Portal:Current events/2012 March 7
March 7, 2012 (Wednesday)
Armed conflict and attacks
- Insurgency in the North Caucasus: Five policemen are killed in a female suicide bombing by the widow of a killed Islamic militant in Dagestan, Russia. (The Telegraph)
- Six British Army soldiers are missing presumed killed in Afghanistan. (AP via Washington Post)
- Valerie Amos, the United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, visits the Baba Amr district in the Syrian city of Homs. (BBC)
Disasters
- The death toll from a series of avalanches in Afghanistan's Badakhshan province rises to 50. (AP via SFGate)
- The Australian town of Yenda, New South Wales, is flooded as floodwaters move through the Murray–Darling Basin. (Daily Telegraph)
International relations
- Swedish media report that the country has been helping Saudi Arabia plan the construction of a weapons factory. (Al Jazeera)
Politics
- China describes Tibetan monks that have self-immolated as "criminals" and accuses the Dalai Lama of supporting the acts. (The Hindu)
- Libyan leader Mustafa Abdul Jalil says he will "defend national unity" after Cyrenaica, the eastern region of the country, declared it would become semi-autonomous. (Al Jazeera)
- Sweden's Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt and his wife, Stockholm county council chair Filippa Reinfeldt, separate after two decades of marriage. (Washington Post) (CBS News) (The Local)
Science
- The biggest solar flare in five years that occurred on March 6 nears Earth with the capacity to disrupt power grids, GPS systems and airline flights. (AP via USA Today)
- Physicists from Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory report data suggesting the elusive hypothesized Higgs boson ("God particle") may have been detected. (New York Times)