US-led coalition forces and Afghan troops killed five suspected members of a "terrorist network" in a raid in northern Afghanistan's Kunduz province March 22, the coalition said. But the mayor of Imam Sahib district, Abdul Manan, said it was his house that was raided and those killed were not militants.

A suicide bomber blew himself up at a funeral for the father of a Kurdish regional government official in northern Iraq's Diyala province March 23, killing 25 people and wounding 45. The bombing in the town of Jalawla underscores the dangers Iraq still faces from militants, even as overall violence falls to levels not seen since mid-2003 and the US prepares to withdraw combat troops by Aug 31, 2010. Jalawla is a mostly Kurdish town, and the Kurdish regional government in a dispute with Iraq's central government over who should control the area.

Yemeni security forces March 25 arrested six suspects in the attack nine days earlier that killed four South Korean tourists. Authorities say the cell is also suspected in a bombing a few days later against a convoy carrying South Korean government inspectors that caused no serious injuries. Security forces are hunting other members of the group, which they say was planning further attacks on tourists and oil installations. (Bloomberg, March 25)

Having already dropped the "enemy combatant" nomenclature, the Barack Obama administration has now formally abandoned the Bush-era phrase "Global War on Terrorism." The new term is the dryly clinical and antiseptic "Overseas Contingency Operation." Is this an improvement—or a switch from a hubristic and bellicose rallying cry to an Orwellian euphemism? From the Washington Post, March 25:

Israel unlawfully and extensively used white phosphorous munitions in their recent Gaza offensive, according to a report released March 25 by Human Rights Watch. The report says that while white phosphorous is allowed to be used to obscure ground operations in open areas and against military targets, international law prohibits air-bursting the shells over populated areas due to the risk it poses to civilians.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said March 19 that it will conduct an internal investigation into reports that Israeli soldiers committed war crimes against Palestinian civilians. The announcement follows soldiers' reports of civilian killings and vandalism under liberal rules of engagement during the recent Gaza Strip operation.

The US Border Patrol intends to employ a chemical herbicide to eradicate stands of the Carrizo cane, an invasive plant that grows as tall as 30 feet and provides convenient cover for undocumented border crossers and smugglers. The variety of Carrizo cane that is common in the Laredo-Del Rio borderlands is from the region of Valencia, Spain.

About 25,000 members of the indigenous Movement of Triqui Unification and Struggle (MULT) marched in Oaxaca city in the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca on March 18 to demand that the state government start talks on incidents of violence against the Triqui and others over the past two years. The protesters tied up traffic as they marched from the Monumento a La Madre along the Cerro del Fortín highway to the city's main plaza.