Year in review: Our pick of world's top news events that shaped 2025

For many, 2025 might be summed up in a single word: turbulent.

Some countries were battered by air strikes, others by trade tariffs. It was a year of wars and ceasefires, political upheaval and popular protests.

2025 saw the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza end with a US-brokered ceasefire which has proven to be shaky, while Russia's war in Ukraine continues to grind on, extending well into its fourth year.

It was also a year which saw Europe question its relationship with the United States and reassess how it handles its own security after the White House appeared to shift its commitment to the NATO military alliance.

It was a tough call to pick just 10 (or so) events in a year where almost every story seemed to be seismic, but here is what we chose.

On 20 January, Donald Trump returned to the White House after a spectacular political comeback. The 79-year-old beat his Democratic rival Kamala Harris, who had been thrust into the race after former President Joe Biden officially dropped out of the running in July 2024.

Questions had circulated for weeks about Biden's age and ability to govern, and he ultimately abandoned his re-election bid before he could be officially nominated at the Democratic National Convention.

Some argue that the decision derailed Harris' campaign before it began, as she did not have sufficient time to develop a cohesive strategy.

What is certain is that the White House door was opened for a second Trump term, as he scored a resounding win at the polls.

Supported by an expanded base of supporters, which now included Big Tech billionaires, young voters, and Latinos, Trump came back much stronger.

With 142 executive orders signed in his first 100 days in office, more than any other president in US history — and some 225 by the end of 2025 — Trump not only looked to put the US first, but also reshape the global order.

The orders focused on national security, immigration restrictions, energy independence and government efficiency, aiming to reverse previous policies.

The administration also took a harder line on the European Union, describing the bloc as declining, "drowning in illegal migration, too much regulation and fixated with green" —unprecedented criticism of a traditional ally that called into question the future of the transatlantic relationship.

Just over a month after taking office, Trump made it clear to Ukraine that US military support could not be taken for granted.

This was the message broadcast to the world during a fiery meeting between Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Trump at the White House on 28 February, where a shouting match took place, with Trump backed by US Vice President JD Vance, who insisted Zelenskyy should "say thank you".

"You're not in a good position, you don't have the cards right now, you are gambling with the lives of millions of people, you are gambling with World War III," Trump told Zelenskyy in one of the most uncomfortable moments of the exchange.

Since Trump returned to office, direct or indirect military and humanitarian support to Ukraine from Washington has been temporarily suspended, limited, halted or restarted, making the US an unpredictable partner among the countries backing Kyiv against Moscow's full-scale invasion.

Although Trump announced that military support had resumed in July, EU officials told Euronews that the bloc's position is that it cannot rely on the US in the long term.

However, the two leaders have met on more amicable terms since the initial bust-up. Trump has called their latest meeting at Mar-a-Lago in December "terrific", asking Zelenskyy if he had enjoyed the food.

In turn, Zelenskyy appeared in a suit, in response to criticism from Trump that sparked their tiff in February.

Washington has since pushed for a peace deal, and Ukraine has been offered 15-year security guarantees, Zelenskyy revealed in December, stating they were "90%" agreed upon.

While the 28-point US-Russia peace plan has been reworked since it was leaked in November, revealing it was initially favourable to Moscow and its maximalist demands, Kyiv is now hoping for further support from European leaders, as 2026 starts with a series of meetings, including top-level "Coalition of the Willing" talks in its first week.

2025 will likely be remembered as a watershed year for global trade relations with the US raising tariffs against many parts of the world, all part of Trump's policy in what he described as a tit-for-tat act.

The unpredictability of the tariffs, which in some cases seemingly served as leverage, created an environment of fear and uncertainty over the future of global markets.

On 2 April, Trump imposed 10% duties on almost all countries worldwide, with further country-specific tariffs scheduled from 9 April, in a sweeping package he dubbed "Liberation Day."

However, after the announcement sent global markets reeling, Trump suspended the implementation of the second round of tariffs to open the door to negotiations.

By the end of July, the White House had made deals with eight trading partners, including the EU, the UK, Japan, South Korea, Indonesia, the Philippines and Vietnam.

The US and China are currently observing a "truce" on tariffs, following months of escalating tensions and threats from Washington and Beijing to impose duties of up to 145% and 125% respectively.

The European Union reached a deal with the US on trade at the end of July, agreeing to a 15% tariff on European exports to the US.

But the agreement did not come without a trade-off, with Brussels promising to purchase US weaponry and energy in exchange for a lower tariff rate.

However, this was not the last request from the US to use tariffs as a tool of political leverage: in November, US officials asked the EU to soften the implementation of digital rules on US tech companies in exchange for lower tariffs on aluminium, currently set at 50%.

2025 saw the election of a new pontiff: the US-born Robert Francis Prevost, who took the name Leo XIV and began his papacy in May following the death of Pope Francis in April at age 88.

The conclave provided little drama, despite the new head of the Catholic Church not being touted as one of the leading candidates.

Despite coming from very different backgrounds, Pope Leo XIV's actions on social matters are generally seen as a continuation of those of Pope Francis, experts said.

The new supreme pontiff and the bishop of Rome has insisted on peace since his inauguration: in his first address, Pope Leo XIV encouraged the world to embrace "peace that is unarmed and disarming" amid significant global conflicts.

"I carry in my heart the suffering of the beloved Ukrainian people. Let everything possible be done to reach an authentic, just and lasting peace as soon as possible," he told the world and around 150,000 faithful gathered on St Peter's Square upon his election.

After Ukraine, the pope also had words for Gaza, calling for an immediate ceasefire and humanitarian relief for the civilian population and for all hostages to be freed.

"But how many other conflicts are there in the world?" he asked.

The fall of Syria's longtime dictator Bashar al-Assad in a lightning rebel offensive in December 2024 effectively signalled the end of more than 13 years of brutal civil war, which left more than 580,000 people dead and 13 million Syrians forcibly displaced.

The man who headed that rebel offensive was Ahmed al-Sharaa, a former Islamist militant with links to Al Qaeda.

Al-Sharaa, who has shed his nom de guerre, Abu Mohammed al-Julani, is now on a mission to present himself as a capable statesman capable of rebuilding his country by forging alliances with new international partners, EU and US included.

He became the first Syrian leader in 60 years to address the United Nations General Assembly and was received by Trump at the White House.

His message has been clear and consistent: lift all international sanctions on Syria to give the country a chance to rebuild.

Those words have been effective to date. In May, the EU lifted all economic sanctions against the country, while the US temporarily lifted all sanctions, only to confirm in December that they had been permanently removed.

The UK followed suit and in November, the UN Security Council voted to lift terror-related sanctions on al-Sharaa.

The EU and the US justified their decision partly by saying Syria deserved a chance to rebuild after more than a decade of war, but there was also a political will to ensure it is a safe place for refugees to return to.

Europe hosts over 1 million Syrian refugees and asylum seekers, with the majority living in Germany and Sweden.

Al-Sharaa's final move of the year was to replace Syria's banknotes, which had featured images of the former ruling al-Assad dynasty, with depictions of flowers, olives and mulberries.

While the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza continued throughout most of 2025, Israel struck its adversaries across other fronts, including Lebanon, Yemen and Syria, targeting the likes of Hezbollah and the Houthis: all widely regarded as Tehran's top proxies.

This culminated in Israel's strikes against Iran's top military commanders, nuclear scientists and key strategic targets in a 12-day conflict reaching its peak when the US joined in with bombers and bunker-buster bombs in attacks on Iran's nuclear facilities.

A ceasefire mediated by the US and Qatar was eventually reached on 24 June, with both sides claiming victory.

Israel and the US said Iran's missile and nuclear programmes had been all but destroyed, claims Tehran denied.

A walk along the red carpet, friendly handshakes and warm exchanges.

These were the first images from one of the most controversial meetings that US President Donald Trump had in 2025 as he welcomed his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin to Alaska.

Putin's visit to the United States, widely regarded as unprecedented after he was made a pariah over his full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, was part of Trump's renewed push to achieve peace and end Russia's war, which he is reportedly growing increasingly weary of.

But despite the significance of the occasion, there were no tangible outcomes from the meeting beyond the images of Putin on US soil being beamed around the world.

After the talks, Trump indicated he was dissatisfied with Putin's behaviour as strikes on Ukraine continued.

During the UN General Assembly in September, Trump said that Ukraine could win back all of the territory it has lost to Russia in almost four years of war, a dramatic U-turn on his position during his disastrous encounter with Zelenskyy in the White House in February.

About a month after the UNGA speech, the US imposed sanctions on major Russian oil companies, due to "Russia's lack of serious commitment to a peace process to end the war in Ukraine," the US Treasury Department said in a statement.

Yet the Alaska summit continued to cast a long shadow over negotiations.

Russian officials repeatedly invoked the "spirit and letter" of the Anchorage meeting, with Foreign Minister Lavrov claiming it had established terms favourable to Moscow.

The Kremlin leveraged Trump's warm reception of Putin — including the red carpet, the military flyover, and a shared limousine ride — as evidence that Washington accepted Russian territorial demands, alarming Kyiv and European allies.

After nearly two years of devastating war in Gaza triggered by the Hamas-led militant attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, a fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hamas took effect in stages throughout 2025, brokered through intensive mediation by the United States, Qatar and Egypt.

The Trump-led 20-point plan came into effect on 10 October and was endorsed by the UN Security Council on 17 November.

Under this agreement, Hamas released the final 20 living Israeli hostages on October 13 in exchange for nearly 2,000 Palestinian prisoners and detainees.

Trump, speaking at a peace summit in Egypt's resort city of Sharm el-Sheikh, attended by leaders from over 20 nations, called it "a historic dawn" and demanded Hamas disarm, warning "if they don't disarm, we will disarm them."

The agreement includes provisions for an international stabilisation force led by the US, with Azerbaijan, Turkey, Indonesia and Egypt expressing interest in participation.

The plan calls for Palestinian technocrats vetted by Israel to govern Gaza, though Hamas insists Palestinians should decide their own leadership.

Significant questions remain about permanent governance, complete Israeli withdrawal, a surge in violence related to Hamas' attempt to keep its grip on power and the return of the remains of one remaining deceased hostage still held in Gaza.

As the year ended, the ceasefire remained fragile, with sporadic clashes and accusations of violations from both sides, while Gaza's humanitarian crisis persisted, with most of the Strip's residents still displaced amid widespread destruction.

Global tensions escalated again towards the end of the year after China applied severe export controls on its rare earth minerals, critical to the manufacture of everything from cars to weapons.

That move also sparked concerns about the global supply chain.

China has a near-monopoly over the group of 17 elements and has said it is restricting exports to protect domestic processing and in response to geopolitical pressure from US tariffs.

While these controls were initially a response to Washington, Brussels became collateral damage in the dispute and was forced to consider ways to respond.

In a speech in October, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the bloc was prepared to use all the tools at its disposal to combat what some European leaders, including French President Emmanuel Macron, described as economic coercion from China.

The ACI, adopted in 2023, would allow the EU to retaliate against a third country by imposing tariffs or restricting access to public procurement, licenses or intellectual property rights.

European Council President António Costa met with Chinese Premier Li Qiang on the sidelines of the ASEAN Summit in Kuala Lumpur.

"I shared my strong concern about China’s expanding export controls on critical raw materials and related goods and technologies," Costa said after the meeting. "I urged him to restore as soon as possible fluid, reliable and predictable supply chains."

While Brussels insists on achieving a constructive solution without escalation, the Commission is pursuing a "de-risking" strategy to reduce its dependence on Chinese minerals.

The world, including the EU, is heavily dependent on China, as the country accounts for 60% of global production and 90% of refining capacity, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA).

In September, China held its largest-ever military parade featuring Xi Jinping, Putin and Kim Jong-un together for the first time, showcasing hypersonic missiles and AI-powered weaponry that underscored Beijing's challenge to Western-led global order.

Beijing offered an olive branch to the EU to build a "win-win" partnership, saying it was open to European businesses expanding into the Chinese market.

Japan's parliament elected Sanae Takaichi as the country's first female prime minister on 21 October, in a historic milestone for a nation that ranks 118th out of 148 countries in gender equality.

Takaichi won 237 votes in the lower house, just four more than needed, after her Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) formed a new coalition with the right-wing Japan Innovation Party following the collapse of its longtime partnership with the centrist Komeito party.

Takaichi is a hardline protege of assassinated former PM Shinzo Abe who opposes same-sex marriage, supports male-only imperial succession, and takes a tough stance on defence and China.

In late December, Japan’s cabinet approved a record defence budget plan exceeding 9 trillion yen (almost €50 billion) for the coming year, aiming to fortify its strike-back capability and coastal defence with cruise missiles and unmanned arsenals as tensions rise in the region.

A record defence budget and an expanding missile and drone programme mark a decisive shift for Japan under Takaichi, as she cleared the path for her country to become the world’s third-largest military spender.

Political instability continued to plague West Africa in 2025, with a military takeover in Guinea-Bissau on 23 November, just one day before election results were to be made public, and an attempted coup in Benin.

The coups extended a rapid-fire pattern that began in Mali in 2020 and 2021, Guinea in 2021, Burkina Faso in 2022, and Niger and Gabon in 2023, forming what observers call a "coup belt" across the Sahel region.

The military juntas have systematically expelled French troops and European diplomatic missions while deepening ties with Russia, including lucrative contracts with Russian government-run Wagner Group mercenaries —rebranded as Africa Corps following Yevgeny Prigozhin's death.

(If that sounds familiar, Africa Korps was a Nazi German expeditionary mission to the continent in World War II. The 21st-century Russian take is already facing serious war crimes allegations.)

France's influence in its former colonies has collapsed, forcing Paris to relocate military bases and abandon decades of post-colonial engagement.

At the same time, the Kremlin has stepped in, gaining access to strategic minerals, military bases and political leverage across the region.