World Current Affairs, December 2011(Part-2)

This time I am loading the current affairs of the world for the month of December 2011. I hope viewes may like it and express their feelings.
This is the second set of World Current Affairs, December 2011.

• Syrian troops reportedly open fire on anti-government protesters following Friday prayers.(16th December)
• Human Rights Watch calls on Bahrain to release political prisoners from the 2011 Bahraini uprising.(16th December)
• Russia joins the World Trade Organization.(16th December)
• Moody's Investors Service downgrades Belgium's credit rating two notches to Aa3.(16th December)
• Japan declares the stricken Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant in cold shutdown.(16th December)
• The death toll from an outbreak of hand, foot and mouth disease in Vietnam reaches 156 with 96,000 people having been sick with the disease as at the end of November 2011.(16th December)
• The United States and North Korea are expected to hold diplomatic talks regarding North Korea's nuclear program. The talks are the first meeting after the six-party talks stalled in 2008.(16th December)
• Russian customs seize radioactive material bound for Iran.(16th December)
• Hollywood actor Christian Bale is prevented from visiting Chinese dissident Chen Guangcheng by police.(16th December)
• Thailand reissues a passport for Thaksin Shinawatra, saying he is no longer a "threat".(16th December)
• Flash floods triggered by Tropical Storm Washi kill at least 400 people in the Philippines with hundreds more missing.(17th December)
• A boat carrying 380 asylum seekers en route from Indonesia to Australia sinks off the coast of Java with hundreds of people missing.(17th December)
• The Arab League threatens to take Syria to the United Nations within two weeks if the country does not accept its proposals to end the crackdown on the uprising. (Xinhua)Clashes continue in Cairo's Tahrir Square for a third day between the Egyptian Army and protesters.(18th December)
• Nine people die following an explosion in a coal mine in Binzhou City in China's Hunan Province.(18th December)
• The Philippines Red Cross estimates that the death toll from the floods caused by Tropical Storm Washi has risen to 521.(18th December)
• Václav Havel, former President of Czechoslovakia and President of the Czech Republic, dies.(18th December)
• Spain's FC Barcelona win the final of the 2011 FIFA Club World Cup, beating Brazil's Santos 4-0 in Yokohama, Japan. Barcelona win the Cup for the second time in three years.(18th December)
• Syria agrees to an Arab League plan to allow monitors into the country amid the uprising.(19th December)
• Samsung Electronics announces it has filed new claims of patent infringement against Apple in Germany, raising the stakes in an ongoing worldwide patent war.(19th December)
• The death of North Korean Supreme Leader Kim Jong-il on December 17 is announced by Korean Central Television.(19th December)
• Kim Jong-un is proclaimed the expected successor to his father.(19th December)
• Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari returns to Pakistan after undergoing treatment in Dubai.(19th December)
• Diplomats from the European Union, Non-aligned Movement and the Arab States Group on the UN Security Council criticise Israeli settlement activities in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.(20th December)
• Joseph Kabila is sworn in as President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, despite the presidency being contested by opposition leader Etienne Tshisekedi.(20th December)
• Two Earth-sized planets, Kepler-20e and Kepler-20d, are found orbiting a star 950 light-years away from Earth.(20th December)
• Health authorities in Hong Kong start slaughtering 17,000 chickens after a carcass infected with bird flu H5N1 is found at a poultry market.(21st December)
• North Korea closes its border with China ahead of the funeral of former leader Kim Jong-il.(21st December)
• Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay agree to close their ports to ships flying the flag of the Falkland Islands at a Mercosur meeting; Argentina and the United Kingdom both claim the islands.(21st December)
• Soyuz TMA-03M, launched from Baikonur, carries a crew of three men to the International Space Station.(21st December)
• At least 72 people are killed and 169 wounded in a series of 16 bombing attacks in the Iraqi capital Baghdad, shortly after the final withdrawal of American forces from Iraq. (22nd December)
• The United States admits it was significantly responsible for an airstrike last month that killed 24 Pakistani soldiers.(22nd December)
• Human Rights Watch alleges that security forces in the Democratic Republic of the Congo have been responsible for the deaths of 24 people since the re-election of Joseph Kabila as President.(22nd December)
• Egypt's military-appointed Prime Minister Kamal Ganzouri calls for national dialogue after weeks of deadly protests against the military regime.(22nd December)
• Police in Brazil seek to press charges for environmental crimes committed by the United States oil company Chevron and drilling firm Transocean in relation to last month's Campos Basin oil spill.(22nd December)
• Russian President Dmitry Medvedev proposes political reforms at his final state-of-the-nation address.(22nd December)
• The Large Hadron Collider makes its first clear observation of a new particle since opening in 2009, the boson Chib 3P.(22nd December)
• North Korea says it will accept all South Korean delegations wishing to pay respects to the late leader Kim Jong-il.(23rd December)
• World leaders attend the funeral of former Czech President and dissident Václav Havel.(23rd December)
• Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi registers her National League for Democracy party, and visits Burma's parliament for the first time.(23rd December)
• Gun battles in Nigeria between government troops and Islamist Boko Haram militants kill 68 people.(24th December)
• The Buddha Memorial Center of Fo Guang Shan in Kaohsiung, Taiwan, housing a tooth relic of Gautama Buddha, is consecrated.(24th December)
• Dutch actor and singer Johannes Heesters, the world's oldest performer, dies at the age of 108.(24th December)
• A former official of the central bank of the People's Republic of China states that the People's Bank of China could lower the country's reserve requirements in 2012.(24th December)
• Cuba announces that it will release 2,900 prisoners – including some political prisoners – in the next few days.(24th December)
• Libya celebrates its independence for the first time in 42 years; independence celebrations were banned under the regime of former dictator Muammar Gaddafi.(24th December)
• At least 39 people are killed and many injured in a series of attacks against churches in Nigeria during Christmas prayers. The Islamic group Boko Haram claims responsibility.(25th December)
• Pope Benedict XVI delivers the annual Christmas message at Saint Peter's Square in Vatican City.(25th December)
• At least 38 migrants from Haiti are found dead after their boat sank off the east coast of Cuba.(25th December)
• Faezeh Hashemi, the daughter of former President of Iran Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, stands trial on charges of making anti-regime propaganda.(25th December)
• Brazil surpasses the United Kingdom to become the world's sixth-largest economy.(26th December)
• The government of China sentences activist Chen Xi to ten years imprisonment for "inciting subversion".(26th December)
• Helen Frankenthaler, who developed Color Field painting, dies at age 83.(27th December)
• Over $30 billion was spent on holiday online shopping in the United States, a 15% increase from last year, according to comScore.(27th December)
• The government of Argentina announces that President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner has cancer in her thyroid gland, and will have an operation on 4 January and step aside as president for 20 days until 24 January.(27th December)
• The Washington-based organisation Human Rights Watch accuses Syria of hiding hundreds of political detainees during a visit by Arab League monitors.(28th December)
• A Russian court rejects an attempt to ban Bhagavad Gita As It Is, a Russian translation of the Hindu holy book Bhagavad Gita.(28th December)
• Stones reportedly fall from the Colisseum, one of Rome's most famous landmarks.(28th December)
• The Silence of the Lambs, a 1991 thriller film starring Jodie Foster and Anthony Hopkins, is to be preserved by the United States Library of Congress as part of its National Film Registry.(28th December)
• 31 people are injured following the crash-landing of a passenger jet at Osh Airport in southern Kyrgyzstan.(28th December)
• Four people are killed and 1,000 others flee their homes amid lahars from the Mount Gamalama volcano in Indonesia.(28th December)
• Iran threatens to close down the key oil route of the Strait of Hormuz if more sanctions are imposed on it by Western nations.(28th December)
• In China, 54 government officials and the Ministry of Railways are punished over a fatal high-speed rail crash in July.(28th December)
• An Egyptian court bans forced virginity tests on female detainees in military prisons.(28th December)
• The corruption trial of the former President of Egypt, Hosni Mubarak, resumes in Cairo.(28th December)
• North Korea begins two days of funeral services for former leader Kim Jong-Il, who died on December 17 of a heart attack, aged 69.(28th December)
• China's Compass satellite navigation system, a rival to the American Global Positioning System (GPS), becomes operational, offering navigation services on the Chinese mainland. The system is expected to become available worldwide by 2020.(28th December)
• Turkish warplanes launch airstrikes aimed at Kurdish militants, accidentally killing 35 smugglers that were suspected as guerillas.(29th December)
• The United States sells 84 F-15 fighter jets to Saudi Arabia.(29th December)
• Mount Cleveland, a volcano in the U.S. state of Alaska, erupts, causing an air traffic alert to be issued.(29th December)
• A Russian nuclear submarine, the K-84 Ekaterinburg, is forced to partially submerge itself at a shipyard in Murmansk to douse a blaze on its hull. No radiation leaks are reported.(29th December)
• The Pacific Island nations of Samoa and Tokelau move from east to west of the International Date Line in order to align their time zone better with their main trading partners, meaning that they will not mark December 30 this year.(29th December)
• Kim Jong-un is acknowledged as the Supreme Leader of North Korea at the conclusion of a state funeral for his father.(29th December)
• Around 500 people protest in the Russian capital Moscow against the detention of opposition leader Sergei Udaltsov.(29th December)
• Poland announces an amnesty for illegal immigrants from January 1, 2012.(29th December)
• The stock for McDonald's rose 31 percent in 2011, the largest gain in the Dow Jones Industrial Average, while Bank of America fell 59 percent, the largest loss in the Dow Jones.(30th December)
• Cyclone Thane makes landfall near the southern Union Territory of Pondicherry on India's southern coast.(30th December)
• North Korea says that "foolish politicians around the world" should not expect any change in the country's policies.(30th December)
• Tens of thousands of Yemenis protest against an immunity deal for former President Ali Abdullah Saleh demanding he face trial for deaths in the 2011 Yemeni uprising.(30th December)
• The party of Democratic Republic of the Congo politician Étienne Tshisekedi says he has been placed under house arrest in Kinshasa since he claimed to have won the presidential election earlier this year.(30th December)
• Ethiopian forces capture the central Somali town of Beledweyne from al-Shabaab Islamist militants.(3st December)
• The President of Sudan Omar Hassan al-Bashir urges members of the Darfur based Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) to seek peace following the recent death of rebel leader Ibrahim Khalil.(31st December)
• The President of Nigeria Goodluck Jonathan declares a state of emergency in the states of Borno, Yobe, Niger and Plateau due to violence by the Islamist sect Boko Haram.(3st December)
• More than 200 people are injured by illegally huge firecrackers and celebratory gunfire in the Philippines.(31st December)
• The President of the United States Barack Obama signs a law providing for new sanctions against Iran.(31st December)
• United States President Barack Obama signs the National Defense Authorization Act into law allowing the indefinite imprisonment of any United States citizen under suspect of terrorism without need of trial.(31st December)
• Kim Jong-un is named as the Supreme Commander of North Korea's armed forces following the death of his father Kim Jong-Il.(31st December)
• NASA succeeds in putting the first of two Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory satellites in orbit around the moon.(31st December)
• In motor sports, WilliamsF1 co-founder Patrick Head resigns as a director of the team after 34 years in Formula One.(31st December)