Main News of March 21

A roundup of what has happened in the past 24 hours

WORLD

* UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said that the United Nations will open an investigation into an alleged chemical weapons attack in Syria as soon as possible.

* The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), one of the largest and most influential pediatrician groups in the United States, announced that it supports same-sex marriage, saying child health and well-being depends on a stable relationship between parents and not on the parents’ sexual orientation.

* Lawmakers in Georgia tentatively approved amendments to the Constitution depriving President Mikheil Saakashvili of the power to dismiss the Cabinet, disband parliament and call elections.

* Abdullah Ocalan, the leader of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) who is serving a life sentence, urged the PKK to end its confrontation with the Turkish authorities, withdraw its militants from the country and start peace negotiations to settle a 30-year conflict.

* Russian-born scientist Alexander Polyakov has been awarded the $3-million 2013 Fundamental Physics Prize for his work in field theory and string theory.

RUSSIA

* Police detained 10 opposition activists who briefly blocked an entrance to Russia’s Central Bank building, demanding the repatriation of Russian money stashed away in tax havens abroad, protest organizers and police said.

* A special forces officer has been killed and two other officers injured during a shootout with suspected militants near Makhachkala, the capital of Russia’s North Caucasus republic of Dagestan, police said.

* A radar probe of the bottom of Chebarkul Lake in Russia’s Urals has revealed a crater possibly created by a fragment of a meteorite that exploded over the city of Chelyabinsk last month, a Russian scientist said.

* Police detained 262 illegal migrants in northwest Moscow, the Interior Ministry said.

* Russia is losing up to 200 polar bears every year to poachers in the far eastern Chukotka region, International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) said.

BUSINESS

* Russia’s state-owned Rosneft put the final touches to its takeover of TNK-BP to become the world’s largest publicly traded oil company.

* Russia’s Finance Ministry lashed out at a new state program to develop the country’s depressed eastern Siberia and Far East over what it said was “bloated state financing.”

DEFENSE

* The Russian Defense Ministry denied media reports speculating that Russia will relocate its resupply base in the Syrian port of Tartus to Beirut due to the escalation of the Syrian conflict.

* A senior Russian diplomat said that the United States has provided new information on its missile defense program that Moscow will study in detail.

* Russia’s Caspian Flotilla will this year be boosted by two rapid attack missile craft and a number of other auxiliary vessels, the Southern Military District said.

SPORTS

* Speed skater Denis Yuskov claimed the first gold of the World Single Distance Championships in Sochi.

* Three multi-faith prayer centers will open in Sochi for athletes at next year’s Winter Olympics, organizers said.