Timeline Denmark
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History: http://www.corvinia.org/history/denmark/index.html
Greenland, the world’s largest
island, is an autonomous territory of Denmark. Denmark has 483
islands.
(SFC, 5/9/97, p.A4)(SSFC, 12/17/00, WB p.2)
9000BC-4000BC
The finest record of Mesolithic and Neolithic peoples exists in
Denmark, due to the country’s numerous bogs.
(PacDis, Winter/’97, p.9)
c7,000BC Early Danish Mesolithic: In the Maglemose
culture large amber pendants were hardly changed.
(PacDis, Winter/’97, p.8)
2400BC-1500BC Late Danish Neolithic: In the
Ertebolle Culture amber pendants were shaped as animals. This
includes the Dagger Period of Northern Europe.
(PacDis, Winter/’97,
p.8)(http://tinyurl.com/9usqn)
400-500 During this period the Jutes of Jutland,
at the northern tip of the Danish peninsula, migrated to Britain as
part of a Germanic invasion. The notion that they settled in what is
now Kent and the Isle of Wight, as is recorded by Anglo-Saxon
chronicler Bede the Venerable, has been confirmed by archaeological
evidence.
(HNQ, 10/7/00)
700-800 Vikings settled the Faeroe Islands in the
8th century replacing Irish settlers. In 1948 the group of 18
islands, located between Britain and Iceland, became an autonomous
region of Denmark.
(SSFC, 7/29/07,
p.G8)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faroe_Islands)
800-900 In Scandinavia Futhark evolved around the
9th century. Instead of 24 letters, the Scandinavian "Younger"
Futhark had 16 letters. In England, Anglo-Saxon Futhorc started to
be replaced by the Latin alphabet by the 9th century, and did not
survive much more past the Norman Conquest. Futhark continued to be
used in Scandinavia for centuries longer, but by 1600 CE, it had
become nothing more than curiosities among scholars and
antiquarians.
(www.ancientscripts.com/futhark.html)
870 Dec 31, Skirmish at
Englefield. Ethelred of Wessex beat back a Danish invasion army.
(MC, 12/31/01)
871 Jan 4, Ethelred of Wessex
was defeated by Danish forces at Reading.
(PCh, 1992, p.72)
871 Jan 8, Ethelred of Wessex
defeated the Danish forces at Ashdown.
(PCh, 1992, p.72)
871 Mar 2, Battle at Marton:
Ethelred van Wessex (d.871) beat the Danish invasion army. Ethelred
died in April and his brother Alfred (22) took over. Alfred became
Alfred the Great and ruled until 899.
(PCh, 1992, p.72)(SC, 3/2/02)
878 King Alfred faced the
invading Danes. In 1911 G.K. Chesterton authored the historical
novel “The Ballad of the White Horse” set in England during this
time.
(SSFC, 4/22/07, p.P10)
959 The Viking (Danish) ruler
Gorm the Old, the father of Harald Bluetooth, died.
(AM, 11/00, p.21)
959-987 Harald Bluetooth, or Harald Blatand,
10th-century king of Denmark, attributed to himself the unification
of Denmark and the Christianization of the Danes. He also conquered
Norway and raided Normandy. He was later invaded and defeated by
German emperor Otto II.
(HNQ, 9/3/98)(AM, 11/00, p.21)
960 Denmark's King Harald
Bluetooth was baptized.
(Econ, 6/28/03, p.55)
979-1016 Aethelred II, the Unrede (Unready), ruled
over England. He attempted to buy peace from Scandinavian invaders
and called for England’s 1st general tax, the Danegeld. Some 140,000
pounds of silver was paid in tribute.
(WSJ, 5/24/01, p.A20)
991 Aug 11, Danes under Olaf
Tryggvason killed Ealdorman Brihtnoth and defeated the Saxons at
Maldon.
(HN, 8/10/98)
1002 Nov 13, English king
Ethelred II launched a massacre of Danish settlers.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethelred_the_Unready)
1014 Feb 3, Sweyn Forkbeard
(b.960), Danish-born Viking king of England (1013-14), died.
(www.nndb.com/people/718/000093439/)
1014 Apr 23, The Battle of
Contarf ended Danish rule in Ireland but a Dane killed Irish King
Brian Boru (87).
(PCh, 1992, p.80)(MC, 4/23/02)
1016 Oct 18, Danes defeated the
Saxons at Battle of Assandun (Ashingdon).
(MC, 10/18/01)
1016-1035 Canute the Great of Denmark became King
of England.
(AHD, 1971, p.198)
1018-1035 Canute the Great became King of Denmark
as well as King of England.
(AHD, 1971, p.198)
1035 Nov 12, King Canute
(b.994) died at age 39. He was king of Denmark, England and Norway
(1014-1035).
(HN, 11/12/98)(MC, 11/12/01)
1047 Oct 25, Magnus I Godhi,
king of Norway and Denmark (1035-47), died.
(MC, 10/25/01)
1076AD The Danish King Svein Estrithson died.
(DrEE, 1/4/97, p.3)
1086 Jul 10, Knut IV, the
Saint, king of Denmark (1080-86), was murdered.
(MC, 7/10/02)
1200-1300 The Danes built a castle at Narva,
Estonia.
(WSJ, 1/25/99, p.A1)
1361 Jul 27, The Battle of
Wisby (Visby) was fought near the town of Visby on the Swedish
island of Gotland, between the forces of the Danish king and the
Gotland peasants. The Danish force was victorious.
(Econ, 12/18/10,
p.111)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Visby)
1375-1412 Queen Margaret I (b.1353) ruled over
Denmark. In 1388 her rule extended over Norway and in 1389 extended
to include Sweden.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_I_of_Denmark)
1375-1412 Queen Margaret I (b.1353) ruled over
Denmark. In 1388 her rule extended over Norway and in 1389 extended
to include Sweden.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_I_of_Denmark)
1380 Iceland fell under Danish
control.
(HNQ, 4/28/00)
1397 Jun 17, The Union of
Kalmar united Denmark, Sweden, and Norway under one monarch. The
alliance grew out of the dynastic ties of the Scandinavian countries
of Denmark, Norway and Sweden in response to rising German influence
in the Baltic. The Kalmar Union is a historiographical term meaning
a series of personal unions (1397–1523) that united the three
kingdoms of Denmark, Norway (with Iceland, Greenland, the Faroe
Islands and, prior to their annexation by Scotland in 1471, Shetland
and Orkney), and Sweden (including Finland) under a single monarch.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalmar_Union)
1494 Feb 20, Johan Friis
(d.1570), chancellor of Denmark (1532-1570), was born in Sweden. He
helped formed Lutheranism.
(http://tinyurl.com/7vnad)
1513 Christian II became King
of Denmark and Norway. He later asserted his right to the Swedish
throne by force of arms.
(TL-MB, p.10)
1520 Nov 4, Danish-Norwegian
king Christian II was crowned king of Sweden.
(MC, 11/4/01)
1523 Christian II was deposed
in Denmark after a civil war and was exiled. His uncle became King
Frederick I of Denmark and Norway.
(TL-MB, p.12)
1523 Sweden became independent
and dropped out of the Kalmar Union, formed in 1397 with Denmark and
Norway.
(www.emersonkent.com/historic_documents/kalmar_union.htm)
1524 Denmark confirmed Swedish
independence under Gustavus Vasa in the Treaty of Malmo.
(TL-MB, p.12)
1546 Dec 14, Tycho Brahe
(d.1601), astronomer, was born in Knudstrup, Denmark. He constructed
the most precise astronomical instruments of his time.
(SCTS, p.136)(HN, 12/14/00)(MC, 12/14/01)
1560 Aug 21, Tycho Brahe
(1546-1601) became interested in astronomy.
(SC, 8/21/02)
1560 In Denmark Frederiksborg
Castle was built by King Frederick II (1534-1588). It was expanded
from 1602-1620 and served as the royal residence for King Christian
IV (1577-1648).
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederiksborg_Palace)
1561 Poland-Lithuania gaining
control over Livonia. In response Sweden seized the territory of
Estonia with the major port of Reval. Denmark, also invested
in the war, seized the Livonian Islands.
(http://tinyurl.com/bngyy)
1562 Aug, Denmark under
Frederick II declared war against Sweden beginning the First
Northern War (1563-1570). The war ended with the Treaty of Stettin
(1570).
(http://tinyurl.com/9jgkk)
1570 Dec 5, Johan Friis,
chancellor of Denmark (b.1532), died. his share of spoliated Church
property had made him one of the wealthiest men in Denmark. Under
King Frederick II (1559-1588), who understood but little of state
affairs, Friis was well-nigh omnipotent. He was largely responsible
for the Scandinavian Seven Years' War (1562-1570), which did so much
to exacerbate the relations between Denmark and Sweden.
(http://tinyurl.com/7vnad)
1570 Dec 15, The Peace of
Stettin was concluded in Livonia. Denmark recognized the
independence of Sweden in the Peace of Stettin. Sweden gave up her
claim to Norway.
(TL-MB,
p.22)(http://depts.washington.edu/baltic/papers/livonianwar.htm)
1572 Nov 11, A supernova was
observed in constellation known as Cassiopeia. Tycho Brahe, Danish
astronomer, discovered a nova in the constellation of Cassiopeia. It
is described in detail in his book "De Nova Stella." The light
eventually became as bright as Venus and could be seen for two weeks
in broad daylight. After 16 months, it disappeared.
(V.D.-H.K.p.197)(www.seds.org/~spider/spider/Vars/sn1572.html)(AP,
12/4/08)
1587 Jan 8, Johannes Fabricius,
astronomer who discovered sunspots, was born in Denmark.
(HN, 1/8/99)(MC, 1/8/02)
1588 Frederick II of Denmark
died and was succeeded by his 10 year-old son, Christian IV.
(TL-MB, p.24)
1588 Tycho Brahe, Danish
astronomer, had his financial support cut by a new Danish king and
moved to Prague where his student, Johannes Kepler, aided him and to
whom he left all his astronomical data.
(V.D.-H.K.p.197)
1602 Denmark imposed a strict
trade monopoly and cut off Iceland's products from lucrative
markets.
(SFEC, 9/19/99, p.A18)
1626 Aug 27, The Danes were
crushed by the Catholic League in Germany, marking the end of Danish
intervention in European wars.
(HN, 8/27/98)
1644 Sep 25, Olaus
Rímer, 1st to accurately measured speed of light, was born in
Denmark.
(MC, 9/25/01)
1676 Jun 1, The Swedish ship
Svardet, armed with 86 bronze canons and under command of Claes
Uggla, went under when Sweden was defeated by a Danish-Dutch fleet
in the Battle of Öland. In 2011 Deep Sea Productions said it
believed it had found the ship off the island of Oland.
(AP,
11/16/11)(www.ocean-discovery.org/thesword.htm)
1676 Ole Christensen Romer
(Roemer), Danish astronomer, derived a speed of light of 130,000
miles per second based on his observations of Io, the innermost moon
of Jupiter.
(http://inkido.indiana.edu/a100/timeline2.html)(NH, 2/05, p.19)
1679 May 14, Peder [Nielsen]
Horrebow, Danish astronomer, was born.
(MC, 5/14/02)
1684 Dec 3, Ludvig Baron
Holberg, founder of Danish & Norwegian literature, was born.
(MC, 12/3/01)
1698 Aug 18, After invading
Denmark and capturing Sweden, Charles XII of Sweden forced Frederick
IV of Denmark to sign the Peace of Travendal.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1725 Czar Peter the Great chose
Vitus Bering (44), a Danish seaman in the Russian navy, to lead an
expedition to discover whether or not Asia was connected to America.
(ON, 2/06, p.1)
1728 Vitus Bering (47), Danish
explorer in the Russian navy, discovered the Bering Strait between
Asia and North America.
(PCh, 1992, p.286)(ON, 2/06, p.1)
1729-1801 The Danish East India Company was
chartered to carry on trade in the East Indies.
(WUD, 1994, p.449)
1732 Apr 17, The 2nd Kamchatka
Expedition was announced in the Russian Senate and Vitus Bering was
named as captain commander. I.K. Kirilov, chief secretary of the
senate, expanded Bering’s mandate to include astronomical and
scientific observations, to explore the seas between Siberia and
Japan and to establish trade relations with peoples encountered.
(ON, 2/06, p.1)
1741 Jul 15, George Steller, an
observer with Vitus Bering (1680-1741), claimed to see the American
mainland (Alaska). Bering, a Danish-born mariner, was on an
exploratory mission on behalf of Russia.
(WSJ, 9/12/00, p.A24)(SFEC, 3/23/97, p.T5)(ON,
2/06, p.2)
1741 Jul 16, Vitus Bering
(1680-1741) first sighted Mt. St. Elias, the second highest peak in
Alaska at 18,008 feet.
(AAM, 3/96, p.84)(WUD, 1994 p.140)
1741 Dec 8, Vitus Bering,
Danish-born explorer and commander in the Russian navy, died on an
island off the Kamchatka Peninsula, later named Bering Island.
(ON, 2/06, p.4)
1748 The Danish Royal Theater
was inaugurated.
(SFEC, 11/1/98, p.T3)
1750 Germany returned the
island of Aero, which measures 22 by 6 miles, to Denmark.
(SSFC, 7/29/07, p.G3)
1764 Jan 19, Bolle Willum
Luxdorph, a Danish diarist, described what is believed to be the
first successful parcel bomb.
(Econ, 11/6/10, p.74)
1768 Johan Friedrich Struensee,
a German doctor, was appointed as personal physician to the insane
young King Christian VII of Denmark. The doctor became lover to the
queen, Caroline Mathilde, the younger sister of George III of
England. Struensee was arrested and executed after 2 years.
(WSJ, 12/7/01, p.W16)
1770 Nov 19, Albert Bertel
Thorvaldsen, sculptor (Dying Lion), was born in Copenhagen, Denmark.
(MC, 11/19/01)
1775 The Danish Royal
Copenhagen Porcelain Manufactory began operations.
(SFC, 3/10/99, Z1 p.6)
1777 Aug 14, Hans Christian
Oersted, Danish scientist, was born. He discovered electromagnetism.
(HN, 8/14/00)
1790s Denmark became the 1st
country to abolish slavery.
(WSJ, 2/26/02, p.A22)
1792 May 16, Denmark abolished
slave trade.
(MC, 5/16/02)
1799 Nov 5, The Danish ship
Oldenborg was wrecked on her outward passage by being beached in the
roadstead at Cape Town, South Africa, during a north-westerly gale,
thus becoming one of the 127 ships that have been lost on this
minuscule portion of the South African coast.
(www.milhist.dk/weapons/oldenbur/oldenbur.htm)
1800 The Althing of Iceland was
abolished by the Danish king.
(HNQ, 4/28/00)
1801 Apr 2, The British navy
defeated the Danish at the Battle of Copenhagen.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1803 Denmark became the first
country to ban slave trade.
(WSJ, 1/11/99, p.R25)
1805 Apr 2, Hans Christian
Andersen (d.1875), author of 150 fairy tales, was born in Odense,
Denmark.
(CFA, '96, p.44)(HN, 4/2/98)(AP, 4/2/99)
1807 Sep 2, British forces
began bombarding Copenhagen for several days, until the Danes agreed
to surrender their naval fleet.
(AP, 9/2/07)
1807 Sep 7, Denmark surrendered
to British forces that had bombarded the city of Copenhagen for four
days.
(AP, 9/7/07)
1813 May 5, Soren Kierkegaard
(d.1855), Danish philosopher and theologian, was born. He founded
Existentialism and believed that man's relation to God must be an
agonizing experience. “Truth is not introduced into the individual
from without, but was within him all the time.” His books included
the philosophical novel “Diary of a Seducer.”
(WUD, 1994, p.786)(AP, 10/23/97)(SFC, 9/4/98,
p.C5)(HN, 5/5/99)
1814 May 17, Norway's
constitution was signed, providing for a limited monarchy. Denmark
ceded Norway to Sweden.
(AP, 5/17/97)(HN, 5/17/98)
1828 The Danish government
decreed that all persons should have a surname which was inherited
from the preceding generation.
(http://share-hodgson.org/patronym.html)(NYT,
10/8/04, p.A4)
1829 Hans Christian Andersen
(1805-1875) published his first literary work: “A Walking Tour from
Holmen’s Canal to the Eastern Point of Amager.”
(ON, 7/06, p.7)
1830 August Bournonville
(1805-1879) founded the Danish ballet tradition, the world's oldest
living ballet heritage. At the age of 25 he became principal dancer
and artistic director for the Royal Danish Ballet and continued to
work there for 47 years.
(www.bournonville.com/mainpage_frame.asp?page=26)
1835 Apr, Hans Christian
Andersen (1805-1875) published novel “Improvisatore,” an alternative
version of his own life based on his travel experiences in Italy.
(ON, 7/06, p.7)
1843 Aug 15, The Tivoli Gardens
opened in Copenhagen.
(SFEC, 2/20/00, p.T8)(MC, 8/15/02)
1844 Nov 23, Duchies of
Schleswig and Holstein were declared independent from Denmark.
(AP, 11/23/02)
1847 Carlsberg began beer
production in Denmark.
(WSJ, 10/7/03, p.B1)
1848 Jul 3, Gen. Peter Von
Scholten, faced with the likely destruction of towns and plantations
by a slave revolt, declared the slaves of the Danish West Indies
(later US Virgin Islands) to be freed.
(SSFC, 7/5/09, p.A3)
1849 May 3, Jacob Riis
(d.1914), American reporter and reformer (How the Other Half Lives),
was born in Denmark.
(HN,
5/3/01)(www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAriis.htm)
1855 Nov 11, Soren A.
Kierkegaard (b.1813), Danish philosopher and theologian, died. In
2005 Joakim Garff authored “Søren A. Kierkegaard: A
Biography.”
(www.connect.net/ron/kierkegaard.html)(WSJ,
2/3/05, p.D8)
1857 Jun 2, Karl Gjellerup,
poet, novelist (Nobel 1917), was born in Denmark.
(SC, 6/2/02)
1859 Hans Christian Anderson
gave his story "The Philosopher's Stone" to a family during his trip
to the Jutland region. The 13-page script was sold at auction in
1999 for $75,400.
(SFC, 4/16/99, p.C8)
1864 May 9, Austria and Denmark
held a ship battle at Helgoland.
(MC, 5/9/02)
1865 May 21, C.J. Thomsen,
archaeologist who named the Stone, Iron and Bronze Ages, was born in
Denmark.
(MC, 5/21/02)
1865 Jun 9, Carl Nielsen,
Danish composer, was born.
(HN, 6/9/01)
1867 Denmark reached a deal to
transfer Saint Thomas and Saint John (part of the Virgin Islands) to
the United States to the US for $7.5 million, but a hurricane,
earthquake, tsunami and fire, as well as domestic and int’l.
political conflicts delayed the transfer for 50 years.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Virgin_Islands)(SSFC,
3/27/11, p.M3)
1868 Oct 16, Denmark ended its
involvement in India by selling the rights to the Nicobar Islands to
the British.
(SFC, 11/3/11, p.A2)
1871 In Denmark the
Jutland-based Jyllands-Posten newspaper was founded.
(AP, 2/8/06)
1872 Aug 3, Haakon VII, King of
Norway, was born in Charlottenlund, Denmark.
(SC, 8/3/02)
1884 In Denmark the Alexander
Nevski church was built in Copenhagen on a request by Czarina Maria
Feodorovna, the Danish-born mother of Nicholas II.
(AP, 1/20/10)
1875 Aug 4, Hans Christian
Andersen (b.1805), Danish fairy tale writer, died. Over his life he
wrote 156 fairy tales as well as numerous novels and travel books.
His biography was later written by Elias Bredsdorff (d.2002 at 90).
(SFC, 8/23/02, p.A27)(ON, 7/06, p.8)
1885 Apr 17, Karen
Blixen-Finecke (Isak Dinesen, d.1962), Danish writer (Out of
Africa), was born. “God made the world round so we would never be
able to see too far down the road.”
(AP, 9/15/00)(HN, 4/17/01)(MC, 4/17/02)
1885 Oct 7, Nils Bohr, Danish
physicist who won the 1992 Nobel Prize for physics and later worked
on the first atom bomb, was born.
(HN, 10/7/98)(MC, 10/7/01)
1889 May 29, August
Strindberg's "Hemsoborna" premiered in Copenhagen.
(SC, 5/29/02)
1890 Mar 20, Lauritz Melchior,
baritone, tenor (Met Opera), was born in Copenhagen, Denmark.
(MC, 3/20/02)
1899 Mar 11, Frederick IX, King
of Denmark, was born.
(HN, 3/11/98)
1902 Apr 18, Denmark became the
1st country to adopt fingerprinting to identify criminals.
(MC, 4/18/02)
1904 A new Danish law forced
the people to stick with the names they had, as opposed to the
previous system where people where named after their fathers first
name.
(WSJ, 3/17/98, p.A1)
1904 Denmark and Sweden issued
the first Christmas seals to raise money to fight tuberculosis.
(SFEC, 12/13/98, Z1 p.10)
1905 Nov 18, The Norwegian
Parliament elected Prince Charles of Denmark to be the next King of
Norway. Prince Charles took the name Haakon VII.
(HN, 11/18/98)
1909 Jan 3, Victor Borge
(d.2000 at 91), musical humorist, was born as Borge Rosenbaum in
Copenhagen. In 1953 he opened his “Comedy in Music” at the Golden
Theater on Broadway and played for 849 performances .
(SSFC, 12/24/00, p.B5)(440 Int'l. 1/3/99)
1909 Wilhelm Johanssen, Danish
botanist, coined the word “gene.”
(NH, 6/01, p.30)
1911 Mar 24, Penal code reform
abolished corporal punishment in Denmark.
(HN, 3/24/98)
1913 The bronze statue of the
Little Mermaid, a character from a Hans Christian Anderson story,
was installed in the Copenhagen harbor. It was commissioned by Carl
Jacobsen, founder of the Carlsberg Beer Co., and created by Edvard
Eriksen. [see 1964]
(SFC,11/5/97, p.C2)
1914 A wooden roller coaster
was added to the Tivoli Gardens, Denmark.
(SFEC, 2/20/00, p.T8)
1914-1931 Karen Blixen, Danish author, lived on a
farm near Nairobi, Kenya. Her lover was Denys Finch-Hatton. She
wrote under the name Isak Dinesen. The two were featured in the 1985
film “Out of Africa” that starred Robert Redford and Meryl Streep.
The country was then called British East Africa.
(SFC, 6/17/98, p.E1)(SFEC, 7/26/98, p.T10)
1916 Feb 13, Vilhelm Hammershoi
(b.1864), Danish painter, died. He is most celebrated for his
interiors, many of which he painted at his residence in Copenhagen.
(Econ, 7/5/08, p.94)
1916 May 31, During World War
I, British and German fleets fought the Battle of Skagerrak at
Jutland off Denmark and 10,000 were left dead. There was no
clear-cut victor, although the British suffered heavier losses.
(HN, 5/31/98)(AP, 5/31/06)
1916 Aug 4, The United States
purchased the Danish Virgin Islands for $25 million. [see 1917]
(AP, 8/4/97)
1916 Aug 4, The United States
signed a treaty to purchase the Danish Virgin Islands for $25
million. The US purchased the southern Virgin Islands including St.
Thomas, St. John, St. Croix and about 50 other small Caribbean
islets and cays from Denmark. They were then known as the Danish
West Indies. The Act of March 3, 1917, authorized payment by the US
of $25 million for the Virgin Islands.
(WUD, 1994, p.1595)(AP, 8/4/97)(HNQ, 11/20/99)
1916 Dec 14, People of Denmark
voted to sell Danish West Indies to United States for $25 million.
[see Aug 4]
(AP, 12/14/02)
1917 Jan 17, The United States
paid Denmark $25 million for the Virgin Islands.
(AP, 1/17/07)
1917 Mar 31, The United States
took possession of the Virgin Islands. The purchase from Denmark for
$25 million had been set up in 1916.
(AP,
3/30/97)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Virgin_Islands)
1918 Dec 1, Danish parliament
passed an act to grant Iceland independence.
(HFA, ‘96, p.20)(MC, 12/1/01)
1922 Jun 19, Aage Nills Bohr,
physicist, study atomic nucleus (Nobel 1975), was born in Denmark.
(MC, 6/19/02)
1922 Otto Jesperson
(1860-1943), Danish linguist, authored “Language: Its Nature,
Development and Origins.” “Men sang out their feelings long before
they were able to speak their thoughts. But of course we must not
imagine that "singing" means exactly the same thing here as in a
modern concert hall. When we say that speech originated in song,
what we mean is merely that our comparatively monotonous spoken
language and our highly developed vocal music are differentiations
of primitive utterances, which had more in them of the latter than
of the former. These utterances were, at first, like the singing of
birds and the roaring of many animals and the crooning of babies,
exclamative, not communicative--that is, they came forth from an
inner craving of the individual without any thought of any
fellow-creatures. Our remote ancestors had not the slightest notion
that such a thing as communicating ideas and feelings to someone
else was possible.”
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_Jespersen)(www.lawrence.edu/fast/koopmajo/antiquity.html)
1924 Jul 10, Denmark took
Greenland as Norway ended its claim.
(MC, 7/10/02)
1926 The bumper car rides
opened at the Tivoli Gardens, Denmark.
(SFEC, 2/20/00, p.T8)
1928 The silent film classic
"Passion of Joan of Arc" was directed by Carl Theodore Dreyer of
Denmark. It later led to a 70 minute oratorio for solo singers,
chorus, and chamber orchestra by Richard Einhorn.
(SFC, 10/11/96, p.C6)(WSJ, 10/8/98, p.W5)
1928 In Denmark Palle Huld
(d.2010) won a competition organized by Danish newspaper that wanted
to send a teenager would-be-reporter around the globe. For 44 days
the 15-year-old traveled to North America, Japan, Siberia and
Germany, and was greeted by 20,000 people upon his return to
Copenhagen. Herge, the pen name of Belgian author Georges Remi,
heard of Huld's journey which reportedly inspired him to create
Tintin, the globe-trotting reporter.
(AP, 12/5/10)
1928 Maria Feodorovna (b.1847),
the daughter of Denmark's King Christian IX and Queen Louise, died
in Denmark. Princess Dagmar had married Russia’s Czar Alexander II
and their six children included Nicholas II, who became czar in
1894. She fled St. Petersburg in 1917. Her casket rested alongside
Danish kings and queens until 2006 when it was sent to Russia.
(AP, 9/23/06)
1931 Einar Weigener, a Danish
painter, had his sex altered in the first surgical procedure of its
kind.
(SFEC, 2/27/00, BR p.5)
1932 Apr, In Denmark 6 of the
world’s leading quantum physicists gathered at Niels Bohr’s
Institute for Theoretical Physics to discuss the latest developments
in the field. In 2007 Gino Segre authored “Faust in Copenhagen: A
Struggle for the Soul of Physics.” The book is organized around a
short comedy performed at the end of the meeting.
(SSFC, 6/24/07, p.M3)(Econ, 7/14/07, p.87)
1932 The Danish LEGO Group was
founded by Ole Kirk Christiansen.
(www.lego.com/eng/info/default.asp?page=group)
1935 Mar 16, Aron Nimzowitsch
(b.1886), a Latvian-born Danish chess player, died. In 1925 he
authored “My System,” which he described as a chess manual based on
entirely new principles.
(WSJ, 3/22/08,
p.W10)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aron_Nimzowitsch)
1935-1970 Denmark gave sex offenders a choice
between prison or surgical castration. The practice was banned due
to criticism that it was inhumane and irreversible.
(SFC, 8/31/96, p.A12)
1938 Karen Blixen (Isak
Dinesen) wrote her novel: “Out of Africa.”
(SFEC, 11/3/96, BR p.5)
1938 Denmark’s K.B. Hallen
sports arena in the Copenhagen opened. It was destroyed by fire in
2011.
(AP, 9/28/11)
1940 Apr 9, The Nazi army
invaded and occupied Denmark and Norway. After the Nazi invasion
most of Denmark’s police were killed. [see Nov 9]
(WSJ, 4/29/96, p.C-1)(DrEE, 1/4/97, p.4) (SFEC,
1/26/97, p.A14)(AP, 4/9/97)
1940 Apr 9, The Nazi army
invaded and occupied Denmark and Norway. German forces landed along
the Norwegian coast and made a paratrooper assault on Oslo and
Stavanger. After the Nazi invasion most of Denmark’s police were
killed.
(WSJ, 4/29/96, p.C-1)(SFEC, 1/26/97, p.A14)(AP,
4/9/97)(ON, 11/05, p.3)
1940 The term "genetic
engineering" was coined in Poland, by Danish microbiologist A. Jost
while giving a lecture on the sex life of yeast at the Technical
Institute in Lwow, Poland.
(Internet)
1941 Mar 30, The U.S. seized
Italian, German and Danish ships in 16 ports.
(HN, 3/30/98)
1941 Physicist Neils Bohr met
with Werner Heisenberg in Copenhagen. In 2000 the meeting was
portrayed in a play by Michael Frayn: “Copenhagen.’
(WSJ, 4/12/00, p.A24)
1943 Aug 28, Denmark declared a
universal strike against Nazi occupiers.
(MC, 8/28/01)
1943 Aug 29, Responding to a
clampdown by Nazi occupiers, Denmark managed to scuttle most of its
naval ships.
(AP, 8/29/97)
1943 Sep 18, Hitler ordered the
deportation of Danish Jews (unsuccessful).
(MC, 9/18/01)
1943 Oct 1, Germans attacked
Jews in Denmark.
(MC, 10/1/01)
1943 Over 7,000 Danish Jews
crossed to Sweden to escape the Nazis.
(Econ, 7/10/04, p.46)
1944 May 24, Icelandic voters
severed all ties with Denmark.
(MC, 5/24/02)
1944 Jun 17, Iceland declared
full independence from Denmark and became a republic.
(DrEE, 1/4/97, p.4)(AP, 6/17/97)
1945 Mar 21, A British bombing
raid was made on Gestapo Headquarters in Denmark to thwart a planned
German arrest of the leadership of the banned Freedom Council. A 2nd
wave of bombers hit a school by mistake killing 86 students and 13
adults.
(SFC, 9/23/02, p.B5)
1945 May 4, German forces in
the Netherlands, Denmark and northwest Germany agreed to surrender.
(AP, 5/4/00)
1945 May 5, Netherlands and
Denmark were liberated from Nazi control. The Liberation of the
Netherlands was completed by the First Canadian Army.
(HN,
5/5/98)(www.bouwman.com/netherlands/Liberation.html)
1945 May 28, Lord Haw Haw (aka
William Joyce), a virulent anti-Semite who broadcast pro-Nazi
propaganda from Germany during the war, was shot in the leg in an
encounter with two British officers near Flensburg on the Danish
border with Germany. He was sentenced to death for treason on 19
September 1945 and hanged on 3 January 1946.
(http://www.shef.ac.uk/library/special/joyce.html)
1947-1972 King Frederik IX ruled with Queen
Ingrid.
(SFC, 11/8/00, p.B7)
1948 Axel Axgil (1915-2011),
born Axel Lundahl-Madsen, was among the founding members of gay
rights group LGBT Danmark.
(AP, 10/30/11)
1949 Mar 6, Robert Storm
Petersen (b.1882), Danish cartoonist, writer, animator, illustrator,
painter and humorist, died. He is known almost exclusively by his
pen name Storm P.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Storm_Petersen)
1949 Apr 4, The (NATO) North
Atlantic Treaty Organization pact was signed by the US, Great
Britain, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Italy,
Portugal, Denmark, Iceland, Norway and Canada. It provided for
mutual defense against aggression and for close military
cooperation.
(www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/official_texts_17120.htm)(TOH, 1982,
p.1949)
1949 Oct 28, Eugenie Anderson
became the 1st woman US ambassador. She was posted to Denmark.
(HFA, ‘96, p.40)(MC, 10/28/01)
1950 Denmark founded the Sirius
Patrol, a unit of the Danish navy, to patrol Greenland.
(SFC, 6/15/00, p.C4)
1954 May 1, Legos, founded by
Danish carpenter Ole Kirk Christiansen, became a registered
trademark in Denmark.
(http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/bllego.htm)
1957 Denmark banned nuclear
weapons from its soil.
(AP, 10/29/10)
1958 Legos, the toy Lego
building block kit with simple red bricks, was introduced with
8-stud bricks that could be combined 24 ways. The company was
founded by Danish carpenter Ole Kirk Christiansen in 1932. Legos
became a registered trademark in 1954. The name was derived from
“les godt,” Danish for play well.
(SFC, 1/9/99, p.B8)(Econ, 10/28/06, p.76)
1958 Monkeypox was first
described in Denmark when several monkey imports developed lesions.
The disease emerged in the Congo in 1970 with sporadic outbreaks
over the years, primarily in Central and West Africa. Ten percent of
those infected can die, and there is evidence of person-to-person
transmission.
(AP, 11/29/06)
1959 Nov 20, Seven European
nations (Austria, Britain, Denmark, Norway, Portugal, Sweden,
Switzerland) signed the Stockholm Convention to form the European
Free Trade Association (EFTA). The organization becoming operative
on May 3 1960.
(www.iceland.org/efta/the-mission/int-organizations/efta/)
1960 Aug 26, Knud Jensen (23),
Danish cyclist, collapsed while riding in a 100-km team trial at the
Olympics in Rome. He fractured his skull and died. An autopsy
revealed amphetamines in his blood. His death would led the
International Olympic Committee to begin a program of drug testing
beginning with the 1968 Games held in Grenoble, France and Mexico
City, Mexico.
(WSJ, 8/7/06,
p.B1)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knud_Enemark_Jensen)
1961 Jan 4, The Danish barbers'
assistants strike ended after 33 yrs. It was the longest strike on
record.
(MC, 1/4/02)
1961 Aug 10, Denmark formally
applied for membership in the European Community.
(http://europa.eu.int/abc/history/1961/index_en.htm)
1962 Nov 18, Niels Bohr (77),
Danish physicist (atom, Nobel 1922), died.
(MC, 11/18/01)
1964 The bronze statue of the
Little Mermaid in the Copenhagen harbor was decapitated. In 1997
friends of the late painter Henrik Bruun told newspapers that Bruun
was responsible.
(SFC,11/5/97, p.C2)
1965 Prof. Fredric J. Mosher
(d.1999 at 85) of UC Berkeley published "A Guide to Danish
Bibliography."
(SFC, 6/17/99, p.C4)
1966 Danish motorcycle gangs
have been around for about 30 years, when local clubs like the
Avengers, Heathens, Hogriders, Pirates, and Pagans began forming.
(WSJ, 5/24/96, p.A-4)
1967 May 11, The United Kingdom
re-applied to join the European Community. It is followed by Ireland
and Denmark and, a little later, by Norway. General de Gaulle is
still reluctant to accept British accession.
(http://europa.eu.int/abc/history/1967/index_en.htm)
1967 Olafur Eliasson, artist,
was born in Denmark to Icelandic parents. He later created
121ethiopia.org, a charitable organization to finance orphanages in
Ethiopia.
(Econ, 10/6/07,
p.100)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%93lafur_El%C3%ADasson)
1968 Jan 21, An American B-52
bomber carrying four hydrogen bombs crashed at North Star Bay,
Greenland, killing one crew member and scattering radioactive
material. Reports began to surface later and in 1995 the Danish
government paid a $15.5 million settlement to some 1,700 exposed
workers.
(www.ens-newswire.com/ens/aug2004/2004-08-09-02.asp)(AP, 1/21/08)
1968 The original Legoland was
built in Billund, Denmark.
(SFEC, 2/7/99, p.T3)
1968 A Danish geologist
published a paper on the Greenland Ice Cap that included melting
threats to it. The study used core samples that drilled down to
bedrock.
(WSJ, 6/8/06, p.D8)
1969 Peter V. Glob (1911-1985),
Danish archeologist, authored "The Bog People: Iron Age Man
Preserved."
(AM, 7/97,
p.62)(www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/Peter-Glob)
1969 San Francisco's hardcore
pioneer director/producer Alex de Renzy, in his directorial debut
with reputed sexologists Phyllis and Eberhard Kronhausen, conducted
interviews with uninhibited Danes, along with closeups of every
detail of conventional sexual intercourse and depictions of
lesbianism, fellatio, and cunnilingus. A 90-minute version screened
in San Francisco was later confiscated and the film was banned in a
number of states. In the wake of the landmark decision in People v.
Alex de Renzy the documentary film “Pornography in Denmark” went
into wide release.
(www.filmsite.org/sexinfilms21.html)(SFC,
7/12/11, p.E1)
1971 The Roskilde rock
festival, inspired by Woodstock, was first held in Denmark.
(SFC, 7/1/00, p.A12)
1971 Denmark became the first
European country to create a Cabinet-level ministry dealing
exclusively with the environment.
(SFC, 12/15/99, p.AA6)
1971 In Denmark the Christiana
enclave took root in Copenhagen when dozens of hippies moved into
the derelict 18th-century navy fort on 600 acres of state-owned
land.
(AP, 3/16/04)(SSFC, 10/31/04, p.A3)
1971 In Denmark the
Jyllands-Posten newspaper declared itself politically independent.
(AP, 2/8/06)
1972 Jan 14, Denmark’s King
Frederik IX (b.1899) died.
(SFC, 11/8/00,
p.B7)(www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=9422986)
1972 Jan 22, Britain, Denmark,
Ireland and Norway joined the European Economic Community.
(AP, 1/22/02)
1973 Jan 1, The European
Economic Community (EEC), the forerunner to the EU, admitted
Britain, Ireland and Denmark even though they made chocolate
containing a small percentage of vegetable fat.
(WSJ, 12/4/97,
p.A22)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_European_Union)
1973 Sep 1, In
Copenhagen, Denmark, the 74-year-old Hafnia Hotel burned, killing
35.
(www.youtube.com/watch?v=44yFsCt3z7Q)
1973 Oct 20, Queen Elizabeth II
opened the Sydney Opera House. It was designed by Danish architect
Joern Utzon and cost 102 million Australian dollars, 14 times the
original estimate. Utzon left the project in 1966. In 2000 Utzon was
named consulting architect and in 2003 was called back to redo the
interiors.
(SFEC, 1/4/98, p.T4)(SFEC, 9/10/00, p.T12)(WSJ,
10/2/03, p.D10)
1973 Denmark instituted a
procedure of chemical castration for sex offenders.
(SFC, 8/31/96, p.A12)
1975 Oct, Aage Nills Bohr
(b.1922), Denmark-born physicist, won the Nobel Prize in Physics for
his study of the atomic nucleus. Ben Mottelson (b.1926),
Danish-American physicist and James Rainwater (1917-1986), American
physicist, also shared the prize.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Nobel_laureates)
1977 Dec 12, Dr. Grethe Rask
(b.1930) from Denmark died of Pneumocystis carinii. She had done
research in Africa. Her symptoms had been manifesting in Dec 1976
and she was hospitalized in Africa. In November 1977 after a brief
recovery, she decided it was time to go home to die. A colleague saw
the wasting, and did an autopsy, where P. carinii was found. She is
believed to be one of the first documented cases of probable AIDS
infection.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grethe_Rask)
1979 May 1, Denmark gave home
rule to Greenland, but continued to make key decisions on law and
order. The legislative basis for the Home Rule Administration is Act
no 56 of 21 February 1979 which came into force on 1 May 1979
following a referendum in Greenland.
(WSJ, 1/13/04,
p.A4)(www.gh.gl/uk/govern/organiza.htm)
1982 Feb 23, In a consultative
referendum, Greenland, which became a member of the European
Community as part of Denmark, opted for withdrawal from the
Community.
(http://europa.eu.int/abc/history/1982/index_en.htm)
1982 Denmark’s monetary policy
was tied to the German mark.
(WSJ, 2/6/98, p.A1)
1982 The Stichting Ingka
Foundation, a Dutch-registered, tax-exempt, non-profit legal entity,
was given the shares of Ingvar Kamprad (b.1926), the Swedish founder
of IKEA. In 2006 Ingka Holding, a private Dutch-registered company,
was the parent of 207 of 235 worldwide IKEA companies, and it
belonged to the Stichting Ingka Foundation.
(Econ, 5/13/06, p.69)(SFC, 4/6/04, p.C3)
1985 A bombing in Copenhagen
killed one person and injured 16. Mohammed Abu Talb was arrested in
Sweden in1989 for the bombing.
(SFC, 11/25/99, p.A14)
1985 P.V. Glob (b.1911), Danish
archeologist, died. His books included “The Bog People: Iron-Age Man
Preserved” (1964).
(www.isle-of-skye.org.uk/celtic-encyclopaedia/celt_bio.htm)
1986 The Hell’s Angels began
renting a building in Copenhagen from the city.
(SFEC, 8/11/96, p.A13)
1987 Denmark recognized
Copenhagen’s Christiana enclave, founded in 1971, as a social
experiment. In 1991 the government gave residents the right to use
the land. In 2006 the government proposed a plan to regularize
housing in the enclave.
(SSFC, 10/22/06, p.G3)
1989 May 26, Danish parliament
allowed legal marriage among homosexuals.
(www.wayoflife.org/fbns/pushing.htm)
1989 Oct 1, In Copenhagen,
Denmark, 11 homosexual couples were married. It was the first time
any country allowed such marriages.
(SFC, 5/26/96, Z1 p.6)(SFC, 12/12/98, p.B3)
1990 Apr 7, An arson fire
aboard a ferry enroute from Norway to Denmark killed 159 people.
(AP, 4/7/00)(AP, 1/14/12)
1992 Mar 5, In Copenhagen the
Ministers for Foreign Affairs of Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany,
Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Poland, Russia and Sweden, in the
presence of the representative from the European Commission, opened
a 2-day meeting and decided to establish a Council of the Baltic Sea
States to serve as a forum for guidance and overall coordination
among the participating states. Iceland joined the CBSS in 1995
(Econ, 6/7/08,
p.63)(www.bmwi.de/English/Navigation/European-policy/baltic-market.html)
1992 Jun 2, Danish voters
rejected the Maastricht union treaty.
(AP, 6/2/97)
1993 May 18, Voters in Denmark
ratified the European Community's Maastricht Treaty on closer
economic and political union.
(AP, 5/18/98)(SC, 5/18/02)
1993 Jun, EU membership
criteria were laid down at the European Council in Copenhagen,
Denmark. Under the “Copenhagen criteria” would-be EU members were
required to show that they meet the political and institutional
standards of membership.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copenhagen_criteria)(Econ, 12/2/06,
p.55)
1993 The Danish chapter of the
Bandidos motorcycle gang started out as the 666 club, changed its
name to the Morticians, then the Undertakers, and then affiliated in
1993 with the Texas-based Bandidos.
(WSJ, 5/24/96, p.A-4)
1994-1997 A Danish nurse and doctor killed 22
nursing-home residents with injections. They were charged in 1997
for the killings and the nurse was also charged with embezzlement.
(SFC,10/22/97, p.1)
1995 Lars Von Trier, a Danish
film director, launched the Dogma 95 concept of minimalist rules to
return the focus of filmmaking to story and plot. The rules forbade
sound editing and any equipment beyond handheld cameras.
(SFC, 8/10/02, p.D4)
1995 Danish Foreign Minister
Niels Helveg Petersen told reporters that no nuclear weapons were
deployed in Greenland. 2 weeks later US Sec. of Defense William
Perry wrote in a confidential letter that warheads and surface to
air missiles had been stored at the Thule air base without
Greenland’s knowledge. The crisis became known as "Thulegate" in
Denmark.
(SFC, 11/3/01, p.C3)
1995 Denmark’s population was
about 5 million
(SFC, 5/9/97, p.A4)
1996 Mar 10, Bandido motorcycle
gang leader Uffe Larson was shot to death in Copenhagen.
(SFEC, 8/11/96, p.A13)
1996 Apr 18, Piet Hein (80),
Danish architect, poet, mathematician, inventor, died.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piet_Hein_(Denmark))
1996 May, It was reported that
Danish motorcycle gangs, engaged in a 2-year feud, had left 4 people
slain and 20 wounded in a rivalry between the local chapters and
supporters of Hells Angels and the Bandidos.
(SFC, 5/22/96, p.A11)
1996 Jul 7, The average cost of
a Big Mac in Denmark was $4.40.
(SFC, 7/7/96, Parade, p.17)
1996 Jul 21, Thirteen pounds of
explosives were hurled at the Hell’s Angel’s headquarters in
Copenhagen. Their compound consists of 5 buildings surrounded by a
10-foot fence.
(SFEC, 8/11/96, p.A13)
1996 Jul 21, Danish cyclist
Bjarne Riis won the Tour de France. In 2007 he admitted to using
performance enhancing drugs to win the race.
(WSJ, 5/26/07,
p.A1)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_Tour_de_France)
1996 Aug 3, In Denmark a
Gulfstream jet crashed and killed Copenhagen’s top military officer
and 8 others as it approached a Faroe Islands airstrip.
(WSJ, 8/5/96, p.A1)
1996 Oct 6, An explosion at the
Copenhagen headquarters of the Hells Angels killed 2 and injured 16.
(SFEC, 10/6/96, A9)
1996 Nov 20, The Danish film
“Breaking the Waves” by Lars von Trier opened in SF. His other films
include “Zentropa” and “The Kingdom.”
(SFC, 11/20/96, p.E3)
1996 A Danish government
admitted in a report that the United States had stored nuclear
weapons in Greenland during the Cold War, although Denmark had
banned nuclear weapons from its soil in 1957.
(AP, 10/29/10)
1997 Jun 9, Danish violinist
Nikolai Znaider won the Queen Elizabeth int’l. music prize.
(SFC, 6/10/97, p.D4)
1997 Jul 12, In Copenhagen, the
last stop of an eight-day European tour, President Clinton said
political divisions in Europe were closing.
(AP, 7/12/98)
1997 Jul 31, Denmark was named
the least corrupt country in the world by business people in a
report released by the German-based Transparency Int’l.
(SFC, 8/1/97, p.B3)
1997 Denmark staged a
contest to crown one of its islands as a “renewable energy”
island. Samsoe Island’s entry, led by engineer Aage Johnson, won the
contest.
(WSJ, 2/9/06, p.A11)
1998 Jan 5, The bronze head of
the Little Mermaid was again sawed off in Copenhagen harbor.
(SFC, 1/7/98, p.A9)(MC, 1/5/02)
1998 Jan 9, The decapitated
head of Danish Little Mermaid was returned.
(MC, 1/9/02)
1998 Feb 1, The head of the
Little Mermaid reattached in Copenhagen.
(SFC, 2/3/98, p.A7)
1998 Apr 27, Some 550,000
Danish workers walked of their jobs after unions turned down a
compromise contract. The unions called for a 6th week of paid
vacation.
(SFC, 4/30/98, p.A10)
1998 May 6, The Danish
government intervened to end a ten day strike by 500,000 workers. It
was planned to make strikes illegal until March, 2000, and offered 2
extra vacation days and an additional 3 days of family leave for
working parents with children under 14.
(WSJ, 5/7/98, p.A16)
1998 May 21, Jack Lynd (71),
San Francisco cab driver, news writer, jazz aficionado (Café
Babar), died of cancer in Denmark. His work included the book “Leo’s
Place.”
(CB, 5/31/98)
1998 The Danish film "The
Kingdom II" was the 2nd of a series by director Lars von Trier. It
starred Ernst-Hugo Jaregard and Kristen Riolffes. It was about some
bizarre and horrifying occurrences at a city hospital in Copenhagen
(SFC, 5/25/98, p.E3)
1999 Mar 5, Denmark's
parliament voted 81-27 to legalize prostitution, effective Jul 1.
(SFC, 3/6/99, p.A14)
1999 May 30, Kirsten Ralov
(77), one of the Denmark's greatest ballerinas, died in Copenhagen
of cancer.
(SFC, 6/5/99, p.A22)
1999 The new Royal Library in
Copenhagen opened with the nickname "The Black Diamond." It included
a 600-seat concert hall.
(SFEC, 2/20/00, p.T8)
1999 The Danish film "Pusher"
starred Kim Bodnia and was written and directed by Nicolas Winding
Refn. It was the portrait of a small-time drug dealer in Copenhagen.
(SFC, 11/1/99, p.E3)
2000 Mar 17, Denmark informed
the 18 Faeroe Islands that they would have to give up subsidies in 4
years if they wanted independence.
(SFC, 3/18/00, p.C1)
2000 Jul 1, The Oeresund Fixed
Link (Oresund Bridge), the centerpiece of a $3.5 billion, 10-mile
rail, motorway, bridge and tunnel project between Copenhagen and
southern Sweden was scheduled for completion. Danish Queen Margrethe
II met with Swedish King Carl Gustaf XVI on the artificial isle of
Peberholm, half way across.
(WSJ, 5/26/00, p.A20)(SFEC, 6/25/00, p.T3)
2000 Jun 30, In Denmark at
least 8 people were crushed to death at the Roskilde rock festival
during a Pearl Jam concert.
(SFC, 7/1/00, p.A12)
2000 Sep 28, Danes voted 53-47%
not to join the European Monetary Union.
(SFC, 9/28/00, p.A12)(SFC, 9/29/00, p.A18)
2000 Nov 7, Denmark’s Queen
Mother Ingrid (90) died. She was born Ingrid Victoria Sofie Louise
Margaretha at the royal castle in Stockholm as the daughter of King
Gustaf VI Adolf.
(SFC, 11/8/00, p.B7)
2000 Dec, Denmark’s
Middelgrunden Wind Farm offshore wind power facility was completed.
The 20 turbines generated power for 32,000 households.
(SFC, 4/23/01, p.A1)
2000 Denmark exported $191
million worth of pork to the US. Ribs accounted for $100 million.
(WSJ, 3/19/00, p.A1)
2000 Genmab, a biotech company
based in Denmark, went public with Dr. Lisa Drakeman of the US as
CEO. Drakeman, with a doctorate in the history of religion, had
gained biotech experience in Medarex, a firm created by her husband.
In 2006 GlaxoSmithKline paid $357 million for a 10% stake in the
company.
(Econ, 6/14/08, p.84)
2001 Mar 29, An oil tanker
collided with a freighter in the Baltic Sea and some 550,000 gallons
of oil were spilled and drifted toward Denmark.
(SFC, 3/30/01, p.D4)
2001 Nov 20, The Liberal
(Venstre) Party under Anders Fogh Rasmussen (1953) won elections in
Denmark. It formed a minority government with the Conservative
People’s Party.
(www.andersfogh.dk/807.0.html)
2001 KaZaA, an internet
file-sharing program, was founded in Amsterdam by Niklas Zennstrom
of Sweden and Janus Friis of Denmark. In 2003 they launched Skype
software for internet telephony.
(Econ, 7/3/04,
p.54)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skype)
2002 Mar 3, Denmark generated
13% of its electricity from wind and planned to raise the figure to
50% by 2030.
(SSFC, 3/3/02, p.A3)
2002 Mar 6, In Kabul,
Afghanistan, 3 Danish and 2 German peacekeeping soldiers were killed
while defusing a soviet era missile.
(WSJ, 3/7/02, p.A1)
2002 May 31, Denmark’s
Parliament voted to stiffen rules on immigration.
(SFC, 6/1/02, p.A9)
2002 Jul 6, Asian and European
finance ministers meeting in Copenhagen were presented a study that
called for the creation of a currency basket system and ultimately a
single Asian currency. The study was part of the Kobe Research
Project, an initiative launched by ASEM in 2001.
(Reuters, 7/7/02)(http://tinyurl.com/79d6f)
2002 Sep 24, The Danish
government announced that the US will return to Denmark a section of
the U.S. air base at Thule in northern Greenland that was created in
1953.
(AP, 9/24/02)
2002 Oct 30, Danish police
arrested Akhmed Zakayev (43), a top aide to Aslan Maskhadov, former
Chechen president.
(SFC, 10/31/02, p.A31)
2003 Mar 17, In Soro, Denmark,
Nizar Al-Khazraji (65), former Iraqi general, disappeared.
(WSJ, 4/9/03, p.A1)(SFC, 4/16/03, p.A11)
2003 Jun 2, In Denmark Thorkild
Grosboel, a Lutheran minister, was suspended for saying that God
doesn't exist and there is no eternal life. Lutheran pastors in
Denmark are employed by the state and bishops cannot fire them.
(AP, 6/3/03)(Econ, 6/28/03, p.55)
2003 Aug 7, Denmark's
unemployment rate rose in June to 6.2 percent, the highest level in
almost five years.
(AP, 8/7/03)
2003 Sep 23, A power outage
struck the capital of Denmark and southern Sweden, leaving nearly 4
million people without electricity.
(AP, 9/23/03)
2003 Oct, Denmark cut taxes on
spirits by 45%.
(Econ, 11/15/03, p.49)
2003 Dec 16, A fire broke out
at Denmark's North Sea Museum, destroying much of the building
housing Europe's largest aquarium.
(AP, 12/17/03)
2003 Denmark became the first
country in the world to introduce restrictions on the use of
industrially produced trans fatty acids. Oils and fats were
forbidden on the Danish market if they contain trans fatty acids
exceeding 2%.
(www.bakeryandsnacks.com/news/ng.asp?id=58838-adm-ramps-up)
2003 Denmark, population 5.4
million, stood as the world's biggest exporter of pork as some
13,000 farmers raised 24 million pigs.
(Econ, 8/9/03, p.44)
2004 Jan 4, In Denmark
residents who openly bought and sold hashish at a famous hippie
enclave in Copenhagen abruptly demolished their booths, trying to
head off a Danish government crackdown on illegal drug sales.
(AP, 1/4/04)
2004 Jan 11, Danish and
Icelandic troops reported a cache of 36 shells buried in the Iraqi
desert, and preliminary tests showed they contained a liquid blister
agent. The 120mm mortar shells are thought to be left over from the
eight-year war between Iraq and neighboring Iran, which ended in
1988.
(AP, 1/11/04)
2004 Feb 24, The 1st charges
were filed against 2 detainees in Guantanamo. Slimane Hadj
Abderrahmane, a Danish citizen, was released from Guantanamo after
being held for 747 days. In 2007 he was arrested in Denmark on
suspicion of withdrawing $18,900 from other people's accounts using
stolen debit cards and PIN codes.
(WSJ, 2/25/04, p.A1)(AP, 8/17/07)
2004 Mar 16, In Denmark police
raided Copenhagen's famed hippie enclave of Christiania, detaining
53 people in a major crackdown on the open sale of hashish. The
enclave took root in 1971 when dozens of hippies moved into the
derelict 18th-century fort on state-owned land.
(AP, 3/16/04)
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, 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 May 14, In Copenhagen,
Denmark, Australian Mary Donaldson married Danish Crown Prince
Frederik, becoming Crown Princess Mary.
(AP, 5/14/04)
2004 Jun, The Danish government
raised the fine for smoking hash in public to $90 and ordered clubs
where it was smoked to be shut down.
(SSFC, 10/31/04, p.A3)
2004 Jul 1, Law 205 took effect
in Denmark and required residents to register themselves and their
homes with the government.
(SSFC, 10/31/04, p.A3)
2004 Jul 12, The Danish
government upheld the clerical suspension of a Lutheran minister who
proclaimed last year that there was no God or afterlife, and he now
could be fired or fined for declaring his beliefs in the pulpit.
(AP, 7/12/04)
2004 Oct 4, The Denmark Science
Ministry said it aims to show the North Pole belongs to Denmark and
is sending an expedition to try to prove that the seabed there is a
natural continuation of Danish territory.
(AP, 10/4/04)
2004 Oct, Some 10,000 people
marched on Denmark’s parliament to protest Law 205.
(SSFC, 10/31/04, p.A3)
2005 Jan 1, Denmark was
forecast for 2.5% GDP growth with a population at 5.4 million and
GDP per head at $48,920.
(Econ, 1/8/05, p.87)
2005 Jan 1, Denmark’s PM Anders
Fogh Rasmussen, in response to cartoons published by Jyllands-Posten
depicting the prophet Muhammad, condemned in his new year’s speech
any attempt to demonize groups of people on the basis of religion or
ethnic background.
(Econ, 1/7/06, p.44)
2005 Jan 8, Hurricane-force
winds swept across northern Europe, leaving at least 13 dead
including 3 in Carlisle, England, 4 in Denmark and 6 in Sweden.
(AP, 1/9/05)
2005 Feb 8, Danes voted in
parliamentary elections dominated by competing strategies for
strengthening the country's cradle-to-grave welfare state and
tightening immigration. Danes re-elected center-right PM Rasmussen
for a 2nd term.
(AP, 2/8/05)(WSJ, 2/9/05, p.A1)
2005 May 4, The Danish
government said that the mission of Denmark's 530 troops in southern
Iraq would be extended until Feb 1.
(AP, 5/4/05)
2005 Jul 5, President Bush
thanked Iraq war ally Denmark during a stopover in Copenhagen while
en route to an international economic summit in Scotland.
(AP, 7/5/06)
2005 Aug 19, The Danish
pump-making company Grundfos said that two of its employees accepted
bribes from Iraqi officials under the United Nations' tainted
oil-for-food program.
(AP, 8/20/05)
2005 Sep 30, The Danish
newspaper Jyllands-Posten published cartoons of the Prophet
Muhammad. Death threats against the artists soon followed with
protest strikes in Kashmir, condemnation from Muslim leaders
worldwide and even criticism from the UN. The paper refused to
apologize for publishing the drawings, citing freedom of speech, a
right cherished in this northern European country of 5.4 million,
that also refused to prosecute an artist who depicted a crucified
Jesus Christ with an erection. Kurt Westergaard created one of the
cartoons, which featured the Prophet Muhammad with a bomb in his
turban. In 2008 Westergaard offered to sell the cartoon. In 2009
Jytte Klausen authored “The Cartoons That Shook the World.”
(AP, 12/9/05)(WSJ, 2/29/08, p.A1)(Econ, 10/31/09,
p.97)
2005 Oct 27, In Denmark 4 young
Muslims were arrested for helping to supply weapons and explosives
for a planned terror attack in Europe. They helped two main suspects
in Bosnia get hold of weapons and explosives with the aim of
committing a terror act. In 2007 a Danish court convicted Abdul
Basit Abu-Lifa (17) and sentenced him to 7 years in jail. In 2008
Elias Ibn Hsain was acquitted on charges that he took part.
(AP, 8/24/06)(AP, 2/16/07)
2005 Denmark’s budget surplus
hit 3.9% of GDP this year.
(Econ, 9/9/06, p.29)
2006 Jan 26, Saudi Arabia
recalled its ambassador in Denmark to protest a published series of
caricatures of the prophet Muhammad. Protests spread across the
Muslim world for weeks, and dozens of people were killed.
(AP, 1/26/07)
2006 Jan 29, Denmark's PM said
his government could not act against satirical cartoons of the
Prophet Mohammed after Libya closed its embassy in Copenhagen amid
growing Muslim anger over the dispute.
(Reuters, 1/29/06)
2006 Jan 30, The controversy
over Danish caricatures of Prophet Muhammad escalated as gunmen
seized an EU office in Gaza and Muslims appealed for a trade boycott
of Danish products. Denmark called for its citizens in the Middle
East to exercise vigilance. A roadside bomb targeted a joint
Danish-Iraqi military patrol near the southern city of Basra.
(AP, 1/30/06)
2006 Feb 5, Thousands of
Muslims rampaged in Beirut, setting fire to the Danish Embassy,
burning Danish flags and lobbing stones at a Maronite Catholic
church as violent protests spread over caricatures of the Prophet
Muhammad.
(AP, 2/5/06)
2006 Feb 6, Analysts and
companies said the boycott of Danish goods called by Islamic
countries to protest the publication of Prophet Muhammad caricatures
was costing Danish businesses more than $1 million a day.
(AP, 2/6/06)
2006 Feb 11, Denmark said it
has temporarily withdrawn its ambassadors from Syria, Iran and
Indonesia because their safety was at risk in the wake of a Danish
newspaper's publication of drawings of the Prophet Muhammad.
(AP, 2/11/06)
2006 Feb 19, Almost five months
after publishing 12 cartoons of the prophet to highlight what it
described as self-censorship, Denmark’s Jyllands-Posten newspaper
printed a full-page apology in a Saudi-owned pan-Arab newspaper.
(AFP, 2/19/06)
2006 Mar 23, A Danish soldier
was killed by a roadside bomb in southern Iraq. He was the third
Danish soldier to die in the conflict.
(AP, 3/23/06)
2006 Mar 29, A group of 27
Danish Muslim organizations have filed a defamation lawsuit against
the newspaper that first published the caricatures of Islam's
Prophet Muhammad.
(AP, 3/30/06)
2006 Apr 6, Cheese and butter
from the Danish company Arla were back on supermarket shelves in
Saudi Arabia after an Islamic group ended a boycott of the dairy
producer sparked by Denmark's publication of drawings of the Prophet
Muhammad.
(AP, 4/6/06)
2006 Aug 24, A Danish
prosecutor charged four young Muslims with helping to supply weapons
and explosives for a planned terror attack in Europe. The four men,
arrested in Denmark last October 27, helped the two main suspects in
Bosnia get hold of weapons and explosives with the aim of committing
a terror act.
(AP, 8/24/06)
2006 Sep 5, Danish authorities
said they foiled a serious terror plot with the arrest of nine men
accused of preparing explosives for a planned attack in Denmark. The
suspects were Danish citizens between the ages of 18 and 33. Eight
of them had immigrant backgrounds. In 2007 a jury in Copenhagen
handed down guilty verdicts to Mohammad Zaher (34), Ahmad Khaldhadi
(22), and Abdallah Andersen (32). Riad Anwer Daabas (19) was
acquitted. Zaher and Khaldhadi, described as the two most active,
were each sentenced to 11 years in prison, while Andersen was given
a four-year sentence.
(AP, 9/5/06)(AP, 11/24/07)
2006 Sep 24, In Copenhagen,
Denmark, youths angered at a court decision to evict squatters from
a downtown building hurled stones, bottles and eggs at police during
a protest. More than 200 were detained.
(AP, 9/25/06)
2006 Oct 4, Professor Eugene
Polzik and his team at the Niels Bohr Institute at Copenhagen
University in Denmark reported a breakthrough in teleportation by
using both light and matter.
(Reuters, 10/4/06)
2006 Dec 16, In Copenhagen,
Denmark, police fired tear gas and detained up to 300 people after
protesters attacked them with cobblestones and fireworks during a
demonstration against the planned eviction of squatters from a
downtown building.
(AP, 12/16/06)
2007 Jan 21, The Danish
container ship Eleonora Maersk, one of the largest ships in the
world, was officially registered.
(www.ships-info.info/mer-eleonora-maersk.htm)(Econ, 11/12/11, p.72)
2007 Feb 1, Ahmed Abu Laban
(60), Denmark's most prominent Muslim leader and a central figure in
last year's uproar over the Prophet Muhammad cartoons, died from
cancer.
(AP, 2/3/07)
2007 Feb 5, A Cold War-era
Soviet submarine that was being towed to Thailand sank off
northwestern Denmark. The Soviet Union built more than 200
Whiskey-class submarines during the Cold War, many of which are now
being offered for sale by private companies.
(AP, 2/6/07)
2007 Feb 21, Denmark’s PM
Rasmussen said that his country will withdraw its 460-member
contingent from southern Iraq by August and transfer security
responsibilities to Iraqi forces.
(AP, 2/21/07)
2007 Mar 1, In Denmark dozens
of people were arrested after angry protesters threw cobblestones at
police when an anti-terror squad started a disputed eviction of
squatters from a building in downtown Copenhagen.
(AP, 3/1/07)
2007 Mar 4, Copenhagen police
arrested dozens of people in a third straight day of unrest
triggered by the eviction of squatters from a disputed youth center.
(AP, 3/4/07)
2007 Mar 5, In Copenhagen,
Denmark, demolition crews started tearing down a graffiti-sprayed
brick building, prompting tears and cries of protest from youths
whose eviction from the makeshift cultural center led to three
nights of rioting. The Youth House served since 1982 as a popular
cultural center for anarchists, punk rockers and left-wing groups.
The squatters considered it free public housing, but courts ordered
them out after the city sold the building to a Christian
congregation. Ruth Evensen, leader of the small congregation that
bought the Youth House in 2001, said the four-story structure had to
be torn down because it was "a total wreck" and posed a fire hazard.
(AP, 3/5/07)(Econ, 3/10/07, p.48)
2007 Mar 14, In Denmark 7
people who raised money for Colombian guerrillas and Palestinian
militants through T-shirt sales were charged under Denmark's
anti-terror law.
(AP, 3/15/07)
2007 Apr 1, Danish researchers
reported that they have isolated bacterial enzymes that effectively
remove sugar molecules from red blood cells that provoke an immune
reactions. This would allow conversion of the A, B, and AB blood
types into Type O, the universal donor type that can be given to
anyone.
(SFC, 4/2/07, p.A2)
2007 Apr 10, Peter Brixtofte
(57), the free-spending Danish mayor of Hilleroed (1986-2002), was
convicted of abusing his office and sentenced to two years in
prison. He had became hugely popular for offering free vacations to
retirees and computers to school children.
(AP, 4/10/07)
2007 May 15, In Denmark
hundreds of black-clad youths clashed with police in Copenhagen,
barricading streets and setting fire to cars to protest the
demolition of a building in the free-wheeling Christiania district.
(AP, 5/15/07)
2007 Jun 23, Authorities said
an outbreak of distemper has been killing seal pups off the coast of
Denmark, warning that thousands of seals could die if the disease
spreads to other northern European countries.
(AP, 6/23/07)
2007 Jun 29, Germany and
Denmark agreed to build an 11-mile bridge spanning the waters
between the two nations and cut travel times between Scandinavia and
central Europe.
(AP, 6/29/07)
2007 Jul 27, Victor Frunza
(72), a Romanian anti-communist dissident and writer, died in
Denmark of a heart attack. He was forced to leave Romania in 1980
after writing a letter critical of the communist regime led by
dictator Nicolae Ceausescu. While in Romania, Frunza secretly wrote
a history of communism in the country that was published in Denmark
in 1984. He also wrote essays championing human rights and published
a political magazine.
(AP, 7/30/07)
2007 Aug 1, Denmark, France and
Indonesia offered to contribute to a joint UN-African Union mission
for Darfur, a 26,000-strong force expected to be made up mostly of
peacekeepers from Africa with backup from Asian troops. Sudan
accepted a UN resolution approving a joint African Union-UN
peacekeeping force in Darfur.
(AP, 8/1/07)(AFP, 8/1/07)
2007 Aug 5, The last men of a
Danish battalion of 450 ground troops left Iraq.
(AFP, 8/7/07)
2007 Aug 10, Denmark was
reported to be planning a monthlong expedition, to begin Aug 12, to
seek evidence that the Lomonosov Ridge, a 1,240-mile underwater
mountain range, is attached to the Danish territory of Greenland,
making it a geological extension of the Arctic island.
(AP, 8/10/07)
2007 Aug 22, Denmark's
government said Somali pirates released the crew of a hijacked
Danish cargo ship after receiving a ransom payment.
(AP, 8/22/07)
2007 Sep 2, In Copenhagen,
Denmark, a protest by hundreds of youth activists turned violent,
with protesters setting fire to street barricades and cars and
smashing shop windows. Officers used tear gas to disperse the crowd.
The unrest started after a demonstration the previous day
commemorating the Youth House, a makeshift cultural center for the
city's anarchists and disaffected youth that was demolished in
March.
(AP, 9/2/07)
2007 Sep 4, Denmark's
intelligence service arrested eight Islamic militants linked to
leading al-Qaida figures, and said the suspects were plotting an
attack involving explosives.
(AP, 9/4/07)
2007 Sep 26, Transparency
International's 2007 index ranked Myanmar and Somalia as the most
corrupt nations. Both received the lowest score of 1.4 out of 10.
Denmark, Finland and New Zealand were ranked the least corrupt, each
scoring 9.4.
(AP, 9/26/07)
2007 Oct 5, Chinese medical
officials agreed not to transplant organs from prisoners or others
in custody, except into members of their immediate families. The
agreement was reached at a meeting of the World Medical Association
in Copenhagen.
(AP, 10/6/07)
2007 Nov 13, Voting began in
Denmark's national election, with polls showing that the
center-right government needs a new ally to stay in power despite a
strong economy and low unemployment. Danes re-elected the governing
coalition to a third term, endorsing its economic and tough
immigration policies. Fogh Rasmussen’s blue block won 90 seats, just
enough for a majority. The New Alliance Party of Naser Khader won
just 5 seats. Pia Kjaersgaard’s far-right Danish People’s party won
25 seats.
(AP, 11/13/07)(Econ, 11/17/07, p.59)
2007 Nov 29, In Afghanistan 2
Danish soldiers were killed in a gunbattle with the Taliban. They
were part of a Danish reconnaissance unit that came under fire in
Gereshk Valley in Helmand Province. Denmark has some 600 troops in
Helmand province that are part of NATO's 40,000-member force in
Afghanistan.
(AP, 11/30/07)
2008 Feb 12, Danish police said
they have arrested three people suspected of plotting to kill one of
the 12 cartoonists behind the Prophet Muhammad drawings that sparked
a deadly uproar in the Muslim world two years ago.
(AP, 2/12/08)
2007 Global wind power amounted
to about 1,200 megawatts with Denmark accounting for about a third
and Britain in 2nd place with 400 megawatts.
(WSJ, 11/29/07, p.B2)
2008 Feb 15, In northern
Copenhagen gangs of rioters set fire to cars and garbage trucks, the
sixth night of rioting and vandalism that has spread from the
capital to other Danish cities.
(Reuters, 2/16/08)
2008 Mar 31, A clash in
southern Afghanistan killed a Danish soldier and wounded two others.
A separate attack on a NATO patrol killed two British troops. an
airstrike killed three men irrigating land close to a road in
Kandahar province. The men may have been mistaken for militants
planting roadside bombs. In Helmand province police arrested Mullah
Naqibullah, a senior Taliban commander who has escaped twice from
Afghan prisons. Naqibullah was nabbed during a clash that left three
insurgents dead.
(AP, 3/31/08)(AP, 4/1/08)
2008 Jun 2, In Pakistan a huge
car bomb exploded outside the Danish Embassy in Islamabad, killing
at least six people and wounding dozens more. Danish security said
that al-Qaida or an al-Qaida-related group likely was behind the
attack.
(AP, 6/2/08)
2008 Jul 25, In southern
Afghanistan a Danish soldier died in a roadside bomb attack. The
death brings the number of Danish troops killed in Afghanistan since
2001 to 15. 3 Taliban militants died in a fight with police in the
Gereshk district of Helmand province.
(AP, 7/25/08)
2008 Aug 25, The Danish central
bank said it has taken over Roskilde Bank, the nation's 10th largest
bank. The 124-year-old institution had been struggling amid global
financial turmoil and mounting losses on mortgage loans as housing
prices fell in Denmark.
(AP, 8/25/08)
2008 Oct 6, European
governments struggled to find a coordinated approach to the crisis
sweeping financial markets, as Denmark became the latest country to
guarantee bank deposits, putting more pressure on Britain and other
countries to follow.
(AP, 10/6/08)
2008 Oct 21, In Denmark Hammad
Khuershid, a Danish citizen of Pakistani origin, and Abdoulghani
Tokhi, an Afghan, were convicted of preparing a terrorist attack.
They were secretly filmed mixing the type of explosive used in the
2005 London transit bombing. They were arrested in the Copenhagen
area in September 2007. Khuershid and Tokhi were sentenced to 12 and
seven years in prison, respectively.
(AP, 10/21/08)
2008 Nov 7, Pirates near
Somalia hijacked a Danish cargo ship with 13 crew members, which
consisted of Russians and Ukrainians. The CEC Future was
released on January 16 following a ransom payment by Clipper
Projects.
(AP, 11/8/08)(AP, 1/16/09)
2008 Nov 29, Joern Utzon
(b.1918), the Danish architect who designed the iconic Sydney Opera
House (1957), died. In 2003 Utzon won the Pritzker prize.
(AP, 11/29/08)(Econ, 12/13/08, p.104)
2008 Dec 4, The Danish navy
intercepted and sunk a suspected pirate vessel drifting off Somalia.
7 men were handed over to authorities in Yemen but were not
immediately suspected of any crime.
(AP, 12/5/08)
2008 Dec 4, In Afghanistan 2
Danish soldiers serving with NATO's force were killed in southern
Helmand province. The governor of Afghanistan's key southern
Kandahar province said he was sacked by the central government and
complained that powerful people in his region had been sabotaging
his work. US-led troops killed four militants in Helmand province,
after the insurgents fired on a joint US-Afghan patrol.
(AFP, 12/4/08)(AP, 12/4/08)(AP, 12/5/08)
2008 Dec 6, In Denmark
"Gomorra," a movie by Italian director Matteo Garrone about Naples'
criminal underworld, won the best film prize at the 21st annual
European Film Awards.
(AP, 12/6/08)
2008 Dec 11, As Greece suffered
through its sixth day of violence, there were troubling signs of
unrest spreading across Europe. Angry youths smashed shop windows,
attacked banks and hurled bottles at police in small but violent
protests in Spain and Denmark, while cars were set alight outside a
consulate in France.
(AP, 12/11/08)
2008 Dec 16, The central banks
of Sweden and Denmark came to the aid of Latvia with currency swap
agreements. This enabled the Bank of Latvia, to borrow as much as
€500 million.
(WSJ, 12/17/08, p.C2)
2008 Dec 16, Stein Bagger,
Danish business executive, was sent back to Denmark from the US,
where he had surrendered following the exposure of an estimated $185
swindle in his firm, IT Factory.
(WSJ, 12/17/08, p.A1)
2008 Dec 19, Three Danish
soldiers and one from the Netherlands were killed in separate
incidents in Afghanistan, losing their lives just as the commitment
of some countries to the fight in Afghanistan begins to wane.
(AP, 12/19/08)
2008 Dec 31, In Denmark a
gunman shot and wounded two Israelis working at the Rosengaard mall
in Odense. Police son arrested a 27-year-old Dane born in Lebanon of
Palestinian parents.
(AP, 1/1/09)(AP, 1/2/09)
2009 Jan 15, Denmark's central
bank lowered its key interest rate by 0.75 to 3 percent.
(AP, 1/15/09)
2009 Jan 18, Denmark said it is
expanding its financial rescue package by lending the country’s
banks and mortgage $17.8 billion.
(SFC, 1/19/09, p.D1)
2009 Feb 23, Denmark seized
control of Fionia Bank A/S by injecting about $172 million in a deal
that will take away shareholder control and split the bank into two
parts until a sale can be realized. The bank was hit by mounting
losses on bad loans to property developers.
(WSJ, 2/24/09, p.C2)
2009 Feb 25, Danish and Chinese
warships stopped pirates attacking two different vessels off
Somalia's coast.
(AP, 2/26/09)
2009 Apr 5, In Denmark Lars
Lokke Rasmussen (b.1964) began serving as prime minister.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lars_L%C3%B8kke_Rasmussen)
2009 May 26, In Denmark
business leaders attending the World Business Summit on Climate
Change urged governments to order steep and mandatory cuts in
greenhouse gases, favoring a cap-and-trade system instead of a tax
to set a market price for carbon waste.
(AP, 5/26/09)
2009 May 26, A Danish court
ruled that residents of Copenhagen's counterculture Christiania
neighborhood have no right to use the former navy base they took
over in 1971. The residents planned to appeal.
(AP, 5/26/09)
2009 Jun 17, In southern
Afghanistan 3 Danish soldiers were when a bomb exploded as their
vehicle passed down Highway 1 heading toward the town of Barakhzai
in Helmand province.
(AFP, 6/17/09)
2009 Jun 21, In China the
Danish-Swedish comedy “Original,” about mental illness, won the best
picture at the 12th Shanghai International Film Festival. It also
took the best actor award for lead Sverrir Gudnason.
(AFP, 6/22/09)
2009 Jun 24, Denmark's Post
Danmark A/S and Sweden's Posten AB merged to form the new holding
company Posten Norden AB in the industry’s first-ever cross border
tie up.
(Econ, 10/31/09,
p.74)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post_Danmark)
2009 Aug 3, Anders Fogh
Rasmussen, a former Danish prime minister, took office as NATO's new
secretary-general. He said his top priorities would be guiding the
war in Afghanistan to a successful conclusion, repairing ties with
Russia, and expanding NATO's partnership with moderate nations in
North Africa and the Middle East.
(AP, 8/3/09)
2009 Aug 28, Denmark announced
the 5 winners of its biennial Index design awards. The winners
included: Kiva.org, of the SF Bay Area for bringing money and
intellectual capital to the working poor; Better Place, of the SF
Bay Area for a clean energy system for all-electric cars; the
Freeplay fetal heart rate monitor; Philip Design for its India-team
designed safe kitchen stove for one-room homes; and Rotterdam-based
Pig 05049 for its list of 185 good and bad products made from a
single pig.
(SFC, 8/29/09, p.E1)
2009 Sep 21, A Danish court
rejected the military's request to stop a book by a former special
forces soldier from being published. Denmark's armed forces had
asked the Bailiff's Court in Copenhagen to ban Thomas Rathsack's
book, "Ranger: At War With the Elite," for national security
reasons. It describes operations that he took part in as a member of
an army ranger unit in Afghanistan and Iraq.
(AP, 9/21/09)
2009 Sep 24, In Vietnam 9 North
Koreans took refuge in Denmark's embassy in Hanoi seeking political
asylum and passage to Seoul. On Oct 20 they left the mission and
were on their way to South Korea.
(Reuters, 10/20/09)(SFC, 9/25/09, p.A2)
2009 Oct 2, In Denmark the IOC
opened a meeting hearing the cases led by government leaders and
kings to win the right to stage the 2016 Olympic Games. US Pres.
Obama spoke for Chicago, Japan's new PM Yukio Hatoyama spoke for
Tokyo, Brazil's President Luiz Inacio Lula Da Silva spoke for Rio de
Janeiro, and Spain's King Juan Carlos and PM Jose Luis Rodriguez
Zapatero spoke for Spain. Brazil won the bid.
(AFP, 10/2/09)(AP, 10/3/09)
2009 Oct 2, President Barack
Obama, while in Copenhagen, met with General Stanley McChrystal, the
top commander of US and NATO troops in Afghanistan, for the first
time since McChrystal presented a grim assessment of the war effort
and requesting more troops.
(Reuters, 10/2/09)
2009 Oct 23, In southern
Afghanistan 2 US soldiers were killed by a home-made bomb. A Danish
soldier lost his life in clashes with Taliban-led insurgents in the
same region.
(AFP, 10/24/09)
2009 Dec 3, In Somalia a male
suicide bomber dressed as a woman attacked a university graduation
ceremony in a small part of Mogadishu still under government
control, killing 24 people, including three Cabinet ministers and
three journalists. The president of Benadir University said 43
students were taking part in the graduation ceremony at the Shamo
Hotel. The bomber was later reported to be a Danish citizen of
Somali descent.
(AP, 12/3/09)(AP, 12/4/09)(AP, 12/10/09)
2009 Dec 7, In Denmark the
largest and most important UN climate change conference in history
opened in Copenhagen, with organizers warning diplomats from 192
nations that this could be the last best chance for a deal to
protect the world from calamitous global warming. This was the 15th
conference of the parties to the 1992 UNFCCC in Rio de Janeiro.
(AP, 12/7/09)(Econ, 12/5/09, SR p.3)
2009 Dec 11, EU leaders agreed
to commit euro2.4 billion ($3.6 billion) a year until 2012 to help
poorer countries combat global warming, as they sought to rescue
their image as climate change innovators and bolster the talks in
Copenhagen. A new draft agreement at the climate talks pulled
together the main elements of a global pact but left gaping holes on
financing and cutting greenhouse gas emissions for world leaders to
fill in next week.
(AP, 12/11/09)
2009 Dec 12, In Denmark
violence broke out in Copenhagen as tens of thousands took to the
streets to demand tough measures on climate change, with
demonstrators around the world rallying for action instead of words.
(AFP, 12/12/09)
2009 Dec 14, In Denmark China,
India and other developing nations boycotted UN climate talks,
bringing negotiations to a halt with their demand that rich
countries discuss much deeper cuts in their greenhouse gas
emissions. Representatives from 135 developing countries said they
refused to participate in any formal working groups at the
192-nation summit until the issue was resolved. African nations
agreed to resume UN climate talks in Copenhagen after a half-day
suspension, accusing rich countries of trying to kill the existing
Kyoto Protocol.
(AP, 12/14/09)(Reuters, 12/14/09)
2009 Dec 16, In Denmark police
fired pepper spray and beat protesters with batons outside the UN
climate conference, as disputes inside left major issues unresolved
just two days before world leaders hope to sign a historic agreement
to fight global warming.
(AP, 12/16/09)
2009 Dec 17, In Copenhagen US
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton sought to put new life
into flagging UN climate talks by announcing the US would join
others in raising $100 billion a year by 2020 to help poorer nations
cope with global warming.
(AP, 12/17/09)
2009 Dec 19, In Denmark the
13-day UN climate conference ended. It narrowly escaped collapse by
agreeing to recognize a political accord brokered by President
Barack Obama with China and other emerging powers. The US supported
the idea that, by 2020, $100 billion should be flowing from the
north to the south every year to pay for emissions reduction and
climate adaptation. A small group of nations blocked the Copenhagen
Accord, because it lacked specific targets for reducing carbon
emissions. After a break, the conference president gaveled the
decision to "take note" of the agreement instead of formally
approving it. Experts said that clears the way for the accord to
become operational in practice even though it has not been formally
approved by the conference. Several developing countries, including
Bolivia, Cuba, Sudan and Venezuela, bitterly protested the deal and
said it is unacceptable because it lacks specific targets for
reducing carbon emissions.
(AP, 12/19/09)(SSFC, 12/20/09, p.A1)(Econ,
10/30/10, p.79)
2010 Jan 1, In Denmark Muhudiin
Mohamed Geele (29), a Somali man armed with an axe and suspected of
links with al Qaeda, broke into the home of Kurt Westergaard (74), a
Danish cartoonist, whose drawings of the Prophet Mohammad caused
global Muslim outrage. The attacker, who was shot and wounded by
police, was charged the next day with two counts of attempted
murder. On Feb 3, 2011, Geele was convicted of terrorism. The next
day he was sentenced to 9 years in prison to be followed by
permanent expulsion.
(Reuters, 1/2/10)(AP, 2/3/11)(Reuters, 2/4/11)
2010 Jan 28, Denmark's
government said that face-covering Muslim veils don't belong in
Danish society but no ban is needed because their use can be limited
under existing rules.
(AP, 1/28/10)
2010 Feb 5, Danish special
forces disrupted the takeover by Somali pirates of the cargo ship
Ariella in the Gulf of Aden. A frogmen unit scaled the sides of the
ship using grappling hooks, secured the bridge, released the crew
and then launched an hours-long search for a pirate the crew had
seen.
(AP, 2/5/10)
2010 Feb 23, Denmark's PM Lars
Loekke Rasmussen (45) announced a major government shake-up,
changing more than a dozen Cabinet posts including the ministers of
defense, justice and foreign affairs to build his own team 10 months
after taking office.
(AP, 2/23/10)
2010 Feb 26, The Danish daily
Politiken newspaper apologized for offending Muslims by reprinting a
cartoon of the Prophet Muhammad with a bomb-shaped turban,
rekindling heated debate about the limits of freedom of speech.
(AP, 2/26/10)
2010 Apr 8, In Denmark scores
of Carlsberg brewery workers walked off the job after the company
tightened rules on workplace drinking. A new policy only allowed
them to drink beer during lunch in the canteen.
(SFC, 4/9/10, p.A2)
2010 May 27, Danish container
shipping and oil group A.P. Moller-Maersk A/S said it has sold its
British supermarket chain Netto to Wal-Mart subsidiary Asda Stores
Ltd. for 778 million pounds ($1.1 billion).
(AP, 5/27/10)
2010 Jul 8, In Norway 2
suspected al-Qaida members were arrested for what Norwegian and US
officials said was a terrorist plot linked to similar plans to bomb
New York's subway and blow up a shopping mall in England. A 3rd
suspect was arrested in Germany. Authorities later said the
ringleader of the plot is Mikael Davud (39), an Uighur who came to
Norway in 1999 as part of a UN refugee program and then became a
Norwegian citizen eight years later. Davud was arrested along with
suspected accomplices Shawan Sadek Saeed Bujak Bujak, an Iraqi Kurd
(37), and Uzbek national, David Jakobsen (31). Norwegian and Danish
police later said the 3 were likely planning an attack against a
Danish newspaper that caricatured the Prophet Muhammad.
(AP, 7/8/10)(AP, 8/29/10)(AP, 9/28/10)
2010 Sep 8, German Chancellor
Angela Merkel praised the bravery of illustrator Kurt Westergaard
(75), a Danish cartoonist who caricatured the Prophet Muhammad, at
an award ceremony honoring his achievements for freedom of speech.
(AP, 9/9/10)
2010 Sep 10, Danish police
surrounded a suspect in Orsted Park near the Hotel Jorgensen
following a small explosion in a bathroom at the hotel. A bomb squad
removed a bag wrapped around his waist with remote controlled
cutting pliers. The man was later identified as Lors Doukayev, a
one-legged Chechen-born boxer living in Belgium. On May 3, 2011,
Doukayev was charged with terrorism for allegedly preparing a letter
bomb that had likely been intended for a newspaper known for
publishing cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad. On May 30, 2011,
Doukayev was convicted of attempted terrorism. The next day he was
sentenced to 12 years.
(Reuters, 9/12/10)(AP, 9/15/10)(AP, 5/3/11)(AP,
5/30/11)(Reuters, 5/31/11)
2010 Sep 20, Saudi Arabia’s
Shura Council voted 62 to 56 against a memorandum of understanding
on bilateral consultations with Denmark after several members
expressed unhappiness over the publication of cartoons of the
Prophet Mohammed in a Danish newspaper.
(AFP, 9/21/10)
2010 Sep 30, In Denmark
Flemming Rose's "The Tyranny of Silence," a book on the crisis
sparked by a Danish newspaper's publication of cartoons of the
Prophet Mohammed five years ago, hit stores in amid concerns over a
backlash from the Muslim world.
(AFP, 9/30/10)
2010 Oct 9, A 650-foot
Lithuanian-flagged ferry was ablaze in the Baltic Sea after an
explosion on the upper deck. Firefighting ships sprayed the vessel
with water to keep it from breaking apart and spilling some 170 tons
of fuel. 249 people aboard were rescued by six ships that moved in
to help after the explosion on the Lisco Gloria around midnight. A
four-person team was lowered to the ferry by helicopter and managed
to anchor the vessel off the southern tip of the Danish island
Langeland to keep it from drifting farther ashore.
(AP, 10/9/10)
2010 Oct 26, An annual report
by Transparency Int’l. marked Somalia as the most corrupt county in
the world, followed by Afghanistan, Myanmar and Iraq. Denmark, New
Zealand and Singapore tied as the world’s least corrupt nations. The
US declined to 22nd from 19th last year.
(SFC, 10/27/10, p.A2)
2010 Dec 23, It was reported
that the first pill designed to curb a person’s urge to have more
than a few drinks of alcohol was undergoing tests in Europe. The
drug (nalmafene) was developed by H. Lundbeck A/S in Valby, Denmark.
(SFC, 12/23/10, p.A2)
2010 Dec 29, In Denmark 4 men
planning to shoot as many people as possible in a building housing
the newsroom of a paper that published cartoons of the Prophet
Muhammad were arrested in an operation that halted an imminent
attack. The 4 were Swedish residents, a Tunisian (44), a
Lebanese-born man (29), an Iraqi asylum seeker, and a 30-year-old
whose national origin was not released. Police in Stockholm arrested
a Swedish citizen of Tunisian origin, suspected of being linked to
the plot. Denmark freed the Iraqi suspect the next day due to an
apparent lack of evidence.
(AP, 12/29/10)(AP, 12/30/10)
2010 Gunnar Wetterberg, Swedish
historian, authored “The Nordic Federal State,” which proposed a
pan-Nordic federation to unite Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway,
and Sweden under a single monarch: Denmark’s Queen Margrethe.
(Econ, 11/6/10, p.66)
2011 Jan 28, A Danish warship
rescued two men who escaped from pirates off the coast of East
Africa. The men were among several crew members who attempted to
shake their captors two days after their ship, the MV Beluga
Nomination, was hijacked.
(AP, 1/28/11)
2011 Feb 9, Danish police
arrested a 44-year-old man after he allegedly shot and killed his
three children and attempted to commit suicide.
(AP, 2/9/11)
2011 Feb 18, The Danish Supreme
Court gave the government the green light to take control of
Christiania, a largely self-governing Copenhagen neighborhood that
was occupied by hippies four decades ago.
(AP, 2/18/11)
2011 Feb 21, Danish shipper
Maersk announced the order of 10 colossal container ships from South
Korea’s Daewoo Shipbuilding.
(Econ, 2/26/11, p.73)
2011 Feb 24, Somali pirates
captured a sailboat carrying Danish couple Jan Quist Johansen his
wife Birgit Marie and three children (12-16), along with two adult
crew members, also Danes. All seven were released on September 6.
(AP, 3/1/11)(AP, 9/7/11)
2011 Mar 10, Forces from
Somalia’s northern region of Puntland failed in a rescue attempt of
a Danish family and 2 crew members. 5 soldiers were killed.
(SFC, 3/12/11, p.A2)
2011 Mar 19, Six Danish F-16
fighter jets landed at the US air base in Sigonella, Sicily, and a
half-dozen US aircraft arrived elsewhere as the military buildup
mounted in Italy for possible action against Libya.
(AP, 3/19/11)
2011 Apr 2, A Danish assault
team backed by helicopters freed 16 Pakistanis and 2 Iranians held
by suspected Somali pirates.
(SFC, 4/12/11, p.A2)
2011 Apr 14, Denmark's foreign
minister said she will urge US states such as Texas and Ohio to stop
using a drug produced by a Danish company in lethal injections. Lene
Espersen said she cannot take direct action against the company that
produces pentobarbital because the drug is not exported from
Denmark. It is produced by a plant in Kansas that is owned by
Denmark's Lundbeck A/S. Britain announced it was banning the export
of three such drugs to the United States.
(AP, 4/14/11)
2011 Apr 30, In Denmark the 900
residents of the Christiania hippie enclave in Copenhagen announced
they had agreed in principle to a deal that will allow them to
collectively buy the former naval base they first occupied four
decades ago.
(AP, 4/30/11)
2011 May 11, Denmark’s
government agreed to reintroduce custom checks at Danish borders.
(Econ, 5/14/11, p.68)
2011 Jun, A Danish convicted
Harry Larsen of a number of abuses, including using a baseball bat
and metal bars to beat some of his family's nine children, and
raping two of its teenage daughters. In its sentence, that court
said he should be sent to a mental health facility. On Dec 15 an
appeals court overturned the ruling and sentenced him to 11 years in
prison.
(AP, 12/15/11)
2011 Jul 1, Denmark approved a
decision to re-establish permanent customs checkpoints at its
borders, removing the last hurdle to a plan aimed at stopping crime
and illegal immigration but which has been strongly criticized in
Europe as violating visa-free travel rules.
(AP, 7/1/11)
2011 Jul 1, Danish
pharmaceutical company Lundbeck Inc. said it will demand that US
distributors sign an agreement stating that they will not make the
sedative pentobarbital available for prisons using it for lethal
injections.
(SFC, 7/2/11, p.A2)
2011 Jul 5, Denmark started a
controversial plan to boost customs checks on its borders, deploying
50 additional customs officers at crossings with Germany and Sweden.
(AP, 7/5/11)
2011 Aug 30, In Denmark a man
was shot dead and two others are injured after a shooting outside a
Copenhagen mosque following prayers to mark the end of the Muslim
fasting month of Ramadan.
(AP, 8/30/11)
2011 Sep 15, Danish voters
appeared set to elect their first female prime minister and end 10
years of pro-market reforms and a hardening of immigration laws.
Polls predicted a majority in the 179-seat Parliament for the
left-leaning opposition led by Social Democratic leader Helle
Thorning-Schmidt.
(AP, 9/15/11)
2011 Sep 29, A Danish court
sentenced 15 motorbike gang members to jail for six murder attempts
on rival gang members. Copenhagen's city court ruled earlier this
month that members of the Hells Angels and their support group,
AK81, were guilty of a series of shootings in the Danish capital in
2009.
(AP, 9/29/11)
2011 Oct 1, Denmark imposed a
“fat tax” on foods such as butter and oil as a way to curb unhealthy
eating habits.
(SFC, 10/3/11, p.A2)
2011 Oct 3, In Denmark PM Helle
Thorning-Schmidt (b.1966) took office. Her government soon scrapped
renewed customs checks at its border with Germany.
(AP,
11/17/11)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helle_Thorning-Schmidt)
2011 Oct 17, British security
group G4S agreed to buy Denmark-based facilities company ISS for
£5.2 billion, creating the world's largest security and
facilities firm.
(AFP, 10/17/11)
2011 Oct 24, In Denmark fashion
icon Margit Brandt (66) died. Her simple cuts and 1960s miniskirts
marked one of the first international breakthroughs for Danish
designs.
(AP, 10/24/11)
2011 Oct 25, In northern
Somalia gunmen kidnapped a female American aid worker (32) and a
Danish man (60), working for the Danish Demining Group. Their Somali
colleague was placed under police custody.
(AP, 10/25/11)(AP, 10/26/11)
2011 Oct 29, In Denmark Axel
Axgil (96), whose struggle for gay rights helped make Denmark the
first country to legalize same-sex partnerships, died in Copenhagen.
(AP, 10/30/11)
2011 Nov 3, Ivar Noergaard
(89), former Danish Economy Minister, died. He had negotiated his
country's 1973 entry into the European Union.
(AP, 11/4/11)
2011 Dec 16, Europol said
police have arrested 112 people in 22 countries after a yearlong
investigation into child pornography, warning that technology is
making combating the spread of child abuse images ever more
difficult. The investigation, code named "Operation Icarus," was
carried out under the leadership of Danish police, due to Danish
expertise in analyzing the peer-to-peer networks that were used to
share files.
(AP, 12/16/11)
2011 Dec 19, In Denmark the
Copenhagen City Court ruled that Marcel Lychau Hansen had strangled
73-year-old Edith Louise Andrup in 1987 and 40-year-old Lene
Buchardt Rasmussen three years later. The court also found him
guilty of raping three teenagers and a 23-year-old woman in 1995 and
two women in 2005 and 2010, respectively.
(AP, 12/19/11)
2012 Jan 3, The US Justice
Dept. said Maersk, a Danish shipping company, will pay $31.9 million
for overcharging the US government for shipments to US troops in
Afghanistan and Iraq for several years.
(SFC, 1/4/12, p.D1)
2012 Jan 7, The Danish navy
captured a suspect pirate mothership off the Horn of Africa. They
arrested 25 suspected pirates and freed 14 people from Iran and
Pakistan.
(AP, 1/8/12)
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