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Our editors’ weekly take on humanitarian news, trends, and developments from around the globe.
On our radar
Iran protests smothered amid uncertainty around US response
Deadly repression by the Iranian government has quashed nearly three weeks of massive protests in Iran, but it is still unclear whether the US will follow through on threats to attack the country. Rights groups claim that more than 2,500 protesters have been killed – a toll that is impossible to confirm because of an internet blackout. Though the vast majority of those deaths are reportedly protesters, Iranian state media said at least 109 members of the security forces had been killed in a two-week span. More than 18,000 people have reportedly been detained by security forces. US President Donald Trump says Washington received assurances that the Islamic Republic won’t move ahead with allegedly planned executions of arrested protesters. However, Trump has not entirely ruled out the possibility of US military action. For its part, the Islamic Republic continues to insist that “terrorists” and groups loyal to their “enemies”, namely in Tel Aviv and Washington, are stirring up the protesters.
SDF clashes flag scale of Syria’s transition challenge
While some civilians are returning to their Aleppo homes after last week’s fighting between the Syrian government and the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), others are evacuating as the government appears poised to launch a new offensive east of the city. The clashes, which broke out on 6 January as negotiations stalled over a March deal to integrate the SDF and its institutions into the Syrian state, killed at least 23 people and displaced nearly 150,000. A 9 January ceasefire calmed the violence but did not not end it, and the government now controls key Aleppo neighbourhoods that had long been controlled by Kurdish forces. Experts say this likely leaves the SDF in a weakened negotiating position for future talks with Damascus. The outbreak of fighting and the withdrawal of the SDF from those neighbourhoods also raise serious questions about the feasibility of bringing minority populations – some of whom have been effectively self-governing for years – into a unified country. This delicate part of Syria’s transition is one of the challenges we flagged in our annual list of humanitarian crises to watch. Click here to read more.
Violence and white supremacy: One year of Trump’s immigration crackdown
Federal agents shot a man in the leg during an immigration raid in Minneapolis, Minnesota on 14 January, one week after an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer killed Renee Nicole Good. In the wake of Good’s killing, tensions between the local community and federal security forces conducting immigration raids have skyrocketed, with the second shooting further inflaming the situation. In recent days, ICE officers have also detained dozens of Somali refugees – including children – who were legally resettled to the US. The administration said it was targeting around 5,600 refugees in Minnesota who have not yet been granted permanent residency. Meanwhile, at least four people died in ICE custody in just the first 10 days of 2026. In its first year in office, the Trump administration has essentially ended all humanitarian immigration pathways to the US and launched a draconian mass deportation campaign that has embraced white supremacist rhetoric and goals, and seen the deployment of masked federal agents using aggressive tactics to cities across the country. Legal immigration has not been spared: On 14 January, the administration announced it was suspending immigrant visa processing from 75 countries.
The climate side of Trump’s Greenland gambit
European troops have landed in Greenland amid tense talks between the country’s government, officials from Denmark, and the United States. President Trump has continued to insist the two-million-square-kilometre Arctic territory should belong to the United States — despite pre-existing security agreements and a (previously) strong relationship with Denmark that allow the US significant use of the semi-autonomous country. There are significant climate change-related reasons why Greenland is becoming of political interest, beyond Trump’s ego. The territory, always in a strategic location, has become even more so in recent years as the surrounding ice has retreated significantly: 105 billion tonnes was lost in 2024-25, according to scientists. This environmental disaster – ice helps cool the planet and its melt will lead to rising seas – also allows ships and submarines more freedom of movement, making military planners nervous. Greenland is home to around 31.4 billion barrels of oil, which the territory gave up trying to extract several years ago. Potentially even more significant are large volumes of untapped critical minerals — necessary to power the technology needed for the green transition away from fossil fuels. China currently controls most of the global market, though a White House document released this week explicitly framed critical minerals as vital to US national security.
Frustration mounts at UAE’s foreign meddling
Somalia’s federal government has severed ties with the United Arab Emirates (UAE) amid growing tensions over the Gulf state’s overseas meddling. The break came after Mogadishu accused Abu Dhabi of allowing Yemeni separatist leader Aidarous al-Zubaidi to illegally enter Somalia via the breakaway region of Somaliland. Al-Zubaidi heads the UAE-backed Southern Transitional Council, whose forces were routed by Saudi-backed troops following a major rupture within the coalition that formed in 2015 to fight the Houthis. Somali officials say al-Zubaidi’s arrival was “the last straw” in relations with the UAE, though Abu Dhabi’s role in facilitating Israel’s recognition of Somaliland appears to have played a part. Some reports suggest Emirati weapons shipments to the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in Sudan are now being disrupted, after Egypt and Saudi Arabia withdrew access to their airspace. The UAE may also be scaling back its operations at the Bosaso port in Puntland, Somalia, which it uses as a transit hub to bring weapons and mercenaries to the RSF. A close ally of Israel and the US, the UAE’s aggressive and imperialist foreign policy – backing armed militias and secessionist groups – is generating blowback across the region.
Patagonia fires prompt conspiracy theories and political storm
Forest fires have engulfed thousands of hectares in various locations of the Argentinian region of Patagonia since December. Authorities have said there is evidence fires that started on 5 January were man-made. The allegation has set off a political storm. Social media posts and Argentinian opposition politicians have circulated unverified claims that Israeli tourists or ex-Israeli soldiers intentionally started the blaze. Argentina’s far-right President Javier Milei is a staunch supporter of Israel. Meanwhile, the government has claimed that Indigenous Mapuche communities in the region are responsible. Both these theories have been refuted by the Argentinian fact-checking media company Chequeado, and the governor of Chubut, the province where the fires are located, has also dismissed them. On top of it all, government budget cuts to fire-management and prevention programmes are being blamed for limiting the country’s resources to respond to the fires.
Weekend read
First Person | How the refugee system fails the whistleblowers it should protect
‘If protection is to mean anything, it must extend to those who take the greatest risks – especially those who speak when silence would have been easier.’
A refugee who blew the whistle on human trafficking argues that the refugee system prefers silence.
And finally…
The ironies underlying Trump’s latest immigration ban
The US Department of State has announced it will halt the processing of visas from 75 countries “whose migrants take welfare from the American people at unacceptable rates”, starting 21 January. The list includes everywhere from Afghanistan to Thailand to Guatemala and Jamaica. However, online users have pointed out the strange irony that among the many others on the list are Kuwait, Iran, and Pakistan. Kuwait currently has one of the world’s strongest-performing currencies, with one Kuwaiti dinar trading for $3.27. Meanwhile, the average yearly income for an Iranian family in the US is between $79,000 and $100,000. But Pakistan’s inclusion may end up being the most surprising, as the listing comes only a few months after Islamabad formally nominated Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize, calling him “a genuine peacemaker”. In their statement, Pakistan said Trump demonstrated “commitment to conflict resolution through dialogue” when he took credit for calming tensions between Islamabad and New Delhi last year. This was, of course, before the US president performed his extraordinary rendition of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro to New York City from his home in Caracas in the middle of the night. It was also before he threatened to take military action against Iran if the Islamic Republic harmed protesters, even as his own immigration officials shot civilians (see above).
