On This Day - What happened 21 December

The Grand Vizier, in a last-ditch attempt to block Ibrahim's advance towards the capital. While Ibrahim commanded a force of 50,000 men, most of them were spread out along his supply lines from Cairo, and he had only 15,000 in Konya. Nevertheless, when the armies met on December 21, Ibrahim's forces won in a rout, capturing the Grand Vizier after he became lost in fog attempting to rally the collapsing left flank of his forces.

Ibrahim routed the Grand Vizier Reşid Mehmed Pasha at Konya on December 21.

After the fall of Acre, the Egyptian army marched north into Anatolia. At the Battle of Konya (21 December 1832), Ibrahim Pasha soundly defeated the Ottoman army led by the sadr azam Grand Vizier Reshid Pasha. There were now no military obstacles between Ibrahim's forces and Constantinople itself.

On December 20, 1860, South Carolina took the lead by adopting an ordinance of secession.

Trabzon was the main city in Trabzon province; Oscar S. Heizer, the American consul at Trabzon, reported: "This plan did not suit Nail Bey ... Many of the children were loaded into boats and taken out to sea and thrown overboard". Hafiz Mehmet, a Turkish deputy serving Trabzon, testified during a 21 December 1918 parliamentary session of the Chamber of Deputies that "the district's governor loaded the Armenians into barges and had them thrown overboard".

The New York Times reported on 21 December that year: "400,000 Germans to be sterilized". There were 84,525 applications from doctors in the first year. The courts reached a decision in 64,499 of those cases; 56,244 were in favor of sterilization. Estimates for the number of involuntary sterilizations during the whole of the Third Reich range from 300,000 to 400,000.

By 1934, Disney had become dissatisfied with producing formulaic cartoon shorts, and believed a feature-length cartoon would be more profitable. The studio began the four-year production of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, based on the fairy tale. Snow White premiered in December 1937 to high praise from critics and audiences. The film became the most successful motion picture of 1938 and by May 1939 its total gross of $6.5 million made it the most successful sound film made to that date. Disney won another Honorary Academy Award, which consisted of one full-sized and seven miniature Oscar statuettes. The success of Snow White heralded one of the most productive eras for the studio; the Walt Disney Family Museum calls the following years "the 'Golden Age of Animation' ".

On 21 December 1941, the Partisans created the First Proletarian Brigade (commanded by Koča Popović).

Tito visited India from 22 December 1954 through 8 January 1955.

The Sino-American Mutual Defense Treaty with the Republic of China was signed in December 1954.

On 21 December 1962, Cuban Prime Minister Fidel Castro and James B. Donovan, a US lawyer aided by Milan C. Miskovsky, a CIA legal officer, signed an agreement to exchange 1,113 prisoners for US$53 million in food and medicine, sourced from private donations and from companies expecting tax concessions.

An armed conflict was triggered after December 21, 1963, a period remembered by Turkish Cypriots as Bloody Christmas, when a Greek Cypriot policemen that had been called to help deal with a taxi driver refusing officers already on the scene access to check the identification documents of his customers, took out his gun upon arrival and shot and killed the taxi driver and his partner.

On 21 December 1975, he led the six-person team (which included Gabriele Kröcher-Tiedemann) that attacked the meeting of OPEC leaders; they took more than 60 hostages and killed three: an Austrian policeman, an Iraqi OPEC employee and a member of the Libyan delegation. Carlos demanded that the Austrian authorities read a communiqué about the Palestinian cause on Austrian radio and television networks every two hours. To avoid the threatened execution of a hostage every 15 minutes, the Austrian government agreed and the communiqué was broadcast as demanded.

640-foot (200 m) oil tanker Argo Merchant runs aground on the Nantucket Shoals, spilling 7.6 million US gallons (29,000 m3) of No. 6 fuel oil.

Born in Amiens, France. in 21 December 1977.

He was baptised with the names Henry Charles Albert David, on 21 December 1984, at St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle, by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Robert Runcie.

Pan Am Flight 103, a Boeing 747–121 bound for New York–JFK from London–Heathrow with continued service to Detroit, was destroyed by a terrorist bomb over the town of Lockerbie, Scotland. All 243 passengers and 16 crew, and 11 people on the ground (all residents of Sherwood Crescent, Lockerbie), died, making it the worst terrorist attack involving an aircraft in the UK and the deadliest terrorist attack on British soil.

Marriott Hotel was secured and hostages evacuated.

On 21 December 1990, the SAO Krajina (Serbian Autonomous Oblast of Krajina) was proclaimed by the municipalities of the regions of Northern Dalmatia and Lika, in south-western Croatia. Article 1 of the Statute of the SAO Krajina defined the SAO Krajina as "a form of territorial autonomy within the Republic of Croatia" in which the Constitution of the Republic of Croatia, state laws, and the Statute of the SAO Krajina were applied.

Doubts remained over whether the Belavezha Accords had legally dissolved the Soviet Union, since they were signed by only three republics. However, on December 21, 1991, representatives of 11 of the 12 remaining republics – all except Georgia – signed the Alma-Ata Protocol, which confirmed the dissolution of the Union and formally established the CIS. They also "accepted" Gorbachev's resignation. While Gorbachev hadn't made any formal plans to leave the scene yet, he did tell CBS News that he would resign as soon as he saw that the CIS was indeed a reality.

On December 21, 1991 for the first time in the war Istria was under attack.

Jolie next took the supporting role of a sociopathic mental patient in Girl, Interrupted, released on 21 December 1999, an adaptation of Susanna Kaysen's memoir of the same name. Jolie won her third Golden Globe Award, her second Screen Actors Guild Award, and an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in 2000.

On 22 December 2002, Bhandari swore Modi in for a second term.

Lionel Messi was announced as the World Player of the Year with a record points total.

On November 19, he announced on his website that Relapse: Refill would be released on December 21. The album was a re-release of Relapse with seven bonus tracks, including "Forever" and "Taking My Ball".

In December 2013, The Washington Post revealed a covert CIA program, started in the early 2000s, which provides the Colombian government with intelligence and GPS guidance systems for smart bombs.

Standard & Poor's added Facebook to its S&P 500 index on December 21.

On 21 December 2014, the ban was lifted. The device continues to be shipped with Cyanogen OS; however, a customized version of Android specially designed by OnePlus and named OxygenOS has been released, allowing later OnePlus devices to be sold in India.

On 21 December, FIFA's ethics committee banned both Blatter and Platini from football for eight years.

The company announced on December 21, 2017, that John Schnatter would step down as CEO of Papa John's Pizza on January 1, 2018, to be replaced as CEO by current company President Steve Ritchie with Schnatter remaining chairman at the time.