WORLD AGENDA 2006

JANUARY: Alan Greenspan, the second-longest serving chairman of the United States Federal Reserve Board, stands down after 18 years in the post. The 79-year-oldÕs policies were central to the economic boom of the 1990s. He is succeeded by Ben Bernanke.

FEBRUARY: The Winter Olympics gets underway in Turin with 2,500 athletes from 85 countries competing in skiing, ice hockey, bobsleigh, skating, luge, curling and biathlon.

MARCH: Parliamentary elections in Ukraine will be hotly contested between the parties of President Viktor Yushchenko and Yulia Tymoshenko, the prime minister who was a key figure in the 2004 Orange Revolution but was sacked amid accusations of corruption.

The Congress of South African Trade Unions plans an HIV/AIDS conference to tackle the stigma that prevents many from seeking treatment in the country where, with the highest infection rate in the world, 900 people die each day of the epidemic.

APRIL: The centenary of Irish-born playwright and novelist Samuel Beckett is celebrated. The Nobel Prize winner, whose most famous work is Waiting for Godot, portrayed the human condition as one that was insignificant in a bleak universe.

MAY: UN peacekeepers end their mission in East Timor, the fledgling nation that broke away from Indonesia in 1999 after a vote of independence which led to a bloody campaign by militia helped by the Indonesian military.

NASA aims to launch the next space shuttle after attempts in August were aborted because of falling debris, the problem that doomed Columbia in 2003. Repair efforts have been hampered by hurricane damage in New Orleans where parts are assembled.

JUNE: The soccer World Cup kicks off in Germany. The tournament is the worldÕs most watched event, notching up an average of over 300 million viewers per match in 2002.

St Petersburg hosts the G8 summit after Vladimir Putin assumes the rotating presidency in January. The Russian leader has said energy security and education will be the main issues.

JULY: A tsunami warning system for the Indian Ocean, capable of alerting authorities within 10 minutes, is due to be in place. Critics say the sensors will send many false alarms and are not matched by emergency evacuation plans in each nation.

AUGUST: Jerusalem hosts WorldPride, a festival of tolerance and multiculturalism postponed from 2005 to avoid clashing with the withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza.

SEPTEMBER: The WWF releases its biennial list of the worldÕs most endangered species.

OCTOBER: The Nato Response Force, set up in 2004, becomes fully operational with 25,000 troops capable of deployment within five days. The multinational NRF, designed to be lethal and agile, is being set up after the 9/11 attacks on US cities.

IranÕs first nuclear plant, the $1 billion Bushehr facility, built with help from Russia, is due to come on stream fuelling controversy over the countryÕs atomic ambitions.

NOVEMBER: The 12th ASEAN summit, attended by leaders from 10 South-East Asian countries, is held in the Philippines.

DECEMBER: Kofi Annan steps down as Secretary-General of the United Nations at the end of two five-year terms. His successor is likely to come from Asia Ð the worldÕs most populous continent Ð with Thailand and Sri Lanka having offered candidates so far.

Work is due to be completed on Palm Island, DubaiÕs $4 billion resort, comprising the worldÕs three largest man-made islands each built in the shape of a palm tree.
/ENDS