scie

nc

e &

tec

hn

OlO

gy

ar

ts &

ar

ch

itec

tUr

er

elig

iOn

&

phil

OsO

phy

pOli

tic

s &

ec

On

Om

y

2010Any sense of American invulnerability was abruptly shattered on 11 September 2001 when Islamist terrorists of the Al-Qaeda movement crashed hijacked airliners into the World Trade Center, New York, and the Pentagon, in Washington DC. After the Soviet withdrawal in 1989, most of Afghanistan had come under the control of the Islamic fundamentalist Taliban, which allowed Islamist groups like Al-Qaeda to set up terrorist training camps there. The USA responded by invading Afghanistan with its NATO allies. Fighting between NATO and the Taliban was still continuing in 2010 with no end in sight.

A US-led invasion of Iraq was scarcely more successful. The regime of Saddam Hussein was quickly overthrown, but the country subsequently suffered years of violence between Sunni and Shi’ite militias. The establishment, and survival, of popular left-wing governments in Venezuela and Bolivia was a sign that Latin America was emerging from the USA’s shadow.

The great success story of the early 21st century was the spectacular growth of the Chinese economy. Thanks to a huge pool of cheap labour and a deliberately undervalued currency, China gained a great competitive advantage over other manufacturing economies, building huge trade surpluses and foreign currency reserves. China’s growth was helped by buoyant consumer demand in the USA, funded by easy credit and an unsustainable real estate bubble. Levels of private debt soared. In 2008, the collapse of the overheated US real-estate market created a financial crisis in the US banking system that soon spread to Europe, triggering a serious recession in most Western economies. Growth in the emerging economies of Brazil, India and China remained strong, however, creating a growing sense that the balance of global economic power was shifting.

Jan apr Jul Oct Jan apr Jul Oct Jan apr Jul Oct Jan apr Jul Oct Jan apr Jul Oct Jan apr Jul Oct Jan apr Jul Oct Jan apr Jul Oct Jan apr Jul Oct Jan apr Jul Oct Jan apr Jul Oct Jan apr Jul OctJan apr Jul Oct Jan apr Jul Oct Jan apr Jul Oct Jan apr Jul Oct Jan apr Jul Oct Jan apr Jul Oct Jan apr Jul Oct

1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 20101992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998

World Population

7 billion

2010

6.91 billion

1923

1992 1 APR War breaks out between Bosnian Serbs, Croats and Muslims after the country declares independence from Yugoslavia.

1993 1 JAN Czechoslovakia splits into the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

1993 1 NOV The European Community becomes the European Union (EU).

1995 JUL Srebrenica massacre: Serbs murder 8,000 Bosnian Muslims.

1995 14 DEC Dayton Accord: US-brokered ceasefire ends the Bosnian war.

1997 NATO and Russia sign a mutual cooperation treaty. 1999 Poland, Czech Republic and

Hungary join NATO.

1999 MAR NATO bombing campaign against Serbia after Serbs start expelling Albanians from Kosovo.

2002 1 JAN The Euro, the common European currency, is introduced in 14 EU countries.

2004 Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Slovakia, Bulgaria and Romania join NATO.

2004 A further ten European countries join the EU.

2008 7–16 AUG Russian invasion of Georgia to support separatists in South Ossetia and Abkhazia.

199320 AUG Oslo Declaration: Israel and PLO agree to the formation of a

Palestinian state.

199816–19 DEC Desert Fox: US/UK bombing campaign against Iraq.

2003 20 MAR–30 APR US-led invasion of Iraq overthrows Saddam Hussein.

2003 MAY Islamist insurgency in Iraq (ongoing).

2006 30 DEC Saddam Hussein is executed for crimes against humanity.

201031 AUG US forces end combat operations in Iraq.

1996 SEP Muslim fundamentalist Taliban seize power in Afghanistan.

1996MAY Hindu fundamentalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) wins the Indian general election.

1999 MAY–JULY Kargil War between India and Pakistan in Kashmir.

2000MAY Population of India reaches one billion.

200918 MAY Sri Lankan government defeats the Tamil Tigers ending the civil war begun in 1983.

2001 7 OCT US-led invasion of Afghanistan to destroy the Taliban (ongoing).

1993 18 JUL Japan’s Liberal Democratic Party loses power for the first time since 1955 (returned to government 1994).

19948 JUL Death of Kim Il-sung, Stalinist president of North Korea: his son Kim Jong Il succeeds.

1997 1 JUL UK returns Hong Kong to Chinese rule.

2010AUG China becomes the second largest economy in the world.

2010DEC Outbreak of the Jasmine revolution in Tunisia.19954 NOV Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin assassinated

by an opponent of the Oslo Declaration.

199324 MAY Eritrea gains independence from Ethiopia.

1994 10 MAY Nelson Mandela wins the presidency in South Africa’s first non-racial elections.

1994 APR–JUL Ethnic conflict in Rwanda results in genocide and a refugee crisis.

1994 1 JAN North American Free Trade Area (NAFTA) comes into effect.

1994 1 JAN Official formation of the Zapatista Mayan peasant guerrilla movement in Chiapas, Mexico.

1994 19 SEP US invasion of Haiti overthrows military regime.

1995 30 OCT Quebec narrowly votes against independence from Canada in a referendum.

19986 DEC Hugo Chávez wins the Venezuelan presidency and announces a ‘Bolívarian revolution’.

1999 1 APR Canada creates the Nunavut Inuit territory.

2001 11 SEPT Al-Qaeda Islamic terrorists crash hijacked airliners into the World Trade Center, New York, and the Pentagon, Washington.

2005 18 DEC Evo Morales becomes the first elected Amerindian president of Bolivia.

200815 SEPT Bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers bank precipitates an

international financial crisis.

1992 6 DEC Hindu fundamentalists destroy a mosque at Ayodhya, allegedly built on the birthplace of the god Rama. 2006Evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins’ The God Delusion denounces religious belief as delusion (UK).

200530 SEP Muhammad cartoons published by a Danish newspaper cause rioting in Muslim countries.

1996Dolly the sheep is the first mammal to be cloned (UK). 2008SEPT The Large Hadron Collider, the world’s largest particle accelerator, is completed at CERN (France/Switzerland).

199828 MAY Pakistan explodes an atomic bomb.

200315 OCT China’s first successful manned orbital space flight.

1992 First definitive detection of planets outside the Solar System (USA).

1992 The FlavrSavr genetically modified tomato is the first GM food licensed for human consumption (USA).

1996Audio Highway’s Listen Up: the first MP3 digital audio player (USA).

2003Human Genome Project issues a complete map of the human genome (USA).

2004Anish Kapoor, Cloud Gate, public sculpture, Chicago.

The first synthetic bacterial cell is created (USA). 2010

1994–2008 The Three Gorges Dam, China: world’s largest hydroelectric plant.

1992 Li Honghzhi founds the Falun Gong cult: suppressed by the Chinese government in 1999.

1992 Serbs destroy the Bosnian National Library, Sarajevo, to extinguish Muslim cultural presence in the region.

1994 MAY Completion of the 50.5 km (31.4 mile) Channel Tunnel linking the UK and France.

1997Frank Gehry, Guggenheim Museum, Bilbao, Spain.

1998Antony Gormley, Angel of the North, monumental sculpture (UK).

2005DEC Novelist Orhan Pamuk is tried for ‘insulting Turkishness’ by writing about the Armenian genocide of 1915–16.

2001Islamic fundamentalist Taliban destroy 6th-century monumental

Buddhas of Bamyan in Afghanistan.2008Herzog and de Meuron, Beijing National Stadium

(Bird’s Nest), Beijing, China.1997Richard Meier, J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles.

2004–9 Adrian Smith, Burj Khalifa skyscraper, Dubai, at 828 m (2,717 ft) the tallest human structure ever built.

1994–96 Russian war against Muslim separatists in Chechnya.

1992–2002 Civil war in Algeria between military government and Islamists.

Dolly the sheep at the Roslin Institute, Edinburgh, 1997.

The world’s tallest building towers over surrounding high-rise blocks in Dubai.

Fireworks celebrate the opening of the 2008 Olympics at Beijing National Stadium.

Refugee during the Bosnian War, 1995.

Statue of Saddam Hussein pulled down after his regime is overthrown.

The Large Hadron Collider in Geneva.

The Twin Towers of the World Trade Center aflame after terrorist attack on September 11 2001.

A Taliban fighter in Afghanistan surrendering in 2010.

214

Copyrighted Material