Portal:Current events/March 2015

Political elections

Estonian parliamentary election, 2015
- The ruling Reform Party wins the elections, but loses the majority that it has had with its current coalition partner, the Social Democratic Party. For the first time in many years, two new parties cross the election threshold, the right-of-centre Free Party and the eurosceptic Conservative People's Party of Estonia. (Estonian Public Broadcasting)
Andorran parliamentary election, 2015
- Despite losing five seats, the Democrats for Andorra narrowly retains their absolute majority in the General Council, winning 15 of the 28 seats. (Elections Andorra)

Science and technology

NASA astronauts perform the third of three ISS spacewalks completing the cabling reroutings needed in preparation for the 2017 arrival of the first commercial spacecraft capable of transporting astronauts. (AP)

March 2, 2015 (Monday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant:
- A coalition of Iraqi Armed Forces and militia numbering around 30,000 launches an offensive against Islamic State positions in Tikrit. Troops seize control of the district of al-Tin and al-Abeid. (BBC)
Second Libyan Civil War (2014–present)
- Libya's Council of Deputies agrees to resume peace talks. (Reuters via Daily Mail)

Business and economy

Hewlett-Packard announces that it will buy Aruba Networks, a California-based manufacturer of wi-fi equipment, for approximately $2.7 billion in combined cash and equity. (press release).

International relations

In response to joint exercises held by South Korea and the United States, North Korea fires two short-range missiles off its coast. (Reuters)

Law and crime

A man shoots to death a woman and a seven-year-old boy then himself in the Queensland town of Biddeston, west of Brisbane, Australia. (ABC News)

Sports

Durham Police arrest English and Sunderland footballer Adam Johnson over suspected sexual activity with a 15-year-old girl. (BBC News)

March 3, 2015 (Tuesday)

Business and economy

Norwegian Air Shuttle will ground all passengers in Norway, Denmark, and Sweden as the result of an industrial dispute. The action leaves 35,000 people stranded. (Norway local)
The Royal Bank of Scotland will fire 14,000 staff as they retreat from geographic positions in US and Asian markets. (The Guardian)
Target Corporation, a major U.S. retail chain, announces cuts that will mean the loss of thousands of jobs, part of a revival plan adopted by CEO Brian Cornell. (press release)

Disasters and accidents

The Villarrica volcano explodes in southern Chile leading to the evacuation of 3,000 people. (Xinhua)
The Engineer Of A Metrolink Crash with a truck Dies from his injuries

International relations

Assassination of Boris Nemtsov
- Russian authorities refuse entry into Russia at Moscow's Sheremetyevo International Airport to a Latvian lawmaker and vice-chair of the biggest bloc in the EU, Sandra Kalniete. Having received no reasonable explanation for the ban, she flies back to Brussels. (AFP via Yahoo! News)
- Russia's authorities deny Poland's Senate speaker Bogdan Borusewicz entry into Russia for the funeral of slain Kremlin critic Nemtsov. (ABC News)
North Korea lifts restrictions on entry into the country imposed ostensibly to stop the spread of the Ebola virus. (BBC)

Law and crime

Former CIA director and U.S. Army officer David Petraeus pleads guilty in federal court to a charge of unauthorized removal and retention of classified information. (Reuters vis MSN)
A Turkish court orders President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to pay 10,000 lira ($4,000) in compensation for the mental anguish caused to artist Mehmet Aksoy for having called his sculpture Monument to Humanity — meant to promote reconciliation between Turkey and Armenia — a "monstrosity" in 2011. (Fox News)
China detains Jing Chunhua, a senior official from Hebei province of China, for investigation by the Communist Party's anti-graft agency for violating party discipline and breaking the law. Jing is the second provincial-ranked official from Hebei province to undergo investigation since the wider anti-corruption campaign began in 2013. (CRI)
Same-sex marriage in Slovenia
- Slovenia becomes the 11th EU member state and the first post-communist state to legalize same-sex marriage and adoption of children by same-sex couples, after a parliamentary vote of 51–28. (Reuters)

Politics and elections

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses a joint meeting of the United States Congress over the nuclear program of Iran. (BBC) (The New York Times)
Myanmarese students on a march to Yangon to protest an academic bill defy a police order to disperse in Letpadan Township. (BBC)
Norwegian Nobel Committee
- For the first time in its 114-year-old history, the Norwegian Nobel Committee (which awards the Nobel Peace Prize) replaces against his will its head, Thorbjørn Jagland. Kaci Kullmann Five succeeds Jagland who will still remain a member of the committee. (AFP via ABC)

Science and technology

An archaeological expedition claims to have found the legendary White City in northeastern Honduras, with artifacts that range in dates from the 11th to 14th century. (National Geographic)

March 4, 2015 (Wednesday)

Disasters and accidents

South of Sicily, Italy's Coast Guard saves 941 trafficked migrants aboard five motorized dinghies and two larger vessels near southern Italian ports. Authorities cannot account for ten people. (AP)
At least 33 miners die in a suspected gas explosion at the Zasyadko coal mine in rebel-held Donetsk region of Ukraine. (BBC) (Reuters via News24)
Turkish Airlines Flight TK726, landing in dense fog in the Nepalese capital Kathmandu, skids off a slippery runway, however, there are no serious injuries. (ABC News)
A toxic chemical fire forces the closure of the Port of Vancouver (Canada's largest and North America's fourth largest port). Authorities later manage to contain the fire, and identify the chemical as trichloroisocyanuric acid. (CBC)

Science and technology

Scientists report the finding of a 2.8-million-year-old jawbone (the "Ledi jaw") forming a potential link between the 3.2-million-year-old hominin (human-like primate) Lucy (Australopithecus) found in the same area, and the 2.35-million-year-old remains of Homo habilis found at nearby Hadar. If assigned to the genus Homo, the new remains represent the oldest known human, some 400,000 years older than previously found. (BBC)
Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen and his team of researchers find the Musashi, one of Japan's biggest and most famous battleships which was sunk by American forces in 1944, on the floor of the Sibuyan Sea. (CNN)

March 5, 2015 (Thursday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

A knife-wielding assailant injures the American ambassador to South Korea, Mark Lippert, in the South Korean capital city of Seoul. Authorities report that the injuries on his face and wrist are not life-threatening. (Yonhap News) (BBC)
Iraqi insurgency (2011–present)
- Separate attacks in Baghdad kill at least eight people. (AP)
Hong Kong-based luxury hotel chain Mandarin Oriental confirms that credit card data has been stolen in a hack attack on the company's network. (BBC)

Arts and culture

The Indian government censors the documentary India's Daughter depicting a December 2012 gang rape and murder due to perceived incitement to violence that the outrage about the film might cause. Nevertheless, the BBC telecasts the film. (Daily Mail) (The Times of India)
The American Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus will phase-out the inclusion of elephants in their performances by 2018. (AP)
His Eminence, Edward Cardinal Egan, the immediate past Archbishop-Emeritus of New York, dies in New York City at the age of 82. (The New York Times)

Business and economy

American pharmaceutical company AbbVie Inc buys leukemia drugmaker Pharmacyclics Inc for $21 billion. (AP)
A New York state appellate court in Manhattan rules to approve in its entirety the 2011 settlement by Bank of America with 22 institutional investors including BlackRock Inc, MetLife Inc, and Allianz SE's Pacific Investment Management Co to resolve claims over $174 billion of mortgage securities issued by the former Countrywide Financial Corp. in a $8.5 billion settlement. (Reuters)
Dublin-based generic drugmaker, specialty drug supplier, and medical imaging agent producer Mallinckrodt Plc increases its presence in U.S. hospitals by buying privately held Ikaria Inc, a maker of a respiratory drug and its delivery system, for $2.3 billion from a group of investors led by private equity firm Madison Dearborn Partners LLC. The deal includes INOmax, which is the only approved product to treat hypoxic respiratory failure in infants through nitric oxide. (Reuters)
Energy-rich Kazakhstan suspends Russian fuel and gas imports to protect its domestic market from a surplus due to a weakened ruble which has sent ripples of economic uncertainty through Central Asia. (The Times of Central Asia)

Disasters and accidents

Tanzanian flooding kills 42 people near Lake Victoria in the Kahama District. (AP)
A Delta Air Lines McDonnell Douglas MD-88 aircraft attempting to complete a snowing landing, veers to the left side off of a recently-plowed runway, thereby missing the end of runway emergency arresting device, and skids onto the edge of water embankment at LaGuardia Airport, New York, United States. (The Aviation Herald)(AP)
American actor Harrison Ford is in stable condition after he crash-lands his 1942 Ryan Aeronautical ST3KR single-engine World War II-era training plane at the Penmar Golf Course, in Venice, Los Angeles, California, just west of the Santa Monica Airport. (AP via MSN) (CNN)
A strong wind-hurricane struck Versilia at around 3 AM at a speed of 220 to 240m/ph (350-385 km/ph) causing 12 deaths and pulling down a lot of trees, fences, roofs and antennas. This is probably one of the biggest storm events and probably the biggest one in Italian history.

Health

Ebola virus epidemic in West Africa
- Liberia's last known ebola patient is discharged from a treatment center in Monrovia. The country now needs 42 days without a subsequent diagnosed infection to be declared disease free. (The New York Times)

Law and crime

The manufacturer of a medical instrument for endoscopic procedures, Olympus Corp, lacked US FDA clearance to sell the current version when it caused an outbreak of infections, including two deaths, from an antibiotic-resistant strain of bacteria, "superbug" Carbapenem-resistant enterobacteriaceae, or CRE, at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center between October 2014 and January 2015 (see February 19). (AP)
A Phoenix, Arizona jury deadlocks in a second trial allowing convicted murderer American Jodi Arias to be spared the death penalty. She will be sent to prison for life for killing her lover in 2008. (AP)
The U.S. Supreme Court schedules oral arguments for hearing cases regarding the bans by states of gay marriage on April 28, 2015. (Reuters via MSN)
A mob storms the central jail in Dimapur, India, and kills Farid Khan, an undocumented migrant from Bangladesh in custody as a rape suspect. The mob ransacks and destroys over 20 shops and torches ten vehicles including a police jeep. (The Hindu)

March 6, 2015 (Friday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

At least two knife-wielding attackers injure nine people at a train station in southern China; the police fatally shoot one of the suspects. (AP)
The United Kingdom's National Crime Agency arrests a man as a suspected hacker in western England in connection with a June 15, 2014 cyber attack on the messaging service used by employees at the U.S. Department of Defense. (AP)(Bloomberg)
The U.S. Justice Department charges two Vietnamese citizens (Quoc Nguyen and Giang Hoang Vu) and a Canadian (David-Manuel Santos Da Silva) with running a massive cyberfraud ring that stole one billion email addresses, then sent spam offering knockoff software products of Adobe Systems Inc with the hacking having occurred between February 2009 and June 2012. The victim breaches include a massive 2011 attack on email marketing firm Epsilon, a unit of Alliance Data Systems Corp. Although the other two are in custody, Nguyen remains at large. The charge against Da Silva is conspiracy to commit money laundering. (Reuters)

Business and Economy

S&P Dow Jones Indices announces it will add the company Apple Inc. to its Dow Jones Industrial Average index of stocks on March 19, replacing AT&T. (The New York Times)

Disasters and accidents

A road accident along the highway between Ismaïlia and Cairo in Egypt, east of Cairo, involving a bus that collided with a microbus kills fifteen people. (AP)
Two massive snowy traffic jams in Kentucky strand motorists for 24 hours or longer. One stretched for about 26 miles along Interstate 65 from just north of Elizabethtown past Shepherdsville, and the other stretched the entire length of Interstate 24 in Kentucky, more than 90 miles. (AP, I-65) (WSMV-TV, I-24)

International relations

Writing in the FIFA Weekly magazine, FIFA president Sepp Blatter calls Iran to end its "intolerable" ban on women attending soccer matches, describing the situation as one that "cannot continue." (CNN)

Health

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approves the country's first biosimilar drug, Zarxio (Europe: 2009, as Zarzio), made by Novartis. Biosimilars are a relatively new class of drugs designed to pave the way for less expensive versions of the complex biologics drug class, and they are not synthesized from chemicals like other drugs, but are made from living cells. Some well known biologics include Remicade and Enbrel for autoimmune diseases, and Herceptin and Avastin for cancer. Zarxio, used to prevent infection in cancer patients receiving chemotherapy, is a close copy of Neupogen, made by Amgen. (The New York Times)

Law and crime

2014 Taipei Metro attack
- The New Taipei City district court sentences Cheng Chieh to death for the May 2014 knife attack on a Taipei Metro train that left four dead and 22 passengers injured. (AP)
Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director John O. Brennan announces plans for a major restructuring and reorganization, including a focus on digital espionage (through the creation of the CIA Directorate of Digital Innovation). The plan will end some longstanding divisions, and create ten new centers that team analysts with operators, fostering collaboration and focus on a range of new security issues and threats, and replacing geographic division offices with hybrid mission centers modeled on the CIA Counterterrorism Center. (The Washington Post via MSN)
Customs officers at the Shahjalal International Airport catch Son Young Nam, a North Korean diplomat trying to smuggle an estimated $1.4 million worth of gold into Bangladesh. Bangladesh authorities release him but will still seek to press charges. (Reuters)
Madison Police Department officers fatally shoot an unarmed 19-year-old black teenager who was suspected of a recent battery. A struggle ensued between the suspect and an officer, and the teen was fatally shot. (Reuters via MSN)

Science and technology

NASA's Dawn spacecraft enters orbit around the dwarf planet Ceres. (AP)(JPL)(AP)
India's Universal Primer Technology disputes the credit for inventing DNA barcoding with the University of Guelph in Canada. (Nature India), (IBN7)

March 7, 2015 (Saturday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Boko Haram
- Maiduguri city in northeast Nigeria sees five suicide bomb blasts with 54 dead and 143 wounded. (AP)
A suspected terrorist attack in Bamako, Mali, kills five people. (AFP via BDlive) (CNN)
Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant
- In Iraq, ISIL destroys the ancient city of Hatra following the destruction of Nimrud. (BBC)

Law and crime

The US Secret Service locks down the White House after a loud noise (later revealed to be a burned-out souvenir truck) is heard on the South Lawn, moments before U.S. President Barack Obama and his family were due to take off by helicopter. He and his family were not yet on the South Lawn when the noise was heard. (Reuters via MSN)(Reuters)
Assassination of Boris Nemtsov
- Russian authorities arrest five men, Anzor Gubashev and Zaur Dadayev, suspects from the rebellious North Caucasus region, according to Russian state media reports, relying on a statement from the Russian Federal Security Service Director Alexander Bortnikov. However, Nemtsov's daughter, Zhanna Nemtsova, speaking from Germany, says she has no idea who they are. Many still suspect Russian governmental involvement in his death. (CNN)(AP)

Politics and elections

According to former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, the flu causes his Vice President, Walter Mondale, 87, to be hospitalized at the famed Mayo Clinic, in Rochester, Minnesota. (CNN)

March 8, 2015 (Sunday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Boko Haram
- Forces from Niger and Chad launch a ground and air offensive against Boko Haram Islamist militants in northeastern Nigeria. (BBC)
A rocket and shelling attack in Kidal, northern Mali kills three people, including a UN peacekeeper. (Al Jazeera)
A bomb explodes outside French supermarket Carrefour in Alexandria, Egypt, killing one person and wounding six. (AP via News24)

Arts and culture

American writer and producer Sam Simon, co-creator of the longest running animated sitcom, The Simpsons, dies at the age of 59 after a 3-year battle with terminal colorectal cancer. (BBC)

Law and crime

A unknown gunman in a vehicle kills Dreekius Oricko Johnson, 28, and wounds former Tennessee Titans and New York Jets running back Chris Johnson in Orlando, Florida. (USA Today via MSN)
Assassination of Boris Nemtsov
- A court in Moscow charges two men of Chechen origin, Zaur Dadayev and Ansor Gubashev, who were among five arrested March 7, with the murder of Russian opposition leader Boris Nemtsov. The others also arrested, Gubashev's younger brother Shahid Gubashev and two others named only as Bakhayev and Eskerkhanov, are still only suspects. (AFP via MSN)
- A sixth suspect in Nemtsov's murder, Beslan Shavanov, 30, who had been holed up in a building in Chechnya's capital, Grozny, blows himself up. (CNN)

Science and technology

The U.S. Army, working with the U.S. Navy and NASA, through its Joint Multi-Role Technology Demonstrator transport helicopter re-design program, in the latest issue of Army Technology Magazine, takes note of some new designs Sikorsky-Boeing (the Sikorsky Defiant, which like the existing Sikorsky X2 and Sikorsky S-97 Raider, features a faster pusher propeller) and Bell Helicopter (the V-280 Valor, which resembles a slimmed-down version of the tilt-rotor V-22 Osprey, and comes in three versions: a troop- and equipment-carrying utility style, a medevac, and an attack chopper) have come up with since they were selected by the Pentagon in August 2014. (Popular Science via MSN)

March 9, 2015 (Monday)

Disasters and accidents

A Carolinian Amtrak passenger train (running north from Charlotte, North Carolina, to New York City) hits a tractor-trailer in Halifax, North Carolina resulting in two cars of the train derailing with several people receiving minor injuries. (AP via MSN)
Villa Castelli helicopter collision
- Two helicopters collide in mid-air in a remote area of northwestern Argentina leaving at least ten dead. Among the dead are a group of French sports stars participating in a reality-television show called Dropped: (AP), (The Telegraph), (BBC)
  - Florence Arthaud - a yachtswoman
  - Camille Muffat - a 2012 Summer Olympics gold medal swimmer
  - Alexis Vastine - a 2008 Summer Olympics bronze medal boxer

International relations

Celebrity British lawyer Amal Clooney files a case in the United Nations on behalf of former Philippines President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo. (Philippine Star)
U.S. President Barack Obama signs an executive order declaring Venezuela a national security threat to the U.S. (Reuters via MSN) (White House text of the order)
The U.S.'s Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director, James Comey, announces an increased reward of $5 million (up from $1 million, issued in 2012) for information leading to the return of a former FBI agent Robert Levinson (who disappeared March 9, 2007, in Iran and who was paid by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to gather information about Iran's nuclear program). (AFP via MSN)

Law and crime

A man kills five people in the Japanese city of Sumoto in a prolonged stabbing attack. (ABC and AFP via ABC Australia)
American film director Randall Miller pleads guilty to involuntary manslaughter and criminal trespassing and will spend two years in county jail and another eight on probation in regards to the February 20, 2014, death of camera assistant Sarah Jones by a freight train on a bridge over the Altamaha River in Wayne County, Georgia (six other crew members were also injured), during filming of a biopic about singer Gregg Allman called Midnight Rider. (BBC)
In a five-day national dragnet last week, Operation Cross Check, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) rounds up 2,059 people who had been convicted of crimes and had been living in the country illegally. Most were not violent criminals (none were implicated in terrorism; almost all the 912 misdemeanors were for driving under the influence, DWI; 476 of the felons were charged with an immigration violation, though some were convicted of manslaughter, robbery, rape, and child pornography). (Tribune Washington Bureau via MSN)

Science and technology

Solar-powered aircraft Solar Impulse 2 begins its circumnavigation of the earth. (BBC)
Explorers of a stalactite cave in Israel's Galilee region uncover a small collection of 2,300-year-old silver coins and jewelry believed to have been hidden from the time of Alexander the Great of Macedonia. The discovery could be the first of its kind to be found from that period in this area. (Reuters via MSN)

Largest Lego tower is built

March 10, 2015 (Tuesday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Sinai insurgency
- A suicide bomber kills one person and injures 24 in an attack on a police station in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula. (AFP via Yahoo! News)

Arts and culture

The family of soul music singer Marvin Gaye wins a $7.3 million lawsuit for copyright infringement against Robin Thicke, Pharrell Williams, and T.I. holding that Thicke's hit "Blurred Lines" resembled Gaye's "Got to Give It Up". (Rolling Stone)

Disasters and accidents

A passenger train collides with a lorry on a level crossing at Dien Sanh, Vietnam leaving one person dead and several others injured. (Tuổi Trẻ News)

Law and crime

Police in New Zealand announce they are investigating threats to contaminate infant formula, after letters were sent to dairy cooperative Fonterra and farming lobby group Federated Farmers containing packages of infant formula laced with 1080 poison. (ABC News)
The Wikimedia Foundation and eight other organisations file a lawsuit in the state of Maryland, US against the National Security Agency and the United States Department of Justice regarding the NSA's mass surveillance program. The Wikimedia Foundation is the owner and parent company of Wikipedia. (NBC News)
The University of Oklahoma expels two students identified as ringleaders in the singing of a racist chant by the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity. (NBC News)
Pakistan lifts a moratorium on the death penalty for terrorism, months after reinstating it. (RTT)

March 11, 2015 (Wednesday)

Disasters and accidents

2014–15 Australian region cyclone season
- Tropical Cyclone Nathan intensifies to a Category 2 system as it nears Cape York Peninsula in the north of the Australian state of Queensland. (The Australian)
A search continues after an army helicopter crashed March 10 during a foggy night training exercise at Eglin Air Force Base in the Florida Panhandle leaving seven Marines and four United States Army soldiers missing. (AP via US News)
A fire and partial collapse of the Admiral shopping complex in the Russian city of Kazan kills at least 17 people with 55 more injured. (Radio Free Europe)

International relations

The Government of Germany advises that Chancellor Angela Merkel will not attend a May 9 World War II Victory Day Parade in Moscow but will visit shortly thereafter. (Radio Free Europe)

Law and crime

Assassination of Boris Nemtsov
- The Kremlin's Rights Council states that they believe that Zaur Dadayev, a former Chechen police officer, who confessed to being part of the murder of Boris Nemtsov did so after being tortured. (AFP via Yahoo! News)
At least 15 armed assailants ambush two vans on a highway in Burgundy, France carrying millions of euros worth of jewels. It was the latest in a string of big jewel heists in France. (AP)
A United States immigration appeals panel approves the deportation of former El Salvador Defence Minister Carlos Eugenio Vides Casanova to potentially face human rights abuses charges in his homeland. (NBC News)

March 12, 2015 (Thursday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

A U.S. drone strike in Somalia near the town of Bardhere kills the mastermind al-Shabab terrorist Aden Garaar responsible for the September 2013 three-day siege Westgate shopping mall attack in Nairobi, Kenya, in which 67 people were killed by four gunmen. (AP)

Business and economy

The United Steelworkers union and Royal Dutch Shell negotiate a contract, pending union ratification, to end of a six-week strike that began February 1 that has affected twelve U.S. refineries. Previously, the strike had been cited as a reason for recent oil price increases. (AP)
In New York City, U.S. district court judge Thomas Griesa expands the force of his existing remedial rulings in the ongoing litigation over the Argentine debt restructuring, blocking planned bond payments by Citigroup. The Citigroup processing of payments would violate a requirement that Argentina treat bondholders equally. (Reuters)

Disasters and accidents

2014–15 South Pacific cyclone season
- Vanuatu prepares for Tropical Cyclone Pam which is predicted to reach Category 5 on the Australian tropical cyclone intensity scale. (ABC Australia via Weatherzone)
2014–15 Australian region cyclone season
- Tropical Cyclone Olwyn intensifies with the potential to reach Category 3 on the Saffir-Simpson scale before making landfall in Western Australia's Pilbara region on March 13. (Perth Now)
The roof of a cement factory under construction collapses killing at least eight people and trapping dozens more in Mongla, Bangladesh. (BBC)(ABC)

Law and crime

Ferguson unrest
- An unknown gunman shoots two policemen in front of the Ferguson city police headquarters in the U.S. state of Missouri. (AP)
The anti-graft agency of the Communist Party of China (CCFDI) investigates former Urumqi party chief Li Zhi. He is the first official investigated from Xinjiang since the campaign began in 2013. (SCMP)

Science and technology

CERN's Large Hadron Collider, which went into shutdown for upgrades to increase beam energy, will resume operation later this month with the hope of creating more Higgs boson particles. (ZD Net)

Sports

FIFA expels Zimbabwe Football Association from qualifying for the 2018 FIFA World Cup for failing to pay former head coach José Claudinei arrears. (FIFA)

March 13, 2015 (Friday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

A Myanmar air raid aimed at rebels on its border with China drops bombs on the Chinese city of Lincang killing four people. (AP via The New York Times)

Business and economy

Egypt Economic Development Conference
- Among the over 2,000 delegates from 112 different countries, U.S. Secretary of State, John Kerry, delivers a speech during the investment summit held in the Egyptian resort town of Sharm el-Sheikh. (AP via ABC News)
Politicians in Cyprus demand the resignation of the governor of the central bank there, Chrystalla Georghadji, raising concerns about a conflict of interest. (Reuters)

Disasters and accidents

Cyclone Pam
- Cyclone Pam causes severe damage in the South Pacific nation of Vanuatu with unconfirmed reports of over 40 deaths. (ABC News Australia)
One South Korean Ministry of Public Safety and Security official dies and three are missing after a helicopter crash off the island of Gageodo. (Yonhap News)
Chile declares a state of emergency and preliminary evacuation of 16,000 as a forest fire threatens the city of Valparaiso. (AFP via Yahoo! News)
The Aung Takon passenger ferry sinks off the coast of Myanmar with 21 dead and 26 people missing. (Straits Times)
A Serbian military Russian-made MI-17 transport helicopter crashes near Belgrade's international airport in foggy weather while evacuating a sick 5-day-old baby with life-threatening respiratory problems from the south of the country, killing all seven people on board. (AP)

Health

In regard to an operation that took place on December 11, 2014, today, a Stellenbosch University and Tygerberg Hospital surgical team from Cape Town, South Africa, reports the world's first successful penis transplant, an operation requiring reconnection of tiny blood vessels and nerves. (BBC)

Law and crime

Swedish prosecutor Marianne Ny lodges a request to interrogate Julian Assange in his London refuge at the Ecuadorian consulate, saying that the reason for her change of mind is that the statute of limitations on several of the crimes of which Assange is suspected runs out in August 2015. (The Guardian)
TeslaCrypt, a malicious computer virus, targets older games (including World of Warcraft) stopping their users from playing their favorite titles unless they pay a ransom. (BBC)

Movies

The Movie Premiere of Cinderella
Remakes and Sequels: Cinderella (1950), Cinderella II: Dreams Come True (2002) and Cinderella III: A Twist in Time (2007)

Science and technology

NASA reports that scientists using the Hubble Space Telescope have found a salty ocean lurking beneath the surface of Jupiter's largest moon, Ganymede. (Scientific American)

March 14, 2015 (Saturday)

Disasters and accidents

The United Nations will send emergency aid to Vanuatu with at least four people officially dead and reports of dozens more dead after Cyclone Pam hit yesterday. (Reuters via Daily Mail)(AP)
A bus crash in the southern Brazilian state of Santa Catarina kills at least 51 people. (AFP via Yahoo! News), (Reuters via Daily Mail)

International relations

Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi visits Sri Lanka's Jaffna District to hand over 27,000 homes to Tamil survivors of the Sri Lankan Civil War. (Al-Jazeera)
After an armed band removed his personal security guards, the Vice President of Sierra Leone, Samuel Sam-Sumana, goes into hiding after applying for asylum at the United States embassy in Freetown. (AAP via SBS)(AP)
Guyana rejects the latest objections raised by neighboring Venezuela over the granting to ExxonMobil Corp. of an oil and gas concession in Caribbean waters claimed by both nations. (Miami Herald)^{[permanent dead link]}

Law and crime

The Los Angeles Police Department issues a warrant for the arrest of American Robert Durst regarding the murder of writer and confidant Susan Berman following the airing of a six-part documentary by HBO called The Jinx. He is later taken into custody in the city of New Orleans. (USA Today)

Politics and elections

The cancellation of several of Russian President Vladimir Putin's scheduled meetings leads to widespread social media speculations regarding the reason for his public absence. (The New York Times)

March 15, 2015 (Sunday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Libyan Civil War
- Fighting rages near the western Libyan city of Sirte between Islamic State affiliated militants and a local militia alliance. (BBC)
The United States embassy and consulates in Saudi Arabia close for Sunday and Monday due to heightened security concerns.(Fox News)
Two suicide bombers belonging to the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan splinter group Jamaat-ul-Ahrar blow themselves up in twin bomb attacks on two churches in the Pakistani city of Lahore, killing at least fourteen people with 70 more injured. (The News Pakistan)(Al Jazeera)

Disasters and accidents

Cyclone Pam
- The government of the island nation of Vanuatu declares a state of emergency for Shefa Province containing the capital Port Vila as authorities struggle to assess the full impact of the category 5 storm. Once assessments of the damage have been done in other provinces, authorities are likely to widen the declared area in a state of emergency. (The Guardian), (ABC via Weatherzone)
- Enele Sopoaga, the Prime Minister of Tuvalu, estimates that 45% of the population has been displaced by the cyclone. (Radio New Zealand)
A car crash kills South African Minister of Public Service and Administration Collins Chabane. (News 24)
Rainstorms hit northern India, resulting in fourteen deaths and widespread damage to crops. (Times of India)
A fire breaks out in the bell tower of Moscow's Novodevichy Convent, established in 1524 and added to UNESCO's World Heritage Sites. (The Guardian)

International relations

Myanmar denies claims by the People's Republic of China that one of its aircraft crossed the Chinese border and dropped a bomb killing four people. (AP via ABC News America)

Politics and elections

The National Assembly of Venezuela grants President Nicolás Maduro the power to legislate by decree for nine months. (AP)

Sports

In basketball, the NCAA announces the field for the Men's Division I Tournament. Undefeated Kentucky is the top overall seed, with Duke, Villanova, and Wisconsin earning the other three #1 seeds. (ESPN)
In auto racing, defending Sprint Cup champion Kevin Harvick wins the 2015 CampingWorld.com 500 at Phoenix International Raceway in his fourth straight win at the track, extending a streak of top-2 finishes dating back to last November. At 7 races, this is the longest such streak since Richard Petty's 11-race streak in 1975.
- The race also features a top-5 finish for 2004 champion Kurt Busch in his first race after being suspended for three races on domestic abuse charges. Earlier in the week, a federal court declined to charge Busch with abuse of his ex-girlfriend occurring last September, leading to his reinstatement. (ESPN)

Weather

The U.S. city of Boston sets an all time snow record, with 108.6 inches of snow for the season. (USA Today)

March 16, 2015 (Monday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Libyan Civil War
- Islamic State kidnaps about 20 medical workers from the Ibn Sina Hospital in the Libyan city of Sirte. (CNN)

Disasters and accidents

Cyclone Pam
- The remnants of Cyclone Pam move down the east coast of New Zealand causing evacuations, heavy flooding, and power outages. (New Zealand Herald)
- The United Nations estimates that every school in Vanuatu has been destroyed or damaged by Cyclone Pam. The interim death toll has risen to 44. (ABC News Australia), (Reuters via Daily Mail)
A bus runs off the road in northwestern Nepal killing at least seventeen people. (The Hindu)

International relations

The President of Russia, Vladimir Putin, orders troops placed on full readiness in snap drills citing increased NATO exercises as the reason. (Bloomberg)

Law and crime

Italian police arrest four people while 51 others are under investigation for corruption associated with public works including a stretch of the high-speed rail line near Florence. (Daily Mail)
An Egyptian court hands down a death sentence to Muslim Brotherhood leader Mohammed Badie and thirteen others. (BBC)
Although he is currently still being held in New Orleans, Louisiana, Los Angeles prosecutors formally charge Robert Durst with the murder of his former friend Susan Berman covered in the HBO documentary miniseries The Jinx. (Variety)
Malaysian police arrest parliamentarian Nurul Izzah Anwar for alleged sedition. Izzah is the daughter of former Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrahim. (Straits Times)

March 17, 2015 (Tuesday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

In Peshawar, an unknown assailant shoots and kills Pakistani lawyer Samiullah Afridi, who had defended Dr. Shakil Afridi (in regards to assisting CIA agents hunt al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden), with two Pakistan militant groups, Jundullah and Jamaatul Ahrar, both claiming responsibility. (Huffington Post)
American-led intervention in Syria:
- Syrian Air Defense Force downs an American MQ-1 Predator surveillance drone operating in ISIL-free province of Latakia. (RT)

Disasters and accidents

A Dutch military helicopter serving as part of the United Nations peacekeeping mission in Mali crashes near Gao, killing two people. (BBC)

International relations

Philippines v. China
- The Philippines submits to The Hague-based Permanent Court of Arbitration a 3,000-page document containing additional volumes of arguments, evidence, and maps seeking to nullify China’s sweeping claim over the resource-rich South China Sea. (GMA News)

Law and crime

In Australia, the New South Wales Police charge the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Adelaide, Philip Wilson, with allegedly covering up a child sexual abuse crime committed by another priest, James Fletcher, in the 1970s. (ABC)
According to the U.S. Secret Service, a white substance mailed in an envelope to the White House and received March 16, 2015, at the White House Mail Screening Facility, tests a "presumptive positive" for cyanide. (Reuters via MSN)
Federal authorities arrest a Missouri man, Cameron James Stout, 24, of Stover, Missouri for threatening to shoot U.S. President Barack Obama. (Reuters via MSN)
A drive-by shooting in Stockton, California kills three people and injures four more. (Reuters via MSN)
American health insurer Premera Blue Cross announces that it was the victim of a cyberattack that exposed bank account numbers and other personal data of 11 million customers on May 5, 2014. (Reuters)

Politics and elections

Israeli legislative election, 2015:
- The Likud party, led by incumbent Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, wins the most seats in the Knesset, winning 30 out of 120 seats. If asked by the President to form a government, Netanyahu will become the first Prime Minister to serve a fourth term. (The New York Times)(The Times of Israel)(AP via Fox News)
Following a congressional and possible criminal investigation surrounding the redecoration of his office and the use of donors' private aircraft at taxpayers' expense, U.S. Representative Aaron Schock (R-IL) resigns effective March 31, 2015. (Peoria Journal Star)

March 18, 2015 (Wednesday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Bardo National Museum attack
- Gunmen attack Tunisia's Bardo National Museum, adjacent to the parliament building, killing 23 people, including 18 foreign tourists. (AP via MSN)(The Telegraph)

Disasters and accidents

2014–15 Australian region cyclone season
- Cyclone Nathan intensifies to a category 2 tropical cyclone (Australian scale) and is expected to make landfall near the Queensland town of Cooktown on March 19. (WA Today)

International relations

The United States Department of Defense authorizes the U.S. Army to destroy a large U.S. stockpile of chemical weapons. (AP via MSN)

Health

Kraft Foods Group Inc. recalls more than 6.5 million 7.25-ounce (0.2-kilogram) boxes of its macaroni and cheese after customers reported finding small pieces of metal inside. The recalled products were shipped nationwide in the U.S. as well as to some countries in South America and the Caribbean. (Bloomberg via MSN)
A study in the medical journal The Lancet states that babies who are breastfed were more likely to have higher IQs, spend more time in school, and end up in higher-paying jobs. (Quartz via MSN) (The Lancet)

Law and crime

A suspected gang-related shooting in a restaurant at Hisingen, an island near the Swedish city of Gothenburg, kills at least two people with several more injured. (Reuters), (BBC)

March 19, 2015 (Thursday)

Disasters and accidents

2014–15 Australian region cyclone season
- Authorities in the Australian state of Queensland prepare for the impact of Severe Tropical Cyclone Nathan which is forecast to make landfall near Cooktown early tomorrow morning. (AAP via Wa Today)
Cyclone Pam
- Authorities in Vanuatu report that it faces imminent shortages of food and water in the wake of Cyclone Pam. (ABC News)
A huge boulder falls upon tourists awaiting to board a ship at the scenic Diecai Hill of China's Guilin region killing seven of them. (AFP via South China Morning Post)

International relations

The Euro zone tells Greece that it must stay with its reform package or risk being forced out of the euro zone by cash-flow problems. (Reuters)
Moldovan authorities ban two Russian journalists, Dmitry Kiselev and Andrei Kondrashov, from the country for five years because they had planned to travel to Moldova to present a documentary sympathetic to Russia annexing the Crimea. (AP via ABC)

Law and crime

A stabbing attack from March 17, leaves three dead and three wounded in New Bern, North Carolina, both the 18-year-old attacker and victims were refugees from Myanmar (Burma). (AP via MSN)
A March 17 DOS attack occurs on Chinese website GreatFire, reaching 2.5 billion spoof requests per hour. (The Epoch Times)

March 20, 2015 (Friday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant
- Islamic State releases a video showing the execution of three Kurdish peshmerga fighters in northern Iraq with threats to execute dozens more. (Reuters)
- An Islamic state attack on a Kurdish Nowruz festival (New Year's Day) kills 45 people. (AAP via SBS)
Yemeni crisis
- Islamic State claims responsibility for suicide bombings in Shiite mosques in Sanaa that kill 142 people. (AFP via Hindustan Times)
An ambush on Mexican police in Ocotlan, Jalisco state kills ten with none of the gunmen apprehended. (Reuters)

Disasters and accidents

2014–15 Australian region cyclone season
- Severe Tropical Cyclone Nathan makes landfall on Cape York Peninsula in far North Queensland as a category 4 (Australian system). (ABC Australia)
The Dehradun-Varanasi Janta Express derails near Bachhrawan Railway Station in Uttar Pradesh northern India resulting in at least 30 deaths and 150 people being injured. (AP via Yahoo News), (Zee News)
A Uruguayan Air Force Beechcraft King Air crashes shortly after take-off from Laguna del Sauce airport, killing ten people. (AP via News24)

Health

Biogen Idec Inc. reports that a drug in a phase II clinical research trial has achieved the first experimental demonstration of a statistically significant reduction in amyloid plaque as well as a slowing of clinical impairment in patients with Alzheimer's disease. The antibody drug, aducanumab, blocked beta amyloid formation, a protein that forms toxic brain-destroying plaques, and significantly slowed cognitive decline. (Reuters)

Law and Crime

To resolve claims they were misled about the company's subprime mortgage exposure, a U.S. District Court Judge, Laura Swain approves a settlement between shareholders and American multinational insurer AIG, providing for a payout of $970.5 million. (Reuters).

Politics and elections

Maurizio Lupi resigns as Italy's Minister for Infrastructure following the arrest of a key aide in a corruption probe. (AP via ABC News)

Science and technology

A solar eclipse, a vernal (for those living in the northern hemisphere) and autumnal (for those in the southern hemisphere) equinox, and a Supermoon will all occur today. (The Independent)
The United States Food and Drug Administration approves genetically modified potatoes and apples. (Mercury News)

March 21, 2015 (Saturday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Yemeni crisis
- The United States military evacuates the remaining 100 Special Operations forces members in the country due to the deteriorating security situation. (CNN)

Arts and culture

Hindu New Year
- Both the Vikram Samwat (Year 2072) and the Shaka Samvat or Indian national calendar (Year 1933) occur today in the Hindu New Year (Ugadi) according to Indian calendars.^{[citation needed]}

Disasters and accidents

2014–15 Australian region cyclone season
- Residents living on the east coast of the Northern Territory prepare for the second tropical cyclone to hit the area in a month as Tropical Cyclone Nathan is likely to make landfall tomorrow morning. (ABC News Australia)
A fire in Brooklyn, New York kills seven children and leaves two others critically injured. (The New York Times) (AP)
An Egyptian accident in which a bus falls off of a bridge and plunges into a canal near Giza city kills at least 35 people. (NEWS.CO.AU)

March 22, 2015 (Sunday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Yemeni crisis
- The United Nations Security Council meets to discuss the deteriorating security situation in Yemen as the United States removes all remaining personnel. (Fox News)
- Shia Houthis rebels capture the strategically important city of Ta'izz. (BBC)
War in North-West Pakistan
- The Pakistan Army claims to have killed 80 Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan fighters in fighting in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in recent days while the Taliban claims to have killed at least six soldiers. (Reuters via ABC News Australia)
Syrian Civil War
- A Syrian Armed Forces helicopter crashes in Jabal al-Zawiya in the Idlib Governorate resulting in the death of one crew member and the capture of four. (BBC)

Arts and culture

The remains of King Richard III of England, that were discovered in a car park in Leicester in 2012, arrive at Leicester Cathedral ahead of a burial on March 26. (BBC)

Disasters and accidents

A campsite tent fire on Ganghwa Island in the South Korean city of Incheon kills five people and seriously injures two others. (Yonhap)^{[permanent dead link]}
2014–15 Australian region cyclone season
- Cyclone Nathan makes landfall near Nhulunbuy in the Northern Territory as a high end Category 2 cyclone. (AAP via SBS)
Japan allocates 820 billion yen ($6.8 billion) for creating a nearly 400-kilometer (250-mile) chain of cement seawalls, at places nearly five stories high, against future tsunami disasters such as the one that struck the country's northeastern coast four years ago. (AP)
A Venezuelan bus plunges into a lake in Aragua state, southwest of the capital Caracas, killing at least eleven people with thirty-six others injured. (BBC)

Politics and elections

French departmental elections, 2015
- Voters in France go to the polls for the first round of voting in local government elections. Exit polls show the conservative UMP in first place, Marine Le Pen's National Front in second, with President François Hollande's French Socialist Party in third. (RTE), (BBC)
Israeli legislative election, 2015
- The President of Israel Reuven Rivlin opens discussions over the formation of a new government, with Benjamin Netanyahu expected to return as Prime Minister. (AFP via Yahoo! News)

Sports

In association football, Liverpool lose to Manchester United at Anfield in the famous Liverpool F.C.–Manchester United F.C. rivalry.

March 23, 2015 (Monday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Iraqi insurgency (2011–present)
- Multiple bombings in Baghdad, Iraq, kill at least nineteen people and wound another thirty-six. (AP)

Business and economy

China's biggest state-owned chemical company ChemChina acquires a 26% stake in Italian tire manufacturer Pirelli with an additional offer to buy the remaining outstanding shares. (AP)

Disasters and accidents

A bus crashes into traffic near Huarmey in northern Peru, leaving at least thirty-seven people dead and dozens injured. (AFP via ABC news)

International relations

The National Assembly of Armenia approves a declaration recognizing the Greek and Assyrian genocides by Ottoman Turkey between 1915 and 1923. (Armenpress)

Law and crime

The South Gauteng High Court sitting in Palm Ridge, Katlehong, finds former doubles tennis champion Bob Hewitt guilty of two counts of rape and one of sexual assault of three former students that he coached in South Africa. (News 24)
Former NFL player Darren Sharper pleads guilty in a Maricopa County, Arizona courtroom to raping two women after spiking their drinks at a Tempe apartment in November 2013, and the court sentences him to nine years in prison. Sharper has also been indicted on charges of sexually assaulting women in the U.S. states of California, Louisiana, and Nevada. (Reuters)
The U.S. Supreme Court affirms Wisconsin's law requiring voters to present photo identification to cast a ballot. (Reuters)
The U.S. state of Utah reinstates the use of execution by firing squad for situations where lethal injection is not possible. (CNN)

Politics and elections

Death of Lee Kuan Yew
- Lee Kuan Yew, a founding father of Singapore as well as its first prime minister, dies at the age of 91 after a prolonged illness. (BBC)
2016 United States presidential election
- Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) announces his intention to run for president. (NBC News)

March 24, 2015 (Tuesday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

War in Afghanistan
- Gunmen kill at least thirteen people in an attack on three passing vehicles including a bus in Wardak province's Sayad Abad district. (Al Jazeera America)

Arts and culture

A BBC investigation finds that Top Gear presenter Jeremy Clarkson assaulted a producer with reports that he will be sacked from the television program. (The Telegraph)

Disasters and accidents

Germanwings Flight 9525
- A Germanwings flight crashes en route from Barcelona, Spain, to Düsseldorf, Germany, in a mountainous region of the Alps near Digne-les-Bains in Southern France leaving 150 dead. Rescue workers recover the damaged, but still usable, cockpit voice recorder. (RT), (Reuters)(The Guardian)(RT)

Science and technology

The Opportunity rover completes a Martian marathon, the first time any vehicle has traveled more than 26.2 miles on the surface of another world. (CNN)

March 25, 2015 (Wednesday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

War in Afghanistan (2001–present)
- The Afghan National Army kills twenty-nine insurgents and injures twenty-one others in a series of operations in Daikundi, Ghazni, and Parwan provinces during the past 24 hours. (Tolonews)
Aftermath of the 2014–15 Yemeni coup d'état
- Yemeni President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi flees Yemen in a boat after Houthi rebels besiege the government's temporary capital of Aden in the southern part of the country. (AP)
- 2015 military intervention in Yemen
  - The Gulf Cooperation Council announces its intervention in Yemen and Saudi Arabia begins launching airstrikes against Houthi forces and installations. (CBS News)

Arts and culture

The BBC sacks Jeremy Clarkson, one of the three presenters for the television program Top Gear. (BBC)
British singer and songwriter Zayn Malik leaves popular boyband One Direction. (The Independent)

Business and economy

American companies Kraft Foods and H.J. Heinz announce merger plans to create a combined company, The Kraft Heinz Company, which will be led by the present CEO of Heinz, Bernardo Hees. (Reuters)

Disasters and accidents

Germanwings Flight 9525
- A search and recovery operation resumes for the remains of the Germanwings flight that crashed into the French Alps on March 24. (BBC)
- An audio recording indicates that a pilot was locked out of the cockpit at the time of the crash and was unable to reenter. (The New York Times)
North American tornado outbreaks
- Tornadoes hit the American city of Tulsa and the surrounding region of eastern Oklahoma leaving one person dead and several others injured. (News on 6), (BBC)

Law and crime

The US Army charges US Army soldier Bowe Bergdahl, who was held captive by the Taliban-aligned Haqqani network in Afghanistan from June 2009 until his release in May 2014, with desertion and misbehavior before the enemy. (CNN)(FOX News)

Politics and elections

Pope Francis appoints Bishop Richard Moth of the British military diocese as Bishop of Arundel and Brighton, England. The diocese had been vacant since September when Bishop Kieran Conry resigned. (Catholic News Agency)

Sports

Major League Soccer, the top league of association football in the United States and Canada, announces that Twin Cities-based North American Soccer League franchise Minnesota United FC will become the league's 23rd franchise, with the team's MLS debut scheduled for 2018. (ESPN)

March 26, 2015 (Thursday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Aftermath of the 2014–15 Yemeni coup d'état
- 2015 military intervention in Yemen
  - The Saudi Arabian Air Force launches airstrikes on Sana'a International Airport and Yemen's al Dulaimi military airport resulting in at least 17 deaths. (Reuters), (Al-Jazeera)

Arts and culture

Exhumation of Richard III of England
- Leicester Cathedral reburies the remains of King Richard III of England. (ABC News Australia)

Disasters and accidents

A scaffolding collapses in Hà Tĩnh Province in Vietnam, killing at least fourteen people and leaving around thirty others injured. (AP), (Reuters)
Germanwings Flight 9525
- French prosecutors claim that evidence supports the conclusion that the co-pilot, Andreas Lubitz, deliberately crashed the plane. (The Guardian)
A building explosion and pancake floor collapse in New York City's East Village causes at least two deaths and multiple injuries. (CBS Local) (USA Today)
Two passenger trains collide in Ayutthaya, Thailand, injuring 22 people. (AP via News24)
A Vietnam People's Air Force military helicopter crashes on Phú Quý island due to strong winds during the landing, with all eight crew members saved. (Thanh Nien News)
Massive floods affect the Chilean regions of Antofagasta, Atacama and Coquimbo, killing at least 15 people and causing the total destruction of cities as Chañaral and several damages in Copiapo. Wikinews in Spanish

Law and crime

After the recent March 17 DOS attack on Chinese website GreatFire (See March 19), a massive distributed denial-of-service attack from China occurs against GitHub, a leading online coding platform, with the Github-hosted GreatFire contents being the main target. (The Verge)

March 27, 2015 (Friday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

2015 military intervention in Yemen
- A Middle Eastern coalition led by the Saudi Arabian army and Egyptian navy attacks positions in Yemen for the second successive day, resulting in at least ten deaths in Saada Governorate. Saudi Arabia declares that it will enforce a "no-fly zone". (CNN)
War in Somalia
- Militants believed to be from al-Shabab attack and temporarily occupy a Mogadishu hotel leaving at least nine people dead. (AP)

Disasters and accidents

A stampede at a Hindu festival in Langalbandh, Bangladesh, kills at least ten people with dozens more injured. (Bangla News), (AP)
Power returns to Amsterdam after a 5-hour blackout that caused the closure of Amsterdam Airport Schiphol and disrupted public transport networks throughout the Netherlands. (Reuters via Daily Mail)
Germanwings Flight 9525
- Investigators, searching one of the two residences of the co-pilot Andreas Lubitz, find a torn doctor's note granting Lubitz medical leave—deeming him unfit for work—for a period including the day of the crash. (CNN)
- In imitation of current U.S. policy, Lufthansa, together with other German airlines announce plans to mandate that two people (either two pilots or a pilot and a flight attendant) must be inside the cockpit at all times. (CNN)

Law and crime

A jury in the U.S. state of California votes for the defendant in a sexual discrimination case brought by Ellen Pao against Silicon Valley venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. (Los Angeles Times)
Italy's highest court acquits American Amanda Knox and Italian Raffaele Sollecito of the murder of Briton Meredith Kercher. (BBC)

Politics and elections

U.S. Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada) announces he will not seek re-election to the United States Senate and intends to retire at the end of his term in January 2017. (CNN)

Science and technology

Soyuz TMA-16M
- Soyuz TMA-16M launches carrying three crew members to the International Space Station. Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Korniyenko and American astronaut Scott Kelly begin a special year-long mission to test the effects of long-term habitation on the human body under conditions of micro gravity and radiation. (AFP via Yahoo News)

March 28, 2015 (Saturday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

2015 military intervention in Yemen
- Saudi airstrikes continue in Yemen for the third successive day while ground fighting occurs in Aden. Saudi Arabia claims to be in full control of Yemen's airspace. (Al-Jazeera)
- Saudi planes evacuate a United Nations mission from the Yemeni capital Sana'a. (Al-Arabiyah)
Somali Civil War (2009–present)
- The death toll from the March 27 hotel siege in Mogadishu rises to 20. (CNN)

Disasters and accidents

Germanwings Flight 9525
- According to an interview with Germany's Bild newspaper, the former girlfriend of co-pilot Andreas Lubitz was told by him that "One day I'm going to do something that will change the whole system, and everyone will know my name and remember." (BBC)
- A mourning religious service is held at Digne-les-Bains in the French Alps near the site of the downed passenger jet. (Guardian)

Law and crime

The Congolese bar owner whom Amanda Knox falsely accused of killing Meredith Kercher criticises a lack of justice in the surprise decision by Italy to quash her conviction yesterday, citing diplomatic pressure coupled with Knox's wealth and status as American, as opposed to his being African. (Guardian)

Politics and elections

Nigerian general election, 2015
- Voters in Nigeria go to the polls for a general election. Gunmen kill at least 15 voters including an opposition house of assembly candidate for Dukku in Gombe. (CNN), (Reuters via MSN)
New South Wales state election, 2015
- Voters in the Australian state of New South Wales go to the polls for a state election with the Liberal-National Coalition led by Mike Baird retaining government. (ABC News Australia), (The Daily Telegraph via The Courier Mail)

Sports

In association football, Russia, recovering after Friday's abandoned Euro 2016 qualifier in Montenegro, press for UEFA to award them victory. Among the injured were goalkeeper Igor Akinfeev, knocked out of the game in the first minute, concussed and nursing a neck injury after a flare struck him in the head; Dmitri Kombarov, struck by another object; Alan Dzagoev, struck by projectiles while being treated for another injury. (The Guardian)

March 29, 2015 (Sunday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

2015 military intervention in Yemen
- Pakistan sends a Boeing 747 to evacuate Pakistani nationals concerned about their security. The plane will be allowed into the country despite the no-fly zone declared by Saudi Arabia. (Reuters)

Disasters and accidents

Air Canada Flight 624
- Air Canada Flight 624 skids off the runway at Halifax Stanfield International Airport, after arriving from Toronto shortly past midnight. All 133 passengers and 5 crews on board survive, with 23 treated for minor injuries. (BBC)

International relations

The President of Egypt Abdel Fattah el-Sisi announces that members of the Arab League have agreed in principle to form a joint military force to respond to security threats. (Ahram Online)

Politics and elections

Death of Lee Kuan Yew
- Singapore holds a funeral and elaborate procession for Lee Kuan Yew, the first Prime Minister of Singapore. (AP)
Nigerian general election, 2015
- Nigeria extends voting in its general election for a second day due to delays and malfunctioning equipment. So far, Boko Haram attacks have killed 43 people. (Bloomberg)
French departmental elections, 2015
- Voters in France go to the polls for local government elections with initial polling suggesting favorable results for former President Nicolas Sarkozy's UMP. (BBC)
Uzbekistani presidential election, 2015
- Voters in Uzbekistan go to the polls for a presidential election with incumbent President Islam Karimov set to win against token opposition. (Al-Jazeera)

Sports

2015 Cricket World Cup
- Australia defeats New Zealand by seven wickets in the final at the Melbourne Cricket Ground. (ABC News Australia), (Sydney Morning Herald)

March 30, 2015 (Monday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Yemeni Crisis (2011–present)
- The People's Republic of China evacuates its citizens from Yemen due to concerns over declining security. (AP)
- 2015 military intervention in Yemen
  - Saudi-led airstrikes hit a refugee camp near a military installation in the northern Harad District killing 21 people. Houthi militants make gains in Hadi's last bastion, Aden. (Reuters)

Business and economy

Creditors offer Puerto Rico's highly leveraged power authority $2 billion in new financing, including $1.2 billion for a new natural gas operation, in exchange for assurances that it will repay its debt. (Reuters)
American company UnitedHealth Group will buy American pharmacy benefit firm Catamaran Corporation for $12.8 billion. (Reuters)

Arts and culture

South African comedian Trevor Noah will succeed Jon Stewart as host of the television program The Daily Show on the Comedy Central network. (The New York Times)

Disasters and accidents

A 7.7 magnitude earthquake off the coast of Papua New Guinea prompts a tsunami warning for Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands. (AP)
A van crash on U.S. Route 27 in Florida near the town of Moore Haven results in 8 deaths and 10 injuries. (NBC News)

Law and crime

The Jerusalem District Court finds former Prime Minister of Israel Ehud Olmert guilty of accepting cash from an American businessman for personal use. (Ynet News)
In Fort George G. Meade, Maryland, base perimeter guards shoot and kill one person and injure another person as two men attempt to crash the entrance gate with their vehicle. The incident also injures a guard. The base is the headquarters for the National Security Agency. (BBC)

Politics and elections

United Kingdom general election, 2015
- Queen Elizabeth II dissolves the Parliament and calls a general election for May 7. (Reuters)
Nigerian general election, 2015
- Challenger Muhammadu Buhari leads by two million votes with three-quarters of the states having their votes counted but votes from some of President Goodluck Jonathan's strongest states in the Niger Delta have yet to be counted. (Reuters)

March 31, 2015 (Tuesday)