TENSIONS OVER IRAN
The EU releases a report addressing its concerns about the development of Iran’s nuclear programme.
JANUARY
SHIP DISASTER
Costa Concordia, an Italian cruise ship, hits a reef off the coast of Italy and partially sinks, killing 30 people.
FEBRUARY
YEMENI ELECTIONS
Ali Abdullah Saleh is succeeded by Vice President Abd Rabbuh Mansur al-Hadi. He was the only candidate on the ballot.
Long live the Queen
Queen Elizabeth II marks the 60th anniversary of her accession to the throne of the United Kingdom.
TV history
Superbowl clash between NY Giants and NE Patriots becomes the most watched programme in American TV history as 111.3 million viewers tune in.
Swan song
American singer Whitney Housten dies, aged 48, after drowning in the bathtub.
MARCH
Russian roulette
Vladimir Putin swaps places with Dmitry Medvedev to become president again, prompting street protests.
Mali coup
President Amadou Toumani Toure is ousted by renegade soldiers, plunging the country into chaos.
Rock band ruckus
Members of Pussy Riot, a Russian feminist punk-rock group, are arrested after staging a protest at an Orthodox church.
Stable Senegal
Macky Sali succeeds Abdoulaye Wade as president in a vote touted as proof of democracy’s maturity in the African nation.
Going viral
KONY 2012, a short campaign film created by a US-based group on Joseph Kony, a fugitive Ugandan rebel leader, gets more than 94 million views on YouTube.
APRIL
Race to Elysee
Francois Hollande defeats incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy to become France’s first socialist president since the 1980s.
Guinea-Bissau takeover
Soldiers seize power two weeks prior to presidential elections.
Failed launch
Kwangmyongsong-3, a North Korean Earth observation satellite, explodes 90 seconds after launch. The West said it was a ballistic missile test.
Flight to freedom
Chen Guangcheng, a blind Chinese activist, escapes from house arrest to the US embassy in Beijing. He later flew off to the US after diplomatic wrangling.
Reforming Myanmar
Aung San Suu Kyi’s party, the National league for Democracy, wins nearly every seat in parliamentary elections as part of mass reforms in Myanmar.
MAY
Egyptian elections
Mohamed Morsi becomes the head of state in the country’s first free democratic elections.
Brought to justice
Charles Taylor, the former Liberian president, is convicted by the ICC for war crimes in neighbouring Sierra Leone.
Record sale
A pastel version of Edvard Munch’s 1895 painting “The Scream” is auctioned off for a record $120m in New York, making it the most expensive work of art.
Facebook goes public
The social networking site holds its initial public offering – with a peak market capitalisation of $104bn.
Afghan attack
Forty schoolgirls are poisoned by suspected Taliban in Talokuan – one of the many such attacks against girl students.
JUNE
View of Venus
For the second time this century, Venus appeared as a small disc moving across the face of the Sun. The next transit will take place in 2117 and 2125.
China’s giant leap
Shenzou 9 was launched with the first Chinese female astronaut on board.
Cannibal chase
A Canadian porn actor who murdered and ate parts of his victim is arrested in Germany after a global hunt.
Escaping extradition
Wikileaks’ Julian Assange enters the Ecuadorian embassy in London to avoid his extradition to Sweden and possibly to the US.
Banksters
The London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR) was in the middle of serial bank frauds in which banks profited from falsely inflating or deflating rates.
JULY
Euro 2012
Spain wins the 2012 UEFA European Football Championship beating Italy 4-0 in Kiev, Ukraine.
Sporting spectacle
The UK hosts the 2012 Summer Olympics. It was the first Olympic Games which had a female competitor in every discipline. Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Brunei entered female competitors for the first time.
God particle
Higgs Boson, the elementary particle, is discovered by CERN.
Blackout
In the worst case of power outage, 620 million people in India are plunged into darkness for almost two days.
Mystery death
Al Jazeera airs a special investigative report on suspicion that polonium poisoning could have led to Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat’s death in 2004.
AUGUST
Mining misery
Dozens die as miners go on strike in South Africa’s Marikana over poor pay and work conditions.
Sea of dispute
Tensions escalate between China, Japan and Taiwan over disputed islands in the South China Sea.
Curiosity Rover
The car sized robotic rover lands on Mars after being launched in November 2011. The rover will investigate Martian climate and geology amongst other things for future research.
Apple versus Samsung
Apple Inc and Samsung Electronics Co. locked in legal battles. Apple won a ruling in its favour in the US, while Samsung won rulings in South Korea, Japan and the UK.
Armenian anger
Armenia cuts off ties with Hungary after the latter extradited convicted murderer Ramil Safarov to Azerbaijan.
End of the road
US astronaut Neil Armstrong, the first man to walk on the moon, dies at the age of 82.
Syria spillover
Kidnappings of Syrians in Lebanon stoke tensions between Sunnis and Shias.
No end in sight
Kofi Annan resigns as the United Nations-Arab League Joint Special Representative to Syria and is replaced by Lakhdar Brahimi.
SEPTEMBER
New launch
Apple Inc. releases the iPhone 5.
US embassy attack
Ambassador J Christopher Stevens is killed in an attack on a US mission in the Libyan city of Benghazi. It occurred amid global protests over a controversial film deemed anti-Muslim.
NHL lockout
Labour dispute leads to cancellation of one-third of north America’s National Hockey League season.
OCTOBER
Venezuela victory
Hugo Chavez wins fourth term as president, defeating Henrique Capriles Radonski.
Hurricane Sandy
Powerful storm devastates parts of the Caribbean, Mid Atlantic and Northeastern US.
Nose-diving Rial
Iranian currency falls to an all-time low following heavy sanctions from Western countries.
Cycle of shame
Cycling champion Lance Armstrong is stripped of all his Tour de France titles following allegations of doping.
BBC blacksheep
Scandal over alleged sexual abuse of underage children by deceased presenter Sir Jimmy Savile lands British broadcaster in turmoil.
Swat shock
Pakistani child activist Malala Yousufzai is shot by suspected Taliban gunmen in Swat Valley, sparking global outrage.
Lebanon assassination
Wissam al-Hassan, the country’s intelligence chief, is killed in a car bombing in Beirut.
Royal grief
Norodom Sihanouk, the Cambodian king, dies.
NOVEMBER
Obama re-elected
Barack Obama wins a second term as US president, defeating Republican rival Mitt Romney.
‘Pillar of Defence’
At least 103 Palestinians and four Israelis are killed in an eight-day Israeli offensive against the Gaza Strip.
A ‘war hero’s’ fall from grace
David Petraeus, the director of the CIA, resigns after details of his extramarital affair are revealed.
China Congress
Xi Jinping succeeds Hu Jintao as the general secretary of the Communist Party of China in an overhaul of the top leadership.
Abortion anguish
Protests erupt over the death of Indian woman in Ireland after allegedly being refused an abortion.
Palestinians' successful bid
The UN approves Palestine’s bid for non-member observer status. Only five countries voted against the bid including the US and Canada.
Disputed decree
Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi issues a decree expanding his presidential powers, sparking mass protests.
UK inquiry
Judge Brian Leveson publishes his report after a year-long inquiry into the ethics of the British press. His report suggested stricter laws.
Mexican poll
Enrique Pena Nieto of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) is elected president.
Legend's exit
Australian batsman, Ricky Ponting, retires from international cricket.
Conflict in DR Congo
M23 rebels and and government forces in biggest clash of year-long conflict when rebels take control of Goma.
DECEMBER
Typhoon Bopha batters the southern Philippines, killing more than 200.
Environmental pact
The United Nations Climate Change Conference agrees to extend the legally binding Kyoto Protocol to limit greenhouse-gas emissions until 2020, in Doha, Qatar.
New Japanese premier elected
Shinzo Abe is voted into office as prime minister for the second time.
Heinous crime
A gunman shoots and kills 26 people including 20 children, aged between 6 and 7 in the US state of Connecticut.
Gang rape in India's capital
A brutal assault on a 23-year-old medical student in a bus in the Indian capital city of New Delhi leads to public outrage and violent protests across the nation.