Portal:Current events/2024 December 22

Armed conflicts and attacks

• Syrian civil war
  • Fall of the Assad regime
    • Syrian mass graves
      • An Assad regime mass grave containing the remains of 93 civilians, including several women and children, is discovered in Qarfa, Daraa Governorate, Syria, with all of the bodies reportedly burnt alive. (SOHR)
  • In the highest-ranking state visit since the regime change, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan holds a meeting with Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham leader Ahmed al-Sharaa in Damascus to support the transitional government. (Reuters)
• Gaza war
  • Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip
    • Israeli airstrikes across the Gaza Strip kill at least 28 people. (France 24)
• Red Sea crisis
  • The US military states that the USS Gettysburg guided-missile cruiser accidentally shot down a Navy F/A-18F Super Hornet fighter jet and injured one of its pilots in a friendly fire incident following a series of airstrikes on Yemen. However, the Houthis claim that they shot down the fighter jet. (CNN) (Middle East Monitor)

Business and economy

• Residents of Logroño, La Rioja, Spain, win the world's biggest lottery, the Spanish Christmas Lottery's El Gordo €2.7 billion prize. (DW)

Disasters and accidents

• 2024–25 South-West Indian Ocean cyclone season
  • The death toll from Cyclone Chido in Cabo Delgado, Mozambique, increases to 94. (DW)
• Juscelino Kubitschek de Oliveira bridge collapse
  • Four people are killed and 13 others are missing when a highway bridge across the Tocantins River between Estreito, Maranhão, and Aguiarnópolis, Tocantins, Brazil, partially collapses. (Xinhua) (G1)
• 2024 Gramado Piper PA-42 crash
  • Ten people are killed and seventeen others are injured when a Piper PA-42 Cheyenne crashes into shops and a hotel while taking off from the Canela Airport in Gramado, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. (CNN) (ASN)
• The death toll from the stampede at two food distribution events in Abuja and Okija, Nigeria, increases to 32. (DW)
• Seven people are killed when a private Cessna 207 crashes into a hill in El Montoso, Jalisco, Mexico. (Bureau of Aircraft Accidents Archive)
• An Airbus EC135 ambulance helicopter crashes near a hospital in Muğla, Turkey, killing all four people onboard. (AP)

International relations

• Russia–Slovakia relations
  • Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico holds a previously unannounced meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia. (The Moscow Times)
• Iceland-European Union relations
  • The new Icelandic Government says it will put Iceland's EU membership to referendum by 2027. (Euronews)

Politics and elections

• 2024 Serbian anti-corruption protests
  • Around 100,000 people gather at the Slavija Square in Belgrade, Serbia, to protest against the government response to the Novi Sad railway station canopy collapse and demand the resignation of President Aleksandar Vučić and the ruling Serbian Progressive Party. President Vučić is dismissive of the protests and accuses the opposition of manipulating the protestors to gain political power. (Al Jazeera) (DW) (N1)
• New Zealand rejects the Cook Islands' proposal to establish its own passports and citizenship but expresses willingness to discuss independence if initiated by Cook Islanders. (Reuters)