WORLD  AGENDA
FEBRUARY 2020

Feb 3, U.S.: Iowa hosts the first caucuses ahead of the Nov 3 election. President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial looms as a complication for Democrat senators Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar, who are required to attend the trial as jurors, a drain on their campaigning efforts

Feb 4, South Africa: Former president Jacob Zuma appears likely to face the corruption charges he has dodged for 15 years, after his application for a permanent stay of prosecution was dismissed

Feb 5, U.S.: The Solar Orbiter, a joint mission between the European Space Agency and NASA that is aimed at understanding how the sun creates and controls the heliosphere, is scheduled to launch from Cape Canaveral on a seven-year mission

Feb 9, U.S.: Todd Phillips’ Joker, about Batman’s nemesis, leads the Oscars race with 11 nominations in 24 categories. Sam Mendes’s World War I epic 1917, Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time ... in Hollywood and Martin Scorsese’s The Irishman each collected 10

Feb 14, U.S.: Washington will halve tariffs on a batch of Chinese imports in Phase One of a new trade deal. In exchange China pledged to buy more U.S. farm, energy and manufactured goods and strengthen intellectual property practices

Feb 21, Iran: Parliamentary elections come at a time when President Rouhani’s government is under siege from nationwide unrest and ever-tightening U.S. economic sanctions. The vote will test the popularity of the reformist bloc in parliament

Feb 21-26, Brazil: Rio’s raucous Carnival kicks off with President Bolsonaro’s slurs unlikely to spoil the party, which draws six million revellers each year. Bolsonaro, notorious for racist and homophobic remarks, retaliated with disapproving posts on social media after several 2019 floats took aim at him

February, Japan: Japan Airlines is offering free round-trip domestic flight tickets to up to 50,000 foreign nationals visiting Japan for the Tokyo Olympics this summer, in a bid to encourage visitors to venture beyond tourist hotspots


Sources: NewsAhead, Julie Mullins
Pictures: Getty Images, ESA/ATG medialab, Warner Bros. 
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