10 world events that marked the year 2022

Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the protest movement in Iran, the abortion issue in the United States - 2022 was rich in different events. AFP offered a list of the 10 events that, according to the agency, marked the world this year.

Putin invaded Ukraine

On February 24, Vladimir Putin ordered Russian troops to invade Ukraine, plunging the world into a crisis not seen since the end of World War II. Facing NATO countries that have pledged their support for Ukraine, the Russian president brandished the threat of nuclear weapons and said he was ready to use any means in his arsenal.

The war caused the largest influx of refugees into Europe since the end of World War II and cost thousands of military and civilian lives.

Putin, who claims he wants to denazify Ukraine, has found himself very isolated diplomatically. Westerners have imposed economic sanctions on Russia that have tightened over time, while supplying arms to Ukraine, which has also been granted EU candidate status.

There are plenty of witness accounts accusing the Russian army of abuses, including the killing of civilians, torture and rape.

At the very beginning of the invasion, the Russian military abandoned the encirclement of the capital, Kyiv, from where Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky makes daily statements to world leaders asking for their support.

The war also raised the threat of a global food crisis due to Russia's naval blockade of the Black Sea. An agreement reached in July allowed Ukraine to gradually begin exporting its abundant grain production.

In September, Putin announced the mobilization of 300,000 reservists and signed annexation documents for four occupied Ukrainian territories following referendums seen by the international community as runaway referendums, while the Russian military has suffered battlefield setbacks.

Following the withdrawal from the Kharkiv region, Moscow ordered the withdrawal of its forces from Kherson in early November. Russia has launched hundreds of punitive strikes against Ukraine's energy grid, plunging millions of Ukrainians into darkness as winter approaches.

Inflation fueled by the energy crisis

The price surge that began in 2021 due to disorganization in supply chains, combined with strong demand for essential products and services after economies reopened post-Covid, has tripled this year to reach levels not seen in decades. Inflation is expected to reach 8 percent in the fourth quarter in G20 countries, weighing on economic growth around the world and causing an increase in the value of corporate output.

Inflation has been fueled by the war in Ukraine, which has plunged Europe into a deep energy crisis. Russia, under the blow of Western sanctions, multiplied punitive measures and even hit the EU's weak point - its dependence on Russian gas. Exports of Russian gas, especially to heavily dependent Germany and Italy, fell sharply.

"The world economy is experiencing its most serious energy crisis since the 1970s," emphasizes the Organization for Economic Development and Cooperation.

The war also led to an increase in the price of grain and consequently of animal feed.

Due to the ongoing restrictions related to Covid, the shortage of electronic circuits, mainly manufactured in Taiwan, has also reverberated in many industries.

In order to curb inflation, the US central bank began raising its key interest rates gradually from March, making borrowing increasingly expensive. The European Central Bank followed suit.

U-turn on abortion, low conservative wave in the US midterm elections

In June, the US Supreme Court gave back to each US state the freedom to ban abortion on its territory, burying the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling. Since that turnaround, twenty US states have outlawed abortion entirely or strictly, and the issue emerged as a campaign issue in November's midterm elections.

These midterm elections did not lead to the conservative wave expected by supporters of former US President Donald Trump. Democrats retained control of the Senate and Republicans won a narrow majority in the House of Representatives.

Still, Trump has announced he is running for the Republican presidential nomination ahead of the 2024 election. The race for that nomination is being contested by several other potential candidates, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, the rising star of the American right.

However, former President Trump's candidacy may be tainted by possible legal proceedings against him. In November, a special prosecutor was appointed to handle two of the many investigations against him.

Political instability and a new monarch in Britain

After a series of scandals and an avalanche of resignations in his government, Conservative Prime Minister Boris Johnson resigned in July. Liz Truss was officially nominated to succeed him in the post by Queen Elizabeth II. Two days later, the queen died after a 70-year reign. Two days after her date of death on September 8, on September 10, Crown Prince Charles was proclaimed King Charles III.

At the same time, Truss became the shortest-serving British Prime Minister in the country's modern history. She lasted just 44 days in office before resigning in turn after triggering a political and financial crisis with her radical economic agenda.

Rishi Sunak came to power in late October during a period of unprecedented instability in the country. He is the fifth British Prime Minister since the Brexit referendum in 2016. Enormous challenges lie ahead for the former banker and Chancellor of the Exchequer, who is only 42 years old. Among them is inflation exceeding 10 percent, a declining health care system... And the end of the year was also marked by a series of strikes in the country.

Extreme weather events

The year 2022 has seen increasing natural disasters related to global warming.

The summer was the hottest ever recorded in Europe. Record temperatures and heat waves triggered drought and dramatic fires that burned more than 660,000 hectares of forest between January and mid-August in the EU, a record. A record loss of ice mass was also noted on the glaciers of the Alps.

At least 15,000 deaths were directly linked to the heat on the old continent, according to the World Health Organization.

China also broke heat records in August and the drought threatened the Horn of Africa with famine.

Fires and deforestation break new records in the Brazilian Amazon.

In Pakistan, historic floods linked to unusually intense monsoon rains have killed more than 1,700 people and forced 8 million people from their homes, leaving a third of the country inundated.

If this year's forecasts are confirmed, the eight years from 2015 to 2022 will be the hottest on record, the World Meteorological Organization warns.

After difficult negotiations, the UN climate conference ended on November 20 in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, with a compromise on aid to poor countries affected by climate change, but also with a failure to set new, more ambitious targets to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases. gases.

Rebellion against the Islamic veil was firmly suppressed in Iran

On September 16, Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old Iranian Kurdish woman, died in hospital three days after she was arrested by the morality police, who accused her of violating the country's dress code, which requires the Islamic veil to be worn in public.

Her death sparked a wave of protests in Iran. They are unprecedented since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Protests for more women's freedoms have gradually turned into a wider movement against the Islamic regime, which has taken over streets, universities and even schools despite repression. Authorities say more than 300 have been killed during the protests, but a Norway-based NGO says the death toll is at least 448.

China: Asserting Xi and Challenging the Zero-Covid Strategy

Chinese President Xi Jinping was re-elected in October as head of the Chinese Communist Party at the 20th Party Congress. He surrounded himself with devoted allies to become the most powerful leader in modern China.

During his decade at the helm of his country, Xi demonstrated a desire for control, infiltrating nearly every governance mechanism and state structure and drawing international criticism on human rights.

Tensions in the Taiwan Strait have reached their highest level in years since US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited Taiwan in early August. China responded with military maneuvers on land and at sea unprecedented since the mid-1990s. US President Joe Biden has said his military will defend Taiwan if China invades the island.

The country's zero-covid strategy, which led to lockdowns of entire neighborhoods or cities when outbreaks of infection occurred, sparked protests in late October on a scale not seen in decades. The authorities acted through repression against them, but also relaxed their sanitary policies.

The various fates of the extreme right

After four years in power, Brazil's far-right President Jair Bolsonaro was narrowly defeated by leftist icon Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva in the Nov. 30 election after a bitter campaign.

Lula, who was in prison on corruption charges (2018-2019) before his convictions were overturned by justice, will officially return to lead the Brazilian state on January 1, 2023. His success seems to cement the return of leftist influence in Latin America.

In Europe, by contrast, ultraconservatives have made major gains in parliamentary elections in some countries, starting with the fourth straight victory for Hungarian nationalist leader Viktor Orban's party in April.

In France, Marine Le Pen's far-right National Assembly scored a historic breakthrough in June, becoming the first opposition force in the National Assembly where President Emmanuel Macron lost his absolute majority.

The nationalist and anti-immigrant Sweden Democrats party was the big winner in the September election and became the second largest political force in the country.

In Italy, Giorgia Meloni won a historic victory in September with her "Italian Brothers" party and was appointed prime minister in October.

Hope for peace in Ethiopia

After two years of conflict, Ethiopia's federal government and rebels from the Tigray region signed a ceasefire agreement in Pretoria on November 2 that should end a war described by NGOs as one of the world's bloodiest. The conflict, which since November 2020 has pitted Ethiopia, supported in particular by the forces of neighboring Eritrea, against the rebel authorities in Tigray, has, according to the UN, been characterized by alleged crimes against humanity committed by all parties to it. The conflict has forced over 2 million Ethiopians to flee their homes.

In addition to disarming the rebels, the peace deal should in particular allow the delivery of humanitarian aid to Tigray, which is almost cut off from the world. Its 6 million inhabitants have been without food and medicine for more than a year. The first aid convoy since the end of August arrived there on 16 November.

Qatar - a criticized host of the World Cup

Entrusting the hosting and organization of the World Cup to Qatar (November 20 to December 18) has triggered an avalanche of criticism against the small Gulf country.

The first Arab country to host the event has been criticized for its treatment of foreign workers, LGBT+ people and women. It has also been criticized for air-conditioning its stadiums in an era of global warming.

The fate of migrant workers - a staple of the country's machinery, where Qataris make up just 10 percent of the 3 million population - is pointed out. Some media say thousands have died at the construction sites, an estimate Doha denies and says it will take legal action against criticism from Western Europe.

Criticism of Qatar has also been expressed in other ways since the start of the World Cup, through symbolic gestures, such as German soccer players pretending to be gagged or European ministers wearing armbands with the colors of the rainbow, a symbol of the LGBT+ community.

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