Timeline of the 21st century

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For other timelines of modern history, see Timelines of modern history. For future timelines, see Timelines of the future.
Millennium: 3rd millennium
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  • 22nd century
Timelines:
State leaders:
Decades:
  • 2000s
  • 2010s
  • 2020s
  • 2030s
  • 2040s
  • 2050s
  • 2060s
  • 2070s
  • 2080s
  • 2090s
Categories: Births – Deaths
Establishments – Disestablishments

This is a timeline of the 21st century.

2001–2009[]

2001[]

  • January 15: Wikipedia is launched.
  • January 20:
    • President Joseph Estrada of the Philippines is ousted.
    • George W. Bush is inaugurated as President of the United States.
  • January 26: An earthquake strikes Gujarat, India, on Republic Day, resulting in more than 20,000 deaths.
  • June 1: Eleven members of the royal family of Nepal, including the king and queen, are killed by Crown Prince Dipendra, who wounds himself and dies three days later.
  • September 11: September 11 attacks: Al-Qaeda terrorists hijack four planes, crashing two into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, the third plane into the Pentagon in Washington, DC, while the fourth plane is downed on the outskirts of Stonycreek Township, Pennsylvania. 2,996 people, including 2,977 victims and 19 hijackers, die in the attacks.
  • October 7–December 17: The United States invades Afghanistan and topples the Taliban regime, resulting in a long-term war.
  • October 23: Steve Jobs introduces the first iPod.
  • November 12: Crash of American Airlines Flight 587.
  • December 3: Enron files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy after a series of scandals.
  • December 11: China becomes a member of the World Trade Organization.
  • December 19–20: During an economic crisis in Argentina, the government effectively freezes all bank accounts for twelve months which leads to riots and President de la Rúa's resignation from office. There are five "presidents" in less than a month.
See also: 2001 § Deaths

2002[]

  • January 1: The Euro enters circulation.
  • February 3 : Tom Brady leads the New England Patriots to win their first Super Bowl; during a nearly two decade span, they would appear in nine, winning six.
  • February 6: Golden Jubilee of Elizabeth II.
  • February 27–March 1: Riots and mass killings in the Indian state of Gujarat leave 1,044 dead.
  • May 20: East Timor gains independence.
  • July 1: The International Criminal Court is established.
  • July 9: The African Union is founded.
  • September 19: The First Ivorian Civil War begins.
  • September 23: Mozilla Firefox is released.
  • October 12: The 2002 Bali bombings killed 202 people and injured 209 more.
  • October 23–26: Chechen rebels seize a theater in Moscow. Amid this siege, around 200 people died.
  • November 16: The 2002-2004 SARS outbreak began in Guangdong.
  • Switzerland joins the United Nations as the 190th member.
  • Steve Fossett becomes the first person to fly solo nonstop around the world.
  • Israel starts Operation Defensive Shield in the West Bank in response to a wave of Palestinian suicide attacks.
  • Construction of the Israeli West Bank barrier begins.
  • SpaceX is founded by Elon Musk.
  • America demands Iraq allow unfettered access to weapons inspectors.
  • The Guantanamo Bay detention camp is established.
  • The Algerian Civil War ends.
  • Hu Jintao is elected as General Secretary of the Communist Party of China.
  • Brazil wins the 2002 FIFA World Cup.
See also: 2002 § Deaths

2003[]

  • February 1: Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrates upon reentry, killing all 7 astronauts on board.
  • February 20: The Station nightclub fire.
  • March 19: The United States invades Iraq and ousts Saddam Hussein, triggering worldwide protests and an 8 year war.
  • August 5: 2003 Marriott Hotel bombing kills 12 people.
  • August 27–29: The first six-party talks, involving South and North Korea, the United States, China, Japan and Russia.
  • November 3–23: The Rose Revolution occurs in Georgia.
  • The War in Darfur begins.
  • The Human Genome Project is completed.
  • The Second Congo War ends with more than 5 million dead.
  • The Second Liberian Civil War ends.
  • The last Volkswagen Beetle is made in Mexico, after 65 years in production.
  • Final flight of the SST (Supersonic Transport) Concorde.
See also: 2003 § Deaths

2004[]

  • February 4: Facebook is formed by Mark Zuckerberg, Andrew McCollum, Eduardo Saverin, Dustin Moskovitz, and Chris Hughes.
  • February 27: The 2004 SuperFerry 14 bombing kills 116 people.
  • March 11: Madrid train bombings killed 193 people and injured around 2,000, Europe's deadliest attack since Pan Am Flight 103.
  • September 1–3: On September 1st (first school day in Russia), a group of chechen terrorists held students, parents and teachers hostage in Beslan school, in North Ossetia–Alania. During three days under attack, 334 people died.
  • October 23–27: Boston Red Sox wins the World Series for the first time since 1918, ending the Curse of the Bambino.
  • November 11: President of the Palestinian National Authority Yasser Arafat dies.
  • November 7–December 23: The Second Battle of Fallujah occurs. It is the deadliest American battle since Vietnam, killing 95 troops.
  • December 8: Union of South American Nations formed.
  • December 26: Boxing Day Tsunami occurs in Indian Ocean, leading to the deaths of 230,000.
  • NATO and the European Union incorporates most of the former Eastern Bloc.
  • Spirit and Opportunity land on Mars.
  • Orange Revolution in Ukraine.
  • First surface images of Saturn's moon Titan.
See also: 2004 § Deaths

2005[]

  • January 9: Second Sudanese Civil War ends.
  • February 14:
  • February 14–April 27: Cedar Revolution in Lebanon triggered by the assassination of Rafic Hariri.
  • February 16: The Kyoto Protocol comes into effect.
  • March 22–April 11: Tulip Revolution in Kyrgyzstan.
  • April 2–19: Pope John Paul II dies, Benedict XVI becomes Pope.
  • June 13: Michael Jackson was acquitted on all charges related to the alleged sexual abuse of a 13-year-old boy.
  • June 23: Reddit is founded by Steve Huffman, Aaron Swartz and Alexis Ohanian.
  • July 7: 7/7 attacks on London Underground.
  • July 26–27: Floods in Maharashtra, India kill over 1000 people.
  • July 29: Michael E. Brown confirms Eris.
  • August 3: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad becomes President of Iran.
  • August 29–31: Hurricane Katrina kills 1,836 people in the Gulf of Mexico.
  • October 8: 80,000 are killed in an earthquake in Kashmir.
  • November 22: Angela Merkel becomes Germany's first female Chancellor.
  • (Date needed)The Provisional Irish Republican Army ends its military campaign in Northern Ireland.
  • Israel withdraws from Gaza.
See also: 2005 § Deaths

2006[]

  • January 16: Ellen Johnson Sirleaf becomes President of Liberia, and thus Africa's first elected female head of state.
  • February 17: 2006 Southern Leyte mudslide.
  • May 21–June 3: Independence of Montenegro.
  • July 11: Mumbai bombings.
  • August 11: Guimaras oil spill.
  • September 1: Roblox was released by David Baszucki.
  • September 19: A coup d'état in Thailand overthrows the government of Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra.
  • October 9–November 13: Google acquires YouTube for US$1.65 billion.
  • October 18: Murder of Altantuya Shaaribuu: The Mongolian model was murdered in Malaysia.
  • November 1: Former Russian security agent Alexander Litvinenko dies from poisoning in the UK.
  • November 21: Comprehensive Peace Accord ends the Nepalese Civil War.
  • December 30: Execution of Saddam Hussein.
  • 2006 Lebanon War.
  • The International Astronomical Union creates the first formal definition of a planet, and excludes Pluto from the list.
  • Twitter is launched.
  • Nintendo launches the Wii.
  • The Baiji, the Yangtze river dolphin, becomes functionally extinct.
  • Italy wins 2006 FIFA World Cup.
See also: 2006 § Deaths

2007[]

  • April 16: Virginia Tech shooting.
  • May 3: Disappearance of Madeleine McCann.
  • June 22–24: Chris Benoit double-murder and suicide.
  • June 27: Gordon Brown becomes Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.
  • December 27: Assassination of Benazir Bhutto.
  • Anti-government protests in Myanmar suppressed by ruling junta.
  • Spike in food prices and subprime crisis help trigger global recession.
  • First Ivorian Civil War ends.
  • Introduction of the iPhone.
See also: 2007 § Deaths

2008[]

Tesla Roadster launched in 2008, the first mass production lithium-ion battery electric car.
  • Stock markets plunge around the world, signaling the start of the Great Recession.
  • May 2: Cyclone Nargis kills 133,000 in Myanmar.
  • May 7: Dmitry Medvedev becomes President of Russia.
  • May 28: The 1st Nepalese Constituent Assembly declares Nepal a republic, ending its monarchy.
  • November 4: Barack Obama is elected to become the first black President of the United States.
  • November 26–29: 2008 Mumbai attacks.
  • Google Chrome is released.
  • The Gaza War begins.
  • 2008 South Ossetia war.
  • Kosovo declares independence, though it is not recognised by the United Nations.
  • Iraqi forces crack down on Muqtada al Sadr's Mahdi forces in Basra and Sadr City.
  • The Large Hadron Collider is completed as the world's largest and most powerful particle collider.
  • Tesla Roadster launched, the first mass production lithium-ion battery electric car.
See also: 2008 § Deaths

2009[]

  • January 3: The cryptocurrency Bitcoin is launched.
  • January 20: Barack Obama is inaugurated as President of the United States, the first African-American to hold the office.
  • June 16: Formation of BRICS economic bloc.
  • June 25: Death of Michael Jackson.
  • September 26: Typhoon Ketsana kills 789 people in the Philippines.
  • December 1: Treaty of Lisbon.
  • The Gaza War ends while Gaza blockade continues.
  • The Sri Lankan Civil War ends.
  • Election protests begin in Iran.
  • The Second Chechen War ends.
  • Boko Haram rebellion begins in Nigeria.
  • 2009 swine flu pandemic began in North America.
See also: 2009 § Deaths

2010s[]

2010[]

  • January 12: A 7.0 magnitude earthquake in Haiti kills 230,000.
  • February 18: 2010 Nigerien coup d'état.
  • March 29: 2010 Moscow Metro bombings.
  • April 10: The President of Poland, Lech Kaczyński, is among 96 killed when their airplane crashes in Smolensk.
  • April 20: The largest oil spill in US history occurs in the Gulf of Mexico.
  • May 10: Benigno Aquino III is elected as the 15th President of the Philippines.
  • May 11: After the 2010 United Kingdom general election, David Cameron becomes Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.
  • May 31: Gaza flotilla raid.
  • June 11–July 11: The FIFA World Cup is held in Africa for the first time.
  • July 22–August 10: 2010 Colombia–Venezuela diplomatic crisis.
  • November 23: North Korea shells the island of Yeonpyeong.
  • Avatar overtakes Titanic as the highest-grossing film.
  • A military crackdown occurs in Thailand.
  • The threat of Greece defaulting on its debts triggers the European sovereign debt crisis and Republic of Ireland's financial crisis.
  • Burmese political prisoner Aung San Suu Kyi is released from house arrest.
  • Arab Spring starts.
  • Kyrgyz Revolution of 2010.
  • The Burj Khalifa in Dubai becomes the tallest structure in the world, standing at 829.8 m (2,722 ft).
  • Dilma Rousseff is elected as the first female president of Brazil.
  • The iPad is introduced.
  • Instagram is launched.
  • 2010 eruptions of Eyjafjallajökull.
  • Julia Gillard is elected Prime Minister of Australia.
See also: 2010 § Deaths

2011[]

  • World population reaches 7 billion.
  • February 22: Christchurch earthquake kills 185 and injures 2,000.
  • March 11: A 9.0 earthquake in Japan triggers a tsunami and the meltdown of the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant.
  • April 29: Wedding of Prince William and Catherine Middleton.
  • May 2: Osama bin Laden is shot dead by United States Navy SEALs in Pakistan.
  • July 9: Independence of South Sudan.
  • July 22: 2011 Norway attacks.
  • August 6–11: Riots flare across England.
  • October 20: Muammar Gaddafi is captured and killed during the Battle of Sirte.
  • Snapchat launched.
  • Arab Spring: revolutions in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya follow, as well as uprisings in Yemen and Bahrain, and protests in several other Arab countries.
  • Syrian civil war begins.
  • Second Ivorian Civil War.
  • Occupy movement inspires worldwide protests.
  • News International phone hacking scandal.
  • The Danyang–Kunshan Grand Bridge, the world's longest, opens in China.
  • Second Ivorian Civil War ends with the arrest of former president Laurent Gbagbo.
  • Iraq War ends.
  • Bombings occur in Russia and Somalia.
  • Floods in Pakistan, Thailand and the Philippines kill roughly 2,500 people.
  • Space Shuttle program is officially ended.
  • NASA launches spacecraft to visit Jupiter and Mars.
See also: 2011 § Deaths

2012[]

  • January 13: Costa Concordia disaster.
  • February 26: Killing of Trayvon Martin: The 17-year-old African-American high school student was killed in Sanford, Florida.
  • May 7: Vladimir Putin is elected president of Russia for the third time.
  • July 20: 2012 Aurora, Colorado shooting.
  • October 9: Assassination attempt of schoolgirl Malala Yousafzai.
  • October 14: Skydiver Felix Baumgartner becomes the first person to break the sound barrier without a vehicle.
  • October 22–November 22: Hurricane Sandy causes $70 billion in damage and kills 233 people.
  • November 6: Barack Obama wins second term as President of the United States, defeating former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney.
  • November 15: Xi Jinping is elected as General Secretary of the Communist Party of China.
  • November 26–December 8: UN Climate Change Conference agrees to extend the Kyoto Protocol until 2020.
  • December 4–9: Typhoon Bopha kills over 1,600 in the Philippines.
  • December 14: Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting.
  • The Higgs boson is discovered.
  • Conflict begins in the Central African Republic.
  • Israel launches Operation Pillar of Defense against the Palestinian-governed Gaza Strip.
  • The US rover, Curiosity, takes a selfie on Mars and finds evidence of an ancient streambed of water on the Red Planet.
  • Diamond Jubilee of Elizabeth II.
  • The 2012 Summer Olympics was hosted in London, United Kingdom.
  • Park Geun-hye is elected President of South Korea.
See also: 2012 § Deaths

2013[]

  • February 15: An undiscovered meteor strikes the Chelyabinsk oblast in Russia, with an airburst injuring thousands and damaging many buildings.
  • February 28–March 13: Pope Benedict XVI resigns, the first Pope to do since 1415, and Pope Francis is elected, becoming the first Pope from Latin America.
  • March 5: Death and state funeral of Hugo Chavez.
  • April 24: The Rana Plaza collapses in Bangladesh.
  • July 3: President of Egypt Mohamed Morsi is deposed by the military in a coup d'état.
  • August 21: A chemical attack in Ghouta, Syria is blamed on President Bashar al-Assad.
  • October 15: A 7.2 magnitude earthquake in Bohol, kills 222.
  • November 8: Typhoon Haiyan kills nearly 6,150 people in Vietnam and the Philippines.
  • November 21: The Euromaidan protest begins in Ukraine.
  • December 5: Death and state funeral of Nelson Mandela.
  • The French military intervenes in the Northern Mali conflict.
  • Terrorist attacks occur in Boston and Nairobi.
  • Edward Snowden releases classified documents concerning mass surveillance by the NSA.
  • Croatia becomes a member of the European Union.
  • Conflict begins in South Sudan.
  • Uruguay becomes the first country to fully legalize cannabis.
  • End of 2012–2013 Cypriot financial crisis.
  • Kiss nightclub fire.
  • 2013 Alberta floods.
  • 2013 Lahad Datu standoff.
  • Guang Da Xing No. 28 incident.
  • Death and funeral of Margaret Thatcher.
See also: 2013 § Deaths

2014[]

  • The worst Ebola epidemic in recorded history occurs in West Africa, infecting nearly 30,000 people and resulting in the deaths of 11,000+.
  • February: Euromaidan protest in Ukraine sparks a revolution and the overthrow of Viktor Yanukovych, leading to Russia's annexation of Crimea and the War in Donbas.
  • March 8: Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 disappears from radar while en route to Beijing from Kuala Lumpur. There were 239 people on board.
  • April 16: The MV Sewol sinks, killing 304 of 476 passengers, 250 of which were students at Danwon High School.
  • May 22: A coup d'état in Thailand overthrows the caretaker government.
  • June 19: King Juan Carlos I of Spain abdicates; his son becomes King Felipe VI.
  • August 9: The shooting of African-American teenager Michael Brown by police leads to violent unrest in Ferguson, Missouri.
  • November 12: The Rosetta spacecraft's Philae probe becomes the first to successfully land on a comet.
  • December 16: Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan kill over 130 students in Pakistan.
  • Indonesia AirAsia Flight 8501 crashes into the Java Sea, while Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 is shot down over Ukraine and Air Algérie Flight 5017 is downed in Mali.
  • Israel launches an assault on the Gaza Strip in response to tit-for-tat murder-kidnappings, leading to the deaths of 71 Israelis and 2,100 Palestinians.
  • ISIS begins its offensive in northern Iraq, leading to intervention in Iraq and Syria by a US-led coalition.
  • Second Libyan Civil War begins.
  • Narendra Modi is elected as the Prime Minister of India.
See also: 2014 § Deaths

2015[]

  • January 1: Five former Soviet Union countries form the Eurasian Economic Union.
  • January 3–7: Boko Haram perpetrates a massacre of over 2,000 people in Baga, Nigeria, and allies itself with ISIL.
  • April 2: Al-Shabaab perpetrates a mass shooting in Kenya, killing 148.
  • April 25–May 3: The death of African-American teenager Freddie Gray by police leads to violent unrest in Baltimore, Maryland.
  • November 30–December 12: 195 nations agree to lower carbon emissions.
  • A series of terrorist attacks occur in Paris.
  • A series of earthquakes in the Himalayas kills over 10,000 people.
  • The heads of China and Taiwan meet for the first time, while the United States and Cuba resume diplomatic relations.
  • Liquid water is found on Mars.
  • First close-up images of Ceres and Pluto.
  • China announces the end of One-child policy after 35 years.
  • European migrant crisis.
  • The Supreme Court of the United States determines that same-sex couples have a constitutional right to marry.
  • Homo naledi, a species of early human, is discovered in Africa.
  • Crash of Germanwings Flight 9525.
  • Volkswagen emissions scandal.
  • Charleston church shooting.
  • Assassination of Boris Nemtsov.
  • 2015 FIFA corruption case.
See also: 2015 § Deaths

2016[]

  • January 8: El Chapo is recaptured following his escape from a high-security prison in Mexico.
  • February 11: Detection of gravitational waves by LIGO confirmed.
  • March 20: Barack Obama becomes the first U.S. president to visit Cuba since Calvin Coolidge in 1928.
  • April 3: Panama Papers, a leak of legal documents, reveals information of 214,888 offshore companies.
  • June 1: The Gotthard Base Tunnel, the world's longest and deepest railway tunnel, is completed.
  • June 12: A shooter kills 49 people at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida.
  • June 23–July 13: The people of the United Kingdom vote to leave the European Union; David Cameron resigns as a result, and Theresa May succeeds him as the second female Prime Minister of the UK.
  • July 4: Juno enters orbit into Jupiter.
  • September 4: Mother Teresa is officially canonized by Pope Francis.
  • October 25–November 2: Chicago Cubs wins the World Series for the first time since 1908, ending the Curse of the Billy Goat.
  • November 4: The Paris Agreement, signed by 195 nations to fight global warming, formally goes into effect.
  • November 8: Donald Trump wins the 2016 presidential election, in an upset against Hillary Clinton, the first female to be nominated for a major party.
  • The United Nations lifts sanctions from Iran in recognition of the dismantling of its nuclear program.
  • Pope Francis and Patriarch Kirill sign the Ecumenical Declaration, the first meeting between Catholic and Orthodox heads since their split in 1054.
  • ISIL claims responsibility for a series of bombings in Brussels, a massacre at Istanbul's Atatürk Airport and car ramming attacks in Nice.
  • Augmented-reality game, Pokémon Go, is released, breaking records in revenue, and becoming the best-selling mobile game.
  • The Colombian government signs a peace deal with FARC to end the Colombian conflict, despite narrowly losing a referendum.
  • The government of Turkey begins a series of purges in reaction to a failed coup d'état attempt.
  • The 2016 Summer Olympics take place in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
  • United States troops withdraw from Afghanistan after 15 years.
  • The President of Brazil, Dilma Rousseff, is impeached.
  • Vajiralongkorn becomes King of Thailand.
  • Tsai Ing-wen is elected as the first female President of Taiwan.
  • Radovan Karadžić found guilty of 10 of 11 counts of war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity and is sentenced to 40 years in prison.
  • A third set of locks in the Panama Canal opens for commercial traffic.
  • 2016 Southern Taiwan earthquake.
See also: 2016 § Deaths

2017[]

  • January 20: Donald Trump is inaugurated as President of the United States.
  • January 21: Millions of people participated in the Women's March, as a response to the inauguration of Donald Trump.
  • February 13: Kim Jong-nam, the half-brother of Kim Jong-Un, is assassinated in Kuala Lumpur.
  • May 22: A terrorist bombing attack at an Ariana Grande concert in Manchester, England kills 22 people and injures over 140.
  • August 11–12: The city of Charlottesville is the site of a far-right rally protesting the removal of Confederate statues throughout the US. During the event, a white supremacist rams his car into a crowd of counter-protesters, injuring 19 and killing one.
  • August 21: A solar eclipse passes throughout the contiguous United States for the first time since 1918.
  • September: Two earthquakes strike Mexico on September 8 and September 19, killing over 400 people.
  • October 1: 60 people are killed in a mass shooting at a music festival in Las Vegas.
  • October 14: A bombing in Mogadishu, Somalia on October 14, kills 587 people and injures 316. It is one of the deadliest terrorist attacks in modern history.
  • October 28: 'Oumuamua, the first known interstellar object, is identified.
  • November 5: 26 people are killed in a church in Sutherland Springs, Texas.
  • Tensions between North Korea and the UN escalate as the country tests a hydrogen bomb and conducts a series of ballistic missile tests. The UN responds with a wave of export sanctions.
  • Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) launch simultaneous attacks in Tehran, destroy the Great Mosque of al-Nuri in Mosul Iraq, and kill 311 in Egypt, but are declared defeated in Iraq by the end of the year.
  • A military operation targeting Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar is declared ethnic cleansing by the UNHCR.
  • This year's Atlantic Hurricane season features Hurricane Harvey, which kills 107 and becomes the costliest hurricane in US history, as well as Hurricane Irma, killing 134, and Hurricane Maria, killing 3,059.
  • Robert Mugabe is ousted in a coup d'état, while Ratko Mladić is declared guilty of genocide.
  • Allegations of sexual abuse against film producer Harvey Weinstein lead to a wave of similar accusations from within Hollywood and other areas of primarily the English-speaking world.
  • Nintendo launches the Nintendo Switch.
  • Grenfell Tower fire in London kills 72 and injures 70.
  • The President of South Korea, Park Geun-hye, is impeached, while Moon Jae-in is elected president.
  • Emmanuel Macron becomes President of France after defeating far-right candidate Marine Le Pen.
See also: 2017 § Deaths

2018[]

  • March 24: March for Our Lives occurs in 900 locations worldwide in response to the 14 February Parkland shooting.
  • May 19: Wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle.
  • June 12: The first summit between the US and North Korea and the first ever crossing of the Korean Demilitarized Zone by a North Korean leader occur.
  • June 24: Saudi Arabia allows women to drive.
  • October 2: Exiled Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi is assassinated inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, triggering a diplomatic crisis for Saudi Arabia.
  • Turkey invades northern Syria, while 70 die in a chemical attack, triggering a missile strike against Bashar al-Assad.
  • Pakatan Harapan becomes the first opposition party to assume power in Malaysia since independence.
  • Twenty-year Eritrean–Ethiopian border conflict formally ends.
  • Yellow vests movement becomes France's largest sustained period of civil unrest since 1968.
  • The Sunda strait tsunami kills 426 and injures 14,000 and the 2018 Sulawesi earthquake and tsunami kills 4,340 and injures 10,700.
  • Macedonia and Greece reach a historic agreement in the Macedonia naming dispute, in which the former is renamed in 2019 to the 'Republic of North Macedonia'.
  • China's National People's Congress votes to abolish presidential term limits, allowing Xi Jinping to rule for life. Xi is also the General Secretary of the Communist Party of China, the highest position without term limits.
  • 2018 Armenian revolution occurs.
  • First post-ISIS election in Iraq.
  • Death and state funeral of George H. W. Bush
  • Twelve boys and their football coach are successfully rescued from the flooded Tham Luang Nang Non cave in Thailand.
  • France wins the 2018 FIFA World Cup in Russia.
  • Leaders from more than 40 international organizations and dignitaries from nearly 200 countries attends the centennial of the ending of the First World War.
  • Bill Cosby found guilty of drugging and sexually assaulting a woman and is sentenced to three to ten years in prison.
  • The Trump administration reimposes sanctions against Iran.
  • The first monkeys are cloned, and first genetically modified humans reported, in China.
  • Jacob Zuma resigns as President of South Africa; Cyril Ramaphosa becomes President.
  • Scott Morrison becomes Prime Minister of Australia.
  • Four people are poisoned, one to death, in Salisbury and Amesbury, England in a suspected Russian assassination attempt. The British government responds by leading the international expulsion of 153 Russian diplomats.
  • The northern white rhinoceros becomes functionally extinct.
  • The university professor Giuseppe Conte becomes Prime Minister of Italy at the head of a populist coalition.
  • Kerch Strait incident triggers martial law in Ukraine.
See also: 2018 § Deaths

2019[]

See also: 2019 § Deaths

2020s[]

2020[]

  • The COVID-19 pandemic, which began spreading late in the prior year, spreads from China to the vast majority of the world's inhabited areas, infecting at least 81 million and killing at least 1.8 million people in its first year.
  • January 3: Qasem Soleimani is targeted and killed at Baghdad International Airport.
  • January 8: Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752 is shot down by Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) shortly after taking off from Tehran, killing all 176 onboard.
  • January 16–February 5: Donald Trump is acquitted by the United States Senate in his first impeachment trial.
  • January 26: A helicopter crash in Calabasas, California kills nine people, including basketball star Kobe Bryant and his 13-year-old daughter Gianna.
  • January 31: The United Kingdom formally withdraws from the European Union.
  • May: Cyclone Amphan becomes the costliest cyclone ever recorded in the Northern Indian Ocean.
  • May 25: The murder of George Floyd sparks protests across the United States and the world.
  • May 30: Crewed spaceflight resumes in the United States for the first time since 2011.
  • June 30: China's National People's Congress grants itself sweeping powers to curtail civil liberties in Hong Kong.
  • July 9: Protests begin in Bulgaria against the government of Boyko Borisov.
  • September 27–November 10: 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war between Armenia and Azerbaijan.
  • October 31: Typhoon Goni leaves the Philippines and Vietnam devastated, with 32 deaths and US$415 million in damage.
  • November 3: The 2020 United States presidential election occurs. Despite the pandemic, early voting and other factors result in the highest voter turnout since 1900, and a record of over 155 million votes cast. Although Joe Biden is declared the winner on November 7, Donald Trump leads an unprecedented effort to prevent official recognition of his defeat, culminating on January 6 the next year.
  • November 11: Typhoon Vamco lashes into Luzon, leaving 111 people dead.
  • Fears of COVID-19 cause the Dow Jones Industrial Average to fall ten percent in one week, its largest drop in history, triggering the COVID-19 Recession, the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.
  • The United States signs a tentative peace agreement with the Taliban.
  • Silurian millipede Kampecaris obanensis, the oldest known land animal, is discovered in Scotland.
  • China and India engage in border skirmishes, the largest escalation between the two powers in 50 years.
  • China launches Chang'e 5 and becomes the third country after the United States and the Soviet Union to return samples of the moon.
See also: 2020 § Deaths

2021[]

  • The COVID-19 pandemic continues, infecting more than 220 million and killing at least 3.6 million people in its second year. The true totals of infected and dead are estimated to be much higher.
  • January 6: Supporters of President Donald Trump, gathered after a rally led by him, attack the United States capitol, leading to no deaths.
  • January 13–February 13: Donald Trump is impeached for a second time following the events of January 6, though he is acquitted again after his trial from February 9-13.
  • January 20: Joe Biden is inaugurated as President of the United States. Kamala Harris, sworn in as Vice President, becomes the first woman, first African American and first Asian American to be vice president.
  • February 13–17: Winter Storm Uri becomes the costliest winter storm in North American history, costing $200 billion and 237 lives, and triggering the 2021 Texas power crisis.
  • March 23–29: The container ship Ever Given obstructs the Suez Canal for six days, costing an estimated $3.6 billion in global trade.
  • April 19:
  • April 20: Idriss Déby, President of Chad, is killed in clashes with rebel forces after 30 years in office.
  • April 28–May 1: A border clash between Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan leads to 55 deaths.
  • May 6–21: Hundreds die in conflicts after Israel evicts six Palestinian families from East Jerusalem.
  • July 4: 50 people are killed and 46 others are injured when a C-130 transport plane of the Philippine Air Force crashes in Jolo, Sulu.
  • July 28: Pedro Castillo is inaugurated as President of Peru.
  • August 14: An earthquake in Haiti kills over 2000 people.
  • August 15: Kabul falls following the 2021 Taliban offensive, as the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan collapses de facto, and the country is governed thereafter by the Taliban as the reinstated Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. The War in Afghanistan thus ends after 20 years following the withdrawal of U.S. and coalition troops.
  • December 16: Typhoon Rai lashes into Visayas and Mindanao, leaving 409 people dead.
  • December 19: Gabriel Boric is elected as President of Chile.
  • Coups d'état occur in Myanmar, Mali and Guinea.
  • Russia begins a military buildup on the Ukrainian border, warning NATO not to intervene.
  • Ryanair Flight 4978 is forced to land by Belarusian authorities to detain dissident journalist Roman Protasevich.
  • 197 nations sign the Glasgow Climate Pact, agreeing to limit the use of coal, and the Netherlands legally mandates Royal Dutch Shell to comply with the Paris Agreement.
See also: 2021 § Deaths


For the current year, see 2022 and 2022 in politics and government.

See also[]

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