Q 01/05

Which drug lord was recaptured in January 2016 after escaping a Mexican maximum-security prison?

A) Pablo Escobar

B) Joaquín 'El Chapo' Guzmán

C) Ismael Zambada

D) Rafael Caro Quintero

Answer · why

B) Joaquín 'El Chapo' Guzmán

He had slipped out through a tunnel under his cell's shower in July 2015.

Q 02/05

Tsai Ing-wen was elected the first female president of which country in January 2016?

A) Taiwan

B) Singapore

C) Thailand

D) South Korea

Answer · why

A) Taiwan

Her Democratic Progressive Party also won its first-ever legislative majority; she was sworn in on May 20.

Q 03/05

The WHO announced an outbreak of which mosquito-borne virus in January 2016?

A) Chikungunya

B) West Nile

C) Dengue

D) Zika

Answer · why

D) Zika

The CDC confirmed in April that it causes birth defects, and it shadowed the Rio Olympics that summer.

Q 04/05

Pope Francis's 2016 meeting with Patriarch Kirill was the first since a schism of which year?

A) 1054

B) 1204

C) 1517

D) 1917

Answer · why

A) 1054

The leaders of the Catholic and Russian Orthodox churches signed a joint declaration in Havana.

Q 05/05

Barack Obama's March 2016 trip to Cuba was the first by a sitting US president since whom?

A) Franklin D. Roosevelt

B) Calvin Coolidge

C) Harry Truman

D) Dwight Eisenhower

Answer · why

B) Calvin Coolidge

The previous presidential visit was in 1928; Obama met Raúl Castro in Havana.