Syria’s use of chemical weapons in an attack that killed hundreds of people thrust the country’s civil war to the top of the agenda in Western capitals. But the... Syria’s use of chemical weapons in an attack that killed hundreds of people thrust the country’s civil war to the top of the agenda in Western capitals. But the resolve by some governments to punish the Assad regime with an American-led missile strike crumbled after the British Parliament surprisingly rejected such action. Russia brokered a deal, backed by the UN and America, under which Syria is destroying its chemical stockpile. The war rumbles on. The UN estimates that three-quarters of Syria’s population will need aid in 2014.
Civil strife enveloped Egypt when Muhammad Morsi, its Islamist president, was ousted by the army after days of street protests against his government that were bigger than the anti-Mubarak demonstrations in 2011. A crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood led to more bloodshed; most of its leaders were imprisoned.
Pakistan’s election marked the country’s first civilian transition of power at the end of a full five-year term. Nawaz Sharif returned as prime minister; he had last held the job in 1999. Bombings and mayhem continued unabated. At least 50 people were killed on the day that Mr Sharif held a press conference with David Cameron, Britain’s prime minister, that discussed security issues.
Although less frequent than in previous years, American drone strikes against militants in Pakistan were bitterly condemned by its government. Drone technology was also more widely talked about elsewhere for other purposes, such as distributing aid to rural areas and delivering packages.
Iraq had its worst year for sectarian violence since 2008, with over 8,000 people killed.
伊拉克经历了自2008年以来宗派暴力最为血腥的一年,共有超过8000人死亡。
The nutcracker
胡桃夹子
A new governing coalition was formed in Italy, headed by Enrico Letta of the centre-left Democrats, after an election in which a quarter of Italians registered their discontent by opting for a new party led by a comedian. Mr Letta got on with the serious business of trying to reduce public debt. The fun ended for Silvio Berlusconi when he was booted out of the Senate, after having been definitively convicted of a crime for the first time.
Cyprus became the fourth country in the euro zone to get a full bail-out, though only after an anxious week in which it had to resubmit a plan to restructure its banks. Ireland became the first country to exit its bail-out programme.
Pope Benedict shook the Catholic church by stepping down, the first pope to retire in 600 years. His successor, Pope Francis, an Argentine Jesuit, shook the church further by saying it should worry less about sexuality and by moving to reform the Vatican.
Tech companies dominated the year’s business news. Twitter completed a successful IPO, with its share price up 73% on the first day of trading. Struggling Black Berry called off a deal whereby its largest investor would have taken it private; it then sacked its chief executive. And Microsoft bought Nokia’s mobile-device business.
Dell rebooted its business by agreeing to a $25 billion offer from its founder, Michael Dell, to take it private, but not before rebellious investors submitted a counterbid for the computer-maker. Dell’s was the largest buy-out since the start of the financial crisis in 2007.
Some of the world’s big central banks got new governors, including Raghuram Rajan at the Reserve Bank of India, Haruhiko Kuroda at the Bank of Japan and Mark Carney at the Bank of England. Janet Yellen was picked to be chairwoman of America’s Federal Reserve; Ben Bernanke steps down early next year. Investors spent most of the year anticipating the start of the Fed’s“ tapering” of its asset-buying programme.
Most stock markets in Europe and America had a good year (those in emerging markets did not fare so well). The Dow Jones Industrial Average had broken a score of record highs by the beginning of December.
China’s new leadership under Xi Jin ping announced the boldest set of reforms for decades. These included more market pricing and a promise to abolish labour camps. China also further relaxed its one-child policy, in place since the 1970s, by allowing parents to have two children if one of the parents is an only child. In 2012 $2 billion-worth of fines were imposed on families that broke the one-child rule.
China tried to stamp its authority on its region by imposing an air defence zone over a swathe of the East China Sea that covers islands contested by Japan. Japan and America ignored China’s demand that it should be notified about flight plans by sending aircraft into the zone without warning. In December China accused Japan of “malicious slander” for suggesting its zone was threatening stability.
In March North Korea startled the world when it said it was preparing for a “state of war” with South Korea. Kim Jong Un, the North’s young dictator, closed the year by executing his uncle for forming “factions” against him.
Edward Snowden provoked a debate about government mass-surveillance programmes when he leaked classified documents about the activities of America’s National Security Agency. The extent of the snooping angered many, though Mr Snowden was accused of putting the security of America and its allies at risk. Some of those allies, including Angela Merkel of Germany and Dilma Rousseff of Brazil, were furious that their personal communications had been monitored.
Israel’s general election returned Binyamin Netanyahu to power. After two months of tortuous negotiations he formed a broad coalition government and appointed Tzipi Livni, who leads the Hatunah party, as chief negotiator with the Palestinians.
Among other big elections, Angela Merkel’s Christian Democrats won a third term in Germany and formed a grand coalition with the centre-left Social Democrats. She is the only leader in the euro zone to have been re-elected since the start of its debt crisis. Australia went through three prime ministers over the course of the year; the centre-right Liberals, led by Tony Abbott, won an election. Michelle Bachelet became Chile’s president again; her first term ended in 2010. Malaysia’s ruling Barisan Nasional coalition had its worst election showing since 1969; it still formed a government. And Uhuru Kenyatta was declared the victor in a presidential election in Kenya. His trial at the International Criminal Court on charges of orchestrating the ethnic violence that followed Kenya’s 2007 election begins in February.
Problems with battery systems led to the temporary grounding of Boeing’s new 787 Dream liner around the world. It was the first time America’s Federal Aviation Administration had grounded a type of aircraft since 1979.
In Bangladesh the collapse of a building that housed clothing factories killed 1,100 workers. They had been ordered to return to work despite warnings about cracks in the structure. It was South Asia’s worst industrial disaster in 30 years.
America’s government was temporarily shut down for the first time in 17 years, after a bickering Congress failed to pass a spending bill. The Republicans frustrated the White House with their blocking tactics, causing the Democrats to introduce a curb on filibustering in the Senate. Barack Obama’s approval ratings headed to the emergency room after the botched roll-out of his health-care reforms.
In Turkey a protest against developing a park in Istanbul snowballed into nationwide demonstrations against the authoritarian tone of Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government. Elsewhere, an increase in fares on São Paulo’s buses was the catalyst for bringing millions of disaffected Brazilians out onto the streets in 100 cities. There was a sense of déjà vu about protests in Thailand(against a government run by a member of the Shinawatra family), Ukraine(against an unreconstructed pro-Russian president) and Greece (against just about everything).
Diplomats hailed an apparent breakthrough on Iran’s nuclear programme that gives it six months to curtail its activities, though in December Iranian negotiators walked out of a meeting to discuss implementing the deal. Earlier,Hassan Rohani, Iran’s new president, was given a cautious welcome by the West. The American and Iranian presidents talked for the first time since 1979.
Although he faced mounting criticism at home, President François Hollande ofFrance was praised abroad for sending French troops to Mali to help fight Islamist separatists. A peace deal was signed in the summer. France also sent troops to the Central African Republic to join a peacekeeping force, led by the African Union, to try to prevent the rebels who had taken over the country from wreaking havoc.
A group affiliated to al-Qaeda and purportedly demanding an end to French operations in Mali seized a gas plant in Algeria and held 800 people hostage. Algerian security forces stormed the complex, but 39 foreign workers were killed during the operation.
In some of the year’s other audacious terrorist attacks, Islamist Somalis attacked a shopping mall in Nairobi, Kenya’s capital, resulting in scores of deaths during a four-day siege; two brothers, motivated by Islamist beliefs, bombed the Boston marathon, killing three people; and two British Islamists of Nigerian descent shocked Londoners when they ran down an off-duty soldier and tried to decapitate him.
Britain’s Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition produced ever more spending cuts. But the government declared that austerity was bearing fruit after several international forecasts of British growth were revised upwards.
After Hugo Chávez’s death from cancer, power was transferred in Venezuela to Nicolás Maduro, who won a presidential election. Mr Maduro carried on where his predecessor left off, accusing the opposition of economic sabotage, expelling American diplomats and forcing through price controls.
Bitcoin, an online currency run on cryptographic software and favoured by drug dealers, gained some respectability this year, with even Ben Bernanke saying it “may hold long-term promise”. But its price is volatile, soaring from $15 in January to above $1,200 in early December and crashing to under $600 a week later.
Small food companies in Europe faced an unbridled disaster when it emerged that a few suppliers to British supermarkets were using horsemeat instead of beef in frozen meals.