\NEdited by Giorgos Vichas\N
Events that are shocking, unique and other magical.
From great discoveries by scientists, to NASA's findings, to the pandemic, to the political games of the world's leaders, to the biggest and most interesting sporting events.
January 6
Invasion of the Capitol during a demonstration by thousands of Republican gunmen supporting outgoing President Donald Trump
January 7
The richest person in the world is now Elon Musk, surpassing Jeff Bezos by $4 billion.
\NJanuary 13
The first arm and shoulder transplant is successfully performed by doctors in Lyon, France, on a patient from Iceland at the Edouard Erio hospital.
17 January
Opposition politician Alexei Navalny is arrested shortly after his arrival in Moscow. The influential government critic is accused of violating the terms of his release (he had been sentenced on parole) and will remain in custody pending a court decision on his case.
22 January
The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons enters into force in 51 countries. However, the world's major nuclear powers have not ratified the international agreement.
January 24
SpaceX successfully launches a record 143 satellites and puts them into orbit with a rocket on its Transporter-1 mission.
February 1
On the morning of February 1, 2021, a coup occurred in Myanmar. The Myanmar military seized power while the democratically elected Prime Minister Aung San Suu Kyi
9 February
The joint WHO-China investigation into the source of the epidemic that led to the COVID-19 pandemic is completed. Experts conclude that a leak of the virus from a factory in Wuhan is too unlikely a scenario, while the most likely source is a natural reservoir in bats.
11 February
In the US, a 133-vehicle car crash in Fort Worth, Texas, kills 6 people and injures 65 others.
17 February
Astronomers announce the discovery of exoplanet HD 110082 b, below Neptune, which is three times larger than Earth and orbits a relatively young star
February 20
A Moscow court upholds the three-year prison sentence of opposition politician and anti-corruption campaigner Alexei Navalny. The politician faces charges of slander
1 March
Attempted coup in Armenia. Protesters occupy the building where the government headquarters is located in Yerevan demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian.
1 March
Former French President Nicolas Sarkozy is sentenced to 3 years in prison for corruption, having been convicted of attempting to offer a prosecutor a job in exchange for providing information for a criminal investigation regarding his political party.
March 5
Pope Francis arrives in Baghdad on the first papal visit to Iraq on record.
March 23
The Suez Canal is blocked when the Panama-flagged container ship Ever Given north of the port of Suez in Egypt is capsized.
April 2
A sealed copy of the 1985 Nintendo Entertainment System game Super Mario Bros. is sold at auction in the United States for $660,000, the highest price a single video game has ever sold for.
13 April
US President Joe Biden says that the US plans to withdraw its troops left in Afghanistan before September 11.
April 19
NASA's Ingenuity helicopter successfully makes the first helicopter flight from the surface of another planet.
April 20
Former police officer Derek Sovin is found guilty of all charges in the murder of George Floyd. His sentence will be announced on June 16
April 24
US President Joe Biden formally recognizes the genocide of Armenians by the Turks during World War I.
27 April
The European Parliament votes in favour of lifting parliamentary immunity for far-right MEP Ioannis Lagos, who has been sentenced since 2020 to 13 years in prison for being in the leadership of Golden Dawn. Belgian police arrest Lagos ahead of his extradition to Greece.
1 May
The US begins to withdraw its troops from Afghanistan in the final phase marking the end of its longest war. In addition, NATO also began withdrawing its troops.
May 10
Palestinian groups in the Gaza Strip including Hamas launch rocket attacks on Israeli towns on the Gaza border, as well as seven towards Jerusalem, wounding one person. Israel retaliates with airstrikes in Gaza, killing 24 people and injuring 103 others. Nine children and a Hamas leader are among the dead.
16 May
Miss Universe for the year 2020 is crowned in Hollywood, USA, by Mexican Andrea Mesa.
16 May
The UEFA Women's Champions League for 2020-21 is won by Barcelona's women's team, beating Chelsea in the final of the competition at the Gamla Ulevi in Gothenburg, Sweden.
May 20
Israel and Hamas agree to a ceasefire to stop air strikes in Gaza and the firing of rockets into Israel. In the last 11 days of the conflict, 232 people have been killed in Gaza and 11 in Israel. Egypt agrees to supervise the implementation of the ceasefire.
22 May
The final of the Eurovision Song Contest 2021 is held in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. Italy with Måneskin and the song Zitti e buoni wins, for the first time since 1990, the first place with 524 points. It is the third time Italy has won first place in the competition.
26 May
In club football, Villarreal win their first Europa League title and the first major trophy in the club's 98-year history after beating Manchester United on penalties. The final was played in Gdansk, Poland, which ended in a 1-1 draw after extra time.
29 May
In club football, Chelsea beat Manchester City 1-0 in the Champions League final held at the Dragao Stadium in Porto, Portugal, winning their second Champions League title.
June 1
China announces the first human case of avian influenza.
June 13
Israel's parliament votes to form a new coalition government, ending 12 years of continuous rule by Benjamin Netanyahu. Naftali Bennett becomes Israel's new Prime Minister.
25 June
Chinese archaeologists announce in the scientific journal The Innovation that the discovery of a skull in the city of Harbin in 1933 known as Homo longi or "Dragon Man" belongs to a previously unknown species of early man and dates back 146,000 years.
1 July
The World Meteorological Organization confirms that a record high temperature of 18.3 °C (64,9 °F)
July 10
The 47th CONMEBOL-organized Copa America football tournament at the Maracana stadium is won by Argentina with a 1-0 victory over host Brazil in the final.
July 11
British billionaire Richard Branson travels into space in the VSS Unity spaceplane, owned by spaceflight company Virgin Galactic. At the age of 70, Branson becomes the second oldest person to travel to space.
11 July
In the final of the European men's football championship, Italy beat England 3-2 on penalties after a 1-1 draw in extra time.
July 12
At least 92 people are killed and more than 100 others injured in a fire that breaks out in an isolation ward for COVID-19 patients in the city of Nasiriyah, Iraq.
July 20
Blue Origin launches into space the first crew to board the New Shepard rocket. The mission consists of billionaire and Blue Origin founder Jeff Bezo, his brother Mark, pilot and Mercury 13 nominee Wally Funk, and 17-year-old Dutch student Oliver Dementon. At 82, Funk and 17-year-old Dement become respectively the oldest and youngest person on record to travel to space.
July 20
In basketball, the Milwaukee Bucks defeat the Phoenix Suns 105-98 in Game 6 of the NBA Finals series to win their first NBA championship since 1971. Giannis Antetokounmpo is voted Most Valuable Player.
July 23
Emperor Naruhito officially declares the start of the 32nd Summer Olympics in Tokyo, involving athletes from 205 countries and territories. The ceremony was not attended by spectators due to concerns over COVID-19.
July 28
Armenia says 3 of its soldiers were killed in the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region during clashes with Azerbaijani forces.
31 July
The Taliban enter Kandahar , where fierce clashes take place between the Taliban and the government army.
5 August
The major fires that have been burning in Greece break out. Residents in Athens are warned to stay indoors because of the smoke from the forest fires burning on the outskirts of the city. Mass evacuations in the northern suburbs.
August 8
The 2020 Summer Olympics officially ends in Tokyo with the closing ceremony. The United States wins the most medals and the most gold medals, with 113 in total, including 39 gold medals. The Olympic flag is handed over to Paris Mayor Anne Indalgo to prepare for the 2024 Games.
August 11
Amid an unprecedented heat wave, authorities in Sicily report a temperature of 48.8°C (119.8°F). If confirmed by the World Meteorological Organization, it will become the highest temperature ever recorded in both Italy and Europe.
August 14
The first case of the hemorrhagic Ebola virus since 1994 is reported in Ivory Coast in an 18-year-old girl who came from Guinea.
15 August
The Taliban enter Kabul and seize the Presidential Palace, overthrowing the government.
19 August
The Taliban declare the establishment of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. At Kabul airport, a total of 12 people are killed in panic and violence as civilians attempt to flee the country.
August 26
A suicide bombing at the entrance to Kabul International Airport kills at least 103 people, including 62 Afghan civilians, 28 Taliban fighters and 13 US soldiers. More than 150 other people were injured. ISIL-K, claimed responsibility for the attack.
August 30
US troops complete their withdrawal from Afghanistan after 20 years.
September 7
El Salvador becomes the first country in the world to adopt the cryptocurrency Bitcoin as a means for legal transactions as well as a national currency as the Bitcoin law goes into effect. However, a small but growing number of people opposed to the new law protested against it in the capital San Salvador.
September 23
Fugitive Catalan former president Carles Puigdemont is arrested at an airport in Alghero, Sardinia, by Italian police in compliance with a search warrant and arrest warrant issued by Spain's Supreme Court. He is charged with sedition for his role in the 2017 Catalan independence referendum and subsequent failed declaration of independence.
26 September
Germans head to the polls to elect a new Bundestag, and a new chancellor to replace Angela Merkel, who is stepping down after 16 years in power.
3 October
In the biggest insider disclosure, 11.9 million leaked documents are published revealing tax evasion and corruption among 330 politicians (including 35 state leaders), and many other celebrities, including 130 billionaires.
4 October
Scientists David Julius and Ardem Pataputian are awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine "for their discoveries of temperature and touch receptors".
5 October
Climatologists Siukuro Manabe and Klaus Hasselman and theoretical physicist Giorgio Parisi are awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for their work in understanding the physical system through climate models.
6 October
The Nobel Prize in Chemistry is awarded to Germany's Benjamin Liszt and Britain's David McMillan for their work.
7 October
The Nobel Prize for Literature for 2021 is awarded to British (Zanzibar-born) Abdulrazak Gurna for his uncompromising and compassionate writing on the effects of colonialism and the fate of refugees between different cultures and continents.
8 October
The Nobel Peace Prize for 2021 is awarded to journalists Maria Resa of the Philippines and Dmitry Muratov of Russia for their efforts to protect press freedom.
11 October
The 2021 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences is awarded to economists David Card, Joshua Angrist and Guido Ibens for their physical experiments on the effects on the economy.
October 13
The Blue Origin mission launches from Van Horn, Texas, with a crew of four aboard the New Shepherd rocket. The crew includes actor William Shatner, best known for his role as Captain Kirk in the Star Trek series, who at the age of 90 becomes the oldest person in history to be launched into space.
October 20
Researchers at NYU Langone Health in New York announce that a team of surgeons led by Dr. Robert Montgomery have succeeded in transplanting the kidney of a genetically mutated pig into a man who had been brain dead for two days without his body rejecting the graft.
October 21
Director of photography Halina Hutchins is killed during the filming of the American movie Rust in Bonanza City, New Mexico, while director Joel Souza is hospitalized in critical condition after actor Alec Baldwin reportedly made a mistake and fired real bullets.
October 28
Facebook, Inc, a subsidiary of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, is renamed Meta, Inc. CEO Mark Zuckerberg says the name change was made to reflect the company's expansion into other areas, such as virtual reality.
November 5
For the first time in the world, COVID-19 virus positive hyenas are found (at a zoo in Denver, USA).
10 November
At the COP26 climate change conference, 24 countries and major car manufacturers, including Ford, Mercedes-Benz and Volvo, agree to phase out new petrol and diesel cars before 2030 and end sales of fossil-fuelled vehicles by 2040.
25 November
The European Medicines Agency officially approves the use of Pfizer-BioNTech's COVID-19 vaccine for children between the ages of 5 and 11, making it the first vaccine approved for these age groups in Europe.
26 November
The World Health Organization names the Lineage B.1 variant.1.529 as "Omicron" and defines it as a "mutation of concern" due to the high number of transformations and increased risk of reinfection.
8 December
The Bundestag elects Olaf Scholz as the new Chancellor of Germany, replacing Angela Merkel after 16 years in power.
December 9
An mRNA vaccine candidate against the human immunodeficiency virus, developed by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Moderna and other institutes, shows an efficacy rate of 79%. and no significant side effects in tests in rhesus macaque monkeys, according to a paper published in Nature Medicine.
December 12
Formula 1 world champion Max Verstappen broke Hamilton's empire after a thrilling final.
15 December
Serial killer and necrophiliac David Fuller is sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. The convicted man had sexually abused the bodies of more than 100 women.
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