To make matters worse, the storm is slow moving. At time of publication, evacuations have begun and aid organizations were preparing for a major relief operation. “Hurricane Matthew, the most powerful Atlantic tropical storm in almost a decade, was gearing up Monday to deliver a potentially devastating blow to Haiti — a Caribbean country that’s still struggling to rebound from a series of earlier natural disasters. Packing 130-mph winds, Matthew was already lashing Haiti with torrential rains as it crawled north Monday. Jamaica and Cuba are also in path of the storm, and the Dominican Republic was expected to absorb a glancing blow. But Haiti will likely feel the full impact of Matthew’s fury later Monday when the center reaches its southwestern coast.” (NBC http://nbcnews.to/2dzdy4w)
And the Best Governed Country in Africa Is…”The Ibrahim Index of African Governance (IIAG) – the most comprehensive survey of its kind on the continent – rates 54 African nations against criteria such as security, human rights, economic stability, just laws, free elections, corruption, infrastructure, poverty, health and education. Mauritius held onto its top spot, followed by Botswana, Cape Verde, the Seychelles and Namibia while South Africa – the continent’s most industrialized country – was in sixth place. While overall the index has improved by just one point over the 10 year period starting in 2006, three out of the top 10 countries have seen their score fall in this period, and major economies like South Africa and Ghana registered some of the largest deteriorations on the continent.” (Reuters http://reut.rs/2dzhKB7)
After Colombia Peace Referendum…”One thing presumably won’t be happening: the FARC rebels won’t be handing over their weapons to the United Nations, as they had agreed to do once the deal was final. But what will happen next is harder to say. “It’s not going to mean that Colombia plunges back into war immediately,” John Otis reports for NPR from Bogota. President Juan Manuel Santos says he intends to maintain a bilateral cease-fire that’s been in effect for several months. And, Otis says, the overall intensity of the war has been lower for the past several years.” (NPR http://n.pr/2dzhsu2)
Quote of the Day…Africa is not a country, edition.‘“For all its difficulties, life expectancy in Africa has risen astonishingly as that country has entered the global economic system.” UK foreign secretary Boris Johnson (Africa news http://bit.ly/2dzhRwz)
Africa
Violence flared again Monday in Ethiopia’s restive Oromia region, where dozens of people were killed a day earlier in a stampede when police tried to disrupt an anti-government protest amid a massive religious festival. (AP http://yhoo.it/2dlVlt3)
Gabon’s prime minister named a new government in the wake of disputed elections, but it contained no representatives of opposition leader Jean Ping, who says the vote was rigged. (Reuters http://bit.ly/2dnhJzE)
Severe drought conditions are still afflicting most of South Africa and temperatures are expected to remain above normal until mid-summer, which would be around December, the national weather service said on Monday. (Reuters http://bit.ly/2dnjDk4)
Cape Verde’s President Jorge Carlos Fonseca won a second term in Sunday’s election with nearly three-quarters of the vote, preliminary results showed. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/2dEHuJx)
Governance across Africa has improved very little over the past decade as deteriorating safety and rule of law have held back progress made in other areas such as human rights or economic opportunities, a survey said on Monday. (Reuters http://bit.ly/2dLNdBA)
MENA
The Palestinian high court Monday ordered municipal elections only in the West Bank and not the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip, possibly ending hopes of the first competitive Palestinian polls in a decade. (AFP http://yhoo.it/2dndKTW)
Morocco has dismantled a suspected Islamic State militant cell and arrested 10 women believed to be planning attacks in the North African kingdom, the Interior Ministry said on Monday. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/2dVaqjO)
Asia
The EU has signed an agreement with the Afghan government allowing its member states to deport an unlimited number of the country’s asylum seekers, and obliging the Afghan government to receive them. (Guardian http://bit.ly/2dLGVBO)
Ethnic activists and community leaders from northern and southeastern Myanmar have condemned recent outbreaks of fighting, large-scale civilian displacement and alleged rights abuses in their areas. (VOA http://bit.ly/2dCLV6U)
At least 600,000 people in North Korea have been affected by heavy flooding that damaged or destroyed 30,000 homes, the Red Cross said, calling for urgent humanitarian aid ahead of the winter. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/2dENpOS)
At least six people were killed and 35 wounded on Monday, when an improvised explosive device tore into a crowded marketplace in a northern Afghan province on the border with Turkmenistan, officials said. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/2dMWHcc)
Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte is rebalancing his foreign policy away from old ally the United States to former U.S. Cold War foes China and Russia, in a move that may generate a windfall of aid for the developing Southeast Asian country. (VOA http://bit.ly/2dnih8R)
The World Bank is indirectly financing a boom in some of Asia’s dirtiest coal-fired power generation despite commitments to end most funding for the sector, a development advocacy group charged on Monday. (AFP http://yhoo.it/2dm3fmb)
Textile workers from Bangladesh to Turkey are using cellphones to report child labor, delayed wages and trafficking – a trend rights groups say shows the promise of technology in tackling abuses in the garment industry. (Reuters http://bit.ly/2dnjIE5)
Thailand is considering testing all pregnant women for Zika, the health ministry said on Monday, following confirmation last week of its first known cases of microcephaly, a birth defect marked by small head size, linked to the Zika virus. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/2dEOWEK)
Villagers in the eastern Indian state of Jharkhand vowed to continue their protest against a coal mine after four people were killed when police opened fire during clashes at the weekend, forcing a halt to operations at the site. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/2dENqCt)
Hundreds of protesters took to the streets of the Thai capital on Monday calling on the junta to address land rights and housing needs in what police and organizers said was one of the biggest demonstrations since the May 2014 coup. (APhttp://yhoo.it/2dm4WzS)
Afghanistan’s leaders will head to Brussels this week, seeking billions of dollars in aid as the country confronts an increasingly powerful Taliban insurgency and pervasive corruption. (AP http://yhoo.it/2dm4xxp)
The Americas
Mexican authorities say hundreds of people evacuated from their homes over the weekend must remain in shelters as eruptions continue at the Colima volcano. (AP http://yhoo.it/2dlXipj)
Brazil’s Workers’ Party – PT – lost big Sunday when Brazilians voted in the first local elections since Dilma Rousseff’s impeachment. (VOA http://bit.ly/2dVlFbW)
Mexico: A lawyer for imprisoned Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman says that the drug lord’s sons want the public to know they had nothing to do with an ambush that left five soldiers dead. (AP http://yhoo.it/2dqXtvw)
Colombia peace deal failure fallout
Political leaders in Colombia are looking for a way forward after voters unexpectedly rejected a peace deal with leftist FARC rebels that would have ended a 52-year-old war. (VOA http://bit.ly/2cYa5ev)
Latin America bemoaned Colombian voters’ rejection of a peace deal with Marxist insurgents but regional leaders urged Bogota to keep pursuing efforts to end the longest-running conflict in the Americas. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/2dCMzkU)
A timeline of Colombia’s conflict with largest rebel group (AP http://yhoo.it/2dEQ6Qo)
Why divided Colombia said ‘No’ to peace deal (AFP http://yhoo.it/2dVnntQ)
…and the rest
Polish women donned black, waved black flags and took to Poland’s streets on Monday, boycotting jobs and classes as part of a nationwide strike to protest a legislative proposal for a total ban on abortion. (AP http://yhoo.it/2dEPQ3U)
Greek police fired tear gas and pepper spray at protesting pensioners who challenged a cordon near the office of Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, whose left-wing government faces mounting pressure over planned austerity measures. (AP http://yhoo.it/2dm3duD)
Estonia finally has chosen a new president, who will be the Baltic country’s first woman to hold the post. (AP http://yhoo.it/2dCLsBx)
A global agreement on climate change is set to win enough ratifications by signatory nations this week to go into force in November, heralding a harder phase of turning promises into cuts in greenhouse gas emissions. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/2dCLvgJ)
Opinion/Blogs
New York Times Journalist Scott Shane Tells The Inside Story of President Obama’s Most Controversial Foreign Policy Decision (Global Dispatches Podcast http://buff.ly/2dm7sWP)
Migration summit failed: 2 weeks later nothing has changed (Humanosphere http://bit.ly/2dN7sef)
Why SDGs and the Paris Climate Agreement Are Intimately Linked (New Times http://bit.ly/2dLzgn0)
Good Governance Is Our Right, Not a Privilege (Daily Maverick http://bit.ly/2dV1XNB)
Keith Knight’s cartoons get to the heart of the US conversation on race (PRI http://bit.ly/2dMVqS4)
Is Facebook neutral on Palestine-Israel conflict? (Al Jazeera http://buff.ly/2dEFe5g)
Ten years on, WikiLeaks and Assange as controversial as ever (Yahoo http://yhoo.it/2dnd5BG)
Five ways to deliver UK aid in the national economic interest (ODI http://bit.ly/2dLN6px)
The $10-a-month teacher – and the slum school she rescued (Guardian http://bit.ly/2dVkObz)