Timeline 2019 January - March
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2019 Jan 1, US authorities fired tear gas into Mexico during the first hours of the new year to repel about 150 migrants who tried to breach the border fence in Tijuana.
(AP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, An American air strike in Yemen killed Jamal al-Badawi, an al-Qaida operative accused of involvement in the 2000 attack on the US Navy ship Cole.
(SFC, 1/7/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 1, The US and Israel officially quit UNESCO, the UN's educational, scientific and cultural agency at the stroke of midnight, the culmination of a process triggered more than a year ago amid concerns that the organization fosters anti-Israel bias. Since 2011 the US has accrued $600 million in unpaid dues, which was one of the reasons for Pres. Donald Trump's decision to withdraw. Israel owed an estimated $10 million.
(AP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, A US excise tax on mined coal that funds the Black Lung Disability Trust Fund was reduced to $0.50 per ton for coal from subsurface mines and $0.25 per ton for surface mines. The cut was expected to cost taxpayers at least $15 billion by 2050.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Lung_Benefits_Act_of_1973)(SFC, 12/11/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 1, NASA rang in the New Year with a historic flyby of the farthest, and quite possibly the oldest, cosmic body ever explored by humankind -- a tiny, distant world called Ultima Thule -- in the hopes of learning more about how planets took shape.
(AFP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, Washington state joined a handful of other states banning those under 21 from buying assault rifles.
(SFC, 1/2/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 1, Pegi Young (b.1952), the ex-wife of Neil Young and co-founder of the Bridge School (1986), died in California after a year long battle with cancer.
(SFC, 1/5/19, p.E1)
2019 Jan 1, Two Austrian women became the first same-sex couple to officially tie the knot in the predominantly Catholic country, following years of legal challenges from gay rights groups.
(AP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, Former Brazilian army captain Jair Bolsonaro took office as president promising to overhaul many aspects of life in Latin America's largest nation.
(AP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, In Burkina Faso local villagers of the Mossi ethnic group attacked a nearby camp of herders from the nomadic Fulani group. Seven Fulani herders were lynched and their homes were burned down. Yirgou residents killed 39 people in Fulani herding communities across the region in retaliation for attacks a day earlier.
(AFP, 1/2/19)(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 1, Democratic Republic of Congo's government cut internet connections and SMS services across the country for a second straight day as the country nervously awaited results from the weekend's chaotic presidential election.
(Reuters, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, France ditched a system whereby residents file income tax returns based on the previous year's earnings, replacing it with a system where the state deducts the taxes directly from people's salaries or pensions each month.
(AFP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, In Hong Kong thousands of demonstrators marched to demand full democracy, fundamental rights, and even independence from China in the face of what many see as a marked clampdown by the Communist Party on local freedoms.
(Reuters, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, In Japan a minivan slammed into pedestrians early today on a street where people had gathered for New Year's festivities in downtown Tokyo. A ninth person was injured after the suspect got out of the car and punched him. Kazuhiro Kusakabe (21) was arrested.
(AP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, In western Germany a man (50) ploughed his car into a crowd of people in early today, injuring at least four in Bottrop and Essen before being arrested by police on suspicion of attempted homicide. This appeared to have been an intentional attack against foreigners.
(AP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, In southern India millions of women stood should to shoulder along highways in Kerala state creating a human wall 300 miles long standing fast against sexism and oppression.
(SFC, 1/3/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 1, Israel's center-left opposition dramatically split ahead of an April 9 election, with leader Avi Gabbay announcing he would no longer partner with veteran politician Tzipi Livni as she sat stone-faced next to him. The announcement meant the end of their Zionist Union alliance, which secured the second most seats in the last general election in 2015, but has since tumbled far in opinion polls.
(AFP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, In Malawi Yasin Phiri, an albino, was killed in front of his young son. Local media said the man's arms were hacked off, his teeth pulled and his private parts removed, prompting calls by local and international civil society groups for government action. On March 1 Malawi said it will offer cash rewards of up $7,000 for information about abductions and killing of people with albinism as anger over government inaction grew ahead of national elections.
(Reuters, 3/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, In Mali armed men reportedly attacked a central village, killing 37 civilians, in what appeared to be ethnic violence. Those killed were from the Fulani ethnic group and included the village chief.
(AP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, Myanmar police clashed with insurgents in the troubled western state of Rakhine. One policeman was critically injured when border guard police were attacked by about 30 men carrying "small and heavy arms" near Saytaung, a village in the Buthidaung area.
(Reuters, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 1, In Pakistan four Taliban militants stormed a security forces facility in the southwestern town of Loralai, triggering a battle that left four security forces and the attackers dead.
(AP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, Romania took over the EU's rotating presidency at a tumultuous time for the bloc and just days after European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker voiced doubts about the country's ability to do the job.
(AFP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, Somalia's government ordered the UN top envoy to the troubled country to leave, accusing him of "deliberately interfering with the country's sovereignty." Nicholas Haysom had raised concerns at the action of Somalia's UN-backed security services in recent violence that left several people dead.
(AFP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 1, Taiwanese immigration authorities found 24 Vietnamese and are searched for 124 others who left their tour groups after arriving in December on tourist visas.
(AP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 1, Thailand police said Sucheep Sornsung (41) shot and killed six family members, including his two young children, before killing himself after a New Year's party in southern Chumphon province.
(Reuters, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, In Turkmenistan a law took effect forbidding the sale of alcoholic drinks including beer on trains, airplanes and ferries and at sports facilities. It also banned the sale of alcohol on holidays when workers get the day off. The law called for alcohol sales to be banned on Saturdays and Sundays beginning in 2021, except at bars and restaurants.
(AP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, Pope Francis ushered in the New Year with an ode to motherhood, reminding the faithful that a mother's example and embrace is the best antidote to today's disjointed world of solitude and misery.
(AP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 2, Pres. Donald Trump said the United States would get out of Syria slowly "over a period of time" and would protect the US-backed Kurdish fighters in the country as Washington draws down troops. US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, which include Kurdish fighters, captured the Syrian town of Kashmah.
(AP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 2, The first of about 80 US military personnel arrived in Gabon in case they are needed to protect US citizens and diplomatic facilities in Congo's capital Kinshasa.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 2, The US military carried out an airstrike in southwestern Somalia that killed 10 members of the al-Shabab extremist group. The US carried out at least 47 such strikes last year in the Horn of Africa nation.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 2, US soldier Peter Lian (21) was charged with murder in the death of his estranged wife, Khuang Par, whose body was discovered in a suitcase in an Indianapolis dumpster on Dec. 23. Lian was accused of flying to Indianapolis from Colorado to kill his estranged wife, then dumping her body in a trash bin and fleeing to Thailand.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 2, US Apple CEO Tim Cook said in a letter to shareholders that demand for iPhones is waning and revenue for the last quarter of 2018 will fall well below projections, a decrease he traced mainly to China.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 2, It was reported that Netflix has removed an episode of a satirical comedy show from its service in Saudi Arabia over its criticism of the kingdom, following a legal request by officials in Riyadh.
(AFP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, New Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro issued an executive order making the Agriculture Ministry responsible for deciding on lands claimed by indigenous peoples, in a victory for agribusiness that will likely enrage environmentalists. The temporary decree will expire unless it is ratified within 120 days by Congress. It strips power over land claim decisions from indigenous affairs agency FUNAI.
(Reuters, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, Chinese President Xi Jinping, declaring that independence is not an option for Taiwan, urged both sides to reach an early consensus on unification and not leave the issue for future generations.
(AP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, DR Congo said it had pulled accreditation for Florence Morice, a French radio journalist, and cut off the broadcasts of Radio France Internationale (RFI) amid tensions over the counting of votes in crucial elections.
(AFP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, A Red Cross official said hundreds of refugees have crossed into Uganda from Congo in the aftermath of that country's presidential election, heightening concerns about the possible cross-border spread of Ebola.
(AP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, In Denmark eight people were killed and 16 injured on the Great Belt Bridge linking Zealand and Funen when a passenger train hit a trailer that had blown off a freight wagon coming the other way. The victims were all on the passenger train.
(Reuters, 1/2/19)(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Jan 2, In France Eric Drouet, of the leaders of the "yellow vest" demonstrations, was arrested late today for organizing an unauthorized protest on the Champs-Elysees avenue. He was released the following afternoon. Drouet already faced a trial for carrying a weapon at a previous protest.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 2, In India two women entered the Sabarimala temple in Kerala state, one of the country's largest Hindu pilgrimage sites that had been forbidden to females between the ages of 10 and 50, sparking protests across the state.
(AP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, In India Hindu nationalists linked to PM Narendra Modi’s ruling party urged him to push through laws to allow the building of a temple on the ruins of a 16th century mosque in Ayodhya.
(Reuters, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, In Italy temporary administrators were appointed to lead the country's 10th largest lender, the struggling Carige, as part of a plan to avoid yet another bank bailout.
(AP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, Madagascan security forces fired tear gas to break up a protest by supporters of losing presidential candidate Marc Ravalomanana, who claims he was denied victory in last month's election because of fraud.
(AFP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, The Dutch Coast Guard said up to 270 containers had fallen off the Panamanian-flagged MSC ZOE, one of the world's biggest container ships, in rough weather near the German island of Borkum and floated southwest toward Dutch waters. Three missing containers contained an organic peroxide, a flammable and highly toxic compound. In Feb. the estimate of fallen containers was raised to 345.
(Reuters, 1/2/19)(AP, 1/3/19)(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Jan 2, A Nigerian Air Force helicopter crashed in combat at Damasak in northern Borno state, killing five crew members.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 2, In Norway avalanche occurred in the northern region of Troms in an area popular with skiers. Three Finns and a Swede were skiing in the area and were reported to police as missing.
(Reuters, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 2, Qatar Airways said it now holds a 5 percent share in China Southern Airlines, helping expand the Gulf carrier's reach in one of the world's fastest growing aviation markets.
(AP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, Philippine officials said the death toll from weekend landslides and devastating floods triggered by a tropical depression in the Bicol and eastern Visayas regions has climbed to 85.
(AP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, Saudi Arabia announced plans to build an entertainment complex in the capital Riyadh, the latest in a series of state-backed efforts to encourage public leisure activities after decades of tight social restrictions.
(Reuters, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, Sudan's largest opposition bloc joined calls by a wide array of political groups for President Omar al-Bashir to step down, turning up the pressure on the longtime autocrat after two weeks of street protests.
(AP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, The Syrian Observatory for Human /Rights said two days of fighting in the provinces of Aleppo and Idlib have killed 31 people, including five civilians. 17 Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) fighters and 16 combatants from the Turkish-backed National Liberation Front rebel alliance were killed in Idlib province.. The al-Qaida-linked Levant Liberation Committee and the Turkey-backed Nour el-Din el-Zinki group blamed each other for triggering the fighting.
(AP, 1/2/19)(AFP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 2, In Thailand tens of thousands of tourists fled popular islands and resort areas as Tropical Storm Pabuk closed in and threatened to batter the southern part of the kingdom with heavy rains, winds and seven-meter (22-foot) waves.
(AFP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, The United States issued a pre-emptive warning to Iran against pursuing three planned space rocket launches that it said would violate a UN Security Council resolution because they use ballistic missile technology.
(Reuters, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Democrats took over the US House of Representatives, ushering in a new era of divided government in Washington with the goal of checking Donald Trump's turbulent presidency.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, In Florida two big rigs and two passenger vehicles collided and spilled diesel fuel across I-75 sparking a massive fire that killed 7 people, including five children riding in a church van.
(SFC, 1/4/19, p.A4)(SFC, 1/5/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan 3, Michigan's Democratic congresswoman Rashida Tlaib kicked off her term with an expletive-laced vow to impeach Donald Trump, testing her party's discipline and earning a chiding the next day from the president.
(AP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 3, In Texas three children were found killed and their mother Kimaria Nelson (24) beaten and severely wounded by a pellet gun in Texas City. Junaid Hashim Mehmood, the father of one of the children was soon arrested and charged with murder.
(http://tinyurl.com/yb43d96j)(SFC, 1/5/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan 3, Stocks went into a steep slide after Apple reported a slowdown in iPhone sales over the holidays in China, a hugely important market for the company.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Texas lawyer Herb Kelleher (b.1931), co-founder of Southwest Airlines, died. He became chairman of the airline in 1978 and CEO in 1982.
(SFC, 1/4/19, p.D2)
2019 Jan 3, In Afghanistan the Taliban killed eight police in an attack on their post in the provincial capital of the northern Baghlan province.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, The new government of Brazil's far-right President Jair Bolsonaro hit the ground running on its first day of business, rushing through changes to put a conservative stamp on the country by trashing progressive achievements of past administrations.
(AFP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Canada said that 13 of its citizens have been detained in China since Huawei Technologies Co Chief Financial Officer Meng Wanzhou was arrested last month in Vancouver at the request of the United States.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 3, A Chinese space probe successfully touched down on the far side of the moon. The Chang'e-4 lunar probe, launched in December, made the "soft landing" and transmitted the first-ever "close range" image of the far side of the moon.
(Reuters, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Croatia threatened to cancel its purchase of F-16 fighter jets from Israel after months of stalling due to a lack of US approval. Washington has objected to the sale because it wants the removal of electronic system upgrades that Israel added in a rare defence dispute between the close allies.
(AFP, 1/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, In El Salvador transgender woman Camila Diaz Cordova (29), who sought asylum in the United States, died after being kidnapped and beaten. This was weeks after she was deported, underscoring the dangers of the Trump administration's hardening policy on asylum seekers.
(Reuters, 2/23/19)
2019 Jan 3, In Greece two men, 67 and 64 years old, along with the older man's wife, went missing after setting out from Keratea in a pouring rain. Their bodies were later found separately in a creek that had turned into a raging river southeast of Athens.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 3, India deported a second small group of Rohingya Muslims, five members of a family, to Myanmar after ordering the expulsion of members of the Myanmar minority group and others who entered the country illegally.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, In southern India Hindu hard-liners shut shops and businesses and clashed with police in Kerala state to protest the entry of two women into the Sabarimala hill temple, one of India's largest Hindu pilgrimage sites.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, In Iran prominent human rights activist Narges Mohammadi and British-Iranian detainee Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe announced plans to go on hunger strike in Tehran's Evin Prison to protest against the denial of medical treatment.
(AFP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Israeli far-right activists clashed with police as authorities moved in to clear away two mobile homes illegally set up on a hilltop near Ramallah in the occupied West Bank.
(AFP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Italy's deputy PM Matteo Salvini demanded the resignations of the rebellious leaders of Florence, Palermo and Naples for refusing to obey a controversial anti-immigration law.
(AFP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Mexico's government said construction on a partly-built $13 billion new Mexico City airport which the new president wants to cancel has been officially suspended.
(Reuters, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Niger's defense ministry said several days of raids have killed more than 280 Boko Haram extremists near the border with Nigeria.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Nigeria's President Muhammadu Buhari appointed his niece, Amina Zakari, to the election commission ahead of presidential elections in February, when he will seek a second term. The opposition quickly objected to the appointment.
(AFP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 3, Saudi Arabia announced that it will seek the death penalty against five suspects in the slaying of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, a killing that has seen members of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman's entourage implicated in the writer's assassination.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, In Spain workers at Amazon's biggest local warehouse started a two-day strike just ahead of a gift-giving feast day, as part of a long-running campaign for better pay and conditions.
(Reuters, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Sudanese security forces fired tear gas to disperse some 200 protesters who were trying to deliver an anti-government petition to the local headquarters of President Omar al-Bashir's ruling party in Port Sudan.
(Reuters, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, In Syria clashes between jihadists and rebels raged inside the last major opposition bastion for a third day, as the death toll mounted to more than 70 fighters.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, In Tunisia two alleged jihadists blew themselves up during an early morning raid by security forces on a house in the central region of Sidi Bouzid.
(AFP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Ankara and Baghdad would deepen cooperation against terrorism after tensions last month over Turkish air strikes against Kurdish militants in Iraq.
(AFP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 4, In southern California three men were killed and four others injured during a brawl at the Gable House Bowl in Torrence.
(SFC, 1/7/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 4, In the SF Bay Area police found three people dead following gunfire at the 1000 block of Center Street in Oakland. Antonio Malike Durant (26) was arrested on Jan. 18 and soon charged with three counts of murder.
(SFC, 1/24/19, p.C6)
2019 Jan 4, In Texas Jenna Scott and her friend Michael Swearingin disappeared. Their bodies were later found in a shallow grave in Clearview, Oklahoma. Cedric Marks (44) was arrested this month in Michigan on a burglary charged related to Scott's house in Temple, Texas.
(http://tinyurl.com/y7986eun)(SFC, 2/4/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 4, Twitter suspended an account that posted links to sensitive personal data and documents stolen by hackers from hundreds of German public figures and politicians — from every political party but the far-right Alternative for Germany. The breach, discovered by journalists a day earlier, affected politicians at all levels.
(AP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, Afghan officials said Taliban fighters are threatening major oil wells near the northern city of Sar-e Pul following days of fighting in which dozens of members of the security forces have been killed and wounded. At least seven border police officers were killed late today when their checkpoint came under attack by insurgents in southern Kandahar province. 16 insurgents were killed and 11 others wounded in an ensuing battle.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)(AP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, An Australian man (24) rammed his four-wheel drive into a Sydney police car, hijacked a supermarket delivery truck and taxi, rammed other cars and stabbed and wounded a passerby before killing himself in front of police.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, It was reported that Bolivia's bee population is being decimated by massive and intensive use of chemical pesticides to protect coca plants, the region's biggest cash crop.
(AFP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, The People's Bank of China said it would cut the amount of cash that banks must hold as reserves by one percentage point essentially freeing up about $218 billion to ease lending.
(SFC, 1/5/19, p.D4)
2019 Jan 4, The China Academy of Social Sciences said in a research report that the country's population is set to reach a peak of 1.442 billion in 2029 and start a long period of "unstoppable" decline in 2030.
(Reuters, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 4, China's Jade Rabbit 2 space rover explored the lunar terrain in the world's first mission on the surface of the far side of the moon.
(AP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, Colombia's government said it has asked Venezuela to verify whether certain members of the ELN rebel group are living in the country and to detain them under Interpol red notices if they are.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, The French government dismissed 'yellow vest' protesters as agitators whose only goal was to topple it, signaling a toughening stance against a movement that has shaken Emmanuel Macron's presidency.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, In Germany an Interior Ministry spokesman said personal data and documents from hundreds of German politicians and public figures have been published online, in what appears one of the most far-reaching cyber-attacks in a country that has become a target of choice for hackers.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, Ghanaian religious leaders said angry young Muslims have attacked a charismatic church in Accra a day after its pastor predicted the country’s chief imam would die this year in a New Year's eve sermon.
(AFP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, In India the office of the chief minister of Kerala state said a woman (46) has become the third to enter the Sabarimala Hindu temple in defiance of an ancient ban on females of menstruating age. Temple management denied that the Sri Lankan woman had in fact entered. Only small protests were reported from across the state.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, In Iraq a fire at a women's shelter in Baghdad killed several lodgers. A police chief called it a "group suicide" caused by women rioting in the shelter. Two women died from stab wounds and seven perished in the fire.
(AP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, Parts of Lebanon's public and private sectors went on a union-organized strike to protest worsening economic conditions and months of delay in the formation of a new government.
(AP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, Mexican federal police took steps to close a migrant shelter in Tijuana, sparking protests from some of the dozens of US-bound people who had been staying there after traveling in a caravan from Central America.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, In Myanmar thirteen policemen were killed and nine injured in early morning attacks on police outposts in Rakhine state by the insurgent Arakan Army, as the country celebrated Independence Day.
(AP, 1/4/19)(Reuters, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 4, Dutch authorities said they will hold Swiss shipping line MSC liable for the cost of cleaning up debris from more than 270 cargo containers that fell off one of its vessels and washed up on shore. Roughly 35 containers have been located and the remainder were lost at sea.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, In Nigeria the Koluama Seven Brothers militant group carried out an unconfirmed warning strike on an oil facility owned by local energy firm Conoil in the southern state of Bayelsa. The group soon threatened a production shut-down and demanded action from Conoil and a traditional ruler called King Solomon Eddy on issues such as job creation.
(Reuters, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 4, A Palestinian broadcasting corporation said masked gunmen have raided its studios in the Gaza Strip.
(AP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, In Peru foreign ministers from 12 Latin American countries and Canada said their governments would not accept Nicolas Maduro as Venezuela's president when he is sworn in for a second six-year term next week. The 14-member Lima Group -- with the exception of Mexico -- said it would not grant recognition to Maduro's hardline socialist government.
(AFP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 4, In the Philippines Talib Abo, a former mayor of the town of Parang, was killed in a shootout with police. His brother, Bobby Abo, was also killed in a separate raid. In 2016 Pres. Duterte had accused them of being involved the drug trade. Police reportedly found guns and methamphetamine at both of the brothers' homes.
(SFC, 1/5/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 4, A Philippine court ordered the arrest of Japanese pachinko billionaire Kazuo Okada, about a month after the country's Department of Justice recommended the filing of charges against him over three counts of fraud. The warrant of arrest was made public on Dec. 6.
(Reuters, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 4, Poland accused France of breaching European Union laws by exceeding spending limits. Paris last month forecast a 2019 deficit of 3.2 percent, which would violate the EU-mandated limit of 3.0 percent of GDP.
(AFP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, In Poland five teenage girls were killed by a fire in an "escape room" attraction in Koszalin. In "escape rooms", participants are locked in a room and race against the clock to solve puzzles and challenges to open a way out.
(Reuters, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 4, In Portugal a court in Lisbon said it was not proven that former Interior Minister Miguel Macedo had favored Chinese and Angolan investors in administrative procedures granting the so-called "golden visas." Two other senior Portuguese officials were found guilty of corruption while two Chinese citizens were convicted of influence-peddling. Another Chinese citizen and an Angolan were acquitted.
(AP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, In Romania Eugeniu Iordachescu (89), a civil engineer who devised an ingenious way to save 12 churches and many other historic buildings from being destroyed by the country's former Communist strongman, died.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 4, In Sudan dozens of protesters chanted anti-government slogans as they left a major mosque following Friday prayers in Omdurman, near Khartoum. Security forces fired teargas and the crowd quickly dispersed.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, In Syria an air strike by the US-led coalition on a village held by the Islamic State killed at least ten people.
(SFC, 1/5/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 4, In southern Thailand one person was reported dead and another missing as rain, wind and surging seawater as Tropical Storm Pabuk buffeted coastal villages and world-famous tourist resorts, knocking down trees and utility poles and flooding roads.
(AP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, The UN human rights office called on Bahrain to release activist Nabeel Rajab, saying that the upholding of his five-year jail sentence by the top court this week showed "continued suppression of government critics".
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, Zimbabwe's government said it has begun laying off 3,365 workers from its youth ministry, as it tries to make good on its promise to cut the bloated civil service and sort out the country's finances.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 5, Afghan government employee Javid Noori, who also worked as a part-time journalist in the Farah region was kidnapped and killed by Taliban militants. His body was found three days later. Noori was abducted from a bus along with 30 other passengers in a remote part of the province.
(Reuters, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 5, In CongoDRC the country's powerful Catholic church warned of a popular "uprising" if untrue results are announced.
(AP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, Heavy snow caused travel chaos in parts of Austria and Germany as authorities closed roads and train routes because of avalanche danger and airports reported weather-related cancelations. A 20-year-old skier died in an avalanche on Mount Teisen, near the Austrian border.
(AP, 1/5/19)(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 5, In Brazil a special deployment of troops began fanning out in the northern city of Fortaleza with orders to stop a spike in violent attacks by criminal gangs against banks, buses and shops. Intelligence reports published by media suggested gangs were revolting against tough new measures recently imposed in the state's prisons.
(AFP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, French "yellow vests" marched through Paris and other cities in protest against high living costs and the perceived indifference of Pres. Emmanuel Macron, whose government this week hardened its stance against them. Former light heavyweight boxer Christophe Dettinger (37) was filmed beating up police officers in Paris during the protests. Dettinger turned himself in to investigators on Jan. 7. On February 13 Dettinger was convicted of assault and given a one-year prison sentence.
(Reuters, 1/5/19)(AP, 1/7/19)(AP, 2/14/19)
2019 Jan 5, In Hungary thousands marched through Budapest's city center to protest against a new law that allows employers to ask staff to work up to 400 hours per year of overtime.
(Reuters, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, In southern India twin arson and bomb attacks rocked Kerala state, continuing a violent backlash that followed the entry of two women into the Sabarimala Hindu temple that forbids female devotees.
(AFP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, An Indian court declared tycoon Vijay Mallya (62) a "fugitive economic offender," a ruling that empowers authorities to confiscate his properties and other assets. Mallya, who left India in 2016, is accused of money laundering and cheating Indian banks out of hundreds of millions of dollars.
(AP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, In Japan a 612-pound (278-kg) bluefin tuna sold for a record 333.6 million yen ($3 million) at the first auction of 2019, after Tokyo's famed Tsukiji market was moved to a new site on the city's waterfront.
(AP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, Madagascar police fired teargas to disperse some 500 supporters of the losing candidate in last month's presidential election, in the fifth such protest this week.
(AFP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, Mexico's Pres. Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador announced a plan to stimulate economic activity for 43 municipalities in six states just south of the US border.
(SSFC, 1/6/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan 5, In Pakistan a car bomb exploded in a Peshawar neighborhood wounding three people and damaging several shops.
(AP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, Gaza authorities arrested five Palestinians on suspicion of ransacking the offices of President Mahmoud Abbas's official Palestine Television station.
(Reuters, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, In northeastern Spain four people died and a baby girl in a critical condition was among the injured, in two separate tower block fires.
(AFP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, Switzerland-based shipping company MSC said that it was committed to finding and retrieving the containers that went overboard on Jan. 2 in a North Sea storm until the last one is found.
(AP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, The Istanbul-based Orthodox patriarch signed the formal decree confirming the creation of an independent Ukrainian church, marking a break with the Russian church that has angered Moscow.
(AFP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, In Vanuatu Mungau Dain (24), a star in the Oscar-nominated film "Tanna," died in the capital Port Vila, after contracting a leg infection that wasn't quickly treated.
(http://tinyurl.com/yclcz2ww)(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 5, The National Society of Film Critics chose Chloe Zhao's low-budget debut feature, "The Rider," as best picture of 2018. The society voted for Olivia Colman as best actress in "The Favourite," and Ethan Hawke as best actor in "First Reformed." The top accolade for best supporting actor went to Steve Yeun of "Burning," while Regina King of "If Beale Street Could Talk" nabbed best supporting actress.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 5, In Egypt a policeman was killed late today as he was trying to defuse an explosive device near a church in a residential Cairo district.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 5, The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces handed over IS fighters and civilians from Kazakhstan to their country. This included five fighters, 11 women and 30 children.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 5, In northern India six schoolchildren and their bus driver were killed as the vehicle rolled down a gorge on a hilly road in Himachal Pradesh state.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 5, In eastern Syria a missile attack by the Islamic State group killed at least one Kurdish fighter and wounded two British soldiers embedded with them.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 5, Venezuela's opposition-controlled but toothless National Assembly declared Nicolas Maduro's presidency illegitimate, calling on the military to support efforts to restore democracy.
(AFP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, A US airstrike in Somalia killed six al-Shabab members near Dheerow Sanle in Lower Shabelle region.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 6, The film "Bohemian Rhapsody" was the top winner in the 76th Golden Globe Awards. Glenn Close won the best actress award for her role in "The Wife." Rami Malek won the best actor award for his role in "Bohemian Rhapsody".
(SFC, 1/7/19, p.D1)
2019 Jan 6, In Kentucky a drunken driver heading the wrong way on a highway hit a family vehicle in Lexington killing all five people from Northville, Mi. Pickup driver Joey Lee Bailey (41) was also killed.
(SFC, 1/8/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 6, At least 30 Afghan villagers searching for gold in a riverbed perished in a flash flood in northeastern Badakhshan province.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, In Austria two German skiers were killed in avalanches in the western region of Vorarlberg, while a Slovenian skier also died in the region of Salzburg. Four snowshoe-hikers went missing after heavy snowfall plunged large parts of the country into chaos. Heavy snowfall in recent days created dangerous conditions across parts of southern Germany, Austria and Switzerland.
(AP, 1/6/19)(AFP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 6, A new British survey said more Britons want to remain a member of the European Union than leave. The survey also showed voters want to make the final decision themselves.
(Reuters, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, In Bulgaria thousands of Orthodox Christian worshippers plunged into icy rivers and lakes across the country to recover crucifixes cast by priests in ceremonies commemorating the baptism of Jesus Christ.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, China's state media reported that Chen Gang, executive secretary of the China Association for Science and Technology, was being probed by the ruling Communist Party's anti-graft watchdog on suspicion of breaking the law and violating discipline.
(Reuters, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, In France hundreds of women marched in Paris to reclaim France's "yellow vest" movement from violent activists, a day after protesters smashed their way into a government ministry.
(AFP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, In western Iran a magnitude 5.5 earthquake hit an area near the Iraqi border, injuring about 31 people.
(Reuters, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, Israel's army struck two Hamas posts in the Gaza Strip after balloons carried an explosive device over the border fence. No injuries were reported.
(AFP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, Malaysian King Sultan Muhammad V (49) abdicated in an unexpected move, after just two years on the throne.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, In Mexico seven men were killed in a shooting attack at the "Las Virginias" bar in the Caribbean coast resort city of Playa del Carmen.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 6, In Nigeria two journalists of the Daily Trust were arrested in Maiduguri. They had written a critical report of the army's performance fighting against Boko Haram extremists.
(SFC, 1/8/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 6, In Pakistan government talks with the United Arab Emirates on setting up an oil refinery in Pakistan "reached their final stage" during the visit of the crown prince of Abu Dhabi.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, Pakistani officials said two roadside bombs blasts have wounded eight people in the country's southwestern Baluchistan province.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, The Palestinian Authority (PA) announced its pullout from the Rafah border crossing, accusing Hamas of undermining its operations and detaining some of its workers.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 6, Dozens of Palestinians protested the arrival of Patriarch Theophilos III, the Greek Orthodox patriarch of the Holy Land, at an Orthodox Christmas celebration in Bethlehem. Palestinians have been demanding his resignation for allegedly selling church land to Israelis.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, In Saudi Arabia a new regulation that took effect aimed at curbing seemingly rampant cases of men secretly ending marriages without informing their wives. Saudi courts will now notify women by text message when they get divorced.
(AFP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, In Thailand Rahaf Mohammed M Alqunun, a Saudi woman held at Bangkok airport, said she would be killed if she was repatriated by Thai immigration officials, who confirmed the 18-year-old was denied entry to the country.
(AFP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, In Sudan thousands took to the streets in Khartoum to call for President Omar al-Bashir to step down, the latest in nearly three weeks of demonstrations against his 29-year autocratic rule. security authorities arrested several faculty members from Khartoum University.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, In Syria Islamist Tahrir al Sham, formerly affiliated to al Qaeda, entered the town of Atareb, days after capturing from their mainstream rivals the strategic town of Darat Izza, both in the western Aleppo countryside, in a military campaign that has since spread across Idlib and areas near the Turkish border. The offensive by Tahrir al Sham has alarmed the National Army, the main Turkish-backed rebel force aimed at unifying disparate factions in the northwest.
(Reuters, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 7, President Donald Trump said the fight in Syria against the Islamic State group was not over and that withdrawal would be done in a "prudent" manner.
(AFP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, The United States military carried out two airstrikes in Somalia that killed four al-Shabab extremists.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 7, In Alabama the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute received withering criticism on social media after rescinding its decision to honor political activist and scholar Angela Davis with the Fred Shuttlesworth Human Rights Award.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, In San Francisco Tom Guido (58), the former manager of the Purple Onion Club, was killed in a building on the 900 block of Post Street. A man who jumped from the building was in critical condition.
(SFC, 1/10/19, p.C1)
2019 Jan 7, It was reported that injury has forced Australian activist Mina Guli (48) to stop her effort to complete 100 marathons in 100 days as a way to highlight the importance of conserving water. Guli had run and walked 62 marathons on several continents, but in South Africa she was diagnosed with multiple stress fractures in her right femur.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro said funding of nongovernmental organizations working in Brazil will be rigidly controlled, reflecting increased oversight by his new right-wing administration over such groups.
(Reuters, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, Suely de Araujo, the head of Brazil's environmental protection agency Ibama, resigned after far-right President Jair Bolsonaro criticized the amount of money the unit spends to rent vehicles in his latest attack on the agency. Ibama is tasked with policing the Amazon rainforest to stop deforestation and illegal mining.
(Reuters, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, Chinese and American officials began talks in Beijing aimed at ending a bruising trade battle between the world's two biggest economies.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, Tesla Inc. broke ground for a factory in Shanghai, its first outside the United States.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, Ethiopian PM Abiy Ahmed and Eritrean President Isaias Afwerki reopened a border crossing between their countries as part of an ongoing reconciliation between the former foes.
(AFP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, In France Jeanne Augier (95), the millionaire owner of Hotel Negresco in Nice, died. She took over the luxury French Riviera hotel in 1957 she took over the hotel in 1957 and worked to extend its influence throughout France and the world.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 7, Gabon foiled an attempted coup after a group of soldiers called for a popular uprising as President Ali Bongo remained in Morocco after suffering a stroke last year. The chief military rebel who led the failed coup was arrested and two of his commandos killed after they stormed a public radio station in Libreville.
(AFP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, In Gambia a truth commission began hearing witness testimony as it set about investigating rights violations committed by the regime of Yahya Jammeh.
(AFP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, In Germany lawmaker Frank Magnitz (66), a local leader of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, was attacked and seriously wounded by several men in the northwestern city of Bremen.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 7, In India a small regional party quit PM Narendra Modi's ruling coalition, protesting against his bid to give citizenship to hundreds of thousands of non-Muslims from neighboring countries such as Bangladesh. The Asom Gana Parishad (AGP), based in the border state of Assam in the northeast, has become the fourth ally to quit the ruling National Democratic Alliance in the past year.
(Reuters, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, Moshe Arens (93), a former Israeli defense minister, foreign minister and an early political mentor to PM Benjamin Netanyahu, died.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, The two leaders of Italy's ruling populist coalition threw their support behind the "yellow vest" protesters roiling neighboring France.
(AFP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, Italy's populist government stepped in to help guarantee struggling Banca Carige SpA, bending to pressure despite the ruling 5-Star Movement's longtime anti-bank bailout rhetoric.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 7, Latvia's President Raimonds Vejonis nominated Krisjanis Karins of the center-right New Unity party for the post of prime minister in the country's third attempt to form a new government in the wake of a general election in October.
(Reuters, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, It was reported that Amnesty International has called on Poland not to deport Tumsu Abdurakhmanov, a Chechen video blogger and critic of Chechen authorities, who is being sought by Russia.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, In Saudi Arabia six people were killed and others arrested in a "preemptive" security operation in al-Qatif, a predominantly Shiite region in the Eastern Province of the kingdom.
(Reuters, 1/8/19)(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 7, In Sudan hundreds gathered at a rally backing President Omar al-Bashir. A minister said more than 800 protesters have been arrested in anti-government demonstrations held across Sudan since last month.
(AFP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, In Syria an IS fighter blew himself up near an SDF checkpoint in Raqqa. A war monitor said the suicide attacker first opened fire at an SDF force outside a local department before going inside and blowing himself up killing five, including four civilians, and wounding eight.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, The head of Thailand's immigration police said that Saudi woman Rahaf Mohammed Alqunun (18), who was stopped in Bangkok as she was trying to travel to Australia for asylum to escape alleged abuse by her family, will not be sent anywhere against her wishes.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, A Turkish court ordered the release on bail of Eren Erdem, a former opposition lawmaker, while he is being tried on terrorism-related charges.
(Reuters, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, A cargo ship sank in rough waters off Turkey's Black Sea coast, killing six crew members including its captain. Seven other crew members were rescued.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, The Vatican appointed a retired China-friendly cardinal to head the Catholic Diocese of Hong Kong, effectively blocking the succession of the highest-ranking serving bishop known to be critical of the Chinese government.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 8, Pres. Donald Trump gave a nine-minute prime-time address to make the case for a southern border wall, his signature domestic policy idea, but made no concessions to opposition Democrats, who have rejected funding for the project.
(AFP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 8, The United States imposed sanctions on seven Venezuelans including the owner of news network Globovision for allegedly plundering billions of dollars from the crisis-hit country through black-market currency exchanges.
(AFP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, In Michigan a Livonia doctor and seven other people were charged in a prescription drug conspiracy. Dr. Zongli Chang (52) later admitted running an $18 million prescription drug scheme. In April he was sentenced to more than 11 years in prison.
(http://tinyurl.com/y27gnh6a)(SFC, 4/19/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 8, In Brazil groups of criminals in the northeastern state of Ceara carried out fresh attacks for a seventh day on public infrastructure and businesses. At least four buses and a construction site were torched overnight in Fortaleza.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, In China a man (49) injured 20 children with a hammer inside a primary school in Beijing. A suspect, surnamed Jia, was employed through a labor service company to perform daily maintenance work at the school. His contract was set to expire this month and had not been renewed.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, Congo-based SYMOCEL said 16 percent of vote counting centers it had observed relied on tallies transmitted by voting machines instead of hand-counted tallies as required by law. The observer mission said it had witnessed 52 "major" irregularities in the 101 vote-counting centers it observed, including people tampering with results.
(Reuters, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, Egypt blocked Palestinians from entering the country from Gaza after Palestinian Authority (PA) personnel pulled out of the Rafah border crossing and Hamas officers took their place. Cairo decided to open Rafah crossing only to Palestinians returning to Gaza, after the PA personnel withdrew.
(Reuters, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, The European Union froze the assets of an Iranian intelligence unit and two of its staff, as the Netherlands accused Iran of two killings on its soil and joined France and Denmark in alleging Tehran plotted other attacks in Europe.
(Reuters, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, Deadly winter weather blasted Europe for yet another day, trapping hundreds of people in Alpine regions. At least 13 people have been killed in weather-related accidents in Europe over the last week.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, French officials slammed a fundraising drive that brought in more than 100,000 euros for Christophe Dettinger, a former boxer filmed punching police officers during the latest "yellow vest" anti-government protests in Paris over the weekend.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, German authorities said a local student (20) in Hesse state has admitted obtaining and publishing the personal data of hundreds of politicians and celebrities and told investigators he acted alone.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, Off Hong Kong one man was killed and two others declared missing after a Vietnamese-listed oil tanker caught fire while it was being refueled.
(AFP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, India's lower house of Parliament approved a bill that would grant residency and citizenship rights to non-Muslims who entered India illegally, allegedly after fleeing persecution in several neighboring nations, despite protests against the legislation in the populous northeast that brought the region to a near standstill.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, India's Supreme Court cleared the way for Vedanta to reopen its south Indian copper smelter by refusing to stay an order from the country's environmental court.
(Reuters, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, In Iraq a car bomb killed two police officers in the city of Tikrit. The wounded included two soldiers, a police officer and three civilians.
(Reuters, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, Authorities in Latvia confiscated two tons of cocaine with a street value of a billion euros ($1.15 billion), the largest seizure ever in the Baltic country. The drug originated from Ecuador. Five Latvian citizens were detained, including one with a previous conviction for smuggling and money laundering.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 8, In Lebanon winter storms packing heavy rain and snow turned streets into rivers of water and mud and paralyzed parts of the country. The storms have flooded Syrian refugee camps, ruining tents, mattresses and food and compounding the misery of people enduring powerful winter winds and biting cold.
(Reuters, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, Madagascar's Constitutional Court confirmed Andry Rajoelina as the winner of the country's Dec. 19 presidential election after his opponent lodged a complaint alleging fraud.
(AFP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, In western Mexico motorists lined up for a fourth straight day at gas stations as the government continued to restrict pipeline deliveries to combat illegal fuel taps.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un arrived on an unannounced visit to Beijing for his fourth summit with President Xi Jinping.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, Poland arrested a Chinese manager at tech giant Huawei in Poland and one of its own former counter-espionage officers and charged them with spying on Poland for China.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 8, Puntland, a region of war-ravaged Somalia, elected a new president, a peaceful transfer of power in a part of the country notorious for piracy and Islamist militias. Said Abdullahi Deni defeated his closest rival, Asad Osman Abdullahi and was sworn in for a new five-year term.
(Reuters, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, In South Africa a train collision in Pretoria killed three people and injured more than 200.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, A South Korean court approved a request by plaintiffs in a wartime forced labor case to seize part of the local assets of Japan's Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corp.
(Reuters, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, In Sudan thousands of protesters staged a "martyrs' rally" in the eastern town of Al-Gadaref to honor those killed in anti-government protests last month. Human Rights Watch said at least 40 people have been killed in the protests and accused security forces of using live ammunition and excessive force as well as arbitrary detentions.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, In northwest Syria a jihadist assault gained ground against Turkish-backed rebels, edging closer to frontlines with government forces.
(Reuters, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, In Thailand about 200 protesters staged a rare demonstration, demanding that there be no further delays in holding elections, which were expected next month but have been put in doubt.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 9, Three days of US-Chinese talks aimed at ending a costly tariff battle wrapped up in an optimistic atmosphere.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, A US supplier of T-shirts and other team apparel to college bookstores cut its ties with a Chinese company that drew workers from an internment camp holding targeted members of ethnic minority groups.
(AP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 9, The San Francisco Giants announced a 20-year agreement with Oracle Corp. for the company to affix its name to the city's waterfront ballpark for an estimated $300-350 million.
(SFC, 1/10/19, p.A1)
2019 Jan 9, Colorado officials said a simplified program will make it easier for thousands of people to seek the elimination of low-level marijuana convictions they received in Denver before recreational use became legal in the state.
(SFC, 1/10/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan 9, A wave of Taliban attacks in western and northern Afghanistan killed 21 members of the country's security forces.
(AP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 9, Australian police late today arrested Savas Avan (48) after 38 packages allegedly containing asbestos were sent to foreign consulates in the cities of Melbourne, Canberra and Sydney.
(AP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 9, Bangladesh police fired tear gas and swung batons as thousands of garment workers demonstrated for better wages for a fourth day. One protester was fatally shot and three dozen others were injured in clashes with police.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, Bosnian Serbs celebrated a holiday to mark the date in 1992 when Bosnian Serbs declared the creation of their own state in Bosnia, igniting the country's devastating four-year war that killed more than 100,000 people and left millions homeless. Bosnia's top court banned the Serb holiday in 2015, but the ban was not observed.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, British MPs voted to force PM Theresa May to quickly set out an alternative plan for Brexit if she loses a crucial vote on her EU withdrawal deal next week, in a second parliamentary defeat in 24 hours.
(AFP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, In Cambodia Kong Korn, a veteran member of the dissolved opposition, party broke ranks with his colleagues and became the first to apply for a government-offered lifting of a ban on engaging in political activity.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, A Cambodian court jailed Ieng Cholsa for three years for insulting the king in Facebook posts, the second known conviction under a new lese majeste law enacted last year, which rights groups fear could be used to stifle dissent.
(Reuters, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, A Egyptian court sentenced Ahmed Douma, one of the country's best-known activists, to 15 years' jail for rioting and attacking security forces in 2011. The Cairo court also ordered Douma to pay six million Egyptian pounds ($336,0005) for damages.
(Reuters, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, Activists from a French protest movement encouraged supporters to set off a bank run by emptying their accounts, while the government urged citizens to express their discontent in a national debate instead of weekly demonstrations disrupting the streets of Paris.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, It was reported that France and Germany have agreed to deepen a 1963 treaty of post-war reconciliation in a bid to show that the European Union's main axis remains strong and counter growing eurosceptic nationalism among some other members. The extension to the Elysee Treaty will be signed on Jan. 22.
(Reuters, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, A French fighter jet carrying two pilots disappeared from radar screens near the Swiss border in a snowstorm.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, Greek authorities said they have broken a drugs ring importing narcotics into the country as dehydrated 'superfood' berries implanted with cocaine.
(Reuters, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, Guatemala's top court overturned a decision by President Jimmy Morales to shut down a UN anti-corruption mission to the central American country.
(AFP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, India's upper house of Parliament approved a bill providing a 10 percent quota in government jobs for the poor members of upper castes who have been excluded from existing quotas for low-ranking castes. The bill now only needs the approval of India's president, a formality, to become law.
(AP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 9, Iran confirmed that is holding US veteran Michael White at a prison in the country.
(SFC, 1/10/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 9, Italy's far-right Deputy PM Matteo Salvini, at a press conference in Warsaw, said he wants his country and Poland to join forces to reshape Europe in his quest for a euroskeptic alliance ahead of elections in May.
(Reuters, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, In Kashmir a mortar shell fired by Indian troops from across the frontier killed a woman as she was trying to reach a shelter during an exchange of fire between India and Pakistan.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, The Kazakh Foreign Ministry said China is allowing more than 2,000 ethnic Kazakhs to abandon their Chinese citizenship and leave the country in a sign that Beijing may be starting to feel a mounting backlash against its sweeping crackdown on Muslims in the far west region of Xinjiang.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, In Lebanon a storm packing snow and rain that has battered the country for five days, flooded neighborhoods and paralyzed major mountain roads. The body of an 8-year Syrian girl, who had gone missing a day earlier after she fell into a river, was found in a nearby orchard.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, Forty-nine migrants disembarked in Malta after spending more than two weeks stranded on board rescue ships, ending a standoff in which European Union countries had refused to offer them a safe port. An agreement brokered by the European Commission calls for a total of some 300 migrants who have reached Malta in recent weeks to be redistributed between eight EU countries, including Italy.
(Reuters, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, Mexico's President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador issued an emotional appeal to his countrymen to help battle against fuel thefts, as long lines spread to gas stations in Mexico City.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, In northern Mexico an apparent clash between drug gangs left 21 bodies, some burned, in the township of Miguel Alemanof, Tamaulipas state. The death toll soon rose to 24 with the discovery of the bodies of three more men.
(AP, 1/10/19)(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 9, Nepal and Japan agreed to allow state-run Nepal Airlines to resume flights between the two Asian nations at the beginning of a two-day visit to Nepal by Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Kono.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, In Nepal a woman (35) and her sons were found dead by family and villagers in a small hut next to their family home due to suspected smoke inhalation. A local tradition exiled women from their homes and forced to live in huts during menstruation.
(AP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 9, It was reported that the Palestinian Authority has cut off the salaries of Hamas lawmakers in the West Bank, the latest in a series of recent measures that have escalated tensions between the rival factions.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, In the Philippines a mammoth crowd of mostly barefoot Catholics joined a raucous procession in Manila of a centuries-old black statue of Jesus Christ.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, Thousands of Poles protested a government plan to hold a massive slaughter of wild boars as a way to stop the spread of the deadly African swine fever among farm pigs.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, Russia's Defense Ministry says it has received 30 Soviet WW II-era T-34 battle tanks from Laos, a move reflecting the national veneration of the weapon. The ministry said more than 58,000 T-34s were built between 1940 and 1946, making it the world's most widely produced tank. The T-34 was widely exported and used in numerous conflicts.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, Saudi Arabia's energy ministry said proven oil reserves stood at 263.2 billion barrels at the end of last year, up from the figure of 261 billion barrels that has been used for almost three decades. The kingdom has another 2.9 billion barrels of crude in a border zone shared with neighboring Kuwait, bringing total oil reserves to 266.1 billion barrels. Saudi oil remains among the cheapest in the world to extract, at only $4 a barrel.
(AFP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, In Sudan thousands of people cheered President Omar al-Bashir in a show of support for his embattled regime in Khartoum Wednesday, as riot police fired tear gas at crowds of protesters at a rival anti-government demonstration.
(AFP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, A Syrian Kurdish militia said its fighters earlier this week captured eight foreign fighters with the Islamic State group in eastern Syria, including an American teenager. The YPG identified the 16-year-old American teenager as Soulay Noah Su.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, In Turkey a pro-Kurdish party legislator said 162 prisoners across Turkey have joined a hunger strike in a show of solidarity with an imprisoned opposition legislator who has been refusing food since November.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 10, President Donald Trump headed to the US-Mexico border to push his demand for a wall, a day after he walked out of negotiations with Democrats in a political crisis paralyzing the government.
(AFP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, In California rookie police Officer Natalie Corona (22) was ambushed and shot dead by a gunman as she investigated a car crash in downtown Davis. Police soon found suspect Kevin Douglas Limbaugh dead after he shot himself in the head.
(SFC, 1/12/19, p.A1)(SSFC, 1/13/19, p.A12)
2019 Jan 10, US carmaker Ford said it planned a major restructuring of its European operations, including job cuts, to boost profitability. Indian-owned Jaguar Land Rover also announced major restructuring in Europe as consumers dump diesel cars for greener electric vehicles.
(AFP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles agreed to pay California $78.4 million as part of a larger agreement with federal regulators to settle allegations of cheating on diesel emission tests.
(SFC, 1/11/19, p.D1)
2019 Jan 10, In Afghanistan Khetab Emir, a senior commander of the Islamic State militant group, was killed in a raid in the eastern area of Nangarhar province.
(Reuters, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 10, Heavy snowfall continued in parts of Austria and southern Germany, with several places cut off and the bad weather expected to persist. Snow was causing problems in other parts of Europe, even in Norway's Arctic Svalbard archipelago. At least 17 weather-related deaths have been reported in Europe over the past week.
(AP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, Baton-wielding Bangladeshi police fired tear gas to break up thousands of garment workers demonstrating for higher wages for a fifth day, forcing dozens of factories to close.
(Reuters, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, Belarus Pres. Alexander Lukashenko sternly warned Russia that it could lose its ally if it fails to offer compensation for higher oil prices.
(AP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, In northern Burkina Faso 12 civilians were killed during a jihadist attack in the village of Gasseliki. The area has been battling a wave of Islamist violence.
(AFP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 10, China's CCTV reported that parent discovered earlier this week that a batch of orally administered polio vaccines were being given to children at a county-run health facility nearly one month after their December 11 expiration date. At least 145 children were administered the expired polio vaccines.
(AFP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 10, Congo's electoral commission (CENI) announced overnight that Felix Tshisekedi (55) had won the Dec. 30 vote, edging out another challenger, businessman Martin Fayulu. The Catholic Church, one of the country's most respected institutions, challenged the official results, suggesting its tally did not give victory to opposition leader Tshisekedi. Four protesters were killed in clashes with security forces in Kikwit.
(AP, 1/10/19)(Reuters, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 10, In southern Croatia a fire broke out at the 252-megawatt (MW) Dubrovnik hydro power plant in Plat, leaving one worker dead and at least three injured.
(Reuters, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, In eastern Cuba seven people were killed and five left in critical condition after a bus crashed carrying tourists and local travelers.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 10, In France ride-hailing giant Uber lost an appeal brought by a former driver who wanted his terms of employment recognized as a fully-fledged work contract.
(AFP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 10, In Germany almost 640 flights were cancelled as security staff went on strike at three airports, meaning disruption for around 100,000 passengers.
(AFP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, India's federal police chief was ousted by a panel led by PM Narendra Modi, drawing criticism from the main opposition Congress party. Alok Verma, chief of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), was suspended in October along with his deputy after they accused each other of bribery and interfering in investigations.
(Reuters, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, In central Mali the French military in coordination with Malian armed forces carried out airstrikes killed some 15 members of an unnamed extremist group that had been preparing an attack.
(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 10, Norway's Aker Energy said it had discovered oil in commercial quantities off Ghana, which the government welcomed as a potential boost to the economy. Exploratory drilling indicated an "estimated 450-550 million barrels of oil equivalent (mmboe)" in the Pecan field.
(AFP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, Saudi Arabia awarded a contract to build a $500 million wind farm, a first for the world's top oil exporter as it pushes to diversify its energy sector. A consortium led by France's EDF and Abu Dhabi's Masdar won the bid for the 400-megawatt Dumat al-Jandal wind project in the northern Al Jouf province.
(AFP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, Spanish police said 28 professional tennis players, including one who participated in last year's US Open, have been linked to an international organized group accused of fixing matches.
(AP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, In southern Thailand four paramilitary volunteers were killed while guarding a school in Pattani province.
(AP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro was sworn into a new term in office by the nation's Supreme Court.
(Reuters, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, A rebel drone hit Yemen's largest air base, killing six loyalist soldiers during a military parade at the Al-Anad Air Base near Aden in an attack which threatened to hamper UN-led peace efforts. On Jan. 13 Maj. Gen. Mohammad Saleh Tamah, chief of Yemen's military intelligence, died of wounds suffered in the attack.
(AFP, 1/10/19)(AP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 11, The US-led coalition against Islamic State said it has begun the process of withdrawing from Syria.
(Reuters, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Oregon police fatally shot a man with a gun at a middle school in Eugene, amid a custody dispute.
(SFC, 1/12/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan 11, The share price in Brazilian airplane manufacturer Embraer soared as markets reacted favorably to the country's President Jair Bolsonaro approving a merger with us giant Boeing. Embraer will only retain control of its military division.
(AFP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, In Bulgaria two snowboarders died in an avalanche. Heavy snowfall this week in the Balkans has closed down schools, left some remote villages cut off and disrupted traffic and power supplies in many areas in the region. At least 20 weather-related deaths have been reported in Europe over the past week.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, In Canada three people were killed and nearly two dozen were injured when a double-decker bus struck a bus shelter in Ottawa during rush hour.
(Reuters, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Thousands of Colombians staged protests in several cities to demand the resignation of the country's chief prosecutor. Nestor Humberto Martinez is a key US ally in the war on drugs, but his critics at home say he has withheld information that links local politicians and business groups with Brazilian construction giant Odebrecht.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Congo runner-up Martin Fayulu announced he will file a court challenge to the presidential election results. Fayulu's camp said its tally showed he won 62 percent of the vote, with Felix Tshisekedi taking 19 percent. The influential Catholic Church also rejected the official result based on tallies by its 40,000-strong observer team. Police confronted opposition protesters in eastern Goma city, killing at least one person.
(AP, 1/11/19)(Reuters, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, In Ecuador at least 17 people died and 12 others were injured in a fire at a drug rehabilitation clinic in Guayaquil.
(Reuters, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 11, Egypt deported a German citizen early today whom it detained in Cairo airport on Dec. 27 on suspicion of plotting terrorism.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, A French judicial source said the president of Japan's Olympic Committee, Tsunekazu Takeda, is under formal investigation in France for suspected corruption related to Japan's successful bid for the 2020 Olympic Games.
(Reuters, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, In Germany airlines canceled around 120 flights at Frankfurt Airport and 90 at Munich Airport because of concerns about snow.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, German automaker Volkswagen posted another annual sales record in 2018 as new SUV models boosted deliveries and the company managed to increase its share in China even as the car market there shrank for the first time in years.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Greece told German Chancellor Angela Merkel it had grounds to pursue a legal claim for billions of euros in reparations for the Nazi occupation of the country in World War Two.
(Reuters, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 11, Greek police fired teargas to disperse hundreds of teachers protesting against government plans to change hiring procedures in the public sector.
(Reuters, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, In India leaders of two political rivals in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh said they will form an alliance in a bid to defeat PM Narendra Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in national election scheduled for May.
(Reuters, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, In Iraq two people were killed in an explosion in Al-Qaim, a city to which displaced families are being encouraged to return.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, The Israeli army said around 12,000 Palestinians had gathered in multiple sites along the border. A Palestinian woman was shot dead by Israeli forces the during protests.
(AFP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, An Italian court cleared the head of the Autostrade motorway operator of responsibility in the deaths of 40 people in a July 28, 2013, coach crash. Several others were jailed.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, In Japan Nissan's ex-chairman Carlos Ghosn was charged with breach of trust, making the star executive's release unlikely for months to come. Greg Kelly, another Nissan executive; and Nissan as a legal entity also were charged with additional underreporting of income, from 2015 through mid-2018.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Macedonia's parliament approved a deal with Greece that would rename the country North Macedonia. Greece's parliament is expected to vote on it before March.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 11, A court in Myanmar rejected the appeal of two Reuters journalists convicted of violating the country's Official Secrets Act during their reporting on the country's crackdown on Rohingya Muslims, and maintained the seven-year prison terms they were sentenced to last year.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, In Nigeria an overturned oil tanker exploded while dozens of people were scooping up the leaking fuel and many were killed. About 60 people were inside a pit scooping fuel when the explosion occurred.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 11, Portugal's parliament extended a residency program for wealthy foreigners to include investors who spend at least 500,000 euros on environmental projects.
(Reuters, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Portugal's parliament unanimously changed the law to expand the definition of rape to cover all sex without consent, joining just seven EU countries with such a wide definition.
(Reuters, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Russia's space agency lost control of the Spektr-R satellite, an orbiting radio telescope launched in 2011 with an expected useful life of about three years.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 11, Prominent Russian LGBT activist Igor Kochetkov said that gay rights supporters have seen a spike in detentions in Chechnya of men and women suspected of being gay since late December.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Spanish police said they have seized 2,700 kg (6,000 pounds) of marijuana bound for the United Kingdom and the Netherlands. The marijuana was grown and processed in Spain's northeastern region and then taken out of the country by truck.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Sudanese security forces fired tear gas to disperse demonstrators who marched after noon prayers in Khartoum to demand that President Omar al-Bashir step down from 30 years in power.
(Reuters, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Syrian state news agency said Israeli warplanes have fired a number of missiles toward the Damascus area, triggering Syrian air defense that shot down most of them.
(Reuters, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 11, Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen appointed close political ally Su Tseng-chang as premier during a Cabinet reshuffle following the ruling party's heavy election losses and growing pressure from rival China.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Thailand's immigration police chief said Saudi woman Rahaf Mohammed Alqunun, who fled alleged abuse by her family, will leave Bangkok for Canada.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 12, The partial US government shutdown entered a record 22nd day, as Pres. Donald Trump remained steadfast in his demand for $5.7 billion to build a Mexico border wall and Democrats in Congress determined to refuse the funds.
(AFP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, The United States stepped up its criticism of Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro with an explicit call for the formation of a new government in the South American country.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, In Afghanistan at least five security forces were killed after their checkpoint came under attack by insurgents in southern Kandahar province. At least nine people were killed when a gas cylinder exploded late today in Kabul.
(AP, 1/12/19)(AP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 12, In Austria three German skiers were killed in an avalanche. A fourth was reported missing. The bodies of the three German skiers were recovered hours later near the resort of Lech. The 4th body was recovered on Jan. 16.
(AP, 1/13/19)(AP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 12, Brazil's government issued a statement saying it recognized Venezuela's Congressional leader, who opposes President Nicolas Maduro, as the rightful president of Venezuela.
(Reuters, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, In Britain hundreds of protesters, inspired by France's yellow vest movement, rallied in London, drawing attention to government austerity programs that have hit the poor hard.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, Rahaf Mohammed al-Qunun (18), a Saudi woman who fled her family this week saying she feared for her life, arrived in Toronto after Canada granted her asylum.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, Chinese telecommunications equipment maker Huawei said it had sacked Wang Weijing, an employee arrested in Poland on spying charges, in a case that could intensify Western security concerns about the company.
(Reuters, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, In northern China 21 coal miners were killed when a mine collapsed in Shenmu, Shaanxi province.
(AP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 12, Congo's presidential runner-up Martin Fayulu said he has asked the constitutional court to order a recount in the disputed election.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, Egyptian security forces killed six Islamic militants in a raid on their desert hideout south of Cairo between the southern provinces of Sohag and Assiut.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, Egypt's Al-Azhar university expelled a female student after she appeared in a video hugging a male colleague, accusing her of undermining the school's reputation. A video went viral earlier this month showing a young man carrying a bouquet of flowers kneeling before a young woman and then hugging her in what appeared to be a marriage proposal. The Al-Azhar University strictly segregates the genders.
(AFP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 12, The French Interior Ministry said about 32,000 people have turned out in yellow vest demonstrations across France, including 8,000 in Paris. Paris police fired water cannon and tear gas to push back demonstrators from around the Arc de Triomphe monument, in the ninth straight weekend of protests against President Emmanuel Macron's economic reforms.
(AP, 1/12/19)(Reuters, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 12, In France two firefighters and a Spanish woman died and nearly people 50 were injured in a massive gas explosion in a bakery that gutted the ground floor of a building in a central Paris shopping district. A 4th body was soon found bringing the overall death toll to four.
(AFP, 1/12/19)(AP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 12, Gabon's President Ali Bongo, who has been out of the country for two months recovering from a stroke, named Julien Nkoghe Bekale as the new prime minister in an apparent effort to shore up his political base days after a failed coup attempt. Bekale replaced Emmanuel Issoze-Ngondet, who has served since 2016.
(Reuters, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, In Germany a small plane crashed east of Berlin, killing two people.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, Thousands of Guatemalans marched against President Jimmy Morales's bid to close a UN anti-corruption mission that sought to investigate him on suspicion of campaign finance violations.
(AFP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, Japan-based Nissan confirmed that Chief Performance Officer Jose Munoz, who took a leave of absence a week ago, has resigned, the first high-profile departure at the Japanese automaker publicly acknowledged as related to the arrest of former Chairman Carlos Ghosn.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, In Kashmir rebel commander Zeenatul Islam was killed along with his associate late today in a gunbattle with Indian troops.
(AP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 12, Malaysia's Pahang state announced it had a new sultan, who is expected to be elected king after the former monarch abdicated following his reported marriage to a Russian former beauty queen. Tengku Abdullah Shah (59) replaced his father, Sultan Ahmad Shah.
(AFP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, In southwest Poland one miner died and six were injured after a tremor struck KGHM's copper mine Rudna, around 700 meters underground.
(Reuters, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, In northern Sweden a mining company truck crashed into a minibus early today. Six Swiss citizens were killed and one person was injured in the crash.
(AP, 1/12/19)(AP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 12, In Syria artillery shelling by government forces pounded parts of the northwestern Idlib province where militants were trying to infiltrate.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, Turkey for a second day loaded tanks and armored vehicles onto trucks and dispatched the convoy to the Turkish province of Hatay on the Syrian border.
(Reuters, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, In Yemen clashes erupted between Huthi rebels and government forces in the flashpoint port city of Hodeida, dealing a new blow to a fragile truce.
(AFP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, In Yemen a fire at a refinery in the southern port city of Aden spread to a second storage tank, injuring six people.
(Reuters, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, Zimbabwe's President Emmerson Mnangagwa said prices of petrol and diesel would more than double to tackle a shortfall caused by increased demand and "rampant" illegal trading. Despite the price hike, diplomats and tourists would be able to access cheaper fuel at certain pumping stations.
(AFP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 13, US President Donald Trump threatened Turkey with economic devastation if it attacks a US-allied Kurdish militia in Syria.
(Reuters, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 13, The FBI arrested Marzieh Hashemi (59), a prominent American-born anchorwoman on Iranian state television's English-language service, after she arrived at St. Louis Lambert International Airport. She had filmed a Black Lives Matter documentary after visiting relatives in the New Orleans area. She has worked at the Iranian state broadcaster service for 25 years. Her son, Reza Hashemi, was also arrested.
(AP, 1/16/19)(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 13, In Alabama Birmingham police Sergeant Wytasha Carter (44) was killed and another officer critically wounded in a shooting as they questioned two people suspected of trying to break into cars. Two suspects were taken into custody.
(SFC, 1/14/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 13, California's PG&E Corp. announced the resignation of CEO Geisha Williams as the company faces billions of dollars in potential liability for its role in the 2017 and 2018 California wildfires.
(SFC, 1/14/19, p.A1)
2019 Jan 13, In Mississippi George Robinson (62), a Black man, was slammed into the pavement by police officers who also struck and kicked him in the head and the chest. Robinson died off his injuries on January 15. The officers were canvassing a predominantly Black neighborhood in Jackson after a pastor, Anthony Longino, was fatally shot in a botched robbery outside his church hours earlier. On August 5, 2020, the three Black police offiers involved were charged with 2nd degree murder.
(SFC, 8/15/20, p.A4)
2019 Jan 13, It was reported that at least 26 people have died from hantavirus in the Patagonia region of Argentina since December. A judge has ordered 85 residents of Epuyen, a town of 3,000 where nine people have died, to remain in their homes for at least 30 days to help halt the outbreak.
(SSFC, 1/13/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 13, Bangladesh's commerce minister said local garment manufacturers have agreed to raise workers' pay, urging people to return to work after a week of violent demonstrations. At least 20 people were hurt when police used teargas and water cannons to disperse workers blocking a major highway in the Ashulia garment manufacturing belt, on the outskirts of the capital Dhaka.
(Reuters, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 13, Dubai-based port operator DP World said it will pay $502 million for a 71.3 percent stake in Chile's Puertos y Logistica SA, a port services firm.
(AP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 13, French media and reporters' organizations denounced attacks on journalists by "yellow vest" anti-government protesters and called for better protection after a series of incidents this weekend. President Emmanuel Macron attempted to rebound from two months of often violent anti-government protests by launching a nationwide debate over the grievances fuelling the "yellow vest" movement.
(Reuters, 1/13/19)(AFP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 13, In France two ski patrollers were killed when the devices they use to trigger avalanches exploded. This brought to at least 26 the number of weather-related deaths reported in parts of Europe this month.
(AP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 13, Greece's defense minister Panos Kammenos announced his resignation and said his right-wing Independent Greeks party is quitting the government after meeting with PM Alexis Tsipras. The government now needs the backing of six lawmakers from opposition parties or independents to avoid a snap election.
(AP, 1/13/19)(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 13, Israel acknowledged that it carried out a weekend air strike on what it called an Iranian arms cache in Syria, and that it also completed a hunt for cross-border tunnels dug by Tehran-allied Lebanese Hezbollah guerrillas.
(Reuters, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 13, Italian officials said former leftist guerrilla Cesare Battisti (64), on the run for almost four decades after escaping prison following a murder conviction, has been arrested in Bolivia and is expected to be extradited to Italy.
(Reuters, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 13, In Kashmir massive anti-India protests and clashes erupted, leading to injuries to at least 16 people after a gunbattle between militants and government forces overnight killed two rebels.
(AP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 13, The Southern African Development Community (SADC) urged Democratic Republic of Congo to recount votes cast in its disorganized presidential election, raising pressure on Kinshasa to ensure the legitimacy of the next government and avert widespread violent unrest.
(Reuters, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 13, In southern Spain a 2-year-old toddler fell into a narrow 100-meter well after walking away from his parents near Totalan, a town northeast of Malaga. On Jan. 26 rescuers found the dead body of the two-year-old boy.
(AP, 1/16/19)(Reuters, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 13, In Sudan hundreds of protesters marched in and around Khartoum, the fourth week of unrest that began over skyrocketing prices and a failing economy but which now calls for the ouster of autocratic President Omar al-Bashir. Security forces clashed with protesters in three cities.
(AP, 1/13/19)(Reuters, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 13, In Switzerland a fire broke out this morning in a six-story building in the southeastern city of Chur. A father (33) from the Dominican Republic and his two young children died in the fire and police were investigating if the man set the fire deliberately.
(AP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 13, Zimbabweans reacted with outrage to a sharp rise in fuel prices announced by President Emmerson Mnangagwa in a move to improve supplies as the country struggles with its worst gasoline shortages in a decade.
(AFP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 14, Teachers in the Los Angeles Union School District went on strike. Some charter school teachers joined their public sector counterparts to demand better working conditions.
(SFC, 1/16/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 14, California-based PG&E Corp. said looming wildfire costs were propelling it toward bankruptcy and that it would file for bankruptcy on or about Jan. 29.
(SFC, 1/16/19, p.D1)
2019 Jan 14, In Michigan Hyundai of South Korea scored two out of three wins in the North American Car, Truck and Utility Vehicle of the Year awards, as the Detroit auto show's press previews officially got underway.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, In New Jersey gunman William Owens (39) entered a UPS processing facility and took two women hostage in Logan Township. He was fatally shot by law officers. Nobody else was hurt.
(SFC, 1/15/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 14, MNG Enterprises, better known as Digital First Media, offered a $1.36 billion buyout of Gannett Co., the publisher of USA Today. The media group has a history of taking over struggling newspapers and slashing jobs.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, In Afghanistan a Taliban suicide bomber killed at least four people and wounded scores when he detonated an explosive-laden vehicle late today in Kabul.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 14, In Austria a worker clearing snow off a roof in Faistenaw died after being swept away as the snow began to slide off.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, In Bosnia three people died and three others were injured in two separate car accidents on icy roads near the northwestern town of Laktasi.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, A Brazilian police officer died and three others were hospitalized after their helicopter crashed in Rio de Janeiro's Guanabara Bay.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, A Chinese court sentenced a Canadian man to be executed for drug smuggling, prompting Canadian PM Justin Trudeau to accuse China of using the death penalty arbitrarily. Robert Lloyd Schellenberg (36) had appealed his original 15-year prison sentence.
(Reuters, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, DR Congo's Constitutional Court said it would start hearing an appeal on Jan. 15 against presidential election results that gave victory to opposition leader Felix Tshisekedi.
(AFP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, Croatia's government formally canceled a $500 million deal to buy 12 used fighter jets from Israel after it collapsed over US objections. The defense minister said the Balkan country will restart the search for the right deal.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, In Egypt a roadside bomb hit a police convoy in the town of Rafah in the north of the Sinai Peninsula, killing a conscript and seriously wounding four others.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, It was reported that a Finnish citizens' initiative to withdraw asylum from people convicted of sex crimes received tens of thousands of signatures over the weekend and has become an important political issue ahead of this year's parliamentary elections.
(Reuters, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, Two French policemen went on trial over the alleged gang-rape of a drunk Canadian tourist in April 2014 at the former headquarters of the Paris police.
(AFP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, Greek riot police used tear gas to disperse state schoolteachers protesting violently in Athens, days after the country's public order minister accused officers of indiscriminately attacking teachers in similar circumstances.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, In Honduras hundreds of migrants began trekking out of a bus station in the violent northern city of Pedro Sula to join a new caravan of people hoping to reach Mexico or the US.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 14, Indonesia said navy divers have recovered the cockpit voice recorder of a Lion Air jet that crashed into the Java Sea last October.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, In Iran a decades-old Iranian Boeing 707 military cargo plane reportedly carrying meat from Kyrgyzstan crashed while trying to land west of Tehran, killing 15 people on board and leaving a sole survivor.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, In Iran Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, a jailed UK-Iranian mother, launched a hunger strike over a lack of medical care and attempts by Tehran to force her to spy on Britain.
(AFP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, Former communist militant Cesare Battisti, wanted in Italy for four murders in the 1970s, arrived in Rome after an international police squad tracked him down and arrested him in Bolivia.
(AFP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, Jordan's King Abdullah and the foreign ministers of France and Iran made separate visits to Iraq, an ally of Tehran, amid US attempts to rally allies against the Islamic Republic as Washington starts withdrawing troops from neighboring Syria.
(Reuters, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, In northeastern Nigeria 7 people were killed when Boko Haram fighters attacked a military base in Rann, setting fire to shelters for those displaced by the conflict.
(AFP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 14, In Poland Pawel Adamowicz, the liberal mayor of the Polish city of Gdansk, died of his wounds a day after being stabbed by a former convict who rushed the stage during a charity event. The attacker has been identified by Polish authorities as a 27-year-old named Stefan.
(Reuters, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov threw cold water on Tokyo's hopes for a quick return of disputed islands in the Pacific, warning Japan that it must recognize them as part of Russia's territory as a starting point for talks.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, In southern Russia one person was killed and four were missing after a gas explosion tore through a multi-storey residential building in the town of Shakhty. The death toll soon climbed to four after the bodies of three missing people were found in the rubble.
(AP, 1/14/19)(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 14, LGBT activists in Russia charged the republic of Chechnya with launching a new crackdown on gays in which at least two people have died and about 40 people have been detained.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, Senegal's the Constitutional Council said the two best known opposition figures have been barred from running in presidential elections next month, increasing President Macky Sall's chances of securing a second term in office. Khalifa Sall and Karim Wade have 48 hours to appeal the Council's decision.
(Reuters, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, Singapore's foreign minister warned of "consequences" if neighboring Malaysia continues to escalate a dispute over waters claimed by the city state.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, It was reported that Suriname authorities confiscated more than 5,000 pounds of cocaine last week in the largest seizure ever for the country.
(SFC, 1/14/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 14, Zimbabwe police fired teargas as angry protesters barricaded roads with burning tires and rocks, after the government more than doubled the price of fuel over the weekend. At least 13 people sustained gunshot wounds during protests against the shock price hike. A police officer was stoned to death by protesters in the city Bulawayo. Two other people died during protests in Chitungwiza, south of Harare, and Kadoma, west of the capital.
(AFP, 1/14/19)(AFP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, It was reported that Jose Irizarry (44), a US federal narcotics agent known for his expensive tastes and high-profile drug seizures, has been implicated in a multimillion-dollar money-laundering conspiracy that involved the very cartel criminals he was charged with fighting in Colombia.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, The US Securities and Exchange Commission charged two Ukrainian men, Artem Radchenko and Oleksandr Ieremenko, with hacking into computers of the SEC to steal quarterly and annual reports of publicly traded companies before their public release. The SEC also filed civil charges against Ieremenko and five others from the US, Ukraine and Russia.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, In Arizona a Tempe police officer shot and killed Antonio Arce (14) after he was encountered burglarizing a car.
(SFC, 1/19/19, p.A8)
2019 Jan 15, Facebook announced that it will invest $300 million over three years to support journalism, with an emphasis on promoting hard-hit local news organizations.
(AFP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, American musical comedy legend Carol Channing (b.1921) died in Rancho Mirage, Ca. She was best known for her performance as Dolly Levi in "Hello, Dolly!," a role she performed more than 5,000 times. She began as a Broadway musical actress, starring in "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes" (1949). Her films included "Thoroughly Modern Millie" (1967).
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carol_Channing)(SFC, 1/16/19, p.A7)
2019 Jan 15, An Australian state government announced plans to mechanically pump oxygen into lakes and rivers after hundreds of thousands of fish died in heatwave conditions. Up to a million dead fish were found floating last week in the Darling River in western New South Wales. 1,800 more rotting fish had since been found in Lake Hume in the state's south.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Brazil's far-right President Jair Bolsonaro decreed the easing of national gun laws as part of his law-and-order agenda, despite fears it could aggravate already staggering violent crime.
(AFP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Britain's Parliament held a historic vote as PM Theresa May lobbied for support but braced for defeat of the UK's divorce deal with the European Union. The House of commons voted 432-202 against May's Brexit plan
(AP, 1/15/19)(SFC, 1/16/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 15, In northern Burkina Faso Canadian geologist Kirk Woodman was kidnapped late today by a dozen gunmen on a mining site owned by Vancouver-based Progress Minerals. His body was found the following afternoon in Oudalan province. A Canadian man and an Italian woman went missing in the same area earlier this month.
(Reuters, 1/16/19)(Reuters, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 15, In western Cameroon at least 30 people were abducted by suspected separatists in the troubled English-speaking Southwest Region.
(AFP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 15, In China Ren Zhengfei, the founder of Huawei, said his company would refuse to disclose secrets about its customers and their communication networks, trying to lay to rest concerns the Chinese tech giant might spy for the Communist government.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Europol said authorities in Belgium and Portugal have dismantled a gang suspected of organizing sham marriages between mostly Portuguese women and Pakistani men. Europol said police have arrested 17 suspects in Belgium — where it also found 43 people it described as "irregular migrants" — and three in Portugal.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, French woman Patricia Dagorn, accused of seducing and then poisoning elderly wealthy men, had her sentence reduced on appeal, after a court overturned two murder convictions in the case. She was sentenced last year to 22 years in prison over the fatal poisoning of two men found dead in 2011 on the Cote d'Azur, and the drugging of two others.
(AFP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, French carmaker Renault said it was recalling some 13,300 Dacia automobiles in Romania over safety issues with the driver's air bag inflator.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Gabon President Ali Bongo returned to medical leave in Morocco, after a brief visit to Libreville where he appeared in a wheelchair on state TV following his stroke last year.
(Reuters, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 15, In Germany Volkswagen CEO Herbert Diess and Ford CEO Jim Hackett said they are forming a global alliance to develop commercial vans and medium-sized pickups together while exploring broader cooperation on future battery-powered and autonomous vehicles and services.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, In India Kanaka Durga (39), one of two Indian women who entered an ancient Hindu Sabarimala temple hill temple earlier this month in defiance of a centuries-old ban on women of menstruating age, alleged she was beaten up by her mother-in-law.
(Reuters, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, An Iranian rocket blasted off into space, but scientists failed to put the Payam satellite into orbit in a launch previously criticized by the United States as helping the Islamic Republic further develop its ballistic missile program.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Italian police seized 644 kg of cocaine worth some 130 million euros ($148 million) hidden in bags of Honduran coffee at the port of Livorno. This was one of the largest drug hauls in Italy in recent years.
(AP, 1/30/19)(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 15, In Kenya a huge blast followed by a gun battle rocked an upmarket hotel and office complex in Nairobi in an attack claimed by the Al-Qaeda-linked Shabaab Islamist group. At least 7 people were killed. One of the five was later identified as Mahir Khalid Riziki (25), who grew up in Mombasa.
(AFP, 1/15/19)(Reuters, 1/15/19)(AFP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 15, Senior Kurdish official Bedran Ciya Kurd categorically rejected a "safe zone" that the Turkish president says his troops plan to set up in northern Syria.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, The Int'l. Criminal Court at The Hague acquitted former Ivory Coast president Laurent Gbagbo over post-electoral violence that killed 3,000 people, the latest in a series of blows for beleaguered ICC prosecutors.
(AFP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, In Pakistan a fire broke out at a home in the garrison city of Rawalpindi, killing a bride to be and four other women who were preparing the woman's wedding.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Russia extended the detention of Ukrainian sailors captured together with their vessels off Crimea in November despite protests from Kiev and the West.
(AFP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Spain's powerful feminist movement rallied across the country against far-right party Vox for seeking to scrap tough laws against gender violence which it argues "criminalizes" men.
(AFP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Authorities in the northeastern Spanish region of Catalonia arrested 17 people, including five alleged members of an extremist Islamist cell, as part of an ongoing anti-terror operation.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, In Thailand Anastasia Vashukevich, a model from Belarus who claimed last year that she had evidence of Russian involvement in helping elect Donald Trump president, pleaded guilty in a court in Pattaya in a case related to holding a sex training seminar and will be deported. She and seven co-defendants were given suspended 18-month prison terms and fines.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Turkey's president said his troops will establish a 20-mile-wide "safe zone" in northern Syria with the help of allies.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, The UN reported that freezing temperatures and the lack of medical care have killed at least 15 displaced Syrian children in recent weeks.
(AFP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Venezuela's opposition-run congress considering a measure that would ask dozens of foreign governments to seek a freeze on bank accounts controlled by the government of President Nicolas Maduro. Congress also prepared to formally declare Maduro a usurper following his inauguration on Jan. 10 to a disputed second term.
(Reuters, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Zimbabwe's military put on a show of force to deter further protests over steep fuel price hikes.
(Reuters, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 16, US federal agents arrested Hasher Jallal Taheb of Cumming Georgia, as he showed for a meeting with an undercover agent and FBI source to carry out an attack on the White House. On April 1, 2020, Taheb (23) pleaded guilty to a charge of attempting to destroy, by fire or an explosive, a building owned by or leased to the United States.
(https://tinyurl.com/ucux2g4)(SFC, 4/3/20, p.A4)
2019 Jan 16, In Nevada Ernesto Martinez-Guzman (20), an illegal immigrant from El Salvador, fatally shot a Reno couple with it at their home with a gun stolen from the couple two weeks earlier. The couple had employed him as a landscaper. His DNA was found on the revolver also used to kill Connie Koontz and Sophia Renken in their homes in Gardnerville. Koontz was found dead Jan. 10. Renken's body was found Jan. 13. Martinez-Guzman was arrested Jan. 19 in Carson City.
(SFC, 1/29/19, p.A5)(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Jan 16, In Texas a child (9) was fatally shot by a cousin (9) while playing with a gun in Houston.
(SFC, 1/18/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 16, In Australia Aiia Maasarwe (21), an exchange student from Shanghai University in China, was attacked shortly after stepping off from a tram in the suburb of Bundoora. Codey Herrmann (20), an aspiring rapper, was soon charged with murder and rape in the death of the Israeli student.
(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 16, Brazil's far-right President Jair Bolsonaro and Argentina's President Mauricio Macri said after their first meeting that they agreed on their opposition to Venezuela's authoritarian government.
(Reuters, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, It was reported that Britain's Parliament has approved a law that will make it illegal to take so-called "upskirting" photos. Following "royal assent" the law will apply in England and Wales. The practice is already banned in Scotland.
(AP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, In Burkina Faso Canadian geologist Kirk Woodman's body was found, following his abduction by a dozen gunmen at a mining site operated by Vancouver-based Progress Minerals. He had been shot, and his body was dumped in an area that is under growing threat from Islamist militants.
(http://tinyurl.com/yb466o59)(Reuters, 4/3/19)
2019 Jan 16, Egypt says its police forces have killed five militants in a shootout in the city of el-Arish in the turbulent northern Sinai Peninsula. It was unclear when the battle took place.
(AP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, Egypt's capital Cairo and some of its port cities were hit by a severe sandstorm, with strong winds and heavy dust forcing the closure of several ports.
(Reuters, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, Gunmen in Ghana shot dead an investigative journalist who helped uncover corruption in soccer. Ahmed Hussein-Suale was shot three times by men on a motorbike while driving home from work in Accra. He was part of a team famous for a documentary last year that accused 77 referees and Ghana's then soccer chief Kwesi Nyantakyi of taking bribes.
(Reuters, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 16, Greek PM Alexis Tsipras very narrowly won a confidence vote after his right-wing partner left the governing coalition to protest an agreement to normalize relations with Macedonia. A nationwide poll this week found 70 percent of respondents oppose the agreement.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 16, Guam's archdiocese of Agana filed for bankruptcy protection, estimating at least $45 million in liabilities over sexual assaults by Catholic clergy.
(http://tinyurl.com/yy9a8bvv)(SFC, 8/9/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 16, Hong Kong customs officers and mainland officials seized 8,300 kilos of pangolin scales and 2,100 kilos of ivory tusks hidden inside a container -- declared to be carrying frozen beef -- at a customs facility. A man and a woman from a trading company in the city were soon arrested.
(AFP, 2/1/19)
2019 Jan 16, Hungary detained Rui Pinto (30), a Portuguese man, on a European arrest warrant filed by Portuguese police on suspicion of extortion and secrecy violations. He had reportedly hacked football bodies' documents - which later appeared on the Football Leaks website - because he was "outraged" by criminality in the sport.
(Reuters, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 16, Kenya's government said security forces have killed at least five militants who stormed the upscale Nairobi DusitD2 hotel compound, taking at least 21 lives and forcing hundreds of others into terrifying escapes after a 20-hour, overnight siege.
(AFP, 1/15/19)(Reuters, 1/15/19)(SFC, 1/17/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 16, In Libya fighting between rival armed groups flared up again in Tripoli, four months after a UN-brokered cease-fire. At least one person was reported killed and 17 others wounded.
(AP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, It was reported that Malaysia has imposed a ban on Israelis participating in any event hosted by the Southeast Asian nation after barring athletes from attending the World Para Swimming championships in July. Malaysia's cabinet had decided on the measure last week.
(Reuters, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, The lower house of Mexico's Congress passed a measure creating a National Guard. It was quickly criticized by President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador for weakening controversial proposals to give the military a greater formal role in policing.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 16, International Criminal Court judges at the Hague said that former Ivory Coast President Laurent Gbagbo and Mr. Ble Goude, a former government minister, should be released immediately following their acquittal on charges of involvement in deadly post-election violence in 2010.
(AP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, Philippine officials turned over to China a former government official wanted back home on charges of corruption that amounted to $210 million. Xie Haojie (49) was arrested on Jan. 13 in Manila in an operation coordinated with Chinese authorities.
(AP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, Polish private Radio Zet said that Iran has stopped issuing tourist visas for Poles.
(Reuters, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, Portuguese police discovered 430 kg (950 pounds) of cocaine concealed inside a banana shipment from Latin America at the port of Leixoes.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 16, Romania's Constitutional Court ruled that secret protocols between prosecutors and the country's domestic intelligence agency were unconstitutional. The decision could cause murder and corruption trials in which prosecutors have relied on evidence that was obtained under the agreement to collapse.
(AP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, South Africa's transport minister pledged to toughen penalties for reckless road users after more than 1,600 people were killed in traffic accidents over the six-week festive season. 17 traffic officers were arrested for corruption over the holidays.
(AFP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, South Korean officials said they have stopped businessmen from bringing North Korean paintings into the country that a report said were purchased at an art studio under UN sanctions.
(AP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, Sudanese police fired tear gas at crowds of anti-government protesters in Kassala, in the first such demonstration held in the eastern town bordering Eritrea.
(AFP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, In Syria a suicide attack carried by IS insurgents killed 19 people, including four Americans, in the northern town of Manbij. The dead included 9 civilians and at least 5 US-backed Syrian fighters.
(Reuters, 1/16/19)(AP, 1/16/19)(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 16, The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), backed by the US, said it was ready to help create a safe zone suggested by US President Donald Trump in its region across north and east Syria.
(Reuters, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, It was reported that Turkish prosecutors are seeking an international arrest warrant for New York Knicks player Enes Kanter, accusing him of membership in a terror organization.
(AP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, The UN Security Council unanimously approved the deployment of up to 75 observers to Yemen's port city of Hodeidah for six months to monitor a ceasefire and redeployment of forces by the warring parties.
(AP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, The UN said at least 890 people are believed to have been killed over three days in December in ethnic violence in northwestern Democratic Republic of Congo, and it warned that the toll could be higher still.
(Reuters, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, Leading Zimbabwean activist Evan Mawarire was arrested by armed police at his home in Harare. Scores of civilians were detained and charged with public violence and others were beaten during protests in response to Mnangagwa increasing the price of fuel by more than 150 percent.
(AFP, 1/16/19)(Reuters, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 17, Michael Cohen, Pres. Trump's former attorney, acknowledged that he paid a technology company to rig Trump's standings in two online polls before the presidential campaign.
(SFC, 1/18/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 17, In Florida a shooting at a strip club in Miami left one security guard dead. Police considered the Booby Trap to be the country's most crime-ridden strip club.
(SFC, 1/19/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan 17, In Chicago a judge acquitted three police officers of trying to cover up the 2014 police shooting of black teenager Laquan McDonald to try to protect another officer who pulled the trigger. Officer Jason Van Dyke shot McDonald 16 times.
(SFC, 1/18/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 17, American poet Mary Oliver (83) died at her home in Hobe sound, Florida. The 1984 Pulitzer Prize winner had authored more than 15 poetry and essay collections.
(SFC, 1/18/19, p.C8)
2019 Jan 17, A US federal judge struck down early-voting restrictions enacted by Wisconsin Republicans in a lame-duck legislative session last year.
(SFC, 1/18/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 17, Facebook said it has removed hundreds of Russia-linked pages, groups and accounts that it says were part of two big disinformation operations targeting users outside the US.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, In Australia the body of Monika Billen, a 62-year-old German tourist, was found beneath a tree in the searing heat of the central Outback, eight days after she was reported missing.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, Rio de Janeiro state prosecutors said they were temporarily suspending an investigation into suspicious payments handled by the former driver of Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro's son, Flavio, due to a Supreme Court ruling.
(Reuters, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, China's ambassador to Canada warned the Canadian government to stop recruiting international support in its feud with China and threatened retaliation if Canada bans Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei for security reasons.
(AP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 17, In Colombia at least eight people were killed and another 10 injured in a car bombing at a police academy in Bogota. Jose Aldemar Rojas (59) rammed a 1993 Nissan loaded with 175 pounds of pentolite through a checkpoint The death toll from the bombing soon rose to 21. Authorities blamed Jose Aldemar Rojas (56), a longtime member of the National Liberation Army (ELN).
(AP, 1/17/19)(AP, 1/18/19)(SFC, 1/18/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 17, Comoros President Azali Assoumani asked: "What's wrong when a Saudi is assassinated in an embassy of Saudi Arabia?" during a speech at a function to launch the construction of a Saudi-funded road in the Indian Ocean island nation.
(Reuters, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 17, In Egypt Islamic militants kidnapped a Christian man traveling in a communal taxi in the turbulent north of the Sinai peninsula. He was later identified as Adeeb Nakhlah (45), a police forensic expert. Police pursued the kidnappers into the desert to which they fled after the incident, killing one of them and wounding two others in a firefight, but could not free the hostage.
(AP, 1/17/19)(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 17, In France Alexandre Benalla, a former bodyguard for President Emmanuel Macron, was taken into police custody over his continued use of diplomatic passports after he was fired for roughing up protesters.
(AFP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, German authorities said they have arrested Navanithan G. (39), a suspected member of the Tamil Tigers. He is alleged to have been involved in the August 2005 assassination of Sri Lanka's Foreign Minister Lakshman Kathirkamar and the attempted killing of Eelam People*s Democratic Party leader Douglas Devananda.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, In Greece striking school teachers and other civil servants shut down central Athens for hours during a protest of new hiring criteria for teachers that were under consideration in parliament.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, Greek police arrested a man trying to sell antiquities excavated by grave robbers that dated back to the third century BC.
(SFC, 1/23/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 17, An Indian court sentenced a popular and flamboyant spiritual guru and three followers to life in prison in the murder 16 years ago of a journalist who published a letter about the guru's alleged sexual exploitation of women. Dr. Saint Gurmeet Singh Ram Rahim Insan and his three followers were convicted on Jan. 11 on murder charges.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, Japan-based Hitachi said it has suspended work on a major new nuclear power station, the Horizon Project, located in Wylfa, on the Welsh island of Anglesey, because it had been unable to agree on financing with the UK government. Hitachi said it will also suspend work on another site located in England.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, Kazakhstan jailed Arman Kudaybergenov and Nural Kiyasov to 18 years in prison for the murder of Denis Ten, the country's first Olympic figure skating medalist. Ten (25) was stabbed in Almaty last July as he struggled with two men he had caught trying to steal the mirrors on his car. Female defendant Zhanar Tolybayeva was found guilty of theft and failing to report a crime, and sentenced to four years.
(Reuters, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, Kenyan police said nine more people have been arrested for their alleged involvement in the extremist attack on the DusitD2 complex in Nairobi this week, bringing the total number of suspects in detention to 11.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, Lithuanian PM Saulius Skvernelis announced he will run for president this year, saying his election would lead to "more harmony" and less intrigue in the Baltic eurozone state. His challengers include independent economist Gitanas Nauseda and conservative ex-finance minister Ingrida Simonyte, who he described as the "heirs" to Pres. Grybauskaite.
(AFP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, In Norway a woman in her 20s was in critical condition after being stabbed in a downtown Oslo supermarket. A Russian suspect (20) arrested after the assault told investigators he wanted to kill several people and that it was a terror attack.
(AP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 17, Polish private radio RMF FM, citing confirmation from the Prime Minister's office, said a Polish man arrested on charges of spying for China last week was an advisor to former PM Beata Szydlo.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, Romanian coal miners ended a weeklong strike after the energy minister offered them wage hikes and other perks.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, President Vladimir Putin arrived to a rousing welcome in Serbia, a key Moscow ally, where he will confer Russia's top award to his counterpart Aleksandar Vucic.
(AFP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, Anastasia Vashukevich, the Belarusian model who claimed last year that she had evidence of Russian interference in the election of Donald Trump as US president, was arrested immediately upon her arrival in Moscow following deportation from Thailand.
(AP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 17, It was reported that another Saudi woman has turned to social media for protection from her father, just days after Canada granted refuge to Rahaf al-Qunun, the 18-year-old Saudi who fled her family. Nojoud al-Mandeel has not fled the kingdom, has not revealed her face and has only made her pleas for help on Twitter in Arabic.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, Sudanese professional and opposition groups held protests in at least a dozen major cities. In Khartoum hundreds braved tear gas and sometimes live fire as they marched toward the presidential palace to deliver a written request that President Omar al-Bashir step down. Riot police broke up a march by hundreds of people on the presidential palace. Three demonstrators were killed.
(AP, 1/17/19)(AFP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 17, In eastern Syria intense US-led coalition airstrikes hit the eastern province of Deir el-Zour, the last area held by the Islamic State group, where the extremists' control has been shrinking over the past weeks.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, A public sector strike brought Tunisia to a standstill as workers heeded calls from a powerful trade union to stay home over demands for wage hikes and economic reforms.
(AFP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, Turkey deported Dutch journalist Ans Boersma (31) after Turkish officials said Ankara received a tip-off from police in the Netherlands that she had suspected links to a jihadist group in Syria. Boersma was a person of interest in an ongoing investigation into militant activity.
(AFP, 1/17/19)(Reuters, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 18, Special counsel Robert Mueller's office issued a rare public statement disputing the accuracy of BuzzFeed News' report that President Donald Trump's former attorney told Mueller that Trump directed the lawyer to lie to Congress.
(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 18, The White House announced after talks between Trump and Kim that Pres. Donald Trump would hold a second summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in late February, but would maintain economic sanctions on Pyongyang.
(Reuters, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 18, A US federal judge found four women guilty of entering the Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge in Arizona without a permit as they sought to place food and water in the desert for migrants.
(SSFC, 1/20/19, p.A10)
2019 Jan 18, Los Angeles teachers picketed and rallied for a 5th day as contract negotiations continued.
(SFC, 1/19/19, p.A8)
2019 Jan 18, Former Chicago police Officer Jason Van Dyke (40) was sentenced to nearly seven years in prison for the 2014 shooting of Laquan McDonald (17).
(SFC, 1/19/19, p.A8)
2019 Jan 18, Jornal Nacional, Brazil's most respected newscast, said that 48 deposits of 2,000 reais each were deposited into the bank account of Senator-elect Flavio Bolsonaro, President Jair Bolsonaro's eldest son, between June and July 2017, when he was a Rio de Janeiro state lawmaker.
(AFP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 18, Bulgarian special police forces arrested 43 people in coordinated raids across the country on a suspected terrorism financing ring.
(Reuters, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, Canada's government dismissed China's warning of repercussions if Ottawa banned Huawei Technologies Co Ltd from supplying equipment to 5G networks, saying it would not compromise on security.
(Reuters, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, Colombian authorities arrested Ricardo Carvajal for his alleged role in the previous days car bombing. They said he showed up on intercepted phone calls boasting of having participated in the attack. Pres. Ivan Duque pressed Cuba to arrest 10 peace negotiators from the National Liberation Army (ELN) for the car bombing that left 21 dead and dozens more wounded.
(AP, 1/18/19)(SFC, 1/19/19, p.A2)(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 18, In the Czech Rep. a man was seriously injured after he set himself on fire in downtown Prague amid commemorative events to remember a student who burned himself to death 50 years ago to inspire resistance against the 1968 Soviet-led invasion of Czechoslovakia.
(AP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, Germany-based Volkswagen Group said that it will pay a fine of 1 billion rupees ($14.2 million) imposed by India for installing software on vehicles that allegedly cheated pollution testing devices, though it is still appealing the order.
(AP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, Indonesia's president said Abu Bakar Bashir (81), the radical Muslim cleric and alleged mastermind of the 2002 Bali bombings, will be granted early release from jail on humanitarian grounds.
(Reuters, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, Iraqi archaeologist Lamia al-Gailani (80) died. She had lent her expertise to rebuild the collection at the National Museum after it was looted in 2003.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 18, An Italian navy helicopter plucked three survivors from a life raft after a rubber dinghy capsized in the Mediterranean Sea off Libya. Up to 117 migrants were believed to have died.
(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 18, In Kashmir at least five people were killed when an avalanche hit a truck in which they were traveling. Five more people were missing.
(Reuters, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, Lebanon used an Arab economic meeting to urge the Arab League to restore Syria's membership, calling it a "historic shame" to keep the Arab country out of the forum.
(AP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, The forces of Libyan strongman Khalifa Haftar reportedly killed three jihadists including a senior Al-Qaeda member in the south of the country days after launching a security operation. They were identified as Abdel Monem al-Hasnaoui, also known as Abu Talha al-Libi, Al-Mahdi Dengo and Egyptian citizen Abdullah al-Dessouki.
(AFP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, It was reported that Malaysia has filed a lawsuit against opposition-run Kelantan state for infringing on the indigenous Temiar tribe's land rights by handing out licenses to plantation companies to cut down timber, the first such action by a sitting government.
(Reuters, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, In central Mexico at least 66 people were killed after a pipeline ruptured by suspected fuel thieves exploded near the town of Tlahuelilpan, Hidalgo state. More than 85 other people were listed as missing. The death toll later rose to 134 after more injured people died at hospitals.
(Reuters, 1/19/19)(AP, 1/19/19)(AP, 1/28/19)(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Jan 18, Myanmar’s army said it has killed 13 rebel fighters in the western Rakhine State between Jan. 5 and Jan. 16. Myanmar's military announced that the Arakan Army, a Buddhist rebel group in Rakhine state, has been classified a terrorist organization.
(Reuters, 1/18/19)(AP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, At The Hague ICC judges said former Ivory Coast President Laurent Gbagbo must spend at least another two weeks in detention at the International Criminal Court, despite being acquitted this week of involvement in deadly post-election violence.
(AP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, Russia said it has agreed for France and Germany to monitor shipping traffic in the Kerch Strait following a naval confrontation between Moscow and Kiev last year.
(AFP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, In Somalia an ambush occurred on an Ethiopian peacekeeping convoy. African Union troops returned fire killing four extremists and wounding several others. Ethiopia denied claims that al-Shabab killed several Ethiopian troops.
(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 18, In Sweden the Centre Party played a decisive role in allowing Stefan Lofven to win a second term as prime minister by abstaining in a parliamentary vote, ending more than four months of political deadlock. The Centre Party and the allied Liberal Party will not join Lofven's new Social Democrat-Green coalition but will support it in return for pursuing such center-right policies as tax cuts and deregulation of the labor and property rental markets.
(Reuters, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, The scandal-plagued Swedish body that awards the Nobel Prize for literature said that poet Katarina Frostenson would leave the Academy after an investigation determined she had leaked the names of winners.
(Reuters, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, In Syria an explosion outside an office belonging to an al-Qaida-linked group in the country's northwestern killed at least 11 people. An airstrike in the country's east on the last area held by the Islamic State group killed at least 20 people in the village of Baghouz. The dead included ten IS members.
(AP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, In southern Thailand gunmen presumed to be Muslim insurgents stormed a Buddhist temple in Narathiwat province, killing two monks and wounding two others.
(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 18, Turkey's state-owned Anadolu news agency said a court has sentenced Murat Arslan, a judge who previously won an award for human rights, to 10 years in prison over links to the network Ankara says orchestrated an attempted coup in 2016.
(Reuters, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, The United Nations said it was "extremely alarmed" by the forced return by Cameroon of thousands of refugees to northeast Nigeria, where Boko Haram Islamists pose a continuing threat to civilians. The UN refugee agency said Cameroon forced "several thousand" refugees back to Nigeria this week. According to the UNHCR Cameroon is currently hosting 370,000 refugees, 100,000 of whom are Nigerians.
(AFP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, The UN human rights office said at least 34 people have been killed in Congo since disputed provisional election results were announced on Jan. 10.
(AP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, Zimbabwe blocked most social media as international criticism mounted of a ruthless security crackdown after anti-government protests.
(AFP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 19, Pres. Donald Trump offered to extend temporary protections for young people brought to the US illegally as children and those fleeing disaster zones in exchange for his long-promised border wall. Democrats dismissed the proposal even before his formal remarks.
(SSFC, 1/20/19, p.A1)
2019 Jan 19, US Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham said Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was responsible for the Oct. 2 murder of Jamal Khashoggi and must be "dealt with", as he threatened new sanctions.
(AFP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, In Alabama tornadoes struck Autauga county an d the town of Wetumpka. At least 25 homes were seriously damaged or destroyed.
(SFC, 1/21/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 19, In San Francisco thousands of protesters marched as part of the third Women's March. More than 100 crowds gathered elsewhere in the US and around the world for social justice and reproductive rights.
(SSFC, 1/20/19, p.A15)
2019 Jan 19, A Catholic diocese in Kentucky apologized after videos emerged showing students from an all-male high school mocking Native American Nathan Philips after a rally in Washington DC. Many of the youths were wearing "Make America Great Again" hats. One student said African American protesters were insulting them. Philips said he approached the students to keep the peace.
(SSFC, 1/20/19, p.A10)(SFC, 1/21/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 19, In Las Vegas Manny Pacquiao of the Philippines showed flashes of his old speed in winning a unanimous 12-round decision over Adrien Broner to easily defend his piece of the welterweight title.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 19, On Oregon Mark Gago killed four members of his family before he was fatally shot by sheriff's deputies late today near Canby.
(SFC, 1/21/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 19, In Chile a magnitude 6.7 earthquake hit the north-central coast late today. As many as 200,000 were left without power and two people dead of heart attacks.
(Reuters, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 19, Yang Hengjun (53), a Chinese-Australian writer and visiting scholar at Columbia University in New York, was detained upon at Guangzhou Airport. Foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying later said that Yang, a former Chinese diplomat and critic of China's Communist Party, was "suspected of engaging in criminal activities endangering China's national security".
(AP, 4/8/19)
2019 Jan 19, In France scuffles broke out as around 7,000 "yellow vest" demonstrators marched through Paris in a 10th consecutive weekend of protests against President Emmanuel Macron's government.
(Reuters, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, In Haiti the 13th PaPJazz festival opened in Port-au-Prince.
(AFP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 19, In Hungary several thousand people demonstrated in Budapest against PM Viktor Orban and a new overtime law that has drawn workers out to the streets in several protest rallies.
(Reuters, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, India's main opposition parties joined forces against PM Narendra Modi at a rally in Kolkata which attracted hundreds of thousands of people months ahead of elections.
(Reuters, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, In Japan representatives from a Pacific Rim trade bloc geared up to roll out and expand the market-opening initiative as they met in Tokyo, reaffirming their commitment to open and free trade and inviting new membership.
(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, Kenyan officials said they have arrested six more people suspected of involvement in the Jan. 15 extremist attack in Nairobi, bringing the total number of detainees to 12.
(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, Madagascan President Andry Rajoelina used his inauguration speech to pledge to fight corruption in a country where politics and business are widely seen as beset by graft.
(AFP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, In Northern Ireland attackers hijacked a pizza delivery vehicle, loaded it with explosives and left it outside the city-center courthouse late today. The device exploded as police, who had spotted the suspicious vehicle, were evacuating the area. Two men in their 20s were soon arrested over the attack, which caused no injuries.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 19, In Pakistan counter-terrorism officers killed four insurgents, including two women, in a shootout on a highway in eastern Punjab province. Three suspects escaped on a motorcycle. Hundreds of people took to the streets in provincial capital Lahore and in Sahiwal, accusing police of killing innocent citizens in what they said was a staged shootout to showcase police performance.
(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, The Philippines' wealthiest man Henry Sy (94), who rose from being a penniless Chinese immigrant to leading a multi-billion dollar business empire, died. Sy made history in 1985 when he opened his first "Supermall" in Manila.
(AFP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, In Somalia a US military air strike killed 52 al-Shabab extremists in the Middle Juba region in response to an attack on Somali forces.
(SSFC, 1/20/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 19, In eastern Syria at least 20 Islamic State group jihadists were killed in Iraqi air raids on their embattled enclave in Baghouz.
(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, In Turkey thousands demonstrated in the Kurdish-majority southeast to support Leyla Guven (55), a detained lawmaker from a pro-Kurdish party who launched a hunger strike in November.
(AFP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, A new UN report said fuel is being shipped illegally for Iran to Houthi Shiite rebels in Yemen to finance their war against the government.
(SSFC, 1/20/19, p.A8)
2019 Jan 19, Zimbabwe police manned checkpoints on many main roads, searching vehicles for protesters allegedly involved in recent anti-government demonstrations.
(AFP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 20, In US a winter storm stretched across at least 15 states from Missouri to Maine and caused the cancellation of more that 1,500 flights.
(SFC, 1/21/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 20, In southern Afghanistan a car bomb attack on a convoy of the governor of Logar province killed at least eight security force members, but left the provincial chief unharmed. The Taliban claimed responsibility.
(Reuters, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, In western Central African Rep. 13 people were killed in an attack, just days before the opening of peace talks. A UN source later said the perpetrators were believed to be Fulani from the so-called 3R group ("return, reclamation, reconciliation").
(AFP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 20, Thousands of Colombians dressed in white poured into the streets to repudiate terrorism after the Jan. 17 car bombing at a Bogota police academy killed 21 people and left dozens more wounded.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, Congo's Constitutional Court confirmed the victory of Felix Tshisekedi, dismissing the claims of massive vote fraud by runner-up Martin Fayulu.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, In France several thousand protesters marched in Paris against abortion and medically assisted reproduction in the 13th March for Life.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, In the French Alps two people died and 25 more were injured, four seriously, in a fire at the ski resort of Courchevel.
(AFP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, Sea-Watch 3, run by a German NGO, said it has contacted Italy, Malta, Libya as well as the Netherlands, since the boat is Dutch-flagged, asking where it can bring the 47 migrants it had taken aboard. Another vessel crowded with panicking migrants and taking on water, meanwhile, put out an urgent, separate appeal for help in the southern Mediterranean.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, Spiegel Online reported that German weapons maker Rheinmetall plans to sue the government over its decision to stop all arms exports to Saudi Arabia after the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
(Reuters, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, In Greece police fired tear gas to disperse protesters outside parliament as tens of thousands rallied in Athens to protest against a name deal with Macedonia.
(Reuters, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, Israel confirmed a diplomatic rapprochement with Muslim-majority Chad as PM Benjamin Netanyahu used a visit to the Chadian capital to stress their mutual interest in confronting Islamist insurgencies.
(Reuters, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, Israel's military said its Iron Dome interceptor system shot down a rocket that had been fired at the northern part of the occupied Golan Heights on the Syria frontier.
(Reuters, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, Masazo Nonaka (113), the world's oldest man, died early today while sleeping at home in Ashoro on Japan's northern main island of Hokkaido.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, In Kenya four people were wounded when gunmen opened fire late today on a Chinese construction site in the remote northeast, before being quickly repelled. The attack was suspected to be the work of Somali Islamists al-Shabaab.
(AFP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 20, Lebanon urged world powers to step up efforts for Syrian refugees to return home regardless of a political solution to the conflict in its war-wracked neighbor, as it hosted the fourth annual Arab Economic and Social Development Summit. Most Arab heads of state were absent.
(AFP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, Libyan security officials said a temporary cease-fire has taken hold in the capital of Tripoli, after deadly fighting between rival militias that dominate the city flared up last week.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, In northern Mali al-Qaida-linked jihadists killed ten UN peacekeepers from Chad in an attack at the Aguelhok base 200 km (125 miles) north of Kidal.
(AP, 1/20/19)(SFC, 1/21/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 20, In Mexico three gunmen in Cancun shot seven people to death at a home in an apparent dispute between street-level drug dealers.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 20, Police in Northern Ireland police arrested four men -- two 21-year-olds, a 34-year-old and a 42-year-old in relation to a bomb blast a day earlier. A 5th man was also soon arrested.
(AFP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 20, Pakistani officials said authorities have arrested more than a dozen counter-terrorism officers after police shot and killed a middle-aged couple, their 13-year-old daughter and another man in what they initially claimed was a shootout with insurgents a day earlier.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, In Portugal police responded to a call about a brawl between two women and entered the "Jamaica" neighborhood in Seixal, where mostly young local residents greeted them with a hail of stones. A video published on the internet showed police officers beating up several black people.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 20, Saudi-led forces launched overnight air strikes on Yemen's capital, described by one resident as the worst in a year. The overnight targets included al-Dulaimi Air Base, a drone storage site, and military training sites. At least two civilians were killed, and others injured.
(Reuters, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, Sudanese police clashed with demonstrators in and around the capital Khartoum, after they deployed in large numbers in anticipation of fresh protests calling on longtime ruler Omar al-Bashir to step down.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, In northern Syria a blast aboard a bus killed at least three people in Afrin.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, Syrian state media say air defenses have repelled an Israeli air raid near the international airport south of Damascus.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, Tonga lost internet contact after something went wrong with a fiber optic cable that connects it to the rest of the world. A small internet company that uses satellites soon stepped in to help restore int'l. calls and some other services.
(SFC, 1/24/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 20, In Yemen an explosion killed five demining specialists in the central province of Maarib.
(AFP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 21, San Francisco food-delivery startup Muncherry, founded in 2011, announced that it has gone out of business.
(SFC, 1/21/19, p.D1)
2019 Jan 21, Kaye Ballard (b.1925), American comic actress, died at her home in Rancho Mirage, Ca. She and Eve Arden played a pair of meddling mothers in the 1967 NBC sitcom "The Mothers-in-Law." The series lasted two seasons.
(SFC, 1/25/19, p.C4)
2019 Jan 21, Russell Baker (b.1925), award-winning American columnist and author, died in Leesburg, Virginia. From 1993 to 2004 he hosted "Masterpiece Theater".
(SFC, 1/24/19, p.C6)
2019 Jan 21, An investment firm in Abu Dhabi bought some 3 tons of gold from Venezuela amid that country's political turmoil. Noor Capital later said it will refrain from any further transactions.
(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Jan 21, In Afghanistan at least 65 people were killed and as many as 70 were wounded by a suicide bomber who drove an armored Humvee packed with explosives at the base in eastern Maidan Wardak province. Dozens of those killed were members of Afghanistan's intelligence agency. A senior defense source said 126 members of the Afghan security forces were killed.
(AP, 1/22/19)(AFP, 1/22/19)(Reuters, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 21, An Albanian court convicted the main opposition Democratic Party leader of defamation over drug-related allegations he made against Taulant Balla, head of the Socialist party parliamentary group. Democratic leader Lulzim Basha was fined 50,000 lek ($455).
(AP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, Cardiff City's new soccer star Emiliano Sala (28) was on board a light aircraft that disappeared en route to the Welsh capital for his club debut.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 21, China's state media said researcher He Jiankui, who claimed to have created the world's first genetically-edited babies, will face a Chinese police investigation, as authorities confirmed that a second woman fell pregnant during the experiment. Jiankui's former university said he had been fired.
(AFP, 1/21/19)(Reuters, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, The European Union sanctioned the heads of Russia's military intelligence and two of their officers blamed for poisoning a former Russian double agent in Britain last year, a decision Moscow dismissed as groundless. The EU also sanctioned a Syrian research center and five staff members.
(Reuters, 1/21/19)(AP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, France's data privacy watchdog fined Google 50 million euros ($57 million) for "lack of transparency, inadequate information and lack of valid consent" regarding ad personalization for users. This was the first penalty for a US tech giant under new European data privacy rules that took effect last year.
(AP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, Germany said it has banned Iran's Mahan Air from landing in the country with immediate effect, citing security concerns and the airline's involvement in Syria. The airline had several weekly flights between Tehran and German cities.
(AP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, An Indian official said police in Kerala state are investigating a suspected attempt to illegally transport more than 100 Indians by boat to New Zealand. The boat had reportedly left Munambam harbor in Kerala on Jan. 12.
(AP, 1/21/19)(Reuters, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, In India police arrested 30 Rohingya, including 12 children, who were found traveling on a bus to Gauhati, the capital of Assam state.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 21, In southern India at least eight people drowned when their boat capsized in a river as they were returning home from a religious festival on a nearby island in Karnataka state.
(AP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, Indonesia's government said it is reviewing the president's decision to release radical cleric Abu Bakar Bashir.
(AP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, Israel inaugurated a new international airport near the Red Sea. Jordan hit out at Israel's move to open the new Ramon International Airport along their shared border close to the Red Sea, saying it would threaten the kingdom's airspace.
(AFP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, Israel struck what it said were Iranian targets in Syria in response to missile fire a day earlier it blamed on Iran, sparking concerns of an escalation after a report that 11 fighters were killed.
(AFP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, In Pakistan a bus has collided with an oil tanker, killing 13 passengers and leaving another 16 with severe burns in southwestern Baluchistan province.
(AP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, In Pakistan a methane gas explosion in a coalmine in the country's southwest killed at least three miners in Baluchistan province.
(AP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, Muslims in the southern Philippines voted in a referendum on a new autonomous region that seeks to end nearly half a century of unrest.
(AP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, In Portugal about two hundred mostly black protesters blocked Lisbon's Avenida da Liberdade thoroughfare this evening, chanting "Down with racism!". Stones were thrown at police officers who dispersed the rally.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 21, Rwandan officials said 14 miners were killed in an eastern tin mine after a hill collapsed on them after heavy rains.
(Reuters, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, South African former executive Angelo Agrizzi told a corruption probe that his old company had paid monthly bribes for 14 years to Nomvula Mokonyane, a minister who served scandal-tainted ex-president Jacob Zuma. Mokonyane, who is currently environmental affairs minister, served as Zuma's minister of water and sanitation between 2014 and 2018, and was earlier a provincial minister.
(AFP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, It was reported that more South Korean female skaters are accusing their coaches of sexually abusing them, following claims by two-time Olympic champion Shim Suk-hee that her former coach had repeatedly raped her.
(AP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, In Sudan about 150 doctors held a silent sit-in outside a hospital in Khartoum to protest the killing of a medic during anti-government protests last week. Authorities cracked down on Arabic-language foreign media working inside the country, as major protests against President Omar al-Bashir enter their second month.
(AFP, 1/21/19)(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 21, In northern Syria an Islamic State suicide bomber targeted a joint convoy of US and allied Kurdish forces, marking the second attack against US troops in less than a week. Five members of the Kurdish-led force were reported killed.
(AP, 1/21/19)(AFP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, It was reported that Uganda's President Yoweri Museveni has ordered authorities to stop issuing and renewing licenses to betting firms in a bid to crack down on gambling.
(AFP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, Venezuela's government suppressed a small military revolt after a group of officers stole weapons and kidnapped several officials. The action triggered violent street protests
(Reuters, 1/21/19)(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 21, Venezuela's Supreme Court chief Maikel Moreno said the court has disavowed Juan Guaido as leader of the country's opposition-run congress.
(Reuters, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, A Zimbabwe court ruled that the government exceeded its mandate in ordering an internet blackout during civilian protests last week, as authorities pressed on with rounding up opposition figures blamed for the unrest.
(Reuters, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 22, The US Supreme Court moved toward allowing Pres. Trump to exclude most transgender from military service.
(SFC, 1/23/19, p.A10)
2019 Jan 22, It was reported that research from the University of Arkansas shows that more than 12,000 people from the Marshall Islands now live in northwest Arkansas.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, In Delaware Jose Rivera (59), the ex-manager of a pest-control company in the US Virgin Islands, was sentenced to a year in prison for poisoning a Delaware family in 2015 with a banned pesticide. Terminix reportedly paid $9.2 million in criminal fines in the case.
(AP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 22, An Iowa state judge struck down the state's "fetal heartbeat" abortion law finding it unconstitutional.
(SFC, 1/23/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 22, Afghanistan's main spy agency reportedly killed the Taliban commander behind a deadly attack on one of its bases a day earlier, and vowed to hunt down and kill all the rest of those involved. Six gunmen were also reported killed in the air strike in Maidan Wardak province. The Taliban issued a statement, denying that the commander had been killed. Officials in Maidan Wardak gave conflicting accounts of the violence.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Bulgaria said it plans to stop allowing wealthy foreigners to buy citizenship against investment, saying the scheme had failed to bring any significant economic benefits for the country.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Canada's ambassador to the United States said the United States will proceed with the formal extradition from Canada of Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou, as Beijing vowed to respond to Washington's actions.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, China demanded the US drop a request that Canada extradite Meng Wanzhou, a top executive of the tech giant Huawei, shifting blame to Washington in a case that has severely damaged Beijing's relations with Ottawa.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Egypt said at least seven troops, including an officer, have been killed in clashes with militants in recent operations in restive northern Sinai Peninsula. The military said in a statement that forces have killed at least 59 suspected militants and arrested another 142 suspected militants and criminals.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Ethiopia said it had granted more than 13,000 people amnesty as part of a broad reform agenda pushed by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed.
(AFP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, The EU and African Union committed to work closely with Congo's president-elect Felix Tshisekedi, backing off reservations about the disputed vote.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, It was announced that the European Commission has fined MasterCard $650 million for breaching antitrust rules by raising payment-processing fees artificially.
(SFC, 1/23/19, p.D4)
2019 Jan 22, In France several suspects were on the run after they robbed a bank on the Champs-Elysees in broad daylight.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, French officials said US singer Chris Brown (29) and two other people are in custody in Paris after a woman filed a rape complaint.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, In Germany Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron signed a new treaty in Aachen to update their 1963 post-war reconciliation accord (Elysee Treaty), aiming to reinvigorate the European Union's main axis as growing eurosceptic nationalism tests the bloc's cohesion.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, In northeastern India police arrested 31 Rohingya In Tripura state after they spent two days in the open in a no man's land along the border with Bangladesh.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Indonesia's Pres. Joko Widodo said that elderly Islamic cleric Abu Bakar Bashir, who inspired the Bali bombers and other extremists, won't be released from prison unless he renounces radicalism, backing down from plans to free him without conditions.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Israel said that it has successfully tested the Arrow-3 interceptor, the country's advanced missile defense system.
(SFC, 1/23/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 22, In Italy anti-mafia police said they had dealt a fresh blow to the Cosa Nostra, arresting seven suspected rising-star mobsters after two of the organized crime group turned state witnesses.
(AFP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, A Tokyo court rejected former Nissan chairman Carlos Ghosn's latest request for bail, more than two months after his arrest.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, A Kosovo court convicted a man for participating in terror groups in Syria and jailed him for five years. In a separate trial, the same court in Pristina convicted five others to prison terms for participation in terror groups and other acts related to terrorism.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Libya's coastguard said 473 migrants trying to reach Italy by inflatables had been brought back to the North African country. The UN criticized European countries for not allowing migrants to disembark at safe ports.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, In Mozambique South African businessman Andre Mayer Hanekom (61), held on suspicion of being a jihadist leader, died in hospital under mysterious circumstances. Hanekom, who ran a maritime business in Palma, was arrested in August alongside two locals and two Tanzanians, with prosecutors accusing them of being part of a jihadist group.
(AFP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 22, In Portugal unidentified attackers threw petrol bombs at a police station in the city of Setubal and torched cars in the capital Lisbon, hours after a protest against alleged racially-motivated police violence ended in clashes.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Romania's Pres. Klaus Iohannis said that a government decree that could invalidate hundreds of corruption cases involving senior officials is "crassly unconstitutional," a development that also prompted concern from the EU.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Russia's Pres. Vladimir Putin met with Japan's PM Shinzo Abe in the Kremlin for the latest round of talks on the dispute over a chain of islands in the Pacific Ocean. Police detained 11 people protesting against territorial concessions outside the Japanese embassy in Moscow.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, In Russia Anastasia Vashukevich, a Belarusian model and self-styled sex instructor who last year claimed to have evidence of Russian interference in the 2016 US presidential election, was released from detention pending trial.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, A Russian a long-range Tu-22M3 bomber crash-landed in the Arctic, leaving three of its crew of four dead.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Russia's Transport Ministry said ten crew died and another 10 were missing presumed dead in a fire that broke out on two ships while they were transferring fuel in the Black Sea. The vessels which caught fire a day earlier have the same names as two Tanzania-flagged ships, the Maestro and Venice, which last year were included on a US sanctions advisory as delivering fuel to Syria.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, In Spain taxi drivers striking to demand tighter regulations for companies using ride-hailing apps blocked traffic for another day in Madrid and Barcelona, while threatening to take their protest to the French border.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Sudanese police fired tear gas at crowds demonstrating in the capital's twin city of Omdurman against the death of a fellow anti-government protester. Sudan's embattled president flew to Qatar, the wealthy Gulf state that has offered him help.
(AFP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, In Switzerland the annual World Economic Forum opened in Davos. Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro gave the keynote address vowing an investment-friendly agenda and attacking leftwing politics in Latin America. US President Donald Trump along with the leaders of France, Britain and Zimbabwe stayed away from the forum as they fought political fires back home.
(AFP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, In Syria a car bomb detonated in the government-held city of Latakia, killing one person and wounding 14.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, In Syria seven siblings were asleep late today in their apartment in Damascus when a fire broke out and spread quickly, suffocating six in their bedroom and burning to death the seventh, a girl, who was stuck under a false ceiling that collapsed as she tried to flee.
(AP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 22, Thailand police said DNA tests show that two bodies found washed up on the shore of the Mekong River in the northeast are the corpses of anti-government activists. The two, known by the pseudonyms Puchana and Kasalong, were among three exiled activists who disappeared in December from homes in Laos, where they took shelter after fleeing Thailand.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, A Turkish court sentenced prominent journalist Nazli Ilicak, already serving a life sentence, to almost six additional years in prison for leaking information deemed secret by the government.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Zimbabwe's President Emmerson Mnangagwa called for a national dialogue among political parties and civic leaders, even as arrests continued.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 23, The US released Marzieh Hashemi, an American anchorwoman for Iranian state television, held for days as a material witness.
(AP, 1/24/19)(SFC, 1/24/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan 23, An appeals board awarded the SF 49ers $36 million in a tax dispute with Santa Clara County over property tax on Levi's Stadium.
(SFC, 1/24/19, p.C1)
2019 Jan 23, In Florida Zephen Xaver (21) opened fire inside a bank and killed five people before surrendering to SWAT negotiators.
(SFC, 1/24/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan 23, In Texas boxer John Duane VanMeter was fatally shot at his home in Uvalde. A boy (12) was later charged with capital murder.
(SFC, 1/28/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 23, In Afghanistan an airstrike launched in the Sangin district killed 16 civilians from the same extended family during heavy fighting between Afghan forces and the Taliban.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 23, The Australian government said it is seeking information about Yang Hengjun, a Chinese-Australian novelist and influential online commentator, who has been reported missing in China.
(AP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, In London WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange petitioned an international human rights commission to order Donald Trump's administration to unseal charges against him as he fights possible extradition to the United States.
(AFP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, Diana Athill (b.1917), a British writer and editor, died. She honed the work of novelists including John Updike and Margaret Atwood before finding late-life fame as a frank and fearless memoirist.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 23, A French court refused an appeal by Chile to extradite a longtime fugitive leftist guerilla who had escaped prison after being convicted for killing an ally of ex-dictator Augusto Pinochet, spurring an immediate rebuke from Chile. France had granted Ricardo Palma Salamanca asylum in November 2018, more than two decades after Chilean authorities imprisoned him for the 1991 murder of Senator Jaime Guzman.
(Reuters, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, France extradited Patrice-Edouard Ngaissona, a member of Africa's top footballing body, to the International Criminal Court in The Hague where he faces war crimes charges in the Central African Republic's 2013 civil war.
(AFP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, Carlos Ghosn, who is fighting breach of trust and other charges in Japan, resigned as head of Renault. Ghosn has been detained for more than two months in Japan. The board of French carmaker Renault SA is expected to name Jean-Dominique Senard of Michelin as chairman, and Renault executive Thierry Bollore as CEO.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 23, The German government approved the export to Qatar of four RAM naval missile systems developed by Germany and the United States. The sale also included 85 dual-mode radar and infrared seekers that guide the missile into its target.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 23, Jack Shepherd (31) turned himself in to Georgian police after being sentenced to six years in prison in Britain while on the run. The web designer was convicted of manslaughter by negligence last year for the death of Charlotte Brown, a 24-year-old woman he took on a champagne-fuelled first date on his speedboat on the River Thames in December 2015.
(http://tinyurl.com/y9gmav54)(AFP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 23, Indonesian officials said torrential rains have overwhelmed a dam and caused landslides that killed at least eight people and displaced more than 2,000 near Makassar, the provincial capital of South Sulawesi.
(AP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, In Iraq a car bomb killed one soldier and injured at least two in a northern town near the oil-rich city of Kirkuk.
(Reuters, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, Italian investigators in Genoa found 2.1 tons of Barcelona-bound pure cocaine dispatched from Colombia's Turbo port. The drug, divided into 1,801 blocks, traveled in a container that had been declared as empty. Spanish police later arrested the alleged recipient of the shipment in Barcelona with the help of Italian authorities in a sting operation.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 23, Latvia's parliament approved the Baltic country's new five-party, center-right coalition government. The parliament backed a new government under PM Krisjanis Karins (54) of the center-right New Unity party, ending months of political deadlock following October's election.
(AP, 1/23/19)(Reuters, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, Romania's national railway company said a group of Turkish companies have won a 600 million-euro ($681 million) contract to modernize a key line in the northwest Transylvania region. The European Union will fund about 80 percent of the project, and the Romanian government the rest.
(AP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, In Russia Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan sat down for Syria-focused talks with Pres. Vladimir Putin as their governments bargain over zones of influence in the war-torn country.
(AP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, The Russian military rolled out a new missile and released its specifications, seeking to dispel the US claim that the weapon violates a key nuclear arms pact. The military insisted that the 9M729 land-based cruise missile conforms to the limits of the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty.
(AP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, Singapore actor Aloysius Pang (28) died in New Zealand. He was on a military training exercise when a gun barrel was lowered on a large artillery device he was helping to repair on Jan. 19. It crushed his abdomen and chest.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 23, In South Korea former senior prosecutor Ahn Tae Geun was sentenced to five years in prison on charges of banishing a junior prosecutor after she tried to expose his sexual misconduct.
(SFC, 1/24/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 23, South Sudan called on the international community to fund efforts to implement a peace deal, which is already four months behind schedule due to lack of money.
(AFP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, Spanish taxi drivers demanding more regulations for app-based ride-hailing services blocked access to a trade exhibition center in Madrid where a major tourism fair began.
(AP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, Sudan's Oil Minister Azhari Abdel Qader said his country has received economic assistance from the United Arab Emirates and accepted offers of support from Russia and Turkey. Pres. Omar al-Bashir met with Qatar's Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani in Doha during his first trip abroad since the protests began.
(Reuters, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, In Sweden a man in his 50s fatally shot his two children before announcing on social media he was killing himself in an apparent murder-suicide.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 23, In Venezuela at least four people died following overnight clashes ahead of rival protests today. Protesters marched in the streets and waved their nation's flag as they demanded that Pres. Nicolas Maduro step down from power. Members of the National Guard launched tear gas at protesters in the middle-class neighborhood of El Paraiso.
(AFP, 1/23/19)(AP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido declared himself interim leader, winning the support of Washington and parts of Latin America. That prompted socialist President Nicolas Maduro, who has led the oil-rich nation since 2013, to sever diplomatic ties with the United States.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 23, Zimbabwe's government acknowledged accusations that its security forces engaged in "systematic torture" during a crackdown on anti-government protests, saying there were lessons to be learnt from the operation.
(AFP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, Zimbabwe music star Oliver Mtukudzi (66) died in Harare.
(AP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 24, The United States targeted two Iran-backed foreign fighter militias in Syria and two airlines that help send weapons to Syria in fresh sanctions as Washington prepares for a military withdrawal from the war-torn country.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, In Arizona law officers shot and killed Christian Albarran (26) during a traffic stop in Ehrenberg following a 146-mile pursuit that began in California. He was wanted on warrants alleging domestic violence and identity theft.
(SFC, 1/28/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 24, In California Carrie Markis (42), a Rancho Cordova registered nurse, was arrested for selling more than 20,000 prescription opioid pills on the dark web. Her partner Andrea Jordan was arrested on April 4.
(http://tinyurl.com/y3ew4d78)(SSFC, 4/7/19, p.C1)
2019 Jan 24, In Missouri police Officer Nathaniel Hendren shot and killed fellow Officer Katlyn Alix as the two engaged in a game of Russian roulette.
(SSFC, 1/27/19, p.A10)
2019 Jan 24, In Pennsylvania Jordan Witmen opened fire at a hotel bar in State College killing two people and wounding a woman. He then broke into a home and fatally shot another man before killing himself.
(SFC, 1/26/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan 24, Adelaide sweltered through the hottest day ever recorded by a major Australian city as the temperature peaked at 115.9 degrees F.
(SFC, 1/25/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 24, The active search for the plane carrying Argentine soccer player Emiliano Sala was called off with authorities saying the chances of survival are "extremely remote" three days after it disappeared from radar over the English Channel.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, In Belgium thousands of students skipped school for the third week in a row and more than 30,000 swamped the center of Brussels to demand better protection of the world's climate.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, China said it has detained Yang Hengjun, a Chinese-Australian writer, for allegedly "endangering China's national security," a vague charge frequently leveled at critics of the ruling Communist Party.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, It was reported that Chinese internet users have lost access to Microsoft Corp.'s Bing search engine, setting off grumbling about the ruling Communist Party's increasingly tight online censorship. The Bing search engine resumed service to Chinese users, after a disruption raised fears among social media users that it was the latest foreign website to be blocked by censors.
(AP, 1/24/19)(AFP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Felix Tshisekedi (55) was sworn in as Congo's president. He immediately pledged tolerance and announced the imminent release of all political prisoners.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, About three dozen Cypriots who alleged they were tortured while in custody during fighting against British colonial rule more than 60 years ago said that they feel vindicated after the UK government agreed to pay them 1 million pounds ($1.3 million).
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, The European Commission said that Syria's President Bashar al-Assad had suspended special visas for European Union diplomats to Damascus.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, The European Commission said it was taking its legal procedure against Hungary to the next step after Budapest criminalized support for migrants, moving the case closer to a possible ruling by the European Court of Justice.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Europe's top rights court ordered Italy to pay thousands of euros in damages to Amanda Knox, the American student acquitted in 2015 of the gruesome killing of her British housemate after spending years behind bars.
(AFP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Germany extradited to Sweden John Ausonius (65), the convicted killer known as the "the laser man" for using a precision-scope rifle to target immigrants.
(AFP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 24, In northern India at least six people were killed when a building collapsed as workers were adding an additional floor to it in Haryana state.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Scientists prepared to embark on an unprecedented, years-long mission to explore the Indian Ocean and document changes taking place beneath the waves that could affect billions of people in the surrounding region over the coming decades.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, In Indonesia Basuki "Ahok" Tjahaja Purnama, the former governor of Jakarta, was freed after serving nearly two years in prison for blasphemy.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Indonesia's national disaster agency said floods and landslides in South Sulawesi province hit by torrential rains this week have killed 30 people and left more than two dozen missing.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Amnesty International said Iran arrested more than 7,000 people last year, including dozens of journalists, and called this a "shameless campaign of repression".
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Israel agreed to allow the transfer of $15 million in Qatari aid to the Hamas militant group in the Gaza Strip. But Hamas said it was rejecting the much-needed cash to protest Israeli delays on the delivery.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Israeli prosecutors charged a Jewish 16-year-old with manslaughter after he allegedly threw a stone at a car last October 12 in the occupied West Bank and killed Palestinian woman Aisha Rabi (48).
(AFP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, In Kosovo around 500,000 pupils and students stayed at home as a strike by teachers demanding a 30 percent pay rise entered its second week. Doctors and miners have also taken strike action for higher wages, and other public sector workers are threatening to do so.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, In Malaysia Siti Aisyah, an Indonesian woman jointly accused of killing the estranged half-brother of North Korea's leader, won an appeal to obtain witness statements given to police as part of her defense.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Sultan Abdullah Sultan Ahmad Shah of central Pahang state was named Malaysia's new king.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, A Nigerian appeals court issued an interim order stopping a tribunal from charging Chief Justice Walter Onnoghen with breaching asset-declaration rules, a month before a presidential election.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Panama's President Juan Carlos Varela met with Pope Francis at the presidential palace. The Pope insisted that public officials live simply, honestly and transparently as he opened a visit to Panama and a region that has been rife with corruption scandals.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Russia accused Washington of stoking street protests in Venezuela and called Nicolas Maduro the legitimate president. Moscow alongside China has become a creditor of last resort for Caracas, lending it billions of dollars as its economy implodes.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Former Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond denied committing any crime after he appeared in court, charged with multiple sex offences including attempted rape.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Sri Lankan rights activists, lawmakers and relatives of slain and disappeared journalists held a vigil over their abductions and killings, demanding the government expedite investigations.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 24, In Sudan protests broke out in several cities and in many areas of the capital Khartoum, the most widespread demonstrations in a wave of anti-government unrest that began last month. The official death toll from the unrest stood at 26, while rights groups said more than 40 have died.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, In northwestern Syria at least three civilians were killed and scores injured from a string of bombs hidden in motorbikes in towns controlled by Turkey-backed rebels.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, A Ukrainian court sentenced former president Viktor Yanukovich in absentia to 13 years in jail on treason charges, saying his conduct in office had opened the door to Russia's annexation of Crimea and conflict in eastern Ukraine.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Agnes Callamard, the UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, said she will travel to Turkey next week to head an "independent international inquiry" into the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, In Venezuela the National Police's Special Action Force (FAES) killed as many as ten people in Jose Felix Ribas, a Caracas slum, a day after residents had joined mass protests against President Nicolas Maduro.
(Reuters, 2/3/19)
2019 Jan 24, Zimbabwe's army said soldiers accused of beating residents in townships following protests over fuel price hikes were impostors who tarnished the name of the military.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 25, President Donald Trump brought a temporary end to the longest government shutdown in US history, while dropping his previous insistence on immediate funding for wall construction along the Mexican border after the Senate and House of Representatives both passed the deal by unanimous consent.
(AFP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 25, President Donald Trump's confidant Roger Stone was arrested by the FBI in a raid before dawn at his Florida home. He charged with lying about his pursuit of Russian-hacked emails damaging to Hillary Clinton's 2016 election bid.
(AP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 25, The United States strongly advised Kosovo to revoke a 100 percent tariff on Serb and Bosnian goods, saying the duty runs counter to US strategic interests. Kosovo's government imposed the measure last year and says it won't be lifted until Belgrade recognizes its sovereignty and stops preventing it from joining international organizations.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, In Alabama the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute said that its board has reversed course and voted to reaffirm an award for political activist Angel Davis.
(SFC, 1/26/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan 25, In Connecticut more than 130 people who say they were sexually abused as children at a now-defunct charity school in Haiti reached a $60 million settlement with a Jesuit university in Connecticut and other defendants.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, In Georgia Daylon Delon Gamble (27) killed four people and wounded a man in a pair of shootings in Rockmart. Gamble was arrested in Indiana on Jan. 27.
(SFC, 1/26/19, p.A6)(SFC, 1/29/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 25, In Kansas three men were sentenced to prison terms of 25 to 30 years for plotting to blow up an apartment complex in Garden City where Somali refugees lived.
(SFC, 1/28/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 25, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed a measure making it illegal to deny people a job, housing, education or public accommodations because they are transgender.
(SSFC, 1/27/19, p.A10)
2019 Jan 25, In New York the World Refugee Council called for up to $20 billion stolen by government leaders and now frozen in the US, Britain and other countries, to be reallocated by courts to help millions of displaced people forced to flee conflict, persecution and victimization.
(SFC, 1/26/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 25, A Texas official said some 95,000 non-US citizens have been identified on voter rolls going back to 1996 and that some 58,000 are believed to have voted in at least one state election.
(SSFC, 1/27/19, p.A12)
2019 Jan 25, Washington state Gov. Jay Inslee declared a statewide public health emergency following a number of confirmed measles cases in and near Vancouver.
(SSFC, 1/27/19, p.A10)
2019 Jan 25, Melbourne, Australia, recorded its hottest day in five years. The temperature reached 42.8 C (109 F) with the airport recording 46 C (114.8 F).
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, Jean Wyllys, Brazil's second openly gay congressman, said he will not serve the new term for which he was re-elected due to death threats and he now plans to live abroad. His Socialism and Liberty Party (PSOL) said his seat in Brasilia will go to a substitute lawmaker who is also gay: Rio councilman David Miranda, the husband of Pulitzer Prize-winning US journalist Glenn Greenwald.
(Reuters, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, In Brazil a dam collapsed at a mine owned by corporate giant Vale in Minas Gerais state. The dam collapse killed at least 84 people with hopes fading for over 200 still missing. The overwhelming majority of the dead and missing were Vale employees or contractors, buried in up to 15 meters (50 feet) of mud that stretched for 12 km (eight miles) and was at some points up to 300 meters (yards) wide. After two months the death toll reached 212 with 93 still missing.
(AFP, 1/27/19)(AFP, 1/30/19)(AP, 3/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, Chinese authorities investigated two explosions in a basement car park and a 30th floor apartment in the country's northeast that left one person dead and one injured in the city of Changchun. Investigators soon concluded that then explosion in an apartment building in the country's northeast was set off by a man killed in the blast.
(AP, 1/25/19)(AP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 25, In Egypt Laura Plummer (34), a British woman, was one of 6,925 prisoners pardoned by President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi on Jan. 25, the anniversary of Egypt's 2011 uprising. She had been arrested in October 2017 on arrival at Hurghada, a Red Sea resort, and was accused of attempting to smuggle hundreds of Tramadol tablets, which are legal in Britain but banned in Egypt.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 25, Ethiopia said it is banning street begging by Syrian nationals who have startled people by showing up in growing numbers in recent months in major cities around hotels and mosques.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, Greece ratified a landmark accord that changes the name of neighboring Macedonia, ending a decades-old dispute with its neighbor and opening the way for the ex-Yugoslav republic to join the European Union and NATO.
(Reuters, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, Indian PM Narendra Modi and visiting South African Pres. Cyril Ramaphosa announced they will boost ties in key areas such as defense, maritime security, information technology and trade under a 3-year strategic exchange program.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, A disaster official in Indonesia said the number of people killed after days of torrential rain triggered flash floods and landslides on Sulawesi island has climbed to 59 with 25 others missing.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, A separatist movement in Indonesia's West Papua province delivered a petition with 1.8 million signatures demanding an independence referendum to UN Human Rights chief Michelle Bachelet.
(Reuters, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 25, Israeli troops shot and killed a Palestinian man in Gaza as thousands took part in a protest along the border. In the West Bank Israeli troops shot and killed a Palestinian teen and wound another as a group of young men hurled stones at the troops.
(SFC, 1/26/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 25, In the Italian Alps a French flight instructor was one of two survivors in a midair collision between a small tourist plane and a helicopter over the Rutor glacier. The death toll from the deadly collision soon rose to seven.
(AP, 1/26/19)(AFP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 25, Japan's Supreme Court upheld a law that effectively requires transgender people to be sterilized before they can have their gender changed on official documents. The 2004 law states that people wishing to register a gender change must have their original reproductive organs, including testes or ovaries, removed and have a body that "appears to have parts that resemble the genital organs" of the gender they want to register.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, It was announced that Japanese brewer Asahi is buying the beer business of Britain's Fuller Smith & Turner's for 250 million pounds ($327 million), in a deal that includes its flagship London Pride.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, In central Mali two UN peacekeepers from Sri Lanka died and several were wounded when their vehicle hit a mine.
(AFP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, Nigeria's President Muhammadu Buhari set off an uproar by announcing the suspension of the chief justice, citing corruption allegations.
(AP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 25, Pakistan announced plans to ease visa restrictions for tourists from 90 countries, including the US and Europe, in a bid to revive its tourism sector, decimated by years of negligence and problems with militants.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, In Panama Pope Francis brought World Youth Day to the Las Garzas de Pacora detention center so that its inmates, even behind barbed wire fencing, could participate in the Catholic Church's big festival of faith.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, In the Philippines the Commission on Elections announced that the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao is deemed ratified following a referendum on Jan. 21.
(AP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 25, Qatar said it will adopt a new formula for aid to Gaza after the Palestinian enclave's rulers Hamas rejected a cash injection over alleged unacceptable Israeli conditions. Qatar would now channel millions of dollars in humanitarian projects "in full coordination with the United Nations".
(AFP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, Russia offered to mediate between the government and opposition in Venezuela if necessary, saying it was ready to cooperate with all political forces that acted responsibly.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, It was reported that a board game that makes light of last year's nerve agent attack on a former Russian spy in Britain has gone on sale in Russia. Players of "Our Guys In Salisbury" roll dice to advance across the board from Moscow to Salisbury, the city where Britain says two Russian spies used a chemical weapon to poison Sergei Skripal and his daughter.
(Reuters, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, Sudan's main opposition leader Sadiq al-Mahdi called for President Omar al-Bashir to step down, throwing his support behind anti-government demonstrators after weeks of deadly protest. Hundreds of protesters marched through Omdurman, across the River Nile from the capital, and police fired teargas to try to break up the rally.
(AFP, 1/25/19)(Reuters, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, A Turkish court released Leyla Guven, a Kurdish lawmaker who was jailed last year for criticizing Ankara's military operation in Syria. She has been on hunger strike for nearly three months and still faces trial and up to 31 years' jail over charges of terrorism leadership and propaganda for her opposition to Turkey's incursion into northwest Syria's Afrin region.
(Reuters, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, Turkish forces shelled YPG militia positions in the northern Syrian region of Tal Rifaat for a third consecutive day.
(Reuters, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, The head of Ukraine's cyber police said hackers likely controlled by Russia are stepping up efforts to disrupt Ukraine's presidential election in March with cyber-attacks on electoral servers and personal computers of election staff.
(Reuters, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, Yanghee Lee, the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Myanmar, said Myanmar's army chief should be prosecuted for genocide against the Rohingya Muslim minority, adding that holding perpetrators to account for crimes was necessary before refugees who fled the country could return.
(Reuters, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, The UN human rights boss Michelle Bachelet called for an independent investigation into alleged excessive use of force by Venezuelan security forces or allied militia, citing reports of at least 20 people killed this week.
(Reuters, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, In Venezuela some US diplomats left the embassy in Caracas for the airport in a convoy escorted by police, after President Nicolas Maduro broke off relations with Washington and ordered American personnel out.
(Reuters, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, In Venezuela Jhonny Godoy (29) was pulled outside his home in the Caracas slum of La Vega and was shot in the abdomen and foot. A disposable diaper was shoved in his mouth, apparently to suffocate him He had recently posted a video of his opposition to Pres. Maduro.
(http://tinyurl.com/yxobxdxh)(SFC, 2/21/19, p.A3)
2019 Jan 25, In Zimbabwe reports of a violent crackdown continued as rights groups and others accused security forces of raping women during house-to-house searches.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 26, US border officials found nearly 254 pounds of the synthetic opioid fentanyl inside a secret compartment of a tractor trailer carrying Mexican produce into Arizona. Agents also found nearly 395 pounds of methamphetamine.
(SFC, 2/1/19, p.A8)
2019 Jan 26, In Louisiana Dakota Theriot (21) killed his parents and three other people in two separate shootings and fled the area in a stolen pickup truck. He was arrested the following day at his grandmother's house in Virginia.
(SSFC, 1/27/19, p.A16)(SFC, 1/28/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 26, Afghan officials said an accidental explosion in northern Baghlan province killed four insurgents and a civilian near a sporting event in an area controlled by the Taliban. In Nangarhar province a female university student was killed when a sticky bomb attached to a vehicle was detonated.
(AP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, Taliban officials said US negotiators agreed a draft peace deal stipulating the withdrawal of foreign forces from Afghanistan within 18 months of the agreement being signed. This came at the end of six days of talks with US special peace envoy Zalmay Khalilzad in Qatar aimed at ending the United States' longest war.
(Reuters, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, In Argentina the bodies of Pirhya Sarussi (63) of Israel and Australian scientist Lily Pereg (54) were found on a lot beside the home of Gilad Pereg near the city of Mendoza. Pereg (36), the son of Sarussi, was arrested. The two sisters had vanished about two weeks ago.
(AP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 26, In Australia Japan's Naomi Osaka battled past Czech eighth seed Petra Kvitova 7-6 (7/2), 5-7, 6-4 to win her first Australian Open crown and become the new world number one.
(AFP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, Tens of thousands of people rallied across Australia calling for the abolition of the Jan. 26 national holiday in protests showing a deep division over a festivity intended to celebrate the birth of modern Australia. The anniversary marks the 1788 arrival of the "First Fleet" of British ships at Sydney Cove. Many indigenous Australians regard it as "Invasion Day".
(Reuters, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, British Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt said Britain will recognize opposition leader Juan Guaido as president unless the government of President Nicolas Maduro makes an announcement about new elections within eight days. Germany, France and Spain made similar announcements.
(AP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, Britain's Telegraph newspaper said it has apologized and paid damages to first lady Melania Trump after publishing an article it said contains many false statements.
(SSFC, 1/27/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 26, Canada's PM Justin Trudeau fired his ambassador to China after the envoy said it would be "great" if the US dropped its extradition request for a Chinese tech executive arrested in Canada.
(AP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 26, In CongoDRC local authorities said 600 rebels, whose conflict killed several thousand people in the restive Kasai region, have ended their war and surrendered their weapons in a sign of support for new President Felix Tshisekedi.
(AFP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, In France "yellow vest" protesters marched through Paris and other cities on the 11th weekend of action against the government, suggesting President Emmanuel Macron has yet to defuse public opposition to some of his policies.
(Reuters, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, Prolific French composer Michel Legrand (86) died in Paris. He won three Oscars and five Grammys during a career spanning more than half a century. His hits included the score for the '60s romance "The Umbrellas of Cherbourg." He first won an Academy Award in 1969 for the song "The Windmills of Your Mind" from Norman Jewison's hit thriller "The Thomas Crown Affair".
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michel_Legrand)(AP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, India held national day celebrations. Thousands of Indians converged on a ceremonial boulevard in New Delhi to watch a display of the country's military power and cultural diversity amid tight security.
(AP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, In Indonesia Eka Tjipta Widjaja (97), patriarch of one of Asia's richest families and the founder of the sprawling Sinarmas conglomerate, died. Forbes last year estimated Widjaja's fortune at $8.6 billion.
(AP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 26, In northwestern Iraq Kurdish protesters stormed a Turkish army position in the Shiladzeh region late today to protest the deaths of four civilians they said were killed last week in Turkish bombardment. One Kurdish protester was killed after Turkish troops opened fire on the demonstrators.
(AFP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 26, In Madagascar six people from the same family were "killed on the spot" by a lightning strike while sheltering from a storm.
(AFP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 26, In Mexico nine companies agreed to labor demands after more than 25,000 workers at dozens of factories in the Matamoros border region went on strike after owners refused union demands for a 20 percent pay hike and an annual bonus.
(SFC, 1/28/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 26, In Myanmar rainbow flags flew high and gay anthems blasted out over Yangon’s river as a flotilla of boats took to the water for the country’s first-ever Pride boat parade in a sign of growing acceptance for LGBT rights.
(AFP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, Spain's PM Pedro Sanchez said he would give Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro eight days to call elections in the south American country or Spain would recognizes Juan Guaido as interim leader in charge of calling an election.
(Reuters, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, In Sudan the group spearheading protests against President Omar al-Bashir called for night-time rallies across the country and new demonstrations over the next few days.
(AFP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, Syria called on Turkey to withdraw its troops from Syria's northern territories and end support for armed opposition groups in order to revive a two-decade-old bilateral security agreement.
(AP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, In eastern Syria five women blew themselves up in various parts of Baghouz, killing one SDF member and wounding three others.
(AFP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 26, Turkey's Defense Ministry said a Turkish military base in northern Iraq has come under attack by Kurdish militants. At least 10 people were wounded when protesters stormed the Turkish military camp near Dohuk in Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdish region, burning two tanks and other vehicles.
(AP, 1/26/19)(Reuters, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, Venezuela's political showdown moved to the United Nations where a Security Council meeting called by the United States pit backers of President Nicolas Maduro against the Trump administration and supporters of the country's self-declared interim leader Juan Guaido.
(AP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, In Yemen eight civilians were killed and 30 others wounded in a "shocking" bomb attack against a center for displaced people in the northwestern province of Hajja.
(AFP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, In San Francisco Peter A. Magowan (b.1942), the former CEO of Safeway (1979-1993), died at his home in Pacific Heights. In 1992 he led a group of investors that purchased the SF Giants ensuring that they would stay in the city.
(SFC, 1/28/19, p.A1)
2019 Jan 27, The state-owned Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. said it has signed agreements worth $5.8 billion with Italy's Eni and Austria's OMV for a share in the firm's refining unit and for the creation of a new trading venture.
(AP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, In Belgium at least 70,000 people braved the cold and rain to demand that their government increase its efforts to fight climate change.
(AP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, Brazilian officials suspended the search for potential survivors of a dam collapse that has killed at least 40 people amid fears that another nearby dam owned by the same company was also at risk of breaching. Firefighters called for the evacuation of some 24,000 people from Brumadinho, Minas Gerais state.
(AP, 1/27/19)(Reuters, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, The Minas Gerais state court in Brazil blocked 5 billion reais ($1.33 billion) in Vale SA assets to pay for damages from a tailings dam that burst at an iron ore mine.
(Reuters, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, Bulgarian Vice President Iliana Yotova said she had signed the final document revoking the citizenship of Russian millionaire Sergey Adonev (57) in May 2018. According to Bulgarian law, her office has the final say about granting or revoking citizenship. It was revoked over a 20-year-old fraud conviction in the United States.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 27, In Burkina Faso nearly a dozen gunmen opened fire on civilians at a market in the Soum province, killing at least 10 people.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 27, In Cuba a rare tornado ripped through several working class districts of eastern Havana late today, leaving at least three dead and scores injured as it reduced some buildings to rubble.
(Reuters, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 27, Egypt hosted embattled Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, saying it supports stability in the country undergoing popular demonstrations against al-Bashir's 29-year rule.
(AP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, Egypt says its air force has killed several militants, including two local commanders, in the restive northern part of the Sinai Peninsula.
(AP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, In France hundreds of people wearing red scarves marched through Paris to protest acts of violence and vandalism that took place during the largely peaceful yellow vest movement's two months of anti-government demonstrations.
(AP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, Berlin and Moscow announced that Germany had provided 12 million euros to help Russian World War II veterans and siege survivors but Moscow said it was not enough.
(AFP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, Israel gave final approval to a law permitting the export of medical marijuana, a move the government expects will catapult investment in local industry and agriculture.
(AP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, Israel officially recognized Venezuela's National Assembly chief Juan Guaido as president.
(AFP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, In Panama Pope Francis celebrated mass with hundreds of thousands of young pilgrims as he wound up a five-day visit during which he defended Central American migrants and acknowledged the Church had been hurt by sex abuse scandals.
(AFP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, In Peru 15 people were killed at a wedding after a wall at the Hotel Alhambra collapsed under heavy rains in the town of Abancay.
(Reuters, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, In the Philippines twin bombings killed 20 people during a church service in the country's restive south, six days after a referendum on autonomy for the mainly Muslim region returned an overwhelming "yes" vote. In July Indonesian police reported that a husband and wife team, members of the banned Jemaah Anshorut Daulah extremist group, had carried out the bombing.
(AP, 1/27/19)(SFC, 7/24/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 27, Russia marked the 75th anniversary of the end of the World War II siege of Leningrad, which claimed more than 800,000 lives.
(AFP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, In Saudi Arabia Mohammed Hussein al-Amoudi, a Saudi-Ethiopian businessman arrested more than 14 months ago in a crackdown on corruption, was released from detention.
(Reuters, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, In Tunisia secular government leaders announced a new party called Long Live Tunisia which is to be led by PM Youssef Chahed and will compete with moderate Islamists in upcoming elections.
(Reuters, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro rejected an international ultimatum to call elections within eight days and said opposition leader Juan Guaido violated the constitution by declaring himself interim leader.
(Reuters, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, Venezuela defused a potential showdown with the United States, suspending a demand that US diplomats leave the country as Washington called on the world to "pick a side" in the South American nation's fast-moving crisis.
(AP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 28, The US imposed restrictions on Venezuelan state-oil company PDVSA with the goal of curbing some $11 billion of crude exports from the OPEC member to the United States this year.
(Reuters, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 28, Blizzard-like conditions in the US Midwest caused the cancellation of some 1,000 flights at Chicago's airports and the closure of hundreds of schools.
(SFC, 1/29/19, p.A10)
2019 Jan 28, In Texas four undercover narcotics officers were shot and wounded during a gun battle that broke out when they tried to serve a search warrant at a home in the Houston area where drugs, including black tar heroin, were being dealt. A 5th police officer was also injured. Two suspects were killed.
(SFC, 1/29/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 28, Facebook said it is tightening requirements for political ads in the European Union ahead of bloc-wide elections scheduled for the spring, its latest effort to fight misinformation and increase transparency on its platforms.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, It was reported that Freedom Forum is selling its Newseum, a Washington DC museum devoted to journalism and the First Amendment, to Baltimore-based Johns Hopkins Univ. for $372.5 million.
(SFC, 1/28/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 28, Afghan Pres. Ashraf Ghani assured his people that their rights will not be compromised in the name of peace with the Taliban, days after the US envoy tasked with resolving America's longest war reported significant progress in talks with the insurgents.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, Bahrain's supreme court upheld a life sentence for opposition leader Sheikh Ali Salman for spying for Gulf rival Qatar, a decision his party slammed as "political revenge".
(AFP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, In Brazil the confirmed death toll rose to 60, with 292 people still missing for the Jan. 25 dam break in Minas Gerais state.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, In Cameroon Maurice Kamto, leader of the opposition MRC, was arrested in the country's economic capital Douala. Party treasurer Alain Fogue was also arrested and over the weekend, Paul-Eric Kingue, who ran Kamto's election campaign, and rapper Valsero were also detained alongside 115 others for attending opposition protest marches in several towns.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 28, Central African Rep. PM Mathieu Simplice Sarandji led a rally of around 3,000 people calling for a global arms embargo to be lifted ahead of a UN meeting later this week.
(AFP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, In China prominent human rights lawyer Wang Quanzhang was sentenced to 4½ years in prison on the charge of subversion of state power, more than three years after he was detained in a sweeping crackdown on the legal profession.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, Denmark began erecting a 70-km (43.4-mile) fence along the German border to keep out wild boars in an attempt to prevent the spread of African swine fever, which could jeopardize the country's valuable pork industry.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, In Egypt French President Emmanuel Macron called for "respect for individual freedoms" as he met with his Pres. Abdel Fattah al-Sisi in Cairo.
(AFP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, In France two armed men attacked a van carrying a jailed prisoner on his way to a court, firing shots at the vehicle and striking a guard before making their getaway in the southern town of Tarascon.
(AFP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, In western Germany three Polish men were killed when their car collided with a truck transporting pigs.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, Greece announced plans to return to bond markets and increase the minimum wage, amid protests against bailout-era measures by farmers who used tractors to block the country's main highway. PM Alexis Tsipras announced an 11-percent rise in the minimum wage, the first after a decade of austerity and months ahead of legislative elections.
(AP, 1/28/19)(AFP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, In Indonesia separatists opened fire on an aircraft carrying military personnel and local government officials in the easternmost Papua region, killing one soldier.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, In Japan Toshiba Corp. unveiled a remote-controlled robot with tongs that it hopes will be able to probe the inside of one of the three damaged reactors at the tsunami-hit Fukushima nuclear plant and grip chunks of highly radioactive melted fuel.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, Malaysian prosecutors charged former prime minister Najib Razak with three more counts of money laundering, allegedly receiving the proceeds of illegal activities in his personal bank accounts.
(Reuters, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, Mexican officials said the death toll from the Juan. 18 fire at an illegally tapped pipeline in Hidalgo state has risen to 115.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, The Netherlands refused an Italian request to take in 47 migrants on a humanitarian ship that is being blocked from Italian ports, saying there was a need to distinguish between genuine refugees and economic migrants.
(Reuters, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, In Nigeria the militant group Boko Haram killed at least 60 people when it renewed its attack on the northeastern town of Rann.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Jan 28, Poland's anti-corruption bureau says it has detained six suspects as part of an investigation into a state-owned arms company, including an ex-lawmaker and former employees from the Defense Ministry.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, Singapore's health ministry accused American Mikhy K. Farrera Brochez of stealing and leaking the records of 14,200 people infected with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, before January 2013. Brochez worked in Singapore as a lecturer for a period before he was jailed for several drug and fraud-related offenses and deported last year.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir extended ceasefires in the conflict-hit states of South Kordofan and Blue Nile, where protest leaders pushed for anti-government rallies.
(AFP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, In eastern Syria Kurdish-led fighters pressed their assault against the Islamic State group, boxing the jihadists into a tiny last pocket of land along the Euphrates River.
(AFP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, Pope Francis said celibacy for priests was a "gift to the Church" and not "optional", while returning to the Vatican from Panama. Francis said there's reason to consider ordaining older, married men in remote communities where priests are in short supply. Celibacy was imposed in the 11th century, possibly partly to prevent descendants of priests inheriting church property.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 29, US intelligence agencies told Congress that North Korea is unlikely to entirely dismantle its nuclear arsenal.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, The United States said that it has handed control of Venezuela's bank accounts in the United States to Juan Guaido, the opposition leader whom Washington has recognized as interim president.
(AFP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Longtime Donald Trump advisor Roger Stone (66) pleaded not guilty to charges stemming from the ongoing investigation into whether the president's campaign colluded with Russia in the 2016 election.
(AFP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, In California Pacific Gas and Electric Co. (PG&E) and its parent filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection because of mounting tolls from fires over the last two years.
(SFC, 1/30/19, p.A1)
2019 Jan 29, In Maryland the state's attorney in Baltimore said her office will no longer prosecute any marijuana possession cases.
(SFC, 1/30/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 29, Australian company TPG Telecom said it had abandoned the rollout of what would have been the country's fourth mobile network because of a ban on Chinese giant Huawei, which would have been the main equipment vendor.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Brazilian prosecutors arrested three employees of miner Vale SA and two contractors, as a criminal investigation began after a devastating dam rupture expected to leave a death toll of more than 300 people.
(Reuters, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, British Investment manager Man Group PLC says it will stop funding the Man Booker and Man Booker International prizes after 2019. The firm says it has donated 25 million pounds ($33 million) to the Booker Prize Foundation since 2002.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, British mining group Gemfields said it will pay 5.8 million pounds in compensation to nearly 300 miners over accusations of torture around a ruby mine in Mozambique, but denied liability.
(AFP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, In Canada Bruce McArthur (67), charged with the murder of eight gay men who disappeared over several years, pleaded guilty in Toronto to the charges. On Jan. 8 he was sentenced to life in prison.
(http://tinyurl.com/y4yhyhk5)(Reuters, 1/29/19)(SFC, 2/9/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 29, China called on the US government to "stop the unreasonable crackdown" on Huawei after the US stepped up pressure on the tech giant by indicting it on charges of stealing technology and violating sanctions on Iran, complicating high-level trade talks between the countries about to begin in Washington.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Congo DRC army and health sources said two soldiers in Beni have died after catching Ebola in an outbreak that has killed hundreds in the eastern region. The deaths of the soldiers brought the total toll to 459 recorded deaths.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Three Congo DRC militia leaders, including a man accused of murdering 39 police officers, surrendered in a show of support for new President Felix Tshisekedi.
(AFP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Denmark said it will raise its military spending to 1.5 percent of its gross domestic product in 2023, up from 1.35 percent planned this year.
(Reuters, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Two migrant boats sank in heavy seas off the coast of Djibouti. 16 people were rescued. The death toll soon rose to 52 with scores still missing.
(AFP, 1/30/19)(AFP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 29, Egypt's interior ministry said security forces have arrested 54 people, including suspected members of the Muslim Brotherhood, for planning to hold protests and commit violence on the anniversary of the 2011 uprising.
(Reuters, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, In Egypt French President Emmanuel Macron held a surprise second meeting with Pres. Abdel Fattah al-Sisi after talks with the country's top clerics, ending a three-day visit aimed at boosting ties while raising human rights concerns. During the visit, Macron and Sisi oversaw the signing of some 30 deals worth nearly a billion euros (dollars) including in transportation, education and health.
(AFP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, In Egypt prominent atheist video blogger Sherif Gaber launched a crowdfunding page called "Help Me Escape Egypt" to aid him in purchasing another nationality so he can override an exit ban imposed by the secret police. Gaber has been repeatedly detained by authorities accusing him of blasphemy, which is sometimes prosecuted in Egypt under laws against "insulting religion".
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 29, The EU approved US soybean exports to be used in the production of biofuels in an effort to boost such imports following last summer's trans-Atlantic meeting between Pres. Donald Trump and his EU Commission counterpart Jean-Claude Juncker.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, French man Jean-Luc Van Den Heede (73) arrived in the harbor of Les Sables d'Olonne in his Rustler 36, the first to finish the 30,000-mile Golden Globe race. Of the 19 sailors who started out last July, only five were still in the race.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Israel's PM Benjamin Netanyahu met late today with Lithuanian PM Saulius Skvernelis, stressing joint interests between the two nations.
(http://tinyurl.com/y7ft26y5)(SFC, 1/31/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 29, Myanmar's parliament voted to create a committee to propose amendments to the country's military-enacted constitution, which grants the armed forces the power to block any change.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Pakistan's top court upheld the acquittal of Asia Bibi, the Christian woman at the center of a blasphemy row which has ignited violent protests, been linked to two assassinations and spotlighted religious extremism. She was expected to leave the country soon.
(AFP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Pakistani Taliban militants armed with guns and grenades attacked a regional police station in the southwestern Baluchistan province, triggering a shootout that killed eight police officers and a civilian and wounded 17 others. Two of the four militants were reported killed.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, The Palestinian government submitted its resignation, a statement said, a move seen as a bid by president Mahmud Abbas to strengthen his position as a decade-old political split deepens. PM Rami Hamdallah's government will remain in place while a new administration is formed.
(AFP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, The Palestinian Authority asked the UN to deploy a permanent international force in the occupied West Bank and east Jerusalem, after Israel announced it was suspending operations of an observer force that had been in the city of Hebron for more than 20 years.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, In Sudan police used tear gas to disperse dozens of demonstrators in Khartoum's Burri neighborhood and hundreds who gathered in its twin city of Omdurman. Sudan's information ministry said security chief Salah Abdallah Mohamed Saleh has ordered the release of people detained during weeks of anti-government protests.
(Reuters, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Syria's Pres. Bashar Assad, during a meeting with visiting Iranian First Vice President Eshaq Jahangiri, said that new trade agreements with Iran will help the two countries face the "economic war" waged against them by the West. The two countries have signed 11 agreements and memoranda of understanding to promote cooperation in Syria's reconstruction after eight years of civil war.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Syrian government forces shelled a northwestern town held by al-Qaida-linked militants, killing at least 10 people and wounding others. A blast hit the governing council of insurgent-held Idlib killing one person and injured three others. The Islamic State later denied being behind a suicide blast.
(AP, 1/29/19)(Reuters, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 29, In Syria militant Muhammad Saifuddin of Indonesia, who used the aliases Abu Walid and Mohammed Karim Yusop Faiz, was killed in eastern Deir Ezzor province where an international coalition fought to defeat remaining pockets of IS group extremists.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Jan 29, It was reported that UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has been chosen as the winner of Germany's prestigious International Charlemagne Prize for contributions to European unity.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, The United Nations refugee agency says more than 30,000 Nigerians fled the border town of Rann over the weekend to seek safety in Cameroon as attacks by Boko Haram extremists continue. Spokesman Babar Baloch said thousands more have fled to neighboring Chad because of the violence in northeastern Nigeria.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, The Vatican said that Father Hermann Geissler, an Austrian section head in the Vatican doctrinal office, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), had submitted his resignation. He denied accusations by a former nun of soliciting sex from her a decade ago while hearing her confession.
(Reuters, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Venezuela's Pres. Nicolas Maduro sought OPEC support against US sanctions imposed on his country's oil industry in a letter sent to OPEC Secretary-General Mohammad Barkindo.
(Reuters, 2/11/19)
2019 Jan 29, Yemen's Huthi rebels released the first prisoner, a sick Saudi soldier, under an agreement with the government brokered last month.
(AFP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Zimbabwe's high court ordered the release on bail of activist pastor Evan Mawarire, who was arrested on charges of subversion amid violent anti-government protests. Lawyers marched on the constitutional court to protest the alleged denial of justice for hundreds of people arrested in a violent crackdown on protests that shut down the country.
(Reuters, 1/29/19)(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 30, US and Chinese negotiators start two days of high-level talks aimed at settling a six-month trade war that has weakened both sides, shaken financial markets and clouded the outlook for the global economy.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, Texas inmate Robert Jennings (61) was executed for the July 1988 fatal shooting of Officer Elston Howard during a robbery at an adult bookstore.
(SFC, 1/31/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 30, An Amnesty International report said digital tourism giants Airbnb, Booking.com, Expedia and TripAdvisor are profiting from "war crimes" by offering services in Israeli settlements. Israel threatened a day earlier to bar Amnesty International from access to the Jewish state over its charges.
(AFP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, In Brazil three state and federal agencies asked that residents refrain from using water directly from the Paraopeba River or 100-meters (109 yards) around it following the Jan. 18 Vale mining dam collapse in Brumadinho.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 30, An Egyptian court sentenced Souad el-Kholy, the deputy governor of the Alexandria, to 12 years in prison on corruption charges. The Cairo criminal court also sentenced her to a one-year suspended sentence for bribery, profiteering and squandering public funds.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, A rights lawyer said Egypt has rounded up at least six activists in the last couple of days in a wave of arrests coinciding with the anniversary of the 2011 uprising.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, Ethiopian prosecutors charged Abdi Mohammed Omer, the former president of the Somali Region, and 46 others with instigating ethnic violence there last year.
(Reuters, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker told British PM Theresa May that the bloc's Brexit divorce deal with London cannot be renegotiated.
(Reuters, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, German authorities arrested three Iraqi refugees on allegations they were planning an Islamic extremist bombing attack, and searched properties in three states in connection with their investigation.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, A German appeals court in Koblenz rejected the complaint of a Jewish man against a decision by the town of Herxheim am Berg to allow a bell dedicated to Adolf Hitler to continue to hang in a church tower.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, Israeli forces shot dead a 16-year-old Palestinian girl who tried to carry out a stabbing attack at a checkpoint between the occupied West Bank and Jerusalem.
(Reuters, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, Italy's PM Giuseppe Conte said that 47 rescued migrants aboard the Sea Watch NGO vessel could finally disembark after Italy and six other countries (France, Germany, Malta, Portugal, Romania and Luxembourg) agreed to take them in.
(AFP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, In the Netherlands a round-the-clock prayer service to stop an Armenian family being deported was ended after 96 days, after the government agreed to make an exception to immigration rules. Hundreds of supporters of the Tamrazyan family have held rites non-stop at the Bethel church in The Hague since Oct. 26 to block their deportation.
(Reuters, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, In the southern Philippines a grenade was thrown into a mosque where Muslim teachers were sleeping early today, killing two of them and injuring four in Zamboanga city.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, Russian lawmaker Rauf Arashukov (32) was arrested during a session of the upper house of parliament and was led away to face questions over two murders after failing in a bid to flee the chamber.
(Reuters, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, In Somalia a US airstrike killed 24 al-Shabab extremists near Shebeeley in the central Hiran region.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 30, In South Korea Kim Kyoung-soo, the governor or South Gyeongsang and a political ally of President Moon Jae-in, received a two-year prison term for his involvement in an online opinion rigging scandal.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, Spanish police said they have arrested 37 people as part of a drug bust in southern Spain and the capital of Madrid.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, Spanish authorities seized more than three tons of cocaine and arrested 11 people off Portugal's Atlantic coast, dismantling a drug smuggling gang that operated across international waters from a cargo vessel.
(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Jan 30, Sweden's state employment agency said it would lay off a third of its own workers, in the first sign of budget cuts and reforms under a newly-formed government propped up by two center-right parties.
(Reuters, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, Taiwan-based Foxconn Technology Group said it is shifting the focus of its planned Wisconsin campus away from blue-collar manufacturing to a research hub, while insisting it remains committed to creating 13,000 jobs as promised.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, Tanzania's home affairs minister said a manhunt has been launched for suspects in the abduction and murder of up to 10 children this month in cases believed to be linked to witchcraft. Local media this week reported at least four dead bodies of missing children had been found abandoned near bushes with missing body parts, believed to be used in rituals.
(Reuters, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, In Thailand more than 400 schools in Bangkok were shut for the rest of the week due to increasing concern over dangerously unhealthy air pollution.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, Turkish citizen, Hamza Ulucay, who worked as a translator for the US Consulate in Adana, was convicted in Turkey's Mardin province on terror charges and sentenced to 4 ½ years in prison, but will be freed from prison with credit for the nearly two years he spent in pre-trial detention.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 31, US court records made public that a group of travel agents have been charged with running illicit "birth tourism" schemes across southern California that allegedly brought in hundreds of pregnant Chinese clients to the US illegally so they could deliver their children on American soil.
(SFC, 2/1/19, p.A8)
2019 Jan 31, Officials said cold temperatures across the US Midwest have left at least 20 people dead.
(SFC, 2/1/19, p.A9)
2019 Jan 31, It was reported that officials were force-feeding six migrants through plastic nasal tubes at a Texas location, following hunger strikes over the past month to protest conditions inside detention facilities.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, The US Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction reported to Congress and said the Afghan government controls or influences 54 percent of districts, down from 56 percent a year earlier, and the Taliban's share slipped from 14 percent to 12 percent.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Texas-based Valero Energy Corp. said it has stopped taking deliveries of Venezuelan crude oil after the Trump administration slapped sanctions on Venezuela's state-owned oil company, Petroleos de Venezuela S.A.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Jan 31, In northern Afghanistan the Taliban attacked an army checkpoint late today in Sari Pul province, killing at least six soldiers. Nine Taliban fighters were reported killed and 13 wounded in a gun battle that followed the attack.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Jan 31, Bangladesh activist Kalpona Akter said more than 5,000 workers who demanded higher wages have been fired by factory owners, and hundreds faced police charges in the world's second-largest garment export industry after China.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, In Belgium thousands of teenagers skipped school for the fourth week in a row in an attempt to push authorities into providing better protection for the world's climate.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Brazil's Minas Gerais state labor prosecutors' office said it had frozen more than 800 million reais ($219 million) of miner Vale's funds as compensation for victims of the Jan. 25 deadly tailings dam burst.
(Reuters, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Britain, France and Germany launched a special payment mechanism that the EU hopes will help save a nuclear deal with Iran by bypassing US sanctions.
(AFP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, In Pakistan the British High Commission in Islamabad said convicted child-sex offender Choudhry Ikhalaq Hussain (41), who was part of a gang that exploited teenage girls in a northern English town, has been arrested in Pakistan where he fled during his trial.
(Reuters, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Cameroon authorities banned planned protest marches in the capital Yaounde after a series of unauthorized anti-government demonstrations and some 200 arrests, including the detention of main opposition leader Maurice Kamto.
(AFP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Chinese President Xi Jinping called for a return to "unity and harmony" on as he welcomed gas-rich Qatar's emir to Beijing, amid a dispute that has seen some Arab states led by Saudi Arabia severing relations with Doha. Qatar's Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani signed several memorandums of understanding with Pres. Xi Jinping.
(Reuters, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, The European Parliament recognized Venezuela's self-declared interim president Juan Guaido as de facto head of state, heightening international pressure on the OPEC member's socialist President Nicolas Maduro.
(Reuters, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, A French court upheld a decision by doctors to withdraw life support for Vincent Lambert (42), a tetraplegic man kept alive in a vegetative state for a decade, after the latest legal challenge by the patient's parents in a divisive right-to-die case.
(AFP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Israel began work to strengthen its border with the Gaza Strip with construction starting on a massive new barrier along the frontier.
(AFP, 2/3/19)
2019 Jan 31, Italy's national statistics agency said its economy, the third-largest in the eurozone, contracted by a quarterly rate of 0.2 percent in the fourth quarter of 2018. Following a 0.1 percent drop in the previous three-month period that means Italy is in a technical recession.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Lebanese leaders reached a deal to set up a new unity government, three political sources from different factions said, ending nine months of wrangling over how to share out cabinet portfolios in the heavily indebted state.
(Reuters, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Readers of the Lebanese daily Al-Mustaqbal leafed through its last print edition, its move online underscoring the challenges ailing Lebanon's press industry.
(Reuters, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, In Mexico a message allegedly from the leader of a fuel theft ring in Guanajuato threatened Lopez Obrador and was found hung some distance from a refinery. Soldiers destroyed explosives found near the refinery.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Jan 31, Poland's top state veterinary official said about 2,500 kg (5,500 pounds) of meat from sick cows who were slaughtered illegally in Poland has been exported to 10 other European Union countries. The Polish veterinary inspectorate stripped the slaughterhouse in Ostrow Mazowiecka of permission to operate earlier this week.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Russian news agencies reported that the state communications regulator said that the BBC World News channel had committed "certain violations" while operating in Russia.
(Reuters, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Saudi Arabia said that it has concluded a crackdown on high-level corruption that began 15 months ago.
(SFC, 2/1/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 31, South Africa's cash-strapped public broadcaster (SABC) announced it would drop plans to lay off a third of its full-time employees as it looks for other savings to cut mounting debts.
(AFP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, In Spain ride-hailing companies Uber and Cabify said that they would stop operating in Barcelona after the regional government passed tighter regulations to appease taxi drivers.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, A Spanish court approved the temporary extradition to the United States of a former Venezuelan official being investigated in a bribery scheme involving Venezuela's state oil company, PDVSA. The extradition of Nervis Villalobos would be for a maximum of six months.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Sudanese police fired tear gas at crowds of demonstrators in the capital and other cities, as fresh protests demanded an end to President Omar al-Bashir's three-decade rule. Protester Ahmed al-Khair, a 33-year-old school teacher, was detained. He was pronounced dead in custody the following evening. Relatives said his body, including his groin area, was covered in bruises. There were also signs of rectal bleeding.
(AP, 1/31/19)(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Jan 31, In Thailand a fleet of drones, trucks and small planes sprayed water to try to reduce air pollution around Bangkok while the city's governor invited critics to brainstorm better ideas to improve the air quality in the capital.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Uganda's revenue agency said authorities have seized 750 pieces of ivory and thousands of pangolin scales being smuggled from neighboring South Sudan, in one of the largest seizures of wildlife contraband in the East African country. Two Vietnamese nationals were in custody over the contraband.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, The UN said cold weather has killed close to 30 children in two months among the civilians who have been fleeing the last jihadist pocket in eastern Syria.
(AFP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Venezuelan security agents detained three foreign journalists -- a Colombian photographer, Spanish reporter and Colombian TV producer -- who had been covering the U.S.-backed effort to oust President Nicolas Maduro for the Spanish news agency EFE. Two detained French journalists were freed.
(Reuters, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Yemeni security officials said seven Houthi rebel prisoners have been released by Saudi Arabia and returned to Sanaa.
(SFC, 2/1/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan, A Washington judge hit Syria with a $302 million judgment over the 2012 death of Marie Colvin of The Sunday Times.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Jan, In San Francisco a one-night street count of the homeless was conducted. Results of the count later pegged the number of homeless at 8,011, based on federal guidelines. A more complete count was expected to be released in July.
(SFC, 5/17/19, p.A1)
2019 Jan, In New York state Vincent Vetromile (19), Brian Colaneri (20), Andrew Crysel (18), and a 16-year-old who wasn’t named because of his age were arrested. They had set an imminent or specific date for an attack on the Muslim community of Islamberg. In June the three older men pleaded guilty and faced up to 12 years in prison.
(SFC, 7/1/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan, In Belarus the remains of at least 1,214 people were found in the center of Brest, which was home to a large, vibrant Jewish community before the Second World War. Their remains were buried at local cemetery on May 22.
(AP, 5/22/19)
2019 Jan, The European Court of Human Rights ordered Russia to pay Georgia 10 million euros ($11.5 million) over the mass deportation of Georgian citizens from Russia in 2006. The court found that Moscow carried out a coordinated policy of targeting at least 1,500 Georgian nationals for expulsion.
(Reuters, 2/12/19)
2019 Jan, Georgia arrested and soon extradited Oleg Tishchenko (42), a Russian software developer, to the United States. He was reported to have been arrested on a US warrant while attending a dance festival. He was indicted in absentia in 2016 for smuggling F-16 fighter jet manuals into Russia in breach of US arms export law.
(http://tinyurl.com/y4qjenvk)(Reuters, 5/15/19)
2019 Jan, In South Korea Kim Yong-kyun (24) died after being sucked into a coal conveyor belt. He was working as a contractor at a power plant 110 km (70 miles) south of Seoul. His death triggered uproar in South Korea where critics say work safety is compromised for temporary or contract workers.
(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Jan, Mohammed Khalifa, a Saudi-born Canadian citizen and a leading figure in the Islamic State of Iraq, was captured overseas by the Syrian Democratic Forces. In 2021 he was transferred into FBI custody, brought to the Eastern District of Virginia and charged in federal court with conspiring to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohammed_Khalifa)(AP, 10/2/21)
2019 Feb 1, US officials said the US Agency for International Development (USAID) has ceased all assistance to Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza. The halt was requested by the Palestinian Authority and was linked to a Jan. 31 deadline set by new US legislation under which foreign aid recipients would be more exposed to anti-terrorism lawsuits.
(Reuters, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, The United States announced that it was pulling out of a landmark nuclear arms control treaty with Russia, accusing Moscow of violating the Cold War-era pact with "impunity" by continuing to develop banned missiles.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, In San Francisco federal Judge Richard Seeborg ruled that Ndume, the Gorilla Foundation's companion gorilla to the late Koko, must go back to the Cincinnati Zoo in accordance with a 2015 agreement. Ndume returned to Cincinnati on June 14.
(SFC, 2/4/19, p.C3)(SFC, 6/15/19, p.C1)
2019 Feb 1, Virginia's Gov. Ralph Northam acknowledged that he was photographed more than 30 years ago in a costume that was racist and offensive on his 1984 medical yearbook page. The next day he denied appearing in KKK robes or in blackface in the yearbook, but revealed that he had darkened his face in the 1980s at a Michael Jackson inspired dance party when he was a young army officer.
(SFC, 2/2/19, p.A6)(SSFC, 2/3/19, p.A12)
2019 Feb 1, Bangladesh's central bank said it has filed a lawsuit in a New York court against a Philippine bank, seeking damages and the return of $81 million stolen from its account with the Federal Reserve Bank of New York in 2016.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, Belarusian model Anastasia Vashukevich, who claims to have information on the ties between Russia and Donald Trump's election campaign, said she has turned it over to Russian billionaire businessman Oleg Deripaska.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, Brazilians payed homage to the 110 victims killed and 238 who are still missing after a Vale mining dam collapsed a week ago in the city of Brumadinho, Minas Gerais state.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, Britain complained about the EU calling Gibraltar a "colony" in a piece of draft legislation, highlighting how the EU is lining up behind Spain in its territorial dispute as Britain quits the bloc.
(Reuters, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, In London a Ugandan mother (37) was convicted of abusing her 3-year-old daughter in Britain's first successful prosecution for female genital mutilation.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, A French priest was sentenced to five years, two without parole, for sexually assaulting four young female parishioners, one of whom was just nine when the offences started, and embezzling 100,000 euros ($115,000) to pay one of his victims.
(AFP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 1, German police caught a suspect over the theft of watches worth some 125,000 euros ($143,000) from an Amsterdam jeweler. The 34-year-old Estonian man was arrested this evening as he crossed the border hours after the robbery.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 1, Hong Kong's High Court refused to allow three transgender men to be recognized as males on their official identity cards because they have not undergone full sex-change operations.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, The head of Hungary's nationalistic Jobbik party said fines of nearly 1 billion forints ($3.6 million) meted out by the state audit office for alleged financial irregularities may force the party to shut down. Jobbik's 20 lawmakers could continue as independents if the party itself shuts down.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, An Indian air force Mirage 2000 trainer aircraft crashed in Bangalore while taking off after being upgraded by a state aerospace company, killing the two pilots.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, TIPH (Temporary International Presence in Hebron) countries Switzerland, Sweden, Norway, Italy and Turkey, condemned in a joint statement the Israeli government's unilateral decision not to extend the observer force's mission in the flashpoint city.
(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 1, Former Ivory Coast president Laurent Gbagbo and co-defendant Charles Blé Goudé were freed from detention by the International Criminal Court.
(Reuters, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, The Israeli army said approximately "10,000 rioters and demonstrators" gathered in different locations along the fence separating the Gaza Strip from Israel. 32 Palestinians were shot and wounded by Israeli troops in the renewed clashes.
(AFP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, At least four Libyan soldiers were killed when forces loyal to Khalifa Haftar fought for hours with a local armed group as they sought to expand south.
(Reuters, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador launched an ambitious forestry program to plant fruit and timber trees, as well as cacao and coffee, on nearly 1.5 million acres (570,000 hectares) in the country's south.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, In southern Niger Boko Haram islamists shot dead six people late today in Bague Djaradi, a village near the border with Nigeria.
(AFP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 1, Pakistani police fired tear gas and wielded batons to disperse a rally by Islamic radicals in the southern port city of Karachi against the acquittal of a Christian woman sentenced to death for blasphemy. Nationwide rallies the extremists had called for against Aasia Bibi's freedom mostly fizzled.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, In South Africa at least three students were killed and 23 injured after a walkway collapsed at a school outside Johannesburg.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, It was reported that a special airlift for thousands of baby flamingos is under way in South Africa as drought has put their breeding ground in peril.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, A South Korean appeals court sentenced former provincial governor Ahn Hee-jung (54) to 3½ years in prison on charges of sexually abusing his secretary.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, Sudanese police fired tear gas at hundreds of protesters in Omdurman, across the Nile from Khartoum. Demonstrators frustrated with a worsening economic crisis have been on the streets near-daily since Dec. 19 calling for an end to the 30-year rule of President Omar al-Bashir.
(Reuters, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, A Turkish court sentenced two Kurdish politicians to lengthy jail terms on charges of belonging to a terrorist organization and disseminating terrorist propaganda. Former parliamentarian Gultan Kisanak, arrested in 2016 when she was the joint mayor of Diyarbakir, was jailed for 14 years and three months. Sebahat Tuncel, who had also served in parliament, was jailed for 15 years.
(Reuters, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 1, Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido said he's respectfully declining offers from the presidents of Mexico and Uruguay to negotiate with Pres. Nicolas Maduro.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 2, Avalanches in Austria, France and Switzerland killed four people.
(AFP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 2, Belgium said it has agreed to host Ivory Coast ex-president Laurent Gbagbo pending a possible appeal against his acquittal by the International Criminal Court in The Hague on charges of crimes against humanity.
(AFP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, In Bolivia a landslide buried cars on a highway northeast of the capital. Eight bodies were soon recovered. At least 18 other people were injured.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 2, Officials in Brazil said the death toll from the collapse of a dam holding back mining waste rose to 121. Another 226 people remained missing.
(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, It was reported that Cape Verde police have detained 11 Russian sailors for the suspected smuggling of more than nine tons of cocaine.
(Reuters, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, China called for Washington to negotiate with Russia instead of pulling out of the 1987 nuclear arms treaty the Trump administration sees as a restraint on its ability to compete with Beijing and Moscow.
(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, Colombia's armed forces clashed with FARC dissident rebels, killing 10 from the group that split from the 2016 peace process.
(AFP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 2, In Cuba the death toll from a rare tornado that struck Havana on Jan. 27 rose to six after two injured victims died in hospital.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 2, In France several thousand "yellow vest" protesters marched through Paris and other cities on the 12th weekend of action against the government, despite opinion polls pointing to a recovery in President Emmanuel Macron's popularity.
(Reuters, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, Iran announced the "successful test" of a new cruise missile with a range of over 1,350 km, coinciding with celebrations for the country's 1979 Islamic revolution. In the southeast one member of the Revolutionary Guards was killed and five were wounded in an attack on a paramilitary base in Nik Shahr.
(AFP, 2/2/19)(Reuters, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, Iraq and Jordan inaugurated a joint industrial area on the border between the neighboring countries. The border crossing was formally reopened.
(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, In Iraq a motorcycle gunman shot dead novelist Alaa Mashzoub (50) late today close to his house in the Shi'ite Muslim city of Kerbala.
(Reuters, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 2, In Jamaica the body of Dr. Lynvale Bloomfield (59), a member of Parliament, was found at his home in the northeast district of Portland.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 2, In Mexico an American anarchist who went by the name John Galton was shot dead at his home in the resort of Acapulco. Mexican police found equipment to process drugs, glass pipes and marijuana plants at the home.
(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, Philippine troops clashed with Abu Sayyaf gunmen in fierce jungle fighting that left five soldiers and three militants dead, as the military pushed forward with a fresh offensive following a deadly church bombing last weekend..
(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, President Vladimir Putin said Russia will abandon a centerpiece nuclear arms treaty but will only deploy intermediate-range nuclear missiles if Washington does so. US President Donald Trump accused Moscow a day earlier of violating the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty with "impunity" by deploying banned missiles.
(AP, 2/2/19)(Econ., 1/23/21, p.41)
2019 Feb 2, In southern Somalia a suicide car bomb exploded outside a military base for Ethiopian soldiers, leaving an unspecified number of casualties.
(Reuters, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, In Spain thousands of elderly people are marching through downtown Madrid to demand better public pensions.
(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, In Spain the film "Campeones" ("Champions"), a comedy about a basketball team featuring actors with mental disabilities, won best picture at the Spanish Film Academy's Goya Awards.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 2, In Sudan thousands of residents poured out onto the streets of the eastern province of Kassala to denounce the death of a protester last week following demonstrations calling for the president's ouster.
(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, In Syria a building damaged during years of war collapsed in the northern city of Aleppo, killing 11 people, including four children. In the northeast a roadside bomb struck a bus carrying teachers in Manbij killing one person.
(AP, 2/2/19)(AFP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, In Syria the US-led coalition reportedly attacked one of its artillery positions in the country's east, wounding two soldiers and destroying a cannon. Militants, holed up in a small area on the Euphrates' eastern bank, launched an attack against government forces and allied Iranian-backed troops in an apparent attempt to clear an escape route westward toward the desert. The IS attacks lasted for hours and left at least 11 militants, including three suicide bombers, dead.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 2, In eastern Syria US-backed Syrian fighters killed nine civilians, including six children, who were trying to flee the last area controlled by the Islamic State group. The civilians had reportedly paid money to smugglers to take them out of the area controlled by the extremists.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 2, Turkish security forces arrested Hatice Kilic, a suspect in an armed attack on the US consulate in Istanbul In August 2015.
(Reuters, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, The UN and African Union announced that a peace deal has been reached between the Central African Republic government and 14 armed groups after their first-ever direct dialogue aimed at ending years of conflict.
(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, Venezuelan air force Gen. Francisco Yanez defected from the administration of President Nicolas Maduro and called on his compatriots to participate in protests against the socialist leader's rule. Rival marches took place in different districts of Caracas. Tens of thousands joined opposition protests against Maduro in Caracas and other cities.
(AP, 2/2/19)(AFP, 2/2/19)(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, The New England Patriots won their sixth title by lumbering their way to a 13-3 victory over the Los Angeles Rams.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 3, In southern California a small plane crashed into a home in Yorba Linda killing the pilot and four people in the home.
(SFC, 2/4/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 3, In San Francisco two people were killed early today when a car entered Hwy. 101 at the Vermont St. exit going the wrong way. Driver Kayla Wilson (21) was killed along with Waheedullah Etimad, the driver of a minivan carrying 6 people.
(SFC, 2/4/19, p.C1)
2019 Feb 3, Rapper 21 Savage was taken into federal immigration custody in the Atlanta area. The Grammy-nominated artist is a British citizen who entered the US legally in 2005 but overstayed his visa.
(SFC, 2/4/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 3, Barbra Siperstein (76), a crusader for transgender rights, died in New Jersey. Two days earlier a New Jersey bill, named in her honor, went into effect granting states residents the right to amend their gender on birth certificates without proof of surgery.
(SSFC, 2/10/19, p.C9)
2019 Feb 3, In Ohio detective Bill Brewer was fatally shot during a standoff that started last evening in an apartment complex in Pierce Township. Suspected gunman Wade Edward Winn (23) was taken into custody early today.
(SFC, 2/4/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 3, In Texas two men and two children were found dead in a house under construction in Dallas. Carbon monoxide poisoning was suspected.
(SFC, 2/5/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 3, Australia announced that the last four child refugees held on the Pacific atoll of Nauru will soon be sent to the United States, ending the banishment of children under the government's harsh asylum-seeker policy.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, Austria's Chancellor Sebastian Kurz said he has spoken with Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido and is joining several other European Union nations in saying he will recognize Guaido as interim president unless new presidential elections are called.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, Belgium police reacted to a warning call at a BNP Paribas bank in Antwerp's famed diamond center. They found the vault door still secured. It was only after they forced their way inside that they realized the sheer audacity of the robbery that had taken place — some 30 empty deposit boxes, a hole in the floor, a tunnel to the sewage system.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 3, It was reported that Britain's brown hares are dying from a pathogen found to be the deadly rabbit hemorrhagic disease Type 2. Numbers of the animals have plummeted by about 80 percent in recent decades due to intensive agriculture that has destroyed their habitats and food supplies.
(SSFC, 2/3/19, p.A20)
2019 Feb 3, El Salvador with a population of some 6.5 million held presidential elections. The World Bank says per capita income is $3,560. Nayib Bukele (37), former San Salvador mayor, was elected president, crushing a two-party system in place since civil war ended in 1992.
(AP, 2/3/19)(AFP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 3, In France Anne-Sophie Schmidt, one of 10 women in three countries who say they were assaulted, harassed or in one case raped by conductor Charles Dutoit, issued a statement calling attention to the allegations ahead of his first major concert since the allegations surfaced in 2017.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, French warplanes struck a rebel convoy in northern Chad, helping local troops repel an incursion across the border from Libya, a sign France's support for President Idriss Deby goes beyond fighting Islamist militants.
(Reuters, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 3, India's PM Narendra Modi paid a daylong visit to disputed Kashmir to review development work as separatists fighting Indian rule called for a shutdown in the Himalayan region.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, Indian news reports said as many as 129 Indians were among those detained Jan. 30 by US immigration authorities in connection with enrollment at a fake university.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, In eastern India seven people were killed and 29 injured when nine coaches of a New Delhi-bound train derailed early today.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, In Indonesia the 1,784-meter (5,853-foot) Mount Karangetang volcano located on Siau island of North Sulawesi province started spitting clouds of gas and lava.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 3, Iran's state-run IRNA news agency reported that a court has handed down prison sentences for 13 protesters arrested during the August 2017 demonstrations over economic hardships.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, Iran's semi-official ISNA news agency reported that a fire in the country's space research center has killed three scientists.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, Four skiers went missing in the Italian Alps. Their bodies were found the next day. Two other Italian skiers were killed by avalanches, one in the Valle d'Aosta region, the other in the Alto Adige (South Tyrol) region.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 3, Japan-based Nissan announced it has cancelled plans to make its X-Trail SUV in the UK. That reverses a decision in late 2016 to build the SUV at Nissan's Sunderland plant in northern England, which employs 7,000 workers.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh passed through the Rafah crossing, along with dozens of other Palestinians to meet with Egyptian security officials in Cairo.
(Reuters, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, In Russia a bus crashed south of Moscow killing at least seven people, four of them children, and sending 32 others to the hospital with injuries.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, South Africa expressed disappointment after the United States and other Western powers wrote to President Cyril Ramaphosa urging him to tackle corruption, and said those countries had breached diplomatic protocol.
(Reuters, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, The head of the UN mission in Yemen launched talks between the government and Huthi rebels aboard a boat in the Red Sea aimed at shoring up a ceasefire.
(AFP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, Pope Francis headed to the UAE for the first ever papal visit to the Arabian Peninsula, birthplace of Islam, where he will hold an open-air mass for tens of thousands of Catholics.
(AFP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, Yemen's deputy chief of staff died from wounds sustained last month in a drone attack by Huthi rebels on the country's largest air base. Major General Saleh al-Zandan was among 11 wounded in the January 10 drone attack on a military parade at the base in Lahij.
(AFP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 4, It was reported that the California Highway Patrol has suspended the police powers of dozens of officers after an investigation revealed at least $360,000 in fraudulent overtime pay in East Los Angeles from March 2016 into 2018.
(SFC, 2/4/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 4, In Nebraska Lisa Kwapniowski (49), a former pharmacy director, pleaded guilty to stealing more than $4.6 million from an Omaha hospital between 2012 and 2018.
(SFC, 2/6/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 4, A report by the International Center for Integrated Mountain Development said that one-third of Himalayan glaciers will melt by the end of the century due to climate change, threatening water sources for 1.9 billion people, even if current efforts to reduce climate change succeed.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 4, In northern Australia emergency workers used boats and helicopters to rescue people from flooded areas where forecasts call for more heavy rainfall.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, In Brazil the death toll from the failure of a tailings dam operated by miner Vale SA rose to 134 while 199 people are still unaccounted for.
(Reuters, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, British air accident investigators said they had found the wreckage of the missing aircraft carrying Premier League soccer player Emiliano Sala on the seabed near Guernsey and that a body was visible inside. The plane is believed to have crashed into the sea on Jan. 21.
(Reuters, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, A British official signed an order that paves the way for tycoon Vijay Mallya's extradition to India to face financial fraud allegations. Mallya has 14 days to appeal.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 4, In Burkina Faso armed men attacked Kain village in Yatenga province early today, killing 14 people. In response Burkina Faso's armed forces killed 146 jihadists in three counterterror operations in the northwest. Human Rights Watch later said some of the so-called terrorists were executed in front of the families.
(AP, 2/5/19)(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 4, Canadian PM Justin Trudeau pledged Can$53 million (US$40 million) in humanitarian aid for Venezuelans amid a deepening crisis. Trudeau spoke in Ottawa at a gathering of the Lima Group of nations. Created in 2017, the Lima Group includes Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico (which did not recognize Guaido), Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Guyana and Saint Lucia.
(AFP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, Congo DRC's outgoing government defended decrees granting former ministers lifetime salaries and other benefits following strong criticism in a country where most of the population lives in poverty.
(Reuters, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, The Czech Republic joined Germany, Spain, France, Sweden, Austria, Denmark and Britain in recognizing Venezuela's opposition leader Juan Guaido as president, arguing that Pres. Nicolas Maduro's re-election was illegitimate.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, EU investigators began a weeklong inspection in Poland based on a media report that beef from unfit animals was exported to more than a dozen countries.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, A Hungarian court sentenced to prison two former executives of an alumina plant involved in the Oct. 4, 2010 red sludge flood, an industrial disaster which killed eight people and injured more than 220.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, Iran's semi-official Tasnim news agency reported the country's top judge said that Tehran would never accept the "humiliating conditions" set by the European Union for non-dollar trade intended to evade US sanctions.
(Reuters, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, Iraqi President Barham Salih said that President Donald Trump did not ask Iraq's permission for US troops stationed there to "watch Iran".
(Reuters, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, Italy blocked a joint European Union position to recognize Venezuela's National Assembly head Juan Guaido as interim president.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, Japanese PM Shinzo Abe said that he and visiting German Chancellor Angela Merkel share a responsibility to work towards global peace and prosperity, with both hoping for a prompt, democratic solution to Venezuela's leadership crisis.
(Reuters, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, The national police chief of the Philippines said five suspected Abu Sayyaf militants accused of involvement in the deadly Jan. 27 suicide attack at a Roman Catholic cathedral in Jolo town have surrendered to authorities.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, Saudi media reported that Saudi Arabia will study how its male guardianship system is being abused, after the flight of an 18-year-old woman to Thailand last month focused global attention on the issue.
(Reuters, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, Saudi state media reported that the government has launched a new office to monitor state spending, saying it would help keep up the fight against corruption after the closing of a 15-month crackdown.
(Reuters, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 4, Somalia's Al-Shabaab militants shot dead Paul Anthony Formosa, the Maltese manager of the Bossaso port in semi-autonomous Puntland state, and detonated a car bomb in Mogadishu, killing at least nine people. Al-Shabab soon claimed responsibility.
(AFP, 2/4/19)(SFC, 2/5/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 4, In Sudan crowds of protesters chanted "freedom, freedom," as riot police fired tear gas on anti-government rallies in the capital and its twin city of Omdurman.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, In the UAE Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayeb, the Grand Imam of Egypt’s Al-Azhar mosque and university, called on Muslims in the Middle East to "embrace" local Christian communities during a ceremony in Abu Dhabi also attended by Pope Francis. The Vatican and Egypt's Al-Azhar mosque and university signed a document on fighting extremism. Pope Francis called for an end to wars in the Middle East.
(Reuters, 2/4/19)(AFP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, The UN Human Rights Committee ruled that Finland has breached the political rights of its Sami population, charging that Helsinki had violated the indigenous people's right to "internal self-determination." According to the Finnish Sami parliament, there are 10,000 Sami in Finland.
(AFP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, Venezuela's opposition leader Juan Guaido accused the military of planning to divert aid being stockpiled in Colombia, Brazil and an unidentified Caribbean island, in order to distribute it through the socialist government's subsidized food program for its own supporters.
(AFP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 4, In Vietnam a college student (20) was killed on the eve of the Lunar New year. She had been taken hostage and raped by five men for two days. A spiritual leader later blamed the victim saying she had bad karma from a past life. Authorities later ordered monks to stop "soul summoning" and "bad karma eviction" ceremonies after an investigation found the rituals to be a swindle.
(SSFC, 3/24/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 5, President Donald Trump announced during his State of the Union address that he intends to meet hold his second summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un on Feb. 27-28 in Vietnam.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 5, The US Coast Guard off-loaded nearly 35,000 pounds of cocaine it had seized from 21 separate vessels over the last three months in Pacific waters off Mexico and Central America.
(SFC, 2/6/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 5, The US FBI said 169 people have been arrested as a result of an 11-day effort targeting human trafficking in the lead-up to the Super Bowl in Atlanta. The agency said nine juvenile victims were recovered.
(SFC, 2/6/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 5, Apple said it has reached an agreement with French authorities over 10 years of back taxes, confirming information published by the French magazine L'Express. The magazine reported that the firm paid nearly 500 million euros ($570 million) to resolve the case in a confidential settlement reached in December.
(AFP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Exxon Mobil and Qatar Petroleum announced that they will go ahead with a $10 billion project to export liquified natural gas from a plant on Texas Gulf Coast.
(SFC, 2/6/19, p.D3)
2019 Feb 5, In northern Afghanistan the Taliban launched a pre-dawn attack on an army base in Kunduz province, killing 26 members of the security forces.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Asia welcomed the lunar Year of the Pig with visits to temples, family banquets and the world's biggest travel spree. Celebrations took place throughout the region, from Beijing and Seoul to Hanoi and Singapore.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, In Australia floodwater receded in Townsville, but overnight monsoonal rain created flash-flooding in communities to the north where authorities have warned residents to move to higher ground. Two bodies were reportedly found near a drain in the flood-stricken city of Townsville.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Baku renewed its contract to host the Azerbaijan Grand Prix through 2023, prolonging the stay of a circuit which initially struggled for acceptance in Formula One but has since become a fan favorite.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, In Bangladesh Hollywood star Angelina Jolie visited sprawling camps that are home to 1 million Rohingya refugees. She urged Myanmar to show a genuine commitment to ending violence and displacement in its Rakhine state.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Administrators KPMG announced that Canadian company Sunrise Records has agreed to buy ailing British music retailer HMV, safeguarding hundreds of jobs. HMV, launched by English composer Edward Elgar in 1921, collapsed close to bankruptcy just before the new year after weak Christmas sales and amid a declining market for CDs and DVDs.
(AFP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Central African Republic's government initialed a peace deal with 14 armed groups following unprecedented talks aimed at ending more than five years of conflict.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, In southern China five people were killed after an explosion at an illegal fireworks stand. The operator of the stand in the southern region of Guangxi was soon arrested on for causing an accident through the use of dangerous articles.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 5, The IMF said it has approved a $2 billion loan payment to Egypt, the latest in the country's three-year aid program.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 5, In France a suspected arson attack on a Paris residential building that left at least 10 people dead. A suspect was detained after she allegedly tried to torch a car nearby.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras visited Turkey where he will meet Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan for talks to ease tensions over bilateral disputes and the long-running Cyprus problem.
(AFP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Indonesian police found 193 Bangladeshis locked up in a shop house in Medan on the island of Sumatra, after human traffickers had lured them with the promise of getting them to Malaysia. Some of the group had been held by the traffickers for three months.
(Reuters, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 5, Iran ruled out linkage between a new EU mechanism to trade with Tehran bypassing US sanctions and an anti-money laundering bill.
(AFP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, The Jerusalem District Prosecutor's Office said that Ilan Levy-Neumand, a dual French-Israeli citizen and resident of a West Bank settlement, was arrested and that prosecutors petitioned the court for his extradition. In 2010, Levy-Neumand was convicted in absentia by a French court for sexual offenses against eight girls and sentenced to 15 years in prison. He fled France for Israel after his arrest in 2002.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Pakistan's PM Imran Khan and President Arif Alvi offered support for rebels in the Indian part of the disputed Himalayan territory of Kashmir as the country staged rallies marking the annual Day of Solidarity with Kashmir.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, It was reported that activists in Russia are expressing alarm about more than 100 whales that are being kept in small, crowded pools in what environmentalists are calling a "whale prison," off the coast of the Russian Far East.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, In the Solomon Islands the MV Solomon Trader ran aground on a reef off Rennell Island, near the largest raised coral atoll in the world, a UNESCO World Heritage site, and soon began leaking oil. Experts later estimated that over 8 tons of oil had leaked into the sea and that more than 660 tons of oil remained onboard. The ship was refloated on May 11 after leaking a huge amount of oil into the sea.
(SFC, 3/2/19, p.A2)(AFP, 5/11/19)
2019 Feb 5, In Sri Lanka food importers and wholesalers shut their shops in Colombo to demand the government resolve a "work to rule" action by custom officials at the island nation's main seaport.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Turkey put up bounties for the capture of eight Turkish servicemen who fled to Greece following a failed coup in 2016.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Pope Francis concluded his historic visit to the Arabian Peninsula with the first-ever papal Mass in the birthplace of Islam. Authorities in the United Arab Emirates said some 180,000 people attended the Mass.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Pope Francis said Catholic priests and bishops had been sexually abusing nuns, and that his predecessor Benedict XVI had dissolved a religious order of women because of "sexual slavery on the part of priests and the founder".
(AFP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 5, Some Zimbabwean teachers stayed at home while others went slow on the job as an indefinite strike at state schools got off to a patchy start amid fears of further intimidation by security forces who cracked down hard on protests last month.
(Reuters, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Officials in Key West, Florida, voted to ban sunscreens containing two ingredients (oxybenzone and octinoxate) that scientists have said are harmful to the coral reef ecosystem. The ban on would begin Jan 1, 2021.
(SFC, 2/7/19, p.A7)
2019 Feb 6, US Pres. Donald Trump told foreign ministers and senior officials from a 79-member US-led coalition battling the Islamic State that he expects to announce next week that the coalition has reclaimed all of the IS caliphate.
(SFC, 2/7/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 6, The United States said it has cut defense assistance to Cameroon -- including plans to supply armored vehicles -- due to concerns over human rights violations.
(AFP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 6, In San Francisco five buildings at Geary Boulevard and Parker Ave. were damaged after crews for Verizon struck a PG&E gas line setting off an explosion.
(SFC, 2/7/19, p.A1)
2019 Feb 6, Craig Newmark, the founder of SF-based Craig's List, said he will donate $10 million to Columbia Univ. and $5 million to the Florida-based Poynter Institute think tank for separate efforts promoting ethics in journalism.
(SFC, 2/7/19, p.A7)
2019 Feb 6, In Missouri an oil leak attributed to the Keystone pipeline was discovered near St. Louis. Sections of both the Keystone pipeline and the Enbridge Inc.'s Platte pipeline were closed as crews sought the source of the leak. TransCanada later said at least 1,800 gallons had leaked.
(SSFC, 2/10/19, p.A8)
2019 Feb 6, Virginia's Attorney General Mark Herring admitted to he wore brown makeup and a wig in 1980 to look like a rapper during a party as a student (19) at the Univ. of Virginia. Within hours Vanessa Tyson, issued a detailed statement saying Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax had forced her to perform oral sex on him in a hotel room in 2004.
(SFC, 2/7/19, p.A8)
2019 Feb 6, In Virginia a grand jury indicted Troy George Skinner (25) of New Zealand on four counts of production of child pornography, kidnapping and attempted kidnapping. Skinner was shot and wounded by the 14-year-old girl's mother after arriving uninvited in June and smashing a glass door to try to get inside.
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 6, US FBI agents raided a bank in Puerto Rico amid allegations over violations of US sanctions imposed on those who do business with Venezuela's government.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, It was reported that two tiny satellites have fallen silent millions of miles away, after proving new technology at Mars. The twin CubeSats, nicknamed WALL-E and EVE, shadowed NASA's InSight lander to Mars last year. This week, NASA said it hasn't heard from them for more than a month now — and doubts it ever will.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, A Taliban official said that the US has promised to withdraw half of its troops from Afghanistan by the end of April, but the US military said it has received no orders to begin packing up.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, In Congo DRC stoppages that hit transport, a key port, television, insurance and the fire service continuing as Pres. Tshisekedi visited Kenya on his first foreign tour.
(AFP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, Estonia extradited to the United States a man suspected of trafficking hundreds of kg of heroin to the New York area and using the profits to fund the Taliban. Haji Abdul Satar Abdul Manaf was detained in Tallinn on Oct. 9.
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 6, France and Germany announced a 65 million euro ($74 million) contract financed equally by both countries over two years as the first act of the joint program to design a next-generation combat jet.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, A German court scaled back a marathon trial over the 2010 deaths of 21 young people in a stampede at a techno music festival in Duisburg, sparking anger from bereaved relatives. The negligent homicide case was terminated for seven of the 10 defendants,
(AFP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, India's Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said that imports of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) grew 12.5 percent over the past five years to 12 million metric tons (13 million tons) in 2018-19, surpassing Japan and putting India in second place behind China.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, In southern India the board of the ancient Hindu Sabarimala hill temple said it now favored allowing female worshippers of menstruating age to enter, reversing its previous support for a centuries-old ban.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, An Indonesian court jailed Auj-e Taqaddas (42), a British woman, for six months for slapping an immigration officer in an argument over a fine for overstaying her visa.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, In Iran gunmen killed a policeman and wounded another officer in a shootout in Lorestan province during which a stray bullet hit a fuel tanker, causing it to explode. Five suspects were soon arrested.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri said Israel has breached Lebanon's waters by licensing a company to "exploit an area" for oil and gas near disputed borders.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, Raya El Hassan, Lebanon's new interior minister, assumed her post, becoming her country's and the Arab world's first female official in charge of powerful security agencies.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, The International Organization for Migration said more than 16,000 migrants returned home from conflict-wracked Libya in 2018 under its "voluntary return" program.
(AFP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, Macedonia moved a step closer to NATO membership, signing accession papers after resolving a long-running name row with Greece.
(AFP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, In the Netherlands a man (31) was fatally shot by police near the central bank in Amsterdam. Detectives the next day said he was carrying a fake weapon and may have been attempting to incite officers into killing him.
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 6, The Dutch water authority said that at least 345 containers fell off the MSC Zoe freighter on Jan. 2. The previous estimate was 291. The ship's owner raised the estimate after unloading the final containers at the port of Gdansk in Poland.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, Cyber security researchers said hackers working on behalf of Chinese intelligence breached the network of Norwegian software firm Visma to steal secrets from its clients. The hacking campaign, which is known as Cloudhopper, targets technology service and software providers in order reach their clients. Cyber security firms and Western governments have warned about Cloudhopper several times since 2017 but have not disclosed the identities of the companies affected.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, Pakistan's top court warned the military and intelligence agencies they must not exceed their mandate and meddle in politics, an apparent rebuke over their handling of Islamist protests in 2017.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, A regional court in western Russia sentenced Dennis Christensen, a Danish Jehovah's Witness, to six years in prison, in arguably the most severe crackdown on religious freedom in Russia in recent years.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, It was reported that Russia has finalized a 38 million euro ($43.27 million) loan for Cuba's defense sector.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, Serbia's PM Ana Brnabi rejected an independent freedom watchdog's report that downgraded the Balkan country from "free" to "partly free." Every Saturday for the last nine weeks, tens of thousands of people have marched in Belgrade and Serbia's other cities and towns to protest what they say is Pres. Aleksandar Vucic's increasingly autocratic rule.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, In Somalia US targeted airstrikes against suspected extremists killed 11 fighters in the vicinity of Gandarshe, Lower Shabelle region.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 6, In South Africa a gas explosion in an unused coal mine in the eastern province of Mpumalanga killed at least six people. Several people had entered the mine to steal copper wires that supply electricity for lighting and ventilation when a gas pipe exploded. More than 20 people were still stuck underground at the mine in Middelburg and were presumed dead. Rescuers later retrieved another 13 bodies from the disused coal mine, raising the confirmed death toll to 18.
(Reuters, 2/7/19)(Reuters, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 6, Sri Lanka's Pres. Maithripala Sirisena told Parliament that executions will resume in the next two months ending a 43-year moratorium on capital punishment.
(SFC, 2/7/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 6, Swedish automaker Volvo Cars, owned by China's Geely holding company, said it is recalling 167,000 cars worldwide because the hatch lid lift system on electric trunks can loosen, stop working in cold weather, and possibly cause damage.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, Thailand's government insisted it cannot free detained soccer player Hakeem al-Araibi, who has refugee status in Australia, until hearings on Bahrain's request for his extradition are completed.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, In Turkey at least one person was killed and four others were left under rubble after an eight-storey residential building collapsed in Istanbul. Officials soon raised death toll in the Kartal district building collapse to 21 with 14 others were injured. Four people were later detained in connection with the collapse.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)(AFP, 2/9/19)(Reuters, 2/10/19)(AP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 6, The UN said that its largest humanitarian aid convoy since the start of the Syrian conflict has reached Rukban refugee camp, where thousands of desperate people are stranded in the desert close to the border with Jordan.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, Venezuela's opposition legislator Carlos Paparoni said the government of President Nicolas Maduro sold 73 tons of gold to the United Arab Emirates and Turkey last year without complying with regulations.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, ICRC President Peter Maurer said the International Committee of the Red Cross has doubled its budget in Venezuela to 18 million Swiss francs in recent weeks and is also helping Venezuelan migrants in neighboring Colombia and Brazil.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, Zimbabwe's main opposition snubbed talks with President Emmerson Mnangagwa meant to try resolve a political and economic crisis, saying any dialogue with the president would have to be brokered by an independent outside mediator. Other smaller parties attended the meeting at Mnangagwa's state house offices in Harare.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 7, The United States sharply rebuked Germany for deporting Adem Yilmaz, a wanted Islamic militant, to Turkey instead of extraditing him to New York to stand trial on terror-related charges. He has been charged by a US federal grand jury with conspiring to carry out a March 3, 2008, suicide bombing in Afghanistan, which left two US soldiers dead and 11 others injured.
(AFP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, The US Supreme Court voted 5-4 to stop Louisiana from requiring abortion providers to have admitting privileges at nearby hospitals.
(SFC, 2/8/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 7, Former Michigan US Rep. John Dingell (b.1926), died at his home in Dearborn. Dingell had set a record for serving 59 years in the US House before retiring in 2014.
(SFC, 2/8/19, p.A7)
2019 Feb 7, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos said he was the target of extortion and blackmail by American Media Inc., the publisher of the National Enquirer. The tabloid had published a story of his extramarital affair last month.
(SFC, 2/8/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 7, The government of Bosnia's autonomous Serb Republic set up panels to re-examine the number of victims in Srebrenica and Sarajevo during Bosnia's 1992-1995 war, a move Western countries viewed as a push to revise history.
(Reuters, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, In Brazil torrential downpours and strong winds killed at least five people and left a trail of destruction in Rio de Janeiro.
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, British writer Rosamunde Pilcher (94) died overnight in Scotland. She wrote more than 12 novels including the family saga "The Shell Seekers" (1987), which sold millions of copies around the world.
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Veteran British actor Albert Finney (b.1936) died in London after a short illness. His films included "Two for the Road" (1967), "Wolfen" (1981), "Shoot the Moon" (1982) and "Erin Brockovich" (2000). His four best actor Academy Award nominations were for "Tom Jones" (1963), as Poirot in "Murder on the Orient Express" (1974), "The Dresser" (1983) and "Under the Volcano" (1984). Finney also appeared and sang in "Scrooge" (1970) and "Annie" (1982), in which he played tycoon Oliver "Daddy" Warbucks.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 7, Chadian President Idriss Deby said a column of rebels which had sought to cross into the country from Libya had been "destroyed" in a series of strikes carried out by French warplanes. The French military has said Mirage 2000 jets struck an armed convoy on three days this week, destroying about 20 of roughly 50 pickup trucks.
(AFP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Police in Chile arrested retired Gen. Juan Emilio Cheyre, a former army chief, on charges of torturing 24 people in 1973, shortly after the coup that brought dictator Augusto Pinochet to power.
(AFP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Congo's new President Felix Tshisekedi landed in Brazzaville, the capital of neighboring Republic of the Congo, to start his first international trip since being elected president in late January.
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, In Costa Rica a second woman accused former president and Nobel Peace laureate Oscar Arias (78) of sexual assault in 2015. The former Miss Costa Rica said he "grabbed" her head and pulled her close to him before "he touched my breasts over my clothes and then gave me a kiss against my will".
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 7, A Danish court sentenced a 36-year-old woman to four years in jail for having drained 500 milliliters (more than a pint) of blood from her young son as often as once a week over a five-year period. A psychiatric report said she suffers from Munchausen syndrome by proxy, a mental condition where caregivers make a child ill in order to attract attention to themselves.
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Egypt executed three Muslim Brotherhood members sentenced to death following torture and beatings to extract confessions. The three were convicted last year for the 2014 killing of a judge's son in the Nile Delta town of Mansoura.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 7, France said its defense cooperation with Cameroon was continuing a day after the United States said it was halting some military assistance to the West African country over allegations of human rights violations by its security forces.
(Reuters, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, France's foreign ministry recalled its ambassador to Rome for consultations over a series of comments from Italy's deputy prime ministers, Luigi Di Maio and Matteo Salvini. Salvini and De Maio have angered Macron in particular by publicly supporting the "yellow vest" protesters who have taken to the streets to denounce high living costs and a perceived indifference by the government to rural and small-town France.
(AFP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, German authorities ruled that Facebook should not be allowed to use customer data from other apps and websites to help target advertisements shown on their Facebook pages without their explicit consent, saying it was exploiting its dominant position in social media. Facebook said it rejected the decision, and would appeal within the one-month frame before it becomes final.
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Reporters Without Borders said that Iranian authorities arrested, jailed and sometimes executed 1.7 million people around the capital Tehran alone in the first 30 years after the 1979 Islamic revolution. At least 860 journalists were arrested, imprisoned or executed over the same period.
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Israel's prestigious $1 million Dan David Prize was awarded to Canadian author Michael Ignatieff and Reporters Without Borders for their work in promoting democracy.
(SFC, 2/8/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 7, The body of Israeli teenager Ori Ansbacher (19) was found in the woods near Jerusalem with stabbing wounds. Police soon arrested Arafat Erfaiyeh (29), a Palestinian suspect in the killing.
(AP, 2/9/19)(SSFC, 2/10/19, p.A6)(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 7, In Jordan a former customs chief, an ex-minister and a top businessman were among 29 suspects charged with corruption in a case involving fake cigarettes. Media reports have said the "tobacco case" had cost Jordan's treasury hundreds of millions of dollars in lost revenues.
(AFP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, In Kosovo hundreds of protesters called on authorities to jail a police officer accused of sexually abusing a girl (16).
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Lebanon's new government approved a policy statement committing to reforms that are seen as critical to putting the heavily indebted state's finances on a sustainable path.
(Reuters, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Lebanon's parliament speaker said an Israeli move to license energy exploration near a disputed maritime boundary threatened to drain Lebanese oil wealth before its own drilling had started.
(Reuters, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Myanmar police arrested 36 people outside the headquarters of Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy party in the Kayah state capital of Loikaw after police broke up the latest protest against a statue of Aung San. Another 10 people were arrested the following day.
(Reuters, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 7, In the Netherlands thousands of students skipped classes to march for action on climate change, following the example of young demonstrators in Belgium and other countries for the first time.
(AFP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Portugal's Health Minister Marta Temido announced that the government has decided to order a so-called civil requisition, whereby workers in essential services are required by law to report for duty in "exceptionally serious" circumstances.
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, The council of Scotland's capital Edinburgh said it will become the first British city to introduce a tourist tax to try to better manage the impact of swelling visitor numbers and booming hotel occupancy. The idea needs a final sign-off by Scotland's devolved parliament.
(Reuters, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Sierra Leone's Pres. Julius Maada Bio declared a national emergency over rape and sexual violence, saying perpetrators are getting younger and their acts more violent.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 7, In Somalia US targeted airstrikes against suspected extremists killed 4 more fighters in the vicinity of Bariire, Lower Shabelle region.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 7, In Sudan hundreds of protesters rallied in Khartoum in support of fellow demonstrators detained in the weeks of rallies against President Omar al-Bashir's iron-fisted rule.
(AFP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, In Syria a Kurdish-led force arrested 63 suspected militants in the city of Raqa during an operation against jihadist sleeper cells.
(AFP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Ugandan police arrested a team of BBC journalists overnight for illegal possession of prescription drugs. The country's government spokesman said the reporters had been helping to expose corruption, and demanded their immediate release.
(Reuters, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, In Uruguay European and Latin American leaders gathered in Montevideo to discuss a plan to solve the deepening crisis in Venezuela, while urging the global community to back away from direct intervention.
(Reuters, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, In Uzbekistan businessman Halemubieke Xiaheman (41) an ethnic Kazakh citizen of China's Xinjiang province, said in a video apparently recorded inside Tashkent airport building that he had been harassed by Chinese security officials to a point where his Russian and Kazakh clients were scared to work with him.
(Reuters, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, Acting US Attorney General Matthew Whitaker said that he has "not interfered in any way" in the special counsel's Russia investigation as he faced a contentious and partisan congressional hearing in his waning days on the job.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, In southern California Reuben Franco (24) was found shot dead at a home in Yucaipa. Two girls, ages 14 and 15, were later arrested in Arizona in connection with Franco's death after they crashed his car.
(SFC, 2/12/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 8, In Connecticut supporters of Sujitno Sajuti (70), a former Fulbright scholar who took sanctuary at a Hartford church to avoid deportation, rallied to call on federal immigration officials to allow him to stay in the US.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, New Hampshire's Supreme Court upheld the conviction of three women who were arrested for going topless on a beach.
(SFC, 2/9/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 8, US media reported that a second woman has accused Virginia's Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax of sexual misconduct, further adding to the political turmoil in the state.
(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 8, Virginia's Gov. Ralph Northam said that he is not going to resign over a racist photo that appeared in his medical school yearbook.
(SFC, 2/9/19, p.A7)
2019 Feb 8, In Afghanistan airstrikes were carried out late today in the Sangin district, where heavy fighting was underway between NATO-backed Afghan forces and the Taliban. A lawmaker later said the airstrikes killed 21 civilians, including women and children. The Taliban attacked an army checkpoint in Sari Pul province late today, killing three soldiers and wounding four.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 8, Australian police said they have arrested six people over the last 24 hours after what authorities said was the largest single seizure of methamphetamine in the United States and the biggest drug haul bound for Australia. US Customs and Border Protection said 1,728 kg (3,800 pounds) of the drug were seized mid-January at the Los Angeles-Long Beach port complex along with smaller amounts of cocaine and heroin.
(AP, 2/8/19)(SFC, 2/9/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 8, In Australia a cyberattack on Parliament's computing network also affected the network used by major political parties. PM Scott Morrison later said a "sophisticated state actor" was behind the attack.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 8, In Brazil a fire tore through the sleeping quarters of the Flamengo soccer club in Rio de Janeiro's western region, killing 10 people and injuring three. The victims were all between 14 and 17 years old.
(AP, 2/8/19)(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 8, China's Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs reported that swine disease had been detected on a farm in Yongzhou in the central province of Hunan, where 4,600 pigs were being raised. First detected in August, the disease has killed more than 1 million pigs in China.
(AP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 8, Colombia's migration office said it has canceled over 300 daily entrance passes for Venezuelan politicians and their families who support Pres. Nicolas Maduro.
(Reuters, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, European Union member states adopted a Franco-German compromise allowing Berlin to remain the lead negotiator with Russia on the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline to Europe.
(AFP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, The Social Insurance Institution of Finland (Kela) said a nationwide experiment with basic income in Finland has not increased employment among those participating in the two-year trial, but their general well-being seems to have increased.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, In Finland an independent 248-page investigative report in English, commissioned by the Finnish government, was released. It said 1,408 Finnish volunteers served within the SS Panzer Division Wiking during 1941-43, most of them aged between 17 and 20 years old. The report concluded that the country's volunteer battalion, which served with Nazi Germany's Waffen-SS, took part in atrocities during World War II, including participating in the mass murder of Jews.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 8, Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel inaugurated the new, fortress-like Berlin headquarters of the scandal-plagued BND foreign intelligence service.
(AFP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, Iceland's government said Britain and the so-called EEA EFTA countries, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway, have reached an agreement on citizens' rights should Britain leave the EU without a withdrawal agreement.
(Reuters, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, An Indian court sentenced seven Muslim men to life in prison for the murder of two Hindu men on Aug. 27, 2013, in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh. The incident had sparked religious riots killing about 65 people and displacing thousands.
(Reuters, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, In Italy engineers started the delicate task of taking apart Genoa's Morandi motorway bridge almost six months after its partial collapse during a storm killed 43 people and injured dozens.
(AFP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, Kashmir officials said heavy snow caused avalanches and landslides have killed 11 people and trapped another.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, Kurdish officials said there was no progress on repatriating dozens of French nationals, including accused Islamic State fighters, women, and children, from prison camps in northern Syria.
(AFP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, A Libyan official said authorities in Misrata have arrested Abdel Qader Azuz, a suspected al Qaeda leader who had fled from the eastern city of Derna, once a jihadist bastion.
(Reuters, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, In northern Mozambique local sources said suspected jihadists have killed seven men and abducted four women in the latest violence to hit the Cabo Delgado region. The bodies were cut into pieces and left in Piqueue village.
(AFP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, Two Palestinian teenagers were killed by Israeli fire during clashes along the Gaza border. Another 17 Palestinians were shot and wounded at different protest sites along the border.
(AFP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, President Klaus Iohannis said that Romania had decided to join other EU countries and allies in recognizing Venezuela's opposition leader Juan Guaido as president partly because Bucharest currently holds the EU's rotating presidency.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, In Russia a truck carrying miners to the Raspadskaya coal mine in the Kemerovo region in central Siberia veered off the road and fell 8 meters (26 feet) down a slope. Six workers were killed and 16 others were injured and hospitalized. In the nearby Belovo region of Kemerovo, a section of a coal mine collapsed, trapping four workers. One of them died of injuries while three others have been rescued.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, Sergei Yursky (83), a renowned Russian film and stage actor, died in Moscow. He has been widely recognized as one of the most talented actors of his generation.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, In Spain two passenger trains rammed head-on into each other on a track near Barcelona, killing one person and injuring about 100 others, most of them slightly.
(AP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 8, Sudanese protesters rallied after prayers in an eastern town against the death in custody of a teacher arrested in connection with anti-government demonstrations sweeping the country. The doctors' union in Sudan said that a government crackdown on weeks of protests has left at least 57 people dead, including three who allegedly died of torture in police custody.
(AFP, 2/8/19)(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, In Syria a mine exploded in agricultural land in the central province of Hama killing seven civilians and wounding another.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, Pilots from Taiwan's China Airlines went on strike in the middle of the Lunar New Year travel rush, forcing the cancellation of at least 18 flights over coming days and stranding thousands of passengers.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, Thailand Princess Ubolratana Rajakanya Sirivadhana Barnavadi (67) shocked the nation when she announced she would be the sole prime ministerial candidate for the party, which is loyal to ousted ex-premier Thaksin Shinawatra. King Maha Vajiralongkorn called her announcement inappropriate" and unconstitutional. She lost her special royal titles more than four decades ago when she married a commoner, an American, but is still called and widely regarded as a princess.
(Reuters, 2/8/19)(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, Ugandan police released three journalists who were working for the British Broadcasting Corporation, after detaining them overnight on suspicion of illegally possessing government prescription drugs.
(Reuters, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 9, Police in Vallejo, Ca., shot dead Willie McCoy (21), a local rapper, after finding him asleep in a car in a Taco Bell drive-through lane with a handgun in his lap.
(SFC, 2/12/19, p.C1)
2019 Feb 9, Ron Miller (85), former CEO of the Walt Disney Co. (1978-1984), died in Napa, Ca.
(SFC, 2/12/19, p.C3)
2019 Feb 9, Virginia's embattled Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax called for authorities, including the FBI, to investigate sexual assault allegations against him while defying widespread demands for his resignation.
(SSFC, 2/10/19, p.A8)
2019 Feb 9, In Afghanistan the Taliban killed at least eight police in an attack on a checkpoint in the northern Sari Pul province.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 9, In Bosnia a policeman was shot dead in Suhodol. Suspect Edin Gacic (42) was also believed to have killed a grocery store owner near Konjic, southwest of Sarajevo, a week earlier.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 9, The British Daily Telegraph published details of allegations of sexual and racial misconduct by retail tycoon Philip Green (66), after the Topshop owner dropped a legal bid to stop the claims being reported.
(AP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, The British government cancelled a ferry contract it had awarded to a firm with no ships, ending weeks of public sniggering and indignation. The Seaborne Freight contract was the smallest of three emergency ferry deals transport secretary Chris Grayling quietly approved over the Christmas break.
(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, UK rising rapper Cadet (28), aka Blaine Cameron Johnson, was killed in a car crash early today on the way to a performance in central England.
(AP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, The Chadian military said it had captured more than 250 rebels, including some top leaders, after an operation against a convoy of militants trying to cross into the country from Libya in late January that also involved French airstrikes. An anti-Deby rebel group, the Union of Resistance Forces (UFR), claimed to have crossed into northern Chad with "three columns" of vehicles.
(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, China's foreign ministry condemned Indian PM Narendra Modi's visit to the disputed northeastern border state of Arunachal Pradesh, saying it "resolutely opposes" activities by Indian leaders in the region.
(AP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, China's state media reported that blizzards in Tibetan areas of western China have left thousands of head of livestock dead and roads covered in up to 45 centimeters (18 inches) of snow.
(AP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, In Croatia water polo team players from Serbia were attacked at a seaside café in Split. Three people were soon detained over the attack and faced hate crime charges.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 9, Thousands of French "yellow vest" demonstrators marched for their 13th weekend of action, with scuffles in Paris. One demonstrator's hand was blown off by a flash-ball grenade.
(Reuters, 2/9/19)(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, In France a woman and a child were killed in a fire late today in the eastern city of Lyon believed to have been sparked by a gas blast in a bakery.
(AFP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 9, Indian officials said at least 39 people have died and another 27 fallen sick from drinking cheap spurious liquor containing toxic methanol in several villages in Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand states.
(AP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, In Italy hundreds of thousands of people demonstrated in Rome led by unions demanding pro-growth policies from the populist government, the biggest such protest in four years.
(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, In Latvia several thousand people, mostly elderly Russian speaking protesters, rallied in front of Riga City Hall in support of Nils Usakovs, the city's mayor and leader of the pro-Kremlin Harmony party, who is under investigation for corruption. The gathering was supported by the Latvian Union of Russians, a local Putinist party.
(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, In northeastern Liberia a gold mine collapsed. Five bodies were recovered on Feb. 13 and 40 people remained trapped.
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 9, Eastern Libyan forces loyal to commander Khalifa Haftar carried out four air strikes near the El Feel oilfield. The strikes were said to be warnings directed at rival commander Ali Kennah, who was inside the compound at the time of the strikes. The Government of National Accord (GNA), backed by the UN, said in a statement that the strike targeted a civilian plane that was trying to evacuate a number of wounded people from the oilfield to Tripoli.
(Reuters, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, Nigeria's main political opposition said it had been forced to cancel a key presidential campaign rally in the capital Abuja, and blamed President Muhammadu Buhari and the ruling party.
(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, Pakistani authorities detained rights activist Dr. Ammar Ali Jan, who led a protest, and journalist Rizwan-ur-Rehman Razi, who allegedly criticized state agencies on social media.
(AP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, The US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) said it had begun to seize the last four-square-km (one-square-mile) patch from the jihadists in eastern Syria.
(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, The Thai Raksa Chart Party swore loyalty to the king a day after its stunning decision to nominate the monarch's sister as its candidate for prime minister backfired when the king called the move inappropriate and unconstitutional.
(AP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, A Tunisian court sentenced seven jihadists to life in prison over attacks at a museum and on a beach in 2015 that killed 60 people, many of them British tourists.
(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, Turkey called on China to close its internment camps for Muslims, saying the camps which reportedly hold a million ethnic Uighur people are a "great shame for humanity".
(Reuters, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 9, It was reported that shantytowns across the Turks and Caicos grow every day as thousands of young Haitians try to escape the poorest economy in the Caribbean, where 60 percent of the population of 11 million people live on less than $2 a day.
(AFP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 9, In Ukraine far-right activists tried to storm a police station in Kiev after forty others were detained at a campaign event for presidential candidate Yulia Tymoshenko. The activists were demanding justice in the killing of an anti-corruption activist.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 9, Active-duty Venezuelan army doctor Colonel Ruben Paz Jimenez said in a video he has dropped his allegiance to President Nicolas Maduro, backing opposition leader Juan Guaido instead and urged his fellow soldiers to help allow humanitarian aid into Venezuela.
(AFP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 9, Conjoined twin boys born two weeks ago in Yemen, who were in urgent need of treatment abroad, died overnight in Houthi-controlled Sanaa.
(Reuters, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, Hollywood stars and British royalty gathered in London for the British Academy Film Awards, where "The Favourite" was living up to its name and leading the race for trophies. The Netflix black-and-white production "Roma" triumphed at the Bafta film awards, boosting Oscar hopes for the US streaming giant whose rise poses a serious challenge to the conventional Hollywood business model.
(AP, 2/10/19)(AFP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 10, Jan-Michael Vincent (b.1945), American TV and film star, died in Ashville, NC. He became nationally recognizable on the TV series "Airwolf" (1984-1986). His films included: "The Undefeated" (1969), "The World's Greatest Athlete" (1973), "Buster and Bille" (1974), "Bite the Bullet" (1975), "Hooper" (1978) and "Big Wednesday" (1978).
(SSFC, 3/10/19, p.C11)
2019 Feb 10, Police in China said accidents on icy highways in central China left at least 13 dead and dozens injured this weekend as millions of families were heading home from the Lunar New Year holiday.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, At the World Government Summit in Dubai Pakistan's PM Imran Khan said his nation needed "painful" economic reforms to cut back on its massive debt, just after meeting the head of the International Monetary Fund.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, Speaking in Dubai IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde warned governments to gear up for a possible economic storm as growth undershoots expectations.
(AFP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, In Ethiopia a statue of Emperor Haile Selassie was unveiled in Addis Ababa at the headquarters of the African Union.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, In Ethiopia Rwandan President Paul Kagame, who led an active, reformist tenure as African Union chair, passed the baton to Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, seen as more likely to focus on security issues than expanding the body's powers.
(AFP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, Hungary's PM Viktor Orban said his government will be increasing financial aid and subsidies for families with several children in an effort to reverse the country's population decline.
(SFC, 2/11/19, p.A3)
2019 Feb 10, Iran's foreign minister offered his country's military assistance to the US-backed Lebanese army, saying Iran is ready to cooperate in all sectors should the Lebanese government want it.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, Israel's PM Benjamin Netanyahu, who seeks re-election, pledged to freeze money transfers to the Palestinian Authority following a deadly Palestinian attack on a young Israeli woman. Palestinian civil affairs minister Hussein al-Sheikh said that the PA would not go along with Israel withholding any part of the tax money due.
(AFP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, A Jordanian court sentenced two brothers to death in connection with a 2016 attack claimed by the Islamic State group, overturning a life sentence handed to the men last year. The shooting attack in Karak killed seven policemen and two Jordanian civilians as well as a female Canadian tourist, and wounded 34 other people.
(AFP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, In Kashmir five rebels were killed in fighting with Indian government forces in the southern Kulgam area.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, In New Zealand strong winds fanned forest fires that have been burning for a week through the South Island, forcing thousands of people from their homes. More residents were expected to flee the Pigeon Valley fire.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, Pakistani journalist Rizwan-ur-Rehman Razi was released on a bond of about $730. He had been booked for tweeting against state agencies.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, Palestinian civil defense crews retrieved the bodies of two Palestinians, including a Hamas policeman, who suffocated to death from gas in a cross-border tunnel under Gaza's frontier with Egypt.
(AFP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 10, In Russia protesters in several cities took to the streets in solidarity with opposition activist Anastasia Shevchenko, the first person to be charged under a new law that carries a prison term for "participation in the activities of an undesirable organization".
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, A Russian official said that Moscow had repatriated a fresh batch of 27 children whose mothers are being held in Iraq for belonging to the Islamic State group. Thirty other children were sent back to Moscow in late December.
(AFP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, South Korea and the United States struck a new deal that increases Seoul's contribution for the cost of the American military presence on its soil.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, In Spain tens of thousands of people waving Spanish flags joined a rally in Madrid called by right-wing and far-right parties against PM Pedro Sanchez, who they accuse of treachery over his negotiations with Catalan separatists.
(AFP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, Sudanese police used tear gas to disperse hundreds of protesters who marched on a women's prison calling for the release of detainees in Omdurman.
(AFP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, An SDF official said the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces have seized ground from Islamic State in a fierce battle to capture its last enclave in eastern Syria.
(Reuters, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, A strike among pilots at Taiwan's flag carrier China Airlines dragged into a third day, resulting in further flight cancellations.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, Pope Francis urged governments to take decisive action against the $150 billion-a-year human trafficking business and the plight of millions of modern-day slaves.
(Reuters, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 11, US lawmakers in Washington DC reached an agreement in principle to possibly prevent another government shutdown. It would some money for barrier construction along the US-Mexico border, but far less than Pres. Trump has demanded.
(SFC, 2/12/19, p.A6)(SFC, 2/13/19, p.A1)
2019 Feb 11, Teachers in Denver went on strike for the first time in 25 years over the district's incentive-based pay system. Teachers returned to their classrooms on Feb 14 after their union reached a tentative deal raising their pay as much as 11 percent.
(SFC, 2/12/19, p.A5)(SFC, 2/15/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 11, Federal health officials warned that a landfill fire, burning for nearly five months south of Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson Int'l. Airport, may cause headaches and respiratory irritation.
(SFC, 2/16/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 11, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani rejected an interim government and said the Taliban are welcome to set up a political office in the capital but that his government must be included in any peace talks.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, Australia's PM Scott Morrison described his government as stronger on national security than the opposition after signing an agreement with the French government to deliver a fleet of submarines and ahead of federal elections expected to be held in May.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, In Belarus a 10th-grade high school student stabbed and killed his history teacher and a classmate at a high school. He also stabbed two classmates who tried to protect the teacher at a school in the town of Stolbtsy.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, A Brazilian Supreme Court justice suspended two criminal proceedings against the country's leader. The ruling by Justice Luiz Fux puts a hold on charges of slander and incitation to rape against President Jair Bolsonaro.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 11, In western Cameroon four people died when gunmen raided a hospital and burnt it to the ground where anglophone separatists have been fighting troops.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, A court in Estonia found former Estonian military officer Deniss Metsavas (38) and his father, Pjotr Volin (65), guilty of treason for spying for Russia. Metsavas passed information along for a decade and was sentenced to 15½ years in prison. Volin worked with the GRU for approximately half as long and received a six-year prison term.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, The EU announced that it is beginning the process to withdraw preferential duty-free and quota-free status for imports from Cambodia. EU Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom charged Cambodia with "severe deficiencies when it comes to human rights and labor rights".
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 11, In France the left-wing Liberation newspaper suspended two of its journalists, including Vincent Glad, who founded the closed Facebook group "League of LOL," a secret "boys club" of journalists that has been accused of harassing women writers and feminists during a near-decade long campaign of online bullying.
(Reuters, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 11, French cash delivery driver Adrien Derbez (27) made off with about three million euros ($3.2 million). He managed to hide half his haul before being arrested the next day.
(AFP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 11, Kim Phuc (55), known as the 'Napalm Girl' in an iconic 1972 Vietnam War photo, received a 10,000 euro ($11,350) award in Germany for her work for peace. Phuc, who now lives in Canada, was honored for her support of UNESCO and children wounded in war, and for speaking out publicly against violence and hatred.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, In Iran vast crowds marked 40 years since the Islamic revolution at a time of heightened tensions with the United States.
(AFP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, Lebanon said it will not take part in a Middle East conference in Poland this week that is widely seen as an effort to isolate Iran.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, East Libyan military forces were in talks with protesting state guards to take over the nation's largest oilfield El Sharara peacefully and pass it to the state oil firm.
(Reuters, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, A Lithuanian government official said Saudi terror suspect Mustafa al-Hawsawi (50), held in Guantanamo, has filed a lawsuit against Lithuania alleging that he was tortured at a secret CIA jail in the Baltic state.
(AFP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, Activists said an Emirati woman (42), who says she was threatened by her family for wanting a divorce, is stuck in a Macedonia migrant center after the Balkan state rejected her asylum request.
(AFP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, Russia and Turkey agreed that they needed to take decisive measures to stabilize the situation in Syria's Idlib province after talks between the two country's defense ministers.
(Reuters, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, South Africa introduced its most severe electricity rationing in nearly five years, presenting President Cyril Ramaphosa with a major political challenge just months ahead of the May general election.
(AFP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, In eastern Syria 13 IS militants, including five suicide attackers, were killed as well as six SDF fighters as Syrian Democratic Forces pushed to clear the village of Baghouz and nearby areas from the Islamic State. US-led coalition warplanes struck the mosque in Baghouz in support of the Kurdish-led SDF. The airstrike occurred as the Islamic State was using the mosque to direct attacks and employ suicide car bombs against the SDF. Syrian state media reported that about 70 people were killed or wounded in an airstrike by the US-led coalition on the edge of Baghouz.
(AP, 2/11/19)(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 11, A Thai court ordered the release of refugee soccer player Hakeem al-Araibi after prosecutors said they were no longer seeking his extradition to Bahrain in a case that had drawn worldwide attention.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, Dozens of Turkish police blocked a march by pro-Kurdish opposition lawmakers in Istanbul that was organized in solidarity with hunger striking MP Leyla Guven, who was released from prison last month.
(AFP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, In Turkey a military helicopter crashed in a residential neighborhood on the Asian side of Istanbul.
(Reuters, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, Venezuelan opposition envoy Maria Teresa Belandria was received as her country's official ambassador in Brazil, and said Brazil's government will provide all possible support to get humanitarian aid to the border.
(Reuters, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 12, California Gov. Gavin Newsom in his first State of the State address said he would shrink the high-speed rail from San Francisco to Los Angeles to just a segment from Bakersfield to Merced.
(SFC, 2/13/19, p.A1)
2019 Feb 12, In NYC jurors found Mexican drug lord Joaquin Guzman guilty of all 10 counts, including running a criminal enterprise, in a trial that began in November. Guzman was found guilty of smuggling tons of drugs into the United States over a decades-long career built on deadly intimidation and bloody turf wars.
(Reuters, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 12, In Texas authorities said five members of a family in Polk County have been found shot to death.
(SFC, 2/13/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 12, Lyndon LaRouche (b.1922), eight-time US presidential candidate, died. In 1988 he was convicted in Virginia on charges of scheming to defraud the IRS and of deliberately defaulting on more than $30 million in loans from thousands of his supporters. He was released in 1994 after serving a third of his 15-year sentence.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyndon_LaRouche)(SFC, 2/15/19, p.A14)
2019 Feb 12, Global oil cartel OPEC said it sharply reduced crude oil production last month, after heavyweight Saudia Arabia slashed output and exports fell in crisis-hit Venezuela.
(AFP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, The Afghan government fired its election commission more than three months after chaotic parliamentary elections. President Ashraf Ghani gave political parties and civil society representatives one week to nominate candidates to a new commission.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Sibghatullah Mujadidi (93), Afghanistan's first president following the withdrawal of Soviet troops from the country and the collapse in 1992 of Kabul's pro-communist government, died.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, In Bosnia Edin Gacic (42), the country's most-wanted fugitive, died after a shootout with police near Sarajevo. A policeman was wounded in the clash.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) said it found in a trove of Twitter messages evidence of possible foreign actors trying to sow divisions between Canadians on pipelines, migrants and other hot-button issues.
(AFP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Members of the Uighur Muslim ethnic group called on China to post videos of their relatives who have disappeared into a vast system of internment camps. A social media campaign was launched under the hashtag #MeTooUyghur. The Uyghur population numbered about 12 million.
(AP, 2/12/19)(Econ., 10/17/20, p.9)
2019 Feb 12, Congo DRC's army said it killed four members of the notorious ADF militia and freed four hostages in an operation in the country's troubled east.
(AFP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, The European Parliament backed a fisheries agreement with Morocco which includes waters off the disputed territory of Western Sahara that Rabat claims. After initial approval, the member states need to officially back it again later.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Germany's top security official banned two publishers for allegedly belonging to a banned Kurdish organization. Publishers Mezopotamien Verlag und Vertrieb GmbH and the MIR Multimedia GmbH were banned because they support the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Thousands of Hungarians rallied in Budapest outside a prestigious scientific institution that says it is the victim of a new power grab by PM Viktor Orban's government. Some of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (MTA) funding has already been slashed with laboratories temporarily closing as a result.
(AFP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, In India a fire engulfed the Arpit Palace Hotel, a shoddily built budget hotel in central New Delhi, killing 17 people and injuring at least four others. The general manager of the Arpit Palace Hotel, Rajender Singh, and manager, Vikar Kumar, were booked on suspicion of culpable homicide for the fire.
(AP, 2/12/19)(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 12, Iraqi PM Adel Abdul-Mahdi said his country will repatriate Iraqi members of the Islamic State group held by US-backed fighters in Syria as well as thousands of their family members.
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 12, On the Italian island of Sardinia shepherds were joined by students on their fifth straight day of protests in a march in Nuoro, where shopkeepers shut stores in solidarity. The shepherds poured milk from large canisters onto streets to protest prices paid by cheesemakers for their milk.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Kenya said it is seeking to close the Dabaab refugee camp within six months. The camp held more than 200,000 refugees from Somalia.
(SSFC, 3/31/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 12, Macedonia's new name, North Macedonia, came into force after constitutional changes were published in the Official Gazette and Skopje's foreign ministry said both Greece and Macedonia had informed the UN by letter that the change is now in force.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 12, A wildlife monitoring group said Malaysian authorities have seized a record 30 tons of pangolin and pangolin products in eastern Sabah state on Borneo, the biggest such bust in the country.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Myanmar police fired rubber bullets, tear gas and water cannon to disperse a protest over a statue of independence hero General Aung San that is opposed by members of the Karenni ethnic minority.
(Reuters, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Dutch fisherman protested outside parliament in a last-ditch attempt to avert a European Union ban on the practice of using electric shocks to stun fish before scooping them up in nets.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, In southern Nigeria fifteen people were killed in a stampede at an election campaign rally by President Muhammadu Buhari.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 12, In Nigeria three people were reported killed when insurgents attacked a motorcade on route to an election rally in Borno state. Survivors of the assault later put the toll much higher. One survivor said he saw about 40 bodies; another estimated that as many as 100 died. The militants also took between 100 and 200 people captive.
(Reuters, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 12, In Pakistan suspected militants killed four officers after opening fire on a police vehicle in the northwestern town of Dera Ismail Khan.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Spanish police arrested 29 people who they allege are involved in a drug trafficking ring in the southern provinces of Cadiz and Malaga.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Spanish police said they had seized more than 200 stuffed endangered animals, including giraffes, rhinos, lions and tigers, from an illegal taxidermy workshop that was selling them online.
(AFP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Spain's Balearic Islands approved a local law that by 2050 aims to ban the use of fossil fuels and adopt renewable energy for all of the region's power needs, in what authorities claim is a pioneering step in Europe.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Sudanese security forces arrested 14 professors who were gathering to protest outside Khartoum University, as anti-government demonstrations neared the end of their eighth week.
(Reuters, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Thailand's telecoms regulator suspended the operating license of a television channel linked to ousted former PM Thaksin Shinawatra weeks ahead of a general election, citing national security concerns.
(Reuters, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Turkey launched one of its largest operations against alleged supporters of the US-based Muslim cleric accused of leading an attempted coup in 2016, ordering the arrest of 1,112 people.
(Reuters, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Venezuela's opposition supporters returned to the streets nationwide to keep the heat on embattled President Nicolas Maduro and demand he allow humanitarian aid into the country where food and medicine shortages are rife.
(Reuters, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, In Zimbabwe dozens of gold miners were caught underground on the outskirts of Kadoma. Between 60 and 70 people were working underground at the time of the accident.
(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 13, President Donald Trump hosted his Colombian counterpart Ivan Duque at the White House to discuss their campaign to pressure Venezuela's far left president, Nicolas Maduro, from power.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, The US House passed a resolution that would force the Trump administration to withdraw US troops from involvement in Yemen.
(SFC, 2/14/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 13, A US district judge ruled that former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort intentionally lied to investigators and a federal grand jury in the special counsel's Russia probe.
(SFC, 2/14/19, p.A7)
2019 Feb 13, The United States charged former US Air Force intelligence officer Monica Witt with helping Iran in a cyber-spying operation that targeted her former colleagues. US officials said Witt supplied classified information about US intelligence officers after defecting to Iran in 2013.
(Reuters, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, The United States delivered laser-guided rockets valued at more than $16 million to the Lebanese army. The rockets are a key component for a fleet of A-29 Super Tucano attack aircraft previously delivered.
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, The US and Poland finalized a deal for Warsaw to buy American mobile rocket launchers worth $414 million (365 million euros) as it lobbies Washington to boost troops on Polish soil.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, In southern California Camden Nicholson (27) was arrested for killing his parents and their housekeeper in Orange County. Court filings later said that authorities suspect Nicholson may have killed his parents on Feb. 11 and the housekeeper a day later.
(http://tinyurl.com/yyx426b9)(SFC, 2/18/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 13, US immigration authorities in Miami detained brothers William and Roberto Isaias from Ecuador who are wanted in the South American country for allegedly stealing millions of dollars from a now-defunct bank.
(AP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 13, The Archdiocese of New Jersey released a list of 63 Roman Catholic clergy members that it said have been credibly accused of sexually abusing minors dating back to 1940.
(SFC, 2/14/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 13, NASA pronounced that its 2004 Mars rover Opportunity was dead.
(SFC, 2/14/19, p.A14)
2019 Feb 13, In Argentina tens of thousands of demonstrators blocked major roads in Buenos Aires as they marched to protest high unemployment and the policies of center-right leader Mauricio Macri, including cuts to public utility subsidies.
(Reuters, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, The Australian government said it would reopen the mothballed Christmas Island detention camp in anticipation of a new wave of asylum seekers arriving by boat after Parliament passed legislation that would give sick asylum seekers easier access to mainland hospitals.
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, Austria's right-wing government announced tougher sentences for violent crimes, particularly against female victims, while pointing to a recent spate of cases in which foreigners are suspected of murdering women.
(Reuters, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, Cyprus' finance minister said his government is tightening rules for the country's lucrative scheme granting passports to wealthy investors, making it ineligible to anyone who has already been rejected by another European Union country running similar plans.
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, The European Parliament approved a free trade deal with Singapore that the European Union hopes to use as a blueprint for further deals in southeast Asia. It will become operational after the member states give their final approval.
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, French carmaker Renault said in a statement its board unanimously decided to waive Ghosn's "non-compete commitment and, consequently, not to pay the corresponding compensation equal to two years fixed and variable compensation".
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, In Germany new crime statistics showed that anti-Semitic offences rose almost 10 percent last year, and that violent attacks were up more than 60 percent, sparking alarm in the Jewish community.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, Greek police said seven men have been arrested in northern Greece after police seized bundles of fake US $100 bills stashed in a warehouse with a total face value of $200,000.
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, India's Supreme Court issued an order to remove forest dwellers in 21 states where about 1.3 million land claims, each potentially representing a household, were rejected.
(Reuters, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 13, An Instagram account that published comic strips depicting the struggles of gay Muslims in Indonesia disappeared from the site following a frenzy of moral outrage online in the world's biggest Muslim nation. The Ministry of Communications said that the account under the username Alpatuni was pornographic.
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, Iran's Fars news reported that twenty members of the elite Revolutionary Guards were killed a suicide attack the southeast of the country.
(Reuters, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, Judges at the International Court of Justice ruled that the UN body has jurisdiction to hear a claim by Iran to recover $1.75 billion in assets frozen by Washington. The case filed in June 2016 centers on assets from the Iranian national bank, Bank Markazi, seized by US courts to compensate families of victims of a 1983 bombing of a US Marine Corps. base which Washington blames on Iran.
(Reuters, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, Israel's Shin Bet security agency alleged that Hamas is using coded television messages to instruct recruits in the occupied West Bank to carry out anti-Israeli attacks.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, In Kenya a small plane crashed in the country's west killing all five people on board, including three Americans.
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, The Maldives' top prosecutor charged former Pres. Yameen Abdul Gayoom with money laundering. The charges are linked to $1 million allegedly found in Yameen's bank account from a shady government deal to lease islands for tourist development in the Maldives, which is famous for its luxury resorts.
(AP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 13, Nigeria's President Muhammadu Buhari and Atiku Abubakar joined other candidates to sign a "peace accord", in front of foreign observers.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, In North Macedonia a bus drove down embankment and overturned in a crash that killed 14 people and left 30 others injured. The death toll rose to 15 after a man died on Feb. 16 at a clinic in Skopje.
(AP, 2/14/19)(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 13, In the Philippines Maria Ressa, the award-winning head of an online news site that has aggressively covered President Rodrigo Duterte's administration, was arrested by government agents in a libel case. She was freed on bail the next day.
(AP, 2/13/19)(SFC, 2/15/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 13, Saudi Arabia said it will lift its warning against citizens traveling to Lebanon as a visiting envoy from the kingdom met top Lebanese officials in Beirut.
(Reuters, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, In South Africa thousands of workers staged nationwide demonstrations to protest against high unemployment and government policies they say have failed to create jobs and are deepening poverty.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, In Spain right-wing and Catalan separatist lawmakers rejected the 2019 draft budget of PM Pedro Sanchez. They withdrew their backing in protest against the leaders of a secessionist movement being put on trial for rebellion and not being able to hold a legal independence referendum.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, In Sweden Angela Gui, the daughter of a detained Swedish publisher, published an account detailing a "strange" meeting with businessmen arranged by Sweden's ambassador to China. She said they threatened her after offering to help secure her father's release from prison in China.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 13, Thailand's Election Commission said it recommended the Thai Raksa Chart Party be dissolved because its prime minister candidate was "in conflict with the system of rule of democracy with king as head of state".
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, In Turkey pro-Kurdish lawmaker Leyla Guven (55), on hunger strike for more than three months, was brought to a hospital but went home by ambulance after refusing treatment. She has vowed to continue her fast until the government allows Kurdish militant leader Abdullah Ocalan to hold regular meetings with his lawyers and family members.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, The UN confirmed that it has been officially informed by the Macedonian government that the country's new name is North Macedonia. The 27-year-old dispute was finally settled in June during UN-brokered talks.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, In eastern Syria hundreds of people fled the IS holdout overnight. Kurdish-led SDF fighters advanced slowly against hundreds of jihadists. Several dozen people fled Baghouz, walking to an SDF-held position four km (two miles) away from the village.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 14, Acting US Defense Secretary Pat Shanahan said the United States will not reduce its troop presence in Afghanistan unilaterally, pledging that any moves will be fully coordinated with its allies.
(AP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, US Vice President Mike Pence demanded that Europeans drop a nuclear deal with Iran and join in seeking to cripple the regime, a cause that united Israel with longtime Arab rivals at a conference in Warsaw.
(AFP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, The US Senate voted 54-45 to confirm William Barr for a second stint as attorney general.
(SFC, 2/15/19, p.A7)
2019 Feb 14, Louisiana State Univ. in Baton Rouge said nine members of the Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity have been arrested for hazing related crimes that allegedly took place last fall.
(SFC, 2/16/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 14, The Tennessee Valley Authority voted to close the remaining coal-fired unit at the Paradise Fossil Plant in Muhlenberg County, Ky. The TVA board also voted to close the Bull Run Fossil Plant near Oak Ridge, Tenn., by December 2023.
(SFC, 2/15/19, p.A8)
2019 Feb 14, Amazon dropped plans for a big new headquarters in NYC.
(SFC, 2/15/19, p.D1)
2019 Feb 14, Facebook Inc said it has removed a number of pages and accounts engaged in "inauthentic behavior" targeting people in Moldova, where elections will be held later this month.
(Reuters, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, The investigative website Bellingcat identified Denis Sergeev, a high-ranking GRU officer and a graduate of Russia’s Military Diplomatic Academy, as the third suspect in the 2018 Novichok poisoning of former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal in Salisbury.
(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 14, British author Andrea Levy (62) died of cancer. She drew on her Jamaican heritage for novels such as "Small Island." The book also won the 2004 Women's Prize for Fiction, for English-language novels published in Britain, and the Commonwealth Writers' Prize.
(AFP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 14, Chinese tech company SenseNets closed an open database that stored the records of individuals "fully accessible to anyone," after Dutch security researcher Victor Gevers reported leaks of personal information on 2.6 million people in Xinjiang to SenseNets. The database had been exposed since last July.
(AFP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 14, Cuba charged that the United States was secretly moving special forces closer to Venezuela as part of a plan to intervene in the South American country using the pretext of a humanitarian crisis.
(Reuters, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, Egypt's parliament gave preliminary approval to constitutional changes that would allow President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi to stay in power after his second term ends in 2022.
(AP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, European plane maker Airbus said it will stop making its superjumbo A380 in 2021 for lack of customers, abandoning the world's biggest passenger jet and one of the aviation industry's most ambitious and most troubled endeavors.
(AP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, Haiti's Pres. Jovenel Moise said he would not surrender the country to armed gangs and drug dealers, as protesters continued to demand his resignation.
(SFC, 2/15/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 14, In Iraq eight members of a militia linked to powerful Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr were killed in a bomb blast near Samarra.
(AFP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, Italian police in Calabria nabbed fugitive kingpin cocaine dealer Francesco Strangio. He hails from a feuding crime clan involved in the 2007 trattoria massacre in Germany. Strangio had been on the run since a January 2018 conviction, carrying a 14-year prison term, for international drug trafficking.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 14, In Japan thirteen gay couples filed the country's first lawsuit challenging the rejection of same-sex marriage, arguing the denial violates their constitutional right to equality.
(AP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, In Kashmir at least 41 soldiers were killed and more than two dozen others wounded in a car bomb attack on a paramilitary convoy along a key highway on the outskirts of Srinagar. Adil Ahmad Dar (20) from the village of Lethipora in Indian Kashmir, rammed a car full of explosives into the convoy. His parents said he had been beaten by Indian troops a few years back when he was returning from school. Pakistan-based Islamist militant group Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) claimed responsibility for the car bomb attack. India's PM Narendra Modi soon placed the blame for the bombing squarely on neighboring Pakistan.
(AP, 2/14/19)(AP, 2/15/19)(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 14, In Libya an armed group kidnapped 14 Tunisian workers in the western city of Zawiya near the capital, Tripoli.
(AP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 14, The World Health Organization (WHO) said that at least 922 children and young adults have died of measles in Madagascar since October, despite a huge emergency vaccination program.
(Reuters, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, Russia's Pres. Putin hosted a meeting in Sochi to weigh the future of Syria with Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan and Iranian President Hassan Rouhani. Russia told Turkey it had no right to create a "safe zone" in northeast Syria unless it sought and received the consent of Syria's Pres. Bashar al-Assad.
(Reuters, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, South African gold mining giant Sibanye-Stillwater announced plans to shed more than 6,000 jobs, or 10 percent of its workforce, from underperforming gold mines.
(AFP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, Yusuf Saloojee, South Africa's former ambassador to Iran, was arrested Johannesburg on charges he took a bribe to help telecoms company MTN win a $31.6 billion license to operate in Iran.
(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 14, Spanish campaigners delivered a petition with more than half a million signatures to the national parliament in Madrid demanding an extension of the statute of limitations in child sex abuse cases.
(AP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, In Sudan security forces fired teargas to disperse hundreds of protesters close to the presidential palace in Khartoum, before plainclothes officers armed with plastic piping rounded up around 30 people.
(Reuters, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, In eastern Syria clearance operations took place in the villages of Shajalah and Baghouz. Scores of militants from the Islamic State group had surrendered to the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces the previous evening.
(AP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, The UN and the Syrian Arab Red Crescent delivered badly-needed humanitarian assistance to more than 40,000 displaced people in the Rukban camp near the Jordanian border.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 14, Venezuela's military reinforced a blockade at the border with Colombia where opposition leader Juan Guaido has vowed to bring in desperately-needed humanitarian aid despite President Nicolas Maduro's vow to keep it out. The opposition's envoy to the US accused the government of President Nicolas Maduro of blocking humanitarian aid to the country and urged the international community to help open "thousands of windows" to let assistance in.
(AFP, 2/14/19)(Reuters, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 15, Pres. Donald Trump announced that he has signed the appropriate paperwork to declare an emergency on the border so he can build a wall along the US-Mexico border. President Donald Trump also announced he was declaring a national emergency to fulfill his pledge to construct the wall. Congress' two top Democrats said they'll use "every remedy available" to oppose Trump's declaration of an emergency to shift billions of federal dollars into building the wall.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, The US government said it will lead an ambitious effort to develop technologies to recycle lithium-ion batteries from electric vehicles, cellphones and other sources to ensure a reliable and affordable supply of metals crucial to battery production in anticipation of soaring global demand and potential shortages.
(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 15, US and Iceland diplomats said they have agreed to set up formal economic channels to boost trade and business investment.
(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, The US Treasury Department imposed sanctions on top Venezuelan security officials and the head of Venezuelan state oil company PDVSA as it ratcheted up pressure on embattled Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro over an election it says was illegal.
(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, The US Justice Department alleged that two former executives for Cognizant Technology Solutions paid about $2 million in bribes to Indian officials to build a new office campus in the country.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, In Illinois Gary Martin (45), an employee of the Henry Pratt Co. in Aurora, was fired. He then killed five people and wounded five police officers before he was fatally shot. Martin had purchased his handgun in 2014. An initial background check did not catch a 1995 felony conviction.
(SFC, 2/16/19, p.A8)(SSFC, 2/17/19, p.A10)
2019 Feb 15, In Maryland Coast Guard Lt. Paul Hassan (49), a self-described white nationalist, was arrested on gun and drug charges. He was later accused of plotting to kill a long list of prominent journalists and Democratic politicians as well as others.
(SFC, 2/21/19, p.A8)
2019 Feb 15, Brazilian police arrested eight employees of mining company Vale SA as part of a criminal investigation into the causes of the Jan. 25 deadly dam disaster.
(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, Thousands of British children marched out of lessons to demand action on climate change, earning a mild rebuke from the prime minister's office for disrupting classes, but praise from the energy minister and activists.
(Reuters, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 15, Costa Rico's Justice Ministry announced that Julio Solis, director of Citizen Peace and Coexistence Promotion, had resigned. The country's vice-minister of economy reported him a day earlier for alleged sexual abuse.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, A top Airbus official said Germany's halt in exports to Saudi Arabia is preventing Britain from completing the sale of 48 Eurofighter Typhoon warplanes to Riyadh, and has delayed potential sales of other weapons such as the A400M military transport. The Eurofighter is built by a consortium of four founding countries: Germany, Britain, Italy and Spain.
(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, Rights group Amnesty International slammed a "ban" it said Egyptian authorities have imposed on family visits to scores of detainees.
(AFP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, Indian activist S Mugilan, who released a video critical of the police shooting of protesters at Vedanta's south Indian copper smelter in May, killing 13 and injuring many others, went missing following a press conference in Chennai, the capital of Tamil Nadu state. He released an analysis of publicly available video footage that he said showed the police had escalated the situation, leading to unnecessary deaths.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 15, In Myanmar the Yangon Northern District Court found Kyi Lin guilty of premeditated murder and illegal weapons possession in the Jan. 29, 2017, shooting of Ko Ni at Yangon's airport. It also sentenced to death another man for helping to plan the killing, and gave prison sentences to two other men it said were also involved in the crime. A fifth suspect accused of being the mastermind remains at large.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, The Pacific island nation of Nauru posted a new rule not allowing doctors to remotely recommend the medical transfer of asylum seekers to Australia. The new rule could thwart an easing of Australia's hardline immigration policy.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 15, In Nigeria Boko Haram insurgents killed eight people during an attack late today on the northeastern city of Maiduguri.
(AFP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 15, In Nigeria authorities in Kaduna state reported at least 66 deaths in fighting said to be between Christian farmers and Fulani Muslim herdsmen. The death toll from the attack soon doubled to more than 130 people.
(SFC, 2/15/19, p.A2)(Reuters, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 15, A Russian court ordered Baring Vostok executive Phillipe Delpal, a French national, to be held in custody for one month and 30 days after he was detained on suspicion of embezzlement. He was one of several executives at private equity group Baring Vostok including Michael Calvey, a US citizen, who were detained a day earlier.
(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, South African police said an arrest warrant for Ajay Gupta, a businessman and friend of former president Jacob Zuma, has been provisionally withdrawn, in a setback for the government's promised fight against corruption.
(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, Spain's PM Pedro Sanchez called an early general election for April 28 that is expected to highlight the deep political divisions coursing through the nation.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, In Spain hundreds of Chinese protested outside a bank in Madrid, claiming they are being unfairly denied access to their accounts while the bank insists it's merely complying with money-laundering laws.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, In Sweden the main suspect (22) in the theft of royal funeral artifacts from a Swedish cathedral confessed to stealing them last July 31 after his DNA was found on the items that were pulled out last week from a garbage bin north of Stockholm.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, In a commander with the Kurdish-led force fighting the extremists said the offensive on the last enclave held by the Islamic State group in eastern Syria has been blunted by the discovery of hundreds of civilians still living there. IS militants clung to their last square km (mile) of land in Baghouz.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, In Thailand the Pheu Thai, the flagship party of the political machine of former PM Thaksin Shinawatra, held its first rally in Bangkok, as campaigning heats up for the first election since a 2014 military coup.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, Turkish police prevented supporters from rallying outside the home of Leyla Guven, a pro-Kurdish lawmaker on hunger strike for 100 days.
(AFP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, A report by the UN human rights office and the UN mission in South Sudan recorded 175 cases, mainly rapes lasting hours by multiple uniformed and armed men, just between September and December 2018.
(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 16, US military transport planes carrying humanitarian aid meant for Venezuelans landed in the Colombian border city of Cucuta, where food and medicine is being stored amidst uncertainty over how and where aid will be distributed.
(Reuters, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, In Mississippi police found four people dead in a home in Clinton following a 12-hour standoff. Suspect Nam Lee was found wounded and soon died.
(SFC, 2/18/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 16, World Pangolin Day was marked around the globe. Conservationists say well over 1 million pangolins have been poached since around 2000.
(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, In Afghanistan the Taliban stormed a police checkpoint late today, killing six police in the northern Balkh province.
(AP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 16, In Albania thousands of opposition supporters clashed with police at an anti-government rally protesting what they claim is a corrupt and inefficient Cabinet. The protesters demanded that the government resign and an early election be held.
(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, Hundreds of passengers throughout Europe were stranded by the abrupt collapse of the British regional airline Flybmi.
(AP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 16, In China Mao Zedong's former secretary Li Rui (101), a bold critic of the ruling Communist Party, died. He had spent a lifetime near the center of elite politics.
(AFP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, Croatian police found a body in a freezer in the hallway of the Dominic family home in the village of Pavlovec, northeast of Zagreb. It was apparently that of Jasmina Dominic, who was reported missing in 2005 but was last seen in 2000 when she was 23 years old. Smiljana Srnec (450, her the older sister, was detained.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 16, In Egypt extremists attacked an army checkpoint in the troubled northern Sinai peninsula at dawn, causing 15 casualties among the armed forces including at least one officer shot dead. Seven of the extremists were reported killed.
(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, In France "yellow vest" protesters took to the streets for the 14th weekend in a row. A poll this week showed dwindling support for the demonstrations.
(Reuters, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, French director Francois Ozon's film "Grace a Dieu" ("By the Grace of God") won the Berlin Film Festival's jury grand prize. The movie, which opens on Feb. 20, portrays French priest Bernard Preynat, who has been accused of molesting dozens of boys during the 1980s and '90s.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 16, German Chancellor Angela Merkel robustly defended European nations' decision to stand by the Iran nuclear deal in comments at the Munich Security Conference, an annual gathering of top global defense and foreign policy officials.
(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, In Germany Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic and Kosovo President Hashim Thaci appeared together at the Munich Security Conference, both expressing interest in reaching an agreement but neither appearing to give ground.
(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, Haiti's PM Jean-Henry Ceant, after days of deadly protests, announced that government officials will lose their perks under emergency economic and anti-corruption measures.
(AFP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 16, India's first locally built semi high-speed train broke down early today on its way back to New Delhi from Varanasi in northern Uttar Pradesh, a day after its inauguration by PM Narendra Modi. The railway ministry said the disruption was possibly due to cattle run over.
(Reuters, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, Mexico's Pres. Manuel Lopez Obrador announced a $3.9 billion bailout for Pemex, the country's state-owned oil company, and promised it an additional $1.6 billion in revenue.
(SSFC, 2/17/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 16, Nigeria's president and the leading opposition candidate urged people to remain calm after a national election scheduled for today was postponed by a week just five hours before polls were due to open.
(Reuters, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, Police in North Macedonia said they've broken up a criminal ring of migrant smugglers and filed charges against 21 people, including a police officer, for illegal trafficking.
(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, A Russian court ordered Michael Calvey, the US founder of one of Russia's biggest private equity firms accused of fraud, to be kept in custody until April 13. Investigators accused Calvey and other executives of embezzling 2.5 billion rubles ($37.73 million).
(Reuters, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, In Serbia thousands of people rallied in the capital for 11th week in a row against populist President Aleksandar Vucic and his government.
(AP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 16, In Spain thousands of Catalan separatists marched in Barcelona to proclaim the innocence of 12 of their leaders who are on trial for their role in a failed 2017 secession bid.
(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, Bruno Ganz (77), Swiss actor, died in Zurich. He gave masterful performances as Adolf Hitler in "Downfall" (2004) and an angel seeking mortality in divided Berlin in "Wings of Desire" (1987).
(AFP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, In eastern Syria jihadist fighters defending the last dreg of the Islamic State group's "caliphate" were holed up in half a square km of Baghouz village. Large numbers of civilians were reported still trapped inside.
(AFP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, The Vatican said former US cardinal Theodore McCarrick (88) has been expelled from the Roman Catholic priesthood after being found guilty of sexual crimes against minors and adults.
(Reuters, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, In Zimbabwe eight artisanal miners, who were trapped underground since Feb. 12 after heavy flooding, were rescued. Dozens of their co-workers remained missing and were feared dead.
(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 17, In Afghanistan a roadside bomb killed three civilians in the southern Kandahar province.
(AP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, In southern Bangladesh a devastating blaze raced through a crammed slum, killing at least nine people and injuring several others in Chittagong city.
(AP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, French officials strongly condemned anti-Semitic abuse and anti-police attacks by some "yellow vest" demonstrators as hundreds gathered in central Paris to mark the third month of the anti-government protests.
(AFP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, In Haiti five US citizens were among eight men arrested while carrying automatic weapons and other arms and driving in cars without license plates. They returned to the United States on Feb. 20 before a scheduled court hearing in the Caribbean nation.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 17, Indian police said authorities have detained 23 men suspected of links to the Pakistan-based militant group that masterminded the Feb. 14 bombing of an Indian security convoy in Kashmir that killed 44 paramilitary police.
(Reuters, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, Hundreds of Indian soldiers descended on the village of Pinglan, which is surrounded by south Kashmir's apple and apricot orchards, just before midnight. By the time they left 18 hours later, one civilian, three armed militants, and five members of the security forces were dead, a row of houses was reduced to rubble, an unexploded missile had been planted in a rice paddy, and more than 120 villagers had sought treatment for exposure to tear gas, alleged beatings, and in some cases mental trauma.
(Reuters, 4/30/19)
2019 Feb 17, Iran's state TV reported that the country's President Hassan Rouhani has unveiled the first Iranian made semi-heavy submarine.
(AP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, Iran's Revolutionary Guards broke up a group of militants in southeast Iran who were linked to a suicide bombing that killed 27 guards near the border with Pakistan last week. Three militants were arrested and explosive material was seized from houses in the cities of Saravan and Khash.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 17, Israel's PM Benjamin Netanyahu handed over his role as foreign minister to intelligence minister Israel Katz, giving up the portfolio he has held since 2015.
(Reuters, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, A Maltese court said it had granted bail to Soko Moussa Shaha Ali, one of two men arrested for hijacking in 2016 after a passenger plane was forced to land in Malta, saying he had spent the maximum time allowed in prison without being tried.
(Reuters, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, Saudi Arabia signed a preliminary agreement with France's Naval Group to build warships in the kingdom, as part of its efforts to develop domestic manufacturing capabilities. Saudi Arabian Military Industries (SAMI), the kingdom’s state defense company, made the announcement at the IDEX military exhibition in Abu Dhabi.
(Reuters, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was greeted with a booming 21-gun salute in Pakistan, as he kicked off an Asia tour months after being tarnished by his alleged links to the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
(AFP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, In Sudan a vendor died after riot police fired tear gas at an anti-government rally in Khartoum. Human Rights Watch said at least 51 have been killed since Dec. 19, when a government decision to triple the price of bread.
(AFP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, A spokesman for the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces said Islamic State militants are preventing more than 1,000 civilians from leaving Baghouz village, a tiny area in eastern Syria still held by the extremist group.
(AP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, The United Arab Emirates (UAE) said it had signed military deals worth 3.87 billion UAE dirhams ($1.1 billion) with international companies.
(Reuters, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, Thousands of volunteers in Venezuela began mobilizing to bring American aid into their crisis-hit country despite a blockade by President Nicolas Maduro who claims the assistance could be cover for a US invasion.
(AFP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 18, California and 15 other states filed a lawsuit against Pres. Donald Trump's emergency declaration to fund a wall on the US-Mexico border.
(SFC, 2/19/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 18, It was reported that the Catholic Diocese of Oakland, Ca., has released the names of 45 clergymen and religious brothers they say are "credibly accused" of sexually assaulting minors.
(SFC, 2/18/19, p.C1)
2019 Feb 18, The NYC Human Rights Commission released guidelines enabling people to seek fines and other remedies if they've been harassed or punished in public spaces because of their hair texture or style.
(SFC, 2/19/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 18, In Afghanistan a doctor was killed late today as he returned home from his private clinic in Kabul by an explosive device attached to his vehicle. The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the attack.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 18, Albania's center-right opposition party said its 33 lawmakers plan to resign from parliament over alleged corruption and inefficiency of the country's Socialist government.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, In southern Bolivia a passenger bus crashed head-on with a dump truck, killing at least 24 people and injuring 12 more.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, Brazil's government banned new upstream mining dams and ordered the decommissioning of all such dams by 2021, targeting the type of structure that burst last month in the town of Brumadinho, where the death toll rose to 169 people with 141 people yet to be located.
(Reuters, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, Seven MPs quit Britain's main opposition Labour Party, citing the leadership's support for Brexit and a growing culture of racism, intimidation and abuse.
(AFP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, British media reported that Honda will close a car factory in Swindon in 2022 with the potential loss of 3,500 jobs, in another blow to a British economy made jittery by Brexit.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, China's cabinet issued guidelines for developing a "Greater Bay Area" around the Pearl River Delta, in a bid to spur growth in Guangdong province and the cities of Hong Kong and Macau.
(Reuters, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, China's government accused the United States of trying to block its industrial development by alleging that Chinese mobile network gear poses a cybersecurity threat to countries rolling out new internet systems.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, In Egypt a late-night suicide blast near Cairo's famed tourist market left two policemen dead. Al-Hassan Abdullah (37) blew himself up after police officers approached to arrest him. A wounded officer soon died raising the death toll to three.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 18, Indian troops suffered new losses in a battle with Kashmir militants that left nine dead. Officials said four soldiers, a policeman, three militants and a civilian were killed in the latest clash. The suspected organizer of last week's suicide bombing was said to be among the dead.
(AP, 2/18/19)(Reuters, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, Israel says that it would host bilateral meetings with the Czech, Slovak and Hungarian leaders this week after Poland withdrew from a planned five-way summit in Jerusalem in protest at Holocaust rhetoric.
(Reuters, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, Lithuanian startup Trafi said Berlin will be the first major European capital to get a transport app that handles billing for all services centrally and requires only a single login. Similar services are already available in Vilnius, Rio de Janeiro and Jakarta.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, Maldives authorities detained former strongman president Abdulla Yameen after he was accused of trying to bribe witnesses in his money laundering trial.
(AFP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, Mexico's President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said he will close the famed Maria Madre island penal colony. It was founded in 1905 off the country's Pacific coast.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, Mexico's navy seized more than 1,300 pounds (630 kg) of cocaine from a speedboat off the country's Pacific coast. 15 crew members were detained.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 18, The Philippine health secretary said that 136 people, mostly children, have died of measles and 8,400 others have fallen ill in an outbreak blamed partly on vaccination fears.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, Poland's PM Mateusz Morawiecki cancelled Warsaw's participation in a Jerusalem summit, accusing an Israeli minister of "racist" comments about the actions of Poles during the Holocaust, further souring relations between the two nations.
(AFP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, In eastern Syria more than 300 Islamic State militants surrounded in the village of Baghouz refused to surrender to US-backed forces and were trying to negotiate for a corridor to the rebel-held northwestern province of Idlib. Two bomb blasts went off in the northwestern city of Idlib, killing at least 13 people.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, The United Arab Emirates announced that it had signed deals worth more than $1.6 billion for the purchase of Patriot missile launchers from US arms giant Raytheon.
(AFP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, The UN said Yemen's warring parties have agreed to start withdrawing forces from the main port of Hodeidah under a UN-sponsored deal, following weeks of diplomacy to salvage a pact that stalled over control of the Red Sea city.
(Reuters, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, Venezuela's opposition said that the state internet provider CANTV has blocked a webpage where volunteers sign up to answer National Assembly president Juan Guaido's call to help bring in desperately needed humanitarian aid.
(AFP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, Zimbabwe President Emmerson Mnangagwa retired four generals, in the first major shake-up of the armed forces since he took office.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 19, A delegation of US lawmakers sought to reassure European allies in Brussels that differences over President Donald Trump's policies were mere "family squabbles" and transatlantic ties remain strong.
(Reuters, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, In Afghanistan at least six civilians were killed by a roadside bomb as their vehicle was traveling through the eastern province of Laghman.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, Egyptian state media reported that security forces have killed 16 suspected militants in two separate raids in the city of Arish in North Sinai.
(Reuters, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, Estonian authorities said that the local branch of Danske Bank must close after the financial group admitted that massive amounts of money from Russia and former Soviet states had been laundered through the subsidiary.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, The European Union reached a tentative agreement on the first specific EU standards for trucks, seeking to get polluting CO2 levels down.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, French residents and public officials from across the political spectrum joined nationwide rallies against anti-Semitism following a series of anti-Semitic acts. Vandals daubed swastikas and anti-Semitic slogans overnight on around 90 graves in a Jewish cemetery in the eastern village of Quatzenheim.
(AP, 2/19/19)(Reuters, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, Karl Lagerfeld (85), German-born French fashion designer, died in Paris. Lagerfeld was one of the most hardworking figures in the fashion world, holding down the top design jobs at LVMH-owned luxury label Fendi from 1977, and Paris' family-owned power-house Chanel in 1983.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, France and Germany launched a drive in Berlin to overhaul the European Union's competition rules to facilitate the creation of world-leading companies. They pushed forward a project to create a car battery consortium aimed at catching up with Asian rivals.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, Hungary launched a new anti-immigration media campaign in which it accused George Soros and EU Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker of allegedly supporting illegal migration. Brussels immediately this dismissed as "fake news".
(AFP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu held back-to-back meetings with Slovak PM Peter Pellegrini, Czech PM Andrej Babis and Hungarian PM Viktor Orban before hosting all three for lunch at his official residence. The series of sit-downs replaced a high-profile summit in Jerusalem that was cancelled over a rift with Poland.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, Pakistan accused India of sponsoring terrorism and of using the United Nations' highest court for "political theater" as it urged judges to dismiss an Indian case seeking to save alleged spy Kulbhushan Jadhav from execution.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, Romania's Social Democratic government adopted emergency legislation including a provision to limit how long top prosecutor agencies can be managed by interim appointees. The measure also removes the prosecutor general's oversight of a unit tasked with investigating magistrates.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 19, Russian lawmakers approved a bill prohibiting military personnel from using smartphones on duty, a move intended to block leaks of sensitive information on social media.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman arrived in India after visiting Pakistan.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, A Swedish court convicted Kurda Bahaalddin H Saeed H Saeed (38), who fought against the Islamic State group in Iraq, of war crimes for posting macabre pictures and videos on Facebook. He was sentenced to 15 months in jail.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, In Switzerland an avalanche buried several skiers on the busy slopes of the resort of Crans-Montana. Scores of rescuers worked to dig out survivors. 10 to 12 people were believed to be trapped under the snow. A Frenchman (34) whose job was to check the safety of ski slopes, was one of four people rescued, but soon died from injuries in the avalanche.
(AP, 2/19/19)(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 19, A senior adviser to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad flatly rejected the idea of giving Syrian Kurds a measure of autonomy, saying such a move would open the door to the partition of the country.
(Reuters, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, A Tanzanian court sentenced Yang Feng Glan (69) of China to 15 years in jail for her role in trafficking tusks from more than 400 elephants. Two Tanzanian men were also found guilty for their role in the illegal commerce. They were also sentenced to 15 years each.
(AFP, 2/19/19)(Reuters, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, A Turkish appeals court upheld jail sentences against opposition journalists in a long-running case targeting the Cumhuriyet newspaper -- one of the few remaining dailies critical of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
(AFP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, Ukraine's Pres. Petro Poroshenko signed a constitutional amendment committing to join NATO and the European Union, acknowledging that the nation still has a long way to go to meet the membership criteria.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, The United Arab Emirates' armed forces signed 514.8 million dirham ($140.17 million) defense contracts with international firms at the IDEX military exhibition in Abu Dhabi.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, A UN report said more than 100,000 people have been displaced by factional fighting and lawlessness in Burkina Faso, most within the past two months.
(Reuters, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, At the Vatican Catholic religious orders from around the world apologized for having failed to respond when their priests raped children, acknowledging that their family-like communities blinded them to sexual abuse and led to misplaced loyalties, denial and cover-ups.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, Venezuelan Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino said the country's opposition would have to pass over "our dead bodies" to oust President Nicolas Maduro and impose a new government.
(Reuters, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 20, US Sec. of State Mike Pompeo said Hoda Muthana (24), an Alabama woman who left home to join the Islamic State in Syria, has no legal claim to American citizenship. Muthana has said she made a mistake and wants to return home with her 18-month-old son.
(SFC, 2/21/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 20, San Francisco police, sheriff's deputies and parole agents arrested 50 people in the Tenderloin over five hours in an effort to improve the quality of life in the drug-plagued area.
{SF, USA, Drugs}
(SFC, 2/22/19, p.C1)
2019 Feb 20, Microsoft Corp said it had discovered hacking targeting democratic institutions, think tanks and non-profit organizations in Europe and plans to offer a cyber security service to several countries to close security gaps. The hacks occurred between September and December 2018, targeting employees of the German Council on Foreign Relations and European offices of The Aspen Institute and The German Marshall Fund.
(Reuters, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, Samsung unveiled its new foldable smartphone in San Francisco. The Galaxy Fold will sell for $1980 when it is released on April 26.
(SFC, 2/21/19, p.D1)
2019 Feb 20, In Bangladesh a fire late today killed at least 70 people in the Chawkbazar area, the oldest part Dhaka.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 20, Three MPs quit Britain's governing Conservative Party in protest at its "disastrous" hard line on Brexit, joining a rebellion in parliament that is redrawing the country's political landscape just weeks before it leaves the EU.
(AFP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, Dubai budget carrier flydubai said it chalked up a loss of $43.5 million in 2018, as airlines across the Gulf struggle with mounting costs and political tensions.
(AFP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, Czech authorities said they would slap checks on beef imported from Poland after veterinarians found the dangerous Salmonella bacteria in a 700-kg batch of Polish beef. The beef was imported from Poland on February 13.
(AFP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, Egypt hanged nine men for the 2015 assassination of the prosecutor general, bringing to 15 the number of executions it has carried out this month.
(AFP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, A French court ordered Switzerland's largest bank, UBS, to pay 4.5 billion euros ($5.1 billion) in fines and damages for helping wealthy French clients evade tax authorities, wrapping up one of France's biggest-ever tax evasion trials.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, A French TV channel said it had been forced to cut short a live Facebook broadcast from a desecrated Jewish cemetery in eastern France because of an onslaught of anti-Semitic commentary.
(Reuters, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, In India Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Indian leader Narendra Modi vowed to increase pressure on countries that fuel terrorism.
(AFP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, India's top court ordered more than a dozen states to evict nearly 1 million people from forest land as they have their failed to prove ownership claims. The court says the eviction must be carried out within five months.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 20, India's Supreme Court found Anil Ambani, the chairman of Reliance Communications, and two of his directors guilty of contempt of court and ordered them to pay 5.5 billion rupees ($77.29 million) owed to Swedish telecom equipment maker Ericsson.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, In southern Libya armed men murdered General Ibrahim Mohamad Kari, security head in the town of Murzuk. Forces loyal to Libyan strongman Khalifa Haftar entered and took control of Murzuk as part of an offensive launched in January.
(AFP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 20, A Lithuanian official says 26 people, including eight judges in different courts, have been detained in a corruption probe, suspected of "large-scale bribery, trading in influence and abuse of powers in the court system".
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, Moroccan police fired water cannons at protesting teachers who were marching toward a royal palace and beat people with truncheons amid demonstrations around Rabat. Morocco now sees an average of 48 protests daily, according to the ministry for human rights.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, Pakistani and Indian officials said that India has halted a key bus service with the Pakistani-controlled part of Kashmir, cutting the only land route linking the divided Himalayan region.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, In Pakistan Naseeb Khan (25) and Bibi Dakhtar (20) were found dead with slit throats in the western suburbs of Karachi. They went missing last year and police suspected they were killed on the orders of an elders' council over a perceived affront to family honor.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 20, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said he will not accept regular monthly tax transfers from Israel if it carries out its decision to deduct amounts the Palestinians pay to the families of prisoners and people killed in fighting with Israel.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, The leader of one of Portugal's main nurses' unions started a hunger strike after prosecutors declared unlawful a crippling three-week-long walkout by surgical nurses and threatened to impose penalties on those still taking part.
(Reuters, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, Russian President Vladimir Putin threatened to deploy new missiles against Western capitals as he delivered a state of the nation address aimed at boosting falling approval ratings.
(AFP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, Russian news agencies said a shipment of Russian medicine and medical equipment has arrived in Venezuela.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, South Africa's Finance Minister Tito Mboweni announced a $1.6 billion-a-year bailout for the country's electricity utility in a bid to stave off further downgrades to Pretoria's credit rating as he unveiled a new budget.
(AFP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, Swiss-based commodities giant Glencore said it will cap how much coal it mines amid shareholder pressure for it to help reduce global emissions of greenhouse gases.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, In eastern Syria a convoy of trucks carrying hundreds of civilians, including men, women and children, left Baghouz, the last enclave held by Islamic State militants, signaling a possible end to a standoff that has lasted for more than a week.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, In eastern Syria French jihadist Fabien Clain (41) was killed in a coalition strike in Baghouz. His younger Jean-Michel (38) was wounded in the same attack but survived. He died in a mortar attack two days later.
(AFP, 3/5/19)
2019 Feb 20, In Syria religious leaders of Russia's republic of Chechnya inaugurated the re-opened 13th century Khalid Ibn al-Walid Mosque in Homs, once the symbol of the rebellion against President Bashar Assad. The mosque hosts the shrine of Khalid Ibn al-Walid, a companion of Prophet Muhammad.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 20, US-backed Syrian forces fighting the Islamic State group in Syria handed over more than 150 Iraqi members of the group to Iraq, the first batch of several to come.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 20, Taiwan's government said that it would propose a draft law to allow same-sex marriage in Asia's first such bill amid a heated debate over marriage equality that has divided the self-ruled island.
(Reuters, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, A Thai court ruled that Dmitry Ukrainsky, a Russian man who allegedly was part of a gang that stole millions of dollars online from bank accounts, can be extradited to the United States to stand trial. However, Ukrainsky's extradition to Russia was previously approved last year by a Thai court after he agreed to return there after he finishes serving a 10-year, 8-month prison term in Thailand for fraud, money laundering and conducting business illegally as a foreigner.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, A UN report said investigators have identified perpetrators of pervasive rape and killings and torture in secret safe houses in South Sudan, and believe oil revenues have driven much of the violence in its civil war.
(Reuters, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, Zambian opposition parties said they will report Pres. Edgar Lungu to the International Criminal Court in The Hague for alleged political violence against his rivals.
(AFP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 21, The White House announced the plans to keep "a small peacekeeping force" in Syria, partly reversing a decision by President Donald Trump in December to pull out the entire 2,000-strong force.
(Reuters, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 21, The US and China resumed high-levels talks aimed at easing a trade standoff that has unnerved global investors and clouded the outlook for the world economy.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, Teachers in Oakland, Ca., hit the picket lines for higher pay, smaller classes and more support for students.
{SF Bay Area}
(SFC, 2/22/19, p.A1)
2019 Feb 21, Former San Francisco police Officer Rain Dougherty (44) pleaded guilty to two counts of bank robbery committed last year in the Richmond and Sunset Districts of the city. He had been suspended four years earlier for sending racist and homophobic text messages to other officers.
{SF, USA, Robbery}
(SFC, 2/22/19, p.C10)
2019 Feb 21, In Vallejo, Ca., Henry Benson (37) and Roselle Cipriano (36), a husband and wife who owned and operated an elder care facility, were indicted by a federal grand jury for distributing and manufacturing methamphetamine pills.
{SF Bay Area, USA, Drugs}
(SFC, 2/22/19, p.C1)
2019 Feb 21, David Horowitz (b.1937), consumer reporter, died in Los Angeles. His syndicated "Fight Back!" program made him perhaps the best-known consumer reporter in the US.
(SFC, 2/21/19, p.C5)
2019 Feb 21, In southern California a small plane crashed in the snowy Tehachapi Mountains killing all three onboard.
(SFC, 2/26/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 21, In Chicago actor Jussie Smollett turned himself in to police on a felony charge of disorderly conduct for allegedly staging a racist antigay attack on himself and filing a false police report.
(SFC, 2/23/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 21, North Carolina's elections board ordered a new election in the last undecided congressional race due to ballot tampering after GOP candidate Mark Harris dropped his bid to be declared the winner.
{North Carolina, USA}
(SFC, 2/22/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 21, It was reported that 50 million gallons of toxic water is being discharged daily from contaminated mining sites into streams and ponds without being treated in California, Colorado, Oklahoma, Montana and at least five other states.
(SFC, 2/21/19, p.A8)
2019 Feb 21, A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched from Cape Canaveral carried a communications satellite for Indonesia and a lunar lander for Israel. The lunar lander was expected to touch down on the Sea of Serenity on April 11.
(SFC, 2/23/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 21, Peter Tork, one of the four musicians featured in the Monkees sitcom (1966-68), died of complications from cancer in eastern Connecticut.
{Connecticut, USA, Pop&Rock}
(SFC, 2/22/19, p.A7)
2019 Feb 21, Moshe Journo (53), an Israeli man who allegedly had been on the run for 15 years after being accused of raping a teenage girl in Pennsylvania, was extradited back to the United States.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 21, In Belgium Swedish teenager Greta Thunberg (16) led a march of thousands of students who are skipped classes for the seventh Thursday in a row to march through Brussels and draw more attention to fighting climate change.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, The Church of England acknowledged the reality of shrinking congregations and overworked priests and lifted a 400-year-old rule requiring that all churches hold services every Sunday.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 21, In southern China Guo Kaibing (33), a reportedly mentally ill man, attacked morning commuters with a knife, wounding 11 people, including students in Ji'an City.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, China announced new measures against gender discrimination in Chinese workplaces that forbid employers from asking potential female hires questions such as if they are married or have children.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 21, The International Monetary Fund said Ecuador has agreed to receive $10 billion in financial aid from global development bodies over three years.
(AFP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, France Info radio and BFM TV reported that French jihadist Fabian Clain had been killed and his brother Jean-Michel seriously wounded after a coalition strike in Baghouz, the final pocket held by the militants in northeastern Syria.
(Reuters, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, Hungarian opposition politicians accused the government of hypocrisy over a program helping to settle Venezuelan refugees of Hungarian origin, saying it contradicted the right-wing government's strict anti-immigration laws.
(AFP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, An Indian government minister said India has decided to stop the flow of water to Pakistan from its share in the rivers under the Indus Water Treaty regulating river flows between the two nations.
(Reuters, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, Israel's acting foreign minister doubled down on his divisive claim that Poles collaborated with the Nazis and "suckled anti-Semitism with their mothers' milk".
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 21, Kazakhstan's Pres. Nursultan Nazarbayev fired the government over what he called its failure to raise living standards and diversify away from oil and gas in the Central Asian nation. An interim administration will be led by Askar Mamin, who previously held the post of first deputy prime minister.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, Eastern Libyan forces loyal to military commander Khalifa Haftar fought tribesmen for a second day for control of the southern city of Murzuq, as part of campaign to secure oilfields in the south. At least three soldiers have been killed over the last 24 hours. Around 11 tribesmen have also been killed and 15 wounded.
(Reuters, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, The World Health Organization (WHO) said that an epidemic of measles in Madagascar has caused more than 900 deaths since the outbreak began last September.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, In Mali Djamel Okacha (aka Yahya Abou El Hamame), an Algerian commander in Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), was killed after French commandos, helicopters and a drone hit a column of vehicles he was traveling in north of Timbuktu. A total of 11 "terrorists" were reported killed.
(AFP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 21, In northern Mozambique a local worker was killed and six others were wounded when two road convoys operated by US gas giant Anadarko came under attack.
(AFP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 21, In northwestern Nigeria two people were killed in clashes between rival party supporters in the village of Kofa, 2-days ahead of rescheduled general elections.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 21, Pakistan's PM Imran Khan authorized the armed forces to "respond decisively and comprehensively to any aggression or misadventure" by neighboring India.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, In Pakistan torrential rains lashed several cities triggering flash floods that left at least 26 people dead across the country.
{Pakistan, Tragedy}
(SFC, 2/22/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 21, A Polish charity helping victims of child abuse committed by Catholic priests accused 24 bishops of concealing perpetrators of sexual molestation of minors. Three activists overturned a statue of a Polish priest accused of sex abuse in the northern city of Gdansk. Father Henryk Jankowski, who died in 2010, has faced accusations of pedophilia.
(Reuters, 2/21/19)(AFP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, Russian state prosecutors formally charged top US investor Michael Calvey, the founder of the Baring Vostok private equity group, with fraud, hours before Washington accused Moscow of denying its diplomats access to him.
(Reuters, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, In Spain riot police briefly clashed with pro-independence Catalan protesters in Barcelona while other activists burned tires and blocked highways across the northeast as part of a day of protests against the trial of 12 separatist leaders.
(Reuters, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, Sudanese security agents arrested several opposition leaders and activists as hundreds of anti-government protesters trying to march on the presidential palace were dispersed with tear gas.
(AFP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, Hundreds of workers in Port Sudan continued a days-long strike against the transfer of its vital container terminal. Workers opposed Khartoum's decision to transfer control of the port's container terminal to a Philippine company, International Container Terminal Services Inc. (ICTSI).
(AFP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, In eastern Syria twin bombings in market killed at least 14 people. US-backed Syrian forces tried to negotiate the release of civilians still trapped in the Islamic State group's last redoubt, as the international coalition warned the jihadists faced "inevitable defeat".
(AP, 2/21/19)(AFP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, Ukraine's State Security Service SBU accused Russia of meddling in the electoral process in Ukraine by creating illegal structures to help guarantee victory for a certain candidate.
(Reuters, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, Pope Francis opened his high-stakes abuse prevention summit at the Vatican. He issued 21 proposals to stem the clergy sex abuse around the world at the start of the 4-day event.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, Venezuela's Pres. maduro ordered the country's vast border with Brazil closed, days before opposition leaders planned to bring in foreign humanitarian aid.
{Brazil, Venezuela}
(SFC, 2/22/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 21, Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido left Caracas with some 80 lawmakers on a 800-km (500-mile) trip to the Colombian border where they hope to receive food and medicine to alleviate shortages in defiance of President Nicolas Maduro.
(Reuters, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 22, The Trump administration and Chinese negotiators resumed high-level talks aimed at resolving a trade dispute that has escalated uncertainty for corporations, unsettled investors and posed a threat to the global economy. Negotiators agreed to extend high-level trade talks through the weekend, and President Donald Trump said he hoped to meet next month at his Florida resort with President Xi Jinping to try to finalize an agreement.
(AP, 2/22/19)(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 22, The Trump administration says it's sent about 191 metric tons of humanitarian assistance over the past two weeks to the Colombian-Venezuelan border for distribution inside Venezuela.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, In Chicago R&B star R. Kelly was arrested on multiple charges of aggravated sexual abuse involving four victims, including at least three between the ages of 13 and 17.
(SFC, 2/23/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 22, In Algeria several hundred demonstrators rallied in Algiers in defiance of a ban on demonstrations, and in other cities as well, against a bid by ailing President Abdelaziz Bouteflika to win a fifth term. Police fired tear gas to block a protest march on the presidential palace, prompting demonstrators to respond with stone-throwing. Security forces arrested 41 people as angry protests rocked the capital.
(AFP, 2/22/19)(AFP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 22, Brazilian authorities moved humanitarian aid to the country's northern border with Venezuela even though the international crossing has been closed.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, In China Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman hailed relations with China as trouble-free, during talks with President Xi Jinping in Beijing aimed at strengthening relations in the face of criticism from the West over the kingdom's human rights record and its war in Yemen.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, In eastern Congo DRC a new case of Ebola was confirmed in the Beni area where authorities believed the epidemic had been brought under control after 23 days without any fresh infections.
(AFP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 22, A deep magnitude-7.5 earthquake struck the Ecuador-Peru border region early today, causing tremors that the Ecuadorian president said were felt around the country.
(Reuters, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, In France hundreds of students took to the streets of Paris to call for more action to fight climate change, one day after a similar march in Brussels. Greta Thunberg, the 16-year-old Swedish schoolgirl who is being hailed as her generation's voice on climate change, joined the Paris march.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, German automakers Daimler and BMW say that trustworthy handling of personal data will be a key competitive advantage in their new joint venture that offers app-based services like free-floating car-sharing in big cities.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, India's top court ordered state authorities to stop threats, assaults and social boycotts of thousands of Kashmiri students, traders and professionals in an apparent retaliation for the killing of 40 paramilitary soldiers in a suicide attack in the Indian portion of Kashmir last week.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, An Indian government minister said at least 41 tea plantation workers have died from drinking toxic bootleg liquor after receiving their weekly wages, and 20 are critically ill in hospital after nearly 100 people drank the liquor a day earlier.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, Israeli gunfire killed Palestinian teenager Youssef al-Dayya (15) at a protest along Gaza-Israel border fence, as thousands in contested Jerusalem descended on a section of a flashpoint holy site that has been closed by Israeli court order for over a decade.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, Israel opened its first embassy in Rwanda, offering support to the East Africa nation from health to education and agriculture, as well as communication technology including cyber-security.
(AFP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, A Japanese probe sent to collect samples from an asteroid 300 million km away for clues about the origin of life and the solar system landed successfully. Hayabusa2 touched down briefly on the Ryugu asteroid, fired a bullet into the surface to puff up dust for collection and blasted back to its holding position.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, Authorities in the Mexican state of Michoacan say that eight men were killed and two soldiers and one state police officer were wounded following a shootout.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, Pakistan re-imposed a ban on two charities run by a US-designated terrorist blamed for the 2008 Mumbai attacks. Jamat-ut-Dawa and Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation are thought to be a front for Lashkar-e-Taiba, a militant group founded by Hafiz Saeed, a Muslim cleric who lives freely in Pakistan.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, It was reported that Pakistan's army has stripped former spy chief Lt. Gen. Asad Durrani of his pension and other benefits over a book he co-authored with his former Indian counterpart. Durrani co-authored "Spy Chronicles" (2018), a book that documents his exploits as head of Inter-Services Intelligence from 1990 to 1992, with A.S. Daulat, the former head of India's Research and Analysis Wing, and Indian journalist Aditya Sinha.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, Pakistani police said five children have died of suspected food poisoning after their family had dinner at a restaurant in Karachi the previous night.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, In the Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte led a ceremony to name Moro Islamic Liberation Front leader Murad Ebrahim and some of his top commanders as among 80 administrators of a transition government for the five-province region called Bangsamoro.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, In Romania magistrates protested outside courthouses across the country in an unprecedented protest against changes in judicial legislation that have raised alarm bells over the rule of law.
(Reuters, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, A Russian court ruled that Paul Whelan, a former US marine accused of spying, should be held in a pre-trial detention facility for a further three months to give investigators more time to look into his case.
(Reuters, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, Russia accused the United States of using aid deliveries to Venezuela as a ploy to carry out military action against President Nicolas Maduro's government.
(AFP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, In Spain a group of unidentified men entered North Korea's embassy in Madrid, bound and gagged staff, and drove off four hours later with computers. Adrian Hong Chang, a Mexican national and US resident, was later identified as the leader of a gang of 10 people who escaped in broad daylight after stealing computers and documents from the embassy, where they shackled and gagged its staff.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Feb 22, It was reported that South Sudan's rival armed groups are recruiting civilians including child soldiers, violating a peace deal signed five months ago.
(SFC, 2/22/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 22, In Sudan security forces fired teargas to disperse hundreds of protesters who marched and chanted anti-government slogans following prayers at a major mosque in the city of Omdurman.
(Reuters, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, In Sweden Johan Nicklas Backstrom (22) was sentenced to four and a half years in prison after he was convicted of stealing 17th-century Swedish royal treasures estimated to be worth 65 million kronor ($7 million) from a cathedral last year.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, Hanna Johannes Cosar, a former Swiss soldier, was found guilty in Zurich of violating Swiss neutrality. He had commanded a Christian militia fighting Islamic State in Syria. Cosar was fined 500 Swiss francs ($499), a relatively lenient punishment, after being convicted by a Swiss military tribunal.
(Reuters, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, In eastern Syria Kurdish-led forces said they would complete the evacuation of thousands of civilians from Islamic State's last redoubt, and welcomed a White House reversal of President Donald Trump's decision to pull out all US troops. Some 2,000 people were believed to remain inside Baghouz.
(Reuters, 2/22/19)(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 22, Turkey ordered the arrest of 295 serving military personnel, accusing them of links to the network of US-based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen, who Ankara says orchestrated a 2016 attempted coup.
(Reuters, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, In Venezuela members of the Pemon ethnic group clashed with the National Guard and army, who were moving tanks to the border with Brazil a day after Maduro ordered the crossing closed. Zoraida Rodriguez, a member of an indigenous community, was killed. The violence came just hours before dueling concerts were expected to begin on the country's western border with Colombia, where tons of donated food and medicine are stored.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 23, Jeff Adachi (59), San Francisco's Public Defender, died of a suspected heart attack at a residence on Telegraph Hill. The city's medical examiner later concluded that Adachi died from a mixture of cocaine and alcohol, which caused his already damaged heart to stop. The leak of a police report on Adachi's death later led to a police raid on the home of journalist Bryan Carmody. In 2020 San Francisco agreed to pay Carmody $369,000 for the illegal police raids on his home and office.
(SFC, 2/25/19, p.C1)(SFC, 3/23/19, p.A1)(SSFC, 5/19/19, p.C1)(SFC, 3/3/20, p.C1)
2019 Feb 23, Weekend storms raked parts of the southern US leaving two people dead. In Mississippi a woman was killed when a tornado hit Columbus. A man died in Tennessee when he drove into floodwaters.
(SFC, 2/25/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 23, Filmmaker and choreographer Stanley Donen (b.1924) died in New York City. He co-directed "Singin'' in the Rain" (1952) with Gene Kelly as well as "On the Town" (1949) and "It's Always Fair Weather" (1955).
(SFC, 2/25/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 23, In Tennessee police Officer Nicholas Galinger (38) was struck while on a call with his field training officer. Hit-and-run suspect Janet Elaine Hinds turned herself in to police on Feb. 25 after she was put on the state's top ten most wanted list.
(SFC, 2/26/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 23, In Texas a Boeing 767 cargo jetliner heading to Houston crashed just east of the city. Three people aboard were killed.
(SFC, 2/23/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 23, In Austria a German man went missing after an avalanche buried a group of backcountry skiers, killing one and injuring a second.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 23, In northern China a bus carrying 50 miners to an underground operation went out of control and crashed into the side of the tunnel. At least 20 people were killed and 30 injured in the vehicle accident blamed on faulty brakes.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, A top Egyptian court reversed a ban on ride-hailing companies including Uber and Careem.
(AFP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, It was reported that the Ethiopian government has begun demolishing thousands of houses they say are illegal in the Oromia region in the outskirts of the capital, Addis Ababa. Residents alleged that they were paying taxes to the government on the properties.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, In France thousands of yellow vest protesters took to the streets across the country for a 15th straight weekend of demonstrations, trying to re-energize supporters while tamping down on the violence and anti-Semitism in the movement's ranks.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, Indian authorities said least 93 people have died and about 200 people have been hospitalized after drinking tainted liquor in two separate incidents in Assam state.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, Indian authorities arrested dozens of Muslim leaders in raids across Kashmir and sent thousands of reinforcements to the troubled territory. Officials in Kashmir said police have arrested at least 200 activists seeking the end of Indian rule.
(AFP, 2/23/19)(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, In northern India 10 people died in an explosion at a house where firecrackers were being illegally manufactured in Uttar Pradesh state.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, In India a fire at the Aero India airshow in Bengaluru, run by the country's defence ministry, destroyed three hundred cars.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, In Iraq five fishermen were killed in an attack by Islamic State group militants on a camp site near the Therthar lake, 100 km (60 miles) northwest of Baghdad. IS militants were believed to be behind a string of ambushes, kidnappings and killings in the countryside.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, Strong winds toppled trees and walls in Italy, causing at least three deaths and forcing a cargo ship to run aground. Gale-force winds swept across Croatia's Adriatic coast, damaging cars, shattering windows and disrupting traffic.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, In Nepal an explosion outside a telecommunication company in Kathmandu killed one person and injured two others.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, Nigeria held presidential elections. In the northeast one soldier was killed and 20 others were injured in a Boko Haram rocket attack in Maiduguri, just hours before elections began.
(AP, 2/23/19)(AFP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, In Poland shipyard workers of Gdansk Solidarity (union) returned the recently overturned statue of Father Henryk Jankowski (d.2010) to its place. Father Jankowski, accused of sex abuse, was formerly a close aide to Lech Walesa during the Gdansk shipyard strikes in 1980s.
(AFP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, In Russia a train carrying war "trophies" captured in Syria left Moscow on a two-month tour to parade Russia's military gains in the eight-year conflict.
(AFP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, In Somalia the United States military killed two al-Shabab extremists in four airstrikes.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 23, Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir appointed Defence Minister General Awad Ibnouf as first vice president and named a new prime minister, a day after declaring a state of emergency that did little to halt street demonstrations. Mohamed Tahir Ayala, governor of Gezira state, was appointed prime minister.
(Reuters, 2/23/19)(AFP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, In eastern Syria US-backed fighters said they were keeping a corridor open to rescue remaining civilians from the Islamic State group's last sliver of territory.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, In Ukraine a minibus hit a landmine while crossing the border at the breakaway Donetsk region, killing two civilians and injuring a third near the village of Yelenovka. The passengers were returning to the rebel-controlled region after collecting their pensions.
(Reuters, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, The UN said that three Guinean peacekeepers had been killed during an attack on their vehicles in Siby near the capital of Bamako, Mali.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 23, A convoy of trucks carrying humanitarian aid for Venezuela left warehouses in Colombia headed for the nearby border crossing, despite President Nicolas Maduro's insistence they would not be allowed to cross. Opposition leader Juan Guaido said a first aid shipment has entered Venezuela from Brazil. Three members of the Venezuelan national guard deserted their posts early today. Venezuelan troops blocking a border bridge with Colombia fired tear gas to repel dozens of opposition lawmakers and activists walking toward the frontier to receive humanitarian aid from the Colombian side. At least two protesters were killed near the Brazilian border. Two aid trucks went up in flames. Some 60 members of security forces defected into Colombia, but the National Guard at the frontier crossings held firm.
(Reuters, 2/23/19)(AP, 2/23/19)(Reuters, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 23, Venezuelan opposition supporters rallied in Curacao's port as the island's government indicated it may allow their humanitarian aid shipment to sail. Pres. Maduro has ordered the country's sea border with Curacao to be closed to block the aid.
(AFP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, Vietnamese officials said that they have arrested Truong Minh Tuan, former minister of information and communications, and his predecessor Nguyen Bac, suspected of mismanaging state investment capital.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 24, President Donald Trump agreed to postpone a tariff hike on Chinese goods. Trump said he would postpone a March 1 deadline for 10 percent punitive tariffs on $200 billion of Chinese imports to rise to 25 percent but set no new date.
(AP, 2/25/19)(SFC, 2/25/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 24, The film "Greenbook" won the best picture award the 91st Academy Awards ceremony. Rami Malek won the best actor Oscar for his performance as rock singer Freddie Mercury in "Bohemian Rhapsody". Olivia Colman won the best actress award for her performance as Queen Anne in "The Favourite".
(AP, 2/25/19)(AFP, 2/25/19)(SFC, 2/25/19, p.E2)
2019 Feb 24, In Washington DC about three dozen relatives of some of the 1 million Uighurs, Kazakhs and others being held without charge spoke out about the mass detentions, hoping to raise awareness of what many are calling a human rights travesty but which Beijing defends as necessary to counter violent religious extremism.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 24, Mac Wiseman (b.1925), bluegrass balladeer and guitar player, died in Nashville. He was a founding member of Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs' Foggy Mountain Boys. His biggest hits included "The Ballad of Davy Crockett" (1955).
(SFC, 2/27/19, p.C5)
2019 Feb 24, Algerian police fired tear gas to disperse hundreds of demonstrators on a third straight day of rare political protests against plans for rarely seen President Abdelaziz Bouteflika to extend his 20-year rule by seeking a fifth term.
(Reuters, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, A flight bound for Dubai from Bangladesh's capital, Dhaka, made an emergency landing in Chittagong, Bangladesh, after a man attempted to hijack the plane. Bangladeshi suspect Mohammed Polash Ahmed asked to speak to the country's prime minister before dying from injuries in an exchange of gunfire with military commandos.
(AP, 2/24/19)(SFC, 2/26/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 24, Officials in the Brazilian border state of Roraima say they've treated 22 Venezuelans who suffered bullet or buckshot wounds during a confrontation over aid shipments. The border was closed for a third day.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, China's Huawei unveiled a new folding-screen phone on the eve of the 4-day MWC Barcelona show, joining the latest trend for bendable devices as it challenges the global smartphone market's dominant players, Apple and Samsung.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, In eastern Congo DRC attackers set fire to an Ebola treatment center run by Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) late today, forcing staff to evacuate patients. One caretaker was killed and another injured.
(Reuters, 2/25/19)(SFC, 2/27/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 24, Cubans began voting in a referendum on a new constitution with the backdrop of mounting pressure from the United States and continued support for the socialist regime of Venezuela.
(AFP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, Gabon President Ali Bongo returned to his country late today for the second time since suffering a stroke in October.
(Reuters, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 24, Iran launched a cruise missile from a submarine for the first time during an ongoing annual military drill in the Strait of Hormuz.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, It was reported that Iran has released Nelly Erin-Cambervelle (59), a French businesswoman from Martinique, who was in jail for entering the country illegally.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, In Japan the people of Okinawa voted on a plan for a US military base relocation to Henoko in a referendum that will send a message on how they feel about housing American troops in Japan. Residents rejected the relocation plan in the non-binding referendum.
(AP, 2/24/19)(SFC, 2/26/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 24, In Kashmir a counterinsurgency police officer and a rebel were killed during a gunbattle, as shops and businesses shut down to protest an ongoing crackdown against activists seeking the end of Indian rule in the disputed region.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, Voters in central Mexico approved a stalled gas-fired power plant, one of seven projects that have been postponed, in many cases for years, by community opposition. A few days before the referendum, anti-plant activist Samir Flores Soberanes was killed in front of his home by armed assailants.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 24, Moldovans voted in a parliamentary election. Both pro-Russian and pro-EU forces accused the ruling party of massive election fraud. The election produced a hung parliament, with results showing the vote split between pro-Western and pro-Russian forces. The outcome set the stage for coalition talks or potentially new elections.
(AP, 2/24/19)(AFP, 2/24/19)(Reuters, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 24, In Nigeria some polling stations remained open in several states while votes were counted in the previous day's presidential election, widely seen as a tight race between the president and a former vice president. The death toll in election-related violence continued to climbed to 39 after one election worker was hit by a bullet after completing work in Rivers state.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, In Pakistan mountain climbers Daniele Nardi of Italy and Briton Tom Ballard last made contact from around an elevation of some 6,300 meters (nearly 20,700 feet) on Nanga Parbat, slightly more than one-third up the 8,126-meter peak nicknamed Killer Mountain because of the dangerous conditions.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 24, Thousands of Palestinian protesters in the Gaza Strip called on Pres. Mahmud Abbas to resign after attempts to pressure his rival Hamas with financial cuts in the impoverished enclave.
(AFP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, In Russia thousands of people marched in central Moscow to commemorate Russian opposition figure Boris Nemtsov, who was killed on Feb. 27, four years ago.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, Senegal held a presidential poll with Macky Sally (56) confident of being reelected after his main challengers were banned from running.
(AFP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, In Spain two people were killed when a small plane crashed more than 100 km (60 miles) north of Madrid.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, In Sudan about a thousand protesters were confronted by forces in military uniform in Omdurman as President Omar al-Bashir swore in new officials. Security forces fired tear gas at hundreds of protesters in the capital Khartoum and across the river Nile in Omdurman.
(Reuters, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, In eastern Syria a land mine left by the Islamic State group struck a van packed with workers killing 24 of them. An estimated 300 IS militants remained besieged in the village of Baghouz, hemmed in by the Euphrates River and the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan said 3,804 civilians were killed last year, the highest number since the international organization began tallying figures in 2009.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, Pope Francis ended his conference on the sexual abuse of children by clergy by calling for an "all-out battle" against a crime that should be "erased from the face of the earth".
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, International condemnation of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro grew after he deployed troops to block foreign aid convoys, with Brazil branding it criminal and urging allies to join a "liberation effort" of the South American nation.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 25, The United States imposed sanctions on four pro-Maduro state governors as it ramped up pressure on Venezuela's President Nicholas Maduro, whose election Washington sees as illegitimate.
(Reuters, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, San Francisco's District Attorney George Gascon announced that his office will wipe out more than 9,000 marijuana-related convictions in cases dating back to 1975.
(SFC, 2/26/19, p.A1)
2019 Feb 25, Kim Vincent Avis (55), aka Ken Gordon-Avis, reportedly vanished after going for a nighttime swim in treacherous waters in Monterey, Ca. Detectives soon began to suspect a hoax. Avis was wanted on 24 counts of rape in Scotland. In July he was arrested in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
(AP, 7/27/19)
2019 Feb 25, US-led scientists said evidence for man-made global warming has reached a "gold standard" level of certainty, adding pressure for cuts in greenhouse gases to limit rising temperatures.
(Reuters, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, In Afghanistan a NATO drone strike mistakenly killed nine members of a government-backed militia in Ghazni province.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 25, In Argentina several assailants entered the Buenos Aires home of Rabbi Gabriel Davidovich and beat him, identifying him as the chief rabbi of the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association, one of the country's most prominent Jewish groups.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 25, The British government said it plans to ban Lebanon-based Hezbollah as a terrorist group, accusing the Iran-backed organization of destabilizing the Middle East.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, Britain's Labor Party said it would back a second public vote on Brexit if the House of Commons rejects its alternative withdrawal plan later this week.
(SFC, 2/26/19, p.A3)
2019 Feb 25, The European Union opened the door to Britain postponing its exit from the 28-nation bloc beyond the March 29 deadline, saying it would be a "rational solution" given the political crisis in the UK.
(AFP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, Paris prosecutors dropped a rape investigation targeting filmmaker Luc Besson (59) because of a lack of evidence.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, In Germany prosecutors fined automaker BMW 8.5 million euros ($9.66 million) for lax oversight in installing defective engine software that led to excessive diesel emissions in 7,965 cars.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, In eastern India hundreds of indigenous people waved flags and shouted slogans to protest against an order to evict more than one million indigenous families accused of encroaching on forest lands.
(Reuters, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, a US-educated veteran diplomat who helped craft the pact that curbed Iran's nuclear program in return for sanctions relief, gave no reason for his decision to quit when he announced it on Instagram.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 25, An Iraqi government source said 14 French nationals accused of fighting for the Islamic State group have been transferred to Iraq by US-backed forces squeezing the jihadists' final Syrian bastion. Since Feb. 21, 280 Iraqi nationals accused of fighting alongside IS have been transferred to Iraqi authorities.
(AFP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, In Italy Gianni Alemanno, a former mayor of Rome (2008-2013), was sentenced to six years in prison for his part in the infiltration of organized crime into the capital. He immediately vowed to appeal.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, Niger hosted leaders of 17 countries on the rim of the Sahel (Benin, Burkina Faso, Chad, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Djibouti, Gambia, Guinea, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Ivory Coast, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal and Sudan) as talks began on a nearly $400-billion plan to help the fragile region cope with climate change.
(AFP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, Serbia's defense ministry took delivery of four Russian-made MiG-29 fighter jets from Belarus, part of an arms purchase that could heighten tensions in the Balkans and increase Moscow's influence in the region.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, In Spain MWC Barcelona, the world's biggest mobile industry trade fair, opened. A global battle between the US government and Chinese tech company Huawei over allegations that it is a cybersecurity risk overshadowed the opening.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, Sudan's Pres. Omar al-Bashir issued decrees giving security forces powers to search buildings, restrict movements of people and public transportation, arrest individuals suspected of crimes related to the state of emergency and seize assets or property during investigations. Police fired tear gas at hundreds of protesters in Khartoum against a state of emergency imposed by Pres. Omar al-Bashir to end rallies against his rule.
(AFP, 2/25/19)(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 25, In Switzerland the international boxing association (AIBA) said it has approved new uniforms for female boxers to wear for religious reasons. Hijabs and full body form-fitting uniforms have been designed.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, In eastern Syria evacuations from the last pocket of territory held by the Islamic State group continued amid a standoff between the militants and the US-backed forces besieging them. An estimated 300 IS militants were besieged in Baghouz.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said the international arms control system is facing collapse and urged Russia and the US to stop the imminent demise of a crucial nuclear treaty.
(AFP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, The United Nations' highest court ruled that Britain carved up Mauritius illegally when it agreed to end colonial rule and must "bring to an end its administration of the Chagos Archipelago as rapidly as possible".
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, Vietnamese President Nguyen Phu Trong arrived in Cambodia for a 2-day visit to strengthen already close bilateral ties.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 26, President Donald Trump arrived at the hotel in Hanoi where he will stay during his summit with North Korea's Kim Jong Un.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, In New York the driver of a car fleeing an earlier crash went around a train gate and was hit by two trains on Long Island. The driver and two passengers were killed.
(SFC, 2/28/19, p.A7)
2019 Feb 26, In Algeria thousands of students staged protests in several university cities across the country to voice their opposition to ailing President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's bid for a fifth term.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro withdrew an executive order signed in January that would have increased the number of officials able to effectively keep government documents and data secret.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 26, British PM Theresa May bowed to intense political pressure and handed control of Brexit to Parliament. May offered lawmakers the chance to vote in two weeks for a potentially disorderly no-deal Brexit or to delay Britain's exit from the European Union if her attempt to ratify a divorce agreement fails.
(AP, 2/26/19)(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, Britain's opposition Labour Party said that interior minister Sajid Javid had to provide evidence to justify his decision to widen a ban on the Lebanese Islamist movement Hezbollah.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, Colombian immigration officials said over 320 mostly low-ranking soldiers fled Venezuela in a span of four days.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, The European Union's top court overturned Latvia's decision to suspend Ilmars Rimsevics, a member of the European Central Bank, while he is investigated for alleged bribery in a scandal that has shaken the country.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, The European Union's top court ruled that the EU organic food logo cannot be used on meat derived from animals that have been slaughtered in accordance with religious rites without first being stunned.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, PSA Group, the French maker of Peugeot automobiles, said it plans to reintroduce the cars to North American markets.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, In Germany a court ruled that the domestic BfV intelligence agency is not allowed to classify the Alternative for Germany (AfD) as a "case to investigate", handing a victory to the far-right party which had brought the case.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, The Hungarian government stepped up its campaign against the leadership of the European Union, repeating its accusations that the EU seeks to promote mass immigration into the continent.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, India's air force carried out air strikes inside Pakistan killing hundreds of militants in a training camp of Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM), the militant group that claimed credit for a Feb. 14 suicide bombing attack that killed Indian paramilitary police in Kashmir. Pakistan said there had been no casualties at all. Following the air strike India and Pakistan troops exchanged gunfire across the border in the disputed region of Kashmir.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, In Indonesia an unlicensed gold mine collapsed and buried dozens of people. Rescuers dug desperately with their bare hands and farm tools to unearth victims calling for help from beneath the rubble. Three people were confirmed dead and 14 were rescued. It was estimated that 43 people were still buried.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 26, Three Iraqi workers were killed in a roadside bomb explosion in the western city of Fallujah.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, Mexico's President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said he would not take sides on the crisis in Venezuela, a day after US Vice President Mike Pence urged Mexico to recognize opposition leader Juan Guaido as Venezuela's rightful president.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, Nigeria's incumbent President Muhammadu Buhari extended his early election lead based on official results from a third of the country's districts as the death toll from sporadic poll-related violence rose to 47.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, In Nigeria gunmen suspected to be Fulani herders stormed into villages of ethnic Adara farmers, killing 29 people and burning some 40 homes. The bloodshed was believed to be in retaliation for gunmen attacking eight Fulani settlements in Kaduna state on February 11, which state governor Nasir El-Rufai said killed more than 130 people.
(AFP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 26, Gaza journalist Hajar Harb appealed a six-month prison term and fine over her reporting in 2016 on alleged corruption within the Hamas-run Health Ministry in a case that has drawn international condemnation of the coastal strip's Islamic rulers.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, It was reported that an opioid crisis has quietly spread in the Gaza Strip, trapping thousands in the hell of addiction and adding another layer of misery to the blockaded and impoverished coastal territory.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, In the southern Philippines former Muslim guerrillas took over governance of a poverty and conflict-wracked Muslim autonomous region, a five-province region called Bangsamoro, under a peace deal partly aimed at combating Islamic State group-aligned militants.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, In Russia a court in Moscow sentenced Col. Sergei Mikhailov, former deputy head of the FSB's Information Security Center, to 22 years in prison and a fine on treason charges. The court also sentenced Ruslan Stoyanov, an executive at the Kaspersky Lab cybersecurity firm, to 14 years in prison and a fine.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir reshuffled his senior military staff. Protesters defied their embattled president's ban on unauthorized public gatherings, with hundreds rallying across the country to call for his resignation.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, Sweden arrested a suspected Russian spy in Stockholm. Kristian Dmitrievski (45), a naturalized Swedish citizen who previously held a Russian passport, was arrested by Sweden's domestic security agency SAPO as he met with a Russian intelligence officer working at Russia's Embassy in Stockholm under diplomatic cover. On March 29 a prosecutor said Dmitrievski has been released.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Feb 26, In northwestern Syria five people were reported killed by shelling and air strikes. Government forces had intensified artillery shelling and air strikes, which have been ramping up over the past 10 days.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, In southern Thailand two police officers were abducted and later found dead in a ditch in Narathiwat province, with the pickup truck of one of the officers stolen and set on fire.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 26, Turkey criticized European Union leaders for attending a summit hosted by Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi days after nine men were executed for killing Egypt's chief prosecutor.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, It was reported that Ukraine's national broadcaster has dropped singer Anna Korsun (27), who was meant to represent the country at the Eurovision Song Contest, due to apparent political differences over Russia.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 27, President Donald Trump and Vietnamese President Nguyen Phu Trong presided over the signing of several trade deals in Hanoi, including agreements to sell the booming Southeast Asian country 110 Boeing planes worth billions of dollars.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, US President Donald Trump and North Korea's Kim Jong Un, leaders of two nations with a long history of hostilities, met in Hanoi for their second summit.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Michael Cohen, Pres. Trump's longtime lawyer and fixer, spoke before the US House Oversight and Reform Committee and accused Pres. Trump of an expansive pattern of lies and criminality.
(SFC, 2/28/19, p.A7)
2019 Feb 27, In northern California the Sonoma County town of Guerneville flooded as the Russian River overflowed its banks and continued rising.
(SFC, 2/28/19, p.A10)
2019 Feb 27, In New Mexico Amanda Madrid (25) was shopping for hamster food shortly before she was fatally shot in Albuquerque. In 2021 a judge sentenced Maiah Madrid-Schleicher (28) to 14 years in prison for the shooting death outside a Family Dollar store.
(Tribune Publ., 6/11/21)
2019 Feb 27, In North Carolina political operative Leslie McCrae Dowless Jr. (63) was arrested on charges of illegal ballot handling and conspiracy. Four other people working for him were also charged.
(SFC, 2/28/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 27, In Australia George Pell, the most senior Catholic cleric ever convicted of child sex abuse, was sent to prison and will wait two weeks to learn his sentence for molesting two choirboys in a Melbourne cathedral two decades ago.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, In Austria a police raid in Seefeld, posted online by a Norwegian news portal, showed Austrian skier Max Hauke apparently with a banned blood transfusion going into his arm while a police investigator stands in the background. The raids led to the arrests of five elite skiers and four other people.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Feb 27, A Bahraini court sentenced 167 people arrested at a sit-in outside the home of Bahrain's leading Shi'ite Muslim cleric in 2017 to between six months and 10 years in prison. 56 of the defendants received 10 year prison terms.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Feb 27, The Bahrain-based long-haul carrier Gulf Air acknowledged it is cancelling and delaying flights without explaining why.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Aid agency Medicins Sans Frontieres (MSF) said Cameroonian and Nigerian authorities have ordered 40,000 refugees in Cameroon to return to northeast Nigeria.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Human Rights Watch denounced the government of Colombia for appointing at least nine officers to key army positions despite credible evidence of implicating them in serious human rights violations during the country's long civil conflict.
(SFC, 2/28/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 27, In Egypt at least 25 people were killed and 50 injured when a locomotive smashed through the buffer stop at Cairo's main train station. A fight between two conductors led to the crash.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)(SFC, 2/28/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 27, The EU expressed concern about Italy's debt levels and warned the government in Rome to push through measures to shore up the public finances.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, A European Parliament committee picked Romanian prosecutor Laura Codruta Kovesi to head a new prosecutor's office fighting fraud, despite fierce opposition from her own government.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, A court in Bali has sentenced Australian Brandon Johnson and his Indonesian girlfriend Remi Purwanti to five years and four months in prison each for possessing cocaine.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani rejected the resignation of Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, standing by a moderate ally long targeted by hardliners in factional struggles over a 2015 nuclear deal with the West.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif signed two agreements in Tehran with Armenia, television footage showed, continuing his duties as Iran's top diplomat.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Israel's PM Benjamin Netanyahu visited Russia for talks with President Vladimir Putin expected to focus on regional security and Syria.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev ordered his government to tap the country's rainy-day fund for $3.6 billion in order to boost public sector salaries and social aid payouts and develop housing and infrastructure.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Libya's Unity government leader Fayez al-Sarraj met rival military strongman Khalifa Haftar in Abu Dhabi, where they agreed "on the need to end the transitional phase through general elections and on ways to preserve the stability of Libya and unify its institutions.
(AFP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 27, In Myanmar thousands of people rallied in Yangon in support of constitutional reform, amid mounting tension between the ruling party and the military over changes to the charter that enshrines the army’s role in politics.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, In Nepal a helicopter flying in bad weather crashed into a mountain, killing all seven people on board.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, The government of Nicaragua released dozens of people who had been arrested in last year's crackdown on street protests. Rights groups have estimated that at least 770 people have been arrested in relation to the protests that broke out last April.
(SFC, 2/28/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 27, Nigerian election authorities said President Muhammadu Buhari (76) has comfortably won a second term at the helm of Africa's largest economy, but his main rival planned a fraud challenge after a vote marred by delays and violence. Some 327 people died in election-related violence since the campaign began in October, 67 of them during or after the Feb. 23 vote.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Dutch officials said that an estimated 90,000 small bottles of Russian vodka, found last week on a Chinese freighter in the port of Rotterdam, will likely be sold at auction or destroyed.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Pakistani PM Imran Khan called for talks with India and hoped "better sense" would prevail to de-escalate the dispute with its nuclear-armed neighbor following air strikes by both sides.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Pakistan's military said it shot down two Indian warplanes in the disputed region of Kashmir and captured a pilot, raising tensions between the nuclear-armed rivals to a level unseen in the last two decades. Mortar shells fired by Indian troops from across the frontier dividing the two sectors of Kashmir killed six civilians and wound several others. A helicopter crash in the region also killed six Indian air force officials and a civilian on the ground.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, The Palestinian Authority said it will not accept tax revenues from Israel following the latter's decision to deduct sums Palestinians pay to prisoners and people killed in fighting with Israel.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Seychelles' second president Albert René (83) died. He took power in a 1977 coup and went on to shape politics for decades.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Volvo's electric performance brand Polestar unveiled a battery-powered compact car touted as a rival to Tesla's Model 3. Sweden-based Volvo is a subsidiary of Chinese automaker Geely.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 28, Talks between President Donald Trump and North Korea's Kim Jong Un collapsed in Hanoi after the two sides failed to bridge a standoff over US sanctions.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, The US Senate confirmed former coal industry lobbyist Andrew Wheeler to lead the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
(SFC, 3/1/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 28, Michael Cohen, Pres. Trump's longtime lawyer and fixer, returned to Capitol Hill for hours of questioning before the US House Intelligence committee.
(SFC, 3/1/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 28, The World Trade Organization panel ruled in favor of the United States in a dispute with China over agricultural subsidies, saying Beijing went beyond WTO limits in its support for wheat and rice producers between 2012 and 2015.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, Andre Previn (1929), Berlin-born American composer and conductor, died at his home in Manhattan. He wrote or arranged music for several dozen movies and authored several books including "Orchestra" (1975) and "No Minor Chords: My Days in Hollywood" (1991).
(SFC, 3/1/19, p.C8)
2019 Feb 28, Texas executed Billie Wayne Coble (70) for the 1989 shooting deaths of his estranged wife's parents, Robert and Zelda Vicha, and their son Bobby Vicha at separate homes.
(SFC, 3/1/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 28, Algerian police arrested a dozen journalists protesting "censorship" of coverage of demonstrations against a fifth term for President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, as the prime minister compared the rallies to those that sparked Syria's war.
(AFP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, In Belgium Swedish teenager Greta Thunberg led thousands of students in a climate change march — the second she's led in as many weeks to draw more attention to the topic.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of Britain's opposition Labour Party, said his party will back a new referendum on Brexit after parliament defeated its alternative plan for leaving the European Union.
(Reuters, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, British Airways announced a multi-billion dollar order for up to 42 Boeing 777 fuel-efficient passenger jets, just two weeks after Airbus said it would no longer make its A380 superjumbo.
(AFP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, Cyprus said ExxonMobil has made the world's third-biggest gas find in the last two years off its coast.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, In Greece Lawyer Zoe Konstantopoulou said Alexander Vinnik (39), a Russian suspected of bitcoin fraud, has been on a hunger strike for three months, during which time he has lost about 30 percent of his body weight. She aired a video of a gaunt-looking Vinnik she said was shot last week.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, India banned the largest political and religious group in Indian-controlled Kashmir in an ongoing crackdown on activists seeking the end of Indian rule. India's home ministry issued the five-year ban on Jama'at-e-Islami, or JeI, accusing the group of being an "unlawful association" and supporting militancy in the region.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Feb 28, Indonesian officials said 19 people had been rescued alive from a gold mine in North Sulawesi's Bolaang Mongondow district as of this evening. The death toll rose to seven and about three dozen miners remain trapped by the Feb. 26 collapse.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, In Liberia two senior figures at the Central Bank, one of whom is the son of former president Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, were arrested following a probe into reports of missing banknotes.
(AFP, 3/1/19)
2019 Feb 28, Pakistan's PM Imran Khan pledged his country would release a captured Indian fighter pilot, a move that could help defuse the most serious confrontation in two decades between the nuclear-armed neighbors over the disputed region of Kashmir..
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, A temporary closure of air space over Pakistan snarled air traffic, especially between Asia and Europe, though some airlines adjusted by rerouting their flights.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, Senegalese election officials announced that President Macky Sall (57) has easily won a second term without the need for a runoff. The four opposition candidates said they would not pursue a legal challenge.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, In central Somalia US air strikes in the Hiran region killed 26 fighters.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Feb 28, In Somalia Islamist al Shabaab fighters in Mogadishu set off an explosive outside the Hotel Maka Al-Mukarama late today Officials declared an end to the siege the following afternoon with 20 people confirmed dead and over 100 injured.
(Reuters, 3/1/19)(AP, 3/1/19)(AFP, 3/2/19)
2019 Feb 28, South Korea-based Hyundai and Kia added more than a half-million vehicles to 3 ½-year string of US recalls for engine failures and fires.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, In Sudan more than 1,000 anti-government protesters demonstrated in and around Khartoum, the first rallies since emergency courts were set up nationwide on Feb. 26 to combat more than two months of unrest.
(Reuters, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, In Syria US-backed forces fighting the Islamic State group said they have freed 24 of their fighters held by IS, and uncovered a mass grave last week outside the village of Baghouz, the last pocket of territory held by the extremist group.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, In Syria the US-coalition supporting the SDF said late today it had killed veteran French jihadist Fabien Clain, who voiced a recording claiming responsibility for the November 2015 attacks on Paris, in a strike in Baghouz. It did not say when he had been killed.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Feb 28, Thailand's legislature passed a cybersecurity bill that would allow authorities access to people's personal information without a court order.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, A UN probe released today said Israel may have committed crimes against humanity in responding to last year's unrest in Gaza, as snipers "intentionally" shot civilians including children, journalists and the disabled.
(AFP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, In Yemen five children were killed in an attack on their home in flashpoint Hodeida province.
(AFP, 3/3/19)
2019 Feb, Costa Rica's government launched a decarbonization plan to rid the country of fossil fuels by 2050.
(AFP, 4/19/19)
2019 Feb, French gay writer Frederic Martel authored "In the Closet of the Vatican." Here he describes a gay subculture at the Vatican.
(SFC, 2/15/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb, Anwar Raslan (b.1963), a former Syrian policeman, was arrested in Germany. He was charged with torturing more than 4,000 people and murdering at least 58 between 2011 and 2012 under dictator Bashar al-Assad. His trial opened in Koblenz in April, 2020.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anwar_Raslan)(Econ., 1/2/21, p.44)
2019 Feb, Peruvian authorities launched "Operation Mercury" to evict thousands of illegal gold miners from Tambopata province in the Amazon rain forest. Hundreds of police and soldiers were deployed there for the long term.
(SFC, 5/17/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb, Peru's government charged former Pres. Toledo Alejandro Toledo, living in San Francisco, with taking $20 million in bribes from Odebrecht, a Brazilian construction company that won a major highway contract during his administration.
(SFC, 10/11/19, p.C8)
2019 Feb, Rwanda abruptly closed its Uganda border crossing at Katuna, with queues of cargo trucks and thronging merchants turned back as soldiers from both armies marshalled along the forest-clad border. The blockade was a result of the worsening animosity between Rwanda's Paul Kagame and Uganda's Yoweri Museveni as the pair traded accusations of espionage, political assassinations and meddling in each other's backyards.
(AFP, 5/15/19)
2019 Feb, Venezuela deported American journalist Jorge Ramos, who showed a video of people eating garbage while he interviewed President Nicolas Maduro.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, The United States imposed sanctions on six Venezuelan security officials for obstructing aid that Washington had tried to force in as part of its effort to support the country's opposition leader against President Nicolas Maduro.
(AFP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, Acclaimed Irish-born architect Kevin Roche (96) died at his home in Connecticut. He left his mark on world-class buildings from New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art and the city's Museum of Jewish Heritage to airports in New York and Washington.
(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 1, In Virginia former high school teacher Christopher Brannon was sentenced to 34 months in prison for hacking into private digital accounts of celebrities and others. He was the fifth person charged in the 2014 "celebgate" scandal.
(SFC, 3/2/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar 1, In southern Afghanistan at least 25 Afghan soldiers were killed as they repelled an attack by the Taliban on a military base in Helmand province. Afghan forces killed at least nine Taliban insurgents, including three suicide bombers.
(Reuters, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, In southern Afghanistan at least 20 people including children were killed by flash floods that engulfed up to 2,000 homes and swept away cars in Kandahar province.
(Reuters, 3/2/19)(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 1, In Algeria tens of thousands of protesters marched through Algiers against ailing President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's bid for a fifth term, surging past a barricade and defying repeated volleys of tear gas fired by police. A total of 183 people were injured during the protests.
(AP, 3/1/19)(Reuters, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 1, Argentine Pres. Mauricio Macri announced a 46 percent increase in subsidies for poor families with children, the only new initiative included in his State of the Union address.
(Reuters, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, Belarus Pres. Alexander Lukashenko strongly rejected the possibility that Russia could incorporate his nation, as the two former Soviet republics discussed how to more closely integrate their economies, including a possible joint currency.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, Botswana's Pres. Mokgweetsi Masisi dismissed a report that the country had offered Zimbabwe a $600 million diamond-backed loan and said his government had only offered to guarantee a $100 million private credit line for Botswana companies to invest in their troubled neighbor.
(Reuters, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, In Brazil Rio de Janeiro's world-famous carnival celebration got underway.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, The British government agreed to pay 33 million pounds ($43 million) to settle a lawsuit that claimed it improperly awarded contracts to run extra ferry services in the event that Britain leaves the EU without an agreement on future relations.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, British girl scout Jodie Chesney (17) was knifed in the back as she listened to music with friends at a park in Harold Hill, east London. Two drug dealers had been looking to take revenge on rivals when they killed Jodie Chesney by mistake. On Nov. 7 Svenson Ong-a-Kwie (19) Arron Isaacs (17), were found guilty after the jury deliberated for less than six hours. In November the two drug dealing teenagers were jailed for life.
(The Telegraph, 11/7/19)(The Telegraph, 11/18/19)
2019 Mar 1, Canada said it will allow a US extradition request for Meng Wangzhou, an executive of Chinese tech giant Huawei, to face charges over possible dealings with Iran to proceed.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 1, Quebec's appeals court upheld a historic ruling ordering three tobacco firms to pay Can$15.5 billion (US$11.6 billion) to smokers in the Canadian province who claimed they were never warned about the health risks associated with smoking.
(AFP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 1, Colombian authorities announced that Carlos Bermeo, a prosecutor with the special peace tribunal, was detained along with a senator and two other suspects for taking a $500,000 bribe in exchange for swaying a controversial ruling over the extradition of Seuxis Hernandez, a rebel peace negotiator, to the US on drug charges.
(SSFC, 3/3/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar 1, In the Czech Rep. an armed Serbian man, reported to be a contract killer, was arrested in Prague. Serbia's Blic daily soon reported that the man is well-known contract killer Caba Der, sought by several countries over multiple murders.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 1, In Denmark a fraud involving public funds show 10 million kroner ($1.5 million) more than originally thought vanished from government coffers. Two new investigations showed that a total of 121 million kroner vanished between 1993 and 2018.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, In Germany thousands of students in the port city of Hamburg marched out of school led by teenage Swedish environmental activist Greta Thunberg to call for more action on climate change.
(Reuters, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, In Germany gardener Bernhard Graumann (59) was found dead in his bed in the southwestern town of Mehlingen. He had been in conflict with both a doctor and a family, and is thought to have planted explosives before he died. The 64-year-old doctor in the nearby town of Enkenbach-Alsenborn was killed this morning. Two days later a woman (37) and her 4-year-old daughter were injured by glass splinters when the woman put a log that had been rigged with explosives into her stove and it blew the door out.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 1, Three Yazidi women and 18 children returned to Iraq from Syria after more than four years in Islamic State captivity. Islamic State militants launched an assault on Sinjar, the Yazidi heartland, on Aug. 3, 2014. According to community leaders, more than 3,000 Yazidis remained unaccounted for.
(Reuters, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu met with Liberian Pres. George Weah in Jerusalem. Netanyahu has made strengthening ties with Africa a foreign policy priority.
(AFP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, In Italy Moroccan-born Imane Fadil (33), a former model and witness at Silvio Berlusconi's sex trial, died at one of the city's hospitals. On March 16 a newspaper suggested she may have been poisoned with a radioactive substance.
(AFP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 1, In Malaysia more 34 Muslim Rohingya women and children were found stranded along a beach in northern Perlis state, and were believed to have been dropped off by human traffickers.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, Mexico's Treasury Secretary Santiago Nieto said the financial intelligence unit of the treasury has frozen $156 million of the state Autonomous University of Hidalgo's funds while it investigates suspected money laundering.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 1, Mexican officials said the death toll from a Jan. 18 explosion at an illegally tapped pipeline has risen to 134.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, In southern Nigeria more than 50 people were left missing after a leaking oil pipeline exploded and caused a stampede in Bayelsa state. The Nembe Creek Trunk pipeline exploded, but no fatalities were reported. It runs from an oil terminal in Bonny to the state of Bayelsa with capacity of 150,000 barrels per day.
(AP, 3/2/19)(AFP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 1, Pakistani officials handed over a captured Indian Wing Commander Abhinandan Varthaman at a border crossing with India in a "gesture of peace" promised by PM Imran Khan amid a dramatic escalation with the country's archrival over the disputed region of Kashmir. In a heavily edited video distributed by the Pakistani military just before his release, Varthaman praised the professionalism of the Pakistani army and criticized Indian media for creating war hysteria.
(AP, 3/1/19)(AFP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 1, Russia vowed to maintain support for the embattled regime of its Venezuelan "friend" President Nicolas Maduro, including with humanitarian aid supplies.
(AFP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, Saudi Arabia announced it had revoked the citizenship of Hamza bin Laden, the son of the late al-Qaida leader who has become an increasingly prominent figure in the terror network. The royal decree stripping his citizenship was signed in November, but only became public now.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, Saudi Arabia decided to put jailed women activists on trial after holding them for nearly a year without charge.
(AFP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 1, South Korean President Moon Jae-in said his government plans to discuss with the United States the possibility of restarting joint inter-Korean economic projects to induce nuclear disarmament from North Korea, which insisted it had asked only for partial sanctions relief in exchange for shutting down its main nuclear complex.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, The Spanish government adopted a decree that aims to cap residential rent rises within the term of a contract ahead of a general election in April. The decree will enter into force in the next few days but will need to be endorsed by parliament later.
(Reuters, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, Sudan's embattled President Omar al-Bashir quit his position as chairman of the ruling party after more than two months of protests against his nearly three-decade rule. Al-Bashir delegated his powers as chairman of the National Congress Party to its deputy chairman, Ahmed Harun, until the party's next general conference.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, In Switzerland former FIFA senior vice president David Chung was banned from soccer for 6½ years for financial wrongdoing linked to a $20 million building project. The Papua New Guinea official resigned as Oceania president after a FIFA-appointed audit found irregularities linked to awarding of contracts for its headquarters in Auckland.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, In eastern Syria more civilians evacuated from the last territory held by the Islamic State group, amid a warning by the United Nations about the plight of thousands who have fled the area in recent weeks.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, Venezuela's Vice President Delcy Rodriguez said President Nicolas Maduro has ordered state oil company PDVSA's office in Lisbon to be relocated to Moscow, a move she said was designed to help safeguard her country's assets.
(Reuters, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 2, SpaceX's new Crew Dragon astronaut capsule was on its way to the International Space Station after it successfully launched from Florida on board a Falcon 9 rocket.
(AFP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, In Abu Dhabi the 57-nation Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), the world's largest body of Muslim-majority nations, reaffirmed its unwavering support for the Kashmiri people in their just cause.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, In Afghanistan Taliban insurgents targeted an Afghan army corps overnight at their camp in southern Helmand province, killing at least 23.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, Azeri opposition blogger Mehman Huseynov was released after serving two years in prison in a case condemned by human rights activists.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, Recently elected DR Congo President Felix Tshisekedi pledged to pardon political prisoners and said he would work for the return of those who had fled abroad for political reasons.
(AFP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, The European Parliament called on Kosovo to suspend a 100-percent tariff on Serb goods to help restart reconciliation talks.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, In Germany union and government negotiators reached a new wage agreement late today that will give more than a million public servants a nearly 8 percent pay increase over 33 months.
(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 2, Iran criticized Britain for its decision to list Hezbollah as a terrorist organization, saying it ignored both the will of a large portion of the Lebanese people and the Tehran-backed group's role in fighting Islamic State.
(Reuters, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, Iran's official IRNA news agency said the Central Bank has merged four banks and a credit union to reform the country's banking system and financial markets.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, Israeli aircraft struck two Hamas observation points in the Gaza Strip, after the army reported balloons carrying an "explosive device" were sent toward Israel.
(AFP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 2, In Italy tens of thousands of people have marched in Milan against policies by the populist government that they say promote racism.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, Pakistan's military said two of its soldiers have been killed in an exchange of fire with Indian forces near the Line of Control that separates the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir between the rivals. Over the last 24 hours a total of at least six civilians have been killed on both sides of Kashmir.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, Russia announced that Zhores Alferov (88), a physicist and Nobel Prize laureate, has died in in St Petersburg. Alferov shared the Nobel Physics Prize in 2000 for developments in semiconductor research that have been used in satellite communications and cellular telephones.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, In eastern Syria Kurdish-led forces battled jihadists defending their last village as operations to flush out the Islamic State group resumed after several days of humanitarian evacuations.
(AFP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, In northern Syria the semi-autonomous Kurdish administration said in a statement that 283 Syrians, suspected of belonging to the Islamic State, had been set free because they have "no blood on their hands".
(AFP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 2, In Syria militants shot dead eight men suspected of being members of the Islamic State group in Idlib. Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) members shot dead members of IS sleepers cells, in front of a restaurant where a previous day's attack occurred.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 3, A tornado registering EF4 hit southeastern Alabama killing 23 people. At least 18 tornadoes struck in Alabama, Florida, Georgia and South Carolina.
(SFC, 3/4/19, p.A6)(SFC, 3/6/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 3, Teachers in Oakland, Ca., approved a new contract ending their 7-day strike. They won salary increases and concessions on class sizes and staff workloads.
(SFC, 3/4/19, p.C1)
2019 Mar 3, Elon Musk's SpaceX white Dragon capsule with just a test dummy aboard docked smoothly with the International Space Station in a big step toward putting the US back in the business of launching astronauts.
(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, Afghanistan donated $1 million to the main UN program for Palestinian refugees at a ceremony in Istanbul.
(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, In Algeria hundreds of students staged new protests in Algiers and other cities against a fifth term for ailing President Abdelaziz Bouteflika as he faced a midnight deadline to register for April elections. Bouteflika vowed in a letter read out on state television late to organize a "national conference" that would set a date for further polls which he would not contest. The message was followed by the formal submission of his candidacy for the April 18 poll.
(AFP, 3/3/19)(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 3, In Australia firefighters battled 25 blazes across the state of Victoria as a record-breaking heatwave delivered the hottest start to March on record for the southern third of the country.
(Reuters, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, In eastern Congo DRC bandits shot dead six people overnight, sparking angry protests by residents who blockaded the main street running through Goma city.
(AFP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, An Egyptian military appeals court upheld a five-year sentence against Hesham Genena, the country's former auditor, for disseminating false news about the military.
(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, Estonians voted in a general election with the center-left coalition fighting for survival in a duel with its traditional liberal rivals and a surging far-right party buoyed by a backlash from mostly rural voters in the Baltic eurozone state. Estonia was on track for its first woman prime minister after the opposition liberal Reform party, led by Kaja Kallas (41), won a general election with 28.8 percent of the vote.
(AFP, 3/3/19)(AFP, 3/4/19)(SFC, 3/5/19, p.A3)
2019 Mar 3, In France at least 2,000 demonstrators gathered in Paris and other cities to protest Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's bid to stand for a fifth term in office.
(AFP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, Members of Italy's Democratic Party voted for a new leader in hope of reversing their party's slumping popularity.
(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, Jordan accused Israeli authorities of barring top Palestinian Muslim officials from Al-Aqsa mosque in annexed east Jerusalem.
(AFP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, In northwestern Kenya four Americans and their Kenyan pilot were killed when their helicopter crashed just after take-off from a remote island in Lake Turkana.
(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 3, In Libya a spokesman for the forces of a Field Marshal Khalifa Hifter based in the country's east said his self-styled Libyan National Army has seized control of Libya's southern border with Algeria.
(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, It was reported that a Nigerian court last week condemned as "illegal and unconstitutional" the arrest and deportation of Cameroonian separatists who had applied for asylum in Nigeria.
(AFP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas arrived in Iraq for talks with officials in Baghdad on the latest developments in the region.
(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, Some 800 Palestinians crossed Sunda from the Gaza Strip into Egypt on their initial stage of a pilgrimage to Mecca, the first time since 2014 Egyptian authorities have granted visas for such a trip.
(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, Philippine authorities found 1,529 live exotic turtles stuffed inside luggage at Manila's airport. The various types of turtles were found inside four pieces of left-behind luggage of a Filipino passenger arriving at Ninoy Aquino International Airport on a Philippine Airlines flight from Hong Kong.
(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 3, Authorities in Saudi Arabia suspended a new television talk show that tackled sensitive issues and aired critical views after just two weeks.
(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 3, South Korea and the US said they are eliminating their massive springtime military drills and replacing them with smaller exercises in what they call an effort to support diplomacy aimed at resolving the North Korean nuclear crisis. They agreed to replace the Key Resolve and Foal Eagle drills with a shorter "Dong Maeng" or "Alliance" exercise which kicked off this week.
(AP, 3/3/19)(AFP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 3, Sudanese protesters marched toward courthouses in different cities across the country, including in the capital of Khartoum.
(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, A Syrian jihadist group linked to Al-Qaeda killed 21 regime and allied forces near Idlib province, in one of the deadliest breaches of a six-month-old truce deal. Five jihadists were also reported killed.
(AFP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, In eastern Syria Islamic State launched car bombs and suicide attackers against the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) assaulting Baghouz, in a last-ditch effort to stave off defeat in its final patch of territory.
(Reuters, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 4, The Trump administration said Washington will scrap the preferential trade status of India and Turkey, as President Donald Trump ramped up his battle against what his administration views as unfair foreign trade practices.
(AFP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 4, The US House Judiciary Committee said it is launching a sweeping new probe of Pres. Donald Trump, his White House, his campaign and his businesses. The panel sent document requests to 81 people linked to the president and his associates.
(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, American and Israeli militaries announced that the US has temporarily deployed its highly advanced THAAD missile defence system in Israel for the first time, reflecting their shared concerns about Iran's development of powerful missiles.
(AP, 3/4/19)(AFP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Juan Vallejo Corona (85), California's most prolific serial killer, died at a hospital while serving 25 life sentences for the murder of 25 farm workers. Their bodies were found near Yuba City in 1971.
(SFC, 3/5/19, p.A1)
2019 Mar 4, American actor Luke Perry (52) died in Los Angeles following a massive stroke last week. He had played the wealthy rebel Dylan McKay on "Beverly Hills, 90210" (1990-2000).
(SFC, 3/5/19, p.A10)
2019 Mar 4, Algerians dismissed President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's promise to quit early if re-elected for a fifth time and said they were ready for new protests seeking his resignation.
(AFP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Belarus lifted a restriction on the number of US diplomats allowed on its territory that had been in force since 2008, a move aimed at improving ties with Washington. Minsk had reduced the number of US diplomats to five from the previous 35 after the United States imposed sanction against Belarusian authorities.
(Reuters, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, British authorities said two teenagers were killed in knife attacks in over the weekend, bringing the number of people killed in stabbings this year to at least 24.
(Reuters, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Britain and Spain said they have reached an agreement that sets out stricter rules for companies and citizens operating from Gibraltar, a British overseas territory which Spain considers a colony.
(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, In London Laureline Garcia-Bertaux (34), originally from France, was reported missing after not turning up for work. Her body was found in a garden in Kew on the evening of March 6. A post-mortem found she had been strangled. A week later suspect Kirill Belorusov (32) was detained in the Estonian capital Tallinn on a European arrest warrant.
(AP, 3/7/19)(AFP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 4, Keith Flint (49), the fiery frontman of British dance-electronic band The Prodigy, was found dead at his home near London. Keith reportedly took his own life over the weekend. The band's 1990s "Firestarter" (1996) and "Breathe" (1996) were an incendiary fusion of techno, breakbeat and acid house music.
(AP, 3/4/19)(AFP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, The Central African Republic's peace agreement was under strain after two militia groups abandoned the deal and a third said it was quitting a new government designed to be the keystone of the accord.
(AFP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, China accused detained Canadian citizen Michael Kovrig of stealing state secrets which were passed on to him from another detained Canadian, Michael Spavor, in what is likely to increase tension between Ottawa and Beijing.
(Reuters, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Egyptian photojournalist Mahmoud Abu Zaid was released after five years in prison and returned home to hugs from family and friends, pledging to continue working despite severe restrictions imposed on his movements, including having to spend the nights at a police station nearby.
(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Indonesia and Australia signed a free trade agreement in Jakarta that will eliminate many tariffs, allow Australian-owned hospitals to operate in the giant Southeast Asian country and increase work visas for young Indonesians.
(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, In Indonesia a court ruled that construction of a Chinese-backed dam, that will cut through the habitat of a the most critically endangered orangutan species, can continue.
(SFC, 3/5/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 4, Israeli security forces shot and killed two Palestinians who carried out a car-ramming attack in the occupied West Bank that injured a soldier and a policeman.
(AFP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Israeli attack helicopters struck Hamas military positions in Gaza, after the country's army reported a balloon-borne "explosive device" from the Palestinian enclave targeted its territory.
(AFP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Lithuanian PM Saulius Skvernelis said he will ask Belarus to convert its Russian-built nuclear power plant to gas provided by Lithuania's liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal and a planned gas link between Lithuania and Poland.
(Reuters, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Mexican archaeologists reported the discovery of a cave filled with hundreds of artifacts beneath the ruins of the Mayan city of Chichen Itza, a stunning city of stone in the Yucatan peninsula that was founded sometime around 750 AD. Locals had actually discovered the cave more than 50 years ago.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 4, In Mexico the townspeople of Santa Rosa de Lima, Guanajuato state, tried to block a police raid on a fuel-theft gang. The gang had allegedly paid for the local support. The municipal force did nothing to help in the raid that freed six kidnap victims.
(SFC, 3/6/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 4, A key train service with neighboring India resumed and schools in Pakistani Kashmir opened in another sign of easing tensions between the two nuclear-armed rivals since a major escalation last week over the disputed Kashmir region.
(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, President Vladimir Putin officially suspended Russia's participation in a key Cold War-era arms treaty, after the US first moved to ditch the INF deal.
(AFP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, In South Sudan the leaders of Ethiopia and Eritrea met with President Salva Kiir seeking to breathe new life into a flagging peace agreement signed six months ago between his government and rebels.
(AFP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, In Switzerland the electric Jaguar I-Pace won the Car of the Year award in Europe ahead of the 89th Geneva International Motor Show, at the Palexpo in Geneva. This was first time the storied British brand has been bestowed the prize.
(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, In eastern Syria hundreds of people including fighters from the Islamic State group evacuated their last foothold hours after US-backed Syrian fighters said they were forced to slow their advance because the extremists are using civilians as human shields. Some 500 people, including fighters, surrendered and evacuated the village of Baghouz and its surrounding areas.
(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Uganda's government said Rwanda has started to allow trucks carrying goods from Uganda to enter at one of the main crossing points on their shared border, a sign that renewed hostilities have started to ease. Their hostilities were fueled by longstanding mutual suspicions and allegations of supporting each other's dissidents.
(Reuters, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Flag-waving Venezuelans turned out to await the return of opposition leader Juan Guaido, who was defying the threat of arrest as he embarks on a renewed push against embattled President Nicolas Maduro.
(AFP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Zambia’s broadcasting regulator ordered a one-month suspension of a TV channel that has been critical of the government, just days after the governing party accused the station of bias and unprofessionalism. Prime TV has openly condemned the government of President Edgar Lungu.
(AFP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 5, The US FDA approved Spravato, a mind altering medication that is a cousin of ketamine, for the treatment of patients who have failed to find relief with at least two anti-depressants. Ketamine has been adopted by the underground rave culture due to its ability to produce psychedelic, out-of-body experiences.
(SFC, 3/6/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 5, It was reported that for just the second time ever an HIV patient was in sustained remission from the virus in what was hailed by experts as proof that the AIDS-causing condition could one day be curable.
(AFP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, In Afghanistan relief efforts continued a day after flooding subsided. The Norwegian Refugee Council said more than 32 people have died and thousands displaced as heavy rains and flooding swept away homes across Afghanistan.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, Albania's main opposition leader urged PM Edi Rama to call a snap election over allegations of corruption and vote fraud, as anti-government protesters rallied outside parliament.
(Reuters, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, Thousands of Algerian students marched in protest at ailing President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's determination to stand for re-election, brushing aside his pledge not to serve a full fifth term.
(AFP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, Belarus Pres. Alexander Lukashenko called for better ties with NATO and lifted restrictions on US diplomats, an apparent bid to win concessions from Moscow by dangling the prospect of rapprochement with the West.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, China announced a robust annual economic growth target and a 7.5 percent rise in military spending as it convened an annual legislative session overshadowed by a tariff war with Washington.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, Chinese tech company Huawei opened a cybersecurity lab in Brussels, the heart of the European Union, as it tries to win over government leaders and fight back US allegations that its equipment poses a national security risk.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, French officials said rioters in the city of Grenoble set fire to 65 cars and targeted security forces with fireworks and Molotov cocktails, after a third night of violence sparked by the death of two teenagers on a stolen scooter during a police chase.
(AFP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, French customs officials warned of lengthy delays at the port of Calais as their work-to-rule strike snarled traffic for a second day, leading to queues of trucks several km (miles) long.
(AFP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 1, In Germany gardener Bernhard Graumann (59) was found dead in his bed in the southwestern town of Mehlingen. He had been in conflict with both a doctor and a family, and is thought to have planted explosives before he died. The 64-year-old doctor in the nearby town of Enkenbach-Alsenborn was killed this morning. Two days later a woman (37) and her 4-year-old daughter were injured by glass splinters when the woman put a log that had been rigged with explosives into her stove and it blew the door out.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 5, The Berlin district court jailed 48-year-old Aleksandr T., a German-Russian dual citizen whose full name wasn't released in line with German privacy rules. He was sentenced to eight years in prison over the July 22 attack on two homeless men at Schoeneweide station. One of the victims later died of his injuries.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, Greece successfully launched its first 10-year bond auction since 2010, as it seeks to gradually regain the confidence of international investors and wean itself off bailout funds.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, A Hungarian court ruled that Rui Pinto, a Portuguese man linked to the publication of internal documents that embarrassed top European clubs and soccer officials in the Football Leaks case, will be extradited to his home country.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, Two groups monitoring air pollution said New Delhi was the world's most polluted capital city in 2018 in a study of the amount of fine particulate matter known as PM2.5 in 61 capital cities around the world. It was followed by the Bangladesh capital of Dhaka and Kabul, capital of Afghanistan.
(Reuters, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, In Indonesia the effort to find victims in the Feb. 26 mine collapse recovered more bodies and body parts as the death toll rose to at least 13.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, Italian energy company Eni said a crane toppled from a methane gas extraction platform, plunging into the Adriatic Sea and killing the crane's operator (63).
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, In Italy a proposal to use 15 million euros in Saudi Arabian government funds for Milan's La Scala opera house came under fire because of anger over the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
(AFP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, Japanese architect Arata Isozaki, credited with bringing together the East and West in his innovative designs, was awarded this year's Pritzker Architecture Prize, known internationally as the highest honor in the field.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, A Tokyo court approved the release of former Nissan Chairman Carlos Ghosn on 1 billion yen ($8.9 million) bail, rejecting an appeal by prosecutors to keep him jailed. The former head of the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi Motors alliance has been detained since he was arrested on Nov.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, It was reported that Nepal has chosen a railway-track gauge used by China for its network and not the main one India uses citing lower costs, a setback for India as it tries to limit Chinese involvement in the Himalayan country.
(Reuters, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, It was announced that Nicaraguan Pres. Daniel Ortega's leftist government and the opposition have agreed a "roadmap" for extended peace talks to resolve 10 months of crisis sparked by a deadly crackdown on dissent in which hundreds of people were killed.
(AFP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 5, Pakistan's Interior Ministry said that authorities have arrested dozens of suspects in the wake the Feb. 14 suicide bombing in Indian-controlled Kashmir that killed 40 Indian troops. Among those arrested was Mufti Abdul Rauf, the brother of the group's leader, Masood Azhar.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, In South Africa growing unrest at Sibanye-Stillwater's gold operations has left nine people dead since workers downed tools in November, prompting the country's mines minister to call on the police to step in and protect the local community.
(Reuters, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, Sri Lanka's government proposed increases in spending on public servants and incentives to boost agriculture and fisheries in a new national budget, which opposition lawmakers criticized as an attempt to attract voters ahead of a presidential election this year.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, In Sudan a one-day strike shuttered businesses and emptied streets in Khartoum, and other parts of the country.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, The opposition Sudanese Congress Party said authorities have released Omar el-Digeir, a senior opposition leader, who had been detained since December in connection with demonstrations against President Omar al-Bashir's rule.
(AFP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, In eastern Syria civilians streamed out of the Islamic State group's last Syrian stronghold into territory held by US-backed forces battling to finish off the jihadists' dying "caliphate" near the village of Baghouz. 280 IS fighters were among those who quit the pocket since March 3.
(AFP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, In Kiev US Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch called on Ukrainian officials to fire the special anti-corruption prosecutor, Nazar Kholodnytsky, who has been accused of helping suspects avoid corruption charges. She also called for a complete audit of a state-owned military procurement company and greater transparency for defense contracts.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 5, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet said Burundi has forced the United Nations to shut its local human rights office after 23 years.
(Reuters, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 6, A US federal appeals court upheld fraud convictions against two men for their roles in a Connecticut auto insurance scam that involved as many as 50 staged car crashes between 2011 and 2014. The 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals in New York rejected the appeals of Mackenzy Noze and Jonas Joseph.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, The US federal government said it is awarding $27 million in grants to the US Virgin Islands to help expand and renovate two airports damaged in 2017 by Hurricanes Irma and Maria.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, The Wall Street Journal reported that Microsoft has detected cyberattacks linked to Iranian hackers that targeted thousands of people at more than 200 companies over the past two years. Microsoft attributed the attacks to a group it calls Holmium, and which other security researchers call APT33.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 6, Militants in Afghanistan set off a suicide blast and stormed a construction company near the airport in Jalalabad, the capital of eastern Nangarhar province, killing at least 17 people.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, Algerian war veterans said that protesters demanding ailing President Abdelaziz Bouteflika step down after 20 years in power had legitimate concerns and they urged all citizens to demonstrate.
(Reuters, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, Angola's Pres. Joao Lourenco met with Portuguese President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa in Luanda in a top-level encounter between nations whose relations have previously been strained by anti-corruption issues.
(AFP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, London's Central Criminal Court sentenced Muslim convert Lewis Ludlow to at least 15 years in prison for plotting a van attack on crowds in London's busy Oxford Street shopping district.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, China said that it is blocking some imports of the agricultural product canola from Canada because of fears of insect infestation. A day earlier Richardson International Ltd., said that China had revoked its permit to export canola there.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, An inquiry into the demise of Cyprus' Co-operative bank faulted senior executives for bad judgment, inaction and ineptitude in dealing with a mountain of bad loans, while blaming the finance minister for failing to take corrective actions.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, Amnesty International said Egyptian activists and journalists have been targeted by phishing attacks coinciding with political events in an intensifying crackdown on dissent since the start of the year.
(Reuters, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, In Estonia Liberal party leader Kaja Kallas, on track to become the country's first female prime minister, announced talks for a grand coalition with the center-left party of outgoing PM Juri Ratas.
(AFP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, In France prison guards blocked access to 18 jails to protest working conditions after the stabbing of two guards by a radicalized inmate.
(AFP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, A manhunt was underway in western Germany for at least two masked suspects who attacked a money transport truck at the Cologne-Bonn airport and shot a guard.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, In Germany the body of a 21-year-old woman was found with several stab wounds at her parents' home. A 22-year-old Tunisian man she had been in a relationship with was arrested the next day on suspicion of homicide.
(AP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 6, Indian and Pakistani soldiers shelled military outposts and villages along their highly militarized frontier in disputed Kashmir, in an outbreak of new violence despite stepped-up diplomatic efforts by the rival countries to ease tensions.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, An activist group said Nasrin Sotoudeh, a prominent human rights lawyer in Iran who defended protesters against the Islamic Republic's mandatory headscarves for women, has been convicted and faces years in prison. She had previously served three years in prison for her work.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu designated Al-Aqsa television channel of the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas a "terrorist organization".
(AFP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, Italy's populist government opened its new minimum income welfare program, fulfilling a key campaign promise of the 5-Star Movement to try to reduce poverty and unemployment in the eurozone's third-largest economy.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, In Kenya thousands of air passengers were stranded after a strike by aviation workers at the main Nairobi airport led to the cancellation and delay of scores of flights and the use of riot police to break up the industrial action. By the end of the day however, most scheduled arrivals had been processed while the departures backlog was being cleared.
(Reuters, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, Bankers and diplomats said Libya's parallel government in the east has sold bonds worth more than $23 billion to fund its wage bill, bypassing the central bank in Tripoli and creating a potential financial black hole if the country reunifies.
(Reuters, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, In Pakistan Mohammed Afzal (31), also known as Afzal Kohistani, was shot dead in the northwestern district of Abbotabad. The young rights campaigner had fought for seven years for justice for five possible victims of so-called honor killings. Police soon identified the killer as his nephew.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 6, In Puerto Rico trucks laden with food, water and gasoline began arriving on the tiny islands of Vieques and Culebra after the governor activated the National Guard due to a breakdown of two ferries that carry supplies.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, Scientists set off on a mission to explore the depths of the Indian Ocean. The Britain-based Nekton non-profit research institute has chartered the Ocean Zephyr, a Danish-flagged supply ship, to explore the waters around the Seychelles. This is the first of a half-dozen regions the Nekton Mission plans to explore before the end of 2022, when scientists will present their research at a summit on the state of the Indian Ocean.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, A South African court handed jail terms of 23 and 18 years to two white farmers who murdered a black teenager suspected of stealing sunflowers in a remote farming community. Pieter Doorewaard (28) and Philip Schutte (35) were found to have killed 15-year-old Matlhomola Mosweu, also spelt Moshoeu, on April 20, 2017, after claiming they caught him taking a plant from a farm in the area.
(AFP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, South Korean President Moon Jae-in proposed a joint project with China to use artificial rain to clean the air in his country, where an acute increase in pollution has caused alarm.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, In eastern Syria hundreds more people made their way out of Islamic State's last pocket, besieged by a US-backed militia. An SDF source put the number of people who left the Baghouz pocket this morning at more than 2,000. The SDF militia captured 400 Islamic State fighters who were trying to escape the enclave.
(Reuters, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, United Nations human rights chief Michelle Bachelet said that she is seeking access to China to verify continuing reports of disappearances and arbitrary detentions, particularly of Muslims in the Xinjiang region.
(Reuters, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, UN rights chief Michelle Bachelet said sanctions had exacerbated the crisis in Venezuela but also slammed Maduro's "violations of civil and political rights" in her annual report to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva.
(AFP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, Venezuela's government said it will expel the German ambassador, Daniel Martin Kriener, for interfering in the country's internal affairs and gave him 48 hours to leave.
(Reuters, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, A Vietnamese fishing boat capsized after reportedly being rammed by a Chinese vessel in the South China Sea's contested Paracel Islands. China said its boat came upon the fishing vessel after it started sinking and sought help for the crew.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 7, US President Donald Trump's special representative for Venezuela pledged that Washington would "expand the net" of sanctions on the South American nation, including more on banks supporting President Nicolas Maduro's government.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, First lady Melania Trump joined Secretary of State Mike Pompeo at the State Department to confer international courage awards on 10 women from Bangladesh, Djibouti, Egypt, Ireland, Jordan, Montenegro, Myanmar, Peru, Sri Lanka and Tanzania. The State Department has honored more than 120 women from scores of countries since it created the International Women of Courage Award in 2007.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Former Trump campaign chief Paul Manafort (69) was sentenced to nearly four years in prison for tax crimes and bank fraud in a high-profile case stemming from Special Counsel Robert Mueller's probe of Russian interference in the 2016 election. This was much less than what was called for under sentencing guidelines.
(AFP, 3/7/19)(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 7, The US House of Representatives passed a resolution condemning anti-Semitism and other bigotry. The one-sided 407-23 vote belied the emotional infighting over how to respond to freshman Rep. lIhan Omar's recent comments suggesting House supporters of Israel have dual allegiances.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 7, In Texas Dan Jenkins (89), the sports writing great and best-selling author whose career covered Ben Hogan to Tiger Woods, died.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 7, In Afghanistan rockets fired at a gathering of the Shi'ite Muslim Hazara minority in Kabul killed at least three people and wounded dozens in an attack claimed by Islamic State. Two insurgents were eventually killed and one person arrested. The death toll in the mortar attack soon rose to 11, while the number of wounded reached almost 100.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)(AP, 3/7/19)(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 7, FUNAI, Brazil's indigenous affairs agency, said it has sent an expedition to the Amazon region looking for members of the Koruba tribe that has had little or no contact with the outside world to steer them clear of the rival Matis group and avoid a bloody clash of cudgels against arrows.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Canadian PM Justin Trudeau defended his government's handling of a political crisis that could dash his chances of winning re-election in October, while admitting some mistakes had been made. Trudeau's Liberal government has been on the defensive for a month over allegations by former Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould that officials inappropriately pressured her last year to help construction firm SNC-Lavalin Group Inc avoid a criminal trial.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Chinese tech giant Huawei challenged a US law that would limit its American sales of telecom equipment on security grounds as the company steps up efforts to preserve its access to global markets for next-generation communications.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Comoros Pres. Azali Assoumani reportedly survived an attempt on his life as he crisscrossed the country drumming up support ahead of polls on March 24.
(AFP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, In Costa Rico judicial police raided Roman Catholic church offices in San Jose, searching for information about two priests accused of sexual abuse.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Medecins Sans Frontières said the battle against Ebola in Democratic Republic of Congo is failing because ordinary people do not trust health workers and an overly militarized response is alienating patients and families.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Egypt's the interior ministry said on security forces have killed seven suspected militants in two operations in Giza, across the Nile from central Cairo.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Egyptian actor Amr Waked (45), living in Spain and known for his criticism of President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi's government, said a military court has sentenced him in absentia to eight years in prison in two separate cases, the latest in a wide-ranging crackdown on dissent and the media in Egypt in recent years.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Ethiopia appealed for $1.3 billion from the international community to assist 8.3 million displaced due to ethnic conflict as well those vulnerable to climate shocks and disease.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, The 28 member states of the European Union all backed a decision on to reject a proposal from the EU executive to add Saudi Arabia to a blacklist of countries suspected of being lax on terrorist financing and money laundering. The decision will force the European Commission to prepare a new list.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, French Catholic cleric, Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, was convicted of failing to report allegations of sexual abuse in his diocese and said he would submit his resignation to Pope Francis. The archbishop of Lyon was handed a six-month suspended prison sentence.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Eurostar trains from Paris to London were running up to two hours late and trucks stacked up on the approaches to the Channel port of Calais as French customs officers staged the fourth day of a work-to-rule strike.
(AFP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, In Germany a regional court judge gave Klaus O. (57) a life sentence after convicting him of attempted murder. He was found guilty of poisoning his co-workers' sandwiches with mercury and other substances between 2015 and 2018.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, A German court sentenced four men for their involvement in running an online child pornography platform to prison sentences from three years and ten months to almost 10 years.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, More than 200 protesters gathered at a Hong Kong university to condemn the expulsion of a student defending free speech, in what was seen as another incremental sign of eroding freedoms in the Chinese-ruled city.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, In the Indian-controlled portion of Kashmir a civilian was killed and at least 30 others were injured by a grenade blast at a bus station.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Three Indonesian soldiers were killed in a gunbattle with Papuan independence fighters. They were part of a contingent to provide security for military engineers on the trans Papua highway.
(AP, 3/7/19)(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 7, Iranian naval forces intervened to repel pirates who attacked an Iranian oil tanker in the Gulf of Aden.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 7, In northern Iraq Islamic State militants ambushed a bus carrying Shiite Muslim paramilitary fighters, killing six militiamen and wounding 31 others in one of the deadliest attacks in recent months.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Malaysian officials said 35 people, mostly students, have been treated for poisoning after a suspected chemical leak near two schools in Johor state.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, In Malaysia Mujahid Yusof Rawa, the minister in charge of religious affairs, said the Islamic Affairs Department had set up a unit to monitor writings and communications insulting Islam and Muhammad.
(Reuters, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 7, In central Mexico at least 25 Central American migrants died when the truck they were traveling in overturned in Chiapas state. 23 of those killed were Guatemalan migrants.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 7, Singapore axed a gig by Watain, a Swedish metal band with Satanic beliefs, whose performances have involved throwing pig's blood onto revelers, just hours before it was due to go ahead.
(AFP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, South Korea's military said it is carefully monitoring North Korean nuclear and missile facilities after the country's spy agency told lawmakers that new activity was detected at a research center where the North is believed to build long-range missiles targeting the US mainland.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, In Sudan an emergency appeals court overturned prison sentences handed down to eight protesters for participating in demonstrations against President Omar al-Bashir's iron-fisted rule. Scores of protesters, many of them women, rallied in Khartoum, condemning a slew of tough measures imposed by President Omar al-Bashir to end weeks-long demonstrations against his rule.
(AFP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, In Geneva Volkswagen-owned Bugatti said a one-off Bugatti luxury sports car has been sold for a record 16.7 million euros ($18.9 million).
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, In eastern Syria scores of suspected IS members, including foreign fighters, were screened and searched for concealed weapons and explosives after leaving the last pocket of territory held by the Islamic State group.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, A court in Thailand ordered the dissolution of the Thai Raksa Chart Party ahead of this month's general election because it nominated a member of the royal family to be its candidate for prime minister.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Ukrainian presidential candidate Yulia Tymoshenko promised life imprisonment for anyone found guilty in alleged military corruption that reportedly includes incumbent Petro Poroshenko.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, In Geneva three dozen countries, including all 28 EU members, called on Saudi Arabia to release 10 activists and cooperate with a UN-led investigation into the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi at its Istanbul consulate. This was the first rebuke of the kingdom at the UN Human Rights Council since it was set up in 2006.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, In Venezuela power went out this afternoon due to a problem at the main hydroelectric plant. The government called the event an act of "sabotage" by ideological adversaries.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, A World Bank arbitration panel ruled that Venezuela must pay US oil giant ConocoPhillips more than $8 billion as compensation for a decade-old expropriation dispute. The Venezuelan government and its state-owned entities currently owe around $150 billion to creditors around the world, while the country's foreign currency reserves have fallen to just $8 billion.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, A Cook County grand jury indicted actor Jessie Smollett on 16 counts that alleged he lied to Chicago police about being the victim of an attack. Police said he staged the attack and recruited two brothers to participate.
(SFC, 3/9/19, p.A4)(SSFC, 3/10/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 8, Kansas Dr. Steven R. Henson (57) was sentenced to life in prison for unlawfully prescribing medication blamed for an overdose death.
(SSFC, 3/10/19, p.A13)
2019 Mar 8, New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham signed a bill to drastically expand mandatory background checks on firearms sales in the state.
(SSFC, 3/10/19, p.A7)
2019 Mar 8, Facebook Inc, which along with other social media companies has faced growing pressure over spurious content spread on its platform, announced it would remove user groups and pages that contained misinformation about vaccinations.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, Campaigners for gender equality marked International Women's Day with protests, discussion panels and walkouts as well as celebrations.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, Tens of thousands of Algerians defied heavily deployed riot police and resumed mass protests against President Abdelaziz Bouteflika posing the biggest threat to his 20-year-old rule. A private TV station said several lawmakers of the ruling FLN party have resigned to join mass anti-government protests.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, In Algeria criminals took advantage of thousands-strong demonstrations to break into the National Museum of Antiquities and Islamic Arts in Algiers, founded in 1897.
(AFP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 8, The BBC reported that the baby son of Shamima Begum, a British-born teenager who left London to join the Islamic State group, has died in Syria. Begum (19) had been stripped of her citizenship by the British government despite her wish to return.
(AFP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 8, Colombia said it will allow Venezuelans to cross the border using expired passports in view of the difficulty of renewing travel documents in the neighboring country in the midst of its economic crisis.
(Reuters, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 8, Finland's coalition government resigned a month ahead of a general election, saying it could not deliver on a healthcare reform package that is widely seen as crucial to securing long-term government finances. President Sauli Niinisto accepted PM Sipila's resignation but asked his government of his Center party and the National Coalition Party to continue in a caretaker capacity until a new cabinet has been appointed.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, Official reports said France and Iran are to exchange ambassadors after Paris suspended nomination of an envoy to Tehran last year over accusations that Iranian intelligence had planned an attack on an opposition group in Paris.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, The International Monetary Fund said it has reached a tentative deal to extend a $229 million loan to Haiti.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, In Hungary MTA President Laszlo Lovasz and Innovations and Technology Minister Laszlo Palkovics announced that they had reached an agreement to separate the science research network from the academy's teaching institutions. Staff members of the historic Hungarian Academy of Sciences said their academic freedom has been threatened by a new deal giving the nationalist government influence over its research institutions.
(Reuters, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 8, Indonesia's military said hundreds of soldiers will be deployed to continue work on the trans Papua highway.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, A top Iranian diplomat asserted that the UK's decision to give diplomatic protection to Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, a British-Iranian woman detained in Iran for nearly three years, contravenes international law.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, On International Women’s Day Yasaman Aryani, her mother Monireh Arabshahi and Mojgan Keshavarz handed out flowers to female passengers on the Tehran metro and spoke of a day when women have the freedom to choose what they wear. Aryani and her mother were each sentenced to 16 years in prison for “inciting and facilitating corruption and prostitution," though the sentence was later reduced.
(AP, 3/8/21)
2019 Mar 8, A Kosovo court acquitted the ethnic Serb identified only as M.Z. of war crimes and genocide charges following suspicion of his involvement committed in crimes in June-July 1998 in the Kline municipality.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, Malawi's ministry of homeland security said heavy rains and flooding in the south have killed at least 23 people, and a further 11 are missing.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, Dutch prosecutors said Uber has agreed to an out-of-court settlement of more than 2 million euros ($2.24 million) linked to an illegal service the ride hailing company offered in the Netherlands.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, In northeastern Nigeria at least five farmers were killed and dozens wounded after their vehicle struck a land mine buried by Boko Haram extremists. Three people were reportedly killed in Rivers state, following clashes between APC and PDP supporters, one day ahead of regional elections.
(SFC, 3/9/19, p.A2)(AFP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 8, North Macedonia's former secret police chief, Saso Mijalkov (53), was sentenced to three years in prison after being convicted of unlawfully influencing a local election in 2013. The court also convicted the head of an ethnic Albanian party and four former electoral commission members over the same case.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, Norway's $1 trillion wealth fund, the biggest of its kind in the world, said it will begin dumping shares in oil and gas companies, but stopped short of barring major producers like ExxonMobil and Chevron.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, A Palestinian was killed and at least 45 others wounded by Israeli fire in new protests and clashes along the Gaza border.
(AFP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 8, Peru's PM Cesar Villanueva stepped down amid calls for President Martin Vizcarra to shake up his government and revive falling approval ratings.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, In the Philippines Malaysian PM Mahathir Mohamad met with Filipino Muslim rebel leader Murad Ebrahim, who has become a regional governor under a Malaysian-brokered peace deal.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, Workers in the Polish city of Gdansk dismantled a statue of the late Solidarity-era priest, Henryk Jankowski, following allegations he sexually abused minors.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, In Portugal thousands of nurses marched through Lisbon in a show of unity to demand better pay and working conditions and protest the government's poor handling of the long-running dispute.
(Reuters, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 8, Saudi Arabia's air defense systems shot down a drone over the kingdom. The Saudi-led military coalition in Yemen accused the country's Houthi fighters of launching the aircraft and targeting civilians.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, Slovenia's health minister resigned, becoming the fourth minister to leave the center-left minority government and raising concerns about its ability to survive until the next scheduled election in 2022. Samo Fakin quit nine days after Environment Minister Jure Leben quit amid media reports about alleged corruption linked to a railway project in 2017 when Leben was a senior infrastructure ministry official.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, South Korea and the US formally signed a deal on Seoul's increased payment for the US troop deployment, amid worries about the future of the countries' decades-long military alliance.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, One of Spain's largest unions, UGT, said an estimated six million people walked out of their jobs for at least two hours in a strike to demand equal pay and rights for women, which it said mobilized more people than a similar action a year ago.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, In Sudan hundreds of protesters chanted anti-government slogans after leaving prayers at a major mosque near Khartoum, drawing tear-gas volleys from police. President Omar al-Bashir on International Women's Day ordered the release of all women arrested in connection with anti-government demonstrations, hours after protesters marched in the two largest cities.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, A Swedish court convicted David Idrisson, a 46-year old Uzbek citizen, of plotting to carry out a bombing in Sweden in the name of Islamic State, sentencing him to seven years in prison followed by expulsion from the country.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, The Swiss government said it will not help bring home adult citizens who joined up with jihadist fighters in Syria and Iraq, insisting national security was paramount.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, In Tunisia 11 newborn babies died over the last two days at the Rabta clinic in Tunis, which is part of a large medical center in the capital. Tunisia's health minister soon resigned following the sudden deaths. On March 10 a 12th infant died at the Rabta state hospital. The deaths were believed to have been caused by an infection acquired in the clinic.
(AFP, 3/10/19)(AFP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 8, The United Nations refugee agency UNHCR said in a report that around 5,000 Yemeni civilians were either killed or wounded last year, which averages out to 93 victims each week.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, Venezuela shut schools and suspended the workday as the worst blackout in decades paralyzed most of the troubled nation for a second day, spurring outrage among citizens already suffering from hyperinflation and a crippling recession.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 9, In California prison guards at Corcoran State Prison in Kings County found inmate Luis Romero (44) beheaded in his cell. Cellmate Jaime Osuna (31) had removed several body parts from Romero.
(SFC, 4/29/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 9, In North Carolina Diana Alejandra Keel went missing. Her body was found days later with multiple stab wounds. Her husband Rexford Lynn Keel Jr. (57) was arrested after being sighted on March 17 near Tucson.
(SFC, 3/19/19, p.A8)
2019 Mar 9, In Afghanistan a large number of Taliban insurgents launched attacks on several army posts in the province's Bala Murghab district. Over the next days 20 soldiers were reported killed, 10 wounded and 20 captured by the hardline Islamist group.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 9, Algeria's higher education ministry brought forward university holidays, as authorities sought to quell protests against ailing President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's bid for a fifth term.
(AFP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, Magomed Daudov, a close ally of Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov, called blogger Tumso Abdurakhmanov "an enemy to me and my brothers" after Abdurakhmanov criticized Kadyrov's late father, the former Chechen leader, on his YouTube channel. Abdurakhmanov (32) fled Chechnya in 2015 and is seeking asylum in Poland.
(AP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 9, Liu Hong of China has set a world record in the women's 50-km race walk, becoming the first woman to finish the event in under 4 hours.
(AP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, In Colombia 14 people were killed in a DC-3 plane crash in Meta province.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 9, In eastern Congo DRC armed Mai Mai militiamen attacked an Ebola treatment center at the heart of an outbreak of the disease, killing a policeman before being repelled by security forces.
(AP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, In France hundreds of "yellow vest" protesters began marches in Paris, marking the 17th straight weekend of anti-government demonstrations. They were joined by others donning pink tops, as child-care workers turned out against a reform of their unemployment subsidies.
(Reuters, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, India said that it was returning a key diplomat to Pakistan's capital amid an easing of tensions between the nuclear neighbors, but also demanded that its archrival take concrete steps against terrorists operating from its territory.
(AP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, Israeli forces said they had launched several strikes against Hamas sites in Gaza in response to a projectile launched from the besieged coastal territory the night before.
(AFP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, The Italian Ambassador to Pakistan said that the bodies of British climber Tom Ballard and Italian climber Daniele Nardi, who went missing on Feb. 24 while ascending Pakistan's Nanga Parbat, the so-called "Killer Mountain," have been found. Their bodies were unlikely to be recovered.
(Reuters, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, In southwest Japan the Guinness World Records officially recognized Kane Tanaka (116) in a ceremony at the nursing home where she lives in Fukuoka.
(AP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, Malaysian police said a was sentenced to more than 10 years' jail and three others were charged over insults against Islam and the Prophet Muhammad on social media.
(Reuters, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, A Malaysian minister decried the presence of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) groups at a march celebrating International Women's Day, calling it "a misuse of democratic space".
(Reuters, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 9, In central Mexico armed assailants opened fire in a nightclub in Salamanca, Guanajuato state, in the early hours today, leaving at least 15 people dead and three others wounded.
(AP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, In Myanmar 60 Arakan Army insurgents attacked a police post late today in Rakhine state, which was safeguarding question and answer sheets from the national high school matriculation examination. Nine policemen were reported killed in the attack.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 9, Nigerians voted for a second time in a fortnight in governorship and state assembly elections.
(AP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, In Sudan nine female protesters were sentenced to 20 lashes and one month in prison for rioting under new emergency laws.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 9, In northern Syria a suicide car bomb attacker blew himself up near a military vehicle in the town of Manbij, wounding eight people, most of them civilians.
(AP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, Pope Francis met with the leadership of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the first-such meeting of its kind, on the eve of the dedication of the Mormon church's huge new temple in Rome.
(AP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, Venezuelan opposition protesters confronted security forces on a main avenue in Caracas, venting their anger over a nationwide blackout, shortages of basic necessities and the government of President Nicolas Maduro.
(AP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 10, In east Texas two men died after their pickup truck collided with a charter bus in Tyler. Five occupants of the bus were hospitalized.
(SFC, 3/11/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 10, Thousands of students took to the streets of Algeria against President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's bid for a fifth term, as schools shut and transport in the capital halted as part of a protest strike. Bouteflika (82) returned to Algeria after medical treatment in Switzerland. Clerics defied any state role in their work, in a rebuff to an ailing leader fighting for his political survival.
(AFP, 3/10/19)(Reuters, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 10, Laleh Shahravesh, a UK citizen, was arrested at Dubai Airport as she arrived for her ex-husband's funeral. Authorities there had received a complaint about Facebook posts that she allegedly made in 2016 calling her ex's new wife a "horse".
(AP, 4/8/19)
2019 Mar 10, Egypt's president appointed Maj. Gen. Kamal el-Wazir, the head of the military's engineering authority, to lead the country's transportation ministry, less than two weeks after its minister resigned over a deadly train crash in Cairo that killed 25 people.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, An Ethiopia, Airlines new Boeing 737-8 MAX crashed shortly after takeoff from Addis Ababa killing all 157 people on board. 35 nationalities were represented. 19 people from at least five UN and affiliated agencies, including the IOM, were among 157 victims.
(AP, 3/10/19)(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 10, In France thousands of Algerian-origin protesters demonstrated in Paris and other cities around the country against President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, calling on him not to seek another term in office.
(AFP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, Guinea-Bissau, one of the world's poorest states, held key legislative elections aimed at ending a protracted political crisis..
(AFP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, Three Israeli soldiers, charged with abusing Palestinian detainees, were sentenced to six and a half months in prison under a plea deal with a military court.
(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 10, In Kashmir Indian troops shelled the Pakistani-controlled sector, killing a 70-year-old man. India blamed Pakistani troops for the initiating fire.
(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 10, Kazakh police arrested Serikjan Bilash, an activist who has campaigned for victims of China's re-education drive in Xinjiang, sealing his informal group's office and taking its computers.
(AFP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, A Malawi official the number of people killed in heavy rains and flooding in the south has risen to 28, while the estimated number of people affected has roughly doubled to 45,312 households.
(Reuters, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, Malaysian police said that six Egyptians and a Tunisian man believed to be linked to an African-based terror group have been detained and deported.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, In the Netherlands thousands of people, many warding off rain under umbrellas, packed a central square in Amsterdam to march for more progressive climate policies.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, In Nigeria dozens of soldiers in armored vehicles encircled a vote counting center in the opposition-held oil-rich southern city of Port Harcourt, in the latest flashpoint as violence overshadowed the previous day's closely-watched regional elections. The Independent National Electoral Commission halted the vote count in Rivers state, citing violence at polling stations, kidnapping of staff, confiscation and destruction of results.
(AFP, 3/10/19)(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 10, Millions of North Korean voters, including leader Kim Jong Un, went to the polls to elect a new lineup of roughly 700 members for the next session of the national legislature, though the vote was more of an endorsement than a competitive contest.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, Palestinian Pres. Mahmoud Abbas chose a longtime adviser, Mohammed Ishtayeh as his new prime minister, a step that deepens the rift with the Gaza Strip's ruling Hamas militant group.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, In Russia thousands of people took to the streets of Moscow and two other cities to rally against tighter internet restrictions, in some of the biggest protests in the capital in years.
(Reuters, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, A Sudanese emergency court sentenced Mariam al-Mahdi, the daughter of opposition Umma Party chief and ex-prime minister Sadiq al-Mahdi, to a week in prison. Hundreds took to the streets in different areas of Omdurman to protest against new emergency laws. Police used tear gas and water cannon to disperse them.
(AFP, 3/10/19)(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, Syria's President Bashar al-Assad said his country was suffering an "economic siege" as his regime faces a raft of international sanctions over the eight-year civil war, as he met Chinese assistant foreign minister Chen Xiaodong in Damascus. US-backed SDF fighters resumed their offensive around Baghouz.
(AFP, 3/10/19)(SFC, 3/11/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar 10, Tibetans and their supporters marked the 60-year anniversary of the Dalai Lama's flight into exile amid an abortive uprising against Chinese control.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan accused a women's march in central Istanbul on March 8 of disrespecting Islam by booing the Islamic call to prayer.
(Reuters, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, Two German journalists left Turkey after Ankara refused to renew their accreditation. The journalists called the government's move an attempt to silence international news organizations and said they refused to be intimidated.
(AFP, 3/10/19)(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, The UN said its children's fund is paying some 100,000 teachers in Yemen, as two million children go without education in the war-torn country.
(AFP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, Venezuela's embattled President Nicolas Maduro grappled with a crippling power outage and mounting protests as a top White House aide said members of the country's military were talking about possibly shifting allegiance to the opposition. An NGO said at least 15 patients with advanced kidney disease died after they stopped receiving dialysis treatments in darkened hospitals.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, Fighting erupted in Yemen's key port city of Hodeida, the first significant clashes since warring sides agreed to a UN-brokered cease-fire deal in December.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 11, Pres. Donald Trump sought 8.6 billion in his new 2020 budget to build the US-Mexico border wall. Trump sent Congress a record $4.75 trillion budget request that called for increased military spending and sharp cuts to domestic programs.
(SFC, 3/11/19, p.A5)(SFC, 3/11/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar 11, The United States imposed sanctions on the Russian bank Evrofinance Mosnarbank over its dealings with the Venezuelan state oil firm PDVSA.
(Reuters, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, Taliban fighters killed or captured an entire Afghan National Army company of more than 50 soldiers in Badghis province.
(SFC, 3/11/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 11, In Afghanistan six-year-old girl, identified as Mahsa, was kidnapped in Kabul. The kidnappers demanded $300,000 from the girl's father. Two men were later arrested in the kidnapping and killing of the girl.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 11, In Algeria more than 1,000 judges said they would refuse to oversee the upcoming election if Pres. Abdelaziz Bouteflika contests it. The ailing Bouteflika (82) abandoned his bid for a fifth term in power but stopped short of stepping down.
(AFP, 3/11/19)(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 11, In Brazil heavy rains overnight caused the deaths of at least 12 people in and around Sao Paulo.
(AP, 3/11/19)(SFC, 3/11/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 11, Authorities in China, Ethiopia and Indonesia grounded all Boeing 737 Max 8 aircraft following the March 10 crash of an Ethiopian Airlines jetliner that killed 157 people.
(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, Egypt said three troops and 46 suspected Islamic militants have been killed in recent days in the northern and central Sinai Peninsula.
(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, A new study, published in the European Heart Journal, said air pollution causes 790,000 premature deaths every year in Europe and 8.8 million worldwide, doubling recent assessments.
(AFP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 11, Police in India said they had recovered four videos from four arrested men, involving other victims in Tamil Nadu state. A woman (19) had said in a complaint filed with the police that she was traveling with the four men, two of whom she knew, in a car last month when she was forcibly disrobed and videotaped. She alleged the men then threatened to upload the video online if she did not meet them whenever summoned.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 11, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani began a 3-day visit in Baghdad to deepen bilateral relations. This was his first official visit to the nation that Tehran once fought a bloody war against and later backed in the battle with the Islamic State group.
(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, Iran's semi-official ISNA news agency said Judge Mohammad Moghiseh has sentenced Nasrin Sotoudeh (55) to five years for plotting against the state and two more years for insulting Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. It was reported that jailed Iranian human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh has been sentenced to 38 years in prison and 148 lashes.
(AP, 3/11/19)(Reuters, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, In Malaysia Indonesian Siti Aisyah, one of two women accused of killing North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's half-brother by smearing VX nerve agent on his face, was freed after two years of detention when prosecutors unexpectedly dropped the murder charge against her.
(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, A Pakistani anti-graft tribunal indicted former PM Raja Pervaiz Ashraf and six others over millions of dollars in losses because of delays to a power project. Ashraf served as prime minister in 2012.
(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, Peruvian President Martin Vizcarra named actor and former culture minister Salvador del Solar as his new prime minister.
(Reuters, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, It was reported that a Philippine appeals court has upheld a decision that an online news site critical of President Rodrigo Duterte violated a constitutional ban on foreign ownership of news media.
(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, Sudan's parliament voted to shorten from one year to six months a state of emergency declared by President Omar al-Bashir last month in response to widespread protests.
(Reuters, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, In eastern Syria Kurdish-led forces slowed an assault to retake a last scrap of land held by the Islamic State group after hundreds more people surrendered. The US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) killed dozens in continuing clashes with Islamic State fighters at Baghouz.
(AFP, 3/11/19)(Reuters, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, The UN's anti-drug agency said production of methamphetamine is skyrocketing in Southeast Asia, with prices dropping and usage expanding.
(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, Much of Venezuela, including parts of the capital Caracas, remained without power for a fifth day, crimping vital oil exports and leaving people struggling to obtain water and food. President Nicolas Maduro again ordered the suspension of classes and the working day. Opposition leader Juan Guaido led the country's legislature in declaring a "state of alarm" over power problems. A five-day power blackout left homes in Caracas without water.
(Reuters, 3/11/19)(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 11, In Venezuela Luis Carlos Diaz, a journalist with dual Spanish and Venezuelan nationality, went missing. Later that night a unit from the feared SEBIN intelligence police turned up at his home and took away computers, mobile phones and money, among other items.
(AP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 11, In Venezuela the Red Cross renewed visits to prisons when a Red Cross delegation visited a model prison in Caracas, the Simon Bolivar Center for the Formation of New Men.
(AP, 4/10/19)
2019 Mar 12, The longest peace talks between the US and the Taliban to end America's 17-year war in Afghanistan concluded in Qatar. Both sides said progress was made.
(SFC, 3/13/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 12, Sam Brownback, the US ambassador-at-large for international religious freedom, said China has done nothing to assuage concerns from the US and others over the detention of Uighurs, Kazakhs and members of other Muslim minority groups.
(AP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, The US aviation regulator said it would not ground Boeing Co 737 MAX planes after a crash in Ethiopia that killed 157 people, bucking a trend of countries around the world that have suspended the aircraft's operations.
(Reuters, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 12, US federal prosecutors announced a bribery and racketeering case in a college admissions cheating scandal.
(SFC, 3/13/19, p.A1)
2019 Mar 12, The San Francisco Board of Supervisors passed an ordnance to create a special permit allowing people to sell and consume cannabis legally at a number of public events.
(SFC, 3/13/19, p.C5)
2019 Mar 12, A divided federal appeals court voted 11-6 to uphold an Ohio antiabortion law that blocks public money for Planned Parenthood.
(SFC, 3/13/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 12, Honda recalled about 1.2 million vehicles in North and Central America from the 2001 to 2016 model years that were not included in the massive string of Takata recalls for air bags that can hurl shrapnel into the passenger compartment. A crash on Jan. 19, 2018 involving a 2004 Honda Odyssey in Maryland initiated an investigation and today's recall.
(AP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, In Afghanistan an air strike on a vehicle killed seven Taliban, including a commander, in Ghazni city. The Taliban said one air strike hit a minibus and a second followed quickly, killing a total of 12 people and wounding six. At least five Afghan troops were killed late today by friendly fire in what was supposed to be a precision airstrike by US forces supporting troops battling insurgents in Uruzgan province.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 12, In Algeria thousands demonstrated in several cities demanding immediate political changes. Algerian students protested against President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's decision to delay presidential elections indefinitely, amid an unprecedented public revolt against his 20-year leadership.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)(AP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, In Brazil two police officers were arrested in the killing of Rio city councilor and black gay rights activist Marielle Franco, almost a year to the day after the brazen murder shocked the country. A sergeant in the military police, Ronnie Lessa (48), was arrested on suspicion of being the shooter. Elcio Vieira de Queiroz (46), who had been sacked from the military police, also was arrested in the pre-dawn operation.
(AFP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, British PM Theresa May's Brexit deal was defeated 391-242 in a historic vote in parliament, pitching Britain into the unknown just 17 days before it is scheduled to leave the European Union.
(AFP, 3/12/19)(SFC, 3/13/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 12, Britain, Germany and France joined a wave of suspensions of Boeing 737 MAX aircraft as US President Donald Trump fretted over modern airplane design following the March 10 crash in Ethiopia that killed 157 people.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, At least 12 people were missing after two collisions between ships and fishing boats off the southeast coast of China.
(AP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, In northeastern Egypt remote-controlled robot jockeys lined up at a major camel racing festival, as owners came under pressure from campaigns to stop using child riders.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 12, European Union governments adopted a broadened blacklist of tax havens, adding the United Arab Emirates and British and Dutch overseas territories in a revamp that tripled the number of listed jurisdictions. The new list added Dutch Caribbean island of Aruba, Barbados, Belize, the British overseas territory of Bermuda, Fiji, the Marshall Islands, Oman, the United Arab Emirates, Vanuatu and Dominica. The EU blacklist originally comprised 17 jurisdictions, including the UAE, but shrank to five after most listed states committed to change their tax rules.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, EU lawmakers voted to lift the immunity of Jean-Marie Le Pen, founder of the far-right National Front, so France can investigate claims he improperly spent EU funds.
(AFP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, French President Emmanuel Macron met with the leaders of Djibouti and Ethiopia at the start of a multi-nation trip to Africa aimed at shoring up military and economic ties in the continent's strategically-important East.
(AP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, Chancellor Angela Merkel said Germany will define its own security standards for a new 5G mobile network, after Washington said it would scale back data-sharing with Berlin if China's Huawei was allowed to participate.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, Husband Reza Khandan said Iranian human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh has been sentenced to an extra 10 years in jail on top of the five-year term she is already serving.
(AFP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, Israeli troops shot dead a Palestinian man in Hebron after he ran toward them with a knife in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, Israeli police evacuated the Al-Aqsa mosque compound, known to Jews as the Temple Mount, after a Molotov cocktail damaged a police post. Police shut off access to it after several weeks of tension at the location.
(AFP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, Israeli undercover officers broke up a drug-dealing network that used a popular messaging app and had connections in the United States, Ukraine and Germany. Police said the ring was headed by Amos Dov Silver, founder of the Israeli online drug marketplace Telegrass. Silver was arrested in Ukraine early today.
(AFP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, Malaysia suspended all Boeing 737 Max 8 flights in and out of the country following two recent fatal crashes.
(AP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, Dutch police arrested two men in Amsterdam for their suspected involvement in the coordinated Islamic State attacks on Paris in November 2015 that killed 130 people. One suspect (29) will be held in restrictive custody for at least two weeks, while the other suspect (31) had to be released for health reasons.
(Reuters, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 12, In Nigeria gunmen abducted a Lebanese construction worker and killed another man in the northern city of Kano.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, Norwegian Air said it will temporarily ground its Boeing 737 MAX 8 passenger jets at the advice of European regulators.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, Oman said it was "temporarily suspending" all flights by Boeing 737 MAX aircraft in the sultanate following the March 10 crash of an Ethiopian Airlines jetliner, becoming the first nation on the Arabian Peninsula to ground the planes.
(AP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, A Pakistani court sentenced 20 members of a criminal gang to death after finding them guilty of killing several security officials and kidnappings in Punjab province. The Chotu gang remained active until 2016, when police backed by military helicopters raided its hideouts in the town of Rajanpur and arrested dozens of suspects.
(AP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, A Sudanese court overturned flogging sentences for nine women for taking part in protests against President Omar al-Bashir's three-decade rule. The court ruled that the women had already spent enough time in jail and ordered their immediate release.
(AFP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, The Syrian government condemned a statement by influential US senator Lindsey Graham that the occupied Golan Heights should remain "forever" under the control of Israel.
(AFP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, In eastern Syria Kurdish-led forces said more people were surrendering from the Islamic State group's last scrap of territory, after overnight air raids and shelling ravaged jihadist outposts. Hundreds of jihadist fighters and their families surrendered and the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces said the battle was as good as over. SDF spokesman Mustefa Bali said about 3,000 jihadists had handed themselves over to the SDF in the past 24 hours.
(AFP, 3/12/19)(Reuters, 3/12/19)(AFP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 12, Ukraine's security service said it has detained an Israeli man who heads a massive global drug trafficking network that markets illegal drugs through the internet.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, A document drawn up by the World Food Program (WFP), labeled as a "Concept of Operations," outlined how the UN organization and its partners "may facilitate the identification, staging, forward movement, reception, and sustainment of (Rohingya) refugees" on Bhasan Char, Bangladesh, estimating an initial appeal for donor funding of between $8.6 and $19 million.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 12, A UN humanitarian agency warned that thousands of Yemeni civilians are caught in the embattled northern district of Hajjah and that 22 people have been killed over the last two days in air strikes by the Saudi-led coalition.
(SFC, 3/13/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 13, The United States grounded Boeing's money-spinning 737 MAX aircraft over safety fears after an Ethiopian Airlines plane crash that killed 157 people, leaving the world's largest plane maker facing its worst crisis in years.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 13, The US Pentagon outlined new rules for transgender troops. A new policy will largely bar transgender troops and military recruits from transitioning to another sex, and require most individuals to serve in their birth gender.
(SFC, 3/14/19, p.A7)
2019 Mar 13, Pete Kaiser became the latest Alaska Native to win the 1,000-mile Iditarod dog sled race.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, California's Gov. Gavin Newsome issued an executive order suspending the state's death penalty.
(SFC, 3/13/19, p.A1)
2019 Mar 13, A winter storm brought blizzards, rain or floods to more than 25 US states. About 1,000 flights were cancelled at Denver Int'l. Airport and nearly 40 more at Colorado Springs.
(SFC, 3/14/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 13, In NYC Francesco "Frank" Cali (53), the reputed boss of New York's Gambino crime family, was shot dead outside his home on Staten Island. Suspect Anthony Comello (24) was arrested in New Jersey on March 16. His lawyer later said Comello apparently believed Cali was part of the “deep state" working to undermine Donald Trump.
(AFP, 3/14/19)(SFC, 3/18/19, p.A5)(The Independent, 12/7/19)
2019 Mar 13, Algeria's government declared itself ready for talks with protesters seeking rapid political change, saying it sought a ruling system based on "the will of the people" after opposition groups rejected proposed reforms as inadequate. Hundreds of school teachers and students protested in Algiers amid fears that President Abdelaziz Bouteflika plans to extend his two-decade rule.
(Reuters, 3/13/19)(AFP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, In Australia Cardinal George Pell, who in past years attended the retreat as Francis' finance minister, was sentenced to six years in prison for sexually abusing two youths in the 1990s. Pell must serve a minimum of 3 years and 8 months before he is eligible for parole. He planned to appeal.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, The news site Zurnal reported that Croatian intelligence officers have tried to recruit followers of the Salafi branch of Islam to smuggle weapons to their mosques in Bosnia. Croatia denied the allegations.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 13, In Brazil Before Guilherme Taucci Monteiro (17) and Henrique de Castro (25) launched an assault on a K-12 public school in Suzano, a suburb of Sao Paulo. Monteiro opened fire with a .38 caliber handgun and de Castro used a crossbow. Seven were killed at the school, including five students, a teacher and a school administrator. Before assaulting the school, they shot and killed a man who owned a used car dealership nearby. Instead of facing officers Monteiro shot de Castro in the head and then shot himself.
(AP, 3/13/19)(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 13, Britain's finance minister and business chiefs urged the country to avoid a "no deal" Brexit after another crushing parliamentary defeat for PM Theresa May over her EU-divorce deal with Brussels. Business leaders reacted with fury after the British government unveiled a temporary tariff regime that could see higher prices on an array of imports ranging from cars to butter, if the country crashes out of the EU later this month without a deal.
(AFP, 3/13/19)(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, Congo's new Pres. Felix Tshisekedi pardoned about 700 political prisoners who were jailed under his predecessor.
(SFC, 3/14/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 13, Egypt barred the passage, takeoff and landing of Boeing 737 MAX aircraft. No Egyptian airlines had Boeing 737 MAX jets in their fleets.
(Reuters, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, Georgia said it had detained two people for handling and trying to sell $2.8 million worth of radioactive uranium-238, which can be developed into nuclear bomb material.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, German authorities extended compensation payments to more gay men who were investigated under a law criminalizing homosexuality that was enthusiastically enforced in West Germany after World War II.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, Greece opened its biggest land registry office in Athens, home to nearly half of the Greek population. Greece, the only European country without a proper register of land ownership, was confident it will finally have one in place by 2021 after spending hundreds of millions of euros on a project that began more than 20 years ago.
(Reuters, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 13, In Indonesia the wife of an Islamic militant arrested for plotting attacks in Jakarta detonated a bomb during a siege of their home in North Sumatra, killing herself and her two-year-old child.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, Iraq banned US plane maker Boeing Co's 737 MAX aircraft from entering or transiting its airspace.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, A senior Israeli official said the army has opened criminal investigations into the deaths of 11 Palestinians killed by Israeli fire during protests along the Gaza border over the past year.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, Israel's army said it has uncovered a unit created by Hezbollah across the ceasefire line in the Syrian Golan Heights and led by Hezbollah commander Ali Musa Daqduq, previously jailed over an attack on US forces.
(AFP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, In Kenya the sixth Global Environment Outlook was released at a UN conference in Nairobi. It said unsustainable human activities globally have degraded the Earth's ecosystems, endangering the ecological foundations of society.
(SFC, 3/14/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 13, Malaysia's government backtracked on an earlier plan to abolish capital punishment for all crimes, saying the death penalty stays but will no longer be mandatory for selected offences.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, Malaysia's government ordered 34 schools in southern Johor state to close after toxic waste illegally dumped into a river sickened scores of students and teachers.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, In Nigeria a three-story building that housed a school collapsed in Lagos. 20 people were soon confirmed dead in the school building, and most of them are children. The school had been operating illegally on the top two floors.
(Reuters, 3/13/19)(AP, 3/14/19)(AP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 13, Norwegian Air said it will seek compensation from plane maker Boeing for costs and lost revenue after grounding its fleet of 737 MAX 8 aircraft in the wake of the Ethiopian Airlines crash.
(Reuters, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, A boat with migrants floundered and took on water while trying to cross the Mediterranean Sea to Spain. 45 migrants reportedly died while 21 others were rescued.
(SFC, 3/15/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 13, Sudan's new PM Mohamed Tahir Eila unveiled a 20-member cabinet tasked with solving an economic crisis that has triggered nationwide protests against the decades-old rule of President Omar al-Bashir.
(AFP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, In eastern Syria Clashes continued as the SDF worked to thwart IS counterattacks.
(AFP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, Ukraine defended its decision to deny entry to an Austrian journalist, claiming that Austria has been too friendly to Russia.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, A human rights expert urged the UN to take "immediate action" to provide justice and remedies to displaced minority communities in Kosovo who were sheltered on lead-contaminated wasteland.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, Venezuela's Pres. Nicolas Maduro's government scrambled on to return power to western Venezuela following heavy looting in Zulia, the second largest city. China offered to help the South American nation end its worst blackout on record.
(Reuters, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 14, Scientists said California was now drought-free for the first time since December, 2011.
(SFC, 3/15/19, p.C1)
2019 Mar 14, Joseph W. Knowland (88), former published of the Oakland Tribune, died at his home in Walnut Creek, Ca. He took over the publisher's chair in 1974 following the death of his father, ex-US Sen. William Knowland. The paper was sold in 1977 to Combined Communications Corp.
(SSFC, 3/24/19, p.C11)
2019 Mar 14, Ralph Metzner (b.1936), Germany-born American psychologist and expert on psychedelic drugs, died at his home in Sonoma, Ca. He authored more than 20 books including "The Psychedelic Experience" co-written with Richard Alpert and Timothy Leary and published in 1964.
(SFC, 3/27/19, p.C5)
2019 Mar 14, Former Indiana Sen. Birch Bayh (b.1928) died at his home in Easton, Md. Bayh served as Indiana senator from 1963 to 1981 and was a champion of the landmark 1972 law banning discrimination against women in college administrations and athletics.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birch_Bayh)(SFC, 3/15/19, p.A9)
2019 Mar 14, In Texas Beto O'Rourke (46), a skateboarding former punk rocker feted as one of the Democratic Party's rising stars, announced he is running for president, joining a crowded field of candidates vying to challenge Pres. Donald Trump in 2020.
(AFP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, PEN American announced that Saudi women Nouf Abdulaziz, Loujain al-Hathloul and Eman al-Nafjan have won the PEN/Barbey Freedom to Write Award. The award was established in 1987 and is given to writers imprisoned for their work.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, In Afghanistan a gunbattle erupted between Afghan forces and supporters of Atta Mohammad Noor, a powerful politician in the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif, who rejected the appointment of a new provincial police chief by President Ashraf Ghani.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Algeria's new PM Noureddine Bedoui said he would form a temporary government of technocrats and others to work toward political change in response to weeks of street protests, and he urged the opposition to join in a dialogue.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Belgian cardinal Godfried Danneels (85), a strong liberal voice within the Roman Catholic Church, died. He was once seen as an outside contender to succeed Pope John Paul II.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, British lawmakers voted on a government proposal setting out what PM Theresa May says are the options on how long to delay Brexit. The House of Commons voted 413-202 to ask the EU to delay the country's exit.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)(AP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 14, Flight recorders from a doomed Ethiopian Airlines flight arrived in France for analysis as frustrated relatives of the 157 people killed stormed out of a meeting with airline officials in Addis Ababa.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Greece reported that its unemployment rate, the highest in the 28-country European Union, climbed slightly to 18.7 percent in the final quarter of 2018.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, India and Pakistan agreed to go forward with a new border crossing and route for Sikh pilgrims to visit a holy temple in Pakistan, a rare glimmer of cooperation after tension flared over the neighbors' decades-old Kashmir dispute.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, In India part of a pedestrian bridge connecting a train station with road has collapsed in Mumbai, killing at least one person and injuring more than a dozen others.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Japan followed other countries on multiple continents in banning the Boeing 737 Max 8 and 9 aircraft from its airspace following the March 10 Ethiopian Airlines' crash.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Japan-based Toyota Motor Corp. announced it is investing an additional $750 million at five US plants that will bring nearly 600 new jobs, including the production of two hybrid vehicles for the first time at its Kentucky facility.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Malaysian prosecutors said the attorney-general has ordered the murder case to proceed against Doan Thi Huong, a Vietnamese woman accused in the killing of the estranged half-brother of North Korea's leader.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Malaysia ordered 111 schools to close as more than 200 children, teachers and others were taken to hospital after breathing in chemical fumes, but PM Mahathir Mohamad said he believed the poisoning crisis was under control.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Authorities in western Mexico found 19 plastic bags, presumably containing human bodies, in a township just east of the city of Guadalajara.
(AP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 14, Mozambique cancelled flights to several domestic destinations as a tropical cyclone, potentially the strongest to hit the country in nearly two decades, approached. Cyclone Idai hit Mozambique late today and continued on to Zimbabwe and Malawi. Over the next two days more than 140 people were killed, hundreds more were missing and tens of thousands left stranded in mainly poor, rural areas.
(AFP, 3/14/19)(AP, 3/16/19)(SSFC, 3/17/19, p.A7)
2019 Mar 14, NATO's 2018 annual report showed that the US-led alliance moved closer to a pledge to dedicate 2 percent of national economic output on defense every year, with European allies reaching the 1.51 percent level, a five-year high.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, In Pakistan a roadside bomb went off in a market near the town of Panjgur, Baluchistan province, killing two people and wounding seven.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Hundreds of Palestinians began taking to the streets in multiple locations throughout the Gaza Strip, protesting the rising cost of living in the Palestinian enclave. Over the next days dozens of people were arrested, including journalists and human rights workers, with security forces using violence to break up the demonstrations.
(AFP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 14, Philippine Pres. Rodrigo Duterte publicly named 46 government officials, including three congressmen, who he says are involved in illegal drugs, and said criminal investigations of them are underway.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, In the Philippines a spokesman for Manila Water Co. Inc., Jeric Sevilla, said that water supplies will be cut for at least six hours a day for an estimated 6.8 million people in more than a million households until the rainy season fills dams and reservoirs in May or June.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, In the Philippines Abu Dar, the leader of Dawla Islamiya, an alliance of pro-Islamic State fighters, was believed to be one of four rebels killed during fighting in Lanao del Sur province. The gunbattle that also left four soldiers dead near southern Tubaran town. DNA tests later confirmed his identity.
(Reuters, 3/15/19)(AP, 4/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Poland's Catholic Church leaders revealed that they have recorded cases of 382 priests abusing minors since 1990.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, The head of the state-backed Saudi human rights commission dismissed an international investigation into the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi as interference, and said everyone accused was already facing justice in the kingdom.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Slovak police and prosecutors said a suspect has been charged with ordering the slaying last year of an investigative reporter and his fiancee, a case that brought down the Slovak government. Slovakian media reported the suspect was Marian Kocner, a businessman long suspected of involvement in the crime. Kocner was already in detention in a separate case involving alleged forgery and securities crime.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, In Sudan hundreds of protesters chanting anti-government slogans took to the streets of several neighborhoods in Khartoum, while President Omar al-Bashir said he would seek dialogue with the opposition for the sake of stability.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, In eastern Syria Islamic State militants accompanied by women and children surrendered to the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in their hundreds as the jihadists lost ground to a US-backed assault on their last shred of territory. More than 15 militants were reported killed this morning.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Turkey's President Tayyip Erdogan opened one of the world's largest hospitals in Ankara, brushing aside criticism of what is the latest in a series of mega projects that have marked his 16 years in power. The Ankara City Hospital, built at a cost of around 1 billion euros, is equipped with some 3,810 beds and covers an area the size of around 100 football pitches.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, The United Nations said that no UN staff should travel on the Boeing 737 Max 8 planes.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, In Yemen the Saudi-led coalition launched a series of airstrikes along the Yemen-Saudi border that mistakenly killed 8 border guards and wounded 33 others allied with the government in the Jawf governorate.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 15, Pres. Donald Trump signed the first veto of his presidency, overriding congressional opposition to secure emergency funds to build more walls on the US-Mexico border.
(AFP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 15, The US State Department said that it is eliminating a coveted five-year tourist visa for Cubans, dealing a heavy blow to entrepreneurs and Cuban members of divided families, who used the visas to see relatives in the United States and buy precious supplies for their businesses on the island.
(AP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 15, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said the United States will revoke or deny visas to International Criminal Court personnel who attempt to investigate or prosecute alleged abuses committed by US forces in Afghanistan or elsewhere and may do the same with those who try to take action against Israel.
(AP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, The US Special Counsel's Office asked a court to delay sentencing for US President Donald Trump's former deputy campaign chairman, Rick Gates, amid "ongoing investigations" stemming from the Russia investigation.
(Reuters, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, The US Environmental Protection Agency banned consumer sales of a paint stripper following personal appeals by families of men who died while using the product. The rule does not affect commercial uses.
(SFC, 3/16/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 15, American poet W.S. Merwin died at his home in Hawaii. Merwin was a two-time winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the US poet laureate from 2010-2011.
(SFC, 3/18/19, p.C3)
2019 Mar 15, In Minnesota the body of a child was found inside a blanket along a highway near Austin. Dariaz Higgins, the father of Noelani Robinson (2), was accused of killing her mother, Sierra Robinson (24), in Milwaukee last week.
(SSFC, 3/17/19, p.A8)
2019 Mar 15, The Univ. of Tennessee said it will begin providing free tuition to state residents stating in the fall of 2020.
(SFC, 3/16/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 15, In Washington state a US District judge granted a temporary restraining order that let Microsoft take over 99 websites that Iranian hackers had used to try to steal sensitive information from targets in the US.
(SSFC, 3/31/19, p.D2)
2019 Mar 15, In Afghanistan Sultan Mahmoud Khirkhowa, a reporter with the local Zhman TV and radio, was killed when two men on a motorcycle opened fire on his vehicle in eastern Khost province.
(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 15, In Algeria a huge crowd of demonstrators marched through Algiers for a fourth consecutive Friday to step up demands for President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's ouster, rejecting his offer not to seek re-election.
(AFP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, In London Michael Seed , a 58-year-old man nicknamed "Basil," was found guilty of being the sixth member of a gang of aging criminals who carried out the 2015 Easter weekend robbery at the Hatton Garden Safety Deposit building, one the most audacious in the annals of British crime.
(Reuters, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, In northern China a landslide knocked down several buildings, killing seven people and leaving 13 others missing in Xiangning county, Shanxi province.
(AP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 15, In Congo DRC at least one person was left dead after protests over local elections turned violent. Members of President Felix Tshisekedi's Union for Democracy and Social Progress took to the streets in Kinshasa and in other parts of the country after the party failed to win any senate seats from Kinshasa in the regional assembly.
(AP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 15, The Catholic Church in Costa Rica asked for forgiveness following recent accusations that three of its priests sexually abused minors, amid a clerical abuse scandal that has ravaged the institution's credibility around the globe.
(Reuters, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, Czech police said they have broken up an international ring smuggling migrants from southeast Asia to western Europe.
(AP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, The EU imposed sanctions on eight more Russian officials that it says were involved in the seizure by Russia of Ukrainian ships and crew in November.
(AP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, Greece backed calls by Bolivia's left-wing President Evo Morales for a negotiated settlement to the severe political and financial crisis in Venezuela, in what marks a different approach to that pursued by key European allies.
(AP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, The Iraqi government started exhuming a mass grave left behind by the Islamic State group in the northwestern Sinjar region in the presence of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Nadia Murad, whose slain relatives are believed to have been buried in the area. Over 70 mass graves have been discovered in Sinjar since it was liberated from IS in November 2015.
(AP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 15, Israel struck dozens of Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip overnight in response to rockets from the Palestinian enclave, including rare fire toward its economic capital Tel Aviv.
(AFP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, In Kenya nations meeting at the UN environment assembly in Nairobi announced that they had agreed to "significantly reduce" single-use plastics over the next decade.
(AFP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, A court in North Macedonia sentenced 16 people, including a former interior minister, from 7 to 18 years in prison for their role in a violent intrusion in parliament at the height of a political crisis in 2017.
(AP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, In Poland thousands of students marched in rainy Warsaw and other cities to demand a ban on burning coal, a major source of carbon dioxide. Tens of thousands of young people skipped school across the globe to march through the streets for an international day of student protests aimed at pushing world leaders into action on climate change.
(AP, 3/15/19)(AFP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, In New Zealand shootings at two mosques in Christchurch left 50 dead in the country's worst-ever mass shooting. Video footage by the shooter was live streamed and widely shared online. Brenton Harrison Tarrant, an Australian-born man (28), was arrested and charged with murder. He left behind a 74-page document posted on social media under his name in which he said he hoped to survive the attack to better spread his views in the media.
(Reuters, 3/15/19)(AFP, 3/15/19)(AP, 3/16/19)(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 15, Nicaragua released 50 prisoners held for taking part in anti-government protests, authorities said, giving a fresh impetus to peace talks on ending the country's long running political crisis.
(AFP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, In eastern Syria the IS launched three suicide attacks outside Baghouz, killing six people as they fled the village near the Iraqi border. An SDF official said IS militants were holding some 300 prisoners, both civilians and SDF fighters.
(AFP, 3/16/19)(SFC, 3/16/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 15, Freeman Mbowe, the head of Tanzania's main opposition party, condemned what he described as a climate of fear installed by a "police state" after he was held in prison for more than three months.
(AFP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, A Turkish court convicted Neil Prakash (27), an Australian-born Islamic State militant, of belonging to a terror group and sentenced him to more than seven years in prison. The court said he could be released in 2½ years under Turkish law.
(AP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, Venezuela President Nicolas Maduro created a military unit charged with protecting basic installations and services such as electricity and water just over a week after the country was hit with a massive blackout.
(AFP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, In Venezuela German journalist Billy Six, detained by Venezuelan intelligence services four months ago, was freed in Caracas, but must report to the court every 15 days. Six was allowed to leave Venezuela if he chose and soon flew home from Caracas.
(AFP, 3/15/19)(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 15, Cyclone Idai hit Zimbabwe, cutting off power and communications. At least 31 people died in southeastern Zimbabwe as homes and bridges were swept away by the tropical storm. The confirmed dead soon rose to 98 with least 217 more missing.
(Reuters, 3/16/19)(SSFC, 3/17/19, p.A7)(AFP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 16, Facebook Inc said it removed 1.5 million videos globally of the New Zealand mosque attack in the first 24 hours after the attack.
(Reuters, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 16, It was reported that Michael R. White, a US Navy veteran from California, has been sentenced to 10 years in prison in Iran, becoming the first American known to be imprisoned there since President Donald Trump took office. White was reportedly convicted of insulting Iran's supreme leader and posting private information online.
(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 16, American rock guitarist Dick Dale (b.1937) died in Los Angeles. His loud chord instrumentals on songs like "Miserlou" and "Let's Go Trippin'" earned him the title King of the Surf Guitar.
(SFC, 3/19/19, p.A9)
2019 Mar 16, In Nevada a robbery suspect died following a shootout the previous evening outside the Bellagio hotel-casino in Las Vegas.
(SSFC, 3/17/19, p.A8)
2019 Mar 16, In Afghanistan at least 50 members of the Afghan security forces surrendered to the Taliban in a fight for control of the western province of Badghis. The Red Cross facilitated the handover of the bodies of 20 soldiers to the Afghan National Army Corps.
(Reuters, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 16, Albanian opposition supporters clashed with police while trying to storm the parliament building in a protest against the government of Socialist PM Edi Rama, which they accuse of being corrupt and linked to organized crime.
(AP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, The local bonfire group in Lustenau, Austria, took three months to build a structure that burned down in less than half an hour this evening. The world's tallest bonfire clocked in at 60.646 meters (198.97 feet). The previous record structure was a 47-meter (154.2-foot) bonfire in Alesund, Norway in 2016.
(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 16, Nigel Farage, the politician who probably did more than anyone else to force Britain's referendum on membership of the European Union, joined protesters at the start of a 270-mile march over what they call a betrayal of the Brexit vote.
(Reuters, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, China's anti-corruption watchdog said it would prosecute Nur Bekri, one of the highest-ranking Uighur officials in the country, over allegations of graft and corruption during his time as governor of Xinjiang province.
(Reuters, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, Several thousand Croats demonstrated in Zagreb, demanding tougher measures against domestic violence and more training for employees in state institutions to help them tackle the problem.
(AP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, In France demonstrators looted and torched shops and businesses on the famed Champs-Elysees avenue in Paris, on the 18th straight weekend of "yellow vest" protests.
(AFP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, Indonesia's anti-graft agency named Muhammad Romahurmuziy, a prominent Islamist politician backing President Joko Widodo's re-election campaign, as a suspect in a bribery case. Romahurmuziy, chairman of the United Development Party (PPP), was arrested a day earlier.
(Reuters, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, In Nicaragua riot police used tear gas against opposition demonstrators and reporters, temporarily detaining over a hundred people after they attempted to protest for the release of opponents to President Daniel Ortega's government.
(AFP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 16, In northeastern Nigeria a fire killed at least eight people and left 15,000 others without shelter after raging through a camp for people displaced by a war against Islamist insurgents in the town of Gajiram, Borno state.
(Reuters, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, Russia said it will respond to new European Union sanctions, without saying what action it would take.
(Reuters, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, Slovaks voted in round one of a ballot that could usher in Zuzana Caputova (45), a vocal government critic, as the country's first female president. Caputova, an anti-corruption campaigner with no experience in public office, won the first round, setting up a tough clash with the ruling Smer party's candidate.
(AP, 3/16/19)(Reuters, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, In eastern Syria US-backed forces battled Islamic State group fighters Saturday as the holdout jihadists clung to the last dregs of their crumbling "caliphate." The latest fighting broke out after the Kurd-led force attacked IS positions inside Baghouz. The SDF said around 32 jihadists, including at least four senior IS figures, were killed in the battle.
(AFP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, Two Turkish soldiers were killed and eight others were wounded in a clash during operations into northern Iraq. Six militants, including a woman, were "neutralized" during the operations.
(Reuters, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, Police in the Ukrainian city of Poltava arrested 10 people as nationalist demonstrators attempted to interrupt a campaign appearance by President Petro Poroshenko. In Kiev about 3,000 nationalists demonstrated outside the presidential administration building, demanding arrests in an alleged embezzlement scheme in Ukraine's defense industries that allegedly involves figures close to Poroshenko and a factory controlled by him.
(AP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 17, The Missouri River reached a record 30.2 feet in Iowa's Fremont County. Heavy rainfall and snowmelt caused flooding in Iowa, Kansas, Missouri and Nebraska with at least two deaths reported.
(SFC, 3/18/19, p.A8)
2019 Mar 17, Afghan officials said an overnight Taliban assault on checkpoints in northern Faryab province killed 22 troops.
(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, Algeria's Ministry of Religious Affairs informed clerics that they are no longer required to submit texts of their sermons to authorities for approval.
(Reuters, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 17, The French government faced heavy criticism over failing to maintain law and order during an arson and looting rampage by "yellow vest" protesters along the famous Champs-Elysees in Paris.
(AFP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, France's BEA air accident investigation said data from the flight data recorder of the Ethiopian jet that crashed last week has been successfully downloaded. BEA said the information has been transferred to Ethiopian investigators and that its technical work on the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder was now done.
(Reuters, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, Indonesian disaster officials said flash flood and mudslides triggered by days of torrential downpours have torn through mountainside villages in Papua province, killing at least 58 people and injuring 59 others.
(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, In Indonesia a magnitude 5.5 earthquake triggered a landslide that hit a popular waterfall on the tourist island of Lombok, killing at least two people and injuring dozens.
(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, Iran's President Hassan Rouhani inaugurated a new phase in the development of a massive natural gas field. The development will allow Iran to overtake Qatar in the production of natural gas.
(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, In Mali gunmen attacked and briefly seized an army base overnight, killing at least 16 soldiers and destroying five vehicles in the central Mopti region. Central Mali is the locus of the Macina Liberation Front, led by Salafist preacher and militant leader Amadou Koufa.
(Reuters, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, In Northern Ireland two 17-year-olds and a 16-year-old died after a crowd of revelers trying to get into a St. Patrick's Day event caused what appears to be a crush at the Greenvale Hotel in Cookstown.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 17, In Pakistan four people were killed and 10 injured when a bomb went off on a train track in the resource-rich province of Baluchistan.
(Reuters, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, A Palestinian stabbed an Israeli soldier to death in the occupied West Bank and used his rifle to wound another soldier and a Jewish settler before escaping.
(Reuters, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, Serbia's Pres. Aleksandar Vucic pledged to defend the country's law and order a day after opposition supporters stormed the national TV station protesting what they said is his autocratic rule and firm control of the media. Thousands of demonstrators rallied around the presidential palace in Belgrade to protest the speech by Vucic.
(AP, 3/17/19)(AFP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, In Somalia a US air strike killed four people near the town of Afgoye. The US Africa Command (AFRICOM) later said it carried out the air strike and that three militants had died in the attack.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 17, In eastern Syria Lorenzo Orsetti (33), an Italian fighting alongside the Kurdish-led YPG force, was killed in battle as he fought diehard jihadists in the village of Baghouz.
(AFP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 17, Hundreds of Sudanese took part in anti-government protests in the capital and other cities as the government announced it had secured $300 million in loans to address the economic crisis that triggered the unrest.
(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, In eastern Syria the SDF admitted to facing difficulties defeating the IS extremists, saying they were being slowed by mines, tunnels and concerns over harming women and children still in Baghouz. The SDF said it would no longer estimate how many people remained, but said recent evacuees told the fighting forces that another 5,000 were still inside.
(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, In Turkey Kurdish activist Zulkuf Gezen died late today. He was one of scores of detainees on hunger strike in support of a Kurdish lawmaker in Diyarbakir. He reportedly hanged himself after 12 years in prison on charges of membership of the PKK Kurdish militant group.
(AFP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, US federal authorities said 1 million pounds (0.45 million kg) of pork products allegedly smuggled from China have been seized at a New Jersey port. Officials feared the meat could be contaminated with African swine fever virus, which has killed more than a million pigs in China.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Former Pennsylvania pediatrician Johnnie Barto was sentenced to at least 79 years in prison for the sexual assault of 31 children, most of them patients.
(SFC, 3/19/19, p.A8)
2019 Mar 18, A group of big internet companies added more than 800 different versions of the New Zealand mosque shooting video to a shared database used to block violent terrorist images and videos.
(AP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 18, The world's biggest plane maker faced escalating pressure after Ethiopia pointed to parallels between its crash and one in Indonesia, sharpening focus on the safety of software installed in Boeing's 737 MAX planes.
(Reuters, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro visited the Central Intelligence Agency's headquarters, an unusual move for a foreign head of state that was not on the public agenda for his first official trip to Washington.
(Reuters, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, In Chechnya Oyub Titiev, who runs the office of the Memorial Human Rights Center in the southern Russian region, was sentenced to four years in a penal settlement after he was found guilty of possessing illegal drugs. His supporters say he was framed, with the drugs planted in his car.
(AP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 18, China reported that it has arrested nearly 13,000 people, described as terrorists, and broken up hundreds of "terrorist gangs" in Xinjiang since 2014.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, In Congo DRC 32 people were killed and 91 others injured when a freight train carrying stowaways derailed overnight in central Kasai province.
(AFP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, In Crimea Russian flags flew across Simferopol as Pres. Vladimir Putin flew in to mark the fifth anniversary of Moscow's internationally condemned annexation of the peninsula from Ukraine. Putin inaugurated two new power stations in Crimea.
(AFP, 3/18/19)(Reuters, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, In Egypt new regulations were published in the official gazette late today, allowing the Supreme Media Regulatory Council to block websites and accounts for "fake news," and impose stiff penalties of up to 250,000 Egyptian pounds ($14,400), all without having to obtain a court order.
(AP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 18, The European Union and NATO condemned Russia's 2014 annexation of Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula five years after Moscow declared the region Russian territory.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, French PM Edouard Phillipe announced a ban on "yellow vest" protests on Paris' Champs-Elysees avenue and two other cities.
(SFC, 3/19/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 18, An Indian police official said a protester and a policeman have died in clashes outside Vedanta Ltd's eastern Indian alumina refinery in Odisha state.
(Reuters, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Indonesian officials said the number of people killed after torrential downpours triggered flash floods and mudslides that tore through mountainside villages in Papua province has climbed to 79.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, An Indonesian official and veterinarian said that an endangered orangutan with a young baby on Sumatra island was blinded after being shot at least 74 times with an air gun last week. The baby died from malnutrition as rescuers rushed the two animals to an orangutan veterinary clinic.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, An Iraqi court sentenced Bilal al-Marchohi (23), a Belgian man, to death by hanging for being part of the Islamic State militant group. He was one of dozens of foreign nationals facing the death penalty in Iraq.
(Reuters, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Israel's military expanded its massive manhunt for a Palestinian assailant as authorities announced that a second Israeli died of wounds sustained in a West Bank shooting attack the previous day.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Milan's Mayor Giuseppe Sala said Italy's famed La Scala opera house will immediately return 3 million euros ($3.4 million) sent to an escrow account by Saudi Arabia. He did not rule out future dealings with the kingdom despite concerns raised over its human rights record.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, It was reported that military roadblocks on Kashmir's main highway are delaying ambulances carrying patients and leading to confrontations with motorists that occasionally turn physical.
(Reuters, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Mozambique's President Filipe Nyusi said that more than 1,000 may have by killed by Cyclone Idai. The official death count stood at 84. The Red Cross said that 90 percent of Beira, a city of 500,000, had been damaged or destroyed. The death toll in Malawi from heavy rains and flooding stood at 56 as of last week.
(AP, 3/18/19)(Reuters, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Dutch police launched a huge manhunt for a gunman who killed three people and wounded nine others in a suspected terror attack inside a tram in Utrecht. Turkish-born suspect Gokmen Tanis (37) was arrested after a seven-hour manhunt by security forces. Two other suspects were also in custody, but were soon released. Another suspect was arrested the next day. On March 20, 2020, Tanis was sentenced to life in prison for killing four people.
(AFP, 3/18/19)(Reuters, 3/19/19)(SFC, 3/20/19, p.A2)(SFC, 3/21/20, p.A3)
2019 Mar 18, It was reported that Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed bills restricting online media and making a criminal of anyone who insults the state, laws that critics see as part of Kremlin efforts to stifle criticism and tighten media control.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Dozens of Serbian high school students have staged a sit-down protest demanding that authorities release a fellow student who was jailed during weekend anti-government protests in Serbia.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Scores of Sudanese protesters chanting "freedom, peace, justice" rallied in Khartoum, as a campaign against President Omar al-Bashir's rule was poised to enter its fourth month.
(AFP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Syria's the defence minister warned that government forces will reclaim control of northeastern areas controlled by the US-backed Kurds, whether by force or through reconciliation.
(AFP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, In eastern Syria US-backed SDF forces battled holdout jihadists after a night of shelling and heavy air strikes.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Turkey and Iran carried out a joint operation against militants from the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) on Turkey's eastern border.
(Reuters, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, A UN report released today showed an increase in allegations of sexual abuse and exploitation by staff working in UN agencies and their partner organizations.
(AFP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Pope Francis turned down an offer to resign by French Roman Catholic cardinal Philippe Barbarin (68), but suggested he stand aside "for a while." Barbarin, the archbishop of Lyon, was recently convicted of failing to report a known predator priest to police.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, President Donald Trump hosted Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, the so-called Trump of the Tropics, launching what officials tout as a new alliance between their right-wing governments.
(AFP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, The United States imposed sanctions against Venezuela's state-run mining company Minerven and its president, Adrian Perdomo, in a bid to further cut off funding to the government of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, The US Supreme Court ruled 5-4 to uphold the Trump administration's power to arrest and hold immigrants indefinitely if they have past crimes on their records that could trigger deportation.
(SFC, 3/20/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 19, A federal jury in San Francisco found that Monsanto's Roundup was a likely cause of a Sonoma man's non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. Edwin Hardeman (70) was diagnosed with the cancer in 2015 after spraying Roundup on his property for decades. On March 27 a jury awarded Hardeman more than $80 million. This included $75 million in punitive damages against Monsanto. On July 15 a judge lowered the award to $25.2 million.
(SFC, 3/20/19, p.C1)(SFC, 3/28/19, p.A1)(SFC, 7/16/19, p.C1)
2019 Mar 19, In Washington state sheriff's deputy Ryan Thompson (42) was killed during an exchange of gunfire with a road rage driving suspect near the town of Kittitas. The suspect was also shot in the exchange and later died in the hospital.
(http://tinyurl.com/y3w22md7)(SFC, 3/21/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 19, The US FDA approved a new drug, brexanalone, made by Sage Therapeutics, as the first drug to treat postpartum depression. Infusion will average $34,000 per patient before discounts.
(SFC, 3/21/19, p.A8)
2019 Mar 19, In Algeria thousands of students, university professors and health workers rallied in Algiers calling for President Abdelaziz Bouteflika to quit, and a new group headed by activists and opposition figures told the army not to interfere.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, Brazilian physicist and astronomer Marcelo Gleiser was awarded the 2019 Templeton Prize, worth $1.4 million, for his work blending science and spirituality. Gleiser, a professor at Dartmouth College, New Hampshire, has written best-selling books and appeared on numerous TV and radio shows, discussing science as a spiritual quest to understand the origins of the universe and life on Earth.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, In Colombia former Southampton and Portsmouth midfielder Jhon Viafara (40) was arrested near Cali on a US drug warrant. A month ago, former national team defender Diego Leon Osorio was convicted for distributing narcotics.
(AP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 19, In western Ethiopia gunmen shot and killed five workers from a mining company near Nedjo town in the restive Oromiya region.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, French authorities reopened a case against Russian billionaire Suleyman Kerimov and indicted him for tax fraud in connection with the suspicious purchase of five luxury villas in southern France.
(AFP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 19, Hundreds of Indian traders in New Delhi burned Chinese goods and urged the government to raise import taxes on them to protest against China's trade and foreign policies. Chinese good were burned in similar protests in several other cities.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, Indonesian officials said the number of people killed after torrential downpours triggered flash floods and mudslides in Papua province has climbed to 89.
(SFC, 3/20/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 19, In Iraq three soldiers were killed and five wounded in an ambush on an army patrol in Tarmiyah, 50 km north of Baghdad.
(AP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, Tsunekazu Takeda (71) said he is stepping down as the president of the Japanese Olympic Committee amid a vote-buying scandal that French investigators suspect helped Tokyo land next year's Olympics. He again denied corruption allegations against him.
(AP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, Protests flared in parts of Indian Kashmir after police said a man being questioned in connection with a security investigation had died in custody. Rizwan Asad Pandit, a chemistry graduate who taught at a private school, had been arrested as part of a "terror case investigation".
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, Indonesian officials said the number of people killed after torrential downpours triggered flash floods and mudslides in Papua province has climbed to 89.
(SFC, 3/20/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 19, Kazakhstan's President Nursultan Nazarbayev (78), the only leader that the independent country has ever known, abruptly announced his resignation after three decades in power, raising uncertainty over the future course of the country.
(AP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, A boat carrying 27 people sank near Libya's coastal town of Sabratha. A baby's body was found after the shipwreck. At least eight migrants were missing at sea.
(AFP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, Aid workers in Mozambique said rapidly rising floodwaters have created "an inland ocean" endangering scores of thousands of families, as they scrambled to rescue survivors of Cyclone Idai who clung to rooftops and trees.
(AP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, In Myanmar at least six people were wounded in gunfire as government soldiers hunted ethnic Rakhine insurgents in the western town of Mrauk U.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, The Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters announced in Oslo that Karen Keskulla Uhlenbeck of the University of Texas at Austin was this year's winner of the Abel Prize, seen by many as the Nobel Prize in mathematics.
(AP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, Philippine authorities seized methamphetamine concealed in tea wrappers and biscuit cans in their second-largest drug haul this year. Three Chinese nationals and a Chinese-Filipino interpreter were arrested.
(AP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 19, Switzerland's parliament approved allowing convicted militants to be sent home to countries where they could face torture, leaving the government to decide how to implement the motion without breaking international law.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, In eastern Syria US-backed Syrian forces took control of an encampment held by the Islamic State group in eastern Syria, after dozens of militants surrendered overnight. An unknown number of militants still clung to a tiny sliver of land about 200 meters by 200 meters trapped between the Euphrates River and the encampment now held by the SDF.
(AP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, The UAE said 11 Arab states including Saudi Arabia, Algeria and Morocco have signed on to the first regional team to cooperate on a space program at the Global Space Congress in Abu Dhabi.
(AFP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, In Zambia two workers died in an accident at Glencore's operation Mopani Copper Mines (MCM), prompting it to suspend production pending investigations.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 20, In Los Angeles a pregnant woman was stabbed multiple times during a carjacking in a San Fernando Valley neighborhood. Two people were soon taken into custody.
(SFC, 3/23/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 20, Philadelphia health officials said 74 people have contracted mumps at Temple Univ. This included 15 confirmed and 59 probable cases.
{Pennsylvania, USA, Microbiology}
(SFC, 3/21/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 20, Afghanistan's election board said the presidential election has been postponed by two months to Sept. 28, as authorities tried to iron out problems with the voting process.
(Reuters, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, Albania's Pres. Ilir Meta said he would be ready to resign from his post — or even to kill himself — if it would help resolve his country's political crisis.
(AP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, Algeria's ruling FLN party said it fully supports protesters, dealing one of the heaviest blows to President Abdelaziz Bouteflika since mass demonstrations against his rule began nearly a month ago.
(Reuters, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, Britain's PM Theresa May asked for a three-month delay to Brexit on to buy time to get her twice-rejected departure deal though parliament, but the request faced immediate resistance from the European Commission.
(Reuters, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, Diamond tycoon Nirav Modi, whose jewels once adorned stars from Bollywood to Hollywood, was ordered held without bail in London, more than a year after Indian authorities alleged he was involved in a $1.8 billion bank fraud.
(AP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, Britain's historic National Portrait Gallery said it has cancelled a £1 million ($1.3 million, 1.1 million euros) donation from the Sackler family, which is accused of contributing to the US opioid crisis. The Sackler Trust, run by the family that owns the controversial Purdue Pharma, which sells the prescription painkiller OxyContin.
(AFP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, European Union regulators fined Google 1.49 billion euros ($1.7 billion) for abusing its dominant role in online advertising, the third big antitrust penalty they've given the internet giant since 2017.
(AP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, Finland topped the UN index of the happiest nations for the second consecutive year, with researchers saying the small Nordic country of 5.5 million has succeeded in generating a happiness recipe for a balanced life not simply dependent on economic and material wealth. Denmark, Norway and Iceland took the next spots. The remaining top ten nations were The Netherlands, Switzerland, Sweden, New Zealand, Canada and Austria. The United States dropped from the 18th to 19th place.
(AP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, An Indian court acquitted four Hindu men accused of bombing a train between India and Pakistan on Feb. 19, 2007, that killed 68 people, mostly Pakistanis, citing a lack of evidence.
(Reuters, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, The Italian parliament blocked prosecutors from pursuing an investigation into Deputy PM Matteo Salvini for abuse of power and kidnapping migrants.
(Reuters, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, Marcello De Vito, president of Rome's city council and a senior figure in Italy's ruling 5-Star Movement, was arrested for allegedly accepting bribes in a widening corruption scandal centered on AS Roma's long-delayed plans to build a new stadium.
(Reuters, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, Japanese police arrested an American man on suspicion of fatally stabbing his Japanese wife at a court where they were to settle a divorce at the entrance to Tokyo Family Court.
(AP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, In Kazakhstan Kassym-Jomart Tokayev (65), speaker of the upper chamber of parliament, was officially sworn in as interim president. Dariga Nazarbayeva (55), the eldest daughter of the outgoing leader, was appointed speaker of parliament, fueling speculation that she may succeed her father as president after next year's election. Nazarbayev remained chairman of the security council and leader of the ruling party. Tokayev immediately proposed changing the name of the capital from Astana to Nursultan (Sultan of Light). Parliament approved the change within hours.
(AP, 3/20/19)(AFP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, In Mozambique aid workers scrambled to save hundreds trapped by floods around the port city of Beira. At least 200 people have died in Mozambique and 98 in Zimbabwe, but the death toll is likely to rise as rescuers are still finding bodies.
(Reuters, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, In the Netherlands right wing populist Thierry Baudet's Forum for Democracy emerged from the sidelines into the Dutch political mainstream as the biggest winner in provincial elections that determine the makeup of the parliament's upper house and also impact the coalition government of PM Mark Rutte.
(AP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 20, A Pakistani student stabbed a college professor to death in Bahawalpur, apparently because he felt that a planned party that women were going to be involved with would be un-Islamic.
(Reuters, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, A Pakistani court sentenced Czech model Tereza Hluskova (22) to eight years and eight months in prison on charges of drug trafficking. Hluskova was arrested in possession of 8.5 kg, or 19 pounds, of heroin in January 2018 at the Lahore airport from where she was heading to Ireland via Dubai, the United Arab Emirates.
(AP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, Ahmad Manasra (22) was traveling home from a wedding when he spotted a family in distress on the side of a West Bank road. Moments later, the Palestinian was fatally shot while another Palestinian driver was seriously wounded — both by an Israeli soldier in a nearby watchtower. In 2020 a plea bargain offered the soldier three months of community service. In Dec. 2020, an Israeli military tribunal upheld the contentious plea bargain.
(AP, 9/8/20)(AP, 12/10/20)
2019 Mar 20, The five parties of the Slovenian center-left government coalition signed an agreement of cooperation with the opposition Left party to secure support for its main projects over the next year.
(Reuters, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, South Korean police said they have arrested two men for using illegal spy cameras at motels to film and livestream videos of about 1,600 guests, raking in about 7 million won ($6,200) over the past three months.
(Reuters, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 20, Ukraine's Pres. Petro Poroshenko ordered new sanctions against Russian companies and individuals involved in construction and other activities in Crimea.
(SFC, 3/21/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 20, UN judges sentenced former Bosnian Serb political leader Radovan Karadzic to life in prison on appeal, ending one of the most momentous trials over massacres and other atrocities committed during the Balkan wars of the 1990s.
(Reuters, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, The UN human rights chief warned that children in Yemen continued to be killed and maimed at an alarming rate, despite a three-month-old truce in Hodeida. The UN said thousands of tons of food aid near the port city of Hodeida is infested with insects and must be fumigated to feed millions of people.
(AP, 3/20/19)(AFP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, Vietnamese police arrested eight Chinese suspected of drug trafficking after seizing 300 kg (660 pounds) of methamphetamine worth up to $26 million.
(AP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, Pres. Donald Trump signed an executive order requiring colleges and universities to protect free speech or loose federal funding for research.
(SFC, 3/22/19, p.A9)
2019 Mar 21, The Trump administration sanctioned two Chinese shipping companies, Dalian Haibo International Freight Co., because they are suspected of helping North Korea evade sanctions.
(AP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 21, US President Donald Trump's recognized Israeli sovereignty over the occupied Syrian Golan Heights. The Golan Heights are scattered with villages inhabited by 22,000 Druze, an Arab minority who practice an offshoot of Islam. Around 20,000 Jewish settlers live in the Golan itself, many working in farming, leisure and tourism.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 21, San Francisco-based Levi Strauss made its debut on the New York Stock Exchange and rose more than 30% to $22.41 per share. The company had already gone public in 1971 and was taken private by the Haas family in 1985.
(SFC, 3/22/19, p.A1)
2019 Mar 21, Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant signed one of the strictest abortion laws in the nation. The measure, effective July 1, bans most abortions once a fetal heartbeat can be detected.
(SFC, 3/22/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 21, Missouri Gov. Mike Parson declared a state of emergency following extensive flooding.
(SFC, 3/22/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 21, Schools were closed in Charlottesville, Va., after a 17-year-old made online racist threats. Nine schools were closed for two days and the teen faced a felony charge.
(SFC, 3/23/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 21, A Wisconsin circuit court judge blocked Republicans' contentious lame-duck laws limiting the powers of new Democratic Gov. Tom Evers.
(SFC, 3/22/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 21, The US Distilled Spirits Council said American whiskey producers are suffering a worsening hangover from the Trump administration's trade disputes.
(AP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, In Afghanistan a string of bombs exploded near a Shiite shrine and cemetery in Kabul as people gathered to mark Nowruz, the Persian new year, leaving six people dead and as many as 20 wounded.
(AP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, In Albania several thousand opposition protesters tried to enter the parliament building calling for the government's resignation and an early election.
(AP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, Brazil's former President Michel Temer was arrested in an investigation of alleged graft in the construction of nuclear plant Angra 3, rattling the political class and threatening to delay a major pension reform.
(Reuters, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, British PM Theresa May said a short delay to Britain's departure from the European Union would give parliament time to make a final choice on Brexit.
(Reuters, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, In eastern China a huge explosion rocked a chemical plant killed at least 64 people and injured more than 600 at the Chenjiagang Industrial Park in Yancheng city, Jiangsu province. More than two dozen people were missing. The death toll soon rose to 78.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)(AP, 3/23/19)(Reuters, 3/23/19)(AFP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 21, Human Rights Watch reported that authorities in China and Myanmar are failing to stop the brutal trafficking of young women, often teenagers, from the conflict-ridden Kachin region for sexual slavery.
(AP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, Congo DRC's health ministry said a six-month-old baby in the eastern city of Bunia has died of Ebola, becoming the first fatality of the disease in a provincial capital.
(AFP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, In Egypt at least 10 people were killed in an explosion at a chemical plant in Ain Sokhna on the Red Sea coast.
(AFP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, EU leaders told British PM Theresa May she can have two months to organize an orderly Brexit. More than one million people have rushed to sign a petition on the British parliament's website calling for the government to revoke its divorce notice to the European Union and remain in the bloc. Backers of Brexit said the petition needed to attract more signatures than the 17.4 million people who voted to leave the EU three years ago before anyone should take any notice.
(Reuters, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, Wikipedia's German-language page was blacked out in protest of a proposal to change European Union copyright rules.
(AP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, Berlin police made nine arrests late today after a fight broke out on the Alexanderplatz in the city center among some 400 backers of two rival stars of YouTube.
(AFP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 21, In Iraq a ferry overloaded with people celebrating the Kurdish new year sank in the Tigris River near Mosul, killing at least 100 people, mostly women and children.
(AFP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 21, Mozambique authorities said the death toll in the country has risen to 217 and around 15,000 people, many of them very ill, still need to be rescued. In neighboring Zimbabwe, the death toll from Cyclone Idai jumped to 139.
(Reuters, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, In Myanmar six villagers were killed and five injured in Rakhine state late today amid clashes between government troops and ethnic Rakhine rebels.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 21, The government of New Zealand announced a ban on "military-style" semi-automatic firearms and high-capacity magazines, just a week after such weapons were used in attacks on two mosques in the city of Christchurch that killed 50 people.
(AP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, A Pakistani anti-terrorism court sentenced two men, including a local government official, to life in prison for their role in the brutal campus lynching two years ago of Mashal Khan (23), a university student accused of blasphemy.
(Reuters, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, Two former Philippine officials said they filed a complaint last week with the International Criminal Court accusing Chinese Pres. Xi Jinping of crimes against humanity over his government's assertive actions in the disputed South China Sea, which they say deprived thousands of fishermen of their livelihood and destroyed the environment.
(AP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, A Serbian court sentenced seven people, three of them in absentia, to up to 11 years in prison for joining Islamic State and conspiring to recruit others to fight for the militants in Syria and elsewhere.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 21, In South Korea K-pop singer and television celebrity, Jung Joon-young, was arrested over accusations he shared his secret sex videos.
(Reuters, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir appointed ruling party head Ahmed Haroun, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC), as an assistant.
(Reuters, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, In Switzerland a woman (75), who wasn't named, stabbed to death a boy (7) as he walked home from school. She was arrested shortly after the attack in the northwestern city of Basel. The boy's family was originally from Kosovo and police investigations indicated he hadn't known the attacker.
(AP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 21, In eastern Syria Kurdish-led forces combed the banks of the Euphrates to smoke out the last jihadists preventing the much-delayed announcement of the demise of the Islamic State's "caliphate".
(AFP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, The International Rescue Committee said 12 people died overnight after arriving at a camp in northeastern Syria from Islamic State's final enclave at Baghouz. Some 2,000 women and children arrived at the al-Hol camp from Baghouz.
(Reuters, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, Venezuelan intelligence agents detained Roberto Marrero, the chief of staff of opposition leader Juan Guaido, during a pre-dawn raid, putting to the test repeated US warnings that President Nicolas Maduro should not go after his opponents.
(Reuters, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 22, US President Donald Trump met with five Caribbean leaders who have sided with the United States and most Western countries in backing Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido as head of state. Trump met with leaders from the Bahamas, Dominican Republic, Haiti, Jamaica and Saint Lucia at his private club in Palm Beach, Florida.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, The Trump administration hit Iran with new sanctions while Secretary of State Mike Pompeo denounced Iran's growing influence on a visit to Lebanon.
(AP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, President Donald Trump said he is reversing his administration's decision to slap new sanctions on North Korea, ordering them withdrawn.
(AP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 22, US Attorney General William Barr received special counsel Robert Mueller's confidential report on the Russia investigation.
(AP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 22, In Arizona Fernando Acosta (25) fatally stabbed Martha Tye in Peoria after their car veered off a freeway and crashed in the Phoenix suburb. A passer-by tackled the suspect and others helped to hold him until police arrived.
(SFC, 3/25/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 22, In Fresno, Ca., a one-year-old boy was fatally mauled by two roaming rottweiler dogs in the front yard of his home.
(SSFC, 3/24/19, p.A10)
2019 Mar 22, In Michigan an agreement was announced between the state and attorneys for the ACLU in which faith-based adoption agencies paid by the state will no longer be able to turn away couples or individuals because of religious objections.
(SSFC, 3/24/19, p.A13)
2019 Mar 22, A US federal judge ruled that New York state's ban on personal ownership of stun guns is unconstitutional.
(SSFC, 3/24/19, p.A10)
2019 Mar 22, Texas sheriff's Deputy Peter Herrera was critically wounded during a traffic stop in San Elizario. Gunman Facundo Chavez (27) was arrested. Herrera died of his wounds on March 24.
(SFC, 3/26/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 22, In Texas benzene and other contaminants seeped into a portion of the Houston Ship Channel after a dike failed near a fire-ravaged petrochemical tank farm.
(SSFC, 3/24/19, p.A10)
2019 Mar 22, In Afghanistan two American service members were killed during an operation. A suicide bomber killed one person and injured four, all members of the same family, in an attack in the southern province of Kandahar. The Taliban attacked two outposts in Sangin, killing 48 Afghan security personnel. Taliban spokesman Qari Yousuf Ahmadi said the two outposts were over-run, killing 52 Afghan troops and wounding 11 more.
(AP, 3/22/19)(Reuters, 3/22/19)(Reuters, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 22, Tens of thousands of Algerians rallied to demand the immediate resignation of Pres. Abdelaziz Bouteflika, who is fighting for his political survival in the face of relentless protests and the desertion of long-time allies.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, Scott Walker (76), the influential singer, songwriter and producer whose hits with the Walker Brothers in the 1960s included "The Sun Ain't Gonna Shine Anymore," died in London.
(AP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 22, In Canada Vlad Cristian Eremia (26) stabbed priest Claude Grou (77) in front of his congregation live on television during mass at St Joseph's Oratory in Montreal.
(AFP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 22, Chadian security sources said Boko Haram militants killed at least 23 Chadian soldiers overnight in the town of Dangdala, near the banks of Lake Chad.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, In Chile a group of South American presidents formed Prosur, a new regional bloc to replace Unasur, founded in 2008. The new bloc included Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Paraguay and Peru.
(SSFC, 3/24/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar 22, China said it will look into charges against two Chinese firms sanctioned by the US because they are suspected of helping North Korea evade sanctions.
(AP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, In China a document by the Communist Youth League (CYL) said it aimed to organize more than 10 million volunteering trips by 2022 for students pursuing technical degrees, seeking to deepen a "rural rejuvenation" drive christened by Xi.
(Reuters, 4/12/19)
2019 Mar 22, A Chinese court fined the firm behind the now-defunct Fanya Nonferrous Metals Exchange 1 billion yuan ($149.04 million) for illegal fundraising and sentenced founder Shan Jiuliang 18 years in prison for crimes including embezzlement.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, In central China a fire on a tour bus traveling along a highway left 26 people dead and as many as 30 injured in Changde, Hunan province.
(AP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, Egypt's Musicians Union barred singer Sherine Abdel-Wahab, popularly known by her first name, from performing after she suggested that Egypt does not respect free speech. It also summoned her for questioning. The singer apologized again after the latest remarks in a TV interview saying she was joking.
(AP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 22, The European Union underlined it does not recognize Israel's sovereignty over the Golan Heights after US President Donald Trump moved to do so for the territory viewed by European allies as occupied.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, The EU rejected PM May's request to extend the Brexit deadline until June 30. Leaders agreed to extend the date until May 22, on the eve of EU elections, if she can persuade the British Parliament to endorse her deal. Failing that she would have until April 12 to choose a new path.
(SFC, 3/23/19, p.A3)
2019 Mar 22, In Germany police arrested 11 people in raids around Frankfurt on a group suspected of planning an Islamic extremist attack using a vehicle and firearms.
(SSFC, 3/24/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar 22, Hungarian authorities detained a Syrian man accused of taking part in beheadings in Syria as a member of Islamic State.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, Indian security forces killed seven militants who they said belonged to Pakistan-based groups during four gunbattles in Kashmir - the highest number of clashes in a single day in recent years. Police said the militants belonged to Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM).
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, Indonesian airline Garuda said it plans to cancel a $6 billion order for Boeing 737 MAX jets, saying some passengers would be frightened to board the plane after two fatal crashes. Analysts said the deal had long been in doubt.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, Indonesian authorities detained a Russian man at Ngurah Rai airport in Bali as he was caught trying to smuggle a young orangutan in a suitcase. Zhestkov Andrei also had two live geckos and five lizards in his luggage and was scheduled to fly to Russia.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)(AFP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 22, Italy's Pres. Sergio Mattarella told visiting Chinese President Xi Jinping that China's new "Silk Road" linking Europe and Asia must be a "two-way street," addressing concerns among Western allies that the colossal infrastructure project is meant merely to amplify Beijing's global influence.
(AP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, In Italy a 5-month-old baby was brought to a hospital in Bologna by helicopter in cardiac arrest due to a home circumcision and soon died.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 22, The confirmed death toll in Mozambique and neighboring Zimbabwe reached 432, with 293 killed in Mozambique, and around 1.7 million people affected. Hundreds of thousands of people scrambled for shelter, food and water across a swathe of southern Africa.
(AFP, 3/22/19)(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, New Zealand's deputy prime minister Winston Peters said Brenton Harrison Tarrant, the gunman accused of killing 50 people in two mosques in the South Pacific nation, would spend the rest of his life in isolation in prison.
(AP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, North Korea abruptly withdrew its staff from a liaison office with South Korea, a development that is likely to put a damper on ties between the countries and further complicate global diplomacy on North Korea's nuclear program.
(AP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, In Pakistan gunmen on motorcycles opened fire on a convoy carrying Maulana Taqi Usmani, a prominent religious scholar, and his associates in the southern port city of Karachi, killing the cleric's two guards and seriously wounding his driver.
(AP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, Two Palestinians were killed by Israeli fire in separate border clashes.
(AFP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 22, Prosecutors said Panama's ex-president Ricardo Martinelli faces up to 21 years in jail for spying on political foes, reporters and business leaders while in power.
(AFP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 22, A Russian court sentenced Pavlo Gryb (20), a Ukrainian teenager, to six years in prison for plotting a bombing in a Russian school. He was kidnapped in summer 2017 in Belarus where he had traveled to meet a girl he met online. He later surfaced in a Russian prison. The girl turned out to be an officer from the Russian intelligence services who was messaging him on her behalf shortly before his trip. Gryb's family said he suffers from cirrhosis of the liver and partial vision loss, urgently needs surgery and may die in a Russian prison.
(AP, 3/22/19)(AFP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, The Swiss government said Britons will be exempt from visa requirements to enter Switzerland in case Britain leaves the EU without a withdrawal agreement.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, Turkey's lira tumbled more than 4 percent against the US dollar, its biggest one-day fall since a currency crisis took hold in August, raising concerns that Turks are buying more foreign cash as ties with Washington deteriorate.
(Reuters, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 22, The UN Human Rights Council criticized Israeli settlement expansion in the occupied Syrian Golan Heights a day after US President Donald Trump's decision to recognize Israeli sovereignty over the disputed territory.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido said Pres. Maduro had lost the ability to "finance political blackmail" to retain power thanks to pressure brought by foreign governments who have recognized him as the South American country's rightful leader in the midst of a hyperinflationary economic collapse.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, A student (16) at the Parkland, Florida, high school, where 17 people were killed in a mass shooting last year, took his own life. A week earlier student Sydney Aiello (19) took her own life. Her mother said she suffered from PTSD and survivor's guilt.
(SFC, 3/25/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 23, In southern Afghanistan a twin bombing at a public ceremony killed at least four people, including a provincial official, and wounded more than 30 in Lashkar Gah, Helmand province. In the north US air strikes in Kunduz province killed about a dozen civilians, as battle intensified there and in southern Helmand province. Four Afghan soldiers died in the fight.
(AP, 3/23/19)(Reuters, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 23, Hundreds of lawyers in Algeria marched in the country's capital, Algiers, to demand the departure of ailing 82-year-old President Abdelaziz Bouteflika at the end of his term scheduled on April 28.
(AP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, Cyclone Trevor made landfall along a remote stretch of the northern Australian coast, bringing fierce winds and heavy rains amid safety fears for a small number of residents who've stayed in the area. Meanwhile Cyclone Veronica, another category 4 system, was expected to cross the northwest Australian coast late today.
(AP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, Hundreds of thousands of people opposed to Britain's withdrawal from the EU marched through central London to demand a new referendum as the deepening Brexit crisis risked sinking PM Theresa May's premiership.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, Bulgarian Justice Minister Tsetska Tsacheva resigned following media reports that she and three other ruling center-right GERB party politicians have bought luxurious apartments at below market prices. Deputy Sports Minister Vanya Koleva also resigned over the deals.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, French "yellow vest" demonstrators began their 19th consecutive weekend of protests against President Emmanuel Macron's government as military units were deployed to help police clamp down on any trouble.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, Iraqi PM Adel Abdul Mahdi sought Egypt's support for efforts to tackle Islamist militants in the region during a visit to Cairo his first trip abroad since taking office in October.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, Ireland extradited dual citizen Eric Eoin Marques (33) to the US, where he faced charges of conspiracy to advertise and distribute child pornography. Prosecutors said Marques hosted an anonymous hosting service on the darknet that spread the porn for five years.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 23, Italy endorsed China's ambitious "Belt and Road" infrastructure plan, becoming the first major Western power to back the initiative to help revive the struggling Italian economy. The signing ceremony was the highlight of a three-day trip to Italy by Chinese President Xi Jinping. Italian firms also inked deals with Chinese counterparts worth an initial 2.5 billion euros ($2.8 billion).
(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, In Kazakhstan the order to change Astana's name to Nur-Sultan was issued by interim President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, who took power after Nursultan Nazarbayev resigned March 19.
(AP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, In Libya relatives and supporters of Abdullah al-Senussi, a Kadhafi-era intelligence chief jailed for his alleged role in a bloody crackdown during the country's 2011 uprising, protested in Tripoli to demand his release over health concerns.
(AFP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, In central Mali an ethnic Dogon militia already blamed for scores of attacks over the past year attacked Ogossogou, an ethnic Peuhl village just before dawn. The death toll from the massacre soon rose to 134 dead.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 23, Mexican police and federal officials detained 107 Central American migrants seeking to enter the United States in the border city of Reynosa. Unidentified gunmen began shooting at police, and one of the attackers was killed in the ensuing exchange of fire.
(Reuters, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 23, Mozambique said the number of people killed after Cyclone Idai tore through the country has risen to 417.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, New Zealand's chief censor banned a 74-page manifesto written by the man accused of slaughtering 50 people at two mosques in the city of Christchurch. The ban means anybody caught with the document on their computer could face up to 10 years in prison, while anyone caught sending it could face 14 years.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 23, Nigerians returned to vote in governorship and state elections after polling a fortnight ago was declared invalid in some areas because of violence.
(AFP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, Pakistan celebrated its national day with a military parade showcasing its missiles, tanks and aircraft. The prime minister and his Indian counterpart exchanged goodwill messages in a sign of easing tensions between the nuclear-armed rivals.
(AP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, Palestinian Habib al-Masri (24) was shot in the chest at protests near Beit Hanoun late today. Two others were wounded. Al-Masri soon died of wounds sustained from Israeli gunfire.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 23, Somalia's al Shabaab stormed a government building, detonating a suicide car bomb in the heart of Mogadishu with at least 15 people, including an assistant minister, killed during the ensuing gun battle. The four militants who attacked the building were shot dead.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, In Sudan eight children were killed in an explosion near a military facility in Omdurman, where they were searching for scrap metal to resell.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 23, The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) announced it had liberated the last village held by IS in Syria, declaring victory over the group. The SDF said it would continue its military and security campaigns against jihadist sleeper cells. IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi remained at large.
(AP, 3/23/19)(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, The Vatican said Pope Francis has accepted the resignation of Cardinal Ricardo Ezzati (77) as archbishop of Santiago, the highest-ranking member of the Catholic Church in Chile, who has been caught up in the country's sex abuse scandal. Spanish-born Capuchin friar and current bishop of Copiapo, Chile, Monsignor Celestino Aos Braco was named as temporary replacement.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)(AP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, Al-Arabiya TV reported that the Saudi-Led coalition in Yemen launched raids on Houthi camps in the capital Sanaa, including the Al-Dailami air base.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 24, The United States clinched a strategic port deal with Oman which US officials say will allow the US military better access to the Gulf region and reduce the need to send ships through the Strait of Hormuz, a maritime choke point off Iran.
(Reuters, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, US Attorney General William Barr Mueller sent a letter to Congress saying he found no evidence in Special Counsel Robert Mueller's Russia report that the Trump campaign colluded with Russia in the 2016 election.
(Reuters, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 24, Chinese President Xi Jinping visited Monaco. This was the first state visit by a Chinese president to the principality. The palace said Monaco is seeking to boost its trade and economic cooperation with China.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, China's President Xi Jinping arrived in France where he had a private dinner with Macron in the resort town of Beaulieu-sur-Mer on the French Riviera.
(AP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 24, Voters on the tiny archipelago of Comoros went to the polls, with Pres. Azali Assoumani (60) widely expected to win a new term in an election that rivals say has been hijacked. The archipelago has had more than 20 successful or attempted power grabs since gaining independence from France in 1975. Its first leader, Ahmed Abdallah, lasted barely a month before being ousted.
(AFP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, A Hungarian court ordered the arrest of a 27-year-old Syrian man suspected of taking part in beheadings in Syria as a member of Islamic State.
(Reuters, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, Indonesia's long-awaited first subway opened in Jakarta with the aim of relieving crippling traffic gridlock in Southeast Asia's biggest economy. President Joko Widodo then presided over a groundbreaking ceremony to mark the beginning of the second phase 8-km (5-mile) northward line.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, Iraq's parliament sacked Nineveh provincial governor Nawfel Akoub, after 100 people died in the March 21 ferry disaster that sparked a wave of grief and anger. Sixteen people have been arrested as part of an investigation into the ferry capsize. 63 people were still listed as missing.
(AFP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, Israeli aircraft targeted Hamas positions in the Gaza Strip early today after Palestinians there threw explosive devices at the border fence during "riots".
(AFP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, Mali's government announced the sacking of senior military officers and the dissolution of a militia, a day after the massacre of more than 130 Muslims, including women and children.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, In Morocco about 10,000 teachers staged a new protest in Rabat to demand permanent jobs, hours after police had used water cannon to disperse an overnight demonstration.
(Reuters, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, Mozambique's death toll rose to 446 from 417. In Zimbabwe, UN agencies have given different tolls of 259 and 154, while in Malawi 56 people died in heavy rains ahead of Cyclone Idai.
2019 Mar 24, In New Zealand thousands gathered in cities to protest racism and remember the 50 Muslims killed by a gunman in Christchurch and as PM Jacinda Ardern announced a national remembrance service to be held later this week.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, Viking Ocean Cruises said rescue helicopters took more than 475 passengers from the Viking Sky cruise ship that got stranded off Norway's western coast in bad weather before the vessel departed for a nearby port under escort and with nearly 900 people still on board.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, In the Philippines more than 10,000 motorcycle riders staged a motorcade in the main highways of Manila to protest at new regulations forcing them to display bigger license plates, saying the measure would not solve the problem. President Rodrigo Duterte signed a measure into law earlier this month requiring all licensed motorbikes to display bigger front and rear plates to make them more visible to the authorities and any witnesses to crimes.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, Two Russian air force planes carrying a Russian defense official and nearly 100 troops arrived in Caracas, Venezuela, amid strengthening ties between the two countries.
(Reuters, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 24, In Sri Lanka work began on a $3.9 billion oil refinery to be funded by a Singapore-Oman joint venture next to a Chinese-run port in what will be Sri Lanka's largest foreign investment ever. The refinery is expected to be up and running in 2023.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, In eastern Syria Islamic State group jihadists emerged from tunnels to surrender to US-backed forces in Baghouz.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, Thailand held its first election since a 2014 military coup. Preliminary results indicated that Thailand's military-backed party won the most votes in the country's first election since a 2014 coup.
(AP, 3/24/19)(AP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 24, In Turkey thousands of supporters of a pro-Kurdish party gathered in Istanbul to celebrate the Kurdish New Year and to attend a campaign rally for local elections that will test the Turkish president's popularity.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, Clashes late today in Yemen's Hodeida left five fighters dead, despite a ceasefire agreement between warring parties in the port city.
(AFP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, Jeremy Richman (49), the father of one of the 20 children killed in the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Connecticut, was found dead of an apparent suicide inside his office building in Newtown.
(SFC, 3/26/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 25, Doctors in Baltimore performed what's thought to be the world's first kidney transplant from a living donor with HIV to an HIV-positive stranger.
(SFC, 3/29/19, p.A12)
2019 Mar 25, Attorney Michael Avenatti (48) was arrested in New York City on charges that included trying to shake down Nike for as much as $25 million by threatening the company with bad publicity. He was released after posting a $300,000 bond. Avenatti has also been charged with bank and wire fraud in separate cases in New York and California.
(SFC, 3/26/19, p.A7)
2019 Mar 25, Prosecutors said that faked data by a research technician was used to obtain federal grants for North Carolina's Duke Univ. The problem was discovered in 2013 after the technician was fired for embezzling university money. A former Duke employee will get nearly $34 million for alerting the government. Duke pay $112 million to settle the whistle-blower lawsuit.
(SFC, 3/26/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 25, In North Carolina five inmates escaped from the Nash County Detention center. Four of the five were caught within 24 hours.
(SFC, 3/27/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar 25, Austria arrested an Iraqi man "under suspicion to have carried out terrorist attacks on railways in Germany in October and December 2018".
(AFP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 25, British lawmakers exasperated by failed efforts to split from the European Union after three years of debates and negotiations voted to give themselves a broader say on what happens next.
(AFP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 25, China ordered a nationwide inspection of chemical firms four days after one of the country's worst industrial accidents.
(AFP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, Chinese President Xi Jinping signed multibillion-dollar deals on energy, the food industry, transport and other sectors as well as a bilateral statement on climate change during his state visit to France. Jinping received the full honors of a formal reception during his state visit that included attending the signing of a multi-billion dollar deal between European aircraft maker Airbus to China. Jinping agreed to work with European leaders to seek fairer international trade rules and to address the world's economic and security challenges.
(AP, 3/25/19)(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 25, Police in Comoros used tear gas to disperse demonstrators led by opposition leaders protesting against what they said were fraudulent presidential elections.
(Reuters, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, The EU announced it has completed its preparations for Britain crashing out of the bloc without a divorce accord, as fears of a chaotic "no-deal" Brexit grew.
(AFP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, In France around 20 people were arrested late today after gangs of vigilantes attacked camps of ethnic Roma people in northeast Paris after false reports that they were responsible for abductions in the area using white vans.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 25, The Hong Kong-based lawyer for two Saudi sisters who fled the kingdom said the young women have secured emergency visas and departed to a new country of residence.
(AP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, The board of India's private Jet Airways accepted the resignations of Chairman Naresh Goyal, his wife and a nominee of Gulf carrier Etihad Airways. Goyal quit amid mounting financial woes which have forced Jet Airways to suspend 14 international routes and ground more than 80 planes. The board approved the setting up of an interim management committee to oversee daily operations and cash flow of the company.
(AP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, Iranian state TV reported that flash floods in southern Iran have killed at least 17 people and injured 74.
(AP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, Italian media reported that former communist militant Cesare Battisti, jailed for life over four murders carried out in the 1970s, has confessed to the killings after decades of denying involvement.
(AFP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador called on Spanish King Felipe VI and Pope Francis to apologize for the conquest and the rights violations committed in the aftermath of Spanish rule over Mexico dating back to 1519. Madrid firmly rejected the proposal.
(AFP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 25, Morocco hosted ministers from 36 African countries for UN-backed talks on ending the four-decades-old conflict in Western Sahara, a swathe of desert on Africa's Atlantic coast.
(AFP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 25, A long-range rocket fired from the Gaza Strip slammed into a house in central Israel and wounded seven people early today. PM Benjamin Netanyahu, who faces an election on April 9, cut short his US visit after the rocket attack.
(AP, 3/25/19)(Reuters, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, Poland's Constitutional Tribunal ruled that controversial rules introduced by the right-wing government that allow lawmakers to choose members of a judicial body are in line with the constitution.
(AP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, In South Africa the 16-nation Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) began 2-day talks pushing for a referendum on the status of Western Sahara.
(AFP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 25, In South Africa mobs armed with metal rods and machetes began breaking into the homes of foreigners in Durban, chasing them out and looting their belongings. Three days of attacks displaced some 300 Malawi migrants, but no arrests resulted.
(AFP, 4/15/19)
2019 Mar 25, The US-backed Syrian fighters who drove the Islamic State from its last strongholds called for an international tribunal to prosecute hundreds of foreigners rounded up in the nearly five-year campaign against the extremist group.
(AP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, Venezuela was hit by a power blackout. Power was restored to much of the country by the evening but went out again during the night.
(Reuters, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, US Sec. of State Mike Pompeo expanded the Trump administration's ban on US aid to groups that promote or provide abortions to include organizations that that comply with the rules but give money to others that don't.
(SFC, 3/27/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar 26, The US Treasury took fresh aim at the international network funneling dollars and euros to Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), naming 25 individuals and entities for financial sanctions.
(AFP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, The US Supreme Court threw out a nearly $315 million judgment against Sudan stemming from the USS Cole bombing in 2000, saying Sudan hadn't properly been notified of the lawsuit.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, In the US a nationwide ban on bump stocks took effect. The attachment allowed semiautomatic weapons to fire rapidly like machine guns.
(SFC, 3/30/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 26, Prosecutors in Illinois' Cook County, who handle crimes in Chicago, dropped charges against actor Jussie Smollett who was accused of staging a hoax hate crime attack against himself. Details of the case were sealed.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 26, An attorney said the Pennsylvania Roman Catholic Diocese of Erie has agreed to pay $2 million to a man who was sexually abused as a child by a priest who made him say confession after the assaults. Defrocked priest David Poulson was sentenced this year to 2½ to 14 years in prison after pleading guilty to the sexual assault of one boy and attempted sexual assault of another.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, Facebook said it has shut down more than 2,600 fake accounts linked to Iran, Russia, Macedonia and Kosovo and aiming to influence political sentiment in various parts of the world.
(AFP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, SF-based ride-hailing service Uber announced that it has acquired Dubai-based competitor Careem for $3.1 billion.
(SFC, 3/27/19, p.D1)
2019 Mar 26, Algeria's powerful army chief Ahmed Gaid Salah said he wants to trigger the constitutional process that would declare President Abdelaziz Bouteflika unfit for office, after more than a month of mass protests against the ailing leader's long rule.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, The Canola Council of Canada confirmed that China formally posted a web notice suspending the license of Viterra for canola seed. Exporters reported last week that Chinese importers are unwilling to purchase the seeds at this time. This was seen as retaliation for Canada's arrest of a top executive of Chinese tech giant Huawei.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, China's former internet censor Lu Wei, who once held high-profile meetings with industry leaders such as Apple CEO Tim Cook and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, was sentenced to 14 years in prison on corruption charges.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, A court in the Czech Republic convicted Radim Zondra of knifing two-time Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova in her home in December, 2016, and sentenced him to eight years in prison.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, The European Commission ignored US calls to ban Chinese tech supplier Huawei as it announced a series of new cybersecurity recommendations for next-generation mobile networks.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, The European Parliament adopted copyright reforms championed by news publishers and the media business, in defiance of the tech giants that lobbied against it.
(AFP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, A German court upheld the murder convictions of two men whose midnight drag race in downtown Berlin in 2016 ended with a crash that killed another driver.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, Germany's meteorological agency DWD says 2018 was the warmest in the country since records began in 1881.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, A court in Georgia ruled that Jack Shepherd (31), a fugitive British man wanted for the manslaughter of a woman killed during a London date on a speedboat in 2015, is to be extradited. The web designer had showed up at a police station in Tbilisi, Georgia, in January and turned himself in.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, Israel kept up air strikes on Gaza and Palestinian militants launched new rockets despite the ceasefire claim. The UN envoy for the Middle East warned of catastrophic consequences from escalating violence in Gaza as Israel and the Palestinian group Hamas continued to exchange fire despite a ceasefire deal.
(AFP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, The academy of Italy's premier opera house, Teatro alla Scala, agreed to start a conservatory for both girls and boys in Saudi Arabia.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 26, In Mexico the head prosecutor of Veracruz state said search teams exhumed 12 sets of remains and have located three more bodies but not yet extracted them.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 26, In Morocco Larbi Rich (54), the driver of a passenger train that derailed and killed seven people last year, was convicted of manslaughter but ordered released on time already served.
(AFP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 26, Myanmar's Supreme Court agreed to rule on an appeal filed by lawyers for Reuters journalists Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo sentenced to seven years in prison for their reporting on Myanmar's brutal crackdown on Rohingya Muslims.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, A Pakistani court placed two teenage sisters from the minority Hindu community in a government shelter as authorities launched an investigation into whether the girls were abducted and forced to convert and marry two Muslim men.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, In South Africa several southern African leaders threw their support behind Western Sahara, with one calling the disputed territory the "last colony" on the African continent.
(AFP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, Spanish weather authorities said 32 million people in the southern European country, or around two-thirds of Spain's population, are having to deal with higher temperatures, longer summers and more frequent tropical nights as a result of climate change.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, In northern Syria the Islamic State group claimed responsibility for an attack early today on a checkpoint of US-backed forces in Manbij that killed seven fighters.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, Demonstrations spread across Syria denouncing Washington's recognition of Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights, in a show of unity in the war-torn country.
(AFP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, Turkish and Russian forces carried out the first "independent and coordinated" patrols in the mainly Kurdish-controlled northern Syrian region of Tel Rifaat.
(Reuters, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, In Tunisia UN official Moncef Kartas, charged with investigating alleged violations of a UN arms embargo on Libya, was detained in Tunis on suspicion of spying. On March 29 Tunisian authorities confirmed that they had detained two Tunisians, including Kartas, on suspicion of "spying for foreign parties".
(AFP, 3/29/19)(AFP, 4/13/19)
2019 Mar 26, The all-female staff of the Vatican newspaper's monthly magazine on women's issues resigned abruptly en masse, saying the new editor was trying limit their autonomy and put them "under direct male control".
(Reuters, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, Venezuela canceled work and school as the second major blackout this month left streets mostly empty in Caracas and residents of the capital wondering how long power would be out amid a deepening economic and political crisis.
(Reuters, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, Yemenis held a mass rally in Sanaa to show support for the Houthi movement on the fourth anniversary of a war that has killed thousands of people and pushed the country to the brink of starvation. An airstrike killed seven people near the Kitaf rural hospital.
(Reuters, 3/26/19)(SFC, 3/28/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar 27, The head of the US Customs and Border Protection held a press conference in El Paso to say the breaking point had arrived. Arrests all along the southern border have skyrocketed in recent months. Border agents were on track to make 100,000 arrests and denials of entry at the southern border this month.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 27, In Arkansas Andre Jackson (34) pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 25 years in prison for the murder of an Italian tourist during an attempted robbery. Carlo Marigliano was found shot to death in a crashed jeep outside a Little Rock apartment complex in July 2017.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 27, In California PG&E received approval from a bankruptcy court to fully access $5.5 billion in financing it lined up from major banks, despite objections from wildfire victims.
(SFC, 3/28/19, p.D1)
2019 Mar 27, Speaking in Hawaii Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen said her government has asked to purchase advanced new fighter jets and tanks from the US, a request that if approved, could set off new tensions between the US and China. Tsai said requests have been submitted for F-16V fighters and M1 Abrams tanks.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 27, In NYC Anna Sorokin (28), the one-time darling of the Big Apple social scene, stood trial on grand larceny and theft of services charges alleging she swindled $275,000 in a 10-month odyssey that saw her jetting to Omaha and Marrakesh before landing in a cell at Rikers Island.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, In Texas a helicopter crashed during a controlled burn at the Sam Houston National Forest killing Daniel Laird, a firefighter from northern California.
(SFC, 3/30/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 27, In Virginia James Alex Fields Jr. pleaded guilty to 29 of 30 federal charges stemming from the 2017 "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville. Anti-racist activist Heather Heyer was killed when Fields plowed his car into a crowd of protesters.
(SFC, 3/28/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 27, In Wisconsin the 3rd District Court of Appeals reinstated laws passed during the 2018 lame-duck legislative session that weaken powers of the Democratic governor and attorney general.
(SFC, 3/28/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 27, The $1 million Turing Award went to artificial intelligence pioneers Yoshua Bengio, Yann LeCun and Geoffrey Hinton.
(SFC, 3/28/19, p.D2)
2019 Mar 27, Ford said it will close three factories in Russia, causing heavy job losses, as it pulls out of passenger vehicle manufacturing in the country.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, Algeria's biggest union and an influential party backed an army call for President Abdelaziz Bouteflika to quit in a managed exit plan that was quickly rejected by protesters demanding the overthrow of the entire political elite.
(Reuters, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, Australia's top cyberwarrior revealed that his country actively participated in the electronic war against the Islamic State group in Syria, degrading their communications during military operations and actively stopping people seeking to join the extremist group.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz confirmed that Martin Sellner, head of the far-right Identitarian Movement, received 1,500 euros in 2018 from the man charged with killing 50 people in mass shootings at mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand. Sellner said he would give the money to a charitable foundation.
(Reuters, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, British lawmakers debated multiple options for leaving the European Union as they sought to bring some clarity to the tortured Brexit process and stop the country tumbling out of the bloc within weeks with no exit plan in place. PM Theresa May offered to give up her job in exchange for her Brexit deal.
(AP, 3/27/19)(SFC, 3/28/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 27, Amnesty International slammed plans by Brunei to implement what the rights group called "vicious" Islamic criminal laws such as stoning to death for gay sex and amputation for theft. The new sections under Brunei's Sharia Penal Code and will come into effect April 3.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, China said that it has expelled former Interpol President Meng Hongwei from public office and the ruling Communist Party as he awaits trial on corruption charges.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, A $436 million superyacht belonging to Russian billionaire Farkhad Akhmedov, at the center of one of the world's costliest divorce battles, was released by a Dubai court after being impounded last year. Forbes has estimated Akhmedov's net worth is $1.4 billion. The US Treasury Department has put him on a list of sanctioned Russian state-owned companies.
(Reuters, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 27, A coalition of opposition parties urged Egyptians to vote against constitutional amendments that would potentially allow President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi to remain in power until 2034.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, The EU said it will suspend ship patrols that have rescued tens of thousands of migrants in the Mediterranean and brought them to Italy, amid deep resistance by populist-led Rome. The rescues were part of the EU's Operation Sophia which diplomats have decided to extend by six months beyond its March 31 expiry date, but without new ship deployments.
(AFP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, A report by the investigative group Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project said Gambia's ex-President Yahya Jammeh looted the tiny West African nation of $1 billion through fear and privilege during his 22 years in power, an amount more than 10 times higher than originally estimated by the new government, leaving the country in lingering debt. The $1 billion was used to finance his lavish lifestyle and is believed to still support him in his exile in Equatorial Guinea.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 27, India shot down one of its satellites in space with an anti-satellite missile. The government said the test was aimed at protecting India's assets in space against foreign attacks. The United States ran the first anti-satellite test in 1959, when satellites themselves were rare and new.
(Reuters, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, Indonesia's Supreme Court rejected the appeal of Meliana, an ethnic Chinese woman, whose complaint about the volume of mosque loudspeakers led to an 18-month prison sentence for blasphemy.
(AP, 4/8/19)
2019 Mar 27, Iran's Pres. Hassan Rouhani travelled to flood-hit zones for the first time after nine days of heavy rains inundated most of the country and killed 43 people.
(AFP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, Iraqi court officials said a warrant has been issued for the arrest of the former governor of Nineveh on corruption charges after at least 90 people were killed in a ferry accident in the provincial capital Mosul. The warrant also included the arrest of some local officials after a court investigation concluded they colluded with the former governor in misusing their powers and committed financial violations. Nawfal Hammadi al-Sultan has fled to the Kurdish regional capital Erbil.
(Reuters, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, In Japan a Nissan committee set up to strengthen corporate governance after the arrest of former Chairman Carlos Ghosn said an investigation found he had wielded too much power and recommended the scandal-hit automaker add more independent outside directors to its board and better oversee compensation and auditing.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, A Kazakh military helicopter with 13 people on board crashed on during exercises. There were casualties, but that it was not yet clear how many.
(Reuters, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, The cargo ship El Hiblu 1 picked up 108 migrants stranded at sea. Some of them then hijacked the vessel when it became clear that it planned to take them back to Libya. The small tanker docked in Malta's port of Valletta the next day after Maltese special forces took control of the vessel. Three migrant teenagers were soon charged in a Maltese court with hijacking the small tanker. They pleaded not guilty.
(Reuters, 3/28/19)(Reuters, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 27, A Lithuanian court found former Soviet defense minister Dmitry Yazov (94) guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity for his role in a 1991 crackdown against the Baltic state's pro-independence movement. 67 former military officials and army officers were being sentenced after a three-year trial.
(Reuters, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, A report released today found gaps in the investigation and possible obstruction of justice in Malaysia's 2015 discovery of mass graves believed to be of Rohingya Muslims and Bangladeshis held in trafficking camps in a hilly jungle area on its border with Thailand. The report said Malaysian authorities were aware of the human trafficking camps more than four months before they were announced publicly.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, A Mozambique government official said five cases of cholera have been confirmed following Cyclone Idai that ravaged the country, killing at least 468 people.
(AFP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, In New Zealand Artemiy Dubovskiy (54) killed himself during a standoff with police. Police searched three of Dubovskiy's properties and found guns, ammunition and violent extremist content.
(http://tinyurl.com/y5vsnklh)(AP, 4/3/19)
2019 Mar 27, Pakistani police arrested a man for beating his wife in public after the incident triggered wide condemnation and uproar on social media. Faisal's wife had complained that her husband had stripped her naked, beat her and shaved her head for refusing to dance for his friends at their home.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, About 150 Palestinian students threw firebombs and rocks at Israeli soldiers who responded with tear gas and rubber-coated metal bullets in the occupied West Bank after an Israeli raid on their university. Palestinian volunteer medic Sajid Muzher (17) was killed by Israeli forces during the clashes. He was shot while trying to treat one of those wounded.
(Reuters, 3/27/19)(AFP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, In Thailand the leader of the Pheu Thai party, which headed the last elected government, and the leaders of five other parties held a news conference to say they believed they had won more than 250 seats in the 500-seat lower house.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, UN officials said at least 707 people had been reported killed by Cyclone Idai, the flooding it caused and heavy rains before it hit. This included 468 in Mozambique, 259 in Zimbabwe and 60 in Malawi.
(Reuters, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, In Venezuela new disruption to the power grid had left 91 percent of the country offline, reversing a "partial recovery" since the latest blackouts started March 25.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 28, Pres. Donald Trump announced that he was backing off a budget request to eliminate funding for the Special Olympics following days of criticism for the proposed cut.
(SFC, 3/29/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 28, The US House of Representatives voted 238-185 to condemn Pres. Donald Trump's move to restrict transgender men and women from military service. Five Republicans broke ranks to vote with all the Democrats in the non-binding resolution.
(SFC, 3/29/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 28, George Clooney called for the boycott of nine hotels in the US and Europe with ties to the sultan of Brunei, which on April 3 will implement Islamic criminal laws to punish gay sex by stoning offenders to death.
(AP, 3/30/19)(Reuters, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 28, In the SF Bay Area Rev. Hector David Mendoza-Vela (42), the head priest of Corpus Christi Parish in Fremont, was arrested on suspicion of 30 counts child sex abuse from 2016-2017.
(SFC, 4/1/19, p.C1)
2019 Mar 28, In Virginia Darwin Martinez-Torres of Sterling was sentenced to life in prison for raping and killing Nabra Hassanen (17) of Reston, a Muslim teenager, as she walked back to a mosque with friends for pre-dawn religious services in June 2017. immigration authorities said Martinez-Torres is an El Salvador native and was in the country illegally.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Albanian opposition protesters made further attempts to enter the parliament by force as they demand the government's resignation and an early election.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Hundreds of protesters took to the streets of central Algiers again to demand the resignation of President Abdelaziz Bouteflika and changes to the political system after the powerful army called for the veteran leader to be removed.
(Reuters, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In Australia Saeed Noori (37), an Islamic State group sympathizer, was sentenced to life in prison. He had rammed a car into pedestrians on a busy Melbourne sidewalk on Dec. 21, 2017, killing one person and injuring 16 others.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In Bangladesh a fire broke out in a 22-storey commercial building, killing 25 people, injuring at least 60 and trapping many. The building had four upper floors constructed illegally in the Banani district of Dhaka.
(AP, 3/28/19)(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 28, Human Rights Watch said at least 170 civilians have been killed since October in fighting in English-speaking western Cameroon between separatists and government forces.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Cuba and Google signed a deal moving the island one step closer to having a state-of-the-art connection to the internet. They agreed to create a seamless, cost-free connection between their two networks once Cuba is able to physically connect to a new undersea fiber-optic cable that would be laid sometime in the future.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, A French court granted bail to Belhassen Trabelsi, a brother-in-law of ousted Tunisian leader Zine El-Abidine Ben Ali, who was arrested on fraud charges this month after three years on the run.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, German automaker Daimler and China's Geely, its largest single shareholder, said that they are setting up a joint venture to develop and operate Daimler's Smart compact car brand worldwide as an all-electric car.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In western Guatemala a large truck slammed into a crowd gathered on a dark highway, killing 18 people and leaving bodies scattered on the roadway. The truck driver fled the scene.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Icelandic budget airline WOW Air collapsed under its financial problems, leading it to ground planes and leave passengers stranded across two continents. The airline had delivered more than a fourth of all visitors to the nation.
(AP, 3/28/19)(SFC, 9/2/19, p.D1)
2019 Mar 28, Kosovo banned all gambling for the next decade in a bid to crack down on crime after two casino staff were murdered last week.
(AFP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 28, A court in the Maldives ordered the release of former president Abdulla Yameen, saying there was not enough reason to hold him beyond a month under the law.
(Reuters, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Norway's justice Minister Tor Mikkel Wara submitted his resignation after his partner was accused of setting his car on fire and other threatening acts.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In the Philippines a rebel assault on a police station in eastern Victoria town backfired when officers fought back and killed three insurgents and captured three others. In the north two Muslim militants were arrested with guns, explosives and Islamic State group-style black flags in in Baggao town, Cagayan province, far from the traditional territory of Muslim militants in the volatile south. Militants Altero Bello and Greg Bello belonged to an IS-aligned jihadist group named Syuful Khilafa Fi Luzon, which was established in 2016.
(AP, 3/29/19)(AP, 4/1/19)
2019 Mar 28, Russia detained a former cabinet minister and oil executive on suspicion of defrauding oil giant Rosneft. Viktor Ishaev was the second former minister from PM Dmitry Medvedev's cabinet to be detained this week.
(Reuters, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Three of eleven Saudi women's rights activists were temporarily released after 10 months in prison. The releases came a day after 11 women's rights activists appeared before a three-judge panel in a Riyadh courtroom and laid out their defense.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In Siberia a ruling by Sakha Republic head Aisen Nikolaev was made public. It bans migrants from driving trucks or buses, producing food, repairing vehicles and other jobs. Tensions between locals and migrants soared this month after three Kyrgyzstan citizens were arrest in a rape and kidnapping case.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Slovakia's Parliament amended the country's constitution to cap the retirement age at 64. Some women can retire up to a year and a half earlier than that, depending on the number of children they've had.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In Somalia an explosives-laden vehicle detonated outside a busy restaurant in Mogadishu, killing at least 16 people. The al-Qaida-linked al-Shabab extremist group claimed responsibility.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Ukraine's interior minister accused both Pres. Petro Poroshenko and former PM Yulia Tymoshenko of waging campaigns that involve bribing voters ahead of the March 31 presidential election.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 28, The UN Security Council ordered countries worldwide to step up the fight against terrorism financing by ensuring they have laws that make it a serious crime to fund terrorist acts.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Venezuela's government said it has barred opposition leader Juan Guaido from holding public office for 15 years citing irregularities in his financial records. Guaido has taken 90 international trips without accounting for the origin of an estimated $94,000 in expenses.
(SFC, 3/28/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 29, President Donald Trump declared he is likely to shut down America's southern border next week unless Mexican authorities immediately halt all illegal immigration. The president, who also cut US aid to three Central American nations whose citizens are fleeing north, emphasized "I am not kidding around" about closing the border, even though such a severe move could hit the economies of both countries.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 29, The US urged Venezuela's military to act to "protect" its citizens as it renewed criticism of Russia's deployment of forces to prop up Pres. Nicolas Maduro.
(AFP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, In Alaska US District Judge Sharon Gleason ruled that an executive order by Pres. Donald Trump that lifted an Obama-era ban on drilling in the Arctic Ocean and parts of the North Atlantic coast was unlawful.
(SSFC, 3/31/19, p.A8)
2019 Mar 29, San Francisco-based ride-hailing company LYFT debuted on Nasdaq at $72 per share. Shares closed up 9 percent at $78.29.
(SFC, 3/29/19, p.D1)(SFC, 3/30/19, p.A1)
2019 Mar 29, In New York City genre-bending acts Radiohead and The Cure led a British invasion into Brooklyn to take their spots in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, while pop icon Janet Jackson entered the shrine in an induction many industry insiders consider long overdue. American folk rock legend Stevie Nicks became the first woman inducted twice. Heavy metal group Def Leppard, pop experimentalists Roxy Music and English psychedelic rock harmonists The Zombies rounded out the five-strong class of British inductees.
(AFP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, A US federal judge in North Carolina ruled that a charter school promoting traditional values is engaging in unconstitutional sex discrimination by requiring girls to wear skirts.
(SFC, 3/30/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 29, South Carolina Univ. student Samantha Josephson (21) was last seen early today as she got into a car she mistook for an Uber. Her body was found in a wooded area in Clarendon County. Nathaniel Rowland (24) was arrested the next day and faced kidnapping and murder charges.
(SFC, 4/1/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 29, An Afghan official says at least 16 people have been killed and nine injured as heavy rains and flooding swept through the country's northern and western provinces over the past two days.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Algerian police used tear gas and water cannon to try to disperse hundreds of thousands of demonstrators demanding the resignation of Pres. Abdelaziz Bouteflika days after the army called for his removal to end weeks of political crisis.
(Reuters, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Bosnia's top court upheld a ban on a controversial Serb holiday that is seen as discriminatory to the country's Muslims and Croats. Bosnian Serbs criticized the ruling as political.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Thousands of people opposed to Britain delaying its departure from the European Union marched through central London as the government scrambled to salvage its Brexit plan.
(Reuters, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Burundi banned the BBC and indefinitely suspended Voice of America, moves that campaigners and the international broadcasters described as a blow to press freedom. Burundi's regulator also banned journalists from working for either organization. Burundi ranks 159th out of 180 countries on the World Press Freedom Index 2018.
(Reuters, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 29, In China a notice posted on the official website of the Guangzhou Department of Ethnic and Religious Affairs said up to 10,000 yuan ($15,000) would be paid for verified information and assistance in hunting down key members and leaders of illegal foreign religious groups and revealing their structures.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Chinese and US negotiators adjourned trade talks in Beijing with US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin saying they had been "constructive".
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Chinese tech giant Huawei's deputy chairman defended its commitment to security after a stinging British government report added to Western pressure on the company by accusing it of failing to repair dangerous flaws in its telecom technology.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Egypt released Alaa Abdel Fattah, a blogger and software engineer, after he spent five years in jail. Abdel Fattah was jailed for protesting without permission in breach of a 2013 law that rights groups say effectively bans protests. Fattah is required to spend his nights at a police station for the next five years despite his release.
(Reuters, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, The European Commission said a no-deal Brexit on April 12 was now "likely" after UK parliament rejected for the third time British PM Theresa May's divorce deal with the European Union.
(Reuters, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, European Union countries decided to extend the mandate of a naval mission hunting smugglers in the Mediterranean Sea, but took the unusual step of restricting the operation by refusing to allow it to deploy any ships, in an effort to ease tensions with Italy's anti-migrant government.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, The European Commission criticized Romania for backsliding on the rule of law and called on Bucharest to treat fairly Laura Kovesi, a candidate to become the bloc's first-ever chief prosecutor.
(Reuters, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, In France Jawad Bendaoud was convicted on appeal of hiding Islamic State jihadist Abdelhamid Abaaoud and his accomplice Chakib Akrouh, who holed up after the November 13, 2015, attacks in Bendaoud's apartment in the Paris suburb of Saint-Denis. He was sentenced to four years in prison.
(AFP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, In Germany thousands of students skipped school in Berlin as part of a growing worldwide youth movement demanding faster action against climate change. Swedish teenager Greta Thunberg, who inspired the protests in Germany and elsewhere by staging weekly "school strikes," headlined the demonstration.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Greece's parliament approved a bill to protect borrowers from foreclosures on their primary homes after tense negotiations with the country's international creditors.
(Reuters, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Thousands of Jordanians protested against the US decision to recognize Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights and against the escalation of hostilities between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, In Mozambique the number of confirmed cases of cholera in the cyclone-hit port city of Beira jumped from five to 138, as government and aid agencies battled to contain the spread of disease among the tens of thousands of victims of the storm.
(Reuters, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, The government of Nicaragua pledged to restore protest and press freedom rights while disarming paramilitaries under a deal reached today, after a year-long political upheaval.
(AFP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 29, Northern Ireland's small but powerful Democratic Unionist Party crushed PM Theresa May's hopes of getting parliament to vote for her Brexit divorce deal on a third attempt.
(AFP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Peruvian police freed Gregorio Rojas, the leader of an indigenous community that has blocked roads to a major Chinese-run copper mine. Hours later they arrested his second-in-command, accusing him of running over police officers while driving drunk.
(Reuters, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 29, In the Philippines the rebel New People's Army marked a half a century after its founding with an attack on a police patrol in northern Mountain Province that killed a policeman.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, In the Philippines the head of Rappler Inc., an online news site that has been critical of President Rodrigo Duterte, was arrested for the second time in two months, this time over a ban on foreign ownership of news media. Maria Ressa later posted bail at a regional trial court.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Slovakia's lawmakers approved a resolution to reject an international treaty on women's rights. Opponents of the 2011 Istanbul Convention charged that some provisions would violate the Slovak constitution — for example because the constitution defines marriage as a union of a man and a woman.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, A court in Slovenia sentenced right-wing politician Andrej Sisko to eight months in prison for organizing a self-style militia that was filmed posing with weapons like axes and rifles.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Thailand's Election Commission, facing widespread criticism for inconsistent and delayed vote totals from the March 24 general election, said computer software was partly to blame.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, In Turkey five Afghan workers were killed and eleven others were injured as a result of a fire in an abandoned three-story building in Ankara.
(Reuters, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Pope Francis enacted sweeping new legislation to protect children from sexual abuse within the Vatican and other Holy See institutions in Rome, as well as by its diplomatic corps worldwide.
(Reuters, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 30, Cities around the world marked Earth Hour this night by turning off the lights in a call for global action on climate change. Beginning in Sydney in 2007, Earth Hour has spread to more than 180 countries, with tens of millions of people joining in. The UN headquarters in New York, the pyramids of Egypt and Rio's Christ the Redeemer statue were among top world monuments plunged into darkness for an hour to put the spotlight on climate change and its impact on the planet.
(AP, 3/30/19)(AFP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 30, The US government cut aid to El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras after President Donald Trump blasted the Central American countries for sending migrants to the United States and threatened to shutter the US-Mexico border.
(Reuters, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 30, In Florida Yujing Zhang (32), a Chinese woman, was held on charges of illegal entering and lying to US agents. Court documents later alleged she told a Secret Service agent she was a Mar-a-Lago member there to use the pool.
(AP, 4/4/19)
2019 Mar 30, Illinois state Trooper Gerald Ellis (36) was killed when a wrong-way vehicle struck his squad car in Green Oaks. The driver of the other vehicle was also killed.
(SSFC, 3/31/19, p.A7)
2019 Mar 30, Billy Adams (79), Hall of Fame pioneer of rockabilly music, died in Westmoreland, Tenn. His hits included "Rock, Pretty Mama" (1957).
(SFC, 4/4/19, p.C4)
2019 Mar 30, An Afghan government official said flash floods have killed at least 32 people across seven western provinces, destroyed homes and swept through makeshift shelters that housed displaced families.
(Reuters, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, In Afghanistan a Taliban assault on a police checkpoint led to the deaths of four students in eastern Ghazni province. 17 others, including 15 students and two teachers, were wounded when an explosion, likely caused by rocket fire, hit the school in Andar district. Vice president, Gen. Abdul Rashid Dostum escaped unharmed after Taliban ambushed his convoy while traveling form northern Balkh to neighboring Zawzjan province. A security guard in the convoy was killed, and two others wounded in the attack.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, In Australia two Japanese teenagers were found dead in Lake McKenzie after being reported missing from a school tour.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, China's Customs Administration confiscated nearly 7.5 tons (6,803 kg) of ivory. Since the start of the year, customs officers have seized a total of 8.5 tons (7,711 kg) of ivory products through 53 investigations.
(AP, 4/15/19)
2019 Mar 30, Egypt President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi said he has raised the minimum wage to 2,000 Egyptian pounds ($115.74) per month from 1,200 ($69.27).
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, An Egyptian court sentenced 18 suspected militants to life in prison for allegedly forming a "terrorist cell" affiliated with the Islamic State group. The Cairo criminal court sentenced another 12 defendants to 10 to 15 years on charges that include plotting attacks on the country's Christian minority in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, French "yellow vests" demonstrators staged their 20th week of anti-government protests despite bans in hotspot areas, as banks called for an end to violence against branches, cash machines and personnel.
(AFP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, Authorities in Iran worked to evacuate villages threatened by flooding in southwestern areas as forecasters predicted more of the heavy rains that have killed at least 45 people this week.
(Reuters, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, Israeli troops shot and killed a Palestinian man near the perimeter fence early today hours before a planned mass rally. Tens of thousands of Palestinians rallied in heavy rain at the Israel-Gaza border to mark the first anniversary of a new wave of protests, facing off against Israeli tanks and troops massed on the fortified frontier. Four Palestinians were killed at the Israel-Gaza border on the first anniversary of the 'Great March of Return' demonstrations.
(AP, 3/30/19)(Reuters, 3/30/19)(Reuters, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 30, In Italy the US-based International Organization for the Family began a 2-day congress in Verona. The organization defines family as strictly centering around a mother and father. A coalition of civic groups mobilized against what they see as a counter-reform movement to limit LGBT and women's rights.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, Mozambique authorities said cholera cases among cyclone survivors have jumped to 271, a figure that nearly doubled from the previous day.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, In Nicaragua at least four people were hurt and 10 detained during a demonstration calling for the release of prisoners, a day after President Daniel Ortega's government and the opposition reached an agreement to restore protest and press freedom rights while disarming paramilitaries.
(AFP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 30, In Pakistan a bus hit a rickshaw killing six schoolgirls and driver in the eastern Bhakkar district of Lahore.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, Pakistani journalist Matloob Musavi was forcibly taken by masked men in private and police vehicles in Karachi.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, Philippine police killed 14 suspected communist rebels after they opened fire during raids in a central province. Rights groups countered that the men were farmers and the latest victims of extrajudicial killings.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 30, Slovakia voted in an election dominated by calls for change, with anti-corruption activist Zuzana Caputova likely to be chosen as its first female president a year after a journalist's murder sparked mass anti-government protests.
(AFP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, In Spain police in Barcelona arrested seven people during clashes with radical Catalan separatists protesting against a political rally by Vox, a new far-right party.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, Thailand's King Maha Vajiralongkorn revoked royal decorations that had been awarded to ousted former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra in a document published in the royal gazette. The royal command was for Thaksin's 2008 corruption conviction and for fleeing the country to escape a two-year prison sentence.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, In Turkey the pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party, or HDP, said in a statement that 53 people were detained in Istanbul overnight in the lead-up to the March 31 municipal elections.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, United Nations officials said at least 746 people have been reported killed in Malawi, Mozambique and Zimbabwe since Cyclone Idai landed on March 14.
(Reuters, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, Pope Francis started a two-day visit to Morocco. He said that problems of migration would never be resolved by physical barriers but instead required social justice and correcting the world's economic imbalances. He also backed Moroccan King Mohammed VI's efforts to spread a moderate form of Islam that promotes inter-religious dialogue and rejects any form of terrorism or violence in God's name.
(Reuters, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 31, In southern California rapper Nipsey Hussle (33) (born as Ermias Asghedom) was shot and killed outside his clothing store in South Los Angeles. Two other people were wounded. The suspected shooter fled the scene. On April 2 police arrested suspect Eric Holder (29) in Bellflower.
(SFC, 4/1/19, p.A6)(SFC, 4/3/19, p.A7)
2019 Mar 31, In Florida Mexican soap opera actor Pablo Lyle (32) punched Juan Ricardo Hernandez (63) in a road rage confrontation. Lyle initially faced only a battery charge, but Hernandez later died in a hospital and Lyle was charged with manslaughter.
(AP, 5/1/19)
2019 Mar 31, A top Algerian businessman, Ali Haddad, was arrested overnight at an Algerian border post as he was apparently trying to go to Tunisia amid political crisis in the country. Haddad, long a backer of President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, resigned this week as head of Algeria's Business Forum.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, Police in Bangladesh arrested the F.R. Tower's owners Tasvir-ul-Islam and S.M.H.I. Faruque overnight in Dhaka and charged them with negligence and violations of a building code that resulted in the deaths of 26 people.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, Brazil said it had a opened a new diplomatic office in Jerusalem that would serve as part of its embassy to Israel, which is located in Tel Aviv.
(Reuters, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, In Brazil Rio de Janeiro Gov. Wilson Witzel said in an interview that snipers were already operating in the state. He said he would empower policemen to shoot down any criminal seen carrying a rifle.
(AP, 4/1/19)
2019 Mar 31, The Canadian Women's Hockey League said it will discontinue operations on May 1. The CWHL was founded in 2007 with a mandate to increase interest in women's hockey.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, In eastern China at least seven people were killed and five injured when a container containing scrap metal exploded in the latest in a series of industrial accidents.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, In China a fire high in the mountains of western Sichuan province killed 30 firefighters and others.
(AP, 4/1/19)
2019 Mar 31, Police in Colombia's second-largest city said they have arrested Thomas Renno of California for allegedly offering cash over Facebook to girls as young as 13 in exchange for sexual acts.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, In northeastern Congo DRC voters in Beni and Butembo, towns ravaged by conflict and an Ebola epidemic, took part in long-delayed elections. At stake were 15 seats in the lower house of parliament, which counts 500 lawmakers.
(AFP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, In Germany Russian airline S7 Group co-owner Natalia Fileva was aboard a single-engine, six-seat Epic LT aircraft that crashed and burned in a field as it approached the small airport at the town of Egelsbach near Frankfurt. Three bodies were recovered in the crash.
(AP, 4/1/19)
2019 Mar 31, Fashion magazine Vogue hit the newsstands in Greece, relaunched after a seven-year absence as publishers bet that the country's economic recovery after a debt crisis will revive an appetite for glossy fashion and lifestyle prints.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, Thousands of protesters hit the streets of Hong Kong to demonstrate against a new extradition proposal. Hong Kong's government has recently announced plans to overhaul its extradition rules, allowing the transfer of fugitives with Taiwan, Macau and mainland China on a "case-basis" for the first time.
(Reuters, 3/31/19)(AFP, 4/1/19)
2019 Mar 31, It was reported that air quality in Indonesia has deteriorated from among the cleanest in the world to one of the most polluted over the past two decades. A study blamed coal-fired power stations, burning land for agriculture and rising car ownership.
(SSFC, 3/31/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar 31, Iranian media said a man has shot dead seven members of his wife's family in the southwestern city of Dezful.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, Israel's PM Benjamin Netanyahu warmly received President Jair Bolsonaro, on the Brazilian leader's first state visit to Israel.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, Israel reopened its commercial crossing with the Gaza Strip but kept military reinforcements deployed on the volatile frontier, a day after a smaller than expected Palestinian protest along the border. Militants fired five rockets from Gaza into Israel early today.
(Reuters, 3/31/19)(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, In Italy several tens of thousands of people marched in support of the ultra-Conservative World Congress of Families, on the final day of their conference in Verona.
(AFP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, In Morocco Pope Francis told Catholic priests and sisters that even though they are few in number, they shouldn't seek to convert others to Christianity but rather engage in dialogue and charity.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, In southern Nepal a powerful rainstorm killed at least 28 people and injured hundreds in a farming region in Bara and Parsa districts.
(AP, 4/1/19)
2019 Mar 31, Catholic priests in Poland burned books they say are sacrilegious, including tomes from British author J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series of fantasy novels. Rev. Rafal Jarosiewicz apologized on April 2, saying the ritual was not intended to condemn specific authors, religions or social groups.
(AFP, 4/1/19)(AP, 4/3/19)
2019 Mar 31, Somalia's al-Shabab Islamic extremist group said it has executed four men accused of spying for the British, Djibouti and Somali intelligence agencies.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, In Spain at least 50,000 people took to the streets of Madrid to draw attention to the emptying of the countryside, a growing issue for rural voters with less than a month to go before general elections.
(AFP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, Sudanese security forces fired tear gas at scores of protesters as they defied a nationwide state of emergency to demonstrate in Khartoum, its twin city Omdurman and other cities across the country.
(AFP, 3/31/19)(AP, 4/1/19)
2019 Mar 31, In northwest Syria one Turkish soldier was killed and another was wounded in a mortar attack on their position. Turkey's military launched retaliatory fire. Turkey said the attack was carried out by the Kurdish YPG militia in the Afrin region.
(Reuters, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, Taiwan condemned what it called a "provocative" move by China after two Chinese fighter jets crossed a maritime border separating the two sides amid growing friction between Taipei and Beijing.
(Reuters, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, Thai demonstrators protested against alleged cheating in the junta-ruled kingdom's first election since a 2014 coup, a week after the controversial poll sowed confusion over the ballot results.
(AFP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, In Tunisia Arab leaders, long divided by regional rivalries, condemned a US decision to recognize Israel's sovereignty over the Golan Heights and said Middle East stability depended on creating an Palestinian state.
(Reuters, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, Turkey voted in local elections in a test for President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, with his ruling party fighting to keep hold of the country's two key cities as an economic slowdown takes hold. In eastern Turkey an election observer and another man were killed in a fight at a school-based polling station. Pres. Erdogan's AKP suffered a major upset in the ballot after results showed they had lost not only the capital Ankara and also the country's economic hub Istanbul.
(AFP, 3/31/19)(AFP, 4/1/19)
2019 Mar 31, Voters in Ukraine cast ballots in a presidential election. Opinion polls have indicated that Volodymyr Zelenskiy, who stars in a TV sitcom about a teacher who becomes president after a video of him denouncing corruption goes viral, was leading a field of 39 candidates. Police say they have received more than 1,600 complaints about electoral violations in the presidential election. Zelenskiy took 30 percent support in the vote, while President Petro Poroshenko was a distant second with about 16 percent. The top two candidates advance to a runoff on April 21.
(AP, 3/31/19)(AP, 4/1/19)
2019 Mar 31, Ukraine police seized heroin worth about $60 million, over half a ton of the powder, in raids in the country's center and west, describing it as the biggest haul they had ever seen.
(AFP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, Venezuela's Pres. Nicolas Maduro announced a 30-day plan to ration electricity following nationwide power cuts.
(SFC, 4/1/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar, The US published a National Space Weather Strategy and Action Plan.
(https://tinyurl.com/yy7qdl5x)(Econ., 6/27/20, p.15)
2019 Mar, The US National Marine Fisheries Service and the Pacific Fishery Management Council said a ban on sardine fishing from Mexico to the Canadian border will go into effect on July 1 for a fifth straight year due to a dramatic decline in the stock. They said the sardine population has plummeted 98.5 percent since 2006.
(SFC, 3/27/19, p.A7)
2019 Mar, Arizona banned prisoners from reading "Chokehold: Policing Black Men," by Paul Butler, a former federal prosecutor. The book discusses the impact of the criminal justice system on black men. In May the American Civil Liberties Union called on the Arizona Dept. of Corrections to rescind the ban.
(SFC, 5/22/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar, Canada's Quebec province introduced Bill 21, a measure that would prohibit civil servants, teachers, nurses, bus drivers, lawyers and other people who interact with the public from wearing religious symbols while at work.
(AP, 4/13/19)
2019 Mar, In Ecuador the government of Lenin Moreno signed a $4.2 billion, 3-year agreement with the IMF aimed at softening the effects of deficit cutting and making the economy more competitive.
(Econ., 7/4/20, p.27)
2019 Mar, In Egypt university teacher Manar Adel Abu el-Naga, her husband Omar Abdelhamid Abu el-Naga and their one-year-old son were taken by security agents from their home in Alexandria. Their whereabouts remained unknown until she appeared in February, 2021, before Egypt’s Supreme State Security prosecutors, who ordered her pre-trial detention over terror charges. Nothing was publicly said about her husband’s whereabouts.
(AP, 3/4/21)
2019 Mar, In Guinea-Bissau nearly 800kg of drugs were found hidden in the false bottom of a Senegalese-registered truck loaded with frozen fish in Safim town, some 15km (nine miles) from the capital.
(BBC, 5/28/20)
2019 Mar, In Norway the 85.4-meter-tall Mjostarnet building, officially the world's tallest timber building, was completed.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mj%C3%B8st%C3%A5rnet)
2019 Mar, A plot to unseat Venezuela's government quickly crumbled when a volunteer combatant was arrested after sneaking across the border into Venezuela from Colombia. Shortly after, Colombian police stopped a truck transporting a cache of brand new weapons and tactical equipment worth around $150,000, including spotting scopes, night vision goggles, two-way radios and 26 American-made assault rifles with the serial numbers rubbed off. The plan was led by Jordan Goudreau, an American citizen and three-time Bronze Star recipient for bravery in Iraq and Afghanistan.
(AP, 5/1/20)
Go to April 2019
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Return to home
2019 Jan 1, US authorities fired tear gas into Mexico during the first hours of the new year to repel about 150 migrants who tried to breach the border fence in Tijuana.
(AP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, An American air strike in Yemen killed Jamal al-Badawi, an al-Qaida operative accused of involvement in the 2000 attack on the US Navy ship Cole.
(SFC, 1/7/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 1, The US and Israel officially quit UNESCO, the UN's educational, scientific and cultural agency at the stroke of midnight, the culmination of a process triggered more than a year ago amid concerns that the organization fosters anti-Israel bias. Since 2011 the US has accrued $600 million in unpaid dues, which was one of the reasons for Pres. Donald Trump's decision to withdraw. Israel owed an estimated $10 million.
(AP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, A US excise tax on mined coal that funds the Black Lung Disability Trust Fund was reduced to $0.50 per ton for coal from subsurface mines and $0.25 per ton for surface mines. The cut was expected to cost taxpayers at least $15 billion by 2050.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Lung_Benefits_Act_of_1973)(SFC, 12/11/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 1, NASA rang in the New Year with a historic flyby of the farthest, and quite possibly the oldest, cosmic body ever explored by humankind -- a tiny, distant world called Ultima Thule -- in the hopes of learning more about how planets took shape.
(AFP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, Washington state joined a handful of other states banning those under 21 from buying assault rifles.
(SFC, 1/2/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 1, Pegi Young (b.1952), the ex-wife of Neil Young and co-founder of the Bridge School (1986), died in California after a year long battle with cancer.
(SFC, 1/5/19, p.E1)
2019 Jan 1, Two Austrian women became the first same-sex couple to officially tie the knot in the predominantly Catholic country, following years of legal challenges from gay rights groups.
(AP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, Former Brazilian army captain Jair Bolsonaro took office as president promising to overhaul many aspects of life in Latin America's largest nation.
(AP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, In Burkina Faso local villagers of the Mossi ethnic group attacked a nearby camp of herders from the nomadic Fulani group. Seven Fulani herders were lynched and their homes were burned down. Yirgou residents killed 39 people in Fulani herding communities across the region in retaliation for attacks a day earlier.
(AFP, 1/2/19)(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 1, Democratic Republic of Congo's government cut internet connections and SMS services across the country for a second straight day as the country nervously awaited results from the weekend's chaotic presidential election.
(Reuters, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, France ditched a system whereby residents file income tax returns based on the previous year's earnings, replacing it with a system where the state deducts the taxes directly from people's salaries or pensions each month.
(AFP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, In Hong Kong thousands of demonstrators marched to demand full democracy, fundamental rights, and even independence from China in the face of what many see as a marked clampdown by the Communist Party on local freedoms.
(Reuters, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, In Japan a minivan slammed into pedestrians early today on a street where people had gathered for New Year's festivities in downtown Tokyo. A ninth person was injured after the suspect got out of the car and punched him. Kazuhiro Kusakabe (21) was arrested.
(AP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, In western Germany a man (50) ploughed his car into a crowd of people in early today, injuring at least four in Bottrop and Essen before being arrested by police on suspicion of attempted homicide. This appeared to have been an intentional attack against foreigners.
(AP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, In southern India millions of women stood should to shoulder along highways in Kerala state creating a human wall 300 miles long standing fast against sexism and oppression.
(SFC, 1/3/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 1, Israel's center-left opposition dramatically split ahead of an April 9 election, with leader Avi Gabbay announcing he would no longer partner with veteran politician Tzipi Livni as she sat stone-faced next to him. The announcement meant the end of their Zionist Union alliance, which secured the second most seats in the last general election in 2015, but has since tumbled far in opinion polls.
(AFP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, In Malawi Yasin Phiri, an albino, was killed in front of his young son. Local media said the man's arms were hacked off, his teeth pulled and his private parts removed, prompting calls by local and international civil society groups for government action. On March 1 Malawi said it will offer cash rewards of up $7,000 for information about abductions and killing of people with albinism as anger over government inaction grew ahead of national elections.
(Reuters, 3/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, In Mali armed men reportedly attacked a central village, killing 37 civilians, in what appeared to be ethnic violence. Those killed were from the Fulani ethnic group and included the village chief.
(AP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, Myanmar police clashed with insurgents in the troubled western state of Rakhine. One policeman was critically injured when border guard police were attacked by about 30 men carrying "small and heavy arms" near Saytaung, a village in the Buthidaung area.
(Reuters, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 1, In Pakistan four Taliban militants stormed a security forces facility in the southwestern town of Loralai, triggering a battle that left four security forces and the attackers dead.
(AP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, Romania took over the EU's rotating presidency at a tumultuous time for the bloc and just days after European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker voiced doubts about the country's ability to do the job.
(AFP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, Somalia's government ordered the UN top envoy to the troubled country to leave, accusing him of "deliberately interfering with the country's sovereignty." Nicholas Haysom had raised concerns at the action of Somalia's UN-backed security services in recent violence that left several people dead.
(AFP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 1, Taiwanese immigration authorities found 24 Vietnamese and are searched for 124 others who left their tour groups after arriving in December on tourist visas.
(AP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 1, Thailand police said Sucheep Sornsung (41) shot and killed six family members, including his two young children, before killing himself after a New Year's party in southern Chumphon province.
(Reuters, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, In Turkmenistan a law took effect forbidding the sale of alcoholic drinks including beer on trains, airplanes and ferries and at sports facilities. It also banned the sale of alcohol on holidays when workers get the day off. The law called for alcohol sales to be banned on Saturdays and Sundays beginning in 2021, except at bars and restaurants.
(AP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 1, Pope Francis ushered in the New Year with an ode to motherhood, reminding the faithful that a mother's example and embrace is the best antidote to today's disjointed world of solitude and misery.
(AP, 1/1/19)
2019 Jan 2, Pres. Donald Trump said the United States would get out of Syria slowly "over a period of time" and would protect the US-backed Kurdish fighters in the country as Washington draws down troops. US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, which include Kurdish fighters, captured the Syrian town of Kashmah.
(AP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 2, The first of about 80 US military personnel arrived in Gabon in case they are needed to protect US citizens and diplomatic facilities in Congo's capital Kinshasa.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 2, The US military carried out an airstrike in southwestern Somalia that killed 10 members of the al-Shabab extremist group. The US carried out at least 47 such strikes last year in the Horn of Africa nation.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 2, US soldier Peter Lian (21) was charged with murder in the death of his estranged wife, Khuang Par, whose body was discovered in a suitcase in an Indianapolis dumpster on Dec. 23. Lian was accused of flying to Indianapolis from Colorado to kill his estranged wife, then dumping her body in a trash bin and fleeing to Thailand.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 2, US Apple CEO Tim Cook said in a letter to shareholders that demand for iPhones is waning and revenue for the last quarter of 2018 will fall well below projections, a decrease he traced mainly to China.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 2, It was reported that Netflix has removed an episode of a satirical comedy show from its service in Saudi Arabia over its criticism of the kingdom, following a legal request by officials in Riyadh.
(AFP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, New Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro issued an executive order making the Agriculture Ministry responsible for deciding on lands claimed by indigenous peoples, in a victory for agribusiness that will likely enrage environmentalists. The temporary decree will expire unless it is ratified within 120 days by Congress. It strips power over land claim decisions from indigenous affairs agency FUNAI.
(Reuters, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, Chinese President Xi Jinping, declaring that independence is not an option for Taiwan, urged both sides to reach an early consensus on unification and not leave the issue for future generations.
(AP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, DR Congo said it had pulled accreditation for Florence Morice, a French radio journalist, and cut off the broadcasts of Radio France Internationale (RFI) amid tensions over the counting of votes in crucial elections.
(AFP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, A Red Cross official said hundreds of refugees have crossed into Uganda from Congo in the aftermath of that country's presidential election, heightening concerns about the possible cross-border spread of Ebola.
(AP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, In Denmark eight people were killed and 16 injured on the Great Belt Bridge linking Zealand and Funen when a passenger train hit a trailer that had blown off a freight wagon coming the other way. The victims were all on the passenger train.
(Reuters, 1/2/19)(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Jan 2, In France Eric Drouet, of the leaders of the "yellow vest" demonstrations, was arrested late today for organizing an unauthorized protest on the Champs-Elysees avenue. He was released the following afternoon. Drouet already faced a trial for carrying a weapon at a previous protest.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 2, In India two women entered the Sabarimala temple in Kerala state, one of the country's largest Hindu pilgrimage sites that had been forbidden to females between the ages of 10 and 50, sparking protests across the state.
(AP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, In India Hindu nationalists linked to PM Narendra Modi’s ruling party urged him to push through laws to allow the building of a temple on the ruins of a 16th century mosque in Ayodhya.
(Reuters, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, In Italy temporary administrators were appointed to lead the country's 10th largest lender, the struggling Carige, as part of a plan to avoid yet another bank bailout.
(AP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, Madagascan security forces fired tear gas to break up a protest by supporters of losing presidential candidate Marc Ravalomanana, who claims he was denied victory in last month's election because of fraud.
(AFP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, The Dutch Coast Guard said up to 270 containers had fallen off the Panamanian-flagged MSC ZOE, one of the world's biggest container ships, in rough weather near the German island of Borkum and floated southwest toward Dutch waters. Three missing containers contained an organic peroxide, a flammable and highly toxic compound. In Feb. the estimate of fallen containers was raised to 345.
(Reuters, 1/2/19)(AP, 1/3/19)(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Jan 2, A Nigerian Air Force helicopter crashed in combat at Damasak in northern Borno state, killing five crew members.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 2, In Norway avalanche occurred in the northern region of Troms in an area popular with skiers. Three Finns and a Swede were skiing in the area and were reported to police as missing.
(Reuters, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 2, Qatar Airways said it now holds a 5 percent share in China Southern Airlines, helping expand the Gulf carrier's reach in one of the world's fastest growing aviation markets.
(AP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, Philippine officials said the death toll from weekend landslides and devastating floods triggered by a tropical depression in the Bicol and eastern Visayas regions has climbed to 85.
(AP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, Saudi Arabia announced plans to build an entertainment complex in the capital Riyadh, the latest in a series of state-backed efforts to encourage public leisure activities after decades of tight social restrictions.
(Reuters, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, Sudan's largest opposition bloc joined calls by a wide array of political groups for President Omar al-Bashir to step down, turning up the pressure on the longtime autocrat after two weeks of street protests.
(AP, 1/2/19)
2019 Jan 2, The Syrian Observatory for Human /Rights said two days of fighting in the provinces of Aleppo and Idlib have killed 31 people, including five civilians. 17 Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) fighters and 16 combatants from the Turkish-backed National Liberation Front rebel alliance were killed in Idlib province.. The al-Qaida-linked Levant Liberation Committee and the Turkey-backed Nour el-Din el-Zinki group blamed each other for triggering the fighting.
(AP, 1/2/19)(AFP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 2, In Thailand tens of thousands of tourists fled popular islands and resort areas as Tropical Storm Pabuk closed in and threatened to batter the southern part of the kingdom with heavy rains, winds and seven-meter (22-foot) waves.
(AFP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, The United States issued a pre-emptive warning to Iran against pursuing three planned space rocket launches that it said would violate a UN Security Council resolution because they use ballistic missile technology.
(Reuters, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Democrats took over the US House of Representatives, ushering in a new era of divided government in Washington with the goal of checking Donald Trump's turbulent presidency.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, In Florida two big rigs and two passenger vehicles collided and spilled diesel fuel across I-75 sparking a massive fire that killed 7 people, including five children riding in a church van.
(SFC, 1/4/19, p.A4)(SFC, 1/5/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan 3, Michigan's Democratic congresswoman Rashida Tlaib kicked off her term with an expletive-laced vow to impeach Donald Trump, testing her party's discipline and earning a chiding the next day from the president.
(AP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 3, In Texas three children were found killed and their mother Kimaria Nelson (24) beaten and severely wounded by a pellet gun in Texas City. Junaid Hashim Mehmood, the father of one of the children was soon arrested and charged with murder.
(http://tinyurl.com/yb43d96j)(SFC, 1/5/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan 3, Stocks went into a steep slide after Apple reported a slowdown in iPhone sales over the holidays in China, a hugely important market for the company.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Texas lawyer Herb Kelleher (b.1931), co-founder of Southwest Airlines, died. He became chairman of the airline in 1978 and CEO in 1982.
(SFC, 1/4/19, p.D2)
2019 Jan 3, In Afghanistan the Taliban killed eight police in an attack on their post in the provincial capital of the northern Baghlan province.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, The new government of Brazil's far-right President Jair Bolsonaro hit the ground running on its first day of business, rushing through changes to put a conservative stamp on the country by trashing progressive achievements of past administrations.
(AFP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Canada said that 13 of its citizens have been detained in China since Huawei Technologies Co Chief Financial Officer Meng Wanzhou was arrested last month in Vancouver at the request of the United States.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 3, A Chinese space probe successfully touched down on the far side of the moon. The Chang'e-4 lunar probe, launched in December, made the "soft landing" and transmitted the first-ever "close range" image of the far side of the moon.
(Reuters, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Croatia threatened to cancel its purchase of F-16 fighter jets from Israel after months of stalling due to a lack of US approval. Washington has objected to the sale because it wants the removal of electronic system upgrades that Israel added in a rare defence dispute between the close allies.
(AFP, 1/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, In El Salvador transgender woman Camila Diaz Cordova (29), who sought asylum in the United States, died after being kidnapped and beaten. This was weeks after she was deported, underscoring the dangers of the Trump administration's hardening policy on asylum seekers.
(Reuters, 2/23/19)
2019 Jan 3, In Greece two men, 67 and 64 years old, along with the older man's wife, went missing after setting out from Keratea in a pouring rain. Their bodies were later found separately in a creek that had turned into a raging river southeast of Athens.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 3, India deported a second small group of Rohingya Muslims, five members of a family, to Myanmar after ordering the expulsion of members of the Myanmar minority group and others who entered the country illegally.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, In southern India Hindu hard-liners shut shops and businesses and clashed with police in Kerala state to protest the entry of two women into the Sabarimala hill temple, one of India's largest Hindu pilgrimage sites.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, In Iran prominent human rights activist Narges Mohammadi and British-Iranian detainee Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe announced plans to go on hunger strike in Tehran's Evin Prison to protest against the denial of medical treatment.
(AFP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Israeli far-right activists clashed with police as authorities moved in to clear away two mobile homes illegally set up on a hilltop near Ramallah in the occupied West Bank.
(AFP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Italy's deputy PM Matteo Salvini demanded the resignations of the rebellious leaders of Florence, Palermo and Naples for refusing to obey a controversial anti-immigration law.
(AFP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Mexico's government said construction on a partly-built $13 billion new Mexico City airport which the new president wants to cancel has been officially suspended.
(Reuters, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Niger's defense ministry said several days of raids have killed more than 280 Boko Haram extremists near the border with Nigeria.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Nigeria's President Muhammadu Buhari appointed his niece, Amina Zakari, to the election commission ahead of presidential elections in February, when he will seek a second term. The opposition quickly objected to the appointment.
(AFP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 3, Saudi Arabia announced that it will seek the death penalty against five suspects in the slaying of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, a killing that has seen members of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman's entourage implicated in the writer's assassination.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, In Spain workers at Amazon's biggest local warehouse started a two-day strike just ahead of a gift-giving feast day, as part of a long-running campaign for better pay and conditions.
(Reuters, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Sudanese security forces fired tear gas to disperse some 200 protesters who were trying to deliver an anti-government petition to the local headquarters of President Omar al-Bashir's ruling party in Port Sudan.
(Reuters, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, In Syria clashes between jihadists and rebels raged inside the last major opposition bastion for a third day, as the death toll mounted to more than 70 fighters.
(AP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, In Tunisia two alleged jihadists blew themselves up during an early morning raid by security forces on a house in the central region of Sidi Bouzid.
(AFP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 3, Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Ankara and Baghdad would deepen cooperation against terrorism after tensions last month over Turkish air strikes against Kurdish militants in Iraq.
(AFP, 1/3/19)
2019 Jan 4, In southern California three men were killed and four others injured during a brawl at the Gable House Bowl in Torrence.
(SFC, 1/7/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 4, In the SF Bay Area police found three people dead following gunfire at the 1000 block of Center Street in Oakland. Antonio Malike Durant (26) was arrested on Jan. 18 and soon charged with three counts of murder.
(SFC, 1/24/19, p.C6)
2019 Jan 4, In Texas Jenna Scott and her friend Michael Swearingin disappeared. Their bodies were later found in a shallow grave in Clearview, Oklahoma. Cedric Marks (44) was arrested this month in Michigan on a burglary charged related to Scott's house in Temple, Texas.
(http://tinyurl.com/y7986eun)(SFC, 2/4/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 4, Twitter suspended an account that posted links to sensitive personal data and documents stolen by hackers from hundreds of German public figures and politicians — from every political party but the far-right Alternative for Germany. The breach, discovered by journalists a day earlier, affected politicians at all levels.
(AP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, Afghan officials said Taliban fighters are threatening major oil wells near the northern city of Sar-e Pul following days of fighting in which dozens of members of the security forces have been killed and wounded. At least seven border police officers were killed late today when their checkpoint came under attack by insurgents in southern Kandahar province. 16 insurgents were killed and 11 others wounded in an ensuing battle.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)(AP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, An Australian man (24) rammed his four-wheel drive into a Sydney police car, hijacked a supermarket delivery truck and taxi, rammed other cars and stabbed and wounded a passerby before killing himself in front of police.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, It was reported that Bolivia's bee population is being decimated by massive and intensive use of chemical pesticides to protect coca plants, the region's biggest cash crop.
(AFP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, The People's Bank of China said it would cut the amount of cash that banks must hold as reserves by one percentage point essentially freeing up about $218 billion to ease lending.
(SFC, 1/5/19, p.D4)
2019 Jan 4, The China Academy of Social Sciences said in a research report that the country's population is set to reach a peak of 1.442 billion in 2029 and start a long period of "unstoppable" decline in 2030.
(Reuters, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 4, China's Jade Rabbit 2 space rover explored the lunar terrain in the world's first mission on the surface of the far side of the moon.
(AP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, Colombia's government said it has asked Venezuela to verify whether certain members of the ELN rebel group are living in the country and to detain them under Interpol red notices if they are.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, The French government dismissed 'yellow vest' protesters as agitators whose only goal was to topple it, signaling a toughening stance against a movement that has shaken Emmanuel Macron's presidency.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, In Germany an Interior Ministry spokesman said personal data and documents from hundreds of German politicians and public figures have been published online, in what appears one of the most far-reaching cyber-attacks in a country that has become a target of choice for hackers.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, Ghanaian religious leaders said angry young Muslims have attacked a charismatic church in Accra a day after its pastor predicted the country’s chief imam would die this year in a New Year's eve sermon.
(AFP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, In India the office of the chief minister of Kerala state said a woman (46) has become the third to enter the Sabarimala Hindu temple in defiance of an ancient ban on females of menstruating age. Temple management denied that the Sri Lankan woman had in fact entered. Only small protests were reported from across the state.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, In Iraq a fire at a women's shelter in Baghdad killed several lodgers. A police chief called it a "group suicide" caused by women rioting in the shelter. Two women died from stab wounds and seven perished in the fire.
(AP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, Parts of Lebanon's public and private sectors went on a union-organized strike to protest worsening economic conditions and months of delay in the formation of a new government.
(AP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, Mexican federal police took steps to close a migrant shelter in Tijuana, sparking protests from some of the dozens of US-bound people who had been staying there after traveling in a caravan from Central America.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, In Myanmar thirteen policemen were killed and nine injured in early morning attacks on police outposts in Rakhine state by the insurgent Arakan Army, as the country celebrated Independence Day.
(AP, 1/4/19)(Reuters, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 4, Dutch authorities said they will hold Swiss shipping line MSC liable for the cost of cleaning up debris from more than 270 cargo containers that fell off one of its vessels and washed up on shore. Roughly 35 containers have been located and the remainder were lost at sea.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, In Nigeria the Koluama Seven Brothers militant group carried out an unconfirmed warning strike on an oil facility owned by local energy firm Conoil in the southern state of Bayelsa. The group soon threatened a production shut-down and demanded action from Conoil and a traditional ruler called King Solomon Eddy on issues such as job creation.
(Reuters, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 4, A Palestinian broadcasting corporation said masked gunmen have raided its studios in the Gaza Strip.
(AP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, In Peru foreign ministers from 12 Latin American countries and Canada said their governments would not accept Nicolas Maduro as Venezuela's president when he is sworn in for a second six-year term next week. The 14-member Lima Group -- with the exception of Mexico -- said it would not grant recognition to Maduro's hardline socialist government.
(AFP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 4, In the Philippines Talib Abo, a former mayor of the town of Parang, was killed in a shootout with police. His brother, Bobby Abo, was also killed in a separate raid. In 2016 Pres. Duterte had accused them of being involved the drug trade. Police reportedly found guns and methamphetamine at both of the brothers' homes.
(SFC, 1/5/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 4, A Philippine court ordered the arrest of Japanese pachinko billionaire Kazuo Okada, about a month after the country's Department of Justice recommended the filing of charges against him over three counts of fraud. The warrant of arrest was made public on Dec. 6.
(Reuters, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 4, Poland accused France of breaching European Union laws by exceeding spending limits. Paris last month forecast a 2019 deficit of 3.2 percent, which would violate the EU-mandated limit of 3.0 percent of GDP.
(AFP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, In Poland five teenage girls were killed by a fire in an "escape room" attraction in Koszalin. In "escape rooms", participants are locked in a room and race against the clock to solve puzzles and challenges to open a way out.
(Reuters, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 4, In Portugal a court in Lisbon said it was not proven that former Interior Minister Miguel Macedo had favored Chinese and Angolan investors in administrative procedures granting the so-called "golden visas." Two other senior Portuguese officials were found guilty of corruption while two Chinese citizens were convicted of influence-peddling. Another Chinese citizen and an Angolan were acquitted.
(AP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, In Romania Eugeniu Iordachescu (89), a civil engineer who devised an ingenious way to save 12 churches and many other historic buildings from being destroyed by the country's former Communist strongman, died.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 4, In Sudan dozens of protesters chanted anti-government slogans as they left a major mosque following Friday prayers in Omdurman, near Khartoum. Security forces fired teargas and the crowd quickly dispersed.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, In Syria an air strike by the US-led coalition on a village held by the Islamic State killed at least ten people.
(SFC, 1/5/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 4, In southern Thailand one person was reported dead and another missing as rain, wind and surging seawater as Tropical Storm Pabuk buffeted coastal villages and world-famous tourist resorts, knocking down trees and utility poles and flooding roads.
(AP, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, The UN human rights office called on Bahrain to release activist Nabeel Rajab, saying that the upholding of his five-year jail sentence by the top court this week showed "continued suppression of government critics".
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 4, Zimbabwe's government said it has begun laying off 3,365 workers from its youth ministry, as it tries to make good on its promise to cut the bloated civil service and sort out the country's finances.
(Reuters, 1/4/19)
2019 Jan 5, Afghan government employee Javid Noori, who also worked as a part-time journalist in the Farah region was kidnapped and killed by Taliban militants. His body was found three days later. Noori was abducted from a bus along with 30 other passengers in a remote part of the province.
(Reuters, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 5, In CongoDRC the country's powerful Catholic church warned of a popular "uprising" if untrue results are announced.
(AP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, Heavy snow caused travel chaos in parts of Austria and Germany as authorities closed roads and train routes because of avalanche danger and airports reported weather-related cancelations. A 20-year-old skier died in an avalanche on Mount Teisen, near the Austrian border.
(AP, 1/5/19)(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 5, In Brazil a special deployment of troops began fanning out in the northern city of Fortaleza with orders to stop a spike in violent attacks by criminal gangs against banks, buses and shops. Intelligence reports published by media suggested gangs were revolting against tough new measures recently imposed in the state's prisons.
(AFP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, French "yellow vests" marched through Paris and other cities in protest against high living costs and the perceived indifference of Pres. Emmanuel Macron, whose government this week hardened its stance against them. Former light heavyweight boxer Christophe Dettinger (37) was filmed beating up police officers in Paris during the protests. Dettinger turned himself in to investigators on Jan. 7. On February 13 Dettinger was convicted of assault and given a one-year prison sentence.
(Reuters, 1/5/19)(AP, 1/7/19)(AP, 2/14/19)
2019 Jan 5, In Hungary thousands marched through Budapest's city center to protest against a new law that allows employers to ask staff to work up to 400 hours per year of overtime.
(Reuters, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, In southern India twin arson and bomb attacks rocked Kerala state, continuing a violent backlash that followed the entry of two women into the Sabarimala Hindu temple that forbids female devotees.
(AFP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, An Indian court declared tycoon Vijay Mallya (62) a "fugitive economic offender," a ruling that empowers authorities to confiscate his properties and other assets. Mallya, who left India in 2016, is accused of money laundering and cheating Indian banks out of hundreds of millions of dollars.
(AP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, In Japan a 612-pound (278-kg) bluefin tuna sold for a record 333.6 million yen ($3 million) at the first auction of 2019, after Tokyo's famed Tsukiji market was moved to a new site on the city's waterfront.
(AP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, Madagascar police fired teargas to disperse some 500 supporters of the losing candidate in last month's presidential election, in the fifth such protest this week.
(AFP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, Mexico's Pres. Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador announced a plan to stimulate economic activity for 43 municipalities in six states just south of the US border.
(SSFC, 1/6/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan 5, In Pakistan a car bomb exploded in a Peshawar neighborhood wounding three people and damaging several shops.
(AP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, Gaza authorities arrested five Palestinians on suspicion of ransacking the offices of President Mahmoud Abbas's official Palestine Television station.
(Reuters, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, In northeastern Spain four people died and a baby girl in a critical condition was among the injured, in two separate tower block fires.
(AFP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, Switzerland-based shipping company MSC said that it was committed to finding and retrieving the containers that went overboard on Jan. 2 in a North Sea storm until the last one is found.
(AP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, The Istanbul-based Orthodox patriarch signed the formal decree confirming the creation of an independent Ukrainian church, marking a break with the Russian church that has angered Moscow.
(AFP, 1/5/19)
2019 Jan 5, In Vanuatu Mungau Dain (24), a star in the Oscar-nominated film "Tanna," died in the capital Port Vila, after contracting a leg infection that wasn't quickly treated.
(http://tinyurl.com/yclcz2ww)(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 5, The National Society of Film Critics chose Chloe Zhao's low-budget debut feature, "The Rider," as best picture of 2018. The society voted for Olivia Colman as best actress in "The Favourite," and Ethan Hawke as best actor in "First Reformed." The top accolade for best supporting actor went to Steve Yeun of "Burning," while Regina King of "If Beale Street Could Talk" nabbed best supporting actress.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 5, In Egypt a policeman was killed late today as he was trying to defuse an explosive device near a church in a residential Cairo district.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 5, The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces handed over IS fighters and civilians from Kazakhstan to their country. This included five fighters, 11 women and 30 children.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 5, In northern India six schoolchildren and their bus driver were killed as the vehicle rolled down a gorge on a hilly road in Himachal Pradesh state.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 5, In eastern Syria a missile attack by the Islamic State group killed at least one Kurdish fighter and wounded two British soldiers embedded with them.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 5, Venezuela's opposition-controlled but toothless National Assembly declared Nicolas Maduro's presidency illegitimate, calling on the military to support efforts to restore democracy.
(AFP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, A US airstrike in Somalia killed six al-Shabab members near Dheerow Sanle in Lower Shabelle region.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 6, The film "Bohemian Rhapsody" was the top winner in the 76th Golden Globe Awards. Glenn Close won the best actress award for her role in "The Wife." Rami Malek won the best actor award for his role in "Bohemian Rhapsody".
(SFC, 1/7/19, p.D1)
2019 Jan 6, In Kentucky a drunken driver heading the wrong way on a highway hit a family vehicle in Lexington killing all five people from Northville, Mi. Pickup driver Joey Lee Bailey (41) was also killed.
(SFC, 1/8/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 6, At least 30 Afghan villagers searching for gold in a riverbed perished in a flash flood in northeastern Badakhshan province.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, In Austria two German skiers were killed in avalanches in the western region of Vorarlberg, while a Slovenian skier also died in the region of Salzburg. Four snowshoe-hikers went missing after heavy snowfall plunged large parts of the country into chaos. Heavy snowfall in recent days created dangerous conditions across parts of southern Germany, Austria and Switzerland.
(AP, 1/6/19)(AFP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 6, A new British survey said more Britons want to remain a member of the European Union than leave. The survey also showed voters want to make the final decision themselves.
(Reuters, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, In Bulgaria thousands of Orthodox Christian worshippers plunged into icy rivers and lakes across the country to recover crucifixes cast by priests in ceremonies commemorating the baptism of Jesus Christ.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, China's state media reported that Chen Gang, executive secretary of the China Association for Science and Technology, was being probed by the ruling Communist Party's anti-graft watchdog on suspicion of breaking the law and violating discipline.
(Reuters, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, In France hundreds of women marched in Paris to reclaim France's "yellow vest" movement from violent activists, a day after protesters smashed their way into a government ministry.
(AFP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, In western Iran a magnitude 5.5 earthquake hit an area near the Iraqi border, injuring about 31 people.
(Reuters, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, Israel's army struck two Hamas posts in the Gaza Strip after balloons carried an explosive device over the border fence. No injuries were reported.
(AFP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, Malaysian King Sultan Muhammad V (49) abdicated in an unexpected move, after just two years on the throne.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, In Mexico seven men were killed in a shooting attack at the "Las Virginias" bar in the Caribbean coast resort city of Playa del Carmen.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 6, In Nigeria two journalists of the Daily Trust were arrested in Maiduguri. They had written a critical report of the army's performance fighting against Boko Haram extremists.
(SFC, 1/8/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 6, In Pakistan government talks with the United Arab Emirates on setting up an oil refinery in Pakistan "reached their final stage" during the visit of the crown prince of Abu Dhabi.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, Pakistani officials said two roadside bombs blasts have wounded eight people in the country's southwestern Baluchistan province.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, The Palestinian Authority (PA) announced its pullout from the Rafah border crossing, accusing Hamas of undermining its operations and detaining some of its workers.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 6, Dozens of Palestinians protested the arrival of Patriarch Theophilos III, the Greek Orthodox patriarch of the Holy Land, at an Orthodox Christmas celebration in Bethlehem. Palestinians have been demanding his resignation for allegedly selling church land to Israelis.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, In Saudi Arabia a new regulation that took effect aimed at curbing seemingly rampant cases of men secretly ending marriages without informing their wives. Saudi courts will now notify women by text message when they get divorced.
(AFP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, In Thailand Rahaf Mohammed M Alqunun, a Saudi woman held at Bangkok airport, said she would be killed if she was repatriated by Thai immigration officials, who confirmed the 18-year-old was denied entry to the country.
(AFP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, In Sudan thousands took to the streets in Khartoum to call for President Omar al-Bashir to step down, the latest in nearly three weeks of demonstrations against his 29-year autocratic rule. security authorities arrested several faculty members from Khartoum University.
(AP, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 6, In Syria Islamist Tahrir al Sham, formerly affiliated to al Qaeda, entered the town of Atareb, days after capturing from their mainstream rivals the strategic town of Darat Izza, both in the western Aleppo countryside, in a military campaign that has since spread across Idlib and areas near the Turkish border. The offensive by Tahrir al Sham has alarmed the National Army, the main Turkish-backed rebel force aimed at unifying disparate factions in the northwest.
(Reuters, 1/6/19)
2019 Jan 7, President Donald Trump said the fight in Syria against the Islamic State group was not over and that withdrawal would be done in a "prudent" manner.
(AFP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, The United States military carried out two airstrikes in Somalia that killed four al-Shabab extremists.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 7, In Alabama the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute received withering criticism on social media after rescinding its decision to honor political activist and scholar Angela Davis with the Fred Shuttlesworth Human Rights Award.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, In San Francisco Tom Guido (58), the former manager of the Purple Onion Club, was killed in a building on the 900 block of Post Street. A man who jumped from the building was in critical condition.
(SFC, 1/10/19, p.C1)
2019 Jan 7, It was reported that injury has forced Australian activist Mina Guli (48) to stop her effort to complete 100 marathons in 100 days as a way to highlight the importance of conserving water. Guli had run and walked 62 marathons on several continents, but in South Africa she was diagnosed with multiple stress fractures in her right femur.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro said funding of nongovernmental organizations working in Brazil will be rigidly controlled, reflecting increased oversight by his new right-wing administration over such groups.
(Reuters, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, Suely de Araujo, the head of Brazil's environmental protection agency Ibama, resigned after far-right President Jair Bolsonaro criticized the amount of money the unit spends to rent vehicles in his latest attack on the agency. Ibama is tasked with policing the Amazon rainforest to stop deforestation and illegal mining.
(Reuters, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, Chinese and American officials began talks in Beijing aimed at ending a bruising trade battle between the world's two biggest economies.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, Tesla Inc. broke ground for a factory in Shanghai, its first outside the United States.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, Ethiopian PM Abiy Ahmed and Eritrean President Isaias Afwerki reopened a border crossing between their countries as part of an ongoing reconciliation between the former foes.
(AFP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, In France Jeanne Augier (95), the millionaire owner of Hotel Negresco in Nice, died. She took over the luxury French Riviera hotel in 1957 she took over the hotel in 1957 and worked to extend its influence throughout France and the world.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 7, Gabon foiled an attempted coup after a group of soldiers called for a popular uprising as President Ali Bongo remained in Morocco after suffering a stroke last year. The chief military rebel who led the failed coup was arrested and two of his commandos killed after they stormed a public radio station in Libreville.
(AFP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, In Gambia a truth commission began hearing witness testimony as it set about investigating rights violations committed by the regime of Yahya Jammeh.
(AFP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, In Germany lawmaker Frank Magnitz (66), a local leader of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, was attacked and seriously wounded by several men in the northwestern city of Bremen.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 7, In India a small regional party quit PM Narendra Modi's ruling coalition, protesting against his bid to give citizenship to hundreds of thousands of non-Muslims from neighboring countries such as Bangladesh. The Asom Gana Parishad (AGP), based in the border state of Assam in the northeast, has become the fourth ally to quit the ruling National Democratic Alliance in the past year.
(Reuters, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, Moshe Arens (93), a former Israeli defense minister, foreign minister and an early political mentor to PM Benjamin Netanyahu, died.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, The two leaders of Italy's ruling populist coalition threw their support behind the "yellow vest" protesters roiling neighboring France.
(AFP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, Italy's populist government stepped in to help guarantee struggling Banca Carige SpA, bending to pressure despite the ruling 5-Star Movement's longtime anti-bank bailout rhetoric.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 7, Latvia's President Raimonds Vejonis nominated Krisjanis Karins of the center-right New Unity party for the post of prime minister in the country's third attempt to form a new government in the wake of a general election in October.
(Reuters, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, It was reported that Amnesty International has called on Poland not to deport Tumsu Abdurakhmanov, a Chechen video blogger and critic of Chechen authorities, who is being sought by Russia.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, In Saudi Arabia six people were killed and others arrested in a "preemptive" security operation in al-Qatif, a predominantly Shiite region in the Eastern Province of the kingdom.
(Reuters, 1/8/19)(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 7, In Sudan hundreds gathered at a rally backing President Omar al-Bashir. A minister said more than 800 protesters have been arrested in anti-government demonstrations held across Sudan since last month.
(AFP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, In Syria an IS fighter blew himself up near an SDF checkpoint in Raqqa. A war monitor said the suicide attacker first opened fire at an SDF force outside a local department before going inside and blowing himself up killing five, including four civilians, and wounding eight.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, The head of Thailand's immigration police said that Saudi woman Rahaf Mohammed Alqunun (18), who was stopped in Bangkok as she was trying to travel to Australia for asylum to escape alleged abuse by her family, will not be sent anywhere against her wishes.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, A Turkish court ordered the release on bail of Eren Erdem, a former opposition lawmaker, while he is being tried on terrorism-related charges.
(Reuters, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, A cargo ship sank in rough waters off Turkey's Black Sea coast, killing six crew members including its captain. Seven other crew members were rescued.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 7, The Vatican appointed a retired China-friendly cardinal to head the Catholic Diocese of Hong Kong, effectively blocking the succession of the highest-ranking serving bishop known to be critical of the Chinese government.
(AP, 1/7/19)
2019 Jan 8, Pres. Donald Trump gave a nine-minute prime-time address to make the case for a southern border wall, his signature domestic policy idea, but made no concessions to opposition Democrats, who have rejected funding for the project.
(AFP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 8, The United States imposed sanctions on seven Venezuelans including the owner of news network Globovision for allegedly plundering billions of dollars from the crisis-hit country through black-market currency exchanges.
(AFP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, In Michigan a Livonia doctor and seven other people were charged in a prescription drug conspiracy. Dr. Zongli Chang (52) later admitted running an $18 million prescription drug scheme. In April he was sentenced to more than 11 years in prison.
(http://tinyurl.com/y27gnh6a)(SFC, 4/19/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 8, In Brazil groups of criminals in the northeastern state of Ceara carried out fresh attacks for a seventh day on public infrastructure and businesses. At least four buses and a construction site were torched overnight in Fortaleza.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, In China a man (49) injured 20 children with a hammer inside a primary school in Beijing. A suspect, surnamed Jia, was employed through a labor service company to perform daily maintenance work at the school. His contract was set to expire this month and had not been renewed.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, Congo-based SYMOCEL said 16 percent of vote counting centers it had observed relied on tallies transmitted by voting machines instead of hand-counted tallies as required by law. The observer mission said it had witnessed 52 "major" irregularities in the 101 vote-counting centers it observed, including people tampering with results.
(Reuters, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, Egypt blocked Palestinians from entering the country from Gaza after Palestinian Authority (PA) personnel pulled out of the Rafah border crossing and Hamas officers took their place. Cairo decided to open Rafah crossing only to Palestinians returning to Gaza, after the PA personnel withdrew.
(Reuters, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, The European Union froze the assets of an Iranian intelligence unit and two of its staff, as the Netherlands accused Iran of two killings on its soil and joined France and Denmark in alleging Tehran plotted other attacks in Europe.
(Reuters, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, Deadly winter weather blasted Europe for yet another day, trapping hundreds of people in Alpine regions. At least 13 people have been killed in weather-related accidents in Europe over the last week.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, French officials slammed a fundraising drive that brought in more than 100,000 euros for Christophe Dettinger, a former boxer filmed punching police officers during the latest "yellow vest" anti-government protests in Paris over the weekend.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, German authorities said a local student (20) in Hesse state has admitted obtaining and publishing the personal data of hundreds of politicians and celebrities and told investigators he acted alone.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, Off Hong Kong one man was killed and two others declared missing after a Vietnamese-listed oil tanker caught fire while it was being refueled.
(AFP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, India's lower house of Parliament approved a bill that would grant residency and citizenship rights to non-Muslims who entered India illegally, allegedly after fleeing persecution in several neighboring nations, despite protests against the legislation in the populous northeast that brought the region to a near standstill.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, India's Supreme Court cleared the way for Vedanta to reopen its south Indian copper smelter by refusing to stay an order from the country's environmental court.
(Reuters, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, In Iraq a car bomb killed two police officers in the city of Tikrit. The wounded included two soldiers, a police officer and three civilians.
(Reuters, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, Authorities in Latvia confiscated two tons of cocaine with a street value of a billion euros ($1.15 billion), the largest seizure ever in the Baltic country. The drug originated from Ecuador. Five Latvian citizens were detained, including one with a previous conviction for smuggling and money laundering.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 8, In Lebanon winter storms packing heavy rain and snow turned streets into rivers of water and mud and paralyzed parts of the country. The storms have flooded Syrian refugee camps, ruining tents, mattresses and food and compounding the misery of people enduring powerful winter winds and biting cold.
(Reuters, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, Madagascar's Constitutional Court confirmed Andry Rajoelina as the winner of the country's Dec. 19 presidential election after his opponent lodged a complaint alleging fraud.
(AFP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, In western Mexico motorists lined up for a fourth straight day at gas stations as the government continued to restrict pipeline deliveries to combat illegal fuel taps.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un arrived on an unannounced visit to Beijing for his fourth summit with President Xi Jinping.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, Poland arrested a Chinese manager at tech giant Huawei in Poland and one of its own former counter-espionage officers and charged them with spying on Poland for China.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 8, Puntland, a region of war-ravaged Somalia, elected a new president, a peaceful transfer of power in a part of the country notorious for piracy and Islamist militias. Said Abdullahi Deni defeated his closest rival, Asad Osman Abdullahi and was sworn in for a new five-year term.
(Reuters, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, In South Africa a train collision in Pretoria killed three people and injured more than 200.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, A South Korean court approved a request by plaintiffs in a wartime forced labor case to seize part of the local assets of Japan's Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corp.
(Reuters, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, In Sudan thousands of protesters staged a "martyrs' rally" in the eastern town of Al-Gadaref to honor those killed in anti-government protests last month. Human Rights Watch said at least 40 people have been killed in the protests and accused security forces of using live ammunition and excessive force as well as arbitrary detentions.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, In northwest Syria a jihadist assault gained ground against Turkish-backed rebels, edging closer to frontlines with government forces.
(Reuters, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 8, In Thailand about 200 protesters staged a rare demonstration, demanding that there be no further delays in holding elections, which were expected next month but have been put in doubt.
(AP, 1/8/19)
2019 Jan 9, Three days of US-Chinese talks aimed at ending a costly tariff battle wrapped up in an optimistic atmosphere.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, A US supplier of T-shirts and other team apparel to college bookstores cut its ties with a Chinese company that drew workers from an internment camp holding targeted members of ethnic minority groups.
(AP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 9, The San Francisco Giants announced a 20-year agreement with Oracle Corp. for the company to affix its name to the city's waterfront ballpark for an estimated $300-350 million.
(SFC, 1/10/19, p.A1)
2019 Jan 9, Colorado officials said a simplified program will make it easier for thousands of people to seek the elimination of low-level marijuana convictions they received in Denver before recreational use became legal in the state.
(SFC, 1/10/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan 9, A wave of Taliban attacks in western and northern Afghanistan killed 21 members of the country's security forces.
(AP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 9, Australian police late today arrested Savas Avan (48) after 38 packages allegedly containing asbestos were sent to foreign consulates in the cities of Melbourne, Canberra and Sydney.
(AP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 9, Bangladesh police fired tear gas and swung batons as thousands of garment workers demonstrated for better wages for a fourth day. One protester was fatally shot and three dozen others were injured in clashes with police.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, Bosnian Serbs celebrated a holiday to mark the date in 1992 when Bosnian Serbs declared the creation of their own state in Bosnia, igniting the country's devastating four-year war that killed more than 100,000 people and left millions homeless. Bosnia's top court banned the Serb holiday in 2015, but the ban was not observed.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, British MPs voted to force PM Theresa May to quickly set out an alternative plan for Brexit if she loses a crucial vote on her EU withdrawal deal next week, in a second parliamentary defeat in 24 hours.
(AFP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, In Cambodia Kong Korn, a veteran member of the dissolved opposition, party broke ranks with his colleagues and became the first to apply for a government-offered lifting of a ban on engaging in political activity.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, A Cambodian court jailed Ieng Cholsa for three years for insulting the king in Facebook posts, the second known conviction under a new lese majeste law enacted last year, which rights groups fear could be used to stifle dissent.
(Reuters, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, A Egyptian court sentenced Ahmed Douma, one of the country's best-known activists, to 15 years' jail for rioting and attacking security forces in 2011. The Cairo court also ordered Douma to pay six million Egyptian pounds ($336,0005) for damages.
(Reuters, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, Activists from a French protest movement encouraged supporters to set off a bank run by emptying their accounts, while the government urged citizens to express their discontent in a national debate instead of weekly demonstrations disrupting the streets of Paris.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, It was reported that France and Germany have agreed to deepen a 1963 treaty of post-war reconciliation in a bid to show that the European Union's main axis remains strong and counter growing eurosceptic nationalism among some other members. The extension to the Elysee Treaty will be signed on Jan. 22.
(Reuters, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, A French fighter jet carrying two pilots disappeared from radar screens near the Swiss border in a snowstorm.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, Greek authorities said they have broken a drugs ring importing narcotics into the country as dehydrated 'superfood' berries implanted with cocaine.
(Reuters, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, Guatemala's top court overturned a decision by President Jimmy Morales to shut down a UN anti-corruption mission to the central American country.
(AFP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, India's upper house of Parliament approved a bill providing a 10 percent quota in government jobs for the poor members of upper castes who have been excluded from existing quotas for low-ranking castes. The bill now only needs the approval of India's president, a formality, to become law.
(AP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 9, Iran confirmed that is holding US veteran Michael White at a prison in the country.
(SFC, 1/10/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 9, Italy's far-right Deputy PM Matteo Salvini, at a press conference in Warsaw, said he wants his country and Poland to join forces to reshape Europe in his quest for a euroskeptic alliance ahead of elections in May.
(Reuters, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, In Kashmir a mortar shell fired by Indian troops from across the frontier killed a woman as she was trying to reach a shelter during an exchange of fire between India and Pakistan.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, The Kazakh Foreign Ministry said China is allowing more than 2,000 ethnic Kazakhs to abandon their Chinese citizenship and leave the country in a sign that Beijing may be starting to feel a mounting backlash against its sweeping crackdown on Muslims in the far west region of Xinjiang.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, In Lebanon a storm packing snow and rain that has battered the country for five days, flooded neighborhoods and paralyzed major mountain roads. The body of an 8-year Syrian girl, who had gone missing a day earlier after she fell into a river, was found in a nearby orchard.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, Forty-nine migrants disembarked in Malta after spending more than two weeks stranded on board rescue ships, ending a standoff in which European Union countries had refused to offer them a safe port. An agreement brokered by the European Commission calls for a total of some 300 migrants who have reached Malta in recent weeks to be redistributed between eight EU countries, including Italy.
(Reuters, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, Mexico's President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador issued an emotional appeal to his countrymen to help battle against fuel thefts, as long lines spread to gas stations in Mexico City.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, In northern Mexico an apparent clash between drug gangs left 21 bodies, some burned, in the township of Miguel Alemanof, Tamaulipas state. The death toll soon rose to 24 with the discovery of the bodies of three more men.
(AP, 1/10/19)(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 9, Nepal and Japan agreed to allow state-run Nepal Airlines to resume flights between the two Asian nations at the beginning of a two-day visit to Nepal by Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Kono.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, In Nepal a woman (35) and her sons were found dead by family and villagers in a small hut next to their family home due to suspected smoke inhalation. A local tradition exiled women from their homes and forced to live in huts during menstruation.
(AP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 9, It was reported that the Palestinian Authority has cut off the salaries of Hamas lawmakers in the West Bank, the latest in a series of recent measures that have escalated tensions between the rival factions.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, In the Philippines a mammoth crowd of mostly barefoot Catholics joined a raucous procession in Manila of a centuries-old black statue of Jesus Christ.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, Thousands of Poles protested a government plan to hold a massive slaughter of wild boars as a way to stop the spread of the deadly African swine fever among farm pigs.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, Russia's Defense Ministry says it has received 30 Soviet WW II-era T-34 battle tanks from Laos, a move reflecting the national veneration of the weapon. The ministry said more than 58,000 T-34s were built between 1940 and 1946, making it the world's most widely produced tank. The T-34 was widely exported and used in numerous conflicts.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, Saudi Arabia's energy ministry said proven oil reserves stood at 263.2 billion barrels at the end of last year, up from the figure of 261 billion barrels that has been used for almost three decades. The kingdom has another 2.9 billion barrels of crude in a border zone shared with neighboring Kuwait, bringing total oil reserves to 266.1 billion barrels. Saudi oil remains among the cheapest in the world to extract, at only $4 a barrel.
(AFP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, In Sudan thousands of people cheered President Omar al-Bashir in a show of support for his embattled regime in Khartoum Wednesday, as riot police fired tear gas at crowds of protesters at a rival anti-government demonstration.
(AFP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, A Syrian Kurdish militia said its fighters earlier this week captured eight foreign fighters with the Islamic State group in eastern Syria, including an American teenager. The YPG identified the 16-year-old American teenager as Soulay Noah Su.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 9, In Turkey a pro-Kurdish party legislator said 162 prisoners across Turkey have joined a hunger strike in a show of solidarity with an imprisoned opposition legislator who has been refusing food since November.
(AP, 1/9/19)
2019 Jan 10, President Donald Trump headed to the US-Mexico border to push his demand for a wall, a day after he walked out of negotiations with Democrats in a political crisis paralyzing the government.
(AFP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, In California rookie police Officer Natalie Corona (22) was ambushed and shot dead by a gunman as she investigated a car crash in downtown Davis. Police soon found suspect Kevin Douglas Limbaugh dead after he shot himself in the head.
(SFC, 1/12/19, p.A1)(SSFC, 1/13/19, p.A12)
2019 Jan 10, US carmaker Ford said it planned a major restructuring of its European operations, including job cuts, to boost profitability. Indian-owned Jaguar Land Rover also announced major restructuring in Europe as consumers dump diesel cars for greener electric vehicles.
(AFP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles agreed to pay California $78.4 million as part of a larger agreement with federal regulators to settle allegations of cheating on diesel emission tests.
(SFC, 1/11/19, p.D1)
2019 Jan 10, In Afghanistan Khetab Emir, a senior commander of the Islamic State militant group, was killed in a raid in the eastern area of Nangarhar province.
(Reuters, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 10, Heavy snowfall continued in parts of Austria and southern Germany, with several places cut off and the bad weather expected to persist. Snow was causing problems in other parts of Europe, even in Norway's Arctic Svalbard archipelago. At least 17 weather-related deaths have been reported in Europe over the past week.
(AP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, Baton-wielding Bangladeshi police fired tear gas to break up thousands of garment workers demonstrating for higher wages for a fifth day, forcing dozens of factories to close.
(Reuters, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, Belarus Pres. Alexander Lukashenko sternly warned Russia that it could lose its ally if it fails to offer compensation for higher oil prices.
(AP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, In northern Burkina Faso 12 civilians were killed during a jihadist attack in the village of Gasseliki. The area has been battling a wave of Islamist violence.
(AFP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 10, China's CCTV reported that parent discovered earlier this week that a batch of orally administered polio vaccines were being given to children at a county-run health facility nearly one month after their December 11 expiration date. At least 145 children were administered the expired polio vaccines.
(AFP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 10, Congo's electoral commission (CENI) announced overnight that Felix Tshisekedi (55) had won the Dec. 30 vote, edging out another challenger, businessman Martin Fayulu. The Catholic Church, one of the country's most respected institutions, challenged the official results, suggesting its tally did not give victory to opposition leader Tshisekedi. Four protesters were killed in clashes with security forces in Kikwit.
(AP, 1/10/19)(Reuters, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 10, In southern Croatia a fire broke out at the 252-megawatt (MW) Dubrovnik hydro power plant in Plat, leaving one worker dead and at least three injured.
(Reuters, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, In eastern Cuba seven people were killed and five left in critical condition after a bus crashed carrying tourists and local travelers.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 10, In France ride-hailing giant Uber lost an appeal brought by a former driver who wanted his terms of employment recognized as a fully-fledged work contract.
(AFP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 10, In Germany almost 640 flights were cancelled as security staff went on strike at three airports, meaning disruption for around 100,000 passengers.
(AFP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, India's federal police chief was ousted by a panel led by PM Narendra Modi, drawing criticism from the main opposition Congress party. Alok Verma, chief of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), was suspended in October along with his deputy after they accused each other of bribery and interfering in investigations.
(Reuters, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, In central Mali the French military in coordination with Malian armed forces carried out airstrikes killed some 15 members of an unnamed extremist group that had been preparing an attack.
(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 10, Norway's Aker Energy said it had discovered oil in commercial quantities off Ghana, which the government welcomed as a potential boost to the economy. Exploratory drilling indicated an "estimated 450-550 million barrels of oil equivalent (mmboe)" in the Pecan field.
(AFP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, Saudi Arabia awarded a contract to build a $500 million wind farm, a first for the world's top oil exporter as it pushes to diversify its energy sector. A consortium led by France's EDF and Abu Dhabi's Masdar won the bid for the 400-megawatt Dumat al-Jandal wind project in the northern Al Jouf province.
(AFP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, Spanish police said 28 professional tennis players, including one who participated in last year's US Open, have been linked to an international organized group accused of fixing matches.
(AP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, In southern Thailand four paramilitary volunteers were killed while guarding a school in Pattani province.
(AP, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro was sworn into a new term in office by the nation's Supreme Court.
(Reuters, 1/10/19)
2019 Jan 10, A rebel drone hit Yemen's largest air base, killing six loyalist soldiers during a military parade at the Al-Anad Air Base near Aden in an attack which threatened to hamper UN-led peace efforts. On Jan. 13 Maj. Gen. Mohammad Saleh Tamah, chief of Yemen's military intelligence, died of wounds suffered in the attack.
(AFP, 1/10/19)(AP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 11, The US-led coalition against Islamic State said it has begun the process of withdrawing from Syria.
(Reuters, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Oregon police fatally shot a man with a gun at a middle school in Eugene, amid a custody dispute.
(SFC, 1/12/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan 11, The share price in Brazilian airplane manufacturer Embraer soared as markets reacted favorably to the country's President Jair Bolsonaro approving a merger with us giant Boeing. Embraer will only retain control of its military division.
(AFP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, In Bulgaria two snowboarders died in an avalanche. Heavy snowfall this week in the Balkans has closed down schools, left some remote villages cut off and disrupted traffic and power supplies in many areas in the region. At least 20 weather-related deaths have been reported in Europe over the past week.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, In Canada three people were killed and nearly two dozen were injured when a double-decker bus struck a bus shelter in Ottawa during rush hour.
(Reuters, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Thousands of Colombians staged protests in several cities to demand the resignation of the country's chief prosecutor. Nestor Humberto Martinez is a key US ally in the war on drugs, but his critics at home say he has withheld information that links local politicians and business groups with Brazilian construction giant Odebrecht.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Congo runner-up Martin Fayulu announced he will file a court challenge to the presidential election results. Fayulu's camp said its tally showed he won 62 percent of the vote, with Felix Tshisekedi taking 19 percent. The influential Catholic Church also rejected the official result based on tallies by its 40,000-strong observer team. Police confronted opposition protesters in eastern Goma city, killing at least one person.
(AP, 1/11/19)(Reuters, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, In Ecuador at least 17 people died and 12 others were injured in a fire at a drug rehabilitation clinic in Guayaquil.
(Reuters, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 11, Egypt deported a German citizen early today whom it detained in Cairo airport on Dec. 27 on suspicion of plotting terrorism.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, A French judicial source said the president of Japan's Olympic Committee, Tsunekazu Takeda, is under formal investigation in France for suspected corruption related to Japan's successful bid for the 2020 Olympic Games.
(Reuters, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, In Germany airlines canceled around 120 flights at Frankfurt Airport and 90 at Munich Airport because of concerns about snow.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, German automaker Volkswagen posted another annual sales record in 2018 as new SUV models boosted deliveries and the company managed to increase its share in China even as the car market there shrank for the first time in years.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Greece told German Chancellor Angela Merkel it had grounds to pursue a legal claim for billions of euros in reparations for the Nazi occupation of the country in World War Two.
(Reuters, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 11, Greek police fired teargas to disperse hundreds of teachers protesting against government plans to change hiring procedures in the public sector.
(Reuters, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, In India leaders of two political rivals in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh said they will form an alliance in a bid to defeat PM Narendra Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in national election scheduled for May.
(Reuters, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, In Iraq two people were killed in an explosion in Al-Qaim, a city to which displaced families are being encouraged to return.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, The Israeli army said around 12,000 Palestinians had gathered in multiple sites along the border. A Palestinian woman was shot dead by Israeli forces the during protests.
(AFP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, An Italian court cleared the head of the Autostrade motorway operator of responsibility in the deaths of 40 people in a July 28, 2013, coach crash. Several others were jailed.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, In Japan Nissan's ex-chairman Carlos Ghosn was charged with breach of trust, making the star executive's release unlikely for months to come. Greg Kelly, another Nissan executive; and Nissan as a legal entity also were charged with additional underreporting of income, from 2015 through mid-2018.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Macedonia's parliament approved a deal with Greece that would rename the country North Macedonia. Greece's parliament is expected to vote on it before March.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 11, A court in Myanmar rejected the appeal of two Reuters journalists convicted of violating the country's Official Secrets Act during their reporting on the country's crackdown on Rohingya Muslims, and maintained the seven-year prison terms they were sentenced to last year.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, In Nigeria an overturned oil tanker exploded while dozens of people were scooping up the leaking fuel and many were killed. About 60 people were inside a pit scooping fuel when the explosion occurred.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 11, Portugal's parliament extended a residency program for wealthy foreigners to include investors who spend at least 500,000 euros on environmental projects.
(Reuters, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Portugal's parliament unanimously changed the law to expand the definition of rape to cover all sex without consent, joining just seven EU countries with such a wide definition.
(Reuters, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Russia's space agency lost control of the Spektr-R satellite, an orbiting radio telescope launched in 2011 with an expected useful life of about three years.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 11, Prominent Russian LGBT activist Igor Kochetkov said that gay rights supporters have seen a spike in detentions in Chechnya of men and women suspected of being gay since late December.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Spanish police said they have seized 2,700 kg (6,000 pounds) of marijuana bound for the United Kingdom and the Netherlands. The marijuana was grown and processed in Spain's northeastern region and then taken out of the country by truck.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Sudanese security forces fired tear gas to disperse demonstrators who marched after noon prayers in Khartoum to demand that President Omar al-Bashir step down from 30 years in power.
(Reuters, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Syrian state news agency said Israeli warplanes have fired a number of missiles toward the Damascus area, triggering Syrian air defense that shot down most of them.
(Reuters, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 11, Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen appointed close political ally Su Tseng-chang as premier during a Cabinet reshuffle following the ruling party's heavy election losses and growing pressure from rival China.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 11, Thailand's immigration police chief said Saudi woman Rahaf Mohammed Alqunun, who fled alleged abuse by her family, will leave Bangkok for Canada.
(AP, 1/11/19)
2019 Jan 12, The partial US government shutdown entered a record 22nd day, as Pres. Donald Trump remained steadfast in his demand for $5.7 billion to build a Mexico border wall and Democrats in Congress determined to refuse the funds.
(AFP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, The United States stepped up its criticism of Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro with an explicit call for the formation of a new government in the South American country.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, In Afghanistan at least five security forces were killed after their checkpoint came under attack by insurgents in southern Kandahar province. At least nine people were killed when a gas cylinder exploded late today in Kabul.
(AP, 1/12/19)(AP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 12, In Austria three German skiers were killed in an avalanche. A fourth was reported missing. The bodies of the three German skiers were recovered hours later near the resort of Lech. The 4th body was recovered on Jan. 16.
(AP, 1/13/19)(AP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 12, Brazil's government issued a statement saying it recognized Venezuela's Congressional leader, who opposes President Nicolas Maduro, as the rightful president of Venezuela.
(Reuters, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, In Britain hundreds of protesters, inspired by France's yellow vest movement, rallied in London, drawing attention to government austerity programs that have hit the poor hard.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, Rahaf Mohammed al-Qunun (18), a Saudi woman who fled her family this week saying she feared for her life, arrived in Toronto after Canada granted her asylum.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, Chinese telecommunications equipment maker Huawei said it had sacked Wang Weijing, an employee arrested in Poland on spying charges, in a case that could intensify Western security concerns about the company.
(Reuters, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, In northern China 21 coal miners were killed when a mine collapsed in Shenmu, Shaanxi province.
(AP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 12, Congo's presidential runner-up Martin Fayulu said he has asked the constitutional court to order a recount in the disputed election.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, Egyptian security forces killed six Islamic militants in a raid on their desert hideout south of Cairo between the southern provinces of Sohag and Assiut.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, Egypt's Al-Azhar university expelled a female student after she appeared in a video hugging a male colleague, accusing her of undermining the school's reputation. A video went viral earlier this month showing a young man carrying a bouquet of flowers kneeling before a young woman and then hugging her in what appeared to be a marriage proposal. The Al-Azhar University strictly segregates the genders.
(AFP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 12, The French Interior Ministry said about 32,000 people have turned out in yellow vest demonstrations across France, including 8,000 in Paris. Paris police fired water cannon and tear gas to push back demonstrators from around the Arc de Triomphe monument, in the ninth straight weekend of protests against President Emmanuel Macron's economic reforms.
(AP, 1/12/19)(Reuters, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 12, In France two firefighters and a Spanish woman died and nearly people 50 were injured in a massive gas explosion in a bakery that gutted the ground floor of a building in a central Paris shopping district. A 4th body was soon found bringing the overall death toll to four.
(AFP, 1/12/19)(AP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 12, Gabon's President Ali Bongo, who has been out of the country for two months recovering from a stroke, named Julien Nkoghe Bekale as the new prime minister in an apparent effort to shore up his political base days after a failed coup attempt. Bekale replaced Emmanuel Issoze-Ngondet, who has served since 2016.
(Reuters, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, In Germany a small plane crashed east of Berlin, killing two people.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, Thousands of Guatemalans marched against President Jimmy Morales's bid to close a UN anti-corruption mission that sought to investigate him on suspicion of campaign finance violations.
(AFP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, Japan-based Nissan confirmed that Chief Performance Officer Jose Munoz, who took a leave of absence a week ago, has resigned, the first high-profile departure at the Japanese automaker publicly acknowledged as related to the arrest of former Chairman Carlos Ghosn.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, In Kashmir rebel commander Zeenatul Islam was killed along with his associate late today in a gunbattle with Indian troops.
(AP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 12, Malaysia's Pahang state announced it had a new sultan, who is expected to be elected king after the former monarch abdicated following his reported marriage to a Russian former beauty queen. Tengku Abdullah Shah (59) replaced his father, Sultan Ahmad Shah.
(AFP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, In southwest Poland one miner died and six were injured after a tremor struck KGHM's copper mine Rudna, around 700 meters underground.
(Reuters, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, In northern Sweden a mining company truck crashed into a minibus early today. Six Swiss citizens were killed and one person was injured in the crash.
(AP, 1/12/19)(AP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 12, In Syria artillery shelling by government forces pounded parts of the northwestern Idlib province where militants were trying to infiltrate.
(AP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, Turkey for a second day loaded tanks and armored vehicles onto trucks and dispatched the convoy to the Turkish province of Hatay on the Syrian border.
(Reuters, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, In Yemen clashes erupted between Huthi rebels and government forces in the flashpoint port city of Hodeida, dealing a new blow to a fragile truce.
(AFP, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, In Yemen a fire at a refinery in the southern port city of Aden spread to a second storage tank, injuring six people.
(Reuters, 1/12/19)
2019 Jan 12, Zimbabwe's President Emmerson Mnangagwa said prices of petrol and diesel would more than double to tackle a shortfall caused by increased demand and "rampant" illegal trading. Despite the price hike, diplomats and tourists would be able to access cheaper fuel at certain pumping stations.
(AFP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 13, US President Donald Trump threatened Turkey with economic devastation if it attacks a US-allied Kurdish militia in Syria.
(Reuters, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 13, The FBI arrested Marzieh Hashemi (59), a prominent American-born anchorwoman on Iranian state television's English-language service, after she arrived at St. Louis Lambert International Airport. She had filmed a Black Lives Matter documentary after visiting relatives in the New Orleans area. She has worked at the Iranian state broadcaster service for 25 years. Her son, Reza Hashemi, was also arrested.
(AP, 1/16/19)(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 13, In Alabama Birmingham police Sergeant Wytasha Carter (44) was killed and another officer critically wounded in a shooting as they questioned two people suspected of trying to break into cars. Two suspects were taken into custody.
(SFC, 1/14/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 13, California's PG&E Corp. announced the resignation of CEO Geisha Williams as the company faces billions of dollars in potential liability for its role in the 2017 and 2018 California wildfires.
(SFC, 1/14/19, p.A1)
2019 Jan 13, In Mississippi George Robinson (62), a Black man, was slammed into the pavement by police officers who also struck and kicked him in the head and the chest. Robinson died off his injuries on January 15. The officers were canvassing a predominantly Black neighborhood in Jackson after a pastor, Anthony Longino, was fatally shot in a botched robbery outside his church hours earlier. On August 5, 2020, the three Black police offiers involved were charged with 2nd degree murder.
(SFC, 8/15/20, p.A4)
2019 Jan 13, It was reported that at least 26 people have died from hantavirus in the Patagonia region of Argentina since December. A judge has ordered 85 residents of Epuyen, a town of 3,000 where nine people have died, to remain in their homes for at least 30 days to help halt the outbreak.
(SSFC, 1/13/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 13, Bangladesh's commerce minister said local garment manufacturers have agreed to raise workers' pay, urging people to return to work after a week of violent demonstrations. At least 20 people were hurt when police used teargas and water cannons to disperse workers blocking a major highway in the Ashulia garment manufacturing belt, on the outskirts of the capital Dhaka.
(Reuters, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 13, Dubai-based port operator DP World said it will pay $502 million for a 71.3 percent stake in Chile's Puertos y Logistica SA, a port services firm.
(AP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 13, French media and reporters' organizations denounced attacks on journalists by "yellow vest" anti-government protesters and called for better protection after a series of incidents this weekend. President Emmanuel Macron attempted to rebound from two months of often violent anti-government protests by launching a nationwide debate over the grievances fuelling the "yellow vest" movement.
(Reuters, 1/13/19)(AFP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 13, In France two ski patrollers were killed when the devices they use to trigger avalanches exploded. This brought to at least 26 the number of weather-related deaths reported in parts of Europe this month.
(AP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 13, Greece's defense minister Panos Kammenos announced his resignation and said his right-wing Independent Greeks party is quitting the government after meeting with PM Alexis Tsipras. The government now needs the backing of six lawmakers from opposition parties or independents to avoid a snap election.
(AP, 1/13/19)(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 13, Israel acknowledged that it carried out a weekend air strike on what it called an Iranian arms cache in Syria, and that it also completed a hunt for cross-border tunnels dug by Tehran-allied Lebanese Hezbollah guerrillas.
(Reuters, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 13, Italian officials said former leftist guerrilla Cesare Battisti (64), on the run for almost four decades after escaping prison following a murder conviction, has been arrested in Bolivia and is expected to be extradited to Italy.
(Reuters, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 13, In Kashmir massive anti-India protests and clashes erupted, leading to injuries to at least 16 people after a gunbattle between militants and government forces overnight killed two rebels.
(AP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 13, The Southern African Development Community (SADC) urged Democratic Republic of Congo to recount votes cast in its disorganized presidential election, raising pressure on Kinshasa to ensure the legitimacy of the next government and avert widespread violent unrest.
(Reuters, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 13, In southern Spain a 2-year-old toddler fell into a narrow 100-meter well after walking away from his parents near Totalan, a town northeast of Malaga. On Jan. 26 rescuers found the dead body of the two-year-old boy.
(AP, 1/16/19)(Reuters, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 13, In Sudan hundreds of protesters marched in and around Khartoum, the fourth week of unrest that began over skyrocketing prices and a failing economy but which now calls for the ouster of autocratic President Omar al-Bashir. Security forces clashed with protesters in three cities.
(AP, 1/13/19)(Reuters, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 13, In Switzerland a fire broke out this morning in a six-story building in the southeastern city of Chur. A father (33) from the Dominican Republic and his two young children died in the fire and police were investigating if the man set the fire deliberately.
(AP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 13, Zimbabweans reacted with outrage to a sharp rise in fuel prices announced by President Emmerson Mnangagwa in a move to improve supplies as the country struggles with its worst gasoline shortages in a decade.
(AFP, 1/13/19)
2019 Jan 14, Teachers in the Los Angeles Union School District went on strike. Some charter school teachers joined their public sector counterparts to demand better working conditions.
(SFC, 1/16/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 14, California-based PG&E Corp. said looming wildfire costs were propelling it toward bankruptcy and that it would file for bankruptcy on or about Jan. 29.
(SFC, 1/16/19, p.D1)
2019 Jan 14, In Michigan Hyundai of South Korea scored two out of three wins in the North American Car, Truck and Utility Vehicle of the Year awards, as the Detroit auto show's press previews officially got underway.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, In New Jersey gunman William Owens (39) entered a UPS processing facility and took two women hostage in Logan Township. He was fatally shot by law officers. Nobody else was hurt.
(SFC, 1/15/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 14, MNG Enterprises, better known as Digital First Media, offered a $1.36 billion buyout of Gannett Co., the publisher of USA Today. The media group has a history of taking over struggling newspapers and slashing jobs.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, In Afghanistan a Taliban suicide bomber killed at least four people and wounded scores when he detonated an explosive-laden vehicle late today in Kabul.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 14, In Austria a worker clearing snow off a roof in Faistenaw died after being swept away as the snow began to slide off.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, In Bosnia three people died and three others were injured in two separate car accidents on icy roads near the northwestern town of Laktasi.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, A Brazilian police officer died and three others were hospitalized after their helicopter crashed in Rio de Janeiro's Guanabara Bay.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, A Chinese court sentenced a Canadian man to be executed for drug smuggling, prompting Canadian PM Justin Trudeau to accuse China of using the death penalty arbitrarily. Robert Lloyd Schellenberg (36) had appealed his original 15-year prison sentence.
(Reuters, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, DR Congo's Constitutional Court said it would start hearing an appeal on Jan. 15 against presidential election results that gave victory to opposition leader Felix Tshisekedi.
(AFP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, Croatia's government formally canceled a $500 million deal to buy 12 used fighter jets from Israel after it collapsed over US objections. The defense minister said the Balkan country will restart the search for the right deal.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, In Egypt a roadside bomb hit a police convoy in the town of Rafah in the north of the Sinai Peninsula, killing a conscript and seriously wounding four others.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, It was reported that a Finnish citizens' initiative to withdraw asylum from people convicted of sex crimes received tens of thousands of signatures over the weekend and has become an important political issue ahead of this year's parliamentary elections.
(Reuters, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, Two French policemen went on trial over the alleged gang-rape of a drunk Canadian tourist in April 2014 at the former headquarters of the Paris police.
(AFP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, Greek riot police used tear gas to disperse state schoolteachers protesting violently in Athens, days after the country's public order minister accused officers of indiscriminately attacking teachers in similar circumstances.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, In Honduras hundreds of migrants began trekking out of a bus station in the violent northern city of Pedro Sula to join a new caravan of people hoping to reach Mexico or the US.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 14, Indonesia said navy divers have recovered the cockpit voice recorder of a Lion Air jet that crashed into the Java Sea last October.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, In Iran a decades-old Iranian Boeing 707 military cargo plane reportedly carrying meat from Kyrgyzstan crashed while trying to land west of Tehran, killing 15 people on board and leaving a sole survivor.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, In Iran Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, a jailed UK-Iranian mother, launched a hunger strike over a lack of medical care and attempts by Tehran to force her to spy on Britain.
(AFP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, Former communist militant Cesare Battisti, wanted in Italy for four murders in the 1970s, arrived in Rome after an international police squad tracked him down and arrested him in Bolivia.
(AFP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, Jordan's King Abdullah and the foreign ministers of France and Iran made separate visits to Iraq, an ally of Tehran, amid US attempts to rally allies against the Islamic Republic as Washington starts withdrawing troops from neighboring Syria.
(Reuters, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, In northeastern Nigeria 7 people were killed when Boko Haram fighters attacked a military base in Rann, setting fire to shelters for those displaced by the conflict.
(AFP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 14, In Poland Pawel Adamowicz, the liberal mayor of the Polish city of Gdansk, died of his wounds a day after being stabbed by a former convict who rushed the stage during a charity event. The attacker has been identified by Polish authorities as a 27-year-old named Stefan.
(Reuters, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov threw cold water on Tokyo's hopes for a quick return of disputed islands in the Pacific, warning Japan that it must recognize them as part of Russia's territory as a starting point for talks.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, In southern Russia one person was killed and four were missing after a gas explosion tore through a multi-storey residential building in the town of Shakhty. The death toll soon climbed to four after the bodies of three missing people were found in the rubble.
(AP, 1/14/19)(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 14, LGBT activists in Russia charged the republic of Chechnya with launching a new crackdown on gays in which at least two people have died and about 40 people have been detained.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, Senegal's the Constitutional Council said the two best known opposition figures have been barred from running in presidential elections next month, increasing President Macky Sall's chances of securing a second term in office. Khalifa Sall and Karim Wade have 48 hours to appeal the Council's decision.
(Reuters, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, Singapore's foreign minister warned of "consequences" if neighboring Malaysia continues to escalate a dispute over waters claimed by the city state.
(AP, 1/14/19)
2019 Jan 14, It was reported that Suriname authorities confiscated more than 5,000 pounds of cocaine last week in the largest seizure ever for the country.
(SFC, 1/14/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 14, Zimbabwe police fired teargas as angry protesters barricaded roads with burning tires and rocks, after the government more than doubled the price of fuel over the weekend. At least 13 people sustained gunshot wounds during protests against the shock price hike. A police officer was stoned to death by protesters in the city Bulawayo. Two other people died during protests in Chitungwiza, south of Harare, and Kadoma, west of the capital.
(AFP, 1/14/19)(AFP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, It was reported that Jose Irizarry (44), a US federal narcotics agent known for his expensive tastes and high-profile drug seizures, has been implicated in a multimillion-dollar money-laundering conspiracy that involved the very cartel criminals he was charged with fighting in Colombia.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, The US Securities and Exchange Commission charged two Ukrainian men, Artem Radchenko and Oleksandr Ieremenko, with hacking into computers of the SEC to steal quarterly and annual reports of publicly traded companies before their public release. The SEC also filed civil charges against Ieremenko and five others from the US, Ukraine and Russia.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, In Arizona a Tempe police officer shot and killed Antonio Arce (14) after he was encountered burglarizing a car.
(SFC, 1/19/19, p.A8)
2019 Jan 15, Facebook announced that it will invest $300 million over three years to support journalism, with an emphasis on promoting hard-hit local news organizations.
(AFP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, American musical comedy legend Carol Channing (b.1921) died in Rancho Mirage, Ca. She was best known for her performance as Dolly Levi in "Hello, Dolly!," a role she performed more than 5,000 times. She began as a Broadway musical actress, starring in "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes" (1949). Her films included "Thoroughly Modern Millie" (1967).
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carol_Channing)(SFC, 1/16/19, p.A7)
2019 Jan 15, An Australian state government announced plans to mechanically pump oxygen into lakes and rivers after hundreds of thousands of fish died in heatwave conditions. Up to a million dead fish were found floating last week in the Darling River in western New South Wales. 1,800 more rotting fish had since been found in Lake Hume in the state's south.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Brazil's far-right President Jair Bolsonaro decreed the easing of national gun laws as part of his law-and-order agenda, despite fears it could aggravate already staggering violent crime.
(AFP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Britain's Parliament held a historic vote as PM Theresa May lobbied for support but braced for defeat of the UK's divorce deal with the European Union. The House of commons voted 432-202 against May's Brexit plan
(AP, 1/15/19)(SFC, 1/16/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 15, In northern Burkina Faso Canadian geologist Kirk Woodman was kidnapped late today by a dozen gunmen on a mining site owned by Vancouver-based Progress Minerals. His body was found the following afternoon in Oudalan province. A Canadian man and an Italian woman went missing in the same area earlier this month.
(Reuters, 1/16/19)(Reuters, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 15, In western Cameroon at least 30 people were abducted by suspected separatists in the troubled English-speaking Southwest Region.
(AFP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 15, In China Ren Zhengfei, the founder of Huawei, said his company would refuse to disclose secrets about its customers and their communication networks, trying to lay to rest concerns the Chinese tech giant might spy for the Communist government.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Europol said authorities in Belgium and Portugal have dismantled a gang suspected of organizing sham marriages between mostly Portuguese women and Pakistani men. Europol said police have arrested 17 suspects in Belgium — where it also found 43 people it described as "irregular migrants" — and three in Portugal.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, French woman Patricia Dagorn, accused of seducing and then poisoning elderly wealthy men, had her sentence reduced on appeal, after a court overturned two murder convictions in the case. She was sentenced last year to 22 years in prison over the fatal poisoning of two men found dead in 2011 on the Cote d'Azur, and the drugging of two others.
(AFP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, French carmaker Renault said it was recalling some 13,300 Dacia automobiles in Romania over safety issues with the driver's air bag inflator.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Gabon President Ali Bongo returned to medical leave in Morocco, after a brief visit to Libreville where he appeared in a wheelchair on state TV following his stroke last year.
(Reuters, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 15, In Germany Volkswagen CEO Herbert Diess and Ford CEO Jim Hackett said they are forming a global alliance to develop commercial vans and medium-sized pickups together while exploring broader cooperation on future battery-powered and autonomous vehicles and services.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, In India Kanaka Durga (39), one of two Indian women who entered an ancient Hindu Sabarimala temple hill temple earlier this month in defiance of a centuries-old ban on women of menstruating age, alleged she was beaten up by her mother-in-law.
(Reuters, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, An Iranian rocket blasted off into space, but scientists failed to put the Payam satellite into orbit in a launch previously criticized by the United States as helping the Islamic Republic further develop its ballistic missile program.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Italian police seized 644 kg of cocaine worth some 130 million euros ($148 million) hidden in bags of Honduran coffee at the port of Livorno. This was one of the largest drug hauls in Italy in recent years.
(AP, 1/30/19)(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 15, In Kenya a huge blast followed by a gun battle rocked an upmarket hotel and office complex in Nairobi in an attack claimed by the Al-Qaeda-linked Shabaab Islamist group. At least 7 people were killed. One of the five was later identified as Mahir Khalid Riziki (25), who grew up in Mombasa.
(AFP, 1/15/19)(Reuters, 1/15/19)(AFP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 15, Senior Kurdish official Bedran Ciya Kurd categorically rejected a "safe zone" that the Turkish president says his troops plan to set up in northern Syria.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, The Int'l. Criminal Court at The Hague acquitted former Ivory Coast president Laurent Gbagbo over post-electoral violence that killed 3,000 people, the latest in a series of blows for beleaguered ICC prosecutors.
(AFP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, In Pakistan a fire broke out at a home in the garrison city of Rawalpindi, killing a bride to be and four other women who were preparing the woman's wedding.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Russia extended the detention of Ukrainian sailors captured together with their vessels off Crimea in November despite protests from Kiev and the West.
(AFP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Spain's powerful feminist movement rallied across the country against far-right party Vox for seeking to scrap tough laws against gender violence which it argues "criminalizes" men.
(AFP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Authorities in the northeastern Spanish region of Catalonia arrested 17 people, including five alleged members of an extremist Islamist cell, as part of an ongoing anti-terror operation.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, In Thailand Anastasia Vashukevich, a model from Belarus who claimed last year that she had evidence of Russian involvement in helping elect Donald Trump president, pleaded guilty in a court in Pattaya in a case related to holding a sex training seminar and will be deported. She and seven co-defendants were given suspended 18-month prison terms and fines.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Turkey's president said his troops will establish a 20-mile-wide "safe zone" in northern Syria with the help of allies.
(AP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, The UN reported that freezing temperatures and the lack of medical care have killed at least 15 displaced Syrian children in recent weeks.
(AFP, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Venezuela's opposition-run congress considering a measure that would ask dozens of foreign governments to seek a freeze on bank accounts controlled by the government of President Nicolas Maduro. Congress also prepared to formally declare Maduro a usurper following his inauguration on Jan. 10 to a disputed second term.
(Reuters, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 15, Zimbabwe's military put on a show of force to deter further protests over steep fuel price hikes.
(Reuters, 1/15/19)
2019 Jan 16, US federal agents arrested Hasher Jallal Taheb of Cumming Georgia, as he showed for a meeting with an undercover agent and FBI source to carry out an attack on the White House. On April 1, 2020, Taheb (23) pleaded guilty to a charge of attempting to destroy, by fire or an explosive, a building owned by or leased to the United States.
(https://tinyurl.com/ucux2g4)(SFC, 4/3/20, p.A4)
2019 Jan 16, In Nevada Ernesto Martinez-Guzman (20), an illegal immigrant from El Salvador, fatally shot a Reno couple with it at their home with a gun stolen from the couple two weeks earlier. The couple had employed him as a landscaper. His DNA was found on the revolver also used to kill Connie Koontz and Sophia Renken in their homes in Gardnerville. Koontz was found dead Jan. 10. Renken's body was found Jan. 13. Martinez-Guzman was arrested Jan. 19 in Carson City.
(SFC, 1/29/19, p.A5)(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Jan 16, In Texas a child (9) was fatally shot by a cousin (9) while playing with a gun in Houston.
(SFC, 1/18/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 16, In Australia Aiia Maasarwe (21), an exchange student from Shanghai University in China, was attacked shortly after stepping off from a tram in the suburb of Bundoora. Codey Herrmann (20), an aspiring rapper, was soon charged with murder and rape in the death of the Israeli student.
(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 16, Brazil's far-right President Jair Bolsonaro and Argentina's President Mauricio Macri said after their first meeting that they agreed on their opposition to Venezuela's authoritarian government.
(Reuters, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, It was reported that Britain's Parliament has approved a law that will make it illegal to take so-called "upskirting" photos. Following "royal assent" the law will apply in England and Wales. The practice is already banned in Scotland.
(AP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, In Burkina Faso Canadian geologist Kirk Woodman's body was found, following his abduction by a dozen gunmen at a mining site operated by Vancouver-based Progress Minerals. He had been shot, and his body was dumped in an area that is under growing threat from Islamist militants.
(http://tinyurl.com/yb466o59)(Reuters, 4/3/19)
2019 Jan 16, Egypt says its police forces have killed five militants in a shootout in the city of el-Arish in the turbulent northern Sinai Peninsula. It was unclear when the battle took place.
(AP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, Egypt's capital Cairo and some of its port cities were hit by a severe sandstorm, with strong winds and heavy dust forcing the closure of several ports.
(Reuters, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, Gunmen in Ghana shot dead an investigative journalist who helped uncover corruption in soccer. Ahmed Hussein-Suale was shot three times by men on a motorbike while driving home from work in Accra. He was part of a team famous for a documentary last year that accused 77 referees and Ghana's then soccer chief Kwesi Nyantakyi of taking bribes.
(Reuters, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 16, Greek PM Alexis Tsipras very narrowly won a confidence vote after his right-wing partner left the governing coalition to protest an agreement to normalize relations with Macedonia. A nationwide poll this week found 70 percent of respondents oppose the agreement.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 16, Guam's archdiocese of Agana filed for bankruptcy protection, estimating at least $45 million in liabilities over sexual assaults by Catholic clergy.
(http://tinyurl.com/yy9a8bvv)(SFC, 8/9/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 16, Hong Kong customs officers and mainland officials seized 8,300 kilos of pangolin scales and 2,100 kilos of ivory tusks hidden inside a container -- declared to be carrying frozen beef -- at a customs facility. A man and a woman from a trading company in the city were soon arrested.
(AFP, 2/1/19)
2019 Jan 16, Hungary detained Rui Pinto (30), a Portuguese man, on a European arrest warrant filed by Portuguese police on suspicion of extortion and secrecy violations. He had reportedly hacked football bodies' documents - which later appeared on the Football Leaks website - because he was "outraged" by criminality in the sport.
(Reuters, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 16, Kenya's government said security forces have killed at least five militants who stormed the upscale Nairobi DusitD2 hotel compound, taking at least 21 lives and forcing hundreds of others into terrifying escapes after a 20-hour, overnight siege.
(AFP, 1/15/19)(Reuters, 1/15/19)(SFC, 1/17/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 16, In Libya fighting between rival armed groups flared up again in Tripoli, four months after a UN-brokered cease-fire. At least one person was reported killed and 17 others wounded.
(AP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, It was reported that Malaysia has imposed a ban on Israelis participating in any event hosted by the Southeast Asian nation after barring athletes from attending the World Para Swimming championships in July. Malaysia's cabinet had decided on the measure last week.
(Reuters, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, The lower house of Mexico's Congress passed a measure creating a National Guard. It was quickly criticized by President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador for weakening controversial proposals to give the military a greater formal role in policing.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 16, International Criminal Court judges at the Hague said that former Ivory Coast President Laurent Gbagbo and Mr. Ble Goude, a former government minister, should be released immediately following their acquittal on charges of involvement in deadly post-election violence in 2010.
(AP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, Philippine officials turned over to China a former government official wanted back home on charges of corruption that amounted to $210 million. Xie Haojie (49) was arrested on Jan. 13 in Manila in an operation coordinated with Chinese authorities.
(AP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, Polish private Radio Zet said that Iran has stopped issuing tourist visas for Poles.
(Reuters, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, Portuguese police discovered 430 kg (950 pounds) of cocaine concealed inside a banana shipment from Latin America at the port of Leixoes.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 16, Romania's Constitutional Court ruled that secret protocols between prosecutors and the country's domestic intelligence agency were unconstitutional. The decision could cause murder and corruption trials in which prosecutors have relied on evidence that was obtained under the agreement to collapse.
(AP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, South Africa's transport minister pledged to toughen penalties for reckless road users after more than 1,600 people were killed in traffic accidents over the six-week festive season. 17 traffic officers were arrested for corruption over the holidays.
(AFP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, South Korean officials said they have stopped businessmen from bringing North Korean paintings into the country that a report said were purchased at an art studio under UN sanctions.
(AP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, Sudanese police fired tear gas at crowds of anti-government protesters in Kassala, in the first such demonstration held in the eastern town bordering Eritrea.
(AFP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, In Syria a suicide attack carried by IS insurgents killed 19 people, including four Americans, in the northern town of Manbij. The dead included 9 civilians and at least 5 US-backed Syrian fighters.
(Reuters, 1/16/19)(AP, 1/16/19)(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 16, The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), backed by the US, said it was ready to help create a safe zone suggested by US President Donald Trump in its region across north and east Syria.
(Reuters, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, It was reported that Turkish prosecutors are seeking an international arrest warrant for New York Knicks player Enes Kanter, accusing him of membership in a terror organization.
(AP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, The UN Security Council unanimously approved the deployment of up to 75 observers to Yemen's port city of Hodeidah for six months to monitor a ceasefire and redeployment of forces by the warring parties.
(AP, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, The UN said at least 890 people are believed to have been killed over three days in December in ethnic violence in northwestern Democratic Republic of Congo, and it warned that the toll could be higher still.
(Reuters, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 16, Leading Zimbabwean activist Evan Mawarire was arrested by armed police at his home in Harare. Scores of civilians were detained and charged with public violence and others were beaten during protests in response to Mnangagwa increasing the price of fuel by more than 150 percent.
(AFP, 1/16/19)(Reuters, 1/16/19)
2019 Jan 17, Michael Cohen, Pres. Trump's former attorney, acknowledged that he paid a technology company to rig Trump's standings in two online polls before the presidential campaign.
(SFC, 1/18/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 17, In Florida a shooting at a strip club in Miami left one security guard dead. Police considered the Booby Trap to be the country's most crime-ridden strip club.
(SFC, 1/19/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan 17, In Chicago a judge acquitted three police officers of trying to cover up the 2014 police shooting of black teenager Laquan McDonald to try to protect another officer who pulled the trigger. Officer Jason Van Dyke shot McDonald 16 times.
(SFC, 1/18/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 17, American poet Mary Oliver (83) died at her home in Hobe sound, Florida. The 1984 Pulitzer Prize winner had authored more than 15 poetry and essay collections.
(SFC, 1/18/19, p.C8)
2019 Jan 17, A US federal judge struck down early-voting restrictions enacted by Wisconsin Republicans in a lame-duck legislative session last year.
(SFC, 1/18/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 17, Facebook said it has removed hundreds of Russia-linked pages, groups and accounts that it says were part of two big disinformation operations targeting users outside the US.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, In Australia the body of Monika Billen, a 62-year-old German tourist, was found beneath a tree in the searing heat of the central Outback, eight days after she was reported missing.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, Rio de Janeiro state prosecutors said they were temporarily suspending an investigation into suspicious payments handled by the former driver of Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro's son, Flavio, due to a Supreme Court ruling.
(Reuters, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, China's ambassador to Canada warned the Canadian government to stop recruiting international support in its feud with China and threatened retaliation if Canada bans Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei for security reasons.
(AP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 17, In Colombia at least eight people were killed and another 10 injured in a car bombing at a police academy in Bogota. Jose Aldemar Rojas (59) rammed a 1993 Nissan loaded with 175 pounds of pentolite through a checkpoint The death toll from the bombing soon rose to 21. Authorities blamed Jose Aldemar Rojas (56), a longtime member of the National Liberation Army (ELN).
(AP, 1/17/19)(AP, 1/18/19)(SFC, 1/18/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 17, Comoros President Azali Assoumani asked: "What's wrong when a Saudi is assassinated in an embassy of Saudi Arabia?" during a speech at a function to launch the construction of a Saudi-funded road in the Indian Ocean island nation.
(Reuters, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 17, In Egypt Islamic militants kidnapped a Christian man traveling in a communal taxi in the turbulent north of the Sinai peninsula. He was later identified as Adeeb Nakhlah (45), a police forensic expert. Police pursued the kidnappers into the desert to which they fled after the incident, killing one of them and wounding two others in a firefight, but could not free the hostage.
(AP, 1/17/19)(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 17, In France Alexandre Benalla, a former bodyguard for President Emmanuel Macron, was taken into police custody over his continued use of diplomatic passports after he was fired for roughing up protesters.
(AFP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, German authorities said they have arrested Navanithan G. (39), a suspected member of the Tamil Tigers. He is alleged to have been involved in the August 2005 assassination of Sri Lanka's Foreign Minister Lakshman Kathirkamar and the attempted killing of Eelam People*s Democratic Party leader Douglas Devananda.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, In Greece striking school teachers and other civil servants shut down central Athens for hours during a protest of new hiring criteria for teachers that were under consideration in parliament.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, Greek police arrested a man trying to sell antiquities excavated by grave robbers that dated back to the third century BC.
(SFC, 1/23/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 17, An Indian court sentenced a popular and flamboyant spiritual guru and three followers to life in prison in the murder 16 years ago of a journalist who published a letter about the guru's alleged sexual exploitation of women. Dr. Saint Gurmeet Singh Ram Rahim Insan and his three followers were convicted on Jan. 11 on murder charges.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, Japan-based Hitachi said it has suspended work on a major new nuclear power station, the Horizon Project, located in Wylfa, on the Welsh island of Anglesey, because it had been unable to agree on financing with the UK government. Hitachi said it will also suspend work on another site located in England.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, Kazakhstan jailed Arman Kudaybergenov and Nural Kiyasov to 18 years in prison for the murder of Denis Ten, the country's first Olympic figure skating medalist. Ten (25) was stabbed in Almaty last July as he struggled with two men he had caught trying to steal the mirrors on his car. Female defendant Zhanar Tolybayeva was found guilty of theft and failing to report a crime, and sentenced to four years.
(Reuters, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, Kenyan police said nine more people have been arrested for their alleged involvement in the extremist attack on the DusitD2 complex in Nairobi this week, bringing the total number of suspects in detention to 11.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, Lithuanian PM Saulius Skvernelis announced he will run for president this year, saying his election would lead to "more harmony" and less intrigue in the Baltic eurozone state. His challengers include independent economist Gitanas Nauseda and conservative ex-finance minister Ingrida Simonyte, who he described as the "heirs" to Pres. Grybauskaite.
(AFP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, In Norway a woman in her 20s was in critical condition after being stabbed in a downtown Oslo supermarket. A Russian suspect (20) arrested after the assault told investigators he wanted to kill several people and that it was a terror attack.
(AP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 17, Polish private radio RMF FM, citing confirmation from the Prime Minister's office, said a Polish man arrested on charges of spying for China last week was an advisor to former PM Beata Szydlo.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, Romanian coal miners ended a weeklong strike after the energy minister offered them wage hikes and other perks.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, President Vladimir Putin arrived to a rousing welcome in Serbia, a key Moscow ally, where he will confer Russia's top award to his counterpart Aleksandar Vucic.
(AFP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, Anastasia Vashukevich, the Belarusian model who claimed last year that she had evidence of Russian interference in the election of Donald Trump as US president, was arrested immediately upon her arrival in Moscow following deportation from Thailand.
(AP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 17, It was reported that another Saudi woman has turned to social media for protection from her father, just days after Canada granted refuge to Rahaf al-Qunun, the 18-year-old Saudi who fled her family. Nojoud al-Mandeel has not fled the kingdom, has not revealed her face and has only made her pleas for help on Twitter in Arabic.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, Sudanese professional and opposition groups held protests in at least a dozen major cities. In Khartoum hundreds braved tear gas and sometimes live fire as they marched toward the presidential palace to deliver a written request that President Omar al-Bashir step down. Riot police broke up a march by hundreds of people on the presidential palace. Three demonstrators were killed.
(AP, 1/17/19)(AFP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 17, In eastern Syria intense US-led coalition airstrikes hit the eastern province of Deir el-Zour, the last area held by the Islamic State group, where the extremists' control has been shrinking over the past weeks.
(AP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, A public sector strike brought Tunisia to a standstill as workers heeded calls from a powerful trade union to stay home over demands for wage hikes and economic reforms.
(AFP, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 17, Turkey deported Dutch journalist Ans Boersma (31) after Turkish officials said Ankara received a tip-off from police in the Netherlands that she had suspected links to a jihadist group in Syria. Boersma was a person of interest in an ongoing investigation into militant activity.
(AFP, 1/17/19)(Reuters, 1/17/19)
2019 Jan 18, Special counsel Robert Mueller's office issued a rare public statement disputing the accuracy of BuzzFeed News' report that President Donald Trump's former attorney told Mueller that Trump directed the lawyer to lie to Congress.
(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 18, The White House announced after talks between Trump and Kim that Pres. Donald Trump would hold a second summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in late February, but would maintain economic sanctions on Pyongyang.
(Reuters, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 18, A US federal judge found four women guilty of entering the Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge in Arizona without a permit as they sought to place food and water in the desert for migrants.
(SSFC, 1/20/19, p.A10)
2019 Jan 18, Los Angeles teachers picketed and rallied for a 5th day as contract negotiations continued.
(SFC, 1/19/19, p.A8)
2019 Jan 18, Former Chicago police Officer Jason Van Dyke (40) was sentenced to nearly seven years in prison for the 2014 shooting of Laquan McDonald (17).
(SFC, 1/19/19, p.A8)
2019 Jan 18, Jornal Nacional, Brazil's most respected newscast, said that 48 deposits of 2,000 reais each were deposited into the bank account of Senator-elect Flavio Bolsonaro, President Jair Bolsonaro's eldest son, between June and July 2017, when he was a Rio de Janeiro state lawmaker.
(AFP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 18, Bulgarian special police forces arrested 43 people in coordinated raids across the country on a suspected terrorism financing ring.
(Reuters, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, Canada's government dismissed China's warning of repercussions if Ottawa banned Huawei Technologies Co Ltd from supplying equipment to 5G networks, saying it would not compromise on security.
(Reuters, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, Colombian authorities arrested Ricardo Carvajal for his alleged role in the previous days car bombing. They said he showed up on intercepted phone calls boasting of having participated in the attack. Pres. Ivan Duque pressed Cuba to arrest 10 peace negotiators from the National Liberation Army (ELN) for the car bombing that left 21 dead and dozens more wounded.
(AP, 1/18/19)(SFC, 1/19/19, p.A2)(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 18, In the Czech Rep. a man was seriously injured after he set himself on fire in downtown Prague amid commemorative events to remember a student who burned himself to death 50 years ago to inspire resistance against the 1968 Soviet-led invasion of Czechoslovakia.
(AP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, Germany-based Volkswagen Group said that it will pay a fine of 1 billion rupees ($14.2 million) imposed by India for installing software on vehicles that allegedly cheated pollution testing devices, though it is still appealing the order.
(AP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, Indonesia's president said Abu Bakar Bashir (81), the radical Muslim cleric and alleged mastermind of the 2002 Bali bombings, will be granted early release from jail on humanitarian grounds.
(Reuters, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, Iraqi archaeologist Lamia al-Gailani (80) died. She had lent her expertise to rebuild the collection at the National Museum after it was looted in 2003.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 18, An Italian navy helicopter plucked three survivors from a life raft after a rubber dinghy capsized in the Mediterranean Sea off Libya. Up to 117 migrants were believed to have died.
(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 18, In Kashmir at least five people were killed when an avalanche hit a truck in which they were traveling. Five more people were missing.
(Reuters, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, Lebanon used an Arab economic meeting to urge the Arab League to restore Syria's membership, calling it a "historic shame" to keep the Arab country out of the forum.
(AP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, The forces of Libyan strongman Khalifa Haftar reportedly killed three jihadists including a senior Al-Qaeda member in the south of the country days after launching a security operation. They were identified as Abdel Monem al-Hasnaoui, also known as Abu Talha al-Libi, Al-Mahdi Dengo and Egyptian citizen Abdullah al-Dessouki.
(AFP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, It was reported that Malaysia has filed a lawsuit against opposition-run Kelantan state for infringing on the indigenous Temiar tribe's land rights by handing out licenses to plantation companies to cut down timber, the first such action by a sitting government.
(Reuters, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, In central Mexico at least 66 people were killed after a pipeline ruptured by suspected fuel thieves exploded near the town of Tlahuelilpan, Hidalgo state. More than 85 other people were listed as missing. The death toll later rose to 134 after more injured people died at hospitals.
(Reuters, 1/19/19)(AP, 1/19/19)(AP, 1/28/19)(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Jan 18, Myanmar’s army said it has killed 13 rebel fighters in the western Rakhine State between Jan. 5 and Jan. 16. Myanmar's military announced that the Arakan Army, a Buddhist rebel group in Rakhine state, has been classified a terrorist organization.
(Reuters, 1/18/19)(AP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, At The Hague ICC judges said former Ivory Coast President Laurent Gbagbo must spend at least another two weeks in detention at the International Criminal Court, despite being acquitted this week of involvement in deadly post-election violence.
(AP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, Russia said it has agreed for France and Germany to monitor shipping traffic in the Kerch Strait following a naval confrontation between Moscow and Kiev last year.
(AFP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, In Somalia an ambush occurred on an Ethiopian peacekeeping convoy. African Union troops returned fire killing four extremists and wounding several others. Ethiopia denied claims that al-Shabab killed several Ethiopian troops.
(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 18, In Sweden the Centre Party played a decisive role in allowing Stefan Lofven to win a second term as prime minister by abstaining in a parliamentary vote, ending more than four months of political deadlock. The Centre Party and the allied Liberal Party will not join Lofven's new Social Democrat-Green coalition but will support it in return for pursuing such center-right policies as tax cuts and deregulation of the labor and property rental markets.
(Reuters, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, The scandal-plagued Swedish body that awards the Nobel Prize for literature said that poet Katarina Frostenson would leave the Academy after an investigation determined she had leaked the names of winners.
(Reuters, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, In Syria an explosion outside an office belonging to an al-Qaida-linked group in the country's northwestern killed at least 11 people. An airstrike in the country's east on the last area held by the Islamic State group killed at least 20 people in the village of Baghouz. The dead included ten IS members.
(AP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, In southern Thailand gunmen presumed to be Muslim insurgents stormed a Buddhist temple in Narathiwat province, killing two monks and wounding two others.
(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 18, Turkey's state-owned Anadolu news agency said a court has sentenced Murat Arslan, a judge who previously won an award for human rights, to 10 years in prison over links to the network Ankara says orchestrated an attempted coup in 2016.
(Reuters, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, The United Nations said it was "extremely alarmed" by the forced return by Cameroon of thousands of refugees to northeast Nigeria, where Boko Haram Islamists pose a continuing threat to civilians. The UN refugee agency said Cameroon forced "several thousand" refugees back to Nigeria this week. According to the UNHCR Cameroon is currently hosting 370,000 refugees, 100,000 of whom are Nigerians.
(AFP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, The UN human rights office said at least 34 people have been killed in Congo since disputed provisional election results were announced on Jan. 10.
(AP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 18, Zimbabwe blocked most social media as international criticism mounted of a ruthless security crackdown after anti-government protests.
(AFP, 1/18/19)
2019 Jan 19, Pres. Donald Trump offered to extend temporary protections for young people brought to the US illegally as children and those fleeing disaster zones in exchange for his long-promised border wall. Democrats dismissed the proposal even before his formal remarks.
(SSFC, 1/20/19, p.A1)
2019 Jan 19, US Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham said Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was responsible for the Oct. 2 murder of Jamal Khashoggi and must be "dealt with", as he threatened new sanctions.
(AFP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, In Alabama tornadoes struck Autauga county an d the town of Wetumpka. At least 25 homes were seriously damaged or destroyed.
(SFC, 1/21/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 19, In San Francisco thousands of protesters marched as part of the third Women's March. More than 100 crowds gathered elsewhere in the US and around the world for social justice and reproductive rights.
(SSFC, 1/20/19, p.A15)
2019 Jan 19, A Catholic diocese in Kentucky apologized after videos emerged showing students from an all-male high school mocking Native American Nathan Philips after a rally in Washington DC. Many of the youths were wearing "Make America Great Again" hats. One student said African American protesters were insulting them. Philips said he approached the students to keep the peace.
(SSFC, 1/20/19, p.A10)(SFC, 1/21/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 19, In Las Vegas Manny Pacquiao of the Philippines showed flashes of his old speed in winning a unanimous 12-round decision over Adrien Broner to easily defend his piece of the welterweight title.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 19, On Oregon Mark Gago killed four members of his family before he was fatally shot by sheriff's deputies late today near Canby.
(SFC, 1/21/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 19, In Chile a magnitude 6.7 earthquake hit the north-central coast late today. As many as 200,000 were left without power and two people dead of heart attacks.
(Reuters, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 19, Yang Hengjun (53), a Chinese-Australian writer and visiting scholar at Columbia University in New York, was detained upon at Guangzhou Airport. Foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying later said that Yang, a former Chinese diplomat and critic of China's Communist Party, was "suspected of engaging in criminal activities endangering China's national security".
(AP, 4/8/19)
2019 Jan 19, In France scuffles broke out as around 7,000 "yellow vest" demonstrators marched through Paris in a 10th consecutive weekend of protests against President Emmanuel Macron's government.
(Reuters, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, In Haiti the 13th PaPJazz festival opened in Port-au-Prince.
(AFP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 19, In Hungary several thousand people demonstrated in Budapest against PM Viktor Orban and a new overtime law that has drawn workers out to the streets in several protest rallies.
(Reuters, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, India's main opposition parties joined forces against PM Narendra Modi at a rally in Kolkata which attracted hundreds of thousands of people months ahead of elections.
(Reuters, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, In Japan representatives from a Pacific Rim trade bloc geared up to roll out and expand the market-opening initiative as they met in Tokyo, reaffirming their commitment to open and free trade and inviting new membership.
(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, Kenyan officials said they have arrested six more people suspected of involvement in the Jan. 15 extremist attack in Nairobi, bringing the total number of detainees to 12.
(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, Madagascan President Andry Rajoelina used his inauguration speech to pledge to fight corruption in a country where politics and business are widely seen as beset by graft.
(AFP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, In Northern Ireland attackers hijacked a pizza delivery vehicle, loaded it with explosives and left it outside the city-center courthouse late today. The device exploded as police, who had spotted the suspicious vehicle, were evacuating the area. Two men in their 20s were soon arrested over the attack, which caused no injuries.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 19, In Pakistan counter-terrorism officers killed four insurgents, including two women, in a shootout on a highway in eastern Punjab province. Three suspects escaped on a motorcycle. Hundreds of people took to the streets in provincial capital Lahore and in Sahiwal, accusing police of killing innocent citizens in what they said was a staged shootout to showcase police performance.
(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, The Philippines' wealthiest man Henry Sy (94), who rose from being a penniless Chinese immigrant to leading a multi-billion dollar business empire, died. Sy made history in 1985 when he opened his first "Supermall" in Manila.
(AFP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, In Somalia a US military air strike killed 52 al-Shabab extremists in the Middle Juba region in response to an attack on Somali forces.
(SSFC, 1/20/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 19, In eastern Syria at least 20 Islamic State group jihadists were killed in Iraqi air raids on their embattled enclave in Baghouz.
(AP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, In Turkey thousands demonstrated in the Kurdish-majority southeast to support Leyla Guven (55), a detained lawmaker from a pro-Kurdish party who launched a hunger strike in November.
(AFP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 19, A new UN report said fuel is being shipped illegally for Iran to Houthi Shiite rebels in Yemen to finance their war against the government.
(SSFC, 1/20/19, p.A8)
2019 Jan 19, Zimbabwe police manned checkpoints on many main roads, searching vehicles for protesters allegedly involved in recent anti-government demonstrations.
(AFP, 1/19/19)
2019 Jan 20, In US a winter storm stretched across at least 15 states from Missouri to Maine and caused the cancellation of more that 1,500 flights.
(SFC, 1/21/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 20, In southern Afghanistan a car bomb attack on a convoy of the governor of Logar province killed at least eight security force members, but left the provincial chief unharmed. The Taliban claimed responsibility.
(Reuters, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, In western Central African Rep. 13 people were killed in an attack, just days before the opening of peace talks. A UN source later said the perpetrators were believed to be Fulani from the so-called 3R group ("return, reclamation, reconciliation").
(AFP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 20, Thousands of Colombians dressed in white poured into the streets to repudiate terrorism after the Jan. 17 car bombing at a Bogota police academy killed 21 people and left dozens more wounded.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, Congo's Constitutional Court confirmed the victory of Felix Tshisekedi, dismissing the claims of massive vote fraud by runner-up Martin Fayulu.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, In France several thousand protesters marched in Paris against abortion and medically assisted reproduction in the 13th March for Life.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, In the French Alps two people died and 25 more were injured, four seriously, in a fire at the ski resort of Courchevel.
(AFP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, Sea-Watch 3, run by a German NGO, said it has contacted Italy, Malta, Libya as well as the Netherlands, since the boat is Dutch-flagged, asking where it can bring the 47 migrants it had taken aboard. Another vessel crowded with panicking migrants and taking on water, meanwhile, put out an urgent, separate appeal for help in the southern Mediterranean.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, Spiegel Online reported that German weapons maker Rheinmetall plans to sue the government over its decision to stop all arms exports to Saudi Arabia after the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
(Reuters, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, In Greece police fired tear gas to disperse protesters outside parliament as tens of thousands rallied in Athens to protest against a name deal with Macedonia.
(Reuters, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, Israel confirmed a diplomatic rapprochement with Muslim-majority Chad as PM Benjamin Netanyahu used a visit to the Chadian capital to stress their mutual interest in confronting Islamist insurgencies.
(Reuters, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, Israel's military said its Iron Dome interceptor system shot down a rocket that had been fired at the northern part of the occupied Golan Heights on the Syria frontier.
(Reuters, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, Masazo Nonaka (113), the world's oldest man, died early today while sleeping at home in Ashoro on Japan's northern main island of Hokkaido.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, In Kenya four people were wounded when gunmen opened fire late today on a Chinese construction site in the remote northeast, before being quickly repelled. The attack was suspected to be the work of Somali Islamists al-Shabaab.
(AFP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 20, Lebanon urged world powers to step up efforts for Syrian refugees to return home regardless of a political solution to the conflict in its war-wracked neighbor, as it hosted the fourth annual Arab Economic and Social Development Summit. Most Arab heads of state were absent.
(AFP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, Libyan security officials said a temporary cease-fire has taken hold in the capital of Tripoli, after deadly fighting between rival militias that dominate the city flared up last week.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, In northern Mali al-Qaida-linked jihadists killed ten UN peacekeepers from Chad in an attack at the Aguelhok base 200 km (125 miles) north of Kidal.
(AP, 1/20/19)(SFC, 1/21/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 20, In Mexico three gunmen in Cancun shot seven people to death at a home in an apparent dispute between street-level drug dealers.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 20, Police in Northern Ireland police arrested four men -- two 21-year-olds, a 34-year-old and a 42-year-old in relation to a bomb blast a day earlier. A 5th man was also soon arrested.
(AFP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 20, Pakistani officials said authorities have arrested more than a dozen counter-terrorism officers after police shot and killed a middle-aged couple, their 13-year-old daughter and another man in what they initially claimed was a shootout with insurgents a day earlier.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, In Portugal police responded to a call about a brawl between two women and entered the "Jamaica" neighborhood in Seixal, where mostly young local residents greeted them with a hail of stones. A video published on the internet showed police officers beating up several black people.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 20, Saudi-led forces launched overnight air strikes on Yemen's capital, described by one resident as the worst in a year. The overnight targets included al-Dulaimi Air Base, a drone storage site, and military training sites. At least two civilians were killed, and others injured.
(Reuters, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, Sudanese police clashed with demonstrators in and around the capital Khartoum, after they deployed in large numbers in anticipation of fresh protests calling on longtime ruler Omar al-Bashir to step down.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, In northern Syria a blast aboard a bus killed at least three people in Afrin.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, Syrian state media say air defenses have repelled an Israeli air raid near the international airport south of Damascus.
(AP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 20, Tonga lost internet contact after something went wrong with a fiber optic cable that connects it to the rest of the world. A small internet company that uses satellites soon stepped in to help restore int'l. calls and some other services.
(SFC, 1/24/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 20, In Yemen an explosion killed five demining specialists in the central province of Maarib.
(AFP, 1/20/19)
2019 Jan 21, San Francisco food-delivery startup Muncherry, founded in 2011, announced that it has gone out of business.
(SFC, 1/21/19, p.D1)
2019 Jan 21, Kaye Ballard (b.1925), American comic actress, died at her home in Rancho Mirage, Ca. She and Eve Arden played a pair of meddling mothers in the 1967 NBC sitcom "The Mothers-in-Law." The series lasted two seasons.
(SFC, 1/25/19, p.C4)
2019 Jan 21, Russell Baker (b.1925), award-winning American columnist and author, died in Leesburg, Virginia. From 1993 to 2004 he hosted "Masterpiece Theater".
(SFC, 1/24/19, p.C6)
2019 Jan 21, An investment firm in Abu Dhabi bought some 3 tons of gold from Venezuela amid that country's political turmoil. Noor Capital later said it will refrain from any further transactions.
(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Jan 21, In Afghanistan at least 65 people were killed and as many as 70 were wounded by a suicide bomber who drove an armored Humvee packed with explosives at the base in eastern Maidan Wardak province. Dozens of those killed were members of Afghanistan's intelligence agency. A senior defense source said 126 members of the Afghan security forces were killed.
(AP, 1/22/19)(AFP, 1/22/19)(Reuters, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 21, An Albanian court convicted the main opposition Democratic Party leader of defamation over drug-related allegations he made against Taulant Balla, head of the Socialist party parliamentary group. Democratic leader Lulzim Basha was fined 50,000 lek ($455).
(AP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, Cardiff City's new soccer star Emiliano Sala (28) was on board a light aircraft that disappeared en route to the Welsh capital for his club debut.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 21, China's state media said researcher He Jiankui, who claimed to have created the world's first genetically-edited babies, will face a Chinese police investigation, as authorities confirmed that a second woman fell pregnant during the experiment. Jiankui's former university said he had been fired.
(AFP, 1/21/19)(Reuters, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, The European Union sanctioned the heads of Russia's military intelligence and two of their officers blamed for poisoning a former Russian double agent in Britain last year, a decision Moscow dismissed as groundless. The EU also sanctioned a Syrian research center and five staff members.
(Reuters, 1/21/19)(AP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, France's data privacy watchdog fined Google 50 million euros ($57 million) for "lack of transparency, inadequate information and lack of valid consent" regarding ad personalization for users. This was the first penalty for a US tech giant under new European data privacy rules that took effect last year.
(AP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, Germany said it has banned Iran's Mahan Air from landing in the country with immediate effect, citing security concerns and the airline's involvement in Syria. The airline had several weekly flights between Tehran and German cities.
(AP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, An Indian official said police in Kerala state are investigating a suspected attempt to illegally transport more than 100 Indians by boat to New Zealand. The boat had reportedly left Munambam harbor in Kerala on Jan. 12.
(AP, 1/21/19)(Reuters, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, In India police arrested 30 Rohingya, including 12 children, who were found traveling on a bus to Gauhati, the capital of Assam state.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 21, In southern India at least eight people drowned when their boat capsized in a river as they were returning home from a religious festival on a nearby island in Karnataka state.
(AP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, Indonesia's government said it is reviewing the president's decision to release radical cleric Abu Bakar Bashir.
(AP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, Israel inaugurated a new international airport near the Red Sea. Jordan hit out at Israel's move to open the new Ramon International Airport along their shared border close to the Red Sea, saying it would threaten the kingdom's airspace.
(AFP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, Israel struck what it said were Iranian targets in Syria in response to missile fire a day earlier it blamed on Iran, sparking concerns of an escalation after a report that 11 fighters were killed.
(AFP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, In Pakistan a bus has collided with an oil tanker, killing 13 passengers and leaving another 16 with severe burns in southwestern Baluchistan province.
(AP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, In Pakistan a methane gas explosion in a coalmine in the country's southwest killed at least three miners in Baluchistan province.
(AP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, Muslims in the southern Philippines voted in a referendum on a new autonomous region that seeks to end nearly half a century of unrest.
(AP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, In Portugal about two hundred mostly black protesters blocked Lisbon's Avenida da Liberdade thoroughfare this evening, chanting "Down with racism!". Stones were thrown at police officers who dispersed the rally.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 21, Rwandan officials said 14 miners were killed in an eastern tin mine after a hill collapsed on them after heavy rains.
(Reuters, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, South African former executive Angelo Agrizzi told a corruption probe that his old company had paid monthly bribes for 14 years to Nomvula Mokonyane, a minister who served scandal-tainted ex-president Jacob Zuma. Mokonyane, who is currently environmental affairs minister, served as Zuma's minister of water and sanitation between 2014 and 2018, and was earlier a provincial minister.
(AFP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, It was reported that more South Korean female skaters are accusing their coaches of sexually abusing them, following claims by two-time Olympic champion Shim Suk-hee that her former coach had repeatedly raped her.
(AP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, In Sudan about 150 doctors held a silent sit-in outside a hospital in Khartoum to protest the killing of a medic during anti-government protests last week. Authorities cracked down on Arabic-language foreign media working inside the country, as major protests against President Omar al-Bashir enter their second month.
(AFP, 1/21/19)(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 21, In northern Syria an Islamic State suicide bomber targeted a joint convoy of US and allied Kurdish forces, marking the second attack against US troops in less than a week. Five members of the Kurdish-led force were reported killed.
(AP, 1/21/19)(AFP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, It was reported that Uganda's President Yoweri Museveni has ordered authorities to stop issuing and renewing licenses to betting firms in a bid to crack down on gambling.
(AFP, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, Venezuela's government suppressed a small military revolt after a group of officers stole weapons and kidnapped several officials. The action triggered violent street protests
(Reuters, 1/21/19)(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 21, Venezuela's Supreme Court chief Maikel Moreno said the court has disavowed Juan Guaido as leader of the country's opposition-run congress.
(Reuters, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 21, A Zimbabwe court ruled that the government exceeded its mandate in ordering an internet blackout during civilian protests last week, as authorities pressed on with rounding up opposition figures blamed for the unrest.
(Reuters, 1/21/19)
2019 Jan 22, The US Supreme Court moved toward allowing Pres. Trump to exclude most transgender from military service.
(SFC, 1/23/19, p.A10)
2019 Jan 22, It was reported that research from the University of Arkansas shows that more than 12,000 people from the Marshall Islands now live in northwest Arkansas.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, In Delaware Jose Rivera (59), the ex-manager of a pest-control company in the US Virgin Islands, was sentenced to a year in prison for poisoning a Delaware family in 2015 with a banned pesticide. Terminix reportedly paid $9.2 million in criminal fines in the case.
(AP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 22, An Iowa state judge struck down the state's "fetal heartbeat" abortion law finding it unconstitutional.
(SFC, 1/23/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 22, Afghanistan's main spy agency reportedly killed the Taliban commander behind a deadly attack on one of its bases a day earlier, and vowed to hunt down and kill all the rest of those involved. Six gunmen were also reported killed in the air strike in Maidan Wardak province. The Taliban issued a statement, denying that the commander had been killed. Officials in Maidan Wardak gave conflicting accounts of the violence.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Bulgaria said it plans to stop allowing wealthy foreigners to buy citizenship against investment, saying the scheme had failed to bring any significant economic benefits for the country.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Canada's ambassador to the United States said the United States will proceed with the formal extradition from Canada of Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou, as Beijing vowed to respond to Washington's actions.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, China demanded the US drop a request that Canada extradite Meng Wanzhou, a top executive of the tech giant Huawei, shifting blame to Washington in a case that has severely damaged Beijing's relations with Ottawa.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Egypt said at least seven troops, including an officer, have been killed in clashes with militants in recent operations in restive northern Sinai Peninsula. The military said in a statement that forces have killed at least 59 suspected militants and arrested another 142 suspected militants and criminals.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Ethiopia said it had granted more than 13,000 people amnesty as part of a broad reform agenda pushed by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed.
(AFP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, The EU and African Union committed to work closely with Congo's president-elect Felix Tshisekedi, backing off reservations about the disputed vote.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, It was announced that the European Commission has fined MasterCard $650 million for breaching antitrust rules by raising payment-processing fees artificially.
(SFC, 1/23/19, p.D4)
2019 Jan 22, In France several suspects were on the run after they robbed a bank on the Champs-Elysees in broad daylight.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, French officials said US singer Chris Brown (29) and two other people are in custody in Paris after a woman filed a rape complaint.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, In Germany Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron signed a new treaty in Aachen to update their 1963 post-war reconciliation accord (Elysee Treaty), aiming to reinvigorate the European Union's main axis as growing eurosceptic nationalism tests the bloc's cohesion.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, In northeastern India police arrested 31 Rohingya In Tripura state after they spent two days in the open in a no man's land along the border with Bangladesh.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Indonesia's Pres. Joko Widodo said that elderly Islamic cleric Abu Bakar Bashir, who inspired the Bali bombers and other extremists, won't be released from prison unless he renounces radicalism, backing down from plans to free him without conditions.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Israel said that it has successfully tested the Arrow-3 interceptor, the country's advanced missile defense system.
(SFC, 1/23/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 22, In Italy anti-mafia police said they had dealt a fresh blow to the Cosa Nostra, arresting seven suspected rising-star mobsters after two of the organized crime group turned state witnesses.
(AFP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, A Tokyo court rejected former Nissan chairman Carlos Ghosn's latest request for bail, more than two months after his arrest.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, A Kosovo court convicted a man for participating in terror groups in Syria and jailed him for five years. In a separate trial, the same court in Pristina convicted five others to prison terms for participation in terror groups and other acts related to terrorism.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Libya's coastguard said 473 migrants trying to reach Italy by inflatables had been brought back to the North African country. The UN criticized European countries for not allowing migrants to disembark at safe ports.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, In Mozambique South African businessman Andre Mayer Hanekom (61), held on suspicion of being a jihadist leader, died in hospital under mysterious circumstances. Hanekom, who ran a maritime business in Palma, was arrested in August alongside two locals and two Tanzanians, with prosecutors accusing them of being part of a jihadist group.
(AFP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 22, In Portugal unidentified attackers threw petrol bombs at a police station in the city of Setubal and torched cars in the capital Lisbon, hours after a protest against alleged racially-motivated police violence ended in clashes.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Romania's Pres. Klaus Iohannis said that a government decree that could invalidate hundreds of corruption cases involving senior officials is "crassly unconstitutional," a development that also prompted concern from the EU.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Russia's Pres. Vladimir Putin met with Japan's PM Shinzo Abe in the Kremlin for the latest round of talks on the dispute over a chain of islands in the Pacific Ocean. Police detained 11 people protesting against territorial concessions outside the Japanese embassy in Moscow.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, In Russia Anastasia Vashukevich, a Belarusian model and self-styled sex instructor who last year claimed to have evidence of Russian interference in the 2016 US presidential election, was released from detention pending trial.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, A Russian a long-range Tu-22M3 bomber crash-landed in the Arctic, leaving three of its crew of four dead.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Russia's Transport Ministry said ten crew died and another 10 were missing presumed dead in a fire that broke out on two ships while they were transferring fuel in the Black Sea. The vessels which caught fire a day earlier have the same names as two Tanzania-flagged ships, the Maestro and Venice, which last year were included on a US sanctions advisory as delivering fuel to Syria.
(Reuters, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, In Spain taxi drivers striking to demand tighter regulations for companies using ride-hailing apps blocked traffic for another day in Madrid and Barcelona, while threatening to take their protest to the French border.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Sudanese police fired tear gas at crowds demonstrating in the capital's twin city of Omdurman against the death of a fellow anti-government protester. Sudan's embattled president flew to Qatar, the wealthy Gulf state that has offered him help.
(AFP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, In Switzerland the annual World Economic Forum opened in Davos. Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro gave the keynote address vowing an investment-friendly agenda and attacking leftwing politics in Latin America. US President Donald Trump along with the leaders of France, Britain and Zimbabwe stayed away from the forum as they fought political fires back home.
(AFP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, In Syria a car bomb detonated in the government-held city of Latakia, killing one person and wounding 14.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, In Syria seven siblings were asleep late today in their apartment in Damascus when a fire broke out and spread quickly, suffocating six in their bedroom and burning to death the seventh, a girl, who was stuck under a false ceiling that collapsed as she tried to flee.
(AP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 22, Thailand police said DNA tests show that two bodies found washed up on the shore of the Mekong River in the northeast are the corpses of anti-government activists. The two, known by the pseudonyms Puchana and Kasalong, were among three exiled activists who disappeared in December from homes in Laos, where they took shelter after fleeing Thailand.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, A Turkish court sentenced prominent journalist Nazli Ilicak, already serving a life sentence, to almost six additional years in prison for leaking information deemed secret by the government.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 22, Zimbabwe's President Emmerson Mnangagwa called for a national dialogue among political parties and civic leaders, even as arrests continued.
(AP, 1/22/19)
2019 Jan 23, The US released Marzieh Hashemi, an American anchorwoman for Iranian state television, held for days as a material witness.
(AP, 1/24/19)(SFC, 1/24/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan 23, An appeals board awarded the SF 49ers $36 million in a tax dispute with Santa Clara County over property tax on Levi's Stadium.
(SFC, 1/24/19, p.C1)
2019 Jan 23, In Florida Zephen Xaver (21) opened fire inside a bank and killed five people before surrendering to SWAT negotiators.
(SFC, 1/24/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan 23, In Texas boxer John Duane VanMeter was fatally shot at his home in Uvalde. A boy (12) was later charged with capital murder.
(SFC, 1/28/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 23, In Afghanistan an airstrike launched in the Sangin district killed 16 civilians from the same extended family during heavy fighting between Afghan forces and the Taliban.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 23, The Australian government said it is seeking information about Yang Hengjun, a Chinese-Australian novelist and influential online commentator, who has been reported missing in China.
(AP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, In London WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange petitioned an international human rights commission to order Donald Trump's administration to unseal charges against him as he fights possible extradition to the United States.
(AFP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, Diana Athill (b.1917), a British writer and editor, died. She honed the work of novelists including John Updike and Margaret Atwood before finding late-life fame as a frank and fearless memoirist.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 23, A French court refused an appeal by Chile to extradite a longtime fugitive leftist guerilla who had escaped prison after being convicted for killing an ally of ex-dictator Augusto Pinochet, spurring an immediate rebuke from Chile. France had granted Ricardo Palma Salamanca asylum in November 2018, more than two decades after Chilean authorities imprisoned him for the 1991 murder of Senator Jaime Guzman.
(Reuters, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, France extradited Patrice-Edouard Ngaissona, a member of Africa's top footballing body, to the International Criminal Court in The Hague where he faces war crimes charges in the Central African Republic's 2013 civil war.
(AFP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, Carlos Ghosn, who is fighting breach of trust and other charges in Japan, resigned as head of Renault. Ghosn has been detained for more than two months in Japan. The board of French carmaker Renault SA is expected to name Jean-Dominique Senard of Michelin as chairman, and Renault executive Thierry Bollore as CEO.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 23, The German government approved the export to Qatar of four RAM naval missile systems developed by Germany and the United States. The sale also included 85 dual-mode radar and infrared seekers that guide the missile into its target.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 23, Jack Shepherd (31) turned himself in to Georgian police after being sentenced to six years in prison in Britain while on the run. The web designer was convicted of manslaughter by negligence last year for the death of Charlotte Brown, a 24-year-old woman he took on a champagne-fuelled first date on his speedboat on the River Thames in December 2015.
(http://tinyurl.com/y9gmav54)(AFP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 23, Indonesian officials said torrential rains have overwhelmed a dam and caused landslides that killed at least eight people and displaced more than 2,000 near Makassar, the provincial capital of South Sulawesi.
(AP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, In Iraq a car bomb killed one soldier and injured at least two in a northern town near the oil-rich city of Kirkuk.
(Reuters, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, Italian investigators in Genoa found 2.1 tons of Barcelona-bound pure cocaine dispatched from Colombia's Turbo port. The drug, divided into 1,801 blocks, traveled in a container that had been declared as empty. Spanish police later arrested the alleged recipient of the shipment in Barcelona with the help of Italian authorities in a sting operation.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 23, Latvia's parliament approved the Baltic country's new five-party, center-right coalition government. The parliament backed a new government under PM Krisjanis Karins (54) of the center-right New Unity party, ending months of political deadlock following October's election.
(AP, 1/23/19)(Reuters, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, Romania's national railway company said a group of Turkish companies have won a 600 million-euro ($681 million) contract to modernize a key line in the northwest Transylvania region. The European Union will fund about 80 percent of the project, and the Romanian government the rest.
(AP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, In Russia Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan sat down for Syria-focused talks with Pres. Vladimir Putin as their governments bargain over zones of influence in the war-torn country.
(AP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, The Russian military rolled out a new missile and released its specifications, seeking to dispel the US claim that the weapon violates a key nuclear arms pact. The military insisted that the 9M729 land-based cruise missile conforms to the limits of the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty.
(AP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, Singapore actor Aloysius Pang (28) died in New Zealand. He was on a military training exercise when a gun barrel was lowered on a large artillery device he was helping to repair on Jan. 19. It crushed his abdomen and chest.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 23, In South Korea former senior prosecutor Ahn Tae Geun was sentenced to five years in prison on charges of banishing a junior prosecutor after she tried to expose his sexual misconduct.
(SFC, 1/24/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 23, South Sudan called on the international community to fund efforts to implement a peace deal, which is already four months behind schedule due to lack of money.
(AFP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, Spanish taxi drivers demanding more regulations for app-based ride-hailing services blocked access to a trade exhibition center in Madrid where a major tourism fair began.
(AP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, Sudan's Oil Minister Azhari Abdel Qader said his country has received economic assistance from the United Arab Emirates and accepted offers of support from Russia and Turkey. Pres. Omar al-Bashir met with Qatar's Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani in Doha during his first trip abroad since the protests began.
(Reuters, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, In Sweden a man in his 50s fatally shot his two children before announcing on social media he was killing himself in an apparent murder-suicide.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 23, In Venezuela at least four people died following overnight clashes ahead of rival protests today. Protesters marched in the streets and waved their nation's flag as they demanded that Pres. Nicolas Maduro step down from power. Members of the National Guard launched tear gas at protesters in the middle-class neighborhood of El Paraiso.
(AFP, 1/23/19)(AP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido declared himself interim leader, winning the support of Washington and parts of Latin America. That prompted socialist President Nicolas Maduro, who has led the oil-rich nation since 2013, to sever diplomatic ties with the United States.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 23, Zimbabwe's government acknowledged accusations that its security forces engaged in "systematic torture" during a crackdown on anti-government protests, saying there were lessons to be learnt from the operation.
(AFP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 23, Zimbabwe music star Oliver Mtukudzi (66) died in Harare.
(AP, 1/23/19)
2019 Jan 24, The United States targeted two Iran-backed foreign fighter militias in Syria and two airlines that help send weapons to Syria in fresh sanctions as Washington prepares for a military withdrawal from the war-torn country.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, In Arizona law officers shot and killed Christian Albarran (26) during a traffic stop in Ehrenberg following a 146-mile pursuit that began in California. He was wanted on warrants alleging domestic violence and identity theft.
(SFC, 1/28/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 24, In California Carrie Markis (42), a Rancho Cordova registered nurse, was arrested for selling more than 20,000 prescription opioid pills on the dark web. Her partner Andrea Jordan was arrested on April 4.
(http://tinyurl.com/y3ew4d78)(SSFC, 4/7/19, p.C1)
2019 Jan 24, In Missouri police Officer Nathaniel Hendren shot and killed fellow Officer Katlyn Alix as the two engaged in a game of Russian roulette.
(SSFC, 1/27/19, p.A10)
2019 Jan 24, In Pennsylvania Jordan Witmen opened fire at a hotel bar in State College killing two people and wounding a woman. He then broke into a home and fatally shot another man before killing himself.
(SFC, 1/26/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan 24, Adelaide sweltered through the hottest day ever recorded by a major Australian city as the temperature peaked at 115.9 degrees F.
(SFC, 1/25/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 24, The active search for the plane carrying Argentine soccer player Emiliano Sala was called off with authorities saying the chances of survival are "extremely remote" three days after it disappeared from radar over the English Channel.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, In Belgium thousands of students skipped school for the third week in a row and more than 30,000 swamped the center of Brussels to demand better protection of the world's climate.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, China said it has detained Yang Hengjun, a Chinese-Australian writer, for allegedly "endangering China's national security," a vague charge frequently leveled at critics of the ruling Communist Party.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, It was reported that Chinese internet users have lost access to Microsoft Corp.'s Bing search engine, setting off grumbling about the ruling Communist Party's increasingly tight online censorship. The Bing search engine resumed service to Chinese users, after a disruption raised fears among social media users that it was the latest foreign website to be blocked by censors.
(AP, 1/24/19)(AFP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Felix Tshisekedi (55) was sworn in as Congo's president. He immediately pledged tolerance and announced the imminent release of all political prisoners.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, About three dozen Cypriots who alleged they were tortured while in custody during fighting against British colonial rule more than 60 years ago said that they feel vindicated after the UK government agreed to pay them 1 million pounds ($1.3 million).
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, The European Commission said that Syria's President Bashar al-Assad had suspended special visas for European Union diplomats to Damascus.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, The European Commission said it was taking its legal procedure against Hungary to the next step after Budapest criminalized support for migrants, moving the case closer to a possible ruling by the European Court of Justice.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Europe's top rights court ordered Italy to pay thousands of euros in damages to Amanda Knox, the American student acquitted in 2015 of the gruesome killing of her British housemate after spending years behind bars.
(AFP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Germany extradited to Sweden John Ausonius (65), the convicted killer known as the "the laser man" for using a precision-scope rifle to target immigrants.
(AFP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 24, In northern India at least six people were killed when a building collapsed as workers were adding an additional floor to it in Haryana state.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Scientists prepared to embark on an unprecedented, years-long mission to explore the Indian Ocean and document changes taking place beneath the waves that could affect billions of people in the surrounding region over the coming decades.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, In Indonesia Basuki "Ahok" Tjahaja Purnama, the former governor of Jakarta, was freed after serving nearly two years in prison for blasphemy.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Indonesia's national disaster agency said floods and landslides in South Sulawesi province hit by torrential rains this week have killed 30 people and left more than two dozen missing.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Amnesty International said Iran arrested more than 7,000 people last year, including dozens of journalists, and called this a "shameless campaign of repression".
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Israel agreed to allow the transfer of $15 million in Qatari aid to the Hamas militant group in the Gaza Strip. But Hamas said it was rejecting the much-needed cash to protest Israeli delays on the delivery.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Israeli prosecutors charged a Jewish 16-year-old with manslaughter after he allegedly threw a stone at a car last October 12 in the occupied West Bank and killed Palestinian woman Aisha Rabi (48).
(AFP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, In Kosovo around 500,000 pupils and students stayed at home as a strike by teachers demanding a 30 percent pay rise entered its second week. Doctors and miners have also taken strike action for higher wages, and other public sector workers are threatening to do so.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, In Malaysia Siti Aisyah, an Indonesian woman jointly accused of killing the estranged half-brother of North Korea's leader, won an appeal to obtain witness statements given to police as part of her defense.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Sultan Abdullah Sultan Ahmad Shah of central Pahang state was named Malaysia's new king.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, A Nigerian appeals court issued an interim order stopping a tribunal from charging Chief Justice Walter Onnoghen with breaching asset-declaration rules, a month before a presidential election.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Panama's President Juan Carlos Varela met with Pope Francis at the presidential palace. The Pope insisted that public officials live simply, honestly and transparently as he opened a visit to Panama and a region that has been rife with corruption scandals.
(AP, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Russia accused Washington of stoking street protests in Venezuela and called Nicolas Maduro the legitimate president. Moscow alongside China has become a creditor of last resort for Caracas, lending it billions of dollars as its economy implodes.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Former Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond denied committing any crime after he appeared in court, charged with multiple sex offences including attempted rape.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Sri Lankan rights activists, lawmakers and relatives of slain and disappeared journalists held a vigil over their abductions and killings, demanding the government expedite investigations.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 24, In Sudan protests broke out in several cities and in many areas of the capital Khartoum, the most widespread demonstrations in a wave of anti-government unrest that began last month. The official death toll from the unrest stood at 26, while rights groups said more than 40 have died.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, In northwestern Syria at least three civilians were killed and scores injured from a string of bombs hidden in motorbikes in towns controlled by Turkey-backed rebels.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, A Ukrainian court sentenced former president Viktor Yanukovich in absentia to 13 years in jail on treason charges, saying his conduct in office had opened the door to Russia's annexation of Crimea and conflict in eastern Ukraine.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, Agnes Callamard, the UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, said she will travel to Turkey next week to head an "independent international inquiry" into the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 24, In Venezuela the National Police's Special Action Force (FAES) killed as many as ten people in Jose Felix Ribas, a Caracas slum, a day after residents had joined mass protests against President Nicolas Maduro.
(Reuters, 2/3/19)
2019 Jan 24, Zimbabwe's army said soldiers accused of beating residents in townships following protests over fuel price hikes were impostors who tarnished the name of the military.
(Reuters, 1/24/19)
2019 Jan 25, President Donald Trump brought a temporary end to the longest government shutdown in US history, while dropping his previous insistence on immediate funding for wall construction along the Mexican border after the Senate and House of Representatives both passed the deal by unanimous consent.
(AFP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 25, President Donald Trump's confidant Roger Stone was arrested by the FBI in a raid before dawn at his Florida home. He charged with lying about his pursuit of Russian-hacked emails damaging to Hillary Clinton's 2016 election bid.
(AP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 25, The United States strongly advised Kosovo to revoke a 100 percent tariff on Serb and Bosnian goods, saying the duty runs counter to US strategic interests. Kosovo's government imposed the measure last year and says it won't be lifted until Belgrade recognizes its sovereignty and stops preventing it from joining international organizations.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, In Alabama the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute said that its board has reversed course and voted to reaffirm an award for political activist Angel Davis.
(SFC, 1/26/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan 25, In Connecticut more than 130 people who say they were sexually abused as children at a now-defunct charity school in Haiti reached a $60 million settlement with a Jesuit university in Connecticut and other defendants.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, In Georgia Daylon Delon Gamble (27) killed four people and wounded a man in a pair of shootings in Rockmart. Gamble was arrested in Indiana on Jan. 27.
(SFC, 1/26/19, p.A6)(SFC, 1/29/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 25, In Kansas three men were sentenced to prison terms of 25 to 30 years for plotting to blow up an apartment complex in Garden City where Somali refugees lived.
(SFC, 1/28/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 25, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed a measure making it illegal to deny people a job, housing, education or public accommodations because they are transgender.
(SSFC, 1/27/19, p.A10)
2019 Jan 25, In New York the World Refugee Council called for up to $20 billion stolen by government leaders and now frozen in the US, Britain and other countries, to be reallocated by courts to help millions of displaced people forced to flee conflict, persecution and victimization.
(SFC, 1/26/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 25, A Texas official said some 95,000 non-US citizens have been identified on voter rolls going back to 1996 and that some 58,000 are believed to have voted in at least one state election.
(SSFC, 1/27/19, p.A12)
2019 Jan 25, Washington state Gov. Jay Inslee declared a statewide public health emergency following a number of confirmed measles cases in and near Vancouver.
(SSFC, 1/27/19, p.A10)
2019 Jan 25, Melbourne, Australia, recorded its hottest day in five years. The temperature reached 42.8 C (109 F) with the airport recording 46 C (114.8 F).
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, Jean Wyllys, Brazil's second openly gay congressman, said he will not serve the new term for which he was re-elected due to death threats and he now plans to live abroad. His Socialism and Liberty Party (PSOL) said his seat in Brasilia will go to a substitute lawmaker who is also gay: Rio councilman David Miranda, the husband of Pulitzer Prize-winning US journalist Glenn Greenwald.
(Reuters, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, In Brazil a dam collapsed at a mine owned by corporate giant Vale in Minas Gerais state. The dam collapse killed at least 84 people with hopes fading for over 200 still missing. The overwhelming majority of the dead and missing were Vale employees or contractors, buried in up to 15 meters (50 feet) of mud that stretched for 12 km (eight miles) and was at some points up to 300 meters (yards) wide. After two months the death toll reached 212 with 93 still missing.
(AFP, 1/27/19)(AFP, 1/30/19)(AP, 3/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, Chinese authorities investigated two explosions in a basement car park and a 30th floor apartment in the country's northeast that left one person dead and one injured in the city of Changchun. Investigators soon concluded that then explosion in an apartment building in the country's northeast was set off by a man killed in the blast.
(AP, 1/25/19)(AP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 25, In Egypt Laura Plummer (34), a British woman, was one of 6,925 prisoners pardoned by President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi on Jan. 25, the anniversary of Egypt's 2011 uprising. She had been arrested in October 2017 on arrival at Hurghada, a Red Sea resort, and was accused of attempting to smuggle hundreds of Tramadol tablets, which are legal in Britain but banned in Egypt.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 25, Ethiopia said it is banning street begging by Syrian nationals who have startled people by showing up in growing numbers in recent months in major cities around hotels and mosques.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, Greece ratified a landmark accord that changes the name of neighboring Macedonia, ending a decades-old dispute with its neighbor and opening the way for the ex-Yugoslav republic to join the European Union and NATO.
(Reuters, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, Indian PM Narendra Modi and visiting South African Pres. Cyril Ramaphosa announced they will boost ties in key areas such as defense, maritime security, information technology and trade under a 3-year strategic exchange program.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, A disaster official in Indonesia said the number of people killed after days of torrential rain triggered flash floods and landslides on Sulawesi island has climbed to 59 with 25 others missing.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, A separatist movement in Indonesia's West Papua province delivered a petition with 1.8 million signatures demanding an independence referendum to UN Human Rights chief Michelle Bachelet.
(Reuters, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 25, Israeli troops shot and killed a Palestinian man in Gaza as thousands took part in a protest along the border. In the West Bank Israeli troops shot and killed a Palestinian teen and wound another as a group of young men hurled stones at the troops.
(SFC, 1/26/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 25, In the Italian Alps a French flight instructor was one of two survivors in a midair collision between a small tourist plane and a helicopter over the Rutor glacier. The death toll from the deadly collision soon rose to seven.
(AP, 1/26/19)(AFP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 25, Japan's Supreme Court upheld a law that effectively requires transgender people to be sterilized before they can have their gender changed on official documents. The 2004 law states that people wishing to register a gender change must have their original reproductive organs, including testes or ovaries, removed and have a body that "appears to have parts that resemble the genital organs" of the gender they want to register.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, It was announced that Japanese brewer Asahi is buying the beer business of Britain's Fuller Smith & Turner's for 250 million pounds ($327 million), in a deal that includes its flagship London Pride.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, In central Mali two UN peacekeepers from Sri Lanka died and several were wounded when their vehicle hit a mine.
(AFP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, Nigeria's President Muhammadu Buhari set off an uproar by announcing the suspension of the chief justice, citing corruption allegations.
(AP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 25, Pakistan announced plans to ease visa restrictions for tourists from 90 countries, including the US and Europe, in a bid to revive its tourism sector, decimated by years of negligence and problems with militants.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, In Panama Pope Francis brought World Youth Day to the Las Garzas de Pacora detention center so that its inmates, even behind barbed wire fencing, could participate in the Catholic Church's big festival of faith.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, In the Philippines the Commission on Elections announced that the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao is deemed ratified following a referendum on Jan. 21.
(AP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 25, Qatar said it will adopt a new formula for aid to Gaza after the Palestinian enclave's rulers Hamas rejected a cash injection over alleged unacceptable Israeli conditions. Qatar would now channel millions of dollars in humanitarian projects "in full coordination with the United Nations".
(AFP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, Russia offered to mediate between the government and opposition in Venezuela if necessary, saying it was ready to cooperate with all political forces that acted responsibly.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, It was reported that a board game that makes light of last year's nerve agent attack on a former Russian spy in Britain has gone on sale in Russia. Players of "Our Guys In Salisbury" roll dice to advance across the board from Moscow to Salisbury, the city where Britain says two Russian spies used a chemical weapon to poison Sergei Skripal and his daughter.
(Reuters, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, Sudan's main opposition leader Sadiq al-Mahdi called for President Omar al-Bashir to step down, throwing his support behind anti-government demonstrators after weeks of deadly protest. Hundreds of protesters marched through Omdurman, across the River Nile from the capital, and police fired teargas to try to break up the rally.
(AFP, 1/25/19)(Reuters, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, A Turkish court released Leyla Guven, a Kurdish lawmaker who was jailed last year for criticizing Ankara's military operation in Syria. She has been on hunger strike for nearly three months and still faces trial and up to 31 years' jail over charges of terrorism leadership and propaganda for her opposition to Turkey's incursion into northwest Syria's Afrin region.
(Reuters, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, Turkish forces shelled YPG militia positions in the northern Syrian region of Tal Rifaat for a third consecutive day.
(Reuters, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, The head of Ukraine's cyber police said hackers likely controlled by Russia are stepping up efforts to disrupt Ukraine's presidential election in March with cyber-attacks on electoral servers and personal computers of election staff.
(Reuters, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, Yanghee Lee, the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Myanmar, said Myanmar's army chief should be prosecuted for genocide against the Rohingya Muslim minority, adding that holding perpetrators to account for crimes was necessary before refugees who fled the country could return.
(Reuters, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, The UN human rights boss Michelle Bachelet called for an independent investigation into alleged excessive use of force by Venezuelan security forces or allied militia, citing reports of at least 20 people killed this week.
(Reuters, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, In Venezuela some US diplomats left the embassy in Caracas for the airport in a convoy escorted by police, after President Nicolas Maduro broke off relations with Washington and ordered American personnel out.
(Reuters, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 25, In Venezuela Jhonny Godoy (29) was pulled outside his home in the Caracas slum of La Vega and was shot in the abdomen and foot. A disposable diaper was shoved in his mouth, apparently to suffocate him He had recently posted a video of his opposition to Pres. Maduro.
(http://tinyurl.com/yxobxdxh)(SFC, 2/21/19, p.A3)
2019 Jan 25, In Zimbabwe reports of a violent crackdown continued as rights groups and others accused security forces of raping women during house-to-house searches.
(AP, 1/25/19)
2019 Jan 26, US border officials found nearly 254 pounds of the synthetic opioid fentanyl inside a secret compartment of a tractor trailer carrying Mexican produce into Arizona. Agents also found nearly 395 pounds of methamphetamine.
(SFC, 2/1/19, p.A8)
2019 Jan 26, In Louisiana Dakota Theriot (21) killed his parents and three other people in two separate shootings and fled the area in a stolen pickup truck. He was arrested the following day at his grandmother's house in Virginia.
(SSFC, 1/27/19, p.A16)(SFC, 1/28/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 26, Afghan officials said an accidental explosion in northern Baghlan province killed four insurgents and a civilian near a sporting event in an area controlled by the Taliban. In Nangarhar province a female university student was killed when a sticky bomb attached to a vehicle was detonated.
(AP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, Taliban officials said US negotiators agreed a draft peace deal stipulating the withdrawal of foreign forces from Afghanistan within 18 months of the agreement being signed. This came at the end of six days of talks with US special peace envoy Zalmay Khalilzad in Qatar aimed at ending the United States' longest war.
(Reuters, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, In Argentina the bodies of Pirhya Sarussi (63) of Israel and Australian scientist Lily Pereg (54) were found on a lot beside the home of Gilad Pereg near the city of Mendoza. Pereg (36), the son of Sarussi, was arrested. The two sisters had vanished about two weeks ago.
(AP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 26, In Australia Japan's Naomi Osaka battled past Czech eighth seed Petra Kvitova 7-6 (7/2), 5-7, 6-4 to win her first Australian Open crown and become the new world number one.
(AFP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, Tens of thousands of people rallied across Australia calling for the abolition of the Jan. 26 national holiday in protests showing a deep division over a festivity intended to celebrate the birth of modern Australia. The anniversary marks the 1788 arrival of the "First Fleet" of British ships at Sydney Cove. Many indigenous Australians regard it as "Invasion Day".
(Reuters, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, British Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt said Britain will recognize opposition leader Juan Guaido as president unless the government of President Nicolas Maduro makes an announcement about new elections within eight days. Germany, France and Spain made similar announcements.
(AP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, Britain's Telegraph newspaper said it has apologized and paid damages to first lady Melania Trump after publishing an article it said contains many false statements.
(SSFC, 1/27/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 26, Canada's PM Justin Trudeau fired his ambassador to China after the envoy said it would be "great" if the US dropped its extradition request for a Chinese tech executive arrested in Canada.
(AP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 26, In CongoDRC local authorities said 600 rebels, whose conflict killed several thousand people in the restive Kasai region, have ended their war and surrendered their weapons in a sign of support for new President Felix Tshisekedi.
(AFP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, In France "yellow vest" protesters marched through Paris and other cities on the 11th weekend of action against the government, suggesting President Emmanuel Macron has yet to defuse public opposition to some of his policies.
(Reuters, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, Prolific French composer Michel Legrand (86) died in Paris. He won three Oscars and five Grammys during a career spanning more than half a century. His hits included the score for the '60s romance "The Umbrellas of Cherbourg." He first won an Academy Award in 1969 for the song "The Windmills of Your Mind" from Norman Jewison's hit thriller "The Thomas Crown Affair".
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michel_Legrand)(AP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, India held national day celebrations. Thousands of Indians converged on a ceremonial boulevard in New Delhi to watch a display of the country's military power and cultural diversity amid tight security.
(AP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, In Indonesia Eka Tjipta Widjaja (97), patriarch of one of Asia's richest families and the founder of the sprawling Sinarmas conglomerate, died. Forbes last year estimated Widjaja's fortune at $8.6 billion.
(AP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 26, In northwestern Iraq Kurdish protesters stormed a Turkish army position in the Shiladzeh region late today to protest the deaths of four civilians they said were killed last week in Turkish bombardment. One Kurdish protester was killed after Turkish troops opened fire on the demonstrators.
(AFP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 26, In Madagascar six people from the same family were "killed on the spot" by a lightning strike while sheltering from a storm.
(AFP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 26, In Mexico nine companies agreed to labor demands after more than 25,000 workers at dozens of factories in the Matamoros border region went on strike after owners refused union demands for a 20 percent pay hike and an annual bonus.
(SFC, 1/28/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 26, In Myanmar rainbow flags flew high and gay anthems blasted out over Yangon’s river as a flotilla of boats took to the water for the country’s first-ever Pride boat parade in a sign of growing acceptance for LGBT rights.
(AFP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, Spain's PM Pedro Sanchez said he would give Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro eight days to call elections in the south American country or Spain would recognizes Juan Guaido as interim leader in charge of calling an election.
(Reuters, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, In Sudan the group spearheading protests against President Omar al-Bashir called for night-time rallies across the country and new demonstrations over the next few days.
(AFP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, Syria called on Turkey to withdraw its troops from Syria's northern territories and end support for armed opposition groups in order to revive a two-decade-old bilateral security agreement.
(AP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, In eastern Syria five women blew themselves up in various parts of Baghouz, killing one SDF member and wounding three others.
(AFP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 26, Turkey's Defense Ministry said a Turkish military base in northern Iraq has come under attack by Kurdish militants. At least 10 people were wounded when protesters stormed the Turkish military camp near Dohuk in Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdish region, burning two tanks and other vehicles.
(AP, 1/26/19)(Reuters, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, Venezuela's political showdown moved to the United Nations where a Security Council meeting called by the United States pit backers of President Nicolas Maduro against the Trump administration and supporters of the country's self-declared interim leader Juan Guaido.
(AP, 1/26/19)
2019 Jan 26, In Yemen eight civilians were killed and 30 others wounded in a "shocking" bomb attack against a center for displaced people in the northwestern province of Hajja.
(AFP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, In San Francisco Peter A. Magowan (b.1942), the former CEO of Safeway (1979-1993), died at his home in Pacific Heights. In 1992 he led a group of investors that purchased the SF Giants ensuring that they would stay in the city.
(SFC, 1/28/19, p.A1)
2019 Jan 27, The state-owned Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. said it has signed agreements worth $5.8 billion with Italy's Eni and Austria's OMV for a share in the firm's refining unit and for the creation of a new trading venture.
(AP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, In Belgium at least 70,000 people braved the cold and rain to demand that their government increase its efforts to fight climate change.
(AP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, Brazilian officials suspended the search for potential survivors of a dam collapse that has killed at least 40 people amid fears that another nearby dam owned by the same company was also at risk of breaching. Firefighters called for the evacuation of some 24,000 people from Brumadinho, Minas Gerais state.
(AP, 1/27/19)(Reuters, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, The Minas Gerais state court in Brazil blocked 5 billion reais ($1.33 billion) in Vale SA assets to pay for damages from a tailings dam that burst at an iron ore mine.
(Reuters, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, Bulgarian Vice President Iliana Yotova said she had signed the final document revoking the citizenship of Russian millionaire Sergey Adonev (57) in May 2018. According to Bulgarian law, her office has the final say about granting or revoking citizenship. It was revoked over a 20-year-old fraud conviction in the United States.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 27, In Burkina Faso nearly a dozen gunmen opened fire on civilians at a market in the Soum province, killing at least 10 people.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 27, In Cuba a rare tornado ripped through several working class districts of eastern Havana late today, leaving at least three dead and scores injured as it reduced some buildings to rubble.
(Reuters, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 27, Egypt hosted embattled Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, saying it supports stability in the country undergoing popular demonstrations against al-Bashir's 29-year rule.
(AP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, Egypt says its air force has killed several militants, including two local commanders, in the restive northern part of the Sinai Peninsula.
(AP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, In France hundreds of people wearing red scarves marched through Paris to protest acts of violence and vandalism that took place during the largely peaceful yellow vest movement's two months of anti-government demonstrations.
(AP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, Berlin and Moscow announced that Germany had provided 12 million euros to help Russian World War II veterans and siege survivors but Moscow said it was not enough.
(AFP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, Israel gave final approval to a law permitting the export of medical marijuana, a move the government expects will catapult investment in local industry and agriculture.
(AP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, Israel officially recognized Venezuela's National Assembly chief Juan Guaido as president.
(AFP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, In Panama Pope Francis celebrated mass with hundreds of thousands of young pilgrims as he wound up a five-day visit during which he defended Central American migrants and acknowledged the Church had been hurt by sex abuse scandals.
(AFP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, In Peru 15 people were killed at a wedding after a wall at the Hotel Alhambra collapsed under heavy rains in the town of Abancay.
(Reuters, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, In the Philippines twin bombings killed 20 people during a church service in the country's restive south, six days after a referendum on autonomy for the mainly Muslim region returned an overwhelming "yes" vote. In July Indonesian police reported that a husband and wife team, members of the banned Jemaah Anshorut Daulah extremist group, had carried out the bombing.
(AP, 1/27/19)(SFC, 7/24/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 27, Russia marked the 75th anniversary of the end of the World War II siege of Leningrad, which claimed more than 800,000 lives.
(AFP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, In Saudi Arabia Mohammed Hussein al-Amoudi, a Saudi-Ethiopian businessman arrested more than 14 months ago in a crackdown on corruption, was released from detention.
(Reuters, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, In Tunisia secular government leaders announced a new party called Long Live Tunisia which is to be led by PM Youssef Chahed and will compete with moderate Islamists in upcoming elections.
(Reuters, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro rejected an international ultimatum to call elections within eight days and said opposition leader Juan Guaido violated the constitution by declaring himself interim leader.
(Reuters, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 27, Venezuela defused a potential showdown with the United States, suspending a demand that US diplomats leave the country as Washington called on the world to "pick a side" in the South American nation's fast-moving crisis.
(AP, 1/27/19)
2019 Jan 28, The US imposed restrictions on Venezuelan state-oil company PDVSA with the goal of curbing some $11 billion of crude exports from the OPEC member to the United States this year.
(Reuters, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 28, Blizzard-like conditions in the US Midwest caused the cancellation of some 1,000 flights at Chicago's airports and the closure of hundreds of schools.
(SFC, 1/29/19, p.A10)
2019 Jan 28, In Texas four undercover narcotics officers were shot and wounded during a gun battle that broke out when they tried to serve a search warrant at a home in the Houston area where drugs, including black tar heroin, were being dealt. A 5th police officer was also injured. Two suspects were killed.
(SFC, 1/29/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 28, Facebook said it is tightening requirements for political ads in the European Union ahead of bloc-wide elections scheduled for the spring, its latest effort to fight misinformation and increase transparency on its platforms.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, It was reported that Freedom Forum is selling its Newseum, a Washington DC museum devoted to journalism and the First Amendment, to Baltimore-based Johns Hopkins Univ. for $372.5 million.
(SFC, 1/28/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 28, Afghan Pres. Ashraf Ghani assured his people that their rights will not be compromised in the name of peace with the Taliban, days after the US envoy tasked with resolving America's longest war reported significant progress in talks with the insurgents.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, Bahrain's supreme court upheld a life sentence for opposition leader Sheikh Ali Salman for spying for Gulf rival Qatar, a decision his party slammed as "political revenge".
(AFP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, In Brazil the confirmed death toll rose to 60, with 292 people still missing for the Jan. 25 dam break in Minas Gerais state.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, In Cameroon Maurice Kamto, leader of the opposition MRC, was arrested in the country's economic capital Douala. Party treasurer Alain Fogue was also arrested and over the weekend, Paul-Eric Kingue, who ran Kamto's election campaign, and rapper Valsero were also detained alongside 115 others for attending opposition protest marches in several towns.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 28, Central African Rep. PM Mathieu Simplice Sarandji led a rally of around 3,000 people calling for a global arms embargo to be lifted ahead of a UN meeting later this week.
(AFP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, In China prominent human rights lawyer Wang Quanzhang was sentenced to 4½ years in prison on the charge of subversion of state power, more than three years after he was detained in a sweeping crackdown on the legal profession.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, Denmark began erecting a 70-km (43.4-mile) fence along the German border to keep out wild boars in an attempt to prevent the spread of African swine fever, which could jeopardize the country's valuable pork industry.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, In Egypt French President Emmanuel Macron called for "respect for individual freedoms" as he met with his Pres. Abdel Fattah al-Sisi in Cairo.
(AFP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, In France two armed men attacked a van carrying a jailed prisoner on his way to a court, firing shots at the vehicle and striking a guard before making their getaway in the southern town of Tarascon.
(AFP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, In western Germany three Polish men were killed when their car collided with a truck transporting pigs.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, Greece announced plans to return to bond markets and increase the minimum wage, amid protests against bailout-era measures by farmers who used tractors to block the country's main highway. PM Alexis Tsipras announced an 11-percent rise in the minimum wage, the first after a decade of austerity and months ahead of legislative elections.
(AP, 1/28/19)(AFP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, In Indonesia separatists opened fire on an aircraft carrying military personnel and local government officials in the easternmost Papua region, killing one soldier.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, In Japan Toshiba Corp. unveiled a remote-controlled robot with tongs that it hopes will be able to probe the inside of one of the three damaged reactors at the tsunami-hit Fukushima nuclear plant and grip chunks of highly radioactive melted fuel.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, Malaysian prosecutors charged former prime minister Najib Razak with three more counts of money laundering, allegedly receiving the proceeds of illegal activities in his personal bank accounts.
(Reuters, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, Mexican officials said the death toll from the Juan. 18 fire at an illegally tapped pipeline in Hidalgo state has risen to 115.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, The Netherlands refused an Italian request to take in 47 migrants on a humanitarian ship that is being blocked from Italian ports, saying there was a need to distinguish between genuine refugees and economic migrants.
(Reuters, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, In Nigeria the militant group Boko Haram killed at least 60 people when it renewed its attack on the northeastern town of Rann.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Jan 28, Poland's anti-corruption bureau says it has detained six suspects as part of an investigation into a state-owned arms company, including an ex-lawmaker and former employees from the Defense Ministry.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, Singapore's health ministry accused American Mikhy K. Farrera Brochez of stealing and leaking the records of 14,200 people infected with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, before January 2013. Brochez worked in Singapore as a lecturer for a period before he was jailed for several drug and fraud-related offenses and deported last year.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir extended ceasefires in the conflict-hit states of South Kordofan and Blue Nile, where protest leaders pushed for anti-government rallies.
(AFP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, In eastern Syria Kurdish-led fighters pressed their assault against the Islamic State group, boxing the jihadists into a tiny last pocket of land along the Euphrates River.
(AFP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 28, Pope Francis said celibacy for priests was a "gift to the Church" and not "optional", while returning to the Vatican from Panama. Francis said there's reason to consider ordaining older, married men in remote communities where priests are in short supply. Celibacy was imposed in the 11th century, possibly partly to prevent descendants of priests inheriting church property.
(AP, 1/28/19)
2019 Jan 29, US intelligence agencies told Congress that North Korea is unlikely to entirely dismantle its nuclear arsenal.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, The United States said that it has handed control of Venezuela's bank accounts in the United States to Juan Guaido, the opposition leader whom Washington has recognized as interim president.
(AFP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Longtime Donald Trump advisor Roger Stone (66) pleaded not guilty to charges stemming from the ongoing investigation into whether the president's campaign colluded with Russia in the 2016 election.
(AFP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, In California Pacific Gas and Electric Co. (PG&E) and its parent filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection because of mounting tolls from fires over the last two years.
(SFC, 1/30/19, p.A1)
2019 Jan 29, In Maryland the state's attorney in Baltimore said her office will no longer prosecute any marijuana possession cases.
(SFC, 1/30/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 29, Australian company TPG Telecom said it had abandoned the rollout of what would have been the country's fourth mobile network because of a ban on Chinese giant Huawei, which would have been the main equipment vendor.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Brazilian prosecutors arrested three employees of miner Vale SA and two contractors, as a criminal investigation began after a devastating dam rupture expected to leave a death toll of more than 300 people.
(Reuters, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, British Investment manager Man Group PLC says it will stop funding the Man Booker and Man Booker International prizes after 2019. The firm says it has donated 25 million pounds ($33 million) to the Booker Prize Foundation since 2002.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, British mining group Gemfields said it will pay 5.8 million pounds in compensation to nearly 300 miners over accusations of torture around a ruby mine in Mozambique, but denied liability.
(AFP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, In Canada Bruce McArthur (67), charged with the murder of eight gay men who disappeared over several years, pleaded guilty in Toronto to the charges. On Jan. 8 he was sentenced to life in prison.
(http://tinyurl.com/y4yhyhk5)(Reuters, 1/29/19)(SFC, 2/9/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 29, China called on the US government to "stop the unreasonable crackdown" on Huawei after the US stepped up pressure on the tech giant by indicting it on charges of stealing technology and violating sanctions on Iran, complicating high-level trade talks between the countries about to begin in Washington.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Congo DRC army and health sources said two soldiers in Beni have died after catching Ebola in an outbreak that has killed hundreds in the eastern region. The deaths of the soldiers brought the total toll to 459 recorded deaths.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Three Congo DRC militia leaders, including a man accused of murdering 39 police officers, surrendered in a show of support for new President Felix Tshisekedi.
(AFP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Denmark said it will raise its military spending to 1.5 percent of its gross domestic product in 2023, up from 1.35 percent planned this year.
(Reuters, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Two migrant boats sank in heavy seas off the coast of Djibouti. 16 people were rescued. The death toll soon rose to 52 with scores still missing.
(AFP, 1/30/19)(AFP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 29, Egypt's interior ministry said security forces have arrested 54 people, including suspected members of the Muslim Brotherhood, for planning to hold protests and commit violence on the anniversary of the 2011 uprising.
(Reuters, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, In Egypt French President Emmanuel Macron held a surprise second meeting with Pres. Abdel Fattah al-Sisi after talks with the country's top clerics, ending a three-day visit aimed at boosting ties while raising human rights concerns. During the visit, Macron and Sisi oversaw the signing of some 30 deals worth nearly a billion euros (dollars) including in transportation, education and health.
(AFP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, In Egypt prominent atheist video blogger Sherif Gaber launched a crowdfunding page called "Help Me Escape Egypt" to aid him in purchasing another nationality so he can override an exit ban imposed by the secret police. Gaber has been repeatedly detained by authorities accusing him of blasphemy, which is sometimes prosecuted in Egypt under laws against "insulting religion".
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 29, The EU approved US soybean exports to be used in the production of biofuels in an effort to boost such imports following last summer's trans-Atlantic meeting between Pres. Donald Trump and his EU Commission counterpart Jean-Claude Juncker.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, French man Jean-Luc Van Den Heede (73) arrived in the harbor of Les Sables d'Olonne in his Rustler 36, the first to finish the 30,000-mile Golden Globe race. Of the 19 sailors who started out last July, only five were still in the race.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Israel's PM Benjamin Netanyahu met late today with Lithuanian PM Saulius Skvernelis, stressing joint interests between the two nations.
(http://tinyurl.com/y7ft26y5)(SFC, 1/31/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan 29, Myanmar's parliament voted to create a committee to propose amendments to the country's military-enacted constitution, which grants the armed forces the power to block any change.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Pakistan's top court upheld the acquittal of Asia Bibi, the Christian woman at the center of a blasphemy row which has ignited violent protests, been linked to two assassinations and spotlighted religious extremism. She was expected to leave the country soon.
(AFP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Pakistani Taliban militants armed with guns and grenades attacked a regional police station in the southwestern Baluchistan province, triggering a shootout that killed eight police officers and a civilian and wounded 17 others. Two of the four militants were reported killed.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, The Palestinian government submitted its resignation, a statement said, a move seen as a bid by president Mahmud Abbas to strengthen his position as a decade-old political split deepens. PM Rami Hamdallah's government will remain in place while a new administration is formed.
(AFP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, The Palestinian Authority asked the UN to deploy a permanent international force in the occupied West Bank and east Jerusalem, after Israel announced it was suspending operations of an observer force that had been in the city of Hebron for more than 20 years.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, In Sudan police used tear gas to disperse dozens of demonstrators in Khartoum's Burri neighborhood and hundreds who gathered in its twin city of Omdurman. Sudan's information ministry said security chief Salah Abdallah Mohamed Saleh has ordered the release of people detained during weeks of anti-government protests.
(Reuters, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Syria's Pres. Bashar Assad, during a meeting with visiting Iranian First Vice President Eshaq Jahangiri, said that new trade agreements with Iran will help the two countries face the "economic war" waged against them by the West. The two countries have signed 11 agreements and memoranda of understanding to promote cooperation in Syria's reconstruction after eight years of civil war.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Syrian government forces shelled a northwestern town held by al-Qaida-linked militants, killing at least 10 people and wounding others. A blast hit the governing council of insurgent-held Idlib killing one person and injured three others. The Islamic State later denied being behind a suicide blast.
(AP, 1/29/19)(Reuters, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 29, In Syria militant Muhammad Saifuddin of Indonesia, who used the aliases Abu Walid and Mohammed Karim Yusop Faiz, was killed in eastern Deir Ezzor province where an international coalition fought to defeat remaining pockets of IS group extremists.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Jan 29, It was reported that UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has been chosen as the winner of Germany's prestigious International Charlemagne Prize for contributions to European unity.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, The United Nations refugee agency says more than 30,000 Nigerians fled the border town of Rann over the weekend to seek safety in Cameroon as attacks by Boko Haram extremists continue. Spokesman Babar Baloch said thousands more have fled to neighboring Chad because of the violence in northeastern Nigeria.
(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, The Vatican said that Father Hermann Geissler, an Austrian section head in the Vatican doctrinal office, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), had submitted his resignation. He denied accusations by a former nun of soliciting sex from her a decade ago while hearing her confession.
(Reuters, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Venezuela's Pres. Nicolas Maduro sought OPEC support against US sanctions imposed on his country's oil industry in a letter sent to OPEC Secretary-General Mohammad Barkindo.
(Reuters, 2/11/19)
2019 Jan 29, Yemen's Huthi rebels released the first prisoner, a sick Saudi soldier, under an agreement with the government brokered last month.
(AFP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 29, Zimbabwe's high court ordered the release on bail of activist pastor Evan Mawarire, who was arrested on charges of subversion amid violent anti-government protests. Lawyers marched on the constitutional court to protest the alleged denial of justice for hundreds of people arrested in a violent crackdown on protests that shut down the country.
(Reuters, 1/29/19)(AP, 1/29/19)
2019 Jan 30, US and Chinese negotiators start two days of high-level talks aimed at settling a six-month trade war that has weakened both sides, shaken financial markets and clouded the outlook for the global economy.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, Texas inmate Robert Jennings (61) was executed for the July 1988 fatal shooting of Officer Elston Howard during a robbery at an adult bookstore.
(SFC, 1/31/19, p.A5)
2019 Jan 30, An Amnesty International report said digital tourism giants Airbnb, Booking.com, Expedia and TripAdvisor are profiting from "war crimes" by offering services in Israeli settlements. Israel threatened a day earlier to bar Amnesty International from access to the Jewish state over its charges.
(AFP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, In Brazil three state and federal agencies asked that residents refrain from using water directly from the Paraopeba River or 100-meters (109 yards) around it following the Jan. 18 Vale mining dam collapse in Brumadinho.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 30, An Egyptian court sentenced Souad el-Kholy, the deputy governor of the Alexandria, to 12 years in prison on corruption charges. The Cairo criminal court also sentenced her to a one-year suspended sentence for bribery, profiteering and squandering public funds.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, A rights lawyer said Egypt has rounded up at least six activists in the last couple of days in a wave of arrests coinciding with the anniversary of the 2011 uprising.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, Ethiopian prosecutors charged Abdi Mohammed Omer, the former president of the Somali Region, and 46 others with instigating ethnic violence there last year.
(Reuters, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker told British PM Theresa May that the bloc's Brexit divorce deal with London cannot be renegotiated.
(Reuters, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, German authorities arrested three Iraqi refugees on allegations they were planning an Islamic extremist bombing attack, and searched properties in three states in connection with their investigation.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, A German appeals court in Koblenz rejected the complaint of a Jewish man against a decision by the town of Herxheim am Berg to allow a bell dedicated to Adolf Hitler to continue to hang in a church tower.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, Israeli forces shot dead a 16-year-old Palestinian girl who tried to carry out a stabbing attack at a checkpoint between the occupied West Bank and Jerusalem.
(Reuters, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, Italy's PM Giuseppe Conte said that 47 rescued migrants aboard the Sea Watch NGO vessel could finally disembark after Italy and six other countries (France, Germany, Malta, Portugal, Romania and Luxembourg) agreed to take them in.
(AFP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, In the Netherlands a round-the-clock prayer service to stop an Armenian family being deported was ended after 96 days, after the government agreed to make an exception to immigration rules. Hundreds of supporters of the Tamrazyan family have held rites non-stop at the Bethel church in The Hague since Oct. 26 to block their deportation.
(Reuters, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, In the southern Philippines a grenade was thrown into a mosque where Muslim teachers were sleeping early today, killing two of them and injuring four in Zamboanga city.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, Russian lawmaker Rauf Arashukov (32) was arrested during a session of the upper house of parliament and was led away to face questions over two murders after failing in a bid to flee the chamber.
(Reuters, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, In Somalia a US airstrike killed 24 al-Shabab extremists near Shebeeley in the central Hiran region.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 30, In South Korea Kim Kyoung-soo, the governor or South Gyeongsang and a political ally of President Moon Jae-in, received a two-year prison term for his involvement in an online opinion rigging scandal.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, Spanish police said they have arrested 37 people as part of a drug bust in southern Spain and the capital of Madrid.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, Spanish authorities seized more than three tons of cocaine and arrested 11 people off Portugal's Atlantic coast, dismantling a drug smuggling gang that operated across international waters from a cargo vessel.
(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Jan 30, Sweden's state employment agency said it would lay off a third of its own workers, in the first sign of budget cuts and reforms under a newly-formed government propped up by two center-right parties.
(Reuters, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, Taiwan-based Foxconn Technology Group said it is shifting the focus of its planned Wisconsin campus away from blue-collar manufacturing to a research hub, while insisting it remains committed to creating 13,000 jobs as promised.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, Tanzania's home affairs minister said a manhunt has been launched for suspects in the abduction and murder of up to 10 children this month in cases believed to be linked to witchcraft. Local media this week reported at least four dead bodies of missing children had been found abandoned near bushes with missing body parts, believed to be used in rituals.
(Reuters, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, In Thailand more than 400 schools in Bangkok were shut for the rest of the week due to increasing concern over dangerously unhealthy air pollution.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 30, Turkish citizen, Hamza Ulucay, who worked as a translator for the US Consulate in Adana, was convicted in Turkey's Mardin province on terror charges and sentenced to 4 ½ years in prison, but will be freed from prison with credit for the nearly two years he spent in pre-trial detention.
(AP, 1/30/19)
2019 Jan 31, US court records made public that a group of travel agents have been charged with running illicit "birth tourism" schemes across southern California that allegedly brought in hundreds of pregnant Chinese clients to the US illegally so they could deliver their children on American soil.
(SFC, 2/1/19, p.A8)
2019 Jan 31, Officials said cold temperatures across the US Midwest have left at least 20 people dead.
(SFC, 2/1/19, p.A9)
2019 Jan 31, It was reported that officials were force-feeding six migrants through plastic nasal tubes at a Texas location, following hunger strikes over the past month to protest conditions inside detention facilities.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, The US Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction reported to Congress and said the Afghan government controls or influences 54 percent of districts, down from 56 percent a year earlier, and the Taliban's share slipped from 14 percent to 12 percent.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Texas-based Valero Energy Corp. said it has stopped taking deliveries of Venezuelan crude oil after the Trump administration slapped sanctions on Venezuela's state-owned oil company, Petroleos de Venezuela S.A.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Jan 31, In northern Afghanistan the Taliban attacked an army checkpoint late today in Sari Pul province, killing at least six soldiers. Nine Taliban fighters were reported killed and 13 wounded in a gun battle that followed the attack.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Jan 31, Bangladesh activist Kalpona Akter said more than 5,000 workers who demanded higher wages have been fired by factory owners, and hundreds faced police charges in the world's second-largest garment export industry after China.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, In Belgium thousands of teenagers skipped school for the fourth week in a row in an attempt to push authorities into providing better protection for the world's climate.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Brazil's Minas Gerais state labor prosecutors' office said it had frozen more than 800 million reais ($219 million) of miner Vale's funds as compensation for victims of the Jan. 25 deadly tailings dam burst.
(Reuters, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Britain, France and Germany launched a special payment mechanism that the EU hopes will help save a nuclear deal with Iran by bypassing US sanctions.
(AFP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, In Pakistan the British High Commission in Islamabad said convicted child-sex offender Choudhry Ikhalaq Hussain (41), who was part of a gang that exploited teenage girls in a northern English town, has been arrested in Pakistan where he fled during his trial.
(Reuters, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Cameroon authorities banned planned protest marches in the capital Yaounde after a series of unauthorized anti-government demonstrations and some 200 arrests, including the detention of main opposition leader Maurice Kamto.
(AFP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Chinese President Xi Jinping called for a return to "unity and harmony" on as he welcomed gas-rich Qatar's emir to Beijing, amid a dispute that has seen some Arab states led by Saudi Arabia severing relations with Doha. Qatar's Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani signed several memorandums of understanding with Pres. Xi Jinping.
(Reuters, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, The European Parliament recognized Venezuela's self-declared interim president Juan Guaido as de facto head of state, heightening international pressure on the OPEC member's socialist President Nicolas Maduro.
(Reuters, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, A French court upheld a decision by doctors to withdraw life support for Vincent Lambert (42), a tetraplegic man kept alive in a vegetative state for a decade, after the latest legal challenge by the patient's parents in a divisive right-to-die case.
(AFP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Israel began work to strengthen its border with the Gaza Strip with construction starting on a massive new barrier along the frontier.
(AFP, 2/3/19)
2019 Jan 31, Italy's national statistics agency said its economy, the third-largest in the eurozone, contracted by a quarterly rate of 0.2 percent in the fourth quarter of 2018. Following a 0.1 percent drop in the previous three-month period that means Italy is in a technical recession.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Lebanese leaders reached a deal to set up a new unity government, three political sources from different factions said, ending nine months of wrangling over how to share out cabinet portfolios in the heavily indebted state.
(Reuters, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Readers of the Lebanese daily Al-Mustaqbal leafed through its last print edition, its move online underscoring the challenges ailing Lebanon's press industry.
(Reuters, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, In Mexico a message allegedly from the leader of a fuel theft ring in Guanajuato threatened Lopez Obrador and was found hung some distance from a refinery. Soldiers destroyed explosives found near the refinery.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Jan 31, Poland's top state veterinary official said about 2,500 kg (5,500 pounds) of meat from sick cows who were slaughtered illegally in Poland has been exported to 10 other European Union countries. The Polish veterinary inspectorate stripped the slaughterhouse in Ostrow Mazowiecka of permission to operate earlier this week.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Russian news agencies reported that the state communications regulator said that the BBC World News channel had committed "certain violations" while operating in Russia.
(Reuters, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Saudi Arabia said that it has concluded a crackdown on high-level corruption that began 15 months ago.
(SFC, 2/1/19, p.A4)
2019 Jan 31, South Africa's cash-strapped public broadcaster (SABC) announced it would drop plans to lay off a third of its full-time employees as it looks for other savings to cut mounting debts.
(AFP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, In Spain ride-hailing companies Uber and Cabify said that they would stop operating in Barcelona after the regional government passed tighter regulations to appease taxi drivers.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, A Spanish court approved the temporary extradition to the United States of a former Venezuelan official being investigated in a bribery scheme involving Venezuela's state oil company, PDVSA. The extradition of Nervis Villalobos would be for a maximum of six months.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Sudanese police fired tear gas at crowds of demonstrators in the capital and other cities, as fresh protests demanded an end to President Omar al-Bashir's three-decade rule. Protester Ahmed al-Khair, a 33-year-old school teacher, was detained. He was pronounced dead in custody the following evening. Relatives said his body, including his groin area, was covered in bruises. There were also signs of rectal bleeding.
(AP, 1/31/19)(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Jan 31, In Thailand a fleet of drones, trucks and small planes sprayed water to try to reduce air pollution around Bangkok while the city's governor invited critics to brainstorm better ideas to improve the air quality in the capital.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Uganda's revenue agency said authorities have seized 750 pieces of ivory and thousands of pangolin scales being smuggled from neighboring South Sudan, in one of the largest seizures of wildlife contraband in the East African country. Two Vietnamese nationals were in custody over the contraband.
(AP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, The UN said cold weather has killed close to 30 children in two months among the civilians who have been fleeing the last jihadist pocket in eastern Syria.
(AFP, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Venezuelan security agents detained three foreign journalists -- a Colombian photographer, Spanish reporter and Colombian TV producer -- who had been covering the U.S.-backed effort to oust President Nicolas Maduro for the Spanish news agency EFE. Two detained French journalists were freed.
(Reuters, 1/31/19)
2019 Jan 31, Yemeni security officials said seven Houthi rebel prisoners have been released by Saudi Arabia and returned to Sanaa.
(SFC, 2/1/19, p.A2)
2019 Jan, A Washington judge hit Syria with a $302 million judgment over the 2012 death of Marie Colvin of The Sunday Times.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Jan, In San Francisco a one-night street count of the homeless was conducted. Results of the count later pegged the number of homeless at 8,011, based on federal guidelines. A more complete count was expected to be released in July.
(SFC, 5/17/19, p.A1)
2019 Jan, In New York state Vincent Vetromile (19), Brian Colaneri (20), Andrew Crysel (18), and a 16-year-old who wasn’t named because of his age were arrested. They had set an imminent or specific date for an attack on the Muslim community of Islamberg. In June the three older men pleaded guilty and faced up to 12 years in prison.
(SFC, 7/1/19, p.A6)
2019 Jan, In Belarus the remains of at least 1,214 people were found in the center of Brest, which was home to a large, vibrant Jewish community before the Second World War. Their remains were buried at local cemetery on May 22.
(AP, 5/22/19)
2019 Jan, The European Court of Human Rights ordered Russia to pay Georgia 10 million euros ($11.5 million) over the mass deportation of Georgian citizens from Russia in 2006. The court found that Moscow carried out a coordinated policy of targeting at least 1,500 Georgian nationals for expulsion.
(Reuters, 2/12/19)
2019 Jan, Georgia arrested and soon extradited Oleg Tishchenko (42), a Russian software developer, to the United States. He was reported to have been arrested on a US warrant while attending a dance festival. He was indicted in absentia in 2016 for smuggling F-16 fighter jet manuals into Russia in breach of US arms export law.
(http://tinyurl.com/y4qjenvk)(Reuters, 5/15/19)
2019 Jan, In South Korea Kim Yong-kyun (24) died after being sucked into a coal conveyor belt. He was working as a contractor at a power plant 110 km (70 miles) south of Seoul. His death triggered uproar in South Korea where critics say work safety is compromised for temporary or contract workers.
(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Jan, Mohammed Khalifa, a Saudi-born Canadian citizen and a leading figure in the Islamic State of Iraq, was captured overseas by the Syrian Democratic Forces. In 2021 he was transferred into FBI custody, brought to the Eastern District of Virginia and charged in federal court with conspiring to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohammed_Khalifa)(AP, 10/2/21)
2019 Feb 1, US officials said the US Agency for International Development (USAID) has ceased all assistance to Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza. The halt was requested by the Palestinian Authority and was linked to a Jan. 31 deadline set by new US legislation under which foreign aid recipients would be more exposed to anti-terrorism lawsuits.
(Reuters, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, The United States announced that it was pulling out of a landmark nuclear arms control treaty with Russia, accusing Moscow of violating the Cold War-era pact with "impunity" by continuing to develop banned missiles.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, In San Francisco federal Judge Richard Seeborg ruled that Ndume, the Gorilla Foundation's companion gorilla to the late Koko, must go back to the Cincinnati Zoo in accordance with a 2015 agreement. Ndume returned to Cincinnati on June 14.
(SFC, 2/4/19, p.C3)(SFC, 6/15/19, p.C1)
2019 Feb 1, Virginia's Gov. Ralph Northam acknowledged that he was photographed more than 30 years ago in a costume that was racist and offensive on his 1984 medical yearbook page. The next day he denied appearing in KKK robes or in blackface in the yearbook, but revealed that he had darkened his face in the 1980s at a Michael Jackson inspired dance party when he was a young army officer.
(SFC, 2/2/19, p.A6)(SSFC, 2/3/19, p.A12)
2019 Feb 1, Bangladesh's central bank said it has filed a lawsuit in a New York court against a Philippine bank, seeking damages and the return of $81 million stolen from its account with the Federal Reserve Bank of New York in 2016.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, Belarusian model Anastasia Vashukevich, who claims to have information on the ties between Russia and Donald Trump's election campaign, said she has turned it over to Russian billionaire businessman Oleg Deripaska.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, Brazilians payed homage to the 110 victims killed and 238 who are still missing after a Vale mining dam collapsed a week ago in the city of Brumadinho, Minas Gerais state.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, Britain complained about the EU calling Gibraltar a "colony" in a piece of draft legislation, highlighting how the EU is lining up behind Spain in its territorial dispute as Britain quits the bloc.
(Reuters, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, In London a Ugandan mother (37) was convicted of abusing her 3-year-old daughter in Britain's first successful prosecution for female genital mutilation.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, A French priest was sentenced to five years, two without parole, for sexually assaulting four young female parishioners, one of whom was just nine when the offences started, and embezzling 100,000 euros ($115,000) to pay one of his victims.
(AFP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 1, German police caught a suspect over the theft of watches worth some 125,000 euros ($143,000) from an Amsterdam jeweler. The 34-year-old Estonian man was arrested this evening as he crossed the border hours after the robbery.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 1, Hong Kong's High Court refused to allow three transgender men to be recognized as males on their official identity cards because they have not undergone full sex-change operations.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, The head of Hungary's nationalistic Jobbik party said fines of nearly 1 billion forints ($3.6 million) meted out by the state audit office for alleged financial irregularities may force the party to shut down. Jobbik's 20 lawmakers could continue as independents if the party itself shuts down.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, An Indian air force Mirage 2000 trainer aircraft crashed in Bangalore while taking off after being upgraded by a state aerospace company, killing the two pilots.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, TIPH (Temporary International Presence in Hebron) countries Switzerland, Sweden, Norway, Italy and Turkey, condemned in a joint statement the Israeli government's unilateral decision not to extend the observer force's mission in the flashpoint city.
(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 1, Former Ivory Coast president Laurent Gbagbo and co-defendant Charles Blé Goudé were freed from detention by the International Criminal Court.
(Reuters, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, The Israeli army said approximately "10,000 rioters and demonstrators" gathered in different locations along the fence separating the Gaza Strip from Israel. 32 Palestinians were shot and wounded by Israeli troops in the renewed clashes.
(AFP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, At least four Libyan soldiers were killed when forces loyal to Khalifa Haftar fought for hours with a local armed group as they sought to expand south.
(Reuters, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador launched an ambitious forestry program to plant fruit and timber trees, as well as cacao and coffee, on nearly 1.5 million acres (570,000 hectares) in the country's south.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, In southern Niger Boko Haram islamists shot dead six people late today in Bague Djaradi, a village near the border with Nigeria.
(AFP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 1, Pakistani police fired tear gas and wielded batons to disperse a rally by Islamic radicals in the southern port city of Karachi against the acquittal of a Christian woman sentenced to death for blasphemy. Nationwide rallies the extremists had called for against Aasia Bibi's freedom mostly fizzled.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, In South Africa at least three students were killed and 23 injured after a walkway collapsed at a school outside Johannesburg.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, It was reported that a special airlift for thousands of baby flamingos is under way in South Africa as drought has put their breeding ground in peril.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, A South Korean appeals court sentenced former provincial governor Ahn Hee-jung (54) to 3½ years in prison on charges of sexually abusing his secretary.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, Sudanese police fired tear gas at hundreds of protesters in Omdurman, across the Nile from Khartoum. Demonstrators frustrated with a worsening economic crisis have been on the streets near-daily since Dec. 19 calling for an end to the 30-year rule of President Omar al-Bashir.
(Reuters, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 1, A Turkish court sentenced two Kurdish politicians to lengthy jail terms on charges of belonging to a terrorist organization and disseminating terrorist propaganda. Former parliamentarian Gultan Kisanak, arrested in 2016 when she was the joint mayor of Diyarbakir, was jailed for 14 years and three months. Sebahat Tuncel, who had also served in parliament, was jailed for 15 years.
(Reuters, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 1, Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido said he's respectfully declining offers from the presidents of Mexico and Uruguay to negotiate with Pres. Nicolas Maduro.
(AP, 2/1/19)
2019 Feb 2, Avalanches in Austria, France and Switzerland killed four people.
(AFP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 2, Belgium said it has agreed to host Ivory Coast ex-president Laurent Gbagbo pending a possible appeal against his acquittal by the International Criminal Court in The Hague on charges of crimes against humanity.
(AFP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, In Bolivia a landslide buried cars on a highway northeast of the capital. Eight bodies were soon recovered. At least 18 other people were injured.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 2, Officials in Brazil said the death toll from the collapse of a dam holding back mining waste rose to 121. Another 226 people remained missing.
(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, It was reported that Cape Verde police have detained 11 Russian sailors for the suspected smuggling of more than nine tons of cocaine.
(Reuters, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, China called for Washington to negotiate with Russia instead of pulling out of the 1987 nuclear arms treaty the Trump administration sees as a restraint on its ability to compete with Beijing and Moscow.
(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, Colombia's armed forces clashed with FARC dissident rebels, killing 10 from the group that split from the 2016 peace process.
(AFP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 2, In Cuba the death toll from a rare tornado that struck Havana on Jan. 27 rose to six after two injured victims died in hospital.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 2, In France several thousand "yellow vest" protesters marched through Paris and other cities on the 12th weekend of action against the government, despite opinion polls pointing to a recovery in President Emmanuel Macron's popularity.
(Reuters, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, Iran announced the "successful test" of a new cruise missile with a range of over 1,350 km, coinciding with celebrations for the country's 1979 Islamic revolution. In the southeast one member of the Revolutionary Guards was killed and five were wounded in an attack on a paramilitary base in Nik Shahr.
(AFP, 2/2/19)(Reuters, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, Iraq and Jordan inaugurated a joint industrial area on the border between the neighboring countries. The border crossing was formally reopened.
(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, In Iraq a motorcycle gunman shot dead novelist Alaa Mashzoub (50) late today close to his house in the Shi'ite Muslim city of Kerbala.
(Reuters, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 2, In Jamaica the body of Dr. Lynvale Bloomfield (59), a member of Parliament, was found at his home in the northeast district of Portland.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 2, In Mexico an American anarchist who went by the name John Galton was shot dead at his home in the resort of Acapulco. Mexican police found equipment to process drugs, glass pipes and marijuana plants at the home.
(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, Philippine troops clashed with Abu Sayyaf gunmen in fierce jungle fighting that left five soldiers and three militants dead, as the military pushed forward with a fresh offensive following a deadly church bombing last weekend..
(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, President Vladimir Putin said Russia will abandon a centerpiece nuclear arms treaty but will only deploy intermediate-range nuclear missiles if Washington does so. US President Donald Trump accused Moscow a day earlier of violating the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty with "impunity" by deploying banned missiles.
(AP, 2/2/19)(Econ., 1/23/21, p.41)
2019 Feb 2, In southern Somalia a suicide car bomb exploded outside a military base for Ethiopian soldiers, leaving an unspecified number of casualties.
(Reuters, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, In Spain thousands of elderly people are marching through downtown Madrid to demand better public pensions.
(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, In Spain the film "Campeones" ("Champions"), a comedy about a basketball team featuring actors with mental disabilities, won best picture at the Spanish Film Academy's Goya Awards.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 2, In Sudan thousands of residents poured out onto the streets of the eastern province of Kassala to denounce the death of a protester last week following demonstrations calling for the president's ouster.
(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, In Syria a building damaged during years of war collapsed in the northern city of Aleppo, killing 11 people, including four children. In the northeast a roadside bomb struck a bus carrying teachers in Manbij killing one person.
(AP, 2/2/19)(AFP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, In Syria the US-led coalition reportedly attacked one of its artillery positions in the country's east, wounding two soldiers and destroying a cannon. Militants, holed up in a small area on the Euphrates' eastern bank, launched an attack against government forces and allied Iranian-backed troops in an apparent attempt to clear an escape route westward toward the desert. The IS attacks lasted for hours and left at least 11 militants, including three suicide bombers, dead.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 2, In eastern Syria US-backed Syrian fighters killed nine civilians, including six children, who were trying to flee the last area controlled by the Islamic State group. The civilians had reportedly paid money to smugglers to take them out of the area controlled by the extremists.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 2, Turkish security forces arrested Hatice Kilic, a suspect in an armed attack on the US consulate in Istanbul In August 2015.
(Reuters, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, The UN and African Union announced that a peace deal has been reached between the Central African Republic government and 14 armed groups after their first-ever direct dialogue aimed at ending years of conflict.
(AP, 2/2/19)
2019 Feb 2, Venezuelan air force Gen. Francisco Yanez defected from the administration of President Nicolas Maduro and called on his compatriots to participate in protests against the socialist leader's rule. Rival marches took place in different districts of Caracas. Tens of thousands joined opposition protests against Maduro in Caracas and other cities.
(AP, 2/2/19)(AFP, 2/2/19)(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, The New England Patriots won their sixth title by lumbering their way to a 13-3 victory over the Los Angeles Rams.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 3, In southern California a small plane crashed into a home in Yorba Linda killing the pilot and four people in the home.
(SFC, 2/4/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 3, In San Francisco two people were killed early today when a car entered Hwy. 101 at the Vermont St. exit going the wrong way. Driver Kayla Wilson (21) was killed along with Waheedullah Etimad, the driver of a minivan carrying 6 people.
(SFC, 2/4/19, p.C1)
2019 Feb 3, Rapper 21 Savage was taken into federal immigration custody in the Atlanta area. The Grammy-nominated artist is a British citizen who entered the US legally in 2005 but overstayed his visa.
(SFC, 2/4/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 3, Barbra Siperstein (76), a crusader for transgender rights, died in New Jersey. Two days earlier a New Jersey bill, named in her honor, went into effect granting states residents the right to amend their gender on birth certificates without proof of surgery.
(SSFC, 2/10/19, p.C9)
2019 Feb 3, In Ohio detective Bill Brewer was fatally shot during a standoff that started last evening in an apartment complex in Pierce Township. Suspected gunman Wade Edward Winn (23) was taken into custody early today.
(SFC, 2/4/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 3, In Texas two men and two children were found dead in a house under construction in Dallas. Carbon monoxide poisoning was suspected.
(SFC, 2/5/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 3, Australia announced that the last four child refugees held on the Pacific atoll of Nauru will soon be sent to the United States, ending the banishment of children under the government's harsh asylum-seeker policy.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, Austria's Chancellor Sebastian Kurz said he has spoken with Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido and is joining several other European Union nations in saying he will recognize Guaido as interim president unless new presidential elections are called.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, Belgium police reacted to a warning call at a BNP Paribas bank in Antwerp's famed diamond center. They found the vault door still secured. It was only after they forced their way inside that they realized the sheer audacity of the robbery that had taken place — some 30 empty deposit boxes, a hole in the floor, a tunnel to the sewage system.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 3, It was reported that Britain's brown hares are dying from a pathogen found to be the deadly rabbit hemorrhagic disease Type 2. Numbers of the animals have plummeted by about 80 percent in recent decades due to intensive agriculture that has destroyed their habitats and food supplies.
(SSFC, 2/3/19, p.A20)
2019 Feb 3, El Salvador with a population of some 6.5 million held presidential elections. The World Bank says per capita income is $3,560. Nayib Bukele (37), former San Salvador mayor, was elected president, crushing a two-party system in place since civil war ended in 1992.
(AP, 2/3/19)(AFP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 3, In France Anne-Sophie Schmidt, one of 10 women in three countries who say they were assaulted, harassed or in one case raped by conductor Charles Dutoit, issued a statement calling attention to the allegations ahead of his first major concert since the allegations surfaced in 2017.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, French warplanes struck a rebel convoy in northern Chad, helping local troops repel an incursion across the border from Libya, a sign France's support for President Idriss Deby goes beyond fighting Islamist militants.
(Reuters, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 3, India's PM Narendra Modi paid a daylong visit to disputed Kashmir to review development work as separatists fighting Indian rule called for a shutdown in the Himalayan region.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, Indian news reports said as many as 129 Indians were among those detained Jan. 30 by US immigration authorities in connection with enrollment at a fake university.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, In eastern India seven people were killed and 29 injured when nine coaches of a New Delhi-bound train derailed early today.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, In Indonesia the 1,784-meter (5,853-foot) Mount Karangetang volcano located on Siau island of North Sulawesi province started spitting clouds of gas and lava.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 3, Iran's state-run IRNA news agency reported that a court has handed down prison sentences for 13 protesters arrested during the August 2017 demonstrations over economic hardships.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, Iran's semi-official ISNA news agency reported that a fire in the country's space research center has killed three scientists.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, Four skiers went missing in the Italian Alps. Their bodies were found the next day. Two other Italian skiers were killed by avalanches, one in the Valle d'Aosta region, the other in the Alto Adige (South Tyrol) region.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 3, Japan-based Nissan announced it has cancelled plans to make its X-Trail SUV in the UK. That reverses a decision in late 2016 to build the SUV at Nissan's Sunderland plant in northern England, which employs 7,000 workers.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh passed through the Rafah crossing, along with dozens of other Palestinians to meet with Egyptian security officials in Cairo.
(Reuters, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, In Russia a bus crashed south of Moscow killing at least seven people, four of them children, and sending 32 others to the hospital with injuries.
(AP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, South Africa expressed disappointment after the United States and other Western powers wrote to President Cyril Ramaphosa urging him to tackle corruption, and said those countries had breached diplomatic protocol.
(Reuters, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, The head of the UN mission in Yemen launched talks between the government and Huthi rebels aboard a boat in the Red Sea aimed at shoring up a ceasefire.
(AFP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, Pope Francis headed to the UAE for the first ever papal visit to the Arabian Peninsula, birthplace of Islam, where he will hold an open-air mass for tens of thousands of Catholics.
(AFP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 3, Yemen's deputy chief of staff died from wounds sustained last month in a drone attack by Huthi rebels on the country's largest air base. Major General Saleh al-Zandan was among 11 wounded in the January 10 drone attack on a military parade at the base in Lahij.
(AFP, 2/3/19)
2019 Feb 4, It was reported that the California Highway Patrol has suspended the police powers of dozens of officers after an investigation revealed at least $360,000 in fraudulent overtime pay in East Los Angeles from March 2016 into 2018.
(SFC, 2/4/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 4, In Nebraska Lisa Kwapniowski (49), a former pharmacy director, pleaded guilty to stealing more than $4.6 million from an Omaha hospital between 2012 and 2018.
(SFC, 2/6/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 4, A report by the International Center for Integrated Mountain Development said that one-third of Himalayan glaciers will melt by the end of the century due to climate change, threatening water sources for 1.9 billion people, even if current efforts to reduce climate change succeed.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 4, In northern Australia emergency workers used boats and helicopters to rescue people from flooded areas where forecasts call for more heavy rainfall.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, In Brazil the death toll from the failure of a tailings dam operated by miner Vale SA rose to 134 while 199 people are still unaccounted for.
(Reuters, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, British air accident investigators said they had found the wreckage of the missing aircraft carrying Premier League soccer player Emiliano Sala on the seabed near Guernsey and that a body was visible inside. The plane is believed to have crashed into the sea on Jan. 21.
(Reuters, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, A British official signed an order that paves the way for tycoon Vijay Mallya's extradition to India to face financial fraud allegations. Mallya has 14 days to appeal.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 4, In Burkina Faso armed men attacked Kain village in Yatenga province early today, killing 14 people. In response Burkina Faso's armed forces killed 146 jihadists in three counterterror operations in the northwest. Human Rights Watch later said some of the so-called terrorists were executed in front of the families.
(AP, 2/5/19)(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 4, Canadian PM Justin Trudeau pledged Can$53 million (US$40 million) in humanitarian aid for Venezuelans amid a deepening crisis. Trudeau spoke in Ottawa at a gathering of the Lima Group of nations. Created in 2017, the Lima Group includes Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico (which did not recognize Guaido), Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Guyana and Saint Lucia.
(AFP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, Congo DRC's outgoing government defended decrees granting former ministers lifetime salaries and other benefits following strong criticism in a country where most of the population lives in poverty.
(Reuters, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, The Czech Republic joined Germany, Spain, France, Sweden, Austria, Denmark and Britain in recognizing Venezuela's opposition leader Juan Guaido as president, arguing that Pres. Nicolas Maduro's re-election was illegitimate.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, EU investigators began a weeklong inspection in Poland based on a media report that beef from unfit animals was exported to more than a dozen countries.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, A Hungarian court sentenced to prison two former executives of an alumina plant involved in the Oct. 4, 2010 red sludge flood, an industrial disaster which killed eight people and injured more than 220.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, Iran's semi-official Tasnim news agency reported the country's top judge said that Tehran would never accept the "humiliating conditions" set by the European Union for non-dollar trade intended to evade US sanctions.
(Reuters, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, Iraqi President Barham Salih said that President Donald Trump did not ask Iraq's permission for US troops stationed there to "watch Iran".
(Reuters, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, Italy blocked a joint European Union position to recognize Venezuela's National Assembly head Juan Guaido as interim president.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, Japanese PM Shinzo Abe said that he and visiting German Chancellor Angela Merkel share a responsibility to work towards global peace and prosperity, with both hoping for a prompt, democratic solution to Venezuela's leadership crisis.
(Reuters, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, The national police chief of the Philippines said five suspected Abu Sayyaf militants accused of involvement in the deadly Jan. 27 suicide attack at a Roman Catholic cathedral in Jolo town have surrendered to authorities.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, Saudi media reported that Saudi Arabia will study how its male guardianship system is being abused, after the flight of an 18-year-old woman to Thailand last month focused global attention on the issue.
(Reuters, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, Saudi state media reported that the government has launched a new office to monitor state spending, saying it would help keep up the fight against corruption after the closing of a 15-month crackdown.
(Reuters, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 4, Somalia's Al-Shabaab militants shot dead Paul Anthony Formosa, the Maltese manager of the Bossaso port in semi-autonomous Puntland state, and detonated a car bomb in Mogadishu, killing at least nine people. Al-Shabab soon claimed responsibility.
(AFP, 2/4/19)(SFC, 2/5/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 4, In Sudan crowds of protesters chanted "freedom, freedom," as riot police fired tear gas on anti-government rallies in the capital and its twin city of Omdurman.
(AP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, In the UAE Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayeb, the Grand Imam of Egypt’s Al-Azhar mosque and university, called on Muslims in the Middle East to "embrace" local Christian communities during a ceremony in Abu Dhabi also attended by Pope Francis. The Vatican and Egypt's Al-Azhar mosque and university signed a document on fighting extremism. Pope Francis called for an end to wars in the Middle East.
(Reuters, 2/4/19)(AFP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, The UN Human Rights Committee ruled that Finland has breached the political rights of its Sami population, charging that Helsinki had violated the indigenous people's right to "internal self-determination." According to the Finnish Sami parliament, there are 10,000 Sami in Finland.
(AFP, 2/4/19)
2019 Feb 4, Venezuela's opposition leader Juan Guaido accused the military of planning to divert aid being stockpiled in Colombia, Brazil and an unidentified Caribbean island, in order to distribute it through the socialist government's subsidized food program for its own supporters.
(AFP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 4, In Vietnam a college student (20) was killed on the eve of the Lunar New year. She had been taken hostage and raped by five men for two days. A spiritual leader later blamed the victim saying she had bad karma from a past life. Authorities later ordered monks to stop "soul summoning" and "bad karma eviction" ceremonies after an investigation found the rituals to be a swindle.
(SSFC, 3/24/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 5, President Donald Trump announced during his State of the Union address that he intends to meet hold his second summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un on Feb. 27-28 in Vietnam.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 5, The US Coast Guard off-loaded nearly 35,000 pounds of cocaine it had seized from 21 separate vessels over the last three months in Pacific waters off Mexico and Central America.
(SFC, 2/6/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 5, The US FBI said 169 people have been arrested as a result of an 11-day effort targeting human trafficking in the lead-up to the Super Bowl in Atlanta. The agency said nine juvenile victims were recovered.
(SFC, 2/6/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 5, Apple said it has reached an agreement with French authorities over 10 years of back taxes, confirming information published by the French magazine L'Express. The magazine reported that the firm paid nearly 500 million euros ($570 million) to resolve the case in a confidential settlement reached in December.
(AFP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Exxon Mobil and Qatar Petroleum announced that they will go ahead with a $10 billion project to export liquified natural gas from a plant on Texas Gulf Coast.
(SFC, 2/6/19, p.D3)
2019 Feb 5, In northern Afghanistan the Taliban launched a pre-dawn attack on an army base in Kunduz province, killing 26 members of the security forces.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Asia welcomed the lunar Year of the Pig with visits to temples, family banquets and the world's biggest travel spree. Celebrations took place throughout the region, from Beijing and Seoul to Hanoi and Singapore.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, In Australia floodwater receded in Townsville, but overnight monsoonal rain created flash-flooding in communities to the north where authorities have warned residents to move to higher ground. Two bodies were reportedly found near a drain in the flood-stricken city of Townsville.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Baku renewed its contract to host the Azerbaijan Grand Prix through 2023, prolonging the stay of a circuit which initially struggled for acceptance in Formula One but has since become a fan favorite.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, In Bangladesh Hollywood star Angelina Jolie visited sprawling camps that are home to 1 million Rohingya refugees. She urged Myanmar to show a genuine commitment to ending violence and displacement in its Rakhine state.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Administrators KPMG announced that Canadian company Sunrise Records has agreed to buy ailing British music retailer HMV, safeguarding hundreds of jobs. HMV, launched by English composer Edward Elgar in 1921, collapsed close to bankruptcy just before the new year after weak Christmas sales and amid a declining market for CDs and DVDs.
(AFP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Central African Republic's government initialed a peace deal with 14 armed groups following unprecedented talks aimed at ending more than five years of conflict.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, In southern China five people were killed after an explosion at an illegal fireworks stand. The operator of the stand in the southern region of Guangxi was soon arrested on for causing an accident through the use of dangerous articles.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 5, The IMF said it has approved a $2 billion loan payment to Egypt, the latest in the country's three-year aid program.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 5, In France a suspected arson attack on a Paris residential building that left at least 10 people dead. A suspect was detained after she allegedly tried to torch a car nearby.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras visited Turkey where he will meet Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan for talks to ease tensions over bilateral disputes and the long-running Cyprus problem.
(AFP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Indonesian police found 193 Bangladeshis locked up in a shop house in Medan on the island of Sumatra, after human traffickers had lured them with the promise of getting them to Malaysia. Some of the group had been held by the traffickers for three months.
(Reuters, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 5, Iran ruled out linkage between a new EU mechanism to trade with Tehran bypassing US sanctions and an anti-money laundering bill.
(AFP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, The Jerusalem District Prosecutor's Office said that Ilan Levy-Neumand, a dual French-Israeli citizen and resident of a West Bank settlement, was arrested and that prosecutors petitioned the court for his extradition. In 2010, Levy-Neumand was convicted in absentia by a French court for sexual offenses against eight girls and sentenced to 15 years in prison. He fled France for Israel after his arrest in 2002.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Pakistan's PM Imran Khan and President Arif Alvi offered support for rebels in the Indian part of the disputed Himalayan territory of Kashmir as the country staged rallies marking the annual Day of Solidarity with Kashmir.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, It was reported that activists in Russia are expressing alarm about more than 100 whales that are being kept in small, crowded pools in what environmentalists are calling a "whale prison," off the coast of the Russian Far East.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, In the Solomon Islands the MV Solomon Trader ran aground on a reef off Rennell Island, near the largest raised coral atoll in the world, a UNESCO World Heritage site, and soon began leaking oil. Experts later estimated that over 8 tons of oil had leaked into the sea and that more than 660 tons of oil remained onboard. The ship was refloated on May 11 after leaking a huge amount of oil into the sea.
(SFC, 3/2/19, p.A2)(AFP, 5/11/19)
2019 Feb 5, In Sri Lanka food importers and wholesalers shut their shops in Colombo to demand the government resolve a "work to rule" action by custom officials at the island nation's main seaport.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Turkey put up bounties for the capture of eight Turkish servicemen who fled to Greece following a failed coup in 2016.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Pope Francis concluded his historic visit to the Arabian Peninsula with the first-ever papal Mass in the birthplace of Islam. Authorities in the United Arab Emirates said some 180,000 people attended the Mass.
(AP, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Pope Francis said Catholic priests and bishops had been sexually abusing nuns, and that his predecessor Benedict XVI had dissolved a religious order of women because of "sexual slavery on the part of priests and the founder".
(AFP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 5, Some Zimbabwean teachers stayed at home while others went slow on the job as an indefinite strike at state schools got off to a patchy start amid fears of further intimidation by security forces who cracked down hard on protests last month.
(Reuters, 2/5/19)
2019 Feb 5, Officials in Key West, Florida, voted to ban sunscreens containing two ingredients (oxybenzone and octinoxate) that scientists have said are harmful to the coral reef ecosystem. The ban on would begin Jan 1, 2021.
(SFC, 2/7/19, p.A7)
2019 Feb 6, US Pres. Donald Trump told foreign ministers and senior officials from a 79-member US-led coalition battling the Islamic State that he expects to announce next week that the coalition has reclaimed all of the IS caliphate.
(SFC, 2/7/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 6, The United States said it has cut defense assistance to Cameroon -- including plans to supply armored vehicles -- due to concerns over human rights violations.
(AFP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 6, In San Francisco five buildings at Geary Boulevard and Parker Ave. were damaged after crews for Verizon struck a PG&E gas line setting off an explosion.
(SFC, 2/7/19, p.A1)
2019 Feb 6, Craig Newmark, the founder of SF-based Craig's List, said he will donate $10 million to Columbia Univ. and $5 million to the Florida-based Poynter Institute think tank for separate efforts promoting ethics in journalism.
(SFC, 2/7/19, p.A7)
2019 Feb 6, In Missouri an oil leak attributed to the Keystone pipeline was discovered near St. Louis. Sections of both the Keystone pipeline and the Enbridge Inc.'s Platte pipeline were closed as crews sought the source of the leak. TransCanada later said at least 1,800 gallons had leaked.
(SSFC, 2/10/19, p.A8)
2019 Feb 6, Virginia's Attorney General Mark Herring admitted to he wore brown makeup and a wig in 1980 to look like a rapper during a party as a student (19) at the Univ. of Virginia. Within hours Vanessa Tyson, issued a detailed statement saying Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax had forced her to perform oral sex on him in a hotel room in 2004.
(SFC, 2/7/19, p.A8)
2019 Feb 6, In Virginia a grand jury indicted Troy George Skinner (25) of New Zealand on four counts of production of child pornography, kidnapping and attempted kidnapping. Skinner was shot and wounded by the 14-year-old girl's mother after arriving uninvited in June and smashing a glass door to try to get inside.
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 6, US FBI agents raided a bank in Puerto Rico amid allegations over violations of US sanctions imposed on those who do business with Venezuela's government.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, It was reported that two tiny satellites have fallen silent millions of miles away, after proving new technology at Mars. The twin CubeSats, nicknamed WALL-E and EVE, shadowed NASA's InSight lander to Mars last year. This week, NASA said it hasn't heard from them for more than a month now — and doubts it ever will.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, A Taliban official said that the US has promised to withdraw half of its troops from Afghanistan by the end of April, but the US military said it has received no orders to begin packing up.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, In Congo DRC stoppages that hit transport, a key port, television, insurance and the fire service continuing as Pres. Tshisekedi visited Kenya on his first foreign tour.
(AFP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, Estonia extradited to the United States a man suspected of trafficking hundreds of kg of heroin to the New York area and using the profits to fund the Taliban. Haji Abdul Satar Abdul Manaf was detained in Tallinn on Oct. 9.
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 6, France and Germany announced a 65 million euro ($74 million) contract financed equally by both countries over two years as the first act of the joint program to design a next-generation combat jet.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, A German court scaled back a marathon trial over the 2010 deaths of 21 young people in a stampede at a techno music festival in Duisburg, sparking anger from bereaved relatives. The negligent homicide case was terminated for seven of the 10 defendants,
(AFP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, India's Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said that imports of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) grew 12.5 percent over the past five years to 12 million metric tons (13 million tons) in 2018-19, surpassing Japan and putting India in second place behind China.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, In southern India the board of the ancient Hindu Sabarimala hill temple said it now favored allowing female worshippers of menstruating age to enter, reversing its previous support for a centuries-old ban.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, An Indonesian court jailed Auj-e Taqaddas (42), a British woman, for six months for slapping an immigration officer in an argument over a fine for overstaying her visa.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, In Iran gunmen killed a policeman and wounded another officer in a shootout in Lorestan province during which a stray bullet hit a fuel tanker, causing it to explode. Five suspects were soon arrested.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri said Israel has breached Lebanon's waters by licensing a company to "exploit an area" for oil and gas near disputed borders.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, Raya El Hassan, Lebanon's new interior minister, assumed her post, becoming her country's and the Arab world's first female official in charge of powerful security agencies.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, The International Organization for Migration said more than 16,000 migrants returned home from conflict-wracked Libya in 2018 under its "voluntary return" program.
(AFP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, Macedonia moved a step closer to NATO membership, signing accession papers after resolving a long-running name row with Greece.
(AFP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, In the Netherlands a man (31) was fatally shot by police near the central bank in Amsterdam. Detectives the next day said he was carrying a fake weapon and may have been attempting to incite officers into killing him.
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 6, The Dutch water authority said that at least 345 containers fell off the MSC Zoe freighter on Jan. 2. The previous estimate was 291. The ship's owner raised the estimate after unloading the final containers at the port of Gdansk in Poland.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, Cyber security researchers said hackers working on behalf of Chinese intelligence breached the network of Norwegian software firm Visma to steal secrets from its clients. The hacking campaign, which is known as Cloudhopper, targets technology service and software providers in order reach their clients. Cyber security firms and Western governments have warned about Cloudhopper several times since 2017 but have not disclosed the identities of the companies affected.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, Pakistan's top court warned the military and intelligence agencies they must not exceed their mandate and meddle in politics, an apparent rebuke over their handling of Islamist protests in 2017.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, A regional court in western Russia sentenced Dennis Christensen, a Danish Jehovah's Witness, to six years in prison, in arguably the most severe crackdown on religious freedom in Russia in recent years.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, It was reported that Russia has finalized a 38 million euro ($43.27 million) loan for Cuba's defense sector.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, Serbia's PM Ana Brnabi rejected an independent freedom watchdog's report that downgraded the Balkan country from "free" to "partly free." Every Saturday for the last nine weeks, tens of thousands of people have marched in Belgrade and Serbia's other cities and towns to protest what they say is Pres. Aleksandar Vucic's increasingly autocratic rule.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, In Somalia US targeted airstrikes against suspected extremists killed 11 fighters in the vicinity of Gandarshe, Lower Shabelle region.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 6, In South Africa a gas explosion in an unused coal mine in the eastern province of Mpumalanga killed at least six people. Several people had entered the mine to steal copper wires that supply electricity for lighting and ventilation when a gas pipe exploded. More than 20 people were still stuck underground at the mine in Middelburg and were presumed dead. Rescuers later retrieved another 13 bodies from the disused coal mine, raising the confirmed death toll to 18.
(Reuters, 2/7/19)(Reuters, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 6, Sri Lanka's Pres. Maithripala Sirisena told Parliament that executions will resume in the next two months ending a 43-year moratorium on capital punishment.
(SFC, 2/7/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 6, Swedish automaker Volvo Cars, owned by China's Geely holding company, said it is recalling 167,000 cars worldwide because the hatch lid lift system on electric trunks can loosen, stop working in cold weather, and possibly cause damage.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, Thailand's government insisted it cannot free detained soccer player Hakeem al-Araibi, who has refugee status in Australia, until hearings on Bahrain's request for his extradition are completed.
(AP, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, In Turkey at least one person was killed and four others were left under rubble after an eight-storey residential building collapsed in Istanbul. Officials soon raised death toll in the Kartal district building collapse to 21 with 14 others were injured. Four people were later detained in connection with the collapse.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)(AFP, 2/9/19)(Reuters, 2/10/19)(AP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 6, The UN said that its largest humanitarian aid convoy since the start of the Syrian conflict has reached Rukban refugee camp, where thousands of desperate people are stranded in the desert close to the border with Jordan.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, Venezuela's opposition legislator Carlos Paparoni said the government of President Nicolas Maduro sold 73 tons of gold to the United Arab Emirates and Turkey last year without complying with regulations.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, ICRC President Peter Maurer said the International Committee of the Red Cross has doubled its budget in Venezuela to 18 million Swiss francs in recent weeks and is also helping Venezuelan migrants in neighboring Colombia and Brazil.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 6, Zimbabwe's main opposition snubbed talks with President Emmerson Mnangagwa meant to try resolve a political and economic crisis, saying any dialogue with the president would have to be brokered by an independent outside mediator. Other smaller parties attended the meeting at Mnangagwa's state house offices in Harare.
(Reuters, 2/6/19)
2019 Feb 7, The United States sharply rebuked Germany for deporting Adem Yilmaz, a wanted Islamic militant, to Turkey instead of extraditing him to New York to stand trial on terror-related charges. He has been charged by a US federal grand jury with conspiring to carry out a March 3, 2008, suicide bombing in Afghanistan, which left two US soldiers dead and 11 others injured.
(AFP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, The US Supreme Court voted 5-4 to stop Louisiana from requiring abortion providers to have admitting privileges at nearby hospitals.
(SFC, 2/8/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 7, Former Michigan US Rep. John Dingell (b.1926), died at his home in Dearborn. Dingell had set a record for serving 59 years in the US House before retiring in 2014.
(SFC, 2/8/19, p.A7)
2019 Feb 7, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos said he was the target of extortion and blackmail by American Media Inc., the publisher of the National Enquirer. The tabloid had published a story of his extramarital affair last month.
(SFC, 2/8/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 7, The government of Bosnia's autonomous Serb Republic set up panels to re-examine the number of victims in Srebrenica and Sarajevo during Bosnia's 1992-1995 war, a move Western countries viewed as a push to revise history.
(Reuters, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, In Brazil torrential downpours and strong winds killed at least five people and left a trail of destruction in Rio de Janeiro.
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, British writer Rosamunde Pilcher (94) died overnight in Scotland. She wrote more than 12 novels including the family saga "The Shell Seekers" (1987), which sold millions of copies around the world.
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Veteran British actor Albert Finney (b.1936) died in London after a short illness. His films included "Two for the Road" (1967), "Wolfen" (1981), "Shoot the Moon" (1982) and "Erin Brockovich" (2000). His four best actor Academy Award nominations were for "Tom Jones" (1963), as Poirot in "Murder on the Orient Express" (1974), "The Dresser" (1983) and "Under the Volcano" (1984). Finney also appeared and sang in "Scrooge" (1970) and "Annie" (1982), in which he played tycoon Oliver "Daddy" Warbucks.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 7, Chadian President Idriss Deby said a column of rebels which had sought to cross into the country from Libya had been "destroyed" in a series of strikes carried out by French warplanes. The French military has said Mirage 2000 jets struck an armed convoy on three days this week, destroying about 20 of roughly 50 pickup trucks.
(AFP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Police in Chile arrested retired Gen. Juan Emilio Cheyre, a former army chief, on charges of torturing 24 people in 1973, shortly after the coup that brought dictator Augusto Pinochet to power.
(AFP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Congo's new President Felix Tshisekedi landed in Brazzaville, the capital of neighboring Republic of the Congo, to start his first international trip since being elected president in late January.
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, In Costa Rica a second woman accused former president and Nobel Peace laureate Oscar Arias (78) of sexual assault in 2015. The former Miss Costa Rica said he "grabbed" her head and pulled her close to him before "he touched my breasts over my clothes and then gave me a kiss against my will".
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 7, A Danish court sentenced a 36-year-old woman to four years in jail for having drained 500 milliliters (more than a pint) of blood from her young son as often as once a week over a five-year period. A psychiatric report said she suffers from Munchausen syndrome by proxy, a mental condition where caregivers make a child ill in order to attract attention to themselves.
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Egypt executed three Muslim Brotherhood members sentenced to death following torture and beatings to extract confessions. The three were convicted last year for the 2014 killing of a judge's son in the Nile Delta town of Mansoura.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 7, France said its defense cooperation with Cameroon was continuing a day after the United States said it was halting some military assistance to the West African country over allegations of human rights violations by its security forces.
(Reuters, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, France's foreign ministry recalled its ambassador to Rome for consultations over a series of comments from Italy's deputy prime ministers, Luigi Di Maio and Matteo Salvini. Salvini and De Maio have angered Macron in particular by publicly supporting the "yellow vest" protesters who have taken to the streets to denounce high living costs and a perceived indifference by the government to rural and small-town France.
(AFP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, German authorities ruled that Facebook should not be allowed to use customer data from other apps and websites to help target advertisements shown on their Facebook pages without their explicit consent, saying it was exploiting its dominant position in social media. Facebook said it rejected the decision, and would appeal within the one-month frame before it becomes final.
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Reporters Without Borders said that Iranian authorities arrested, jailed and sometimes executed 1.7 million people around the capital Tehran alone in the first 30 years after the 1979 Islamic revolution. At least 860 journalists were arrested, imprisoned or executed over the same period.
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Israel's prestigious $1 million Dan David Prize was awarded to Canadian author Michael Ignatieff and Reporters Without Borders for their work in promoting democracy.
(SFC, 2/8/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 7, The body of Israeli teenager Ori Ansbacher (19) was found in the woods near Jerusalem with stabbing wounds. Police soon arrested Arafat Erfaiyeh (29), a Palestinian suspect in the killing.
(AP, 2/9/19)(SSFC, 2/10/19, p.A6)(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 7, In Jordan a former customs chief, an ex-minister and a top businessman were among 29 suspects charged with corruption in a case involving fake cigarettes. Media reports have said the "tobacco case" had cost Jordan's treasury hundreds of millions of dollars in lost revenues.
(AFP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, In Kosovo hundreds of protesters called on authorities to jail a police officer accused of sexually abusing a girl (16).
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Lebanon's new government approved a policy statement committing to reforms that are seen as critical to putting the heavily indebted state's finances on a sustainable path.
(Reuters, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Lebanon's parliament speaker said an Israeli move to license energy exploration near a disputed maritime boundary threatened to drain Lebanese oil wealth before its own drilling had started.
(Reuters, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Myanmar police arrested 36 people outside the headquarters of Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy party in the Kayah state capital of Loikaw after police broke up the latest protest against a statue of Aung San. Another 10 people were arrested the following day.
(Reuters, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 7, In the Netherlands thousands of students skipped classes to march for action on climate change, following the example of young demonstrators in Belgium and other countries for the first time.
(AFP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Portugal's Health Minister Marta Temido announced that the government has decided to order a so-called civil requisition, whereby workers in essential services are required by law to report for duty in "exceptionally serious" circumstances.
(AP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, The council of Scotland's capital Edinburgh said it will become the first British city to introduce a tourist tax to try to better manage the impact of swelling visitor numbers and booming hotel occupancy. The idea needs a final sign-off by Scotland's devolved parliament.
(Reuters, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Sierra Leone's Pres. Julius Maada Bio declared a national emergency over rape and sexual violence, saying perpetrators are getting younger and their acts more violent.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 7, In Somalia US targeted airstrikes against suspected extremists killed 4 more fighters in the vicinity of Bariire, Lower Shabelle region.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 7, In Sudan hundreds of protesters rallied in Khartoum in support of fellow demonstrators detained in the weeks of rallies against President Omar al-Bashir's iron-fisted rule.
(AFP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, In Syria a Kurdish-led force arrested 63 suspected militants in the city of Raqa during an operation against jihadist sleeper cells.
(AFP, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, Ugandan police arrested a team of BBC journalists overnight for illegal possession of prescription drugs. The country's government spokesman said the reporters had been helping to expose corruption, and demanded their immediate release.
(Reuters, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, In Uruguay European and Latin American leaders gathered in Montevideo to discuss a plan to solve the deepening crisis in Venezuela, while urging the global community to back away from direct intervention.
(Reuters, 2/7/19)
2019 Feb 7, In Uzbekistan businessman Halemubieke Xiaheman (41) an ethnic Kazakh citizen of China's Xinjiang province, said in a video apparently recorded inside Tashkent airport building that he had been harassed by Chinese security officials to a point where his Russian and Kazakh clients were scared to work with him.
(Reuters, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, Acting US Attorney General Matthew Whitaker said that he has "not interfered in any way" in the special counsel's Russia investigation as he faced a contentious and partisan congressional hearing in his waning days on the job.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, In southern California Reuben Franco (24) was found shot dead at a home in Yucaipa. Two girls, ages 14 and 15, were later arrested in Arizona in connection with Franco's death after they crashed his car.
(SFC, 2/12/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 8, In Connecticut supporters of Sujitno Sajuti (70), a former Fulbright scholar who took sanctuary at a Hartford church to avoid deportation, rallied to call on federal immigration officials to allow him to stay in the US.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, New Hampshire's Supreme Court upheld the conviction of three women who were arrested for going topless on a beach.
(SFC, 2/9/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 8, US media reported that a second woman has accused Virginia's Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax of sexual misconduct, further adding to the political turmoil in the state.
(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 8, Virginia's Gov. Ralph Northam said that he is not going to resign over a racist photo that appeared in his medical school yearbook.
(SFC, 2/9/19, p.A7)
2019 Feb 8, In Afghanistan airstrikes were carried out late today in the Sangin district, where heavy fighting was underway between NATO-backed Afghan forces and the Taliban. A lawmaker later said the airstrikes killed 21 civilians, including women and children. The Taliban attacked an army checkpoint in Sari Pul province late today, killing three soldiers and wounding four.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 8, Australian police said they have arrested six people over the last 24 hours after what authorities said was the largest single seizure of methamphetamine in the United States and the biggest drug haul bound for Australia. US Customs and Border Protection said 1,728 kg (3,800 pounds) of the drug were seized mid-January at the Los Angeles-Long Beach port complex along with smaller amounts of cocaine and heroin.
(AP, 2/8/19)(SFC, 2/9/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 8, In Australia a cyberattack on Parliament's computing network also affected the network used by major political parties. PM Scott Morrison later said a "sophisticated state actor" was behind the attack.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 8, In Brazil a fire tore through the sleeping quarters of the Flamengo soccer club in Rio de Janeiro's western region, killing 10 people and injuring three. The victims were all between 14 and 17 years old.
(AP, 2/8/19)(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 8, China's Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs reported that swine disease had been detected on a farm in Yongzhou in the central province of Hunan, where 4,600 pigs were being raised. First detected in August, the disease has killed more than 1 million pigs in China.
(AP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 8, Colombia's migration office said it has canceled over 300 daily entrance passes for Venezuelan politicians and their families who support Pres. Nicolas Maduro.
(Reuters, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, European Union member states adopted a Franco-German compromise allowing Berlin to remain the lead negotiator with Russia on the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline to Europe.
(AFP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, The Social Insurance Institution of Finland (Kela) said a nationwide experiment with basic income in Finland has not increased employment among those participating in the two-year trial, but their general well-being seems to have increased.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, In Finland an independent 248-page investigative report in English, commissioned by the Finnish government, was released. It said 1,408 Finnish volunteers served within the SS Panzer Division Wiking during 1941-43, most of them aged between 17 and 20 years old. The report concluded that the country's volunteer battalion, which served with Nazi Germany's Waffen-SS, took part in atrocities during World War II, including participating in the mass murder of Jews.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 8, Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel inaugurated the new, fortress-like Berlin headquarters of the scandal-plagued BND foreign intelligence service.
(AFP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, Iceland's government said Britain and the so-called EEA EFTA countries, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway, have reached an agreement on citizens' rights should Britain leave the EU without a withdrawal agreement.
(Reuters, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, An Indian court sentenced seven Muslim men to life in prison for the murder of two Hindu men on Aug. 27, 2013, in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh. The incident had sparked religious riots killing about 65 people and displacing thousands.
(Reuters, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, In Italy engineers started the delicate task of taking apart Genoa's Morandi motorway bridge almost six months after its partial collapse during a storm killed 43 people and injured dozens.
(AFP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, Kashmir officials said heavy snow caused avalanches and landslides have killed 11 people and trapped another.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, Kurdish officials said there was no progress on repatriating dozens of French nationals, including accused Islamic State fighters, women, and children, from prison camps in northern Syria.
(AFP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, A Libyan official said authorities in Misrata have arrested Abdel Qader Azuz, a suspected al Qaeda leader who had fled from the eastern city of Derna, once a jihadist bastion.
(Reuters, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, In northern Mozambique local sources said suspected jihadists have killed seven men and abducted four women in the latest violence to hit the Cabo Delgado region. The bodies were cut into pieces and left in Piqueue village.
(AFP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, Two Palestinian teenagers were killed by Israeli fire during clashes along the Gaza border. Another 17 Palestinians were shot and wounded at different protest sites along the border.
(AFP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, President Klaus Iohannis said that Romania had decided to join other EU countries and allies in recognizing Venezuela's opposition leader Juan Guaido as president partly because Bucharest currently holds the EU's rotating presidency.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, In Russia a truck carrying miners to the Raspadskaya coal mine in the Kemerovo region in central Siberia veered off the road and fell 8 meters (26 feet) down a slope. Six workers were killed and 16 others were injured and hospitalized. In the nearby Belovo region of Kemerovo, a section of a coal mine collapsed, trapping four workers. One of them died of injuries while three others have been rescued.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, Sergei Yursky (83), a renowned Russian film and stage actor, died in Moscow. He has been widely recognized as one of the most talented actors of his generation.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, In Spain two passenger trains rammed head-on into each other on a track near Barcelona, killing one person and injuring about 100 others, most of them slightly.
(AP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 8, Sudanese protesters rallied after prayers in an eastern town against the death in custody of a teacher arrested in connection with anti-government demonstrations sweeping the country. The doctors' union in Sudan said that a government crackdown on weeks of protests has left at least 57 people dead, including three who allegedly died of torture in police custody.
(AFP, 2/8/19)(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, In Syria a mine exploded in agricultural land in the central province of Hama killing seven civilians and wounding another.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, Pilots from Taiwan's China Airlines went on strike in the middle of the Lunar New Year travel rush, forcing the cancellation of at least 18 flights over coming days and stranding thousands of passengers.
(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, Thailand Princess Ubolratana Rajakanya Sirivadhana Barnavadi (67) shocked the nation when she announced she would be the sole prime ministerial candidate for the party, which is loyal to ousted ex-premier Thaksin Shinawatra. King Maha Vajiralongkorn called her announcement inappropriate" and unconstitutional. She lost her special royal titles more than four decades ago when she married a commoner, an American, but is still called and widely regarded as a princess.
(Reuters, 2/8/19)(AP, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 8, Ugandan police released three journalists who were working for the British Broadcasting Corporation, after detaining them overnight on suspicion of illegally possessing government prescription drugs.
(Reuters, 2/8/19)
2019 Feb 9, Police in Vallejo, Ca., shot dead Willie McCoy (21), a local rapper, after finding him asleep in a car in a Taco Bell drive-through lane with a handgun in his lap.
(SFC, 2/12/19, p.C1)
2019 Feb 9, Ron Miller (85), former CEO of the Walt Disney Co. (1978-1984), died in Napa, Ca.
(SFC, 2/12/19, p.C3)
2019 Feb 9, Virginia's embattled Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax called for authorities, including the FBI, to investigate sexual assault allegations against him while defying widespread demands for his resignation.
(SSFC, 2/10/19, p.A8)
2019 Feb 9, In Afghanistan the Taliban killed at least eight police in an attack on a checkpoint in the northern Sari Pul province.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 9, In Bosnia a policeman was shot dead in Suhodol. Suspect Edin Gacic (42) was also believed to have killed a grocery store owner near Konjic, southwest of Sarajevo, a week earlier.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 9, The British Daily Telegraph published details of allegations of sexual and racial misconduct by retail tycoon Philip Green (66), after the Topshop owner dropped a legal bid to stop the claims being reported.
(AP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, The British government cancelled a ferry contract it had awarded to a firm with no ships, ending weeks of public sniggering and indignation. The Seaborne Freight contract was the smallest of three emergency ferry deals transport secretary Chris Grayling quietly approved over the Christmas break.
(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, UK rising rapper Cadet (28), aka Blaine Cameron Johnson, was killed in a car crash early today on the way to a performance in central England.
(AP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, The Chadian military said it had captured more than 250 rebels, including some top leaders, after an operation against a convoy of militants trying to cross into the country from Libya in late January that also involved French airstrikes. An anti-Deby rebel group, the Union of Resistance Forces (UFR), claimed to have crossed into northern Chad with "three columns" of vehicles.
(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, China's foreign ministry condemned Indian PM Narendra Modi's visit to the disputed northeastern border state of Arunachal Pradesh, saying it "resolutely opposes" activities by Indian leaders in the region.
(AP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, China's state media reported that blizzards in Tibetan areas of western China have left thousands of head of livestock dead and roads covered in up to 45 centimeters (18 inches) of snow.
(AP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, In Croatia water polo team players from Serbia were attacked at a seaside café in Split. Three people were soon detained over the attack and faced hate crime charges.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 9, Thousands of French "yellow vest" demonstrators marched for their 13th weekend of action, with scuffles in Paris. One demonstrator's hand was blown off by a flash-ball grenade.
(Reuters, 2/9/19)(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, In France a woman and a child were killed in a fire late today in the eastern city of Lyon believed to have been sparked by a gas blast in a bakery.
(AFP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 9, Indian officials said at least 39 people have died and another 27 fallen sick from drinking cheap spurious liquor containing toxic methanol in several villages in Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand states.
(AP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, In Italy hundreds of thousands of people demonstrated in Rome led by unions demanding pro-growth policies from the populist government, the biggest such protest in four years.
(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, In Latvia several thousand people, mostly elderly Russian speaking protesters, rallied in front of Riga City Hall in support of Nils Usakovs, the city's mayor and leader of the pro-Kremlin Harmony party, who is under investigation for corruption. The gathering was supported by the Latvian Union of Russians, a local Putinist party.
(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, In northeastern Liberia a gold mine collapsed. Five bodies were recovered on Feb. 13 and 40 people remained trapped.
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 9, Eastern Libyan forces loyal to commander Khalifa Haftar carried out four air strikes near the El Feel oilfield. The strikes were said to be warnings directed at rival commander Ali Kennah, who was inside the compound at the time of the strikes. The Government of National Accord (GNA), backed by the UN, said in a statement that the strike targeted a civilian plane that was trying to evacuate a number of wounded people from the oilfield to Tripoli.
(Reuters, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, Nigeria's main political opposition said it had been forced to cancel a key presidential campaign rally in the capital Abuja, and blamed President Muhammadu Buhari and the ruling party.
(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, Pakistani authorities detained rights activist Dr. Ammar Ali Jan, who led a protest, and journalist Rizwan-ur-Rehman Razi, who allegedly criticized state agencies on social media.
(AP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, The US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) said it had begun to seize the last four-square-km (one-square-mile) patch from the jihadists in eastern Syria.
(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, The Thai Raksa Chart Party swore loyalty to the king a day after its stunning decision to nominate the monarch's sister as its candidate for prime minister backfired when the king called the move inappropriate and unconstitutional.
(AP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, A Tunisian court sentenced seven jihadists to life in prison over attacks at a museum and on a beach in 2015 that killed 60 people, many of them British tourists.
(AFP, 2/9/19)
2019 Feb 9, Turkey called on China to close its internment camps for Muslims, saying the camps which reportedly hold a million ethnic Uighur people are a "great shame for humanity".
(Reuters, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 9, It was reported that shantytowns across the Turks and Caicos grow every day as thousands of young Haitians try to escape the poorest economy in the Caribbean, where 60 percent of the population of 11 million people live on less than $2 a day.
(AFP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 9, In Ukraine far-right activists tried to storm a police station in Kiev after forty others were detained at a campaign event for presidential candidate Yulia Tymoshenko. The activists were demanding justice in the killing of an anti-corruption activist.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 9, Active-duty Venezuelan army doctor Colonel Ruben Paz Jimenez said in a video he has dropped his allegiance to President Nicolas Maduro, backing opposition leader Juan Guaido instead and urged his fellow soldiers to help allow humanitarian aid into Venezuela.
(AFP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 9, Conjoined twin boys born two weeks ago in Yemen, who were in urgent need of treatment abroad, died overnight in Houthi-controlled Sanaa.
(Reuters, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, Hollywood stars and British royalty gathered in London for the British Academy Film Awards, where "The Favourite" was living up to its name and leading the race for trophies. The Netflix black-and-white production "Roma" triumphed at the Bafta film awards, boosting Oscar hopes for the US streaming giant whose rise poses a serious challenge to the conventional Hollywood business model.
(AP, 2/10/19)(AFP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 10, Jan-Michael Vincent (b.1945), American TV and film star, died in Ashville, NC. He became nationally recognizable on the TV series "Airwolf" (1984-1986). His films included: "The Undefeated" (1969), "The World's Greatest Athlete" (1973), "Buster and Bille" (1974), "Bite the Bullet" (1975), "Hooper" (1978) and "Big Wednesday" (1978).
(SSFC, 3/10/19, p.C11)
2019 Feb 10, Police in China said accidents on icy highways in central China left at least 13 dead and dozens injured this weekend as millions of families were heading home from the Lunar New Year holiday.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, At the World Government Summit in Dubai Pakistan's PM Imran Khan said his nation needed "painful" economic reforms to cut back on its massive debt, just after meeting the head of the International Monetary Fund.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, Speaking in Dubai IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde warned governments to gear up for a possible economic storm as growth undershoots expectations.
(AFP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, In Ethiopia a statue of Emperor Haile Selassie was unveiled in Addis Ababa at the headquarters of the African Union.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, In Ethiopia Rwandan President Paul Kagame, who led an active, reformist tenure as African Union chair, passed the baton to Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, seen as more likely to focus on security issues than expanding the body's powers.
(AFP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, Hungary's PM Viktor Orban said his government will be increasing financial aid and subsidies for families with several children in an effort to reverse the country's population decline.
(SFC, 2/11/19, p.A3)
2019 Feb 10, Iran's foreign minister offered his country's military assistance to the US-backed Lebanese army, saying Iran is ready to cooperate in all sectors should the Lebanese government want it.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, Israel's PM Benjamin Netanyahu, who seeks re-election, pledged to freeze money transfers to the Palestinian Authority following a deadly Palestinian attack on a young Israeli woman. Palestinian civil affairs minister Hussein al-Sheikh said that the PA would not go along with Israel withholding any part of the tax money due.
(AFP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, A Jordanian court sentenced two brothers to death in connection with a 2016 attack claimed by the Islamic State group, overturning a life sentence handed to the men last year. The shooting attack in Karak killed seven policemen and two Jordanian civilians as well as a female Canadian tourist, and wounded 34 other people.
(AFP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, In Kashmir five rebels were killed in fighting with Indian government forces in the southern Kulgam area.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, In New Zealand strong winds fanned forest fires that have been burning for a week through the South Island, forcing thousands of people from their homes. More residents were expected to flee the Pigeon Valley fire.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, Pakistani journalist Rizwan-ur-Rehman Razi was released on a bond of about $730. He had been booked for tweeting against state agencies.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, Palestinian civil defense crews retrieved the bodies of two Palestinians, including a Hamas policeman, who suffocated to death from gas in a cross-border tunnel under Gaza's frontier with Egypt.
(AFP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 10, In Russia protesters in several cities took to the streets in solidarity with opposition activist Anastasia Shevchenko, the first person to be charged under a new law that carries a prison term for "participation in the activities of an undesirable organization".
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, A Russian official said that Moscow had repatriated a fresh batch of 27 children whose mothers are being held in Iraq for belonging to the Islamic State group. Thirty other children were sent back to Moscow in late December.
(AFP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, South Korea and the United States struck a new deal that increases Seoul's contribution for the cost of the American military presence on its soil.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, In Spain tens of thousands of people waving Spanish flags joined a rally in Madrid called by right-wing and far-right parties against PM Pedro Sanchez, who they accuse of treachery over his negotiations with Catalan separatists.
(AFP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, Sudanese police used tear gas to disperse hundreds of protesters who marched on a women's prison calling for the release of detainees in Omdurman.
(AFP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, An SDF official said the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces have seized ground from Islamic State in a fierce battle to capture its last enclave in eastern Syria.
(Reuters, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, A strike among pilots at Taiwan's flag carrier China Airlines dragged into a third day, resulting in further flight cancellations.
(AP, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 10, Pope Francis urged governments to take decisive action against the $150 billion-a-year human trafficking business and the plight of millions of modern-day slaves.
(Reuters, 2/10/19)
2019 Feb 11, US lawmakers in Washington DC reached an agreement in principle to possibly prevent another government shutdown. It would some money for barrier construction along the US-Mexico border, but far less than Pres. Trump has demanded.
(SFC, 2/12/19, p.A6)(SFC, 2/13/19, p.A1)
2019 Feb 11, Teachers in Denver went on strike for the first time in 25 years over the district's incentive-based pay system. Teachers returned to their classrooms on Feb 14 after their union reached a tentative deal raising their pay as much as 11 percent.
(SFC, 2/12/19, p.A5)(SFC, 2/15/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 11, Federal health officials warned that a landfill fire, burning for nearly five months south of Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson Int'l. Airport, may cause headaches and respiratory irritation.
(SFC, 2/16/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 11, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani rejected an interim government and said the Taliban are welcome to set up a political office in the capital but that his government must be included in any peace talks.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, Australia's PM Scott Morrison described his government as stronger on national security than the opposition after signing an agreement with the French government to deliver a fleet of submarines and ahead of federal elections expected to be held in May.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, In Belarus a 10th-grade high school student stabbed and killed his history teacher and a classmate at a high school. He also stabbed two classmates who tried to protect the teacher at a school in the town of Stolbtsy.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, A Brazilian Supreme Court justice suspended two criminal proceedings against the country's leader. The ruling by Justice Luiz Fux puts a hold on charges of slander and incitation to rape against President Jair Bolsonaro.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 11, In western Cameroon four people died when gunmen raided a hospital and burnt it to the ground where anglophone separatists have been fighting troops.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, A court in Estonia found former Estonian military officer Deniss Metsavas (38) and his father, Pjotr Volin (65), guilty of treason for spying for Russia. Metsavas passed information along for a decade and was sentenced to 15½ years in prison. Volin worked with the GRU for approximately half as long and received a six-year prison term.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, The EU announced that it is beginning the process to withdraw preferential duty-free and quota-free status for imports from Cambodia. EU Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom charged Cambodia with "severe deficiencies when it comes to human rights and labor rights".
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 11, In France the left-wing Liberation newspaper suspended two of its journalists, including Vincent Glad, who founded the closed Facebook group "League of LOL," a secret "boys club" of journalists that has been accused of harassing women writers and feminists during a near-decade long campaign of online bullying.
(Reuters, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 11, French cash delivery driver Adrien Derbez (27) made off with about three million euros ($3.2 million). He managed to hide half his haul before being arrested the next day.
(AFP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 11, Kim Phuc (55), known as the 'Napalm Girl' in an iconic 1972 Vietnam War photo, received a 10,000 euro ($11,350) award in Germany for her work for peace. Phuc, who now lives in Canada, was honored for her support of UNESCO and children wounded in war, and for speaking out publicly against violence and hatred.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, In Iran vast crowds marked 40 years since the Islamic revolution at a time of heightened tensions with the United States.
(AFP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, Lebanon said it will not take part in a Middle East conference in Poland this week that is widely seen as an effort to isolate Iran.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, East Libyan military forces were in talks with protesting state guards to take over the nation's largest oilfield El Sharara peacefully and pass it to the state oil firm.
(Reuters, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, A Lithuanian government official said Saudi terror suspect Mustafa al-Hawsawi (50), held in Guantanamo, has filed a lawsuit against Lithuania alleging that he was tortured at a secret CIA jail in the Baltic state.
(AFP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, Activists said an Emirati woman (42), who says she was threatened by her family for wanting a divorce, is stuck in a Macedonia migrant center after the Balkan state rejected her asylum request.
(AFP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, Russia and Turkey agreed that they needed to take decisive measures to stabilize the situation in Syria's Idlib province after talks between the two country's defense ministers.
(Reuters, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, South Africa introduced its most severe electricity rationing in nearly five years, presenting President Cyril Ramaphosa with a major political challenge just months ahead of the May general election.
(AFP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, In eastern Syria 13 IS militants, including five suicide attackers, were killed as well as six SDF fighters as Syrian Democratic Forces pushed to clear the village of Baghouz and nearby areas from the Islamic State. US-led coalition warplanes struck the mosque in Baghouz in support of the Kurdish-led SDF. The airstrike occurred as the Islamic State was using the mosque to direct attacks and employ suicide car bombs against the SDF. Syrian state media reported that about 70 people were killed or wounded in an airstrike by the US-led coalition on the edge of Baghouz.
(AP, 2/11/19)(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 11, A Thai court ordered the release of refugee soccer player Hakeem al-Araibi after prosecutors said they were no longer seeking his extradition to Bahrain in a case that had drawn worldwide attention.
(AP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, Dozens of Turkish police blocked a march by pro-Kurdish opposition lawmakers in Istanbul that was organized in solidarity with hunger striking MP Leyla Guven, who was released from prison last month.
(AFP, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, In Turkey a military helicopter crashed in a residential neighborhood on the Asian side of Istanbul.
(Reuters, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 11, Venezuelan opposition envoy Maria Teresa Belandria was received as her country's official ambassador in Brazil, and said Brazil's government will provide all possible support to get humanitarian aid to the border.
(Reuters, 2/11/19)
2019 Feb 12, California Gov. Gavin Newsom in his first State of the State address said he would shrink the high-speed rail from San Francisco to Los Angeles to just a segment from Bakersfield to Merced.
(SFC, 2/13/19, p.A1)
2019 Feb 12, In NYC jurors found Mexican drug lord Joaquin Guzman guilty of all 10 counts, including running a criminal enterprise, in a trial that began in November. Guzman was found guilty of smuggling tons of drugs into the United States over a decades-long career built on deadly intimidation and bloody turf wars.
(Reuters, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 12, In Texas authorities said five members of a family in Polk County have been found shot to death.
(SFC, 2/13/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 12, Lyndon LaRouche (b.1922), eight-time US presidential candidate, died. In 1988 he was convicted in Virginia on charges of scheming to defraud the IRS and of deliberately defaulting on more than $30 million in loans from thousands of his supporters. He was released in 1994 after serving a third of his 15-year sentence.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyndon_LaRouche)(SFC, 2/15/19, p.A14)
2019 Feb 12, Global oil cartel OPEC said it sharply reduced crude oil production last month, after heavyweight Saudia Arabia slashed output and exports fell in crisis-hit Venezuela.
(AFP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, The Afghan government fired its election commission more than three months after chaotic parliamentary elections. President Ashraf Ghani gave political parties and civil society representatives one week to nominate candidates to a new commission.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Sibghatullah Mujadidi (93), Afghanistan's first president following the withdrawal of Soviet troops from the country and the collapse in 1992 of Kabul's pro-communist government, died.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, In Bosnia Edin Gacic (42), the country's most-wanted fugitive, died after a shootout with police near Sarajevo. A policeman was wounded in the clash.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) said it found in a trove of Twitter messages evidence of possible foreign actors trying to sow divisions between Canadians on pipelines, migrants and other hot-button issues.
(AFP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Members of the Uighur Muslim ethnic group called on China to post videos of their relatives who have disappeared into a vast system of internment camps. A social media campaign was launched under the hashtag #MeTooUyghur. The Uyghur population numbered about 12 million.
(AP, 2/12/19)(Econ., 10/17/20, p.9)
2019 Feb 12, Congo DRC's army said it killed four members of the notorious ADF militia and freed four hostages in an operation in the country's troubled east.
(AFP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, The European Parliament backed a fisheries agreement with Morocco which includes waters off the disputed territory of Western Sahara that Rabat claims. After initial approval, the member states need to officially back it again later.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Germany's top security official banned two publishers for allegedly belonging to a banned Kurdish organization. Publishers Mezopotamien Verlag und Vertrieb GmbH and the MIR Multimedia GmbH were banned because they support the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Thousands of Hungarians rallied in Budapest outside a prestigious scientific institution that says it is the victim of a new power grab by PM Viktor Orban's government. Some of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (MTA) funding has already been slashed with laboratories temporarily closing as a result.
(AFP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, In India a fire engulfed the Arpit Palace Hotel, a shoddily built budget hotel in central New Delhi, killing 17 people and injuring at least four others. The general manager of the Arpit Palace Hotel, Rajender Singh, and manager, Vikar Kumar, were booked on suspicion of culpable homicide for the fire.
(AP, 2/12/19)(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 12, Iraqi PM Adel Abdul-Mahdi said his country will repatriate Iraqi members of the Islamic State group held by US-backed fighters in Syria as well as thousands of their family members.
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 12, On the Italian island of Sardinia shepherds were joined by students on their fifth straight day of protests in a march in Nuoro, where shopkeepers shut stores in solidarity. The shepherds poured milk from large canisters onto streets to protest prices paid by cheesemakers for their milk.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Kenya said it is seeking to close the Dabaab refugee camp within six months. The camp held more than 200,000 refugees from Somalia.
(SSFC, 3/31/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 12, Macedonia's new name, North Macedonia, came into force after constitutional changes were published in the Official Gazette and Skopje's foreign ministry said both Greece and Macedonia had informed the UN by letter that the change is now in force.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 12, A wildlife monitoring group said Malaysian authorities have seized a record 30 tons of pangolin and pangolin products in eastern Sabah state on Borneo, the biggest such bust in the country.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Myanmar police fired rubber bullets, tear gas and water cannon to disperse a protest over a statue of independence hero General Aung San that is opposed by members of the Karenni ethnic minority.
(Reuters, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Dutch fisherman protested outside parliament in a last-ditch attempt to avert a European Union ban on the practice of using electric shocks to stun fish before scooping them up in nets.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, In southern Nigeria fifteen people were killed in a stampede at an election campaign rally by President Muhammadu Buhari.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 12, In Nigeria three people were reported killed when insurgents attacked a motorcade on route to an election rally in Borno state. Survivors of the assault later put the toll much higher. One survivor said he saw about 40 bodies; another estimated that as many as 100 died. The militants also took between 100 and 200 people captive.
(Reuters, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 12, In Pakistan suspected militants killed four officers after opening fire on a police vehicle in the northwestern town of Dera Ismail Khan.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Spanish police arrested 29 people who they allege are involved in a drug trafficking ring in the southern provinces of Cadiz and Malaga.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Spanish police said they had seized more than 200 stuffed endangered animals, including giraffes, rhinos, lions and tigers, from an illegal taxidermy workshop that was selling them online.
(AFP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Spain's Balearic Islands approved a local law that by 2050 aims to ban the use of fossil fuels and adopt renewable energy for all of the region's power needs, in what authorities claim is a pioneering step in Europe.
(AP, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Sudanese security forces arrested 14 professors who were gathering to protest outside Khartoum University, as anti-government demonstrations neared the end of their eighth week.
(Reuters, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Thailand's telecoms regulator suspended the operating license of a television channel linked to ousted former PM Thaksin Shinawatra weeks ahead of a general election, citing national security concerns.
(Reuters, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Turkey launched one of its largest operations against alleged supporters of the US-based Muslim cleric accused of leading an attempted coup in 2016, ordering the arrest of 1,112 people.
(Reuters, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, Venezuela's opposition supporters returned to the streets nationwide to keep the heat on embattled President Nicolas Maduro and demand he allow humanitarian aid into the country where food and medicine shortages are rife.
(Reuters, 2/12/19)
2019 Feb 12, In Zimbabwe dozens of gold miners were caught underground on the outskirts of Kadoma. Between 60 and 70 people were working underground at the time of the accident.
(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 13, President Donald Trump hosted his Colombian counterpart Ivan Duque at the White House to discuss their campaign to pressure Venezuela's far left president, Nicolas Maduro, from power.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, The US House passed a resolution that would force the Trump administration to withdraw US troops from involvement in Yemen.
(SFC, 2/14/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 13, A US district judge ruled that former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort intentionally lied to investigators and a federal grand jury in the special counsel's Russia probe.
(SFC, 2/14/19, p.A7)
2019 Feb 13, The United States charged former US Air Force intelligence officer Monica Witt with helping Iran in a cyber-spying operation that targeted her former colleagues. US officials said Witt supplied classified information about US intelligence officers after defecting to Iran in 2013.
(Reuters, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, The United States delivered laser-guided rockets valued at more than $16 million to the Lebanese army. The rockets are a key component for a fleet of A-29 Super Tucano attack aircraft previously delivered.
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, The US and Poland finalized a deal for Warsaw to buy American mobile rocket launchers worth $414 million (365 million euros) as it lobbies Washington to boost troops on Polish soil.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, In southern California Camden Nicholson (27) was arrested for killing his parents and their housekeeper in Orange County. Court filings later said that authorities suspect Nicholson may have killed his parents on Feb. 11 and the housekeeper a day later.
(http://tinyurl.com/yyx426b9)(SFC, 2/18/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 13, US immigration authorities in Miami detained brothers William and Roberto Isaias from Ecuador who are wanted in the South American country for allegedly stealing millions of dollars from a now-defunct bank.
(AP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 13, The Archdiocese of New Jersey released a list of 63 Roman Catholic clergy members that it said have been credibly accused of sexually abusing minors dating back to 1940.
(SFC, 2/14/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 13, NASA pronounced that its 2004 Mars rover Opportunity was dead.
(SFC, 2/14/19, p.A14)
2019 Feb 13, In Argentina tens of thousands of demonstrators blocked major roads in Buenos Aires as they marched to protest high unemployment and the policies of center-right leader Mauricio Macri, including cuts to public utility subsidies.
(Reuters, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, The Australian government said it would reopen the mothballed Christmas Island detention camp in anticipation of a new wave of asylum seekers arriving by boat after Parliament passed legislation that would give sick asylum seekers easier access to mainland hospitals.
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, Austria's right-wing government announced tougher sentences for violent crimes, particularly against female victims, while pointing to a recent spate of cases in which foreigners are suspected of murdering women.
(Reuters, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, Cyprus' finance minister said his government is tightening rules for the country's lucrative scheme granting passports to wealthy investors, making it ineligible to anyone who has already been rejected by another European Union country running similar plans.
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, The European Parliament approved a free trade deal with Singapore that the European Union hopes to use as a blueprint for further deals in southeast Asia. It will become operational after the member states give their final approval.
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, French carmaker Renault said in a statement its board unanimously decided to waive Ghosn's "non-compete commitment and, consequently, not to pay the corresponding compensation equal to two years fixed and variable compensation".
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, In Germany new crime statistics showed that anti-Semitic offences rose almost 10 percent last year, and that violent attacks were up more than 60 percent, sparking alarm in the Jewish community.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, Greek police said seven men have been arrested in northern Greece after police seized bundles of fake US $100 bills stashed in a warehouse with a total face value of $200,000.
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, India's Supreme Court issued an order to remove forest dwellers in 21 states where about 1.3 million land claims, each potentially representing a household, were rejected.
(Reuters, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 13, An Instagram account that published comic strips depicting the struggles of gay Muslims in Indonesia disappeared from the site following a frenzy of moral outrage online in the world's biggest Muslim nation. The Ministry of Communications said that the account under the username Alpatuni was pornographic.
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, Iran's Fars news reported that twenty members of the elite Revolutionary Guards were killed a suicide attack the southeast of the country.
(Reuters, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, Judges at the International Court of Justice ruled that the UN body has jurisdiction to hear a claim by Iran to recover $1.75 billion in assets frozen by Washington. The case filed in June 2016 centers on assets from the Iranian national bank, Bank Markazi, seized by US courts to compensate families of victims of a 1983 bombing of a US Marine Corps. base which Washington blames on Iran.
(Reuters, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, Israel's Shin Bet security agency alleged that Hamas is using coded television messages to instruct recruits in the occupied West Bank to carry out anti-Israeli attacks.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, In Kenya a small plane crashed in the country's west killing all five people on board, including three Americans.
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, The Maldives' top prosecutor charged former Pres. Yameen Abdul Gayoom with money laundering. The charges are linked to $1 million allegedly found in Yameen's bank account from a shady government deal to lease islands for tourist development in the Maldives, which is famous for its luxury resorts.
(AP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 13, Nigeria's President Muhammadu Buhari and Atiku Abubakar joined other candidates to sign a "peace accord", in front of foreign observers.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, In North Macedonia a bus drove down embankment and overturned in a crash that killed 14 people and left 30 others injured. The death toll rose to 15 after a man died on Feb. 16 at a clinic in Skopje.
(AP, 2/14/19)(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 13, In the Philippines Maria Ressa, the award-winning head of an online news site that has aggressively covered President Rodrigo Duterte's administration, was arrested by government agents in a libel case. She was freed on bail the next day.
(AP, 2/13/19)(SFC, 2/15/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 13, Saudi Arabia said it will lift its warning against citizens traveling to Lebanon as a visiting envoy from the kingdom met top Lebanese officials in Beirut.
(Reuters, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, In South Africa thousands of workers staged nationwide demonstrations to protest against high unemployment and government policies they say have failed to create jobs and are deepening poverty.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, In Spain right-wing and Catalan separatist lawmakers rejected the 2019 draft budget of PM Pedro Sanchez. They withdrew their backing in protest against the leaders of a secessionist movement being put on trial for rebellion and not being able to hold a legal independence referendum.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, In Sweden Angela Gui, the daughter of a detained Swedish publisher, published an account detailing a "strange" meeting with businessmen arranged by Sweden's ambassador to China. She said they threatened her after offering to help secure her father's release from prison in China.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 13, Thailand's Election Commission said it recommended the Thai Raksa Chart Party be dissolved because its prime minister candidate was "in conflict with the system of rule of democracy with king as head of state".
(AP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, In Turkey pro-Kurdish lawmaker Leyla Guven (55), on hunger strike for more than three months, was brought to a hospital but went home by ambulance after refusing treatment. She has vowed to continue her fast until the government allows Kurdish militant leader Abdullah Ocalan to hold regular meetings with his lawyers and family members.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, The UN confirmed that it has been officially informed by the Macedonian government that the country's new name is North Macedonia. The 27-year-old dispute was finally settled in June during UN-brokered talks.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 13, In eastern Syria hundreds of people fled the IS holdout overnight. Kurdish-led SDF fighters advanced slowly against hundreds of jihadists. Several dozen people fled Baghouz, walking to an SDF-held position four km (two miles) away from the village.
(AFP, 2/13/19)
2019 Feb 14, Acting US Defense Secretary Pat Shanahan said the United States will not reduce its troop presence in Afghanistan unilaterally, pledging that any moves will be fully coordinated with its allies.
(AP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, US Vice President Mike Pence demanded that Europeans drop a nuclear deal with Iran and join in seeking to cripple the regime, a cause that united Israel with longtime Arab rivals at a conference in Warsaw.
(AFP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, The US Senate voted 54-45 to confirm William Barr for a second stint as attorney general.
(SFC, 2/15/19, p.A7)
2019 Feb 14, Louisiana State Univ. in Baton Rouge said nine members of the Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity have been arrested for hazing related crimes that allegedly took place last fall.
(SFC, 2/16/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 14, The Tennessee Valley Authority voted to close the remaining coal-fired unit at the Paradise Fossil Plant in Muhlenberg County, Ky. The TVA board also voted to close the Bull Run Fossil Plant near Oak Ridge, Tenn., by December 2023.
(SFC, 2/15/19, p.A8)
2019 Feb 14, Amazon dropped plans for a big new headquarters in NYC.
(SFC, 2/15/19, p.D1)
2019 Feb 14, Facebook Inc said it has removed a number of pages and accounts engaged in "inauthentic behavior" targeting people in Moldova, where elections will be held later this month.
(Reuters, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, The investigative website Bellingcat identified Denis Sergeev, a high-ranking GRU officer and a graduate of Russia’s Military Diplomatic Academy, as the third suspect in the 2018 Novichok poisoning of former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal in Salisbury.
(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 14, British author Andrea Levy (62) died of cancer. She drew on her Jamaican heritage for novels such as "Small Island." The book also won the 2004 Women's Prize for Fiction, for English-language novels published in Britain, and the Commonwealth Writers' Prize.
(AFP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 14, Chinese tech company SenseNets closed an open database that stored the records of individuals "fully accessible to anyone," after Dutch security researcher Victor Gevers reported leaks of personal information on 2.6 million people in Xinjiang to SenseNets. The database had been exposed since last July.
(AFP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 14, Cuba charged that the United States was secretly moving special forces closer to Venezuela as part of a plan to intervene in the South American country using the pretext of a humanitarian crisis.
(Reuters, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, Egypt's parliament gave preliminary approval to constitutional changes that would allow President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi to stay in power after his second term ends in 2022.
(AP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, European plane maker Airbus said it will stop making its superjumbo A380 in 2021 for lack of customers, abandoning the world's biggest passenger jet and one of the aviation industry's most ambitious and most troubled endeavors.
(AP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, Haiti's Pres. Jovenel Moise said he would not surrender the country to armed gangs and drug dealers, as protesters continued to demand his resignation.
(SFC, 2/15/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 14, In Iraq eight members of a militia linked to powerful Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr were killed in a bomb blast near Samarra.
(AFP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, Italian police in Calabria nabbed fugitive kingpin cocaine dealer Francesco Strangio. He hails from a feuding crime clan involved in the 2007 trattoria massacre in Germany. Strangio had been on the run since a January 2018 conviction, carrying a 14-year prison term, for international drug trafficking.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 14, In Japan thirteen gay couples filed the country's first lawsuit challenging the rejection of same-sex marriage, arguing the denial violates their constitutional right to equality.
(AP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, In Kashmir at least 41 soldiers were killed and more than two dozen others wounded in a car bomb attack on a paramilitary convoy along a key highway on the outskirts of Srinagar. Adil Ahmad Dar (20) from the village of Lethipora in Indian Kashmir, rammed a car full of explosives into the convoy. His parents said he had been beaten by Indian troops a few years back when he was returning from school. Pakistan-based Islamist militant group Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) claimed responsibility for the car bomb attack. India's PM Narendra Modi soon placed the blame for the bombing squarely on neighboring Pakistan.
(AP, 2/14/19)(AP, 2/15/19)(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 14, In Libya an armed group kidnapped 14 Tunisian workers in the western city of Zawiya near the capital, Tripoli.
(AP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 14, The World Health Organization (WHO) said that at least 922 children and young adults have died of measles in Madagascar since October, despite a huge emergency vaccination program.
(Reuters, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, Russia's Pres. Putin hosted a meeting in Sochi to weigh the future of Syria with Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan and Iranian President Hassan Rouhani. Russia told Turkey it had no right to create a "safe zone" in northeast Syria unless it sought and received the consent of Syria's Pres. Bashar al-Assad.
(Reuters, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, South African gold mining giant Sibanye-Stillwater announced plans to shed more than 6,000 jobs, or 10 percent of its workforce, from underperforming gold mines.
(AFP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, Yusuf Saloojee, South Africa's former ambassador to Iran, was arrested Johannesburg on charges he took a bribe to help telecoms company MTN win a $31.6 billion license to operate in Iran.
(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 14, Spanish campaigners delivered a petition with more than half a million signatures to the national parliament in Madrid demanding an extension of the statute of limitations in child sex abuse cases.
(AP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, In Sudan security forces fired teargas to disperse hundreds of protesters close to the presidential palace in Khartoum, before plainclothes officers armed with plastic piping rounded up around 30 people.
(Reuters, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, In eastern Syria clearance operations took place in the villages of Shajalah and Baghouz. Scores of militants from the Islamic State group had surrendered to the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces the previous evening.
(AP, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 14, The UN and the Syrian Arab Red Crescent delivered badly-needed humanitarian assistance to more than 40,000 displaced people in the Rukban camp near the Jordanian border.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 14, Venezuela's military reinforced a blockade at the border with Colombia where opposition leader Juan Guaido has vowed to bring in desperately-needed humanitarian aid despite President Nicolas Maduro's vow to keep it out. The opposition's envoy to the US accused the government of President Nicolas Maduro of blocking humanitarian aid to the country and urged the international community to help open "thousands of windows" to let assistance in.
(AFP, 2/14/19)(Reuters, 2/14/19)
2019 Feb 15, Pres. Donald Trump announced that he has signed the appropriate paperwork to declare an emergency on the border so he can build a wall along the US-Mexico border. President Donald Trump also announced he was declaring a national emergency to fulfill his pledge to construct the wall. Congress' two top Democrats said they'll use "every remedy available" to oppose Trump's declaration of an emergency to shift billions of federal dollars into building the wall.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, The US government said it will lead an ambitious effort to develop technologies to recycle lithium-ion batteries from electric vehicles, cellphones and other sources to ensure a reliable and affordable supply of metals crucial to battery production in anticipation of soaring global demand and potential shortages.
(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 15, US and Iceland diplomats said they have agreed to set up formal economic channels to boost trade and business investment.
(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, The US Treasury Department imposed sanctions on top Venezuelan security officials and the head of Venezuelan state oil company PDVSA as it ratcheted up pressure on embattled Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro over an election it says was illegal.
(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, The US Justice Department alleged that two former executives for Cognizant Technology Solutions paid about $2 million in bribes to Indian officials to build a new office campus in the country.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, In Illinois Gary Martin (45), an employee of the Henry Pratt Co. in Aurora, was fired. He then killed five people and wounded five police officers before he was fatally shot. Martin had purchased his handgun in 2014. An initial background check did not catch a 1995 felony conviction.
(SFC, 2/16/19, p.A8)(SSFC, 2/17/19, p.A10)
2019 Feb 15, In Maryland Coast Guard Lt. Paul Hassan (49), a self-described white nationalist, was arrested on gun and drug charges. He was later accused of plotting to kill a long list of prominent journalists and Democratic politicians as well as others.
(SFC, 2/21/19, p.A8)
2019 Feb 15, Brazilian police arrested eight employees of mining company Vale SA as part of a criminal investigation into the causes of the Jan. 25 deadly dam disaster.
(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, Thousands of British children marched out of lessons to demand action on climate change, earning a mild rebuke from the prime minister's office for disrupting classes, but praise from the energy minister and activists.
(Reuters, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 15, Costa Rico's Justice Ministry announced that Julio Solis, director of Citizen Peace and Coexistence Promotion, had resigned. The country's vice-minister of economy reported him a day earlier for alleged sexual abuse.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, A top Airbus official said Germany's halt in exports to Saudi Arabia is preventing Britain from completing the sale of 48 Eurofighter Typhoon warplanes to Riyadh, and has delayed potential sales of other weapons such as the A400M military transport. The Eurofighter is built by a consortium of four founding countries: Germany, Britain, Italy and Spain.
(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, Rights group Amnesty International slammed a "ban" it said Egyptian authorities have imposed on family visits to scores of detainees.
(AFP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, Indian activist S Mugilan, who released a video critical of the police shooting of protesters at Vedanta's south Indian copper smelter in May, killing 13 and injuring many others, went missing following a press conference in Chennai, the capital of Tamil Nadu state. He released an analysis of publicly available video footage that he said showed the police had escalated the situation, leading to unnecessary deaths.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 15, In Myanmar the Yangon Northern District Court found Kyi Lin guilty of premeditated murder and illegal weapons possession in the Jan. 29, 2017, shooting of Ko Ni at Yangon's airport. It also sentenced to death another man for helping to plan the killing, and gave prison sentences to two other men it said were also involved in the crime. A fifth suspect accused of being the mastermind remains at large.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, The Pacific island nation of Nauru posted a new rule not allowing doctors to remotely recommend the medical transfer of asylum seekers to Australia. The new rule could thwart an easing of Australia's hardline immigration policy.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 15, In Nigeria Boko Haram insurgents killed eight people during an attack late today on the northeastern city of Maiduguri.
(AFP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 15, In Nigeria authorities in Kaduna state reported at least 66 deaths in fighting said to be between Christian farmers and Fulani Muslim herdsmen. The death toll from the attack soon doubled to more than 130 people.
(SFC, 2/15/19, p.A2)(Reuters, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 15, A Russian court ordered Baring Vostok executive Phillipe Delpal, a French national, to be held in custody for one month and 30 days after he was detained on suspicion of embezzlement. He was one of several executives at private equity group Baring Vostok including Michael Calvey, a US citizen, who were detained a day earlier.
(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, South African police said an arrest warrant for Ajay Gupta, a businessman and friend of former president Jacob Zuma, has been provisionally withdrawn, in a setback for the government's promised fight against corruption.
(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, Spain's PM Pedro Sanchez called an early general election for April 28 that is expected to highlight the deep political divisions coursing through the nation.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, In Spain hundreds of Chinese protested outside a bank in Madrid, claiming they are being unfairly denied access to their accounts while the bank insists it's merely complying with money-laundering laws.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, In Sweden the main suspect (22) in the theft of royal funeral artifacts from a Swedish cathedral confessed to stealing them last July 31 after his DNA was found on the items that were pulled out last week from a garbage bin north of Stockholm.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, In a commander with the Kurdish-led force fighting the extremists said the offensive on the last enclave held by the Islamic State group in eastern Syria has been blunted by the discovery of hundreds of civilians still living there. IS militants clung to their last square km (mile) of land in Baghouz.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, In Thailand the Pheu Thai, the flagship party of the political machine of former PM Thaksin Shinawatra, held its first rally in Bangkok, as campaigning heats up for the first election since a 2014 military coup.
(AP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, Turkish police prevented supporters from rallying outside the home of Leyla Guven, a pro-Kurdish lawmaker on hunger strike for 100 days.
(AFP, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 15, A report by the UN human rights office and the UN mission in South Sudan recorded 175 cases, mainly rapes lasting hours by multiple uniformed and armed men, just between September and December 2018.
(Reuters, 2/15/19)
2019 Feb 16, US military transport planes carrying humanitarian aid meant for Venezuelans landed in the Colombian border city of Cucuta, where food and medicine is being stored amidst uncertainty over how and where aid will be distributed.
(Reuters, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, In Mississippi police found four people dead in a home in Clinton following a 12-hour standoff. Suspect Nam Lee was found wounded and soon died.
(SFC, 2/18/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 16, World Pangolin Day was marked around the globe. Conservationists say well over 1 million pangolins have been poached since around 2000.
(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, In Afghanistan the Taliban stormed a police checkpoint late today, killing six police in the northern Balkh province.
(AP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 16, In Albania thousands of opposition supporters clashed with police at an anti-government rally protesting what they claim is a corrupt and inefficient Cabinet. The protesters demanded that the government resign and an early election be held.
(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, Hundreds of passengers throughout Europe were stranded by the abrupt collapse of the British regional airline Flybmi.
(AP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 16, In China Mao Zedong's former secretary Li Rui (101), a bold critic of the ruling Communist Party, died. He had spent a lifetime near the center of elite politics.
(AFP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, Croatian police found a body in a freezer in the hallway of the Dominic family home in the village of Pavlovec, northeast of Zagreb. It was apparently that of Jasmina Dominic, who was reported missing in 2005 but was last seen in 2000 when she was 23 years old. Smiljana Srnec (450, her the older sister, was detained.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 16, In Egypt extremists attacked an army checkpoint in the troubled northern Sinai peninsula at dawn, causing 15 casualties among the armed forces including at least one officer shot dead. Seven of the extremists were reported killed.
(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, In France "yellow vest" protesters took to the streets for the 14th weekend in a row. A poll this week showed dwindling support for the demonstrations.
(Reuters, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, French director Francois Ozon's film "Grace a Dieu" ("By the Grace of God") won the Berlin Film Festival's jury grand prize. The movie, which opens on Feb. 20, portrays French priest Bernard Preynat, who has been accused of molesting dozens of boys during the 1980s and '90s.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 16, German Chancellor Angela Merkel robustly defended European nations' decision to stand by the Iran nuclear deal in comments at the Munich Security Conference, an annual gathering of top global defense and foreign policy officials.
(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, In Germany Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic and Kosovo President Hashim Thaci appeared together at the Munich Security Conference, both expressing interest in reaching an agreement but neither appearing to give ground.
(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, Haiti's PM Jean-Henry Ceant, after days of deadly protests, announced that government officials will lose their perks under emergency economic and anti-corruption measures.
(AFP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 16, India's first locally built semi high-speed train broke down early today on its way back to New Delhi from Varanasi in northern Uttar Pradesh, a day after its inauguration by PM Narendra Modi. The railway ministry said the disruption was possibly due to cattle run over.
(Reuters, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, Mexico's Pres. Manuel Lopez Obrador announced a $3.9 billion bailout for Pemex, the country's state-owned oil company, and promised it an additional $1.6 billion in revenue.
(SSFC, 2/17/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 16, Nigeria's president and the leading opposition candidate urged people to remain calm after a national election scheduled for today was postponed by a week just five hours before polls were due to open.
(Reuters, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, Police in North Macedonia said they've broken up a criminal ring of migrant smugglers and filed charges against 21 people, including a police officer, for illegal trafficking.
(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, A Russian court ordered Michael Calvey, the US founder of one of Russia's biggest private equity firms accused of fraud, to be kept in custody until April 13. Investigators accused Calvey and other executives of embezzling 2.5 billion rubles ($37.73 million).
(Reuters, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, In Serbia thousands of people rallied in the capital for 11th week in a row against populist President Aleksandar Vucic and his government.
(AP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 16, In Spain thousands of Catalan separatists marched in Barcelona to proclaim the innocence of 12 of their leaders who are on trial for their role in a failed 2017 secession bid.
(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, Bruno Ganz (77), Swiss actor, died in Zurich. He gave masterful performances as Adolf Hitler in "Downfall" (2004) and an angel seeking mortality in divided Berlin in "Wings of Desire" (1987).
(AFP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, In eastern Syria jihadist fighters defending the last dreg of the Islamic State group's "caliphate" were holed up in half a square km of Baghouz village. Large numbers of civilians were reported still trapped inside.
(AFP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, The Vatican said former US cardinal Theodore McCarrick (88) has been expelled from the Roman Catholic priesthood after being found guilty of sexual crimes against minors and adults.
(Reuters, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 16, In Zimbabwe eight artisanal miners, who were trapped underground since Feb. 12 after heavy flooding, were rescued. Dozens of their co-workers remained missing and were feared dead.
(AP, 2/16/19)
2019 Feb 17, In Afghanistan a roadside bomb killed three civilians in the southern Kandahar province.
(AP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, In southern Bangladesh a devastating blaze raced through a crammed slum, killing at least nine people and injuring several others in Chittagong city.
(AP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, French officials strongly condemned anti-Semitic abuse and anti-police attacks by some "yellow vest" demonstrators as hundreds gathered in central Paris to mark the third month of the anti-government protests.
(AFP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, In Haiti five US citizens were among eight men arrested while carrying automatic weapons and other arms and driving in cars without license plates. They returned to the United States on Feb. 20 before a scheduled court hearing in the Caribbean nation.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 17, Indian police said authorities have detained 23 men suspected of links to the Pakistan-based militant group that masterminded the Feb. 14 bombing of an Indian security convoy in Kashmir that killed 44 paramilitary police.
(Reuters, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, Hundreds of Indian soldiers descended on the village of Pinglan, which is surrounded by south Kashmir's apple and apricot orchards, just before midnight. By the time they left 18 hours later, one civilian, three armed militants, and five members of the security forces were dead, a row of houses was reduced to rubble, an unexploded missile had been planted in a rice paddy, and more than 120 villagers had sought treatment for exposure to tear gas, alleged beatings, and in some cases mental trauma.
(Reuters, 4/30/19)
2019 Feb 17, Iran's state TV reported that the country's President Hassan Rouhani has unveiled the first Iranian made semi-heavy submarine.
(AP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, Iran's Revolutionary Guards broke up a group of militants in southeast Iran who were linked to a suicide bombing that killed 27 guards near the border with Pakistan last week. Three militants were arrested and explosive material was seized from houses in the cities of Saravan and Khash.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 17, Israel's PM Benjamin Netanyahu handed over his role as foreign minister to intelligence minister Israel Katz, giving up the portfolio he has held since 2015.
(Reuters, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, A Maltese court said it had granted bail to Soko Moussa Shaha Ali, one of two men arrested for hijacking in 2016 after a passenger plane was forced to land in Malta, saying he had spent the maximum time allowed in prison without being tried.
(Reuters, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, Saudi Arabia signed a preliminary agreement with France's Naval Group to build warships in the kingdom, as part of its efforts to develop domestic manufacturing capabilities. Saudi Arabian Military Industries (SAMI), the kingdom’s state defense company, made the announcement at the IDEX military exhibition in Abu Dhabi.
(Reuters, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was greeted with a booming 21-gun salute in Pakistan, as he kicked off an Asia tour months after being tarnished by his alleged links to the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
(AFP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, In Sudan a vendor died after riot police fired tear gas at an anti-government rally in Khartoum. Human Rights Watch said at least 51 have been killed since Dec. 19, when a government decision to triple the price of bread.
(AFP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, A spokesman for the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces said Islamic State militants are preventing more than 1,000 civilians from leaving Baghouz village, a tiny area in eastern Syria still held by the extremist group.
(AP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, The United Arab Emirates (UAE) said it had signed military deals worth 3.87 billion UAE dirhams ($1.1 billion) with international companies.
(Reuters, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 17, Thousands of volunteers in Venezuela began mobilizing to bring American aid into their crisis-hit country despite a blockade by President Nicolas Maduro who claims the assistance could be cover for a US invasion.
(AFP, 2/17/19)
2019 Feb 18, California and 15 other states filed a lawsuit against Pres. Donald Trump's emergency declaration to fund a wall on the US-Mexico border.
(SFC, 2/19/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 18, It was reported that the Catholic Diocese of Oakland, Ca., has released the names of 45 clergymen and religious brothers they say are "credibly accused" of sexually assaulting minors.
(SFC, 2/18/19, p.C1)
2019 Feb 18, The NYC Human Rights Commission released guidelines enabling people to seek fines and other remedies if they've been harassed or punished in public spaces because of their hair texture or style.
(SFC, 2/19/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 18, In Afghanistan a doctor was killed late today as he returned home from his private clinic in Kabul by an explosive device attached to his vehicle. The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the attack.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 18, Albania's center-right opposition party said its 33 lawmakers plan to resign from parliament over alleged corruption and inefficiency of the country's Socialist government.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, In southern Bolivia a passenger bus crashed head-on with a dump truck, killing at least 24 people and injuring 12 more.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, Brazil's government banned new upstream mining dams and ordered the decommissioning of all such dams by 2021, targeting the type of structure that burst last month in the town of Brumadinho, where the death toll rose to 169 people with 141 people yet to be located.
(Reuters, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, Seven MPs quit Britain's main opposition Labour Party, citing the leadership's support for Brexit and a growing culture of racism, intimidation and abuse.
(AFP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, British media reported that Honda will close a car factory in Swindon in 2022 with the potential loss of 3,500 jobs, in another blow to a British economy made jittery by Brexit.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, China's cabinet issued guidelines for developing a "Greater Bay Area" around the Pearl River Delta, in a bid to spur growth in Guangdong province and the cities of Hong Kong and Macau.
(Reuters, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, China's government accused the United States of trying to block its industrial development by alleging that Chinese mobile network gear poses a cybersecurity threat to countries rolling out new internet systems.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, In Egypt a late-night suicide blast near Cairo's famed tourist market left two policemen dead. Al-Hassan Abdullah (37) blew himself up after police officers approached to arrest him. A wounded officer soon died raising the death toll to three.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 18, Indian troops suffered new losses in a battle with Kashmir militants that left nine dead. Officials said four soldiers, a policeman, three militants and a civilian were killed in the latest clash. The suspected organizer of last week's suicide bombing was said to be among the dead.
(AP, 2/18/19)(Reuters, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, Israel says that it would host bilateral meetings with the Czech, Slovak and Hungarian leaders this week after Poland withdrew from a planned five-way summit in Jerusalem in protest at Holocaust rhetoric.
(Reuters, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, Lithuanian startup Trafi said Berlin will be the first major European capital to get a transport app that handles billing for all services centrally and requires only a single login. Similar services are already available in Vilnius, Rio de Janeiro and Jakarta.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, Maldives authorities detained former strongman president Abdulla Yameen after he was accused of trying to bribe witnesses in his money laundering trial.
(AFP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, Mexico's President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said he will close the famed Maria Madre island penal colony. It was founded in 1905 off the country's Pacific coast.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, Mexico's navy seized more than 1,300 pounds (630 kg) of cocaine from a speedboat off the country's Pacific coast. 15 crew members were detained.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 18, The Philippine health secretary said that 136 people, mostly children, have died of measles and 8,400 others have fallen ill in an outbreak blamed partly on vaccination fears.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, Poland's PM Mateusz Morawiecki cancelled Warsaw's participation in a Jerusalem summit, accusing an Israeli minister of "racist" comments about the actions of Poles during the Holocaust, further souring relations between the two nations.
(AFP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, In eastern Syria more than 300 Islamic State militants surrounded in the village of Baghouz refused to surrender to US-backed forces and were trying to negotiate for a corridor to the rebel-held northwestern province of Idlib. Two bomb blasts went off in the northwestern city of Idlib, killing at least 13 people.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, The United Arab Emirates announced that it had signed deals worth more than $1.6 billion for the purchase of Patriot missile launchers from US arms giant Raytheon.
(AFP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, The UN said Yemen's warring parties have agreed to start withdrawing forces from the main port of Hodeidah under a UN-sponsored deal, following weeks of diplomacy to salvage a pact that stalled over control of the Red Sea city.
(Reuters, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, Venezuela's opposition said that the state internet provider CANTV has blocked a webpage where volunteers sign up to answer National Assembly president Juan Guaido's call to help bring in desperately needed humanitarian aid.
(AFP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 18, Zimbabwe President Emmerson Mnangagwa retired four generals, in the first major shake-up of the armed forces since he took office.
(AP, 2/18/19)
2019 Feb 19, A delegation of US lawmakers sought to reassure European allies in Brussels that differences over President Donald Trump's policies were mere "family squabbles" and transatlantic ties remain strong.
(Reuters, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, In Afghanistan at least six civilians were killed by a roadside bomb as their vehicle was traveling through the eastern province of Laghman.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, Egyptian state media reported that security forces have killed 16 suspected militants in two separate raids in the city of Arish in North Sinai.
(Reuters, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, Estonian authorities said that the local branch of Danske Bank must close after the financial group admitted that massive amounts of money from Russia and former Soviet states had been laundered through the subsidiary.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, The European Union reached a tentative agreement on the first specific EU standards for trucks, seeking to get polluting CO2 levels down.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, French residents and public officials from across the political spectrum joined nationwide rallies against anti-Semitism following a series of anti-Semitic acts. Vandals daubed swastikas and anti-Semitic slogans overnight on around 90 graves in a Jewish cemetery in the eastern village of Quatzenheim.
(AP, 2/19/19)(Reuters, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, Karl Lagerfeld (85), German-born French fashion designer, died in Paris. Lagerfeld was one of the most hardworking figures in the fashion world, holding down the top design jobs at LVMH-owned luxury label Fendi from 1977, and Paris' family-owned power-house Chanel in 1983.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, France and Germany launched a drive in Berlin to overhaul the European Union's competition rules to facilitate the creation of world-leading companies. They pushed forward a project to create a car battery consortium aimed at catching up with Asian rivals.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, Hungary launched a new anti-immigration media campaign in which it accused George Soros and EU Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker of allegedly supporting illegal migration. Brussels immediately this dismissed as "fake news".
(AFP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu held back-to-back meetings with Slovak PM Peter Pellegrini, Czech PM Andrej Babis and Hungarian PM Viktor Orban before hosting all three for lunch at his official residence. The series of sit-downs replaced a high-profile summit in Jerusalem that was cancelled over a rift with Poland.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, Pakistan accused India of sponsoring terrorism and of using the United Nations' highest court for "political theater" as it urged judges to dismiss an Indian case seeking to save alleged spy Kulbhushan Jadhav from execution.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, Romania's Social Democratic government adopted emergency legislation including a provision to limit how long top prosecutor agencies can be managed by interim appointees. The measure also removes the prosecutor general's oversight of a unit tasked with investigating magistrates.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 19, Russian lawmakers approved a bill prohibiting military personnel from using smartphones on duty, a move intended to block leaks of sensitive information on social media.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman arrived in India after visiting Pakistan.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, A Swedish court convicted Kurda Bahaalddin H Saeed H Saeed (38), who fought against the Islamic State group in Iraq, of war crimes for posting macabre pictures and videos on Facebook. He was sentenced to 15 months in jail.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, In Switzerland an avalanche buried several skiers on the busy slopes of the resort of Crans-Montana. Scores of rescuers worked to dig out survivors. 10 to 12 people were believed to be trapped under the snow. A Frenchman (34) whose job was to check the safety of ski slopes, was one of four people rescued, but soon died from injuries in the avalanche.
(AP, 2/19/19)(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 19, A senior adviser to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad flatly rejected the idea of giving Syrian Kurds a measure of autonomy, saying such a move would open the door to the partition of the country.
(Reuters, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, A Tanzanian court sentenced Yang Feng Glan (69) of China to 15 years in jail for her role in trafficking tusks from more than 400 elephants. Two Tanzanian men were also found guilty for their role in the illegal commerce. They were also sentenced to 15 years each.
(AFP, 2/19/19)(Reuters, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, A Turkish appeals court upheld jail sentences against opposition journalists in a long-running case targeting the Cumhuriyet newspaper -- one of the few remaining dailies critical of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
(AFP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, Ukraine's Pres. Petro Poroshenko signed a constitutional amendment committing to join NATO and the European Union, acknowledging that the nation still has a long way to go to meet the membership criteria.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, The United Arab Emirates' armed forces signed 514.8 million dirham ($140.17 million) defense contracts with international firms at the IDEX military exhibition in Abu Dhabi.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, A UN report said more than 100,000 people have been displaced by factional fighting and lawlessness in Burkina Faso, most within the past two months.
(Reuters, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, At the Vatican Catholic religious orders from around the world apologized for having failed to respond when their priests raped children, acknowledging that their family-like communities blinded them to sexual abuse and led to misplaced loyalties, denial and cover-ups.
(AP, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 19, Venezuelan Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino said the country's opposition would have to pass over "our dead bodies" to oust President Nicolas Maduro and impose a new government.
(Reuters, 2/19/19)
2019 Feb 20, US Sec. of State Mike Pompeo said Hoda Muthana (24), an Alabama woman who left home to join the Islamic State in Syria, has no legal claim to American citizenship. Muthana has said she made a mistake and wants to return home with her 18-month-old son.
(SFC, 2/21/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 20, San Francisco police, sheriff's deputies and parole agents arrested 50 people in the Tenderloin over five hours in an effort to improve the quality of life in the drug-plagued area.
{SF, USA, Drugs}
(SFC, 2/22/19, p.C1)
2019 Feb 20, Microsoft Corp said it had discovered hacking targeting democratic institutions, think tanks and non-profit organizations in Europe and plans to offer a cyber security service to several countries to close security gaps. The hacks occurred between September and December 2018, targeting employees of the German Council on Foreign Relations and European offices of The Aspen Institute and The German Marshall Fund.
(Reuters, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, Samsung unveiled its new foldable smartphone in San Francisco. The Galaxy Fold will sell for $1980 when it is released on April 26.
(SFC, 2/21/19, p.D1)
2019 Feb 20, In Bangladesh a fire late today killed at least 70 people in the Chawkbazar area, the oldest part Dhaka.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 20, Three MPs quit Britain's governing Conservative Party in protest at its "disastrous" hard line on Brexit, joining a rebellion in parliament that is redrawing the country's political landscape just weeks before it leaves the EU.
(AFP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, Dubai budget carrier flydubai said it chalked up a loss of $43.5 million in 2018, as airlines across the Gulf struggle with mounting costs and political tensions.
(AFP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, Czech authorities said they would slap checks on beef imported from Poland after veterinarians found the dangerous Salmonella bacteria in a 700-kg batch of Polish beef. The beef was imported from Poland on February 13.
(AFP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, Egypt hanged nine men for the 2015 assassination of the prosecutor general, bringing to 15 the number of executions it has carried out this month.
(AFP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, A French court ordered Switzerland's largest bank, UBS, to pay 4.5 billion euros ($5.1 billion) in fines and damages for helping wealthy French clients evade tax authorities, wrapping up one of France's biggest-ever tax evasion trials.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, A French TV channel said it had been forced to cut short a live Facebook broadcast from a desecrated Jewish cemetery in eastern France because of an onslaught of anti-Semitic commentary.
(Reuters, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, In India Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Indian leader Narendra Modi vowed to increase pressure on countries that fuel terrorism.
(AFP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, India's top court ordered more than a dozen states to evict nearly 1 million people from forest land as they have their failed to prove ownership claims. The court says the eviction must be carried out within five months.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 20, India's Supreme Court found Anil Ambani, the chairman of Reliance Communications, and two of his directors guilty of contempt of court and ordered them to pay 5.5 billion rupees ($77.29 million) owed to Swedish telecom equipment maker Ericsson.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, In southern Libya armed men murdered General Ibrahim Mohamad Kari, security head in the town of Murzuk. Forces loyal to Libyan strongman Khalifa Haftar entered and took control of Murzuk as part of an offensive launched in January.
(AFP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 20, A Lithuanian official says 26 people, including eight judges in different courts, have been detained in a corruption probe, suspected of "large-scale bribery, trading in influence and abuse of powers in the court system".
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, Moroccan police fired water cannons at protesting teachers who were marching toward a royal palace and beat people with truncheons amid demonstrations around Rabat. Morocco now sees an average of 48 protests daily, according to the ministry for human rights.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, Pakistani and Indian officials said that India has halted a key bus service with the Pakistani-controlled part of Kashmir, cutting the only land route linking the divided Himalayan region.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, In Pakistan Naseeb Khan (25) and Bibi Dakhtar (20) were found dead with slit throats in the western suburbs of Karachi. They went missing last year and police suspected they were killed on the orders of an elders' council over a perceived affront to family honor.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 20, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said he will not accept regular monthly tax transfers from Israel if it carries out its decision to deduct amounts the Palestinians pay to the families of prisoners and people killed in fighting with Israel.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, The leader of one of Portugal's main nurses' unions started a hunger strike after prosecutors declared unlawful a crippling three-week-long walkout by surgical nurses and threatened to impose penalties on those still taking part.
(Reuters, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, Russian President Vladimir Putin threatened to deploy new missiles against Western capitals as he delivered a state of the nation address aimed at boosting falling approval ratings.
(AFP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, Russian news agencies said a shipment of Russian medicine and medical equipment has arrived in Venezuela.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, South Africa's Finance Minister Tito Mboweni announced a $1.6 billion-a-year bailout for the country's electricity utility in a bid to stave off further downgrades to Pretoria's credit rating as he unveiled a new budget.
(AFP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, Swiss-based commodities giant Glencore said it will cap how much coal it mines amid shareholder pressure for it to help reduce global emissions of greenhouse gases.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, In eastern Syria a convoy of trucks carrying hundreds of civilians, including men, women and children, left Baghouz, the last enclave held by Islamic State militants, signaling a possible end to a standoff that has lasted for more than a week.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, In eastern Syria French jihadist Fabien Clain (41) was killed in a coalition strike in Baghouz. His younger Jean-Michel (38) was wounded in the same attack but survived. He died in a mortar attack two days later.
(AFP, 3/5/19)
2019 Feb 20, In Syria religious leaders of Russia's republic of Chechnya inaugurated the re-opened 13th century Khalid Ibn al-Walid Mosque in Homs, once the symbol of the rebellion against President Bashar Assad. The mosque hosts the shrine of Khalid Ibn al-Walid, a companion of Prophet Muhammad.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 20, US-backed Syrian forces fighting the Islamic State group in Syria handed over more than 150 Iraqi members of the group to Iraq, the first batch of several to come.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 20, Taiwan's government said that it would propose a draft law to allow same-sex marriage in Asia's first such bill amid a heated debate over marriage equality that has divided the self-ruled island.
(Reuters, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, A Thai court ruled that Dmitry Ukrainsky, a Russian man who allegedly was part of a gang that stole millions of dollars online from bank accounts, can be extradited to the United States to stand trial. However, Ukrainsky's extradition to Russia was previously approved last year by a Thai court after he agreed to return there after he finishes serving a 10-year, 8-month prison term in Thailand for fraud, money laundering and conducting business illegally as a foreigner.
(AP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, A UN report said investigators have identified perpetrators of pervasive rape and killings and torture in secret safe houses in South Sudan, and believe oil revenues have driven much of the violence in its civil war.
(Reuters, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 20, Zambian opposition parties said they will report Pres. Edgar Lungu to the International Criminal Court in The Hague for alleged political violence against his rivals.
(AFP, 2/20/19)
2019 Feb 21, The White House announced the plans to keep "a small peacekeeping force" in Syria, partly reversing a decision by President Donald Trump in December to pull out the entire 2,000-strong force.
(Reuters, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 21, The US and China resumed high-levels talks aimed at easing a trade standoff that has unnerved global investors and clouded the outlook for the world economy.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, Teachers in Oakland, Ca., hit the picket lines for higher pay, smaller classes and more support for students.
{SF Bay Area}
(SFC, 2/22/19, p.A1)
2019 Feb 21, Former San Francisco police Officer Rain Dougherty (44) pleaded guilty to two counts of bank robbery committed last year in the Richmond and Sunset Districts of the city. He had been suspended four years earlier for sending racist and homophobic text messages to other officers.
{SF, USA, Robbery}
(SFC, 2/22/19, p.C10)
2019 Feb 21, In Vallejo, Ca., Henry Benson (37) and Roselle Cipriano (36), a husband and wife who owned and operated an elder care facility, were indicted by a federal grand jury for distributing and manufacturing methamphetamine pills.
{SF Bay Area, USA, Drugs}
(SFC, 2/22/19, p.C1)
2019 Feb 21, David Horowitz (b.1937), consumer reporter, died in Los Angeles. His syndicated "Fight Back!" program made him perhaps the best-known consumer reporter in the US.
(SFC, 2/21/19, p.C5)
2019 Feb 21, In southern California a small plane crashed in the snowy Tehachapi Mountains killing all three onboard.
(SFC, 2/26/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 21, In Chicago actor Jussie Smollett turned himself in to police on a felony charge of disorderly conduct for allegedly staging a racist antigay attack on himself and filing a false police report.
(SFC, 2/23/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 21, North Carolina's elections board ordered a new election in the last undecided congressional race due to ballot tampering after GOP candidate Mark Harris dropped his bid to be declared the winner.
{North Carolina, USA}
(SFC, 2/22/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 21, It was reported that 50 million gallons of toxic water is being discharged daily from contaminated mining sites into streams and ponds without being treated in California, Colorado, Oklahoma, Montana and at least five other states.
(SFC, 2/21/19, p.A8)
2019 Feb 21, A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched from Cape Canaveral carried a communications satellite for Indonesia and a lunar lander for Israel. The lunar lander was expected to touch down on the Sea of Serenity on April 11.
(SFC, 2/23/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 21, Peter Tork, one of the four musicians featured in the Monkees sitcom (1966-68), died of complications from cancer in eastern Connecticut.
{Connecticut, USA, Pop&Rock}
(SFC, 2/22/19, p.A7)
2019 Feb 21, Moshe Journo (53), an Israeli man who allegedly had been on the run for 15 years after being accused of raping a teenage girl in Pennsylvania, was extradited back to the United States.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 21, In Belgium Swedish teenager Greta Thunberg (16) led a march of thousands of students who are skipped classes for the seventh Thursday in a row to march through Brussels and draw more attention to fighting climate change.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, The Church of England acknowledged the reality of shrinking congregations and overworked priests and lifted a 400-year-old rule requiring that all churches hold services every Sunday.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 21, In southern China Guo Kaibing (33), a reportedly mentally ill man, attacked morning commuters with a knife, wounding 11 people, including students in Ji'an City.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, China announced new measures against gender discrimination in Chinese workplaces that forbid employers from asking potential female hires questions such as if they are married or have children.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 21, The International Monetary Fund said Ecuador has agreed to receive $10 billion in financial aid from global development bodies over three years.
(AFP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, France Info radio and BFM TV reported that French jihadist Fabian Clain had been killed and his brother Jean-Michel seriously wounded after a coalition strike in Baghouz, the final pocket held by the militants in northeastern Syria.
(Reuters, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, Hungarian opposition politicians accused the government of hypocrisy over a program helping to settle Venezuelan refugees of Hungarian origin, saying it contradicted the right-wing government's strict anti-immigration laws.
(AFP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, An Indian government minister said India has decided to stop the flow of water to Pakistan from its share in the rivers under the Indus Water Treaty regulating river flows between the two nations.
(Reuters, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, Israel's acting foreign minister doubled down on his divisive claim that Poles collaborated with the Nazis and "suckled anti-Semitism with their mothers' milk".
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 21, Kazakhstan's Pres. Nursultan Nazarbayev fired the government over what he called its failure to raise living standards and diversify away from oil and gas in the Central Asian nation. An interim administration will be led by Askar Mamin, who previously held the post of first deputy prime minister.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, Eastern Libyan forces loyal to military commander Khalifa Haftar fought tribesmen for a second day for control of the southern city of Murzuq, as part of campaign to secure oilfields in the south. At least three soldiers have been killed over the last 24 hours. Around 11 tribesmen have also been killed and 15 wounded.
(Reuters, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, The World Health Organization (WHO) said that an epidemic of measles in Madagascar has caused more than 900 deaths since the outbreak began last September.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, In Mali Djamel Okacha (aka Yahya Abou El Hamame), an Algerian commander in Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), was killed after French commandos, helicopters and a drone hit a column of vehicles he was traveling in north of Timbuktu. A total of 11 "terrorists" were reported killed.
(AFP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 21, In northern Mozambique a local worker was killed and six others were wounded when two road convoys operated by US gas giant Anadarko came under attack.
(AFP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 21, In northwestern Nigeria two people were killed in clashes between rival party supporters in the village of Kofa, 2-days ahead of rescheduled general elections.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 21, Pakistan's PM Imran Khan authorized the armed forces to "respond decisively and comprehensively to any aggression or misadventure" by neighboring India.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, In Pakistan torrential rains lashed several cities triggering flash floods that left at least 26 people dead across the country.
{Pakistan, Tragedy}
(SFC, 2/22/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 21, A Polish charity helping victims of child abuse committed by Catholic priests accused 24 bishops of concealing perpetrators of sexual molestation of minors. Three activists overturned a statue of a Polish priest accused of sex abuse in the northern city of Gdansk. Father Henryk Jankowski, who died in 2010, has faced accusations of pedophilia.
(Reuters, 2/21/19)(AFP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, Russian state prosecutors formally charged top US investor Michael Calvey, the founder of the Baring Vostok private equity group, with fraud, hours before Washington accused Moscow of denying its diplomats access to him.
(Reuters, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, In Spain riot police briefly clashed with pro-independence Catalan protesters in Barcelona while other activists burned tires and blocked highways across the northeast as part of a day of protests against the trial of 12 separatist leaders.
(Reuters, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, Sudanese security agents arrested several opposition leaders and activists as hundreds of anti-government protesters trying to march on the presidential palace were dispersed with tear gas.
(AFP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, Hundreds of workers in Port Sudan continued a days-long strike against the transfer of its vital container terminal. Workers opposed Khartoum's decision to transfer control of the port's container terminal to a Philippine company, International Container Terminal Services Inc. (ICTSI).
(AFP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, In eastern Syria twin bombings in market killed at least 14 people. US-backed Syrian forces tried to negotiate the release of civilians still trapped in the Islamic State group's last redoubt, as the international coalition warned the jihadists faced "inevitable defeat".
(AP, 2/21/19)(AFP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, Ukraine's State Security Service SBU accused Russia of meddling in the electoral process in Ukraine by creating illegal structures to help guarantee victory for a certain candidate.
(Reuters, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, Pope Francis opened his high-stakes abuse prevention summit at the Vatican. He issued 21 proposals to stem the clergy sex abuse around the world at the start of the 4-day event.
(AP, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 21, Venezuela's Pres. maduro ordered the country's vast border with Brazil closed, days before opposition leaders planned to bring in foreign humanitarian aid.
{Brazil, Venezuela}
(SFC, 2/22/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 21, Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido left Caracas with some 80 lawmakers on a 800-km (500-mile) trip to the Colombian border where they hope to receive food and medicine to alleviate shortages in defiance of President Nicolas Maduro.
(Reuters, 2/21/19)
2019 Feb 22, The Trump administration and Chinese negotiators resumed high-level talks aimed at resolving a trade dispute that has escalated uncertainty for corporations, unsettled investors and posed a threat to the global economy. Negotiators agreed to extend high-level trade talks through the weekend, and President Donald Trump said he hoped to meet next month at his Florida resort with President Xi Jinping to try to finalize an agreement.
(AP, 2/22/19)(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 22, The Trump administration says it's sent about 191 metric tons of humanitarian assistance over the past two weeks to the Colombian-Venezuelan border for distribution inside Venezuela.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, In Chicago R&B star R. Kelly was arrested on multiple charges of aggravated sexual abuse involving four victims, including at least three between the ages of 13 and 17.
(SFC, 2/23/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 22, In Algeria several hundred demonstrators rallied in Algiers in defiance of a ban on demonstrations, and in other cities as well, against a bid by ailing President Abdelaziz Bouteflika to win a fifth term. Police fired tear gas to block a protest march on the presidential palace, prompting demonstrators to respond with stone-throwing. Security forces arrested 41 people as angry protests rocked the capital.
(AFP, 2/22/19)(AFP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 22, Brazilian authorities moved humanitarian aid to the country's northern border with Venezuela even though the international crossing has been closed.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, In China Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman hailed relations with China as trouble-free, during talks with President Xi Jinping in Beijing aimed at strengthening relations in the face of criticism from the West over the kingdom's human rights record and its war in Yemen.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, In eastern Congo DRC a new case of Ebola was confirmed in the Beni area where authorities believed the epidemic had been brought under control after 23 days without any fresh infections.
(AFP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 22, A deep magnitude-7.5 earthquake struck the Ecuador-Peru border region early today, causing tremors that the Ecuadorian president said were felt around the country.
(Reuters, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, In France hundreds of students took to the streets of Paris to call for more action to fight climate change, one day after a similar march in Brussels. Greta Thunberg, the 16-year-old Swedish schoolgirl who is being hailed as her generation's voice on climate change, joined the Paris march.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, German automakers Daimler and BMW say that trustworthy handling of personal data will be a key competitive advantage in their new joint venture that offers app-based services like free-floating car-sharing in big cities.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, India's top court ordered state authorities to stop threats, assaults and social boycotts of thousands of Kashmiri students, traders and professionals in an apparent retaliation for the killing of 40 paramilitary soldiers in a suicide attack in the Indian portion of Kashmir last week.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, An Indian government minister said at least 41 tea plantation workers have died from drinking toxic bootleg liquor after receiving their weekly wages, and 20 are critically ill in hospital after nearly 100 people drank the liquor a day earlier.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, Israeli gunfire killed Palestinian teenager Youssef al-Dayya (15) at a protest along Gaza-Israel border fence, as thousands in contested Jerusalem descended on a section of a flashpoint holy site that has been closed by Israeli court order for over a decade.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, Israel opened its first embassy in Rwanda, offering support to the East Africa nation from health to education and agriculture, as well as communication technology including cyber-security.
(AFP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, A Japanese probe sent to collect samples from an asteroid 300 million km away for clues about the origin of life and the solar system landed successfully. Hayabusa2 touched down briefly on the Ryugu asteroid, fired a bullet into the surface to puff up dust for collection and blasted back to its holding position.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, Authorities in the Mexican state of Michoacan say that eight men were killed and two soldiers and one state police officer were wounded following a shootout.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, Pakistan re-imposed a ban on two charities run by a US-designated terrorist blamed for the 2008 Mumbai attacks. Jamat-ut-Dawa and Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation are thought to be a front for Lashkar-e-Taiba, a militant group founded by Hafiz Saeed, a Muslim cleric who lives freely in Pakistan.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, It was reported that Pakistan's army has stripped former spy chief Lt. Gen. Asad Durrani of his pension and other benefits over a book he co-authored with his former Indian counterpart. Durrani co-authored "Spy Chronicles" (2018), a book that documents his exploits as head of Inter-Services Intelligence from 1990 to 1992, with A.S. Daulat, the former head of India's Research and Analysis Wing, and Indian journalist Aditya Sinha.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, Pakistani police said five children have died of suspected food poisoning after their family had dinner at a restaurant in Karachi the previous night.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, In the Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte led a ceremony to name Moro Islamic Liberation Front leader Murad Ebrahim and some of his top commanders as among 80 administrators of a transition government for the five-province region called Bangsamoro.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, In Romania magistrates protested outside courthouses across the country in an unprecedented protest against changes in judicial legislation that have raised alarm bells over the rule of law.
(Reuters, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, A Russian court ruled that Paul Whelan, a former US marine accused of spying, should be held in a pre-trial detention facility for a further three months to give investigators more time to look into his case.
(Reuters, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, Russia accused the United States of using aid deliveries to Venezuela as a ploy to carry out military action against President Nicolas Maduro's government.
(AFP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, In Spain a group of unidentified men entered North Korea's embassy in Madrid, bound and gagged staff, and drove off four hours later with computers. Adrian Hong Chang, a Mexican national and US resident, was later identified as the leader of a gang of 10 people who escaped in broad daylight after stealing computers and documents from the embassy, where they shackled and gagged its staff.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Feb 22, It was reported that South Sudan's rival armed groups are recruiting civilians including child soldiers, violating a peace deal signed five months ago.
(SFC, 2/22/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 22, In Sudan security forces fired teargas to disperse hundreds of protesters who marched and chanted anti-government slogans following prayers at a major mosque in the city of Omdurman.
(Reuters, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, In Sweden Johan Nicklas Backstrom (22) was sentenced to four and a half years in prison after he was convicted of stealing 17th-century Swedish royal treasures estimated to be worth 65 million kronor ($7 million) from a cathedral last year.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, Hanna Johannes Cosar, a former Swiss soldier, was found guilty in Zurich of violating Swiss neutrality. He had commanded a Christian militia fighting Islamic State in Syria. Cosar was fined 500 Swiss francs ($499), a relatively lenient punishment, after being convicted by a Swiss military tribunal.
(Reuters, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, In eastern Syria Kurdish-led forces said they would complete the evacuation of thousands of civilians from Islamic State's last redoubt, and welcomed a White House reversal of President Donald Trump's decision to pull out all US troops. Some 2,000 people were believed to remain inside Baghouz.
(Reuters, 2/22/19)(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 22, Turkey ordered the arrest of 295 serving military personnel, accusing them of links to the network of US-based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen, who Ankara says orchestrated a 2016 attempted coup.
(Reuters, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 22, In Venezuela members of the Pemon ethnic group clashed with the National Guard and army, who were moving tanks to the border with Brazil a day after Maduro ordered the crossing closed. Zoraida Rodriguez, a member of an indigenous community, was killed. The violence came just hours before dueling concerts were expected to begin on the country's western border with Colombia, where tons of donated food and medicine are stored.
(AP, 2/22/19)
2019 Feb 23, Jeff Adachi (59), San Francisco's Public Defender, died of a suspected heart attack at a residence on Telegraph Hill. The city's medical examiner later concluded that Adachi died from a mixture of cocaine and alcohol, which caused his already damaged heart to stop. The leak of a police report on Adachi's death later led to a police raid on the home of journalist Bryan Carmody. In 2020 San Francisco agreed to pay Carmody $369,000 for the illegal police raids on his home and office.
(SFC, 2/25/19, p.C1)(SFC, 3/23/19, p.A1)(SSFC, 5/19/19, p.C1)(SFC, 3/3/20, p.C1)
2019 Feb 23, Weekend storms raked parts of the southern US leaving two people dead. In Mississippi a woman was killed when a tornado hit Columbus. A man died in Tennessee when he drove into floodwaters.
(SFC, 2/25/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 23, Filmmaker and choreographer Stanley Donen (b.1924) died in New York City. He co-directed "Singin'' in the Rain" (1952) with Gene Kelly as well as "On the Town" (1949) and "It's Always Fair Weather" (1955).
(SFC, 2/25/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 23, In Tennessee police Officer Nicholas Galinger (38) was struck while on a call with his field training officer. Hit-and-run suspect Janet Elaine Hinds turned herself in to police on Feb. 25 after she was put on the state's top ten most wanted list.
(SFC, 2/26/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb 23, In Texas a Boeing 767 cargo jetliner heading to Houston crashed just east of the city. Three people aboard were killed.
(SFC, 2/23/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 23, In Austria a German man went missing after an avalanche buried a group of backcountry skiers, killing one and injuring a second.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 23, In northern China a bus carrying 50 miners to an underground operation went out of control and crashed into the side of the tunnel. At least 20 people were killed and 30 injured in the vehicle accident blamed on faulty brakes.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, A top Egyptian court reversed a ban on ride-hailing companies including Uber and Careem.
(AFP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, It was reported that the Ethiopian government has begun demolishing thousands of houses they say are illegal in the Oromia region in the outskirts of the capital, Addis Ababa. Residents alleged that they were paying taxes to the government on the properties.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, In France thousands of yellow vest protesters took to the streets across the country for a 15th straight weekend of demonstrations, trying to re-energize supporters while tamping down on the violence and anti-Semitism in the movement's ranks.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, Indian authorities said least 93 people have died and about 200 people have been hospitalized after drinking tainted liquor in two separate incidents in Assam state.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, Indian authorities arrested dozens of Muslim leaders in raids across Kashmir and sent thousands of reinforcements to the troubled territory. Officials in Kashmir said police have arrested at least 200 activists seeking the end of Indian rule.
(AFP, 2/23/19)(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, In northern India 10 people died in an explosion at a house where firecrackers were being illegally manufactured in Uttar Pradesh state.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, In India a fire at the Aero India airshow in Bengaluru, run by the country's defence ministry, destroyed three hundred cars.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, In Iraq five fishermen were killed in an attack by Islamic State group militants on a camp site near the Therthar lake, 100 km (60 miles) northwest of Baghdad. IS militants were believed to be behind a string of ambushes, kidnappings and killings in the countryside.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, Strong winds toppled trees and walls in Italy, causing at least three deaths and forcing a cargo ship to run aground. Gale-force winds swept across Croatia's Adriatic coast, damaging cars, shattering windows and disrupting traffic.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, In Nepal an explosion outside a telecommunication company in Kathmandu killed one person and injured two others.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, Nigeria held presidential elections. In the northeast one soldier was killed and 20 others were injured in a Boko Haram rocket attack in Maiduguri, just hours before elections began.
(AP, 2/23/19)(AFP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, In Poland shipyard workers of Gdansk Solidarity (union) returned the recently overturned statue of Father Henryk Jankowski (d.2010) to its place. Father Jankowski, accused of sex abuse, was formerly a close aide to Lech Walesa during the Gdansk shipyard strikes in 1980s.
(AFP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, In Russia a train carrying war "trophies" captured in Syria left Moscow on a two-month tour to parade Russia's military gains in the eight-year conflict.
(AFP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, In Somalia the United States military killed two al-Shabab extremists in four airstrikes.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 23, Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir appointed Defence Minister General Awad Ibnouf as first vice president and named a new prime minister, a day after declaring a state of emergency that did little to halt street demonstrations. Mohamed Tahir Ayala, governor of Gezira state, was appointed prime minister.
(Reuters, 2/23/19)(AFP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, In eastern Syria US-backed fighters said they were keeping a corridor open to rescue remaining civilians from the Islamic State group's last sliver of territory.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, In Ukraine a minibus hit a landmine while crossing the border at the breakaway Donetsk region, killing two civilians and injuring a third near the village of Yelenovka. The passengers were returning to the rebel-controlled region after collecting their pensions.
(Reuters, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, The UN said that three Guinean peacekeepers had been killed during an attack on their vehicles in Siby near the capital of Bamako, Mali.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 23, A convoy of trucks carrying humanitarian aid for Venezuela left warehouses in Colombia headed for the nearby border crossing, despite President Nicolas Maduro's insistence they would not be allowed to cross. Opposition leader Juan Guaido said a first aid shipment has entered Venezuela from Brazil. Three members of the Venezuelan national guard deserted their posts early today. Venezuelan troops blocking a border bridge with Colombia fired tear gas to repel dozens of opposition lawmakers and activists walking toward the frontier to receive humanitarian aid from the Colombian side. At least two protesters were killed near the Brazilian border. Two aid trucks went up in flames. Some 60 members of security forces defected into Colombia, but the National Guard at the frontier crossings held firm.
(Reuters, 2/23/19)(AP, 2/23/19)(Reuters, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 23, Venezuelan opposition supporters rallied in Curacao's port as the island's government indicated it may allow their humanitarian aid shipment to sail. Pres. Maduro has ordered the country's sea border with Curacao to be closed to block the aid.
(AFP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 23, Vietnamese officials said that they have arrested Truong Minh Tuan, former minister of information and communications, and his predecessor Nguyen Bac, suspected of mismanaging state investment capital.
(AP, 2/23/19)
2019 Feb 24, President Donald Trump agreed to postpone a tariff hike on Chinese goods. Trump said he would postpone a March 1 deadline for 10 percent punitive tariffs on $200 billion of Chinese imports to rise to 25 percent but set no new date.
(AP, 2/25/19)(SFC, 2/25/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 24, The film "Greenbook" won the best picture award the 91st Academy Awards ceremony. Rami Malek won the best actor Oscar for his performance as rock singer Freddie Mercury in "Bohemian Rhapsody". Olivia Colman won the best actress award for her performance as Queen Anne in "The Favourite".
(AP, 2/25/19)(AFP, 2/25/19)(SFC, 2/25/19, p.E2)
2019 Feb 24, In Washington DC about three dozen relatives of some of the 1 million Uighurs, Kazakhs and others being held without charge spoke out about the mass detentions, hoping to raise awareness of what many are calling a human rights travesty but which Beijing defends as necessary to counter violent religious extremism.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 24, Mac Wiseman (b.1925), bluegrass balladeer and guitar player, died in Nashville. He was a founding member of Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs' Foggy Mountain Boys. His biggest hits included "The Ballad of Davy Crockett" (1955).
(SFC, 2/27/19, p.C5)
2019 Feb 24, Algerian police fired tear gas to disperse hundreds of demonstrators on a third straight day of rare political protests against plans for rarely seen President Abdelaziz Bouteflika to extend his 20-year rule by seeking a fifth term.
(Reuters, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, A flight bound for Dubai from Bangladesh's capital, Dhaka, made an emergency landing in Chittagong, Bangladesh, after a man attempted to hijack the plane. Bangladeshi suspect Mohammed Polash Ahmed asked to speak to the country's prime minister before dying from injuries in an exchange of gunfire with military commandos.
(AP, 2/24/19)(SFC, 2/26/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 24, Officials in the Brazilian border state of Roraima say they've treated 22 Venezuelans who suffered bullet or buckshot wounds during a confrontation over aid shipments. The border was closed for a third day.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, China's Huawei unveiled a new folding-screen phone on the eve of the 4-day MWC Barcelona show, joining the latest trend for bendable devices as it challenges the global smartphone market's dominant players, Apple and Samsung.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, In eastern Congo DRC attackers set fire to an Ebola treatment center run by Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) late today, forcing staff to evacuate patients. One caretaker was killed and another injured.
(Reuters, 2/25/19)(SFC, 2/27/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 24, Cubans began voting in a referendum on a new constitution with the backdrop of mounting pressure from the United States and continued support for the socialist regime of Venezuela.
(AFP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, Gabon President Ali Bongo returned to his country late today for the second time since suffering a stroke in October.
(Reuters, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 24, Iran launched a cruise missile from a submarine for the first time during an ongoing annual military drill in the Strait of Hormuz.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, It was reported that Iran has released Nelly Erin-Cambervelle (59), a French businesswoman from Martinique, who was in jail for entering the country illegally.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, In Japan the people of Okinawa voted on a plan for a US military base relocation to Henoko in a referendum that will send a message on how they feel about housing American troops in Japan. Residents rejected the relocation plan in the non-binding referendum.
(AP, 2/24/19)(SFC, 2/26/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 24, In Kashmir a counterinsurgency police officer and a rebel were killed during a gunbattle, as shops and businesses shut down to protest an ongoing crackdown against activists seeking the end of Indian rule in the disputed region.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, Voters in central Mexico approved a stalled gas-fired power plant, one of seven projects that have been postponed, in many cases for years, by community opposition. A few days before the referendum, anti-plant activist Samir Flores Soberanes was killed in front of his home by armed assailants.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 24, Moldovans voted in a parliamentary election. Both pro-Russian and pro-EU forces accused the ruling party of massive election fraud. The election produced a hung parliament, with results showing the vote split between pro-Western and pro-Russian forces. The outcome set the stage for coalition talks or potentially new elections.
(AP, 2/24/19)(AFP, 2/24/19)(Reuters, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 24, In Nigeria some polling stations remained open in several states while votes were counted in the previous day's presidential election, widely seen as a tight race between the president and a former vice president. The death toll in election-related violence continued to climbed to 39 after one election worker was hit by a bullet after completing work in Rivers state.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, In Pakistan mountain climbers Daniele Nardi of Italy and Briton Tom Ballard last made contact from around an elevation of some 6,300 meters (nearly 20,700 feet) on Nanga Parbat, slightly more than one-third up the 8,126-meter peak nicknamed Killer Mountain because of the dangerous conditions.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 24, Thousands of Palestinian protesters in the Gaza Strip called on Pres. Mahmud Abbas to resign after attempts to pressure his rival Hamas with financial cuts in the impoverished enclave.
(AFP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, In Russia thousands of people marched in central Moscow to commemorate Russian opposition figure Boris Nemtsov, who was killed on Feb. 27, four years ago.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, Senegal held a presidential poll with Macky Sally (56) confident of being reelected after his main challengers were banned from running.
(AFP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, In Spain two people were killed when a small plane crashed more than 100 km (60 miles) north of Madrid.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, In Sudan about a thousand protesters were confronted by forces in military uniform in Omdurman as President Omar al-Bashir swore in new officials. Security forces fired tear gas at hundreds of protesters in the capital Khartoum and across the river Nile in Omdurman.
(Reuters, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, In eastern Syria a land mine left by the Islamic State group struck a van packed with workers killing 24 of them. An estimated 300 IS militants remained besieged in the village of Baghouz, hemmed in by the Euphrates River and the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan said 3,804 civilians were killed last year, the highest number since the international organization began tallying figures in 2009.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, Pope Francis ended his conference on the sexual abuse of children by clergy by calling for an "all-out battle" against a crime that should be "erased from the face of the earth".
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 24, International condemnation of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro grew after he deployed troops to block foreign aid convoys, with Brazil branding it criminal and urging allies to join a "liberation effort" of the South American nation.
(AP, 2/24/19)
2019 Feb 25, The United States imposed sanctions on four pro-Maduro state governors as it ramped up pressure on Venezuela's President Nicholas Maduro, whose election Washington sees as illegitimate.
(Reuters, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, San Francisco's District Attorney George Gascon announced that his office will wipe out more than 9,000 marijuana-related convictions in cases dating back to 1975.
(SFC, 2/26/19, p.A1)
2019 Feb 25, Kim Vincent Avis (55), aka Ken Gordon-Avis, reportedly vanished after going for a nighttime swim in treacherous waters in Monterey, Ca. Detectives soon began to suspect a hoax. Avis was wanted on 24 counts of rape in Scotland. In July he was arrested in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
(AP, 7/27/19)
2019 Feb 25, US-led scientists said evidence for man-made global warming has reached a "gold standard" level of certainty, adding pressure for cuts in greenhouse gases to limit rising temperatures.
(Reuters, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, In Afghanistan a NATO drone strike mistakenly killed nine members of a government-backed militia in Ghazni province.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 25, In Argentina several assailants entered the Buenos Aires home of Rabbi Gabriel Davidovich and beat him, identifying him as the chief rabbi of the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association, one of the country's most prominent Jewish groups.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 25, The British government said it plans to ban Lebanon-based Hezbollah as a terrorist group, accusing the Iran-backed organization of destabilizing the Middle East.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, Britain's Labor Party said it would back a second public vote on Brexit if the House of Commons rejects its alternative withdrawal plan later this week.
(SFC, 2/26/19, p.A3)
2019 Feb 25, The European Union opened the door to Britain postponing its exit from the 28-nation bloc beyond the March 29 deadline, saying it would be a "rational solution" given the political crisis in the UK.
(AFP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, Paris prosecutors dropped a rape investigation targeting filmmaker Luc Besson (59) because of a lack of evidence.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, In Germany prosecutors fined automaker BMW 8.5 million euros ($9.66 million) for lax oversight in installing defective engine software that led to excessive diesel emissions in 7,965 cars.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, In eastern India hundreds of indigenous people waved flags and shouted slogans to protest against an order to evict more than one million indigenous families accused of encroaching on forest lands.
(Reuters, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, a US-educated veteran diplomat who helped craft the pact that curbed Iran's nuclear program in return for sanctions relief, gave no reason for his decision to quit when he announced it on Instagram.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 25, An Iraqi government source said 14 French nationals accused of fighting for the Islamic State group have been transferred to Iraq by US-backed forces squeezing the jihadists' final Syrian bastion. Since Feb. 21, 280 Iraqi nationals accused of fighting alongside IS have been transferred to Iraqi authorities.
(AFP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, In Italy Gianni Alemanno, a former mayor of Rome (2008-2013), was sentenced to six years in prison for his part in the infiltration of organized crime into the capital. He immediately vowed to appeal.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, Niger hosted leaders of 17 countries on the rim of the Sahel (Benin, Burkina Faso, Chad, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Djibouti, Gambia, Guinea, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Ivory Coast, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal and Sudan) as talks began on a nearly $400-billion plan to help the fragile region cope with climate change.
(AFP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, Serbia's defense ministry took delivery of four Russian-made MiG-29 fighter jets from Belarus, part of an arms purchase that could heighten tensions in the Balkans and increase Moscow's influence in the region.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, In Spain MWC Barcelona, the world's biggest mobile industry trade fair, opened. A global battle between the US government and Chinese tech company Huawei over allegations that it is a cybersecurity risk overshadowed the opening.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, Sudan's Pres. Omar al-Bashir issued decrees giving security forces powers to search buildings, restrict movements of people and public transportation, arrest individuals suspected of crimes related to the state of emergency and seize assets or property during investigations. Police fired tear gas at hundreds of protesters in Khartoum against a state of emergency imposed by Pres. Omar al-Bashir to end rallies against his rule.
(AFP, 2/25/19)(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 25, In Switzerland the international boxing association (AIBA) said it has approved new uniforms for female boxers to wear for religious reasons. Hijabs and full body form-fitting uniforms have been designed.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, In eastern Syria evacuations from the last pocket of territory held by the Islamic State group continued amid a standoff between the militants and the US-backed forces besieging them. An estimated 300 IS militants were besieged in Baghouz.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said the international arms control system is facing collapse and urged Russia and the US to stop the imminent demise of a crucial nuclear treaty.
(AFP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, The United Nations' highest court ruled that Britain carved up Mauritius illegally when it agreed to end colonial rule and must "bring to an end its administration of the Chagos Archipelago as rapidly as possible".
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 25, Vietnamese President Nguyen Phu Trong arrived in Cambodia for a 2-day visit to strengthen already close bilateral ties.
(AP, 2/25/19)
2019 Feb 26, President Donald Trump arrived at the hotel in Hanoi where he will stay during his summit with North Korea's Kim Jong Un.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, In New York the driver of a car fleeing an earlier crash went around a train gate and was hit by two trains on Long Island. The driver and two passengers were killed.
(SFC, 2/28/19, p.A7)
2019 Feb 26, In Algeria thousands of students staged protests in several university cities across the country to voice their opposition to ailing President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's bid for a fifth term.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro withdrew an executive order signed in January that would have increased the number of officials able to effectively keep government documents and data secret.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 26, British PM Theresa May bowed to intense political pressure and handed control of Brexit to Parliament. May offered lawmakers the chance to vote in two weeks for a potentially disorderly no-deal Brexit or to delay Britain's exit from the European Union if her attempt to ratify a divorce agreement fails.
(AP, 2/26/19)(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, Britain's opposition Labour Party said that interior minister Sajid Javid had to provide evidence to justify his decision to widen a ban on the Lebanese Islamist movement Hezbollah.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, Colombian immigration officials said over 320 mostly low-ranking soldiers fled Venezuela in a span of four days.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, The European Union's top court overturned Latvia's decision to suspend Ilmars Rimsevics, a member of the European Central Bank, while he is investigated for alleged bribery in a scandal that has shaken the country.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, The European Union's top court ruled that the EU organic food logo cannot be used on meat derived from animals that have been slaughtered in accordance with religious rites without first being stunned.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, PSA Group, the French maker of Peugeot automobiles, said it plans to reintroduce the cars to North American markets.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, In Germany a court ruled that the domestic BfV intelligence agency is not allowed to classify the Alternative for Germany (AfD) as a "case to investigate", handing a victory to the far-right party which had brought the case.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, The Hungarian government stepped up its campaign against the leadership of the European Union, repeating its accusations that the EU seeks to promote mass immigration into the continent.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, India's air force carried out air strikes inside Pakistan killing hundreds of militants in a training camp of Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM), the militant group that claimed credit for a Feb. 14 suicide bombing attack that killed Indian paramilitary police in Kashmir. Pakistan said there had been no casualties at all. Following the air strike India and Pakistan troops exchanged gunfire across the border in the disputed region of Kashmir.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, In Indonesia an unlicensed gold mine collapsed and buried dozens of people. Rescuers dug desperately with their bare hands and farm tools to unearth victims calling for help from beneath the rubble. Three people were confirmed dead and 14 were rescued. It was estimated that 43 people were still buried.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 26, Three Iraqi workers were killed in a roadside bomb explosion in the western city of Fallujah.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, Mexico's President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said he would not take sides on the crisis in Venezuela, a day after US Vice President Mike Pence urged Mexico to recognize opposition leader Juan Guaido as Venezuela's rightful president.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, Nigeria's incumbent President Muhammadu Buhari extended his early election lead based on official results from a third of the country's districts as the death toll from sporadic poll-related violence rose to 47.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, In Nigeria gunmen suspected to be Fulani herders stormed into villages of ethnic Adara farmers, killing 29 people and burning some 40 homes. The bloodshed was believed to be in retaliation for gunmen attacking eight Fulani settlements in Kaduna state on February 11, which state governor Nasir El-Rufai said killed more than 130 people.
(AFP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 26, Gaza journalist Hajar Harb appealed a six-month prison term and fine over her reporting in 2016 on alleged corruption within the Hamas-run Health Ministry in a case that has drawn international condemnation of the coastal strip's Islamic rulers.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, It was reported that an opioid crisis has quietly spread in the Gaza Strip, trapping thousands in the hell of addiction and adding another layer of misery to the blockaded and impoverished coastal territory.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, In the southern Philippines former Muslim guerrillas took over governance of a poverty and conflict-wracked Muslim autonomous region, a five-province region called Bangsamoro, under a peace deal partly aimed at combating Islamic State group-aligned militants.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, In Russia a court in Moscow sentenced Col. Sergei Mikhailov, former deputy head of the FSB's Information Security Center, to 22 years in prison and a fine on treason charges. The court also sentenced Ruslan Stoyanov, an executive at the Kaspersky Lab cybersecurity firm, to 14 years in prison and a fine.
(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir reshuffled his senior military staff. Protesters defied their embattled president's ban on unauthorized public gatherings, with hundreds rallying across the country to call for his resignation.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)(AP, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, Sweden arrested a suspected Russian spy in Stockholm. Kristian Dmitrievski (45), a naturalized Swedish citizen who previously held a Russian passport, was arrested by Sweden's domestic security agency SAPO as he met with a Russian intelligence officer working at Russia's Embassy in Stockholm under diplomatic cover. On March 29 a prosecutor said Dmitrievski has been released.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Feb 26, In northwestern Syria five people were reported killed by shelling and air strikes. Government forces had intensified artillery shelling and air strikes, which have been ramping up over the past 10 days.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, In southern Thailand two police officers were abducted and later found dead in a ditch in Narathiwat province, with the pickup truck of one of the officers stolen and set on fire.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 26, Turkey criticized European Union leaders for attending a summit hosted by Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi days after nine men were executed for killing Egypt's chief prosecutor.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 26, It was reported that Ukraine's national broadcaster has dropped singer Anna Korsun (27), who was meant to represent the country at the Eurovision Song Contest, due to apparent political differences over Russia.
(Reuters, 2/26/19)
2019 Feb 27, President Donald Trump and Vietnamese President Nguyen Phu Trong presided over the signing of several trade deals in Hanoi, including agreements to sell the booming Southeast Asian country 110 Boeing planes worth billions of dollars.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, US President Donald Trump and North Korea's Kim Jong Un, leaders of two nations with a long history of hostilities, met in Hanoi for their second summit.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Michael Cohen, Pres. Trump's longtime lawyer and fixer, spoke before the US House Oversight and Reform Committee and accused Pres. Trump of an expansive pattern of lies and criminality.
(SFC, 2/28/19, p.A7)
2019 Feb 27, In northern California the Sonoma County town of Guerneville flooded as the Russian River overflowed its banks and continued rising.
(SFC, 2/28/19, p.A10)
2019 Feb 27, In New Mexico Amanda Madrid (25) was shopping for hamster food shortly before she was fatally shot in Albuquerque. In 2021 a judge sentenced Maiah Madrid-Schleicher (28) to 14 years in prison for the shooting death outside a Family Dollar store.
(Tribune Publ., 6/11/21)
2019 Feb 27, In North Carolina political operative Leslie McCrae Dowless Jr. (63) was arrested on charges of illegal ballot handling and conspiracy. Four other people working for him were also charged.
(SFC, 2/28/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 27, In Australia George Pell, the most senior Catholic cleric ever convicted of child sex abuse, was sent to prison and will wait two weeks to learn his sentence for molesting two choirboys in a Melbourne cathedral two decades ago.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, In Austria a police raid in Seefeld, posted online by a Norwegian news portal, showed Austrian skier Max Hauke apparently with a banned blood transfusion going into his arm while a police investigator stands in the background. The raids led to the arrests of five elite skiers and four other people.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Feb 27, A Bahraini court sentenced 167 people arrested at a sit-in outside the home of Bahrain's leading Shi'ite Muslim cleric in 2017 to between six months and 10 years in prison. 56 of the defendants received 10 year prison terms.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Feb 27, The Bahrain-based long-haul carrier Gulf Air acknowledged it is cancelling and delaying flights without explaining why.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Aid agency Medicins Sans Frontieres (MSF) said Cameroonian and Nigerian authorities have ordered 40,000 refugees in Cameroon to return to northeast Nigeria.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Human Rights Watch denounced the government of Colombia for appointing at least nine officers to key army positions despite credible evidence of implicating them in serious human rights violations during the country's long civil conflict.
(SFC, 2/28/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 27, In Egypt at least 25 people were killed and 50 injured when a locomotive smashed through the buffer stop at Cairo's main train station. A fight between two conductors led to the crash.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)(SFC, 2/28/19, p.A5)
2019 Feb 27, The EU expressed concern about Italy's debt levels and warned the government in Rome to push through measures to shore up the public finances.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, A European Parliament committee picked Romanian prosecutor Laura Codruta Kovesi to head a new prosecutor's office fighting fraud, despite fierce opposition from her own government.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, A court in Bali has sentenced Australian Brandon Johnson and his Indonesian girlfriend Remi Purwanti to five years and four months in prison each for possessing cocaine.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani rejected the resignation of Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, standing by a moderate ally long targeted by hardliners in factional struggles over a 2015 nuclear deal with the West.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif signed two agreements in Tehran with Armenia, television footage showed, continuing his duties as Iran's top diplomat.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Israel's PM Benjamin Netanyahu visited Russia for talks with President Vladimir Putin expected to focus on regional security and Syria.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev ordered his government to tap the country's rainy-day fund for $3.6 billion in order to boost public sector salaries and social aid payouts and develop housing and infrastructure.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Libya's Unity government leader Fayez al-Sarraj met rival military strongman Khalifa Haftar in Abu Dhabi, where they agreed "on the need to end the transitional phase through general elections and on ways to preserve the stability of Libya and unify its institutions.
(AFP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 27, In Myanmar thousands of people rallied in Yangon in support of constitutional reform, amid mounting tension between the ruling party and the military over changes to the charter that enshrines the army’s role in politics.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, In Nepal a helicopter flying in bad weather crashed into a mountain, killing all seven people on board.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, The government of Nicaragua released dozens of people who had been arrested in last year's crackdown on street protests. Rights groups have estimated that at least 770 people have been arrested in relation to the protests that broke out last April.
(SFC, 2/28/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb 27, Nigerian election authorities said President Muhammadu Buhari (76) has comfortably won a second term at the helm of Africa's largest economy, but his main rival planned a fraud challenge after a vote marred by delays and violence. Some 327 people died in election-related violence since the campaign began in October, 67 of them during or after the Feb. 23 vote.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Dutch officials said that an estimated 90,000 small bottles of Russian vodka, found last week on a Chinese freighter in the port of Rotterdam, will likely be sold at auction or destroyed.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Pakistani PM Imran Khan called for talks with India and hoped "better sense" would prevail to de-escalate the dispute with its nuclear-armed neighbor following air strikes by both sides.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Pakistan's military said it shot down two Indian warplanes in the disputed region of Kashmir and captured a pilot, raising tensions between the nuclear-armed rivals to a level unseen in the last two decades. Mortar shells fired by Indian troops from across the frontier dividing the two sectors of Kashmir killed six civilians and wound several others. A helicopter crash in the region also killed six Indian air force officials and a civilian on the ground.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, The Palestinian Authority said it will not accept tax revenues from Israel following the latter's decision to deduct sums Palestinians pay to prisoners and people killed in fighting with Israel.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Seychelles' second president Albert René (83) died. He took power in a 1977 coup and went on to shape politics for decades.
(Reuters, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 27, Volvo's electric performance brand Polestar unveiled a battery-powered compact car touted as a rival to Tesla's Model 3. Sweden-based Volvo is a subsidiary of Chinese automaker Geely.
(AP, 2/27/19)
2019 Feb 28, Talks between President Donald Trump and North Korea's Kim Jong Un collapsed in Hanoi after the two sides failed to bridge a standoff over US sanctions.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, The US Senate confirmed former coal industry lobbyist Andrew Wheeler to lead the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
(SFC, 3/1/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 28, Michael Cohen, Pres. Trump's longtime lawyer and fixer, returned to Capitol Hill for hours of questioning before the US House Intelligence committee.
(SFC, 3/1/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 28, The World Trade Organization panel ruled in favor of the United States in a dispute with China over agricultural subsidies, saying Beijing went beyond WTO limits in its support for wheat and rice producers between 2012 and 2015.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, Andre Previn (1929), Berlin-born American composer and conductor, died at his home in Manhattan. He wrote or arranged music for several dozen movies and authored several books including "Orchestra" (1975) and "No Minor Chords: My Days in Hollywood" (1991).
(SFC, 3/1/19, p.C8)
2019 Feb 28, Texas executed Billie Wayne Coble (70) for the 1989 shooting deaths of his estranged wife's parents, Robert and Zelda Vicha, and their son Bobby Vicha at separate homes.
(SFC, 3/1/19, p.A6)
2019 Feb 28, Algerian police arrested a dozen journalists protesting "censorship" of coverage of demonstrations against a fifth term for President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, as the prime minister compared the rallies to those that sparked Syria's war.
(AFP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, In Belgium Swedish teenager Greta Thunberg led thousands of students in a climate change march — the second she's led in as many weeks to draw more attention to the topic.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of Britain's opposition Labour Party, said his party will back a new referendum on Brexit after parliament defeated its alternative plan for leaving the European Union.
(Reuters, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, British Airways announced a multi-billion dollar order for up to 42 Boeing 777 fuel-efficient passenger jets, just two weeks after Airbus said it would no longer make its A380 superjumbo.
(AFP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, Cyprus said ExxonMobil has made the world's third-biggest gas find in the last two years off its coast.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, In Greece Lawyer Zoe Konstantopoulou said Alexander Vinnik (39), a Russian suspected of bitcoin fraud, has been on a hunger strike for three months, during which time he has lost about 30 percent of his body weight. She aired a video of a gaunt-looking Vinnik she said was shot last week.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, India banned the largest political and religious group in Indian-controlled Kashmir in an ongoing crackdown on activists seeking the end of Indian rule. India's home ministry issued the five-year ban on Jama'at-e-Islami, or JeI, accusing the group of being an "unlawful association" and supporting militancy in the region.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Feb 28, Indonesian officials said 19 people had been rescued alive from a gold mine in North Sulawesi's Bolaang Mongondow district as of this evening. The death toll rose to seven and about three dozen miners remain trapped by the Feb. 26 collapse.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, In Liberia two senior figures at the Central Bank, one of whom is the son of former president Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, were arrested following a probe into reports of missing banknotes.
(AFP, 3/1/19)
2019 Feb 28, Pakistan's PM Imran Khan pledged his country would release a captured Indian fighter pilot, a move that could help defuse the most serious confrontation in two decades between the nuclear-armed neighbors over the disputed region of Kashmir..
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, A temporary closure of air space over Pakistan snarled air traffic, especially between Asia and Europe, though some airlines adjusted by rerouting their flights.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, Senegalese election officials announced that President Macky Sall (57) has easily won a second term without the need for a runoff. The four opposition candidates said they would not pursue a legal challenge.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, In central Somalia US air strikes in the Hiran region killed 26 fighters.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Feb 28, In Somalia Islamist al Shabaab fighters in Mogadishu set off an explosive outside the Hotel Maka Al-Mukarama late today Officials declared an end to the siege the following afternoon with 20 people confirmed dead and over 100 injured.
(Reuters, 3/1/19)(AP, 3/1/19)(AFP, 3/2/19)
2019 Feb 28, South Korea-based Hyundai and Kia added more than a half-million vehicles to 3 ½-year string of US recalls for engine failures and fires.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, In Sudan more than 1,000 anti-government protesters demonstrated in and around Khartoum, the first rallies since emergency courts were set up nationwide on Feb. 26 to combat more than two months of unrest.
(Reuters, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, In Syria US-backed forces fighting the Islamic State group said they have freed 24 of their fighters held by IS, and uncovered a mass grave last week outside the village of Baghouz, the last pocket of territory held by the extremist group.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, In Syria the US-coalition supporting the SDF said late today it had killed veteran French jihadist Fabien Clain, who voiced a recording claiming responsibility for the November 2015 attacks on Paris, in a strike in Baghouz. It did not say when he had been killed.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Feb 28, Thailand's legislature passed a cybersecurity bill that would allow authorities access to people's personal information without a court order.
(AP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, A UN probe released today said Israel may have committed crimes against humanity in responding to last year's unrest in Gaza, as snipers "intentionally" shot civilians including children, journalists and the disabled.
(AFP, 2/28/19)
2019 Feb 28, In Yemen five children were killed in an attack on their home in flashpoint Hodeida province.
(AFP, 3/3/19)
2019 Feb, Costa Rica's government launched a decarbonization plan to rid the country of fossil fuels by 2050.
(AFP, 4/19/19)
2019 Feb, French gay writer Frederic Martel authored "In the Closet of the Vatican." Here he describes a gay subculture at the Vatican.
(SFC, 2/15/19, p.A2)
2019 Feb, Anwar Raslan (b.1963), a former Syrian policeman, was arrested in Germany. He was charged with torturing more than 4,000 people and murdering at least 58 between 2011 and 2012 under dictator Bashar al-Assad. His trial opened in Koblenz in April, 2020.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anwar_Raslan)(Econ., 1/2/21, p.44)
2019 Feb, Peruvian authorities launched "Operation Mercury" to evict thousands of illegal gold miners from Tambopata province in the Amazon rain forest. Hundreds of police and soldiers were deployed there for the long term.
(SFC, 5/17/19, p.A4)
2019 Feb, Peru's government charged former Pres. Toledo Alejandro Toledo, living in San Francisco, with taking $20 million in bribes from Odebrecht, a Brazilian construction company that won a major highway contract during his administration.
(SFC, 10/11/19, p.C8)
2019 Feb, Rwanda abruptly closed its Uganda border crossing at Katuna, with queues of cargo trucks and thronging merchants turned back as soldiers from both armies marshalled along the forest-clad border. The blockade was a result of the worsening animosity between Rwanda's Paul Kagame and Uganda's Yoweri Museveni as the pair traded accusations of espionage, political assassinations and meddling in each other's backyards.
(AFP, 5/15/19)
2019 Feb, Venezuela deported American journalist Jorge Ramos, who showed a video of people eating garbage while he interviewed President Nicolas Maduro.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, The United States imposed sanctions on six Venezuelan security officials for obstructing aid that Washington had tried to force in as part of its effort to support the country's opposition leader against President Nicolas Maduro.
(AFP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, Acclaimed Irish-born architect Kevin Roche (96) died at his home in Connecticut. He left his mark on world-class buildings from New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art and the city's Museum of Jewish Heritage to airports in New York and Washington.
(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 1, In Virginia former high school teacher Christopher Brannon was sentenced to 34 months in prison for hacking into private digital accounts of celebrities and others. He was the fifth person charged in the 2014 "celebgate" scandal.
(SFC, 3/2/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar 1, In southern Afghanistan at least 25 Afghan soldiers were killed as they repelled an attack by the Taliban on a military base in Helmand province. Afghan forces killed at least nine Taliban insurgents, including three suicide bombers.
(Reuters, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, In southern Afghanistan at least 20 people including children were killed by flash floods that engulfed up to 2,000 homes and swept away cars in Kandahar province.
(Reuters, 3/2/19)(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 1, In Algeria tens of thousands of protesters marched through Algiers against ailing President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's bid for a fifth term, surging past a barricade and defying repeated volleys of tear gas fired by police. A total of 183 people were injured during the protests.
(AP, 3/1/19)(Reuters, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 1, Argentine Pres. Mauricio Macri announced a 46 percent increase in subsidies for poor families with children, the only new initiative included in his State of the Union address.
(Reuters, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, Belarus Pres. Alexander Lukashenko strongly rejected the possibility that Russia could incorporate his nation, as the two former Soviet republics discussed how to more closely integrate their economies, including a possible joint currency.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, Botswana's Pres. Mokgweetsi Masisi dismissed a report that the country had offered Zimbabwe a $600 million diamond-backed loan and said his government had only offered to guarantee a $100 million private credit line for Botswana companies to invest in their troubled neighbor.
(Reuters, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, In Brazil Rio de Janeiro's world-famous carnival celebration got underway.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, The British government agreed to pay 33 million pounds ($43 million) to settle a lawsuit that claimed it improperly awarded contracts to run extra ferry services in the event that Britain leaves the EU without an agreement on future relations.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, British girl scout Jodie Chesney (17) was knifed in the back as she listened to music with friends at a park in Harold Hill, east London. Two drug dealers had been looking to take revenge on rivals when they killed Jodie Chesney by mistake. On Nov. 7 Svenson Ong-a-Kwie (19) Arron Isaacs (17), were found guilty after the jury deliberated for less than six hours. In November the two drug dealing teenagers were jailed for life.
(The Telegraph, 11/7/19)(The Telegraph, 11/18/19)
2019 Mar 1, Canada said it will allow a US extradition request for Meng Wangzhou, an executive of Chinese tech giant Huawei, to face charges over possible dealings with Iran to proceed.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 1, Quebec's appeals court upheld a historic ruling ordering three tobacco firms to pay Can$15.5 billion (US$11.6 billion) to smokers in the Canadian province who claimed they were never warned about the health risks associated with smoking.
(AFP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 1, Colombian authorities announced that Carlos Bermeo, a prosecutor with the special peace tribunal, was detained along with a senator and two other suspects for taking a $500,000 bribe in exchange for swaying a controversial ruling over the extradition of Seuxis Hernandez, a rebel peace negotiator, to the US on drug charges.
(SSFC, 3/3/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar 1, In the Czech Rep. an armed Serbian man, reported to be a contract killer, was arrested in Prague. Serbia's Blic daily soon reported that the man is well-known contract killer Caba Der, sought by several countries over multiple murders.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 1, In Denmark a fraud involving public funds show 10 million kroner ($1.5 million) more than originally thought vanished from government coffers. Two new investigations showed that a total of 121 million kroner vanished between 1993 and 2018.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, In Germany thousands of students in the port city of Hamburg marched out of school led by teenage Swedish environmental activist Greta Thunberg to call for more action on climate change.
(Reuters, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, In Germany gardener Bernhard Graumann (59) was found dead in his bed in the southwestern town of Mehlingen. He had been in conflict with both a doctor and a family, and is thought to have planted explosives before he died. The 64-year-old doctor in the nearby town of Enkenbach-Alsenborn was killed this morning. Two days later a woman (37) and her 4-year-old daughter were injured by glass splinters when the woman put a log that had been rigged with explosives into her stove and it blew the door out.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 1, Three Yazidi women and 18 children returned to Iraq from Syria after more than four years in Islamic State captivity. Islamic State militants launched an assault on Sinjar, the Yazidi heartland, on Aug. 3, 2014. According to community leaders, more than 3,000 Yazidis remained unaccounted for.
(Reuters, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu met with Liberian Pres. George Weah in Jerusalem. Netanyahu has made strengthening ties with Africa a foreign policy priority.
(AFP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, In Italy Moroccan-born Imane Fadil (33), a former model and witness at Silvio Berlusconi's sex trial, died at one of the city's hospitals. On March 16 a newspaper suggested she may have been poisoned with a radioactive substance.
(AFP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 1, In Malaysia more 34 Muslim Rohingya women and children were found stranded along a beach in northern Perlis state, and were believed to have been dropped off by human traffickers.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, Mexico's Treasury Secretary Santiago Nieto said the financial intelligence unit of the treasury has frozen $156 million of the state Autonomous University of Hidalgo's funds while it investigates suspected money laundering.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 1, Mexican officials said the death toll from a Jan. 18 explosion at an illegally tapped pipeline has risen to 134.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, In southern Nigeria more than 50 people were left missing after a leaking oil pipeline exploded and caused a stampede in Bayelsa state. The Nembe Creek Trunk pipeline exploded, but no fatalities were reported. It runs from an oil terminal in Bonny to the state of Bayelsa with capacity of 150,000 barrels per day.
(AP, 3/2/19)(AFP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 1, Pakistani officials handed over a captured Indian Wing Commander Abhinandan Varthaman at a border crossing with India in a "gesture of peace" promised by PM Imran Khan amid a dramatic escalation with the country's archrival over the disputed region of Kashmir. In a heavily edited video distributed by the Pakistani military just before his release, Varthaman praised the professionalism of the Pakistani army and criticized Indian media for creating war hysteria.
(AP, 3/1/19)(AFP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 1, Russia vowed to maintain support for the embattled regime of its Venezuelan "friend" President Nicolas Maduro, including with humanitarian aid supplies.
(AFP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, Saudi Arabia announced it had revoked the citizenship of Hamza bin Laden, the son of the late al-Qaida leader who has become an increasingly prominent figure in the terror network. The royal decree stripping his citizenship was signed in November, but only became public now.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, Saudi Arabia decided to put jailed women activists on trial after holding them for nearly a year without charge.
(AFP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 1, South Korean President Moon Jae-in said his government plans to discuss with the United States the possibility of restarting joint inter-Korean economic projects to induce nuclear disarmament from North Korea, which insisted it had asked only for partial sanctions relief in exchange for shutting down its main nuclear complex.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, The Spanish government adopted a decree that aims to cap residential rent rises within the term of a contract ahead of a general election in April. The decree will enter into force in the next few days but will need to be endorsed by parliament later.
(Reuters, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, Sudan's embattled President Omar al-Bashir quit his position as chairman of the ruling party after more than two months of protests against his nearly three-decade rule. Al-Bashir delegated his powers as chairman of the National Congress Party to its deputy chairman, Ahmed Harun, until the party's next general conference.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, In Switzerland former FIFA senior vice president David Chung was banned from soccer for 6½ years for financial wrongdoing linked to a $20 million building project. The Papua New Guinea official resigned as Oceania president after a FIFA-appointed audit found irregularities linked to awarding of contracts for its headquarters in Auckland.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, In eastern Syria more civilians evacuated from the last territory held by the Islamic State group, amid a warning by the United Nations about the plight of thousands who have fled the area in recent weeks.
(AP, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 1, Venezuela's Vice President Delcy Rodriguez said President Nicolas Maduro has ordered state oil company PDVSA's office in Lisbon to be relocated to Moscow, a move she said was designed to help safeguard her country's assets.
(Reuters, 3/1/19)
2019 Mar 2, SpaceX's new Crew Dragon astronaut capsule was on its way to the International Space Station after it successfully launched from Florida on board a Falcon 9 rocket.
(AFP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, In Abu Dhabi the 57-nation Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), the world's largest body of Muslim-majority nations, reaffirmed its unwavering support for the Kashmiri people in their just cause.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, In Afghanistan Taliban insurgents targeted an Afghan army corps overnight at their camp in southern Helmand province, killing at least 23.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, Azeri opposition blogger Mehman Huseynov was released after serving two years in prison in a case condemned by human rights activists.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, Recently elected DR Congo President Felix Tshisekedi pledged to pardon political prisoners and said he would work for the return of those who had fled abroad for political reasons.
(AFP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, The European Parliament called on Kosovo to suspend a 100-percent tariff on Serb goods to help restart reconciliation talks.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, In Germany union and government negotiators reached a new wage agreement late today that will give more than a million public servants a nearly 8 percent pay increase over 33 months.
(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 2, Iran criticized Britain for its decision to list Hezbollah as a terrorist organization, saying it ignored both the will of a large portion of the Lebanese people and the Tehran-backed group's role in fighting Islamic State.
(Reuters, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, Iran's official IRNA news agency said the Central Bank has merged four banks and a credit union to reform the country's banking system and financial markets.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, Israeli aircraft struck two Hamas observation points in the Gaza Strip, after the army reported balloons carrying an "explosive device" were sent toward Israel.
(AFP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 2, In Italy tens of thousands of people have marched in Milan against policies by the populist government that they say promote racism.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, Pakistan's military said two of its soldiers have been killed in an exchange of fire with Indian forces near the Line of Control that separates the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir between the rivals. Over the last 24 hours a total of at least six civilians have been killed on both sides of Kashmir.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, Russia announced that Zhores Alferov (88), a physicist and Nobel Prize laureate, has died in in St Petersburg. Alferov shared the Nobel Physics Prize in 2000 for developments in semiconductor research that have been used in satellite communications and cellular telephones.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, In eastern Syria Kurdish-led forces battled jihadists defending their last village as operations to flush out the Islamic State group resumed after several days of humanitarian evacuations.
(AFP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 2, In northern Syria the semi-autonomous Kurdish administration said in a statement that 283 Syrians, suspected of belonging to the Islamic State, had been set free because they have "no blood on their hands".
(AFP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 2, In Syria militants shot dead eight men suspected of being members of the Islamic State group in Idlib. Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) members shot dead members of IS sleepers cells, in front of a restaurant where a previous day's attack occurred.
(AP, 3/2/19)
2019 Mar 3, A tornado registering EF4 hit southeastern Alabama killing 23 people. At least 18 tornadoes struck in Alabama, Florida, Georgia and South Carolina.
(SFC, 3/4/19, p.A6)(SFC, 3/6/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 3, Teachers in Oakland, Ca., approved a new contract ending their 7-day strike. They won salary increases and concessions on class sizes and staff workloads.
(SFC, 3/4/19, p.C1)
2019 Mar 3, Elon Musk's SpaceX white Dragon capsule with just a test dummy aboard docked smoothly with the International Space Station in a big step toward putting the US back in the business of launching astronauts.
(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, Afghanistan donated $1 million to the main UN program for Palestinian refugees at a ceremony in Istanbul.
(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, In Algeria hundreds of students staged new protests in Algiers and other cities against a fifth term for ailing President Abdelaziz Bouteflika as he faced a midnight deadline to register for April elections. Bouteflika vowed in a letter read out on state television late to organize a "national conference" that would set a date for further polls which he would not contest. The message was followed by the formal submission of his candidacy for the April 18 poll.
(AFP, 3/3/19)(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 3, In Australia firefighters battled 25 blazes across the state of Victoria as a record-breaking heatwave delivered the hottest start to March on record for the southern third of the country.
(Reuters, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, In eastern Congo DRC bandits shot dead six people overnight, sparking angry protests by residents who blockaded the main street running through Goma city.
(AFP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, An Egyptian military appeals court upheld a five-year sentence against Hesham Genena, the country's former auditor, for disseminating false news about the military.
(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, Estonians voted in a general election with the center-left coalition fighting for survival in a duel with its traditional liberal rivals and a surging far-right party buoyed by a backlash from mostly rural voters in the Baltic eurozone state. Estonia was on track for its first woman prime minister after the opposition liberal Reform party, led by Kaja Kallas (41), won a general election with 28.8 percent of the vote.
(AFP, 3/3/19)(AFP, 3/4/19)(SFC, 3/5/19, p.A3)
2019 Mar 3, In France at least 2,000 demonstrators gathered in Paris and other cities to protest Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's bid to stand for a fifth term in office.
(AFP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, Members of Italy's Democratic Party voted for a new leader in hope of reversing their party's slumping popularity.
(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, Jordan accused Israeli authorities of barring top Palestinian Muslim officials from Al-Aqsa mosque in annexed east Jerusalem.
(AFP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, In northwestern Kenya four Americans and their Kenyan pilot were killed when their helicopter crashed just after take-off from a remote island in Lake Turkana.
(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 3, In Libya a spokesman for the forces of a Field Marshal Khalifa Hifter based in the country's east said his self-styled Libyan National Army has seized control of Libya's southern border with Algeria.
(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, It was reported that a Nigerian court last week condemned as "illegal and unconstitutional" the arrest and deportation of Cameroonian separatists who had applied for asylum in Nigeria.
(AFP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas arrived in Iraq for talks with officials in Baghdad on the latest developments in the region.
(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, Some 800 Palestinians crossed Sunda from the Gaza Strip into Egypt on their initial stage of a pilgrimage to Mecca, the first time since 2014 Egyptian authorities have granted visas for such a trip.
(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, Philippine authorities found 1,529 live exotic turtles stuffed inside luggage at Manila's airport. The various types of turtles were found inside four pieces of left-behind luggage of a Filipino passenger arriving at Ninoy Aquino International Airport on a Philippine Airlines flight from Hong Kong.
(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 3, Authorities in Saudi Arabia suspended a new television talk show that tackled sensitive issues and aired critical views after just two weeks.
(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 3, South Korea and the US said they are eliminating their massive springtime military drills and replacing them with smaller exercises in what they call an effort to support diplomacy aimed at resolving the North Korean nuclear crisis. They agreed to replace the Key Resolve and Foal Eagle drills with a shorter "Dong Maeng" or "Alliance" exercise which kicked off this week.
(AP, 3/3/19)(AFP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 3, Sudanese protesters marched toward courthouses in different cities across the country, including in the capital of Khartoum.
(AP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, A Syrian jihadist group linked to Al-Qaeda killed 21 regime and allied forces near Idlib province, in one of the deadliest breaches of a six-month-old truce deal. Five jihadists were also reported killed.
(AFP, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 3, In eastern Syria Islamic State launched car bombs and suicide attackers against the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) assaulting Baghouz, in a last-ditch effort to stave off defeat in its final patch of territory.
(Reuters, 3/3/19)
2019 Mar 4, The Trump administration said Washington will scrap the preferential trade status of India and Turkey, as President Donald Trump ramped up his battle against what his administration views as unfair foreign trade practices.
(AFP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 4, The US House Judiciary Committee said it is launching a sweeping new probe of Pres. Donald Trump, his White House, his campaign and his businesses. The panel sent document requests to 81 people linked to the president and his associates.
(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, American and Israeli militaries announced that the US has temporarily deployed its highly advanced THAAD missile defence system in Israel for the first time, reflecting their shared concerns about Iran's development of powerful missiles.
(AP, 3/4/19)(AFP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Juan Vallejo Corona (85), California's most prolific serial killer, died at a hospital while serving 25 life sentences for the murder of 25 farm workers. Their bodies were found near Yuba City in 1971.
(SFC, 3/5/19, p.A1)
2019 Mar 4, American actor Luke Perry (52) died in Los Angeles following a massive stroke last week. He had played the wealthy rebel Dylan McKay on "Beverly Hills, 90210" (1990-2000).
(SFC, 3/5/19, p.A10)
2019 Mar 4, Algerians dismissed President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's promise to quit early if re-elected for a fifth time and said they were ready for new protests seeking his resignation.
(AFP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Belarus lifted a restriction on the number of US diplomats allowed on its territory that had been in force since 2008, a move aimed at improving ties with Washington. Minsk had reduced the number of US diplomats to five from the previous 35 after the United States imposed sanction against Belarusian authorities.
(Reuters, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, British authorities said two teenagers were killed in knife attacks in over the weekend, bringing the number of people killed in stabbings this year to at least 24.
(Reuters, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Britain and Spain said they have reached an agreement that sets out stricter rules for companies and citizens operating from Gibraltar, a British overseas territory which Spain considers a colony.
(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, In London Laureline Garcia-Bertaux (34), originally from France, was reported missing after not turning up for work. Her body was found in a garden in Kew on the evening of March 6. A post-mortem found she had been strangled. A week later suspect Kirill Belorusov (32) was detained in the Estonian capital Tallinn on a European arrest warrant.
(AP, 3/7/19)(AFP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 4, Keith Flint (49), the fiery frontman of British dance-electronic band The Prodigy, was found dead at his home near London. Keith reportedly took his own life over the weekend. The band's 1990s "Firestarter" (1996) and "Breathe" (1996) were an incendiary fusion of techno, breakbeat and acid house music.
(AP, 3/4/19)(AFP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, The Central African Republic's peace agreement was under strain after two militia groups abandoned the deal and a third said it was quitting a new government designed to be the keystone of the accord.
(AFP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, China accused detained Canadian citizen Michael Kovrig of stealing state secrets which were passed on to him from another detained Canadian, Michael Spavor, in what is likely to increase tension between Ottawa and Beijing.
(Reuters, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Egyptian photojournalist Mahmoud Abu Zaid was released after five years in prison and returned home to hugs from family and friends, pledging to continue working despite severe restrictions imposed on his movements, including having to spend the nights at a police station nearby.
(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Indonesia and Australia signed a free trade agreement in Jakarta that will eliminate many tariffs, allow Australian-owned hospitals to operate in the giant Southeast Asian country and increase work visas for young Indonesians.
(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, In Indonesia a court ruled that construction of a Chinese-backed dam, that will cut through the habitat of a the most critically endangered orangutan species, can continue.
(SFC, 3/5/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 4, Israeli security forces shot and killed two Palestinians who carried out a car-ramming attack in the occupied West Bank that injured a soldier and a policeman.
(AFP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Israeli attack helicopters struck Hamas military positions in Gaza, after the country's army reported a balloon-borne "explosive device" from the Palestinian enclave targeted its territory.
(AFP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Lithuanian PM Saulius Skvernelis said he will ask Belarus to convert its Russian-built nuclear power plant to gas provided by Lithuania's liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal and a planned gas link between Lithuania and Poland.
(Reuters, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Mexican archaeologists reported the discovery of a cave filled with hundreds of artifacts beneath the ruins of the Mayan city of Chichen Itza, a stunning city of stone in the Yucatan peninsula that was founded sometime around 750 AD. Locals had actually discovered the cave more than 50 years ago.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 4, In Mexico the townspeople of Santa Rosa de Lima, Guanajuato state, tried to block a police raid on a fuel-theft gang. The gang had allegedly paid for the local support. The municipal force did nothing to help in the raid that freed six kidnap victims.
(SFC, 3/6/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 4, A key train service with neighboring India resumed and schools in Pakistani Kashmir opened in another sign of easing tensions between the two nuclear-armed rivals since a major escalation last week over the disputed Kashmir region.
(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, President Vladimir Putin officially suspended Russia's participation in a key Cold War-era arms treaty, after the US first moved to ditch the INF deal.
(AFP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, In South Sudan the leaders of Ethiopia and Eritrea met with President Salva Kiir seeking to breathe new life into a flagging peace agreement signed six months ago between his government and rebels.
(AFP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, In Switzerland the electric Jaguar I-Pace won the Car of the Year award in Europe ahead of the 89th Geneva International Motor Show, at the Palexpo in Geneva. This was first time the storied British brand has been bestowed the prize.
(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, In eastern Syria hundreds of people including fighters from the Islamic State group evacuated their last foothold hours after US-backed Syrian fighters said they were forced to slow their advance because the extremists are using civilians as human shields. Some 500 people, including fighters, surrendered and evacuated the village of Baghouz and its surrounding areas.
(AP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Uganda's government said Rwanda has started to allow trucks carrying goods from Uganda to enter at one of the main crossing points on their shared border, a sign that renewed hostilities have started to ease. Their hostilities were fueled by longstanding mutual suspicions and allegations of supporting each other's dissidents.
(Reuters, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Flag-waving Venezuelans turned out to await the return of opposition leader Juan Guaido, who was defying the threat of arrest as he embarks on a renewed push against embattled President Nicolas Maduro.
(AFP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 4, Zambia’s broadcasting regulator ordered a one-month suspension of a TV channel that has been critical of the government, just days after the governing party accused the station of bias and unprofessionalism. Prime TV has openly condemned the government of President Edgar Lungu.
(AFP, 3/4/19)
2019 Mar 5, The US FDA approved Spravato, a mind altering medication that is a cousin of ketamine, for the treatment of patients who have failed to find relief with at least two anti-depressants. Ketamine has been adopted by the underground rave culture due to its ability to produce psychedelic, out-of-body experiences.
(SFC, 3/6/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 5, It was reported that for just the second time ever an HIV patient was in sustained remission from the virus in what was hailed by experts as proof that the AIDS-causing condition could one day be curable.
(AFP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, In Afghanistan relief efforts continued a day after flooding subsided. The Norwegian Refugee Council said more than 32 people have died and thousands displaced as heavy rains and flooding swept away homes across Afghanistan.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, Albania's main opposition leader urged PM Edi Rama to call a snap election over allegations of corruption and vote fraud, as anti-government protesters rallied outside parliament.
(Reuters, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, Thousands of Algerian students marched in protest at ailing President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's determination to stand for re-election, brushing aside his pledge not to serve a full fifth term.
(AFP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, Belarus Pres. Alexander Lukashenko called for better ties with NATO and lifted restrictions on US diplomats, an apparent bid to win concessions from Moscow by dangling the prospect of rapprochement with the West.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, China announced a robust annual economic growth target and a 7.5 percent rise in military spending as it convened an annual legislative session overshadowed by a tariff war with Washington.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, Chinese tech company Huawei opened a cybersecurity lab in Brussels, the heart of the European Union, as it tries to win over government leaders and fight back US allegations that its equipment poses a national security risk.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, French officials said rioters in the city of Grenoble set fire to 65 cars and targeted security forces with fireworks and Molotov cocktails, after a third night of violence sparked by the death of two teenagers on a stolen scooter during a police chase.
(AFP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, French customs officials warned of lengthy delays at the port of Calais as their work-to-rule strike snarled traffic for a second day, leading to queues of trucks several km (miles) long.
(AFP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 1, In Germany gardener Bernhard Graumann (59) was found dead in his bed in the southwestern town of Mehlingen. He had been in conflict with both a doctor and a family, and is thought to have planted explosives before he died. The 64-year-old doctor in the nearby town of Enkenbach-Alsenborn was killed this morning. Two days later a woman (37) and her 4-year-old daughter were injured by glass splinters when the woman put a log that had been rigged with explosives into her stove and it blew the door out.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 5, The Berlin district court jailed 48-year-old Aleksandr T., a German-Russian dual citizen whose full name wasn't released in line with German privacy rules. He was sentenced to eight years in prison over the July 22 attack on two homeless men at Schoeneweide station. One of the victims later died of his injuries.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, Greece successfully launched its first 10-year bond auction since 2010, as it seeks to gradually regain the confidence of international investors and wean itself off bailout funds.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, A Hungarian court ruled that Rui Pinto, a Portuguese man linked to the publication of internal documents that embarrassed top European clubs and soccer officials in the Football Leaks case, will be extradited to his home country.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, Two groups monitoring air pollution said New Delhi was the world's most polluted capital city in 2018 in a study of the amount of fine particulate matter known as PM2.5 in 61 capital cities around the world. It was followed by the Bangladesh capital of Dhaka and Kabul, capital of Afghanistan.
(Reuters, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, In Indonesia the effort to find victims in the Feb. 26 mine collapse recovered more bodies and body parts as the death toll rose to at least 13.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, Italian energy company Eni said a crane toppled from a methane gas extraction platform, plunging into the Adriatic Sea and killing the crane's operator (63).
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, In Italy a proposal to use 15 million euros in Saudi Arabian government funds for Milan's La Scala opera house came under fire because of anger over the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
(AFP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, Japanese architect Arata Isozaki, credited with bringing together the East and West in his innovative designs, was awarded this year's Pritzker Architecture Prize, known internationally as the highest honor in the field.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, A Tokyo court approved the release of former Nissan Chairman Carlos Ghosn on 1 billion yen ($8.9 million) bail, rejecting an appeal by prosecutors to keep him jailed. The former head of the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi Motors alliance has been detained since he was arrested on Nov.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, It was reported that Nepal has chosen a railway-track gauge used by China for its network and not the main one India uses citing lower costs, a setback for India as it tries to limit Chinese involvement in the Himalayan country.
(Reuters, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, It was announced that Nicaraguan Pres. Daniel Ortega's leftist government and the opposition have agreed a "roadmap" for extended peace talks to resolve 10 months of crisis sparked by a deadly crackdown on dissent in which hundreds of people were killed.
(AFP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 5, Pakistan's Interior Ministry said that authorities have arrested dozens of suspects in the wake the Feb. 14 suicide bombing in Indian-controlled Kashmir that killed 40 Indian troops. Among those arrested was Mufti Abdul Rauf, the brother of the group's leader, Masood Azhar.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, In South Africa growing unrest at Sibanye-Stillwater's gold operations has left nine people dead since workers downed tools in November, prompting the country's mines minister to call on the police to step in and protect the local community.
(Reuters, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, Sri Lanka's government proposed increases in spending on public servants and incentives to boost agriculture and fisheries in a new national budget, which opposition lawmakers criticized as an attempt to attract voters ahead of a presidential election this year.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, In Sudan a one-day strike shuttered businesses and emptied streets in Khartoum, and other parts of the country.
(AP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, The opposition Sudanese Congress Party said authorities have released Omar el-Digeir, a senior opposition leader, who had been detained since December in connection with demonstrations against President Omar al-Bashir's rule.
(AFP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, In eastern Syria civilians streamed out of the Islamic State group's last Syrian stronghold into territory held by US-backed forces battling to finish off the jihadists' dying "caliphate" near the village of Baghouz. 280 IS fighters were among those who quit the pocket since March 3.
(AFP, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 5, In Kiev US Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch called on Ukrainian officials to fire the special anti-corruption prosecutor, Nazar Kholodnytsky, who has been accused of helping suspects avoid corruption charges. She also called for a complete audit of a state-owned military procurement company and greater transparency for defense contracts.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 5, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet said Burundi has forced the United Nations to shut its local human rights office after 23 years.
(Reuters, 3/5/19)
2019 Mar 6, A US federal appeals court upheld fraud convictions against two men for their roles in a Connecticut auto insurance scam that involved as many as 50 staged car crashes between 2011 and 2014. The 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals in New York rejected the appeals of Mackenzy Noze and Jonas Joseph.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, The US federal government said it is awarding $27 million in grants to the US Virgin Islands to help expand and renovate two airports damaged in 2017 by Hurricanes Irma and Maria.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, The Wall Street Journal reported that Microsoft has detected cyberattacks linked to Iranian hackers that targeted thousands of people at more than 200 companies over the past two years. Microsoft attributed the attacks to a group it calls Holmium, and which other security researchers call APT33.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 6, Militants in Afghanistan set off a suicide blast and stormed a construction company near the airport in Jalalabad, the capital of eastern Nangarhar province, killing at least 17 people.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, Algerian war veterans said that protesters demanding ailing President Abdelaziz Bouteflika step down after 20 years in power had legitimate concerns and they urged all citizens to demonstrate.
(Reuters, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, Angola's Pres. Joao Lourenco met with Portuguese President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa in Luanda in a top-level encounter between nations whose relations have previously been strained by anti-corruption issues.
(AFP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, London's Central Criminal Court sentenced Muslim convert Lewis Ludlow to at least 15 years in prison for plotting a van attack on crowds in London's busy Oxford Street shopping district.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, China said that it is blocking some imports of the agricultural product canola from Canada because of fears of insect infestation. A day earlier Richardson International Ltd., said that China had revoked its permit to export canola there.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, An inquiry into the demise of Cyprus' Co-operative bank faulted senior executives for bad judgment, inaction and ineptitude in dealing with a mountain of bad loans, while blaming the finance minister for failing to take corrective actions.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, Amnesty International said Egyptian activists and journalists have been targeted by phishing attacks coinciding with political events in an intensifying crackdown on dissent since the start of the year.
(Reuters, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, In Estonia Liberal party leader Kaja Kallas, on track to become the country's first female prime minister, announced talks for a grand coalition with the center-left party of outgoing PM Juri Ratas.
(AFP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, In France prison guards blocked access to 18 jails to protest working conditions after the stabbing of two guards by a radicalized inmate.
(AFP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, A manhunt was underway in western Germany for at least two masked suspects who attacked a money transport truck at the Cologne-Bonn airport and shot a guard.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, In Germany the body of a 21-year-old woman was found with several stab wounds at her parents' home. A 22-year-old Tunisian man she had been in a relationship with was arrested the next day on suspicion of homicide.
(AP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 6, Indian and Pakistani soldiers shelled military outposts and villages along their highly militarized frontier in disputed Kashmir, in an outbreak of new violence despite stepped-up diplomatic efforts by the rival countries to ease tensions.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, An activist group said Nasrin Sotoudeh, a prominent human rights lawyer in Iran who defended protesters against the Islamic Republic's mandatory headscarves for women, has been convicted and faces years in prison. She had previously served three years in prison for her work.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu designated Al-Aqsa television channel of the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas a "terrorist organization".
(AFP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, Italy's populist government opened its new minimum income welfare program, fulfilling a key campaign promise of the 5-Star Movement to try to reduce poverty and unemployment in the eurozone's third-largest economy.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, In Kenya thousands of air passengers were stranded after a strike by aviation workers at the main Nairobi airport led to the cancellation and delay of scores of flights and the use of riot police to break up the industrial action. By the end of the day however, most scheduled arrivals had been processed while the departures backlog was being cleared.
(Reuters, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, Bankers and diplomats said Libya's parallel government in the east has sold bonds worth more than $23 billion to fund its wage bill, bypassing the central bank in Tripoli and creating a potential financial black hole if the country reunifies.
(Reuters, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, In Pakistan Mohammed Afzal (31), also known as Afzal Kohistani, was shot dead in the northwestern district of Abbotabad. The young rights campaigner had fought for seven years for justice for five possible victims of so-called honor killings. Police soon identified the killer as his nephew.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 6, In Puerto Rico trucks laden with food, water and gasoline began arriving on the tiny islands of Vieques and Culebra after the governor activated the National Guard due to a breakdown of two ferries that carry supplies.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, Scientists set off on a mission to explore the depths of the Indian Ocean. The Britain-based Nekton non-profit research institute has chartered the Ocean Zephyr, a Danish-flagged supply ship, to explore the waters around the Seychelles. This is the first of a half-dozen regions the Nekton Mission plans to explore before the end of 2022, when scientists will present their research at a summit on the state of the Indian Ocean.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, A South African court handed jail terms of 23 and 18 years to two white farmers who murdered a black teenager suspected of stealing sunflowers in a remote farming community. Pieter Doorewaard (28) and Philip Schutte (35) were found to have killed 15-year-old Matlhomola Mosweu, also spelt Moshoeu, on April 20, 2017, after claiming they caught him taking a plant from a farm in the area.
(AFP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, South Korean President Moon Jae-in proposed a joint project with China to use artificial rain to clean the air in his country, where an acute increase in pollution has caused alarm.
(AP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, In eastern Syria hundreds more people made their way out of Islamic State's last pocket, besieged by a US-backed militia. An SDF source put the number of people who left the Baghouz pocket this morning at more than 2,000. The SDF militia captured 400 Islamic State fighters who were trying to escape the enclave.
(Reuters, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, United Nations human rights chief Michelle Bachelet said that she is seeking access to China to verify continuing reports of disappearances and arbitrary detentions, particularly of Muslims in the Xinjiang region.
(Reuters, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, UN rights chief Michelle Bachelet said sanctions had exacerbated the crisis in Venezuela but also slammed Maduro's "violations of civil and political rights" in her annual report to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva.
(AFP, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, Venezuela's government said it will expel the German ambassador, Daniel Martin Kriener, for interfering in the country's internal affairs and gave him 48 hours to leave.
(Reuters, 3/6/19)
2019 Mar 6, A Vietnamese fishing boat capsized after reportedly being rammed by a Chinese vessel in the South China Sea's contested Paracel Islands. China said its boat came upon the fishing vessel after it started sinking and sought help for the crew.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 7, US President Donald Trump's special representative for Venezuela pledged that Washington would "expand the net" of sanctions on the South American nation, including more on banks supporting President Nicolas Maduro's government.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, First lady Melania Trump joined Secretary of State Mike Pompeo at the State Department to confer international courage awards on 10 women from Bangladesh, Djibouti, Egypt, Ireland, Jordan, Montenegro, Myanmar, Peru, Sri Lanka and Tanzania. The State Department has honored more than 120 women from scores of countries since it created the International Women of Courage Award in 2007.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Former Trump campaign chief Paul Manafort (69) was sentenced to nearly four years in prison for tax crimes and bank fraud in a high-profile case stemming from Special Counsel Robert Mueller's probe of Russian interference in the 2016 election. This was much less than what was called for under sentencing guidelines.
(AFP, 3/7/19)(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 7, The US House of Representatives passed a resolution condemning anti-Semitism and other bigotry. The one-sided 407-23 vote belied the emotional infighting over how to respond to freshman Rep. lIhan Omar's recent comments suggesting House supporters of Israel have dual allegiances.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 7, In Texas Dan Jenkins (89), the sports writing great and best-selling author whose career covered Ben Hogan to Tiger Woods, died.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 7, In Afghanistan rockets fired at a gathering of the Shi'ite Muslim Hazara minority in Kabul killed at least three people and wounded dozens in an attack claimed by Islamic State. Two insurgents were eventually killed and one person arrested. The death toll in the mortar attack soon rose to 11, while the number of wounded reached almost 100.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)(AP, 3/7/19)(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 7, FUNAI, Brazil's indigenous affairs agency, said it has sent an expedition to the Amazon region looking for members of the Koruba tribe that has had little or no contact with the outside world to steer them clear of the rival Matis group and avoid a bloody clash of cudgels against arrows.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Canadian PM Justin Trudeau defended his government's handling of a political crisis that could dash his chances of winning re-election in October, while admitting some mistakes had been made. Trudeau's Liberal government has been on the defensive for a month over allegations by former Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould that officials inappropriately pressured her last year to help construction firm SNC-Lavalin Group Inc avoid a criminal trial.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Chinese tech giant Huawei challenged a US law that would limit its American sales of telecom equipment on security grounds as the company steps up efforts to preserve its access to global markets for next-generation communications.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Comoros Pres. Azali Assoumani reportedly survived an attempt on his life as he crisscrossed the country drumming up support ahead of polls on March 24.
(AFP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, In Costa Rico judicial police raided Roman Catholic church offices in San Jose, searching for information about two priests accused of sexual abuse.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Medecins Sans Frontières said the battle against Ebola in Democratic Republic of Congo is failing because ordinary people do not trust health workers and an overly militarized response is alienating patients and families.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Egypt's the interior ministry said on security forces have killed seven suspected militants in two operations in Giza, across the Nile from central Cairo.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Egyptian actor Amr Waked (45), living in Spain and known for his criticism of President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi's government, said a military court has sentenced him in absentia to eight years in prison in two separate cases, the latest in a wide-ranging crackdown on dissent and the media in Egypt in recent years.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Ethiopia appealed for $1.3 billion from the international community to assist 8.3 million displaced due to ethnic conflict as well those vulnerable to climate shocks and disease.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, The 28 member states of the European Union all backed a decision on to reject a proposal from the EU executive to add Saudi Arabia to a blacklist of countries suspected of being lax on terrorist financing and money laundering. The decision will force the European Commission to prepare a new list.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, French Catholic cleric, Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, was convicted of failing to report allegations of sexual abuse in his diocese and said he would submit his resignation to Pope Francis. The archbishop of Lyon was handed a six-month suspended prison sentence.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Eurostar trains from Paris to London were running up to two hours late and trucks stacked up on the approaches to the Channel port of Calais as French customs officers staged the fourth day of a work-to-rule strike.
(AFP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, In Germany a regional court judge gave Klaus O. (57) a life sentence after convicting him of attempted murder. He was found guilty of poisoning his co-workers' sandwiches with mercury and other substances between 2015 and 2018.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, A German court sentenced four men for their involvement in running an online child pornography platform to prison sentences from three years and ten months to almost 10 years.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, More than 200 protesters gathered at a Hong Kong university to condemn the expulsion of a student defending free speech, in what was seen as another incremental sign of eroding freedoms in the Chinese-ruled city.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, In the Indian-controlled portion of Kashmir a civilian was killed and at least 30 others were injured by a grenade blast at a bus station.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Three Indonesian soldiers were killed in a gunbattle with Papuan independence fighters. They were part of a contingent to provide security for military engineers on the trans Papua highway.
(AP, 3/7/19)(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 7, Iranian naval forces intervened to repel pirates who attacked an Iranian oil tanker in the Gulf of Aden.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 7, In northern Iraq Islamic State militants ambushed a bus carrying Shiite Muslim paramilitary fighters, killing six militiamen and wounding 31 others in one of the deadliest attacks in recent months.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Malaysian officials said 35 people, mostly students, have been treated for poisoning after a suspected chemical leak near two schools in Johor state.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, In Malaysia Mujahid Yusof Rawa, the minister in charge of religious affairs, said the Islamic Affairs Department had set up a unit to monitor writings and communications insulting Islam and Muhammad.
(Reuters, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 7, In central Mexico at least 25 Central American migrants died when the truck they were traveling in overturned in Chiapas state. 23 of those killed were Guatemalan migrants.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 7, Singapore axed a gig by Watain, a Swedish metal band with Satanic beliefs, whose performances have involved throwing pig's blood onto revelers, just hours before it was due to go ahead.
(AFP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, South Korea's military said it is carefully monitoring North Korean nuclear and missile facilities after the country's spy agency told lawmakers that new activity was detected at a research center where the North is believed to build long-range missiles targeting the US mainland.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, In Sudan an emergency appeals court overturned prison sentences handed down to eight protesters for participating in demonstrations against President Omar al-Bashir's iron-fisted rule. Scores of protesters, many of them women, rallied in Khartoum, condemning a slew of tough measures imposed by President Omar al-Bashir to end weeks-long demonstrations against his rule.
(AFP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, In Geneva Volkswagen-owned Bugatti said a one-off Bugatti luxury sports car has been sold for a record 16.7 million euros ($18.9 million).
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, In eastern Syria scores of suspected IS members, including foreign fighters, were screened and searched for concealed weapons and explosives after leaving the last pocket of territory held by the Islamic State group.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, A court in Thailand ordered the dissolution of the Thai Raksa Chart Party ahead of this month's general election because it nominated a member of the royal family to be its candidate for prime minister.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, Ukrainian presidential candidate Yulia Tymoshenko promised life imprisonment for anyone found guilty in alleged military corruption that reportedly includes incumbent Petro Poroshenko.
(AP, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, In Geneva three dozen countries, including all 28 EU members, called on Saudi Arabia to release 10 activists and cooperate with a UN-led investigation into the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi at its Istanbul consulate. This was the first rebuke of the kingdom at the UN Human Rights Council since it was set up in 2006.
(Reuters, 3/7/19)
2019 Mar 7, In Venezuela power went out this afternoon due to a problem at the main hydroelectric plant. The government called the event an act of "sabotage" by ideological adversaries.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, A World Bank arbitration panel ruled that Venezuela must pay US oil giant ConocoPhillips more than $8 billion as compensation for a decade-old expropriation dispute. The Venezuelan government and its state-owned entities currently owe around $150 billion to creditors around the world, while the country's foreign currency reserves have fallen to just $8 billion.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, A Cook County grand jury indicted actor Jessie Smollett on 16 counts that alleged he lied to Chicago police about being the victim of an attack. Police said he staged the attack and recruited two brothers to participate.
(SFC, 3/9/19, p.A4)(SSFC, 3/10/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 8, Kansas Dr. Steven R. Henson (57) was sentenced to life in prison for unlawfully prescribing medication blamed for an overdose death.
(SSFC, 3/10/19, p.A13)
2019 Mar 8, New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham signed a bill to drastically expand mandatory background checks on firearms sales in the state.
(SSFC, 3/10/19, p.A7)
2019 Mar 8, Facebook Inc, which along with other social media companies has faced growing pressure over spurious content spread on its platform, announced it would remove user groups and pages that contained misinformation about vaccinations.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, Campaigners for gender equality marked International Women's Day with protests, discussion panels and walkouts as well as celebrations.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, Tens of thousands of Algerians defied heavily deployed riot police and resumed mass protests against President Abdelaziz Bouteflika posing the biggest threat to his 20-year-old rule. A private TV station said several lawmakers of the ruling FLN party have resigned to join mass anti-government protests.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, In Algeria criminals took advantage of thousands-strong demonstrations to break into the National Museum of Antiquities and Islamic Arts in Algiers, founded in 1897.
(AFP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 8, The BBC reported that the baby son of Shamima Begum, a British-born teenager who left London to join the Islamic State group, has died in Syria. Begum (19) had been stripped of her citizenship by the British government despite her wish to return.
(AFP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 8, Colombia said it will allow Venezuelans to cross the border using expired passports in view of the difficulty of renewing travel documents in the neighboring country in the midst of its economic crisis.
(Reuters, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 8, Finland's coalition government resigned a month ahead of a general election, saying it could not deliver on a healthcare reform package that is widely seen as crucial to securing long-term government finances. President Sauli Niinisto accepted PM Sipila's resignation but asked his government of his Center party and the National Coalition Party to continue in a caretaker capacity until a new cabinet has been appointed.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, Official reports said France and Iran are to exchange ambassadors after Paris suspended nomination of an envoy to Tehran last year over accusations that Iranian intelligence had planned an attack on an opposition group in Paris.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, The International Monetary Fund said it has reached a tentative deal to extend a $229 million loan to Haiti.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, In Hungary MTA President Laszlo Lovasz and Innovations and Technology Minister Laszlo Palkovics announced that they had reached an agreement to separate the science research network from the academy's teaching institutions. Staff members of the historic Hungarian Academy of Sciences said their academic freedom has been threatened by a new deal giving the nationalist government influence over its research institutions.
(Reuters, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 8, Indonesia's military said hundreds of soldiers will be deployed to continue work on the trans Papua highway.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, A top Iranian diplomat asserted that the UK's decision to give diplomatic protection to Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, a British-Iranian woman detained in Iran for nearly three years, contravenes international law.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, On International Women’s Day Yasaman Aryani, her mother Monireh Arabshahi and Mojgan Keshavarz handed out flowers to female passengers on the Tehran metro and spoke of a day when women have the freedom to choose what they wear. Aryani and her mother were each sentenced to 16 years in prison for “inciting and facilitating corruption and prostitution," though the sentence was later reduced.
(AP, 3/8/21)
2019 Mar 8, A Kosovo court acquitted the ethnic Serb identified only as M.Z. of war crimes and genocide charges following suspicion of his involvement committed in crimes in June-July 1998 in the Kline municipality.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, Malawi's ministry of homeland security said heavy rains and flooding in the south have killed at least 23 people, and a further 11 are missing.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, Dutch prosecutors said Uber has agreed to an out-of-court settlement of more than 2 million euros ($2.24 million) linked to an illegal service the ride hailing company offered in the Netherlands.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, In northeastern Nigeria at least five farmers were killed and dozens wounded after their vehicle struck a land mine buried by Boko Haram extremists. Three people were reportedly killed in Rivers state, following clashes between APC and PDP supporters, one day ahead of regional elections.
(SFC, 3/9/19, p.A2)(AFP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 8, North Macedonia's former secret police chief, Saso Mijalkov (53), was sentenced to three years in prison after being convicted of unlawfully influencing a local election in 2013. The court also convicted the head of an ethnic Albanian party and four former electoral commission members over the same case.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, Norway's $1 trillion wealth fund, the biggest of its kind in the world, said it will begin dumping shares in oil and gas companies, but stopped short of barring major producers like ExxonMobil and Chevron.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, A Palestinian was killed and at least 45 others wounded by Israeli fire in new protests and clashes along the Gaza border.
(AFP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 8, Peru's PM Cesar Villanueva stepped down amid calls for President Martin Vizcarra to shake up his government and revive falling approval ratings.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, In the Philippines Malaysian PM Mahathir Mohamad met with Filipino Muslim rebel leader Murad Ebrahim, who has become a regional governor under a Malaysian-brokered peace deal.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, Workers in the Polish city of Gdansk dismantled a statue of the late Solidarity-era priest, Henryk Jankowski, following allegations he sexually abused minors.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, In Portugal thousands of nurses marched through Lisbon in a show of unity to demand better pay and working conditions and protest the government's poor handling of the long-running dispute.
(Reuters, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 8, Saudi Arabia's air defense systems shot down a drone over the kingdom. The Saudi-led military coalition in Yemen accused the country's Houthi fighters of launching the aircraft and targeting civilians.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, Slovenia's health minister resigned, becoming the fourth minister to leave the center-left minority government and raising concerns about its ability to survive until the next scheduled election in 2022. Samo Fakin quit nine days after Environment Minister Jure Leben quit amid media reports about alleged corruption linked to a railway project in 2017 when Leben was a senior infrastructure ministry official.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, South Korea and the US formally signed a deal on Seoul's increased payment for the US troop deployment, amid worries about the future of the countries' decades-long military alliance.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, One of Spain's largest unions, UGT, said an estimated six million people walked out of their jobs for at least two hours in a strike to demand equal pay and rights for women, which it said mobilized more people than a similar action a year ago.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, In Sudan hundreds of protesters chanted anti-government slogans after leaving prayers at a major mosque near Khartoum, drawing tear-gas volleys from police. President Omar al-Bashir on International Women's Day ordered the release of all women arrested in connection with anti-government demonstrations, hours after protesters marched in the two largest cities.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, A Swedish court convicted David Idrisson, a 46-year old Uzbek citizen, of plotting to carry out a bombing in Sweden in the name of Islamic State, sentencing him to seven years in prison followed by expulsion from the country.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, The Swiss government said it will not help bring home adult citizens who joined up with jihadist fighters in Syria and Iraq, insisting national security was paramount.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, In Tunisia 11 newborn babies died over the last two days at the Rabta clinic in Tunis, which is part of a large medical center in the capital. Tunisia's health minister soon resigned following the sudden deaths. On March 10 a 12th infant died at the Rabta state hospital. The deaths were believed to have been caused by an infection acquired in the clinic.
(AFP, 3/10/19)(AFP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 8, The United Nations refugee agency UNHCR said in a report that around 5,000 Yemeni civilians were either killed or wounded last year, which averages out to 93 victims each week.
(AP, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 8, Venezuela shut schools and suspended the workday as the worst blackout in decades paralyzed most of the troubled nation for a second day, spurring outrage among citizens already suffering from hyperinflation and a crippling recession.
(Reuters, 3/8/19)
2019 Mar 9, In California prison guards at Corcoran State Prison in Kings County found inmate Luis Romero (44) beheaded in his cell. Cellmate Jaime Osuna (31) had removed several body parts from Romero.
(SFC, 4/29/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 9, In North Carolina Diana Alejandra Keel went missing. Her body was found days later with multiple stab wounds. Her husband Rexford Lynn Keel Jr. (57) was arrested after being sighted on March 17 near Tucson.
(SFC, 3/19/19, p.A8)
2019 Mar 9, In Afghanistan a large number of Taliban insurgents launched attacks on several army posts in the province's Bala Murghab district. Over the next days 20 soldiers were reported killed, 10 wounded and 20 captured by the hardline Islamist group.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 9, Algeria's higher education ministry brought forward university holidays, as authorities sought to quell protests against ailing President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's bid for a fifth term.
(AFP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, Magomed Daudov, a close ally of Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov, called blogger Tumso Abdurakhmanov "an enemy to me and my brothers" after Abdurakhmanov criticized Kadyrov's late father, the former Chechen leader, on his YouTube channel. Abdurakhmanov (32) fled Chechnya in 2015 and is seeking asylum in Poland.
(AP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 9, Liu Hong of China has set a world record in the women's 50-km race walk, becoming the first woman to finish the event in under 4 hours.
(AP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, In Colombia 14 people were killed in a DC-3 plane crash in Meta province.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 9, In eastern Congo DRC armed Mai Mai militiamen attacked an Ebola treatment center at the heart of an outbreak of the disease, killing a policeman before being repelled by security forces.
(AP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, In France hundreds of "yellow vest" protesters began marches in Paris, marking the 17th straight weekend of anti-government demonstrations. They were joined by others donning pink tops, as child-care workers turned out against a reform of their unemployment subsidies.
(Reuters, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, India said that it was returning a key diplomat to Pakistan's capital amid an easing of tensions between the nuclear neighbors, but also demanded that its archrival take concrete steps against terrorists operating from its territory.
(AP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, Israeli forces said they had launched several strikes against Hamas sites in Gaza in response to a projectile launched from the besieged coastal territory the night before.
(AFP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, The Italian Ambassador to Pakistan said that the bodies of British climber Tom Ballard and Italian climber Daniele Nardi, who went missing on Feb. 24 while ascending Pakistan's Nanga Parbat, the so-called "Killer Mountain," have been found. Their bodies were unlikely to be recovered.
(Reuters, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, In southwest Japan the Guinness World Records officially recognized Kane Tanaka (116) in a ceremony at the nursing home where she lives in Fukuoka.
(AP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, Malaysian police said a was sentenced to more than 10 years' jail and three others were charged over insults against Islam and the Prophet Muhammad on social media.
(Reuters, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, A Malaysian minister decried the presence of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) groups at a march celebrating International Women's Day, calling it "a misuse of democratic space".
(Reuters, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 9, In central Mexico armed assailants opened fire in a nightclub in Salamanca, Guanajuato state, in the early hours today, leaving at least 15 people dead and three others wounded.
(AP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, In Myanmar 60 Arakan Army insurgents attacked a police post late today in Rakhine state, which was safeguarding question and answer sheets from the national high school matriculation examination. Nine policemen were reported killed in the attack.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 9, Nigerians voted for a second time in a fortnight in governorship and state assembly elections.
(AP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, In Sudan nine female protesters were sentenced to 20 lashes and one month in prison for rioting under new emergency laws.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 9, In northern Syria a suicide car bomb attacker blew himself up near a military vehicle in the town of Manbij, wounding eight people, most of them civilians.
(AP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, Pope Francis met with the leadership of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the first-such meeting of its kind, on the eve of the dedication of the Mormon church's huge new temple in Rome.
(AP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 9, Venezuelan opposition protesters confronted security forces on a main avenue in Caracas, venting their anger over a nationwide blackout, shortages of basic necessities and the government of President Nicolas Maduro.
(AP, 3/9/19)
2019 Mar 10, In east Texas two men died after their pickup truck collided with a charter bus in Tyler. Five occupants of the bus were hospitalized.
(SFC, 3/11/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 10, Thousands of students took to the streets of Algeria against President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's bid for a fifth term, as schools shut and transport in the capital halted as part of a protest strike. Bouteflika (82) returned to Algeria after medical treatment in Switzerland. Clerics defied any state role in their work, in a rebuff to an ailing leader fighting for his political survival.
(AFP, 3/10/19)(Reuters, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 10, Laleh Shahravesh, a UK citizen, was arrested at Dubai Airport as she arrived for her ex-husband's funeral. Authorities there had received a complaint about Facebook posts that she allegedly made in 2016 calling her ex's new wife a "horse".
(AP, 4/8/19)
2019 Mar 10, Egypt's president appointed Maj. Gen. Kamal el-Wazir, the head of the military's engineering authority, to lead the country's transportation ministry, less than two weeks after its minister resigned over a deadly train crash in Cairo that killed 25 people.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, An Ethiopia, Airlines new Boeing 737-8 MAX crashed shortly after takeoff from Addis Ababa killing all 157 people on board. 35 nationalities were represented. 19 people from at least five UN and affiliated agencies, including the IOM, were among 157 victims.
(AP, 3/10/19)(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 10, In France thousands of Algerian-origin protesters demonstrated in Paris and other cities around the country against President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, calling on him not to seek another term in office.
(AFP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, Guinea-Bissau, one of the world's poorest states, held key legislative elections aimed at ending a protracted political crisis..
(AFP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, Three Israeli soldiers, charged with abusing Palestinian detainees, were sentenced to six and a half months in prison under a plea deal with a military court.
(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 10, In Kashmir Indian troops shelled the Pakistani-controlled sector, killing a 70-year-old man. India blamed Pakistani troops for the initiating fire.
(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 10, Kazakh police arrested Serikjan Bilash, an activist who has campaigned for victims of China's re-education drive in Xinjiang, sealing his informal group's office and taking its computers.
(AFP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, A Malawi official the number of people killed in heavy rains and flooding in the south has risen to 28, while the estimated number of people affected has roughly doubled to 45,312 households.
(Reuters, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, Malaysian police said that six Egyptians and a Tunisian man believed to be linked to an African-based terror group have been detained and deported.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, In the Netherlands thousands of people, many warding off rain under umbrellas, packed a central square in Amsterdam to march for more progressive climate policies.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, In Nigeria dozens of soldiers in armored vehicles encircled a vote counting center in the opposition-held oil-rich southern city of Port Harcourt, in the latest flashpoint as violence overshadowed the previous day's closely-watched regional elections. The Independent National Electoral Commission halted the vote count in Rivers state, citing violence at polling stations, kidnapping of staff, confiscation and destruction of results.
(AFP, 3/10/19)(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 10, Millions of North Korean voters, including leader Kim Jong Un, went to the polls to elect a new lineup of roughly 700 members for the next session of the national legislature, though the vote was more of an endorsement than a competitive contest.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, Palestinian Pres. Mahmoud Abbas chose a longtime adviser, Mohammed Ishtayeh as his new prime minister, a step that deepens the rift with the Gaza Strip's ruling Hamas militant group.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, In Russia thousands of people took to the streets of Moscow and two other cities to rally against tighter internet restrictions, in some of the biggest protests in the capital in years.
(Reuters, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, A Sudanese emergency court sentenced Mariam al-Mahdi, the daughter of opposition Umma Party chief and ex-prime minister Sadiq al-Mahdi, to a week in prison. Hundreds took to the streets in different areas of Omdurman to protest against new emergency laws. Police used tear gas and water cannon to disperse them.
(AFP, 3/10/19)(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, Syria's President Bashar al-Assad said his country was suffering an "economic siege" as his regime faces a raft of international sanctions over the eight-year civil war, as he met Chinese assistant foreign minister Chen Xiaodong in Damascus. US-backed SDF fighters resumed their offensive around Baghouz.
(AFP, 3/10/19)(SFC, 3/11/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar 10, Tibetans and their supporters marked the 60-year anniversary of the Dalai Lama's flight into exile amid an abortive uprising against Chinese control.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan accused a women's march in central Istanbul on March 8 of disrespecting Islam by booing the Islamic call to prayer.
(Reuters, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, Two German journalists left Turkey after Ankara refused to renew their accreditation. The journalists called the government's move an attempt to silence international news organizations and said they refused to be intimidated.
(AFP, 3/10/19)(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, The UN said its children's fund is paying some 100,000 teachers in Yemen, as two million children go without education in the war-torn country.
(AFP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, Venezuela's embattled President Nicolas Maduro grappled with a crippling power outage and mounting protests as a top White House aide said members of the country's military were talking about possibly shifting allegiance to the opposition. An NGO said at least 15 patients with advanced kidney disease died after they stopped receiving dialysis treatments in darkened hospitals.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 10, Fighting erupted in Yemen's key port city of Hodeida, the first significant clashes since warring sides agreed to a UN-brokered cease-fire deal in December.
(AP, 3/10/19)
2019 Mar 11, Pres. Donald Trump sought 8.6 billion in his new 2020 budget to build the US-Mexico border wall. Trump sent Congress a record $4.75 trillion budget request that called for increased military spending and sharp cuts to domestic programs.
(SFC, 3/11/19, p.A5)(SFC, 3/11/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar 11, The United States imposed sanctions on the Russian bank Evrofinance Mosnarbank over its dealings with the Venezuelan state oil firm PDVSA.
(Reuters, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, Taliban fighters killed or captured an entire Afghan National Army company of more than 50 soldiers in Badghis province.
(SFC, 3/11/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 11, In Afghanistan six-year-old girl, identified as Mahsa, was kidnapped in Kabul. The kidnappers demanded $300,000 from the girl's father. Two men were later arrested in the kidnapping and killing of the girl.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 11, In Algeria more than 1,000 judges said they would refuse to oversee the upcoming election if Pres. Abdelaziz Bouteflika contests it. The ailing Bouteflika (82) abandoned his bid for a fifth term in power but stopped short of stepping down.
(AFP, 3/11/19)(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 11, In Brazil heavy rains overnight caused the deaths of at least 12 people in and around Sao Paulo.
(AP, 3/11/19)(SFC, 3/11/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 11, Authorities in China, Ethiopia and Indonesia grounded all Boeing 737 Max 8 aircraft following the March 10 crash of an Ethiopian Airlines jetliner that killed 157 people.
(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, Egypt said three troops and 46 suspected Islamic militants have been killed in recent days in the northern and central Sinai Peninsula.
(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, A new study, published in the European Heart Journal, said air pollution causes 790,000 premature deaths every year in Europe and 8.8 million worldwide, doubling recent assessments.
(AFP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 11, Police in India said they had recovered four videos from four arrested men, involving other victims in Tamil Nadu state. A woman (19) had said in a complaint filed with the police that she was traveling with the four men, two of whom she knew, in a car last month when she was forcibly disrobed and videotaped. She alleged the men then threatened to upload the video online if she did not meet them whenever summoned.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 11, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani began a 3-day visit in Baghdad to deepen bilateral relations. This was his first official visit to the nation that Tehran once fought a bloody war against and later backed in the battle with the Islamic State group.
(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, Iran's semi-official ISNA news agency said Judge Mohammad Moghiseh has sentenced Nasrin Sotoudeh (55) to five years for plotting against the state and two more years for insulting Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. It was reported that jailed Iranian human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh has been sentenced to 38 years in prison and 148 lashes.
(AP, 3/11/19)(Reuters, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, In Malaysia Indonesian Siti Aisyah, one of two women accused of killing North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's half-brother by smearing VX nerve agent on his face, was freed after two years of detention when prosecutors unexpectedly dropped the murder charge against her.
(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, A Pakistani anti-graft tribunal indicted former PM Raja Pervaiz Ashraf and six others over millions of dollars in losses because of delays to a power project. Ashraf served as prime minister in 2012.
(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, Peruvian President Martin Vizcarra named actor and former culture minister Salvador del Solar as his new prime minister.
(Reuters, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, It was reported that a Philippine appeals court has upheld a decision that an online news site critical of President Rodrigo Duterte violated a constitutional ban on foreign ownership of news media.
(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, Sudan's parliament voted to shorten from one year to six months a state of emergency declared by President Omar al-Bashir last month in response to widespread protests.
(Reuters, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, In eastern Syria Kurdish-led forces slowed an assault to retake a last scrap of land held by the Islamic State group after hundreds more people surrendered. The US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) killed dozens in continuing clashes with Islamic State fighters at Baghouz.
(AFP, 3/11/19)(Reuters, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, The UN's anti-drug agency said production of methamphetamine is skyrocketing in Southeast Asia, with prices dropping and usage expanding.
(AP, 3/11/19)
2019 Mar 11, Much of Venezuela, including parts of the capital Caracas, remained without power for a fifth day, crimping vital oil exports and leaving people struggling to obtain water and food. President Nicolas Maduro again ordered the suspension of classes and the working day. Opposition leader Juan Guaido led the country's legislature in declaring a "state of alarm" over power problems. A five-day power blackout left homes in Caracas without water.
(Reuters, 3/11/19)(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 11, In Venezuela Luis Carlos Diaz, a journalist with dual Spanish and Venezuelan nationality, went missing. Later that night a unit from the feared SEBIN intelligence police turned up at his home and took away computers, mobile phones and money, among other items.
(AP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 11, In Venezuela the Red Cross renewed visits to prisons when a Red Cross delegation visited a model prison in Caracas, the Simon Bolivar Center for the Formation of New Men.
(AP, 4/10/19)
2019 Mar 12, The longest peace talks between the US and the Taliban to end America's 17-year war in Afghanistan concluded in Qatar. Both sides said progress was made.
(SFC, 3/13/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 12, Sam Brownback, the US ambassador-at-large for international religious freedom, said China has done nothing to assuage concerns from the US and others over the detention of Uighurs, Kazakhs and members of other Muslim minority groups.
(AP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, The US aviation regulator said it would not ground Boeing Co 737 MAX planes after a crash in Ethiopia that killed 157 people, bucking a trend of countries around the world that have suspended the aircraft's operations.
(Reuters, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 12, US federal prosecutors announced a bribery and racketeering case in a college admissions cheating scandal.
(SFC, 3/13/19, p.A1)
2019 Mar 12, The San Francisco Board of Supervisors passed an ordnance to create a special permit allowing people to sell and consume cannabis legally at a number of public events.
(SFC, 3/13/19, p.C5)
2019 Mar 12, A divided federal appeals court voted 11-6 to uphold an Ohio antiabortion law that blocks public money for Planned Parenthood.
(SFC, 3/13/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 12, Honda recalled about 1.2 million vehicles in North and Central America from the 2001 to 2016 model years that were not included in the massive string of Takata recalls for air bags that can hurl shrapnel into the passenger compartment. A crash on Jan. 19, 2018 involving a 2004 Honda Odyssey in Maryland initiated an investigation and today's recall.
(AP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, In Afghanistan an air strike on a vehicle killed seven Taliban, including a commander, in Ghazni city. The Taliban said one air strike hit a minibus and a second followed quickly, killing a total of 12 people and wounding six. At least five Afghan troops were killed late today by friendly fire in what was supposed to be a precision airstrike by US forces supporting troops battling insurgents in Uruzgan province.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 12, In Algeria thousands demonstrated in several cities demanding immediate political changes. Algerian students protested against President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's decision to delay presidential elections indefinitely, amid an unprecedented public revolt against his 20-year leadership.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)(AP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, In Brazil two police officers were arrested in the killing of Rio city councilor and black gay rights activist Marielle Franco, almost a year to the day after the brazen murder shocked the country. A sergeant in the military police, Ronnie Lessa (48), was arrested on suspicion of being the shooter. Elcio Vieira de Queiroz (46), who had been sacked from the military police, also was arrested in the pre-dawn operation.
(AFP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, British PM Theresa May's Brexit deal was defeated 391-242 in a historic vote in parliament, pitching Britain into the unknown just 17 days before it is scheduled to leave the European Union.
(AFP, 3/12/19)(SFC, 3/13/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 12, Britain, Germany and France joined a wave of suspensions of Boeing 737 MAX aircraft as US President Donald Trump fretted over modern airplane design following the March 10 crash in Ethiopia that killed 157 people.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, At least 12 people were missing after two collisions between ships and fishing boats off the southeast coast of China.
(AP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, In northeastern Egypt remote-controlled robot jockeys lined up at a major camel racing festival, as owners came under pressure from campaigns to stop using child riders.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 12, European Union governments adopted a broadened blacklist of tax havens, adding the United Arab Emirates and British and Dutch overseas territories in a revamp that tripled the number of listed jurisdictions. The new list added Dutch Caribbean island of Aruba, Barbados, Belize, the British overseas territory of Bermuda, Fiji, the Marshall Islands, Oman, the United Arab Emirates, Vanuatu and Dominica. The EU blacklist originally comprised 17 jurisdictions, including the UAE, but shrank to five after most listed states committed to change their tax rules.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, EU lawmakers voted to lift the immunity of Jean-Marie Le Pen, founder of the far-right National Front, so France can investigate claims he improperly spent EU funds.
(AFP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, French President Emmanuel Macron met with the leaders of Djibouti and Ethiopia at the start of a multi-nation trip to Africa aimed at shoring up military and economic ties in the continent's strategically-important East.
(AP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, Chancellor Angela Merkel said Germany will define its own security standards for a new 5G mobile network, after Washington said it would scale back data-sharing with Berlin if China's Huawei was allowed to participate.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, Husband Reza Khandan said Iranian human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh has been sentenced to an extra 10 years in jail on top of the five-year term she is already serving.
(AFP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, Israeli troops shot dead a Palestinian man in Hebron after he ran toward them with a knife in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, Israeli police evacuated the Al-Aqsa mosque compound, known to Jews as the Temple Mount, after a Molotov cocktail damaged a police post. Police shut off access to it after several weeks of tension at the location.
(AFP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, Israeli undercover officers broke up a drug-dealing network that used a popular messaging app and had connections in the United States, Ukraine and Germany. Police said the ring was headed by Amos Dov Silver, founder of the Israeli online drug marketplace Telegrass. Silver was arrested in Ukraine early today.
(AFP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, Malaysia suspended all Boeing 737 Max 8 flights in and out of the country following two recent fatal crashes.
(AP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, Dutch police arrested two men in Amsterdam for their suspected involvement in the coordinated Islamic State attacks on Paris in November 2015 that killed 130 people. One suspect (29) will be held in restrictive custody for at least two weeks, while the other suspect (31) had to be released for health reasons.
(Reuters, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 12, In Nigeria gunmen abducted a Lebanese construction worker and killed another man in the northern city of Kano.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, Norwegian Air said it will temporarily ground its Boeing 737 MAX 8 passenger jets at the advice of European regulators.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, Oman said it was "temporarily suspending" all flights by Boeing 737 MAX aircraft in the sultanate following the March 10 crash of an Ethiopian Airlines jetliner, becoming the first nation on the Arabian Peninsula to ground the planes.
(AP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, A Pakistani court sentenced 20 members of a criminal gang to death after finding them guilty of killing several security officials and kidnappings in Punjab province. The Chotu gang remained active until 2016, when police backed by military helicopters raided its hideouts in the town of Rajanpur and arrested dozens of suspects.
(AP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, A Sudanese court overturned flogging sentences for nine women for taking part in protests against President Omar al-Bashir's three-decade rule. The court ruled that the women had already spent enough time in jail and ordered their immediate release.
(AFP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, The Syrian government condemned a statement by influential US senator Lindsey Graham that the occupied Golan Heights should remain "forever" under the control of Israel.
(AFP, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, In eastern Syria Kurdish-led forces said more people were surrendering from the Islamic State group's last scrap of territory, after overnight air raids and shelling ravaged jihadist outposts. Hundreds of jihadist fighters and their families surrendered and the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces said the battle was as good as over. SDF spokesman Mustefa Bali said about 3,000 jihadists had handed themselves over to the SDF in the past 24 hours.
(AFP, 3/12/19)(Reuters, 3/12/19)(AFP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 12, Ukraine's security service said it has detained an Israeli man who heads a massive global drug trafficking network that markets illegal drugs through the internet.
(Reuters, 3/12/19)
2019 Mar 12, A document drawn up by the World Food Program (WFP), labeled as a "Concept of Operations," outlined how the UN organization and its partners "may facilitate the identification, staging, forward movement, reception, and sustainment of (Rohingya) refugees" on Bhasan Char, Bangladesh, estimating an initial appeal for donor funding of between $8.6 and $19 million.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 12, A UN humanitarian agency warned that thousands of Yemeni civilians are caught in the embattled northern district of Hajjah and that 22 people have been killed over the last two days in air strikes by the Saudi-led coalition.
(SFC, 3/13/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 13, The United States grounded Boeing's money-spinning 737 MAX aircraft over safety fears after an Ethiopian Airlines plane crash that killed 157 people, leaving the world's largest plane maker facing its worst crisis in years.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 13, The US Pentagon outlined new rules for transgender troops. A new policy will largely bar transgender troops and military recruits from transitioning to another sex, and require most individuals to serve in their birth gender.
(SFC, 3/14/19, p.A7)
2019 Mar 13, Pete Kaiser became the latest Alaska Native to win the 1,000-mile Iditarod dog sled race.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, California's Gov. Gavin Newsome issued an executive order suspending the state's death penalty.
(SFC, 3/13/19, p.A1)
2019 Mar 13, A winter storm brought blizzards, rain or floods to more than 25 US states. About 1,000 flights were cancelled at Denver Int'l. Airport and nearly 40 more at Colorado Springs.
(SFC, 3/14/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 13, In NYC Francesco "Frank" Cali (53), the reputed boss of New York's Gambino crime family, was shot dead outside his home on Staten Island. Suspect Anthony Comello (24) was arrested in New Jersey on March 16. His lawyer later said Comello apparently believed Cali was part of the “deep state" working to undermine Donald Trump.
(AFP, 3/14/19)(SFC, 3/18/19, p.A5)(The Independent, 12/7/19)
2019 Mar 13, Algeria's government declared itself ready for talks with protesters seeking rapid political change, saying it sought a ruling system based on "the will of the people" after opposition groups rejected proposed reforms as inadequate. Hundreds of school teachers and students protested in Algiers amid fears that President Abdelaziz Bouteflika plans to extend his two-decade rule.
(Reuters, 3/13/19)(AFP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, In Australia Cardinal George Pell, who in past years attended the retreat as Francis' finance minister, was sentenced to six years in prison for sexually abusing two youths in the 1990s. Pell must serve a minimum of 3 years and 8 months before he is eligible for parole. He planned to appeal.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, The news site Zurnal reported that Croatian intelligence officers have tried to recruit followers of the Salafi branch of Islam to smuggle weapons to their mosques in Bosnia. Croatia denied the allegations.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 13, In Brazil Before Guilherme Taucci Monteiro (17) and Henrique de Castro (25) launched an assault on a K-12 public school in Suzano, a suburb of Sao Paulo. Monteiro opened fire with a .38 caliber handgun and de Castro used a crossbow. Seven were killed at the school, including five students, a teacher and a school administrator. Before assaulting the school, they shot and killed a man who owned a used car dealership nearby. Instead of facing officers Monteiro shot de Castro in the head and then shot himself.
(AP, 3/13/19)(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 13, Britain's finance minister and business chiefs urged the country to avoid a "no deal" Brexit after another crushing parliamentary defeat for PM Theresa May over her EU-divorce deal with Brussels. Business leaders reacted with fury after the British government unveiled a temporary tariff regime that could see higher prices on an array of imports ranging from cars to butter, if the country crashes out of the EU later this month without a deal.
(AFP, 3/13/19)(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, Congo's new Pres. Felix Tshisekedi pardoned about 700 political prisoners who were jailed under his predecessor.
(SFC, 3/14/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 13, Egypt barred the passage, takeoff and landing of Boeing 737 MAX aircraft. No Egyptian airlines had Boeing 737 MAX jets in their fleets.
(Reuters, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, Georgia said it had detained two people for handling and trying to sell $2.8 million worth of radioactive uranium-238, which can be developed into nuclear bomb material.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, German authorities extended compensation payments to more gay men who were investigated under a law criminalizing homosexuality that was enthusiastically enforced in West Germany after World War II.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, Greece opened its biggest land registry office in Athens, home to nearly half of the Greek population. Greece, the only European country without a proper register of land ownership, was confident it will finally have one in place by 2021 after spending hundreds of millions of euros on a project that began more than 20 years ago.
(Reuters, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 13, In Indonesia the wife of an Islamic militant arrested for plotting attacks in Jakarta detonated a bomb during a siege of their home in North Sumatra, killing herself and her two-year-old child.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, Iraq banned US plane maker Boeing Co's 737 MAX aircraft from entering or transiting its airspace.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, A senior Israeli official said the army has opened criminal investigations into the deaths of 11 Palestinians killed by Israeli fire during protests along the Gaza border over the past year.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, Israel's army said it has uncovered a unit created by Hezbollah across the ceasefire line in the Syrian Golan Heights and led by Hezbollah commander Ali Musa Daqduq, previously jailed over an attack on US forces.
(AFP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, In Kenya the sixth Global Environment Outlook was released at a UN conference in Nairobi. It said unsustainable human activities globally have degraded the Earth's ecosystems, endangering the ecological foundations of society.
(SFC, 3/14/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 13, Malaysia's government backtracked on an earlier plan to abolish capital punishment for all crimes, saying the death penalty stays but will no longer be mandatory for selected offences.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, Malaysia's government ordered 34 schools in southern Johor state to close after toxic waste illegally dumped into a river sickened scores of students and teachers.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, In Nigeria a three-story building that housed a school collapsed in Lagos. 20 people were soon confirmed dead in the school building, and most of them are children. The school had been operating illegally on the top two floors.
(Reuters, 3/13/19)(AP, 3/14/19)(AP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 13, Norwegian Air said it will seek compensation from plane maker Boeing for costs and lost revenue after grounding its fleet of 737 MAX 8 aircraft in the wake of the Ethiopian Airlines crash.
(Reuters, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, A boat with migrants floundered and took on water while trying to cross the Mediterranean Sea to Spain. 45 migrants reportedly died while 21 others were rescued.
(SFC, 3/15/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 13, Sudan's new PM Mohamed Tahir Eila unveiled a 20-member cabinet tasked with solving an economic crisis that has triggered nationwide protests against the decades-old rule of President Omar al-Bashir.
(AFP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, In eastern Syria Clashes continued as the SDF worked to thwart IS counterattacks.
(AFP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, Ukraine defended its decision to deny entry to an Austrian journalist, claiming that Austria has been too friendly to Russia.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, A human rights expert urged the UN to take "immediate action" to provide justice and remedies to displaced minority communities in Kosovo who were sheltered on lead-contaminated wasteland.
(AP, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 13, Venezuela's Pres. Nicolas Maduro's government scrambled on to return power to western Venezuela following heavy looting in Zulia, the second largest city. China offered to help the South American nation end its worst blackout on record.
(Reuters, 3/13/19)
2019 Mar 14, Scientists said California was now drought-free for the first time since December, 2011.
(SFC, 3/15/19, p.C1)
2019 Mar 14, Joseph W. Knowland (88), former published of the Oakland Tribune, died at his home in Walnut Creek, Ca. He took over the publisher's chair in 1974 following the death of his father, ex-US Sen. William Knowland. The paper was sold in 1977 to Combined Communications Corp.
(SSFC, 3/24/19, p.C11)
2019 Mar 14, Ralph Metzner (b.1936), Germany-born American psychologist and expert on psychedelic drugs, died at his home in Sonoma, Ca. He authored more than 20 books including "The Psychedelic Experience" co-written with Richard Alpert and Timothy Leary and published in 1964.
(SFC, 3/27/19, p.C5)
2019 Mar 14, Former Indiana Sen. Birch Bayh (b.1928) died at his home in Easton, Md. Bayh served as Indiana senator from 1963 to 1981 and was a champion of the landmark 1972 law banning discrimination against women in college administrations and athletics.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birch_Bayh)(SFC, 3/15/19, p.A9)
2019 Mar 14, In Texas Beto O'Rourke (46), a skateboarding former punk rocker feted as one of the Democratic Party's rising stars, announced he is running for president, joining a crowded field of candidates vying to challenge Pres. Donald Trump in 2020.
(AFP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, PEN American announced that Saudi women Nouf Abdulaziz, Loujain al-Hathloul and Eman al-Nafjan have won the PEN/Barbey Freedom to Write Award. The award was established in 1987 and is given to writers imprisoned for their work.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, In Afghanistan a gunbattle erupted between Afghan forces and supporters of Atta Mohammad Noor, a powerful politician in the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif, who rejected the appointment of a new provincial police chief by President Ashraf Ghani.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Algeria's new PM Noureddine Bedoui said he would form a temporary government of technocrats and others to work toward political change in response to weeks of street protests, and he urged the opposition to join in a dialogue.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Belgian cardinal Godfried Danneels (85), a strong liberal voice within the Roman Catholic Church, died. He was once seen as an outside contender to succeed Pope John Paul II.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, British lawmakers voted on a government proposal setting out what PM Theresa May says are the options on how long to delay Brexit. The House of Commons voted 413-202 to ask the EU to delay the country's exit.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)(AP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 14, Flight recorders from a doomed Ethiopian Airlines flight arrived in France for analysis as frustrated relatives of the 157 people killed stormed out of a meeting with airline officials in Addis Ababa.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Greece reported that its unemployment rate, the highest in the 28-country European Union, climbed slightly to 18.7 percent in the final quarter of 2018.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, India and Pakistan agreed to go forward with a new border crossing and route for Sikh pilgrims to visit a holy temple in Pakistan, a rare glimmer of cooperation after tension flared over the neighbors' decades-old Kashmir dispute.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, In India part of a pedestrian bridge connecting a train station with road has collapsed in Mumbai, killing at least one person and injuring more than a dozen others.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Japan followed other countries on multiple continents in banning the Boeing 737 Max 8 and 9 aircraft from its airspace following the March 10 Ethiopian Airlines' crash.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Japan-based Toyota Motor Corp. announced it is investing an additional $750 million at five US plants that will bring nearly 600 new jobs, including the production of two hybrid vehicles for the first time at its Kentucky facility.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Malaysian prosecutors said the attorney-general has ordered the murder case to proceed against Doan Thi Huong, a Vietnamese woman accused in the killing of the estranged half-brother of North Korea's leader.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Malaysia ordered 111 schools to close as more than 200 children, teachers and others were taken to hospital after breathing in chemical fumes, but PM Mahathir Mohamad said he believed the poisoning crisis was under control.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Authorities in western Mexico found 19 plastic bags, presumably containing human bodies, in a township just east of the city of Guadalajara.
(AP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 14, Mozambique cancelled flights to several domestic destinations as a tropical cyclone, potentially the strongest to hit the country in nearly two decades, approached. Cyclone Idai hit Mozambique late today and continued on to Zimbabwe and Malawi. Over the next two days more than 140 people were killed, hundreds more were missing and tens of thousands left stranded in mainly poor, rural areas.
(AFP, 3/14/19)(AP, 3/16/19)(SSFC, 3/17/19, p.A7)
2019 Mar 14, NATO's 2018 annual report showed that the US-led alliance moved closer to a pledge to dedicate 2 percent of national economic output on defense every year, with European allies reaching the 1.51 percent level, a five-year high.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, In Pakistan a roadside bomb went off in a market near the town of Panjgur, Baluchistan province, killing two people and wounding seven.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Hundreds of Palestinians began taking to the streets in multiple locations throughout the Gaza Strip, protesting the rising cost of living in the Palestinian enclave. Over the next days dozens of people were arrested, including journalists and human rights workers, with security forces using violence to break up the demonstrations.
(AFP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 14, Philippine Pres. Rodrigo Duterte publicly named 46 government officials, including three congressmen, who he says are involved in illegal drugs, and said criminal investigations of them are underway.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, In the Philippines a spokesman for Manila Water Co. Inc., Jeric Sevilla, said that water supplies will be cut for at least six hours a day for an estimated 6.8 million people in more than a million households until the rainy season fills dams and reservoirs in May or June.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, In the Philippines Abu Dar, the leader of Dawla Islamiya, an alliance of pro-Islamic State fighters, was believed to be one of four rebels killed during fighting in Lanao del Sur province. The gunbattle that also left four soldiers dead near southern Tubaran town. DNA tests later confirmed his identity.
(Reuters, 3/15/19)(AP, 4/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Poland's Catholic Church leaders revealed that they have recorded cases of 382 priests abusing minors since 1990.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, The head of the state-backed Saudi human rights commission dismissed an international investigation into the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi as interference, and said everyone accused was already facing justice in the kingdom.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Slovak police and prosecutors said a suspect has been charged with ordering the slaying last year of an investigative reporter and his fiancee, a case that brought down the Slovak government. Slovakian media reported the suspect was Marian Kocner, a businessman long suspected of involvement in the crime. Kocner was already in detention in a separate case involving alleged forgery and securities crime.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, In Sudan hundreds of protesters chanting anti-government slogans took to the streets of several neighborhoods in Khartoum, while President Omar al-Bashir said he would seek dialogue with the opposition for the sake of stability.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, In eastern Syria Islamic State militants accompanied by women and children surrendered to the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in their hundreds as the jihadists lost ground to a US-backed assault on their last shred of territory. More than 15 militants were reported killed this morning.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, Turkey's President Tayyip Erdogan opened one of the world's largest hospitals in Ankara, brushing aside criticism of what is the latest in a series of mega projects that have marked his 16 years in power. The Ankara City Hospital, built at a cost of around 1 billion euros, is equipped with some 3,810 beds and covers an area the size of around 100 football pitches.
(Reuters, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, The United Nations said that no UN staff should travel on the Boeing 737 Max 8 planes.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 14, In Yemen the Saudi-led coalition launched a series of airstrikes along the Yemen-Saudi border that mistakenly killed 8 border guards and wounded 33 others allied with the government in the Jawf governorate.
(AP, 3/14/19)
2019 Mar 15, Pres. Donald Trump signed the first veto of his presidency, overriding congressional opposition to secure emergency funds to build more walls on the US-Mexico border.
(AFP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 15, The US State Department said that it is eliminating a coveted five-year tourist visa for Cubans, dealing a heavy blow to entrepreneurs and Cuban members of divided families, who used the visas to see relatives in the United States and buy precious supplies for their businesses on the island.
(AP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 15, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said the United States will revoke or deny visas to International Criminal Court personnel who attempt to investigate or prosecute alleged abuses committed by US forces in Afghanistan or elsewhere and may do the same with those who try to take action against Israel.
(AP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, The US Special Counsel's Office asked a court to delay sentencing for US President Donald Trump's former deputy campaign chairman, Rick Gates, amid "ongoing investigations" stemming from the Russia investigation.
(Reuters, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, The US Environmental Protection Agency banned consumer sales of a paint stripper following personal appeals by families of men who died while using the product. The rule does not affect commercial uses.
(SFC, 3/16/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 15, American poet W.S. Merwin died at his home in Hawaii. Merwin was a two-time winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the US poet laureate from 2010-2011.
(SFC, 3/18/19, p.C3)
2019 Mar 15, In Minnesota the body of a child was found inside a blanket along a highway near Austin. Dariaz Higgins, the father of Noelani Robinson (2), was accused of killing her mother, Sierra Robinson (24), in Milwaukee last week.
(SSFC, 3/17/19, p.A8)
2019 Mar 15, The Univ. of Tennessee said it will begin providing free tuition to state residents stating in the fall of 2020.
(SFC, 3/16/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 15, In Washington state a US District judge granted a temporary restraining order that let Microsoft take over 99 websites that Iranian hackers had used to try to steal sensitive information from targets in the US.
(SSFC, 3/31/19, p.D2)
2019 Mar 15, In Afghanistan Sultan Mahmoud Khirkhowa, a reporter with the local Zhman TV and radio, was killed when two men on a motorcycle opened fire on his vehicle in eastern Khost province.
(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 15, In Algeria a huge crowd of demonstrators marched through Algiers for a fourth consecutive Friday to step up demands for President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's ouster, rejecting his offer not to seek re-election.
(AFP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, In London Michael Seed , a 58-year-old man nicknamed "Basil," was found guilty of being the sixth member of a gang of aging criminals who carried out the 2015 Easter weekend robbery at the Hatton Garden Safety Deposit building, one the most audacious in the annals of British crime.
(Reuters, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, In northern China a landslide knocked down several buildings, killing seven people and leaving 13 others missing in Xiangning county, Shanxi province.
(AP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 15, In Congo DRC at least one person was left dead after protests over local elections turned violent. Members of President Felix Tshisekedi's Union for Democracy and Social Progress took to the streets in Kinshasa and in other parts of the country after the party failed to win any senate seats from Kinshasa in the regional assembly.
(AP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 15, The Catholic Church in Costa Rica asked for forgiveness following recent accusations that three of its priests sexually abused minors, amid a clerical abuse scandal that has ravaged the institution's credibility around the globe.
(Reuters, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, Czech police said they have broken up an international ring smuggling migrants from southeast Asia to western Europe.
(AP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, The EU imposed sanctions on eight more Russian officials that it says were involved in the seizure by Russia of Ukrainian ships and crew in November.
(AP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, Greece backed calls by Bolivia's left-wing President Evo Morales for a negotiated settlement to the severe political and financial crisis in Venezuela, in what marks a different approach to that pursued by key European allies.
(AP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, The Iraqi government started exhuming a mass grave left behind by the Islamic State group in the northwestern Sinjar region in the presence of Nobel Peace Prize laureate Nadia Murad, whose slain relatives are believed to have been buried in the area. Over 70 mass graves have been discovered in Sinjar since it was liberated from IS in November 2015.
(AP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 15, Israel struck dozens of Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip overnight in response to rockets from the Palestinian enclave, including rare fire toward its economic capital Tel Aviv.
(AFP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, In Kenya nations meeting at the UN environment assembly in Nairobi announced that they had agreed to "significantly reduce" single-use plastics over the next decade.
(AFP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, A court in North Macedonia sentenced 16 people, including a former interior minister, from 7 to 18 years in prison for their role in a violent intrusion in parliament at the height of a political crisis in 2017.
(AP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, In Poland thousands of students marched in rainy Warsaw and other cities to demand a ban on burning coal, a major source of carbon dioxide. Tens of thousands of young people skipped school across the globe to march through the streets for an international day of student protests aimed at pushing world leaders into action on climate change.
(AP, 3/15/19)(AFP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, In New Zealand shootings at two mosques in Christchurch left 50 dead in the country's worst-ever mass shooting. Video footage by the shooter was live streamed and widely shared online. Brenton Harrison Tarrant, an Australian-born man (28), was arrested and charged with murder. He left behind a 74-page document posted on social media under his name in which he said he hoped to survive the attack to better spread his views in the media.
(Reuters, 3/15/19)(AFP, 3/15/19)(AP, 3/16/19)(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 15, Nicaragua released 50 prisoners held for taking part in anti-government protests, authorities said, giving a fresh impetus to peace talks on ending the country's long running political crisis.
(AFP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, In eastern Syria the IS launched three suicide attacks outside Baghouz, killing six people as they fled the village near the Iraqi border. An SDF official said IS militants were holding some 300 prisoners, both civilians and SDF fighters.
(AFP, 3/16/19)(SFC, 3/16/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 15, Freeman Mbowe, the head of Tanzania's main opposition party, condemned what he described as a climate of fear installed by a "police state" after he was held in prison for more than three months.
(AFP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, A Turkish court convicted Neil Prakash (27), an Australian-born Islamic State militant, of belonging to a terror group and sentenced him to more than seven years in prison. The court said he could be released in 2½ years under Turkish law.
(AP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, Venezuela President Nicolas Maduro created a military unit charged with protecting basic installations and services such as electricity and water just over a week after the country was hit with a massive blackout.
(AFP, 3/15/19)
2019 Mar 15, In Venezuela German journalist Billy Six, detained by Venezuelan intelligence services four months ago, was freed in Caracas, but must report to the court every 15 days. Six was allowed to leave Venezuela if he chose and soon flew home from Caracas.
(AFP, 3/15/19)(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 15, Cyclone Idai hit Zimbabwe, cutting off power and communications. At least 31 people died in southeastern Zimbabwe as homes and bridges were swept away by the tropical storm. The confirmed dead soon rose to 98 with least 217 more missing.
(Reuters, 3/16/19)(SSFC, 3/17/19, p.A7)(AFP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 16, Facebook Inc said it removed 1.5 million videos globally of the New Zealand mosque attack in the first 24 hours after the attack.
(Reuters, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 16, It was reported that Michael R. White, a US Navy veteran from California, has been sentenced to 10 years in prison in Iran, becoming the first American known to be imprisoned there since President Donald Trump took office. White was reportedly convicted of insulting Iran's supreme leader and posting private information online.
(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 16, American rock guitarist Dick Dale (b.1937) died in Los Angeles. His loud chord instrumentals on songs like "Miserlou" and "Let's Go Trippin'" earned him the title King of the Surf Guitar.
(SFC, 3/19/19, p.A9)
2019 Mar 16, In Nevada a robbery suspect died following a shootout the previous evening outside the Bellagio hotel-casino in Las Vegas.
(SSFC, 3/17/19, p.A8)
2019 Mar 16, In Afghanistan at least 50 members of the Afghan security forces surrendered to the Taliban in a fight for control of the western province of Badghis. The Red Cross facilitated the handover of the bodies of 20 soldiers to the Afghan National Army Corps.
(Reuters, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 16, Albanian opposition supporters clashed with police while trying to storm the parliament building in a protest against the government of Socialist PM Edi Rama, which they accuse of being corrupt and linked to organized crime.
(AP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, The local bonfire group in Lustenau, Austria, took three months to build a structure that burned down in less than half an hour this evening. The world's tallest bonfire clocked in at 60.646 meters (198.97 feet). The previous record structure was a 47-meter (154.2-foot) bonfire in Alesund, Norway in 2016.
(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 16, Nigel Farage, the politician who probably did more than anyone else to force Britain's referendum on membership of the European Union, joined protesters at the start of a 270-mile march over what they call a betrayal of the Brexit vote.
(Reuters, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, China's anti-corruption watchdog said it would prosecute Nur Bekri, one of the highest-ranking Uighur officials in the country, over allegations of graft and corruption during his time as governor of Xinjiang province.
(Reuters, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, Several thousand Croats demonstrated in Zagreb, demanding tougher measures against domestic violence and more training for employees in state institutions to help them tackle the problem.
(AP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, In France demonstrators looted and torched shops and businesses on the famed Champs-Elysees avenue in Paris, on the 18th straight weekend of "yellow vest" protests.
(AFP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, Indonesia's anti-graft agency named Muhammad Romahurmuziy, a prominent Islamist politician backing President Joko Widodo's re-election campaign, as a suspect in a bribery case. Romahurmuziy, chairman of the United Development Party (PPP), was arrested a day earlier.
(Reuters, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, In Nicaragua riot police used tear gas against opposition demonstrators and reporters, temporarily detaining over a hundred people after they attempted to protest for the release of opponents to President Daniel Ortega's government.
(AFP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 16, In northeastern Nigeria a fire killed at least eight people and left 15,000 others without shelter after raging through a camp for people displaced by a war against Islamist insurgents in the town of Gajiram, Borno state.
(Reuters, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, Russia said it will respond to new European Union sanctions, without saying what action it would take.
(Reuters, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, Slovaks voted in round one of a ballot that could usher in Zuzana Caputova (45), a vocal government critic, as the country's first female president. Caputova, an anti-corruption campaigner with no experience in public office, won the first round, setting up a tough clash with the ruling Smer party's candidate.
(AP, 3/16/19)(Reuters, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, In eastern Syria US-backed forces battled Islamic State group fighters Saturday as the holdout jihadists clung to the last dregs of their crumbling "caliphate." The latest fighting broke out after the Kurd-led force attacked IS positions inside Baghouz. The SDF said around 32 jihadists, including at least four senior IS figures, were killed in the battle.
(AFP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, Two Turkish soldiers were killed and eight others were wounded in a clash during operations into northern Iraq. Six militants, including a woman, were "neutralized" during the operations.
(Reuters, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 16, Police in the Ukrainian city of Poltava arrested 10 people as nationalist demonstrators attempted to interrupt a campaign appearance by President Petro Poroshenko. In Kiev about 3,000 nationalists demonstrated outside the presidential administration building, demanding arrests in an alleged embezzlement scheme in Ukraine's defense industries that allegedly involves figures close to Poroshenko and a factory controlled by him.
(AP, 3/16/19)
2019 Mar 17, The Missouri River reached a record 30.2 feet in Iowa's Fremont County. Heavy rainfall and snowmelt caused flooding in Iowa, Kansas, Missouri and Nebraska with at least two deaths reported.
(SFC, 3/18/19, p.A8)
2019 Mar 17, Afghan officials said an overnight Taliban assault on checkpoints in northern Faryab province killed 22 troops.
(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, Algeria's Ministry of Religious Affairs informed clerics that they are no longer required to submit texts of their sermons to authorities for approval.
(Reuters, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 17, The French government faced heavy criticism over failing to maintain law and order during an arson and looting rampage by "yellow vest" protesters along the famous Champs-Elysees in Paris.
(AFP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, France's BEA air accident investigation said data from the flight data recorder of the Ethiopian jet that crashed last week has been successfully downloaded. BEA said the information has been transferred to Ethiopian investigators and that its technical work on the flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder was now done.
(Reuters, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, Indonesian disaster officials said flash flood and mudslides triggered by days of torrential downpours have torn through mountainside villages in Papua province, killing at least 58 people and injuring 59 others.
(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, In Indonesia a magnitude 5.5 earthquake triggered a landslide that hit a popular waterfall on the tourist island of Lombok, killing at least two people and injuring dozens.
(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, Iran's President Hassan Rouhani inaugurated a new phase in the development of a massive natural gas field. The development will allow Iran to overtake Qatar in the production of natural gas.
(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, In Mali gunmen attacked and briefly seized an army base overnight, killing at least 16 soldiers and destroying five vehicles in the central Mopti region. Central Mali is the locus of the Macina Liberation Front, led by Salafist preacher and militant leader Amadou Koufa.
(Reuters, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, In Northern Ireland two 17-year-olds and a 16-year-old died after a crowd of revelers trying to get into a St. Patrick's Day event caused what appears to be a crush at the Greenvale Hotel in Cookstown.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 17, In Pakistan four people were killed and 10 injured when a bomb went off on a train track in the resource-rich province of Baluchistan.
(Reuters, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, A Palestinian stabbed an Israeli soldier to death in the occupied West Bank and used his rifle to wound another soldier and a Jewish settler before escaping.
(Reuters, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, Serbia's Pres. Aleksandar Vucic pledged to defend the country's law and order a day after opposition supporters stormed the national TV station protesting what they said is his autocratic rule and firm control of the media. Thousands of demonstrators rallied around the presidential palace in Belgrade to protest the speech by Vucic.
(AP, 3/17/19)(AFP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, In Somalia a US air strike killed four people near the town of Afgoye. The US Africa Command (AFRICOM) later said it carried out the air strike and that three militants had died in the attack.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 17, In eastern Syria Lorenzo Orsetti (33), an Italian fighting alongside the Kurdish-led YPG force, was killed in battle as he fought diehard jihadists in the village of Baghouz.
(AFP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 17, Hundreds of Sudanese took part in anti-government protests in the capital and other cities as the government announced it had secured $300 million in loans to address the economic crisis that triggered the unrest.
(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, In eastern Syria the SDF admitted to facing difficulties defeating the IS extremists, saying they were being slowed by mines, tunnels and concerns over harming women and children still in Baghouz. The SDF said it would no longer estimate how many people remained, but said recent evacuees told the fighting forces that another 5,000 were still inside.
(AP, 3/17/19)
2019 Mar 17, In Turkey Kurdish activist Zulkuf Gezen died late today. He was one of scores of detainees on hunger strike in support of a Kurdish lawmaker in Diyarbakir. He reportedly hanged himself after 12 years in prison on charges of membership of the PKK Kurdish militant group.
(AFP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, US federal authorities said 1 million pounds (0.45 million kg) of pork products allegedly smuggled from China have been seized at a New Jersey port. Officials feared the meat could be contaminated with African swine fever virus, which has killed more than a million pigs in China.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Former Pennsylvania pediatrician Johnnie Barto was sentenced to at least 79 years in prison for the sexual assault of 31 children, most of them patients.
(SFC, 3/19/19, p.A8)
2019 Mar 18, A group of big internet companies added more than 800 different versions of the New Zealand mosque shooting video to a shared database used to block violent terrorist images and videos.
(AP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 18, The world's biggest plane maker faced escalating pressure after Ethiopia pointed to parallels between its crash and one in Indonesia, sharpening focus on the safety of software installed in Boeing's 737 MAX planes.
(Reuters, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro visited the Central Intelligence Agency's headquarters, an unusual move for a foreign head of state that was not on the public agenda for his first official trip to Washington.
(Reuters, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, In Chechnya Oyub Titiev, who runs the office of the Memorial Human Rights Center in the southern Russian region, was sentenced to four years in a penal settlement after he was found guilty of possessing illegal drugs. His supporters say he was framed, with the drugs planted in his car.
(AP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 18, China reported that it has arrested nearly 13,000 people, described as terrorists, and broken up hundreds of "terrorist gangs" in Xinjiang since 2014.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, In Congo DRC 32 people were killed and 91 others injured when a freight train carrying stowaways derailed overnight in central Kasai province.
(AFP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, In Crimea Russian flags flew across Simferopol as Pres. Vladimir Putin flew in to mark the fifth anniversary of Moscow's internationally condemned annexation of the peninsula from Ukraine. Putin inaugurated two new power stations in Crimea.
(AFP, 3/18/19)(Reuters, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, In Egypt new regulations were published in the official gazette late today, allowing the Supreme Media Regulatory Council to block websites and accounts for "fake news," and impose stiff penalties of up to 250,000 Egyptian pounds ($14,400), all without having to obtain a court order.
(AP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 18, The European Union and NATO condemned Russia's 2014 annexation of Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula five years after Moscow declared the region Russian territory.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, French PM Edouard Phillipe announced a ban on "yellow vest" protests on Paris' Champs-Elysees avenue and two other cities.
(SFC, 3/19/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 18, An Indian police official said a protester and a policeman have died in clashes outside Vedanta Ltd's eastern Indian alumina refinery in Odisha state.
(Reuters, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Indonesian officials said the number of people killed after torrential downpours triggered flash floods and mudslides that tore through mountainside villages in Papua province has climbed to 79.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, An Indonesian official and veterinarian said that an endangered orangutan with a young baby on Sumatra island was blinded after being shot at least 74 times with an air gun last week. The baby died from malnutrition as rescuers rushed the two animals to an orangutan veterinary clinic.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, An Iraqi court sentenced Bilal al-Marchohi (23), a Belgian man, to death by hanging for being part of the Islamic State militant group. He was one of dozens of foreign nationals facing the death penalty in Iraq.
(Reuters, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Israel's military expanded its massive manhunt for a Palestinian assailant as authorities announced that a second Israeli died of wounds sustained in a West Bank shooting attack the previous day.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Milan's Mayor Giuseppe Sala said Italy's famed La Scala opera house will immediately return 3 million euros ($3.4 million) sent to an escrow account by Saudi Arabia. He did not rule out future dealings with the kingdom despite concerns raised over its human rights record.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, It was reported that military roadblocks on Kashmir's main highway are delaying ambulances carrying patients and leading to confrontations with motorists that occasionally turn physical.
(Reuters, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Mozambique's President Filipe Nyusi said that more than 1,000 may have by killed by Cyclone Idai. The official death count stood at 84. The Red Cross said that 90 percent of Beira, a city of 500,000, had been damaged or destroyed. The death toll in Malawi from heavy rains and flooding stood at 56 as of last week.
(AP, 3/18/19)(Reuters, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Dutch police launched a huge manhunt for a gunman who killed three people and wounded nine others in a suspected terror attack inside a tram in Utrecht. Turkish-born suspect Gokmen Tanis (37) was arrested after a seven-hour manhunt by security forces. Two other suspects were also in custody, but were soon released. Another suspect was arrested the next day. On March 20, 2020, Tanis was sentenced to life in prison for killing four people.
(AFP, 3/18/19)(Reuters, 3/19/19)(SFC, 3/20/19, p.A2)(SFC, 3/21/20, p.A3)
2019 Mar 18, It was reported that Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed bills restricting online media and making a criminal of anyone who insults the state, laws that critics see as part of Kremlin efforts to stifle criticism and tighten media control.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Dozens of Serbian high school students have staged a sit-down protest demanding that authorities release a fellow student who was jailed during weekend anti-government protests in Serbia.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Scores of Sudanese protesters chanting "freedom, peace, justice" rallied in Khartoum, as a campaign against President Omar al-Bashir's rule was poised to enter its fourth month.
(AFP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Syria's the defence minister warned that government forces will reclaim control of northeastern areas controlled by the US-backed Kurds, whether by force or through reconciliation.
(AFP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, In eastern Syria US-backed SDF forces battled holdout jihadists after a night of shelling and heavy air strikes.
(AP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Turkey and Iran carried out a joint operation against militants from the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) on Turkey's eastern border.
(Reuters, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, A UN report released today showed an increase in allegations of sexual abuse and exploitation by staff working in UN agencies and their partner organizations.
(AFP, 3/18/19)
2019 Mar 18, Pope Francis turned down an offer to resign by French Roman Catholic cardinal Philippe Barbarin (68), but suggested he stand aside "for a while." Barbarin, the archbishop of Lyon, was recently convicted of failing to report a known predator priest to police.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, President Donald Trump hosted Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, the so-called Trump of the Tropics, launching what officials tout as a new alliance between their right-wing governments.
(AFP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, The United States imposed sanctions against Venezuela's state-run mining company Minerven and its president, Adrian Perdomo, in a bid to further cut off funding to the government of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, The US Supreme Court ruled 5-4 to uphold the Trump administration's power to arrest and hold immigrants indefinitely if they have past crimes on their records that could trigger deportation.
(SFC, 3/20/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 19, A federal jury in San Francisco found that Monsanto's Roundup was a likely cause of a Sonoma man's non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. Edwin Hardeman (70) was diagnosed with the cancer in 2015 after spraying Roundup on his property for decades. On March 27 a jury awarded Hardeman more than $80 million. This included $75 million in punitive damages against Monsanto. On July 15 a judge lowered the award to $25.2 million.
(SFC, 3/20/19, p.C1)(SFC, 3/28/19, p.A1)(SFC, 7/16/19, p.C1)
2019 Mar 19, In Washington state sheriff's deputy Ryan Thompson (42) was killed during an exchange of gunfire with a road rage driving suspect near the town of Kittitas. The suspect was also shot in the exchange and later died in the hospital.
(http://tinyurl.com/y3w22md7)(SFC, 3/21/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 19, The US FDA approved a new drug, brexanalone, made by Sage Therapeutics, as the first drug to treat postpartum depression. Infusion will average $34,000 per patient before discounts.
(SFC, 3/21/19, p.A8)
2019 Mar 19, In Algeria thousands of students, university professors and health workers rallied in Algiers calling for President Abdelaziz Bouteflika to quit, and a new group headed by activists and opposition figures told the army not to interfere.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, Brazilian physicist and astronomer Marcelo Gleiser was awarded the 2019 Templeton Prize, worth $1.4 million, for his work blending science and spirituality. Gleiser, a professor at Dartmouth College, New Hampshire, has written best-selling books and appeared on numerous TV and radio shows, discussing science as a spiritual quest to understand the origins of the universe and life on Earth.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, In Colombia former Southampton and Portsmouth midfielder Jhon Viafara (40) was arrested near Cali on a US drug warrant. A month ago, former national team defender Diego Leon Osorio was convicted for distributing narcotics.
(AP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 19, In western Ethiopia gunmen shot and killed five workers from a mining company near Nedjo town in the restive Oromiya region.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, French authorities reopened a case against Russian billionaire Suleyman Kerimov and indicted him for tax fraud in connection with the suspicious purchase of five luxury villas in southern France.
(AFP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 19, Hundreds of Indian traders in New Delhi burned Chinese goods and urged the government to raise import taxes on them to protest against China's trade and foreign policies. Chinese good were burned in similar protests in several other cities.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, Indonesian officials said the number of people killed after torrential downpours triggered flash floods and mudslides in Papua province has climbed to 89.
(SFC, 3/20/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 19, In Iraq three soldiers were killed and five wounded in an ambush on an army patrol in Tarmiyah, 50 km north of Baghdad.
(AP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, Tsunekazu Takeda (71) said he is stepping down as the president of the Japanese Olympic Committee amid a vote-buying scandal that French investigators suspect helped Tokyo land next year's Olympics. He again denied corruption allegations against him.
(AP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, Protests flared in parts of Indian Kashmir after police said a man being questioned in connection with a security investigation had died in custody. Rizwan Asad Pandit, a chemistry graduate who taught at a private school, had been arrested as part of a "terror case investigation".
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, Indonesian officials said the number of people killed after torrential downpours triggered flash floods and mudslides in Papua province has climbed to 89.
(SFC, 3/20/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 19, Kazakhstan's President Nursultan Nazarbayev (78), the only leader that the independent country has ever known, abruptly announced his resignation after three decades in power, raising uncertainty over the future course of the country.
(AP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, A boat carrying 27 people sank near Libya's coastal town of Sabratha. A baby's body was found after the shipwreck. At least eight migrants were missing at sea.
(AFP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, Aid workers in Mozambique said rapidly rising floodwaters have created "an inland ocean" endangering scores of thousands of families, as they scrambled to rescue survivors of Cyclone Idai who clung to rooftops and trees.
(AP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, In Myanmar at least six people were wounded in gunfire as government soldiers hunted ethnic Rakhine insurgents in the western town of Mrauk U.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, The Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters announced in Oslo that Karen Keskulla Uhlenbeck of the University of Texas at Austin was this year's winner of the Abel Prize, seen by many as the Nobel Prize in mathematics.
(AP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, Philippine authorities seized methamphetamine concealed in tea wrappers and biscuit cans in their second-largest drug haul this year. Three Chinese nationals and a Chinese-Filipino interpreter were arrested.
(AP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 19, Switzerland's parliament approved allowing convicted militants to be sent home to countries where they could face torture, leaving the government to decide how to implement the motion without breaking international law.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, In eastern Syria US-backed Syrian forces took control of an encampment held by the Islamic State group in eastern Syria, after dozens of militants surrendered overnight. An unknown number of militants still clung to a tiny sliver of land about 200 meters by 200 meters trapped between the Euphrates River and the encampment now held by the SDF.
(AP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, The UAE said 11 Arab states including Saudi Arabia, Algeria and Morocco have signed on to the first regional team to cooperate on a space program at the Global Space Congress in Abu Dhabi.
(AFP, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 19, In Zambia two workers died in an accident at Glencore's operation Mopani Copper Mines (MCM), prompting it to suspend production pending investigations.
(Reuters, 3/19/19)
2019 Mar 20, In Los Angeles a pregnant woman was stabbed multiple times during a carjacking in a San Fernando Valley neighborhood. Two people were soon taken into custody.
(SFC, 3/23/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 20, Philadelphia health officials said 74 people have contracted mumps at Temple Univ. This included 15 confirmed and 59 probable cases.
{Pennsylvania, USA, Microbiology}
(SFC, 3/21/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 20, Afghanistan's election board said the presidential election has been postponed by two months to Sept. 28, as authorities tried to iron out problems with the voting process.
(Reuters, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, Albania's Pres. Ilir Meta said he would be ready to resign from his post — or even to kill himself — if it would help resolve his country's political crisis.
(AP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, Algeria's ruling FLN party said it fully supports protesters, dealing one of the heaviest blows to President Abdelaziz Bouteflika since mass demonstrations against his rule began nearly a month ago.
(Reuters, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, Britain's PM Theresa May asked for a three-month delay to Brexit on to buy time to get her twice-rejected departure deal though parliament, but the request faced immediate resistance from the European Commission.
(Reuters, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, Diamond tycoon Nirav Modi, whose jewels once adorned stars from Bollywood to Hollywood, was ordered held without bail in London, more than a year after Indian authorities alleged he was involved in a $1.8 billion bank fraud.
(AP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, Britain's historic National Portrait Gallery said it has cancelled a £1 million ($1.3 million, 1.1 million euros) donation from the Sackler family, which is accused of contributing to the US opioid crisis. The Sackler Trust, run by the family that owns the controversial Purdue Pharma, which sells the prescription painkiller OxyContin.
(AFP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, European Union regulators fined Google 1.49 billion euros ($1.7 billion) for abusing its dominant role in online advertising, the third big antitrust penalty they've given the internet giant since 2017.
(AP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, Finland topped the UN index of the happiest nations for the second consecutive year, with researchers saying the small Nordic country of 5.5 million has succeeded in generating a happiness recipe for a balanced life not simply dependent on economic and material wealth. Denmark, Norway and Iceland took the next spots. The remaining top ten nations were The Netherlands, Switzerland, Sweden, New Zealand, Canada and Austria. The United States dropped from the 18th to 19th place.
(AP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, An Indian court acquitted four Hindu men accused of bombing a train between India and Pakistan on Feb. 19, 2007, that killed 68 people, mostly Pakistanis, citing a lack of evidence.
(Reuters, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, The Italian parliament blocked prosecutors from pursuing an investigation into Deputy PM Matteo Salvini for abuse of power and kidnapping migrants.
(Reuters, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, Marcello De Vito, president of Rome's city council and a senior figure in Italy's ruling 5-Star Movement, was arrested for allegedly accepting bribes in a widening corruption scandal centered on AS Roma's long-delayed plans to build a new stadium.
(Reuters, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, Japanese police arrested an American man on suspicion of fatally stabbing his Japanese wife at a court where they were to settle a divorce at the entrance to Tokyo Family Court.
(AP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, In Kazakhstan Kassym-Jomart Tokayev (65), speaker of the upper chamber of parliament, was officially sworn in as interim president. Dariga Nazarbayeva (55), the eldest daughter of the outgoing leader, was appointed speaker of parliament, fueling speculation that she may succeed her father as president after next year's election. Nazarbayev remained chairman of the security council and leader of the ruling party. Tokayev immediately proposed changing the name of the capital from Astana to Nursultan (Sultan of Light). Parliament approved the change within hours.
(AP, 3/20/19)(AFP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, In Mozambique aid workers scrambled to save hundreds trapped by floods around the port city of Beira. At least 200 people have died in Mozambique and 98 in Zimbabwe, but the death toll is likely to rise as rescuers are still finding bodies.
(Reuters, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, In the Netherlands right wing populist Thierry Baudet's Forum for Democracy emerged from the sidelines into the Dutch political mainstream as the biggest winner in provincial elections that determine the makeup of the parliament's upper house and also impact the coalition government of PM Mark Rutte.
(AP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 20, A Pakistani student stabbed a college professor to death in Bahawalpur, apparently because he felt that a planned party that women were going to be involved with would be un-Islamic.
(Reuters, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, A Pakistani court sentenced Czech model Tereza Hluskova (22) to eight years and eight months in prison on charges of drug trafficking. Hluskova was arrested in possession of 8.5 kg, or 19 pounds, of heroin in January 2018 at the Lahore airport from where she was heading to Ireland via Dubai, the United Arab Emirates.
(AP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, Ahmad Manasra (22) was traveling home from a wedding when he spotted a family in distress on the side of a West Bank road. Moments later, the Palestinian was fatally shot while another Palestinian driver was seriously wounded — both by an Israeli soldier in a nearby watchtower. In 2020 a plea bargain offered the soldier three months of community service. In Dec. 2020, an Israeli military tribunal upheld the contentious plea bargain.
(AP, 9/8/20)(AP, 12/10/20)
2019 Mar 20, The five parties of the Slovenian center-left government coalition signed an agreement of cooperation with the opposition Left party to secure support for its main projects over the next year.
(Reuters, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, South Korean police said they have arrested two men for using illegal spy cameras at motels to film and livestream videos of about 1,600 guests, raking in about 7 million won ($6,200) over the past three months.
(Reuters, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 20, Ukraine's Pres. Petro Poroshenko ordered new sanctions against Russian companies and individuals involved in construction and other activities in Crimea.
(SFC, 3/21/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 20, UN judges sentenced former Bosnian Serb political leader Radovan Karadzic to life in prison on appeal, ending one of the most momentous trials over massacres and other atrocities committed during the Balkan wars of the 1990s.
(Reuters, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, The UN human rights chief warned that children in Yemen continued to be killed and maimed at an alarming rate, despite a three-month-old truce in Hodeida. The UN said thousands of tons of food aid near the port city of Hodeida is infested with insects and must be fumigated to feed millions of people.
(AP, 3/20/19)(AFP, 3/20/19)
2019 Mar 20, Vietnamese police arrested eight Chinese suspected of drug trafficking after seizing 300 kg (660 pounds) of methamphetamine worth up to $26 million.
(AP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, Pres. Donald Trump signed an executive order requiring colleges and universities to protect free speech or loose federal funding for research.
(SFC, 3/22/19, p.A9)
2019 Mar 21, The Trump administration sanctioned two Chinese shipping companies, Dalian Haibo International Freight Co., because they are suspected of helping North Korea evade sanctions.
(AP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 21, US President Donald Trump's recognized Israeli sovereignty over the occupied Syrian Golan Heights. The Golan Heights are scattered with villages inhabited by 22,000 Druze, an Arab minority who practice an offshoot of Islam. Around 20,000 Jewish settlers live in the Golan itself, many working in farming, leisure and tourism.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 21, San Francisco-based Levi Strauss made its debut on the New York Stock Exchange and rose more than 30% to $22.41 per share. The company had already gone public in 1971 and was taken private by the Haas family in 1985.
(SFC, 3/22/19, p.A1)
2019 Mar 21, Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant signed one of the strictest abortion laws in the nation. The measure, effective July 1, bans most abortions once a fetal heartbeat can be detected.
(SFC, 3/22/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 21, Missouri Gov. Mike Parson declared a state of emergency following extensive flooding.
(SFC, 3/22/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 21, Schools were closed in Charlottesville, Va., after a 17-year-old made online racist threats. Nine schools were closed for two days and the teen faced a felony charge.
(SFC, 3/23/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 21, A Wisconsin circuit court judge blocked Republicans' contentious lame-duck laws limiting the powers of new Democratic Gov. Tom Evers.
(SFC, 3/22/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 21, The US Distilled Spirits Council said American whiskey producers are suffering a worsening hangover from the Trump administration's trade disputes.
(AP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, In Afghanistan a string of bombs exploded near a Shiite shrine and cemetery in Kabul as people gathered to mark Nowruz, the Persian new year, leaving six people dead and as many as 20 wounded.
(AP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, In Albania several thousand opposition protesters tried to enter the parliament building calling for the government's resignation and an early election.
(AP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, Brazil's former President Michel Temer was arrested in an investigation of alleged graft in the construction of nuclear plant Angra 3, rattling the political class and threatening to delay a major pension reform.
(Reuters, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, British PM Theresa May said a short delay to Britain's departure from the European Union would give parliament time to make a final choice on Brexit.
(Reuters, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, In eastern China a huge explosion rocked a chemical plant killed at least 64 people and injured more than 600 at the Chenjiagang Industrial Park in Yancheng city, Jiangsu province. More than two dozen people were missing. The death toll soon rose to 78.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)(AP, 3/23/19)(Reuters, 3/23/19)(AFP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 21, Human Rights Watch reported that authorities in China and Myanmar are failing to stop the brutal trafficking of young women, often teenagers, from the conflict-ridden Kachin region for sexual slavery.
(AP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, Congo DRC's health ministry said a six-month-old baby in the eastern city of Bunia has died of Ebola, becoming the first fatality of the disease in a provincial capital.
(AFP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, In Egypt at least 10 people were killed in an explosion at a chemical plant in Ain Sokhna on the Red Sea coast.
(AFP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, EU leaders told British PM Theresa May she can have two months to organize an orderly Brexit. More than one million people have rushed to sign a petition on the British parliament's website calling for the government to revoke its divorce notice to the European Union and remain in the bloc. Backers of Brexit said the petition needed to attract more signatures than the 17.4 million people who voted to leave the EU three years ago before anyone should take any notice.
(Reuters, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, Wikipedia's German-language page was blacked out in protest of a proposal to change European Union copyright rules.
(AP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, Berlin police made nine arrests late today after a fight broke out on the Alexanderplatz in the city center among some 400 backers of two rival stars of YouTube.
(AFP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 21, In Iraq a ferry overloaded with people celebrating the Kurdish new year sank in the Tigris River near Mosul, killing at least 100 people, mostly women and children.
(AFP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 21, Mozambique authorities said the death toll in the country has risen to 217 and around 15,000 people, many of them very ill, still need to be rescued. In neighboring Zimbabwe, the death toll from Cyclone Idai jumped to 139.
(Reuters, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, In Myanmar six villagers were killed and five injured in Rakhine state late today amid clashes between government troops and ethnic Rakhine rebels.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 21, The government of New Zealand announced a ban on "military-style" semi-automatic firearms and high-capacity magazines, just a week after such weapons were used in attacks on two mosques in the city of Christchurch that killed 50 people.
(AP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, A Pakistani anti-terrorism court sentenced two men, including a local government official, to life in prison for their role in the brutal campus lynching two years ago of Mashal Khan (23), a university student accused of blasphemy.
(Reuters, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, Two former Philippine officials said they filed a complaint last week with the International Criminal Court accusing Chinese Pres. Xi Jinping of crimes against humanity over his government's assertive actions in the disputed South China Sea, which they say deprived thousands of fishermen of their livelihood and destroyed the environment.
(AP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, A Serbian court sentenced seven people, three of them in absentia, to up to 11 years in prison for joining Islamic State and conspiring to recruit others to fight for the militants in Syria and elsewhere.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 21, In South Korea K-pop singer and television celebrity, Jung Joon-young, was arrested over accusations he shared his secret sex videos.
(Reuters, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir appointed ruling party head Ahmed Haroun, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC), as an assistant.
(Reuters, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, In Switzerland a woman (75), who wasn't named, stabbed to death a boy (7) as he walked home from school. She was arrested shortly after the attack in the northwestern city of Basel. The boy's family was originally from Kosovo and police investigations indicated he hadn't known the attacker.
(AP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 21, In eastern Syria Kurdish-led forces combed the banks of the Euphrates to smoke out the last jihadists preventing the much-delayed announcement of the demise of the Islamic State's "caliphate".
(AFP, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, The International Rescue Committee said 12 people died overnight after arriving at a camp in northeastern Syria from Islamic State's final enclave at Baghouz. Some 2,000 women and children arrived at the al-Hol camp from Baghouz.
(Reuters, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 21, Venezuelan intelligence agents detained Roberto Marrero, the chief of staff of opposition leader Juan Guaido, during a pre-dawn raid, putting to the test repeated US warnings that President Nicolas Maduro should not go after his opponents.
(Reuters, 3/21/19)
2019 Mar 22, US President Donald Trump met with five Caribbean leaders who have sided with the United States and most Western countries in backing Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido as head of state. Trump met with leaders from the Bahamas, Dominican Republic, Haiti, Jamaica and Saint Lucia at his private club in Palm Beach, Florida.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, The Trump administration hit Iran with new sanctions while Secretary of State Mike Pompeo denounced Iran's growing influence on a visit to Lebanon.
(AP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, President Donald Trump said he is reversing his administration's decision to slap new sanctions on North Korea, ordering them withdrawn.
(AP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 22, US Attorney General William Barr received special counsel Robert Mueller's confidential report on the Russia investigation.
(AP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 22, In Arizona Fernando Acosta (25) fatally stabbed Martha Tye in Peoria after their car veered off a freeway and crashed in the Phoenix suburb. A passer-by tackled the suspect and others helped to hold him until police arrived.
(SFC, 3/25/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 22, In Fresno, Ca., a one-year-old boy was fatally mauled by two roaming rottweiler dogs in the front yard of his home.
(SSFC, 3/24/19, p.A10)
2019 Mar 22, In Michigan an agreement was announced between the state and attorneys for the ACLU in which faith-based adoption agencies paid by the state will no longer be able to turn away couples or individuals because of religious objections.
(SSFC, 3/24/19, p.A13)
2019 Mar 22, A US federal judge ruled that New York state's ban on personal ownership of stun guns is unconstitutional.
(SSFC, 3/24/19, p.A10)
2019 Mar 22, Texas sheriff's Deputy Peter Herrera was critically wounded during a traffic stop in San Elizario. Gunman Facundo Chavez (27) was arrested. Herrera died of his wounds on March 24.
(SFC, 3/26/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 22, In Texas benzene and other contaminants seeped into a portion of the Houston Ship Channel after a dike failed near a fire-ravaged petrochemical tank farm.
(SSFC, 3/24/19, p.A10)
2019 Mar 22, In Afghanistan two American service members were killed during an operation. A suicide bomber killed one person and injured four, all members of the same family, in an attack in the southern province of Kandahar. The Taliban attacked two outposts in Sangin, killing 48 Afghan security personnel. Taliban spokesman Qari Yousuf Ahmadi said the two outposts were over-run, killing 52 Afghan troops and wounding 11 more.
(AP, 3/22/19)(Reuters, 3/22/19)(Reuters, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 22, Tens of thousands of Algerians rallied to demand the immediate resignation of Pres. Abdelaziz Bouteflika, who is fighting for his political survival in the face of relentless protests and the desertion of long-time allies.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, Scott Walker (76), the influential singer, songwriter and producer whose hits with the Walker Brothers in the 1960s included "The Sun Ain't Gonna Shine Anymore," died in London.
(AP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 22, In Canada Vlad Cristian Eremia (26) stabbed priest Claude Grou (77) in front of his congregation live on television during mass at St Joseph's Oratory in Montreal.
(AFP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 22, Chadian security sources said Boko Haram militants killed at least 23 Chadian soldiers overnight in the town of Dangdala, near the banks of Lake Chad.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, In Chile a group of South American presidents formed Prosur, a new regional bloc to replace Unasur, founded in 2008. The new bloc included Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Paraguay and Peru.
(SSFC, 3/24/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar 22, China said it will look into charges against two Chinese firms sanctioned by the US because they are suspected of helping North Korea evade sanctions.
(AP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, In China a document by the Communist Youth League (CYL) said it aimed to organize more than 10 million volunteering trips by 2022 for students pursuing technical degrees, seeking to deepen a "rural rejuvenation" drive christened by Xi.
(Reuters, 4/12/19)
2019 Mar 22, A Chinese court fined the firm behind the now-defunct Fanya Nonferrous Metals Exchange 1 billion yuan ($149.04 million) for illegal fundraising and sentenced founder Shan Jiuliang 18 years in prison for crimes including embezzlement.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, In central China a fire on a tour bus traveling along a highway left 26 people dead and as many as 30 injured in Changde, Hunan province.
(AP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, Egypt's Musicians Union barred singer Sherine Abdel-Wahab, popularly known by her first name, from performing after she suggested that Egypt does not respect free speech. It also summoned her for questioning. The singer apologized again after the latest remarks in a TV interview saying she was joking.
(AP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 22, The European Union underlined it does not recognize Israel's sovereignty over the Golan Heights after US President Donald Trump moved to do so for the territory viewed by European allies as occupied.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, The EU rejected PM May's request to extend the Brexit deadline until June 30. Leaders agreed to extend the date until May 22, on the eve of EU elections, if she can persuade the British Parliament to endorse her deal. Failing that she would have until April 12 to choose a new path.
(SFC, 3/23/19, p.A3)
2019 Mar 22, In Germany police arrested 11 people in raids around Frankfurt on a group suspected of planning an Islamic extremist attack using a vehicle and firearms.
(SSFC, 3/24/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar 22, Hungarian authorities detained a Syrian man accused of taking part in beheadings in Syria as a member of Islamic State.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, Indian security forces killed seven militants who they said belonged to Pakistan-based groups during four gunbattles in Kashmir - the highest number of clashes in a single day in recent years. Police said the militants belonged to Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM).
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, Indonesian airline Garuda said it plans to cancel a $6 billion order for Boeing 737 MAX jets, saying some passengers would be frightened to board the plane after two fatal crashes. Analysts said the deal had long been in doubt.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, Indonesian authorities detained a Russian man at Ngurah Rai airport in Bali as he was caught trying to smuggle a young orangutan in a suitcase. Zhestkov Andrei also had two live geckos and five lizards in his luggage and was scheduled to fly to Russia.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)(AFP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 22, Italy's Pres. Sergio Mattarella told visiting Chinese President Xi Jinping that China's new "Silk Road" linking Europe and Asia must be a "two-way street," addressing concerns among Western allies that the colossal infrastructure project is meant merely to amplify Beijing's global influence.
(AP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, In Italy a 5-month-old baby was brought to a hospital in Bologna by helicopter in cardiac arrest due to a home circumcision and soon died.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 22, The confirmed death toll in Mozambique and neighboring Zimbabwe reached 432, with 293 killed in Mozambique, and around 1.7 million people affected. Hundreds of thousands of people scrambled for shelter, food and water across a swathe of southern Africa.
(AFP, 3/22/19)(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, New Zealand's deputy prime minister Winston Peters said Brenton Harrison Tarrant, the gunman accused of killing 50 people in two mosques in the South Pacific nation, would spend the rest of his life in isolation in prison.
(AP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, North Korea abruptly withdrew its staff from a liaison office with South Korea, a development that is likely to put a damper on ties between the countries and further complicate global diplomacy on North Korea's nuclear program.
(AP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, In Pakistan gunmen on motorcycles opened fire on a convoy carrying Maulana Taqi Usmani, a prominent religious scholar, and his associates in the southern port city of Karachi, killing the cleric's two guards and seriously wounding his driver.
(AP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, Two Palestinians were killed by Israeli fire in separate border clashes.
(AFP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 22, Prosecutors said Panama's ex-president Ricardo Martinelli faces up to 21 years in jail for spying on political foes, reporters and business leaders while in power.
(AFP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 22, A Russian court sentenced Pavlo Gryb (20), a Ukrainian teenager, to six years in prison for plotting a bombing in a Russian school. He was kidnapped in summer 2017 in Belarus where he had traveled to meet a girl he met online. He later surfaced in a Russian prison. The girl turned out to be an officer from the Russian intelligence services who was messaging him on her behalf shortly before his trip. Gryb's family said he suffers from cirrhosis of the liver and partial vision loss, urgently needs surgery and may die in a Russian prison.
(AP, 3/22/19)(AFP, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, The Swiss government said Britons will be exempt from visa requirements to enter Switzerland in case Britain leaves the EU without a withdrawal agreement.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, Turkey's lira tumbled more than 4 percent against the US dollar, its biggest one-day fall since a currency crisis took hold in August, raising concerns that Turks are buying more foreign cash as ties with Washington deteriorate.
(Reuters, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 22, The UN Human Rights Council criticized Israeli settlement expansion in the occupied Syrian Golan Heights a day after US President Donald Trump's decision to recognize Israeli sovereignty over the disputed territory.
(Reuters, 3/22/19)
2019 Mar 22, Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido said Pres. Maduro had lost the ability to "finance political blackmail" to retain power thanks to pressure brought by foreign governments who have recognized him as the South American country's rightful leader in the midst of a hyperinflationary economic collapse.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, A student (16) at the Parkland, Florida, high school, where 17 people were killed in a mass shooting last year, took his own life. A week earlier student Sydney Aiello (19) took her own life. Her mother said she suffered from PTSD and survivor's guilt.
(SFC, 3/25/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 23, In southern Afghanistan a twin bombing at a public ceremony killed at least four people, including a provincial official, and wounded more than 30 in Lashkar Gah, Helmand province. In the north US air strikes in Kunduz province killed about a dozen civilians, as battle intensified there and in southern Helmand province. Four Afghan soldiers died in the fight.
(AP, 3/23/19)(Reuters, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 23, Hundreds of lawyers in Algeria marched in the country's capital, Algiers, to demand the departure of ailing 82-year-old President Abdelaziz Bouteflika at the end of his term scheduled on April 28.
(AP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, Cyclone Trevor made landfall along a remote stretch of the northern Australian coast, bringing fierce winds and heavy rains amid safety fears for a small number of residents who've stayed in the area. Meanwhile Cyclone Veronica, another category 4 system, was expected to cross the northwest Australian coast late today.
(AP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, Hundreds of thousands of people opposed to Britain's withdrawal from the EU marched through central London to demand a new referendum as the deepening Brexit crisis risked sinking PM Theresa May's premiership.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, Bulgarian Justice Minister Tsetska Tsacheva resigned following media reports that she and three other ruling center-right GERB party politicians have bought luxurious apartments at below market prices. Deputy Sports Minister Vanya Koleva also resigned over the deals.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, French "yellow vest" demonstrators began their 19th consecutive weekend of protests against President Emmanuel Macron's government as military units were deployed to help police clamp down on any trouble.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, Iraqi PM Adel Abdul Mahdi sought Egypt's support for efforts to tackle Islamist militants in the region during a visit to Cairo his first trip abroad since taking office in October.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, Ireland extradited dual citizen Eric Eoin Marques (33) to the US, where he faced charges of conspiracy to advertise and distribute child pornography. Prosecutors said Marques hosted an anonymous hosting service on the darknet that spread the porn for five years.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 23, Italy endorsed China's ambitious "Belt and Road" infrastructure plan, becoming the first major Western power to back the initiative to help revive the struggling Italian economy. The signing ceremony was the highlight of a three-day trip to Italy by Chinese President Xi Jinping. Italian firms also inked deals with Chinese counterparts worth an initial 2.5 billion euros ($2.8 billion).
(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, In Kazakhstan the order to change Astana's name to Nur-Sultan was issued by interim President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, who took power after Nursultan Nazarbayev resigned March 19.
(AP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, In Libya relatives and supporters of Abdullah al-Senussi, a Kadhafi-era intelligence chief jailed for his alleged role in a bloody crackdown during the country's 2011 uprising, protested in Tripoli to demand his release over health concerns.
(AFP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, In central Mali an ethnic Dogon militia already blamed for scores of attacks over the past year attacked Ogossogou, an ethnic Peuhl village just before dawn. The death toll from the massacre soon rose to 134 dead.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 23, Mexican police and federal officials detained 107 Central American migrants seeking to enter the United States in the border city of Reynosa. Unidentified gunmen began shooting at police, and one of the attackers was killed in the ensuing exchange of fire.
(Reuters, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 23, Mozambique said the number of people killed after Cyclone Idai tore through the country has risen to 417.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, New Zealand's chief censor banned a 74-page manifesto written by the man accused of slaughtering 50 people at two mosques in the city of Christchurch. The ban means anybody caught with the document on their computer could face up to 10 years in prison, while anyone caught sending it could face 14 years.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 23, Nigerians returned to vote in governorship and state elections after polling a fortnight ago was declared invalid in some areas because of violence.
(AFP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, Pakistan celebrated its national day with a military parade showcasing its missiles, tanks and aircraft. The prime minister and his Indian counterpart exchanged goodwill messages in a sign of easing tensions between the nuclear-armed rivals.
(AP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, Palestinian Habib al-Masri (24) was shot in the chest at protests near Beit Hanoun late today. Two others were wounded. Al-Masri soon died of wounds sustained from Israeli gunfire.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 23, Somalia's al Shabaab stormed a government building, detonating a suicide car bomb in the heart of Mogadishu with at least 15 people, including an assistant minister, killed during the ensuing gun battle. The four militants who attacked the building were shot dead.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, In Sudan eight children were killed in an explosion near a military facility in Omdurman, where they were searching for scrap metal to resell.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 23, The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) announced it had liberated the last village held by IS in Syria, declaring victory over the group. The SDF said it would continue its military and security campaigns against jihadist sleeper cells. IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi remained at large.
(AP, 3/23/19)(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, The Vatican said Pope Francis has accepted the resignation of Cardinal Ricardo Ezzati (77) as archbishop of Santiago, the highest-ranking member of the Catholic Church in Chile, who has been caught up in the country's sex abuse scandal. Spanish-born Capuchin friar and current bishop of Copiapo, Chile, Monsignor Celestino Aos Braco was named as temporary replacement.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)(AP, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 23, Al-Arabiya TV reported that the Saudi-Led coalition in Yemen launched raids on Houthi camps in the capital Sanaa, including the Al-Dailami air base.
(Reuters, 3/23/19)
2019 Mar 24, The United States clinched a strategic port deal with Oman which US officials say will allow the US military better access to the Gulf region and reduce the need to send ships through the Strait of Hormuz, a maritime choke point off Iran.
(Reuters, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, US Attorney General William Barr Mueller sent a letter to Congress saying he found no evidence in Special Counsel Robert Mueller's Russia report that the Trump campaign colluded with Russia in the 2016 election.
(Reuters, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 24, Chinese President Xi Jinping visited Monaco. This was the first state visit by a Chinese president to the principality. The palace said Monaco is seeking to boost its trade and economic cooperation with China.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, China's President Xi Jinping arrived in France where he had a private dinner with Macron in the resort town of Beaulieu-sur-Mer on the French Riviera.
(AP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 24, Voters on the tiny archipelago of Comoros went to the polls, with Pres. Azali Assoumani (60) widely expected to win a new term in an election that rivals say has been hijacked. The archipelago has had more than 20 successful or attempted power grabs since gaining independence from France in 1975. Its first leader, Ahmed Abdallah, lasted barely a month before being ousted.
(AFP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, A Hungarian court ordered the arrest of a 27-year-old Syrian man suspected of taking part in beheadings in Syria as a member of Islamic State.
(Reuters, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, Indonesia's long-awaited first subway opened in Jakarta with the aim of relieving crippling traffic gridlock in Southeast Asia's biggest economy. President Joko Widodo then presided over a groundbreaking ceremony to mark the beginning of the second phase 8-km (5-mile) northward line.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, Iraq's parliament sacked Nineveh provincial governor Nawfel Akoub, after 100 people died in the March 21 ferry disaster that sparked a wave of grief and anger. Sixteen people have been arrested as part of an investigation into the ferry capsize. 63 people were still listed as missing.
(AFP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, Israeli aircraft targeted Hamas positions in the Gaza Strip early today after Palestinians there threw explosive devices at the border fence during "riots".
(AFP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, Mali's government announced the sacking of senior military officers and the dissolution of a militia, a day after the massacre of more than 130 Muslims, including women and children.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, In Morocco about 10,000 teachers staged a new protest in Rabat to demand permanent jobs, hours after police had used water cannon to disperse an overnight demonstration.
(Reuters, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, Mozambique's death toll rose to 446 from 417. In Zimbabwe, UN agencies have given different tolls of 259 and 154, while in Malawi 56 people died in heavy rains ahead of Cyclone Idai.
2019 Mar 24, In New Zealand thousands gathered in cities to protest racism and remember the 50 Muslims killed by a gunman in Christchurch and as PM Jacinda Ardern announced a national remembrance service to be held later this week.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, Viking Ocean Cruises said rescue helicopters took more than 475 passengers from the Viking Sky cruise ship that got stranded off Norway's western coast in bad weather before the vessel departed for a nearby port under escort and with nearly 900 people still on board.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, In the Philippines more than 10,000 motorcycle riders staged a motorcade in the main highways of Manila to protest at new regulations forcing them to display bigger license plates, saying the measure would not solve the problem. President Rodrigo Duterte signed a measure into law earlier this month requiring all licensed motorbikes to display bigger front and rear plates to make them more visible to the authorities and any witnesses to crimes.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, Two Russian air force planes carrying a Russian defense official and nearly 100 troops arrived in Caracas, Venezuela, amid strengthening ties between the two countries.
(Reuters, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 24, In Sri Lanka work began on a $3.9 billion oil refinery to be funded by a Singapore-Oman joint venture next to a Chinese-run port in what will be Sri Lanka's largest foreign investment ever. The refinery is expected to be up and running in 2023.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, In eastern Syria Islamic State group jihadists emerged from tunnels to surrender to US-backed forces in Baghouz.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, Thailand held its first election since a 2014 military coup. Preliminary results indicated that Thailand's military-backed party won the most votes in the country's first election since a 2014 coup.
(AP, 3/24/19)(AP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 24, In Turkey thousands of supporters of a pro-Kurdish party gathered in Istanbul to celebrate the Kurdish New Year and to attend a campaign rally for local elections that will test the Turkish president's popularity.
(AP, 3/24/19)
2019 Mar 24, Clashes late today in Yemen's Hodeida left five fighters dead, despite a ceasefire agreement between warring parties in the port city.
(AFP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, Jeremy Richman (49), the father of one of the 20 children killed in the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Connecticut, was found dead of an apparent suicide inside his office building in Newtown.
(SFC, 3/26/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 25, Doctors in Baltimore performed what's thought to be the world's first kidney transplant from a living donor with HIV to an HIV-positive stranger.
(SFC, 3/29/19, p.A12)
2019 Mar 25, Attorney Michael Avenatti (48) was arrested in New York City on charges that included trying to shake down Nike for as much as $25 million by threatening the company with bad publicity. He was released after posting a $300,000 bond. Avenatti has also been charged with bank and wire fraud in separate cases in New York and California.
(SFC, 3/26/19, p.A7)
2019 Mar 25, Prosecutors said that faked data by a research technician was used to obtain federal grants for North Carolina's Duke Univ. The problem was discovered in 2013 after the technician was fired for embezzling university money. A former Duke employee will get nearly $34 million for alerting the government. Duke pay $112 million to settle the whistle-blower lawsuit.
(SFC, 3/26/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 25, In North Carolina five inmates escaped from the Nash County Detention center. Four of the five were caught within 24 hours.
(SFC, 3/27/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar 25, Austria arrested an Iraqi man "under suspicion to have carried out terrorist attacks on railways in Germany in October and December 2018".
(AFP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 25, British lawmakers exasperated by failed efforts to split from the European Union after three years of debates and negotiations voted to give themselves a broader say on what happens next.
(AFP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 25, China ordered a nationwide inspection of chemical firms four days after one of the country's worst industrial accidents.
(AFP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, Chinese President Xi Jinping signed multibillion-dollar deals on energy, the food industry, transport and other sectors as well as a bilateral statement on climate change during his state visit to France. Jinping received the full honors of a formal reception during his state visit that included attending the signing of a multi-billion dollar deal between European aircraft maker Airbus to China. Jinping agreed to work with European leaders to seek fairer international trade rules and to address the world's economic and security challenges.
(AP, 3/25/19)(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 25, Police in Comoros used tear gas to disperse demonstrators led by opposition leaders protesting against what they said were fraudulent presidential elections.
(Reuters, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, The EU announced it has completed its preparations for Britain crashing out of the bloc without a divorce accord, as fears of a chaotic "no-deal" Brexit grew.
(AFP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, In France around 20 people were arrested late today after gangs of vigilantes attacked camps of ethnic Roma people in northeast Paris after false reports that they were responsible for abductions in the area using white vans.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 25, The Hong Kong-based lawyer for two Saudi sisters who fled the kingdom said the young women have secured emergency visas and departed to a new country of residence.
(AP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, The board of India's private Jet Airways accepted the resignations of Chairman Naresh Goyal, his wife and a nominee of Gulf carrier Etihad Airways. Goyal quit amid mounting financial woes which have forced Jet Airways to suspend 14 international routes and ground more than 80 planes. The board approved the setting up of an interim management committee to oversee daily operations and cash flow of the company.
(AP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, Iranian state TV reported that flash floods in southern Iran have killed at least 17 people and injured 74.
(AP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, Italian media reported that former communist militant Cesare Battisti, jailed for life over four murders carried out in the 1970s, has confessed to the killings after decades of denying involvement.
(AFP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador called on Spanish King Felipe VI and Pope Francis to apologize for the conquest and the rights violations committed in the aftermath of Spanish rule over Mexico dating back to 1519. Madrid firmly rejected the proposal.
(AFP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 25, Morocco hosted ministers from 36 African countries for UN-backed talks on ending the four-decades-old conflict in Western Sahara, a swathe of desert on Africa's Atlantic coast.
(AFP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 25, A long-range rocket fired from the Gaza Strip slammed into a house in central Israel and wounded seven people early today. PM Benjamin Netanyahu, who faces an election on April 9, cut short his US visit after the rocket attack.
(AP, 3/25/19)(Reuters, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, Poland's Constitutional Tribunal ruled that controversial rules introduced by the right-wing government that allow lawmakers to choose members of a judicial body are in line with the constitution.
(AP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, In South Africa the 16-nation Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) began 2-day talks pushing for a referendum on the status of Western Sahara.
(AFP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 25, In South Africa mobs armed with metal rods and machetes began breaking into the homes of foreigners in Durban, chasing them out and looting their belongings. Three days of attacks displaced some 300 Malawi migrants, but no arrests resulted.
(AFP, 4/15/19)
2019 Mar 25, The US-backed Syrian fighters who drove the Islamic State from its last strongholds called for an international tribunal to prosecute hundreds of foreigners rounded up in the nearly five-year campaign against the extremist group.
(AP, 3/25/19)
2019 Mar 25, Venezuela was hit by a power blackout. Power was restored to much of the country by the evening but went out again during the night.
(Reuters, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, US Sec. of State Mike Pompeo expanded the Trump administration's ban on US aid to groups that promote or provide abortions to include organizations that that comply with the rules but give money to others that don't.
(SFC, 3/27/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar 26, The US Treasury took fresh aim at the international network funneling dollars and euros to Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), naming 25 individuals and entities for financial sanctions.
(AFP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, The US Supreme Court threw out a nearly $315 million judgment against Sudan stemming from the USS Cole bombing in 2000, saying Sudan hadn't properly been notified of the lawsuit.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, In the US a nationwide ban on bump stocks took effect. The attachment allowed semiautomatic weapons to fire rapidly like machine guns.
(SFC, 3/30/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 26, Prosecutors in Illinois' Cook County, who handle crimes in Chicago, dropped charges against actor Jussie Smollett who was accused of staging a hoax hate crime attack against himself. Details of the case were sealed.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 26, An attorney said the Pennsylvania Roman Catholic Diocese of Erie has agreed to pay $2 million to a man who was sexually abused as a child by a priest who made him say confession after the assaults. Defrocked priest David Poulson was sentenced this year to 2½ to 14 years in prison after pleading guilty to the sexual assault of one boy and attempted sexual assault of another.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, Facebook said it has shut down more than 2,600 fake accounts linked to Iran, Russia, Macedonia and Kosovo and aiming to influence political sentiment in various parts of the world.
(AFP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, SF-based ride-hailing service Uber announced that it has acquired Dubai-based competitor Careem for $3.1 billion.
(SFC, 3/27/19, p.D1)
2019 Mar 26, Algeria's powerful army chief Ahmed Gaid Salah said he wants to trigger the constitutional process that would declare President Abdelaziz Bouteflika unfit for office, after more than a month of mass protests against the ailing leader's long rule.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, The Canola Council of Canada confirmed that China formally posted a web notice suspending the license of Viterra for canola seed. Exporters reported last week that Chinese importers are unwilling to purchase the seeds at this time. This was seen as retaliation for Canada's arrest of a top executive of Chinese tech giant Huawei.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, China's former internet censor Lu Wei, who once held high-profile meetings with industry leaders such as Apple CEO Tim Cook and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, was sentenced to 14 years in prison on corruption charges.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, A court in the Czech Republic convicted Radim Zondra of knifing two-time Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova in her home in December, 2016, and sentenced him to eight years in prison.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, The European Commission ignored US calls to ban Chinese tech supplier Huawei as it announced a series of new cybersecurity recommendations for next-generation mobile networks.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, The European Parliament adopted copyright reforms championed by news publishers and the media business, in defiance of the tech giants that lobbied against it.
(AFP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, A German court upheld the murder convictions of two men whose midnight drag race in downtown Berlin in 2016 ended with a crash that killed another driver.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, Germany's meteorological agency DWD says 2018 was the warmest in the country since records began in 1881.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, A court in Georgia ruled that Jack Shepherd (31), a fugitive British man wanted for the manslaughter of a woman killed during a London date on a speedboat in 2015, is to be extradited. The web designer had showed up at a police station in Tbilisi, Georgia, in January and turned himself in.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, Israel kept up air strikes on Gaza and Palestinian militants launched new rockets despite the ceasefire claim. The UN envoy for the Middle East warned of catastrophic consequences from escalating violence in Gaza as Israel and the Palestinian group Hamas continued to exchange fire despite a ceasefire deal.
(AFP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, The academy of Italy's premier opera house, Teatro alla Scala, agreed to start a conservatory for both girls and boys in Saudi Arabia.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 26, In Mexico the head prosecutor of Veracruz state said search teams exhumed 12 sets of remains and have located three more bodies but not yet extracted them.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 26, In Morocco Larbi Rich (54), the driver of a passenger train that derailed and killed seven people last year, was convicted of manslaughter but ordered released on time already served.
(AFP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 26, Myanmar's Supreme Court agreed to rule on an appeal filed by lawyers for Reuters journalists Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo sentenced to seven years in prison for their reporting on Myanmar's brutal crackdown on Rohingya Muslims.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, A Pakistani court placed two teenage sisters from the minority Hindu community in a government shelter as authorities launched an investigation into whether the girls were abducted and forced to convert and marry two Muslim men.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, In South Africa several southern African leaders threw their support behind Western Sahara, with one calling the disputed territory the "last colony" on the African continent.
(AFP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, Spanish weather authorities said 32 million people in the southern European country, or around two-thirds of Spain's population, are having to deal with higher temperatures, longer summers and more frequent tropical nights as a result of climate change.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, In northern Syria the Islamic State group claimed responsibility for an attack early today on a checkpoint of US-backed forces in Manbij that killed seven fighters.
(AP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, Demonstrations spread across Syria denouncing Washington's recognition of Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights, in a show of unity in the war-torn country.
(AFP, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, Turkish and Russian forces carried out the first "independent and coordinated" patrols in the mainly Kurdish-controlled northern Syrian region of Tel Rifaat.
(Reuters, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, In Tunisia UN official Moncef Kartas, charged with investigating alleged violations of a UN arms embargo on Libya, was detained in Tunis on suspicion of spying. On March 29 Tunisian authorities confirmed that they had detained two Tunisians, including Kartas, on suspicion of "spying for foreign parties".
(AFP, 3/29/19)(AFP, 4/13/19)
2019 Mar 26, The all-female staff of the Vatican newspaper's monthly magazine on women's issues resigned abruptly en masse, saying the new editor was trying limit their autonomy and put them "under direct male control".
(Reuters, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, Venezuela canceled work and school as the second major blackout this month left streets mostly empty in Caracas and residents of the capital wondering how long power would be out amid a deepening economic and political crisis.
(Reuters, 3/26/19)
2019 Mar 26, Yemenis held a mass rally in Sanaa to show support for the Houthi movement on the fourth anniversary of a war that has killed thousands of people and pushed the country to the brink of starvation. An airstrike killed seven people near the Kitaf rural hospital.
(Reuters, 3/26/19)(SFC, 3/28/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar 27, The head of the US Customs and Border Protection held a press conference in El Paso to say the breaking point had arrived. Arrests all along the southern border have skyrocketed in recent months. Border agents were on track to make 100,000 arrests and denials of entry at the southern border this month.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 27, In Arkansas Andre Jackson (34) pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 25 years in prison for the murder of an Italian tourist during an attempted robbery. Carlo Marigliano was found shot to death in a crashed jeep outside a Little Rock apartment complex in July 2017.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 27, In California PG&E received approval from a bankruptcy court to fully access $5.5 billion in financing it lined up from major banks, despite objections from wildfire victims.
(SFC, 3/28/19, p.D1)
2019 Mar 27, Speaking in Hawaii Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen said her government has asked to purchase advanced new fighter jets and tanks from the US, a request that if approved, could set off new tensions between the US and China. Tsai said requests have been submitted for F-16V fighters and M1 Abrams tanks.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 27, In NYC Anna Sorokin (28), the one-time darling of the Big Apple social scene, stood trial on grand larceny and theft of services charges alleging she swindled $275,000 in a 10-month odyssey that saw her jetting to Omaha and Marrakesh before landing in a cell at Rikers Island.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, In Texas a helicopter crashed during a controlled burn at the Sam Houston National Forest killing Daniel Laird, a firefighter from northern California.
(SFC, 3/30/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 27, In Virginia James Alex Fields Jr. pleaded guilty to 29 of 30 federal charges stemming from the 2017 "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville. Anti-racist activist Heather Heyer was killed when Fields plowed his car into a crowd of protesters.
(SFC, 3/28/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 27, In Wisconsin the 3rd District Court of Appeals reinstated laws passed during the 2018 lame-duck legislative session that weaken powers of the Democratic governor and attorney general.
(SFC, 3/28/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 27, The $1 million Turing Award went to artificial intelligence pioneers Yoshua Bengio, Yann LeCun and Geoffrey Hinton.
(SFC, 3/28/19, p.D2)
2019 Mar 27, Ford said it will close three factories in Russia, causing heavy job losses, as it pulls out of passenger vehicle manufacturing in the country.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, Algeria's biggest union and an influential party backed an army call for President Abdelaziz Bouteflika to quit in a managed exit plan that was quickly rejected by protesters demanding the overthrow of the entire political elite.
(Reuters, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, Australia's top cyberwarrior revealed that his country actively participated in the electronic war against the Islamic State group in Syria, degrading their communications during military operations and actively stopping people seeking to join the extremist group.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz confirmed that Martin Sellner, head of the far-right Identitarian Movement, received 1,500 euros in 2018 from the man charged with killing 50 people in mass shootings at mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand. Sellner said he would give the money to a charitable foundation.
(Reuters, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, British lawmakers debated multiple options for leaving the European Union as they sought to bring some clarity to the tortured Brexit process and stop the country tumbling out of the bloc within weeks with no exit plan in place. PM Theresa May offered to give up her job in exchange for her Brexit deal.
(AP, 3/27/19)(SFC, 3/28/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 27, Amnesty International slammed plans by Brunei to implement what the rights group called "vicious" Islamic criminal laws such as stoning to death for gay sex and amputation for theft. The new sections under Brunei's Sharia Penal Code and will come into effect April 3.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, China said that it has expelled former Interpol President Meng Hongwei from public office and the ruling Communist Party as he awaits trial on corruption charges.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, A $436 million superyacht belonging to Russian billionaire Farkhad Akhmedov, at the center of one of the world's costliest divorce battles, was released by a Dubai court after being impounded last year. Forbes has estimated Akhmedov's net worth is $1.4 billion. The US Treasury Department has put him on a list of sanctioned Russian state-owned companies.
(Reuters, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 27, A coalition of opposition parties urged Egyptians to vote against constitutional amendments that would potentially allow President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi to remain in power until 2034.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, The EU said it will suspend ship patrols that have rescued tens of thousands of migrants in the Mediterranean and brought them to Italy, amid deep resistance by populist-led Rome. The rescues were part of the EU's Operation Sophia which diplomats have decided to extend by six months beyond its March 31 expiry date, but without new ship deployments.
(AFP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, A report by the investigative group Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project said Gambia's ex-President Yahya Jammeh looted the tiny West African nation of $1 billion through fear and privilege during his 22 years in power, an amount more than 10 times higher than originally estimated by the new government, leaving the country in lingering debt. The $1 billion was used to finance his lavish lifestyle and is believed to still support him in his exile in Equatorial Guinea.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 27, India shot down one of its satellites in space with an anti-satellite missile. The government said the test was aimed at protecting India's assets in space against foreign attacks. The United States ran the first anti-satellite test in 1959, when satellites themselves were rare and new.
(Reuters, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, Indonesia's Supreme Court rejected the appeal of Meliana, an ethnic Chinese woman, whose complaint about the volume of mosque loudspeakers led to an 18-month prison sentence for blasphemy.
(AP, 4/8/19)
2019 Mar 27, Iran's Pres. Hassan Rouhani travelled to flood-hit zones for the first time after nine days of heavy rains inundated most of the country and killed 43 people.
(AFP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, Iraqi court officials said a warrant has been issued for the arrest of the former governor of Nineveh on corruption charges after at least 90 people were killed in a ferry accident in the provincial capital Mosul. The warrant also included the arrest of some local officials after a court investigation concluded they colluded with the former governor in misusing their powers and committed financial violations. Nawfal Hammadi al-Sultan has fled to the Kurdish regional capital Erbil.
(Reuters, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, In Japan a Nissan committee set up to strengthen corporate governance after the arrest of former Chairman Carlos Ghosn said an investigation found he had wielded too much power and recommended the scandal-hit automaker add more independent outside directors to its board and better oversee compensation and auditing.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, A Kazakh military helicopter with 13 people on board crashed on during exercises. There were casualties, but that it was not yet clear how many.
(Reuters, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, The cargo ship El Hiblu 1 picked up 108 migrants stranded at sea. Some of them then hijacked the vessel when it became clear that it planned to take them back to Libya. The small tanker docked in Malta's port of Valletta the next day after Maltese special forces took control of the vessel. Three migrant teenagers were soon charged in a Maltese court with hijacking the small tanker. They pleaded not guilty.
(Reuters, 3/28/19)(Reuters, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 27, A Lithuanian court found former Soviet defense minister Dmitry Yazov (94) guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity for his role in a 1991 crackdown against the Baltic state's pro-independence movement. 67 former military officials and army officers were being sentenced after a three-year trial.
(Reuters, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, A report released today found gaps in the investigation and possible obstruction of justice in Malaysia's 2015 discovery of mass graves believed to be of Rohingya Muslims and Bangladeshis held in trafficking camps in a hilly jungle area on its border with Thailand. The report said Malaysian authorities were aware of the human trafficking camps more than four months before they were announced publicly.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, A Mozambique government official said five cases of cholera have been confirmed following Cyclone Idai that ravaged the country, killing at least 468 people.
(AFP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, In New Zealand Artemiy Dubovskiy (54) killed himself during a standoff with police. Police searched three of Dubovskiy's properties and found guns, ammunition and violent extremist content.
(http://tinyurl.com/y5vsnklh)(AP, 4/3/19)
2019 Mar 27, Pakistani police arrested a man for beating his wife in public after the incident triggered wide condemnation and uproar on social media. Faisal's wife had complained that her husband had stripped her naked, beat her and shaved her head for refusing to dance for his friends at their home.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, About 150 Palestinian students threw firebombs and rocks at Israeli soldiers who responded with tear gas and rubber-coated metal bullets in the occupied West Bank after an Israeli raid on their university. Palestinian volunteer medic Sajid Muzher (17) was killed by Israeli forces during the clashes. He was shot while trying to treat one of those wounded.
(Reuters, 3/27/19)(AFP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, In Thailand the leader of the Pheu Thai party, which headed the last elected government, and the leaders of five other parties held a news conference to say they believed they had won more than 250 seats in the 500-seat lower house.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, UN officials said at least 707 people had been reported killed by Cyclone Idai, the flooding it caused and heavy rains before it hit. This included 468 in Mozambique, 259 in Zimbabwe and 60 in Malawi.
(Reuters, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 27, In Venezuela new disruption to the power grid had left 91 percent of the country offline, reversing a "partial recovery" since the latest blackouts started March 25.
(AP, 3/27/19)
2019 Mar 28, Pres. Donald Trump announced that he was backing off a budget request to eliminate funding for the Special Olympics following days of criticism for the proposed cut.
(SFC, 3/29/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 28, The US House of Representatives voted 238-185 to condemn Pres. Donald Trump's move to restrict transgender men and women from military service. Five Republicans broke ranks to vote with all the Democrats in the non-binding resolution.
(SFC, 3/29/19, p.A5)
2019 Mar 28, George Clooney called for the boycott of nine hotels in the US and Europe with ties to the sultan of Brunei, which on April 3 will implement Islamic criminal laws to punish gay sex by stoning offenders to death.
(AP, 3/30/19)(Reuters, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 28, In the SF Bay Area Rev. Hector David Mendoza-Vela (42), the head priest of Corpus Christi Parish in Fremont, was arrested on suspicion of 30 counts child sex abuse from 2016-2017.
(SFC, 4/1/19, p.C1)
2019 Mar 28, In Virginia Darwin Martinez-Torres of Sterling was sentenced to life in prison for raping and killing Nabra Hassanen (17) of Reston, a Muslim teenager, as she walked back to a mosque with friends for pre-dawn religious services in June 2017. immigration authorities said Martinez-Torres is an El Salvador native and was in the country illegally.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Albanian opposition protesters made further attempts to enter the parliament by force as they demand the government's resignation and an early election.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Hundreds of protesters took to the streets of central Algiers again to demand the resignation of President Abdelaziz Bouteflika and changes to the political system after the powerful army called for the veteran leader to be removed.
(Reuters, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In Australia Saeed Noori (37), an Islamic State group sympathizer, was sentenced to life in prison. He had rammed a car into pedestrians on a busy Melbourne sidewalk on Dec. 21, 2017, killing one person and injuring 16 others.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In Bangladesh a fire broke out in a 22-storey commercial building, killing 25 people, injuring at least 60 and trapping many. The building had four upper floors constructed illegally in the Banani district of Dhaka.
(AP, 3/28/19)(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 28, Human Rights Watch said at least 170 civilians have been killed since October in fighting in English-speaking western Cameroon between separatists and government forces.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Cuba and Google signed a deal moving the island one step closer to having a state-of-the-art connection to the internet. They agreed to create a seamless, cost-free connection between their two networks once Cuba is able to physically connect to a new undersea fiber-optic cable that would be laid sometime in the future.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, A French court granted bail to Belhassen Trabelsi, a brother-in-law of ousted Tunisian leader Zine El-Abidine Ben Ali, who was arrested on fraud charges this month after three years on the run.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, German automaker Daimler and China's Geely, its largest single shareholder, said that they are setting up a joint venture to develop and operate Daimler's Smart compact car brand worldwide as an all-electric car.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In western Guatemala a large truck slammed into a crowd gathered on a dark highway, killing 18 people and leaving bodies scattered on the roadway. The truck driver fled the scene.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Icelandic budget airline WOW Air collapsed under its financial problems, leading it to ground planes and leave passengers stranded across two continents. The airline had delivered more than a fourth of all visitors to the nation.
(AP, 3/28/19)(SFC, 9/2/19, p.D1)
2019 Mar 28, Kosovo banned all gambling for the next decade in a bid to crack down on crime after two casino staff were murdered last week.
(AFP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 28, A court in the Maldives ordered the release of former president Abdulla Yameen, saying there was not enough reason to hold him beyond a month under the law.
(Reuters, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Norway's justice Minister Tor Mikkel Wara submitted his resignation after his partner was accused of setting his car on fire and other threatening acts.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In the Philippines a rebel assault on a police station in eastern Victoria town backfired when officers fought back and killed three insurgents and captured three others. In the north two Muslim militants were arrested with guns, explosives and Islamic State group-style black flags in in Baggao town, Cagayan province, far from the traditional territory of Muslim militants in the volatile south. Militants Altero Bello and Greg Bello belonged to an IS-aligned jihadist group named Syuful Khilafa Fi Luzon, which was established in 2016.
(AP, 3/29/19)(AP, 4/1/19)
2019 Mar 28, Russia detained a former cabinet minister and oil executive on suspicion of defrauding oil giant Rosneft. Viktor Ishaev was the second former minister from PM Dmitry Medvedev's cabinet to be detained this week.
(Reuters, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Three of eleven Saudi women's rights activists were temporarily released after 10 months in prison. The releases came a day after 11 women's rights activists appeared before a three-judge panel in a Riyadh courtroom and laid out their defense.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In Siberia a ruling by Sakha Republic head Aisen Nikolaev was made public. It bans migrants from driving trucks or buses, producing food, repairing vehicles and other jobs. Tensions between locals and migrants soared this month after three Kyrgyzstan citizens were arrest in a rape and kidnapping case.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Slovakia's Parliament amended the country's constitution to cap the retirement age at 64. Some women can retire up to a year and a half earlier than that, depending on the number of children they've had.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, In Somalia an explosives-laden vehicle detonated outside a busy restaurant in Mogadishu, killing at least 16 people. The al-Qaida-linked al-Shabab extremist group claimed responsibility.
(AP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Ukraine's interior minister accused both Pres. Petro Poroshenko and former PM Yulia Tymoshenko of waging campaigns that involve bribing voters ahead of the March 31 presidential election.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 28, The UN Security Council ordered countries worldwide to step up the fight against terrorism financing by ensuring they have laws that make it a serious crime to fund terrorist acts.
(AFP, 3/28/19)
2019 Mar 28, Venezuela's government said it has barred opposition leader Juan Guaido from holding public office for 15 years citing irregularities in his financial records. Guaido has taken 90 international trips without accounting for the origin of an estimated $94,000 in expenses.
(SFC, 3/28/19, p.A2)
2019 Mar 29, President Donald Trump declared he is likely to shut down America's southern border next week unless Mexican authorities immediately halt all illegal immigration. The president, who also cut US aid to three Central American nations whose citizens are fleeing north, emphasized "I am not kidding around" about closing the border, even though such a severe move could hit the economies of both countries.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 29, The US urged Venezuela's military to act to "protect" its citizens as it renewed criticism of Russia's deployment of forces to prop up Pres. Nicolas Maduro.
(AFP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, In Alaska US District Judge Sharon Gleason ruled that an executive order by Pres. Donald Trump that lifted an Obama-era ban on drilling in the Arctic Ocean and parts of the North Atlantic coast was unlawful.
(SSFC, 3/31/19, p.A8)
2019 Mar 29, San Francisco-based ride-hailing company LYFT debuted on Nasdaq at $72 per share. Shares closed up 9 percent at $78.29.
(SFC, 3/29/19, p.D1)(SFC, 3/30/19, p.A1)
2019 Mar 29, In New York City genre-bending acts Radiohead and The Cure led a British invasion into Brooklyn to take their spots in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, while pop icon Janet Jackson entered the shrine in an induction many industry insiders consider long overdue. American folk rock legend Stevie Nicks became the first woman inducted twice. Heavy metal group Def Leppard, pop experimentalists Roxy Music and English psychedelic rock harmonists The Zombies rounded out the five-strong class of British inductees.
(AFP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, A US federal judge in North Carolina ruled that a charter school promoting traditional values is engaging in unconstitutional sex discrimination by requiring girls to wear skirts.
(SFC, 3/30/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 29, South Carolina Univ. student Samantha Josephson (21) was last seen early today as she got into a car she mistook for an Uber. Her body was found in a wooded area in Clarendon County. Nathaniel Rowland (24) was arrested the next day and faced kidnapping and murder charges.
(SFC, 4/1/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar 29, An Afghan official says at least 16 people have been killed and nine injured as heavy rains and flooding swept through the country's northern and western provinces over the past two days.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Algerian police used tear gas and water cannon to try to disperse hundreds of thousands of demonstrators demanding the resignation of Pres. Abdelaziz Bouteflika days after the army called for his removal to end weeks of political crisis.
(Reuters, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Bosnia's top court upheld a ban on a controversial Serb holiday that is seen as discriminatory to the country's Muslims and Croats. Bosnian Serbs criticized the ruling as political.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Thousands of people opposed to Britain delaying its departure from the European Union marched through central London as the government scrambled to salvage its Brexit plan.
(Reuters, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Burundi banned the BBC and indefinitely suspended Voice of America, moves that campaigners and the international broadcasters described as a blow to press freedom. Burundi's regulator also banned journalists from working for either organization. Burundi ranks 159th out of 180 countries on the World Press Freedom Index 2018.
(Reuters, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 29, In China a notice posted on the official website of the Guangzhou Department of Ethnic and Religious Affairs said up to 10,000 yuan ($15,000) would be paid for verified information and assistance in hunting down key members and leaders of illegal foreign religious groups and revealing their structures.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Chinese and US negotiators adjourned trade talks in Beijing with US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin saying they had been "constructive".
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Chinese tech giant Huawei's deputy chairman defended its commitment to security after a stinging British government report added to Western pressure on the company by accusing it of failing to repair dangerous flaws in its telecom technology.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Egypt released Alaa Abdel Fattah, a blogger and software engineer, after he spent five years in jail. Abdel Fattah was jailed for protesting without permission in breach of a 2013 law that rights groups say effectively bans protests. Fattah is required to spend his nights at a police station for the next five years despite his release.
(Reuters, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, The European Commission said a no-deal Brexit on April 12 was now "likely" after UK parliament rejected for the third time British PM Theresa May's divorce deal with the European Union.
(Reuters, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, European Union countries decided to extend the mandate of a naval mission hunting smugglers in the Mediterranean Sea, but took the unusual step of restricting the operation by refusing to allow it to deploy any ships, in an effort to ease tensions with Italy's anti-migrant government.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, The European Commission criticized Romania for backsliding on the rule of law and called on Bucharest to treat fairly Laura Kovesi, a candidate to become the bloc's first-ever chief prosecutor.
(Reuters, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, In France Jawad Bendaoud was convicted on appeal of hiding Islamic State jihadist Abdelhamid Abaaoud and his accomplice Chakib Akrouh, who holed up after the November 13, 2015, attacks in Bendaoud's apartment in the Paris suburb of Saint-Denis. He was sentenced to four years in prison.
(AFP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, In Germany thousands of students skipped school in Berlin as part of a growing worldwide youth movement demanding faster action against climate change. Swedish teenager Greta Thunberg, who inspired the protests in Germany and elsewhere by staging weekly "school strikes," headlined the demonstration.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Greece's parliament approved a bill to protect borrowers from foreclosures on their primary homes after tense negotiations with the country's international creditors.
(Reuters, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Thousands of Jordanians protested against the US decision to recognize Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights and against the escalation of hostilities between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, In Mozambique the number of confirmed cases of cholera in the cyclone-hit port city of Beira jumped from five to 138, as government and aid agencies battled to contain the spread of disease among the tens of thousands of victims of the storm.
(Reuters, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, The government of Nicaragua pledged to restore protest and press freedom rights while disarming paramilitaries under a deal reached today, after a year-long political upheaval.
(AFP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 29, Northern Ireland's small but powerful Democratic Unionist Party crushed PM Theresa May's hopes of getting parliament to vote for her Brexit divorce deal on a third attempt.
(AFP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Peruvian police freed Gregorio Rojas, the leader of an indigenous community that has blocked roads to a major Chinese-run copper mine. Hours later they arrested his second-in-command, accusing him of running over police officers while driving drunk.
(Reuters, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 29, In the Philippines the rebel New People's Army marked a half a century after its founding with an attack on a police patrol in northern Mountain Province that killed a policeman.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, In the Philippines the head of Rappler Inc., an online news site that has been critical of President Rodrigo Duterte, was arrested for the second time in two months, this time over a ban on foreign ownership of news media. Maria Ressa later posted bail at a regional trial court.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Slovakia's lawmakers approved a resolution to reject an international treaty on women's rights. Opponents of the 2011 Istanbul Convention charged that some provisions would violate the Slovak constitution — for example because the constitution defines marriage as a union of a man and a woman.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, A court in Slovenia sentenced right-wing politician Andrej Sisko to eight months in prison for organizing a self-style militia that was filmed posing with weapons like axes and rifles.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Thailand's Election Commission, facing widespread criticism for inconsistent and delayed vote totals from the March 24 general election, said computer software was partly to blame.
(AP, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, In Turkey five Afghan workers were killed and eleven others were injured as a result of a fire in an abandoned three-story building in Ankara.
(Reuters, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 29, Pope Francis enacted sweeping new legislation to protect children from sexual abuse within the Vatican and other Holy See institutions in Rome, as well as by its diplomatic corps worldwide.
(Reuters, 3/29/19)
2019 Mar 30, Cities around the world marked Earth Hour this night by turning off the lights in a call for global action on climate change. Beginning in Sydney in 2007, Earth Hour has spread to more than 180 countries, with tens of millions of people joining in. The UN headquarters in New York, the pyramids of Egypt and Rio's Christ the Redeemer statue were among top world monuments plunged into darkness for an hour to put the spotlight on climate change and its impact on the planet.
(AP, 3/30/19)(AFP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 30, The US government cut aid to El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras after President Donald Trump blasted the Central American countries for sending migrants to the United States and threatened to shutter the US-Mexico border.
(Reuters, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 30, In Florida Yujing Zhang (32), a Chinese woman, was held on charges of illegal entering and lying to US agents. Court documents later alleged she told a Secret Service agent she was a Mar-a-Lago member there to use the pool.
(AP, 4/4/19)
2019 Mar 30, Illinois state Trooper Gerald Ellis (36) was killed when a wrong-way vehicle struck his squad car in Green Oaks. The driver of the other vehicle was also killed.
(SSFC, 3/31/19, p.A7)
2019 Mar 30, Billy Adams (79), Hall of Fame pioneer of rockabilly music, died in Westmoreland, Tenn. His hits included "Rock, Pretty Mama" (1957).
(SFC, 4/4/19, p.C4)
2019 Mar 30, An Afghan government official said flash floods have killed at least 32 people across seven western provinces, destroyed homes and swept through makeshift shelters that housed displaced families.
(Reuters, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, In Afghanistan a Taliban assault on a police checkpoint led to the deaths of four students in eastern Ghazni province. 17 others, including 15 students and two teachers, were wounded when an explosion, likely caused by rocket fire, hit the school in Andar district. Vice president, Gen. Abdul Rashid Dostum escaped unharmed after Taliban ambushed his convoy while traveling form northern Balkh to neighboring Zawzjan province. A security guard in the convoy was killed, and two others wounded in the attack.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, In Australia two Japanese teenagers were found dead in Lake McKenzie after being reported missing from a school tour.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, China's Customs Administration confiscated nearly 7.5 tons (6,803 kg) of ivory. Since the start of the year, customs officers have seized a total of 8.5 tons (7,711 kg) of ivory products through 53 investigations.
(AP, 4/15/19)
2019 Mar 30, Egypt President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi said he has raised the minimum wage to 2,000 Egyptian pounds ($115.74) per month from 1,200 ($69.27).
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, An Egyptian court sentenced 18 suspected militants to life in prison for allegedly forming a "terrorist cell" affiliated with the Islamic State group. The Cairo criminal court sentenced another 12 defendants to 10 to 15 years on charges that include plotting attacks on the country's Christian minority in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, French "yellow vests" demonstrators staged their 20th week of anti-government protests despite bans in hotspot areas, as banks called for an end to violence against branches, cash machines and personnel.
(AFP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, Authorities in Iran worked to evacuate villages threatened by flooding in southwestern areas as forecasters predicted more of the heavy rains that have killed at least 45 people this week.
(Reuters, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, Israeli troops shot and killed a Palestinian man near the perimeter fence early today hours before a planned mass rally. Tens of thousands of Palestinians rallied in heavy rain at the Israel-Gaza border to mark the first anniversary of a new wave of protests, facing off against Israeli tanks and troops massed on the fortified frontier. Four Palestinians were killed at the Israel-Gaza border on the first anniversary of the 'Great March of Return' demonstrations.
(AP, 3/30/19)(Reuters, 3/30/19)(Reuters, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 30, In Italy the US-based International Organization for the Family began a 2-day congress in Verona. The organization defines family as strictly centering around a mother and father. A coalition of civic groups mobilized against what they see as a counter-reform movement to limit LGBT and women's rights.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, Mozambique authorities said cholera cases among cyclone survivors have jumped to 271, a figure that nearly doubled from the previous day.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, In Nicaragua at least four people were hurt and 10 detained during a demonstration calling for the release of prisoners, a day after President Daniel Ortega's government and the opposition reached an agreement to restore protest and press freedom rights while disarming paramilitaries.
(AFP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 30, In Pakistan a bus hit a rickshaw killing six schoolgirls and driver in the eastern Bhakkar district of Lahore.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, Pakistani journalist Matloob Musavi was forcibly taken by masked men in private and police vehicles in Karachi.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, Philippine police killed 14 suspected communist rebels after they opened fire during raids in a central province. Rights groups countered that the men were farmers and the latest victims of extrajudicial killings.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 30, Slovakia voted in an election dominated by calls for change, with anti-corruption activist Zuzana Caputova likely to be chosen as its first female president a year after a journalist's murder sparked mass anti-government protests.
(AFP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, In Spain police in Barcelona arrested seven people during clashes with radical Catalan separatists protesting against a political rally by Vox, a new far-right party.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, Thailand's King Maha Vajiralongkorn revoked royal decorations that had been awarded to ousted former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra in a document published in the royal gazette. The royal command was for Thaksin's 2008 corruption conviction and for fleeing the country to escape a two-year prison sentence.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, In Turkey the pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party, or HDP, said in a statement that 53 people were detained in Istanbul overnight in the lead-up to the March 31 municipal elections.
(AP, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, United Nations officials said at least 746 people have been reported killed in Malawi, Mozambique and Zimbabwe since Cyclone Idai landed on March 14.
(Reuters, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 30, Pope Francis started a two-day visit to Morocco. He said that problems of migration would never be resolved by physical barriers but instead required social justice and correcting the world's economic imbalances. He also backed Moroccan King Mohammed VI's efforts to spread a moderate form of Islam that promotes inter-religious dialogue and rejects any form of terrorism or violence in God's name.
(Reuters, 3/30/19)
2019 Mar 31, In southern California rapper Nipsey Hussle (33) (born as Ermias Asghedom) was shot and killed outside his clothing store in South Los Angeles. Two other people were wounded. The suspected shooter fled the scene. On April 2 police arrested suspect Eric Holder (29) in Bellflower.
(SFC, 4/1/19, p.A6)(SFC, 4/3/19, p.A7)
2019 Mar 31, In Florida Mexican soap opera actor Pablo Lyle (32) punched Juan Ricardo Hernandez (63) in a road rage confrontation. Lyle initially faced only a battery charge, but Hernandez later died in a hospital and Lyle was charged with manslaughter.
(AP, 5/1/19)
2019 Mar 31, A top Algerian businessman, Ali Haddad, was arrested overnight at an Algerian border post as he was apparently trying to go to Tunisia amid political crisis in the country. Haddad, long a backer of President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, resigned this week as head of Algeria's Business Forum.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, Police in Bangladesh arrested the F.R. Tower's owners Tasvir-ul-Islam and S.M.H.I. Faruque overnight in Dhaka and charged them with negligence and violations of a building code that resulted in the deaths of 26 people.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, Brazil said it had a opened a new diplomatic office in Jerusalem that would serve as part of its embassy to Israel, which is located in Tel Aviv.
(Reuters, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, In Brazil Rio de Janeiro Gov. Wilson Witzel said in an interview that snipers were already operating in the state. He said he would empower policemen to shoot down any criminal seen carrying a rifle.
(AP, 4/1/19)
2019 Mar 31, The Canadian Women's Hockey League said it will discontinue operations on May 1. The CWHL was founded in 2007 with a mandate to increase interest in women's hockey.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, In eastern China at least seven people were killed and five injured when a container containing scrap metal exploded in the latest in a series of industrial accidents.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, In China a fire high in the mountains of western Sichuan province killed 30 firefighters and others.
(AP, 4/1/19)
2019 Mar 31, Police in Colombia's second-largest city said they have arrested Thomas Renno of California for allegedly offering cash over Facebook to girls as young as 13 in exchange for sexual acts.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, In northeastern Congo DRC voters in Beni and Butembo, towns ravaged by conflict and an Ebola epidemic, took part in long-delayed elections. At stake were 15 seats in the lower house of parliament, which counts 500 lawmakers.
(AFP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, In Germany Russian airline S7 Group co-owner Natalia Fileva was aboard a single-engine, six-seat Epic LT aircraft that crashed and burned in a field as it approached the small airport at the town of Egelsbach near Frankfurt. Three bodies were recovered in the crash.
(AP, 4/1/19)
2019 Mar 31, Fashion magazine Vogue hit the newsstands in Greece, relaunched after a seven-year absence as publishers bet that the country's economic recovery after a debt crisis will revive an appetite for glossy fashion and lifestyle prints.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, Thousands of protesters hit the streets of Hong Kong to demonstrate against a new extradition proposal. Hong Kong's government has recently announced plans to overhaul its extradition rules, allowing the transfer of fugitives with Taiwan, Macau and mainland China on a "case-basis" for the first time.
(Reuters, 3/31/19)(AFP, 4/1/19)
2019 Mar 31, It was reported that air quality in Indonesia has deteriorated from among the cleanest in the world to one of the most polluted over the past two decades. A study blamed coal-fired power stations, burning land for agriculture and rising car ownership.
(SSFC, 3/31/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar 31, Iranian media said a man has shot dead seven members of his wife's family in the southwestern city of Dezful.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, Israel's PM Benjamin Netanyahu warmly received President Jair Bolsonaro, on the Brazilian leader's first state visit to Israel.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, Israel reopened its commercial crossing with the Gaza Strip but kept military reinforcements deployed on the volatile frontier, a day after a smaller than expected Palestinian protest along the border. Militants fired five rockets from Gaza into Israel early today.
(Reuters, 3/31/19)(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, In Italy several tens of thousands of people marched in support of the ultra-Conservative World Congress of Families, on the final day of their conference in Verona.
(AFP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, In Morocco Pope Francis told Catholic priests and sisters that even though they are few in number, they shouldn't seek to convert others to Christianity but rather engage in dialogue and charity.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, In southern Nepal a powerful rainstorm killed at least 28 people and injured hundreds in a farming region in Bara and Parsa districts.
(AP, 4/1/19)
2019 Mar 31, Catholic priests in Poland burned books they say are sacrilegious, including tomes from British author J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series of fantasy novels. Rev. Rafal Jarosiewicz apologized on April 2, saying the ritual was not intended to condemn specific authors, religions or social groups.
(AFP, 4/1/19)(AP, 4/3/19)
2019 Mar 31, Somalia's al-Shabab Islamic extremist group said it has executed four men accused of spying for the British, Djibouti and Somali intelligence agencies.
(AP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, In Spain at least 50,000 people took to the streets of Madrid to draw attention to the emptying of the countryside, a growing issue for rural voters with less than a month to go before general elections.
(AFP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, Sudanese security forces fired tear gas at scores of protesters as they defied a nationwide state of emergency to demonstrate in Khartoum, its twin city Omdurman and other cities across the country.
(AFP, 3/31/19)(AP, 4/1/19)
2019 Mar 31, In northwest Syria one Turkish soldier was killed and another was wounded in a mortar attack on their position. Turkey's military launched retaliatory fire. Turkey said the attack was carried out by the Kurdish YPG militia in the Afrin region.
(Reuters, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, Taiwan condemned what it called a "provocative" move by China after two Chinese fighter jets crossed a maritime border separating the two sides amid growing friction between Taipei and Beijing.
(Reuters, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, Thai demonstrators protested against alleged cheating in the junta-ruled kingdom's first election since a 2014 coup, a week after the controversial poll sowed confusion over the ballot results.
(AFP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, In Tunisia Arab leaders, long divided by regional rivalries, condemned a US decision to recognize Israel's sovereignty over the Golan Heights and said Middle East stability depended on creating an Palestinian state.
(Reuters, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, Turkey voted in local elections in a test for President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, with his ruling party fighting to keep hold of the country's two key cities as an economic slowdown takes hold. In eastern Turkey an election observer and another man were killed in a fight at a school-based polling station. Pres. Erdogan's AKP suffered a major upset in the ballot after results showed they had lost not only the capital Ankara and also the country's economic hub Istanbul.
(AFP, 3/31/19)(AFP, 4/1/19)
2019 Mar 31, Voters in Ukraine cast ballots in a presidential election. Opinion polls have indicated that Volodymyr Zelenskiy, who stars in a TV sitcom about a teacher who becomes president after a video of him denouncing corruption goes viral, was leading a field of 39 candidates. Police say they have received more than 1,600 complaints about electoral violations in the presidential election. Zelenskiy took 30 percent support in the vote, while President Petro Poroshenko was a distant second with about 16 percent. The top two candidates advance to a runoff on April 21.
(AP, 3/31/19)(AP, 4/1/19)
2019 Mar 31, Ukraine police seized heroin worth about $60 million, over half a ton of the powder, in raids in the country's center and west, describing it as the biggest haul they had ever seen.
(AFP, 3/31/19)
2019 Mar 31, Venezuela's Pres. Nicolas Maduro announced a 30-day plan to ration electricity following nationwide power cuts.
(SFC, 4/1/19, p.A4)
2019 Mar, The US published a National Space Weather Strategy and Action Plan.
(https://tinyurl.com/yy7qdl5x)(Econ., 6/27/20, p.15)
2019 Mar, The US National Marine Fisheries Service and the Pacific Fishery Management Council said a ban on sardine fishing from Mexico to the Canadian border will go into effect on July 1 for a fifth straight year due to a dramatic decline in the stock. They said the sardine population has plummeted 98.5 percent since 2006.
(SFC, 3/27/19, p.A7)
2019 Mar, Arizona banned prisoners from reading "Chokehold: Policing Black Men," by Paul Butler, a former federal prosecutor. The book discusses the impact of the criminal justice system on black men. In May the American Civil Liberties Union called on the Arizona Dept. of Corrections to rescind the ban.
(SFC, 5/22/19, p.A6)
2019 Mar, Canada's Quebec province introduced Bill 21, a measure that would prohibit civil servants, teachers, nurses, bus drivers, lawyers and other people who interact with the public from wearing religious symbols while at work.
(AP, 4/13/19)
2019 Mar, In Ecuador the government of Lenin Moreno signed a $4.2 billion, 3-year agreement with the IMF aimed at softening the effects of deficit cutting and making the economy more competitive.
(Econ., 7/4/20, p.27)
2019 Mar, In Egypt university teacher Manar Adel Abu el-Naga, her husband Omar Abdelhamid Abu el-Naga and their one-year-old son were taken by security agents from their home in Alexandria. Their whereabouts remained unknown until she appeared in February, 2021, before Egypt’s Supreme State Security prosecutors, who ordered her pre-trial detention over terror charges. Nothing was publicly said about her husband’s whereabouts.
(AP, 3/4/21)
2019 Mar, In Guinea-Bissau nearly 800kg of drugs were found hidden in the false bottom of a Senegalese-registered truck loaded with frozen fish in Safim town, some 15km (nine miles) from the capital.
(BBC, 5/28/20)
2019 Mar, In Norway the 85.4-meter-tall Mjostarnet building, officially the world's tallest timber building, was completed.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mj%C3%B8st%C3%A5rnet)
2019 Mar, A plot to unseat Venezuela's government quickly crumbled when a volunteer combatant was arrested after sneaking across the border into Venezuela from Colombia. Shortly after, Colombian police stopped a truck transporting a cache of brand new weapons and tactical equipment worth around $150,000, including spotting scopes, night vision goggles, two-way radios and 26 American-made assault rifles with the serial numbers rubbed off. The plan was led by Jordan Goudreau, an American citizen and three-time Bronze Star recipient for bravery in Iraq and Afghanistan.
(AP, 5/1/20)
Go to April 2019
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End of file
