There was a violent start to 2010 in Pakistan when a suicide bomber blew up his SUV at a volleyball field in the village of Shah Hassankhel killing 89 people on New Year’s Day.
On January 4, Dubai opened the world’s tallest structure, in a glitzy ceremony. The $1.5-billion tower reaches up 828 meters, 200 storeys into the sky. It surpasses the next highest inhabited building, Taiwan’s Taipei 101, by more than 300 meters.
On January 8, gunmen opened fire on a bus carrying Togo’s national football squad, killing the driver and wounding nine others, including two players. The team was travelling to the 2010 Africa Nations Cup, the continent’s most-followed sporting event.
On January 12, a major earthquake rocked Haiti, killing thousands and left the Caribbean nation appealing for international help. A five-story U.N. building was also brought down by the 7.0 magnitude quake, the most powerful to hit Haiti in more than 200 years.
And also in January, Apple’s I-pad made its debut, raising a philosophical question: Do we really need yet another gadget? Apparently, we do.
The repercussions of Haiti disaster followed in February. Several weeks after the devastating earthquake in Haiti, 10 American missionaries, who were accused of illegally trying to take children out of the quake-hit country, appeared in court on February 4. The missionaries were arrested on with a busload of 33 children they said were orphaned by the January quake.
On February 15, Irish Bishops met Pope Benedict in the Vatican, to discuss a pedophilia scandal that has shaken Catholic Ireland. The meetings were held to discuss a plan for action for the Irish Church following the abuse scandal. Ireland has been in a state of shock since the publication in November 2009 of the Murphy Commission Report which said the Church in Ireland had "obsessively" hidden child abuse in the Dublin archdiocese from 1975 to 2004, and operated a policy of "don’t ask, don’t tell".
On February 18, the leadership of a coup that ousted Niger’s President Mamadou Tandja said they had suspended the country’s constitution and dissolved all state institutions. The statement was broadcast to the nation on state television.
On 24 February, Greek riot police in Athens fired tear gas at stone-throwing protesters during a strike rally, organized to oppose the government’s austerity measures. The government’s economic programme to help Greece emerge from a financial crisis includes cuts to supplementary wages of public servants, salary and hiring freezes, tax reforms and rises.
Another major earthquake hit Chile this time. On 27 February, a huge magnitude-8.8 earthquake struck Chile early killing more than 100 people, knocking down homes and hospitals, and triggering a tsunami that rolled menacingly across the Pacific.
The trial of Radovan Karadzic resumed on March 1, at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia in The Hague, where he was charged with some of the 1992-95 Bosnian war’s worst atrocities. Karadzic denied the 11 war crimes charges against him, including two of genocide and chose to represent himself in court.
Shortly before midnight on March 21, a volcano in the south of Iceland erupted when the Eyjafjallajokull glacier started to spew smoke and lava about one kilometer high. International flights were diverted away from the island, and other flights were cancelled.
On March 29, an amateur video showed scene following suicide attack in metro station in Moscow. Smoke filled the underground platform at Moscow’s Lubyanka metro station, as a blast tore through a carriage of a train carrying commuters across the capital. Two female suicide bombers killed at least 38 people on packed trains during morning rush hour.
Maoist rebels in India killed at least 73 police on April 6, by setting off explosives and firing from hilltops around a dense forest area in the centre of the country. Thousands have been killed in the insurgency which began in the late 1960s.
On April 7, the mayor’s office in the Kyrgyz capital Bishkek declared a state of emergency, after riot police clashed with thousands of anti-government protesters. At least five people were killed in clashes between anti-government demonstrators and riot police, when nationwide protests spread to the heart of the Central Asian nation.
On April 8, the Presidents of the United States and Russia signed a landmark disarmament treaty they hope will herald better bilateral ties and raise pressure on countries seeking nuclear weapons to renounce such ambitions. The agreement will cut strategic nuclear arsenals deployed by the former Cold War foes by 30 percent within seven years, but leave each with enough to destroy the other.
On April 10, Polish President Lech Kaczynski was killed, along with his wife and much of Poland’s ruling and military elite, when the plane in which they were flying crashed in thick fog near Smolensk in western Russia. Kaczynski and a party of government officials had been planning to mark the 70th anniversary of the massacre of Polish officers by Soviet forces in a nearby forest.
On April 22, British Petroleum’s off shore oil drilling rig Deepwater Horizon sank in the Gulf of Mexico after it burned for 36 hours. The rig was drilling with 126 workers on board when it was ripped by an explosion and fire on April 20. Some 115 workers escaped. By the afternoon of April 22, a five-mile-long oil slick extended from the accident site. Floating oil spill barriers, skimmers and airplanes dropping dispersant were used to try and control and clean up the spill. U.S. President Barack Obama said "BP is ultimately responsible under the law for paying the costs of cleanup operations."
On May 1, US police, tipped off by a street vendor, found and defused a car bomb inside a sport utility vehicle in an incident that forced the evacuation of New York’s Times Square. Police bomb technicians removed and dismantled three propane tanks, consumer-grade fireworks, two gasoline containers and two clocks apparently used as timers in the rear of the vehicle.
On May 2, The Eurozone and the International Monetary Fund agreed to a €110 billion bailout package for Greece. The package involved sharp austerity measures for Greece, a debt laden country in the Eurozone.
On May 4, Nude, Green Leaves and Bust 106.5 million, setting another new world record for a work of art sold at auction.
On May 7, Scientists conducting the Neanderthal genome project announce that they have sequenced enough of the Neanderthal genome to suggest that Neanderthals and humans may have interbred
On June 9, ethnic fighting in Kyrgyzstan between Kyrgyz and Uzbeks resulted in the deaths of hundreds. The spreading of the violence required the interim government led by Roza Otunbayeva to declare a state of emergency on June 12, in an attempt to take control of the situation. The clashes killed up to 2,000 people, mostly Uzbeks, and displaced some 100,000.
On 18 June, Jose Saramago, 87, who became the first Portuguese-language writer awarded the Nobel Literature Prize, died in Lanzarote, one of Spain’s Canary Islands, of multiple organ failure after a long illness.
The biggest spy swap since the end of the Cold War took place in Austria on July 9, when Russia and the United States exchanged 14 agents. The dramatic conclusion to the espionage scandal was a carefully choreographed swap at Vienna airport, when 10 Russian agents were exchanged for four Americans imprisoned in Russia for spying and pardoned by Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.
On July 11, darkness fell in French Polynesia, when tourists, scientists and locals gathered to catch a glimpse of a rare total solar eclipse. The eclipse was visible over an 11,000-kilometre corridor across the south Pacific.
Regions across central and southern China were plagued by torrential rains in July, triggering mudslides and flooding that killed over 700 people. Rescue workers worked around the clock to free stranded residents, travelling through the flooded streets in boats loaded with supplies.
BP’s leaking well was capped earlier in July after 60,000 barrels of oil per day had spilled into the Gulf, ruining fishing and tourism industries and polluting the shoreline with slimy deposits. BP chief Executive Bob Dudley insisted that BP has a long-term commitment to the Gulf region.
On 11 July, Spanish national football team became the champions in 2010 South Africa World Cup, beating the Netherlands 1-0 in the final game.
On August 9, Japan marked the 65th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki, in a solemn ceremony near the site of its ground zero. A bell tolled at 11:02 a.m. local time, the exact time the bomb was dropped, as tens of thousands of children, elderly survivors, dignitaries and representatives from nearly 60 countries in Nagasaki’s Peace Park bowed their heads for a minute of silence in memory of the more than 140,000 who died in the attack and from radiation sickness afterwards.
August saw the debate over the construction of an Islamic centre and mosque near the World Trade Centre, scene of the September 11, 2001 attacks, heating up across the US. The issue provoked heated debate, with politicians and religious and civic groups across the country weighing in on the subject.
Heavy monsoon rains in August saw the worst flooding in Pakistan’s history, leaving almost 2,000 dead. It is estimated that up to 2 million homes were damaged or destroyed by the flood waters. International community rushed to the help of flood stricken Pakistani people.
France continued its plans to demolish hundreds of illegal Roma camps in a crime crackdown in August. The French centre-right government repatriated over 600 Roma, mostly to Romania. France called on the European Commission to force Romania to stem the flow of Roma leaving the country, suggesting it could block Bucharest’s entry to the Schengen border-free zone if it failed to do so.
On 18 September, Afghan President Hamid Karzai went to a polling station in central Kabul amid tight security to cast his ballot for the country’s parliamentary elections. Attacking five polling stations before they opened, the Taliban had vowed to disrupt the poll and urged potential voters to stay at home. The voter turnout was nearly 40 %.
On October 9, nearly half a million Bangladeshis were left homeless after three days of storms which killed at least 15 people and left 50 missing.
On October 13, thirty-three workers trapped for more than two months deep in a Chilean mine finally reached the surface in a specially-made rescue capsule. The miners spent 69 days in the hot, humid bowels of the gold and copper mine in Chile’s northern Atacama Desert since it caved in on August 5. For the first 17 days of their ordeal, the miners were all believed to be dead, and their story of survival, as well as the extraordinary rescue operation captured the world’s attention.
A wave of protests took place across France in October as French unions protested over austerity measures and economic reforms, being introduced by the French government in an attempt to tackle the financial crisis affecting Europe. Backed by a majority of voters, unions were trying to force President Nicolas Sarkozy to retreat on what is seen as the defining reform of his presidency.
On October 25, a tsunami pounded several Indonesian islands, leaving a trail of destruction in its wake. The tsunami was triggered by a 7.5 magnitude earthquake, which struck 78 km west of South Pagai, one of the Mentawai islands. The number of dead was estimated at more than 400, as rescue workers searched for hundreds more missing.
On November 4, Greek police detonated a parcel bomb addressed to the French embassy in Athens. Several parcel bombs were found across Athens. Two men, both Greek, aged 22 and 24, appeared in court on the same day, after being arrested on November 1 for being in possession of two parcel bombs including one addressed to French President Nicolas Sarkozy.
On November 5, volcanic ash forced flights to be cancelled in Indonesia, after Mount Merapi volcano erupted with renewed ferocity killing several people and blanketing the surrounding area with ash. Ten days of eruptions killed more than 98 people and forced the evacuation of more than 75,000. A column of ash billowed at least 4 km above the crater of Mount Merapi, as worried authorities evacuated villages within a 20 km radius of the volcano.
On November 11, a Chinese vase discovered during a routine house clearance in a London suburb sold for $ 69 million dollars, 40 times its estimate and an auction record for any work of art from Asia.
On November 13, military-ruled Myanmar freed Nobel Peace Prize-winner Aung San Suu Kyi after her latest period of house arrest expired.
On November 22, Cambodian police and onlookers struggled to help dozens of people who were trapped beneath each other following a stampede at Bon Om Touk water festival. Three-hundred-and forty-five people were killed and another 300 injured in the crush.
Amateur video filmed on November 23, showed smoke rising on the South Korean island of Yeonpyeong, after North Korea fired dozens of artillery shells, setting buildings on fire and prompting a return of fire by the South. South Korea’s military said two soldiers had been killed and 17 wounded in the shelling, the biggest attack in years.
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was placed on Interpol’s wanted list over rape allegations made against him in Sweden, Interpol said on December 1. The 39-year-old is under intense scrutiny after whistle-blowing website WikiLeaks began releasing a selection of more than 250,000 classified U.S. diplomatic cables.
On December 2, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that several countries had agreed to help fight a forest fire raging for hours that killed up to 40 people. Israeli fire fighters said it was the biggest forest fire in the country’s history, with some 2,800 hectares of land destroyed.