After months of sharp rhetoric, Boeing and the machinists announced a surprise agreement on a new contract last week.
Even the possibility of a change in leadership in Syria had reverberations this week, with the surprise agreement between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority to form a unity government.
Mr Cameron's dramatic climbdown sets the scene for a surprise agreement limiting the inflow of migrants instead, and comes amid growing speculation that a proposed "emergency brake", allowing the Government to temporarily restrict freedom of movement, may be agreed.
The trigger was a surprise agreement — signed in a cloak-and-dagger operation six days earlier by the presidents of Russia and Ukraine — that was presented for ratification that day.
Shortly after announcing the surprise agreement, Mr. Gbagbo addressed loyalists who had surrounded a French military base in Abidjan for four days to demand that the French peacekeepers leave.
A surprise agreement by President Chen Shui-bian on Tuesday to a recount of votes in the disputed election last Saturday is a shrewd move that has put the opposition Nationalist Party in a difficult position, politicians and political analysts said.
The surprise agreement follows a war of words in which New York city mayor, Bill de Blasio, accused Uber of trying to "dictate to government" and failing to take a "wise course" in its dealings with the city.
Pakistani officials said the surprise agreement to resume peace talks, stalled since July 2001, was the result of public steps to build good will between the people of the two countries, and of private steps to rebuild trust between their leaders.
Yet on that front Mr Hollande has also just scored a success, albeit a modest one.On January 11th, after three months of talks at the government's request, unions and bosses reached a surprise agreement that will ease some of the country's labour-market rigidities.
The legal maneuver is Lord Black's latest effort to frustrate Hollinger's board, which is planning to discuss the situation by conference call today and remains furious about Lord Black's surprise agreement on Sunday to sell his controlling stake in the company to a set of reclusive entrepreneurial British brothers.
The indictment was such bad news for Trump that it was predictable that he would try to squash it with an even bigger story, his surprise agreement to end the government shutdown in three weeks, which quickly took the lead on most websites.
