At least 10 people have been killed and three are missing in flooding in the central Chinese province of Hunan, state media report.

Storms have pummeled the province since the beginning of the month, with some monitoring stations reporting historic levels of rainfall, the Xinhua News Agency said late Wednesday.

The trade group representing the cruise ship industry unsuccessfully pushed international authorities to water down new environmental regulations despite its members' climate commitments, experts in marine air pollution warn. Late last month, the International Maritime Organization rejected a cruise industry effort that would have improved cruise ships' carbon pollution scores. Environmental groups say it also would have led to more air pollution by allowing cruise liners to continue with business as usual.

The Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA) has membership that accounts for 95% of global cruise trips. Its four biggest members, Carnival Cruise Line, Royal Caribbean, Norwegian Cruise Line and MSC Cruises, tout their climate awareness and have all committed to drastically cutting emissions.

Hungarian Ambassador Csaba Korosi has been elected as the next president of the U.N. General Assembly, and he warned immediately that the world is in the throes of a dangerous crisis and the credibility of the United Nations is at stake.

Korosi, who takes over the presidency of the 193-member world body in September, said there is "a red alert" for the global climate and crises in food, energy and water supplies. In addition, he said, people everywhere are still affected by the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic, "the global economy is at the threshold of recession and the sovereign debts are at an unprecedented level."

Rescue teams scrambled to douse a massive blaze in Lebanon's largest pine forest on Wednesday that authorities said could be deliberate, as the country braced for another summer of fires.

The fire in the northern Dinniyeh region broke out on Tuesday night, prompting the army and volunteer firefighters to intervene to try to salvage one of the Middle East's lushest pine forests.

Moussa Fatimi's wheat field was once part of a thriving Syrian breadbasket. Now, he can't even grow enough to feed his family, and the land has been turned over to animals.

Fatimi's crop has withered from a climate crisis, adding to fears of supply shortages sparked by the war in Ukraine as Syria grapples with record-high rates of food insecurity.

U.S. wildlife officials have agreed to revise the critical habitat designation for Florida manatees, which have been dying in record numbers because water pollution is killing a main food source.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said in a court settlement made public Wednesday that it will publish a proposed revision by Sept. 12, 2024. The agreement comes in a long-running court case involving the Center for Biological Diversity, Defenders of Wildlife and the Save the Manatee Club.

Scientists have discovered the world's largest plant off the Australia coast — a seagrass meadow that has grown by repeatedly cloning itself.

Genetic analysis has revealed that the underwater fields of waving green seagrass are a single organism covering 70 square miles (180 square kilometers) through making copies of itself over 4,500 years.

A quick-thinking custodian safely confined a curious cougar in an empty classroom after it entered a Northern California high school Wednesday morning, authorities said.

The custodian was opening Pescadero High for the school day when the juvenile mountain lion was spotted, said Detective Javier Acosta with the San Mateo County Sheriff's Office. No students or teachers were on campus at the time, Acosta said.

Hurricane Agatha made history as the strongest hurricane ever recorded to come ashore in May during the eastern Pacific hurricane center, making landfall on a sparsely populated stretch of small beach towns and fishing villages in southern Mexico.

The storm came ashore in Oaxaca state Monday afternoon as a strong Category 2 hurricane, with maximum sustained winds of 105 mph (165kph), then it quickly lost power as it moved inland over the mountainous interior.

France will put down a killer whale stranded for weeks in the River Seine, after attempts to lead the animal out to sea failed and revealed it is severely sick, local authorities said.