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Ukraine starts a missile test near Crimea, annexed by Russia in 2014, while Russia puts its air-defense and naval forces in the region on high alert. (Reuters)
The United States Senate votes 99–0 in favor of a ten-year extension of the Iran Sanctions Act, the measure will now be sent to President Barack Obama to sign into law. The act was due to expire on December 31, 2016, if not renewed. (Reuters)
Law and crime
Six members of one family, including three children, are found dead in Böheimkirchen, Austria. Police suspect a murder-suicide by one of the female relatives. (BBC News)
Politics and elections
Despite criticism by UN Special Envoy for Yemen, 42 cabinet members of the National Salvation Government in Yemen have taken oath and convened its first meeting. The new government, led by the former governor of Aden Abdel-Aziz bin Habtour, vowed to help UN efforts for peace and stability in the country.(UN News Center), (Al Manar tv), (SABA NET),(Muslim Times)
Denmark's government announces it will be withdrawing its seven F-16 fighter jets from military operations against ISIL in Iraq and Syria from mid-December. (Reuters)
Business and economy
Ministers of the European Union have given the EU president a mandate to lower charges that mobile phone services can impose on one another for keeping each others' customers connected as the customers "roam," that is, travel about Europe. (Reuters)
The bodies of 21 coal miners are retrieved from an unlicensed coal mine in the Chinese city of Qitaihe in the province of Heilongjiang. Four people have been arrested including the owner of the mine and three managers. (AP via Daily Mail)
The Russian Central Bank says hackers, who were attempting to steal about 5 billion rubles, did take more than 2 billion ($31 million) this year from member bank accounts. (Reuters)(CNN)
Recovery efforts continue in the US city of Oakland, California, after a fire at a music party in a converted warehouse kills at least nine people with dozens missing. (NBC News)(East Bay Times)
A house fire in Akron, Ohio (US), kills four people, including two young girls. One woman safely fled her attic bedroom. A seriously injured 12-year-old girl is revived and rescued. (AP)(Akron Beacon Journal)
German police arrested a 17-year-old asylum seeker from Afghanistan in the rape and murder case of Maria L. in Freiburg while a similar case nearby is still under investigation. (Der Spiegel)(Die Welt)
At least 12 people, including 10 children, are killed in a bus crash in Siberia, Russia. (RFERL)
Human remains are found in the sea near where an Indonesian police plane carrying 13 people crashed. The plane was traveling to the island of Batam. (AP via Daily Mail)
Three women, the Imatra Town Council chairwoman and two local reporters, are shot dead outside a restaurant in Imatra, Finland, a town east of the capital, Helsinki. A 23-year-old suspect is apprehended by police. (YLE)(AP)
Six Pakistani nationals fishing in the Red Sea, off the coast of Mocha in the Taiz Governorate of Yemen, are killed and another six are unaccounted for after a Saudi air raid on a boat carrying 12 Pakistani sailors. (The News), (The Nation, Pakistan)
The Iraqi Army bears down on a strategic bridge across the Tigris River in Mosul. Fighting is occurring in the Salam neighbourhood less than 1.5 kilometres from the Tigris. (Al-Jazeera)
Airlines serving the regional hub cancel 87 flights into and out of Sea-Tac airport, due to ice on airport runways. Among the affected air carriers, Alaska Airlines has cancelled 35 flights. (KTUU-TV)
Amnesty International criticizes a Saudi court decision to impose the death sentence on 15 people in a case involving 32 people including 30 Saudis, one Iranian and one Afghan national in an alleged Iranian spy cell. (The New York Times), (Amnesty)
The U.S. Supreme Court upholds an appeals court decision in an insider trading case, Salman v. U.S., holding that there is no requirement that a tipper receive any pecuniary consideration for a breach of faith in order to predicate the prosecution of the tippee. (Scotusblog)
Union leader Chuck Jones criticizes Donald Trump's announcement of kept jobs saying that the numbers mentioned are lower. Jones says that 550 workers would actually lose their livelihoods, while other workers were never scheduled to leave. (Washington Post via MSN)
U.S. stocks closed higher Wednesday with the Dow industrials and S&P 500 notching new records. (Market Watch)
At least 96 people are killed following a 6.4 magnitude earthquake in Indonesia's Aceh region. Hundreds of people are injured and several buildings have collapsed. (BBC), (AP), (USA Today)
As of December 1, the total death toll for the war stands at an estimated 9,758 people according to a United Nations report released today. (United Nations)
A 7.8 magnitude earthquake strikes off the coast of Makira in the Solomon Islands, causing infrastructure damage, yet no casualties have been reported in the hours following the quake. (ABC News)
Canadian lawyer Richard McLaren issues a report claiming that 1,000 Russian athletes have been involved in or the beneficiaries of "manipulations to conceal Positive testing". Germany and the United States have called for Russia to be banned from international competition. (Yahoo! News)
Cardell Hayes is found guilty of manslaughter by a Louisiana jury in the road rage shooting death of former New Orleans Saints star Will Smith. (CBS)
In West Virginia police officers executing a bailpiece shot and killed a man who "operated a motor vehicle in an aggressive manner" towards officers at a Walmart parking lot. (ABC News)
A man is killed and two wounded in a triple shooting in Algiers neighborhood of New Orleans(NOLA)
A person is sought who left after he accidentally dropped a gun which fired and injured a store employee at a Home Depot restroom in Sunset Hills near St Louis Missouri. (St Louis Post Dispatch)
In Miami Gardens Florida, one was killed and one wounded when a gunman approached and fired at two people in a parked car. Wounded they drove while still being shot at and crashed into two parked cars. (WSVN)
In Brooklyn New York, 2 brothers were stabbed, 1 fatally in a dispute after a school soccer match. (New York Daily News)
Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov says he is hoping he is wrong stating that the United States "orchestrated, coordinated" the Islamic State's recent capture of Palmyra in order to "give a break to those bandits that are in eastern Aleppo." (Reuters)
National Amusements announces CBS Corporation and Viacom media companies will not be merging. CBS shares rose 1.8 percent closing in on a nearly 2-1/2 year high while Viacom fell 6.9 percent. (Reuters)
President-electDonald Trump says he sees no reason why the U.S. should continue to abide by the One China policy unless a bargain is reached with Beijing involving trade. (The Guardian)
A Chinese foreign ministry spokesman says these comments raise the possibility that U.S.-China relations could be adversely affected, and that the One-China policy is the political foundation of the ties between the two countries. (CBS News)(NPR)
The warring parties reach agreement on a ceasefire, now that the fighting has ended, to allow civilians and the remaining rebel fighters trapped in the besieged Syrian city to evacuate. Five buses will start moving to pick up passengers at 5:00 a.m. EET Wednesday (03:00 UTC). (NBC News)(Reuters)
Gambian security forces take over the headquarters of the electoral commission as the current president, Yahya Jammeh, refuses to accept the recent election results. (BBC), (The New York Times)
The Federal Reserve System raises the benchmark interest rate in the United States to a level between 0.5 and 0.75%. This is the second time in a decade that the Federal Reserve has increased interest rates. (New York Times)
Satellite images show anti-aircraft guns and missile defence systems being built on artificial islands in the South China Sea; China had previously committed to not militarising its controversial developments in the region. (BBC News)
Yahoo! announces that ID information about more than 1 billion accounts may have been hacked in August 2013. This is separate from the company's earlier disclosure of a data breach of 500,000 accounts in 2014. (The New York Times)(Business Insider)
Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio holds a press conference showing findings from 2 different forensic experts of "9 points of forgery" alleging President Obama's long form birth certificate was forged and also claims to have found the birth certificate used to make the forgery. (USA Today)(Newsmax)
Evacuations following the failed ceasefire are once again disrupted by the Syrian forces for reasons withheld. An estimate of 8000 people, mostly civilians, successfully fled the remains of the city. (The New York Times)
Scientists discover that the Totten Glacier is experiencing rapid basal melt, with deep warm water entering underneath the glacier at the rate of 220,000 cubic meters per second. (The Washington Post)
Protests, with looting, erupt in several Venezuelan states as citizens lack cash for gas, groceries, and Christmas gifts, since the highly used, but now worthless, 100-bolívar notes were removed from circulation, and the substitute 500-bolívar notes are not available because of delays in bank deliveries. (Reuters)(Webindia123.com)
The President of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro suspends plans to eliminate the 100 bolívar note from circulation, in a country where much of the population lives on cash, without bank accounts. (Reuters)
Rebels attack and burn several buses en route to evacuate ill and injured people from the besieged Syrian villages of Al-Fu'ah and Kafriya. (The Guardian)
An explosion outside a military camp in southern Yemen kills at least 49 people and injures many more. The explosion is believed to have been caused by a suicide bomber wearing an explosive vest. (AP)(BBC)
Regulators in the European Union initiate a "public consultation" on Big Data looking at whether more regulation or supervision of the collection of high volumes of information on individuals is appropriate. (Reuters)
Disasters and accidents
Companies shut down production in Beijing and cars are taken off the road after a red alert for smog is issued in northern China. Dozens of cities have closed schools due to the smog. (AP)
Three people are shot by a gunman at an Islamic centre near the Zürich Hauptbahnhof train station. A manhunt was conducted for the assailant, a 24-year-old Swiss citizen of Ghanaian descent, whose body was found close to the Islamic centre. (GlobalNews)
The International Committee of the Red Cross claims that 25,000 residents of the rebel-held territories have been evacuated from Aleppo as Hezbollah warns remaining residents in the former rebel enclave to leave "as quickly as possible". (AP)
German officials offer a reward of up to 100,000 euros ($104,000) for 24-year-old Tunisian asylum-seeker Anis Amri, whose identifying information was found in the truck used in the attack. (Reuters)
Five people are killed in a Taliban attack on Afghan Member of Parliament Mir Wali's home in Helmand Province. At least three security guards and two civilians were killed in the assault; Wali and others were injured. The gunmen are holding a number of occupants hostage. (PressTV)(Reuters)
A federal jury orders DuPont to pay $2 million to a man with testicular cancer after finding the company liable for diseases linked to C8, a Teflon-making chemical. (Reuters)(CNBC)
Gambia's Chief Justice sets January 10, 2017, for the hearing by the Supreme Court, made up of judges from Nigeria and Sierra Leone, of PresidentYahya Jammeh's ruling party's legal challenge of the December 1 election results. (Reuters)
The bodies of over 100 Syrian ArmyPOWs are reportedly found in what was the last rebel held territory of East Aleppo. Syrian Army officers claim they were executed by rebel forces. (Al-Masdar News)
An Afriqiyah Airways flight originating from Sabha, Libya, is hijacked and forced to make an emergency landing in Malta. Hijackers threaten to blow up the aircraft with grenades, but the standoff ends peacefully with all hostages released and both hijackers surrendering. (Chicago Tribune)
Arts and culture
Carrie Fisher, the actress best known for the role of Princess Leia in the Star Wars franchise, suffers a massive heart attack while on a flight and is rushed to a hospital near Los Angeles International Airport in critical condition. (Mirror)
Business and economy
As new Libyan production comes on line, the world price of crude oil falls below $55 a barrel. (Reuters)
Bonanza Creek Energy says it plans to file for bankruptcy on or by January 5, 2017 and hopes to exit the process quickly, within the first quarter. (Reuters)
A passenger bus carrying 46 people, mostly school groups from Tonga, crashes in the Gisborne Region of New Zealand, approximately 30 kilometers south of the city of Gisborne. Two people died while several were injured, with some still hospitalized. (New Zealand Herald)
Bezeq, an Israeli telecoms company, says that it has received word from the country's telecoms regulator that it will be allowed to end the "structural separation" of its business operations by product (i.e. mobile phone, internet, land lines). (Reuters)
Medical research reveals shrinkage in women’s brains as a result of pregnancy. Loss of gray matter in certain regions of the brain may make the brain more efficient and specialized for child-rearing. There is also evidence of links to long-term changes in brain. (ScienceNews)(Nature)
Government forces push to capture a Houthi enclave in Bayhan District, on the border between Shabwa and Marib provinces, resulting at least 28 Houthi militants and 12 Yemeni soldiers killed. (Dunya News)
The Philippine Coast Guard looks for 18 missing sailors from a ship sunk by Typhoon Nock-ten (Nina). At least seven people are confirmed to have died in the storm. (AP via Daily Mail)
A train and a bus collide in Tunis, Tunisia, killing 5 and injuring around 52. (Nessma)
Law and crime
The Korea Fair Trade Commission fines U.S. company Qualcomm $852.9 million for alleged antitrust violations for restricting access of its competitors to its patents. (Bloomberg)
Russian president Vladimir Putin says a ceasefire has been brokered between the Syrian government and rebel forces. The ceasefire is said to be guaranteed by Russia and Turkey and would exclude UN-denominated terror organizations such as ISIL and al-Nusra. The FSA says it would abide by the truce, while Ahrar al-Sham expresses "reservations". (ITV)(Reuters)
Naveed Baloch, the man from Pakistan who was wrongly arrested in the aftermath of the recent attack on a Christmas market in Berlin, gives an interview outlining the conditions in which he was held and reveals he is now in hiding amid fears for his life. (The Guardian)
The funeral of Łukasz Urban, the driver killed in the course of last week's attack on a Christmas market in Berlin, takes place in his village of Banie near the German border. President of PolandAndrzej Duda and a German diplomat attend. (BBC)(Deutsche Welle)
After 35 Russian diplomats are expelled from the United States, Russia's foreign minister Sergey Lavrov recommends expelling 35 American diplomats. Russian President Vladimir Putin rejects Lavrov's recommendation and expresses a desire to restore relations between the two countries. (The New York Times)(Newshub)
The U.S. Burlington Electric Department says that a code associated with a broad Russian hacking campaign dubbed "Grizzly Steppe" by the U.S. Government has been detected on a laptop associated with a Vermont electric utility but not connected to the grid. (The Boston Globe)
Mali returns two people France deported on the same planes they arrived on. (BBC)
Law and crime
A body found in a burnt-out vehicle north of the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro is confirmed to be that of missing Greek Ambassador Kyriakos Amiridis. A military police officer who had an affair with the ambassador's wife confesses to the murder. The wife and a second man are also detained. (BBC)
Sahaj International opens in Kochi in the South Indian state of Kerala. The country's first school for transgender pupils, it caters for adults who left school early. (BBC)
United States troops withdraw from Afghanistan after 15 years.
Arts and culture
China, with their largest television network China Central Television, announces a new launch of a global media platform extending globally and renaming the network China Global Television Network. (News Asia)
Disasters and accidents
In Helsinki, Finland, authorities detain an unidentified driver after driving at high speed, and veering for unknown reasons, into a crowd, injuring 7 people. Authorities quickly conclude no evidence points to a deliberate attack. (RT)
