22 October 2026, as the history books will tell it on 22 October 2036.

For a brief moment in October 2026, things seemed to be moving in the war in Ukraine. In the first half of the month the US eased its sanctions on Russian diesel until April 2027, and then waived the main measures of a new sanctions law against Russia, including tariffs of up to 100 per cent on major buyers of Russian oil and gas.^1,2,3,4 President Trump also said: “I think it’s time for Ukraine to get a new president.”^5,6

Historians see those weeks as the moment the pressure changed direction. It was not the aggressor that had to give ground, but the country under attack. An ‘energy ceasefire’ announced by Trump on 11 October did not stop Russian attacks on Ukrainian energy facilities.^7,8

newAfter talks between US envoy Steve Witkoff and Vladimir Putin on 21 October, the Kremlin said Russia was willing to resume three-way talks with the US and Ukraine after 10 November. President Zelensky said Ukraine supported this.^9,10,11,12 newWithin hours, Russian missiles and drones struck Kyiv, wounding 15 people according to the city’s mayor.^10,12

From those weeks Moscow drew the lesson that would shape the rest of the decade: keep fighting, and the concessions will come.

On 10 October 2025 a ceasefire took effect in Gaza.^1,3 Even so, by 20 October 2026 more than 1,500 Palestinians had been killed since it took effect, according to the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza.^4,5,6 In early October 2026 the death toll since the Hamas attack of 7 October 2023 stood at more than 74,000, according to the same ministry.^2,3

The ceasefire never became more than a ceasefire on paper. Reconstruction never got under way, because no one wanted to pay for what might be destroyed again the next day. A generation of children grew up among the rubble, without schooling and without prospects. Without a political solution, radicalisation grew on both sides.

On 9 October 2026 the South African jurist Navi Pillay, a former judge at the International Criminal Court, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. A few hours later the Trump administration imposed sanctions on the court itself. Secretary of State Marco Rubio declared: “Either the ICC will end its threats, or we will end the ICC.”^1,2,4 The court called the sanctions an assault on the rule of law and on the very foundations of the international legal order, and wrote: “History will judge this moment.”^1,3

In the history books of 2036, the verdict is harsh. Many transactions with the court were initially covered by a six-month grace period.^1,2,5 When it expired in April 2027, banks, insurers and software suppliers pulled out. The court was largely paralysed and a handful of member states withdrew. Trump had already called for this at the UN General Assembly on 22 September 2026: “I call on all nations that are members of the ICC to officially resign from this rogue institution immediately.”^6,7 The next day the Pacific island nation of Nauru notified the UN that it was leaving the court; the withdrawal takes effect after one year.^8,9

With that, the last place where leaders could be held to account for war crimes disappeared. What that meant can be seen in Sudan (§ 4.1).

After US-Israeli strikes on Iran on 28 February 2026, Iran closed the Strait of Hormuz; from 13 April the US blockaded Iranian ports.^1,2,3,4 On 8 July, after Iranian attacks on merchant ships and US counter-strikes, Trump declared the interim ceasefire over.^5,6 On 20 October, according to Iranian state television, Iran’s security chief told Pakistan’s army chief that no enriched uranium would leave the country, and that there would be no talks with the US until its conditions were met.^7,8 newThe next day the US imposed sanctions on a law firm, a ship manager and shipping agents that it said helped Iran’s ‘shadow fleet’ of oil tankers. By then the price of Brent crude oil had risen to nearly 112 dollars a barrel, its highest level in five months.^9,10,11,12

Fuel prices even became a factor in the war in Ukraine (§ 1.1). The fuel crisis of 2026 thus struck war, the economy, hunger and the climate all at once. Governments subsidised fossil fuels to head off unrest, and investment in the energy transition was put off year after year (§ 5.1).

On 13 October 2026 the IMF projected global growth of 3.1 per cent for 2026 and global inflation of 4.7 per cent. That forecast assumed oil and gas shipments through the Strait of Hormuz would resume by March 2027.^1,2 They did not, and inflation stayed high.

The IMF also found that just 32 economies accounted for 95 per cent of global growth, down from 54 in April. It warned of an AI-related stock market correction, rising government bond yields and high public debt.^1,2 According to the IMF, low-income countries were spending 14 per cent of their government revenue on debt payments, up from 6 per cent a decade earlier.^3,4 The warnings came true. The market correction hit pension funds and savers, and heavily indebted governments were in no position to step in. The gap between the few countries that shared in the gains and everyone else became the economic story of the decade.

On 26 October 2025, after a siege of some eighteen months, the RSF militia took the Sudanese city of El Fasher.^1,2,3 In early November 2025 the IPC, the international hunger classification system, officially confirmed famine in El Fasher and Kadugli.^4,5 On 12 October 2026 the IPC warned of a growing risk of famine in Darfur and Kordofan, driven by war, displacement and drought.^6,7 On 19 October a drone strike on a market in Abyei, an area disputed between Sudan and South Sudan, killed at least 153 people, according to local officials. They blamed Sudan’s army; a Sudanese officer told AP the army was targeting RSF fuel tankers.^8,9 newOn 21 October 22 countries and several international organisations met in Geneva, under the auspices of the UN and Switzerland, to coordinate peace efforts. Neither Sudan’s army-led government nor the RSF took part. The meeting concluded that there was no military solution and urged outside powers to stop supplying drones, fighters and money, but no ceasefire was agreed.^10,11

Hunger then spread across Kordofan, and the country effectively broke apart into territories held by rival armies. Because the International Criminal Court was being strangled at the same time (§ 2.1), no one was put on trial for starving whole cities. The history books of 2036 call Sudan the crisis the world watched and allowed to happen.

The UN World Food Programme projected that 318 million people would face crisis-level hunger or worse in 2026, more than double the number in 2019. Because of funding cuts, it said it could help only about a third of them. The US, the largest donor, cut its foreign aid, and other donor countries also cut back.^1,2,3

What that meant became clear in Gaza (§ 1.2). On 19 October 2026 the World Food Programme announced that, for lack of funding, it was cutting food aid there by about a third: 500,000 people would lose their monthly support and food parcels would be halved.^7,8,9

In the years that followed, rich countries shifted even more money to defence and energy (§ 1.1, § 3.1). Those who received no help took to the road. On the night of 8 to 9 October 2026 an overcrowded migrant boat bound for Yemen capsized off the coast of Djibouti. According to the UN migration agency IOM, at least 139 people died, 15 of them children.^4,5,6 In hindsight it was not an isolated incident but an omen. The debate on migration hardened, leaving even less political room to tackle the causes.

In May 2026 the World Health Organization (WHO) declared an Ebola outbreak in eastern Congo a public health emergency of international concern.^1,2 The outbreak involved the Bundibugyo strain of the virus, for which there is no approved vaccine or treatment.^1,3 By 20 October Congo had recorded more than 9,500 confirmed infections and more than 4,600 deaths, according to government figures.^4,5 It was the second-largest Ebola outbreak on record.^4,6 Cases were also confirmed in Uganda and Kenya.^4,7,8 Uganda declared its outbreak over in late August.^4,13 On 20 October Nigeria confirmed its first case; according to the WHO, it was the fifth country to detect the virus in this outbreak.^12,13

Uganda closed its border with Congo in May.^8,11 The US admitted travellers who had been in Congo only once they had spent 21 days outside the country.^4,10 The WHO had advised against closing borders, and reported serious gaps in funding for the response.^1,7,8,9

Historians see the outbreak as a test: do countries close their borders, or do they help pay for the response? The world mostly chose the former. The virus kept circulating in East Africa well into 2027, and when the next epidemic arrived, vaccines and emergency funds were once again missing.

The COP31 climate summit was scheduled for 9 to 20 November 2026 in Antalya, with Türkiye as host. Following the previous summit in Belém, Brazil, it was to focus on implementation: turning the climate goals into action.^1,2 In early October the World Meteorological Organization and the Copernicus climate service reported a rapidly strengthening El Niño, with record sea temperatures in the Pacific.^3,4 newOn 21 October the WMO warned that sea temperatures in the tropical Pacific could reach an unprecedented 3.8 degrees above average between November and January.^8,9 On 21 October the UN Environment Programme calculated that the world was heading for 2.6 degrees of warming by 2100 if countries kept to their climate plans, and 2.8 degrees under current policies. That was about 0.1 degrees worse than a year earlier, partly because the US had left the Paris Agreement.^5,6,7

The strong El Niño made the following year especially hot. The summit took place in the middle of the fuel crisis (§ 3.1), and short-term concerns won out. Countries kept their targets on paper, but implementation slipped. Around 2030, warming permanently exceeded 1.5 degrees. In the 2030s, the debate in coastal countries from Bangladesh to Egypt shifted from how to prevent it to how much protection against the sea would cost, and who would pay.