With gold prices the highest they have been in nearly a decade, the quest for the precious metal is heating up in a remote area of Peru where mining and criminal activities overlap. Switzerland, the world's hub for gold refining, is watching closely.

Throughout Latin America, pollution from transport and machinery has been adding to greenhouse gas emissions while causing growing health issues. A Swiss programme based on technology developed for trans-Alpine tunnels has helped Chile become a leader in addressing vehicle smog.

Madrid, Spain - Some of them have not been home for nearly three months. Representing indigenous communities from across the Amazon rainforest, several dozen activists arrived in Europe in October to attend a Vatican synod on the environmental crisis in their region.

Empowered by having put climate issues at the centre of recent parliamentary elections in Switzerland, youth leaders who travelled to Madrid to attend the United Nations climate talks say they are frustrated – and tired – following discussions by negotiators.

The battle over new funding for disaster damages continues to be divisive as diplomats finished a gruelling final week of negotiations at the COP25 climate summit in Madrid.

Overshadowed by events in Madrid, where the United Nations COP25 conference is taking place, activists in the Chilean capital, Santiago, are eager that social justice becomes more central to international climate discussions.

This year, the signal from the scientific community has been loud and clear on climate change: something needs to be done, and soon. But leadership at the United Nations’ annual climate conference appears less clear-cut, and the head of the Swiss delegation is frustrated by hesitation to move ahead. At the vast congress center in the outskirts of the Spanish capital where this year’s UN climate talks are taking place, protesters from around the world, including youth groups and indigenous peopl

These communities have for centuries been the first line of defense for the planet.

Environmental and human exposure to toxic substances is a global crisis, according to a report presented at the United Nations on Oct. 24.

By the end of 2020 the number of Venezuelans to have fled their country will have risen from 4.5 million to 6.5 million, piling further pressure on regional hosts Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru, where rising restrictions and xenophobia are already making life harder for refugees and migrant

Amid numerous alarming environmental reports, the call for action to address climate change has never been so loud. Is the Swiss financial sector stepping up to the plate?

Three years after the death of its authoritarian president Islam Karimov, Uzbekistan’s cotton production remains a sensitive topic among its citizens, many of whom were forced to participate in the annual harvest. A Swiss-backed international programme may help bring back investors after a boycott of Uzbek cotton, but not everyone is sure how much has really changed.

The Switzerland-based multinational wants to expand its copper mining operations in a remote area of the Peruvian Andes. The local community is against the idea, fearing for their health and livelihoods.

Conflict, crime, and political repression often place with weapons and – by extension – the arms trade at the centre of sexual- and gender-based violence around the globe.

Nearly half the world’s rainforests have been lost since the 1960s, and agriculture is the leading culprit, estimated to be responsible for about 80% of deforestation in tropical and subtropical countries between 2000 and 2010. With the planet needing to feed at least 2 billion more people by 2050, pressure on the environment continues to rise.

Palm oil cultivation is booming in Peru, boosting the income of small farmers who supply Swiss food giant Nestlé with the product. But the crop is one of the main drivers of deforestation in this part of the country. Can farmers really “go green” amid so much demand?

New requirements for Venezuelans to hold “humanitarian visas” before entering Peru will drive large numbers of migrants into the informal economy, where they will lose protection, assistance, and government services, aid groups are warning. Peru is the second most popular destination country after Colombia for the more than four million Venezuleans the UN estimates have fled their country’s economic and political meltdown since 2015.

Cameroon’s longtime president Paul Biya’s latest “private visit” to his usual retreat at the Intercontinental Hotel in Geneva has sparked more than its usual mix of political controversy and quiet embarrassment.

After denying the existence of a humanitarian crisis for years and blocking foreign aid, Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro struck an unexpected deal in March to allow the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies to assist his increasingly hungry and sick population. One month after the first shipment of medical supplies and generators arrived in Venezuela, The New Humanitarian spoke to Yves Daccord, director-general of the International Committee of the Red Cross, and IFRC Secretary General Elhadj As Sy to find out how the mission was going.

As the world’s second-deadliest Ebola outbreak ever continues to ravage communities in the Democratic Republic of Congo, international aid groups are reconsidering the way they respond after a string of attacks by armed assailants on health centres.