January 8, 2015 (Thursday)
Armed conflicts and attacks
- Charlie Hebdo shooting
- One of the suspects in the killings, Hamyd Mourad, voluntarily surrenders to police in Charleville-Mézières while the other two suspects are still at large. (The New York Times) (CNN)
- On the night of January 7 and morning of January 8, assailants throw grenades and fire guns at three mosques throughout France. (ForeignPolicy.com)
- 2015 Baga massacre
- Boko Haram militants raze the entire town of Baga in north-east Nigeria. Bodies lay strewn on Baga's streets with as many as 2,000 people having been killed. Boko Haram now controls 70% of Borno State, which is the worst-affected by the insurgency. (BBC)
- Iraqi insurgency (2011–present)
- A suicide bomber targets a police checkpoint in the town of Youssifiyah, killing seven people. (AAP via The Australian)
Business and economy
- Dunkin' Donuts signs a franchise agreement for 1,400 new cafes in China by the year 2035. (Reuters)
- Coca-Cola announces that it plans to cut 1,800 jobs worldwide. (CNBC)
- Subaru recalls 199,000 vehicles (2008-2014), citing brake line rust issues. (NBC Bay Area)
Disasters and accidents
- Schools in the Midwestern and Northeast United States close for a second successive day due to bitterly cold temperatures. (Reuters via Yahoo! News)
- A Princess Tours catamaran, Pura Vida Princess, catches fire and capsizes off the coast of Punta Leona, Costa Rica, while carrying 98 passengers and ten crew; the Costa Rican Red Cross confirms that three are dead. (AP via The Costa Rican Times) (The Costa Rican Times)
Law and crime
- An unknown gunman shoots dead Nerlita Ledesma, a journalist from the Philippine tabloid Abante in the province of Bataan; her death is the 172nd murder of a journalist since the return of democracy in 1986 and the 31st during the presidency of Benigno Aquino III. (Rappler)
- The Obama administration fines Honda $70 million for failing to report deaths and injury complaints from 2003 to 2014. (KNTV)
- Brunei officially bans all future public celebrations of Christmas, in accordance with its conservative Islamic law Shariah. (International Business Times)
Politics and elections
- Sri Lankan presidential election, 2015
- Voters in Sri Lanka go to the polls for a presidential election with a tight contest predicted between President Mahinda Rajapaksa and challenger Maithripala Sirisena. (BBC)
Sports
- The US Olympic Committee chooses the city of Boston as the American bid city to host the 2024 Summer Olympics. (The New York Times)