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Credit: Attila Kisbenedek/AFP

By Inés M. Pousadela
MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay, May 8 2026 (IPS)

When Péter Magyar took the stage in Budapest on the night of 12 April, he told the crowd they had ‘liberated Hungary’. The hyperbole seemed justified. His party, Tisza, had won a parliamentary supermajority on the highest turnout since Hungary’s first free election in 1990, ending 16 years of increasingly autocratic rule.

An autocracy built in plain sight

Ousted Prime Minister Viktor Orbán boasted of turning Hungary into a model of what he called ‘illiberal democracy’. When he returned to power in 2010, he set about dismantling every institution capable of constraining him. His party, Fidesz, rewrote the constitution, restructured the Constitutional Court and gerrymandered electoral districts so thoroughly that in 2014 and 2018, it won two-thirds of parliamentary seats on under half of the vote.

Public broadcasting became a party mouthpiece, and Orbán-connected oligarchs took over private media. Fidesz captured universities and arts bodies. The government used Pegasus spyware against opponents, demonised migrants and LGBTQI+ people as threats to the nation and passed a law criminalising attendance at Budapest Pride. Civil society organisations faced escalating restrictions on their funding, and the government created a Sovereignty Protection Office to investigate and harass them further. The Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem) index eventually downgraded Hungary to ‘electoral autocracy’ status — the first European Union (EU) member state to receive that designation.

The EU’s blind spot

The EU’s response was inadequate. In 2018, the European Parliament triggered Article 7(1) of the Treaty on European Union, the first step in a procedure that could, in theory, suspend a state’s voting rights. In practice, Article 7 was never fully applied, because doing so requires unanimous agreement among all other member states, and there are always states unwilling to go that far. The Rule of Law Conditionality Regulation, in force since 2022, allowed the EU to freeze up to US$32 billion in funds for Hungary, but this mechanism too was compromised by political calculation. In December 2023, the Commission released around US$12 billion in cohesion funds seemingly in exchange for Hungary lifting its veto on Ukraine aid, effectively trading rule-of-law conditionality for foreign policy compliance.

Ultimately, the EU did not solve its Orbán problem; Hungarian voters did. This suggests structural reforms are still needed to prevent another autocrat from playing the same blocking game Hungary did.

After Orbán

Previous opposition coalitions in Hungary failed partly because Orbán’s machine had a reliable weapon against them: the accusation that they served Brussels, Hungary-born funder George Soros and a cosmopolitan elite detached from Hungarian values. Magyar, a former Fidesz insider who broke with the party in February 2024 following a scandal over a presidential pardon granted to a man convicted of covering up child sexual abuse, was immune to that weapon. His campaign was deliberately post-ideological, focused on corruption, crumbling public services and economic stagnation, while Orbán ran a fear-based campaign centred on the EU and the war in Ukraine. Voters chose economic reality over a manufactured threat. In the end, the electoral architecture Orbán had built to reward the first-placed party converted Tisza’s win into a supermajority of 141 of 199 parliamentary seats.

But Magyar’s victory will not necessarily bring a progressive transformation. He is a conservative politician leading a centre-right party whose platform made no explicit commitment on LGBTQI+ rights. During the campaign, he criticised the Budapest Pride ban as a distraction rather than a rights violation, committing only to protecting freedom of assembly more broadly. His victory speech promised a Hungary where ‘no one is stigmatised for loving someone differently from the majority’, but this was a shift in tone rather than a policy commitment. LGBTQI+ rights are unlikely to regress further under Magyar, but recovery will depend on sustained pressure from civil society.

Orbán may be out of government, but Fidesz appointees remain embedded throughout the state apparatus. Magyar has pledged to invite the European Public Prosecutor’s Office to examine alleged misuses of EU funds, dismantle the Sovereignty Protection Office and drop proposed legislation that would have further extended powers to restrict civil society. Delivering on those pledges and unravelling 16 years of institutional capture will require sustained political will.

Hungarian civil society faces its first genuine opening in 16 years. To make the most of it, it will need to push hard and consistently for the restoration of civic space, the rule of law and LGBTQI+ rights, and not mistake a change of government for a change of direction.

For the EU, Magyar’s victory opens a window to change a decision-making structure that allows a single member state to hold the bloc’s foreign policy hostage. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen’s call for qualified majority voting for foreign policy decisions may now gain traction. But the broader question of how the EU enforces its democratic standards against a member state determined to flout them remains open. The EU should resolve it before the next challenge arises.

Inés M. Pousadela is CIVICUS Head of Research and Analysis, co-director and writer for CIVICUS Lens and co-author of the State of Civil Society Report. She is also a Professor of Comparative Politics at Universidad ORT Uruguay.

For interviews or more information, please contact research@civicus.org

 

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Credit: UKBET (UK Bangladesh Education Trust)

By Mohammed A. Sayem
SYLHET, Bangladesh, May 8 2026 (IPS)

When catastrophic floods swept through the Haor wetlands of Sunamganj in 2022, they destroyed far more than homes and crops. They shattered childhoods.

Jannat was only nine years old when floodwater swallowed her family’s house, farmland, and livestock. Like thousands of displaced families in northeastern Bangladesh, they took shelter in a school building converted into an emergency flood centre. But when the water receded, there was nothing left to return to.

The family migrated to a slum in Sylhet city to survive. Her father, once a farmer in the fertile haor lands, began pulling a rented rickshaw. Her mother started working as a domestic worker. Jannat’s school life ended almost overnight. Instead of carrying books, she began washing dishes and cleaning clothes in another family’s home for food and a small income.

Her story reflects a growing reality across climate-vulnerable Bangladesh. The 2022 floods in Sylhet, Kanaighat, Companygonj and Sunamganj were among the worst in more than a century. United Nations agencies estimated that nearly 7.2 million people across northeastern Bangladesh were affected, including around 3.5 million children. Entire villages disappeared under water, electricity collapsed across districts, schools were turned into emergency shelters, and thousands of hectares of cropland were destroyed. UNICEF reported that 1.6 million children were stranded by the floods, while hundreds of educational institutions and community clinics were damaged or submerged.

Credit: UKBET (UK Bangladesh Education Trust)

The crisis did not end in 2022. In 2024, another devastating wave of flooding inundated nearly 75 per cent of Sylhet district, affecting more than two million people across northeastern Bangladesh and displacing thousands of families yet again. More than 800 schools were flooded and large areas of farmland went underwater, deepening poverty and food insecurity. This year again, heavy rainfall and upstream water flows submerged more than 46,000 hectares of standing Boro rice fields in the haor region during harvesting season, threatening livelihoods and increasing the risk of climate migration and child labour. Experts warn that repeated climate shocks are trapping vulnerable families in a cycle of disaster, displacement, and poverty.

Yet hope can still rise from disaster.

The Doorstep Learning Programme (DLP) of UKBET, a UK-based international NGO working in Bangladesh, was created to support children trapped in domestic labour and other vulnerable situations in urban slums. Rather than waiting for children to return to school on their own, the programme brings education, counselling, and rehabilitation support directly to their communities. Through flexible learning support and family livelihood assistance, it helps children return to education while reducing families’ dependence on child labour for survival.

Credit: UKBET (UK Bangladesh Education Trust)

DLP identified Jannat and supported her return to school alongside her younger brother. The programme also helped her father secure his own rickshaw, giving the family a more stable livelihood and a chance to rebuild their future.

As global leaders gather at the Eighth Assembly of the Global Environment Facility (GEF) in Samarkand, Uzbekistan in May–June 2026 to discuss climate financing and resilience, stories like Jannat’s must remain at the centre of international attention. (Global Environment Facility) Climate change is no longer only about rising temperatures or environmental loss. It is about children losing education, dignity, and hope.

Credit: UKBET (UK Bangladesh Education Trust)

Local community-led initiatives that protect vulnerable children and strengthen climate resilience deserve far greater global investment and support through mechanisms such as the GEF Trust Fund and international adaptation financing.

Because children like Jannat are not victims to be pitied. They are futures worth protecting.

Mohammed A Sayem is Executive Director, UKBET
Sylhet, Bangladesh
msayem@ukbet-bd.org

IPS UN Bureau

 

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UNICEF and partners established the first Primary Health Care (PHC) Centre and Child-Friendly Space/Learning Space in Jabalia, North Gaza on 12 January, 2026. Credit: UNICEF/Rawan Eleyan

By Oritro Karim
UNITED NATIONS, May 8 2026 (IPS)

Despite the implementation of a ceasefire between Hamas and Israel last October, Israeli forces continue to launch airstrikes into the Occupied Palestinian Territory. This has resulted in extensive destruction of infrastructure, loss of human life and exacerbating immense health needs amid an increasingly strained health system in Gaza.

Recent months have marked a significant escalation in hostilities, with routine bombardment pushing communities that have been displaced multiple times to the brink, while continued blockages of humanitarian aid hinder relief efforts and deprive thousands of life-saving services.

“Gaza’s crisis is far from over. For millions of civilians, the emergency is ongoing, relentless, and life-threatening. Food insecurity remains widespread and severe,” said Faten, the International Rescue Committee’s (IRC) Senior Protection Manager in Gaza. “Gaza’s healthcare system has all but collapsed with 94% of Gaza’s hospitals destroyed or damaged.”

Findings from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) underscore the urgent state of crisis in the Gaza Strip. OCHA experts leading a safety report recorded a significant number of security incidents over the past week, noting that the figures are among the highest reported since the declaration of the ceasefire last year. Experts from the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) note that Israeli forces continue to maintain a high level of activity across the Gaza Strip, most notably in the northern region, where the scale of needs is most pronounced.

According to figures from OCHA, between October 7, 2023, and April 29, 2026, a total of 72,599 Palestinians have been killed in the Gaza Strip and another 172,411 injured. UNRWA has also reported that over 391 UN personnel have been killed since the start of the war through May 7. Hostilities from Israeli forces remain a routine part of daily life for Palestinians across Gaza, with UN experts recording airstrikes, shelling, and gunfire across all areas, particularly densely populated ones.

In May, a UNRWA school in Jabalia was struck by gunfire, injuring two displaced civilians residing within the school for shelter. OCHA also recorded two separate incidents in which humanitarian facilities came under fire in May, alongside an airstrike landing near a UN warehouse and a stone-throwing incident that damaged humanitarian relief vehicles. The UN continues to underscore the urgency of all actors complying with international humanitarian law, including all parties’ obligations to facilitate humanitarian operations and protect civilians and civilian infrastructure in all contexts.

Displacement also remains widespread, with over 90 percent of the population having been internally displaced. Many communities have been displaced multiple times, with more than half of the displaced population being children. Thousands of families currently reside in poor-quality makeshift shelters, such as damaged residential buildings and schools, where they face increasingly limited access to basic essential services, such as food, water, fuel and sanitation.

It is estimated that UNRWA currently hosts over 65,000 displaced Palestinians across 82 collective emergency shelters throughout the enclave. Approximately 126 UNRWA displacement sites are located with the Yellow Line, as well as areas within the Orange Line, where humanitarian aid remains subject to Israeli monitoring and intervention.

Many of these displacement sites face severe security concerns, overcrowding, and unsanitary conditions, while health responses fail to keep pace and mitigate the rapid spread of infectious disease and illnesses.

Gaza’s health system has borne the brunt of the crisis, being on the brink of collapse as the immense scale of needs continues to grow every day. Compounded by Israeli blockades on humanitarian aid deliveries, relief efforts have been severely hindered by a lack of supplies, such as batteries, lubricants, and spare parts.

“51 percent of essential medicines are currently at zero stock in Gaza, which is severely limiting the ability to treat patients with life-threatening conditions, including those requiring intensive care and cancer treatment,” said Faten. “Hospitals are overwhelmed, under-resourced, and increasingly unable to provide adequate care.”

Additionally, humanitarian movement remains severely constricted as armored vehicles break down, posing significant security risks to aid personnel as they attempt to assist vulnerable populations. Furthermore, continued restrictions on generators, engine oil, and other key supplies hinder sanitation efforts, debris clearance, food distribution, water trucking, ambulance services, and the delivery of educational and medical supplies.

Over the past several months, UNRWA teams on the frontlines have recorded a significant uptick in rodent infestations across multiple overcrowded displacement shelters across the enclave, being most pronounced in Khan Younis, as well as areas with large amounts of rubble, including northern Gaza.

Heath facilities have also reported a significant increase in the frequency of rat bites, which are linked to the transmission of rodent-borne diseases such as leptospirosis. Efforts to contain the spread of infection are hindered by a severe shortage of pesticides, anti-lice shampoos, and scabicidal medications. As a result, UNRWA has recorded a significant increase in cases of chickenpox, as well as ectoparasitic skin diseases, such as scabies, over the past few months.

“With designated landfills becoming inaccessible during hostilities, the market has been used as a major solid waste dump, with trash now covering an entire city block and exceeding four flights in height,” said Stéphane Dujarric, UN Spokesperson for the Secretary-General during a press briefing on May 7.

“Our sanitation partners report that Gaza’s two sanitary landfills are near the perimeter fence surrounding the Strip, where access needs to be enabled by Israeli authorities. They also stress the need for permissions to bring into Gaza the machinery to remove the waste, the rubble and explosive ordnance, as well as the spare parts required to operate that equipment. These permissions are also critical to address health risks linked to pests and rodents,” Dujarric continued.

Despite immense challenges, UNRWA remains on the frontlines of this crisis, providing lifesaving services to vulnerable, displaced communities. Since October 2023, the agency has conducted over 17.2 million health consultations, including over 71,800 consultations between April 20 and 26 of this year alone. UNRWA continues to support six health centers, four temporary centers, and 28 medical points across the enclave, and have provided psychosocial support services to over 730,000 displaced Palestinians, including 520,000 children. The agency also continues to provide protection services, which have proved to be instrumental as security concerns reach new highs, particularly around displacement sites.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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Le procès en appel de l'affaire du financement libyen de la campagne présidentielle de Nicolas Sarkozy de 2007 se tient à Paris depuis le 16 mars. Condamné en première instance à cinq ans de prison, il avait été détenu 20 jours à l'automne. Résumé de la huitième semaine d'audience, au cours de laquelle l'ancien chef de l'État a dû affronter les avocats de proches de victimes de l'attentat du DC-10. 

A plastic model of the famous “Ghost of Ukraine”, made of plastics that are based on oil products, a shortage of Persian Gulf oil may greatly affect the plastics industry in Asia.

As fluctuations in the oil and gas markets come from almost daily policy changes in the Middle East, purchasers of Persian Gulf dependant oil exports nervously plan contingencies on how to manage possible outcomes. While allies like Europe, South Korea and Japan try to figure out the intricacies of producing and manufacturing with reduced petroleum production, all industries try to adapt while missing key resources. Ironically, the oil based products used to make simple things like a model kit of some of the planes and ships now fighting as American icons in the Persian Gulf might not be able to be produced as the plastics used to make model kits will become harder to obtain with a reduction in petroleum products in places like Japan. Despite this, the larger effect of these policies is a benefit to Western aligned powers in the Asia-Pacific if it denies China the low cost energy imports it would need to fuel a war with Taiwan. While economic pains are temporary, all allied nations from Japan to India to Australia prefer not having to respond to a PLA attack on Taiwan when current Middle Eastern energy policy could prevent the next Great World War from commencing in Asia.

The source of indirect and direct funds and power for regimes like Cuba and China often came through oil supplies from places like Russia and Venezuela, with Venezuela replacing much of the free oil provided to Cuba by the Soviet Union after the Cold War. China was purchasing upwards of 90% of Iran’s sanctioned oil exports while also depending on Venezuelan and Russian oil and gas imports to run its growing economic boom, with many profits from their modern industrialisation going directly into China’s weapons manufacturing industry. While Russian and Iranian oil was sanctioned, many countries sought out low cost energy being sold by those regimes under sanction. With Western powers during the Ukraine War either denying energy exports to their allies, or simply purchasing Russian oil via third party countries that would send re-branded Russian oil into Europe, policies in Allied countries lead to the indirect funding of Russia’s war efforts. Effecting this dark energy exports market is key to ending adversarial funding for conflicts in Ukraine, the Middle East and a future conflict in Asia.

Unlike support by many in Russia for its Government’s actions in Ukraine, most of the Iranian population do not support their Government, and it would likely be the case that a conflict between China and most of their neighbouring countries would not be popularly supported by average citizens in China. The current policy approach in challenging Venezuela and Iran is being done in order to establish deterrent control over oil and gas that could tie any aggression to consequences. If China were to take military action against Taiwan or India, give overwhelming support to their allies, or attempt Covid 2.0 or increases in the Fentanyl trade, the West could strain China’s military complex by starving it of energy resources. This might be preferential to one of the largest naval engagements in human history and a massacre of young soldiers on both sides of the line. It is doubtful that many Chinese nationals would wish to die in that unneeded conflict, especially when they currently one of the most stable economic engines in the world economy with little restrictions by foreign powers on local rights issues. While a conflict with India in the mountain regions would be witnessed by few, a conflict with Taiwan would be seen by millions in cities and regions on the coast of China closest to Taiwan, with massive losses of young men being suffered by every family in the region. For most, the cost of a war with Taiwan is simply not worth the gains.

A thought experiment would be useful in a scenario where we consider not the interests of China’s ruling party elites, but that of the people of China itself. In the current conflict, it would be agreed by those on both sides of the fence that no one wants to put Chinese cities or their citizens in the dark, and like with the Iranian people, the conflict is with the regime and not the people who always made up one of the great cultures of humanity. We must consider that if China was a like minded democracy, what would their strategic initiatives be, and would they maintain the same adversaries due to that strategic position? With a current China and a Mirror Universe China, both countries would be able to maintain a strong industrial base, but like many Western economies, would be destined to be stable at around 3%-4% rate of growth. In both cases, the Government would be subject to the will of its people, with the current Government being afraid of its citizens uprising in tough times and the Mirror Universe version being constrained by elected votes and its international reputation. Both China’s would be challenged by competing economies from India, Japan and South Korea, but would also be integrated with those industries with a commonality of commercial entities present in all markets in the region. China would still look to expand its markets, its influence economically and culturally, and seek lost territories from when they were unable to challenge opposing powers. The difference seems to be one of stability through fear as opposed to peace through innovation, stability and strength. As long as the former is appeased and ignored while threats increase internationally, or overtly accepted as a mean to disrupt and dismantle healthy Western democracies, the potential of not only the Persian and Chinese people, but those young and innovative minds in the West will be subjected to an uncertain future. What is apparent is that freedom is a rare gift, coming from a long tradition of development, ideas and ethics, and is not a commonly occurred achievement throughout the history of human civilisation.

There are worries that processing operations in the country will drag Malaysia into the middle of China-U.S. competition.

One track pursued traditional intelligence collection against Asian governments and defense entities; the other sought to surveil and silence overseas critics.

L'accaparement des terres et des ressources de Palestine n'a pas débuté avec les grandes expulsions de 1948. Au temps du mandat britannique, le mouvement sioniste avait déjà envisagé et engagé un processus de colonisation avancée, qui impliquait l'effacement des populations, des structures et (…) / Israël, Palestine, Histoire, Conflit israélo-arabe, Colonialisme

That three liberal democracies acted against Beijing’s long arm on a single day was not coordinated – but perhaps it should have been.

A proposed Board of Trade will matter only if it can keep ordinary commercial disputes from becoming tests of national resolve.

La fermeture du détroit d'Ormuz par l'Iran en réponse à l'agression israélo-américaine a créé une onde de choc mondiale. Vingt ans de transition « verte » n'ont pas fondamentalement entamé la dépendance de l'humanité au pétrole. Certains pays importateurs tâchent de prévenir les pénuries en (…) / Monde, Golfe, Énergie, Pétrole, Géopolitique, Conflit

The India-Pakistan clashes gave the J-10C a new, highly coveted status: battled-tested.

The NEV industry is China’s best – maybe only – hope for leading a major tech manufacturing sector. But new technologies might erase China’s advantage.

Actuellement en négociations, la future politique agricole commune (PAC) de 2028 à 2034 suscite de nombreux débats entre États membres. En cause, les sommes consacrées à l'agriculture, mais aussi à la protection de l'environnement. Le sujet divise, d'autant que, dans le même temps, se pose la (…) / Normes, Europe, Ukraine, Agriculture

Russia's oil and gas revenues fell sharply in January-April 2026, according to data released by the Russian Finance Ministry. Compared with the same period last year, revenues from oil and gas exports dropped by more than one-third — down 38.3% to 2.298 trillion rubles. The ministry attributed the decline primarily to lower global oil prices. At the same time, non-oil-and-gas revenues increased by 10.2% to 9.423 trillion rubles. The Finance Ministry expects the federal budget to receive 8.919 trillion rubles in oil-and-gas revenues and 31.365 trillion rubles in non-energy revenues over the course of 2026.

None of Pakistan’s recent space achievements would be possible without Chinese help. Is Pakistan building a space program or just leasing one?

The European left can make Europe’s China policy more socially intelligent. But leftists must not forget that Chinese society is more than the Chinese state.

With President Khurelsukh’s state visit to Kazakhstan, and his appearance at the Regional Ecological Summit in Astana, Mongolia has reached both shores of the Caspian. 

The BJP, or its allies, are now in power in all five Indian states that share a border with Bangladesh.

« J'ai prié pour un seul enfant, et Allah m'en a donné cinq ». Bedriya Adem, 35 ans, évoque ce qu'elle a ressenti pendant sa « longue attente » et exprime toute sa joie d'être « bénie avec cinq bébés à la fois ».