Kenia Hernández: Indigenous Rights Defender Imprisoned for Her Activism

Kenia Hernández is an Indigenous Mexican lawyer and human rights defender dedicated to advancing women’s rights and social justice.

World Lost More Than 7 Million Hectares of Forest in 2025

The world lost more than 7 million hectares of forest to deforestation in 2025, a modest improvement on recent years but still far from what is needed to meet global forest protection targets by 2030, according to a new assessment of international conservation efforts.

What Faith Can Teach Agriculture

Years ago, standing in a small farmer's field in Haiti, I began to suspect that we had agriculture backward. The development world saw a man in need of rescue. I saw a farmer who might help rescue the rest of us.

BRAZIL: ‘Resistance Is Intergenerational, and Art Is How Energy Gets Renewed’

 
CIVICUS discusses the role of art in climate and rights struggles in the Brazilian Amazon with Tom Wheeler, executive director and co-founder of Treesistance. Treesistance is a platform operated by the Netherlands-based Sinchi Foundation that partners with Indigenous communities across four Brazilian states on cultural preservation and forest protection.

Forty Years of the ‘Right to Development’: When Growth Excludes, Is It Still Development?

World leaders have warned that the most vulnerable people have been left behind as the right to development has promised more than it has delivered, with development seemingly the preserve of the superrich and powerful.

Outpacing Foreign Aid, Migrant Remittances Are a Lifeline Ensuring Families Are Fed and Healthy, Says IFAD

Migrants now send home more money than foreign aid, and this is pulling rural families out of poverty, according to the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD).

Killing of Environmental Defenders Reflects Power Struggle Over World’s Resources

At least 124 land and environmental defenders were killed around the world in 2025 while protecting forests, rivers, farmland and Indigenous territories, according to a new report by Global Witness that warns violence against activists remains widespread even as recorded killings have declined from previous years.

UN and Partners Work to Stabilize Health and WASH Systems in Venezuela Following Deadly Earthquakes

Two months after devastating twin earthquakes struck northern and central Venezuela on June 24, the humanitarian community has been on the frontlines, delivering lifesaving aid and focusing efforts on sustainable paths for rehabilitation.

What 1.5°C Overshoot Means for Small Islands

The world is now expected to breach the 1.5 degrees Celsius warming limit that small island states have spent years defending as a threshold for survival.

Colombia Declares State of Emergency Following Deadly Earthquake

Over the past week, the humanitarian crisis in Colombia has deteriorated significantly following the Mw 7.4–7.5 earthquake that struck the Chocó department on August 10. With the Colombian government declaring a State of Emergency across 15 departments, the nation continues to struggle with massive civilian casualties, immense damage to critical infrastructure, and the disruption of basic services. The national government and the humanitarian community continue to coordinate lifesaving responses and monitor conditions as they evolve.

ECUADOR: ‘Criminalisation Serves as a Deterrent, Seeking to Discipline Others’

 
CIVICUS discusses the rapid erosion of civic space in Ecuador with Gabriela Panchana, an activist, communicator and founder of the En Voz Alta and Rumbo Plural digital platforms.

How Mexico’s Search Collectives Claimed a Place at the World Cup

Weeks have gone by since the World Cup ended. Its aftermath has sparked a broader conversation about who football’s biggest tournament belongs to and how it should look in 2030. One postscript to that conversation comes from Mexico.

Remembering Fidel Castro, a Hero of the World’s Oppressed People

The 13th of August marked the 100th birthday of Cuba’s revolutionary leader Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz - in short Fidel Castro. Amidst an intensified US siege and the threat of invasion, Cubans commemorated their dear leader’s centenary birth anniversary with events that included an International Book Fair, art exhibitions, concerts and gatherings of delegates from left-wing organisations across the continent.

Nicaragua: End of the Electoral Illusion

On 19 July, the 47th anniversary of the Sandinista revolution that first brought him to power, Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega declared that his country would hold ‘no more elections’ so that the opposition could never again try to ‘seize power’. Just like that, he scrapped a presidential vote that had previously been pushed back to 2027, abandoning even the fiction of democratic legitimacy. The move changes little in practice, since no free vote had been possible for years. But it’s still revealing: a government that controls the army, the courts, the electoral machinery and the police, and will still not risk even a stage-managed ballot, is one that has lost confidence in its people.

Accepting What It Cannot Control, CARICOM Focuses on What It Can

From wars that drive up fuel prices to supply chain disruptions, inflation and increasingly frequent climate disasters, Caribbean leaders say many of the forces shaping the region's future lie beyond their control.

Guatemala: A Narrow Opening in a Captured Justice System

José Rubén Zamora, founder of elPeriódico, Guatemala’s now-defunct leading investigative newspaper, spent 1,295 days in detention before a court granted him house arrest on 12 February. He endured long stretches of solitary confinement in a military jail, held in near-constant darkness and subjected to treatment that six UN experts warned could amount to torture. His offence was simply doing his job. For decades, he exposed the corrupt dealings of Guatemala’s economic and political elites. Prosecutors are still trying to send him back to prison.

Hunger in Latin America Keeps Falling – Now Healthy Diets Must Become Affordable

Hunger is falling across most of Latin America and the Caribbean. The region’s next challenge is harder: ensuring that everyone can afford a healthy diet, not merely enough calories to survive.

Don’t Cry for Milei, Argentina

Sunday’s World Cup final focused world attention on the stench of corruption, past and current, surrounding some of its main protagonists, including Argentina, and the presidents of FIFA, Argentina and the main host nation.

As Gold Prices Soar, Communities Pay the Price in Poisoned Rivers, Vanishing Forests and Organized Crime

The sweltering heat inside a London conference hall did not deter Indigenous leader Jackeline Mendoza Díaz from condemning the sheer destruction of the Peruvian Amazon. Her voice occasionally trembled with emotion but delivered a strong message — painting a picture far removed from the glittering gold bars traded in the world’s financial capitals.

MEXICO: ‘Our Call for Justice for Our Missing Loved Ones Must Reach the World Just as World Cup Goals Do’

 
CIVICUS speaks about efforts to use the 2026 FIFA World Cup to highlight Mexico’s enforced disappearance crisis with Ana Enamorado, a Honduran national who continues to search for her missing son in Mexico, and founder of the Regional Network of Migrant Families.