The US Department of State warns of the risks of travel to Mali. Extremist and militant elements, including terrorist groups, continue to be present in northern Mali. Members of these groups killed two UN peacekeepers on Dec. 14, 2013, and kidnapped five aid workers on Feb. 8, 2014. There have been multiple rocket attacks on Gao, and three rockets were launched near Timbuktu airport on Feb. 17.

After taking off from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, at 12:41 a.m. on March 8, Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 — with 239 passengers and crew on board — headed for Beijing, China, due to land at 6:30 a.m. However, a little after 1:00 it disappeared, sparking an international search operation that remained ongoing at press time.

Sometime after its final message to Malaysian ground control, the plane’s transponder was turned off and the plane turned west, according to the Malaysian military,...

In Tunisia on March 5, president Moncef Marzouki lifted a 3-year-long state of emergency that had been declared after president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali was ousted by a popular uprising in 2011. It had given police and armed forces more authority to act against suspected militants, particularly the Islamist group Ansar al-Sharia, which formed after the 2011 revolt. 

In its antiterror campaign, the military killed seven insurgents in Tunis on Feb. 4, seizing 800 kilograms of explosives...