UN decries ‘paltry outcomes’ and ‘deadly complacency’ at COP30

November 24, 2025

UN slams 'meagre results' and 'fatal inaction' at COP30 — A deal struck at the COP30 summit in Belém in Brazil at the weekend failed to include commitments to rein in greenhouse gases

Belém, Broken Promises, and the Quiet Roar of a Warming World

Belém felt like a crossroads last week: the humid Amazon air pressed against the glass of conference halls while outside, the river breathed slow and brown, carrying the stories of fishing families and rubber tappers who know the forest’s moods better than any negotiator. Inside, the world’s diplomats and activists tried to stitch together a response to a crisis that refuses to knit itself back together.

But when the lights went down on COP30, the verdict was unmistakable to many: small steps, big rhetoric, and what one global rights leader called “meagre results.” Volker Türk, the UN human rights chief, spoke plainly at a business and human rights forum in Geneva: “I often wonder how future generations will judge our leaders’ actions—and their fatal inaction—on the climate crisis. Could the inadequate response of today be considered ecocide or even a crime against humanity?”

The words landed like stones in a still pond. They reflected a broader frustration at the summit in Belém, where negotiators approved a package that nudges money toward vulnerable nations but conspicuously skirted the subject many expected to be front and center: fossil fuels.

The good news—and what it leaves behind

There were tangible gains. Heads of state and negotiators agreed to scale up finance for poorer nations wrestling with droughts, floods and coastlines swallowed by rising seas. The summit launched a voluntary initiative intended to accelerate action so countries meet their existing emissions pledges, and it called for richer nations to at least triple the money they provide for adaptation by 2035.

“Money matters,” said María Silva, a climate policy advisor from Mozambique who attended the talks. “Our coastal communities need seawalls, farmers need heat-tolerant seeds, and our cities need cooling plans. If finance only trickles, the places that already suffer the most will continue to pay with lives and livelihoods.”

Yet even the victories felt partial. Delegates from several countries objected to the summit closing without stronger, concrete plans to rein in greenhouse gas emissions or to explicitly name the prime culprit: fossil fuels.

Missing words, loud implications

When negotiators neatly avoided the phrase “phase out” of fossil fuels in formal text, many in the climate community saw a symptom of a deeper political calculus. The deal’s silence on oil, gas and coal did not come from ignorance. It came from politics: alliances of producing countries, economic dependence, and the messy reality of transitioning energy systems that currently depend on hydrocarbons.

Mary Robinson, former president of Ireland and chair of The Elders, struck a nuanced tone on RTÉ’s Morning Ireland. “We didn’t get what we would have liked,” she said, “which was a formal mention of phasing out fossil fuel. But there is an informal process that is robust—more than 80 countries behind it. Momentum is real.”

Robinson’s optimism hinged on an economic pivot she has watched for years: renewable energy is falling in cost and rising in reliability. “Clean energy is getting cheaper and more dependable every year,” she said. “Even oil producers can see the future market—Saudi Arabia could move into clean energy tomorrow and make millions. The hard part is moving from billions to millions right now.”

From coral to canopy: the science keeps knocking

Scientists at COP30 warned—again—about planetary thresholds. Coral reefs, already bleached and brittle in many parts of the world, could face irreversible losses if global warming continues on its current trajectory. The Amazon, too, increasingly reads as a region on edge, with drought and fire stress threatening what we’ve long called the planet’s lungs.

“We’re not negotiating abstract numbers,” said Dr. Kamal Bhattacharya, an ecologist who has worked in the Amazon for two decades. “We are bargaining with systems that sustain millions—freshwater cycles, fisheries, seasonal rains that farmers depend on. When you cross ‘tipping points,’ the changes become self-reinforcing and, often, rapid.”

These scientific warnings are not new. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has repeatedly signaled the narrow margins left to keep warming below 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels—a threshold that, if breached, brings more extreme heatwaves, sea-level rise and biodiversity loss.

Money, trust, and a long shadow of debt

Finance was the story’s more pragmatic strand. Developing countries have made clear they need immediate, predictable funds for adaptation—the concrete work of protecting people from harm already in motion. At COP30, the push to triple adaptation finance by 2035 speaks to an acknowledgement that adaptation has been chronically underfunded. Rich nations promised $100 billion annually to developing countries more than a decade ago. The delivery has been slow, and many say it fell short or was poorly targeted.

“We are asking for justice, not charity,” said Aline Teixeira, a community leader from Pará state, where Belém sits at the mouth of the Amazon. “Our mothers and fathers read the weather differently; they are already losing crops, fish, homes. We need predictable funds, not promises that evaporate at the airport lounge.”

There was also a nod toward making trade policies and climate action speak to each other—an admission that rising barriers and tariffs can block the spread of clean technologies. Aligning trade and climate policy is political heavy lifting, but it could make renewable transition cheaper and faster if done right.

Local color: Belém’s pulse amid global debate

Outside the conference center, Belém’s markets perfumed the air—rumbling with a cacophony of acai vendors, fishmongers and artisans. Children ran past stalls selling carved wood and river fish skewers. Indigenous leaders held quieter conversations about tradition, knowledge and survival. The contrast was stark: local rhythms of life that lean on the forest and river, and international negotiations that often forget those granular human realities.

“You can’t separate the climate from culture here,” said Joaquim, a fisherman whose family has navigated the estuary for generations. “When the river changes, our songs change. We are not statistics.”

What now? A question for the reader—and a call for wider imagination

COP30 left us with a mixed ledger: modest financial progress, a failure to target the core mechanics of the crisis, and a clear signal that the politics of fossil fuels remain the Gordian knot of climate diplomacy. Volker Türk’s haunting question—could inaction amount to a crime against humanity?—is not meant to criminalize politicians overnight. It is meant to pry open our moral imagination.

How will history judge this moment? Will our grandchildren inherit a planet shored up by courageous transitions and equitable finance, or will they inherit a ledger of compromises and missed deadlines? The answer depends on choices that will be made in boardrooms, ministries, and town halls across continents.

So I’ll ask you—what do you think matters most right now: accelerating finance for adaptation, a fast and fair phase-out of fossil fuels, or technological fixes like carbon capture and storage? Your answer will likely reveal how you weigh immediate human suffering against long-term planetary stability.

Belém was not an ending. It was a mirror. It showed us that momentum exists, but also how fragile it is. The forest, river and people around that city keep living in the consequences of decisions made in far-off capitals. That closeness—between the global and the local—is where accountability must begin.

Massive Russian strike kills four amid ongoing peace negotiations

hanad

November 24, 2025

Four killed in 'massive' Russian strike amid peace talks — A man embraces his children in front of an emergency vehicle at the site of a Russian drone strike in Kharkiv

Smoke over Kharkiv: A City Still Counting the Cost as Diplomats Race for Peace

Late into a cold evening, the sirens wailed, then the city held its breath. Kharkiv — Ukraine’s industrious, auburn-roofed northeastern hub — woke to the smell of smoke and the soft thud of emergency crews pulling people from the wreckage of apartments that had been ordinary minutes earlier.

“At first we thought it was thunder,” a neighbour told me, voice breaking as she cupped a steaming paper cup of tea. “Then we saw the flames. Two families from my stairwell are gone.”

The official tally, relayed by the city’s mayor, is stark: four dead, 17 wounded. Local officials described the strike as “massive,” saying residential blocks and essential infrastructure were hit and that several fires burned through the night. Emergency services reported three residential buildings and an infrastructure facility ablaze. For those on the ground, the numbers are not statistics but the faces of friends and the hollowed shells of homes.

Negotiations in Geneva — A Promise and a Question Mark

As the smoke still rose over Kharkiv, diplomats in Geneva were poring over a different kind of rubble: a draft peace framework that both the United States and Ukraine say they have refined after intense talks. The two delegations released a joint statement announcing a “refined peace framework,” though the contours remain, by design or necessity, opaque.

“We have moved forward together in a serious way,” an American official who participated in the talks told reporters. “The new draft aims to protect Ukraine’s core interests while opening a path to de-escalation.” Kyiv, for its part, has acknowledged the work but has not issued its own public endorsement of the specific text.

So where does this leave the millions living under the shadow of missiles and drones? It leaves them asking the oldest, hardest questions: Can diplomacy keep up with the guns? Can a piece of paper protect a city from a strike that came in the middle of night?

What’s on the table — and what isn’t

The headlines referenced an earlier 28-point proposal that sent shockwaves across capitals and Kyiv alike. That initial document, widely criticized as too accommodating to Russia’s demands, reportedly asked Ukraine to cede territory, accept limits on its armed forces, and abandon aspirations to join NATO — terms many Ukrainians viewed as tantamount to surrender after years of bloodshed.

Officials say the draft now under discussion is “refined,” with adjustments intended to better reflect Ukrainian security needs. European partners, who were not part of the original drafting according to several sources, rushed to offer their own counterproposal — one that reportedly includes stronger security guarantees and softer language on territorial concessions.

“Any agreement that does not guarantee the safety of civilians and the sovereignty of Ukraine is fundamentally unacceptable,” said a Kyiv-based security analyst. “Talks cannot paper over the reality on the ground: cities are still being attacked.”

Frontlines and Home Lives

The rocket that hit Kharkiv is one instance in a pattern: long-range drone and missile attacks continue to pummel power plants, gas pipelines, and water systems. The consequences are immediate and mundane — no hot water, no heating at night, the refrigerator humming quietly as food starts to spoil — but they compound into a civic crisis.

Local hospitals, already strained, have been forced to ration electricity and work by diesel generators. “Patients are sleeping in shifts by emergency lights. We do what we can,” said a hospital nurse. “People call us from other towns asking when the lights will come back. We don’t know.”

Ukrainian authorities have warned that millions have intermittently lost water, gas, or electricity in recent weeks — a cascading reminder that modern war is as much about cutting the lifelines of cities as it is about seizing terrain. Where governments and diplomats see leverage, civilians see daily survival.

Politics, Pressure, and the Weight of Deadlines

Diplomatic activity has accelerated under intense international pressure. A series of meetings — some reportedly involving high-profile private actors and controversial figures — has prompted both sharp criticism and frantic behind-the-scenes bargaining. U.S. representatives say they want to hammer out a deal quickly; Kyiv has been urged publicly and privately to act within tight timeframes.

“Deadlines can force progress, but they can also force concessions people aren’t ready to make,” a European diplomat in Geneva observed. “What we need is a durable settlement, not a hurry that unravels the moment one side feels betrayed.”

Domestically, President Volodymyr Zelensky faces mounting pressures: the grinding toll of war, a fragile economy stretched thin, and the corrosive re-emergence of corruption scandals that have eroded public trust. These internal strains make any negotiation infinitely more complicated; leaders must balance geopolitical give-and-take with the democratic imperative to remain accountable to a populace that has sacrificed much.

Sanctions, oil, and the economics of conflict

Complicating the calculus are international efforts to squeeze the financial arteries of the conflict. The U.S. has recently tightened sanctions on aspects of Russia’s oil sector — a patchwork of measures aimed at constraining revenue streams that fund military campaigns. Meanwhile, Ukraine’s own attacks on energy infrastructure across occupied regions have reduced incomes for industries once generating steady cash.

“Sanctions bite, but they don’t end wars overnight,” a London-based energy economist said. “What they do is reshape bargaining power. Whether that becomes a lever toward peace or simply forces a reorientation of tactics is still uncertain.”

Voices from the Ground

Back in Kharkiv, people speak not about balance sheets and red lines but about bread and schoolbooks. “My child asks if the city will always be like this,” said a teacher standing outside a shuttered school, her scarf wrapped tight against the cold. “I say no, I tell her I believe it will be better. But belief feels fragile.”

A volunteer firefighter, soot-streaked and exhausted, offered a blunt diagnosis: “We patch what we can. We save who we can. But unless the world gives us more than words, we will always be a step behind the next strike.”

What should we ask of diplomacy?

As readers, what should we demand? Transparency from negotiators? Stronger, enforceable security guarantees for Ukraine? A clear-eyed strategy for rebuilding once the guns fall silent? These are not rhetorical flourishes — they are practical necessities. Any plan that aims to stop the fighting must include robust mechanisms to protect civilians, rebuild shattered infrastructure, and provide independent verification of compliance.

And while diplomats tinker with drafts in Geneva, ordinary people will keep living — and dying — under a calculus they did not choose. That moral dissonance should trouble us all.

Where we go from here

There are no easy endings. The refined framework in Geneva may guide a path toward ceasefire and talks, or it may harden into another document that fails to stop the rockets. What matters, beyond the language of any draft, is whether it changes the day-to-day reality of places like Kharkiv.

“If we are negotiating peace, we must be negotiating for the lives of people still in their apartments,” said a humanitarian worker arriving with blankets. “Peace that starts when the last siren is silent is too late.”

As the sun finally cut through the smoke the next morning, neighbors were already cleaning glass from windows and sharing what food they had. Diplomats in Geneva will return to their maps and talking points. But the survivors in Kharkiv — and cities like it across the region — will measure success not by signatures on paper, but by whether, at dawn tomorrow, they can turn on a light and feel safe enough to sleep.

Global reactions to COP30 range from sharp criticism to cautious support

hanad

November 24, 2025

Reaction to COP30 ranges from disappointment to support — COP30 President André Corrêa do Lago (centre) gestures next to his advisers after the plenary session was interrupted

Heat, Hope and Hard Bargains: Inside COP30’s Quiet Storm in Belém

Belém is a city of green humidity and river-borne commerce. The air here hums with mosquitoes and the sweet, tart tang of açaí sold in wooden bowls at dawn. It is also, for a fortnight each year, a place where the future of the planet is negotiated—part cathedral of science, part marketplace of power.

At COP30, those two currents ran into one another with familiar friction: heartfelt alarm from countries on the frontline of climate breakdown; cautious celebration from those who saw a fragile lifeline preserved; and sharp anger from campaigners and delegates who had hoped the summit would mark a decisive turn away from fossil fuels.

The Missing Line: Fossil Fuel Phase-Out and a Fractured Consensus

If there was one moment of collective gasp in the plenary, it came when the final text emerged without a clear, time-bound commitment to phase out fossil fuels—the single largest driver of greenhouse gas emissions. For many delegates, that omission was less a compromise than a betrayal.

“Denying the best available science requires us not only to put the climate regime at risk, but also our own existence,” a Colombian delegate shouted when the watered-down language was read, echoing what many saw as a moral imperative. “Which message are we sending the world, Mr President?”

The reason is painfully simple: the atmosphere is already warmer by roughly 1.1–1.2°C compared with pre-industrial levels, and scientists warn that to keep warming below the Paris Agreement’s 1.5°C threshold requires rapid, deep cuts in fossil fuel use. Yet the summit process—reliant on unanimity—allowed oil-producing blocs, including a number of Arab states, Russia and India, to resist explicit phase-out language.

The result left some negotiators stunned. “We came here to map an exit ramp for coal, oil and gas,” said a small island-state negotiator, voice low but furious. “Instead we were given a maze.”

Why It Matters

Global CO2 emissions from fossil fuels are in the tens of billions of tonnes annually, and atmospheric concentrations remain stubbornly high. That is why activists and many governments demanded a clear roadmap: not just rhetoric, but dates, finance and justice mechanisms to ensure that the transition does not leave workers or communities behind.

Between Disappointment and Relief: Divergent Reactions

Not everyone left the conference centre disillusioned. Some framed the outcome as a pragmatic preservation of the Paris Agreement at a time of geopolitical turbulence.

“I would have preferred a more ambitious agreement,” said UK Secretary of State Ed Miliband in the press hall, “but in a moment when global politics is fractured, the recommitment of 190-plus countries to Paris and to the 1.5°C goal is significant.”

The European Union, for its part, welcomed language on boosting adaptation funding—pledging a step-change for the countries most exposed to climate impacts. “We should support it because it at least goes in the right direction,” an EU commissioner told journalists, adding that richer nations must stand “shoulder to shoulder” with the poorest.

Money Talks—but Not Enough

Money was the other battleground. Delegates in Belém celebrated a pledge to triple adaptation finance for vulnerable countries, but charities and policy experts were blunt: the numbers fall far short of need.

“This was supposed to be an adaptation COP,” said a climate justice adviser from a major aid organisation at the riverside café where negotiators nursed bitter coffee. “What we were left with were vague commitments—some hope, but not the figures that will keep communities alive through floods, droughts and shifting seasons.”

Estimates vary, but analysts have warned that adaptation costs for low- and middle-income countries could rise into the hundreds of billions of dollars annually by 2030. Even with the pledged increases, advocates say current flows are only scratching the surface.

Adaptation needs: potentially $140–300 billion a year by 2030 (various UN-linked estimates)
Climate finance shortfalls: developed countries have repeatedly missed the $100 billion annual goal pledged in 2009
On the table in Belém: a pledge to significantly increase adaptation funding—welcome but numerically vague

The Human Side: Voices from the Ground

Outside the negotiation rooms, the city’s market was a reminder of what’s at stake. A fishmonger who has worked the waters of the Pará for four decades spoke of shifts he’s seen in the river’s rhythm. “The seasons change like a confused clock,” he said, shrugging as he gutted a pirarucu. “The rain comes late and the fish hide. We have to learn new rhythms.” His comment landed with the quiet weight of experience—local knowledge that rarely fits into diplomatic language.

An Indigenous leader from the Amazon—whose community has seen fires creep closer in recent years—pressed for stronger protections. “Our rivers are our lifeblood,” she said, fingers stained with the dye used in ritual crafts. “When the forest dies, so do our songs.”

A Win for People: The Just Transition Mechanism

One bright note in the document was a new commitment to a ‘Just Transition’ mechanism—an attempt to ensure that climate action protects jobs and communities during the shift away from fossil fuels.

NGOs hailed this as a people-powered victory. “This mechanism could be transformational,” said Karol Balfe, an NGO leader, describing it as “a blueprint for making climate action socially fair.” Human rights groups stressed that the framework must respect Indigenous rights and protect workers.

Ann Harrison, a climate justice advisor at a leading human rights NGO, framed the move as a rebuke to fossil fuel lobbyists. “This was people power winning in the negotiating halls,” she said. “Now the hard work begins: turning commitments into enforceable protections on the ground.”

Innovations Beyond the Plenary: The Bio Economy Challenge

Not all meaningful progress was contained in the final text. Brazil launched a ‘Bio Economy Challenge’—an effort to scale up industries based on renewable biomass, regenerative agriculture and waste reduction. Among local entrepreneurs, there was excitement.

“This is about value from what we already have,” said a smallholder who produces manioc and artisanal oils. “If we can market our crops as part of a sustainable, circular economy, it changes everything for families here.”

Experts say the bioeconomy can bolster resilience: regenerative farming, reduced reliance on pesticides, and diversification can help communities withstand floods and droughts. But scaling requires investment, technical support and markets—exactly the gaps that COP finance discussions tried, and largely struggled, to fill.

So What Now? Questions for a World at the Crossroads

As the tents come down in Belém and the river settles back into its old routes, a few questions linger: Can a fragile global consensus be turned into urgent, financed action? Will promises about justice and adaptation be matched by money and timelines? And how long will policymakers allow fossil fuel interests to shape agreements when the data on warming is already ominous?

These are not just negotiation tactics. They are choices about the lives of fishermen, Indigenous guardians of forests, factory workers facing the end of coal jobs—and the children who will inherit a climate made by today’s decisions.

What kind of world do you want to help build? Will you demand governments move beyond platitudes to hard timelines and real dollars? The answer will shape the next decade of climate politics.

Looking Ahead

Belém was a crucible: messy, emotional and ultimately inconclusive in some of its most urgent demands. It produced tools and commitments that matter—the just transition mechanism, pledges to scale adaptation, and new economic experiments like the Bio Economy Challenge. Yet for many, the absence of a clear fossil fuel phase-out remains an open wound.

The road from promises to planetary protection is long and uneven. COP30 did not supply a map; it offered footprints. The rest of the world must decide whether those footprints will become a trail toward a livable future—or a series of halting steps that leave the hardest-hit behind.

Belém’s rivers will keep flowing. The question is whether the decisions made there will help the world flow toward resilience—or deeper crisis.

Bolsonaro says paranoia drove him to tamper with medical monitor

hanad

November 24, 2025

Bolsonaro says paranoia made him tamper with monitor — Former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro leaving hospital in September after a series of medical examinations

A Late-Night Soldering, a Scorched Ankle Bracelet, and a Nation Watching

It was the kind of small domestic drama that somehow became a national thunderclap. In the quiet of his Brasília residence, a former president — once the country’s most polarizing political figure — said he picked up a soldering iron and, convinced by a drug-fueled hallucination, tried to remove what he believed was a hidden wire inside his court-ordered ankle monitor.

That explanation, delivered to a judge during a brisk custody hearing, has rippled through Brazilian politics, sparking fierce debate: Was this a genuine medical episode, an act of desperation, or another dramatic act in the long, ugly theatre of Brazil’s post-2022 polarization?

The sequence of events

Lawyers, federal police reports and court documents reconstruct the scene: an alert came to officials that the ankle monitor — the electronic bracelet tracking the former president under judicial restrictions — had been tampered with. Police found the device with obvious burn marks and other damage. In his legal response, the man said he had experienced “paranoia” brought on by a cocktail of medicines prescribed by different doctors and that he “came to his senses” before any escape attempt.

During a roughly 30-minute custody hearing, he denied any intent to flee. He insisted he was alone when the incident occurred — his daughter, his brother and an adviser were asleep — and told the judge he had been suffering a hallucination that made him think the monitor contained a wire that needed to be removed.

Justice Alexandre de Moraes, who ordered the arrest, was unmoved. The judge accepted the police account that the ankle monitor had been significantly damaged and ruled that custody should be maintained. The former president was taken into a small holding cell at a federal police station: a single bed, a television, air conditioning and a bathroom. He was visited by his wife, a doctor and one of his attorneys.

What’s at stake: the legal tapestry behind the arrest

The man at the center of this story is no ordinary defendant. He was sentenced last September to 27 years and three months in prison for his role in a coup plot following the 2022 election that handed power to Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. He has already spent more than 100 days under house arrest in Brasília in a related matter. These are not minor charges; they go to the heart of how a democracy deals with a leader accused of trying to overturn electoral outcomes.

“This is not about political rivalry,” an independent legal analyst in Brasília told me. “It’s about whether the rule of law applies equally to everyone. The court has to weigh flight risk, risk of reoffending, and interference with the investigation.”

Outside the gates: faithful, furious, and a nation divided

Outside the federal police station, flags and banners formed a patchwork of yellow and green under the late-afternoon sky. Supporters made impassioned — sometimes florid — proclamations of political persecution. “They’re not arresting a criminal; they’re silencing a movement,” said Renato Costa, who drove from a nearby town with a cooler of beer and a Bolsonaro flag draped over his shoulders. “We’re here for him, because we believe in the future he promised.”

Others used the moment to rail at the judge they see as their nemesis. “Justice de Moraes is a political actor in a robe,” exclaimed Elaine Maria, a woman in her sixties who had tears in her eyes as she shouted toward the courthouse. “They will not break us with cages and bracelets.”

And yet, across town, small groups of Lula supporters and advocates for judicial independence gathered in quieter, more tentative conversations about constitutional stability. “It’s a painful chapter for Brazil,” said Ana Ribeiro, a human-rights lawyer. “But the court’s role is to protect the system, not to be swayed by mob scenes on either side.”

Small details, big symbols

There were intimate human touches that made the story feel close and real: a former first lady’s visit to the detained man, a doctor checking his vitals, a soldering iron cooling in an otherwise ordinary home. A son had organized a vigil, stating it would be roughly 700 meters away — a distance the former president argued posed no threat to his custody — yet still the authorities acted preemptively.

Numbers can feel abstract until they’re anchored in a single image. To borrow one: 700 meters — about 2,300 feet — isn’t far in the scale of a city; it’s the length of seven football fields. Close enough for supporters to sing and shout, but not close enough, officials say, to tamper with the legal restrictions that the court imposed.

Why this matters beyond Brasília

Brazil’s drama is not solely a domestic melodrama. It’s emblematic of a global pattern: charismatic populists confronting institutions, polarized publics who see courts as either saviors or persecutors, and the fragile choreography of democracy under strain. From Europe to Latin America to parts of Asia, countries wrestling with similar tensions are asking the same questions: When a leader’s rhetoric becomes incendiary or when alleged actions challenge electoral integrity, who holds the line?

“There’s a lesson here for any democracy,” said Dr. Miriam Tavarez, a political scientist focused on Latin American institutions. “Courts must be impartial, but impartiality is a lonely position in the face of mass mobilization. The judiciary’s legitimacy depends on transparency and consistent application of the law.”

What to watch next

Ongoing legal procedures: Will additional charges or hearings follow? How will the appeals process play out?
Public demonstrations: Will the vigils that now draw hundreds swell into thousands? And how will the security forces respond?
Political recalibration: How will political parties and legislators position themselves in the months leading up to regional and national contests?

There are no easy answers. But we can keep watching — and asking hard questions. When political passions burn as hot as Brazil’s do, every gesture, every legal decision, every late-night action becomes magnified.

Endings and beginnings

For now, the image that lingers is small and domestic: a damaged bracelet with burn marks, a man explaining a medicine-induced hallucination, a soldering iron set aside. But those small images sit atop tectonic forces — a justice system testing its mettle, a divided electorate, and a modern democracy learning to balance accountability with legal rights.

Are we witnessing the end of a political era for one man, or the opening of a more fraught chapter in Brazil’s modern history? The answer will not come from a single court hearing or a single night. It will arrive in appeals and ballots, in vigils and statutes, and in the slow work of institutions proving whether they can withstand the heat.

As Brazilians gather in city squares, and as the world watches with a mix of curiosity and concern, one question keeps returning: how will a nation rebuild trust when its leaders are accused of trying to dismantle the very system that sustains it?

US welcomes pivotal breakthrough in Ukraine talks, calls it major progress

hanad

November 24, 2025

US hails 'significant step forward' in Ukraine talks — A rescue worker walks past a wreckage of cars near damaged residential buildings after Russian drone attack on Ukraine

In Geneva’s Quiet Rooms, a Dangerous Hope

There were no banners, no marching crowds — just a small, stubborn cluster of negotiators and the soft hum of air conditioning in a Geneva hotel conference room where, for a few hours, diplomats tried to stitch together the ragged edges of a war.

On one side of the table sat a U.S. delegation led by Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Across from them were Ukrainian envoys, and sprinkled in the room were European officials whose capitals watch the outcome with a mix of dread and cautious expectation. The joint statement released after the session called the outcome “an updated and refined peace framework.” But as anyone who has watched wars drag on knows, “refined” can mean many things — truce, surrender, or the first step toward something that might actually hold.

Negotiations, Nuance, and a Deadline

President Donald Trump had set a public marker: Ukraine had until 27 November to accept his 28-point proposal to end nearly four years of fighting that began with Russia’s large-scale invasion in February 2022. The plan — as described by Western and Ukrainian critics — contained hardline demands from Moscow: territorial concessions, reductions in Ukraine’s armed forces, and a pledge that Kyiv would never join NATO.

“We need an agreement that stops the bullets and keeps a sovereign Ukraine intact,” said a Geneva diplomat who asked not to be named. “That’s the thin line everyone keeps circling.”

According to the joint U.S.-Ukraine readout, negotiators emerged with a fresh draft. “The talks were constructive, focused, and respectful,” the statement read, stressing that any eventual deal must “fully uphold Ukraine’s sovereignty and deliver a sustainable and just peace.” Both sides promised to continue work “in the coming days.”

What Was on the Table

The details of the draft remain closely held, but reporting and statements from Kyiv indicate the original 28-point plan included, broadly:

Territorial compromises in areas currently contested after Russia’s advances.
Restrictions or reductions on the size and posture of Ukraine’s armed forces.
A formal guarantee that Ukraine would not move toward NATO membership.

For Kyiv, these points cut at the core of national identity and security: land, the ability to defend itself, and the right to choose alliances. For Moscow and some Western intermediaries, they are the price for an immediate cessation of hostilities. But can such prices be reconciled without the sort of trust that wars tend to erode?

Meanwhile, the War Didn’t Pause

While diplomats in Switzerland worked on a paper, the violence that the paper seeks to stop continued to claim lives. A drone strike on Kharkiv — Ukraine’s second city and a place that still bears the marks of repeated bombardment — killed four people and wounded 17, local officials said.

“Seventeen people are known to have been wounded. Four people have died,” Kharkiv mayor Igor Terekhov wrote on Telegram, the terse cadence of those numbers undercutting the room where the negotiations unfolded. Oleg Synegubov, head of the Kharkiv regional military administration, described the strike as “massive,” noting fires and the destruction of buildings across two city districts.

“Three residential buildings and an infrastructure facility were on fire,” emergency services added, their statement a cold litany familiar to many Ukrainians: the names of neighborhoods, the hours of response, the tally of the hurt.

Outside the immediate pain, there’s a broader picture. Millions of Ukrainians remain displaced, homes and hospitals have been damaged repeatedly, and the economic costs ripple across Europe and the globe. To many residents, the city’s café terraces, pre-war rhythms, and Saturday markets are memories patched over by sirens and the careful choreography of checkpoints and blackouts.

Voices from the Ground

In Kyiv, a schoolteacher named Olena — who asked journalists not to use her full name — said she had mixed feelings about the talks. “If a paper can stop my students from practicing fire drills, I will read it,” she said. “But I will not sign away the right for them to grow up in their own country.”

A humanitarian aid worker who has rotated through frontline shelters described the mood in stark human terms. “People want safety more than they want headlines. A deal that keeps children safe and hospitals open — that’s what will make lives better tomorrow,” she said. “But if that deal leaves their relatives in areas under foreign control, it will be a hollow peace.”

From Geneva, a European official argued that compromises are inevitable in diplomacy. “No side gets everything it wants,” he said. “The goal is to limit the pain and create mechanisms to resolve disputes. What we need to decide is whether those mechanisms will be enforceable.”

The Broader Stakes: Why This Matters to the World

This is not just a regional negotiation. The outcome — however small the ink on the paper — will send signals about norms, the viability of deterrence, and the limits of international institutions. If a deal is achieved that is seen as imposing terms favoring a stronger state’s demands over the territorial integrity of a sovereign one, what precedent does that set for contested borders elsewhere?

Consider the global trends at play: rising authoritarianism in parts of the world, the proliferation of drone warfare into urban centers, and the economic interdependence that turns local conflicts into global markets’ concerns. A settlement that stabilizes Ukraine could relieve energy anxieties and ease inflationary pressures in some countries. A settlement perceived as unjust could embolden other powers to test borders, with human costs echoing far beyond Eastern Europe.

Questions to Ask

What would a “sustainable and just peace” look like after almost four years of catastrophe? Can guarantees be enforced in a way that assures civilians they can return home? And who will hold the guarantor to their promise?

These are not rhetorical. They are the kind of practical questions negotiating teams in Geneva must answer before signatures are put to paper, and they are the questions that will be asked in living rooms in Kharkiv, in factories in Lviv, and in parliaments from Oslo to Canberra.

What Comes Next

Both Washington and Kyiv say they will keep working on joint proposals. The immediate task is narrow and procedural — finalize language, reconcile different red lines, and define verification. The larger task is social and moral: rebuild trust so that an agreement does not become a temporary ceasefire before the next round of violence.

“This is the moment to be brave enough to make a peace that holds and wise enough not to pretend there are shortcuts,” said a senior negotiator involved in the talks. “There are no perfect answers, only less damaging ones.”

As the papers shuffle in Geneva and ambulances still thread through Kharkiv streets, the rest of the world watches. Will diplomacy catch up with the devastation on the ground, or will promises evaporate while people pick through the rubble? The answers will shape lives for years to come — and they begin in the small conference rooms where diplomats speak quietly and hope loudly.

How Kim Kardashian Turned Fame Into a Billion-Dollar Beauty and Fashion Empire

hanad

November 23, 2025

NASA rejects Kim Kardashian's claim over Moon landing — NASA's acting administrator has hit back at Kim Kardashian's claims that the Moon landing did not happen

A shapewear start-up that detonated into an empire

On a humid Los Angeles afternoon, a squadron of shoppers lined up outside a Skims pop-up, eyes bright, phones ready, coffee in one hand and a mesh drawstring bag in the other. Inside, soft nudes and sculpting panels shimmered under flattering light. It felt less like a retail opening and more like a minor religious revival for contour and comfort.

That scene tells you everything about how a brand born from one woman’s obsession with fit—Kim Kardashian’s answer to Spanx—has become a magnet for money, headlines, and fierce debate. Skims’ journey has been equal parts fashion disruption, celebrity spectacle, and sharp business maneuvering. It also carries the scars of missteps: the original name “Kimono” sparked an international outcry for cultural appropriation that reverberated from Tokyo to tiny boutique streets in Kyoto. “We felt that name erased the complexity of our culture,” says Dr. Aiko Tanaka, a cultural studies lecturer in Tokyo. “It wasn’t just a word—it was a living tradition.”

The numbers people talk about

Skims tells investors it’s on track for more than $1 billion in revenue in a year—a milestone that, if true, would put the company squarely in the big-league category. In a 2023–2024 capital raise the brand secured roughly $225 million, which, when extrapolated by the buyers’ math, pegged Skims at a $5 billion valuation.

That jump from a roughly $4 billion valuation two years prior has a clear accelerant: a partnership with Nike and the joint NikeSkims line, an entry into activewear and performance shaping that gave the brand instant credibility beyond the bedroom and the club.

Yet valuations are part art, part wager. “We’re not buying a set of factories or long-term contracts—often we’re buying narrative,” says Sarah Mendelson, a retail analyst based in New York. “When a brand has explosive social reach and a platform like Kim’s, investors pay for the story they hope will turn into durable cash flows.”

What’s certain, and what’s not

Claimed revenue: Skims projects >$1 billion (company-provided figure).
Recent capital raise: about $225 million.
Implied valuation after the raise: roughly $5 billion.
Partnerships: notable tie-up with Nike to launch NikeSkims.
Profitability: undisclosed—private-company accounting makes it hard to assess margins or EBITDA.

That last point is key. A billion in revenue sounds dazzling—as does a $5 billion price tag—until you learn how much of that top-line is eaten by returns, advertising, influencers, and the cost of making growth happen. If it costs $1.1 billion to sell $1 billion of goods, valuation glitters but shareholders get dust.

Celebrity as currency

Kim’s personal brand is the secret sauce most investors are betting on. Forbes valued her net worth around $1.9 billion in the mid‑2020s, and the Skims valuation is a big reason. But her wealth is a mosaic of ventures—TV, social media (she has roughly 350 million followers on Instagram, tens of millions across Twitter and TikTok), endorsements, and a track record of launching and reshaping businesses.

“There’s a halo effect with her name,” says Javier Morales, a Miami-based small-business owner whose artisanal hair clips sold out after Kardashian posted a picture wearing one. “We had three times our usual site traffic in 48 hours. It was insane. We couldn’t keep up.”

The economics of celebrity endorsements are blunt: a single Instagram post from a global star can command figures in the high hundreds of thousands—sometimes more—depending on reach and exclusivity. That fleeting spotlight, however, can produce real spikes in demand. For smaller makers, a Kardashian nod is a windfall; for investors, it’s a double-edged sword, because a brand entwined with a single person risks losing value if that person steps back.

A long history of launches, reinventions, and risky bets

Kim has not been a one-trick pony. Long before Skims, there was Dash, Khroma Beauty, KKW Beauty (which at one point drew a $200 million investment from Coty for a 20% stake), and SKKN by Kim. Some lines soared, others fizzled. Coty famously took a hit when ownership moved and product lines restructured—reminding the market that celebrity holdfasts are part glamour, part corporate chessboard.

Even among the siblings, fortunes vary. Kylie Jenner’s cosmetics empire was once used to crown her a billionaire in headlines, but later scrutiny by public filings revealed discrepancies that adjusted the story—and valuations—downward. The episode is a cautionary tale: media narratives can inflate a company’s worth, especially when privately held numbers are opaque.

Why this matters beyond celebrity gossip

Skims is a prism reflecting bigger trends. It shows how culture, commerce, and attention capitalism collide: social platforms compress influence into measurable scores, brands become platforms for identity, and investors chase growth narratives in a low-yield world. It also raises questions about taste, responsibility, and local culture—how global celebrity brands borrow, sometimes clumsily, from other traditions.

“We are living through a time when cultural objects are turned into commodities more rapidly than before,” notes Dr. Tanaka. “That’s not inherently bad, but it demands reflection and respect.”

So—hype or hard business?

Ask a venture capitalist and they’ll talk about multiples, TAM (total addressable market), and customer LTVs. Ask a shopper and they’ll show you a stacking pile of Skims boxes. Ask a critic and they’ll point to the original naming controversy and to the broader social costs of hypervisibility.

Perhaps the best answer sits between those poles: Skims is both a business with serious traction and a brand whose valuation includes a hefty slice of future hope. That hope is buying inventory, opening stores, striking collaborations, and leaning into a cultural moment where comfort, body confidence, and celebrity intersect.

Will the story age into a case study of brilliant brand building—or into a warning about valuations divorced from margin realities? Only time, and transparent ledgers, will tell.

Either way, as you scroll past another influencer unboxing a nude thong on your phone, consider this: how much of what we buy is about the product itself, and how much is about the person who made it famous? Who owns the stories we tell with the clothes we wear?

Cutting greenhouse gas emissions is now more urgent than ever

hanad

November 23, 2025

Reducing greenhouse gas emissions couldn't be more urgent — The Jänschwalde power station, a mainly coal fired thermal power plant in the southeast of Germany

Belém, Heat and Hope: Walking the Tightrope of an “Implementation COP”

The air in Belém was thick with river humidity and expectation. Vendors at the Ver‑o‑Peso market folded baskets of açaí and tucupi into neatly stacked pyramids, while colleagues from delegations huddled under the shade of mangrove trees, comparing notes and scanning the list of plenary sessions. For months this city in the Brazilian Amazon had been promised a rare thing: a COP that would move from speech to action.

“We called this the implementation COP,” a Brazilian minister told me on the steps of the conference centre, palms wiping the sweat from his brow. “The work was supposed to be not about signing more declarations, but doing what was already promised.”

That promise—the one stitched into the Paris Agreement in 2015 and amended, reiterated and amplified across subsequent COPs—has a simple, brutal logic: cut greenhouse gas emissions fast enough to keep global heating near 1.5°C. In diplomatic language it’s mitigation; in everyday language it’s the future of harvests, coasts, and lives. Yet delivering mitigation is a system-shaking task. It demands reworking power grids, overhauling transport, retraining workforces and reengineering economies. And anywhere people depend on oil money, the disruption is not theoretical—it’s existential.

From Dubai to Belém: Momentum Meets Resistance

At COP28, delegates celebrated a landmark commitment to start a managed transition away from fossil fuels. The headline felt like progress. But momentum is not destiny. In the months that followed, signals of backsliding appeared: a lukewarm follow‑up at the next COP, and then in Belém the blow-by-blow of negotiations revealed an old faultline—wealthier nations pressuring for a roadmap to phase out fossil fuels while oil-producing blocs and some large economies insisted their energy futures could not be boxed in.

“You can’t ask us to shut the tap when you haven’t minded the well,” a delegate from an oil-producing country told me bluntly. “We have citizens to feed, schools to run, hospitals to maintain.”

On the other side of the table, representatives of small island states and least-developed countries spoke with a different kind of urgency. “We are losing homes, not promises,” said a health worker from a coastal community in West Africa. “People tell our children climate change is future tense. We know it’s now.”

Money on the Table—or Not

For many of the delegates from the Global South the conversation in Belém never started with fossil fuels. It began with finance: the bruising politics of who pays for the damage and how quickly the money moves. The Loss and Damage Fund, long campaigned for and finally agreed, remains a promise until cheques exchange hands. Wealthier nations have historically failed to meet the €100 billion climate finance pledge they agreed to years ago; even where climate finance flows, it is often in loans, not grants, deepening indebtedness.

“We were not willing to agree to tighter fossil fuel commitments while our hospitals, mangroves, and farmers go under,” said an African climate negotiator. “If implementation means painful change, then the Global North has to make sure countries can adapt and recover.”

Numbers offer a clearer view. Delegates in Belém kept returning to a few stark figures: the long-promised €100 billion annual goal is often cited as a benchmark, yet independent analyses show that delivered amounts have been inconsistent and frequently fall short of needs; adaptation finance needs alone are projected to run into the tens to hundreds of billions per year, depending on the methodology. And a line in the sand—$300 million a year—became shorthand in many closed-door sessions for an initial, symbolic flow to the Loss and Damage Fund, insufficient in scale but politically significant if unlocked.

Local Voices, Global Stakes

Walk outside the negotiating halls and the story is tactile. A fisherwoman on the shores of Belém laughed nervously when I asked whether she trusted the diplomats. “They speak like priests,” she said. “They pronounce, but they don’t plant.” Behind her the Guamá River carried dead leaves and plastic bottles; a child waded ankle-deep, tossing a stick. The contrast was immediate—the ornate conference rooms where delegations argued about carbon accounting versus the riverbanks where people already live at climate’s blunt edge.

Indigenous leaders, too, were present in force—many of them skeptical but not silent. “Our forests are not a bargaining chip,” said an elder speaking through an interpreter. “You cannot speak of implementation while corporations plan to dig through our bones.” These words landed in a cavernous plenary hall and circulated in newsfeeds—an echo of climate justice claims that have driven activism for decades.

How the Negotiations Unraveled—and Why It Matters

Negotiations in Belém ended not with a triumphant roadmap but with an uneasy compromise that left many delegates frustrated. An attempt led by a coalition of countries—85 strong, including multiple EU members and Latin American states—to enshrine a “roadmap for transitioning away from fossil fuels” into the final text was blocked. The opposing camp, anchored by oil-producing states and backed by geopolitical heavyweights, insisted on language that allowed for energy sovereignty and gradual transitions.

“We are not anti-transition,” a spokesperson for one of the oil-producing delegations said. “We are pro-fairness. Tell me when the finance is here and I’ll agree to the timetable.”

So what did Belém deliver? For some it reiterated the perennial truth of climate diplomacy: that moral clarity collides with political power. For others it underscored a more practical reality—without guarantees of finance for adaptation and loss and damage, calls for rapid fossil fuel phaseouts are unlikely to be accepted by those who fear economic collapse.

What If the World Keeps Waiting?

Ask yourself this: if promises to the most vulnerable remain unpaid while the extraction of fossil fuels continues, who bears the burden? The question is not rhetorical. It goes to the heart of global inequality and the architecture of international cooperation.

Every COP becomes a mirror of broader geopolitics—trade shifts, energy security anxieties, electoral cycles and the rise of populism. Belém reflected those currents. It also showed that implementation cannot be a mantra uttered by ministers in air‑conditioned rooms; it must be built into budgets, industrial strategies and the livelihoods of the people living at the margins.

€100 billion: the long-promised annual climate finance target from wealthy nations (delivery to date remains contested and incomplete).
Loss and Damage Fund: established in recent years but starved of the consistent, scaled finance that would make it functional for many recipients.
Adaptation finance needs: estimated in the tens to hundreds of billions annually by various analyses—far exceeding current flows.

Belém’s Aftertaste: A Call for a New Politics of Trust

On my last night in Belém I walked the waterfront as markets closed and kids chased each other under sodium lamps. A youth activist I’d met at a march watched a barge drift by and said, “We will keep pushing—but we need partners, not lectures. Show us the money, show us the jobs, and then tell us how to change.”

Climate policy without finance is like a recipe without ingredients. Belém asked the world to choose: continue with polite, incremental steps that placate interests and paper over inequity, or create a new politics—one that pairs the hard talk on fossil fuels with an equally hard commitment to pay, to retrain, and to protect the people already losing everything.

Will the next COP square that circle? Will wealthy nations finally convert pledges into bank transfers that communities can use immediately? Or will the tug of geopolitics keep the world on the same slow, dangerous path?

Belém didn’t resolve these questions. But it made them unavoidably clear. The city’s humid air, ever-present river and voices from the street made the stakes impossible to ignore: implementation is not just a policy objective. It’s a test of whether the global community can match its words with the concrete support that will decide which futures are possible—and for whom.

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