Portal:Current events/2015 November 24

November 24, 2015 (Tuesday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Sinai insurgency
- November 2015 Sinai attack
  - A day after the second round of parliamentary elections closes, militants attack a hotel housing election judges in the provincial capital of al-Arish in Egypt's North Sinai. At least seven people are killed and 12 others injured, including two judges. The Islamic State's Wilayat Sinai branch claims responsibility. (Reuters) (Eyewitness News)
Russian military intervention in the Syrian Civil War, 2015 Russian Sukhoi Su-24 shootdown
- Turkish F-16 fighter jets shoot down a Russian Sukhoi Su-24 aircraft that had allegedly infringed its airspace near the Syrian border. Russia's Ministry of Defence denies the Su-24 entered Turkish airspace and initially said it was shot down by ground fire over Syria's Latakia Governorate. A video emerged of one pilot killed as local rebel Turkmen fighters shot at him while he was parachuting and a video of his body, while the fate of the other pilot is unknown but is presumed dead. A combat search and rescue mission by Russian forces failed to reach them. It is the first time a NATO member has shot down a Russian plane since the 1950s. (Irish Independent) (BBC) (The Telegraph)
- A Russian military helicopter is destroyed on the ground by a U.S. TOW missile used by Syrian rebels after it was forced to make an emergency landing in northern Latakia. (Reuters)
- A Russian marine is killed by rebel gunfire while on a mission to rescue the crew of the downed Su-24 near the Syrian-Turkish border, Russia's Defence Ministry confirms. (BBC)
- Russian President Vladimir Putin says there will be “serious consequences” for Russia–Turkey relations following Turkey's actions, and describes the incident as a "stab in the back by the accomplices of terrorists”. Russian government agencies began limiting Russian tourists from traveling to Turkey. (Independent)
- Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan warns everyone to "respect the right of Turkey to defend its borders," says that the reason why worse incidents have not taken place in the past regarding Syria is because of the "cool-headedness of Turkey" and stresses that Turkey's actions are fully in line with the new rules of engagement that the country adopted after Syria shot down a Turkish jet in 2012. (BBC)
- Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu defends the action saying Turkey has the right "to take all kinds of measures" against border violations as a "national duty," but that it did not amount to an aggression against any foreign territory and the country called for NATO to hold an extraordinary meeting later in the day. (AFP via The Express Tribune)
Second Libyan Civil War
- A car-bomb kills five guards at a checkpoint east of the Libyan capital, Tripoli. (Channel News Asia)
Insurgency in the Maghreb (2002–present)
- An explosion on a bus carrying Tunisian Presidential Guard personnel in Tunisia's capital Tunis leaves at least 15 people dead, as the country's government declares a state of emergency. (Independent)
Yemeni Civil War
- Houthi militants blow up several bridges in Yemen's southwestern Taiz Governorate to halt the advance of pro-Hadi government forces. (AFP via Yahoo)
- UN aid chief Stephen O’Brien accuses Houthi militia of blocking and diverting deliveries of aid to Taiz city where some 200,000 people are living under siege. (Gulf News)

Arts and culture

Barack Obama presents the Presidential Medal of Freedom to 17 people including Willie Mays, Barbra Streisand, Itzhak Perlman, James Taylor, Gloria Estefan and Emilio Estefan, Stephen Sondheim and Steven Spielberg. (New York Times)
LGBT rights in Vietnam
- The National Assembly of Vietnam unanimously passes the law, which will take effect in 2017 as part of the revised civil code, that recognizes and allows gender reassignment surgery. (ABC News)

Health and medicine

Ebola virus epidemic in West Africa
- A 15-year-old boy from Liberia's Paynesville district, who tested positive for Ebola last week, dies of the disease at a treatment center near the capital, Monrovia, just over 11 weeks after the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the country free of the virus. The boy's father and brother, who also tested positive, are at the center; his mother and two other siblings were admitted for observation. In addition, 160 people who came in direct contact with the boy, are being monitored. (Reuters) (BBC) (AP via ABC News)
U.S. federal health officials are investigating an outbreak of deadly E. coli bacteria that has sickened 19 people in California, Colorado, Missouri, Montana, Utah, Virginia, and Washington. Preliminary evidence suggests that rotisserie chicken salad made and sold in Costco Wholesale stores is the likely source. This follows a totally unrelated outbreak earlier this month connected to Chipotle Mexican Grill restaurants. Those restaurants have been cleaned, new ingredients ordered, and have been reopened. The Costco E. coli 157 strain, which has caused five people to be hospitalized- two of which developed hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS; which can readily lead to acute renal failure and sepsis), is more dangerous than the Chipotle E. coli 026 strain, though there have been no deaths yet. (AP via MSN) (Washington Post) (Washington Post-2)

International relations

United Kingdom withdrawal from the European Union
- According to an opinion poll, a majority of British citizens now want the United Kingdom to leave the European Union as voter anxiety rises over the bloc's handling of a crisis provoked by an influx of migrants into Europe. A referendum on the United Kingdom's EU membership is scheduled to take place before the end of 2017. (Reuters)
European migrant crisis
- Sweden will introduce tighter border controls and asylum rules in a bid to reduce the number of asylum seekers entering the country. Sweden expects up to 190,000 asylum seekers to reach its borders this year and says its reception system cannot cope. "The situation is untenable", according to Swedish prime minister Stefan Löfven who told reporters, "to put it bluntly, more people will have to seek asylum and get protection in other European countries". (Reuters)
- Germany starts deporting unsuccessful asylum seekers to the Balkans. (Reuters via Thomson Reuters Foundation)
Israel–United States relations, Palestine–United States relations
- United States Secretary of State John F. Kerry holds separate talks with Israeli and Palestinian leaders, his first on their home turf in over a year since Israeli-Palestinian negotiations broke down in the spring of 2014, in a bid to curb the persistent wave of violence that erupted two months ago. (Los Angeles Times)

Law and crime

A military court in Bangkok charges two men, Adem Karadag and Yusufu Miefaili, with offences related to the 2015 Bangkok bombing. (Al Jazeera)
A bomb blast at the Hellenic Business Federation offices in central Athens, Greece, damages the Cypriot Embassy across the street. While there is yet no claim for responsibility the authorities suspect a domestic guerrilla group set off the blast. (Reuters)
Shooting of Laquan McDonald
- Chicago, Illinois police officer Jason Van Dyke is charged with first-degree murder for the October 2014 shooting death of Laquan McDonald, a 17-year-old boy armed with a 3-inch knife. The charge comes shortly before the release of the police video showing the shooting. Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel meets with community leaders to discuss the video’s release and the potential ramifications for the city. (CNN)
2015 Roubaix shootings
- At least one person is killed after a group of armed men took people hostage in the northern French town of Roubaix near the Belgian border. The hostages are thought to be a bank director and his family. French police say the incident may be related to a robbery and not to the November 2015 attacks in Paris. (Irish Independent)
Recordings of JFK Assassination
- Gayle Nix Jackson, granddaughter of Orville Nix who filmed U.S. President John F. Kennedy’s assassination, sues the government to get the original copy of her grandfather’s movie back — or to get paid for it. A former FBI analyst said, “The film is a mirror image of the Zapruder film from the other side of Dealey Plaza." (Washington Post) (BBC) (Document on Scribd.com)
Minneapolis, Minnesota (U.S.) police arrest three men suspected of involvement in Monday's shooting of five people, with non-life-threatening gunshot injuries, who had been protesting the recent police killing of Jamar Clark, a 24-year-old African-American man. Protesters, who had been told to watch out for white supremacists wearing masks or camouflage clothing, said that the shooting occurred after a group of people — three men and a woman, all wearing ski masks — were seen filming the protest. The two officers involved in Mr. Clark's shooting are on paid leave during the investigations, including one by the Justice Department's civil rights division. (Washington Post) (Washington Post update)

Politics and elections

U.S. reactions to November 2015 Paris attacks
- The American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana sues Indiana Governor Mike Pence over his decision to block Syrian refugees from resettling in the state. The ACLU, on behalf of Indianapolis-based nonprofit Exodus Refugee Immigration, accuses Pence of violating the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution by accepting refugees from other countries but not those from Syria. (AP via Miami Herald) (Indianapolis Star) (USA Today)
António Costa, the leader of the Socialist Party, is named as the Prime Minister of Portugal. (Reuters)
Echoing criticisms of the U.S. intelligence community in the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Derek Harvey, a former U.S. intelligence official, says that the U.S. intelligence community is failing in its assessments of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. Another unnamed source says the U.S. intelligence community is “playing catch up“ regarding efforts to monitor ISIL activities in the U.S. These, following reports that U.S. Central Command intelligence analysts were instructed to give favorable spin on anti-ISIL efforts. (The Telegraph) (Fox News)