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Washington, December 12
Since World War II, a single phenomenon has not dominated the news around the world like the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 has.
In the United States, a tumultuous presidential election and a wave of protests over racial injustice also drew incessant coverage.
To some extent, other dramatic events were overshadowed. Among them: China’s crackdown on Hong Kong’s democracy; an apocalyptic explosion in Beirut; the shocking death by helicopter crash of basketball icon Kobe Bryant and his daughter.
Some seemingly epic events earlier in the year now seem distant, like the impeachment of President Donald Trump and the January announcement by Prince Harry and Meghan Markle that they were abandoning their prominent roles in the British royal family. Just a few weeks later came the long-awaited Brexit, Britain’s formal withdrawal from the European Union.
As most of the world battled COVID, armed conflicts erupted between Armenia and Azerbaijan and in the Tigray region of Ethiopia. Afghanistan’s seemingly endless war dragged on, even as the warring sides moved cautiously toward peace talks. Mass protests challenged the ruling powers in Belarus and Thailand.
Due to past instances of sexual assault and sexual abuse, Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein received a 23-year prison sentence and the Boy Scouts of America declared bankruptcy.
Some other important events of 2020:
Iran: The year ended as it began with tensions between Iran and the United States inflamed by the assassination of a senior official. On January 3, a US drone attack killed Revolutionary Guard General Qassem Soleimani. Iran responded with a missile strike that wounded dozens of US soldiers in Iraq. In December, a mysterious attack near Tehran killed a nuclear scientist whom the United States and others had identified as the organizer of Iran’s effort to search for nuclear weapons two decades ago. Iran blamed that attack on Israel.
Immigration: Throughout 2020, the Trump administration lobbied to extend a wall along the US-Mexico border, even as it implemented immigration policies that outraged human rights defenders.
The targets included unaccompanied children seeking refuge in the United States; Hundreds were detained in hotels before being evicted. The administration also sought to suspend the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program that protects some young immigrants from deportation.
But a federal judge ruled that new applications for the program must be accepted.
Hong Kong: China imposed a comprehensive national security law in Hong Kong. The ensuing crackdown on dissent effectively nullified China’s commitment to allow the city to maintain its promised rights for 50 years after the 1997 handover of British colonial rule. The arrests of leading opposition figures and the expulsion of local lawmakers, prompting the resignation of the entire opposition camp, led numerous countries to restrict legal cooperation with Hong Kong. The United States imposed travel bans and financial penalties.
Opioids: Purdue Pharma, the maker of OxyContin, pleaded guilty to three criminal counts, formally taking responsibility for its role in an opioid epidemic that has contributed to the deaths of more than 470,000 Americans over two decades. Purdue admitted to hampering efforts to combat the addiction crisis. The pleas stemmed from a settlement that includes $ 8.3 billion in fines and forfeitures, but advocates for the victims were concerned that Purdue’s owners, the Sackler family, could emerge with their fortune largely intact.
Notable deaths: For sports fans around the world, 2020 was sadly marked by the deaths of two popular superstars: Kobe Bryant, 41, and Diego Maradona, soccer, 60. Among those killed along with Bryant in the helicopter crash was his daughter Gianna, 13 years old. herself a promising athlete. Other revered figures who died were America’s civil rights leader John Lewis, guitarist Eddie Van Halen, and actors Chadwick Boseman and Sean Connery. Many admirers of the liberal US Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg not only mourned her death, but deplored her replacement by a conservative, Amy Coney Barrett.
Beirut explosion: Lebanon’s capital was devastated in August by one of the largest non-nuclear explosions ever recorded. A fire detonated a reserve of almost 3,000 tons of ammonium nitrates that rotted in a port warehouse. The explosion ripped through Beirut, sucking in air and blowing up houses as windows shattered for miles around.
More than 200 people died and thousands were injured, compounding the ills of a nation already beset by massive protests and economic collapse.
France-Muslims: The October beheading of a teacher by an 18-year-old Chechen on the outskirts of Paris, followed by the murder of three people in Nice by a Tunisian migrant, prompted France to declare its highest-level security alert. The attacks came amid a trial over the 2015 massacre at the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo, which had published cartoons of the prophet of Islam.
The teacher was beheaded for showing the cartoons to his class while discussing freedom of expression, vigorously championed by President Emmanuel Macron. Macron’s cartoons and stance fueled calls by Muslim nations to boycott French products; and some French Muslims resented the security crackdown.
Hurricanes: It was a historically busy hurricane season that forecasters had to turn to the Greek alphabet after running out of assigned names. In the United States, Louisiana took the brunt of the attack: three hurricanes and two tropical storms. – AP
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