Category World News

Nine in 10 families in Afghanistan are going hungry or falling into debt as millions of new returnees stretch resources in poverty-stricken areas in the east and north, according to the United Nations.

Taliban-controlled Afghanistan – battered by aid cuts, sanctions and repeated natural disasters, including a deadly quake in August – is struggling to absorb 4.5 million people who have returned since 2023. About 1.5 million were forced back this year from Pakistan and Iran, which have intensified efforts to expel Afghan refugees.

A UN Development Programme (UNDP) report released on Wednesday said returning Afghans are reeling from severe economic insecurity. More than half of returnee households are skipping medical care to afford food while more than 90 percent have taken on debt, the report said.

Their debts range from $373 to $900 when the average monthly income is $100, according to the report, whose findings were based on a survey of more than 48,000 households.

Returnees are also struggling to find decent housing as rent prices have tripled. More than half report lacking sufficient space or bedding while 18 percent report having been displaced for a second time in the past year. In western Afghanistan’s Injil and Guzara districts, “most returnees live in tents or degraded structures,” the report says.

The UNDP called for urgent support to strengthen Afghans’ livelihoods and services in high-return areas.

“Area-based recovery works,” said Stephen Rodriques, UNDP resident representative in Afghanistan. “By linking income opportunities, basic services, housing and social cohesion, it is possible to ease pressure on high-return districts and reduce the risk of secondary displacement.”

Aid for Afghanistan, still reeling from the impact of decades of war before the United States’s withdrawal in 2021, has plummeted, and donor countries have failed to meet the $3.1bn the UN sought for Afghanistan this year.

The Taliban government appealed for international humanitarian assistance after this year’s earthquake, and it has formally protested against Pakistan’s mass expulsion of Afghan nationals, saying it is “deeply concerned” about their treatment.

‘Women prevented from working’

The UNDP also warned that limited economic opportunities for women in Afghanistan are exacerbating the plight of returnees, who more frequently rely on female breadwinners.

Participation by women in Afghanistan’s labour force has fallen to 6 percent, one of the lowest globally, and restrictions on their movement have made it nearly impossible for women who head households to access jobs, education or healthcare, the agency said.

“Afghanistan’s returnee and host communities are under immense strain,” said Kanni Wignaraja, UN assistant secretary-general and UNDP regional director for Asia and the Pacific. “In some provinces, one in four households depend on women as the main breadwinner, so when women are prevented from working, families, communities, the country lose out.”

Australia and Indonesia say they are close to signing a “watershed” defence treaty that will upgrade their already close collaboration on security issues.

The treaty was approved on Wednesday by Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto, who is on his first state visit to Australia, although the pact between the two countries will not be officially signed until January.

The new agreement will commit Australia and Indonesia to “consult at a leader and ministerial level, on a regular basis on matters of security”, the Australian leader said.

It will also facilitate “mutually beneficial security activities, and if either or both countries’ security is threatened, to consult and consider what measures may be taken, either individually or jointly, to deal with those threats”, Albanese said.

“This treaty is a recognition from both our nations that the best way to secure that peace and stability is by acting together,” he added.

“It signals a new era in the Australia-Indonesia relationship,” he said, adding that the deal committed the two countries to “close cooperation in the defence and security field”.

“Good neighbours will help each other in times of difficulties,” Prabowo said.

Within Indonesian culture, he added, “we have a saying when we face an emergency, it is our neighbour that will help us”.

Today I stood alongside my friend Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto on HMAS Canberra to make an historic announcement.
 
The governments of Australia and Indonesia have just substantively concluded negotiations on a new bilateral treaty on our common security.
 
Australia’s… pic.twitter.com/bI53L7tj8q

While the text of the treaty has not been made public, Albanese said it is based on a 1995 security agreement signed by then-Australian Prime Minister Paul Keating and Indonesian President Soeharto, according to Australian broadcaster ABC News.

The deal was later cancelled by Indonesia due to Australia’s involvement in a United Nations peacekeeping mission to East Timor, a former Portuguese colony that was brutally occupied by Indonesia from 1975 to 1999.

Since East Timor’s independence in 2002, relations between Jakarta and Canberra have improved, and they have since signed two important security pacts – the 2006 Lombok Treaty and the 2024 Defence Cooperation Agreement.

The new treaty builds on the previous agreements and commits both Australia and Indonesia to consult each other if one or both countries believe their security is threatened, and then to consider whether to deal with such threats either “individually or jointly”, Albanese said.

Australia and Indonesia share longstanding concerns about the rise of China, which is seen as an important economic partner but also a strategic competitor with a growing military presence in the South China Sea and Pacific region.

Keating, the former Australian premier, told ABC News last year that even 30 years ago, he and Soeharto were worried about Beijing.

“Soeharto and my arrangement was essentially a mutual defence pact. Because a major threat to one, given the geography, necessarily impacted on the other, or had consequences for the other or would have had consequences,” he said, according to ABC News.

Indigenous protesters have stormed the COP30 climate summit venue in Belem, Brazil, confronting security guards as they demanded climate action and forest protection.

The demonstrators on Tuesday tried to enter the United Nations compound, where thousands of international delegates are gathered for the climate talks. Many carried flags advocating for land rights and signs declaring, “Our land is not for sale.”

“We can’t eat money,” said Nato, an Indigenous leader from the Tupinamba community, who uses only one name. “We want our lands free from agribusiness, oil exploration, illegal miners and illegal loggers.”

Security personnel pushed back against the protesters, barricading the entrance with tables. A witness reported that one guard was evacuated in a wheelchair while holding his stomach. A security guard told the Reuters news agency he suffered a cut above his eye after being struck with a heavy drumstick thrown from the crowd. Security confiscated several weighty sticks from the protesters.

The confrontation ended when the protesters, who had been part of a larger march of hundreds of people to the venue, dispersed. Security later allowed delegates to exit after initially instructing them to remain inside until the area was secured.

“Earlier this evening, a group of protesters breached security barriers at the main entrance to the COP, causing minor injuries to two security staff and minor damage to the venue,” a spokesperson said in a statement.

“Brazilian and United Nations security personnel took protective actions to secure the venue, following all established security protocols. Brazilian and United Nations authorities are investigating the incident. The venue is fully secured, and COP negotiations continue.”

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has emphasised the importance of Indigenous communities in this year’s COP30 negotiations. Earlier in the week, dozens of Indigenous leaders arrived by boat to participate in the talks and advocate for greater involvement in forest management.

All 20 personnel on board a Turkish C-130 military cargo aircraft that crashed in Georgia close to its border with Azerbaijan have died, the Turkish Defence Ministry says, as investigators examine the cause of the accident at the site.

The confirmation came on Wednesday, a day after the plane crashed after taking off from the nearby Azerbaijani city of Ganja.

“Our heroic comrades-in-arms were martyred,” Defence Minister Yasar Guler said in a social media post, alongside photographs of the deceased in their uniforms.

The ministry said a Turkish accident investigation, in coordination with Georgian authorities, had begun inspecting the wreckage at the crash site in the Sighnaghi municipality of Georgia’s Kakheti district early on Wednesday.

The crash, Turkiye’s deadliest military incident since 2020, happened about 5km (3.1 miles) from the Georgian-Azerbaijani border.

Georgia’s Sakaeronavigatsia air traffic control service said the aircraft disappeared from radar soon after entering the country’s airspace, sending no distress signal prior to the crash.

Dramatic footage published by Azerbaijani media appeared to show the aircraft sending a large cloud of black smoke into the sky after it crashed, leaving debris strewn across the ground.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said he was “deeply saddened” by the crash and expressed his condolences.

The leaders of Azerbaijan and Georgia, along with NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, have conveyed condolences over the crash, while the United States ambassador to Turkiye, Tom Barrack, also expressed his country’s solidarity.

US firm Lockheed Martin, the maker of the C-130 Hercules, also expressed its condolences and said it was committed to assisting the investigation in any way required.

Russia has lost a legal fight to build a new embassy near Australia’s Parliament, with the nation’s top court ruling that Canberra acted within its rights when it cancelled the lease for the site.

Australia passed legislation in 2023 to mothball the planned embassy building after officials deemed it to pose a security threat.

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said at the time that his government decided to revoke the lease over the “specific risk” posed by the site, located about 300 metres (328 yards) from Parliament House.

Russia, which blasted the move as “Russophobic hysteria”, challenged the legislation in court, arguing that it was not valid under the Australian Constitution.

In a unanimous ruling on Wednesday, the High Court found that the cancellation of the lease had been a “valid exercise of the legislative power” to enact laws related to the acquisition of property.

The court, however, ruled that Russia was entitled to compensation after paying about $2m for the 99-year lease in 2008.

The court previously rejected a bid by Moscow to stop its officials from being evicted from the site.

The government introduced new legislation on June 15 to end the Russian lease on the land after intelligence agencies warned the location was a risk to national security.

In a statement following the ruling, Attorney General Michelle Rowland said, “Australia will always stand up for our values and we will stand up for our national security.”

“The government welcomes the High Court’s decision that found the government acted lawfully in terminating the Russian Embassy’s lease,” Rowland said in a statement.

“The government will closely consider the next steps in light of the court’s decision,” Rowland added.

The Russian embassy said it was studying the judgement, according to Australian broadcaster ABC News.

“The Russian side will carefully study the text of the court ruling, which sets a precedent,” an embassy official said in a statement.

Relations between Australia and Russia have been strained for years.

Ties deteriorated sharply after the downing of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17, which multiple investigations blamed on pro-Russian separatists, and then plunged further after Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

#BREAKING: The lease was granted to Russia in 2008, but was withdrawn when parliament passed a new law citing ASIO advice that the planned embassy could pose a threat to national security. https://t.co/6S6bf37h7m