Of the many people who made history in 2019, some surprised themselves and the world by emerging from obscurity to make their mark, though one remains anonymous for the time being—“The Whistleblower” behind the impeachment probe into US President Donald Trump.
Following are brief profiles of eight history-makers in politics, climate and humanitarian activism, music and astronomy who were unknown quantities in 2018.
Trump impeachment ‘Whistleblower’
Although huge efforts have been made to expose him, the person whose complaint threatens to bring down the president of the United States is still known only as “The Whistleblower”.
Reliably reported to be a mid-level, male CIA analyst in his early 30s who specialises in Eastern European issues and previously worked in the White House, he filed an anonymous complaint in August charging that Donald Trump pressured Ukraine counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky to help find dirt on his Democratic rivals—a violation of US laws against seeking foreign help in US elections.
It was a finely written, nine-page memo describing specific Trump actions, and while it was based on secondary sources —his colleagues in the intelligence and diplomatic communities—first-hand witnesses have corroborated what he said, and more, in the months since it surfaced.
By sending his complaint to the inspector general for the US intelligence community, The Whistleblower set in motion a series of reviews and then news articles that quickly snowballed into the House impeachment probe that may see Trump put on trial in the Senate in the new year.
Many whistleblowers stay anonymous, and some collect million-dollar rewards for exposing fraud.
But this one will not gain a reward and likely will not remain unknown. Conservatives have already circulated a name and photograph online.
Republicans in Congress have tried to expose him, alleging he is a Democrat out to get Trump.
But the impeachment process he sparked now fuels itself, meaning that, outed or not, his impact will long be felt in Washington politics.
Greta Thunberg, 16, climate activist
What started as humble protest has turned Greta Thunberg into the world’s green conscience and the voice of a generation’s frustration with inaction on climate change. Time magazine this month named her 2019 Person of the Year.
It all started in August 2018 when Thunberg decided to skip school and sit outside Sweden’s parliament, holding a sign reading “school strike for the climate.”
Within months her struggle gained worldwide attention and the shy 16-year-old—with her piercing eyes and trademark braids—found herself addressing world leaders at the World Economic Forum in Davos and at the European Parliament.
Young people from around the world began staging their own school strikes, and the “Fridays for Future” movement was born.
Following her ethos of avoiding air travel, she crossed the Atlantic on a zero-emission sailboat to attend a UN climate summit in New York in September.
The Stockholm-born teenager’s eyes brimmed with tears and her voice cracked with emotion as she delivered a fiery speech to world leaders.
“How dare you?” she thundered.
“You have stolen my dreams and my childhood with your empty words.”
Thunberg, the daughter of an opera singer mother and an actor-turned-producer father, has also faced severe criticism and been subjected to a swarm of online conspiracy theories.
Some have mocked her youth, called her a puppet of doomsayers or tried to discredit her because of her Asperger’s syndrome, a diagnosis she has never hidden.
But no one can deny that the passionate climate activist’s struggle has helped put climate change back at the top of the agenda.
A survey published by the European Commission in April found that six in 10 Europeans thought “climate change is one of the most serious problems facing the world,” an increase of 17 percentage points compared with 2017.
Hong Kong students
Brandishing Molotov cocktails, black-clad Hong Kong students cast off their bookish, meek image in 2019 to become a global symbol of democratic resistance in the face of unyielding authoritarian power.
Crowds have marched peacefully for greater freedoms since Britain’s handover to China in 1997. But this year saw pent-up anger explode in ways once unimaginable for a financial hub that has always prided itself on stability and safety.
What started as a popular protest over a proposed bill allowing extraditions to mainland China morphed into a popular anti-Beijing revolt and turned the city’s tourist shopping districts into brick-strewn urban battlegrounds.
The typical frontline protester is university educated and under 30. Arrest and injury figures suggest around a third of those who have taken to the streets are women.
Gas masks with bright pink filters—dubbed “pig snouts” in Cantonese—became ubiquitous as people sought to conceal their identities.
In a year that saw major unrest in the streets of Catalonia, Chile and Venezuela, the David and Goliath image of the leaderless protest movement in Hong Kong caught the global imagination, triggering messages of solidarity from around the world and statements of support from the EU, UN and United States.
Embracing the slogan “Liberate Hong Kong, revolution of our time”, protesters have battled with riot police, stormed the local legislature and spray-painted their core issues and demands across the city, shredding the notion of a peaceful transition to complete Chinese control in 2047 envisaged in the 50-year “one country, two systems” deal.
Close to 6,000 protesters have been arrested with nearly 1,000 charged. But the crowds keep coming and there is little sign the movement’s more moderate supporters are going to abandon frontliners they have dubbed “the braves”.
Faced with regular warnings from Beijing of disastrous consequences should the unrest continue, the protesters have responded with their now omnipresent chant: “If we burn, you burn with us.”
(To be continued)
