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This is Jeffrey and Joyce Daniels’ patch of earth

in the middle of the South Pacific

in Vanuatu

on one of 83 remote islands

in a tiny village

on a spit of land

that’s slowly vanishing beneath rising seas.

When Jeffrey was a child, this land was twice as wide. 

Now his home and village are losing ground to the sea year by year.

The entire village must move – but few can afford it.

Some in Vanuatu are pushing back.

They want to sue countries for climate change loss and damage.

They plan to bring the battle from battered communities like Jeffrey’s village to the UN’s top court in The Hague.

Vanuatu is slated to receive $23 million in climate financing.

The damage from April’s Cyclone Harold: $440 million.

From 2015's Cyclone Pam: 2/3rds of GDP.

It’s simply not enough, says Ralph Regenvanu, who leads the push to sue for damages.

Vanuatu, he says, is “always building back after a cyclone or disaster.”

It's locked in costly recovery despite contributing little to climate change.

Climate loss and damage is deeper than violent cyclones or rising seas in Vanuatu and the Pacific.

Seasons are changing. Staple crops, once plentiful, are harder or impossible to grow.  

“It is dying,” Jeffrey says of his island’s agriculture.

Salome Kalo is trying to defend her community.

She helps her neighbours cope – diversified crops, new growing techniques, shared costs as incomes shrink.

But adapting to extreme weather has its limits. She fears her community is reaching theirs.

Will a climate lawsuit work?

There’s no blueprint. There are plenty of hurdles.

Never before has one country sued another for climate change damage.

Legal action will come too late for people like Jeffrey.

His village is already emptying.

The waters creep higher each year.

A graveyard, perched precariously on the tip of his island, will be the first to vanish beneath the waves.

Read the full story: Inside Vanuatu’s climate change fight

✍: Ann Esswein  

📷,🛰️: Felie Zernack

➔ bit.ly/climatelawsuit

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Southeast Asia’s extreme monsoon season continues: After battering the Philippines, Typhoon Goni threatens Vietnam, still reeling from weeks of floods and a barrage of storms.

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What happens when crimes are committed in one of the world’s largest refugee camps? Examining the patchwork justice system in the Rohingya camps.

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Can there be peace without accountability? As Taliban talks begin, a Kabul museum tells stories from an unresolved war – and tries to rewrite 40 years of conflict: Afghanistan’s memory museum pushes for justice by reframing a war

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It's a joy for me to bury them.

Boubacar Wann Diallo, the migrant devoted to finding the names and origins of corpses that wash up on Morocco’s shores: A quest to honour migrant dead.

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The legacy of colonialism and hazard risks: a (virtual) roundtable discussion on the role of Indigenous knowledge and experiences in disaster prevention and response.

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NPR: The living “tree bridges” in northeast India’s Meghalaya State.

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This film is different in that it’s a cutesy, delicate movie about Muslims being cute, not terrorists.

Actress Sasanee Weecharat on a rom-com challenging stereotypes in Thailand.

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Everything that has been done is targeting the refugees.

Overlooked and outnumbered, local communities say they’ve suffered on the margins of the massive Rohingya refugee response. Now, the coronavirus pandemic is adding new fuel to long-held grievances.

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‘Excessive’ rains hit millions across Asia

Unusually heavy monsoon rainfall is driving severe flooding over large swathes of Asia, from northeast India and Bangladesh, to China, Mongolia, and Japan.

The US space agency, NASA, says this year’s flooding has been “excessive”. A map tracking rainfall using satellite data, published today, shows some parts of Asia have seen more than 1,000 milimetres of rain since June.

Scientists say climate change is making extreme weather more unpredictable and more intense. So-called “extreme event attribution” studies have zeroed in on climate change’s role in specific disasters, including heavy pre-monsoon rains that hit northeast Bangladesh in 2017.

While many parts of Asia are now struggling with floods, some areas are conspicuously dry. Parts of Laos are seeing extreme drought conditions, according to the regional Mekong River Commission, and this month’s rains are forecast to be below average.

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An outspoken graffiti artist. A bystander blinded during protests. A pregnant woman navigating military clampdowns. Masrat Zahra's photos explore the shifting role of women and girls amid lockdowns and violence in Kashmir 📷.

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There are thousands of different languages and dialects spoken in India. This map shows the primary language spoken by a majority of the population in each district. Source: Translators without Borders, from 2011 Census of India.

How translators are decoding the coronavirus pandemic for a polyglot nation of 1.3 billion.

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"People are falling down, one by one, like dominoes." 

How coronavirus hit Aden: A Yemeni doctor’s diary. Illustrations by Adly Mirza.

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In Afghanistan, the coronavirus fight goes through Taliban territory.

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“Anyone can be arrested when going out the door.” 

Immigration raids and arrests are fuelling new anxiety for refugees and asylum seekers in Malaysia.

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The numbers do not add up.

The coronavirus gender imbalance: From Afghanistan to Yemen, and Chad to Somalia, far fewer women are testing positive.

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I don’t know if the coronavirus, or missing vaccinations, is more dangerous to my kid.

Pakistan faces a two-pronged problem in scaling up routine immunisation coverage: keeping hospitals and clinics open and accessible, and convincing parents to use them in the middle of a pandemic.