December 20, 2015 (2015-12-20) (Sunday)
Armed conflicts and attacks
- Air France Flight 463 en route to Paris from Mauritius makes an emergency landing in Mombasa, Kenya, after a package, suspected to be a bomb is found in the toilet. Later, Air France CEO Frédéric Gagey says it was a false alarm; the package contained a mixture of cardboard, sheets of paper, and a timer. (AP via News24) (CNN) (Reuters)
- Territorial disputes in the South China Sea, China–Vietnam relations
- Syrian Civil War
- A missile-strike in Jaramana in southern Syria kills high-ranking Lebanese Hezbollah commander Samir Kuntar and eight National Defence Force (NDF) personnel. The responsibility for the incident taken by the Free Syrian Army, though Hezbollah alleges Israeli involvement. Kuntar was the longest serving Lebanese prisoner in Israel until his release in 2008. On April 22, 1979 Kuntar and his team broke into an apartment building and kidnapped a father, 31-year-old Danny Haran, and his 4-year-old daughter, Einat, taking them to a nearby beach and killing them. (Reuters)
- Russian military intervention in the Syrian Civil War
- Airstrikes, apparently from Russian jets, kill scores of people in the center of rebel-held Idlib in northwest Syria. The missiles hit a busy market place, several government buildings, and residential areas. At least 73 bodies, 30 unidentified, have been recovered. (Reuters)
- A motorist runs over pedestrians at the Las Vegas Strip between Planet Hollywood and Paris Las Vegas, killing one person and injuring at least 26 more. (ABC)
Arts and culture
Business and economics
Disasters and accidents
- 2015 Shenzhen landslide
- Thirty-three buildings collapse after a landslide hit an industrial park in Shenzhen, China, leaving at least 91 people missing. (CNN)
- An avalanche in Svalbard, a Norwegian Arctic archipelago, kills one and injures nine others as the snow smashes into 10 houses in Longyearbyen. The deluge from Sukkertoppen mountain follows Friday's 60 mph storm that ripped off a school roof and temporarily closed the airport. Dozens of homes at the foot of the mountain were evacuated and all of the area's residents have been located, according to Tone Hertzberg, a spokeswoman for Svalbard's governor. Experts from Norges Geotekniske Institutt are examining nearby slopes. (AP via CBS News) (newsinenglish.no)
- A ferry ran into trouble in rough seas off the coast of Indonesia's island of Sulawesi, with at least three killed, including two children, 39 rescued, and 77 missing. The New Marina, a fiberglass boat, was reported to be carrying 109 passengers with a crew of 10. The National Search and Rescue Agency says the boat sank 22.5 km (24 miles) off the coast of the Wajo Regency in South Sulawesi. Rescue teams expect to resume their search for the missing, Monday. (BenarNews) (Muscat Daily)
- Two pilots are killed after a South Korean-made KAI T-50 Golden Eagle crashes and bursts into flames at an air show in Yogyakarta on Indonesia's Java island. (The Telegraph)
Politics and elections