January 2017 in History

Events in History

Jan 1 Portuguese politician and diplomat António Guterres becomes United Nations Secretary General, replacing South Korean Ban Ki-moon

Jan 2 US House Republicans vote to gut the independent Office of Congressional Ethics, a public uproar forces them to back down the next day

Jan 6 Elizabeth Warren announces her intention to run for a second term as Massachusetts Senator

Jan 12 US President Barack Obama in surprise presentation awards Vice President Joe Biden with the Presidential Medal of Freedom

Jan 17 Nigerian military mistakenly bomb refugee camp killing more than 70 in Rann, Borno state

Jan 17 Search for missing aircraft MH370 over the Indian Ocean is called off

Jan 17 US President Barack Obama commutes WikiLeaks discloser Chelsea Manning's prison sentence from 35 to 7 years

Jan 18 NASA and NOAA announce that 2016 was the hottest year on record, surpassing the previous record set in 2015 which itself topped a record set in 2014

Jan 19 Adama Barrow sworn in as President of Gambia in Dahkar as Senegalese troops enter Gambia to persuade former President Yahya Jammeh to leave

Jan 19 Mexican drug lord Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán is extradited to the United States to face trial for his leadership of the Sinaloa drug cartel

Jan 20 Car ploughs into pedestrians in central Melbourne, killing 6 and injuring 27

Jan 20 Donald Trump is inaugurated as the 45th President of the United States of America and Mike Pence as the 48th Vice President

Jan 21 More than 2 million people protest worldwide in the 'Women's March' against Donald Trump, with 500,000 marching in Washington, D.C.
Jan 22 Chile declares a State of Emergency and requests international assistance as wildfires rage out of control

Jan 22 Jared Kushner is sworn in as Senior Advisor to US President, Donald Trump

Jan 23 Most expensive house in the US worth $250 million goes on the market in Bel Air, Los Angeles
Jan 23 Thunderstorms and tornadoes in Georgia and Mississippi leave at least 18 dead in the US
Jan 24 President Trump withdraws the US from the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA)
Jan 25 Kisenosato becomes the 1st Japanese home-grown sumo champion since 1998 when he is made yokozuna, 72nd Grand Champion
Jan 27 Donald Trump issues executive order banning travel to the US for 7 mostly Muslim countries and suspending admission for refugees
Jan 28 US President Donald Trump and Australian PM Malcolm Turnbull have a contentious phone call over deal for US to take 1,250 refugees
Jan 29 Attack on mosque in Quebec kills 6 and injures 17, shooter is French Canadian student
Jan 30 Scientists in central China reveal oldest known human ancestor - 540-million-year-old Saccorhytus in a fossil
Jan 31 Romanian government passes emergency decree to release prisoners and decriminalise corruption charges, triggering huge protests in Bucharest
Jan 31 US President Donald Trump announces he is nominating 49 year old Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court
Jan 31 US President Donald Trump fires Attorney General Sally Yates after she instructs Justice Department officials not to defend Trump's travel ban

Jan 8 Dutch-American "Dancing with the Stars" pro Louis Van Amstel (44) weds American health coach Joshua Lancaster (27) in Sundance, Utah

Jan 1 Derek Parfit, British philosopher who specialized in problems of personal identity, rationality and ethics, dies at 74
Jan 2 John Berger, English art critic & author (Ways of Seeing), dies at 90
Jan 3 Igor Volk, Soviet cosmonaut (Soyuz T-12) & test pilot, dies at 79
Jan 4 Douglas Wass, British civil servant (Permanent Secretary to HM Treasury, 1974-83), dies at 93

Jan 7 17th President of Portugal (1986-96) and Prime Minister (1976-78 and 1983-85), dies after falling into a coma at 92

Jan 7 Nat Hentoff, American columnist and novelist (Village Voice, The Cold Society), dies at 91
Jan 8 Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, 4th President of Iran (1989-97) and de facto commander-in-chief of the Iranian military during the Iran-Iraq War, dies of a heart attack at 82
Jan 8 Roy Innis, American activist, leader of the Congress of Racial Equality, dies at 82
Jan 9 Warren Allen Smith, American gay rights activist and writer, dies at 95
Jan 9 Zygmunt Bauman, Polish-born sociologist (Modernity and the Holocaust), dies at 91

Jan 10 British war correspondent who was the first to report on the outbreak of WWII, dies at 105

Jan 10 Oliver Smithies, British biochemist (2007 Noble Prize for gene targeting), dies at 91
Jan 10 Steven McDonald, New York City Police Department patrolman who was shot and paralyzed in the line of duty, dies at 59
Jan 13 Alexis Mardas, Greek electronics engineer, entrepreneur, and Beatles hanger-on also known as "Magic Alex", dies of pneumonia at 74
Jan 13 Antony Armstrong-Jones [Lord Snowdon], British photographer and ex-husband of Princess Margaret, dies at 86

Jan 14 Chinese economist and linguist known as the "father of pinyin", dies at 111

Jan 16 Eugene Cernan, American NASA astronaut (12th person on the moon), dies at 82
Jan 19 H. Boyd Woodruff, American microbiologist whose research led to antibiotics, dies at 99
Jan 21 Emma Tennant, English writer (Pemberley: Or, Pride and Prejudice Continued), dies at 79
Jan 23 Lee O’Denat, American internet entrepreneur (WorldStarHipHop.com), dies of heart disease at 43
Jan 25 Buchi Emecheta, Nigerian English writer (Price of Bride), dies at 72
Jan 25 Robert Garcia, American politician hit by Wedtech scandal (Rep-D-NY, 1978-83), dies at 84