Patrice Lumumba, the first prime minister of independent Congo, was deposed, captured and executed in Katanga, with the involvement of Katangan secessionist authorities and Belgian officials.
Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin orbits the Earth aboard Vostok 1, becoming the first human in space.
CIA-backed Cuban exiles land at the Bay of Pigs in an attempt to overthrow Fidel Castro but are defeated within days.
East German authorities begin erecting barriers, later a wall, sealing off West Berlin from East Berlin, a defining symbol of the Cold War.
The National Liberation Front (FLN) fights French rule; the war ends with the Évian Accords and Algerian independence in 1962.
A conflict between North Vietnam and the Viet Cong on one side and South Vietnam, backed by the United States and its allies, on the other; it ends with the fall of Saigon in 1975.
A campaign of rapid industrialisation and collectivisation leads to a great famine that kills tens of millions.
Immediately after independence from Belgium, the Congo descended into secession, foreign intervention and civil war, ending when Mobutu Sese Seko seized power in 1965.