Up to 70 were killed across Burma on March 14 as security forces continue to fire on pro-democracy protesters, bringing the death toll since the Feb. 1 coup to well over 100. Most of the killings were in Yangon's outlying townships, where protesters have barricaded off streets in an attempt to secure territory. Martial law was declared in six of these townships, giving the military broad authority over those areas. Protesters have started using the hashtags #WeNeedR2P and #WeNeedR2PForMyanmar. In images seen from the air, protesters have arranged placards or lights from their mobile phones to spell out "WE NEED R2P." This is a reference to the "responsibility to protect" doctrine developed in the 1990s following the disastrous failures to prevent genocide in Bosnia and Rwanda.

In the latest outbreak of fast-escalating violence across Africa's Sahel, gunmen in southwestern Niger on March 15 killed at least 58 people when they intercepted a convoy of four commercial transport vehicles carrying local civilian residents from a weekly market, and attacked nearby villages. The passengers were summarily executed, and homes and granaries put to the torch in the villages. The attacks took place in the Tillabéri region, near the flashpoint "tri-border area" where Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso come together. Militant groups linked to ISIS and al-Qaeda cross back and forth between all three countries.

A week after the US State Department added the Islamist insurgents in northern Mozambique to its list of "foreign terrorist organizations," the Pentagon is now preparing to send a team of military advisors into the conflict zone. The US Embassy in Maputo announced March 15 that the two-month Joint Combined Exchange Training (JCET) program will see US Special Forces troops instructing Mozambican marines. This follows an announcement weeks ealier by Portugal, the former colonial power in Mozambique, that it is dispatching an elite military unit to help fight the insurgents, known locally as the Shabaab. Lisbon is also petitioning the European Union to send an international military mission to the region to back up the Mozambique Armed Defense Forces (FADM).

Ten years ago this week, the Syrian Revolution began with peaceful pro-democracy protests. The first demonstrations broke out in the city of Deraa after local schoolchildren painted a mural depicting scenes and slogans from the recent revolutions in other Arab countries, and were detained and brutalized by the police. The Bashar Assad regime responded to the demonstrations with serial massacres. After months of this, the Free Syrian Army emerged, initially as a self-defense militia to protect protesters. But the situation soon escalated to an armed insurgency. The regime lost control of large areas of the country, and local civil resistance committees backed by the FSA seized control. Assad then escalated to levels of violence rarely seen on Earth since World War II.

Protesters against a mining project pelted stones at the vehicle of Argentina's President Alberto Fernández on a visit to southern Chubut province March 13, forcing him to flee the scene. The incident took place at the pueblo of Lago Puelo, in an area recently affected by devastating forest fires. Fernández was assailed as soon as he tried to step out of the car, with protesters chanting slogans against both him and provincial governor Mariano Arcioni. Fernández cut short his tour, and after escaping the confrontation was whisked from the area by Federal Police helicopter. The Chubut provincial legislature is considering a measure to allow Canadian firm Pan American Silver to move ahead with its $1 billion Navidad mining project, but the vote has been held up by protest mobilizations by communities opposed the project, under the slogan "No is no." (Europa Press, Diario Junio, Entre Rios)

With a May 1 deadline for the withdrawal of US forces from Afghanistan approaching but a final peace deal stalled, the White House is said to be considering an extension beyond this date for removal of its 2,500 troops remaining in the country. The Washington Post writes that the Biden administration "is likely to postpone a full withdrawal—potentially with Taliban acquiescence—to buy more time to advance a power-sharing proposal they hope can break an impasse in talks between the militants and the Afghan government."

The Biden administration on March 10 designated two alleged affiliates of the Islamic State, in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Mozambique, as "Foreign Terrorist Organizations." The State Department named as FTOs the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) in DR Congo and Ansar al-Sunna in Mozambique. The Department also designated the respective leaders of those organizations, Seka Musa Baluku and Abu Yasir Hassan, as "Specially Designated Terrorists." The designations freeze all US property and assets in the names of these groups and leaders, and prohibit US citizens from doing business with them. Additionally, the Department stated that "it is a crime to knowingly provide material support or resources" to the groups, or "to attempt or conspire to do so."

At least 29 were killed, including women and children, when gunmen attacked a church at Debos Kebele, a village in Horo Guduru zone of Ethiopia's Oromia regional state on March 5. Local residents were gathered in the church to celebrate the start of the two-month Lent fast by followers of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahdo rite. The massacre was the bloodiest in a wave of attacks on residents of the Amhara ethnicity in the region over the past months.  The National Movement of Amhara (NaMA) blames the attacks on the rebel Oromo Liberation Army (OLA), but also accuses the central government of complicity. NaMA said that at rallies in support of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed in the region, Amhara are stigmatized and referred to by the pejorative "neftegna"—meaning "rifleman" or "musketeer," a reference to armed settlers in Oromia under the Amhara-dominated Abyssinian monarchy.