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Worldwide current events
Sports events

Topics in the news

Didier Queloz and Michel Mayor

Turkey begins a military offensive into Rojava, Syria, after U.S. troops withdraw from the region.
Protests in Ecuador calling for the resignation of President Lenín Moreno cause the government to relocate from Quito to Guayaquil.
The Nobel Prize in Physics is awarded to Jim Peebles, Michel Mayor (pictured) and Didier Queloz (pictured).
The Nobel Prize in Medicine is awarded to William Kaelin Jr., Peter Ratcliffe and Gregg Semenza for research into cell reaction to oxygen availability.
Archaeologists announce the discovery of En Esur, the largest known Bronze Age settlement in the Southern Levant.

October 10, 2019 (Thursday)

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Arts and culture

The Swedish Academy awards the Nobel Prize in Literature to Olga Tokarczuk, "for a narrative imagination that with encyclopedic passion represents the crossing of boundaries as a form of life", and to Peter Handke, "for an influential work that with linguistic ingenuity has explored the periphery and the specificity of human experience." (The Guardian)

October 9, 2019 (Wednesday)

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Armed conflicts and attacks

2019 Halle synagogue attack
- Two people are killed and two others are injured in attacks by a man wearing military camouflage near a synagogue and at a kebab shop in Halle, Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. Shots are also reported in nearby Landsberg. A suspect, 27-year old Stephan Billiet is arrested. The attack had been livestreamed on Twitch for 35 minutes citing anti-Semitic and racist motivations. (BBC) (DW) (The Guardian)
Operation Peace Spring, Turkish involvement in the Syrian Civil War, Kurdish–Turkish conflict (2015–present)
- Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan says his country has launched a military invasion of northern and eastern Syria. The Kurdish YPG-led Syrian Democratic Forces say that Turkish fighter aircraft strike targets and "civilian areas". Syrian state television says the Turkish artillery shelling of Ras al-Ayn, al-Hasakah Governorate, is "random", and Ayn Issa, Raqqa Governorate, is also being shelled. (Deutsche Welle) (Al Jazeera) (Xinhuanet)
- The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces requests urgent air support from the United States, and a no-fly zone over northern Syria to protect it from Turkish air raids. U.S. President Donald Trump has ordered U.S. forces to not intervene in the conflict. (Reuters) (BBC)
- Women at the SDF-controlled Al-Hawl refugee camp, which holds around 74,000 refugees, mostly the wives and children of ISIL fighters, riot and burn their tents according to a Kurdish security official. (Kurdistan24)
- The U.S. Military takes two of the Beatle ISIS Fighters previously held by the Kurds to face trial in the United States. (Reuters) (ABC News)
Military activity of ISIL
- President of Niger Mahamadou Issoufou claims that American hostage Jeffery Ray Woodke is still alive and being held by a jihadi group affiliated with ISIS. Woodke was kidnapped in October of 2016. (ABC News)

Business and economy

The OECD releases a set of proposals, for the 134 countries which accepted the principle, to discuss and negotiate a change in international taxation of the big digital and consumer goods companies' global profits. (Reuters)
International sanctions during the Venezuelan crisis
- Adobe cuts access to its software and cancels all Creative Cloud memberships in Venezuela, to comply with U.S. President Donald Trump's trade restrictions. (BBC)
European debt crisis
- Greece issues new three-month debt at a negative interest rate. (Financial Times)

Law and crime

2019 Tunisian presidential election
- An appeals court in Tunisia releases candidate Nabil Karoui from prison, days before the second round of the presidential election. (Al Jazeera)

Politics and government

2019 Ecuadorian protests
- Ecuadorian President Lenín Moreno says that he will not resign "under any circumstance" and continues with his government in Guayaquil. (Infobae)

Science and technology

The Nobel Prize in Chemistry is awarded to John B. Goodenough, M. Stanley Whittingham and Akira Yoshino for the development of lithium ion batteries. (CNN)

October 8, 2019 (Tuesday)

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Armed conflicts and attacks

Turkish involvement in the Syrian Civil War, Northern Syria Buffer Zone
- Turkish officials say that Turkish Air Force jets have begun bombing the Syrian-Iraqi border on Monday night ahead of an imminent ground invasion of northern Syria that is controlled by Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, whom Turkey regards as terrorists. (The Hill)
War in Afghanistan (2001–present)
- A bomb explodes in a classroom at Ghazni University in Afghanistan, wounding at least nineteen students. The same university was targeted last month with a bomb attached to a university minibus that killed one and injured five. (Gulf News)
Two sappers die and four more are wounded trying to defuse World War II shells in Poland. The last such casualties occurred in 1982. (Xinhua) (TVN24)

Health and environment

Pacific Gas and Electric shuts off power to 800,000 customers in Northern California citing safety concerns from an elevated fire risk due to the weather conditions. (CBS 13 Sacramento)

International relations

Brexit negotiations in 2019
- President of the European Council Donald Tusk tells Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Boris Johnson that "what's at stake is not a stupid blame game", after a UK source said talks were "close to breaking down" following a reported argument in a phone call between Johnson and German chancellor Angela Merkel on the subject of the post-Brexit status of Northern Ireland. (CNN)
China–United States relations, China–United States trade war
- The U.S. State Department announces it imposed visa restrictions on numerous Chinese government officials it believes responsible for the detention or abuse of Muslim Uighurs and other ethnic minorities in Xinjiang province. The move follows the Department of Commerce adding twenty-eight Chinese firms and bureaus to their "trade blacklist" on Monday for similar reasons. (Reuters)

Law and crime

Thirteen men are arrested in the United Kingdom for a drug smuggling conspiracy which over several years moved 50 tonnes of illegal drugs from the Netherlands, valuing over tens of millions of pounds. The National Crime Agency called it “the biggest ever [drug] conspiracy that we've seen in the UK”. (BBC)

Politics and elections

2019 Ecuadorian protests
- The Government of Ecuador, headed by President Lenín Moreno, moves to Guayaquil as the Carondelet Palace in Quito is overtaken by protesters and chaos persists in the capital. (The Guardian)
- As the situation in the country worsens, incumbent President Lenín Moreno denounces a "coup attempt" by Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela and former Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa. (Chicago Tribune)
Politics of Italy
- Italian lawmakers vote to reduce the number of seats in the Chamber of Deputies from 630 to 400, and 315 seats to 200 in the Senate of the Republic at the next Italian general election. (Reuters)

Science and technology

The Nobel Prize in Physics is awarded to Jim Peebles for theoretical discoveries in physical cosmology and Michel Mayor and Didier Queloz for the discovery of 51 Pegasi b, an exoplanet orbiting a solar-type star. (BBC)

October 7, 2019 (Monday)

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Armed conflicts and attacks

A 32-year-old Syrian man rams a stolen truck into eight cars in Limburg an der Lahn, Hesse, causing eight injuries. German police believe it was intentional, but the motive is yet to be determined. (The Guardian)
2019 Jalalabad suicide bombing
- A bomb on a rickshaw detonates as a minibus carrying new army recruits passes in Jalalabad, Nangarhar Province, Afghanistan. A military spokesperson says ten, including a child, were killed and a further 27 wounded. (The Washington Post)
Syrian Civil War, Kurdish–Turkish conflict (2015–present), International military intervention against ISIL, Northern Syria Buffer Zone
- U.S. forces begin to withdraw from northern Syria. (Foreign Policy)
- The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces calls the U.S. withdrawal a "stab in the back". (BBC)
- A U.S. Department of Defense spokesperson says Turkey has been pulled off the Combined Air Operations Centre's air tasking order and that the U.S. has halted sharing aerial surveillance information with Turkey. (Middle East Monitor) (Military Times)
- U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham strongly criticizes President Trump's decision, describing the event as "a big win for Iran and Assad [and] a big win for ISIL". Former American envoy Brett McGurk mentions the 60,000 SDF-held ISIL detainees, saying that the State Department and inspectors general at the Department of Defense warn they are the "nucleus for a resurgent ISIL". (The Guardian)

Arts and culture

Censorship in China
- China bans American animated sitcom South Park in response to the episode "Band in China" which parodied censorship in China and Chinese influence on Hollywood. (New York Post) (CNN) (Global News)

Business and economy

Economic effects of Brexit
- Holger Bingmann, head of the Federation of German Wholesale, Foreign Trade and Services, tells journalists German businesses have lost €3.5 billion so far this year due to Brexit. (Deutsche Welle)
Pizza Express, a UK-based chain with 470 restaurants, including 150 overseas, reportedly hires financial advisors ahead of talks with its creditors. The business is £1.1 billion in debt and has made a loss for two consecutive years. It employs around 14,000 people. (BBC)
China–United States trade war
- Citing human rights issues, the United States Department of Commerce puts 20 Chinese public security bureaus and eight high tech companies, such as HikVision, SenseTime and Megvii, on the Export Administration Regulations entities blacklist. Like Huawei, which was sanctioned on an identical blueprint for national security reasons, the entities will need U.S. government approval before they can purchase components from U.S. companies. (Reuters) (American Shipper)

Disasters and accidents

The Ukrainian Ministry of Transport announces it has revoked the air operator's certificate of Ukraine Air Alliance, effective from October 5. The move results from the October 4 crash of an Antonov An-12 owned by the airline, after it ran out of fuel near Lviv, Ukraine. The decision was taken the same day. (The Aviation Herald)
A North Korean fishing boat collides with a Japanese Fisheries Agency vessel and sinks off Japan. At least 20 North Koreans are pulled from the water. The Japanese ship had been attempting to warn the North Korean vessel away from Japanese territory. (Bloomberg) (The New York Times)
An overloaded ship carrying migrants capsizes and sinks off the island of Lampedusa, Italy, in rough conditions in the Mediterranean Sea. Search and rescue is underway; of at least 50 on board, 22 survivors have been saved and 13 bodies found. The deceased and missing both include pregnant women. The International Organization for Migration states the boat had departed from Tunisia. (Deutsche Welle)

Law and crime

King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden decides that the children of Prince Carl Philip and Princess Sofia, and the children of Princess Madeleine and Christopher O'Neill will no longer be members of the Royal House of Sweden. The purpose of the decision is to establish which members of the Royal House may be expected to perform official duties incumbent on the Head of State or related to the function of the Head of State. (Swedish Royal Court)
In Lower Manhattan, New York City, a 24-year-old homeless man is charged with murdering four other homeless men and attempting to murder a fifth in random attacks. Authorities identify one of the deceased as an 83-year-old man, but release no further details about the victims. (The Independent)
Two protestors who were arrested in Rostov-on-Don in 2017 while holding signs seeking resignations from the Russian government, and have been in custody since, are sentenced to over six years each in high-security prisons. They were charged with planning violent mass disturbances, and said that they confessed during torture. (The Times)
The Supreme Court of the United States opens its 2019–2020 nine-month term with eight of its nine justices present. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who underwent a number of medical procedures for cancer throughout the past year, was present, but Justice Clarence Thomas was absent "due to an unspecified illness." (Reuters)
2019 Hong Kong protests
- The first people are charged with breaking the ban on wearing face masks in Hong Kong. The government of Hong Kong says the prohibition of face masks is needed to end months of violent protests. (The Guardian)

Politics and elections

Tax returns of Donald Trump
- A judge rules against U.S. President Donald Trump, ordering him to release eight years of state tax returns to New York officials. The defense makes an immediate appeal to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, and is granted a temporary stay "pending expedited review." (BBC)

Science and technology

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine is awarded to Peter J. Ratcliffe, William Kaelin Jr. and Gregg L. Semenza for their discoveries of how cells sense and adapt to oxygen availability. (The New York Times)
Astronomers announce the discovery of 20 new moons around Saturn, adding to the 62 previously known. The new moons comprise 17 retrograde moons in the Norse group and three prograde moons, two of which belong to the Inuit group. (Phys.org)

October 6, 2019 (Sunday)

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Armed conflicts and attacks

Syrian Civil War, Kurdish–Turkish conflict (2015–present), Northern Syria Buffer Zone
- Following a phone call between U.S. President Donald Trump and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the White House says that Turkish Armed Forces will launch an incursion into Syrian Democratic Forces-held northern Syria, and that United States Armed Forces will be withdrawing from the region to avoid clashing with its NATO ally. (The Guardian)

Law and crime

List of mass shootings in the United States in 2019
- Police in Kansas City, Kansas, are seeking two unnamed suspects after two men opened fire at a bar, killing four people and wounding another five. (BBC)
Crime in Austria
- An Austrian man kills five people in the town of Kitzbühel, Tyrol: his ex-girlfriend, her brother and parents, as well as her new boyfriend. He gives himself up at the police station. (Reuters)

Politics and elections

The Jordanian government announces it has struck a deal with the teachers' union to end a month-long strike that affected at least 1.5 millon students. The strike was instigated over pay in light of new austerity measures. (Reuters)
2019 Kosovan parliamentary election
- Following the resignation of Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj in July, voters in Kosovo cast their ballots to elect the new members of the Assembly of the Republic of Kosovo. Opposition party, Vetëvendosje, lead by Albin Kurti wins in an unprecedented victory. (DW)
2019 Portuguese legislative election
- Portuguese voters head to the polls to elect a new session to the Assembly of the Republic. In line with opinion polls, exit polls show the incumbent Socialist Party winning the most seats, but likely not quite enough to form a majority. (euronews) (Reuters)
2019 Tunisian parliamentary election
- Tunisian citizens gather to vote in the country's latest parliamentary election. (DW)

Science and technology

Fermi bubbles
- Scientists say that, using data from the Hubble Space Telescope, they have found evidence of a 300,000-year-long burst of radiation originating 3.5 million years ago from or near the center of our galaxy, erupting through both galactic poles, with effects on the Magellanic Stream, 200,000 light-years away. (EarthSky)

October 5, 2019 (Saturday)

edithistorywatch

Armed conflicts and attacks

Syrian Civil War, Kurdish–Turkish conflict (2015–present), Northern Syria Buffer Zone
- Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan threatens to invade SDF-held areas in Northern Syria "today or tomorrow", after dubbing joint US-Turkish patrols per the buffer zone agreement a "fairy tale". (Reuters) (Daily Sabah)
Paris police headquarters stabbing
- Counter-terror investigators confirm the man who killed four people at Paris police headquarters two days ago was a convert who adhered to Islamist extremism and had contact with Salafists. (BBC)

Disasters and accidents

Ukraine–European Union relations
- The European Aviation Safety Agency revokes its authorisation of Ukraine Air Alliance, effectively banning the airline from all airspace in the European Union. The move results from yesterday's crash of an Antonov An-12 owned by the airline, after it ran out of fuel near Lviv, Ukraine. (The Aviation Herald)

International relations

Russia–Venezuela relations
- Russian Deputy Prime Minister Yuri Borisov visits ally Venezuela, reiterating Russia's support of disputed president Nicolás Maduro and announcing new trade deals with the economically crippled country. (Reuters)

Law and crime

In Lower Manhattan, New York City, four homeless men are beaten to death and a fifth severely injured while sleeping. A 24-year-old man, also believed homeless, is in custody. (CNN)
After acquitting five Muslim men of murder, Thai judge Kanakorn Pianchana gives a speech complaining of corrupt pressure upon the judiciary, including in this case, to convict without sufficient evidence. He then shoots himself in the chest in court in Yala, but survives. Criticism from judges of the Thai legal system is rare, but rights groups claim Muslims often face trumped-up charges in the region, which is Muslim-majority and suffers from insurgency. (BBC)

Politics and elections

2019 Emirati parliamentary election
- A pool of citizens of the United Arab Emirates heads to the polls in the country's fourth parliamentary election. (Gulf News)

Sports

2019 World Artistic Gymnastics Championships
- In the floor exercise, Simone Biles lands a triple-twisting double backflip in a tucked position. The new skill will be named "Biles 2", the third element named after her, and will have a FIG difficulty value of J. (PopSugar via Yahoo!)

October 4, 2019 (Friday)

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Armed conflicts and attacks

2018–19 Arab protests
- On the third day of protests in Iraq, the death toll reaches 100. The government imposes near-total internet blackout. (BBC)
- The Iraqi military says "unidentified snipers" have shot four people dead on the streets of Baghdad amid protests, including two police officers, with dozens of others wounded by sniper fire. Reuters reporters witness at least one protester being shot in the head by a sniper, killing him. (Reuters) (BBC)

Disasters and accidents

An Antonov An-12 cargo plane operated by Ukraine Air Alliance runs out of fuel and crashes as it approaches Lviv International Airport in Ukraine. Five of the seven occupants are killed, and the airport closes. (BBC)

Law and crime

2019 Hong Kong protests
- Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam invokes the colonial-era Emergency Regulations Ordinance and bans the use of face masks in public gatherings. (RTHK Hong Kong English)
Crime in Italy
- Two police officers are killed and another is wounded after a Dominican suspect opens fire on them at a police station in Trieste, Italy. (La Repubblica)
A woman in Florida is arrested and charged with explosives offences after a police raid on her home finds 24 pipe bombs and bomb-making material and several other weapons. She admits constructing the devices to harm people. Police were notified of the problem by the 27-year-old's parents. (CNN)
2019 college admissions bribery scandal
- A parent is sentenced to five months in prison, a fine of $100,000 and 500 hours of community service for his involvement in the college admissions scandal. (CNN)
Hwaseong serial murders
- Police in South Korea receive confessions from convicted murderer Lee Chun-jae to the serial rapes and murders, which occurred between 1986 and 1991 and left at least nine dead. He denies a tenth murder, now believed to be perpetrated by a copycat. The investigations inspired the movie Memories of Murder and saw 21,000 people investigated. Lee, who is serving life for the 1994 rape and murder of his sister in law, cannot be prosecuted because the statute of limitations has expired. He had been linked to three victims earlier this month by DNA. (CNN)

Politics and elections

2019 Argentine general election
- At a conference in Washington, D.C., Sergio Massa, candidate for the Argentine Chamber of Deputies for Frente de Todos, the coalition of candidate Alberto Fernández, says Fernández's position on Venezuela is clear and that keeping silent about the situation in Venezuela is to "become an accomplice of the government [of Maduro]". He also is the first member of Fernández's party to describe Venezuela as a "dictatorship". (Infobae in Spanish)
2019 Ecuadorian protests
- Ecuadorian President Lenín Moreno declares a state of emergency amid nationwide protests against a hike in fuel prices. The protests have crippled the country's transport network with all major roads and bridges blocked in the capital Quito. (BBC)

Science and technology

Foreign interference in the 2020 United States elections
- Microsoft says a network of hackers linked to the Iranian government has attempted to access the email accounts of people associated with a 2020 presidential election campaign, as well as prominent Iranian expatriates in the United States. Microsoft has not named the specific campaign which was targeted by Iran. (NBC News)

More October 2019 events...

Time: 13:54 UTC|Day: 10 October