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Lionel Messi wins Ballon d’Or over Ronaldo & Neymar –
Barcelona forward Lionel Messi has won the Ballon d’Or award for the world’s best player for the fifth time. The 28-year-old Argentine had 41.33% of the vote, with Real Madrid forward Cristiano Ronaldo (27.76%) second and Barca’s Neymar (7.86%) third. Either Messi or Ronaldo, who became a three-time winner last year, have won the past eight awards. United States midfielder Carli Lloyd, who scored a hat-trick in the World Cup final, won the women’s award. England coach Mark Sampson was beaten to the women’s football coach of the year award by USA boss Jill Ellis. [BBC] See List of the Day
Lionel Messi

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EHANG184, world’s first Autonomous Aerial Vehicle

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Past Ballon d’Or winners

Messi’s 2015 in numbers

• 61 games, 52 goals and 26 assists.
• A goal every 101 minutes and an assist every 202 minutes.
• Best minutes-per-goal rate – 80 – of anyone scoring a minimum of 10 goals across Europe’s top five leagues during 2015.
• Directly involved in 49 goals in La Liga – 34 scored and 15 assists – which was the joint-most with Ronaldo in 2015 across the top five European leagues.
• Scored in all six club tournaments in 2015, as Barcelona won five of them.

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Armed conflicts and attacks

• Iraqi Civil War (2014–present)
  • At least 51 people are reportedly killed in an attack on a shopping centre in Iraq‘s capital, Baghdad, and a car bombing outside an illegal casino in Miqdadiyah, east of Baghdad, with the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant claiming responsibility for both attacks. (BBC), (AAP via SBS) (Reuters)
• American-led intervention in Iraq (2014–present)
  • A U.S. airstrike destroys an ISIL money and payroll hub in central Mosul. (CNN)
• Militia occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge
  • Armed militiamen, also known as the Citizens for Constitutional Freedom, who are occupying the USFWS administered Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Harney County, Oregon, tear down a part of a fence that they claim was erected by the federal government in order to allow privately owned cattle to graze on the adjacent public land. USFWS condemns the actions through a written statement which states that, “Removing fences, damaging any refuge property, or unauthorized use of equipment would be additional unlawful actions by the illegal occupiers. Any movement of cattle onto the refuge or other activities that are not specifically authorized by [the Fish and Wildlife Service] constitutes trespassing.” (The Guardian), (The Oregonian)

Business and economy

• Arch Coal, the second largest coal-mining concern in the United States, files for chapter 11 protection because it has been hit hard by the collapsing market demand for that commodity. (Reuters)

Disasters and accidents

• The Metropolitan Fire Brigade in the Australian city of Melbourne warn residents about haze from a large industrial fire burning in the suburb of Broadmeadows. (Melbourne Age)
• 2015–16 Great Britain and Ireland floods
  • Philip Dilley, chairman of the UK‘s Environment Agency resigns after receiving heavy criticism for not returning from a family holiday in Barbados during the recent heavy floods in Northern England andScotland. (Belfast Telegraph)

Law and crime

• New Year’s Eve sexual assaults in Germany
  • Thousands of protesters in Leipzig demonstrate against a record refugee influx they blame for mass sexual violence at New Year’s Eve events in Cologne and other German cities. Many chanted ‘We are the people’, ‘Resistance!’ and ‘Deport them!’. The rally was organized by a local chapter of PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the Occident). Six Pakistani men and one Syrian man were also attacked by so-called vigilantes in Cologne, following calls on social media for “revenge” in the wake of the New Year’s Eve assaults. (Daily Mail)

Sport

• In association football, Lionel Messi of FC Barcelona and Argentina wins the 2015 FIFA Ballon d’Or, his fifth such award. (AP via Sportsfan)
• In Australian football, 34 current and former players with the Essendon Football Club are banned from playing in the Australian Football League during the 2016 AFL season after the Court of Arbitration for Sport finds that they took the banned substance thymosin-beta 4. (AAP and The Australian)
• 2016 College Football Playoff National Championship
  • In American football, the Alabama Crimson Tide defeat the Clemson Tigers 46-40 to win the College Football Playoff National Championship. (NCAA)

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