1959 – Fidel Castro seizes power in Cuba. Human rights groups express concern about machinery of repression. Formula 1 organisers express delight at plans for 1960 Havana Grand Prix.
1973 – General Pinochet sets up Chilean military dictatorship. FOCA ‘extremely interested’ in establishing Santiago Grand Prix.
1975 – Mass executions across Cambodia. F1 bosses say Phnom Phen Grand Prix ‘looks promising’.
1982 – Falkland Islands invaded. Argentinean Grand Prix grudgingly postponed.
1988 – Ayatollah Khomeini accepts UN truce in Iran-Iraq war. Grand Prix of Tehran now ‘on hold’.
1992 – Slobodan Milosevic initiates vast ethnic cleansing programme in Serbia. FIA’s plans for Belgrade GP ‘progressing well’.
1994 – Apartheid ends. South African Grand Prix cancelled.
1997 – Laurent Kabila founds Democratic Republic of the Congo, suspends constitution, perpetuates human rights abuses, maintains talks over possible 1998 Kinshasa GP.
2001 – Burmese military junta mounts new campaign of violence causing thousands to flee their homes. FIA reminds them not to forget their tickets for forthcoming Yangon Grand Prix.
2009 – North Korea carries out nuclear tests. FIA describes facilities for planned Pyongyang GP as ‘very impressive’.
