October 27, 2015 (2015-10-27) (Tuesday)
Armed conflicts and attacks
- Saudi Arabian-led intervention in Yemen
- A Yemeni hospital in Saada run by Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders) is destroyed by several Saudi-led coalition airstrikes overnight. The director of the hospital, Ali Mughli, reported "The air raids resulted in the destruction of the entire hospital with all that was inside - devices and medical supplies - and the moderate wounding of several people". Another airstrike hit a nearby girls school and damaged several civilian homes according to local media. UNICEF said the Saada hospital was the 39th health center hit in Yemen since March. The Saudi-led coalition denies that its planes had hit the hospital. (Reuters)
- Syrian Civil War, Destruction of cultural heritage by ISIL
- American-led intervention in Iraq (2014–2021), American-led intervention in Syria
- United States Defense Secretary Ashton Carter says the U.S. will begin "direct action on the ground" against the ISIL forces in Iraq and Syria, aiming to intensify pressure on the militants as progress against the militants remains elusive. The U.S. has done some special operations raids in Syria, e.g., last week's rescue operation with Kurdish forces in northern Iraq to free hostages held by ISIL. Carter also said the U.S. would intensify the air campaign against ISIL with heavier airstrikes and will focus on Raqqa, the group's declared capital in Syria. (NBC News) (Al Jazeera) (AP via Boston Globe)
- Second Libyan Civil War
- A Libyan helicopter carrying cash for a local bank on the way out and returning to Tripoli with passengers is shot down near the coastal Almaya area west of the capital city, killing at least 14 of its 23 passengers including senior officers Hosein Bodaya and Duhain Al-Rammah, officials with Libya’s Dawn militias. (AP via ABC News) (BBC) (UPI)
- Israeli-Palestinian conflict (2015)
- War in North-West Pakistan
Business and economics
Disasters and accidents
International relations
- Territorial disputes in the South China Sea, China–United States relations
- A United States Navy ship, the USS Lassen, sails near the Spratly Islands, challenging Beijing's claim that the islands are Chinese territory. China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs strongly condemned the actions of the United States in the South China Sea, saying “China will firmly react to this deliberate provocation". (Wall Street Journal) (NPR) (The New York Times)
- Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Zhang Yesui summons US ambassador Max Baucus to protest a US naval patrol close to Beijing's man-made islands in the South China Sea. Zhang called the US patrol "extremely irresponsible" and urged Washington to cease actions that harm China's sovereignty and security. (Hong Kong Standard) (The Guardian)
- Greg Poling, a director at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, says the U.S. operation was aimed at testing control of the seas, not sovereignty over the disputed islands, to force a clarification of China's claims. Under maritime law, artificial islands were not usually afforded the 12-mile territorial zone, and that the U.S. Navy deliberately chose to send the destroyer near Subi Reef for this reason. (CNN)
- Humanitarian International Services Group, an NGO founded by evangelical Christian Kay Miramine, was part of a secret Pentagon program devised by Lt. Gen. William Boykin used to spy on North Korea, according to an investigation by the online publication The Intercept. The program, which started in 2004, was shut down in 2012 by now-retired Admiral William McRaven, concerned with pushback if this became public. Some current and former American NGO staff with experience in North Korea have expressed doubts about key claims in the report. (The Intercept) (Christian Post) (NK News)
- Vienna Conference on Syria, Syrian Civil War
- Iran is invited to attend the next round of talks over Syria's future, along with the representatives from the United States, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Britain, France, Germany, Jordan, the United Arab Emirates, and the United Nations mediator for Syria, Staffan de Mistura. The next round of the "Vienna II" meeting is expected to start tomorrow and continue Friday in Vienna, Austria. (Irish Examiner) (Reuters) (Sputnik News) (New York Times)
- United Nations humanitarian chief Stephen O'Brien tells the Security Council the worsening conflict in Syria has left 13.5 million people in need of aid and some form of protection, including more than six million children. (AP) (Arab News)
- The United Nations General Assembly overwhelmingly condemns the U.S. embargo of Cuba in its first vote on the matter since the start of normalization of relations between the two countries. The largely symbolic tally on the unenforceable resolution was 191 to 2 (U.S., Israel). (UPI) (AP via ABC News)
- President Benigno Aquino III says the Philippines doesn't have the capacity to permanently house Manus Island refugees from Australian-run detention camps. (AP via Washington Post) (Sydney Morning Herald)
Law and crime
Politics and elections