Financing for Development Conference Kicks Off in Addis

The biggest development conference in a decade kicks off in Ethiopia today. Heads of state, ministers of finance and dignitaries from the public and private sector are coming together for a week of meetings focused on funding sustainable development. “The announcements of new public commitments have already begun. On Friday the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, and five big regional development banks pledged $400bn in lending over the next three years. The World Bank and others are also unveiling facilities for women’s and children’s health and to allow governments in the developing world to take advantage of the bank’s triple A credit rating and issue new bonds at lower interest rates. There will also be an emphasis during the conference on helping developing economies mobilise their own public resources and improve how they collect taxes and other tasks.” (FT http://on.ft.com/1HpiDmi)

Take a Deeper Dive…If you have 15 minutes and want a good curtain raiser on this conference, including the big points of convergence and contention between the major players and some of the expected official and unofficial outcomes, listen to Mark’s podcast episode with Minh Thu Pham of the United Nations Foundation. (Global Dispatches Podcast http://bit.ly/1HpiiQJ)

Happy Birthday, Malala… Malala Yousafzai, the youngest winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, celebrated her 18th birthday in Lebanon on Sunday by opening a school for Syrian refugee girls, repeating her call for world leaders to invest in “books not bullets” (SMH http://bit.ly/1HpiRKi)

So much for the Ceasefire...Fighting near the southern Yemeni city of Aden killed 35 people on Sunday, the exiled government said, in breach of a temporary humanitarian truce brokered by the United Nations. (Reuters http://reut.rs/1Hpj3Jz)

Quote of the Day: “Putting bread on the table, putting a roof over the heads of one’s children, giving them health and an education, these are essential for human dignity,” he said,” Pope Francis (yes, again) while in Asuncion. http://yhoo.it/1fAKrv5

Africa

Suspected Boko Haram militants launched an attack on the prison in the southern Niger town of Diffa late on Saturday, military sources said, in an apparent bid to free fellow members of the Nigerian Islamist group held there. (Reuters http://bit.ly/1DaNYVW)

Burundi’s army has captured scores of gunmen and killed others in two days of clashes in the north, a regional governor said on Sunday, the latest flare-up of violence in a nation that emerged from civil war in 2005. (Reuters http://bit.ly/1DaO5kk)

Chadian police on Sunday warned that anyone found wearing the Muslim full-face veil would be arrested, after a Boko Haram suicide bombing in the capital left 15 dead. (AFP http://yhoo.it/1Jd1EBL)

A U.N. diplomat based in South Sudan’s northern Unity state will be expelled from the state in a retaliatory move following the publication of a human rights report last month that accused government forces of committing widespread attacks on civilians there, a South Sudanese official said Sunday. (AP http://yhoo.it/1Jd1H0v)

MENA

Major issues remain unresolved in the Iran nuclear talks, a senior U.S. official said on Sunday in a comment that appeared designed to play down speculation that an agreement was imminent. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/1HzdZPG)

Car bombs and suicide attacks targeting mainly Shiite Muslim districts of Baghdad have killed 35 people, one of the heaviest recent tolls in the Iraqi capital which has faced a wave of bombings by Islamic State militants. (ABC-Australia http://ab.co/1HpiZJL)

Israel on Sunday released a Palestinian prisoner who staged a 56-day hunger strike that brought him near death in a protest against a controversial procedure allowing indefinite detention without charge. (AFP http://yhoo.it/1HzdUeL)

An Israeli human rights group released a video Sunday that purports to show a high-ranking Israeli officer fatally shooting a fleeing Palestinian teenager who had thrown a rock at his vehicle, smashing its windshield. (AP http://yhoo.it/1Jd1IBC)

Asia

Several hundred workers in Myanmar rallied Sunday for a higher minimum wage despite a warning by factory owners that the demand might put them out of business. (AP http://yhoo.it/1Hze0my)

In a nation where religion and ethnicity are incendiary issues, a selfie campaign by Myanmar students promoting cross-cultural friendships has become a rare counterpoint to bilious anti-Muslim rhetoric from hardline Buddhist monks. (AFP http://yhoo.it/1HzdYuV)

Many people living in this coastal village in Vanuatu believe the March cyclone that sent waves surging through their homes was the latest and most dramatic sign of climate change. They are now considering rebuilding their entire community on higher ground. (AP http://yhoo.it/1Hze1qL)

A judge on China’s highest court has come under investigation for corruption, becoming one of the most senior judicial officials to be swept up by the country’s anti-graft dragnet. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/1fAKy9S)

Police who seized Asia’s largest known shipment of liquid cocaine at a Bangladeshi port late last month say it was headed for India, the latest sign that drug cartels are increasingly plying their trade in South Asia. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/1fAKyH4)

China says 109 ethnic Uighurs who were deported from Thailand last week were heading to Turkey, Syria or Iraq to join Islamic militants. (VOA http://bit.ly/1HVSIpI)

A suicide car bomb killed 25 people and wounded 10 in southeastern Afghanistan close to a U.S. base on Sunday, police said. (Reuters http://reut.rs/1HpiYFz)

The Americas

Pope Francis, wrapping up his three-country tour of South America, on Sunday urged people living in a flood-prone shantytown in Paraguay to stay united in their struggle for better living and working conditions. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/1JZCRqw)

Mexico mounted an all-out manhunt Sunday for its most powerful drug lord, Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, who escaped from a maximum security prison through a 1 mile tunnel from a small opening in the shower area of his cell, according to the country’s top security official. (AP http://yhoo.it/1HzdXHo)

Pope Francis is balancing out his apology for the crimes the Catholic Church committed against indigenous during the colonial-era conquest of the Americas with high praise for the Jesuit missions in Paraguay that brought Christianity and European-style education and economic organization to the natives. (AP http://yhoo.it/1fAKuHd)

Colombia pledged on Sunday to de-escalate military action against leftist guerrillas if the rebels uphold their unilateral ceasefire, providing a breakthrough in peace talks that had been threatened by an escalation of battlefield violence. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/1Jd1HgY)

…and the rest

Opinion/Blogs

To Resurrect A Vanishing Language, Try YouTube and Indiegogo (Goats and Soda http://n.pr/1O4qEQa

Will the Addis financing summit make a difference? (ODI http://bit.ly/1M4TIbQ)

The case for well-planned infrastructure mega-projects (An Africanist Perspective http://bit.ly/1O4qTux)

50,000 images of Africa that are not from Africa (WhyDev http://bit.ly/1O4qTum)

Lessons from Make Poverty History (Global Dashboard http://bit.ly/1O4qUyu)

Why Australian aid cuts are harmful for Afghanistan (Devpolicy http://bit.ly/1O4qTdS)

Craig Murray: IMF and USA set to ruin Ghana (Development Truths http://bit.ly/1O4qSXm)