2023

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2023 (MMXXIII) is the current year, and is a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar, the 2023rd year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 23rd year of the 3rd millennium and the 21st century, and the 4th year of the 2020s decade.

The year so far has seen the continued waning of the COVID-19 pandemic (which the WHO ceased calling a global health emergency on May 5), the continuation of Russian invasion of Ukraine which began in 2022, and the outbreak of an armed conflict in Sudan beginning in April. The year also had multiple catastrophic natural disasters, including the fifth-deadliest earthquake of the 21st century striking Turkey and Syria, leaving nearly 60,000 people dead, as well as Cyclone Freddy, the longest-lasting recorded tropical cyclone in history, leading to over 1,400 deaths.

2023 additionally witnessed a banking crisis resulting in the collapse of numerous American regional banks as well as the buyout of Credit Suisse by UBS in Switzerland. Among American banks, the two largest banks which collapsed were Silicon Valley Bank and First Republic Bank, the third and second largest banking collapses in US history respectively.

In the realm of technology, 2023 has seen the continued rise of generative AI models, with applications across various industries reaching new heights. These models, leveraging advancements in machine learning and natural language processing, have become capable of creating realistic and coherent text, images, and music. An AI arms race between private companies has continued since the late 2010s, with Microsoft-backed OpenAI and Google-owner Alphabet today most dominant among firms.

Events

January

• January 1 – Croatia adopts the euro and joins the Schengen Area, becoming the 20th member state of the Eurozone and the 27th member of the Schengen Area. This is the first enlargement of the Eurozone since Lithuania's entry in 2015, and the first enlargement of the Schengen Area since Liechtenstein's entry in 2011.
• January 3 – Starting from this date, many countries impose travel restrictions on travel from China due to the relaxation of the country's zero-COVID policy.
• January 5 – The funeral of Pope Benedict XVI is held at Saint Peter's Square within the Vatican City.
• January 8
  • COVID-19 pandemic: China reopens its borders to international visitors, marking the end of travel restrictions that began in March 2020.
  • Supporters of former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro storm the Brazilian National Congress, the Supreme Federal Court and the Presidential Palace of Planalto.
• January 10–17 – A deadly cold snap in Afghanistan kills 166 people and nearly 80,000 livestock.
• January 15 – Yeti Airlines Flight 691 crashes during final approach into Pokhara, Nepal, killing all 72 people on board.
• January 17 – Nguyễn Xuân Phúc resigns as President of Vietnam amid several recent scandals in the government.
• January 18 – 2023 Antiguan and Barbudan general election: The Labour Party receives a third victory in a row, winning 9/17 seats in the parliament.
• January 20 – The Parliament of Trinidad and Tobago elects former senate president, minister and lawyer Christine Kangaloo as president of the country in a 48–22 vote.
• January 25 – Chris Hipkins succeeds Jacinda Ardern as Prime Minister of New Zealand, six days after she announced her resignation.
• January 27 – Widespread unrest erupts in Israel following an Israeli military raid in Jenin which left nine Palestinians dead. Incendiary air balloons are launched into Israeli-populated areas following it. Israel responds with targeted airstrikes. Later the same day, seven Jewish civilians are murdered in a synagogue in Neve Yaakov in a terrorist attack.
• January 27–28 – The second round of the 2023 Czech presidential election is held, with Petr Pavel declared winner.
• January 30 – A Jamaat-ul-Ahrar suicide bombing inside a mosque in Peshawar, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan, kills 84 people and injures over 220 others.

February

• February 2 – The European Central Bank and Bank of England each raise their interest rates by 0.5 percentage points to combat inflation, one day after the US Federal Reserve raises its federal funds rate by 0.25 percentage points.
• February 3
  • The US announces it is tracking alleged Chinese spy balloons over the Americas, with one drifting from Yukon to South Carolina before being shot down the next day, and a second hovering over Colombia and Brazil. This event is followed by subsequent detections and shootdowns of high-altitude objects elsewhere.
  • A Norfolk Southern train carrying hazardous materials derails in East Palestine, Ohio. Multiple train cars burned for more than two days, followed by emergency crews conducting a controlled burn of several additional cars, releasing hydrogen chloride and phosgene into the atmosphere.
• February 5
  • The 2023 Cypriot presidential election is held, with Nikos Christodoulides elected president.
  • Cyclone Freddy forms in the Indian Ocean, going on to become the longest lasting, most powerful tropical cyclone in history and causing over 1400 deaths and countless injuries and property damage across the region.
• February 6 – 2023 Turkey–Syria earthquake: A 7.8 M_ww earthquake strikes Gaziantep Province in southeastern Turkey. A 7.5 M_ww  aftershock occurs on the same day in nearby Kahramanmaraş Province. Widespread damage and at least 59,000 deaths are caused in Turkey and Syria, with more than 121,000 injured.
• February 13 – The 2023 Bangladeshi presidential election scheduled for 19 February is held, with Shahabuddin Chuppu of the Awami League, the only nominated candidate, elected unopposed.
• February 20 – A magnitude 6.4 earthquake, an aftershock of the earlier February 6 earthquake, strikes southern Turkey and is also felt in Syria, Lebanon and Egypt.
• February 21 – Vladimir Putin announces that Russia is suspending its participation in New START, a nuclear arms reduction treaty with the US.
• February 25 – 2023 Nigerian general election: Bola Tinubu is elected as Nigeria's president, defeating former vice president Atiku Abubakar and Peter Obi.
• February 27 – The United Kingdom and the European Union reach an agreement surrounding modifications to the Northern Ireland Protocol.
• February 28 – A train crash in Thessaly, Greece, kills 57 people and injures dozens. The crash leads to nationwide protests and strikes against the condition of Greek railways and their mismanagement by the government.

March

• March 2 – The National Assembly of Vietnam declares Võ Văn Thưởng as the country's new president after receiving 98.38% votes from the Vietnamese parliament.
• March 4 – UN member states agree on a legal framework for the High Seas Treaty, which aims to protect 30% of the world's oceans by 2030.
• March 5 – The 2023 Estonian parliamentary election is held, with two centre-right liberal parties gaining an absolute majority for the first time.
• March 8 – Allied Democratic Forces jihadist insurgents use machetes to kill about 35 people in the village of Mukondi, North Kivu, Democratic Republic of the Congo.^{[importance?]}
• March 10
  • 2023 People's Republic of China presidential election: The National People's Congress unanimously re-elects Xi Jinping as the President of the People's Republic of China to an unprecedented third term.
  • Iran and Saudi Arabia agree to resume diplomatic relations which were severed in 2016 at talks meditated by China.
  • Silicon Valley Bank, the 16th largest bank in the United States, fails, creating then the largest bank failure since the 2008 financial crisis, affecting companies around the world.
• March 14 – OpenAI launches GPT-4, the next-generation large language model for artificial intelligence chatbot ChatGPT. The new model can respond to images and has the ability to process up to 25,000 words.
• March 17 – The International Criminal Court issues an arrest warrant for Russian president Vladimir Putin, the first against a leader of a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council.
• March 18 – A 6.8 earthquake strikes southern Ecuador killing 18 people, injuring nearly 500 and causing major damage.
• March 19 – In a deal brokered by the Swiss government, investment bank UBS agrees to buy Credit Suisse for CHF 3 billion (US$3.2 billion) in an all-stock deal.
• March 20 – The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) releases the synthesis report of its Sixth Assessment Report on climate change.
• March 26 – 2023 Israeli judicial reform protests: Large-scale spontaneous protests erupt across Israel in the wake of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu firing his defence minister who spoke against the government's judicial overhaul plan.

April

• April 2
  • The 2023 Bulgarian parliamentary election is held in an attempt to end the political gridlock as a result of the 2021–2023 Bulgarian political crisis.
  • The 2023 Montenegrin presidential election is held, with Jakov Milatović of the Europe Now! movement winning in the second round, becoming the first president not from the DPS party since the introduction of a multi-party system in 1990.
  • The 2023 Finnish parliamentary election is held, with the centre-right National Coalition led by Petteri Orpo receiving the most votes.
  • The 2023 Andorran parliamentary election is held, with the ruling Democrats for Andorra led by Prime Minister Xavier Espot winning the majority of the seats.
  • 2023 Saint Petersburg bombing: Russian pro-government war correspondent Vladlen Tatarsky is killed by a bombing at a café in Saint Petersburg owned by oligarch Yevgeny Prigozhin. Sixteen others are injured.^{[importance?]}
• April 4 – Finland becomes the 31st member of NATO, doubling the alliance's border with Russia.
• April 5 – Clashes between Palestinians and the Israeli police happen at Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem.
• April 10 – Two document leaks from the Pentagon detailing foreign military aid relating to the Russian invasion of Ukraine are leaked onto the Internet.
• April 11 – Myanmar civil war: In the village of Pazigyi, at least 165 people are killed by the Myanmar Air Force during the opening celebrations of a People's Defence Force administration office.
• April 14 – Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) is launched by the European Space Agency (ESA) to search for life in the Jovian system, with an expected arrival date of 2031.
• April 15
  • Nuclear power in Germany ends after the closure of the final power plants and nuclear being a power source for the country for over 50 years.
  • Fighting breaks out across Sudan between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces. The RSF captures Khartoum International Airport, and the presidential palace in Khartoum.
• April 19 – At least 90 people are killed and another 322 injured in a crowd crush during a Ramadan charity event in Sanaa, Yemen.
• April 20 – SpaceX's Starship rocket, the largest and most powerful rocket ever built, is launched during a flight test from a base in Boca Chica, Texas. It explodes four minutes after launch.
• April 25 – A mass cult suicide is uncovered in Shakahola forest, Kenya. 240 followers are found in shallow graves throughout the forest. Over 613 people remain missing.
• April 30 – The 2023 Paraguayan general election is held, with the Colorado Party candidate Santiago Peña being the president-elect of Paraguay, winning in a landslide.

May

• May 1 – 2023 banking crisis: San Francisco-based First Republic Bank fails and is auctioned off by the US FDIC to JPMorgan Chase for $10.7 billion. The collapse surpasses March's collapse of Silicon Valley Bank to become the second largest in US history.
• May 4 – A series of floods and landslides strikes villages in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, resulting in over 400 deaths.
• May 5 – The World Health Organization ends its declaration of COVID-19 being a global health emergency, but continues to refer to it as a pandemic.
• May 6 – The coronation of Charles III and Camilla as King and Queen of the United Kingdom and the other Commonwealth realms is held in Westminster Abbey, London.
• May 7 – Syria is readmitted into the Arab League after being suspended since 2011.
• May 9 – Cyclone Mocha forms in the Indian Ocean, killing over 400 people and injuring over 700 as it strikes Myanmar and Bangladesh.
• May 9–13 – The Eurovision Song Contest 2023 is held in Liverpool, UK. Swedish contestant Loreen wins with the song "Tattoo".
• May 14
  • The 2023 Thai general election is held, with pro-democratic parties such as the Move Forward and Pheu Thai parties gaining a majority of seats in the House of Representatives while pro-military parties such as Palang Pracharat lost seats.
  • 49th G7 summit takes place in Hiroshima, Japan. Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy arrives in Japan on the second day of the summit.
• May 21 – The 2023 Greek legislative election is held; the ruling New Democracy wins a plurality of seats in the Hellenic Parliament, but incumbent prime minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis indicates his desire to not form a coalition with other parties and may call a snap election in an effort to secure a majority of seats.
• May 28 – The second round of the 2023 Turkish presidential election is held; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan defeats Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu with 52.18% of the vote to win a third term as president.

June

• June 2 – A train collision in Odisha, India results in at least 288 deaths and 1,000 others injured.
• June 6 – Russian invasion of Ukraine: The Nova Kakhovka dam in the Russian-controlled region of Kherson is destroyed, threatening the region with devastating floodwaters.

Predicted and scheduled events

• June 25 – 2023 Guatemalan general election
• July 23 – 2023 Spanish general election
• August 23 – 2023 Zimbabwean general election
• September 8 – October 28 – 2023 Rugby World Cup in France
• October 22 – 2023 Argentine general election

Date unknown

• 2023 Libyan parliamentary elections
• 2023 Polish parliamentary election
• The European Spallation Source is expected to go into operation in Lund, Sweden.
• Türksat 6A, Turkey's first domestic and national satellite, is planned to be sent to space in cooperation with SpaceX.

Deaths