Today in History - August 4
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1060 Aug 4, Henry
I (52), King of France (1027-60), died.
(MC, 8/4/02)
1181 Aug 4, A supernova was seen
in Cassiopeia. Chinese and Japanese astronomers observed a supernova.
The star 3C58 was later identified as the heart of the explosion in the
constellation Cassiopeia. In 2002 it was thought to be composed of
quarks.
(MC, 8/4/02)(SFC, 4/11/02, p.A2)
1265 Aug 4, King Henry III in the
Battle at Evesham put down a revolt of English barons lead by Simon de
Montfort. Montfort, the English earl of Leicester, died in the battle.
(HN, 8/4/98)(MC, 8/4/02)
1347 Aug 4, English troops
conquered Ft. Calais. After an 11 month siege, French Calais fell to
England's King Edward III. English rule lasted for more than two
centuries.
(WSJ, 11/6/95, p. A-1)(MC, 8/4/02)
1476 Aug 4, Jacob van
Armagnac-Pardiac, French duke of Nemours, was beheaded.
(MC, 8/4/02)
1498 Aug 4-1498 Aug 12,
Christopher Columbus explored the Gulf of Paria (Venezuela) between
Trinidad and South America.
(http://www1.minn.net/~keithp/v3.htm)
1558 Aug 4, 1st printing of Zohar
(Jewish Kabala).
(MC, 8/4/02)
1578 Aug 4, A crusade against the
Moors of Morocco was routed at the Battle of Alcazar-el-Kebir. King
Sebastian of Portugal and 8,000 of his soldiers were killed. Sebastian
was killed along with the King of Fez and the Moorish Pretender in the
Battle of Alcazar. He was succeeded by Cardinal Henry.
(TL-MB, 1988, p.22)(HN, 8/4/98)
1664 Aug 4, Louis Lully, composer,
was born.
(MC, 8/4/02)
1666 Aug 4, Johan Evertsen,
Italian admiral of Zeeland, was lynched in Brielle.
(MC, 8/4/02)
1689 Aug 4-5, War between England
and France led them to use their native American allies as proxies. In
retaliation for the French attack on the Seneca in 1687, one thousand,
five hundred Iroquois, with English support, attacked Lachine down
river from the mission of the Mountain of Ville-Marie (Montreal),
killing some 400. They put everything to fire and axe. Some
suggest that this is a gross exaggeration and that only 24-25 were
killed and likely 90 were captured by the Iroquois, but never returned.
(www.telusplanet.net/public/dgarneau/french23.htm)
1693 Aug 4, Dom Perignon invented
champagne. [see 1688]
(MC, 8/4/02)
1704 Aug 4, In the War of Spanish
Succession, an Anglo-Dutch fleet captured Gibraltar.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Gibraltar)(AP, 9/19/06)
1705 Aug 4, Vaclav Matyas Gurecky,
composer, was born.
(MC, 8/4/02)
1717 Aug 4, A friendship treaty
was signed between France and Russia.
(HN, 8/4/98)
1735 Aug 4, A jury acquitted John
Peter Zenger of the New York Weekly Journal of seditious libel.
(AP, 8/4/97)
1753 Aug 4, George Washington
became a master mason.
(MC, 8/4/02)
1789 Aug 4, The Constituent
Assembly in France dissolved feudal system by abolishing the privileges
of nobility.
(HN, 8/4/98)(MC, 8/4/02)
1790 Aug. 4, US Treasury Secretary
Alexander Hamilton urged that ten boats for the collection of revenue
be built. This was to stop smuggling, especially of coffee, which was
hampering trade. The Coast Guard was born as the Revenue Cutter
Service. The Coast Guard was empowered to board and inspect any vessel
in US waters and any US boat anywhere in the world.
(Smith., 8/95, p.25)(HFA, '96, p.36)(SFC, 5/20/96,
p.A-16)(AP, 8/4/00)
1792 Aug 4, Percy Bysshe Shelley
(d.1822), English poet and author who wrote "Prometheus Unbound," was
born in Field Place, England. He married Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin,
author of "Frankenstein." He wrote the poem "Adonais."
(WUD, 1994, p.1314)(HN, 8/4/98)
1805 Aug 4, William Rowan
Hamilton (d.1865), Irish scientist, was born.
(HN, 8/4/00)
1809 Aug 4, Hapsburg Emp. Francis
I appointed Count Clemens von Metternich (36) minister of state.
(PC, 1992 ed, p.371)
1821 Aug 4, The 1st edition of
Saturday Evening Post was published. It continued until 1969.
(MC, 8/4/02)
1830 Aug 4, Plans for the city of
Chicago were laid out.
(AP, 8/4/97)
1855 Aug 4, John Bartlett, a
Cambridge bookseller, published the 1st edition of "Bartlett’s Familiar
Quotations."
(WSJ, 10/18/02, p.W17)(MC, 8/4/02)
1864 Aug 4, Federal troops fail to
capture Fort Gaines on Dauphin Island, one of the Confederate forts
defending Mobile Bay. [see Aug 3]
(HN, 8/4/99)
1875 Aug 4, The first Convention
of Colored Newspapermen was held in Cincinnati, Ohio.
(HN, 8/4/98)
1875 Aug 4, Hans Christian
Andersen (b.1805), Danish fairy tale writer, died. His biography was
later written by Elias Bredsdorff (d.2002 at 90).
(SFC, 8/23/02, p.A27)(MC, 8/4/02)
1879 Aug 4, A law was passed in
Germany making Alsace Lorraine a territory of the empire.
(HN, 8/4/98)
1884 Aug 4, Thomas Stevens
(1853-1935) arrived in Boston after 104 days from SF in the 1st bicycle
trip to cross the US. He later continued around world (2 yrs 9 mos) on
a trip financed with articles for "Outing and the Wheelman" magazine.
(MC, 4/22/02)(ON, 9/03, p.12)
1892 Aug 4, Lizzie Borden’s father
and stepmother, Andrew and Abby Durfee Gray Borden, were killed with an
ax in Fall River, Mass. Based on strong circumstantial evidence, Sunday
school teacher Lizzie (32), Andrew Borden's daughter from a previous
marriage, was charged and acquitted of the murders by an all-male jury.
Later an opera titled "Lizzie Borden" by Jack Beeson drew a portrait of
family pathology that depicted her as guilty of the crime.
(WSJ,3/13/95, p.A-13)(AP, 8/4/97)(SFC, 9/17/97,
p.A16)(HNPD, 8/4/98)
1900 Aug 4, Louis "Satchmo"
Armstrong, (Daniel Louis Armstrong, d.1971) jazz trumpet player, was
born in New Orleans. He developed a vocal style called "scat singing";
was a band leader, film star and worldwide celebrity; his career
spanned five decades. His autobiography “Satchmo” was published in
1954. "I got a simple rule about everybody. If you don't treat me
right, shame on you." Laurence Bergreen in 1997 wrote a biography
titled: "Louis Armstrong: An Extravagant Life."
(SFEC, 6/29/97, BR p.4)(AP,
12/1/99)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Armstrong)
1900 Aug 4, Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon
(d.2002), later known as the Queen Mum (mother of Queen Elizabeth II),
was born in Scotland as the daughter of Lord Glamis, who became the
14th Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorne. She later became the wife of
King George VI.
(SFC, 8/4/00, p.A18)(SFC, 8/5/00, p.A12)(WSJ,
8/10/00, p.A16)(MC, 8/4/02)
1901 Aug 4, Louis Armstrong, jazz
trumpet player, was born. Laurence Bergreen in 1997 wrote a biography
titled: "Louis Armstrong: An Extravagant Life." [see Jul 4, 1900]
(SFEC, 6/29/97, BR p.4)(HN, 8/4/01)
1903 Aug 4, Cardinal Giuseppe
Sarto of Venice was elected Pope Pius X.
(MC, 8/4/02)
1908 Aug 4, Bronson Howard
(b.1842), playwright and Detroit-born founder of the American
Dramatist’s Club, died in New Jersey.
(www.theatredatabase.com/19th_century/bronson_howard_001.html)
1909 Aug 4, Baseball umpire Tim
Hurst instigated a riot by spitting at A's 2nd baseman Eddie Collins,
who had questioned a call. This lead to Hurst's banishment.
(MC, 8/4/02)
1912 Aug 4, Raoul Wallenberg,
Swedish diplomat credited with saving nearly 100,000 Budapest Jews
during World War II, was born.
(HN, 8/4/98)
1912 Aug 4, The 1st detachment of
American forces requested by President Diaz, arrived at Managua,
Nicaragua, from Corinto. It was a handful of seamen from the USS
ANNAPOLIS.
(http://www.scuttlebuttsmallchow.com/usmcnic3.html)
1914 Aug 4, Britain and Belgium
declared war after German troops entered Belgium. The United States
proclaimed its neutrality.
(HNQ, 7/24/98)(AP, 8/4/97)
1916 Aug 4, The United States
signed a treaty to purchase the Danish Virgin Islands for $25 million.
The US purchased the southern Virgin Islands including St. Thomas, St.
John, St. Croix and about 50 other small Caribbean islets and cays from
Denmark. They were then known as the Danish West Indies. The Act of
March 3, 1917, authorized payment by the US of $25 million for the
Virgin Islands.
(WUD, 1994, p.1595)(AP, 8/4/97)(HNQ, 11/20/99)
1917 Aug 4, Pravda called for the
killing of all capitalists, priests and officers.
(MC, 8/4/02)
1929 Aug 4, Some 60,000 SA and SS
storm troopers marched in Munich.
(MC, 8/4/02)
1930 Aug 4, Michael Cullen
introduced King Kullen in queens, NYC, the 1st US supermarket.
(SFC, 8/4/05, p.C1)
1930 Aug 4, Siegfried Wagner (61),
German opera composer and son of Richard Wagner, died.
(MC, 8/4/02)
1932 Aug 4, Luigi Beccali
(1907-1990), Italian athlete, won Olympic gold in the 1500 meters. He
gave a Fascist salute at the winners’ podium.
(WSJ, 4/12/08, p.R2)(http://tinyurl.com/6al4up)
1936 Aug 4, Jesse Owens
(1913-1980) won his 2nd Olympic medal (long jump) at the Berlin
Olympics.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Owens)
1940 Aug 4, The Paris Soir
reported that Gen. Charles de Gaulle had been condemned to death in
absentia for treason by a Vichy military court.
(WSJ, 8/2/00, p.A12)
1942 Aug 4, The British government
charged that Mohandas Gandhi and his All-Indian Congress Party favored
"appeasement" with Japan.
(HN, 8/4/98)
1942 Aug 4, The 1st train with
Jews departed Mechelen, Belgium, to Auschwitz.
(MC, 8/4/02)
1944 Aug 4, RAF pilot T. D. Dean
became the first pilot to destroy a V-1 buzz bomb when he tipped the
pilotless craft's wing, sending it off course.
(HN, 8/4/98)
1944 Aug 4, British 8th army
reached the suburbs of Florence, Italy.
(MC, 8/4/02)
1944 Aug 4, Nazi police
raided the secret annex of a building in Amsterdam and arrested eight
people, including 15-year-old Anne Frank, whose diary became a famous
account of the Holocaust. She died at the Bergen-Belsen concentration
camp in the spring of 1945, just weeks before the camp was liberated.
(AP, 8/4/02)
1944 Aug 4, A Halifax JP-276A took
off on its final flight from the Italian city of Brindisi around 8
p.m., to drop weapons, ammunition and medical supplies for resistance
fighters involved in the Warsaw Uprising against the Nazis. The plane
was shot down by Poland's Nazis occupiers and crashed near the town of
Dabrowa Tarnowska, in southern Poland. Remnants were recovered in 2006
and the remains of the crew, 5 Canadians and 2 Britons, were formally
buried in 2007.
(AP, 10/4/07)
1948 Aug 4, A 5 day US southern
filibuster succeeded in maintaining the poll tax.
(MC, 8/4/02)
1952 Aug 4, Helicopters from the
U.S. Air Force Air Rescue Service landed in Germany, completing the
first transatlantic flight by helicopter in 51 hours and 55 minutes of
flight time.
(HN, 8/4/00)
1953 Aug 4, Black families moved
into the Trumbull Park housing project in Chicago.
(MC, 8/4/02)
1954 Aug 4, A uranium rush began
in Saskatchewan, Canada.
(MC, 8/4/02)
1955 Aug 4, Billy Bob Thornton,
American actor, was born. He became an occasional director, playwright,
screenwriter and singer. By 2009 he was married five times, his most
recent ex-wife being actress Angelina Jolie.
(www.spiritus-temporis.com/billy-bob-thornton/)
1955 Aug 4, Eisenhower authorized
$46 million for the construction of CIA headquarters.
(MC, 8/4/02)
1955 Aug 4, The U-2 reconnaissance
prototype made its first flight.
(NPub, 2002, p.17)
1956 Aug 4, Elvis Presley released
"Hound Dog."
(MC, 8/4/02)
1958 Aug 4, Mary Decker Stanley,
winner of seven track and field records, was born.
(HN, 8/4/98)
1958 Aug 4, Billboard, founded in
1894, premiered its all-genre singles Hot 100 chart.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billboard_Hot_100)
1961 Aug 4, Barack Obama, later US
Senator from Illinois, was born in Honolulu to a black Kenyan father
and a white American mother. He lived most of his early life in Hawaii.
From ages six to ten, he lived in Jakarta, Indonesia with his mother
and Indonesian stepfather.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barack_Obama)
1962 Aug 4, Nelson Mandela was
captured by South African police.
(MC, 8/4/02)
1964 Aug 4, Pres. Johnson ordered
an immediate retaliation for the Aug 2 attack on the US destroyer
Maddox in the Gulf of Tonkin off North Vietnam.
(SSFC, 6/9/02, p.F5)
1964 Aug 4, The destroyers U.S.S.
Maddox and Turner Joy allegedly exchanged fire with supposed North
Vietnamese patrol boats. At the time it was taken as evidence that
Hanoi was raising the stakes against the United States. The destroyers
were in effect shooting at false radar contacts. In 2005 it was
reported that a secret 2001 report had concluded that the NSA officers
deliberately distorted the Aug 4 data to support the belief that North
Vietnamese ships attacked American destroyers 2 days after a previous
clash.
(www.usni.org/navalhistory/articles99/nhandrade.htm#tx17)(SFC,
10/31/05, p.A3)
1964 Aug 4, The bodies of missing
civil rights workers Michael H. Schwerner, Andrew Goodman and James E.
Chaney were found buried in an earthen dam in Nashoba County,
Mississippi. Schwerner and Goodman were Jewish-Americans from Pelham
and New York City respectively and Chaney was a Black from Meridian,
Mississippi. The three civil rights workers had disappeared from
Philadelphia, Mississippi, on June 21, 1964, not long after they had
been held for six hours in the Neshoba County, Mississippi jail on
charges of speeding. Their burned car was discovered on June
23rd, prompting a search by the FBI for the three young men.
Their story became the basis for the movie Mississippi Burning,
starring Gene Hackman, Willem Defoe and Frances McDormand in 1988. In
2005, on the forty-first anniversary of the crime, Edgar Ray Killen
(80) an ordained Baptist minister, was found guilty of three counts of
manslaughter.
(AP, 8/4/97)(WSJ, 1/16/98, p.A12)
1972 Aug 4, Arthur Bremer (b.1950)
was sentenced to 63 years for shooting Alabama Gov. Wallace and 3
bystanders on May 15, 1972, in Laurel, Maryland. An appeal reduced the
sentence to 53 years. After 35 years of incarceration, Bremer was
released from prison on parole on November 9, 2007. He remains on
probation until 2025 and resides in a halfway house in Cumberland,
Maryland.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Bremer#Release)
1972 Aug 4, Uganda’s president Idi
Amin gave some 50,000 Asians 90 days to leave the country following an
alleged dream in which, he claimed, God told him to expel them.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idi_Amin)
1975 Aug 4, In Malaysia the
Japanese Red Army raided a building in Kuala Lumpur that housed US,
Swedish, Japanese and Canadian embassies. 52 hostages were exchanged
for Red Army members.
(http://www.ioss.gov/docs/julytodecember.html)
1977 Aug 4, President Carter
signed a measure establishing the Department of Energy.
(AP, 8/4/97)
1977 Aug 4, In San Francisco some
50 elderly tenants of the International Hotel in Chinatown were
forcefully evicted by police as thousands of protestors filled the
streets. The structure was demolished in 1979 and a hole occupied the
site. In 2004 city officials declared a 2-block corridor on Kearny as
“Manilatown” as construction rose on 14-story Int’l. Hotel Senior
Residences. In 2007 Estella Habal authored “San Francisco’s
International Hotel: Mobilizing the Filipino American Community in the
Anti-Eviction Movement.”
(SFC, 12/13/96, p.A30)(SFC, 8/1/97,
p.A25)(eyewitness)(SFC, 6/8/01, WBa p.6)(SFC, 7/24/02, p.A17)(SFC,
7/28/04, p.B1)(SSFC, 8/19/07, p.M1)
1982 Aug 4, Ronald Smith of Canada
killed two Americans in Montana during a drunken road trip. In March
1893 Smith was convicted and sentenced to death.
(Econ, 5/24/08,
p.55)(http://bulk.resource.org/courts.gov/c/F2/914/914.F2d.1153.88-4115.html)
1983 Aug 4, In Burkina Faso Blaise
Compaore played a key role in a coup that brought Thomas Sankara
(1949-1987) to power.
(Econ, 3/21/09,
p.49)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Sankara)
1987 Aug 4, The Federal
Communications Commission voted 4-0 to rescind the Fairness Doctrine,
which required radio and television stations to present balanced
coverage of controversial issues. The US Supreme Court had ruled it
constitutional in 1969.
(AP, 8/4/97)(SFC, 5/5/03, p.B4)
1987 Aug 4, Jesse Unruh (b.1922),
Democrat and the 54th speaker of the California state Assembly
(1961-1969), died while serving as California state treasurer
(1975-1987). In 2007 Bill Boyarsky authored “Big Daddy: Jesse Unruh and
the Art of Power Politics.”
(SSFC, 11/11/07,
p.M1)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Unruh)
1988 Aug 4, Hertz car rental
agreed to pay out $23 million in a consumer fraud case.
(www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1282/is_n18_v40/ai_6636696)
1989 Aug 4, Iranian President
Hashemi Rafsanjani offered to help end the hostage crisis in Lebanon,
prompting President Bush to say he was "encouraged."
(AP, 8/4/99)
1990 Aug 4, In Armenia Levon
Ter-Petrosyan (52) was elected Chairman of the Armenian Supreme Soviet.
(www.armeniapedia.org/index.php?title=Levon_Ter_Petrosian)
1990 Aug 4, The European Community
imposed an embargo on imports of oil from Iraq and Kuwait to protest
the Baghdad government’s invasion of its oil-rich neighbor.
(AP, 8/4/00)
1991 Aug 4, The Greek luxury liner
"Oceanos" sank in heavy seas off South Africa’s southeast coast; all
402 passengers and 179 crew members survived.
(AP, 8/4/01)
1991 Aug 4, Israeli Cabinet
members overwhelmingly backed a Middle East peace conference under
conditions set by Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir.
(AP, 8/4/01)
1992 Aug 4, The crew of the space
shuttle Atlantis encountered difficulties as they tried to reel out a
satellite attached to miles of thin cord as part of an
electricity-producing experiment.
(AP, 8/4/97)
1993 Aug 4, The US Senate approved
a $5.8 billion disaster bill for Midwestern flood victims.
(AP, 8/4/98)
1993 Aug 4, A federal judge
sentenced Los Angeles police officers Stacey Koon and Laurence Powell
to 2 1/2 years in prison for violating Rodney King's civil rights.
(AP, 8/4/98)
1993 Aug 4, Rwandan Hutu's and
Tutsi's negotiated power-sharing agreement in Arusha, Tanzania. It was
viewed as a sellout by extremist leaders of the Hutu majority.
(WSJ, 11/15/96, p.A16)(MC, 8/4/02)
1994 Aug 4, Howard Stern dropped
out of the NY gubernatorial race.
(MC, 8/4/02)
1994 Aug 4, Serb-dominated
Yugoslavia withdrew its support for Bosnian Serbs, sealing the 300-mile
border between Yugoslavia and Serb-held Bosnia.
(AP, 8/4/99)
1995 Aug 4, A US judge ruled that
Oregon's assisted-suicide law, approved by the voters last Nov., is
unconstitutional. The law would have allowed doctors to prescribe
lethal doses of drugs for dying patients.
(WSJ, 8/4/95, p.B-1)
1995 Aug 4, That 1% of Americans
own 40% of the nation's wealth is uncontested as fact.
(WSJ, 8/4/95, p.A-11)
1995 Aug 4, J. Howard Marshall II,
Texas oil tycoon and alumnus of Haverford College, Pa., died. In 1994
Marshall married Playboy Playmate Anna Nicole Smith (26). In 2002, a
federal judge ruled that the dying 90-year-old truly loved his then
26-year-old wife and awarded her $88 million in a court fight with
Marshall’s son. In 2004 an appeals court reversed the judgement.
(www.lasc.org/opinions/97cc1718.opn.pdf)(AP,
12/31/04)
1995 Aug 4, Croatia launched an
offensive against Krajina, Operation Storm, and captured in days a
region that Serb rebels had held for 4 years. Most of its province of
Krajina, including the Serb stronghold Knin, was taken in a 3-day
offensive. Some 3,000 shells were fired into Knin and less than 250 hit
military targets. Some 100,000 Croatian Serbs were driven from the
area. Up to 600 Serb civilians were killed. A report on the events was
published in 1999: "Report on the Military Operation Storm and its
Aftermath" by the Croatian Helsinki Committee for Human Rights.
(WSJ, 6/11/96, p.A14)(SFC,10/16/97, p.A12)(SFEC,
3/21/99, p.A17)(SFC, 4/27/99, p.A10)
1996 Aug 4, On the final day of
the Atlanta Olympics, Josia Thugwane became the first black South
African to win a gold medal as he finished first in the marathon; the
U.S. women's basketball team defeated Brazil 111-87 to win the gold;
David Reid won the only boxing gold medal for the United States. A
three-hour closing ceremony of music, dance and light, attended by at
least 80,000 people, brought the games to an official close with a
final ceremony.
(WSJ, 8/5/96, p.A1)(AP, 8/4/97)
1996 Aug 4, In San Francisco the
Cannabis Buyer’s Club at 1444 Market St. was raided by agents of the
California Bureau of Narcotic Enforcement.
(SFC, 8/5/96, p.A1)
1997 Aug 4, US Teamsters under Ron
Carey (1935-2008) went on a 15-day strike against United Parcel Service
after talks broke down with nation's largest package delivery service.
(AP, 8/4/98)(SFC, 12/13/08, p.B5)
1997 Aug 4, From Bosnia it was
reported that Croats near Jajce had driven out hundreds of Muslims who
had recently returned to their homes.
(WSJ, 8/4/97, p.A1)
1997 Aug 4, In Cuba a small
explosion damaged a lobby in a Havana hotel. US-based groups were
blamed for this and a pair of bombings from 3 weeks ago.
(WSJ, 8/5/97, p.A1)
1997 Aug 4, In France the world’s
oldest person, Jeanne Calment (122), died in a retirement home in
Arles. The title was passed on to Christien Mortensen of San Rafael,
Ca., (115). It was later found that Marie-Louise Febronie Meilleur of
Ontario was to turn 117 in August.
(SFC, 8/5/97, p.A18)(SFC, 8/15/97, p.A20)(AP, 8/4/98)
1997 Aug 4, From Mexico it was
reported that the Lacandon Jungle rain forest was 40% destroyed from
its original 4 million acres. Poor peasants were clearing the jungle by
fire to provide for agricultural needs.
(SFC, 8/4/97, p.A8)
1997 Aug 4, In Mexico gunmen
killed 6 people in the Max Fim restaurant in Ciudad Juarez.
(SFC, 8/5/97, p.A9)
1997 Aug 4, In Montserrat
superheated rock from the Soufriere Hills volcano flowed into the
abandoned capital of Plymouth.
(SFC, 8/5/97, p.A9)
1997 Aug 4, Russia announced that
it would redenominate the ruble at the beginning of 1998. Three zeroes
would be taken off the bills with current inflation at about 12%.
(WSJ, 8/5/97, p.A1)
1997 Aug 4, In Sri Lanka weekend
fighting reportedly left 200 Tamil Tigers and 67 government troops
dead. The rebel bodies were severely disfigured.
(SFC, 8/5/97, p.A9)
1997 Aug 4, In Turkey 76 military
officers and nco’s were dismissed in a continuing effort to root out
Islamic activism in the ranks.
(WSJ, 8/5/97, p.A1)
1998 Aug 4, Turning aside an
urgent White House appeal, Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist cleared
the way for prosecutors to question White House lawyers about their
advice to President Clinton in the Monica Lewinsky case.
(AP, 8/4/99)
1998 Aug 4, In Michigan Geoffrey
Fieger, a defense lawyer for Dr. Jack Kevorkian, won the Democratic
nomination for governor.
(SFC, 8/6/93, p.A5)
1998 Aug 4, The US Air Force
announced plans to group its combat aircraft into ten teams over the
next 2 years.
(SFC, 8/5/98, p.A4)
1998 Aug 4, The Dow Jones
industrial average plunged 299.43 points, the third-biggest point drop
to that time finishing at 8,487.31.
(SFC, 8/5/98, p.A1)(AP, 8/4/99)
1998 Aug 4, In Colombia over 2
dozen attacks in half of the nation’s 32 provinces left at least 76
people dead.
(SFC, 8/5/98, p.A10)(WSJ, 8/5/98, p.A1)
1998 Aug 4, The Egyptian Jihad
under Dr. Zawahri denounced the CIA-led arrests in Albania and said
Americans should soon receive a response "in the only language that
they understand."
(WSJ, 7/2/02, p.A8)
1998 Aug 4, Japan announced that
it will begin a new nuclear power plant in Higashidori in Dec. 51
nuclear power plants currently supply about 1/3 of the nation’s power.
(SFC, 8/5/98, p.A10)
1998 Aug 4, A heat wave swept over
Eastern Europe and caused 20 deaths in Romania.
(SFC, 8/5/98, p.A10)
1998 Aug 4, In Sri Lanka Pres.
Kumaratunga ordered a month-long state of emergency and effectively
postponed provincial elections scheduled for August.
(SFC, 8/8/98, p.B1)
1999 Aug 4, On the eve of
congressional votes on the Republicans’ $792 billion tax cut proposal,
President Clinton again pledged a veto, saying the GOP package was
"risky and plainly wrong."
1999 Aug 4, The New Jersey Supreme
Court ruled that the 1990 expulsion of a gay assistant scoutmaster by
the Boy Scouts of America violated the state's anti-discrimination law.
(SFC, 8/5/99, p.A3)
1999 Aug 4, Dow Chemical said it
was acquiring Union Carbide for $9.3 billion in stock.
(SFC, 8/5/99, p.A1)
1999 Aug 4, Victor Mature
(b.1913), film star died in San Diego County, California. His career
included 55 movies, 5 marriages and $18 million which he invested
wisely.
(www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=8698)
1999 Aug 4, George Robertson,
British Defense Minister, was chosen as the new secretary general of
NATO.
(SFC, 8/5/99, p.A10)
1999 Aug 4, It was reported that
flooding of the Yangtze River had left 1.8 million people homeless.
Summer flooding left some 725 people dead.
(WSJ, 8/5/99, p.A1)(SFC, 8/6/99, p.A12)
1999 Aug 4, In Congo at least 518
people, mostly civilians, were killed when Sudanese planes, at the
request of Congo's government, bombed the rebel-held towns of Makanza
and Bogbonga. Sudan denied the charges and Congolese Pres. Kabila
denied responsibility.
(SFC, 8/5/99, p.A12)(SFC, 8/7/99, p.A12)
1999 Aug 4, Cuban high jumper
Javier Sotomajor was stripped of his gold medal from the Pan American
Games after he tested positive for cocaine.
(WSJ, 8/5/99, p.A1)
1999 Aug 4, In Iran the daily
Salam newspaper was banned for 5 years and publisher Mousavi-Khoeiniha
was barred from journalism.
(SFC, 8/5/99, p.A14)
1999 Aug 4, In Kashmir 4 days of
fighting left at least 50 people dead including 32 militants and 7
Indian soldiers.
(SFC, 8/6/99, p.A16)
1999 Aug 4, It was reported that
flooding in North Korea had claimed 42 lives.
(WSJ, 8/4/99, p.A1)
1999 Aug 4, In Russia the
Fatherland Party of Yuri Luzhkov merged with the governor's All Russia
movement.
(SFC, 8/5/99, p.A12)
2000 Aug 4, Fresh from the
Republican national convention in Philadelphia, GOP presidential
nominee George W. Bush and running mate Dick Cheney began an air and
rail tour of four swing states: Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan and
Illinois. For his part, Democratic presidential candidate Al Gore
mocked the Republican gathering as a special-interests-sponsored sham.
(AP, 8/4/01)
2000 Aug 4, NY officials issued a
statewide alert for West Nile encephalitis after the 1st case of the
year was reported on Staten Island.
(SFC, 8/5/00, p.A3)
2000 Aug 4, In England the Queen
Mum celebrated her 100th birthday.
(SFC, 8/4/00, p.A18)
2000 Aug 4, It was reported that
the war in Chechnya had killed 2,508 Russian soldiers since 8/2/99. A
mother’s group put the figure up to 6,000.
(WSJ, 8/4/00, p.A1)
2000 Aug 4, In Georgia three Red
Cross workers were believed to have been kidnapped. Their car was found
the next day near the border with Chechnya.
(SFC, 8/7/00, p.C16)(WSJ, 8/7/00, p.A1)
2000 Aug 4, Ildefonso Salido
Ibarra, owner of the El Debate newspaper, was kidnapped in Sinaloa
state. He was released after 4 days.
(SFEC, 11/12/00, p.A19)(http://tinyurl.com/25oh9b)
2000 Aug 4, Russia reported that
Chechen rebels had decapitated 2 Russian colonels, who had been seized
earlier in the Vedeno region.
(SFC, 8/5/00, p.C1)
2001 Aug 4, In Florida an
immigration official turned back Muhammed al-Kahtani (al-Qahtani), a
Saudi who had flown in from London with $2,800 in cash and no return
ticket. He was later captured in Afghanistan and detained at Guantanamo
after officials suspected that he was the intended 20th hijacker for
the Nov 11 attacks. In 2008 the Pentagon dropped charges against
al-Qahtani.
(Econ, 2/16/08, p.39)(AP, 5/13/08)
2001 Aug 4, Steve Fossett launched
his 5th bid to circle the globe in an unpressurized gondola from
Australia. He set a duration record on Aug 16 over Argentina. He was
forced down over Brazil on Aug 17.
(SFC, 8/17/01, p.D1)(SFC, 8/18/01, p.A8)
2001 Aug 4, In NYC police officer
Joseph Gray (40) ran over Maria Herrera (24), her son Andy and her
sister (16). A baby boy was delivered by c-section but did not survive.
Gray had been drinking with fellow officers at a strip club and was
later charged with manslaughter for killing the family while driving
drunk on his way to work. 17 cops at the 72nd precinct were soon
disciplined transferred or suspended. Gray was convicted of
manslaughter in 2002 and sentenced to five to 15 years in prison. Ms.
Herrera's husband, Victor, and his mother-in-law, Maria Peña,
later filed lawsuits. The city settled the civil lawsuit for $1.5
million.
(www.courttv.com/trials/gray_joseph/chronology.html)(AP,
8/5/02)(http://tinyurl.com/5oa8lz)
2001 Aug 4, Thousands of admirers
turned out in London to celebrate the 101st birthday of Britain's Queen
Mother Elizabeth in what would be the last such celebration. The Queen
Mother died March 30, 2002.
(AP, 8/4/02)
2001 Aug 4, In India torrential
rains and floods swept over Bihar state and at least 3 people were
killed. Thousands were marooned.
(SSFC, 8/5/01, p.A14)
2001 Aug 4, The Israeli army fired
missiles at a convoy carrying the Palestinian West Bank leader Marwan
Barghouti.
(SSFC, 8/5/01, p.A12)
2001 Aug 4, In Macedonia ethnic
Albanian rebels lobbed mortars at police stations near Tetovo.
(SSFC, 8/5/01, p.A14)
2001 Aug 4, Philippine soldiers
rescued 13 hostages of the 36 seized by Abu Sayyaf rebels on Aug 2.
(SSFC, 8/5/01, p.A14)
2001 Aug 4, In Moscow Kim Jong Il
and Pres. Putin signed a joint statement declaring that North Korea’s
missile program is not designed to threaten any nation.
(SSFC, 8/5/01, p.A12)(AP, 8/4/02)
2002 Aug 4, US Treasury Sec. Paul
O'Neill arrived in Uruguay and announced a $1.5 billion temporary loan
to stabilize the financial crises.
(SFC, 8/5/02, p.A10)
2002 Aug 4, It was reported that
low-grade inflammation is worse for human health than high cholesterol
levels. Increases of C-reactive protein from the inflammation could
trigger the release of lumps of plaque and cause arterial clots leading
to heart attacks. Associated factors included high blood pressure,
smoking and chronic gum disease.
(SSFC, 8/4/02, p.A9)
2002 Aug 4, In Dallas, Tx., a man,
woman and 3 children were shot to death. The woman's husband was taken
into custody.
(SFC, 8/5/02, p.A7)
2002 Aug 4, In Bolivia Gonzalo
Sanchez de Lozada (72), a wealthy businessman who grew up in the United
States and former president (1882-1997), was voted by Congress (84-43)
to the presidency for a second time.
(AP, 8/5/02)
2002 Aug 4, Britain's Queen
Elizabeth closed Manchester's hugely successful Commonwealth Games
after 11 days of sport and ceremony.
(Reuters, 8/4/02)
2002 Aug 4, Holly Wells and
Jessica Chapman vanished while walking near their homes in Soham, 12
miles northeast of Cambridge, England. [see Aug 16] On August 17, 2002
a game warden found their partially burned bodies in a six-foot-deep
ditch close to the RAF Lakenheath airbase in Suffolk.
(AP,
8/9/02)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ian_Huntley)
2002 Aug 4, India's federal
government planned to distribute 7.142 billion rupees ($147 million) to
12 states to tackle problems arising out of a failed monsoon. Much of
India was facing the worst drought in a decade due to erratic monsoon
rains. An outbreak of encephalitis in India's remote northeastern state
of Assam rose to 100 on Sunday, as heavy monsoon rains wreaked havoc in
large parts of the region.
(Reuters, 8/4/02)
2002 Aug 4, In northern Israel a
Palestinian suicide bomber blew apart a bus during rush hour, killing
at least nine people, wounding dozens. 3 more people died in a gun
battle outside the Damascus Gate. 7 Arabs with Israeli citizenship were
later arrested for assisting the bomber.
(AP, 8/4/02)(SFC, 8/5/02, p.A1)(SFC, 8/27/02, p.A10)
2002 Aug 4, In southeastern Spain
2 people, including a 6-year-old girl, were killed and several others
were injured when a car bomb exploded in front of a military police
barracks. Twenty-five others were injured.
(AP, 8/5/02)
2003 Aug 4, California Governor
Gray Davis asked the state Supreme Court to delay his Oct. 7 recall
election until the following March. The recall went ahead as originally
scheduled.
(AP, 8/5/04)
2003 Aug 4, In northern
Afghanistan a soldier of warlord Abdul Rashid Dostum mishandled a
mortar and the shell exploded, killing 13 troops and injuring nine
others.
(AP, 8/5/03)
2003 Aug 4, Azerbaijan's
parliament named ailing President Geidar Aliev's son, Ilham Geidar Oglu
Aliev (b.1961), as PM.
(AP, 8/4/03)
2003 Aug 4, Brazilian novelist
Ruben Fonseca (b.1925) won Mexico's prestigious Juan Rulfo Prize for
literature.
(AP, 8/4/03)
2003 Aug 4, In Honduras 9 members
of a family were shot to death by suspected gang that raided their home
in San Pedro Sula.
(AP, 8/4/03)
2003 Aug 4, West African forces
arrived in Liberia to oversee the departure of President Charles Taylor.
(AP, 8/4/08)
2003 Aug 4, Chung Mong-hun (54) a
top executive of the Hyundai conglomerate, whose business spearheaded
reconciliation efforts with North Korea but ended up tangled in debt
and scandal, plunged to his death from his office window.
(AP, 8/4/03)
2003 Aug 4, Mexico's federal
government dispatched some 650 federal agents to Tijuana in the latest
attempt to curb smuggling and corruption in the rough border city.
(AP, 8/4/03)
2003 cAug 4, Pres. Putin visited
Malaysia to seal a $900 million sale of Sukhoi fighter jets and tout
Russia's liberal sale policies.
(WSJ, 8/5/03, p.A1)
2004 Aug 4, Richard Smith, a
Staten Island ferry pilot, pleaded guilty to manslaughter charges in a
crash that killed 11 commuters in the October 15, 2003, wreck of the
Andrew J. Barberi Staten Island ferry, acknowledging that he'd passed
out at the helm after arriving at work with medication in his system.
(AP, 8/4/05)
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2003_Staten_Island_Ferry_crash)
2004 Aug 4, Former teacher Mary
Kay Letourneau, convicted of having sex with a sixth-grade pupil, was
released from a Washington state prison.
(AP, 8/4/05)
2004 Aug 4, It was reported that
LeapFrog Enterprises would donate 20,000 interactive women’s health
books to Afghan women under a $1.25 million development and
distribution grant from the US Dept. of health and Human Services.
(SFC, 8/4/04, p.C1)
2004 Aug
4, In China a school employee with a history of schizophrenia slashed
15 students and three teachers with a kitchen knife at a Beijing
kindergarten, killing one child and leaving terrified classmates
covered in blood.
(AP, 8/4/03)
2004 Aug 4, Fighting between
insurgents and Iraqi security forces in Mosul left at least 22 dead. At
least 14 of the dead were civilians.
(SFC, 8/5/04, p.A12)
2004 Aug 4, In Kashmir Muslim
militants killed nine Indian troopers in an attack on a paramilitary
camp, just hours before India and Pakistan, which both claim the
region, began a round of peace talks.
(AP, 8/5/04)
2004 Aug 4, Police in eastern
Nigeria discovered skulls and corpses of at least 83 people in shrines
where a secretive cult was believed to have carried out traditional
ritual killings. 30 shamans were arrested in a part of Anambra state
called “the evil forest.”
(AP, 8/5/04)(WSJ, 8/6/04, p.A1)(CP, 8/13/04)
2004 Aug 4, Clashes in the Gaza
Strip left 4 Palestinians dead including a 10-year-old boy. Israeli
forces uncovered a smuggling tunnel on the border with Egypt.
(SFC, 8/5/04, p.A3)
2004 Aug 4, The official Saudi
Press reported that municipal elections across Saudi Arabia, the first
such polls in decades, have been have been pushed back two months to
November.
(AP, 8/4/04)
2004 Aug 4, In southern Tanzania
some 22 villagers appeared in court on charges of killing 7 people who
allegedly practiced witchcraft. Villagers said the witches cut off the
sexual organs of dead villagers and used them to concoct charms
intended to bring good harvests and fortune.
(AP, 8/5/04)
2005 Aug 4, In Washington DC
Steven Rosen (53) and Keith Weissman (53), former employees of a
pro-Israeli lobbying group, were indicted for passing classified
information to foreign officials beginning in 1999.
(SFC, 8/4/05, p.A11)
2005 Aug 4, Mayor Gavin Newsom
signed a $5.3 billion SF city budget.
(SFC, 8/5/05, p.B4)
2005 Aug 4, Milton Campbell (70),
blues singer, died in Memphis, Ten.
(SFC, 8/5/05, p.B7)
2005 Aug 4, A roadside bomb
exploded near a US military vehicle near the Afghan border with
Pakistan, killing an American service member and wounding another. 2 US
service members drowned after their Humvee slid into a river during an
operation targeting insurgents in eastern Afghanistan.
(AP, 8/5/05)
2005 Aug 4, Al-Qaida's No. 2,
Ayman al-Zawahri, threatened more destruction in London in a videotape
aired on Al-Jazeera. He also threatened the United States with tens of
thousands of military dead if it did not withdraw from Iraq; President
Bush responded by saying, "We will stay the course, we will complete
the job."
(AP, 8/4/06)
2005 Aug 4, The Bank of England
cut official interest rates by a quarter of a percentage point to 4.5
percent, noting the risk that already sluggish household spending and
investment growth in Britain could slow further.
(AP, 8/4/05)
2005 Aug 4, India’s Supreme Court
upheld a lower court's death sentence on Mohammed Afzal, a resident of
south Kashmir. Afzal was found guilty of involvement in the December
2001 parliament raid in which five gunmen killed nine people before
being shot dead.
(AP, 8/5/05)
2005 Aug 4, In Bali a truth
commission set up by Indonesia and East Timor began work, seeking to
deflect growing calls for an international tribunal to probe the tiny
territory's bloody independence vote in 1999.
(AP, 8/4/05)
2005 Aug 4, A car bomb hit members
of a radical Shiite militia in northern Iraq as attacks nationwide
killed at least 11 people. Unidentified gunmen attacked an Iraqi army
patrol in a town north of Baghdad, killing four Iraqi troops. An
American soldier assigned to a unit in Mosul was killed in action.
(AP, 8/4/05)(AP, 8/6/05)
2005 Aug 4, Israel announced plans
to expand a settlement near Jerusalem even as it prepares to withdraw
from the Gaza Strip.
(AP, 8/4/05)
2005 Aug 4, Eden Natan Zada (19),
an Israeli soldier absent without leave, opened fire while riding a bus
in Shfaram, killing 4 Israeli Arabs and wounding 13. A video released
later shows him being beaten to death by the crowd immediately after,
while he was still on the bus.
(AP, 8/4/05)(SFC, 8/5/05,
p.A1)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eden_Natan-Zada)
2005 Aug 4, A Jordanian prosecutor
said Jordan has arrested 17 militants linked to al-Qaida who were
allegedly plotting to attack U.S. troops and Jordanian intelligence
agents.
(AP, 8/4/05)
2005 Aug 4, In Northern Ireland
some 40 police officers were injured trying to break up a five-hour
riot by Protestant militants who burned 10 cars and a double-decker bus
in Belfast. The mob claimed to be venting their anger over recent
police raids on the homes of Protestant paramilitary figures in the
area. About 15 homes were raided and six men arrested shortly before
the riot began.
(AP, 8/5/05)
2005 Aug 4, North Korea's envoy to
disarmament talks said that Pyongyang insists on retaining the right to
"peaceful nuclear activities," a condition that other delegates say has
deadlocked the talks.
(AP, 8/4/05)
2005 Aug 4, Pakistan's Supreme
Court blocked a proposal by an Islamist-controlled provincial
government to introduce what critics say would be a Taliban-style
judicial system enforced by religious police.
(AP, 8/4/05)
2005 Aug 4, A mini-submarine
carrying seven Russians became caught on an underwater antenna 600 feet
below the surface of the Pacific Ocean; the men were rescued three days
later with help from a British vessel.
(AP, 8/4/06)
2005 Aug 4, South Korean
researchers reported their successful cloning of a dog. The puppy was
born 3 months earlier and was the only success of 1,095 embryos. In
2006 Dr. Hwang Woo Suk’s stem cell work was discredited but the cloning
of Snuppy supported.
(SFC, 8/4/05, p.A15)(WSJ, 12/24/05, p.A1)(WSJ,
1/10/06, p.A1)
2005 Aug 4, The Sudanese Red
Crescent (SRC) said at least 130 people have been killed and around 350
injured after 3 days of violence following the death of former rebel
leader and First Vice President John Garang.
(Reuters, 8/4/05)
2005 Aug 4, In Turkey an explosion
in a trash can in an Istanbul suburb killed a mother and daughter and
injured five others as they left a wedding party.
(AP, 8/4/05)
2006 Aug 4, The US placed
sanctions on 7 firms from North Korea, Russia, India and Cuba for arms
dealings with Iran.
(WSJ, 8/5/06, p.A1)
2006 Aug 4, In Philadelphia
Danieal Kelly (14), a disabled girl, was found dead in her mother's
squalid house covered with bone-deep, maggot-infested bedsores. She
weighed 42 pounds. In 2008 4 social workers were among nine people
charged in relation to her death. In 2008 Andrea Kelly, the mother, was
charged with murder and Daniel, the father, was charged with child
endangerment. Both parents retained lawyers who filed suits against
their criminal co-defendants, blaming them for the girl's demise. In
2009 mother Andrea Kelly pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 20-40
years in prison.
(AP,
8/1/08)(www.philly.com/philly/news/26859869.html)(SFC, 4/30/09, p.A4)
2006 Aug 4, In southern
Afghanistan 2 police officers were killed and eight others wounded in a
roadside bomb aimed at a district governor. UNICEF said schools are
increasingly being attacked across Afghanistan and an estimated 100,000
children in the south are shut out of the classroom due to closures.
(AFP, 8/5/06)(Reuters, 8/4/06)
2006 Aug 4, In Argentina Julio
Simon, a former police officer, was sentenced to 25 years in prison for
human rights abuses in connection with the 1978 disappearance of
Chilean Jose Poblete and his Argentine wife, Gertrudis Hlaczik, during
the military dictatorship.
(AP, 8/5/06)
2006 Aug 4, Bangladesh announced a
fresh round of polio vaccination drives amid growing signs that the
lethal disease has staged a comeback in the impoverished South Asian
country.
(AFP, 8/4/06)
2006 Aug 4, In Colombia leftist
rebels were blamed for two attacks, a car bomb that killed four
officers outside a Cali police station and an attack that killed two
soldiers in a western province.
(AP, 8/4/06)
2006 Aug 4, In India floods caused
by heavy monsoon rains swept away people and destroyed homes in the
southern coastal area of Andhra Pradesh, killing at least 31 people
over the last 2 days.
(AP, 8/4/06)
2006 Aug 4, Hundreds of thousands
of Shiites chanting "Death to Israel" and "Death to America" marched
through the streets of Baghdad's biggest Shiite district in a massive
show of support for Hezbollah in its battle against Israel. At least 35
people were killed elsewhere in Iraq, many of them in a car bombing and
gunbattle in the northern city of Mosul. Some 3,700 soldiers of the
Army's 172nd Stryker Brigade moved into Baghdad from the northern city
of Mosul. In Mosul 20 militants were believed to have been killed
during prolonged street gunfights with security forces in the city's
eastern neighborhoods. Gunmen killed a bodyguard of a senior Justice
Ministry official in western Baghdad, and a police commando was killed
by a roadside bomb in the central city of Samarra.
(AP, 8/4/06)(AP, 8/5/06)
2006 Aug 4, Israel expanded its
assault on Lebanon, launching its first major attack on the Christian
heartland north of Beirut and severing the last significant road link
to Syria. Hezbollah renewed attacks on northern Israel, killing two
civilians in a barrage of 120 rockets. An Israeli airstrike hit dozens
of farm workers loading vegetables near the Lebanon-Syria border,
killing as many as 33. Five Lebanese civilians were killed and 19
wounded in the Israeli airstrikes north of Beirut in Christian areas
where Hezbollah has little support. Hezbollah's leader offered to stop
attacking if Israel ends its airstrikes. Israeli airstrikes flattened
two southern Lebanese houses and more than 50 people were buried in the
rubble, security officials and the state news agency said. Israel
denied attacking the villages.
(AP, 8/4/06)(SFC, 8/5/06, p.A11)
2006 Aug 4, Israel began pulling
tanks out of southern Gaza after a two-day incursion. Israeli troops
conducted house-to-house searches in the southern Gaza Strip and killed
three Palestinians with tanks and air strikes.
(AP, 8/4/06)
2006 Aug 4, In Mexico's
southernmost Chiapas state a 7-year-old boy and his father died,
bringing to 10 the number of people killed after eating poisonous
mushrooms. Officials said recent genetic mutations have made some
mushrooms, consumed for years in Indian communities, newly poisonous.
(AP, 8/4/06)
2006 Aug 4, In southern Nigeria 3
Filipinos working for a US construction firm were kidnapped, a day
after a German was abducted in the same region.
(AP, 8/4/06)
2006 Aug 4, In northern Pakistan
monsoon rains triggered fresh landslides and floods, as officials and
reports said 37 people had died over the last 4 days in weather-related
incidents.
(AP, 8/4/06)
2006 Aug 4, Sri Lankan troops
thwarted a Tamil Tiger rebel attack in northeastern Muttur, killing 35
insurgents. The Red Cross said 6,000 to 7,000 families were still
trying to flee Muttur. In 2008 a local rights group accused Colombo of
a major cover-up of the August 2006 killing of Action Against Hunger
(ACF) workers and for the first time named a list of suspects.
(AP, 8/5/06)(AP, 8/7/06)(AFP, 4/3/08)
2006 Aug 4, In Turkey 2 explosives
detonated within minutes of each other in a southern city of Adana,
seriously wounding one person and injuring 16 others.
(AP, 8/4/06)
2006 Aug 4, In Uganda Vincent
Otti, deputy leader of The Lord's Resistance Army, said his group has
declared a unilateral cease-fire, but government negotiators said they
have not yet agreed to peace.
(AP, 8/4/06)
2006 Aug 4, The Ukraine Parliament
named Viktor Yanukovych prime minister. His fraud-tainted 2004
presidential victory was turned back by the Orange Revolution.
(AP, 8/4/06)
2007 Aug 4, President Bush toured
the site of a collapsed highway bridge in Minneapolis, pledging to cut
red tape that could delay rebuilding.
(AP, 8/4/08)
2007 Aug 4, Barry Bonds tied Hank
Aaron's 755 career home runs as his San Francisco Giants lost 3-2 to
the San Diego Padres.
(AP, 8/4/08)
2007 Aug 4, Alex Rodriguez became
at age 32 the youngest player in major league history to hit 500 home
runs with a first-inning homer in a 16-8 NY Yankee victory over Kansas
City.
(AP, 8/4/08)
2007 Aug 4, In Newark, New Jersey,
3 friends were forced to kneel against a wall behind an elementary
school and were shot to death at close range, and a fourth was found
about 30 feet away with gunshot and knife wounds to her head. Natasha
Aerial (19) was listed in fair condition at Newark's University
Hospital. Police identified her companions as her brother, Terrance
Aerial (18), Ofemi Hightower (20), and Deshawn Harvey (20). On Aug 7 a
15-year-old boy was arrested in the case. On Aug 8 Jose Carranza (28),
an illegal immigrant from Peru, was also arrested as a suspect. Two
more suspects were arrested in suburban DC on Aug 18.
(AP,
8/6/07)(www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,292911,00.html)(AP, 8/18/07)
2007 Aug 4, Oakland, Ca., police
said they have identified Devaughndre Broussard (19), a handyman at
Your Black Muslim Bakery, as the person responsible for the Aug 2,
murder of journalist Chauncey Bailey. He was one of 7 men arrested a
day earlier. It was later learned that Broussard falsely confessed to
the killing at the urging of Yusuf Bey IV, head of the bakery.
(SSFC, 8/5/07, p.A1)(SFC, 8/21/07, p.B1)
2007 Aug 4, Yousef Megahed (21) of
Egypt and Ahmed Mohamed (24) of Kuwait, students from the Univ. of
South Florida, were arrested following a speeding stop in the vicinity
of the Naval Weapons Station, located in Goose Creek, South Carolina.
Pipe bombs were found in their vehicle. They were later indicted for
carrying explosives across state lines. In 2008 Ahmed Abdellatif Sherif
Mohamed pleaded guilty in a Tampa court to making a video demonstrating
how to build a remote bomb detonator to help terrorists.
(www.charleston.net/news/2007/aug/17/fbi_backs_off_arrests13265/)(WSJ,
9/1/07, p.A1)(WSJ, 6/19/08, p.A2)
2007 Aug 4, NASA launched its
Phoenix Mars Lander, a robotic dirt and ice digger, scheduled to land
on Mars on May 25, 2008.
(SSFC, 8/5/07, p.A10)
2007 Aug 4, Lee Hazlewood
(b.1929), songwriter, died in Henderson, Nev. His songs included “These
Boots Are Made for Walkin’,” sung by Nancy Sinatra in 1966.
(SFC, 8/7/07,
p.D9)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_Hazlewood)
2007 Aug 4, A suicide car bomber
blew himself up next to a convoy of foreign troops just west of
Kandahar city, killing two civilians who were nearby. Four civilians
were killed in a roadside blast in Zhari district of Kandahar province.
(AP, 8/4/07)(AFP, 8/5/07)
2007 Aug 4, Algerian newspapers
reported that the army, stepping up a counter-offensive after attacks
by al Qaeda's north Africa wing, has killed around 16 of the group's
fighters in the past three days.
(AP, 8/4/07)
2007 Aug 4, In Bangladesh deaths
from monsoon rains topped 200, with at least 16 more fatalities
reported overnight. 7.5 million people have been either marooned or
displaced from their homes.
(AP, 8/4/07)
2007 Aug 4, Thousands of
Brazilians marched in Sao Paulo to denounce President Luiz Inacio Lula
da Silva's government as corrupt and indifferent.
(AP, 8/5/07)
2007 Aug 4, British PM Gordon
Brown said that authorities were doing "everything in our power" to
track the source of a foot-and-mouth disease outbreak and wipe out the
animal illness before it wreaked economic devastation.
(AP, 8/4/07)
2007 Aug 4, A Hong Kong newspaper
reported that China is cracking down on cable television operators who
offer unauthorized foreign satellite broadcasts, the communist
government's latest bid to maintain its monopoly on information.
(AP, 8/4/07)
2007 Aug 4, A roadside bomb
targeting an Iraqi Army convoy killed one civilian and wounded five
others at a busy intersection in central Baghdad. In western Baghdad a
mortar round landed on a house in Ghazaliyah, killing another civilian.
In northern Iraq Salim Khudaeir, a police lieutenant colonel, was
gunned down on his way to work. US forces killed four suspects in a
raid targeting an insurgent group believed to be coordinating
logistical support from Iran for Shiite militias in Iraq. The killings
took place in the town of Qasirin in Diyala province. West of Tarmiyah
US troops captured 20 suspects accused of having ties to a high-ranking
al-Qaida in Iraq figure. Two more suspects were also arrested for
alleged ties to another leader from the same group. Four more suspects
were detained for alleged involvement in a sniper cell that employed 35
gunmen. In Kirkuk five people were captured, three accused of
association with an al-Qaida media cell, and two for involvement in car
bomb attacks. 3 US soldiers died Saturday south of Baghdad.
(AP, 8/4/07)(AP, 8/7/07)
2007 Aug 4, In Nepal the toll from
monsoon-triggered flooding and landslides stood at 91, with most of the
deaths in the Terai plains region on Nepal's southern border with India.
(AP, 8/4/07)
2007 Aug 4, Javed Hashmi, one of
Pakistan's top opposition leaders, was released to the raucous cheers
of supporters after four years in prison and immediately vowed to
resume his campaign against President Gen. Pervez Musharraf. He left
prison a day after the Supreme Court granted him bail in his 23-year
sentence on charges of treason and inciting an army mutiny against
Musharraf. A suicide attacker detonated a car bomb at a busy bus
station in Parachinar, North West Frontier Province, killing at least
nine people and wounding 35 others. 4 soldiers and 10 militants were
killed in a checkpoint shootout.
(AP, 8/4/07)
2007 Aug 4, Two Palestinians were
killed and six wounded in an Israeli air strike on two vehicles near
the southern Gaza Strip's border with Egypt.
(AP, 8/5/07)
2007 Aug 4, Zbigniew Krakowski
(56), a Polish sea captain in charge of the 2,000-ton Jork, crashed his
ship into an unmanned gas platform in the North Sea while drunk. The
platform, owned by US firm ConocoPhillips, went out of action with
losses at 615,000 pounds a month in revenue. In November Krakowski was
jailed for 12 months.
(AFP, 11/2/07)
2007 Aug 4, Serbian police
exchanged fire with uniformed gunmen in an ethnic Albanian area of
southern Serbia bordering the breakaway Kosovo province. One person was
killed.
(Reuters, 8/5/07)
2007 Aug 4, Unemployment in Sierra
Leone, with a population of some 6 million, stood at close to 80% with
poverty and corruption widespread and endemic. The country’s
Anti-Corruption Commission was now a lame duck as its $2 million annual
funding was suspended by exasperated British donors.
(Econ, 8/4/07, p.42)
2008 Aug 4, President George W.
Bush signed into law legislation paving the way for Libya to pay
hundreds of millions of dollars to compensate US victims of bombing
attacks that Washington blames on Tripoli.
(Reuters, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 4, Alaska sued the US
government saying its listing of polar bears as a threatened species
will hurt oil exploration and tourism.
(WSJ, 8/6/08,
p.A1)(www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/49694/story.htm)
2008 Aug 4, In SF Mayor Newsom
signed into law stringent green building codes for new construction and
renovations of existing structures in the city.
(SFC, 8/5/08, p.B1)
2008 Aug 4, In Afghanistan a pair
of Taliban fighters died when a mine they were planting exploded
prematurely in the Spin Boldak district of Kandahar province. Police
killed five Taliban fighters after the militants ambushed a police
patrol in Kandahar’s Panjwayi district.
(AP, 8/4/08)(AP, 8/5/08)
2008 Aug 4, Bangladesh held local
elections that observers hailed as a success. A fire swept through a
five-story building in a crowded section of the capital, Dhaka, killing
at least 10 people and injuring five others.
(AFP, 8/5/08)(AP, 8/4/08)(Econ, 8/9/08, p.42)
2008 Aug 4, In Chile Alberto
Achacaz Walakial, one of the last surviving members of the nomadic
Kaweskar tribe, died of blood poisoning. Government documents listed
Achacaz's age at 79, but some believe he was close to 90. The tribe
once plied the waters off Chile's Patagonian coast. Experts estimate
that only about a dozen full-blooded Kaweskars, or Alacalufes, survive
and the group appears destined to disappear in the near future as there
are no women of fertile age left. Since the arrival of the first
Europeans, Chile has lost five of its original 14 indigenous tribes to
disease, displacement or the overuse of their natural resources.
(AP, 8/5/08)
2008 Aug 4, In western China 2
Uighur men rammed a truck into a clutch of jogging policemen and tossed
explosives, killing 17 officers, in an attack in Kashgar, Xinjiang
province, just days before the Beijing Olympics. The 2 men were
sentenced to death on Dec 17.
(AP, 8/4/08)(SFC, 8/5/08, p.A11)(AP, 12/17/08)
2008 Aug 4, Ecuador's government
said it would seize a family business group's stock shares in 58
companies to help recover debts generated by the collapse of the
family's former bank. The action came a little less than a month after
authorities seized 200 businesses linked to the family of William and
Roberto Isaias, who fled to the US in 2000 shortly after their bank
collapsed.
(AP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 4, India announced an
additional $450 million in aid for development projects in Afghanistan.
PM Singh met with Afghan Pres. Karzai in New Delhi and both countries
pledged to fight terrorism.
(WSJ, 8/4/08, p.A10)
2008 Aug 4, Indian officials
pledged to stop Hindus from imposing an economic blockade on the mainly
Muslim Kashmir valley as tensions heightened with the deaths of
protesters. Police opened fire at hundreds of stone-throwing Hindu
protesters angry over a government decision to not transfer land to a
Hindu shrine, killing two people. A Muslim protester was also killed by
a tear gas shell.
(AFP, 8/4/08)(AP, 8/4/08)(WSJ, 8/6/08, p.A10)
2008 Aug 4, In Iran journalist
Yaghoob Mirnehad was executed in the city of Zahedan after being
sentenced to death earlier this year. Iran accused Mirnehad of being
involved in the armed Jundallah group, which operates along the
Iranian-Pakistani border. The Jundallah group, or God's Brigade, has
launched attacks against Iranian soldiers and police in the area near
Pakistan and Afghanistan, which is a key crossing point for narcotics.
(AP, 8/5/08)
2008 Aug 4, Iraqi officials
reported that at least nine Iraqis died in a separate series of
bombings. 2 American soldiers were killed and one was wounded by a
roadside bomb in Baghdad that also killed 2 Iraqis.
(AP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 4, Israel's defense
minister said a group of around 150 Fatah fighters who fled to Israel
from the Gaza Strip will be allowed to relocate to the West Bank
because they face "immediate danger" from Gaza's Hamas rulers.
(AP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 4, Italy’s Defense
Ministry deployed some 3,000 soldiers in cities across the country as
part of government measures to fight street crime.
(AP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 4, A Jordanian military
court sentenced 12 men to up to five years in jail for planning to join
Iraq's insurgency and carry out attacks against US and Iraqi forces.
The five men who received the longest jail terms were at large and
tried in absentia.
(AP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 4, A shootout between
Mexican police and smugglers driving a truck carrying illegal
immigrants left 2 people dead near Agua Dulce.
(AP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 4, A Nigerian
presidential panel on oil and gas sector reform recommended that the
state oil company be transformed into an "independent limited liability
company."
(AFP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 4, In Pakistan a
remote-controlled bomb explosion struck a military convoy and wounded
eight soldiers in South Waziristan. Militants torched four girls'
schools, a health office and a forestry office. A senior officer said
that over the past week 94 Islamist militants were killed and 14
soldiers lost in fighting in the northwestern Swat valley. At least 25
civilians and eight policemen were also killed in the fighting.
Brigadier Zia Bodla said the army planned a major operation against the
insurgents.
(Reuters, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 4, The Philippine Supreme
Court, acting on a petition by Christian politicians, blocked the
signing of a key accord granting an expanded southern homeland to
minority Muslims as part of a deal to end decades of bloody Islamic
rebellion.
(AP, 8/4/08)(Econ, 8/9/08, p.41)
2008 Aug 4, In Venezuela changes
in areas from the military to small business loans were pushed through
by the president in 26 laws released in the official gazette. Chavez
approved them on the final day of an 18-month period during which
lawmakers had granted him special legislative powers.
(AP, 8/4/08)
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