Dispatches

Marching in Paris

Millions marched down the Boulevard Voltaire in Paris in solidarity on Sunday Jan. 11 after the terrorist attacks on the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo and a kosher grocery store. The same day the French government also deployed 10,000 troops to guard Jewish sites around the country. Though the march was announced only two days before, it brought a historic gathering of dozens of foreign leaders including French President François Hollande, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, British Prime Minister David Cameron, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, and Jordanian King Abdullah II. No high-level American leader was present, with U.S. ambassador to France Jane Hartley the most prominent to join the march (even though U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder was in Paris that day for a security conference). In a rare admission afterward, White House press secretary Josh Earnest said the United States made a mistake and should have sent a higher-ranking official to the march.

Jan. 13

Ukraine attack

A rocket attack on a passenger bus killed 12 civilians in separatist-held Donetsk in eastern Ukraine. The Ukrainian authorities said the rocket came from separatist territory, which the Russian-backed rebels denied. The attack, the largest of the year, crushed a brief cease-fire between the two sides and halted planned peace talks between Ukraine, Russia, Germany, and France.

Jan. 21

Cuba summit

A U.S. delegation led by Assistant Secretary of State Roberta Jacobson arrived in Havana for two days of talks aimed at normalizing relations—the first U.S. diplomats to enter Cuba since the 1970s. Hours before the U.S. team sat down with Cuban counterparts, President Barack Obama in his State of the Union address said the U.S. policy once directed at communist leader Fidel Castro was “long past its expiration date” and pledged “to end a legacy of mistrust in our hemisphere.” The same day, a Russian spy ship pulled into Havana’s harbor unannounced. The Viktor Leonov, its listening equipment prominently displayed, parked not far from the site of historic talks.

Jan. 14

El Capitan climb

After 19 days of climbing, falls, and injuries, Americans Tommy Caldwell, 36, and Kevin Jorgeson, 30, became the first to “free-climb” the Dawn Wall of El Capitan, the smooth granite face in Yosemite National Park. The 3,000-foot Dawn Wall is considered the most difficult climb in the world, and they ascended with only their hands, feet, and a rope they used solely to stop a fall. They did most of their climbing at night to avoid the daytime heat, and between climbing the pair slept in a tent hooked to the cliff face. The climbers had attempted the Dawn Wall five times over the last five years.

Jan. 15

Belgian sweep

Under heightened alert to imminent terror attacks, Belgian counterterrorism police conducted raids around the country and killed two suspected Muslim militants and wounded another in Verviers, Belgium. According to authorities the militants, recently returned from Syria, were part of a cell planning “a major imminent attack.” When police raided their house, the militants opened fire with automatic weapons, the Belgian prosecutor said. None of the counterterrorism police were injured. Belgian police arrested more than a dozen other suspects but said the mastermind of the planned attack remained at large.

Jan. 12

Buckeye victory

The Ohio State Buckeyes, under third-string quarterback Cardale Jones, beat the favored Oregon Ducks 42-20 to win the college football national championship. The win cemented the dominant legacy of Ohio State head coach Urban Meyer, who is 38-3 over the three seasons he has led the team, and now 3-0 in national title games. The Buckeyes’ win capped a season of upsets, including beating No. 1-ranked Alabama to advance to the championship game.

Jan. 15

Getting out of Gitmo

The Obama administration has accelerated its transfer of detainees out of Guantanamo Bay in the last couple months in an effort to move toward President Barack Obama’s goal of closing the military prison. On Jan. 15, the administration announced the transfer of five Yemeni detainees, four to Oman and one to Estonia. The five had been held at Guantanamo since 2002 but never charged. That comes on the heels of another transfer of five detainees to Kazakhstan at the end of last year. Now 122 detainees remain at the prison. Closing the prison is unlikely while Congress is under Republican control. In mid-January Senate Republicans introduced a measure to slow transfers of detainees under certain circumstances. “If you look at the security situation that we’re facing around the world right now, now is not the time to be emptying Guantanamo with no plan for how and where these individuals are going to go,” said Sen. Kelly Ayotte, R-N.H.