Portal:Current events/2023 December 12

December 12, 2023 (Tuesday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Israel–Hamas war
- 2023 Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip
  - Ten Israeli troops are killed in clashes in the Gaza Strip, including a colonel of the Golani Brigade killed in Shuja'iyya, Gaza City, bringing the total number of IDF personnel killed to 115. (Reuters) (The Guardian)
Insurgency in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
- Daraban police station attack
  - A Tehreek-e-Jihad militant blows himself up by ramming a car bomb outside a police station being used by the army in Daraban, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan, before five gunmen open fire, killing at least 23 people and injuring 34 others. (Al Jazeera)
Islamist insurgency in the Sahel
- Two soldiers are killed by an improvised explosive device while riding a motorcycle in Karimama, Alibori, Benin. (AFP via The Guardian)
Mexican drug war
- Six gunmen from the Sinaloa Cartel and Jalisco New Generation Cartel were killed after an encounter between criminal factions, in the locality of Boquilla del Carmen, municipality of Villanueva Zacatecas. Police and soldiers also find two people wounded, as well as one armed suspect and guns and a grenade. (AP)(El Financiero)

Business and economy

2021–2023 inflation
- Sri Lankan economic crisis
  - The International Monetary Fund (IMF) resumes its US$2.9 billion bailout for Sri Lanka, releasing a $337 million tranche, after the country secures a debt restructuring agreement with China, its largest bilateral creditor. (AFP via NDTV)
- The IMF approves a $681 million disbursement for Bangladesh, the second portion of a $4.7 billion loan package. (EFE)
Visa policy of Kenya
- Kenyan President William Ruto announces that all tourists will no longer require a travel visa to enter the country from January, with the visa being replaced by electronic travel authorisation. (Reuters)
The Entertainment Software Association announces that the annual gaming expo E3 will no longer take place, after having run for over 28 years. (The Washington Post)
The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime reports that Myanmar has surpassed Afghanistan as the world's largest producer of opium. (AFP via France 24)

International relations

2023 Guayana Esequiba crisis
- Vincentian prime minister Ralph Gonsalves announces that Saint Vincent and the Grenadines will host a meeting between the leaders of Venezuela and Guyana on 14 December to discuss the two countries' ongoing dispute over Guayana Esequiba and to prevent an armed escalation. (Al Jazeera)
International reactions to the Israel–Hamas war
- United Nations General Assembly Resolution ES-10/22
  - The United Nations passes a resolution by a vote of 153–10, with 23 abstentions, demanding an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in the war in Gaza, the unconditional and immediate release of all hostages, and for both sides to comply with the law of war. (Reuters)

Law and crime

Illegal immigration to Mexico
- Mexico’s immigration agency detains two buses carrying 102 migrants in the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca. The majority of the migrants came from the West African nations of Senegal and Guinea, as well as six from Djibouti, two from Congo and one from Mauritania. (AP)
Several drug dealers and a soldier are killed during a shootout at Jordan's border with Syria. (Al Jazeera)
A district court in Fukushima, Japan, convicts three former soldiers for sexually assaulting a colleague, Rina Gonoi, during a military exercise in 2021, sentencing them to two years in prison and suspending them from the military for four years. (AFP via WION)
Five members of a family are shot by gunmen in Guayaquil, Ecuador. Four children die instantly, while their mother died two days later, while their father is injured. The gunmen intended to target members of the Los Lagartos gang in an adjacent house, according to Ecuadorian police. (Express)

Science and technology

NASA's Perseverance finds evidence that an ancient river delta on Mars held a crater-filling lake billions of years ago. (NASA)

Sports