DHAKA: If we look back, we see the year 2014 is full of conflicts. Militant group Islamic State (IS) dominated the media reports most of the time. The war in Ukraine and Israeli attacks on Palestine, especially on Gaza made headlines for a long. The missing of planes, particularly MH370, drew people’s attention world-wide. More major incidents are given below:
1. Ebola virus outbreak
The most widespread epidemic of Ebola virus disease in history is currently ongoing in several West African countries. It has caused significant mortality, with a reported case fatality rate of 70%. The World Health Organization (WHO) and respective governments have reported a total of 20,164 suspected cases and 7,894 deaths till 29 December.
2. Israel-Gaza conflict
On 8 July 2014, Israel launched a military operation which it designated Operation Protective Edge in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip. Thereafter, seven weeks of Israeli bombardment, Palestinian rocket attacks, and ground fighting killed more than 2,200 people, the vast majority of them Gazans while 66 Israeli soldiers, 5 Israeli civilians and one Thai civilian were killed and 469 IDF soldiers and 261 Israeli civilians were injured.
3. IS militancy
The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria also known by the Arabic acronym Da’ish and self-proclaimed as the Islamic State (IS), is a Sunni Islamist rebel group based in Iraq and Syria, where it controls territory. It also operates in eastern Libya, the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt, and other areas of the Middle East, North Africa, South Asia, and Southeast Asia.
The United Nations has held IS responsible for human rights abuses and war crimes, and Amnesty International has reported ethnic cleansing by the group on a ‘historic scale’. Over 60 countries are directly or indirectly waging war against IS.
4. MH370 missing with 200 passengers
Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 (MH370) was a scheduled international passenger flight that disappeared 8 March, while flying from Kuala Lumpur International Airport, Malaysia, to Beijing Capital International Airport, China. Flight 370 last made voice contact with air traffic control at 01:19 MYT (17:19 UTC, 7 March) when it was over the South China Sea, less than an hour after takeoff, and the aircraft disappeared from air traffic controllers’ radar screens at 01:21 MYT (17:21 UTC). The aircraft, a Boeing 777-200ER, was carrying 12 Malaysian crew members and 227 passengers from 15 nations.
5. Nigerian School Girls Abduction
On the night of 14–15 April, some 276 female students were kidnapped from the Government Secondary School in the town of Chibok in Borno State, Nigeria. Responsibility for the kidnappings was claimed by Boko Haram, an Islamic Jihadist and terrorist organization based in northeast Nigeria. The students have been forced to convert to Islam and into marriage with members of Boko Haram, with a reputed ‘bride price’ of $12.50.
6. South Korea ferry disaster
The sinking of the MV Sewol occurred on the morning of 16 April en route from Incheon to Jeju. The Japanese-built South Korean ferry capsized while carrying 476 people, mostly secondary school students from Danwon High School. Of the approximately 172 survivors, many were rescued by fishing boats and other commercial vessels that arrived at the scene approximately 30 minutes before any South Korean coast guard or ROK Navy ships.
7. Crimea status referendum and annexation
Crimean status referendum was held on March 16 by the legislature of Autonomous Republic of Crimea as well as by the local government of Sevastopol, both subdivisions of Ukraine at the time. The referendum asked the people of Crimea whether they wanted to join Russia as a federal subject, or if they wanted to restore the 1992 Crimean constitution and Crimea’s status as a part of Ukraine.
The official result from the Autonomous Republic of Crimea was a 96.77 percent vote for integration of the region into the Russian Federation with an 83.1 percent voter turnout.
Following the referendum, Russia effectively administered Crimea as two federal subjects — the Republic of Crimea and the federal city of Sevastopol starting March 21.
8. Coup in Thailand
On 22 May, the Royal Thai Armed Forces, led by General Prayuth Chan-ocha, Commander of the Royal Thai Army (RTA), launched a coup d’état against the caretaker government of Thailand, following six months of political crisis. The military established a junta called National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO) to govern the nation.
The NCPO issued an interim constitution granting itself amnesty and sweeping power. It also established a military dominated national legislature which later unanimously voted General Prayuth as a new prime minister of the country.
9. Malaysian plane shot down in Ukraine
Airplane with 298 onboard was shot down by a surface-to-air missile over Ukraine. Everyone on the plane was dead and the aircraft debris was scattered over a 10-mile swath of land.
Malaysia Airlines posted a list of passenger nationalities on its website for the 298 passengers and crew: 154 Dutch, 27 Australian, 43 Malaysian (including 15 crew and two infants), 12 Indonesian (including one infant), 9 British, 4 German, 4 Belgian, 3 Filipino and one Canadian. The airline said it did not yet know the nationalities of the remaining 41 passengers. An aide to Ukraine’s interior minister quoted by Interfax claimed the total number of dead in the crash was more than 300 and included 23 US citizens.
10. Scotland independence referendum
The Scottish independence referendum was took place in Scotland on 18 September. It quested the voters ‘Should Scotland be an independent country?’. The ‘No’ side won, with 2,001,926 (55.3%) voting against independence and 1,617,989 (44.7%) voting in favour. The turnout of 84.6% was the highest recorded for an election or referendum in the United Kingdom since the introduction of universal suffrage.
11. Turkey mine accident
On 13 May, an explosion at a coal mine in Soma, Manisa, Turkey, caused an underground mine fire, which burned until 15 May. In total, 301 people were killed in what was the worst mine disaster in Turkey’s history. The mine, operated by coal producer Soma Kömür İşletmeleri A.Ş., suffered an explosion, the cause of which is still under investigation.
12. European Spacecraft Rosetta Landed on Comet
For the first time in history, a spacecraft from Earth has landed on the face of a comet speeding through deep space. The European Space Agency’s Philae lander on the Rosetta spacecraft made its nail-biting, history-making touchdown on the Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko on November 12.
13. UN climate protocol
Governments took a step back from chaos in the climate change discussions in Lima in Peru and found a way forward on December 14, albeit with some fudges and compromises, giving themselves just 12 months to finalise a crucial international agreement to avoid dangerous levels of global warming.
Manuel Pulgar-Vidal, Peru’s environment minister, who had skilfully presided over more than two weeks of fraught negotiations, announced that a deal had been struck by more than 190 countries.
The five pages of text, dubbed the Lima Call for Climate Action, outline a way forward on hotly contested issues, including the process for countries to set out their pledges to cut annual emissions of greenhouse gases after 2020.
The overall aim remains the creation of an international agreement on climate change which is due to be settled at the next UN summit, COP21, to be held in Paris in December 2015.
14. US, Cuba relations breakthrough
US president Barack Obama and Cuba counterpart Raúl Castro thanked Pope Francis for helping broker a historic deal to begin normalising relations between the United States and Cuba, after 18 months of secret talks over prisoner releases brought a sudden end to decades of cold war hostility.
The two presidents spoke simultaneously on December 18 to confirm the surprise reversal of a long-running US policy of isolating Cuba, detailing a series of White House steps that will relax travel, commercial and diplomatic restrictions in exchange for the release of Americans and dissidents held in Havana.
15. Pakistan school massacre
On 16 December, an devastating attack had left the world surprised. After investigation police has found out that 9 members of the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) conducted a terrorist attack on the Army Public School in the Pakistani city of Peshawar. They entered the school and opened fire on school staff and children, killing 145 people, including 132 schoolchildren, ranging between eight and eighteen years of age.
16. AirAsia plane crash
Indonesia AirAsia’s Flight QZ8501, an Airbus A320-200, lost its contact with air traffic control early on December 28 during bad weather on a flight from the Indonesian city of Surabaya to Singapore. The navy said 40 bodies had been recovered as dusk fell. The plane has yet to be found and there was no word on the possibility of any survivors.
Indonesian rescuers searching for a missing AirAsia plane carrying 162 people pulled bodies and wreckage from the sea off the coast of Borneo as relatives of those on board broke down in tears on hearing the news.
BDST: 2034 HRS, DEC 31, 2014
