Today in History - July 1
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2009 Jul 31,
California authorities said the white striped fruit fly has been found
in Southern California, marking the first detection of the Southeast
Asian pest in the Western Hemisphere. Several thousand traps were soon
placed in the La Verne area of eastern Los Angeles County, where 7 of
the flies were found.
(SFC, 8/1/09, p.A4)
2009 Jul 31, A jury ordered Joel
Tenenbaum (b.1983), a student at Boston Univ., to pay damages of
$675,000 for sharing 30 songs over the Internet. He was later ordered
to destroy his illegal music files — but a judge declined to force him
to stop promoting the activity.
(Econ, 9/5/09, TQ
p.4)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joel_Tenenbaum)(AP, 12/7/09)
2009 Jul 31, The space shuttle
Endeavour returned to Florida after over 2 weeks aloft and a successful
construction job that boosted the size and power of the international
space station.
(AP, 8/1/09)
2009 Jul 31, In Afghanistan a US
service member died in the south of the country. In Geneva the UN
issued a report stating that the number of civilians killed in conflict
in Afghanistan has jumped 24% so far this year, with bombings by
insurgent and airstrikes by international forces the biggest single
killers.
(AP, 7/31/09)
2009 Jul 31, UN human rights
experts asked Azerbaijan to stop curbing free speech and to protect
journalists from harassment, violence and even murder.
(Reuters, 7/31/09)
2009 Jul 31, In southeastern
Bangladesh landslides caused by heavy monsoon rains killed 10 people.
(AP, 7/31/09)
2009 Jul 31, Britain's defense
ministry said Sikh soldiers have begun guarding the monarch and her
treasures. “Regiments take it in turn to stand in for the Household
Division and it just happens that two of the soldiers this time round
are Sikh.”
(AP, 7/31/09)
2009 Jul 31, In Colombia at least
eight former officials of the domestic intelligence agency surrendered
to face criminal charges for allegedly spying illegally on opponents of
President Alvaro Uribe including judges, journalists and human rights
workers.
(AP, 8/1/09)
2009 Jul 31, Cuba suspended plans
for a Communist Party congress and lowered its 2009 economic growth
projection from 2.5% to 1.7%, as the island's economy struggled through
a "very serious" crisis.
(AP, 7/31/09)
2009 Jul 31, An Indian court
issued a warrant for the arrest of Warren Anderson, the former head of
the American chemical company responsible for a gas leak that killed at
least 10,000 people in Bhopal 25 years ago. Anderson was the head of
Union Carbide Corp. when its factory in the central Indian city leaked
40 tons of poisonous gas on Dec. 3, 1984, in the world's worst
industrial disaster. In 1989, Union Carbide paid $470 million in
compensation to the Indian government and said officials were
responsible for the cleanup. India said its efforts were slowed when
Midland, Mich.-based Dow Chemical Co. took over Union Carbide in 2001,
seven years after Union Carbide sold its interest in the Bhopal plant.
(AP, 7/31/09)
2009 Jul 31, Iran detained 3
Americans after they mistakenly crossed the border from northern Iraq.
They crossed into Iranian territory while hiking in a mountainous area
near the town of Ahmed Awaa. Freelance journalist Shane Bauer, Sara
Shourd and Josh Fattal, all graduates of the University of California,
Berkeley, were detained after apparently straying across the border
while hiking in Iraq's northern Kurdish region.
(AP, 8/1/09)(AP, 11/9/09)
2009 Jul 31, In Iraq bombs
exploded near five Shiite mosques in Baghdad, killing at least 29
people, in an apparent coordinated attack that targeted worshippers
leaving Friday prayers. Iraqi police announced they had recovered
millions of dollars stolen on July 28 from a state-run bank in a
robbery that left eight guards dead.
(AP, 7/31/09)
2009 Jul 31, The Irish Times
newspaper won a long-running legal battle to protect the identity of a
key source who provided documents showing that former PM Bertie Ahern
was under investigation for corruption. Colm Keena and Geraldine
Kennedy had refused to comply with an October 2007 High Court judgment
ordering them to identify their source for the confidential documents
from a fact-finding tribunal into political corruption. The scandal
spurred Ahern to resign in May 2008 after 11 years in power.
(AP, 7/31/09)
2009 Jul 31, In Mexico assailants
gunned down five men and a woman in a pool hall in the border city of
Ciudad Juarez.
(AP, 7/31/09)
2009 Jul 31, Anuradha Koirala, the
founder of Nepalese charity Maiti Nepal, said British actress Joanna
Lumley has agreed to be its international ambassador. The charity helps
victims of human trafficking.
(AFP, 7/31/09)
2009 Jul 31, Nigeria's national
police claimed victory over a radical Islamist sect after its leader
was killed by security forces. Experts warned revenge attacks could
occur and a leading human rights group demanded a probe into the
killing. At least 300 people were killed in violence that erupted in
several states around northern Nigeria since July 26.
(Reuters, 7/31/09)
2009 Jul 31, Pakistan's Supreme
Court ruled that former Pres. Pervez Musharraf's imposition of
emergency rule in 2007 was unconstitutional.
(AP, 7/31/09)
2009 Jul 31, Turkey's navy
commandos aboard a frigate captured seven pirates in the Gulf of Aden
off Somalia's coast. Turkish commandos had captured five other pirates
in a similar operation in the Gulf of Aden a week ago.
(AP, 7/31/09)
2009 Jul 31, Venezuelan regulators
revoked the broadcast rights of 34 radio stations for allegedly failing
to submit the proper paperwork to the broadcasting regulator, deepening
a rift between President Chavez's government and the private media.
Venezuelan lawmakers approved an election law to redraw voting
districts, a step that President Hugo Chavez's opponents say will give
his party a big advantage in next year's congressional vote.
(AP, 7/31/09)(AP, 8/1/09)(Econ, 8/8/09, p.32, 34)
2009 Jul 31, A new study by the
Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation and Vietnam's ministry of
defense said more than one-third of the land in six central Vietnamese
provinces remained contaminated with land mines and unexploded bombs
from the Vietnam War.
(AP, 7/31/09)
2009 Jul 31, Global Witness, which
monitors the exploitation of natural resources, backed calls for a ban
on trading in Zimbabwe diamonds due to human rights abuses in mining of
the gem.
(AFP, 7/31/09)
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