The biggest international news of 2022: Russian invasion of Ukraine, Britain’s new prime minister, and human rights at the Qatar World Cup
- The US Supreme Court sent shock waves worldwide in June when it overturned ‘Roe v Wade’, which enshrined a national right to abortion
- World felt the impact of climate change through record-high temperatures and extreme flooding in Pakistan and Nigeria
A dog walks past a building burned from a Russian strike during intense shelling in Bakhmut, Ukraine on December 26, 2022. Photo: Reuters From the Russian invasion of Ukraine to the overturning of abortion laws in the United States, here is a round-up of the biggest events to mark 2022.
Russia invades Ukraine
Russian President Vladimir Putin launched the biggest invasion in Europe since World War II when he sent troops into Ukraine on February 24, causing millions of Ukrainians to flee abroad.
The West imposed unprecedented sanctions on Moscow and sent billions of dollars in aid to Ukraine. Russian forces failed to capture the capital, Kyiv, and topple the government of President Volodymyr Zelensky.
UN launches record US$51.5 billion emergency funding appeal for an estimated 339 million people
In the south, Russia captured most of Ukraine’s Black Sea coastline, including the port of Mariupol, which was destroyed in a three-month siege.
In April, Russian forces were accused of massacring scores of civilians in the Kyiv suburb of Bucha.
By September, Ukrainian forces had regained ground in the northeast and south. Putin hastily annexed four Ukrainian regions partly controlled by Russia, a move condemned as illegal by the United Nations.
In November, Russian forces retreated from the southern port of Kherson, ending an eight-month occupation.
Russian strikes have relentlessly battered Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, causing power cuts across the country as winter sets in.
In December, on his first overseas trip since the invasion, Zelensky went to Washington to address US Congress, appealing for long-term US support.
Black Sea dolphins casualties of Russia’s war in Ukraine
UK gets another prime minister – fifth in six years
Britain got its fifth conservative prime minister in six years.
Rishi Sunak took office in October after his tax-cutting predecessor Liz Truss self-combusted in just 44 days – the shortest-ever tenure for a British leader.
Truss’s lightning fall from grace, sparked by a disastrous mini budget, capped a tumultuous 2022 in Britain.
The year was marked by the death of the nation’s longest-serving monarch, Queen Elizabeth, at the age of 96 and the forced resignation of Brexiteer premier Boris Johnson after a series of scandals.
US Supreme Court overturns Roe v Wade
The US Supreme Court caused global shock waves in June when it overturned its landmark 1973 “Roe v Wade” decision, which enshrined the constitutional right to abortion nationwide, returning the issue to individual states.
Following the ruling, abortion bans were brought in by Republicans in 16 US states, home to 26.5 million women.
What is Roe v. Wade, and what does it mean for the US now that it’s been overturned?
China’s Xi wins third term
President Xi Jinping cemented his control at the helm of China after winning a historic third term in November as leader the world’s second-largest economy.
But the Chinese lost patience with the snap lockdowns, mass testing and curbs on movement imposed by the government’s signature zero-Covid strategy.
Hundreds of people took part in protests against the restrictions in Beijing, Guangzhou, Shanghai, Urumqi, Wuhan and other cities. Some even dared to call for Xi’s resignation.
Meanwhile, China’s warplane incursions into Taiwan’s air defence zone skyrocketed while Beijing held the largest military exercises in decades around the self-ruled island, raising alarm in Taipei.
In December, Beijing announced it would reopen its borders and drop quarantine, pivoting from zero-Covid to living with the virus.
Extreme weather and record temperatures
Europe sweltered through the hottest summer in its recorded history, with the mercury topping 40 degrees Celsius for the first time in Britain.
Parts of the Arctic and Antarctic, China and the US also experienced record temperatures.
Extreme weather events linked to climate change continued to wreak havoc in developing countries.
Flooding in Pakistan affected vast swathes of the country, Nigeria suffered its worst floods in a decade and parts of drought-hit Somalia faced the threat of famine.
At the United Nations climate summit in Egypt (COP27), developing nations finally succeeded in getting wealthy polluters to agree to pay into a “loss and damage” fund to compensate poorer countries for climate damage.
Was COP27 a win for the climate? All about the loss and damage fund
World faces energy crisis, inflation
The invasion of Ukraine and resulting sanctions on Russia created an energy crisis of a magnitude unseen in half a century, with costs for gas and electricity soaring globally.
Britain saw its energy bills double over the space of a year. Soaring energy prices were also a factor in Sri Lanka’s cost-of-living crisis, which in August forced then-president Gotabaya Rajapaksa to flee abroad.
Inflation soared globally, prompting central banks to aggressively hike interest rates, raising fears of another major debt crisis.
Far-right politicians gain ground
The far-right made unprecedented gains in Europe.
Voters in Italy elected their most right-wing leader since World War II in post-fascist firebrand Giorgia Meloni.
The anti-immigration Sweden Democrats were the big winners of a general election that brought conservatives to power in that country.
Hong Kong government blasts US panel for claiming national security law damaged city’s freedom
In France, a surge by both the far right and hard left stripped centre-right President Emmanuel Macron of his parliamentary majority.
But in Latin America, the right has been in decline.
Veteran left-winger Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva made a stunning comeback in Brazil, ousting far-right incumbent Jair Bolsonaro. Left-wing leaders also came to power in Colombia and Honduras.
Mass protests in Iran
In Iran, the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini following her arrest for alleged violations of the country’s Islamic dress code sparked the country’s biggest protests in years.
On the street and on social media, women and girls defiantly removed their headscarves in an unprecedented challenge to the country’s clerical leadership.
Iran sought to quell the protests by sentencing some of the protesters to death.
The bold tactics that have kept the protests in Iran going
On December 8, Mohsen Shekari, 23, became the first person executed by authorities over the protests. Four days later, Majidreza Rahnavard, 23, was hanged in public.
The Oslo-based monitor Iran Human Rights on December 19 said Iran’s security forces had killed at least 469 people in the protests while at least 14,000 people have been arrested, according to the UN.
Ethiopia brokers peace deal in Tigray
After two years of conflict, which has killed an untold number of civilians and led to near-famine conditions in Tigray, Ethiopia’s government and Tigrayan rebels agreed on a landmark peace deal.
The agreement allows critical humanitarian aid to resume to the northern region.
Refugee teen from Ethiopia’s war-torn Tigray region recounts 16-month odyssey
Human rights concerns at Qatar World Cup
Controversy marred the run-up to the Middle East’s first football World Cup.
Some fans boycotted the tournament in Qatar over concerns about human rights and the high number of deaths among migrant workers involved in constructing eight new stadiums.
The human cost of the 2022 Fifa World Cup in Qatar – the migrant workers who built the event
The decision by the conservative Islamic kingdom to ban alcohol from stadiums also left a bitter taste but as the tournament progressed, attention shifted to the on-pitch drama.
In an extraordinary finale, Lionel Messi clinched the title that had eluded one of the greatest players of all time, leading Argentina to victory against France in a penalty shoot-out triumph after an epic match ended 3-3.