June 2026

Intriguing and somewhat puzzling — one of the many reactions to an international magazine which is now 45 years old and has proudly managed to keep going without any commercial taint in the form of advertisements. Share International magazine has always been maverick — an outlier. Affiliated with no religion, and yet its pages herald a spiritual hierarchy of Masters at the head of which group is Maitreya, the World Teacher. And yet totally interconnected, in its contents and the thrust of its principles, with economics, ecological concerns, politics on an international and local level.

It has perplexed by its commitment to the need to change the world or rather, the world’s priorities. Almost in the same breath we tackle hunger, poverty, injustice, education, the importance of the family, all aimed at fostering sharing on a global scale through systemic change. The range it covers is unusual to say the least and that is without mentioning its focus on the evolution of consciousness and insistence on the fact that we, humanity, are essentially spiritual beings in incarnation to work out our own and the collective destiny of this planet — seen to be a living sentient being as part of a larger encompassing sphere of sentient existence.

Share International is a ‘handbook of hope’: a brilliant future awaits us if we accept our responsibility and make the urgently needed changes. See this month’s articles which highlight such efforts — take for example the life and achievements of Sir David Attenborough; read, for instance, of the absolute dedication to law, to truth, to facts, to personal and moral integrity in the life, triumphs and fight of Francesca Albanese to establish the rights of the Palestinian people and to carry out her task within the purlieu of international law and human rights treaties.

Share International is a ‘manual for Maitreya’ — his teachings, his amazing being, wisdom, service and heart. See the ‘back page’ for Benjamin Creme’s moving description of Maitreya’s joy and sorrow.

Share International is a ‘user guide for evolution’, filled as it is with wisdom gathered from the writings of Benjamin Creme’s Master, from Maitreya, from Benjamin Creme — explaining how people can take a hand in their own evolution and grow in their understanding of life — the inner and the outer, and the process of bringing the two together.

This publication is a ‘flight instructors’ manual’ which, if followed assiduously, could take the reader to new heights — far beyond the bounds of our planet; it is a scientific handbook taking us deep into sub-atomic life — as can be vicariously lived in the review of Vera Stanley Alder’s book “From the mundane to the magnificent”.

Share International is a ‘manifesto of guidelines for the future’ — guidelines which come to the modern reader from ancient indigenous lore. See the review of an interview with Roberto Mendoza and brilliant economist of the future, Clara Mattei.

This magazine is ‘a service instruction guide’ — explaining the nature and importance of service to create change and evolution in society and in one’s self. See Benjamin Creme’s very full answer about the role and importance of service.

Readers should be prepared to be puzzled, intrigued, challenged.

Israel is a democracy. This makes it difficult to hide the inconvenient fact that it is profoundly racist. The recent episode involving Minister Ben-Gvir taunting an international group of pro-Palestine activists is in many ways revealing. The activists were on board unarmed boats bringing food and medical supplies to the long-besieged Palestinians of Gaza when Israeli forces seized the boats in international waters, then arraigned and detained the activists in Israel. The high official waved an Israeli flag before the crouched detainees, whose hands were tied behind their backs, and sarcastically proclaimed, “Welcome to Israel. We are the owners here.”

In fact, the suffering of the activists pales in comparison with what is being done to the Palestinians. A recent exposé in the New York Times reveals systematic sexual abuse, including the use of specially trained dogs to rape prisoners. This sadistic method surpasses the “achievements” of the otherwise sophisticated Nazi torturers in humiliating their victims.

Minister Ben-Gvir performed in Hebrew and posted his video for all to see. The targeted audience was regular Israelis. The country is gearing up for an election, and the episode was broadcast to gain him votes. The hundreds of clips that Israeli military personnel posted of themselves gloating and chanting as they blow up houses, hospitals, and schools in Gaza clearly suggest that they expected admiration rather than opprobrium from their society.

As usual, Israel and its vassals treated this as a public relations problem. The Israeli ambassador in Washington called it a sledgehammer blow to Israel’s diplomatic efforts to burnish its deteriorating reputation. Prime Minister Netanyahu and Foreign Minister Saar also criticized Ben-Gvir’s performance. Even the US ambassador, Reverend Huckabee — who is often more pro-Israeli than Israel — chimed in. These damage-control measures focus on the episode itself and, predictably, ignore its context and purpose.

A few years ago, Ben-Gvir ran for election under the slogan “Nobody is to the Right of Me,” and he came out triumphant. He is often portrayed in mainstream Western media as a regrettable outlier. But he is anything but. The minister of national security knows his society and embodies its dominant trends. This is why he shows how tough he is not only with the Palestinians but also with their supporters from abroad. Cruelty and vindictiveness are winning cards in Israel.

He never misses an opportunity to display these qualities. Ben-Gvir was one of the sponsors of the recent law authorizing the death sentence by hanging for Palestinians. The law was approved by the Israeli parliament, which, thanks to the proportional voting system, fairly reflects the country’s public opinion. Ben-Gvir celebrated this democratic achievement with champagne brought into the hallowed parliamentary chambers, and — needless to say — the entire scene of jubilation was in full view of the public.

But that was not the end. Soon thereafter, the honorable member of the legislature was celebrating his 50th birthday. His wife offered him a birthday cake decorated with a noose, and this too was broadcast for all to see. There is no record of Frau Himmler offering her husband, the head of the SS, a birthday cake in the shape of a crematorium. In fact, the Nazis tried to hide the genocide they were committing. They were afraid the German citizenry might not approve. Israeli leaders have no such fear.

Finally, a few words about Western reactions. Canada, France, Germany, Italy, and the United States — all complicit in the genocide in Gaza — deplored the Israeli mistreatment of the activists in stronger terms than they ever reacted to Israel’s torture and slaughter of Palestinians. This showed once again the racist hypocrisy of their commitment to human rights. Palestinians, Lebanese, Iranians, and other “less white” peoples do not deserve the same human rights as Europeans and their descendants settled elsewhere, usually by means of perpetrating their own genocide against the local inhabitants.

One can only admire the perspicacity of the Martinique poet Aimé Césaire, who wrote in 1955 in his Discourse on Colonialism: “What he [the white man] does not forgive Hitler is not the crime itself, the crime against man, it is not the humiliation of man in himself, it is the crime against the white man, it is the humiliation of the white man, and for having applied to Europe colonialist procedures hitherto only applied to the Arabs of Algeria, the coolies of India, and the negroes of Africa.”

Anticolonial sentiment briefly prevailed during the few decades of the Cold War. The Soviet Union had long supported anti-colonial struggle, and the West did not want to “lose Africa to the Russians.” The times have changed. Significantly, it was during the twilight of the USSR that the UN General Assembly revoked its 1975 resolution equating Zionism with racism. Later on, a French president called on his compatriots to be proud of the achievements that France brought to its former colonies. And at the recent security conference in Munich, the U.S. Secretary of State Rubio praised the European colonization of America as “a sacred inheritance.” He also called on Europeans to be “unapologetic in our heritage and proud of this common inheritance.”

No wonder that Israel’s settler colonial project continues to enjoy impunity from most Western governments. These democratic regimes continue to sell arms to Israel and allow overflight of American transport planes carrying bombs to kill Palestinians, Lebanese, and Iranians. After all, this state terrorizing everyone around is “the only democracy in the Middle East.” Democracy has never been an obstacle to racist terror.

(Source: pressenza.com. Reproduced with permission from Pressenza and the author.)

A recent episode of the Forum for Real Economic Emancipation’s podcast, titled ‘What the American left got wrong: an Indigenous Elder’s Diagnosis’, features an interview with Indigenous filmmaker, and life-long activist and organizer, Roberto Mendoza, by economist and academic, Clara Mattei. They discuss, among related subjects, the contrast in values between capitalism and Indigenous cultures, such as native American tribes and capitalism. The interview offers important insights into paradigms such as Communalism, which organizes the economy around co-operative labor, shared wealth, and the collective management of local resources.

Mendoza, born in 1943, is a member of the Muscogee tribe, and is described as having been deeply involved with the Indigenous liberation movement, especially in the 1960s and 1970s.

The conversation starts by discussing what Mendoza sees as the primary weaknesses of the radical leftist movements of the 60’s and 70’s, namely what he identifies as patriarchy, which expressed as blatant sexism — but which was considered normal or societally acceptable at the time. Mendoza then explains that an Indigenous thought leader, John Mohawk had first inspired him to think more deeply about Indigenous peoples’ values.

Quoting Martin Luther King Jr’s article about Vietnam: “We as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values”, Mendoza says this call gave him pause: “What are the values? He didn’t have a chance to really make it clear. So I took it on myself to find out what our values were in more detail, and what capitalist values were.” Mendoza then wrote an article outlining these two paradigms and their distinct contrasts, outlined here.

Indigenous values: generosity, sharing, no hoarding.
Capitalist values: greed, hoarding profit.

Indigenous values: co-operation, working together.
Capitalist values: competition, ‘dog eat dog’.

Indigenous values: community; we are all related, including plants and animals.
Capitalist values: individualism, me first, pull yourself up by your bootstraps.

Indigenous values: reciprocity; if you take, you must give back in some form, not just things, but also energy.
Capitalist values: exploitation of people, the earth and living beings; taking more than you need.

Indigenous values: gender equality, women respected and honored, lineage goes through the mother, women can be leaders, respected. The commons belong to everyone; the land, water, soil — none of this can be bought or sold (this is crucial).
Capitalist values: patriarchy, women subordinate to men; religions have male priests, men can control and use women and girls. Private property; owners can mark off, then exploit, extract for private gain.

Mattei emphasizes that in examining these values, it becomes visible how entrained society is to behave with relation to our economic institutions, for example: “…Common land versus private property and thus the idea of extraction of the private property rather than the care of the common land. Indigenous values — Earth-centered spirituality, all living beings are sacred and need to be nurtured and protected. On the other hand, capitalist values — materialism, the earth seen as real estate, humans as commodities, everything can be bought or sold in the Americas.”

She also notes the inherent incompatibility of these two approaches and that Indigenous values prioritize food sovereignty, locally grown organic gardens, small farms, while capitalist values prioritise industrial-sized factory farming, the use of pesticides, herbicides, and antibiotics. “And very important”, she explains, “I think we also have this idea of Indigenous values being based on horizontal direct democracy, governed by consensus, a balance between male and female leaders.” Referring to capitalism, she points out: “On the other hand, we have hierarchy, top-down authoritarian governance, representative democracy — which is, again, a veil to hide the non-democratic functioning of our economy. The state has a monopoly of power with mostly men as leaders.”

Mendoza: “Yeah, I look at it like the foundation of a house. Everything is built on those values — consciously or unconsciously. And the reason that I put them out there for the movement is because I realized that all of us, including myself, were raised under capitalist values. And we unconsciously hold these values, and we start to let go [of them], when we get involved in the movement, of course. But not completely. And sometimes, in the 70s and the 60s, there were still capitalist values constantly affecting the way men would work, especially like the way in [which] they would treat women. And the way they could dislike or hate gay people. So, the source of all of the negative feelings of racism, sexism, and patriarchy is the values of the capitalist system.”

The interview continues and explores alternatives such as Communalism, and Mendoza points to the Zapatistas in Southern Mexico and the Kurds in Rojava (Northern Syria) as modern success stories. Both groups rejected the traditional top-down model of forming a ‘nation state’ in favor of horizontal autonomy, direct democracy, and (particularly in Rojava) militant commitments to women’s liberation.

Mendoza shares that ultimately it’s relationship, not materialism, that Indigenous cultures consider as the source of happiness: “Good relationships, not only with your family, your friends, and with your other fellow native people, but with all people; and I went even further and said, it became clear to me, that we had to have a good relationship with the Earth, and with all living things.

“Our leaders and thinkers had those values, of seeing beyond just their tribe, or their family, and looking at the whole world. He, [Black Elk, 1863-1950, spiritual visionary] puts out the idea that we native people, [are] one part of a circle of people around the world. And we’re all one people that need to get together and help each other and act on these Indigenous values.”

(Sources: YouTube; Forum for Real Economic Emancipation (FREE))

“Change starts where you stand. This means that we are all agents of change. Every one of us,” said award ceremony host, journalist Vanessa Hauc. “Change is born from the choices that we make every single day. It rises from conviction. From the refusal to accept injustice as inevitable, from the voices that will not be silenced. It begins next door, down the street, in our communities. And it grows when ordinary people decide they can no longer stand by. Change is about courage. It’s about standing up when it’s difficult, speaking out when it’s risky, and holding on when the odds are against you.”

Ms Hauc also acknowledged the presence of 350 future leaders at the award ceremony in San Francisco, young people from around the region “who are going to inherit our planet and are forming the next generation of environmental protectors.”

The Goldman Prize, awarded annually to environmental heroes from each of the world’s six inhabited continental regions, honors the achievements and leadership of grassroots environmental activists from around the world, inspiring people across the globe to take action to protect the planet.

In 37 years, the Prize has honored 239 winners — including 112 women — from 98 nations. Many have gone on to positions as government officials, heads of state, NGO leaders, and Nobel Prize laureates. This is the first year that all six Prize winners are women, a testament to the critical role of women in the environmental movement. Each of this year’s award winners — from Nigeria, South Korea, the United States, Colombia, the United Kingdom, and Papua New Guinea — received financial support to continue their environmental work.

Protecting rainforests — and bats — in Nigeria

The 25,000-acre Afi Mountain Wildlife Sanctuary in southeastern Nigeria contains some of West Africa’s last remaining primary rainforests.

A biodiversity hotspot, it is home to numerous endemic and endangered animals including many species of bats. Wildfires have become an increasing threat to both the rainforest and 16 surrounding farming communities.

“The thing about wildfires is they originate on farms and it’s not intentional,” says conservation ecologist Iroro Tanshi. “The way people manage these farms is they use fires to clean the farms every year, but climate change has completely toppled the pattern of rainfall and people can no longer predict when to burn safely.”

With her husband Ben, she co-founded the Small Mammal Conservation Organization to protect habitat for small mammals in West Africa, with bat research and awareness as a primary focus.

“People don’t give bats as much credit as they deserve,” Tanshi says. They’re important because they plant seeds. They pollinate lots of flowers, and so they provide us all these amazing ecosystem services.”

In 2016, Tanshi discovered in the Afy Mountains the presence of short-tailed roundleaf bats, thought to be extinct in the region and highly endangered globally.

But a devastating wildfire swept through the forest just days after the discovery. “That fire that drove us out in 2016 burned through the land until the rains came. So there was nowhere to put out the fire. Fifty percent of the park was impacted.”

The incident was a wakeup call for her team. If they couldn’t reduce wildfires in the region, the short-tailed roundleaf bats and other endangered animals could be lost forever.

So in 2017, Tanshi brought the idea of a Zero Wildfire Campaign to local residents. “We had this community meeting and people just poured in. It felt like we were touching a raw nerve. People wanted to talk about fires, because while we were worried about fires in forests for bats, community people are worried about fires destroying farms.”

With full community support, the Zero Wildfire Campaign worked with village leaders to enhance existing wildfire prevention laws. Tanshi’s team also implemented an education campaign in local communities to raise awareness about wildfires and conservation.

“In our case, because we’re also trying to educate people about bats, it was like a win-win for bats and fire. We then decided that we have to collect weather data, so we could tell when fires were happening.”

Installing weather stations and studying weather patterns, Tanshi’s team was able to accurately predict good days and bad days for necessary burning on farms. But her team needed a way to communicate this to farmers. So they implemented fire warning systems, including signs inspired by fire prevention practices used in the US.

“We collect the data, analyze it, predict the risk, and then we communicate it. But because we wanted to get down to zero wildfires, we set up a system of forest guardians in villages, who can actually respond when one fire goes rogue. We equip them with remote firefighting gear and they are on standby on high-risk days.”

From 2022 to 2025, forest guardians put out 74 fire outbreaks, making Tanshi’s vision of zero wildfires in the Afy Mountains a reality.

Collaboration between her team and local communities has helped safeguard the biodiverse stronghold for short-tailed roundleaf bats and many other endangered species while also protecting farms and creating new jobs for residents.

Said Tanshi, upon receiving the award: “Our planet is on fire and we should all be ignited to action.

“Under the pressure of climate change, devastating wildfires are now the most common cause of deforestation, contributing more to atmospheric carbon than all vehicular emissions combined.

“But the good news is we can stop those fires. I hope … No, I promise, we will stop those fires. Why am I so confident? Because this spotlight from the Goldman Prize will inspire a park ranger in rural Madagascar. A little girl in Congo somewhere will dream of saving her ancestral forest. And a farmer in Brazil will imagine another path to protecting his crops.”

Youth-led group wins landmark environmental lawsuit in South Korea

South Korea is one of the most densely populated countries on the planet.

Despite its relatively small land area, the state is among the world’s largest greenhouse gas emitters with heavy dependence on imported fossil fuels, and historical investment in overseas coal. As global temperatures rise, severe climate events such as heat waves, monsoons, and flooding are already impacting South Korea with increasing frequency.

Borum Kim was a college student when a devastating heat wave hit Seoul in 2018, causing thousands of illnesses and killing dozens of people, including a local woman who was about her mother’s age.

Borum and her peers began organizing climate strikes and school walkouts. In March 2020, Borum and her team organized 19 youth plaintiffs in filing a lawsuit against the government, arguing that its inaction on climate change fundamentally violated the rights of future generations.

Borum and her group, Youth for Climate Action, went on to organize a massive letter-writing campaign, coordinate public actions, and help more than 100 plaintiffs from across civil society file lawsuits building on the original constitutional complaint.

As the lawsuit slowly progressed, Borum’s persistent advocacy helped mobilize thousands of people, growing climate action into a social movement that resonated across South Korea.

In August 2024, the South Korean Constitutional Court unanimously ruled that the government’s climate policies were unconstitutional and violated the rights of its citizens.

The ruling mandated that the South Korean legislature develop emissions reduction targets grounded in a science-based plan to reach net zero by 2050. If implemented, it has the potential to avoid more than 1,500 million tons of carbon emissions — equivalent to the annual emissions of approximately 500 coal-fired power plants — over the next 25 years. And it has inspired similar youth-led climate lawsuits throughout Asia.

Kim said: “I began my journey in climate activism with a simple yet desperate hope: to create real change. Over the past 8 years, I have come to realize that the climate crisis is not just a matter of rising temperatures. In a society where burning fossil fuels and greenhouse gas emissions are still prioritized, disasters are treated as individual tragedies to be endured alone.

“Those without power are not even recognized as having rights, as being entitled to exist safely amid the crisis. Within a structure where risks grow irreversibly, the most vulnerable — and even the ordinary lives of those around me — are being pushed into danger.

“That is why I became so committed to the idea that everyone must have an equal right to safety, even in the face of this immense threat.”

Stopping a huge mining project in Alaska

In southwest Alaska, the Bristol Bay watershed is home to an extraordinary and biodiverse landscape. Its vast network of interconnected waterways supports the largest wild sockeye salmon run on Earth. Salmon are central to the traditional practices of the Yup’ik and other indigenous people who have called this land home for thousands of years.

Acting on behalf of 15 tribal nations, Yup’ik leader Alannah Acaq Hurley led a campaign that stopped the proposed Pebble Mine megaproject in Alaska’s Bristol Bay region. As the executive director for the United Tribes of Bristol Bay (UTBB), Alannah and a broad-based coalition yielded a historic veto of the copper and gold mining project in January 2023 from the US Environmental Protection Agency.

The victory safeguards Bristol Bay and its greater watershed from the construction of what would have been North America’s largest open-pit mine. Hurley and UTBB continue to work to protect the bay from encroaching development.

“At the end of the day, this is a fight for humanity and honestly our ability to continue as humans on this planet,” she said.

Upon receiving the award, Hurley said: “I accept this award on behalf of our tribal leaders, the people of Bristol Bay, many mentors and allies, and my friends and amazing family.

“This award honors all of us. Those who stood against all odds. Those who never wavered in speaking up against greed and destruction.

“It honors those who have shown up year after year writing letters, testifying at hearings, protesting, and raising their kids to value people over profit.

“This award honors our tribal leaders who are here tonight representing so many others back in Bristol Bay.

“… This award honors the courage, the service, and sacrifice for our communities.

“This award honors those in our communities who wake up every day and live our indigenous values, who practice and pass down our sacred ways of life to our people, whose very lives are the examples of the sacred teachings from our ancestors on how to live a good life, caring for all life on earth with respect, gratitude, and balance.

“The world is in dire need of these teachings as we struggle with the devastating symptoms of greed and individualism.

“This award honors our many elders and the leaders who have joined our ancestors amidst this fight. They made sure we know who we are, where we come from, and that we must do whatever we can to protect and pass our ways of life to the future. Their legacy lives on in this critical work and in the young people preparing to take this torch as ancestral stewards and guardians of our homelands.”

Mobilizing against fracking in Colombia

The Magdalena River flows a thousand miles from the Andes to the Caribbean Sea and is one of Colombia’s most biodiverse waterways. It’s also a major economic corridor.

In a region known as the Magdalena Medio, Ecopetrol, Colombia’s largest company, operates a massive oil refinery that stretches for over a mile. Just downstream from Echopetrol is the community of Puerto Wilches.

Yuvelis Morales Blanco grew up in Puerto Wilches, the daughter of a subsistence fisherman. As a young adult, she helped mobilize her community against two key drilling projects, successfully preventing the introduction of commercial fracking into Colombia.

In 2022, with fracking raised as a national issue, Ecopetrol suspended its contracts for the pilot fracking projects. In August 2024 — with the projects still suspended — the Colombian Constitutional Court, in response to a lawsuit by a local organization, confirmed that the projects had violated the right of the Afro-Colombian community of Puerto Wilches to free, prior, and informed consent.

Blanco said: “The youth and children are calling on us to imagine a world without fossil fuels, to imagine it is possible, and make it a reality. Our generation has uniquely lived in the fossil fuel era; however, hello! This is a direct call from the Magdalena Medio: We continue to resist fracking, fishing for our dreams of peace in the rivers of life.”

Shutting down oil drilling in southeastern England

Despite a pressing need for global reductions in carbon emissions, the United Kingdom, one of Europe’s largest oil and gas producers, continues its buildout of fossil fuel infrastructure. While most fuels are extracted from the North Sea, the 500-square-mile Weald region in southeast England contains large oil and gas reserves.

Environmentalist and writer Sarah Finch and the Weald Action Group she co-founded led a tireless campaign against oil drilling in the region for over a decade. They persevered through five years of escalating court battles against one oil development in the county of Surrey until the coalition secured a Supreme Court ruling, in June 2024, that finally forced its shutdown.

The resulting “Finch ruling” states that authorities must consider the downstream impacts that fossil fuels will have on the global climate before granting permission to extract them. This legal precedent has already stopped subsequent fossil fuel extraction projects and other industrial development across the UK and could inform EU policy going forward.

Upon receiving the award, Finch said: “After many years of community mobilizing, popular protests, and a landmark legal victory, we ended up helping to change the future of fossil fuels in the UK.

“… It took a five-year journey through the courts to achieve it. It was a huge step forward, but we still need our government and others around the world to phase down the production of fossil fuels and invest in the clean energy that will bring real prosperity.

“So, everybody here and everybody watching this, don’t stop pushing for this where you live. Write to your local and federal representatives about climate change. Tell them about the impacts that you have experienced. Join forces with other groups working on this. There’s no part of society that will be unaffected by the climate emergency, and we need to make sure it’s at the top of everyone’s agenda.”

Compelling a mining company in Papua New Guinea to clean up the environment

Bougainville is the largest island in Papua New Guinea’s (PNG) Autonomous Region of Bougainville, covering about 3,600 square miles with an estimated population of 350,000. The island contains vast copper and gold reserves, fertile land for cocoa and coconut production, and extensive marine resources.

The Panguna copper and gold mine — located in a mountainous, rural region at the island’s center — was developed by Rio Tinto, the world’s second-largest mining company, and operated through a subsidiary from 1972 to 1989. During its lifespan, it was one of the world’s largest open-pit mines and accounted for 44% of PNG’s export revenue.

Theonila Roka Matbob led a successful campaign that compelled Rio Tinto to sign a landmark memorandum of understanding in November 2024 to address environmental and social devastation caused by its long-dormant Panguna mine.

Despite having abandoned the site 35 years earlier after a social uprising against the mine, the company formally acknowledged the wide range of harms the mine has caused and has begun a collaborative remediation process that aims to address urgent risks and establish a long-term remedy mechanism.

Said Matbob: “We have had a long fight for justice starting from the time of the mine’s operation. It is a fight that I have taken up so that my children can inherit a different world to the one I grew up in.

“… This award gives me hope and a boost to keep going despite all challenges we face. It is a reminder that we are not alone in this struggle. There are people around the world like all of you who will stand with us and support us.”

(Source: goldmanprize.org)

Francesca Albanese is an Italian legal scholar and expert on human rights. Born in 1977 and a mother of two, she holds a law degree with honours from the University of Pisa and a Master of Laws in human rights from SOAS University of London. Since May 2022, she has served as the United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories (OPT) — the first woman to hold this position. She has become known for her outspokenness on the subject of the occupation of Palestine and is seen as someone who dares to speak truth to power.

Subtitled “Stories, Words and Wounds of Palestine”, her book When the World Sleeps, available in both Italian and English, chronicles her experiences living both in and outside Palestine, and includes a history of the ongoing occupation and the suffering of the Palestinian people. Despite fulfilling her UN mandate of objectivity, including the rigorous investigation and research that goes into writing her reports, she has experienced increasing resistance from those who are not happy with her conclusions and views, and continues to receive much attention in the media.

On that note, she begins the book’s preface by saying that she has just been sanctioned by the US Department of the Treasury (July 2025), purportedly due to her working with the also-sanctioned International Criminal Court, but unofficially in retaliation for her reporting on Israel’s violations of Palestinian human rights. This has resulted in the freezing of her US assets and barring US citizens and corporations from engaging with her (including her own daughter), making her the first UN official to be sanctioned in this way.¹

She then goes on to share the story of her upbringing and early career — initially four years with the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, then her move to Palestine to work with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).

As a UN lawyer in occupied Palestine, she witnessed the dissonance between the principles of international law — equality, justice, dignity — and the realities on the ground. Disenchanted with the system, she left the UN to look for other work and conduct independent research. The bombing of Gaza in 2012 and 2014 pulled her back in, and she wrote a book titled Palestinian Refugees in International Law, published by Oxford University Press in 2020.

In 2022, after living two years in Palestine with her husband in her role as an international official, Albanese was chosen for the voluntary position of UN Special Rapporteur, created to document and report on violations committed by Israel as the occupying power in Gaza, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem. She has, as one of more than fifty UN independent experts, endeavoured to be a truthful witness. In the case of Palestine, this has involved highlighting the huge disparity between occupier and occupied, a situation that has been normalised by an international community unwilling to act.

She speaks of the unprecedented horrors occurring in Gaza, and that the Palestinians’ protests against the regime of apartheid, which has oppressed them for generations, continue to remain unheard. She also mentions that many voices support her legal qualification that the State of Israel is committing genocide, illegal occupation and apartheid, but that the repression of her voice, as well as the voices of many others, has grown in unprecedented ways.

It is hard to disagree with her assertion that freedom of expression is fundamental and should be one of the bulwarks of liberal democracies: “What does democracy consist of, if there can be no room for debate?”

Albanese writes very clearly and expressively, based on a depth of knowledge and genuine compassion for those under occupation. The book consists of 10 stories based on pivotal figures she has met and worked with, to help paint a picture of the history, present, and future of Palestine. Their names, as chapter titles, are followed with the themes focused on in each chapter:

What is childhood in Palestine?
What are the consequences of the occupation?
What does it mean to live in Jerusalem?
How do you recognise anti-Semitism?
How do you overthrow apartheid?
How far can the cruelty of genocide go?
How to calculate conditions that lead to the destruction of a people?
Where is home for a refugee?
Why is it so important to preserve the memory of a people?
It takes two to tango (regarding her husband Max)

She hopes that, although these stories show pain and despair, they might also support the notion that peace in Palestine and the entire region is possible, if fashioned on the basis of justice and accountability.

“True peace can only be built on equality and freedom for all, grounded in a vision of universal justice that affords equal rights and responsibilities to all, regardless of their race or nationality.”

There’s a real humanity in the way she shares her story. The grim situation is offset by descriptions of characters she’s met along the way, the beauty of some of the locations she’s visited, and ways in which people — even when their freedoms are being suppressed — will still do what they can to create a sense of community and warmth.

Through her impassioned and commonsense way of writing, the reader gains a balanced perspective on the situation in the OPT, and by her example, Albanese encourages others to speak up when they, too, witness injustice.

“When the world sleeps, it falls on us, we the people, to wake it up — and now more than ever the world needs an awakening.” — Francesca Albanese

¹ As at May 13, a federal judge in Washington DC has temporarily blocked these sanctions, ruling they violate Francesca Albanese’s First Amendment rights.

A report released 14 May showing that Somalia is rapidly descending into famine underscored the harms done by the illegal dismantling of the US Agency for International Development [USAID], a department that President Donald Trump and billionaire Elon Musk targeted as part of a broader assault on the Federal Government.

New data from the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) showed that more than six million people — around a third of Somalia’s population — are facing acute hunger as drought and conflict combine with humanitarian aid cuts to create a devastating humanitarian emergency. Around 1.9 million children in Somalia “are now expected to require treatment for acute malnutrition in 2026”, according to IPC, and regions of the country are at severe risk of famine.

“Humanitarian assistance remains a lifeline but is far from sufficient, reaching only 12% of people in Phase 3 or above,” said IPC, a partnership of aid organizations and United Nations agencies. “A rapid and sustained scale up of multisectoral assistance — particularly in hotspot areas such as Burhakaba — is urgently needed to prevent further deterioration and loss of life.”

Reuters noted that “global cuts to foreign aid, including by the United States, have substantially reduced support to Somalia.” The outlet added that “impacts of the US-Israeli war on Iran are complicating efforts to respond to food shortages caused by multiple failed rain seasons ⁠and ongoing insecurity.”

Mohamed Mohamud Hassan, Save the Children’s Somalia Director, said in a statement 14 May that the country is “in the grip of a deepening humanitarian catastrophe” and the “window to prevent famine… is closing fast”.

“Children are dying from preventable causes — malnutrition, disease, displacement — while funding falls far short of what is urgently needed,” said Hassan. “We call on the international community to act now, scale up lifesaving assistance, and ensure that no child dies because the world looked away.”

The US has historically been the largest contributor of humanitarian aid to Somalia, but the Trump administration’s shuttering of USAID cut off much of the American food and medical aid that was flowing to the East African nation. The Trump administration’s dismantling of USAID has also severely harmed Somalia’s economy.

“Somalia is once again standing at the edge of catastrophe,” Richard Crothers, Somalia Country Director at the International Rescue Committee, said Friday. “This is a crisis of access, affordability, and global political failure. Without urgent action now, Somalia risks becoming one of the clearest examples of what happens when early warnings are ignored and humanitarian systems are allowed to erode.”

Experts say the closure of USAID last year is already responsible for hundreds of thousands of preventable deaths, and researchers have warned that millions more could die by 2030 if the aid is not restored.

In addition to sounding the alarm about Somalia, IPC released reports this week detailing increasingly dire hunger in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Sudan — countries that were also devastated by the gutting of USAID.

“USAID was the leading donor in the country and most aid agencies relied on its funding to help people survive and rebuild their lives,” said Manenji Mangundu, Oxfam International’s DRC Country Director. “Without it, agencies have been forced to make terrible triage decisions including who gets to live and who might needlessly die.”

“The world cannot continue to look the other way — the situation is dire,” Mangundu added.

(Source: Common Dreams)

On 8 May 2026, one of the most admired, trusted and respected people on the planet was acknowledged by The Guardian to be “the greatest ambassador for life on Earth”. A major event was held at the Royal Albert Hall in London with a wide variety of presentations (see link below). Other tributes were offered in newspapers and TV. PBS’s ‘Passport’ members were treated to the amazing story of the making of Attenborough’s first documentary series ‘Life on Earth’. And a unique birthday greeting was sent by King Charles through an unusual series of ‘messengers’.

Thanks to our new internet-based format, we are able to let the story tell itself in the following highlights from a day Sir David never expected:

“The greatest ambassador for life on Earth”: Tributes paid to David Attenborough on his 100th birthday [The Guardian, 8 May]

David Attenborough’s 100 most spectacular screen moments [The Guardian, 8 May]

To honour Sir David’s 100th birthday, His Majesty King Charles is supported by a cast of stars from nature to relay his handwritten message in time for the celebration at the Royal Albert Hall. [The Guardian, 8 May]

The riveting PBS (Public Broadcasting Service) episode where David Attenborough tells the back-story of the wildlife blockbuster, ‘Life on Earth’, that would change his life forever.

An evening to celebrate the 100th birthday of Sir David Attenborough [BBC.com Media Centre]

The permanent decline of fossil fuels

The title from an April report from Ember, an energy think tank, says it all: “Fossil power’s global decline has begun.” This decline includes the 38 member countries of the Organisation for Economic, Co-operation and Development as well as non-OECD countries.

In OECD countries, fossil fuel generation peaked in 2007, and by 2025 it had dropped 19% below its peak. This shift reduced OECD power sector emissions by 28%. Two member states — Iceland and Costa Rica — now operate zero-emission power systems.

Outside of the OECD, 2025 was the first year in this century when fossil fuel generation fell (other than 2020, when COVID skewed the results). This shift was led by China with its rapidly-expanded solar power, and India, which is leapfrogging into clean energy and skipping the coal-heavy history of economies that industrialized earlier.

Sodium: a battery breakthrough

Alternatives for lithium, a key ingredient in batteries, have failed to deliver the necessary energy density to compete in Electric Vehicles (EVs) or energy storage — until now. In April, however, Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. Ltd. (CATL), the world’s dominant EV battery manufacturer, signed a 60 GWh sodium-ion battery deal with HyperStrong, a leading energy storage integrator. It was the largest sodium-ion battery order ever placed.

CATL says it’s solved the key manufacturing challenges, and that the agreement signifies that it now has “large scale delivery capabilities” for sodium-ion technology. It plans to start mass production of EVs using the technology by the end of 2026.

The advantages of sodium over lithium as the charge carrier in batteries is its abundance (1,000 times more abundant than lithium), its low cost, and its ability to operate in a wider range of temperatures (-40⁰C to 70⁰C). Sodium-based batteries also serve as a shield from volatility in lithium prices, which rose in China almost 190% from June 2025 to April 2026.

Sodium-ion cells still don’t have as much energy density as lithium-ion cells so are less attractive for EVs, but they’re a particularly good alternative for applications where cost is more important, as in grid-sale energy storage. Electrek says, “if sodium-ion can deliver 15,000+ cycles at a fraction of lithium’s raw material cost, it could fundamentally reshape the economics of grid-scale storage… arguably the single biggest bottleneck to scaling renewable energy.”

Electricity is cheaper with renewables

Despite the fact that Europe is dealing with an energy crisis due to the current turmoil in the Middle East that’s spiking oil and gas prices, a new report has found that electricity in some European countries was almost 25% cheaper between 2023 and 2025 because of renewables. Further, a SolarPower Europe analysis found that solar power has saved Europe more than €100 million every day in 2026 since March 1, resulting in total savings of more than €3 billion. If gas prices remain high, experts say total savings in 2026 could reach €67.5 billion.

The data also shows that the price impacts grow stronger when more renewables come online. These findings indicate that electrifying the economy — a key pillar in the energy transition — would reduce Europe’s vulnerability to fossil fuel shocks and therefore make further investment in renewables more attractive.

The Conference on Transitioning Away from Fossil Fuels forges a new path

By all accounts, the first Conference on Transitioning Away from Fossil Fuels was a resounding success. Held from April 24-29 in Santa Marta, Colombia and hosted by Colombia and The Netherlands, the Conference brought together 57 countries in support of the commitments made under the Paris Agreement. These represented a third of the world’s economy. Also represented were subnational governments, academia, social movements, NGOs, trade unions, parliamentarians, the private sector, multilateral development banks, Indigenous Peoples, peoples of African descent, peasants, and women, children and youth.

The delegates’ mood was described as “euphoric,” to finally be focusing on concrete solutions. One reason for the uplifted spirits might have been the absence of countries that showed no interest in being a part of the ‘coalition of the willing’. Colombia wanted to avoid rehashing the unproductive debates at COP30, and so did not invite China, Russia, the US or India, among a few other countries.

The first four days of the conference consisted of a science pre-conference, a Peoples’ Assembly, and meetings of subnational governments, unions, and the private sector. A Peoples’ Summit separate from the Colombia meetings was also held during that time.

The pre-conference science panel
The pre-conference science panel announced three new scientific initiatives: one was a new global science panel headed by Dr. Johan Rockström, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany and Dr. Carlos Nobre, a researcher on the Amazon rainforest from the University of São Paulo in Brazil. The panel, which will be composed of 50-100 scientists from around the world, will provide rapid analysis on how to transition away from fossil fuels — focusing on transition pathways, technology solutions, policy design and evaluation, and finance instruments and governments. It will be totally independent and able to provide annual updates, unlike the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

The second scientific initiative was a new “synthesis report,” offering “12 action insights” for how countries can transition away from fossil fuels. For example, “halt all new fossil-fuel expansion,” and “prohibit fossil fuel advertising… recognizing fossil fuels as health-harming products.”

The third initiative was a new roadmap for how Colombia can transition away from fossil fuels, showing that by following the roadmap, Colombia could see net economy-wide savings of up to $23bn annually by 2050. Because the biggest issues facing countries are economic and have to do with the cost of living, this initiative illustrates the importance of presenting national roadmaps in economic terms.

Indigenous and civil society participation
The Colombian government brought together a “People’s Assembly,” that included hundreds of Indigenous peoples, Afro-descendent peoples, peasant farmers, trade representatives, and other civil society members. The purpose was to get their input on the conference’s main objectives, and they were also given opportunities to speak during the summit’s high-level segment — alongside ministers in the opening and closing plenary sessions, rather than at the end.

Beyond the Assembly organized by the Colombian government, civil society also organized its own “people’s summit,” involving 900 organizations and networks. This summit also gathered insights from representatives of different groups, ending in a joint declaration stating that the energy transition must be rights-based, funded, and result in the dismantling of the fossil fuel-dependent systems that have caused harm and destruction.

High level sessions
The last two days — April 28 and 29 — were the “high level” sessions with a plenary and closed-door breakouts for participants. Indigenous groups, civil society members and other stakeholders also participated in these sessions and were given equal opportunities to contribute. The conversations were free-flowing and informal, because computers were prohibited and participants had to speak from their minds and hearts. This unusual format was described as “refreshing,” “highly successful,” and “groundbreaking.”

Key outcomes to set an action-oriented course
The first outcome of the conference was confirmation that Tuvalu and Ireland will co-host a second transitioning away from fossil fuels conference in Tuvalu in 2027, with a pre-conference meeting in Ireland.

A second outcome was establishing three separate “workstreams” focusing on concrete opportunities and channels for cooperation to overcome fossil fuel dependencies: 1) developing national and regional roadmaps away from fossil fuels, 2) changing the financial system to better facilitate the transition away from fossil fuels, and 3) advancing progress toward a fossil fuel-free trade system.

The third outcome was the establishment of a coordination group to ensure continuity toward the second and later conferences.

The fourth outcome was delineating actions to ensure that the Santa Marta process complements the activities of other UN agencies and existing frameworks, and sustains its momentum.

The fifth outcome was well-stated by the Colombian environment minister Irene Vélez Torres: “the true belief of the countries that are here is that we need to go back to science and … back up our decision-making, processes and pathways with science.” The mechanism for that emphasis on science was launched in the science pre-conference as the Science Panel for the Global Energy Transition.

Important issues to be resolved
The debt crisis of the global south is one of the most crucial issues to be tackled, since many of these countries want to invest in renewables but are unable to because of high interest repayments on loans and imports of fossil fuels. Changes in the global financial architecture are necessary, as well as shifting government subsidies from fossil fuels to renewables and debt reduction.

A second roadblock is the investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS), a legal mechanism in many trade agreements that allows companies to sue governments in secret tribunals for their loss of earnings if governments attempt to reduce dependency on coal, oil or gas or enact measures boosting renewables. This has resulted in cases worth at least $100bn where companies have received compensation for their loss of earnings.

The third challenge is the need to have a robust renewable energy economy to transition to, which will require critical minerals to build the necessary billions of wind turbines, solar panels, electric vehicles and batteries. The issue here is the human rights abuses and destruction of natural landscapes associated with mining for the minerals. The goal would be protections for workers and proper regulations to ensure a clean, fair transition.

Finally, at Santa Marta, for the first time, Indigenous representatives drew up their proposals in an autonomous debating space and participated in high-level segments. They had an opportunity to tell ministers directly to pay more attention to Indigenous knowledge, protect Indigenous rights and conserve nature during the transition. Oswaldo Muca Castizo, general coordinator for the Organization of Indigenous Peoples of the Colombian Amazon summed it up: “Our territories are fundamental to maintaining life on this planet. Where our rights are respected, nature is protected.”

All told, the conference was an auspicious beginning for a completely new approach to handling the climate crisis quickly, fairly, and effectively on an international basis.

(Sources: theguardian.com; static1.squarespace.com; carbonbrief.org)

Study suggests airborne microplastics driving up global temperatures

A new study, published 4 May 2026 in Nature Climate Change, suggests that airborne microplastics may be worsening climate change by raising global temperatures. Analyzing the optical properties of various microplastics in the lab and simulating their effect on a global scale, researchers at Fudan University in China found that the particles may significantly affect warming. The study’s team argues that these particles are not being factored into global climate assessments, such as those published by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC); “Our work suggests that climate models need to be updated,” said Hongbo Fu, Professor of Environmental Science and Atmospheric Chemistry and co-author of the report. “IPCC should take notice.”

More broadly, says Steve Allen, a microplastics researcher at the environmental advocacy organization Healthy Earth, the results underscore the need to reduce our reliance on plastics — which are often made from the by-products of fossil fuel production. “What needs to be looked at is the carbon emissions throughout the life cycle of plastic production adding to the total climate change effect,” he says. The “takeaway message” is “that we can reduce climate change by removing plastic from our lives.”

Source: www.scientificamerican.com

New UNESCO report shows designated sites are critical for biodiversity, climate resilience and communities

A new UNESCO report, People and Nature in UNESCO-Designated Sites: Global and Local Contributions, is the first to assess UNESCO World Heritage Sites, Biosphere Reserves, and UNESCO Global Geoparks as a single global network. With more than 2,260 sites, covering over 13 million square kilometres, this network represents an area larger than China and India combined. Drawing on partnerships with more than 20 leading research institutions worldwide, the report’s remarkable findings highlight the essential role UNESCO-designated sites play in protecting biodiversity, supporting communities, and strengthening resilience in the face of climate change. As an example, while global wildlife populations are declining -73% since 1970, those located within UNESCO-designated sites have remained comparatively stable. Additionally, these sites encompass more than 60% of globally mapped species, with around 40% of these found nowhere else on Earth.

The report also underscores the environmental significance of UNESCO-designated sites. Collectively, these store an estimated 240 gigatons of carbon — equivalent to nearly two decades of current global emissions if released. Yet, without stronger action, more than one in four UNESCO sites could reach critical tipping points by 2050, with potentially irreversible consequences — including loss of glaciers, the collapse of coral reefs, species displacement, water stress and the shifting of forests as carbon sinks to carbon sources.

UNESCO-designated sites are vital hubs for humanity as well. Ten percent of the global population — nearly 900 million people, live in these sites or surrounding areas, and more than 1,000 languages are documented across them. They represent cultural strongholds, as at least a quarter overlap with Indigenous Peoples’ lands and territories. This rises to nearly half in Africa, the Caribbean and Latin America. The report also finds that around 10% of global GDP is generated in UNESCO-designated sites and their surrounding areas, underlining their wider social and economic significance.

While these places show what can be achieved through long-term protection, collaboration and local stewardship, the report also warns that they are under increasing strain. Nearly 90% of UNESCO-designated sites face high levels of environmental stress, while climate-related hazards have increased by 40% over the past decade.

The report therefore sets out four priority areas for action:

• restoring ecosystems to strengthen resilience
• supporting sustainable development, including through transboundary co-operation
• integrating UNESCO-designated sites more fully into climate policy and planning
• strengthening inclusive governance with Indigenous Peoples and local communities

UNESCO Director-General, Khaled El-Enany says of the report: “The findings are clear: UNESCO sites are delivering for both people and nature. Inside these territories, communities thrive, humanity’s heritage endures, and biodiversity is holding on while it collapses elsewhere. By measuring the global value and contributions of these sites, this report reveals what we stand to lose if they are not prioritized. It is an urgent call to scale ambition, recognizing UNESCO sites as strategic assets in tackling climate change and biodiversity loss, and investing now to protect ecosystems, cultures, and livelihoods for generations to come.”

(Source: unesco.org.uk)

Rainforests can recover much faster than thought

Scientists had thought that it would take over a century for animals to return to deforested land in the tropics. In new research published in the journal Nature, the conclusion is that ecosystem recovery can happen in mere decades.

It was commonly thought that it would take the full regeneration of trees and plants to the level of the old, original pristine forest before the animal population would recover, but to the surprise of scientists, animal life is recovering much more rapidly than trees.

The four-year research project was conducted across two nature reserves in Ecuador and involved dozens of scientists with a wide range of specialties. Each of the 45 patches of forest had once been cut down for cacao plantations or cattle pastures and were at varying stages of regrowth.

Teams of scientists studied 16 types of animals and plants — including bats, insects, ground mammals, birds, bacteria, trees and seedlings. They then compared them with over a dozen older, intact forests.

Help from communities living near the forests was essential to the success of the project: locals shared the land’s history, acted as guides through the forest, and assisted in the laboratory. Farmers in the region also allowed the scientists to set up experiments on their land.

The resulting paper indicated how quickly a tropical forest ecosystem can recover. A finding was that a majority of animals return in just three decades, in numbers and at diversity levels very similar to those in untouched ecosystems.

Lourens Poorter, a professor of tropical forest ecology at Wageningen University in the Netherlands said that although earlier studies had begun to change the mindset that tropical forests require centuries to recover, it takes a long time for such ideas to change science: “This is a message of hope… the exciting thing is that nature is capable of recovering by itself.”

The study authors said the results aren’t an excuse to continue cutting down tropical forests: old forests are what enable the recovery of young ones. The study was conducted within a patchwork of old, intact forest and newly regrowing ones found side-by-side, common in Central and South America.

Although the findings are good news for many parts of the tropics, more damaged areas may not be able to bounce back in the same way. Many regions are so degraded that hardly any healthy rainforest is left. In those cases, recovery will likely require human intervention and take much longer.

(Source: nytimes.com)

Tie job promotions to decarbonization

China says promotions for provincial leaders will now be tied to their performance on climate, such as measures of emissions peaking, clean energy uptake, and fossil fuel limits. The new system tied to decarbonization will no doubt accelerate the country’s already robust clean energy transition.

Scale a low-cost solution for Arsenic poisoning

Arsenic in drinking water threatens over 200 million people with disability and sometimes even death, and although there are numerous ways to remove arsenic from drinking water, most are too expensive or complex to be useful for those in need. A high school intern working with professors from the City University of New York, however, has developed a low-cost solution: a modified teabag.

Intern and research author Vick Tan says: “Clean drinking water should not depend on access to expensive infrastructure. Our research shows that simple low-cost materials can be engineered into scalable solutions for arsenic remediation from drinking water, one of the world’s most urgent public health crises.”

The research paper shows that pulverized eggshells placed in a teabag infused with iron oxide nanoparticles can remove 90% of the arsenic in water. The researchers also announced a test for arsenic concentrations that doesn’t require advanced lab equipment. It indicates whether or not water needs purifying and how much soaking is required. The authors estimate the cost of a purifying teabag to be $0.07 USD, and if rinsed and washed in an alkaline solution, a bag could be reused up to five times.

Use eco-tourism to protect endangered species

In Uganda, communities living close to the Bwindi Impenetrable Forest, where critically endangered mountain gorillas still exist in the wild, were poaching them, transmitting diseases, and destroying their habitat. However, through the work of Dr. Gladys Kalema-Zikusoka and the Conservation Through Public Health organization, villagers are now organized into conservation teams and profiting from eco-tourism as well as other forms of enterprise, such as up-market coffee-growing. Village health teams help prevent diseases and infections from being passed back and forth between gorillas and people, and other teams use non-harmful techniques to keep the gorillas out of the village farms when they come out of the forest. In recent years, gorilla numbers have been rising, and they’re no longer considered critically endangered.

Institute a social safety net for the poorest

Tanzania has been a beneficiary of the World Bank Group’s Productive Social Safety Net Project in prior years and is preparing to embark on Phase III. The overall project is designed to support Tanzania’s poorest households by providing access to social protection and better jobs in two major ways. The first is cash transfers with measures to help families save, invest in their children’s health and education, and build skills for self-employment. This includes business grants and entrepreneurship training for youth.

The second form of support is climate-smart public works, which provide both temporary jobs for workers and build community assets like small-scale water harvesting and rangeland management systems.

Phase II reached 5.2 million people in 1.36 million households. It resulted in a 10% reduction in poverty among participants, led to a 6% increase in school enrollment, increased food security and the use of health services, and 71% of all benefits successfully reached the poorest 20% of the population. Phase III is expected to reach about 2.2 million extremely poor and vulnerable people in about 100 of the poorest areas in Mainland and Zanzibar.

Organize a debt-for-nature swap

Ecuador completed a debt-for-nature swap at the end of 2024, with the support of The Nature Conservancy, the US International Development Finance Corporation, the Inter-American Development Bank, and Bank of America. The debt conversion refinanced approximately $1.53 billion of Ecuador’s international bonds, generating over $800 million in net fiscal savings for Ecuador by 2035. The swap is also expected to produce approximately $460 million for Amazon conservation over the next 17 years.

Now, in 2026, the first call for grant proposals has been launched from the Amazon Biocorridor Fund, which will manage grants for projects aiming to improve the management of protected areas, preserve forests and wetlands, and safeguard rivers within the Ecuadorian Amazon. And, to ensure their participation in decisions that affect their territories and well-being, Indigenous peoples and nationalities participate in the design of the Amazon Biocorridor Program’s conservation efforts.

This kind of refinancing is an excellent solution for the debt crises in the Global South, which limit countries’ ability to address climate change and protect their natural resources fairly and effectively.

Huge oyster bed planned for UK rewilding project

In one of the largest rewilding projects in UK waters, more than 15 million juvenile oysters are to be released into the North Sea. The scheme will assist in repairing damaged marine ecosystems, and at the same time, sequester a large amount of carbon.

Run by the Green Britain Foundation, the Nature Restoration Fund, Marine Fund Scotland and North Bay Innovations, the project will provide a template to revive oyster beds in coastal areas around the UK.

Located around Orkney, the plan is to re-establish a huge oyster bed that experts say will not only benefit fish and the bay, but also sea mammals, seabirds and the whole environment.

Oyster beds used to be a significant part of the UK’s marine ecosystems, and covered huge areas of coast, but oysters became a popular food source; for example between 1840 and 1850 alone, Londoners consumed approximately 700 million of the shellfish.

As well as overfishing, climate change, pollution, and clearing areas for shipping channels had a huge impact on oyster populations and the subspecies who depended on the oyster beds, which decimated marine ecosystems.

Restoration projects such as the one near Orkney offer the chance to rebuild marine life, and at the same time help tackle the climate crisis.

Dale Vince, the founder of the Green Britain Foundation and one of the scheme’s backers, said research suggests oyster reefs can sequester significant amounts of planet-heating CO2. 15 million oysters in a 100 hectares (247 acres) bed, could potentially sequester up to 76 tonnes of CO2 each year. The real aim was to stimulate the natural spawning of beds. If established around coastlines, the potential for carbon capture would increase “by over 1,000-fold per annum after about 15 years”.

The Liberal Democrat MP for Orkney and Shetland, Alistair Carmichael, welcomed the plan.
“Orkney has a long and productive history of working the seas that surround us. It is in all our interests to balance the needs and demands on our waters and our seabed so that everyone can benefit from it for generations to come.”

(source: theguardian.com)

Reshaping the balance of power

A powerful legal precedent was set in November 2025, when the High Court in Kenya overturned parts of the Seed and Plant Varieties Act 2012 which had banned a farming tradition of saving, selling or swapping indigenous seeds. Smallholder farmers, many of them women, grow 80 percent of all food there and rely on this ancient system, but the new legislation made them liable to unaffordable penalties or prison if they did not comply. In making their challenge to the ruling, they were supported by a broad coalition of campaign groups concerned at the implications of agribusiness dominating and standardizing the food chain for their profit only, and certainly not for the benefit of the planet.

The Government filed an appeal against the ruling in late 2025. Nevertheless, Greenpeace celebrated the finding as an affirmation that ancient rights supersede those of commercial interests, “reshaping the legal balance of power between communities and agribusiness worldwide”.

Listing some of the many reasons for resisting corporate pressure to change farming practices, Global Justice Now said: “When farmers plant a variety of seeds in their field they are thought of as backward by agribusiness corporations which maintain that genetically modified (GM) and hybrid varieties are the future of farming. Yet through millennia of traditional seed breeding, humans have developed thousands of different varieties for food crops across the world. Seed diversity allows farmers control over their food system, protects biodiversity and builds resilience against climate change.”

Farm production diversity reduces the need for herbicides and pesticides, and research in Malawi shows that where such diversity prevails, so does more dietary diversity — a key indicator for health and nutrition.

Farmers argued that the Act threatened their livelihoods, their social standing and their privacy. They found they were liable to punitive fines or prison if they continued to work with, sell or share the seeds they knew and trusted to meet the needs of their climate conditions, including drought. They were required to register as seed merchants, but the fees far exceeded their potential incomes; their homes could be inspected to check they were not storing their own seeds as they had always done.

The intention of the Act was said to have been to protect seed integrity from intentional fraud and to maximize yields, but Wambugu Wanjohi from the Law Society of Kenya, says that parts of the law clearly “favoured big commercial and corporate interests over the rights of farmers.”

At the time of the finding, Elizabeth Atieno, Greenpeace Africa, said: “Today, the shackles have been removed from Kenya’s farmers. The court has affirmed what we have known all along: Seed is Sovereign. This is not just a legal win; it is a victory for our culture, our resilience, and our future. By validating indigenous seeds, the court has struck a blow against the corporate capture of our food system. We can finally say that in Kenya, feeding your community with climate-resilient, locally adapted seeds is no longer a crime.”

(Sources: Devex; Global Justice Now; Greenpeace; Reuters)

The right for cacti (and nature) to exist

A groundbreaking court case in Italy has marked the first time that a conservation organization has been awarded damages because their work to prevent biodiversity loss has been severely compromised.

“What makes this case absolutely unique is that, for the first time in history, a court ordered those responsible to pay damages to an organization — our association — for harming its mission to protect nature,” said botanist Andrea Cattabriga, from the Associazione per la Biodiversità e la sua Conservazione, the NGO that brought the case.

At the centre of the civil litigation are the Copiapoa, some of the world’s rarest cacti that grow only along the steep, extremely dry hills around the coastal town of Paposo in the Atacama Desert, northern Chile. The plants draw nearly all their water from the sea fog which sustains what the Centre for Biological Diversity describes as “surprising biodiversity in an otherwise hostile region”.

Already being pushed beyond their limits by climate change bringing hotter temperatures, drier winds and less fog, they are moving to extinction faster still, thanks to continuing illegal international trade — despite the global treaty that’s meant to regulate cross-border trade in endangered species.

Botanist Pablo Guerrero of the Universidad de Concepción says: “The demand comes from enthusiasts who want to own a piece of the desert — ideally with all the marks of the wild.” For many collectors, Copiapoa have become status symbols, especially when the plants come directly from their natural habitat. Buyers even choose the plants themselves as traders stream live videos on Instagram or Facebook from the desert asking which plants they should dig up.

A study in 2015 found that 31 percent of all cactus species worldwide are threatened by poaching — one of the highest rates among plant groups. It’s worse now. But it isn’t just the Copiapoa that are being wiped out in the Atacama. It’s the microclimate they create, giving refuge and sustenance to various small creatures. Without these cacti, this desert really would be a dead place.

Cattabriga says, the ruling symbolically acknowledged “a nature that is finally recognized here in all its components: plants, animals, but also rivers, forests, entire ecosystems … with a right to exist.”

(Sources: TheRevelator.org)

A new milestone passed for human rights in the European Union

Days after voters ousted Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán from power in April, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) ruled Hungary’s anti-LGBTQ propaganda law in breach of Article 2 of the Treaty on European Union and its founding values of equality and human rights.

According to the press release “… that law is contrary to the very identity of the (European) Union as a common legal order in a society in which pluralism prevails. Hungary cannot validly rely on its national identity as justification for adopting a law which is in breach of the values referred to above.”

When enacted by Orbán’s Government, the law had intensified Orbán’s campaign against LGBTQ rights, increasing social hostility and fuelling vigilante attacks against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. It had been passed in 2021 under the guise of child protection measures defending ‘traditional Catholic values’ of family.

ILGA-Europe Deputy Director Katrin Hugendubel urged Hungary’s new Prime Minister to repeal the law, saying: “If Péter Magyar truly aims to be pro-EU, he must place this at the top of his agenda for his first 100 days in office, as an essential part of his EU-facing reforms”.

(Sources: washingtonblade.com; The Guardian)

NZ pension fund ruled to have invested in companies that breach human rights

The High Court in New Zealand has ruled that the NZ superannuation fund has been operating under “unlawful” and “unreasonable” rules, by investing in companies which do business in the occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT).

The decision by the High Court forces the Guardians of New Zealand Superannuation to rewrite the standards that govern where pension money is invested, particularly in regards to companies accused of contributing to breaches of human rights.

The judicial review at the High Court in Auckland, NZ was brought by representatives of the Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA), who argued the fund should divest from four major companies: Airbnb, Booking.com, Motorola, and Expedia, all of which operate in the OPT, and are listed on a United Nations database of businesses linked to Israeli settlements.

Airbnb and Booking.com advertise homes for rent in Israeli settlements, for example, and Motorola is involved in surveillance of Palestinians within the occupied territories.

The Court heard the Guardians excluded five Israeli banks in 2021 because they financed construction of unlawful Israeli settlements in the OPT. However, they had previously refused to divest from Motorola, Booking.com, Airbnb and Expedia, claiming they did not meet an “exclusion threshold”.

One of the representatives for PSNA, John Minto, described the decision as a hugely significant victory that would “send a shockwave” through New Zealand’s investment community.

(Source: stuff.co.nz)

Comparatively speaking the Planetary Logos on His own plane is to Sanat Kumara what the soul of the human being is to his threefold personality. A further comparison is that the Lord of the World may be regarded as a personal disciple of the Solar Logos on supernal levels, just as a human disciple works under the guidance of a Master of Wisdom.

Just as a soul seeks incarnation in a physical body to gain experiences which should eventually lead to the realization of a higher consciousness or initiation, so Sanat Kumara has incarnated in the physical planet Earth for His own specific purpose, which must also lead to some higher initiation on His Path of Higher Evolution.

It was during the Lemurian Age, some 18.5 million years ago, that the Planetary Logos incarnated and entered His physical vehicle, our planet Earth, as the Lord of the World, Sanat Kumara. Our Lord has never assumed a dense physical body, but has ever since that distant past been functioning on etheric levels. ‘In Him we live and move and have our being, and none of us can pass beyond the radius of His aura’.

With His initial coming, Sanat Kumara was accompanied by several highly evolved Entities or ‘Kumaras’, Who came as His assistants, serving as focal points of planetary force, to contribute towards the unfolding of the Great Plan for the self-conscious development of all life. Of this original group six still remain with Him, functioning as members of the Central Council in Shamballa. Sanat Kumara, with these six supporting Kumaras, act as the seven guiding force centres, not only for transmitting energies throughout our planetary scheme, but also as directing and co-ordinating agents, linking all centres and organs of life within the Earth’s corporate body.

The Tibetan points out that Sanat Kumara and His Council Members, in long departed ages, all passed through human evolution, since the life principle can only be effectively blended with the reasoning intellect, when expressed through a human instrument. It is only by means of this instrument that the various stages of manifested life, needed for the evolution of the reasoning mind, can be consciously created. The only conclusion which can be drawn from this is that the Earth cannot be the only source of human beings, and that humans also exist, or at least have existed in bygone ages, on other planets or on heavenly bodies beyond our solar system.

At the time of the incarnation of the Lord of the World, the animal kingdom was already well established on Earth, with animal-man representing its highest form of development. This fine animal had a powerful physical body, with a well co-ordinated emotional body for registering sensations and feelings, but with only just the first rudiments of mind, and still without self-consciousness. The lacking characteristic required for lifting animal-man into the human kingdom was also contributed by the Planetary Logos, by providing suitable channels for the manifestation of the human Monads. The Monad, working through its Spiritual Triad (reflecting spiritual Will, Intuition or Wisdom, and the Higher Mind), and subsequently through the Soul incarnating in the dense physical body, furnished this last essential for entry into the human world — the self-consciousness. Man, as a rational, self-conscious unit, but still well down on the mental scale, could now proceed with his evolution, simultaneously providing the field of physical experience needed by the Monad.

The Lord of the World, as the direct representative of the Planetary Logos on Earth, retains in His hands the reins of government of all functional departments, and is responsible for the evolutionary aspects, not only of the human race and the devas, but of all creation. Sanat Kumara also forms the direct link between the Earth and extraplanetary forces by retaining close contact with the other planetary Logoi of our solar system. It is His task to impress the members of His Grand Council with those energies received from outer space, and to reveal to Them the next phase of the unfolding Purpose, which They in turn will pass on to the Hierarchy of Masters. Sanat Kumara is therefore the One providing all men with Life, and Who is carrying and guiding all of creation along its evolutionary path to its eventual consummation. With never ending patience, day after day, year after year, age after age, He continues radiating His rays of Light, Wisdom, Love and Understanding into the minds of men, thus systematically incorporating His Will and Purpose, and evolving the Plan for humanity.

Shamballa
The term Shamballa (or The Father’s House) sometimes implies different meanings, depending on the context in which it is being used.

Primarily it refers to the etheric seat of the Spiritual Hierarchy, the headquarters of the Lord of the World and His surround.

Based on this concept, Shamballa is also regarded as one of the seven energy centres in the etheric body of the Planetary Logos, forming a triangle with two other closely related centres, namely the Hierarchy of Masters, and Humanity. It is ‘the Centre where the Will of God is known’, and from where the Hierarchy draws its Life.

The Shamballa Centre is activated by the First Ray of Will and Power, the major function of which is bequeathing, transmitting and circulating the fundamental principle of Life to all forms within the manifested Life of our Logos.

It is from here that the Divine Purpose is directed. It is the source from where all significant political movements originate, and the point from which the destiny and progress of races and nations is determined.

In esoteric literature ‘Shamballa’ is often used in a comprehensive sense, as an Entity with its own life and intention, and as the source of the ‘Shamballa Energy and Will’. This is of course only a symbolic and inclusive reference to the powers of the Lord of the World, working through His Council and other assistants, all focused in Shamballa, and from there radiating their forces as a synthesized unit.

Shamballa is the Earth’s main receptive agent for the inflow of both solar and cosmic energies, and acts as the transmuting centre before transmitting the moderated energies to the human and lower kingdoms of nature. [Share International October 1987]

For untold ages, man has wandered the Earth for sustenance, gain, security and peace. As tribes and even nations, he has criss-crossed the planet over and over again, fighting with, and intermarrying with, a long succession of disparate peoples. The result of this endless wandering is the One humanity today. No matter the differences in colour, religion, tradition and language, all men are descendants of common ancestors and have evolved by the same means to their present state. That this present state undoubtedly favours some groups over others is the result of many historical factors, and not of any innate difference in intelligence or adaptability. Throughout history, groups have risen to prominence for a longer or shorter time, only to sink back into obscurity again, leaving their creativity to remind later generations of their presence.

All of this being true, it is essential for modern humanity to see itself as One, and the differences in appearance the result of relatively recent climatic conditions, together with the different ray influences which have manifested regularly through the emerging racial types. Humanity is still evolving in consciousness, together, as One.

Advancing together, each race and sub-race adds some new quality to the whole. The process of repeated incarnations ensures that gradually, each individual inherits the new knowledge and awareness of the epoch. If men truly understood the complexity and beauty of this process, gone forever would be the dislike and distrust, the ‘racism’ of today. Men would realize that, in truth, they are brothers, journeying together on a seemingly endless voyage of self-discovery.

When We, your Elder Brothers, work more openly, you will find that this truth is central in Our understanding of man’s nature and relationship. The human family is the nourishing base of our lives. In it we learn to co-operate and thus create together, fashioning the rich tapestry of our shared identity.

How, then, can men come to this essential understanding? We, the Brotherhood, will demonstrate this relationship in all We do, and men will come to see themselves thus, as brothers all. Sharing will bring men to this happy pass and will glorify them in their new demonstration of truth. So shall it be.

Then will men conquer the heights of achievement, sharing their knowledge and experience. Gone forever will be the false barriers which men have erected to keep at a distance their brothers, realizing them at last as themselves.

The Introduction to this book asks: “Could we — and will we — learn to plug our minds in to various wave lengths, some of which come from outside our solar system? Why not? Such achievement would necessitate training which is not yet available — but if it were?”

From the Mundane to the Magnificent describes the wonders of such a training. It is an extraordinary book of autobiography — and Vera Stanley Alder (1898-1984) was an extraordinary person. It was written quite late in her life — she had earlier written more impersonal ones about the Ageless Wisdom.

The ‘Mundane‘ refers to the outer lives of two women, Vera Stanley Alder (‘Verity’ as she was nicknamed as a child and called throughout this book) and her cousin Marion, living in the countryside during World War 2, growing vegetables — very successfully — to give themselves sustenance in the time of severe rationing. They shared the house with a ‘family mascot’, a Tibetan hare named Bin, who seemed remarkably intelligent and responsive to human needs. In due course, they catered for a section of the army stationed there. But eventually this ‘mundane’ life comes to feel ‘unreal’ to Verity.

The ‘Magnificent‘ comes from the encounters of Verity with an astral visitor called Raphael, and the visions he reveals to her of the livingness of the etheric world and the future for the Earth. She begins to live a “double life”, grounded in her gardening and living with her down-to-earth cousin, but gradually being able to experience the wonders and the vision of the future that Raphael reveals to her.

Her success in growing food had not made her happy — the war was continuing, and was bringing her difficult and depressing questions about the cruelty of humanity. She realizes that all her knowledge was second-hand. Despite her understanding of the Ageless Wisdom, reincarnation and karma, which had answered many of her questions, why, she asked, “was humanity so muddled?… I want to see the truth for myself instead of relying on so many teachings…”. In her despair, she is unexpectedly visited by Raphael, “a tall, silent, bearded figure”, who, without frightening her, addresses her as ‘Verity’. Her visitor tells her that she was suffering from “Divine Discontent” — a “good illness”.

She apparently passes a test when she says she wants to know — understand — about “radical things” which would make life better, in order to help humanity. Immediately, she has a very strange sensation of floating above her own body on the couch and seeing her “etheric double …the body on the bed”, which “became fainter and more ethereal-looking … At the same time, the blue light which permeated it grew stronger. …It extended quite evenly for about an inch outside the skin. It seemed to shimmer softly, with quivering life.” After a while, she realizes that what she is seeing is “a second body, interpenetrating my own physical one …composed of millions of tiny, interlaced threads, fine as the finest spider’s web…”.

As she remains in her astral body, she finds she can move instantaneously by thought — and she is given a different kind of vision, of herself as a kind of ghost. She is made to realize that her aura is not pure — she suffers from “a passionate temper”. Finally, her lesson for the day is over — she goes along a ‘thread’ (the life thread) back to her physical body — and Raphael is nowhere to be seen. (This passage — and many of the visions that follow cannot be summarized, and I urge anyone interested to read the book for themselves.)

In the following weeks, Verity has many more illuminating and wonderful experiences with Raphael. In her astral body, she is taken outside the planet and sees it with the same sense of wonder that maybe the astronauts of Artemis II did this year. But she can see more — the Earth’s most beautiful astral body is disturbed and ‘stained’ by mankind’s stupidity and recklessness.

Raphael is also able to ‘shrink’ Verity so that she can see the very cells that life consists of. He takes her to a ‘lunatic asylum’ and has her explore the aura of a nurse, then takes her inside her own body. She sees the ‘elementals’ responsible for the body’s functions, and the great beauty of the human heart which, as Raphael explains, is the centre of the love energy, the expression of the goal of the whole of this solar system. In her following astral journeys, Verity is given extraordinary insight into many aspects of illness, health and dreaming, most often visually, some of which she illustrates in fine detail. (She was a trained artist).

In the final chapter, Verity describes Raphael’s departure from her life and the vision he has for the future which involves “the spiritual kingdom entering fully into the conscious physical world so that there is no longer any division”. From an ‘airship’, they see England transformed into a hospitable landscape, with ‘community towns’ which cater for all needs. All this would come about when humanity’s fears and greed for money would end. Raphael gives Verity a similar message to that of Benjamin Creme, who worked several decades later: that the second coming of Christ, the Teacher expected by all religions, will take place as the Earth moves into the Aquarian age, though not before tumult and pain. He presents a vision of the “new teachings” for humanity, and tells Verity to prepare herself to learn: “how to actually communicate with and be aware of all non-physical beings from the high world of Devas to the involutionary realm of nature spirits”.

Raphael also prepares Verity for her own future: “Every time you suffer and fall by the wayside, pick yourself up, recollect who and what you really are, and go on with your destined work with renewed vigour and vision. Remember always that you are on your way to the Second Birth — that escape out of the womb of ignorance and materialism into the freedom of godhead on Earth.” He gives Verity an experience of ‘utter peace’, bathed in his ‘golden light’, that also becomes hers, as he disappears as a physical being from her life. But he promises that she has learned through meditation to tune in with him, so that she will be “at one not only with me but with my teacher also”.

Verity’s work with Raphael on the physical plane has come to an end, but she is transformed — and able to write this enlightening and visionary book.

Benjamin Creme answers questions about Vera Stanley Alder

Q. At the end of your book The Reappearance of the Christ and the Masters of Wisdom, under “Suggested Further Reading”, you list works by Vera Stanley Alder, the English esotericist. Please give her ray structure and point in evolution.
A. Soul 2; personality 4, sub-ray 6; mental body 3, sub-ray 6; astral body 4, sub-ray 6; physical body 3, sub-ray 7. She was 1.65 degrees initiate.

Q. (1) Is Raphael, in the book From the Mundane to the Magnificent by Vera Stanley Alder, a Master of Wisdom? (2) Was he a disciple of a Master working on the inner planes?
A: (1) No. (2) Yes. (Share International, October 2011)

Q. In her last book From the Mundane to the Magnificent (1979), esotericist Vera Stanley Alder describes an intriguing episode in her life which took place in 1942. She relates how an advanced being, whom she calls Raphael, takes it upon himself to reveal to her aspects of reality in a series of ‘hands-on’ experiences on the inner planes. In the last of these lessons he grants her wish for a vision of the future. When asked how such a brilliant future could ever be realized, Raphael assures her that this will be possible through the intervention in the near future of the “Coming One”, the Christ, known in the east as Maitreya Buddha.
(1) Can you say whether this experience took place in 1942, three years before Maitreya’s decision to return at the earliest possible moment? (2) Was Raphael merely settling a karmic debt, as he told Mrs Alder, or did/does he have a specific part to play as regards Maitreya’s return? (3) Do you know if Mrs Alder ever received confirmation of her experience by way of your information, before she died in 1984?
A. (1) Yes. Outside the physical brain, time does not exist. (2) Both. (3) Yes. She contacted me and we met at her home in Bournemouth, England. (Share International October 2001)