For days, state-run television in Iran declared that, for their own safety, citizens should stay home and keep children indoors on the evening of March 16. And indeed, the streets of Iran did erupt into flames. But the opposition to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad did not organize it. Tuesday evening was the beginning of Nowrooz, the two-week-long traditional Iranian New Year celebration, which for more than three millenniums marked the beginning of spring in the Persian world. The popular holiday, celebrated with bonfires and, more recently, illegal fireworks, is so hoary it predates the three Abrahamic religions – Judaism, Christianity and Islam – a fact that the mullahs who rule Iran are quite sensitive about. One ayatullah, Nasser Makarem Shirazi, called the first day of Nowrooz a “superstitious act and baseless. Pious and sensible Muslims will stay away from it.”

From the time the sun set Tuesday evening, Tehran was filled with the sounds of small explosions and the smell of smoke. Police and Basij militia presence throughout the city was as high as it has been at any point since last year’s controversial presidential election, but for the most part, the law-enforcement officers remained cool, with some officers even joining crowds around bonfires and chatting with the attendees. Some small scuffles broke out when Basij arrived to break up impromptu block parties. (See pictures of Iran’s antigovernment demonstrations.)

The explosions continued well past midnight, although the state did what it could to keep Iranians from attending the festivities, including airing Hollywood blockbusters such as Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull on television. None of those tactics worked; the streets were filled with people who for one night seemed to ignore the recent proscriptions of the ruling religious establishment. Said an attendee who asked to remain anonymous: “This isn’t something that the government can take away from us. We’ve been doing this for 3,000 years. They should just accept it.” ]

The holiday is so sensitive that the opposition doesn’t want to be anywhere near accusations that it is fomenting unrest during its celebration. The so-called Green Movement leadership actually asked its followers not to target the day for protest, as has been done with Muslim holy days and the anniversaries of important dates in the Islamic revolution led by the late Ayatullah Khomeini. The blowback would be worse for opposition leaders like Mir-Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karoubi if they were seen as promoting demonstrations during a festival from the days before Iran converted to Islam. No one wants to be called un-Islamic. (See how Iran’s opposition is searching for a new strategy.)

Yet the first day of Nowrooz has always been irresistible to Iranians, because it is tied not to Muslim piety but to Persian pride. Its roots are in Zoroastrianism, the world’s first monotheistic religion – the country’s national faith before Islam – one in which fire is revered as a symbol of purity. Apart from the theocracy, most Iranians in and outside the country, irrespective of their religion, celebrate the ancient rites. The Tuesday-night event itself is known as Chaharshanbe Suri (literally “Wednesday Party,” because dusk brings the new day in Iran) and was originally intended as a ritual to ward off evil spirits and negative energy collected in the previous year. That purification is done by leaping over a series of small bonfires.

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BANGKOK – Thai protesters seeking a change of government planned more shock tactics Wednesday, saying they would pour gallons (liters) of their own blood at the prime minister’s house in an upscale neighborhood of the Thai capital.

This followed similar “blood sacrifices” Tuesday at Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva’s office and the headquarters of his Democrat Party. The dramatic acts grabbed attention but put the “Red Shirt” protest movement no closer to its goal of forcing new elections.

Protest leaders said they planned to march Wednesday to Abhisit’s house in the Sukhumvit Road area, home to many rich Thais and expatriates. Abhisit has been sleeping at an army headquarters and taking trips out of the city since the demonstrations began.

More than 100,000 demonstrators from all over the country gathered in Bangkok on Sunday, vowing to continue their protest until victory. But Abhisit has rejected their demands to dissolve Parliament, saying only that he will listen to the protesters’ point of view and leaving the situation in a stalemate.

Reporters asked one of the protest leaders, Veera Musikapong, what their next move would be, and he replied, “I want to know that myself.” He said the group maps strategy on a day-by-day basis.

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MOORHEAD, Minn. – When the swollen Red River threatened his uninsured house last spring, all Mark Baumgardner could do was pack up, leave and hope he wouldn’t lose everything.

In the end, his house was spared. But he learned a lesson: This year, he bought flood insurance.

“When the weather service started saying, `Yeah, it’s going to be as bad as last year,’ I decided I was going to get some peace of mind and be done with it,” he said.

Thousands of people in flood-prone areas of North Dakota and Minnesota are purchasing flood insurance after gambling for years without it. The number of policies obtained through a government-backed program has ballooned since the 2009 deluge along the Red River, which runs between the two states.

In North Dakota, fewer than 4,000 residents had flood coverage before last year’s disaster. That has more than tripled to over 13,000. In Minnesota, nearly 11,000 have insurance, up from about 9,000.

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LONDON – Britain’s Unite union said Tuesday that it was in talks with the U.S. International Brotherhood of Teamsters regarding the weeklong strike it plans against British Airways.

Unite’s 12,000 cabin crew members are locked in a battle with BA’s management over a pay freeze and changes to working conditions. The group has promised a seven-day strike beginning Saturday that is expected to affect hundreds of thousands of travelers — and it has appealed for international help to pressure BA.

Spokesman Andrew Murray said a union official was in Washington to brief officials from the Teamsters on Wednesday, but gave few details.

Murray said the official was “explaining the background to the dispute at the request of American trade unionists.” He declined to identify the official, saying the union was “not wanting to draw huge attention to all this at the moment.”

It wasn’t immediately clear what kind of help the Teamsters, who represent 40,000 workers in the aviation industry, could provide. But Britain’s opposition Conservative Party accused Unite of “pulling out all the stops to frustrate the efforts BA is making to keep their passengers flying.”

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PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti – When the young woman needed to use the toilet, she went out into the darkened tent camp and was attacked by three men.

“They grabbed me, put their hands over my mouth and then the three of them took turns,” the slender 21-year-old said, wriggling with discomfort as she nursed her baby girl, born three days before Haiti’s devastating quake.

“I am so ashamed. We’re scared people will find out and shun us,” said the woman, who suffers from abdominal pain and itching, likely from an infection contracted during the attack.

Women and children as young as 2, already traumatized by the loss of homes and loved ones in the Jan. 12 catastrophe, are now falling victim to rapists in the sprawling tent cities that have become home to hundreds of thousands of people.

With no lighting and no security, they are menacing places after sunset. Sexual assaults are daily occurrences in the biggest camps, aid workers say — and most attacks go unreported because of the shame, social stigma and fear of reprisals from attackers.

Rape was a big problem in Haiti even before the earthquake and frequently was used as a political weapon in times of upheaval. Both times the first democratically elected president, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, was ousted, his enemies assassinated his male supporters and raped their wives and daughters.

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