my News review 2011 part 1 - revolutions, voicemails and weddings

As the year 2011 draws to a close, I thought I would take a look back at some of the events that have made the news. Some good, some bad, some light-hearted, in news terms this has been a busy year, and I couldn’t possibly cover all of it in one post. So over the next couple of days I hope you’ll keep reading as I share my opinions of what I thought was newsworthy this year in a series of posts.

It’s been quite an eventful year all in all, and I think it’s fair to say that in many ways 2011 is a year that will go down in history. Here in the UK we’ve had media scandals, rioting, super-injunctions and a wedding, while undoubtedly the most significant happenings abroad have been in the Middle East.

The most significant world event has been the Arab Spring, which has been a series of uprisings across the Middle East which actually started in December 2010 when a Tunisian man burned himself to death in protest over his treatment by the police. This sparked uprisings across the region, in Tunisia, where the government was overthrown and President Ben Ali
Was ousted, Egypt, where President Hosni Mubarak and his government were overthrown, Yemen, where the President, Ali Abdullah Saleh, stepped down. Further protests (some of which are still ongoing) occurred in Syria, Bahrain, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Morocco, Jordan, Algeria, Iraq, but perhaps the most notable was the civil war in Libya where there was also involvement from NATO, and which resulted in the death of Muammar Gaddafi.

I think it fair to say that all this has merely marked the beginning of change in the Middle East, and that it will most likely be a while before the full implications will be known. But one can only hope that all this change is change for the better, in countries where true democracy is still only in its infancy.

Back in the UK, the phone hacking scandal, which has actually been ongoing for several years now, took a nasty turn when it emerged that the voicemails of murdered school girl Millie Dowler had been hacked by journalists. Following this revelation it subsequently emerged that other victims of crime had also been victims of phone hacking by tabloid journalists. All these revelations led to the closure of Britain’s longest running Sunday paper, the News of the World, and has deeply tarnished the reputation of British journalism, perhaps irrevocably, but only time will tell. Currently a public enquiry into events, the Leveson Enquiry, is still ongoing.

On a lighter note, this year saw the wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton, (the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge) which in truth has been a long-awaited event. A record 24 million people watched the wedding in the UK, with the ceremony being televised in 180 countries across the globe. People waited in anticipation to see Kate's dress.
, and the crowds eagerly awaited the first kiss.

Of course the next big question people have is when the couple will be announcing the arrival of a royal baby, but I think that with the upcoming Olympics and the Queen’s diamond Jubilee they might just be busy with other things for the time being.

There have of course been many other significant and indeed historical events in this year’s news, and I will cover some of those in my next post, so do keep reading.