Hard Numbers: Duterte's drug war kills kids, global hunger surges, Mexican narcos strike, Japans army thins

June 29, 2020

129: When the Philippines' tough-talking populist president Rodrigo Duterte first took office in 2016, he unleashed a controversial war on drugs that has killed thousands of people and drawn heat from global human rights watchdogs. Now activists say at least 129 children are among the dead — most of them killed by government forces or their allies.

270: The number of people in need of food aid globally could rise to at least 270 million as a result of pandemic-related job losses and vanishing remittances, according to the UN's World Food Program. That's an 82 percent increase over last year, and the WFP says it doesn't have enough money to meet the need.

3: Mexico's Police Chief was seriously wounded and three people were killed in a brazen assassination attempt attributed to a powerful drug cartel. Among the dead were two bodyguards and a bystander. Mexican authorities have long struggled to subdue the cartels — now it looks like that battle is coming straight to the capital.

8: Japan's aging population is having a direct effect on national security. The country currently has an 8 percent shortfall in troops for its Self-Defense Forces, and has missed recruitment targets every year since 2014.

What We’re Watching: Air Crash in India, Time running out for Iran nuclear deal, ICE protests move beyond LA, anti-immigration violence in Northern Ireland

Air India Flight AI171 crashed into the hostel canteen of the B.J. Medical College (BJMC), a well-known medical college in Ahmedabad, India, on June 12, 2025, while students were having lunch inside. Casualties in the building is not known.

West Asia News Agency, Majid Asgaripour/WANA via REUTERS

Hard Numbers: Duterte's drug war kills kids, global hunger surges, Mexican narcos strike, Japans army thins

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Hard Numbers: Duterte's drug war kills kids, global hunger surges, Mexican narcos strike, Japans army thins

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More from GZERO Media

NATO has long had an informal requirement that its members spend 2% of GDP on defense. However, despite decades of urging by successive US presidents, many member states have consistently fallen short of that target.

Prime Minister Mark Carney pledged this week to increase Canada’s military budget to meet NATO’s target this year. It’s not year clear where the money will go.

Canadian and US officials are reportedly approaching at least the framework of a deal covering trade and other issues.

In this episode of Europe in :60, Carl Bildt breaks down Serbia’s evolving foreign policy, and political developments in Poland.

GZEROMEDIA

Subscribe to GZERO Media's newsletter: Signal

The US on Wednesday evacuated nonessential diplomatic and military personnel from Baghdad and several military bases in the region.

The Trump administration wants to slash the budget of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the US’ main medical research institution, by 40% for the next fiscal year.

Flooding in South Africa’s Eastern Cape, the result of snow and heavy rain, has left at least 49 people dead, including several people on a school bus that was swept away by the waters.

An increasingly small proportion of each country’s population was alive during some of the most seminal moments in 20th-century history, altering the worldviews of today’s electorates.

On Saturday, US President Donald Trump activated 2,000 members of the California National Guard to quell protests against Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s deportation efforts in Los Angeles, after small but highly visible demonstrations had popped up across the city in the days prior.