Today in History - April 2
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742 Apr 2,
Charlemagne (d.814), Charles I the Great, King of the Franks and first
Holy Roman emperor (800-14), was born. His capital was at Aachen
(Acquisgrana in Latin).
(V.D.-H.K.p.105)(SFEM, 10/12/97, p.46)(HN, 4/2/98)
1118 Apr 2, Boudouin I of Bologne
and Edessa, 1st crusader, king of Jerusalem, died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1416 Apr 2, Ferdinand I (52) the
Justified, king of Aragon and Sicily, died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1502 Apr 2, Arthur, English crown
prince, husband of Catharina of Aragon, died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1513 Apr 2,
Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de Leon landed in Florida. Juan Ponce de
Leon, Spanish explorer, discovered Florida and planted orange and lemon
trees there. [see March 27, 1512 entry] He also discovered the Dry
Tortugas west of Key West.
(TL-MB, p.10)(NH, 4/97, p.317)(AP, 4/2/97)
1550 Apr 2, Jews were expelled
from Genoa, Italy. [see Jun 15, 1567]
(MC, 4/2/02)
1595 Apr 2, Cornelis de Houtman's
ships departed to Asia around Cape of Good Hope.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1602 Apr 2, Maria de Jesus de
Agreda (Maria Coronel), Spanish Franciscan, was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1618 Apr 2, Francesco M. Grimaldi,
mathematician, physicist (light diffraction), was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1645 Apr 2, Robert Devereux
resigned as parliament supreme commander.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1725 Apr 2, Giovanni Casanova,
Italian adventurer, was born. [see Apr 5]
(HN, 4/2/01)
1728 Apr 2, Franz Asplmayr,
composer, was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1758 Apr 2, Johann Balthasar Konig
(67), composer, died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1763 Apr 2, Giacomo Gotifredo
Ferrari, composer, was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1784 Apr 2, Pierre Leclair (74),
composer, died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1792 Apr 2, Congress passed the
Coinage Act, which authorized establishment of the U.S. Mint. It
established the US dollar defined in fixed weights of gold and silver.
State chartered banks issued paper money convertible to gold or silver
coins to ease business transactions. U.S. authorized $10 Eagle, $5
half-Eagle & 2.50 quarter-Eagle gold coins & silver dollar,
dollar, quarter, dime & half-dime.
(HFA, '96, p.28)(AP, 4/2/97)(WSJ, 1/13/98, p.A1)
(HN, 4/2/98)
1796 Apr 2, Haitian revolt leader
Toussaint L’Ouverture commanded French forces at Santo Domingo.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1800 Apr 2, 1st performance of
Ludwig van Beethoven's 1st Symphony in C.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1801 Apr 2, The British navy
defeated the Danish at the Battle of Copenhagen.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1805 Apr 2, Hans Christian
Andersen (d.1875), author of 150 fairy tales, was born in Odense,
Denmark.
(CFA, '96, p.44)(HN, 4/2/98)(AP, 4/2/99)
1814 Apr 2, Henry Lewis "Old Rock"
Benning, Brig General in Confederate Army, was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1827 Apr 2, William Holdman Hunt,
English painter (Light of the World), was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1827 Apr 2, Joseph Dixon began
manufacturing lead pencils.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1834 Apr 2, Frederic-Auguste
Bartholdi, sculptor (Statue of Liberty), was born in Colmar,
France.
(HN, 4/2/01)
1840 Apr 2, Emile Zola (d.1902),
French novelist, reporter (Nana) , was born. He tried to wake the
consciousness of the fin de siecle.
(HN, 4/2/98)(SFC, 12/29/00, p.C6)(V.D.-H.K.p.279)
1845 Apr 2, H.L. Fizeau and J.
Leon Foucault took the 1st photo of Sun.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1853 Apr 2, Lucie de la Tour du
Pin (83), born as Henriette-Lucie Dillon and former lady-in-waiting to
Marie Antoinette, died Paris. Her memoir, “Journal of a Woman of Fifty
Years,” was not published until 1906. In 2009 Caroline Moorhead
authored “Dancing to the Precipice: Lucie de la Tour du Pin and the
French Revolution.”
(Econ, 3/7/09, p.91)(http://tinyurl.com/co3xor)
1860 Apr 2, The
first Italian Parliament met at Turin. Italy was unified. The
Rothschild banking empire bankrolled Italy’s independence.
(AP, 4/2/97) (SFC, 6/11/96, p.A16)(SFC, 7/12/96,
p.A11)
1863 Apr 2, In Richmond, Va., a
large crowd of hungry women from one of Richmond's working-class
neighborhoods demanded bread from Governor John Letcher. When the
governor did not respond favorably to the rioters' demands, the women
marched down Main Street, shouting "Bread" as they made their way to
the commissary, where they smashed store windows and grabbed food and
anything else they could get their hands on. Not until the mob faced
President Davis and his troops did the rampage end. Varina Howell Davis
wrote an account of the riots after her husbands death in 1889.
(HNQ, 5/8/02)(AH, 6/02, p.24)
1864 Apr 2, Skirmish at Crump's
Hill (Piney Woods), Louisiana.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1864 Apr 2, Skirmish at
Spoonville-Antoine, Arkansas.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1865 Apr 2, Confederate President
Davis and most of his Cabinet fled the Confederate capital of Richmond,
Va. Grant broke Lee’s line at Petersburg. President Jefferson Davis
moved his government headquarters to Danville, Va., when its previous
capital, Richmond, became engulfed in flames. Though it would have been
safer to secure a location further south, Danville was naturally
protected by the Dan and Staunton rivers, and it was in close proximity
to Gen. Robert E. Lee’s army to the north and Gen. Joseph E. Johnston’s
army to the south. The Piedmont Railroad connected Danville and
Greensboro, N.C. and offered easy access to supplies.
(AP, 4/2/97)(HN, 4/2/98)(HNQ, 11/1/01)
1865 Apr 2, Battle of Petersburg,
Va. (Ft Gregg, Sutherland's Station).
(MC, 4/2/02)
1865 Apr 2, Battle of Ft. Blakely,
AL. and Selma, AL.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1865 Apr 2, Ambrose Powell Hill
(39), Confederate general, was killed in action.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1866 Apr 2, Pres. Johnson ended
war in Ala, Ark, Fla, Ga, Miss, La, NC, SC, Ten and Va.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1870 Apr 2, Victoria Claflin
Woodhull (1838-1927) became the first woman to run for president of the
United States when she announced her candidacy for the 1872 election,
but she spent Election Day in jail for sending obscene literature
through the mail. Articulate and radical in her beliefs, she boldly
challenged convention in Victorian-era America. Victoria and her
sister, Tennessee Claflin, got their start as spiritual advisors to
financier Cornelius Vanderbilt. With his backing, the sisters became
the first women to open their own successful brokerage firm. Woodhull
was the first woman newspaper publisher, a feminist and a militant
suffragist, but most shocking to Victorian sensibilities, she also
advocated free love.
(HNPD, 4/28/99)
1872 Apr 2, George B. Brayton
patented a gasoline powered engine.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1872 Apr 2, Samuel F.B. Morse
(80), developer of the electric telegraph, died in New York. In 2003
Kenneth Silverman authored "Lightning Man," a biography of Morse.
(AP, 4/2/99)(MC, 4/2/02)(WSJ, 10/28/03, p.A1)
1875 Apr 2, Walter Chrysler,
founder of Chrysler automobile company, was born. He grew up in Ellis,
Kansas.
(HN, 4/2/98)(WSJ, 8/10/00, p.A16)
1884 Apr 2, The London prison for
debtors closed.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1891 Apr 2, Max Ernst, German
painter and sculptor, founder of surrealism, was born. [see Jan 24]
(HN, 4/2/98)
1896 Apr 2, Theodore Robinson
(b.1852), American Impressionist painter, died in NYC.
(WSJ, 10/1/04, p.W2)(http://97.1911encyclopedia.org)
1900 Apr 2, Heinrich Besseler,
German musicologist, was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1902 Apr 2, Thomas L. Talley set
up the first moving picture theater as part of a carnival in Los
Angeles.
(SFEC, 5/23/99, Z1 p.10)(MC, 4/2/02)
1905 Apr 2, Kurt Adler (d.1988),
American conductor, was born. "Tradition is what you resort to when you
don't have the time or the money to do it right."
(HN, 4/2/01)(AP, 8/25/99)
1905 Apr 2, Serge Lifar, dancer
and opera director, was born.
(HN, 4/2/01)
1908 Apr 2, Buddy Ebsen (d.2003),
actor-dancer, was born in Belleville, Ill. He played Jed Clampett in
the popular television series The Beverly Hillbillies.
(AP,
4/2/08)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddy_Ebsen)
1910 Apr 2, Karl Harris perfected
the process for the artificial synthesis of rubber.
(HN, 4/2/98)
1910 Apr 2, Boyd Alexander (37),
English explorer (Niger to the Nile), was murdered.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1912 Apr 2, Titanic underwent sea
trials under its own power.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1912 Apr 2, Sun Yet Sen formed the
Kuomintang-Party in China.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1914 Apr 2, Alec Guinness, English
stage and film actor, was born illegitimate and spent his early years
in penury.
(WSJ, 8/15/00, p.A26)
1914 Apr 2, Federal Reserve Board
announced plans to divide country into 12 districts. [see Nov 16, 1914]
(HN, 4/2/98)
1916 Apr 2, German troops overtook
Bois de Caillette.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1917 Apr 2, At 8:30 p.m. President
Woodrow Wilson, delivered his message before a joint session of
Congress and recommended that a state of war be declared between the
United States and the imperial German government. Realizing that the
war looming ahead would be a costly one, Wilson said, "the day has come
when America is privileged to spend her blood and her might for the
principles that gave her birth and happiness and the peace which she
has treasured…" and "The world must be made safe for democracy."
(AP, 4/2/97)(HN,
4/2/98)(http://condor.stcloudstate.edu/~brixr01/theTIMEMACHINE.html)
1917 Apr 2, Jeannette Pickering
Rankin was sworn in as the first woman to serve in the U.S. House of
Representatives.
(HN, 4/2/01)
1919 Apr 2, Ian Hunter,
impresario, was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1920 Apr 2, Jack Webb, actor (Joe
Friday-Dragnet), was born in Santa Monica, Calif.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1921 Apr 2, Einstein (1879-1955)
made his first visit to the US on a fundraising tour with Zionist
leader Chaim Weizman. Prof. Albert Einstein lectured in NYC on his new
theory of relativity. In 2007 Jurgen Neffe authored “Einstein: A
Biography;” and Jozsef Illy edited “Albert Meets America.”
(SSFC, 5/13/07,
p.M6)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Einstein)
1925 Apr 2, George MacDonald
Fraser, poet, author (Flashman at the Charge), was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1926 Apr 2, Riots took place
between Moslems and Hindus in Calcutta.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1930 Apr 2, Girolamo Arriego,
composer, was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1930 Apr 2, Ethiopia’s Empress
Zauditu died and Ras Tafari assumed the title of Emperor.
(www.ethiopianembassy.org/history.shtml)
1931 Apr 2, Virne "Jackie"
Mitchell became the 2nd woman to play for an all-male pro baseball
team. In an exhibition game against the New York Yankees, she struck
out both Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig in an exhibition game in Chattanooga,
Tennessee.
(HN,
4/2/01)(www.exploratorium.edu/baseball/mitchell.html)
1932 Apr 2, Aviator Charles A.
Lindbergh and Dr. John F. Condon turned over $50,000 in ransom to an
unidentified man in a New York City cemetery in the Bronx, in exchange
for Lindbergh's kidnapped son. The infant was not returned, and was
found dead the following month.
(AP, 4/2/97)(HN, 4/2/98)
1935 Apr 2, Sharon Acker, actress
(Della Street-Perry Mason 1973), was born in Toronto, Canada.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1935 Apr 2, Sir Watson-Watt
patented RADAR.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1939 Apr 2, Marvin P. Gaye Jr,
singer (Sexual Healing), was born in Wash, DC.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1941 Apr 2, USS Hornet with Jimmy
Doolittle's B-25s departed from SF.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1942 Apr 2,
Glenn Miller and his orchestra recorded "American Patrol" at the RCA
Victor studios in Hollywood.
(AP, 4/2/97)
1944 Apr 2, Soviet forces entered
Romania, one of Germany's allied countries.
(HN, 4/2/01)
1945 Apr 2, Linda Hunt, actress
(Bostonians, Eleni, Silverado), was born in Morristown, NJ.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1945 Apr 2, 1st US units reached
the east coast of Okinawa.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1948 Apr 2, Emmylou Harris,
American singer, was born.
(HN, 4/2/01)
1953 Apr 2, Jean Epstein (56),
French director (Vive la Vie), died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1956 Apr 2, The soap operas "As
the World Turns" and "The Edge of Night" premiered on CBS television.
(AP,
4/2/99)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Edge_of_Night)
1956 Apr 2, Peter Ustinov's
"Romanoff and Juliet," premiered in Manchester.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1958 Apr 2, National Advisory
Council on Aeronautics was renamed NASA.
(HN, 4/2/98)
1960 Apr 2, Cuba bought oil from
USSR.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1961 Apr 2, Wallingford Riegger
(75), US composer (Bacchangle), died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1963 Apr 2, Reverend Dr. Martin
Luther King began the first non-violent campaign in Birmingham,
Alabama.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1964 Apr 2, A military coup in
Brazil by Gen. Humberto Castello Branco ousted Pres. Joao Goulart and
altered the traditional power structure. Gen'l. Golbery do Couto e
Silva was a leader in the coup. Business interests led by Jorge Oscar
de Mello Flores (d.2000 at 88) supported the military coup.
(WSJ, 12/4/95, p.A-9)(WSJ, 7/7/99, p.A17)(SFC,
8/3/00, p.D2)(MC, 4/2/02)
1965 Apr 2, Rodney King, black
motorist brutally beaten by LA cops, was born in Sacramento, Calif.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1965 Apr 2, Rolf Hochhuth's play
"The Deputy," which blamed Pope Pius XII for war crimes, was banned in
Italy.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1966 Apr 2, Cecil Scott Forester
(66), English author (Horatio Hornblower), died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1968 Apr 2, The influential
science-fiction film "2001: A Space Odyssey," produced and directed by
Stanley Kubrick, had its world premiere in Washington.
(AP, 4/2/08)
1968 Apr 2, Senator Eugene
McCarthy won the Democratic primaries in Wisconsin. In 2004 Dominic
Sandbrook authored "Eugene McCarthy: The Rise and Fall of Postwar
American Liberalism."
(http://news.minnesota.publicradio.org/features/2005/06/15_newsroom_mccarthytimeline/)(SSFC,
4/11/04, p.M6)
1968 Apr 2, In West Germany the
Baader-Meinhof gang was formed and named after its founders, Andreas
Baader and Ulrike Meinhof. Both later committed suicide in prison. The
gang became known as the Red Army Faction and led assassinations,
bombings and bank robberies in West Germany through the 1970s and
1980s. The RAF published a letter to Reuters in 1998 and declared to
have disbanded.
(SFC, 4/21/98,
p.A18)(www.baader-meinhof.com/timeline/1968.html)
1970 Apr 2, In Nepal 2 men began
an ascent of south face of Annapurna I, the highest final stage in a
wall climb in world.
(MC, 4/2/02)\
1971 Apr 2, The ABC sci-fi soap
opera "Dark Shadows,” which premiered in 1966, aired for the last time.
(www.tv.com/Dark-Shadows/show/2374/summary.html)
1972 Apr 2, Tennessee Williams'
"Small Craft Warnings," premiered in NYC.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_Craft_Warnings)
1972 Apr 2, In response to the
North Vietnamese Easter Offensive, President Nixon authorized the US
7th Fleet to target NVA troops massed around the Demilitarized Zone
with air strikes and naval gunfire.
(www.historyplace.com/unitedstates/vietnam/index-1969.html)
1973 Apr 2, CBS radio began on
hour news 24 hours a day.
(http://tinyurl.com/5hvvw4)
1974 Apr 2, In the 46th Academy
Awards "Sting," Glenda Jackson and Jack Lemmon win. Robert Opel (33) of
SF streaked naked across the stage. Opel was shot and killed 5 years
later during a robbery in SF.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/46th_Academy_Awards)(SFEC, 3/14/99, DB
p.37)
1974 Apr 2,
French President Georges Pompidou (62) died in Paris. Alain Pohrer
(1909-1996) as president of the Senate then served as interim president
for 7 weeks.
(SFC, 12/12/96, p.C8)(AP, 4/2/97)
1978 Apr 2, TV show "Dallas"
premiered on CBS as a 5 week mini-series. It was produced by Leonard
Katzman (1927-1996) and ran through May, 1991. [see Mar 2]
(SFC, 9/9/96, p.A26)(MC, 4/2/02)
1979 Apr 2, Israeli PM Menachem
Begin visited Cairo, Egypt, and met with Pres. Sadat.
(www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/time70s.html#1979)
1979 Apr 2, Anthrax was found to
have leaked from the secret lab of Compound 19 in Sverdlovsk (later
renamed Yekaterinburg) in the Ural Mountains. It caused a local
epidemic that killed at least 64/66 people. Pres. Yeltsin acknowledged
the leak in 1992 and allowed a team of researchers to investigate the
site. In 2000 Jeanne Guillemin authored "Anthrax: The Investigation of
a Deadly Outbreak." [see Mar 30]
(SFC, 2/19/00, p.A14)(SFEC, 8/13/00, BR p.7)(WSJ,
9/18/01, p.B1)
1981 Apr 2, Heavy battle took
place between Christian militia and Syrian army in East Lebanon.
Casualties and injuries were in the hundreds.
(www.2la.org/lebanon/ee/terrorlb.htm)
1982 Apr 2,
Several thousand troops from Argentina seized the disputed Falkland
Islands, located in the south Atlantic, from Britain but Lady Thatcher
had Britain take them back the following June. Britain fought with
Argentina in the Falkland Islands War, also known as the Falklands War,
the Malvinas War and the South Atlantic War. The short, undeclared war
between the two nations was fought over claims to the Falkland Islands
(Islas Malvinas) and neighboring islands. Argentina had laid claims to
the territories since the 19th century, but spurred by a related
dispute on South Georgia island and political expediency, the military
government of Argentina invaded the Falkland Islands. A British naval
task force was assembled and headed towards the war zone by late April.
British forces established a beachhead on the Falklands in late May.
With the surrender of the Argentine garrison at Stanley on June 14, the
conflict was essentially over.
(TMC, 1994, p.1982)(WSJ, 12/12/95, p.A-15)(AP,
4/2/99)(HNQ, 1/10/01)
1986 Apr 2, George Corley Wallace
(1919-1998), Governor of Alabama (Dem.), announced his retirement.
(http://tinyurl.com/fuobf)(http://tinyurl.com/eegg3)
1986 Apr 2, Four American
passengers were killed when a bomb exploded aboard a TWA jetliner en
route from Rome to Athens, Greece.
(AP, 4/2/98)
1987 Apr 2, IBM announced the
upcoming release of the PS/2 and OS/2 computers featuring the Microsoft
MS OS/2 and Windows 2.0 computer operating systems.
(Wired, 12/98,
p.196)(http://pages.prodigy.net/michaln/history/pr/87apr_m3592.html)
1987 Apr 2, Buddy Rich (b.1917),
jazz drummer, died.
(www.drummerworld.com/drummers/Buddy_Rich.html)
1988 Apr 2, Secretary of State
George P. Shultz briefed Pope John Paul II on his Middle East peace
proposals during a private audience at the Vatican.
(AP, 4/2/98)
1989 Apr 2, Soviet leader Mikhail
S. Gorbachev began a visit to Cuba amid differences with President
Fidel Castro over the type of reforms Gorbachev was instituting in the
Soviet Union.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1990 Apr 2, The University of
Nevada at Las Vegas won the NCAA college basketball championship,
defeating Duke 103-73.
(AP, 4/2/00)
1990 Apr 2, Saddam Hussein of Iraq
threatened to hit Israel with binary chemical weapons.
(http://tinyurl.com/oz5my)
1990 Apr 2, In a conciliatory
gesture, the president of Lithuania invited Kremlin officials to
discuss the republic's secession drive.
(AP, 4/2/00)
1991 Apr 2, Iraqi state media
reported that only a few more days were needed to stamp out fighting
with Kurdish rebels, who reported renewed skirmishes around the
strategic oil center of Kirkuk.
(AP, 4/2/01)
1992 Apr 2, John Gotti (d.2002),
Mafia boss, was convicted in New York City of 5 murders and
racketeering. Underboss Sammy “the Bull” Gravano provided testimony.
The murders included the 1985 hit on Paul Castellano, head of the
Gambino family. He was sentenced to life in prison on June 23.
(AP, 4/2/98)(USAT, 9/24/98, p.11A)(SFC, 6/11/02,
p.A2)(SSFC, 8/11/02, Par p.4)
1992 Apr 2, The space shuttle
Atlantis returned from a nine-day mission.
(AP, 4/2/02)
1992 Apr 2, French Premier Edith
Cresson, who had served 10 turbulent months as France's first woman
prime minister, resigned after election setbacks for the ruling
Socialists.
(AP, 4/2/02)
1993 Apr 2, President Clinton
presided at a daylong conference in Portland, Ore., on how much logging
should be allowed on federal land.
(AP, 4/2/98)
1993 Apr 2, Ellie Nesler
(1952-2008) shot and killed Daniel Driver in a Jamestown, Ca.,
courtroom. Driver had been accused of molesting her son and three other
boys. She was sentenced to 10 years in prison. She later admitted to
investigators that she had taken “crank” that morning. She was freed in
1997 after serving 3 and 1/2 years in prison. The events were made into
a 1999 TV movie. In 2002 she was sentenced to 6 years in prison for
selling and possessing illegal drugs. In 2005 her son Willy was
convicted of 1st degree murder for the stomping death in 2004 of a man
on their property.
(SFC, 11/21/96, p.A22)(SFC, 8/22/97, p.A1)(SFC,
6/23/99, p.B1)(SFC, 6/6/06, p.B8)(SFC, 12/30/08, p.B1)
1993 Apr 2, The Bosnian Serb
parliament rejected a peace plan drafted by U.N. and European mediators
and already approved by Bosnian Muslims and Croats.
(AP, 4/2/98)
1994 Apr 2, President Clinton
warned Americans against "demagogues of division" in his weekly radio
address, while calling for greater personal responsibility and
cooperation to overcome the nation's problems.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1994 Apr 2, In California Preston
Tate was shot and killed by guards during an allegedly staged fight at
the Corcoran State Prison.
(SFC, 11/22/96, p.A26)
1994 Apr 2, Consumer reporter
Betty Furness died in Hartsdale, N.Y., at age 78.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1995 Apr 2, Baseball owners
accepted the players' union offer to play without a contract, ending
the longest and costliest strike in the history of professional sports.
(AP, 4/2/98)
1995 Apr 2, The NYC Police Dept
and Transit Police merged into one organization.
(www.nyc.gov/html/nypd/html/transportation/tpd.html)
1995 Apr 2, Members of the
extremist group Hamas accidentally set off a bomb that tore through
their hideout in the Gaza Strip, killing six people.
(AP, 4/2/00)
1996 Apr 2, A federal appeals
court rejected New York state laws banning doctor-assisted suicide,
saying it would be discriminatory to let people disconnect life support
systems while refusing to let others end their lives with medication.
(AP, 4/2/01)
1996 Apr 2, In Colombia architect
Juan Carlos Gaviria, brother of former pres. Cesar Gaviria was
kidnapped by a group called Dignity for Colombia.
(SFC, 6/13/96, p.C3)
1996 Apr 2, If the Indian Hindu
Nationalist Party wins elections, it will move toward testing a nuclear
bomb.
(WSJ, 4/2/96, p.A-1)
1996 Apr 2, N. Korea appealed for
food. $2 million in aid was lost last month when a ship sank off Taiwan.
(WSJ, 4/2/96, p.A-1)
1996 Apr 2, More than 100 Haitians
died when a ferry sank.
(WSJ, 4/3/96, p.A-1)
1997 Apr 2, The White House
released documents showing how eager it had been to exploit the
money-drawing powers of President Clinton and Vice President Gore
during the 1996 campaign while coordinating with the Democratic Party's
fund-raising machine.
(AP, 4/2/98)
1997 Apr 2, An Air Force A-10
Thunderbolt jet with four 500- pound bombs was lost over the Colorado
Rockies. It was piloted by Capt. Craig Button (32). Wreckage of the
plane was found Apr 20 on the sheer face of New York Mountain [Gold
Dust Peak], 15 miles from Vail. It was later suspected that he
committed suicide due to a possible revelation of homosexuality. A 1998
official report cited unrequited love for a former girlfriend and his
mother's Christian pacifist faith.
(SFE, 4/9/97, p.A16)(SFC, 4/21/97, p.A1)(WSJ,
4/21/97, p.A1)(SFC, 5/3/97, p.A3)(SFC, 12/25/98, p.A3)(SFC, 8/26/99,
p.A3)
1997 Apr 2, Tomoyuki Tanaka (86),
producer (Godzilla), died of a stroke.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1998 Apr 2, California agreed to
settle a sexual harassment lawsuit brought by 3 female prison workers
for $4.3 million.
(SFC, 4/3/98, p.A26)
1998 Apr 2, In Kansas City it was
reported that the SubTropolis underground business complex had some 4.3
million sq. feet of mine space converted to warehouse, office and
factory use with 50 enterprises employing 1300 people. The underground
industrial park began in 1945 as a limestone mine.
(WSJ, 4/2/98, p.A1)
1998 Apr 2, In Burma ethnic Karen
rebels launched attacks against Burmese troops and killed 30 people.
(SFC, 4/4/98, p.A16)
1998 Apr 2, In Columbia Thomas
Fiore (43), one of the hostages captured Mar 27, escaped captivity by
the FARC rebel group.
(SFC, 4/3/98, p.B5)
1998 Apr 2, A French court found
Maurice Papon (1910-2007), a career civil servant, guilty of deporting
Jews from Bordeaux in 1942-1943, when he was secretary-general of the
Gironde Prefecture. He was sentenced to 10 years in prison, but served
only 3 due to ill health.
(SFC, 4/2/98, p.C2)(SFC, 4/3/98, p.B2)(Econ,
2/24/07, p.99)
1998 Apr 2, Iran and Iraq began a
war prisoner exchange involving nearly 6000 men, mostly Iraqis.
(WSJ, 4/3/98, p.A1)
1998 Apr 2, In Northern Ireland
police intercepted a 980-pound bomb at Dublin’s ferry port.
(SFC, 4/3/98, p.B8)
1998 Apr 2, In Israel three Arab
homes were demolished in the Bedouin village of Suweij. Clashes with
Israeli police occurred over the next few days as the Arabs attempted
to rebuild their homes.
(SFC, 4/6/98, p.A12)
1998 Apr 2, In Latvia the only
Jewish synagogue in Riga was bombed.
(SFC, 4/798, p.A14)
1998 Apr 2, Shaking their fists in
rage, thousands of mourners marched in a funeral procession in the West
Bank for a top Hamas bombmaker, Mohiyedine Sharif, hailed by
Palestinians as a martyr and condemned by Israel as a terrorist.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1998 Apr 2, In Romania Radu
Vasile, an economist and leader of the national Peasant Party, was
named by Pres. Emil Constantinescu as the new prime minister. He soon
began reforms with an economic program to restore domestic and foreign
confidence.
(SFC, 4/3/98, p.B5)(WSJ, 5/6/98, p.A18)
1998 Apr 2, Sudanese soldiers shot
and beat to death 74 student conscripts who tried to flee the Ailafoon
military camp. At least 55 others drowned when their boat capsized on
the blue Nile while they tried to escape.
(SFC, 4/13/98, p.A12)
1999 Apr 2, The US Labor
Department reported that the nation's unemployment rate fell to a
29-year low of 4.2 percent in March 1999.
(AP, 4/2/00)
1999 Apr 2, Sec. of Energy Bill
Richardson ordered the computer systems at Los Alamos laboratory to be
shut down due to security leaks.
(SFEC, 5/2/99, p.A24)
1999 Apr 2, David L. Smith (30), a
New Jersey computer programmer, was arrested and charged with writing
and unleashing the Melissa computer virus.
(SFC, 4/3/99, p.A3)
1999 Apr 2, At least 7 people died
in a freak snowstorm while trying to cross the Mexican border into
California in the Cleveland National Forest.
(SFC, 4/3/99, p.A1)
1999 Apr 2, NATO planners began
preliminary discussions about the possibility of sending ground troops
into Kosovo.
(SFC, 4/3/99, p.A1)
1999 Apr 2, Allied aircraft
resumed bombing in Iraq after a 2 week lull.
(SFC, 4/3/99, p.A4)
1999 Apr 2, In Albania Hashim
Thaci, a leading nationalist politician, named a new government with
himself in charge. Moderates loyal to Ibrahim Rugova were excluded
after no candidates were put forth.
(SFC, 4/3/99, p.A6)
1999 Apr 2, From West Kalimantan,
Indonesia, it was reported Malays and indigenous Dayaks had killed over
200 people over the last 2 weeks. Nearly 30,000 Muslim people,
originally from Madura, were reported to have fled their villages.
(WSJ, 4/2/99, p.A9)
1999 Apr 2, In Russia Pres.
Yeltsin ordered the dismissal of Prosecutor Gen'l. Yuri Skuratov just
hours after Skuratov appeared on TV announcing that he had the names of
Russian officials who had illegally transferred dirty money into Swiss
bank accounts. Skuratov was earlier caught on video cavorting with 2
prostitutes.
(SFC, 4/3/99, p.A3)
1999 Apr 2, At least 55 people
were gunned down by Serbian police and militiamen in the Kosovo city of
Djakovica.
(SFC, 4/29/99, p.D2)
2000 Apr 2, Connecticut won its
second women’s NCAA national championship with a 71-to-52 victory over
Tennessee.
(AP, 4/2/01)
2000 Apr 2, More than 600 people
set out on a five-day, 120-mile protest march to Columbia, South
Carolina, to urge state lawmakers to move the Confederate flag from the
Statehouse dome.
(AP, 4/2/01)
2000 Apr 2, It was reported that a
Nov. 1999, 79-page CIA report: “International Trafficking in Women to
the United States: A Contemporary Manifestation of Slavery,” claimed
50,000 victims per year in the US.
(SFEC, 4/2/00, p.A3)
2000 Apr 2, In Japan Prime
Minister Keizo Obuchi suffered a stroke and Mikio Aoki took over as
Acting Premier. He died more than a month later.
(SFC, 4/3/00, p.A8)(AP, 4/2/01)
2000 Apr 2, In Rwanda Tutsi leader
Paul Kagame was nominated as president.
(WSJ, 4/3/00, p.A1)
2000 cApr 2, South Korea said it
would slaughter 350,000 hoofed livestock to stem public concerns over
an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease.
(WSJ, 4/3/00, p.A21)
2000 Apr 2, In Sri Lanka a rebel attack launched 7
days earlier had left 78 fighters dead. Rebels said 700 government
troops had been killed since the attack began with 71 rebels dead. The
army admitted to 102 deaths and claimed 210 rebels killed. Thousands of
residents were stranded near the Elephant Pass causeway.
(SFC, 4/3/00, p.A9)
2001 Apr 2, Duke won its third
national men's basketball championship (NCAA) with an 82-to-72 victory
over Arizona for the.
(WSJ, 4/4/01, p.A18)(AP, 4/2/02)
2001 Apr 2, Pres. Bush demanded
that the Chinese release the US Navy crew and spy plane that had made
an emergency landing on China’s Hainan Island after colliding with a
Chinese fighter.
(SFC, 4/3/01, p.A1)(WSJ, 4/3/01, p.A1)(AP, 4/2/02)
2001 Apr 2, Pres. Bush met with
Egypt’s Pres. Mubarak and both pledged to continue searching for an end
to Middle East violence.
(WSJ, 4/3/01, p.A1)
2001 Apr 2, Vincent Cianci Jr.
(59), mayor of Providence, RI, was indicted by a federal grand jury on
racketeering charges. Cianci was convicted on a single count of
racketeering conspiracy in Jun, 2002, and sentenced to 5 years and 4
months in jail on Sep 6. In 2003 Mike Stanton authored "The Prince of
Providence," a biography of Cianci.
(SFC, 4/3/01, p.A2)(SFC, 6/25/02, p.A4)(SFC, 9/7/02,
p.A3)(WSJ, 8/5/03, p.D5)
2001 Apr 2, The town of Edgar
Springs, Mo., was named the population center of the US. It marked the
point where the US would balance if its 281 million population were
equally distributed. The actual center was 3 miles east of town.
(SFC, 4/3/01, p.A2)
2001 Apr 2, Scientists reported
new evidence for “dark energy” and believed that it was causing the
universe to expand faster with time.
(SFC, 4/3/01, p.A1)
2001 Apr 2, An Israeli helicopter
rocketed a truck and killed an Islamic Jihad militant. In Bethlehem a
sniper killed an Israeli soldier.
(WSJ, 4/3/01, p.A1)
2001 Apr 2, In Japan the new
freedom of information law went into effect 2 years after it was
approved by Parliament.
(SSFC, 4/15/01, p.D4)
2001 Apr 2, In Nepal a Maoist
insurgency killed at least 38 people.
(SFC, 4/3/01, p.A9)
2002 Apr 2, In California a SF
jury awarded $33.7 million to a former Navy electrician who acquired
mesothelioma from asbestos exposure. Foster Wheeler Corp. was the
defendant.
(SFC, 4/3/02, p.A13)
2002 Apr 2, In Illinois federal
prosecutors indicted the campaign committee of Gov. George Ryan and 2
former top aids on charges of racketeering, mail fraud and conspiracy
to obstruct justice.
(SFC, 4/3/02, p.A3)
2002 Apr 2, Prof. John Pierce
(92), communications engineer and author, died in Mountain View, Ca. He
authored about 20 books, invented the Pierce Gun, a vacuum tube that
transmits electrons, received some 90 patents and provided the
transistor its name.
(SFC, 4/9/02, p.A18)
2002 Apr 2, Argentina marked the
20th anniversary of the Falklands War and Pres. Duhalde said the
Falkland Islands would be regained through diplomacy.
(SFC, 4/3/02, p.A7)
2002 Apr 2, The Israeli army
attacked the headquarters of Jibril Rajoub, security chief of the
Palestinian Authority. The Israeli Army said it found a letter in
Arafat’s compound that detailed money requests for building bombs. PM
Sharon offered Yasser Arafat a one-way ticket to exile and battles with
Palestinian militiamen continued and at least 13 Palestinians were
killed.
(SFC, 4/2/02, p.A1)(SFC, 4/3/02, p.A1,10)(WSJ,
4/3/02, p.A1)
2002 Apr 2, Israel seized control
of Bethlehem; Palestinian gunmen forced their way into the Church of
the Nativity, the traditional birthplace of Jesus, where they began a
39-day standoff.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, In the 15th day of
Operation Iraqi Freedom American forces crossed the Tigris River in the
drive toward the Iraqi capital and destroyed the Baghdad Division of
Iraq's Republican Guard. Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff, supported the war plan along with Defense Sec. Donald
Rumsfeld against criticism. US Marines took Numaniya, a city of 80,000.
American forces fought their way to within sight of the Baghdad
skyline; Iraqi soldiers discarded their military uniforms by the
roadside to hide their identity.
(SFC, 4/2/03, p.A1)(SFC, 4/4/03, p.W1)(AP, 4/2/08)
2003 Apr 2, A Navy F/A-18C Hornet
after his fighter jet went down during a bombing run over Karbala. In
2004 it was reported that the jet was shot down by an Army Patriot
missile. 7 US Army soldiers were killed when their Black Hawk
helicopter was shot down.
(AP, 4/3/03)(SFC, 4/3/03, p.A1)(SFC, 12/11/04, p.A12)
2003 Apr 2, Polish troops fighting
with the US-led coalition in Iraq reported encountering many Iraqi
combatants in civilian clothes.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, Saddam Hussein
declared that "victory is at hand," and issued a new statement urging
Iraqis to fight on and defend their towns according to a broadcast on
Iraqi satellite television.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, Mirko Sarovic, a
Bosnian Serb who was the chairman of the country's three-member
multiethnic presidency, resigned after being implicated in a local
company's violation of the UN arms embargo against Iraq.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, Burundi said Ethiopia,
Mozambique and South Africa will send 3,500 peacekeepers to enforce a
truce ending nearly 10 years of civil war.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, Guatemala City police
raided the house of a suspected drug lord and found $14 million in cash.
(SFC, 4/4/03, p.A18)
2003 Apr 2, In Indian-controlled
Kashmir the chief of the largest militant group was killed in a
shootout with police in the strife-torn Himalayan province.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, Israeli forces raided
Gaza and 6 Palestinians were killed.
(SFC, 4/3/03, p.A12)(WSJ, 4/3/03, p.A1)
2003 Apr 2, The Japanese
government said a Japanese whaling fleet killed 400 minke whales during
a five-month scientific expedition in Antarctic waters.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, In Mexico 9 people
were found tortured and killed near the border city of Nuevo Laredo in
apparent drug-related violence.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, In the southern
Philippine city of Davao a bomb exploded near a bustling wharf, and
killed 16 people including two children.
(AP, 4/3/03)(SFC, 4/3/03, p.A11)
2003 Apr 2, The UN health agency
advised travelers to avoid going to Hong Kong and the Chinese province
of Guangdong because of the deadly outbreak of SARS.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, Vietnam's PM Phan Van
Khai spoke with Thich Huyen Quang, the leader of a banned Buddhist
church, about religious freedoms. Quang has been under house arrest in
1982.
(AP, 4/3/03)
2004 Apr 2, Washington announced
plans to fingerprint and photograph millions of travelers to the United
States. The measure, which will take effect by Sept. 30, affected
citizens in 27 countries who had been allowed to travel within the US
without a visa for up to 90 days.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, The US Labor Dept.
reported a 308,000 increase in jobs along with a rise in unemployment
from 5.6 to 5.7%. The DJIA rose 97 points in response to close at
10,470.
(SFC, 4/3/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 2, The Pentagon said it
released 15 people held as terrorism suspects at a U.S. military prison
at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, reducing the number confined there to 595.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, The 6-month Tyco trial
ended with a hung jury. A threatening letter to a lone dissident juror
prompted the judge to call a mistrial. A retrial was planned.
(SFC, 4/3/04, p.C1)
2004 Apr 2, Sun Microsystems
announced that Microsoft would pay it nearly $2 billion to settle a
legal dispute. Sun also announced layoffs of 3,300 and a business
partnership with Microsoft.
(SFC, 4/3/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 2, In Brussels an
official ceremony welcomed Bulgaria, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia,
Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia into the NATO alliance.
(SFC, 4/3/04, p.A11)
2004 Apr 2, In Brazil Jociel
Conceicao dos Santos (20), a handyman, recanted a confession and denied
he killed an American couple (Nov 30, 2003). He blamed two other
Brazilians for the crime.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, Police in France
captured the elusive former leader of the Basque ETA rebel group as
well as the separatist group's logistics chief.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, Georgian authorities
reported that they had detained four men on suspicion of plotting to
assassinate the president, and officials accused the autonomous
province of Adzharia of being behind the alleged plot.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, In India a crowded bus
veered off a mountain road and fell into a ravine in Jammu-Kashmir
state, killing 34 passengers and injuring 35 others.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, Two Indian Air Force
fighter jets went missing and were believed to have crashed during
routine flights over Kashmir.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, PM Ariel Sharon
revealed the scope of his withdrawal plan, saying Israel will leave all
of the Gaza Strip and dismantle four West Bank settlements.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, Pakistan's 2-week
operation in South Waziristan wound down. The military said 63 foreign
and local militants had been killed along with at least 46 security
forces.
(SFC, 4/2/04, p.A11)
2004 Apr 2, A Spanish railroad
inspector found a 26-pound bomb hidden in a bag on a busy high-speed
line. Police said the device may contain the same dynamite used in last
month's Madrid train bombings.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, In Sri Lanka Pres.
Kumaratunga's political alliance won the most seats in parliamentary
elections, indicating deep popular support for its tough stance toward
Tamil Tiger rebels.
(AP, 4/3/04)(WSJ, 4/5/04, p.A1)
2005 Apr 2, In Florida Terri
Schiavo's body was cremated as disagreements continued between her
husband and her parents, who were unable to have their own independent
expert observe her autopsy.
(AP, 4/2/06)
2005 Apr 2, In southern
Afghanistan Taliban militants stormed a government building in Deshu
district and killed 3 Afghan soldiers in a two-hour gunbattle before
fleeing. A Western security source in Kandahar linked the attack to an
ongoing counter-narcotics drive in Helmand province and said security
was deteriorating there.
(AFP, 4/3/05)(SSFC, 4/3/05, p.A9)
2005 Apr 2, An Australian navy
helicopter crashed on the earthquake-devastated Indonesian island of
Nias. Media reported that nine people were killed and two were rescued.
(AP, 4/2/05)
2005 Apr 2, Brazilian state police
detained 2 police officers in the Mar 31 shooting spree that left 30
dead in Rio’s north side.
(SSFC, 4/3/05, p.A9)
2005 Apr 2, UN troops killed up to
38 militia fighters during a raid by hundreds of peacekeepers backed by
helicopter gunships in the Ituri district of eastern Congo.
(Reuters, 4/2/05)
2005 Apr 2, The Czech information
minister resigned, becoming the 4th Czech government member to do so
this week in fallout over a scandal surrounding PM Stanislav Gross'
luxury apartment.
(AP, 4/2/05)
2005 Apr 2, Ecuador's former
president Abdala Bucaram returned home after spending eight years in
exile in Panama, telling thousands that he plans to lead a "revolution
of the poor" modeled after President Hugo Chavez' Venezuela.
(AP, 4/3/05)
2005 Apr 2, In central Iraq a car
bomb exploded, killing five people, including 4 police officers on
patrol. A gunmen killed an education official in Baghdad. A US Marine
was killed in Ramadi. 40-60 insurgents attacked the Abu Ghraib prison
but were repelled by US forces.
(AP, 4/2/05)(SSFC, 4/3/05, p.A3)
2005 Apr 2, Pope John Paul II,
born in Poland in 1920 as Karol Wojtyla, died in Rome at age 84. He was
elevated to Pope in 1978 and was the first non-Italian pope in 455
years. In November Viking published “John Paul the Great: Remembering a
Spiritual Father” by Peggy Noonan.
(AP, 4/2/05)(WSJ, 11/22/05, p.D8)
2005 Apr 2, President Robert
Mugabe's ruling party won 78 out of 120 contested seats in Zimbabwe's
disputed parliamentary elections, giving him enough seats to press
ahead with plans to change the constitution to strengthen his grip on
power. The Opposition for Democratic Change (MDC) won 35 seats.
(AP, 4/2/05)(SFC, 4/2/05, p.A12)(Reuters, 4/2/05)
2006 Apr 2, Thunderstorms packing
tornadoes and hail as big as softballs ripped through eight US states,
killing at least 27 people. Tennessee was hit hardest, with tornadoes
striking five western counties and killing 23 people, including an
infant. Severe thunderstorms, many producing tornadoes, also struck
parts of Iowa, Kentucky, Arkansas, Missouri, Ohio, Illinois and
Indiana. Strong wind was blamed or at least three deaths in Missouri.
(AP, 4/3/06)
2006 Apr 2, It was reported that
Cecilia Fire Thunder, president of the Oglala Sioux Tribe in South
Dakota, had joined with 14 co-chairs to form the South Dakota Campaign
for Healthy Families. The group planned a referendum in favor of
abortion.
(SSFC, 4/2/06, p.A4)
2006 Apr 2, Alcatel SA and Lucent
Technologies Inc. said that the French telecom equipment maker would
acquire its US rival. The deal valued Lucent at about $13.5 billion
(11.1 billion euros) in a stock swap that would form a major new global
player. Headquarters would be in Paris and about 8,800 jobs would be
cut.
(AP, 4/2/06)(Econ, 4/8/06, p.63)
2006 Apr 2, In Afghanistan
suspected Taliban militants shot dead 9 policemen and wounded three
others. Insurgents fatally shot a Turkish road engineer and burned his
body in Nimroz province.
(AP, 4/2/06)(WSJ, 4/3/06, p.A1)
2006 Apr 2, The World Health
Organization (WHO) confirmed that four Egyptians have caught bird flu,
including two who died from the virus.
(Reuters, 4/3/06)
2006 Apr 2, In France the
contested First Job Contract appeared in the Official Journal, where
new laws are recorded.
(WSJ, 4/3/06, p.A8)
2006 Apr 2, Iran announced its
second major new missile test within days, saying it has successfully
fired a high-speed torpedo called Hoot (whale), capable of destroying
huge warships and submarines.
(AP, 4/3/06)(SFC, 4/3/06, p.A3)
2006 Apr 2, Iraqi police reported
that at least 3 more bodies were found in several neighborhoods of
Baghdad. A Sunni clerical association announced that gunmen had
assassinated a Sunni Arab sheik, Abdul-Minaam Awad, in his village of
Zobaa 40 miles west of Baghdad. 6 insurgents died while manufacturing a
homemade bomb inside a house in Madain, about 15 miles southeast of
Baghdad. Drive-by shooters killed a police captain outside his home in
Baghdad's Dora neighborhood. 5 Marines were killed and one was injured
when the seven-ton US military truck rolled over in a flash food. 4
American troops were killed by hostile fire. Gunmen killed a Shiite man
and three of his relatives at their home in southern Baghdad. Secretary
of State Condoleezza Rice and British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw made
a surprise trip to Iraq to urge its leaders to form a unified
government.
(AP, 4/2/06)(AP, 4/3/06)(AP, 4/2/07)
2006 Apr 2, Mauritanian officials
said a boat packed with West Africans trying to reach Europe collided
with a fishing vessel, leaving 32 of the migrants missing and believed
drowned.
(CP, 4/2/06)
2006 Apr 2, In Pakistan’s
neighboring South Waziristan the bullet-riddled body of Maulana Zahir
Shah, was found. The cleric was killed by suspected Islamic militants
over suspicion he was a spy for the US and Britain. Ten people
including five tribal police were killed and 13 injured in separate
bomb blasts in the restive southwestern Pakistani province of
Baluchistan.
(AP, 4/2/06)(AFP, 4/2/06)
2006 Apr 2, Thailand citizens
voted in snap parliamentary elections. Thailand's PM urged citizens to
ignore an opposition boycott, saying the vote was crucial to ending the
country's deepening political stalemate amid demands for his
resignation. Bombs exploded at three polling stations in restive
southern Thailand, injuring four soldiers and a police officer.
(AP, 4/2/06)
2006 Apr 2, In southeastern Turkey
one protester died after police opened fire to disperse Kurdish
demonstrators, raising the death toll in six days of street violence to
nine. A group of men stopped a passenger bus and tossed gasoline bombs
at it, sending the vehicle careening into pedestrians and killing 3 in
Istanbul as pro-Kurdish riots continued to spread. The countrywide
death toll from nearly a week of unrest climbed to 15.
(AP, 4/2/06)(AP, 4/3/06)
2007 Apr 2, The US asked Tehran
for information on the disappearance of a former FBI agent who went
missing on a private business trip to Iran.
(WSJ, 4/3/07, p.A1)
2007 Apr 2, The US Supreme Court
ruled that a US government agency has the power under the clean air law
to regulate greenhouse gas emissions that spur global warming. In its
first case on climate change, the Supreme Court declared in a 5-4
ruling that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases were air
pollutants under the Clean Air Act.
(Reuters, 4/2/07)(AP, 4/2/08)
2007 Apr 2, Florida won its second
consecutive college basketball championship, beating Ohio State 84-75;
the Gators became the first team to repeat since Duke in 1991-92.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2007 Apr 2, Chicago’s police
superintendent, Philip Cline, announced his retirement after 2 videos
emerged of off-duty police officers beating civilians.
(Econ, 10/20/07, p.42)(http://tinyurl.com/2tt8en)
2007 Apr 2, Sam Zell, billionaire
real estate investor, reached an agreement to buy the Chicago-based
Tribune Co. in a 2-stage deal valued at $8.2 billion.
(SFC, 4/3/07, p.C1)
2007 Apr 2, First Data Corp. said
it is being acquired by an affiliate of private equity firm Kohlberg
Kravis Roberts & Co. for about $27 billion.
(SFC, 4/3/07, p.C3)
2007 Apr 2, In Afghanistan 3
police died when militants attacked a checkpoint on the road linking
the southern town of Kandahar with Spin Boldak on the
Pakistan-Afghanistan border.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, A UN conference on
climate change opened in Belgium with the EU's top environment official
calling on the US to join efforts to curb global warming.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Canada's controversial
annual seal hunt opened in the southern Gulf of St. Lawrence, where the
worst ice conditions in more than two decades have nearly wiped out the
herd there.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, China’s first deadline
for income taxes was extended a few days because of low compliance.
Anyone earning over 120,000 yuan ($15,500) annually was supposed to
file a return. In southwestern China developers tore down a stubborn
couple's house after a three-year standoff that hindered a construction
project and captivated the nation. The couple reportedly negotiated a
deal with the real estate developer that gives them a new apartment and
a sizable compensation package.
(Econ, 4/14/07, p.49)(AP, 4/3/07)(Econ, 4/7/07, p.39)
2007 Apr 2, In Iraq a suicide
truck bomber targeted a police station in the oil-rich northern city of
Kirkuk, killing at least 13 people and wounding dozens, including many
children from a nearby school. A parked car exploded in a garage near a
governmental property registration agency in western Baghdad, killing
three people and wounding 10. A suicide bomber drove his car into a
police checkpoint in the southern insurgent stronghold of Dora, killing
four people, including two policemen. A roadside bomb killed four
civilians and wounded 20 in the Shiite town of Khalis. A roadside bomb
struck an Iraqi military convoy, killing one soldier and wounding 7 in
the Qazaniyah area northeast of Baghdad. 4 US soldiers were killed in
combat.
(AP, 4/2/07)(Reuters, 4/3/07)
2007 Apr 2, Jordan's military
court convicted six alleged militants of planning suicide attacks
against Jordan's main international airport and against hotels hosting
Israeli and American tourists.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Gunmen in Nigeria's
southern Bayelsa State kidnapped two Lebanese nationals.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Around 5,000 tribesmen
gathered in a Pakistani border area to enlist for ongoing battles
against foreign Al-Qaeda militants.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Palestinian
journalists began a three-day strike to protest the kidnapping of
British Broadcasting Corp. correspondent Alan Johnston, the
longest-held reporter ever abducted in the Gaza Strip.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Russia's foreign spy
service released previously classified files on a double agent who,
under the codename "Britt", passed secrets to Moscow from inside
British intelligence in the 1940s.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Saudi Arabia signaled
it is unlikely to accept an Israeli invitation to a regional peace
conference, saying that Israel must first stop mistreating Palestinians
and move to withdraw from Arab lands.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Tsunami waves churned
by an undersea earthquake crashed ashore in the Solomon Islands, wiping
away entire villages and triggering alerts from Australia to Hawaii. At
least 50 people were killed.
(AP, 4/3/07)(AP, 4/2/08)
2007 Apr 2, In Somalia a human
rights organization said fierce fighting between Ethiopian-backed
government forces and Islamic insurgents has killed 381 people over
four days.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, South Korea and the US
agreed to a trade pact with only minutes to go before a deadline.
Last-minute haggling meant missing two self-imposed deadlines over the
weekend. Some estimates say the agreement could add $20 billion to the
already more than $70 billion of two-way trade each year.
(Reuters, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, In eastern Sri Lanka
at least 16 people, including three children, were killed and 25
wounded when a bomb ripped through a crowded bus. Sri Lankan security
forces killed at least 23 Tamil Tiger rebels in fresh fighting in the
island's east.
(AP, 4/2/07)(AFP, 4/3/07)
2007 Apr 2, In Sudan 53 people
were killed in a gruesome pair of minibus accidents north of Khartoum.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Thailand's premier
hailed ties with Japan as he prepared to sign a free-trade agreement
with his country's top investor, easing international isolation of the
kingdom since last year's coup. Army-installed PM Surayud Chulanont
will sign the deal April 3, which Thailand hopes will boost investment
from Japan.
(AFP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Ukraine’s president
called early elections for May 27 amid a standoff with the pro-Russian
premier, who vowed to fight what he called a coup.
(WSJ, 4/3/07, p.A1)
2008 Apr 2, Arkansas Gov. Mike
Beebe singed legislation to repeal a botched marriage law, and
reinstated 17 as the minimum age to marry for boys and 16 for girls.
(AP, 4/3/08)
2008 Apr 2, In Arkansas 3 men were
presumed drowned when scaffolding underneath an Arkansas River bridge
collapsed. They were working on a project to install a water main
beneath the bridge for the Central Arkansas Water utility.
(AP, 4/3/08)
2008 Apr 2, Argentine farmers,
rebelling over soaring export taxes on their crops, declared a 30-day
truce suspending a three-week-long strike that has stripped grocery
shelves of beef and produce, granting Cristina Fernandez a reprieve in
the first major crisis of her presidency.
(AP, 4/3/08)(WSJ, 4/3/08, p.A1)
2008 Apr 2, Australia began
pumping carbon dioxide underground to reduce greenhouse gas emissions,
using a technology that locks dangerous gases deep in the Earth.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Chad's main rebel
group urged former colonial ruler France to stop backing President
Idriss Deby Itno and cease flying over rebel positions in the central
African nation's restive east.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Diplomats said that
China has given the UN nuclear watchdog intelligence linked to Tehran's
alleged attempts to make nuclear arms.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Cubans snapped up DVD
players, motorbikes and pressure cookers for the first time as Raul
Castro's new government loosened controls on consumer goods and invited
private farmers to plant tobacco, coffee and other crops on unused
state land.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Norberto Collado
Abreu, the helmsman of the Granma yacht that carried Fidel Castro from
Mexico to Cuba to launch his revolution in 1956, died in Havana.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Newspapers reported
that Egypt has ordered the seizure of the March 25 special edition of
the German news magazine Der Spiegel after it was deemed to be
insulting to Islam and the Prophet Mohammed.
(AFP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, France pledged to send
up to 1,000 troops to Afghanistan in a move that will avert a Canadian
threat to pull its contingent out of NATO's war in the violent south.
(Reuters, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, In northern Iraq, a
suicide bomber attacked an Iraqi checkpoint west of Mosul, killing
seven people, including a woman and a 5-year-old child. A US airstrike
destroyed a house in the southern city of Basra, killing a militant,
the US military said, and Iraqi witnesses and hospital officials said
at least three civilians were among the dead. A roadside bomb targeting
a US convoy exploded near a restaurant in Baghdad's main Shiite
district of Sadr City, killing at least 3 Iraqi civilians and wounding
13. 4 US-allied fighters were killed and 4 others abducted at a fake
checkpoint near Duluiyah.
(AP, 4/2/08)(AP, 4/3/08)
2008 Apr 2, Irish PM Bertie Ahern,
one of Europe's longest serving leaders, announced that he will resign
next month amid growing pressure over alleged financial irregularities.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, In Kazakhstan
Zhaksybek Kulekeyev, a former government minister and head of the state
railway company, was formally charged with taking a $100,000 bribe.
(Econ, 4/12/08, p.49)
2008 Apr 2, Myanmar democracy
leader Aung San Suu Kyi's opposition party urged voters to reject a
military-backed draft constitution, saying it was undemocratic and
drafted under the junta's direct control.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, In New Zealand new
government population figures showed that the Asian population is
growing faster than any other ethnic group and will outnumber
indigenous Maori by 2026.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Russia's foreign
minister said that Moscow will not allow newly independent Kosovo to
become a member of the UN.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Pyotr Kuznetsov,
leader of a Russian doomsday cult, apparently tried to kill himself
after most of his followers abandoned a bunker where they had been
awaiting the end of the world for five months. The last 9 of 35 cult
members emerged on May 16.
(Reuters, 4/4/08)(SFC, 5/17/08, p.A3)
2008 Apr 2, In Sri Lanka
government troops captured a strip of land from Tamil Tigers. 2
civilians were shot dead by suspected Tamil Tiger rebels in the
Wilpattu wildlife park.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Thailand's Health
Ministry ordered hospitals and medical clinics to temporarily stop
performing castrations for non-medical reasons, saying that the
procedure performed on transsexuals needs stricter monitoring.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, In Yemen security
forces killed one demonstrator and wounded four others in the fourth
day of rioting that has engulfed the country's south.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, In Zimbabwe the main
opposition party claimed outright victory for its leader Morgan
Tsvangirai, saying he had won 50.3 percent of the vote compared to 43.8
percent for President Robert Mugabe.
(AP, 4/2/08)
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