IHT Quick Read: April 26

NEWS The White House said Thursday that it believes the Syrian government has used chemical weapons in its civil war, an assessment that could test President Obama’s repeated warnings that such an attack could precipitate American intervention in Syria. Mark Lander and Eric Schmitt report from Washington.

Despite qualms about embroiling peacekeeping troops in the global fight against Islamist extremists, the United Nations Security Council voted Thursday to establish a force for Mali, where militants controlled much of the north until France intervened in January. Neil MacFarquhar reports from the United Nations.

In March 2011, the Russian security service sent a stark warning to the F.B.I., reporting that Tamerlan Tsarnaev was “a follower of radical Islam” who had “changed drastically since 2010” and was preparing to travel to Russia’s turbulent Caucasus to connect with underground militant groups. Six months later, Russia sent the same warning to the C.I.A. Scott Shane, Michael S. Schmidt and Eric Schmitt report from Washington.

As rescuers struggled on Thursday to reach survivors in one of the worst manufacturing disasters in history, pointed questions were being raised about why a Bangladesh factory building was not padlocked after terrified workers notified the police, government officials and a powerful garment industry group about cracks in the walls. Julfikar Ali Manik reports from Dhaka, Steven Greenhouse from New York and Jim Yardley from New Delhi.

One of President Enrique Peña Nieto’s signature efforts to shake up Mexico â€" a broad plan to overhaul the education system â€" has run into violent protests that underscore how difficult it may be to carry out, particularly in some volatile states with poor academic performance. Karla Zabludovsky reports from Mexico City.

London’s reputation as the libel capital of the world, “a town called sue,” is poised to end. A new law enacted Thursday strengthens the position of people sued for libel here and puts an end to most cases of so-called libel tourism. Sarah Lyall reports from London.

European Union regulators took another step on Thursday toward reaching an antitrust settlement with Google, asking the company’s competitors to review changes proposed by Google to resolve concerns with its Internet search and advertising business. James Kanter reports from Brussels.

ARTS The long-awaited pairing of Adrian Lester and Rory Kinnear in “Othello” at the National Theatre in London is one of the director Nicholas Hytner’s greatest achievements. Matt Wolf reviews from London.

Copies of “The Great Gatsby,” which is selling briskly, now come with two covers: one based on the original art, and another that is a tie-in to the coming movie. Julie Bosman reports.

SPORTS Right now, the energy, the pace, the physical power and the strength of mind shown by both German soccer clubs surely marks a change in the ruling class of international soccer. Rob Hughes writes from London.

Swiss Quotas Highlight Europe’s Immigration Debate

LONDON â€" A decision by Switzerland to limit migration from other European countries has provoked a sharp response from officials of the European Union.

The federal government in Bern announced on Wednesday it was extending quotas on long-term residence permits granted to citizens of eight Eastern European states and anticipated expanding the measure to include migrants from Western Europe.

Switzerland is not a member of the 27-member Union. However, under a 1999 freedom of movement agreement, EU citizens are allowed to live and work there, as 1.2 million of them currently do.

Under pressure from a vociferous anti-immigration campaign, and faced with 80,000 extra arrivals from the rest of Europe each year, the government has invoked a safeguard clause that allows it to set quotas.

Catherine Ashton, the European Union’s foreign policy chief, was among officials who rebuked the Swiss. “These measures disregard the great benefits that the free movement of persons brings to the citizens of both Switzerland and the E.U.,” she said.

She also warned Bern that the distinction it was making between migrants from different parts of the Continent violated the 1999 agreement.

The Swiss announcement hinted that the move had less to do with raw numbers than with an attempt to assuage right-wing populist opinion.

The government said the quotas were needed to make immigration more acceptable to society. According to Simonetta Sommaruga, the Swiss justice minister who announced the curbs, “It’s a fact that there is unease among the population, and it’s necessary to take this unease seriously.”

The Swiss action was the latest evidence that immigration is being pushed up the European policy agenda at a time when the Continent is confronting low growth, high unemployment and austerity cuts that are putting pressure on social welfare expenditure.

In many countries, the economic crisis has spurred a backlash against immigration that mainstream politicians are finding hard to ignore.

The claims put by anti-immigration groups in Switzerland find echoes in the rest of Europe: Migrants are only interested in claiming welfare benefits, they jump the queue for subsidized housing, and they push up crime rates.

It is a climate in which advocates of free movement, who can quote statistics showing hard-working, tax-paying migrants are a positive asset to their host countries, have been placed on the defensive.

At one extreme of the anti-immigrant backlash is Greece’s neo-Nazi Golden Dawn movement.

At the other are groups such as Britain’s United Kingdom Independence Party, which is predicting a coming onslaught of migrants from Romania and Bulgaria.

Citizens of the two Eastern European states will have the right to seek a wider range of jobs elsewhere in the European Union when rules for them are relaxed next year, although there is evidence that relatively few will chose to move to Britain.

Mainstream parties have meanwhile toughened their stance on the immigration issue, apparently reflecting fears of a loss of electoral support to anti-immigrant rivals.

Are the Swiss pandering to prejudice with their quota rules? Is there an argument for restricting immigration in the current European economic climate, or should the Continent’s politicians be stressing the benefits of free movement? Let us know your views.

And the Oliviers Will Go to . . .

LONDONâ€"This Sunday the London theater’s annual Laurence Olivier Awards will be bestowed, and those who want to guess at the eventual victors should know one thing: Anyone could win.

That’s not entirely true, I suppose, in a few categories. There may well be a minor mutiny within the plush surrounds of the Royal Opera House if Michael Ball and Imelda Staunton don’t pick up the actor and actress in a musical prizes for their thunderous performances in the recent Chichester Festival Theatre production of “Sweeney Todd.” The director Jonathan Kent’s revival of the Stephen Sondheim musical  transferred last year to London’s West End for a six-month run.

Yes, their competition in both categories is pretty thin, as reflects a year (2012) in which Londoners’ eyes were focused more on the Olympics than big musicals. (That shortfall, by the way, is being seriously redressed this year, which offers the most musicals-intensive lineup in many a season.)

But even amid a stronger array of colleagues, these two star turns would stand apart, Mr. Ball for physically reinventing himself to play the murderous barber of the title and Ms. Staunton for about as completely rounded a Mrs. Lovett as one could imagine, in which terror, comedy and pity joined forces to roof-raising effect.

Look elsewhere, though, and Oliviers are up for grabs, not least in a town that very much doesn’t play by the rules that prevail at Broadway’s Tonys - whose own list of nominations is due on April 30. (The Oliviers are decided upon by a mixture of industry professionals and a theater panel totaling in the region of 160, though not everyone necessarily votes in every category.)

The Tony rule of thumb is that the last shows in tend to be the first to nab the prizes, the same rationale that accounts for a flood of Oscar hopefuls toward the end of every year. Not so at the Oliviers. To be sure, Peter Morgan’s play “The Audience,” starring Helen Mirren as Queen Elizabeth II, is up for five prizes, having opened in March just at the cusp of eligibility for this year’s gongs. By contrast, another British dame, Judi Dench, opened in “Peter and Alice” in late March a few weeks after the cut-off, so she and her co-star, Ben Whishaw, will be considered in the 2014 nominations.

But I’m not sure that I would necessarily value Ms. Mirren’s chances any higher than her three challengers for best actress, all of whom are in plays that have closed. Hattie Morahan must be some sort of favorite for her wild-eyed, ceaselessly febrile Nora in the Young Vic’s revival of “A Doll’s House,” given that Ms. Morahan has already won this same prize from two separate organizations in the run-up to the Oliviers.  (Rounding out the category are previous Olivier winner Kristin Scott Thomas for “Old Times” and Billie Piper in “The Effect.”)

Why four nominees for actress in a play but five when it comes to actor, among them James McAvoy’s “Macbeth” and Rupert Everett’s Oscar Wilde in “The Judas Kiss”?  (My hunch, by the way, is that Mr. Everett will win.)

The answer lies in a tie during the nominating process, which also accounts for five women making the supporting actress short list as against four in the supporting actor race. Why the Oliviers can’t widen their pool to five nominees across the board seems distinctly odd in a theater culture that each year offers up for consideration more than twice the number of possible shows than is ever managed by the Tonys.

That abundance, in turn, speaks to the British capital’s sustained output of work from subsidized playhouses like the National and to the inclusion sometimes, though not always, of so-called “affiliate theaters” like the Young Vic, whose off-Broadway equivalents are ineligible for Tonys.

If the Oliviers were purely a numbers game, “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time” and “Top Hat” would sweep the boards, since Simon Stephens’s play (which opened at the National and has transferred to the West End) and the Irving Berlin-scored musical at the Aldwych Theatre have 15 nods between them.

But this is awards event that goes its own way. Two years ago, the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical “Love Never Dies” received seven nominations but came away empty-handed. By contrast, August Wilson’s lovely play “Jitney” was nominated in just one category in 2002 - Best Play - and took it against opposition from four British shows. (There were five nominees back in those days. Sigh ….. )

Parochialism obviously is not an issue here, which can’t always be said of a scenario on Broadway that has allowed such decisions as the awarding of the 1995 Tony for Best Play to Terrence McNally’s “Love! Valour! Compassion!” over Tom Stoppard’s “Arcadia.” No surprises for guessing which of those two titles has proven far and away the more enduring text.

You could question this year’s nominations for Mark Rylance and Jenny Tiramani as actor and costume designer, respectively, of the Globe Theatre’s successful commercial transfer of the director Tim Carroll’s all-male “Twelfth Night.” Um, wasn’t Mr. Rylance nominated for an Olivier for the same part (Olivia) in 2003, the year in which Ms. Tiramani won for her costume designs for this very play, as also directed by Mr. Carroll? The explanation, I gather, is that this go-round was deemed a new production, presumably because of the passage of time and a (largely) new supporting cast.

In which case, I look forward to Mr. Rylance reprising this part and this play once a decade until it eventually brings him this award. In the meanwhile, when it comes to Sunday’s gong-giving, may the best man or woman â€" or even man-dressed-as-woman â€" win.