June 1 – Europe: SWITZERLAND
Switzerland opens the world’s longest and deepest rail tunnel, the Gotthard Base Tunnel, which cuts through the Alps. It is 35.5 miles long and up to 1.4 miles deep. It took 17 years to build it at the cost of $12 billion. The tunnel will considerably speed up transportation of goods, which previously had to be taken by trucks. Estimated 260 freight trains and 65 passenger trains will go through the tunnel each day.

June 5 – Latin America: PERU
Peru’s economist Pedro Pablo Kuczynski narrowly defeats Keiko Fujimori, the daughter of jailed former president Alberto Fujimori, in the second round of Peru’s presidential elections. Kuczynski held positions in the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund before being designated as general manager of Peru’s Central Reserve Bank. He also served as Minister of Energy and Mines in the early 1980s under President Fernando Belaúnde Terry, and as Minister of Economy and Finance and Prime Minister under President Alejandro Toledo in the 2000s. As an economist, Kuczynski promises to focus of Peru’s economic growth.

June 9 – International Organizations / Africa:
THE BILL AND MELINDA GATES FOUNDATION / HEIFER INTERNATIONAL / AFRICA
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is launching a new program, in partnership with a charitable organization Heifer International, aimed at lifting some people from extreme poverty in sub-Saharan Africa. According to the Pew Research Center, 41 percent of people in sub-Saharan Africa live on less than $1.25 a day, more than twice as high as in any other region. The Foundation plans to donate 100,000 chickens upon calculations that raising just five hens will earn a person one third over the poverty line. This would help 30 percent of rural families. Critics of the program raise questions such as where the chicken farmers would get the feed, and whether the growing number of chickens would lower demand and drive down the price.

June 12 – North America: UNITED STATES
Omar Mateen, a 29-year-old American security guard, kills 49 people and wounds 53 in a mass shooting at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida in the United States. Mateen is killed after a three-hour standoff with police. This is the deadliest mass shooting in the U.S. and the deadliest incident of violence against the LGBT community. During the standoff Mateen called 911 and pledged his allegiance to Islamic State (IS), but the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) says it found no evidence to confirm his ties to this terrorist organization. This massacre renews a polarizing debate on gun control in the U.S. The two guns used by the shooter were high-capacity semi-automatic pistol and semi-automatic rifle also used in other mass shootings, including those in San Bernardino, Newtown and Aurora. Any efforts to ban semi-automatic weapons are strongly opposed by the National Rifle Association (NRA). (June 15): A US Democratic senator from Connecticut, Chris Murphy, leads a 14-hour filibuster demanding that Congress agree on legislation that would ban suspected terrorists from buying guns and expand background checks to gun shows and Internet sales. He ends the filibuster after securing a commitment from the Senate leadership to hold a vote on the two proposals. (June 22): In a similar protest against Congressional inaction on gun control, sixty members of the House Democratic Caucus in the House of Representatives, led by Georgia Representative John Lewis and Massachusetts Representative Katherine Clark, stage a sit-in on the floor. They demand that Republican Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan, allow vote on gun safety legislation. They occupy the floor through the night, but leave the next day after Ryan adjourns the House for the July 4 holiday without voting on the measure. Democrats insist that they will continue pursuing gun safety legislation.

June 13 – Africa: ETHIOPIA / ERITREA
Deadly clashes erupt on the disputed border between Ethiopia and Eritrea and both sides blame the other for the incident. Eritrea got full independence from Ethiopia in 1993, but the two countries still dispute their border alignment. Between 1998 and 2000 both countries fought a border war and aftermath agreed to an independent boundary commission, which in 2002 ruled on the boundary. However, Ethiopia rejected the commission’s ruling claiming that certain areas, specifically the town of Badme, should be within its territory.

June 13 – East Asia / North America: PHILIPPINES / CANADA
A radical Islamic group Abu Sayyaf based in the Philippines kills Canadian Robert Hall who was kidnapped for ransom 10 months earlier. The group demanded several million dollars for Hall, but the Canadian government opposes paying ransoms for hostages. The Abu Sayyaf group is based in the southwestern part of the Philippines, where for more than four decades it has been engaged in an insurgency for an independent Islamic province in this predominantly Catholic country. The group has only a few hundreds of militants, but is considered very violent.

June 16 – International Organizations / Middle East: 
HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL / IRAQ / SYRIA
In its report, the United Nations Human Rights Council accuses Islamic State (IS) of genocide and multiple crimes against humanity and war crimes against the Yazidis. The Yazidis are an ethnically Kurdish religious community indigenous to northern Mesopotamia who practice an ancient religion of Yazidism. Most of the world’s Yazidis live in the Sinjar region of northern Iraq and in Syria. The UN report indicates that IS specifically targets the Yazidis and seeks to destroy the Yazidis’ way of life through killings, enslavement, sexual slavery, torture, forcible transfer, and inhuman and degrading treatment. Thousands of Yazidis are held captive and subjected to horrific treatment. The report concludes that the genocide of the Yazidis is on-going.

June 18 – Africa: EGYPT
An Egyptian court sentences former President Mohammed Morsi to life in prison in an espionage trial. Although the court has acquitted him of spying for Qatar, it sentenced him to life for leading an unlawful organization. Six of his co-defendants receive death penalties, including two journalists from Qatar-based Al-Jazeera channel who are sentenced in absentia,. Morsi is also convicted of stealing secret state documents and receives another 15-year jail term. Mohammed Morsi was the first democratically elected head of state in Egyptian history. Qatar was a main backer of Morsi and his Muslim Brotherhood movement. He stayed in office only from June 30, 2012 to July 3, 2013 when he was deposed in a military coup by army chief General Abdel Fattah el-Sisi.

June 20 – International Organizations: UN HIGH COMMISSIONER on REFUGEES
United Nations High Commissioner on Refugees (UNHCR) reports that as of December of 2015, the number of refugees, asylum-seekers and internally displaced persons exceeded 65 million compared to 10.4 million at the end of 2011. Another way to interpret this statistics is that every minute 24 people around the world are forced to leave their homes. Most of these people leave due to persecution, wars, and human rights abuses. The main contributing factor to this upward trend has been the civil war in Syria, but also the outbreak of other armed conflicts or deterioration of ongoing ones in Afghanistan, Burundi, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Mali, Somalia, South Sudan, and Ukraine. More than half of the refugees come from three countries: Syria, Afghanistan, and Somalia. With 1.84 million refugees in its territory, Turkey hosts the largest number of refugees. Pakistan hosts the second-largest number of refugees worldwide with 1.5 million individuals, virtually all of them from Afghanistan. Lebanon is the third-largest refugee-hosting country, with 1.2 million refugees under UNHCR’s mandate.

June 21 – Africa / International Organizations:
DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO / CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC / INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT
Jean-Pierre Bemba is sentenced to 18 years in prison following a landmark conviction at the International Criminal Court (ICC) for war crimes, crimes against humanity and sexual violence. Bemba was vice president in the transitional government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) between 2003 and 2006 and a leader of the Movement for the Liberation of the Congo (MLC), a rebel group that later turned into a political party. The crimes were committed in Central African Republic (CAR) in 2002 and 2003 by a contingent of the MLC troops during so called CAR Operation. Bemba was a military commander and the leader of the forces that committed the crimes.

June 22 – East Asia: NORTH KOREA
North Korea carries out another missile test in defiance of the UN resolution that bans it from any use of ballistic missile technology. Although the first launched missile fails, the second one flies about 250 miles reaching an altitude of more than 620 miles. The missile is believed to be of intermediate range that could reach South Korea, Japan, and the U.S. territory of Guam in the Pacific.

June 23 – Europe: UNITED KINGDOM / EUROPEAN UNION
A referendum in the United Kingdom on its membership in the European Union results in 52 percent of voters in favor of leaving versus 48 percent in favor of remaining in the EU, with a turnout of 72 percent. The event is referred to as Brexit. Prime Minister David Cameron announces he will step down by October as he failed to convince the voters about the importance of being part of the EU. The Leave campaign triumphed in England and Wales, where in some areas people voted by over 70 percent to leave. In contrast, the Remain campaign dominated in London, Scotland, Northern Ireland, and Gibraltar, as well as the city of London. The First Minister of Scotland Nicola Sturgeon says that Scotland might refuse consent for legislation required to leave the EU and will hold another referendum on independence from the UK. The UK joined the EU in 1973 what was then the European Economic Community (EEC). Its withdrawal from the EU has been a political goal pursued by various individuals, such as former Mayor of London Boris Johnson, and political parties such as UK Independence Party (UKIP) led by Nigel Farage. The European Union leaders call on the UK to start the process of withdrawal as soon as possible, but it is expected to take at least two years. Withdrawal from the European Union has been a right of EU member-states since 2007 under Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty, but so far it has never been used. Before the start of any negotiations between the UK and the EU, the UK first has to invoke the Article 50. This is expected to happen after a new Prime Minister is selected later in 2016.

June 26 – Latin America: PANAMA
The expanded Panama Canal opens for commercial operations, with the Chinese-owned container ship Cosco Shipping Panama being the first one to use the third set of locks. The new locks allow transit of larger ships with a greater cargo capacity. The original Panama Canal was built by the U.S., opened in 1914 and transferred to Panama in 1999.

June 26 – Middle East: IRAQ
Backed by airstrikes from the U.S.-led Coalition, Iraqi forces re-capture the city of Falluja and its suburbs from the Islamic State (IS) militants and declare the city fully liberated. There are about 50,000 civilians who have been trapped in the city, with little food and water, often used as human shields by the militants. Falluja was under IS control since January 2014 and considered the second most important stronghold of the militants in Iraq, after Mosul. The Iraqi air forces target several hundreds of IS vehicles with thousands of militants fleeing the city.

June 27 – Middle East / Europe: TURKEY / ISRAEL
Turkey and Israel reach a deal to normalize their relationship after the killing of 10 Turkish activists in the Palestinian territory of the Gaza Strip by Israeli soldiers 6 years ago known as the Mavi Marmara incident. Both countries agree to restore their diplomatic relations. Israel agrees to pay $20 million in compensation and allow Turkey to continue infrastructure projects in Gaza, such as residential buildings, a hospital, a power station and a desalination plant for drinking water, as well as other type of humanitarian aid to the Palestinians. Turkey, on the other hand, agrees to pass legislation that will protect Israeli troops from legal claims over the Mavi Marmara incident, and to prevent any military action or fundraising by Hamas in Turkey.

June 28 – Middle East / Europe: TURKEY
Three suicide bombers attack Turkey’s international airport in Istanbul during a busy travel day, killing 41 people and injuring 239. The police kill all three attackers. Istanbul’s Ataturk airport is the third busiest in Europe, serving more than 61 million travelers a year. All three attackers are from the former Soviet Union area: Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Russia’s North Caucasus region, but Turkey believes that Islamic State (IS) terrorist organization was behind planning the bombings. IS targets Turkey for its close relations with the Western governments and NATO. This is the fourth major terrorist attack in Turkey this year, crippling the country’s tourist industry.

June 30 – Europe / Middle East: EUROPEAN UNION / TURKEY
The European Union re-opens accession talks with Turkey, getting ready to negotiate Chapter 33 – Financial and budgetary provisions. Membership negotiations with Turkey started in 2005 and so far out of 35 Chapters necessary to complete the accession process, 15 have been opened and one has been closed. Turkey’s membership in the EU is controversial among many EU members.