February 8, 2016
(Monday)
Armed conflicts and attacks
- Second Libyan Civil War
- A Libyan Air Force MiG-23 fighter jet crashes due to a "mechanical failure", while conducting airstrikes on Islamic State-controlled areas in the eastern city of Derna. (Reuters)
- Syrian Civil War
- United Nations investigators accuse the Government of Syria of "extermination" in its jails and detention centres. (Wires via ABC News Australia)
- Saudi Arabian-led intervention in Yemen
- A Scud missile fired from Yemen is intercepted over Saudi Arabia. The missile's target is believed to have been the King Khalid Air Base, near the city of Khamis Mushait. (AFP via Al Arabiya)
- War in Afghanistan (2001–2021)
- A suicide bomber strikes a crowded market in eastern Afghanistan killing five civilians and wounding nine others. (The New York Times) (Appeal Democrat)[permanent dead link ]
Disasters and accidents
- 2016 Taiwan earthquake
- The death toll from the Taiwan earthquake rises to 38 with more than 100 people missing. (Reuters via Yahoo! News) (AP via CBS News)
- Tainan mayor William Lai warns the death toll probably will exceed 100. "There are more fatalities than those pulled out," he said. (USA Today)
- 2015–16 UK and Ireland windstorm season
- Storm Imogen is set to impact the British Isles with 80mph winds and heavy rain. The United Kingdom's Met Office issues warnings for South West England, particularly the Cornish coast due to large waves, and South Wales. (Sky News)
- European migrant crisis
- At least 27 migrants die in a shipwreck in the Aegean Sea when a boat capsizes in the Turkish bay of Edremit, near the Greek island of Lesbos. (ANSAmed) (Leadership) (news.com.au) (BBC)
Health and medicine
- Billy Kenoi, the mayor of Hawaii's Big Island, declares a state of emergency to deal with the growing outbreak of dengue fever, which is spread by infected mosquitoes. (Reuters) (Huffington Post)
International relations
- Korean border incidents
- The South Korean Navy fires warning shots at a North Korean patrol boat after it crossed the Northern Limit Line in the Yellow Sea and entered South Korean-controlled waters. As of 2016, North Korea refuses to recognize the so-called Northern Limit Line, that was drawn up at the end of the Korean War. (Reuters)
- Refugees of the Syrian Civil War
- New refugee camps go up near the Syria–Turkey border after Turkey blocks thousands of refugees from entering the country. (BBC)
Law and crime
- The Constitutional Court of Colombia rules on banning all mining activities in the Páramo ecosystems due to environmental concerns. (BBC)
- DotGovs, a hacker group that released data on almost 10,000 Department of Homeland Security employees yesterday, publish contact information for 20,000 FBI employees. (CNN)
- The French data protection authority and the independent watchdog CNIL cite Facebook for breaching privacy laws by the collection and transfer of 30 million users' Internet data, and by tracking non-users. Companies are no longer protected by the International Safe Harbor pact that was ruled illegal last October. (Reuters) (AP via ABC News)
Sport
- Daniel Bryan announces that he will retire from WWE. (WWE)