Weekly Review

Journalists uncovered Bain Capital securities filings identifying G.O.P. presidential candidate Mitt Romney as the head of the company until 2002—three years longer than he has previously claimed. If the filings are accurate, Romney would have controlled the investment firm during a controversial period when several companies it managed… Read More

Jorge Rafael Videla and Reynaldo Bignone, leaders of the military junta that ruled Argentina from 1976 to 1983, were found guilty of ordering the abductions of dozens of children born to leftist mothers imprisoned in the regime’s clandestine torture centers. Testifying in his own defense, Videla had called… Read More

The United Nations hosted a summit in Geneva to broker a plan for peace and the establishment of a unified transitional government in Syria, where an uprising has killed more than 14,000 people in sixteen months. “The way things have been going thus far—we are not helping anyone,” said… Read More

Mohamed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood was declared the winner of the election to succeed ousted Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak, thereby becoming the country’s first democratically elected leader. Tens of thousands of Egyptians celebrated the announcement in Cairo’s Tahrir Square, where they had assembled to protest recent decrees by… Read More

President Barack Obama announced that his administration would stop deporting illegal immigrants who entered the country before age 16 and are now under 30, have been continuous residents for at least five years, are military veterans or high school students or graduates, and do not pose a criminal… Read More

After denying for weeks that it would request an aid package from other Eurozone nations, Spain accepted a $125 billion bailout in order to recapitalize its insolvent banks and stabilize its financial markets in advance of what are expected to be tumultuous Greek elections. “Nobody pressured me,” said… Read More

In Egypt, former president Hosni Mubarak and former interior minister Habib El-Adly were sentenced to life in prison for complicity in the murder and attempted murder of protesters in the 2011 uprising that removed Mubarak from power. “The people released a collective sigh of relief after a nightmare… Read More

Syrian government forces killed at least 108 civilians, including 49 children, in Houla, a rebel-held village near Homs. Activists and witnesses said the Syrian army shelled the town with tank fire and mortars during the day, then sent militiamen to kill people house by house that night. The Syrian government… Read More

President Barack Obama hosted a G8 summit at Camp David and a NATO summit in Chicago. At the G8 gathering, leaders stayed up late chatting, debated policy while exercising on treadmills, and sang “Happy Birthday” to Japanese prime minister Yoshihiko Noda around a chocolate birthday cake. “Camp David has just… Read More

One day after North Carolina approved a state-constitution amendment banning same-sex marriages, and three days after Vice President Joe Biden claimed he was “absolutely comfortable” with gay marriage, Barack Obama became the first sitting U.S. president to announce that he believes gay couples should be able to wed. During… Read More

Ali Abd al-Aziz Ali, Walid bin Attash, Mustafa Ahmed al-Hawsawi, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, and Ramzi bin al-Shibh were arraigned before a military tribunal at Camp Justice in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, for orchestrating the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Six of the victims’ families, who had won the right… Read More

Imprisoned Chinese lawyer and human rights activist Chen Guangcheng escaped house arrest in Shandong Province and fled to Beijing, where he was reportedly being harbored at the American Embassy on the eve of an official visit by secretary of state Hillary Clinton. Chen, who is known for exposing forced… Read More

Twelve U.S. Secret Service agents and 12 U.S. military servicemen involved in President Barack Obama’s security detail at the Summit for the Americas in Cartagena, Colombia, were under investigation after a local woman, known as “Dania,” accused an agent of refusing to adequately compensate her for sleeping with… Read More

North Korea commemorated the hundredth anniversary of Great Leader Kim Il Sung’s birth by unveiling a new portrait of Dear Leader Kim Jong Il, formally naming new leader Kim Jong Un as head of the National Defense Commission, and launching a long-range rocket bearing a satellite called Bright Shining… Read More

In Mali, Amadou Toumani Touré resigned as president, and the leaders of the military coup that deposed him three weeks ago agreed to restore constitutional rule. The junta’s announcement came hours after Tuareg rebels declared the independent nation of Azawad in the north, following a ten-week military offensive by… Read More

The U.S. Supreme Court heard three days of oral arguments about the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act. In audio recordings released following the second day of debate, the Obama Administration’s lead advocate, Solicitor General Donald Verrilli Jr., was heard to stumble repeatedly while defending the law. “I’ve seen… Read More

The U.S. Department of Justice, the FBI, and the grand jury of Seminole County, Florida, announced investigations into the death of Trayvon Martin, a 17-year-old African American who was shot by neighborhood-watch captain George Zimmerman on February 26 in the city of Sanford. Local police had declined to arrest… Read More

A gunman killed a teacher and three children on the playground of the Ozar Hatorah Jewish school in Toulouse, France, and then fled on a black scooter. “We all know each other in this school, do you understand?” said one mother. “All the children here are a family.” A… Read More

In Afghanistan, a 38-year-old U.S. Army staff sergeant assigned to support Green Beret village-stabilization operations turned himself in after killing sixteen villagers, nine of them children, in the middle of the night, then setting fire to eleven of the corpses, including those of four girls under the age of… Read More

Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney won the Arizona and Michigan Republican primaries, as well as the Washington State Republican caucus. Newt Gingrich, who placed last in Michigan and Washington, said that Romney was not a “convincing” front-runner and that the campaign for the G.O.P. nomination would “go on… Read More

Syria’s government reported that nearly 90 percent of voters had approved a draft constitution introducing democratic reforms, including a multiparty system. The referendum was boycotted by opposition groups and condemned by international leaders. “To open polling stations but continue to open fire on the civilians of the country,” said… Read More

A prison fire in Honduras killed 359 people, making it the deadliest such fire on record. An inmate was reported to have started the fire after phoning the state governor’s office and saying he was going to burn down the prison, then lighting his bedding on fire. The facility… Read More

Greeceâ??s parliament approved an austerity bill, cutting 15,000 government jobs and reducing the minimum wage by 22 percent in exchange for $170 billion in bailout funds from the European Union and the I.M.F. “We must show that Greeks, when they are called on to choose between the bad and the… Read More

Russia and China vetoed a U.N. Security Council resolution condemning Syria for its campaign to suppress dissent and backing an Arab League plan for Bashar al-Assad to step down as Syrian leader. The vote came as the Assad regime was launching a major offensive on the city of… Read More

A Christian martyr. Republican presidential candidates Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich released their most recent tax returns. Romney’s showed that he made $21.6 million in 2010, paid taxes at a rate of 14 percent, and gave $4 million to the Mormon church over two years. Gingrich’s return showed… Read More

An American cattleman. Francesco Schettino, captain of the Costa Concordia cruise liner whose capsizing off the Italian island of Giglio killed at least 15 people, was revealed to have deviated from the shipâ??s authorized route in order to salute a former captain who lived on the island. The… Read More

A kinkajou, 1886. Tunisia commemorated the first anniversary of the Arab Springâ??and of the ousting of President Zine al-Abidine Ben Aliâ??by pardoning 9,000 prisoners and commuting 122 death sentences. BBCMyanmar released 651 political prisoners, leading the U.S. State… Read More

A Small Family. Mitt Romney won the first stage of the Republican leadership race, beating Rick Santorum by eight votes, 30,015 to 30,007, in the Iowa caucus. “This has been a great victory for him,” said Romney of Santorum. Michele Bachmann, who had claimed she would stay… Read More

People around the world celebrated the passing of another year as 2012 began. The first to ring in the new year were the South Pacific nations of Samoa and Tokelau, which officially switched to the Western side of the international date line by jumping ahead to Saturday on Thursday at… Read More

The world failed to end. The United States observed the tenth anniversary of the terrorist attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people on September 11, 2001. Osama bin Laden was assassinated in Abbottabad, Pakistan, during a joint mission by U.S. Navy SEALs and CIA agents. The Iraq War ended. Protests across… Read More