Portal:Current events/2010 March 24

Current events of March 24, 2010 (2010-03-24) (Wednesday)

• United Kingdom Chancellor Alistair Darling presents his 2010 United Kingdom Budget to the House of Commons.
• Tiny South Talpatti Island off the coast of Bengal disappears, washed away thirty years after the mud flat island was created by delta currents, ending the Indian and Bangladeshi dispute over the territory. The Calcutta Institute raised fears over more islands, such as the Maldives, going under in the future. (BBC) (The Times of India) (Los Angeles Times) (Miami Herald)
• The European Union calls for Iran to halt internet censorship and jamming of radio broadcasts. (Voice of America) (The Sydney Morning Herald)
• Luis Moreno-Ocampo, Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), says that monitoring Sudan's election next month would be like monitoring a vote in Hitler's Germany. (The Washington Post)
• Middle East:
  • More than 100 people with possible links to Al-Qaeda are arrested in Saudi Arabia for allegedly planning attacks on oil and security installations in the country. (Al Jazeera) (The Times)
  • The United States requests clarifications on new Jewish housing in East Jerusalem after the Israeli Prime Minister meets the US President at the White House in Washington, D.C. (The Jerusalem Post) (The Daily Telegraph)
  • Palestinians have condemned the latest plans for more Jewish homes in East Jerusalem, announced as Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu ended a US visit. (BBC)
• Six people die and more than 30 people are injured after a car bomb explodes in the centre of the Colombian Pacific port city of Buenaventura. (BBC) (Toronto Sun) (CNN) (ABC News) (TVNZ) (Radio Netherlands Worldwide)
• Portugal's credit rating is downgraded from AA to AA- by the Fitch Group due to fears over its high debt levels. (BBC) (The Daily Telegraph) (CNN)
• A Sharia court in Kaduna bans the Civil Rights Congress of Nigeria from debating punishment amputations via Twitter. (BBC) (The Washington Post) (Radio Netherlands Worldwide)
• An out-of-control train derailment in Norway kills three people and seriously injures several others. (BBC) (CNN) (Al Jazeera)
• Scientists identify the Denisova hominin - a previously unknown type of ancient human through DNA analysis from a finger found in a cave in Siberia, Russia. (Nature) (BBC) (The New York Times)
• Go Daddy, the largest domain name registration company in the world, announces it will cease registering websites in China after the Chinese government required customers to provide photographs and other identifying information before registering. (CNET) (Washington Post) (AP)
• Indonesia bans a conference of Asian gay activists, saying it could prompt violent protests by conservative Muslim groups. (The New York Times) (Jakarta Post) (AsiaOne)
• Pope Benedict XVI accepts the resignation of Bishop of Cloyne John Magee. (RTÉ) (The Daily Telegraph) (BBC) (Al Jazeera)
• American mathematician John Tate wins the Abel Prize for advancing "one of the most elaborate and sophisticated branches of modern mathematics" (The Hindu) (AP)
• A landslide kills at least three, injures 11 in Indonesia's West Sumatra in Saok Laweh village. (The Hindu)
• The online encyclopedia Wikipedia goes offline, with users encountering navigation error messages. (CNN) (The Daily Telegraph) (PC Magazine)
• Students at the University of Ottawa protest and shut down right-wing pundit Ann Coulter's second stop on her trans-Canada tour. (CBC)
• Craig David is named as a United Nations Goodwill Ambassador. (UN)