Just weeks before an international conference on climate change, the United Nations signaled it was scaling back expectations of reaching agreement on a new treaty to slow global warming. Janos Pasztor, director of the secretary-general's Climate Change Support Team, said Monday "it's hard to say how far the conference will be able to go" because the U.S. Congress has not agreed on a climate bill, and industrialized nations have not agreed on targets to reduce their carbon dioxide emissions or funding to help developing countries limit their discharges.

On the face of it, a commitment by all United Nations member states to reach an understanding on how the world body should intervene to stop genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing would not seem like a major stretch. But the debate scheduled in the General Assembly for Thursday over the concept, known as "the responsibility to protect," is producing rancor before it even begins. So much, in fact, that instead of figuring out how to enforce the doctrine, the General Assembly could end up debating the policy's validity all over again, even though about 150 world leaders already endorsed it in 2005.

The UN World Food Programme (WFP) on Tuesday announced a $214-million roll-out directed at 14 global "hunger hotspots". The measure comes as nearly one billion poor people worldwide grapple with the "unrelenting global high food and fuel price crisis", the Rome-based WFP said in a statement. The $214 million will help provide food rations to highly vulnerable groups; continuing to feed school-aged children even while school is out and giving supplemental food to pregnant women and young children whose mental and physical development is at stake, WFP said. In addition, the money expands food assistance to urban areas hardest hit by high food prices, including through vouchers and support for small farmers and markets in countries where WFP will purchase food assistance locally.

The request by the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court for an arrest warrant against the president of Sudan focuses attention on one of the greatest challenges of international relations: whether and how to seek justice during an ongoing conflict, when the worst of the accused perpetrators still hold great power. Luis Moreno-Ocampo, the ICC's chief prosecutor, gave advance warning of his intentions, telling the United Nations Security Council last month that he intended to pursue the highest officials for serious crimes in Darfur. Sudan's government responded by making threats intended to intimidate the court. The international community, including humanitarian organizations feeding and protecting tens of thousands of civilians in Darfur, feared damage to the sputtering peace talks on Darfur; damage to an already weakened North-South Sudan peace agreement; even a forced exodus of peacekeepers and humanitarian workers.

After a decade-long campaign of intimidation in northern Uganda that displaced more than 1.5 million people into camps, Kony finally seemed to be cornered and running out of options. With his forces chased into Garamba National Park in the northeast of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kony's emissaries entered peace talks two years ago and promised demobilization. A peace agreement ceremony was set for April 10 in the Sudanese town of Ri-Kwangba near the Congo border. Hundreds of delegates, journalists and observers arrived. But after a series of confused excuses -- too many people, not enough security -- it became clear that Kony had no intention of showing up or giving up.

It's a shame that the Iraq war has made it impossible to advocate regime change, because Zimbabwe's strongman, President Robert Mugabe, is such a deserving candidate. While the CIA has been dutifully keeping its powder dry, Mugabe, a despot who lacks oil or nuclear weapons, has become an increasingly lethal menace to his own people.

Catholics and Muslims united to help Buddhists on Wednesday, as South Florida religious leaders announced a joint collection to benefit cyclone victims in Myanmar. The collection is set to start this weekend at 18 mosques in Palm Beach, Broward and Miami-Dade counties, plus the 120 parishes and missions in the Archdiocese of Miami. Their goal is raising funds for Myanmar, a mainly Buddhist nation hit May 3 by Cyclone Nargis. The United Nations expects the death toll to reach 100,000, and nearly 2 million people need emergency aid.

Zimbabwe’s ruling party, bent on retaining control after 28 years in power, has broadened its campaign of intimidation and violence to include teachers and even aid workers, disrupting education and basic care for tens of thousands of children across the country, according to humanitarian groups, union officials and the teachers themselves. Teachers have been upbraided by the ruling party for allegedly siding with the opposition during the nation’s disputed March elections, in which they served as poll monitors. More than 2,700 of them have fled or been evicted from classrooms, the teachers’ union says.

The number of dead and missing in the Burma cyclone soared past 60,000 Tuesday amid signs the toll will rise even higher, as much of the disaster zone remained flooded by seawater, threatened by disease and out of reach of an international relief operation that is taking shape. President Bush offered to send U.S. Navy units to help in the operation, and sharply criticized Burma's military-run government for delays in approving visas for emergency teams. Burmese dissident groups took issue with the timing of the administration's criticism, suggesting it could complicate the relief effort.

How can the world's hungriest schoolchildren be denied meals while the farm bill being debated in a House-Senate conference provides millions in subsidies for wealthy farmers? That's what Congress proposes. In all fairness, it should not become law. We are puzzled that Congress wants to increase overall farm bill spending by billions of dollars yet reduce by more than 90 percent the mandatory funding to feed hungry children. The program at issue saves lives and has a proven ability to break the cycle of poverty and hopelessness in poor countries.