Six In The Morning Tuesday October 4

Hurricane Matthew: Dangerous storm closes in on Haiti

One of the most powerful Atlantic hurricanes in recent years is closing in on Haiti, bringing winds, rains and storm surges.

Hurricane Matthew, a Category Four storm, is forecast to hit the western tip of Haiti early on Tuesday.

But what the US National Hurricane Center called "life-threatening" conditions are already bearing down.

Interim Haitian President Jocelerme Privert said a number of people had been killed.

"We've already seen deaths. People who were out at sea. There are people who are missing. They are people who didn't respect the alerts. They've lost their lives," he said.

Iraqi Kurdish Peshmerga appeal to UK for help against Isis chemical attack

Battle for Mosul, designed to end the Isis caliphate in Iraq, expected to begin as early as middle of this month

Patrick Wintour Diplomatic editor

Tuesday 4 October 201609.13 BST

Kurdish Peshmerga forces preparing to join the attack on Mosul, the Islamic State stronghold in northern Iraq, have written to the UK defence secretary, Michael Fallon, asking urgently for equipment to protect themselves from an Isis chemical attack.

The battle for Mosul, designed to end the Isis caliphate in Iraq, is expected to begin as early as middle of this month, with Peshmerga forces likely to play a vital role.

The letter was sent to Fallon by the Kurdish high representative in the UK, Karwan Jamal Tahir, who said Kurdish forces had been subject to the use of chemical weapons on at least 19 separate occasions and were concerned at the lack of protection while trying to hold a front line stretching over 1,000km.

Tree frog named 'Toughie', last known member of his species, dies in Atlanta

The Rabbs’ fringe-limbed tree frog, first discovered in Panama in 2005, is now thought to be extinct

• Tim Walker US Correspondent 
• @timwalker 

The last known member of a rare tree frog species has died at the Atlanta Botanical Garden in Georgia. The Rabbs’ fringe-limbed tree frog was known to staff at the Garden as “Toughie” and believed to be approximately 12 years old. His body was found in his enclosure last week during a routine daily inspection, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported.

Scientists have estimated that up to half of all the world’s amphibian species are threatened with extinction, many of them due to chytridiomycosis, a disease caused by a virulent fungus. The Garden, Zoo Atlanta and Southern Illinois University sent a team of scientists to Central America in 2005 to collect species before the disease struck the region.

Calais mayor fails in bid to halt UK-funded, anti-migrant wall

Latest update : 2016-10-04

The mayor of the northern French port of Calais on Monday failed in her bid to halt construction of a wall aimed at stopping migrants from reaching Britain.

Calais Mayor Natacha Bouchart, who pledged on September 23 to use "all legal weapons in my possession" to fight the controversial barrier, filed an injunction to halt work on the wall.

The mayor argued, "Calais residents are fed up with seeing barriers and barbed wire everywhere. They feel completely hemmed in."

But the local administration immediately overruled the move, allowing the work, which began on September 20, to continue.

Poverty eradication uphill task for Pakistan, India: World Bank

ANWAR IQBAL

WASHINGTON: Statistics released by the World Bank this week show that both India and Pakistan face an uphill task in eradicating poverty, despite Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s claim that Islamabad needs to learn from New Delhi how to fight poverty.

The World Bank report — “Poverty and Shared Prosperity” — places Pakistan among the countries where incomes of the poorest are growing faster than average. The poorest in Pakistan are slightly ahead of the four per cent national growth rate while China tops the list with a more than 8pc growth rate. Sri Lanka is also in this category.

Vox Sentences: Colombia learns what happens when you let people vote on peace

Updated by Dara Lind and Dylan Matthews

• Voters in Colombia very narrowly rejected a peace deal with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) in a referendum vote Sunday. [República de Colombia]
• The referendum loss brings a fruitless end to a protracted peace process that was supposed to be the crowning achievement of President Manuel Santos. [BuzzFeed News / Karla Zabludovsky and Hayes Brown]