2011 Yemeni protests: Thousands of pro and anti-government protesters demonstrate in the capital Sana'a, amid fears of a confrontation between the two sides. (Al Jazeera)
2011 Saudi Arabian protests: Demonstrations occur in the east of the country in support of anti-government rallies in Bahrain and calling for political freedoms in Saudi Arabia. (Reuters)
Ireland's government agrees to bank bailout number five, valued at €24 billion, and does not force senior bondholders into burden-sharing. (The Irish Times)
It is revealed that chief executive of nationalised Anglo Irish Bank Mike Aynsley received €1 million, including a "housing allowance" for his second home in Australia, while the bank admits billions were squandered last year in the biggest corporate loss in the country's history. (Irish Independent)
Efforts to refloat a stranded German-Danish consortium-owned steel vessel which flies the flag of Antigua and Barbuda get underway off the coast of Connemara in the west of Ireland. (Irish Independent)
Former chief executive of nationalised Anglo Irish Bank David Drumm is questioned about the bank's debts and his declaration of bankruptcy in Massachusetts. Drumm bans the press from attending. (The Irish Times)
Senator Steve Fielding launches his campaign to outlaw lies on April 1 in his battle against those who engage in the "ever-growing annual tradition of playing practical jokes on less intelligent Australians". (The Sydney Morning Herald)
FIFA suspends Bosnia and Herzegovina from international football after its failure to drop a rotating presidential system between a Muslim, a Serb and a Croat, which is similar to the country's complex political system. (BBC Sport)
Goldstone continues to defend portions of the report, including those that accused Hamas of violations and demands that the Palestinians investigate their violations in Gaza, as Israel has investigated its actions, while Hamas has not held any investigations. (The Jerusalem Post)
Syrian president Assad appoints a new governor for Daraa as he struggles to please the people demonstrating in unprecedented protests against his regime. (Al Jazeera)
Concern grows as Ai Weiwei, who has criticised his country's human rights record, fails to reappear more than 24 hours after his disappearance by guards at Beijing Airport. Police issue no comment, though they have since raided his studio. (BBC)(Al Jazeera)(Radio Television Hong Kong)
The French and German foreign ministries call on China to release Ai Weiwei from prison, while Amnesty International is also critical of his detention. (BBC)
The Japanese Foreign Ministry issues a statement that 19 foreign nationals died in the earthquake and tsunami, with dozens more still missing, mostly from China and South Korea. (UPI)
Controversial Irish senator Ivor Callely, who last year was embroiled in an expenses scandal, is fined €60 by a court for breaching the law. (TV3)(The Irish Times)(RTÉ)
As part of the British government's package of welfare reforms, from today the one-and-a-half million people in the United Kingdom who claim incapacity benefit will begin to receive letters asking them to attend a work capability assessment. The tests are part of government plans to reduce the number of long-term claimants and will take until 2014 to complete. (BBC)
Alcide Djédjé, the Foreign Minister claims that Gbagbo's forces have laid down their arms and he is negotiating with Ouattara over the terms of surrender. (CNN)
Amid ongoing protests, Syria opposition says Assad wants talks (Haaretz)
Arts and culture
The whereabouts of Chinese artist Ai Weiwei remain undetermined 48 hours after his disappearance as the U.S., France, Germany, Britain and Amnesty International ask that he be released immediately. (Al Jazeera)
A public civil partnership between a same-sex couple takes place in Dublin, the first time this has happened in Ireland. (The Irish Times)
Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus loses his final appeal in the Supreme Court of Bangladesh against his dismissal from his own Grameen micro-finance bank; the bank thought him too old for the job. (BBC)
Rebels against the Gaddafi regime in Libya have begun to export oil. (BBC)
For over 50 days, the Libyan city of Misrata has been shelled by artillery, tanks, and snipers, and for over 20 days has had its water intentionally shut off by Muammar Gaddafi's forces. As supplies run short, hundreds of thousands are at risk of death. (Euronews)
Police investigating the murder of Sian O'Callaghan have identified human remains found at a second site as those of Swindon woman Becky Godden-Edwards, who had been missing for eight years. (BBC)
Politics
Amid growing concern and criticism of its planned reforms to the NHS in England, the UK government says it is willing to make major changes to the policy. (BBC)
A Mexican Drug War-related march inspired by the killing of seven people, one of whom was the son of prominent poet and journalist Javier Sicilia, occur in more than 20 Mexican cities, with marchers chanting "No more blood!". (BBC)(LA Times)
Médecins Sans Frontières releases a report accusing Bahrain's military of deliberately targeting doctors and hospitals, "paralyzing" them, and turning them into "places to be feared". (Al Jazeera)
Libya:
NATO kills at least 13 Libyan rebels and injures many more in an air raid near Ajdabiya after rebels reportedly fired on NATO planes, though there is speculation that the air-strike may have come from Gaddafi's fighter jets evading the no fly zone. (BBC)(Al Jazeera)
The United States considers putting troops on the ground. (CBS)
Syria:
The Assad regime grants nationality to thousands of Kurds in al-Hasaka in a bid to appease protesters. (Al Jazeera)
The Iron Dome mobile air defense system successfully intercepted a Grad rocket launched from the Gaza Strip at the Israeli city Ashkelon, marking the first time in history a short-range rocket was ever intercepted.(Haaretz)
China's foreign ministry confirms police are investigating artist and government critic Ai Weiwei, who disappeared over the weekend, for suspected economic crimes amid reports that he has been force-fed milk powder while on hunger strike in prison in reference to his campaigns against the 2008 Chinese milk scandal. (BBC)(AFP via Jakarta Globe)(Al Jazeera)
General Electric Co. announces that it is investing $600 million to construct a facility for the manufacture of thin-film solar panels, and says it hopes and expects to drive the price of solar energy down. (Reuters)
Injections of nitrogen into one of the reactors at Japan's stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant begins in an effort to stop further hydrogen blasts. (BBC)
Calls increase for an independent international investigation into the recently released tape recording of police in the Republic of Ireland discussing the rape of two female protesters, one of whom is from North America. One of the women discusses her experience in public after police leak the identities of the women. (Irish Examiner)(TV3)
The case of a group of elderly Kenyans - 3 men and 1 woman in their 70s and 80s - reaches London's High Court, with the group seeking compensation and apology for their torture by British officers during the 1950s Mau Mau Uprising, including castration, sexual abuse, forced labour and beatings. (Al Jazeera)
Prominent religious leader Maulvi Showkat Ahmed Shah is killed when explosives attached to a bicycle are detonated outside a mosque in Srinagar, Kashmir, thought to be the first attack of its kind in about two years. The capital's shops shut down and traffic is suspended. (BBC)
At least 25 people are killed and at least 320 others are wounded at Camp Ashraf. (Al Jazeera)
At least two people are killed and hundreds more are injured, including 30 critically, as security forces open fire on people in Ta'izz during protests against the Saleh regime. (Al Jazeera)
Thousands of people gather in Tahrir Square in Cairo for a "Day of Trial and Cleansing", calling for ousted president Hosni Mubarak and his regime to be prosecuted. (Al Jazeera)
A crew member shoots two of his crew mates on board the nuclear submarine HMS Astute at Southampton in Hampshire, England, killing one and sending the other into a life-threatening condition; police dismiss any link to terrorism. (BBC)(Al Jazeera)
Eight people are killed and 130 injured in a massive car pile-up caused by a sandstorm on the German autobahn A 19 near Rostock. The pile-up involves about 80 vehicles and causes at least 30 of them to catch fire, making it the worst accident in the state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. (BBC)(TheLocal)
Three children die after drinking suspected nitrite- (as opposed to 2008's melamine-) tainted milk in China; 35 others are hospitalized. (BBC)(China.org.cn)
The Egyptian Army initiates a fatal crackdown in Tahrir Square, Cairo, on people protesting that ousted president Hosni Mubarak be prosecuted for corruption. (BBC)
Women's groups protest outside the Oireachtas after police are filmed discussing raping women after their arrest. (The Guardian)
The Police Service of Northern Ireland says that a "sophisticated and substantial" 500lb bomb left in a van under the main Belfast to Dublin road near Newry had the potential to cause huge loss of life and devastation, and may have been destined for a town centre. (BBC)
72-year-old Indian social activist Anna Hazare is to end a four-day hunger strike after the government agrees to his wishes for tougher anti-corruption laws which have gained widespread public support. (BBC)
Highland Capital has brought an adversary proceeding within the U.S. bankruptcy court, New York, in regard to the Lyondell reorganization, against the securities unit of UBS AG for third-party inferenece with a contract between Highland and Lyondell. (BusinessWeek)
Japan is hit by a magnitude 6.6 aftershock one month after the main earthquake, knocking out power to Fukushima I for nearly an hour. (Washington Post)
British Prime Minister David Cameron is criticised by the University of Oxford for an "incorrect and highly misleading" claim that only one black student was enrolled there in 2009. During a question and answer session on the effect of higher tuition fees on poorer students, Cameron had called the figures "disgraceful". The University says that at least 26 black students started there that year. (BBC)
Almost all of 169 ChineseChristians detained on Sunday, after they tried to hold an outdoor prayer session, are released; the unofficial Chinese church vows to hold more services. (MSN Malaysia News)(BBC)
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu mulls withdrawing IDF forces from parts of the West Bank and handing over full security control to the Palestinian Authority to demonstrate an Israeli diplomatic initiative that would block a possible "diplomatic tsunami" that could follow international recognition of a Palestinian state. (Haaretz)
Pakistan seeks CIA reduction in the country by 25%-40% (BBC)
North Korea confirms that it has detained a United States citizen Jun Young Su and is preparing to charge him with "committing a crime" against the country. (BBC)
Réjean Hinse, a Quebec man wrongly convicted of a crime in the 1960s before being acquitted by the Supreme Court of Canada 30 years later receives a record $13.1 million in compensation. (CBC)
Five months after his expulsion from the Shas party, Israeli rabbi Chaim Amsellem forms the Whole Nation party, and announces plans to run for the 19th Knesset on a secular-religious unity platform. (Ynetnews)
British Business Secretary Vince Cable criticises Prime Minister David Cameron as "very unwise" for making a speech on immigration in which he spoke of reducing the number of immigrants into the UK from hundreds of thousands to tens of thousands. He said the comments "risked inflaming extremism", although Cameron dismissed these concerns. (BBC)
Nasdaq, in pursuit of its bid for control of NYSE Euronext, would be willing to sell one key NYSE Euronext property, the American Stock Exchange, in order to resolve antitrust issues, according to an unnamed source cited by Reuters. (Reuters)
US actor Nicolas Cage is arrested in New Orleans for alleged domestic abuse battery, disturbing the peace and public drunkenness. (UPI)
A Chinese student from Beijing studying at York University in Toronto is found dead after a male stalker entered her room to use a cell phone while she was chatting online via webcam to a friend in China; she was found undressed and her computer is missing. (AFP)(Montreal Gazette)(Global Post)
At a fundraiser, Barack Obama is caught on an open mic confronting Paul Ryan's record of creating the debt which he is now claiming to be trying to fix, among numerous other things. (ABC)
Fourteen people claimed to be responsible for shooting 52 protestors in Sana’a in March are referred to the state prosecutor. (Al-Arabiya)
Business and economy
China raises its bank reserves requirements as an anti-inflation move, an increase of 50 basis points (half of a percent) effective April 21. (Financial Times)
Geoffrey Matai of Kenya sets a new record for the fastest time to run the Boston Marathon, completing its 26-mile course with a time of 2:03:02. (New York Times)
NATO and the civilian council of Misrata request ground troops to protect the city of Misrata from Gaddafi's forces, after NATO admits it is unable to stop the artillery shelling of Misrata. (Hotair)
U.S. serviceman Bradley Manning is moved by officials to a military prison in Kansas amid increased international concerns about the U.S. military's policy of forcing him to strip naked in his cell and taking away his clothes. (BBC)(Al Jazeera)
An error by an American air traffic controller leads to the plane carrying Michelle Obama of the United States to come two miles too close to another plane near Washington, D.C.(BBC)
The United Nations Security Council fails to come up with an agreed public statement at its first meeting to discuss the crisis in Yemen as violence continues. (BBC)
Muammar Gaddafi's forces continue to use artillery shelling against civilians and rebels in Misrata. Rebels from the Nafusa Mountains region capture Libya's west border, where over 100 loyalist soldiers surrender to Tunisian authorities after being chased out by rebels. (Al Jazeera)
U.S. Congressman Ed Markey (D-Mass.) sends Apple chief executive Steve Jobs a letter asking him to explain the purpose of a file embedded on iPhones and iPads that keeps a detailed log of the devices' location. (Los Angeles Times)
The controversy escalates as some governments announce an intent to investigate any violation of privacy laws. (The New York Times)
Former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak's name is to be removed from all public places including schools and streets by order of an Egyptian court. (Al Jazeera)
U.S. Senator John Ensign, a NevadaRepublican, announces his resignation from his Senate seat effective May 3, due to allegations he had an affair with the wife of a member of his staff. (Bloomberg)
2011 Syrian protests: At least 88 people are killed as a result of police firing at massive "Great Friday" anti-government protests across the country, the deadliest day of protest there yet. (Al Jazeera)(Press TV)
2011 Libyan civil war: The head of America's military says the war is moving towards stalemate, even after its air strikes destroy 30-40 per cent of Libya's ground forces. American senator John McCain visits Benghazi. (BBC)
Amid a protest against the construction of a new Tesco superstore in the Stokes Croft area of the English city of Bristol, 9 people are arrested and 8 police officers are injured. (BBC)
A farmer in Los Pozos, Veracruz, Mexico opens fire outside a local church after its Good Friday sermon, killing a woman and two children. (WLOS)
Pope Benedict XVI becomes the first pontiff to take part in a televised question-and-answer session, a pre-recorded programme for Italian television. (BBC)(The Guardian)
After the shooting, Ynet reports "Palestinian sources reported local Palestinian youths gathered around the Joseph Tomb's compound shortly after the incident and set it on fire." (Ynet)(The Jerusalem Post)
Tunisian revolution: Thousands of people demonstrate in Tunis to demand both the resignation of interim prime minister Beji Caid el Sebsi, a link with the old guard brought down in January's popular revolution, and the prosecution of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, who fled to Saudi Arabia after being ousted, on charges such as murder and drug-trafficking. (Press TV)
2011 Syrian protests: Police and soldiers open fire from rooftops in Jabla, killing and injuring nearby people; no protest was taking place at the time. An independent investigation is urged into Friday's massacre of close to 100 people as well as Saturday's killings of mourners at the funerals. (BBC)(CNN)(Al Jazeera)
2011 Moroccan protests: Thousands of people participate in massive peaceful demonstrations against the government on streets across Morocco, calling for an end to corruption and torture. (Press TV)(Al Jazeera)
2011 Saudi Arabian protests: Amid demonstrations by the unemployed, women protesters gather to demand a vote but are defeated and rounded up by authorities. (Press TV)
2011 Yemeni protests: Mass protests continue nationwide in defiance of the Saleh regime's claims the country's leader is to soon resign from his 32-year rule; protesters demand his immediate removal from power. (BBC)(CNN)(Al Jazeera)(Press TV)
2011 Libyan civil war: Deaths continue to climb in the besieged Libyan city of Misrata, while Spanish photojournalist Manu Brabo telephones his parents from the military prison in which he is being held in Tripoli. (CNN)(BBC)
The cables show the United States relied on the internationally widely available Casio F91W digital watch as "the sign of al-Qaida" and as "evidence" to imprison its captives in the Guantanamo Bay detention camp. (The Guardian)
Staff at Guantánamo Bay were instructed that any Muslim traveling to Afghanistan after 11 September 2001 was likely to have gone there "to support Osama bin Laden through direct hostilities against the US forces", with any other reasons being dismissed as "total fabrications", making it difficult for the interrogated to plead their innocence. (The Guardian)
Details of U.S. collaboration with at least 10 foreign intelligence agencies emerge, with Chinese, Tunisian, Moroccan, Russian, Saudi, Tajik, Jordanian, Algerian, Yemeni and Kuwaiti delegations assisting the U.S. with interrogations at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp, and China and Russia vowing to prosecute and punish any repatriated Uighurs or Uzbeks. (The Guardian)
Details of how an al-Qaeda-linked militant duped Canadian intelligence agents also emerge. (The Globe and Mail)
It is disclosed that an Al Jazeera journalist imprisoned by the United States at Guantánamo for six years was interrogated about the news network. He claims to have been beaten and sexually assaulted. (The Guardian)
The U.S. government "strongly condemns" international media outlets, specifically The New York Times, for publishing the files it had wanted to keep secret. (The Jerusalem Post)
At least 45 people are wounded, with others missing, following a strike by warplanes on Muammar Gaddafi's Tripoli compound as NATO conducted the raid. (Press TV)(Reuters)
At least 17 people are killed and at least 24 others are injured as a four-storey building goes up in flames in Daxing, a suburb of Beijing. (BBC)(Xinhua)
BBC television personality Andrew Marr admits to having taken out a high court superinjunction after Private Eye launches a challenge, though Marr states he "did not come into journalism to go around gagging journalists". (The Guardian)
U.S. president Barack Obama is criticised by supporters of imprisoned Welsh-born U.S. serviceman Bradley Manning for interfering in any future trial after Obama is caught on camera accusing Manning of breaking the law. (AFP via Google News)(MSNBC)
2011 Bahraini protests: Students rally across Iran to protest against the silent response of the United Nations to the crackdown on peaceful demonstrations by the Bahraini government (with the assistance of Saudi Arabia). (Press TV)
Troops from Thailand and Cambodia exchange gunfire for the sixth straight day as the death toll from the conflict during the period reaches fourteen. (BBC)
Julian Assange confirms the presence of Indian names in the Swiss bank data list about to be made public and that the names come from "the U.S., Britain, Germany, Austria and Asia — from all over" including "business people, politicians, people who have made their living in the arts and multinational conglomerates — from both sides of the Atlantic". (The Hindu)
In an unprecedented question and answer meeting with reporters, the U.S. Federal ReservechairmanBen Bernanke expects less economic growth for 2011 as the economy has been weaker in recent months than he had thought it would be. (BBC)
A local National Weather Service building is evacuated as a tornado passes over its radar site and it temporarily switches operations to Mobile in the same state of Alabama.
Bahraini forces fire live rounds at civilians in Sitra as part of its crackdown on protests against the regime, assisted by Saudi Arabia. Video footage emerges showing the use of poison gas against civilians. (Press TV)
The King of Saudi Arabia cancels his trip to Bahrain over fears that the people of Bahrain may become irritated by his presence after he assisted in the regime's violent crackdown. (Tehran Times)
The UK's Oxford Aviation Academy suspends 7 trainee airline pilots after the Bahraini regime orders that they be sent home immediately for participating in a peaceful demonstration in London against their government's attacks on civilians. (The Guardian)
Syrian ambassador to the United Kingdom Dr Sami Khiyami's invitation to tomorrow's wedding of Prince William and Catherine Middleton is withdrawn after British officials deem it "inappropriate" for him to attend as a crackdown on dissent continues. Khiyami describes it as all "a bit embarrassing". (BBC)
2011 Yemeni protests: Thousands of people demonstrate in unity nationwide in condemnation of a violent government crackdown that killed at least 13 civilians in Sanaa. (Al Jazeera)
Former U.S. president Jimmy Carter, after visiting North Korea, calls on the U.S. and South Korea to stop starving the North Koreans and accuses the U.S. and South Korea of violating the human rights of the North Korean people. Carter also says Kim Jong-il is willing to hold unconditional talks with South Korea, though current U.S. officials dismiss the visit of their former president to North Korea as "strictly private". (BBC)
A "Day of Rage" is set to get underway in Syria as the popular uprising against Bashar al-Assad's regime continues. (BBC)
Security forces shut off Daraa's water supply and electricity, and begin confiscating food, in an effort to starve the people of the city. (News24)(Al Jazeera)
At least 62 people are killed as scores of people die in the "Day of Rage". (Al Jazeera)(BBC)
100,000 people march through central Sanaa in one of the largest protests yet to have taken place against the Saleh regime, with protesters demanding that he resign immediately rather than wait for the phased handover of power he has orchestrated. (Al Jazeera)
Thousands march across Bahrain, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia in defiance of yesterday's death sentences handed down to anti-government protesters by the ruling Bahraini regime, with people in Lahore (Pakistan) carrying symbolic coffins in solidarity. (Al Jazeera)
NATO reports it has intercepted Muammar Gaddafi's forces in the act of laying mines in Misrata as Tunisia successfully captures some of the troops who have brought the Libyan civil war onto its territory. (BBC)
Air India pilots continue a strike for a third successive day with 120 flights cancelled. (Hindustan Times)
Unemployment figures in Spain increase to a 14-year high; nearly 5,000,000 people are unemployed. (BBC)
Demand for Samsung Electronics products plummets again, with the company only managing net profits of $2.6 billion for the first three months of 2011. (BBC)
Disasters
At least 43 people are killed and others are missing after a minibus of mourners falls from a ferry on the River Nile. (BBC)
Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh calls on the PLO to withdraw its recognition of Israel’s right to exist in response to Israel’s opposition to the reconciliation deal between his movement and Fatah. (The Jerusalem Post)
Veteran former French right-wing interior minister Charles Pasqua has his conviction for illegally selling weapons to Angola quashed, while jail terms for Israeli-Russian businessman Arkady Gaydamak and French magnate Pierre Falcone are cut. (BBC)
Australian Defence Force Academy sex scandal: 2 cadets are charged with misusing an electronic communications service and an indecent act after the secret filming of a woman engaging in sexual intercourse is broadcast on the internet. (BBC)
A ruling by the Oregon Supreme Court in the United States could lead to 30 prisoners serving life sentences for murder being freed early, if a parole board considers them to be capable of rehabilitation. (Oregon Live)
The French Football Federation (FFF) announces an internal inquiry over allegations of a secret racial quota targeting blacks and Arabs and supported by its own officials. (BBC News)
Muammar Gaddafi, the leader of Libya, says on state television that he is prepared to enter a ceasefire in the Libyan Civil War but it must apply to both sides. Muammar Gaddafi has made such claims before but each time he failed to uphold one. (Al Jazeera)
Gaddafi's government attempts to block deliveries to Misrata by using naval mines, which are in the process of being removed by NATO. (BBC)
A study carried out by the Danish Booksellers Association reveals almost one third of Danes over the age of 14 read at least one book annually written in the English language. (The Copenhagen Post)
Army intelligence analyst Bradley Manning, imprisoned by the United States on charges of disclosing government information to the general public, is found competent to stand trial by a "panel of experts", despite having earlier been thought of as a "suicide risk" and having his clothes removed. (The Hindu)
6 major U.S. tobacco companies, accused of delivering an "unreasonably dangerous" product, defeat a lawsuit taken by 37 hospitals in the U.S. state of Missouri. The hospitals were looking for financial assistance with the treatment of illnesses caused by smoking. (BBC)(Bloomberg / The Irish Times)
Current U.S. officials and former president Jimmy Carter disagree over allegations that the U.S. is deliberately keeping food aid from North Korea despite severe food shortages among people there. (BBC)
