Here is what's happening across the United States and around the world today.
Quieter night in Ferguson
FERGUSON, Mo. (AP) — Police say 44 people were arrested in a second night of protests in Ferguson, Missouri, after it was announced that a city police officer would not be indicted in the shooting death of 18-year-old Michael Brown.
Monday night brought looting and fires to vehicles and commercial buildings.
But there were three times as many National Guard troops out last night.
Ferguson officer: 'I know I did my job right'
FERGUSON, Mo. (AP) — The Ferguson, Missouri police officer who shot 18-year-old Michael Brown is speaking publicly for the first time.
Wilson tells ABC News, "I know I did my job right," and he says his conscience is clear.
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Stories that affect your life across the U.S. and around the world.
Twenty-eight-year-old Darren Wilson says had Brown been white, the encounter with him Aug. 9 would have unfolded the same way.
Cleveland crowd protests over boy shot by police
CLEVELAND (AP) — The attorneys for the family of a Cleveland boy are asking police to release the complete surveillance video of a confrontation between the boy and an officer.
Twelve-year-old Tamir Rice was shot dead by police at a playground Saturday, after police received got a 911 call about a gun at a playground.
The gun ended up being fake. Several hundred people protested the shooting on Tuesday.
Thanksgiving travelers contend with rain, snow
MINEOLA, N.Y. (AP) — People traveling the Washington-to-Boston corridor ahead of Thanksgiving could face some challenges thanks to a nor'easter packing rain and snow.
The National Weather Service says major Northeast cities are likely to see moderate to heavy rain most of the day Wednesday.
But New York and other places are gearing up for several inches of snow.
And higher elevation areas west of the Interstate 95 corridor could see as much as 6 to 12 inches before the nor'easter exits Wednesday night.
Activists raise Raqqa strikes death toll to 95
BEIRUT (AP) — Activists have raised the death toll from a series of Syrian government airstrikes on the Islamic State group's stronghold in northeastern Syria to at least 95.
The strikes targeted Raqqa Tuesday. Some of the air raids struck a market near a museum and an industrial neighborhood in the city, causing many civilian casualties.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights raised its death toll today to 95. Its director, Rami Abdurrahman, said they include 52 civilians whose names the group was able to document. Other activists estimated more than 100 people had been killed.
The Associated Press could not independently confirm the death toll — one of the worst single-day tolls in the city.
UN appeals for $405M for Afghanistan aid in 2015
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — The United Nations has appealed for $405 million to cover the humanitarian needs of the people in Afghanistan in 2015.
U.N. humanitarian coordinator Mark Bowden says that almost 8,000 civilians have been killed in the war with Taliban-led insurgents this year, and more than 100,000 people have been forced from their homes.
As the conflict expands in the coming year, more help will be needed, he says.
Around 1.2 million children in Afghanistan are acutely malnourished, half a million of them younger than five years old. Half a million children die each year of preventable disease, and already 4,000 families are facing the onset of winter without adequate housing.
Last year, the U.N. appealed for $406 million in Afghanistan, but received $237 million.
AP sources: EPA to propose stricter smog standard
WASHINGTON (AP) — Coming full circle on a campaign promise, the Obama administration will propose tightening the amount of a smog-forming pollutant in the air.
People familiar with the proposal tell the Associated Press that the EPA will recommend lowering the limit for ground-level ozone to 65 to 70 parts per billion, down from a 75 parts per billion standard set in the 2008.
The proposal will be announced Wednesday to meet a court-ordered Dec. 1 deadline.
The stricter standard makes good a campaign promise Obama made during his first run for the White House: to reverse President George W. Bush's decision to set a limit weaker than scientists advised.
In 2011, facing re-election, Obama scrapped an EPA plan to tighten the standard after Republicans and industries said it would hamper the economy.
White House veto threat shelves possible tax plan
WASHINGTON (AP) — A White House veto threat appears to have put on ice a congressional effort to permanently renew a handful of generous tax breaks for businesses and individuals. Officials say that the plan, brewing behind closed doors on Capitol Hill, favored corporations over the working class.
The unusual veto threat came before the parameters of a potential agreement were even revealed.
Speculation on Capitol Hill on Tuesday focused on a potential agreement to permanently enact tax breaks on business investments in new equipment and research and development, part of a plan that would renew dozens of expired tax breaks for businesses and individuals.
The White House immediately threatened a veto, saying Congress should also make permanent more generous tax credits for the working poor and people with children.
Black Friday gun buys test background check system
BRIDGEPORT, W.Va. (AP) — As stores crowd with holiday shoppers, gun buyers will be challenging the nation's background check system to keep up.
There are already nine guns for every 10 people in the U.S. and someone is killed with a firearm every 16 minutes. Stakes are already high with about 40 background checks requested every minute. On Black Friday, it speeds up to nearly two gun checks per second.
Kimberly Del Greco helps run the National Instant Criminal Background Check System. She calls it a perfect storm of time limits and insufficient data and resources.
About 500 FBI agents have just three days to verify information that keeps guns from criminals, the mentally ill and people with restraining orders. Otherwise, the sale goes through. About 512 gun sales a day effectively beat the system in 2013.
Saudi Arabia: Deaths from MERS virus reach 348
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) — Saudi Arabia's Health Ministry says that a total of 348 people have died in the kingdom after contracting Middle East Respiratory Syndrome or MERS.
The ministry's latest figures, released late Tuesday, include two recent deaths recorded in the capital Riyadh. It brings to 810 the number of confirmed cases in Saudi Arabia since the virus was first identified in 2012.
The virus has since spread to other parts of the world, though it has mostly remained centered in Saudi Arabia. MERS belongs to a family of viruses known as coronaviruses that include both the common cold and SARS, or severe acute respiratory syndrome.
The kingdom launched an effort to improve its anti-infection measures earlier this year after a number of health workers died from the virus.
Germany to require 30 pct women in top boardrooms
BERLIN (AP) — Germany's coalition government wants major companies to have at least 30 percent women on its supervisory boards.
The leaders of Germany's Social Democrats and Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservative bloc agreed on the measure at a late-night meeting Tuesday. Merkel says a bill will be put to Cabinet on Dec. 11.
Currently women hold just 22 percent of non-executive positions on the boards of companies listed in Germany's benchmark DAX 30 index. They hold six percent of management board posts.
The new plan will affect 100 listed companies starting 2016. Companies that fail to recruit enough women to non-executive boardroom posts will be barred from giving the seats to men.
Introducing a women's quota was one of the center-left Social Democrats' demands for entering into a coalition with Merkel's conservatives.
Developers look to create underground NYC park
NEW YORK (AP) — Visitors from around the world are drawn to New York's High Line, the elevated park built on defunct railroad tracks that have been turned into an oasis of flowers, grasses and trees.
Private planners are now looking deep under Manhattan to create what is billed as the world's first underground park — the Lowline.
The project would be set in a 116-year-old abandoned trolley terminal below the Lower East Side. Once filled with struggling immigrants, the neighborhood is now a hip location with bars, boutiques and renovated apartments in old tenement buildings.
Street-level solar collectors would be used to filter sunshine about 20 feet down to bedrock.
The team developing the Lowline hopes to start construction in five years. It'll cost about $60 million.
That's what's happening. Read more stories to jump start your day in our special Breakfast Buzz section.
