A new era of global instability has intensified challenges in addressing the world drug problem, empowering organized crime groups and pushing drug use to historically high levels, says the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) in the World Drug Report 2025 launched on 26 June 2025.
UNODC/Ioulia Kondratovitch | There have been a record number of seizures of amphetamine-type stimulants.
“This edition of the World Drug Report shows that organized drug trafficking groups continue to adapt, exploit global crises, and target vulnerable populations,” said Ghada Waly, Executive Director of UNODC.
Jewish protest against Benjamin Netanyahu, 24 Mar 2023 Alisdare Hickson from Woolwich, United Kingdom, CC BY-SA 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
16 Jun 2025 – For nearly 30 years, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has driven the Middle East into war and destruction. The man is a powder keg of violence.
(UN News)* —Most families in the Gaza Strip are surviving on one meal a day and one-third go entire days without eating as a result of Israel’s continued bombardment of the enclave, according to the UN World Food Programme (WFP) and partners.
The meals which families are able to obtain are nutritiously poor — thin broths, lentils or rice, one piece of bread or sometimes just a combination of herbs and olive oil known as duqqa.
(UN News)* — Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, are increasingly being subjected to forced displacement and land seizures, the UN human rights office, OHCHR, reported on Thursday .
Israeli authorities have stepped up measures to transfer large numbers of people from long-standing Palestinian towns and communities, according to OHCHR’s office in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.
—Helping those with less isn’t charity – it’s a shared investment in a better future. Yet global development financing is under strain. An upcoming UN conference in Sevilla, Spain, aims to change that by mobilizing large-scale investment for a more just and sustainable world.
(UN News)* — According to the United Nations, the world needs an extra $4 trillion every year to tackle some of the world’s biggest challenges – ending poverty and hunger, fighting climate change, and reducing inequality.
ATLANTA, USA, Jun 26 2025 ( IPS)* –Chest thumping “Mission Accomplished” claims by President Trump that he ordered the world’s biggest conventional bombs to be dropped on a sleeping nation of 90 million people, were premature.
IAEA chief Rafael Grossi said Iran has reported no increase inradiation levels outside Fordow, Isfahan and Natanz nuclear sites. After surprise US bombing raids on Iranian uranium enrichment facilities over the weekend, the head of the UN-backed nuclear watchdog on Monday appealed for immediate access to the targeted sites to assess the damage that is likely “very significant”. 23 June 2025. Credit: Dean Calma/IAEA
To top it off he bragged that Iran’s nuclear capacity was devastated and that the whole nation fired “not a single shot” back.
— A growing network of online communities known collectively as the “manosphere” is emerging as a serious threat to gender equality, as toxic digital spaces increasingly influence real-world attitudes, behaviours, and policies, the UN agency dedicated to ending gender discrimination has warned.
Unsplash/Anthony Tran | Women and girls are feeling less comfortable to be exposed to the risks and threats when they engage in digital platforms, according to UN Women.
With more than 5.5 billion people connected online – nearly all of them active on social media – digital platforms have become central to how people interact, UN Women highlights.
However, they are also being weaponised to spread misogyny and hate.
A funding shortfall is forcing WFP and other humanitarian organizations to cut assistance to some of the world’s most vulnerable people
Omnia and her young son received a hot WFP meal upon arrival at Uganda’s Kiryandongo refugee settlement, but WFP’s assistance countrywide is shrinking for lack of funds. Photo: WFP/Daisy Masembe
— Omnia and her young son stand in line under a harsh midday sun, waiting for the daily hot lunch for newcomers at Uganda’s Kiryandongo refugee settlement.
Exhaustion is etched on the face of this single mother, who arrived by bus from war-torn Sudan the day before.
More than 12 million people – one quarter of the population – are at risk of gender-based violence
GEDAREF STATE, SUDAN, 19 June 2025 (UN Population Fund)* – “Every woman and girl here is at risk, no matter her age or background. No one is safe,” said Khadija*, a midwife at a maternity clinic in Sudan’s eastern Gedaref State.
HUMAN WRONGS WATCH 