World
‘It’s going to be worse’: Brazil braces for more pain amid record flooding
The death toll has climbed to 56 in Brazil’s southern Rio Grande do Sul state, with tens of thousands displaced.
Overpowering floods and mudslides caused by torrential rains are continuing to sweep southern Brazil, killing at least 56 people and forcing tens of thousands out of their homes, the government said.
As well as raising the death toll on Saturday, the country’s civil defence agency said rising water levels in the state of Rio Grande do Sul were straining dams and threatening the metropolis of Porto Alegre.
Triggered by storms that began on Monday, the flooding is only expected to get worse, local authorities said, as rescuers scoured the ruins of washed-out homes, bridges, and roads for missing people.
“Forget everything you’ve seen, it’s going to be much worse in the metropolitan region,” Governor Eduardo Leite said on Friday as the state’s streets were submerged.
‘Nothing could be saved’
The flooding, Brazil’s worst in 80 years, has so far affected at least 265 municipalities in Rio Grande do Sul, according to the southernmost state’s civil defence department.
It has injured at least 74 people, displaced more than 24,000, and left 350,000 with some form of property damage.
“Nothing could be saved,” said Claudio Almiro, who lost his home and possessions to the flooding.
“Many people have even lost their lives. I raise my hand to heaven and thank God that I’m alive.”
Residents in several cities and towns have been left completely cut off from the world, with no electricity or telephone access, while others have been forced to abandon their livestock.
“You don’t know if the water will continue to rise or what will happen to the animals, they may soon drown,” said Raul Metzel, from Capela de Santana, north of the state’s capital.
Five days in, as the rainfall shows no signs of letting up, four of the state’s dams are at risk of collapsing, creating the risk of a new “emergency situation”, according to civil defence officials.
Brazil’s federal government has sent aircraft, boats and more than 600 soldiers to help clear roads, distribute food, water and mattresses, and set up shelters, while local volunteers have also helped with search efforts.
‘Disastrous cocktail’
Climatologist Francisco Eliseu Aquino said the devastating storms were the result of a “disastrous cocktail” of global warming and the El Nino weather phenomenon.
South America’s largest country has recently experienced a string of extreme weather events, including a cyclone in September that killed at least 31 people.
Aquino said the region’s particular geography meant it was often confronted by the effects of tropical and polar air masses colliding – but these events have “intensified due to climate change”.
And when they coincide with El Nino, a periodic warming of the waters in the tropical Pacific, the atmosphere becomes more unstable, he said.
World
‘Criminal Minds’ Star Paget Brewster Tells TV Journalist to ‘Work at a Shelter’ After Mixed Review, Sparking Outrage From Other Critics
“Criminal Minds” star Paget Brewster lashed out at ScreenRant staffer Shealyn Scott over X on Saturday afternoon for her story lamenting the changes Paramount+ has brought to the long-running procedural drama.
“Hello critic Shealynn Scott,” Brewster wrote in the since-deleted post. “You’re young. You don’t know that bad pics and bad reviews can lead to 350 people losing their jobs. Sell vintage. Work at a shelter. Do something better than what you do now. Because right now you suck.”
Film and TV critics were quick to hit back in the replies. David Rooney, chief film critic at The Hollywood Reporter, wrote in his response to Brewster, “This is a very bad look. An actor on a long-running show attacking a young reviewer who contextualizes her respectful criticisms with obvious knowledge of the material — says way more about u being thin-skinned than it does about her professionalism. ‘Work at a shelter,’ really?!”
Senior ScreenRant writer Andy Behbakht also came to the defense of Scott, writing, “This is disgusting behavior on your part, and really tragic to see you tearing down a young female journalist whom you are literally telling that she ‘sucks’ and that she shouldn’t be in the field that she is in. I stand by my colleague, and you owe her an apology.”
Brewster released an apology for the post on Sunday. She wrote on X, “Hi guys, I was mean to Shealyn Scott last night and I profoundly regret it. Shame on me for insulting a human being for doing their job. I’m very sorry, Shealyn. And I’m sorry to those who follow me that you saw me behave like that. Turns out, last night, I sucked.”
“Criminal Minds” premiered its 15th and final season on CBS in 2020, and then was revived for Paramount+ in 2022 under the title “Criminal Minds: Evolution.” Scott’s piece discussed the changes “Criminal Minds” underwent when it went from linear to streaming.
“From details as small as a ratings change to TV-MA— which allows David Rossi (Joe Mantegna) and Emily Prentiss (Paget Brewster) the occasional heated expletive— to new main cast members like Tyler Green (Ryan-James Hatanaka), there’s no doubt that ‘Criminal Minds: Evolution’ has its own unique identity,” Scott wrote in her story. “Plenty of the continuation’s changes have been received warmly, and ‘Criminal Minds’ unquestionably still works as a gripping crime drama, but there are just as many tweaks that feel more like downgrades— including the new 10-episode season structure. Though logical in theory, the shortened seasons are unfortunately working against ‘Criminal Minds’’ greatest strengths.”
World
Meloni’s spat with Trump is calculated strategy to boost her approval ratings: expert
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Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s escalating feud with President Donald Trump is nothing but a calculated political strategy aimed at boosting her standing at home, a leading Italian political analyst told Fox News Digital on Sunday.
After the row between Trump and Meloni escalated on June 20, analysts also said the Italian leader may see little downside in confronting Trump, particularly as she faces declining approval ratings ahead of Italy’s 2027 general election.
The diplomatic dispute had reached a boiling point after Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani announced June 19 that he was scrapping a trip to Washington, where he had been scheduled to meet Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
“Giorgia Meloni must have calculated that a public row with Trump yields no tangible consequences, other than an increase in her domestic and international standing,” Mattia Diletti, a political science lecturer at Sapienza University of Rome, said.
TRUMP SAYS MELONI ‘WANTS TO BE FRIENDS AGAIN’ AFTER ITALY REFUSED TO HELP US AMID IRAN WAR
Giorgia Meloni said President Trump’s statements were “completely made up” and that “neither I nor Italy ever beg.” (Mandel NGAN / POOL / AFP via Getty Images; Bastien Ohier / Hans Lucas / AFP via Getty Images))
Giovanni Orsina, a political scientist at Rome’s Luiss University, also told the Financial Times that the row would offer a “positive image” for Meloni and a “silver lining” to a confrontation she had “desperately tried to avoid.”
The friction between Trump and Meloni intensified after an interview broadcast by Italy’s La7 television network, where the president claimed she had asked for a photograph with him at the G7 summit and that he agreed only out of pity.
“She begged me to take a picture with her,” Trump said. “She wanted a picture with me so badly. I wouldn’t have taken it, but I felt sorry for her.”
RUBIO MEETS MELONI AS TRUMP–POPE CLASH CLASH ESCALATES US STRAINS WITH KEY EUROPEAN ALLY
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni attends her annual press conference in Rome on Jan. 9, 2026, addressing government priorities and policy challenges for the year ahead. (Antonio Masiello/Getty Images)
Meloni fired back, releasing a video statement on X rejecting the president’s narrative.
“I am frankly stunned,” Meloni said in the video message. “I don’t know why the president of the United States behaves this way toward his own allies. But there’s one thing he must remember: Neither I nor Italy ever beg.”
Trump doubled down on Truth Social and tied the row directly to Meloni’s political fortunes.
“Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni asked, over and over, for a picture with me during the G7 meeting in France,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
“She is doing poorly in Italy with her level of popularity, possibly because she turned down the United States of America… when it came to denying Iran from obtaining or developing a nuclear weapon … She wouldn’t even let us use Italy’s landing strips or runways, a great logistical inconvenience … Now, after the United States defeated Iran militarily, she wants to be friends again in order to get her ‘numbers up.’ No thanks!!!”
Within hours, Meloni responded on social media: “As for my popularity, being your friend certainly has not helped it … My popularity depends on my ability to defend Italy’s national interest… In any case, my popularity is none of your concern. I suggest you focus on yours.”
TRUMP ‘RIGHT TO BE OUTRAGED’ BY EUROPE’S BETRAYAL ON IRAN, SAYS FORMER THATCHER ADVISOR
Rubio will travel to Italy on Wednesday for meetings with Pope Leo and Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni. (Maria Grazia Picciarella/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)
The back-and-forth marks a reversal for two leaders who once enjoyed a close political alignment.
When Meloni first came to power, she positioned herself as a bridge between Washington and Brussels while pushing ties with Trump based on shared nationalism and stances on immigration.
“Politically, Trump has favored Meloni,” Diletti noted, pointing out that she had previously visited Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida in 2025. She was the only European Union leader to attend his second inauguration.
The cracks also appeared in April when Trump criticized Meloni for siding with Pope Leo XIV’s condemnation of the U.S. conflict with Iran.
On Sunday, Trump also criticized Italy and Giorgia Meloni over their approach to Iran, accusing the NATO ally of failing to help confront Tehran’s nuclear ambitions.
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“As the 2027 Italian general election approaches, Meloni is facing a decline in approval ratings for the first time,” Diletti explained.
“The opportunity to counter a President so unpopular in Europe and Italy helps bolster her approval ratings and allows her to build European solidarity,” he claimed.
World
Mourners gather to remember Lebanese conservationist killed by Israel
Renowned turtle conservationist Mona Khalil had been wounded in an Israeli attack in southern Lebanon.
Published On 21 Jun 2026
Mourners have gathered in Beirut to pay their respects to a much-loved Lebanese conservationist who died from wounds caused by an Israeli strike on her home on the country’s southern coast.
Mona Khalil, 77, who spent more than two decades protecting sea turtles along Lebanon’s coastline, was critically injured in the attack in the village of al-Mansouri in Tyre province on June 4 and succumbed to her wounds more than two weeks later, on Friday.
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News of her death triggered an outpouring of grief among environmentalists and those who volunteered and worked with her over the years, many of whom gathered in Beirut on Sunday.
The Orange House Project, which Khalil helped build into a small conservation hub and ecotourism site in al-Mansouri, became a refuge for endangered loggerhead and green sea turtles and a training ground for volunteers documenting nesting activity along the coast.
Khalil was born in Lagos, Nigeria, in 1949. She held Dutch as well as Lebanese citizenship, having lived in the Netherlands before returning to Lebanon and settling in what had once been her grandmother’s home – the building that would later become known as the Orange House.
At the heart of Khalil’s work was a narrow stretch of coastline, al-Mansouri beach, where a fleeting encounter with a turtle that had emerged from the ocean to lay its eggs in 1999 propelled her on a lifelong journey devoted to animals.
Each nesting season, Khalil and volunteers would patrol the beach at night, marking fresh tracks in the sand and carefully relocating vulnerable nests away from human activity and coastal light pollution.
Journalist and environmental activist Fadia Jomaa first met Khalil in 2016 while researching sea turtles in Lebanon and then decided to volunteer with her project.
During the previous war between Israel and the Lebanese armed group Hezbollah in 2024, Khalil initially refused to leave al-Mansouri beach, Jomaa said. The Lebanese army ultimately persuaded her to evacuate for her safety.
“She was the last one to leave the area,” Jomaa noted.
“She had an awful time in Beirut,” the journalist said, adding that Khalil longed to return to the south, to the Orange House and the beach she had spent years protecting.
“She used to say, ‘My soul will stay here,’” Jomaa said, recalling conversations in which Khalil would point to an olive tree or a small hill overlooking al-Mansouri beach. “She used to say, ‘This is where you will bury me.’”
Where Khalil will ultimately be buried remains uncertain and is tied to the security situation in the area, Jomaa said.
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