Events
January
- January 1: Estonia officially adopts the euro currency and becomes the seventeenth eurozone country.[1]
- January 21: Three people have been killed in the Albanian capital of Tirana during clashes between police and thousands of opposition supporters.[2]
- January 24: 37 people were killed and more than 180 others wounded in a suicide bombing at Domodedovo International Airport in Moscow, Russia.[3][4]
- January 29: At least 10 people were reported to have died in a train crash in eastern Germany.[5]
February
March
- March 26: At least 138 people were detained in a large protest march against planned public spending cuts by the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition government in the city of London.[6][7]
April
- April 8: Due to very low visibility in a sandstorm, 80 cars piled up in a mass crash on German Autobahn 19. 30 of these caught fire, resulting in the death of eight people and the injury of 131 others.[8]
- April 29: An estimated two billion people watched the wedding of Prince William, Duke of Cambridge and Catherine Middleton at Westminster Abbey in London.[9]
May
- May 11: A magnitudine 5.1 earthquake struck the Region of Murcia, Spain, causing significant damage in the city of Lorca.[10] 10 people were reported dead.[11]
- May 16: The European Union agreed to €78 billion rescue deal for Portugal. The bailout loan will be equally split between the European Financial Stabilisation Mechanism, the European Financial Stability Facility, and the International Monetary Fund.[12]
- May 21: Two people have been killed and twenty others were seriously injured in a series of anti-government protests held in the Georgian capital of Tbilisi.[13]
- May 22: Hundreds of flights were cancelled as a result of the eruption of Grímsvötn volcano.[14]
- May 26
- Three young Russian women have died and another twenty citizens were hospitalized after drinking poisoned alcohol on a yacht in Turkey.[15]
- Ratko Mladić, the war crimes fugitive accused of orchestrating the Siege of Sarajevo and the Srebrenica massacre, has been arrested in Serbia.[16]
- May 27: Riot police clashed with protesters as authorities cleared away a makeshift camp in Plaça de Catalunya, Barcelona, set up as part of a Spain-wide demonstration against the country's precarious economic conditions. At least 121 people were lightly injured.[17]
June
- June 2: Four people have been killed in a major explosion at an oil refinery in south-west Wales.[18]
- June 20: More than 300 people were injured in a sectarian interface near a Catholic enclave in east Belfast.[19]
- June 21: 44 people have died in a plane crash in north-west Russia.[citation needed]
July
- July 10: At least 122 people have died when a passenger ship sank with more than 200 people aboard on Russia's Volga River.[20]
- July 20: Goran Hadžić is detained in Serbia, becoming the last of 161 people indicted by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.[21]
- July 22: Anders Behring Breivik kills 77 people in twin terrorist attacks in Norway after a bombing in the Regjeringskvartalet government center in Oslo and a shooting at a political youth camp on the island of Utøya.[22][23][24]
- July 29: At least 17 people were killed and 11 injured in an explosion in Suhodolskaya-Vostochnaya coal mine, Ukraine.[25] A short time after the explosion, an elevator collapsed at the Bazhanova coal mine, in the industrial city of Makiivka. According to local authorities, two miners were killed and three others were injured.[26]
August
- August 6-11: Riots and looting initially breakout in London but spread to other English cities. The initial riot occurred after a peaceful protest in Tottenham, north London over the fatal police shooting of Mark Duggan, which later turned violent.[27] The aftermath saw over 3000 arrests made, consisting of individuals involved in rioting, looting, arson and other related criminal activity, 5 people killed and 186 police officers injured.[28]
- August 9: A Russian cargo plane has crashed in a remote far eastern area, with all 11 people on board believed to have been killed.[29]
- August 12: A passenger train has crashed in central Poland, killing one passenger and injuring at least 81.[30]
September
- September 7: At least 45 people died when a plane carrying the Lokomotiv Yaroslavl ice hockey team crashed during take-off.[citation needed]
- September 15: Four miners died after the Gleision Colliery was flooded by the waters of River Tawe due to an explosion.[31][32]
- September 26: Two people have been killed and six others injured in ethnic clashes in the Bulgarian city of Plovdiv.[33]
October
- October 15: A protest took place in Rome, Italy, to protest against economic inequality and the influence of the European Commission, the European Central Bank, the International Monetary Fund on politics and also against the government of Silvio Berlusconi.[34] The protest turned into a violent demonstration, resulting in the injury of 135 people and the arresting of 13 others.[34]
- October 20: Basque separatist militant organisation ETA declared an end to its 43-year campaign of political violence, which has killed over 800 people since 1968.[35]
- October 23: At least 604 people were killed and more than 4,152 injured in a magnitude 7.1 earthquake, near the city of Van, Turkey.[36]
- October 24: 17 people died in Western European unprecedented floods, caused by low-pressure area Meeno.[37]
- October 27: After an emergency meeting in Brussels, the European Union announced an agreement to tackle the European sovereign debt crisis which includes a writedown of 50% of Greek bonds, a recapitalisation of European banks and an increase of the bailout fund of the European Financial Stability Facility totaling to €1 trillion.[38][39]
November
- November 4: Seven people have been killed and 51 injured in a 34-vehicle pile-up on the M5 motorway in Somerset.[40]
- November 9: A magnitude 5.7 earthquake struck south-west of Van, causing the death of over 12 people in the collapse of several hotels.[41]
December
- December 18: A jack-up rig capsized and sank in the Sea of Okhotsk with the loss of 53 of its 67 crew.[42]