Today in History - March 2
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871 Mar 2, Battle at Marton (Maeretun): 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)
986 Mar 2, Lotharius (44), King of France (954-86), died.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1121 Mar 2, Dirk VI became count of Holland.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1122 Mar 2, Floris II, the fat one, count of Holland, died.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1127 Mar 2, Charles the Good, Count of Flanders, was murdered. Flemish towns (Ghent, Bruges and Ypres) forced the selection of Thierry of Alsace as the new count despite Louis VI’s choice of the son of Normandy’s Robert Curthose.
(PCh, 1992, p.92)(SC, 3/2/02)
1316 Mar 2, Robert II the Steward, King of Scotland (1371-90), was born.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1333 Mar 2, Wladyslaw IV, the Short One, Great, duke, king of Poland, died.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1402 Mar 2, In Marienburg Svitrigaila crossed over to the Knights of the Cross and promised to uphold the Salyn treaty that was broken by Vytautas.
(LHC, 3/1/03)
1458 Mar 2, Hussite George van Podiebrad was chosen king of Bohemia.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1459 Mar 2, Adrian VI [Adriaan F Boeyens], Netherlands, Pope (1522-23), was born.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1481 Mar 2, Franz von Sickingen, German knight, was born.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1498 Mar 2, Vasco da Gama's fleet visited Mozambique Island.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1629 Mar 2, English King Charles I fleeced the house of commons.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1675 Mar 2, Prince William III was installed as Governor of Overijssel.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1725 Mar 2, George F. Handel’s opera "Giulio Cesare in Egitto" premiered in London.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1776 Mar 2, Americans began shelling British troops in Boston. Henry Knox had managed to drag 58 canon and mortars from Fort Ticonderoga to the Dorchester Heights above Boston.
(HN, 3/2/99)(WSJ, 5/20/05, p.W10)
1776 Mar 2, The American Secret Committee of Correspondence appointed Connecticut lawyer Silas Deane as a special envoy to negotiate with the French government for aid.
(AH, 2/06, p.59)
1789 Mar 2, Pennsylvania ended the prohibition of theatrical performances.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1793 Mar 2, Sam Houston, the first president of the Republic of Texas (1836-38, 1841-44), was born near Lexington, Va. He fought for Texas' independence from Mexico; President of Republic of Texas; U.S. Senator; Texas governor
(AP, 3/2/98)(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)(SC, 3/2/02)
1797 Mar 2, The Directory of Great Britain authorized vessels of war to board and seize neutral vessels, particularly if the ships were American.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1797 Mar 2, Horace [Horatio] Walpole (79), British horror writer, died.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1799 Mar 2, Congress standardized US weights and measures.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1807 Mar 2, US Congress banned slave trade effective January 1, 1808. The further importation of slaves was abolished but an inter-American slave trade continued.
(V.D.-H.K.p.276)(WSJ, 12/16/97, p.A18)(WSJ, 10/19/98, p.A24)(SC, 3/2/02)
1810 Mar 2, Leo XIII (Vincenzo G Pecci), 256th Catholic Pope (1878-1903), was born.
(HN, 3/2/99)(SC, 3/2/02)
1815 Mar 2, To put an end to robberies by the Barbary pirates, the United States declared war on Algiers.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1817 Mar 2, The 1st US Evangelical church building was dedicated in New Berlin, PA.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1819 Mar 2, Territory of Arkansas was organized. [see Jul 4]
(SC, 3/2/02)
1819 Mar 2, US passed its 1st immigration law.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1824 Mar 2, Bedrich Friedrich Smetana (1884), Czech, Bohemian composer (Bartered Bride, Moldau), was born.
(WUD, 1994, p.1345)(WSJ, 10/4/96, p.A7)(SC, 3/2/02)
1824 Mar 2, In the Supreme Court case of Gibbons v Ogden held that the power to regulate interstate commerce was granted to Congress by the Commerce Clause of the Constitution. The Court found that New York's licensing requirement for out-of-state operators was inconsistent with a congressional act regulating the coasting trade. Gibbons had hired Cornelius Vanderbilt as captain of his boat, Bellona, which operated under a federal license.
(Econ, 4/18/09, p.90)(ON, 6/12, p.2)
1825 Mar 2, The 1st grand opera in US sung in English was in NYC.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1829 Mar 2, Carl Schurz, was born. He was a Civil War general, political reformer and anti-imperialist.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1829 Mar 2, New England Asylum for the Blind, 1st in US, was incorporated in Boston.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1831 Mar 2, John Frazee becomes 1st US sculptor to receive a federal commission.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1836 Mar 2, Texas declared its independence from Mexico on Sam Houston's 43rd birthday. The first vice-president was Lorenzo de Zavala. Mexico refused to recognize Texas but diplomatic relations were established with the US, Britain and France. Texas was an independent republic until 1845.
(WSJ, 11/21/95, p.A-12)(WP, 6/29/96, p.A15)(SFC, 4/28/97, p.A3)(AP, 3/2/98)(HN, 3/2/99)
1836 Mar 2, Mexican forces under General Jose de Urrea defeated Texan forces at the Battle of Agua Dulce.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goliad_Campaign)
1853 Mar 2, The Territory of Washington was organized after separating from Oregon Territory. Pres. Franklin Pierce appointed Isaac Ingalls Stevens (1818-1862) as the first governor of the Washington Territory. Stevens served as US Congressman from the territory (1857-1858), and as a major general in the Union Army during the American Civil War. He died at the Battle of Chantilly.
(HN, 3/2/99)(SC, 3/2/02)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Stevens)
1858 Mar 2, Frederick Cook, New Orleans, patented a cotton-bale metallic tie.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1861 Mar 2, The Territory of Nevada was created by an act of Congress. The first elected governor of the state was Henry G. Blasdel. US Congress created the Dakota & Nevada Territories out of the Nebraska & Utah territories
(LVRJ, 11/1/97, p.1B)(SFEC, 7/9/00, DB p.67)(SC, 3/2/02)
1862 Mar 2, Gen’l. Frederick W. Lander (b.1821), transcontinental engineer and Union General, died of “congestion of the brain" at Paw Paw, Virginia. He was the chief engineer of the Central Overland route. In 2000 Gary L. Ecalbarger authored “Frederick W. Lander: The Great Natural American Soldier."
(www.picturehistory.com/find/p/16832/mcms.html)(ACC, 2004)
1863 Mar 2, The US Congress passed the False Claims Act to protect the government from being ripped off by suppliers outfitting the Union army. It is often referred to as the "Lincoln Law," because it was passed under the administration of President Abraham Lincoln.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_Claims_Act)(Econ, 8/30/14, p.22)
1863 Mar 2, Congress authorized track width of 4'-8½" for Union Pacific RR.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1864 Mar 2, Russian Czar Alexander II upheld reforms in Poland that gave landholders ownership of their lands.
(LHC, 3/1/03)
1865 Mar 2, Freedman's Bureau was founded for Black Education.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1865 Mar 2, General Lee proposed peace to Grant. President Abraham Lincoln rejected Confederate General Robert E. Lee's plea for peace talks, demanding unconditional surrender.
(HFA, ‘96, p.22)(HN, 3/2/99)
1865 Mar 2, General Early's army was defeated at Waynesborough.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1865 Mar 2, British newspaper "Morning Chronicle" began publishing.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1866 Mar 2, Excelsior Needle Company of Wolcottville, Connecticut, began making sewing machine needles, the 1st US company to make sewing needles.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)(SC, 3/2/02)
1867 Mar 2, The first Reconstruction Act was passed by Congress.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1867 Mar 2, Congress abolished peonage in New Mexico.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1867 Mar 2, US Congress created the Department of Education.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1867 Mar 2, Howard University, Washington DC, was incorporated. General Oliver Otis Howard, Union Civil War commander, co-founded Howard Univ.
(http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/today/nov20.html)(ON, 4/07, p.8)
1867 Mar 2, Jesse James-gang robbed a bank in Savannah MO, 1 dead.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1868 Mar 2, University of Illinois opened.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1873 Mar 2, George Smith, British Assyriologist, arrived at the ruins of Nineveh outside Mosul (Iraq). Over the next few weeks he found tablets referring to more pieces of the Gilgamesh story, a record of kings in the Babylionian dynasties, as wellas lists of cuneiform symbols.
(ON, 11/07, p.5)
1874 Mar 2, Baseball batter's box was officially adopted.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1876 Mar 2, Pius XII [Eugenio MGG Pacelli], 260th Pope (1939-58), was born to an aristocratic Roman family accustomed to serving the Catholic Church.
(SFEC, 9/26/99, BR p.3)(SC, 3/2/02)
1877 Mar 2, Republican Rutherford B. Hayes was declared winner of the 1876 presidential election over Democrat Samuel J. Tilden, even though Tilden had won the popular vote 50.1 to 47.95%. A special US congressional panel had awarded Florida’s electors to Rutherford B. Hayes.
(PCh, 1992, p.542)(AP, 3/2/98)(WSJ, 12/11/00, p.A18)
http://condor.stcloudstate.edu/~brixr01/theTIMEMACHINE.html
1879 Mar 2, Julia Martha Thomas (55), a wealthy widow, was killed by her housekeeper Kate Webster (29) very close to Park Road in well-to-do Richmond, England, but her head was never found. Webster was tried and executed, but Thomas’ head was never found until it was unearthed in October, 2010, by workmen building an extension at the home of David Attenborough, the face of BBC natural history programs for more than 50 years. In 2011 the skull was formally recognized as that of Julia Martha Thomas.
(AFP, 7/6/11)
1887 Mar 2, The American Trotting Association was organized in Detroit, Mich., on this day.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1889 Mar 2, Congress passed the Indian Appropriations Bill, proclaiming unassigned lands in the public domain; the first step toward the famous Oklahoma Land Rush.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1889 Mar 2, Kansas passed 1st US antitrust legislation.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1893 Mar 2, 1st federal railroad legislation was passed; required safety features.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1895 Mar 2, Berthe Morisot (b.1841) French impressionist painter, died of pneumonia.
(NMWA, 12/04, p.10)
1896 Mar 2, Bone Mizell, the famed cowboy of Florida, was sentenced to two years of hard labor in the state pen for cattle rustling. He would only serve a small portion of the sentence.
(HN, 3/2/00)
1897 Mar 2, President Cleveland vetoed legislation that would have required a literacy test for immigrants.
(AP, 3/2/98)
1899 Mar 2, President McKinley signed a measure creating the rank of Admiral of the Navy for Adm. George Dewey.
(AP, 3/299)
1899 Mar 2, Congress established Mount Rainier National Park in Washington state, the nation's 5th national park.
(AP, 3/2/98)(SFC, 8/14/99, p.A6)
1900 Mar 2, Kurt Weill, composer (The Threepenny Opera), Brecht collaborator, was born in Dessau, Germany.
(HN, 3/2/01)(SC, 3/2/02)
1901 Mar 2, US Congress passed the Platt amendment, which limited Cuban autonomy as a condition for withdrawal of US troops. Washington retained the right to intervene militarily in Cuba as a condition of ending the postwar US occupation. The US did in fact intervene several times, and American business and mafia gangs came to dominate many aspects of the island in the run-up to the 1959 revolution.
(HN, 3/2/99)(AP, 2/15/13)
1901 Mar 2, Hawaii's 1st telegraph company opened.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1903 Mar 2, The Martha Washington Hotel opened for business in New York City. The hotel featured 416 rooms and was the first hotel exclusively for women.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1904 Mar 2, Henry Dreyfuss, industrial designer of everything from telephones to the interior of the Boeing 707, was born.
(HN, 3/2/01)
1904 Mar 2, Theodor Seuss Geisel [Dr. Seuss] was born in Springfield, Mass. He was the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of "The Cat in the Hat," "Green Eggs and Ham," "The Grinch Who Stole Christmas" and other children's books.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)(HN, 3/2/99)(SSFC, 5/26/02, Par p.8)
1904 Mar 2, "Official Playing Rules of Professional Base Ball Clubs" was adopted.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1904 Mar 2, Gabriele d'Annunzio's "La figlia di Iorio" premiered in Milan.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1907 Mar 2, Georges Feydeaus' "La Puce à l'Oreille" premiered in Paris, France.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1907 Mar 2, General Louis Botha was named premier of Transvaal.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1908 Mar 2, An international conference on arms reduction opened in London.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1908 Mar 2, Gabriel Lippman introduced the new three-dimensional color photography at the Academy of Sciences.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1909 Mar 2, Great Britain, France, Germany and Italy asked Serbia to set no territorial demands.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1915 Mar 2, British Vice Admiral Carden began bombing of Dardanelles forts.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1915 Mar 2, Vladmir Jabotinsky formed a Jewish military force to fight in Palestine.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1917 Mar 2, President Woodrow Wilson signed the Jones-Shafroth Act giving Puerto Ricans US citizenship. The Jones Act separated the Executive, Judicial, and Legislative branches of Puerto Rican government, provided civil rights to the individual, and created a locally elected bicameral legislature. The two houses were a Senate consisting of 19 members and a 39-member House of Representatives. However, the Governor and the President of the US had the power to veto any law passed by the legislature. Also, the US Congress had the power to stop any action taken by the legislature in Puerto Rico.
(www.loc.gov/rr/hispanic/1898/jonesact.html)(AP, 3/2/98)
1917 Mar 2, Desi Arnaz (Desiderio Alberto Arnez y de Acha III) was born in Santiago, Cuba. His father was the mayor of Santiago.
(www.youns.com/lucy/desiarnaz.asp)
1918 Mar 2, Hubert Bancroft (b.1832) San Francisco-based historian and ethnologist, died in SF. His work included compiling and editing a 39-volume chronicle that traced the saga of the Pacific Coast from the Spanish conquistadors to the Gold Rush. The Bancroft Library at UC Berkeley was named in his honor after UC purchased his book collection in 1905. In 2014 his great-great granddaughter reduced and published his 800-page autobiography as a 225-page book.
(SFC, 5/27/14, p.E1)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hubert_Howe_Bancroft)
1919 Mar 2, The 1st congress of Communist Int’l. opened at the Kremlin.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1920 Mar 2, Karel Capek’s "Loupeznik" premiered in Prague.
(www.enotes.com/peoples-chronology/year-1920/theater-film)
1923 Mar 2, Doc Watson, blue grass singer and guitarist, was born.
(HN, 3/2/01)
1923 Mar 2, The first issue of the weekly periodical, "TIME" appeared on newsstands. The first issue, dated March 3, was 32 pages and featured a charcoal sketch of Congressman Joseph Gurney Cannon on the cover. It was the United States’ first modern newsmagazine. The worldwide Time Magazine was conceived by Henry Luce and Briton Hadden (d.1929) in 1922. Luce and Hadden had just graduated from Yale. In 2006 Isaiah Wilner authored “The Man Time Forgot," a biography of Hadden.
(www.time.com/time/covers/0,16641,19230303,00.html)(WSJ, 1/11/00, p.B1)
1923 Mar 2, In Italy, Mussolini admitted that women have a right to vote, but declares that the time was not right.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1925 Mar 2, State and federal highway officials developed a nationwide route numbering system and adopted the familiar U.S. shield-shaped, numbered marker. For instance, in the east, there is U.S. 1 that runs from New England to Florida and in the west, the corresponding highway, U.S. 101, from Tacoma, WA to San Diego, CA.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1925 Mar 2, Japan's House of Representatives recognized male suffrage.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1925 Mar 2, SDAP-Second-Faction (Dutch Socialists) of parliament demanded drastic disarmament.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1927 Mar 2, Babe Ruth signed a 3-year contract with the New York Yankees for a guarantee of $70,000 a year, thus becoming baseball's highest paid player.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1929 Mar 2, US Congress created Court of Customs and Patent Appeals.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1929 Mar 2, The San Mateo-Hayward Bridge, then called the San Francisco Bay Toll-Bridge, opened. The $7.5 million, 7.1-mile span was for the time the longest in the world. The initial toll was 45 cents per car with an additional nickel for each passenger. On hand were Gov. C.C. Young, SF Mayor James Rolph Jr., and San Mateo Mayor Fred Beer. Pres. Coolidge pressed a button in the white House that sparked the final connection.
(SFEC, 3/8/98, p.W31)(Ind, 3/30/02, 5A)
1930 Mar 2, SF took possession of the Spring Valley Water Co. The company had its headquarters in a 7-storey building at 425 Mason St.
(SFC, 12/17/04, p.F2)(SSFC, 8/24/14, p.C2)
1930 Mar 2, Harry Kuchins made the first indoor glider flight inside the St. Louis, MO, Terminal Building. We laugh hysterically at this and we know you think we make this stuff up, but we don't. It really happened.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1930 Mar 2, Novelist D.H. Lawrence died of tuberculosis in a sanitarium in Vence, France, at the age of 45.
(HN, 3/2/01)
1931 Mar 2, Tom Wolfe, journalist, author (Right Stuff), was born in Richmond, VA.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1931 Mar 2, Mikhail Gorbachev, Soviet Secretary-General (1985-91), was born. He was responsible for restructuring the Soviet economy (perestroika) and openness and information (glasnost). Mikhail Gorbachev rose through the ranks of the Communist Party as an expert in agricultural affairs. Born to a peasant family, Gorbachev worked on a farm as a combine operator before going to Moscow State University in 1950. He joined the party in 1952 and, upon graduation with a law degree in 1955, he became a full-time party official. In 1967 he graduated from the Stavropol Agricultural Institute and was named to the party’s Central Committee in 1971. He was promoted to the party Secretariat in 1978, earning a reputation as an innovator as party secretary of agriculture.
(HN, 3/2/99)(HNQ, 6/17/99)(WSJ, 12/1/07, p.A8)
1933 Mar 2, Hollywood premiered "King Kong" in New York featuring Fay Wray. The film, directed by Meriam C. Cooper, used stop-motion photography and an 18-inch model for Kong. The film saved RKO Studios from bankruptcy. It was re-released in 1938 with a scene excised of Kong ripping at Fay Wray’s dress and then sniffing his finger. It was rated #43 by the Amer. Film Inst. in 1998. In 2001 it was rated the #12 most thrilling film.
(SFC, 4/13/96, p.E5)(SFC, 11/15/97, p.C6)(AP, 3/2/98)(WSJ, 3/19/98, p.R4)
1933 Mar 2, Most powerful earthquake in 180 years hit Japan.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1934 Mar 2, Doug Watkins jazz musician (bass: Pepper-Knepper Quintet, Hank Mobley Quartet, Horace Silver and the Jazz Messengers), was born.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1934 Mar 2, Union Pacific tested a light-weight high-speed passenger train in Omaha.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1935 Mar 2, King Prajadhipok abdicated and left for England. He was replaced by Ananda Mahidol (1925-1946), who became Rama VIII.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ananda_Mahidol)
1938 Mar 2, Landslides and floods cause over 200 deaths in Los Angeles, CA.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1938 Mar 2, Trials of Soviet leaders began in the Soviet Union.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1939 Mar 2, The Massachusetts legislature voted to ratify the Bill of Rights, 147 years after the first 10 amendments to the U.S. Constitution had gone into effect.
(AP, 3/2/98)
1939 Mar 2, Roman Catholic Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli was elected Pope; he took the name Pius XII.
(WSJ, 4/25/97, p.A18)(WSJ, 5/8/97, p.A23)(AP, 3/2/98)
1939 Mar 2, Howard Carter, archeologist, died in London at age 62. He led the discovery of the Tomb of Tutankhamen in 1922.
(ON, 5/00, p.8)
1940 Mar 2, The first televised intercollegiate track meet was seen by TV viewers in New York City as W2XBS presented the action live from Madison Square Garden. New York University won the meet.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1940 Mar 2, Soviet armies conquered Tuppura Island, Finland.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1942 Mar 2, John Irving, novelist (The World According to Garp), was born.
(HN, 3/2/01)
1942 Mar 2, Lou Reed [Louis Firbank], vocalist, guitarist (Walk on the Wild Side, Velvet Underground), was born in Freeport, NY.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1942 Mar 2, 14th Academy Awards: "How Green was My Valley", Gary Cooper and Joan Fontaine won.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1942 Mar 2, Admiral Helfrich departed Java for Ceylon.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1943 Mar 2, George Benson, jazz, blues guitarist (Breezin', This Masquerade), was born.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1943 Mar 2, The battle of the Bismarck Sea began. US and Australian warplanes were able to inflict heavy damage on a Japanese convoy.
(AP, 3/2/07)
1943 Mar 2, The center of Berlin was bombed by the RAF. Some 900 tons of bombs were dropped in a half hour.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1943 Mar 2, 1st transport of Jews from Westerbork, Netherlands, to Sobibor concentration camp.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1944 Mar 2, Lou Reed (Firbank) was born. (singer, songwriter, guitarist: group: Velvet Underground; solo: Walk on the Wild Side, Charley's Girl; I Love You Suzanne; appeared in Paul Simon film: One Trick Pony)
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1944 Mar 2, In the 16th Academy Awards presentation moved from a banquet hall to Graumann's Chinese Theatre in Los Angeles this night. Jennifer Jones (24) won an Oscar for Best Actress in the film, "The Song of Bernadette". Jack Benny was the host that year. Best film was "Casablanca," Paul Lukas won for best actor.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)(SC, 3/2/02)
1944 Mar 2, In Salerno, Italy, fumes from a locomotive stalled in a tunnel suffocated 521 people.
(SFC, 6/4/98, p.A15)(AP, 2/18/04)
1945 Mar 2, The American flag is raised again over Corregidor, with General Douglas MacArthur and members of his staff present. MacArthur, commander of U.S. Army Forces in the Far East, reluctantly fled his headquarters on the rocky Philippine island of Corregidor in March 1942 as the Japanese closed in. MacArthur praised the gallant but futile defense of Corregidor as “an inspiration to carry on the struggle until the Allies should fight their way back" and vowed to return one day. On February 16, 1945, elements of the U.S. Sixth Army began the assault on Corregidor, and after furious fighting, MacArthur made good on his promise.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1945 Mar 2, 8th Air Force bombed Dresden.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1945 Mar 2, King Michael of Romania gave in to Communist government.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1946 Mar 2, Kingman Douglass became deputy director of CIA.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1946 Mar 2, Dutch troops landed on East Bali.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1946 Mar 2, Ho Chi Minh was elected president of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1949 Mar 2, The Lucky Lady II (USAF B-50 Superfortress), landed at Fort Worth, Texas, after completing the first non-stop, round-the-world flight: 23,452-mis in 94 hours.
(AP, 3/2/98)(SC, 3/2/02)
1949 Mar 2, 1st automatic street light was in New Milford, CT.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1950 Mar 2, Karen Carpenter was born. (drummer, singer: Grammy Award-winning group: The Carpenters: Best New Artist, Group w/Vocal: Close to You [1970], We've Only Just Begun, Top of the World, Please Mr. Postman)
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1950 Mar 2, Silly Putty was introduced to the public. Silly Putty was accidentally invented in 1943 by James Wright of General Electric.
(www.sillyputty.com/silly_science/silly_science.htm)(http://tinyurl.com/zwree)
1951 Mar 2, In the 1st NBA All-Star Game: East beat West 111-94 at Boston.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1951 Mar 2, The U.S. Navy launched the K-1, the first modern submarine designed to hunt enemy submarines.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1955 Mar 2, The William Inge play “Bus Stop" opened at the Music Box Theatre in New York.
(AP, 3/2/02)
1955 Mar 2, Claudette Colvin refuses to give up her seat in Montgomery, Alabama, nine months b Rosa Parks' famous arrest for the same offense.
(HN, 3/2/00)
1955 Mar 2, King Norodom Sihanouk of Cambodia put his father on the throne and assumed the position of prime minister.
(SC, 3/2/02)(WSJ, 5/15/03, p.A8)
1956 Mar 2, Morocco tore up the Treaty of Féz and declared independence from France. A protocol on Moroccan independence was signed in Paris.
(HN, 3/2/99)(EWH, 1968, p.1244)(SC, 3/2/02)
1957 Mar 2, Boxer Carlos Ortiz won a technical knockout against Lou Filippo (1925-2009). Filippo was originally awarded a victory in the 1st bout against Ortiz after being hit after the bell, but a Times reporter questioned a member of the California State Athletic Commission about that ruling, and the no-contest decision was invoked. Filippo lost the next fight to Ortiz about a month later, and retired at 23-9-3 with 8 knockouts and one no-contest. Both were later named to the Boxing Hall of Fame. Filippo went on to play a role in all five of the “Rocky" movies.
(www.badlefthook.com/2009/11/5/1117708/lou-filippo-1925-2009)(SFC, 11/6/09, p.C5)
1958 Mar 2, Chart Toppers: Sweet Little Sixteen, Chuck Berry; At the Hop, Danny & the Juniors; Oh Julie, Crescendos; Don't, Elvis Presley.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1958 Mar 2, A multinational expedition led by British geologist and explorer Vivian Fuchs (d.1999 at 91) completed the first overland crossing of Antarctica by way of the South Pole in 99 days.
(SFC, 11/13/99, p.A22)(AP, 3/2/08)
1958 Mar 2, Yemen announced it will join the United Arab Republic (Egypt and Syria).
(SC, 3/2/02)
1959 Mar 2, Miles Davis began recording “Kind of Blue" with John Coltrane, Cannonball Adderly, Philley Joe Jones, Paul Chambers and Bill Evans. Modes rather than chords formed the basis for improvisation on “So What" and “Flamenco Sketches." In 2000 Ashley Kahn authored “Kind of Blue," The Making of the Miles Davis Masterpiece. Eric Nisenson authored “The Making of Kind of Blue: Miles Davis and His Masterpiece."
(SFC, 8/24/98, p.B1)(SFEC, 11/5/00, BR p.1)
1961 Mar 2, "13 Daughters" opened at 54th St Theater NYC for 28 performances.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1962 Mar 2, Jon Bon Jovi (John Bongiovi) was born. (singer, musician, songwriter: You Give Love a Bad Name, Living on a Prayer)
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1962 Mar 2, Wilt "The Stilt" Chamberlain (d.1999 at 63) scored 100 points and broke an NBA record as the Philadelphia Warriors beat the New York Knicks 169-147 in Hershey Pa. before 4,124 fans. Chamberlain broke NBA marks for the most field goal attempts (63), most field goals made (36), most free throws made (28), most points in a half (59), most field goal attempts in a half (37), most field goals made in a half (22), and most field goal attempts in one quarter (21). The 316 total points scored tied an NBA record. The basketball used for the game was stolen by Kerry Ryman (14) after he shook Chamberlain’s hand. Ryman’s ball was auctioned in 2000 for $551,844.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)(SFC, 10/13/99, p.A13)(SFC, 4/29/00, p.A2)
1962 Mar 2, JFK announced US will resume above ground nuclear testing.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1964 Mar 2, Beatles began filming "A Hard Day's Night."
(SC, 3/2/02)
1965 Mar 2, The movie version of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s musical “The Sound of Music," starring Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer, had its world premiere at New York’s Rivoli Theater. The musical, about the Trapp Family, was a hit on the Great White Way for 3-1/2 years and one of the most popular motion pictures of all time. It remains a classic even today. The movie brought instant stardom for Miss Andrews, who went on to star in other singing roles in the theatre, on television, in movies and as a popular recording artist.
(AP, 3/2/05)
1965 Mar 2, More than 150 U.S. and South Vietnamese planes bombed two bases in North Vietnam in the first of the "Rolling Thunder" raids.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1966 Mar 2, Milton Obote stage a coup against Pres. Edward Mutesa (d.1969) and had himself declared president of Uganda. Mutesa, the Baganda king and non-executive president of Uganda, was burned out of his palace and exiled. Mutesa fled Obote’s army and went to London where his son, Ronald Muwenda Mutebi was enrolled in boarding school.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milton_Obote)(WSJ, 12/19/94, A-1,6)(Econ, 7/26/08, p.58)
1966 Mar 2, There were some 215,000 US soldiers in Vietnam. Gen. Westmoreland called for 325,000 by July and 410,000 by December.
(SC, 3/2/02)(Econ, 7/11/09, p.88)
1967 Mar 2, At the 9th Grammy Awards: “Strangers in Night" by Frank Sinatra won Record of the Year and “Michele" by the Beatles won Song of the Year. The song "Winchester Cathedral" by the New Vaudeville Band won the Grammy best contemporary recording category.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammy_Awards_of_1967)
1967 Mar 2, The US performed a nuclear test at its Nevada Test Site. The Rivet III test was part of Operation Latchkey.
(www.absoluteastronomy.com/topics/Operation_Latchkey)
1968 Mar 2, The Poor Peoples' March on Washington, envisioned by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. as a means of dramatizing the plight of the poor of all races, got under way.
{USA, Black History}
(www.project1968.com/in-the-news-may-2-1968.html)
1968 Mar 2, In Switzerland the World Ice Pairs Figure Skating Championship in Geneva was won by Lyudmila Belousova and Oleg Protopopov (USSR). The Ladies Figure Skating Championship was won by Peggy Fleming (USA). The Men's Figure Skating Championship was won by Emmerich Danzer (Austria).
(SC, 3/2/02)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Figure_Skating_Championships)
1968 Mar 17, The siege of Khe Sanh was the longest and bloodiest battle of the Vietnam War. During the siege Manny Babbit was wounded. Babbit in 1980 killed a 78-year-old woman in Sacramento, Ca., and was convicted and sentenced to death. He was awarded his Purple Heart while on death row in 1998.
(SFC, 3/20/98, p.A1)
1968 Mar 2, The USSR launched space probe Zond 4. It failed to leave Earth orbit.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zond_4)
1969 Mar 2, Dmitri Shostakovich, Russian composer, completed his 14th Symphony.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symphony_No._14_(Shostakovich))(http://tinyurl.com/66tpar)
1969 Mar 2, Phil Esposito of the Boston Bruins became the 1st NHL Player to score 100 points in a season.
(www.nhl.com/history/030269.html)
1969 Mar 2, The Concorde jetliner's 1st test flight took place in Bristol, England.
(www.xent.com/pipermail/fork/Week-of-Mon-20031013/026200.html)
1969 Mar 2, Chinese and Russian soldiers clashed on Damansky Island and approximately 70 died. The Soviet and Chinese border troops had been skirmishing since 1959 along the 2,500 mile border. Recent skirmishes were along the Ussuri River border. The Soviets used a full scale tank assault to repulse a Chinese attack on the island of Damansky. A border treaty in the 1990s gave the island to China.
(www.jstor.org/pss/1957173)(WSJ, 11/19/96, p.A1)(SFC, 12/28/96, p.A13)(WSJ, 12/16/05, p.A1)(http://tinyurl.com/n43dsd4)
1970 Mar 2, The US Supreme Court set age 23 as the cut-off for prosecuting men who fail to register for the draft on their 18th birthday.
(http://tinyurl.com/4urpvk)
1972 Mar 2, Pioneer 10 was launched from Cape Kennedy. It carried a plaque designed by Carl Sagan and Frank Drake showing some details of human civilization on Earth. The craft headed to Jupiter and then continued into deep space long past expectations. In 2001 contact was re-established with the craft 7.29 billion miles distant and enroute toward the constellation Taurus. Contact was again made in 2002. Pioneer was expected to reach the red star Aldebaran in Taurus in about 2 million years.
(SFC, 3/4/96, p.A5)(SFEC, 9/28/97, p.A14)(SFC, 4/30/01, p.A7)
1972 Mar 2, Jean-Bédel Bokassa appointed himself President for life of the Central African Republic.
(www.etat.sciencespobordeaux.fr/_anglais/chronologie/centralafrican.html)
1972 Mar 2, In Jamaica Michael Manley (1924-1997, Socialist and champion of the nonaligned movement, was sworn in as prime minister.
(SFC, 3/8/96, p.A21)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Manley)
1973 Mar 2, Federal forces surrounded Wounded Knee, South Dakota, which was occupied by members of the militant American Indian Movement who were holding at least 10 hostages.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1973 Mar 2, Arab commandos, "Black September" terrorists, led by Abu Jihad executed 3 hostages: US ambassador Cleo A. Noel (54), deputy George Curtis Moore (47) and Belgian charge d’affaires Guy Eid (38), in Khartoum, Sudan. Pres. Nixon refused their demands. The operation was later reported to have been organized by Yasser Arafat.
(WSJ, 1/10/02, p.A12)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khartoum_diplomatic_assassinations)
1974 Mar 2, In the 16th Grammy Awards Roberta Flack won for the song “Killing Me Softly" & Bette Midler won as Best New Artist. Stevie Wonder got five Grammy Awards for his album, "Innervisions" and his hit songs, "You Are The Sunshine of My Life" and "Superstition".
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammy_Awards_of_1974)
1974 Mar 2, US 1st class postage stamps rose from 8 cents to 10 cents.
(www.akdart.com/postrate.html)
1974 Mar 2, In Spain Catalan activist Salvador Puig (b.1948) became the world’s last person to be garroted. He was executed by the Francoist regime after being tried by a military tribunal and found guilty of the death of a Spanish gendarme.
(SFC, 1/1/15, p.D1)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salvador_Puig_Antich)
1975 Mar 2, Linda McCartney (1941-1998) was arrested in Los Angeles with possession of marijuana.
(www.philbrodieband.com/music_trivia-yesterdays_march.htm)
1975 Mar 2, Madeleine Vionnet (b.1876), French dressmaker, died at age 98. In 1999 Betty Kirke published the biography: "Madeleine Vionnet."
(SFEC, 5/16/99, BR p.8)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madeleine_Vionnet)
1976 Mar 2, The musical revue Bubbling Brown Sugar" opened at ANTA Theater in NYC for 766 performances.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bubbling_Brown_Sugar)
1976 Mar 2, Bob Lurie (b.1929), real estate magnate, led a group to acquire ownership of the San Francisco Giants baseball club.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Lurie)
1977 Mar 2, Bette Davis (1908-1989) became the 1st woman to receive Life Achievement Award.
(www.worldofquotes.com/history/3_2/7/index.html)
1977 Mar 2, Future Tonight Show host Jay Leno debuted with host Johnny Carson.
(www.lvol.com/bios/e136.html)
1977 Mar 2, The U.S. House of Representatives adopted a strict code of ethics.
(AP, 3/2/00)
1977 Mar 2, Libya amended its constitution and changed its name from The Libyan Arab Republic to The Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahirya.
(http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/dr_ibrahim_ighneiwa/libyans.htm)
1978 Mar 2, Sam Shepard’s play "Curse of the Starving Class" premiered at the New York Shakespeare Festival.
(SFEC, 5/30/99, DB p.37)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curse_of_the_Starving_Class)
1978 Mar 2, Soyuz 28 carried 2 cosmonauts to Salyut 6. Czech pilot Vladimir Remek became the first non-Russian, non-American in space.
(HN, 3/2/99)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soyuz_28)
1980 Mar 2, Snow fell in Florida.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_snow_events_in_Florida)
1981 Mar 2, Howard Stern began broadcasting on WWDC in Washington DC.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1981 Mar 2, The United States planned to send 20 more advisors and $25 million in military aid to El Salvador.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1981 Mar 2, A Pakistan Airways Boeing 720 was hijacked by 3 Pakistani terrorists. The passengers and crew were released March 15 in Syria.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/march/15/newsid_2818000/2818437.stm)
1982 Mar 2, Philip K. Dick (53), science fiction writer, died. His work included dozens of novels and over 100 short stories. His novel "Valis" (Vast Active Living Intelligence System) was an autobiographical work. In 1989 Lawrence Sutin wrote the biography: "Divine Invasions: A Life of Philip K. Dick." The 1982 film Blade Runner was loosely based on his novel: "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep." The 2003 film "Paycheck" was based on his 1953 same name novel. In 2004 Emmanuel Carrere authored “I Am Alive and You Are Dead: A Journey Into the Mind of Philip K. Dick.
(WSJ, 4/27/99, p.A20)(SFC, 6/25/02, p.D1)(SFC, 12/27/03, p.D1)(Econ, 4/17/04, p.83)
1982 Mar 2, The French term "région" was officially created by the Law of Decentralization, when by the same act their legal status was conferred. The first direct regional elections for representatives took place on 16 March 1986. France is administratively divided into 26 regions (French: régions), of which 22 are on mainland France, and four are overseas.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regions_of_France)
1982 Mar 2, In Peru over 50 Shining Path terrorists attack the prison of Ayacucho, releasing drug traffickers and 54 terrorists held there. The leader of the attack, Edith Lagos, was killed in the battle.
(www.larouchepub.com/other/1995/2246_sendero.html)
1983 Mar 2, The USSR launched spacecraft "TKS-M" to "Salyut-7" space station, which was named "Cosmos-1443".
(www.videocosmos.com/calendar-march0110.shtm)
1984 Mar 2, One of the first McDonald's franchises was closed in Des Plaines, IL.
(http://tinyurl.com/28tp6z)
1985 Mar 2, Country singer, Gary Morris hit #1 on the country charts for the first time with "Baby Bye Bye" from his album, "Faded Blue". Other chart toppers included: Careless Whisper, Wham! featuring George Michael; California Girls, David Lee Roth; Can't Fight this Feeling, REO Speedwagon.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1985_in_country_music)(http://eightiesclub.tripod.com/id201.htm)
1985 Mar 2, The US government approved a screening test for AIDS that detected antibodies to the virus, allowing possibly contaminated blood to be excluded from the blood supply.
(AP, 3/2/98)
1985 Mar 2, The Gordo cartoon strip, one of the first in the US to celebrate Mexican culture, ended. Gus Arriola (1917-2008) had begun the strip in 1941.
(SSFC, 2/3/08, p.B1)
1985 March 2, The tug Willamette Pilot III sank in heavy seas off the coast of Mendocino, Ca. 6 crew members died.
(SSFC, 3/7/10, DB p.46)
1985 Mar 2, Three Assyrians were executed by the Baath regime of Iraq for distributing literature against the Arabization policies of the government.
(www.unpo.org/article.php?id=741)
1986 Mar 2, Protesters tried to stop the sale of the Land Rover Motor Co. to a US owner.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1987 Mar 2, Two sets of quintuplets were born on the same day in the USA as Rosalind Helms delivered a basketball team of bouncing babies in Peoria, IL and Robin Jenkins became the mother of five in Las Vegas, NV.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1987 Mar 2, US government officials reported that the median price for a new home had topped $100,000 for the first time. The new six-figure price of $110,700 was up from $94,600.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1987 Mar 2, The Macintosh II computer was introduced. The 1st color Mac had a CPU speed of 16 MHz and sold for $3,898.
(SFC, 1/24/04, p.A12)(www.applematters.com/index.php/section/history/2006/03/02/)
1988 Mar 2, In the 30th Grammy Awards: Graceland, Joshua Tree, Jody Watley won.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1988 Mar 2, Dutch Liberal Party merged with SDP.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1988 Mar 2, The U.N. General Assembly voted overwhelmingly to order the United States to submit to binding arbitration its plan to close the observer mission of the Palestine Liberation Organization. A federal court later stopped the U.S.
(AP, 3/2/98)
1989 Mar 2, Madonna's "Like a Prayer" premiered on worldwide Pepsi commercial.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1989 Mar 2, Gloria Estefan (b.1957) and the Miami Sound Machine received the 1st star on the Latin Star Walk on Calle Ocho, the main street of Little Havana in Miami, Fl.
(http://tinyurl.com/czkup)
1989 Mar 2, Exxon Houston ran aground in Hawaii and spilled 117,000 gallons of oil.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1989 Mar 2, Representatives from the 12 European Community nations agreed to ban all production of CFCs (chlorofluorocarbons) by the end of this century.
(AP, 3/299)
1989 Mar 2, A grenade attack in downtown Panama killed a U.S. soldier and injured 28 other people at the My Place discotheque on Via Espania and Calle 50. [AP posted this event as 1990, the EW posted it as 1989]
(AP, 3/2/00)(EW)
1990 Mar 2, More than 6,000 drivers went on strike against Greyhound Lines Inc. The company, later declaring an impasse in negotiations, fired the strikers.
(AP, 3/2/00)
1990 Mar 2, A grenade attack in downtown Panama killed a U.S. soldier and injured 28 other people at the My Place discotheque on Via Espania and Calle 50. [AP posted this event as 1990, the EW posted it as 1989]
(AP, 3/2/00)(EW)
1991 Mar 2, "Aspects of Love" closed at Broadhurst Theater in NYC after 377 performances.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1991 Mar 2, "La Bete" closed at Eugene O'Neill Theater in NYC after 24 performances.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1991 Mar 2, Serge Gainsbourg (b.1928), French singer-songwriter, actor and director, died of a heart attack. His extremely varied musical style and individuality make him difficult to categorize. His legacy has been firmly established, and he is often regarded as one of the world's most influential popular musicians.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serge_Gainsbourg)
1991 Mar 2, The UN Security Council adopted a resolution dictating allied demands that Iraq had to meet before a formal-cease fire was declared in the Persian Gulf War. Iraq released CBS newsman Bob Simon and his crew, held captive for nearly six weeks.
(AP, 3/2/01)
1991 Mar 2, Shiite Muslims in southern Iraq and the Kurds rose up against Iraqi forces but were crushed by Iraqi armor that killed 50,000 and forced more than a million Kurds to flee to Turkey and Iran.
(SFC, 9/4/96, p.A7)(SFC, 9/4/96, p.A8)
1991 Mar 2, Following the Kuwait cease-fire a retreating Iraqi unit stumbled into the Gen. McCaffrey’s 24th infantry division and some 400 Iraqis were reported killed. Army investigations concluded that the Iraqis started the Rumaylah battle.
(SFC, 5/15/00, p.A3)(WSJ, 5/19/00, p.A38)(www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYqoaT0RTFU)
1991 Mar 2, A Tiger car bomb in Colombo, Sri Lanka, killed deputy defense minister Ranjan Wijeratne.
(SFC, 7/24/96, p.A9)
1992 Mar 2, A jury was seated in Simi Valley, Calif., in the assault trial of four Los Angeles police officers charged with beating motorist Rodney King.
(AP, 3/2/02)
1992 Mar 2, Actress Sandy Dennis died in Westport, Conn., at age 54.
(AP, 3/2/02)
1992 Mar 2, The 47th session of the UN General Assembly welcomed eight former Soviet republics and San Marino as its newest members. Kazakhstan’s Pres. Nursultan Nazarbayev proposed to the UN General Assembly an annual reduction of military budgets by 1% and using the money to fund and strengthen UN peace projects.
(AP, 3/2/02)(Econ, 12/16/06, p.81)
1993 Mar 2, In the third day of a standoff between federal agents and Branch Davidians near Waco, Texas, local radio stations broadcast a taped statement in which the group's leader, David Koresh, promised to surrender; however, the standoff continued.
(AP, 3/2/98)
1994 Mar 2, The government of Mexico and Indian rebels reached a tentative accord on most insurgent demands for the ending the rebellion, including sweeping political reforms.
(AP, 3/299)
1995 Mar 2, The US Senate rejected the balanced-budget amendment; the vote, 65-35, was two votes shy of the two-thirds majority needed for passage.
(AP, 3/2/00)
1995 Mar 2, Ted Truman, a top int’l. staffer at the Federal Reserve, reported to Alan Greenspan that massive dollar sales were driving down the US currency. In response the Fed and Treasury bought $600 million in marks and yen and repeated the action next day joined by 13 central banks.
(WSJ, 1/18/05, p.A13)
1995 Mar 2, "Smokey Joe's Café," previewed on Feb 9, opened at Virginia Theater in NYC.
(www.jimsdeli.com/theater/1997-before/smokey-joes-cafe.htm)
1995 Mar 2, The space shuttle STS-67 (Endeavour 8) blasted off to study the far reaches of the universe.
(AP, 3/2/00)
1995 Mar 2, Ferry boat sank off Sumbe, Angola, and over 42 people were killed.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1995 Mar 2, British trader Nick Leeson, blamed for the collapse of Barings PLC, was detained in Germany.
(AP, 3/2/00)
1995 Mar 2, The last U.N. peacekeepers in Somalia were evacuated.
(AP, 3/2/00)
1996 Mar 2, Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole reignited his presidential campaign with an overwhelming victory in the South Carolina Republican primary.
(AP, 3/2/01)
1996 Mar 2, In Australia the first conservative government in 13 years was elected in a landslide victory. John Howard with a pro-business coalition defeated the reformist labor party of Paul Keating.
(WSJ, 3/4/96, p. A-1)(SFC, 11/27/98, p.A16)
1996 Mar 2, Jacobo Majluta (61), President of Dominican Republic (1982), died.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1997 Mar 2, It was revealed that Vice President Gore had raised millions of dollars for the 1996 campaign through direct telephone solicitations, and that some of the calls were made on special phones installed in government buildings for that purpose.
(AP, 3/2/98)
1997 Mar 2, Saudi Arab billionaire Prince al-Waleed bin Talal acquired 5% of Apple.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1997 Mar 2, A storm hit Arkansas with as many as 20 tornadoes and caused major flooding in the Ohio Valley. At least 41 people were killed.
(SFEC, 3/3/97, p.A3)
1997 Mar 2, A state of emergency was declared in Albania and at least 4 demonstrators were killed in Vlora in clashes with police. The Adriatic town of Sarande was sacked by rioters.
(SFEC, 3/3/97, p.A12)(WSJ, 3/3/97, p.A1)
1997 Mar 2, In China Premier Li Peng asked the National People’s Congress for a 12.7% increase in the defense budget for a total of $9.68 billion.
(WSJ, 3/3/97, p.A1)
1997 Mar 2, The Russian Soyuz TM-24 returned to Earth.
(http://space.kursknet.ru/cosmos/english/machines/stm24.sht)
1997 Mar 2, In Spain matadors across the country went on strike as the bullfighting season opened. They favored a policy of shaving bull’s horns that was opposed by the government.
(SFEC, 3/3/97, p.A12)
1997 cMar 2, In Turkey the military submitted a 20-measure package to Prime Minister Erbakan that called for some new laws and stricter application of existing laws to protect secular principles.
(SFC, 3/5/97, p.A8)
1998 Mar 2, Henry Steele Commager (b.1902), American historian and champion of the Constitution, died in Amherst, Mass. He and R.B. Morris edited the 40-volume series "The Rise of the American Nation."
(WSJ, 3/3/98, p.A1)(SFC, 3/3/98, p.D8)
1998 Mar 2, Natascha Kampusch (10) vanished in Vienna, Austria, on her way to school, triggering a massive search that extended into neighboring Hungary. In 2006 Kampusch, who had been held captive in a cellar, managed to escape. Wolfgang Priklopil (44), her alleged abductor, committed suicide by jumping in front of a train. In 2007 Natascha’s mother, Brigitta Sirny authored: "Desperate Years: My life Without Natascha." In 2008 Herwig Haidinger, the former head of Austria's Federal Criminal Investigations Bureau, accused authorities of ignoring a tip in April 1998 from a local policeman that pointed to Priklopil. He also alleged that Interior Ministry officials refused to look into that accusation once Kampusch reappeared, so to avoid a scandal before parliamentary elections that fall.
(AP, 8/24/06)(AP, 8/8/07)(AP, 2/11/08)
1998 Mar 2, U.N. Security Council unanimously endorsed Secretary-General Kofi Annan's deal to open Iraq's presidential palaces to arms inspectors.
(AP, 3/299)
1998 Mar 2, Serb police clashed with 30,000 protesting Albanians in Kosovo.
(WSJ, 3/3/98, p.A1)
1999 Mar 2, Conservative commentator Pat Buchanan launched a third presidential bid.
(AP, 3/2/00)
1999 Mar 2, Texas Governor George W. Bush announced he was forming a presidential exploratory committee.
(AP, 3/2/00)
1999 Mar 2, Hewlett-Packard announced that it would split its non-computer business into a separate company.
(SFC, 3/3/99, p.A1)
1999 Mar 2, In England Dusty Springfield (59), pop-soul singer, died from breast cancer. Her hits included ""You Don't Have to Say You Love Me," "I Just Don't Know What to Do With Myself" and "Son of a Preacher Man."
(SFC, 3/4/99, p.D2)
1999 Mar 2, Israeli leaders made campaign promises to leave Lebanon within a year.
(SFC, 3/3/99, p.A10)
1999 Mar 2, In Atyrau, Kazakhstan, 26 inmates stabbed themselves in the stomach in an attempted mass suicide to protest prison conditions. All survived.
(SFC, 3/5/99, p.D2)
1999 Mar 2, In Kosovo KLA leader Adem Demaci announced that he would step down but would continue to oppose the peace plan. Meanwhile Yugoslav tank and mortar fire pounded rebel positions in the hillsides of the Macedonian border. Demaci was replaced by Hashim Thaci (29).
(SFC, 3/3/99, p.A8)(SFC, 3/4/99, p.A12)
1999 Mar 2, In Sierra Leone the Kamajors militia won the battle for Moyamba after 6 days of heavy fighting. They reported that 200 rebels were killed.
(SFC, 3/3/99, p.A10)
1999 Mar 2, In Uganda Hutu rebels killed 8 hostages and 4 Ugandans. Among the dead were Americans Robert Haubner and Susan Miller of Hillsboro, Ore. They were there to track the mountain gorillas. Uganda insisted that the 2 Americans, 4 Britons and 2 New Zealanders died in a police rescue bid.
(SFC, 3/3/99, p.A1)(WSJ, 3/3/99, p.A1)(SFEC, 3/7/99, p.T14)
2000 Mar 2, A federal jury in Washington convicted Maria Hsia, a friend and political supporter of Vice President Al Gore, for arranging more than $100,000 in illegal donations during the 1996 presidential campaign. Hsia was later sentenced to three months of home confinement.
(AP, 3/2/01)
2000 Mar 2, Merck pledged a $100 million donation of Hepatitis B vaccine to inoculate children in poor nations.
(WSJ, 3/2/00, p.A1)
2000 Mar 2, Dr. Larry C. Ford committed suicide just days after a botched assassination attempt on his business partner at Biofem Inc., of Irvine, Calif. Ford had met with scientists from South Africa's Project Coast in the 1980s to discuss chemical and biological warfare under Wouter Basson, head of the project. Project Coast, which has been accused of trying to create deadly bacteria that would only affect blacks, poisoning opponents' clothing and stockpiling cholera, HIV and anthrax, opened an offshore bank account to pay Ford. In 2002 former FBI informant Peter Fitzpatrick told "60 Minutes" that Ford passed a bag filled with cholera, typhoid, botulism, anthrax and bubonic plague to a South African military doctor during a meeting at the house of the South African trade attache in California.
(AP, 11/3/02)
2000 Mar 2, In Chechnya rebels ambushed Russian troops outside Grozny and killed at least 20 police commandos.
(SFC, 3/4/00, p.A1)
2000 Mar 2, Former Chilean dictator General Augusto Pinochet left Britain for his homeland, hours after he was ruled mentally unfit to stand trial on charges of human rights abuses.
(AP, 3/2/01)
2000 Mar 2, In Israel commandos killed as many as 3-4 Palestinian Hamas militants at Taibeh. They said that 4 simultaneous bombings were scheduled in crowded areas of major cities.
(SFC, 3/3/00, p.A14)(WSJ, 3/3/00, p.A1)
2000 Mar 2, In Kosovo French peacekeepers forced their way through Serb protestors to return 41 Albanians to their homes across the Ibar River.
(SFC, 3/4/00, p.A10)
2000 Mar 2, In the Philippines some 40 rebels of the New People's Army killed 10 soldiers at Balilihan in Bohol province.
(SFC, 3/3/00, p.D4)
2000 Mar 2, Zimbabwe ordered black war veterans to quit white-owned farms.
(WSJ, 3/3/00, p.A1)
2001 Mar 2, In Afghanistan the Taliban began the destruction of the giant Buddha of Bamiyan despite int’l. protests. The United Nations tried in vain to persuade Afghanistan's ruling Taliban to reverse its decision to destroy a pair of giant, ancient statues of Buddha and other Buddhist relics that the regime considered idolatrous.
(SSFC, 3/4/01, p.A1)(SFC, 12/30/01, p.D3)(AP, 3/2/02)
2001 Mar 2, In China 37 members of the banned Falun Gong were sentenced to prison terms of 3-10 years. Most had been convicted of “using a cult to obstruct the law."
(SFC, 3/3/01, p.A12)
2001 Mar 2, In France Alois Brunner, former deputy of Adolf Eichmann, was sentenced to life imprisonment for war crimes against humanity. He was believed to be still alive in Syria, where he fled in 1954.
(SFC, 3/3/01, p.A10)
2001 Mar 2, In Indonesian some 7,000 Madurese refugees escaped from Borneo while some 13,000 still waited in camps for boats. The killing appeared to have stopped.
(SFC, 3/3/01, p.A12)
2001 Mar 2, In Israel the Labor Party chose 8 members to serve in the Cabinet of Ariel Sharon. Shimon Peres was named foreign minister and Benjamin Ben-Eliezer as defense minister.
(SFC, 3/3/01, p.A10)
2001 Mar 2, In the Philippines the Supreme Court affirmed the legitimacy of Pres. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo and denied immunity to former Pres. Estrada.
(SFC, 3/3/01, p.A12)
2001 Mar 2, In Thailand a bomb blast gutted a Thai Airways Boeing 737-400 in Bangkok just before PM Shinawatra was to board. One crew member was killed. It was later reported that the empty center fuel tank of the plane had exploded.
(SFC, 3/5/01, p.A12)(WSJ, 6/26/08, p.A12)
2002 Mar 2, US and Afghan forces attacked hundreds of suspected al Qaeda and Taliban fighters in eastern Afghanistan. 1 US soldier was killed.
(SSFC, 3/3/02, p.A1)
2002 Mar 2, From Brazil it was reported that at least 23 people had died from dengue fever in Rio de Janeiro and that officially some 52,000 had become ill.
(SFC, 3/2/02, p.A10)
2002 Mar 2, In Colombia the bodies of Sen. Martha Catalina Daniels, her driver, Carlos Lozano, and Ana Maria Medina, the wife of a local politician, were found outside Zipacon, 35 miles north of Bogota. FARC was suspected.
(SFC, 3/4/02, p.A3)
2002 Mar 2, Egypt’s Pres. Mubarek (73) began a 4-day visit to the US.
(SSFC, 3/3/02, p.A19)
2002 Mar 2, Rioting spread as the death toll in India's religious strife reached 408.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2002 Mar 2, In Jerusalem a suicide bomber killed himself and 9 others including several children. In the West Bank gunmen opened fire on Israeli motorists and killed 9 people.
(SSFC, 3/3/02, p.A1)
2002 Mar 2-3, Macedonia police killed 7 men who allegedly attempted an ambush near Butel, a suburb of Skopje. Police said the attackers were probably Pakistanis. Foreign officials later discounted these assertions and suspected that they were illegal immigrants. A 2 year investigation followed in the so-called "Rastanski Lozja" action, and revealed police staged the killing to show they were participating in the U.S.-led campaign against terrorism. A bomb blast at the Macedonia consulate in Karachi on Dec 5, 2002, killed 3 people in apparent retaliation.
(SSFC, 3/3/02, p.A15)(WSJ, 3/8/02, p.A8)(SFC, 4/5/02, p.H1)(AP, 4/30/04)(SFC, 5/1/04, p.A7)
2003 Mar 2, Fidel Castro offered to mediate with North Korea over its nuclear program, though he acknowledged Cuba's ability to stem the growing crisis was limited.
(AP, 3/2/03)
2003 Mar 2, In Estonia a center-left party depicting itself as a champion of the poor barely won the popular vote in parliamentary elections, which could make it difficult to form a coalition government.
(AP, 3/3/03)
2003 Mar 2, Iraq crushed another six Al Samoud II missiles, as ordered by UN weapons inspectors. Iraqi scientist Mahmud Faraj Bilal al-Samarrai, implicated in Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction (WMD), surrendered to the CIA. He was freed in 2012.
(AP, 3/2/08)(AFP, 4/15/12)
2003 Mar 2, Israeli troops backed by tanks and helicopters raided a Gaza Strip town, killing two Palestinians in fierce fighting and demolishing an apartment building and the exterior wall of a hospital.
(AP, 3/2/03)
2003 Mar 2, Netherlands, the world's 4th largest poultry exporter, discovered a bird flu in some its poultry for the 1st time in 30 years.
(WSJ, 3/6/03, p.A11)
2003 Mar 2, In Karachi, Pakistan, religious coalitions joined tens of thousands of others in a march to protest a possible U.S.-led war against Iraq.
(AP, 3/3/03)
2003 Mar 2, North Korea deployed 4 MiGs to intercept a US RC-135S spy plane some 150 miles off its coast.
(WSJ, 3/4/03, p.A1)
2003 Mar 2, Landlocked Switzerland became the first European country to win the America's Cup as "Alinghi" swept Team New Zealand in five races.
(AP, 3/2/04)
2003 Mar 2, Syria reportedly finished pulling 4,000 troops out of Lebanon in an effort to reduce tensions and keep radical Sunni groups from attacking Israel.
(SSFC, 3/2/03, A6)
2003 Mar 2, In northern Uganda rebels of the Lord's Resistance Army fighting a 16-year war called a cease-fire and asked to meet Pres. Yoweri Museveni.
(AP, 3/3/03)
2003 Mar 2, The United Arab Emirates won support from Kuwait and Bahrain in its call for Saddam Hussein to quit power to avert a war.
(AP, 3/3/03)
2004 Mar 2, Alan Greenspan said interest rates are too low for long term economic stability, but did not indicate when they would be raised. The DJIA closed at 10,592.
(WSJ, 3/3/04, p.A3)
2004 Mar 2, John Kerry won the 10-state Super Tuesday series and knocked the fight out of his spirited rival, John Edwards.
(AP, 3/3/04)
2004 Mar 2, Californians voters approved Proposition 57, Gov. Schwarzenegger's $15 billion bond measure, to be repaid over the next 9 to 14 years. Prop 58 to prohibit future deficit financing also passed.
(SFC, 3/03/04, p.A1)
2004 Mar 2, Residents of Killington, Vermont, voted to join New Hampshire due to a dispute over property taxes.
(ST, 3/2/04, p.A5)(AP, 3/2/04)
2004 Mar 2, Bernard Ebbers, former WorldCom CEO, was indicted on federal charges in the multibillion-dollar accounting scandal at the telecommunications giant. Scott Sullivan, his top financial officer, pleaded guilty and agreed to testify against him.
(AP, 3/2/04)(WSJ, 2/18/05, p.A1)
2004 Mar 2, NY state filed charges against the mayor of New Paltz for marrying gay couples.
(WSJ, 3/3/04, p.A1)
2004 Mar 2, NASA scientists reported that the Mars rover Opportunity had discovered evidence that water was once present on the surface.
(SFC, 3/03/04, p.A2)
2004 Mar 2, Mercedes McCambridge (85), Academy Award-winning actress, died in San Diego.
(AP, 3/2/05)
2004 Mar 2, Marge Schott (75), the controversial former owner of the Cincinnati Reds, died.
(AP, 3/2/05)
2004 Mar 2, In Chechnya rebel attacks and land mines killed five Russian soldiers.
(AP, 3/3/04)
2004 Mar 2, In China authorities shut down water supplies after a combination of synthetic ammonia and nitrogen from the Sichuan General Chemical Factory leaked into the Tuo River. Nearly 1 million people were left without water for drinking and bathing.
(AP, 3/5/04)
2004 Mar 2, Haiti rebel leader Guy Philippe declared himself the new chief of Haiti's military, which had been disbanded by ousted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide.
(AP, 3/2/04)
2004 Mar 2, Attacks on Shiite Muslims in Iraq killed at least 180 people as multiple explosions hit Shiite shrines in Baghdad and Karbala on the Shia festival of Ashura. An Iranian vice president blamed al-Qaida for the attacks.
(AP, 3/3/04)(SSFC, 2/20/05, p.A14)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March_2004)
2004 Mar 2, In Pakistan firing and suicide attack on Shiite Muslims in an Ashura procession in Quetta claimed 45 lives.
(http://archives.dawn.com/2004/03/04/top1.htm)
2004 Mar 2, Khalil al-Zaben (59), a close associate of Yasser Arafat, was assassinated in Gaza City by unidentified gunmen. Separately Arafat agreed to a new system for paying his security forces.
(SFC, 3/03/04, p.A8)
2004 Mar 2, Russian authorities said they have confirmed that a man killed in the Dagestan region a few days earlier was Ruslan Gelayev, one of the Chechnya's most powerful rebel warlords.
(AP, 3/2/04)
2004 Mar 2, In Venezuela demonstrators hurled rocks and gasoline bombs at soldiers as protests intensified after the elections council ruled against an opposition petition to force a presidential recall referendum.
(AP, 3/3/04)
2005 Mar 2, President Bush demanded in blunt terms that Syria get out of Lebanon.
(AP, 3/2/05)
2005 Mar 2, The number of U.S. military deaths in Iraq reached 1,500.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2005 Mar 2, Alan Greenspan warned that US federal budget deficits are unsustainable and urged Congress to cut spending.
(SFC, 3/3/05, p.A1)
2005 Mar 2, The US Treasury proposed rules for a new Roth 401(k).
(SFC, 3/3/05, p.C1)
2005 Mar 2, The woman who accused NBA star Kobe Bryant of rape settled her lawsuit against him, ending the case.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2005 Mar 2, It was reported that the Palm Beach, Fla., hedge fund KL Financial, with assets of $200 million, had run out of funds.
(WSJ, 3/2/05, p.C1)
2005 Mar 2, In Florida dozens of dolphins beached on the Florida Keys. Sonar from a US submarine was later suspected.
(SSFC, 3/6/05, p.A3)
2005 Mar 2, In Tennessee a school bus driver was shot and killed by a 14-year old student, who was recently disciplined by the driver for using snuff.
(WSJ, 3/3/05, p.A1)
2005 Mar 2, In Afghanistan Pres. Karzai appointed Habiba Sarobi as governor of Bamiyan province, making her Afghanistan’s 1st female governor.
(SFC, 3/3/05, p.A10)
2005 Mar 2, In eastern Afghanistan a gunbattle between U.S.-led coalition forces and militants left three militants and two civilians dead.
(AP, 3/5/05)
2005 Mar 2, Australia’s central bank raised interest rates to 5.5% from 5.25%. The 2004 annual growth rate was reported to be 1.5%.
(WSJ, 3/3/05, p.A11)
2005 Mar 2, In Azerbaijan Elmar Huseinov, founder and editor of the opposition magazine Monitor, was shot to death in the entryway of his Baku apartment building.
(AP, 3/3/05)
2005 Mar 2, Brazil's lower house of Congress overwhelmingly approved a law creating a framework to legalize biotech seed sales for genetically modified crops.
(AP, 3/3/05)
2005 Mar 2, In northern China a cache of explosives at the home of a coal mine manager blew up in Kecheng, killing him and at least 10 others including 2 children at a nearby school.
(AP, 3/3/05)(SFC, 3/3/05, p.A6)
2005 Mar 2, Queen Elizabeth II dubbed Bill Gates (49) an honorary noble.
(SFC, 3/3/05, p.A2)
2005 Mar 2, France's newly appointed Finance Minister Thierry Breton pledged to keep a tight lid on public spending in an effort to rein in the budget deficit.
(AP, 3/2/05)
2005 Mar 2, Two car bombs killed at least 14 Iraqi soldiers in separate attacks, and the al-Qaida group in Iraq claimed responsibility for one.
(SFC, 3/3/05, p.A6)(WSJ, 3/3/05, p.A1)
2005 Mar 2, Pakistani police arrested a man wanted in the murder of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl and already sentenced to death in absentia for a hotel bombing that killed 11 French engineers.
(AP, 3/2/05)
2005 Mar 2, Former Serbian army chief Gen. Momcilo Perisic, a one-time ally of ex-president Slobodan Milosevic, said that he has been indicted by the UN war crimes court and will surrender next week.
(AP, 3/3/05)
2005 Mar 2, In a new book entitled "Mari, the Metropolis of the Euphrates," Jean-Claude Margueron said the third millennium BC city, in modern day Syria, was "one of the first modern cities of humanity.
(AP, 3/2/05)
2005 Mar 2, It was reported that the bodies of at least 34 men found in Venezuela's central Guarico state in the past three years had burns, bruises and cuts suggesting they were tortured before being executed.
(AP, 3/2/05)
2006 Mar 2, On his first trip to India, President Bush and his Indian counterpart agreed on a landmark nuclear energy agreement that deepens ties between the world's oldest and largest democracies.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, The Senate voted to renew the USA Patriot Act.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2006 Mar 2, "Killer nurse" Charles Cullen, who'd killed at least 29 patients, was sentenced in Somerville, N.J., to spend the rest of his life in prison. In 2010 a jury awarded $95 million in damages to families of 8 people who claimed their loved ones were among those killed by Cullen.
(AP, 3/2/07)(SFC, 3/11/10, p.A8)
2006 Mar 2, LA prosecutors said 19 people, many of them former police officers or with police connections, have been charged with staging home robberies in Southern California to steal drugs, money and weapons.
(Reuters, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, The US Federal Reserve began shipping a new colorized $10 bill to commercial banks.
(WSJ, 3/3/06, p.C3)
2006 Mar 2, It was reported that Thomas Monaghan, founder of Domino’s Pizza, hoped that the new town of Ave Maria in southwestern Florida would be governed under strict Roman Catholic principles. The town was being constructed around Ave Maria Univ. east of Naples. The town and university, bankrolled by Monaghan with $250 million, were set to open in 2007.
(SFC, 3/2/06, p.A2)
2006 Mar 2, General Motors Corp. said it has made major steps in developing a commercially viable hydrogen-powered vehicle and expects it can get the emission-free cars into dealerships in the next four to nine years.
(AFP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, An oil spill in Alaska curtailed Prudhoe Bay production. At least 265,000 gallons spilled onto the tundra from a British Petroleum (BP) line handling 100,000 barrels per day. The spill of 5,000 barrels was the largest in the field’s 29-year history. In 2011 a $25 million settlement was reached with a BP subsidiary for the spill.
(WSJ, 3/3/06, p.A1)(SFC, 3/11/06, p.A4)(SSFC, 8/13/06, p.A18)(SFC, 5/4/11, p.A6)
2006 Mar 2, Garrett Scott (37), documentary film maker, died in Coronado, Ca., of cardiac arrest. His 2005 film “Occupation: Dreamland" was based on footage shot with co-director Ian Olds, while embedded with the 82nd Airborne in Fallujah, Iraq.
(SFC, 3/7/06, p.B5)
2006 Mar 2, In Bangladesh Shaikh Abdur Rahman, the fugitive leader of an Islamic militant group wanted for a deadly wave of bombings. surrendered to police after a 33-hour siege. Rahman, who fought in the Afghan war after graduating from Medina University in Saudi Arabia, formed the Jamayetul Mujahideen in the late 1990s.
(AFP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, Belarussian President Alexander Lukashenko defiantly told his Western critics to stay out of his country's affairs, while an opposition rival for the presidency was beaten by security forces and detained.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, In Croatia 8 former soldiers were convicted of torturing ethnic Serbs in a wartime prison, four years after they were cleared of the same charges in a trial later annulled as being flawed.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, It was reported that Cuban academics hoping to attend a gathering of Latin America experts in Puerto Rico had been denied visas by the American government, marking the latest in the current US administration's trend of shutting out Cubans.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, The European Central Bank raised its key interest rate by a quarter percentage point to 2.5 percent amid worries about inflation.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, Haiti's newly elected Pres. Rene Preval met with Dominican Republic President Leonel Fernandez in Santo Domingo amid rising tensions between their countries over immigration and security.
(AP, 3/3/06)
2006 Mar 2, A bomb ripped through a vegetable market in a Shiite section of Baghdad killing 38 people. A leading Sunni politician escaped an attack on his convoy as unrelenting violence pushing Iraq toward civil war.
(AP, 3/2/06)(WSJ, 3/3/06, p.A1)
2006 Mar 2, John Pace, the former UN human rights chief in Iraq said human rights abuses in Iraq are as bad now as they were under Saddam Hussein. It was reported that sectarian evictions by Sunnis and Shiites were growing in Baghdad neighborhoods
(AP, 3/2/06)(SFC, 3/2/06, p.A12)
2006 Mar 2, Tommaso Onofri, a 17-month-old epileptic boy, was kidnapped from his home in Casalbaroncolo, near Parma, Italy. His body was found April 1. He was killed by blows to the head with a shovel. Suspects Mario Alessi, a construction worker, and Salvatore Raimondi have been accusing each other of killing the child shortly after the kidnapping. A woman was accused of complicity in the kidnapping.
(AP, 3/7/06)(AP, 4/3/06)
2006 Mar 2, In Kenya masked gunmen identifying themselves as police raided the country's oldest newspaper and its sister television station, two days after three journalists were detained for a story about Kenya's president. The closures of The Standard and the Kenya Television Network, ordered by security minister John Michuki, appeared to mark the first time a Kenyan government has shut down the operations of a major media company.
(AP, 3/2/06)(Econ, 3/25/06, p.52)
2006 Mar 2, Kosovo's president, Fatmir Sejdiu, issued a statement calling on Lt. Gen. Agim Ceku (44), a former leader of the now disbanded Kosovo Liberation Army, to become prime minister and form a new government.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, Libya released all 84 jailed members of the banned Muslim Brotherhood movement who had been held since the late 1990s.
(AFP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, North and South Korea opened high-level military talks for the first time in almost two years, aiming to reduce tension along the world's most heavily fortified border and prevent accidental naval skirmishes.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, In Pakistan a suicide attacker rammed a car packed with explosives into a vehicle carrying an American diplomat in Karachi, killing diplomat David Foy and 3 other people before President Bush's visit to Pakistan. Fifty-two people were wounded. An Uzbek national, arrested in Pakistan in July, told interrogators that Al-Qaeda had organized the suicide attack.
(AFP, 7/26/06)(AP, 3/2/07)
2006 Mar 2, Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas said in a published interview that the al-Qaida terror network has infiltrated the Gaza Strip and West Bank.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, Puerto Rico's Gov. Anibal Acevedo Vila signed into law a ban on smoking in enclosed public places, the toughest anti-tobacco prohibition in the Caribbean.
(AP, 3/3/06)
2006 Mar 2, In South Africa early results put the ruling African National Congress well ahead in local elections, despite voter unhappiness with the rate of progress in improving the lives of poor blacks.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, South Africa joined a growing list of countries inviting Hamas leaders for talks, raising Israeli concerns that the international front against the Islamic militants is crumbling.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, Venezuela's VP Jose Vicente Rangel said that the US was the world's biggest consumer of illegal drugs and had no "moral authority" to criticize Venezuela for failing to control narcotics.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, Vietnam announced it has commuted the death sentence of Nguyen Van Chinh (45), a convicted Australian drug trafficker, to life imprisonment after heavy lobbying by the Australian government.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2007 Mar 2, US Defense Secretary Robert Gates fired Army Secretary Francis Harvey as the Bush administration scrambled to respond to an outcry over poor treatment for veterans at the Army's top hospital.
(Reuters, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, The US Energy and Defense departments chose Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory to design the country’s first new nuclear warhead since the Cold War.
(SFC, 3/3/07, p.A1)
2007 Mar 2, A charter bus carrying a college baseball team from Ohio’s Mennonite-affiliated Bluffton University plunged off a highway ramp in Georgia and slammed into the pavement below, killing six people, injuring 29 and scattering sports equipment across the road. A 7th player died from his injuries on Mar 9.
(AP, 3/2/07)(AP, 3/9/07)
2007 Mar 2, Checkpoint Systems Inc. said it will provide Reno GmbH with RFID (radio frequency identification) tags and store tagging systems. Reno GmbH plans to embed wireless chips in shoes sold at hundreds of stores across the continent.
(http://tinyurl.com/2cpo45)
2007 Mar 2, Scientists scanning the deep interior of Earth have found evidence of a vast water reservoir beneath eastern Asia that is at least the volume of the Arctic Ocean.
(www.livescience.com/environment/070228_beijing_anomoly.html)
2007 Mar 2, In western Afghanistan insurgents attacked a police post, leaving one police officer dead and two wounded. A mortar round landed on a US military outpost in the same Herat province, wounding 12 civilian Afghan workers and two Afghan soldiers.
(AP, 3/3/07)
2007 Mar 2, Brazilian police arrested 18 people accused of allowing illegal logging in the Amazon rain forest and were searching for 19 others, including environmental protection agents.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, The British Broadcasting Corp. said that it has signed a deal with Google Inc.'s YouTube that will allow the popular Web site to show excerpts of the broadcaster's news and entertainment programs.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, Bulgaria's Socialist-led government survived a no-confidence on a motion filed by the opposition, claiming that the government was unable to cope with a health care crisis.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, Chechnya's parliament approved Ramzan Kadyrov, a widely feared former security chief as president of the war-battered Russian republic in a nearly unanimous vote.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, China demanded the United States scrap a planned sale of hundreds of missiles to Taiwan, warning the deal would harm regional stability and bilateral ties.
(AFP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, In Colombia prosecutors ordered the arrest of Alvaro Araujo Noguera, a prominent political boss, for alleged involvement in a kidnapping at the heart of a scandal tying the country’s political elite to right-wing paramilitary groups.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, Henri Troyat (95), French writer, died. He fled Russia's revolution as a child and went on to become one of France's most prolific, popular and respected authors.
(AP, 3/5/07)
2007 Mar 2, An al-Qaida-linked Sunni group said that it kidnapped 18 government workers and soldiers in retaliation for the alleged rape of a Sunni woman by members of the Shiite-dominated police force. Hours later, the government said the bodies of 14 security officers had been found. In Baghdad, a pair of car bombs killed 11 people in separate attacks.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, In Italy Premier Romano Prodi won a confidence vote in the lower house of parliament, formally ending Italy's political crisis.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, Moammar Gadhafi said in an unusual debate that it was time for his long-isolated nation to open up to the world and that one day Libya won't need him as leader. Still, he insisted that the ruling ideology he has entrenched here for three decades is superior to Western democracy.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, In Morocco 12 Islamic militants were convicted of terrorism-related charges, including eight with alleged ties to al-Qaida who had volunteered to fight in Iraq.
(AP, 3/3/07)
2007 Mar 2, In Nigeria 7 people were shot dead and 10 others were seriously wounded when gunmen opened fire in a crowded district of Port Harcourt.
(AP, 3/3/07)
2007 Mar 2, In eastern Pakistan a bomb rigged to a bicycle exploded near a car carrying a judge, seriously wounding him and killing at least three people in Multan.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, People caught smoking in bars and restaurants in Puerto Rico faced fines as a ban on lighting up in enclosed public spaces took effect.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, Ivan Safronov, a Russian military affairs writer for the daily Kommersant, fell to his death from a fifth-story window in Moscow. On Mar 6 his newspaper said he had received threats while gathering material for a report claiming Russia planned to provide sophisticated weapons to Syria and Iran.
(AP, 3/6/07)
2007 Mar 2, An explosion in a Slovakian ammunition factory killed two people, left six missing and injured 45, five seriously.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, In Somalia 4 mortar explosions rocked Mogadishu, wounding six people, including two children.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, South Korea delayed a full resumption of aid shipments to North Korea until the communist regime shuts down its main atomic reactor under an international agreement to take steps toward abandoning its nuclear weapons program. A South Korean activist said 80 North Korean refugees are hiding in various Asian countries and preparing to seek asylum in the United States. North and South Korea agreed to resume reunions of families that have been separated by their divided border.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, In the jungles of southern Thailand soldiers killed five suspected Muslim insurgents during a raid on a weapons training camp.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, Venezuela accused US anti-drug agents of collaborating with traffickers and rejected Washington's allegations that rampant corruption has allowed illegal drug smuggling to thrive in the South American country.
(AP, 3/3/07)
2008 Mar 2, Ayman al-Zawahri, Al-Qaida's No. 2 leader, published "Exonerations," with al-Sahab, al-Qaida's media wing, on militant Islamic Web sites. The book slams radical militants who have disavowed armed struggle and turned their backs on violence.
(AP, 3/2/08)
2008 Mar 2, In southern California Jamiel Shaw II (17) was gunned down by Pedro Espinoza, a 19-year-old illegal Mexican immigrant, in Arlington Heights, LA County. On Nov 2, 2012, Espinoza was sentenced to death.
(http://tinyurl.com/n2oyxdn)
2008 Mar 2, Blind jazz guitarist Jeff Healey (41), known for his blues-based rock and his distinctive playing style, died in a Toronto hospital after a life-long battle with cancer.
(Reuters, 3/3/08)
2008 Mar 2, Amaro da Costa, a senior East Timorese rebel soldier, surrendered. He was accused of being involved in last month's attacks on the country's president and prime minister.
(Reuters, 3/2/08)
2008 Mar 2, In northern Honduras 8 people were shot dead at a billiards hall by gunmen disguised as policemen in San Pedro Sula, a city plagued by violent gangs and drug traffickers. Honduras last month began a nationwide effort to halt a rising wave of violence and stem the flow of guns on the street.
(AP, 3/3/08)
2008 Mar 2, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said his landmark visit to Iraq opened a new chapter in "brotherly" relations between the two countries, which were once bitter enemies. 13 gunmen were killed and eight were injured in clashes with American and Iraqi forces in the town of Tal Afar. 2 police officers were also killed and four were injured. In two other separate attacks in Diyala, police reported that five people were killed when a roadside bomb hit a bus, while another assault killed a patrolling police officer. The US military found a grave in Samarra with 14 bodies, believed to be members of the Iraqi security forces executed by al-Qaida in Iraq. A car bomb in Samarra had killed four people, including one child. Police in Samarra, however, reported that at least seven people were killed and 10 people were injured. In central and northern Iraq US and Iraqi forces killed 9 suspected insurgents and detained 44 others in raids targeting al-Qaida. 3 Iraqi troops were killed in one of the operations. During the operation, the SWAT teams found bomb-making materials, a rocket-propelled grenade launcher, rifles, grenades, a landmine and ammunition.
(AP, 3/2/08)(AP, 3/3/08)(AP, 3/6/08)
2008 Mar 2, Israeli aircraft sent missiles slamming into the office of the prime minister of Hamas-ruled Gaza before dawn, pressing forward with an offensive that has killed nearly 70 Palestinians in two days of fighting. A 21-month-old girl was among the dead in new violence. The Israeli onslaught failed to stop rockets from battering southern Israel. 9 were fired at southern Israel by midday, including one that struck a house in Sderot.
(AP, 3/2/08)
2008 Mar 2, In northwestern Pakistan a suicide bomber blew himself up at a large meeting called by tribal elders pushing for peace, killing at least 40 people and injuring more than 100 in Darra Adam Khel in North West Frontier Province about 25 miles south of Peshawar.
(AP, 3/2/08)
2008 Mar 2, Russians voted for a new president in an election likely to hand victory to First Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, President Vladimir Putin's chosen successor, but criticized by the opposition for a lack of real competition. With 99.45 percent of the votes counted, Medvedev had 70.23 percent.
(Reuters, 3/2/08)(AP, 3/3/08)
2008 Mar 2, In Sri Lanka artillery exchanges left at least 25 Tamil rebels and two Sri Lankan soldiers dead as Pres. Rajapakse vowed to destroy the separatist guerrillas.
(AFP, 3/3/08)
2008 Mar 2, Thais went to the polls to vote in the country's first elections for the upper house of Parliament since a 2006 military coup ousted elected PM Thaksin Shinawatra.
(AP, 3/2/08)
2008 Mar 2, Venezuela and Ecuador ordered troops to their borders with Colombia, sharply raising tensions after Colombia killed a top rebel leader on Ecuadorean soil. Ecuadorean troops recovered the seminude bodies of 15 rebels in their jungle camp. Soldiers also found three wounded women at the camp, a Mexican philosophy student injured by shrapnel and two Colombians, who were evacuated by helicopter to be treated.
(AP, 3/3/08)
2009 Mar 2, The Obama administration threw open the curtain on years of Bush-era secrets, revealing anti-terror memos that claimed exceptional search-and-seizure powers and divulging that the CIA destroyed nearly 100 videotapes of interrogations and other treatment of terror suspects.
(AP, 3/2/09)
2009 Mar 2, The US government unveiled a revamped rescue package to insurance giant American International Group (AIG) and will provide the troubled company with another $30 billion in taxpayer money on an "as needed" basis. The DJIA fell 299.64 to close at 6763.29, falling below 7,000 for the first time in 12 years.
(AP, 3/2/09)(WSJ, 3/3/09, p.A1)
2009 Mar 2, A massive late winter snow storm roared out of the Southeast and into the Northeast overnight, idling hundreds of flights and making the morning rush treacherous as motorists contended with nearly a foot of snow in spots. Some 950 flights were canceled at the three main New York area airports, an almost 300 canceled in Philadelphia.
(AP, 3/2/09)(SFC, 3/3/09, p.A5)
2009 Mar 2, An asteroid named 2009 DD45, about the size of one that blasted Siberia a century ago, buzzed by Earth. It measured between 69 feet and 154 feet in diameter and came to 48,800 miles from Earth.
(AP, 3/4/09)
2009 Mar 2, A study by Oceana, a worldwide environmental group, said food supplies for large ocean fish were dwindling due to industrial fishing to supply fish farms. An estimated 4 to 11 pounds of prey fish were being consumed to produce one pound of farmed salmon.
(SFC, 3/3/09, p.B1)
2009 Mar 2, In southern Australia rescuers used jet skis, backhoes and human muscle to save dozens of whales and dolphins stranded on Naracoopa Beach on Tasmania state's King Island. Rescuers refloated 54 whales and five bottlenose dolphins. A total of 194 pilot whales and seven dolphins became stranded the previous evening.
(AP, 3/2/09)(AP, 3/3/09)
2009 Mar 2, A Chinese man said he was the mystery collector behind winning bids for two imperial bronzes auctioned last week at Christie's over Beijing's objections, and that he made the bogus offers to protest any sale of the looted relics. The sculptures disappeared from the Summer Palace on the outskirts of Beijing when French and British forces sacked and burned it at the end of the second Opium War in 1860. The sculptures date to the early Qing Dynasty, established by invading Manchu tribesmen in 1644. The Christie's catalog said they were made for the Zodiac fountain at the imperial palace.
(AP, 3/2/09)
2009 Mar 2, In China a top justice official said courts will accept the cases of hundreds of families with children sickened in last year's tainted milk scandal.
(AP, 3/3/09)
2009 Mar 2, Cuban President Raul Castro's ousted powerful officials close to his brother Fidel in the biggest government shakeup since he took power a year ago.
(AP, 3/3/09)
2009 Mar 2, At a donor’s conference in Egypt Palestinian Pres. Mahmoud Abbas, seeking to shore up his position against rival Hamas, asked international donors to funnel millions of dollars through his government to rebuild the devastated Gaza Strip. The gathering aimed to raise at least $2.8 billion from 80 donor nations and international organizations.
(AP, 3/2/09)
2009 Mar 2, In Guinea-Bissau soldiers assassinated President Joao Bernardo "Nino" Vieira in his palace hours after a bomb blast killed his rival. A pre-dawn gunfight at the palace erupted hours after armed forces chief of staff Gen. Batiste Tagme na Waie, a longtime rival of the president, was killed by a bomb blast at his headquarters. The military insisted no coup was taking place.
(AP, 3/2/09)
2009 Mar 2, Iran dismissed US concerns about how much fissile material the country has produced, saying it isn't developing a nuclear bomb and that any effort to make weapons-grade uranium would be difficult under the eyes of international inspectors.
(AP, 3/2/09)
2009 Mar 2, In Iraq Ali Hassan al-Majid, aka “Chemical Ali," was sentenced to death for a 3rd time, following his conviction relating to the Feb 19, 1999, death of ayatollah Mohammed Sadiq al-Sadr. Previous convictions related the killing of Kurds in the late 1980s and the 1991 crackdown on Shiites in southern Iraq.
(SFC, 3/3/09, p.A3)
2009 Mar 2, In Morocco Hassan Al Haski (41), a Moroccan man already convicted over the 2004 Madrid bombings, was sentenced on appeal to 10 years in jail for his role in suicide attacks the year before in Casablanca that killed 45 people.
(AFP, 3/3/09)
2009 Mar 2, In Pakistan a suicide bomber killed at least five people and wounded seven others at a religious school in southwestern Kili Karbala village in Pishin district.
(AFP, 3/2/09)
2009 Mar 2, In Peru's southern province of Puno 10 people were killed dead and 16 left missing at a remote mining camp buried by a mudslide.
(AP, 3/3/09)
2010 Mar 2, The Washington DC council voted to censure ex-mayor Marion Barry over a report accusing him of helping award a $15,000 city contract to a woman with whom he had a sexual relationship.
(SFC, 3/3/10, p.A6)
2010 Mar 2, In California Jerry Brown, former 2-term Democrat state governor (1975-1983), announced that he would run for a 3rd term as governor.
(SFC, 3/2/10, p.A1)
2010 Mar 2, In Darien, Ill., the bodies of 3 family members were found shot to death. Prosecutors later said Johnny Borizov (28) had persuaded Jacob Nodarse (23) to kill the mother of his son, Angela Kramer, her parents and a brother over a custody dispute. Nodarse was arrested the next day in Florida.
(SFC, 3/8/10, p.A8)(http://tinyurl.com/yaejaep)
2010 Mar 2, In southeast New Mexico two employees at a Navajo oil refinery were killed and two others critically injured after a storage tank exploded into flames.
(AP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, In Rhode Island the Central Falls Teachers’ Union pledged to support reforms. The school board had voted last week to fire 93 teachers and staff from the high school after the end of the school year. On May 16 the school district announced that it had reached an agreement with the union to return all staffers.
(SFC, 3/4/10, p.A8)(SFC, 5/17/10, p.A4)
2010 Mar 2, The Afghan government denied that it had banned live media coverage of insurgent attacks, saying it was developing guidelines, not restrictions, to prevent live footage from aiding fighters at the scene.
(AP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, In Australia Seth Enslow, an American motorcycle stuntman twice, broke the world record for the longest distance jumped on a Harley-Davidson motorcycle, sailing through the air near Australia's Sydney Harbor to shatter the previous 10-year-old record. Bubba Blackwell set the previous record with a 157 foot (47.85 meters) jump in Las Vegas in 1999.
(AP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, In London, England, Muhammad Tahir-ul-Qadri, a former Pakistani lawmaker and the leader of a global Muslim movement, issued a fatwa, or religious edict, that he calls an absolute condemnation of terrorism. The 600-page fatwa bans suicide bombing "without any excuses, any pretexts, or exceptions." The religious scholar is the founder of Minhaj-ul-Quran, a worldwide movement that promotes a nonpolitical, tolerant Islam.
(AP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, The BBC volunteered to become smaller.
(Econ, 3/6/10, p.74)
2010 Mar 2, Egyptian newspapers reported that former UN atomic chief Mohamed ElBaradei has called for constitutional changes in his first statement since forming an opposition group.
(AFP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, French authorities arrested Agathe Habyarimana, the widow of the former Rwandan president killed in a plane crash, on a Rwandan warrant issued on genocide-related charges. She was soon freed on bail. The crash is widely considered the event that sparked the east African country's 1994 genocide. In 2004 France rejected her request for political asylum, alleging she was at the heart of the regime responsible for the genocide.
(AP, 3/2/10)(Econ, 3/6/10, p.65)
2010 Mar 2, Germany’s Federal Constitutional Court overturned a law that let anti-terror authorities retain data on telephone calls and e-mails, saying it marked a “grave intrusion" into personal privacy rights.
(SFC, 3/3/10, p.A2)
2010 Mar 2, Guatemalan authorities arrested Nelly Bonilla, the country’s anti-drug czar, Police Chief Baltazar Gomez, and police officer Fernando Carrillo, in a case involving stolen cocaine and slain police.
(AP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, In Ingushetia Russian forces killed Alexander Tikhomirov, also known as Said Buryatsky, in a gun battle near Nazran.
(Reuters, 3/6/10)
2010 Mar 2, In Iran the kaleme opposition Web site reported that an appeals court has upheld the death sentence for Mohammad Amin Valian (20), a student who took part in an anti-government rally in December that left eight people dead. Valian was found guilty of Moharebeh, a religious offense that translates as defiance of God, a crime punishable by death under Iranian law.
(AP, 3/3/10)
2010 Mar 2, Mexico's interior department said prosecutors have detained 10 Mexican immigration agents and three airline workers at Cancun's international airport on suspicion of trafficking Chinese migrants. Oscar Arriola, reputed to have led a cartel that smuggled two tons of cocaine a month into the US before authorities dismantled the ring around 2004, was handed over to US officials and extradited to Colorado.
(AP, 3/2/10)(Reuters, 3/3/10)
2010 Mar 2, The Moroccan state security service announced that police have dismantled a terrorist network “of six people imbued with Takfirist ideology," that was active in several towns in the northeast. Takfiris, a tiny minority of Muslims in Morocco, believe that society and its leaders have turned away from the narrow path of what they see as true Islam.
(AFP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, In Nigeria planted explosives in the Niger Delta damaged the Kokori oil flow station operated by Royal Dutch Shell PLC, marking the latest attack in a region supposedly brought under control by a government amnesty program.
(AP, 3/3/10)
2010 Mar 2, Ian Paisley (83), the hard-line Northern Ireland evangelist who led Protestants into power-sharing with Catholics, announced he will retire from the British Parliament after a 40-year career.
(AP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, It was reported that Spanish investigators, working with private computer-security firms, have arrested the three alleged ringleaders of the so-called Mariposa botnet, which appeared in December 2008 and grew into one of the biggest weapons of cybercrime. The Mariposa botnet infected almost 13 million computers across 190 countries. More arrests were expected soon in other countries.
(AP, 3/2/10)(SSFC, 3/14/10, p.D1)
2010 Mar 2, South Sudan’s 17 rival political parties signed an election code of conduct, committing themselves to ensure upcoming polls in April are free and fair.
(AFP, 3/3/10)
2010 Mar 2, Tajikistan's main opposition party said it plans to sue the Central Asian nation's elections board amid claims it abetted fraud in this weekend's parliamentary vote.
(AP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, In Ukraine PM Yulia Tymoshenko's pro-Western "Orange" coalition dissolved, losing its majority in parliament and paving the way for the new president to consolidate his power.
(AP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, In Uganda overnight landslides in the mountainous region of Bududa buried three villages and killed at least 92 people with 250 still missing.
(AP, 3/2/10)(AP, 3/3/10)
2010 Mar 2, In Uzbekistan an independent think-tank and a rights group claimed that authorities have instructed health workers to surgically sterilize women as part of a government campaign to reduce the birth rate.
(AP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, In southern Yemen a three-story building collapsed when explosives stored in its basement went off, killing at least eight people. Officials said the basement was used by an arms dealer to store dynamite and other explosives.
(AP, 3/2/10)
2011 Mar 2, Pres. Obama signed a bill to continue government operations for 2 more weeks. The bill included $4 billion in spending cuts.
(SFC, 3/3/11, p.A5)
2011 Mar 2, The US Supreme Court, in an endorsement of free speech, decided 8-1 that anti-gay protesters, who picket funerals of US soldiers, cannot be sued.
(SFC, 3/3/11, p.A5)
2011 Mar 2, The US Army filed 22 new charges, including aiding the enemy, against Pvt. 1st Class Bradley E. Manning, suspected of leaking sensitive and classified documents to WikiLeaks.
(SFC, 3/3/11, p.A4)
2011 Mar 2, The US Fish and Wildlife Service declared the eastern cougar to be extinct, confirming a widely held belief among wildlife biologists that native populations of the big cat were wiped out by man a century ago.
(AP, 3/2/11)
2011 Mar 2, In the Bahamas a fire destroyed a shantytown, leaving nearly 700 people homeless, most of them Haitian migrants.
(AP, 3/3/11)
2011 Mar 2, Bangladesh's government ordered Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus from his post as head of his microfinance bank, a humiliating blow for an activist whose revolutionary idea of giving out small loans lifted many out of poverty. The Grameen Bank said he remained in charge and that it would fight the decision.
(AP, 3/2/11)
2011 Mar 2, Britain seized £100 million ($160 million, 117 million euros) of Libyan currency found on a Libya-bound ship after escorting the vessel to an English port.
(AFP, 3/4/11)
2011 Mar 2, In Germany a gunman shot dead 2 US airmen at Frankfurt airport. The gunman was identified as Arid Uka (21), a Kosovo national who was working on a short-term contract at the Frankfurt international postal center. The airmen were later identified as Senior Airman Nick Alden (25) of South Carolina and Airman 1st Class Zachary R. Cuddeback (21) of Virginia. On Feb 10, 2012, Uka was convicted and sentenced to life in prison.
(AP, 3/2/11)(Reuters, 3/3/11)(AP, 3/10/11)
2011 Mar 2, Jerusalem officials approved new housing for Jews in the heart of an Arab neighborhood, infuriating Palestinians who see the growing Jewish presence in the city's war-won eastern sector as undermining their aspirations to statehood. Israel closed the Karni Crossing east of Gaza City citing security concerns. This left only the Kerem Shalom checkpoint for commercial crossing.
(AP, 3/2/11)(SFC, 3/3/11, p.A2)
2011 Mar 2, Libyan strongman Moamer Kadhafi warned "thousands" would die if the West intervened to support the uprising against him. Government troops briefly captured Marsa El Brega, an oil export terminal, before being driven back by rebels. Shells splashed in the Mediterranean and a warplane bombed a beach where rebel fighters were charging over the dunes. At least five people were killed in the fighting. Thousands of Bangladheshi migrant workers, desperate to leave Libya, pressed up against the gates of the Tunisia frontier, angry at their government for sending no help. Britain, Spain, France and others launched emergency airlifts along Libya's borders, trying to prevent racially charged attacks on the tens of thousands of foreign workers try to flee.
(AFP, 3/2/11)(Reuters, 3/2/11)(AP, 3/2/11)
2011 Mar 2, In Libya Andrei Netto of the Brazilian newspaper O Estado de Sao Paulo, was detained in Zawiyah. He had been travelling with Ghaith Abdul-Ahad, an Iraqi national who has been reporting from western Libya for the past two weeks. Abdul-Ahad was last in touch with the Guardian newspaper through a third party on March 6. Netto was released on March 10.
(AFP, 3/10/11)(AP, 3/11/11)
2011 Mar 2, Nepalese authorities banned the sale of marijuana during a popular Hindu festival at which holy men traditionally smoke the drug and share it with young men and women.
(AP, 3/3/11)
2011 Mar 2, In the Netherlands prosecutors at the International Criminal Court said they will open a formal investigation into possible crimes against humanity in Libya.
(AP, 3/2/11)
2011 Mar 2, In Pakistan assailants purportedly sent by al-Qaida and the Taliban killed Shahbaz Bhatti (42), the only Christian member of Pakistan's federal Cabinet, spraying his car with bullets outside his mother's home in Islamabad.
(AP, 3/2/11)
2011 Mar 2, The Philippine military deployed two warplanes near a disputed area in the South China Sea after a ship searching for oil complained it was harassed by two Chinese patrol boats. The Chinese vessels later left without confrontation at the Reed Bank, which is near the disputed Spratly Islands that are claimed by the Philippines, China and other nations.
(AP, 3/3/11)
2011 Mar 2, In St. Lucia three gay men from Atlanta were beaten and robbed after masked bandits broke into their mountain rental home in Soufriere. Police later arrested two suspects in the assault and looked for three more.
(AP, 3/14/11)
2011 Mar 2, In Sudan at least 70 people were killed and two villages razed in two days of fighting in the flashpoint oil-producing border district of Abyei.
(AFP, 3/2/11)
2011 Mar 2, Leading human rights activists condemned Venezuelan authorities for sentencing union leader Ruben Gonzalez to prison for launching a strike, saying more than 100 other unionists also face charges after participating in protests.
(AP, 3/3/11)
2011 Mar 2, In southern Yemen security forces fired tear gas and shot at hundreds of protesters. Two protesters were shot and killed in Sadr, Lahaj province. A coalition of Yemeni opposition groups proposed a plan to end the country's political crisis that would involve embattled Pres. Saleh stepping down by the end of the year.
(AP, 3/2/11)(AP, 3/3/11)
2011 Mar 2, Zimbabwe’s Pres. Mugabe threatened to boycott Western products before seizing companies from countries that have imposed sanctions against him and his allies.
(AFP, 3/2/11)
2012 Mar 2, US authorities charged 29 people who were conspiring to illegally import counterfeit luxury fashion goods and deadly drugs worth hundreds of millions of dollars from China and Taiwan. Some 20 arrests took place in New Jersey, Florida, Texas, New York, and in the Philippines, as part of an international investigation.
(AFP, 3/2/12)
2012 Mar 2, In California police and federal agents seized 750 pounds of methamphetamine from a San Jose apartment. Street value was estimated at $34 million.
(SSFC, 3/4/12, p.C1)
2012 Mar 2, A string of violent storms scratched away small towns in the South and Midwest as an early season tornado outbreak left 39 people in 5 states, including 14 in Indiana, 19 in Kentucky, 3 in Ohio and one each in Alabama and Georgia.
(AP, 3/3/12)(http://tinyurl.com/6u9f2bp)(SFC, 3/5/12, p.A9)
2012 Mar 2, BP reached a partial settlement in the Gulf of Mexico oil spill trial in which tens of billions are at stake. Terms of the settlement with a committee representing thousands of private claimants such as fishermen and coastal businesses were not released. There was no word on the status of BP's negotiations with the US government.
(AFP, 3/3/12)
2012 Mar 2, James Q. Wilson, social scientist (b.1931), died in Boston. His books included “Bureaucracy" (1989). In 1982 he and George L. Kelling introduced their broken windows theory, a criminological theory of the norm setting and signaling effect of urban disorder and vandalism on additional crime and anti-social behavior. It was implemented in NYC under Mayor Giuliani (1994-2001), and led to a plunge in violent felonies.
(SSFC, 3/4/12, p.C9)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_windows_theory)(Econ, 3/10/12, p.106)
2012 Mar 2, In Afghanistan a suicide bomber on a motorcycle attacked a NATO convoy in the Kandahar province, wounding seven people including four soldiers.
(AFP, 3/2/12)
2012 Mar 2, Norman St John-Stevas (82), a gay British academic and Conservative politician died.
(Econ, 3/10/12, p.70)
2012 Mar 2, Danish prosecutors charged four people with terrorism for allegedly planning a shooting attack on a newspaper that had printed cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad. The 4 men from Sweden were arrested on Dec 29, 2010.
(AP, 12/30/10)(AP, 3/2/12)
2012 Mar 2, Leaders of 25 EU countries signed a new treaty in Brussels designed to limit government overspending. Spain’s PM Mariano Rajoy said he would miss deficit targets this year to spare his country from austerity overload.
(SFC, 3/3/12, p.A2)
2012 Mar 2, France said it is closing its embassy in Syria, a day after two French journalists escaped to Lebanon.
(AP, 3/2/12)
2012 Mar 2, In India rampaging lawyers at a court complex in Bangalore, India's software hub, assaulted TV camera crews and pelting onlookers and police with furniture and bottles during a brawl. The journalists said they were attacked because of their coverage of a lawyers' street protest last month against an alleged police assault on a fellow advocate. The brawl erupted during a trial involving a mining fraud in Karnataka, of which Bangalore is the state capital.
(AFP, 3/3/12)
2012 Mar 2, It was reported that thousands of male Indonesian civil servants had their monthly pay transferred to their wives' bank accounts this week in a bid by a local government to stop men having affairs.
(AFP, 3/2/12)
2012 Mar 2, Iranians voted in their first national poll since the disputed 2009 re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, choosing a new parliament they hope will fix their country's sanctions-hit economy. Overall, the new parliament looked to be virtually entirely conservative, with the previous 60 reformist MPs winnowed down to a bare handful following the boycott of the main reformist blocs in the elections.
(AFP, 3/2/12)(AFP, 3/4/12)
2012 Mar 2, In Ivory Coast a military court put on trial 28 paramilitary police accused of crimes in the period last year when former president Laurent Gbagbo tried to cling to power.
(AFP, 3/2/12)
2012 Mar 2, Kenya launched the construction of a massive port, railway and refinery near a UNESCO-listed Indian Ocean island in a project it bills as the biggest ever in an African nation. Residents of the coastal island of Lamu had protested against the planned port.
(AP, 3/2/12)(AFP, 3/2/12)
2012 Mar 2, Mozambique's government said it has refused to let mining giant Rio Tinto use the Zambezi River to transport coal to the Indian Ocean for export. For now the Sena railway line to Beira in the center of the country and the Nacala line in the north were the preferred export routes for coal.
(AFP, 3/2/12)
2012 Mar 2, In northern Nigeria gunmen shot dead a soldier in the city of Kano.
(AFP, 3/3/12)
2012 Mar 2, Pakistan's ruling party made gains in the country's upper house of parliament in legislative elections. The PPP won 19 seats, increasing its majority to 41 in a much-needed boost for Zardari's weakened administration.
(AP, 3/2/12)(AFP, 3/3/12)
2012 Mar 2, In northwest Pakistan a suicide bomber attacked the headquarters of a rival insurgent group, killing 23 Lashkar-e-Islam supporters in an outbreak of factional fighting in the Tirah valley. Lashkar-e-Islam fighters had earlier attacked military post killing 10 soldiers. 23 militants were also killed in the fighting. Fighter jets left at least 15 militants dead in the Orakzai tribal agency.
(AP, 3/2/12)(SFC, 3/3/12, p.A4)
2012 Mar 2, In Somalia African Union-backed Somali government troops attacked and seized positions of hardline Shebab insurgents in the war-torn capital Mogadishu.
(AFP, 3/2/12)
2012 Mar 2, It was reported that the UN-backed Somali government spent only $1 million on social services despite having $58 million in revenue, according to an unpublished report by Abdirazak Fartaag, a former Somali government official.
(AP, 3/3/12)
2012 Mar 2, Syrian activists accused regime forces of carrying out execution-style killings and burning homes as part of a scorched-earth campaign in a restive neighborhood of Homs, while the Red Cross headed to the area following a bloody, monthlong siege to dislodge rebel forces. The Observatory said 10 people were killed in the town of Rastan near Homs when a mortar landed near marchers. The LCC said 16 were killed in the same event, among 52 reported dead nationwide.
(AP, 3/2/12)
2012 Mar 2, Thai police said they confiscated over 4 million methamphetamine tablets near the border with Myanmar, where much of it is produced.
(SFC, 3/3/12, p.A2)
2012 Mar 2, In Tunisia protesters began camping outside the offices of Wataniya in Tunis, demanding the "cleansing" of the national broadcaster and jeering at journalists. On April 25 they ended their protest after the government promised to address their concerns and asked them to leave.
(AFP, 4/25/12)
2012 Mar 2, In Yemen massive crowds gathered across the country, demanding that officers loyal to ousted president Ali Abdullah Saleh be purged from the country's armed forces.
(AP, 3/2/12)
2013 Mar 2, President Barack Obama pressed Congress to work with him on a compromise to halt a fiscal crisis he said was starting to "inflict pain" on communities across the United States.
(Reuters, 3/2/13)
2013 Mar 2, In Wyoming Ildiko Freitas (40) and her parents were killed by two intruders at her home in Cody. Stephen Hammer (19) and Tanner Vanpelt (18) were soon arrested and charged with murder and robbery.
(SFC, 3/6/13, p.A5)
2013 Mar 2, Bangladesh security forces killed two people and injured dozens as they clashed with demonstrators for a 3rd day in violence triggered by a death sentence given to Delwar Hossain Sayedee.
(SSFC, 3/3/13, p.A5)
2013 Mar 2, Chad's military chief announced that his troops deployed in northern Mali had killed Moktar Belmoktar, the terrorist who orchestrated the attack on a natural gas plant in Algeria that left 36 foreigners dead.
(AP, 3/2/13)
2013 Mar 2, China’s Xinhua News Agency reported that a massive sulfuric acid leak at a warehouse in Liaoning province has killed at least 3 people.
(SSFC, 3/3/13, p.A5)
2013 Mar 2, In Egypt Hossam Eldin Abdullah Abdelazim, was killed when an armored police vehicle crushed him to death during clashes between protesters and police in Mansoura. A police car in Port Said hit five protesters along a main road and sped off. The violence came as US Secretary of State John Kerry was in Cairo talking with opposition figures ahead of his meeting with the president and defense minister on March 3.
(AP, 3/2/13)
2013 Mar 2, German property developer Maik Uwe Hinkel rejected calls to halt work to remove one of the last remaining stretches of the Berlin Wall, despite angry protests against the plan.
(AP, 3/2/13)
2013 Mar 2, A Libyan security official said 50 Egyptians, who were arrested in Benghazi last week for allegedly spreading Christianity, are being charged with illegally entering and working in the country and will be deported.
(AP, 3/2/13)
2013 Mar 2, Violent ethnic riots rattled Macedonia's capital, culminating with hundreds raging through the city center, clashing with police, overturning cars and attacking a bus station. At least 22 people were injured, 13 of them police officers.
(AP, 3/2/13)
2013 Mar 2, In Malaysia gunmen ambushed and killed six policemen as fears mounted that armed intruders from the southern Philippines had slipped into at least three coastal districts on Borneo island. 6 gunmen were also killed in the fighting.
(AP, 3/3/13)(Econ, 3/9/13, p.51)
2013 Mar 2, In Mali a French soldier died in an assault on jihadists in the Adrar des Ifoghas mountains along the Algerian border. About 15 jihadists were reported killed in the fighting in the Ametettai Valley.
(AP, 3/3/13)
2013 Mar 2, In Nigeria Abubakar Shekau, the leader of Boko Haram, denied in a newly released video any peace talks with the government.
(AP, 3/3/13)
2013 Mar 2, The Syrian Army's General Command said its troops have carried out special operations in towns and villages along a road between Hama and Aleppo’s airport, restoring stability there and at the airport.
(AP, 3/2/13)
2014 Mar 2, At the Hollywood Academy Awards “12 Years a Slave," directed by Steve McQueen of Britain, won the Best Picture Oscar. Matthew McConaughtey won the Best Actor Oscar for his role in “Dallas Buyers Club." Cate Blanchett won the Best Actress Oscar for her role in “Blue Jasmine." Actress Lupita Nyong'o (31) of Kenya won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress in the movie "12 Years A Slave." Jared Leto won the Best Supporting Oscar for his role in “Dallas Buyers Club." Alfonso Cuaron won the Best Director Oscar for “Gravity," which won a total of seven Oscars.
(SFC, 3/3/14, p.C4)(Econ, 3/8/14, p.58)
2014 Mar 2, British director Malcolm Clarke won the documentary short prize for "The Lady in Number 6," a profile of musician and Holocaust survivor Alice Herz-Sommer (d.2014 at 110).
(AP, 3/3/14)
2014 Mar 2, The Italian film "The Great Beauty" won the Oscar for best foreign-language film.
(AP, 3/3/14)
2014 Mar 2, New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez signed legislation to ban texting. 41 other states have already banned texting by all drivers.
(SFC, 3/3/14, p.A6)
2014 Mar 2, A massive winter storm system packing cold air, snow and freezing rain pummeled the central US and headed for the East Coast.
(Reuters, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, In eastern Afghanistan a militant car bomb prematurely exploded overnight, killing 9 insurgents and 4 civilians. A lone suicide bomber entered a police station in Kandahar province, though officers' fire forced him to detonate his explosive vest early, only wounding one civilian. 12 Taliban escaped from the 1,200-inmate Kandahar Prison after a prison employee falsely put their names on a list of detainees who were scheduled for release. Two were soon recaptured.
(AP, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, In Bolivia 4 people were killed and over 60 injured when a metal footbridge collapsed onto a group of musicians marching in the opening parade of Carnival in Oruro.
(SSFC, 3/2/14, p.A4)
2014 Mar 2, In Hong Kong thousands marched to support press freedom and denounce violence following the Feb 26 attack on Kevin Lau Chun-to, former editor of the Ming Pao newspaper.
(SFC, 3/3/14, p.A2)
2014 Mar 2, In Iraq attacks in predominantly Sunni Arab areas north and west of Baghdad killed 6 people, all members of the security forces.
(AFP, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, Hundreds of thousands of ultra-Orthodox Jews held a mass prayer in Jerusalem in protest at a bill that would cut their community's military exemptions and end a tradition upheld since Israel's foundation.
(Reuters, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, Jamaican police said they have seized over 2,100 pounds (952 kg) of marijuana and arrested a suspect in a 2-day operation at a container terminal in Kingston.
(AP, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, In Libya gunmen shot dead French engineer Patrice Real in Benghazi. A member of the security forces was also killed by a bomb placed under his car and a former policeman was seriously wounded. Five unidentified bodies were found in and around the city.
(AFP, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, Pakistani warplanes bombed the hideout of militant leader Mullah Tamanchey, killing 5 insurgents, only a day after the Pakistani Taliban declared a one-month ceasefire to pursue stalled peace talks with the government. Tamanchey had directed the deadly assault a day earlier against a convoy carrying a polio vaccination team.
(Reuters, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, South Africa's biggest trade union, the 340,000-strong National Union of Metalworkers (NUMSA), said it was laying the ground for a new "working class" political party. The United Front Movement for Socialism would group together left-leaning organizations to fight for better education, healthcare and municipal services for South Africa's poor.
(AFP, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, In Syria gun battles and shelling hit the Palestinian camp of Yarmuk in southern Damascus, breaking a truce in place since mid-February.
(AFP, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, Ukraine mobilized for war and Washington threatened to isolate Russia economically, after President Vladimir Putin declared he had the right to invade his neighbor.
(Reuters, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, Ukraine's new PM Arseniy Yatsenyuk and world leaders urged Russian President Vladimir Putin to pull back his military as hundreds of armed men surrounded a Ukrainian military base in Crimea. Ukraine's navy chief announced he had switched allegiance to the pro-Russian authorities of the flashpoint peninsula of Crimea, a day after he was appointed to the post by interim leader Oleksandr Turchynov.
(AP, 3/2/14)(AFP, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, Venezuela released dozens of anti-government protesters and an Italian photographer, but that did nothing to appease demonstrators set for more rallies against President Nicolas Maduro. Thousands marched peacefully in Caracas. Afterwards some 1,500 erected barricades and clashed with National Guard troops.
(AFP, 3/2/14)(SFC, 3/3/14, p.A4)
2014 Mar 2, In central Yemen gunmen ambushed a colonel in the security forces, killing him and wounding his guard. Armed tribesmen clashed with security forces on the southern edge of Sanaa, leaving two gunmen dead and three soldiers wounded.
(AP, 3/2/14)
2015 Mar 2, The NY Times revealed that when Hillary Clinton was secretary of state she used a personal e-mail account rather than a government one for all her official business.
(Econ., 3/7/15, p.32)
2015 Mar 2, A new study was published saying a wave of migrants from the eastern fringes of Europe some 4,500 years ago left their trace in the DNA — and possibly the languages — of modern Europeans. They found that DNA associated with the Yamnaya people appeared strongly in what is now northern Germany. The Yamnaya were herders who lived in the steppe north of the Black and Aral Seas.
(AP, 3/3/15)
2015 Mar 2, Bangladeshi security officials arrested Farabi Shafiur Rahman as a suspect in the killing of blogger Avijit Roy, a prominent critic of extremist Islam who was hacked to death on Feb 26.
(AP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, British police said they had charged 10 men with sexual offences against children and adults, part of a wider investigation into child sexual exploitation in the northern English town of Rochdale.
(Reuters, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Motorists in England and Wales faced tougher penalties for driving under the influence of drugs as new laws took effect. Drivers will be prosecuted if they are caught exceeding new legal limits for eight illegal drugs and eight prescription drugs.
(AFP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Chinese military prosecutors released a list of 14 generals convicted of graft or placed under investigation in an accelerating nationwide anti-corruption drive.
(AP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Scandinavian Airlines said some 50 flights have been canceled to and from Denmark after members of a Danish cabin crew union walked out to protest the carrier's plan to transfer employees to a domestic airline acquired by SAS.
(AP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, In Egypt an explosion in Cairo near the High Court killed 2 people.
(SSFC, 3/8/15, p.A4)
2015 Mar 2, The EU approved new rules that clamp down on the use of flimsy plastic bags hazardous to the environment.
(SFC, 3/3/15, p.A2)
2015 Mar 2, In India a law banning the possession and sale of beef went into effect in the state of Maharashtra. The ban on the slaughter of cattle put thousands out of work and created problems for struggling farmers.
(SFC, 3/6/15, p.A5)(SFC, 3/27/15, p.A2)
2015 Mar 2, Iran’s The Center for Investigation of Organized Crime, a branch of the elite Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), accused Facebook of spreading immoral content and said it had arrested several users. State television reported Iran has monitored 8 million Facebook accounts with new software and will watch other social media sites for content that contravenes the Islamic Republic's moral codes.
(Reuters, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Iraq's armed forces, backed by Shi'ite militia, attacked Islamic State strongholds north of Baghdad as they launched an offensive to retake the city of Tikrit and the surrounding Sunni Muslim province of Salahuddin.
(Reuters, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Israel said it has busted an Israeli-Palestinian smuggling ring that funneled iron, electronic equipment and other prohibited materials to Gaza, bypassing Israel's stringent border security to help Hamas rebuild its militant infrastructure following last year's war.
(AP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Libya’s internationally recognized parliament appointed Major General Khalifa Belgacem Haftar for the post of commander-in-chief of the army after promoting him to the rank of lieutenant general.
(AFP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, The principality of Monaco signed an accord with Italy aimed at ending banking secrecy, days after Switzerland and Liechtenstein inked similar pledges to exchange financial information with Rome.
(AP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, In Myanmar truckloads of police prevented hundreds of students from continuing their march to Yangon to protest a new law that they say curbs academic freedom.
(AP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Namibia's outgoing Pres. Hifikepunye Pohamba (79) was named winner of the Mo Ibrahim Prize for "good governance" in Africa, the world's richest award that has seen a dearth of worthy candidates.
(AFP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, In Norway flights by a subsidiary of low-cost airline Norwegian Air Shuttle — Norwegian Air Norway — were partly disrupted after pilots continued a walkout begun Feb 28, causing the company's share price to crash 5 percent in Oslo.
(AP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Pakistani officials said hundreds of parents in the northwest were arrested and jailed over the weekend on charges of endangering public security after refusing to give their children polio vaccinations.
(AP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, In Switzerland the large family car Volkswagen Passat was voted car of the year by European automotive editors at the Geneva International Motor Show.
(AP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Syrian regime forces and Kurdish militia fought separate battles with the Islamic State group in a strategic area near the Iraqi and Turkish borders.
(AFP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Konstandinos Erik Scurfield (25), a former Royal Marine, died in a battle with IS militants, becoming the first Briton to be killed while fighting with Kurdish forces battling Islamic State jihadists in Syria.
(AFP, 3/4/15)
2015 Mar 2, Tunisia canceled a new tax imposed on travelers crossing Libya’s border after the measure triggered rioting.
(Reuters, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Ukraine's military said one Ukrainian serviceman was killed and four wounded in separatist eastern territories in the past 24 hours. But it warned that rebels were using the truce to regroup for new attacks on government positions.
(Reuters, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Venezuela gave the US two weeks to reduce its diplomatic mission in Caracas to 17 diplomats, from an estimated 100, to match the 17 Venezuelan diplomats serving in the US.
(SFC, 3/3/15, p.A2)
2016 Mar 2, The US and its allies in Iraq and Syria staged 29 strikes against Islamic State.
(Reuters, 3/3/16)
2016 Mar 2, In Mississippi Rafael McCloud (33), a capital murder suspect, escaped from the Warren County jail.
(SFC, 3/3/16, p.A4)
2016 Mar 2, New Jersey newspapers called for the resignation of Gov. Chris Christie over his endorsement of Donald Trump for president.
(SFC, 3/3/16, p.A4)
2016 Mar 2, In New Jersey Rafal Kaldon (38), accused of beating Norbert Nowak to death at a disco in Poland in August, 1996, was arrested.
(AP, 3/3/16)
2016 Mar 2, In Oklahoma City Aubrey McClendon (56), co-founder of Chesapeake Energy and a part-owner of the NBA’s Oklahoma City Thunder, drove his SUV into a wall a day after he was indicted for conspiring to rig bids to buy oil and natural gas leases in northwest Oklahoma.
(SFC, 3/3/16, p.C2)(Econ, 3/5/15, p.58)
2016 Mar 2, US astronaut Scott Kelly and Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko landed in Kazakhstan after almost a year in space in a ground-breaking experiment foreshadowing a potential manned mission to Mars.
(AFP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, Mining company Samarco and its owners, BHP Billiton and Vale SA, reached a deal with the Brazilian government to pay an estimated 20 billion reais ($5.1 billion) in damages over 15 years for a deadly dam spill in November.
(Reuters, 3/3/16)
2016 Mar 2, Jason Lawrance (50), a British man, was found guilty of raping five women he met through the US Internet dating service match.com, which he was allowed to use despite complaints to the website from his victims.
(AFP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, Cambodian National Police and Chinese police took part in rounding up 105 Chinese citizens at the Golden Crown Casino's hotel, releasing 67 after confirming they were not on wanted lists. Police said the people arrested are suspected of involvement in scams carried out against Chinese citizens over Internet phone services.
(AP, 3/3/16)
2016 Mar 2, An Egyptian military court handed down seven death sentences for an April 2015 bombing that killed 2 army cadets as they waited to board a bus. The court in Alexandria also sentenced five people to life in prison, which in Egypt means 25 years.
(AFP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, The EU launched a new aid program worth an initial 700 million euros that mirrors the kind of disaster relief it offers developing nations. Greece, the main gateway to Europe, would initially be the main beneficiary of the emergency scheme. The number of migrants awaiting passage to central and northern Europe swelled on Greece's border with Macedonia as the frontier remained shut.
(Reuters, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, In northern France dozens of riot police moved in for a third day to demolish the shantytown on the outskirts of the port city of Calais after half a dozen shelters were burned down overnight.
(AFP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, A Guatemalan court ordered two former military officers convicted of holding indigenous women as sex slaves during the nation's civil war to pay their victims just over $1 million in compensation.
(Reuters, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, An Indian court said a university student leader can be freed on bail more than two weeks after he was detained for alleged sedition in a case that has sparked nationwide protests and accusations of government intolerance of dissent. The court said Kanhaiya Kumar could be released if he pays about $148 bail, refrains from political activity and is supervised by a faculty member at Jawaharlal Nehru University.
(AP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, An earthquake of magnitude 7.9 that struck off Indonesia's island of Sumatra killing a number of people.
(Reuters, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, Iraq signed a deal with an Italian company to repair and maintain its largest dam, near the northern, Islamic State-held city of Mosul.
(AP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, Israeli forces demolished dozens of structures including a school in the northern West Bank this week, leaving 10 families homeless.
(AFP, 3/4/16)
2016 Mar 2, Jordan said it has thwarted planned attacks by the Islamic State group on its soil, killing 7 suspected jihadists in a major security operation near the Syrian frontier. One member of Jordan's security forces was killed and three wounded in clashes that raged for several hours until dawn.
(AP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, In Libya a gunfight took place near the city of Sabratha. Two Italian construction workers, who were kidnapped in Libya last July, were believed killed during the clash between militants from the Islamic State group and local militias fighting them.
(AP, 3/3/16)
2016 Mar 2, Macedonia allowed some 200 refugees to cross its border with Greece, as 10,000 more were left waiting in miserable conditions.
(AFP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, Qatar-based beIN Media Group said it has purchased a 100-percent stake in the film studio Miramax, part of its expansion into the entertainment business.
(AP, 3/3/16)
2016 Mar 2, Russia's state prosecutor demanded a 23-year prison sentence for Ukrainian pilot and lawmaker Nadiya Savchenko who is accused of killing two Russian journalists in war-torn Ukraine.
(AFP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, In Russia some 15 tons (110 barrels) of oil spilled off from an idled pipeline on the Pacific island of Sakhalin according to oil producer Rosneft. Local ecologists said the scale of disaster was far larger.
(Reuters, 3/3/16)
2016 Mar 2, A Saudi-led bloc of six Gulf Arab nations, the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC), formally branded Hezbollah a terrorist organization, ramping up the pressure on the Lebanese militant group fighting on the side of President Bashar Assad in Syria.
(AP, 3/2/16)(Econ, 3/5/16, p.45)
2016 Mar 2, South Korea's opposition members of parliament ended a record-breaking filibuster to block an "anti-terrorism" bill sponsored by their conservative rivals. The opposition Minju party led the eight-day filibuster, the world’s longest. South Korea’s National Assembly passed its first legislation on human rights in North Korea, in a move that is expected to enrage its northern rival.
(Reuters, 3/2/16)(AP, 3/2/16)(Econ, 4/96, p.41)
2016 Mar 2, In Syria a Kurdish-led fighting alliance captured a hill overlooking a main road in Aleppo from the militant Nusra Front group and its allies. In southern Syria a car bomb targeted a meeting of commanders of a US-backed moderate rebel group, killing 18, including the faction's top commander.
(AP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, Former Tanzanian president Benjamin Mkapa was named as the new mediator for talks to end a nearly year-long crisis in neighboring Burundi by the regional East African Community (EAC).
(AFP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, Thailand police seized 895,897 counterfeit brand-name sunglasses at a warehouse where they also arrested two Chinese nationals accused of importing them from China. the sunglasses were purported to be famous brands such as Ray-Ban, Oakley, Louis Vuitton and Christian Dior.
(AP, 3/3/16)
2016 Mar 2, In southeastern Turkey residents of Cizre began returning home after authorities partially lifted a curfew in place since December for a controversial operation against Kurdish rebels which left many homes devastated. 3 soldiers and 10 Kurdish PKK militants were killed in clashes in Mardin province and Diyarbakir.
(AFP, 3/2/16)(Reuters, 3/3/16)
2016 Mar 2, Ukrainian authorities said 3 soldiers have been killed and two wounded in the Donbas region in the country's east as their car exploded.
(AP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, The United Nations Security Council unanimously adopted a resolution that dramatically expands existing UN sanctions on North Korea in response to its Jan. 6 nuclear test, a measure largely negotiated by Washington and Beijing.
(Reuters, 3/2/16)
2017 Mar 2, Several congressional Republicans called on Attorney General Jeff Sessions to recuse himself from investigations into alleged Russian meddling in the US presidential election after it emerged he met last year with Russia's ambassador but did not disclose the contacts in Senate testimony. Sessions became the second high-ranking member of the Trump administration to take a hit over conversations with Russia's envoy to the US, recusing himself from any probe that examines communications between Trump aides and Moscow.
(Reuters, 3/2/17)(AP, 3/3/17)
2017 Mar 2, US VP Mike Pence swore in retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson as secretary of housing and former Texas Gov. Mike Perry as energy secretary.
(SFC, 3/3/17, p.A6)
2017 Mar 2, The Kansas Supreme Court ruled that the state’s spending on public education was unconstitutionally low.
(SFC, 3/3/17, p.A6)
2017 Mar 2, US federal prosecutors announced they have captured members of the MS-13 street gang who killed three Long Island high school students last year with a machete and baseball bats.
(SFC, 3/3/17, p.A6)
2017 Mar 2, In Nebraska a prison riot at the Tecumseh State Correctional Institution left two inmates dead. About 40 inmates refused to return to their cells after staff members reported a fire to one of the housing units.
(SFC, 3/4/17, p.A6)
2017 Mar 2, Snap, the parent company of social media Snapchat, closed at $24.48, a 44% jump over its IPO price of $17. The company had started in 2011 as Picaboo. The securities sold had no voting power so all the power stayed with co-founders Evan Spiegel and Bobby Murphy.
(SFC, 3/3/17, p.C1)(Econ, 2/4/17, p.53)(Econ, 2/11/17, p.56)
2017 Mar 2, In Afghanistan a suspected US drone strike killed Qari Abdullah, a top commander of the militant Haqqani network. He was the man who in 2014 accompanied US Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl when he was handed over to US authorities.
(AP, 3/3/17)
2017 Mar 2, An Austrian court found eight Iraqi nationals guilty of gang-raping a German tourist on New Year's Eve, 2015, and sentenced them to prison terms of between nine and 13 years.
(AP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, Nations and philanthropists pledged close to $200 million for family planning at an international conference in Brussels that aimed to make up for the gap left by President Donald Trump's ban on US funding to groups linked to abortion.
(AP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, Canada adopted a military doctrine that explicitly acknowledges soldiers’ right to use force to protect themselves, even when the threat comes from children.
(Econ, 4/1/17, p.28)
2017 Mar 2, Croatia's conservative government formed a council to deal with the country's previous pro-Nazi and Communist regimes in a bid to overcome the deep divisions that still exist over the Balkan nation's past.
(AP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, The Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia urged the European Union to boost the role of national parliaments under a planned overhaul of the bloc's decision-making process.
(Reuters, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, In Egypt German Chancellor Angela Merkel and President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi held talks on ways of slowing migration to Europe, including tightening control over borders.
(AP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, Egypt's top appeals court found Hosni Mubarak innocent of involvement in the killing of protesters during the 2011 uprising that ended his 30-year rule, in a final ruling that could see the former president walk free.
(Reuters, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, In Italy three skiers were killed in an avalanche in the northern Alps. Another five people were injured at Plan de la Gabba.
(AP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, In southern Italy two African workers were killed late today after fire broke out at a camp housing hundreds of migrants who pick fruit and vegetables near Foggia.
(Reuters, 3/3/17)(AP, 3/3/17)
2017 Mar 2, Northern Ireland began voting in snap elections to resolve a political crisis fuelled by bad blood and Brexit. The DUP and Ulster Unionists won only 38 seats in the 90-member Assembly The pro-British Democratic Unionist Party narrowly remained the largest party following the closest-ever election for the provincial assembly. If the conservative and pro-British Democratic Unionist Party and the socialist and pro-Irish republican Sinn Fein cannot resolve their differences within three weeks of the vote, the assembly's executive could be suspended and the province fully governed from London.
(AFP, 3/2/17)(Reuters, 3/4/17)(Econ, 3/11/17, p.56)
2017 Mar 2, Kurdish forces seized an oil facility in Kirkuk to send a message to the Iraqi government to build a refinery.
(Reuters, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, Mexican journalist Cecilio Pineda Birto was shot dead in Ciudad Altamirano while in a hammock at a car wash waiting for his car to be serviced.
(AP, 3/3/17)
2017 Mar 2, Nigeria filed criminal charges of corruption against oil multinationals Royal Dutch Shell and Eni over the $1.1 billion sale of one of Africa's richest oil blocks. Malabu Oil, secretly set up by former Oil Minister Dan Etete, was awarded OPL 245 while he was oil minister. Nigeria's government got only $210 million from the deal.
(AP, 3/4/17)
2017 Mar 2, Pakistan announced plans to bring its militancy-wracked tribal areas into the mainstream political fold by ending a de facto system of direct rule that critics said suppressed development and fuelled extremism.
(AFP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, Pakistan said it will conduct its first census in 19 years. The 70-day data-gathering campaign will start March 15.
(Reuters, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, In Pakistan a suspected US drone strike killed two men on a motorcycle in a village near the Afghanistan border.
(Reuters, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, It was reported that the shores of Peru’s Lake Titicaca, South America's largest lake, are littered with dead frogs, discarded paint buckets and bags of soggy trash and that the water itself contains toxic levels of lead and mercury. Untreated sewage water drains from two dozen nearby cities and illegal gold mines high in the Andes dump up to 15 tons of mercury a year into a river leading to the lake.
(AP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny accused PM Dmitry Medvedev of controlling a property empire including mansions, yachts and vineyards financed by oligarchs through a network of shadowy non-profit organizations.
(AFP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, In Somalia at least 57 al-Shabab members were killed after African Union troops from Kenya and Somali forces attacked one of its camps outside Afmadhow.
(AP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, In South Africa emergency workers dug through rubble in Johannesburg after part of the Charlotte Maxeke hospital's roof collapsed, reportedly trapping several patients.
(AFP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, South Sudan announced it would increase work permit fees for foreign workers from the $100-$300 range to between $1,000 and $10,000 per year, depending on the qualifications of the worker. International aid agencies on March 10 warned this would worsen a humanitarian crisis in the famine-hit country. In early April South Sudan suspended the plans to charge foreign workers a $10,000 work permit fee, after criticism that it would create a huge expense for aid organizations.
(AFP, 3/11/17)(AP, 4/3/17)
2017 Mar 2, A Madrid judge banned a bright orange bus emblazoned with an anti-transgender message from driving through the Spanish capital on the grounds that it was discriminatory and could provoke hate crimes.
(Reuters, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, In Sudan Bakri Hassan Saleh, a former army general and top aide to President Omar al-Bashir, was sworn in as the country’s first prime minister since the post was scrapped in a 1989 Islamist-backed coup.
(AFP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, Sweden reintroduced compulsory military service, seven years after abandoning it, to respond to global security challenges including Russia's assertive behavior in the Baltic Sea region.
(AFP, 3/2/17)(SFC, 3/3/17, p.A4)
2017 Mar 2, Syrian troops backed by Russian jets completed the recapture of the historic city of Palmyra from the Islamic State group. Fighters of the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) announced they would cede several villages to the government as part of a deal brokered by Russia to avoid conflict with Turkey.
(AFP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, Syrian warplanes carried out eight air strikes in a rebel-held district of the mostly government-controlled city of Homs. The air strikes killed two civilians and wounded more than 24 people in al-Waer, as UN-sponsored peace talks continued in Geneva.
(Reuters, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, In western Ukraine eight miners died when a methane gas explosion tore through a pit in the western Lviv region.
(AFP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, The United States carried out 25 air strikes in Yemen targeting al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula in al-Maraqisha, a rugged mountainous area where al Qaeda militants took refuge last year.
(Reuters, 3/2/17)(Econ, 3/18/17, p.24)
Go to http://www.timelinesdb.com
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871 Mar 2, Battle at Marton (Maeretun): 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)
986 Mar 2, Lotharius (44), King of France (954-86), died.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1121 Mar 2, Dirk VI became count of Holland.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1122 Mar 2, Floris II, the fat one, count of Holland, died.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1127 Mar 2, Charles the Good, Count of Flanders, was murdered. Flemish towns (Ghent, Bruges and Ypres) forced the selection of Thierry of Alsace as the new count despite Louis VI’s choice of the son of Normandy’s Robert Curthose.
(PCh, 1992, p.92)(SC, 3/2/02)
1316 Mar 2, Robert II the Steward, King of Scotland (1371-90), was born.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1333 Mar 2, Wladyslaw IV, the Short One, Great, duke, king of Poland, died.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1402 Mar 2, In Marienburg Svitrigaila crossed over to the Knights of the Cross and promised to uphold the Salyn treaty that was broken by Vytautas.
(LHC, 3/1/03)
1458 Mar 2, Hussite George van Podiebrad was chosen king of Bohemia.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1459 Mar 2, Adrian VI [Adriaan F Boeyens], Netherlands, Pope (1522-23), was born.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1481 Mar 2, Franz von Sickingen, German knight, was born.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1498 Mar 2, Vasco da Gama's fleet visited Mozambique Island.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1629 Mar 2, English King Charles I fleeced the house of commons.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1675 Mar 2, Prince William III was installed as Governor of Overijssel.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1725 Mar 2, George F. Handel’s opera "Giulio Cesare in Egitto" premiered in London.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1776 Mar 2, Americans began shelling British troops in Boston. Henry Knox had managed to drag 58 canon and mortars from Fort Ticonderoga to the Dorchester Heights above Boston.
(HN, 3/2/99)(WSJ, 5/20/05, p.W10)
1776 Mar 2, The American Secret Committee of Correspondence appointed Connecticut lawyer Silas Deane as a special envoy to negotiate with the French government for aid.
(AH, 2/06, p.59)
1789 Mar 2, Pennsylvania ended the prohibition of theatrical performances.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1793 Mar 2, Sam Houston, the first president of the Republic of Texas (1836-38, 1841-44), was born near Lexington, Va. He fought for Texas' independence from Mexico; President of Republic of Texas; U.S. Senator; Texas governor
(AP, 3/2/98)(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)(SC, 3/2/02)
1797 Mar 2, The Directory of Great Britain authorized vessels of war to board and seize neutral vessels, particularly if the ships were American.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1797 Mar 2, Horace [Horatio] Walpole (79), British horror writer, died.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1799 Mar 2, Congress standardized US weights and measures.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1807 Mar 2, US Congress banned slave trade effective January 1, 1808. The further importation of slaves was abolished but an inter-American slave trade continued.
(V.D.-H.K.p.276)(WSJ, 12/16/97, p.A18)(WSJ, 10/19/98, p.A24)(SC, 3/2/02)
1810 Mar 2, Leo XIII (Vincenzo G Pecci), 256th Catholic Pope (1878-1903), was born.
(HN, 3/2/99)(SC, 3/2/02)
1815 Mar 2, To put an end to robberies by the Barbary pirates, the United States declared war on Algiers.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1817 Mar 2, The 1st US Evangelical church building was dedicated in New Berlin, PA.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1819 Mar 2, Territory of Arkansas was organized. [see Jul 4]
(SC, 3/2/02)
1819 Mar 2, US passed its 1st immigration law.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1824 Mar 2, Bedrich Friedrich Smetana (1884), Czech, Bohemian composer (Bartered Bride, Moldau), was born.
(WUD, 1994, p.1345)(WSJ, 10/4/96, p.A7)(SC, 3/2/02)
1824 Mar 2, In the Supreme Court case of Gibbons v Ogden held that the power to regulate interstate commerce was granted to Congress by the Commerce Clause of the Constitution. The Court found that New York's licensing requirement for out-of-state operators was inconsistent with a congressional act regulating the coasting trade. Gibbons had hired Cornelius Vanderbilt as captain of his boat, Bellona, which operated under a federal license.
(Econ, 4/18/09, p.90)(ON, 6/12, p.2)
1825 Mar 2, The 1st grand opera in US sung in English was in NYC.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1829 Mar 2, Carl Schurz, was born. He was a Civil War general, political reformer and anti-imperialist.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1829 Mar 2, New England Asylum for the Blind, 1st in US, was incorporated in Boston.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1831 Mar 2, John Frazee becomes 1st US sculptor to receive a federal commission.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1836 Mar 2, Texas declared its independence from Mexico on Sam Houston's 43rd birthday. The first vice-president was Lorenzo de Zavala. Mexico refused to recognize Texas but diplomatic relations were established with the US, Britain and France. Texas was an independent republic until 1845.
(WSJ, 11/21/95, p.A-12)(WP, 6/29/96, p.A15)(SFC, 4/28/97, p.A3)(AP, 3/2/98)(HN, 3/2/99)
1836 Mar 2, Mexican forces under General Jose de Urrea defeated Texan forces at the Battle of Agua Dulce.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goliad_Campaign)
1853 Mar 2, The Territory of Washington was organized after separating from Oregon Territory. Pres. Franklin Pierce appointed Isaac Ingalls Stevens (1818-1862) as the first governor of the Washington Territory. Stevens served as US Congressman from the territory (1857-1858), and as a major general in the Union Army during the American Civil War. He died at the Battle of Chantilly.
(HN, 3/2/99)(SC, 3/2/02)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Stevens)
1858 Mar 2, Frederick Cook, New Orleans, patented a cotton-bale metallic tie.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1861 Mar 2, The Territory of Nevada was created by an act of Congress. The first elected governor of the state was Henry G. Blasdel. US Congress created the Dakota & Nevada Territories out of the Nebraska & Utah territories
(LVRJ, 11/1/97, p.1B)(SFEC, 7/9/00, DB p.67)(SC, 3/2/02)
1862 Mar 2, Gen’l. Frederick W. Lander (b.1821), transcontinental engineer and Union General, died of “congestion of the brain" at Paw Paw, Virginia. He was the chief engineer of the Central Overland route. In 2000 Gary L. Ecalbarger authored “Frederick W. Lander: The Great Natural American Soldier."
(www.picturehistory.com/find/p/16832/mcms.html)(ACC, 2004)
1863 Mar 2, The US Congress passed the False Claims Act to protect the government from being ripped off by suppliers outfitting the Union army. It is often referred to as the "Lincoln Law," because it was passed under the administration of President Abraham Lincoln.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_Claims_Act)(Econ, 8/30/14, p.22)
1863 Mar 2, Congress authorized track width of 4'-8½" for Union Pacific RR.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1864 Mar 2, Russian Czar Alexander II upheld reforms in Poland that gave landholders ownership of their lands.
(LHC, 3/1/03)
1865 Mar 2, Freedman's Bureau was founded for Black Education.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1865 Mar 2, General Lee proposed peace to Grant. President Abraham Lincoln rejected Confederate General Robert E. Lee's plea for peace talks, demanding unconditional surrender.
(HFA, ‘96, p.22)(HN, 3/2/99)
1865 Mar 2, General Early's army was defeated at Waynesborough.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1865 Mar 2, British newspaper "Morning Chronicle" began publishing.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1866 Mar 2, Excelsior Needle Company of Wolcottville, Connecticut, began making sewing machine needles, the 1st US company to make sewing needles.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)(SC, 3/2/02)
1867 Mar 2, The first Reconstruction Act was passed by Congress.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1867 Mar 2, Congress abolished peonage in New Mexico.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1867 Mar 2, US Congress created the Department of Education.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1867 Mar 2, Howard University, Washington DC, was incorporated. General Oliver Otis Howard, Union Civil War commander, co-founded Howard Univ.
(http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/today/nov20.html)(ON, 4/07, p.8)
1867 Mar 2, Jesse James-gang robbed a bank in Savannah MO, 1 dead.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1868 Mar 2, University of Illinois opened.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1873 Mar 2, George Smith, British Assyriologist, arrived at the ruins of Nineveh outside Mosul (Iraq). Over the next few weeks he found tablets referring to more pieces of the Gilgamesh story, a record of kings in the Babylionian dynasties, as wellas lists of cuneiform symbols.
(ON, 11/07, p.5)
1874 Mar 2, Baseball batter's box was officially adopted.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1876 Mar 2, Pius XII [Eugenio MGG Pacelli], 260th Pope (1939-58), was born to an aristocratic Roman family accustomed to serving the Catholic Church.
(SFEC, 9/26/99, BR p.3)(SC, 3/2/02)
1877 Mar 2, Republican Rutherford B. Hayes was declared winner of the 1876 presidential election over Democrat Samuel J. Tilden, even though Tilden had won the popular vote 50.1 to 47.95%. A special US congressional panel had awarded Florida’s electors to Rutherford B. Hayes.
(PCh, 1992, p.542)(AP, 3/2/98)(WSJ, 12/11/00, p.A18)
http://condor.stcloudstate.edu/~brixr01/theTIMEMACHINE.html
1879 Mar 2, Julia Martha Thomas (55), a wealthy widow, was killed by her housekeeper Kate Webster (29) very close to Park Road in well-to-do Richmond, England, but her head was never found. Webster was tried and executed, but Thomas’ head was never found until it was unearthed in October, 2010, by workmen building an extension at the home of David Attenborough, the face of BBC natural history programs for more than 50 years. In 2011 the skull was formally recognized as that of Julia Martha Thomas.
(AFP, 7/6/11)
1887 Mar 2, The American Trotting Association was organized in Detroit, Mich., on this day.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1889 Mar 2, Congress passed the Indian Appropriations Bill, proclaiming unassigned lands in the public domain; the first step toward the famous Oklahoma Land Rush.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1889 Mar 2, Kansas passed 1st US antitrust legislation.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1893 Mar 2, 1st federal railroad legislation was passed; required safety features.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1895 Mar 2, Berthe Morisot (b.1841) French impressionist painter, died of pneumonia.
(NMWA, 12/04, p.10)
1896 Mar 2, Bone Mizell, the famed cowboy of Florida, was sentenced to two years of hard labor in the state pen for cattle rustling. He would only serve a small portion of the sentence.
(HN, 3/2/00)
1897 Mar 2, President Cleveland vetoed legislation that would have required a literacy test for immigrants.
(AP, 3/2/98)
1899 Mar 2, President McKinley signed a measure creating the rank of Admiral of the Navy for Adm. George Dewey.
(AP, 3/299)
1899 Mar 2, Congress established Mount Rainier National Park in Washington state, the nation's 5th national park.
(AP, 3/2/98)(SFC, 8/14/99, p.A6)
1900 Mar 2, Kurt Weill, composer (The Threepenny Opera), Brecht collaborator, was born in Dessau, Germany.
(HN, 3/2/01)(SC, 3/2/02)
1901 Mar 2, US Congress passed the Platt amendment, which limited Cuban autonomy as a condition for withdrawal of US troops. Washington retained the right to intervene militarily in Cuba as a condition of ending the postwar US occupation. The US did in fact intervene several times, and American business and mafia gangs came to dominate many aspects of the island in the run-up to the 1959 revolution.
(HN, 3/2/99)(AP, 2/15/13)
1901 Mar 2, Hawaii's 1st telegraph company opened.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1903 Mar 2, The Martha Washington Hotel opened for business in New York City. The hotel featured 416 rooms and was the first hotel exclusively for women.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1904 Mar 2, Henry Dreyfuss, industrial designer of everything from telephones to the interior of the Boeing 707, was born.
(HN, 3/2/01)
1904 Mar 2, Theodor Seuss Geisel [Dr. Seuss] was born in Springfield, Mass. He was the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of "The Cat in the Hat," "Green Eggs and Ham," "The Grinch Who Stole Christmas" and other children's books.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)(HN, 3/2/99)(SSFC, 5/26/02, Par p.8)
1904 Mar 2, "Official Playing Rules of Professional Base Ball Clubs" was adopted.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1904 Mar 2, Gabriele d'Annunzio's "La figlia di Iorio" premiered in Milan.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1907 Mar 2, Georges Feydeaus' "La Puce à l'Oreille" premiered in Paris, France.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1907 Mar 2, General Louis Botha was named premier of Transvaal.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1908 Mar 2, An international conference on arms reduction opened in London.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1908 Mar 2, Gabriel Lippman introduced the new three-dimensional color photography at the Academy of Sciences.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1909 Mar 2, Great Britain, France, Germany and Italy asked Serbia to set no territorial demands.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1915 Mar 2, British Vice Admiral Carden began bombing of Dardanelles forts.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1915 Mar 2, Vladmir Jabotinsky formed a Jewish military force to fight in Palestine.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1917 Mar 2, President Woodrow Wilson signed the Jones-Shafroth Act giving Puerto Ricans US citizenship. The Jones Act separated the Executive, Judicial, and Legislative branches of Puerto Rican government, provided civil rights to the individual, and created a locally elected bicameral legislature. The two houses were a Senate consisting of 19 members and a 39-member House of Representatives. However, the Governor and the President of the US had the power to veto any law passed by the legislature. Also, the US Congress had the power to stop any action taken by the legislature in Puerto Rico.
(www.loc.gov/rr/hispanic/1898/jonesact.html)(AP, 3/2/98)
1917 Mar 2, Desi Arnaz (Desiderio Alberto Arnez y de Acha III) was born in Santiago, Cuba. His father was the mayor of Santiago.
(www.youns.com/lucy/desiarnaz.asp)
1918 Mar 2, Hubert Bancroft (b.1832) San Francisco-based historian and ethnologist, died in SF. His work included compiling and editing a 39-volume chronicle that traced the saga of the Pacific Coast from the Spanish conquistadors to the Gold Rush. The Bancroft Library at UC Berkeley was named in his honor after UC purchased his book collection in 1905. In 2014 his great-great granddaughter reduced and published his 800-page autobiography as a 225-page book.
(SFC, 5/27/14, p.E1)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hubert_Howe_Bancroft)
1919 Mar 2, The 1st congress of Communist Int’l. opened at the Kremlin.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1920 Mar 2, Karel Capek’s "Loupeznik" premiered in Prague.
(www.enotes.com/peoples-chronology/year-1920/theater-film)
1923 Mar 2, Doc Watson, blue grass singer and guitarist, was born.
(HN, 3/2/01)
1923 Mar 2, The first issue of the weekly periodical, "TIME" appeared on newsstands. The first issue, dated March 3, was 32 pages and featured a charcoal sketch of Congressman Joseph Gurney Cannon on the cover. It was the United States’ first modern newsmagazine. The worldwide Time Magazine was conceived by Henry Luce and Briton Hadden (d.1929) in 1922. Luce and Hadden had just graduated from Yale. In 2006 Isaiah Wilner authored “The Man Time Forgot," a biography of Hadden.
(www.time.com/time/covers/0,16641,19230303,00.html)(WSJ, 1/11/00, p.B1)
1923 Mar 2, In Italy, Mussolini admitted that women have a right to vote, but declares that the time was not right.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1925 Mar 2, State and federal highway officials developed a nationwide route numbering system and adopted the familiar U.S. shield-shaped, numbered marker. For instance, in the east, there is U.S. 1 that runs from New England to Florida and in the west, the corresponding highway, U.S. 101, from Tacoma, WA to San Diego, CA.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1925 Mar 2, Japan's House of Representatives recognized male suffrage.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1925 Mar 2, SDAP-Second-Faction (Dutch Socialists) of parliament demanded drastic disarmament.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1927 Mar 2, Babe Ruth signed a 3-year contract with the New York Yankees for a guarantee of $70,000 a year, thus becoming baseball's highest paid player.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1929 Mar 2, US Congress created Court of Customs and Patent Appeals.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1929 Mar 2, The San Mateo-Hayward Bridge, then called the San Francisco Bay Toll-Bridge, opened. The $7.5 million, 7.1-mile span was for the time the longest in the world. The initial toll was 45 cents per car with an additional nickel for each passenger. On hand were Gov. C.C. Young, SF Mayor James Rolph Jr., and San Mateo Mayor Fred Beer. Pres. Coolidge pressed a button in the white House that sparked the final connection.
(SFEC, 3/8/98, p.W31)(Ind, 3/30/02, 5A)
1930 Mar 2, SF took possession of the Spring Valley Water Co. The company had its headquarters in a 7-storey building at 425 Mason St.
(SFC, 12/17/04, p.F2)(SSFC, 8/24/14, p.C2)
1930 Mar 2, Harry Kuchins made the first indoor glider flight inside the St. Louis, MO, Terminal Building. We laugh hysterically at this and we know you think we make this stuff up, but we don't. It really happened.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1930 Mar 2, Novelist D.H. Lawrence died of tuberculosis in a sanitarium in Vence, France, at the age of 45.
(HN, 3/2/01)
1931 Mar 2, Tom Wolfe, journalist, author (Right Stuff), was born in Richmond, VA.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1931 Mar 2, Mikhail Gorbachev, Soviet Secretary-General (1985-91), was born. He was responsible for restructuring the Soviet economy (perestroika) and openness and information (glasnost). Mikhail Gorbachev rose through the ranks of the Communist Party as an expert in agricultural affairs. Born to a peasant family, Gorbachev worked on a farm as a combine operator before going to Moscow State University in 1950. He joined the party in 1952 and, upon graduation with a law degree in 1955, he became a full-time party official. In 1967 he graduated from the Stavropol Agricultural Institute and was named to the party’s Central Committee in 1971. He was promoted to the party Secretariat in 1978, earning a reputation as an innovator as party secretary of agriculture.
(HN, 3/2/99)(HNQ, 6/17/99)(WSJ, 12/1/07, p.A8)
1933 Mar 2, Hollywood premiered "King Kong" in New York featuring Fay Wray. The film, directed by Meriam C. Cooper, used stop-motion photography and an 18-inch model for Kong. The film saved RKO Studios from bankruptcy. It was re-released in 1938 with a scene excised of Kong ripping at Fay Wray’s dress and then sniffing his finger. It was rated #43 by the Amer. Film Inst. in 1998. In 2001 it was rated the #12 most thrilling film.
(SFC, 4/13/96, p.E5)(SFC, 11/15/97, p.C6)(AP, 3/2/98)(WSJ, 3/19/98, p.R4)
1933 Mar 2, Most powerful earthquake in 180 years hit Japan.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1934 Mar 2, Doug Watkins jazz musician (bass: Pepper-Knepper Quintet, Hank Mobley Quartet, Horace Silver and the Jazz Messengers), was born.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1934 Mar 2, Union Pacific tested a light-weight high-speed passenger train in Omaha.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1935 Mar 2, King Prajadhipok abdicated and left for England. He was replaced by Ananda Mahidol (1925-1946), who became Rama VIII.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ananda_Mahidol)
1938 Mar 2, Landslides and floods cause over 200 deaths in Los Angeles, CA.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1938 Mar 2, Trials of Soviet leaders began in the Soviet Union.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1939 Mar 2, The Massachusetts legislature voted to ratify the Bill of Rights, 147 years after the first 10 amendments to the U.S. Constitution had gone into effect.
(AP, 3/2/98)
1939 Mar 2, Roman Catholic Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli was elected Pope; he took the name Pius XII.
(WSJ, 4/25/97, p.A18)(WSJ, 5/8/97, p.A23)(AP, 3/2/98)
1939 Mar 2, Howard Carter, archeologist, died in London at age 62. He led the discovery of the Tomb of Tutankhamen in 1922.
(ON, 5/00, p.8)
1940 Mar 2, The first televised intercollegiate track meet was seen by TV viewers in New York City as W2XBS presented the action live from Madison Square Garden. New York University won the meet.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1940 Mar 2, Soviet armies conquered Tuppura Island, Finland.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1942 Mar 2, John Irving, novelist (The World According to Garp), was born.
(HN, 3/2/01)
1942 Mar 2, Lou Reed [Louis Firbank], vocalist, guitarist (Walk on the Wild Side, Velvet Underground), was born in Freeport, NY.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1942 Mar 2, 14th Academy Awards: "How Green was My Valley", Gary Cooper and Joan Fontaine won.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1942 Mar 2, Admiral Helfrich departed Java for Ceylon.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1943 Mar 2, George Benson, jazz, blues guitarist (Breezin', This Masquerade), was born.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1943 Mar 2, The battle of the Bismarck Sea began. US and Australian warplanes were able to inflict heavy damage on a Japanese convoy.
(AP, 3/2/07)
1943 Mar 2, The center of Berlin was bombed by the RAF. Some 900 tons of bombs were dropped in a half hour.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1943 Mar 2, 1st transport of Jews from Westerbork, Netherlands, to Sobibor concentration camp.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1944 Mar 2, Lou Reed (Firbank) was born. (singer, songwriter, guitarist: group: Velvet Underground; solo: Walk on the Wild Side, Charley's Girl; I Love You Suzanne; appeared in Paul Simon film: One Trick Pony)
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1944 Mar 2, In the 16th Academy Awards presentation moved from a banquet hall to Graumann's Chinese Theatre in Los Angeles this night. Jennifer Jones (24) won an Oscar for Best Actress in the film, "The Song of Bernadette". Jack Benny was the host that year. Best film was "Casablanca," Paul Lukas won for best actor.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)(SC, 3/2/02)
1944 Mar 2, In Salerno, Italy, fumes from a locomotive stalled in a tunnel suffocated 521 people.
(SFC, 6/4/98, p.A15)(AP, 2/18/04)
1945 Mar 2, The American flag is raised again over Corregidor, with General Douglas MacArthur and members of his staff present. MacArthur, commander of U.S. Army Forces in the Far East, reluctantly fled his headquarters on the rocky Philippine island of Corregidor in March 1942 as the Japanese closed in. MacArthur praised the gallant but futile defense of Corregidor as “an inspiration to carry on the struggle until the Allies should fight their way back" and vowed to return one day. On February 16, 1945, elements of the U.S. Sixth Army began the assault on Corregidor, and after furious fighting, MacArthur made good on his promise.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1945 Mar 2, 8th Air Force bombed Dresden.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1945 Mar 2, King Michael of Romania gave in to Communist government.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1946 Mar 2, Kingman Douglass became deputy director of CIA.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1946 Mar 2, Dutch troops landed on East Bali.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1946 Mar 2, Ho Chi Minh was elected president of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1949 Mar 2, The Lucky Lady II (USAF B-50 Superfortress), landed at Fort Worth, Texas, after completing the first non-stop, round-the-world flight: 23,452-mis in 94 hours.
(AP, 3/2/98)(SC, 3/2/02)
1949 Mar 2, 1st automatic street light was in New Milford, CT.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1950 Mar 2, Karen Carpenter was born. (drummer, singer: Grammy Award-winning group: The Carpenters: Best New Artist, Group w/Vocal: Close to You [1970], We've Only Just Begun, Top of the World, Please Mr. Postman)
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1950 Mar 2, Silly Putty was introduced to the public. Silly Putty was accidentally invented in 1943 by James Wright of General Electric.
(www.sillyputty.com/silly_science/silly_science.htm)(http://tinyurl.com/zwree)
1951 Mar 2, In the 1st NBA All-Star Game: East beat West 111-94 at Boston.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1951 Mar 2, The U.S. Navy launched the K-1, the first modern submarine designed to hunt enemy submarines.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1955 Mar 2, The William Inge play “Bus Stop" opened at the Music Box Theatre in New York.
(AP, 3/2/02)
1955 Mar 2, Claudette Colvin refuses to give up her seat in Montgomery, Alabama, nine months b Rosa Parks' famous arrest for the same offense.
(HN, 3/2/00)
1955 Mar 2, King Norodom Sihanouk of Cambodia put his father on the throne and assumed the position of prime minister.
(SC, 3/2/02)(WSJ, 5/15/03, p.A8)
1956 Mar 2, Morocco tore up the Treaty of Féz and declared independence from France. A protocol on Moroccan independence was signed in Paris.
(HN, 3/2/99)(EWH, 1968, p.1244)(SC, 3/2/02)
1957 Mar 2, Boxer Carlos Ortiz won a technical knockout against Lou Filippo (1925-2009). Filippo was originally awarded a victory in the 1st bout against Ortiz after being hit after the bell, but a Times reporter questioned a member of the California State Athletic Commission about that ruling, and the no-contest decision was invoked. Filippo lost the next fight to Ortiz about a month later, and retired at 23-9-3 with 8 knockouts and one no-contest. Both were later named to the Boxing Hall of Fame. Filippo went on to play a role in all five of the “Rocky" movies.
(www.badlefthook.com/2009/11/5/1117708/lou-filippo-1925-2009)(SFC, 11/6/09, p.C5)
1958 Mar 2, Chart Toppers: Sweet Little Sixteen, Chuck Berry; At the Hop, Danny & the Juniors; Oh Julie, Crescendos; Don't, Elvis Presley.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1958 Mar 2, A multinational expedition led by British geologist and explorer Vivian Fuchs (d.1999 at 91) completed the first overland crossing of Antarctica by way of the South Pole in 99 days.
(SFC, 11/13/99, p.A22)(AP, 3/2/08)
1958 Mar 2, Yemen announced it will join the United Arab Republic (Egypt and Syria).
(SC, 3/2/02)
1959 Mar 2, Miles Davis began recording “Kind of Blue" with John Coltrane, Cannonball Adderly, Philley Joe Jones, Paul Chambers and Bill Evans. Modes rather than chords formed the basis for improvisation on “So What" and “Flamenco Sketches." In 2000 Ashley Kahn authored “Kind of Blue," The Making of the Miles Davis Masterpiece. Eric Nisenson authored “The Making of Kind of Blue: Miles Davis and His Masterpiece."
(SFC, 8/24/98, p.B1)(SFEC, 11/5/00, BR p.1)
1961 Mar 2, "13 Daughters" opened at 54th St Theater NYC for 28 performances.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1962 Mar 2, Jon Bon Jovi (John Bongiovi) was born. (singer, musician, songwriter: You Give Love a Bad Name, Living on a Prayer)
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1962 Mar 2, Wilt "The Stilt" Chamberlain (d.1999 at 63) scored 100 points and broke an NBA record as the Philadelphia Warriors beat the New York Knicks 169-147 in Hershey Pa. before 4,124 fans. Chamberlain broke NBA marks for the most field goal attempts (63), most field goals made (36), most free throws made (28), most points in a half (59), most field goal attempts in a half (37), most field goals made in a half (22), and most field goal attempts in one quarter (21). The 316 total points scored tied an NBA record. The basketball used for the game was stolen by Kerry Ryman (14) after he shook Chamberlain’s hand. Ryman’s ball was auctioned in 2000 for $551,844.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)(SFC, 10/13/99, p.A13)(SFC, 4/29/00, p.A2)
1962 Mar 2, JFK announced US will resume above ground nuclear testing.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1964 Mar 2, Beatles began filming "A Hard Day's Night."
(SC, 3/2/02)
1965 Mar 2, The movie version of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s musical “The Sound of Music," starring Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer, had its world premiere at New York’s Rivoli Theater. The musical, about the Trapp Family, was a hit on the Great White Way for 3-1/2 years and one of the most popular motion pictures of all time. It remains a classic even today. The movie brought instant stardom for Miss Andrews, who went on to star in other singing roles in the theatre, on television, in movies and as a popular recording artist.
(AP, 3/2/05)
1965 Mar 2, More than 150 U.S. and South Vietnamese planes bombed two bases in North Vietnam in the first of the "Rolling Thunder" raids.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1966 Mar 2, Milton Obote stage a coup against Pres. Edward Mutesa (d.1969) and had himself declared president of Uganda. Mutesa, the Baganda king and non-executive president of Uganda, was burned out of his palace and exiled. Mutesa fled Obote’s army and went to London where his son, Ronald Muwenda Mutebi was enrolled in boarding school.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milton_Obote)(WSJ, 12/19/94, A-1,6)(Econ, 7/26/08, p.58)
1966 Mar 2, There were some 215,000 US soldiers in Vietnam. Gen. Westmoreland called for 325,000 by July and 410,000 by December.
(SC, 3/2/02)(Econ, 7/11/09, p.88)
1967 Mar 2, At the 9th Grammy Awards: “Strangers in Night" by Frank Sinatra won Record of the Year and “Michele" by the Beatles won Song of the Year. The song "Winchester Cathedral" by the New Vaudeville Band won the Grammy best contemporary recording category.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammy_Awards_of_1967)
1967 Mar 2, The US performed a nuclear test at its Nevada Test Site. The Rivet III test was part of Operation Latchkey.
(www.absoluteastronomy.com/topics/Operation_Latchkey)
1968 Mar 2, The Poor Peoples' March on Washington, envisioned by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. as a means of dramatizing the plight of the poor of all races, got under way.
{USA, Black History}
(www.project1968.com/in-the-news-may-2-1968.html)
1968 Mar 2, In Switzerland the World Ice Pairs Figure Skating Championship in Geneva was won by Lyudmila Belousova and Oleg Protopopov (USSR). The Ladies Figure Skating Championship was won by Peggy Fleming (USA). The Men's Figure Skating Championship was won by Emmerich Danzer (Austria).
(SC, 3/2/02)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Figure_Skating_Championships)
1968 Mar 17, The siege of Khe Sanh was the longest and bloodiest battle of the Vietnam War. During the siege Manny Babbit was wounded. Babbit in 1980 killed a 78-year-old woman in Sacramento, Ca., and was convicted and sentenced to death. He was awarded his Purple Heart while on death row in 1998.
(SFC, 3/20/98, p.A1)
1968 Mar 2, The USSR launched space probe Zond 4. It failed to leave Earth orbit.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zond_4)
1969 Mar 2, Dmitri Shostakovich, Russian composer, completed his 14th Symphony.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symphony_No._14_(Shostakovich))(http://tinyurl.com/66tpar)
1969 Mar 2, Phil Esposito of the Boston Bruins became the 1st NHL Player to score 100 points in a season.
(www.nhl.com/history/030269.html)
1969 Mar 2, The Concorde jetliner's 1st test flight took place in Bristol, England.
(www.xent.com/pipermail/fork/Week-of-Mon-20031013/026200.html)
1969 Mar 2, Chinese and Russian soldiers clashed on Damansky Island and approximately 70 died. The Soviet and Chinese border troops had been skirmishing since 1959 along the 2,500 mile border. Recent skirmishes were along the Ussuri River border. The Soviets used a full scale tank assault to repulse a Chinese attack on the island of Damansky. A border treaty in the 1990s gave the island to China.
(www.jstor.org/pss/1957173)(WSJ, 11/19/96, p.A1)(SFC, 12/28/96, p.A13)(WSJ, 12/16/05, p.A1)(http://tinyurl.com/n43dsd4)
1970 Mar 2, The US Supreme Court set age 23 as the cut-off for prosecuting men who fail to register for the draft on their 18th birthday.
(http://tinyurl.com/4urpvk)
1972 Mar 2, Pioneer 10 was launched from Cape Kennedy. It carried a plaque designed by Carl Sagan and Frank Drake showing some details of human civilization on Earth. The craft headed to Jupiter and then continued into deep space long past expectations. In 2001 contact was re-established with the craft 7.29 billion miles distant and enroute toward the constellation Taurus. Contact was again made in 2002. Pioneer was expected to reach the red star Aldebaran in Taurus in about 2 million years.
(SFC, 3/4/96, p.A5)(SFEC, 9/28/97, p.A14)(SFC, 4/30/01, p.A7)
1972 Mar 2, Jean-Bédel Bokassa appointed himself President for life of the Central African Republic.
(www.etat.sciencespobordeaux.fr/_anglais/chronologie/centralafrican.html)
1972 Mar 2, In Jamaica Michael Manley (1924-1997, Socialist and champion of the nonaligned movement, was sworn in as prime minister.
(SFC, 3/8/96, p.A21)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Manley)
1973 Mar 2, Federal forces surrounded Wounded Knee, South Dakota, which was occupied by members of the militant American Indian Movement who were holding at least 10 hostages.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1973 Mar 2, Arab commandos, "Black September" terrorists, led by Abu Jihad executed 3 hostages: US ambassador Cleo A. Noel (54), deputy George Curtis Moore (47) and Belgian charge d’affaires Guy Eid (38), in Khartoum, Sudan. Pres. Nixon refused their demands. The operation was later reported to have been organized by Yasser Arafat.
(WSJ, 1/10/02, p.A12)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khartoum_diplomatic_assassinations)
1974 Mar 2, In the 16th Grammy Awards Roberta Flack won for the song “Killing Me Softly" & Bette Midler won as Best New Artist. Stevie Wonder got five Grammy Awards for his album, "Innervisions" and his hit songs, "You Are The Sunshine of My Life" and "Superstition".
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammy_Awards_of_1974)
1974 Mar 2, US 1st class postage stamps rose from 8 cents to 10 cents.
(www.akdart.com/postrate.html)
1974 Mar 2, In Spain Catalan activist Salvador Puig (b.1948) became the world’s last person to be garroted. He was executed by the Francoist regime after being tried by a military tribunal and found guilty of the death of a Spanish gendarme.
(SFC, 1/1/15, p.D1)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salvador_Puig_Antich)
1975 Mar 2, Linda McCartney (1941-1998) was arrested in Los Angeles with possession of marijuana.
(www.philbrodieband.com/music_trivia-yesterdays_march.htm)
1975 Mar 2, Madeleine Vionnet (b.1876), French dressmaker, died at age 98. In 1999 Betty Kirke published the biography: "Madeleine Vionnet."
(SFEC, 5/16/99, BR p.8)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madeleine_Vionnet)
1976 Mar 2, The musical revue Bubbling Brown Sugar" opened at ANTA Theater in NYC for 766 performances.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bubbling_Brown_Sugar)
1976 Mar 2, Bob Lurie (b.1929), real estate magnate, led a group to acquire ownership of the San Francisco Giants baseball club.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Lurie)
1977 Mar 2, Bette Davis (1908-1989) became the 1st woman to receive Life Achievement Award.
(www.worldofquotes.com/history/3_2/7/index.html)
1977 Mar 2, Future Tonight Show host Jay Leno debuted with host Johnny Carson.
(www.lvol.com/bios/e136.html)
1977 Mar 2, The U.S. House of Representatives adopted a strict code of ethics.
(AP, 3/2/00)
1977 Mar 2, Libya amended its constitution and changed its name from The Libyan Arab Republic to The Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahirya.
(http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/dr_ibrahim_ighneiwa/libyans.htm)
1978 Mar 2, Sam Shepard’s play "Curse of the Starving Class" premiered at the New York Shakespeare Festival.
(SFEC, 5/30/99, DB p.37)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curse_of_the_Starving_Class)
1978 Mar 2, Soyuz 28 carried 2 cosmonauts to Salyut 6. Czech pilot Vladimir Remek became the first non-Russian, non-American in space.
(HN, 3/2/99)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soyuz_28)
1980 Mar 2, Snow fell in Florida.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_snow_events_in_Florida)
1981 Mar 2, Howard Stern began broadcasting on WWDC in Washington DC.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1981 Mar 2, The United States planned to send 20 more advisors and $25 million in military aid to El Salvador.
(HN, 3/2/99)
1981 Mar 2, A Pakistan Airways Boeing 720 was hijacked by 3 Pakistani terrorists. The passengers and crew were released March 15 in Syria.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/march/15/newsid_2818000/2818437.stm)
1982 Mar 2, Philip K. Dick (53), science fiction writer, died. His work included dozens of novels and over 100 short stories. His novel "Valis" (Vast Active Living Intelligence System) was an autobiographical work. In 1989 Lawrence Sutin wrote the biography: "Divine Invasions: A Life of Philip K. Dick." The 1982 film Blade Runner was loosely based on his novel: "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep." The 2003 film "Paycheck" was based on his 1953 same name novel. In 2004 Emmanuel Carrere authored “I Am Alive and You Are Dead: A Journey Into the Mind of Philip K. Dick.
(WSJ, 4/27/99, p.A20)(SFC, 6/25/02, p.D1)(SFC, 12/27/03, p.D1)(Econ, 4/17/04, p.83)
1982 Mar 2, The French term "région" was officially created by the Law of Decentralization, when by the same act their legal status was conferred. The first direct regional elections for representatives took place on 16 March 1986. France is administratively divided into 26 regions (French: régions), of which 22 are on mainland France, and four are overseas.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regions_of_France)
1982 Mar 2, In Peru over 50 Shining Path terrorists attack the prison of Ayacucho, releasing drug traffickers and 54 terrorists held there. The leader of the attack, Edith Lagos, was killed in the battle.
(www.larouchepub.com/other/1995/2246_sendero.html)
1983 Mar 2, The USSR launched spacecraft "TKS-M" to "Salyut-7" space station, which was named "Cosmos-1443".
(www.videocosmos.com/calendar-march0110.shtm)
1984 Mar 2, One of the first McDonald's franchises was closed in Des Plaines, IL.
(http://tinyurl.com/28tp6z)
1985 Mar 2, Country singer, Gary Morris hit #1 on the country charts for the first time with "Baby Bye Bye" from his album, "Faded Blue". Other chart toppers included: Careless Whisper, Wham! featuring George Michael; California Girls, David Lee Roth; Can't Fight this Feeling, REO Speedwagon.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1985_in_country_music)(http://eightiesclub.tripod.com/id201.htm)
1985 Mar 2, The US government approved a screening test for AIDS that detected antibodies to the virus, allowing possibly contaminated blood to be excluded from the blood supply.
(AP, 3/2/98)
1985 Mar 2, The Gordo cartoon strip, one of the first in the US to celebrate Mexican culture, ended. Gus Arriola (1917-2008) had begun the strip in 1941.
(SSFC, 2/3/08, p.B1)
1985 March 2, The tug Willamette Pilot III sank in heavy seas off the coast of Mendocino, Ca. 6 crew members died.
(SSFC, 3/7/10, DB p.46)
1985 Mar 2, Three Assyrians were executed by the Baath regime of Iraq for distributing literature against the Arabization policies of the government.
(www.unpo.org/article.php?id=741)
1986 Mar 2, Protesters tried to stop the sale of the Land Rover Motor Co. to a US owner.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1987 Mar 2, Two sets of quintuplets were born on the same day in the USA as Rosalind Helms delivered a basketball team of bouncing babies in Peoria, IL and Robin Jenkins became the mother of five in Las Vegas, NV.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1987 Mar 2, US government officials reported that the median price for a new home had topped $100,000 for the first time. The new six-figure price of $110,700 was up from $94,600.
(HC, Internet, 2/3/98)
1987 Mar 2, The Macintosh II computer was introduced. The 1st color Mac had a CPU speed of 16 MHz and sold for $3,898.
(SFC, 1/24/04, p.A12)(www.applematters.com/index.php/section/history/2006/03/02/)
1988 Mar 2, In the 30th Grammy Awards: Graceland, Joshua Tree, Jody Watley won.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1988 Mar 2, Dutch Liberal Party merged with SDP.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1988 Mar 2, The U.N. General Assembly voted overwhelmingly to order the United States to submit to binding arbitration its plan to close the observer mission of the Palestine Liberation Organization. A federal court later stopped the U.S.
(AP, 3/2/98)
1989 Mar 2, Madonna's "Like a Prayer" premiered on worldwide Pepsi commercial.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1989 Mar 2, Gloria Estefan (b.1957) and the Miami Sound Machine received the 1st star on the Latin Star Walk on Calle Ocho, the main street of Little Havana in Miami, Fl.
(http://tinyurl.com/czkup)
1989 Mar 2, Exxon Houston ran aground in Hawaii and spilled 117,000 gallons of oil.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1989 Mar 2, Representatives from the 12 European Community nations agreed to ban all production of CFCs (chlorofluorocarbons) by the end of this century.
(AP, 3/299)
1989 Mar 2, A grenade attack in downtown Panama killed a U.S. soldier and injured 28 other people at the My Place discotheque on Via Espania and Calle 50. [AP posted this event as 1990, the EW posted it as 1989]
(AP, 3/2/00)(EW)
1990 Mar 2, More than 6,000 drivers went on strike against Greyhound Lines Inc. The company, later declaring an impasse in negotiations, fired the strikers.
(AP, 3/2/00)
1990 Mar 2, A grenade attack in downtown Panama killed a U.S. soldier and injured 28 other people at the My Place discotheque on Via Espania and Calle 50. [AP posted this event as 1990, the EW posted it as 1989]
(AP, 3/2/00)(EW)
1991 Mar 2, "Aspects of Love" closed at Broadhurst Theater in NYC after 377 performances.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1991 Mar 2, "La Bete" closed at Eugene O'Neill Theater in NYC after 24 performances.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1991 Mar 2, Serge Gainsbourg (b.1928), French singer-songwriter, actor and director, died of a heart attack. His extremely varied musical style and individuality make him difficult to categorize. His legacy has been firmly established, and he is often regarded as one of the world's most influential popular musicians.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serge_Gainsbourg)
1991 Mar 2, The UN Security Council adopted a resolution dictating allied demands that Iraq had to meet before a formal-cease fire was declared in the Persian Gulf War. Iraq released CBS newsman Bob Simon and his crew, held captive for nearly six weeks.
(AP, 3/2/01)
1991 Mar 2, Shiite Muslims in southern Iraq and the Kurds rose up against Iraqi forces but were crushed by Iraqi armor that killed 50,000 and forced more than a million Kurds to flee to Turkey and Iran.
(SFC, 9/4/96, p.A7)(SFC, 9/4/96, p.A8)
1991 Mar 2, Following the Kuwait cease-fire a retreating Iraqi unit stumbled into the Gen. McCaffrey’s 24th infantry division and some 400 Iraqis were reported killed. Army investigations concluded that the Iraqis started the Rumaylah battle.
(SFC, 5/15/00, p.A3)(WSJ, 5/19/00, p.A38)(www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYqoaT0RTFU)
1991 Mar 2, A Tiger car bomb in Colombo, Sri Lanka, killed deputy defense minister Ranjan Wijeratne.
(SFC, 7/24/96, p.A9)
1992 Mar 2, A jury was seated in Simi Valley, Calif., in the assault trial of four Los Angeles police officers charged with beating motorist Rodney King.
(AP, 3/2/02)
1992 Mar 2, Actress Sandy Dennis died in Westport, Conn., at age 54.
(AP, 3/2/02)
1992 Mar 2, The 47th session of the UN General Assembly welcomed eight former Soviet republics and San Marino as its newest members. Kazakhstan’s Pres. Nursultan Nazarbayev proposed to the UN General Assembly an annual reduction of military budgets by 1% and using the money to fund and strengthen UN peace projects.
(AP, 3/2/02)(Econ, 12/16/06, p.81)
1993 Mar 2, In the third day of a standoff between federal agents and Branch Davidians near Waco, Texas, local radio stations broadcast a taped statement in which the group's leader, David Koresh, promised to surrender; however, the standoff continued.
(AP, 3/2/98)
1994 Mar 2, The government of Mexico and Indian rebels reached a tentative accord on most insurgent demands for the ending the rebellion, including sweeping political reforms.
(AP, 3/299)
1995 Mar 2, The US Senate rejected the balanced-budget amendment; the vote, 65-35, was two votes shy of the two-thirds majority needed for passage.
(AP, 3/2/00)
1995 Mar 2, Ted Truman, a top int’l. staffer at the Federal Reserve, reported to Alan Greenspan that massive dollar sales were driving down the US currency. In response the Fed and Treasury bought $600 million in marks and yen and repeated the action next day joined by 13 central banks.
(WSJ, 1/18/05, p.A13)
1995 Mar 2, "Smokey Joe's Café," previewed on Feb 9, opened at Virginia Theater in NYC.
(www.jimsdeli.com/theater/1997-before/smokey-joes-cafe.htm)
1995 Mar 2, The space shuttle STS-67 (Endeavour 8) blasted off to study the far reaches of the universe.
(AP, 3/2/00)
1995 Mar 2, Ferry boat sank off Sumbe, Angola, and over 42 people were killed.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1995 Mar 2, British trader Nick Leeson, blamed for the collapse of Barings PLC, was detained in Germany.
(AP, 3/2/00)
1995 Mar 2, The last U.N. peacekeepers in Somalia were evacuated.
(AP, 3/2/00)
1996 Mar 2, Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole reignited his presidential campaign with an overwhelming victory in the South Carolina Republican primary.
(AP, 3/2/01)
1996 Mar 2, In Australia the first conservative government in 13 years was elected in a landslide victory. John Howard with a pro-business coalition defeated the reformist labor party of Paul Keating.
(WSJ, 3/4/96, p. A-1)(SFC, 11/27/98, p.A16)
1996 Mar 2, Jacobo Majluta (61), President of Dominican Republic (1982), died.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1997 Mar 2, It was revealed that Vice President Gore had raised millions of dollars for the 1996 campaign through direct telephone solicitations, and that some of the calls were made on special phones installed in government buildings for that purpose.
(AP, 3/2/98)
1997 Mar 2, Saudi Arab billionaire Prince al-Waleed bin Talal acquired 5% of Apple.
(SC, 3/2/02)
1997 Mar 2, A storm hit Arkansas with as many as 20 tornadoes and caused major flooding in the Ohio Valley. At least 41 people were killed.
(SFEC, 3/3/97, p.A3)
1997 Mar 2, A state of emergency was declared in Albania and at least 4 demonstrators were killed in Vlora in clashes with police. The Adriatic town of Sarande was sacked by rioters.
(SFEC, 3/3/97, p.A12)(WSJ, 3/3/97, p.A1)
1997 Mar 2, In China Premier Li Peng asked the National People’s Congress for a 12.7% increase in the defense budget for a total of $9.68 billion.
(WSJ, 3/3/97, p.A1)
1997 Mar 2, The Russian Soyuz TM-24 returned to Earth.
(http://space.kursknet.ru/cosmos/english/machines/stm24.sht)
1997 Mar 2, In Spain matadors across the country went on strike as the bullfighting season opened. They favored a policy of shaving bull’s horns that was opposed by the government.
(SFEC, 3/3/97, p.A12)
1997 cMar 2, In Turkey the military submitted a 20-measure package to Prime Minister Erbakan that called for some new laws and stricter application of existing laws to protect secular principles.
(SFC, 3/5/97, p.A8)
1998 Mar 2, Henry Steele Commager (b.1902), American historian and champion of the Constitution, died in Amherst, Mass. He and R.B. Morris edited the 40-volume series "The Rise of the American Nation."
(WSJ, 3/3/98, p.A1)(SFC, 3/3/98, p.D8)
1998 Mar 2, Natascha Kampusch (10) vanished in Vienna, Austria, on her way to school, triggering a massive search that extended into neighboring Hungary. In 2006 Kampusch, who had been held captive in a cellar, managed to escape. Wolfgang Priklopil (44), her alleged abductor, committed suicide by jumping in front of a train. In 2007 Natascha’s mother, Brigitta Sirny authored: "Desperate Years: My life Without Natascha." In 2008 Herwig Haidinger, the former head of Austria's Federal Criminal Investigations Bureau, accused authorities of ignoring a tip in April 1998 from a local policeman that pointed to Priklopil. He also alleged that Interior Ministry officials refused to look into that accusation once Kampusch reappeared, so to avoid a scandal before parliamentary elections that fall.
(AP, 8/24/06)(AP, 8/8/07)(AP, 2/11/08)
1998 Mar 2, U.N. Security Council unanimously endorsed Secretary-General Kofi Annan's deal to open Iraq's presidential palaces to arms inspectors.
(AP, 3/299)
1998 Mar 2, Serb police clashed with 30,000 protesting Albanians in Kosovo.
(WSJ, 3/3/98, p.A1)
1999 Mar 2, Conservative commentator Pat Buchanan launched a third presidential bid.
(AP, 3/2/00)
1999 Mar 2, Texas Governor George W. Bush announced he was forming a presidential exploratory committee.
(AP, 3/2/00)
1999 Mar 2, Hewlett-Packard announced that it would split its non-computer business into a separate company.
(SFC, 3/3/99, p.A1)
1999 Mar 2, In England Dusty Springfield (59), pop-soul singer, died from breast cancer. Her hits included ""You Don't Have to Say You Love Me," "I Just Don't Know What to Do With Myself" and "Son of a Preacher Man."
(SFC, 3/4/99, p.D2)
1999 Mar 2, Israeli leaders made campaign promises to leave Lebanon within a year.
(SFC, 3/3/99, p.A10)
1999 Mar 2, In Atyrau, Kazakhstan, 26 inmates stabbed themselves in the stomach in an attempted mass suicide to protest prison conditions. All survived.
(SFC, 3/5/99, p.D2)
1999 Mar 2, In Kosovo KLA leader Adem Demaci announced that he would step down but would continue to oppose the peace plan. Meanwhile Yugoslav tank and mortar fire pounded rebel positions in the hillsides of the Macedonian border. Demaci was replaced by Hashim Thaci (29).
(SFC, 3/3/99, p.A8)(SFC, 3/4/99, p.A12)
1999 Mar 2, In Sierra Leone the Kamajors militia won the battle for Moyamba after 6 days of heavy fighting. They reported that 200 rebels were killed.
(SFC, 3/3/99, p.A10)
1999 Mar 2, In Uganda Hutu rebels killed 8 hostages and 4 Ugandans. Among the dead were Americans Robert Haubner and Susan Miller of Hillsboro, Ore. They were there to track the mountain gorillas. Uganda insisted that the 2 Americans, 4 Britons and 2 New Zealanders died in a police rescue bid.
(SFC, 3/3/99, p.A1)(WSJ, 3/3/99, p.A1)(SFEC, 3/7/99, p.T14)
2000 Mar 2, A federal jury in Washington convicted Maria Hsia, a friend and political supporter of Vice President Al Gore, for arranging more than $100,000 in illegal donations during the 1996 presidential campaign. Hsia was later sentenced to three months of home confinement.
(AP, 3/2/01)
2000 Mar 2, Merck pledged a $100 million donation of Hepatitis B vaccine to inoculate children in poor nations.
(WSJ, 3/2/00, p.A1)
2000 Mar 2, Dr. Larry C. Ford committed suicide just days after a botched assassination attempt on his business partner at Biofem Inc., of Irvine, Calif. Ford had met with scientists from South Africa's Project Coast in the 1980s to discuss chemical and biological warfare under Wouter Basson, head of the project. Project Coast, which has been accused of trying to create deadly bacteria that would only affect blacks, poisoning opponents' clothing and stockpiling cholera, HIV and anthrax, opened an offshore bank account to pay Ford. In 2002 former FBI informant Peter Fitzpatrick told "60 Minutes" that Ford passed a bag filled with cholera, typhoid, botulism, anthrax and bubonic plague to a South African military doctor during a meeting at the house of the South African trade attache in California.
(AP, 11/3/02)
2000 Mar 2, In Chechnya rebels ambushed Russian troops outside Grozny and killed at least 20 police commandos.
(SFC, 3/4/00, p.A1)
2000 Mar 2, Former Chilean dictator General Augusto Pinochet left Britain for his homeland, hours after he was ruled mentally unfit to stand trial on charges of human rights abuses.
(AP, 3/2/01)
2000 Mar 2, In Israel commandos killed as many as 3-4 Palestinian Hamas militants at Taibeh. They said that 4 simultaneous bombings were scheduled in crowded areas of major cities.
(SFC, 3/3/00, p.A14)(WSJ, 3/3/00, p.A1)
2000 Mar 2, In Kosovo French peacekeepers forced their way through Serb protestors to return 41 Albanians to their homes across the Ibar River.
(SFC, 3/4/00, p.A10)
2000 Mar 2, In the Philippines some 40 rebels of the New People's Army killed 10 soldiers at Balilihan in Bohol province.
(SFC, 3/3/00, p.D4)
2000 Mar 2, Zimbabwe ordered black war veterans to quit white-owned farms.
(WSJ, 3/3/00, p.A1)
2001 Mar 2, In Afghanistan the Taliban began the destruction of the giant Buddha of Bamiyan despite int’l. protests. The United Nations tried in vain to persuade Afghanistan's ruling Taliban to reverse its decision to destroy a pair of giant, ancient statues of Buddha and other Buddhist relics that the regime considered idolatrous.
(SSFC, 3/4/01, p.A1)(SFC, 12/30/01, p.D3)(AP, 3/2/02)
2001 Mar 2, In China 37 members of the banned Falun Gong were sentenced to prison terms of 3-10 years. Most had been convicted of “using a cult to obstruct the law."
(SFC, 3/3/01, p.A12)
2001 Mar 2, In France Alois Brunner, former deputy of Adolf Eichmann, was sentenced to life imprisonment for war crimes against humanity. He was believed to be still alive in Syria, where he fled in 1954.
(SFC, 3/3/01, p.A10)
2001 Mar 2, In Indonesian some 7,000 Madurese refugees escaped from Borneo while some 13,000 still waited in camps for boats. The killing appeared to have stopped.
(SFC, 3/3/01, p.A12)
2001 Mar 2, In Israel the Labor Party chose 8 members to serve in the Cabinet of Ariel Sharon. Shimon Peres was named foreign minister and Benjamin Ben-Eliezer as defense minister.
(SFC, 3/3/01, p.A10)
2001 Mar 2, In the Philippines the Supreme Court affirmed the legitimacy of Pres. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo and denied immunity to former Pres. Estrada.
(SFC, 3/3/01, p.A12)
2001 Mar 2, In Thailand a bomb blast gutted a Thai Airways Boeing 737-400 in Bangkok just before PM Shinawatra was to board. One crew member was killed. It was later reported that the empty center fuel tank of the plane had exploded.
(SFC, 3/5/01, p.A12)(WSJ, 6/26/08, p.A12)
2002 Mar 2, US and Afghan forces attacked hundreds of suspected al Qaeda and Taliban fighters in eastern Afghanistan. 1 US soldier was killed.
(SSFC, 3/3/02, p.A1)
2002 Mar 2, From Brazil it was reported that at least 23 people had died from dengue fever in Rio de Janeiro and that officially some 52,000 had become ill.
(SFC, 3/2/02, p.A10)
2002 Mar 2, In Colombia the bodies of Sen. Martha Catalina Daniels, her driver, Carlos Lozano, and Ana Maria Medina, the wife of a local politician, were found outside Zipacon, 35 miles north of Bogota. FARC was suspected.
(SFC, 3/4/02, p.A3)
2002 Mar 2, Egypt’s Pres. Mubarek (73) began a 4-day visit to the US.
(SSFC, 3/3/02, p.A19)
2002 Mar 2, Rioting spread as the death toll in India's religious strife reached 408.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2002 Mar 2, In Jerusalem a suicide bomber killed himself and 9 others including several children. In the West Bank gunmen opened fire on Israeli motorists and killed 9 people.
(SSFC, 3/3/02, p.A1)
2002 Mar 2-3, Macedonia police killed 7 men who allegedly attempted an ambush near Butel, a suburb of Skopje. Police said the attackers were probably Pakistanis. Foreign officials later discounted these assertions and suspected that they were illegal immigrants. A 2 year investigation followed in the so-called "Rastanski Lozja" action, and revealed police staged the killing to show they were participating in the U.S.-led campaign against terrorism. A bomb blast at the Macedonia consulate in Karachi on Dec 5, 2002, killed 3 people in apparent retaliation.
(SSFC, 3/3/02, p.A15)(WSJ, 3/8/02, p.A8)(SFC, 4/5/02, p.H1)(AP, 4/30/04)(SFC, 5/1/04, p.A7)
2003 Mar 2, Fidel Castro offered to mediate with North Korea over its nuclear program, though he acknowledged Cuba's ability to stem the growing crisis was limited.
(AP, 3/2/03)
2003 Mar 2, In Estonia a center-left party depicting itself as a champion of the poor barely won the popular vote in parliamentary elections, which could make it difficult to form a coalition government.
(AP, 3/3/03)
2003 Mar 2, Iraq crushed another six Al Samoud II missiles, as ordered by UN weapons inspectors. Iraqi scientist Mahmud Faraj Bilal al-Samarrai, implicated in Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction (WMD), surrendered to the CIA. He was freed in 2012.
(AP, 3/2/08)(AFP, 4/15/12)
2003 Mar 2, Israeli troops backed by tanks and helicopters raided a Gaza Strip town, killing two Palestinians in fierce fighting and demolishing an apartment building and the exterior wall of a hospital.
(AP, 3/2/03)
2003 Mar 2, Netherlands, the world's 4th largest poultry exporter, discovered a bird flu in some its poultry for the 1st time in 30 years.
(WSJ, 3/6/03, p.A11)
2003 Mar 2, In Karachi, Pakistan, religious coalitions joined tens of thousands of others in a march to protest a possible U.S.-led war against Iraq.
(AP, 3/3/03)
2003 Mar 2, North Korea deployed 4 MiGs to intercept a US RC-135S spy plane some 150 miles off its coast.
(WSJ, 3/4/03, p.A1)
2003 Mar 2, Landlocked Switzerland became the first European country to win the America's Cup as "Alinghi" swept Team New Zealand in five races.
(AP, 3/2/04)
2003 Mar 2, Syria reportedly finished pulling 4,000 troops out of Lebanon in an effort to reduce tensions and keep radical Sunni groups from attacking Israel.
(SSFC, 3/2/03, A6)
2003 Mar 2, In northern Uganda rebels of the Lord's Resistance Army fighting a 16-year war called a cease-fire and asked to meet Pres. Yoweri Museveni.
(AP, 3/3/03)
2003 Mar 2, The United Arab Emirates won support from Kuwait and Bahrain in its call for Saddam Hussein to quit power to avert a war.
(AP, 3/3/03)
2004 Mar 2, Alan Greenspan said interest rates are too low for long term economic stability, but did not indicate when they would be raised. The DJIA closed at 10,592.
(WSJ, 3/3/04, p.A3)
2004 Mar 2, John Kerry won the 10-state Super Tuesday series and knocked the fight out of his spirited rival, John Edwards.
(AP, 3/3/04)
2004 Mar 2, Californians voters approved Proposition 57, Gov. Schwarzenegger's $15 billion bond measure, to be repaid over the next 9 to 14 years. Prop 58 to prohibit future deficit financing also passed.
(SFC, 3/03/04, p.A1)
2004 Mar 2, Residents of Killington, Vermont, voted to join New Hampshire due to a dispute over property taxes.
(ST, 3/2/04, p.A5)(AP, 3/2/04)
2004 Mar 2, Bernard Ebbers, former WorldCom CEO, was indicted on federal charges in the multibillion-dollar accounting scandal at the telecommunications giant. Scott Sullivan, his top financial officer, pleaded guilty and agreed to testify against him.
(AP, 3/2/04)(WSJ, 2/18/05, p.A1)
2004 Mar 2, NY state filed charges against the mayor of New Paltz for marrying gay couples.
(WSJ, 3/3/04, p.A1)
2004 Mar 2, NASA scientists reported that the Mars rover Opportunity had discovered evidence that water was once present on the surface.
(SFC, 3/03/04, p.A2)
2004 Mar 2, Mercedes McCambridge (85), Academy Award-winning actress, died in San Diego.
(AP, 3/2/05)
2004 Mar 2, Marge Schott (75), the controversial former owner of the Cincinnati Reds, died.
(AP, 3/2/05)
2004 Mar 2, In Chechnya rebel attacks and land mines killed five Russian soldiers.
(AP, 3/3/04)
2004 Mar 2, In China authorities shut down water supplies after a combination of synthetic ammonia and nitrogen from the Sichuan General Chemical Factory leaked into the Tuo River. Nearly 1 million people were left without water for drinking and bathing.
(AP, 3/5/04)
2004 Mar 2, Haiti rebel leader Guy Philippe declared himself the new chief of Haiti's military, which had been disbanded by ousted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide.
(AP, 3/2/04)
2004 Mar 2, Attacks on Shiite Muslims in Iraq killed at least 180 people as multiple explosions hit Shiite shrines in Baghdad and Karbala on the Shia festival of Ashura. An Iranian vice president blamed al-Qaida for the attacks.
(AP, 3/3/04)(SSFC, 2/20/05, p.A14)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March_2004)
2004 Mar 2, In Pakistan firing and suicide attack on Shiite Muslims in an Ashura procession in Quetta claimed 45 lives.
(http://archives.dawn.com/2004/03/04/top1.htm)
2004 Mar 2, Khalil al-Zaben (59), a close associate of Yasser Arafat, was assassinated in Gaza City by unidentified gunmen. Separately Arafat agreed to a new system for paying his security forces.
(SFC, 3/03/04, p.A8)
2004 Mar 2, Russian authorities said they have confirmed that a man killed in the Dagestan region a few days earlier was Ruslan Gelayev, one of the Chechnya's most powerful rebel warlords.
(AP, 3/2/04)
2004 Mar 2, In Venezuela demonstrators hurled rocks and gasoline bombs at soldiers as protests intensified after the elections council ruled against an opposition petition to force a presidential recall referendum.
(AP, 3/3/04)
2005 Mar 2, President Bush demanded in blunt terms that Syria get out of Lebanon.
(AP, 3/2/05)
2005 Mar 2, The number of U.S. military deaths in Iraq reached 1,500.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2005 Mar 2, Alan Greenspan warned that US federal budget deficits are unsustainable and urged Congress to cut spending.
(SFC, 3/3/05, p.A1)
2005 Mar 2, The US Treasury proposed rules for a new Roth 401(k).
(SFC, 3/3/05, p.C1)
2005 Mar 2, The woman who accused NBA star Kobe Bryant of rape settled her lawsuit against him, ending the case.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2005 Mar 2, It was reported that the Palm Beach, Fla., hedge fund KL Financial, with assets of $200 million, had run out of funds.
(WSJ, 3/2/05, p.C1)
2005 Mar 2, In Florida dozens of dolphins beached on the Florida Keys. Sonar from a US submarine was later suspected.
(SSFC, 3/6/05, p.A3)
2005 Mar 2, In Tennessee a school bus driver was shot and killed by a 14-year old student, who was recently disciplined by the driver for using snuff.
(WSJ, 3/3/05, p.A1)
2005 Mar 2, In Afghanistan Pres. Karzai appointed Habiba Sarobi as governor of Bamiyan province, making her Afghanistan’s 1st female governor.
(SFC, 3/3/05, p.A10)
2005 Mar 2, In eastern Afghanistan a gunbattle between U.S.-led coalition forces and militants left three militants and two civilians dead.
(AP, 3/5/05)
2005 Mar 2, Australia’s central bank raised interest rates to 5.5% from 5.25%. The 2004 annual growth rate was reported to be 1.5%.
(WSJ, 3/3/05, p.A11)
2005 Mar 2, In Azerbaijan Elmar Huseinov, founder and editor of the opposition magazine Monitor, was shot to death in the entryway of his Baku apartment building.
(AP, 3/3/05)
2005 Mar 2, Brazil's lower house of Congress overwhelmingly approved a law creating a framework to legalize biotech seed sales for genetically modified crops.
(AP, 3/3/05)
2005 Mar 2, In northern China a cache of explosives at the home of a coal mine manager blew up in Kecheng, killing him and at least 10 others including 2 children at a nearby school.
(AP, 3/3/05)(SFC, 3/3/05, p.A6)
2005 Mar 2, Queen Elizabeth II dubbed Bill Gates (49) an honorary noble.
(SFC, 3/3/05, p.A2)
2005 Mar 2, France's newly appointed Finance Minister Thierry Breton pledged to keep a tight lid on public spending in an effort to rein in the budget deficit.
(AP, 3/2/05)
2005 Mar 2, Two car bombs killed at least 14 Iraqi soldiers in separate attacks, and the al-Qaida group in Iraq claimed responsibility for one.
(SFC, 3/3/05, p.A6)(WSJ, 3/3/05, p.A1)
2005 Mar 2, Pakistani police arrested a man wanted in the murder of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl and already sentenced to death in absentia for a hotel bombing that killed 11 French engineers.
(AP, 3/2/05)
2005 Mar 2, Former Serbian army chief Gen. Momcilo Perisic, a one-time ally of ex-president Slobodan Milosevic, said that he has been indicted by the UN war crimes court and will surrender next week.
(AP, 3/3/05)
2005 Mar 2, In a new book entitled "Mari, the Metropolis of the Euphrates," Jean-Claude Margueron said the third millennium BC city, in modern day Syria, was "one of the first modern cities of humanity.
(AP, 3/2/05)
2005 Mar 2, It was reported that the bodies of at least 34 men found in Venezuela's central Guarico state in the past three years had burns, bruises and cuts suggesting they were tortured before being executed.
(AP, 3/2/05)
2006 Mar 2, On his first trip to India, President Bush and his Indian counterpart agreed on a landmark nuclear energy agreement that deepens ties between the world's oldest and largest democracies.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, The Senate voted to renew the USA Patriot Act.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2006 Mar 2, "Killer nurse" Charles Cullen, who'd killed at least 29 patients, was sentenced in Somerville, N.J., to spend the rest of his life in prison. In 2010 a jury awarded $95 million in damages to families of 8 people who claimed their loved ones were among those killed by Cullen.
(AP, 3/2/07)(SFC, 3/11/10, p.A8)
2006 Mar 2, LA prosecutors said 19 people, many of them former police officers or with police connections, have been charged with staging home robberies in Southern California to steal drugs, money and weapons.
(Reuters, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, The US Federal Reserve began shipping a new colorized $10 bill to commercial banks.
(WSJ, 3/3/06, p.C3)
2006 Mar 2, It was reported that Thomas Monaghan, founder of Domino’s Pizza, hoped that the new town of Ave Maria in southwestern Florida would be governed under strict Roman Catholic principles. The town was being constructed around Ave Maria Univ. east of Naples. The town and university, bankrolled by Monaghan with $250 million, were set to open in 2007.
(SFC, 3/2/06, p.A2)
2006 Mar 2, General Motors Corp. said it has made major steps in developing a commercially viable hydrogen-powered vehicle and expects it can get the emission-free cars into dealerships in the next four to nine years.
(AFP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, An oil spill in Alaska curtailed Prudhoe Bay production. At least 265,000 gallons spilled onto the tundra from a British Petroleum (BP) line handling 100,000 barrels per day. The spill of 5,000 barrels was the largest in the field’s 29-year history. In 2011 a $25 million settlement was reached with a BP subsidiary for the spill.
(WSJ, 3/3/06, p.A1)(SFC, 3/11/06, p.A4)(SSFC, 8/13/06, p.A18)(SFC, 5/4/11, p.A6)
2006 Mar 2, Garrett Scott (37), documentary film maker, died in Coronado, Ca., of cardiac arrest. His 2005 film “Occupation: Dreamland" was based on footage shot with co-director Ian Olds, while embedded with the 82nd Airborne in Fallujah, Iraq.
(SFC, 3/7/06, p.B5)
2006 Mar 2, In Bangladesh Shaikh Abdur Rahman, the fugitive leader of an Islamic militant group wanted for a deadly wave of bombings. surrendered to police after a 33-hour siege. Rahman, who fought in the Afghan war after graduating from Medina University in Saudi Arabia, formed the Jamayetul Mujahideen in the late 1990s.
(AFP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, Belarussian President Alexander Lukashenko defiantly told his Western critics to stay out of his country's affairs, while an opposition rival for the presidency was beaten by security forces and detained.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, In Croatia 8 former soldiers were convicted of torturing ethnic Serbs in a wartime prison, four years after they were cleared of the same charges in a trial later annulled as being flawed.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, It was reported that Cuban academics hoping to attend a gathering of Latin America experts in Puerto Rico had been denied visas by the American government, marking the latest in the current US administration's trend of shutting out Cubans.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, The European Central Bank raised its key interest rate by a quarter percentage point to 2.5 percent amid worries about inflation.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, Haiti's newly elected Pres. Rene Preval met with Dominican Republic President Leonel Fernandez in Santo Domingo amid rising tensions between their countries over immigration and security.
(AP, 3/3/06)
2006 Mar 2, A bomb ripped through a vegetable market in a Shiite section of Baghdad killing 38 people. A leading Sunni politician escaped an attack on his convoy as unrelenting violence pushing Iraq toward civil war.
(AP, 3/2/06)(WSJ, 3/3/06, p.A1)
2006 Mar 2, John Pace, the former UN human rights chief in Iraq said human rights abuses in Iraq are as bad now as they were under Saddam Hussein. It was reported that sectarian evictions by Sunnis and Shiites were growing in Baghdad neighborhoods
(AP, 3/2/06)(SFC, 3/2/06, p.A12)
2006 Mar 2, Tommaso Onofri, a 17-month-old epileptic boy, was kidnapped from his home in Casalbaroncolo, near Parma, Italy. His body was found April 1. He was killed by blows to the head with a shovel. Suspects Mario Alessi, a construction worker, and Salvatore Raimondi have been accusing each other of killing the child shortly after the kidnapping. A woman was accused of complicity in the kidnapping.
(AP, 3/7/06)(AP, 4/3/06)
2006 Mar 2, In Kenya masked gunmen identifying themselves as police raided the country's oldest newspaper and its sister television station, two days after three journalists were detained for a story about Kenya's president. The closures of The Standard and the Kenya Television Network, ordered by security minister John Michuki, appeared to mark the first time a Kenyan government has shut down the operations of a major media company.
(AP, 3/2/06)(Econ, 3/25/06, p.52)
2006 Mar 2, Kosovo's president, Fatmir Sejdiu, issued a statement calling on Lt. Gen. Agim Ceku (44), a former leader of the now disbanded Kosovo Liberation Army, to become prime minister and form a new government.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, Libya released all 84 jailed members of the banned Muslim Brotherhood movement who had been held since the late 1990s.
(AFP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, North and South Korea opened high-level military talks for the first time in almost two years, aiming to reduce tension along the world's most heavily fortified border and prevent accidental naval skirmishes.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, In Pakistan a suicide attacker rammed a car packed with explosives into a vehicle carrying an American diplomat in Karachi, killing diplomat David Foy and 3 other people before President Bush's visit to Pakistan. Fifty-two people were wounded. An Uzbek national, arrested in Pakistan in July, told interrogators that Al-Qaeda had organized the suicide attack.
(AFP, 7/26/06)(AP, 3/2/07)
2006 Mar 2, Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas said in a published interview that the al-Qaida terror network has infiltrated the Gaza Strip and West Bank.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, Puerto Rico's Gov. Anibal Acevedo Vila signed into law a ban on smoking in enclosed public places, the toughest anti-tobacco prohibition in the Caribbean.
(AP, 3/3/06)
2006 Mar 2, In South Africa early results put the ruling African National Congress well ahead in local elections, despite voter unhappiness with the rate of progress in improving the lives of poor blacks.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, South Africa joined a growing list of countries inviting Hamas leaders for talks, raising Israeli concerns that the international front against the Islamic militants is crumbling.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, Venezuela's VP Jose Vicente Rangel said that the US was the world's biggest consumer of illegal drugs and had no "moral authority" to criticize Venezuela for failing to control narcotics.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2006 Mar 2, Vietnam announced it has commuted the death sentence of Nguyen Van Chinh (45), a convicted Australian drug trafficker, to life imprisonment after heavy lobbying by the Australian government.
(AP, 3/2/06)
2007 Mar 2, US Defense Secretary Robert Gates fired Army Secretary Francis Harvey as the Bush administration scrambled to respond to an outcry over poor treatment for veterans at the Army's top hospital.
(Reuters, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, The US Energy and Defense departments chose Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory to design the country’s first new nuclear warhead since the Cold War.
(SFC, 3/3/07, p.A1)
2007 Mar 2, A charter bus carrying a college baseball team from Ohio’s Mennonite-affiliated Bluffton University plunged off a highway ramp in Georgia and slammed into the pavement below, killing six people, injuring 29 and scattering sports equipment across the road. A 7th player died from his injuries on Mar 9.
(AP, 3/2/07)(AP, 3/9/07)
2007 Mar 2, Checkpoint Systems Inc. said it will provide Reno GmbH with RFID (radio frequency identification) tags and store tagging systems. Reno GmbH plans to embed wireless chips in shoes sold at hundreds of stores across the continent.
(http://tinyurl.com/2cpo45)
2007 Mar 2, Scientists scanning the deep interior of Earth have found evidence of a vast water reservoir beneath eastern Asia that is at least the volume of the Arctic Ocean.
(www.livescience.com/environment/070228_beijing_anomoly.html)
2007 Mar 2, In western Afghanistan insurgents attacked a police post, leaving one police officer dead and two wounded. A mortar round landed on a US military outpost in the same Herat province, wounding 12 civilian Afghan workers and two Afghan soldiers.
(AP, 3/3/07)
2007 Mar 2, Brazilian police arrested 18 people accused of allowing illegal logging in the Amazon rain forest and were searching for 19 others, including environmental protection agents.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, The British Broadcasting Corp. said that it has signed a deal with Google Inc.'s YouTube that will allow the popular Web site to show excerpts of the broadcaster's news and entertainment programs.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, Bulgaria's Socialist-led government survived a no-confidence on a motion filed by the opposition, claiming that the government was unable to cope with a health care crisis.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, Chechnya's parliament approved Ramzan Kadyrov, a widely feared former security chief as president of the war-battered Russian republic in a nearly unanimous vote.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, China demanded the United States scrap a planned sale of hundreds of missiles to Taiwan, warning the deal would harm regional stability and bilateral ties.
(AFP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, In Colombia prosecutors ordered the arrest of Alvaro Araujo Noguera, a prominent political boss, for alleged involvement in a kidnapping at the heart of a scandal tying the country’s political elite to right-wing paramilitary groups.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, Henri Troyat (95), French writer, died. He fled Russia's revolution as a child and went on to become one of France's most prolific, popular and respected authors.
(AP, 3/5/07)
2007 Mar 2, An al-Qaida-linked Sunni group said that it kidnapped 18 government workers and soldiers in retaliation for the alleged rape of a Sunni woman by members of the Shiite-dominated police force. Hours later, the government said the bodies of 14 security officers had been found. In Baghdad, a pair of car bombs killed 11 people in separate attacks.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, In Italy Premier Romano Prodi won a confidence vote in the lower house of parliament, formally ending Italy's political crisis.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, Moammar Gadhafi said in an unusual debate that it was time for his long-isolated nation to open up to the world and that one day Libya won't need him as leader. Still, he insisted that the ruling ideology he has entrenched here for three decades is superior to Western democracy.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, In Morocco 12 Islamic militants were convicted of terrorism-related charges, including eight with alleged ties to al-Qaida who had volunteered to fight in Iraq.
(AP, 3/3/07)
2007 Mar 2, In Nigeria 7 people were shot dead and 10 others were seriously wounded when gunmen opened fire in a crowded district of Port Harcourt.
(AP, 3/3/07)
2007 Mar 2, In eastern Pakistan a bomb rigged to a bicycle exploded near a car carrying a judge, seriously wounding him and killing at least three people in Multan.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, People caught smoking in bars and restaurants in Puerto Rico faced fines as a ban on lighting up in enclosed public spaces took effect.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, Ivan Safronov, a Russian military affairs writer for the daily Kommersant, fell to his death from a fifth-story window in Moscow. On Mar 6 his newspaper said he had received threats while gathering material for a report claiming Russia planned to provide sophisticated weapons to Syria and Iran.
(AP, 3/6/07)
2007 Mar 2, An explosion in a Slovakian ammunition factory killed two people, left six missing and injured 45, five seriously.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, In Somalia 4 mortar explosions rocked Mogadishu, wounding six people, including two children.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, South Korea delayed a full resumption of aid shipments to North Korea until the communist regime shuts down its main atomic reactor under an international agreement to take steps toward abandoning its nuclear weapons program. A South Korean activist said 80 North Korean refugees are hiding in various Asian countries and preparing to seek asylum in the United States. North and South Korea agreed to resume reunions of families that have been separated by their divided border.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, In the jungles of southern Thailand soldiers killed five suspected Muslim insurgents during a raid on a weapons training camp.
(AP, 3/2/07)
2007 Mar 2, Venezuela accused US anti-drug agents of collaborating with traffickers and rejected Washington's allegations that rampant corruption has allowed illegal drug smuggling to thrive in the South American country.
(AP, 3/3/07)
2008 Mar 2, Ayman al-Zawahri, Al-Qaida's No. 2 leader, published "Exonerations," with al-Sahab, al-Qaida's media wing, on militant Islamic Web sites. The book slams radical militants who have disavowed armed struggle and turned their backs on violence.
(AP, 3/2/08)
2008 Mar 2, In southern California Jamiel Shaw II (17) was gunned down by Pedro Espinoza, a 19-year-old illegal Mexican immigrant, in Arlington Heights, LA County. On Nov 2, 2012, Espinoza was sentenced to death.
(http://tinyurl.com/n2oyxdn)
2008 Mar 2, Blind jazz guitarist Jeff Healey (41), known for his blues-based rock and his distinctive playing style, died in a Toronto hospital after a life-long battle with cancer.
(Reuters, 3/3/08)
2008 Mar 2, Amaro da Costa, a senior East Timorese rebel soldier, surrendered. He was accused of being involved in last month's attacks on the country's president and prime minister.
(Reuters, 3/2/08)
2008 Mar 2, In northern Honduras 8 people were shot dead at a billiards hall by gunmen disguised as policemen in San Pedro Sula, a city plagued by violent gangs and drug traffickers. Honduras last month began a nationwide effort to halt a rising wave of violence and stem the flow of guns on the street.
(AP, 3/3/08)
2008 Mar 2, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said his landmark visit to Iraq opened a new chapter in "brotherly" relations between the two countries, which were once bitter enemies. 13 gunmen were killed and eight were injured in clashes with American and Iraqi forces in the town of Tal Afar. 2 police officers were also killed and four were injured. In two other separate attacks in Diyala, police reported that five people were killed when a roadside bomb hit a bus, while another assault killed a patrolling police officer. The US military found a grave in Samarra with 14 bodies, believed to be members of the Iraqi security forces executed by al-Qaida in Iraq. A car bomb in Samarra had killed four people, including one child. Police in Samarra, however, reported that at least seven people were killed and 10 people were injured. In central and northern Iraq US and Iraqi forces killed 9 suspected insurgents and detained 44 others in raids targeting al-Qaida. 3 Iraqi troops were killed in one of the operations. During the operation, the SWAT teams found bomb-making materials, a rocket-propelled grenade launcher, rifles, grenades, a landmine and ammunition.
(AP, 3/2/08)(AP, 3/3/08)(AP, 3/6/08)
2008 Mar 2, Israeli aircraft sent missiles slamming into the office of the prime minister of Hamas-ruled Gaza before dawn, pressing forward with an offensive that has killed nearly 70 Palestinians in two days of fighting. A 21-month-old girl was among the dead in new violence. The Israeli onslaught failed to stop rockets from battering southern Israel. 9 were fired at southern Israel by midday, including one that struck a house in Sderot.
(AP, 3/2/08)
2008 Mar 2, In northwestern Pakistan a suicide bomber blew himself up at a large meeting called by tribal elders pushing for peace, killing at least 40 people and injuring more than 100 in Darra Adam Khel in North West Frontier Province about 25 miles south of Peshawar.
(AP, 3/2/08)
2008 Mar 2, Russians voted for a new president in an election likely to hand victory to First Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, President Vladimir Putin's chosen successor, but criticized by the opposition for a lack of real competition. With 99.45 percent of the votes counted, Medvedev had 70.23 percent.
(Reuters, 3/2/08)(AP, 3/3/08)
2008 Mar 2, In Sri Lanka artillery exchanges left at least 25 Tamil rebels and two Sri Lankan soldiers dead as Pres. Rajapakse vowed to destroy the separatist guerrillas.
(AFP, 3/3/08)
2008 Mar 2, Thais went to the polls to vote in the country's first elections for the upper house of Parliament since a 2006 military coup ousted elected PM Thaksin Shinawatra.
(AP, 3/2/08)
2008 Mar 2, Venezuela and Ecuador ordered troops to their borders with Colombia, sharply raising tensions after Colombia killed a top rebel leader on Ecuadorean soil. Ecuadorean troops recovered the seminude bodies of 15 rebels in their jungle camp. Soldiers also found three wounded women at the camp, a Mexican philosophy student injured by shrapnel and two Colombians, who were evacuated by helicopter to be treated.
(AP, 3/3/08)
2009 Mar 2, The Obama administration threw open the curtain on years of Bush-era secrets, revealing anti-terror memos that claimed exceptional search-and-seizure powers and divulging that the CIA destroyed nearly 100 videotapes of interrogations and other treatment of terror suspects.
(AP, 3/2/09)
2009 Mar 2, The US government unveiled a revamped rescue package to insurance giant American International Group (AIG) and will provide the troubled company with another $30 billion in taxpayer money on an "as needed" basis. The DJIA fell 299.64 to close at 6763.29, falling below 7,000 for the first time in 12 years.
(AP, 3/2/09)(WSJ, 3/3/09, p.A1)
2009 Mar 2, A massive late winter snow storm roared out of the Southeast and into the Northeast overnight, idling hundreds of flights and making the morning rush treacherous as motorists contended with nearly a foot of snow in spots. Some 950 flights were canceled at the three main New York area airports, an almost 300 canceled in Philadelphia.
(AP, 3/2/09)(SFC, 3/3/09, p.A5)
2009 Mar 2, An asteroid named 2009 DD45, about the size of one that blasted Siberia a century ago, buzzed by Earth. It measured between 69 feet and 154 feet in diameter and came to 48,800 miles from Earth.
(AP, 3/4/09)
2009 Mar 2, A study by Oceana, a worldwide environmental group, said food supplies for large ocean fish were dwindling due to industrial fishing to supply fish farms. An estimated 4 to 11 pounds of prey fish were being consumed to produce one pound of farmed salmon.
(SFC, 3/3/09, p.B1)
2009 Mar 2, In southern Australia rescuers used jet skis, backhoes and human muscle to save dozens of whales and dolphins stranded on Naracoopa Beach on Tasmania state's King Island. Rescuers refloated 54 whales and five bottlenose dolphins. A total of 194 pilot whales and seven dolphins became stranded the previous evening.
(AP, 3/2/09)(AP, 3/3/09)
2009 Mar 2, A Chinese man said he was the mystery collector behind winning bids for two imperial bronzes auctioned last week at Christie's over Beijing's objections, and that he made the bogus offers to protest any sale of the looted relics. The sculptures disappeared from the Summer Palace on the outskirts of Beijing when French and British forces sacked and burned it at the end of the second Opium War in 1860. The sculptures date to the early Qing Dynasty, established by invading Manchu tribesmen in 1644. The Christie's catalog said they were made for the Zodiac fountain at the imperial palace.
(AP, 3/2/09)
2009 Mar 2, In China a top justice official said courts will accept the cases of hundreds of families with children sickened in last year's tainted milk scandal.
(AP, 3/3/09)
2009 Mar 2, Cuban President Raul Castro's ousted powerful officials close to his brother Fidel in the biggest government shakeup since he took power a year ago.
(AP, 3/3/09)
2009 Mar 2, At a donor’s conference in Egypt Palestinian Pres. Mahmoud Abbas, seeking to shore up his position against rival Hamas, asked international donors to funnel millions of dollars through his government to rebuild the devastated Gaza Strip. The gathering aimed to raise at least $2.8 billion from 80 donor nations and international organizations.
(AP, 3/2/09)
2009 Mar 2, In Guinea-Bissau soldiers assassinated President Joao Bernardo "Nino" Vieira in his palace hours after a bomb blast killed his rival. A pre-dawn gunfight at the palace erupted hours after armed forces chief of staff Gen. Batiste Tagme na Waie, a longtime rival of the president, was killed by a bomb blast at his headquarters. The military insisted no coup was taking place.
(AP, 3/2/09)
2009 Mar 2, Iran dismissed US concerns about how much fissile material the country has produced, saying it isn't developing a nuclear bomb and that any effort to make weapons-grade uranium would be difficult under the eyes of international inspectors.
(AP, 3/2/09)
2009 Mar 2, In Iraq Ali Hassan al-Majid, aka “Chemical Ali," was sentenced to death for a 3rd time, following his conviction relating to the Feb 19, 1999, death of ayatollah Mohammed Sadiq al-Sadr. Previous convictions related the killing of Kurds in the late 1980s and the 1991 crackdown on Shiites in southern Iraq.
(SFC, 3/3/09, p.A3)
2009 Mar 2, In Morocco Hassan Al Haski (41), a Moroccan man already convicted over the 2004 Madrid bombings, was sentenced on appeal to 10 years in jail for his role in suicide attacks the year before in Casablanca that killed 45 people.
(AFP, 3/3/09)
2009 Mar 2, In Pakistan a suicide bomber killed at least five people and wounded seven others at a religious school in southwestern Kili Karbala village in Pishin district.
(AFP, 3/2/09)
2009 Mar 2, In Peru's southern province of Puno 10 people were killed dead and 16 left missing at a remote mining camp buried by a mudslide.
(AP, 3/3/09)
2010 Mar 2, The Washington DC council voted to censure ex-mayor Marion Barry over a report accusing him of helping award a $15,000 city contract to a woman with whom he had a sexual relationship.
(SFC, 3/3/10, p.A6)
2010 Mar 2, In California Jerry Brown, former 2-term Democrat state governor (1975-1983), announced that he would run for a 3rd term as governor.
(SFC, 3/2/10, p.A1)
2010 Mar 2, In Darien, Ill., the bodies of 3 family members were found shot to death. Prosecutors later said Johnny Borizov (28) had persuaded Jacob Nodarse (23) to kill the mother of his son, Angela Kramer, her parents and a brother over a custody dispute. Nodarse was arrested the next day in Florida.
(SFC, 3/8/10, p.A8)(http://tinyurl.com/yaejaep)
2010 Mar 2, In southeast New Mexico two employees at a Navajo oil refinery were killed and two others critically injured after a storage tank exploded into flames.
(AP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, In Rhode Island the Central Falls Teachers’ Union pledged to support reforms. The school board had voted last week to fire 93 teachers and staff from the high school after the end of the school year. On May 16 the school district announced that it had reached an agreement with the union to return all staffers.
(SFC, 3/4/10, p.A8)(SFC, 5/17/10, p.A4)
2010 Mar 2, The Afghan government denied that it had banned live media coverage of insurgent attacks, saying it was developing guidelines, not restrictions, to prevent live footage from aiding fighters at the scene.
(AP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, In Australia Seth Enslow, an American motorcycle stuntman twice, broke the world record for the longest distance jumped on a Harley-Davidson motorcycle, sailing through the air near Australia's Sydney Harbor to shatter the previous 10-year-old record. Bubba Blackwell set the previous record with a 157 foot (47.85 meters) jump in Las Vegas in 1999.
(AP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, In London, England, Muhammad Tahir-ul-Qadri, a former Pakistani lawmaker and the leader of a global Muslim movement, issued a fatwa, or religious edict, that he calls an absolute condemnation of terrorism. The 600-page fatwa bans suicide bombing "without any excuses, any pretexts, or exceptions." The religious scholar is the founder of Minhaj-ul-Quran, a worldwide movement that promotes a nonpolitical, tolerant Islam.
(AP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, The BBC volunteered to become smaller.
(Econ, 3/6/10, p.74)
2010 Mar 2, Egyptian newspapers reported that former UN atomic chief Mohamed ElBaradei has called for constitutional changes in his first statement since forming an opposition group.
(AFP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, French authorities arrested Agathe Habyarimana, the widow of the former Rwandan president killed in a plane crash, on a Rwandan warrant issued on genocide-related charges. She was soon freed on bail. The crash is widely considered the event that sparked the east African country's 1994 genocide. In 2004 France rejected her request for political asylum, alleging she was at the heart of the regime responsible for the genocide.
(AP, 3/2/10)(Econ, 3/6/10, p.65)
2010 Mar 2, Germany’s Federal Constitutional Court overturned a law that let anti-terror authorities retain data on telephone calls and e-mails, saying it marked a “grave intrusion" into personal privacy rights.
(SFC, 3/3/10, p.A2)
2010 Mar 2, Guatemalan authorities arrested Nelly Bonilla, the country’s anti-drug czar, Police Chief Baltazar Gomez, and police officer Fernando Carrillo, in a case involving stolen cocaine and slain police.
(AP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, In Ingushetia Russian forces killed Alexander Tikhomirov, also known as Said Buryatsky, in a gun battle near Nazran.
(Reuters, 3/6/10)
2010 Mar 2, In Iran the kaleme opposition Web site reported that an appeals court has upheld the death sentence for Mohammad Amin Valian (20), a student who took part in an anti-government rally in December that left eight people dead. Valian was found guilty of Moharebeh, a religious offense that translates as defiance of God, a crime punishable by death under Iranian law.
(AP, 3/3/10)
2010 Mar 2, Mexico's interior department said prosecutors have detained 10 Mexican immigration agents and three airline workers at Cancun's international airport on suspicion of trafficking Chinese migrants. Oscar Arriola, reputed to have led a cartel that smuggled two tons of cocaine a month into the US before authorities dismantled the ring around 2004, was handed over to US officials and extradited to Colorado.
(AP, 3/2/10)(Reuters, 3/3/10)
2010 Mar 2, The Moroccan state security service announced that police have dismantled a terrorist network “of six people imbued with Takfirist ideology," that was active in several towns in the northeast. Takfiris, a tiny minority of Muslims in Morocco, believe that society and its leaders have turned away from the narrow path of what they see as true Islam.
(AFP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, In Nigeria planted explosives in the Niger Delta damaged the Kokori oil flow station operated by Royal Dutch Shell PLC, marking the latest attack in a region supposedly brought under control by a government amnesty program.
(AP, 3/3/10)
2010 Mar 2, Ian Paisley (83), the hard-line Northern Ireland evangelist who led Protestants into power-sharing with Catholics, announced he will retire from the British Parliament after a 40-year career.
(AP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, It was reported that Spanish investigators, working with private computer-security firms, have arrested the three alleged ringleaders of the so-called Mariposa botnet, which appeared in December 2008 and grew into one of the biggest weapons of cybercrime. The Mariposa botnet infected almost 13 million computers across 190 countries. More arrests were expected soon in other countries.
(AP, 3/2/10)(SSFC, 3/14/10, p.D1)
2010 Mar 2, South Sudan’s 17 rival political parties signed an election code of conduct, committing themselves to ensure upcoming polls in April are free and fair.
(AFP, 3/3/10)
2010 Mar 2, Tajikistan's main opposition party said it plans to sue the Central Asian nation's elections board amid claims it abetted fraud in this weekend's parliamentary vote.
(AP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, In Ukraine PM Yulia Tymoshenko's pro-Western "Orange" coalition dissolved, losing its majority in parliament and paving the way for the new president to consolidate his power.
(AP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, In Uganda overnight landslides in the mountainous region of Bududa buried three villages and killed at least 92 people with 250 still missing.
(AP, 3/2/10)(AP, 3/3/10)
2010 Mar 2, In Uzbekistan an independent think-tank and a rights group claimed that authorities have instructed health workers to surgically sterilize women as part of a government campaign to reduce the birth rate.
(AP, 3/2/10)
2010 Mar 2, In southern Yemen a three-story building collapsed when explosives stored in its basement went off, killing at least eight people. Officials said the basement was used by an arms dealer to store dynamite and other explosives.
(AP, 3/2/10)
2011 Mar 2, Pres. Obama signed a bill to continue government operations for 2 more weeks. The bill included $4 billion in spending cuts.
(SFC, 3/3/11, p.A5)
2011 Mar 2, The US Supreme Court, in an endorsement of free speech, decided 8-1 that anti-gay protesters, who picket funerals of US soldiers, cannot be sued.
(SFC, 3/3/11, p.A5)
2011 Mar 2, The US Army filed 22 new charges, including aiding the enemy, against Pvt. 1st Class Bradley E. Manning, suspected of leaking sensitive and classified documents to WikiLeaks.
(SFC, 3/3/11, p.A4)
2011 Mar 2, The US Fish and Wildlife Service declared the eastern cougar to be extinct, confirming a widely held belief among wildlife biologists that native populations of the big cat were wiped out by man a century ago.
(AP, 3/2/11)
2011 Mar 2, In the Bahamas a fire destroyed a shantytown, leaving nearly 700 people homeless, most of them Haitian migrants.
(AP, 3/3/11)
2011 Mar 2, Bangladesh's government ordered Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus from his post as head of his microfinance bank, a humiliating blow for an activist whose revolutionary idea of giving out small loans lifted many out of poverty. The Grameen Bank said he remained in charge and that it would fight the decision.
(AP, 3/2/11)
2011 Mar 2, Britain seized £100 million ($160 million, 117 million euros) of Libyan currency found on a Libya-bound ship after escorting the vessel to an English port.
(AFP, 3/4/11)
2011 Mar 2, In Germany a gunman shot dead 2 US airmen at Frankfurt airport. The gunman was identified as Arid Uka (21), a Kosovo national who was working on a short-term contract at the Frankfurt international postal center. The airmen were later identified as Senior Airman Nick Alden (25) of South Carolina and Airman 1st Class Zachary R. Cuddeback (21) of Virginia. On Feb 10, 2012, Uka was convicted and sentenced to life in prison.
(AP, 3/2/11)(Reuters, 3/3/11)(AP, 3/10/11)
2011 Mar 2, Jerusalem officials approved new housing for Jews in the heart of an Arab neighborhood, infuriating Palestinians who see the growing Jewish presence in the city's war-won eastern sector as undermining their aspirations to statehood. Israel closed the Karni Crossing east of Gaza City citing security concerns. This left only the Kerem Shalom checkpoint for commercial crossing.
(AP, 3/2/11)(SFC, 3/3/11, p.A2)
2011 Mar 2, Libyan strongman Moamer Kadhafi warned "thousands" would die if the West intervened to support the uprising against him. Government troops briefly captured Marsa El Brega, an oil export terminal, before being driven back by rebels. Shells splashed in the Mediterranean and a warplane bombed a beach where rebel fighters were charging over the dunes. At least five people were killed in the fighting. Thousands of Bangladheshi migrant workers, desperate to leave Libya, pressed up against the gates of the Tunisia frontier, angry at their government for sending no help. Britain, Spain, France and others launched emergency airlifts along Libya's borders, trying to prevent racially charged attacks on the tens of thousands of foreign workers try to flee.
(AFP, 3/2/11)(Reuters, 3/2/11)(AP, 3/2/11)
2011 Mar 2, In Libya Andrei Netto of the Brazilian newspaper O Estado de Sao Paulo, was detained in Zawiyah. He had been travelling with Ghaith Abdul-Ahad, an Iraqi national who has been reporting from western Libya for the past two weeks. Abdul-Ahad was last in touch with the Guardian newspaper through a third party on March 6. Netto was released on March 10.
(AFP, 3/10/11)(AP, 3/11/11)
2011 Mar 2, Nepalese authorities banned the sale of marijuana during a popular Hindu festival at which holy men traditionally smoke the drug and share it with young men and women.
(AP, 3/3/11)
2011 Mar 2, In the Netherlands prosecutors at the International Criminal Court said they will open a formal investigation into possible crimes against humanity in Libya.
(AP, 3/2/11)
2011 Mar 2, In Pakistan assailants purportedly sent by al-Qaida and the Taliban killed Shahbaz Bhatti (42), the only Christian member of Pakistan's federal Cabinet, spraying his car with bullets outside his mother's home in Islamabad.
(AP, 3/2/11)
2011 Mar 2, The Philippine military deployed two warplanes near a disputed area in the South China Sea after a ship searching for oil complained it was harassed by two Chinese patrol boats. The Chinese vessels later left without confrontation at the Reed Bank, which is near the disputed Spratly Islands that are claimed by the Philippines, China and other nations.
(AP, 3/3/11)
2011 Mar 2, In St. Lucia three gay men from Atlanta were beaten and robbed after masked bandits broke into their mountain rental home in Soufriere. Police later arrested two suspects in the assault and looked for three more.
(AP, 3/14/11)
2011 Mar 2, In Sudan at least 70 people were killed and two villages razed in two days of fighting in the flashpoint oil-producing border district of Abyei.
(AFP, 3/2/11)
2011 Mar 2, Leading human rights activists condemned Venezuelan authorities for sentencing union leader Ruben Gonzalez to prison for launching a strike, saying more than 100 other unionists also face charges after participating in protests.
(AP, 3/3/11)
2011 Mar 2, In southern Yemen security forces fired tear gas and shot at hundreds of protesters. Two protesters were shot and killed in Sadr, Lahaj province. A coalition of Yemeni opposition groups proposed a plan to end the country's political crisis that would involve embattled Pres. Saleh stepping down by the end of the year.
(AP, 3/2/11)(AP, 3/3/11)
2011 Mar 2, Zimbabwe’s Pres. Mugabe threatened to boycott Western products before seizing companies from countries that have imposed sanctions against him and his allies.
(AFP, 3/2/11)
2012 Mar 2, US authorities charged 29 people who were conspiring to illegally import counterfeit luxury fashion goods and deadly drugs worth hundreds of millions of dollars from China and Taiwan. Some 20 arrests took place in New Jersey, Florida, Texas, New York, and in the Philippines, as part of an international investigation.
(AFP, 3/2/12)
2012 Mar 2, In California police and federal agents seized 750 pounds of methamphetamine from a San Jose apartment. Street value was estimated at $34 million.
(SSFC, 3/4/12, p.C1)
2012 Mar 2, A string of violent storms scratched away small towns in the South and Midwest as an early season tornado outbreak left 39 people in 5 states, including 14 in Indiana, 19 in Kentucky, 3 in Ohio and one each in Alabama and Georgia.
(AP, 3/3/12)(http://tinyurl.com/6u9f2bp)(SFC, 3/5/12, p.A9)
2012 Mar 2, BP reached a partial settlement in the Gulf of Mexico oil spill trial in which tens of billions are at stake. Terms of the settlement with a committee representing thousands of private claimants such as fishermen and coastal businesses were not released. There was no word on the status of BP's negotiations with the US government.
(AFP, 3/3/12)
2012 Mar 2, James Q. Wilson, social scientist (b.1931), died in Boston. His books included “Bureaucracy" (1989). In 1982 he and George L. Kelling introduced their broken windows theory, a criminological theory of the norm setting and signaling effect of urban disorder and vandalism on additional crime and anti-social behavior. It was implemented in NYC under Mayor Giuliani (1994-2001), and led to a plunge in violent felonies.
(SSFC, 3/4/12, p.C9)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_windows_theory)(Econ, 3/10/12, p.106)
2012 Mar 2, In Afghanistan a suicide bomber on a motorcycle attacked a NATO convoy in the Kandahar province, wounding seven people including four soldiers.
(AFP, 3/2/12)
2012 Mar 2, Norman St John-Stevas (82), a gay British academic and Conservative politician died.
(Econ, 3/10/12, p.70)
2012 Mar 2, Danish prosecutors charged four people with terrorism for allegedly planning a shooting attack on a newspaper that had printed cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad. The 4 men from Sweden were arrested on Dec 29, 2010.
(AP, 12/30/10)(AP, 3/2/12)
2012 Mar 2, Leaders of 25 EU countries signed a new treaty in Brussels designed to limit government overspending. Spain’s PM Mariano Rajoy said he would miss deficit targets this year to spare his country from austerity overload.
(SFC, 3/3/12, p.A2)
2012 Mar 2, France said it is closing its embassy in Syria, a day after two French journalists escaped to Lebanon.
(AP, 3/2/12)
2012 Mar 2, In India rampaging lawyers at a court complex in Bangalore, India's software hub, assaulted TV camera crews and pelting onlookers and police with furniture and bottles during a brawl. The journalists said they were attacked because of their coverage of a lawyers' street protest last month against an alleged police assault on a fellow advocate. The brawl erupted during a trial involving a mining fraud in Karnataka, of which Bangalore is the state capital.
(AFP, 3/3/12)
2012 Mar 2, It was reported that thousands of male Indonesian civil servants had their monthly pay transferred to their wives' bank accounts this week in a bid by a local government to stop men having affairs.
(AFP, 3/2/12)
2012 Mar 2, Iranians voted in their first national poll since the disputed 2009 re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, choosing a new parliament they hope will fix their country's sanctions-hit economy. Overall, the new parliament looked to be virtually entirely conservative, with the previous 60 reformist MPs winnowed down to a bare handful following the boycott of the main reformist blocs in the elections.
(AFP, 3/2/12)(AFP, 3/4/12)
2012 Mar 2, In Ivory Coast a military court put on trial 28 paramilitary police accused of crimes in the period last year when former president Laurent Gbagbo tried to cling to power.
(AFP, 3/2/12)
2012 Mar 2, Kenya launched the construction of a massive port, railway and refinery near a UNESCO-listed Indian Ocean island in a project it bills as the biggest ever in an African nation. Residents of the coastal island of Lamu had protested against the planned port.
(AP, 3/2/12)(AFP, 3/2/12)
2012 Mar 2, Mozambique's government said it has refused to let mining giant Rio Tinto use the Zambezi River to transport coal to the Indian Ocean for export. For now the Sena railway line to Beira in the center of the country and the Nacala line in the north were the preferred export routes for coal.
(AFP, 3/2/12)
2012 Mar 2, In northern Nigeria gunmen shot dead a soldier in the city of Kano.
(AFP, 3/3/12)
2012 Mar 2, Pakistan's ruling party made gains in the country's upper house of parliament in legislative elections. The PPP won 19 seats, increasing its majority to 41 in a much-needed boost for Zardari's weakened administration.
(AP, 3/2/12)(AFP, 3/3/12)
2012 Mar 2, In northwest Pakistan a suicide bomber attacked the headquarters of a rival insurgent group, killing 23 Lashkar-e-Islam supporters in an outbreak of factional fighting in the Tirah valley. Lashkar-e-Islam fighters had earlier attacked military post killing 10 soldiers. 23 militants were also killed in the fighting. Fighter jets left at least 15 militants dead in the Orakzai tribal agency.
(AP, 3/2/12)(SFC, 3/3/12, p.A4)
2012 Mar 2, In Somalia African Union-backed Somali government troops attacked and seized positions of hardline Shebab insurgents in the war-torn capital Mogadishu.
(AFP, 3/2/12)
2012 Mar 2, It was reported that the UN-backed Somali government spent only $1 million on social services despite having $58 million in revenue, according to an unpublished report by Abdirazak Fartaag, a former Somali government official.
(AP, 3/3/12)
2012 Mar 2, Syrian activists accused regime forces of carrying out execution-style killings and burning homes as part of a scorched-earth campaign in a restive neighborhood of Homs, while the Red Cross headed to the area following a bloody, monthlong siege to dislodge rebel forces. The Observatory said 10 people were killed in the town of Rastan near Homs when a mortar landed near marchers. The LCC said 16 were killed in the same event, among 52 reported dead nationwide.
(AP, 3/2/12)
2012 Mar 2, Thai police said they confiscated over 4 million methamphetamine tablets near the border with Myanmar, where much of it is produced.
(SFC, 3/3/12, p.A2)
2012 Mar 2, In Tunisia protesters began camping outside the offices of Wataniya in Tunis, demanding the "cleansing" of the national broadcaster and jeering at journalists. On April 25 they ended their protest after the government promised to address their concerns and asked them to leave.
(AFP, 4/25/12)
2012 Mar 2, In Yemen massive crowds gathered across the country, demanding that officers loyal to ousted president Ali Abdullah Saleh be purged from the country's armed forces.
(AP, 3/2/12)
2013 Mar 2, President Barack Obama pressed Congress to work with him on a compromise to halt a fiscal crisis he said was starting to "inflict pain" on communities across the United States.
(Reuters, 3/2/13)
2013 Mar 2, In Wyoming Ildiko Freitas (40) and her parents were killed by two intruders at her home in Cody. Stephen Hammer (19) and Tanner Vanpelt (18) were soon arrested and charged with murder and robbery.
(SFC, 3/6/13, p.A5)
2013 Mar 2, Bangladesh security forces killed two people and injured dozens as they clashed with demonstrators for a 3rd day in violence triggered by a death sentence given to Delwar Hossain Sayedee.
(SSFC, 3/3/13, p.A5)
2013 Mar 2, Chad's military chief announced that his troops deployed in northern Mali had killed Moktar Belmoktar, the terrorist who orchestrated the attack on a natural gas plant in Algeria that left 36 foreigners dead.
(AP, 3/2/13)
2013 Mar 2, China’s Xinhua News Agency reported that a massive sulfuric acid leak at a warehouse in Liaoning province has killed at least 3 people.
(SSFC, 3/3/13, p.A5)
2013 Mar 2, In Egypt Hossam Eldin Abdullah Abdelazim, was killed when an armored police vehicle crushed him to death during clashes between protesters and police in Mansoura. A police car in Port Said hit five protesters along a main road and sped off. The violence came as US Secretary of State John Kerry was in Cairo talking with opposition figures ahead of his meeting with the president and defense minister on March 3.
(AP, 3/2/13)
2013 Mar 2, German property developer Maik Uwe Hinkel rejected calls to halt work to remove one of the last remaining stretches of the Berlin Wall, despite angry protests against the plan.
(AP, 3/2/13)
2013 Mar 2, A Libyan security official said 50 Egyptians, who were arrested in Benghazi last week for allegedly spreading Christianity, are being charged with illegally entering and working in the country and will be deported.
(AP, 3/2/13)
2013 Mar 2, Violent ethnic riots rattled Macedonia's capital, culminating with hundreds raging through the city center, clashing with police, overturning cars and attacking a bus station. At least 22 people were injured, 13 of them police officers.
(AP, 3/2/13)
2013 Mar 2, In Malaysia gunmen ambushed and killed six policemen as fears mounted that armed intruders from the southern Philippines had slipped into at least three coastal districts on Borneo island. 6 gunmen were also killed in the fighting.
(AP, 3/3/13)(Econ, 3/9/13, p.51)
2013 Mar 2, In Mali a French soldier died in an assault on jihadists in the Adrar des Ifoghas mountains along the Algerian border. About 15 jihadists were reported killed in the fighting in the Ametettai Valley.
(AP, 3/3/13)
2013 Mar 2, In Nigeria Abubakar Shekau, the leader of Boko Haram, denied in a newly released video any peace talks with the government.
(AP, 3/3/13)
2013 Mar 2, The Syrian Army's General Command said its troops have carried out special operations in towns and villages along a road between Hama and Aleppo’s airport, restoring stability there and at the airport.
(AP, 3/2/13)
2014 Mar 2, At the Hollywood Academy Awards “12 Years a Slave," directed by Steve McQueen of Britain, won the Best Picture Oscar. Matthew McConaughtey won the Best Actor Oscar for his role in “Dallas Buyers Club." Cate Blanchett won the Best Actress Oscar for her role in “Blue Jasmine." Actress Lupita Nyong'o (31) of Kenya won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress in the movie "12 Years A Slave." Jared Leto won the Best Supporting Oscar for his role in “Dallas Buyers Club." Alfonso Cuaron won the Best Director Oscar for “Gravity," which won a total of seven Oscars.
(SFC, 3/3/14, p.C4)(Econ, 3/8/14, p.58)
2014 Mar 2, British director Malcolm Clarke won the documentary short prize for "The Lady in Number 6," a profile of musician and Holocaust survivor Alice Herz-Sommer (d.2014 at 110).
(AP, 3/3/14)
2014 Mar 2, The Italian film "The Great Beauty" won the Oscar for best foreign-language film.
(AP, 3/3/14)
2014 Mar 2, New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez signed legislation to ban texting. 41 other states have already banned texting by all drivers.
(SFC, 3/3/14, p.A6)
2014 Mar 2, A massive winter storm system packing cold air, snow and freezing rain pummeled the central US and headed for the East Coast.
(Reuters, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, In eastern Afghanistan a militant car bomb prematurely exploded overnight, killing 9 insurgents and 4 civilians. A lone suicide bomber entered a police station in Kandahar province, though officers' fire forced him to detonate his explosive vest early, only wounding one civilian. 12 Taliban escaped from the 1,200-inmate Kandahar Prison after a prison employee falsely put their names on a list of detainees who were scheduled for release. Two were soon recaptured.
(AP, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, In Bolivia 4 people were killed and over 60 injured when a metal footbridge collapsed onto a group of musicians marching in the opening parade of Carnival in Oruro.
(SSFC, 3/2/14, p.A4)
2014 Mar 2, In Hong Kong thousands marched to support press freedom and denounce violence following the Feb 26 attack on Kevin Lau Chun-to, former editor of the Ming Pao newspaper.
(SFC, 3/3/14, p.A2)
2014 Mar 2, In Iraq attacks in predominantly Sunni Arab areas north and west of Baghdad killed 6 people, all members of the security forces.
(AFP, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, Hundreds of thousands of ultra-Orthodox Jews held a mass prayer in Jerusalem in protest at a bill that would cut their community's military exemptions and end a tradition upheld since Israel's foundation.
(Reuters, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, Jamaican police said they have seized over 2,100 pounds (952 kg) of marijuana and arrested a suspect in a 2-day operation at a container terminal in Kingston.
(AP, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, In Libya gunmen shot dead French engineer Patrice Real in Benghazi. A member of the security forces was also killed by a bomb placed under his car and a former policeman was seriously wounded. Five unidentified bodies were found in and around the city.
(AFP, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, Pakistani warplanes bombed the hideout of militant leader Mullah Tamanchey, killing 5 insurgents, only a day after the Pakistani Taliban declared a one-month ceasefire to pursue stalled peace talks with the government. Tamanchey had directed the deadly assault a day earlier against a convoy carrying a polio vaccination team.
(Reuters, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, South Africa's biggest trade union, the 340,000-strong National Union of Metalworkers (NUMSA), said it was laying the ground for a new "working class" political party. The United Front Movement for Socialism would group together left-leaning organizations to fight for better education, healthcare and municipal services for South Africa's poor.
(AFP, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, In Syria gun battles and shelling hit the Palestinian camp of Yarmuk in southern Damascus, breaking a truce in place since mid-February.
(AFP, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, Ukraine mobilized for war and Washington threatened to isolate Russia economically, after President Vladimir Putin declared he had the right to invade his neighbor.
(Reuters, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, Ukraine's new PM Arseniy Yatsenyuk and world leaders urged Russian President Vladimir Putin to pull back his military as hundreds of armed men surrounded a Ukrainian military base in Crimea. Ukraine's navy chief announced he had switched allegiance to the pro-Russian authorities of the flashpoint peninsula of Crimea, a day after he was appointed to the post by interim leader Oleksandr Turchynov.
(AP, 3/2/14)(AFP, 3/2/14)
2014 Mar 2, Venezuela released dozens of anti-government protesters and an Italian photographer, but that did nothing to appease demonstrators set for more rallies against President Nicolas Maduro. Thousands marched peacefully in Caracas. Afterwards some 1,500 erected barricades and clashed with National Guard troops.
(AFP, 3/2/14)(SFC, 3/3/14, p.A4)
2014 Mar 2, In central Yemen gunmen ambushed a colonel in the security forces, killing him and wounding his guard. Armed tribesmen clashed with security forces on the southern edge of Sanaa, leaving two gunmen dead and three soldiers wounded.
(AP, 3/2/14)
2015 Mar 2, The NY Times revealed that when Hillary Clinton was secretary of state she used a personal e-mail account rather than a government one for all her official business.
(Econ., 3/7/15, p.32)
2015 Mar 2, A new study was published saying a wave of migrants from the eastern fringes of Europe some 4,500 years ago left their trace in the DNA — and possibly the languages — of modern Europeans. They found that DNA associated with the Yamnaya people appeared strongly in what is now northern Germany. The Yamnaya were herders who lived in the steppe north of the Black and Aral Seas.
(AP, 3/3/15)
2015 Mar 2, Bangladeshi security officials arrested Farabi Shafiur Rahman as a suspect in the killing of blogger Avijit Roy, a prominent critic of extremist Islam who was hacked to death on Feb 26.
(AP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, British police said they had charged 10 men with sexual offences against children and adults, part of a wider investigation into child sexual exploitation in the northern English town of Rochdale.
(Reuters, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Motorists in England and Wales faced tougher penalties for driving under the influence of drugs as new laws took effect. Drivers will be prosecuted if they are caught exceeding new legal limits for eight illegal drugs and eight prescription drugs.
(AFP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Chinese military prosecutors released a list of 14 generals convicted of graft or placed under investigation in an accelerating nationwide anti-corruption drive.
(AP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Scandinavian Airlines said some 50 flights have been canceled to and from Denmark after members of a Danish cabin crew union walked out to protest the carrier's plan to transfer employees to a domestic airline acquired by SAS.
(AP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, In Egypt an explosion in Cairo near the High Court killed 2 people.
(SSFC, 3/8/15, p.A4)
2015 Mar 2, The EU approved new rules that clamp down on the use of flimsy plastic bags hazardous to the environment.
(SFC, 3/3/15, p.A2)
2015 Mar 2, In India a law banning the possession and sale of beef went into effect in the state of Maharashtra. The ban on the slaughter of cattle put thousands out of work and created problems for struggling farmers.
(SFC, 3/6/15, p.A5)(SFC, 3/27/15, p.A2)
2015 Mar 2, Iran’s The Center for Investigation of Organized Crime, a branch of the elite Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), accused Facebook of spreading immoral content and said it had arrested several users. State television reported Iran has monitored 8 million Facebook accounts with new software and will watch other social media sites for content that contravenes the Islamic Republic's moral codes.
(Reuters, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Iraq's armed forces, backed by Shi'ite militia, attacked Islamic State strongholds north of Baghdad as they launched an offensive to retake the city of Tikrit and the surrounding Sunni Muslim province of Salahuddin.
(Reuters, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Israel said it has busted an Israeli-Palestinian smuggling ring that funneled iron, electronic equipment and other prohibited materials to Gaza, bypassing Israel's stringent border security to help Hamas rebuild its militant infrastructure following last year's war.
(AP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Libya’s internationally recognized parliament appointed Major General Khalifa Belgacem Haftar for the post of commander-in-chief of the army after promoting him to the rank of lieutenant general.
(AFP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, The principality of Monaco signed an accord with Italy aimed at ending banking secrecy, days after Switzerland and Liechtenstein inked similar pledges to exchange financial information with Rome.
(AP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, In Myanmar truckloads of police prevented hundreds of students from continuing their march to Yangon to protest a new law that they say curbs academic freedom.
(AP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Namibia's outgoing Pres. Hifikepunye Pohamba (79) was named winner of the Mo Ibrahim Prize for "good governance" in Africa, the world's richest award that has seen a dearth of worthy candidates.
(AFP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, In Norway flights by a subsidiary of low-cost airline Norwegian Air Shuttle — Norwegian Air Norway — were partly disrupted after pilots continued a walkout begun Feb 28, causing the company's share price to crash 5 percent in Oslo.
(AP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Pakistani officials said hundreds of parents in the northwest were arrested and jailed over the weekend on charges of endangering public security after refusing to give their children polio vaccinations.
(AP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, In Switzerland the large family car Volkswagen Passat was voted car of the year by European automotive editors at the Geneva International Motor Show.
(AP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Syrian regime forces and Kurdish militia fought separate battles with the Islamic State group in a strategic area near the Iraqi and Turkish borders.
(AFP, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Konstandinos Erik Scurfield (25), a former Royal Marine, died in a battle with IS militants, becoming the first Briton to be killed while fighting with Kurdish forces battling Islamic State jihadists in Syria.
(AFP, 3/4/15)
2015 Mar 2, Tunisia canceled a new tax imposed on travelers crossing Libya’s border after the measure triggered rioting.
(Reuters, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Ukraine's military said one Ukrainian serviceman was killed and four wounded in separatist eastern territories in the past 24 hours. But it warned that rebels were using the truce to regroup for new attacks on government positions.
(Reuters, 3/2/15)
2015 Mar 2, Venezuela gave the US two weeks to reduce its diplomatic mission in Caracas to 17 diplomats, from an estimated 100, to match the 17 Venezuelan diplomats serving in the US.
(SFC, 3/3/15, p.A2)
2016 Mar 2, The US and its allies in Iraq and Syria staged 29 strikes against Islamic State.
(Reuters, 3/3/16)
2016 Mar 2, In Mississippi Rafael McCloud (33), a capital murder suspect, escaped from the Warren County jail.
(SFC, 3/3/16, p.A4)
2016 Mar 2, New Jersey newspapers called for the resignation of Gov. Chris Christie over his endorsement of Donald Trump for president.
(SFC, 3/3/16, p.A4)
2016 Mar 2, In New Jersey Rafal Kaldon (38), accused of beating Norbert Nowak to death at a disco in Poland in August, 1996, was arrested.
(AP, 3/3/16)
2016 Mar 2, In Oklahoma City Aubrey McClendon (56), co-founder of Chesapeake Energy and a part-owner of the NBA’s Oklahoma City Thunder, drove his SUV into a wall a day after he was indicted for conspiring to rig bids to buy oil and natural gas leases in northwest Oklahoma.
(SFC, 3/3/16, p.C2)(Econ, 3/5/15, p.58)
2016 Mar 2, US astronaut Scott Kelly and Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko landed in Kazakhstan after almost a year in space in a ground-breaking experiment foreshadowing a potential manned mission to Mars.
(AFP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, Mining company Samarco and its owners, BHP Billiton and Vale SA, reached a deal with the Brazilian government to pay an estimated 20 billion reais ($5.1 billion) in damages over 15 years for a deadly dam spill in November.
(Reuters, 3/3/16)
2016 Mar 2, Jason Lawrance (50), a British man, was found guilty of raping five women he met through the US Internet dating service match.com, which he was allowed to use despite complaints to the website from his victims.
(AFP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, Cambodian National Police and Chinese police took part in rounding up 105 Chinese citizens at the Golden Crown Casino's hotel, releasing 67 after confirming they were not on wanted lists. Police said the people arrested are suspected of involvement in scams carried out against Chinese citizens over Internet phone services.
(AP, 3/3/16)
2016 Mar 2, An Egyptian military court handed down seven death sentences for an April 2015 bombing that killed 2 army cadets as they waited to board a bus. The court in Alexandria also sentenced five people to life in prison, which in Egypt means 25 years.
(AFP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, The EU launched a new aid program worth an initial 700 million euros that mirrors the kind of disaster relief it offers developing nations. Greece, the main gateway to Europe, would initially be the main beneficiary of the emergency scheme. The number of migrants awaiting passage to central and northern Europe swelled on Greece's border with Macedonia as the frontier remained shut.
(Reuters, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, In northern France dozens of riot police moved in for a third day to demolish the shantytown on the outskirts of the port city of Calais after half a dozen shelters were burned down overnight.
(AFP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, A Guatemalan court ordered two former military officers convicted of holding indigenous women as sex slaves during the nation's civil war to pay their victims just over $1 million in compensation.
(Reuters, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, An Indian court said a university student leader can be freed on bail more than two weeks after he was detained for alleged sedition in a case that has sparked nationwide protests and accusations of government intolerance of dissent. The court said Kanhaiya Kumar could be released if he pays about $148 bail, refrains from political activity and is supervised by a faculty member at Jawaharlal Nehru University.
(AP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, An earthquake of magnitude 7.9 that struck off Indonesia's island of Sumatra killing a number of people.
(Reuters, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, Iraq signed a deal with an Italian company to repair and maintain its largest dam, near the northern, Islamic State-held city of Mosul.
(AP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, Israeli forces demolished dozens of structures including a school in the northern West Bank this week, leaving 10 families homeless.
(AFP, 3/4/16)
2016 Mar 2, Jordan said it has thwarted planned attacks by the Islamic State group on its soil, killing 7 suspected jihadists in a major security operation near the Syrian frontier. One member of Jordan's security forces was killed and three wounded in clashes that raged for several hours until dawn.
(AP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, In Libya a gunfight took place near the city of Sabratha. Two Italian construction workers, who were kidnapped in Libya last July, were believed killed during the clash between militants from the Islamic State group and local militias fighting them.
(AP, 3/3/16)
2016 Mar 2, Macedonia allowed some 200 refugees to cross its border with Greece, as 10,000 more were left waiting in miserable conditions.
(AFP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, Qatar-based beIN Media Group said it has purchased a 100-percent stake in the film studio Miramax, part of its expansion into the entertainment business.
(AP, 3/3/16)
2016 Mar 2, Russia's state prosecutor demanded a 23-year prison sentence for Ukrainian pilot and lawmaker Nadiya Savchenko who is accused of killing two Russian journalists in war-torn Ukraine.
(AFP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, In Russia some 15 tons (110 barrels) of oil spilled off from an idled pipeline on the Pacific island of Sakhalin according to oil producer Rosneft. Local ecologists said the scale of disaster was far larger.
(Reuters, 3/3/16)
2016 Mar 2, A Saudi-led bloc of six Gulf Arab nations, the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC), formally branded Hezbollah a terrorist organization, ramping up the pressure on the Lebanese militant group fighting on the side of President Bashar Assad in Syria.
(AP, 3/2/16)(Econ, 3/5/16, p.45)
2016 Mar 2, South Korea's opposition members of parliament ended a record-breaking filibuster to block an "anti-terrorism" bill sponsored by their conservative rivals. The opposition Minju party led the eight-day filibuster, the world’s longest. South Korea’s National Assembly passed its first legislation on human rights in North Korea, in a move that is expected to enrage its northern rival.
(Reuters, 3/2/16)(AP, 3/2/16)(Econ, 4/96, p.41)
2016 Mar 2, In Syria a Kurdish-led fighting alliance captured a hill overlooking a main road in Aleppo from the militant Nusra Front group and its allies. In southern Syria a car bomb targeted a meeting of commanders of a US-backed moderate rebel group, killing 18, including the faction's top commander.
(AP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, Former Tanzanian president Benjamin Mkapa was named as the new mediator for talks to end a nearly year-long crisis in neighboring Burundi by the regional East African Community (EAC).
(AFP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, Thailand police seized 895,897 counterfeit brand-name sunglasses at a warehouse where they also arrested two Chinese nationals accused of importing them from China. the sunglasses were purported to be famous brands such as Ray-Ban, Oakley, Louis Vuitton and Christian Dior.
(AP, 3/3/16)
2016 Mar 2, In southeastern Turkey residents of Cizre began returning home after authorities partially lifted a curfew in place since December for a controversial operation against Kurdish rebels which left many homes devastated. 3 soldiers and 10 Kurdish PKK militants were killed in clashes in Mardin province and Diyarbakir.
(AFP, 3/2/16)(Reuters, 3/3/16)
2016 Mar 2, Ukrainian authorities said 3 soldiers have been killed and two wounded in the Donbas region in the country's east as their car exploded.
(AP, 3/2/16)
2016 Mar 2, The United Nations Security Council unanimously adopted a resolution that dramatically expands existing UN sanctions on North Korea in response to its Jan. 6 nuclear test, a measure largely negotiated by Washington and Beijing.
(Reuters, 3/2/16)
2017 Mar 2, Several congressional Republicans called on Attorney General Jeff Sessions to recuse himself from investigations into alleged Russian meddling in the US presidential election after it emerged he met last year with Russia's ambassador but did not disclose the contacts in Senate testimony. Sessions became the second high-ranking member of the Trump administration to take a hit over conversations with Russia's envoy to the US, recusing himself from any probe that examines communications between Trump aides and Moscow.
(Reuters, 3/2/17)(AP, 3/3/17)
2017 Mar 2, US VP Mike Pence swore in retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson as secretary of housing and former Texas Gov. Mike Perry as energy secretary.
(SFC, 3/3/17, p.A6)
2017 Mar 2, The Kansas Supreme Court ruled that the state’s spending on public education was unconstitutionally low.
(SFC, 3/3/17, p.A6)
2017 Mar 2, US federal prosecutors announced they have captured members of the MS-13 street gang who killed three Long Island high school students last year with a machete and baseball bats.
(SFC, 3/3/17, p.A6)
2017 Mar 2, In Nebraska a prison riot at the Tecumseh State Correctional Institution left two inmates dead. About 40 inmates refused to return to their cells after staff members reported a fire to one of the housing units.
(SFC, 3/4/17, p.A6)
2017 Mar 2, Snap, the parent company of social media Snapchat, closed at $24.48, a 44% jump over its IPO price of $17. The company had started in 2011 as Picaboo. The securities sold had no voting power so all the power stayed with co-founders Evan Spiegel and Bobby Murphy.
(SFC, 3/3/17, p.C1)(Econ, 2/4/17, p.53)(Econ, 2/11/17, p.56)
2017 Mar 2, In Afghanistan a suspected US drone strike killed Qari Abdullah, a top commander of the militant Haqqani network. He was the man who in 2014 accompanied US Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl when he was handed over to US authorities.
(AP, 3/3/17)
2017 Mar 2, An Austrian court found eight Iraqi nationals guilty of gang-raping a German tourist on New Year's Eve, 2015, and sentenced them to prison terms of between nine and 13 years.
(AP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, Nations and philanthropists pledged close to $200 million for family planning at an international conference in Brussels that aimed to make up for the gap left by President Donald Trump's ban on US funding to groups linked to abortion.
(AP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, Canada adopted a military doctrine that explicitly acknowledges soldiers’ right to use force to protect themselves, even when the threat comes from children.
(Econ, 4/1/17, p.28)
2017 Mar 2, Croatia's conservative government formed a council to deal with the country's previous pro-Nazi and Communist regimes in a bid to overcome the deep divisions that still exist over the Balkan nation's past.
(AP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, The Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia urged the European Union to boost the role of national parliaments under a planned overhaul of the bloc's decision-making process.
(Reuters, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, In Egypt German Chancellor Angela Merkel and President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi held talks on ways of slowing migration to Europe, including tightening control over borders.
(AP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, Egypt's top appeals court found Hosni Mubarak innocent of involvement in the killing of protesters during the 2011 uprising that ended his 30-year rule, in a final ruling that could see the former president walk free.
(Reuters, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, In Italy three skiers were killed in an avalanche in the northern Alps. Another five people were injured at Plan de la Gabba.
(AP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, In southern Italy two African workers were killed late today after fire broke out at a camp housing hundreds of migrants who pick fruit and vegetables near Foggia.
(Reuters, 3/3/17)(AP, 3/3/17)
2017 Mar 2, Northern Ireland began voting in snap elections to resolve a political crisis fuelled by bad blood and Brexit. The DUP and Ulster Unionists won only 38 seats in the 90-member Assembly The pro-British Democratic Unionist Party narrowly remained the largest party following the closest-ever election for the provincial assembly. If the conservative and pro-British Democratic Unionist Party and the socialist and pro-Irish republican Sinn Fein cannot resolve their differences within three weeks of the vote, the assembly's executive could be suspended and the province fully governed from London.
(AFP, 3/2/17)(Reuters, 3/4/17)(Econ, 3/11/17, p.56)
2017 Mar 2, Kurdish forces seized an oil facility in Kirkuk to send a message to the Iraqi government to build a refinery.
(Reuters, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, Mexican journalist Cecilio Pineda Birto was shot dead in Ciudad Altamirano while in a hammock at a car wash waiting for his car to be serviced.
(AP, 3/3/17)
2017 Mar 2, Nigeria filed criminal charges of corruption against oil multinationals Royal Dutch Shell and Eni over the $1.1 billion sale of one of Africa's richest oil blocks. Malabu Oil, secretly set up by former Oil Minister Dan Etete, was awarded OPL 245 while he was oil minister. Nigeria's government got only $210 million from the deal.
(AP, 3/4/17)
2017 Mar 2, Pakistan announced plans to bring its militancy-wracked tribal areas into the mainstream political fold by ending a de facto system of direct rule that critics said suppressed development and fuelled extremism.
(AFP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, Pakistan said it will conduct its first census in 19 years. The 70-day data-gathering campaign will start March 15.
(Reuters, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, In Pakistan a suspected US drone strike killed two men on a motorcycle in a village near the Afghanistan border.
(Reuters, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, It was reported that the shores of Peru’s Lake Titicaca, South America's largest lake, are littered with dead frogs, discarded paint buckets and bags of soggy trash and that the water itself contains toxic levels of lead and mercury. Untreated sewage water drains from two dozen nearby cities and illegal gold mines high in the Andes dump up to 15 tons of mercury a year into a river leading to the lake.
(AP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny accused PM Dmitry Medvedev of controlling a property empire including mansions, yachts and vineyards financed by oligarchs through a network of shadowy non-profit organizations.
(AFP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, In Somalia at least 57 al-Shabab members were killed after African Union troops from Kenya and Somali forces attacked one of its camps outside Afmadhow.
(AP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, In South Africa emergency workers dug through rubble in Johannesburg after part of the Charlotte Maxeke hospital's roof collapsed, reportedly trapping several patients.
(AFP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, South Sudan announced it would increase work permit fees for foreign workers from the $100-$300 range to between $1,000 and $10,000 per year, depending on the qualifications of the worker. International aid agencies on March 10 warned this would worsen a humanitarian crisis in the famine-hit country. In early April South Sudan suspended the plans to charge foreign workers a $10,000 work permit fee, after criticism that it would create a huge expense for aid organizations.
(AFP, 3/11/17)(AP, 4/3/17)
2017 Mar 2, A Madrid judge banned a bright orange bus emblazoned with an anti-transgender message from driving through the Spanish capital on the grounds that it was discriminatory and could provoke hate crimes.
(Reuters, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, In Sudan Bakri Hassan Saleh, a former army general and top aide to President Omar al-Bashir, was sworn in as the country’s first prime minister since the post was scrapped in a 1989 Islamist-backed coup.
(AFP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, Sweden reintroduced compulsory military service, seven years after abandoning it, to respond to global security challenges including Russia's assertive behavior in the Baltic Sea region.
(AFP, 3/2/17)(SFC, 3/3/17, p.A4)
2017 Mar 2, Syrian troops backed by Russian jets completed the recapture of the historic city of Palmyra from the Islamic State group. Fighters of the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) announced they would cede several villages to the government as part of a deal brokered by Russia to avoid conflict with Turkey.
(AFP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, Syrian warplanes carried out eight air strikes in a rebel-held district of the mostly government-controlled city of Homs. The air strikes killed two civilians and wounded more than 24 people in al-Waer, as UN-sponsored peace talks continued in Geneva.
(Reuters, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, In western Ukraine eight miners died when a methane gas explosion tore through a pit in the western Lviv region.
(AFP, 3/2/17)
2017 Mar 2, The United States carried out 25 air strikes in Yemen targeting al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula in al-Maraqisha, a rugged mountainous area where al Qaeda militants took refuge last year.
(Reuters, 3/2/17)(Econ, 3/18/17, p.24)
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