The final meeting of African nations' climate negotiators ahead of the global U.N. summit kicks off in the Namibian capital Windhoek on Monday, with participants expected to focus on how to ramp up renewable energy on the continent.

Organizers of the annual Climate Change and Development in Africa conference said the meeting serves as the final chance for the continent's negotiators, government officials, climate scientists, grassroots civil societies and farming associations to fine tune the continent's interests and agree on a common position to promote at the climate summit in Egypt in November, known as COP27.

This year's United Nations climate summit is brought to you by Coke.

Soft drink giant Coca-Cola Co.'s sponsorship of the flagship U.N. climate conference, known as COP27, sparked an online backlash and highlighted broader concerns about corporate lobbying and influence.

The devastating floods in South Sudan have blocked aid from reaching displaced people, the U.N. said Friday, warning that a camp housing 75,000 Sudanese refugees would receive no food this month.

The world's newest nation is reeling from four consecutive years of flooding, with two-thirds of the country and more than 900,000 people now directly impacted by the floodwaters, according to the United Nations.

Just months after enduring floods that destroyed crops and submerged entire communities, thousands of families in the Brazilian Amazon are now dealing with severe drought that, at least in some areas, is the worst in decades. The low level of the Amazon River, at the center of the largest drainage system in the world, has put dozens of municipalities under alert.

The fast-decreasing river water level is due to lower-than-expected rainfall during August and September, according to Luna Gripp, a geosciences researcher who monitors the western Amazon's river levels for the Brazilian Geological Survey.

A pair of giant pandas sent as a gift from China arrived in Qatar on Wednesday ahead of next month's World Cup.

They will take up residence in an indoor enclosure in the desert nation designed to duplicate conditions in the dense forests of China's mountainous Sichuan province. Eight hundred kilograms (nearly 1,800 pounds) of fresh bamboo will be flown in each week to feed them.

The Indian government's flagship program to encourage individual and collective action on climate was launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the United Nations Secretary-General on Thursday.

Mission Life, where "life" is an acronym for "lifestyle for environment," is designed to encourage individual behaviors like switching off vehicle engines at traffic lights, turning off taps when not in use and switching to longer-lasting alternatives to single-use plastic bags. The government estimates those actions, if taken on a national scale, could significantly limit emissions, water use and waste.

A British watchdog Wednesday hit out at HSBC for adverts promoting its green initiatives that failed to highlight the bank's contributions to greenhouse gas emissions.

After losing four relatives to respiratory illness, Zeina Matar fled her hometown north of Lebanon's capital where she says a decaying power plant generates little electricity but very deadly pollution.

Around 34,000 homes could be inundated or isolated in Victoria state as a flood emergency continues across parts of Australia's southeast, an official said Monday.

Victoria is the worst-affected state with some towns experiencing the highest river peaks in decades. The states of New South Wales and Tasmania were also experiencing flooding in an emergency that began last week.

The chair of an influential negotiating bloc in the upcoming United Nations climate summit in Egypt has called for compensation for poorer countries suffering from climate change to be high up on the agenda.

Madeleine Diouf Sarr, who chairs the Least Developed Countries group, told The Associated Press that the November conference — known as COP27 — should "capture the voice and needs of the most climate-vulnerable nations and deliver climate justice."