Portal:Current events/March 2018

• Presidency of Donald Trump
  • U.S. President Donald Trump announces plans to impose tariffs on steel and aluminium imports. (BBC), (The Hill)

• Crime in Norway, Crime in the United States
  • Police in Oslo, Norway, say that the FBI is assisting in the investigation into two forged nominations of Donald Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize. The impersonator allegedly used the same stolen identity twice. (Newser), (The Washington Post)
• Terrorism in Turkey
  • Dilek Öcalan, MP for the pro-Kurdish HDP party, is sentenced to two and a half years in jail on charges of terror propaganda related to her participation in the 2016 funeral of a PKK fighter. Nine HDP MPs are currently in jail. (NRT)

• Politics of Iraq
  • The Parliament of Iraq votes to oblige the federal government to set a schedule for the withdrawal of foreign troops. (Iraq News)
• Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections
  • An alleged Senate Intelligence Committee report states that a House Intelligence Committee Republican was behind the leak to Fox News of private text messages between a Russian-connected lawyer and Senator Mark Warner, the committee vice-chairman, concerning an attempt to contact Christopher Steele, author of the Trump–Russia dossier. Committee chairman Richard Burr later denied the leak report. (The New York Times), (Slate) (The Hill)
• 2018 opening of regular sessions of the National Congress of Argentina
  • Argentine President Mauricio Macri delivers a speech in the Congress to start the regular sessions for 2018. (Reuters)

• Discoveries of exoplanets
  • NASA astronomers use the Hubble and Spitzer space telescopes in research implying that "hot Saturn" (high surface-atmosphere temperatures and gas giant-mass) exoplanet WASP-39b, located 700 light-years from Earth, has a large amount of water molecules in its atmosphere. (NASA)

• 2018 NHL Stadium Series
  • The Washington Capitals defeated the Toronto Maple Leafs in a special outdoor hockey match, 5–2, at the Navy–Marine Corps Memorial Stadium in Annapolis, Maryland. (The Washington Post)

• 2018 Ouagadougou attacks
  • A terrorist attack at the French embassy and military headquarters in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, leaves 28 people dead and at least 50 others injured. (BBC)
• Ituri conflict
  • An attack on a village, part of the unrest between ethnic Lendu and Hema communities, leaves 49 people dead in the Ituri Province of DR Congo. (News18)
• War in Afghanistan (2001–2021)
  • A suicide car bomber kills one person and injures fourteen others near the Australian embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan. (Reuters via Newshub)

• 2017–18 European windstorm season
  • An avalanche near Entraunes in southeastern France, kills at least four people and leaves another one missing. (BBC)
• March 1–3, 2018 nor'easter
  • A massive winter storm occurs in the East Coast of the United States, leaving millions without power and cancelling thousands of airplane flights. (CNN via MSN)
• 2018 Baku fire
  • At least 25 people are killed in a fire at a drug-rehabilitation clinic in Baku, Azerbaijan. (RFE/RL)

• Russia–United States relations
  • Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov denies White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders' claim that Russia breached any international arms control pacts, after President Vladimir Putin's March 1 speech on nuclear weapons. (Reuters)
• Cuba–United States relations
  • The United States permanently downgrades their embassy in Havana, making its status 'unaccompanied', meaning a post at which no family members are permitted to reside. The status change comes after alleged health attacks. (Miami Herald)

• 2016–2018 investigations involving Benjamin Netanyahu
  • An Israel Police anti-corruption unit questions Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his wife Sara. (Reuters)
• Cannabis in Greece
  • The Hellenic Parliament passes a bill legalising the use of medical cannabis in Greece. New Democracy, Communist Party, Golden Dawn and the Union of Centrists voted against the government-sponsored bill. (Greek Reporter)
• Central Michigan University shooting
  • A student shoots his parents dead in a dorm at Central Michigan University in Mount Pleasant, Michigan, United States. (NBC), (BBC)

• Italian general election, 2018
  • Antonio Tajani, the current President of the European Parliament, accepts the offer of Silvio Berlusconi to stand as a candidate for Prime Minister of Italy for Forza Italia. (The Local)
• Politics of the European Union
  • European Union lawmakers strike a deal on opening up the 3.6 and 26 GHz bandwidths by 2020 to make room for the new 5G network. (Reuters)
• Politics of Germany, SPD party member vote on the 2018 coalition agreement of Germany
  • Postal ballots of the 2018 SPD coalition party member vote are due. The vote will determine if the SPD is allowed to form a coalition with Angela Merkel's CDU. (Reuters)

• Long-distance swimming
  • The Dutch swimmer Maarten van der Weijden sets the 24-hour swimming record in a 25-meter pool at 102.8 kilometres (63.9 mi). (SwimSwam)

• Israeli–Palestinian conflict
  • Gazan officials say Israeli soldiers killed a Palestinian farmer on his own land in the Gaza Strip. An Israeli military spokesperson said that he got too close to the border fence. (Oman Times)
• Turkish military operation in Afrin
  • According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, at least 36 pro-Syrian government troops were killed in a Turkish airstrike in Afrin, Syria. (BBC)
  • Turkish troops and the Free Syrian Army seize control of the strategic town of Rajo, Syria, from YPG forces. (Al Masdar News) (The Guardian) (AP via San Francisco Chronicle)

• Protectionism in the United States, United States–European Union relations
  • In a message on Twitter, U.S. President Donald Trump says the U.S. will apply a tax on cars made in the European Union if the E.U. "further" increases tariffs. (CNBC) (BBC)

• "Polish death camp" controversy
  • Hours after the Polish so-called Holocaust Law about discussing of historical facts takes effect, the Polish League Against Defamation sues Argentinian newspaper Página/12, which it accuses of suggesting Poland was complicit in the Holocaust. (Reuters)
• Murder of Ján Kuciak
  • On the day of the funeral of slain journalist Ján Kuciak, for lack of evidence, police release seven Italian nationals who are accused of links with the 'Ndrangheta mafia in a posthumously published investigative report by Kuciak. (Daily Star)

• Stoneman Douglas High School shooting
  • The Florida Senate rejects a bill to ban assault weapons and holds a moment of “silence and reflection” for the Parkland, Florida, victims. (The Washington Post)

• Rules of association football
  • The International Football Association Board, which sets the rules for association football, approves the use of video assistant referees, which will be used at the 2018 FIFA World Cup in Russia. (BBC)

• 90th Academy Awards
  • The Shape of Water wins a leading four awards, including Best Picture, followed by Dunkirk, which won three awards. (CNBC)
  • The ceremony records its lowest U.S. television audience in recorded history, according to Nielsen Holdings. (BBC)

• An explosion followed by a building collapse kills four and injures 20 in Poznan, Poland. (Reuters)

• Online advertising
  • Advertisers remove their ads from InfoWars founder Alex Jones' YouTube channels. Many of the brands say they were not aware their adverts were being shown on the channel until being contacted by CNN. (The Independent) (CNN)

• 2017–18 South African listeriosis outbreak
  • South African officials determine that the country's ongoing listeriosis outbreak—which is already the world's deadliest listeriosis outbreak, killing over 180 people and sickening 1,000 more—was caused by contaminated "Polony" processed meat. The Ministry of Health issues a recall of contaminated products from RCL Foods and from Tiger Brands subsidiary company Enterprise Food and advises the public to avoid all processed meat products that are sold as ready-to-eat. (Reuters)

• North Korea–United States relations
  • 2017–18 North Korea crisis
    • U.S. President Donald Trump states North Korea was recently seeking talks with the United States. (Chicago Tribune)
• North Korea–South Korea relations
  • South Korean President Moon Jae-in announces he is sending two officials to meet with North Korea. (The Week)

• Presidency of Donald Trump
  • In a private speech to Republican donors at Mar-a-Lago, U.S. President Donald Trump congratulates Chinese President Xi Jinping on eliminating China's presidential term limits, reportedly advocates for similar action to be taken in the United States. (CNN)
• Italian general election, 2018
  • Italians go to the polls today to elect the 630 members of the Chamber of Deputies and the 315 members of the Senate of the Republic. (BBC)
• SPD party member vote on the 2018 coalition agreement of Germany
  • SPD party members approve with 66% in favour to allow to form a coalition with Angela Merkel's CDU/CSU, ending a five-month political deadlock after the federal elections. (BBC)
• 2017–18 Spanish constitutional crisis, Spanish unionism
  • 15,000 demonstrators gather in Barcelona, Spain, to support the mock region of Tabarnia—a hypothetical area that includes the least independentist areas of Catalonia—as a way to oppose Catalan independence and the declaration of independence on October 27. (The Washington Post)
• Swiss referendums, 2018
  • Swiss voters reject a proposal to scrap the television licence fee that provides the majority of funding for the Swiss Broadcasting Corporation. Swiss voters also approve the right of the federal government to levy VAT and direct federal tax until 2025. (BBC)

• Wildlife of Antarctica
  • Scientists discover a large colony of more than 750,000 pairs of Adélie penguins on the Danger Islands in Antarctica. (WGN-TV)
• Hyperbolic asteroids
  • Hyperbolic asteroids A/2017 U7 and A/2018 C2 are announced, although their orbit suggests they are not interstellar in origin. (Minor Planet Center₁) (Minor Planet Center₂)

• Tongo Tongo ambush
  • ISIL releases purported footage of the October 2017 attack on American special forces in Tongo Tongo, Niger. (BBC)
• Allied Democratic Forces insurgency
  • Seven people are killed in an attack on the city of Beni, North Kivu, DR Congo by the Allied Democratic Forces rebel group, which crossed the border from Uganda. (Xinhua News Agency)

• Global warming
  • NIWA declares that the previous summer, which had an average temperature of 18.8 °C (65.8 °F), was the hottest in New Zealand history. (The New Zealand Herald)
• Children's rights
  • A UNICEF report says that 20% of girls under 18 are married, compared to 25% ten years ago, with an estimated 25 million marriages having been prevented in the past decade. (BBC) (Voice of America)

• Egypt–Saudi Arabia relations
  • Saudi Arabian Prince Mohammad bin Salman meets Pope Tawadros II at Saint Mark's Coptic Orthodox Cathedral. (Reuters)
• United States–Vietnam relations
  • The USS Carl Vinson enters Vietnam's Da Nang Port, becoming the first U.S. aircraft carrier to visit a Vietnamese port since the Vietnam War in 1975. The visit comes amid tensions in the region with China. (NPR)

• Poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal
  • Former Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter are taken to a hospital in critical condition after being exposed to an unknown substance in Wiltshire, United Kingdom. Skripal was granted refugee status in the UK following a "spy swap" deal between the UK and Russia in 2010. (BBC)

• Italian general election, 2018
  • Italy faces a period of political instability after the results of the general election are almost complete. The populist Five Star Movement (M5S) is projected to be the largest party in the Italian Parliament with 32% of the vote. The party has long stated its hostility towards forming a coalition government. (The Wall Street Journal)
  • Former Prime Minister and candidate to the elections, Matteo Renzi, resigns as Secretary of the Democratic Party. (Politico)
• 2017–18 Spanish constitutional crisis
  • The Speaker of the Catalan Parliament, Roger Torrent, proposes Jordi Sànchez i Picanyol as a candidate for President of the Generalitat of Catalonia, but he has been preventively jailed since 16 October 2017, accused of sedition. This happens after Carles Puigdemont resigns as a possible candidate, who, if elected, would have been a symbolic president with a symbolic government in Brussels. The candidacy of Sànchez also reportedly lacks one seat for a majority. (El País)
• Politics of New Zealand
  • National Party politician and former Minister of Finance Steven Joyce resigns from parliament. (Newshub) (The New Zealand Herald)
• Politics of the United States
  • Republicans raise concern about U.S. President Donald Trump's plan to impose tariffs on metal imports. Speaker of the House Paul Ryan says he is "extremely worried" about the impact of a trade war, adding that it could "undermine economic gains". (BBC via RNZ) (Vox)
  • Fighting breaks out between anti-fascist protesters and supporters of white nationalist Richard B. Spencer when he gives a speech at Michigan State University, before they are separated by police. (Chicago Tribune)
• Politics of China
  • China's "two sessions" - the annual meetings of the national legislature and the top political advisory body - opens in Beijing; major announcements include an 8% rise in its military budget and a GDP growth target of around 6.5%. (BBC 1), (BBC 2), (Reuters)

• Cyberethics
  • Facebook apologizes after including a question in a user survey on the acceptability of soliciting sexual pictures from minors on its platform. (The Verge)
• Maritime archaeology
  • A search team led by Paul Allen's company Vulcan, Inc., using his research vessel Petrel, announces the discovery of the wreck of the USS Lexington (CV-2) about 800 kilometres (500 mi) off the eastern coast of Australia at a depth of around 3 km (2 mi). The aircraft carrier was lost in the Battle of the Coral Sea during World War II. (United States Naval Institute) (BBC)

• Kamwina Nsapu rebellion
  • The UN Refugee Agency reports that more than 900,000 people have been displaced by the ongoing fighting in the central provinces of DR Congo between militias and government forces since 2016. (UNHCR)
• 2018 anti-Muslim riots in Sri Lanka
  • Sri Lanka imposes a nationwide 10-day state of emergency, the first since 2011, in an effort to calm communal tensions. The previous day, a Sinhalese Buddhist mob attack on Sri Lankan Muslim shops in the region of Kandy, Central Province, left a Muslim person dead. (Reuters) (The New York Times)

• 2018 Antonov An-26 crash
  • A Russian Antonov An-26 transport plane crashes during an attempted landing at Khmeimim Air Base in Latakia, Syria, killing all 39 people onboard. (BBC)

• 2018 North Korea–United States summit
  • South Korea states that North Korea is willing to hold talks with the United States on denuclearization on the Korean Peninsula. (Fox News)
  • U.S. President Donald Trump tweets that possible progress is being made in talks with North Korea. (The Washington Examiner)
• 2018 inter-Korean summit
  • South Korea and North Korea agree to hold a summit in April 2018. (LocalNews8) (CNBC)
  • Assassination of Kim Jong-nam
    • The United States accuses North Korea of using VX to kill Kim Jong-nam, and imposes apparently symbolic sanctions against North Korea. (Reuters)
• Foreign relations of New Zealand
  • New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announces that New Zealand will give NZ$10 million to Tonga to help with rebuilding after the country was struck by Cyclone Gita in February. (1 News)

• Presidency of Donald Trump
  • The U.S. Office of Special Counsel says that Kellyanne Conway violated the Hatch Act of 1939 during two 2017 television interviews. (ABC News)
• Stormy Daniels–Donald Trump scandal
  • Porn star Stormy Daniels sues Donald Trump, arguing that a nondisclosure agreement signed by her and Trump's lawyer Michael Cohen is invalid. (NBC News)
• Free speech zones on college and university campuses, Safe-space
  • Violence breaks out as protesters storm an event organized by the King's College London Libertarian Society which featured Yaron Brook (Ayn Rand Institute) and the antifeminist YouTuber Sargon of Akkad. (The Telegraph)

• Politics of Russia
  • Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich replaces Deputy Prime Minister Vitaly Mutko as the Russian government executive in charge of the 2018 FIFA World Cup. (AP via ABC News)
• Presidency of Donald Trump
  • U.S. National Economic Council director Gary Cohn announces his resignation. (BBC)

• 2018 in spaceflight
  • SpaceX successfully launches Spanish communications satellite Hispasat 30W-6 into orbit on a Falcon 9 Full Thrust rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. (CBS News)

• 2018 Vienna stabbing
  • Two connected stabbings occurred in Vienna, Austria: three people were seriously injured outside a Japanese restaurant, and one man in a later stabbing. The perpetrator was arrested. (The Independent)

• A message in a bottle found in Australia is confirmed to have been adrift for almost 132 years, making it reportedly the oldest known message in a bottle. (ABC Online)

• Accidents and incidents involving helicopters
  • A Russian Border Guard Service Mil Mi-8 crashes in Chechnya, killing at least eight people. (TASS)
• March 6–8, 2018 nor'easter
  • A second winter storm occurs in the East Coast of the United States, only a few days after another storm. (The Weather Company)

• Australia–East Timor relations
  • Australia and East Timor sign a treaty for a permanent maritime border in the Timor Sea, ending a decade-long dispute over rights to the sea's rich oil and gas reserves. (BBC)

• Hate crime in the United Kingdom
  • Paul Golding and Jayda Fransen, leader and deputy of the British far-right organization Britain First, are convicted of hate crimes for posting things deemed offensive online. Golding is sentenced to 36 weeks in prison and Fransen to 18 weeks in prison for promoting Islamophobic activities and harassment. (The Independent) (BBC)
• Crime in the United States
  • Former United States Department of Justice attorney Jeffrey Wertkin is sentenced to 2½ years in prison for what prosecutors called the DoJ's "most serious" example of public corruption, which involved stealing more than 40 whistleblower fraud cases in 2016 with intentions to sell the secret information to companies under federal investigation. (The Washington Post)

• Aftermath of the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting
  • Florida's House of Representatives votes 67–50 to approve a gun and school safety bill that would raise the age to buy firearms from 18 to 21, sending the bill to Governor Rick Scott to sign into law. The measure also prohibits bump stocks, and creates a program for the arming of some teachers. (NBC News)

• Observational astronomy
  • European astronomers observe the "birth" of a symbiotic X-ray binary, IGR J17329-2731, described as a transient, from the Galactic Center using INTEGRAL space telescope. (European Space Agency) (The Astronomer's Telegram)
• Asteroid close approaches to Earth in 2018
  • Near-Earth asteroid 2017 VR12 makes a flyby past Earth. (USA Today)
• Forensic anthropology
  • Emeritus University of Tennessee Professor Richard Jantz claims that bones found in 1940 on Nikumaroro, Kiribati, almost certainly belong to lost aviation pioneer Amelia Earhart. (Newshub)

• Turkish military operation in Afrin
  • The Turkish-backed Free Syrian Army seizes control of Jindires in Syria's Afrin District from the Kurdish YPG. The town is extensively destroyed by Turkish airstrikes, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. (Reuters) (France 24)

• Economy of the United States
  • Toys "R" Us considers closing all its stores in the United States. (CNBC)

• 2017–18 North Korea crisis
  • 2018 North Korea–United States summit
    • Secretary of State Rex Tillerson says "potentially positive signals" come from North Korea, but that the two countries are "still a long way" from direct negotiations. (NBC News)
    • U.S. President Donald Trump accepts an invitation from North Korean Supreme Leader Kim Jong-un to discuss North Korea's denuclearization sometime by May. (CBC) (The New York Times)
  • Japan–North Korea relations
    • Japanese Prime Minister Shinzō Abe says inter-Korea talks could be a "meaningless" ploy by North Korea. (The Japan Times)
• United States recognition of Jerusalem as capital of Israel, Foreign relations of Guatemala
  • Secretary-General of the Arab League Ahmed Aboul Gheit demands Guatemala reverse its decision to move its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. The Minister of Foreign Affairs of Guatemala, Sandra Jovel says the move is "irreversible." (JPost)
• Protectionism in the United States
  • Citing national security reasons, U.S. President Donald Trump imposes tariffs of 25% on steel and 10% on aluminum imported from most countries. Canada and Mexico are provisionally exempt pending NAFTA renegotiations. The tariffs will take effect on March 23. (CBS News)
• Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership
  • Eleven countries in Asia, North America, Oceania, and South America sign the revised Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement. (The New York Times)

• Democratic Republic of the Congo general election, 2018
  • Prime Minister Bruno Tshibala says the election – delayed repeatedly since President Joseph Kabila's term expired in December 2016 – will occur this December. (Reuters via Standard Digital)
• The first Aurat March (social/political demonstration) was held on 8 March 2018 being International Women's Day in Karachi, Pakistan, annually held since then and feminist slogan Mera Jism Meri Marzi (My body, my choice) in demand for women's right to bodily autonomy and against gender-based violence came into vogue in Pakistan. (Al-Jazeera)

• Media of the United Kingdom
  • British music journalism magazine New Musical Express (NME) issues its final print edition after 66 years, becoming a purely digital medium. (London Evening Standard)

• 2017–18 North Korea crisis
  • 2018 North Korea–United States summit
    • White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders says that the White House needs to see "concrete and verifiable steps" toward the denuclearization of North Korea before meeting with Kim Jong-un. (Business Insider)
  • Australia–North Korea relations, Australia–United States relations
    • Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull urges U.S. President Donald Trump to be cautious in North Korea talks. Turnbull also said that Australia must retain sanctions on North Korea. (Canberra Times)
  • France–North Korea relations, France–United States relations
    • French President Emmanuel Macron says that Trump should hold tough talks with North Korea. (First Post)

• Yountville hostage crisis
  • An Afghan War veteran and recently expelled resident takes an executive director and two psychologists into a room at the Veterans Home of California in Yountville, California. Seven hours later, California Highway Patrol officers find all of them shot dead. (The New York Times)
• Crime in New York
  • A Brooklyn federal court sentences Martin Shkreli to seven years in prison for securities fraud in his hedge fund and pharmaceutical companies. (CNBC)
• Federal pardons in the United States
  • U.S. President Donald Trump pardons Kristian Saucier, who had served a one-year sentence for unauthorized possession and retention of national defense information. (The Washington Post)

• Politics of Mauritius
  • Mauritian President Ameenah Gurib-Fakim is to resign over a financial scandal, where she was accused of using a charity bank card to make personal purchases worth tens of thousands of dollars. (Reuters) (BBC)

• 2018 in spaceflight
  • Arianespace launches mission VS18 from the Guiana Space Centre, a Soyuz rocket carrying a payload of four O3b communications satellites for SES. (NASASpaceFlight.com)

• 2018 Winter Paralympics
  • The opening ceremony of the 2018 Paralympic Games in South Korea takes place. (BBC)
• Figure skating in the United States
  • American figure skating coach Richard Callaghan is suspended by the United States Center for SafeSport for alleged inappropriate sexual conduct with a 15-year-old pupil in 1985, first reported in 1999. (The Washington Post)

• Economy of the Democratic Republic of the Congo
  • Congolese President Joseph Kabila signs a law that increases taxes on mining and government royalties on international mining companies working in DR Congo, including on the mining of cobalt, despite the opposition from foreign companies. (BBC)

• East-Central Africa Division of Seventh-day Adventists
  • Lightning strikes a Seventh-day Adventist Church in Nyaruguru District, Rwanda, killing 16 people and injuring dozens. (BBC)

• Environmental issues in Chile
  • Outgoing Chilean President Michelle Bachelet signs a new law which creates nine marine reserves. The new legislation will increase the area of sea under state protection from 4.3% to 42.4%. (BBC)

• 2017–18 North Korea crisis
  • North Korea–United States relations
    • Jeju Island emerges as a possible location for U.S.–North Korea summit talks in May. (The Hankyoreh)
  • North Korea–Sweden relations
    • North Korean foreign minister Ri Yong-ho will visit Sweden and meet with Deputy Prime Minister Margot Wallström. (Reuters via The Japan Times)

• Aftermath of the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting
  • The NRA is suing Florida after it passed a gun control law which would raise the minimum age for purchasing guns from 18 to 21. (CNN) (BBC)
  • The U.S. Department of Justice submits a regulation to ban bump stocks, a modification to semi-automatic guns that allows the user to fire at a faster rate. (Reuters)

• 2017–18 South Pacific cyclone season
  • Cyclone Hola makes landfall in New Zealand. (Newshub)
• 2018 New York City helicopter crash
  • A helicopter crash in Manhattan's East River kills five people. (ABC News)
• 2018 Bombardier Challenger 604 crash
  • A private plane from Sharjah to Istanbul crashes in the Zagros Mountains in Iran, killing Turkish socialite Mina Başaran along with, according to Iranian state media, ten other people on board. (The National UAE), (BBC)

• Visa policy of the United Kingdom
  • Far-right activist and journalist Lauren Southern is detained at Calais and prevented from entering the United Kingdom, with the reason given by the UK Home Office that her presence 'was not conducive to the public good'. (London Evening Standard), (Fox News)
• 2018 Vienna embassy stabbing
  • An Austrian soldier was stabbed and injured in front of the Iranian embassy in Vienna. The attacker, which had Islamist sympathies according to the authorities, was shot dead. (Reuters)

• 2018 National People's Congress
  • China's National People's Congress approves the removal of presidential term limits, in a move that allows current president Xi Jinping to remain president for life. (BBC)
• Chilean general election, 2017
  • Sebastian Piñera takes office for the second time as President of Chile. (SBS)
• 2018 anti-Muslim riots in Sri Lanka
  • The suspension of Facebook remains in place until the riots end. (The Sunday Times)

• College basketball in the United States
  • The field for the NCAA Division I Men's Tournament is announced. The top overall seed is Virginia, with Villanova, Kansas, and Xavier as the other #1 seeds. (ESPN)

• Acquisitions by Apple
  • Apple Inc. buys digital magazine subscription app Texture for an undisclosed sum. (CNBC)
• United States antitrust law
  • Citing national security concerns, U.S. President Donald Trump blocks Broadcom's proposed acquisition of Qualcomm. (CNBC)

• US-Bangla Airlines Flight 211
  • An aircraft operated by Bangladeshi airline US-Bangla Airlines crashes at Tribhuvan International Airport, Kathmandu, Nepal, killing 49 of the 71 people on board. (BBC)

• Poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal, Russia–United Kingdom relations
  • British Prime Minister Theresa May says she believes it is "highly likely" that the Russian government was behind an attempt to murder Sergei Skripal and his daughter using a Novichok agent. (Deutsche Welle)

• Austin package explosions
  • Police in Austin, Texas announce that three package bombs in recent days that have killed two people and injured one more appear to be connected. The packages were left off at three separate locations and were not placed there by any delivery service, police say. (CNN)

• Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections
  • Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee announce the end of their Russia investigation, against the objections of Democratic members. According to the investigation's preliminary findings, the 2016 Trump campaign did not collude with the Russian government, and, contrary to the U.S. intelligence community's previous conclusions, Russia did not have a preference for Donald Trump as a presidential candidate. (NBC News)

• 2017–18 Superleague Greece
  • The Superleague Greece season is suspended indefinitely by the Greek Ministry of Culture and Sports after PAOK FC owner Ivan Savvidis invaded the pitch with several bodyguards during a match against AEK Athens F.C. while armed with a gun, after his side had a late goal ruled out for offside. (BBC)
• College basketball in the United States
  • The field for the 2018 NCAA Division I Women's Basketball Tournament is announced. Connecticut, the only remaining unbeaten Division I team of either sex, is the top overall seed, with Notre Dame, Louisville, and Mississippi State as the other #1 seeds. (AP via ESPN)

• Naxalite–Maoist insurgency
  • Maoists blow up a mine-protected vehicle of CRPF personnel with an IED, killing at least nine and injuring two others in Sukma district, Chhattisgarh, India. (Hindustan Times)

• The Argentine Navy rescues four United States Antarctic Program scientists and a contractor stranded on Joinville Island in Antarctica after their icebreaker RV Laurence M. Gould encountered thick sea-ice. (BBC)
• A bus plunges into a ravine in the Amhara Region, Ethiopia, killing at least 38 people, mostly students. (Channel News Asia)

• Japan–North Korea relations
  • Anonymous Japanese government sources say that Japan is considering a summit meeting between Japanese Prime Minister Shinzō Abe and North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un. (AFP)

• Transport in Iraq
  • Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi lifts a ban on international air travel to the Kurdistan Region. (France24)

• Cabinet of Donald Trump
  • U.S. President Donald Trump fires Rex Tillerson as Secretary of State, moving to replace him with CIA Director Mike Pompeo. Trump selects CIA Deputy Director Gina Haspel to replace Pompeo as director. (The Washington Post)

• Trans-Neptunian objects
  • 2015 TH367 (previously known as V774104), a 100–400 kilometer asteroid, is announced as possibly the fourth most distant known Solar System object from the Sun at nearly 90 (±10) times Earth's distance from the Sun. (Minor Planet Center)

• Toba catastrophe theory
  • A study is released suggesting that humanity flourished even after Lake Toba erupted 74,000 years ago. (International Business Times)

• Discoveries of exoplanets
  • K2-155d, a Super-Earth exoplanet, is discovered and could produce life. (Cnet)

• 2018 NCAA Division I Men's Basketball Tournament
  • The 2018 NCAA tournament begins, with the First Four starting in Dayton, Ohio. (ESPN)

• British physicist and cosmologist Stephen Hawking dies aged 76 at his home in Cambridge. (The Guardian) (The New York Times) (BBC)

• Economy of the United Kingdom
  • Toys "R" Us announce that they will close down all of their stores in the United Kingdom after rescue talks fail, resulting in the loss of about 3,000 jobs. (The Guardian)
• Economy of the United States
  • Shortly after the announcement of the closure of Toys "R" Us stores in the UK, the company announced that they will close down all 800 stores in the United States, resulting in the loss of about 33,000 jobs. (The Washington Post)
  • Ford issues a recall of 1.4 million vehicles, including some models of the Ford Fusion and the Lincoln MKZ, citing an issue where the steering wheel could come loose. (CNN)
• Panama Papers
  • Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca announces that it is shutting down due to the economic and reputational damage inflicted by its role in the global tax evasion scandal. (The Guardian)

• Two U.S. Navy aviators – a pilot and a weapons officer – are killed after they eject from their FA-18 fighter jet, which crashes into the sea off Key West, Florida. (Navy Times) (CNN)

• Foreign relations of the Philippines
  • Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte announces the withdrawal of the Philippines from the International Criminal Court (ICC) over "outrageous attacks" by United Nations officials. (Reuters)
• Australia–South Africa relations, South African farm attacks, Racism in South Africa
  • Australian Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton says white South African farmers could receive fast-track visas on "humanitarian grounds" amid calls to transfer land ownership from white to black farmers, and fears over the number of racially-motivated farm killings. (BBC)
• Russia–United Kingdom relations, Poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal
  • The United Kingdom expels 23 Russian diplomats and cuts off all top-level ties with Russia as punishment for a reported attack with the Novichok military-grade nerve agent, an attack which Prime Minister Theresa May described as an "unlawful use of force by the Russian state against the United Kingdom". (The Guardian) (NPR) (Reuters)

• 2018 United States gun violence protests
  • Students throughout the United States participate in a walkout protest against gun violence. (ABC News)
• Crime in Brazil, Politics of Brazil
  • Brazilian politician and outspoken police critic Marielle Franco is killed along with her driver in a drive-by shooting in Rio de Janeiro. (BBC)
• Telford child sex abuse ring
  • After an 18-month Sunday Mirror investigation, Theresa May has called for an inquiry "as quickly as possible" on reported Asian grooming gangs in Telford whereby up to 1,000 girls were lured from their families to be drugged, beaten, raped and even murdered. (The Mirror)

• Politics of Germany
  • Angela Merkel is elected and sworn in for a new term as Chancellor of Germany. Olaf Scholz and Heiko Maas assume the positions of Vice-Chancellor and Federal Minister of Foreign Affairs respectively. (The Guardian)
• Politics of Slovenia
  • Miro Cerar announces his resignation as Prime Minister of Slovenia, due to the Supreme Court of Slovenia's annulment of the referendum that approved building a railway between Koper and Divača, a project which he calls "strategic". (Associated Press)
• Pennsylvania's 18th congressional district special election, 2018
  • Democrat Conor Lamb declares victory in the special election of Pennsylvania's 18th congressional district. The final vote could still be determined by a recount if at least three voters in each precinct petition for one. (The New York Times) (Fox News)
• Presidency of Donald Trump
  • U.S. President Donald Trump appoints conservative commentator Larry Kudlow as National Economic Council director, replacing outgoing Gary Cohn. (BBC)
• Internet censorship
  • Facebook blocks Britain First, a far-right group that has been deregistered as a political party in the United Kingdom, because leaders Paul Golding and Jayda Fransen have repeatedly violated its community standards. (The New York Times) (BBC) (NBC News)

• Economy of the United States
  • The largest U.S. broadcaster, iHeartMedia, owner of 850 radio stations, files for chapter 11 bankruptcy after accumulating US$20 billion in debt. (CNN)
  • Southeastern Grocers announces a plan to file for bankruptcy and close 94 of its locations. (CNN)

• Florida International University pedestrian bridge collapse
  • An under-construction pedestrian bridge over the eight-lane Tamiami Trail at Florida International University in Miami collapses killing at least six people and flattening eight cars. Nine people are rescued from the rubble and taken to nearby Kendall Regional Medical Center. Two require immediate surgery; the others injured sustain non-life-threatening wounds. (The Washington Post)
• Accidents and incidents involving helicopters
  • A U.S. Air Force HH-60 Pave Hawk helicopter crashes near Al-Qa'im in Iraq's western Al Anbar Governorate, killing all seven people on board. (ABC News) (CNN)
• Approximately 3,400kg of gold ingots break free from a Nimbus Airlines Antonov An-12 cargo plane and fall onto the runway at Yakutsk Airport. (The Aviation Herald)

• 2017–18 North Korea crisis
  • North Korea–Sweden relations, 2018 North Korea–United States summit
    • North Korea foreign minister Ri Yong-ho visits Sweden for talks. (NK News) (CNN)
• Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act
  • The Trump administration imposes financial sanctions on 19 Russian nationals, including 12 of those indicted in the Special Counsel investigation. (Business Insider)
• Russia–United Kingdom relations, Poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal
  • Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergey Lavrov says Russia will "definitely" expel British diplomats. (Sputnik News)
• Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh
  • The government of Myanmar agrees to repatriate 374 Rohingya refugees from a list of 8,000 submitted by the government of Bangladesh. Myanmar's authorities blamed their Bangladeshi counterparts for the slow process, citing "incomplete" information for many of the refugees on the list. (The Guardian)
• Iran–Saudi Arabia relations
  • Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman says that Saudi Arabia will develop nuclear weapons if Iran does. (Reuters)

• Politics of Slovakia
  • Prime Minister of Slovakia Robert Fico resigns amid controversy over the murder of Ján Kuciak. (The Guardian) (BBC)

• Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race
  • Norwegian musher Joar Leifseth Ulsom wins the 2018 Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race. (KTUU News)

• 2017–18 North Korea crisis
  • 2018 inter-Korean summit, North Korea–South Korea relations
    • South Korea states that they want high-level talks with North Korea before the summit. (Reuters)
  • South Korea–United States relations
    • South Korea and the United States announce that the Foal Eagle and Key Resolve military drills will be scaled down and shortened. (The Malay Mail)
• Crime in the United Kingdom, Russia–United Kingdom relations
  • The death of Russian businessman Nikolai Glushkov, who lived in exile in the United Kingdom, is confirmed by a coroner's examination to be a murder. The killing happened eight days after the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal. (BBC)

• South African Arms Deal
  • South Africa's National Prosecuting Authority Director Shaun Abrahams says former President Jacob Zuma will be prosecuted for corruption, relating to a R30 billion arms deal in the late 1990s. Zuma disputes all the allegations against him. (The Guardian)
• The Holocaust in Latvia
  • Police arrest a man at the Freedom Monument displaying a poster of soldiers killing Jews as a protest against an annual march in Riga, Latvia, honoring two Latvian SS divisions during World War II. (JTA) (The Times of Israel)
• Aviation in the United States
  • The Federal Aviation Administration of the United States restricts "doors off" aircraft flights following a helicopter crash that killed 5 people. (CNN)
• Catholic Church sexual abuse cases
  • Anthony Sablan Apuron, the former Archbishop of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Agaña, Guam is found guilty on charges of the sexual abuse of minors by a tribunal. He is suspended from the exercise of his authority over the archdiocese. (Zenit)
  • Another lawsuit is filed against the Catholic Church in Guam, bringing the total lawsuits alleging historical sexual abuse to 157. Louis Brouillard, who is now 96, was on Guam from 1948 to 1981, and is accused of abusing boys in 100 of the lawsuits the church is facing. (RNZ)

• Presidency of Donald Trump
  • U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions fires former Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe because of a report from the Office of Professional Responsibility accusing McCabe of making an unauthorized news media disclosure and lacking candor on multiple occasions. (CBS News)

• Discoveries of exoplanets
  • European astronomers discover eight new exoplanets classified as Hot Jupiters as part of the WASP project. (The Talking Democrat)

• 2018 NCAA Division I Men's Basketball Tournament
  • For the first time in the history of the Division I men's tournament, a #16 seed defeats a #1 seed, as UMBC shocks top overall seed Virginia 74–54. (AP via ESPN)

• 2018 Philippine Piper PA-23 Apache crash
  • A Piper PA-23 passenger aircraft bound for Laoag International Airport in Ilocos Norte, Philippines, crashes upon take off from Plaridel Airport in Bulacan, killing all five people onboard as well as five on the ground. (Reuters) (Rappler)

• Russia–United Kingdom relations, Reactions to the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal
  • In response to the UK's decision to expel 23 Russian diplomats following the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal, the Russian Federation expels 23 British diplomats, closes the British Council in Russia and closes the Consulate-General of the United Kingdom in Saint Petersburg. (BBC)

• Judicial system of Iran
  • Former Vice President of Iran Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei, a close ally to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is arrested after criticizing Iran's judiciary. (AP via Al-Arabiya)
• Crime in the United States
  • A man is arrested in Austin, Texas, for threatening, via email, to bomb the SXSW festival. (NPR)
• Facebook and Cambridge Analytica data breach
  • Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey launches an investigation into alleged harvesting of Facebook profiles by Cambridge Analytica, a firm employed by Donald Trump's 2016 election campaign. (BBC) (Reuters via The New York Times)
• The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration of the United States launches an investigation into potential defects in the airbag control systems of some Kia and Hyundai models. (NPR)

• South Australian state election, 2018, Batman by-election, 2018, Cottesloe state by-election, 2018
  • Australian voters in South Australia, the Melbourne division of Batman, and the Perth electoral district of Cottesloe go to the polls in three separate elections. (Switzer Daily)
  • The SA Liberals win a majority of seats in South Australia's lower house, ending 16 years of Labor Party government in the state. (The Guardian)
  • Ged Kearney retains the Batman Division for the Australian Labor Party, despite earlier predictions that the Australian Greens would win. (SBS News)

• Turkish military operation in Afrin
  • The Turkish Army and Free Syrian Army seize the Kurdish stronghold of Afrin from the YPG in northern Syria, raising the Turkish flag above the city centre. A statue of the Kurdish legendary figure, Kaveh the Blacksmith, is bulldozed by Turkish-backed forces. (BBC) (Reuters)

• 2018 Manila Pavilion Hotel fire
  • Three people are killed in a fire at the Manila Pavilion Hotel in the Philippines. (Reuters)
• Florida International University pedestrian bridge collapse
  • The Miami Police Department states that they believe they have recovered the last of the victims killed by the bridge's collapse. (NPR)
• Cirque du Soleil fatal accidents
  • A Cirque du Soleil performer dies after falling 15 feet (4.6 m) during a performance in Tampa, Florida. (CBC)
• 2017–18 Australian bushfire season
  • A bushfire destroys dozens of buildings in Tathra, New South Wales, Australia. (BBC)

• 2018 anti-Muslim riots in Sri Lanka
  • Sri Lanka ends the state of emergency declared on March 6, 2018. (BBC)
• Far-right politics in the United Kingdom
  • Lutz Bachmann, the founder of the German nationalist group Pegida, is detained and prevented from speaking at a free speech rally at Speakers' Corner in Hyde Park, London, at which activist Tommy Robinson is also speaking. (The Independent) (The Guardian)

• Russian presidential election, 2018
  • Voters in Russia cast their votes for the President of Russia. Incumbent Vladimir Putin wins a fourth term in office, with just over 75% of the popular vote. (Reuters)

• 2018 Winter Paralympics
  • The closing ceremony of the Winter Paralympics takes place with the United States team winning the medal table with 36 medals (13 gold, 15 silver and 8 bronze). (BBC)

• Turkish military operation in Afrin
  • The Turkish-backed Free Syrian Army rebels loot the Syrian city of Afrin. (BBC)
• The United Nations reports that from January 2017 to January 2018 a total of 47 people were killed in protests against Congolese President Joseph Kabila. (Yahoo! News)

• "Gaudete et exsultate" ('Rejoice and Be Glad'; from Matthew 5:12) is the third apostolic exhortation of Pope Francis, dated on the Solemnity of Saint Joseph, and is subtitled "on the call to holiness in today's world". It addresses the universal call to holiness, with a focus "to repropose the call to holiness in a practical way for our own time". (Catholic Herald)

• Economy of the United States
  • After struggling with debt from a leveraged buyout, Claire's files for chapter 11 bankruptcy in the United States. The company has issued a statement that it expects its stores to remain operational while it restructures its debt. (CNN)

• History of autonomous cars
  • A woman in Tempe, Arizona, dies after being hit by a self-driving car operated by Uber, in what appears to be the first death of a pedestrian struck by an autonomous vehicle on public roads. In response to the fatal accident, Uber suspends self-driving car tests in all U.S. cities as well as Toronto. (The Guardian) (BBC)

• Austin serial bombings
  • In Austin, Texas, a fourth bomb detonates, injuring two men. The Austin Police Department believes it is connected to the other parcel bombings, but do not believe it to be connected to the bomb threat leveled at the SXSW festival. (BBC) (NPR)
• Turpin case
  • The seven adults of the "Turpin children" are reported to have been released from the Corona Regional Medical Center in California and placed into an undisclosed residential home to lead normal lives. (ABC)
• Crime in Turkey
  • Turkish police discover 1.4 kilograms (3.1 lb) of radioactive-labelled material in a car in Ankara. Initially claimed to be californium by the smugglers, the material is later identified as a type of polystyrene sulfonate. (BBC) (Daily Sabah)
• 2018 Riverview killings
  • A Florida man is arrested after killing his girlfriend and nine-year-old daughter in their home in Riverview, Florida. (Bay News 9)

• Federal drug policy of the United States
  • U.S. President Donald Trump unveils his plan to combat the United States's opioid epidemic which includes harsher penalties for drug traffickers, including the death penalty. (CNN)

• Syrian Civil War
  • A rocket fired from rebel-held Eastern Ghouta strikes a popular market in Damascus, killing at least 35 people, according to Syrian state TV SANA. (Reuters) (Channel News Asia)
  • An airstrike in Eastern Ghouta kills two women and 15 children in an underground school. (BBC)
• Military activity of ISIL
  • Indian external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj tells Parliament DNA testing on remains in a mass grave in Iraq confirms 39 Indian nationals believed to have been kidnapped by ISIL have been killed. (The Guardian)

• Weinstein effect
  • After a series of allegations of sexual misconduct against co-founder Harvey Weinstein, The Weinstein Company files for chapter 11 bankruptcy. The company also states that it will release all employees from a non-disclosure agreement which could prevent them from coming forward regarding the alleged misconduct of Weinstein. (CNN)
• Economy of India
  • Aircel, India's fifth-largest wireless provider, declares bankruptcy. (CNN)

• A Red Arrows jet crashes in North Wales, killing an engineer. (The Scotsman)
• History of autonomous cars
  • Toyota pulls all its self-driving cars off U.S. roads in the wake of a fatal accident involving an Uber vehicle. (The Verge)
  • Police state their investigation indicates the collision could not have been avoided. (AZ Central)
• 2017–2018 South African listeriosis outbreak
  • The World Health Organisation says a listeria outbreak spread via infected food responsible for 200 deaths in South Africa may have spread to Namibia. The organisation reaches out to 16 African nations it assesses as at risk. (CBC)
• 2018 disasters in the Philippines
  • A bus falls off a bridge in Occidental Mindoro, Philippines, killing at least 19 people and injuring 21 others. (Rappler)
• Saratov Airlines Flight 703
  • Russia's Ministry of Transport suspends all flights by Saratov Airlines after conducting checks on the company's Antonov An-148 aircraft. (The Aviation Herald)

• 2017–2018 North Korea crisis
  • Delegations from North Korea, South Korea, and the United States meet in the outskirts of Helsinki, Finland. (Reuters)
  • North Korean state media KCNA claims that, as a result of its nuclear weapons program, there has been "dramatic atmosphere for reconciliation" with South Korea, and "a sign of change" from the United States. (SBS news)
• China–Japan relations, China–South Korea relations, Japan–South Korea relations
  • Japan, China, and South Korea agree in principle to hold a trilateral summit in May. (SCMP)
• South Korea–United States relations
  • South Korea and the United States announce that the Foal Eagle and Key Resolve military drills will start on April 1 and last for four weeks. (ABC News)
• United States recognition of Jerusalem as capital of Israel
  • Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas insults U.S. Ambassador to Israel David M. Friedman, calling him a "son of a dog" when he says Israeli settlers build on their land in the occupied West Bank. The U.S. warns Abbas to "choose between hate and peace". (The Kuwait Times) (Jerusalem Online) (The Telegraph)
  • Palestinians are planning a mass demonstration in the Gaza Strip, ahead of the U.S. Embassy move. (Bloomberg)
• Human rights in China
  • Chinese diplomat Chen Cheng repeatedly interrupts and objects to exiled dissident Yang Jianli's testimony to the United Nations Human Rights Council. (The Guardian)
• Cyprus dispute
  • Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan asserts his nation will secure Northern Cyprus' access to natural hydrocarbon resources off the Cypriot coast. The comments come amid disputes as to sovereign rights and access to offshore resources on the island. (The Daily Sabah)
• Brexit negotiations
  • The Court of Session allows an appeal by a cross-party group of Scottish politicians seeking court permission for a referral to the European Court of Justice. The group wish for a ruling that the UK can abandon Brexit without permission from the European Union's other member states. A lower court will examine the claim. (The Guardian)
• Poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal
  • All 23 Russian diplomats expelled from the UK and their families depart on a flight to Moscow. (Sky News)

• Austin serial bombings
  • A bomb detonates overnight at a FedEx facility in San Antonio, Texas, United States. The FBI believes the bombing is linked to the other bombings in the area. The ATF reports that there were no serious injuries. Both the bomb's point of origin and intended destination were in Austin. (CNN) (NPR)
  • A second package presumed to have been sent by the bomber is discovered in a FedEx facility near Austin–Bergstrom International Airport. (New York Times)
• School shootings in the United States
  • A shooting occurs at Great Mills High School in Great Mills, Maryland. Two students are reported injured; the shooter is killed by police. (CNN)
• Alleged Libyan financing in the 2007 French presidential election
  • Former French President Nicolas Sarkozy is held for up to 48 hours and questioned by police in Nanterre over allegations that he illegally accepted €50 million from Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi to finance his bid in the 2007 presidential election. (NPR)
• Shooting of Justine Damond
  • Minneapolis Police formally charge Mohamed Noor with third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter for the shooting death of Justine Damond. (Star Tribune)
• Human rights in Turkey
  • The United Nations issues a report calling for an end to the nation's state of emergency, claiming it has been used to violate human rights. Turkey responds, calling the report "biased" and "unacceptable". (al-Jazeera)
  • The European Court of Human Rights says that Turkish authorities violated the rights of journalists Mehmet Altan and Sahin Alpay when they were arrested in the aftermath of a failed coup. The court ruled the men, one of whom is now serving life, were innocent and their rights to freedom of expression and to liberty had been violated. (Euronews)
• Human rights in the United Kingdom
  • The Department for Work and Pensions wins a court case holding that benefits claimants cannot raise arguments based on the European Convention on Human Rights at tribunals, and must instead go via the High Court. (The Canary)
• Legal status of cryptocurrencies
  • U.S. President Donald Trump issues an executive order banning U.S. entities from trading in the Venezuelan Petro cryptocurrency. Trump calls the digital currency, launched last month, an "attempt to circumvent U.S. sanctions". (al-Jazeera)

• Politics of Norway
  • Norwegian justice minister Sylvi Listhaug resigns amid controversy over remarks on human rights and national security. (The Guardian)
• Politics of Slovakia
  • Protests continue in Slovakia after last week's collapse of the government, which included the resignation of Prime Minister Robert Fico. (NPR)
• Politics of Zambia
  • Zambian Minister Bowman Lusambo is suspended by Parliament over an assault on a fellow lawmaker in October 2017. (Africa News)

• Eschatology in Norse mythology
  • Analysis of ancient ice cores extracted from Greenland dates an eruption on Eldgjá volcano in Iceland. Iceland's largest eruption in the last 2,000 years was described in ancient poem Völuspá. (Infosurhoy)
• Extinction threshold
  • Sudan, the last known male Northern white rhinoceros, dies in captivity, leaving two females as the only surviving members of the subspecies. (BBC)
• ESA missions
  • The European Space Agency announces a mission to study the atmospheres of exoplanets. Selected as Cosmic Vision medium class M4 mission, ARIEL is expected to launch in 2028. (BBC)
• Japan's space development
  • Japan announces a fund worth US$940 million to encourage the foundation of new companies involved in space exploration. (CNBC)
• Marine debris
  • A study commissioned by the UK government concludes marine plastic debris may treble within ten years, and predicts the "ocean economy" will double to US$3 trillion (£2 trillion) by 2030. (BBC)

• Saudi Arabian-led intervention in Yemen
  • Houthis claim to have shot down a Royal Saudi Air Force F-15 jet over Sa'da province, Yemen. (Sputnik News)
• Syrian Civil War
  • The Syrian government and rebel forces reach an agreement to allow 7,500 people to evacuate from rebel-held Harasta, Eastern Ghouta. (al-Jazeera)
• Boko Haram insurgency, Dapchi schoolgirls kidnapping
  • Boko Haram releases most of the 110 Nigerian schoolgirls it had kidnapped in February 2018, and warns against sending them back to school. (The Globe and Mail)

• Accidents and incidents involving helicopters
  • A Eurocopter 120 helicopter carrying five people crashes into the sea near Hardy Reef off the Whitsunday Islands, Queensland, Australia. Two people are killed. (The Guardian)
• Aftermath of the 2015 Shoreham Airshow crash
  • The Crown Prosecution Service charges pilot Andrew Hill with 11 counts of manslaughter by gross negligence and one count of endangering an aircraft over an accident at Shoreham Airshow in England. (The Telegraph)
• Metro Hotel Dublin fire
  • A fire breaks out in the upper floors of a hotel and apartment block building in Ballymun, Ireland, near Dublin Airport. The fire affects the top seven floors of the building and two floors of apartments, without casualties. (RTE) (The Irish Times)
• History of autonomous cars
  • Police release onboard video from an autonomous Uber car that fatally struck a pedestrian crossing the road in Tempe, Arizona. (BBC)

• Israel–Syria relations
  • Israel admits for the first time that it carried out an airstrike on a suspected nuclear reactor in Deir ez-Zor Governorate, Syria, on 6 September 2007. The strike allegedly killed ten North Korean workers. (Reuters)
• Austria–Israel relations
  • Austrian foreign minister Karin Kneissl recalls diplomat Jürgen-Michael Kleppich from Israel after he is photographed wearing a t-shirt with slogans linked to Nazism. (The Local)
• Economy of the African Union
  • The leaders of 44 African Union states sign an agreement in Kigali, Rwanda, to create the African Continental Free Trade Area (CFTA). (BBC)
• Poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal
  • Russia holds a briefing on the case for all foreign diplomats in Moscow, where it accuses the United Kingdom of "withholding evidence." (The Guardian)
• Poland in the European Union
  • Polish Foreign Minister Jacek Czaputowicz accuses the European Union of "double standards" and of suffering "a deficit of democracy". Poland and the European Commission are engaged in disputes over migrant quotas and proposed reform of Poland's judiciary. (al-Jazeera)

• Censorship in Singapore
  • The Singaporean Parliament approves the Public Order and Safety (Special Powers) Act, which makes it a crime to take pictures and relay information during terror attacks. (Channel News Asia)
• Austin serial bombings
  • Mark Anthony Conditt, the main suspect in the serial bombings, dies after detonating a bomb in his vehicle while being pursued by Austin police officers. The police chief warns residents that while they believe the bomber is deceased, he may have sent more packages before his death. (CNN)
• Crime in the United Kingdom
  • James Ibori, a former governor of Delta State, Nigeria, launches a bid to overturn his guilty pleas on corruption charges in the UK alleging police corruption. (Africa News)
• Alleged Libyan influence in the 2007 French elections
  • Former President of France Nicolas Sarkozy is preliminarily charged with illegal funding of his 2007 presidential campaign, passive corruption and receiving money from Libyan embezzlement. (Voice of America)
• Aftermath of the 2017 Parsons Green bombing
  • The Independent claims the Metropolitan Police misidentified material in convicted bomber Ahmad Hassan's possession as not related to ISIS when in fact it was produced by the group. The newspaper says it has submitted evidence to the Central Criminal Court that could affect Hassan's sentence. (The Independent)
• Police in the Philippines fatally shoot 13 suspected drug dealers in Bulacan. (France 24)

• Politics of Myanmar
  • Myanmar President Htin Kyaw resigns due to ill health. Vice-President Myint Swe, a former general, will become acting president until a new president is chosen. (CNN) (U.S. News & World Report) (BBC)
• Jackfruit becomes official state fruit of Kerala.
• 2017–18 Spanish constitutional crisis
  • Catalan activist Jordi Sànchez i Picanyol, imprisoned accused of sedition, drops his bid to lead the Catalan government. (BBC)
  • Jordi Turull i Negre, ex-member of the dismissed regional government, who was imprisoned amid sedition and under investigation due to his connection in a corruption scandal involving CiU, is named candidate by the President of Catalan Parliament in an investiture for Thursday, March 22. (El Mundo)
• Resignation of Pedro Pablo Kuczynski
  • Peruvian President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski resigns amid a vote buying scandal. (BBC)
• Antiguan general election, 2018
  • Voters in Antigua and Barbuda go to the polls, with Barbudan residents having to travel to Antigua in order to participate. (The Telegraph)
• Politics of Kosovo
  • In Kosovo, opposition lawmakers set off tear gas to prevent the ratification of a border treaty with neighboring Montenegro. (CNN)

• Discoveries of exoplanets
  • Fifteen new exoplanets are discovered. Three of them, larger than Earth, are also discovered around the dwarf star K2-155. Furthermore, a 3D climate simulation was created to find out if K2-155d has water. (Health Thoroughfare) (ScienceDaily)
• 2018 in spaceflight
  • Three people (two American, one Russian) launch successfully from the Baikonur Cosmodrome aboard Soyuz MS-08 to the International Space Station as part of Expedition 55. (NASA)

• Somali Civil War (2009–present)
  • A car bomb blast in Mogadishu, near the Weheliye hotel in the Somali capital, kills at least 14 people and injures 10 others. Al-Shabab claims responsibility for the blast. (AP via MSN)
• Syrian Civil War
  • Evacuations of 7,500 people from rebel-held Harasta, Eastern Ghouta begin. Rebels agree with the Syrian government and Russia for the displaced people to be exiled in Idlib Governorate. (The Guardian)
  • A market in the town of Harem, Idlib province, is reportedly struck by Russian aircraft, killing 35 people including 12 children. (NPR)
• Yemeni forces launch a missile attack on Aramco's HQ in Najran, Saudi Arabia. (Press TV)

• Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act
  • Craigslist deactivates its personals section in response to the U.S. Senate's passage of the bill. (Buzzfeed)

• Economic policy of the Donald Trump administration
  • U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer tells a Senate panel that President Donald Trump has decided to "pause" tariffs on steel and aluminium imports from the European Union, Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Mexico, and South Korea. (BBC)

• 2018 Unipetrol explosion
  • Six people are killed after an explosion at a Unipetrol plant in Kralupy nad Vltavou, Czech Republic. (BBC)
• A four-storey building collapse kills two firefighters in Pennsylvania. (Snopes)

• China–United States relations
  • U.S. President Donald Trump imposes tariffs on US$60 billion of Chinese goods, while also limiting China's ability to invest in the U.S. technology industry. (The Washington Post)
• 2017–18 Qatar diplomatic crisis
  • Qatar's Interior Ministry releases a list of individuals and entities it says are linked to terrorism. Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Egypt, who had demanded the list amid tensions with Qatar, welcome its release but criticise the time taken to prepare it. (Gulf News)
• Foreign relations of Poland
  • Poland's ruling Law and Justice proposes changes to planned judicial reforms in response to European Union criticisms the plans threaten judicial independence. The European Commission is threatening Poland with sanctions over the reforms. (Deutsche Welle)
  • Polish and U.S. authorities say the completion of the United States missile defense complex in Poland, part of a NATO project, will be delayed until 2020. (U.S. News and World Report)
  • Poland's ruling Law and Justice's Arkadiusz Mularczyk says Germany owes Polish victims of World War II a total of 1.984 trillion zloty (US$543 billion, 440 billion euros) in compensation. (The Times of Israel)
• Russia–Sudan relations
  • Russian President Vladimir Putin accepts an invitation to visit Sudan from Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir. (Africa News)
• Cyprus dispute
  • The European Union calls on Turkey to cease military actions aimed at enforcing Turkish claims to disputed natural gas deposits. The bloc also asks Turkey to release detained EU citizens. (al-Jazeera)

• Murder of Maria Ladenburger
  • Iranian immigrant Hussein Khavari is convicted of rape and murder in a case that provoked widespread discussion of refugee immigration to Germany. (BBC)
• Ukrainian crisis
  • Ukrainian MP Nadiya Savchenko is arrested in Parliament over an alleged plot to attack Parliament and overthrow the government. (BBC)
• Alleged Libyan influence in the 2007 French elections
  • In a statement to French investigating magistrates, ex-President Nicolas Sarkozy refutes corruption charges relating to alleged receipt of funding from the then President of Libya, Muammar Gaddafi, in 2007. (The Telegraph)
• Crime in Brazil
  • An open letter from international politicians, activists, journalists, and academics demands an independent commission be formed to investigate the assassination of Brazilian human rights activist Marielle Franco and her driver. (The Guardian)
• Cow vigilante violence in India since 2014
  • An Indian court convicts eleven Hindus of murdering a Muslim man they discovered transporting beef, sentencing them to life. It is the first successful prosecution of cow vigilantism violence in India. (BBC)
• Palestinian government
  • Two men accused of an attempt to assassinate Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah die in a shootout with security forces. Two Hamas security personnel also die. (The Jerusalem Post)
• Crime in Kenya
  • The Kenyan Court of Appeals rules forced anal examinations on suspected homosexuals are illegal. (Deutsche Welle)
• Sanctions against Iran
  • Malta imposes a freeze on Pilatus Bank. The bank's Iranian chairman Ali Sadr Hashemi Nejad was arrested and charged in the United States earlier this week, accused of breaching United States sanctions against Iran. (Reuters)

• Protests against Emmanuel Macron
  • People in 150 places across France take to the streets peacefully in a general strike to protest President Macron's economic reforms. Railways, airways, schools and power generation are affected. (Reuters)
• Cyprus dispute
  • Turkey announces it is to send a drilling boat to disputed waters claimed by both Cyprus and Northern Cyprus. (The Guardian)
• Poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal
  • Detective Sergeant Nick Bailey, wounded when he came to the aid of the poisoned Russian dissidents, is discharged from hospital. (BBC)
  • British Prime Minister Theresa May calls the incident "part of a pattern of Russian aggression against Europe" and promises to raise the matter at an upcoming European Union summit. (BBC)
  • An inquest is opened into the death of murdered Russian exiled dissident Nikolai Glushkov in London. (The Independent)
  • The Court of Protection hears the Skripals are unable to communicate and may have suffered lifelong brain damage. It rules blood samples can be taken from the pair for analysis by the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons and grants the group access to medical records. (The Independent)
• Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections
  • John Dowd, the most senior lawyer advising U.S. President Donald Trump on allegations of Russian electoral interference, resigns. (BBC) (CNN)
• 2017–18 Spanish constitutional crisis
  • Jordi Turull fails in the first vote to become President of the Generalitat. The next session will be held on Saturday, March 24. (La Vanguardia)
  • Marta Rovira, Carme Forcadell, ex-president of the Parliament and Dolors Bassa, ex-member of the dismissed government who was in prison accused of sedition, resigns as Deputy before the declaration in front of Supreme Court that will be held on March 23. (La Vanguardia)
• Resignation of Pedro Pablo Kuczynski
  • A Peruvian court confirms it will consider a request to impose a travel ban on President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski if his resignation is confirmed by lawmakers, who are considering whether to accept it. Some politicians have vowed to resist the resignation in favour of instead impeaching Kuczynski. (The New Jersey Herald)
  • Peruvian Vice President Martín Vizcarra returns from Canada, where he is his nation's ambassador, in preparation to take over the Presidency. (CBC)
• Presidency of Donald Trump
  • U.S. President Donald Trump announces former United States Ambassador to the United Nations John R. Bolton will become his National Security Advisor, succeeding the outgoing H. R. McMaster. (USA Today)
• Antiguan general election, 2018
  • Antigua and Barbuda's ruling Antigua and Barbuda Labour Party wins a second term in a landslide vote. (The Sun Daily)

• Human genetics
  • DNA tests confirm Ata, an unusual six-inch-long mummy found in Chile in 2003, to be the remains of a newborn human with genetic mutations. (BBC)

• Aftermath of the 2017 Parsons Green bombing
  • Convicted terrorist Ahmed Hassan Mohammed Ali is jailed for life in London for one count of attempted murder and one of causing an explosion with intent to endanger life. He will have to serve 34 years before becoming eligible for parole. (Surrey Advertiser)
• Carcassonne and Trèbes attack
  • Four people are killed and 16 wounded when an extremist takes hostages in Trèbes, France. The suspect is killed by police. (BBC) (CNN)
• War in Afghanistan (2001–2021)
  • A car bomb is driven into a crowd outside the Ghazi Muhammad Ayub Khan Stadium in Lashkar Gah, Helmund, before detonating. At least 13 people are killed. (BBC)
• Northern Mali conflict
  • Malian Prime Minister Soumeylou Boubeye Maiga visits separatist rebel stronghold Kidal. (WBOY-TV 12 News)

• Economy of Denmark
  • Boeing loses a case in Copenhagen city court against the Danish Ministry of Defense over access to documents used in the purchase of Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning II fighters in preference over Boeing F/A 18 Super Hornets. Boeing argued the evaluation process used in the purchase had been "flawed". (Reuters)

• 2018 disasters in Vietnam
  • A fire at a condominium complex in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, kills at least 13 people and injures another 27, with most people dying of suffocation or jumping from high floors. (The Washington Post)

• Poland in the European Union
  • Polish Foreign Minister Jacek Czaputowicz asks the European Commission to halt its use of Article 7 of the Treaty on European Union against the nation in exchange for modifications to controversial proposed judicial reforms. (Radio Poland)
• Poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal, Russia–European Union relations
  • The European Union agrees with the United Kingdom's assessment of the incident, stating that "there is no plausible alternative explanation" to Russian involvement. (NPR)
  • The EU ambassador to Russia is recalled from Moscow. (BBC)
• Iran–United States relations, Cyberwarfare in Iran
  • The United States charges and sanctions nine Iranians and the Iranian company Mabna Institute for hacking and attempting to hack hundreds of universities. (Reuters)
• Cyprus dispute
  • Turkey calls a statement of European Union support for Greek Cypriots in a dispute over offshore resources "unacceptable". Turkey has been using its Navy to prevent exploration by Cypriot vessels. (al-Jazeera)
• 2018 North Korea-United States summit
  • New US National Security Advisor John R. Bolton says that President Donald Trump should insist on Libya-styled denuclearization for North Korea. (Reuters)

• Crime in South Korea
  • Former President of South Korea Lee Myung-bak is detained on charges of taking bribes when he was in office. (Reuters)
• School shootings in the United States
  • One of the victims of the shooting at Great Mills High School in Maryland dies from her injuries. (CNN)
• Crime in the United Kingdom
  • Two lorry drivers receive prison terms, one of 14 years, for killing eight people when their vehicles collided with a bus on the M1 in Buckinghamshire, England, in 2017. (BBC)
• Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections
  • Tumblr shuts down 84 accounts linked to the Internet Research Agency. (The Outline)
• Gun violence in the United States
  • The US Department of Justice announces it will reclassify bump stocks as machine guns, effectively outlawing them. (Axios)
• Human rights in the United States, Transgender personnel in the United States military
  • US President Donald Trump issues an order banning "transgender persons who require or have undergone gender transition" from the military. Pentagon spokesman Major David Eastburn says this announcement will have no immediate practical effect for the military which will continue to recruit and retain transgender people in accordance with current law. (BBC) (NBC News)
• During a three-week US Border Patrol Operation Sandman near Yuma, Arizona, there are 204 arrests for human smuggling. (KYMA)

• 2017–18 Spanish constitutional crisis
  • Thirteen Catalan separatist politicians appear before the Spanish Supreme Court. Marta Rovira, who is "self-exiled" in Switzerland, does not attend. (AP via U.S. News & World Report) (The Washington Post)
  • The judge remands Jordi Turull, Josep Rull, Carme Forcadell, Dolors Bassa and Raul Romeva into custody again. (New York Times)
  • Judge Llarena reactivates the European Arrest Warrants against Carles Puigdemont, Marta Rovira, and four fugitive ex-members of dismissed regional government. (El Mundo)
• Abortion in Poland
  • Thousands protest across Poland against the government's proposed restrictions on abortion. (The Guardian)
• Resignation of Pedro Pablo Kuczynski
  • The Peruvian Congress votes 105–12 to accept President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski's resignation. (ABC News)
  • Vice President Martín Vizcarra is sworn in to replace Kuczyski. (The Guardian)
• Politics of the United Kingdom
  • Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn sacks Shadow Secretary of State for Northern Ireland Owen Smith after he called for a second referendum on European Union membership. He is replaced by Rochdale MP Tony Lloyd. (The Guardian)
• Government shutdowns in the United States
  • The United States government avoids another government shutdown when President Trump signs the 1.3 Trillion dollar omnibus spending bill into law. This bill ensures no more shutdown threats until October 1, 2018. (Federal News Radio), (The Washington Post)
• Politics of Mauritius
  • President Ameenah Gurib leaves the office after resigning on 17 March over a credit card from a NGO scandal. She is succeeded ad interim by Vice President Barlen Vyapoory. (Al Jazeera)

• Fauna of Australia
  • More than 140 pilot whales die in Hamelin Bay, Australia, after beaching themselves. (BBC)

• Terrorism in Egypt
  • A bomb planted beneath a car explodes in Alexandria, Egypt, as a motorcade carrying the city's head of security passes by, killing at least two people. (The Telegraph)
• Saudi Arabian-led intervention in Yemen
  • Saudi aircraft attack Houthi targets in residential areas of Hudaydah and Sa'dah, Yemen, killing at least seven civilians. (Press TV)
• Terrorism in Greece
  • An Afghan community centre is burned down in Athens, Greece. An extreme far-right group claims responsibility, and the United Nations condemns the attack. (ABC News)

• The Times reports their journalist, Bel Trew, had been expelled from Egypt shortly after her February 20 arrest. Trew had been given the option of a military trial or leaving the country. (AP) (The Guardian)
• 2018 Kids' Choice Awards
  • The 31st annual Kids' Choice Awards takes place. (Hollywood Reporter)

• The Kofu District Public Prosecutor’s Office in Japan announces nobody will be prosecuted over the collapse of the Sasago Tunnel, which killed nine and injured three. Officials say the collapse would have been difficult to predict. (The Japan Times)
• Two men are rescued from a capsized dredger off Malaysia after 50 hours in an air pocket in the engine room. The death toll so far is nine, with rescue efforts underway to search for more survivors. (Sky News)

• 2018 inter-Korean summit
  • North Korea accepts South Korea's proposal to hold high-level inter-Korean talks, scheduled to take place on March 29. (CNN)
• Poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal
  • A friend of poisoned exiled Russian spy Sergei Skripal claims Skripal had written to Vladimir Putin asking to return to Russia. Russia denies receiving such a letter. (BBC)
  • The 23 British diplomats and their families expelled from the Russian Federation arrive on a flight from Moscow. (BBC)
  • Investigators discover the Skripals switched off their mobile phones for four hours shortly before falling ill, and begin examining mobile phone data from everyone in Salisbury the day of the crime in a bid to link a phone to the poisoner. (Daily Mirror)

• A car is deliberately driven into a group of schoolgirls in Glasgow, Scotland, injuring five. Police launch an attempted murder probe. (BBC)

• 2018 United States gun violence protests
  • Hundreds of thousands of people participate in the March for Our Lives protest around the world regarding gun violence, mass shootings and school shootings in the United States. (BBC) (PBS)
• Peruvian ex-President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski's homes are raided by police investigating Operation Car Wash. A judge orders him to remain in Peru. (Deutsche Welle)

• Somali Civil War (2009–present)
  • A car bomb claimed by Al-Shabab kills five people including the driver and wounds around ten others outside Somalia's Parliament, Interior Ministry, and Presidential Palace buildings in Mogadishu. (ABC)
• War in Afghanistan (2001–2021)
  • Two suicide bombers strike a Shi'ite mosque in Herat, Afghanistan, killing one person and wounding seven others. Security forces kill one bomber while the device kills the other. ISIL claims responsibility. (Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty)
• Iraqi insurgency (2017–present)
  • ISIL releases a statement claiming responsibility for killing or wounding 103 Iraqi soldiers within one month. The group also claims to have abducted 13 more soldiers, and destroyed 12 armoured vehicles. (Iraqi News)
• Yemeni Crisis (2011–present)
  • Houthi forces fire several Burkan-2 ballistic missiles at targets in Saudi Arabia with at least one person, an Egyptian national, being killed in Riyadh. The Royal Saudi Air Defense says it intercepted seven missiles, three of them targeting Riyadh, two targeting Jizan and one apiece targeting Najran and Khamis Mushait. (The Washington Post)

• 2018 Kemerovo fire
  • A fire in the Winter Cherry complex, a shopping centre in Kemerovo, Russia, kills at least 64 people, the majority of which are children. (BBC)
• South Korean ferry disasters
  • A passenger ferry grounds off the coast of South Korea, injuring at least six people with The South Korean Coastguard evacuating all 163 on board. (Channel News Asia)
• A bus and a lorry collide head-on near Kitonga, Tanzania, killing twenty six people and wounding nine others. (The Nation)

• Trump tariffs, South Korea–United States relations
  • South Korea and the United States reach agreements on trade and steel tariffs. (Bloomberg)
• Russia–European Union relations, Reactions to the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal
  • EU diplomatic chief Federica Mogherini holds crisis talks with Markus Ederer, the bloc's recalled ambassador to Russia. (France24)
• Qatar–Russia relations, Modern conflicts in the Middle East
  • Sheikh Tamim of Qatar visits Russia to discuss the situation in Syria, Yemen and Palestine. (Al Jazeera)

• A suspected drunk driver loses control while fleeing police in Maputo, Mozambique, strikes a crowd, and kills 21 people, injuring 30 more. (The Nation)

• 2017–18 Spanish constitutional crisis
  • Catalonia's ex-President Carles Puigdemont is detained in Germany. (The Daily Telegraph)
  • Fugitive ex-minister Clara Ponsatí i Obiols says she will hand herself over to Police Scotland, who have received a copy of the European Arrest Warrant for her. (BBC)
  • Protests erupt across Spain, especially in Barcelona, against Puigdemont's detention. (BBC)
• Aftermath of the Carcassonne and Trèbes attack
  • A former French Parliamentarian candidate of the La France Insoumise party is arrested for tweeting that the death of Lt-Col Arnaud Beltrame was "great" and "one less vote for Emmanuel Macron." (BBC)

• Novae in the Milky Way galaxy
  • Researchers publish observations of a possible nova (ASASSN-18fv) in the constellation Carina. (AAVSO), (APOD)
• Kangaroo Route, History of Qantas
  • Qantas Airways Flight QF9 becomes the first ever regularly scheduled non-stop flight between Australia and Europe after making the 17-hour journey from Perth to London. (The Evening Standard)
• Climate of Europe
  • An anomalous weather event caused due to dust from a sandstorm in the Sahara, leads to an orange snow blanketing several Eastern European countries, including Ukraine, Bulgaria, Romania and Russia. This weather event happens roughly every five years; a similar event occurred in Siberia in 2007. (The Guardian)

• Terrorism in the United Kingdom
  • Six alleged members of the banned neo-Nazi group National Action appear in court. One is accused of planning to kill MP Rosie Cooper and another is charged with inciting murder. (The Independent)

• Economy of the United States
  • U.S. firearms and ammunition manufacturer Remington Arms files for chapter 11 bankruptcy protection after amassing US$950 million worth of debt. (Bloomberg)
  • Following a collapse of a farm and a large release of Atlantic salmon into the Pacific, the state of Washington bans the farming of Atlantic salmon in their territorial waters. (NPR)
• China launches an oil futures market, with contracts denominated in yuan, in a bid to compete with oil benchmarks from the United States and Europe. (MarketWatch)

• 2018 Kemerovo fire
  • Witnesses and Russia's Investigative Committee say the Winter Cherry complex's exits were blocked and there were no alarms during the disaster. (BBC)
• US-Bangla Airlines Flight 211
  • The death toll rises to 52 people as a survivor dies in hospital. (Khaleej Times)
• 2018 New York City Eurocopter AS350 crash
  • The US National Transportation Safety Board releases a preliminary investigative report containing new information on the accident, in which five passengers drowned when they were trapped in the wreckage. (CNN)
• 2017–18 Volvo Ocean Race
  • A British yachtsman falls overboard from Sun Hung Kai/Scallywag. A search and rescue operation launches, with one ship diverting from over 400 nautical miles away. (BBC)
• History of autonomous cars
  • The governor of Arizona suspends all statewide-testing of Uber autonomous cars following the March 19 fatal accident involving Uber self-driving car research. (The Verge)
• A same-sex couple and three of their adopted children have been found dead at the bottom of a cliff at the coast of northern California, along with the wreckage of their SUV. After further investigation, authorities eventually deduced that it was very likely that the couple, which was previously known to have abused their children, intentionally drove off the cliff with them. (CNN)

• Reactions to the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal
  • More than 100 Russian diplomats are expelled from over 20 countries. (BBC)
  • U.S. President Donald Trump orders the closure of the Russian consulate in Seattle. (BBC)
• European Council President Donald Tusk and European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker conclude talks with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. The parties say they have been unable to agree on human rights issues but pledge to hold more talks. (The Financial Times)
• A letter from 59 US Senators is sent to Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki criticising proposed legislation on reparations to Holocaust victims. The Senators say the bill will discriminate against victims and descendants who had emigrated. (The Times of Israel)

• Crime in France
  • French police detain two men in connection with the murder of an 85-year-old Holocaust survivor who was found in the burned remains of her apartment. The prosecutor's office is investigating if the killing was "motivated by the real or supposed adherence to a religion". (Reuters)
• Carbanak
  • Spanish police in Alicante arrest the suspected leader of a bank hacking scheme believed to have stolen over €1 billion. (Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty)
• Carcassonne and Trèbes attack
  • In regards to the March 23 attack that killed four people, French state prosecutor François Molins charges attacker Radouane Lakdim's 18-year-old girlfriend with terrorist conspiracy. (The Guardian)

• Egyptian presidential election, 2018
  • The Egyptian electorate vote in their presidential election, with incumbent President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi facing only one opponent. (The Washington Post)

• Discoveries of exoplanets
  • ArXiv publishes research that a gas giant may be orbiting a brown dwarf. The exoplanet, designated OGLE-2017-BLG-1522Lb, orbits its host at a distance of 0.59 AU and could be the first known gas giant to have formed inside the protoplanetary disk of a brown dwarf. (Phys.org)

• Terrorism in the United Kingdom
  • Old Bailey Justice Charles Haddon-Cave sentences convicted terrorist Umar Haque, who indoctrinated children he was teaching in London so that he could use them to commit attacks, to lifetime incarceration with parole eligibility only after 25 years. (The Evening Standard)
• Islamophobic incidents in the United Kingdom
  • Justice Michael Alexander Soole sentences Paul Moore to lifetime incarceration with a minimum imprisonment of 20 years for using his car to attack Muslims following a string of terror attacks in 2017 linked to Islamic extremism. (The Guardian)
• War in Afghanistan (2001–2021)
  • NATO says the Afghan Air Force dropped its first laser-guided bomb on a Taliban compound on March 22. NATO have trained the Afghans in use of the equipment. (ABC)
• Turkish involvement in the Syrian Civil War
  • The government of Turkey states that eleven Kurdish militants have been killed near its Syrian border, and two soldiers were killed by an explosion in Syria. (US News)

• History of autonomous cars
  • U.S. graphics processing unit producer Nvidia suspends all its tests of self-driving cars. (The Verge)
• History of the electric vehicles
  • The United States National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) launches a probe into a Tesla electric car crash and fire in California. The NTSB says it will investigate issues firefighters had trying to determine how to respond. (Bloomberg)
• 2018 Kemerovo fire
  • President Vladimir Putin visits the scene and declares "criminal negligence" responsible for the high death toll. (BBC)
• Maritime incidents in 2018
  • Two ships collide in the Great Belt strait between Funen and Zealand, near Romsø, Denmark. One catches fire. (The Local)
  • Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency (MMEA) expands the search area to 560 square nautical miles for nine crewmen missing since March 21 from a capsized sand dredger off the coast of Malaysia. MMEA requests for the Indonesian National Search and Rescue Agency to assist in the operation. (The Malay Mail)
• 2017–18 Volvo Ocean Race
  • Chilean search and rescue authorities declare that a crewman who fell overboard from a competitor vessel is lost at sea. (The Telegraph)
• 2018 in aviation
  • The South Korean Aviation and Railway Accident Investigation Board issues its final report on the March 2016 near-collision between a China Southern Airbus A319 and a Korean Air Boeing 737-800 on a runway in Cheongju, South Korea. The Board reports the Airbus crew misunderstood the full meaning of the specific ground control runway instruction. (The Aviation Herald)

• Kim Jong-un and Xi Jinping's meeting
  • North Korea's supreme leader Kim Jong-un meets with China's paramount leader Xi Jinping in Beijing, on what is his first known travel outside North Korea since assuming office in 2011. (Reuters)
• Reactions to the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal
  • NATO and the government of Australia expel Russian diplomats. (The Independent), (The Guardian)
• Netherlands–Turkey relations
  • The government of the Netherlands recalls a diplomat from Turkey after local newspapers accused him of spying. (Dutch News)

• Aftermath of the Manchester Arena bombing
  • A United Kingdom panel, chaired by the former head of the Home civil service, Lord Bob Kerslake, issues a report which concludes that firefighters were prevented from attending the scene of the bombing for two hours. The report makes more than 50 recommendations. (BBC)
• Censorship in Spain
  • A Madrid court issues an order shutting down a website that uses extracts from Don Quixote to recreate the book Farina. Farina, an investigation of drug trafficking, is the subject of a freedom of speech debate after a court halted sales ahead of a libel case. (AP via The Washington Post), (The Telegraph)
• Crime in the United States
  • The FBI arrests Everett, Washington, 43-year-old Thanh Cong Phan on suspicion of charges of illegally shipping explosive materials by sending 12 package bombs to the CIA as well as multiple military and government facilities in the Washington, D.C. area. Those devices did not explode. (CBS News)
• Kent County, Michigan special prosecutor Bill Forsyth charges William Strampel, the former dean of the Michigan State University College of Osteopathic Medicine, in the United States District Court for the Western District of Michigan in East Lansing, Michigan, with misconduct in office, fourth-degree criminal sexual conduct, and two counts of willful neglect of duty in connection with the Larry Nassar scandal. (Detroit Free Press)
• Law enforcement in the Netherlands
  • A Dutch court rules police are liable for a mass shooting at a shopping centre that killed six and wounded sixteen because the gunman should not have been issued a firearms licence. (Sky News)

• Egyptian presidential election, 2018
  • Voting enters the second day. (Reuters)

• Discoveries of exoplanets
  • Led overall by researchers at Aix-Marseille Université in France using NASA's Kepler Space Telescope, Nature Astronomy publishes observations of what may be a new exoplanet named K2-229b, whose attributes may resemble the planet of Mercury (hot, metallic, and dense). (Health Thoroughfare), (Phys), (Nature Astronomy)

• Terrorism in the United Kingdom
  • The Sentencing Council for England and Wales issues new guidelines increasing the penalties for terrorist offences. (The Financial Times), (The Law Gazette), (Sentencing Council for England and Wales) (The Times of India)
  • A report by Max Hill QC, an independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, reviewing the police response to the March 2017 Westminster attack, concludes that the arrests of 12 people cleared of involvement were appropriate, as was the questioning of them on their religious beliefs. (The Guardian)
• Terrorism in Italy
  • Italian counter-terror police arrest Elmahdi Halili on suspicion of planning attacks with knives and lorries, attempting to recruit terrorist attackers, and creating the first piece of Islamic State propaganda in Italian. (The Local)
• Libyan Crisis (2011–present)
  • United States Africa Command announces that a March 24 airstrike in Ubari, Libya, killed Musa Abu Dawud, who was a wanted alleged senior member of al-Qaida. (Stars and Stripes)
• Iraqi insurgency (2017–present)
  • Iraqi authorities announce the arrest of alleged senior Islamic State member Saab Abdullah al-Issawi in a military-supported airdrop in Anbar. (Iraqi News)
• Somali Civil War (2009–present)
  • A car bomb near an International Committee of the Red Cross office wounds three people in Mogadishu, Somalia. (Anadolu Agency)
• Terrorism in Greece
  • An anarchist group claims responsibility for a bombing outside a courthouse in Athens, Greece, on March 24. (eKathimerini)

• Conviviality PLC, owner of Wine Rack and Bargain Booze, announces it has been refused investment to stave off bankruptcy and will likely enter administration. (The Guardian)
• The United Arab Emirates, with help from Korea Electric Power Corp., completes construction of the first reactor complex at the Barakah nuclear power plant 50 kilometres (31 mi) west of Ruwais. The complex is the first Arab nuclear power plant. (The Mercury News)

• Shutdown of Gran Turismo 6 Online Servers
• A partially-constructed building collapses onto a truck in Jacobs, Durban, South Africa, killing at least three people and hospitalising six more. (News 24), (Eyewitness News)
• A tank containing ethyl acetate explodes in a port in Livorno, Italy, killing two people. (The Local)
• California Highway Patrol search and rescue operations continue off the Californian coast for three children missing following a crash which killed five of their relatives. Their car drove out of a seaside unbarricaded parking lot and off of a 75-foot cliff into the sea on March 26. (KGW 8 News)
• Caribbean Airlines Flight 523
  • U.S. Federal Judge Michael P. Shea of the U.S. District Court for the District of Connecticut in Hartford, Connecticut awards an injured passenger US$272,000 against Caribbean Airlines over the July 2011 airliner crash in Guyana. (The Washington Post)
• A New Zealand light aircraft pilot Rod Vaughan claims that his plane was brought down at Waihi after colliding with a drone. If true, it would be the first such incident in the country. (Stuff)

• China–North Korea relations
  • The governments of China and North Korea both confirm that North Korea's supreme leader Kim Jong-un met with China's paramount leader Xi Jinping in Beijing during the past four days. China states that North Korea is "committed to denuclearization" and willing to hold a summit with the United States. (Reuters)
• Reactions to the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal
  • Former Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko, himself the victim of a September 2004 poisoning, calls for military action to be considered against Russia. (Sky News)
• Poland–United States relations
  • Poland signs a deal with the United States to buy a US$4.75 billion Patriot missile system. (BBC)
• Poland in the European Union
  • Polish environment minister Henryk Kowalczyk says Poland alone should decide the fate of the protected Białowieża Forest, ahead of a European Court of Justice ruling on whether additional logging allowed by the Polish government at the UNESCO world heritage site breaches European Union rules. (Reuters)

• Crime in Italy
  • A judge in Catania, Italy, upholds the seizure of a Proactiva Open Arms ship that brought migrants to Sicily after refusing to hand them over to the Libyan Coast Guard. (The Libya Observer)
• Crime in the United Kingdom
  • English judge Christine Henson fines St. Michael's Hospice in St. Leonards, at East Sussex, over the July 2015 fire in which three residents died. (BBC)
• Poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal
  • Police investigating the attack say they believe the Skripals were poisoned at Sergei Skripal's home. (Sky News)
• History of autonomous cars
  • Claims emerge that Uber had disabled Volvo's collision avoidance technology in the self-driving car involved in a fatal accident in Arizona. (Bloomberg)
  • Uber reaches an out-of-court settlement with the victim's family. (Reuters)
• Crime in Qatar
  • Mubarak al-Ajji, named on a Qatari official list of wanted terrorists, wins second place at a government-sponsored triathlon and is photographed at the medal ceremony. (The Week)
• Crime in Canada
  • A court in Quebec City accepts guilty pleas to six murders and six attempted murders tendered by Alexandre Bissonnette on March 26 and lifts restrictions on reporting the pleas after he passes a psychiatric evaluation. The charges relate to the January 2017 Islamophobic shooting at a mosque that Justin Trudeau described as a terrorist attack. (The South China Morning Post)
• Crime in China
  • A Chinese court sentences Zhang Zhongsheng, the former Vice Mayor of Lüliang, Shanxi, to death. Zhongsheng was convicted of accepting bribes totaling 1.04 billion yuan (US$160 million). (The South China Morning Post)
• Aftermath of the Orlando nightclub shooting
  • The trial of Noor Salman, widow of Pulse nightclub shooter Omar Mateen, hears closing arguments. Jurors begin deliberations. During the trial it was revealed that Mateen's father was an FBI informant. (CNN)
• Cyberattacks
  • Computers at Boeing are infected with the WannaCry ransomware. (The Seattle Times)
• French left-wing activist Stephane Poussier receives a one-year suspended term for praising the death of a policeman in a terrorist attack. (The Times of Israel)

• 2017–18 Spanish constitutional crisis
  • Clara Ponsatí i Obiols, fugitive ex-Minister of Education of Catalonia, hands herself over to Police Scotland. She appears before court and is released on bail. (The Guardian) (BBC)
  • The Spanish National Police Corps arrest the two Mossos d'Esquadra and Asia History academic, Josep Lluís Alay, who accompanied Puigdemont in the van at the moment he was detained in Germany amid a crime of concealment. On 28 March were released. (El País)
• Egyptian presidential election, 2018
  • On the final day of the election, Egypt's National Election Authority says it will fine abstaining voters. (The Egypt Independent)
• Cabinet of Donald Trump
  • U.S. President Donald Trump announces that he is replacing David Shulkin as Secretary of Veterans Affairs and will nominate Ronny Jackson, who is currently the President's Physician, to fill the position. (USA Today)
• Officials with former Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva say shots were fired at two of his reelection campaign buses. (The Guardian)
• Human rights activist Malala Yousafzai returns to her native Pakistan for the first time since being shot in October 2012 to meet with Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi. (BBC)

• Australian Aboriginal languages
  • The linguistics journal Diachronica publishes Australian research implying that a tracement of the country's indigenous languages can be made back to a single, common language known as Proto-Australian, which was spoken around 10,000-years ago. (BBC)
• Giant-impact hypothesis
  • Research published in the journal Science Advances implies the Earth may have had water earlier than thought, and that terrestrial water could have survived the impact that created the Moon, the event which was previously hypothesised to be responsible for our planet's water. (New Scientist), (Science Advances)
• Galaxy formation and evolution
  • Research published in the journal Nature implies the existence of a galaxy that appears to contain no dark matter, dubbed NGC1052-DF2. If confirmed it would be the first such galaxy discovered. (BBC), (Nature)

• 2016 Berlin truck attack
  • Italian police arrest five Tunisians suspected of links to Anis Amri, perpetrator of the December 2016 terror attack in Germany. (Reuters)
• Terrorism in Israel
  • The Central District Attorney’s Office filed an indictment with the Israeli Lod District Court against Abed al-Karim Adel Asi for the murder of a rabbi on February 5 and the Haifa District Attorney’s Office filed an indictment against Malek Yusef Nahar Asadi for the March 4 attempted murder by ramming a car which injured four people. (The Jerusalem Post)
• Terrorism in the United States
  • U.S. District judge George B. Daniels of the District Court for the Southern District of New York has rejected the government of Saudi Arabia’s request to throw out lawsuits claiming the nation helped plan the September 11 attacks. (The Independent)

• British automotive and aerospace engineering firm GKN (founded in 1759) is sold to British-based investment company Melrose Industries for £8.1 billion. (BBC)

• A magnitude 6.9 earthquake strikes off the coast of New Britain Island, Papua New Guinea, at a depth of 35 km (22 mi). There are no reports of immediate damage. [https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-43592321 (BBC)
• A boat capsizes in Nawabshah, Pakistan, killing eight people. (Geo News)
• A Línea Aérea Amaszonas passenger plane overruns the runway at Riberalta Airport after abandoning takeoff due to a bird strike and crashes into a ditch with no injuries. (The Aviation Herald)
• The Bureau d'Enquêtes et d'Analyses pour la Sécurité de l'Aviation Civile completes its probe into the March 2016 near-miss between two commercial aircraft at Basel/Mulhouse Airport, concluding miscommunication between an air crew and air traffic control was to blame. One aircraft took off over the top of the other one. (The Aviation Herald)

• 2018 inter-Korean summit
  • Authorities announce that the summit between the governments of North Korea and South Korea will take place on April 27, 2018. (USA Today)
• Reactions to the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal
  • The Putin administration closes the United States consulate in Saint Petersburg and expels 60 U.S. diplomats from Russia as a retaliatory measure to the closing of the Russian consulate in Seattle, Washington. (BBC)
• Poland in the European Union
  • The Polish government announces a planned visit for April 9 from European Commission Vice President Frans Timmermans. The government of Poland and the European Union are locked in a dispute over planned judicial reforms. (AFP News via Yahoo)
• American-led intervention in the Syrian Civil War
  • U.S. President Donald Trump, during a speech on his infrastructure plan in Richland County, Ohio, announces U.S. forces will be leaving Syria "very soon." (Politico) (White House Dossier)

• 2018 Valencia, Venezuela fire
  • An attempted prison break and subsequent rioting and fires at a police station in Valencia, Carabobo State, Venezuela, results in at least 68 people dead. Two women who were visiting inmates are thought to be among the dead. Prosecutor General Tarek Saab says an investigation into what has happened would begin immediately. (BBC)
• A French animal rights activist is charged under counterterror legislation for praising the death of a butcher in a terror attack. (The Times of Israel)
• Extradition law in the United States
  • U.S. Department of Justice immigration Judge Jose A. Sanchez in Boston, Massachusetts, approves an extradition request from the government of Guatemala for Juan Alicio Samayoa Cabrera, who is wanted for trial for war crimes. (WBUR News)
• Asylum in the United States
  • Because the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) routinely failed to notify screened immigrant asylum-seekers of the one-year deadline for filing an actual asylum application, Western Washington state chief federal district judge Ricardo S. Martinez orders DHS to give those who missed the deadline another year to file their application, and to modify the DHS asylum system to avoid future problems. (AP via The Washington Post)
• Weinstein effect
  • A pair of women accuse The Ren & Stimpy Show creator John Kricfalusi of sexually abusing them in the 1990s while they were minors. Kricfalusi, who was in his 40s at the time, admitted to Buzzfeed that he had an underage girlfriend during the years in question. (BuzzFeed)
• A car bomb kills five people and injures six others in Ajdabiya, Libya. (Reuters)

• Egyptian presidential election, 2018
  • State media reports preliminary indications incumbent President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi has won 90% of the vote with a 41% turnout. (BBC)
• 2018 Kentucky Senate Bill 151
  • Lawmakers at the Kentucky Senate and the Kentucky House of Representatives pass a heavily disputed pension overhaul and forward it to Governor Matt Bevin for his signature. Several school districts will close on Friday due to teacher protests against the bill. (AP) (WYMT-TV) (The Courier-Journal)

• 2018 Major League Baseball season
  • The 2018 Major League Baseball season begins. (Hollywood Life)

• Terrorism in Pakistan
  • A bomb targeting police in Dera Ismail Khan, Pakistan, kills three people and injures five others. (Geo News)
• Syrian Civil War
  • A roadside bomb in Syria kills one British and one U.S. soldier and injures five more coalition personnel. It is the first death of a British soldier fighting ISIL. (The Telegraph)
  • The government of Turkey rejects the government of France's offer to mediate in the conflict between Turkish armed forces and Kurdish YPG militia in Syria. (BBC)
• 2018 Gaza border protests
  • On Land Day, the start of a planned six-week protest at the Israeli-Gazan border involving tens of thousands of Palestinians, Israeli forces kill 16 Palestinians and wound over 1,100 others as tens of thousands of protestors approach the border fence. (The Times of Israel), (Reuters)
• Terrorism in Italy
  • In the latest in a series of raids, Italian authorities detain 19-year-old Ilyass Hadouz in Fossano on suspicion of pro-ISIL extremism. (Euronews)
  • National counter-terror prosecutor Federico Cafiero de Raho states that an estimated 50 people have returned to Italy after fighting with the Islamic State. (ANSA)
• Aftermath of the Orlando nightclub shooting
  • A United States court jury in Florida finds the widow of Omar Mateen not guilty of assisting her husband in the June 2016 attack that killed 49 people. (CNN)
• Terrorism in Germany
  • Police in Germany announce that earlier this week they detained four Syrian nationals on suspicion of arson and attempted murder over a Turkish Muslim mosque firebombing in Ulm. Police say the attack "may have been politically motivated". (The Local)

• A bus carrying migrant workers from Myanmar catches fire near Bangkok, Thailand, killing twenty people and injuring one other. (Evening Standard)
• Stansted Airport in the United Kingdom is evacuated after a bus catches fire outside the main terminal. (The Telegraph)
• A hot air balloon hits a tree near Sydney, Australia, wounding 16 people. (Sky News)
• An overloaded bus carrying migrants from Iran, Pakistan, and Afghanistan crashes into a light pole on the Igdir-Kars highway in Turkey and catches fire. A second bus hits some of the ejected passengers, killing at least 17 people and wounding 36 others. (The Times of Israel)
• An overloaded bus explodes a tyre and crashes near Bhanjyang, Nepal, killing at least two people and wounding dozens of others. A riot follows. (ABC)
• The government of Russia declares a state of emergency in Volokolamsk over toxic hydrogen sulphide fumes leaking from a dump at at least ten times permitted concentrations. (BBC)

• Russia and weapons of mass destruction
  • The Russian military announces a second test of its most advanced nuclear ICBM, the RS-28 Sarmat, from a base in Plesetsk. President Vladimir Putin claimed in his March 1 state of the nation speech that the new nuclear arsenal will be impossible for U.S.-engineered technology to intercept. (ABC News) (Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty)

• Polish President Andrzej Duda vetoes a bill that would have demoted all communist-era military officers who served between 1944 and 1990 to private. (Deutsche Welle)

• Alcohol licensing laws of Ireland
  • The government of Ireland lifts a 90-year ban on the sale of alcohol on the religious holiday of Good Friday. (BBC)
• Reactions to the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal
  • The Putin administration gives the government of the United Kingdom one month to reduce its diplomatic missions' sizes to mirror those of the Russian ones in Britain. (The Telegraph)
  • The government of Russia expels 59 diplomats from 23 nations and may also take retaliatory action against four other countries. (Reuters via Geo News)
  • The government of Russia claims that United Kingdom police searched an Aeroflot Airbus jet at Heathrow Airport arriving from Moscow. The Metropolitan Police deny searching the aircraft. (Sky News)
• The government of Ukraine states that it expelled two Iranians earlier this year for attempting to buy a Kh-31 missile in Kiev, in violation of United Nations sanctions. (The Daily Beast)
• Senegalese Judge Malick LaMotte sentences Khalifa Sall, mayor of Dakar, Senegal, to a five-year term for fraud. (BBC)
• Protestors take to the streets in Faisalabad, Pakistan, following the rape and murder of a local university student. (Geo News)
• Illegal immigration to the United States
  • Mexican federal police and migration agents find 136 migrants in a locked truck abandoned near a freeway in Veracruz. Without water or food, the people from the countries of Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador, and Nicaragua, including dozens of minors, were en route to the United States. (Reuters)
• Immigration to the United States
  • The Trump administration through the United States Department of State publishes a 60-day notice of request for public comment, proposing to collect social media identities from nearly everyone who seeks entry into the United States. (The Indian Express)
• Alexanda Amon Kotey and El Shafee Elsheikh, detained in Syria on suspicion of beheading hostages for Islamic State, claim their right to a fair trial has been breached by the government of the United Kingdom stripping them of citizenship. (Sky News)
• Four suicide bombers attack Maiduguri, Nigeria, killing five people with thirteen others wounded. (Daily Post)
• Terrorism in the United States
  • Judge Ellen Lipton Hollander of the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland sentences Maryland resident Mohamed Elshinawy to a 20-year term for financing ISIS. (AP via Fox News)
• U.S. sportswear brand Under Armour states that the personal details (including user names, email addresses and scrambled passwords) of about 150 million users of the MyFitnessPal application were compromised in one of the biggest hacks in history. (The Guardian)
• The Lansing, Michigan, Catholic Diocese's insurance company files a civil suit against Rev. Jonathan Wehrle, former pastor of St. Martha's Catholic Church in Okemos, a Lansing suburb, for the embezzlement of more than $5 million from his parish. Wehrle already faces six criminal counts for using embezzled funds to pay for home construction (appraised for much more than a $1 million), maintenance, and purchases. (Lansing State Journal), (AP via ABC News), (Lansing State Journal²)

• Suicide among LGBT youth
  • Journal of Adolescent Health publishes research from the University of Texas at Austin implying that transgender youths have a much lower risk of suicide when they are permitted to use their own chosen names. (Eureka Alert!), (Journal of Adolescent Health)
• Chinese space program
  • Updated predictions suggest that derelict Chinese space station Tiangong-1 will reenter Earth's atmosphere over the weekend. (CNET)

• International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach meets North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. (ESPN)

• Terrorism in the United Kingdom
  • Police in London announce the arrest on March 29 of a 19-year-old man suspected of the commission, preparation, or instigation of acts of terrorism. (Time 107.5fm)
• Syrian Civil War, Siege of Eastern Ghouta, Rif Dimashq offensive (February 2018–present)
  • The Syrian Army declares that the Eastern Ghouta towns of Arbin, Zamalka, Jobar, and Ein Tarma are vacated of rebel fighters. Except for the town of Douma, which is facing an ultimatum, the government controls most of the area around the capital Damascus. (AP via The New Zealand Herald)

• General Conference (LDS Church)
  • The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints announces the elevation of Brazilian Ulisses Soares and Chinese American Gerrit W. Gong to the church's top leadership group, the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. They are respectively the first Latin American and first man of Asian descent to serve in this role. (AP via Yahoo!)
  • LDS President Russell M. Nelson announces that High Priests Quorum will be merged into Elders Quorum. (Daily Herald)
• A man attempts Seppuku at Nankang Software Park in Taiwan, apparently in response to the final public appearance of online celebrity Zhou 'Dora' Yingxin. (Kotaku)

• U.S.-based automobile manufacturer Tesla confirms that one of their Model X cars was placed into Autopilot mode moments before a fatal crash in California, United States. Tesla's Autopilot system is not intended to operate independently and as such the driver is meant to have their hands on the wheel at all times. The recorder of the system logged that the driver did not have their hands on the wheel at the time of the crash. (BBC)
• Updated analysis by the European Space Agency and Aerospace Corporation suggests that the derelict Chinese space station Tiangong-1 will crash on tomorrow evening or the day thereafter in the morning. Although the prediction remains highly uncertain, the station may impact around Africa. (Space.com)
• A fire destroys four World Food Programme warehouses in Hudaydah, Yemen, which contained 50 tonnes of food as well as fuel and mattresses. (BBC)
• Stansted Airport in the United Kingdom reopens after a shuttle bus fire. (The Guardian)
• In Japan, Kyushu Electric Power shuts down their Genkai Nuclear Power Plant because of a steam leak less than a week after being restarted for the first time in seven years. (The Mainichi)
• An explosion at a market in Jalalabad, Afghanistan, kills one person and injures three others. (Tolo News)
• A bulldozer damages a gas line with a subsequent explosion at a construction site in al-Jalala mountain, Egypt, killing two people and wounding nine more. (The Egypt Independent)
• A hotel collapses in Indore, India, killing at least 10 people. (CNBC)
• A fairground ride collapses in Neuville-sur-Saône, central France. Occupied pods attached to the ride fall to the ground, ejecting some riders, with one man dead. (Channel News Asia)
• 2018 Balikpapan oil spill
  • As workers attempt to clean up an oil spill, a fire breaks out off the coast of Borneo near Balikpapan, Indonesia, killing at least two fishermen. Search and rescue personnel evacuate all 20 crew from a nearby ship. (AFP via Channel News Asia)

• Poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal
  • The United Kingdom Foreign Office considers a consular request from the government of Russia for visitation with Yulia Skripal, the daughter of poisoned ex-spy Sergei Skripal. (The Guardian)
• The Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency claims a Vietnamese fishing vessel tried to ram one of their boats when they tried to detain it for illegally entering and fishing from Malaysian waters. (The Sun Daily)
• 2018 Gaza border protests
  • Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas accuses Israel of responsibility for the deaths of 16 protestors at the border with Gaza. Israel accuses Palestinian terrorists of using civilians as human shields. A video begins circulating on social media appearing to show an unarmed teenager being shot. (Bloomberg)
  • Israel claims to have identified ten of the dead as members of terrorist organisations, and publishes a list of their names and the groups Israel says they belonged to. (The Times of Israel)
• An unknown source supposedly leaks a report from the German defence ministry which suggests the nation's Tornado fighter jets may not meet NATO requirements for secure encrypted communications and are therefore potentially unsuitable for NATO missions. (Reuters)
• The French ambassador to Italy is summoned to the Italian foreign ministry to explain an incident in which French police cross over the sovereign border of Italy, enter a migrant clinic in Turin, and force a refugee to take a urine test. (BBC)
• In order to make sea room for expanding berthing facilities in Trincomalee Harbour, the Sri Lankan navy raises the SS Sagaing, a British passenger ship sunk when it was bombed in an April 1942 Japanese air strike during World War II. (BBC)

• Crime in Russia
  • The Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs detains Ziyavudin Magomedov, his brother Magomed Magomedov, and the chief executive of the Summa Group on charges of embezzlement of public funds and criminal association. A Moscow court orders Ziyavudin Magomedov, one of the richest Russians, to remain in pre-trial custody until May 30. (TASS), (Reuters)
• Human rights in Turkey
  • The Law Society of England and Wales issues a report claiming that Turkey has prosecuted 1,539 lawyers since the 2016 coup d'état attempt. The report states that 580 people still remain incarcerated with 103 more having received prison sentences. (The Law Gazette)
• In Madarganj Upazila, Jamalpur, Bangladesh, a group of between 70 and 80 people from one faith of mosque attack an inauguration ceremony for another faith of mosque, resulting in at least 20 injured. (The Rabwah Times)

• Sierra Leonean general election, 2018
  • The second round of a general election begins in Sierra Leone with a tight race expected between the People's Party and the All People's Congress. Incumbent President Ernest Bai Koroma is constitutionally barred from seeking a third term in office. (The Guardian)
• Botswanan President Ian Khama steps down and hands power over to Vice President Mokgweetsi Masisi. (Africa News)

• The current largest cruise ship in the world Royal Caribbean International's $1.35 billion MV Symphony of the Seas commences its maiden voyage. (USA Today)

• 2018 NCAA Division I Men's Basketball Tournament
  • The Michigan Wolverines and the Villanova Wildcats advance to the National Championship Game after defeating the Loyola Ramblers and Kansas Jayhawks in the Final Four. (CBS Sports)