Year 2013
Events
January
January 10 – More than 100 people are killed and 270 injured in several
bomb blasts in Pakistan.
January 11 – The French military begins a five-month intervention into
the Northern Mali conflict, targeting the militant Islamist Ansar Dine
group.
January 16–20 – Thirty-nine international workers and one security guard
die in a hostage crisis at a natural gas facility near In Aménas,
Algeria.
January 27 – An estimated 233 people die in a nightclub fire at the Kiss
nightclub in the Santa Maria, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil.
February
February 12 – North Korea conducts its third underground nuclear test,
prompting widespread condemnation and tightened economic sanctions from
the international community.
February 15 – A meteor explodes over the Russian city of Chelyabinsk,
injuring 1,489-1,492 people and damaging over 4,300 buildings. It is the
most powerful meteor to strike Earth's atmosphere in over a century. The
incident, along with a coincidental flyby of a larger asteroid, prompts
international concern regarding the vulnerability of the planet to
meteor strikes.
February 21 – American scientists use a 3D printer to create a living
lab-grown ear from collagen and animal ear cell cultures. In the future,
it is hoped that similar ears could be grown to order as transplants for
human patients suffering from ear trauma or amputation.
February 28 – Benedict XVI resigns as pope, becoming the first to do so
since Gregory XII in 1415, and the first to do so voluntarily since
Celestine V in 1294.
March
March 13 – Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio of Argentina is elected the
266th pope, whereupon he takes the name Francis and becomes the first
Jesuit pope, the first pope from the Americas, and the first pope from
the Southern Hemisphere.
March 24 – Central African Republic President François Bozizé flees to
the Democratic Republic of the Congo, after rebel forces capture the
nation's capital, Bangui.
March 25 – The European Union agrees to a €10 billion economic bailout
for Cyprus. The bailout loan will be equally split between the European
Financial Stabilisation Mechanism, the European Financial Stability
Facility, and the International Monetary Fund. The deal precipitates a
banking crisis in the island nation.
April
April 2 – The United Nations General Assembly adopts the Arms Trade
Treaty to regulate the international trade of conventional weapons.
April 15 – Two Chechnya-born Islamist brothers (one of whom was a United
States citizen) explode two bombs at the Boston Marathon in Boston,
Massachusetts, in the United States, killing 3 and injuring 264 others.
April 24 – The 2013 Savar building collapse, one of the worst industrial
disasters in the world, kills 1,134 people in Bangladesh.
April 30 – Willem-Alexander is inaugurated as King of the Netherlands
following the abdication of Beatrix.
May
May 6 – Three women, missing for more than nine years, are found alive
in Cleveland, Ohio. Police arrest Ariel Castro, their abductor, later
that day.
May 15 – In a study published in the scientific journal Nature,
researchers from Oregon Health & Science University in the United States
describe the first production of human embryonic stem cells by cloning.
May 22 – British Army soldier Fusilier Lee Rigby of the Royal Regiment
of Fusiliers is murdered in Woolwich, southeast London by Islamic
terrorists Michael Adebolajo and Michael Adebowale.
May 31 – The El Reno tornado, near El Reno, Oklahoma, United States,
having a record-breaking width 2.6 miles (4.2 km), with maximum wind
speeds up to 301 mph (484 km/h), is the widest tornado ever recorded on
earth.
June
June 6 – Former CIA employee Edward Snowden discloses operations engaged
in by a U.S. government mass surveillance program to news publications
and flees the country, later being granted temporary asylum in Russia.
June 25 – Emir of Qatar Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani abdicates and his son
Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani assumes power.
June 26
Kevin Rudd defeats Julia Gillard in an Australian Labor Party leadership
ballot and consequently becomes Prime Minister of Australia, three years
after Gillard replaced Rudd.
United States v. Windsor (570 U.S. 744) decided in the Supreme Court of
the United States, overturning a key section of the Defense of Marriage
Act and hence granting federal recognition to same-sex marriage in the
United States.
July
July 1 – Croatia becomes the 28th member of the European Union.
July 3 – Amid mass protests across Egypt, President Mohamed Morsi is
deposed in a military coup d'état, leading to widespread violence.
July 21 – Philippe is sworn in as King of the Belgians, following the
abdication of Albert II.
August
August 14 – Following the military coup in Egypt, two anti-coup camps
are raided by the security forces, leaving 2,696 dead. The raids were
described by Human Rights Watch as "one of the world's largest killings
of demonstrators in a single day in recent history".
August 21 – 1,429 are killed in the Ghouta chemical attack during the
Syrian Civil War.
August 29 – The United Kingdom Parliament votes against UK military
attacks on Syria.
September
September 7
2013 Australian federal election: The Liberal/National Coalition led by
Tony Abbott defeats the Labor Government led by Prime Minister Kevin
Rudd. Abbott would be sworn in on September 18th.
The International Olympic Committee awards Tokyo the right to host the
2020 Summer Olympics.
September 21 – al-Shabaab Islamic militants attack the Westgate shopping
mall in Nairobi, Kenya, killing at least 62 civilians and wounding over
170.
October
October 10 – Delegates from some 140 countries and territories sign the
Minamata Treaty, a UNEP treaty designed to protect human health and the
environment from emissions and releases of mercury and mercury
compounds.
October 18 – Saudi Arabia rejects a seat on the United Nations Security
Council, making it the first country to reject a seat on the Security
Council. Jordan takes the seat on December 6.
November
November 5 – The unmanned Mars Orbiter Mission is launched by India from
its launchpad in Sriharikota.
November 8 – Typhoon Haiyan (Yolanda), one of the strongest tropical
cyclones on record, hits the Philippines and Vietnam, causing
devastation with at least 6,241 dead.
November 12 – Three Studies of Lucian Freud, a series of portraits of
Lucian Freud by the British painter Francis Bacon, sells for US$142.4
million in a New York City auction, setting a world record for an
auctioned work of art.
November 15 – The Playstation 4 released.
November 17 – Fifty people are killed when Tatarstan Airlines Flight 363
crashes at Kazan Airport, Russia.
November 21 – Euromaidan pro-EU demonstrations begin in Ukraine after
President Viktor Yanukovych rejects an economic association agreement
between the European Union and Ukraine in favor of closer ties to
Russia.
November 24 – Iran agrees to limit their nuclear development program in
exchange for sanctions relief.
December
December 7 – Ninth Ministerial Conference of the World Trade
Organization delegates sign the Bali Package agreement aimed at
loosening global trade barriers.
December 14 – Chinese unmanned spacecraft Chang'e 3, carrying the Yutu
rover, becomes the first spacecraft to "soft"-land on the Moon since
1976 and the third ever robotic rover to do so.
December 15 – Fighting between ethnic Dinka and Nuer members of the
presidential guard break out in Juba, South Sudan, plunging the country
into civil war.
December 25 – 38 people are killed in the Christmas Day bombings in
Iraq.
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