A Final Status Report on the MDGs

And the news is overwhelmingly encouraging. Not all of the goals were met, but humanity took historic steps to end extreme poverty and the pathologies associated with it. “A 15-year effort to implement eight goals adopted by world leaders at the start of the new millennium has helped lift more than one billion people out of extreme poverty, enabled more girls to go to school than ever before, and brought unprecedented results in fighting diseases such as HIV/AIDS, the U.N. chief said Monday.In the final report on the Millennium Development Goals released Monday, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said the global mobilization to implement the goals by the end of 2015 has produced “the most successful anti-poverty movement in history.” (NYT http://nyti.ms/1Rhmr0B)

Deadly Boko Haram attack in northern Nigeria…At least 44 people were killed in twin bomb blasts in the central Nigerian city of Jos, the emergency services said on Monday, after a wave of mass casualty attacks blamed on Boko Haram militants. (AFP http://yhoo.it/1eAbBRy)

Comings and Goings…Former member of congress and co-founder of Avaaz, Tom Periello will replace Russ Feingold as the President’s Special Envoy for the Great Lakes Region of Africa. (AFP http://yhoo.it/1NN1sgK)

More money please…Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai wants world leaders to spend more money, on top of their earlier promises, to secure 12 years of free primary and secondary education for all children across the world. (AP http://yhoo.it/1HJ7JZZ)

Stranger than fiction: Chinese government researchers are using chickens, fish and toads to try to predict earthquakes, media reported. (AFP http://yhoo.it/1eAbQfw)

Developing story: A customs officer was wounded and three freight trucks were torched when armed men attacked the town of Nimule near the border with Uganda, officials and residents said Monday. (VOA http://bit.ly/1HIDswe)

So, about China…A top U.N. official is expressing concern about whether China-backed development projects overseas will have adequate protections for human rights. (VOA http://bit.ly/1H7yvXw)

Africa

The Malian Islamist rebel group Ansar Dine claimed it carried out a series of attacks against U.N. peacekeepers and Malian army targets in the country’s capital, Bamako, and border areas near Ivory Coast and Mauritania. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/1NMR4FH)

Nigeria’s military has freed 180 detainees held for months, including women carrying babies with toddlers clinging to their skirts, declaring they are no longer suspected of being part of the Boko Haram Islamic extremist insurgency. (AP http://yhoo.it/1NMQTu5)

Kenyan anti-gay protesters marched in Nairobi Monday warning US President Barack Obama not to speak about gay rights when he visits the country of his ancestors later this month. (AFP http://yhoo.it/1HJ7uy9)

A Burundian general who backed a failed coup in May threatened to launch an armed uprising after President Pierre Nkurunziza refused to bow to opposition and international demands to abandon a bid for a third term. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/1NMQR5o)

The prime minister of Burkina Faso, Yacouba Izaac Zida, said he has not resigned — contrary to rumors and what the local news media have been reporting in recent days. The reports have circulated amid a dispute involving Zida and the presidential guard, the RSP. (VOA http://bit.ly/1NMQrMm)

It’s estimated more than 20 million Nigerians suffer from mental illness, but many opt for traditional healers instead of getting professional help. (VOA http://bit.ly/1NMQ8Bq)

President Robert Mugabe on Monday moved Zimbabwe’s information minister, who he branded a “devil incarnate” last year, to an education department role in his second cabinet reshuffle since December. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/1NMR8W0)

As precision farmers in South Africa go hi tech to boost yields, some are also adopting a “conservation” approach to land management, which involves limiting soil disturbance to build up nutrients in the ground and increase production. (TRF http://bit.ly/1H7t4rp)

Zambia: In the advent of unpredictable weather, smallholder rain-dependent agriculture is increasingly becoming a risky business and the situation could worsen if, as seems likely, the world experiences levels of global warming that could lead to an increase in droughts, floods and diseases, both in frequency and intensity. (IPS http://bit.ly/1HJ6XMy)

Ride-hailing service Uber said on Monday its drivers had faced intimidation in South Africa following a protest last week by members of metered taxi associations who say the online app competes unfairly for business. (VOA http://bit.ly/1NMQnw6)

MENA

Nearly 100 people were killed on Monday in air strikes across Yemen, the Houthi-run state news agency reported, as a Saudi-led coalition stepped up attacks that are likely to weigh on efforts to broker a humanitarian truce. (AFP http://reut.rs/1RhmxW7)

The Islamic State group has regained control of a northern Syrian town captured by Kurdish fighters two weeks ago, activists and IS-linked social media outlets reported Monday. (AP http://yhoo.it/1NMRj3K)

Cash for educating children caught up in disasters, ranging from the war in Syria to the earthquake in Nepal, needs to rise sharply to cope with a surge in the number of young refugees, a U.N. envoy said on Monday. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/1HJ7uyh)

New anti-terrorism legislation in Egypt is targeting the media and making it a criminal offense to publish news contradicting the government’s version of events in terrorism-related cases. (VOA http://bit.ly/1HIDtQW)

Asia

A shoe factory collapsed in eastern China during a weekend shift, killing 14 people and injuring 33 others, local authorities said Monday. (AP http://yhoo.it/1NMR7Sb)

Fourteen Thai students who were arrested after staging anti-coup rallies must face military court and will not be released beforehand, Thailand’s army chief said on Monday, despite growing calls for charges to be dropped. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/1JKryCx)

A foreigner who flew to the Philippines from the Middle East has become the second confirmed case of MERS in the country, the health department said Monday, as a deadly outbreak in South Korea spreads alarm across Asia. (AFP http://yhoo.it/1eAbKVk)

Dozens of Afghans have rallied to denounce last week’s court ruling that overturned the death sentences for four men convicted for taking part in the mob killing of a woman outside a Kabul shrine in March. (AP http://yhoo.it/1NMRdJf)

A severe drought in Thailand is limiting the growing season of the country’s important rice crop. Farmers are blaming the government for not doing more to protect a key export. (VOA http://bit.ly/1eAa4LB)

The BRICS emerging economies will launch a development bank at a summit this week which Russian President Vladimir Putin hopes will help reduce Western dominance of world financial institutions and show Moscow is not isolated. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/1HJ7BK3)

The Americas

Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos must make strong gestures to avoid another half-century of conflict in the South American nation, a commander for the FARC rebel group said. (AFP http://yhoo.it/1HJ7xdq)

Nothing like a good measles outbreak to get Americans thinking more kindly about vaccines. One third of parents say they think vaccines have more benefit than they did a year ago, according to a poll conducted in May. (NPR http://n.pr/1JKqGh7)

Chilean President Michelle Bachelet’s approval rating fell to a record low in June after a month of political shakeups and protests, an opinion poll showed Monday. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/1HJ7w99)

A Republican entrepreneur seeking to push his party to fight climate change and support clean energy in the U.S. said on Sunday he has given his first big campaign gift to Senator Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/1JKrF0O)

…and the rest

About 800 million people still live in dire poverty and suffer from hunger despite the United Nations Millennium Development Goals being the most successful anti-poverty push in history, the U.N. said on Monday. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/1HJ7lL8)

The World Health Organization says cholera vaccines are effectively controlling the spread of the deadly disease in a number of high-risk areas around the globe, but the lack of vaccines limits the ability to protect all people in need. (VOA http://bit.ly/1NMQpEl)

Hungary’s parliament passed legislation on Monday that tightens its asylum rules, providing the legal framework for the erection of a fence along the country’s southern border with Serbia to stem the flow of illegal migrants. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/1HJ7FcP)

New information uncovered by a UN panel on the death of former secretary-general Dag Hammarskjold should be investigated to establish whether his plane was attacked just before it crashed in southern Africa, the UN chief said Monday. (AFP http://yhoo.it/1H7yrqK)

Advanced countries need to do more to address breaches of integrity by public officials and help win back citizens’ trust in national governments, a survey by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) found. (TRF http://yhoo.it/1HIDqVh)

Opinion/Blogs

Anand Gopal wrote the most important foreign policy book of the last decade. He discusses his pulitzer-finalist book and why he traveled to Afghanistan on a whim to report this crucial story. (Global Dispatches Podcast http://bit.ly/1H3E4Hh)

Make poverty history? A decade on from Gleneagles, it is a genuine possibility (Guardian http://bit.ly/1NMQw2K)

The number of children out of school is growing: What happened? (WhyDev http://bit.ly/1KMTyUR)

The biggest barrier to ending poverty is… our paternalism? (Chris Blattman http://bit.ly/1KMU59e)

A Climate Apollo Program (Policy Innovations http://bit.ly/1NMUWqm)

Who will determine aid spending in the next 10 years? (Devex http://bit.ly/1NMV8Gc)

On Horseshit (Aid Leap http://bit.ly/1NMUVCT)

Women’s Rights Advocacy – Why Am I Involved? (Fahamu http://bit.ly/1eA9r4p)

Ghana: What’s Holding Back Ghana’s Progress in Reducing Maternal Mortality (The Conversation http://bit.ly/1JKqnTv)

Africa Should Invest in Its Youth, Education and Agriculture (The Monitor http://bit.ly/1eA9E7L)

What have the millennium development goals achieved? (Guardian http://bit.ly/1HJ7gXS)

Religion and the SDGs – The ‘New Normal’ and Calls for Action (IPS http://bit.ly/1HID5BP)