Combu Island – Ilha do Combu in Portuguese – rises like a wall of living green from Brazil’s Guamá River. It is a testament to centuries of shared existence between the forest and its riverside communities. Here, cupuaçu, taperebá, pupunha, araçá and cacao are more than fruits; they are threads in the fabric of local culture, livelihoods and identity.

On Sunday, a foot patrol of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) was targeted by an Israeli army Merkava tank from a position established by Israel in Lebanese territory.

Ukraine is facing what has been described as an “unprecedented housing crisis” three and a half years after the full-scale invasion of the Eastern European country by Russia.

BELÉM, Brazil, November 15 (IPS) - In the scorching heat and humidity, Canru Pataxo marched with his one-year-old son firmly held in his arms.

A large-scale campaign under the slogan “We Will Rebuild Gaza” was launched on Saturday in Gaza City, with the participation of local organisations and United Nations agencies, in an effort to begin cleaning operations and removing debris left by the war.

In Belém, Brazil, as the world turns its eyes to the Amazon where COP30 has been underway for the past week, one question looms large: can climate finance move from pledge to lifeline?

In Somalia, where six out of ten births take place without a doctor, childbirth is often a matter of survival.

BELÉM, Brazil, November 14 (IPS) - Farmer and climate activist from Nigeria, Melody Areola, is beating the heat in Belém and voicing farmers’ rights in climate discussions. As the UN Climate Conference, COP30, in Brazil approaches the end of its first week, activists like Melody are making their voices louder.

BELÉM, Brazil, November 14 (IPS) - An open letter by more than 1,000 organizations from 106 countries, including trade unions, Indigenous leaders, feminist and youth movements, Afro-descendants, peasant groups, environmental advocates, disability networks and community organizations, to all States Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change is calling for a people-centered Just Transition.

BELÉM, Brazil, November 14 (IPS) - A young woman at COP30 speaks about retracing her father’s footsteps. At only 16, her father and her grandfather were among the first families displaced by an unfolding climatic crisis of erratic weather and worsening climate conditions that goes on to date from their ancestral village in Sundarbans. Nearly 60 years later, she is on a mission to reclaim her ancestral lands.