From the USA-Cuba rapprochement to Juan Manuel Santos’s Nobel Prize, we take a look back at an extraordinarily tumultuous year in the Americas. Then, we head to the US naval base of Pearl Harbor, where Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe this week offered condolences to the victims of Japan's attack 75 years ago. Finally, the world mourns one of Hollywood’s absolute royals: Actor and author Carrie Fisher – the eternal Princess Leia – who died four days after suffering a heart attack.