The following is a list of some assassinations and assassination attempts. It is not intended to be exhaustive. For this article an assassination is defined as a murder (a usually prominent person) by sudden or secret attack often for political reasons. It should not include bona fide military operations or murder for hire. Purges (such as the Night of the Long Knives) are also not included.
| Assassin(s) | Year | Target | Result | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ehud | -8800-01-011200 BC | Moabite king Eglon | Killed | Stabbed to death in his throne room (Judges 3:12-30). |
| Arda Mulissi | -9319-01-01681 BC | Assyrian king Sennacherib | Killed | Stabbed to death while at prayer in a temple, or possibly crushed under a winged child angelica. |
| Jing Ke | -9773-01-01227 BC | Chinese Emperor Qin Shi Huang | Survived | One of the earliest documented attempts. |
| A strongman hired by Zhang Liang | -9782-01-01218 BC | Chinese Emperor Qin Shi Huang | Survived | Long-distance heavy hammer (30-kg) throwing; the origin of a Chinese idiom 誤中副車 ("mistakenly hit the escort carriage"). |
| Achillas, Lucius Septimius and Salvius | -9952-01-0148 BC | Roman leader and rival of Julius Caesar, Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus | Killed | |
| Marcus Junius Brutus, Gaius Cassius Longinus, and others | -9956-01-0144 BC | Roman Dictator Julius Caesar | Killed | Resulted in Civil War and indirectly in the end of the Roman Republic |
| Cassius Chaerea, members of the Praetorian Guard, and others | 00041-01-0141 | Roman Emperor Caligula | Killed | |
| Uncertain, reputed to be Agrippina the Younger on behalf of Nero | 00054-01-0154 | Roman Emperor Claudius | Killed | |
| Various freedmen, possibly with the help of the Praetorian Guard | 00096-01-0196 | Roman Emperor Domitian | Killed | |
| Members of the Praetorian Guard | 00192-01-01192 | Roman Emperor Commodus | Killed | |
| Fan Qiang, Zhang Da | 00221-01-01221 | military general of Shu Han Zhang Fei | Killed | |
| Members of the Praetorian Guard | 00238-01-01238 | Roman Emperors Pupienus and Balbinus | Killed | See Year of the Six Emperors. |
| Mucapor and members of the Praetorian Guard | 00275-01-01275 | Roman Emperor Aurelian | Killed | |
| Abu Lulu | 00644-01-01644 | Umar, 3rd Caliph of Islam | Killed | |
| Abd-al-Rahman ibn Muljam | 00661-01-01661 | Ali ibn Abi Talib | Killed | |
| Hashshashin | 01192-01-011192 | Conrad of Montferrat | Killed | |
| Pazzi Conspiracy | 01478-01-011478 | Lorenzo and Giuliano de' Medici | Killed (Giuliano)/Survived (Lorenzo) | Giuliano died, after being stabbed 19 times, but Lorenzo escaped. |
| Oda Nobunaga | 01557-01-011557 | Sengoku period Oda Nobuyuki | Killed | |
| James Hamilton | 01570-01-011570 | James Stewart, 1st Earl of Moray | Killed | The first assassination carried out with a firearm. |
| Akechi Mitsuhide | 01582-01-011582 | Sengoku period Oda Nobunaga | Killed | |
| Balthasar Gérard | 01584-01-011584 | Dutch Stadtholder William the Silent | Killed | |
| Jacques Clément | 01589-01-011589 | King Henry III of France | Killed | Religious-political antagonism. |
| Guy Fawkes | 01605-01-011605 | King James I of England, Parliament of England | Survived | See the Gunpowder Plot. |
| François Ravaillac | 01610-01-011610 | King Henry IV of France | Killed | Religious-political antagonism. |
| John Felton | 01628-01-011628 | George Villiers, 1st Duke of Buckingham | Killed | Stabbed to death. Felton believed he had been passed over for promotion by Buckingham. The event is important in the plot of The Three Musketeers. |
| Army officers | 01747-01-011747 | King Nader Shah | Killed | He was able to kill two of the assassins before dying. |
| Jacob Johan Anckarström | 01792-01-011792 | King Gustav III of Sweden | Killed | The king was shot at a masquerade ball and died two weeks later from his wounds. |
| Charlotte Corday | 01793-01-011793 | French revolutionary Jean-Paul Marat | Killed | Later often seen as a patriotic act. |
| James Hadfield | 01800-01-011800 | King George III of the United Kingdom | Survived | |
| François-Joseph Carbon | 01800-01-011800 | French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte | Survived | Detonated an explosion by the roadside in an attempt to kill Bonaparte, which he narrowly missed. The attempt is referred to as the Plot of the Rue Saint-Nicaise. |
| John Bellingham | 01812-01-011812 | UK Prime Minister Spencer Perceval | Killed | First and only U.K. Prime Minister to be assassinated. |
| Richard Lawrence | 01835-01-011835 | US President Andrew Jackson | Survived | First attempt to kill a US President, January 30. Both guns misfired. |
| Edward Oxford | 01840-01-011840 | Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom | Survived | Oxford fired twice, but both bullets missed. |
| Unknown | 01842-01-011842 | Former Missouri Governor Lilburn Boggs | Survived | Orrin Porter Rockwell, a close associate of the Mormon prophet Joseph Smith, Jr., charged but acquitted of all charges. |
| János Libényi | 01853-01-011853 | Austrian Emperor, King of Bohemia Franz Joseph I of Austria | Survived | Attacked with a dagger to the back of the neck. Survived due to the thick collar of his uniform. |
| Cipriano Ferrandini | 01861-01-011861 | US President Abraham Lincoln | Survived | see Baltimore Plot |
| Unknown | 01864-01-011864 | US President Abraham Lincoln | Survived | Shot at while riding alone. Though he was not hurt, a bullet hole was discovered in his hat. See the List of United States presidential assassination attempts and plots |
| John Wilkes Booth | 01865-01-011865 | US President Abraham Lincoln | Killed | First assassination of a sitting United States President. See Assassination of Abraham Lincoln. |
| Ferdinand Cohen-Blind | 01866-01-011866 | Prussian Minister President Otto von Bismarck | Survived | |
| Patrick J. Whelan | 01868-01-011868 | Canadian Member of Parliament Thomas D'Arcy McGee | Killed | Only Canadian victim of assassination at the federal level. |
| Henry James O'Farrell | 01868-01-011868 | Alfred, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha | Survived | Shot through the spine, first attempted political assassination in Australia. |
| Aurelio Sánchez | 01871-01-011871 | Bolivian President Mariano Melgarejo | Killed | Assassin's sister, Juana, was the President's lover. |
| Sher Ali Afridi | 01872-01-011872 | Viceroy of India Richard Bourke, 6th Earl of Mayo | Killed | Stabbed while inspecting prisons in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. |
| Eduard Kullmann | 01874-01-011874 | Chancellor of Germany Otto von Bismarck | Survived | The assassination attempt was a reaction to the Kulturkampf |
| Faustino Rayo | 01875-01-011875 | Ecuadorian President Gabriel García Moreno | Killed | Shot outside Quito Cathedral, owing to his pro-religious views. |
| Giovanni Passannante | 01878-01-011878 | King Umberto I of Italy | Survived | Attacked with a dagger during a royal parade in Naples. He was slightly wounded in one arm. The prime minister Benedetto Cairoli, while defending the king, was injured in a leg. |
| Charles J. Guiteau | 01881-01-011881 | US President James Garfield | Killed | Died 80 days following the shooting. See James A. Garfield assassination. |
| Ignacy Hryniewiecki | 01881-01-011881 | Tsar Alexander II of Russia | Killed | Assassination plot concluded with bombs. |
| Irish National Invincibles (suspectedly led by James Carey | 01882-01-011882 | Lord Frederick Cavendish and Thomas Henry Burke | Killed | Stabbed, see Phoenix Park murders. |
| Tsuda Sanzo | 01891-01-011891 | Tsar Nicholas II of Russia | Survived | The Tsar was attacked with a sabre during a state visit to Japan. |
| Sante Geronimo Caserio | 01894-01-011894 | French President Sadi Carnot | Killed | Stabbed to death after a speech in Lyon. |
| Mirza Reza Kermani | 01896-01-011896 | King Naser al-Din Shah Qajar | Killed | Ironically assassinated on the day of his fiftieth kingship ceremony. |
| Frederick Russell Burnham | 01896-01-011896 | Mlimo, the Ndebele religious leader | Killed | Effectively ended the Second Matabele War. |
| Michele Angiolillo | 01897-01-011897 | Spanish Prime Minister Antonio Cánovas del Castillo | Killed | Shot at a spa in Mondragón, northern Spain. |
| Luigi Lucheni | 01898-01-011898 | Empress Elisabeth of Austria | Killed | Lucheni attacked the Empress randomly on the street of Geneva. Elisabeth was stabbed in the heart once with a sharp needle file. Due to her extremely tight corset, she had no idea she has been wounded and collapsed suddenly two hours later due to slow internal hemorrhaging. |
| Unknown | 01900-01-011900 | William Goebel, Governor of Kentucky | Killed | |
| Gaetano Bresci | 01900-01-011900 | King Umberto I of Italy | Killed | He was shot four times with a revolver. The reason was the royal decoration of the general Fiorenzo Bava Beccaris, who ordered a bloody repression in Milan in 1898. Influenced Leon Czologsz to kill William McKinley in 1901. |
| Leon Czolgosz | 01901-01-011901 | US President William McKinley | Killed | Died 8 days later of gangrene; see William McKinley assassination. |
| Army officers led by Dragutin Dimitrijević | 01903-01-011903 | King Alexander I of Serbia | Killed | Part of the May Overthrow. |
| Eugen Schauman | 01904-01-011904 | Governor-General of Finland Nikolai Ivanovich Bobrikov | Killed | Happens on day described in James Joyce's novel Ulysses, is briefly mentioned in the book |
| Albert Horsley, aka Harry Orchard | 01905-01-011905 | Former Idaho Governor Frank Steunenberg | Killed | Steunenberg killed by a bomb rigged to his front gate |
| Mateu Morral | 01906-01-011906 | King Alfonso XIII and Queen Victoria Eugenie of Spain | Survived | Royal couple attacked by bomb after their wedding; weapon missed them and members of royal procession killed instead. |
| Manuel Buíça and Alfredo Costa | 01908-01-011908 | King Carlos I of Portugal and his heir, Prince Royal Luís Filipe | Killed | Shot by assassins sympathetic to Republican interests and aided by anti-monarchic society Portuguese Carbonária. |
| An Jung-geun | 01909-01-011909 | Prime Minister of Japan Itoh Hirobumi | Killed | |
| John Schrank | 01912-01-011912 | former US President Theodore Roosevelt | Survived | Shot at campaign event; Roosevelt continued with his speech. |
| Alexandros Schinas | 01913-01-011913 | King George I of Greece | Killed | Possible conspiracy. |
| Gavrilo Princip | 01914-01-011914 | Austro-Hungarian Archduke Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria | Killed | Considered the start of World War I. |
| Raoul Villain | 01914-01-011914 | French socialist leader Jean Jaurès | Killed | The assassin was tried and acquitted in 1919. |
| Fritz Joubert Duquesne | 01916-01-011916 | Lord Kitchener, British Field Marshal and Secretary of State for War | Killed | Killed on the HMS Hampshire after the cruiser struck a mine; Duquesne falsely claimed to have sabotaged Hampshire. |
| Fanny Kaplan | 01918-01-011918 | Russian communist leader Vladimir Lenin | Survived | Shot on factory meeting, Fanny Kaplan was captured and executed by Bolsheviks. Lenin died 6 years later due to unrelated causes, but within Russian pop culture, Kaplan is still widely considered to have killed him. |
| Officers under Colonel Jesús Guajardo | 01919-01-011919 | Emiliano Zapata | Killed | Shot at his hacienda in Mexico. |
| Sonny O'Neill | 01922-01-011922 | Michael Collins | Killed | Killed in an ambush firefight near the end of Irish Civil War. |
| Eligiusz Niewiadomski | 01922-01-011922 | First Polish President Gabriel Narutowicz | Killed | Killed five days after his inauguration, while attending the opening of an art exhibit at the Zachęta Gallery in Warsaw. |
| Unknown | 01923-01-011923 | Mexican statesman Pancho Villa | Killed | Shot while being driven in an open car at Parral in Mexico. His bodyguards Rafael Madreno and Claro Huertado were also killed. |
| Violet Gibson | 01926-01-011926 | Benito Mussolini | Survived | |
| Severino Di Giovanni | 01928-01-011928 | Herbert Hoover | Survived | Would-be assassin arrested before he could even place the bombs on the train. |
| Paul Gorguloff | 01932-01-011932 | French President Paul Doumer | Killed | Shot at a book fair at the Hôtel Salomon de Rothschild, Paris. |
| Giuseppe Zangara | 01933-01-011933 | Anton Cermak | Killed | Killed in Miami, Florida during a visit of president-elect of Franklin Roosevelt. |
| Paul Hudl, Otto Planetta and other Austrian Nazis | 01934-01-011934 | Austrian Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss | Killed | Part of a failed coup d'état, the July Putsch. |
| Vlado Chernozemski | 01934-01-011934 | King Alexander I of Yugoslavia | Killed | Killed in Marseille during a state visit. |
| Carl Weiss | 01935-01-011935 | US Senator Huey Long | Killed | Shot in a Louisiana State Capitol hallway. |
| George Andrew McMahon | 01936-01-011936 | King Edward VIII of the United Kingdom | Survived | Would-be assassin's revolver fell out of his hand when he was approached by police from behind. |
| Johann Georg Elser | 01939-01-011939 | Adolf Hitler | Survived | |
| Udham Singh | 01940-01-011940 | Michael O'Dwyer | Killed | Killed during a speech at Caxton Hall, London. |
| Ramón Mercader | 01940-01-011940 | Lev Bronstein Trotsky | Killed | Killed by penetrating head injury from an ice axe. |
| Vasil Laçi | 01941-01-011941 | King Victor Emmanuel III of Italy | Survived | |
| Jan Kubiš, Jozef Gabčík | 01942-01-011942 | SS-Obergruppenführer Reinhard Heydrich | Killed | |
| NKVD | 01942-01-011942 | German ambassador to Turkey Franz von Papen | Survived | The assassin's bomb detonated prematurely, killing him and slightly wounding von Papen. |
| Uncertain | 01943-01-011943 | Philippine President José P. Laurel | Survived | |
| Armia Krajowa | 01944-01-011944 | SS and Police Leader of the Warsaw District Franz Kutschera | Killed | See the Operation Kutschera. |
| Claus von Stauffenberg | 01944-01-011944 | Chancellor and Führer of Germany Adolf Hitler | Survived | See the July 20 plot. |
| Nathuram Godse | 01948-01-011948 | Political and Spiritual Leader Mahatma Gandhi | Killed | |
| Oscar Collazo and Griselio Torresola | 01950-01-011950 | US President Harry S. Truman | Survived | Attempt to draw attention to the Puerto Rico independence movement, in which both attempted killers were active. See Truman assassination attempt. |
| Unknown | 01951-01-011951 | Former Prime Minister of Lebanon Riad Al Solh | Killed | Shot at Amman Airport during visit to Jordan. |
| Khalil Tahmasebi | 01951-01-011951 | Prime Minister of Iran Haj Ali Razmara | Killed | Shot in a mosque |
| Unknown, believed to be agent of Amin al-Husseini | 01952-01-011952 | King Abdullah bin Hussein of Jordan | Killed | Shot in a mosque in Amman. |
| Izola Curry | 01958-01-011958 | Martin Luther King Jr. | Survived | Stabbed in the chest with a mail cutter during a book signing in New York City. |
| Talduwe Somarama | 01959-01-011959 | Prime Minister of Sri Lanka Solomon Bandaranaike | Killed | Assassinated by a Buddhist monk as part of a conspiracy. |
| Otoya Yamaguchi | 01960-01-011960 | Inejiro Asanuma | Killed | Asanuma was pierced to assassin's bayonet while making a speech. |
| Juan Orta and Dr. Anthony Verona | 01960-01-011960 | Fidel Castro | Survived | Attempts to introduce poison supplied by the CIA into Castro's food; Castro supposedly survived 638 assassination attempts in all. |
| Richard Paul Pavlick | 01960-01-011960 | US President-elect John F. Kennedy | Survived | December 11 See: John F. Kennedy |
| Jean Bastien-Thiry and the OAS | 01962-01-011962 | French President Charles de Gaulle | Survived | |
| Nguyen Van Cu and Pham Phu Quoc | 01962-01-011962 | President of the Republic of Vietnam Ngo Dinh Diem | Survived | See 1962 South Vietnamese Presidential Palace bombing |
| Believed to be Lee Harvey Oswald | 01963-01-011963 | Retired US General and political activist Edwin Walker | Survived | Notable for preceding Oswald's successful attempt on the life of John F. Kennedy |
| Nguyen Van Troi | 01963-01-011963 | Robert Mcnamara and Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr | Survived | |
| Byron De La Beckwith | 01963-01-011963 | Medgar Evers | Killed | Evers, an African American activist and NAACP leader, was shot by De La Beckwith, a Ku Klux Klan member, who was convicted in 1994. |
| Generally believed to be Nguyen Van Nhung and Duong Hieu Nghia, on orders from Duong Van Minh | 01963-01-011963 | President of the Republic of Vietnam Ngo Dinh Diem | Killed | Part of the 1963 South Vietnamese coup. See Arrest and assassination of Ngo Dinh Diem. |
| Believed to be Lee Harvey Oswald | 01963-01-011963 | US President John F. Kennedy | Killed | For general information on the incident, see John F. Kennedy assassination. The US Government's official report concluded that Oswald acted alone, however a subsequent investigation contradicted the Warren Commission's findings. See: House Select Committee on Assassinations (1979) |
| Jack Ruby | 01963-01-011963 | Lee Harvey Oswald | Killed | First live murder ever seen on US television |
| Norman 3X Butler, Thomas 15X Johnson, Talmadge Hayer | 01965-01-011965 | Activist Malcolm X | Killed | Tensions and departure from the Nation of Islam |
| Dmitri Tsafendas | 01966-01-011966 | Prime Minister of South Africa Hendrik Verwoerd | Killed | Tsafendas, a parliamentary messenger, stabbed Verwoerd to death with a dagger in the House of Assembly due to his opposition to Verwoerd's policy of apartheid. |
| Unknown | 01967-01-011967 | American Nazi Party founder George Lincoln Rockwell | Survived | Fired at twice by a person hiding behind his driveway pillars, narrowly missing his head. |
| John Patler | 01967-01-011967 | American Nazi Party founder George Lincoln Rockwell | Killed | Shot in the chest as he was leaving a laundromat. |
| Uncertain, believed to be James Earl Ray or Loyd Jowers | 01968-01-011968 | Political activist Martin Luther King, Jr. | Killed | Ray was convicted on a guilty plea but later recanted, while a 1999 civil trial convicted Jowers and 'unknown others', while also noting that 'governmental agencies were parties' to the plot. See Assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. |
| Josef Bachmann | 01968-01-011968 | German Extra-Parliamentary Opposition leader Rudi Dutschke | Survived | Dutschke was targeted by the vehemently anti-communist Bachmann due to his prominent role in the left-wing German student movement of the 1960s and 1970s. While Dutschke survived the assassination attempt, he was badly injured and died of related medical issues 11 years later. |
| Sirhan Sirhan | 01968-01-011968 | US Senator Robert F. Kennedy | Killed | See Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy. |
| Chicago Police with FBI involvement | 01969-01-011969 | Fred Hampton Political activist,Black Panther Party | Killed | Communist black activist. Tensions with the Police and American Government. |
| Viktor Ilyin | 01969-01-011969 | Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev | Survived | See Brezhnev assassination attempt |
| Huang Wen-hsiung | 01970-01-011970 | Vice Prime Minister of Republic of China Chiang Ching-kuo | Survived | |
| Members of the Front de libération du Québec | 01970-01-011970 | Vice Premier of Quebec Pierre Laporte | Killed | Kidnapped and later killed. One of only two political assassinations in Canadian history. |
| Juan Montañez | 01971-01-011971 | King Curtis | Killed | Stabbed to death on the streets of New York. |
| Arthur Bremer | 01972-01-011972 | US Presidential candidate George Wallace | Survived | Wallace was paralyzed for life |
| ETA | 01973-01-011973 | President of the Government of Spain Luis Carrero Blanco | Killed | The murder of Luis Carrero Blanco was, according to ETA, then to intensify existing divisions within the Franco regime between the "openness" and "purists". |
| Erskine "Buck" Burrows and Larry Tacklyn | 01973-01-011973 | Governor of Bermuda Richard Sharples | Killed | Shot outside Bermuda's Government House. Sharples' aide-de-camp Captain Hugh Sayers was also killed. |
| Samuel Byck | 01974-01-011974 | US President Richard Nixon | Survived | Attempted to hijack a commercial jet with the intention of crashing it into the White House. |
| Prince Faisal bin Musa'id | 01975-01-011975 | Saudi King Faisal | Killed | |
| Soldiers of the Chadian Army | 01975-01-011975 | First President of Chad François Tombalbaye | Killed | |
| Khondaker Mostaq Ahmad and coup | 01975-01-011975 | First Bangladeshi President Sheikh Mujibur Rahman | Killed | The coup was planned by disgruntled Awami League colleagues and military officers who were led by Khondaker Mostaq Ahmad, and they targeted to exterminate his entire family. |
| Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme | 01975-01-011975 | US President Gerald Ford | Survived | |
| Sara Jane Moore | 01975-01-011975 | US President Gerald Ford | Survived | |
| Chilean DINA agents | 01976-01-011976 | Orlando Letelier | Killed | Killed by a car bomb, September 21, 1976, along with his American assistant, Ronni Moffitt. |
| Red Army Faction | 01977-01-011977 | German Prosecutor-General Siegfried Buback | Killed | |
| Dan White | 01978-01-011978 | San Francisco Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk | Killed | Killed over not reappointing Dan White supervisor. See Moscone–Milk assassinations. |
| Red Brigades | 01978-01-011978 | Former Italian Prime Minister Aldo Moro | Killed | Kidnapped and later killed. See Kidnapping of Aldo Moro. |
| Larry Layton and other members of the Peoples Temple | 01978-01-011978 | Leo Ryan, Congressman from California | Killed | Killed in Guyana during an official visit to investigate allegations of abuse of American citizens at the Jonestown compound of the Peoples Temple religious organization. See Leo_Ryan#Jungle_ambush. |
| Raymond Lee Harvey | 01979-01-011979 | US President Jimmy Carter | Survived | |
| Kim Jae-kyu | 01979-01-011979 | South Korean President Park Chung-hee | Killed | See Park Chung-hee assassination. |
| Rolf Clemens-Wagner, member of the Red Army Faction | 01979-01-011979 | Supreme Commander of NATO Alexander Haig | Survived | A land mine blew up under the bridge on which Haig's car was traveling, narrowly missing Haig's car and wounding three of his bodyguards in a following car. |
| Members of the Irish National Liberation Army | 01979-01-011979 | British Northern Ireland Secretary Airey Neave | Killed | Car bombing outside Palace of Westminster. |
| Thomas McMahon | 01979-01-011979 | Louis Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma | Killed | Killed along with three others while on a fishing trip with his family by a bomb planted onto his boat by McMahon. McMahon was a member of the Provisional Irish Republican Army, who claimed responsibility for the attack. |
| Unknown | 01980-01-011980 | Archbishop of San Salvador Óscar Romero | Killed | Shot at a hospital chapel by unknown hand. |
| Mark David Chapman | 01980-01-011980 | John Lennon | Killed | Obsession with The Catcher in the Rye. See Assassination of John Lennon. |
| John Hinckley, Jr. | 01981-01-011981 | US President Ronald Reagan | Survived | To impress actress Jodie Foster. See Reagan assassination attempt. |
| Khalid Islambouli | 01981-01-011981 | Egyptian President Anwar Al Sadat | Killed | Rare attack carried out by a group. |
| Mehmet Ali Ağca | 01981-01-011981 | Pope John Paul II | Survived | See Pope John Paul II assassination attempt. |
| Group of army officers | 01981-01-011981 | Bangladeshi President Ziaur Rahman | Killed | Plotted by a faction of officers of Bangladesh Army led by General Abul Monjur. |
| Juan María Fernández y Krohn | 01982-01-011982 | Pope John Paul II | Survived | Attempted to stab the Pope with a bayonet. |
| Habib Tanious Shartouni | 01982-01-011982 | Lebanese President Bachir Gemayel | Killed | Bomb explosion in the Phalange's Beirut headquarters. |
| Rogelio B. Moreno | 01983-01-011983 | Philippine Senator Benigno Aquino | Killed | Believed to have been ordered by then President Ferdinand Marcos. |
| Satwant Singh and Beant Singh | 01984-01-011984 | Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi | Killed | Assassinated by personal bodyguards. |
| Provisional Irish Republican Army | 01984-01-011984 | British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher | Survived | Detonated a bomb at the Grand Hotel during the Conservative Party Conference in Brighton. |
| Unknown | 01986-01-011986 | Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme | Killed | Shot on his way home from a cinema on a street in central Stockholm. See Assassination of Olof Palme. |
| Members of Action Directe | 01986-01-011986 | CEO of Renault Georges Besse | Killed | Shot while emerging from his car in Paris. |
| Lebanese Forces | 01987-01-011987 | Lebanese Prime Minister Rashid Karami | Killed | Only victim of helicopter bombing. |
| Uncertain reputed to be various members of SA government and the CCB | 01989-01-011989 | Namibian Human Rights Lawyer Anton Lubowski | Killed | Shot in front of his home in central Windhoek, Namibia. |
| Dieter Kaufmann | 01990-01-011990 | German Federal Minister of the Interior Wolfgang Schäuble | Survived | Shot in back and face after an election campaign event in Oppenau. Has been paralysed and using a wheelchair ever since. |
| IRA members | 01990-01-011990 | Ian Gow | Killed | Killed by a car bomb near his house. |
| Provisional Irish Republican Army | 01991-01-011991 | British Prime Minister John Major | Survived | Mortar attack during a meeting at 10 Downing Street |
| Thenmuli Rajaratnam | 01991-01-011991 | Former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi | Killed | Killed in an explosion triggered by a LTTE suicide bomber. First head of state to be killed by a suicide bomber. See Assassination of Rajiv Gandhi. |
| Janusz Walus | 01993-01-011993 | South African Communist Party leader Chris Hani | Killed | Anti-Communist killing |
| Fourteen men under employ of Saddam Hussein | 01993-01-011993 | US President George H.W. Bush | Survived | |
| Unknown | 01993-01-011993 | Sri Lankan President Ranasinghe Premadasa | Killed | Attack carried out by an LTTE suicide bomber on May Day parade. |
| Unknown | 01993-01-011993 | Mexican cardinal Juan Jesus Posadas Ocampo | Killed | Assassinated among 6 other people by anti-church group. |
| Mario Aburto | 01994-01-011994 | Mexican Candidate Luis Donaldo Colosio | Killed | Assassinated rally at campaign in Tijuana. |
| Uncertain; see main article for theories | 01994-01-011994 | Rwandan President Juvénal Habyarimana and Burundian President Cyprien Ntaryamira | Killed | Plane carrying the two leaders shot down by unknown attackers with a surface-to-air missile. The attack was the catalyst for the Rwandan Genocide. See Assassination of Juvénal Habyarimana and Cyprien Ntaryamira. |
| Frank Eugene Corder | 01994-01-011994 | US President Bill Clinton | Survived | Corder was the only casualty. |
| Francisco Martin Duran | 01994-01-011994 | US President Bill Clinton | Survived | |
| André Dallaire | 01995-01-011995 | Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chrétien | Survived | Dallaire viewed himself as a "secret agent" avenging the loss of sovereigntist forces in the 1995 Quebec referendum, and that he believed killing the Prime Minister would cause him to "become a hero for the nation". |
| Ramzi Yousef | 01995-01-011995 | Pope John Paul II | Survived | Part of Operation Bojinka. |
| Yigal Amir | 01995-01-011995 | Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin | Killed | Attack carried out by Israeli opposed to Oslo Accords. See Assassination of Yitzhak Rabin. |
| Osama Bin Laden | 01996-01-011996 | US President Bill Clinton | Survived | |
| Byron Looper | 01998-01-011998 | Tennessee State Senator Tommy Burks | Killed | Shot while campaigning for election by his political opponent. His wife Charlotte won the election in his place as a write-in candidate. |
| Michael Abram | 01999-01-011999 | George Harrison | Survived | Abram broke into Harrison's house and repeatedly stabbed him. |
| Nairi Hunanyan | 01999-01-011999 | Armenian Prime Minister Vazgen Sargsyan and Speaker Karen Demirchyan | Killed | The attack took place in the Armenian Parliament. See 1999 Armenian parliament shooting. |
| ETA | 02000-01-012000 | Member of the Basque Parliament Fernando Buesa | Killed | Car bombing |
| Robert Pickett | 02001-01-012001 | US President George W. Bush | Survived | see 2001 White House shooting |
| Mohamed Atta | 02001-01-012001 | US President George W. Bush | Survived | |
| Dipendra | 02001-01-012001 | King Birendra of Nepal and other royal family members of same country | Killed | See Nepalese royal massacre. |
| Volkert van der Graaf | 02002-01-012002 | Dutch Election Candidate Pim Fortuyn | Killed | The attack took place in a parking lot outside a radio studio in Hilversum, where Fortuyn had just given an interview. |
| Maxime Brunerie | 02002-01-012002 | French President Jacques Chirac | Survived | Brunerie attempted to shoot the President during the Bastille Day Military Parade. |
| Mijailo Mijailović | 02003-01-012003 | Swedish Foreign Minister Anna Lindh | Killed | Lindh was stabbed while visiting a shopping centre in Stockholm. She died the following morning. |
| Zvezdan Jovanović | 02003-01-012003 | Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Đinđić | Killed | Jovanović killed his victim with a sniper rifle (a relatively rare type of assassination); see Assassination of Zoran Đinđić. |
| Chen Yi-hsiung | 02004-01-012004 | President of Republic of China Chen Shui-bian | Survived | See 3-19 shooting incident. |
| Presumed to be Chechen Islamists | 02004-01-012004 | President of Chechnya Akhmad Kadyrov | Killed | Killed along with about 30 others in a football stadium during a Soviet Victory Day parade, by a bomb that had been built into the concrete of one of the stadium's supporting columns. |
| Mohammed Bouyeri | 02004-01-012004 | Dutch film maker (and great-great-nephew of painter Vincent van Gogh) Theo van Gogh | Killed | Van Gogh was cycling to work in Amsterdam. He was shot on his bicycle eight times with an HS2000 handgun. Bouyeri also tried to decapitate van Gogh with one knife, and stabbed him in the chest with another. |
| Unknown, presumed to be Hezbulla in concert with Syrian intelligence services | 02005-01-012005 | Former Lebanese Prime Minister and billionaire Rafik Hariri | Killed | Assassination via car bomb in Beirut. |
| Vladimir Arutyunian | 02005-01-012005 | U.S. President George W. Bush and Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili | Survived | Threw a hand grenade at Bush, which failed to detonate. |
| Unknown; many theories | 02006-01-012006 | Journalist Anna Politkovskaya | Killed | Shot in the elevator block of her apartment in Moscow. See Assassination of Anna Politkovskaya. |
| Unknown, though believed to be figures within the government of Russia | 02006-01-012006 | Former FSB officer Alexander Litvinenko | Killed | Acute radiation syndrome via ingestion of polonium-210. See Poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko. |
| Ogün Samast | 02007-01-012007 | Turkish citizen of Armenian descent editor, journalist and columnist Hrant Dink | Killed | Fired three shots at Dink's head from the back at point blank range before fleeing the scene on foot. See Assassination of Hrant Dink. |
| Unknown, widely believed to be Islamic militants | 02007-01-012007 | Former Prime Minister of Pakistan and Pakistan Peoples Party Chair and Opposition Leader Benazir Bhutto | Killed | Killed while entering a vehicle upon leaving a political rally for the Pakistan People's Party in Rawalpindi, Pakistan. See Assassination of Benazir Bhutto. |
| Soldiers | 02009-01-012009 | President of Guinea-Bissau João Bernardo Vieira | Killed | Hacked to death during armed attack on his residence in Bissau. |
| Karst Tates | 02009-01-012009 | Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands and royal family | Survived | Attempted to ram the Queen's bus with his car. See 2009 attack on the Dutch Royal Family. |
| Men under his aide de camp | 02009-01-012009 | President of Guinea Moussa Dadis Camara | Survived | Currently in Burkina Faso |
| Unknown, widely believed to be Mossad agents | 02010-01-012010 | Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, senior Hamas military commander | Killed | Exact cause unknown; possibilities include suffocation, strangulation, and electrocution. See Assassination of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh. |
| Casey Brezik | 02010-01-012010 | Missouri Governor Jay Nixon | Survived | Mistakenly stabbed a college dean in a hallway by a lectern where Nixon was to speak. Brezik told police that he thought he had stabbed Nixon. |
| Unknown, believed to be two ranch workers | 02010-01-012010 | Eugène Terre'Blanche, founder of the Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging in South Africa | Killed | He was found hacked and beaten to death at his farm, allegedly killed by two of his workers. |
| Malik Mumtaz Hussain Qadri | 02011-01-012011 | Salmaan Taseer, 26th Governor of Punjab | Killed | Killed by one of his security guards due to Taseer's opposition to Pakistan's blasphemy laws |
| Jared Lee Loughner | 02011-01-012011 | Gabrielle Giffords, U.S. Representative from Arizona | Survived | Shot, along with several staffers, a U.S. District Judge (John Roll, who was killed) and several civilians, at a constituent event in her district. There were a total of at least 6 deaths and 12 injured. |
| Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan | 02011-01-012011 | Shahbaz Bhatti, Federal Minister for Minorities of Pakistan | Killed | Killed due to his opposition to Pakistan's blasphemy laws |
| Sardar Mohammad | 02011-01-012011 | Ahmed Wali Karzai, half-brother of Afghan president Hamid Karzai | Killed | Shot twice in the head and chest by his security guard as he was coming out of his bathroom |
| Unknown, possibly security guards or members of the Obaida Ibn Jarrah Brigade | 02011-01-012011 | Abdul Fatah Younis, commander-in-chief of the armed forces of the Libyan Republic | Killed | Shot due to his prior history before defecting to the NTC |
| Unknown, possibly members of the Taliban or the Haqqani network. | 02011-01-012011 | Former Afghan President Burhanuddin Rabbani | Killed | Assassinated while leading peace negotiations between the internationally recognized Afghan government of Hamid Karzai and the Taliban. |
| Manssor Arbabsiar | 02011-01-012011 | Saudi Arabian Ambassador to the United States Adel Al-Jubeir | Survived | Arbabsiar and Golham Shakuri (an Iranian government official) plotted to assassinate the Saudi Arabian Ambassador to the United States by hiring a hitman from a Mexican drug cartel member, who was in fact an undercover DEA agent. See 2011 alleged Iran assassination plot. |
| Either Liwa al Islam or the Free Syrian Army (both claimed responsibility) | 02012-01-012012 | Syria's Defense Minister General Dawoud Rajiha, Deputy Defense Minister Asef Shawkat, former Defense Minister General Hasan Turkmani, and Intelligence and National Security Chief Hisham Ikhtiyar | Killed | Killed either with a remotely detonated bomb or via suicide attack as part of the Syrian civil war. Several other leading government officials may have been injured or killed. |
| Unknown; pro-al Qaeda group located in Libya is currently the chief suspect | 02012-01-012012 | U.S. Ambassador to Libya J. Christopher Stevens | Killed | Stevens was killed by asphyxiation, while three other men were shot and killed after they were moved to a safehouse during an uprising at the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya. See U.S. Consulate attack in Benghazi. |
| Unknown assailants | 02013-01-012013 | Tunisian politician Chokri Belaid, leader of the Democratic Patriots' Movement | Killed | Belaid, a Marxist lawyer and politican, was shot outside his home in El Menzah, sparking protests against the ruling Ennahda party and calls for a general strike. |
Famous quotes containing the words list of, list and/or attempts:
“Shea—they call him Scholar Jack—
Went down the list of the dead.
Officers, seamen, gunners, marines,
The crews of the gig and yawl,
The bearded man and the lad in his teens,
Carpenters, coal-passers—all.”
—Joseph I. C. Clarke (1846–1925)
“Feminism is an entire world view or gestalt, not just a laundry list of women’s issues.”
—Charlotte Bunch (b. 1944)
“Society gains nothing whilst a man, not himself renovated, attempts to renovate things around him; he has become tediously good in some particular but negligent or narrow in the rest; and hypocrisy and vanity are often the disgusting result.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)