Even as the world is gripped by the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan, Russia announced it will build a reactor in neighboring Belarus—where large areas still remain closed off due to the 1986 Chernobyl meltdown. The Russian-designe plant is to be built near Ostrovets, just 50 miles from the capital city of European Union member Lithuania. The deal was announced March 15 at a meeting between Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and Belarussian President Alexander Lukashenko in Minsk. Under the agreement, Russia's state-owned Atomstroyeksport will build the nuclear station, with the first reactor due to come on line in 2016 and as many as four more reactors operational by 2025.

Despite a temporary construction moratorium in the wake of the Fukushima disaster, China is still planning to move ahead with an ambitious thrust of nuclear development—with a new generation of supposedly meltdown-proof reactors. The technology in the works will be the "world’s first high-temperature, gas-cooled reactor," an official of the Huaneng Nuclear Power Development Co. told Bloomberg. The new Chinese reactor will not depend on external sources for cooling, but will instead use helium, an inert gas, in its cooling system, officials say. The reactor will be built to "withstand temperatures exceeding 1,600 degrees Celsius (2,912 degrees Fahrenheit) for several hundred hours without melting down," according to the China Business News.

Power was restored to the control room of the No. 3 reactor at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant late March 22, and the Tokyo Electric Power Co. plans to try to restart the cooling pumps. Engineers are now trying to reactivate monitoring systems, such as those measuring temperatures of the spent fuel rods. At unit No. 4, a construction vehicle designed to pour concrete for high rises is being used to pump water into the reactor building. International Atomic Energy Agency director general, Yukiya Amano, speaking from Vienna, noted "positive developments," while warning: "The crisis has still not been resolved and the situation at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant remains very serious," with "high levels" of radiation measured around the plant. (USA Today, NHK World, NYT, March 22) Hours after the announcement that power had been restored, TEPCO, said black smoke was rising from the No. 3 reactor building. The smoke gradually cleared after about an house, and TEPCO said that the radiation level at plant gate, one kilometer west of the No. 3 reactor, was unchanged at 265.1 micro-sieverts per hour. Gray smoke was seen rising from the same reactor building the previous day. (NHK World, March 23)

Yemen's Parliament enacted several emergency measures March 23 at the request of President Ali Abdullah Saleh in an effort to end anti-government protests. The new laws give the government greater power to arrest and detain protesters and to censor the media. The new laws follow Saleh's declaration last week of a 30-day state of emergency. The measure passed easily as many minority party members of the 301-seat parliament did not attend the session. Saleh warned that Yemen could face a civil war after opposition leaders rejected his offer to step down by the end of this year. The emergency laws expire in 30 days. despite an appeal from youths at the forefront of anti-regime protests that it could lead to a new "massacre." (Jurist, March 23)

US Defense Secretary Robert Gates said in Cairo March 23 that the UN Security Council resolution authorizing a no-fly zone in Libya is "not time-limited" and that it was unrealistic to expect military action to be over in a matter of weeks. "So I think that there is no current timeline in terms of when it might end," he told reporters. The comments came as nearly 12 hours of Allied air-strikes broke the Libyan regime's five-day siege of the key rebel-held town of Misurata. Aerial bombardment destroyed tanks and artillery, sending the bulk of Moammar Qaddafi's besieging forces fleeing, and securing the town for the rebels. The battle for Misurata is said to have cost some 100 lives from shelling, snipers and street fighting. (Middle East Online, The Guardian, March 23)

An Israeli woman critically wounded when a bomb ripped through a bus near Jerusalem's central bus station on March 23 died of her injuries after being hospitalized. The attack was the first major bombing in Jerusalem since 2004. More recent deadly attacks involved gunmen, as in the case of the Mercaz Harav attack in March 2008 that left eight yeshiva students dead, or Palestinians commandeering bulldozers or cars and using them as weapons. (Maan News Agency, JTA, March 23)

Syrian security forces killed 15 people March 23 in the city of Deraa, witnesses and rights activists said. Seven were killed when security personnel fired on a group of protesters that gathered after dawn prayers outside al-Omari mosque. Later, about 3,000 protesters from neighboring towns gathered outside Deraa and clashed with an army unit. Syrian state television reported the government fired the governor of Deraa province, and promised reforms. The protest wave in Deraa was apparently sparked after local schoolchildren painted a mural depicting scenes and slogans from the recent revolutions in other Arab countries, and were detained by police. (CNN, FT, March 23)

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), a US civil and human rights organization, wrote the US Justice Department's Civil Rights Division on March 10 asking the agency to conclude an ongoing investigation of alleged abuses by the Puerto Rican police and to publish its findings. The ACLU said that its Puerto Rican branch has been reporting these allegations to the Justice Department since around May 2008. The letter, signed by ACLU executive director Anthony Romero and addressed to Assistant Attorney General Thomas Perez, follows through on the organization's decision in February to make the situation in Puerto Rico "a high priority."