69CE
Jan 15, Servius
Sulpicius Galba (70), 6th emperor of Rome (68-69), was lynched.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1432
Jan 15, Afonso
V "the African", king of Portugal (1438-1481), was born.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1507
Jan 15, Johann
Oporinus [Herbster], Swiss book publisher (Koran), was born.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1535
Jan 15, Henry
VIII declared himself head of English Church. [see Oct 30, 1534]
(MC, 1/15/02)
1552
Jan 15, France
signed a secret treaty with German Protestants.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1559
Jan 15, England's Queen
Elizabeth I was crowned in Westminster Abbey and Lord Dudley soon
became her
favorite.
(TL-MB, 1988, p.19)(AP, 1/15/98)
1582
Jan 15, Russia
ceded Livonia and Estonia to Poland, and lost access to Baltic.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1622
Jan 15, Moliere (d.1673) [Jean
Baptiste Poquelin], French actor and comic dramatist, was born. He was
the
author of "Tartuffe" and "The Misanthrope" (1666). He also
did the bilingual experiment "L’Impromptu du Versailles." His last
play was "The Imaginary Invalid." "It is a stupidity second to
none, to busy oneself with the correction of the world."
(WUD, 1994, p.923)(WSJ, 4/5/96,
p.A-6)(LSA, Spg/97, p.14)(WSJ, 4/2/98, p.A20)(AP, 11/10/98)(HN, 1/15/99)
1624
Jan 15, The people of Mexico
rioted upon hearing that their churches were to be closed.
(HN, 1/15/99)
1716
Jan 15, Philip Livingston,
Declaration of Independence signer, was born.
(HN, 1/15/99)
1777
Jan 15, The people of New
Connecticut declared their independence. The tiny republic became the
state of
Vermont in 1791.
(AP, 1/15/99)(ST,
3/2/04, p.A1)
1797
Jan 15, In St. Petersburg
Russia, Prussia and Austria signed and act that terminated the
Lithuanian-Polish state.
(LHC,
1/15/03)
1811
Jan 15, In a secret session,
Congress planned to annex Spanish East Florida.
(HN, 1/15/99)
1823
Jan 15, Matthew Brady, Civil War
photographer, was born.
(HN, 1/15/99)
1827
Jan 15, At Monticello, Va., 130
slaves and other possessions of Thomas Jefferson were sold at auction.
Sally
Hemmings and 5 members of the Hemings family were freed shortly
thereafter.
(SFEC, 5/16/99, p.A9)
1844
Jan 15, The University of Notre
Dame received its charter from the state of Indiana.
(AP, 1/15/98)
1861
Jan 15, Elisha
Otis received patent # 31,128 for his steam elevator.
(www.sterlingelevatorcons.com/history.htm)
1865
Jan 15, Union troops captured
Fort Fisher at Wilmington, North Carolina. It was the last major
Confederate
port open to blockade runners.
(AH, 2/05, p.16)
1870
Jan 15, The Democratic party was
represented as a donkey in a cartoon by Thomas Nast in Harper's Weekly.
(Hem, 8/96, p.84)(AP, 1/15/98)
1877
Jan 15, Lewis
M. Terman, psychologist (developed Stanford-Binet IQ test), was born in
Indiana.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1885
Jan 15, Wilson
Bentley (1865-1931) of Jericho, Vermont, made the world’s 1st clear
photographs
of snow crystals.
(ON, 11/04, p.4)
1892
Jan 15, The rules of basketball
were published for the first time, in Springfield, Mass., where the
game
originated.
(AP,
1/15/00)
1896
Jan 15, Matthew
B. Brady (73), US Civil War photographer, died in the charity ward of a
New
York hospital at age 73. His project "Gallery of Illustrious
Americans" included many leading figures of his time. In 1955 James D.
Horan authored "Matthew Brady, Historian with a Camera." In 1946 Roy
Meredith authored "Mr. Lincoln’s Camera man, Matthew B. Brady."
(ON, 1/00, p.12)(ON,
12/06, p.10)
1906
Jan 15, Aristotle Onassis, Greek
tycoon, who married Jackie Kennedy, was born.
(HN, 1/15/99)
1907
Jan 15,
3-element vacuum tube was patented by Dr. Lee De Forest.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1908
Jan 15, Edward Teller (d.2003),
US physicist known as the "Father of the H-bomb," was born in
Budapest. In 2001 he authored his "Memoirs."
(HN, 1/15/99)(WSJ, 10/30/01, p.A21)(SFC, 9/10/03, p.A1)
1909
Jan
15, In San Francisco police arrested Miss Frances Smith, attired in a
jaunty
sailor costume, and Miss May Burke as they strolled down Montgomery
street.
Smith was charged with masquerading in male attire and Burke was
charged with
vagrancy.
(SSFC, 1/10/10, DB
p.42)
1913
Jan 15, Lloyd
Bridges, actor (Sea Hunt, Roots, Airplane), was born in San Leandro,
Calif.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1913
Jan 15, The first telephone line
between Berlin and New York was inaugurated.
(HN, 1/15/99)
1915
Jan 15, Fannie Farmer (b.1857),
American culinary expert, died. Her “Boston Cooking-School Cook Book”
(1896)
became a widely used culinary text.
(WSJ, 12/29/07, p.W8)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fannie_Merritt_Farmer)
1915
Jan 15, Japan
claimed economic control of China.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1918
Jan 15, Gamal
Abdel Nasser, President of Egypt (1954-1971), was born.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1919
Jan 15, 2
million gallons of molasses flooded Boston, Ma., drowning 21. [see Jan
5]
(MC, 1/15/02)
1919
Jan 15, Karl
Liebknecht (47), Marxist revolutionary, was murdered.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1919
Jan 15, Rosa
Luxemburg (b.1870), Marxist revolutionary, was murdered.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1919
Jan 15, Peasants in Central
Russia rose against the Bolsheviks.
(HN, 1/15/99)
1920
Jan 15, John J.
"Cardinal" O'Connor, Phila, Roman Catholic Archbishop of NY, was
born.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1920
Jan 15, The Dry Law
(Prohibition) went into effect in the United States. Selling liquor and
beer
became illegal under the 18th amendment. [see Jan 16]
(HN, 1/15/99)(SFC, 10/13/99, p.E7)
1920
Jan 15, The United States
approved a $150 million loan to Poland, Austria and Armenia to aid in
their war
with the Russian communists.
(HN, 1/15/99)
1923
Jan 15, Lithuanians took
Klaipeda back from French control.
(LC, 1998, p.8)(LHC,
1/15/03)
1927
Jan 15, The Dumbarton Bridge
(drawbridge) opened carrying the first auto traffic across the San
Francisco
bay.
(HN, 1/15/99)(Ind, 5/23/00,14A)
1929
Jan 15, "Queen
Ida" Guillory, Zydeco accordionist, was born.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1929
Jan 15, Martin Luther King Jr.
(d1968), American Baptist Minister and Civil Rights leader, was born in
Atlanta, Georgia. He won the Nobel Peace prize in 1964 and was
assassinated in
1968. Dr. King began his involvement in the civil rights movement in
1955 with
his leadership of the Montgomery bus boycott, which ended segregated
seating on
city buses. Adopting Mohandas K. Gandhi's principles of nonviolence,
King led
demonstrations, sit-ins and boycotts in cities throughout the South to
show the
injustice of racist policies. He explained his belief in nonviolence in
a
letter written during one of his many incarcerations: "Nonviolent
direct
action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a
community
which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the
issue. It
seeks so to dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored...."
King's efforts helped to bring about the passage of the Civil Rights
Act of
1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. He was awarded the Nobel Peace
Prize in
1964. Dr. King's leadership of the civil rights movement brought many
threats
against his life and on April 4, 1968, he was killed by a sniper's
bullet in
Memphis, Tennessee. Martin Luther King Day was established by President
Ronald
Reagan in 1986, for the third Monday in January. "Injustice anywhere is
a
threat to justice everywhere." "A man can't ride your back unless
it's bent."
(HFA, '96, p.22)(AHD, p.721)(AP,
4/3/97)(AP, 1/15/98)(HNPD, 1/15/99)
1929
Jan 15, The U.S. Senate ratified
the Kellogg-Briand anti-war pact.
(HN, 1/15/99)
1930
Jan 15, Amelia Earhart set an
aviation record for women at 171 mph in a Lockheed Vega.
(HN, 1/15/99)
1934
Jan 15, Babe
Ruth signed a contract for $35,000 ($17,000 cut).
(MC, 1/15/02)
1934
Jan 15, Patrick
O'Malley, US policeman, was killed by John Dillinger.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1934
Jan 15, An 8.4
earthquake in India and Nepal killed some 15,000 people. It damaged the Mahabuddha Temple in
Patan,
Nepal, one of but 3 in the world.
(http://asc-india.org/menu/gquakes.htm)(WSJ, 1/22/98, p.A17)
1936
Jan 15, The
non-profit Ford Foundation incorporated.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1936
Jan 15, In London, Japan quit
all naval talks after being denied equality.
(HN, 1/15/99)
1939
Jan 15, In the
1st NFL pro bowl the NY Giants beat the All Stars 13-10 in Wrigley
Field.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1942
Jan 15,
Jawaharlal Nehru succeeded Mohandas K. Gandhi as head of India's
National
Congress Party.
(AP, 1/15/02)
1943
Jan 15, Work
was completed on the Pentagon, headquarters of the U.S. Department of
Defense in Arlington, Va. In 2007 Steve Vogel authored “The Pentagon: A History.”
(AP, 1/15/98)(Econ, 6/30/07, p.93)
1944
Jan 15, General
Eisenhower arrived in England.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1944
Jan 15, The U.S. Fifth Army
successfully broke the German Winter Line in Italy with the capture of
Mount
Trocchio.
(HN, 1/15/99)
1947
Jan 15, A grisly, still-unsolved
murder case came to light in Los Angeles as the mutilated remains of
22-year-old aspiring actress Elizabeth Short, known as the "Black
Dahlia" for the dark outfits she wore, were found dumped in a vacant
lot.
Her body was severed at the waist, drained of blood and fully posed in
a vacant
lot. The Black Dahlia murder case remained unsolved even though 500
hundred men
confessed to the murder. In 1977 John Gregory Dunne authored "True
Confessions," a novel based on the case. In 1987 James Ellroy authored
"The Black Dahlia." In 2003 Steve Hodel authored "Black Dahlia
Avenger," in which he held that the killer was Dr. George Hodel, his
own
father.
(SFEC, 12/1/96, BR p.3)(SFEC,
4/5/98, p.C16)(AP, 1/15/01)(NW, 4/21/03, p.59)(SFC,
1/2/04,
p.D1)(SFC, 4/16/04, p.B7)
1949
Jan 15, Chinese Communists
occupied Tientsin after a 27-hour battle with Nationalist forces.
(HN, 1/15/99)
1951
Jan 15, Supreme
Court ruled that the "clear and present danger" of incitement to riot
is not protected speech and can be a cause for arrest.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1953
Jan 15, The First Asian
Socialist Conference agreed on alliances with the West and land for the
peasants.
(HN, 1/15/99)
1961
Jan 15, The
Supremes signed with Motown Records.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1965
Jan 15, Sir Winston Churchill
suffered a severe stroke.
(HN, 1/15/99)
1967
Jan 15, The first Super Bowl was
played as the Green Bay Packers of the National Football League
defeated the
Kansas City Chiefs of the American Football League, 35-10 in Los
Angeles. The matchup was officially
called the AFL-NFL World Championship Game.
(WSJ, 1/28/97, p.A16)(AP, 1/15/98)
1967
Jan 15, Some 462 Yale faculty
members called for an end to the bombing in North Vietnam.
(HN, 1/15/99)
1969
Jan 15, The Russian Soyuz 5 went
into orbit. The crew then maneuvered to dock with Soyuz 4 and Yevgeny
Khrunov
(d.2000 at 67) became the first astronaut to transfer between linked
capsules.
(SFC, 5/27/00, p.A26)
1971
Jan 15, George
Harrison’s
"My Sweet Lord"
was released in the UK. The US release was in 1970.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Sweet_Lord)
1971
Jan 15, Egypt’s
Aswan High Dam, 600 miles upstream from Cairo, was formally
inaugurated. It had
been completed Jul 21, 1970.
1972
Jan 15, Heavyweight Joe Frazier
(b.1944) KO’d Terry Daniels.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Frazier)
1973
Jan 15, Gene
Shalit (b.1932) replaced Joe Garagiola on the Today Show panel.
(www.nndb.com/people/625/000023556/)(http://tinyurl.com/6bzkbm)
1973
Jan 15, President Nixon
announced the suspension of all U.S. offensive action in North Vietnam,
citing
progress in peace negotiations.
(AP, 1/15/98)
1973
Jan 15, Four of six remaining
Watergate defendants pleaded guilty.
(HN, 1/15/99)
1973
Jan 15, Pope
Paul VI had an audience with Golda Meir at Vatican.
1974
Jan 15,
"Happy Days" began an 11 year run on ABC.
(www.imdb.com/title/tt0070992/)
1974
Jan 15, In Wichita, Kansas, 4
members of the Otero family were found murdered. Their murder was later
associated with the BTK serial killer.
(SSFC, 2/27/05,
p.A3)(www.kansas.com/214/story/16542.html)
1976
Jan 15, Sara Jane Moore was
sentenced to life in prison for her attempt on the life of President
Ford in
San Francisco.
(AP, 1/15/98)
1978
Jan 15, Lisa Levy and Margaret
Bowman, two students at Florida State University in Tallahassee, were
murdered
in their sorority house. Theodore Bundy (1946-1989) was later convicted
of the
crime, and executed.
(AP, 1/15/98)
1979
Jan 15, The
Soviet Union vetoed a United Nations resolution and called for the
withdrawal
of all Vietnamese troops from Cambodia.
(HN, 1/15/99)
1981
Jan 15, The
"Hill Street Blues" premiered on NBC-TV. It ran
to 1987.
(SFEC, 5/24/98, DB p.39)(www.imdb.com/title/tt0081873/)
1981
Jan 15, Emanuel
Celler (92), (Rep-D-NY, 1923-73), died.
(http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=C000264)
1982
Jan 15, Walter W. Smith
(b.1905), NY sports writer, died in Connecticut.
He won the Pulitzer
Prize in 1976 and in 2000 a collection of 167 essays (1941-1981) was
published:
"Red Smith on Baseball: The Game’s Greatest Writer on the Game’s
Greatest
Years."
(SFEM, 4/9/00, p.18)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Smith_(sportswriter))
1983
Jan 15, Meyer Lansky (born Majer
Suchowlinski, July 4, 1902), American gangster, died. He and Charles
"Lucky" Luciano were instrumental in the development of the so-called
"National Crime Syndicate" in the United States. He was the
intellectual impetus behind the Commission and the so-called "Mogul of
the
Mob." In 2004 Enrique
Cirules authored
"The Secret Life of Meyer Lansky in Havana." The book was only
available in Cuba in Spanish.
(AP, 5/28/07)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meyer_Lansky)
1984
Jan 15, Police
raided the vacation home of Paul and Linda McCartney (1941-1998)
following a
tip. Both were arrested on possession of cannabis.
(http://leftofcentrist.blogspot.com/2007_01_01_archive.html)
1985
Jan 15, Tancredo Neves
(1910-1985) became the 1st elected president of
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tancredo_Neves)
1987
Jan 15, Ray
Bolger (b.1904), actor and dancer, died in Los Angeles. He played the
Scarecrow
in the 1939 production of the “Wizard of Oz.”
(www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=1528)
1988
Jan 15, Jimmy
"The Greek" Snyder made racist remarks about black athletes. The CBS football analyst was fired the next day.
(http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/almanac/video/1988/)
1988
Jan 15, Sean
MacBride (b.1904), Ireland, commander of Irish Republican Army, died.
He was a
founding member of Amnesty Int’l. and was awarded the Nobel peace Prize
in
1974. He wrote the Constitution of the Organization for African Unity
and the
first Constitution of Ghana, the first UK African Colony to achieve
Independence.
(http://tinyurl.com/ggzwn)
1988
Jan 15, In Jerusalem, riot
police charged into the Al Aqsa and Dome of the Rock mosques after
worshipers
beat a policeman and stole his pistol during some of the worst clashes
seen on
the revered Temple Mount.
(AP, 1/15/98)
1989
Jan 15, NATO, the Warsaw Pact
and 12 other European countries adopted a human rights and security
agreement
in Vienna, Austria.
(AP, 1/15/99)
1990
Jan 15, A computer problem
disrupted AT&T long-distance service for about nine hours.
(AP,
1/15/00)
1990
Jan 15, Soviet leader Gorbachev
and the Soviet Presidium declared a state of emergency in parts of
Azerbaijan
and Armenia in the wake of escalating ethnic violence.
(AP,
1/15/00)
1991
Jan 15, In Colombia Jorge Luis
Ochoa turned himself in to police during an intense hunt for leaders of
the
Medellin drug cartel. The Colombian Constitution of this year forbade
the extradition
of its citizens.
(SFC, 7/6/96, p.A10)
1991
Jan 15, With hours remaining
before a United Nations deadline for Iraq to withdraw from Kuwait, UN
Secretary-General Javier Perez de Cuellar made a final appeal to Saddam
Hussein
to remove his troops.
(AP, 1/15/01)
1992
Jan 15, The Yugoslav federation,
founded in 1918, effectively collapsed as the European Community
recognized the
republics of Croatia and Slovenia.
(AP, 1/15/98)
1993
Jan 15, Lyricist Sammy Cahn, who
wrote the words to "Call me Irresponsible" and "High Hopes,"
died in Los Angeles at age 79.
(AP, 1/15/98)
1993
Jan 15, In Paris a historic
disarmament ceremony ended with the last of 125 countries signing a
treaty banning
chemical weapons.
(AP, 1/15/98)
1993
Jan 15, A 7.5
earthquake struck northern Japan and 2 people died.
(http://neic.usgs.gov/neis/eq_depot/2003/eq_030925/)
1994
Jan 15, President Clinton paid
solemn tribute to victims of Stalinist purges and German occupation
during a
six-hour stop in the former Soviet republic of Belarus before
continuing on to
Geneva.
(AP, 1/15/99)
1994
Jan 15, Harry Nilsson (52), singer-songwriter
died in Agoura Hills, Calif.
(AP, 1/15/99)
1995
Jan 15, The San Francisco 49ers defeated the
Dallas Cowboys 38-28 in the
National Football Conference title game, while the San Diego Chargers
upset the
Pittsburgh Steelers 17-13 in the American Football Conference
championship.
(AP, 1/15/05)
1995
Jan 15, San Francisco’s I. Magnin store
on Union Square closed. The
first I. Magnin was founded in 1877 on Market St. In 2006 James Thomas
Mullane
authored “A Store to Remember,” an illustrated history of the store.
(SSFC, 12/31/06,
p.E1,5)
1995
Jan 15, British soldiers ended
daytime patrols in Belfast, Ireland.
(SFC, 6/18/96, p.A8)
1995
Jan 15, Pope John Paul II
celebrated a final Mass during his visit to the Philippines, drawing
millions
of people.
(AP,
1/15/00)
1996
Jan 15, In San Jose, Ca., Romel
Reid, was arrested and later indicted on
23 accounts of rape.
(SFC, 5/31/96, p.E2)
1996
Jan 15, Juan Garcia Abrego, a
top drug suspect, was arrested and deported to the US for trial. He
allegedly
headed a syndicate with links to cocaine operations in Colombia.
Horacio Brunt,
Mexican policeman, collared Juan Garcia Abrego, a Mexican drug kingpin.
He was
sentenced to 11 life terms in 1997.
(WSJ, 1/16/96, p. A-1)(WSJ, 4/12/96,
p.A-1)(SFC, 2/1/97, p.A3)
1996
Jan 15, Ailing Greek Premier
Andreas Papandreou resigned.
(AP, 1/15/01)
1996
Jan 15, Risking the lives of
more than 100 hostages in an effort to wipe out their Chechen rebel
captors,
the Russian military hurled rockets and shells at the tiny village of
Pervomayskaya,
at the border of Dagestan and Chechnya.
(WSJ, 1/16/96, p. A-1)(AP, 1/15/01)
1997
Jan 15, Boeing agreed to make
rudder changes to its 737 airplanes at an estimated cost of $120
million.
(WSJ, 1/16/97, p.A1)
1997
Jan 15, The crews of the shuttle
Atlantis and the Russian space station Mir had a raucously joyful
meeting,
hours after their spacecraft had docked.
(AP, 1/15/98)
1997
Jan 15, The Israeli cabinet
approved the Hebron accord 11-7. The Palestinian cabinet approved the
accord by
a wide margin. A bitterly divided Israeli Cabinet agreed to withdraw
troops
from most of Hebron and rural West Bank areas, approving an accord
wrapped up
hours earlier by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian
leader
Yasser Arafat.
(WSJ, 1/16/97, p.A1)(AP, 1/15/98)
1997
Jan 15, Mexico announced the
final $3.5 billion payment on the [Feb,
1995] $13.5 billion US loan.
(SFC, 1/16/97, p.A1)
1997
Jan 15, In Peru intelligence
officers took Leonor LaRosa, a fellow intelligence agent, into custody
and
began torturing her on accusations that she informed newspapers of
military
plans to intimidate and assassinate opposition activists and
journalists. La
Rosa named 4 intelligence agents as directly responsible. Ricardo
Anderson was
named as one of the 4 agents.
(SFC, 6/28/97, p.A10)(SFC, 3/11/00,
p.A9)(WSJ, 5/30/00, p.A1)
1998
Jan 15, The Feb issue of the
American Demographics magazine noted that American adults on average
reported
58 sexual episodes a year.
(SFC, 1/15/98, p.A2)
1998
Jan 15, Pres. Clinton presented
the Presidential Medal of Freedom to 15 honorees.
(SFC, 1/16/98, p.A1,13)
1998
Jan 15, The US and Singapore
announced an agreement for US ships to use a planned $35 million naval
base
beginning in 2000.
(SFC, 1/16/98, p.B4)
1998
Jan 15, Henry Cisneros'
ex-mistress, Linda Medlar Jones, pleaded guilty to misleading federal
authorities investigating the former U.S. housing secretary's payment
of
alleged hush money to her. Jones served nearly 18 months in
prison; she
was later pardoned by President Clinton.
(AP, 1/15/08)
1998
Jan 15, Labor
Secretary Alexis Herman denied
allegations that she had sold her influence in the White House.
Herman
was cleared in 2000 by Independent Counsel Ralph I. Lancaster.
(AP, 1/15/08)
1998
Jan 15, NASA
announced John Glenn, 76, may fly in space again.
(MC, 1/15/02)
1998
Jan 15, Junior Wells (63),
Chicago Blues harmonica star, died. His album "Hoodoo Man Blues" was
recorded in the 1960s and considered by many as one of the best
all-time blues
albums.
(SFC, 1/17/98, p.A19)(MC,
1/15/02)
1998
Jan 15, In Algeria the
government agreed to a revamped EU delegation to seek ways to end the
violence.
(SFC, 1/16/98, p.B4)
1998
Jan 15, Eastern Slavonia
reintegrated into Croatia. Some 75,000 Croat refugees promised friction
with
the Serbs occupying their homes. The 2-year UN peace mission ended but
180
int’l. observers were to remain as monitors.
(SFEC, 8/17/97, Par p.2)(WSJ,
1/15/98, p.A1)(SFC, 1/16/98, p.B2)
1998
Jan 15, In Sri Lanka a Jaffna
library of Tamil literature was reopened as a gesture conciliatory
gesture
toward separatist rebels.
(WSJ, 1/16/98, p.A1)
1998
Jan 15, In Turkey the parliament
passed legislation allowing husbands to be indicted for domestic abuse
even if
their wives refuse to press charges.
(SFC, 1/16/98, p.B4)
1999
Jan 15, House prosecutors
prodded senators at President Clinton's impeachment trial to summon
Monica
Lewinsky, Vernon Jordan and others for testimony and "invite the
president"
to appear as well.
(AP,
1/15/00)
1999
Jan 15, SF based AirTouch was
sold to Vodafone Group PLC of Britain for $56 billion.
(SFC, 1/16/99, p.A1)
1999
Jan 15, Off of Argentina a
Liberian tanker collided with a German vessel and leaked over 65,000
gallons of
crude oil near the Rio de la Plata, 50 miles north of Buenos Aires.
(SFC, 1/23/99, p.C1)
1999
Jan 15, In Brazil the real was
allowed to float and the Bovespa index moved up 33%. The real closed at
1.43 to
the dollar.
(SFC, 1/16/99, p.A10)
1999
Jan 15, China asserted its
sovereignty over the potentially oil-rich Spratly Islands and rejected
a
Philippine proposal to discuss the disputed islands.
(SFC, 1/16/99, p.A11)
1999
Jan 15, In Greece some 30,000
people protested new education reforms that would base university
entrance on
course work rather than a single exam.
(SFC, 1/16/99, p.A11)
1999
Jan 15, In southern India a
stampede by Hindu pilgrims left 51 dead after a hill collapsed near the
Sabarimala shrine.
(WSJ, 1/15/99, p.A1)
1999
Jan 15, In Iraq the US again
fired at an air-defense site.
(WSJ, 1/15/99, p.A1)
1999
Jan 15, In Kosovo Yugoslav army
units killed 15 Albanian rebels. Later reports indicated that 45
Albanians were
massacred at Racak.
(SFC, 1/16/99, p.A10)(SFC, 1/22/99,
p.A10)
1999
Jan 15, The Sudanese government
and rebels agreed to a 3-month extension of a cease-fire in a
southwestern
province.
(SFC, 1/16/99, p.A11)
2000
Jan 15, The US EPA placed new
restrictions on the cultivation of genetically modified Bt corn.
(SFEC, 1/16/00, p.A5)
2000
Jan 15, Madeleine Albright
stopped in Colombia to discuss a $1.2 billion emergency aid package
that
included $400 million for 30 US Blackhawk helicopters to help in the
drug war.
(SFEC, 1/16/00, p.A25)
2000
Jan 15, In
Belgrade Serbian paramilitary leader Zeljko Raznatovic (47), aka Arkan,
was
shot dead along with associates. Serb police later arrested 3 suspects,
Dobrosav Gavric (23), Dejan Pitulic (33), and Vujadin Krstic (36), and
called
the murder a gangland hit.
(SFEC, 1/16/00,
p.A1,16)(SFEC, 1/23/00, p.A27)(WSJ, 1/24/00, p.A23)
2000
Jan 15, In China 5.9 and 6.5
earthquakes hit in Yunnan province and 4 people were killed.
(SFEC, 1/16/00, p.A25)
2000
Jan 15, In Colombia the
government military claimed to have killed 44 guerrillas. 6 soldier and
police
also died as well as 8 civilians in a town 30 miles southeast of Bogota.
(SFC, 1/18/00, p.A9)
2000
Jan 15, In San Jose, Costa Rica,
a Czech-built Let 410 Taxi Aereo Centroamericano flight crashed and 4
people
were killed with 17 injured.
(SFC, 1/17/00, p.A11)
2000
Jan 15, In Russia Gennady
Zyuganov and Grigory Yavlinsky joined the presidential race.
(SFEC, 1/16/00, p.A16)
2001
Jan 15,
President-elect Bush marked the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday at an
elementary
school in Houston, where he promised wary black Americans: "My job will
be
to listen not only to the successful, but also to the suffering."
(AP, 1/15/02)
2001
Jan 15, In East Africa the
presidents of Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda formed a regional partnership,
reviving one that collapsed in 1978.
(SFC, 1/16/01, p.A10)
2001
Jan 15, The Jan 13 El Salvador
earthquake death toll climbed to over 707 and damages were estimated at
$1
billion [see Jan 13].
(SFC, 1/16/01, p.A1)(SSFC, 1/21/01,
p.D1)
2001
Jan 15, The Palestinian
authority offered amnesty to suspected collaborators with Israel.
(SFC, 1/16/01, p.A9)
2001
Jan 15, In the Philippines
flooding of the Balugo River and tributaries drove some 12,000 people
from
their homes.
(SFC, 1/16/01, p.A10)
2002
Jan
15, It was reported that an American, Clark Russell Bowers (37), had
been taken
hostage in Afghanistan with ransom at $25k.
(SFC,
1/15/02, p.A10)
2002
Jan
15, Nancy Pelosi, California Senator, began her position as Democratic
whip.
(SFC,
1/15/02, p.A1)
2002
Jan
15, Attorney General John Ashcroft said that John Walker Lindh, the
20-year-old
Californian who had fought alongside the Taliban in Afghanistan, would
be
charged with conspiracy to kill U.S. citizens and could face life in
prison if
convicted. Lindh received a 20-year sentence after pleading guilty to
supplying
services to the Taliban and carrying explosives in commission of a
felony.
(SFC,
1/16/02, p.A1)(SFC, 1/25/02, p.A20)(AP, 1/15/03)
2002
Jan
15, Arthur Andersen LLP said it was firing senior auditor David B.
Duncan, who
had organized a "rushed disposal" of Enron documents after federal
regulators requested information about the failing energy company.
(AP,
1/15/03)
2002
Jan
15, Michael Bilandic (78), former Chicago mayor and Illinois Supreme
Court
chief justice, died.
(AP,
1/15/03)
2002
Jan
15, In Argentina protesters rioted in 3 provinces as the peso fell to
1.95 to
the dollar from 1.7
(SFC,
1/16/02, p.A8)
2002
Jan
15, Fighting began in Burundi between the army and Hutu rebels. At
least 60
people were dead after a week.
(SFC,
1/26/02, p.A8)
2002
Jan
15, China reported that at least 50 miners were killed in 3 separate
mine
accidents.
(SFC,
1/16/02, p.A7)
2002
Jan
15, In Colombia FARC rebels staged attacks in Puente Quetame, Ibague,
Guayabal
and Cubarral following an accord to continue peace talks. At least 4
people
were killed.
(SFC,
1/16/02, p.A8)
2002
Jan
15, Palestinian gunmen killed 2 Israelis in separate attacks in the
West Bank
and near Jerusalem. Avi Boaz (71) was abducted and killed after
visiting with a
Palestinian family. The Palestinian Authority arrested Ahmed Saadat,
sec.
gen’l. of the PFLP.
(SFC,
1/16/02, p.A7)(SFC, 1/17/02, p.A11)
2002
Jan
15, Philippine police arrested Fathur Rohman Al-Ghozi of Indonesia, an
alleged
bomb-maker in an al Qaeda linked terrorist cell. Ghozi admitted to
providing
munitions and financing for the Dec 30, 2000, attack in Manila that
killed 22.
(WSJ,
1/21/02, p.A10)
2002
Jan
15, In the Philippines 15 people were killed in a shootout between
Muslim demonstrators
and police in Jolo.
(SFC,
1/16/02, p.A7)
2003
Jan 15, White
House budget director Mitchell Daniels predicted federal deficits will exceed
$200 billion and probably go over $300 billion in 2004.
(SFC,
1/16/03, p.A7)(AP,
1/15/04)
2003
Jan 15, A
Texas Tech professor was arrested on a complaint of giving false
information to
the FBI. Authorities said Thomas C. Butler had reported that vials
containing
deadly bacteria were missing when, in fact, he had destroyed them.
Butler was
later acquitted at trial of the most serious charges against him,
including
lying to the FBI.
(AP, 1/15/04)
2003
Jan 15,
Mickey Mouse and The Walt Disney Company scored a big victory as the
Supreme
Court upheld longer copyright protections for cartoon characters,
songs, books
and other creations worth billions of dollars.
(AP, 1/15/04)
2003
Jan 15, The EU
Parliament voted to ban the use of animals to test cosmetics by 2009.
Imports
of cosmetics using animal testing would also be banned.
(WSJ, 1/16/03, p.A1)
2003
Jan 15,
Lufthansa introduced Internet access to passengers on a flight from
Germany to
Washington DC.
(SFC, 1/15/03, p.B1)
2003
Jan 15, Former
New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani ended a two-day visit to Mexico's
capital,
declaring that fighting government corruption will be crucial in
lowering
crime.
(AP, 1/15/03)
2004
Jan 15, Carol Moseley Braun
ended her White House, leaving an all-male field for the presidency and
giving
her support to Democratic front-runner Howard Dean.
(AP, 1/15/04)
2004
Jan 15, The NASA Spirit rover rolled onto the
surface of Mars for the first time
since the vehicle bounced to a landing nearly two weeks earlier.
(AP, 1/15/05)
2004
Jan 15, Olivia Goldsmith (54),
author of "The First Wives Club" (1992), died in NYC of complications
from plastic surgery. Her book became a revenge fantasy for wives
tossed aside
in favor of younger women. It became a No. 1 film in 1996 starring
Goldie Hawn,
Diane Keaton and Bette Midler.
(AP, 1/16/04)(SFC, 1/17/04, p.A17)
2004
Jan 15, Ron O’Neal (66), star of
the 1972 film "Superfly," died in Los Angeles.
(SFC, 1/16/04, p.A3)(SFC, 1/17/04,
p.A17)
2004
Jan 15, In Argentina Pres.
Nestor Kirchner ordered an investigation into charges the army operated
training camps on torture techniques during the mid-80s.
(AP, 1/16/04)
2004
Jan 15, In Australia regular
train service from Adelaide to Darwin in 43 hours was set to begin.
Plans for
the Transcontinental line had begun in 1911.
(SSFC, 10/26/03, p.A1)
2004
Jan 15, Manik Saha (49), a
Bangladeshi reporter for the New Age newspaper and the BBC, was leaving
a press
club when unidentified attackers hurled a bomb at him. He was the first
journalist in the world to be murdered in 2004.
(AP, 1/16/04)
2004
Jan 15, Ecuador's
government declared
a state of emergency in the prison system after a series of protests.
(AP, 2/18/04)
2004
Jan 15, India and Pakistan,
resumed rail services across their border. The frontier had been closed
for 2
years.
(SFC, 1/16/04, p.A16)
2004
Jan 15, Iraqi bank notes bearing
Saddam Hussein's portrait became obsolete as a three-month period to
exchange
old bills for new ones came to an end. The new currency required 27
flights of
747 planes for delivery.
(AP, 1/15/04)(WSJ, 1/20/04, p.A14)
2004
Jan 15, In Karachi, Pakistan, a
car bomb blew up outside a Christian Bible society, injuring 12 people.
(AP, 1/15/04)
2004
Jan 15, Amnesty Int'l. said more
than 400 prisoners have been hanged since 1991 in Singapore, mostly for
drug
offenses. The London-based rights report on Singapore was entitled "A
Hidden Toll of Executions."
(AP, 1/15/04)(WSJ, 1/16/04, p.A1)
2005
Jan 15, A
military court at Fort
Hood, Texas, sentenced Army Specialist Charles Graner Jr. to 10 years
behind
bars for physically and sexually mistreating Iraqi prisoners at Abu
Ghraib
prison.
(AP, 1/15/06)
2005
Jan 15,
Michelle Kwan won her
ninth title at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships; earlier, Johnny
Weir won
his second straight men's title..
(AP, 1/15/06)
2005
Jan
15, Dan Lee (35), Pixar animator, died in Berkeley, Ca. His work
included the design
of Nemo in Pixar’s animated film “Finding Nemo.”
(SFC, 2/1/05, p.B7)
2005
Jan 15, Opera
singer Victoria de
los Angeles (81) died in Barcelona, Spain.
(AP, 1/15/06)
2005
Jan 15, Ruth Warrick (88), stage
and screen actress
and the inveterate busybody on "All My Children," died in NY. She
played Phoebe Tyler Wallingford in the TV soap opera that debuted in
1970.
(AP, 1/18/05)
2005
Jan 15, Visiting Chancellor of the
Exchequer Gordon
Brown revealed that Britain has decided to cancel Mozambique's total
debt to it
of 150 million dollars (114 million euros) to help the southern African
country
combat poverty. He said: "We've also agreed to pay 10 percent of
Mozambique's
multilateral debt."
(AP, 1/15/05)
2005
Jan 15, China and Taiwan agreed to
allow the first
direct flights since 1949.
(AP, 1/15/05)
2005
Jan 15, Sami Mohammed Ali Said
al-Jaaf, also known
as Abu Omar al-Kurdi, was arrested during a raid in Baghdad.
On
Jan 24 authorities announced the arrest of Al-Jaaf, an al-Qaida figure
allegedly behind the vast majority of the car bombings in Baghdad.
(AP, 1/24/05)
2005
Jan 15, In Kashmir separatist
guerrillas stormed a
government building in Srinagar, triggering a gunbattle with security
forces
days ahead of Republic Day celebrations.
(AP, 1/15/05)
2005
Jan 15, Mahmoud Abbas was sworn in
as Palestinian
Authority president. 46 members of the Palestinian election commission,
including top managers, resigned saying they were pressured by Mahmoud
Abbas'
campaign and intelligence officials to abruptly change voting
procedures during
the Jan. 9 presidential poll.
(AP, 1/15/05)
2005
Jan 15, Massive demonstrations
across Russia posed
a major challenge to President Vladimir Putin, and Moscow authorities
bowed to
the demands of protesting retirees by restoring some of their state
benefits,
such as free public transportation and subsidized medicine.
(AP, 1/15/05)
2005
Jan 15, Savo Todovic (52), a
Bosnian Serb wanted by
the U.N. war crimes tribunal for crimes he allegedly committed during
the
1992-95 war, surrendered to Bosnian Serb police.
(AP, 1/15/05)
2005
Jan 15, Police and militants fought
a gun battle in
a small Kuwaiti town near a US military logistics center, leaving one
Saudi
gunman dead and two policemen wounded.
(AP, 1/15/05)
2005
Jan 15, Gunmen shot and killed
three police
officers as authorities stormed a house in Kaspiisk, a port on the
Caspian Sea
in the Russian province of Dagestan. Riot police and other security
forces
besieged a house in the provincial capital, Makhachkala, where gunmen
were
hiding and one officer was killed.
(AP, 1/16/05)
2006
Jan
15, A spokesman said Rep
Bob Ney, an Ohio Republican implicated in a lobbying corruption
investigation,
will step aside temporarily as chairman of the US House Administration
Committee.
(AP, 1/16/06)
2006
Jan
15, Police in
(AFP,
1/15/06)(SFC, 9/5/08,
p.A5)(SFC, 10/24/08, p.A4)
2006
Jan 15, The NASA space capsule, Stardust,
returned
safely to Earth in a desert near Salt Lake City with the first dust ever fetched from a comet, a cosmic
bounty that
scientists hope will yield clues to how the solar system formed.
(http://stardust.jpl.nasa.gov/photo/er.html)(AP, 1/15/06)
2006
Jan
15, In southern
Afghanistan a suicide car bomb hit a Canadian military convoy, killing
three
civilians, including a Canadian diplomat.
(AP, 1/15/06)
2006
Jan 15, Chileans voted in a
presidential runoff
election that pitted Michelle Bachelet, a socialist pediatrician
promising to
maintain the country's free-market policies, against Sebastian Pinera,
a
Harvard-trained economist and multimillionaire businessman vowing to
fight
poverty. Michelle Bachelet (54) won the elections with 53% of the vote,
compared to 46% for Pinera.
(AP, 1/16/06)
2006
Jan 15, Finnish President Tarja
Halonen won the
first round of the country's presidential election, but failed to
obtain an
absolute majority and will be forced into a runoff.
(AP, 1/15/06)
2006
Jan
15, Iran’s Pres. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad proposed his 1st budget bill. The
government
expected some $36 billion in oil revenues, promised to build 300,000
housing units
and planned to maintain energy subsidies amounting to 10% of GDP.
(Econ, 2/11/06,
p.45)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmoud_Ahmadinezhad)
2006
Jan 15, Iran said it would sponsor
a conference to
examine the scientific evidence supporting the Holocaust.
(AP, 1/15/06)
2006
Jan 15, The US military freed 509
Iraqi detainees
from three prisons in Iraq, including two journalists who work for
Reuters.
(AFP, 1/15/06)
2006
Jan 15, Israel’s acting PM Ehud
Olmert faced his first major
test when he led his Cabinet in a unanimous decision to let
Palestinians vote
in Jerusalem later this month.
(AP, 1/15/06)
2006
Jan 15, Crown prince Sheik Saad Al
Abdullah Al
Sabah, in his mid-70s and ailing himself, assumed the throne of Kuwait
following the death of emir Sheik Jaber Al Ahmed Al Sabah.
(AP, 1/15/06)
2006
Jan
15, In Malaysia a
homemade bomb filled with nails and bullet casings exploded outside a
shopping
mall on Penang island, killing one man and injuring another.
(AP, 1/16/06)
2006
Jan 15, Separatist gunmen shot dead
several
Nigerian troops and overran an oil plant run by the Anglo-Dutch Shell,
amid
fears for the safety of four kidnapped foreign workers. The Movement
for the
Emancipation of the Nigerian Delta (MEND) claimed responsibility. MEND
told Shell
to pay $1.5 billion to the state of Bayelsa for pollution it said Shell
has
caused.
(AFP, 1/15/06)(Econ, 1/21/06,
p.47)
2006
Jan 15, North Korea news reported
that North Korea
has awarded a medal for the first time to an American, Ellsworth Culver
(1927-2005),
the late leader of Mercy Corps, a U.S.-based aid group, for his efforts
to help
the communist state fight hunger and poverty.
(AP, 1/15/06)
2006
Jan 15, An overcrowded boat
capsized during a
religious sea parade in a remote central Philippine province, and at
least 16
people drowned and more were missing.
(AP, 1/15/06)
2006
Jan 15, Taiwan's ruling party
elected a former
close aide to President Chen Shui-bian as its new leader, a move seen
as an
endorsement of Chen and his pro-independence stance.
(AFP, 1/15/06)
2006
Jan 15, A Turkish girl died from
suspected bird
flu, while her brother was critically ill in hospital after testing
positive
for the virus.
(Reuters, 1/15/06)
2007
Jan
15, In the 64th Golden Globe Awards the
film "Babel" won for best dramatic film;
"Dreamgirls" was
named best musical or comedy; "Grey’s
Anatomy" won best dramatic television series, while
"Ugly Betty" won for best TV musical or comedy series. Forest
Whitaker won the film actor award for “The Last King of Scotland; Helen
Mirren
won the film actress award for “The Queen.”
(SFC, 1/16/07, p.E1)(AP, 1/15/08)
2007
Jan
15, California’s top agricultural official said 3 days of freezing
temperatures
had ruined as much as 70% of the state’s citrus crop.
(SFC, 1/16/07, p.A1)
2007
Jan 15, The death toll from a
powerful winter storm
rose to 36 across six states as utility crews labored to restore
service to
hundreds of thousands of Missouri households and businesses enduring
cold
weather without electricity for heat and lights.
(AP, 1/15/07)
2007
Jan
15, Richard Musgrave (b.1910), German-born American economist and
Harvard
professor (1965-1981), died in Santa Cruz, Ca. His books included the
classic
textbook: “The Theory of Public Finance: A Study in Public Economy.”
(SFC, 1/22/07, p.B4)
2007
Jan 15, In southern Afghanistan
NATO troops
attacked a militant base in an operation that left one Western soldier
dead and
several wounded. 13 suspected Taliban militants were killed and 17
others were
wounded during the clash with NATO troops. Gunmen in the east killed a
deputy
provincial council chief. Afghan agents arrested Abul Haq Haqiq, aka
Dr.
Mohammad Hanif, one of two spokesmen who often contacted journalists on
behalf
of the Taliban, in eastern Afghanistan. He said that fugitive leader
Mullah
Mohammad Omar is under the protection of the ISI in Quetta. (ISI is
Pakistan's
Inter-Services Intelligence agency and Quetta is a city in southwestern
Pakistan near the border with Afghanistan.) Afghan officials have
alleged some
of the Taliban's leadership may be based there.
(AP, 1/15/07)(AP,
1/16/07)(AFP, 1/17/07)
2007
Jan 15, A British prosecutor told
a jury that 6 men
plotted to kill London subway and bus passengers with bombs made from
hydrogen
peroxide and flour on July 21, 2005, two weeks after suicide bombers
killed 52
commuters in the city. The devices failed to explode.
(AP, 1/15/07)
2007
Jan 15, It was reported that a
team at the British institute that cloned
Dolly the sheep have made a genetically engineered chicken that
produces cancer
drugs in its eggs. The proteins they chose were miR24, a monoclonal
antibody
with potential for treating melanoma, and human interferon b-1a, an
immune
system protein from a family of proteins that attacks tumors and
viruses.
(Reuters, 1/15/07)
2007
Jan 15, More than 100 rebels
attacked a
northwestern town in the Central African Republic, sparking the first
fighting
with government troops in more than a month.
(AP, 1/15/07)
2007
Jan 15, Anti-government rebels in
Chad said they
have captured a new location in the far north of the central African
country
after ending a truce at the weekend. Chadian defense minister, General
Bichara
Issa Djadallah, denied the rebel claim.
(AFP, 1/15/07)
2007
Jan 15, More than 500 armed
militants in Chechnya and
other parts of Russia's troubled North Caucasus surrendered to
authorities as
part of an amnesty that expired at day’s end.
(AP, 1/15/07)
2007
Jan 15, Bo Yibo (b.1908), one of
China's first
Communist revolutionaries and a member of the post-Mao circle of
leaders known
as the "eight immortals," died in Beijing.
(AFP, 1/16/07)
2007
Jan 15, In Colombia Eugenio
Montoya Sanchez (37), believed by
authorities to be a leader of the Norte del Valle drug cartel, was
captured
following a shootout, ending a years-long hunt for a man wanted by
American
officials for allegedly smuggling tons of cocaine into the
(AP, 1/16/07)(AP,
1/19/07)(Econ,
1/20/07, p.48)(SFC,
4/29/09,
p.A4)
2007
Jan 15, In Ecuador nationalist
Rafael Correa was sworn in as
president. He pledged to fight a political establishment widely
discredited as
corrupt. He signed a decree calling a referendum for a Constituent
Assembly and
doubled a monthly welfare payment to $30 for some 1.3 million of the
poorest
people.
(AP, 1/15/07)(Econ, 1/20/07, p.48)(Econ, 4/21/07,
p.39)
2007
Jan 15, In India hundreds of Hindu holy men, naked but for
the ash smeared on their bodies and an occasional marigold garland, led
a sea
of humanity to the waters of the Ganges River to wash away their sins
at the
apex of a weekslong pilgrimage.
(AP, 1/15/07)
2007
Jan 15, Two
top aides to Saddam Hussein were hanged
before dawn, and the head of one of them, the former Iraqi dictator's
half
brother Barzan Ibrahim, was severed from his body during the execution.
3
policemen were killed and two hurt when a roadside bomb targeted their
car in a
southeastern section of Baghdad.
(AP, 1/15/07)
2007
Jan 15, The Israeli government
published plans to
build 44 homes in Israel's largest West Bank settlement, violating a
pledge to
the US as Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was in the region on a
peace-seeking mission.
(AP, 1/15/07)
2007
Jan
15, An Israeli court
ruled that a dead soldier's family can have his sperm impregnated into
the body
of a woman he never met.
(AP, 1/29/07)
2007
Jan 15, Kyrgyzstan Pres. Bakiyev
signed into law
constitutional amendments strengthening his powers that he had pushed
through
after threatening to dissolve parliament.
(AP, 1/15/07)
2007
Jan 15, President Felipe Calderon
launched a
program to create jobs for young Mexicans and curb the flow of millions
of
migrants to the United States.
(AP, 1/15/07)
2007
Jan 15, The editor and a journalist
at a Moroccan
news weekly that published jokes relating to Islam were convicted of
insulting
the religion. The court gave three-year suspended sentences to Driss
Ksikes,
editor of Nichane, and to journalist Sanaa al-Aji. Both were barred
from
journalistic activity with Nichane for two months and the independent
Arab-language magazine was suspended for two months. They were fined
$9,280
each.
(AP, 1/15/07)(AP,
1/30/07)
2007
Jan 15, Nepal’s Parliament was
dissolved and replaced by an
interim legislature including former communist rebels, a major step to
co-opt
the ex-guerrillas into mainstream Nepalese politics after they agreed
to end
their decade-long insurgency.
(AP, 1/15/07)
2007
Jan 15, Some 2,000 ethnic Pashtun
tribesmen rallied
in this Pakistani border town near Afghanistan to condemn the Pakistani
government for new border control measures.
(AP, 1/15/07)
2007
Jan 15, Russian authorities
began cracking down on millions of illegal migrants throughout
Russia as new rules tightening government control of migration came
into
effect, prompting concerns that the country could face serious
shortages of
low-wage laborers.
(AP, 1/15/07)
2007
Jan 15, A cargo ship and a commuter
hydrofoil
collided near the entrance to the Sicilian port of Messina, killing
four people
and leaving dozens of passengers injured.
(AP, 1/16/07)
2007
Jan 15, Somali troops and allied
Ethiopian soldiers
conducted house-to-house searches, pursuing gunmen who carried out an
attack in
the northeastern part of the capital.
(AP, 1/15/07)
2007
Jan 15, In South Korea unionized
workers at Hyundai Motor Co.
began a promised partial strike amid a dispute with management over
bonuses.
(AP, 1/15/07)
2008
Jan
15, Pres. Bush signed an exemption to allow the US Navy to continue
using
high-power sonar off the coast of Southern California. Anti-submarine
warfare
training would still not go forward because an injunction was in place
against
the practice due to its effect on whales and other marine mammals. On
Feb 4 a
federal judge rejected the Bush exemption.
(SFC,
1/17/08,
p.A3)(SFC,
2/5/08,
p.A3)
2008
Jan
15, Republican Mitt Romney won the Michigan primary with 39.4% of the
vote.
McCain got 30% and Huckabee 15.4%.
(SFC,
1/16/08,
p.A11)
2008
Jan 15, A US District judge ordered
the border city of Eagle Pass, Texas, to surrender 233 acres to the
federal
government for the construction of a border fence by the Homeland
Security
Dept.
(SFC,
1/17/08,
p.A5)
2008 Jan 15, US lawyers for the families of seven Americans killed in the Sep, 1989, bombing of French UTA Flight 772 said a federal judge in Washington has ordered Libya and six of its officials to pay more than $6 billion in damages.
(Reuters,
1/16/08)
2008 Jan 15, Citigroup Inc. said it lost $9.8 billion in last year's final three months, the largest quarterly deficit in its 196-year history. The company slashed its dividend and 4,200 jobs as it recorded a mammoth write-down for bad bets on the mortgage industry. Vikram Pandit planned a $14.5 capital infusion from sovereign wealth funds and others.
(AP,
1/15/08)(Econ,
1/19/08,
p.82)
2008 Jan 15, Brad Renfro (25), a street-smart Tennessee schoolboy plucked from obscurity in 1993 to play the title role in "The Client" (1993), was found dead in his home in LA.
(AP,
1/16/08)
2008 Jan 15, A Boeing-built satellite for mobile voice and data services was placed in orbit by a rocket launched from a floating platform in the Pacific Ocean.
(AP,
1/16/08)
2008 Jan 15, Afghan authorities raided a house in Kabul where the alleged attackers on the Serena Hotel had spent the night before the attack. Police found a video showing two of the assailants, identified as Farouq and Salahuddin, saying they were ready to die. The owner of the house and his brother were arrested. Officials said heavy snow, avalanches and cold weather have killed at least 85 people in western Afghanistan in recent days.
(AP,
1/15/08)
2008 Jan 15, Australia's new government told an Indian envoy that it will not sell uranium to his country while it is not a member of the global nonproliferation treaty.
(AP,
1/15/08)
2008 Jan 15, An Australian judge banned the company that conducts Japan's whale hunt from killing the animals in a large part of its regular hunting grounds off Antarctica. Japanese whalers said they are holding captive two activists who "illegally" boarded their vessel in the Southern Ocean, in a dramatic escalation in the battle between the two sides.
(AP,
1/15/08)
2008 Jan 15, Barbados held elections. The opposition swept to power, winning at least 20 of the 30 seats in Barbados' legislature. David Thompson led the Democratic Labor Party back to power and inherited a public debt equal to 88% of GDP.
(AP,
1/16/08)(Econ,
1/19/08,
p.40)
2008
Jan 15, Brazil signed
accords with Cuba offering economic aid and sealed a deal to drill for
oil off
the island’s coast. Brazil’s Pres. Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva Trade with
businessmen in tow signed trade and investment deals totaling some $1
billion.
(WSJ,
1/16/08,
p.A1)(Econ, 6/28/08, p.45)
2008 Jan 15, Britain and Russia traded threats and recrimination as a diplomatic feud over the role of the British government's cultural arm worsened.
(Reuters,
1/15/08)
2008 Jan 15, The Canadian government fired the country's top nuclear watchdog, criticizing her for how she handled the closure of a key reactor which makes medical radioisotopes.
(Reuters,
1/16/08)
2008 Jan 15, Finland's Nokia, the top global mobile phone manufacturer, said that it planned to close a factory in Germany by mid-year which employs 2,300 workers.
(AFP,
1/15/08)
2008 Jan 15, The French government announced during a visit by Pres. Sarkozy that it will set up a permanent military base of up to 500 troops in the United Arab Emirates.
(AP,
1/15/08)
2008 Jan 15, In Georgia tens of thousands of people demonstrated in Tbilisi, pressing for a presidential runoff but celebrating an agreement giving the opposition more control over the main state-funded television station.
(AP,
1/15/08)
2008 Jan 15, India confirmed a bird flu outbreak among poultry following the death of thousands of chickens in the past week in the state of West Bengal. A train collided with a packed auto rickshaw in eastern India, killing nine people and injuring two.
(AFP,
1/15/08)(AP, 1/15/08)
2008 Jan 15, In Iraq 5 school children were killed after being struck by a car in the convoy of a top judicial official during a chaotic gunbattle with checkpoint guards in Baghdad.
(AP,
1/16/08)
2008 Jan 15, Israeli tanks and helicopters raided Gaza, killing the son of the territory's most powerful leader and 16 other Palestinians in the bloodiest day of fighting since Hamas seized the coastal strip in June.
(AP,
1/15/08)
2008 Jan 15, Kenya’s legislators chose an opposition member as parliament speaker in a close vote, giving a victory to foes of the president as they prepared for mass protest rallies. Grace Kaindi, the police chief of Kisumu, said she had ordered her officers to fire on a rioting crowd, saying she was forced to because police were overwhelmed during protests over disputed elections. Of the 612 deaths government officials have attributed to election violence, 53 were in Kisumu; hospital records show 44 of those were killed by police bullets.
(AP,
1/16/08)
2008 Jan 15, An explosion targeted a US Embassy vehicle in northern Beirut, killing four Lebanese and injuring a local embassy employee.
(AP,
1/15/08)
2008 Jan 15, In Mexico before dawn Margarito Saldana, Tijuana district commander, was shot dead while he slept in his home.
(AP,
1/15/08)
2008 Jan 15, In Nigeria a civilian was killed and two policemen injured in an overnight attack on the convoy of a port authority official in the oil hub city Port Harcourt. Anglo-Dutch energy giant Shell said that local people were hampering efforts to repair the sabotaged pipelines at the Forcados export terminal in southern Nigeria.
(AFP,
1/15/08)
2008 Jan 15, In Pakistan some 200 Islamic militants overran the Sararogha Fort close to the Afghan border breaking through the walls with rockets. The battle killed seven soldiers and left 20 missing. The military said 50 attackers died.
(AP,
1/16/08)
2008 Jan 15, In the Philippines gunmen ransacked a Roman Catholic school in the southernmost Tawi-Tawi Island, fatally shooting Reynaldo Roda (55), a priest who had received death threats from Muslim militants and abducting a teacher.
(AP,
1/16/08)
2008 Jan 15, In Saudi Arabia Pres. Bush urged OPEC nations to put more oil on the world market and warned that soaring prices could cause an economic slowdown in the US. The kingdom's oil minister said Saudi Arabia will raise oil production when the market justifies it.
(AP,
1/15/08)
2008 Jan 15, A southern official said in the local press that troops from northern Sudan are hiding out in bushes of south Sudan in defiance of a peace deal requirement to withdraw.
(AFP,
1/15/08)
2008 Jan 15, Singing schoolchildren welcomed Taiwanese President Chen Shui-bian to St. Lucia for his first visit since the small Caribbean island shifted diplomatic ties to Taipei instead of rival China.
(AP,
1/16/08)
2008 Jan 15, In southern Thailand suspected Muslim insurgents exploded a bomb that left at least 39 people injured in a market in Yala.
(AP,
1/15/08)
2008 Jan 15, Turkish warplanes bombed Kurdish rebel targets in northern Iraq in the latest in a series of cross-border air strikes.
(AFP,
1/15/08)
2009 Jan 15, Pres. George W. Bush offered his own first draft of history, summarizing eight years in office. He told the country that while his policies have been unpopular, there can be little debate about the results saying America has gone more than seven years without another terrorist attack on our soil.
(AP, 1/16/09)
2009 Jan 15, Pres. Bush passed new rules to end over fishing of 40 struggling marine species. Under the rules the nation’s 8 regional fishery management councils must draw up measures to end over fishing by 2010.
(WSJ, 1/26/09, p.A2)
2009 Jan 15, Eric Holder, Obama’s choice for attorney general, called waterboarding torture and vowed to shut Guantanamo.
(WSJ, 1/16/09, p.A1)
2009 Jan 15, Roland Burris was sworn in as junior senator from Illinois.
(SFC, 1/16/09, p.A4)
2009 Jan 15, The US dollar strengthened against the ruble to a record 32.40 rubles, well above the high set in 2003. The depreciation was expected to continue.
(WSJ, 1/16/09, p.C8)
2009 Jan 15, A US Airways Airbus A320 jetliner, piloted by Chesley B. Sullenberger and bound for Charlotte, NC, landed in the Hudson River after both engines failed shortly after takeoff from LaGuardia and an encounter with a flock of geese. All 155 people aboard Flight 1549 survived.
(AP, 1/16/09)(WSJ, 1/16/09, p.A3)
2009 Jan 15, In western Afghanistan Gen. Fazaludin Sayar, a top Afghan army general, was killed in a helicopter crash. All 12 others aboard were also killed.
(AP, 1/15/09)
2009 Jan 15, Australia's tropical Queensland state declared a flood disaster over an area the size of France and Germany after recent monsoon storms. The floods are eventually expected to move inland, helping fill lakes and relieving a long-running drought in parts of Australia's desert interior and tropical north.
(Reuters, 1/20/09)
2009 Jan 15, The British government announced its support for a controversial third runway at London's chronically overcrowded Heathrow Airport, despite angry opposition from green groups and locals.
(AP, 1/15/09)
2009 Jan 15, Bulgarians held a rally outside parliament for the second day to demand that their government resign because of alleged corruption and a deepening economic crisis.
(AP, 1/15/09)
2009 Jan 15, A police official said Chinese authorities have detained 13 members of a gang suspected of kidnapping and selling children, sometimes swooping by on motorcycles and snatching them in broad daylight. Xinhua News Agency said Su Tonghua (21) was arrested on Dec. 31. His 12 accomplices were arrested last week.
(AP, 1/15/09)
2009 Jan 15, Denmark's central bank lowered its key interest rate by 0.75 to 3 percent.
(AP, 1/15/09)
2009 Jan 15, The European Central Bank cuts its key rate by half a point to 2%, matching its lowest level ever, set in December 2005.
(WSJ, 1/16/09, p.A5)
2009 Jan 15, The last Ethiopian troops backing Somalia's fragile government left Mogadishu, as Islamist forces took control of bases that the Ethiopians had vacated. An Islamist court under Shabab publicly executed politician Abdirahman Ahmed (55) to death by firing squad for showing sympathy for Christianity.
(AP, 1/15/09)(Econ, 2/28/09, p.48)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abdirahman_Ahmed)
2009 Jan 15, In Hong Kong Grace Mugabe (43), the wife of Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe, struck a photographer in the face repeatedly as her bodyguard grabbed him when he was trying to snap photos of her leaving the five-star Kowloon Shangri-la Hotel. She was later granted diplomatic immunity from prosecution over her alleged assault of the British journalist.
(AFP, 3/22/09)(http://tinyurl.com/clw9hb)
2009 Jan 15, Iraq's minister of higher education escaped injury when a roadside bomb exploded near his convoy in central Baghdad. A government security guard was killed and four people were wounded in another blast. Iraqi police arrested 13 suspected Sunni insurgents north of Baghdad, including three senior members of an al-Qaida front group.
(AP, 1/15/09)
2009 Jan 15, The Irish government nationalized Anglo Irish Bank after its chairman, Sean Fitzpatrick, failed to disclose some €83 million in personal loans.
(Econ, 2/28/09, p.54)(www.gavinsblog.com/2009/01/15/anglo-irish-bank-nationalised/)
2009 Jan 15, Israel shelled the United Nations headquarters in the Gaza Strip, engulfing the compound and the main warehouse in fire and destroying thousands of pounds of food and humanitarian supplies intended for Palestinian refugees. Fighting killed at least 70 people including 2 top Hamas leaders, Said Siam (49), the minister of the interior, and deputy Salah Abu Sharah. Gaza medical officials said 1,100 Palestinians have been killed since Israel's offensive started Dec. 27.
(AP, 1/15/09)(SFC, 1/16/09, p.A2)
2009 Jan 15, Kazakh lawmakers approved legislation to guarantee at least two political parties are represented in parliament, a move designed to improve the Central Asian nation's tarnished democratic credentials.
(AP, 1/15/09)
2009 Jan 15, A Luxembourg court ordered Swiss bank UBS AG to pay French financial company Oddo & Cie euro30 million ($40 million) it had invested in a fund linked to the alleged fraud perpetrated by US financier Bernard Madoff.
(AP, 1/15/09)
2009 Jan 15, Police in New Zealand said they had nabbed a man who was trying to crack a bar's safe after posting security camera footage of the act on the Internet networking site Facebook.
(AP, 1/15/09)
2009 Jan 15, Pakistani officials said 71 people have been arrested in a crackdown on groups allegedly linked to the Mumbai attacks, while adding that the information India has handed over needs work before it can be used as evidence in court. Pakistan also said security forces had closed five training camps run by Lashkar-e-Taiba, the group blamed for the Mumbai attack, and arrested the entire top, middle and lower-level leadership and those of a related charity. Security forces killed and injured a large number of militants in the Swat valley in the country's northwest. Four local militant commanders died in the clash.
(AP, 1/15/09)(Reuters, 1/15/09)(AP, 1/16/09)(WSJ, 1/16/09, p.A5)
2009 Jan 15, In the Philippines gunmen abducted three Red Cross workers in a southern Muslim militant stronghold, prompting a search operation by US-backed Filipino troops through dense jungles in the country's worst foreign hostage crisis in nearly eight years. Seven suspects including three police officers were later arrested in connection with a wide-ranging official enquiry into the abductions on the southern island of Jolo. Eugenio Vagni (63), Italian Red Cross worker, was released on July 11. A Swiss and a Filipino, had been freed earlier in the year by the militants.
(AP, 1/15/09)(AFP, 4/6/09)(AP, 7/11/09)
2009 Jan 15, The US Air Force began airlifting heavy machinery to Rwandan troops serving in an international mission in Darfur, the first time the new US Africa Command has undertaken a large-scale peacekeeper support operation.
(AP, 1/15/09)
2009 Jan 15, Swiss pharmaceutical giant Novartis AG said it has secured a $486 million contract to build a new flu vaccine plant in North Carolina.
(AP, 1/15/09)
2009 Jan 15, Togo agreed to extradite to the US Solano Cortez Jorge, an alleged druglord from Colombia, who was arrested trying to smuggle hundreds of pounds (kilograms) of cocaine through this West African nation last year.
(AP, 1/16/09)
2009 Jan 15, In Turkmenistan Pres. Gurbanguli Berdymukhamedov fired almost one-third of his Cabinet and the head of the state oil company in a large-scale reshuffle reminiscent of his eccentric predecessor's frequent purges.
(AP, 1/16/09)
2009 Jan 15, Ukraine rejected Russia's latest request to pipe natural gas westward to increasingly frustrated EU consumers, deepening the bitter economic and political dispute that has paralyzed energy shipments to Europe.
(AP, 1/15/09)