Many are also cutting their contributions to help support millions displaced by violence and climate change around the world

International News via Reuters:

Developing countries which host most of the world’s refugees could close their borders if Western states persist with aid cuts, the head of the Danish Refugee Council warned on Tuesday.

As countries like Britain and Germany tighten their asylum rules amid anti-immigration sentiment, many are also cutting their contributions to help support millions displaced by violence and climate change around the world.

Charlotte Slente, Secretary General of the Danish Refugee Council, which works in dozens of countries, said she was concerned that poorer states who take in 75% of them will also implement new restrictions.

“They are now being a bit abandoned by the donors,” she told Reuters in an interview in Geneva. “I’m a little bit afraid for what we’re going to see in terms of the reaction among these host nations, when they realise that less money will come in.”

She cited an example where Uganda, for years a generous host of refugees from Sudan, South Sudan and Somalia, has started restricting numbers.

Ugandan government officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Other states are also under strain.

Chad has nearly 900,000 refugees from Sudan’s civil war but they are not getting enough aid and camps are filling up, said Slente who visited them last month.

The NGO has already had to cut back support to displaced people this year due to funding cuts, mostly by the United States which previously accounted for 20% of contributions, and has scaled back foreign aid dramatically under President Donald Trump.

The Danish Refugee Council has cut nearly 2,000 posts and scaled back aid in many countries, including nutrition supplies to mothers and their children in places like Cameroon and Afghanistan, Slente said.

Other donors have so far kept contributions to her NGO steady but Slente expects falling contributions from other European countries as they shift funds to defence.

Reporting by Emma Farge; Additional reporting by Elias Biryabarema in Kampala, Editing by Alexandra Hudson

The Small Arms Survey found that between 2015 and 2024, seven in 10 firearms that could be traced from six Caribbean nations came from Florida and Georgia

International News via Reuters:

Organized crime in the Caribbean is being fueled by arms trafficking that can be traced largely to a handful of areas in the U.S. states of Florida and Georgia, a study by Geneva-based Small Arms Survey has found.

U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration has ramped up efforts against drug cartels, from classifying gangs as terrorist organizations to bombing alleged drug trafficking boats off the coast of Venezuela.

The Small Arms Survey – an independent research project whose findings are used by international governments and United Nations bodies – found that between 2015 and 2024, seven in 10 firearms that could be traced from six Caribbean nations came from Florida and Georgia.

Its analysis spanned the Bahamas, Barbados, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Jamaica, and Trinidad and Tobago.

Some 30% of all firearms seized in those countries and successfully traced to the U.S. were bought from dealers in just two counties in Florida – Miami-Dade and Broward.

The mayors of those counties did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The report also looked at seizures by U.S. Customs officials, finding that 78% of Caribbean-bound illegal arms shipments were detected in ports around the Florida cities of Tampa and Miami, and Atlanta, Georgia.

Matt Schroeder, a senior researcher at the Small Arms Survey, noted that limited data on arms trafficking made it difficult to assess how trends were evolving, and called for further research.

“Any effective campaign against drug trafficking and organized crime has to look at the trafficking of weapons,” he said in an interview.

The issue has fueled diplomatic tensions in the region, with several countries across the Caribbean backing a Mexican government lawsuit that sought to hold U.S. gunmakers responsible for weapons trafficking to foreign crime groups. The U.S. Supreme Court threw out the lawsuit earlier this year.

Schroeder said strikes on alleged drug boats were unlikely to have a major impact on arms trafficking, and warned against possible diversion of resources away from U.S. Customs or U.S. law enforcement operations in the Caribbean. 

“If you’re going to have any meaningful decrease in the trafficking of weapons, it has to focus on improving the capacity of law enforcement specifically to detect contraband in the international shipments,” Schroeder said.

The U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the U.S. agency that investigates illegal firearms use, has identified the Bahamas and Haiti as among the top markets for illegal U.S. firearms. It has said that growing gang power in Haiti has prevented the agency from obtaining accurate trace data since 2021.

Reporting by Sarah Morland in Mexico CityEditing by Matthew Lewis

A UNCTAD report presented in London said shifts in financial markets now drive global trade almost as much as real economic activity

International News via Reuters:

The financial system risks undermining global trade if it fails to adapt to the economy’s needs, with developing countries likely to suffer the most, the UN Trade and Development Agency said on Tuesday.

A UNCTAD report presented in London said shifts in financial markets now drive global trade almost as much as real economic activity, with financial conditions increasingly determining global trade flows and shaping development prospects worldwide.

“Trade is not just a chain of suppliers. It is also a chain of credit lines, payment systems, currency markets and capital flows,” UNCTAD’s Secretary-General Rebeca Grynspan said in a news release.

The UNCTAD said global growth was expected to slow from 2.9% in 2024 to 2.6% in 2025 due to rising financial volatility but also geopolitical tensions.

More than 90% of global trade relies on bank financing, with dollar liquidity and cross-border payment systems remaining essential to international commerce.

“This deep reliance on financial channels makes trade closely linked to global financial and monetary conditions,” the report said. “A shift in interest rates or investor sentiment in a major financial centre can affect trade volumes worldwide.”

The report said although developing economies are expected to grow faster than advanced ones, they face higher financing costs, volatile capital flows, and rising climate-related risks, factors that constrain the fiscal and investment space needed to sustain growth.

The dollar remains central to global finance. While this offers stability in uncertain times, it also ties developing economies to financial cycles they have little power to influence, the agency said.

UNCTAD called for reforms to align trade and finance and ensure long-term stability, including modernising trade rules, reforming the international monetary system to limit damaging currency and capital-flow volatility, and strengthening capital markets to expand affordable long-term finance.

“What does genuine resilience require? Integrated policy frameworks that recognise links between trade, finance and sustainability,” Grynspan said. “Fundamentally, we cannot understand trade isolated from finance.”

Reporting by Catarina Demony; Editing by Sharon Singleton