Portal:Current events/2015 February 28
February 28, 2015 (Saturday)
Armed conflicts and attacks
- Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant
- A series of car bombs kill 19 people in Balad Ruz, east-central Iraq. (AP via News 24)
International relations
- Lithuania–United States relations:
- Lithuania signs a trade agreement to buy liquefied natural gas from the United States in a move aimed at reducing the EU Baltic state's heavy dependence on Russian gas deliveries. (Reuters)
- United States–Venezuela relations
- Venezuela president Nicolás Maduro announces new sanctions on the United States, including visa restrictions. He stated that Americans would have to obtain visas in order to enter Venezuela. Furthermore, Maduro announced that former U.S. President George W. Bush, former U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney, former CIA Director George Tenet, and U.S. Senators Bob Menendez (D–NJ) and Marco Rubio (R–FL) would be banned from entering the country. (Reuters) (BBC)
Law and crime
- The municipal intermediate people’s court for the eastern city of Dongying convicts Ni Fake, former Vice-Governor of Anhui province in China, on charges of bribery and "amassing wealth of unclear origin", and sentences him to seventeen years in prison. (The Guardian)
- The Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference removes disgraced senior official Ling Jihua from the office of Vice-Chairman and also strips him of his ordinary delegate status. (Straits Times)