World News in Brief: Updates from Gaza, the West Bank and Afghanistan, UN development reforms, change at the top of WFP

• On June 23, 2026, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian declared that Iran will not engage in negotiations regarding its ballistic missile program. • This stance comes amidst an ongoing conflict involving the United States and Israel, signaling a hardening of Tehran's position on its strategic weaponry.

• President Donald Trump has dismissed claims that no visits are scheduled for International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors, insisting that Iran has already agreed to increased nuclear inspections. • This diplomatic tension occurs alongside ongoing military conflict, as fighting between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon continues despite a renewed ceasefire agreement reached on Friday.

• A new book titled "Regime Change: Inside the Imperial Presidency of Donald Trump" reveals that a former cabinet member referred to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as a "special needs child for the Europeans." • The comments reportedly surfaced during a meeting focused on discussing a proposed minerals deal between the United States and Ukraine.

Matriarchal groups in east and west exhibit distinct click patterns, used to form social structuresFrom “Howdy” to “G’day”, English – like other languages – is rich in dialects. Now researchers have found sperm whales on different sides of the Mediterranean show similar variations in their vocalisations.Sperm whales communicate vocally using sequences of short clicks called codas. However, the rhythmic pattern of these clicks, known as the dialect, can differ between different matriarchal groups. Continue reading...

Autobiographical work Free Me aims to encourage victims to speak out in country where violence against women is risingThere are audible gasps in the auditorium in Nairobi as a husband launches a volley of blows and slaps on his wife and pushes her to the floor. “I wish I could spare you this,” the wife tells the audience. “My husband beat me up as if we were in a bar fight. Except, in a bar someone fights back.”The scene comes from Free Me, an autobiographical play by Gathoni Kimuyu, a Kenyan theatre and TV producer who lived through an abusive marriage. Continue reading...

Church marks 300 years with exhibition and online archive telling of UK’s first Black voters, and history of compassion and protestFrom a family of chimney sweeps including one of Britain’s two earliest documented Black voters, to the mystery of a 19-year-old youth believed enslaved, St Martin-in-the-Fields church on Trafalgar Square still has secrets to share as it marks its 300th anniversary.Standing at the heart of London’s political and cultural life for three centuries, its ranks of engraved memorial stones set into the floor and walls of the crypt and cafe are yielding glimpses into long-forgotten lives of ordinary Londoners. Continue reading...

Jane Allan’s winning Darling portrait prize painting has raised eyebrows after her Doyles art award piece was compared to artist Nicholas HardingAn Australian painter was “clearly influenced” by New York artist Jean-Michel Basquiat in a major prize-winning work, according to the National Portrait Gallery, after she was accused of winning a separate $20,000 prize with “an imitation” of a Nicholas Harding piece.The National Portrait Gallery has declined to comment further on the marked similarities between a 1982 work by Basquiat, Untitled (Two Heads on Gold), and a work by Lennox Head artist Jane Allan, titled Weight of the Mind’s Periapt. Continue reading...

Party colleagues concerned opposition leader was missing an opportunity to differentiate Coalition from One NationFollow our Australia news live blog for latest updatesGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastAngus Taylor has attempted to clarify comments on multiculturalism after his five non-answers on Tuesday which left colleagues dumfounded and questioning the opposition leader’s approach to One Nation.As senior Liberals lined up endorse to Australia’s cultural diversity on Wednesday, outspoken backbencher, Andrew McLachlan, went further, challenging his leader to “embrace the reality of modern Australia”. Continue reading...

Nancy Lacore will spearhead effort to flip Republican House seat in November’s midterm electionsA three-star navy rear-admiral fired by Pete Hegseth last year in the defense secretary’s purge of senior US military officials has won the Democratic primary in a closely watched congressional race.Nancy Lacore secured the party’s nomination for the US House of Representatives in South Carolina’s first congressional district on Tuesday after defeating Mac Deford, a US Coast Guard veteran, in a runoff. Continue reading...

JFK’s grandson Jack Schlossberg fails to advance in election to replace Jerry Nadler in Manhattan districtZohran Mamdani’s growing influence over the Democratic party was on show in New York City on Tuesday as three congressional candidates endorsed by New York’s democratic socialist mayor won closely watched primaries.Brad Lander, the former New York City comptroller who also ran for mayor last year before endorsing Mamdani, won his race comfortably, defeating the Democratic representative Dan Goldman. Continue reading...

China’s LineShine debuts at number one in Top500 – a list sometimes viewed as a national measure of global tech prowessA supercomputer in China now outranks its US counterparts as the world’s most powerful. It is the first time since 2017 that a Chinese computer has topped a list sometimes viewed as a measure of a nation’s technological prowess.The LineShine computer in Shenzhen displaced top-ranked US computer El Capitan in the Top500 rankings released on Tuesday. It was LineShine’s debut on the list. Continue reading...

Judge vacates administrations policies, finding actions of ICE and another government arm ‘arbitrary and capricious’A federal ⁠judge in California vacated the ⁠Trump administration’s ​nationwide policies expanding arrests at immigration courthouses and the duration for detaining noncitizens in short-term facilities, finding the actions of US Immigration ⁠and Customs Enforcement and another government arm “arbitrary and capricious”.US district judge P Casey Pitts of the northern district of California on Tuesday vacated ICE’s ⁠policies that had rescinded previous strictures on arrests at immigration courthouses and allowed detainees to ​be held in short-term cells for up ‌to 72 hours. He ‌did the same for a similar policy undertaken by the US Department of Justice’s ‌executive office for immigration review that removed limits on courthouse arrests. Continue reading...