Today in History - March 28
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193 Mar 28, Publius Helvius Pertinax, Roman Emperor (192-93), was assassinated.
(HFA, '96, p.26)(MC, 3/28/02)
1472 Mar 28, Fra Bartolommeo (d.1517), Florentine Renaissance painter, was born.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fra_Bartolommeo)
1483 Mar 28, Raphael, painter (School of Athens), was born in Urbino, Italy. [see Apr 6]
(MC, 3/28/02)
1503 Mar 28, The 2nd Lithuanian war with Russia (1500-1503) ended with a treaty. Lithuania lost a fourth of its territory.
(LHC, 3/28/03)
1515 Mar 28, Theresa of Avila (d.1582), Teresa de Jesus (St. Theresa), Spanish Carmelite nun, mystic writer, saint, was born. She initiated reforms in the Order. She co-founded with John of the Cross (1542-1591) the Order of Discalced (barefoot) Carmelites. "Untilled ground, however rich, will bring forth thistles and thorns; so also the mind of man." "To wish to act like angels while we are still in this world is nothing but folly."
(CU, 6/87)(WUD, 1994, p.769)(AP, 12/8/97)(AP, 7/5/98)(MC, 3/28/02)
1556 Mar 28, Philip II, Charles V's son, was crowned king of Spain. [see Sep 12]
(MC, 3/28/02)
1652 Mar 28, Samuel Sewall, British colonial merchant and one of the Salem witch trial judges, was born.
(HN, 3/28/01)
1660 Mar 28, Georg Ludwig, German monarch of Hanover, King George I of Great Britain, was born.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1673 Mar 28, Adam Pijnacker (51), Dutch landscape painter, etcher, was buried.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1687 Mar 28, Constantine Huygens (90), diplomat, poet, composer (Bluebottles), died.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1737 Mar 28, Francesco Zanetti, composer, was born.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1766 Mar 28, Joseph Weigl, Austrian composer, conductor (Emmeline), was born.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1774 Mar 28, Britain passed the Coercive Act against Massachusetts. [see May 20]
(HN, 3/28/98)
1776 Mar 28, Mexican Captain Juan Bautista de Anza, Lt. Jose Moraga, and Franciscan priest Pedro Font arrived at the tip of San Francisco. De Anza planted a cross at what is now Fort Point. They camped at Mountain Lake and searched inland for a more hospitable area and found a site they called Laguna de los Dolores or the Friday of Sorrows since the day was Friday before Palm Sunday. Anza became known as the “father of SF." Mission Dolores was founded by Father Francisco Palou and Father Pedro Cambon. Rancho San Pedro, near what is now Pacifica, served as the agricultural center. Laguna de los Dolores was later believed to be a spring near the modern-day corner of Duboce and Sanchez.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_Bautista_de_Anza)(SFEC, 9/21/97, p.C7)(SFEC, 3/1/98, p.W34)(SFC, 2/19/11, p.A10)
1878 Mar 28, The Hastings College of Law, the law department of the University of California, was founded with a donation of $100,000 by Serranus Clinton Hastings.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serranus_Clinton_Hastings)
1794 Mar 28, Marie-Joseph de Condorcet (b.1743), mathematician (Theory of Comets) and philosopher, died as a fugitive from French Revolution Terrorists.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marquis_de_Condorcet)
1797 Mar 28, Nathaniel Briggs of New Hampshire patented a washing machine.
(AP, 3/28/97)
1799 Mar 28, NY state abolished slavery.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1800 Mar 28, The Parliament in Westminster passed an Act of Union formally binding Ireland with England and abolished the Irish parliament. The Act of Union entailed the loss of legislative independence of the Irish Parliament. The Act of Union received royal assent on August 1 and became effective on Jan 1, 1801.
(www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/614673/Act-of-Union)(SFEC, 12/22/96, Z1 p.6)(WSJ, 11/20/98, p.W6)
1804 Mar 28, Ohio passed law restricting movement of Blacks. [see Jan 5]
(MC, 3/28/02)
1818 Mar 28, Wade Hampton (d.1902), Confederate general, was born.
(HN, 3/28/98)(MC, 3/28/02)
1818 Mar 28, Giuseppe Antonio Capuzzi (62), composer, died.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1834 Mar 28, The US Senate voted to censure Pres. Jackson for the removal of federal deposits from the Bank of the United States. The Senate declared that Pres. Andrew Jackson: "in the last executive proceedings in relation to the public revenue, has assumed upon himself authority and power not conferred by the constitution and laws, but in derogation of both."
(AP, 3/28/97)
1837 Mar 28, Felix Mendelssohn married Cecile Jeanrenaud.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1844 Mar 28, Jose Zorilla's "Don Juan Tenorio," premiered in Madrid.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1845 Mar 28, Mexico dropped diplomatic relations with US.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1854 Mar 28, During the Crimean War, Britain and France declared war on Russia.
(AP, 3/28/97)
1859 Mar 28, 1st performance of John Brahms' 1st Serenade for orchestra.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1862 Mar 28, Aristide Briand, premier of France (1909-22), was born.
(HN, 3/28/98)
1862 Mar 28, US Civil War skirmish at Bealeton Station, Virginia.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1864 Mar 28, A group of Copperheads attacked Federal soldiers in Charleston Ill. Five were killed and twenty wounded.
(HN, 3/28/99)
1868 Mar 28, Maxim Gorki, Russian writer, was born. [see Mar 16]
(HN, 3/28/98)
1871 Mar 28, Willem Mengelberg, conductor (NY Philharmonic 1922-30), was born in Utrecht, Neth.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1878 Mar 28, The Hastings College of Law, the law department of the University of California, was founded with a donation of $100,000 by Serranus Clinton Hastings. Hastings (d.1893) donated $100,000 in gold coins to found California’s first law school. It was later reported that he had ordered attacks on native Yuki villages that killed women and children.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serranus_Clinton_Hastings)(NY Times, 10/27/21)
1879 Mar 28, British mounted troops under Colonel Henry Evelyn Wood went up Hlobane Mountain to battle the Zulus—only to be surrounded by a 22,000-man impi (army). Lieutenant Colonel Redvers Buller, received the Victoria Cross for his gallantry during the difficult withdrawal of his troopers from the mountain. Hlobane was the worst rout of British cavalry—and the last Zulu victory—of the Anglo-Zulu War in South Africa.
(HN, 3/12/98)(HN, 3/28/99)
1881 Mar 28, "Greatest Show On Earth" was formed by P.T. Barnum and James A. Bailey. [see 1879 and Mar 16,18, 1881]
(MC, 3/28/02)
1881 Mar 28, Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky (42), composer, died. [see Mar 16]
(MC, 3/28/02)
1885 Mar 28, The Salvation Army was officially organized in the U.S.
(HN, 3/28/98)
1886 Mar 28, Jarosla Novotny, composer, was born.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1890 Mar 28, Paul Whiteman, orchestra leader (Paul Whiteman's TV Teen Club), was born in Denver, Co.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1895 Mar 28, Spencer W. Kimball, 12th Prophet of the Mormon Church, was born.
(HN, 3/28/98)
1895 Mar 28, Major James McCudden, the first RAF pilot to receive the Victoria Cross, was born.
(HN, 3/28/99)
1896 Mar 28, The opera "Andrea Chenier," by Umberto Giordano, premiered in Milan, Italy.
(AP, 3/28/97)
1898 Mar 28, The Supreme Court ruled in United States v. Wong Kim Ark that a child born in the United States to Chinese immigrants was a US citizen.
(AP, 3/28/08)
1903 Mar 28, Rudolf Serkin, pianist (Marlboro School of Music), was born in Eger, Bohemia.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1905 Mar 28, Marlin Perkins, TV host (Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom), was born in Carthage, Mo.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1907 Mar 28, Pavel Ivanovich Blaramberg (65), composer, died.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1908 Mar 28, Automobile owners lobbied Congress, supporting a bill that called for vehicle licensing and federal registration.
(HN, 3/28/98)
1909 Mar 28, Nelson Algren (d.1981, novelist (The Man with the Golden Arm, A Walk on the Wild Side), was born.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nelson_Algren)
1910 Mar 28, Pres. Theodore Roosevelt gave his “Law and Order in Egypt" speech at Cairo Univ. Sheikh Ali Yusuf, Muslim cleric and popular columnist, had written an open letter in praise of Roosevelt’s visit, but the president’s imperious tone soon disappointed Egyptian hopes.
(www.mobipocket.com/EN/eBooks/eBookDetails.asp?BookID=86377)(Econ, 6/6/09, p.1910)
1910 Mar 28, The first seaplane took off from water at Martinques, France.
(HN, 3/28/98)
1911 Mar 28, M.K. Ciurlionis (b.1875), Lithuanian artist and composer, died.
(LC, 1998, p.12)
1914 Mar 28, Edmund Sixtus Muskie, (Sen-D-Me), US Sec of State (1980), was born.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1917 Mar 28, The Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC) was founded, these were Great Britain’s first official service women.
(HN, 3/28/99)
1917 Mar 28, Puccini's "La Rondine," premiered in Monte Carlo.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1917 Mar 28, Jews were expelled from Tel Aviv and Jaffa by Turkish authorities.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1920 Mar 28, Dirk Bogarde, actor (Death in Venice, Servant), was born in London, England.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1920 Mar 28, Thomas Masaryk was elected president of Czechoslovakia.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1922 Mar 28, The 1st microfilm device was introduced.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1924 Mar 28, At the request of French President Raymond Poincaré Col. Ernest Mercier with the support of ninety banks and companies founded Compagnie française des pétroles (CFP), later renamed Total.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_SE)
1927 Mar 28, Karl Prohaska (57), composer, died.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1928 Mar 28, Zbigniew Brzezinski, US national security advisor (Carter), was born in Warsaw.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1928 Mar 30, Petaluma farmers shipped 58 carloads of eggs by train to SF. 50,000 cases contained some 18 million eggs.
(Ind, 4/26/03, p.5A)
1928 Mar 28, J.L. Rutledge, Pacific Air Transport pilot, ran out of fuel and parachuted from his plane near Orinda, Ca. The plane crashed nearby and he retrieved the mail and delivered it to the Orinda post office.
(SFC, 3/28/03, p.E8)
1928 Mar 28, Giuseppe Ferrata (63), composer, died.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1929 Mar 28, Frederick Exley, American novelist (A Fan's Notes), was born.
(HN, 3/28/01)
1930 Mar 28, Jerome Isaac Friedman, American physicist, was born. He helped confirm the existence of quarks.
(HN, 3/28/01)
1930 Mar 28, The names of the Turkish cities of Constantinople and Angora were changed to Istanbul and Ankara.
(AP, 3/28/97) (HN, 3/28/98)
1931 Mar 28, Byron Bancroft Johnson (b.1864), founder of the American League Baseball organization, died. In 1937 he was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame.
(ON, 6/09, p.12)
1933 Mar 28, Nazis ordered a ban on all Jews in businesses, professions and schools.
(HN, 3/28/98)
1933 Mar 28, German Reichstag conferred dictatorial powers on Hitler.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1935 Mar 28, Goddard used gyroscopes to control a rocket.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1936 Mar 28, Mario Vargas Llosa, Peruvian novelist (Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter, Death in the Andes), was born.
(HN, 3/28/01)
1938 Mar 28, The US Supreme Court in Lovell v City of Griffin declared that it is unconstitutional to require someone to get a government permit to engage in free speech.
(SFC, 4/18/09, p.B2)(http://supreme.justia.com/us/303/444/case.html)
1938 Mar 28, Colonel Edward Mandell House (b.1858), friend and advisor to Pres. Woodrow Wilson, died in Texas. In 2006 Godfrey Hodgson authored “Woodrow Wilson’s Right Hand: The Life of Colonel Edward M. House."
(www.library.yale.edu/un/house/chrono.htm)
1939 Mar 28, Philip Barry's "Philadelphia Story," premiered in NYC.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1939 Mar 28, Clark Gable (d.1960) and Carol Lombard (d.1942) stayed at the Arizona Oatman Hotel for their honeymoon. [see Mar 29]
(SSFC, 6/17/01, p.T8)
1939 Mar 28, The Spanish Civil War ended as Madrid fell to Francisco Franco. He emerged victorious and became head of Fascist Spain ending the Spanish Civil War. France executed more than 100,000 people who had opposed him. In 1982 Dan Richardson wrote "Comintern Army," a historical work on the Spanish Civil War. "The Historical Dictionary of the Spanish Civil War" was published in 1982. In 1991 Burnett Bolloten wrote "The Spanish Civil War." In 2006 Antony Beevor authored “The Battle for Spain: The Spanish Civil War 1936-1936." This was an update of his 1982 account.
(SFC, 11/12/96, p.A12)(AP, 3/28/97)(HN, 3/28/98)(WSJ, 11/19/96, p.A22)(Econ, 6/24/06, p.97)
1941 Mar 28, Novelist and critic Virginia Woolf (1882-1941), born as Virginia Stephen, died in Lewes, England. She feared a mental breakdown and threw herself into the River Ouse near her home in Sussex. Her body was never found. She was an English novelist, essayist and critic and wrote standing up. Her diaries over nearly three decades filled 26 volumes. In 1997 "Art and Affection, A Life of Virginia Woolf" was published. In 1997 a biography by Hermione Lee was published.
(SFC, 6/23/96, Z1 p.2)(SFEM, 1/12/97, BR p.7)(AP, 3/28/97)(SFEC, 6/22/97, BR p.8)(HN, 3/28/01)(Econ., 5/23/20, p.70)
1941 Mar 28, The Italian fleet was routed by the British at the Battle of Matapan off the coast of Greece. More than 2,000 Italian sailors died and five Italian ships were destroyed. Mavis Batey (1921-2013) of British intelligence had decoded a message that signaled the attack three days earlier.
(HN, 3/28/99)(SFC, 11/29/13, p.C4)
1942 Mar 28, Samuel Ramey, bass (La Scala, Met Opera), was born in Colby, Kansas.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1942 Mar 28, Japanese-American lawyer Minoru Yasui (1916-1986) violated a military curfew in Portland, Oregon, and demanded to be arrested after he was refused enlistment to fight for the US. He was one of the few Japanese Americans who fought laws that directly targeted Japanese Americans or Japanese immigrants following the bombing of Pearl Harbor. In 2015 he was among 17 people awarded the presidential Medal of Freedom.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minoru_Yasui)(SFC, 11/24/15, p.A5)
1942 Mar 28, British naval forces continued the raid on the Nazi-occupied French port of St. Nazaire. British Bomber Command launched an attack on the German city of Lubeck with 234 RAF bombers.
(AP, 3/28/97)(HN, 3/28/98)(MC, 3/28/02)
1942 Mar 28, A British ship, the HMS Capbeltown, a Lend-Lease American destroyer, which was specifically rammed into a German occupied dry-dock in France, exploded, knocking the area out of action for the German battleship Tirpitz.
(HN, 3/28/00)
1943 Mar 28, Sergei Vasilyevich Rachmaninoff (70), Russian-born composer, died in Beverly Hills, Calif.
(AP, 3/28/97)
1945 Mar 28, Germany launched the last of the V-2 rockets (buzz bomb) against England.
(HN, 3/28/99)
1949 Mar 28, Sec. of Defense James Forrestal resigned due to a mental breakdown. He was worn out by his futile efforts to bring about the unification of the armed services. He was succeeded by Louis A. Johnson. Johnson proceeded to slash defense expenses. He retired all but 5 aircraft carriers and dismantled the first supercarrier.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Forrestal)
1951 Mar 28, China proclaimed the “peaceful liberation" of Tibet. Some 5,000 Tibetans were killed in the process.
(Econ, 7/10/10, p.40)
1953 Mar 28, In the 7th Tony Awards: Crucible and Wonderful Town won.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1953 Mar 28, Jim Thorpe (b.1887), native American decathlon athlete (Olympics-gold-1912), died in Lomita, California.
(AP, 3/28/02)(www.reference.com/browse/wiki/Jim_Thorpe)
1954 Mar 28, In the 8th Tony Awards: Teahouse of the August Moon and Kismet won
(MC, 3/28/02)
1955 Mar 28, John Marshall Harlan was sworn in to the U.S. Supreme Court.
(HN, 3/28/98)
1958 Mar 28, W.C. Handy, the "Father of the Blues," died in New York at age 84.
(AP, 3/28/08)
1959 Mar 28, China announced the dissolution of the Tibetan government. The State Council of the People's Republic of China dissolved the Government of Tibet, which according to official history, liberated Tibetans from feudalism and theocracy. On January 19, 2009, this day was adopted as a holiday, “Serf Emancipation Day," by the Tibetan legislature.
(AP, 1/16/09)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serfs_Emancipation_Day)
1960 Mar 28, In Glasgow, Scotland, a factory exploded burying 20 fire fighters.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1962 Mar 28, The U.S. Air Force announced research into the use of lasers to intercept missiles and satellites.
(HN, 3/28/98)
1963 Mar 28, Alec A. Templeton (52), composer, pianist (Alec Templeton Time), died.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1964 Mar 28, Much of Crescent City, Ca., was demolished early today by a tsunami generated from the 8.6 earthquake that hit Valdez, Alaska. 11 people were killed.
(AP, 3/11/11)(SSFC, 3/23/14, DB p.42)
1964 Mar 28, First pirate radio station began to broadcast off the coast of England. Radio Caroline debuted with a combination of rock music and lively disk jockey whose patter played to a huge audience in Great Britain. British authorities, tried unsuccessfully, to shut down the radio station ship. Radio Caroline had become competition to the staid and usually dull British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC). [see Dec 23]
(MC, 3/28/02)
1965 Mar 28, In San Francisco the Rev. Martin Luther King said that his Southern Christian Leadership Conference would soon call for a massive economic withdrawal program against the State of Alabama.
(SSFC, 3/29/15, DB p.42)
1966 Mar 28, Navy corpsman Robert R. Ingram was shot while with his platoon of marines on a ridge in Quang Ngai province, South Vietnam. He continued providing medical attention to his comrades with multiple wounds to himself. He was awarded a belated Medal of Honor in 1998 due to lost paperwork.
(SFC, 7/11/98, p.A3)
1968 Mar 28, The U.S. lost its first aircraft in Vietnam. An F-111 vanished in a combat mission over North Vietnam. Republic Aircraft's F-105 Thunderchief, better known as the 'Thud,' was the Air Force's war-horse in Vietnam.
(HN, 3/28/98)
1968 Mar 28, In Memphis a riot erupted during a protest march in support of striking sanitation workers led by Martin Luther King. One African-American marcher was killed and King urged calm as National Guard troops are called to Memphis to restore order. King subsequently departed Memphis, but vowed to return on April 4 to attend another march.
(SFC, 12/1/97, p.A3)(http://tinyurl.com/atrl3z)
1969 Mar 28, Dwight D. Eisenhower (b.1890), the 34th president of the US, died at Walter Reed General Hospital in Washington at age 78. In 2002 Carlo D’Este authored "Eisenhower: A Soldier’s Life." In 2006 John Wukovits authored “Eisenhower. In 2007 Kasey S. Pipes authored “Ike’s Final Battle: The Road to Little Rock and the Challenge of Equality." In 2007 Michael Korda authored “Ike: An American Hero." In 2012 Jean Edward Smith authored “Eisenhower: In War and Peace."
(AP, 3/28/97)(WSJ, 7/12/02, p.W12)(WSJ, 3/7/07, p.D7)(AH, 6/07, p.70)(SFC, 8/22/07, p.E1)(Econ, 3/17/12, p.92)
1970 Mar 28, Over 1,000 people were killed when a major earthquake damaged 254 villages in Gediz, Turkey. Estimates of the magnitude varied from 6.9 to 7.3.
(http://earthquake.usgs.gov/regional/world/events/1970_03_28.php)
1971 Mar 28, CBS aired the final broadcast of its Ed Sullivan Show. Reruns and pre-emptions aired in that time slot throughout the following April and May, and in June, CBS announced that The Ed Sullivan Show had been cancelled.
(http://tviv.org/The_Ed_Sullivan_Show)
1971 Mar 28, In the 25th Tony Awards held in NYC “Sleuth" won for best play & “Company" won for best musical.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/25th_Tony_Awards)
1973 Mar 28, The Irish Navy caught Joe Cahill (1920-2004) as he tried to smuggle 5 tons of Russian-made explosives, guns and ammunition from Libya.
(SFC, 7/26/04, p.B4)(http://tinyurl.com/5lfwh2)
1974 Mar 28, In Romania the position of President of the Republic was created especially for Nicolae Ceausescu, who is then named President for life by Grand National Assembly.
(www.ceausescu.org/ceausescu_texts/ceausescu_chronology.htm)
1977 Mar 28, In the 49th Academy Awards "Rocky," Peter Finch and Faye Dunaway won.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/49th_Academy_Awards)
1978 Mar 28, Laura Beyerly (16) was last seen in the Los Altos, Ca., school parking lot. Her remains were found a year later in the Santa Cruz County hills on property belonging to the uncle of Scott B. Schultz. In 2006 police in Colorado arrested Scott B. Schultz, a boy friend with whom she had broken up. In 2007 Schultz faced just one year in jail in a plea deal.
(SFC, 8/24/06, p.B1)(SFC, 9/2/06, p.B3)(SFC, 6/16/07, p.B1)
1978 Mar 28, A SF city power failure lasted up to an hour and 42 minutes after workmen in a Potrero power plant skipped a step while restarting a circuit.
(SFC, 3/28/03, p.E8)
1978 Mar 28, In San Francisco the badly beaten and strangled body of Marissa Rolf Harvey (15) was found in the Sutro Heights Park area. She had disappeared a day earlier while on trip from New York to visit family. In 2021 Mark Stanley Personette (76) was arrested in Conifer, about 40 miles outside of Denver, and booked into a local jail on one count of homicide.
(https://tinyurl.com/2p8e2umz)(SFC, 12/20/21, p.C1)
1979 Mar 28, America's worst commercial nuclear accident occurred inside the Unit Two reactor at the Three Mile Island plant near Middletown, Pa., almost to meltdown. Thousands living near the plant left the area before the 12-day crisis ended, during which time some radioactive water and gases were released. A combination of mechanical and human factors allowed the Unit 2 reactor to lose cooling water. It cost more than $1 billion and more than a decade to remove the damaged nuclear fuel. A 1997 study indicated increased cancer rates for people living downwind.
(TMC, 1994, p.1979)(SFC, 6/8/96, p.A2)(SFC, 2/24/96, p.A3)(AP, 3/28/97) (HN, 3/28/98)(MC, 3/28/02)
1979 Mar 28, Michelle Triola Marvin lost her palimony suit against actor Lee Marvin. She had sought half of $3.6 million that Marvin earned during their 1964-1970 relationship. A judge awarded her $104,000 so that she could learn new job skills. In 1981 a California State Court of Appeal rescinded the award.
(SFC, 1/1/09, p.B5)(http://law.jrank.org/pages/3295/Marvin-V-Marvin-Palimony-Suit-1979.html)
1980 Mar 28, Jesse Owens (b.1913), Olympic-gold medal winner (1936), died. In 1986 William J. Baker authored “Jess Owens: An American Life."
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Owens)(ON, 8/10, p.12)
1982 Mar 28, Voters in El Salvador went to the polls for a constituent assembly election that resulted in victory for the Christian Democrats, led by President Jose Napoleon Duarte.
(AP, 3/28/97)
1984 Mar 28, Zoe, the 1st frozen-embryo child, was born in Melbourne, Australia. Scientists reported the birth 2 weeks later.
(www.breedingbetterdogs.com/aging.html)
1985 Mar 28, Neil Simon's "Biloxi Blues," premiered in NYC.
(http://tinyurl.com/ygdptw)
1985 Mar 28, Marc Chagall (b.1887), Belarus-born French painter, died. In 2008 Jackie Wullschlager authored “Chagall: A Biography."
(www.artelino.com/articles/marc_chagall.asp)(Econ, 9/20/08, p.101)
1986 Mar 28, The U.S. Senate passed a $100 million aid package for the Nicaraguan contras.
(HN, 3/28/98)
1986 Mar 28, In Indiana high school student Denise Pflum went missing in Connersville after she planned to return to the site of a party to retrieve her purse. In 2020 the Fayette County Sheriff’s Office announced that Shawn M. McClung has been charged with voluntary manslaughter in the girl’s death.
(Miami Herald, 7/9/20)
1986 Mar 28, Extremist Sikhs killed 13 Hindus in Ludhiana, India.
(http://tinyurl.com/h5at2)
1987 Mar 28, Maria Augusta von Trapp (b.1905), one of the Trapp Family Singers, died in Morrisville, Vt. Her 1949 book “The Story of the Trapp Family Singers" was fictionalized in the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical The Sound of Music (1965).
(AP, 3/28/97)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maria_von_Trapp)
1988 Mar 28, Richard Gephardt ended his bid for the Democratic presidential nomination, following his third-place finish in the Michigan caucuses.
(AP, 3/28/98)
1989 Mar 28, President Bush sent three high-ranking officials to Alaska to "take a hard look" at the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska's Prince William Sound. '
(AP, 3/28/99)
1990 Mar 28, Jesse Owens (1913-1980) was awarded (posthumously) the Congressional Gold Medal from President George Bush.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Owens)
1990 Mar 28, British customs officials announced they had foiled an attempt to supply Iraq with 40 American-made devices for triggering nuclear weapons, following an 18-month investigation by U.S. and British authorities.
(AP, 3/28/00)
1991 Mar 28, Former President Reagan declared his support for the so-called “Brady Bill" requiring a seven-day waiting period for handgun purchases.
(AP, 3/28/01)
1991 Mar 28, Fire seriously damaged the US Embassy in Moscow.
(AP, 3/27/01)
1991 Mar 28, Tens of thousands of supporters of Boris N. Yeltsin marched in Moscow in defiance of President Mikhail S. Gorbachev’s ban on rallies.
(AP, 3/28/01)
1992 Mar 28, Democrats Bill Clinton and Jerry Brown clashed over Brown's flat-tax proposal, with Clinton charging the plan would hurt the poor, and Brown accusing Clinton of inventing "another big lie."
(AP, 3/28/97)
1993 Mar 28, Francisco Garcia Diaz discovered a type II supernova in M81 (NGC 3031).
(www.aavso.org/aavso/membership/nova.shtml)
1993 Mar 28, Chinese Premier Li Peng won a second term.
(AP, 3/28/98)
1993 Mar 28, About 10,000 people marched in Dublin, Ireland, to protest an IRA bombing that killed two young boys.
(AP, 3/28/98)
1993 Mar 28, Russian President Boris Yeltsin and his chief political rival, parliament speaker Ruslan Khasbulatov, claimed victory after surviving attempts by the Russian Congress to oust them.
(AP, 3/28/98)
1994 Mar 28, In Johannesburg, South Africa, ANC guards killed more than 50 people in violence that erupted during a march by Zulu nationalists.
(AP, 3/28/99)(WSJ, 3/29/96, p.A-1)
1994 Mar 28, Absurdist playwright Eugene Ionesco died in Paris at age 81.
(AP, 3/28/99)
1995 Mar 28, Loomis guard Rick Price was shot in the head and killed during an armored car robbery in Sonoma, Ca. Bank robber William Crouch was also killed by a second guard and alleged accomplice Joan Carrafa of Glen Ellen was later arrested. She was convicted in 1996 for first degree murder.
(SFC, 5/25/96, p.A16)
1995 Mar 28, In Japan, Mitsubishi Bank and the Bank of Tokyo agreed to a merger to create what was then the world's largest bank.
(AP, 3/28/00)
1996 Mar 28, Congress passed the line-item veto, giving the president power to cut government spending by scrapping specific programs.
(AP, 3/28/97)
1996 Mar 28, The space shuttle Atlantis astronauts said goodbye to the crew of Russia's space station Mir and then flew away, leaving Shannon Lucid behind for a five-month stay in orbit.
(AP, 3/28/97)
1996 Mar 28, Col. Gadhaffi of Libya sent troops to put down unrest in northeastern Libya after a 400 prisoners, many including dissidents and Islamic militants, escaped from prison last week.
(WSJ, 3/28/96, p.A-1)
1997 Mar 28, Robert Pinsky (56) of Boston Univ. was named poet laureate of the United States by the Library of Congress.
(SFC, 3/28/97, p.A7)
1997 Mar 28, A medical examiner revealed that some members of the Heaven's Gate cult who'd committed suicide in a California mansion had also been castrated in apparent pursuit of the group's ideal of androgynous immortality.
(AP, 3/28/98)
1997 Mar 28, The UN Security Council agreed to send a multinational force to Albania to protect the delivery of humanitarian aid.
(SFC, 3/29/97, p.A10)
1998 Mar 28, President Clinton, during his visit to South Africa, went to Soweto, a landmark in the bloody uprising against apartheid, to honor South Africans "who answered the call of conscience" and defeated their country's system of white supremacy.
(AP, 3/28/99)
1998 Mar 28, It was reported that the US government conducted a series of “sub-critical" underground explosions involving radioactive plutonium in a sealed chamber 960 feet below ground at the Los Alamos National Lab.
(SFC, 3/28/98, p.A5)
1998 Mar 28, In France tens of thousands marched in demonstrations against the right-wing National Front, which made gains in recent regional elections.
(SFEC, 3/29/98, p.A12)
1998 Mar 28, In India the Hindu Nationalist BJP won a confidence vote in parliament by a narrow margin, 274-261.
(SFEC, 3/29/98, p.A12)
1998 Mar 28, In Madagascar the locust swarm was reported to have covered an estimated 24 million acres in the south of the country.
(SFC, 3/28/98, p.A5)
1998 Mar 28, In Russia former Prime Minister Victor Chernomyrdin announced his candidacy for the presidential election in 2000.
(SFEC, 3/29/98, p.A12)
1999 Mar 28, Venus Williams beat kid sister Serena 6-1, 4-6, 6-4 to win the Lipton Championships in the first all-sister women's final in 115 years.
(AP, 3/28/00)
1999 Mar 28, The Sea Launch Co. successfully fired a Ukrainian and Russian built rocket from their Odyssey, marine based, self-propelled platform.
(SFC, 3/29/99, p.A2)
1999 Mar 28, It was reported that Amnesty Int'l. placed the US on its list of human rights violators on the 1st day of the 1st week of the UN annual meeting on global democratic rights in Geneva.
(SFEC, 3/28/99, p.A25)
1999 Mar 28, In SF the 15-story Verducci Hall of California State Univ. on Lake Merced Drive was blown up. It was to be replaced by a new apartment complex. The building, which opened in 1969, was named after Joe Verducci, a former CSU athletic director, and had been vacant since 1991.
(SFC, 3/17/99, p.A12)(SFC, 3/29/99, p.A1,5)
1999 Mar 28, In Cuba the Baltimore Orioles beat a Cuban baseball all-star team 3:2 in 11 innings. A rematch in Baltimore was scheduled for May 3.
(SFC, 3/29/99, p.A1)
1999 Mar 28, Ethiopia claimed to have killed tens of thousands of Eritrean soldiers since Feb 23. Eritrea made equally high and unconfirmed claims of enemy casualties.
(WSJ, 3/29/99, p.A1)
1999 Mar 28, In Israel hundreds of government and public service workers resumed their nationwide strike against a decision to cap wage increases.
(SFC, 3/29/99, p.A8)
1999 Mar 28, In Japan the exploits of Nasubi, a 23-year-old comedian, came to an end as his producers revealed him naked to a studio audience. For over a year he had been shown on weekly TV, without his knowledge, trying to survive on prizes from magazine competitions. He never won any clothes.
(SFC, 4/1/99, p.E5)
1999 Mar 28, An American Stealth F117 Nighthawk is shot down over northern Yugoslavia during the NATO air strikes against Serbs attacking Kosovo.
(HN, 3/28/00)
1999 Mar 28, NATO broadened its attacks on Yugoslavia to target Serb military forces in Kosovo in the fifth straight night of airstrikes. UN officials reported that some 500,000 ethnic Albanians had fled Kosovo. NATO officials raised the possibility of using ground troops in Yugoslavia as low-level strikes against tanks began. It was feared that anger over the war would spill over to Bosnia.
(SFC, 3/29/99, p.A1,10)(AP, 3/28/00)
1999 Mar 28, The notorious Scorpions unit stormed the northern Kosovo town of Podujevo. In 2004 a Belgrade court convicted Sasa Cvjetan, a member of the unit, of killing 14 ethnic Albanian civilians, mostly women and children. The verdict was overturned but in 2005 a re-trial confirmed his guilt and 20-year sentence. In 2008 four members of the Scorpions paramilitary group were tried by a Belgrade court for allegedly gunning down 19 civilians in Podujevo. On June 18, 2009, they were convicted sentenced to between 15 and 20 years in prison.
(AP, 6/17/05)(AP, 12/11/08)(AP, 6/18/09)(www.hlc-rdc.org/Saopstenja/1712.en.html)
1999 Mar 28, In Paraguay Pres. Raul Cubas resigned and ended a week of political turmoil. Senator Luis Gonzalez Macchi was sworn in as president. Gen'l. Lino Oviedo was granted asylum in Argentina.
(SFC, 3/29/99, p.A9)(SFC, 3/30/99, p.F2)
2000 Mar 28, In a unanimous ruling, the Supreme Court sharply curtailed police power to rely on anonymous tips to stop and search people.
(AP, 3/28/01)
2000 Mar 28, The inflatable boat of a UC Davis research group capsized off the coast of Baja California and at least 3 people died.
(SFC, 3/29/00, p.A1)
2000 Mar 28, In Tennga, Georgia, a freight train collided with a school bus and 2 children were killed with 5 critically injured.
(SFC, 3/29/00, p.A3)
2000 Mar 28, A tornado hit fort Worth, Texas, and 4 people were killed with over 100 injured. It cut a 2-mile swath and inflicted $450 million in damages.
(SFC, 3/29/00, p.A1)(WSJ, 5/6/02, p.A1)
2000 Mar 28, Prof. Adam B. Ulam of Harvard Univ., died at age 77. His 18 books included “Stalin: The Man and His Era" (1973).
(SFC, 4/1/00, p.A26)
2000 Mar 28, Nine of 11 OPEC nations voted to raise oil production by a total of 1.45 million barrels a day.
(SFC, 3/29/00, p.A1)
2000 Mar 28, In Niedersill, Austria, a massive avalanche killed 11 people.
(SFC, 3/29/00, p.A15)
2000 Mar 28, Mohamad Hasan (69), an Indonesian timber tycoon associated with former Pres. Suharto, was arrested for fraud. He had directed the state sanctioned plywood monopoly and controlled a forest mapping company. Hasan received a 6-year sentence and was jailed at Batu prison where he soon organized the inmate obsidian polishing operations.
(WSJ, 3/29/00, p.A19)(WSJ, 8/13/03, p.A1)
2000 Mar 28, Jordan with US intelligence help indicted 28 followers of Osama bin Laden for plotting attacks against American tourists in Dec.
(SFC, 3/29/00, p.A14)
2000 Mar 28, In Rugazi, Uganda, 28 bodies were found under the floor of the home of Dominic Kataribabo, leader of the Movement for the Restoration of Ten Commandments. This brought the total dead to at least 591.
(SFC, 3/29/00, p.A15)
2001 Mar 28, The EU expressed concern over Pres. Bush’s abandonment of the Kyoto Treaty for cutting carbon dioxide emissions.
(WSJ, 3/29/01, p.A1)
2001 Mar 28, The US Senate voted to double the “hard money" contribution limits to candidates and political parties.
(SFC, 3/29/01, p.A1)
2001 Mar 28, A federal appeals court in San Francisco threw out a record $107 million verdict against anti-abortion activists, ruling that a Web site and wanted posters branding abortion doctors “baby butchers" and criminals were protected by the First Amendment.
(AP, 3/28/02)
2001 Mar 28, The authors of a book on the Oklahoma City bombing revealed that during prison interviews, Timothy McVeigh had shown no remorse for what happened, and called the 19 children who died “collateral damage."
(AP, 3/28/02)
2001 Mar 28, Bosnian Croat soldiers deserted by the hundreds following orders by the self-proclaimed Croat National Assembly led by the nationalist Croat Democratic Union. Many returned after the defense ministry warned that they would forfeit wages and benefits.
(SFC, 3/29/01, p.A12)
2001 Mar 28, Two Israeli teenagers were killed by a Palestinian suicide bomber. Israeli gunships followed up with missile strikes at Arafat’s personal security forces (Force 17) and at least 3 Palestinians were killed.
(SFC, 3/29/01, p.A10)
2001 Mar 28, In Jordan an Arab summit convened. Delegates had already approved a draft resolution for the UN to allow Baghdad to fund the Palestinian uprising.
(WSJ, 3/27/01, p.A17)
2001 Mar 28, Macedonia began final assaults on rebels near the Kosovo border as political talks were set to begin.
(SFC, 3/29/01, p.A10)
2001 Mar 28, In Mexico Zapatistas told the Mexican legislature that the military phase of their struggle was over and that political efforts would take precedence.
(SFC, 3/29/01, p.A1)
2001 Mar 28, Russia’s Pres. Putin replaced his defense and interior ministers. Sergei Ivanov was appointed the new defense minister and Boris Gryzlov the new interior minister.
(SFC, 3/29/01, p.A10)
2002 Mar 28, A US diplomat, reportedly the CIA station chief, was pulled from Belgrade following accusations that he was receiving military secrets.
(WSJ, 3/29/02, p.A1)
2002 Mar 28, Walter Hewlett, a dissident director of Hewlett-Packard Co., claimed HP used corporate assets to entice and coerce certain financial institutions to vote for the merger with Compaq Corp.
(SFC, 3/29/02, p.A1)
2002 Mar 28, US Air Force Staff Sergeant Timothy Woodland was convicted in a Japanese court and sentenced to nearly three years in prison for raping a woman on the southern island of Okinawa.
(AP, 3/28/03)
2002 Mar 28, Matthew J. Bourgeois (35), a Navy Seal from Tallahassee, was killed by a land mine in Kandahar.
(SFC, 3/29/02, p.A9)
2002 Mar 28, A US Navy helicopter crashed on Split Mountain in the Sequoia National Forest and 2 crew members were killed.
(SFC, 3/29/02, p.A5)
2002 Mar 28, In Beirut the Arab League committed to accepting Israel as a neighbor under conditions that included the creation of an independent Palestinian state and Israel's full withdrawal from war-won lands, an offer that Israel did not accept.
(SFC, 3/29/02, p.A15)(AP, 3/28/03)(www.mideastweb.org/saudipeace.htm)
2002 Mar 28, A Hamas attack left 4 Israelis dead in a West Bank settlement. Arafat said he was ready to call for a cease-fire.
(WSJ, 3/29/02, p.A1)
2002 Mar 28, In Pakistan police in Faisalabad and Lahore seized over 40 suspects in the Islamabad bombing. At least 2 suspects were killed in Faisalabad. Abu Zubaydah, a top al Qaeda commander, was among those arrested.
(SFC, 3/29/02, p.A10)(SSFC, 3/31/02, p.A17)(SFC, 4/2/02, p.A7)
2002 Mar 28, Pope John Paul II accepted the resignation of Julius Paetz, archbishop of Poznan, Poland, due to a sex scandal and accusations of molesting young seminarians.
(SFC, 3/29/02, p.A7)
2003 Mar 28, In the 10th day of Operation Iraqi Freedom the biggest bombs dropped on Baghdad so far, two 4,700-pound "bunker busters," struck a communications tower. In the south, Iraqi fighters defending the besieged city of Basra fired on hundreds of civilians trying to flee. The British supply ship Sir Galahad docked at the port of Umm Qasr. The Bush administration said fighting might not be over for months. At least 58 people were killed in a crowded market in northwest Baghdad by what local officials called a coalition bombing. A US pilot was heard saying "I'm going to be sick," then "we're in jail, dude," after firing on the British convoy in the southern Iraqi city of Basra. Lance Corporal of Horse Matty Hull was killed by American pilots.
(AP, 3/28/03)(SFC, 3/29/03, p.W1)(AP, 2/6/07)(Econ, 2/10/07, p.58)
2003 Mar 28, Chechen rebels killed six Russian soldiers and two riot police.
(AP, 3/29/03)
2003 Mar 28, In Hong Kong at least 58 more people became sick with symptoms of SARS. 11 Hong Kong deaths were on the disease.
(SFC, 3/29/03, p.A1)
2003 Mar 28, In Jammu-Kashmir suspected Islamic militants attacked and mutilated 5 Kashmiri Muslim villagers, accusing them of being police informants.
(AP, 3/28/03)
2003 Mar 28, Japan's first spy satellites were blasted into orbit, causing an angry North Korea to warn the move could spark an arms race in the region.
(AP, 3/28/03)
2003 Mar 28, The UN Security Council voted unanimously to extend the UN assistance mission in Afghanistan for a year.
(AP, 3/28/03)
2004 Mar 28, Art James (74), TV game show host died in Palm Springs, Calif.
(AP, 3/28/05)
2004 Mar 28, Sir Peter Ustinov (b. Apr 16, 1921), a brilliant wit and mimic who won two Oscars for an acting career that ranged from the evil Nero in "Quo Vadis" to the quirky Agatha Christie detective Hercule Poirot, died at age 82 in Switzerland.
(AP, 3/29/04)
2004 Mar 28, A powerful storm, dubbed Catarina, lashed Brazil's southern coast, damaging thousands of homes, killing two people.
(AP, 3/29/04)
2004 Mar 28, In Kinshasa, Congo, government forces battled attackers at military installations and television headquarters. Diplomats called it a coup attempt against Pres. Joseph Kabila.
(AP, 3/28/04)
2004 Mar 28, France's left-wing opposition bulldozed its way across the country in second-round midterm regional elections, putting pressure on President Jacques Chirac to revamp his Cabinet and perhaps even ditch his prime minister due to widely unpopular economic reforms and rising unemployment.
(AP, 3/28/04)(AP, 3/29/04)
2004 Mar 28, Georgians voted in the country's third election in less than six months. Supporters of President Mikhail Saakashvili swept to victory in Georgia's parliamentary election, according to early results.
(AP, 3/28/04)(AP, 3/29/04)
2004 Mar 28, Guadeloupe's leader conceded defeat in regional elections that pushed her conservative party out of power for the first time in 12 years, a loss seen as public backlash toward moves to win greater autonomy from Paris.
(AP, 3/29/04)
2004 Mar 28, In Iraq US soldiers in the northern city of Mosul shot and killed four rebels suspected of involvement in attacks in the region. Gunmen in Mosul killed 2 British and Canadian electrical engineers. Coalition forces closed Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's newspaper, claiming it incited anti-US violence.
(AP, 3/29/04)(WSJ, 4/1/04, p.A10)(WSJ, 4/19/04, p.A14)
2004 Mar 28, Israel's state attorney officially recommended that PM Ariel Sharon be indicted for bribe-taking.
(AP, 3/28/04)
2004 Mar 28, The Thailand government said violence in the Muslim-dominated south was at a "crucial stage" and pledged tougher measures, after a bombing in the region injured 29 people, including 10 Malaysian tourists.
(AP, 3/28/04)
2004 Mar 28, Premier Recep Tayyip Erdogan's Islamic-rooted party appeared headed for a resounding victory in Turkey's local elections.
(AP, 3/28/04)
2004 Mar 28, Clashes between supporters of Zimbabwe's ruling party and the opposition killed one person and wounded at least 11 during the second day of polling in a parliamentary by-election.
(AP, 3/29/04)
2004 Mar 28-29, In Uzbekistan 2 suicide bombings, attacks on police and an explosion at a terrorist bomb-making factory in Kakhramon killed 19 people and injured 26. The explosion led to 4 days of violence that left at least 47 people dead in including 33 militants.
(AP, 3/29/04)(SSFC, 4/4/04, p.A22)
2005 Mar 28, The Colorado Supreme Court threw out the death penalty in a rape-and-murder case because five of the jurors had consulted the Bible and quoted Scripture during deliberations.
(AP, 3/28/06)
2005 Mar 28, Hank Greenberg, former longtime CEO of American Int’l. Group (AIG), announced his retirement. He was ousted as CEO 2 weeks earlier.
(WSJ, 3/29/05, p.C1)
2005 Mar 28, It was reported that a consortium of 7 private equity firms purchased SunGard Data systems for $11.3 billion in the biggest buyout since 1989.
(Econ, 4/2/05, p.66)
2005 Mar 28, Hu Xiaoliam was appointed the 1st female head of China’s State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE). The regulator will oversee new trading and price quotes in 8 currency pairs through the interbank China foreign Exchange Trade System (CFETS).
(Econ, 4/2/05, p.68)
2005 Mar 28, In Haiti gunmen with assault rifles ambushed a group of police in Port-au-Prince, spraying their car with bullets in a bold daylight attack that killed 2 officers and a driver.
(AP, 3/28/05)
2005 Mar 28, An 8.7 earthquake occurred in northern Sumatra, Indonesia, in what technically was considered an aftershock to the Dec 26 quake. At least 330 people were killed in collapsed buildings on Nias Island. No major tsunami followed. The UN raised its toll to 624. The government estimated 400-500 were killed.
(SFC, 3/29/05, p.A1)(AP, 3/31/05)(Econ, 4/2/05, p.37)
2005 Mar 28, In Iraq 3 Romanian journalists and their translator were abducted near their Baghdad hotel. The journalists were freed by US forces on May 22. In 2015 Iraqi-born Mohammad Munaf, sentenced in absentia to 10 years prison in 2008 by the Bucharest Appeals Court, was brought to Romania. Munaf was the journalists' guide at the time of the kidnapping and had been held by the US military since May 2005. A Syrian businessman was serving a 20-year sentence in Romania for masterminding the kidnapping.
(AP, 3/29/05)(SSFC, 10/15/06, p.A20)(AP, 8/27/15)
2005 Mar 28, Ireland enacted a law outlawing English on road signs and official maps on much of the nation’s western coast, where many people speak Gaelic.
(SFC, 3/29/05, p.A2)
2005 Mar 28, Israeli troops raided the West Bank town of Jenin, carrying out house-to-house searches and arresting eight Palestinians.
(AP, 3/28/05)
2005 Mar 28, It was reported that Japanese consumer prices had fallen in February at their fastest pace in nearly 2 years. Japan’s deflation was now almost 6 years old. The Ministry of Finance said government debt hit a new record high of $7.062 trillion as of the end of Dec.
(WSJ, 3/28/05, p.A14)
2005 Mar 28, Interim leader Kurmanbek Bakiyev recognized Kyrgyzstan's new parliament as legitimate even though it was chosen in disputed elections, a move designed to end a struggle between the rival legislatures.
(AP, 3/28/05)
2005 Mar 28, Tafa Balogun, Nigeria’s Inspector General of Police, was arrested. He was later charged with numerous counts including embezzling $93 million from police funds.
(Econ, 8/20/05, p.37)(www.efccnigeria.org/)
2005 Mar 28, In Peshawar, Pakistan, thousands of opposition activists chanted "Death to dictatorship!" in the latest demonstration against Pres. Gen. Pervez Musharraf's grip on power.
(AP, 3/28/05)
2005 Mar 28, Pres. Vladimir Putin ordered the Russian government to draft legal reforms that would close the book on shady privatization deals of the 1990s and streamline tax collection.
(AP, 3/28/05)
2005 Mar 28, Sudanese authorities said they had detained 14 people on suspicion of crimes, including rape and murder, committed in the war-ravaged western region of Darfur.
(AFP, 3/28/05)
2006 Mar 28, President Bush announced that White House chief of staff Andy Card has resigned and will be replaced by budget director Joshua Bolten.
(AP, 3/28/06)
2006 Mar 28, The US Federal Reserve under new chairman Ben Bernanke raised its key federal funds rate by a quarter percentage point to 4.75%.
(SFC, 3/29/06, p.C1)
2006 Mar 28, Caspar W. Weinberger (b.1917), former US defense secretary under Pres. Reagan, died.
(SFC, 3/29/06, p.B9)(Econ, 4/1/06, p.71)
2006 Mar 28, In southern Afghanistan a roadside bomb blew up a vehicle carrying Afghan army soldiers, killing six of them.
(AP, 3/28/06)
2006 Mar 28, Rights advocates said some 20 detained opposition supporters have gone on hunger strike to protest conditions at a Belarusian jail holding 400 opposition supporters, as authorities continued to crackdown on dissent following the disputed March 19 election.
(AP, 3/28/06)
2006 Mar 28, In China new regulations viewed on the Health Ministry's Web site forbade the buying and selling of organs and require that donors give written permission for their organs to be transplanted.
(AP, 3/28/06)
2006 Mar 28, Some 1-3 million protesters poured onto France's streets and absent workers hobbled transport services in the first nationwide strike against a new labor law for youths, increasing pressure on the embattled PM to withdraw the contested measure.
(AP, 3/28/06)(Econ, 4/1/06, p.22)
2006 Mar 28, It was reported that France produced 78% of its electricity from nuclear power.
(WSJ, 3/28/06, p.A1)
2006 Mar 28, The German state of Bavaria announced a ban on the use of cell phones in schools to prevent students from viewing images of pornography and extreme violence.
(AP, 3/28/06)
2006 Mar 28, Three groups of gunmen kidnapped 24 Iraqis from a currency exchange and two electronics stores in Baghdad, while a car bomb exploded south of the capital as police exchanged fire with two suicide bombers at a police station, wounding a dozen people. Two US soldiers were killed and three wounded in two attacks outside Baghdad.
(AP, 3/28/06)(AP, 3/29/06)
2006 Mar 28, Israelis voted in an election billed as a referendum on the future of the West Bank, with the leading candidate, acting PM Ehud Olmert, promising to pull back from most of the territory and draw Israel's final borders by 2010. The Kadima Party won the parliamentary elections. Two Israelis were killed in an explosion in southern Israel near the Gaza Strip border.
(AP, 3/28/06)(AP, 3/28/07)
2006 Mar 28, President Anote Tong of the Republic of Kiribati announced the formation of the world's third-largest marine reserve at the 8th UN conference on the Convention on Biological Diversity under way this week in Brazil.
(Reuters, 3/28/06)
2006 Mar 28, Officials said former Liberian President Charles Taylor disappeared from his Nigerian haven, days after his hosts agreed to transfer him to a war crimes tribunal for the murder, rape and maiming of more than a half-million Africans. Taylor was arrested trying to cross the border into Cameroon. He then was flown back to Liberia.
(AP, 3/28/06)(AP, 3/29/06)
2006 Mar 28, A Mexican judge ordered an Argentine journalist to remove references to one of the first lady's sons in a book that claims he benefited financially from his family's political connections. The book "Cronicas Malditas," or roughly "Accursed Chronicles" (2005), alleged that two of Sahagun's three sons, principally Manuel Bribiesca, had used their connections to get preferential treatment on federal government work contracts during the administration of President Vicente Fox, which began in December 2000.
(AP, 3/28/06)
2006 Mar 28, The Palestinian parliament overwhelming approved the new Hamas Cabinet, setting the stage for the new administration to take office later this week.
(AP, 3/28/06)
2006 Mar 28, In South Korea prosecutors formally arrested the top executive of an affiliate of Hyundai Motor Co. in an investigation into suspicions that South Korea's largest carmaker created slush funds through its 39 subsidiaries for bribery.
(AP, 3/28/06)(WSJ, 4/8/06, p.1)
2006 Mar 28, Spain’s ENCE said it will suspend construction of a controversial pulp mill in Uruguay to allow Argentina and Uruguay to resolve their differences over the environmental impact of the project. In October ENCE announced that it was abandoning the project.
(FT, 3/29/06, p.8)(Econ, 10/7/06, p.46)
2006 Mar 28, In Sudan Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa called on Arab leaders to move toward a goal of "entering the nuclear club" and making use of atomic energy for peaceful purposes. The absence of at least 10 heads of state, including President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt and Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah, raised concerns of a lackluster summit.
(AP, 3/28/06)
2006 Mar 28, In Sudan Arab leaders promised to fund African soldiers in Darfur from October this year, despite international pressure to allow the United Nations to take over the mission.
(Reuters, 3/28/06)
2006 Mar 28, Thousands of Kurdish protesters rampaged after funerals for 4 Kurdish PKK guerrillas killed by Turkish troops. They hurled firebombs at armored police vehicles and smashed windows at a police station. 2 Kurds were killed and 40 people injured.
(AP, 3/29/06)(Econ, 4/15/06, p.54)
2006 Mar 28, Ukraine President Viktor Yushchenko met separately with both his estranged Orange Revolution ally and an old pro-Moscow adversary as he sought to form a coalition after most voters rejected his party in weekend parliamentary elections.
(AP, 3/28/06)
2007 Mar 28, Circuit City, a US electronics retailer, fired 3,400 of its highest paid hourly workers and planned to hire replacements wiling to work for less. The laid-off workers were to get a severance package and a chance to reapply for their former jobs at lower pay.
(SFC, 3/29/07, p.C3)
2007 Mar 28, The California Dept. of Agriculture ordered an intrastate quarantine on plants to fight the infestation of light brown apple moths. On May 2 the US Dept. of Agriculture ordered similar restrictions.
(SFC, 5/4/07, p.C3)
2007 Mar 28, Discount retailer TJX Cos. revealed that information from at least 45.7 million credit and debit cards was stolen over an 18-month period. The breach was initially disclosed in January.
(AP, 3/29/07)
2007 Mar 28, Jazz musician Tony Scott (85), a clarinetist, composer and arranger who worked with such greats as Billie Holiday and Charlie Parker, died in Rome.
(AP, 4/1/07)
2007 Mar 28, In Afghanistan a suicide bomber trying to blend in with street beggars exploded himself near a top intelligence official in a crowded part of Kabul, killing four people.
(AP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, In Australia a passenger ferry plowed into a pleasure boat under Sydney's iconic Harbor Bridge, killing at least 3 people, including two professional figure skating judges.
(AP, 3/29/07)
2007 Mar 28, Retired Gurkha soldiers staged a mass protest in London over Britain's refusal to give them full pensions and other rights.
(AP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, Briton Richard Rogers (73), the famed architect of a series of iconic buildings all over the world, was announced winner of the 2007 Pritzker Architecture Prize.
(AFP, 3/29/07)
2007 Mar 28, In northern China an underground gas explosion killed 26 miners in a coal mine in Linfen city, Shanxi province. 6 workers were trapped underground after a subway construction site for the 2008 Beijing Olympics collapsed. Hopes for their survival were slim.
(AP, 3/29/07)
2007 Mar 28, Ecuador's highest electoral court fired a judge who tried to return half the country's legislators to their posts as a political crisis over the rewriting of the country's constitution deepened.
(AP, 3/29/07)
2007 Mar 28, In France an official at a Paris maternity hospital said Sister Marie-Simon-Pierre is the French nun whose testimony of a mystery cure from Parkinson's disease will likely be accepted as the miracle the Vatican needs to beatify Pope John Paul II.
(AP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, Guinean leaders agreed on the formation of a new government in a bid to end months of unrest and political crisis.
(AFP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, Iran aired a video of 15 captured British sailors and marines; the lone female captive, shown in a white tunic and a black head scarf, said the British boats had "trespassed." The crew members were released April 4, 2007.
(AP, 3/28/08)
2007 Mar 28, In Iraq Shiite militants and police enraged by massive truck bombings in the northwestern town of Tal Afar went on a revenge spree against Sunni residents there, killing as many as 60 people. Suicide bombers detonated explosives on trucks carrying highly toxic chlorine in Fallujah, wounding about 15 US and Iraqi security forces.
(AP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, Hundreds of Israeli police in riot gear dragged squatters from the ruins of the former Homesh settlement, ending a three-day showdown between the government and settlers trying to re-establish the settlement. Homesh was one of four settlements in the northern West Bank dismantled in 2005.
(AP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, A Japanese man was sentenced to death for murdering three people he lured through a suicide Web site by offering to die with them.
(AP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, In Tank, Pakistan, hundreds of militants fired rockets, killed one security official and kidnapped a school principal where police had slain two men accused of recruiting students for suicide attacks.
(AP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, Unidentified gunmen shot at a Hamas militant leader and his family during a car chase through Gaza City, injuring five people, including bystanders and a child. A small group of Arab lesbians quietly defied Islamist protesters and a social taboo to gather at a rare public conference in Haifa, Israeli. It was organized by Aswat, an organization for Arab lesbians with members in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
(AP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, The health department of Philippines said HIV/AIDS is ravaging the large overseas work force, posing a long-term threat to one of Manila's key sources of foreign exchange. Jun Ducat (56), a Manila day-care center owner armed with grenades and guns, held more than 30 youngsters and teachers hostage on a bus, then freed them after a 10-hour standoff that he used to denounce corruption and demand better lives for impoverished children.
(AFP, 3/28/07)(http://english.people.com.cn/200703/29/eng20070329_362055.html)
2007 Mar 28, Russia's scientific elite, in a rare show of disobedience to the Kremlin, voted against a government-proposed charter that would have transferred control of the historically independent Academy of Sciences to the state.
(AP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, Sudan and the UN signed an agreement to guarantee humanitarian access to refugees in Darfur. UN chief Ban Ki-moon tried to persuade President Omar al-Bashir to accept UN peacekeepers in Darfur, hours after al-Bashir flatly rejected the deployment.
(AP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, In Tanzania 14 Southern African leaders meet for a two-day extraordinary summit on economic and political regional woes spurred by crises in Zimbabwe and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
(AFP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, Police stormed the offices of Zimbabwe's main opposition party and arrested leader Morgan Tsvangirai, hours before he planned to talk to reporters about a wave of political violence that had left him briefly hospitalized. Tsvangirai was released after several hours.
(AP, 3/28/07)(AP, 3/29/07)
2008 Mar 28, The US Transportation Security Administration said it will change they way its officers search passengers with body piercings after a Texas woman complained she was forced to remove a nipple ring with pliers in order to board an airplane.
(AP, 3/29/08)
2008 Mar 28, The grey wolf of the northern Rocky Mountains was taken off the federal protection list after reaching a population of some 1,500 in the greater Yellowstone region. Wolves were reintroduced in 1995 after disappearing from the area in 1926. On July 18 a judge restored protection for the wolves in Montana, Wyoming and Idaho, derailing plans for public wolf hunts this fall. On Sep 29 a federal court overturned the Bush administration’s decision to remove gray wolves from the endangered species list in the Great lakes region.
(Econ, 3/29/08, p.44)(SFC, 7/19/08, p.A4)(WSJ, 9/30/08, p.A1)
2008 Mar 28, Helen Yglesias (92), American novelist and editor, died. Her first book: “How she Died" (1972), tells of Mary Moody Schwartz, the daughter of a Communist convicted of spying for the Soviets in the 1930s.
(SFC, 4/8/08, p.B5)
2008 Mar 28, British Airways Plc cancelled a fifth of flights from its new $8.6 billion terminal at London's Heathrow airport as chaos from its shambolic opening spilled into a second day.
(AP, 3/28/08)
2008 Mar 28, Jean-Jacques Demafouth, an exiled former defense minister in the Central African Republic, said that he had been elected head of the main rebel group and would lead it into peace talks. The UN said rebel fighters attacked CAR villages between Feb 9 and Mar 10 raping women and taking 150 hostages, including 55 children.
(AFP, 3/28/08)
2008 Mar 28, In Chile 5 youths, aged 14-20, attacked 9 German soldiers and took them hostage in the port city of Iquique. One soldier escaped and police quickly surrounded the house and arrested four suspects after a shootout.
(AP, 3/29/08)
2008 Mar 28, China allowed the first foreign diplomats to visit Tibet following deadly riots, as Germany joined some other European nations in announcing its leader would skip the Olympics opening. Police closed off Lhasa's Muslim quarter, two weeks after Tibetan rioters burned down the city's mosque during the largest anti-Chinese protests in nearly two decades.
(AP, 3/28/08)
2008 Mar 28, Mohamed Bacar, the rebel leader of the Comoros island of Anjouan, arrived in Reunion to an uncertain future, two days after his ouster by Comoran and African Union forces.
(AP, 3/28/08)
2008 Mar 28, President Raul Castro's government said it is allowing cell phones for ordinary Cubans, a luxury previously reserved for those who worked for foreign firms or held key posts with the communist-run state.
(AP, 3/28/08)
2008 Mar 28, A commerce ministry official said Egypt is to suspend rice exports for six months to try to meet the demands of its own people hit by soaring food prices. Hundreds of residents of the ancient city of Luxor clashed with riot police during a protest against government attempts to move them to make room for an open-air museum free of modern buildings.
(AP, 3/28/08)(AP, 3/29/08)
2008 Mar 28, Indonesian police said they were investigating the deaths over the last 2 weeks of 21 people who drank a concoction labeled an herbal remedy.
(AP, 3/28/08)
2008 Mar 28, PM Nouri al-Maliki's office says the Iraqi government has given residents of Basra until April 8 to turn over "heavy and medium-size weapons" in return for a reward. US warplanes carried out at least two airstrikes overnight in Basra for the first time since clashes between Shiite militias and Iraqi security forces erupted this week. A US warplane strafed snipers in the southern city of Basra, killing at least 16 suspected militants after Iraqi troops came under heavy fire. Shiite militants also clashed with government forces for a fourth day in Iraq's oil-rich south and sporadic fighting broke out in Baghdad. A US helicopter also fired a Hellfire missile during fighting in the Baghdad's militia stronghold of Sadr City, killing four gunmen. Iraqi police and hospital officials in Sadr City said 5 civilians were killed and 4 others wounded in the attack. A US air assault in the Kazamiyah neighborhood, west of Sadr City, killed 10 militants. At least 12 militia fighters were killed and 7 others wounded in fighting in Mahmoudiya. Fierce fighting in the Mahdi Army stronghold of Nasiriyah killed at least 4 people. 2 Iraqi security forces were killed and 3 wounded in Kut.
(AP, 3/28/08)(AP, 3/29/08)(AP, 3/30/08)
2008 Mar 28, Jordan, Iraq and Yemen announced at the last minute that their top leaders will not attend this weekend's Arab summit in Damascus.
(AP, 3/28/08)
2008 Mar 28, North Korea test-fired a barrage of short-range missiles in apparent response to the new South Korean government's tougher stance on Pyongyang.
(AP, 3/28/08)
2008 Mar 28, Palestinian medics say a Palestinian man was killed by Israeli army fire as he approached Gaza's border fence with Israel. The Israeli military said the man was armed and hurled a grenade at forces close to the fence.
(AP, 3/29/08)
2008 Mar 28, South Africa launched a four million dollar program to track down tuberculosis patients who have defaulted treatment, leading to resistant strains of the illness.
(AP, 3/28/08)
2008 Mar 28, In northeastern Tanzania 75 miners were missing and believed to have died in mines following heavy rains.
(AP, 3/29/08)
2008 Mar 28, Turkish warplanes hit Kurdish rebel targets in northern Iraq.
(AP, 3/29/08)
2008 Mar 28, Combat helicopters and F-16 fighter jets opened fire at a clandestine airstrip in Venezuela's remote southern plains as part of a government counter-drug effort. Army Gen. Jesus Gonzalez told state television that so far this year, the military has demolished 67 airstrips used by drug traffickers to smuggle cocaine from neighboring Colombia to the United States and Europe. Another 90 are to be destroyed next week.
(AP, 3/28/08)
2009 Mar 28, In Milton, Massachusetts, Samantha Revelus (17) was stabbed and killed by her brother. Kerby Revelus (23) then decapitated his 5-year-old sister as her birthday cake from the day before sat on the kitchen table. He then turned on his 9-year-old sister, who called police. Responding officers broke down the door and shot him dead. Sarafina was hospitalized with defensive wounds to her hands and stab wounds in her abdomen and one of her legs.
(AP, 3/30/09)
2009 Mar 28, The space shuttle Discovery landed in Florida following a 13-day mission to the Int’l. Space Station (ISS).
(SSFC, 3/29/09, p.A12)
2009 Mar 28, In North Dakota the Red River crested at 12:15 a.m. at 40.82 feet, more than 22 feet above flood stage.
(AP, 3/29/09)
2009 Mar 28, Afghanistan's president offered support for the new US strategy for the growing conflict in his country, praising increased civil and military aid and highlighting a plan for reconciliation with moderate elements of the Taliban.
(AP, 3/28/09)
2009 Mar 28, Sydney became the world's first major city to plunge itself into darkness for the second worldwide Earth Hour, a global campaign to highlight the threat of climate change.
(AP, 3/28/09)
2009 Mar 28, Thousands of demonstrators marched through London to demand action on poverty, jobs and climate change at the start of a week of protests aimed at the G20 summit in the capital.
(AP, 3/28/09)
2009 Mar 28, In Dubai Sulim Yamadayev, a former Chechen rebel and brother of Ruslan Yamadaev (d.2008), was shot in a brazen attack and died on March 30. He had switched sides to the government during Chechnya's long-running conflict with Moscow. On April 5 Dubai authorities said they had arrested two suspects in the slaying. They said Adam Delimkhanov, a Chechen member of Russia’s lower house and the Chechen president's right-hand man, had masterminded the killing. On April 12, 2010, Mahdi Tagi Dhurnia of Iran and Tajik national Mahsoudjan Asmanov were sentenced to 25 years in prison after being found guilty of aiding and abetting the assassination of Yamadayev.
(AP, 3/31/09)(SFC, 3/31/09, p.A5)(AP, 4/5/09)(SFC, 4/6/09, p.A3)(AP, 4/12/10)(AP, 12/22/10)(Econ., 3/14/15, p.55)
2009 Mar 28, An Egyptian health ministry spokesman said a two-year-old girl has contracted bird flu, the 60th reported case since the first outbreak of the disease in the country in 2006.
(AP, 3/28/09)
2009 Mar 28, In Guyana Janet Jagan (88), a Chicago native who became Guyana's first white and first female president (1997), died.
(AP, 3/28/09)
2009 Mar 28, Police in northern India arrested a great-grandson of the country's first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, over allegations he made inflammatory comments against Muslims. Police fired in the air and baton-charged a crowd of at least 10,000 of Varun Gandhi's supporters shouting pro-Hindu slogans as he was arrested in his constituency in Uttar Pradesh.
(Reuters, 3/28/09)
2009 Mar 28, Iraqi troops in Baghdad arrested the head of Fadhil's Awakening Council for alleged terrorist activity and for purportedly leading an armed group loyal to Saddam Hussein's ousted party. Adil al-Mashhadani was believed to have been involved in murder, extortion and other crimes as well as leading an armed wing of Saddam's Baath party.
(AP, 3/29/09)
2009 Mar 28, In Nigeria police s outside Lagos freed a Lebanese hostage after a shoot-out in which six of his captors were killed. The man was seized March 23 by gunmen from a waterfront construction site in Lagos' upmarket residential and business area.
(AFP, 3/29/09)
2009 Mar 28, Pakistani security forces killed 26 militants during an operation in a restive tribal region bordering Afghanistan. Helicopter gunships went into action in Mohmand, one of seven lawless tribal districts in northwest Pakistan where Taliban militants have been active. Dozens of suspected militants fired rockets at a transport terminal in Peshawar, damaging a dozen shipping containers.
(AFP, 3/28/09)(AP, 3/29/09)
2009 Mar 28, Tibetans rallied against the China’s new holiday, Serfs Liberation Day, on the 50th anniversary of Beijing’s crushing of a Tibetan uprising that led to the Dalai lama’s exile.
(AP, 3/29/09)
2010 Mar 28, President Barack Obama made a surprise visit to Afghanistan for a firsthand look at the 8-year-old war he inherited and dramatically escalated. German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere held talks in Afghanistan on stuttering progress in training the country's security forces. Russia accused the US of conniving with Afghanistan's drug producers by refusing to destroy opium crops, the second time in a week Moscow has taken a swipe at the West over drug policy.
(AP, 3/28/10)(AFP, 3/28/10)(Reuters, 3/28/10)
2010 Mar 28, US federal agents in Ohio arrested 2 members of Hutaree, a Christian militia group “preparing for end time battles to keep the testimony of Jesus Christ alive." A 3rd person was arrested the next day in Indiana as part of an investigation led by the FBI in Michigan.
(SFC, 3/29/10, p.A6)
2010 Mar 28, The Pritzker Architecture Prize was awarded to Kazuyo Sejima and Ryue Nishizawa, partners in Sanaa Ltd. of Tokyo. Their work included NYC’s New Museum of Contemporary Art, completed in 2007.
(SFC, 3/29/10, p.A6)
2010 Mar 28, In Colorado Kayleah Wilson (12) went missing as she walked to a b-day party in Greeley. On May 19 police retrieved her decomposing body from an irrigation ditch about a mile and a half from her home.
(SFC, 4/5/10, p.A4)(SFC, 5/21/10, p.A4)
2010 Mar 28, British Airways cabin crew entered the second day of a four-day strike, bringing further travel disruption with no end in sight for a dispute that has become increasingly political.
(AFP, 3/28/10)
2010 Mar 28, In Central Africa LRA elements were chased by the Ugandan army, which killed at least 15 rebels in the village of Dembia. More than 40 people were abducted from the three villages including in Bangassou, where about 400 people had taken refuge from the fighting.
(AFP, 3/30/10)
2010 Mar 28, In northern China at least 153 miners were trapped underground after water gushed into the state-owned the Wangjialing coal mine. 115 Chinese miners were pulled out alive on April 5 after being trapped for over a week in the flooded mine. Some had eaten sawdust and strapped themselves to the shafts' walls with their belts to avoid drowning while they slept. As of April 11 the death toll stood at 33 with 5 miners still missing.
(AP, 3/28/10)(AP, 3/29/10)(AP, 4/5/10)(AP, 4/11/10)
2010 Mar 28, Zhejiang Geely Holding Group signed a binding deal to buy Ford Motor Co.'s Volvo Cars unit for $1.8 billion, representing a coup for the independent Chinese automaker which is aiming to expand in Europe.
(AP, 3/28/10)
2010 Mar 28, Colombian rebels handed over Pvt. Josue Calvo (23) to the International Red Cross in their first release of a captive in more than a year. The insurgents are promising to soon free a second soldier they've held for far longer.
(AP, 3/28/10)(SFC, 3/29/10, p.A2)
2010 Mar 28, In Guyana Sangeeta Persaud (15) died after neighbors and a local pastor tried to treat her convulsions with an exorcism at a church.
(AP, 4/3/10)
2010 Mar 28, In Iraq several bombs exploded near a house linked to a prominent Sunni figure who ran in this month's parliamentary elections, killing five people and wounding 26 others.
(AP, 3/28/10)
2010 Mar 28, Israel said it will restrict access to its territory from the occupied West Bank starting late today ahead of the week-long Jewish Passover holiday.
(AP, 3/28/10)
2010 Mar 28, In Italy voters cast their ballots in regional elections. Premier Silvio Berlusconi emerged as the victor in the elections widely depicted as a test of his popularity. Only 64% bothered to vote.
(AP, 3/28/10)(AP, 3/30/10)(Econ, 4/3/10, p.53)
2010 Mar 28, In Libya Arab leaders renewed their support for Mideast peace efforts, rejecting pressure from Syria and Libya on the Palestinians to abandon talks with Israel and resume armed resistance.
(AP, 3/28/10)
2010 Mar 28, In Mexico gunmen in Durango state killed 10 young people riding in pickup truck when they didn't stop at a gang's illegal roadblock. 3 gunmen died in a clash with soldiers near a park crowded with families in the border city of Nuevo Laredo. Tamaulipas state investigators said police found the bodies of three men who had been shot to death in the town of Miguel Aleman. In the Nuevo Leon city of Santa Catarina, three men and two women were killed in a shootout with soldiers inside a motel.
(AP, 3/30/10)
2010 Mar 28, Pakistani troops repulsed a Taliban attack on an army base and bombed two militant hide-outs close to the Afghan border, killing 22 insurgents in Orakzai tribal region where the army is pressing an offensive.
(AP, 3/28/10)(SFC, 3/29/10, p.A2)
2010 Mar 28, In the Philippines 2 marines were wounded and several Abu Sayyaf fighters were believed killed as troops pursued militants in an offensive on Jolo island that ended today. At least one body of an Abu Sayyaf fighter, killed in the 2-day assault, was dug up by troops.
(AP, 3/28/10)(SFC, 3/29/10, p.A2)
2010 Mar 28, Russia's Pres. Medvedev thought the country had too much time on its hands, so on Sunday he eliminated two of its 11 time zones.
(AP, 3/28/10)
2010 Mar 28, In Russia thousands of angry people demonstrated in the northwestern city of Arkhangelsk against the high cost of living and demanded that the government of PM Vladimir Putin quits.
(AP, 3/28/10)
2010 Mar 28, In Switzerland an armed gang of masked men raided the Grand Casino, packed with about 600 guests near Basel, and made off with hundreds of thousands of dollars.
(AP, 3/28/10)
2011 Mar 28, President Barack Obama explained to a hesitant America why he launched the military assault in Libya.
(AP, 3/29/11)
2011 Mar 28, Federal agricultural workers in Louisiana were reported using blow torches to burning every prickly pear cactus they came across in hope of killing off a cactus-eating pest that's been on a tear across the Gulf Coast and is moving West. Cactoblastis cactorum, a tan-colored moth from Argentina, has been moving steadily across the Gulf Coast for the past decade. Federal workers hoped to stop it before it gets to Texas and the population explodes with an abundant food supply.
(AP, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, Indiana House Democrats, who fled the state 5 weeks ago to protest a Republican assault on labor unions and public education, resumed work after winning concessions on several issues.
(SFC, 3/29/11, p.A6)
2011 Mar 28, Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder signed legislation that will lead the state to pay fewer weeks of unemployment benefits next year than any other state.
(SFC, 3/29/11, p.A6)
2011 Mar 28, In Afghanistan former transport minister Inayatullah Qasimi was arrested on charges of corruption. He was released 3 days later, but faced trial for misuse of public funds and abuse of authority. Qasimi was accused of corruption and abuse of power while in office between 2004 and 2005.
(AFP, 3/31/11)
2011 Mar 28, In Albania Alfred Shkurti (45) was convicted of ordering six murders and personally committing a seventh as head of a gang active in Albania, Turkey, Bulgaria, Macedonia and Romania, which trafficked drugs to western Europe. Shkurti was arrested in Turkey and extradited to Albania in 2009 on an international warrant.
(AP, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, Australia launched its first national health TV advertising campaign aimed at Aboriginal people, hoping to halve the 50 percent of indigenous people who smoke by 2018.
(AFP, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, Australia's annual cane toad cull was declared a success by organizers who said that more than 14,000 of the noxious pests had perished as a result. The number of cane toads across Australia is estimated to have ballooned to more than 200 million since being introduced from Brazil in the 1930s to control scarab beetles infesting the country's sugar cane.
(AFP, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, Bahrain's foreign minister said it was "completely untrue" that Kuwait would mediate to resolve the country's political crisis, a reaction leading opposition group Wefaq said augured badly for any resolution.
(Reuters, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, Former US President Jimmy Carter arrived in Cuba to discuss economic policies and ways to improve Washington-Havana relations.
(AP, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, Egypt's Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF), a group of 24 senior officers, said on its website that ousted president Hosni Mubarak and his family are under house arrest, denying that the former leader had fled to Saudi Arabia. Members of an ultraconservative Muslim sect clashed with villagers south of Cairo over demands that a liquor store and coffee shops be closed a sign of the increasing assertiveness of the fundamentalist Salafi movement.
(AFP, 3/28/11)(AP, 3/29/11)(Econ, 10/8/11, p.59)
2011 Mar 28, German Chancellor Angela Merkel pledged to press ahead with a review of nuclear power's future after her coalition suffered a "very painful" defeat in a weekend state election dominated by Japan's nuclear crisis. The anti-nuclear Greens doubled their voter share to 24.2% in Baden-Wuerttenberg state.
(AP, 3/28/11)(SFC, 3/28/11, p.A3)
2011 Mar 28, Honduran police using tear gas and water cannons dispersed a group of protesters who blocked a main avenue in the capital to demand the return of ousted former President Manuel Zelaya from exile.
(AP, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, In Ivory Coast forces loyal to Alassane Ouattara, the internationally recognized president, seized the city of Duekoue.
(SFC, 3/29/11, p.A2)
2011 Mar 28, In Japan power company officials said plutonium has been detected in 5 locations in the soil outside of the stricken Fukushima nuclear complex. A TEPCO official said the amounts were very small and were not a risk to public health. TEPCO said highly radioactive water has leaked from the reactor. Environmental group Greenpeace said it had detected high levels of radiation outside an exclusion zone.
(AP, 3/28/11)(Reuters, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, Libyan rebel forces fought their way to the doorstep of Moammar Gadhafi's hometown of Sirte, a key government stronghold guarding the road to the capital Tripoli. British jets bombed ammunition bunkers in southern Libya after weekend strikes took out a score of tanks and armored vehicles near the towns of Ajdabiya and Misrata. Libya's Foreign Ministry declared a ceasefire in Misrata.
(AP, 3/28/11)(AFP, 3/28/11)(Reuters, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, Mexican police found the bodies of six men and one woman inside a car abandoned in an exclusive gated community near Cuernavaca, Morelos state. The dead included Juan Francisco Sicilia, son of poet Javier Sicilia. Army soldiers killed four alleged gunmen in the border city of Nuevo Laredo. A shootout between rival gangs in Monterrey killed two men, including a hot dog vendor caught in the cross fire. In western Michoacan state, the bodies of two men were found in Apatzingan with messages from a new drug gang: "The Knights Templar will not permit assassins to kill innocent people."
(AP, 3/29/11)(AP, 4/15/11)
2011 Mar 28, In Pakistan Islamist militants ambushed a troop convoy near Peshawar killing 11 soldiers.
(SFC, 3/29/11, p.A2)
2011 Mar 28, An association of Israelis of Polish descent slammed Warsaw's decision to suspend plans to offer compensation for property seized during the Nazi and communist eras. Citing economic conditions Polish PM Donald Tusk last week suspended work on a law that would have given some compensation to former owners of lost property.
(AP, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, Portugal's financial tailspin gathered speed despite political efforts to contain the acute debt crisis that is also unnerving the 17-nation eurozone.
(AP, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, In Russia at least 17 rebels and three law enforcement officers were killed in Ingushetia. Authorities also detained two brothers in the security raid on charges of helping stage the January 24 Domodedovo airport bombing.
(Reuters, 3/28/11)(AP, 3/29/11)
2011 Mar 28, Syrian security forces fired tear gas and live ammunition on hundreds of protesters in Daraa as President Bashar Assad faced down the most serious unrest of his 11 years in power with a bloody, weeklong crackdown.
(AP, 3/28/11)(SFC, 3/29/11, p.A3)
2011 Mar 28, In southern Yemen a powerful blast at a factory making explosives and weapons killed as many as 150 people after the facility was briefly taken over by Islamic militants and then looted by residents of the area.
(AP, 3/28/11)(SFC, 3/29/11, p.A3)(Econ, 4/2/11, p.22)
2012 Mar 28, US undercover federal agents attempted to buy a grenade launcher in Richmond, Ca. The sellers planned to rob the suspected illegal arms dealers and a gunbattle erupted. Otis Mobley Jr. and 2 accomplices were arrested.
(SFC, 5/16/13, p.A9)
2012 Mar 28, In New York a dispute over the estate of Brooke Astor, who died in 2007 at age 105, ended with a settlement that freed $100 million for charities and cut half the amount going to the son convicted of bilking her.
(SFC, 3/29/12, p.A7)
2012 Mar 28, Earl Scruggs (b.1924), bluegrass banjo player, died in Nashville. He helped shape the sound of 20th-century country music. His “Foggy Mountain Breakdown" with guitarist Lester Flatt was used as the getaway music in the film “Bonnie and Clyde" (1967).
(SFC, 3/29/12, p.C5)
2012 Mar 28, In Afghanistan a NATO supply convoy came under attack in Farah province. 37 people were reported killed, including 28 Taliban attackers.
(SFC, 3/30/12, p.A3)
2012 Mar 28, Human Rights Watch said hundreds of Afghan women were languishing in prison for so-called moral crimes, which included running away from home and having sex outside marriage. The group estimated a total of 400 women were in prison and girls in juvenile detention facilities having been accused or convicted of offences including "running away", which is not a crime under the Afghan penal code.
(AFP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, A collection of about 100 African films went online, offering rentals for $5 to view classics from directors like Senegal's Ousmane Sembene and Egypt's Youssef Chahine. The African Film Library was 3 years in the making, sponsored by South African satellite television service M-Net, which digitally remastered the movies and placed them online for rental.
(AFP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, In Cuba tens of thousands of people massed in Havana's Revolution Plaza for Pope Benedict XVI's Mass on the final day of his visit. The Pope demanded more freedom for the Catholic Church in Cuba and preached against "fanaticism" in an unusually political sermon. Shortly after the Mass, Benedict met for about half an hour with Fidel Castro.
(AP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, In Egypt members of a controversial panel tasked with drafting a new constitution elected Muslim Brotherhood member Saad al-Katatni, currently the speaker of parliament, to head the committee.
(AFP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, Fiji's military regime said it had seized control of national carrier Air Pacific from Australia's Qantas because it did not want foreigners to own or control Fijian airlines.
(AFP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, Hong Kong's court of appeal overturned a Sep 30, 2011, landmark ruling that opened the door for thousands of foreign maids to claim residency saying the High Court could not override the government's authority to decide who can live in the city and who cannot.
(AFP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, A coalition of environmental groups warned that some 200 critically-endangered orangutans in a protected area of Indonesia’s Aceh province will be wiped out by the end of the year if land clearing in Tripa Swamp is not stopped.
(AFP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, In Iraq Arab foreign ministers met in Baghdad to debate a draft resolution calling on Damascus to end violence and hold talks with the opposition.
(AFP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, Italy seized more than 1.1 billion euros ($1.5 billion) of assets controlled by the Libyan dictator Moamer Kadhafi's family including stakes in top companies, land and a Harley Davidson motorcycle.
(AFP, 3/29/12)
2012 Mar 28, Libyan government spokesman Nasser al-Manaa said 3 days of clashes between tribes in the southern town of Sabha have killed more than 70 people. The clashes erupted in the city center when the Toubou refused to hand over to local authorities one of their men accused of killing a member of the Bussif tribe.
(AFP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, In Mali thousands marched in support of the coup leaders, who sought to quell fears they plan to cling to power by promising democracy and ruling out taking part in elections.
(AFP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, In northeastern Nigeria suspected members of Islamist group Boko Haram bombed a police station and freed more than a dozen prisoners, while three of the attackers were killed in Damagun in Yobe state. Two gunmen shot dead a police inspector in Maiduguri.
(AFP, 3/29/12)
2012 Mar 28, In Poland former intelligence chief Zbigniew Siemiatkowski was charged with exceeding his powers related to a secret CIA prison in Poland during his tenure (2002-2004). Former CIA officials have told the AP that a prison in Poland operated from December 2002 until the fall of 2003, and that prisoners were subjected to harsh questioning and waterboarding in the village of Stare Kiejkuty. Intelligence officials, aviation reports and human rights groups have said "black sites" were based in Afghanistan and Thailand as well as Poland, Lithuania and Romania.
(SFC, 3/29/12, p.A2)(AP, 3/31/12)
2012 Mar 28, Puerto Rico's police chief Emilio Diaz Colon, a retired National Guard general, quit less than a year after being appointed to lead a department that federal agents have accused of corruption, illegal killings and civil rights violations.
(AP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, Syrian activists said government forces have captured the northern town of Saraqeb from rebels after four days of fighting in which more than 40 people were killed and homes were burned down. 3 Syrian soldiers were killed in clashes with rebels in the central province of Homs.
(AP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, Tunisia's interior ministry banned demonstrations on the capital's main avenue which has become a hub of protests since the fall of strongman Zine el Abidine Ben Ali in January last year.
(AFP, 3/29/12)
2012 Mar 28, A Tunisian court convicted Jaber Majeri (Jabeur Mejri) and Ghazi Beji for posting images of the prophet purportedly being intimate with one of his wives. They were sentenced to 7½ years in prison and fined $800. An appeals court in June upheld the conviction. Beji had fled to Europe and was sentenced in absentia. On Feb 4, 2014, artists from a dozen countries launched an online campaign called "100 drawings for Jabeur" in support of Mejri.
(SFC, 6/26/12, p.A2)(http://tinyurl.com/lfr52jj)(AFP, 2/4/14)
2012 Mar 28, A Ugandan court charged the country's main opposition leader Kizza Besigye with an offence linked to the killing of a police officer during a rally last week.
(AFP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, Yemen's Saudi Arabia's deputy consul, Abdullah al-Khalidi (Abdullah Mohammed Khalifa al-Khaldi), was seized by unknown gunmen outside his home in southern port city of Aden. Al-Qaida's Yemen branch claimed responsibility.
(AFP, 3/28/12)(AP, 5/26/12)
2013 Mar 28, The Standard & Poor’s 500 stock index hit an all-time high of 1569.19, surpassing the Oct 9,2007 high of 1565.15.
(SSFC, 3/31/13, p.D1)
2013 Mar 28, Nevada’s Legislature expelled an assemblyman for the first time in its history. Steven Brooks, representing North Las Vegas, has been arrested twice and hospitalized for mental health evaluation.
(SFC, 3/29/13, p.A4)
2013 Mar 28, Bahrain cleared 21 medical personnel of charges linked to anti-government protests, but cases remain open against two others who failed to appear in court.
(AP, 3/28/13)
2013 Mar 28, Britain's domestic spy agency (MI5) chose Andrew Parker (50) as its new director. Parker was an ornithologist with counter-terrorism experience in the Middle East and Northern Ireland.
(AP, 3/28/13)
2013 Mar 28, In Britain Giovanni Di Stefano, a flamboyant but unqualified lawyer, was sentenced to 14 years in jail for fraud. His clients included deposed Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. He had no legal qualifications and was not registered to practice in Britain or Italy, where he had offices.
(AP, 3/28/13)
2013 Mar 28, Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd reopened a rail line in western Minnesota, a day after a mile-long train hauling crude oil from Alberta, Canada, derailed in the area, spilling up to 30,000 gallons of oil.
(Reuters, 3/28/13)
2013 Mar 28, Ousted Central African Republic President Francois Bozize requested exile in Benin days after rebels invaded and overthrew his government of a decade.
(AP, 3/29/13)
2013 Mar 28, China’s State Council, the country’s highest executive organ of state power, released a code of conduct for officials in hopes for a more pransparent government.
(SSFC, 3/31/13, p.A4)
2013 Mar 28, The UN Security Council authorized a new intervention brigade for CongoDRC with a mandate to take military action alone or with Congolese troops against rebel groups to help bring peace in the conflict-racked east.
(SFC, 3/29/13, p.A2)
2013 Mar 28, Cypriots get their first chance to access their savings in almost two weeks when the country's banks reopened, albeit with strict restrictions on transactions.
(AP, 3/28/13)
2013 Mar 28, Israel fully reopened its border crossings with the Gaza Strip that were closed following militant rocket fire during President Barack Obama's visit to the region last week.
(AP, 3/28/13)
2013 Mar 28, A Kosovo court found three ethnic Serbs guilty of storming a UN-run court and inciting riots that led to the death of a Ukrainian peacekeeper in 2008. Marijan Ilincic and Dragan Milojevic were sentenced to 22 and 18 months in prison, respectively. Zoran Cavic was convicted of similar charges and given a 9-month sentence that was suspended for one year. Three other defendants were cleared of all charges.
(AP, 3/29/13)
2013 Mar 28, In central Nigeria an attack in the Bokkos local government area killed 18 civilians. The military killed six while trying to repel attackers in the assault.
(AP, 3/30/13)
2013 Mar 28, A West Bank appeals court upheld a one-year prison term for Mamdouh Hamamreh, a Palestinian journalist who had a photo on his Facebook page that authorities claimed portrayed President Mahmoud Abbas as a traitor.
(AP, 3/28/13)(SFC, 3/29/13, p.A2)
2013 Mar 28, Fitch, a ratings agency, awarded the Philippines its first ever investment-grade credit rating.
(Econ, 4/6/13, p.86)
2013 Mar 28, In northwest Russia a bus crash killed six people and injured at least 18 others, including orphans returning from a field trip.
(AP, 3/28/13)
2013 Mar 28, In Syria mortar shells slammed into a cafeteria at Damascus University, killing at least 10 people and wounding 20 in what was the deadliest in a string of such attacks on President Assad's seat of power. Officials denied opposition claims that an Iranian cargo plane, allegedly carrying weapons to Assad's regime, was hit as it landed at Damascus Int’l. Airport. This day of fierce clashes killed at least 38 people.
(AP, 3/28/13)(AP, 3/29/13)
2013 Mar 28, Pope Francis washed and kissed the feet of two young women at Rome’s Casal del Marmo juvenile detention center, a surprising departure from church rules that restrict the Holy Thursday ritual to men.
(AP, 3/28/13)
2013 Mar 28, A Thai court jailed a man for three years and four months on for selling video CDs showing sections of an Australian news series that contained content deemed offensive to Thailand's royal family. Akachai Hongkawan (37) was also fined 66,666 baht ($2,300).
(AP, 3/28/13)
2014 Mar 28, President Barack Obama opened a fence-mending visit to Saudi Arabia, arriving in the oil-rich Gulf nation for meetings to reassure its elderly monarch of the US commitment to the Arab world.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, California’s Democratic controlled state Senate voted to suspend three members. They included Leland Yee of SF and San Mateo Ct. and Ron Calderon and Roderick Wright of LA County. The suspended senators would continue to receive pay until their terms expire.
(SFC, 3/29/14, p.A1)(SSFC, 3/30/14, p.C5)
2014 Mar 28, US authorities said 11 people have been arrested for trafficking methamphetamine to the Bakken oil patch and will face drug conspiracy charges in Montana.
(SSFC, 3/30/14, p.A11)
2014 Mar 28, In Afghanistan six foreigners including three Americans were trapped inside a Kabul guesthouse after a group of Taliban gunmen laid siege to the building. A gun battle erupted after a Taliban suicide bomber blew himself up outside the building and insurgents forced their way in. The aid workers survived. One small Afghan girl, a passer-by, was killed as well as a driver and all five attackers.
(Reuters, 3/28/14)(AFP, 3/29/14)(SFC, 3/29/14, p.A4)
2014 Mar 28, Australian officials moved the search area for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, that disappeared March 8, 1,100 km (680 miles) to the northeast following a new analysis of radar data, and planes quickly found multiple objects in the new zone.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, Brazilian prosecutors sought the arrest of 13 executives from 3 int’l. companies allegedly involved in a cartel to raise prices for the construction and upkeep of subway and train systems in Sao Paulo.
(SFC, 3/29/14, p.A2)
2014 Mar 28, In Egypt Journalist Mayada Ashraf, from the privately owned Al-Dustour newspaper, was shot in the head as she covered clashes between police and supporters of deposed Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in the northern neighborhood of Ein Shams. 4 other people were killed including a Christian woman named Mary Sameh (26). Prosecutors the next day blamed five masked gunmen from the Muslim Brotherhood. A protester who attended the Ein Shams rally said it was the police who opened fire on the crowd as the demonstrators were about to disperse.
(AFP, 3/29/14)
2014 Mar 28, The Guinean health ministry confirmed eight cases of Ebola in Conakry, including one fatality. The total number of suspected cases recorded from January to March 28 was 111 cases of haemorrhagic fever, including 70 deaths.
(AFP, 3/29/14)
2014 Mar 28, An Indian air force cargo plane inducted into service just last year crashed during a training mission, killing all five crew members.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, In Iraq a triple bombing struck a busy market area in northern Baghdad, killing 4 people.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, Israeli police and antiquities inspectors arrested a gang accused of looting ancient Jewish burial caskets from a cave in the Jerusalem area.
(AFP, 3/31/14)
2014 Mar 28, In the Ivory Coast Ghanaian President John Dramani Mahama was elected the new head of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) at a summit of the 15-nation regional bloc.
(AFP, 3/29/14)
2014 Mar 28, In Kashmir at least three gunmen disguised as Indian soldiers opened fire on a car, killing a passenger and triggering a firefight with army troops in the Dayalchak area.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, A Lebanese policeman was killed by unknown gunmen in the northern city of Tripoli.
(AFP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, In Morocco some 800 African migrants tried to climb barbed-wire fences to enter the Spanish enclave of Melilla. Most were turned back by security forces from both sides.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, Netherlands’ public prosecutor said Milutin Graic (41), wanted in Croatia on suspicion of war crimes during the violent breakup of Yugoslavia in the 1990s, has been arrested in Roosendaal.
(Reuters, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, New Zealand’s government announced it would sell a minority stake in power company Genesis Energy for 736 million New Zealand dollars ($638 million). The company will list on the New Zealand stock market on April 17. More than two-thirds of people who voted in a referendum last year said they opposed the government asset sales.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, Nigeria’s military said they have arrested two Britons and 10 local citizens on charges of trying to bribe a military officer to facilitate oil theft. Security sources have said the sheer scale of oil theft would not be possible without systematic collusion by various security agencies.
(Reuters, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, In eastern Pakistan gunmen on a motorcycle opened fire late today on a car carrying senior journalist Raza Rumi, killing his driver before escaping in Lahore.
(AP, 3/29/14)
2014 Mar 28, A Palestinian official said Israel will not free the final batch of prisoners they had been expecting alongside US-brokered peace talks. Israeli cabinet members had warned they would block the final release, anticipated for the end of March, if the Palestinians refused to extend the talks beyond their April 29 deadline.
(AFP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, The Philippines signed contracts worth $527 million to buy 12 fighter jets from South Korea and four combat utility helicopters from Canada to boost the capability of its air force.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, Russia's Pres. Vladimir Putin said Ukraine could regain some arms and equipment of military units in Crimea that did not switch their loyalty to Russia.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, Russia said Switzerland has imposed restrictions on military exports to Russia over events in Ukraine which were counterproductive and not in line with the country's policy of neutrality.
(Reuters, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, Sweden sentenced a Malaysian couple to prison for beating their four children with sticks and clothes hangers. The abuse occurred from 2010 until December 2013, when Swedish police arrested the couple. The children, aged 7-14, were taken back to their home country following a massive social media campaign calling for their return.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, The UN's top human rights body voted overwhelmingly to renew its war crimes investigation in Syria for another year.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, The UN said over a million people in South Sudan have been forced from their homes during more than three months of ongoing fighting, with conditions continuing to worsen.
(AFP, 3/29/14)
2014 Mar 28, Uruguay’s drug czar said every legal marijuana plant in the country will be registered and tracked using radio frequency tags.
(SFC, 3/29/14, p.A2)
2014 Mar 28, In southern Yemen 2 al-Qaeda militants and a soldier were killed in a raid by security forces on a residential building in Dalea.
(Reuters, 3/28/14)
2015 Mar 28, Many lights were turned off around the world for Earth Hour, an initiative began in Sydney in 2007, from 8:30pm.
(AFP, 3/29/15)
2015 Mar 28, NASA said a Russian Soyuz spacecraft with three crew on board successfully docked with the International Space Station after blasting off from Kazakhstan. An American and two Russians floated into the International Space Station, beginning what is to be a year away from Earth for two of them.
(AFP, 3/28/15)(AP, 3/28/15)
2015 Mar 28, It was reported that the California Public Utilities Commission had accumulated legal fees of $5.1 million relating to an ongoing state and federal corruption probe of the agency. In 2014 the agency had signed a $49,000 attorney representation contract with the Sheppard Mullin law firm.
(SFC, 3/28/15, p.D1)
2015 Mar 28, Albania received 266 million euros from the World Bank for its public finances and road maintenance.
(SSFC, 3/29/15, p.A6)
2015 Mar 28, Brazil said it has accepted China's invitation to join a Beijing-backed international infrastructure bank.
(AP, 3/28/15)
2015 Mar 28, Residents of eastern Cameroon killed several suspected fighters from a Central African Republic rebel group who were trying to carry out a large-scale kidnapping near the border town of Garoua-Boulai.
(AP, 3/29/15)
2015 Mar 28, China’s Pres. Xi Jinping opened a major regional economic conference at the Boao Forum on Hainan Island and argued for strong Chinese-led efforts to promote Asian economic and political cooperation. Mr. Xi described his “One Belt, One Road" (OBOR) vision for regional and global cooperation.
(SSFC, 3/29/15, p.A6)(Econ., 4/11/15, p.41)
2015 Mar 28, In Egypt a bomb wounded four civilians and four policemen outside Cairo University.
(AFP, 3/28/15)
2015 Mar 28, In northeastern India 3 policemen were killed and six others injured when militants of the Hmar People's Convention attacked a convoy of lawmakers in Mizoram state with automatic weapons.
(AP, 3/28/15)
2015 Mar 28, Japan opened what organizers billed as the world's first "Otaku" (geeks) summit, drawing visitors from around the world as the country looks to boost the international fan base for Japanese comic books and anime.
(AFP, 3/28/15)
2015 Mar 28, Kenya's president suspended four cabinet secretaries and 17 other senior officials to facilitate investigations into allegations of corruption.
(AP, 3/28/15)
2015 Mar 28, Nigeria held elections. Polling in the country's presidential and parliamentary election was suspended in some places because of glitches with new voter ID card readers. Boko Haram extremists killed at least 41 people, including a legislator, and scared hundreds of people from polling stations in three states in the northeast.
(AFP, 3/28/15)(AP, 3/29/15)
2015 Mar 28, Pakistan's military said its soldiers killed at least 15 militants in the Tirah valley of the Khyber region.
(AP, 3/28/15)
2015 Mar 28, Saudi Arabia's navy evacuated dozens of diplomats from Yemen and the United Nations pulled out international staff after a third night of Saudi-led air strikes trying to stem advances by Iranian-allied Houthi fighters.
(Reuters, 3/28/15)
2015 Mar 28, In Sri Lanka Priyantha Sirisena (42) the youngest brother of President Maithripala Sirisena, died two days after he was attacked with an ax in what authorities said was a personal dispute.
(AP, 3/29/15)
2015 Mar 28, In Syria Islamist groups including al Qaeda's Nusra Front seized the city of Idlib for the first time since the conflict in the country began. The bodies of least 15 detainees were found, apparently executed by government forces, after Idlib was taken.
(Reuters, 3/28/15)(AP, 3/29/15)(AFP, 3/29/15)
2015 Mar 28, In Tunisia Khaled Ben Hamadi Chaieb, the operational chief in the March 18 deadly museum attack on foreign tourists, was among 9 people killed in anti-terrorist operations. Tens of thousands of Tunisians marched through the capital to denounce extremist violence.
(Reuters, 3/29/15)(SFC, 3/30/15, p.A2)
2015 Mar 28, In Yemen a series of explosions rocked an arms depot in Aden, killing at least 14 people as looters swarmed the facility. At least 61 people were reported killed in three days of fighting between Shiite rebels and loyalist militia in Aden.
(AFP, 3/28/15)
2016 Mar 28, The USS Sirocco intercepted and seized a shipment of weapons hidden aboard a small dhow in the Arabian Sea. The US Navy later said the shipment included 1,500 Kalashnikov assault rifles, 200 rocket-propelled grenade launchers and 21 .50-caliber machine guns likely heading to war-torn Yemen from Iran.
(AP, 4/4/16)
2016 Mar 28, In Washington DC Larry Dawson (66) was shot by police after he entered the Capitol visitor center brandishing a weapon. He was hospitalized in critical but stable condition.
(AFP, 3/29/16)
2016 Mar 28, US authorities said the FBI said it has unlocked the iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino terror attackers, ending a heated legal standoff with Apple that had pitted US authorities against Silicon Valley.
(AFP, 3/29/16)
2016 Mar 28, California Gov. Jerry Brown announced a deal with state lawmakers and public unions that would make the minimum wage $15 an hour by 2022, up from $10. The state Legislature passed the bill on March 31. Brown planned to sign the legislation on April 4.
(SFC, 3/29/16, p.A1)(SFC, 4/1/16, p.A1)
2016 Mar 28, Utah Gov. Gary Herbert signed legislation requiring doctors to give anesthesia to women having an abortion at 20 weeks of pregnancy or later, based on the premise that a fetus can feel pain at that point.
(SFC, 3/29/16, p.A5)
2016 Mar 28, In Afghanistan overnight attacks by the Taliban on two police checkpoints in the volatile southern Helmand province killed at least 8 police. A US soldier shot and killed an Afghan boy near Bagram Airfield close to Kabul. The boy had been carrying what looked like an automatic rifle.
(AP, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, An Angola a court sentenced 17 youth activists, including a well-known rapper, to between two and eight years in jail for rebellion against Pres. Jose Eduardo dos Santos. They were arrested last June and have denied the charges against them.
(AFP, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, Azeri human rights activist and lawyer Intigam Aliyev was freed from jail. Aliyev was detained in Baku in August 2014 and charged with tax evasion, abuse of office and illegal entrepreneurship. Azerbaijan pardoned 148 prisoners including journalists, rights activists and political opponents this month in an apparent move to deflect Western criticism of the ex-Soviet republic's human rights record.
(Reuters, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, Bangladesh's top court rejected a 28-year-old petition to remove Islam as the official religion of the Muslim-majority South Asian nation.
(AP, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, In Britain some 100,000 homes were left without power due to Storm Katie. High winds caused some 130 flights at Gatwick and Heathrow airports to be diverted or cancelled.
(SFC, 3/29/16, p.A2)
2016 Mar 28, Chinese President Xi Jinping arrived in the Czech Republic for a visit aimed at boosting economic and political ties.
(AP, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, China's state media said the military will end so-called paid for services within the next three years, the latest move to modernize the armed forces amid a reform and anti-corruption push.
(Reuters, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, Dubai-based Dodsal Group said it has discovered 2.7 trillion cubic feet of gas deposits in Tanzania's Ruvu Basin Coast Region valued at around $8 billion.
(AP, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, In Guatemala at least 19 people were killed after the bus they were traveling in plunged down a 200-meter (660 feet) ravine near the town of Nahuala.
(Reuters, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, Iran said it will pursue its development of ballistic missiles despite the US blacklisting of more Iranian companies linked to the program.
(Reuters, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, Iraq's parliament gave embattled PM Haider al-Abadi until March 31 to present a cabinet of technocrats as Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr expanded his protest movement for reform. Sadr himself spent the night camping in the Green Zone.
(AFP, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, Japan switched on a radar station in the East China Sea, giving it a permanent intelligence gathering post close to Taiwan and a group of islands disputed by Japan and China, drawing an angry response from Beijing. The new Self Defense Force base is on the island of Yonaguni.
(Reuters, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, Japanese PM Shinzo Abe welcomed Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe -- the 92-year-old former guerrilla fighter who is widely shunned in the West but frequently courted in Asia.
(AFP, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, In south Lebanon 2 people were shot dead and others wounded in the Ain al-Hilweh Palestinian refugee camp after a dispute between rival political groups erupted into gunfire.
(Reuters, 3/29/16)
2016 Mar 28, Montenegro authorities deported 58 foreigners, including 43 Russians, associated with a religious cult. Local media reported that they are members of Aum Shinrikyo, the Japanese doomsday cult that carried out a deadly nerve gas attack on Tokyo's subway in 1995.
(AP, 3/29/16)
2016 Mar 28, Myanmar's outgoing government lifted a nearly four-year curfew in the western state of Rakhine, where clashes between the minority Rohingya Muslims and majority Buddhists left more than 200 people dead, mostly Muslims.
(AP, 3/29/16)
2016 Mar 28, The presidents of Russia and Iran agreed to step up bilateral contacts, including over the Syrian conflict, in which both countries are allies of President Bashar al-Assad.
(Reuters, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, Syrian government forces backed by Russian air strikes battled Islamic State insurgents around Palmyra, trying to extend their gains after taking back control of a city whose ancient temples were dynamited by the ultra-radical militants.
(Reuters, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, In Taiwan a man, identified as Wang Ching-yu (33), grabbed a girl (3) from behind and decapitated her with a kitchen knife shortly before noon outside a subway in Taipei. The girl was with her mother, who was unable to prevent the attack.
(AP, 3/29/16)
2016 Mar 28, In Ukraine over 500 protesters gathered outside the administrative headquarters of the president to call for the resignation of Viktor Shokin, the country's general prosecutor, who they say, has failed to use the full power of his office to deal with endemic corruption.
(AP, 3/28/16)
2017 Mar 28, US President Donald Trump signed an executive order to undo a slew of Obama-era climate change regulations that his administration says is hobbling oil drillers and coal miners, a move environmental groups have vowed to take to court. Trump signed an executive order to review and revise Obama’s flagship energy policy, the Clean Power Plan, which has never been implemented.
(Reuters, 3/28/17)(Econ, 4/1/17, p.22)
2017 Mar 28, The US Supreme Court voted 5-3 to reverse a Texas appeals court ruling that said Death Row inmate Bobby James Moore was not intellectually disabled in the 1980 murder of a Houston grocery store clerk.
(SFC, 3/29/17, p.A4)
2017 Mar 28, The US FDA approved Dupixent, developed by Sanofi of Paris and Regeneron Pharmaceuticals of New York, for moderate or severe eczema. The initial price was listed at $37,000 per year. The FDA also approved Genentech’s Ocrevus, the first drug for an aggressive kind of multiple schlerosis.
(SFC, 3/29/17, p.C2)(SFC, 3/30/17, p.A6)
2017 Mar 28, Tech giant Amazon expanded its global reach with the announcement of a deal to buy Dubai-based Souq.com, the Middle East's largest online retailer.
(AFP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, Wells Fargo said it has agreed to pay $110 million to settle a class-action lawsuit over up to two million accounts that its employees opened for customers without getting their permission.
(SFC, 3/29/17, p.C1)
2017 Mar 28, In Australia Tropical Cyclone Debbie hit the far north of Queensland as a category 4 storm. It was soon downgraded to category 2.
(Reuters, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, In Bangladesh at least four people died and several remain missing after a ferry carrying about 80 passengers capsized the Panguchi River. At least 18 people remained missing.
(Reuters, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, Britain's new 12-sided £1 coin with the symbols of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland goes into circulation on the eve of the launch of a Brexit process that has put national unity in doubt.
(AFP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, London and Paris signed a business agreement, to be launched in 2018, to cooperate in attracting visitors and companies.
(AP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, Canada’s prestigious Gairdner Award went to UCSF researcher David Julius for his work on how pain is perceived by receptors in human nerve endings.
(SFC, 3/28/17, p.A1)
2017 Mar 28, The Danish branch of the ride-sharing service Uber said it is shutting down its services in Denmark due to a proposed law that toughens standards for cabs.
(AP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, The central European Visegrad Group (Czech Rep., Hungary, Poland and Slovakia) rejected a European Union policy that calls for all member states to receive migrants, protesting suggestions that the level of their compliance could be linked to the availability of EU funds to them.
(AP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, A French court sent Carlos the Jackal, once one of the world's most wanted criminals, back to jail for his third life sentence after convicting him of a grenade attack 42 years ago on a Paris shop that killed two people.
(Reuters, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, A Gambian boy (16) was rescued by a Spanish frigate after a rubber boat packed with 147 migrants sank in the Mediterranean shortly after leaving Libya a few days earlier. The sole survivor was transferred to an Italian Coast Guard ship. 140 others disembarked at a different port March 30 and several identified the boy as having been on the same boat. Aid groups said this reduced the death toll to five.
(Reuters, 3/29/17)(Reuters, 3/31/17)
2017 Mar 28, German prosecutors announced an investigation into claims that Turkish agents are spying on alleged followers of exiled preacher Fethullah Gulen in Germany.
(AFP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, Iceland became the first country to introduce legislation requiring employers to prove they are paying men and women equally.
(SFC, 3/31/17, p.C2)
2017 Mar 28, In Kashmir three civilians were killed and 28 other people were injured in anti-India protests that erupted following a gunbattle between rebels and government forces that killed a rebel.
(AP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, Former rebels in Mali reversed a decision to boycott a national reconciliation conference after receiving assurances from the government.
(AFP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, In northern Mexico inmates rioted at a psychiatric block in a prison, broke into a prison pharmacy and took drugs that caused the deaths of two of them in Cadereyta, Nuevo Leon state. Disturbances had begun earlier this week as inmates protested a new program to inspect visitors with a type of X-ray machine to prevent contraband being smuggled into the facility.
(AP, 3/29/17)
2017 Mar 28, In Mexico Rev. Oscar Lopez Navarro was abducted late today outside his residence by people who had been following him in the city of Tampico.
(AP, 3/30/17)
2017 Mar 28, Montenegro became set to become NATO's 29th member following the US Senate's overwhelming ratification.
(AP, 3/29/17)
2017 Mar 28, Air Koryo, North Korea's national carrier, connected Pyongyang with the northeastern Chinese city of Dandong on a twice-weekly inaugural flight.
(Reuters, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, Thousands of students at the Univ. of Puerto Rico went on a one-week strike to protest multimillion-dollar cuts prompted by an economic crisis.
(AP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, Romania’s former tourism minister Elena Udrea was handed a six-year sentence for bribery and abuse of office connected to a boxing gala that she organized in 2011. Former chairman of Romania's Boxing Federation Rudel Obreja received a five-year sentence for tax evasion. Udrea's assistant received three years for complicity to bribery.
(AP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, In South Africa celebrated anti-apartheid activist Ahmed Kathrada (87), a Robben Island prisoner and one of Nelson Mandela's closest colleagues in the struggle against white rule, died in Johannesburg.
(AFP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, In Syria the Islamic State group launched a counter-attack to fend off a US-backed advance around the Tabqa airbase near the jihadists' stronghold Raqa. The SDF held back the attack and managed to seize some ammunition and rocket stores.
(AFP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, Thailand authorities escalated their effort to collect taxes they say are due from ousted PM Thaksin Shinawatra, posting a bill for 17.6 billion baht ($503 million) at the house where he lived before fleeing into exile in 2008 to avoid a prison term for conflict of interest. A lawyer for Thaksin contended that under the law in existence at the time of the 2006 sale, the shares were exempt from tax.
(AP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, Yemeni troops captured a senior leader of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) during an early morning raid in the southeastern Hadramawt region. They detained three others and killed two more.
(Reuters, 3/28/17)
2018 Mar 28, Pres. Donald Trump fired David Shulkin, the embattled head of the Department of Veteran Affairs. Chief White House physician Dr. Ronny Jackson was named as the next VA secretary. Shulkin later said he was undone by advocates of privatization within the administration.
(SFC, 3/29/18, p.A7)(SFC, 3/30/18, p.A8)
2018 Mar 28, US Immigration and customs Enforcement officials said they found 34 immigrants at a home in Phoenix and took them into custody for deportation.
(SFC, 3/29/18, p.A6)
2018 Mar 28, FBI agents arrested Antoin Austin of Euclid, Ohio, after purchasing fentanyl on a hidden website that featured his ads. He was accused of acting as a sort-of middleman between Chinese suppliers of synthetic opioids and users in the US.
(http://tinyurl.com/yaf8r8uy)(SFC, 4/4/18, p.A6)
2018 Mar 28, Facebook unveiled new privacy settings aiming to give its users more control over how their data is shared, following an outcry over hijacking of personal information at the giant social network.
(AFP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, In Afghanistan at least two people including a district police chief were gunned down when militants opened fire on a crowd gathered at a funeral in eastern Nangarhar province.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, In Albania some 150 truck drivers from Kosovo held a peaceful protest against Albania's first planned toll road.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, A Bulgarian state commission said renowned psychoanalyst and philosopher Julia Kristeva (76), who has lived in France since 1965, worked as an agent and collaborator with the Balkan country's secret service during the communist era. Foreign Policy magazine has ranked Kristev as one of the 100 greatest thinkers of the 20th century.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, Croatia said it will purchase upgraded Israeli F-16 fighter aircraft as it seeks to bolster its defenses amid Russia's arming of neighboring Serbia. They will replace the country's aging MiG-21 fighters, of which only six are believed to be operational.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, The government of Ecuador said it has suspended outside communications for Wikileaks founder Julian Assange at its London Embassy due to his failure to honor a 2017 written agreement not to send messages involving "interference in relation to other states".
(SFC, 3/29/18, p.A4)
2018 Mar 28, Egyptian authorities warned people to vote or risk paying a fine, as they looked to boost turnout in a lackluster 3-day election that is virtually guaranteed to hand President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi a second four-year term.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, German police searched the homes of 10 people suspected of providing support to the far-right extremist "Freital Group" in the states of Saxony, Lower Saxony and Bavaria.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, German Automakers Daimler and BMW said they agreed to merge their transportation services businesses, so they can expand offerings in ride-hailing apps, car-sharing, parking, and charging electric cars.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, In Ghana some 3,500 people protested in Accra against the expansion of its defense cooperation with the United States, in a rare public display of opposition to the growing foreign military presence in West Africa.
(Reuters, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, The Athens-based Racist Violence Recording Network (RVRN) said attacks by organized groups against migrants, refugees and activists have been creeping up in Greece, and called for zero tolerance towards racist violence.
(Reuters, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, Israeli chief of staff Lieutenant General Gadi Eisenkot warned the army has been given authorization to open fire ahead of mass protests on the Gaza border planned for March 30.
(AFP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, Israel announced it was launching a domestic digital health database that could make it a global medical powerhouse. The move aims to improve public health worldwide, but critics warn it risks compromising personal privacy.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, In Japan SoftBank Group Corp. Chief Executive Masayoshi Son announced a $200 billion solar power project in Saudi Arabia, which he described as "the world's biggest solar power generation".
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, Malaysia's Parliament approved redrawn electoral boundaries despite protests that the ruling coalition was cheating to ensure victory in the upcoming general election. Embattled PM Najib Razak introduced the new electoral maps, which were approved with 129 lawmakers voting for them and 80 against.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, Montenegro decided to expel a Russian diplomat over the poisoning of a former Russian double agent that the British government has blamed on Moscow.
(Reuters, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, Myanmar's parliament elected Win Myint as the country's new president. The longtime loyalist of Aung San Suu Kyi is expected to carry on his predecessor's practice of deferring to her as her nation's de facto leader.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, In the southern Philippines Abu Sayyaf leader Nurhassan Jamiri surrendered with 13 of his men Basilan province.
(SFC, 3/30/18, p.A2)
2018 Mar 28, In Romania Bucharest Mayor Gabriela Firea adopted a project that will provide 13,800 lei ($3,700) for women who seek in-vitro fertilization in a bid to increase falling birthrates. Up to 1,000 women will be able to benefit from the aid, to be paid in three installments.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, In Russia the head of a human rights office in Dagestan was attacked near his home. Memorial, one of Russia's biggest human rights groups, said the assault was linked to his work.
(Reuters, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, Saudi Arabia's King Salman approved a recommendation made by his son and heir, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, to grant students abroad on government scholarships and those studying at their own expense a $2000 financial boost.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, In Scotland former Catalan minister Clara Ponsati, facing extradition to Spain on charges of rebellion, turned herself in to authorities in Edinburgh. Ponsati was granted bail after appearing for an extradition hearing at a Scottish court.
(AP, 3/28/18)(Reuters, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, Singapore invited Human Rights Watch to give evidence at a parliamentary hearing on "fake news" as a dispute grew between the New York-based group and the city state.
(Reuters, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, Slovakia's foreign minister said the government has decided to recall its ambassador to Moscow for consultations over the nerve agent attack on a former spy in Britain.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, In Spain Catalonia's parliament said it supported detained ex-Catalan president Carles Puigdemont's right to again lead the region while he awaits a German court ruling on extraditing him to Spain for directing a banned independence campaign.
(Reuters, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, Thailand authorities ordered the temporary closing of the beach made famous by the Leonardo DiCaprio movie "The Beach" to halt environmental damage caused by too many tourists. Maya Bay, on Phi Phi Leh island in the Andaman Sea, will be closed to all visitors for four months annually starting this June to allow for the recovery of the island's battered coral reefs and sea life.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, In Venezuela a fast-moving fire swept through a station where prisoners were being kept in crowded cells, killing 68 people in one of the worst catastrophes involving the nation's prison system.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2019 Mar 28, Pres. Donald Trump announced that he was backing off a budget request to eliminate funding for the Special Olympics following days of criticism for the proposed cut.
(SFC, 3/29/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 28, The US House of Representatives voted 238-185 to condemn Pres. Donald Trump's move to restrict transgender men and women from military service. Five Republicans broke ranks to vote with all the Democrats in the non-binding resolution.
(SFC, 3/29/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 28, George Clooney called for the boycott of nine hotels in the US and Europe with ties to the sultan of Brunei, which on April 3 will implement Islamic criminal laws to punish gay sex by stoning offenders to death.
(AP, 3/30/19)(Reuters, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 28, In the SF Bay Area Rev. Hector David Mendoza-Vela (42), the head priest of Corpus Christi Parish in Fremont, was arrested on suspicion of 30 counts child sex abuse from 2016-2017.
(SFC, 4/1/19, p.C1)
2019 Mar 28, In Texas Javier Ambler (40) died after a car chase that started when he did not dim his headlights for oncoming traffic in Williamson County. When authorities reached Ambler, they tased him multiple times. Body camera footage showed Ambler telling them that he could not breathe. In 2021 a court approved a settlement in the Javier Ambler lawsuit of $5 million.
(The Hill, 12/15/21)
2019 Mar 28, In Virginia Darwin Martinez-Torres of Sterling was sentenced to life in prison for raping and killing Nabra Hassanen (17) of Reston, a Muslim teenager, as she walked back to a mosque with friends for pre-dawn religious services in June 2017. immigration authorities said Martinez-Torres is an El Salvador native and was in the country illegally.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Albanian opposition protesters made further attempts to enter the parliament by force as they demand the government's resignation and an early election.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Hundreds of protesters took to the streets of central Algiers again to demand the resignation of President Abdelaziz Bouteflika and changes to the political system after the powerful army called for the veteran leader to be removed.
(Reuters, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In Australia Saeed Noori (37), an Islamic State group sympathizer, was sentenced to life in prison. He had rammed a car into pedestrians on a busy Melbourne sidewalk on Dec. 21, 2017, killing one person and injuring 16 others.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In Bangladesh a fire broke out in a 22-storey commercial building, killing 25 people, injuring at least 60 and trapping many. The building had four upper floors constructed illegally in the Banani district of Dhaka.
(AP, 3/28/19)(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 28, Human Rights Watch said at least 170 civilians have been killed since October in fighting in English-speaking western Cameroon between separatists and government forces.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Cuba and Google signed a deal moving the island one step closer to having a state-of-the-art connection to the internet. They agreed to create a seamless, cost-free connection between their two networks once Cuba is able to physically connect to a new undersea fiber-optic cable that would be laid sometime in the future.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, A French court granted bail to Belhassen Trabelsi, a brother-in-law of ousted Tunisian leader Zine El-Abidine Ben Ali, who was arrested on fraud charges this month after three years on the run.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, German automaker Daimler and China's Geely, its largest single shareholder, said that they are setting up a joint venture to develop and operate Daimler's Smart compact car brand worldwide as an all-electric car.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In western Guatemala a large truck slammed into a crowd gathered on a dark highway, killing 18 people and leaving bodies scattered on the roadway. The truck driver fled the scene.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Icelandic budget airline WOW Air collapsed under its financial problems, leading it to ground planes and leave passengers stranded across two continents.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Kosovo banned all gambling for the next decade in a bid to crack down on crime after two casino staff were murdered last week.
(AFP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 28, A court in the Maldives ordered the release of former president Abdulla Yameen, saying there was not enough reason to hold him beyond a month under the law.
(Reuters, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Norway's justice Minister Tor Mikkel Wara submitted his resignation after his partner was accused of setting his car on fire and other threatening acts.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In the Philippines a rebel assault on a police station in eastern Victoria town backfired when officers fought back and killed three insurgents and captured three others. In the north two Muslim militants were arrested with guns, explosives and Islamic State group-style black flags in in Baggao town, Cagayan province, far from the traditional territory of Muslim militants in the volatile south. Militants Altero Bello and Greg Bello belonged to an IS-aligned jihadist group named Syuful Khilafa Fi Luzon, which was established in 2016.
(AP, 3/29/19)(AP, 4/1/19)
2019 Mar 28, Russia detained a former cabinet minister and oil executive on suspicion of defrauding oil giant Rosneft. Viktor Ishaev was the second former minister from PM Dmitry Medvedev's cabinet to be detained this week.
(Reuters, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Three of eleven Saudi women's rights activists were temporarily released after 10 months in prison. The releases came a day after 11 women's rights activists appeared before a three-judge panel in a Riyadh courtroom and laid out their defense.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In Siberia a ruling by Sakha Republic head Aisen Nikolaev was made public. It bans migrants from driving trucks or buses, producing food, repairing vehicles and other jobs. Tensions between locals and migrants soared this month after three Kyrgyzstan citizens were arrest in a rape and kidnapping case.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Slovakia's Parliament amended the country's constitution to cap the retirement age at 64. Some women can retire up to a year and a half earlier than that, depending on the number of children they've had.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In Somalia an explosives-laden vehicle detonated outside a busy restaurant in Mogadishu, killing at least 16 people. The al-Qaida-linked al-Shabab extremist group claimed responsibility.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Ukraine's interior minister accused both Pres. Petro Poroshenko and former PM Yulia Tymoshenko of waging campaigns that involve bribing voters ahead of the March 31 presidential election.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 28, The UN Security Council ordered countries worldwide to step up the fight against terrorism financing by ensuring they have laws that make it a serious crime to fund terrorist acts.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Venezuela's government said it has barred opposition leader Juan Guaido from holding public office for 15 years citing irregularities in his financial records. Guaido has taken 90 international trips without accounting for the origin of an estimated $94,000 in expenses.
(SFC, 3/28/19, p.A2)
2020 Mar 28, Pres. Donald Trump endorsed the $2 trillion coronavirus economic stimulus bill. He signed the bill into law but said he would not be bound by provisions that interfered with his executive authority. Democrats had pushed for increased oversight of a $500 billion corporate loan fund. Trump also approved coronavirus disaster declarations for Michigan and Massachusetts.
(Bloomberg, 3/28/20)(SFC, 3/31/20, p.A8)
2020 Mar 28, Washington, D.C., confirmed 37 new coronavirus cases, raising its total to 304.
(SSFC, 3/29/20, p.A6)
2020 Mar 28, In San Francisco the number of coronavirus cases climbed to 304 with four deaths.
(SSFC, 3/29/20, p.A9)
2020 Mar 28, In the SF Bay Area Lonnie Franklin (67), a convicted serial killer, died at San Quentin State Prison. He was known as the "Grim Sleeper" who preyed on the women of South Los Angeles for more than two decades.
(AP, 3/29/20)
2020 Mar 28, Idaho's Blaine County has reported more than 80 confirmed cases of coronavirus. The county includes Sun Valley Resort whioch draws skiers from around the world.
(SSFC, 3/29/20, p.A6)
2020 Mar 28, In Louisiana inmate Patrick Jones (47) died after contracting the coronavirus at the federal minimum-security prison in Oakdale, where at least five prisoners have tested positive for the virus.
(NBC News, 3/29/20)
2020 Mar 28, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer issued an executive order requiring communities statewide to restore water service, effectively ending water shutoffs for the duration of the coronavirus pandemic.
(AP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, In Michigan the number of coronavirus infections surged in Detroit to 1,381, with 31 deaths. More than a fifth of Detroit's police force was quarantined. Two officers have died and at least 39 have tested positive, including the chief of police.
(AP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said there are now 52,318 confirmed cases in the state, after 7,681 new cases were reported in the last 24 hours. The governor also announced he was postponing the presidential primary in the state from April 28 to June 23.
(Good Morning America, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, New York City reported at least 26,000 diagnosed cases of COVID-19, with 450 deaths.
(Good Morning America, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Former US Sen. Tom Coburn (72), died. The Oklahoma family doctor had earned a reputation as a conservative political maverick as he railed against federal earmarks and subsidies for the rich. Coburn had been diagnosed years earlier with prostate cancer.
(AP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Rhode Island Gov. Gina Raimondo announced that the National Guard would go door-to-door to make sure New Yorkers are following 14-day quarantine orders.
(Good Morning America, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, The number of worldwide coronavirus infections surpassed 620,000 with more than 28,000 deaths as new cases also stacked up quickly in Europe. Abbott Laboratories unveiled a coronavirus test that can tell if someone is infected in as little as five minutes, and is so small and portable it can be used in almost any health-care setting.
(Bloomberg, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, The Taliban said it will refuse to negotiate with the team announced by the Afghan government, in a potential setback to the next steps of the U.S.-brokered peace process. The Taliban attacked several provinces in the north as American diplomats expressed optimism that the peace process was getting back on track.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)(SSFC, 3/29/20, p.A3)
2020 Mar 28, Albania flew a team of doctors and nurses to neighboring Italy to help it deal with the coronavirus pandemic as its own cases have yet to strain the health sector. Albania has 197 cases of the illness, with 10 deaths.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Australia’s death toll from the coronavirus outbreak rose to 14. The number of confirmed infections stood at 3,635, an increase of 469 from a day earlier. Australia stepped up enforcement of social distancing rules, implementing fines, closing beaches and threatening stricter measures if people defy pleas to stay at home.
(Bloomberg, 3/28/20)(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Australian authorities pressed ahead with plans to fly 800 cruise ship passengers to Germany this weekend after a downward revision in the number of people on board who needed to be tested for the coronavirus.
(AP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Bosnia's autonomous Serb Republic declared a state of emergency, handing legislative powers to the region's president to expedite the passage of laws to ease the impact of the coronavirus epidemic. Bosnia has recorded 259 cases of coronavirus with four deaths.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Brazil's federal government launched an advertising campaign against social distancing measures to fight the coronavirus outbreak, the latest flashpoint in a battle between President Jair Bolsonaro and state governors trying to stop the virus' spread.
(AP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, A Brazilian court blocked a decree by President Jair Bolsonaro that exempted places of worship from confinement orders. The federal court in Rio de Janeiro state ruled that religious services pose a public health risk. The government can still appeal the decision.
(AFP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Britain reported 17,089 confirmed cases of the coronavirus and 1,019 deaths and the peak of the epidemic in the country is expected to come in a few weeks.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, The Chinese city of Wuhan, where the outbreak first emerged, began lifting a two-month lockdown by restarting some metro services and reopening borders, allowing some semblance of normality to return and families to reunite.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, China sent a plane loaded with medical personnel and supplies to help Pakistan fight the spread of the coronavirus in one of the world's most populous nations. Pakistan has 1,408 confirmed cases of the virus, including 11.
(AP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Northern Cyprus reported its first death from the coronavirus after a 67-year old German tourist died in hospital in Nicosia.
(AP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, In Germany the number of confirmed coronavirus cases rose to 48,582 and 325 people have died of the disease.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Greece confirmed 95 new coronavirus cases, bringing the total to 1,061 since the country's first recorded infection on Feb. 26.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, India has confirmed 775 cases of coronavirus and 19 deaths.
(SSFC, 3/29/20, p.A5)
2020 Mar 28, Indonesia's capital Jakarta announced a two-week extension of its state of emergency following the nationwide surge in coronavirus cases,.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Iran announced that 139 more people had died from the novel coronavirus, raising the official death toll to 2,517. The health ministry said 3,076 more cases had been confirmed in the past 24 hours, bringing the total number of infections to 35,408.
(AFP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Iraqi doctors said the country may be singularly unprepared for the coronavirus, with the number of cases at 450 and deaths at 40.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Italy's Lombardy region recorded 542 new deaths as the national government was said to be mulling plans to extend a country-wide lockdown to mid-April. Italy reported 889 deaths due to the coronavirus. The death toll surged past 10,000. Confirmed cases rose by about 6,000 to 92,472.
(AP, 3/28/20)(Reuters, 3/28/20)(Reuters, 3/29/20)
2020 Mar 28, In Japan new coronavirus infections in Tokyo rose by more than 60, the biggest daily increase yet.
(Bloomberg, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, In Kenya police fired tear gas at a crowd of ferry commuters as the country's first day of a coronavirus curfew slid into chaos. Virus cases across Africa climbed above 4,000.
(SSFC, 3/29/20, p.A5)
2020 Mar 28, Lebanese security forces cleared away a protest camp in central Beirut on Saturday and reopened roads blocked by demonstrators since protests against the governing elite started in October. Lebanon has recorded 412 cases of coronavirus and eight deaths.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Mali recorded its first coronavirus just hours before polls were to open on March 29 for a long-delayed parliamentary election.
(AFP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Mexico's President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said his government will comply with a public consultation to halt the construction of US brewer Constellation Brands Inc's more than $1 billion brewery project in the border city of Mexicali.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Namibia, the world’s top producer of marine diamonds and the fifth-biggest of uranium, halted mining and quarrying operations to curb the coronavirus outbreak.
(Bloomberg, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, The Netherlands reported 93 deaths from the new coronavirus to take its total to 639 while another 1,159 cases of the virus were confirmed, both smaller rises than a day earlier. The country has confirmed a total of 9,762 cases of the virus.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, The Philippine health ministry reported 14 new coronavirus deaths and 272 additional cases, marking the country's single largest daily increase in fatalities and infections. This brought total infections in the Philippines to 1,075 and deaths to 68.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Poland's parliament passed a law early today allowing postal voting for senior citizens and those in quarantine or self-isolating as the government looks to press ahead with May presidential elections which opposition parties want postponed.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Portugal’s coronavirus cases rose 20% in one day and deaths climbed to 100 from 76. Total cases rose to 5,170 from 4,268 a day earlier. Authorities said all foreigners in Portugal with pending applications will be treated as permanent residents from March 30 until at least July 1, to ensure migrants have access to public services during the virus outbreak.
(Bloomberg, 3/28/20)(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Qatar reported its first death from the new coronavirus late today, saying the total number of reported cases there was at least 590.
(AP, 3/29/20)
2020 Mar 28, Russia reported 228 new cases of coronavirus overnight, bringing the total to 1,264, with four deaths attributed to the virus. Russia said it will close its borders starting on March 30 in a bid to curb the spread of the coronavirus. The order will not apply to Russian diplomats and the drivers of freight trucks, among others. Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin urged Muscovites to stay at home during the non-working week announced by President Vladimir Putin in a bid to curb the spread of the coronavirus.
(Bloomberg, 3/28/20)(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Russia's state-controlled Rosneft oil company said that it is ceasing operations and selling its assets in Venezuela. Rosneft said that it’s turning over its Venezuelan projects to an unnamed state-owned company in what it called an effort to protect its shareholders’ interests.
(SSFC, 3/29/20, p.A3)(Bloomberg, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Saudi air defenses intercepted Yemeni rebel missiles over Riyadh and a city on the Yemen border late today, leaving two civilians wounded in the curfew-locked capital amid efforts to combat coronavirus.
(AFP, 3/29/20)
2020 Mar 28, South African billionaire businessman Patrice Motsepe said his group of companies would donate 1 billion rand ($57 million) to help fight the coronavirus outbreak that has forced the country into total lockdown as infections climbed.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Spain death toll due to coronavirus rose to 6,528. Spain reported 8,189 new cases of novel coronavirus in the last 24 hours, putting the total number of cases at 72,248.
(Bloomberg, 3/28/20)(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, The death toll in Switzerland from coronavirus climbed to 235 with total cases at 13,213.
(AP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Thailand reported 109 new coronavirus cases and one death, bringing the total to 1,245 infections and six deaths.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Turkey halted all intercity trains and limited domestic flights as the number of coronavirus cases jumped to 7,402, with 108 dead.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, The United Arab Emirates extended to April 5 a de-facto nightly curfew to sterilize public places. The UAE has reported two deaths from the coronavirus pandemic and 468 confirmed infections.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, A doctor (39) in Uzbekistan died after unsuccessfully trying to treat a coronavirus infection that he kept secret.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Vietnam began limiting domestic flights and stop public gatherings for two weeks, as it aimed to keep down the number of coronavirus cases. The health ministry reported an additional 11 coronavirus cases, bringing the total number in the country to 174. There are 1,729 suspected cases in the country.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2021 Mar 28, In Alaska five people were killed on a heli-skiing excursion when their chopper crashed. Czech billionaire, Petr Kellner (56), whose net worth has been estimated at $17.5 billion by Forbes, was aboard the Airbus AS350 B3 helicopter when it went down near Knik Glacier. One survivor was listed in serious but stable condition.
(NY Times, 3/29/21)
2021 Mar 28, California to date had 3,635,640 cases of coronavirus and 58,348 deaths. The SF Bay Area had 420,547 cases and 5,873 deaths. Total cases nationwide reached over 30,255,303 with the death toll at 549,288.
(sfist.com, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, In southern California Krys Brandon Ruiz (26), a transgender male, died from a fatal gunshot wound following an altercation with Lompoc Police officers minutes after they received a report of a person walking northbound on H Street with a handgun shortly after 8 p.m. An hour before the shooting, Ruiz was dropped off at his apartment by his mother after dinner, blocks away from the shooting location.
(Tribune Publ., 4/17/21)
2021 Mar 28, In Indiana serial killer Joseph Edward Duncan III (58) died in US prison, having admitted to slaughtering seven people — including five children — in Idaho, Washington state, Montana and California.
(AP, 3/31/21)
2021 Mar 28, In Maryland Joshua Green (27) shot three people at a Royal Farms convenience store in Essex, killing two of them. Police believed Green had also shot and killed his parents in Baldwin before killing himself.
(SFC, 3/30/21, p.A3)
2021 Mar 28, A year after becoming a global epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic, New York and New Jersey were back atop the list of US states with the highest rates of infection. New Jersey has been reporting about 647 new cases for every 100,000 residents over the past 14 days. New York has averaged 548.
(AP, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, In Tennessee powerful rainstorms flooded roads and houses across Nashville, killing at least four people.
(NY Times, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, Albania started a mass inoculation campaign ahead of the summer tourism season after acquiring 192,000 doses of Chinese coronavirus vaccine Sinovac earlier this week.
(AP, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, Armenia’s embattled PM Nikol Pashinyan confirmed that he will step down from the post in April in order to allow for an early parliamentary election.
(AP, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, Australian broadcaster Nine Entertainment was unable to air its news bulletin from its Sydney headquarters due to "technical difficulties" which a source with knowledge of the matter blamed on a suspected cyber attack.
(Reuters, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, In eastern Bangladesh three people were killed in two separate clashes between Hefajat-e-Islam activists and police in Sarail upazila and Brahmanbaria district town. Hundreds of members of a hardline Islamist group attacked Hindu temples and a train, as violence spread across the country in the wake of a visit by Indian PM Narendra Modi. At least 11 protesters have been killed over the last two days.
(https://tinyurl.com/4e5k3r35)(Reuters, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, In Canada a man went on a stabbing spree in North Vancouver killing one woman and injuring six other people. A suspect in his 20s was arrested.
(SFC, 3/29/21, p.A3)
2021 Mar 28, It was reported that a digital illustration by a prominent Chinese propaganda artist mocking Western governments, media and businesses critical of labor conditions in Xinjiang has gone viral on China's social media. The digital art by Wuheqilin, named after a one-horned Chinese mythical beast, shows two figures with white pointed hoods interviewing a scarecrow in a field of cotton and Black slaves.
(AP, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, In France critical care doctors said surging coronavirus infections could soon overwhelm their ability to care for the sick in Paris hospitals.
(SFC, 3/29/21, p.A4)
2021 Mar 28, It was reported that Agnes Callamard, a French human rights expert who led a UN investigation into the killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, has been appointed the new leader of Amnesty International.
(AP, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, In Indonesia two suicide bombers believed to be members of an Islamist militant group attacked a Catholic church in city of Makassar on the first day of the Easter Holy Week, wounding 19 people. A recently married couple with suspected militant links used pressure cooker bombs to blow themselves up outside the Roman Catholic cathedral.
(Reuters, 3/28/21)(AP, 3/30/21)
2021 Mar 28, Jerusalem's Church of the Holy Sepulcher opened to the public on Palm Sunday, allowing Christians to attend mass at the start of Holy Week on the site where they believe Jesus was crucified and rose from the dead.
(Reuters, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, In Mozambique rebels fought the Mozambican army for the fifth straight day for control of the strategic northern town of Palma, as reports came in that dozens of civilians have been killed and bodies were littering the streets.
(AP, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, In Myanmar at least nine people were killed as protests continued against the Feb. 1 military coup. About 3,000 villagers from territory controlled by the Karen fled across the border to Thailand after Myanmar military aircraft dropped bombs on a Karen guerrilla position.
(AP, 3/29/21)
2021 Mar 28, Sudan’s interim government and the main rebel group in the country agreed to re-start peace talks.
(AP, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, In northeast Syria thousands of Kurdish-led forces, with assistance from the US-led coalition, launched a military operation at the sprawling Al-Hol camp, in a new effort to identify and arrest Islamic State militants and tamp down escalating killings and violence in the camp. The camp houses some 62,000 people, including wives and children of IS members.
(AP, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said the United Nations is holding "serious negotiations" with China for unfettered access to the Xinjiang region to verify reports that Muslim Uighurs are being persecuted.
(Reuters, 3/28/21)
2022 Mar 28, US President Joe Biden submitted a $5.79 trillion budget plan to Congress that calls for record peacetime military spending while raising taxes for billionaires and companies and lowering government deficits.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, President Biden said his assertion days earlier that Russian President Vladimir Putin "cannot remain in power" was an expression of moral outrage and not intended as a formal policy call for regime change.
(AFP, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Top diplomats of the United States and four Arab countries (Bahrain, Egypt, Morocco, UAE) convened in Israel in a display of unity against Iran but also used the rare summit to press their host to revive long-stalled peacemaking with the Palestinians.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Total US COVID-19 cases reached over 80,000,546 with the death toll at 978,102.
(sfist.com, 3/29/22)
2022 Mar 28, In Connecticut Jamie Petrone-Codrington, a former Yale School of Medicine administrator, pleaded guilty to fraud and tax offenses after stealing $40 million in computer and electronic software from the school over a nearly ten-year period..
(https://tinyurl.com/4w5rf9r9)
2022 Mar 28, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida signed the Parental Rights in Education legislation that prohibits classroom instruction and discussion about sexual orientation and gender identity in some elementary school grades.
(NY Times, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Police in Panama City, Florida, displayed 75 confiscated guns following weekend arrests of 161 people as rowdy spring break crowds prompted curfews and some establishments to close from Miami Beach to the Panhandle.
(SFC, 3/29/22, p.A3)
2022 Mar 28, In Pennsylvania three people were killed and at least a dozen were injured after a blinding snow squall led to a fiery pileup of at least 50 vehicles, including several tractor-trailers, on I-81 in Schuylkill County.
(NY Times, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Fox News host Tucker Carlson offered a warning about the repercussions of removing Russian President Vladimir Putin from power, and suggested that Islamic extremists would somehow get hold of the country’s nuclear weapons and use them on Americans.
(Huffpost, 3/29/22)
2022 Mar 28, Shares of Tesla jumped after the car maker announced its second stock split in less than two years.
(SFC, 3/29/22, p.C2)
2022 Mar 28, Walmart Inc said it will stop sales of tobacco products in some of its more than 5,000 stores across the United States.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Abu Dhabi's Mubadala Investment Company said it is pausing investments in Russia, which represent less than 1% of its portfolio, because of the Ukraine crisis.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, It was reported that Afghanistan's Taliban has instructed all government employees to wear a beard and adhere to a dress code or risk being fired.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Belgian biotech firm UCB SA said the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved its drug to treat seizures associated with Lennox-Gastaut Syndrome (LGS), a rare form of childhood epilepsy.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, It was reported that internet service in dozens of neighborhoods in Brazil's major cities have been taken over by companies associated with alleged criminals unafraid to use force and intimidation to push out rivals.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Britain instructed public sector bodies to review energy and other contracts they have with Russian firms and consider switching suppliers, noting that existing energy agreements could benefit the Russian state.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Britain's BBC said the Taliban have banned its television news in three main languages of Afghanistan from being broadcast.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, British military intelligence said the Russian private military company, the Wagner Group, has been deployed to eastern Ukraine.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Cambodian PM Hun Sen condemned Russia's invasion of Ukraine and echoed calls for an immediate ceasefire made by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), which Cambodia currently chairs.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Canada's federal government signed a deal with Ontario to implement a subsidized child care program in that province, creating a national daycare program for the first time in Canada.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Survivors of Canada's residential schools asked Pope Francis to guarantee unfettered access to Church records on the institutions where indigenous children were abused and their culture denied.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, China's financial hub of Shanghai launched a two-stage lockdown of its 26 million residents, closing bridges and tunnels and restricting highway traffic in a scramble to contain surging COVID-19 cases.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, In Colombia at least 11 members of a group formed by former FARC rebels who reject a peace deal were killed in combat in a rural area of Puerto Leguizamo municipality, Putumayo province.
(Reuters, 3/29/22)
2022 Mar 28, In eastern CongoDRC heavy fighting erupted overnight as fighters from the M23 rebel group attacked army positions near the border with Uganda and Rwanda.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, El Salvador said more than 1,000 gang suspects have been arrested following a wave of weekend killings that left 87 people dead. Police said five MS-13 leaders, who reportedly ordered the killings, have been captured.
(SFC, 3/29/22, p.A3)
2022 Mar 28, European Economic Commissioner Paolo Gentiloni said the impact of Russia's invasion of Ukraine on food security will potentially have "dramatic consequences" for African countries that rely on grains imports.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, An EU agency said authorities in three European countries have frozen more than $130 million in assets linked to an investigation into money laundering in Lebanon. The assets, frozen on March 25, amount to 120 million euros ($131.6 million).
(AP, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said Moscow broke all rules of international order by using force to shift borders and it will be Russia that will most severely suffer the consequences of this.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, The Honduran Supreme Court authorized the extradition of former president Juan Orlando Hernandez to the United States to face drug trafficking and firearms charges dating back to his two terms in office.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, In India thousands of workers began a two-day strike to protest government economic policies. Their demands included freezing all privatization plans and providing social security.
(SFC, 3/29/22, p.A2)
2022 Mar 28, It was reported that Indian companies are snapping up Russian oil as it is available at a deep discounts after some companies and countries shunned purchases from Moscow due to sanctions against Russia for its Ukraine invasion. India, which has refrained from outright condemnation of Moscow, has not banned the importation of Russian oil.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Israel voiced support for Morocco's autonomy proposal for Western Sahara after the countries' foreign ministers met at an Israel-Arab summit.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Kazakhstan's deputy foreign minister told a German newspaper that companies exiting Russia due to the war in Ukraine are welcome to move production to Kazakhstan.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, A Kazakh radio station fired one of its presenters after she said "we will call in Uncle Vova if you talk too much" in a heated Facebook debate, a reference to Russian President Vladimir Putin and the idea that Russia could invade. Kazakhstan has avoided criticizing Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, It was reported that millions of dollars of public funds allegedly stolen by two of Kenya's richest men are being returned from Jersey to Kenya to buy life-saving Covid-19 equipment following a landmark agreement signed in London.
(BBC, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, The International Monetary Fund said it has reached a staff-level agreement on a $470 million facility for Mozambique.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, In northern Nigeria at least 8 people were killed and several were missing after suspected bandits attacked a passenger train headed from Abuja to Kaduna late today. Suspected bandits soon contacted some families to say they are holding relatives who went missing following the attack, and that they will demand a ransom. 168 people remained missing following the attack.
(Reuters, 3/29/22)(Reuters, 3/31/22)(BBC, 4/4/22)
2022 Mar 28, Pakistan's parliament took up a no-confidence motion moved by opposition lawmakers in a bid to remove Prime Minister Imran Khan, pushing the South Asian nation closer to political turmoil.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Peruvian President Pedro Castillo survived an impeachment vote in Congress that fell short of the votes needed to oust the leftist leader eight months after he took office.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Sri Lanka's central bank governor said the government has sought an additional credit line of $1.5 billion from India to import essentials, amid its worst economic crisis in decades.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Russia said it will not supply gas to Europe for free as it works out methods for accepting payments for its gas exports in rubles but G7 nations refused the demand.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Novaya Gazeta, Russia's leading independent newspaper, suspended operations after pressure from Russian authorities, a move that comes less than six months after its editor won the Nobel Peace Prize for his paper’s courageous reporting under difficult circumstances.
(AP, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, It was reported that wealthy Russians are pouring money into real estate in Turkey and the United Arab Emirates, seeking a financial haven in the wake of Moscow's invasion of Ukraine and Western sanctions, according to many property companies. Some 14,000 Russians have reportedly arrived in Turkey since the war began on Feb. 24, many carrying wads of cash due to blocks on their US credit cards.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, South Korea officials said the daily average of new COVID-19 declined last week for the first time in more than two months.
(SFC, 3/29/22, p.A4)
2022 Mar 28, Swiss bank Credit Suisse said it has stopped pursuing new business in Russia after the invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, In northeastern Syria clashes broke out late today between US-backed Syrian Kurdish fighters and members of the Islamic State group at al-Hol, Hassakeh province. At least three people were killed inside the restive camp that houses IS families.
(AP, 3/29/22)
2022 Mar 28, Tunisia's Parliament Speaker Rached Ghannouchi said parliament will hold two full sessions this week, to consider revoking President Kais Saied moves toward a new constitution and one-man rule.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Ukraine's military intelligence published the names and contact details of 620 people it alleged were officers of Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) involved in "criminal activities" in Europe.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Ukrainian defense ministry spokesperson Oleksander Motuzyanyk said Ukraine sees no signs on the ground that Russia has given up a plan to surround the Ukrainian capital Kyiv. A spokesperson for the mayor of Mariupol said nearly 5,000 people have been killed in the southern city since Russian forces laid siege to it.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Irpin Mayor Oleksandr Markushyn said Ukrainian forces had seized back full control of the town near Kyiv which has been one of the main hotspots of fighting with Russian troops near the capital. A senior US defense official said Ukrainian forces have retaken the town of Trostyanets, south of Sumy, from Russian forces.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, The United Arab Emirates' energy minister doubled down on an oil alliance with Russia that's helped buoy crude prices to their highest in years as Moscow's war on Ukraine rattles markets and sends energy and commodity prices soaring.
(AP, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said Venezuelan security forces have carried out joint operations with Colombian rebel group the National Liberation Army (ELN) against former members of the FARC rebels who remain armed. HRW said At least 103 people were killed in Arauca in the first two months of this year amid violence between armed groups.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
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For Asia History: https://www.asiaobserver.org/category/news/on-this-day-in-asian-history
193 Mar 28, Publius Helvius Pertinax, Roman Emperor (192-93), was assassinated.
(HFA, '96, p.26)(MC, 3/28/02)
1472 Mar 28, Fra Bartolommeo (d.1517), Florentine Renaissance painter, was born.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fra_Bartolommeo)
1483 Mar 28, Raphael, painter (School of Athens), was born in Urbino, Italy. [see Apr 6]
(MC, 3/28/02)
1503 Mar 28, The 2nd Lithuanian war with Russia (1500-1503) ended with a treaty. Lithuania lost a fourth of its territory.
(LHC, 3/28/03)
1515 Mar 28, Theresa of Avila (d.1582), Teresa de Jesus (St. Theresa), Spanish Carmelite nun, mystic writer, saint, was born. She initiated reforms in the Order. She co-founded with John of the Cross (1542-1591) the Order of Discalced (barefoot) Carmelites. "Untilled ground, however rich, will bring forth thistles and thorns; so also the mind of man." "To wish to act like angels while we are still in this world is nothing but folly."
(CU, 6/87)(WUD, 1994, p.769)(AP, 12/8/97)(AP, 7/5/98)(MC, 3/28/02)
1556 Mar 28, Philip II, Charles V's son, was crowned king of Spain. [see Sep 12]
(MC, 3/28/02)
1652 Mar 28, Samuel Sewall, British colonial merchant and one of the Salem witch trial judges, was born.
(HN, 3/28/01)
1660 Mar 28, Georg Ludwig, German monarch of Hanover, King George I of Great Britain, was born.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1673 Mar 28, Adam Pijnacker (51), Dutch landscape painter, etcher, was buried.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1687 Mar 28, Constantine Huygens (90), diplomat, poet, composer (Bluebottles), died.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1737 Mar 28, Francesco Zanetti, composer, was born.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1766 Mar 28, Joseph Weigl, Austrian composer, conductor (Emmeline), was born.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1774 Mar 28, Britain passed the Coercive Act against Massachusetts. [see May 20]
(HN, 3/28/98)
1776 Mar 28, Mexican Captain Juan Bautista de Anza, Lt. Jose Moraga, and Franciscan priest Pedro Font arrived at the tip of San Francisco. De Anza planted a cross at what is now Fort Point. They camped at Mountain Lake and searched inland for a more hospitable area and found a site they called Laguna de los Dolores or the Friday of Sorrows since the day was Friday before Palm Sunday. Anza became known as the “father of SF." Mission Dolores was founded by Father Francisco Palou and Father Pedro Cambon. Rancho San Pedro, near what is now Pacifica, served as the agricultural center. Laguna de los Dolores was later believed to be a spring near the modern-day corner of Duboce and Sanchez.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_Bautista_de_Anza)(SFEC, 9/21/97, p.C7)(SFEC, 3/1/98, p.W34)(SFC, 2/19/11, p.A10)
1878 Mar 28, The Hastings College of Law, the law department of the University of California, was founded with a donation of $100,000 by Serranus Clinton Hastings.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serranus_Clinton_Hastings)
1794 Mar 28, Marie-Joseph de Condorcet (b.1743), mathematician (Theory of Comets) and philosopher, died as a fugitive from French Revolution Terrorists.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marquis_de_Condorcet)
1797 Mar 28, Nathaniel Briggs of New Hampshire patented a washing machine.
(AP, 3/28/97)
1799 Mar 28, NY state abolished slavery.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1800 Mar 28, The Parliament in Westminster passed an Act of Union formally binding Ireland with England and abolished the Irish parliament. The Act of Union entailed the loss of legislative independence of the Irish Parliament. The Act of Union received royal assent on August 1 and became effective on Jan 1, 1801.
(www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/614673/Act-of-Union)(SFEC, 12/22/96, Z1 p.6)(WSJ, 11/20/98, p.W6)
1804 Mar 28, Ohio passed law restricting movement of Blacks. [see Jan 5]
(MC, 3/28/02)
1818 Mar 28, Wade Hampton (d.1902), Confederate general, was born.
(HN, 3/28/98)(MC, 3/28/02)
1818 Mar 28, Giuseppe Antonio Capuzzi (62), composer, died.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1834 Mar 28, The US Senate voted to censure Pres. Jackson for the removal of federal deposits from the Bank of the United States. The Senate declared that Pres. Andrew Jackson: "in the last executive proceedings in relation to the public revenue, has assumed upon himself authority and power not conferred by the constitution and laws, but in derogation of both."
(AP, 3/28/97)
1837 Mar 28, Felix Mendelssohn married Cecile Jeanrenaud.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1844 Mar 28, Jose Zorilla's "Don Juan Tenorio," premiered in Madrid.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1845 Mar 28, Mexico dropped diplomatic relations with US.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1854 Mar 28, During the Crimean War, Britain and France declared war on Russia.
(AP, 3/28/97)
1859 Mar 28, 1st performance of John Brahms' 1st Serenade for orchestra.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1862 Mar 28, Aristide Briand, premier of France (1909-22), was born.
(HN, 3/28/98)
1862 Mar 28, US Civil War skirmish at Bealeton Station, Virginia.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1864 Mar 28, A group of Copperheads attacked Federal soldiers in Charleston Ill. Five were killed and twenty wounded.
(HN, 3/28/99)
1868 Mar 28, Maxim Gorki, Russian writer, was born. [see Mar 16]
(HN, 3/28/98)
1871 Mar 28, Willem Mengelberg, conductor (NY Philharmonic 1922-30), was born in Utrecht, Neth.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1878 Mar 28, The Hastings College of Law, the law department of the University of California, was founded with a donation of $100,000 by Serranus Clinton Hastings. Hastings (d.1893) donated $100,000 in gold coins to found California’s first law school. It was later reported that he had ordered attacks on native Yuki villages that killed women and children.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serranus_Clinton_Hastings)(NY Times, 10/27/21)
1879 Mar 28, British mounted troops under Colonel Henry Evelyn Wood went up Hlobane Mountain to battle the Zulus—only to be surrounded by a 22,000-man impi (army). Lieutenant Colonel Redvers Buller, received the Victoria Cross for his gallantry during the difficult withdrawal of his troopers from the mountain. Hlobane was the worst rout of British cavalry—and the last Zulu victory—of the Anglo-Zulu War in South Africa.
(HN, 3/12/98)(HN, 3/28/99)
1881 Mar 28, "Greatest Show On Earth" was formed by P.T. Barnum and James A. Bailey. [see 1879 and Mar 16,18, 1881]
(MC, 3/28/02)
1881 Mar 28, Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky (42), composer, died. [see Mar 16]
(MC, 3/28/02)
1885 Mar 28, The Salvation Army was officially organized in the U.S.
(HN, 3/28/98)
1886 Mar 28, Jarosla Novotny, composer, was born.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1890 Mar 28, Paul Whiteman, orchestra leader (Paul Whiteman's TV Teen Club), was born in Denver, Co.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1895 Mar 28, Spencer W. Kimball, 12th Prophet of the Mormon Church, was born.
(HN, 3/28/98)
1895 Mar 28, Major James McCudden, the first RAF pilot to receive the Victoria Cross, was born.
(HN, 3/28/99)
1896 Mar 28, The opera "Andrea Chenier," by Umberto Giordano, premiered in Milan, Italy.
(AP, 3/28/97)
1898 Mar 28, The Supreme Court ruled in United States v. Wong Kim Ark that a child born in the United States to Chinese immigrants was a US citizen.
(AP, 3/28/08)
1903 Mar 28, Rudolf Serkin, pianist (Marlboro School of Music), was born in Eger, Bohemia.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1905 Mar 28, Marlin Perkins, TV host (Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom), was born in Carthage, Mo.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1907 Mar 28, Pavel Ivanovich Blaramberg (65), composer, died.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1908 Mar 28, Automobile owners lobbied Congress, supporting a bill that called for vehicle licensing and federal registration.
(HN, 3/28/98)
1909 Mar 28, Nelson Algren (d.1981, novelist (The Man with the Golden Arm, A Walk on the Wild Side), was born.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nelson_Algren)
1910 Mar 28, Pres. Theodore Roosevelt gave his “Law and Order in Egypt" speech at Cairo Univ. Sheikh Ali Yusuf, Muslim cleric and popular columnist, had written an open letter in praise of Roosevelt’s visit, but the president’s imperious tone soon disappointed Egyptian hopes.
(www.mobipocket.com/EN/eBooks/eBookDetails.asp?BookID=86377)(Econ, 6/6/09, p.1910)
1910 Mar 28, The first seaplane took off from water at Martinques, France.
(HN, 3/28/98)
1911 Mar 28, M.K. Ciurlionis (b.1875), Lithuanian artist and composer, died.
(LC, 1998, p.12)
1914 Mar 28, Edmund Sixtus Muskie, (Sen-D-Me), US Sec of State (1980), was born.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1917 Mar 28, The Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC) was founded, these were Great Britain’s first official service women.
(HN, 3/28/99)
1917 Mar 28, Puccini's "La Rondine," premiered in Monte Carlo.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1917 Mar 28, Jews were expelled from Tel Aviv and Jaffa by Turkish authorities.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1920 Mar 28, Dirk Bogarde, actor (Death in Venice, Servant), was born in London, England.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1920 Mar 28, Thomas Masaryk was elected president of Czechoslovakia.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1922 Mar 28, The 1st microfilm device was introduced.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1924 Mar 28, At the request of French President Raymond Poincaré Col. Ernest Mercier with the support of ninety banks and companies founded Compagnie française des pétroles (CFP), later renamed Total.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_SE)
1927 Mar 28, Karl Prohaska (57), composer, died.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1928 Mar 28, Zbigniew Brzezinski, US national security advisor (Carter), was born in Warsaw.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1928 Mar 30, Petaluma farmers shipped 58 carloads of eggs by train to SF. 50,000 cases contained some 18 million eggs.
(Ind, 4/26/03, p.5A)
1928 Mar 28, J.L. Rutledge, Pacific Air Transport pilot, ran out of fuel and parachuted from his plane near Orinda, Ca. The plane crashed nearby and he retrieved the mail and delivered it to the Orinda post office.
(SFC, 3/28/03, p.E8)
1928 Mar 28, Giuseppe Ferrata (63), composer, died.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1929 Mar 28, Frederick Exley, American novelist (A Fan's Notes), was born.
(HN, 3/28/01)
1930 Mar 28, Jerome Isaac Friedman, American physicist, was born. He helped confirm the existence of quarks.
(HN, 3/28/01)
1930 Mar 28, The names of the Turkish cities of Constantinople and Angora were changed to Istanbul and Ankara.
(AP, 3/28/97) (HN, 3/28/98)
1931 Mar 28, Byron Bancroft Johnson (b.1864), founder of the American League Baseball organization, died. In 1937 he was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame.
(ON, 6/09, p.12)
1933 Mar 28, Nazis ordered a ban on all Jews in businesses, professions and schools.
(HN, 3/28/98)
1933 Mar 28, German Reichstag conferred dictatorial powers on Hitler.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1935 Mar 28, Goddard used gyroscopes to control a rocket.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1936 Mar 28, Mario Vargas Llosa, Peruvian novelist (Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter, Death in the Andes), was born.
(HN, 3/28/01)
1938 Mar 28, The US Supreme Court in Lovell v City of Griffin declared that it is unconstitutional to require someone to get a government permit to engage in free speech.
(SFC, 4/18/09, p.B2)(http://supreme.justia.com/us/303/444/case.html)
1938 Mar 28, Colonel Edward Mandell House (b.1858), friend and advisor to Pres. Woodrow Wilson, died in Texas. In 2006 Godfrey Hodgson authored “Woodrow Wilson’s Right Hand: The Life of Colonel Edward M. House."
(www.library.yale.edu/un/house/chrono.htm)
1939 Mar 28, Philip Barry's "Philadelphia Story," premiered in NYC.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1939 Mar 28, Clark Gable (d.1960) and Carol Lombard (d.1942) stayed at the Arizona Oatman Hotel for their honeymoon. [see Mar 29]
(SSFC, 6/17/01, p.T8)
1939 Mar 28, The Spanish Civil War ended as Madrid fell to Francisco Franco. He emerged victorious and became head of Fascist Spain ending the Spanish Civil War. France executed more than 100,000 people who had opposed him. In 1982 Dan Richardson wrote "Comintern Army," a historical work on the Spanish Civil War. "The Historical Dictionary of the Spanish Civil War" was published in 1982. In 1991 Burnett Bolloten wrote "The Spanish Civil War." In 2006 Antony Beevor authored “The Battle for Spain: The Spanish Civil War 1936-1936." This was an update of his 1982 account.
(SFC, 11/12/96, p.A12)(AP, 3/28/97)(HN, 3/28/98)(WSJ, 11/19/96, p.A22)(Econ, 6/24/06, p.97)
1941 Mar 28, Novelist and critic Virginia Woolf (1882-1941), born as Virginia Stephen, died in Lewes, England. She feared a mental breakdown and threw herself into the River Ouse near her home in Sussex. Her body was never found. She was an English novelist, essayist and critic and wrote standing up. Her diaries over nearly three decades filled 26 volumes. In 1997 "Art and Affection, A Life of Virginia Woolf" was published. In 1997 a biography by Hermione Lee was published.
(SFC, 6/23/96, Z1 p.2)(SFEM, 1/12/97, BR p.7)(AP, 3/28/97)(SFEC, 6/22/97, BR p.8)(HN, 3/28/01)(Econ., 5/23/20, p.70)
1941 Mar 28, The Italian fleet was routed by the British at the Battle of Matapan off the coast of Greece. More than 2,000 Italian sailors died and five Italian ships were destroyed. Mavis Batey (1921-2013) of British intelligence had decoded a message that signaled the attack three days earlier.
(HN, 3/28/99)(SFC, 11/29/13, p.C4)
1942 Mar 28, Samuel Ramey, bass (La Scala, Met Opera), was born in Colby, Kansas.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1942 Mar 28, Japanese-American lawyer Minoru Yasui (1916-1986) violated a military curfew in Portland, Oregon, and demanded to be arrested after he was refused enlistment to fight for the US. He was one of the few Japanese Americans who fought laws that directly targeted Japanese Americans or Japanese immigrants following the bombing of Pearl Harbor. In 2015 he was among 17 people awarded the presidential Medal of Freedom.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minoru_Yasui)(SFC, 11/24/15, p.A5)
1942 Mar 28, British naval forces continued the raid on the Nazi-occupied French port of St. Nazaire. British Bomber Command launched an attack on the German city of Lubeck with 234 RAF bombers.
(AP, 3/28/97)(HN, 3/28/98)(MC, 3/28/02)
1942 Mar 28, A British ship, the HMS Capbeltown, a Lend-Lease American destroyer, which was specifically rammed into a German occupied dry-dock in France, exploded, knocking the area out of action for the German battleship Tirpitz.
(HN, 3/28/00)
1943 Mar 28, Sergei Vasilyevich Rachmaninoff (70), Russian-born composer, died in Beverly Hills, Calif.
(AP, 3/28/97)
1945 Mar 28, Germany launched the last of the V-2 rockets (buzz bomb) against England.
(HN, 3/28/99)
1949 Mar 28, Sec. of Defense James Forrestal resigned due to a mental breakdown. He was worn out by his futile efforts to bring about the unification of the armed services. He was succeeded by Louis A. Johnson. Johnson proceeded to slash defense expenses. He retired all but 5 aircraft carriers and dismantled the first supercarrier.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Forrestal)
1951 Mar 28, China proclaimed the “peaceful liberation" of Tibet. Some 5,000 Tibetans were killed in the process.
(Econ, 7/10/10, p.40)
1953 Mar 28, In the 7th Tony Awards: Crucible and Wonderful Town won.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1953 Mar 28, Jim Thorpe (b.1887), native American decathlon athlete (Olympics-gold-1912), died in Lomita, California.
(AP, 3/28/02)(www.reference.com/browse/wiki/Jim_Thorpe)
1954 Mar 28, In the 8th Tony Awards: Teahouse of the August Moon and Kismet won
(MC, 3/28/02)
1955 Mar 28, John Marshall Harlan was sworn in to the U.S. Supreme Court.
(HN, 3/28/98)
1958 Mar 28, W.C. Handy, the "Father of the Blues," died in New York at age 84.
(AP, 3/28/08)
1959 Mar 28, China announced the dissolution of the Tibetan government. The State Council of the People's Republic of China dissolved the Government of Tibet, which according to official history, liberated Tibetans from feudalism and theocracy. On January 19, 2009, this day was adopted as a holiday, “Serf Emancipation Day," by the Tibetan legislature.
(AP, 1/16/09)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serfs_Emancipation_Day)
1960 Mar 28, In Glasgow, Scotland, a factory exploded burying 20 fire fighters.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1962 Mar 28, The U.S. Air Force announced research into the use of lasers to intercept missiles and satellites.
(HN, 3/28/98)
1963 Mar 28, Alec A. Templeton (52), composer, pianist (Alec Templeton Time), died.
(MC, 3/28/02)
1964 Mar 28, Much of Crescent City, Ca., was demolished early today by a tsunami generated from the 8.6 earthquake that hit Valdez, Alaska. 11 people were killed.
(AP, 3/11/11)(SSFC, 3/23/14, DB p.42)
1964 Mar 28, First pirate radio station began to broadcast off the coast of England. Radio Caroline debuted with a combination of rock music and lively disk jockey whose patter played to a huge audience in Great Britain. British authorities, tried unsuccessfully, to shut down the radio station ship. Radio Caroline had become competition to the staid and usually dull British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC). [see Dec 23]
(MC, 3/28/02)
1965 Mar 28, In San Francisco the Rev. Martin Luther King said that his Southern Christian Leadership Conference would soon call for a massive economic withdrawal program against the State of Alabama.
(SSFC, 3/29/15, DB p.42)
1966 Mar 28, Navy corpsman Robert R. Ingram was shot while with his platoon of marines on a ridge in Quang Ngai province, South Vietnam. He continued providing medical attention to his comrades with multiple wounds to himself. He was awarded a belated Medal of Honor in 1998 due to lost paperwork.
(SFC, 7/11/98, p.A3)
1968 Mar 28, The U.S. lost its first aircraft in Vietnam. An F-111 vanished in a combat mission over North Vietnam. Republic Aircraft's F-105 Thunderchief, better known as the 'Thud,' was the Air Force's war-horse in Vietnam.
(HN, 3/28/98)
1968 Mar 28, In Memphis a riot erupted during a protest march in support of striking sanitation workers led by Martin Luther King. One African-American marcher was killed and King urged calm as National Guard troops are called to Memphis to restore order. King subsequently departed Memphis, but vowed to return on April 4 to attend another march.
(SFC, 12/1/97, p.A3)(http://tinyurl.com/atrl3z)
1969 Mar 28, Dwight D. Eisenhower (b.1890), the 34th president of the US, died at Walter Reed General Hospital in Washington at age 78. In 2002 Carlo D’Este authored "Eisenhower: A Soldier’s Life." In 2006 John Wukovits authored “Eisenhower. In 2007 Kasey S. Pipes authored “Ike’s Final Battle: The Road to Little Rock and the Challenge of Equality." In 2007 Michael Korda authored “Ike: An American Hero." In 2012 Jean Edward Smith authored “Eisenhower: In War and Peace."
(AP, 3/28/97)(WSJ, 7/12/02, p.W12)(WSJ, 3/7/07, p.D7)(AH, 6/07, p.70)(SFC, 8/22/07, p.E1)(Econ, 3/17/12, p.92)
1970 Mar 28, Over 1,000 people were killed when a major earthquake damaged 254 villages in Gediz, Turkey. Estimates of the magnitude varied from 6.9 to 7.3.
(http://earthquake.usgs.gov/regional/world/events/1970_03_28.php)
1971 Mar 28, CBS aired the final broadcast of its Ed Sullivan Show. Reruns and pre-emptions aired in that time slot throughout the following April and May, and in June, CBS announced that The Ed Sullivan Show had been cancelled.
(http://tviv.org/The_Ed_Sullivan_Show)
1971 Mar 28, In the 25th Tony Awards held in NYC “Sleuth" won for best play & “Company" won for best musical.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/25th_Tony_Awards)
1973 Mar 28, The Irish Navy caught Joe Cahill (1920-2004) as he tried to smuggle 5 tons of Russian-made explosives, guns and ammunition from Libya.
(SFC, 7/26/04, p.B4)(http://tinyurl.com/5lfwh2)
1974 Mar 28, In Romania the position of President of the Republic was created especially for Nicolae Ceausescu, who is then named President for life by Grand National Assembly.
(www.ceausescu.org/ceausescu_texts/ceausescu_chronology.htm)
1977 Mar 28, In the 49th Academy Awards "Rocky," Peter Finch and Faye Dunaway won.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/49th_Academy_Awards)
1978 Mar 28, Laura Beyerly (16) was last seen in the Los Altos, Ca., school parking lot. Her remains were found a year later in the Santa Cruz County hills on property belonging to the uncle of Scott B. Schultz. In 2006 police in Colorado arrested Scott B. Schultz, a boy friend with whom she had broken up. In 2007 Schultz faced just one year in jail in a plea deal.
(SFC, 8/24/06, p.B1)(SFC, 9/2/06, p.B3)(SFC, 6/16/07, p.B1)
1978 Mar 28, A SF city power failure lasted up to an hour and 42 minutes after workmen in a Potrero power plant skipped a step while restarting a circuit.
(SFC, 3/28/03, p.E8)
1978 Mar 28, In San Francisco the badly beaten and strangled body of Marissa Rolf Harvey (15) was found in the Sutro Heights Park area. She had disappeared a day earlier while on trip from New York to visit family. In 2021 Mark Stanley Personette (76) was arrested in Conifer, about 40 miles outside of Denver, and booked into a local jail on one count of homicide.
(https://tinyurl.com/2p8e2umz)(SFC, 12/20/21, p.C1)
1979 Mar 28, America's worst commercial nuclear accident occurred inside the Unit Two reactor at the Three Mile Island plant near Middletown, Pa., almost to meltdown. Thousands living near the plant left the area before the 12-day crisis ended, during which time some radioactive water and gases were released. A combination of mechanical and human factors allowed the Unit 2 reactor to lose cooling water. It cost more than $1 billion and more than a decade to remove the damaged nuclear fuel. A 1997 study indicated increased cancer rates for people living downwind.
(TMC, 1994, p.1979)(SFC, 6/8/96, p.A2)(SFC, 2/24/96, p.A3)(AP, 3/28/97) (HN, 3/28/98)(MC, 3/28/02)
1979 Mar 28, Michelle Triola Marvin lost her palimony suit against actor Lee Marvin. She had sought half of $3.6 million that Marvin earned during their 1964-1970 relationship. A judge awarded her $104,000 so that she could learn new job skills. In 1981 a California State Court of Appeal rescinded the award.
(SFC, 1/1/09, p.B5)(http://law.jrank.org/pages/3295/Marvin-V-Marvin-Palimony-Suit-1979.html)
1980 Mar 28, Jesse Owens (b.1913), Olympic-gold medal winner (1936), died. In 1986 William J. Baker authored “Jess Owens: An American Life."
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Owens)(ON, 8/10, p.12)
1982 Mar 28, Voters in El Salvador went to the polls for a constituent assembly election that resulted in victory for the Christian Democrats, led by President Jose Napoleon Duarte.
(AP, 3/28/97)
1984 Mar 28, Zoe, the 1st frozen-embryo child, was born in Melbourne, Australia. Scientists reported the birth 2 weeks later.
(www.breedingbetterdogs.com/aging.html)
1985 Mar 28, Neil Simon's "Biloxi Blues," premiered in NYC.
(http://tinyurl.com/ygdptw)
1985 Mar 28, Marc Chagall (b.1887), Belarus-born French painter, died. In 2008 Jackie Wullschlager authored “Chagall: A Biography."
(www.artelino.com/articles/marc_chagall.asp)(Econ, 9/20/08, p.101)
1986 Mar 28, The U.S. Senate passed a $100 million aid package for the Nicaraguan contras.
(HN, 3/28/98)
1986 Mar 28, In Indiana high school student Denise Pflum went missing in Connersville after she planned to return to the site of a party to retrieve her purse. In 2020 the Fayette County Sheriff’s Office announced that Shawn M. McClung has been charged with voluntary manslaughter in the girl’s death.
(Miami Herald, 7/9/20)
1986 Mar 28, Extremist Sikhs killed 13 Hindus in Ludhiana, India.
(http://tinyurl.com/h5at2)
1987 Mar 28, Maria Augusta von Trapp (b.1905), one of the Trapp Family Singers, died in Morrisville, Vt. Her 1949 book “The Story of the Trapp Family Singers" was fictionalized in the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical The Sound of Music (1965).
(AP, 3/28/97)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maria_von_Trapp)
1988 Mar 28, Richard Gephardt ended his bid for the Democratic presidential nomination, following his third-place finish in the Michigan caucuses.
(AP, 3/28/98)
1989 Mar 28, President Bush sent three high-ranking officials to Alaska to "take a hard look" at the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska's Prince William Sound. '
(AP, 3/28/99)
1990 Mar 28, Jesse Owens (1913-1980) was awarded (posthumously) the Congressional Gold Medal from President George Bush.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Owens)
1990 Mar 28, British customs officials announced they had foiled an attempt to supply Iraq with 40 American-made devices for triggering nuclear weapons, following an 18-month investigation by U.S. and British authorities.
(AP, 3/28/00)
1991 Mar 28, Former President Reagan declared his support for the so-called “Brady Bill" requiring a seven-day waiting period for handgun purchases.
(AP, 3/28/01)
1991 Mar 28, Fire seriously damaged the US Embassy in Moscow.
(AP, 3/27/01)
1991 Mar 28, Tens of thousands of supporters of Boris N. Yeltsin marched in Moscow in defiance of President Mikhail S. Gorbachev’s ban on rallies.
(AP, 3/28/01)
1992 Mar 28, Democrats Bill Clinton and Jerry Brown clashed over Brown's flat-tax proposal, with Clinton charging the plan would hurt the poor, and Brown accusing Clinton of inventing "another big lie."
(AP, 3/28/97)
1993 Mar 28, Francisco Garcia Diaz discovered a type II supernova in M81 (NGC 3031).
(www.aavso.org/aavso/membership/nova.shtml)
1993 Mar 28, Chinese Premier Li Peng won a second term.
(AP, 3/28/98)
1993 Mar 28, About 10,000 people marched in Dublin, Ireland, to protest an IRA bombing that killed two young boys.
(AP, 3/28/98)
1993 Mar 28, Russian President Boris Yeltsin and his chief political rival, parliament speaker Ruslan Khasbulatov, claimed victory after surviving attempts by the Russian Congress to oust them.
(AP, 3/28/98)
1994 Mar 28, In Johannesburg, South Africa, ANC guards killed more than 50 people in violence that erupted during a march by Zulu nationalists.
(AP, 3/28/99)(WSJ, 3/29/96, p.A-1)
1994 Mar 28, Absurdist playwright Eugene Ionesco died in Paris at age 81.
(AP, 3/28/99)
1995 Mar 28, Loomis guard Rick Price was shot in the head and killed during an armored car robbery in Sonoma, Ca. Bank robber William Crouch was also killed by a second guard and alleged accomplice Joan Carrafa of Glen Ellen was later arrested. She was convicted in 1996 for first degree murder.
(SFC, 5/25/96, p.A16)
1995 Mar 28, In Japan, Mitsubishi Bank and the Bank of Tokyo agreed to a merger to create what was then the world's largest bank.
(AP, 3/28/00)
1996 Mar 28, Congress passed the line-item veto, giving the president power to cut government spending by scrapping specific programs.
(AP, 3/28/97)
1996 Mar 28, The space shuttle Atlantis astronauts said goodbye to the crew of Russia's space station Mir and then flew away, leaving Shannon Lucid behind for a five-month stay in orbit.
(AP, 3/28/97)
1996 Mar 28, Col. Gadhaffi of Libya sent troops to put down unrest in northeastern Libya after a 400 prisoners, many including dissidents and Islamic militants, escaped from prison last week.
(WSJ, 3/28/96, p.A-1)
1997 Mar 28, Robert Pinsky (56) of Boston Univ. was named poet laureate of the United States by the Library of Congress.
(SFC, 3/28/97, p.A7)
1997 Mar 28, A medical examiner revealed that some members of the Heaven's Gate cult who'd committed suicide in a California mansion had also been castrated in apparent pursuit of the group's ideal of androgynous immortality.
(AP, 3/28/98)
1997 Mar 28, The UN Security Council agreed to send a multinational force to Albania to protect the delivery of humanitarian aid.
(SFC, 3/29/97, p.A10)
1998 Mar 28, President Clinton, during his visit to South Africa, went to Soweto, a landmark in the bloody uprising against apartheid, to honor South Africans "who answered the call of conscience" and defeated their country's system of white supremacy.
(AP, 3/28/99)
1998 Mar 28, It was reported that the US government conducted a series of “sub-critical" underground explosions involving radioactive plutonium in a sealed chamber 960 feet below ground at the Los Alamos National Lab.
(SFC, 3/28/98, p.A5)
1998 Mar 28, In France tens of thousands marched in demonstrations against the right-wing National Front, which made gains in recent regional elections.
(SFEC, 3/29/98, p.A12)
1998 Mar 28, In India the Hindu Nationalist BJP won a confidence vote in parliament by a narrow margin, 274-261.
(SFEC, 3/29/98, p.A12)
1998 Mar 28, In Madagascar the locust swarm was reported to have covered an estimated 24 million acres in the south of the country.
(SFC, 3/28/98, p.A5)
1998 Mar 28, In Russia former Prime Minister Victor Chernomyrdin announced his candidacy for the presidential election in 2000.
(SFEC, 3/29/98, p.A12)
1999 Mar 28, Venus Williams beat kid sister Serena 6-1, 4-6, 6-4 to win the Lipton Championships in the first all-sister women's final in 115 years.
(AP, 3/28/00)
1999 Mar 28, The Sea Launch Co. successfully fired a Ukrainian and Russian built rocket from their Odyssey, marine based, self-propelled platform.
(SFC, 3/29/99, p.A2)
1999 Mar 28, It was reported that Amnesty Int'l. placed the US on its list of human rights violators on the 1st day of the 1st week of the UN annual meeting on global democratic rights in Geneva.
(SFEC, 3/28/99, p.A25)
1999 Mar 28, In SF the 15-story Verducci Hall of California State Univ. on Lake Merced Drive was blown up. It was to be replaced by a new apartment complex. The building, which opened in 1969, was named after Joe Verducci, a former CSU athletic director, and had been vacant since 1991.
(SFC, 3/17/99, p.A12)(SFC, 3/29/99, p.A1,5)
1999 Mar 28, In Cuba the Baltimore Orioles beat a Cuban baseball all-star team 3:2 in 11 innings. A rematch in Baltimore was scheduled for May 3.
(SFC, 3/29/99, p.A1)
1999 Mar 28, Ethiopia claimed to have killed tens of thousands of Eritrean soldiers since Feb 23. Eritrea made equally high and unconfirmed claims of enemy casualties.
(WSJ, 3/29/99, p.A1)
1999 Mar 28, In Israel hundreds of government and public service workers resumed their nationwide strike against a decision to cap wage increases.
(SFC, 3/29/99, p.A8)
1999 Mar 28, In Japan the exploits of Nasubi, a 23-year-old comedian, came to an end as his producers revealed him naked to a studio audience. For over a year he had been shown on weekly TV, without his knowledge, trying to survive on prizes from magazine competitions. He never won any clothes.
(SFC, 4/1/99, p.E5)
1999 Mar 28, An American Stealth F117 Nighthawk is shot down over northern Yugoslavia during the NATO air strikes against Serbs attacking Kosovo.
(HN, 3/28/00)
1999 Mar 28, NATO broadened its attacks on Yugoslavia to target Serb military forces in Kosovo in the fifth straight night of airstrikes. UN officials reported that some 500,000 ethnic Albanians had fled Kosovo. NATO officials raised the possibility of using ground troops in Yugoslavia as low-level strikes against tanks began. It was feared that anger over the war would spill over to Bosnia.
(SFC, 3/29/99, p.A1,10)(AP, 3/28/00)
1999 Mar 28, The notorious Scorpions unit stormed the northern Kosovo town of Podujevo. In 2004 a Belgrade court convicted Sasa Cvjetan, a member of the unit, of killing 14 ethnic Albanian civilians, mostly women and children. The verdict was overturned but in 2005 a re-trial confirmed his guilt and 20-year sentence. In 2008 four members of the Scorpions paramilitary group were tried by a Belgrade court for allegedly gunning down 19 civilians in Podujevo. On June 18, 2009, they were convicted sentenced to between 15 and 20 years in prison.
(AP, 6/17/05)(AP, 12/11/08)(AP, 6/18/09)(www.hlc-rdc.org/Saopstenja/1712.en.html)
1999 Mar 28, In Paraguay Pres. Raul Cubas resigned and ended a week of political turmoil. Senator Luis Gonzalez Macchi was sworn in as president. Gen'l. Lino Oviedo was granted asylum in Argentina.
(SFC, 3/29/99, p.A9)(SFC, 3/30/99, p.F2)
2000 Mar 28, In a unanimous ruling, the Supreme Court sharply curtailed police power to rely on anonymous tips to stop and search people.
(AP, 3/28/01)
2000 Mar 28, The inflatable boat of a UC Davis research group capsized off the coast of Baja California and at least 3 people died.
(SFC, 3/29/00, p.A1)
2000 Mar 28, In Tennga, Georgia, a freight train collided with a school bus and 2 children were killed with 5 critically injured.
(SFC, 3/29/00, p.A3)
2000 Mar 28, A tornado hit fort Worth, Texas, and 4 people were killed with over 100 injured. It cut a 2-mile swath and inflicted $450 million in damages.
(SFC, 3/29/00, p.A1)(WSJ, 5/6/02, p.A1)
2000 Mar 28, Prof. Adam B. Ulam of Harvard Univ., died at age 77. His 18 books included “Stalin: The Man and His Era" (1973).
(SFC, 4/1/00, p.A26)
2000 Mar 28, Nine of 11 OPEC nations voted to raise oil production by a total of 1.45 million barrels a day.
(SFC, 3/29/00, p.A1)
2000 Mar 28, In Niedersill, Austria, a massive avalanche killed 11 people.
(SFC, 3/29/00, p.A15)
2000 Mar 28, Mohamad Hasan (69), an Indonesian timber tycoon associated with former Pres. Suharto, was arrested for fraud. He had directed the state sanctioned plywood monopoly and controlled a forest mapping company. Hasan received a 6-year sentence and was jailed at Batu prison where he soon organized the inmate obsidian polishing operations.
(WSJ, 3/29/00, p.A19)(WSJ, 8/13/03, p.A1)
2000 Mar 28, Jordan with US intelligence help indicted 28 followers of Osama bin Laden for plotting attacks against American tourists in Dec.
(SFC, 3/29/00, p.A14)
2000 Mar 28, In Rugazi, Uganda, 28 bodies were found under the floor of the home of Dominic Kataribabo, leader of the Movement for the Restoration of Ten Commandments. This brought the total dead to at least 591.
(SFC, 3/29/00, p.A15)
2001 Mar 28, The EU expressed concern over Pres. Bush’s abandonment of the Kyoto Treaty for cutting carbon dioxide emissions.
(WSJ, 3/29/01, p.A1)
2001 Mar 28, The US Senate voted to double the “hard money" contribution limits to candidates and political parties.
(SFC, 3/29/01, p.A1)
2001 Mar 28, A federal appeals court in San Francisco threw out a record $107 million verdict against anti-abortion activists, ruling that a Web site and wanted posters branding abortion doctors “baby butchers" and criminals were protected by the First Amendment.
(AP, 3/28/02)
2001 Mar 28, The authors of a book on the Oklahoma City bombing revealed that during prison interviews, Timothy McVeigh had shown no remorse for what happened, and called the 19 children who died “collateral damage."
(AP, 3/28/02)
2001 Mar 28, Bosnian Croat soldiers deserted by the hundreds following orders by the self-proclaimed Croat National Assembly led by the nationalist Croat Democratic Union. Many returned after the defense ministry warned that they would forfeit wages and benefits.
(SFC, 3/29/01, p.A12)
2001 Mar 28, Two Israeli teenagers were killed by a Palestinian suicide bomber. Israeli gunships followed up with missile strikes at Arafat’s personal security forces (Force 17) and at least 3 Palestinians were killed.
(SFC, 3/29/01, p.A10)
2001 Mar 28, In Jordan an Arab summit convened. Delegates had already approved a draft resolution for the UN to allow Baghdad to fund the Palestinian uprising.
(WSJ, 3/27/01, p.A17)
2001 Mar 28, Macedonia began final assaults on rebels near the Kosovo border as political talks were set to begin.
(SFC, 3/29/01, p.A10)
2001 Mar 28, In Mexico Zapatistas told the Mexican legislature that the military phase of their struggle was over and that political efforts would take precedence.
(SFC, 3/29/01, p.A1)
2001 Mar 28, Russia’s Pres. Putin replaced his defense and interior ministers. Sergei Ivanov was appointed the new defense minister and Boris Gryzlov the new interior minister.
(SFC, 3/29/01, p.A10)
2002 Mar 28, A US diplomat, reportedly the CIA station chief, was pulled from Belgrade following accusations that he was receiving military secrets.
(WSJ, 3/29/02, p.A1)
2002 Mar 28, Walter Hewlett, a dissident director of Hewlett-Packard Co., claimed HP used corporate assets to entice and coerce certain financial institutions to vote for the merger with Compaq Corp.
(SFC, 3/29/02, p.A1)
2002 Mar 28, US Air Force Staff Sergeant Timothy Woodland was convicted in a Japanese court and sentenced to nearly three years in prison for raping a woman on the southern island of Okinawa.
(AP, 3/28/03)
2002 Mar 28, Matthew J. Bourgeois (35), a Navy Seal from Tallahassee, was killed by a land mine in Kandahar.
(SFC, 3/29/02, p.A9)
2002 Mar 28, A US Navy helicopter crashed on Split Mountain in the Sequoia National Forest and 2 crew members were killed.
(SFC, 3/29/02, p.A5)
2002 Mar 28, In Beirut the Arab League committed to accepting Israel as a neighbor under conditions that included the creation of an independent Palestinian state and Israel's full withdrawal from war-won lands, an offer that Israel did not accept.
(SFC, 3/29/02, p.A15)(AP, 3/28/03)(www.mideastweb.org/saudipeace.htm)
2002 Mar 28, A Hamas attack left 4 Israelis dead in a West Bank settlement. Arafat said he was ready to call for a cease-fire.
(WSJ, 3/29/02, p.A1)
2002 Mar 28, In Pakistan police in Faisalabad and Lahore seized over 40 suspects in the Islamabad bombing. At least 2 suspects were killed in Faisalabad. Abu Zubaydah, a top al Qaeda commander, was among those arrested.
(SFC, 3/29/02, p.A10)(SSFC, 3/31/02, p.A17)(SFC, 4/2/02, p.A7)
2002 Mar 28, Pope John Paul II accepted the resignation of Julius Paetz, archbishop of Poznan, Poland, due to a sex scandal and accusations of molesting young seminarians.
(SFC, 3/29/02, p.A7)
2003 Mar 28, In the 10th day of Operation Iraqi Freedom the biggest bombs dropped on Baghdad so far, two 4,700-pound "bunker busters," struck a communications tower. In the south, Iraqi fighters defending the besieged city of Basra fired on hundreds of civilians trying to flee. The British supply ship Sir Galahad docked at the port of Umm Qasr. The Bush administration said fighting might not be over for months. At least 58 people were killed in a crowded market in northwest Baghdad by what local officials called a coalition bombing. A US pilot was heard saying "I'm going to be sick," then "we're in jail, dude," after firing on the British convoy in the southern Iraqi city of Basra. Lance Corporal of Horse Matty Hull was killed by American pilots.
(AP, 3/28/03)(SFC, 3/29/03, p.W1)(AP, 2/6/07)(Econ, 2/10/07, p.58)
2003 Mar 28, Chechen rebels killed six Russian soldiers and two riot police.
(AP, 3/29/03)
2003 Mar 28, In Hong Kong at least 58 more people became sick with symptoms of SARS. 11 Hong Kong deaths were on the disease.
(SFC, 3/29/03, p.A1)
2003 Mar 28, In Jammu-Kashmir suspected Islamic militants attacked and mutilated 5 Kashmiri Muslim villagers, accusing them of being police informants.
(AP, 3/28/03)
2003 Mar 28, Japan's first spy satellites were blasted into orbit, causing an angry North Korea to warn the move could spark an arms race in the region.
(AP, 3/28/03)
2003 Mar 28, The UN Security Council voted unanimously to extend the UN assistance mission in Afghanistan for a year.
(AP, 3/28/03)
2004 Mar 28, Art James (74), TV game show host died in Palm Springs, Calif.
(AP, 3/28/05)
2004 Mar 28, Sir Peter Ustinov (b. Apr 16, 1921), a brilliant wit and mimic who won two Oscars for an acting career that ranged from the evil Nero in "Quo Vadis" to the quirky Agatha Christie detective Hercule Poirot, died at age 82 in Switzerland.
(AP, 3/29/04)
2004 Mar 28, A powerful storm, dubbed Catarina, lashed Brazil's southern coast, damaging thousands of homes, killing two people.
(AP, 3/29/04)
2004 Mar 28, In Kinshasa, Congo, government forces battled attackers at military installations and television headquarters. Diplomats called it a coup attempt against Pres. Joseph Kabila.
(AP, 3/28/04)
2004 Mar 28, France's left-wing opposition bulldozed its way across the country in second-round midterm regional elections, putting pressure on President Jacques Chirac to revamp his Cabinet and perhaps even ditch his prime minister due to widely unpopular economic reforms and rising unemployment.
(AP, 3/28/04)(AP, 3/29/04)
2004 Mar 28, Georgians voted in the country's third election in less than six months. Supporters of President Mikhail Saakashvili swept to victory in Georgia's parliamentary election, according to early results.
(AP, 3/28/04)(AP, 3/29/04)
2004 Mar 28, Guadeloupe's leader conceded defeat in regional elections that pushed her conservative party out of power for the first time in 12 years, a loss seen as public backlash toward moves to win greater autonomy from Paris.
(AP, 3/29/04)
2004 Mar 28, In Iraq US soldiers in the northern city of Mosul shot and killed four rebels suspected of involvement in attacks in the region. Gunmen in Mosul killed 2 British and Canadian electrical engineers. Coalition forces closed Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's newspaper, claiming it incited anti-US violence.
(AP, 3/29/04)(WSJ, 4/1/04, p.A10)(WSJ, 4/19/04, p.A14)
2004 Mar 28, Israel's state attorney officially recommended that PM Ariel Sharon be indicted for bribe-taking.
(AP, 3/28/04)
2004 Mar 28, The Thailand government said violence in the Muslim-dominated south was at a "crucial stage" and pledged tougher measures, after a bombing in the region injured 29 people, including 10 Malaysian tourists.
(AP, 3/28/04)
2004 Mar 28, Premier Recep Tayyip Erdogan's Islamic-rooted party appeared headed for a resounding victory in Turkey's local elections.
(AP, 3/28/04)
2004 Mar 28, Clashes between supporters of Zimbabwe's ruling party and the opposition killed one person and wounded at least 11 during the second day of polling in a parliamentary by-election.
(AP, 3/29/04)
2004 Mar 28-29, In Uzbekistan 2 suicide bombings, attacks on police and an explosion at a terrorist bomb-making factory in Kakhramon killed 19 people and injured 26. The explosion led to 4 days of violence that left at least 47 people dead in including 33 militants.
(AP, 3/29/04)(SSFC, 4/4/04, p.A22)
2005 Mar 28, The Colorado Supreme Court threw out the death penalty in a rape-and-murder case because five of the jurors had consulted the Bible and quoted Scripture during deliberations.
(AP, 3/28/06)
2005 Mar 28, Hank Greenberg, former longtime CEO of American Int’l. Group (AIG), announced his retirement. He was ousted as CEO 2 weeks earlier.
(WSJ, 3/29/05, p.C1)
2005 Mar 28, It was reported that a consortium of 7 private equity firms purchased SunGard Data systems for $11.3 billion in the biggest buyout since 1989.
(Econ, 4/2/05, p.66)
2005 Mar 28, Hu Xiaoliam was appointed the 1st female head of China’s State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE). The regulator will oversee new trading and price quotes in 8 currency pairs through the interbank China foreign Exchange Trade System (CFETS).
(Econ, 4/2/05, p.68)
2005 Mar 28, In Haiti gunmen with assault rifles ambushed a group of police in Port-au-Prince, spraying their car with bullets in a bold daylight attack that killed 2 officers and a driver.
(AP, 3/28/05)
2005 Mar 28, An 8.7 earthquake occurred in northern Sumatra, Indonesia, in what technically was considered an aftershock to the Dec 26 quake. At least 330 people were killed in collapsed buildings on Nias Island. No major tsunami followed. The UN raised its toll to 624. The government estimated 400-500 were killed.
(SFC, 3/29/05, p.A1)(AP, 3/31/05)(Econ, 4/2/05, p.37)
2005 Mar 28, In Iraq 3 Romanian journalists and their translator were abducted near their Baghdad hotel. The journalists were freed by US forces on May 22. In 2015 Iraqi-born Mohammad Munaf, sentenced in absentia to 10 years prison in 2008 by the Bucharest Appeals Court, was brought to Romania. Munaf was the journalists' guide at the time of the kidnapping and had been held by the US military since May 2005. A Syrian businessman was serving a 20-year sentence in Romania for masterminding the kidnapping.
(AP, 3/29/05)(SSFC, 10/15/06, p.A20)(AP, 8/27/15)
2005 Mar 28, Ireland enacted a law outlawing English on road signs and official maps on much of the nation’s western coast, where many people speak Gaelic.
(SFC, 3/29/05, p.A2)
2005 Mar 28, Israeli troops raided the West Bank town of Jenin, carrying out house-to-house searches and arresting eight Palestinians.
(AP, 3/28/05)
2005 Mar 28, It was reported that Japanese consumer prices had fallen in February at their fastest pace in nearly 2 years. Japan’s deflation was now almost 6 years old. The Ministry of Finance said government debt hit a new record high of $7.062 trillion as of the end of Dec.
(WSJ, 3/28/05, p.A14)
2005 Mar 28, Interim leader Kurmanbek Bakiyev recognized Kyrgyzstan's new parliament as legitimate even though it was chosen in disputed elections, a move designed to end a struggle between the rival legislatures.
(AP, 3/28/05)
2005 Mar 28, Tafa Balogun, Nigeria’s Inspector General of Police, was arrested. He was later charged with numerous counts including embezzling $93 million from police funds.
(Econ, 8/20/05, p.37)(www.efccnigeria.org/)
2005 Mar 28, In Peshawar, Pakistan, thousands of opposition activists chanted "Death to dictatorship!" in the latest demonstration against Pres. Gen. Pervez Musharraf's grip on power.
(AP, 3/28/05)
2005 Mar 28, Pres. Vladimir Putin ordered the Russian government to draft legal reforms that would close the book on shady privatization deals of the 1990s and streamline tax collection.
(AP, 3/28/05)
2005 Mar 28, Sudanese authorities said they had detained 14 people on suspicion of crimes, including rape and murder, committed in the war-ravaged western region of Darfur.
(AFP, 3/28/05)
2006 Mar 28, President Bush announced that White House chief of staff Andy Card has resigned and will be replaced by budget director Joshua Bolten.
(AP, 3/28/06)
2006 Mar 28, The US Federal Reserve under new chairman Ben Bernanke raised its key federal funds rate by a quarter percentage point to 4.75%.
(SFC, 3/29/06, p.C1)
2006 Mar 28, Caspar W. Weinberger (b.1917), former US defense secretary under Pres. Reagan, died.
(SFC, 3/29/06, p.B9)(Econ, 4/1/06, p.71)
2006 Mar 28, In southern Afghanistan a roadside bomb blew up a vehicle carrying Afghan army soldiers, killing six of them.
(AP, 3/28/06)
2006 Mar 28, Rights advocates said some 20 detained opposition supporters have gone on hunger strike to protest conditions at a Belarusian jail holding 400 opposition supporters, as authorities continued to crackdown on dissent following the disputed March 19 election.
(AP, 3/28/06)
2006 Mar 28, In China new regulations viewed on the Health Ministry's Web site forbade the buying and selling of organs and require that donors give written permission for their organs to be transplanted.
(AP, 3/28/06)
2006 Mar 28, Some 1-3 million protesters poured onto France's streets and absent workers hobbled transport services in the first nationwide strike against a new labor law for youths, increasing pressure on the embattled PM to withdraw the contested measure.
(AP, 3/28/06)(Econ, 4/1/06, p.22)
2006 Mar 28, It was reported that France produced 78% of its electricity from nuclear power.
(WSJ, 3/28/06, p.A1)
2006 Mar 28, The German state of Bavaria announced a ban on the use of cell phones in schools to prevent students from viewing images of pornography and extreme violence.
(AP, 3/28/06)
2006 Mar 28, Three groups of gunmen kidnapped 24 Iraqis from a currency exchange and two electronics stores in Baghdad, while a car bomb exploded south of the capital as police exchanged fire with two suicide bombers at a police station, wounding a dozen people. Two US soldiers were killed and three wounded in two attacks outside Baghdad.
(AP, 3/28/06)(AP, 3/29/06)
2006 Mar 28, Israelis voted in an election billed as a referendum on the future of the West Bank, with the leading candidate, acting PM Ehud Olmert, promising to pull back from most of the territory and draw Israel's final borders by 2010. The Kadima Party won the parliamentary elections. Two Israelis were killed in an explosion in southern Israel near the Gaza Strip border.
(AP, 3/28/06)(AP, 3/28/07)
2006 Mar 28, President Anote Tong of the Republic of Kiribati announced the formation of the world's third-largest marine reserve at the 8th UN conference on the Convention on Biological Diversity under way this week in Brazil.
(Reuters, 3/28/06)
2006 Mar 28, Officials said former Liberian President Charles Taylor disappeared from his Nigerian haven, days after his hosts agreed to transfer him to a war crimes tribunal for the murder, rape and maiming of more than a half-million Africans. Taylor was arrested trying to cross the border into Cameroon. He then was flown back to Liberia.
(AP, 3/28/06)(AP, 3/29/06)
2006 Mar 28, A Mexican judge ordered an Argentine journalist to remove references to one of the first lady's sons in a book that claims he benefited financially from his family's political connections. The book "Cronicas Malditas," or roughly "Accursed Chronicles" (2005), alleged that two of Sahagun's three sons, principally Manuel Bribiesca, had used their connections to get preferential treatment on federal government work contracts during the administration of President Vicente Fox, which began in December 2000.
(AP, 3/28/06)
2006 Mar 28, The Palestinian parliament overwhelming approved the new Hamas Cabinet, setting the stage for the new administration to take office later this week.
(AP, 3/28/06)
2006 Mar 28, In South Korea prosecutors formally arrested the top executive of an affiliate of Hyundai Motor Co. in an investigation into suspicions that South Korea's largest carmaker created slush funds through its 39 subsidiaries for bribery.
(AP, 3/28/06)(WSJ, 4/8/06, p.1)
2006 Mar 28, Spain’s ENCE said it will suspend construction of a controversial pulp mill in Uruguay to allow Argentina and Uruguay to resolve their differences over the environmental impact of the project. In October ENCE announced that it was abandoning the project.
(FT, 3/29/06, p.8)(Econ, 10/7/06, p.46)
2006 Mar 28, In Sudan Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa called on Arab leaders to move toward a goal of "entering the nuclear club" and making use of atomic energy for peaceful purposes. The absence of at least 10 heads of state, including President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt and Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah, raised concerns of a lackluster summit.
(AP, 3/28/06)
2006 Mar 28, In Sudan Arab leaders promised to fund African soldiers in Darfur from October this year, despite international pressure to allow the United Nations to take over the mission.
(Reuters, 3/28/06)
2006 Mar 28, Thousands of Kurdish protesters rampaged after funerals for 4 Kurdish PKK guerrillas killed by Turkish troops. They hurled firebombs at armored police vehicles and smashed windows at a police station. 2 Kurds were killed and 40 people injured.
(AP, 3/29/06)(Econ, 4/15/06, p.54)
2006 Mar 28, Ukraine President Viktor Yushchenko met separately with both his estranged Orange Revolution ally and an old pro-Moscow adversary as he sought to form a coalition after most voters rejected his party in weekend parliamentary elections.
(AP, 3/28/06)
2007 Mar 28, Circuit City, a US electronics retailer, fired 3,400 of its highest paid hourly workers and planned to hire replacements wiling to work for less. The laid-off workers were to get a severance package and a chance to reapply for their former jobs at lower pay.
(SFC, 3/29/07, p.C3)
2007 Mar 28, The California Dept. of Agriculture ordered an intrastate quarantine on plants to fight the infestation of light brown apple moths. On May 2 the US Dept. of Agriculture ordered similar restrictions.
(SFC, 5/4/07, p.C3)
2007 Mar 28, Discount retailer TJX Cos. revealed that information from at least 45.7 million credit and debit cards was stolen over an 18-month period. The breach was initially disclosed in January.
(AP, 3/29/07)
2007 Mar 28, Jazz musician Tony Scott (85), a clarinetist, composer and arranger who worked with such greats as Billie Holiday and Charlie Parker, died in Rome.
(AP, 4/1/07)
2007 Mar 28, In Afghanistan a suicide bomber trying to blend in with street beggars exploded himself near a top intelligence official in a crowded part of Kabul, killing four people.
(AP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, In Australia a passenger ferry plowed into a pleasure boat under Sydney's iconic Harbor Bridge, killing at least 3 people, including two professional figure skating judges.
(AP, 3/29/07)
2007 Mar 28, Retired Gurkha soldiers staged a mass protest in London over Britain's refusal to give them full pensions and other rights.
(AP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, Briton Richard Rogers (73), the famed architect of a series of iconic buildings all over the world, was announced winner of the 2007 Pritzker Architecture Prize.
(AFP, 3/29/07)
2007 Mar 28, In northern China an underground gas explosion killed 26 miners in a coal mine in Linfen city, Shanxi province. 6 workers were trapped underground after a subway construction site for the 2008 Beijing Olympics collapsed. Hopes for their survival were slim.
(AP, 3/29/07)
2007 Mar 28, Ecuador's highest electoral court fired a judge who tried to return half the country's legislators to their posts as a political crisis over the rewriting of the country's constitution deepened.
(AP, 3/29/07)
2007 Mar 28, In France an official at a Paris maternity hospital said Sister Marie-Simon-Pierre is the French nun whose testimony of a mystery cure from Parkinson's disease will likely be accepted as the miracle the Vatican needs to beatify Pope John Paul II.
(AP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, Guinean leaders agreed on the formation of a new government in a bid to end months of unrest and political crisis.
(AFP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, Iran aired a video of 15 captured British sailors and marines; the lone female captive, shown in a white tunic and a black head scarf, said the British boats had "trespassed." The crew members were released April 4, 2007.
(AP, 3/28/08)
2007 Mar 28, In Iraq Shiite militants and police enraged by massive truck bombings in the northwestern town of Tal Afar went on a revenge spree against Sunni residents there, killing as many as 60 people. Suicide bombers detonated explosives on trucks carrying highly toxic chlorine in Fallujah, wounding about 15 US and Iraqi security forces.
(AP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, Hundreds of Israeli police in riot gear dragged squatters from the ruins of the former Homesh settlement, ending a three-day showdown between the government and settlers trying to re-establish the settlement. Homesh was one of four settlements in the northern West Bank dismantled in 2005.
(AP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, A Japanese man was sentenced to death for murdering three people he lured through a suicide Web site by offering to die with them.
(AP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, In Tank, Pakistan, hundreds of militants fired rockets, killed one security official and kidnapped a school principal where police had slain two men accused of recruiting students for suicide attacks.
(AP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, Unidentified gunmen shot at a Hamas militant leader and his family during a car chase through Gaza City, injuring five people, including bystanders and a child. A small group of Arab lesbians quietly defied Islamist protesters and a social taboo to gather at a rare public conference in Haifa, Israeli. It was organized by Aswat, an organization for Arab lesbians with members in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
(AP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, The health department of Philippines said HIV/AIDS is ravaging the large overseas work force, posing a long-term threat to one of Manila's key sources of foreign exchange. Jun Ducat (56), a Manila day-care center owner armed with grenades and guns, held more than 30 youngsters and teachers hostage on a bus, then freed them after a 10-hour standoff that he used to denounce corruption and demand better lives for impoverished children.
(AFP, 3/28/07)(http://english.people.com.cn/200703/29/eng20070329_362055.html)
2007 Mar 28, Russia's scientific elite, in a rare show of disobedience to the Kremlin, voted against a government-proposed charter that would have transferred control of the historically independent Academy of Sciences to the state.
(AP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, Sudan and the UN signed an agreement to guarantee humanitarian access to refugees in Darfur. UN chief Ban Ki-moon tried to persuade President Omar al-Bashir to accept UN peacekeepers in Darfur, hours after al-Bashir flatly rejected the deployment.
(AP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, In Tanzania 14 Southern African leaders meet for a two-day extraordinary summit on economic and political regional woes spurred by crises in Zimbabwe and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
(AFP, 3/28/07)
2007 Mar 28, Police stormed the offices of Zimbabwe's main opposition party and arrested leader Morgan Tsvangirai, hours before he planned to talk to reporters about a wave of political violence that had left him briefly hospitalized. Tsvangirai was released after several hours.
(AP, 3/28/07)(AP, 3/29/07)
2008 Mar 28, The US Transportation Security Administration said it will change they way its officers search passengers with body piercings after a Texas woman complained she was forced to remove a nipple ring with pliers in order to board an airplane.
(AP, 3/29/08)
2008 Mar 28, The grey wolf of the northern Rocky Mountains was taken off the federal protection list after reaching a population of some 1,500 in the greater Yellowstone region. Wolves were reintroduced in 1995 after disappearing from the area in 1926. On July 18 a judge restored protection for the wolves in Montana, Wyoming and Idaho, derailing plans for public wolf hunts this fall. On Sep 29 a federal court overturned the Bush administration’s decision to remove gray wolves from the endangered species list in the Great lakes region.
(Econ, 3/29/08, p.44)(SFC, 7/19/08, p.A4)(WSJ, 9/30/08, p.A1)
2008 Mar 28, Helen Yglesias (92), American novelist and editor, died. Her first book: “How she Died" (1972), tells of Mary Moody Schwartz, the daughter of a Communist convicted of spying for the Soviets in the 1930s.
(SFC, 4/8/08, p.B5)
2008 Mar 28, British Airways Plc cancelled a fifth of flights from its new $8.6 billion terminal at London's Heathrow airport as chaos from its shambolic opening spilled into a second day.
(AP, 3/28/08)
2008 Mar 28, Jean-Jacques Demafouth, an exiled former defense minister in the Central African Republic, said that he had been elected head of the main rebel group and would lead it into peace talks. The UN said rebel fighters attacked CAR villages between Feb 9 and Mar 10 raping women and taking 150 hostages, including 55 children.
(AFP, 3/28/08)
2008 Mar 28, In Chile 5 youths, aged 14-20, attacked 9 German soldiers and took them hostage in the port city of Iquique. One soldier escaped and police quickly surrounded the house and arrested four suspects after a shootout.
(AP, 3/29/08)
2008 Mar 28, China allowed the first foreign diplomats to visit Tibet following deadly riots, as Germany joined some other European nations in announcing its leader would skip the Olympics opening. Police closed off Lhasa's Muslim quarter, two weeks after Tibetan rioters burned down the city's mosque during the largest anti-Chinese protests in nearly two decades.
(AP, 3/28/08)
2008 Mar 28, Mohamed Bacar, the rebel leader of the Comoros island of Anjouan, arrived in Reunion to an uncertain future, two days after his ouster by Comoran and African Union forces.
(AP, 3/28/08)
2008 Mar 28, President Raul Castro's government said it is allowing cell phones for ordinary Cubans, a luxury previously reserved for those who worked for foreign firms or held key posts with the communist-run state.
(AP, 3/28/08)
2008 Mar 28, A commerce ministry official said Egypt is to suspend rice exports for six months to try to meet the demands of its own people hit by soaring food prices. Hundreds of residents of the ancient city of Luxor clashed with riot police during a protest against government attempts to move them to make room for an open-air museum free of modern buildings.
(AP, 3/28/08)(AP, 3/29/08)
2008 Mar 28, Indonesian police said they were investigating the deaths over the last 2 weeks of 21 people who drank a concoction labeled an herbal remedy.
(AP, 3/28/08)
2008 Mar 28, PM Nouri al-Maliki's office says the Iraqi government has given residents of Basra until April 8 to turn over "heavy and medium-size weapons" in return for a reward. US warplanes carried out at least two airstrikes overnight in Basra for the first time since clashes between Shiite militias and Iraqi security forces erupted this week. A US warplane strafed snipers in the southern city of Basra, killing at least 16 suspected militants after Iraqi troops came under heavy fire. Shiite militants also clashed with government forces for a fourth day in Iraq's oil-rich south and sporadic fighting broke out in Baghdad. A US helicopter also fired a Hellfire missile during fighting in the Baghdad's militia stronghold of Sadr City, killing four gunmen. Iraqi police and hospital officials in Sadr City said 5 civilians were killed and 4 others wounded in the attack. A US air assault in the Kazamiyah neighborhood, west of Sadr City, killed 10 militants. At least 12 militia fighters were killed and 7 others wounded in fighting in Mahmoudiya. Fierce fighting in the Mahdi Army stronghold of Nasiriyah killed at least 4 people. 2 Iraqi security forces were killed and 3 wounded in Kut.
(AP, 3/28/08)(AP, 3/29/08)(AP, 3/30/08)
2008 Mar 28, Jordan, Iraq and Yemen announced at the last minute that their top leaders will not attend this weekend's Arab summit in Damascus.
(AP, 3/28/08)
2008 Mar 28, North Korea test-fired a barrage of short-range missiles in apparent response to the new South Korean government's tougher stance on Pyongyang.
(AP, 3/28/08)
2008 Mar 28, Palestinian medics say a Palestinian man was killed by Israeli army fire as he approached Gaza's border fence with Israel. The Israeli military said the man was armed and hurled a grenade at forces close to the fence.
(AP, 3/29/08)
2008 Mar 28, South Africa launched a four million dollar program to track down tuberculosis patients who have defaulted treatment, leading to resistant strains of the illness.
(AP, 3/28/08)
2008 Mar 28, In northeastern Tanzania 75 miners were missing and believed to have died in mines following heavy rains.
(AP, 3/29/08)
2008 Mar 28, Turkish warplanes hit Kurdish rebel targets in northern Iraq.
(AP, 3/29/08)
2008 Mar 28, Combat helicopters and F-16 fighter jets opened fire at a clandestine airstrip in Venezuela's remote southern plains as part of a government counter-drug effort. Army Gen. Jesus Gonzalez told state television that so far this year, the military has demolished 67 airstrips used by drug traffickers to smuggle cocaine from neighboring Colombia to the United States and Europe. Another 90 are to be destroyed next week.
(AP, 3/28/08)
2009 Mar 28, In Milton, Massachusetts, Samantha Revelus (17) was stabbed and killed by her brother. Kerby Revelus (23) then decapitated his 5-year-old sister as her birthday cake from the day before sat on the kitchen table. He then turned on his 9-year-old sister, who called police. Responding officers broke down the door and shot him dead. Sarafina was hospitalized with defensive wounds to her hands and stab wounds in her abdomen and one of her legs.
(AP, 3/30/09)
2009 Mar 28, The space shuttle Discovery landed in Florida following a 13-day mission to the Int’l. Space Station (ISS).
(SSFC, 3/29/09, p.A12)
2009 Mar 28, In North Dakota the Red River crested at 12:15 a.m. at 40.82 feet, more than 22 feet above flood stage.
(AP, 3/29/09)
2009 Mar 28, Afghanistan's president offered support for the new US strategy for the growing conflict in his country, praising increased civil and military aid and highlighting a plan for reconciliation with moderate elements of the Taliban.
(AP, 3/28/09)
2009 Mar 28, Sydney became the world's first major city to plunge itself into darkness for the second worldwide Earth Hour, a global campaign to highlight the threat of climate change.
(AP, 3/28/09)
2009 Mar 28, Thousands of demonstrators marched through London to demand action on poverty, jobs and climate change at the start of a week of protests aimed at the G20 summit in the capital.
(AP, 3/28/09)
2009 Mar 28, In Dubai Sulim Yamadayev, a former Chechen rebel and brother of Ruslan Yamadaev (d.2008), was shot in a brazen attack and died on March 30. He had switched sides to the government during Chechnya's long-running conflict with Moscow. On April 5 Dubai authorities said they had arrested two suspects in the slaying. They said Adam Delimkhanov, a Chechen member of Russia’s lower house and the Chechen president's right-hand man, had masterminded the killing. On April 12, 2010, Mahdi Tagi Dhurnia of Iran and Tajik national Mahsoudjan Asmanov were sentenced to 25 years in prison after being found guilty of aiding and abetting the assassination of Yamadayev.
(AP, 3/31/09)(SFC, 3/31/09, p.A5)(AP, 4/5/09)(SFC, 4/6/09, p.A3)(AP, 4/12/10)(AP, 12/22/10)(Econ., 3/14/15, p.55)
2009 Mar 28, An Egyptian health ministry spokesman said a two-year-old girl has contracted bird flu, the 60th reported case since the first outbreak of the disease in the country in 2006.
(AP, 3/28/09)
2009 Mar 28, In Guyana Janet Jagan (88), a Chicago native who became Guyana's first white and first female president (1997), died.
(AP, 3/28/09)
2009 Mar 28, Police in northern India arrested a great-grandson of the country's first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, over allegations he made inflammatory comments against Muslims. Police fired in the air and baton-charged a crowd of at least 10,000 of Varun Gandhi's supporters shouting pro-Hindu slogans as he was arrested in his constituency in Uttar Pradesh.
(Reuters, 3/28/09)
2009 Mar 28, Iraqi troops in Baghdad arrested the head of Fadhil's Awakening Council for alleged terrorist activity and for purportedly leading an armed group loyal to Saddam Hussein's ousted party. Adil al-Mashhadani was believed to have been involved in murder, extortion and other crimes as well as leading an armed wing of Saddam's Baath party.
(AP, 3/29/09)
2009 Mar 28, In Nigeria police s outside Lagos freed a Lebanese hostage after a shoot-out in which six of his captors were killed. The man was seized March 23 by gunmen from a waterfront construction site in Lagos' upmarket residential and business area.
(AFP, 3/29/09)
2009 Mar 28, Pakistani security forces killed 26 militants during an operation in a restive tribal region bordering Afghanistan. Helicopter gunships went into action in Mohmand, one of seven lawless tribal districts in northwest Pakistan where Taliban militants have been active. Dozens of suspected militants fired rockets at a transport terminal in Peshawar, damaging a dozen shipping containers.
(AFP, 3/28/09)(AP, 3/29/09)
2009 Mar 28, Tibetans rallied against the China’s new holiday, Serfs Liberation Day, on the 50th anniversary of Beijing’s crushing of a Tibetan uprising that led to the Dalai lama’s exile.
(AP, 3/29/09)
2010 Mar 28, President Barack Obama made a surprise visit to Afghanistan for a firsthand look at the 8-year-old war he inherited and dramatically escalated. German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere held talks in Afghanistan on stuttering progress in training the country's security forces. Russia accused the US of conniving with Afghanistan's drug producers by refusing to destroy opium crops, the second time in a week Moscow has taken a swipe at the West over drug policy.
(AP, 3/28/10)(AFP, 3/28/10)(Reuters, 3/28/10)
2010 Mar 28, US federal agents in Ohio arrested 2 members of Hutaree, a Christian militia group “preparing for end time battles to keep the testimony of Jesus Christ alive." A 3rd person was arrested the next day in Indiana as part of an investigation led by the FBI in Michigan.
(SFC, 3/29/10, p.A6)
2010 Mar 28, The Pritzker Architecture Prize was awarded to Kazuyo Sejima and Ryue Nishizawa, partners in Sanaa Ltd. of Tokyo. Their work included NYC’s New Museum of Contemporary Art, completed in 2007.
(SFC, 3/29/10, p.A6)
2010 Mar 28, In Colorado Kayleah Wilson (12) went missing as she walked to a b-day party in Greeley. On May 19 police retrieved her decomposing body from an irrigation ditch about a mile and a half from her home.
(SFC, 4/5/10, p.A4)(SFC, 5/21/10, p.A4)
2010 Mar 28, British Airways cabin crew entered the second day of a four-day strike, bringing further travel disruption with no end in sight for a dispute that has become increasingly political.
(AFP, 3/28/10)
2010 Mar 28, In Central Africa LRA elements were chased by the Ugandan army, which killed at least 15 rebels in the village of Dembia. More than 40 people were abducted from the three villages including in Bangassou, where about 400 people had taken refuge from the fighting.
(AFP, 3/30/10)
2010 Mar 28, In northern China at least 153 miners were trapped underground after water gushed into the state-owned the Wangjialing coal mine. 115 Chinese miners were pulled out alive on April 5 after being trapped for over a week in the flooded mine. Some had eaten sawdust and strapped themselves to the shafts' walls with their belts to avoid drowning while they slept. As of April 11 the death toll stood at 33 with 5 miners still missing.
(AP, 3/28/10)(AP, 3/29/10)(AP, 4/5/10)(AP, 4/11/10)
2010 Mar 28, Zhejiang Geely Holding Group signed a binding deal to buy Ford Motor Co.'s Volvo Cars unit for $1.8 billion, representing a coup for the independent Chinese automaker which is aiming to expand in Europe.
(AP, 3/28/10)
2010 Mar 28, Colombian rebels handed over Pvt. Josue Calvo (23) to the International Red Cross in their first release of a captive in more than a year. The insurgents are promising to soon free a second soldier they've held for far longer.
(AP, 3/28/10)(SFC, 3/29/10, p.A2)
2010 Mar 28, In Guyana Sangeeta Persaud (15) died after neighbors and a local pastor tried to treat her convulsions with an exorcism at a church.
(AP, 4/3/10)
2010 Mar 28, In Iraq several bombs exploded near a house linked to a prominent Sunni figure who ran in this month's parliamentary elections, killing five people and wounding 26 others.
(AP, 3/28/10)
2010 Mar 28, Israel said it will restrict access to its territory from the occupied West Bank starting late today ahead of the week-long Jewish Passover holiday.
(AP, 3/28/10)
2010 Mar 28, In Italy voters cast their ballots in regional elections. Premier Silvio Berlusconi emerged as the victor in the elections widely depicted as a test of his popularity. Only 64% bothered to vote.
(AP, 3/28/10)(AP, 3/30/10)(Econ, 4/3/10, p.53)
2010 Mar 28, In Libya Arab leaders renewed their support for Mideast peace efforts, rejecting pressure from Syria and Libya on the Palestinians to abandon talks with Israel and resume armed resistance.
(AP, 3/28/10)
2010 Mar 28, In Mexico gunmen in Durango state killed 10 young people riding in pickup truck when they didn't stop at a gang's illegal roadblock. 3 gunmen died in a clash with soldiers near a park crowded with families in the border city of Nuevo Laredo. Tamaulipas state investigators said police found the bodies of three men who had been shot to death in the town of Miguel Aleman. In the Nuevo Leon city of Santa Catarina, three men and two women were killed in a shootout with soldiers inside a motel.
(AP, 3/30/10)
2010 Mar 28, Pakistani troops repulsed a Taliban attack on an army base and bombed two militant hide-outs close to the Afghan border, killing 22 insurgents in Orakzai tribal region where the army is pressing an offensive.
(AP, 3/28/10)(SFC, 3/29/10, p.A2)
2010 Mar 28, In the Philippines 2 marines were wounded and several Abu Sayyaf fighters were believed killed as troops pursued militants in an offensive on Jolo island that ended today. At least one body of an Abu Sayyaf fighter, killed in the 2-day assault, was dug up by troops.
(AP, 3/28/10)(SFC, 3/29/10, p.A2)
2010 Mar 28, Russia's Pres. Medvedev thought the country had too much time on its hands, so on Sunday he eliminated two of its 11 time zones.
(AP, 3/28/10)
2010 Mar 28, In Russia thousands of angry people demonstrated in the northwestern city of Arkhangelsk against the high cost of living and demanded that the government of PM Vladimir Putin quits.
(AP, 3/28/10)
2010 Mar 28, In Switzerland an armed gang of masked men raided the Grand Casino, packed with about 600 guests near Basel, and made off with hundreds of thousands of dollars.
(AP, 3/28/10)
2011 Mar 28, President Barack Obama explained to a hesitant America why he launched the military assault in Libya.
(AP, 3/29/11)
2011 Mar 28, Federal agricultural workers in Louisiana were reported using blow torches to burning every prickly pear cactus they came across in hope of killing off a cactus-eating pest that's been on a tear across the Gulf Coast and is moving West. Cactoblastis cactorum, a tan-colored moth from Argentina, has been moving steadily across the Gulf Coast for the past decade. Federal workers hoped to stop it before it gets to Texas and the population explodes with an abundant food supply.
(AP, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, Indiana House Democrats, who fled the state 5 weeks ago to protest a Republican assault on labor unions and public education, resumed work after winning concessions on several issues.
(SFC, 3/29/11, p.A6)
2011 Mar 28, Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder signed legislation that will lead the state to pay fewer weeks of unemployment benefits next year than any other state.
(SFC, 3/29/11, p.A6)
2011 Mar 28, In Afghanistan former transport minister Inayatullah Qasimi was arrested on charges of corruption. He was released 3 days later, but faced trial for misuse of public funds and abuse of authority. Qasimi was accused of corruption and abuse of power while in office between 2004 and 2005.
(AFP, 3/31/11)
2011 Mar 28, In Albania Alfred Shkurti (45) was convicted of ordering six murders and personally committing a seventh as head of a gang active in Albania, Turkey, Bulgaria, Macedonia and Romania, which trafficked drugs to western Europe. Shkurti was arrested in Turkey and extradited to Albania in 2009 on an international warrant.
(AP, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, Australia launched its first national health TV advertising campaign aimed at Aboriginal people, hoping to halve the 50 percent of indigenous people who smoke by 2018.
(AFP, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, Australia's annual cane toad cull was declared a success by organizers who said that more than 14,000 of the noxious pests had perished as a result. The number of cane toads across Australia is estimated to have ballooned to more than 200 million since being introduced from Brazil in the 1930s to control scarab beetles infesting the country's sugar cane.
(AFP, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, Bahrain's foreign minister said it was "completely untrue" that Kuwait would mediate to resolve the country's political crisis, a reaction leading opposition group Wefaq said augured badly for any resolution.
(Reuters, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, Former US President Jimmy Carter arrived in Cuba to discuss economic policies and ways to improve Washington-Havana relations.
(AP, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, Egypt's Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF), a group of 24 senior officers, said on its website that ousted president Hosni Mubarak and his family are under house arrest, denying that the former leader had fled to Saudi Arabia. Members of an ultraconservative Muslim sect clashed with villagers south of Cairo over demands that a liquor store and coffee shops be closed a sign of the increasing assertiveness of the fundamentalist Salafi movement.
(AFP, 3/28/11)(AP, 3/29/11)(Econ, 10/8/11, p.59)
2011 Mar 28, German Chancellor Angela Merkel pledged to press ahead with a review of nuclear power's future after her coalition suffered a "very painful" defeat in a weekend state election dominated by Japan's nuclear crisis. The anti-nuclear Greens doubled their voter share to 24.2% in Baden-Wuerttenberg state.
(AP, 3/28/11)(SFC, 3/28/11, p.A3)
2011 Mar 28, Honduran police using tear gas and water cannons dispersed a group of protesters who blocked a main avenue in the capital to demand the return of ousted former President Manuel Zelaya from exile.
(AP, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, In Ivory Coast forces loyal to Alassane Ouattara, the internationally recognized president, seized the city of Duekoue.
(SFC, 3/29/11, p.A2)
2011 Mar 28, In Japan power company officials said plutonium has been detected in 5 locations in the soil outside of the stricken Fukushima nuclear complex. A TEPCO official said the amounts were very small and were not a risk to public health. TEPCO said highly radioactive water has leaked from the reactor. Environmental group Greenpeace said it had detected high levels of radiation outside an exclusion zone.
(AP, 3/28/11)(Reuters, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, Libyan rebel forces fought their way to the doorstep of Moammar Gadhafi's hometown of Sirte, a key government stronghold guarding the road to the capital Tripoli. British jets bombed ammunition bunkers in southern Libya after weekend strikes took out a score of tanks and armored vehicles near the towns of Ajdabiya and Misrata. Libya's Foreign Ministry declared a ceasefire in Misrata.
(AP, 3/28/11)(AFP, 3/28/11)(Reuters, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, Mexican police found the bodies of six men and one woman inside a car abandoned in an exclusive gated community near Cuernavaca, Morelos state. The dead included Juan Francisco Sicilia, son of poet Javier Sicilia. Army soldiers killed four alleged gunmen in the border city of Nuevo Laredo. A shootout between rival gangs in Monterrey killed two men, including a hot dog vendor caught in the cross fire. In western Michoacan state, the bodies of two men were found in Apatzingan with messages from a new drug gang: "The Knights Templar will not permit assassins to kill innocent people."
(AP, 3/29/11)(AP, 4/15/11)
2011 Mar 28, In Pakistan Islamist militants ambushed a troop convoy near Peshawar killing 11 soldiers.
(SFC, 3/29/11, p.A2)
2011 Mar 28, An association of Israelis of Polish descent slammed Warsaw's decision to suspend plans to offer compensation for property seized during the Nazi and communist eras. Citing economic conditions Polish PM Donald Tusk last week suspended work on a law that would have given some compensation to former owners of lost property.
(AP, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, Portugal's financial tailspin gathered speed despite political efforts to contain the acute debt crisis that is also unnerving the 17-nation eurozone.
(AP, 3/28/11)
2011 Mar 28, In Russia at least 17 rebels and three law enforcement officers were killed in Ingushetia. Authorities also detained two brothers in the security raid on charges of helping stage the January 24 Domodedovo airport bombing.
(Reuters, 3/28/11)(AP, 3/29/11)
2011 Mar 28, Syrian security forces fired tear gas and live ammunition on hundreds of protesters in Daraa as President Bashar Assad faced down the most serious unrest of his 11 years in power with a bloody, weeklong crackdown.
(AP, 3/28/11)(SFC, 3/29/11, p.A3)
2011 Mar 28, In southern Yemen a powerful blast at a factory making explosives and weapons killed as many as 150 people after the facility was briefly taken over by Islamic militants and then looted by residents of the area.
(AP, 3/28/11)(SFC, 3/29/11, p.A3)(Econ, 4/2/11, p.22)
2012 Mar 28, US undercover federal agents attempted to buy a grenade launcher in Richmond, Ca. The sellers planned to rob the suspected illegal arms dealers and a gunbattle erupted. Otis Mobley Jr. and 2 accomplices were arrested.
(SFC, 5/16/13, p.A9)
2012 Mar 28, In New York a dispute over the estate of Brooke Astor, who died in 2007 at age 105, ended with a settlement that freed $100 million for charities and cut half the amount going to the son convicted of bilking her.
(SFC, 3/29/12, p.A7)
2012 Mar 28, Earl Scruggs (b.1924), bluegrass banjo player, died in Nashville. He helped shape the sound of 20th-century country music. His “Foggy Mountain Breakdown" with guitarist Lester Flatt was used as the getaway music in the film “Bonnie and Clyde" (1967).
(SFC, 3/29/12, p.C5)
2012 Mar 28, In Afghanistan a NATO supply convoy came under attack in Farah province. 37 people were reported killed, including 28 Taliban attackers.
(SFC, 3/30/12, p.A3)
2012 Mar 28, Human Rights Watch said hundreds of Afghan women were languishing in prison for so-called moral crimes, which included running away from home and having sex outside marriage. The group estimated a total of 400 women were in prison and girls in juvenile detention facilities having been accused or convicted of offences including "running away", which is not a crime under the Afghan penal code.
(AFP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, A collection of about 100 African films went online, offering rentals for $5 to view classics from directors like Senegal's Ousmane Sembene and Egypt's Youssef Chahine. The African Film Library was 3 years in the making, sponsored by South African satellite television service M-Net, which digitally remastered the movies and placed them online for rental.
(AFP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, In Cuba tens of thousands of people massed in Havana's Revolution Plaza for Pope Benedict XVI's Mass on the final day of his visit. The Pope demanded more freedom for the Catholic Church in Cuba and preached against "fanaticism" in an unusually political sermon. Shortly after the Mass, Benedict met for about half an hour with Fidel Castro.
(AP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, In Egypt members of a controversial panel tasked with drafting a new constitution elected Muslim Brotherhood member Saad al-Katatni, currently the speaker of parliament, to head the committee.
(AFP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, Fiji's military regime said it had seized control of national carrier Air Pacific from Australia's Qantas because it did not want foreigners to own or control Fijian airlines.
(AFP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, Hong Kong's court of appeal overturned a Sep 30, 2011, landmark ruling that opened the door for thousands of foreign maids to claim residency saying the High Court could not override the government's authority to decide who can live in the city and who cannot.
(AFP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, A coalition of environmental groups warned that some 200 critically-endangered orangutans in a protected area of Indonesia’s Aceh province will be wiped out by the end of the year if land clearing in Tripa Swamp is not stopped.
(AFP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, In Iraq Arab foreign ministers met in Baghdad to debate a draft resolution calling on Damascus to end violence and hold talks with the opposition.
(AFP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, Italy seized more than 1.1 billion euros ($1.5 billion) of assets controlled by the Libyan dictator Moamer Kadhafi's family including stakes in top companies, land and a Harley Davidson motorcycle.
(AFP, 3/29/12)
2012 Mar 28, Libyan government spokesman Nasser al-Manaa said 3 days of clashes between tribes in the southern town of Sabha have killed more than 70 people. The clashes erupted in the city center when the Toubou refused to hand over to local authorities one of their men accused of killing a member of the Bussif tribe.
(AFP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, In Mali thousands marched in support of the coup leaders, who sought to quell fears they plan to cling to power by promising democracy and ruling out taking part in elections.
(AFP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, In northeastern Nigeria suspected members of Islamist group Boko Haram bombed a police station and freed more than a dozen prisoners, while three of the attackers were killed in Damagun in Yobe state. Two gunmen shot dead a police inspector in Maiduguri.
(AFP, 3/29/12)
2012 Mar 28, In Poland former intelligence chief Zbigniew Siemiatkowski was charged with exceeding his powers related to a secret CIA prison in Poland during his tenure (2002-2004). Former CIA officials have told the AP that a prison in Poland operated from December 2002 until the fall of 2003, and that prisoners were subjected to harsh questioning and waterboarding in the village of Stare Kiejkuty. Intelligence officials, aviation reports and human rights groups have said "black sites" were based in Afghanistan and Thailand as well as Poland, Lithuania and Romania.
(SFC, 3/29/12, p.A2)(AP, 3/31/12)
2012 Mar 28, Puerto Rico's police chief Emilio Diaz Colon, a retired National Guard general, quit less than a year after being appointed to lead a department that federal agents have accused of corruption, illegal killings and civil rights violations.
(AP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, Syrian activists said government forces have captured the northern town of Saraqeb from rebels after four days of fighting in which more than 40 people were killed and homes were burned down. 3 Syrian soldiers were killed in clashes with rebels in the central province of Homs.
(AP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, Tunisia's interior ministry banned demonstrations on the capital's main avenue which has become a hub of protests since the fall of strongman Zine el Abidine Ben Ali in January last year.
(AFP, 3/29/12)
2012 Mar 28, A Tunisian court convicted Jaber Majeri (Jabeur Mejri) and Ghazi Beji for posting images of the prophet purportedly being intimate with one of his wives. They were sentenced to 7½ years in prison and fined $800. An appeals court in June upheld the conviction. Beji had fled to Europe and was sentenced in absentia. On Feb 4, 2014, artists from a dozen countries launched an online campaign called "100 drawings for Jabeur" in support of Mejri.
(SFC, 6/26/12, p.A2)(http://tinyurl.com/lfr52jj)(AFP, 2/4/14)
2012 Mar 28, A Ugandan court charged the country's main opposition leader Kizza Besigye with an offence linked to the killing of a police officer during a rally last week.
(AFP, 3/28/12)
2012 Mar 28, Yemen's Saudi Arabia's deputy consul, Abdullah al-Khalidi (Abdullah Mohammed Khalifa al-Khaldi), was seized by unknown gunmen outside his home in southern port city of Aden. Al-Qaida's Yemen branch claimed responsibility.
(AFP, 3/28/12)(AP, 5/26/12)
2013 Mar 28, The Standard & Poor’s 500 stock index hit an all-time high of 1569.19, surpassing the Oct 9,2007 high of 1565.15.
(SSFC, 3/31/13, p.D1)
2013 Mar 28, Nevada’s Legislature expelled an assemblyman for the first time in its history. Steven Brooks, representing North Las Vegas, has been arrested twice and hospitalized for mental health evaluation.
(SFC, 3/29/13, p.A4)
2013 Mar 28, Bahrain cleared 21 medical personnel of charges linked to anti-government protests, but cases remain open against two others who failed to appear in court.
(AP, 3/28/13)
2013 Mar 28, Britain's domestic spy agency (MI5) chose Andrew Parker (50) as its new director. Parker was an ornithologist with counter-terrorism experience in the Middle East and Northern Ireland.
(AP, 3/28/13)
2013 Mar 28, In Britain Giovanni Di Stefano, a flamboyant but unqualified lawyer, was sentenced to 14 years in jail for fraud. His clients included deposed Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. He had no legal qualifications and was not registered to practice in Britain or Italy, where he had offices.
(AP, 3/28/13)
2013 Mar 28, Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd reopened a rail line in western Minnesota, a day after a mile-long train hauling crude oil from Alberta, Canada, derailed in the area, spilling up to 30,000 gallons of oil.
(Reuters, 3/28/13)
2013 Mar 28, Ousted Central African Republic President Francois Bozize requested exile in Benin days after rebels invaded and overthrew his government of a decade.
(AP, 3/29/13)
2013 Mar 28, China’s State Council, the country’s highest executive organ of state power, released a code of conduct for officials in hopes for a more pransparent government.
(SSFC, 3/31/13, p.A4)
2013 Mar 28, The UN Security Council authorized a new intervention brigade for CongoDRC with a mandate to take military action alone or with Congolese troops against rebel groups to help bring peace in the conflict-racked east.
(SFC, 3/29/13, p.A2)
2013 Mar 28, Cypriots get their first chance to access their savings in almost two weeks when the country's banks reopened, albeit with strict restrictions on transactions.
(AP, 3/28/13)
2013 Mar 28, Israel fully reopened its border crossings with the Gaza Strip that were closed following militant rocket fire during President Barack Obama's visit to the region last week.
(AP, 3/28/13)
2013 Mar 28, A Kosovo court found three ethnic Serbs guilty of storming a UN-run court and inciting riots that led to the death of a Ukrainian peacekeeper in 2008. Marijan Ilincic and Dragan Milojevic were sentenced to 22 and 18 months in prison, respectively. Zoran Cavic was convicted of similar charges and given a 9-month sentence that was suspended for one year. Three other defendants were cleared of all charges.
(AP, 3/29/13)
2013 Mar 28, In central Nigeria an attack in the Bokkos local government area killed 18 civilians. The military killed six while trying to repel attackers in the assault.
(AP, 3/30/13)
2013 Mar 28, A West Bank appeals court upheld a one-year prison term for Mamdouh Hamamreh, a Palestinian journalist who had a photo on his Facebook page that authorities claimed portrayed President Mahmoud Abbas as a traitor.
(AP, 3/28/13)(SFC, 3/29/13, p.A2)
2013 Mar 28, Fitch, a ratings agency, awarded the Philippines its first ever investment-grade credit rating.
(Econ, 4/6/13, p.86)
2013 Mar 28, In northwest Russia a bus crash killed six people and injured at least 18 others, including orphans returning from a field trip.
(AP, 3/28/13)
2013 Mar 28, In Syria mortar shells slammed into a cafeteria at Damascus University, killing at least 10 people and wounding 20 in what was the deadliest in a string of such attacks on President Assad's seat of power. Officials denied opposition claims that an Iranian cargo plane, allegedly carrying weapons to Assad's regime, was hit as it landed at Damascus Int’l. Airport. This day of fierce clashes killed at least 38 people.
(AP, 3/28/13)(AP, 3/29/13)
2013 Mar 28, Pope Francis washed and kissed the feet of two young women at Rome’s Casal del Marmo juvenile detention center, a surprising departure from church rules that restrict the Holy Thursday ritual to men.
(AP, 3/28/13)
2013 Mar 28, A Thai court jailed a man for three years and four months on for selling video CDs showing sections of an Australian news series that contained content deemed offensive to Thailand's royal family. Akachai Hongkawan (37) was also fined 66,666 baht ($2,300).
(AP, 3/28/13)
2014 Mar 28, President Barack Obama opened a fence-mending visit to Saudi Arabia, arriving in the oil-rich Gulf nation for meetings to reassure its elderly monarch of the US commitment to the Arab world.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, California’s Democratic controlled state Senate voted to suspend three members. They included Leland Yee of SF and San Mateo Ct. and Ron Calderon and Roderick Wright of LA County. The suspended senators would continue to receive pay until their terms expire.
(SFC, 3/29/14, p.A1)(SSFC, 3/30/14, p.C5)
2014 Mar 28, US authorities said 11 people have been arrested for trafficking methamphetamine to the Bakken oil patch and will face drug conspiracy charges in Montana.
(SSFC, 3/30/14, p.A11)
2014 Mar 28, In Afghanistan six foreigners including three Americans were trapped inside a Kabul guesthouse after a group of Taliban gunmen laid siege to the building. A gun battle erupted after a Taliban suicide bomber blew himself up outside the building and insurgents forced their way in. The aid workers survived. One small Afghan girl, a passer-by, was killed as well as a driver and all five attackers.
(Reuters, 3/28/14)(AFP, 3/29/14)(SFC, 3/29/14, p.A4)
2014 Mar 28, Australian officials moved the search area for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, that disappeared March 8, 1,100 km (680 miles) to the northeast following a new analysis of radar data, and planes quickly found multiple objects in the new zone.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, Brazilian prosecutors sought the arrest of 13 executives from 3 int’l. companies allegedly involved in a cartel to raise prices for the construction and upkeep of subway and train systems in Sao Paulo.
(SFC, 3/29/14, p.A2)
2014 Mar 28, In Egypt Journalist Mayada Ashraf, from the privately owned Al-Dustour newspaper, was shot in the head as she covered clashes between police and supporters of deposed Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in the northern neighborhood of Ein Shams. 4 other people were killed including a Christian woman named Mary Sameh (26). Prosecutors the next day blamed five masked gunmen from the Muslim Brotherhood. A protester who attended the Ein Shams rally said it was the police who opened fire on the crowd as the demonstrators were about to disperse.
(AFP, 3/29/14)
2014 Mar 28, The Guinean health ministry confirmed eight cases of Ebola in Conakry, including one fatality. The total number of suspected cases recorded from January to March 28 was 111 cases of haemorrhagic fever, including 70 deaths.
(AFP, 3/29/14)
2014 Mar 28, An Indian air force cargo plane inducted into service just last year crashed during a training mission, killing all five crew members.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, In Iraq a triple bombing struck a busy market area in northern Baghdad, killing 4 people.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, Israeli police and antiquities inspectors arrested a gang accused of looting ancient Jewish burial caskets from a cave in the Jerusalem area.
(AFP, 3/31/14)
2014 Mar 28, In the Ivory Coast Ghanaian President John Dramani Mahama was elected the new head of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) at a summit of the 15-nation regional bloc.
(AFP, 3/29/14)
2014 Mar 28, In Kashmir at least three gunmen disguised as Indian soldiers opened fire on a car, killing a passenger and triggering a firefight with army troops in the Dayalchak area.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, A Lebanese policeman was killed by unknown gunmen in the northern city of Tripoli.
(AFP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, In Morocco some 800 African migrants tried to climb barbed-wire fences to enter the Spanish enclave of Melilla. Most were turned back by security forces from both sides.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, Netherlands’ public prosecutor said Milutin Graic (41), wanted in Croatia on suspicion of war crimes during the violent breakup of Yugoslavia in the 1990s, has been arrested in Roosendaal.
(Reuters, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, New Zealand’s government announced it would sell a minority stake in power company Genesis Energy for 736 million New Zealand dollars ($638 million). The company will list on the New Zealand stock market on April 17. More than two-thirds of people who voted in a referendum last year said they opposed the government asset sales.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, Nigeria’s military said they have arrested two Britons and 10 local citizens on charges of trying to bribe a military officer to facilitate oil theft. Security sources have said the sheer scale of oil theft would not be possible without systematic collusion by various security agencies.
(Reuters, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, In eastern Pakistan gunmen on a motorcycle opened fire late today on a car carrying senior journalist Raza Rumi, killing his driver before escaping in Lahore.
(AP, 3/29/14)
2014 Mar 28, A Palestinian official said Israel will not free the final batch of prisoners they had been expecting alongside US-brokered peace talks. Israeli cabinet members had warned they would block the final release, anticipated for the end of March, if the Palestinians refused to extend the talks beyond their April 29 deadline.
(AFP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, The Philippines signed contracts worth $527 million to buy 12 fighter jets from South Korea and four combat utility helicopters from Canada to boost the capability of its air force.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, Russia's Pres. Vladimir Putin said Ukraine could regain some arms and equipment of military units in Crimea that did not switch their loyalty to Russia.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, Russia said Switzerland has imposed restrictions on military exports to Russia over events in Ukraine which were counterproductive and not in line with the country's policy of neutrality.
(Reuters, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, Sweden sentenced a Malaysian couple to prison for beating their four children with sticks and clothes hangers. The abuse occurred from 2010 until December 2013, when Swedish police arrested the couple. The children, aged 7-14, were taken back to their home country following a massive social media campaign calling for their return.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, The UN's top human rights body voted overwhelmingly to renew its war crimes investigation in Syria for another year.
(AP, 3/28/14)
2014 Mar 28, The UN said over a million people in South Sudan have been forced from their homes during more than three months of ongoing fighting, with conditions continuing to worsen.
(AFP, 3/29/14)
2014 Mar 28, Uruguay’s drug czar said every legal marijuana plant in the country will be registered and tracked using radio frequency tags.
(SFC, 3/29/14, p.A2)
2014 Mar 28, In southern Yemen 2 al-Qaeda militants and a soldier were killed in a raid by security forces on a residential building in Dalea.
(Reuters, 3/28/14)
2015 Mar 28, Many lights were turned off around the world for Earth Hour, an initiative began in Sydney in 2007, from 8:30pm.
(AFP, 3/29/15)
2015 Mar 28, NASA said a Russian Soyuz spacecraft with three crew on board successfully docked with the International Space Station after blasting off from Kazakhstan. An American and two Russians floated into the International Space Station, beginning what is to be a year away from Earth for two of them.
(AFP, 3/28/15)(AP, 3/28/15)
2015 Mar 28, It was reported that the California Public Utilities Commission had accumulated legal fees of $5.1 million relating to an ongoing state and federal corruption probe of the agency. In 2014 the agency had signed a $49,000 attorney representation contract with the Sheppard Mullin law firm.
(SFC, 3/28/15, p.D1)
2015 Mar 28, Albania received 266 million euros from the World Bank for its public finances and road maintenance.
(SSFC, 3/29/15, p.A6)
2015 Mar 28, Brazil said it has accepted China's invitation to join a Beijing-backed international infrastructure bank.
(AP, 3/28/15)
2015 Mar 28, Residents of eastern Cameroon killed several suspected fighters from a Central African Republic rebel group who were trying to carry out a large-scale kidnapping near the border town of Garoua-Boulai.
(AP, 3/29/15)
2015 Mar 28, China’s Pres. Xi Jinping opened a major regional economic conference at the Boao Forum on Hainan Island and argued for strong Chinese-led efforts to promote Asian economic and political cooperation. Mr. Xi described his “One Belt, One Road" (OBOR) vision for regional and global cooperation.
(SSFC, 3/29/15, p.A6)(Econ., 4/11/15, p.41)
2015 Mar 28, In Egypt a bomb wounded four civilians and four policemen outside Cairo University.
(AFP, 3/28/15)
2015 Mar 28, In northeastern India 3 policemen were killed and six others injured when militants of the Hmar People's Convention attacked a convoy of lawmakers in Mizoram state with automatic weapons.
(AP, 3/28/15)
2015 Mar 28, Japan opened what organizers billed as the world's first "Otaku" (geeks) summit, drawing visitors from around the world as the country looks to boost the international fan base for Japanese comic books and anime.
(AFP, 3/28/15)
2015 Mar 28, Kenya's president suspended four cabinet secretaries and 17 other senior officials to facilitate investigations into allegations of corruption.
(AP, 3/28/15)
2015 Mar 28, Nigeria held elections. Polling in the country's presidential and parliamentary election was suspended in some places because of glitches with new voter ID card readers. Boko Haram extremists killed at least 41 people, including a legislator, and scared hundreds of people from polling stations in three states in the northeast.
(AFP, 3/28/15)(AP, 3/29/15)
2015 Mar 28, Pakistan's military said its soldiers killed at least 15 militants in the Tirah valley of the Khyber region.
(AP, 3/28/15)
2015 Mar 28, Saudi Arabia's navy evacuated dozens of diplomats from Yemen and the United Nations pulled out international staff after a third night of Saudi-led air strikes trying to stem advances by Iranian-allied Houthi fighters.
(Reuters, 3/28/15)
2015 Mar 28, In Sri Lanka Priyantha Sirisena (42) the youngest brother of President Maithripala Sirisena, died two days after he was attacked with an ax in what authorities said was a personal dispute.
(AP, 3/29/15)
2015 Mar 28, In Syria Islamist groups including al Qaeda's Nusra Front seized the city of Idlib for the first time since the conflict in the country began. The bodies of least 15 detainees were found, apparently executed by government forces, after Idlib was taken.
(Reuters, 3/28/15)(AP, 3/29/15)(AFP, 3/29/15)
2015 Mar 28, In Tunisia Khaled Ben Hamadi Chaieb, the operational chief in the March 18 deadly museum attack on foreign tourists, was among 9 people killed in anti-terrorist operations. Tens of thousands of Tunisians marched through the capital to denounce extremist violence.
(Reuters, 3/29/15)(SFC, 3/30/15, p.A2)
2015 Mar 28, In Yemen a series of explosions rocked an arms depot in Aden, killing at least 14 people as looters swarmed the facility. At least 61 people were reported killed in three days of fighting between Shiite rebels and loyalist militia in Aden.
(AFP, 3/28/15)
2016 Mar 28, The USS Sirocco intercepted and seized a shipment of weapons hidden aboard a small dhow in the Arabian Sea. The US Navy later said the shipment included 1,500 Kalashnikov assault rifles, 200 rocket-propelled grenade launchers and 21 .50-caliber machine guns likely heading to war-torn Yemen from Iran.
(AP, 4/4/16)
2016 Mar 28, In Washington DC Larry Dawson (66) was shot by police after he entered the Capitol visitor center brandishing a weapon. He was hospitalized in critical but stable condition.
(AFP, 3/29/16)
2016 Mar 28, US authorities said the FBI said it has unlocked the iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino terror attackers, ending a heated legal standoff with Apple that had pitted US authorities against Silicon Valley.
(AFP, 3/29/16)
2016 Mar 28, California Gov. Jerry Brown announced a deal with state lawmakers and public unions that would make the minimum wage $15 an hour by 2022, up from $10. The state Legislature passed the bill on March 31. Brown planned to sign the legislation on April 4.
(SFC, 3/29/16, p.A1)(SFC, 4/1/16, p.A1)
2016 Mar 28, Utah Gov. Gary Herbert signed legislation requiring doctors to give anesthesia to women having an abortion at 20 weeks of pregnancy or later, based on the premise that a fetus can feel pain at that point.
(SFC, 3/29/16, p.A5)
2016 Mar 28, In Afghanistan overnight attacks by the Taliban on two police checkpoints in the volatile southern Helmand province killed at least 8 police. A US soldier shot and killed an Afghan boy near Bagram Airfield close to Kabul. The boy had been carrying what looked like an automatic rifle.
(AP, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, An Angola a court sentenced 17 youth activists, including a well-known rapper, to between two and eight years in jail for rebellion against Pres. Jose Eduardo dos Santos. They were arrested last June and have denied the charges against them.
(AFP, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, Azeri human rights activist and lawyer Intigam Aliyev was freed from jail. Aliyev was detained in Baku in August 2014 and charged with tax evasion, abuse of office and illegal entrepreneurship. Azerbaijan pardoned 148 prisoners including journalists, rights activists and political opponents this month in an apparent move to deflect Western criticism of the ex-Soviet republic's human rights record.
(Reuters, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, Bangladesh's top court rejected a 28-year-old petition to remove Islam as the official religion of the Muslim-majority South Asian nation.
(AP, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, In Britain some 100,000 homes were left without power due to Storm Katie. High winds caused some 130 flights at Gatwick and Heathrow airports to be diverted or cancelled.
(SFC, 3/29/16, p.A2)
2016 Mar 28, Chinese President Xi Jinping arrived in the Czech Republic for a visit aimed at boosting economic and political ties.
(AP, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, China's state media said the military will end so-called paid for services within the next three years, the latest move to modernize the armed forces amid a reform and anti-corruption push.
(Reuters, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, Dubai-based Dodsal Group said it has discovered 2.7 trillion cubic feet of gas deposits in Tanzania's Ruvu Basin Coast Region valued at around $8 billion.
(AP, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, In Guatemala at least 19 people were killed after the bus they were traveling in plunged down a 200-meter (660 feet) ravine near the town of Nahuala.
(Reuters, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, Iran said it will pursue its development of ballistic missiles despite the US blacklisting of more Iranian companies linked to the program.
(Reuters, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, Iraq's parliament gave embattled PM Haider al-Abadi until March 31 to present a cabinet of technocrats as Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr expanded his protest movement for reform. Sadr himself spent the night camping in the Green Zone.
(AFP, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, Japan switched on a radar station in the East China Sea, giving it a permanent intelligence gathering post close to Taiwan and a group of islands disputed by Japan and China, drawing an angry response from Beijing. The new Self Defense Force base is on the island of Yonaguni.
(Reuters, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, Japanese PM Shinzo Abe welcomed Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe -- the 92-year-old former guerrilla fighter who is widely shunned in the West but frequently courted in Asia.
(AFP, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, In south Lebanon 2 people were shot dead and others wounded in the Ain al-Hilweh Palestinian refugee camp after a dispute between rival political groups erupted into gunfire.
(Reuters, 3/29/16)
2016 Mar 28, Montenegro authorities deported 58 foreigners, including 43 Russians, associated with a religious cult. Local media reported that they are members of Aum Shinrikyo, the Japanese doomsday cult that carried out a deadly nerve gas attack on Tokyo's subway in 1995.
(AP, 3/29/16)
2016 Mar 28, Myanmar's outgoing government lifted a nearly four-year curfew in the western state of Rakhine, where clashes between the minority Rohingya Muslims and majority Buddhists left more than 200 people dead, mostly Muslims.
(AP, 3/29/16)
2016 Mar 28, The presidents of Russia and Iran agreed to step up bilateral contacts, including over the Syrian conflict, in which both countries are allies of President Bashar al-Assad.
(Reuters, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, Syrian government forces backed by Russian air strikes battled Islamic State insurgents around Palmyra, trying to extend their gains after taking back control of a city whose ancient temples were dynamited by the ultra-radical militants.
(Reuters, 3/28/16)
2016 Mar 28, In Taiwan a man, identified as Wang Ching-yu (33), grabbed a girl (3) from behind and decapitated her with a kitchen knife shortly before noon outside a subway in Taipei. The girl was with her mother, who was unable to prevent the attack.
(AP, 3/29/16)
2016 Mar 28, In Ukraine over 500 protesters gathered outside the administrative headquarters of the president to call for the resignation of Viktor Shokin, the country's general prosecutor, who they say, has failed to use the full power of his office to deal with endemic corruption.
(AP, 3/28/16)
2017 Mar 28, US President Donald Trump signed an executive order to undo a slew of Obama-era climate change regulations that his administration says is hobbling oil drillers and coal miners, a move environmental groups have vowed to take to court. Trump signed an executive order to review and revise Obama’s flagship energy policy, the Clean Power Plan, which has never been implemented.
(Reuters, 3/28/17)(Econ, 4/1/17, p.22)
2017 Mar 28, The US Supreme Court voted 5-3 to reverse a Texas appeals court ruling that said Death Row inmate Bobby James Moore was not intellectually disabled in the 1980 murder of a Houston grocery store clerk.
(SFC, 3/29/17, p.A4)
2017 Mar 28, The US FDA approved Dupixent, developed by Sanofi of Paris and Regeneron Pharmaceuticals of New York, for moderate or severe eczema. The initial price was listed at $37,000 per year. The FDA also approved Genentech’s Ocrevus, the first drug for an aggressive kind of multiple schlerosis.
(SFC, 3/29/17, p.C2)(SFC, 3/30/17, p.A6)
2017 Mar 28, Tech giant Amazon expanded its global reach with the announcement of a deal to buy Dubai-based Souq.com, the Middle East's largest online retailer.
(AFP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, Wells Fargo said it has agreed to pay $110 million to settle a class-action lawsuit over up to two million accounts that its employees opened for customers without getting their permission.
(SFC, 3/29/17, p.C1)
2017 Mar 28, In Australia Tropical Cyclone Debbie hit the far north of Queensland as a category 4 storm. It was soon downgraded to category 2.
(Reuters, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, In Bangladesh at least four people died and several remain missing after a ferry carrying about 80 passengers capsized the Panguchi River. At least 18 people remained missing.
(Reuters, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, Britain's new 12-sided £1 coin with the symbols of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland goes into circulation on the eve of the launch of a Brexit process that has put national unity in doubt.
(AFP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, London and Paris signed a business agreement, to be launched in 2018, to cooperate in attracting visitors and companies.
(AP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, Canada’s prestigious Gairdner Award went to UCSF researcher David Julius for his work on how pain is perceived by receptors in human nerve endings.
(SFC, 3/28/17, p.A1)
2017 Mar 28, The Danish branch of the ride-sharing service Uber said it is shutting down its services in Denmark due to a proposed law that toughens standards for cabs.
(AP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, The central European Visegrad Group (Czech Rep., Hungary, Poland and Slovakia) rejected a European Union policy that calls for all member states to receive migrants, protesting suggestions that the level of their compliance could be linked to the availability of EU funds to them.
(AP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, A French court sent Carlos the Jackal, once one of the world's most wanted criminals, back to jail for his third life sentence after convicting him of a grenade attack 42 years ago on a Paris shop that killed two people.
(Reuters, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, A Gambian boy (16) was rescued by a Spanish frigate after a rubber boat packed with 147 migrants sank in the Mediterranean shortly after leaving Libya a few days earlier. The sole survivor was transferred to an Italian Coast Guard ship. 140 others disembarked at a different port March 30 and several identified the boy as having been on the same boat. Aid groups said this reduced the death toll to five.
(Reuters, 3/29/17)(Reuters, 3/31/17)
2017 Mar 28, German prosecutors announced an investigation into claims that Turkish agents are spying on alleged followers of exiled preacher Fethullah Gulen in Germany.
(AFP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, Iceland became the first country to introduce legislation requiring employers to prove they are paying men and women equally.
(SFC, 3/31/17, p.C2)
2017 Mar 28, In Kashmir three civilians were killed and 28 other people were injured in anti-India protests that erupted following a gunbattle between rebels and government forces that killed a rebel.
(AP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, Former rebels in Mali reversed a decision to boycott a national reconciliation conference after receiving assurances from the government.
(AFP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, In northern Mexico inmates rioted at a psychiatric block in a prison, broke into a prison pharmacy and took drugs that caused the deaths of two of them in Cadereyta, Nuevo Leon state. Disturbances had begun earlier this week as inmates protested a new program to inspect visitors with a type of X-ray machine to prevent contraband being smuggled into the facility.
(AP, 3/29/17)
2017 Mar 28, In Mexico Rev. Oscar Lopez Navarro was abducted late today outside his residence by people who had been following him in the city of Tampico.
(AP, 3/30/17)
2017 Mar 28, Montenegro became set to become NATO's 29th member following the US Senate's overwhelming ratification.
(AP, 3/29/17)
2017 Mar 28, Air Koryo, North Korea's national carrier, connected Pyongyang with the northeastern Chinese city of Dandong on a twice-weekly inaugural flight.
(Reuters, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, Thousands of students at the Univ. of Puerto Rico went on a one-week strike to protest multimillion-dollar cuts prompted by an economic crisis.
(AP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, Romania’s former tourism minister Elena Udrea was handed a six-year sentence for bribery and abuse of office connected to a boxing gala that she organized in 2011. Former chairman of Romania's Boxing Federation Rudel Obreja received a five-year sentence for tax evasion. Udrea's assistant received three years for complicity to bribery.
(AP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, In South Africa celebrated anti-apartheid activist Ahmed Kathrada (87), a Robben Island prisoner and one of Nelson Mandela's closest colleagues in the struggle against white rule, died in Johannesburg.
(AFP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, In Syria the Islamic State group launched a counter-attack to fend off a US-backed advance around the Tabqa airbase near the jihadists' stronghold Raqa. The SDF held back the attack and managed to seize some ammunition and rocket stores.
(AFP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, Thailand authorities escalated their effort to collect taxes they say are due from ousted PM Thaksin Shinawatra, posting a bill for 17.6 billion baht ($503 million) at the house where he lived before fleeing into exile in 2008 to avoid a prison term for conflict of interest. A lawyer for Thaksin contended that under the law in existence at the time of the 2006 sale, the shares were exempt from tax.
(AP, 3/28/17)
2017 Mar 28, Yemeni troops captured a senior leader of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) during an early morning raid in the southeastern Hadramawt region. They detained three others and killed two more.
(Reuters, 3/28/17)
2018 Mar 28, Pres. Donald Trump fired David Shulkin, the embattled head of the Department of Veteran Affairs. Chief White House physician Dr. Ronny Jackson was named as the next VA secretary. Shulkin later said he was undone by advocates of privatization within the administration.
(SFC, 3/29/18, p.A7)(SFC, 3/30/18, p.A8)
2018 Mar 28, US Immigration and customs Enforcement officials said they found 34 immigrants at a home in Phoenix and took them into custody for deportation.
(SFC, 3/29/18, p.A6)
2018 Mar 28, FBI agents arrested Antoin Austin of Euclid, Ohio, after purchasing fentanyl on a hidden website that featured his ads. He was accused of acting as a sort-of middleman between Chinese suppliers of synthetic opioids and users in the US.
(http://tinyurl.com/yaf8r8uy)(SFC, 4/4/18, p.A6)
2018 Mar 28, Facebook unveiled new privacy settings aiming to give its users more control over how their data is shared, following an outcry over hijacking of personal information at the giant social network.
(AFP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, In Afghanistan at least two people including a district police chief were gunned down when militants opened fire on a crowd gathered at a funeral in eastern Nangarhar province.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, In Albania some 150 truck drivers from Kosovo held a peaceful protest against Albania's first planned toll road.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, A Bulgarian state commission said renowned psychoanalyst and philosopher Julia Kristeva (76), who has lived in France since 1965, worked as an agent and collaborator with the Balkan country's secret service during the communist era. Foreign Policy magazine has ranked Kristev as one of the 100 greatest thinkers of the 20th century.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, Croatia said it will purchase upgraded Israeli F-16 fighter aircraft as it seeks to bolster its defenses amid Russia's arming of neighboring Serbia. They will replace the country's aging MiG-21 fighters, of which only six are believed to be operational.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, The government of Ecuador said it has suspended outside communications for Wikileaks founder Julian Assange at its London Embassy due to his failure to honor a 2017 written agreement not to send messages involving "interference in relation to other states".
(SFC, 3/29/18, p.A4)
2018 Mar 28, Egyptian authorities warned people to vote or risk paying a fine, as they looked to boost turnout in a lackluster 3-day election that is virtually guaranteed to hand President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi a second four-year term.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, German police searched the homes of 10 people suspected of providing support to the far-right extremist "Freital Group" in the states of Saxony, Lower Saxony and Bavaria.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, German Automakers Daimler and BMW said they agreed to merge their transportation services businesses, so they can expand offerings in ride-hailing apps, car-sharing, parking, and charging electric cars.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, In Ghana some 3,500 people protested in Accra against the expansion of its defense cooperation with the United States, in a rare public display of opposition to the growing foreign military presence in West Africa.
(Reuters, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, The Athens-based Racist Violence Recording Network (RVRN) said attacks by organized groups against migrants, refugees and activists have been creeping up in Greece, and called for zero tolerance towards racist violence.
(Reuters, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, Israeli chief of staff Lieutenant General Gadi Eisenkot warned the army has been given authorization to open fire ahead of mass protests on the Gaza border planned for March 30.
(AFP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, Israel announced it was launching a domestic digital health database that could make it a global medical powerhouse. The move aims to improve public health worldwide, but critics warn it risks compromising personal privacy.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, In Japan SoftBank Group Corp. Chief Executive Masayoshi Son announced a $200 billion solar power project in Saudi Arabia, which he described as "the world's biggest solar power generation".
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, Malaysia's Parliament approved redrawn electoral boundaries despite protests that the ruling coalition was cheating to ensure victory in the upcoming general election. Embattled PM Najib Razak introduced the new electoral maps, which were approved with 129 lawmakers voting for them and 80 against.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, Montenegro decided to expel a Russian diplomat over the poisoning of a former Russian double agent that the British government has blamed on Moscow.
(Reuters, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, Myanmar's parliament elected Win Myint as the country's new president. The longtime loyalist of Aung San Suu Kyi is expected to carry on his predecessor's practice of deferring to her as her nation's de facto leader.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, In the southern Philippines Abu Sayyaf leader Nurhassan Jamiri surrendered with 13 of his men Basilan province.
(SFC, 3/30/18, p.A2)
2018 Mar 28, In Romania Bucharest Mayor Gabriela Firea adopted a project that will provide 13,800 lei ($3,700) for women who seek in-vitro fertilization in a bid to increase falling birthrates. Up to 1,000 women will be able to benefit from the aid, to be paid in three installments.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, In Russia the head of a human rights office in Dagestan was attacked near his home. Memorial, one of Russia's biggest human rights groups, said the assault was linked to his work.
(Reuters, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, Saudi Arabia's King Salman approved a recommendation made by his son and heir, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, to grant students abroad on government scholarships and those studying at their own expense a $2000 financial boost.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, In Scotland former Catalan minister Clara Ponsati, facing extradition to Spain on charges of rebellion, turned herself in to authorities in Edinburgh. Ponsati was granted bail after appearing for an extradition hearing at a Scottish court.
(AP, 3/28/18)(Reuters, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, Singapore invited Human Rights Watch to give evidence at a parliamentary hearing on "fake news" as a dispute grew between the New York-based group and the city state.
(Reuters, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, Slovakia's foreign minister said the government has decided to recall its ambassador to Moscow for consultations over the nerve agent attack on a former spy in Britain.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, In Spain Catalonia's parliament said it supported detained ex-Catalan president Carles Puigdemont's right to again lead the region while he awaits a German court ruling on extraditing him to Spain for directing a banned independence campaign.
(Reuters, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, Thailand authorities ordered the temporary closing of the beach made famous by the Leonardo DiCaprio movie "The Beach" to halt environmental damage caused by too many tourists. Maya Bay, on Phi Phi Leh island in the Andaman Sea, will be closed to all visitors for four months annually starting this June to allow for the recovery of the island's battered coral reefs and sea life.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2018 Mar 28, In Venezuela a fast-moving fire swept through a station where prisoners were being kept in crowded cells, killing 68 people in one of the worst catastrophes involving the nation's prison system.
(AP, 3/28/18)
2019 Mar 28, Pres. Donald Trump announced that he was backing off a budget request to eliminate funding for the Special Olympics following days of criticism for the proposed cut.
(SFC, 3/29/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 28, The US House of Representatives voted 238-185 to condemn Pres. Donald Trump's move to restrict transgender men and women from military service. Five Republicans broke ranks to vote with all the Democrats in the non-binding resolution.
(SFC, 3/29/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 28, George Clooney called for the boycott of nine hotels in the US and Europe with ties to the sultan of Brunei, which on April 3 will implement Islamic criminal laws to punish gay sex by stoning offenders to death.
(AP, 3/30/19)(Reuters, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 28, In the SF Bay Area Rev. Hector David Mendoza-Vela (42), the head priest of Corpus Christi Parish in Fremont, was arrested on suspicion of 30 counts child sex abuse from 2016-2017.
(SFC, 4/1/19, p.C1)
2019 Mar 28, In Texas Javier Ambler (40) died after a car chase that started when he did not dim his headlights for oncoming traffic in Williamson County. When authorities reached Ambler, they tased him multiple times. Body camera footage showed Ambler telling them that he could not breathe. In 2021 a court approved a settlement in the Javier Ambler lawsuit of $5 million.
(The Hill, 12/15/21)
2019 Mar 28, In Virginia Darwin Martinez-Torres of Sterling was sentenced to life in prison for raping and killing Nabra Hassanen (17) of Reston, a Muslim teenager, as she walked back to a mosque with friends for pre-dawn religious services in June 2017. immigration authorities said Martinez-Torres is an El Salvador native and was in the country illegally.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Albanian opposition protesters made further attempts to enter the parliament by force as they demand the government's resignation and an early election.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Hundreds of protesters took to the streets of central Algiers again to demand the resignation of President Abdelaziz Bouteflika and changes to the political system after the powerful army called for the veteran leader to be removed.
(Reuters, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In Australia Saeed Noori (37), an Islamic State group sympathizer, was sentenced to life in prison. He had rammed a car into pedestrians on a busy Melbourne sidewalk on Dec. 21, 2017, killing one person and injuring 16 others.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In Bangladesh a fire broke out in a 22-storey commercial building, killing 25 people, injuring at least 60 and trapping many. The building had four upper floors constructed illegally in the Banani district of Dhaka.
(AP, 3/28/19)(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 28, Human Rights Watch said at least 170 civilians have been killed since October in fighting in English-speaking western Cameroon between separatists and government forces.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Cuba and Google signed a deal moving the island one step closer to having a state-of-the-art connection to the internet. They agreed to create a seamless, cost-free connection between their two networks once Cuba is able to physically connect to a new undersea fiber-optic cable that would be laid sometime in the future.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, A French court granted bail to Belhassen Trabelsi, a brother-in-law of ousted Tunisian leader Zine El-Abidine Ben Ali, who was arrested on fraud charges this month after three years on the run.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, German automaker Daimler and China's Geely, its largest single shareholder, said that they are setting up a joint venture to develop and operate Daimler's Smart compact car brand worldwide as an all-electric car.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In western Guatemala a large truck slammed into a crowd gathered on a dark highway, killing 18 people and leaving bodies scattered on the roadway. The truck driver fled the scene.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Icelandic budget airline WOW Air collapsed under its financial problems, leading it to ground planes and leave passengers stranded across two continents.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Kosovo banned all gambling for the next decade in a bid to crack down on crime after two casino staff were murdered last week.
(AFP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 28, A court in the Maldives ordered the release of former president Abdulla Yameen, saying there was not enough reason to hold him beyond a month under the law.
(Reuters, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Norway's justice Minister Tor Mikkel Wara submitted his resignation after his partner was accused of setting his car on fire and other threatening acts.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In the Philippines a rebel assault on a police station in eastern Victoria town backfired when officers fought back and killed three insurgents and captured three others. In the north two Muslim militants were arrested with guns, explosives and Islamic State group-style black flags in in Baggao town, Cagayan province, far from the traditional territory of Muslim militants in the volatile south. Militants Altero Bello and Greg Bello belonged to an IS-aligned jihadist group named Syuful Khilafa Fi Luzon, which was established in 2016.
(AP, 3/29/19)(AP, 4/1/19)
2019 Mar 28, Russia detained a former cabinet minister and oil executive on suspicion of defrauding oil giant Rosneft. Viktor Ishaev was the second former minister from PM Dmitry Medvedev's cabinet to be detained this week.
(Reuters, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Three of eleven Saudi women's rights activists were temporarily released after 10 months in prison. The releases came a day after 11 women's rights activists appeared before a three-judge panel in a Riyadh courtroom and laid out their defense.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In Siberia a ruling by Sakha Republic head Aisen Nikolaev was made public. It bans migrants from driving trucks or buses, producing food, repairing vehicles and other jobs. Tensions between locals and migrants soared this month after three Kyrgyzstan citizens were arrest in a rape and kidnapping case.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Slovakia's Parliament amended the country's constitution to cap the retirement age at 64. Some women can retire up to a year and a half earlier than that, depending on the number of children they've had.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In Somalia an explosives-laden vehicle detonated outside a busy restaurant in Mogadishu, killing at least 16 people. The al-Qaida-linked al-Shabab extremist group claimed responsibility.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Ukraine's interior minister accused both Pres. Petro Poroshenko and former PM Yulia Tymoshenko of waging campaigns that involve bribing voters ahead of the March 31 presidential election.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 28, The UN Security Council ordered countries worldwide to step up the fight against terrorism financing by ensuring they have laws that make it a serious crime to fund terrorist acts.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Venezuela's government said it has barred opposition leader Juan Guaido from holding public office for 15 years citing irregularities in his financial records. Guaido has taken 90 international trips without accounting for the origin of an estimated $94,000 in expenses.
(SFC, 3/28/19, p.A2)
2020 Mar 28, Pres. Donald Trump endorsed the $2 trillion coronavirus economic stimulus bill. He signed the bill into law but said he would not be bound by provisions that interfered with his executive authority. Democrats had pushed for increased oversight of a $500 billion corporate loan fund. Trump also approved coronavirus disaster declarations for Michigan and Massachusetts.
(Bloomberg, 3/28/20)(SFC, 3/31/20, p.A8)
2020 Mar 28, Washington, D.C., confirmed 37 new coronavirus cases, raising its total to 304.
(SSFC, 3/29/20, p.A6)
2020 Mar 28, In San Francisco the number of coronavirus cases climbed to 304 with four deaths.
(SSFC, 3/29/20, p.A9)
2020 Mar 28, In the SF Bay Area Lonnie Franklin (67), a convicted serial killer, died at San Quentin State Prison. He was known as the "Grim Sleeper" who preyed on the women of South Los Angeles for more than two decades.
(AP, 3/29/20)
2020 Mar 28, Idaho's Blaine County has reported more than 80 confirmed cases of coronavirus. The county includes Sun Valley Resort whioch draws skiers from around the world.
(SSFC, 3/29/20, p.A6)
2020 Mar 28, In Louisiana inmate Patrick Jones (47) died after contracting the coronavirus at the federal minimum-security prison in Oakdale, where at least five prisoners have tested positive for the virus.
(NBC News, 3/29/20)
2020 Mar 28, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer issued an executive order requiring communities statewide to restore water service, effectively ending water shutoffs for the duration of the coronavirus pandemic.
(AP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, In Michigan the number of coronavirus infections surged in Detroit to 1,381, with 31 deaths. More than a fifth of Detroit's police force was quarantined. Two officers have died and at least 39 have tested positive, including the chief of police.
(AP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said there are now 52,318 confirmed cases in the state, after 7,681 new cases were reported in the last 24 hours. The governor also announced he was postponing the presidential primary in the state from April 28 to June 23.
(Good Morning America, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, New York City reported at least 26,000 diagnosed cases of COVID-19, with 450 deaths.
(Good Morning America, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Former US Sen. Tom Coburn (72), died. The Oklahoma family doctor had earned a reputation as a conservative political maverick as he railed against federal earmarks and subsidies for the rich. Coburn had been diagnosed years earlier with prostate cancer.
(AP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Rhode Island Gov. Gina Raimondo announced that the National Guard would go door-to-door to make sure New Yorkers are following 14-day quarantine orders.
(Good Morning America, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, The number of worldwide coronavirus infections surpassed 620,000 with more than 28,000 deaths as new cases also stacked up quickly in Europe. Abbott Laboratories unveiled a coronavirus test that can tell if someone is infected in as little as five minutes, and is so small and portable it can be used in almost any health-care setting.
(Bloomberg, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, The Taliban said it will refuse to negotiate with the team announced by the Afghan government, in a potential setback to the next steps of the U.S.-brokered peace process. The Taliban attacked several provinces in the north as American diplomats expressed optimism that the peace process was getting back on track.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)(SSFC, 3/29/20, p.A3)
2020 Mar 28, Albania flew a team of doctors and nurses to neighboring Italy to help it deal with the coronavirus pandemic as its own cases have yet to strain the health sector. Albania has 197 cases of the illness, with 10 deaths.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Australia’s death toll from the coronavirus outbreak rose to 14. The number of confirmed infections stood at 3,635, an increase of 469 from a day earlier. Australia stepped up enforcement of social distancing rules, implementing fines, closing beaches and threatening stricter measures if people defy pleas to stay at home.
(Bloomberg, 3/28/20)(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Australian authorities pressed ahead with plans to fly 800 cruise ship passengers to Germany this weekend after a downward revision in the number of people on board who needed to be tested for the coronavirus.
(AP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Bosnia's autonomous Serb Republic declared a state of emergency, handing legislative powers to the region's president to expedite the passage of laws to ease the impact of the coronavirus epidemic. Bosnia has recorded 259 cases of coronavirus with four deaths.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Brazil's federal government launched an advertising campaign against social distancing measures to fight the coronavirus outbreak, the latest flashpoint in a battle between President Jair Bolsonaro and state governors trying to stop the virus' spread.
(AP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, A Brazilian court blocked a decree by President Jair Bolsonaro that exempted places of worship from confinement orders. The federal court in Rio de Janeiro state ruled that religious services pose a public health risk. The government can still appeal the decision.
(AFP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Britain reported 17,089 confirmed cases of the coronavirus and 1,019 deaths and the peak of the epidemic in the country is expected to come in a few weeks.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, The Chinese city of Wuhan, where the outbreak first emerged, began lifting a two-month lockdown by restarting some metro services and reopening borders, allowing some semblance of normality to return and families to reunite.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, China sent a plane loaded with medical personnel and supplies to help Pakistan fight the spread of the coronavirus in one of the world's most populous nations. Pakistan has 1,408 confirmed cases of the virus, including 11.
(AP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Northern Cyprus reported its first death from the coronavirus after a 67-year old German tourist died in hospital in Nicosia.
(AP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, In Germany the number of confirmed coronavirus cases rose to 48,582 and 325 people have died of the disease.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Greece confirmed 95 new coronavirus cases, bringing the total to 1,061 since the country's first recorded infection on Feb. 26.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, India has confirmed 775 cases of coronavirus and 19 deaths.
(SSFC, 3/29/20, p.A5)
2020 Mar 28, Indonesia's capital Jakarta announced a two-week extension of its state of emergency following the nationwide surge in coronavirus cases,.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Iran announced that 139 more people had died from the novel coronavirus, raising the official death toll to 2,517. The health ministry said 3,076 more cases had been confirmed in the past 24 hours, bringing the total number of infections to 35,408.
(AFP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Iraqi doctors said the country may be singularly unprepared for the coronavirus, with the number of cases at 450 and deaths at 40.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Italy's Lombardy region recorded 542 new deaths as the national government was said to be mulling plans to extend a country-wide lockdown to mid-April. Italy reported 889 deaths due to the coronavirus. The death toll surged past 10,000. Confirmed cases rose by about 6,000 to 92,472.
(AP, 3/28/20)(Reuters, 3/28/20)(Reuters, 3/29/20)
2020 Mar 28, In Japan new coronavirus infections in Tokyo rose by more than 60, the biggest daily increase yet.
(Bloomberg, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, In Kenya police fired tear gas at a crowd of ferry commuters as the country's first day of a coronavirus curfew slid into chaos. Virus cases across Africa climbed above 4,000.
(SSFC, 3/29/20, p.A5)
2020 Mar 28, Lebanese security forces cleared away a protest camp in central Beirut on Saturday and reopened roads blocked by demonstrators since protests against the governing elite started in October. Lebanon has recorded 412 cases of coronavirus and eight deaths.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Mali recorded its first coronavirus just hours before polls were to open on March 29 for a long-delayed parliamentary election.
(AFP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Mexico's President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said his government will comply with a public consultation to halt the construction of US brewer Constellation Brands Inc's more than $1 billion brewery project in the border city of Mexicali.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Namibia, the world’s top producer of marine diamonds and the fifth-biggest of uranium, halted mining and quarrying operations to curb the coronavirus outbreak.
(Bloomberg, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, The Netherlands reported 93 deaths from the new coronavirus to take its total to 639 while another 1,159 cases of the virus were confirmed, both smaller rises than a day earlier. The country has confirmed a total of 9,762 cases of the virus.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, The Philippine health ministry reported 14 new coronavirus deaths and 272 additional cases, marking the country's single largest daily increase in fatalities and infections. This brought total infections in the Philippines to 1,075 and deaths to 68.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Poland's parliament passed a law early today allowing postal voting for senior citizens and those in quarantine or self-isolating as the government looks to press ahead with May presidential elections which opposition parties want postponed.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Portugal’s coronavirus cases rose 20% in one day and deaths climbed to 100 from 76. Total cases rose to 5,170 from 4,268 a day earlier. Authorities said all foreigners in Portugal with pending applications will be treated as permanent residents from March 30 until at least July 1, to ensure migrants have access to public services during the virus outbreak.
(Bloomberg, 3/28/20)(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Qatar reported its first death from the new coronavirus late today, saying the total number of reported cases there was at least 590.
(AP, 3/29/20)
2020 Mar 28, Russia reported 228 new cases of coronavirus overnight, bringing the total to 1,264, with four deaths attributed to the virus. Russia said it will close its borders starting on March 30 in a bid to curb the spread of the coronavirus. The order will not apply to Russian diplomats and the drivers of freight trucks, among others. Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin urged Muscovites to stay at home during the non-working week announced by President Vladimir Putin in a bid to curb the spread of the coronavirus.
(Bloomberg, 3/28/20)(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Russia's state-controlled Rosneft oil company said that it is ceasing operations and selling its assets in Venezuela. Rosneft said that it’s turning over its Venezuelan projects to an unnamed state-owned company in what it called an effort to protect its shareholders’ interests.
(SSFC, 3/29/20, p.A3)(Bloomberg, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Saudi air defenses intercepted Yemeni rebel missiles over Riyadh and a city on the Yemen border late today, leaving two civilians wounded in the curfew-locked capital amid efforts to combat coronavirus.
(AFP, 3/29/20)
2020 Mar 28, South African billionaire businessman Patrice Motsepe said his group of companies would donate 1 billion rand ($57 million) to help fight the coronavirus outbreak that has forced the country into total lockdown as infections climbed.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Spain death toll due to coronavirus rose to 6,528. Spain reported 8,189 new cases of novel coronavirus in the last 24 hours, putting the total number of cases at 72,248.
(Bloomberg, 3/28/20)(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, The death toll in Switzerland from coronavirus climbed to 235 with total cases at 13,213.
(AP, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Thailand reported 109 new coronavirus cases and one death, bringing the total to 1,245 infections and six deaths.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Turkey halted all intercity trains and limited domestic flights as the number of coronavirus cases jumped to 7,402, with 108 dead.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, The United Arab Emirates extended to April 5 a de-facto nightly curfew to sterilize public places. The UAE has reported two deaths from the coronavirus pandemic and 468 confirmed infections.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, A doctor (39) in Uzbekistan died after unsuccessfully trying to treat a coronavirus infection that he kept secret.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2020 Mar 28, Vietnam began limiting domestic flights and stop public gatherings for two weeks, as it aimed to keep down the number of coronavirus cases. The health ministry reported an additional 11 coronavirus cases, bringing the total number in the country to 174. There are 1,729 suspected cases in the country.
(Reuters, 3/28/20)
2021 Mar 28, In Alaska five people were killed on a heli-skiing excursion when their chopper crashed. Czech billionaire, Petr Kellner (56), whose net worth has been estimated at $17.5 billion by Forbes, was aboard the Airbus AS350 B3 helicopter when it went down near Knik Glacier. One survivor was listed in serious but stable condition.
(NY Times, 3/29/21)
2021 Mar 28, California to date had 3,635,640 cases of coronavirus and 58,348 deaths. The SF Bay Area had 420,547 cases and 5,873 deaths. Total cases nationwide reached over 30,255,303 with the death toll at 549,288.
(sfist.com, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, In southern California Krys Brandon Ruiz (26), a transgender male, died from a fatal gunshot wound following an altercation with Lompoc Police officers minutes after they received a report of a person walking northbound on H Street with a handgun shortly after 8 p.m. An hour before the shooting, Ruiz was dropped off at his apartment by his mother after dinner, blocks away from the shooting location.
(Tribune Publ., 4/17/21)
2021 Mar 28, In Indiana serial killer Joseph Edward Duncan III (58) died in US prison, having admitted to slaughtering seven people — including five children — in Idaho, Washington state, Montana and California.
(AP, 3/31/21)
2021 Mar 28, In Maryland Joshua Green (27) shot three people at a Royal Farms convenience store in Essex, killing two of them. Police believed Green had also shot and killed his parents in Baldwin before killing himself.
(SFC, 3/30/21, p.A3)
2021 Mar 28, A year after becoming a global epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic, New York and New Jersey were back atop the list of US states with the highest rates of infection. New Jersey has been reporting about 647 new cases for every 100,000 residents over the past 14 days. New York has averaged 548.
(AP, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, In Tennessee powerful rainstorms flooded roads and houses across Nashville, killing at least four people.
(NY Times, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, Albania started a mass inoculation campaign ahead of the summer tourism season after acquiring 192,000 doses of Chinese coronavirus vaccine Sinovac earlier this week.
(AP, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, Armenia’s embattled PM Nikol Pashinyan confirmed that he will step down from the post in April in order to allow for an early parliamentary election.
(AP, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, Australian broadcaster Nine Entertainment was unable to air its news bulletin from its Sydney headquarters due to "technical difficulties" which a source with knowledge of the matter blamed on a suspected cyber attack.
(Reuters, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, In eastern Bangladesh three people were killed in two separate clashes between Hefajat-e-Islam activists and police in Sarail upazila and Brahmanbaria district town. Hundreds of members of a hardline Islamist group attacked Hindu temples and a train, as violence spread across the country in the wake of a visit by Indian PM Narendra Modi. At least 11 protesters have been killed over the last two days.
(https://tinyurl.com/4e5k3r35)(Reuters, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, In Canada a man went on a stabbing spree in North Vancouver killing one woman and injuring six other people. A suspect in his 20s was arrested.
(SFC, 3/29/21, p.A3)
2021 Mar 28, It was reported that a digital illustration by a prominent Chinese propaganda artist mocking Western governments, media and businesses critical of labor conditions in Xinjiang has gone viral on China's social media. The digital art by Wuheqilin, named after a one-horned Chinese mythical beast, shows two figures with white pointed hoods interviewing a scarecrow in a field of cotton and Black slaves.
(AP, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, In France critical care doctors said surging coronavirus infections could soon overwhelm their ability to care for the sick in Paris hospitals.
(SFC, 3/29/21, p.A4)
2021 Mar 28, It was reported that Agnes Callamard, a French human rights expert who led a UN investigation into the killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, has been appointed the new leader of Amnesty International.
(AP, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, In Indonesia two suicide bombers believed to be members of an Islamist militant group attacked a Catholic church in city of Makassar on the first day of the Easter Holy Week, wounding 19 people. A recently married couple with suspected militant links used pressure cooker bombs to blow themselves up outside the Roman Catholic cathedral.
(Reuters, 3/28/21)(AP, 3/30/21)
2021 Mar 28, Jerusalem's Church of the Holy Sepulcher opened to the public on Palm Sunday, allowing Christians to attend mass at the start of Holy Week on the site where they believe Jesus was crucified and rose from the dead.
(Reuters, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, In Mozambique rebels fought the Mozambican army for the fifth straight day for control of the strategic northern town of Palma, as reports came in that dozens of civilians have been killed and bodies were littering the streets.
(AP, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, In Myanmar at least nine people were killed as protests continued against the Feb. 1 military coup. About 3,000 villagers from territory controlled by the Karen fled across the border to Thailand after Myanmar military aircraft dropped bombs on a Karen guerrilla position.
(AP, 3/29/21)
2021 Mar 28, Sudan’s interim government and the main rebel group in the country agreed to re-start peace talks.
(AP, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, In northeast Syria thousands of Kurdish-led forces, with assistance from the US-led coalition, launched a military operation at the sprawling Al-Hol camp, in a new effort to identify and arrest Islamic State militants and tamp down escalating killings and violence in the camp. The camp houses some 62,000 people, including wives and children of IS members.
(AP, 3/28/21)
2021 Mar 28, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said the United Nations is holding "serious negotiations" with China for unfettered access to the Xinjiang region to verify reports that Muslim Uighurs are being persecuted.
(Reuters, 3/28/21)
2022 Mar 28, US President Joe Biden submitted a $5.79 trillion budget plan to Congress that calls for record peacetime military spending while raising taxes for billionaires and companies and lowering government deficits.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, President Biden said his assertion days earlier that Russian President Vladimir Putin "cannot remain in power" was an expression of moral outrage and not intended as a formal policy call for regime change.
(AFP, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Top diplomats of the United States and four Arab countries (Bahrain, Egypt, Morocco, UAE) convened in Israel in a display of unity against Iran but also used the rare summit to press their host to revive long-stalled peacemaking with the Palestinians.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Total US COVID-19 cases reached over 80,000,546 with the death toll at 978,102.
(sfist.com, 3/29/22)
2022 Mar 28, In Connecticut Jamie Petrone-Codrington, a former Yale School of Medicine administrator, pleaded guilty to fraud and tax offenses after stealing $40 million in computer and electronic software from the school over a nearly ten-year period..
(https://tinyurl.com/4w5rf9r9)
2022 Mar 28, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida signed the Parental Rights in Education legislation that prohibits classroom instruction and discussion about sexual orientation and gender identity in some elementary school grades.
(NY Times, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Police in Panama City, Florida, displayed 75 confiscated guns following weekend arrests of 161 people as rowdy spring break crowds prompted curfews and some establishments to close from Miami Beach to the Panhandle.
(SFC, 3/29/22, p.A3)
2022 Mar 28, In Pennsylvania three people were killed and at least a dozen were injured after a blinding snow squall led to a fiery pileup of at least 50 vehicles, including several tractor-trailers, on I-81 in Schuylkill County.
(NY Times, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Fox News host Tucker Carlson offered a warning about the repercussions of removing Russian President Vladimir Putin from power, and suggested that Islamic extremists would somehow get hold of the country’s nuclear weapons and use them on Americans.
(Huffpost, 3/29/22)
2022 Mar 28, Shares of Tesla jumped after the car maker announced its second stock split in less than two years.
(SFC, 3/29/22, p.C2)
2022 Mar 28, Walmart Inc said it will stop sales of tobacco products in some of its more than 5,000 stores across the United States.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Abu Dhabi's Mubadala Investment Company said it is pausing investments in Russia, which represent less than 1% of its portfolio, because of the Ukraine crisis.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, It was reported that Afghanistan's Taliban has instructed all government employees to wear a beard and adhere to a dress code or risk being fired.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Belgian biotech firm UCB SA said the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved its drug to treat seizures associated with Lennox-Gastaut Syndrome (LGS), a rare form of childhood epilepsy.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, It was reported that internet service in dozens of neighborhoods in Brazil's major cities have been taken over by companies associated with alleged criminals unafraid to use force and intimidation to push out rivals.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Britain instructed public sector bodies to review energy and other contracts they have with Russian firms and consider switching suppliers, noting that existing energy agreements could benefit the Russian state.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Britain's BBC said the Taliban have banned its television news in three main languages of Afghanistan from being broadcast.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, British military intelligence said the Russian private military company, the Wagner Group, has been deployed to eastern Ukraine.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Cambodian PM Hun Sen condemned Russia's invasion of Ukraine and echoed calls for an immediate ceasefire made by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), which Cambodia currently chairs.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Canada's federal government signed a deal with Ontario to implement a subsidized child care program in that province, creating a national daycare program for the first time in Canada.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Survivors of Canada's residential schools asked Pope Francis to guarantee unfettered access to Church records on the institutions where indigenous children were abused and their culture denied.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, China's financial hub of Shanghai launched a two-stage lockdown of its 26 million residents, closing bridges and tunnels and restricting highway traffic in a scramble to contain surging COVID-19 cases.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, In Colombia at least 11 members of a group formed by former FARC rebels who reject a peace deal were killed in combat in a rural area of Puerto Leguizamo municipality, Putumayo province.
(Reuters, 3/29/22)
2022 Mar 28, In eastern CongoDRC heavy fighting erupted overnight as fighters from the M23 rebel group attacked army positions near the border with Uganda and Rwanda.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, El Salvador said more than 1,000 gang suspects have been arrested following a wave of weekend killings that left 87 people dead. Police said five MS-13 leaders, who reportedly ordered the killings, have been captured.
(SFC, 3/29/22, p.A3)
2022 Mar 28, European Economic Commissioner Paolo Gentiloni said the impact of Russia's invasion of Ukraine on food security will potentially have "dramatic consequences" for African countries that rely on grains imports.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, An EU agency said authorities in three European countries have frozen more than $130 million in assets linked to an investigation into money laundering in Lebanon. The assets, frozen on March 25, amount to 120 million euros ($131.6 million).
(AP, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said Moscow broke all rules of international order by using force to shift borders and it will be Russia that will most severely suffer the consequences of this.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, The Honduran Supreme Court authorized the extradition of former president Juan Orlando Hernandez to the United States to face drug trafficking and firearms charges dating back to his two terms in office.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, In India thousands of workers began a two-day strike to protest government economic policies. Their demands included freezing all privatization plans and providing social security.
(SFC, 3/29/22, p.A2)
2022 Mar 28, It was reported that Indian companies are snapping up Russian oil as it is available at a deep discounts after some companies and countries shunned purchases from Moscow due to sanctions against Russia for its Ukraine invasion. India, which has refrained from outright condemnation of Moscow, has not banned the importation of Russian oil.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Israel voiced support for Morocco's autonomy proposal for Western Sahara after the countries' foreign ministers met at an Israel-Arab summit.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Kazakhstan's deputy foreign minister told a German newspaper that companies exiting Russia due to the war in Ukraine are welcome to move production to Kazakhstan.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, A Kazakh radio station fired one of its presenters after she said "we will call in Uncle Vova if you talk too much" in a heated Facebook debate, a reference to Russian President Vladimir Putin and the idea that Russia could invade. Kazakhstan has avoided criticizing Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, It was reported that millions of dollars of public funds allegedly stolen by two of Kenya's richest men are being returned from Jersey to Kenya to buy life-saving Covid-19 equipment following a landmark agreement signed in London.
(BBC, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, The International Monetary Fund said it has reached a staff-level agreement on a $470 million facility for Mozambique.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, In northern Nigeria at least 8 people were killed and several were missing after suspected bandits attacked a passenger train headed from Abuja to Kaduna late today. Suspected bandits soon contacted some families to say they are holding relatives who went missing following the attack, and that they will demand a ransom. 168 people remained missing following the attack.
(Reuters, 3/29/22)(Reuters, 3/31/22)(BBC, 4/4/22)
2022 Mar 28, Pakistan's parliament took up a no-confidence motion moved by opposition lawmakers in a bid to remove Prime Minister Imran Khan, pushing the South Asian nation closer to political turmoil.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Peruvian President Pedro Castillo survived an impeachment vote in Congress that fell short of the votes needed to oust the leftist leader eight months after he took office.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Sri Lanka's central bank governor said the government has sought an additional credit line of $1.5 billion from India to import essentials, amid its worst economic crisis in decades.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Russia said it will not supply gas to Europe for free as it works out methods for accepting payments for its gas exports in rubles but G7 nations refused the demand.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Novaya Gazeta, Russia's leading independent newspaper, suspended operations after pressure from Russian authorities, a move that comes less than six months after its editor won the Nobel Peace Prize for his paper’s courageous reporting under difficult circumstances.
(AP, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, It was reported that wealthy Russians are pouring money into real estate in Turkey and the United Arab Emirates, seeking a financial haven in the wake of Moscow's invasion of Ukraine and Western sanctions, according to many property companies. Some 14,000 Russians have reportedly arrived in Turkey since the war began on Feb. 24, many carrying wads of cash due to blocks on their US credit cards.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, South Korea officials said the daily average of new COVID-19 declined last week for the first time in more than two months.
(SFC, 3/29/22, p.A4)
2022 Mar 28, Swiss bank Credit Suisse said it has stopped pursuing new business in Russia after the invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, In northeastern Syria clashes broke out late today between US-backed Syrian Kurdish fighters and members of the Islamic State group at al-Hol, Hassakeh province. At least three people were killed inside the restive camp that houses IS families.
(AP, 3/29/22)
2022 Mar 28, Tunisia's Parliament Speaker Rached Ghannouchi said parliament will hold two full sessions this week, to consider revoking President Kais Saied moves toward a new constitution and one-man rule.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Ukraine's military intelligence published the names and contact details of 620 people it alleged were officers of Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) involved in "criminal activities" in Europe.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Ukrainian defense ministry spokesperson Oleksander Motuzyanyk said Ukraine sees no signs on the ground that Russia has given up a plan to surround the Ukrainian capital Kyiv. A spokesperson for the mayor of Mariupol said nearly 5,000 people have been killed in the southern city since Russian forces laid siege to it.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Irpin Mayor Oleksandr Markushyn said Ukrainian forces had seized back full control of the town near Kyiv which has been one of the main hotspots of fighting with Russian troops near the capital. A senior US defense official said Ukrainian forces have retaken the town of Trostyanets, south of Sumy, from Russian forces.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, The United Arab Emirates' energy minister doubled down on an oil alliance with Russia that's helped buoy crude prices to their highest in years as Moscow's war on Ukraine rattles markets and sends energy and commodity prices soaring.
(AP, 3/28/22)
2022 Mar 28, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said Venezuelan security forces have carried out joint operations with Colombian rebel group the National Liberation Army (ELN) against former members of the FARC rebels who remain armed. HRW said At least 103 people were killed in Arauca in the first two months of this year amid violence between armed groups.
(Reuters, 3/28/22)
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