An outpouring of grief in Sri Lanka

SRI LANKA: Grief can’t be contained by Tuesday’s national day of mourning, as many families are burying their dead. Listen. Police in Sri Lanka say the death toll has climbed to 359 people—making the Easter attacks the single deadliest terror incident carried out by Islamic State anywhere. ISIS posted online a video of the suicide bombers it alleged carried out the attacks, while the U.S. ambassador in Sri Lanka warned of “ongoing terrorist plots.”

EGPYT: Egyptians voted to change the constitution, allowing President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi to remain in office until perhaps 2030, tightening his grasp on power in the nominally democratic country. This comes after the 2011 Arab Spring promised to usher in democracy. “It’s been true for several years now that the gains of 2011 have been lost,” said scholar Michele Dunne of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “But I think that this just makes it more and more clear to people.” Already, authorities have in the past three years detained more than 15,000 civilians who await military trials.

NIGER: Between 2013 and 2017, U.S. special operations forces saw combat in at least 13 African countries—and U.S. personnel were killed or wounded in at least six of them. This report (and don’t miss the map) illustrates how the United States exerts military power under the radar and without full-on troop commitments and political fallout.

Concerning Navy SEALs and Marine Raiders operating in Mali, it’s not all pretty.

PHILIPPINES: A 6.4 magnitude earthquake hit the Philippines on Tuesday, following a 6.1 earthquake on Monday. The first quake killed at least 16 people and was centered about 40 miles northwest of Manila. Rescue workers searched for survivors through Monday night, and city officials turned off power as a precautionary measure.

MIDDLE EAST: David Schenker gets high marks from Republicans and Democrats to become the top U.S. diplomat overseeing Mideast policy, despite a holdup by Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., who’s asking all the wrong questions about Syria. Schenker has cultivated ties crossing religious and sectarian lines in Lebanon and Jordan and “brings a special feel to the job,” said former Obama aide Dennis Ross.

JAPAN has a new emperor, and major headaches ahead of May 1, when a new imperial era begins.

CHANNEL ISLANDS: Sark is a world apart, where a feudal system in place since 1565 didn’t come to an end until 2008.

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