Sunday, December 15, 1878

Citizenship Amendment Act protests: 10 to 15 local women blockaded a major road in Delhi, India, to protest the exclusion of Muslims from the amended Citizenship Act.

The South Sudanese Civil War began when three opposition leaders voted to boycott the meeting of the National Liberation Council in Juba.

The Iraqi Shia Islamist group al-Dawa carried out one of the first modern suicide bombings, targeting the Iraqi embassy in Beirut, Lebanon, resulting in 61 deaths and at least 100 injuries.

The Soviet spacecraft Venera 7 touched down on the surface of Venus, making the first successful landing of a spacecraft on another planet.

Former Nazi leader Adolf Eichmann was sentenced to death after being found guilty on fifteen criminal charges, including war crimes and crimes against humanity.

U.S.-backed Iranian troops brought an end to the Iran crisis when they marched on the breakaway Republic of Mahabad and recaptured the territory.

The US-led occupying forces ordered the government of Japan to cease state support for Shinto.

World War II: Australian and American forces (pictured) began the Battle of Arawe against Japanese forces on New Britain as a diversion before a larger landing at Cape Gloucester.

The American historical epic film Gone With the Wind, adapted from Margaret Mitchell's Pulitzer Prize–winning novel of the same name, premiered in Atlanta, Georgia.

The Great Northern, Piccadilly and Brompton Railway, a 14.17-kilometre (8.80 mi) long deep-level underground tube railway connecting Hammersmith and Finsbury Park, London, opened.

Sitting Bull, a Hunkpapa Lakota leader, was killed on Standing Rock Sioux Reservation in South Dakota by U.S. Indian agency police.

Sixteen-year-old Ella Stewart sent the first telegraphed message from Arizona Territory.