• Next on Russia-Ukraine: U.S. President Donald Trump has spent the past couple of weeks using sticks to pressure Ukraine to accept a ceasefire, while showering Russia with unexpected carrots. With Ukraine agreeing to a truce Tuesday, the action is now moving to Moscow. The Kremlin’s view is that Russia is winning the war and can press for its aims, including Ukrainian neutrality and annexation of regions Russia has claimed. (Russia’s military said today it had taken Sudzha, in the Kursk region.) But Russian President Vladimir Putin will want to maintain President Trump’s goodwill, and keep the carrots coming. How he handles Mr. Trump’s demand for an immediate cessation of hostilities is a key indicator of how the peace process will go forward. The stage is set for imminent U.S.-Russia dialogue. – Staff
• Trade war accelerates: Canada and the European Union hit back March 12 at increased steel and aluminum tariffs imposed by President Donald Trump. Canada matched Mr. Trump’s 25% tariff increase on steel and aluminum, and raised import taxes on some other U.S. goods. The EU will also raise tariffs on U.S. products. Still, U.S. inflation slowed last month for the first time since September, the Labor Department said Wednesday. Economists remain cautious about where it is headed next. – The Associated Press
• Pakistan ends insurgents’ attack: Pakistan’s security forces rescued 346 hostages from a passenger train that separatist insurgents of the Baloch Liberation Army attacked on March 11. Officials said all 50 assailants were killed, but not before they killed 21 of the 440 passengers. Pakistan’s prime minister traveled to restive southwestern Balochistan province today to meet with survivors of the attack and the commandos who rescued them. – AP
• Climate-project funding revoked: The Environmental Protection Agency terminated grant agreements worth $20 billion issued by the Biden administration under what’s known as the green bank to finance clean energy and climate-friendly projects. The action comes weeks after the EPA froze the grants. – AP
  • Related Monitor story: US science funding was a bipartisan priority. Now it’s a target of federal cuts.
• New air-safety regulations: U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said the agency will make permanent restrictions to prevent helicopters from flying near Washington Reagan National Airport when two lesser-used runways are operational. The move follows a midair collision in January that killed 67 people. – Reuters
  • Related Monitor story: Rising safety is the historical trend in aviation. But is that changing in the U.S.? In January, we reported how the D.C. crash came amid what some see as growing stresses on air-safety systems.
• Greenland postscript: Election issues Tuesday in Greenland, an autonomous territory of Denmark, included healthcare and fisheries. Not on the ballot: independence, on which a snap election could eventually follow. The U.S. president has suggested that Greenland could thrive under American administration. One poll indicated only 6% of Greenlanders favored that. “We don’t want to be Americans, nor Danes,” Greenland’s prime minister wrote on Facebook. “We are Kalaallit.” Before the vote, won by a center-right party, Denmark’s foreign minister acknowledged big-power interest in Greenland. He expressed hope that Greenland would offer “steadfast politicians to lead the country through it."  – Staff

Less than a week after immigration officials in New York arrested Mahmoud Khalil, a Palestinian student activist and a green-card holder, much remains unclear about the government’s specific accusations against him. The Trump administration appears to be entering uncharted legal waters as the government seeks to define – and deport – individuals whom it sees as threats. Some immigration advocates are wary of government retaliation against First Amendment-protected speech; others see Mr. Khalil’s case as part of a broader crackdown on dissent. As with many aspects of this administration, “It’s pushing the law to the limit,” says Gabriel Chin, an immigration law scholar at the University of California, Davis School of Law.

About half of the employees at the U.S. Department of Education were placed on administrative leave or took a buyout March 11. The cuts reflect a “commitment to efficiency, accountability, and ensuring that resources are directed where they matter most: to students, parents, and teachers,” said Secretary of Education Linda McMahon in a statement. Will an outright effort to shut it down follow? That would take an act of Congress. It’s also unclear what effect doing so would have on the students who rely on extra services from federal funding or financial aid for higher education. Without agency oversight, “Our economy and workforce will suffer, and this will damage our economy for generations to come,” says Keri Rodrigues, co-founder of the National Parents Union.

The Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel used cheap drones, tractors, and hang gliders. It succeeded despite Israel’s $1.1 billion above-and-below-ground barrier on its 40-mile border with Gaza – one equipped with sensors and remote-controlled weaponry, and hailed as an “iron wall.” Investigations indicate that Israel’s army and Shin Bet security force failed to understand that Hamas was capable of carrying out such a coordinated attack. Among the emerging causes for the intelligence failure: that heavy use of technology comes at the expense of human intelligence gathering and assessment, which is better at detecting tone and context. “Once you become reliant on one source,” says a researcher whose work serves the Israeli intelligence community, “your line of sight is narrowed.”

The U.S. president’s scrapping of diversity, equity, and inclusion policies has opened the door for a rollback of such efforts in Europe. Are European businesses – some just getting comfortable with such programming – inclined to step through it? European companies that have received U.S. government contracts will be under pressure to follow U.S. directives. Other European businesses, without U.S. links, are obliged to follow European DEI regulations, and appear to be doing so. Some appear to be resisting what they see as a rollback. “European businesses are already living with diversity,” says a French businessman and the commissioner for diversity and equal opportunities under the Sarkozy administration. “We’ve come too far to go backwards.”

When Kendy Auguste, an English teacher in Haiti, posted a quirky smartphone video of himself rapping about language, it was a hit far beyond his follower base. Its viral success was a classic tale of how social media can dissolve borders and democratize fame. But as algorithms swelled his number of views, the number of remixes and spoofs also grew. Those videos – many by social media account holders in France – were racking up views that Mr. Auguste knew were earning money. Because his account was registered in Haiti, where users couldn’t be paid, his own videos were valued at nothing. That perpetuated a perception that ideas from some parts of the world are worth more than those from other regions.

An offseason beach holds surprises. Snow forms sparse lines in the sand. Harsh wind and high tides bring summer detritus to the surface. Our essayist takes a bag with him whenever he goes to the beach. “Trash bugs me,” he writes, “and I can do something about it.” On a sunny March day during the pandemic, when he and his wife headed to the shore, the winter had been long and gray. But “It wasn’t long before we started spotting them: brightly colored sand toys, newly revealed,” he writes. They had stumbled upon a sedimentary layer of human making. These were treasures. Our writer knew what to do. 

For the past seven years, the vast majority of countries have seen a decline in rule of law, according to surveys by the World Justice Project. Not so the Philippines. Last year, it was one of a few countries whose global ranking rose, even if slightly from a low score.

Besides making reforms to its justice system, the Southeast Asian nation has now passed a major test. On Tuesday, it honored an arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court and flew a former president, Rodrigo Duterte, to the Netherlands. He will soon face trial at The Hague on charges of crimes against humanity for years of extrajudicial killings by police and vigilantes that he openly supported.

Reactions among Filipinos so far hint at widespread gratitude for this stunning example of equality before the law and embrace of universal norms of justice. Mr. Duterte’s 2016-2022 term as president, and an earlier stint as mayor of the country’s second-largest city, was a dark chapter for the Philippines, a country of 115 million people.

The arrest “should not only signal the end of impunity but ignite a larger movement for justice, transparency and the restoration of human rights,” former Justice Secretary Leila de Lima told Radio Free Asia.

Leaders of countries edging toward violent autocracy – or already in it – have probably taken notice of the International Criminal Court’s success. Set up in 1998 to realize a post-1945 international legal order and prevent “atrocity crimes,” the tribunal has limited powers and, so far, limited success in arrests and prosecutions. Yet the turnaround by the Philippines suggests that public thinking on rule of law can change quickly.

“While the world faces an increasingly uncertain future, it is somewhat reassuring that a few fundamental norms of international law will continue to hold until a more stable global order is achieved,” Eyal Benvenisti, a University of Cambridge law professor, wrote in February for the digital law journal Just Security.

For family members of victims killed during Mr. Duterte’s reign of terror, the arrest is only a first step. As Rep. Jude Acidre of the House of Representatives said, “We owe it to them to make sure that we start healing, but that healing will come only through one thing – through justice.”