Timeline 2004 April - June
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2004 Apr 1, Pres.
Bush signed the "Laci Peterson" bill giving new protections for the
unborn that for the first time made it a separate federal crime to harm
a fetus during an assault on the mother.
(WSJ, 4/2/04, p.A1)(AP, 4/1/05)
2004 Apr 1, The DJIA removed
AT&T, Kodak and Int'l. Paper and added American Int'l. Group,
Pfizer and Verizon Comm.
(WSJ, 4/2/04, p.C1)
2004 Apr 1, Scientists reported
that the genetic code of the common laboratory rat has been deciphered.
(SFC, 4/1/04, p.A4)
2004 Apr 1, Google introduce
Gmail, a Web based e-mail service with one gigabyte of free storage per
user. In 2007 the storage was expanded to “free unlimited.” Google’s
index passed 8 billion pages this year.
(WSJ, 6/13/07, p.B1)(SFC, 2/2/08, p.C1)
2004 Apr 1, Paul Atkinson (58),
guitarist in the British group Zombies, died in LA. The group's songs
included "She's Not There" (1964).
(SFC, 4/7/04, p.B6)
2004 Apr 1, Carrie Snodgress (57),
actress, died in Los Angeles.
(AP, 4/1/05)
2004 Apr 1, Afghanistan and its
neighbors agreed to cooperate in stemming the country's drug exports
after donors pledged $8.2 billion in new reconstruction aid.
(AP, 4/1/04)
2004 Apr 1, In Canada the largest
strike in Newfoundland history began as thousands of upbeat workers
took to picket lines while the premier said he has no plans to end the
walkout with legislation.
(AP, 4/1/04)
2004 Apr 1, A Colombian man,
Carlos Gamarra-Murillo (53), was arrested for allegedly trying to buy
$4 million in machine guns, grenade launchers and other weapons for a
leftist rebel group. The suspect wanted to pay in cocaine and cash.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 1, In Colombia gunmen
riding a motorcycle killed Carlos Bernal, a regional leader of
Colombia's main left-leaning political party.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 1, Pres. Oscar Berger
said Guatemala will cut its army in half and slash the military budget
to comply with peace accords that ended a 36-year civil war.
(AP, 4/1/04)
2004 Apr 1, India began
distributing AIDS drugs to 100,000 people. An estimated 4.6 million
were infected.
(SFC, 4/2/04, p.A15)
2004 Apr 1, In Iraq insurgents
attacked a U.S. military convoy and a Humvee was burned near Fallujah,
a day after the grisly killing and mutilation of four American contract
workers in the city.
(AP, 4/1/04)
2004 Apr 1, A gas explosion ripped
through a refinery in Iraq while it was being inspected by Czech
engineers, killing one and injuring two others.
(AP, 4/5/04)
2004 Apr 1, Italy, Turkey,
Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands arrested 41 militants in a
coordinated crackdown on a Turkish Marxist group. Police in Istanbul
arrested 25 suspects of the Marxist Revolutionary People's Liberation
Army/Front, or DHKP-C, while security forces in the other countries
detained 16 others.
(AP, 4/1/04)
2004 Apr 1, In Uzbekistan a woman
blew herself up in the central Bukhara region, killing a man and
critically injuring herself.
(AP, 4/1/04)
2004 Apr 2, Washington announced
plans to fingerprint and photograph millions of travelers to the United
States. The measure, which will take effect by Sept. 30, affected
citizens in 27 countries who had been allowed to travel within the US
without a visa for up to 90 days.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, The US Labor Dept.
reported a 308,000 increase in jobs along with a rise in unemployment
from 5.6 to 5.7%. The DJIA rose 97 points in response to close at
10,470.
(SFC, 4/3/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 2, The Pentagon said it
released 15 people held as terrorism suspects at a U.S. military prison
at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, reducing the number confined there to 595.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, The 6-month Tyco trial
ended with a hung jury. A threatening letter to a lone dissident juror
prompted the judge to call a mistrial. A retrial was planned.
(SFC, 4/3/04, p.C1)
2004 Apr 2, Sun Microsystems
announced that Microsoft would pay it nearly $2 billion to settle a
legal dispute. Sun also announced layoffs of 3,300 and a business
partnership with Microsoft.
(SFC, 4/3/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 2, In Brussels an
official ceremony welcomed Bulgaria, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia,
Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia into the NATO alliance.
(SFC, 4/3/04, p.A11)
2004 Apr 2, In Brazil Jociel
Conceicao dos Santos (20), a handyman, recanted a confession and denied
he killed an American couple (Nov 30, 2003). He blamed two other
Brazilians for the crime.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, Police in France
captured the elusive former leader of the Basque ETA rebel group as
well as the separatist group's logistics chief.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, Georgian authorities
reported that they had detained four men on suspicion of plotting to
assassinate the president, and officials accused the autonomous
province of Adzharia of being behind the alleged plot.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, In India a crowded bus
veered off a mountain road and fell into a ravine in Jammu-Kashmir
state, killing 34 passengers and injuring 35 others.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, Two Indian Air Force
fighter jets went missing and were believed to have crashed during
routine flights over Kashmir.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, PM Ariel Sharon
revealed the scope of his withdrawal plan, saying Israel will leave all
of the Gaza Strip and dismantle four West Bank settlements.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, Pakistan's 2-week
operation in South Waziristan wound down. The military said 63 foreign
and local militants had been killed along with at least 46 security
forces.
(SFC, 4/2/04, p.A11)
2004 Apr 2, A Spanish railroad
inspector found a 26-pound bomb hidden in a bag on a busy high-speed
line. Police said the device may contain the same dynamite used in last
month's Madrid train bombings.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, In Sri Lanka Pres.
Kumaratunga's political alliance won the most seats in parliamentary
elections, indicating deep popular support for its tough stance toward
Tamil Tiger rebels.
(AP, 4/3/04)(WSJ, 4/5/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 3, Soccer player Freddy
Adu (14), became the youngest athlete in a major American professional
sport in well over a century as he entered a game between his team,
D.C. United, and the San Jose Earthquakes (D.C. United won, 2-1).
(AP, 4/3/05)
2004 Apr 3, The US Postal Service
unveiled a new John Wayne commemorative postage stamp for its annual
"Legends of Hollywood" issue at a private fund-raiser.
(AP, 4/5/04)
2004 Apr 3, Hundreds of thousands
of Germans protested against Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's unpopular
drive to trim the welfare state.
(AP, 4/3/04)
2004 Apr 3, A U.S.-led
multinational force trying to bring stability to Haiti helped detain
Jean Robert, a rebel sympathizer and gang leader accused of terrorizing
supporters of Aristide.
(AP, 4/9/04)
2004 Apr 3, In Iraq 2 attacks on
Iraqi police south of Baghdad killed four people. Col. Wissam Hussein,
the police chief of Mahmudiyah, was shot to death by gunmen dressed as
police.
(AP, 4/3/04)(SSFC, 4/4/04, p.A3)
2004 Apr 3, Israeli troops
arrested 23 wanted Palestinians early in a large-scale raid in the West
Bank city of Nablus. Zohair Arda, a Palestinian gunman, broke into an
Israeli settlement early, killing an Israeli man and wounding his
12-year-old daughter in their home. Israeli troops entered the Tulkarem
refugee camp overnight and demolished the home of Arda (18), who was
shot dead during the attack.
(AP, 4/3/04)(AP, 4/4/04)
2004 Apr 3, Slovaks voted for a
new president. Former authoritarian PM Meciar led after the first round
of Slovakia's presidential election. Low turnout set up an Apr 17
runoff against a former political ally.
(AP, 4/4/04)(WSJ, 4/5/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 3, In Spain Sarhane
Abdelmajid Fakhet (35), a Tunisian national and the alleged ringleader
of last month's train bombings in Madrid, was among 5 suspects who blew
themselves up as police raided their apartment.
(AP, 4/4/04)(SFC, 4/5/04, p.A3)(WSJ, 4/6/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 4, In India suspected
Islamic extremists stormed a police station in the city of Karachi and
killed 5 police, forcing their victims to recite Quranic verses before
shooting them.
(AP, 4/4/04)
2004 Apr 4, Muqtada al-Sadr issued
a call to his followers to "terrorize your enemy." Gunmen opened fire
on the Spanish garrison in the holy city of Najaf during a huge
demonstration by followers of al-Sadr, an anti-American Shiite Muslim
cleric. An American and Salvadoran soldier were killed along with 22
Iraqis. More than 130 people were wounded. A car bomb exploded in
Kirkuk, killing three civilians and wounding two others. 7 US soldiers
were killed in Baghdad.
(AP, 4/4/04)(SFC, 4/5/04, p.A8)(WSJ, 4/5/04,
p.A1)(WSJ, 4/19/04, p.A14)
2004 Apr 4, Maoist rebels in
southern Nepal killed at least 9 police officers.
(SFC, 4/5/04, p.A2)
2004 Apr 4, In Slovenia some 95
percent of referendum voters opposed reinstating permanent residency
and other rights to more than 18,000 people, mostly Bosnians, Croats
and Serbs, whose names were stricken from state records following
independence from the former Yugoslavia in 1991.
(AP, 4/5/04)
2004 Apr 5, Univ. of Connecticut
won the basketball NCAA finals over Georgia Tech 82-73.
(WSJ, 4/6/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 5, Pulitzer Prize winners
were announced. Edward P. Jones won the fiction award for "The Known
World." Steven Hahn won the history award for "A Nation Under Our Feet"
Black Political Struggles in the Rural South from Slavery to the Great
Migration." Anne Applebaum won the general non-fiction award for
"Gulag: A History."
(SFC, 4/6/04, p.A2)
2004 Apr 5, A US-Canadian task
force investigating the massive power blackout of Aug 14, 2003, called
for urgent approval of mandatory reliability rules to govern the
electric transmission industry.
(AP, 4/5/05)
2004 Apr 5, Leonard Reed (b.1907),
tap dancer extraordinary, died.
(Econ, 4/17/04, p.84)
2004 Apr 5, Rebel attacks across
Chechnya killed six Russian soldiers.
(AP, 4/6/04)
2004 Apr 5, China promised $122
million to Pres. Skerritt in return for revoking Dominica’s recognition
of Taiwan.
(Econ, 4/10/04, p.29)
2004 Apr 5, Six ethnic Croats
surrendered to the U.N. war crimes tribunal to face allegations they
participated in the torture and massacre of Muslims in Bosnia in 1993.
(AP, 4/5/04)
2004 Apr 5, The governing
coalition of Curacao, a Dutch Caribbean territory, collapsed over
allegations that the justice minister gave favors to a political donor
convicted of corruption.
(AP, 4/6/04)
2004 Apr 5, Indonesians voted in
legislative elections with Golkar, the party that once supported
ex-dictator Suharto, expected to win the most seats. Some 140,000
Indonesians chose between 450,000 candidates competing for 15,276
offices.
(AP, 4/5/04)(WSJ, 4/6/04, p.A1)(Econ, 4/10/04, p.31)
2004 Apr 5, In northeastern Iran
an oil tanker truck and a passenger bus collided, killing 30 people and
injuring 27.
(AP, 4/5/04)
2004 Apr 5, Paul Bremer, the top
U.S. administrator in Iraq, declared a radical Shiite cleric an
"outlaw" after his supporters rioted in Baghdad and four other cities
in fighting that killed at least 52 Iraqis, eight U.S. troops and a
Salvadoran soldier. A warrant was issued for al-Sadr related to the
murder of a rival Shiite leader in 2003.
(AP, 4/5/04)(WSJ, 4/6/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 5, Israeli troops killed
3 Palestinians near a Gaza settlement.
(WSJ, 4/6/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 5, Alexander Lerner (90),
an eminent cyberneticist and a leading member of the "refusenik"
movement that promoted Jewish emigration from the former Soviet Union,
died in Israel.
(AP, 7/6/04)
2004 Apr 5, A flash flood swept
through two border communities in northern Mexico, flooding rivers,
washing away houses and killing 15 people. Dozens more were reported
missing.
(AP, 4/5/04)
2004 Apr 5, Pakistan gave
tribesmen 2 weeks to expel foreign terrorists.
(SFC, 4/6/04, p.A3)
2004 Apr 5, In Sri Lanka Pres.
Kumaratunga appointed Mahinda Rajapakse as PM.
(SFC, 4/6/04, p.A2)
2004 Apr 6, The University of
Connecticut's women's basketball team beat Tennessee 70-61 to win a
third consecutive NCAA title, a day after UConn also won the men's
championship.
(AP, 4/6/05)
2004 Apr 6, China issued a major
ruling on how Hong Kong chooses its leaders, saying the territory must
submit proposed political reforms to Beijing for approval.
(AP, 4/6/04)
2004 Apr 6, In Ecuador in the
midst of a national strike by prison guards, inmates in Quito's women's
prison took two television news crews hostage to press their demands
for shorter sentences and better living conditions.
(AP, 4/6/04)
2004 Apr 6, In Indonesia the
Golkar Party of former dictator Suharto held a slight lead in
parliamentary elections. Golkar won the most seats in the parliamentary
election with 21.6 percent. Pres. Sukarnoputri’s Indonesian Democratic
Party of Struggle (PDI-P) won 18.5%.
(AP, 4/6/04)(AP, 5/5/04)(Econ, 5/8/04, p.42)
2004 Apr 6, Insurgents and
rebellious Shiites mounted a string of attacks across Iraq's south and
U.S. Marines launched a major assault on the turbulent city of
Fallujah. Up to a dozen Marines were killed in Ramadi. Two more
coalition soldiers were reported killed. US warplanes firing rockets
destroyed four houses in the besieged city of Fallujah. A doctor said
26 Iraqis, including women and children, were killed and 30 wounded in
the strike. British troops killed 15 Iraqis in Amara. In Nasiriya 15
Iraqis were killed in fighting with Italian troops.
(AP, 4/6/04)(SFC, 4/7/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 6, Jordan's military
court convicted 8 Muslim militants and sentenced them to death for the
2002 killing of U.S. aid official Laurence Foley in a terror conspiracy
linked to al-Qaida.
(AP, 4/6/05)
2004 Apr 6, In Lithuania lawmakers
narrowly ousted Rolandas Paksas, the scandal-ridden president, for
abuse of office, passing all three accusations against Paksas: that he
illegally arranged citizenship for one of his chief financial backers,
businessman Yuri Borisov; that he divulged state secrets; and that he
used his office for financial gain.
(AP, 4/6/04)
2004 Apr 6, The Barcelona city
council passed a resolution condemning bullfighting and declaring the
city Spain's first to come out against the centuries-old sport.
(AP, 4/6/04)
2004 Apr 6, With Tamil Tiger
rebels threatening to restart the civil war, Sri Lanka's newly
installed PM called on neighboring India to help revive the island's
faltering peace process.
(AP, 4/6/04)
2004 Apr 7, Citizens Against
Government Waste (CAGW) issued its latest "Pig Book," an exposition of
"improper of unnecessary" US federal expenditures.
(SSFC, 4/4/04, Par p.24)
2004 Apr 7, The US government
issued the 1st license for a manned suborbital rocket to Scaled
Composites of Mojave headed by Burt Rutan.
(SFC, 4/8/04, p.A2)
2004 Apr 7, In Brazil Amazon
Indians attacked prospectors who were illegally digging for diamonds.
Cinta Larga Indians massacred 29 illegal wildcat diamond miners on
their remote northern reservation. 28 Indians were charged in the
killings, but the case has stalled over jurisdictional questions.
(AP, 4/14/04)(AP, 12/10/07)
2004 Apr 7, In Germany a court in
Hamburg released Mounir el-Motassadeq (30), the only man convicted so
far of involvement in the Sep 11, 2001, attacks.
(WSJ, 4/8/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 7, A U.S.-led
multinational force trying to bring stability to Haiti helped
detain Wilford Ferdinand, a top rebel figure.
(AP, 4/9/04)
2004 Apr 7, In India a land mine
killed at least 26 policemen in the eastern state of Jharkhand.
Communist guerrillas, calling for a boycott of India's national
elections, were suspected.
(AP, 4/8/04)
2004 Apr 7, U.S. Marines in a
fierce battle for this Sunni Muslim stronghold fired rockets that hit a
mosque compound filled with worshippers, and witnesses said as many as
40 people were killed. Shiite-inspired violence spread to nearly all of
the country.
(AP, 4/7/04)
2004 Apr 7, Militiamen loyal to
al-Sadr, the radical Shiite cleric, clashed with Polish troops in
Karbala, and Muntadhir al-Mussawi, an aide to the cleric, was killed.
(AP, 4/7/04)
2004 Apr 7, In Iraq 2 German
counter-terrorism GSG-9 security agents were ambushed and went missing
while on a routine trip from Jordan to Baghdad.
(AP, 4/10/04)
2004 Apr 7, In Malaysia 3 men
armed with firebombs, machetes and an ax attacked Myanmar's embassy,
hacking one senior official and starting a fire that destroyed the
building.
(AP, 4/7/04)
2004 Apr 7, A Moscow court
sentenced Russian arms control researcher Igor Sutyagin to 15 years in
prison for spying on behalf of the United States.
(AP, 4/7/04)
2004 Apr 8, Condoleeza Rice, US
national security advisor, testified before the National Commission on
Terrorism Attacks and contended that that Pres. Bush did not ignore
threats of terrorism in the months before Sep 11, 2001.
(SFC, 4/9/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 8, Clear Channel fired
Howard Stearn after FCC regulators proposed fining the company $495,000
for airing the shock jock's sexually explicit broadcasts. [see 1985]
(SFC, 4/9/04, p.A3)
2004 Apr 8, Reliant Energy, based
in Houston, Texas, was indicted over an alleged plot to boost power
prices in June, 2000, at a cost to consumers of as much as $32 million.
On August 15, 2005, Reliant announced that it had reached a $460
million settlement with the states of California, Oregon and
Washington, resolving civil litigation claims against the company
related to the sale of electricity in the California electricity crisis
of 2000 and 2001. In March 2007, Reliant agreed to pay a $22.2 million
penalty in addition to a $13.8 million credit provided in a previous
settlement with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reliant_Energy)(SFC,
4/9/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 8, Fred Olivi (82), who
copiloted the plane that dropped the atomic bomb on Nagasaki, died in
Lemont, Ill.
(AP, 4/8/05)
2004 Apr 8, In Afghanistan troops
loyal to ethnic Uzbek warlord Abdul Rashid Dostum overran Maymana, the
center of Faryab province. In the south, clashes left at least 7 people
dead, including two Afghan soldiers, and two police officers killed in
an attack by suspected Taliban.
(AP, 4/8/04)(SFC, 4/9/04, p.A3)
2004 Apr 8, Algeria held elections
seen as a turning point toward democracy for the North African nation
after a bloody Islamic insurgency. President Abdelaziz Bouteflika was
re-elected with 83% of the vote, but his challenger cried foul and
promised to appeal.
(AP, 4/9/04)(SFC, 4/10/04, p.A3)
2004 Apr 8, In China PM Wen Jiabao
suspended plans for a huge dam system on the Nu River in western China
due to environmental concerns.
(SFC, 4/9/04, p.A10)
2004 Apr 8, In France striking
power workers switched off street lights and cut electricity to homes
to protest plans to partially privatize public utilities. Even the
famed Chateau de Versailles lost power.
(AP, 4/8/04)
2004 Apr 8, Shiite Muslim militias
held partial control over three southern Iraqi cities, Kufa, Kut and
Najaf. Sunni insurgents killed a U.S. Marine in the battle for
Fallujah. In escalating violence, gunmen kidnapped eight South Korean
civilians. The US military announced 5 deaths. The estimated Iraqi toll
was 460.
(AP, 4/8/04)(SFC, 4/9/04, p.A1)(WSJ, 4/9/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 8, In a dramatic video,
Iraqi insurgents revealed they had kidnapped 3 Japanese and threatened
to burn them alive in 3 days unless Japan agrees to withdraw its
troops. The hostages were later released unharmed.
(AP, 4/9/05)
2004 Apr 8, In Indian-held Kashmir
a grenade explosion and gunfire at an election rally killed 9 people
and wounded at least 60, including the state's tourism and finance
ministers.
(AP, 4/8/04)(WSJ, 4/9/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 8, A Moscow court handed
down a 20-year prison sentence to a Chechen woman who was earlier
convicted of carrying a bomb that killed an explosives expert.
(AP, 4/8/04)
2004 Apr 8, In the Philippines 6
members of the Muslim extremist Abu Sayyaf group including Hamsiraji
Sali, a senior leader wanted by the US, were killed in a clash with
government troops on southern Basilan island. In Oct three informants
received $1 million for their help.
(AP, 4/8/04)(SFC, 4/9/04, p.A3)(SFC, 11/27/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 8, The Sudanese
government signed a cease-fire with rebels in the western Darfur region.
(SFC, 4/9/04, p.A2)
2004 Apr 8, U.N. Secretary-General
Kofi Annan expressed disappointment after Cypriot leaders on both sides
rejected his reunification plan.
(AP, 4/8/04)
2004 Apr 9, Sein Lwin (81), who
served briefly as Myanmar's president in 1988, died.
(AP, 4/10/04)
2004 Apr 9, US forces partially
reoccupied Kut, the southern city seized by a rebellious Shiite
militia, but an American-declared halt in Fallujah was undercut by
bursts of gunfire on the first anniversary of the fall of Baghdad. 2
soldiers and a Marine died in separate incidents. Rebels attacked a
convoy near Baghdad's airport and kidnapped 2 US soldiers and 7
construction employees of Halliburton subsidiary KBR. 4 bodies were
found in the area a few days later. The body of civilian truck driver
William Bradley was found in January 2005; Thomas Hamill escaped his
captors in May 2004; Timothy Bell remains unaccounted for. Army
reservist Staff Sgt. Matt Maupin (20) of Batavia, Ohio, was captured
when his fuel convoy, part of the 724th Transportation Co., was
ambushed west of Baghdad. Maupin's remains were found in March on the
outskirts of Baghdad, about 12 miles from where the convoy was ambushed.
(SSFC, 4/11/04, p.A22)(SFC, 4/13/04, p.A1)(SFC,
4/14/04, p.A15)(AP, 4/9/05)(AP, 6/17/06)(WSJ, 4/28/08, p.A2)
2004 Apr 9, In Nepal police
detained more than a thousand protesters for defying a ban on public
rallies, as an estimated 25,000 demonstrators flooded the streets of
the Kathmandu to demand that the king restore democracy.
(AP, 4/9/04)
2004 Apr 9, Rival Tamil Tiger
guerrilla factions fought with mortars and guns, in a battle that
killed at least nine people, wounded 20.
(AP, 4/9/04)
2004 Apr 9, Investigators in the
Ukraine reported that the bodies of at least 50 people believed to have
been killed by Nazi troops have been unearthed from a mass grave in the
Crimean peninsula, 550 miles southeast of Kiev.
(AP, 4/10/04)
2004 Apr 10, Pres. Bush signed
into law a bill that let companies reduce the required contributions to
their defined-benefit pension plans by more than $80 billion over the
next 2 years.
(Econ, 4/17/04, p.73)
2004 Apr 10, The White House
declassified and released a document sent to President Bush before the
Sept. 11 attacks which cited recent intelligence of a possible al-Qaida
plot to strike inside the US.
(AP, 4/10/05)
2004 Apr 10, Several thousand
protesters gathered in SF and called for an end to US military presence
in Iraq.
(SSFC, 4/11/04, p.B3)
2004 Apr 10, San Francisco Police
officer Isaac A. Espinoza (29) was shot dead and his partner wounded in
the Bayview neighborhood. Suspect David Hill (21) was arrested the next
day. Hill used an illegal AK-47 against the officers that had been
given to him by Marvin Jeffrey Jr., a police informant. In 2007 Hill
was found guilty of 2nd degree murder.
(SFC, 4/12/04, p.A1)(SSFC, 8/13/06, p.A1)(SFC,
1/5/07, p.A1)
2004 Apr 10, A coal mine explosion
trapped five miners underground in a northeastern Chinese city where
more than 150 miners have been killed in the past year.
(AP, 4/10/04)
2004 Apr 10, In Colombia a patrol,
searching for rebels of the FARC, gunned down a peasant family carrying
a sick baby to hospital. Three youths, aged 14 to 17, and the
six-month-old were among the dead.
(AP, 4/13/04)
2004 Apr 10, Iraqi government
negotiators entered the besieged city of Fallujah as fierce battles
raged elsewhere in central Iraq, including Baghdad. In Baqouba 40
Iraqis were killed. A top Iraqi Red Crescent official and his wife were
killed in an apparent attack on their car in northern Iraq.
(AP, 4/10/04)
2004 Apr 10, A stray bullet killed
an 11-year old Palestinian girl in her kitchen when Israeli troops
fired on her neighborhood in the southern Gaza Strip.
(AP, 4/10/04)
2004 Apr 10, In Mexico a gas
explosion leveled two buildings, killed at least six people and injured
more than a dozen others in the border town of Nuevo Progreso.
(AP, 4/11/04)
2004 Apr 10, In southern Peru
heavy rains triggered mudslides near the famed Inca citadel of Machu
Picchu, killing at least six people. Five others were missing and
feared dead.
(AP, 4/11/04)
2004 Apr 10, In the southern
Philippines more than 50 inmates, including many suspected members of a
Muslim extremist group, used a smuggled pistol to escape from prison.
At least nine were killed by police.
(AP, 4/10/04)
2004 Apr 10, Rania al-Baz, a
popular Saudi TV host, was severely beaten by her husband. She suffered
13 facial fractures that required 12 operations. She allowed photos to
be broadcast and opened discussions of ongoing violence against women
in Saudi Arabia.
(SFC, 4/20/04, p.A6)
2004 Apr 10, In Siberia an
apparent methane blast ripped through a coal mine, killing at least 44
miners.
(AP, 4/11/04)(AP, 4/12/04)
2004 Apr 10, Some 11% of South
Africans, 5 million people, were reported to be infected with AIDS. An
earlier government report said 100,000 civil servants were HIV positive.
(Econ, 4/10/04, p.39)
2004 Apr 10, Some 100,000 people
in Taiwan protested the disputed presidential election.
(WSJ, 4/12/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 10, Sakip Sabanci (71),
Turkey’s richest man and head of Sabanci Holding, died. He left his
niece Guler Sabanci in charge of his business.
(www.guardian.co.uk/turkey/story/0,12700,1193172,00.html)
2004 Apr 10, In Vietnam's troubled
Central Highlands province of Daklak ethnic minority villagers
protested over religion and land issues.
(AP, 4/10/04)
2004 Apr 10, In Sri Lanka the
Liberation Tigers took control of the areas held by the Karuna group
and declared a two-day truce to allow civilians to celebrate the
Buddhist and Hindu New Year.
(AP, 4/11/04)
2004 Apr 11, Pres. Bush defended
his response to a briefing memo from August 2001 about possible
terrorist plots against the US, saying he was "satisfied that some of
the matters were being looked into" and that there were no specific
threats against New York and Washington.
(AP, 4/11/05)
2004 Apr 11, Sikhs celebrated
Vaisakhi, their New Year and commemoration of 17th century Guru Gobind
Singh. They claimed about 20 million followers worldwide.
(AP, 4/11/04)(SFC, 4/12/04, p.B5)
2004 Apr 11, The British Sunday
Times reported that an Indian steel tycoon paid $128 million for a
mansion in London, breaking the world record for the most expensive
house purchase.
(AP, 4/12/04)
2004 Apr 11, China’s People’s
Bank, in an effort to slow the growth in money supply, raised bank
reserve requirements from 7 to 7.5%, the 3rd increase in 8 months.
(Econ, 4/17/04, p.71)
2004 Apr 11, Thousands of Hong
Kong residents demanded full democracy and called on their unpopular
leader to quit as they marched past Beijing's representative office.
(AP, 4/11/04)
2004 Apr 11, Paul Eduardovich
Goldman, 39, a naturalized U.S. citizen, killed himself afternoon in a
prison in the suburbs of Grenoble, France. He was expected to be
extradited to Pennsylvania to face first-degree murder charges in the
fatal stabbing of Faina Zonis, 42, a Philadelphia mortgage processor
found dead in her office on Dec. 29.
(AP, 4/13/04)
2004 Apr 11, Gunmen shot down a
U.S. attack helicopter during fighting in western Baghdad, killing its
two crew members. The bloodied bodies of two men, purportedly Americans
killed during fighting in Fallujah, were shown on Arab TV. US forces
and insurgents agreed to a cease-fire in Fallujah.
(AP, 4/11/04)(SSFC, 4/11/04, p.A23)
2004 Apr 11, Henrik Frandsen, a
35-year-old plumber from Copenhagen, was reported missing in Iraq.
Iraqi police found his body the next day.
(AP, 4/21/04)
2004 Apr 11, Arjan Erkel, A Dutch
aid worker who headed the North Caucasus mission of Medecins Sans
Frontieres and was kidnapped in Russia nearly two years ago, was freed
in a police operation in Dagestan.
(AP, 4/11/04)
2004 Apr 11, Syrian Kurdish
parties issued a statement saying the Assad regime had arrested
hundreds and tortured some to death following the unrest in March.
(WSJ, 4/12/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 11, Pope John Paul II
celebrated Easter Mass with calls for world leaders to resolve
conflicts in Iraq, the Holy Land and Africa.
(AP, 4/11/05)
2004 Apr 12, Barry Bonds hit his
660th home run to tie godfather Willie Mays for third on baseball's
career list. Bonds hit a towering three-run shot in the fifth inning,
sending the San Francisco Giants to a 7-5 win over the visiting
Milwaukee Brewers.
(AP, 4/12/05)
2004 Apr 12, Miss Missouri, Shandi
Finnessey, a 25-year-old graduate student who has published a
children's book, was crowned Miss USA at the 52nd annual pageant.
(AP, 4/13/04)
2004 Apr 12, A federal judge
allowed a nationwide ban on dietary supplements containing ephedra to
take effect, turning aside a plea from two manufacturers.
(AP, 4/12/05)
2004 Apr 12, A man and woman
pleaded guilty in Houston to taking part in a smuggling scheme that
resulted in the deaths of 19 illegal immigrants abandoned in a truck
trailer.
(AP, 4/12/05)
2004 Apr 12, DuPont Co., the No. 2
U.S. chemicals maker, said it will cut 3,500 jobs, or 6 percent of its
work force, as part of a previously announced plan to reduce costs by
$900 million in the face of high raw material prices.
(Reuters, 4/12/04)
2004 Apr 12. Microsoft reported
that it agreed to pay $440 million to settle a broad patent suit with
InterTrust. It covered the protection of digital content against
unauthorized copying.
(WSJ, 4/12/04, p.A3)
2004 Apr 12, In Brazil more than
1,000 police stormed into two Rio shantytowns, attempting to halt a
violent dispute among drug traffickers that has left at least 10 people
dead.
(AP, 4/12/04)
2004 Apr 12, Chechnya rebels
killed 10 Russian soldiers, including five whose convoy was shelled
while driving through an insurgent stronghold.
(AP, 4/12/04)
2004 Apr 12, In Colombia
government soldiers accidentally killed three fellow troops after
mistaking them for outlawed paramilitary gunmen near Puerto Gaitan.
(AP, 4/13/04)
2004 Apr 12, A senior government
minister said India will not deploy peacekeeping troops in Iraq without
a mandate from the United Nations because the situation there is "not
favorable."
(AP, 4/12/04)
2004 Apr 12, In Lucknow, India,
thousands of people crowding into a park for a politician's birthday
celebration and to receive free saris stampeded, killing 21 women and
children.
(AP, 4/12/04)
2004 Apr 12, Gunfire was largely
silenced in the second day of a truce in Fallujah, where Iraqi doctors
said 600 people, including many civilians, were killed.
(AP, 4/12/04)
2004 Apr 12, Israeli troops
exchanged fire with Palestinian gunmen near an Israeli settlement in
the Northern Gaza Strip, killing at least three of the assailants.
(AP, 4/12/04)
2004 Apr 12, In Mexico Morelos
state Gov. Sergio Estrada ordered the firing of all 552 state police
officers following charges that commanders provided protection to drug
traffickers.
(SFC, 4/13/04, p.A2)
2004 Apr 12, In Russia a bomb
exploded on the roof of a businessman's armored car in Moscow, killing
at least four people including the businessman.
(AP, 4/12/04)
2004 Apr 13, Barry Bonds hit his
661st homer, passing Willie Mays to take sole possession of third place
on baseball's career list.
(AP, 4/13/05)
2004 Apr 13, Swimmer Michael
Phelps won the 2003 Sullivan Award as the nation's top amateur athlete.
(AP, 4/13/05)
2004 Apr 13, Pres. Bush defended
his Iraq policy, vowed no retreat and conceded the need for UN help in
a televised press conference.
(SFC, 4/14/04, p.A1)(WSJ, 4/14/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 13, Attorney Gen'l.
Ashcroft, speaking at the hearings on 9/11, placed much of the blame
for terrorist successes on budgetary and investigatory constraints
inherited from the Clinton administration.
(WSJ, 4/14/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 13, The FDA approved a
clinical trial by Cyberkinetics on implants in humans for a
brain-computer interface.
(SFC, 4/14/04, p.C8)
2004 Apr 13, Brazil's 10,000
federal customs agents began a 4-day strike, threatening to tie up the
nation's ports and international airports unless the government grants
them a pay raise.
(AP, 4/13/04)
2004 Apr 13, Authorities in
Shanghai announced that divorced couples who remarry will be allowed to
have a second child.
(AP, 4/13/04)
2004 Apr 13, Cuba agreed to buy
$13 million in food from American companies and reached a tentative
deal for up to $10 million in farm goods from California.
(AP, 4/13/04)
2004 Apr 13, Hungarian authorities
said they arrested three Arabs who were plotting to assassinate
visiting Israeli President Moshe Katsav.
(AP, 4/13/04)
2004 Apr 13, A 2,500-strong U.S.
force, backed by tanks and artillery, pushed to the outskirts of the
Shiite holy city of Najaf for a showdown with a radical cleric. One
soldier was killed enroute. US forces in Fallujah killed over 100
insurgents.
(AP, 4/13/04)(SFC, 4/15/04, p.A17)
2004 Apr 13, Four Italians working
as private security guards for a U.S. company in Iraq were reported
missing, and an Arab satellite TV broadcaster said they were kidnapped
by insurgents.
(AP, 4/13/04)
2004 Apr 13, In Saudi Arabia
militants near Unaizah opened fire on a police checkpoint at dawn,
killing four police officers and fleeing in security agents' cars.
(AP, 4/13/04)
2004 Apr 14, President Bush gave
PM Ariel Sharon U.S backing for Israeli plans to hold on to parts of
the West Bank. He also ruled out Palestinian refugees returning to
Israel, bringing strong criticism from the Palestinians.
(AP, 4/15/04)
2004 Apr 14, In Afghanistan killed
a district police chief and eight Afghan soldiers in an ambush in
southern Zabul province.
(AP, 4/15/04)
2004 Apr 14, Tornadoes swept
through northern Bangladesh, killing at least 69 people, injuring
hundreds and blowing away thousands of flimsy huts.
(AP, 4/15/04)(AP, 4/16/04)
2004 Apr 14, China began offering
free AIDS tests to anyone who wants one and free treatment for infected
people who can't afford.
(AP, 4/14/04)
2004 Apr 14, Colombian President
Alvaro Uribe launched a campaign to persuade Congress to amend the
constitution to allow him to run for a second term in 2006.
(AP, 4/15/04)
2004 Apr 14, In Indonesia Akbar
Tandjung, the leader of the party once led by Indonesian dictator
Suharto, claimed victory in parliamentary elections that were a major
setback to President Megawati Sukarnoputri.
(AP, 4/14/04)
2004 Apr 14, In Iraq U.S.
warplanes and helicopters hammered gunmen in Fallujah, straining a
truce there. A 2,500-strong U.S. force massed on the outskirts of the
holy city of Najaf for a showdown with radical cleric al-Sadr.
Militants executed an Italian captive. A platoon of US Marines came
under assault in Anbar Province. In 2005 Michael M. Phillips authored
“The Gift of Valor,” portraits of the men in action on this day. Cpl.
Jason Dunham saved the lives of two of his fellow Marines by jumping on
a grenade during an ambush in Karabilah. Dunham died 8 days later. In
2006 Pres. Bush awarded Dunham a posthumous Medal of Honor.
(AP, 4/14/04)(WSJ, 5/31/05, p.D10)(AP,
4/15/04)(http://tinyurl.com/yzc8gh)(WSJ, 1/6/06, p.A1)
2004 Apr 14, The UN emissary to
Iraq proposed a caretaker government to replace the Governing Council
on June 30 to shepherd the country to free election in Jan 2005.
(SFC, 4/15/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 14, Macedonians voted to
replace the president who was killed in a February plane crash.
(AP, 4/14/04)
2004 Apr 14, Peru's Congress
approved murder charges against ex-President Alberto Fujimori for
allegedly authorizing the death squad killing of a union leader over a
decade ago.
(AP, 4/15/04)
2004 Apr 14, Russia said it will
begin the evacuation of some of its citizens from Iraq on in light of
the deteriorating security situation in that country.
(AP, 4/14/04)
2004 Apr 14, Seychelles Pres.
France Albert Rene, one of Africa's longest-serving leaders, said he
was ready to step down after nearly 3 decades at the helm of this
Indian Ocean nation.
(AP, 4/14/04)
2004 Apr 14, South Africans of all
races voted for a new government for the third time in a decade. The
African National Congress, the party that led them out of apartheid,
won nearly 70% of the vote.
(AP, 4/14/04)(WSJ, 4/15/04, p.A1)(WSJ, 4/16/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 14, In South Korea the
386 generation (3 for in their 30s, 8 for coming of age in the 80s, and
6 for being born in the 60s) was reported to be playing a significant
role in the parliamentary elections.
(WSJ, 4/14/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 15, In the finale to the
first edition of the NBC reality show "The Apprentice," an estimated
27.6 million viewers tuned in to watch. Donald Trump "hired" Bill
Rancic over Kwame Jackson during a segment that was telecast live.
(AP, 4/16/05)
2004 Apr 15, The Pentagon told
20,000 US soldiers in Iraq that their tours would be extended.
(WSJ, 4/16/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 15, The US EPA warned
California and a 30 other states to clean up smog-plagued regions. 474
counties fell short of standards including 36 in California.
(SFC, 4/16/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 15, Several Los Angeles
porn-movie companies said they would stop production for 2 months
following reports that 2 stars, including veteran performer Darren
James, had recently tested positive for AIDS.
(SFC, 4/16/04, p.A2)(Econ, 4/24/04, p.66)
2004 Apr 15, The United States
pledged $400 million to support a U.N. plan for reunifying Cyprus, but
stressed no money would come unless voters on the divided island
approve the settlement in a referendum next week.
(AP, 4/15/04)
2004 Apr 15, Thomas Corbally
(b.1921), man of mystery, died. He became known as part of the 1963
British Profumo scandal. An FBI report declassified in 1987
characterized him as an American businessman who ran sex orgies in his
London flat."
(SFC, 4/27/04, p.B7)
2004 Apr 15, Colombian police
seized dozens of estates and homes belonging to reputed drug kingpin
Diego Montoya.
(AP, 4/15/04)
2004 Apr 15, A man identifying
himself as Osama bin Laden offered a "truce" to European countries that
do not attack Muslims, saying it would begin when their soldiers leave
Islamic nations, according to a recording broadcast on Arab satellite
networks.
(AP, 4/15/04)
2004 Apr 15, Tim Berners-Lee,
inventor of the world wide web, became the 1st recipient of Finland’s
Millennium Technology Prize.
(Econ, 5/14/05,
p.84)(www.infoworld.com/article/04/04/16/HNbernerslee_1.html)
2004 Apr 15, In Hungary government
leaders and the Israeli president inaugurated this country's first
Holocaust museum in memory of Hungary's 600,000 Holocaust victims.
(AP, 4/15/04)
2004 Apr 15, In Iraq 3 Japanese
hostages who had been threatened with death unless Tokyo withdrew its
troops from Iraq were released.
(AP, 4/15/04)
2004 Apr 15, A U.S. businessman
was abducted from his hotel in the southern city of Basra by kidnappers
disguised as policemen.
(AP, 4/16/04)
2004 Apr 15, Gunmen killed a
high-ranking Iranian diplomat in Baghdad.
(AP, 4/15/04)
2004 Apr 15, Branko Crvenkovski,
Macedonia's PM, took the lead in elections to replace the president who
died in a plane crash, but he didn't get enough votes to avoid a runoff.
(AP, 4/15/04)
2004 Apr 15, In western Mexico, an
explosion tore through a small fireworks store in Tonala, killing seven
people including a small child.
(AP, 4/16/04)
2004 Apr 15, The liberal Uri Party
loyal to South Korea's impeached president Roh Moo Hyun, won the most
seats in parliamentary elections.
(AP, 4/15/04)(SFC, 4/16/04, p.A3)
2004 Apr 16, Pres. Bush said he is
handing over the lead role in the Iraqi political transition to the
UN's top envoy. Pres. Bush and British PM Tony Blair, meeting in
Washington, endorsed giving the UN broad control over Iraq's political
future.
(SFC, 4/17/04, p.A1)(AP, 4/16/05)
2004 Apr 16, On Nov 22, 2005,
London’s Daily Mirror reported that Pres. Bush spoke of targeting
Al-Jazeera's headquarters in Doha, Qatar, when he met PM Blair at the
White House on April 16, 2004. A civil servant was charged under
Britain's Official Secrets Act for allegedly leaking a government memo
that described the meeting.
(AP, 11/22/05)
2004 Apr 16, Videotape broadcast
on the Arab TV station Al-Jazeera showed Army Pvt. 1st Class Keith M.
Maupin, abducted during an attack on a fuel truck convoy near Baghdad a
week earlier. Arab television reported June 29, 2004, that Maupin had
been killed; he is listed as missing by the U.S. military.
(AP, 4/16/05)
2004 Apr 16, California lawmakers
passed legislation aimed at reforming the nation's most expensive
workers' compensation program, a move that businesses applauded but
critics derided as a sellout to insurance companies.
(AP, 4/17/04)
2004 Apr 16, After analyzing 730
confirmed cases of gout from among a group of 47,000 men over 12 years,
London researchers demonstrated that drinkers are more likely to get
gout, and that beer is worse and wine is best. Gout is caused by
deposits of crystals of a chemical called uric acid in joints. Alcohol
consumption leads to "hyperuricaemia" -- when the body produces too
much uric acid.
(Reuters, 4/16/04)
2004 Apr 16, In Afghanistan
suspected Taliban rebels fired rockets and machine-guns at a checkpoint
in a remote southwestern region, killing 8 Afghan soldiers in a
nighttime attack.
(AP, 4/18/04)
2004 Apr 16, In Recife, Brazil,
thousands of militant farmers converged to press the government for
speedier land reform.
(AP, 4/16/04)
2004 Apr 16, Abu Walid, Saudi-born
rebel commander also known as Abdul Aziz al-Ghamdi, was killed by
Russian government forces in Chechnya.
(AP, 4/19/04)
2004 Apr 16, Yu Zhendong, a
fugitive Chinese banker accused of helping embezzle $485 million from
his state-owned bank, was returned to China by U.S. authorities.
(AP, 4/16/04)
2004 Apr 16, A Chinese newspaper
reported that China over the last few months had arrested nearly a
dozen military officers — including at least four generals — on charges
of spying for rival Taiwan.
(AP, 4/16/04)
2004 Apr 16, In Chongqing, China,
leaking chlorine gas exploded at a chemical plant, killing at least 7
people and forcing 150,000 to flee their homes.
(AP, 4/17/04)(WSJ, 4/19/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 16, In Iraq U.S. military
and civilian officials met with leaders from Fallujah, the first known
direct negotiations between Americans and city representatives since
the siege of Fallujah began April 5.
(AP, 4/16/04)
2004 Apr 16, Two Iraqi civilians
were killed and four wounded when 122 mm rockets fired by insurgents
fell short of a military camp and hit a civilian area.
(AP, 4/18/04)
2004 Apr 16, In Italy Premier
Silvio Berlusconi's corruption trial resumed in Milan.
(AP, 4/16/04)
2004 Apr 16, Jose Luis Rodriguez
Zapatero, Spain's young and largely untested Socialist leader, won
parliamentary Friday as prime minister.
(AP, 4/16/04)
2004 Apr 17, The body of
University of North Dakota student Dru Sjodin (22) was found in a
ravine northwest of Crookston, Minn. She was last seen Nov 22 at the
Grand Forks, ND, mall, where she worked. Alfonso Rodriquez was arrested
in Dec. and investigators matched DNA in blood in his car to Sjodin.
(AP, 4/18/04)(SSFC, 4/18/04, p.A13)
2004 Apr 17, In southern Pakistan
assailants opened fire on a vehicle, killing four Afghans and wounding
another person.
(AP, 4/17/04)
2004 Apr 17, Soundarya (32), an
Indian movie star, and three other people were killed when their plane
crashed in southern India minutes after takeoff.
(AP, 4/17/04)
2004 Apr 17, Ten U.S. troops were
killed in combat across Iraq, including five U.S. Marines killed in
pitched battles near the Syrian border, and an eleventh soldier died in
a tank rollover.
(AP, 4/19/04)
2004 Apr 17, Iraqi gunmen opened
fire on a coalition military patrol outside of the encircled southern
city of Najaf, killing one soldier. 2 gunmen were killed.
(AP, 4/17/04)
2004 Apr 17, Sgt. Maj. Ahmed
Mustafa Ibrahim Ali, a Jordanian policeman, shot into a group of U.N.
police officers in a prison compound in Kosovo. Two Americans and the
Jordanian assailant were killed. 10 U.S. officers and an Austrian were
wounded in the gunbattle.
(AP, 4/18/04)(SSFC, 4/18/04, p.A14)
2004 Apr 17, A Palestinian suicide
bomber blew himself up at an industrial zone between Israel and Gaza,
wounding four Israeli security workers.
(AP, 4/17/04)
2004 Apr 17, An Israeli missile
strike came 4 hours after a suicide bombing and killed Hamas leader
Abdel Aziz Rantisi (56) as he rode in his car in Gaza City. The dead
included Akram Nassar (35) Rantisi's personal bodyguard and his son
Mohammed (27).
(AP, 4/17/04)(SSFC, 4/18/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 17, In Slovakia Ivan
Gasparovic (63), an ex-chairman of parliament previously loyal to ex-PM
Vladimir Meciar (61), won a presidential runoff against Meciar with
59.91 percent of the vote. The turnout was 43.5%.
(AP, 4/18/04)(Econ, 4/24/04, p.49)
2004 Apr 18, Ratu Sir Kamisese
Mara (83), Fiji's first prime minister and a key U.S. ally in the South
Pacific during the Cold War, died. The paramount chief of the Lau
Islands of eastern Fiji, he was revered for holding together bickering
tribes as he welded Fiji into a stable, multiracial nation after 96
years of colonial British rule.
(AP, 4/19/04)
2004 Apr 18, In Indonesia
Presidential front-runner Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said he had chosen
the country's popular welfare minister as his running mate, forging a
ticket that polls show could easily defeat incumbent Megawati
Sukarnoputri in July.
(AP, 4/18/04)
2004 Apr 18, Koken Nosaka (79),
Japanese lawmaker, died. He was a former top government spokesman under
Japan's first Socialist prime minister in the post-World War II era.
(AP, 4/18/04)
2004 Apr 18, Hamas secretly
appointed a new Gaza Strip chief. Dr. Mahmoud Zahar was appointed as
the group's 3rd leader.
(AP, 4/18/04)(SFC, 4/23/04, p.A16)
2004 Apr 18, In Libya Moammar
Gadhafi called for the abolition of Libya's three decade-old
exceptional courts and other strict laws criticized by human rights
groups.
(AP, 4/18/04)
2004 Apr 18, North Korean leader
Kim Jong Il crossed into China in a special train for a summit to
discuss the North's nuclear weapons program with the Chinese president.
(AP, 4/18/04)
2004 Apr 18, Rodriguez Zapatero,
Spain's new PM, ordered the withdrawal of 1,300 Spanish troops from
Iraq.
(SFC, 4/19/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 18, The UN reported that
at least 50,000 people have fled their homes in recent weeks because of
militia attacks and fighting between Sudanese government and rebel
forces in southern Sudan.
(AP, 4/18/04)
2004 Apr 19, In the Boston
Marathon Timothy Cherigat of Kenya won for the men at 2:10:37;
Catherine Ndereba of Kenya won for the women at 2:24:27.
(WSJ, 4/20/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 19, Researchers reported
in the Annals of Internal Medicine that fairly heavy alcohol
consumption appears to moderately increase the risk of cancer in the
colon and rectum.
(Reuters, 4/19/04)
2004 Apr 19, The annual
environmental Goldman Prizes were awarded in SF. Winners included
Rashida Bee and Champa Devi Shukla of India for their work following
the Bhopal catastrophe; Margie Richard of the US for her work following
chemical leaks in Norco, Louisiana; Rudolf N. Amenga-Etego of Ghana for
his work in suspending a water privatization project; Libia R. Grueso
Castelblanco of Colombia for her work in securing territorial rights
for rural communities; Manana Kochladze of Georgia for winning
concessions to protect villagers and a pristine gorge from an oil
pipeline; Demetrio De Carvalho of East Timor for his environmental
efforts.
(SFC, 4/19/04, p.B5)
2004 Apr 19, Jim Cantalupo (60),
McDonald's Corp. Chairman and Chief Executive, died of an apparent
heart attack in Florida and the company named Chief Operating Officer
Charlie Bell to replace him as CEO.
(AP, 4/19/04)
2004 Apr 19, John Maynard
(1920-2004), a leading British evolutionary biologist widely credited
with taking the radical step of applying game theory to the subject,
died in Lewes, England. His books included "The Theory of Evolution"
(1958) and "The Evolution of Sex" (1978).
(SSFC, 4/25/04, p.B7)(AP, 4/29/04)
2004 Apr 19, Norris McWhirter
(78), co-creator of the Guinness Book of Records (1955), died in
England of a heart attack.
(WSJ, 4/21/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 19, In Brazil riot police
used tear gas and rubber bullets to eject hundreds of squatters who had
seized a vacant building in Sao Paulo to demand the government speed up
redistribution of land to the poor.
(AP, 4/19/04)
2004 Apr 19, Chilean troops
prepared to take up posts in central Haiti, extending the peacekeeping
presence where as many as 400 rebels still hold sway.
(AP, 4/19/04)
2004 Apr 19, Honduras President
Ricardo Maduro announced the pullout of his 370 troops from Iraq "in
the shortest time possible."
(AP, 4/20/04)(WSJ, 4/20/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 19, In Iraq US officials
and local leaders in Fallujah agreed to a number of measures to reduce
tensions.
(SFC, 4/20/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 19, Pierluigi Vigna,
Italy's national anti-Mafia prosecutor, said Italian mobsters and
Islamic terrorist groups have forged links in arms and drug trafficking.
(AP, 4/20/04)
2004 Apr 19, North Korean leader
Kim Jong Il reportedly held talks with Chinese President Hu Jintao
about the North's nuclear arms program and requests for economic aid.
(AP, 4/19/04)
2004 Apr 19, A Russian rocket
roared into space carrying an American, a Russian and a Dutchman to the
international space station on the 3rd manned mission since the halt of
the US shuttle program.
(SFC, 4/19/04, p.A5)(AP, 4/19/05)
2004 Apr 19, Saudi police seized 2
explosives packed SUVs on a highway outside Riyadh. It the 3rd day in a
row that such a seizure was announced.
(WSJ, 4/20/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 19, The Uzbek government
labeled the activities of George Soros' foundation "undesirable" after
the billionaire philanthropist said its office was being forced to
close and blasted human rights abuses in this Central Asian nation.
(AP, 4/19/04)
2004 Apr 20, The US Labor Dept.
established new rules on overtime pay. It expanded the range for lower
income workers and put a ceiling on overtime for higher income workers.
(WSJ, 4/21/04, p.D1)
2004 Apr 20, The US federal
government agreed to settle a civil suit filed by leaders of Earth
First following an FBI arrest in Oakland May 24, 1990. Darryl Cherney
and the estate of Judi Bari expected to receive $2 million.
(SFC, 4/23/04, p.B1)
2004 Apr 20, A US federal
commission said oceans of the US are in dire shape due to pollution and
over fishing.
(WSJ, 4/21/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 20, An Oregon judge
ordered a halt to same sex marriages. He also ordered official
recognition of marriages already held in Multnomah County.
(SFC, 4/21/04, p.A3)
2004 Apr 20, Karen Jurgensen, the
editor of USA Today, resigned following charges of fabrication and
fraud against foreign correspondent Jack Kelley.
(Econ, 4/24/04, p.66)
2004 Apr 20, WorldCom emerged from
bankruptcy renamed as MCI.
(WSJ, 2/18/05, p.A1)
2004 Apr 20, The NASA Gravity
Probe B satellite, designed by Stanford researchers, was launched to
test Einstein's General Theory of Relativity.
(SFC, 4/21/04, p.A7)
2004 Apr 20, A tornado hit Utica,
Ill., and 8 people were killed in the basement of a tavern.
(SFC, 4/22/04, p.A6)(WSJ, 4/22/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 20, Afghanistan carried
out its first execution since the fall of the hardline Taliban, putting
a bullet to the head of a former military commander convicted of more
than 20 murders. "During his detention, Abdullah Shah reportedly
revealed first hand evidence against several regional commanders
currently in positions of power against whom no charges have been
brought."
(AP, 4/27/04)
2004 Apr 20, In Argentina a
federal judge issued an international arrest warrant for former
President Carlos Menem who has refused to appear for questioning in a
corruption probe.
(AP, 4/21/04)
2004 Apr 20, British PM Tony Blair
said he would put a new European Union constitution to a nationwide
vote. No date was set.
(AP, 4/20/04)
2004 Apr 20, China urged North
Korean leader Kim Jong Il to rethink his demands for a written U.S.
pledge not to attack, saying only a softer line can ease the standoff
over Pyongyang's nuclear program.
(AP, 4/20/04)
2004 Apr 20, Yang Xiuzhu, former
vice-mayor of Wenzhou and vice-director of the Zhejiang Provincial
Construction Bureau, fled abroad as investigations began on bribery
charges. She was believed to have taken bribes of 253.2 million yuan
(US$30 million).
(http://tinyurl.com/aza8m)(Econ, 6/4/05, p.42)
2004 Apr 20, Chinese state media
reported that from April last year, about 50 to 60 infants died from
malnutrition after being fed a milk formula with virtually no
nutritional value.
(AP, 4/20/04)(SFC, 4/21/04, p.A8)
2004 Apr 20, Gen. Jose Miguel Soto
Jimenez said the Dominican Republic will pull its troops out of Iraq
early, in the next few weeks, following the lead of Spain and Honduras.
(AP, 4/20/04)
2004 Apr 20, Elections began in
India for the 1st of 5 stages culminating May 10. India's general
elections implemented the use of computerized voting machines.
(WSJ, 4/19/04, p.A1)(AP, 4/22/04)
2004 Apr 20, Indonesia's Golkar
Party chose ex-Gen. Wiranto as its presidential candidate. He was
indicted by the UN for human-rights abuses in East Timor in 1999.
(WSJ, 4/21/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 20, In Iraq a barrage of
18 mortars hit a Baghdad jail, killing 21 prisoners.
(AP, 4/20/04)
2004 Apr 20, Authorities in
southern Italy reported that they had seized about 7,500 Kalashnikov
assault rifles and other combat-grade firearms from a Turkish-flagged
ship headed for New York. The weapons were destined for a company in
the U.S. state of Georgia.
(AP, 4/20/04)
2004 Apr 20, In Jordan police shot
and killed three suspected terrorists who were believed to have planned
to detonate a bomb that would have flattened a large part of the
capital Amman.
(AP, 4/20/04)
2004 Apr 20, Palestinians fired a
barrage of homemade rockets and mortar shells at Gaza Strip settlements
and towns inside Israel in retaliation for the killing of Hamas leader
Abdel Aziz Rantisi. Over two days, 15 Qassam rockets hit Israeli
targets, wounding one Israeli and damaging at least five structures.
Israeli soldiers raided the Gaza neighborhood where some of the rockets
originated, killing 5 Palestinians, among them 3 militants, and
wounding 21 others.
(AP, 4/20/04)(SFC, 4/21/04, p.A12)
2004 Apr 20, Palestinian militants
stormed a Palestinian police station in Gaza City and released three
men with possible links to a deadly bombing of a U.S. diplomatic convoy.
(AP, 4/23/04)
2004 Apr 21, Alan Greenspan, US
Federal Reserve Chairman, set the stage for an interest rate increase
in congressional testimony.
(SFC, 4/22/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 21, Mary McGrory (85),
Washington Post columnist, died.
(AP, 4/21/05)
2004 Apr 21, U.S. forces battled
Taliban holdouts in a forbidding mountain range in southern
Afghanistan, killing two fighters and arresting two others.
(AP, 4/22/04)
2004 Apr 21, Chile said it would
begin negotiating a free-trade pact with India beginning in August. It
would at first be limited to commerce in goods.
(WSJ, 4/22/04, p.A17)
2004 Apr 21, Two German fighter
jets collided and crashed in the country's north, police said. The
two-person crew of one plane died and the other crew parachuted to
safety.
(AP, 4/21/04)
2004 Apr 21, The Iranian film
“Marmulak” (Lizard) premiered. It was a comedy about a fugitive
criminal disguised as a mullah.
(Econ, 5/8/04, p.45)
2004 Apr 21, In Basra, Iraq, 5
suicide attackers detonated simultaneous car bombs against 3 police
buildings during rush hour, killing at least 74 people, including 23
children.
(AP, 4/21/04)(SFC, 4/22/04, p.A1)(AP, 4/21/05)
2004 Apr 21, U.S Marines backed by
tanks and helicopter gunships battled insurgents in northern Fallujah,
killing nine.
(AP, 4/21/04)
2004 Apr 21, In Israel Mordechai
Vanunu walked out of prison after serving 18 years for spilling
Israel's nuclear secrets. He was later indicted on charges of violating
the terms of his release.
(AP, 4/21/04)(AP, 4/21/05)
2004 Apr 21, Israeli troops killed
9 Palestinians after rocket attacks were fired at Israel for a 2nd day.
(WSJ, 4/22/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 21,
Karl Hass (92), a former Nazi officer convicted of the wartime massacre
of 335 Italian civilians, died in a rest home near Rome, where he had
been serving a life sentence under house arrest.
(AP, 4/21/05)
2004 Apr 21, Otto Herrera (39), a
Guatemalan man described by U.S. authorities as Central America's
most-wanted drug smuggler, was captured by Mexican agents at Mexico
City's Juarez Int'l. Airport. Mexico made the arrest at the request of
U.S. authorities who had offered a $5 million reward for his capture.
(AP, 4/22/04)
2004 Apr 21, President Sam Nujoma
assured Namibians that a land expropriation program would be conducted
in a legal and orderly manner.
(AP, 4/21/04)
2004 Apr 21, Two car bombs blasted
the Saudi security headquarters, killing at least 4 people and wounding
148.
(AP, 4/21/04)(SFC, 4/22/04, p.A16)
2004 Apr 21, Refugees in Chad
reported that Sudanese and Arab militias were conducting a "reign of
terror" to push blacks out of western Sudan.
(WSJ, 4/22/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 22, On Earth Day Pres.
Bush toured a Maine nature preserve and said the US should try to
expand its wetlands.
(WSJ, 4/23/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 22, Sex abuse victims
were awarded nearly $70 million after suing part of the Evangelical
Lutheran Church in America.
(AP, 4/22/05)
2004 Apr 22, The Queen Mary 2
arrived in NYC on its maiden transatlantic voyage. A crew of 1,250 and
2,600 passengers made the 6-day crossing from Southampton, England.
(SFC, 4/23/04, p.A3)
2004 Apr 22, Pat Tillman, former
safety for the Arizona Cardinals, was killed in an ambush in
Afghanistan. He had walked away from millions of dollars to join the
Army Rangers and serve his country. In late May the Army said that
Tillman was likely killed by friendly fire. In 2005 a new Army report
said top officials held back information that Tillman was killed by
“friendly fire.” In 2007 a Pentagon report found no plot to conceal
evidence, but recommended that officers be held accountable for making
misleading statements about Tillman’s death. A general was censured on
July 31, 2007. In 2009 Jon Krakauer authored “Where Men Win Glory: The
Odyssey of Pat Tillman.”
(AP, 4/24/04)(AP, 5/29/04)(SFC, 5/4/05, p.A9)(SFC,
3/27/07, p.A1)(WSJ, 8/1/07, p.A1)(SSFC, 9/20/09, p.B1)
2004 Apr 22, Algerian officials
said the Salafists, a rebel group linked to al Qaeda, were in surrender
talks to end a 12-year Islamic insurgency.
(WSJ, 4/23/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 22, In Brazil inmates at
Urso Branco State Prison ended a 5-day rebellion that left nine people
dead at the overcrowded prison, after authorities agreed to improve
conditions.
(AP, 4/22/04)
2004 Apr 22, Tens of thousands of
Cypriots turned out in a final show of support for a U.N. plan to end
the 30-year division of their island.
(AP, 4/23/04)
2004 Apr 22, Guatemala Pres. Oscar
Berger joined the heads of Congress and the Supreme Court in publicly
acknowledging government responsibility in the 1990 killing of human
rights leader Myrna Mack.
(AP, 4/22/04)
2004 Apr 22, In Haiti Louis-Jodel
Chamblain, a rebel commander convicted of killing supporters of ousted
President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, surrendered to justice officials.
(AP, 4/23/04)
2004 Apr 22, The Iraqi health
minister said that 576 Iraqi insurgents and civilians had died during
the sharp upturn in violence since April 1 that has also taken the
lives of at least 100 U.S. soldiers.
(AP, 4/22/04)
2004 Apr 22, A gunman in
traditional Arab robe and headdress shot and killed a South African
security guard in a Baghdad shop after accusing him of being a Jew.
(Reuters, 4/22/04)
2004 Apr 22, It was reported that
Japanese scientists had demonstrated mammalian reproduction in mice
using 2 sets of female genes.
(SFC, 4/22/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 22, In Nigeria rival
militias threatened to escalate an ethnic conflict in Nigeria's oil
delta, where 10 people were killed this week in an attack on a boat
full of market vendors.
(AP, 4/22/04)
2004 Apr 22, In North Korea 2
trains carrying oil and liquefied petroleum gas exploded near the
Ryongchon train station when workers knocked wagons against power
lines. Over 160 were killed including 76 children, 1,249 injured and
8,100 homes were destroyed.
(SFC, 4/23/04, p.A1)(AP, 4/25/04)(SSFC, 4/25/04,
p.A14)(WSJ, 4/28/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 22, U.S. authorities
prohibited Peru's largest airline, Aero Continente, from flying to the
United States because of safety concerns.
(AP, 4/23/04)
2004 Apr 22, Spain has agreed to a
U.S. request to leave its intelligence agents in Iraq and not withdraw
them along with its 1,300 troops.
(AP, 4/22/04)
2004 Apr 22, Saudi security forces
killed five wanted militants and were pursuing others after shootouts
that spread over two days in the port city of Jiddah.
(AP, 4/23/04)
2004 Apr 23, President Bush eased
Reagan-era sanctions against Libya in return for Moammar Gadhafi's
giving up weapons of mass destruction.
(AP, 4/23/05)
2004 Apr 23, In Illiopolis, Ill.,
4 workers were killed in an explosion at the Formosa Plastics Plant.
The entire community was forced to evacuate the area.
(SSFC, 4/25/04, p.A2)
2004 Apr 23, China confirmed two
cases of SARS and said the mother of one patient has died, apparently
the first SARS fatality in the country since July.
(AP, 4/23/04)
2004 Apr 23, France closed its
last coal mine.
(AP, 4/23/04)
2004 Apr 23, A rain-triggered
landslide smashed into a bus on Indonesia's Sumatra island, killing at
least 37 passengers and leaving six others buried under tons of mud.
(AP, 4/24/04)
2004 Apr 23, Paul Bremmer, the top
U.S. administrator in Iraq, announced an easing of the ban on members
of Saddam Hussein's disbanded party, a move that will allow thousands
of former Baathists to return to their positions in the military and
government bureaucracy.
(AP, 4/23/04)
2004 Apr 23, Israeli troops killed
four Palestinians, one of them armed, in arrest raids in the West Bank.
(AP, 4/23/04)
2004 Apr 23, In Nigeria a
speedboat full of gunmen attacked a boat carrying oil workers in the
delta region. 2 Americans and 4 others were killed.
(AP, 4/24/04)(SSFC, 4/25/04, p.A3)
2004 Apr 23, President Thabo Mbeki
was elected unopposed for a second term. He pledged to fight poverty
and improve opportunities for all South Africans after his party scored
its biggest victory yet in a decade of multiracial democracy.
(AP, 4/23/04)
2004 Apr 23, In Thailand a massive
fire raced through a slum in downtown Bangkok, snarling traffic and
spewing plumes of black smoke over embassies and five-star hotels in
the area. Armed assailants fatally shot an army officer, just hours
after unidentified attackers set fire to about 50 public buildings in
all 13 districts of Narathiwat in the worst day of arson attacks in
Thailand's Muslim-dominated south.
(AP, 4/23/04)
2004 Apr 24, In Los Angeles,
Vitali Klitschko stopped Corrie Sanders late in the eighth round to win
the WBC heavyweight title vacated by the retirement of Lennox Lewis.
(AP, 4/24/05)
2004 Apr 24, Greek Cypriots
overwhelmingly rejected a UN plan, the Annan Plan, to reunite Cyprus.
The European Union pledged to start searching for ways to extend a hand
of friendship to the island's long-ostracized Turkish side. It meant
that only the Greek side of Cyprus would join the European Union on May
1.
(AP, 4/25/04)(WSJ, 4/26/04, p.A13)(Econ, 5/1/04,
p.49)
2004 Apr 24, Insurgents struck a
U.S. military base north of Baghdad with rockets at dawn, killing 4
American soldiers. A rocket crashed into a crowded market in the Iraqi
capital, killing at least three people. In addition up to 12 Iraqis
were killed in several attacks, including an apparent suicide car
bombing in Tikrit. At least 33 Iraqis died this day in multiple
incidents.
(AP, 4/24/04)(SSFC, 4/25/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 24, Three small dhows, a
boat often used in the Gulf, exploded in the Gulf waters off Iraq's
port of Umm Qasr when approached by teams sent to intercept them. Oil
terminals at al-Basra and Khawr al-Amaya were targeted. The dhow near
Khawr al-Amaya flipped over a U.S. Navy interception craft, killing 2
US sailors and wounding five others. Al Qaeda later claimed
responsibility.
(AP, 4/25/04)(WSJ, 4/27/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 24, In Sri Lanka
President Chandrika Kumaratunga's alliance won a key regional election,
nearly 3 weeks after it emerged as the single largest party in
parliamentary polls.
(AP, 4/25/04)
2004 Apr 25, In Washington DC tens
of thousands of women gathered for an abortion-rights rally as Sen.
Hillary Rodham Clinton told several hundred of them the issue is about
women gaining full equality.
(AP, 4/25/04)(SFC, 4/26/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 25, The IMF ended 2 days
of talks in Washington DC and finance leaders agreed on the need to
continue canceling the debts of poor countries and to provide more aid
in the form of grants.
(SFC, 4/26/04, p.A7)
2004 Apr 25, Thom Gunn (b.1929),
British-born poet, died in SF at age 74. His 1st book, titled "Fighting
Terms" (1954), was recognized as part of the British group called "The
Movement." He moved from England to America in 1954 to live with his
male lover and explore the California culture.
(SFC, 4/28/04, p.B7)(Econ, 5/8/04, p.83)
2004 Apr 25, Estee Lauder
(b.1906), cosmetics pioneer whose pots of potions and tubs of
moisturizers have turned the clock back for millions of faces across
the globe, died in NYC.
(AP, 4/26/04)
2004 Apr 25, In Austria Heinz
Fischer, the candidate of the opposition Social Democrats, defeated
Foreign Minister Benita Ferrero-Waldner, a conservative rival backed by
right-wing populist Joerg Haider in a presidential election.
(AP, 4/25/04)
2004 Apr 25, Clashes between
Congolese troops and Rwandan insurgents in eastern Congo killed at
least 61 people over the weekend.
(AP, 4/26/04)
2004 Apr 25, A roadside bomb
exploded by a U.S. patrol in Baghdad, killing a U.S. soldier and
sparking a gunbattle.
(AP, 4/25/04)
2004 Apr 25, In Indonesia's Maluku
islands Muslim and Christian gangs fought running battles, leaving at
least 10 people dead, including two youths who were hacked to death by
sword-wielding men.
(AP, 4/25/04)
2004 Apr 25, Pope John Paul II
added six more people to the ranks of Catholics on the path to possible
sainthood. Honored were: August Czartoryski (1858-1893) of Poland, a
prince who became a Salesian priest; Laura Montoya (1874-1949) of
Colombia, who founded the Congregation of the Missionary Sisters of the
Immaculate Mary; Maria Guadalupe Garcia Zavala (1878-1963) of Mexico,
co-founder of the Congregation of the Servants of Saint Margaret Mary
and the Poor; Nemesia Valle (1847-1916) of Italy, a nun of the
Congregation of the Sisters of Charity of Saint Giovanna Antida
Thouret; Eusebia Palomino Yenes (1899-1935) of Spain; a nun of the
Institute of the Daughters of Mary, Help of Christians; and da Costa
(1904-1955), who became a lay Salesian cooperator.
(AP, 4/25/04)
2005 Apr 26, Following
conservative criticism of his anti-war activities during the Vietnam
era, Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry accused President
Bush of failing to prove whether he'd fulfilled his commitment to the
National Guard during the same period.
(AP, 4/26/05)
2004 Apr 26, The US unveiled a new
$50 bill to make counterfeiting more difficult.
(SFC, 4/27/04, p.C1)
2004 Apr 26, Scientists reported
that a new gene-therapy treatment for Alzheimer's patients had produced
encouraging results.
(SFC, 4/28/04, p.A5)
2004 Apr 26, Denis Hills (90), the
writer sentenced to death by Idi Amin for describing the Ugandan
dictator as a "black Nero" and "village tyrant," died in southern
England.
(AP, 5/1/04)
2004 Apr 26, Hubert Selby Jr.
(b.1928), author of "Last Exit to Brooklyn," died in LA.
(SFC, 4/27/04, p.B7)
2004 Apr 26, Mainland China dealt
a crushing blow to Hong Kong's hopes for full democracy, when its most
powerful legislative panel ruled the territory won't have direct
elections for its next leader in 2007 or for all its lawmakers in 2008.
(AP, 4/26/04)
2004 Apr 26, Regional presidents
looked poised to win control of the federal parliament in Comoros as
preliminary election results were tallied. Each of the 3 main islands
has its own president and legislature.
(AP, 4/26/04)
2004 Apr 26, In Indonesia's Maluku
islands mobs set fire to buildings at a Christian-run university. 18
people have died in two days of clashes between Christians and Muslims.
(AP, 4/26/04)
2004 Apr 26, In Baghdad, Iraq, an
explosion leveled part of a building as American troops searched it for
suspected production of "chemical munitions." 2 soldiers were killed
and 5 wounded in the blast. In a Fallujah suburb 1 Marine was killed
along with 8 insurgents.
(AP, 4/26/04)(SFC, 4/27/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 26, Iraqi kidnappers said
they would kill 3 Italian hostages unless Italians rally against
Italy's participation in the occupation of Iraq.
(SFC, 4/27/04, p.A8)
2004 Apr 26, In southern
Kyrgyzstan a landslide buried a village, and up to 33 people were
feared dead.
(AP, 4/26/04)
2004 Apr 26, Hamas denounced 2
Palestinian men who died while stopping a suicide bomber from entering
Israel.
(WSJ, 4/28/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 26, In Peru angry
highland Indians beat their town's mayor to death after he refused to
resign in the face of protests, then the mob attacked the Llave police
station, trapping dozens of officers.
(AP, 4/27/04)
2004 Apr 27, Republican Sen. Arlen
Specter, of Pennsylvania, beat back a tough primary threat, barely
defeating conservative congressman Pat Toomey.
(AP, 4/27/05)
2004 Apr 27, The Chinese
government said it had shut down a U.S. visa information center in
Shanghai because of complaints of overcharging.
(AP, 4/28/04)
2004 Apr 27, It was reported that
China planned to consolidate some 35,000 rural cooperatives over the
next 3 years to about 3,000. The government estimated cooperative bad
loans at 26% of the total loans.
(WSJ, 4/27/04, p.A16)
2004 Apr 27, In Indonesia gunmen
in Ambon killed two paramilitary police officers and critically wounded
a third and a Muslim man later was incinerated by a bomb explosion,
bringing the death toll since Sunday to 24.
(AP, 4/28/04)
2004 Apr 27, It was reported that
10 US contractors in Iraq have paid over $300 million in penalties
since 2000 to resolved various allegations.
(SFC, 4/27/04, p.C1)
2004 Apr 27, US troops fought
gunbattles with militiamen overnight near the city of Najaf, killing 64
gunmen and destroying an anti-aircraft system belonging to the
insurgents.
(AP, 4/27/04)
2004 Apr 27, Iraqi police moved
into the streets of the besieged city of Fallujah following hours of
pounding by US warplanes and artillery on Sunni insurgents.
(AP, 4/27/05)
2004 Apr 27, Israeli troops killed
two Hamas fugitives and seriously wounded a third in a gun battle in
the West Bank Tulkarem refugee camp.
(AP, 4/27/04)
2004 Apr 27, Libyan leader Moammar
Gadhafi arrived in Brussels, his first trip to Europe in 15 years.
Gadhafi sought "full normalization" of relations and entry to the aid
and trade program the EU runs with countries around the Mediterranean,
including Israel.
(AP, 4/27/04)
2004 Apr 27, Peruvian police
retook control of an Andean town, a day after highland Indians beat to
death the mayor, accusing him of corruption.
(AP, 4/27/04)
2004 Apr 27, Russian Foreign
Minister Sergey Lavrov and EU officials signed an accord extending the
EU-Russia partnership accord to Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland,
Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Cyprus and Malta,
which join May 1.
(AP, 4/27/04)
2004 Apr 27, In Damascus 4 gunmen
detonated a bomb placed under a car before firing bullets and grenades
at Syrian security forces. Hours later police found weapons including
rocket propelled grenades and guns during the raid in the nearby town
of Khan al-Sheih.
(AP, 4/28/04)
2004 Apr 28, The US monetary
policy subcommittee approved a bill to put the faces of US presidents
on new dollar coins.
(SFC, 4/29/04, p.C3)
2004 Apr 28, CBS broadcast photos
on “60 Minutes” showing US abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison.
(SFC, 5/6/04, p.A17)
2004 Apr 28, In Colombia a
construction crew's backhoe tumbled down a hillside onto a school bus
on the highway below, killing 21 children and two adults and injuring
36 others.
(AP, 4/29/04)
2004 Apr 28, The Dian Fossey fund
reported that the lowland gorilla population in eastern Congo has
dropped over 70% since 1994 due to human warfare.
(WSJ, 4/29/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 28, Masked demonstrators
stormed the main cathedral in El Salvador's capital and demanded the
country's new president withdraw troops from Iraq and rehire dozens of
fired government employees.
(AP, 4/29/04)
2004 Apr 28, Iran's Ayatollah
Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi ordered a ban on the use of torture for
obtaining confessions.
(SFC, 4/29/04, p.A3)
2004 Apr 28, In Iraq a series of
explosions and gunfire rocked Fallujah in new fighting the day after a
heavy battle in which U.S. warplanes and artillery pounded the city in
a show of force against Sunni insurgents. Elsewhere 1 US and 2
Ukrainian soldiers were killed.
(AP, 4/28/04)(WSJ, 4/29/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 28, Macedonians chose
between a liberal prime minister and a nationalist candidate in
presidential elections. Front-runner Branko Crvenkovski, the current
PM, and right-wing opposition politician Sasko Kedev, a U.S.-educated
doctor with little political background, competed in the runoff
election for the mostly ceremonial post. Oremier Crvenkovski claimed
victory and Kedev claimed fraud.
(AP, 4/28/04)(WSJ, 4/29/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 28, The six nations
involved in resolving the North Korea nuclear arsenal dispute — the
United States, China, the two Koreas, Russia and Japan —scheduled to
begin working level talks May 12 in Beijing, China.
(AP, 4/29/04)
2004 Apr 28, Pakistan said it will
reduce the size of its army by 50,000, but military officials said this
1st reduction in its 57-year history men will not hurt fighting
strength.
(AP, 4/28/04)
2004 Apr 28, A Spanish judge
indicted Amer Azizi, a Moroccan fugitive, on charges of helping to plan
the Sept. 11 hijackings.
(AP, 4/28/05)
2004 Apr 28, In Thailand police
gunned down machete-wielding militants who stormed security outposts in
Thailand's Muslim-dominated south, killing at least 112 people. The
16th century Krue-sae Mosque was damaged by soldiers who fired
automatic weapons, tear gas and grenades at it and killed 32 suspected
Islamic insurgents.
(AP, 4/28/04)
2004 Apr 28, The UN Security
Council unanimously approved Resolution 1540 requiring all 191 UN
states to pass laws to keep weapons of mass destruction out of the
hands of terrorists.
(AP, 4/29/04)(www.nti.org/f_WMD411/f2n.html)
2004 Apr 29, The US Sep 11 panel
held a joint interview behind closed doors with Pres. Bush and VP
Cheney.
(WSJ, 4/29/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 29, A national monument
to the 16 million U.S. men and women who served during World War II
opened to the public in Washington DC. Official dedication was set for
May 29.
(AP, 4/29/04)(SFC, 4/30/04, p.A3)
2004 Apr 29, GM ended production
of its Oldsmobile line (b.1897), named after Ransom E. Olds. The last
Olds Alero rolled of a GM assembly line in Lansing, Mich.
(SFC, 4/28/04, p.C1)
2004 Apr 29, Google unveiled an
IPO that could raise as much as $2.7 billion.
(SFC, 4/30/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 29, Cleanup crews arrived
at Suisun Marsh in the SF Bay area to tackle an estimated 60,000 gallon
diesel fuel spill from a pipeline operated by Kinder Morgan Energy
Partners of Houston, Texas.
(SFC, 4/30/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 29, Thousands of Cubans,
young and old, played their favorite game into the night to break the
world record for most people playing chess simultaneously.
(AP, 4/29/04)
2004 Apr 29, US Marines announced
an agreement to end a bloody, nearly month long siege of Fallujah,
saying American forces will pull back and allow an all-Iraqi force
commanded by one of Saddam Hussein's generals to take over security.
Elsewhere 10 U.S. soldiers were killed, 8 of them from a car bomb south
of Baghdad.
(AP, 4/29/04)(WSJ, 4/30/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 29, In Peru 800 people in
a village near Lake Titicaca took five aldermen hostage Thursday after
their mayor fled in fear of his life.
(AP, 4/29/04)
2004 Apr 29, A Russian court
acquitted 4 commando officers in the shooting deaths of 6 Chechen
civilians, after the officers admitted in court that they mistakenly
opened fire on their vehicle and set the car on fire to conceal the
incident based on orders from superiors.
(SFC, 4/30/04, p.A3)
2004 Apr 30, On ABC's "Nightline,"
Ted Koppel read aloud the names of 721 U.S. servicemen and women killed
in the Iraq war. The Sinclair Broadcast Group refused to air the
program on seven ABC stations.
(AP, 4/30/05)
2004 Apr 30, Graphic photographs
were shown on TV screens across the Middle East of naked Iraqi
prisoners being humiliated by smiling U.S. military police. Pres. Bush
condemned the mistreatment of prisoners, saying it "does not reflect
the nature of the American people."
(AP, 4/30/04)
2004 Apr 30, Former NBA star
Jayson Williams was acquitted of manslaughter in the shotgun slaying of
a limousine driver at his mansion, but found guilty of trying to cover
up the shooting.
(AP, 4/30/04)
2004 Apr 30, Michael Jackson
pleaded not guilty in Santa Maria, Calif., to a grand jury indictment
that expanded the child molestation case against him.
(AP, 4/30/05)
2004 Apr 30, In the SF Bay Area
the National Labor Relations Board ruled that cab drivers for an East
Bay syndicate to taxi companies are employees, not independent
contractors, and therefore entitled to unionize. The companies refused
to negotiate.
(SFC, 7/28/04, p.B5)
2004 Apr 30, Bosnian Serb
authorities offered details of six previously undisclosed mass graves
in the town of Srebrenica.
(AP, 4/30/04)
2004 Apr 30, In Indonesia hundreds
of protesters clashed with police as officers re-arrested Abu
Bakar Bashir (66), a Muslim cleric accused of heading an
al-Qaeda-linked terror network. Muslims and Christians with homemade
bombs and military-issue weapons clashed in the eastern city of Ambon,
leaving 15 wounded and scores of houses in flames.
(AP, 4/30/04)
2004 Apr 30, Iraqi troops led by
Maj. Gen. Jassim Mohammed Saleh (49), one of Saddam Hussein's generals,
replaced U.S. Marines and raised the Iraqi flag at the entrance to
Fallujah under a plan to end the month long siege of the city. A
suicide car bomb on the outskirts killed two Americans and wounded six.
Saleh was replaced May 3 by Muhammad Latif, a former Iraqi intelligence
officer.
(AP, 4/30/04)(SFC, 5/4/04, p.A11)
2004 Apr 30, U.S. troops and
radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr agreed to a three-day truce in
negotiations to end the standoff at Najaf.
(AP, 4/30/04)
2004 Apr 30, The Associated Press
found that around 1,361 Iraqis were killed from April 1 to April 30, 10
times the figure of at least 136 U.S. troops who died during the same
period.
(AP, 4/30/04)
2004 Apr 30, A bus skidded off a
mountain highway in central Nepal, killing at least 29 people.
(AP, 5/1/04)
2004 Apr 30, In southern Vietnam a
tourist boat carrying about 130 passengers sank off the coast.
Authorities recovered 22 bodies, including one 8-year-old boy.
(AP, 5/1/04)
2004 Apr, The US trade deficit
climbed to $48.3 billion, up from $46.6 billion in March.
(Econ, 7/10/04, p.63)
2004 Apr, Wired Magazine honored
UCSF researcher Joe DeRisi with a Rave Award for his new virus-spotting
microarray.
(www.wired.com/wired/archive/12.04/rave.html?pg=13)
2004 Apr, The Anti-Phishing
Working Group counted some 1,125 phishing attacks this month. The scam
of duping computer users into revealing private data developed into a
serious threat in the 2nd half of 2003 when banks in Australia and New
Zealand came under attack. Each attack sends an estimated 50k to 10
million phishing e-mails.
(WSJ, 5/27/04, p.B1)
2004 Apr, Some 64% of all Internet
e-mail was identified as spam. Up from 60% in Jan.
(WSJ, 5/28/04, p.B1)
2004 Apr, Elon Musk, co-founder of
PayPal agreed to invest about $30 million in Tesla Motors, an electric
car venture based in San Carlos, Ca. The firm was founded by Martin
Eberhard and marc Tarpenning, co-founders of the Rocket e-book firm. In
2006 the Tesla Roadster was assembled by Lotus Cars in England with an
electric motor made in Taiwan.
(SFC, 8/9/06, p.A2)(Econ, 7/29/06, p.73)
2004 Apr, Australian police,
trying to break a large drug syndicate, supplied information that led
to the arrest of the nine Australians on Indonesian resort island of
Bali. The nine were allegedly carrying 11.2 kilograms (24.7 pounds) of
heroin at the time and faced the death penalty on drugs charges.
(AP, 10/26/05)
2004 Apr, David Blunkett, British
home secretary, launched a plan for a national identity card.
(Econ, 5/1/04, p.62)
2004 Apr, In Costa Rica some 80
families began staying at the Metropolitan Cathedral, when police
removed them from the Bambuzal plantation, owned by Standard Fruit Co.
in Rio Frio de Sarapiqui, about 30 miles north of the Costa Rican
capital. The families say that the land should be divided among the
landless under laws that require companies to work large tracts of land
in order to keep it. Standard says it is working the land to produce
bamboo.
(AP, 7/19/04)
2004 Apr, Bjorn Lomborg (b.1965),
Danish environmentalist, was named one of the 100 globally most
influential people by Time magazine. In May he organized the Copenhagen
Consensus, a list of priorities to make the world a better place. In
2006 he authored “Global Crises, Global Solutions.”
(Econ, 6/24/06, p.38)(www.lomborg.com/biograph.htm)
2004 Apr, Thamir Mubarak Atrouz,
the mastermind behind 2 deadly suicide attacks, August 19 and 29, 2003,
was killed in Fallujah. Al-Qaida in Iraq reported his death in November
2005.
(AP, 11/22/05)
2004 Apr-2005 Mar, Statistics for
this period showed that 18,793 people were murdered in South Africa, an
average of 51 a day in a nation of 47 million.
(AP, 8/26/06)
2004 May 1, Smarty Jones won the
Kentucky Derby and ran his record to 7-for-7, the first unbeaten Derby
winner since Seattle Slew in 1977.
(AP, 5/1/04)
2004 May 1, Shanghai Tobacco,
maker of Panda and other cigarette brands, embarked on a campaign to
extend Panda beyond the political and military elite. WHO statistics
held that China accounts for 30% of the 5.5 trillion cigarettes
consumed daily world-wide.
(WSJ, 5/26/04, p.A1)
2004 May 1, Revelers across
ex-communist eastern Europe celebrated their historic entry to the
European Union. 10 new members (Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia,
Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia)
joined. Malta joined with 70 exemptions to EU rules. Poland had 43
exemptions. Latvia had 32. The Turkish occupied area of Cyprus was
suspended from entry.
(AP, 5/1/04)(Econ, 2/28/04, p.50)(Econ, 4/16/05,
p.16)
2004 May 1, Jean-Jacques Laffont
(57), an award-winning French economist and one of the leading figures
in the study of information theory, died in southern France. His books
included "Incentives in Public Decision Making" (1979).
(AP, 5/14/04)
2004 May 1, In Iraq US top
commander Lt. Gen. Sanchez notified 6 officers of his intent to issue a
memorandum of reprimand for the abuse of prisoners at the Abu Ghraib
prison.
(SFC, 5/4/04, p.A1)
2004 May 1, In Yanbu, Saudi
Arabia, suspected militants sprayed gunfire inside the offices of
Houston-based ABB Ltd., an oil contractor, killing at least six people
— including two Americans and three other Westerners — and wounding
dozens. Police killed four brothers in a shootout after a car chase in
which the attackers reportedly dragged the naked body of one victim
behind their getaway car.
(AP, 5/1/04)(SFC, 5/3/04, p.A7)(WSJ, 2/25/06, p.A1)
2004 May 2, In Afghanistan a
fuel-truck explosion killed at least 25 people in western Herat.
(WSJ, 5/3/04, p.A1)
2004 May 2, In Colombia 2 small
bombs exploded outside the Ministry of Social Affairs in Bogota,
injuring nine people and shattering windows.
(AP, 5/2/04)
2004 May 2, American hostage
Thomas Hamill, kidnapped three weeks ago in an insurgent attack on his
convoy, was found by U.S. forces south of Tikrit after he apparently
escaped from his captors.
(AP, 5/2/04)
2004 May 2, Shiite militiamen
attacked a U.S. convoy in southern Iraq, killing two soldiers and
setting vehicles on fire. Two other American soldiers were killed in
Baghdad. At least 9 US soldiers were killed across central and northern
Iraq.
(AP, 5/2/04)(SFC, 5/3/04, p.A1)
2004 May 2, Adzharian forces blew
up the three major bridges connecting their recalcitrant province with
the rest of Georgia in what their leader said was a preventive measure
against Georgian military action.
(AP, 5/2/04)
2004 May 2, In Israel PM Sharon’s
Likud Party rejected his proposal to withdraw troops and settlers from
the West Bank. Palestinian militants attacked an Israeli vehicle in the
Gaza Strip, killing 4 children and their mother. Israeli soldiers
killed the 2 attackers.
(AP, 5/2/04)(SFC, 5/3/04, p.A1)
2004 May 2, In Mexico a small
plane carrying federal anti-narcotics agents crashed, killing all seven
people on board.
(AP, 5/4/04)
2004 May 2-2004 May 4, In Nigeria
Tarok fighters, a predominantly Christian tribe, attacked Yelwa, a town
dominated by Hausa, a rival Muslim ethnic group, razing homes and
mosques and killing 500-600 people in 2 attacks over the last 3 days.
(AP, 5/6/04)(SFC, 5/7/04, p.A9)
2004 May 2, Martin Torrijos (40),
son of former military dictator Gen’l. Omar Torrijos, was easily
elected as Panama's next leader in its first presidential vote since
the handover of the Panama Canal and withdrawal of US troops in
December 1999. Torrijos promised to tackle vested interests.
(AP, 5/3/04)(Econ, 1/19/08, p.39)
2004 May 3, The US military said
it had reprimanded seven officers in the abuse of inmates at Baghdad's
notorious Abu Ghraib prison, the first known punishments in the case;
two of the officers were relieved of their duties.
(AP, 5/3/05)
2004 May 3, Marvin Runyon (79),
former postmaster general, died in Nashville, Tenn.
(AP, 5/3/05)
2004 May 3, A NYC court found
financier Frank Quattrone (48) guilty on 3 counts of obstruction of
justice and witness tampering. On Aug 22, 2006, a NY judge approved a
settlement that would allow him to avoid another trial and return to
the securities industry.
(SFC, 5/4/04, p.A1)(Econ, 8/26/06, p.56)
2004 May 3, The fast-spreading
"Sasser" computer worm has infected hundreds of thousands of PCs
globally and the number could soon rise sharply. When a machine is
infected, error messages may appear and the computer may reboot
repeatedly.
(Reuters, 5/3/04)
2004 May 3, A group of British
scientists announced early work on a new procedure that makes teeth
grow from stem cells implanted in the gum.
(AFP, 5/3/04)
2004 May 3, In Bangladesh at least
5 women were crushed to death and dozens were injured when a false fire
alarm caused about 4,000 workers to rush for the exits of a garment
factory.
(AP, 5/3/04)
2004 May 3, Bulgaria sent 24 of
its soldiers home after they complained about being unprepared for duty
in Iraq.
(AP, 5/3/04)
2004 May 3, Militiamen pounded a
U.S. base in the most intense attacks yet on U.S. troops in the Shiite
city of Najaf. US troops killed 20 Shiite militiamen in Najaf.
Insurgents opened fire in the Baghdad, killing one American soldier and
wounding two others.
(AP, 5/3/04)(WSJ, 5/4/04, p.A1)
2004 May 3, California Gov. Arnold
Schwarzenegger paid a hastily arranged visit to King Abdullah II of
Jordan following criticism from Arab-Americans that his Mideast trip
excluded a meeting with Arabs.
(AP, 5/3/04)
2004 May 3, A car packed with
explosives went off as a bus carried Chinese engineers to a port
project in remote southwestern Pakistan, killing 3 of them and injuring
11 other people.
(AP, 5/3/04)
2004 May 4, The US Army disclosed
that the deaths of 10 prisoners and abuse of 10 more in Iraq and
Afghanistan were under criminal investigation, as US commanders in
Baghdad announced interrogation changes.
(AP, 5/4/05)
2004 May 4, The United States
walked out of a U.N. meeting to protest its decision minutes later to
give Sudan a third term on the Human Rights Commission.
(AP, 5/4/05)
2004 May 4, William J. Krar (63)
of East Texas was sentenced to 11 years in federal prison for
stockpiling weapons that included a sodium-oxide bomb capable of
killing everyone inside a midsize civic building.
(SFC, 5/5/04, p.A9)
2004 May 4, Oil prices for June
delivery rose to $38.98 a barrel.
(WSJ, 5/5/04, p.A1)
2004 May 4, Some 3,000
firefighters battled wildfires in Southern California.
(SFC, 5/5/04, p.A7)
2004 May 4, In Afghanistan 2
foreign contractors helping the UN prepare for landmark elections and
their Afghan driver were killed in an attack in a remote eastern
province. The bullet-ridden bodies of 10 government soldiers were found
in southern Afghanistan, hours after the men were abducted in two raids
by suspected Taliban militants.
(AP, 5/5/04)
2004 May 4, In Australia 800
delegates of the Country Women's Association of New South Wales voted
to drop the singing of "God Save the Queen" altogether and only permit
renditions of "Advance Australia Fair", the national anthem.
(AFP, 5/4/04)
2004 May 4, In Bogota Famed
Colombian painter Fernando Botero opened a new exhibition that
graphically depicts the bloodshed of his nation's war and the cruel
crime of kidnapping.
(AP, 5/4/04)
2004 May 4, In Greece 3 bombs
exploded outside a police station near Athens in a series of timed
blasts, causing serious damage just 100 days before the Olympic Games.
(AP, 5/5/04)
2004 May 4, In Haiti a provisional
council was sworn to oversee fresh elections.
(AP, 5/4/04)
2004 May 4, Shiite militiamen
fired several mortar shells at a U.S. base in Najaf and at a city hall
guarded by Bulgarian troops in another Shiite city. Elsewhere, four
U.S. soldiers died after their Humvee overturned during a combat patrol.
(AP, 5/4/04)
2004 May 4, Pakistan and China
signed a deal for the construction of a nuclear power plant, the second
such plant to be built in Pakistan with Beijing's help.
(AP, 5/4/04)
2004 May 5, Pres. Bush gave
interviews to 2 Arab-language networks saying he and the American
people were appalled by the revelations of prisoner mistreatment in
Iraq.
(SFC, 5/6/04, p.A1)
2004 May 5, A 1905 painting by
Pablo Picasso titled 'Garcon a la pipe' (Boy with a Pipe) sold for a
record $104 million at Sotheby's in NYC.
(AP, 5/5/04)(WSJ, 5/11/04, p.A18)
2004 May 5, British-based
SABMiller launched an unsolicited HK$4.3 billion ($550m) bid for Harbin
Brewery, China’s 4th largest brewer.
(Econ, 5/8/04, p.61)
2004 May 5, In central China
shelves stacked high with garlic collapsed and killed 15 workers at a
cold-storage warehouse in Zhenghou.
(AP, 5/6/04)
2004 May 5, Russian foreign
minister Igor Ivanov helped ease Aslan Abashidze out of Adzharia,
Georgia.
(Econ, 5/8/04, p.49)
2004 May 5, Coalition forces
raided buildings used by a militia loyal to a radical Shiite cleric in
two southern cities and clashed with militiamen elsewhere in fighting
that killed 15 Iraqis.
(AP, 5/5/04)
2004 May 5, Israel's state
comptroller said the Housing Ministry has funneled nearly $6.5 million
to illegal settlement construction in the West Bank in the past three
years, more than half of it to outposts Israel pledged to remove.
(AP, 5/5/04)
2004 May 5, Israeli warplanes
fired missiles at a suspected guerrilla hideout in south Lebanon,
shortly after Hezbollah gunners fired on Israeli jets.
(AP, 5/5/04)
2004 May 5, Mexico celebrated the
142nd anniversary of its victory over French forces.
(AP, 5/6/04)
2004 May 5, Nicaragua said its
army had destroyed 333 surface-to-air missiles at the urging of the US
and that the military planned to destroy another 333 SAM-7s in late
July. More than 2,000 Russian-made SAM-7s, shoulder-fired missiles
capable of taking down a plane, were left over from the 1980s Contra
war.
(AP, 5/6/04)
2004 May 6, An estimated 51.1
million people tuned in for the final first-run episode of "Friends" on
NBC.
(AP, 5/6/05)
2004 May 6, Pres. Bush told King
Abdullah II of Jordan that he was sorry for the mistreatment of Iraqi
prisoners by US guards.
(SFC, 5/7/0, p.A1)
2004 May 6, The FBI arrested
Oregon lawyer Brandon Mayfield as part of the investigation into the
Madrid train bombings; however, the bureau later said Mayfield's arrest
had been a mistake, and apologized. In 2006 the US government agreed to
pay Mayfield $2 million to settle a lawsuit.
(AP, 5/6/05)(SFC, 11/30/06, p.A7)
2004 May 6, Lea Fastow, wife of
former Enron finance chief Andrew Fastow, pleaded guilty to a
misdemeanor charge and was sentenced to one year in prison.
(SFC, 5/7/04, p.C3)
2004 May 6, An audio recording
attributed to Osama bin Laden offered rewards in gold for the killing
of top U.S. and U.N. officials in Iraq or of the citizens of any nation
fighting there.
(AP, 5/7/04)
2004 May 6, The Bank of England
raised interest rates a quarter point to 4.25%.
(Econ, 5/8/04, p.53)
2004 May 6, The leader of the
breakaway region of Adzharia fled after street protests, and Georgia's
president flew into the restive province, vowing to pursue the
integration of two other separatist regions.
(AP, 5/6/04)
2004 May 6, A suicide attacker
detonated a car bomb outside the so-called Green Zone that houses the
U.S. headquarters in Baghdad, killing five Iraqi civilians and a U.S.
soldier. U.S. soldiers backed by tanks and armored fighting vehicles
seized control of the governor's office from Shiite militiamen in the
city of Najaf. As many as 41 Iraqis were killed in Najaf.
(AP, 5/6/04)(SFC, 5/7/04, p.A17)
2004 May 6, A Libyan court
sentenced five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor to death on
charges they intentionally infected some 393 children with the AIDS
virus as part of an experiment to find a cure. 9 Libyan health workers
were acquitted. Under Libyan law, death sentences generate an automatic
60-day period for appeal.
(AP, 5/6/04)(SSFC, 6/6/04, E3)
2004 May 6, A Mexican court
sentenced eight drug-gang members to 40 years each in prison for their
roles in the 1993 shooting of Cardinal Juan Jesus Posadas Ocampo and 6
others at a Guadalajara airport.
(AP, 5/7/04)
2004 May 6, In Nigeria lawmakers
in the mostly Islamic Kano state approved a law calling for Muslims to
be whipped and Christians to be jailed if they are caught drinking
alcohol.
(AP, 5/8/04)
2004 May 6, Hundreds of Rwandan
rebels attacked Kingi village in volatile eastern Congo, sparking a
two-hour battle in which at least five Congolese soldiers and
insurgents were killed.
(AP, 5/7/04)
2004 May 7, Donald Rumsfeld, US
Defense Secretary, testified before Congress for 6 hours and apologized
for Iraqi prisoner abuse by US soldiers.
(SFC, 5/8/04, p.A1)
2004 May 7, Army Pvt. 1st Class
Lynndie England, shown in photographs smiling and pointing at naked
Iraqi prisoners, was charged by the military with assaulting the
detainees and conspiring to mistreat them, becoming the seventh soldier
charged in the scandal.
(AP, 5/7/05)
2004 May 7, Raymon Bass (17), a
San Francisco Mission High senior and standout athlete, was shot to
death. Police later arrested Florentino Tobie (19) based on an account
by Cadero Currington, a gang insider, who said the killing was due to
feud with Bass’s cousins. In late 2007 the SF DA dropped the murder
charges against Tobie, because Currington bolted rather than retake the
witness stand.
(SFC, 1/1/08, p.B1)
2004 May 7, In Bangladesh gunmen
opened fire at an opposition rally outside the capital, killing 4
people including a member of parliament. Ahsanullah Master, a senior
member of Bangladesh's main opposition Awami League, and a young man
were killed when a group of armed men opened fire on a rally being
addressed by the politician. On Apr 16, 2005, a court sentenced 22 to
death for the killings.
(AP, 5/7/04)(Reuters, 4/16/05)
2004 May 7, Chile legalized
divorce despite strong opposition from the Catholic Church.
(AP, 5/8/04)
2004 May 7, German authorities
arrested Sven Jaschen, an 18-year-old high school student, for creating
the "Sasser" network computer worm. Jaschan also confessed to
writing the Netsky virus and was suspected to be responsible for 70% of
the 2004 virus infections. In 2005 Jaschan was found guilty of computer
sabotage and illegally altering data. He was given a suspended sentence
of one year and nine months.
(AP, 5/8/04)(USAT, 5/11/04, p.4B)(SFC, 7/29/04,
p.C3)(AP, 7/8/05)
2004 May 7, In Iraq gunmen
ambushed a Polish TV crew south of Baghdad, killing a producer and a
correspondent who was Poland's best-known war reporter.
(AP, 5/7/04)
2004 May 7, Israeli troops raided
a West Bank village near the town of Tulkarem, surrounding a house and
killing two Palestinian militants.
(AP, 5/7/04)
2004 May 7, Israeli warplanes
struck suspected guerrilla positions in southern Lebanon after
artillery fire killed one Israeli soldier on the border.
(AP, 5/7/04)
2004 May 7, Nepal's prime minister
Surya Bahadur Thapa quit after weeks of protests demanding the return
of democracy in the Himalayan kingdom wracked by political instability
and a Maoist insurgency.
(AP, 5/7/04)
2004 May 7, In Karachi, Pakistan,
a bomb exploded at a Shiite Muslim mosque packed with worshippers,
killing 14 people and wounding more than 200 in a suspected suicide
attack.
(AP, 5/8/04)
2004 May 8, Former Iraq hostage
Thomas Hamill returned home to a chorus of cheering family and friends
in Mississippi.
(AP, 5/8/05)
2004 May 8, In Bangladesh
Ahsanullah Master, a member of the main opposition Awami League, was
killed.
(AP, 5/9/04)
2004 May 8, Gunmen loyal to
radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr rampaged through Basra and
Amarah, attacking British patrols and government buildings. Witnesses
in Basra reported 9 militiamen killed in the fighting. One child was
killed when his house was struck by a projectile. Attackers in Habhab
set off a bomb outside the house of a police official killing three
members of his family and wounding three others. A pipeline was bombed
and slowed the flow of export oil by as much as 25%.
(AP, 5/8/04)(SFC, 5/11/04, p.A9)
2004 May 9, Alan King, comedian,
died in NYC. King was born in Brooklyn as Irwin Alan Kniberg. His books
included “Is Salami and Eggs Better than Sex?” (1985).
(SFC, 5/10/04, p.A2)
2004 May 9, The Bangladesh
government put thousands of security forces on the streets of Dhaka and
nearby Tongi as a strike to protest the killing of Ahsanullah Master, a
member of the main opposition Awami League, brought the country to a
standstill.
(AP, 5/9/04)
2004 May 9, Canada rallied to beat
Sweden for the second straight year in the gold-medal game at the world
hockey championships, 5-3.
(AP, 5/9/05)
2004 Mar 9, In Chad 2 days of
fighting broke out as the army battled Islamic militants near a remote
village on the country's western border with Niger, killing 43
"terrorists" of a group suspected of links with al-Qaida. Chad’s
defense minister said hundreds of Arab militiamen from Sudan had raided
a village inside Chad, setting off gun battles with the army that
killed dozens of fighters.
(AP, 3/12/04)(AP, 5/9/04)
2004 May 9, The Chinese government
warned that AIDS is continuing to spread and estimated that there were
some 840,000 carriers of the disease.
(SFC, 5/10/04, p.A3)
2004 May 9, Akhmad Kadyrov (52),
the Kremlin-backed president of Russia's warring Chechnya region, was
killed along with at least 6 others when an explosion tore through a
stadium in Grozny, during Victory Day observances marking the defeat of
the Nazis in World War II. Russian Sergei Abramov was named acting
president.
(AP, 5/10/04)(SFC, 5/10/04, p.A1)(SFC, 5/11/04, p.A7)
2004 May 9, U.S. and British
troops clashed with forces of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr for
a second day. 4 Iraqis were killed in an explosion in a Baghdad market.
Militants loyal to al-Sadr took over Sadr City.
(AP, 5/9/04)(SFC, 5/10/04, p.A1)(SFC, 5/11/04, p.A9)
2004 May 9, Polish police in Lodz
mistakenly opened fire with live ammunition to stop a street fight,
killing a 19-year-old man and wounding three others.
(AP, 5/9/04)
2004 May 9, Brenda Fassie (39),
South Africa's first black pop star, who gave a voice to
disenfranchised blacks at the height of apartheid, died of
complications from an asthma attack.
(AP, 5/10/04)
2004 May 10, President Bush
reacted with "deep disgust and disbelief" during a Pentagon visit as he
examined new photos and video clips of American soldiers abusing Iraqi
prisoners.
(AP, 5/10/05)
2004 May 10, Charles Prince, CEO
of Citigroup, said his bank would pay $2.65 billion to settle
class-action litigation accusing it of misleading investors in WorldCom.
(Econ, 5/15/04, p.73)(AP, 5/10/05)
2004 May 10, Scientists working
with mice reported success in killing fat cells by cutting off their
blood supply.
(WSJ, 5/10/04, p.B1)
2004 May 10, In Bloomington,
Indiana, Brood X of the 17-year Cicadas started emerging from the
ground. Billions and possibly even trillions of cicadas were expected
to emerge across much of the eastern half of the United States over the
next few weeks.
(Reuters, 5/15/04)(Econ, 5/8/04, p.75)
2004 May 10, An asteroid
identified as 2004JG6 was observed inside Earth’s orbit and traveling
around the sun every 184 days.
(SFC, 5/31/04, p.A4)
2004 May 10, In India exit polls
showed PM Vajpayee’s coalition government was far short of a majority
needed to control Parliament.
(SFC, 5/11/04, p.A7)
2004 May 10, A U.S. aircraft
destroyed a Baghdad office of Muqtada al-Sadr. His followers said two
people were killed and six injured. US military said as many as 35
Al-Sadr supporters were killed. Gunmen fired on a vehicle in the
northern oil city of Kirkuk, killing two foreign construction workers
and their Iraqi driver.
(AP, 5/10/04)(SFC, 5/11/04, p.A9)(USAT, 5/11/04,
p.7A)
2004 May 10, In Iraq one Russian
worker was killed and two were taken hostage 18 miles south of Baghdad.
(AP, 5/11/04)
2004 May 10, A U.N.-backed
tribunal issued an arrest warrant against Indonesia's former military
chief and current presidential candidate Gen. Wiranto for human rights
abuses during the territory's bloody break with Jakarta in 1999.
(AP, 5/10/04)
2004 May 10, In Matamoros, Mexico,
drug outlaw Alberto Guerrero, his bodyguard and 3 teenage girls were
killed by a spray of bullets outside the Wild West dance hall. Ex-army
commandos turned traffickers, known as Zetas, were responsible.
(SFC, 6/22/04, p.D3)
2004 May 10, In Philippine
elections voters cast ballots for president, vice president, the House
of Representatives, half of 24 seats in the Senate and about 17,000
municipal posts. Incumbent Gloria Macapagal Arroyo opposed film star
Fernando Poe Jr. Arroyo won a narrow victory over her movie star rival
and her coalition gained a majority in the legislature.
(AP, 5/10/04)(AP, 5/24/04)(WSJ, 5/25/04, p.A1)
2004 May 10, Saudi oil ministers
called on OPEC to pump more oil.
(SFC, 5/11/04, p.A1)
2004 May 11, The Bush
administration ordered economic sanctions against Syria for supporting
terrorism. Food and medicine were excepted.
(SFC, 5/12/04, p.A3)
2004 May 11, NBA star Kobe Bryant
pleaded not guilty in a Colorado court to a rape charge. Prosecutors
later dropped the case.
(AP, 5/11/05)
2004 May 11, Oil for June delivery
rose to 40.06 per barrel, the highest price in 13 years.
(SFC, 5/12/04, p.A1)
2004 May 11, A video, posted on an
al-Qaida-linked Web site, showed the beheading of Nick Berg, an
American civilian in Iraq. The execution was carried out to
avenge abuses of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison. Abu Musab
al-Zarqawi, aka Ahmad Fadhil al Khalayeh, was later identified as the
beheader. Nick Berg (26) was from West Chester, Pa.
(AP, 5/11/04)(SFC, 5/12/04, p.A1)(SFC, 5/14/04,
p.A13)(ST, 5/14/04, p.A17)
2004 May 11, Taliban guerrillas
killed two Afghan soldiers on a U.S.-funded highway in a troubled
southeastern province where American troops continue to arrest
suspected militants.
(AP, 5/12/04)
2004 May 11, Brazil decided to
expel American journalist Larry Rohter, who had just published a story
on Pres. Lula’s drinking.
(Econ, 5/15/04, p.36)
2004 May 11, The Int’l. Justice
Mission, a US-based evangelical Christian organization, was reported to
be active in battling the child-sex trade in Cambodia. The group,
founded in 1997 by Gary Haugen, was operating with $1.7 million in
federal funds.
(SFC, 5/11/04, p.A1)
2004 May 11, Cuba’s dollar-only
stores “closed for inventory.” Cuba blamed new US measures aimed at
squeezing the island’s economy.
(SFC, 5/12/04, p.A9)
2004 May 11, India's stock market
suffered its deepest plunge in four years due to fears the government's
liberal economic policies might falter if the prime minister's ruling
alliance fails to get a majority in Parliament, as predicted by exit
polls.
(AP, 5/11/04)
2004 May 11, Hamas militants
triumphantly displayed remains of some of the six Israeli soldiers
killed in a roadside bombing in Gaza City, prompting Israeli threats of
punishing reprisals if body parts are not returned. 8 Palestinians were
killed and 123 wounded in a battle that pitted hundreds of gunmen
against Israeli troops.
(AP, 5/11/04)
2004 May 11, A bomb in a crowded
market in Kirkuk killed 4 Iraqis and wounded 3.
(WSJ, 5/18/04, p.A3)
2004 May 11, In Nigeria angry
young Muslim men attacked "nonbelievers" with machetes in Kano, while
others burned cars, stores and apartments in apparent revenge for last
week's killings of hundreds of Muslims by a Christian group.
(AP, 5/11/04)
2004 May 11, In Pakistan Shabaz
Shariff, the brother of deposed PM Nawaz Sharif, was deported to Saudi
Arabia 90 minutes after landing in Lahore.
(SFC, 5/12/04, p.A9)
2004 May 11, In Scotland an
explosion destroyed part of a plastics factory in Glasgow. 7 people
were killed and 44 injured. 2 remained missing.
(AP, 5/11/04)(AP, 5/12/04)
2004 May 12, Members of US
Congress expressed outrage after they were privately shown fresh
pictures and videos of Iraqi prisoners being abused by US troops.
(AP, 5/12/05)
2004 May 12, NBC completed a
merger with the Universal television and entertainment businesses to
create a major media conglomerate.
(AP, 5/12/05)
2004 May 12, A wildlife group
warned that world cod stocks were falling and could be wiped out in 15
years if the current rate of over fishing continues.
(WSJ, 5/13/04, p.A1)
2004 May 12, In Iraq US soldiers
backed by tanks and helicopters battled fighters loyal to a radical
cleric near a mosque in Karbala, hours after Iraqi leaders agreed on a
proposal that would end his standoff. As many as 25 insurgents were
killed.
(AP, 5/12/04)
2004 May 12, Israeli troops
launched a massive incursion into a Gaza neighborhood, firing missiles,
demolishing buildings and scouring rooftops, in a bid to recover the
body parts of six soldiers killed the day before by Palestinian
militants. An Israeli helicopter fired a missile in Gaza's Zeitoun
neighborhood, killing at least three Palestinians. Five Israeli
soldiers were killed when Palestinians blew up an Israeli armored
vehicle.
(AP, 5/12/04)(AP, 5/13/04)
2004 May 12, The Paris Club of
creditor nations agreed to cancel all $152 million owed by Niger to the
club's 19 member countries.
(AP, 5/12/04)
2004 May 12, In Nigeria Muslim
mobs in Kano attacked Christians and as many as 30 people were killed.
(SFC, 5/13/04, p.A10)
2004 May 13, The last episode of
"Frasier" aired on TV following an 11-year run.
(SFC, 5/15/04, p.E3)
2004 May 13, During a campaign
swing in West Virginia, President Bush said he felt "disgraced" by the
images of U.S. soldiers abusing Iraqi prisoners but reminded his
listeners that actions of a handful of Americans should not sully the
nation's military.
(AP, 5/13/05)
2004 May 13, Defense Secretary
Donald H. Rumsfeld visited the Abu Ghraib prison camp in Iraq, where he
insisted the Pentagon did not try to cover up abuses there.
(AP, 5/13/05)
2004 May 13, The SpaceShipOne
rocket climbed to 211,400 feet, becoming the 1st privately funded
vehicle to reach the edge of space.
(ST, 5/14/04, p.A12)
2004 May 13, It was reported that
scientists had recorded as much as a 10% drop in the amount of sunshine
reaching Earth since the 1950s, likely due to atmospheric pollution.
(SFC, 5/13/04, p.A1)
2004 May 13, Floyd Kalber (79), TV
anchorman, died in Burr Ridge, Ill.
(AP, 5/13/05)
2004 May 13, Colombia's outlawed
right-wing paramilitary groups agreed to move into a special zone as
they negotiate eventual demobilization.
(AP, 5/13/04)
2004 May 13, France and Germany
declared an intention to formulate a joint industrial policy aimed at
creating a framework for mergers and joint ventures.
(Econ, 5/22/04, p.55)
2004 May 13, India's opposition
Congress Party led by Sonia Gandhi (57) captured the most seats in
parliamentary elections, a stunning defeat for PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee.
Congress won 145 of 543 seats.
(AP, 5/12/04)(Econ, 4/4/09, p.45)
2004 May 13, Israeli forces pulled
out of Gaza City after Egyptian intermediaries helped return body parts
of Israeli soldiers. At least 12 Palestinians were killed as the army
left behind a swath of destruction.
(AP, 5/13/04)(SFC, 5/14/04, p.A6)
2004 May 13, Libya agreed to halt
military trade with North Korea, Syria and Iran.
(WSJ, 5/14/04, p.A1)
2004 May 14, The Pentagon
announced that Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, the top US commander in Iraq,
had banned virtually all coercive interrogation practices on Iraqi
prisoners.
(SFC, 5/15/04, p.A1)
2004 May 14, Anna Lee (91), whose
nearly 70-year acting career in movies and television spanned from her
breakthrough role in "How Green Was My Valley" to an extended run on
"General Hospital," died of pneumonia.
(AP, 5/17/04)
2004 May 14, Algerian officials
reported that 13 of the countries 48 provinces were infested with
swarms of desert locusts.
(ST, 5/14/04, p.A1)
2004 May 14, A Brazilian domestic
airliner crashed near the Amazon city of Manaus, killing all 30
passengers and three crew members.
(AP, 5/15/04)
2004 May 14, Britain's Daily
Mirror newspaper published a front-page apology after photographs
purportedly showing British forces abusing Iraqi prisoners turned out
to be fake.
(AP, 5/14/05)
2004 May 14, In Copenhagen,
Denmark, Australian Mary Donaldson married Danish Crown Prince
Frederik, becoming Crown Princess Mary.
(AP, 5/14/04)
2004 May 14, In Iraq 4 people were
detained in Salaheddin province for the killing of American Nicholas
Berg, whose decapitation was captured on videotape. The informant who
tipped off authorities was killed by unidentified gunmen the day after
the arrests.
(AP, 5/21/04)
2004 May 14, Heavy fighting raged
in the Rafah refugee camp, killing two Israeli soldiers and a
Palestinian man.
(AP, 5/14/04)
2004 May 14, It was reported that
drought in Peru had forced water restrictions in Lima.
(ST, 5/14/04, p.A3)
2004 May 14, Poland's new PM Marek
Belka, who had urged patience for free-market reforms and his country's
mission in Iraq, lost a parliamentary confidence vote.
(AP, 5/14/04)
2004 May 14, In South Korea the
Constitutional Court ruled to dismiss the impeachment case against
Pres. Roh. It agreed that Roh violated election rules when he spoke in
favor of the Uri party at a news conference.
(AP, 5/14/04)(SFC, 5/14/04, p.A5)
2004 May 15, Smarty Jones won the
Preakness by a record 11 1/2 lengths.
(AP, 5/16/04)
2004 May 15, In Golden, Colorado,
a 40-ton steel bridge girder collapsed on I-70 near Golden and sheered
off the top of an SUV killing its 3 passengers.
(SSFC, 5/16/04, p.A2)(AP, 5/15/05)
2004 May 15, William Hinton
(b.1919), American agronomist and author: “Fanshen: A Documentary of
Revolution in a Chinese Village” (1966), died.
(Econ, 5/29/04, p.85)
2004 May 15, Col. Robert Morgan
(85), commander of the famed Memphis Belle B-17 bomber that flew combat
missions over Europe during World War II, died in Asheville, N.C..
(AP, 5/15/05)
2004 May 15, Suspected insurgents
attacked a coalition combat patrol in southern Afghanistan, killing one
American soldier and wounding two others. At least 122 U.S. troops have
died, 53 killed in action, since the start of Operation Enduring
Freedom in 2001 to topple the Taliban regime for harboring al-Qaida.
(AP, 5/16/04)
2004 May 15, Yang Shen-sum (92), a
Chinese artist who was a master of the Lingnan school of painting, died
in Hong Kong. He had moved to Canada in 1988 and was in Hong Kong on a
visit.
(AP, 5/16/04)
2004 May 15, In Iraq a U.S.
soldier was killed and another was wounded in a roadside bombing. The
death brought to 776 the number of U.S. service members who have died
since the start of military operations in Iraq last year. Of those, 566
died from hostile action and 210 died of non-hostile causes. At least
38 Iraqis were killed over the last 24 hours.
(AP, 5/16/04)(SSFC, 5/16/04, p.A3)
2004 May 15, More than 100,000
Israelis rallied in favor of a pullout from the Gaza Strip.
(AP, 5/15/04)
2004 May 15, In Jordan a three-day
World Economic Forum began. Augusto Lopez-Claros, chief economist and
director of the Global Competitiveness Program in the World Economic
Forum, said "oil will remain a source of instability in the world, and
perhaps in the short-term it is the most significant factor."
(AP, 5/14/04)(AP, 5/15/04)
2004 May 15, U.S. forces fought
militiamen loyal to radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr in Karbala, while
insurgents in the northern city of Mosul attacked an Iraqi army
recruiting center, killing four people and wounding 19.
(AP, 5/15/04)
2004 May 15, Visiting U.S.
national security adviser Condoleezza Rice and Russian President
Vladimir Putin on Saturday discussed the next steps necessary to bring
stability to Iraq.
(AP, 5/15/04)
2004 May 16, The United States
announced a new initiative to speed up the approval process for new
combination AIDS drugs that was designed to bring cheap, easy-to-use
treatment to millions of people in Africa and the Caribbean.
(AP, 5/16/05)
2004 May 16, Dominican Republic
President Hipolito Mejia sought a second term in an election. Leonel
Fernandez, former Dominican leader (1996-2000), reclaimed the
presidency in a vote that reflected frustration with the nation's worst
economic crisis in decades. A polling-station shooting left 3 people
dead.
(AP, 5/16/04)(AP, 5/17/04)(WSJ, 5/17/04, p.A1)
2004 May 16, Gunmen In Baghdad
fired on a minibus, killing two Iraqi women who worked for the U.S.-led
coalition. Assailants in a southern city killed a coalition translator
and critically injured another.
(AP, 5/16/04)
2004 May 16, It was reported that
a Scottish bus firm had begun issuing DNA “spit kits” to help drivers
verify assault charges on passengers spitting at drivers.
(SSFC, 5/16/04, p.A2)
2004 May 16, Pope John Paul II
named six new saints, including Gianna Beretta Molla, revered by
abortion foes because she'd refused to end her pregnancy despite
warnings it could kill her. Beretta Molla, an Italian pediatrician,
died in 1962 at age 39, a week after giving birth to her fourth child.
(AP, 5/16/05)
2004 May 16, In Uganda rebels
killed 22 civilians during a raid on a Gulu district camp set up for
refugees.
(AP, 5/22/04)
2004 May 17, Transsexuals were
cleared to compete in the Olympics for the first time.
(AP, 5/17/05)
2004 May 17, In Massachusetts gay
couples began exchanging vows, marking the first time a state has
granted gays and lesbians the right to marry and making the United
States one of four countries where homosexuals can legally wed.
(AP, 5/17/04)
2004 May 17, Tony Randall (84),
actor who served as a fussy foil for Rock Hudson and Doris Day, David
Letterman and Johnny Carson and, most famously, Jack Klugman on "The
Odd Couple," died in NYC.
(AP, 5/18/04)
2004 May 17, June Taylor (86),
Emmy-winning television choreographer died in Miami.
(AP, 5/17/05)
2004 May 17, China and Kazakhstan
agreed to build a 744-mile crude oil pipeline to send an initial 10
million tons of Kazakh oil to Xinjiang by 2006.
(WSJ, 6/17/04, p.A16)
2004 May 17, Cuba’s dollar-only
stores were ordered to mark up their prices 10-30% for staples.
(AP, 5/21/04)
2004 May 17, In northern Honduras
authorities said a short-circuit caused a fire that killed 103 inmates
before dawn. Survivors of the fire claimed that the inferno was
intentionally set by fellow inmates. The prison at San Pedro Sula,
designed for 800, was crammed with 2,200.
(AP, 5/18/04)(SFC, 5/18/04, p.A8)(Econ, 5/22/04,
p.31)
2004 May 17, India's stock market
took the biggest one-day plunge in its 129-year history as investors
panicked over how communist parties would influence the new government.
An investigation followed into the alleged murky dealings by a dozen
foreign firms.
(AP, 5/17/04)(Econ, 5/28/05, p.76)
2004 May 17, The US military in
Iraq reported that a roadside bomb containing deadly sarin nerve agent
had exploded a few days earlier near a U.S. military convoy.
(AP, 5/17/04)
2004 May 17, Abdel-Zahraa Othman,
also known as Izzadine Saleem, the head of the Iraqi Governing Council,
was killed in a suicide car bombing near a checkpoint outside the
coalition headquarters in central Baghdad. 8 others were also killed.
(AP, 5/17/04)(WSJ, 5/18/04, p.A3)
2004 May 17, Myanmar held a
constitutional convention.
(WSJ, 5/17/04, p.A1)
2004 May 17, Two Russian workers
held hostage in Iraq for a week were freed.
(AP, 5/17/04)
2004 May 18, Randy Johnson (40)
pitched a perfect game to lead the Arizona Diamondbacks to a 2-0
victory over the Atlanta Braves.
(SFC, 5/19/04, p.D1)
2004 May 18, Pres. Bush formally
nominate Alan Greenspan for a 5th 4-year term as chairman of the
Federal Reserve.
(SFC, 5/19/04, p.C1)
2004 May 18, Former NYC fire
commissioner Thomas Von Essen and former police chief Bernard Kerik
came under harsh criticism from some members of the Sept. 11 commission.
(AP, 5/18/05)
2004 May 18, SF Supervisors
learned that the Civil Service Commission had cut their salaries to
$90,000 from $112,000 following a survey of other state municipalities.
(SFC, 5/19/04, p.B4)
2004 May 18, Kubi, SF Zoo’s
29-year-old gorilla, died, 11 days following his May 7 surgery to
remove a diseased lung.
(SFC, 5/19/04, p.A1)
2004 May 18, In SF Chris Johnson
(26) was killed in the Safeway parking lot at Geary and Fillmore just
after attending a funeral for his nephew, Raymon Bass (17), who had
been killed as part of a gang feud in the Western Addition. In 2008
Kevin Carradine Jr. (24) was convicted of first-degree murder for
Johnson’s murder and sentenced for 77 years to life.
(SFC, 2/27/08, p.B4)(SFC, 5/30/08, p.B3)
2004 May 18, Elvin Ray Jones (76),
renowned jazz drummer and member of John Coltrane's quartet who also
played alongside Duke Ellington, Charlie Parker and Miles Davis, died
in new Jersey.
(AP, 5/19/04)
2004 May 18, In Afghanistan U.S.
forces killed 3 Taliban commanders and arrested five more members of
the hardline militia.
(AP, 5/21/04)
2004 May 18, Australia and the US
signed a bilateral free trade agreement.
(WSJ, 5/19/04, p.A16)
2004 May 18, An Azerbaijani cargo
plane crashed in a forest after taking off from an airport in China's
northwest, killing its seven-member crew.
(AP, 5/18/04)
2004 May 18, Chechen rebels
ambushed 2 military vehicles killing 8 Russian soldiers and
4-pro-Moscow police officers.
(WSJ, 5/19/04, p.A1)
2004 May 18, An explosion and a
fire at two coal mines in northern China killed at least 22 workers and
trapped 25.
(AP, 5/19/04)
2004 May 18, Colombia, Ecuador and
Peru opened negotiations in Cartagena for a free trade accord with the
United States as anti-riot police clashed with protesters who say the
pact would lead to job losses in the South American nations.
(AP, 5/18/04)
2004 May 18, Colombian troops near
La Salina seized 800 bullets soaked in liquid cyanide after clashes
with FARC rebels left 2 guerrillas dead.
(AP, 5/20/04)
2004 May 18, In France Myriam
Delay, an unemployed mother, stunned a courtroom in the northern French
town of Outreau saying she lied in accusing the 13 people of
pedophilia, one of whom committed suicide behind bars. A week later she
again reversed her testimony: "I was there and I saw everything... We
ruined children's lives.” 10 of 17 defendants were convicted in July. 6
of the 10 convicted were acquitted in 2005.
(AP, 5/20/04)(AP, 5/25/04)(AP, 12/01/05)
2004 May 18, Sonia Gandhi
announced she would "humbly decline" to be the next prime minister of
India. Manmohan Singh (71), a respected Oxford-educated economist, was
reported to be Gandhi's choice to become PM.
(AP, 5/18/04)
2004 May 18, Before dawn U.S.
troops killed nine fighters loyal to al-Sadr in Karbala. Ten Iraqi
fighters were wounded in the clashes near the city's Imam Hussein and
Imam Abbas shrines. At least five Iraqi insurgents were killed during
clashes in Karbala later in the day.
(AP, 5/18/04)
2004 May 18, Israeli troops under
Operation Rainbow combed the Rafah refugee camp for weapons and gunmen
in the biggest Gaza offensive in years. Twenty Palestinians were
killed, including two teenagers shot as they gathered laundry.
(AP, 5/18/04)(SFC, 5/18/04, p.A3)(SFC, 5/25/04, p.A5)
2004 May 18, Nigeria's Pres.
Obasanjo declared a state of emergency in a troubled central state on,
invoking sweeping powers in a bid to halt religious and ethnic
bloodletting. Obasanjo sacked Gov. Joshua Dariye and dissolved the
legislature in the central state of Plateau.
(AP, 5/18/04)
2004 May 18, Brian Stewart (34), a
suspected member of an outlawed anti-Catholic gang, was shot dead in
Belfast. Police said a likely motive was feuding between paramilitary
extremists over control of rackets and criminal profits.
(AP, 5/18/04)
2004 May 18, A powerful typhoon
slammed into the Philippines, causing at least 19 deaths on eastern
islands in the archipelago.
(AP, 5/19/04)
2004 May 18, In Uzbekistan Andrei
Shelkavenko (36) died in police custody from apparent torture. Human
Rights Watch said this was the fifth death from torture in Uzbek police
custody since May 2003. Shelkavenko had been arrested 3 weeks earlier
on suspicion of murder.
(AP, 5/21/04)
2004 May 19, Specialist Jeremy C.
Sivits wept and apologized after receiving a year in prison and a bad
conduct discharge in the first court-martial stemming from abuse of
Iraqis at the Abu Ghraib prison.
(AP, 5/19/05)
2004 May 19, Jack Eckerd (91),
founder of the Eckerd drug store chain, died in Florida.
(WSJ, 5/20/04, p.A1)
2004 May 19, Melvin J. Lasky (84),
an American writer and editor who shaped opinions against communism in
Cold War Europe, died at his home in Berlin.
(AP, 5/27/04)
2004 May 19, In Afghanistan
clashes left at least 4 Taliban dead.
(WSJ, 5/20/04, p.A1)
2004 May 19, Britain opened the
world’s 1st stem cell bank.
(WSJ, 5/20/04, p.A1)
2004 May 19, The European Union
lifted its 6-year-old ban on biotech products by approving imports of
an insect-resistant strain of sweet corn for human consumption.
(AP, 5/19/04)
2004 May 19, Sonia Gandhi
announced that her Congress party had elected economist Manmohan Singh
(71) as the next prime minister of India.
(AP, 5/19/04)
2004 May 19, US Army Spc. Jeremy
C. Sivits received the maximum penalty, one year in prison, reduction
in rank and a bad conduct discharge, in the first court-martial
stemming from mistreatment of Iraqi prisoners at the Abu Ghraib prison.
(AP, 5/19/04)
2004 May 19, In Iraq US bombing
killed up to 45 people, mostly women and children from the Bou Fahad
tribe, at Mogr el-Deeb near the Syrian border. Witnesses said the site
was a wedding celebration while US officials called it a way station
for infiltrators.
(AP, 5/20/04)(SFC, 5/20/04, p.A1)
2004 May 19, Israeli forces fired
a missile and a tank shell into a large crowd of Palestinians
demonstrating against the invasion of a neighboring refugee camp,
witnesses said. At least 10 Palestinians were killed, all children and
teenagers.
(AP, 5/19/04)
2004 May 19, Ivory Coast's
president fired 3 rebel and opposition ministers from a national unity
government, including the leader of insurgents holding the northern
half of the country.
(AP, 5/20/04)
2004 May 19, A cyclone that swept
through western Myanmar and left more than 140 people dead or missing,
and about 18,000 people homeless.
(AP, 5/28/04)
2004 May 19, In the Philippines
Typhoon Nida left 31 people dead.
(SFC, 5/21/04, p.B10)
2004 May 19, A Moscow court
sentenced Mikhail Trepashkin, a former intelligence agent, to 4 years
in prison, on a charge of revealing state secrets. The charge was
related to Trepashkin’s investigations of 4 bombings in apartments
across Russia in 1999 that were blamed on Chechen separatists.
(SFC, 5/20/04, p.A10)
2004 May 19, Antonina Presnyakova,
Russian Ebola researcher, died following an accidental needle stick
containing the deadly virus. She worked at the Vektor State Research
Center of Virology and Biotechnology outside Novosibirsk in central
Siberia.
(AP, 5/25/04)
2004 May 20, President Bush made a
rare visit to Capitol Hill, where he sought to ease Republican
lawmakers' concerns over the Iraq campaign.
(AP, 5/20/05)
2004 May 20, Detroit Zoo officials
said they will stop exhibiting elephants on ethical grounds because
elephants can develop arthritis and stress-related ailments in
captivity.
(Reuters, 5/20/04)
2004 May 20, In Afghanistan 3
suspected militants were killed and 23 people detained after 4 U.S.
soldiers were shot and wounded during raids against militia forces in
Tani district. Residents claimed a case of mistaken identities.
(AP, 5/21/04)
2004 May 20, In Colombia 3 bombs
exploded in 2 parts of Medellin, killing at least four people and
wounding 15. A wave of attacks marked the 40th anniversary of FARC.
(AP, 5/21/04)(AP, 5/22/04)
2004 May 20, Iraqi police backed
by American soldiers raided the home and offices of Ahmad Chalabi, a
prominent Iraqi politician.
(AP, 5/20/04)
2004 May 20, Taketo Hatakeyama
(41), a member of Japan’s Sumiyoshi Kai crime group, killed himself as
police stormed his apartment building in Utsunomiya. This followed a
2-day standoff. A woman was found dead inside.
(AP, 5/20/04)
2004 May 20, Voters in Malawi, one
of the world's poorest nations, flocked to the polls for their third
multiparty elections in a decade. Bingu wa Mutharika, Pres. Muluzi’s
handpicked successor, was declared the winner. The ruling party lost
its parliamentary majority.
(AP, 5/20/04)(SFC, 5/24/04, p.A3)
2004 May 20, Palestinian uprising
leader Marwan Barghouti, widely seen as a potential successor to Yasser
Arafat, was convicted of ordering shootings that killed four Israelis
and a Greek monk and supplying funds and arms for other attacks.
Israeli troops pressed their offensive in a Gaza Strip refugee camp for
a third day, killing 8 Palestinians, most of them armed, and
demolishing several buildings. In the West Bank, 3 Palestinians were
killed by army fire.
(AP, 5/20/04)
2004 May 20, Four suspected Saudi
militants and a policeman were killed in a shootout the Saudi city of
Buraida.
(Reuters, 5/21/04)
2004 May 20, In Uganda rebels
raided the northern village of Gulu, hacking and burning to death at
least 25 people, including eight children.
(AP, 5/22/04)
2004 May 21, Nearly 100,000
unionized SBC Communications Inc. workers began a four-day strike to
protest the local-phone giant's latest contract offer.
(AP, 5/21/04)
2004 May 21, In northeastern
Bangladesh a bomb exploded during noon prayers at a Muslim shrine,
killing two Bangladeshi men and wounding about 100 people.
(AP, 5/22/04)
2004 May 20, The UN Security
Council approved a peacekeeping force of 5,600 troops for Burundi to
help the African nation finally end a 10-year civil war.
(AP, 5/21/05)
2004 May 21, The European Union
confirmed its backing for Russia to join the World Trade Organization,
and Russian President Vladimir Putin said Moscow in turn would speed up
ratification of the troubled Kyoto accord on global warming.
(AP, 5/21/04)
2004 May 21, In Iraq American
AC-130 gunships and tanks bombarded militia positions near two shrines
in the holy city of Karbala, killing 18 fighters loyal to a rebel
cleric.
(AP, 5/21/04)
2004 May 21, Israeli troops pulled
back from two neighborhoods in the Rafah refugee camp.
(AP, 5/21/04)
2004 May 20, Japanese automaker
Mitsubishi Motors Corp., struggling to survive, announced it would cut
11,000 jobs.
(AP, 5/21/05)
2004 May 21, African finance
ministers began a two-day meeting in Uganda to discuss how their
governments can do more to reduce trade imbalances with rich nations.
(AP, 5/21/04)
2004 May 22, Filmmaker Michael
Moore's "Fahrenheit 9/11," a scathing indictment of White House actions
after the Sept. 11 attacks, won the top prize at the Cannes Film
Festival. It was the first documentary to win Cannes' prestigious
Palme d'Or since Jacques Cousteau's and Louis Malle's "The Silent
World" in 1956.
(AP, 5/23/04)
2004 May 22, Samuel Johnson (76),
who'd built the family's SC Johnson wax company into a consumer
products giant, died.
(AP, 5/22/05)
2004 May 22, An Arab League summit
met for a 2-day session in Tunis. 8 Arab leaders, including Crown
Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, failed to show up and Libyan leader
Moammar Gadhafi walked out on the 1st day.
(AP, 5/23/04)
2004 May 22, The Commonwealth of
Britain and its former colonies lifted a four-year suspension of
Pakistan.
(AP, 5/22/04)
2004 May 22, A bomb planted by
suspected rebels exploded in a crowded discotheque in northwest
Colombia, killing at least six people and wounding 82.
(AP, 5/23/04)
2004 May 22, In Baghdad a car bomb
exploded outside the home of a deputy interior minister, wounding him
and killing at least five people, including four police.
(AP, 5/22/04)
2004 May 22, Bombs exploded
outside three banks in Jiutepec, central Mexico, heavily damaging them
but causing no injuries. A note near the bombing sites signed by a
group calling itself the Comando Jaramillista Morelense 23 de Mayo — in
tribute to the peasant leader Ruben Jaramillo, who was murdered along
with his family by state forces on May 23, 1962.
(AP, 5/23/04)
2004 May 22, A 3-year-old
Palestinian girl was shot and killed in the Rafah refugee camp on the
fifth day of Israeli searches and house demolitions. A suicide bomber
blew himself at an Israeli army checkpoint in the West Bank, wounding
five people.
(AP, 5/22/04)
2004 May 22, North Korea agreed to
release the family members of Japanese citizens kidnapped by Northern
agents, and Japan pledged aid to the impoverished country at a summit
between the two nations' leaders.
(AP, 5/22/04)
2004 May 22, Spain's Crown Prince
Felipe married former TV anchorwoman Letizia Ortiz, the first commoner
in line to be queen in Spanish history.
(AP, 5/22/04)
2004 May 22, Voters in Sierra
Leone choose local councils for the first time in 30 years.
(AP, 5/23/04)
2004 May 22, The ship car carrier
MV Hyundai, carrying 4,000 cars, sank after colliding with the oil
tanker MT Kaminesan just south of Singapore.
(AP, 5/23/04)
2004 May 22, Arab militiamen
killed at least 56 people in a raid in western Sudan, just days after
the government declared the troubled region was stable.
(AP, 5/24/04)
2004 May 23, Seattle’s new $165
million downtown Central Library, designed by Rem Koolhaas, officially
opened.
(SFC, 5/21/04, p.W1)(WSJ, 1/13/05, p.D8)
2004 May 23, In eastern Bangladesh
2 river ferries carrying about 250 passengers capsized during a storm,
and dozens of people were feared dead. The death toll climbed to 74.
(AP, 5/24/04)(WSJ, 5/24/04, p.A1)(AP, 5/25/04)
2004 May 23, Rod Hall (53),
British literary agent, was found dead in his London home. An autopsy
revealed the cause of death to be multiple stab wounds to the chest and
abdomen. On May 29 Usman Durrani, 20, a student from east London, was
charged with the murder.
(AP, 5/30/04)
2004 May 23, In France a section
of the futuristic, cylindrical passenger terminal at Paris' Charles de
Gaulle airport collapsed, killing 4 people and injuring three.
(AP, 5/23/05)
2004 May 23, In Germany Horst
Koehler, a former head of the IMF and advocate of bolder economic
reforms, was elected as the country's 9th postwar president.
(AP, 5/23/04)(Econ, 5/22/04, p.47)
2004 May 23, In India's portion of
Kashmir suspected Islamic militants blew up a military bus, killing at
least 33 soldiers and relatives, and wounding 15.
(AP, 5/23/04)(SFC, 5/24/04, p.A7)
2004 May 23, It was reported that
Iraq faces an estimated $120 billion debt including over $21 billion
creditors of the Paris Club.
(SSFC, 5/23/04, p.A1)
2004 May 23, In Iraq US troops
battled fighters loyal to a radical Muslim cleric in his stronghold of
Kufa, and at least 32 insurgents and three civilians were killed.
Gunmen killed a police captain and a university student who were headed
by car to Baghdad from Baqouba. Insurants loyal to al-Sadr gave up
control of central Karbala.
(AP, 5/23/04)(SFC, 5/24/04, p.A1)
2004 May 23, A car explosion
rocked the West Bank city of Nablus, killing at least 2 people. Israeli
military denied responsibility.
(AP, 5/23/04)
2004 May 23, In Tunisia Arab
leaders concluded a 2-day summit and committed their countries to
political reforms.
(SFC, 5/24/04, p.A7)
2004 May 24, Pres. Bush offered a
5 step plan in Iraq: 1) hand over authority to a sovereign Iraqi
government; 2) Help establish security; 3) Continue rebuilding the
infrastructure; 4) Encourage more int’l. support; 5) Move toward a
national election.
(SFC, 5/25/04, p.A1)
2004 May 24, In a rare public
apology, the FBI admitted mistakenly linking an American lawyer's
fingerprint to one found near the scene of a terrorist bombing in Spain.
(AP, 5/24/05)
2004 May 24, NY Attorney General
Eliot Spitzer sued the NY Stock Exchange, former exchange chairman Dick
Grasso and an executive who headed its compensation committee. Spitzer
wanted Grasso to return $100 million of the $200 million plus that the
NY Exchange gave or promised to Grasso.
(WSJ, 5/25/04, p.A1)
2004 May 24, It was reported that
Alcoa planned to build a $1 billion aluminum smelter on the island of
Trinidad and another in Iceland.
(WSJ, 5/24/04, p.A1)
2004 May 24, Brooke Wilberger (19)
vanished from an apartment in Corvallis, Ore. In 2009 Joel Courtney
(43) pleaded guilty to her murder and revealed the location of her
remains. He was sentenced to life in prison.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brooke_Wilberger)(SFC,
9/22/09, p.A5)
2004 May 24, A fire in London hit
an art storage warehouse and is believed to have destroyed works by
some 100 contemporary Young British artists (YBAs) worth millions of
dollars, including part of a collection owned by former advertising
guru Charles Saatchi.
(AP, 5/26/04)(Econ, 5/29/04, p.58)
2004 May 24, Heavy rains left as
many as 2000 people dead across the island of Hispaniola. Health
officials feared up to 1,000 people could be dead in the Haitian town
of Mopau. Floods wiped out villages across Haiti and the Dominican
Republic. The final toll was over 3,300 dead.
(AP, 5/27/04)(SFC, 5/28/04, p.A3)(AP, 6/5/04)
2004 May 24, In Iraq an explosion
destroyed a civilian car with armor plating near an entrance to the
headquarters of the U.S.-led coalition, killing four people including
two British civilians. An Associated Press survey found that more than
5,500 Iraqis died violently in just Baghdad and three provinces in the
first 12 months of the occupation.
(AP, 5/24/04)
2004 May 24, In Liberia an
American citizen working with a U.S. military assessment team was
killed in his hotel room in the capital Monrovia.
(AP, 5/26/04)
2004 May 24, In Malawi opposition
supporters rioted as Bingu wa Mutharika was sworn in as president.
(WSJ, 5/25/04, p.A1)
2004 May 24, The WHO confirmed an
outbreak of the deadly ebola virus has killed four people in south
Sudan.
(AFP, 5/24/04)
2004 May 25, Phish, a popular jam
band, announced that they would be breaking up following a final summer
tour. Trey Anastasio, band leader, made the announcement on
www.phish.com.
(SFC, 5/27/04, p.AE3)
2004 May 25, Catholic church
officials said the Archdiocese of Boston would close 65 of 357 parishes
due to declining attendance and increased financial problems.
(SFC, 5/26/04, p.A5)(AP, 5/25/05)
2004 May 25, David Dellinger,
peace activist and one of the 1968 “Chicago Seven” defendants, died in
Vermont.
(SFC, 5/27/04, p.B7)
2004 May 25, Publisher Roger W.
Straus Jr. died in New York at age 87.
(AP, 5/25/05)
2004 May 25, U.S. warplanes helped
Afghan forces pound Taliban militants in the mountains of southern
Afghanistan, killing some 20 suspected insurgents at a recently
discovered camp.
(AP, 5/26/04)
2004 May 25, In Ethiopia heads of
state and government from at least 8 African countries attended a
ceremony to inaugurate the new Peace and Security council (PSC) at the
African Union's headquarters in Addis Ababa.
(AP, 5/25/04)
2004 May 25, A sacred shrines in
Najaf suffered minor damage during clashes between U.S. forces and
radical Shiite militiamen that killed at least 13 Iraqis, some of them
civilians.
(AP, 5/25/04)
2004 May 25, In Iraq with U.S.
Marines gone and central government authority virtually nonexistent,
Fallujah resembles an Islamic mini-state and anyone caught selling
alcohol is flogged and paraded in the city.
(AP, 5/25/04)
2004 May 25, Israeli troops
abruptly left the Rafah refugee camp without completing a sweep for
arms smuggling tunnels. The weeklong offensive left 45 Palestinians
killed by Israeli fire, including at least 17 gunmen and 12 children
under 16.
(AP, 5/25/04)
2004 May 25, Officials in southern
Pakistan reported that 9 people have died and 1,600 have been sickened
after drinking contaminated water from a state-operated reservoir.
(AP, 5/25/04)
2004 May 25, In Pakistan a
powerful gas explosion in a coal mine killed 15 miners near Sajibit,
the capital of Baluchistan province.
(AP, 5/26/04)
2004 May 25, Sudanese officials
said the government has reached an agreement with rebels on issues that
have stalled talks to end the 21-year-old war, clearing the way for a
comprehensive peace deal. The talks in Naivasha, 60 miles west of
Nairobi, do not involve insurgents fighting a 15-month rebellion in the
Darfur region of western Sudan.
(AP, 5/25/04)
2004 May 26, Fantasia Barrino was
crowned the latest American Idol in the Fox network's talent contest.
(AP, 5/26/05)
2004 May 26, The US government
planned to set a limit on how much salt American should consume to
2,300 mg a day.
(WSJ, 5/26/04, p.A1)
2004 May 26, The FBI issued an
alert warning of a possible major terrorist attack in the US this
summer. Photos of 7 suspects were released.
(SFC, 5/26/04, p.A1)(SFC, 5/27/04, p.A1)
2004 May 26, A District court jury
in McAlester, Oklahoma, convicted Terry Nichols of 161 counts of 1st
degree murder in the 1995 Oklahoma City federal building bombing.
Nichols later received 161 consecutive life sentences.
(SFC, 5/27/04, p.A3)(AP, 5/26/05)
2004 May 26, It was reported that
a new study showed that aspirin might help reduce women’s chances of
developing the most common form of breast cancer.
(WSJ, 5/26/04, p.A1)
2004 May 26, Argentina said it is
imposing a 20% tax on natural gas exports. Chile, which imports 90% of
Argentina’s gas, would be hard hit.
(WSJ, 5/27/04, p.A18)
2004 May 26, Amnesty International
charged that Brazilian police killed hundreds of suspects over the past
year, despite a commitment by the government to set higher standards
for public security.
(AP, 5/26/04)
2004 May 26, African and Latin
American leaders meeting in China urged rich countries to fight
terrorism by sharing wealth, not through military intervention.
(AP, 5/26/04)
2004 May 26, The U.N. mission in
Democratic Republic of Congo is widening an investigation into
allegations peacekeepers sexually abused minors in the northeastern
town of Bunia.
(AP, 5/26/04)
2004 May 26, U.S. troops captured
a key lieutenant of radical Shiite leader Muqtada al-Sadr during
overnight clashes in Najaf that killed 24 people and wounded nearly 50.
(AP, 5/26/04)
2004 May 26, In Iraq masked gunmen
attacked Russian technicians heading to work at a major electric power
station, killing two of them. In Moscow, the firm's executive director,
Alexander Rybinsky, announced the full evacuation of company personnel
from Iraq. Some 241 employees are expected to start leaving.
(AP, 5/26/04)
2004 May 26, In Pakistan 2 cars
exploded minutes apart outside an English-language school near the U.S.
consul's residence in Karachi, killing a policeman and wounding 25
other people.
(AP, 5/26/04)
2004 May 26, In Russia Pres. Putin
gave his state-of–the-union address and called for an expansion of the
oil export capacity.
(WSJ, 5/27/04, p.A1)
2004 May 26, Sudanese VP Ali Osman
Taha and John Garang, SPLA southern rebel leader, signed protocols to
pave the way for a comprehensive deal.
(AP, 5/27/04)(Econ, 5/29/04, p.14)
2004 May 26, The U.N. Security
Council called for the immediate deployment of international monitors
to Sudan's western Darfur region and put new pressure on the country's
government to end a conflict there.
(AP, 5/26/04)
2004 May 27, In Baltimore 3
children were found dead. One was beheaded with a butcher knife and the
others were nearly decapitated. Adan Espinoza Canela, 17, and
Policarpio Espinoza, 22, were arrested on murder charges the next day.
(AP, 5/29/04)
2004 May 27, Australia's
conservative government introduced legislation to ban same-sex
marriages and wants immigration rules to stop gays and lesbians from
adopting foreign children. The government has also announced that
same-sex partners will be recognized for the first time by federal
authorities as dependents.
(AP, 5/27/04)
2004 May 27, In Australia
British-born Jack Roche changed his plea from innocent to guilty,
acknowledging his role in an al-Qaida plot to blow up the Israeli
Embassy in Canberra. On June 1 Roche was sentenced to 9 years in prison.
(AP, 5/28/04)(AP, 6/1/04)
2004 May 27, London police
arrested Abu Hamza al-Masri, a radical Muslim cleric suspected of
helping the deadly 2000 suicide attack on the USS Cole. The US sought
his extradition on terrorism charges. He was accused of trying to build
a terrorist training camp in Oregon.
(AP, 5/27/04)(WSJ, 5/28/04, p.A1)
2004 May 27, Cuba and Mexico
agreed to return their respective ambassadors following a dispute
earlier this month.
(WSJ, 5/28/04, p.A1)
2004 May 27, In Egypt 5 people
were burned to death and 14 others injured when a gas canister, carried
by a passenger, blew up on a commuter bus in Cairo.
(AFP, 5/28/04)
2004 May 27, The U.S.-led
coalition agreed to suspend offensive operations in Najaf after local
leaders struck a deal with radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr to end a
bloody standoff.
(AP, 5/27/04)(SFC, 5/28/04, p.A1)
2004 May 27, In Iraq gunmen south
of Baghdad attacked a car carrying Japanese journalists Shinsuke
Hashida (61) and his nephew, Kotaro Ogawa (33). The vehicle burst into
flames and both were killed.
(AP, 5/28/04)
2004 May 27, Umberto Agnelli (69),
Fiat Chairman, died in Turin.
(SFC, 5/29/04, p.B6)y
2004 May 27, Lebanese soldiers
opened fire on anti-government demonstrators, killing 5 and wounding at
least seven. Demonstrators set fire to the Labor Ministry.
(AP, 5/27/04)(WSJ, 5/28/04, p.A1)
2004 May 27, The Nigerian state of
Kano abandoned its moratorium on polio vaccinations.
(SFC, 5/28/04, p.A3)
2004 May 27, Relief workers were
racing against the clock to keep hundreds of thousands of people from
dying in Sudan's western Darfur region, in what has become the biggest
humanitarian crisis of "our age."
(AP, 5/27/04)
2004 May 27, Vito Bigione (52),
one of Italy's most-wanted Mafia suspects, was captured in Venezuela.
He was accused of a key role in international drug trafficking and
flown back to Italy. Bigione had spent years living in Namibia and only
recently moved to Venezuela.
(AP, 5/29/04)
2004 May 28, US officials and 5
Central American countries (Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala,
Honduras and Nicaragua) signed a free trade pact (CAFTA), to be later
approved by Congress. The Dominican Republic would be included later.
(SFC, 5/29/04, p.A4)
2004 May 28, International Clown
Hall of Fame in downtown Milwaukee posthumously inducted the late Vance
"Pinto" Colvig as the first Bozo. Capitol Records executive Alan
Livingston created Bozo for recordings in 1946. For years, promoter and
entertainer Larry Harmon claimed to have both created the character and
said he was the original.
(AP, 5/28/04)
2004 May 28, In Colombia Carlos
Mauricio Garcia, also known as "Rodrigo" or "Double Zero," was shot in
the head five times by assassins as he left a Santa Marta supermarket.
The former right-wing paramilitary leader objected to the militia's
involvement in drug trafficking.
(AP, 5/30/04)
2004 May 28, French engineers
brought the two central ends of the Millau road viaduct in southwest
France together, completing the span of the highest bridge in the
world. The bridge spans the valley of the Tarn river to carry a
motorway from Clermont-Ferrand to Beziers and establishing a major
north-south axis parallel to the Rhone valley. The $378 million bridge
is expected to open Jan 2005.
(AFP, 5/29/04)(Econ, 1/1/05, p.71)
2004 May 28, An earthquake damaged
homes in northern Iran. The toll from a 6.2 earthquake reached 36 dead
with 250 people injured.
(AP, 5/28/04)(AP, 5/30/04)
2004 May 28, The Iraqi Governing
Council nominated one of its own members, Iyad Allawi, a Shiite Muslim
physician who spent years in exile, to become prime minister of the new
government to take power June 30.
(AP, 5/28/04)
2004 May 28, The Tokyo High Court
sentenced Yoshihiro Inoue (34), a former doomsday cult member, to death
for a 1995 nerve gas attack on Tokyo's subways, overturning a lower
court ruling condemning him to life in prison.
(AP, 5/28/04)
2004 May 28, Malaysia issued a
detention order for Buhary Syed Abu Tahir, a Sri Lankan businessman, on
charges that in 2002 he brought 7 Libyan technicians to Malaysia to be
trained to operate machines to produce centrifuge parts for Libya’s
nuclear weapons program. Tahir was a key associate of Abdul Qadeer
Khan, former head of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons program.
(WSJ, 6/4/04, p.A10)
2004 May 28, In Montenegro gunmen
shot dead Dusko Jovanovic, the editor of a conservative daily. PM
Djukanovic had sued Jovanovic and the Dan daily for stories linking the
premier to a major human trafficking case. A court hearing was to begin
next month. Damir Mandic was tried and acquitted in 2006 but that
ruling was overturned after an appeal, and a retrial was held. In 2009
the Montenegro Higher Court ruled that karate expert Damir Mandic was
guilty of the "well-planned and premeditated" murder of editor Dusko
Jovanovic.
(AP, 5/28/04)(AP, 4/28/09)
2004 May 28, In Saudi Arabia
suspected Islamic militants sprayed gunfire inside two oil industry
compounds on the Persian Gulf, killing at least 10 people including one
American.
(AP, 5/29/04)(SSFC, 5/30/04, p.A1)
2004 May 28, The Sudanese
government and rebels from Darfur agreed that the first international
observers of a fragile ceasefire would deploy there next week.
Villagers in west Sudan said Sudanese aircraft bombed their village and
killed at least 11 people.
(AP, 5/28/04)(Reuters, 5/29/04)
2004 May 29, A new WW II memorial
was dedicated on the National Mall in Washington DC.
(SFC, 5/28/04, p.A1)
2004 May 29, Archibald Cox (92),
fired by Pres. Nixon for his efforts in the Watergate investigation,
died in Maine.
(AP, 5/30/04)
2004 May 29, Samuel Dash (79),
chief Senate counsel during the Watergate hearings, died in Washington
DC.
(SSFC, 5/30/04, p.B7)
2004 May 29, In southern
Afghanistan 4 members of the American special forces were killed in
action in Zabul province, a stronghold of Taliban militants.
(AP, 5/29/04)
2004 May 29, Taliban guerrillas
riding in a fleet of vehicles shot up a government office in southern
Afghanistan, killing four Afghan soldiers.
(AP, 5/30/04)
2004 May 29, In Brazil Inmates
rioted at the Benfica detention center in a northern Rio district,
seizing guns and taking guards hostage after 14 inmates broke out in a
mass escape.
(AP, 5/29/04)
2004 May 29, Unidentified gunmen
shot and killed a U.N. military observer in eastern Congo and a second
was reported missing. About 10,800 U.N. troops are deployed in Congo,
monitoring the peace deal and helping the government regain control of
the country. Elections are scheduled for June 2005.
(AP, 5/29/04)
2004 May 29, In Iran the
Gov. Masoud Emami of Qazvin province was killed along with 7 others
when their helicopter crashed while surveying earthquake damage.
(SSFC, 5/30/04, p.A14)
2004 May 29, A Palestinian gunman
killed an Israeli officer after opening fire on Israeli troops
conducting a routine raid in the West Bank Balata refugee camp. An
Israeli man was stabbed in the back by a Palestinian in Jerusalem's Old
City.
(AP, 5/29/04)
2004 May 29, In Saudi Arabia
gunmen shot down security guards and entered 2 office complexes in
Khobar searching for and murdering anyone looking western.
(Econ, 6/5/04, p.41)
2004 May 30, Buddy Rice won the
Indianapolis 500 in the rain.
(AP, 5/30/05)
2004 May 30, In Hawaii lava from
the Kilauea eruption, which began Jan. 3, 1983, reached the ocean for
the first time in nearly a year on May 30.
(AP, 6/12/04)
2004 May 30, Australians have been
warned they face an environmental crisis unless they stop squandering
scarce water resources in the world's most arid inhabited continent.
(AFP, 5/30/04)
2004 May 30, In southwest China a
landslide triggered by torrential rains buried a village in Guizhou
province, killing 8 people.
(AP, 6/1/04)
2004 May 30, Ousted Haitian
President Jean-Bertrand Aristide left Jamaica for South Africa, saying
it would be his "temporary home" until he could return to Haiti.
(AP, 5/30/05)
2004 May 30, An Israeli air strike
killed Wael Nassar (38), a top Hamas commander, along with his
assistant and a bystander in Gaza City.
(SSFC, 5/30/04, p.A9)
2004 May 30, In Pakistan gunmen
killed Mufti Nizamuddin Shamzai, a senior pro-Taliban cleric, sparking
riots across Karachi city by thousands of his Sunni Muslim supporters
who ransacked shops, banks and a police station.
(AP, 5/30/04)
2004 May 30, Saudi commandos
stormed the expatriate resort of Khobar to free up to 60 foreign
hostages seized by Islamic militant gunmen who had attacked oil
industry compounds, killing 22 people. Americans were among those
killed and taken captive. 3 suspects escaped.
(AP, 5/31/04)(WSJ, 6/1/04, p.A1)
2004 May 31, Powerful storms again
swept across the US Midwest and beyond, knocking out power to thousands
of customers and spawning tornadoes that leveled buildings. At least 9
deaths were blamed on the storms during the Memorial Day weekend.
(AP, 5/31/04)
2004 May 31, In Austria a
catamaran filled 27 people overturned on Hinterbruehl Grotto, Europe's
largest underground lake, drowning 5 people after the boat's railings
formed a cage 5 feet down on the lake floor.
(AP, 5/31/04)
2004 May 31, Newbridge Capital, an
American private equity firm, became the 1st foreign financial to gain
control of a Chinese bank with an 18% stake in Shenzhen Development
Bank and majority control of the board.
(Econ, 6/5/04, p.70)
2004 May 31, U.S. troops clashed
with Shiite militiamen in the holy city of Kufa for a second day in
fighting that killed two Americans. In Baghdad, a car bomb exploded
near the headquarters of the U.S. coalition, killing at least two
people and injuring more than 20.
(AP, 5/31/04)
2004 May 31, Felipe Calderon,
Mexico's energy secretary resigned, a day after President Vicente Fox
criticized him for an early jump into the 2006 presidential races.
(AP, 5/31/04)
2004 May 31, Nigeria’s President
Olusegun Obasanjo said that his country's 30-billion-dollar external
debt was "burdensome, unsustainable and unpayable" and appealed for
leniency from its creditors.
(AP, 5/31/04)
2004 May 31, In Pakistan 20-25
people were killed in Karachi in an apparent suicide bombing at a
crowded Shiite Muslim mosque.
(AP, 6/1/04)(WSJ, 8/19/04, p.A11)
2004 May 31, Ousted Haitian
President Jean-Bertrand Aristide and his family received a first-class
diplomatic welcome from South Africa, his new home in exile.
(AP, 5/31/04)
2004 May, Brian Knutson, professor
of neuroscience at Stanford Univ., used an fMRI imaging machine to
study brain patterns and found that the same neural networks in the
brain responded to orgasm, cocaine and stock trading. He also found
that these networks can and often do override the frontal cortex, our
seat of reason.
(SSFC, 2/5/06, p.J4)
2004 May, Michael Franti, SF
musician, traveled to Iraq and shot video that led to his 2006 book and
film titled “I Know I’m Not Alone.”
(SFC, 9/7/06, p.E4)
2004 May, In High Point, North
Carolina, police presented nine suspected drug dealers with community
members, who confronted them on the harm they were causing as well as
incriminating evidence of their activities. The suspects were offered a
chance to stop dealing, which most accepted. Over 2 years later crime
was down 25% in the area. The program was the brain-child of Prof.
David Kennedy of New York’s John Jay College of Criminal Justice.
(WSJ, 9/27/06, p.A1)
2004 May, Bolivian public sector
unions and many workers began a general strike to force the resignation
of Pres. Carlos Mesa due to spending cuts and new taxes.
(Econ, 5/8/04, p.37)
2004 May, The EU and the USA
reached a deal regarding US security interests and the transfer of
passenger data from European airlines. The deal was challenged by civil
liberty groups. In 2006 a court upheld that the agreement lacked an
adequate legal basis.
(Econ, 6/3/06, p.47)
2004 May, A Japanese consulate
worker in Shanghai committed suicide. Japanese newspapers later
reported the official took his life because Chinese officials were
pressuring him for secret information, using a "woman problem" as
leverage. China accused Japan of deliberately smearing China's
international image.
(AP, 1/1/06)
2004 May, An reporter in Sardinia
reported that PM Berlusconi was transforming a grotto into a secret
boat tunnel at his Villa Certosa property and questioned whether legal
permits had been obtained. The next day the Interior Ministry claimed
that all matters relating to the villa were to be protected under a
state secrecy law.
(WSJ, 11/15/04, p.A1)
2004 May, In Macao the Las Vegas
Sands Casino opened with 360 gambling tables. The casino quickly
expanded and by 2007 was the largest under one roof in the world.
(Econ, 1/27/07, p.66)
2004 May, In Niger a law came into
force that threatened slave-owners with up to 30 years in jail.
Anti-Slavery Int’l. estimated 43,000 slaves in Niger.
(Econ, 3/12/05, p.49)
2004 May, Andrei Kozlov (41), the
top deputy chairman of Russia's Central Bank, yanked the license of
Sodbiznesbank, a midsize Moscow bank, for money laundering.
(WSJ, 9/22/06, p.A6)
2004 May, Singapore introduced its
first batch of 10-dollar plastic notes. In 2005 two-dollar polymer
notes were scheduled to be issued January 12, 2006.
(AP, 12/22/05)
2004 Jun 1, The US Dept. of
Homeland Security awarded a contract, valued as much as a $10 billion,
to a group of companies led by a unit of Accenture Ltd., a
Bermuda-based business consultancy.
(WSJ, 6/2/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 1, A US federal judge
declared the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act unconstitutional, saying
the measure infringed on women's right to choose.
(AP, 6/1/05)
2004 Jun 1, In New Jersey a new
ruling took effect that barred reduced nightclub cover charges and
cocktail tabs for women due to a discrimination suit filed 6 years
earlier.
(SFC, 6/18/04, p.W2)
2004 Jun 1, Anheuser-Busch offered
HK$5.58 per share for China’s Harbin Brewery Group Ltd. 2 days later
SABMiller withdrew its HK$4.30 offer.
(WSJ, 6/4/04, p.A3)
2004 Jun 1, William Manchester
(82), historian and biographer, died in Middletown, Conn. His work
included “The Arms of Krupp” (1958) and “The Death of a President”
(1967), an account of the Kennedy assassination.
(SFC, 6/2/04, B7)
2004 Jun 1, In eastern Afghanistan
a bomb planted under the chair of a city police chief exploded, killing
him and wounding two government officials.
(AP, 6/1/04)
2004 Jun 1, In eastern Bolivia
army soldiers fought peasants blocking a highway in a clash that killed
one soldier and one civilian.
(AP, 6/2/04)
2004 Jun 1, In Brazil police
entered the Benfica prison after a three-day rebellion and found the
bodies of 38 inmates, some of them mutilated. At least 14 of 900 had
escaped.
(AP, 6/2/04)
2004 Jun 1, In northeast Brazilian
state of Alagoas 2 days of heavy rains killed 20 people and left some
2,100 homeless.
(AP, 6/2/04)
2004 Jun 1, Congolese soldiers
battled troops loyal to Brig. Gen. Laurent Nkunda, a renegade
commander in eastern Congo, breaking a shaky cease-fire.
(AP, 6/1/04)
2004 Jun 1, Ecuador's Finance
Minister Mauricio Pozo resigned, leaving struggling President Lucio
Gutierrez to find a replacement to lead an economic policy approved by
international lenders but unpopular at home.
(AP, 6/1/04)
2004 Jun 1, Ecuador hosted the
Miss Universe pageant. Jennifer Hawkins, a 20-year-old, blue-eyed
Australian, was named Miss Universe 2004.
(AP, 6/2/04)
2004 Jun 1, Michel Dansel, French
intellectual, held a mock funeral ceremony for the verb. His new
233-page book, “Le Train de Nulle Part” (The Train to Nowhere), was
written without verbs.
(WSJ, 7/16/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 1, In Haiti US commanders
began turning over authority to a UN force under Gen. Augusto Pereira
of Brazil.
(SFC, 6/2/04, A1)
2004 Jun 1, Ghazi Mashal Ajil
al-Yawer, a tribal chief, was named interim president of Iraq.
(AP, 6/1/04)
2004 Jun 1, In Iraq bombs exploded
in central Baghdad and near a U.S. military base in the northern city
of Beiji. At least 14 people were killed.
(AP, 6/1/04)(SFC, 6/2/04, A13)
2004 Jun 1, Leonid Parfyonov, a
leading Russian television news anchor, was dismissed and the his show,
"Namedni (Recently)," shut down after the program tried to broadcast an
interview with the widow of a slain Chechen separatist leader.
(AP, 6/2/04)
2004 Jun 1, In Turkey Kurdish
rebels, Kongra-Gel, announced a resumption of battle saying the
government had not met their terms.
(Econ, 9/4/04, p.51)
2004 Jun 2, South Dakotans elected
Democrat Stephanie Herseth to Rep. Janklow’s seat.
(WSJ, 6/3/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 2, U.S. and Afghan troops
backed by American warplanes fought Taliban militants in the mountains
of southern Afghanistan, killing 17 insurgents and arresting eight. In
northwestern Afghanistan 3 foreign medical workers associated with
Doctors Without Borders and 2 Afghans were killed when their car was
ambushed.
(AP, 6/3/04)(SFC, 6/3/04, A10)(SFC, 6/5/04, A8)
2004 Jun 2, In eastern Algeria
insurgents ambushed an Algerian military convoy night, killing at least
10 soldiers and wounding 45 others.
(AP, 6/2/04)
2004 Jun 2, The Azerbaijani Fuel
and Energy Minister said that $3.4 billion would be invested by 2006 in
the first phase of development of the Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli oil field.
(AP, 6/2/04)
2004 Jun 2, In Congo DRC forces
loyal to renegade Congolese Tutsi commander Brig- Gen. Laurent Nkunda,
captured Bukavo, a key eastern border city from government troops.
(AP, 6/2/04)(Econ, 6/5/04, p.46)
2004 Jun 2, Militants loyal to
Muqtada al-Sadr clashed with U.S. forces near a mosque in Kufa and in
Baghdad. Officials said 6 Iraqis were killed and 40 others wounded.
(AP, 6/2/04)
2004 Jun 2, In Nepal King
Gyanendra named Sher Bahadur Deuba, a former prime minister fired two
years ago for alleged incompetence, as prime minister again amid
political turmoil.
(AP, 6/2/04)
2004 Jun 2, Romania’s Pres. Ion
Iliescu unveiled the new Logan sedan, a joint venture between Renault
and Romania’s Dacia. Starting prices were around $6,100. In 2007 nearly
80,000 Logans were sold in western Europe.
(SFC, 6/3/04, C5)(Econ, 5/31/08, SR p.7)
2004 Jun 2, Saudi security forces
killed two suspected militants linked to a weekend shooting and
hostage-taking.
(AP, 6/2/04)
2004 Jun 2, In southeast Turkey
Kurdish guerrillas fired on troops a day after announcing an end to a
5-year cease fire.
(WSJ, 6/3/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 3, Julio Franco became,
at age 45, the oldest player in major league history to hit a grand
slam, connecting in Atlanta's 8-to-4 victory over Philadelphia.
(AP, 6/3/05)
2004 Jun 3, Pres. Bush said CIA
Director George Tenet, has resigned for personal reasons. Tenet
announced his resignation amid a controversy over intelligence lapses
about suspected weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and the Sept. 11
terrorist attacks.
(AP, 6/3/05)
2004 Jun 3, The United States
signed an agreement to give Egypt $300 million to compensate it for
"regional unrest" stemming from last year's war in Iraq.
(AP, 6/4/04)
2004 Jun 3, FBI Director Robert
Mueller proposed the creation of an intelligence service within the FBI
with clear authority over all FBI activities.
(SFC, 6/4/04, A5)
2004 Jun 3, Former Pres. Clinton
opened a book tour for his 957-page memoir “My Life” to be published on
June 22.
(SFC, 6/4/04, A2)
2004 Jun 3, In Congo U.N. troops
opened fire on rioters, killing two, as a mob broke into their base and
tens of thousands of protesters overran the capital city of Kinshasa.
Demonstrations swept the country over fighting in its volatile east.
(AP, 6/3/04)
2004 Jun 3, Germany’s Goethe
Center opened a reading room in Pyongyang, North Korea.
(www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,1207346,00.html)
2004 Jun 3, Several mortar shells
were fired at the Italian Embassy in Baghdad, causing some Iraqi deaths.
(AP, 6/3/04)
2004 Jun 3, In Beirut, Lebanon,
OPEC leaders agreed to raise their output ceiling by 2.5 million
barrels a day.
(WSJ, 6/4/04, p.A2)
2004 Jun 3, In Pakistan police and
Shiite Muslim protesters clashed the northern city of Gilgit, killing
one man. Investigators named an al-Qaida-linked militant group as their
chief suspect in the suicide bombing of a Shiite mosque in Karachi that
triggered mass rioting.
(AP, 6/3/04)
2004 Jun 3, Nam Cam (Truong Van
Cam, 57), an alleged Vietnamese crime "godfather," and four of his
gangster colleagues were executed by firing squad after being convicted
in a major crackdown on crime that is said to have reached into the
ruling Communist Party.
(AP, 6/3/04)
2004 Jun 4, Pres. Bush nominated
John Danforth, former Republican senator from Missouri, to be US
ambassador to the UN.
(SFC, 6/5/04, A3)
2004 Jun 4, Pope John Paul II met
with President Bush and reminded him of the Vatican's opposition to the
war in Iraq.
(AP, 6/4/04)
2004 Jan 2, Independence Air,
formerly known as Atlantic Coast Airlines, began operations at Dulles
Airport. The DC based carrier shut down Jan 5, 2006.
(SFC, 1/3/06, p.E1)
2004 Jun 4, In Granby, Colo.,
Marvin Heemeyer, a muffler shop owner, tore through town in a plated
bulldozer in anger over a zoning dispute, before shooting himself dead.
(SFC, 6/5/04, A3)
2004 Jun 4, In southern
Afghanistan U.S. troops and warplanes attacked Taliban rebels besieging
a remote checkpoint. Eight militants were killed.
(AP, 6/5/04)
2004 Jun 4, In Brazil President
Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva designated four new national forests to
protect more than a million acres of rainforest.
(AP, 6/4/04)
2004 Jun 4, In Colombia Francisco
Galan, jailed leader of the ELN, was granted a 1-day parole to address
the Senate. He denounced the problem of landmines and called for an end
to the country’s violence.
(Econ, 6/12/04, p.36)
2004 Jun 4, In Hong Kong tens of
thousands of residents rallied on the 15th anniversary of the bloody
Tiananmen Square crackdown.
(AP, 6/5/04)
2004 Jun 4, American and Shiite
militia forces agreed to withdraw from the holy cities of Najaf and
Kufa and turn over security to Iraqi police. 5 Americans were killed
and 5 wounded in 3 clashes in Sadr City. US combat deaths reached 601.
(AP, 6/4/04)(SFC, 6/5/04, A1)
2004 Jun 4, The two Koreas agreed,
after an all-night negotiating session, to try to ease tensions by,
among other things, ending blaring propaganda efforts on their border.
(AP, 6/4/04)
2004 Jun 4, Nigerian troops killed
17 armed bandits in oil-rich Delta state, as military operations
intensified to disarm criminals engaged in oil theft and piracy in the
Niger delta.
(Reuters, 6/5/04)
2004 Jun 4, In central Russia a
bomb hidden behind a kiosk exploded in a crowded market in Samara. 10
people were killed and 37 wounding.
(AP, 6/5/04)
2004 Jun 4-2004 Jun 6, The
Shangri-La Dialogue, a regional security conference, was held in
Singapore. It was organized by the London-based Int’l. Institute for
Strategic Studies.
(Econ, 6/12/04, p.37)
2004 Jun 5, Smarty Jones lost to
Birdstone (36-to-1) at the 136th running at Belmont Park.
(SSFC, 6/6/04, C1)
2004 Jun 5, The U.S.S. Jimmy
Carter, the most advanced nuclear submarine in the U.S. Navy, was
christened at a shipyard in Groton, Conn., in the presence of the
former president and his wife, Rosalynn, who cracked a bottle of
champagne against the sail.
(AP, 6/5/05)
2004 Jun 5, Ronald Reagan
(b.1911), 40th US president (1981-1989), died in California after a
long twilight struggle with Alzheimer's disease. In 2005 Paul Lettow
authored “Ronald Reagan and His Quest to Abolish Nuclear Weapons.” It
focused on what Reagan said and did. John Ehrman authored “The
Eighties: America in the Age of Reagan,” in which he sees Reagan as the
embodiment of the conservative movement. In 2006 Richard Reeves
authored “President Reagan: The Triumph of Imagination.”
(AP, 6/6/04)(SSFC, 3/27/05, p.E3)(Econ, 2/4/06, p.75)
2004 Jun 5, The European
Investment Bank (EIB) granted a loan of 100 million euros (122 million
dollars) to Egypt's state-run natural gas holding company (EGAS) to
finance pipeline construction in Jordan.
(AFP, 6/6/04)
2004 Jun 5, France's first gay
marriage was performed in the southwest city of Bordeaux. On July 27 it
was officially declared void by a court but the two homosexual men
involved immediately said they would appeal the ruling.
(AP, 7/27/04)
2004 Jun 5, French engineering
giant Alstom said a consortium it was leading had signed an
88-million-euro ($107 mil) contract for work on three railway lines in
the suburbs of Algiers.
(AP, 6/6/04)
2004 Jun 5, Iranian officials said
police had killed at least 58 drug smugglers and confiscated more than
50 tons of narcotics in the past two months.
(AP, 6/5/04)
2004 Jun 5, In Iraq a roadside
bomb killed an American soldier and wounded 3 others in the 2nd fatal
attack on U.S. troops in Baghdad in as many days. Iraq's new leader
called for a halt to attacks on foreign troops.
(AP, 6/5/04)
2004 Jun 5, In Iraq 8 people
stormed into a police station south of Baghdad, opened fire and killed
seven officers before planting explosives to destroy the building.
(AP, 6/6/04)
2004 Jun 5, Japan's legislature
adopted a bill designed to save the country's troubled pension system
following an all-night debate marred by brawls and a walkout by
opposition parties. The bill raised pension fund premiums from 13.58%
of pay to 18.3% by 2017.
(AP, 6/5/04)(Econ, 7/16/05, p.36)
2004 Jun 5, In Venezuela tens of
thousands of opposition supporters marched through Caracas to celebrate
a recent announcement by election authorities that President Hugo
Chavez likely will face a recall referendum on his rule.
(AP, 6/6/04)
2004 Jun 6, In the 58th annual
Tony Awards “Avenue Q” won for best Broadway musical. "I Am My Own
Wife" was named best play; Phylicia Rashad, who starred in a revival of
"A Raisin in the Sun," became the first black actress to win a Tony for
a leading dramatic role.
(SFC, 6/7/04, D1)(AP, 6/6/05)
2004 Jun 6, World leaders,
including President Bush and French President Jacques Chirac put aside
their differences to commemorate the D-Day invasion that broke Nazi
Germany's grip on continental Europe.
(AP, 6/6/05)
2004 Jun 6, In eastern Congo
insurgents ambushed a U.N. convoy, killing two South African
peacekeepers and wounding nine others in continuing.
(AP, 6/6/04)
2004 Jun 6, A car bomb exploded
near the gate to a U.S.-run base north of Baghdad, killing six people
and injuring 20 others. Assailants ambushed a convoy of security
contractors traveling to Baghdad's airport, killing 2 Americans and 2
Poles working for a U.S. security company. The US military free 320
prisoners at Abu Ghraib leaving some 3,100. Attacks over the last 24
hours killed at least 21 people.
(AP, 6/6/04)(SFC, 6/7/04, A10)
2004 Jun 6, Ariel Sharon’s cabinet
declared its intent to remove 21 Jewish settlements in the Gaza strip
plus 4 in the West Bank. An Israeli court sentenced Palestinian leader
Marwan Barghouti to 5 consecutive life terms and 40 years for his role
in attacks that killed 4 Israelis and a Greek monk.
(AP, 6/6/04)(Econ, 6/12/04, p.45)
2004 Jun 6, In Saudi Arabia Simon
Chambers (36), an Irish cameraman working for the BBC, was killed in a
shooting in Riyadh. A BBC correspondent was injured.
(SFC, 6/7/04, A8)
2004 Jun 7, In Hockey’s Stanley
Cup Tampa Bay defeated the Calgary Flames in game 7.
(WSJ, 6/8/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 7, The US Supreme court
ordered US highways to be opened to long-haul Mexican trucks, rejecting
objections by labor and environmental groups.
(SFC, 6/8/04, A1)
2004 Jun 7, In Ecuador Indians
blocked the Pan American Highway. They demanded the resignation of
Pres. Gutierrez as he hosted an OAS meeting.
(WSJ, 6/8/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 7, In eastern India a
boat crowded mainly with women and children capsized in a river, with
at least 40 people feared dead.
(AP, 6/7/04)
2004 Jun 7, In Iraq 9 militias
agreed to disband in exchange for veteran’s pensions, jobs and other
rewards. The Mahdi Army of al-Sadr was not included.
(SFC, 6/8/04, A6)
2004 Jun 7, Pilots at Royal Air
Maroc, Morocco's national carrier, have decided to end their strike,
which began May 26 in response to the firing of 6 colleagues.
(AFP, 6/7/04)
2004 Jun 7, Russian President
Vladimir Putin flew to Mexico for talks with his Pres. Fox, who has
said he hoped to increase military cooperation with Moscow. Putin, the
1st Russian head-of-state to visit Mexico, said the two major oil
producing nations should share knowledge on oil exploration and the
energy sector.
(AP, 6/7/04)
2004 Jun 7, US and South Korean
officials announced plans to withdraw a third of 37,000 US troops from
South Korea by the end of next year.
(AP, 6/7/04)
2004 Jun 8, John Ashcroft, US
Attorney General, told Congress he would not release a 2002 policy memo
on the degree of pain and suffering legally permitted during enemy
interrogations.
(SFC, 6/9/04, A1)
2004 Jun 8, U.S.-led troops backed
by jet fighters and helicopters killed 21 Taliban militants, after
rebels attacked a convoy in the mountains of southern Afghanistan.
(AP, 6/9/04)
2004 Jun 8, Britain planned to
give an extra 15 million pounds (27 million dollars) in relief aid to
Sudan's crisis-hit Darfur region.
(AFP, 6/8/04)
2004 Jun 8, In Ecuador foreign
ministers from around the Americas declared war on the deeply ingrained
corruption in the region at the end of a two-day meeting in Quito.
(AP, 6/9/04)
2004 Jun 8, In Gabon a small
airliner crashed after takeoff from Libreville. At least 14 of 30
people aboard were killed.
(WSJ, 6/9/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 8, Two volcanoes in
separate parts of Indonesia shot forth plumes of smoke and showers of
stones, killing two hikers and forcing the evacuation of 5,000
villagers.
(AP, 6/8/04)
2004 Jun 8, Iraqi officials
declared that the interim government has assumed full control of the
country's oil industry.
(AP, 6/8/04)
2004 Jun 8, In Iraq 3 Italians and
a Polish contractor who'd been abducted were freed by US special forces.
(AP, 6/8/05)
2004 Jun 8, In Iraq 2 car bombs
exploded in Mosul and Baquoba, killing at least 14 Iraqis and one U.S.
soldier. 6 coalition soldiers, two Poles, three Slovaks and a Latvian,
were killed in an explosion while defusing mines in Suwayrah.
(AP, 6/8/04)
2004 Jun 8, In Saudi Arabia an
American citizen who worked for a US defense contractor was shot and
killed in Riyadh.
(AP, 6/8/04)
2004 Jun 8, In Venezuela,
elections officials said President Hugo Chavez must face a recall vote
on Aug 15. Should Chavez lose a recall before Aug. 19, the completion
of the fourth year of his six-year term, presidential elections would
be held within a month. After Aug 19, Chavez's vice president, Jose
Vicente Rangel, would serve out the remainder of Chavez's term.
(AP, 6/9/04)
2004 Jun 8, The Zimbabwe
government announced that all farmland will be nationalized and private
land ownership abolished. Title deeds of farm properties will be
scrapped and replaced by 99-year leases with rent payable to the
government.
(AP, 6/8/04)
2004 Jun 8, Venus made a rare
transit across face of the sun.
(AP, 6/9/04)
2004 Jun 8, The UN voted 15-0 to
accept a US and British resolution to end the formal co-occupation of
Iraq on June 30.
(SFC, 6/9/04, A1)
2004 Jun 9, A new scoring system
for figure skating was approved after the Olympic pairs scandal forced
the sport's governing body to make radical changes.
(AP, 6/9/05)
2004 Jun 9-2004 Jun 10, The body
of Ronald Reagan was laid in state in the Washington DC Capitol
Rotunda. Thousands viewed the flag-draped casket of the 40th president
prior to his burial in California.
(SFC, 6/10/04, A15)(AP, 6/9/05)
2004 Jun 9, G-8 Summit leaders at
Sea Island Resort near Savannah, Georgia, called for Middle East reform
and a broader role for NATO in Iraq.
(WSJ, 6/11/04, p.A7)
2004 Jun 9, The Federal
Communications Commission (FCC) agreed to a record $1.75 million
settlement with Clear Channel to resolve indecency complaints against
Howard Stern and other radio personalities.
(AP, 6/9/05)
2004 Jun 9, An Afghan commander
said that Afghan and U.S. forces killed more than 70 Taliban rebels in
a seven-day operation in a mountainous southern district, including at
least 20 militants who died in a single clash.
(AP, 6/9/04)
2004 Jun 9, In Bangladesh a
six-story apartment building collapsed in Dhaka, killing at least 11
people and trapping about 25 inside.
(AP, 6/9/04)
2004 Jun 9, A Chinese state
newspaper said 1 baby died and 20 were hospitalized with severe
malnutrition in eastern China after drinking low-quality milk powder,
two months after a nationwide crackdown on fake infant formula.
(AP, 6/9/04)
2004 Jun 9, In eastern Congo
Government forces regained control of Bukavu without a fight as rebel
forces fled.
(AP, 6/9/04)
2004 Jun 9, Human Rights Watch
said as many as one-third of the workers in El Salvador's sugarcane
fields are under the age of 18, urging companies to boycott Salvadoran
sugar.
(AP, 6/9/04)
2004 Jun 9, Kurdish parties warned
that they might bolt Iraq's new government if Shiites gain too much
power. Saboteurs blew up an oil pipeline, forcing a 10 percent cut in
electricity output.
(AP, 6/9/04)
2004 Jun 9, In Fallujah a mortar
attack killed 12 members of the Iraqi security force.
(WSJ, 6/10/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 9, In Nigeria unions
representing millions of workers launched a general strike over fuel
price hikes.
(AP, 6/9/04)
2004 Jun 9, In Nigeria Christians
battled Muslims in Abuja, burning homes and places of worship in a
dispute over construction of a mosque near a Christian tribal leader's
palace. Police confirmed nine deaths and witnesses put the toll at more
than 50.
(AP, 6/10/04)
2004 Jun 9, At least 20 militants
were killed in a gunbattle with the Pakistani army in a tense border
region where hundreds of al-Qaida militants are suspected to be hiding.
(AP, 6/10/04)
2004 Jun 9, State-run Turkish TV
aired its 1st ever broadcast in the Kurdish dialect of Kurmandji. Hours
later Leyla Zana and 3 colleagues were released after spending 10 years
in jail for belonging to the PKK rebel group.
(Econ, 6/12/04, p.50)
2004 Jun 10, A G-8 summit at Sea
Island Resort near Savannah, Georgia, ended without an agreement on
Iraq. The group agreed to extend through 2006 the Heavily Indebted Poor
Countries Initiative.
(WSJ, 6/11/04, p.A7)
2004 Jun 10, Ray Charles (b.1930),
rhythm ‘n’ blues piano player and singer best known for "Hit the Road
Jack" and "Georgia on My Mind," died in Beverly Hills.
(USAT, 6/11/04, p.1A)
2004 Jun 10, In northern
Afghanistan gunmen stormed a camp of sleeping Chinese road workers in
Kunduz province, killing at least 11.
(AP, 6/10/04)(WSJ, 6/10/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 10, Europeans began
casting ballots across 25 member nations of the expanded European Union
for a new European Parliament.
(Econ, 6/19/04, p.49)
2004 Jun 10, German researchers
reported that a border collie named Rico understands more than 200
words and can learn new ones as quickly as many children.
(AP, 6/10/04)
2004 Jun 10, In Indonesia Mount
Awu on Sangihe Island erupted. Nearly 12,000 people living around the
mountain had been evacuated to a nearby town.
(AP, 6/10/04)
2004 Jun 10, In Iraq Shiite gunmen
seized a police station in Najaf. 4 Iraqis were killed and 13 were
injured.
(AP, 6/10/04)
2004 Jun 10, In Pakistan gunmen
opened fire on a motorcade carrying the top military official in
Karachi, killing 11 men including 8 soldiers. The general was unhurt.
(AP, 6/10/04)(WSJ, 8/19/04, p.A11)
2004 Jun 10, In Thailand hooded
assailants with assault rifles slashed the throat of a night guard
outside a government school in the Muslim south and seized weapons from
other security personnel who were inside.
(AP, 6/11/04)
2004 Jun 11, Pres. Reagan’s formal
funeral was held in Simi, Ca.
(USAT, 6/11/04, p.1A)
2004 Jun 11, Terry Nichols escaped
execution as the District court jury in McAlester, Oklahoma, deadlocked
in the penalty phase of his trial. He was convicted May 26 on 161
counts of 1st degree murder in the 1995 Oklahoma City federal building
bombing.
(WSJ, 6/14/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 11, The Cassini
spacecraft flew within 1,285 miles of Phoebe, one of the outer moons of
Saturn.
(SSFC, 6/13/04, A11)
2004 Jun 11, A new audiotape, was
broadcast on the Arab satellite station Al-Arabiya alleges that a U.S.
plan for reform in the Middle East is really a bid to replace Arab
leaders. It was believed to be from al-Qaida No. 2 Ayman al-Zawahri.
(AP, 6/12/04)
2004 Jun 11, Congo's government
said its security forces had put down an attempted coup by dissidents
in President Joseph Kabila's personal guard.
(AP, 6/11/04)
2004 Jun 11, Two crowded boats
collided on a lake straddling the Congo-Rwanda border on and one of
them capsized, with some 80 people believed trapped aboard.
(AP, 6/11/04)
2004 Jun 11, In Iraq gunmen
stormed a police station south of Baghdad, drove off the poorly armed
police and blew up the building in the 4th such attack against Iraqi
security installations over the last week.
(AP, 6/11/04)
2004 Jun 11, Al-Sharqiya (The
Eastern), a privately owned TV operation, began broadcasting in Iraq.
Founder Saad al-Bazzaz (54) invested $30 million in start-up costs.
(WSJ, 8/22/05, p.B1)
2004 Jun 11, Irish voters have
overwhelmingly approved a constitutional amendment to tighten their
liberal citizenship laws.
(AP, 6/12/04)
2004 Jun 11, Egon von Furstenberg
(57), a Swiss-born aristocrat known as the "prince of high fashion,”
died in Rome.
(AP, 6/11/04)
2004 Jun 11, In Nigeria labor
groups representing millions of workers abandoned a crippling three-day
general strike.
(AP, 6/11/04)
2004 Jun 11, Poland's president
nominated economist Marek Belka as prime minister for the 2nd time,
opening the way for lawmakers to confirm a new government or trigger
early elections by rejecting it.
(AP, 6/11/04)
2004 Jun 11, A commission of the
government of the Republika Srpska, the Serbian part of Bosnia, finally
admitted that Serbian forces were responsible for the 1995 Muslim
massacre at Srebrenica.
(Econ, 6/19/04, p.53)
2004 Jun 11, In Palermo, Sicily, a
court convicted and sentenced 30 top Sicilian mobsters to life
imprisonment after a 10-year trial covering a total of 77 murders.
(AP, 6/12/04)
2004 Jun 11, In Yemen a gunman
opened fire with an automatic rifle on worshippers in a mosque outside
the capital during midday prayers, killing four people and wounding six.
(AP, 6/12/04)
2004 Jun 12, It was reported that
engineers had created a “metal-rubber,” a substance that conducts
electricity like metal, but also stretches like rubber up to 250% of
its original length.
(Econ, 6/12/04, p.14)
2004 Jun 12, Central African
leaders of Chad and Cameroon officially opened the taps on one of the
largest private investments in sub-Saharan Africa, a 663-mile, $3.7
billion pipeline snaking from Chad through virgin rain forests to the
Atlantic.
(AP, 6/12/04)
2004 Jun 12, Iran said it would
reject international restrictions on its nuclear program and challenged
the world to accept Tehran as a member of the "nuclear club."
(AP, 6/13/04)
2004 Jun 12, In Iraq gunmen killed
Bassam Salih Kubba, a deputy foreign minister as he went to work in
Baghdad.
(AP, 6/12/04)
2004 Jun 12, In Indian-controlled
Kashmir suspected rebels threw a grenade into a crowded tourist
restaurant, killing 4 people and injuring 25 others.
(AP, 6/12/04)
2004 Jun 12, A Lebanese Foreign
Ministry official said Iraqi gunmen had kidnapped three Lebanese in
Iraq and killed one of them.
(AP, 6/12/04)
2004 Jun 12, In central Pakistan a
powerful bomb exploded outside the home of a senior security official,
killing one person and wounding three.
(AP, 6/12/04)
2004 Jun 12, A parade in Moscow
celebrated the Day of Russia. Formerly known as Independence Day, the
holiday marks the Russian parliament's June 12, 1990, declaration of
sovereignty from the Soviet Union.
(AP, 6/12/04)
2004 Jun 12, In Saudi Arabia an
American was kidnapped. An al-Qaida statement, posted on an Islamic Web
site, showed a passport-size photo of a brown-haired man and a Lockheed
Martin business card bearing the name Paul M. Johnson. Islamic
militants shot and killed Kenneth Scroggs of Laconia, New Hampshire, in
his garage in Riyadh.
(AP, 6/13/04)(AP, 6/20/04)
2004 Jun 13, Former President
George H.W. Bush celebrated his 80th birthday with a 13,000-foot
parachute jump over his presidential library in College Station, Texas.
(AP, 6/13/05)
2004 Jun 13, It was reported that
a quarter teaspoon of cinnamon a day helped to reduce glucose, fat and
cholesterol levels by a s much as 30%.
(SSFC, 6/13/04, Par p.8)
2004 Jun 13, Robert Lees, former
screenwriter, was decapitated at his Hollywood home. Keven Lee Graff
(27) was later charged with Lees’ murder and that of a neighbor.
(SFC, 7/29/04, p.B3)
2004 Jun 13, Author and academic
Stuart Hampshire, a former chairman of the department of philosophy at
Princeton University who argued that philosophy must be studied within
the context of other disciplines, died in Oxford, England. His books
included "The Freedom of the Individual."
(AP, 6/16/04)
2004 Jun 13, EU balloting, begun
June 10, ended. Some 150 million Europeans cast ballots across 25
member nations of the expanded European Union. Turnout was 45.3 percent.
(AP, 6/14/04)(Econ, 6/19/04, p.49)
2004 Jun 13, A suicide attacker
detonated a car bomb near a U.S. military camp in Baghdad, killing at
least 12 people, and wounding 13. Gunmen killed a senior Education
Ministry official in the second assassination of a government figure in
as many days.
(AP, 6/13/04)
2004 Jun 13, Pakistani troops
ended a major operation to flush out al-Qaida suspects and their local
supporters from hide-outs in a remote region near Afghanistan. 72
people died, including 17 security personnel.
(AP, 6/14/04)
2004 Jun 13, Philippine air force
troops clashed with communist guerrillas camped out on a farm near
Manila and 3 rebels were killed.
(AP, 6/13/04)
2004 Jun 13, The race for Serbia's
top job produced no outright winner, but left the two top contenders,
nationalist Tomislav Nikolic and reformist Boris Tadic, to face each
other in a second round of voting in two weeks.
(AP, 6/14/04)(Econ, 6/19/04, p.53)
2004 Jun 13, Saudi Arabia held a
3-day “national dialogue” in Medina on how women’s lives could be
improved. On Jun 15, recommendations (19) were given to Crown Prince
Abdullah.
(Econ, 6/19/04, p.26)
2004 Jun 13, In South Korea more
than 9,000 activists shouting "No to globalization!" marched through
downtown Seoul to protest a meeting of the World Economic Forum.
(AP, 6/13/04)
2004 Jun 13, The UN Conference on
Trade and Development opened in San Paulo, Brazil. This marked its 11th
forum over a 40 year history. The so-called Group of 77 developing
nations actually has 132 member nations.
(AP, 6/13/04)
2004 Jun 14, The US Supreme Court
allowed millions of schoolchildren to keep affirming loyalty to one
nation "under God" but dodged the underlying question of whether the
Pledge of Allegiance is an unconstitutional blending of church and
state.
(AP, 6/15/04)
2004 Jun 14, John Ashcroft
unsealed an indictment against Nuradin Abdi, a Somali immigrant, on
charges of plotting with al Qaeda operatives to blow up a shopping mall
in Columbus, Ohio. Abdi was arrested on immigration charges on Nov 28,
2003. Abdi was sentenced to 10 years in prison in 2007 after pleading
guilty in an alleged plot to blow up an Ohio shopping mall.
(SFC, 6/15/04, p.A3)(AP, 2/27/09)
2004 Jun 14, Azerbaijan Fatulla
Huseynov (67), an opposition party leader known for his bold military
exploits in the war over the Nagorno-Karabakh enclave, was shot and
killed in Baku.
(AP, 6/14/04)
2004 Jun 14, In Bangladesh the
death toll from a powerful weekend storm rose to at least 13. About 140
fishermen were missing.
(AP, 6/14/04)
2004 Jun 14, UN humanitarian chief
Jan Egeland said Eastern Congo is rapidly turning into a major
humanitarian disaster, with 3.3 million people out of reach of relief
groups.
(Reuters, 6/14/04)
2004 Jun 14, The US military
released hundreds of prisoners from Abu Ghraib prison.
(AP, 6/14/04)
2004 Jun 14, A car bomb tore
through a convoy in central Baghdad, killing at least 12 people,
including an American and four other foreigners working to rebuild
Iraq's power plants.
(AP, 6/14/04)
2004 Jun 14, The bodies of 6
Shiite truck drivers were found at a morgue in Ramadi, west of
Fallujah. They had sought refuge in a police station but were handed
over to a hard-line Sunni cleric because they were Shiites.
(AP, 6/15/04)
2004 Jun 14, The Israeli Supreme
Court decided that Israeli municipalities must permit the sale of pork
where a majority of residents demand it.
(AP, 6/14/04)
2004 Jun 14, An Israeli helicopter
attack in the West Bank killed 2 Palestinian militants.
(WSJ, 6/15/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 14, It was reported that
Hmong commanders in Laos acknowledged 21 rebel groups with about 17,000
fighters and family members.
(SFC, 6/14/04, p.A8)
2004 Jun 14, Police in Nepal said
a land mine planted by suspected rebels blew up two police trucks in
western Nepal, killing at least 22 officers.
(AP, 6/14/04)
2004 Jun 12, At least 14 people
were killed in Nigeria's oil-rich Delta state as vigilante mobs hunted
down suspected armed robbers, soaked them in petrol and then set them
alight.
(Reuters, 6/15/04)
2004 Jun 14, UN humanitarian chief
Jan Egeland criticized the Sudanese government for blocking aid
workers, food and equipment from reaching the Darfur region.
(AP, 6/14/04)
2004 Jun 14, The Swiss parliament
voted to end a 96-year ban on absinthe. The green spirit was allowed
back into shops in much of western Europe following an European Union
directive in 1981, but it remained outlawed in Switzerland.
(AFP, 6/14/04)
2004 Jun 14, Typhoon Chanthu
killed 7 people and left seven more missing when it swept through
central Vietnam over the weekend.
(AP, 6/14/04)
2004 Jun 15, The Detroit Pistons
beat the Los Angeles Lakers 100-87 in Game Five of the NBA Finals for
their first championship in 14 years.
(SFC, 6/16/04, p.D1)(AP, 6/15/05)
2004 Jun 15, The Southern Baptist
Convention quit a global federation of Baptist denominations as SBC
leaders denounced the Baptist World Alliance and other groups for
accepting liberal theology.
(AP, 6/15/05)
2004 Apr 15, Tim Berners-Lee,
inventor of the world wide web, became the 1st recipient of Finland’s
$1.2 million Millennium Technology Prize.
(Econ, 5/14/05,
p.84)(www.infoworld.com/article/04/04/16/HNbernerslee_1.html)
2004 Jun 15, It was reported that
China had ordered water prices increased for the 1st time since the
founding of the People’s Republic due to strains on supplies from
development.
(WSJ, 6/15/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 15, In Colombia suspected
leftist rebels raided a ranch near La Gabarra in one of the biggest
cocaine-producing regions, tied up 34 coca pickers with the hammocks
they had been sleeping in, and gunned them all down.
(AP, 6/16/04)(Econ, 6/19/04, p.38)
2004 Jun 15, In Germany Volkswagen
fired Klaus-Joachim Gebauer, a midlevel personnel manager, for alleged
embezzlement. Gebauer soon began telling stories of management sex
junkets in Brazil, India and other places.
(WSJ, 11/17/05, p.A1)
2004 Jun 15, Iraq's interim
government received a boost when its neighbors welcomed the transfer of
sovereignty in that country at the end of June. Two explosions on
pipelines in southern Iraq cut oil exports from the south by half.
(AP, 6/15/04)
2004 Jun 15, A Saudi al Qaeda
group threatened to execute Paul M. Johnson Jr. within 72 hours unless
fellow jihadists were released were released from prison.
(SFC, 6/19/04, p.A15)
2004 Jun 15, In Sierra Leone a
U.N.-backed war crimes trial began. The court was trying alleged crimes
including rape, burning and looting, use of child soldiers and forced
marriage committed during the 1991-2002 war.
(AP, 6/16/04)
2004 Jun 16, Rebuffing Bush
administration claims, the independent commission investigating the
Sept. 11 attacks said no evidence existed that al-Qaida had strong ties
to Saddam Hussein.
(AP, 6/16/05)
2004 Jun 16, Gov. Barbour of
Mississippi singed a law capping jury awards in most lawsuits.
(WSJ, 6/17/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 16, A new computer worm
targeting mobile phones was reported. It was dubbed “Cabir” and
reportedly written by a virus-writing group in Spain known as 29A.
(WSJ, 6/16/04, p.B9)
2004 Jun 16, Al Lapin Jr. (76),
co-founder of the International House of Pancakes in 1958, died in Los
Angeles.
(AP, 6/16/05)
2004 Jun 16, In northern
Afghanistan a remote-controlled bomb hit a convoy of German
peacekeepers, killing an Afghan driver and three civilians.
(AP, 6/16/04)
2004 Jun 16, French power workers
cut electricity to the Eiffel Tower and President Jacques Chirac's
residence in western Paris to protest the government's plans to
partially privatize state utilities in an effort to raise money.
(AP, 6/16/04)
2004 Jun 16, In India a passenger
train derailed after smashing into boulders on a bridge, killing at
least 20 people and injuring 50. The engine of the Bombay-bound
Matsyagandha Express jumped the tracks and plunged off the bridge.
(AP, 6/16/04)
2004 Jun 16, Saboteurs blasted a
southern pipeline for the 2nd time in as many days, shutting down
Iraq's oil exports. Gunmen killed a security chief for the state-run
Northern Oil Co. Muqtada al-Sadr ordered his Shiite militias out of
Najaf and Kufa.
(AP, 6/16/04)(WSJ, 6/17/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 16, A Jordanian military
court convicted 15 men, only one of whom was in custody, for a terror
conspiracy targeting U.S. and Israeli interests.
(AP, 6/16/04)
2004 Jun 16, Libyan Arab Airline
announced plans to spend a billion dollars over the next decade to buy
22 new aircraft, ranging from 14-seaters to jets with a capacity of 350
seats.
(AP, 6/16/04)
2004 Jun 16, Jose Fernando Jimenez
Lecona, Mexico City police official, was shot to death outside his
home. Lecona, head of a high-risk crimes unit, was investigating a
string of brazen kidnappings.
(SFC, 6/18/04, p.A3)
2004 Jun 16, In Nepal a passenger
bus veered off a mountainous highway west of the capital, killing at
least 12 passengers and leaving many more injured.
(AP, 6/16/04)
2004 Jun 16, In Pakistan a bus
collided with a truck and plunged from a bridge near Islamabad, killing
at least 40 passengers and injuring 10.
(AP, 6/16/04)
2004 Jun 16, President Vladimir
Putin signed a strategic partnership deal with Uzbekistan, seeking to
restore Russian influence.
(AP, 6/16/04)
2004 Jun 16, Thanom Kittikachorn
(92), ex-military ruler of Thailand died at the age of 92. He helped
the US during the Vietnam War before being ousted in a popular uprising
in 1973. Thanom came to be known as one of Thailand's "Three Tyrants"
when he ran the country in the 1960s and early 1970s with his son, Col.
Narong Kittikachorn, and Narong's father-in-law, Field Marshal Praphas
Charusathien.
(AP, 6/17/04)
2004 Jun 17, The US bipartisan
commission investigating the 2001 Sep 11 attacks released its final
report. The report found that officials, blindsided by terrorists and
beset by poor communications, were so slow to react on Sept. 11, 2001,
that the last of four hijacked planes had crashed by the time Vice
President Dick Cheney ordered hostile aircraft shot down.
(SFC, 6/18/04, p.A1)(AP, 6/17/05)
2004 Jun 17, President Bush
disputed the Sept. 11 commission's finding that Saddam Hussein had no
strong ties to al-Qaida, saying the former Iraqi leader had had
"numerous contacts" with the terrorist network.
(AP, 6/17/05)
2004 Jun 17, It was reported that
power was shifting away from manufacturers and producers to retailers
and distributors who deliver goods to customers. In 1990 Alvin Toffler
authored “Power Shift,” a look at power shifts in the everyday world.
(WSJ, 6/17/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 17, In Afghanistan
fighters loyal to several regional warlords stormed Chagcharan, a
provincial capital of western Ghor province, and forced the governor to
flee.
(AP, 6/18/04)
2004 Jun 17, Algerian troops
killed one of North Africa's most-wanted terrorist leaders, who allied
his group with Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network. Nabil Sahraoui (also
known as Abu Ibrahim Mustapha), one of his key right-hand men and a
"good number" of other Salafist lieutenants were killed in a military
sweep.
(AP, 6/20/04)(SFC, 6/21/04, p.A6)
2004 Jun 17, A jury in Brussels,
Belgium, convicted Marc Dutroux (47), an ex-convict, of abducting 6
girls in 1995-96. It also found him guilty of murdering 2 of the girls
and an accomplice.
(AP, 6/17/04)
2004 Jun 17, Brazil’s Senate
backed a rise in the minimum wage to 275 reais ($88) per month and
approved a new bankruptcy law.
(Econ, 6/26/04, p.42)
2004 Jun 17, In Brazil the Camara
Dam on the Mamanguate River burst and flooded the city of Alagoa Grande
in Paraiba state, some 1,300 miles northeast of Sao Paulo. At least 3
people were killed.
(AP, 6/18/04)
2004 Jun 17, A Chad military
official said Arab militias, known as Janjawids, fought Chadian troops
in Birak, a locality inside Chad about 10 miles (six kilometers) from
the border with western Sudan. 69 Janjawids militiamen were killed and
two taken prisoner in the fighting. He did not give figures for any
losses among Chadian troops.
(AP, 6/17/04)
2004 Jun 17, In the Dominican
Republic Craig Roger Hiserote (55), an American executive for a North
Carolina-based energy company, was killed by two gunmen on a motorcycle
as he drove home from work in the coastal town of San Pedro de Macoris.
(AP, 6/17/04)
2004 Jun 17, In Iraq 2 car
bombings killed 41 people and wounding 142. A sport utility vehicle
packed with artillery shells blew up in a crowd of people waiting to
volunteer for the Iraqi military. Another car bomb north of the capital
killed six members of the Iraqi security forces.
(AP, 6/17/04)(WSJ, 6/18/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 17, Tahar Ben Jelloun
(59), a Moroccan-born novelist and poet, won the Int’l. IMPAC Dublin
Literary Award for the best work of English fiction for 2002. Linda
Coverdale, translator of “This Blinding Absence of Light,” received a
quarter of the $120,000 prize.
(SFC, 6/18/04, p.E2)
2004 Jun 17, In Peru the
400-year-old Lima Roman Catholic cathedral celebrated its restoration,
a project that began in 1997. A new museum in a converted sacristy
displays a nine-painting series depicting Santa Rosa de Lima's road to
canonization in the 1600s as the first saint of the New World.
(AP, 6/18/04)
2004 Jun 17, Pakistan's army
killed Nek Muhammad (Nek Mohammed), a renegade Wazir tribal leader,
tracing him to a mud-brick compound near Wana via a satellite phone and
then leveling the building in a helicopter assault. He was accused of
sheltering al-Qaida fighters. Army troops killed 30 tribesman suspected
of shielding al-Qaida fugitives. As many as 70 "foreign terrorists"
were also killed in the operation. In southern Pakistan Munawar
Soharwardi, a leading opposition politician, was slain in a drive-by
shooting.
(AP, 6/17/04)(AP, 6/18/04)(AP, 6/23/04)(Econ,
4/14/07, p.44)
2004 Jun 18, The Commerce Dept.
reported that the US current-account deficit grew to a record $144.9
billion in the 1st quarter. The current-account deficit for 2003 was
$530.7 billion.
(WSJ, 6/21/04, p.A12)
2004 Jun 18, The Hanky Panky thong
model 4811 was described as the top seller in its category. In
2003 thongs accounted for a quarter of the $2.6 billion panty
market. Gale Epstein and Lida Orzeck began Hanky Panky in the late
1970s.
(WSJ, 6/18/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 18, It was reported that
farming and related businesses accounted for 12% of the US GDP and
about 17% of American jobs.
(WSJ, 6/18/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 18, It was reported that
Terry Semel, CEO of Yahoo, and his wife Jane Bovington Semel planned to
donate $25 million to UCLA’s Neuropsychiatric Institute.
(SFC, 6/18/04, p.C1)
2004 Jun 18, In southern
Afghanistan Taliban insurgents attacked a government office in Mizan,
sparking a gunfight with Afghan troops that killed seven people.
(AP, 6/19/04)
2004 Jun 18, European Union
leaders sealed a hard-fought deal on a new constitution. It needs
approval by all 25 member states before it can take effect, expected in
2007.
(AP, 6/19/04)
2004 Jun 18, Germany's parliament
passed a measure that will allow the military to shoot down hijacked
airliners in German airspace if they are deemed a threat.
(AP, 6/18/04)
2004 Jun 18, Insurgents clashed
with U.S. forces northeast of Baghdad for the second time in as many
days, and two of the militants were killed.
(AP, 6/18/04)
2004 Jun 18, South Korea said it
will send 3,000 soldiers to northern Iraq beginning in early August to
assist the U.S.-led coalition.
(AP, 6/18/04)
2004 Jun 18, A Saudi al-Qaida
group said it killed American hostage Paul M. Johnson Jr., posting 3
photos on the Internet showing his body and severed head. Hours later
Saudi security forces killed Abdulaziz al-Moqrin (31), a top al-Qaida
leader, and 3 other militants in Riyadh.
(AP, 6/18/04)(AP, 6/19/04)
2004 Jun 18, The U.N. atomic
watchdog agency censured Iran for past cover-ups in its nuclear program
in a resolution, warning Tehran to be more forthcoming.
(AP, 6/18/04)
2004 Jun 18, The UN warned the
Aral Sea, once one of the world's largest inland bodies of water, could
dry up unless neighboring countries work to increase its water supply.
(AP, 6/18/04)
2004 Jun 18, West African defense
chiefs agreed to create a 6,500-strong multinational force to respond
to "crisis and threats to peace" in the war-ravaged region. The
announcement followed a 2-day meeting in Abuja, Nigeria, involving
defense chiefs of staff from the 15 member nations of ECOWAS.
{Nigeria}
(AP, 6/18/04)(www.ecowas.info/)
2004 Jun 19, In Chechnya rebel
attacks killed seven Russian soldiers and police officers over the last
24 hours.
(AP, 6/19/04)
2004 Jun 19, A US military plane
fired missiles into a residential neighborhood in Fallujah, killing 26
people and leveling houses. The target was a hideout of Abu Musab
al-Zarqawi's terror network. 23 of the 26 killed were foreign
terrorists. 3 Iraqis were among the dead.
(AP, 6/19/04)(SFC, 6/21/04, p.A7)
2004 Jun 19, In Nepal rebels
ambushed a police truck with a bomb and gunfire, also hitting a nearby
passenger bus in an attack that killed 14 policemen and 4 civilians,
including at least one child.
(AP, 6/19/04)
2004 Jun 19, Nikolai Girenko (64),
prominent human rights defender, was shot and killed at his home in St.
Petersburg, Russia. Investigators believed that his work as an expert
witness in racism trials and investigations of neo-Nazis is the most
likely motive for his murder.
(SSFC, 8/14/05,
p.A3)(www.amnesty.ie/user/content/view/full/2425)
2004 Jun 19, Sudanese President
Omar Hassan al-Bashir ordered "complete mobilization" to disarm all
illegal armed groups in the western region of Darfur, including the
Arab militias who have been harassing African villagers.
(AP, 6/19/04)
2004 Jun 20, Bermuda-based Bacardi
Limited agreed to purchase Grey Goose vodka, distilled and bottled in
France, from Sidney Frank Importing Co. for roughly $2 billion.
(AP, 6/21/04)
2004 Jun 20, India and Pakistan
announced they would establish a new hot line to alert each other of
potential nuclear accidents or threats.
(AP, 6/20/04)
2004 Jun 20, In Iraq a roadside
bomb exploded along a highway leading to Baghdad's airport, killing two
Iraqi soldiers and wounding 11 others.
(AP, 6/20/04)
2004 Jun 20, Iraq resumed oil
exports of about 1 million barrels a day through its southern Basra
terminal after completing repairs to pipelines sabotaged by insurgents.
(AP, 6/21/04)
2004 Jun 20, The Arab satellite TV
network Al-Jazeera aired a videotape purportedly from al-Qaida-linked
militants showing Kim Sun Il (33), a South Korean hostage, begging for
his life and pleading with his government to withdraw troops from Iraq.
(AP, 6/21/04)(SFC, 6/21/04, p.A7)
2004 Jun 20, A Philippine
congressional committee announced, six weeks after the election, that
President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo has won another term in office. In
2005 an audio file, allegedly wiretapped by military intelligence,
became available with Arroyo speaking to election’s official Virgilio
Garcillano. The “Hello Garci? file became popular as a cell phone ring
tone.
(AP, 6/20/04)(SFC, 6/22/05, p.A2)
2004 Jun 20, Zimbabwe’s government
said it would honor ownership rights to land bought on the property
market, backtracking on previous announcements it would nationalize all
farmland.
(AP, 6/20/04)
2004 Jun 21, The US Supreme Court
ruled 5-4 that people can be arrested for refusing to give their names
to police even if no crime is alleged.
(WSJ, 6/22/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 21, Connecticut Gov. John
G. Rowland announced his resignation, amid a federal corruption
investigation and a growing move to impeach him.
(AP, 6/21/04)
2004 Jun 21, SpaceShipOne lifted
off from the Mojave Desert in the initial stage of the world's first
attempted commercial space flight. SpaceShipOne reached 62.21 miles. It
was designed by legendary aerospace designer Burt Rutan and was built
with more than $20 million in funding by billionaire Paul Allen. It was
piloted by Michael Melvill.
(AP, 6/21/04)(WSJ, 6/22/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 21, In northeastern
Bangladesh a bomb exploded at an opposition rally wounding nearly 40
people.
(AP, 6/21/04)
2004 Jun 21, Ephrem Nkezabera
(52), a former Rwandan banker, was arrested in Brussels and held on
charges of genocide and crimes against humanity in the 1994 Rwandan
massacre.
(AP, 7/30/04)
2004 Jun 21, In central Bolivia a
crowded bus plunged off a 800-foot precipice, killing as many as 38
people.
(AP, 6/23/04)
2004 Jun 21, Leonel Brizola
(b.1922), former governor of Rio Grande do Sul and Rio de Janeiro
states, died of a heart attack. Brizola, one of Brazil's most notable
leftist politicians, created and armed the so-called "Groups of 11,"
cells designed to resist the military dictatorship.
(AP, 6/22/04)(SFC, 6/24/04, p.B6)
2004 Jun 21, Local and
international police officials warned that Europe is awash in
counterfeit euro bills of excellent quality.
(AP, 6/21/04)
2004 Jun 21, In Iraq ambushes in
Ramadi left 4 US soldiers dead. A roadside bomb south of Mosul killed 5
Iraqi contractors.
(SFC, 6/22/04, p.D1)
2004 Jun 21, Iran’s Revolutionary
Guards, known as Pasdaran, confiscated three British military vessels
and arrested eight armed crew members in the Shatt al-Arab waterway.
The men were released 2 days later.
(AP, 6/21/04)(SFC, 6/24/04, p.A12)(Econ, 4/7/07,
p.24)
2004 Jun 21, A Swiss court cleared
the way for Gypsies to sue IBM over allegations that the computer
company's expertise helped the Nazis commit mass murder more
efficiently.
(AP, 6/22/04)
2004 Jun 21, Vietnam's central
bank said it has given approval to the US-based Far East National Bank
to open a branch in Ho Chi Minh City, the 3rd US bank branched in
Vietnam.
(AP, 6/21/04)
2004 Jun 22, The American Film
Institute released its list of 100 best movie songs. Judy Garland’s
“Over the Rainbow” from the 1939 “Wizard of Oz” topped the list.
(SFC, 6/24/04, p.E6)
2004 Jun 22, A federal judge
granted class-action status to a lawsuit against Wal-Mart on behalf of
1.6 million women who claimed discrimination in pay and promotions.
(SFC, 6/23/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 22, Former Pres.
Clinton’s 957-page memoir “My Life” went on sale.
(SFC, 6/18/04, p.E1)
2004 Jun 22, Microsoft received
patent #6,754,472 for “a method and apparatus for transmitting power
and data using the human body.”
(Econ, 7/3/04, p.66)
2004 Jun 22, Mattie Stepanek (13),
poet (Heartsongs, 2001) and peace advocate, died from mitochondrial
myopathy, a neuromuscular disease.
(SSFC, 9/5/04, Par p.5)
2004 Jun 22, In Egypt a 5-story
apartment building collapsed in the southern city of Aswan, killing at
least 13. Eight residents remain missing.
(AP, 6/22/04)(AP, 6/23/04)
2004 Jun 22, A bus in western
France overturned, killing at least 11 people and seriously injuring up
to three others.
(AP, 6/22/04)
2004 Jun 22, In Haiti a fire
ripped through a downtown section of Port-au-Prince, destroying more
than 30 businesses.
(AP, 6/23/04)
2004 Jun 22, In the Ivory Coast
dozens of boys and men suffocated in an airless, sweltering shipping
container. Rebels locked up more than 100 people for days. 75 bodies
were pulled out.
(AP, 8/6/04)
2004 Jun 22, Islamic militants
beheaded a South Korean who pleaded in a heart-wrenching videotape that
"I don't want to die" after his government refused to pull its troops
from Iraq. Hours later, the United States launched an airstrike in
Fallujah, where residents said the strike hit a parking lot. 3 people
were killed and 9 wounded. Elsewhere 2 American soldiers were killed
and one wounded in an attack on a convoy near Balad, 50 miles north of
Baghdad. In 2006 it was reported that Spc. Patrick Ryan McCaffrey and
2nd Lt. Andre Demetrius Tyson had been killed by Iraqi soldiers
patrolling alongside US soldiers near Balad.
(AP, 6/22/04)(SFC, 6/21/06, p.A1)
2004 Jun 22, Francisco Ortiz
Franco, Mexican newspaper, editor was shot to death in Tijuana.
(AP, 6/22/05)
2004 Jun 22, Thousands of Russian
troops poured into Nazran, Ingushetia, chasing Chechen rebels who set
fire to police and government buildings and killed over 90 people in
brazen overnight attacks.
(AP, 6/22/04)(Econ, 2/12/05, p.21)
2004 Jun 22, North Korea, the US,
and four other nations agreed to discuss a freezing of the North's
nuclear program and inspections that would lead to its eventual
dismantlement.
(AP, 6/22/04)
2004 Jun 23, In a major retreat,
the US abandoned an attempt to win a new exemption for American troops
from international prosecution for war crimes, an effort that had faced
strong opposition because of the Iraqi prisoner abuse scandal.
(SFC, 6/24/04, p.A3)(AP, 6/23/05)
2004 Jun 23, The US issued 4 new
1st class stamps, part of a series featuring Disney themes. This set
was titled “The Art of Disney.”
(SFC, 6/24/04, p.B3)
2004 Jun 23, In Iraq Polish forces
purchased 17 rockets for a Soviet-era launcher and two mortar rounds
containing the nerve agent cyclosarin for an undisclosed sum.
(AP, 7/2/04)
2004 Jun 23, Saudi Arabia offered
Islamic militants a limited amnesty, saying their lives would be spared
if they surrendered but they would face the "full might" of state wrath
if they did not. Prince Nayef said foreign residents may be allowed to
carry guns.
(AP, 6/23/04)(SFC, 6/25/04, p.A10)
2004 Jun 24, Federal investigators
questioned President Bush for more than an hour in connection with the
news leak of a CIA operative's name.
(AP, 6/24/05)
2004 Jun 24, A federal appeals
court struck down a Federal Communications Commission effort to make
sweeping changes in media ownership rules.
(AP, 6/24/05)
2004 Jun 24, The US Census Bureau
reported that San Antonio had eclipsed Dallas as the nation's
8th-largest city.
(AP, 6/23/04)
2004 Jun 24, Carl Rakosi (100),
American poet, died in SF.
(SFC, 7/2/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 24, In eastern
Afghanistan 2 U.S. Marines were killed and another was wounded in an
attack at Kunar province.
(AP, 6/25/04)
2004 Jun 24, George Bacchus (51),
a Guyana cattle farmer who prompted an inquiry into an alleged
government hit squad, was assassinated.
(AP, 6/24/04)
2004 Jun 24, In India a bomb
exploded in a crowded bus, killing at least five people and critically
wounding 17 in the northeastern state of Assam.
(AP, 6/24/04)
2004 Jun 24, In southern Iran a
tanker truck carrying gasoline crashed into packed buses and erupted in
flames, killing 71 people. 108 people were injured, many suffering
severe burns.
(AP, 6/25/04)
2004 Jun 24, Western advisers
completed their handover Iraq’s remaining government ministries. The
final 11 of 25 were handed over 6 days before the official end of
coalition occupation.
(SFC, 6/25/04, p.A13)
2004 Jun 24, Insurgents launched
coordinated attacks against police and government buildings across
Iraq. The strikes killed over 105 people, including three American
soldiers. In Mosul alone 4 car bombs killed 62 people.
(AP, 6/24/04)(SFC, 6/25/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 24, Israeli troops posted
near a Gaza Strip settlement killed two Palestinians wearing
bulletproof vests and armed with submachine guns, ammunition clips and
grenades.
(AP, 6/24/04)
2004 Jun 24, In Russia Yukos named
Steven Theede, an American oil industry veteran, as chief executive.
Yukos faced a $3.41 billion bill for back taxes.
(WSJ, 6/25/04, p.B2)
2004 Jun 24, In Istanbul, Turkey,
bombs shattered a bus and exploded outside a hotel where President Bush
was to stay the following weekend, in back-to-back attacks that killed
four people and wounded 17.
(AP, 6/25/04)
2004 Jun 25, Pres. Bush stopped in
Ireland to meet with EU leaders, while on his way to Turkey for a
summit with NATO leaders. Thousands of protesters demonstrated against
his actions in Iraq.
(SFC, 6/26/04, p.A3)
2004 Jun 25, Jack Ryan (44), US
Republican Senate candidate from Illinois, pulled out of the race
following the disclosure of details from his 1999 divorce from TV
actress Jeri Ryan.
(SSFC, 6/27/04, p.A5)
2004 Jun 25, In southern
Afghanistan suspected Taliban gunmen sprayed a van with bullets after
finding that occupants had registered to vote. some 10-16 people were
killed.
(SFC, 6/28/04, p.A6)(AP, 6/25/05)
2004 Jun 25, Australia's
government decided to cover most of the outside of cigarette packages
with graphic images showing the physical damage caused by smoking.
(AFP, 6/25/04)
2004 Jun 25, The Council of
Australian Governments (COAG) agreed to and signed the National Water
Initiative (NWI) to improve water management across the country.
(www.pmc.gov.au/nwi/index.cfm)
2004 Jun 25, US air strikes hit
Fallujah and up to 25 people were killed. Al-Sadr announced a
unilateral cease fire.
(SFC, 6/26/04, p.A13)
2004 Jun 25-2004 Jun 27, Ugandan
rebels (LRA) in southern Sudan unleashed a two-day campaign of arson,
looting and murder, killing 100 villagers and forcing 15,000 others to
flee their homes.
(AP, 7/9/04)
2004 Jun 26, President Bush won
support from the 25-nation European Union for an initial agreement to
help train Iraq's armed forces.
(AP, 6/26/05)
2004 Jun 26, The world’s top
central bankers approved Basel 2, “Int’l. Convergence of Capital
Measures and Capital Standards,” a new capital-adequacy framework for
banks.
(Econ, 7/3/04,
p.61)(www.bsp.gov.ph/about_bsp/CAF/basel2.htm)(Econ, 5/20/06, Survey
p.10)
2004 Jun 26, Taliban remnants
claimed responsibility for the bomb attack that killed two Afghani
United Nations election workers in eastern Afghanistan.
(AP, 6/26/04)
2004 Jun 26, In Beijing, China, 4
days of talks on North Korea’s nuclear program ended with a promise for
further discussion.
(SSFC, 6/27/04, p.A24)
2004 Jun 26, Czech PM Vladimir
Spidla resigned after his Social Democrats did badly in EU elections.
(Econ, 7/3/04, p.6)
2004 Jun 26, In Berlin, Germany,
hundreds of thousands of revelers sporting costumes from full Victorian
garb to skimpy leather outfits and feather boas celebrated gay pride.
(AP, 6/26/04)
2004 Jun 26, In Indian-controlled
Kashmir suspected Islamic rebels raided a village and shot to death 12
Muslims while they slept.
(AP, 6/26/04)
2004 Jun 26, Insurgents launched
attacks in the strife-ridden city of Baqouba, and nine people died, six
of them insurgents. Attacks occurred in other cities north and south of
Baghdad.
(AP, 6/26/04)
2004 Jun 26, In Iraq explosions
that rocked the center of the predominantly Shiite Muslim city of
Hillah killed 40 people and injured 22.
(AP, 6/27/04)
2004 Jun 26, Israeli troops killed
7 Palestinian militants during a raid in Nablus.
(SSFC, 6/27/04, p.A24)
2004 Jun 26, Israeli composer
Naomi Shemer (74) died. Her most famous work was "Jerusalem of Gold,"
an emotional ballad describing the country's attachment and yearning
for the city, shortly before Israel captured east Jerusalem in the 1967
Mideast war.
(AP, 6/26/04)
2004 Jun 26, Pakistan Prime
Minister Zafarullah Jamali told a meeting of ruling party members he
had resigned from office, dissolved the cabinet and nominated as his
successor president of the Pakistan Muslim League (PML) Chaudhry
Shujaat Hussain.
(AP, 6/26/04)
2004 Jun 26, Rebels from Sudan's
remote Darfur demanded the imposition of a military no-fly zone, free
access for aid workers and war crimes trials for Arab militias who have
looted and burned throughout the region.
(AP, 6/26/04)
2004 Jun 27, Insurgents threatened
to behead Cpl. Wassef Ali Hassoun, a U.S. Marine who'd vanished in
Iraq, in a videotaped that aired on Arab television. However, Hassoun
contacted American officials in his native Lebanon the following month;
after being reunited with his family in Utah, Hassoun disappeared in
December.
(AP, 6/27/05)
2004 Jun 27, In Lithuania Valdas
Adamkus won the 2nd round of elections against center-left candidate
Kazimira Prunskiene.
(WSJ, 6/28/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 27, Hundreds of thousands
of Mexicans wearing white staged a silent march through the heart of
their nation's capital to protest kidnappings, violent crimes and the
failures of law enforcement to curb them.
(AP, 6/27/04)
2004 Jun 27, In Mongolia elections
the renamed Communists lost their majority to an opposition block. The
left-leaning MPRP won 36 seats while the MDC took 34.
(WSJ, 6/29/04, p.A1)(Econ, 8/7/04, p.35)
2004 Jun 27, Palestinian militants
blew up an Israeli army post with explosives in a tunnel near the Gush
Katif settlement in the Gaza Strip. At least one soldier was killed. A
firefight followed that left 2 Palestinians dead.
(SFC, 6/28/04, p.A6)
2004 Jun 27, Serbia held
elections. Pro-Western Boris Tadic led early polls over the
ultranationalist candidate, Tomislav Nikolic. Boris Tadic, won 53.5
percent of votes.
(AP, 6/28/04)
2004 Jun 27, Saudi Arabia
dispatched two planeloads of aid to Sudan's war-torn western region of
Darfur.
(AFP, 6/27/04)
2004 Jun 27, Turkey rejected the
demands of Islamic militants who are threatening to behead three of its
kidnapped citizens during a visit by President Bush to Turkey.
(AP, 6/27/04)
2004 Jun 27, Over 40 thousand
Turks chanting anti-Bush slogans demonstrated against the president's
visit to their country and a NATO summit. NATO leaders closed ranks on
a pledge to take a bigger military role in Iraq; Pres. Bush declared
that the alliance was poised to "meet the threats of the 21st century."
Pres. Bush called on the EU to admit Turkey as a member.
(AP, 6/27/04)(Econ, 9/11/04, p.50)(AP, 6/27/05)
2004 Jun 28, The US Supreme Court
ruled 6-3 that detainees at Guantanamo must have access to the US legal
system. The Court ruled that the war on terrorism did not give the
government a "blank check" to hold a US citizen and foreign-born terror
suspects in legal limbo.
(WSJ, 6/29/04, p.A1)(AP, 6/28/05)
2004 Jun 28, America resumed
direct diplomatic ties with Libya after a 24-year break.
(USAT, 6/29/04, p.12A)(AP, 6/28/05)
2004 Jun 28, In Texas 2 freight
trains collided in San Antonio and one engineer was killed. Derailed
train cars released clouds of chlorine gas and ammonium nitrate.
2 people died from the toxic gases.
(USAT, 6/29/04, p.3A)(WSJ, 6/30/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 28, Seven Afghan
policemen were killed as NATO agreed to boost its troop contingent
there to 10,000 ahead of September elections.
(WSJ, 6/29/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 28, In Canada the Liberal
Party suffered heavy losses forcing PM Paul Martin to establish the 1st
minority government since 1979.
(WSJ, 6/29/04, p.A1)(SFC, 6/30/04, p.A7)
2004 Jun 28, In Germany Mozart's
opera "Die Entfuehrung aus dem Serail" (The Abduction from the
Seraglio) has caused a scandal in Berlin. A new production featured
rape, torture and masturbation, a nude bass singing an aria in the
shower and a cross-dressing hero who rounds off the night by
slaughtering a troupe of semi-naked prostitutes.
(AP, 6/28/04)
2004 Jun 28, The European Union
denied China's request to be officially recognized as a market economy,
saying that an assessment of the Chinese economy showed too much state
interference and poor corporate governance.
(AP, 6/28/04)
2004 Jun 28, Iran’s Deputy
Interior Minister Ali Asghar Ahmadi said two Iranian soldiers and eight
rebels were killed in clashes with Kurds. A pro-Kurdish news agency
said 16 soldiers and four rebels died.
(AP, 7/10/04)
2004 Jun 28, The US-led coalition
in a surprise move, transferred sovereignty to an interim Iraqi
government two days early.
(AP, 6/28/04)
2004 Jun 28, NATO leaders agreed
to help train Iraq's armed forces just hours after the new government
in Baghdad took over sovereignty from the U.S.-led administration.
(AP, 6/28/04)
2004 Jun 28, A Palestinian rocket
attack on Sderot killed an Israeli boy (3) and man (49).
(USAT, 6/29/04, p.12A)
2004 Jun 29, The US Supreme Court
blocked a law meant to shield Web-surfing children from online
pornography.
(AP, 6/29/05)
2004 Jun 29, In Ecuador 33
prisoners, some armed with assault rifles and knives, battled their way
out the front door of Quito's main prison in an escape that left 4
inmates and a guard dead.
(AP, 6/29/04)
2004 Jun 29, Israeli forces
countered a Palestinian rocket attack with tanks and missiles in
northern Gaza. One Palestinian was killed.
(USAT, 6/29/04, p.12A)
2004 Jun 29, A UN helicopter
crashed in Sierra Leone and all 24 aboard were killed.
(WSJ, 6/30/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 30, The US Federal
Reserve raised interest rates by a quarter point.
(SFC, 7/1/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 30, A federal appeals
court approved an antitrust settlement Microsoft had negotiated with
the Justice Department.
(AP, 6/30/05)
2004 Jun 30, The Cassini probe
entered Saturn’s orbit for 4 years of explorations. Its 4-year mission
included a close approach to Saturn’s 3rd moon Iapetus.
(Econ, 4/24/04, p.83)(WSJ, 7/1/04, p.A1)
2004 Jun 30, The Iraqis took legal
custody of Saddam Hussein and 11 of his top lieutenants, a first step
toward the ousted dictator's expected trial for crimes against humanity.
(AP, 6/30/05)
2004 Jun 30, From Nigeria it was
reported that Alhaji Dokubo-Asari head of an ethnically diverse mix of
fighters who chiefly worship Egbesu, the traditional god of war for
ethnic Ijaw, was trying to wrest the oil-rich Niger Delta away from
multinational oil giants and the government, and put it into the hands
of "the people."
(AP, 7/1/04)
2004 Jun, The US Treasury Dept.
imposed restrictions requiring that academic trips to Cuba be at least
10 weeks long. This eliminated popular 1-2 week visits offered by US
universities.
(SSFC, 4/9/06, p.F4)
2004 Jun, The US IRS warned
companies in the Virgin Islands, in what is known as the Economic
Development Commission program, to avoid manipulating residency and
income rules to qualify for tax breaks. Enforcement of new regulations
began in early 2005.
(WSJ, 12/27/06, p.A4)
2004 Jun, In Georgia Chris Griffin
reportedly killed a 1,000-pound hog with 9-inch tusks at the River Oak
Plantation. Only a photo portrayed the “Hogzilla” kill. In 2005 experts
from National Geographic confirmed the kill but reduced the size to
about 800 pounds.
(AP, 7/29/04)(SFC, 3/22/05, p.A2)
2004 Jun, Chiquita Brands Int’l.,
a Cincinnati-based banana company, sold its Colombian banana operations.
(SFC, 3/15/07, p.A5)
2004 Jun, Doctors at Rhode Island
Hospital implanted a BrainGate, pea-size sensor made by Cyberkinetics,
in the brain of Matthew Nagle, a quadriplegic, which connected to
computer. Over a 9-month period he learned to use his mind to control
motion on a video monitor and a robotic arm. The journal Nature
reported the results of the experiment on July 13, 2006.
(SFC, 7/13/06, p.A1)(Econ, 7/15/06, p.77)
2004 Jun, In Alsace, France,
Pierre Bodein, nicknamed "Pierrot le fou," or "Crazy Pierre," raped,
killed and mutilated two young victims, Jeanne-Marie Kegelin (11) and
Julie Scharsch (14). He also murdered and mutilated Edwige Vallee (38),
and attempted to kidnap two other girls. In 2007 Bodein was convicted
of viciously murdering two girls and a woman and sentenced to life in
prison.
(AP, 7/11/07)
2004 Jun, The Saudi parliament
passed legislation overturning a law banning girls and women from
participating in physical education and sports. In August the ministry
of education announced that it had no intention of honoring the
legislation.
(SFC, 8/26/04, p.B1)
2004 Jun, Fawaz al-Nashimi (aka
Turki bin Fuheid al-Muteiry), an al-Qaida operative, was killed in a
gunbattle with Saudi forces. He was involved in the May 29 attack
inside two oil industry compounds. In 2006 an al-Qaida statement
identified him as the would-be 20th hijacker for the Sep. 11 attacks.
(SFC, 6/21/06, p.A3)
2004 Jun, In northern Yemen Shiite
Muslim rebels began a revolt in Saada. By 2009 fighting claimed at
least 4,000 lives. The rebels were led by Shiite cleric Hussein Badr
Eddin al-Hawthi until his death in clashes later in 2004. Abdel-Malek
al-Hawthi, the brother of the slain leader, became chief.
(AP, 8/6/09)
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