Venezuela The Venezuelan Supreme Tribunal of Justice rules that the latest inauguration of President Hugo Chávez can be deferred while his recovery continues from a cancer operation.
U.S. Secretary of Labor U.S. Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis announces her resignation from the position, and is expected to step down some time around the presidential inauguration in late January.
Sri-Lanka Despite international protest, Sri-Lankan maid Rizana Nafeek is executed in Saudi Arabia for killing an infant in her care.
British Retired British businessman Christopher Tappin is sentenced to 33 months in prison by a U.S. court after pleading guilty to selling weapon parts to Iran.
SeaStreak A SeaStreak ferry travelling to Lower Manhattan, New York City, crashes into the dock, injuring 85 people.
James M. Buchanan James M. Buchanan, who won the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1986 for his role in developing public choice theory, dies aged 93 in the American town of Blacksburg, Virginia.
Iran Forty-eight Iranians who were kidnapped by Free Syrian Army rebels in the capital Damascus in August 2012 are released in exchange for 2,130 prisoners held by the Syrian government.