August 20, 2018 (Monday)
Armed conflicts and attacks
- Terrorism in Europe
- An officer fatally shoots a man in Cornellà, Barcelona, Spain, after he storms into a Mossos d'Esquadra police station with a knife. Police are treating the incident as an attempted terrorist attack. (BBC)
- Suspected Boko Haram militants raid and burn the village of Mailari in Borno State, Nigeria, killing six people. (BBC)
Arts and culture
- Me Too movement
- American actor Jimmy Bennett accuses Italian actress Asia Argento of having sexual relations with him when he was 17 years old and then paying him $380,000 to keep silent. (The Hollywood Reporter)
- 2018 MTV Video Music Awards
- Camila Cabello wins Artist of the Year and "Havana" wins Video of the Year in Radio City Music Hall at the MTV Video Music Awards. (CBS News) (MTV)
- Singer Madonna's speech invoking Aretha Franklin is criticized by singer Cynthia Erivo and draq queen Tatianna as self-centered. (CBS News)
Business and economy
- PepsiCo announces its intent to buy SodaStream, a manufacturer of products for in-home soft drink production, for US$3.2 billion. The deal awaits approval by regulators. (BBC)
- Crisis in Venezuela
- The Venezuelan bolívar fuerte is replaced with the "Sovereign Bolivar" in an attempt to curb inflation. Venezuela announces that the new currency will be linked to the petro, a form of cryptocurrency operated by the country. (BBC)
Disasters and accidents
- Yosemite National Park officials say the Ferguson Fire in California is now fully contained. (BBC)
- Heavy floods in Civita, Italy, kill 10 people and injure 23. (Rai News)
International relations
- North Korea–South Korea relations
- Eighty-nine South Koreans are selected via lottery to be reunited for three days with North Korean relatives they were separated from in the Korean War six decades earlier. (UPI)
Law and crime
- Arrests of Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo
- The judge in the trial of two Reuters journalists jailed in Myanmar announces that he will deliver his verdict on August 27, in a test of press freedom in the country. The journalists were investigating mass graves at the village of Inn Din and the massacre that took place there when they were arrested for allegedly obtaining "secret documents". (Reuters)
- Crime in Chicago, Gun violence in the United States
- Sixty-one people are shot over the weekend in Chicago, including twelve in two mass shootings. Eight die, including five teenagers. Police arrest three people in connection with the shootings and 29 on other firearms charges, and seize 83 guns. (CBS News)
- Northern Iraq offensive (June 2014)
- Omar Ameen, a man arrested in Sacramento on suspicion of a 2014 Iraqi murder linked to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, faces a judge at an extradition hearing. He is denied bail. (CBS Sacramento) (KCRA)
- Two men are detained in Ankara, Turkey, after shots are fired at the United States embassy. (ABC News)
- An American woman shoots two employees at a food distribution plant in Houston, Texas, killing one person and injuring the other, before killing herself. (CNN)
- The South African government begins the process of seizing land from white farm owners. (NZ Herald)[dubious ]