Portal:Current events/2019 May 23

May 23, 2019 (Thursday)

Armed conflicts and attacks

Syrian Civil War, Northwestern Syria offensive (April 2019–present)
- Sky News journalist Alex Crawford and her media team are fired on by Syrian Army tanks in the Tahrir al-Sham-held village of Hbit, Idlib Governorate, while covering the fighting there. Their guide, Bilal Abdul Kareem, is injured by shrapnel to his chest. (The Guardian)

Business and economy

Panasonic suspends shipments of certain hardware components to Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd. to comply with U.S. restrictions on the company. (Reuters)
U.S. President Donald Trump announces a second aid package worth $16 billion for farmers impacted by the China–United States trade war. (CNBC) (Fox Business)

Law and crime

John Walker Lindh, the first person to be convicted of a crime in the War on Terror, is released on probation from a U.S. federal prison after serving 17 years of a 20-year sentence. Lindh has refused to renounce Islamist extremism and will be on probation for three years. U.S. President Donald Trump condemns the early release. (CNN) (Associated Press)
The U.S. city of Baltimore, Maryland, has been battling a ransomware attack that has blocked government email accounts and disabled online payments to city departments. The hackers breached the city's servers on May 7 and demanded $100,000 (£79,000) worth of Bitcoin. (BBC News)
Interpol's Operation Blackwrist arrests nine people in Australia, Thailand and the United States, and rescues 50 children in connection with a 63,000-member online pedophilia ring. More arrests are expected. Investigators from nearly 60 countries participated in this operation. (ChannelNewsAsia) (CBS News)
Indictment and arrest of Julian Assange
- The United States Department of Justice charges WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange with 17 counts of violating the Espionage Act, including provisions that prohibit a conspiracy to obtain, receive and disclose national defense information, attempting to crack computer passwords, and unlawful receipt of sensitive information such as State Department communications and Defense Department logs. (NPR)
Aftermath of the Mueller special counsel investigation and Crossfire Hurricane (FBI investigation)
- U.S. President Donald Trump, in a directive, orders the Intelligence Community to cooperate with U.S. Attorney General William Barr's review of the origins of the Special Counsel investigation. The order allows Attorney General Barr to declassify information he sees fit for the review process. (Reuters) (Fox News)
American serial killer Bobby Joe Long who murdered 10 women in the Tampa Bay Area during an eight month period in 1984 is executed by lethal injection. (CBS News)

Politics and elections

2019 European Parliament election
- European citizens in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands vote in the first day of 2019's European Parliament elections. (European Parliament)
2019 Indian general election
- The Bharatiya Janata Party, led by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, is declared the clear victor of the latest Indian general election. (Reuters)
2019 Malawian general election
- The Malawi Electoral Commission reports, with 75% of the vote counted, President Peter Mutharika leads with 40.44% of votes, the opposition Malawi Congress Party's Lazarus Chakwera has 35.34%, and Deputy President Saulos Chilima received 18.35% of the votes cast in Tuesday's presidential election. (Reuters)
The French Senate approves the reworded autonomy statute for French Polynesia. (Radio New Zealand)

Science and technology

Discoveries of exoplanets
- Eighteen Earth-like exoplanets are discovered via a new algorithm. (New Atlas) (Space Ref)