Portal:Current events/2006 December 21
December 21, 2006 (Thursday)
- Muslim cleric Abu Bakar Bashir is cleared of any involvement in the 2002 Bali bombings by the Supreme Court of Indonesia. (News Limited)
- Ipswich murder case: Suffolk police announce that Steven Wright has been charged with all five murders. (Suffolk Constabulary statement)
- U.S. military prosecutors charge three Marines with murder in connection with the Haditha killings. (CBC)
- New Jersey Governor Jon S. Corzine signs a bill granting civil unions to same-sex couples, with all the rights and privileges of marriage. New Jersey becomes the third U.S. state to offer civil unions, and the fifth to offer some version of marriage to gay couples. (San Francisco Chronicle)
- War in Somalia:
- Fresh heavy fighting is reported near the weak Somali government's Baidoa base, amid fears conflict could plunge the entire Horn of Africa into crisis. (BBC)
- Somalia's Council of Islamic Courts says it is at war with Ethiopian troops. (Aljazeera)
- Opponents of the President of Iran Mahmoud Ahmadinejad win a number of victories in local elections and elections to the Assembly of Experts as dissatisfaction grows with his Presidency. (Philadelphia Inquirer)[permanent dead link]
- Saparmurat Niyazov, the President-for-life of Turkmenistan, dies at the age of 66. (BBC) The date of the next presidential election is to be announced on 26 December 2006. (Pravda)
- Shane Warne, the leading test cricket wicket taker of all time, announces that he will retire from international cricket at the end of the 2006-07 Ashes series. (AP via CNN)