Nearly 16 million people with HIV are now on life-saving an antiretrovirals, says a new report from UNAIDS. The addition of more than 2 million people this year alone is great, but is not fast enough says Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders. “It’s good news the pace of HIV treatment scale-up continues to increase, with 2.2 million people newly started on treatment in one year, but to achieve the global goal of reaching 30 million people with treatment by 2020, we’re going to need to see 3 million new people on treatment each year,” said Sharonann Lynch, HIV and tuberculosis policy advisor for MSF’s Access Campaign. (Guardian http://bit.ly/21eqNIC)
Liberia Ebola Death…A 15-year-old boy has died of Ebola in Liberia, the first such fatality for months in a country declared free of the disease in September, chief medical officer Francis Kateh said on Tuesday. (Reuters http://bit.ly/1TcSSL6)
GM mosquitoes…Hundreds of genetically modified mosquitoes that are incapable of spreading the malaria parasite to humans have been created in a laboratory as part of a radical approach to combating the disease. (Guardian http://bit.ly/21eoK7h)
A volatile situation Becomes Even more precarious…”One of the world’s most volatile regions was roiled further Tuesday when Turkey shot down a Russian warplane near the Turkish-Syrian border. Turkey said it hit the plane after it repeatedly violated Turkey’s airspace and ignored 10 warnings.” (CNN http://cnn.it/1NNSGx2)
Holy stats of the day: Christianity in Africa ahead of the Pope’s visit this week. (Pew http://pewrsr.ch/1NNT6no)
Depressing stat of the day: More than half the world’s primates, including apes, lemurs and monkeys, are facing extinction, international experts warned Tuesday, as they called for urgent action to protect mankind’s closest living relatives. (AFP http://yhoo.it/1OexNQv)
Africa
South Sudan’s foreign minister has again said his government is committed to the implementation of the peace agreement signed last August between rebels loyal to former vice president Riek Machar and the Juba government led by President Salva Kiir. (VOA http://bit.ly/1MAnKm8)
Burundi’s interior minister suspended 10 civil society groups, accusing them of fueling widespread violence in recent months, a senior official said on Tuesday. (Reuters http://bit.ly/1I8LeA3)
Peace talks between Sudan’s government and rebels have adjourned without a deal after a week of negotiations in Ethiopia, African Union mediators said Tuesday. (AFP http://yhoo.it/1lHMkJi)
Floods caused by El Nino could displace more than 100,000 people in Ethiopia, where more than 8 million people are facing a food crisis because of the worst drought since a devastating 1984 famine, the United Nations said. (Reuters http://bit.ly/1I8M7Zu)
Three Kenyan soldiers were wounded, one of them critically, when their vehicle was hit in eastern Kenya by a roadside bomb that the Somali Islamist al Shabaab group said it had planted. (Reuters http://bit.ly/1lHL5JZ)
Ethiopia needs to find new ways to finance infrastructure projects after relying heavily on state-driven investment to build new roads, railways and dams to drive growth in its economy, the World Bank said. (Reuters http://bit.ly/1I8M7ZE)
A perfect storm of lower rainfall and a growing population beckons for Botswana. (IPS http://bit.ly/1OeumJs)
The Gambia has announced it will ban female genital mutilation after the Guardian launched a global campaign to end the practice. (Guardian http://bit.ly/21eoO77)
MENA
Tunisia’s president declared a 30-day state of emergency across the country and imposed an overnight curfew for the capital after an explosion Tuesday struck a bus carrying members of the presidential guard, killing at least 12 people and wounding 20 others. (AFP http://yhoo.it/1NNSmyw)
Islamic State militants attacked a hotel in the northern Sinai Peninsula of Egypt with explosives and gunfire early on Tuesday, killing at least seven people, including a judge, according to security officials, Egyptian state media and a statement by the group. (NYT http://nyti.ms/1NNTmCL)
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry began a one-day visit to Israel and the Palestinian territories on Tuesday by describing a wave of Palestinian knife and car ramming attacks as terrorism that must be condemned. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/1lHMeBt)
Asia
Impoverished migrant workers in Thailand are sold or lured by false promises and forced to catch and process fish that ends up in global food giant Nestlé’s supply chains, disclosed the company. (AP http://bit.ly/21eoNQp)
Fiji’s police chief said Tuesday his officers were investigating allegations of a plot to destabilise the government, refusing to deny it may have emanated from the force’s own ranks. (AFP http://yhoo.it/1MAnDXY)
The U.N. human rights agency on Tuesday called on Thailand to immediately close a military detention center where two high-profile prisoners died in controversial circumstances over the past month. (AP http://yhoo.it/1T0AiVN)
Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha on Tuesday said two registered refugees were deported to China, at Beijing’s request, after they entered Thailand illegally. (AP http://yhoo.it/1lHMj89)
A court in Myanmar has declined to drop a charge against a young woman accused of poking fun at Myanmar’s army chief on Facebook, highlighting the challenges faced by the former dictatorship as it grapples with a social media explosion and other newfound freedoms of expression. (AP http://yhoo.it/1SidjFv)
Food prices are shooting up in Afghanistan as the harvest has been halted in the country’s breadbasket in the northern province of Kunduz, where farmers have fled fighting and fields are infested with explosives. (IRIN http://bit.ly/21eoODV)
A climate condition that has reinforced the impact of an El Nino weather event in recent months has broken down over the past fortnight, but a strong El Nino persists, Australia’s weather bureau said on Tuesday. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/1I8LgrD)
Almost all human organs donated for transplant in China go unused, state-run media said, after years of controversy about the use of body parts from executed prisoners. (AFP http://yhoo.it/1TcSP1Q)
The Americas
Canada’s New Liberal government will announce Tuesday its plan to resettle 25,000 Syrian refugees, bolstered by the support of all 10 of the country’s provinces. (AP http://yhoo.it/1MAnHa2)
A lawsuit is challenging the Indiana governor’s decision to stop state agencies from helping resettle Syrian refugees, saying the action wrongly targets the refugees based on their nationality. (AP http://yhoo.it/1Si9wbm)
Authorities say a man has been charged with leaving a fake bomb at a Virginia mosque. (AP http://yhoo.it/1TcU3dt)
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is defending its ability to screen refugee applicants following the deadly attacks in Paris, and officials there say that state governors who want to refuse Syrian refugees on security grounds have unfounded fears. (VOA http://bit.ly/1OezCwH)
…and the rest
A total 147 heads of state and government have confirmed their attendance of the climate summit due to start in Paris next week, the French government said Tuesday. (AFP http://yhoo.it/1T0Alko)
Sweden will introduce tighter border controls and asylum rules in a bid to reduce the number of asylum seekers reaching the country, and force other EU countries to take in greater numbers of refugees, the government said on Tuesday. (Reuters http://yhoo.it/1T0Akge)
Leading British cities have signed up to a pledge to run entirely on green energy by 2050 as local governments push for accelerated change ahead of next week’s UN climate change summit in Paris. (AFP http://yhoo.it/1T0Ansu)
Opinion/Blogs
Peter Piot and Paul Stoffels: Ebola will always return unless we develop the tools to end it (Guardian http://bit.ly/1MAnL9Q)
Ebola Was Eliminated from Liberia. Now It’s Back. (UN Dispatch http://bit.ly/1Oex2qx)
Unsustainable Development Goals: Are 222 indicators too many? (IRIN http://bit.ly/1lHNlAW)
Assassinating Terrorists Does Not Work (Boston Review http://bit.ly/1SifOaM)
Does Financial Inclusion Exclude? Formal Savings Reduces Informal Risk-Sharing Among Women in Kenya (Development Impact http://bit.ly/1lHORTN)
A Pope’s Visit May Bring Hope But Does It Also Bring Change? (Goats and Soda http://n.pr/1lHONDn)
The Afghan Refugee Crisis: Multiple Origins, Few Solutions (Prosper http://bit.ly/1lHOWXt)
Can KJ Seung Change How the World Treats Tuberculosis? (Boston Magazine http://bit.ly/1Sig1L9)
Analysis: Are Young People the Answer to Africa’s Food Security? (Inter Press Service http://bit.ly/1lHMfoM)
Secret aid worker: NGOs rarely say no to corporate cash (Guardian http://bit.ly/1T0AkwT)
The dating game of development finance (Devex http://bit.ly/1TcVU1I)