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Philippines profile
A chronology of key events:
1542 - Spanish expedition claims the islands and names them the Philippines after the heir to the Spanish throne.
Mount Mayon
Mount Mayon volcano, with its near-perfect cone, is active
1890s - Beginnings of insurrection against Spanish rule.
1898 - During the Spanish-American War, the US navy destroys the Spanish fleet in Manila Bay. Spain cedes the Philippines to the US under the Treaty of Paris in December. The US proclaims military rule.
1899 - Insurgent activity against US forces begins.
1901 - Leader of insurgents, Emilio Aguinaldo, is captured.
1902 - US civil government replaces military rule.
1907 - A Philippine assembly is inaugurated.
1935 - A plebiscite approves the establishment of the Commonwealth of the Philippines. Manuel Quezon is the first president. The Philippines is promised full independence within 10 years.
Invasion and occupation
1941 - Japan attacks the Philippines by air and invades two weeks later.
1944 - US forces retake the islands.
Ex-president Ferdinand Marcos
Marcos amassed an estimated $10bn fortune
- Born in 1917
- Became president in 1965
- Fled the country in 1986
- Died in Hawaii in 1989
1946 - The islands are granted full independence and renamed the Republic of the Philippines.
1947 - The US is awarded military bases on the islands.
1951 - Peace treaty signed with Japan. The Philippines eventually receive $800m in reparations payments.
1965 - Ferdinand Marcos becomes president.
1969 - Marcos is re-elected amidst allegations of electoral fraud. Marcos supports the US policy in Vietnam. There are protests against this. Muslim separatists in the south of the country also begin their campaign of guerrilla war.
Martial law
1972 - Marcos declares martial law. The parliament is suspended, opposition politicians are arrested, censorship is imposed.
1973 - A new constitution gives Marcos absolute powers.
1977 - Opposition leader Benigno Aquino is sentenced to death. Marcos delays the execution.
1980 - Aquino allowed to travel to the US for medical treatment.
1981 - Martial law is lifted. Marcos wins presidential elections.
1983 - Aquino returns to the Philippines, but is shot dead as he leaves his plane. The military is blamed for the murder.
"People power"
1986 - Presidential elections see Marcos opposed by Aquino's widow, Corazon. Marcos declares himself the winner, but Aquino disputes the result. There are mass protests, dubbed "people power", in Manila. The military withdraws its support for Marcos, who flees to Hawaii. The new government claims Marcos had looted billions of dollars during his time in power.
1989 December - US jets assist Philippine government forces in suppressing an attempted coup.
1990 - Military officials are convicted of the murder of Benigno Aquino.
1991 - The US abandons Clark Air Base after a volcanic eruption smothers it with ash.
1992 - Aquino's defence minister, Fidel Ramos, wins presidency. The US closes Subic Bay Naval Station.
1996 - Peace agreement reached with Muslim separatist group, the Moro National Liberation Front. Another group, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), carries on its campaign.
1998 - Joseph Estrada elected president.
2000 November - Impeachment proceedings start against Estrada on allegations of corruption, betrayal of public trust, and violation of the constitution.
2001 January - Impeachment trial is suspended on the 16th. There are mass street protests. The military withdraws its support. Estrada stands down on the 20th, proclaiming his innocence. His vice-president, Gloria Arroyo, is sworn in as president.
2001 March - The MILF declares a ceasefire and says it is ready to hold talks with the government.
Estrada tried
2001 April - Estrada is charged with plundering more than 80 million dollars from state funds while in office. He is eventually found guilty and jailed for life. He wins a pardon.
2002 January - US says joint exercises with Filipino military signal new phase in war on international terrorism. Exercises take place near stronghold of Abu Sayyaf group which US says has links to Osama Bin Laden.
US helps fight against extremists
US military has backed attempts to subdue extremists in the south
2002 October - Series of deadly bomb blasts - on a Manila bus and at three locations in Zamboanga city - blamed on Islamic militants.
2003 February - Ceasefire between MILF and government breaks down. Planned talks are called off in May after a rebel attack on Mindanao kills 30.
2003 July - Government signs ceasefire with MILF ahead of planned talks in Malaysia.
Mutiny
2003 July - Army mutiny in Manila; some 300 soldiers seize a shopping centre but surrender peacefully following negotiations. President Arroyo declares a state of rebellion.
2004 February - Peace talks between government and communist rebel New People's Army start in Norway, but are called off by the rebels in August.
2004 June - With counting completed, Gloria Arroyo wins May's presidential elections.
Influential Cardinal
The late Cardinal Sin, a driving force behind two uprisings
2004 July - Philippines withdraws its troops from Iraq, bowing to the demands of the kidnappers of a Filipino lorry driver. The driver is freed.
2004 November-December - Hundreds of people are killed in floods and mudslides caused by powerful storms and a typhoon.
2005 January - Heavy fighting between troops and MILF rebels breaks the July 2003 ceasefire.
2005 April - Breakthrough on contentious issue of ancestral land achieved at peace talks in Malaysia between government and MILF rebels.
2005 June - Influential Cardinal Jaime Sin, who led two peaceful revolts, dies aged 76.
Arroyo under pressure
2005 July-September - President Arroyo is pressured to resign over allegations of vote-rigging. In September she survives an opposition attempt to impeach her.
2005 November-December - Scores are killed during clashes between troops and Muslim Abu Sayyaf rebels on the southern island of Jolo.
2006 February - More than 1,000 people are killed by a mudslide which engulfs a village on the central island of Leyte.
Political killings
2007: students in Quezon city stage a mock massacre in protest against political killings
- Report implicated military in deaths of hundreds of activists
President Arroyo declares a week-long state of emergency after the army says it has foiled a planned coup.
2006 December - Hundreds of people are feared dead after Typhoon Durian batters the east, triggering mudslides.
2007 January - Tests confirm that a body found in a remote area is that of Abu Sayyaf leader Khaddafy Janjalani. The army says he was killed in fighting in 2006.
2007 February - Government report accuses military figures of being behind the killings of hundreds of mainly left-wing activists since 2001.
2007 April - The military says it is stepping up its offensive against the Islamic militant group, Abu Sayyaf, after the group beheaded seven Christian hostages on the southern island of Jolo.
Southern separatism
2007 August - 26 Soldiers killed in fighting with separatists on Jolo.
2007 November - Renegade soldiers make a failed coup bid at a luxury hotel in Manila after breaking out of court where they were standing trial for the failed 2003 mutiny.
2008 July - Government negotiators say they have reached an agreement with MILF rebels on the expansion of a Muslim autonomous region in the south.
2008 August - The MILF deal collapses after Christian communities raise objections and renewed fighting on the southern island of Mindanao leaves at least 30 people dead.
2008 December - Norwegian-brokered peace talks with New People's Army Maoist guerrillas break down, NPA attacks army patrol on Mindanao.
2009 June - Army says it has captured a major MILF base on Mindanao, killing 30 rebels.
2009 September - Army says it has captured a leading figure in the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), Camarudin Hadji Ali, in the south.
2009 November - An attack on group of people travelling to file election nomination papers on Mindanao leaves 57 dead. Victims' relatives blame the rival Ampatuan clan for the massacre.
Mindanao massacre
The 2009 massacre of 57 people on Mindanao shocked the Philippines
2009 December - Peace talks resume between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front in Malaysia, after breaking down 16 months ago.
A founder of Abu Sayyaf alleged to have helped forge links with al-Qaeda, Abdul Basir Latip, is arrested on Mindanao. He denies being a member of a militant group.
2010 February - The army captures Abu Sayyaf leader Mujibar Alih Amon, suspected of a kidnapping raid on a Malaysian resort in 2000 and the killing of Christian missionaries in 2001.
Prosecutors charge 196 more people with murder over the Maguindanao massacre in November, including Andal Ampatuan Snr, a former provincial governor and ally of President Arroyo.
2010 March - Peace monitors return to Mindanao to oversee MILF talks. The government hopes a peace deal can be secured by April.
Eleven soldiers are killed in an ambush on Mindoro island in an ambush by the communist New People's Army rebels.
2010 June - Benigno "Noynoy" Aquino becomes president.
2010 September - Andal Ampatuan junion, a member of the powerful Ampatuan clan, goes on trial on charges of organising the 2009 November mass killing in Maguindanao province.
2011 February - The government and communist New People's Army (NPA) agree to work towards a peace deal by 2012 at talks in Oslo, their first negotiations since the previous round broke down in 2004. Troops arrested prominent NPA member Tirso Alcantara the previous month.
2011 June - Secretary of State Hillary Clinton commits the US to the defence of the Philippines amid rising tensions in the South China Sea with China over the disputed Spratly islets. She says the US will honour its defence pact and offer the Philippines affordable weapons.
2011 October - The armed forces carry out the first air strikes for three years on separatist MILF rebel areas in Zamboanga in the south of the country after a wave of violence in which 35 people died.
2011 November - Former president Gloria Arroyo is arrested on vote-fraud charges over a Senate seat election in 2007. She denies the charges.
The Philippines orders a ban on the deployment of its workers to 41 countries, including Afghanistan, Iraq and India, as these have failed to sign agreements protecting foreign workers from abuse.
Hollande defends Afghan exit plan
Spain's Bankia seeks 19bn euros
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