Today in History - April 4
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188 Apr 4,
Caracalla, [Marcus Aurelius Antonius], well-bathed Roman emperor
(211-217), was born.
(MC, 4/4/02)
527 Apr 4, In Constantinople,
Justin, seriously ill, crowned his nephew Justinian as his co-emperor.
(HN, 4/4/99)
896 Apr 4, Pope Formosus died. His
body was exhumed by his successor in the Cadaver Synod. He was then put
on trial for perjury, found guilty and dumped in the Tiber River.
(PTA, 1980, p.224)(WSJ, 6/27/01, p.A14)
1406 Apr 4, Robert III, King of
Scotland (1390-1406), died.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1460 Apr 4, University of Basle,
Switzerland, formed.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1541 Apr 4, Ignatius Loyola,
Spanish ecclesiastic, was elected 1st superior-general of the Jesuits.
(TL-MB, 1988, p.16)(MC, 4/4/02)
1581 Apr 4, Frances Drake
completed the circumnavigation of the world and was made a knight.
(HN, 4/4/98)(MC, 4/4/02)
1604 Apr 4, Thomas Churchyard,
poet, pamphleteer, died.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1617 Apr 4, John Napier, Scottish
mathematician, inventor (logarithms), died.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1655 Apr 4, Battle at Postage
Farina, Tunis: English fleet licked Barbarian pirates.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1664 Apr 4, Adam Willaerts, Dutch
seascape painter, died.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1686 Apr 4, English king James II
published a Declaration of Indulgence.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1687 Apr 4, King James II ordered
his Declaration of Indulgence read in church.
(http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=1327117)
1716 Apr 4, John Evangelist
Schreiber, composer, was born.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1752 Apr 4, Niccolo Antonio
Zingarelli, composer (Andromeda), was born.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1774 Apr 4, Oliver Goldsmith,
Irish poet (She Stoops to Conquer), died.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1780 Apr 4, Edward Hicks (d.1849),
Quaker preacher and painter, was born. His work included over 60
paintings that were all titled “The Peaceable Kingdom.’
(WSJ, 11/16/99, p.A28)(SFC, 9/25/00, p.F1)(HN,
4/4/01)
1788 Apr 4, Last of the Federalist
essays was published. The series of 85 letters were written by
Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay urging ratification of
the US Constitution. Defects in the Articles of Confederation became
apparent, such as the lack of central authority over foreign and
domestic commerce and the inability of Congress to levy taxes, leading
Congress to endorse a plan to draft a new constitution.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1792 Apr 4, American abolitionist
Thaddeus Stevens, U.S. Radical Republican congressional leader, was
born in Danville, Vt.
(AP, 4/4/98)(HN, 4/4/98)
1802 Apr 4, Dorothea Dix, American
proponent of treatment of mental inmates, was born.
(HN, 4/4/98)
1806 Apr 4, Friedrich Gottlob
Fleischer (84), composer, died.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1807 Apr 4, Joseph Jerome Le
Francaise de Lalande, French astronomer, died.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1812 Apr 4, The territory of
Orleans became the 18th state and later became known as Louisiana.
(HN, 4/4/99)
1814 Apr 4, Napoleon Bonaparte
first abdicated at Fontainebleau. He was allowed to keep the title of
emperor. [see Apr 11]
(www.napoleonseries.org/reference/political/legislation/restoration.cfm)
1818 Apr 4, Congress decided the
flag of the United States would consist of 13 red and white stripes and
20 stars, with a new star to be added for every new state of the Union.
(AP, 4/4/97) (HN, 4/4/98)
1821 Apr 4, Linus Yale, American
portrait painter and inventor of the Yale lock, was born.
(HN, 4/4/01)(MC, 4/4/02)
1823 Apr 4, Karl Wilhelm Siemens,
inventor (laid undersea cables), was born.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1828 Apr 4, Casparus van Wooden
patented chocolate milk powder (Amsterdam).
(MC, 4/4/02)
1832 Apr 4, Charles Darwin aboard
HMS Beagle reached Rio de Janeiro.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1841 Apr 4, President William
Henry Harrison (68), 9th President of the US, succumbed to pneumonia
one month after his inaugural, becoming the first U.S. chief executive
to die in office. VP. Tyler assumed office.
(A&IP, ESM, p.59,96b)(AP, 4/4/97)
1843 Apr 4, Hans Richter,
composer, was born.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1844 Apr 4, Charles Bulfinch (80),
1st US professional architect (Mass State House), died.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1850 Apr 4, The
city of Los Angeles was incorporated.
(AP, 4/4/97)
1859 Apr 4, Giacomo Meyerbeer's
Opera "Dinorah" was produced in Paris.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1859 Apr 4, Knut Hamsun (d.1952),
Norwegian writer, was born. He won the Nobel Prize in literature in
1920.
(SFEC, 4/20/97, DB p.47-49)
1862 Apr 4, Battle of Yorktown,
Virginia, began as Union gen. George B. McClellan closed in on
Richmond. This began the Peninsular Campaign aimed at capturing
Richmond.
(HN, 4/4/99)(MC, 4/4/02)
1865 Apr 4, Lee's army arrived at
the Amelia Courthouse.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1884 Apr 4, Isoroku Yamamoto,
Japanese Naval commander, was born. He masterminded the attack on Pearl
Harbor.
(HN, 4/4/99)
1887 Apr 4,
Susanna Medora Salter became the first woman elected mayor of an
American community -- Argonia, Kan.
(AP, 4/4/97)
1896 Apr 4, Arthur Murray,
ballroom dance instructor, was born.
(HN, 4/4/01)
1896 Apr 4, Robert Sherwood,
playwright, was born.
(HN, 4/4/01)
1896 Apr 4, Tristan Tzara, [Samuel
Rosenfeld] French poet (Approximate Man), was born.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1899 Apr 4, Duke Ellington,
bandleader (Take the A Train) , was born.
(HN, 4/4/98)
1900 Apr 4, California pioneer
John Bidwell (b.1819), founder of Chico, Ca. died. In 2003 Michael
Jerome Gillis and Michael Magliari authored “John Bidwell and
California: The Life and Writings of a Pioneer, (1841-1900).”
(SFC, 4/21/07,
p.B5)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Bidwell)
1900 Apr 4, There was an
assassination attempt on Prince of Wales, King Edward VII.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1906 Apr 4, John Cameron Swayze,
newscaster (Timex, Hindenburg), was born in Wichita, Ks.
(AP, 4/4/06)
1912 Apr 4, A Chinese republic was
proclaimed in Tibet.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1914 Apr 4, Marguerite Duras,
French author (The Lover), was born.
(HN, 4/4/01)
1914 Apr 4, "Perils of Pauline"
was shown for 1st time in LA.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1915 Apr 4, Muddy Waters, American
blues musician, was born as McKinley Morganfield.
(HN, 4/4/01)(MC, 4/4/02)
1916 Apr 4, US Senate agreed
(82-6) to participate in WW I.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1917 Apr 4, U.S. Senate voted 90-6
to enter World War I on Allied side.
(HN, 4/4/98)
1918 Apr 4, Battle of Somme, an
offensive by the British against the German Army ended.
(HN, 4/4/99)
1919 Apr 4, Antony Tudor,
choreographer (Metropolitan Opera 1957), was born in England.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1920 Apr 4, Arabs attacked Jews in
Jerusalem.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1922 Apr 4, Elmer Bernstein, movie
music composer (Robot Monster), was born in NYC.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1924 Apr 4, Eva Marie Saint,
actress (Sandpiper, Loving, Exodus), was born in Newark, NJ.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1928 Apr 4, Maya Angelou, American
poet, was born.
(HN, 4/4/98)
1929 Apr 4, Sigmund Romberg's "New
Moon" musical opened in London.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1931 Apr 4, Andre Michelin, CEO
(Michelin Tires), died.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1931 Apr 4, George Whitefield
Chadwick (76), composer, died.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1932 Apr 4, Anthony Perkins, actor
(Psycho), was born in NYC.
(HN, 4/4/01)(MC, 4/4/02)
1932 Apr 4, George Bernard Shaw's
"Too True to be Good," premiered in NYC.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1932 Apr 4, Vitamin C was 1st
isolated by C.C. King at the Univ. of Pittsburgh.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1938 Apr 4, Bart Giamatti,
baseball commissioner, president of Yale, was born.
(HN, 4/4/01)
1940 Apr 4, Richard Rodgers' and
Lorenz Hart's "Higher & Higher," premiered in NYC.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1941 Apr 4, Field Marshal Erwin
Rommel captured the British held town of Benghazi in North Africa.
(HN, 4/4/99)
1944 Apr 4, British troops
captured Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1944 Apr 4, De Gaulle formed a new
regime in exile with communists.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1945 Apr 4, U.S.
forces liberated the Nazi death camp Ohrdruf in Germany.
(AP, 4/4/97)
1945 Apr 4, US tanks and infantry
conquered Bielefeld.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1945 Apr 4, US
troops on Okinawa encountered the first significant resistance from
Japanese forces at the Machinato Line.
(AP, 4/4/07)
1945 Apr 4, Hungary was liberated
from Nazi occupation (National Day).
(MC, 4/4/02)
1947 Apr 4, Scientists noted the
largest group of sunspots on record.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1948 Apr 4, 84-year-old Connie
Mack challenged 78-year-old Clark Griffith to a race from home to 1st
base; it ended in a tie.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1949 Apr 4, The 12-nation North
Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) pact was signed by the US,
Great Britain, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Italy,
Portugal, Denmark, Iceland, Norway and Canada. It provided for mutual
defense against aggression and for close military cooperation.
(WUD, 1994, p.1684)(TOH, 1982, p.1949)(HN, 4/4/98)
1956 Apr 4, Enid Bagnold's "Chalk
Garden," premiered in London.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1956 Apr 4, Spain relinquished its
protectorate to Morocco.
(EWH, 1968, p.1240)
1957 Apr 4, Heitor Villa-Lobos'
10th Symphony, premiered in Paris.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1958 Apr 4, The 1st march against
nuclear weapons began in London with a 4-day to the Atomic Weapons
Research Establishment close to Aldermaston, England.
(Econ, 8/16/08,
p.56)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aldermaston_Marches)
1960 Apr 4, In the 32nd Academy
Awards "Ben-Hur," Charlton Heston and Simone Signoret won.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1968 Apr 4, Civil rights leader
Martin Luther King, 39, was assassinated while standing on the balcony
of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tenn. James Earl Ray (d.1998)
confessed and pleaded guilty in Mar, 1969, but later tried to recant
and said he was a fall guy. In 1993 Lloyd Jowers (d.2000), a Memphis
businessman, said on ABC-TV that he had hired King's killer as a favor
to an underworld figure who was a friend. Jowers said he received
$100,000 from Memphis produce merchant Frank Liberto to arrange King’s
murder. In 1997 Ray identified an arms smuggler named "Raoul" as the
real killer. In 1998 a former FBI agent produced documents from Ray’s
car with the name Raul. In 1999 a civil trial jury in Memphis ruled
that the 1968 killing of Rev. Martin Luther King was a conspiracy. The
jury concluded that Lloyd Jowers, a former café owner, had
conspired with elements of the Memphis Police Dept., the federal
government and organized crime to kill King. In 2000 a Justice Dept.
report rejected allegations of conspiracy. In 2002 Rev. Ronald Denton
Wilson (61) said that his father, Henry Clay Wilson (d.1990), had shot
King. In 2003 Stewart Burns authored "To the Mountaintop: Martin Luther
King's Sacred Mission to Save America."
(SF E&C, 1/15/1995, A-15)(WUD, 1994,
p.1687)(SFC, 12/26/96, p.A3)(AP, 4/4/97)(SFC, 4/7/97, p.A10)(SFC,
3/25/98, p.A3)(SFC, 4/24/98, p.A1)(SFEC, 11/21/99, p.A12)(SFC,
11/23/99, p.A9)(SFC, 12/9/99, p.A1)(SFC, 12/10/99, p.A15)(SFC, 5/24/00,
p.C5)(SFC, 6/10/00, p.A3)(SFC, 4/4/02, p.A2)(SSFC, 1/11/04, p.M1)
1968 Apr 4, Bobby Kennedy spoke at
a black ghetto in Indianapolis just after hearing of the assassination
of Martin Luther King. His speech registered the enormity of the event
and began the work of healing. Riots over the next few days hit 76
American cities, but Indianapolis remained quiet.
(Econ, 4/22/06, p.79)
1969 Apr 4, In Houston, Texas, Dr.
Denton Cooley implanted the 1st temporary artificial heart.
(www.nytimes.com/2007/11/27/health/27docs.html)
1971 Apr 4, "Follies" opened at
Winter Garden Theater in NYC for 524 performances.
(MC, 4/4/02)
1972 Apr 4, In further response to
the North Vietnamese Easter Offensive, US President Nixon authorized a
massive bombing campaign targeting all NVA troops invading South
Vietnam along with B-52 air strikes against North Vietnam. "The
bastards have never been bombed like they're going to be bombed this
time," Nixon privately declares.
(www.historyplace.com/unitedstates/vietnam/index-1969.html)
1972 Apr 4, Adam Clayton Powell
Jr. (b.1908), American politician, died in Florida. He was elected to
the US House of Representatives from Harlem in 1945 and became chair of
the Education and Labor Committee in 1961. He was the first black
Congressman from New York.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Clayton_Powell_Jr.)
1974 Apr 4, Hank Aaron of the
Atlanta Braves tied Babe Ruth's home-run record by hitting his 714th
round-tripper in Cincinnati.
(HN, 4/4/98)(AP, 4/4/99)
1974 Apr 4, In England an armed
payroll robbery took place at the London Electricity Board (LEB).
George Davis (b.1941) was arrested for the robbery and his wife, Rose
Davis (d.2009, campaigned for his release. In 1976 the conviction was
overturned as unsafe. In Sep 1977 George was again arrested for a bank
robbery and Rose promptly divorced him. In 2009 she authored “The Wars
of Rosie: Hard Knocks, Endurance and the 'George Davis Is Innocent'
Campaign.”
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Davis_(armed_robber))(Econ,
2/14/09, p.98)
1975 Apr 4, The first group of
boat people from Vietnam began arriving in Malaysia. More than 1
million people fled from the close of the war to the early 1980s.
(SFC, 4/17/96, p.A-9)
1975 Apr 4, Some 155 people, most
of them children, were killed when a U.S. Air Force C-5A transport
plane evacuating Vietnamese orphans as part of “Operation Babylift”
crashed shortly after takeoff from Saigon.144 adults and 76 babies were
killed. There were over 170 survivors.
(AP, 4/4/97)(SFC, 4/3/00, p.A8)(MC, 4/4/02)
1977 Apr 4, Egyptian Pres Anwar
Sadat held his 1st meeting with President Jimmy Carter.
(www.jimmycarterlibrary.org/documents/diary/1977/d040477t.pdf)
1979 Apr 4, Bechtel Corp.
announced that it had won a contract to manage construction of a
115-square-mile airport for Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The cost was
estimated a $3 billion.
(SFC, 4/2/04, p.F3)
1979 Apr 4, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto
(51), the deposed prime minister of Pakistan, was hanged after he was
convicted of conspiring to murder a political opponent.
(AP, 4/4/99)(HN, 4/4/99)
1981 Apr 4,
Henry Cisneros became the first Mexican-American elected mayor of a
major U.S. city -- San Antonio, Texas.
(AP, 4/4/97)
1982 Apr, 4, Dalia Ratnikas was
born at San Francisco General Hospital, after wearing out 3 shifts of
nurses, to Florence Monzasch and Algis Ratnikas.
(EW, 4/4/82)
1983 Apr 4, The
space shuttle Challenger roared into orbit on its maiden voyage and the
first US female into space was Sally Ride.
(TMC, 1994, p.1983)(AP, 4/4/97)
1985 Apr 4, Gary Dotson, who
served six years of a prison sentence for rape, was freed on bail from
the Joliet Correctional Center in Illinois after his accuser, Cathleen
Crowell Webb, testified that the attack had never occurred.
(AP, 4/4/05)
1985 Apr 4, A coup in Sudan ousted
President Nimeiry and replaced him with Gen. Dahab.
(HN, 4/4/99)
1987 Apr 4,
During a visit to Chile, Pope John Paul II denounced torture and
pleaded for reconciliation.
(AP, 4/4/97)
1988 Apr 4, The Arizona Senate
convicted Gov. Evan Mecham of two charges of official misconduct, and
removed him from office. Mecham was the first U.S. governor to so
censured in nearly six decades.
(AP, 4/4/98)
1989 Apr 4, Democrat Richard M.
Daley was elected mayor of Chicago, defeating Republican Edward R.
Vrdolyak and independent Timothy C. Evans.
(AP, 4/4/99)
1990 Apr 4, Secretary of State
James Baker met in Washington with his Soviet counterpart, Eduard
Shevardnadze, for three days of talks on the Lithuanian crisis and arms
control.
(AP, 4/4/00)
1990 Apr 4, Security law violator
Ivan Boesky was released from federal custody.
(http://www3.cnn.com/almanac/9804/04/)
1991 Apr 4, Pennsylvania Senator
John Heinz III, a leading 3-term Republican voice on health and trade
policy, and six other people, including two children, were killed when
a helicopter collided with Heinz’s plane over a schoolyard in Merion,
Pennsylvania. Mrs. Teresa Heinz took his place as head of the family
philanthropies. In 1995 she married Sen. John Kerry.
(SFC, 9/25/99, p.A21)(AP, 4/4/01)(WSJ, 4/16/04, p.A1)
1991 Apr 4, Max Frisch (d.1991),
Swiss architect and writer, died. His books included “I’m Not Stiller”
(1958), a look at the nature of identity.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Frisch)(WSJ,
4/25/09, p.W8)
1991 Apr 4, In Benin Nicephore
Soglo (1991-1996) took office as president. He had defeated Mathieu
Kerekou in the country’s first free presidential elections. For the
first time in mainland Africa a leader let himself be ousted peacefully.
(http://people.africadatabase.org/en/person/3534.html)(Econ, 10/24/09,
p.20)
1992 Apr 4, His
campaign acknowledged that Bill Clinton had received an induction
notice in April 1969 while attending college in Oxford, England;
Clinton said the notice arrived after he was due to report, and that
his local draft board had told him he could complete the school term.
(AP, 4/4/97)
1993 Apr 4, President Clinton and
Russian President Boris Yeltsin wrapped up their two-day summit in
Vancouver, B.C. Clinton extended $1.6 billion in aid; Yeltsin
proclaimed the two countries "partners and future allies."
(AP, 4/4/98)
1993 Apr 4, Alfred Mosher Butts
(b.1899), US architect and inventor of the Scrabble game, died.
(WSJ, 6/28/01, p.B1)(MC, 4/4/02)
1994 Apr 4, The University of
Arkansas won the NCAA basketball championship, defeating Duke 76-72.
(AP, 4/4/99)
1994 Apr 4, On Wall Street, stocks
plummeted in violent spasms of selling that sent the Dow industrial
down more than 40 points to a six-month low.
(AP, 4/4/99)
1994 Apr 4, Jim Clark and Marc
Andreeson founded Mosaic Communications Corp., the predecessor of
Netscape Communications.
(WSJ, 11/25/98, p.B1)
1995 Apr 4, Francisco Martin
Duran, who had raked the White House with semiautomatic rifle fire in
October 1994, was convicted in Washington of trying to assassinate
President Clinton. Duran was later sentenced to 40 years in prison.
(AP, 4/4/00)
1995 Apr 4, Sen. Alfonse D'Amato,
R-N.Y., used a mock Japanese accent to ridicule O.J. Simpson trial
judge Lance Ito on a nationally syndicated radio program. He apologized
two days later on the Senate floor.
(AP, 4/4/00)
1995 Apr 4, Fierce fighting
continues in Algeria as Muslim revolutionaries struggle against the
military regime in power. It is estimated that over 1,000 people are
being killed per month. France backs the military regime who, stopped
free elections last year when it was clear that the Muslim
fundamentalists were going to win.
(NPR)
1995 Apr 4, It was reported that
Nuclear Matrix Proteins that act as a type of scaffolding for DNA were
being used as markers for cancer. They were also thought to help turn
genes off and on.
(WSJ, 4/4/95, B-1)
1996 Apr 4, President Clinton
signed legislation severing the link between crop prices and government
subsidies.
(AP, 4/4/97)
1996 Apr 4, The former general
manager of Daiwa Bank's New York branch pleaded guilty to aiding a $1.1
billion cover-up.
(AP, 4/4/97)
1996 Apr 4, US intelligence
indicated that Libya was building a chemical weapons plant at Tarhunah,
40 miles southeast of Tripoli. The plant was reportedly designed to
replace a plant at Rabta, 55 miles SW of Tripoli, where Libya insists
that only pharmaceuticals are produced.
(SFC, 4/4/96, p.A-3)
1996 Apr 4, X-rays were found
coming from the Hyakutake comet by a teams of US and German scientists.
(SFC, 4/4/96, p.A-10)
1996 Apr 4, In Afghanistan
Mohammed Omar unsealed a shrine in Kandahar that held a cloak believed
to have belonged to the prophet Mohammed. He placed the cloak over his
shoulders and declared himself the commander of the faithful and leader
of all Islam.
(SFC, 12/7/01, p.A16)
1996 Apr 4, Beijing announced that
it would prosecute 18 former officials for embezzling more than 2.2
billion. The scandal is tied to last year’s firing of Beijing’s
Communist boss.
(WSJ, 4/4/96, A-1)
1996 Apr 4, The Red Cross said
more than 55,000 people have been driven from their homes in Burundi by
ethnic fighting that intensified last month. More than 100,000 have
been killed since 1993 in the conflict between majority Hutus and
minority Tutsis.
(WSJ, 4/5/96, p.A-1)
1996 Apr 4, In the capital city of
Antananarivo, Madagascar, thousands of people demonstrated against the
president amid calls for a military coup.
(SFC, 5/5/96, p.T-9)
1996 Apr 4, The average negotiated
wage in Mexico has been 19%, far below the inflation rate of 27-30%
forecast by independent economists. The government just raised the
minimum wage 12% but also implemented a 27% raise in the cost of
tortillas.
(WSJ, 4/4/96, A-10)
1997 Apr 4, It was reported that
US psychologist Edward Larson followed a 1916 procedure by psychologist
James Leuba in a random poll of selected scientists to inquire if they
believed in God. Leuba had predicted that disbelief would spread as
education expanded. Both polls produced similar results whereby 40%
said that they believed in God.
(SFC, 4/4/97, p.A12)
1997 Apr 4, Space shuttle Columbia
blasted off from Cape Canaveral, Fla., on what was supposed to have
been a 16-day mission. However, a defective power generator forced the
shuttle's return four days later.
(WSJ, 4/9/97, p.A1)(AP, 4/4/98)
1997 Apr 4, In Zaire rebel forces
captured Mbuji-Mayi, capital of Eastern Kasai province and home of
Zaire’s diamond industry. Departing government troops looted the city
and 100 people were killed in clashes between the retreating soldiers
and locals.
(SFC, 4/5/97, p.A8)
1998 Apr 4, During a visit to
Haiti, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright urged leaders to stop
political infighting that had paralyzed the Caribbean nation for nearly
a year.
(AP, 4/4/99)
1998 Apr 4, A new US toll-free
exchange number, 877, was launched.
(SFC, 3/31/98, p.D1)
1998 Apr 4, Larry Singleton,
rapist and murderer, was sentenced in Florida to death for the 1997
murder of Roxanne Hayes (31). He died in prison of cancer on December
28, 2001.
(SFC, 1/1/02,
p.A13)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Singleton)
1998 Apr 4, In Georgia two small
planes collided over Marietta and at least 5 people were killed.
(SFEC, 4/5/98, p.A10)
1998 Apr 4, In Ethiopia a locust
plague was reported covering an area of 3,700 acres in the regions of
Jijiga and Dire Dawa. Aerial spraying was begun.
(SFC, 4/4/98, p.A7)
1998 Apr 4, North Korea proposed
that officials at the deputy minister level meet in Beijing for talks.
South Korea accepted the following day to reopen talks on economic aid
and other issues.
(SFC, 4/6/98, p.A12)
1998 Apr 4, In the Ukraine a gas
explosion at the Skochinsky coal mine outside Donetsk killed 63 men.
(SFEC, 4/5/98, p.A20)(AP, 4/4/08)
1998 Apr 4-20, Richard Butler,
chief arms inspector in Iraq, refused to certify the Iraq’s weapons of
mass destruction have been destroyed.
(SFC, 9/24/02, p.A11)
1999 Apr 4, The Colorado Rockies
beat the San Diego Padres 8-2 in baseball's first season opener held in
Mexico.
(AP, 4/4/00)
1999 Apr 4, NATO dropped more
bombs on downtown Belgrade and said that it would send some 8,000
troops into Albania to help Kosovo refugees. The Freedom Bridge over
the Danube at Novi Sad was destroyed. The US announced that it would
send 24 Apache helicopter gunships to attack Serbian troops and tanks
in Kosovo. Some 30,000 refugees crossed into Albania in the last
24-hour period. Shipping on the Danube was not fully restored until
2002.
(SFEC, 4/4/99, p.A1,12)(SFC, 4/5/99, p.A1,10)(SSFC,
2/3/02, Par p.7)
1999 Apr 4, Bexhet Ahmeti
witnessed Serb militiamen shoot and burn 5 Kosovars.
(SFC, 4/21/99, p.A10)
1999 cApr 4, In Kyrgyzstan Prime
Minister Zhumabek Ibraimov (50) died following recent surgery in Russia.
(WSJ, 4/5/99, p.A1)
1999 Apr 4, In Malaysia Azizah
Ismail, the wife of Anwar Ibrahim, announced the formation of the
National Justice Party and called on opposition forces to topple Prime
Minister Mahathir Mohamad.
(SFC, 4/5/99, p.A9)
2000 Apr 4, Ha Jin, Prof. of
English at Emory Univ. won the PEN/Faulkner Prize for His novel
“Waiting.” Jin had arrived in the US from China in 1985.
(SFC, 4/5/00, p.C3)
2000 Apr 4, In a volatile day on
the US stock market, the Nasdaq composite index and the DJIA each
plunged 554 points before but recovered with a loss of 74.79 as buyers
flooded back into the market. The Dow fell 504 but recovered with a net
loss of 57.
(SFC, 4/5/00, p.A13)(AP, 4/4/01)
2000 Apr 4, In India 532 rebels of
the United Liberation Front of Assam turned in their weapons and gave
up their struggle for independence. Some 2000 fighters still remained
in the jungles of Assam. Over 5,000 people had been killed in the
front’s campaign since 1979.
(SFC, 4/5/00, p.A11)
2000 Apr 4, In Iraq US and British
warplanes bombed military sites in the south and Iraqi news reported 2
civilians killed and 2 wounded.
(SFC, 4/5/00, p.A11)
2000 Apr 4, In Japan the cabinet
resigned and allowed the Parliament to elect Yoshiro Mori as the new
Prime Minister. The former trade minister was elected as president of
the ruling Liberal Democratic Party earlier the same day.
(SFC, 4/5/00, p.A1)
2000 Apr 4, In Pakistan Arif Khan
(45), the governor of Kunduz province in Afghanistan, was shot and
killed along with his bodyguard by 2 gunmen in Peshawar.
(SFC, 4/5/00, p.A11)
2001 Apr 4, Hideo Nomo became the
fourth pitcher in major league history to throw a no-hitter in both
leagues with Boston's 3-to-0 victory over Baltimore. Nomo, who threw a
no-hitter for Los Angeles in 1996, joined Cy Young, Jim Bunning and
Nolan Ryan as the only pitchers with no-hitters in both leagues.
(AP, 4/4/02)
2001 Apr 4, US diplomats met with
24 US crew members held by the Chinese military on Hainan island. Colin
Powell issued a statement of regret over the loss of the Chinese pilot
involved in the incident. Powell also sent a letter to China’s chief
foreign policy official outlining ways of settlement.
(SFC, 4/4/01, p.A1)(SFC, 4/5/01, p.A1)
2001 Apr 4, The US Pentagon
reportedly destroyed its last canister of napalm, a jellied gasoline
used extensively during the Vietnam war. It was developed in 1942 by
Harvard and Army chemists who combined naphthene and palmitate. It was
made by Dow Chemical from 1965-1969.
(SFC, 4/4/01, p.A3)
2001 Apr 4, Myriad Genetics
announced a plan, with partners Oracle and Hitachi, to map out how
human proteins interact.
(WSJ, 4/5/01, p.B1)
2001 Apr 4, Chinese President
Jiang Zemin demanded the United States apologize for the collision
between a U.S. Navy spy plane and a Chinese fighter jet; the Bush
administration offered a chorus of regrets, but no apology.
(AP, 4/4/02)
2001 Apr 4, In Israel an armored
personnel carrier accidentally overturned in the West Bank and 5
soldiers were killed.
(SFC, 4/5/01, p.A11)
2001 Apr 4, In Sudan Col. Ibrahim
Shamsul-Din, deputy defense minister, and 13 other high ranking
military officers were killed as their Antonov plane crashed on takeoff
in Adaril.
(SFC, 4/5/01, p.A11)
2002 Apr 4, Pres. Bush demanded
that Israel withdraw from West Bank cities and end settlement activity
in occupied territories. He dismissed Yasser Arafat as a failed leader
who had "betrayed the hopes of his people." Bush ordered Sec. of State
Colin Powell to the region to seek a cease-fire.
(SFC, 4/5/02, p.A1,14)(AP, 4/4/03)
2002 Apr 4, Pres. Bush responded
to British TV journalist Trevor McDonald’s question “Have you made up
your mind that Iraq must be attacked?” by saying: “I made up my mind
that Hussein needs to go.”
(SFC, 6/15/02, p.A13)
2002 Apr 4, Yasser Esam Hamdi
(22), a prisoner in Cuba, was reported to be a US citizen born in
Louisiana. Hamdi was transferred to a jail in Virginia Apr 5. In 2004
Hamdi, held without charge since his 2001 capture, gave up his US
citizenship and was released to Saudi Arabia.
(WSJ, 4/5/02, p.A1)(SFC, 4/6/02, p.A3)(WSJ, 9/23/04,
p.A1)
2002 Apr 4, Two teen-agers were
sentenced to long prison terms in the stabbing deaths of Dartmouth
College professors Half and Susanne Zantop. Robert Tulloch pleaded
guilty to murder and received the mandatory sentence of life without
parole; James Parker was sentenced to 25 years to life as an accomplice
to murder.
(AP, 4/4/03)
2002 Apr 4, Draft rice-genome maps
were published by scientists from China and Switzerland’s Syngenta.
(WSJ, 4/5/02, p.A1)
2002 Apr 4, Afghan officials
reported that poppy farmers would be offered $500 per acre to destroy
their crops. Refusal would still result in crop destruction.
(SFC, 4/5/02, p.A8)
2002 Apr 4, The Angola government
and Unita signed a cease-fire agreement.
(SFC, 4/5/02, p.A11)
2002 Apr 4, It was reported that
Saddam Hussein of Iraq had raised financial payments to the relatives
of suicide bombers from $10k to $25k.
(SFC, 4/4/02, p.A10)
2002 Apr 4, Israeli officials made
public 2 documents signed by Arafat that authorized payments to
Palestinian militants wanted for attacks on Israel.
(SFC, 4/5/02, p.A15)
2002 Apr 4, Israel continued for a
7th-day its offensive titled Operation Defensive Shield. Tanks entered
Hebron house-to-house fighting with Palestinian gunmen in the Jenin
refugee camp. 3 Israeli soldiers were killed. Guerrilla fighters fired
9 rockets into Israel.
(SFC, 4/5/02, p.A16)
2002 Apr 4, The UN released $995
million in compensation to Kuwait for Iraq’s 1990 invasion. Most went
to 1,058 individuals. Saudi Arabia received $82.6 million and Jordan
got $44.9.
(SFC, 4/5/02, p.A12)
2003 Apr 4, Pres. Bush issued an
executive order giving federal health officials power to quarantine
anyone suspected of being infected with SARS. The disease had spread to
17 countries killing at least 90 people and infected some 2,300.
(SFC, 4/5/03, p.A1)(SSFC, 4/6/03, p.A9)
2003 Apr 4, On the 17th day of
Operation Iraqi Freedom thousands of Iraqis fled Baghdad as US forces
seized the international airport to the west and armored convoys
pressed in from the south. Army Sgt. 1st Class Paul Ray Smith was
killed in the battle. In 2005 Pres. Bush awarded him the 1st US Medal
of Honor of the Iraq campaign. A Marine unit found concentrations of
cyanide and mustard-gas agents in the Euphrates River near Nasiriyah.
(AP, 4/4/03)(SFC, 4/5/05, p.A3)(WSJ, 4/7/03, p.A7)
2003 Apr 4, Peter Arnett, fired by
NBC earlier this week for giving an interview to state-run Iraqi
television, began reporting for pan-Arab satellite channel Al-Arabiya.
Atlantic Monthly journalist Michael Kelley was killed in a humvee
accident near Baghdad.
(AP, 4/5/03)(SSFC, 5/4/03, p.C3)
2003 Apr 4, Six more moons were
reported to have been found orbiting Jupiter, pushing to 58 the total
number of known natural satellites of the solar system's largest planet.
(AP, 4/5/03)
2003 Apr 4, Dr. Russell R. Monroe
(82), neurologist and authority on brain mechanisms, genius and
criminal behaviour, died. His books included "Creative Brainstorms: The
Relationship Between Madness and Genius."
(SFC, 4/9/03, p.A28)
2003 Apr 4, In Algeria 8 Austrian
tourists were reported missing. Searchers using camels and helicopters
equipped with heat-seeking sensors were already scouring the Sahara
Desert for 21 tourists, mostly Germans, who vanished in Algeria over
the past six weeks.
(AP, 4/4/03)(SSFC, 4/6/03, p.A8)
2003 Apr 4, In northeastern
Bangladesh a river boat carrying more than 170 people capsized, killing
79 people, including 49 children.
(AP, 4/4/03)(AP, 4/7/03)
2003 Apr 4, In southern Brazil 2
buses crashed head-on during heavy rains, killing 18 people and
injuring seven others.
(AP, 4/4/03)
2003 Apr 4, Chinese experts in
hard-hit Guangdong province told the scientists they have found a rare
form of airborne chlamydia in some of their SARS patients, raising the
possibility that more than one germ may be involved. Other Chinese
cases suggest the disease might be passed by touching something tainted
by a sick person's mucous or saliva.
(AP, 4/5/03)
2003 Apr 4, A standoff between
Cuban troops and the hijackers of a small ferry who had tried to sail
to Florida ended as soldiers stormed the boat and hostages jumped
overboard to safety.
(AP, 4/5/03)
2003 Apr 4, Israeli troops
uncovered an explosives lab and arrested Anwar Alian (22), a senior
Islamic Jihad militant, during a sweep of Tulkarem.
(SFC, 4/5/03, p.A9)
2003 Apr 4, Mexican police over
the last 2 days arrested 9 members of the powerful Juarez Cartel during
raids across the country.
(AP, 4/4/03)
2004 Apr 4, In India suspected
Islamic extremists stormed a police station in the city of Karachi and
killed 5 police, forcing their victims to recite Quranic verses before
shooting them.
(AP, 4/4/04)
2004 Apr 4, Muqtada al-Sadr issued
a call to his followers to "terrorize your enemy." Gunmen opened fire
on the Spanish garrison in the holy city of Najaf during a huge
demonstration by followers of al-Sadr, an anti-American Shiite Muslim
cleric. An American and Salvadoran soldier were killed along with 22
Iraqis. More than 130 people were wounded. A car bomb exploded in
Kirkuk, killing three civilians and wounding two others. 7 US soldiers
were killed in Baghdad.
(AP, 4/4/04)(SFC, 4/5/04, p.A8)(WSJ, 4/5/04,
p.A1)(WSJ, 4/19/04, p.A14)
2004 Apr 4, Maoist rebels in
southern Nepal killed at least 9 police officers.
(SFC, 4/5/04, p.A2)
2004 Apr 4, In Slovenia some 95
percent of referendum voters opposed reinstating permanent residency
and other rights to more than 18,000 people, mostly Bosnians, Croats
and Serbs, whose names were stricken from state records following
independence from the former Yugoslavia in 1991.
(AP, 4/5/04)
2005 Apr 4, The Los Angeles Times
and The Wall Street Journal captured two Pulitzer Prizes apiece;
Marilynne Robinson received the fiction award for her novel "Gilead,"
while John Patrick Shanley received the drama Pulitzer for "Doubt."
(SFC, 4/5/05, p.A11)(AP, 4/4/06)
2005 Apr 4, The North Carolina
Tarheels won the NCAA men’s basketball championship over Illinois,
75-70.
(WSJ, 4/5/05, p.A1)
2005 Apr 4, The US Supreme Court
ruled that IRAs can’t be seized in bankruptcies.
(WSJ, 4/5/05, p.A1)
2005 Apr 4, The US Treasury Dept.
said all Series EE bonds sold after May 1 will pay interest rates that
are fixed for at least 20 years.
(SFC, 4/5/05, p.C1)
2005 Apr 4, US Coaches Jim Boeheim
and Jim Calhoun were elected to the Basketball Hall of Fame.
(AP, 4/4/06)
2005 Apr 4, Oil prices hit an
interday high of $58.28 per barrel.
(SFC, 4/5/05, p.C1)
2005 Apr 4, Chevron announced
plans to purchase Unocal Corp. for $18.4 billion. Chevron’s eventual
acquisition of Unocal included a stake in the Yadana project in
Myanmar, in which Unocal invested in the 1990s along with France’s
Total, Myanmar Oil and Gas Enterprise and the petroleum Authority of
Thailand. Total with a 31% stake operated the project. The Yadana
project brought in an estimated $969 million to the government
undercutting international sanctions to isolate the regime.
(SFC, 4/5/05, p.A1)(SFC, 10/4/07, p.A10)(SFC,
4/29/08, p.D3)
2005 Apr 4, Evergreen Int’l., a
Panamanian shipping line, pleaded guilty to over 2 dozen counts of
illegal dumping around the US. It was ordered to pay a fine of $25
million, one of the largest ever imposed for polluting the ocean.
(SFC, 4/5/05, p.B8)
2005 Apr 4, The leaders of
Australia and Indonesia signed a partnership agreement that they said
would lead to new security pact between their countries.
(AP, 4/4/05)
2005 Apr 4, In Brazil authorities
arrested 11 police suspected of participating in death squad killings
that left 30 people dead in two towns on Rio's poor outskirts.
(AP, 4/5/05)
2005 Apr 4, In Canada Edward
Bronfman, Canadian businessman, died. Bronfman and his brother, Peter,
built Edper Investments Ltd. into a business with interests ranging
from forestry and mining to banking, beer and hockey to form the core
of what is today Brascan Corp.
(SFC, 4/6/05, p.B7)(http://tinyurl.com/6jsag)
2005 Apr 4, China's foreign
ministry called in Japan's ambassador to Beijing to express its
"indignation" at Tokyo's approval of nationalist school history
textbooks.
(AP, 4/5/05)
2005 Apr 4, Shanghai, China's
largest city, enacted a new rule requiring home owners to pay off their
mortgages before selling property, the boldest measure yet in new
efforts to cool surging real estate prices.
(AP, 4/7/05)
2005 Apr 4, About 300 university
students staged a rowdy protest in downtown Cairo calling for Egyptian
President Hosni Mubarak to step down and further democratic reforms.
(AP, 4/5/05)
2005 Apr 4, Maoist rebel leaders
in southern India said they had given up on efforts to make peace,
blaming local police for mounting violence since a truce collapsed more
than three months ago.
(AP, 4/4/05)
2005 Apr 4, A joint US-Iraqi
attack on dozens of insurgents in eastern Diyala province left two
American soldiers and one Iraqi soldier dead. A suicide bomber blew
himself up near the gates of Abu Ghraib prison.
(AP, 4/5/05)(SFC, 4/5/05, p.A3)
2005 Apr 4, PM Junichiro Koizumi
proposed privatizing Japan's postal service by 2017, a step that would
create the world's biggest bank out of the mammoth pile of cash
deposited at post offices by conscientious Japanese savers.
(AP, 4/4/05)
2005 Apr 4, Kyrgyz President Askar
Akayev, who fled the country last month after demonstrators stormed his
offices, signed a resignation agreement.
(AP, 4/4/05)
2005 Apr 4, A minister said
Malaysia plans to hire 169,000 foreign workers to overcome an acute
labor shortage after a crackdown on illegal migrants.
(AP, 4/4/05)
2005 Apr 4, Nepal's King
Gyanendra, in his first address to the military since he seized power,
urged the security forces to crush a long-running revolt by Maoist
rebels, accusing the militants of "terrorism."
(AP, 4/4/05)
2005 Apr 4, A Palestinian official
immediately denounced Israeli plans to dispose of garbage on
Palestinian land in the West Bank, as violating international law,
saying, "We are not a dumping ground."
(AP, 4/4/05)
2005 Apr 4, Tens of thousands of
pilgrims paid their final respects to Pope John Paul II after his body
was carried on a crimson platform to St. Peter's Basilica.
(AP, 4/4/06)
2006 Apr 4, Republican Rep. Tom
DeLay of Texas, the House of Representatives' fallen majority leader,
announced the end of a re-election fight he was in jeopardy of losing
and said he would soon step down from the US Congress.
(AP, 4/4/06)
2006 Apr 4, In Massachusetts
legislators passed a bill requiring all citizens to have health
insurance. Gov. Romney signed it on April 12. The cost of the plan was
estimated at $1 billion, about as much as the state spends on the
uninsured. A dearth of primary-care physicians threatened to undermine
the program.
(WSJ, 4/5/06, p.A1)(Econ, 4/8/06, p.35)(SFC,
4/12/06, p.A4)(WSJ, 1/25/07, p.B1)
2006 Apr 4, Maryland beat Duke,
78-75, in overtime to win its first NCAA women's basketball title.
(AP, 4/4/07)
2006 Apr 4, Computer Sciences
Corp. said it plans to cut about 5,000 jobs, or about 6 percent of its
work force, over two years and is considering selling the company.
(AP, 4/4/06)
2006 Apr 4, Arab diplomats said
top intelligence officers from several Arab countries and Turkey have
been meeting secretly to coordinate their governments' strategies in
case civil war erupts in Iraq and in an attempt to block Iran's
interference in the war-torn nation.
(AP, 4/5/06)
2006 Apr 4, A boatload of 52 dazed
and exhausted African men arrived at the Canary Islands, the latest of
a stream of desperate migrants risking everything on the open sea for a
slim chance at life in Europe.
(AP, 4/4/06)
2006 Apr 4, In Colombia
authorities announced the arrests of 7 active and retired police and
army officers working for one of Colombia's largest cocaine cartels,
who used commercial cargo planes to ship drugs to the US.
(AP, 4/4/06)
2006 Apr 4, Wen Jiabao arrived in
Fiji as the first Chinese premier to visit the Pacific islands, seeking
to deepen China's influence in the region and contain Taiwan's
diplomatic clout.
(AP, 4/4/06)
2006 Apr 4, Human Rights Watch
said tens of thousands of street children across Congo risk being
recruited by political parties to create chaos, intimidate voters and
contest the results of up-coming elections.
(AP, 4/4/06)
2006 Apr 4, In France a nationwide
strike shut down the Eiffel Tower and snarled air and rail travel for
the second time in a week while students barricaded themselves in
schools to protest a jobs measure that has riven the country and put
the government in crisis mode.
(AP, 4/4/06)
2006 Apr 4, Mphasis BFL Ltd., an
Indian software services company, welcomed a $380 million bid by
Electronic Data Systems for a 52% stake.
(WSJ, 4/5/06, p.B3)
2006 Apr 4, Foreign Minister
Manouchehr Mottaki said Iran is prepared to negotiate on the
large-scale enrichment of uranium but will never abandon its right to
enrich uranium.
(AP, 4/4/06)
2006 Apr 4, The Iraq tribunal
announced new criminal charges against Saddam Hussein and six others,
accusing them of genocide and crimes against humanity stemming from a
1980s crackdown against Kurds. A car bomb exploded in a mostly Shiite
area of eastern Baghdad, killing at least 10 and wounding 28. Another
blast in Baghdad killed a woman and two of her young sons.
(AP, 4/4/06)
2006 Apr 4, Denis Donaldson (55),
former British agent inside Sinn Fein, was killed by shotgun blasts in
northwest Ireland.
(AP, 4/5/06)
2006 Apr 4, Israeli warplanes
fired three missiles into the presidential compound of Palestinian
leader Mahmoud Abbas, wounding 2 people and leaving deep craters in the
ground.
(AP, 4/4/06)
2006 Apr 4, Kuwaiti women voted
and ran as candidates for the first time in a municipal election in the
conservative country's capital, but initial reports indicated not many
women were casting ballots.
(AP, 4/4/06)
2006 Apr 4, Charles Taylor
appeared in a UN-backed court in Sierra Leone with 11 counts of crimes
against humanity and other violations of int’l. law.
(Econ, 4/8/06, p.46)
2006 Apr 4, The South Korean ship
628 Dongwon was seized by eight armed assailants, who approached in two
speed boats firing guns off the coast of Somalia. 25 crew members were
reported safe and officials sought their release. The sailors were
released July 30 after more than $800,000 in ransom was paid.
(AP, 4/5/06)(AP, 7/30/06)
2006 Apr 4, Thailand’s Embattled
PM Thaksin Shinawatra abruptly announced he will step down from office,
bowing to a mounting opposition campaign seeking his ouster over
allegations of corruption and abuse of power.
(AP, 4/4/06)
2006 Apr 4, Venezuelan authorities
found the bullet-ridden bodies of three Canadian boys who had been
kidnapped more than a month ago. John Faddoul (17), along with his
brothers Kevin (13) and Jason (12) were abducted Feb. 23 when
unidentified men dressed as police stopped their car at a checkpoint in
Caracas as the boys were on their way to school.
(AP, 4/5/06)
2007 Apr 4, Apple updated its
desktop Mac Pro computers adding two new 3.0GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon
processors, bringing 8-core processing to the Mac. The new machines can
run the 3.0GHz Intel Xeon processors and are available as build to
order options.
(www.macworld.com/news/2007/04/04/eightcore/index.php)
2007 Apr 4, Radio host Don Imus
made offensive on-air remarks about the Rutgers University women's
basketball team. Despite a subsequent apology, Imus was fired by CBS
Radio and cable network MSNBC; he was hired elsewhere by year's end.
(AP, 4/4/08)
2007 Apr 4, Jon and Karen
Huntsman, the billionaire parents of Utah’s Gov. Jon Huntsman,
announced that they would pay $1 million for a public education
campaign in Utah about the risks of cervical cancer and a new vaccine
that can prevent it.
(SFC, 4/5/07, p.A6)
2007 Apr 4, NYSE Euronext shares
slipped in their first day of trading following the completion of the
$14 billion deal that created the first trans-Atlantic stock exchange.
Jan-Michiel Hessels served as chairman of the NYSE following the merger
with Euronext.
(http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070404/ap_on_bi_ge/nyse_euronext)(WSJ,
4/14/07, p.A6)
2007 Apr 4, Film director Robert
Clark (67), best known for the holiday classic "A Christmas Story"
(1983), was killed in southern California with his son in a head-on
crash with a vehicle steered into the wrong lane by a drunken driver.
(AP, 4/5/07)
2007 Apr 4, In Algeria an
international desertification conference closed with a call (dubbed the
Algiers Appeal) to all African countries to ratify the Kyoto Protocol,
to help slow the rapid expansion of deserts on the continent.
(AFP, 4/4/07)
2007 Apr 4, Argentina's main
teachers' union called for a one-day national strike next week after
protesting colleagues seeking higher pay clashed with riot police in
two provinces.
(AP, 4/4/07)
2007 Apr 4, The United Nations
children's agency called for urgent action to tackle a "humanitarian
disaster" in the Central African Republic (CAR), affected by conflict
for the past ten years.
(AP, 4/4/07)
2007 Apr 4, In Chile police used
tear gas and water cannons to disperse hundreds of protesting students
in the capital of Santiago, and detained nearly 100 people.
(AP, 4/4/07)
2007 Apr 4, Ecuador's
constitutional court upheld a decision by the country's electoral
tribunal to fire more than half of the politically unstable nation's
legislature.
(AP, 4/5/07)
2007 Apr 4, In India South Asian
leaders (SAARC) wrapped up a two-day summit predicting a new dawn for
the region but offering little in terms of concrete action.
(AP, 4/4/07)
2007 Apr 4, Iran’s President
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad freed the 15 detained British sailors and marines
as an Easter holiday "gift" to the British people. Syria said it played
a key role in resolving the standoff over the 15 British sailors and
marines held by Iran.
(AP, 4/4/07)
2007 Apr 4, Iraq's top corruption
fighter said that $8 billion in government money was wasted or stolen
over the past three years and claimed he was threatened with death
after opening an investigation into scores of Oil Ministry employees.
Gunmen opened fire on a minibus carrying power plant workers in a
predominantly Sunni area west of Kirkuk, killing six men. Gunmen also
attacked a police patrol near Baqouba, killing four officers. 6 of the
gunmen were killed in a subsequent gunbattle. Two mortar rounds also
slammed into a house in the predominantly Shiite town of Khalis, just
after midnight, killing a woman and wounding two other women and a
4-year-old boy. Gunmen wearing police uniforms seized 22 shepherds and
their sheep in southern Iraq in the latest mass abduction of Shiite
workers by presumed Sunni insurgents. A roadside bomb killed two US
soldiers and wounded three others in southern Baghdad. Another blast
north of the capital killed two soldiers and wounded one.
(AP, 4/4/07)(AFP, 4/4/07)(AP, 4/5/07)
2007 Apr 4, New Ivory Coast PM
Guillaume Soro, a rebel leader who has controlled the north for four
years, took office, a key step in an accord aimed at bringing a lasting
peace.
(AP, 4/4/07)
2007 Apr 4, In Kuwait a medical
source said preliminary tests for bird flu were positive on four
Bangladeshi workers who had been culling infected chickens.
(AP, 4/4/07)
2007 Apr 4, Libyan leader Muammar
Gaddafi urged Africa to form a unified continental army to defend its
interests. He said former colonial powers should pay compensation for
the raw materials they had extracted.
(Reuters, 4/4/07)
2007 Apr 4, Hostage takers in
southern Nigeria released four foreign workers held captive in the
oil-rich region. The British High Commission and an industry source
said a Briton and a Dutch national held hostage in volatile oil-rich
southern Nigeria have been released. Gordon Gray was kidnapped March 31
from an offshore rig in the Niger delta. The Dutch man was kidnapped
March 23 from Port Harcourt. 2 Lebanese nationals working for a
construction firm, Setraco, were also released.
(AFP, 4/4/07)
2007 Apr 4, In Northern Ireland
protestant leader Ian Paisley shook hands with Irish PM Bertie Ahern in
public for the first time, marking another small step on the path to
peace.
(AP, 4/4/07)
2007 Apr 4, Heavy fighting between
Pakistani tribesmen and foreign militants allegedly linked to al-Qaida
killed 60 people near the Afghan border. About 50 of those killed in
the past 24 hours in the South Waziristan region were Uzbeks. The main
commander of the tribal militia battling the foreign militants is
Maulvi Nazir, a known Taliban sympathizer who the government says has
come over to its side. Nazir recently established Islamic courts
throughout South Waziristan, a 10,000-square-mile area with some
500,000 inhabitants.
(AP, 4/4/07)(SFC, 6/1/07, p.A9)
2007 Apr 4, A Palestinian gunman
was killed in an exchange of fire with Israeli troops in an area where
militants frequently fire rockets toward Israel.
(AP, 4/4/07)
2007 Apr 4, In the Philippines
police said they found the bodies of two missing members of the
militant Peasant Movement of the Philippines, or KMP, near a river in
the northern town of Lailo in Cagayan province.
(AFP, 4/4/07)
2007 Apr 4, Sri Lanka’s defense
ministry said its warplanes "bombed and completely destroyed" a key
Tamil Tiger naval base.
(AP, 4/4/07)
2007 Apr 4, In Damascus US House
Speaker Nancy Pelosi held talks with Syria's leader despite White House
objections, saying she pressed President Bashar Assad over his
country's support for militant groups and passed him a peace message
from Israel.
(AP, 4/4/07)
2007 Apr 4, Thousands of
supporters of Ukraine's Russian-leaning prime minister marched to the
office of the pro-Western president, protesting a presidential order to
hold early elections.
(AP, 4/4/07)
2007 Apr 4, Offices and factories
in Zimbabwe's two main cities were operating as normal on the second
day of a 48-hour strike called by the main labor organization over the
deepening economic crisis. Many workers appeared to have shunned the
call on the second day of the stoppage organized by the Zimbabwe
Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU).
(AFP, 4/4/07)
2008 Apr 4, The US labor Dept.
reported that employers slashed 80,000 jobs in march, the most in five
years, as the national unemployment rate climbed to 5.1 percent.
(AP, 4/5/08)
2008 Apr 4, Child welfare
officials scrambled to find foster homes for dozens of girls removed
from a secretive West Texas religious retreat built by polygamist
leader Warren Jeffs after a 16-year-old living there complained of
physical abuse. By April 8 Texas had taken 416 children into protective
custody. Some 140 women came along voluntarily. It was later reported
that over half of the teenage girls from the Yearning for Zion Ranch
had children or were pregnant. The number of 14-17 year old girls with
children was later reduced as ages became confirmed. On May 22 a state
appeals court ruled that authorities had no right to take children from
the polygamist compound. In 2009 jurors convicted sect member Raymond
Jessop (38) of sexually assaulting a girl, who became pregnant at age
16.
(AP, 4/5/08)(Econ, 4/12/08, p.36)(WSJ, 4/29/08,
p.A1)(SFC, 5/17/08, p.A2)(SFC, 5/23/08, p.A2)(SFC, 11/6/09, p.A6)
2008 Apr 4, In SF cyclist Tammy
Thomas, Univ. of Oklahoma law student, was found guilty of lying to a
federal grand jury about her use of banned drugs.
(SFC, 4/5/08, p.A1)
2008 Apr 4, In southern
Afghanistan a roadside bomb killed a Canadian soldier, while a suicide
attack in the same region left three policemen and a civilian dead.
(AP, 4/5/08)
2008 Apr 4, In Argentina a court
sentenced the adoptive parents of a baby born to a missing political
prisoner to up to eight years in prison for concealing the child's
identity, in a landmark case with roots in Argentina's dictatorship.
(AP, 4/4/08)
2008 Apr 4, In Brazil officials
said floods triggered by two weeks of torrential downpours have killed
at least 10 people and forced more than 30,000 people to flee their
homes in the normally arid northeast.
(AP, 4/5/08)
2008 Apr 4, In London a prosecutor
told a court that Assad Sarwar (27), a man accused of plotting to down
trans-Atlantic airliners, was also developing plans to cripple nuclear
power stations, a European gas pipeline and Britain's electricity grid.
(AP, 4/5/08)
2008 Apr 4, A Bulgarian official
revealed that the country's communist-era border troops killed East
Germans and others who tried to get to the West by sneaking across this
Balkan country's borders during the Cold War. Documents detailed at
least two cases in which citizens of then communist East Germany were
killed, one in 1974 and one in 1988. Archives also showed that 22
Bulgarians were shot while trying to escape to Greece or Turkey between
1964 and 1967.
(AP, 4/5/08)
2008 Apr 4, Chile's Constitutional
Court halted a government program that provided the contraceptive known
as the "morning-after" pill free to women and girls as young as 14.
(AP, 4/4/08)
2008 Apr 4, In China the
traditional Qingming Festival (Tomb Sweeping Day), was celebrated as an
official holiday for the first time.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qingming_Festival)
2008 Apr 4, Interpol issued a "red
notice" for the capture of Colombian rebel leader Rodrigo Granda,
wanted in connection with the 2004 high-profile kidnapping and killing
of Cecilia Cubas (31), the daughter of former Paraguay Pres. Raul Cubas.
(AP, 4/5/08)
2008 Apr 4, US President George W.
Bush arrived in Croatia after a NATO summit at which leaders invited
the former Yugoslav republic to join the 26-nation western alliance.
(AP, 4/4/08)
2008 Apr 4, At least three
Haitians were killed and 25 others injured amid food riots and clashes
with UN peacekeepers.
(AP, 4/4/08)
2008 Apr 4, Indonesia's Supreme
Court overturned the conviction of a notorious militia leader accused
in attacks that left about 1,000 people dead following East Timor's
1999 independence vote. With Eurico Guterres' upcoming release, all 18
suspects originally indicted will have been acquitted or set free.
(AP, 4/5/08)
2008 Apr 4, Iraq's prime minister
ordered a nationwide freeze on raids against suspected Shiite militants
after the leader of the biggest militia complained that arrests were
continuing even after he ordered fighters off the streets. A suicide
bomber killed at least 15 people and wounded 8 when he blew himself up
during a policeman's funeral in Sadiyah. Military and police officials
in Basra said a number of Iraqi soldiers and police were reported to
have mutinied or refused to engage al-Sadr's militants during last
week's fighting. A roadside bomb killed four policeman and wounded one
in Hillah. In the Hayaniyah area of Basra a house was destroyed in an
airstrike. Police said five people were killed, acknowledging they
included an unspecified number of militants who had fired a mortar at
Iraqi security forces.
(AP, 4/4/08)(AP, 4/5/08)
2008 Apr 4, An executive for a
prominent Tuscan wine producer said authorities confiscated some
600,000 bottles of his company's 2003 Brunello di Montalcino, alleging
too many bottles were produced for it to be entirely authentic.
(AP, 4/4/08)
2008 Apr 4, In Mexico two soldiers
deserted and were later killed during a gunbattle with police in the
state of Nuevo Leon. 3 state police officers and a civilian also died
in the violence. The Mexican army said soldiers looking for drug
traffickers found $6 million in cash inside a truck near the US border
and arrested five men at the scene. The daily El Universal reported
that five soldiers had been arrested for passing information to the
Sinaloa alliance of Pacific Coast smugglers.
(AP, 4/5/08)(Reuters, 4/4/08)
2008 Apr 4, In the West Bank 12
members of the members of the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades fled the
Palestinian-run Jneid Prison in Nablus, complaining that guards had
pummeled them with clubs following a fight among the detainees.
(AP, 4/5/08)
2008 Apr 4, In Panama Cecilio
Padron (66), a Cuban-American businessman tied to an influential
anti-Castro organization, was kidnapped. He was released on Feb 23,
2009 following a $3 million ransom. Three national police officers and
two civilians were later detained in connection with the kidnapping.
The police were accused of handing Padron over to his kidnappers in
exchange for $500 each.
(AP, 3/4/09)
2008 Apr 4, President Gloria
Arroyo announced major investments to overhaul the Philippine
agriculture sector, as the country grapples with soaring rice prices
that have raised fears of social unrest.
(AFP, 4/4/08)
2008 Apr 4, Russian President
Vladimir Putin strongly criticized NATO's eastward expansion plans but
ruled out chances of a new Cold War, insisting that Moscow wants to be
friends with the Western military alliance.
(AP, 4/4/08)
2008 Apr 4, In Russia an
explosion, apparently caused by an accident with gas-powered welding
equipment in an apartment, ripped through a Moscow apartment tower,
blowing out exterior walls, sparking a fire and killing at least three
people.
(AP, 4/4/08)
2008 Apr 4, Pirate attackers off
Somalia’s coast stormed the 288-foot Le Ponant as it returned without
passengers from the Seychelles, in the Indian Ocean. French officials
hoped to avoid using force to free the 30 crew members.
(AP, 4/5/08)
2008 Apr 4, Lee Kun-Hee (66), the
head of South Korea's biggest business group, Samsung, appeared for
questioning as part of a high-profile probe into an alleged
multi-million dollar bribery slush fund.
(AFP, 4/4/08)
2008 Apr 4, A South Korean
official said quarantine workers have destroyed more than 100,000
chickens following the first outbreak of a deadly strain of bird flu in
the country in more than a year.
(AP, 4/4/08)
2008 Apr 4, Sri Lanka's air force
bombed and destroyed a Tamil separatist training camp in the island's
north.
(AP, 4/4/08)
2008 Apr 4, In Thailand climate
negotiators ended 5 days of talks. More than 160 nations agreed to
consider how to reduce rapidly growing emissions from air and sea
travel as they worked toward drafting an ambitious new treaty on global
warming.
(AFP, 4/4/08)(WSJ, 4/5/08, p.A1)
2008 Apr 4, In Zimbabwe the ruling
ZANU-PF party decided President Robert Mugabe should contest a runoff
vote against opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai if neither wins a
majority in a presidential election. Hundreds of guerrilla war veterans
who support President Robert Mugabe marched through the capital,
raising fears he might turn to violence to prolong his rule.
Authorities introduced a new 50 million bank note, state media
reported. The new Zimbabwe dollar note is worth $1 in black market
trading and can buy just three loaves of bread.
(Reuters, 4/4/08)(AP, 4/4/08)
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