AIDS conference marks successes in treatment, rates of infection

For the first time, more than half the people worldwide who need treatment for HIV/AIDS -- some 8 million of 15 million -- are actually receiving it, Michel Sidibé, executive director of UNAIDS, said Sunday at the start of the International AIDS Conference in Washington, D.C. A rival conference was being held in India for sex workers refused visas to attend the conference, which is expected to draw 25,000 people through Friday. While rates of HIV infection have fallen 20% since the peak of the epidemic a decade ago, rates of drug-resistant HIV were on the rise in sub-Saharan Africa. The Guardian (London) (7/22), Devex.com (7/20), The Washington Post/BlogPost (7/20), Mail & Guardian (South Africa) (7/21), BBC (7/22)     

• UN mission to Syria is extended for "final" time 
• Syrian refugee numbers surge amid fierce clashes 
• Solar stoves harness sun, power of rural women 
• Dominican machismo is devastating to women, girls 
• Aquifer brings security to water-scarce Namibia 
• A tablet computer by an African, for Africans 
• Perpetrators of violence an Afghan who's who 

• UN mission to Syria is extended for "final" time
  United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon dispatched to Syria the world body's peacekeeping chief, Hervé Ladsous, and top military adviser, Gen. Babacar Gaye, after the Security Council on Friday extended by 30 days the unarmed observer mission that has been suspended because of an unprecedented escalation of violence in the country's 17-month-old uprising against the regime of President Bashar Assad. Diplomats unanimously re-upped the mission for what they said was the "final" time after Russia and China vetoed a resolution that would have imposed economic sanctions on the besieged government. Mail & Guardian (South Africa)/Reuters (7/21), The New York Times (tiered subscription model) (7/20), BBC (7/20)     

• 7 are killed in raid on UN-defended Ivorian camp
  At least seven people were killed and 13 injured when a band of youths Friday attacked a United Nations-protected camp for internally displaced persons in Cote d'Ivoire. The incident, apparently in retaliation for a fatal robbery in a nearby town, spurred an estimated 5,000 people to flee the camp, underscoring the tensions simmering after the postelection violence last year that ousted strongman Laurent Gbagbo. Al-Jazeera (7/21), Reuters (7/21)     

• Other News

• Senegal is ordered by UN court to prosecute Chad's Habré
  The New York Times (tiered subscription model) (7/20)     

• Palestinian bid for full UN membership gains Arab League support
  Ahram Online (Egypt)/Agence France-Presse (7/23)     

• Syrian refugee numbers surge amid fierce clashes
  The Arab League today pledged $100 million to assist Syrian refugees who had fled to neighboring countries to escape the killing that has claimed more than 14,000 lives over the past year and a half and spiked last week -- reaching levels of up to 30,000, according to the United Nations -- after fierce fighting engulfed the capital, Damascus. Most camps, while places of hatred and defiance, also are repositories "of sadness, of interrupted or shattered lives," reports The New York Times. Reuters (7/20), The New York Times (tiered subscription model) (7/21), Los Angeles Times/World Now blog (tiered subscription model) (7/21), The Guardian (London) (7/23), The Washington Post (7/17)     

• Other News

• Community anti-polio worker is slain in Pakistan
  The Washington Post/The Associated Press (7/21)     

• Forced late-term abortions heap pressure on China's one-child policy
  The New York Times (tiered subscription model) (7/22)     

• Madonna's would-be girls school to become Malawi cemetery
  The Guardian (London) (7/20)     

• Solar stoves harness sun, power of rural women
  The nonprofit Solar Household Energy is promoting use of its low-cost, solar-powered cookstove through demonstrations to gatherings of women in countries such as Mexico. The company's primarily goal is to get women, who spend much of their days cooking and searching for firewood, to view solar cooking as a lucrative business. Sustainablog (7/19)     

• Dominican machismo is devastating to women, girls
  In the Dominican Republic, a woman or girl is killed in an act of violence almost daily, usually at the hands of the men who profess to love them. The island's often violent culture of machismo is supported through lax prosecutions. Only 4% of the reported 62,000 cases of violence against women in 2010 went to trial. TrustLaw/The Word on Women blog (7/20)     

• Other News

• 9 women are imprisoned for genital cutting in Cote d'Ivoire
  The New York Times (tiered subscription model)/The Associated Press (7/21)     

• Iran morality policing risks deep divisions in society under strain
  The Washington Post (7/21)     

• Aquifer brings security to water-scarce Namibia
  An aquifer recently discovered beneath Namibia, heretofore recognized as the driest country in sub-Saharan Africa, could supply people in the country's north with enough water for the next 400 years, according to scientists. The new source, some 10,000 years old, is projected to ease the effects of drought brought on by climate change. BBC (7/20)     

• Other News

• Vietnam world's worst for illegal wildlife trade, WWF says
  The Washington Post/The Associated Press (7/22)     

• Brazil prisoners use pedal power to illuminate park
  Al-Jazeera (7/22)     

• A tablet computer by an African, for Africans
  The low-cost Inye tablet computer, a cross between a laptop and a mobile phone, is geared toward the African market. It comes with pre-installed local applications including one that raises awareness about HIV and another that addresses water and sanitation. The machine, which is devised by a Nigerian, but manufactured in China, sells for $350. BBC (7/20)     

• Other News

• Gmail SMS is released for basic mobile phones in Africa
  BBC (7/19)     

• Perpetrators of violence an Afghan who's who
  An 800-page report on human rights abuses in Afghanistan that took six years to compile -- and spans from the the 1980s, the period of Soviet occupation, through 2001, the end of Taliban rule -- implicates some of the country's most prominent warlords and government officials. The conclusions are unlikely to be published anytime soon, though, because those same people are doing all they can to suppress the findings of the study commissioned in 2005 by President Hamid Karzai. The New York Times (tiered subscription model) (7/22)     

• Other News

• India, Pakistan to revive "cricket diplomacy" for first time in 5 years
  The Washington Post (7/22)     

• U.S. to revoke Rwanda military aid over involvement in Congolese mutiny
  Reuters (7/21)     

• Impact of hunger strike sees boost in Internet age
  Mail & Guardian (South Africa) (7/16)     

Top five news stories selected by UN Wire readers in the past week.

• Deadly blast precedes Security Council vote on Syria (The Hill)

• Vote on Syria sanctions, mission vetoed at Security Council (CNN)

• A night in the most lawless city on the planet (BBC)

• The UN and private security firms (BBC)

• Migiro to represent UN on HIV/AIDS in Africa (RTT News)

• Results based on number of times each story was clicked by readers.

Position Title Company Name Location Project Coordinator Invisible Children Inc. Bangui, Central African Republic Deployment Coordinator (Security & Risk) RedR Australia Melbourne, Australia Program Associate One Acre Fund Kenya, Rwanda, or Burundi, International AFRICA FIELD PROGRAMS DIRECTOR THE NATURE CONSERVANCY Nairobi, Kenya Director of Market Development, Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves United Nations Foundation Washington, DC Executive Assistant to the Vice President (New York) United Nations Foundation New York City, NY Global Health Integration Officer United Nations Foundation Washington, DC IT Support Assistant United Nations Foundation New York City, NY Deployment Officer RedR Australia Melbourne, Australia Raiser’s Edge Database Coordinator United Nations Foundation Washington, DC Partnership Officer, Shot@Life United Nations Foundation Washington, DC Senior Development Associate, Energy and Climate United Nations Foundation Washington, DC

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