Timeline 2008 July-September
Return to home
2008 Jul 1, An
Alabama jury found Glaxo and Novartis guilty of drug-price fraud and
ordered them to pay $114 million.
(WSJ, 7/2/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 1, Nicholas T. Sheley
(28) was arrested in Granite City, Ill., following a manhunt that
extended into Missouri. The ex-convict was suspected in eight recent
grisly slayings. He was suspected of killing, among others, a
93-year-old man, a toddler and a couple whose blood-soaked dogs were
found roaming a motel parking lot.
(AP, 7/2/08)(SFC, 7/11/08, p.A4)
2008 Jul 1, Starbucks, the
Seattle-based coffee retailer, said it would close another 500
stores in America and reduce its work force by about 7%. The closure
of 100 stores had been announced earlier this year. 70% of the
stores to close were opened after 2005.
(Econ, 7/5/08, p.74)
2008 Jul 1, In California the
11-day old Basin Complex Fire in the Los Padres National Forest
threatened the Esalen Institute in Big Sur.
(AP, 7/2/08)
2008 Jul 1, Robert E. Boni
(b.1928), writer and former chief executive of Armco (1985-1989),
died. In 1993 a partnership between Armco and Kawasaki led to the
formation of AK Steel Holding Corp.
(WSJ, 7/19/08, p.A5)
2008 Jul 1, Clay Felker
(b.1925), founder of the New York magazine (1968) and New West
magazine (1976), died in his New York home. From 1994 he taught at
UC Berkeley for over a decade.
(SFC, 7/2/08, p.A2)
2008 Jul 1, In Afghanistan 4
police officers died when their vehicle struck a roadside bomb as
they went to reinforce a checkpost that had come under attack in
southern Uruzgan province. The US-led force said it helped Afghan
security forces kill "several" insurgents in the province and a
young girl was also killed in the fighting. Five Taliban militants
died in a clash in southern Zabul province. Another rebel was killed
in southwestern Nimroz province. Official figures showed June was
the deadliest month for foreign troops in Afghanistan since the 2001
fall of the Taliban and the second in a row in which casualties
exceeded those in Iraq.
(AFP, 7/1/08)
2008 Jul 1, The African Union,
meeting in Egypt, announced that it was extending the mandate of its
force in Somalia for another six months but urged the UN to take
over the peacekeeping mission. The African leaders also called for
dialogue between Zimbabwe's political foes and a national unity
government following President Robert Mugabe's widely discredited
reelection.
(AFP, 7/1/08)(AP, 7/2/08)
2008 Jul 1, Josef Branis (66)
fatally shot four relatives in two houses in the Vienna suburb
of Strasshof after being evicted from his sister's Vienna
apartment. He was arrested in August after being on the run for
weeks.
(AP, 1/27/09)(www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25495397/)
2008 Jul 1, In China a man
armed with a knife stormed a police station in Shanghai, stabbing
officers inside and killing 6 officers. On September 1 Yang Jia (28)
was sentenced to death for the knife attack. In northwest China 18
miners were killed in a mine-shaft collapse at the state-owned
Huisen Liangshuijing Coal Mine in Shaanxi province. Yang Jia was
executed on Nov 26.
(AP, 7/1/08)(AP, 7/2/08)(AP, 9/1/08)(AP,
11/26/08)
2008 Jul 1, Gao Wenyuan, the
regional Grassland Work Office's director, told Xinhua News
that Inner Mongolia in north China is mobilizing 33,000 people,
including 1,100 technical staff, to wipeout a plague of locusts in
the past two weeks.
(http://english.gov.cn/2008-07/01/content_1032452.htm)
2008 Jul 1, France took over
the rotating presidency of the European Union with high-level
meetings and a ceremony at the Arc de Triomphe.
(AP, 7/1/08)
2008 Jul 1, French officials
said the asbestos-contaminated aircraft carrier Clemenceau, which
was towed half-way across the globe in a failed bid to have it
dismantled, will be broken up by Able UK in Britain. The ship was
decommissioned in 1997.
(AFP, 7/1/08)
2008 Jul 1, Munich-based
Giesecke & Devrient, caved in to pressure from the German
government to stop supplying Zimbabwe with special blank paper
money. Zimbabwe required new notes every few weeks as the inflation
rate pushed well over one million percent.
(WSJ, 7/2/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 1, Iranian state radio
said that at least 25 people were killed and 16 injured in a bus
accident near Tehran.
(AP, 7/1/08)
2008 Jul 1, In Iraq militants
killed seven people in a series of attacks in Iraq's eastern Diyala
province, and a local official said government crackdowns against
Sunni extremists elsewhere in the country were driving them back to
the area. Staffan de Mistura, the UN envoy to Iraq, said it was
unlikely that the country would be able to hold provincial elections
by the beginning of October as planned because lawmakers had failed
to approve a new election law.
(AP, 7/1/08)
2008 Jul 1, Israel closed its
cargo crossings with the Gaza Strip after accusing Palestinian
militants of firing a rocket at southern Israel in violation of a
shaky truce. The Israeli military said its radar detected a rocket
launched from Gaza the previous evening that struck near the
communal farm of Mefalsim.
(AP, 7/1/08)
2008 Jul 1, In Kingston,
Jamaica, 39 young American missionaries, from the Georgia-based
Adventures in Missions, were robbed by two gunmen who broke into a
Salvation Army school for the blind where they were volunteering.
(AP, 7/2/08)
2008 Jul 1, In Muslim majority
Indian-held Kashmir authorities reversed a controversial plan to
transfer land to a Hindu shrine as Muslim and Hindu protesters held
massive rallies across the region assailing the state government for
its handling of the politically sensitive issue.
(AP, 7/1/08)
2008 Jul 1, Malaysian
opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim vowed to seize power from a
"corrupt" government at a rally of some 15,000 supporters as he
fights back against new sodomy accusations.
(AFP, 7/2/08)
2008 Jul 1, In Mexico videos
showing Leon police practicing torture techniques on a fellow
officer and dragging another through vomit at the instruction of a
US adviser created an uproar, which has struggled to eliminate
torture in law enforcement.
(AP, 7/2/08)
2008 Jul 1, In Mongolia
thousands of people staged a violent protest in the capital as they
voiced outrage over what they claimed were rigged elections, forcing
police to fire gunshots.
(AP, 7/1/08)
2008 Jul 1, In Myanmar a ferry
named "Myo Pa Pa Tun" sank in the Yway river in the cyclone-battered
Irrawaddy delta, killing 38 people. 44 others were rescued.
(AP, 7/4/08)
2008 Jul 1, A smoking ban went
into effect in cafes, restaurants and bars across the Netherlands,
as the country joins a growing list of European countries to tighten
rules on tobacco use in public places. Smoking marijuana in the
Netherlands' infamous "coffee shops" is still permitted under the
new law, as long the drug is not mixed with tobacco.
(AFP, 7/1/08)
2008 Jul 1, The Nigerian Senate
passed a resolution barring the anti-graft agency EFCC and other
security agents from arresting witnesses who appear before
parliament. The lawmakers passed the resolution following the
arrests of an Austrian contractor and two former ministers on the
floor of the Senate shortly after testifying before a parliamentary
hearing on the aviation sector.
(AFP, 7/2/08)
2008 Jul 1, Pakistani forces
destroyed a major militant compound in the Khyber tribal region. The
site served as key headquarters for the banned Lashkar-e-Islam.
(SFC, 7/2/08, p.A3)
2008 Jul 1, Panama's Supreme
Court overturned a presidential pardon of four Cuban emigres accused
of plotting to kill Fidel Castro, including former CIA operative
Luis Posada Carriles. The court ruled that 180 pardons granted in
2004 by outgoing President Mireya Moscoso, including those the four
Cubans, were unconstitutional.
(AP, 7/2/08)
2008 Jul 1, Officials said
Maoist rebels in the southern Philippines killed two soldiers in a
public market and torched a cellular phone tower as the latest
flare-up in the 40-year-old insurgency showed no sign of abating.
(AP, 7/1/08)
2008 Jul 1, In Sri Lanka
fighting erupted in the Vavuniya and Welioya regions bordering the
rebels' de facto state in the north. The fighting in Vavuniya killed
16 rebels and one soldier, while in the nearby Welioya region, 11
rebels and one soldier died.
(AP, 7/2/08)
2008 Jul 1, Thailand’s deputy
prime minister said the Thai government has suspended its decision
to support Cambodia's bid to have an 11th century temple near the
Thai border declared a world landmark. In 1962, the International
Court of Justice awarded the Preah Vihear temple and the land it
occupies to Cambodia.
(AP, 7/1/08)
2008 Jul 2, The US lifted a
moratorium on applications to build solar power plants on public
lands in 6 Western states.
(WSJ, 7/3/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 2, In Vermont the body
of a missing girl (12), whose uncle (Michael Jacques) allegedly
planned to force her into a sex ring the day she disappeared, was
found in Randolph, not far from his house.
(AP, 7/2/08)
2008 Jul 2, In California Hans
Florine (44) and Yuji Hirayama (39) broke a World Record for the
fastest climb up the Nose of El Capitan (2:43:33) in Yosemite
National Park. On Oct 12 they broke the record again with a time of
2:37:5. On Nov 6, 2010, climbers Dean Potter and Sean Leary broke
the record with a time of 2:36:45.
(SFC, 7/3/08, p.A1)(SFC, 10/13/08, p.A1)(SFC,
11/15/10, p.A1)
2008 Jul 2, In central
Afghanistan a roadside blast killed five Afghan soldiers in Logar
province. Gunfire brought down a US UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter in
the same province, but no US personnel were hurt. In the northwest
Afghan and international troops killed 25 Taliban after militants
ambushed an Afghan patrol in Muqur district.
(AP, 7/3/08)
2008 Jul 2, President Alexander
Lukashenko said he acceded to Western and opposition demands for
greater democracy ahead of elections.
(WSJ, 7/3/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 2, The British
government said police have arrested more than 500 suspects in a
crackdown on human trafficking in the sex trade. Police made 528
arrests in the operation, codenamed Pentameter 2, after raiding 822
premises, of which 157 were massage parlors and 582 houses and
flats. The operation began in October and involved 55 police forces.
(AFP, 7/2/08)
2008 Jul 2, Colombian spies
tricked leftist rebels into handing over presidential candidate
Ingrid Betancourt (kidnapped in 2002), three US military contractors
(captured in 2003), and 10 other hostages in a helicopter rescue so
successful that not a single shot was fired. In 2009 Keith Stansell,
Thomas Howes and Marc Gonsalves authored "Out of Captivity," a
memoir of their 5 ½ year captivity by Colombia's leftist
rebels.
(AP, 7/2/08)(AP, 2/26/09)
2008 Jul 2, Deutsche Bank
acquired the Dutch corporate banking arm of ABN AMRO from Fortis, a
Benelux bank, for $1.1 billion in cash.
(Econ, 7/12/08, p.83)
2008 Jul 2, In India an
estimated four million truckers went on strike to press for uniform
diesel prices and to protest against an increase in taxes.
(AFP, 7/2/08)
2008 Jul 2, Iraqi security
forces arrested two locally prominent supporters of radical Shiite
cleric Muqtada al-Sadr as part of their crackdown against Shiite
militias in the southern city of Amarah. Police said Abdul-Jabar
Wahid Humaidi, head of the provincial council in Maysan, where
Amarah is the capital, and Fadhil Niama, head of the council's
security committee, were suspected of supporting Shiite militias. A
string of mortar shells hit the residential area of al-Amil in
western Baghdad, killing one civilian and wounding eight others. In
eastern Diyala province, US-allied Sunnis killed two al-Qaida
terrorists south of Baqouba.
(AP, 7/2/08)
2008 Jul 2, In Israel Hussam
Dwayat (30), a Palestinian man from Arab east Jerusalem plowed, an
enormous construction vehicle into cars, buses and pedestrians on a
busy street, killing at least 3 people and wounding at least 45
before he was shot dead by security officers. Palestinian witnesses
said an angry crowd in the Gaza Strip has stormed a border crossing
with Egypt throwing rocks at Egyptian troops.
(AP, 7/2/08)
2008 Jul 2, Italian Premier
Silvio Berlusconi pledged to end the garbage crisis in Naples and
the surrounding area by the end of July.
(AP, 7/2/08)
2008 Jul 2, Japan and Middle
Eastern leaders agreed on a project to bring thousands of badly
needed jobs to the West Bank, voicing hope it would lay the
groundwork for a Palestinian state.
(AFP, 7/2/08)
2008 Jul 2, In Kashmir the
Indian army said 11 Muslim rebels and an Indian soldier have been
killed in two days of fierce fighting in a district bordering the
Pakistani part of the disputed state.
(AFP, 7/2/08)
2008 Jul 2, Stanley Ho, casino
entrepreneur in Macao, agreed to sell a 25% stake from some $500
million in his SJM Holdings, which owned 19 or Macao’s 29 casinos.
(Econ, 7/5/08, p.75)
2008 Jul 2, In Mexico 4
decapitated bodies were found on a street in Culiacan, blocks away
from their severed heads. Four gunmen were killed hours later, after
opening fire on federal police patrolling Culiacan, a center for the
powerful Sinaloa drug cartel. Under attack, police shot back at the
home where the gunmen were holed up, killing the four assailants and
capturing two others.
(AP, 7/3/08)
2008 Jul 2, The Moroccan news
agency said 35 alleged recruiters for Al-Qaeda operations in Algeria
and Iraq were arrested by police in Morocco, where they were also
accused of planning attacks. The suspects allegedly belong to a
Salafist group, Salafiya Jihadiya.
(AFP, 7/3/08)
2008 Jul 2, The Nigerian
government charged two former aviation ministers with misusing a
$165-million fund set up to improve air safety after three airplane
accidents.
(AP, 7/2/08)
2008 Jul 2, In South Korea tens
of thousands of auto workers went on strike to oppose the
government's lifting of a ban on US beef imports.
(AP, 7/2/08)
2008 Jul 2, In Sri Lanka a
series of battles between government forces and Tamil Tiger fighters
on the front lines of the civil war killed 26 rebels. The fighting
took place throughout the day, killing two rebels in the Vavuniya
area, 12 in Mannar and 12 in Welioya. Rebel spokesman Rasiah
Ilanthirayan disputed those figures, saying three of his fighters
and 11 soldiers were killed in the fighting.
(AP, 7/3/08)
2008 Jul 2, Zimbabwe opposition
leader Morgan Tsvangirai rejected an African Union decision to keep
South Africa's president alone in charge of efforts to resolve
Zimbabwe's political crisis. The European Commission insisted that
Zimbabwe opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai should be named at the
head of any new government. South African President Thabo Mbeki
rejected the EU position.
(AP, 7/2/08)(AFP, 7/2/08)
2008 Jul 3, Phillip Bennett,
the former chief executive of Refco, was sentenced to 16 years in
prison for fleecing investors of more than $2.4 billion in a fraud
that destroyed the world's largest independent commodities broker.
(Reuters, 7/3/08)
2008 Jul 3, Larry Harmon (83)
wasn't the original Bozo the Clown, but he was the real one. Harmon,
who portrayed the wing-haired clown for more than half a century,
died of congestive heart failure.
(AP, 7/4/08)
2008 Jul 3, US employers cut
payrolls by 62,000 in June, the sixth straight month of nationwide
job losses, underscoring the economy's fragile state. The
unemployment rate held steady at 5.5 percent.
(AP, 7/3/08)
2008 Jul 3, Vodafone Group PLC
said it planned to acquire a 70% stake in Ghana Telecom Co. for $900
million.
(WSJ, 7/5/08, p.B6)
2008 Jul 3, In Afghanistan
gunmen lobbed a grenade and sprayed a police checkpoint with gunfire
in the southern Kandahar province, killing eight officers. A
roadside blast next to a police vehicle in central Ghazni province
killed two officers and wounded five others. In eastern Paktika
province, Afghan and foreign troops killed seven suspected militants
during a clash near the Pakistan border. Afghan security forces
seized 1.4 tons of opium in western Afghanistan near the border with
Iran.
(AP, 7/4/08)(AFP, 7/5/08)
2008 Jul 3, Top Bolivian and US
officials sought to heal their nations' strained relations in their
first meeting since a raucous protest outside the American embassy
sent the US ambassador back to Washington for security
consultations.
(AP, 7/3/08)
2008 Jul 3, Former Congolese
rebel leader Jean-Pierre Bemba arrived in the Netherlands to face
war crimes charges before the International Criminal Court.
(AP, 7/3/08)
2008 Jul 3, The Cypriot
parliament approved the European Union treaty, making Cyprus the
20th EU member to ratify the document aimed at streamlining
decision-making in the bloc.
(AP, 7/4/08)
2008 Jul 3, In El Salvador a
bus carrying members of an evangelical church was swept off a bridge
in San Salvador. 29 bodies were recovered the next day.
(SFC, 7/4/08, p.A3)
2008 Jul 3, Lydia Lassen-Berge
(69), a former prostitute dubbed the "Black Widow" by the German
press, was sentenced to life in prison for the murder of four
wealthy but frail elderly male companions. Siegmund Schlufter (53),
her accomplice, was sentenced to 12 years in jail for carrying out
the killings.
(AFP, 7/3/08)
2008 Jul 3, In Indonesia a
police source said that a group of 10 suspected Muslim militants
detained in raids on Sumatra island by Indonesia's anti-terrorism
unit was plotting to attack Western targets. The raids followed the
capture of a suspected militant after a tip-off by authorities in
Singapore.
(Reuters, 7/3/08)
2008 Jul 3, It was reported
that Italian authorities have started fingerprinting tens of
thousands of Gypsies living in nomad camps across the country,
brushing aside accusations of racism by human rights advocates and
international organizations. The Interior Ministry said prints will
only be taken from people who do not have a valid Italian or EU
document.
(AP, 7/3/08)
2008 Jul 3, In the southern
Philippines suspected communist guerrillas launched a series of
attacks, lobbing a grenade that killed three people and raiding a
police station and a gold mining company.
(AP, 7/3/08)
2008 Jul 3, In southeastern
Slovenia two canoes were crushed running over a dam. The next day
divers pulled seven bodies out of the Sava River and fought strong
currents to search for five other people still missing.
(AP, 7/4/08)
2008 Jul 3, South Korea's
president called for an end to a long-running dispute over American
beef imports, saying it was time for the nation to concentrate
instead on overcoming its economic difficulties.
(AP, 7/3/08)
2008 Jul 3, In Sri Lanka a wave
of battles in Mannar, Vavuniya and Welioya killed 32 rebels and two
soldiers.
(AP, 7/4/08)
2008 Jul 3, A group of around
200 Zimbabweans gathered outside the US embassy in Harare, pleading
for political asylum and food after being displaced in recent
election violence.
(AFP, 7/3/08)
2008 Jul 4, In California 27
major fires were considered active. These included the Basin Complex
Fire in Los Padres National Forest where over 68,700 acres were
scorched and the Indians Fire in Monterey County with 81,300 acres
consumed.
(SFC, 7/4/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 4, In Milwaukee,
Wisconsin, early morning gunfire killed 2 men and 2 women on the
city’s north side.
(SFC, 7/4/08, p.A4)
2008 Jul 4, Jesse Helms
(b.1921), former 5-term US Senator from North Carolina, died in
Raleigh, NC. Helms had switched to the Republican Party in 1970 and
was elected to the Senate in 1972, the first Republican from North
Carolina in the 20th century. The conservative senator earned the
title “Senator No” as a leading crusader against communism,
liberalism, tax increases, abortion, homosexuality, affirmative
action and court-ordered busing to desegregate schools.
(SFC, 7/4/08, p.A2)
2008 Jul 4, Evelyn Keyes
(b.1916), American film star, died in Montecito, Ca. Her 3 former
husbands included director John Huston, director Charles Vidor and
jazz musician Artie Shaw. Her nearly 50 films included a role as the
younger sister of Scarlett O’Hara in “Gone With the Wind” (1939).
Her memoir “Scarlett O’Hara’s Younger Sister” was published in 1977.
(SFC, 7/12/08, p.B5)(WSJ, 2/21/09, p.W8)
2008 Jul 4, In southern
Afghanistan gunmen assassinated parliament member and former
military commander Habibullah Jan. In Helmand province a roadside
bomb militants were planting detonated prematurely, killing 10
Taliban. 22 civilians were killed in air strikes in the Waygal
district, including a woman and a child. A spokesman for the US-led
coalition said the airstrikes in Nuristan province hit militants who
earlier attacked a US military base with mortars. Several militants
were killed during an operation in Ghazni province. More than 20
militants were killed and wounded during a battle with NATO-backed
Afghan forces in Kunar province.
(AP, 7/5/08)(AP, 7/6/08)
2008 Jul 4, In Austria 9
people, including a prominent executive who fled to France in an
attempt to elude justice, were convicted of criminal charges in a
major Austrian bank fraud case linked to the 2005 collapse of New
York-based commodities brokerage Refco Inc. Vienna Federal Court
Judge Claudia Bandion-Ortner found the defendants responsible for
euro1.4 billion (US$1.9 billion) in losses at BAWAG, Austria's No. 4
bank.
(AP, 7/4/08)
2008 Jul 4, In Belarus about 50
people were wounded by a home-made bomb that sprayed nuts and bolts
into a crowd at an open-air concert in Minsk attended by long-time
ruler President Alexander Lukashenko.
(Reuters, 7/4/08)
2008 Jul 4, China and Taiwan
launched regular direct flights for the first time in nearly six
decades, ushering in what Beijing called a "new start" in their
tense and testy relations.
(AP, 7/4/08)
2008 Jul 4, Colombia's military
found more than a ton of explosives in a house in a rural area
outside the capital.
(AP, 7/6/08)
2008 Jul 4, Ecuador's
constitutional assembly pardoned hundreds of jailed convicts,
low-level drug couriers known as "mules." An estimated 1,200
prisoners may be eligible for pardon.
(AP, 7/7/08)
2008 Jul 4, India's coalition
government underwent a major shake-up with the dominant Congress
party pushing on with a controversial nuclear deal with the US and
ditching left-wing allies. In eastern India at least six people were
killed and 20 injured in a stampede at a popular Hindu religious
festival in Orissa state’s Puri district. Truck drivers called off
their strike after the government agreed to roll back rising road
tolls.
(AFP, 7/4/08)(WSJ, 7/5/08, p.A5)
2008 Jul 4, State television
said Iran delivered its response to an international offer of
incentives for it to suspend uranium enrichment, a central part of
its nuclear program. It did not say what the response was.
(AP, 7/4/08)
2008 Jul 4, In Basra, Iraq,
gunmen on a motorcycle assassinated Sheik Salim al-Dirraji, an
official of Iraq's biggest Shiite party.
(AP, 7/5/08)
2008 Jul 4, Japan announced it
will provide $50 million in new emergency food aid to help
developing countries cope with the impact of soaring food prices.
(AP, 7/4/08)
2008 Jul 4, Fierce fighting
raged in India's portion of Kashmir, killing five army soldiers and
a suspected Muslim rebel near the de facto border with Pakistan.
(AP, 7/4/08)
2008 Jul 4, In New Zealand
morning rush-hour traffic slowed to a crawl in most cities as
truckers snarled highways and streets with thousands of vehicles to
protest higher road taxes.
(AP, 7/4/08)
2008 Jul 4, In Nigeria hundreds
of soldiers, who served as UN peacekeepers in Liberia, went on the
rampage in southwestern Akure in protest against the military
authorities' refusal to pay their allowance. On April 27, 2009, a
Nigerian court-martial sentenced 27 former UN peacekeepers to life
in prison after they were convicted of mutiny following their
protests. On Aug 29 the army commuted the life sentences to 7 years.
(AP, 7/5/08)(AP, 4/28/09)(AFP, 8/29/09)
2008 Jul 4, North Korea said it
will not take further steps to dismantle its nuclear program until
the US and its other negotiating partners award fuel oil and
political benefits promised under an aid-for-disarmament deal.
(AP, 7/4/08)
2008 Jul 4, In Pakistan a bomb
exploded on a busy street in the southwestern city of Quetta,
killing a 4-year old girl and wounding 11 other people.
(AP, 7/4/08)
2008 Jul 4, Poland rejected a
US offer to boost its air defenses in return for basing a "missile
shield" on Polish soil but PM Donald Tusk said Poland remains open
for further talks with Washington.
(Reuters, 7/4/08)
2008 Jul 4, In Sri Lanka
soldiers took control of Michael Base in the rebel stronghold of
Mullaitivu district after three days of fighting. Other battles in
Vavuniya killed 18 rebels and wounded three soldiers. Fighting in
Mannar, Jaffna and Welioya left 15 rebels dead and one soldier
wounded.
(AP, 7/4/08)(AP, 7/5/08)
2008 Jul 4, Robert Mugabe ruled
out the prospect of talks with his opponents on ending Zimbabwe's
political crisis unless they acknowledge his victory in the one-man
presidential election. Botswana's government urged its neighbors not
to recognize Mugabe's re-election as it reiterated calls for
Zimbabwe to be suspended from a regional bloc.
(AFP, 7/4/08)
2008 Jul 5, Kent Couch (48), a
gas station owner, flew a lawn chair rigged with helium-filled
balloons more than 200 miles across the Oregon desert, landing in a
field in Idaho. He used his trusty BB gun to help him return to
Earth.
(AP, 7/6/08)(www.couchballoons.com/)
2008 Jul 5, In Afghanistan a
clash killed seven Taliban and two police in Helmand province. Five
other officers were wounded during the fight in Nawa district. A
Canadian military medic was killed when an explosive device
detonated in the Panjwayi District.
(AP, 7/6/08)(Reuters, 7/7/08)
2008 Jul 5, Argentina's lower
house of Congress approved a package of grain-export taxes that have
sparked nationwide farm protests and food shortages.
(AP, 7/5/08)
2008 Jul 5, A small boat packed
with at least 148 illegal immigrants from Africa landed on a beach
in the Canary Islands.
(AP, 7/5/08)
2008 Jul 5, In northern China
an apparent blast at a coal mine killed 21 workers at the Wujiu coal
mine outside Datong city in Shanxi province. In central China a
four-story building under construction in a suburb of Wuhan city
collapsed and killed eight people.
(AP, 7/6/08)
2008 Jul 5, Dagestan's Interior
Ministry says three policemen were wounded when a bomb went off near
their vehicle in the town of Khasavyurt.
(AP, 7/5/08)
2008 Jul 5, In northern India
flooding, house collapses and lightning strikes from heavy rains
killed at least 14 people, raising the reported death toll in the
annual monsoon season to 79.
(AP, 7/6/08)
2008 Jul 5, In Ingushetia a
police officer was killed and another was injured when their armored
vehicle came under grenade fire.
(AP, 7/5/08)
2008 Jul 5, An Iranian
government spokesman says the country's nuclear program remains
unchanged, indicating that Tehran has no plans to stop enriching
uranium.
(AP, 7/5/08)
2008 Jul 5, The last major
remnant of Saddam Hussein's nuclear program — a huge stockpile of
concentrated natural uranium, reached a Canadian port to complete a
secret US operation that included a two-week airlift from Baghdad
and a ship voyage crossing two oceans. In Iraq one American soldier
died of a non-combat cause.
(AP, 7/6/08)(AP, 7/5/08)
2008 Jul 5, In northern Japan
more than 1,000 people marched to protest an upcoming summit of the
G8 industrialized countries. Police arrested four protesters after a
brief scuffle.
(AP, 7/5/08)
2008 Jul 5, In Kashmir
thousands of protesters clashed with police in Srinagar over
allegations that government forces set fire to Jenab Sahib, a local
Muslim shrine.
(AP, 7/5/08)
2008 Jul 5, Macedonia’s leading
party said PM Nikola Gruevski has agreed to form a coalition
government with the main ethnic Albanian party to aim at getting its
NATO and EU bids back on track.
(Reuters, 7/5/08)
2008 Jul 5, Nigerian officials
said radioactive materials in abandoned mining fields in central
Nigeria's Plateau state pose a serious health hazard to two million
people. Police said Nigeria has deployed troops in the remote
southeastern state of Ebonyi after 14 people were killed and scores
of buildings destroyed in clashes between rival groups feuding over
land.
(AP, 7/5/08)(Reuters, 7/5/08)
2008 Jul 5, Pakistan's Foreign
Ministry insisted that its nuclear proliferation case was closed, a
day after the disgraced architect of its atomic program claimed the
army under President Pervez Musharraf helped spread the technology
to North Korea in 2000. A government official said Pakistani
security forces have eased an operation against insurgents in a
tribal region near the border with Afghanistan as local elders try
to negotiate peace with a militant leader.
(AP, 7/5/08)
2008 Jul 5, South Korean police
said about 50,000 people protested in Seoul against a US beef import
deal and the policies of the new president, whose government has
faced weeks of street rallies.
(AP, 7/5/08)
2008 Jul 5, In Sri Lanka
clashes were reported in several villages in Vavuniya district where
12 rebels were killed. 3 rebels were killed in Mannar and 4 rebels
and a soldier were killed in Welioya.
(AP, 7/6/08)
2008 Jul 5, In southern
Thailand suspected insurgents shot up a bustling cafe, killing three
customers and injuring four others.
(AP, 7/5/08)
2008 Jul 5, In northern Yemen
an explosion at the main post office building of Saada killed at
least five people.
(AP, 7/5/08)
2008 Jul 6, In Afghanistan the
chief government official in the Deh Bala district of Nangarhar
province said villagers reported that as many as 27 people walking
in a group toward a wedding were killed in a bombing. Up to 10
others were wounded. The US-led coalition said an airstrike killed
or wounded 20 militants in Nangarhar. An official investigation
later found that the US-led air strikes struck a wedding and killed
47 Afghan civilians.
(AP, 7/6/08)(AFP, 7/11/08)
2008 Jul 6, In Iraq a car bomb
in northern Baghdad killed six people and injured 14 others,
including three policemen. Ali Abdul Ridha al-Badri, the head of an
awakening council in Iskandariyah, and was killed by a bomb attached
to his car after meeting with US forces. A roadside bomb in Diyala
province killed a high-ranking member of the Patriotic Union of
Kurdistan along with 7 others. 2 civilians were killed in Baquba
when police clashed with members of the Awakening Councils.
(AP, 7/6/08)(SFC, 7/7/08, p.A5)
2008 Jul 6, Israel re-opened
its border crossings with the Gaza Strip after closing them because
of Palestinian rocket fire.
(AP, 7/6/08)
2008 Jul 6, In northern Mexico
a plane carrying a load of auto parts crashed s it was trying to
land, killing the pilot and severely injuring the co-pilot.
(AP, 7/6/08)
2008 Jul 6, Myanmar's state-run
newspaper said the overwhelming election victory by Aung San Suu
Kyi's party in 1990 has been nullified by the approval of a
military-backed constitution and her National League for Democracy
party should prepare for a new vote in 2010.
(AP, 7/6/08)
2008 Jul 6, In Pakistan a
two-story apartment building collapsed in the port city of Karachi,
killing eight people, including a toddler. A suicide attacker
detonated explosives near a police station in Islamabad, killing at
least 15 people and wounding dozens.
(AP, 7/6/08)
2008 Jul 6, In Somalia gunmen
opened fire on people leaving a mosque in Mogadishu, killing one of
the country’s senior UN officials.
(SFC, 7/7/08, p.A3)
2008 Jul 6, South Korea said it
was implementing a multi-stage contingency plan aimed at reducing
energy consumption before the skyrocketing oil prices push Asia's
fourth-largest economy into a full-fledged crisis.
(Reuters, 7/6/08)
2008 Jul 6, Sri Lankan fighter
jets bombed a Tamil Tiger rebel position in their northern
stronghold.
(AP, 7/6/08)
2008 Jul 6, The United Arab
Emirates canceled all its Iraqi debt and moved to restore a full
diplomatic mission in Baghdad by naming a new ambassador.
(AP, 7/6/08)
2008 Jul 7, Tropical storm
Bertha strengthened to become the first hurricane of the Atlantic
season.
(AP, 7/7/08)
2008 Jul 7, Bruce Conner
(b.1933), SF-based artist, died. His collages and prints looked back
to classics of surrealism. His work was later said to look like a
bridge between the Beat generation and postmodernism.
(http://daily.greencine.com/archives/006353.html)(SFC, 7/8/08,
p.B5)(SFC, 5/4/09, p.E3)
2008 Jul 7, In Afghanistan a
car bomb detonated by a suicide bomber ripped through the front wall
of the Indian Embassy in central Kabul, killing 41 people in the
deadliest attack in the capital since the fall of the Taliban.
(AP, 7/7/08)(AP, 7/8/08)
2008 Jul 7, Austria’s ruling
coalition crumbled and new elections were expected as early as
September. The left-right alliance broke up after 18 months in
office.
(WSJ, 7/8/08, p.A12)(Econ, 7/12/08, p.63)
2008 Jul 7, In central
Bangladesh 2 passenger buses collided head-on, killing at least 20
people and wounding dozens more.
(AP, 7/7/08)
2008 Jul 7, The Church of
England's ruling body voted its support for women to become bishops
without giving traditionalist supporters of male-only priesthood the
concessions they had sought.
(AP, 7/8/08)
2008 Jul 7, In China Diana
O'Brien (22), a Canadian model, was found murdered in her Shanghai
apartment. On Jul 11 police arrested Chen Jun (18), who confessed to
killing the woman during a robbery.
(AP, 7/11/08)
2008 Jul 7, In Colombia a
rose-laden US cargo plane headed for Miami crashed before dawn near
Bogota, killing a father and son in their home on the ground. It was
the second time in six weeks that a Boeing 747 flown by Ypsilanti,
Michigan-based Kalitta Air has crashed.
(AP, 7/8/08)
2008 Jul 7, In Congo (DRC)
unidentified gunmen ambushed a vehicle belonging to the World
Wildlife Fund in Virunga national Park, killing two people and
wounding three others.
(AP, 7/9/08)
2008 Jul 7, Police in East
Timor's capital fired tear gas to disperse students protesting a
plan by lawmakers to buy themselves new cars with state funds.
(AP, 7/7/08)
2008 Jul 7, In Egypt smugglers
killed a police officer during a shootout on the border with Israel.
(AP, 7/7/08)
2008 Jul 7, A court in
Equatorial Guinea convicted former British officer Simon Mann on of
being the key player in a failed 2004 coup plot in this Central
African nation and sentenced him to 34 years and four months in
prison.
(AP, 7/7/08)
2008 Jul 7, European Union
nations gave their backing to a French-drafted pact calling for
tightening immigration and asylum rules across the 27-nation bloc.
(AP, 7/8/08)
2008 Jul 7, In Germany war
crimes suspect Callixte Mbarushimana, a former UN employee wanted
for his alleged role in the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, was arrested in
Frankfurt.
(AFP, 7/8/08)
2008 Jul 7, Germany’s Fresenius
SE said it has agreed to buy US generic drug maker APP
Pharmaceuticals for $3.7 billion in cash in a deal that will give
the health care company more opportunities in the North American
market for drugs administered intravenously.
(AP, 7/7/08)
2008 Jul 7, PM al-Maliki said
Iraq has proposed a short-term memorandum of understanding with the
US rather than trying to hammer through a formal agreement on the
presence of US forces. A roadside bomb near a dress shop in Baqouba
killed a woman and injured 14 others.
(AP, 7/7/08)
2008 Jul 7, Israeli troops in
jeeps swooped down on the West Bank town of Nablus, shutting down a
girls' school, a medical center and two other facilities of a
Hamas-affiliated charity. Palestinian militants fired a mortar shell
at a border crossing with the Gaza Strip. Israel's military said it
had begun digging up the bodies of Lebanese fighters after the
government struck a deal with Hezbollah guerrillas to swap five
living prisoners and dozens of bodies for two Israeli soldiers
captured in 2006.
(AP, 7/7/08)
2008 Jul 7, Israeli Lt. Col.
Omri Borberg was caught on video holding the arm of Ashraf Abu
Rahmeh while he was shot in the foot with a rubber-coated bullet in
the West Bank village of Naalin. On Jan 27, 2011, an Israeli
military court sentenced two soldiers, convicted in the close-range
shooting of a bound and blindfolded Palestinian man, but spared them
jail time.
(AP, 1/27/11)(http://tinyurl.com/45ufwxq)
2008 Jul 7, In Italy transport
workers went on strike, forcing the cancellation of thousands of
bus, tram and subway lines and snarling traffic across the country.
(AP, 7/7/08)
2008 Jul 7, In Japan G8 leaders
raised the prospect of more sanctions against Zimbabwe unless quick
progress is made to end a political crisis after a violent election
that extended President Robert Mugabe's 28-year rule. The G8 met
with seven African leaders at its annual summit. African leaders
urged the Group of Eight nations to tackle spiking oil and food
prices. Japan included 5 “outreach” countries (Brazil, China, India,
Mexico and South Africa) for brief discussions with the G8.
(Reuters, 7/7/08)(AFP, 7/7/08)(Econ, 7/5/08,
p.33)
2008 Jul 7, In Indian Kashmir
Ghulam Nabi Azad, the chief minister said he was stepping down
following protests over the government’s handling of the transfer of
government land to the Shiri Amarnath Shrine Board, a trust running
the revered Hindu shrine.
(WSJ, 7/8/08, p.A12)
2008 Jul 7, Mexican police
found six charred bodies on a Tijuana street following a bloody
weekend that left 14 people dead.
(AP, 7/7/08)
2008 Jul 7, In Pakistan a total
of seven small blasts left 43 people wounded in the commercial
capital of Karachi.
(AP, 7/8/08)
2008 Jul 7, Serbia's parliament
approved a new government that includes a pro-Western group and the
political party of the late strongman Slobodan Milosevic.
(AP, 7/8/08)
2008 Jul 7, The South African
Reserve Bank said 5 million coins featuring a smiling Nelson Mandela
will go into circulation on July 18, the former president's 90th
birthday.
(AP, 7/7/08)
2008 Jul 7, Sudan's parliament
approved a new electoral law, a crucial step towards scheduled
national elections and a democratic transition laid out in peace
arrangements after a 21-year civil war.
(AP, 7/7/08)
2008 Jul 7, A UNESCO official
said that an 11th century temple that sits on Cambodia's disputed
border zone with Thailand has been designated as a world heritage
site. Hindu-themed Preah Vihear reflects the beliefs of the kings
who ruled what was then the Angkorean empire.
(AP, 7/8/08)
2008 Jul 8, A report from a US
Senate Homeland Security investigations subcommittee said sellers of
medical supplies collected as much as $93 million in fraudulent
Medicare claims based on prescriptions from doctors who were
actually dead.
(SFC, 7/9/08, p.A6)
2008 Jul 8, Boeing announced a
deal with SkyHook Int’l., a private Canadian firm, to develop a
heavy lift rotorcraft capable of carrying 4o tons.
(Econ, 7/12/08, p.76)
2008 Jul 8, In California the
Butte Lightning Complex Fire destroyed 41 homes overnight in and
around Paradise. The next day 10,000 people were evacuated from the
area.
(SFC, 7/10/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 8, T. Boone Pickens,
energy baron, announced his “Pickens Plan” for installing wind
turbines in parts of four Texas Panhandle counties. The plans were
scrapped in 2009 due to lack of transmission lines.
(AP, 7/7/09)
2008 Jul 8, John Templeton
(b.1912), legendary mutual fund manager, died in Nassau. His
Templeton Growth Fund in 1954 was among the first to invest in
companies outside the US. In 1972 he started the Templeton Prize,
which made its first award to Mother Teresa in 1973.
(WSJ, 7/9/08, p.C17)(Econ, 7/19/08, p.95)
2008 Jul 8, Abkhazia's leader
Sergei Bagapsh rejected a US proposal to deploy an international
police force there.
(AP, 7/8/08)
2008 Jul 8, In eastern
Afghanistan a roadside bomb blast killed one NATO soldier and
wounded four others. a provincial police chief said five insurgents
and two policemen died during a clash in central Ghazni province.
(AP, 7/8/08)
2008 Jul 8, Brazilian police
arrested a former Sao Paulo mayor and two prominent financiers in a
case that grew out of an influence-peddling scandal involving senior
government officials.
(AP, 7/9/08)
2008 Jul 8, A Chinese court
jailed Xiong Zhengliang, a former anti-graft prosecutor for life,
for torturing a suspect to death. His superior was sentenced to
seven years in prison for trying to cover up the case. Liang Jiping,
a deputy director of the county's electricity bureau, was detained
in May 2007 on suspicion of taking bribes. Liang died on June 1,
2007, after being held in custody for nearly five days and in three
separate places.
(Reuters, 7/9/08)
2008 Jul 8, Chinese police
killed five Muslims who were planning a "holy war" in the latest
alleged terror threat ahead of the Beijing Olympics. The five were
shot dead when police raided their hide-out in Urumqi.
(AFP, 7/9/08)
2008 Jul 8, The United States
and the Czech Republic signed a treaty in Prague allowing Washington
to build part of a missile defense shield in the central European
state despite opposition from its former Cold War master Russia.
(Reuters, 7/8/08)
2008 Jul 8, Ecuador's
government seized 3 television stations and 195 businesses, owned by
the Isaias family, to collect debts stemming from the 1998 failure
of Filanbanco, owned by Roberto and William Isaias. The economy
minister resigned just hours before the takeover.
(AP, 7/9/08)(Econ, 7/12/08, p.48)
2008 Jul 8, The EU formally
invited Slovakia to join the euro zone on Jan. 1, 2009.
(AP, 7/8/08)
2008 Jul 8, Industrial
conglomerate Siemens AG said it will cut 16,750 jobs, or 4.2 percent
of its global work force, to streamline operations and slice nearly
$2 billion in costs in the face of a slowing economy.
(AP, 7/8/08)
2008 Jul 8, A German cargo ship
held captive for 41 days off the coast of Somalia was released and
all aboard were safe and unharmed. A Somali official said the
pirates received a ransom of $750,000. The Lehmann Timber was one of
two ships hijacked on May 30 off the Horn of Africa.
(AP, 7/9/08)
2008 Jul 8, Tillman Thomas,
former political detainee, returned his party to power in Grenada
after 13 years in opposition. The apparent win by the National
Democratic Congress was a stunning setback for PM Keith Mitchell's
conservative New National Party, which was seeking an unprecedented
4th consecutive term in legislative elections.
(AP, 7/9/08)
2008 Jul 8, Indian PM Manmohan
Singh's communist allies withdrew their support for his
four-year-old coalition government to protest the government's plan
to push forward with a controversial nuclear deal with the United
States. The government had gained new support from the Samajwadi
Party (SP) and submitted a draft request to the IAEA for a required
safeguards accord on July 9.
(AP, 7/8/08)(Econ, 7/12/08, p.50)
2008 Jul 8, At Developing Eight
summit of Islamic nations, meeting in Kuala Lumpur, the leaders of
Indonesia and Malaysia called for boosting world food production and
finding a permanent solution to skyrocketing oil prices, saying the
twin problems have become "grave threats" to the world economy.
(AP, 7/8/08)
2008 Jul 8, Iraq's national
security adviser said his country will not accept any security deal
with the United States unless it contains specific dates for the
withdrawal of US-led forces.
(AP, 7/8/08)
2008 Jul 8, The Israeli
military said Gaza militants fired a mortar shell into Israel in
another violation of a shaky truce.
(AP, 7/8/08)
2008 Jul 8, In Japan G8 leaders
endorsed halving world emissions of greenhouse gases by 2050. The G8
also agreed to impose targeted sanctions against leading Zimbabwean
officials after a violent election last month that extended
President Robert Mugabe's 28-year rule.
(AP, 7/8/08)
2008 Jul 8, Amos Kimunya,
Kenya’s finance minister, was forced to resign following the sale of
the Grand Regency Hotel to Libyans, without taking bids and
advertising the sale. The hotel had been confiscated from Kamlesh
Paul Pattni, a businessman alleged to have paid hundreds of millions
to individuals close to former Pres. Daniel arap Moi, for the export
of gold and diamonds that did not exist.
(Econ, 7/12/08, p.60)
2008 Jul 8, The Mexican
government said UNESCO has added a Monarch butterfly reserve in
southern Mexico to its list of World Heritage sites.
(AP, 7/8/08)
2008 Jul 8, State-media said
Myanmar's military regime has approved visas for more than 1,500
international aid workers to help victims of Cyclone Nargis, with
half of them involved in relief operations in storm-hit regions.
(AP, 7/8/08)
2008 Jul 8, In northwest
Pakistan unknown assailants fired on a vehicle carrying tribal
police forces, killing four and wounding seven.
(AP, 7/808)
2008 Jul 8, In Russia’s
Caucasus region the Interior Ministry of Kabardino-Balkaria province
said unidentified gunmen had riddled the police car with bullets in
the village of Baksan. 3 police officers were killed.
(AP, 7/8/08)
2008 Jul 8, A human rights
group said domestic workers in Saudi Arabia often suffer abuse that
in some cases amounts to slavery, as well as sexual violence and
lashings for spurious allegations of theft or witchcraft.
(AP, 7/8/08)
2008 Jul 8, In Sudan about two
hundred gunmen on horseback and in SUVs ambushed peacekeepers from a
joint UN-African Union force in the Darfur region. Five Rwandan
soldiers and two police officers, one from Ghana and the other from
Uganda, were killed in fierce gunbattles that lasted more than two
hours.
(AP, 7/9/08)
2008 Jul 8, Sudan's army
spokesman claimed Ethiopian forces had attacked a police base 17
kilometers (11 miles) inside Sudanese territory, killing 19 people,
including one police officer. Ethiopia denied the accusations.
(AFP, 7/9/08)
2008 Jul 8, In eastern Turkey
Kurdish guerrillas kidnapped three German tourists on a climbing
expedition. The Germans were released on July 20.
(AP, 7/20/08)
2008 Jul 9, A grand jury in
Anchorage indicted Sen. John Cowdery, an Alaska legislator, on
bribery and conspiracy counts in a federal investigation of
corruption that already has led to convictions against three former
state lawmakers. Federal prosecutors allege that Cowdery conspired
with executives of oil field services company VECO Corp. to bribe
another unnamed state senator for votes to support oil and gas
legislation.
(AP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 9, The California
state Board of Education voted to make algebra mandatory in the
eighth grade beginning in 2011, in order to bring the state into
compliance with the federal No Child Left Behind program.
(SFC, 7/10/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 9, Michigan Gov.
Jennifer Granholm signed legislation approving a compact by 8 states
surrounding the Great Lakes. Michigan was last of the 8 states to
approve the agreement, which outlaws diversions of Great lakes water
from natural drainage basins with rare exceptions.
(WSJ, 7/10/08, p.A2)
2008 Jul 9, In western
Pennsylvania the bodies of 22-year-old Ashley Guarino, her
2-year-old daughter Dreux and 11-month-old son Orlando Jr. were
found by relatives. Orlando Maurice Guarino (38) was arrested the
next day and charged with the murders of his wife and children.
(AP, 7/11/08)
2008 Jul 9, It was announced
that the Abu Dhabi Investment Council had purchased a 90% stake in
NYC’s Chrysler Building for $800 million.
(WSJ, 7/10/08, p.C3)
2008 Jul 9, US electronic games
publisher Activision under Bobby Kotick closed its merger with the
gaming arm of Vivendi, a French media conglomerate, in a deal valued
at $18.8 billion.
(Econ, 8/15/09,
p.60)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Activision_Blizzard)
2008 Jul 9, In northwestern
Afghanistan a group of villagers used a machine gun, sticks and
stones to kill two Taliban militants and chase 10 others away.
NATO-led forces in central Logar province killed a Taliban militant
involved with suicide bombing networks. 9 British soldiers were
injured in Helmand province when an Apache helicopter opened fire
after mistaking them for the enemy.
(AP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 9, China convicted and
then executed two ethnic Uighur men and imprisoned another 15 for
alleged terrorist links in the western region of Xinjiang.
(AP, 7/12/08)
2008 Jul 9, German
investigators carried out raids on 600 homes in Austria, Switzerland
and Germany seeking chemicals used to produce an illicit date-rape
drug.
(AP, 7/9/08)
2008 Jul 9, In Grenada Tillman
Thomas, former political detainee, was sworn in as the new prime
minister.
(AP, 7/9/08)
2008 Jul 9, Iran test-fired
nine long- and medium-range missiles during war games that officials
said aimed to show the country can retaliate against any US and
Israeli attack.
(AP, 7/9/08)
2008 Jul 9, In Iraq a suicide
bomber killed 8 civilians in an attack on a military convoy in
Mosul. A bomb in Fallujah killed four police officers and one
civilian. A bomb killed a US soldier in Samarra. In total bombs and
bullets killed 20 Iraqis.
(AP, 7/9/08)(SFC, 7/10/08, p.A7)
2008 Jul 9, In Ingushetia
police said three officers have been killed and four kidnapped in
separate attacks.
(AP, 7/9/08)
2008 Jul 9, An Israel-Hamas
truce has boiled down to a simple trade-off: For a day of calm,
Israel adds five truckloads of cows and 200 tons of cement to the
barest basics it ships to Gaza, but rocket fire from the territory
reseals the border for a day.
(AP, 7/9/08)
2008 Jul 9, In Italy police in
Naples arrested 44 suspected mobsters in a crackdown on drug
trafficking. The latest raids led to the confiscation of apartments,
cars, motorcycles, farmland and companies worth nearly $480 million.
(AP, 7/9/08)
2008 Jul 9, In Japan G8 leaders
reiterated their commitment for doubling aid to Africa by 2010 and
instituted new accountability procedures to ensure that wealthy
countries fulfill their promises of aid there. They also agreed to
combat global warming but developing nations declined o endorse
emissions targets.
(SFC, 7/10/08, p.A7)(WSJ, 7/10/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 9, In northern Lebanon
heavy fighting erupted between government supporters and Hezbollah's
allies, killing at least 4 people and shattering a truce that lasted
just two weeks.
(AP, 7/9/08)
2008 Jul 9, Tribal elders and
Pakistani authorities struck a deal aimed at bringing peace to a
militant-infested northwest region where a paramilitary offensive
has tried to flush out insurgents. Police captured Rafiuddin, an
aide to top commander Baitullah Mehsud, along with four associates
they traveled in a vehicle through the town of Hangu in the South
Waziristan region.
(AP, 7/9/08)(AP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 9, In Peru tens of
thousands of union workers took to the streets across the country to
protest rising food and fuel prices they blame on the free market
policies of President Alan Garcia.
(AP, 7/9/08)
2008 Jul 9, A Spanish patrol
boat rescued 33 people and recovered one body from the boat off the
coast of southern Almeria province. 15 African migrants, most of
them small children, died of hunger, thirst or exposure as they
drifted across the Mediterranean on the small, overcrowded boat.
(AP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 9, In Istanbul,
Turkey, men armed with pistols and shotguns attacked a police guard
post outside the US consulate, sparking a gunbattle that left 3
attackers and 3 officers dead.
(AP, 7/9/08)(Reuters, 7/9/08)
2008 Jul 10, Pres. Bush signed
a bill that overhauls government eavesdropping and grants
immunity to telecommunications companies that help the US spy on
Americans in suspected terrorism cases.
(SFC, 7/10/08, p.A4)
2008 Jul 10, The American
Medical Association issued a formal apology for more than a century
of discriminatory policies that excluded blacks from participating
in a group long considered the voice of US doctors.
(AP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 10, Rocky Aoki (69),
founder of the Benihana steakhouse chain, died in New York from
complications of cancer. Aoki was also a wrestler and avid
balloonist.
(SFC, 7/12/08,
p.B5)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiroaki_Aoki)
2008 Jul 10, Officials said a
decade-long drought in Australia's most important crop-growing
region is worsening and there is little hope for relief from either
saving rains or a new government conservation plan.
(AP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 10, Britons voted in a
by-election triggered when David Davis, a top opposition MP, quit in
protest at government plans to increase the period police can hold
terror suspects before charging them.
(AFP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 10, Salman Rushdie's
novel "Midnight's Children" was named as the greatest Booker Prize
winner ever, scooping a special "best of the best" award for the
second time.
(AP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 10, In China migrant
workers began a 3-day riot in Kanmen town in coastal Zhejiang
province. Three hundred military police arrived on July 13 and 30
migrant workers have been detained. A Hong Kong-based rights group
said the unrest was centered around a migrant worker who was beaten
by a security guard while trying to get a temporary residence
permit.
(AP, 7/14/08)
2008 Jul 10, The European
Parliament called the fingerprinting of Gypsies in Italy a clear act
of racial discrimination and urged the authorities to stop it.
(AP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 10, European Union
lawmakers called for tougher EU sanctions against Zimbabwe,
including putting businessmen who finance Pres. Mugabe's regime on a
visa ban list.
(AP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 10, In France four
people were found shot dead near the southwestern city of Toulouse.
A fifth victim died later in hospital.
(AFP, 7/11/08)
2008 Jul 10, Indonesia executed
Ahmad Suradji (57), a man convicted of killing 42 women and girls in
a series of ritual slayings he believed would give him magical
powers.
(AP, 7/11/08)
2008 Jul 10, In Indonesia
Asnawi Sandri, a 38-year-old father of two, died in the hospital,
days after he came down with symptoms of bird flu. This raised the
unofficial toll in the world's hardest hit nation to 111 in three
years.
(AP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 10, Iran test-fired
more long-range missiles overnight in a second round of exercises
meant to show that the country can defend itself against any attack
by the US or Israel.
(AP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 10, Iraq's Oil
Ministry said that it is close to signing contracts to build two new
oil refineries in southern Iraq. Turkey's PM Recep Tayyip Erdogan
became the first Turkish leader to visit Iraq in nearly 20 years.
(AP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 10, Israeli troops
shot and killed a teenage Palestinian militant along the country's
border with Gaza. Soldiers thought he was armed but, after
inspecting the body, found that he was not. In the fourth day of
operations in the city of Nablus, Israel closed a clinic and TV
station, and raided a mosque.
(AP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 10, In northern
Mexico, 6 bullet-ridden bodies were found inside the auto body shop
in Culiacan, the capital of Sinaloa state, and three more bodies
were found on the street just outside the business. A police
investigator was found shot to death in his truck near Culiacan's
police headquarters.
(AP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 10, Nigeria's main
militant group said it would resume attacks in the country's
oil-rich river delta region because of Britain's recent pledge to
back the government in the conflict there. UN special envoy Ibrahim
Gambari resigned as chairman of a planned peace summit for the
oil-rich Niger Delta following opposition from regional leaders.
(AP, 7/10/08)(AFP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 10, North Korea
returned to international talks on its nuclear activities after a
nine-month break, in what host China hailed as a potential turning
point in the disarmament process.
(AFP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 10, In Pakistan six
mortar rounds appeared to have targeted a military post in Angore
Adda in South Waziristan, seriously wounding six Pakistani troops,
lightly wounding two other troops and also injuring two civilians in
a nearby market.
(AP, 7/12/08)
2008 Jul 10, A Palestinian
health official said a tunnel used to smuggle goods across the
Gaza-Egypt border has collapsed, killing two Palestinians.
(AP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 10, The Interfax news
agency, citing a source in Russia's secret services, reported that
the head of the embassy's trade and investment section, Christopher
Bowers, was believed to be a senior British intelligence officer.
(AP, 7/11/08)
2008 Jul 10, Somali insurgents
killed at least two people in an overnight attack on an army base 15
miles (24 kilometers) northeast of the government headquarters in
Baidoa.
(AP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 10, In Turkey
authorities detained four suspects in connection with the July 9
attack on the US consulate in Istanbul which left 3 policemen and 3
assailants dead.
(AP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 10, In Uzbekistan a
fire at a Soviet-era military base spread to an ammunition depot,
igniting a series of powerful explosions that killed three people
and injured 21 others.
(AP, 7/10/08)
2008 Jul 11, US banking
regulators seized IndyMac Bancorp Inc., Pasadena-based mortgage
lender, after withdrawals by panicked depositors led to the
second-largest banking failure in US history. Fannie Mae and Freddie
Mac said that their finances were sufficiently sound to withstand
the housing crisis as government officials scrambled to restore
confidence in the country's two largest mortgage finance companies.
(Reuters, 7/12/08)(SFC, 7/12/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 11, Gregg Bergersen
(51), a former US Defense Department analyst, was sentenced in
Virginia to 57 months in prison for passing classified information
about Taiwan to a Chinese government agent.
(Reuters, 7/12/08)
2008 Jul 11, Apple introduced
its next generation iPhone in 22 countries. Unprecedented demand
caused initial service problems.
(SFC, 7/12/08, p.C1)
2008 Jul 11, Oil prices touched
$147 a barrel before beginning a decline.
(Econ, 8/9/08, p.70)
2008 Jul 11, Dr. Michael
DeBakey (b.1908), the world-famous cardiovascular surgeon, died. He
pioneered such now-common procedures as bypass surgery and invented
a host of devices to help heart patients. He was among the first to
link lung cancer to smoking in a medical journal article in 1939.
(AP, 7/12/08)(SSFC, 7/13/08, p.B6)
2008 Jul 11, In San Francisco
Armando Estrada (30) of Rodeo, Ca., was shot and killed at 20th and
Mission streets. In 2009 Jonathan Cruz-Ramirez and Guillermo
Herrera, alleged members of the MS-13 street gang, were charged with
the murder.
(SFC, 10/23/09,
p.A12)(www.sfgov.org/site/police_index.asp?id=91505)
2008 Jul 11, In Australia the
official program for the Catholic church's World Youth Day began,
but was partly overshadowed by the launch of an investigation into
sexual abuse allegations against a disgraced priest. Thousands of
pilgrims converged on Sydney as it braced for the weekend arrival of
Pope Benedict.
(AFP, 7/11/08)(AP, 7/11/08)
2008 Jul 11, Brazilian
President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva promised to support East Timor
during talks in Dili with Timorese leaders including President Jose
Ramos-Horta.
(AFP, 7/11/08)
2008 Jul 11, In Cambodia Khim
Sam Bo (47), a journalist working for a pro-opposition newspaper,
was killed along with his son (19) in a drive-by shooting in Phnom
Phen. A gunman on a motorcycle shot five times at the victims as
they were leaving a sports stadium on a motorcycle.
(AP, 7/12/08)
2008 Jul 11, Officials said the
bodies of four Africans have been found in a small boat packed with
migrants trying to reach Spain's Canary Islands. It was the third
such tragedy in a week.
(AP, 7/12/08)
2008 Jul 11, President Raul
Castro warned Cubans to prepare for a "realistic" brand of communism
that is economically viable and does away with excessive state
subsidies designed to promote equality on the island.
(AP, 7/11/08)
2008 Jul 11, The Czech
Republic’s Industry and Trade Ministry announced that Russia has
reduced its oil shipments to the country without providing an
explanation. The cutback was announced three days after the nation
signed a military agreement with Washington that the Kremlin
strongly opposes. Russia later said the supplies dropped because 2
Russian firms had decided to refine more crude at home.
(AP, 7/11/08)(WSJ, 7/15/08, p.A9)
2008 Jul 11, Ethiopia's Ogadeni
rebels accused the regime in Addis Ababa of deliberately blocking
international aid to their war-wracked and drought-stricken region.
(AFP, 7/11/08)
2008 Jul 11, In Iraq the US
military detained nine people suspected of involvement in the
al-Qaida in Iraq group in raids in Baghdad and the cities of Beiji
and Mosul.
(AP, 7/11/08)
2008 Jul 11, Israeli police
revealed stinging new allegations against PM Ehud Olmert, accusing
him of pocketing tens of thousands of dollars by deceiving multiple
sources into paying for the same trips abroad. Israeli troops killed
a Palestinian gunman who opened fire in the early morning on an
Israeli civilian driving in the West Bank.
(AP, 7/11/08)(AP, 7/12/08)
2008 Jul 11, International
donors pledged more than half of the euro1.5 billion ($2.36 billion)
in aid requested by Kosovo to build up its infrastructure and
democratic institutions.
(AP, 7/11/08)
2008 Jul 11, Lebanon's PM Fuad
Saniora announced a new national unity Cabinet in which Hezbollah
and its allies have veto power over government decisions.
(AP, 7/11/08)
2008 Jul 11, A fishing boat,
carrying eight Taiwanese, one Chinese and six crew members from
Madagascar, sank after reporting engine problems.
(AP, 7/14/08)
2008 Jul 11, In the Netherlands
health authorities announced a Dutch woman, infected during a
holiday to Uganda by the contagious Marburg virus, had died
overnight. The Marburg virus is similar to Ebola and causes heavy
bleeding. About 100 people who may have had contact with the woman
were under surveillance.
(AFP, 7/11/08)
2008 Jul 11, A senior military
official said the Nigerian navy has arrested 15 Filipinos after
intercepting a vessel carrying a significant quantity of stolen
crude oil off the coast of the Niger Delta. Gunboats intercepted the
MV Lina Panama in the waters off Brass, home to a major oil export
terminal in the southern state of Bayelsa. One security source said
the vessel was thought to be carrying tens of thousands of tons of
stolen oil.
(Reuters, 7/12/08)
2008 Jul 11, A North Korean
soldier fatally shot a South Korean woman tourist (53) at a mountain
resort in the communist North, prompting the South to suspend the
high-profile tour program. Park Wang-ja had strayed a
half-mile into a fenced off military area and was shot twice from
behind.
(AP, 7/11/08)
2008 Jul 11, In Serbia a bus
carrying Polish tourists overturned north of Belgrade, killing six
people and injuring nearly 40.
(AP, 7/11/08)
2008 Jul 11, Somali troops shot
and killed 7 civilians in southern Mogadishu after accusing them of
being part of an Islamic insurgency.
(SFC, 7/11/08, p.A3)
2008 Jul 11, In southern Sri
Lanka suspected rebel gunmen ambushed a crowded passenger bus as it
traveled down a small rural road. The attack killed a boy and three
women and wounded 25 others. Clashes broke out in the Mannar,
Vavuniya and Welioya regions surrounding the rebel stronghold killed
17 rebels.
(AP, 7/12/08)
2008 Jul 11, Thai prosecutors
filed new corruption charges against ousted PM Thaksin Shinawatra
for alleged abuse of authority to benefit his family business.
(AP, 7/11/08)
2008 Jul 11, A Turkish news
agency reported that army troops clashed with Kurdish rebels in the
southeast and that 10 of the rebels were killed.
(AP, 7/11/08)
2008 Jul 11, The UN
commemorated World Population Day.
(www.unfpa.org/wpd/)
2008 Jul 11, Venezuela's Hugo
Chavez and Colombia's Alvaro Uribe mended relations after months of
sniping that threatened trade and unleashed a diplomatic crisis.
(AP, 7/11/08)
2008 Jul 11, Zimbabwe’s
opposition Movement for Democratic Change said a total of 113 MDC
supporters have now been killed in politically-related violence.
Zimbabwe's ruling party and opposition held a second day of talks in
South Africa. A UN Security Council bid to pass sanctions against
Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe was vetoed by Russia and China.
(AP, 7/11/08)(AFP, 7/11/08)(AFP, 7/12/08)
2008 Jul 12, Les Crane, pioneer
talk radio and TV host, died in Marin, California. In 1964 he hosted
the “The Les Crane Show,” a late night TV talk show on ABC that ran
for 4 months.
(SFC, 7/17/08, p.B5)
2008 Jul 12, Bobby Murcer (62),
former Yankee baseball player and broadcaster, died from a malignant
brain tumor in Oklahoma City. The only person to play with Mantle
and Mattingly, the popular Murcer hit .277 with 252 home runs and
1,043 RBIs in 17 seasons with the Yankees, San Francisco and the
Chicago Cubs. He made the All-Star team in both leagues and won a
Gold Glove.
(AP, 7/13/08)
2008 Jul 12, Tony Snow (53), a
conservative writer and commentator who cheerfully sparred with
reporters in the White House briefing room during a stint as
President Bush's press secretary, died of colon cancer.
(AP, 7/12/08)
2008 Jul 12, In central
Afghanistan Taliban militants executed two women just outside Ghazni
city after accusing them of working as prostitutes on a US base. A
soldier serving with ISAF died of wounds caused by an explosion in
northern Afghanistan. NATO troops killed Bismullah Akhund, an
insurgent leader in Helmand's Naw Zad district.
(AP, 7/13/08)(AP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 12, NATO said a recent
border clash that wounded several Pakistani and Afghan security
personnel was sparked by insurgents in Afghanistan who fired at
targets in both countries, apparently to stoke cross-border
tensions.
(AP, 7/12/08)
2008 Jul 12, The Arab League
said it will hold crisis talks on Sudan after reports the
International Criminal Court may seek Sudanese President Omar
al-Beshir's arrest, amid fears for peace efforts in Darfur. It would
mark the first-ever bid by the ICC, based in The Hague, to charge a
sitting head of state. The African Union said that plans by the ICC
could jeopardize peace efforts in Darfur.
(AFP, 7/12/08)
2008 Jul 12, Ethiopia said it
has arrested eight "Eritrean-trained" rebels suspected of carrying
out bombings that rocked the capital Addis Ababa and killed eight
people earlier this year.
(Reuters, 7/13/08)
2008 Jul 12, French President
Nicolas Sarkozy met his Egyptian counterpart Hosni Mubarak, kicking
off a round of diplomacy with Middle East leaders ahead of an
EU-Mediterranean summit. Sarkozy said that Syria and Lebanon will
open embassies in each other's countries for the first time. Syria's
leader cautioned there was still work to be done before that could
happen.
(AP, 7/12/08)(AP, 7/13/08)
2008 Jul 12, In Jakarta,
Indonesia, Brazil’s President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and
President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono pledged cooperation on biofuels
during talks in a bid to take advantage of surging oil prices.
(AFP, 7/12/08)
2008 Jul 12, In western Nepal
about 500 riot policemen took senior officers hostage in a revolt
over ill treatment and poor food. They released their captives and
surrendered after a two-day standoff.
(AP, 7/13/08)(AP, 7/14/08)
2008 Jul 12, In Nigeria a truck
drivers strike to protest soaring fuel prices entered its 2nd day.
At least 17 people died at a prayer meeting in rural Nigeria after
apparently breathing noxious fumes from their power generator while
asleep. Their bodies were discovered on July 15.
(AFP, 7/12/08)(Reuters, 7/16/08)
2008 Jul 12, North Korea agreed
to completely disable its main nuclear facilities by the end of
October and to allow thorough site inspections to verify that all
necessary steps had been taken as the latest round of six-nation
disarmament talks concluded in Beijing.
(AFP, 7/12/08)
2008 Jul 12, In northwestern
Pakistan at least 13 paramilitary forces and three militants were
killed in an ambush and shootout when militants attacked a Frontier
Constabulary convoy in the Zargari area of Hangu district.
Provincial police in Hangu arrested half a dozen Taliban including
Rafiuddin, a lieutenant of Baitullah Mehsud. The militants in
response captured 29-49 hostages.
(AP, 7/13/08)(SFC, 7/19/08, p.A5)
2008 Jul 12, In Sri Lanka 18
rebels and a soldier were killed in Mannar district; 7 rebels and a
soldier were killed in Vavuniya and six guerrillas died in Welioya.
Each side often exaggerates the casualties and damage inflicted on
its enemy while underreporting its own losses.
(AP, 7/13/08)
2008 Jul 12, Pope Benedict XVI
left Rome on a flight to Australia for a 10-day pilgrimage. The Pope
said he will use his visit to Australia to apologize for sexual
abuse by priests and to examine how the Church can "prevent, heal
and reconcile".
(AFP, 7/12/08)
2008 Jul 12, President Hugo
Chavez said that he is expanding his Venezuela's Petrocaribe
oil-supply pact to include Guatemala.
(AP, 7/13/08)
2008 Jul 12, Thousands of
Venezuelans protested in the capital demanding that the Supreme
Court overturn a "blacklist" blocking key opponents of President
Hugo Chavez from running in upcoming elections.
(AP, 7/12/08)
2008 Jul 13, The US Securities
and Exchange Commission said it would immediately conduct
investigations aimed at preventing the intentional spreading of
false information intended to manipulate securities prices. the
Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department announced steps to brace
slumping mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
(Reuters, 7/14/08)(AP, 7/14/08)
2008 Jul 13, Terry Childs (43),
a San Francisco computer engineer, was arrested on felony charges
for allegedly plotting to hijack the city’s computer system. Childs,
who continue to draw his $127,735 annual salary, refused to provide
passwords to the network system and was held in lieu of a $5 million
bail. Mayor Newsom met with Childs on July 21, who provided system
code. Cisco engineers had the system back under control by July 22.
On April 27, 2010, Childs was convicted of felony computer
tampering. On April 27, 2010, a Superior Court jury concluded that
his crime cost the city over $200,000, making him eligible for a
maximum state sentence of 5 years. On Aug 6, 2010, Childs was
sentenced to 4 years in prison.
(SFC, 7/16/08, p.B1)(SFC, 7/23/08, p.B1)(SFC,
4/28/10, p.C1)(SFC, 8/7/10, p.C2)
2008 Jul 13, Belgian-based
brewer InBev announced it will buy Anheuser-Busch for $52 billion.
(http://www.kansascity.com/382/story/703682.html)
2008 Jul 13, In southern
Afghanistan a suicide bomber on a motorcycle blew himself up next to
a police patrol killing 24 people in Uruzgan province. A two-day
battle sparked by an insurgent attack killed at least 40 militants
in Helmand province. A NATO soldier died in a roadside blast in
Helmand province. In Kunar province, fighting erupted when militants
attacked a NATO security force outpost. In eastern Logar province
gunmen kidnapped parliament member Abdul Wali and his driver.
Well-armed militants got inside a remote military outpost in the
village of Wanat in the mountainous northeastern province of Kunar.
9 American soldiers were killed in the deadliest assault on US
forces in Afghanistan in three years. In 2010 the US Army reversed a
decision to punish three officers for command failures that led to
the deadly firefight.
(AP, 7/13/08)(AP, 7/14/08)(AP, 6/23/10)
2008 Jul 13, Algeria’s
government newspaper El Moudjhaid said a consortium of British-based
oil services company Petrofac and Indonesian engineering company
IKPT provisionally won a contract to build an LNG plant in western
Mediterranean port of Arzew.
(AP, 7/13/08)
2008 Jul 13, Pope Benedict XVI
arrived in Sydney, after a stop in Darwin, for one of the largest
Christian gatherings on Earth, starting a visit set to be marked by
his apology for sexual abuse by priests in Australia.
(AFP, 7/13/08)
2008 Jul 13, French President
Nicolas Sarkozy urged the disparate and conflicted countries around
the Mediterranean Sea to make peace as European rivals did in the
20th century as he launched an unprecedented Union for the
Mediterranean. 43 nations, including Israel and Arab states, pledged
to work for a Middle East free of weapons of mass destruction at the
close of a summit to launch an unprecedented Union for the
Mediterranean aimed at securing peace across the restive region.
(AP, 7/13/08)(AP, 7/14/08)
2008 Jul 13, Iranian state TV
said the country is exploring a newly discovered oil field believed
to contain more than 1 billion barrels of crude oil.
(AP, 7/13/08)
2008 Jul 13, In Iraq gunmen
attacked a soccer game near Duluiya killing a police officer and a
Sunni Muslim allied with the US against al-Qaida. A roadside bomb in
Fallujah killed 4 police officers. A bomb hit a truck near Baquba.
The driver and his assistant died of their wounds at a nearby
hospital. Some 70 women graduated in the first Daughters of Iraq, a
group of female security volunteers.
(SFC, 7/14/08, p.A3)
2008 Jul 13, Thousands of
Japanese rallied against the permanent basing of the nuclear-powered
USS George Washington aircraft carrier near Tokyo, saying a recent
onboard fire made it unsafe.
(AP, 7/13/08)
2008 Jul 13, In Indian Kashmir
10 people were hurt when police had to fire shots in the air and use
tear gas to disperse a crowd that was attacking pro-India
politicians.
(AP, 7/13/08)
2008 Jul 13, In Mexico gunmen
opened fire on four cars on a busy street in Guamuchil, killing
eight people. Among the victims were a girl (11), two 17-year-old
boys and two women aged 18 and 19. On July 16 Mexico's government
offered a reward of nearly US$100,000 for information leading to the
capture of the gunmen.
(AP, 7/14/08)(AP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 13, In Poland
Bronislaw Geremek (76), former foreign minister (1997-2000), died in
a car accident near Lubien. He was an icon in the struggle against
communist rule and a founding member of the Solidarity trade union.
(AFP, 7/13/08)(Econ, 7/26/08, p.98)
2008 Jul 13, In Sierra Leone a
passenger plane loaded with 1,540 pounds of cocaine was found
abandoned at the main airport.
(SFC, 7/14/08, p.A11)
2008 Jul 13, A World Food
Program contractor was gunned down in Somalia, the 5th agency worker
to be killed this year.
(SFC, 7/16/08,
p.A15)(www.usatoday.com/news/world/2008-07-15-somalia_N.htm)
2008 Jul 13, In Sudan thousands
of protesters chanting "Down, Down USA!" rallied in Khartoum after
reports that the International Criminal Court (ICC) may seek the
arrest of Sudan's president for alleged war crimes. A stampede among
crowds of people attending a military graduation ceremony killed 17
people at the al-Merriekh Stadium in Omdurman, the twin city of
Khartoum. The dead were mostly women and children with 3 dozen
others injured.
(Reuters, 7/13/08)(AP, 7/14/08)
2008 Jul 14, Pres. Bush lifted
the presidential moratorium on offshore drilling, however Congress
has renewed its ban on drilling every year since 1981 and top
Democrats said it will do so again this year.
(SFC, 7/15/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 14, David Remnick,
editor of The New Yorker magazine, defended the newest satirical
cover of the magazine by cartoonist Barry Blitt, which depicted Sen.
Barack Obama in Muslim garb and his wife as an Afro-sporting gun
packer.
(SFC, 7/15/08, p.A10)
2008 Jul 14, Thousands of Univ.
of California workers faced suspension and other disciplinary action
for walking off their jobs despite a judge’s ruling barring them
from doing so. The employees had been without a contract since
January.
(SFC, 7/15/08, p.B1)
2008 Jul 14, In Pennsylvania
Luis Ramirez (25), an illegal Mexican migrant worker, died in
Shenandoah after being beaten by white youths. 4 young men were
charged and found responsible for the fight, but most of the federal
charges against them were dropped. Local police were later accused
of tampering with evidence and witnesses or lying to the FBI. In
2010 Derrick Donchak and Brandon Piekarsky were convicted for a
federal hate crime. In 2011 former police chief Matthew Nestor was
found guilty of falsifying his police report, a charge that carries
up to 20 years in prison. Officer William Moyer was found guilty of
lying to the FBI but was acquitted of four other counts. Officer
Jason Hayes, who's engaged to the mother of one of Ramirez's
attackers, was acquitted of both charges against him. In all, the
jury convicted on two of nine counts. On Feb 23, 2011, Donchak and
Piekarsky were sentenced to nine years each in prison for roles in
the death of Ramirez.
(www.maldef.org/luis_ramirez_petition/)(SFC,
10/15/10, p.A6)(AP, 1/27/11)(Reuters, 2/24/11)
2008 Jul 14, In eastern
Afghanistan seven insurgents were killed in fighting in Wanat,
Nuristan province, where 9 US soldiers were killed a day earlier. An
"Arab terrorist" was captured during the operation.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2008 Jul 14, Britain vowed to
increase pressure on Zimbabwe's leaders by pushing for tougher EU
sanctions and hunting down their assets around the world, after
failing to secure bolstered UN action.
(AF, 7/14/08)
2008 Jul 14, Three British
Muslim men pleaded guilty to conspiring to cause explosions, part of
a plan prosecutors say would have involved smuggling liquid bombs
onto airliners with the intention of blowing them up mid-flight.
(Reuters, 7/14/08)
2008 Jul 14, At Britain’s
Farnborough International Airshow Etihad Airways, the national
carrier of the United Arab Emirates, said it had agreed to buy 45
Boeing passenger jets worth 9.4 billion dollars (5.9 billion euros).
(AFP, 7/14/08)
2008 Jul 14, A Chinese migrant
worker at the Shuangqiao Garden Plaza in Wenshan county killed one
person and stabbed nine others after discovering his savings of
2,600 yuan ($380) had been swapped for counterfeit notes while he
visited a prostitute.
(Reuters, 7/16/08)
2008 Jul 14, An explosion at a
mine in northern Hebei province killed 34 miners and a rescue
worker. In November, 2009, officials at the mine were charge with
moving dead bodies, destroying evidence and paying journalists 2.6
million yuan ($380,000) not to report the explosion. In 2010 a
journalist was sentenced to 16 years in prison for taking bribes to
help cover up the disaster, which took place just 3 weeks before the
Beijing Olympics.
(www.nytimes.com/2009/12/01/world/asia/01mine.html?_r=1)(AP, 1/6/10)
2008 Jul 14, Greek police said
9 British women faced prostitution charges after being arrested at
the weekend for taking part in an oral sex competition in the Greek
holiday island of Zakynthos. Six British and six Greek men,
including two bar owners, were also charged in the incident, which
took place at Laganas beach.
(Reuters, 7/14/08)
2008 Jul 14, Police in the
Adriatic city of Pescara arrested Otttaviano Del Turco, the governor
of Italy's Abruzzo region, in a health care corruption
investigation. Prosecutors said at least 35 people are being
investigated.
(AP, 7/14/08)(Econ, 7/19/08, p.60)
2008 Jul 14, Malaysian police
locked down Parliament with roadblocks and massive security to
prevent opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim and his supporters from
attending a key debate.
(AP, 7/14/08)
2008 Jul 14, In Mexico
commander Gerardo Valdes, the head of kidnapping and organized crime
investigations in the border state of Coahuila, was seized by at
least six men when he was driving in Saltillo. An unidentified man
called police and said that Valdes had been grabbed by the Juarez
Cartel.
(AP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 14, In Peru a new law
went into effect allowing couples who agree upon alimony, child
custody and division of assets to seek divorce from a qualified
notary or municipality.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2008 Jul 14, Russia agreed to
write off $242 million in Tajikistan debt and take control of the
Okno mountaintop station, operational since 2004. It was designed to
track satellites and even fragments of space debris.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2008 Jul 14, South Korea said
it will recall its ambassador from Japan over a rekindled debate
about disputed islands between the countries, as the new Seoul
government seeks to lift its sagging popularity at home with an
appeal to nationalism.
(AP, 7/14/08)
2008 Jul 14, Spain's biggest
bank, Santander, said it had reached agreement to buy British lender
Alliance and Leicester in an all-share deal worth 1.26 billion
pounds (1.57 billion euros) as it continues its push into the
British market.
(AFP, 7/14/08)
2008 Jul 14, Spanish
construction giant Martinsa-Fadesa announced in a filing with
Spanish stock market regulators that it is seeking protection from
creditors.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2008 Jul 14, The prosecutor of
the International Criminal Court filed genocide charges against
Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, accusing him of masterminding
attempts to wipe out African tribes in Darfur with a campaign of
murder, rape and deportation. The filing marked the first time
prosecutors at the world's first permanent, global war crimes court
have issued charges against a sitting head of state.
(AP, 7/14/08)
2008 Jul 14, In Turkey
prosecutors indicted 86 secular Turks, including high-ranking
ex-military officials, on terrorism charges for their alleged
involvement in plots to topple the Islamic-rooted government. They
were suspected of being part of Ergenekon, an ultra-nationalist gang
bent on overthrowing the AKP government.
(AP, 7/14/08)(Econ, 7/19/08, p.34)
2008 Jul 14, In Vietnam Dayana
Mendoza, Miss Venezuela, was crowned Miss Universe 2008 in a contest
marked by the spectacle of Miss USA falling down during the evening
gown competition for the second year in a row.
(AP, 7/14/08)
2008 Jul 15, US Federal Reserve
Chairman Ben Bernanke told Congress the fragile economy is facing
"numerous difficulties" including persistent strains in financial
markets, rising joblessness and housing problems — despite the Fed's
aggressive interest rate reductions and other fortifying steps.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2008 Jul 15, The SEC said it
would immediately move to curb improper short selling in Fannie Mae
and Freddie Mac as well as those of 17 financial firms. The move
would be effective July 21 and expire after 30 days. The SEC also
planned to consider extending the requirements to all stocks traded
in the US.
(WSJ, 7/16/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 15, Mei Ling Chen (46)
of Taiwan was arrested in Sunnyvale, Ca., after customs inspectors
at SF Int’l. Airport found $380,000 in counterfeit $100 bills in a
package of dried seafood.
(SFC, 7/18/08, p.B11)
2008 Jul 15, Robin Long (25), a
US Army deserter who had fled to Canada in 2005, was deported from
British Columbia back to the US.
(SFC, 7/16/08, p.A9)
2008 Jul 15, General Motors
Corp. said it will lay off salaried workers, cut truck production,
suspend its dividend and borrow $2 billion to $3 billion to weather
a severe downturn in the US market.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2008 Jul 15, Volkswagen
announced that it would build a $1 billion car plant in Chattanooga,
Tenn., and expected to open it as soon as 2011.
(WSJ, 7/30/08,
p.C10)(www.youtube.com/watch?v=IiFdSOp19gU)
2008 Jul 15, It was reported
that Hawaii’s Oahu island planned to export some 100,000 tons of
trash a year to the mainland. At current rates its 200-acre
municipal landfill would reach capacity in 15 years. Expanded
recycling and a new boiler were also in the works.
(WSJ, 7/15/08, p.A2)
2008 Jul 15, In California 2
vehicles collided on a bridge and fell into the Delta-Mendota Canal
near Westley. 6 farm workers and a septic truck driver died.
(SFC, 7/16/08, p.B3)(SFC, 7/17/08, p.B2)
2008 Jul 15, Gee Gee Engesser
(b.19126), animal trainer and “Blond Bombshell” of the circus, died
in Florida.
(WSJ, 8/23/08, p.A7)
2008 Jul 15, In Pennsylvania
Betty Schirmer (56) was killed in an apparent car accident. In 2010
her husband, Pastor Arthur Burton Schirmer, was charged with killing
her and staging the car accident. The charge also prompted an
investigation into the suspicious death of his 1st wife, Jewel
Schirmer, in 1999.
(SFC, 9/14/10,
p.A4)(www.delmarvanow.com/article/20100914/NEWS01/100914005)
2008 Jul 15, In southwestern
Afghanistan air strikes against extremist rebels killed 4 women and
5 children as well as several insurgents. NATO pulled soldiers out
of the outpost in Wanat village in northeastern Kunar province,
which militants had breached killing 9 US soldiers.
(AP, 7/16/08)
2008 Jul 15, Tens of thousands
of Argentine farmers and government supporters staged dueling
protests ahead of a Senate vote on a package of grain-export taxes
that generated months of bitter farm strikes.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2008 Jul 15, In Australia the
world's biggest Christian festival opened with a spectacular
harbor-side mass for up to 150,000 pilgrims taking part in World
Youth Day celebrations in Sydney headed by Pope Benedict XVI.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2008 Jul 15, Belgium PM Yves
Leterme offered King Albert the resignation of his government after
he acknowledged he would not make a deadline for a constitutional
reform deal despite months of talks. He offered to resign after
realizing it would be impossible to resolve deep divisions over
increased autonomy for French- and Dutch-speaking Belgians.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2008 Jul 15, Tropical Storm
Bertha headed back out over open ocean and away from the US mainland
after it battered Bermuda, knocking out electricity to thousands on
the Atlantic tourist island. Bertha entered its 13th day becoming
the longest-lived July tropical storm in history.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2008 Jul 15, China voiced
concern over an International Criminal Court prosecutor's decision
to seek an arrest warrant for Sudan's president on charges of
genocide in the African country's war-torn Darfur region.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2008 Jul 15, Croatia adopted a
law that allows Sunday shopping only over the summer and Christmas
holidays. It goes into effect January 1. The law also allows stores
in gas, bus and train stations to open on Sundays year-round, along
with those in hospitals. Bakeries, newsstands and flower shops are
also exempt from the ban.
(AP, 7/16/08)
2008 Jul 15, The EU agreed to
an emergency aid package for its fishing industry to cope with fuel
prices.
(WSJ, 7/17/08, p.A8)
2008 Jul 15, In eastern India
at least 20 members of a wedding party were killed when the jeep
carrying them plunged into a roadside canal outside Patna, the
capital of Bihar state.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2008 Jul 15, Indonesia's
president acknowledged that his country carried out gross human
rights abuses during East Timor's 1999 break for independence, but
stopped short of offering a full apology and said no one would be
prosecuted.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2008 Jul 15, In Iraq 2 suicide
bombers blew themselves up in a crowd of army recruits at the Saad
military camp in Baqouba, where devastating attacks persist despite
security improvements elsewhere. At least 28 people died. In western
Mosul, a bomb near an Iraqi police station killed four Iraqi
civilians. Half an hour later, one Iraqi police officer and seven
civilians died in a suicide car bombing in the east of the city.
Three other bombs in Mosul wounded 15 people. The US military said
it had captured the Iranian-trained leader of an explosives cell in
Baghdad.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2008 Jul 15, Israel's Cabinet
overwhelmingly approved an emotionally charged deal to trade a
Lebanese militant convicted of killing three people for two Israeli
soldiers captured by Hezbollah guerrillas and believed to be dead.
Israeli troops arrested three Hamas council members in a dawn raid
on the West Bank city of Nablus. Witnesses and residents said a
total of 12 Hamas members were arrested.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2008 Jul 15, In Italy a judge
in Venice indicted Saber Fadhil Hussein for plotting a terrorist
attack on US bases in Iraq using ultra-light aircraft.
(SFC, 7/16/08, p.A9)
2008 Jul 15, Fishermen across
Japan went on a massive one-day strike to protest skyrocketing fuel
prices, the latest blow to the country's foundering fishing
industry.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2008 Jul 15, Malaysian police
issued an arrest warrant for opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim in
connection with a sodomy accusation by a male former aide.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2008 Jul 15, In South Korea Won
Jeong-hwa (34) was arrested and later confessed that she was a spy
trained and commissioned by North Korea's intelligence agency. On
Oct 15 she was sentenced to five years in prison for spying.
(AP, 8/27/08)(AP, 10/15/08)
2008 Jul 15, A plan for a
referendum on self-determination in Spain's northern Basque Country
became law in the region, setting the stage for a confrontation with
the government in Madrid which has termed the poll illegal.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2008 Jul 15, In Sri Lanka
fighting reportedly killed a total of 51 rebels and a soldier.
(AP, 7/16/08)
2008 Jul 15, In Switzerland
Hannibal Kadhafi (32), the son of Libya’s leader, was arrested along
with his wife Aline at a luxury hotel in Geneva after the servants,
a Moroccan and a Tunisian, alleged they had been abused by the
couple. The 2-day detention led to reprisals by Libya. Days after
Hannibal Kadhafi’s arrest, Swiss businessmen Max Goeldi and Rachid
Hamdani were detained in Libya on alleged visa violations. The
servants later dropped their legal complaints after receiving some
compensation. In November, 2009, Goeldi and Hamdani were handed over
to the Swiss embassy in Tripoli. Libya then announced that they
would go on trial on accusations of tax evasion and violating
residency laws.
(AP, 9/2/08)(AP, 11/9/09)(AP, 11/12/09)
2008 Jul 15, Taiwan indicted 5
former ministers, who had served under former Pres. Chen Shui-bian,
on corruption charges relating to misuse of special expense
accounts.
(SFC, 7/16/08, p.A15)
2008 Jul 15, Turkey’s military
said aircraft and artillery units had shelled rebel positions in
Sirnak province, killing 22 rebels.
(AP, 7/15/08)
2008 Jul 16, The United States
signed a pair of agreements to boost trade and investment ties with
countries in southern and eastern Africa. These included the Trade,
Investment and Development Cooperation Agreement with the Southern
Africa Customs Union (SACU), which includes Botswana, Lesotho,
Namibia, South Africa and Swaziland; and the Trade Investment and
Framework Agreement (TIFA) with the East African Community, which
includes Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda.
(Reuters, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 16, The US Postal
Service released a series of stamps honoring black cinema.
(SFC, 7/16/08, p.E3)
2008 Jul 16, California state
educators said 24% of the state’s high school students had dropped
out of school during the 2006-2007 school year.
(SFC, 7/17/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 16, Jo Stafford
(b.1917), pop star singer during the 1940s and 1950s, died in Los
Angeles. Her songs included “You Belong To Me,” a big hit in 1952.
(SFC, 7/19/08, p.B5)
2008 Jul 16, The governor of
Kandahar said eight militants were killed during an operation in the
southern province's Khakrez district in the past two days. A
regional Taliban commander, Mullah Mahmoud, who controlled about 250
fighters, was among those killed. Several militants were killed in
the Nahr Surkh district of Helmand. Coalition and Afghan security
forces uncovered and destroyed a large weapons cache in northern
Jawzjan province.
(AP, 7/16/08)(AP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 16, Thousands of
British local government employees began a two-day strike over pay.
Unions expected more than half a million workers in England, Wales
and Northern Ireland to join the walkout that began after midnight.
(AP, 7/16/08)
2008 Jul 16, Anglican bishops
from around the world gathered in Canterbury for the Lambeth
Conference, with the 10-yearly meeting set to be dominated by deep
splits over the roles of women and homosexuals.
(AP, 7/16/08)
2008 Jul 16, Cambodia assembled
its troops near the Thai border in the second day of alleged
incursions by Thai soldiers amid tensions over disputed border land
near a historic temple.
(AP, 7/16/08)
2008 Jul 16, The government of
China’s Gansu province told the Ministry of Health about an unusual
surge of kidney stones among infants who had all drunk the same
brand of milk.
(Econ, 9/20/08, p.57)
2008 Jul 16, In Egypt a truck
ploughed into traffic at a closed level crossing, pushing a bus,
truck and several cars into the path of a passenger train. Four
people died from their injuries overnight bringing the total number
of dead to 41.
(AFP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 16, In France the
first stone was laid at the Louvre's new Arts of Islam gallery, the
first major modern architectural addition to the museum since its
famed glass pyramid was built in the 1980s.
(AP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 16, In eastern India
at least 20 special commando police officers were killed when their
vehicle struck a land mine planted by communist rebels in Orissa
state.
(AP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 16, Coalition forces
handed the Iraqi government control of a province south of Baghdad,
reflecting security improvements across the country. US and Polish
forces operated in the mostly Shiite province of Qadisiyah, the
tenth of 18 provinces to revert to Iraqi authority. A car bomb
killed at least 7 children and 11 other people in the northern city
of Tal Afar. 90 people also were injured in the blast at a popular
outdoor market. A car bomb killed two civilians in Mosul.
(AP, 7/16/08)
2008 Jul 16, Hezbollah handed
over two black coffins with the bodies of two Israeli soldiers and
Israel freed 5 Lebanese militants, including Samir Kantar, who
killed a 4-year-old girl and her father in 1979.
(AP, 7/16/08)(WSJ, 7/17/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 16, An Italian
parliamentary panel gave initial approval to a plan to fingerprint
everyone in the country, a move that could defuse criticism over a
mandatory program to fingerprint Gypsies.
(AP, 7/16/08)
2008 Jul 16, Malaysian police
arrested opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim on suspicion that he
sodomized a male aide, pre-empting his voluntary appearance at the
police headquarters to answer the allegation. He was interrogated
for more than eight hours and made to sleep on a "cold cement" floor
in a holding cell before being released the next day.
(AP, 7/16/08)(AP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 16, Mexico's navy
seized a homemade submarine carrying a drug shipment off the Pacific
coast and arrested its four-man crew.
(AP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 16, In Nigeria about
30 armed men in speedboats attacked a navy vessel that was guarding
key oil facilities in southern Rivers state. Three militants, a
naval serviceman and a civilian were killed. MEND said it was not
involved.
(Reuters, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 16, In southwestern
Pakistan a roadside bomb wounded seven security personnel and two
passers-by. In the northwest a military operation began to expel
insurgents from Zargari. 10 militants were killed and five troops
wounded.
(AP, 7/16/08)(AP, 7/18/08)
2008 Jul 16, The Philippine
government and Moro Islamic Liberation Front reached a deal to
create an ancestral homeland for 3 million Muslims.
(WSJ, 7/17/08, p.A8)
2008 Jul 16, Gold production
was severely disrupted in parts of South Africa as thousands of
mineworkers downed tools to protest rising living costs.
(AFP, 7/16/08)
2008 Jul 16, In South Korea
former Samsung Chairman Lee Kun-hee saw the suspension of his prison
sentence in a tax-evasion conviction, a move that confirmed South
Koreans' view that tycoons are immune from jail.
(AP, 7/16/08)
2008 Jul 16, In Spain King
Abdullah of Saudi Arabia kicked off an interfaith conference in
Madrid, an effort to bring Muslims, Christians and Jews closer
together amid a world that often puts the three faiths at odds.
(AP, 7/16/08)
2008 Jul 16, Sri Lankan
soldiers captured a key naval base used by the Tamil Tiger rebels in
the northern part of the country. Fighting in the north killed 24
rebels and 3 soldiers.
(AP, 7/16/08)(AP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 16, In Sudan a
peacekeeper with the United Nations-African Union was shot and
killed in Darfur. The peacekeeper, believed to be a Nigerian company
commander, died while on patrol near a peacekeeping camp.
(AP, 7/16/08)
2008 Jul 16, Turkey’s military
said 11 Kurdish rebels were killed in an ongoing operation in
Hakkari province, near the border with Iraq.
(AP, 7/16/08)
2008 Jul 16, In Turkey Ahmet
Yildiz, a gay Kurd, was allegedly killed by his father for
besmirching the family honor. In 2011 the film “Zenne Dancer,” based
on his story, won 5 awards at the Golden Orange Film Festival.
(Econ, 10/22/11,
p.64)(http://ahmetyildizismyfamily.blogspot.com/)
2008 Jul 16, Zimbabwe’s central
bank's governor said the annual rate of inflation, already the
highest in the world, has hit a new record level of 2.2 million
percent.
(AFP, 7/16/08)
2008 Jul 17, Kay Ryan (b.1945)
of Fairfax, Ca., was named the 16th poet laureate of the US. She was
selected by James Billington, the Librarian of Congress.
(SFC, 7/18/08, p.A6)
2008 Jul 17, The US Treasury
moved to freeze assets of four Algerians it said were leaders of an
al Qaeda-affiliated group responsible for deadly bombings in Algeria
last month.
(Reuters, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 17, The US government
lifted a salmonella warning on tomatoes, but still warned caution on
fresh jalapeno and serrano peppers.
(SFC, 7/18/08, p.A6)
2008 Jul 17, It was reported
that the US debt amounted to $455,000 per household. By September
the national debt reached $10 trillion and obliged the national debt
clock in New York’s Times Square to move its dollar sign to make
room.
(SFC, 7/17/08, p.A10)(Econ, 10/9/10, SR p.6)
2008 Jul 17, Andy Stern, head
of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), led a global
day of action targeting KKR-owned sites in 25 countries, calling for
an end to favorable tax treatment of private equity.
(Econ, 8/2/08, p.70)
2008 Jul 17, California became
the first US state to approve green building standards.
(SFC, 7/18/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 17, In western
Afghanistan US Special Forces and Afghan troops called in airstrikes
during a raid on a militant cell, killing 15 insurgents while
freeing 15 hostages in Herat province. Taliban militants attacked a
convoy carrying supplies for NATO forces in Zabul. A following
gunbattle killed an Afghan security worker and wounded five.
(AP, 7/17/08)(AP, 7/18/08)
2008 Jul 17, Aafia Siddiqui, a
Pakistani woman once identified as a possible al-Qaida associate,
was arrested by Afghan police, who found recipes for explosives and
descriptions of New York landmarks in her handbag. [see Aug 5]
(SSFC, 8/24/08, p.A5)(AFP, 8/30/08)
2008 Jul 17, Algeria and
Germany wound up two days of talks in Algiers with a call for more
economic cooperation between the two countries.
(AP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 17, In Algeria a truck
and a bus collided on one of the main highways in the Relizane
region killing 7 people with 28 seriously injured.
(AFP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 17, Argentina's Senate
narrowly rejected a grain-export tax package, a government-backed
proposal that has led to nationwide farm strikes and regional food
shortages.
(AP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 17, In Sidney,
Australia, Pope Benedict XVI delivered a stinging attack on pop
culture, consumerism and "false idols" to 150,000 mainly teenaged
Catholic pilgrims gathered for World Youth Day.
(AFP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 17, Belgium's King
Albert II refused to accept the resignation of the prime minister
and his government, calling on key officials to redouble efforts to
resolve an longtime disagreement over more self-rule for the
country's Dutch and French speakers.
(AP, 7/18/08)
2008 Jul 17, A new company of
Chinese engineers deployed to Sudan's war-torn western region of
Darfur, boosting the number of UN-led peacekeeping troops to 8,000.
(AP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 17, Wikimania 2008
opened in to Alexandria, Egypt, for a 3-day tradecraft meeting. The
gathering of online encyclopedia creators drew some 650 Wikipedians
from 45 countries.
(WSJ, 8/8/08,
p.W1)(http://wikimania2008.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page)
2008 Jul 17, In Amman, Jordan,
a gunman shot and wounded six people near a Roman amphitheater. He
shot himself in the head as he was chased by police, and was in
critical condition. A police official identified the assailant as
Thaer al-Weheidi (19), a resident of Baqaa camp, the largest of 11
Palestinian refugee settlements in Jordan. Al-Weheidi died on July
22.
(AP, 7/17/08)(AP, 7/22/08)
2008 Jul 17, Kuwait's official
news agency says the tiny Gulf country has named an ambassador to
Iraq for the first time since the 1991 Gulf War.
(AP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 17, Macedonia's main
opposition party walked out of parliament after its deputy leader
was arrested and charged in a corruption probe.
(AP, 7/18/08)
2008 Jul 17, Six prominent
members of Colombia’s largest rebel group FARC met this day with
Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega according to Nicaragua’s La
Prensa newspaper. The members of the guerrilla organization arrived
in Nicaragua in a Cessna airplane from Venezuela. Both Ortega and
Venezuela denied the newspaper report.
(http://colombiareports.com/2008/07/23/ortega-met-with-farc-delegation-says-la-prensa/)
2008 Jul 17, Nigerian villagers
blew up a key crude oil supply pipeline operated by Agip, the
Nigerian subsidiary of Italian group Eni, cutting production.
(AFP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 17, Violent protests
erupted at Pakistan's main stock market as growing economic and
political uncertainty pushed Pakistani shares to a new 18-month low.
(AP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 17, A survey team
member said a Russian government audit has revealed that up to
50,000 pieces are missing from the country’s museums, everything
from Pre-Revolutionary medals and weapons to precious works of art.
(AP, 7/18/08)
2008 Jul 17, Sri Lankan air
force jets bombed a group of ethnic Tamil rebels. Troops attacked
rebel bunkers along the front lines in the Vavuniya area, killing 10
Tamil Tiger fighters. Fighting in the area also killed four
soldiers, while a fifth soldier was missing in action. Fighting in
Welioya killed nine rebels and one soldier, while another rebel was
killed in Jaffna.
(AP, 7/17/08)(AFP, 7/18/08)
2008 Jul 17, An official of the
Swiss bank UBS announced that it was halting its offshore banking
services for US citizens after it came under scathing criticism for
facilitating massive tax evasion.
(AFP, 7/18/08)
2008 Jul 17, An organization
claiming to represent groups involved in southern Thailand's Muslim
insurgency announced it will end all violence in the region as of
July 14. Former army commander and Defense Minister Chetta Thanajaro
said the organization that made the announcement represented 11
different underground groups operating in southern Thailand.
(AP, 7/17/08)
2008 Jul 17, Venezuela's ruling
party pledged to seek to reform the nation's constitution to let
President Hugo Chavez seek indefinite re-election.
(AP, 7/18/08)
2008 Jul 18, The Batman sequel
"The Dark Knight" opened and set a single-day box office record by
taking in $66.4 million.
(AP, 7/19/08)
2008 Jul 18, Nebraska’s new
safe-haven law went into effect allowing parents to abandon unwanted
children, under age 19, at state-licensed hospitals with no
questions asked. The law was later amended after parents and
guardians, some from out of state, dropped off children as old as
17.
(SFC, 8/23/08, p.A4)(SFC, 10/21/08, p.A3)
2008 Jul 18, New Hampshire
decided to accept an offer from Venezuela of free heating oil for
the state’s poor.
(WSJ, 7/19/08, p.A2)
2008 Jul 18, In Houston, Texas,
one of the nation's largest mobile cranes collapsed at
LyondellBasell refinery, killing four workers. An additional 7
workers were injured when the crane collapsed during routine
maintenance at the chemical plant.
(AP, 7/19/08)
2008 Jul 18, In Afghanistan a
roadside blast the Nava district of Helmand province. Three guards
were killed and four wounded. 2 French aid workers were taken from
their guest house in the early hours in the central province of Day
Kundi, one of the poorest areas of Afghanistan. On August 2 Action
Against Hunger said the aid workers had been released.
(AP, 7/18/08)(AFP, 8/2/08)
2008 Jul 18, In Algeria the
government of Mali and ethnic Tuareg rebels reached a truce
agreement in dangerous northern Mali. One faction of the Tuareg
group refused to sign the deal, saying it did not do enough to help
the Tuaregs.
(AP, 7/22/08)
2008 Jul 18, Argentina’s
President Cristina Fernandez canceled a widely protested farm export
tax hike following months of protest and a stunning rejection by the
Senate. She issued a resolution reducing the export taxes to their
previous level.
(AP, 7/18/08)(Econ, 7/26/08, p.43)
2008 Jul 18, In Australia Pope
Benedict XVI warned Christian leaders that the push to unite
Christian churches was at a "critical juncture" and called on people
of all religions to join together against violence.
(AFP, 7/18/08)
2008 Jul 18, A border clash
triggered by a smuggling attempt left two Bangladeshi troops dead
and one Indian soldier seriously wounded.
(AP, 7/18/08)
2008 Jul 18, In Brazil police
said at least eight alleged drug traffickers were killed during a
raid in a Rio de Janeiro shantytown.
(AP, 7/18/08)
2008 Jul 18, A report of the
European Union Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF) was leaked to the media.
According the report, which was sent to Bulgarian Deputy Prime
Minister Plugchieva two weeks ago, businessman Lyudmil Stoykov, who
sponsored the president's election campaign, and his associate Mario
Nikolov, who is a sponsor of Parvanov's Bulgarian Socialist Party,
were involved in large-scale abuses of EU funds.
(http://english.people.com.cn/90001/90777/90853/6452879.html)
2008 Jul 18, Cuba’s Communist
officials decreed that private farmers and cooperatives can use up
to 100 acres (40 hectares) of idle government land, as President
Raul Castro works to revive the floundering agricultural sector.
(AP, 7/19/08)
2008 Jul 18, In Iraq two
suspected insurgents, linked to the June 26 suicide attack, were
captured in a near Tarmiyah, north of Baghdad.
(http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080801/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq)
2008 Jul 18, Israel’s Shin Bet
security service said investigators had arrested six men in June and
July suspected of trying to set up an al-Qaida-linked terror
network, including one who wanted to shoot down President Bush's
helicopter.
(AP, 7/18/08)
2008 Jul 18, Suspected Muslim
rebels threw a grenade at a crowded bus terminal in the Indian
portion of Kashmir, wounding 35 people, including seven children.
(AP, 7/19/08)
2008 Jul 18, Mexico's president
replaced a 1791 time capsule discovered atop Mexico City's cathedral
with a new one containing messages from golf star Lorena Ochoa,
novelist Carlos Fuentes and a boy genius.
(AP, 7/19/08)
2008 Jul 18, In northwestern
Pakistan, at least 10 Taliban died in fierce fighting between two
rival militant groups. The Taliban threatened to begin executing
hostages captured on July 12 unless the government releases their
comrades.
(AP, 7/19/08)(SFC, 7/19/08, p.A5)
2008 Jul 18, Senegal’s
President Abdoulaye Wade said Sudan President Omar al-Beshir has
agreed to restore relations with Chad, more than two months after
Khartoum severed ties accusing Ndjamena of backing Darfur rebels.
(AFP, 7/18/08)
2008 Jul 18, In Singapore Peter
Lloyd (41), a TV reporter for the Australian Broadcasting
Corporation (ABC), was charged with trafficking about one gram of
methamphetamine to a Singaporean for 100 Singapore dollars (73.5 US)
at a hotel early this month.
(AFP, 7/18/08)
2008 Jul 18, In Spain, a
spokesman said police in the southern city of Seville have been left
red-faced after more than 100 kilos of drugs were stolen from police
headquarters and replaced with talcum powder.
(AFP, 7/18/08)
2008 Jul 18, In Spain a
Saudi-organized conference of the world's great religions called for
an international agreement to combat terrorism, "a universal
phenomenon that requires unified international efforts."
(AFP, 7/18/08)
2008 Jul 18, South Africa’s
Pres. Thabo Mbeki announced plans to work with the UN and African
Union as he attempts to mediate a settlement in Zimbabwe.
(SFC, 7/19/08, p.A8)
2008 Jul 18, Sri Lankan
warplanes carried out air raids over the rebel-controlled northern
region of Mullaittivu, targeting a Tiger logistics base. The
military said fighting in the northern Vavuniya district left nine
rebels killed. 7 insurgents were killed along the Welioya front,
while 3 more were killed in Jaffna. Angry protesters halted trains
and clashed with policemen in Colombo as authorities began
demolishing their homes, saying they were unauthorized constructions
that encroached on government lands.
(AFP, 7/18/08)(AP, 7/18/08)(AP, 7/19/08)
2008 Jul 18, Tropical Storm
Kalmaegi wreaked havoc across Taiwan, leaving at least 19 people
dead and seven missing.
(AFP, 7/20/08)
2008 Jul 18, Thailand sent more
military reinforcements to a disputed part of the Cambodian border,
after the tense four-day standoff nearly erupted into gunfire during
the night.
(AFP, 7/18/08)
2008 Jul 18, In Tunisia 2
officials and three others were convicted of plotting terror attacks
and to overthrow the government.
(WSJ, 7/19/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 18, In southeastern
Turkey 10 members of the separatist Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK)
were killed in clashes with Turkish military forces.
(Reuters, 7/19/08)
2008 Jul 19, Democratic
presidential contender Barack Obama started a campaign-season tour
of combat zones and foreign capitals, visiting with US forces in
Kuwait and then Afghanistan — the scene of a war he says deserves
more attention and more troops. Afghan troops clashed with Taliban
insurgents in Zabul province attacking a supply convoy for NATO
troops, killing nine militants. Roadside bombs in Kandahar province
killed a NATO soldier in a separate convoy and four policemen. In
Helmand province militants attacked a police checkpoint and in the
ensuing gunfight three Taliban fighters were killed. NATO forces
accidentally killed at least four civilians in eastern Paktika
province.
(AP, 7/19/08)(AP, 7/20/08)
2008 Jul 19, The Arab League
criticized the International Criminal Court's prosecutor for seeking
the arrest of Sudan's president on genocide charges, saying
diplomacy should be given a priority to solve the conflict in
Darfur.
(Reuters, 7/19/08)
2008 Jul 19, In Sidney,
Australia, Pope Benedict apologized directly for the first time for
sexual abuse of minors by Catholic clergy, but victims groups said
they wanted action and not words.
(Reuters, 7/19/08)
2008 Jul 19, Brazilian actress
and comedian Dercy Goncalves (101), known for her vulgar wit and
scandalous behavior, died in Rio de Janeiro.
(AP, 7/20/08)
2008 Jul 19, In Bogota the
presidents of Brazil and Colombia vowed to boost trade and
investment between their nations ahead of crucial world trade talks
next week.
(AP, 7/20/08)
2008 Jul 19, Czech police said
a 21-year-old British man, wanted for child sex and pornography
offences in Britain, has been detained in a Prague suburb where he
had been in hiding for two years.
(AFP, 7/19/08)
2008 Jul 19, In Germany more
than 1.5 million revelers danced through the streets of Dortmund at
the annual Love Parade techno music festival.
(AP, 7/19/08)
2008 Jul 19, In Geneva a
decision to bend policy and sit down with Iran at nuclear talks
fizzled, with Iran stonewalling Washington and 5 other world powers
on their call to freeze uranium enrichment.
(AP, 7/20/08)
2008 Jul 19, Iraq's largest
Sunni Arab political bloc ended a nearly yearlong boycott of the
Shiite-led government in another step toward healing the sectarian
rifts that once brought almost daily bloodshed. In Baghdad British
PM Gordon Brown said plans are being made to scale back troops, but
refused to consider an "artificial timetable" for withdrawing
Britain's remaining 4,000 soldiers.
(AP, 7/19/08)
2008 Jul 19, In Kashmir at
least 10 Indian soldiers were killed and 14 others injured when
their bus was hit by an improvised explosive device in the disputed
Himalayan region.
(AFP, 7/19/08)(SSFC, 7/20/08, p.A2)
2008 Jul 19, In Lebanon the
Jund al-Sham group, which follows the extremist ideology of
al-Qaida, clashed with members of the mainstream Palestinian Fatah
movement. Two other Palestinian militants were killed in the clash.
(AP, 7/20/08)
2008 Jul 19, While visiting
Buenos Aires Lithuanian President Valdas Adamkus said his country is
ready to conduct talks with the US about hosting elements of a
missile defense system.
(UPI, 7/19/08)
2008 Jul 19, In Nepal lawmakers
failed to elect the country's first president and end weeks of
political deadlock. No candidate won the 298 votes necessary. A bus
veered off a mountain road and plunged into a river in central Nepal
killing 14 passengers and leaving many missing.
(AFP, 7/19/08)(AP, 7/19/08)
2008 Jul 19, In Pakistan
paramilitary forces stumbled on 2 training camps near Dera Bugti in
Baluchistan province. 6 troops and an unknown number of ethnic
Baluch insurgents died in fighting that began when militants fired
on patrolling security forces.
(WSJ, 7/22/08, p.A12)
2008 Jul 19, Mullah Rahim, the
most senior Taliban leader in Afghanistan's Helmand province, gave
himself up to Pakistani officials.
(AP, 7/22/08)
2008 Jul 19, In Sri Lanka
soldiers killed 11 rebels in Vavuniya while five rebels died in the
nearby Mannar district. A soldier was killed by a sniper's bullet in
Mannar.
(AP, 7/20/08)
2008 Jul 20, Democratic
presidential candidate Barack Obama pledged steadfast aid to
Afghanistan in talks with its Western-backed leader and vowed to
pursue the war on terror "with vigor" if he is elected. 9 policemen
were killed in international military air strikes called in when
police and troops clashed after mistaking each other for Taliban.
International soldiers had moved into a district in Farah province
without informing police, who thought they were militants. 3
children were killed in the southern province of Helmand when a bomb
blew up a minivan. One NATO soldier was killed in Khost province. A
precision missile strike by British aircraft killed Abdul Rasaq, a
Taliban leader who led fighters in the Musa Qala area of Helmand
province.
(AP, 7/20/08)(AFP, 7/20/08)(SFC, 7/21/08, p.A7)
2008 Jul 20, In Australia Pope
Benedict XVI said a "spiritual desert" was spreading throughout the
world and he challenged young people to shed the greed and cynicism
of their time to create a new age of hope for humankind.
(AP, 7/20/08)
2008 Jul 20, In central Bolivia
a Venezuelan military helicopter often used to transport Bolivian
President Evo Morales crashed. Four Venezuelan military personnel
and a Bolivian officer were reported killed.
(AP, 7/21/08)
2008 Jul 20, Beijing started
its most drastic pollution-control plan, restricting car use and
limiting factory emissions in a last-minute push to clear
smog-choked skies for the August Olympics.
(AP, 7/20/08)
2008 Jul 20, Well over a
million Colombians, clad in white and shouting "No more kidnapping,"
marked their independence day with marches and concerts demanding
freedom for hostages still held by leftist rebels.
(AP, 7/20/08)
2008 Jul 20, In northern India
a packed bus collided with a truck in Uttar Pradesh state, killing
at least 17 people and wounding 35 others.
(AP, 7/20/08)
2008 Jul 20, Activists said
Iran has sentenced eight women and one man convicted of adultery to
death by stoning. The nine, who are between 27 and 50 years old,
were convicted of adultery in separate cases in different Iranian
cities.
(AP, 7/20/08)
2008 Jul 20, In Iraq a new
airport opened in Najaf in what the prime minister said was a key
step in the reconstruction of a country devastated by war. The
government said an oil refinery in Iraq's western desert has resumed
production. American soldiers killed two armed relatives of a
provincial governor during a raid in Salahuddin province against
al-Qaida in Iraq. 2 private security contractors were killed in a
car bombing in Mosul. 8 Iraqis were injured in the blast.
(AP, 7/20/08)(AP, 7/21/08)
2008 Jul 20, In Israel British
PM Gordon Brown, on his first official visit as prime minister, said
that economic development was key to bringing peace to the Middle
East. Brown demanded that Israel cease settlement construction and
promised more money to jump-start the battered Palestinian economy.
(AP, 7/20/08)
2008 Jul 20, Barack Obama made
a brief stop in Kuwait, a key US ally. The delegation met with the
emir, Sheik Sabah Al Ahmed Al Sabah, and other senior officials.
(AP, 7/21/08)
2008 Jul 20, In Lebanon
Shehadeh Jawhar, military commander of the Jund al-Sham group, died
from wounds in the previous day’s clash with members of the
mainstream Palestinian Fatah movement.
(AP, 7/20/08)
2008 Jul 19, Morocco's police
seized more than 10 tons of drugs during raids in the north of the
country and along its coasts.
(AP, 7/21/08)
2008 Jul 20, In Pakistan five
militants died in a failed assault on the Tora Warai military fort
near Hangu. The army said security forces had killed 15 militants
and detained 60 others, in the first major action against insurgents
under Pakistan's new government.
(AP, 7/20/08)
2008 Jul 20, In northern Spain
4 bombs exploded at popular seaside resorts in Cantabria, after
warning calls from the Basque separatist group ETA. No casualties
were reported.
(AP, 7/20/08)
2008 Jul 20, Sri Lankan
government forces captured a Tamil Tiger rebel base in the north
after a 48-hour battle that left at least 15 rebels dead. Air force
jets destroyed six rebel boats.
(AP, 7/20/08)
2008 Jul 20, A state newspaper
reported that Zimbabwe will transfer ownership of all foreign-owned
firms that support Western sanctions against President Robert
Mugabe's government to locals and investors from "friendly"
countries.
(Reuters, 7/20/08)
2008 Jul 21, The US FDA issued
an advisory for consumers to avoid eating uncooked jalapeno peppers
after it found a jalapeno grown in Mexico in a Texas border town
warehouse that tested positive with the same strain of salmonella
that was earlier associated with tomatoes.
(SFC, 7/22/08, p.A10)
2008 Jul 21, The war crimes
trial of Salim Hamdan, bin Laden’s driver, began at Guantanamo. The
judge barred evidence obtained in Afghanistan, citing coercive
conditions.
(WSJ, 7/22/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 21, Brocade
Communications said it will pay nearly $3 billion for Foundry
Networks, founded in 1996. Both Silicon Valley firms companies
competed with Cisco Systems.
(WSJ, 7/22/08, p.B8)
2008 Jul 21, A US B-52 bomber
that was due to fly in a Liberation Day parade in the US territory
of Guam crashed into the Pacific Ocean soon after take-off. All of
the bomber's six-man crew were killed.
(AFP, 7/21/08)(AP, 7/23/08)
2008 Jul 21, Sid Craig
(b.1932), co-founder of the Jenny Craig chain of diet centers
(1983), died. Craig founded Jenny Craig, named after his wife, in
Australia and expanded to the US in 1985. The company went public in
1992. In 2006 Nestle SA bought the operation.
(WSJ, 7/26/08, p.A5)
2008 Jul 21, In Sidney Pope
Benedict XVI met privately with Australians who were sexually abused
as children by priests, ending a pilgrimage to the country with a
gesture of contrition and concern over a scandal that has rocked the
Roman Catholic church.
(AP, 7/21/08)
2008 Jul 21, Eric Dowling
(b.1915), former English POW, died. He was nicknamed "Digger" for
helping excavate tunnels used in the breakout from a World War II
German prison camp that became known as the "Great Escape." Dowling
played a key role in planning the march 24, 1944, escape by 76
prisoners from Stalag Luft III prison near Sagan in eastern Germany
— now Zagan, Poland.
(AP, 8/7/08)
2008 Jul 21, Talks between
Cambodia and Thailand to resolve a military stand-off on their joint
border ended without a solution.
(AFP, 7/21/08)
2008 Jul 21, In Chechnya the
bullet-riddled bodies of three officers, who had been guarding an
Interior Ministry trailer, were found on a collective farm. The
assailants made off with the officers' guns.
(AP, 7/21/08)
2008 Jul 21, China and Russia
signed an agreement that demarcated their 2,700 mile border ending a
long running border dispute.
(WSJ, 7/22/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 21, In China 2 people
were killed in explosions aboard two public buses in Kunming city,
Yunnan province. On Dec 24 Li Yan reportedly confessed to his role
in the bombings as he lay on his death bed after trying to plant
another bomb. 20 miners escaped or were rescued from a flooded coal
mine in southern China but six have died and 30 remain trapped.
(AFP, 7/21/08)(AP, 7/22/08)(SFC, 12/29/08, p.A3)
2008 Jul 21, Egyptian police
arrested 39 members of the country's largest opposition group, the
banned Muslim Brotherhood during a raid on a camp north of Cairo.
The men, aged 18 to 35, said they were only on vacation. Egyptian
authorities shut down the Cairo office of an Iranian TV network, as
the two nations spar over "Assassination of a Pharaoh," a film that
justifies the killing of former Egyptian President Anwar Sadat by
Islamic militants.
(AP, 7/21/08)(AP, 7/24/08)
2008 Jul 21, President Nicolas
Sarkozy's risky bid to rewrite France's political rules with
sweeping constitutional changes worked, but just barely, with both
houses of parliament meeting in special session to pass the measures
by a single vote. The reform gives parliament greater power but also
adds a new privileges to France's already strong presidency, notably
allowing the chief of state to address together the two houses of
congress. However, it limits the president to two five-year terms.
(AP, 7/21/08)
2008 Jul 21, Rakhat Aliyev, the
ex-son-in-law of Kazakhstan Pres. Nazarbayev, accused the president
of diverting billions in state assets and other corruption.
(WSJ, 7/22/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 21, An aid agency said
Kenyan armed forces are preventing aid workers from helping
homeless, hungry families caught between a brutal militia and an
army crackdown.
(AP, 7/21/08)
2008 Jul 21, A UN-led report
said Myanmar needs at least $1 billion over the next three years to
put the survivors of Cyclone Nargis back on their feet, in the first
comprehensive assessment of damage caused by the disaster that
killed more than 84,000 people.
(AP, 7/21/08)
2008 Jul 21, Lawmakers in Nepal
voted in the Himalayan nation's first post-royal president, but
their rejection of a candidate backed by the Maoists was likely to
lead to more political deadlock. Ram Baran Yadav, who was supported
by the centrist Nepali Congress party, won 308 out of 590 votes cast
in Nepal's constitutional assembly.
(AFP, 7/21/08)
2008 Jul 21, A Pakistani court
barred the disgraced architect of Pakistan's atomic weapons program
from speaking about nuclear proliferation, less than three weeks
after he implicated the army in the sharing of nuclear technology
with North Korea. Intelligence officials in Quetta said at least 30
insurgents, including three rebel commanders, had been killed.
Suspected Islamic militants shot dead a pro-government tribal chief
and wounded three other people in an attack on the outskirts of Khar
near Pakistan's border with Afghanistan.
(AP, 7/21/08)(AFP, 7/21/08)
2008 Jul 21, Pakistan’s Geo TV
broadcasted a recent interview with Mustafa Abu al-Yazeed, a senior
al-Qaida leader. He urged Pakistanis to help Afghans fight US-led
coalition forces and condemned President Pervez Musharraf for
arresting Arab and Afghan fighters and handing them over to
Washington.
(AP, 7/22/08)
2008 Jul 21, Radovan Karadzic
(63), the wartime leader of Bosnian Serbs, was arrested in a
Belgrade suburb. A judge ordered his transfer to the UN war crimes
tribunal in The Hague.
(AP, 7/22/08)
2008 Jul 21, In Singapore the
10 members of ASEAN adopted a common charter that included a list of
15 purposes.
(www.aseansec.org/21806.htm)(Econ, 2/12/11, p.52)
2008 Jul 21, In Sri Lanka 44
rebels and two government soldiers were killed in fighting.
(AP, 7/22/08)
2008 Jul 21, The African Union
urged the UN Security Council to put on hold the International
Criminal Court's move to indict Sudanese President Omar Hassan
al-Bashir over war crimes in Darfur.
(Reuters, 7/21/08)
2008 Jul 21, Swiss
pharmaceutical giant Roche offered 43.7 billion dollars to acquire
the remaining shares in US subsidiary Genentech, the bio-tech
pioneer underpinning its dominance of the cancer treatment market.
(AP, 7/21/08)
2008 Jul 21, Vietnam raised its
fuel prices by 31%.
(WSJ, 7/22/08, p.A13)
2008 Jul 21, In Zimbabwe
mediator South African Pres. Thabo Mbeki oversaw a ceremony in
Harare at which Robert Mugabe and opposition leader Morgan
Tsvangirai signed an agreement for negotiations to bring the country
out of political chaos in their first meeting in a decade.
(AFP, 7/21/08)
2008 Jul 22, North
Carolina-based Wachovia Corp., the 4th largest US bank, lost $8.86
billion in the 2nd quarter, and said it was slashing its dividend
and cutting 6,350 jobs after losses tied to mortgages soared.
(AP, 7/22/08)
2008 Jul 22, California
reported 63,061 foreclosures during the 2nd 3 months of this year.
(SFC, 7/23/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 22, California Gov.
Schwarzenegger signed SB685 giving state pet owners the right to set
up a legally enforceable trust to care for their animals. The bill
was sponsored by Senator Leland Yee (D-San Francisco/San Mateo).
(SFC, 7/26/08, p.C1)(http://tinyurl.com/5uppps)
2008 Jul 22, Dolly was upgraded
to hurricane status as it headed toward the US-Mexican border.
(WSJ, 7/23/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 22, Estelle Getty
(b.1923), the sarcastic octogenarian Sophia on TV's "The Golden
Girls," died. The diminutive stage and TV actress had spent 40 years
struggling for success before landing the role of a lifetime in
1985.
(AP, 7/22/08)(SFC, 7/23/08, p.A8)
2008 Jul 22, US-led coalition
and Afghan troops for a 2nd day clashed with and called in
airstrikes on Taliban militants in western Afghanistan, killing and
wounding more than 25 insurgents. In Kabul a suicide bomber on foot
detonated himself next to the walls of the city's historic Babur
Gardens, a popular public park, wounding three civilians. In central
Wardak province, US-led coalition forces killed "several militants"
while hunting for a Taliban leader said to have been behind an
attack that killed three American troops and their interpreter last
month. Militants attacked a British patrol in Kajaki district of
Helmand province. The soldier was initially wounded and later died.
A civilian vehicle struck a mine in Khost province, killing four
people and wounding three. The dead included a 2-year-old and a
woman. In southern Helmand province, Afghan troops killed five
insurgents in a clash. A policeman and two Afghan soldiers were
wounded in the encounter. Gunmen killed the spokesman for the
governor of Paktika province, Ghamai Khan Mohammadyar, and wounded
his wife, his brother and his mother.
(AP, 7/22/08)(AP, 7/23/08)
2008 Jul 22, Cambodia asked the
UN Security Council and its Southeast Asian neighbors to intervene
in resolving a military standoff over disputed border territory
around an ancient temple, stepping up its rhetoric against Thailand.
(AP, 7/22/08)
2008 Jul 22, Sheik Hassan Dahir
Aweys took over the Islamist opposition Alliance for the
Re-Liberation of Somalia (ARS), which operates in exile in Eritrea.
(AP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 22, India’s BJP
opposition was defeated in a confidence vote and charged the ruling
Congress Party-led coalition of offering bribes in exchange for
abstentions in the vote.
(WSJ, 7/23/08, p.A8)
2008 Jul 22, Iraqi PM Nouri
al-Maliki met with German Chancellor Angela Merkel for talks aimed
at strengthening economic ties between the two countries.
(AP, 7/22/08)
2008 Jul 22, In Mexico a
measure took effect eliminating jail times for illegal immigrants
caught in Mexico.
(AP, 7/22/08)
2008 Jul 22, Nepal's Maoists
said they would not form the Himalayan nation's first post-royal
government after the defeat of their candidate for president,
setting off a new political crisis.
(AFP, 7/22/08)
2008 Jul 22, Palestinian rammed
a construction truck into three cars and a bus near the Jerusalem
hotel where Barack Obama is supposed to stay, injuring four people
before an Israeli civilian shot and killed the attacker.
(AP, 7/22/08)
2008 Jul 22, Spanish police
dismantled the most active cell of the armed Basque separatist group
ETA with the detention of nine suspected members of the group. Among
those captured was Arkaitz Goikoetxea, the leader of the "Vizcaya"
cell which Spanish authorities suspect was behind most of the
attacks carried out by ETA since it called off a ceasefire in June
2007.
(AFP, 7/22/08)
2008 Jul 22, The Tamil Tiger
rebels announced they would observe a unilateral 10-day cease-fire
as a goodwill gesture during a regional summit to be held later this
month. An airstrike deep inside the rebels' de facto state killed 22
members of the Black Tigers, the group's suicide force.
(AP, 7/22/08)
2008 Jul 23, Bill Gates, former
boss of Microsoft, joined Michael Bloomberg, the mayor of NYC, in
announcing a combined $500 million package to stamp out smoking.
(www.usatoday.com/news/health/2008-07-23-smoking_N.htm)
2008 Jul 23, It was reported
that Napa Valley’s Chateau Montelena, winner of a 1976 wine tasting
event in France, was being purchased by Cos d’Estournel of Bordeaux,
France.
(SFC, 7/23/08, p.C1)
2008 Jul 23, In Louisiana an
oil tanker and an oil barge collided near New Orleans creating a
12-mile oil slick and closing almost 100 miles of the Mississippi
River. Over 400,000 gallons of fuel spilled into the river.
(SFC, 7/24/08, p.A3)(SFC, 7/25/08, p.A2)
2008 Jul 23, Google unveiled a
new service dubbed “Knol,” an Internet encyclopedia, in which
contributing authors would share in ad revenue.
(SFC, 7/24/08, p.C4)
2008 Jul 23, Two environmental
groups estimated that cement kilns in the US annually released
mercury compounds totaling some 23,000 pounds. Two of the worst
emitters were located in northern California in Cupertino and
Davenport.
(SFC, 7/24/08, p.B1)
2008 Jul 23, In Afghanistan
militants killed a district police chief in the eastern Nangarhar
province after striking his convoy with a roadside bomb. Police
clashed with Taliban fighters in Uruzgan province, killing three
militants.
(AP, 7/23/08)
2008 Jul 23, The African Union
said it was incapable of stabilizing the situation in Somalia and
urged the UN take over peacekeeping operations in the lawless Horn
of Africa country.
(Reuters, 7/23/08)
2008 Jul 23, Australia
announced an extra $29 million in aid for survivors of Myanmar's May
cyclone, but pressed its recalcitrant military junta to democratize
quickly and respect human rights.
(AP, 7/23/08)
2008 Jul 23, The European
Commission froze almost euro500 million ($800 million) in aid to
Bulgaria, citing corruption, organized crime, severe spending
irregularities and alleged vote-buying in a country that only joined
the EU last year.
(AP, 7/23/08)
2008 Jul 23, In Democratic
Republic of Congo at least 45 people were killed and another 100
were missing after a boat sank on a remote stretch of the Ubangi
river.
(Reuters, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 23, France passed a
new law to let companies negotiate longer working hours with union
representatives, all but squelching the 35-hour week.
(Econ, 7/26/08, p.61)
2008 Jul 23, Iraq's Kurdish
government has denounced a draft law paving the way for US-backed
provincial elections and urged the presidential council to reject
it. The 18-year-old son of the chief editor of a US-sponsored
newspaper was shot to death as an American patrol passed nearby in
the northern city of Kirkuk.
(AP, 7/23/08)(AP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 23, US Presidential
hopeful Barack Obama donned a Jewish skullcap at Israel's Holocaust
memorial and vowed to preserve America's close ties with Israel in a
dramatic visit to the Holy Land in which he also promised the
Palestinians to push vigorously to win them a state.
(AP, 7/23/08)
2008 Jul 23, Hurricane Dolly
toppled trees and sent billboards flying in the Mexican city of
Matamoros, and authorities south of the US border warned of possible
flooding. Dolly also hit south Texas, but by evening it had weakened
to a tropical storm.
(AP, 7/24/08)(SFC, 7/24/08, p.A3)
2008 Jul 23, Opposition
lawmakers walked out of a Mongolian parliamentary session before
they were to be sworn in, saying they refused to participate because
last month's election was fraudulent.
(AP, 7/23/08)
2008 Jul 23, Nigeria's main
militant group threatened to destroy the nation's major oil
pipelines within 30 days to counter allegations it had struck a $12
million deal with the government to protect them.
(AP, 7/23/08)
2008 Jul 23, An international
rights group pressed Pakistan's new government to quickly
investigate the disappearance of hundreds of people allegedly
rounded up by security agencies as part of the anti-terror campaign.
(AP, 7/23/08)
2008 Jul 23, In Sri Lanka
government forces killed 25 rebels in battles in the Vavuniya,
Mannar, Jaffna and Welioya regions along the front lines.
(AP, 7/24/08)
2008 Jul 23, In Sudan
government planes bombed Karbala, a Darfur village, while Pres.
Bashir was addressing cheering crowds in the nearby city of
el-Fasher. according to a rebel faction 3 people were killed and 8
injured.
(Reuters, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 23, Turkish warplanes
bombed 13 Kurdish rebel targets in the Zab region of northern Iraq.
(AP, 7/24/08)
2008 Jul 23, Venezuela signed
over three more oil fields to a joint venture with Belarus, with
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez declaring that the two nations were
strongly united in their resistance to "US imperialism" and
Washington's "lackeys."
(AP, 7/23/08)
2008 Jul 24, The US confirmed
that it planned to shift 230 million dollars in aid to Pakistan from
counter-terrorism programs to upgrading the country's F-16 fighter
jets.
(AFP, 7/24/08)
2008 Jul 24, New York Attorney
General Andrew Cuomo sued banking giant UBS for fraud, accusing the
company of marketing tens of billions of dollars of auction-rate
securities as safe even when they knew the investments were in
trouble.
(AP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 24, The US CDC
reported that at least 1,013 people had died between 2005 and 2007 a
street version of the painkiller fentanyl. Many deaths were likely
unreported.
(WSJ, 7/25/08, p.A12)
2008 Jul 24, NASA released
findings that indicate magnetic explosions about one-third of the
way to the moon cause the northern lights, or aurora borealis, to
burst in spectacular shapes and colors, and dance across the sky.
(AP, 7/24/08)
2008 Jul 24, Ford Motor Co.
posted the worst quarterly performance in its history, losing $8.67
billion in the second quarter.
(AP, 7/24/08)
2008 Jul 24, It was reported
that the sabal palm, the Florida’s state tree, was under attack by a
microscopic killer and had scientists stumped.
(SFC, 7/24/08, p.A6)
2008 Jul 24, In southern
Afghanistan insurgents attacked an Afghan military convoy in Zabul
province and 35 militants were killed after the army called for
assistance from the US-led coalition. A British army dog handler was
fatally shot by insurgents.
(AP, 7/24/08)(AP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 24, Hundreds of
Anglican bishops from around the world were among 1,500 people who
marched through central London calling for urgent action to tackle
global poverty.
(AFP, 7/24/08)
2008 Jul 24, Max Mosley (68),
motor racing chief and son of Britain's 1930s Fascist leader Oswald
Mosley, won 60,000 pounds ($119,100) in damages at London's High
Court from the News of the World newspaper for breaching his privacy
by reporting details of a German-themed sex session with five
prostitutes.
(Reuters, 7/26/08)
2008 Jul 24, Ten insurgents and
two Cameroonian soldiers were killed in a rebel attack in the
oil-rich Bakassi peninsula. The rebels, who call themselves the
Niger Delta Defense and Security Council, oppose Cameroon's
ownership of the West African peninsula, which is also claimed by
Nigeria.
(AP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 24, In Ecuador a
special assembly approved a new 444-article draft constitution
granting its leftist president broad powers, including the ability
to dissolve Congress and set monetary policy, and freeing him to run
for office through 2017.
(AP, 7/25/08)(Econ, 8/2/08, p.40)
2008 Jul 24, French PM Francois
Fillon said a 15% cut in military manpower and base closings will
save billions of dollars. The military ranks will be cut by 54,000.
(SFC, 7/25/08, p.A12)
2008 Jul 24, French giant
automaker Renault said it will cut about 5,000 jobs in Europe among
measures to reduce costs by 10 percent as it prepares for a sharp
and possibly rocky downturn.
(AFP, 7/24/08)
2008 Jul 24, In Germany US
presidential candidate Barack Obama and German Chancellor Angela
Merkel discussed the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as climate
and energy issues at Germany's chancellery. Obama stood before an
enormous crowd in Berlin and summoned Europeans and Americans to
work together to "defeat terror and dry up the well of extremism
that supports it."
(AP, 7/24/08)
2008 Jul 24, In northern
Baghdad gunmen in a speeding car opened fire on two different
awakening council checkpoints in the Azamiyah neighborhood killing
three of its guards and leaving another wounded. A female suicide
bomber blew herself up near US-allied Sunni Arab fighters walking in
a crowded area of Baqouba, killing at least eight of the guards and
wounding 24 other people.
(AP, 7/24/08)
2008 Jul 24, Iraq was told it's
not welcome to the Beijing Olympics because of a political feud in
Baghdad that angered the games' guardians and exiled a country that
arrived to a roaring ovation at the opening ceremony four years ago.
(AP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 24, An Israeli
official said a key committee has approved construction of the first
new Jewish settlement in the West Bank in a decade. The news
infuriated Palestinians, who said the decision could cripple peace
efforts.
(AP, 7/24/08)
2008 Jul 24, In Indian Kashmir
a suspected Islamic militant threw a hand grenade at a group of
migrant laborers, killing a woman and her four children in one of
two attacks that claimed a total of nine lives.
(AP, 7/24/08)
2008 Jul 24, Libya said it will
halt fuel supplies to key oil client Switzerland in the latest
reprisal for last week's brief detention in Geneva of a son of
Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi.
(AFP, 7/24/08)
2008 Jul 24, In Mexico state
prison chief Salvador Barreno was shot and killed as he drove in
Ciudad Juarez, across from El Paso, Texas. His bodyguard was also
killed. 3 other men died in a separate shooting minutes later.
(AP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 24, In Nigeria a
petrol tanker burst into flames main in the main city of Lagos,
killing at least 12 people and leaving several others with severe
burns. 5 eastern European oil workers were abducted from a Swedish
boat in the Niger delta. The 5 Russian oil workers were released on
July 26.
(AFP, 7/24/08)(AP, 7/26/08)(AP, 7/28/08)
2008 Jul 24, In southern Norway
a group of men armed with bats and iron bars attacked a center for
political asylum-seekers, leaving more than 20 people injured.
(AP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 24, In the southern
Philippines a homemade bomb ripped through a commuter bus, wounding
27 people. In North Cotabato province communist rebels attacked a
banana farm associated with Dole Foods Co. and a land mine hit a
security vehicle rushing to intervene, killing one and wounding
three others.
(AP, 7/24/08)
2008 Jul 24, In Singapore North
Korea's reclusive communist regime, long seen as a nuclear threat to
the region, signed a nonaggression pact with Southeast Asia, in a
largely symbolic move. The Treaty of Amity and Cooperation (TAC)
with the Association of the Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) came
into force in 1976, requires signatories to renounce the use or
threat of force and calls for the peaceful settlement of conflicts.
(AP, 7/24/08)
2008 Jul 24, In South Africa
talks began in earnest on resolving Zimbabwe's political crisis
after President Robert Mugabe gave his senior lieutenants the final
go-ahead to negotiate power-sharing with the opposition.
(AP, 7/24/08)
2008 Jul 24, Sri Lankan forces
battled rebel gunmen deep inside the nation's northern jungles,
killing 25 guerrilla fighters and seizing new territory. Battles in
other parts of the war zone killed 13 rebels and three soldiers.
(AP, 7/24/08)(AP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 24, In Suriname a boy
(12) stabbed and killed a 9-year-old girl in front of her classmates
and teacher at a rural elementary school.
(AP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 25, President George
W. Bush signed an order expanding US sanctions against the
"illegitimate" Zimbabwe government of President Robert Mugabe.
(Reuters, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 25, US regulators took
over two banks and sold them to Mutual of Omaha Bank, the sixth and
seventh bank failures this year as financial institutions struggle
with a housing bust and credit crunch. The Office of the Comptroller
of the Currency said it closed First National Bank of Nevada and
First Heritage Bank NA of California.
(Reuters, 7/26/08)
2008 Jul 25, US Federal
regulators formally approved the merger of Sirius Satellite Radio
Inc. and rival XM Satellite Radio Holdings Inc., the nation's only
two satellite radio operators. The companies first applied for
permission to combine in March 2007.
(AP, 7/26/08)
2008 Jul 25, California’s Gov.
Schwarzenegger signed a bill banning trans fat in restaurants and
food facilities, making California the first state to do so. The law
takes effect in two stages: Jan 1, 2010 and Jan 1, 2011.
(WSJ, 7/26/08, p.A1)(SSFC, 7/27/08, p.C1)
2008 Jul 25, Texas nurse Chere
Lyn Tomayko, wanted by the FBI for international parental
kidnapping, was awarded refugee status in Costa Rica and cannot be
extradited to the US. In December 1996, a US judge gave joint
custody of a daughter, Alexandria Camille Cyprian, to Tomayko and
her ex-boyfriend Robert Cyprian, with the condition that Alexandria
live in Tarrant County, Texas. Tomayko said she moved to Costa Rica
because she had been physically abused by Cyprian.
(AP, 7/26/08)
2008 Jul 25, Harriet Burns
(b.1928), the 1st woman hired to work as a designer for Walt Disney
Imagineering (1955), died in Los Angeles.
(SFC, 7/31/08, p.B5)
2008 Jul 25, Harvey Houtkin
(b.1948), self-proclaimed father of day trading, died in San Diego.
He had opened All-Tech Direct Inc. in Suffern, NY, in 1988 and
traded on the Small Order Execution System. He was suspended from
trading in 2001.
(WSJ, 8/2/08,
p.A7)(www.signonsandiego.com/news/metro/20080801-9999-1n1sharp.html)
2008 Jul 25, Randy Pausch (47),
a Carnegie Mellon University computer scientist, died at his home in
Virginia. His "last lecture" in September 2007, about facing
terminal cancer, has become an Internet sensation and a best-selling
book.
(AP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 25, In southern
Afghanistan a Danish soldier died in a roadside bomb attack. The
death brings the number of Danish troops killed in Afghanistan since
2001 to 15. 3 Taliban militants died in a fight with police in the
Gereshk district of Helmand province.
(AP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 25, In Goiania,
Brazil, Mohamed D'Ali Carvalho Santos stabbed to death and
dismembered Cara Marie Burke (17), a British citizen, while high on
crack cocaine. In 2009 Santos was sentenced to 19 years for the
killing and two more for hiding the body.
(AP, 5/14/09)
2008 Jul 25, British PM Gordon
Brown suffered another serious blow to his leadership after Scottish
nationalists won a longtime Labour seat in Glasgow.
(AFP, 7/25/08)(WSJ, 7/26/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 25, In Colombia police
arrested Sen. Carlos Garcia, the head of one of Colombia's main
governing parties, for alleged ties with far-right paramilitaries.
(AP, 7/26/08)
2008 Jul 25, Estonia urged the
EU to take stronger action against Somali pirates attacking cargo
ships bound for Europe, after an Estonian sailor was held hostage
for 41 days.
(AFP, 7/26/08)
2008 Jul 25, The EU and South
Africa began their first-ever summit in the French city of Bordeaux.
Brussels solidly backed Pretoria's mediating role in Zimbabwe as the
only way of ending ruinous political chaos.
(AFP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 25, US presidential
hopeful Barack Obama met with Pres. Sarkozy during a short stop in
Paris.
(SFC, 7/26/08, p.A3)
2008 Jul 25, German
semi-conductor group Infineon posted a sharp quarterly loss and
announced the loss of 3,000 jobs.
(AP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 25, India's
high-technology capital Bangalore was rocked by 8 bomb blasts. One
woman was killed and over 150 wounded.
(AFP, 7/25/08)(Econ, 8/2/08, p.44)(WSJ, 11/28/08,
p.A6)
2008 Jul 25, A bomb exploded
outside a Gaza City cafe and another went off outside the home of a
Hamas lawmaker. One person was killed. A mysterious beachside blast
killed 3 Hamas members and a 6-year-old girl. 2 more Hamas activists
died the next day.
(AP, 7/25/08)(AP, 7/26/08)
2008 Jul 25, In Lebanon clashes
between Sunni Muslim gunmen and the Alawite broke out at dawn when a
hand grenade was thrown toward a Sunni area. Fighting left one
person dead.
(AP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 25, Energy companies
in the three Baltic states and Poland agreed to set up a joint
venture to develop a nuclear power plant in Lithuania.
(Reuters 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 25, In Nigeria two oil
workers, one Nigerian and one Filipino, were kidnapped in the Niger
delta.
(AP, 7/26/08)
2008 Jul 25, In northwestern
Pakistan militants blew up a girls school and 10 shops in 2 separate
areas of the Swat valley. There were no casualties.
(AP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 25, A bomb exploded
outside a Gaza City cafe and another went off outside the home of a
Hamas lawmaker. One person was killed. A mysterious beachside blast
killed 3 Hamas members and a 6-year-old girl. 2 more Hamas activists
died the next day.
(AP, 7/25/08)(AP, 7/26/08)
2008 Jul 25, Sheik Hassan Dahir
Aweys, Somalia's new hard-line opposition leader, promised to pacify
his shattered country through Islamic law, warning UN peacekeepers
they will face attack if they deploy and support the government.
(AP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 25, Ahmedou Ould
Abdallah, the UN special envoy for Somalia, sounded the alarm about
rampant illegal fishing and the dumping of toxic waste off the coast
of the lawless nation.
(AFP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 25, In Sri Lanka heavy
fighting between Sri Lankan government forces and Tamil Tiger rebels
along the front lines of their civil war killed 62 rebels and eight
soldiers.
(AP, 7/26/08)
2008 Jul 25, Sudan threatened
to expel peacekeepers from Darfur if President Omar al-Beshir is
indicted for war crimes by the International Criminal Court.
(AFP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 25, In eastern Yemen a
suicide car bomber rammed a vehicle into the Interior Ministry's
headquarters, killing a policeman and injuring eight others.
(AP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 25, A UN official said
as much as 25 percent of cyclone relief aid in Myanmar is being lost
because of the military government's foreign exchange system.
(AP, 7/25/08)
2008 Jul 26, In southern
Afghanistan NATO-led soldiers killed four civilians after opening
fire on a car that did not stop at a checkpoint.
(AP, 7/26/08)
2008 Jul 26, US presidential
hopeful Barack Obama met PM Gordon Brown in London, focusing on key
foreign policy issues facing both countries, particularly
Afghanistan and Iraq. Obama also met with Tory leader David Cameron
and Middle East envoy Tony Blair.
(AFP, 7/26/08)
2008 Jul 26, Brazil's Embraer
(EMBR3.SA), the world's third-biggest commercial jet maker, said it
would invest 148 million euros in two new plants in Portugal -- its
first industrial units in Europe that will make wings and tailpieces
for exports.
(AP, 7/26/08)
2008 Jul 26, In southern Haiti
at least 29 people were killed when a large truck carrying people
and merchandise collided with three pickups east of Cavailon.
(AP, 7/27/08)
2008 Jul 26, In western India
at least 51 people were killed and 161 wounded when 19 bombs went
off in several crowded neighborhoods of Ahmadabad, Gujarat state.
(AP, 7/26/08)(Econ, 8/2/08, p.44)
2008 Jul 26, President Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad said that Iran now has 6,000 centrifuges, a significant
increase in the number of uranium-enriching machines in its nuclear
program.
(AP, 7/26/08)
2008 Jul 26, In Lebanon three
more people were killed in the second day of sectarian clashes
between Sunnis and Alawites in northern Lebanon, bringing the total
to 9 with 42 wounded.
(AP, 7/26/08)
2008 Jul 26, In Nigeria
unidentified men in a speed boat seized eight foreign oil workers at
gunpoint in the Niger delta. They were released later in the day.
(AP, 7/26/08)
2008 Jul 26, In Pakistan 3
soldiers and at least 12 suspected insurgents were killed in
fighting after the militants ambushed a convoy in the Dera Bugti
district of Baluchistan province.
(AP, 7/27/08)
2008 Jul 26, Hamas security
arrested dozens of supporters of the rival Fatah group, hurled
grenades at the home of a Fatah leader and set up checkpoints across
Gaza following the previous day’s beachside blast that killed five
Hamas members and a 6-year-old girl. Masked Hamas gunmen nabbed
Sawah Abu Saif (42), a Palestinian cameraman for German TV, from his
Gaza home, during a mass weekend roundup of alleged activists of the
rival Fatah movement. He was tortured and released on July 31.
(AP, 7/26/08)(AP, 7/31/08)
2008 Jul 26, South Korea’s
government said days of torrential rains have led to the deaths of
seven people and left six others missing.
(AP, 7/26/08)
2008 Jul 26, In Spain Maria
Remedios Garcia Albert (57) was arrested in San Lorenzo de el
Escorial on suspicion of belonging to Colombia's FARC rebel group.
(AP, 7/27/08)
2008 Jul 26, In northern Sri
Lanka 12 Tamil Tiger rebels were killed by security forces in fresh
clashes in the Wanni region.
(AP, 7/28/08)
2008 Jul 26, Sudan’s army
attacked a rebel police post in North Darfur, killing four troops,
before conducting search operations in nearby villages according the
Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM). Sudan's army initially denied the
report. On July 29 Khartoum said rebels of Minni Arcua Minnawi's
Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM) attacked a convoy on that road and
the police responded, killing four of them and injuring two.
(Reuters, 7/27/08)(Reuters, 7/29/08)
2008 Jul 27, In Knoxville,
Tennessee, Jim D. Adkisson (58) entered the Tennessee Valley
Unitarian Universalist Church during a children's performance and
killed 2 people. In 2009 Adkisson pleaded guilty to killing 2 people
and wounding 6 others because he hated the church’s liberal
politics.
(AP, 7/28/08)(SFC, 7/28/08, p.A2)(SFC, 2/10/09,
p.A7)
2008 Jul 27, In Afghanistan
some 50 to 70 insurgents were killed when helicopter gunships and
ground fighting repulsed an attack by about 100 rebels in the Spera
district of Khost province near the Pakistan border. 2 Policemen
were killed in the attack. Elsewhere in Khost province, a suicide
bomber blew himself up inside a tent of security guards, killing one
of them and injuring six more. NATO troops killed two children in
southern Afghanistan by opening fire on a car that they feared was
about to attack their convoy.
(AFP, 7/27/08)(WSJ, 7/28/08, p.A10)(AP, 7/28/08)
2008 Jul 27, In Antigua
newlyweds Benjamin and Catherine Mullany, both 31, were attacked
inside their cottage at the Cocos Hotel resort in the island's
southwest. Both were shot in the head. Catherine was killed. A
comatose Benjamin was flown back to Britain where he was pronounced
dead on August 3. On August 18 a 20-year old man and 17-year-old
male were taken to a magistrate court in St. John's and were charged
with murder, robbery and receiving stolen goods. The trial of Avie
Howell and Kaniel Martin began June 1, 2011.
(AP, 8/2/08)(AP, 8/4/08)(AP, 8/19/08)(AP, 6/2/11)
2008 Jul 27, Cambodian PM Hun
Sen's party claimed it won a sweeping victory in polls overshadowed
by a military standoff with Thailand. Tens of thousands of
opposition supporters were excluded from the electoral register.
(AFP, 7/27/08)(Econ, 8/2/08, p.45)
2008 Jul 27, In Egypt Youssef
Chahine (1926), filmmaker, died in Cairo. His 28 films included “The
Blazing Sun” (1954) with Omar Sharif. His 1994 film “The Emigrant,”
about the Old Testament figure of Joseph, was denounced by militant
Islamists and banned.
(SFC, 7/29/08, p.B5)
2008 Jul 27, Iran hanged 29
people at dawn after they had been convicted of murder, drug
trafficking and other crimes.
(AP, 7/27/08)
2008 Jul 27, In Iraq gunmen
hiding in reeds in Madain, a Sunni town south of Baghdad, killed
seven Shiite pilgrims as they were marching to a shrine in the
capital for a major holiday.
(AP, 7/27/08)
2008 Jul 27, Israeli troops
killed a Hamas militant in the West Bank town of Hebron. Troops
exchanged gunfire with the man (25) for 12 hours before bulldozing
the structure.
(AP, 7/27/08)
2008 Jul 27, Mexico City
residents voted against the president's proposal to give private
companies a bigger role in the country's state-run oil industry in a
nonbinding referendum.
(AP, 7/28/08)
2008 Jul 27, Ram Baran Yadav,
Nepal's first president, appealed for rival parties in the
newly-republican nation to form a consensus government and end weeks
of political deadlock, in his maiden address to the people.
(AFP, 7/27/08)
2008 Jul 27, Spain's National
Court jailed seven people on charges of belonging to a militant cell
of the Basque separatist group ETA.
(AP, 7/27/08)
2008 Jul 27, In Sri Lanka at
least 16 different battles broke out in the Welioya and Vavuniya
regions, some of them sparked by government attacks on the rebels'
bunker lines. The rebels also carried out at least five roadside
bombings against troops. The violence killed 18 rebels and four
soldiers.
(AP, 7/28/08)
2008 Jul 27, In Istanbul,
Turkey, bomb blasts killed 17 people in a crowded square in the
residential neighborhood of Gungoren. 5 of the dead were children.
Turkish warplanes bombed 12 Kurdish rebel targets on Mount Qandil in
northern Iraq.
(AP, 7/28/08)(AP, 7/27/08)
2008 Jul 27, Floods in western
Ukraine killed 22 people, including 4 children, and 5 in neighboring
Romania after 5 days of nonstop rain. A senior government official
described them as the worst in a century. Heavy rain in the
southwestern Carpathian Mountains caused the Prut and Dniestr rivers
to overflow. The flooding affected more than 40,000 houses and led
to the evacuation of some 20,000 people.
(Reuters, 7/27/08)(AP, 7/28/08)
2008 Jul 27, Venezuela’s Pres.
Chavez, during his weekly TV program "Alo Presidente", made some
sharp criticisms of various government officials, calling on them to
fight against bureaucracy and corruption. He then brought to the
attention of the audience the book, "Reformism or Revolution" by
Alan Woods (b.1944), a Welsh Trotskyist.
(www.marxist.com/alan-woods-speaking-tour-in-venezuela/)(Econ,
11/20/10, p.44)
2008 Jul 28, Pres. Bush met
with Pakistan’s new PM Yousaf Raza Gilani at the White House and
they agreed to battle terrorists in Pakistan.
(SFC, 7/29/08, p.A10)
2008 Jul 28, A senior Bush
administration official said the budget deficit for this year will
set a record in dollar terms, approaching $490 billion.
(AP, 7/28/08)
2008 Jul 28, Sir Richard
Branson and Burt Rutan unveiled their White Knight Two, the
mothership of SpaceShip Two, at the Mohave Air & Space Port in
California. Spaceship Two, the passenger rocket, was being built for
Branson’s Virgin Galactic, which hoped to soon carry passengers into
space.
(SFC, 7/29/08, p.A5)
2008 Jul 28, The
propeller-driven "Zephyr" aircraft, owned by QinetiQ Group PLC,
began a flight over the Arizona desert and continued for an
unofficial record of 83 hours and 37 minutes, more than doubling the
official world record set by Northrop Grumman's "Global Hawk" in
2001. The 66 pound- (30 kilogram-) plane was launched by hand and
flown by autopilot and via satellite.
(AP, 8/24/08)
2008 Jul 28, Police in Alabama
arrested Anthony Hopkins (37), a part-time evangelist, after finding
a body in his home freezer. Police believed it was the body of his
wife, Arletha Hopkins, who had not been heard of for 3 years.
(www.wsbtv.com/news/17043437/detail.html)
2008 Jul 28, US-led coalition
troops killed several militants during a raid in central
Afghanistan, while a suspected bomb maker and his family died in an
accidental blast in Kunar province.
(AP, 7/29/08)
2008 Jul 28, Hernan Arbizu,
former JPMorgan Chase & Co private banking executive, was
arrested in Argentina following an indictment on charges of
embezzling about $5.4 million. He fled to Argentina before being
fired in June.
(Reuters, 7/29/08)
2008 Jul 28, Tarek bin Laden
signed a deal with Djibouti to build Noor City, the first of a
hundred “Cities of Light” that the Saudi Binladen Group planned
around the world. Plans called for the city to have 2.5 million
people by 2025 and 4.5 million for its Yemeni twin.
(Econ, 8/2/08,
p.50)(www.railpage.com.au/f-p1093077.htm)
2008 Jul 28, In England
hijackers made off with boxes of blank British passports worth a
fortune on the black market in a raid on a delivery van in the
Manchester suburb of Oldham. British policed later said the
passports were "very secure" as they contained a micro-chip which
had not been activated.
(AFP, 7/29/08)(AP, 7/31/08)
2008 Jul 28, Antoine Wendo
Kolosoy (aka Papa Wendo, b.1925), Congolese riverboat mechanic,
boxer and rumba singer, died at age 82. He cut his first records in
1947 for Olympia, a Belgian label.
(Econ, 8/16/08, p.84)
2008 Jul 28, Lebanese singer
Suzanne Tamim (30) was found stabbed and her throat slashed in
Dubai. On August 8 Egypt banned news coverage of the brutal slaying
following media reports in other papers that said a wealthy Egyptian
businessman ordered 3 men to carry out the killing. On Sep 2 Hisham
Talaat Moustafa, an Egyptian lawmaker and business tycoon, was
arrested in the death Tamim. He was accused of paying a former
police officer $2 million to kill her. On May 21, 2009, Moustafa was
sentenced to death for ordering Tamim’s death. Former officer,
Mohsen el-Sukkary, was also convicted and sentenced to death. In
2010 Moustafa was spared the death penalty after a retrial changed
his original death sentence to 15 years in prison.
(www.allaboutjazz.com/php/news.php?id=21342)(AP,
9/2/08)(AP, 5/21/09)(AP, 9/28/10)
2008 Jul 28, Pierre Beres
(b.1913), king of the French booksellers, died.
(SFC, 8/4/08, p.B3)
2008 Jul 28, In Iraq 3 female
suicide bombers blew their explosive vests in the middle of pilgrims
in Baghdad, moments after a roadside bomb attack, killing at least
32 people and wounding 102. In Kirkuk 25 people were killed and 185
wounded when a blast tore through a crowd of Kurds protesting a
draft provincial elections law. A roadside bomb attack killed four
civilians near Balad Ruz.
(AP, 7/28/08)
2008 Jul 28, In central Japan 4
people died after being swept away in torrential rains that caused
floods and mudslides and prompted an evacuation order for 50,000
people.
(AP, 7/28/08)
2008 Jul 28, In Nepal
protesters blocked traffic and held demonstrations to protest the
decision by Paramananda Jha, the newly elected vice president, to
take his oath of office in Hindi,which is not recognized as an
official language.
(AP, 7/28/08)
2008 Jul 28, Militants in
Nigeria's Niger Delta said they had blown up two major oil pipelines
belonging to Royal Dutch Shell, forcing the firm to halt some
production and helping push world oil prices higher.
(Reuters, 7/28/08)
2008 Jul 28, A suspected US
missile strike on a Pakistani madrassa killed six people, including
foreigners. Pakistani security officials said Al-Qaeda chemical
weapons expert Midhat Mursi al-Sayid Umar (54) was believed to have
been killed in the US missile strike in the South Waziristan tribal
district. The Egyptian, also known as Abu Khabab al-Masri, had a
five-million-US-dollar bounty on his head and allegedly ran
terrorist training camps in Afghanistan. In Kohat a bomb rigged to a
bicycle killed a teenage boy and wounded 12 policemen. Pakistani
Taliban militants shot dead three intelligence officials near
Mingora, the main town in Swat. The Taliban later confirmed that
al-Masri had been killed along with 3 other commanders.
(Reuters, 7/28/08)(AFP, 7/28/08)(AP,
7/28/08)(AFP, 7/29/08)(AP, 8/3/08)
2008 Jul 28, In the Philippines
a packed commuter bus strayed into an oncoming lane and crashed
head-on into another bus on a highway south of Manila, killing at
least 11 people and injuring 29 others.
(AP, 7/29/08)
2008 Jul 28, Navanethem Pillay,
a judge from South Africa, was confirmed as the new UN chief of
human rights.
(SFC, 7/29/08, p.A3)
2008 Jul 29, Pres. Bush signed
a bill freezing the assets of political and military leaders in
Myanmar and banning the importation of rubies and jade from Myanmar
to the US. The legislation also gave incentives to Chevron to divest
its natural gas program there. The US Treasury announced financial
sanctions on 10 companies suspected of being owned by Myanmar’s
government.
(SFC, 7/30/08, p.A4)
2008 Jul 29, The US Senate’s
Foreign Relations Committee voted to triple America’s non-military
assistance to Pakistan to $1.5 billion a year.
(Econ, 8/9/08, p.39)
2008 Jul 29, Alaska Senator Ted
Stevens (84), the longest-serving Republican in the US Senate, was
indicted for making false statements concerning gifts he received
from an oil-services firm.
(AFP, 7/29/08)
2008 Jul 29, In Maryland police
raided the home of Berwyn Heights Mayor Cheye Calvo shooting to
death the couple's two dogs and seizing an unopened package
containing 32 pounds of marijuana. The couple appeared to be
innocent victims of a scheme by two men to smuggle millions of
dollars worth of marijuana by having it delivered to about a
half-dozen unsuspecting recipients.
(AP, 8/8/08)
2008 Jul 29, New York’s Gov.
David Paterson delivered a special address on the state’s
deteriorating fiscal condition. His new budget placed the state’s
deficit at $6.4 billion.
(Econ, 8/2/08, p.36)
2008 Jul 29, The SF Board of
Directors voted 8-3 to ban the sale of tobacco products at most
pharmacies in the city.
(SFC, 7/30/08, p.B1)
2008 Jul 29, Department store
chain Mervyns LLC filed for bankruptcy protection, the latest in a
series of merchants stumbling in the harsh retail environment and
another blow to the nation’s struggling malls. In August Mervyn’s
sued its former private equity owners saying they stripped the
department store chain of its valuable real estate and then nearly
doubled its rent effectively pushing the California-based company
into bankruptcy.
(www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25918757/)(WSJ, 9/4/08,
p.B1)
2008 Jul 29, Starbucks said it
will close more than two-thirds of its 84 stores in Australia by the
end of the week under a cost-cutting plan that will put almost 700
people out of work.
(AP, 7/29/08)
2008 Jul 29, Luther Davis
(b.1916), Tony-winning playwright and screenwriter, died in the
Bronx. His plays included “Kismet” (1954). In 1978 he turned Kismet
into a new show titled “Timbuktu!”
(www.nytimes.com/2008/08/02/theater/02davis.html?partner=rssnyt&emc=rss)
2008 Jul 29, US Army scientist
Bruce E. Ivins died of an apparent overdoes of Tylenol at Frederick
Memorial Hospital in Maryland. Federal prosecutors investigating the
2001 anthrax attacks were planning to indict and seek the death
penalty against Ivins in connection with anthrax mailings that
killed five people. Ivins, who was developing a vaccine against the
deadly toxin, committed suicide. On Feb 19, 2010, the FBI formally
closed his case concluding that Ivins acted alone in the 2001
anthrax mailings.
(AP, 8/1/08)(AP, 2/20/10)(SFC, 2/16/11, p.A6)
2008 Jul 29, In Afghanistan a
roadside blast that apparently targeted an Afghan senator mediating
a land dispute in eastern Paktia province killed 3 policemen and
wounded 3 others. In Logar province militants attacked a police van,
killing two officers, then taking the vehicle. A British soldier was
killed in Helmand.
(AP, 7/30/08)
2008 Jul 29, The Bosnian war
crimes court convicted seven Bosnian Serbs of genocide in the 1995
massacre of Bosnian Muslims at Srebrenica and handed down prison
sentences ranging from 38 to 42 years. Four others were acquitted.
Milenko Trifunovic, Brano Dzinic and Aleksandar Radovanovic received
the 42-year sentences, while Milos Stupar, Slobodan Jakovljevic and
Branislav Medan each got 40 years and Petar Mitrovic received 38
years.
(AP, 7/29/08)
2008 Jul 29, In central Brazil
the torso of Cara Marie Burke, 17, from London, was found in a
suitcase in Goiania. She had been stabbed to death by Mohamed D'Ali
Carvalho dos Santos (20) over the weekend in his apartment. Santos
was arrested on July 31 and confessed. Reports said he was a cocaine
user.
(AFP, 8/1/08)
2008 Jul 29, In Britain a Sikh
teenager won a High Court discrimination case against a school which
banned her from classes after she refused to remove a religious
bangle.
(AFP, 7/29/08)
2008 Jul 29, Ecuador’s Foreign
Ministry said the US military must stop using its only outpost in
South America for anti-drug flights when Washington's 10-year lease
on the base in Ecuador expires in 2009.
(AP, 7/29/08)
2008 Jul 29, Hundreds of armed
former soldiers from Haiti's disbanded army stormed an old barracks
and civilian prison to demand the force be reinstated.
(AP, 7/29/08)
2008 Jul 29, India’s central
Reserve Bank raised its key lending rate an unexpected half per cent
to 9%, a 7-year high.
(WSJ, 7/30/08, p.C2)
2008 Jul 29, Indian and
Pakistani soldiers traded fire across the heavily armed Kashmir
frontier for more than 12 hours overnight and into the day in what
the Indian army called the worst violation of a 2003 cease-fire
agreement between the nuclear-armed neighbors.
(AP, 7/29/08)
2008 Jul 29, US and Iraqi
forces launched a new operation aimed at clearing al-Qaida in Iraq
from the volatile Diyala province, considered the last major
insurgent safe haven near the capital.
(AP, 7/29/08)
2008 Jul 29, The International
Olympic Committee agreed to allow Iraq to participate in the Beijing
games, reversing itself after Baghdad pledged to ensure the
independence of its national Olympics.
(AP, 7/30/08)
2008 Jul 29, Israeli gunfire
killed a 10-year-old Palestinian boy during a confrontation between
troops and stone-throwers in a West Bank village.
(AP, 7/29/08)
2008 Jul 29, In Mexico a family
of six was found dead in their home in western Jalisco state,
allegedly targeted by kidnappers aided by corrupt cops. Four
victims, including two children, were shot in the head. A teenage
boy's throat was slashed. His mother was asphyxiated with a plastic
bag.
(AP, 8/21/08)
2008 Jul 29, Pakistani Taliban
militants killed 3 soldiers, including an army captain, and
kidnapped 30 security forces from a police station in the
northwestern Swat Valley.
(AFP, 7/29/08)(WSJ, 7/31/08, p.A12)
2008 Jul 29, A huge blast
rocked a training base run by the Islamic militant Hamas in southern
Gaza, injuring at least five members of the group.
(AP, 7/30/08)
2008 Jul 29, Russian news said
2 small, manned submarines reached the bottom of Lake Baikal, the
world's deepest freshwater lake. The "Mir-1" and "Mir-2"
submersibles descended 1.05 miles (1,680 meters) to the bottom of
the vast Siberian lake.
(AP, 7/29/08)
2008 Jul 29, Russian proxies in
South Ossetia started shelling pro-Georgian villages there.
(Econ, 1/23/10, p.78)
2008 Jul 29, A UN court trying
the masterminds of Rwanda's 1994 genocide said that its mandate had
been extended by a year until 2009.
(AP, 7/29/08)
2008 Jul 29, Talks in South
Africa on Zimbabwe's political crisis broke up with no power-sharing
deal between President Robert Mugabe and his bitter rival Morgan
Tsvangirai in sight.
(AFP, 7/29/08)
2008 Jul 29, In Sri Lanka 21
Tamil Tigers and 4 soldiers were slain in clashes in the northern
Wanni region.
(AP, 7/30/08)
2008 Jul 29, Turkish warplanes
attacked Kurdish rebels in Iraq's north, killing a group of
guerrillas gathered at a mountain cave.
(AP, 7/29/08)
2008 Jul 29, WTO
Director-General announced on that the latest negotiations for a
much-delayed trade liberalization deal under the so-called Doha
Round had broken down after nine days due to unresolved differences.
The deadlock centered on a row between the US and India over special
tariff measures to protect poor farmers from surging imports or
price falls.
(AFP, 7/30/08)
2008 Jul 30, President Bush
signed a massive housing bill intended to provide mortgage relief
for 400,000 struggling homeowners and stabilize financial markets.
Bush also signed an executive order updating the authority of the
national intelligence director.
(AP, 7/30/08)(WSJ, 7/31/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 30, President George
W. Bush signed legislation repealing a rule that prevented
HIV-infected immigrants, students and tourists from receiving US
visas without special waivers. Bush also signed an act reauthorizing
PEPFAR, the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. It will
provide $39 billion to be spent on AIDS over the next 5 years, up
from $15 billion for the past 5 years.
(AP,
8/5/08)(www.whitehouse.gov/infocus/hivaids/)(Econ, 8/9/08, p.75)
2008 Jul 30, The NY Times
reported that a top Central Intelligence Agency official has
traveled to Islamabad and confronted senior officials with evidence
of ties between Pakistan's spy agency and militants operating in
that country's tribal areas.
(Reuters, 7/30/08)
2008 Jul 30, US federal health
officials said the salmonella strain linked to a nationwide outbreak
has been found in irrigation water and in a sample from a batch of
serrano peppers at a Mexican farm in Nuevo Leon. Mexico's
Agriculture Department rejected the FDA's conclusion saying "The
farm unit in question ended its harvest more than a month ago, so
the sample they say they have lacks scientific validity" because the
sample "was taken recently from a tank holding rain water that was
not used in production."
(AP, 7/31/08)
2008 Jul 30, In SF Mayor Gavin
Newsom signed into law a $6.5 billion city budget.
(SFC, 7/31/08, p.B1)
2008 Jul 30, Nicholas Corozzo
(68), New York City mob captain, pleaded guilty to racketeering and
2 murders in 1996. In 2009 he was sentenced to 13 years in prison.
(http://tinyurl.com/cz7tj8)(SSFC, 4/19/09, p.A10)
2008 Jul 30, In Afghanistan
Insurgents and a roadside blast killed five Afghan policemen.
(AP, 7/30/08)
2008 Jul 30, Aborigines won
traditional ownership rights over a large stretch of coastline in
northern Australia, in a landmark ruling lawyers said could set a
precedent in other parts of the country.
(AP, 7/30/08)
2008 Jul 30, Former Bosnian
Serb leader Radovan Karadzic sat in a UN jail cell after being flown
to the Netherlands in the dead of night to face charges of genocide
against Muslims and Croats during the Balkan wars of the 1990s.
(AP, 7/30/08)
2008 Jul 30, Media watchdog
Ofcom fined the BBC 400,000 pounds, the largest financial penalty it
has ever issued against the public broadcaster, for misleading the
public through fake quizzes and competitions.
(Reuters, 7/30/08)
2008 Jul 30, In Canada Tim
McLean (22), sleeping on a Greyhound bus was killed and decapitated
by his seatmate, Vince Weiguang Li (40), as the bus rolled across
the Canadian Prairies in Manitoba. On march 5, 2009, a judge ruled
that Li would not be judged criminally responsible due to mental
illness.
(Reuters, 7/31/08)(AP, 8/1/08)(AP, 3/5/09)
2008 Jul 30, A human rights
group said Chinese authorities have sent Liu Shaokun to a labor camp
for a year. He had posted pictures of collapsed schools on the
Internet and was detained last June for allegedly “seriously
disturbing social order.” And disrupting post-quake reconstruction
efforts.
(WSJ, 7/31/08, p.A7)
2008 Jul 30, The UN Security
Council voted to end an 8-year-long peacekeeping mission between
Eritrea and Ethiopia despite continuing tensions, a move that the
United Nations' chief has warned could lead to a new war.
(AP, 7/30/08)
2008 Jul 30, Germany's highest
court partially overturned bans on smoking in bars, ruling that
states must either ban smoking in all restaurants and pubs or offer
exceptions for single-room establishments.
(AP, 7/30/08)
2008 Jul 30, In the troubled
Russian republic of Ingushetia a car bomb exploded outside the
regional police headquarters morning, killing at least two police.
(AP, 7/30/08)
2008 Jul 30, Nearly 50,000
Iraqi police and soldiers were involved in a US-backed operation
against al-Qaida in Iraq in one of its last major strongholds near
the capital. A roadside bomb targeted an Iraqi army patrol in
eastern Baghdad, killing at least one Iraqi soldier and wounding
seven other people.
(AP, 7/30/08)
2008 Jul 30, Israel’s PM Ehud
Olmert announced he would step down after his Kadima Party's
leadership race in September, called because of a series of
corruption allegations against him.
(AP, 7/31/08)
2008 Jul 30, In Lebanon gunmen
attacked a Lebanese military post in the country's east, killing one
soldier and wounding another.
(AP, 7/30/08)
2008 Jul 30, Mexican police
captured Ever Villafane Martinez, a Colombian cartel operative who
represented Colombia's Norte del Valle drug cartel in dealings with
Mexico's Beltran Leyva gang. He had escaped from a Colombian prison
in 2001 and was wanted on drug charges in the US.
(AP, 8/1/08)
2008 Jul 30, Morocco's King
Mohammed VI condemned Algeria's continuing closure of their common
border, despite repeated calls by Rabat for it to be reopened.
Algiers has set a global settlement of the conflict in Western
Sahara as a precondition for reopening the border, which it closed
in 1994 after Morocco claimed Algerian secret service agents were
behind an Islamist extremist attack in Marrakesh.
(AFP, 7/30/08)
2008 Jul 30, Nigerian security
officials said rival militant factions in Nigeria's oil-producing
Niger Delta have clashed in an apparent turf war, killing at least
four people.
(Reuters, 7/30/08)
2008 Jul 30, The UN said hunger
in North Korea is at its worst since the 1990s, prompting the
resumption of emergency UN food shipments after a two-year hiatus.
(AFP, 7/30/08)
2008 Jul 30, In Pakistan fierce
fighting erupted in the restive Swat valley, killing 25 militants
and four soldiers and undermining the government's strategy of
offering peace deals to pro-Taliban insurgents. Sher Ali, an
insurgent commander known as Mullah Toor, was killed in the
fighting.
(AP, 7/30/08)(WSJ, 7/31/08, p.A12)
2008 Jul 30, The papal nuncio
said Paraguay's president-elect Fernando Lugo (57) has received
unprecedented permission from the pope to resign as bishop, ending a
dispute over his priestly status.
(AP, 7/31/08)
2008 Jul 30, Alexander
Tsygankov, a Russian oil executive detained in Libya since last
November, was freed, hours before Russian PM Vladimir Putin was due
to host the country's prime minister.
(Reuters, 7/31/08)
2008 Jul 30, Saudi Arabia's
Islamic religious police banned the sale dogs and cats as pets, as
well as walking them in public due to “the rising of phenomenon of
men using cats and dogs to make passes at women and pester families"
as well as "violating proper behavior in public squares and malls."
(AP, 7/31/08)
2008 Jul 30, Sri Lankan war
planes bombed a suspected Tiger base in the north. The army launched
a wave of attacks against Tamil Tiger separatists in the north,
sparking battles that killed 24 rebels and one soldier.
(AFP, 7/30/08)(AP, 7/31/08)
2008 Jul 30, Turkey’s high
court narrowly voted against disbanding the ruling Justice and
Development Party, but cut off millions of dollars in state aid to
the Islamic-oriented party.
(SFC, 7/31/08, p.A12)
2008 Jul 30, Zimbabwe’s reserve
bank said it will drop 10 zeros from its hyper-inflated currency —
turning 10 billion dollars into one. President Robert Mugabe
threatened a state of emergency if businesses profiteer from the
country's economic and political unraveling.
(AP, 7/30/08)
2008 Jul 31, The US Congress
approved legislation that will allow the State Department to settle
all remaining lawsuits against Libya by US terrorism victims.
(AP, 7/31/08)
2008 Jul 31, California’s Gov.
Schwarzenegger ordered the layoffs of thousands of state workers
along with steep pay cuts for most other state employees to ease the
state’s budget gap of $17.2 billion.
(SFC, 8/1/08, p.A1)
2008 Jul 31, A US Virgin
Islands hospital fired four board members after a US government
audit found alleged financial mismanagement and the use of taxpayer
money to fund lucrative pay packages for top administrators.
(AP, 7/31/08)
2008 Jul 31, Booz Allen
Hamilton, a consulting firm on cybersecurity, split from Booz &
Co., in order to focus on the public sector. Booz & Co.
continued focused on the private sector. Their non-compete agreement
expired in August, 2011.
(Econ, 7/16/11,
p.69)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Booz_Allen_Hamilton)
2008 Jul 31, Exxon Mobil Corp.
reported second-quarter earnings of $11.68 billion, the biggest
quarterly profit ever by any US corporation, but the results were
well short of Wall Street expectations and its shares fell.
(AP, 7/31/08)
2008 Jul 31, Scientists
reported that Phoenix spacecraft robot has confirmed the presence of
frozen water lurking below the Martian permafrost.
(AP, 7/31/08)
2008 Jul 31, Ivan Miranda (14)
was killed in the SF Excelsior district in a gang motivated attack.
Rony Aguilera (17), an illegal immigrant from Honduras, was charged
in the sword attack. Aguilera had veen arrested in 2007 in an
assault case, but was not referred to federal authorities under a
recently discarded city sanctuary ordnance. In 2009 Walter
Chinchilla-Linar (23) and Cesar Alvarado (19), alleged members of
MS-13 street gang, were charged with the stabbing death of Miranda.
(SFC, 11/14/08, p.A1)(SFC, 10/23/09, p.A12)
2008 Jul 31, In Wisconsin a
gunman opened fire on a group of young adults from Michigan killing
3, aged 17-19, along the Menominee riverbank in the town of Niagara.
The next day police arrested Scott J. Johnson (38). He had a raped a
woman near the same site the evening before the murders. In 2009
Johnson was sentenced to life in prison without parole.
(AP, 8/2/08)(SFC, 5/22/09, p.A6)
2008 Jul 31, A small jet
crashed while preparing to land at Degner Regional Airport in
Minnesota killing 8 people including several casino and construction
executives.
(WSJ, 7/31/08, p.A2)
2008 Jul 31, Brazilian
President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva launched the Amazon Fund to
provide grants to projects intended to stop the Amazon rainforest
from shrinking.
(Econ, 8/9/08, p.37)
2008 Jul 31, Haitian lawmakers
ratified Michele Pierre-Louis to be the country's prime minister,
ending more than three months of political bickering and deadlock in
Parliament.
(AP, 8/1/08)
2008 Jul 31, At least 36 Hindu
pilgrims from Nepal were killed when their bus plunged into a river
in the mountainous northern Indian state of Uttarakhand.
(AFP, 7/31/08)
2008 Jul 31, In Iraq a
suicide car bomber rammed an explosives-laden vehicle into the wall
of a police station near the northern city of Mosul, killing three
policemen and wounding four. A judge died of wounds suffered in an
attack the day before in Mosul. Insurgents clashed with US-allied
Sunni Arab fighters and killed one of them near the village of
al-Waib, south of Baqouba.
(AP, 7/31/08)
2008 Jul 31, A mortar shell hit
a house in the Swat valley where Pakistani security forces are
battling Islamic militants, killing a family of seven. Another 10
civilians died in fighting in the region. Militants torched a nearby
girls school.
(AP, 7/31/08)(SFC, 8/1/08, p.A10)
2008 Jul 31, Palestinian
President Mahmoud Abbas ordered the release of all Hamas activists
detained in recent days by his security forces.
(AP, 7/31/08)
2008 Jul 31, Russia’s
Pres. Medvedev said that he had signed an anticorruption plan and
that he was serious about clamping down on graft.
(WSJ, 7/31/08, p.A6)
2008 Jul 31, South Korea's
Constitutional Court overturned a ban on doctors telling parents the
gender of unborn babies, saying the country has grown out of a
preference for sons and that the restriction violates parents' right
to know.
(AP, 7/31/08)
2008 Jul 31, Sri Lanka’s army
troops crossed into Kilinochchi district, where the rebels' de facto
capital is located, in fighting for the first time in 11 years.
(AP, 8/2/08)
2008 Jul 31, Sudanese courts
sentenced another 22 alleged Darfur rebels to death over an
unprecedented attack on the capital last May in which more than 222
people were killed.
(AFP, 7/31/08)
2008 Jul 31, In Thailand the
wife of ousted PM Thaksin Shinawatra was found guilty of evading
millions of dollars in taxes and sentenced to three years in prison,
dealing a staggering blow to a man who was once one of the richest
and most powerful in Thailand.
(AP, 7/31/08)
2008 Jul 31, Turkey’s Deputy PM
Cemil Cicek signaled the government would not push for a fresh round
of legislation to lift the head scarf ban.
(AP, 7/31/08)
2008 Jul 31, Fourteen of the UN
security council's 15 members voted in favor of Resolution 1828 to
extends the mandate of the joint UN-African Union peacekeeping force
in Darfur (UNAMID) for one year from this day, when it had been set
to expire. The United States abstained in the vote because language
added to the resolution noting concern that any indictment of Beshir
might jeopardize the Darfur peace process.
(AFP, 8/1/08)
2008 Jul 31, Venezuela’s Pres.
Chavez said his government will nationalize Banco de Venezuela, the
local unit of the Spanish banking giant Banco Santander.
(WSJ, 7/31/08, p.A6)
2008 Jul, In Alaska Gov.
Palin’s chief of staff told Walter Monegan, the state public safety
commissioner, that he was being fired because the governor wanted
“to go in a different direction.” Monegan, hired by Palin shortly
after she took office in 2006, said his firing was connected to his
failure to remove Mike Wooten, Palin’s former brother-in-law, from
the state police force.
(SFC, 9/1/08, p.A7)
2008 Jul, Sofiane Hadarbache, a
former Guantanamo inmate, was sent back to Algeria. He was picked up
by US forces outside of the Afghan capital, Kabul, in 2001 and sent
to the US detention facility in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where he was
held through July 2008. On Nov 4, 2010, an Algerian court acquitted
Hadarbache of charges that included belonging to a terrorist group
operating abroad and counterfeiting.
(AP, 11/5/10)
2008 Jul, Mubadala Development,
an investment arm of Abu Dhabi, announced that it intended to became
a major shareholder in GE.
(Econ, 9/20/08, SR p.24)
2008 Jul, Fifty-five thousand
jobs were lost in Canada this month, the biggest number since
February 1991, principally the result of a struggling private sector
in the country's central provinces.
(Reuters, 8/8/08)
2008 Jul, In China the founder
of a company involved in commodities futures trading allegedly fled
to the US with millions of dollars of customers’ money.
(Econ, 8/9/08, p.40)
2008 Jul, Kadisiya became the
10th of 18 Iraqi provinces to come under Iraqi command.
(Econ, 8/2/08, p.48)
2008 Jul, Japan for the first
time exported more to China this month than to America. Japan’s
public sector debt stood at 170% of GDP, the highest among the big
rich economies.
(Econ, 9/6/08, p.87)
2008 Jul, Religious leaders
meeting in Norway unveiled a plan for a code of conduct for holy
sites on which all governments could agree.
(Econ, 8/30/08,
p.60)(www.arcworld.org/news.asp?pageID=254)
2008 Jul, In the Ukraine a
16th-century Caravaggio painting, "The Taking of Christ, or the Kiss
of Judas," was stolen from the Museum of Western and Eastern Art in
Odessa. It was valued at several million euros. In 2010 Berlin
recovered the painting and arrested four members of an international
gang of art thieves as they tried to sell it to an interested buyer.
(AP, 6/28/10)
2008 Jul, In Venezuela
inflation was running at 32%.
(Econ, 7/19/08, p.47)
2008 Aug 1, US Federal and
state regulators closed First Priority Bank of Bradenton, Florida,
the 8th US bank to fail this year. It would be acquired by
SunTrustBanks Inc.
(WSJ, 8/4/08, p.A3)(www.fpbank.com/)
2008 Aug 1, In eastern
Afghanistan 4 NATO soldiers were killed in a bomb blast in Kunar
province. Another soldier was killed in a separate explosion in
Khost province. More than a dozen" rebels were killed in ground
fighting and air strikes after attacking an Afghan and US-led
coalition patrol in the southern province of Uruzgan. Several more
were killed in the southwestern province of Farah after their
hideout was discovered. Three other militants linked to Taliban, one
of them a doctor, were killed when a bomb they were planting
exploded in eastern Khost province. Islamic rebels captured six
policemen following a brief firefight in Khost province.
(AFP, 8/1/08)(AFP, 8/2/08)
2008 Aug 1, Anglo-Australian
mining giant Rio Tinto said it received correspondence from Guinea
President Lansana Conte "purporting to rescind the Simandou Mining
Concession."
(AFP, 8/3/08)
2008 Aug 1, China’s broad
anti-monopoly law, promulgated in August, 2007, went into effect. It
became informally referred to as its economic consitution.
(www.iflr.com/Article/2017768/Anti-Monopoly-Law.html)(Econ, 3/21/09,
p.68)
2008 Aug 1, In southern Egypt
12 people were killed and 16 others wounded when two speeding
passenger buses rammed into a truck.
(AFP, 8/1/08)
2008 Aug 1, A German farmer who
lost both his arms in an accident was successfully fitted with two
new limbs in what is believed to be the first complete double arm
transplant.
(AP, 8/1/08)
2008 Aug 1, In southern India
at least 32 people have died after several coaches of the Gautami
Express train caught fire.
(AP, 8/1/08)
2008 Aug 1, In Iraq a roadside
bomb attack has killed two Iraqi soldiers and wounded two others in
northern city of Kirkuk.
(AP, 8/1/08)
2008 Aug 1, The body of
Fernando Marti, the 14-year-old son of a prominent businessman, was
found in the trunk of a car in Mexico City. He had been kidnapped in
June. The kidnap and murder prompted a wave of anti-crime protests
across the nation. In September police detained five suspects
including Sergio Ortiz, a former agent of a now-disbanded city
detective force, who led the "Flower Gang" responsible for
kidnapping Marti in June. In July, 2009, Jose Montiel (34) and Noe
Robles (31) were arrested for the kidnapping. They were believed to
be members of a Mexico City gang responsible for at least 23
abductions.
(AP, 9/8/08)(AP, 7/18/09)
2008 Aug 1, In northwestern
Pakistan about 35 militants kidnapped 2 policemen on the outskirts
of Khar.
(AP, 8/1/08)
2008 Aug 1, Hamas forces seized
about 15 leaders of Fatah in Gaza, upping the stakes in a week of
tit-for-tat arrests between the bitter Palestinian rivals. Fatah
said more than 200 of its men have been seized over the past week.
Five Palestinians died and 18 were wounded in a smuggling tunnel
under the Gaza-Egypt border after Egyptian troops blew up the
entrance.
(AP, 8/1/08)(AP, 8/2/08)
2008 Aug 1, Leonid Nevzlin, a
top manager of the now defunct YUKOS business empire, was sentenced
by a Russian court to life in prison for ordering a series of high
profile murders, a verdict he dismissed as the result of a show
trial organized by the Kremlin.
(Reuters, 8/1/08)
2008 Aug 1, In Sri Lanka new
fighting between government forces and the rebels across the
country's embattled northern region killed 38 rebels and 14
soldiers.
(AP, 8/2/08)
2008 Aug 1, A sniper
assassinated Brig. Gen. Mohammed Suleiman, a senior Syrian general
close to President Bashar Assad, at a beach resort in the northern
port city of Tartous.
(AP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 1, An African Union
(AU) peacekeeper from Uganda was killed when a roadside bomb struck
his convoy in the capital Mogadishu.
(AFP, 8/1/08)
2008 Aug 1, King George Tupou V
was crowned King of Tonga.
(Econ, 8/9/08, p.42)
2008 Aug 1, In central Turkey a
three-story girls dormitory collapsed, killing at least 18 students
and setting off a search for a half dozen people believed to be
under the rubble in Balcilar. A gas leak from kitchen pipes caused
the powerful explosion, leaving another 27 people injured. 3
dormitory administrators were charged on August 3 with "causing
death through negligence."
(AP, 8/1/08)(AP, 8/2/08)(AP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 1, The UN atomic
watchdog's board of governors unanimously approved an inspections
agreement with India that is key to finalizing a US-India nuclear
deal.
(AP, 8/1/08)
2008 Aug 2, The US Centers for
Disease Control (CDC) said that due to new tracking methods 40% more
people are infected by the HIV virus than was previosly believed.
(SSFC, 8/3/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 2, In Santa Cruz, Ca.,
2 firebombs exploded outside the homes of 2 UC Santa Cruz
biologists. They were similar to some used in the past by animal
rights activists.
(SFC, 8/4/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 2, Peter W. Rodman
(b.1943), lawyer, government official and foreign policy expert,
died. His book “Presidential Command: Power, Leadership, and the
Making of Foreign Policy from Richard Nixon to George W. Bush” was
published in 2009.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Rodman)(WSJ,
1/12/09, p.A11)
2008 Aug 2, In Afghanistan a
suspected rebel bomb struck a minibus carrying a newly married
couple, killing the bride and groom and 11 wedding guests.
(AP, 8/2/08)
2008 Aug 2, Perez Celis
(b.1939), a prestigious Argentine muralist, painter and sculptor,
died in Buenos Aires.
(AP, 8/3/08)
2008 Aug 2, Geoff Ballard
(b.1932), founder of Ballard Power and advocate for fuel cells, died
in Vancouver, Canada. In 1999 he had started General Hydrogen to
explore ways to manufacture and market hydrogen as a fuel. Plug
Power bought General Hydrogen in 2007 for $10 million.
(SFC, 8/12/08, p.B5)
2008 Aug 2, In China Zhang
Jinfu (43), a farmer, killed six and injured one in a stabbing spree
in the Hubei province village of Xuyang.
(AP, 8/3/08)
2008 Aug 2, China’s Sanlu
Group, a dairy product producer, told Fronterra, a New Zealand
company that owns 43% of Sanlu, that there was problem with milk
powder.
(Econ, 9/20/08, p.57)
2008 Aug 2, Saad Eddin Ibrahim
(69), an exiled Egyptian human rights activist who also holds US
nationality, was sentenced in abstentia to two years in prison for
defaming Egypt. He was accused him of defaming the country after a
series of articles and speeches on citizenship and democracy in
which he criticized the Egyptian regime. Ibrahim, who founded the
Ibn Khaldoun Centre for Development Studies, was sentenced in 2001
to seven years for "tarnishing Egypt's reputation," before being
freed on appeal after spending 10 months behind bars.
(AFP, 8/2/08)
2008 Aug 2, Overnight fighting
that included sniper and mortar fire between Georgian forces and
separatists in the breakaway South Ossetia region left six people
dead and 13 wounded.
(AP, 8/2/08)
2008 Aug 2, In northern India
40 farm laborers died after a truck carrying them home from the
fields plunged into a river near Ghoomsa in Bihar state.
(AP, 8/3/08)
2008 Aug 2, More than 1,000
Sunni Arabs and Turkomen staged a demonstration to protest calls by
Kurds to annex the oil-rich city of Kirkuk to their autonomous
region as Iraqi officials met in Baghdad to defuse tension over the
disputed city. The U.S. military said it has released more than
10,000 detainees in Iraq so far this year, more than in all of 2007,
as it continues to try phase out its running of Iraqi prisons. A
roadside bomb in Baghdad killed one member of the US-allied Sunni
fighters and wounded two others. An American soldier died and
another was injured in a vehicle accident southwest of Baghdad.
(AP, 8/2/08)(AP, 8/3/08)
2008 Aug 2, In Nigeria gunmen
seized 2 French oil workers from a bar in Onne near the oil hub of
Port Harcourt. The 2 were released on Sep 5.
(AFP, 9/5/08)
2008 Aug 2, In Pakistan a bomb
exploded at a bridge, killing at least nine security forces in the
Swat valley, where Pakistani troops are battling Islamic militants.
(AP, 8/2/08)
2008 Aug 2, In Pakistan 22
climbers, mostly foreigners, reached the summit of K-2, the world's
second-highest mountain, but an ice avalanche struck them during
their descent. At least 11 of the mountaineers were killed.
(AP, 8/3/08)(AFP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 2, Hamas security
forces battled fighters in a tribal stronghold where they say
suspects in a deadly bombing last week were hiding. Three Hamas men
were killed, along with six Fatah supporters, and nearly 90 were
wounded. Some 180 Fatah supporters fled into Israel from a deadly
Hamas crackdown.
(AP, 8/2/08)(AP, 8/3/08)
2008 Aug 2, In Sri Lanka a
two-day summit of leaders of the 15th South Asian Association for
Regional Cooperation (SAARC), opened amid extraordinary security.
Leaders of Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, The Maldives,
Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka attended the summit. Government troops
captured rebel-held Vellankulam village in Mannar, the last rebel
stronghold in the area. Fresh fighting between Sri Lankan troops and
Tamil Tiger separatists killed 14 rebels and two soldiers across the
embattled northern region.
(AP, 8/2/08)(AP, 8/3/08)
2008 Aug 3, Some 19,000 runners
participated in the 31st annual SF Marathon. Chad Worthen (34) of
Sacramento won with a time of 2:31:52. Lauren Gustafson of Millbrae
won among the women with a time of 2:52:33.
(SFC, 8/4/08, p.B1)
2008 Aug 3, In Gearhart,
Oregon, a small plane crashed into a seaside house killing 2 people
aboard and 2 children in the vacation home.
(SFC, 8/5/08, p.A3)
2008 Aug 3, Lou Teicher
(b.1924), pianist, died in North Carolina. He was half of the
popular piano duo Ferrante & Teicher whose movie themes and love
songs earned them wide popularity in the 1960s. Together they
recorded some 150 albums.
(SFC, 8/7/08, p.B5)
2008 Aug 3, In Afghanistan a
roadside bomb struck a US-led coalition vehicle, killing one service
member and wounding another on the outskirts of Kabul. Afghan and
NATO troops targeted a group of Taliban fighters in Helmand
province, killing 17 militants and wounding six others. Four police
were killed separately in a militant ambush in central Ghazni
province.
(AP, 8/3/08)(AP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 3, In Algeria 21
people, six of them policemen, were injured in a suicide car bomb
attack in the town of Tizi Ouzou in Algeria's Kabylie region.
(AFP, 8/3/08)
2008 Aug 3, Cambodia said that
Thai soldiers are occupying a second temple site on their border in
an escalation of an ongoing armed standoff that nearly led to
clashes between the neighbors last month.
(AP, 8/3/08)
2008 Aug 3, In Canada a small
plane crashed on Vancouver Island. Two survivors were pulled from
the wreckage but five other people on the aircraft died.
(Reuters, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 3, In Greece
Athanassios Arvanitis (31) beheaded his girlfriend and her dog on
the island of Santorini and then escaped in a patrol car. Police
shot him 5 times as he ran over 2 women on a motorcycle before being
caught.
(SFC, 8/4/08, p.A3)
2008 Aug 3, Hundreds of
Honduran squatters angry over a land dispute attacked the home of
Henry Sorto, a local police official. Five employees and six of
Osorto's family members were burned, shot and hacked to death with
machetes.
(AP, 8/4/08)(AP, 8/5/08)
2008 Aug 3, In northern India
145 people, including many women and children, were killed when
pilgrims stampeded at a Hindu temple. The devotees were attending a
9-day religious festival at the Naina Devi Temple in the Bilaspur
district of the Himachal Pradesh state.
(AP, 8/3/08)
2008 Aug 3, In Indonesia a top
health official said a factory worker had died of bird flu west of
Jakarta, bringing the death toll in the country worst hit by the
virus to 112.
(AP, 8/3/08)
2008 Aug 3, In Iraq a truck
bomb exploded during rush hour on a busy street in northern Baghdad,
killing at least 12 people and wounding about two dozen. A roadside
bomb killed six people, including three Iraqi soldiers, and wounded
13 others south of Baghdad. In Tarmiyah a clash between US-allied
fighters and civilians killed one civilian and wounded 10 others.
(AP, 8/3/08)
2008 Aug 3, Israeli and
Palestinian officials said most of the 180 Fatah supporters, who had
fled into Israel, would be sent back into the Gaza Strip.
(AP, 8/3/08)
2008 Aug 3, The breakaway
republic of South Ossetia began sending hundreds of children across
the border to its Russian ally amid increasing violence between the
republic and Georgian government forces.
(AP, 8/3/08)
2008 Aug 3, Alexander
Solzhenitsyn (b.1918), Russian Nobel literature laureate (1970),
died of heart failure in his Moscow home. His books, which included
“One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich” (1962) and "Gulag
Archipelago" (1973), chronicled the horrors of dictator Josef
Stalin's slave labor camps. In 1974, he was stripped of his
citizenship and put on a plane to West Germany for refusing to keep
silent about his country's past.
(Reuters, 8/4/08)(WSJ, 8/9/08, p.W12)
2008 Aug 3, In Scotland the
Int’l. Primatological Society Congress opened a 6-day conference. On
August 5 scientists released a report saying the nearly half of the
world’s 634 types of primates are in danger of becoming extinct due
to human activity.
(SFC, 8/5/08, p.A3)
2008 Aug 3, In Senegal former
US president Bill Clinton wound up a four-nation Africa tour aimed
at combating HIV/AIDS in Dakar, praising France for its financial
support through the agency Unitaid.
(AP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 3, In Somalia a bomb
hidden under a pile of garbage killed at least 20 people, half of
them women who were sweeping the street in Mogadishu.
(AP, 8/3/08)
2008 Aug 3, In Sri Lanka the
South Asian summit ended. Tensions between India and Pakistan
overshadowed the summit, but the two nuclear-armed rivals vowed to
work together and save a tenuous peace process. A draft summit
declaration called for collective action to combat "all forms of
terrorist violence" that was threatening their "peace, stability and
security." The leaders also agreed to implement a regional trade
pact, signed in 1995 but never fully implemented. Troops repulsed an
attempt by Tamil rebels to retake a recently captured guerrilla
stronghold in heavy fighting that killed 21 rebels and three
soldiers. Thirteen rebels and three soldiers were killed in other
clashes in the Mannar, Vavuniya and Welioya regions.
(AFP, 8/3/08)(AP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 3, Venezuelan
President Hugo Chavez says 24 Sukhoi fighter jets have been
delivered to Venezuela, and are ready to defend his country from
"imperialist" aggressions.
(AP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 3, Zimbabwe's rival
parties resumed power-sharing talks, a day ahead of the expiry of a
deadline to conclude discussions to end a ruinous political crisis.
(AFP, 8/3/08)
2008 Aug 4, President George W.
Bush signed into law legislation paving the way for Libya to pay
hundreds of millions of dollars to compensate US victims of bombing
attacks that Washington blames on Tripoli.
(Reuters, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 4, Alaska sued the US
government saying its listing of polar bears as a threatened species
will hurt oil exploration and tourism.
(WSJ, 8/6/08,
p.A1)(www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/49694/story.htm)
2008 Aug 4, In SF Mayor Newsom
signed into law stringent green building codes for new construction
and renovations of existing structures in the city.
(SFC, 8/5/08, p.B1)
2008 Aug 4, In Afghanistan a
pair of Taliban fighters died when a mine they were planting
exploded prematurely in the Spin Boldak district of Kandahar
province. Police killed five Taliban fighters after the militants
ambushed a police patrol in Kandahar’s Panjwayi district.
(AP, 8/4/08)(AP, 8/5/08)
2008 Aug 4, Bangladesh held
local elections that observers hailed as a success. A fire swept
through a five-story building in a crowded section of the capital,
Dhaka, killing at least 10 people and injuring five others.
(AFP, 8/5/08)(AP, 8/4/08)(Econ, 8/9/08, p.42)
2008 Aug 4, In Chile Alberto
Achacaz Walakial, one of the last surviving members of the nomadic
Kaweskar tribe, died of blood poisoning. Government documents listed
Achacaz's age at 79, but some believe he was close to 90. The tribe
once plied the waters off Chile's Patagonian coast. Experts estimate
that only about a dozen full-blooded Kaweskars, or Alacalufes,
survive and the group appears destined to disappear in the near
future as there are no women of fertile age left. Since the arrival
of the first Europeans, Chile has lost five of its original 14
indigenous tribes to disease, displacement or the overuse of their
natural resources.
(AP, 8/5/08)
2008 Aug 4, In western China 2
Uighur men rammed a truck into a clutch of jogging policemen and
tossed explosives, killing 17 officers, in an attack in Kashgar,
Xinjiang province, just days before the Beijing Olympics. The 2 men
were sentenced to death on Dec 17.
(AP, 8/4/08)(SFC, 8/5/08, p.A11)(AP, 12/17/08)
2008 Aug 4, Ecuador's
government said it would seize a family business group's stock
shares in 58 companies to help recover debts generated by the
collapse of the family's former bank. The action came a little less
than a month after authorities seized 200 businesses linked to the
family of William and Roberto Isaias, who fled to the US in 2000
shortly after their bank collapsed.
(AP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 4, India announced an
additional $450 million in aid for development projects in
Afghanistan. PM Singh met with Afghan Pres. Karzai in New Delhi and
both countries pledged to fight terrorism.
(WSJ, 8/4/08, p.A10)
2008 Aug 4, Indian officials
pledged to stop Hindus from imposing an economic blockade on the
mainly Muslim Kashmir valley as tensions heightened with the deaths
of protesters. Police opened fire at hundreds of stone-throwing
Hindu protesters angry over a government decision to not transfer
land to a Hindu shrine, killing two people. A Muslim protester was
also killed by a tear gas shell.
(AFP, 8/4/08)(AP, 8/4/08)(WSJ, 8/6/08, p.A10)
2008 Aug 4, In Iran journalist
Yaghoob Mirnehad was executed in the city of Zahedan after being
sentenced to death earlier this year. Iran accused Mirnehad of being
involved in the armed Jundallah group, which operates along the
Iranian-Pakistani border. The Jundallah group, or God's Brigade, has
launched attacks against Iranian soldiers and police in the area
near Pakistan and Afghanistan, which is a key crossing point for
narcotics.
(AP, 8/5/08)
2008 Aug 4, Iraqi officials
reported that at least nine Iraqis died in a separate series of
bombings. 2 American soldiers were killed and one was wounded by a
roadside bomb in Baghdad that also killed 2 Iraqis.
(AP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 4, Israel's defense
minister said a group of around 150 Fatah fighters who fled to
Israel from the Gaza Strip will be allowed to relocate to the West
Bank because they face "immediate danger" from Gaza's Hamas rulers.
(AP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 4, Italy’s Defense
Ministry deployed some 3,000 soldiers in cities across the country
as part of government measures to fight street crime.
(AP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 4, A Jordanian
military court sentenced 12 men to up to five years in jail for
planning to join Iraq's insurgency and carry out attacks against US
and Iraqi forces. The five men who received the longest jail terms
were at large and tried in absentia.
(AP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 4, A shootout between
Mexican police and smugglers driving a truck carrying illegal
immigrants left 2 people dead near Agua Dulce.
(AP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 4, A Nigerian
presidential panel on oil and gas sector reform recommended that the
state oil company be transformed into an "independent limited
liability company."
(AFP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 4, In Pakistan a
remote-controlled bomb explosion struck a military convoy and
wounded eight soldiers in South Waziristan. Militants torched four
girls' schools, a health office and a forestry office. A senior
officer said that over the past week 94 Islamist militants were
killed and 14 soldiers lost in fighting in the northwestern Swat
valley. At least 25 civilians and eight policemen were also killed
in the fighting. Brigadier Zia Bodla said the army planned a major
operation against the insurgents.
(Reuters, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 4, The Philippine
Supreme Court, acting on a petition by Christian politicians,
blocked the signing of a key accord granting an expanded southern
homeland to minority Muslims as part of a deal to end decades of
bloody Islamic rebellion.
(AP, 8/4/08)(Econ, 8/9/08, p.41)
2008 Aug 4, In Venezuela
changes in areas from the military to small business loans were
pushed through by the president in 26 laws released in the official
gazette. Chavez approved them on the final day of an 18-month period
during which lawmakers had granted him special legislative powers.
(AP, 8/4/08)
2008 Aug 5, President Bush got
a mixed reception in South Korea at the start of his three-nation
Asian trip. About 30,000 people gathered in front of Seoul City Hall
for an afternoon Christian prayer service supporting Bush's trip. As
evening approached police fired water cannons at an estimated 20,000
anti-Bush protesters gathered nearby.
(AP, 8/5/08)
2008 Aug 5, The US Energy
Department said that even if no new reactors are built, getting rid
of the country's nuclear waste will cost $96.2 billion and require a
major expansion of the planned Nevada waste dump beyond limits
imposed by Congress.
(AP, 8/5/08)
2008 Aug 5, The US government
charged 11 people with stealing tens of millions of credit and debit
card numbers from major retailers including TJX Cos Inc, in one of
the largest reported identity-theft incidents on record.
(Reuters, 8/5/08)
2008 Aug 5, The US General
Accounting Office predicted Iraq could finish the year with as much
as a $79 billion cumulative budget surplus due to the influx of oil
revenues. The GAO estimated that Iraqi oil revenues from 2005
through the end of this year will amount to at least $156 billion.
(AP, 8/7/08)
2008 Aug 5, Aafia Siddiqui, a
Pakistani woman once identified as a possible al-Qaida associate,
was extradited from Afghanistan and arraigned in New York on charges
that she tried to kill US agents and military officers. Siddiqui was
educated at Brandeis and MIT and fled to Pakistan after 9/11 because
of anti-Muslim sentiment. She and her children dropped out of sight
in March 2003, after 9/11 mastermind Khalid sheikh Mohammed
mentioned her name during an interrogation. She was arrested by
Afghan police on July 17, who found recipes for explosives and
descriptions of New York landmarks in her handbag. Siddiqui is the
wife of Ammar al-Baluchi, a nephew of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who
was believed to be the chief planner of the Sep 11, 2001, attacks.
(SFC, 8/6/08, p.A3)(WSJ, 8/6/08, p.A7)(SSFC,
8/24/08, p.A5)
2008 Aug 5, Texas executed Jose
Medellin (33) for the 1993 rape and killing of two teenage girls in
Houston. Mexico protested the execution, which took place despite a
world court ruling for a new hearing, and expressed concern for the
rights of other Mexicans detained in the US. On Jan 19, 2009, the
International Court of Justice at The Hague ruled that the US defied
its order when authorities in Texas last year executed a Mexican
convicted of rape and murder.
(AP, 8/6/08)(AP, 1/19/09)
2008 Aug 5, John A. "Junior"
Gotti (44) was arrested at his Long Island home on charges linking
him to three New York murders. In 1999 Junior Gotti pleaded guilty
to racketeering crimes including bribery, extortion, gambling and
fraud. He was sentenced to 77 months in prison and was released in
2005.
(AP, 8/5/08)
2008 Aug 5, The Chinese Embassy
in Washington revoked the visa of Joey Cheek, 2006 Olympic gold
medalist, effectively barring the speedskating champion from the
2008 Olympics. Cheek had co-founded Team Darfur, an organization of
athletes attempting to draw attention to human rights violations in
Darfur.
(SFC, 8/6/08, p.A8)
2008 Aug 5, In California 9
firefighters were killed and 4 injured when their helicopter crashed
after battling a blaze in Trinity County. Investigators in 2010
concluded that lax federal oversight and Carson Helicopter’s
decision to underestimate the craft’s weight led to the crash.
(SFC, 8/7/08, p.A1)(SFC, 12/8/10, p.C7)
2008 Aug 5, A magnitude 6.0
earthquake rocked the western Chinese provinces of Sichuan and
Gansu, killing one person and injuring 23 near the site of May's
devastating quake that killed at least 70,000 people.
(Reuters, 8/5/08)
2008 Aug 5, Wildlife
researchers said they have discovered some 125,000 western lowland
gorillas deep in the forests of the Republic of Congo.
(WSJ, 8/6/08, p.A10)
2008 Aug 5, The EU said it will
give Haiti $4.6 million to help pay for food in the world's poorest
country.
(AP, 8/5/08)
2008 Aug 5, In Iran Ali Kordan
was narrowly approved as the new interior minister. An honorary
Oxford degree that he cited was soon disclosed as a fake.
(SFC, 8/14/08, p.A11)
2008 Aug 5, It was reported
that Muqtada al-Sadr planned to reorganize his Mahdi Army militia
into a social services organization. Gunmen killed Sheik Ibrahim
al-Karbouli, a senior leader of a US-allied Sunni group, and six of
his guards in an ambush in Youssifiyah. Police also discovered the
bodies of three awakening council members who were abducted several
days ago. Roadside bombings also killed another person and wounded a
dozen, in a second consecutive day of bombings in the capital.
(WSJ, 8/4/08, p.A1)(AP, 8/5/08)
2008 Aug 5, In Japan 4 people
were missing after being washed away by a surge of sewage water
while working in a manhole in downtown Tokyo.
(AP, 8/5/08)
2008 Aug 5, In Montenegro 4
Michigan residents were among 12 ethnic Albanians convicted of
plotting a rebellion to carve out a homeland within the tiny Balkan
republic.
(AP, 8/5/08)
2008 Aug 5, Officials in
Pakistan said floods triggered by heavy monsoon rains have destroyed
thousands of homes and caused at least 27 deaths in the last 24
hours.
(AP, 8/5/08)
2008 Aug 5, Rwanda formally
accused senior French officials of involvement in its 1994 genocide.
(Reuters, 8/5/08)
2008 Aug 5, Serbia's war
crimes prosecutor's office indicted Branko Grujic and Branko Popovic
in the 1992 killing of about 700 Muslims in eastern Bosnia. The
killings took place near the town of Zvornik on the border with
Bosnia.
(AP, 8/5/08)
2008 Aug 5, In Turkey an oil
pipeline that has allowed the West to tap the rich fields of
Azerbaijan, bypassing Iran and Russia, was set on fire. A Kurdish
rebel organization later admitted sabotaging the pipeline.
(AP, 8/7/08)
2008 Aug 5, The UN said heavy
rains and storms have led to some of the worst floods in 40 years in
parts of Ukraine, Moldova and Romania since July 22, causing great
damage to homes, infrastructure and farmland. In Ukraine, 34 people
have been killed in the west of the country along the Dnestr and
Prut rivers; in Moldova, three people are reported to have drowned
in the capital Chisinau; in Romania five people have been killed.
(AFP, 8/5/08)
2008 Aug 5, Venezuela's Supreme
Court ruled that a list barring hundreds of candidates suspected of
corruption from running in elections is constitutional, despite
complaints that it singles out opponents of President Hugo Chavez.
(AP, 8/5/08)
2008 Aug 6, President George W.
Bush flew into Bangkok on the latest leg of a pre-Olympics Asian
tour, although his focus in Thailand is mainly on the "outpost of
tyranny" junta in neighboring Myanmar.
(AP, 8/6/08)
2008 Aug 6, The US said it will
protest to China over its decision to revoke the visa of Olympic
gold medalist Joey Cheek, an activist on the African region of
Darfur where China is accused of failing to help end the crisis.
Speedskater Cheek is co-founder of Team Darfur, an international
coalition of athletes campaigning to draw world attention to the
humanitarian crisis there.
(Reuters, 8/6/08)
2008 Aug 6, A jury of six
military officers at Guantanamo Bay reached a split verdict in the
war crimes trial of Salim Ahmed Hamdan, a former driver for Osama
bin Laden, clearing him of some charges but convicting him of others
that could send him to prison for life. Hamdan was convicted of
supporting terrorism but acquitted of conspiracy to commit attacks.
The next day the US military jury sentenced Hamdan to 5 1/2 years in
prison, including five years and a month already served at
Guantanamo Bay.
(AP, 8/6/08)(WSJ, 8/7/08, p.A1)(AP, 8/8/08)
2008 Aug 6, A Bulgarian court
declared the Kremikovtzi steel plant to be insolvent. Ukrainian
billionaire Kostyantin Zhevago and Luxembourg-based ArcelorMittal SA
competed to take over the plant operations following the insolvency
proceedings.
(WSJ, 8/7/08, p.B2)
2008 Aug 6, Officials said
Cambodia's genocide tribunal has been hit by new corruption
allegations, compelling foreign donors to withhold more than
$300,000 from the proceedings pending a review of the claims.
(AP, 8/6/08)
2008 Aug 6, China announced
changes to its foreign exchange rules to address surging growth in
its hard currency reserves.
(WSJ, 8/7/08, p.C12)
2008 Aug 6, France accused
Rwanda of making "unacceptable accusations" by alleging Paris played
an active role in the 1994 genocide, but said it was still
determined to mend damaged ties with Kigali.
(AP, 8/6/08)
2008 Aug 6, In Indian Kashmir a
Hindu protester was shot dead in army firing as Premier Manmohan
Singh was due to hold talks with political parties in a bid to
defuse tensions in the region.
(AP, 8/6/08)
2008 Aug 6, Israel released
five Palestinian teenagers from jail as part of a prisoner exchange
agreement made with Lebanon's Hezbollah militia last month.
(AP, 8/6/08)
2008 Aug 6, Army officers in
Mauritania, upset with government overtures toward Islamic
hard-liners, staged a coup overthrowing the first government to be
freely elected in more than 20 years. President Sidi Ould Cheikh
Abdallahi was held at his palace in Nouakchott by presidential guard
soldiers, led by Mohamed Ould Abdelaziz. Arab-dominated Mauritania,
with a population of 3.4 million, has been wracked by more than 10
coups or attempted coups since independence from France in 1960.
(AP, 8/6/08)(Econ, 8/9/08, p.44)
2008 Aug 6, In Nepal a contest
to choose the next "Miss Nepal," slated August 7, was cancelled
after Maoist female lawmakers denounced the beauty pageant.
(AFP, 8/6/08)
2008 Aug 6, Pakistani Pres.
Pervez Musharraf abruptly canceled then reinstated his trip to the
Olympic Games as local media reported that the ruling coalition had
agreed on steps to remove him. 9 militants including Ali Bakht, a
top-ranking militant, were killed and many injured during a search
and cordon operation conducted by security forces in the Kabal
district of the Swat valley. Two insurgents died when the explosive
device they were planting in a female educational institution
exploded prematurely in Kabal sub-district. 3 civilians died in the
various parts of the Swat district when stray mortar rounds hit
their houses. An attack on a Pakistani military checkpost by some
200 pro-Taliban militants triggered intense fighting that killed 25
insurgents and two paramilitary soldiers near the Afghan border.
(AFP, 8/6/08)(http://tinyurl.com/6bwtwo)(AP,
8/7/08)
2008 Aug 6, Thousands protested
in South Africa as workers disrupted gold mining and other major
industries in a national strike over price hikes rattling the
continent's economic powerhouse.
(AP, 8/6/08)
2008 Aug 6, Taiwan's President
Ma Ying-jeou declassified documents allegedly implicating his
predecessor Chen Shui-bian in a high-profile embezzlement case.
(AP, 8/6/08)
2008 Aug 6, Riot police used
tear gas as they blocked hundreds of Venezuelans protesting what
they call new moves by President Hugo Chavez to concentrate his
power.
(AP, 8/7/08)
2008 Aug 6, Zimbabwe's ruling
ZANU-PF and the opposition MDC called on their supporters to end
political violence in the country. A newspaper reported that
President Robert Mugabe would have amnesty from prosecution and a
ceremonial role in government under a draft settlement to resolve
the country's crisis.
(Reuters, 8/6/08)(AFP, 8/6/08)
2008 Aug 7, A US federal judge
ruled that American Indian plaintiffs were entitled to $455 million,
a fraction of the $47 billion they sought in a year trial for
alleged losses on royalties overseen by the Interior Department
since 1887.
(SFC, 8/8/08, p.A6)
2008 Aug 7, A federal judge
ordered Detroit’s Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick to jail for violating the
terms of his bond in his perjury case, a decision the judge said he
would have made for any "John Six-Pack" defendant before him.
(AP, 8/7/08)
2008 Aug 7, In Arizona an SUV
packed with suspected illegal immigrants flipped over southeast of
Phoenix killing at least 9 people. There were 19 people in the
vehicle.
(SFC, 8/8/08, p.A4)
2008 Aug 7, In northern
California the Muir Heritage Land Trust said it will pay $1.8
million for 423 acres in Franklin Canyon, ending a long-standing
land fight.
(SFC, 8/8/08, p.B1)
2008 Aug 7, Afghan and
coalition forces killed at least four militants in Nahr Surkh
district of Helmand province. In central Afghanistan US-led
coalition forces "inadvertently" killed four women and a child
during a clash that killed several militants.
(AP, 8/8/08)
2008 Aug 7, In Algeria 18
people were reported dead from a crash between a van and a bus near
the city of Mascara, and 25 were reported injured. Three men who
were in critical condition subsequently died.
(AFP, 8/8/08)
2008 Aug 7, It was reported
that two subsidiaries of government-owned Dubai World have acquired
a 20% stake in Canada’s circus operator Cirque du Soleil. In May the
circus had agreed to perform on Palm Jumeirah, a man-made island,
for 15 years starting in 2011.
(SFC, 8/7/08, p.C2)
2008 Aug 7, It was reported
that the Dubai-based Al Yousuf Group has invested $10 million in
Zap, a Santa Rosa, Ca., firm that makes electric cars.
(SFC, 8/7/08, p.C1)
2008 Aug 7, In Thailand first
lady Laura Bush, meeting with refugees who fled a brutal campaign by
Myanmar's military junta, urged China and other countries to join
the US in imposing sanctions against the country.
(AP, 8/7/08)
2008 Aug 7, The US Olympic team
chose Lopez Lomong, one of the "Lost Boys" of Sudan, to carry the
flag at the Olympic opening ceremony, throwing the spotlight on
China's much-criticized policy on Darfur.
(AFP, 8/7/08)
2008 Aug 7, A new US Embassy
report released by the Japanese Foreign Ministry said the USS
Houston submarine was already leaking during nine earlier port calls
in Japan and the amount of radiation leaked was larger than
initially reported. It "has been steadily leaking a small amount" of
radiation from June 2006 to July 2008 when it entered a drydock in
Hawaii.
(AP, 8/7/08)
2008 Aug 7, Critics of China's
human rights record made sure they were not forgotten, a day before
the grand opening of the Beijing Olympics, with protest actions the
world over and in China itself. Thousands of Tibetan exiles
demonstrated in Nepal and India.
(AFP, 8/7/08)(AP, 8/7/08)
2008 Aug 7, Heavy shelling
overnight in the Georgian breakaway province of South Ossetia
wounded at least 21 people. Cyber attacks from Russia began to
target Georgian government Web sites. An organization known as the
Russian Business Network was the leading suspect in the attacks.
Georgia’s Pres. Saakashvili ordered the shelling of Tskhinvali, the
capital of South Ossetia.
(AP, 8/7/08)(WSJ, 8/12/08, p.A9)(Econ, 8/30/08,
p.49)
2008 Aug 7, Sheik Salah
al-Obeidi said Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr will call on his
fighters to maintain a cease-fire against American troops but may
lift the order if a planned Iraq-US security agreement lacks a
timetable for the withdrawal of American forces. A roadside bomb
killed eight Bedouins, including three women and two children, on a
remote desert highway west of Nasiriyah frequently used by US and
Iraqi troops. Gunmen killed a senior member of the Sunni Iraqi
Islamic Party, Mahmoud Younis Fathi, and a colleague as they were
driving to work in the northern city of Mosul. Elsewhere in Mosul,
three Iraqi policemen were killed when a booby-trapped wooden cart
exploded after they arrived to collect a body that had been left on
the street beside it.
(AP, 8/7/08)
2008 Aug 7, Japan accepted over
200 Indonesian nurses into the country, an unprecedented move as
Tokyo struggles to quell a labor shortage triggered by sinking
fertility rates.
(AP, 8/7/08)
2008 Aug 7, Maldives President
Maumoon Abdul Gayoom signed and adopted a new constitution that
allows multiparty elections and other democratic reforms after
decades of authoritarian rule.
(AP, 8/7/08)
2008 Aug 7, Pakistan's ruling
coalition announced plans to seek the impeachment of Pres. Pervez
Musharraf, alleging the US-backed former general had "eroded the
trust of the nation" during his eight years in power. Musharraf
cancelled his trip to the Olympics in Beijing.
(AP, 8/7/08)(SFC, 8/8/08, p.A2)
2008 Aug 7, A device exploded
on a beach in Sochi, a Black Sea Russian resort that will host the
2014 Winter Olympics, killing two people and wounding three.
(AP, 8/7/08)
2008 Aug 7, In Sri Lanka army
troops attacked and captured a rebel bunker in Welioya, where
separate clashes killed 15 rebels and four soldiers. In nearby
Vavuniya district, fighting killed two rebels and wounded two
soldiers.
(AP, 8/8/08)
2008 Aug 7, In Turkey a series
of explosions at a municipal government building in Istanbul
slightly injured three people. Shells from a mortar-like mechanism
were fired from a cemetery near a municipal government building.
(AP, 8/7/08)
2008 Aug 8, John Edwards,
former North Carolina senator and Democratic presidential candidate,
admitted that he had an extramarital affair with Rielle Hunter, a
film producer, in 2006 but denied fathering a daughter with her.
(AP, 8/9/08)(Econ, 8/16/08,
p.34)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rielle_Hunter)
2008 Aug 8, Struggling home
finance giant Fannie Mae reported a massive second quarter loss of
2.3 billion dollars, more than three times analysts' estimates.
(AFP, 8/8/08)
2008 Aug 8, UBS AG agreed to
buy back $19 billion in auction rate securities improperly sold as
higher-rate equivalents for super-safe money market funds.
(WSJ, 8/9/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 8, Joseph Bennett (43)
of Canada tried to drive an 58 bags contained 275,000 Ecstasy pills,
estimated at $6.5 million in street value, into Port Huron,
Michigan. In 2009 a federal judge in Detroit sentenced him to
7½ years in prison.
(SFC, 6/25/09, p.A5)(http://tinyurl.com/koa934)
2008 Aug 8, Nebraska Beef, an
Omaha meat packer, recalled 1.2 million pounds of beef after
products were linked to illnesses in 12 states. In July the company
had recalled over 5 million pounds of beef due to an outbreak of E.
coli in 7 states.
(SSFC, 8/10/08, p.A4)
2008 Aug 8, In Texas a charter
bus carrying Vietnamese worshippers on a pilgrimage ran off a
highway overpass north of Dallas and plunged onto a roadway below.
15 people were killed and 40 injured.
(AP, 8/8/08)
2008 Aug 8, In western
Afghanistan a coalition service member died in a roadside blast.
About 20 Taliban fighters were killed in a battle with Afghan and
US-led forces near a key military supply route in the western Bala
Buluk district. An Afghan child was killed and two injured by
militants who attacked alliance troops in northeastern Kunar
province.
(AP, 8/8/08)(AP, 8/9/08)
2008 Aug 8, In Algeria 12 armed
Islamists, including a number of individuals considered among the
leaders of Al-Qaeda in the Maghreb, were killed overnight by the
army in an ambush near Beni Douala, near Tizi Ouzou.
(AFP, 8/10/08)
2008 Aug 8, Australian Customs
and police said they had seized 4.4 tons of ecstasy tablets worth
nearly 400 million dollars, describing it as the biggest haul of the
illicit drug anywhere in the world. Police said the seizure of the
drugs, which were concealed in tins of tomato shipped to Australia
from Italy, had resulted in the arrests of 21 people across the
country beginning in pre-dawn raids.
(AFP, 8/8/08)
2008 Aug 8, Bolivia said it has
reached an agreement in principle to purchase the local operations
of energy company Royal Dutch Shell PLC as part of President Evo
Morales' nationalization push.
(AP, 8/8/08)
2008 Aug 8, President Bush
blended carefully calibrated political messages for China and Russia
with enthusiasm for his nation's athletes as he became the first US
president to attend an Olympics abroad.
(AP, 8/8/08)
2008 Aug 8, In Beijing, China,
the 29th Olympic Games, costing an estimated 40 billion dollars and
shrouded by political controversies, burst into life with a
spectacular opening ceremony at the “bird’s nest” stadium designed
by Ai Weiwei. The official slogan for the games this year was “One
world, one dream.” Actress activist Mia Farrow began Web-casting her
own "Darfur Olympics" from a refugee camp on the barren Sudan-Chad
border, aiming to shame China into using its influence with Khartoum
to end the Darfur conflict.
(AP, 8/8/08)(AP, 8/7/08)(Econ, 8/2/08,
p.28)(Econ, 8/2/08, p.85)
2008 Aug 8, In the Czech
Republic an international express train crashed into a collapsed
bridge, killing at least six people and injuring dozens.
(Reuters, 8/8/08)
2008 Aug 8, The EU tightened
trade sanctions against Iran to punish Tehran for not committing to
a long-standing demand of the international community that it freeze
its nuclear enrichment program.
(AP, 8/8/08)
2008 Aug 8, Georgian troops
launched a major military offensive to regain control of South
Ossetia, prompting a furious response from Russia, which sent tanks
into the region. The convoy was expected to reach the provincial
capital by evening. Georgia said it shot down two Russian combat
planes. Separatist officials in South Ossetia said 15 civilians had
been killed in fighting overnight. Georgia later acknowledged that
it used M85 cluster munition near the Roki tunnel that connects
South Ossetia with Russia, while Russia denied use of cluster bombs.
(AP, 8/8/08)(AP, 9/1/08)
2008 Aug 8, Guinea Bissau's
army announced it had arrested rear admiral Jose Americo Bubo Na
Tchute, the head of the navy, over an attempted coup.
(AFP, 8/9/08)
2008 Aug 8, Anti-US cleric
Muqtada al-Sadr ordered most of his followers to disarm but said he
will maintain an elite fighting unit to resist the Americans in
Iraq. Ashraf al-Yas (19) talked his way through a police checkpoint,
drove his vehicle into a crowded farmers market and detonated his
explosives. He killed 28 people and injured 72 in Tal Afar. A
roadside bombing in Baghdad killed an American soldier and wounded 2
others.
(AP, 8/8/08)(AP, 8/9/08)(SSFC, 8/10/08,
p.A19)(AP, 8/30/08)
2008 Aug 8, In Nigeria police
arrested the head of a federal agency charged with developing
Nigeria's impoverished southern oil region after allegations the man
spent millions of dollars on a witch doctor in hopes vanquishing a
rival.
(AP, 8/8/08)
2008 Aug 8, In Pakistan at
least seven Pakistani troops and 30 militants were reported killed
in two days of clashes at Loisam and its surrounding areas in the
Bajaur tribal district. Insurgents stormed a police post in Buner
and killed 8 police officers.
(AFP, 8/8/08)(SSFC, 8/10/08, p.A11)
2008 Aug 8, In Sri Lanka
artillery shells fired by the army hit a hospital overnight killing
an 18-month-old baby and wounding 16 people. Infantry clashes in the
north killed 31 rebels and four soldiers.
(AP, 8/8/08)(AP, 8/9/08)
2008 Aug 8, The Large Hadron
Collider (LHC) near Geneva, began initial tests.
(Econ, 8/2/08,
p.78)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Large_Hadron_Collider)
2008 Aug 8, In Turkey Mehmet
Dursun Uygurturkoglu (35) doused himself with gasoline and set
himself alight during a protest by ethnic Uighurs outside the
Chinese Embassy. Other demonstrators jumped on the man and quickly
extinguished the flames with a blanket.
(AP, 8/8/08)
2008 Aug 8, Researchers said at
least 38 Warao Indians have died in remote villages in Venezuela
since June 2007. Medical experts suspected an outbreak of rabies
spread by bites from vampire bats.
(AP, 8/8/08)
2008 Aug 9, In SF the 10th
annual Gumball 3000 Rally, an 8-day, 3,000 mile trip across the West
Coast, North Korea and China, began with a parade that included some
100 participants who had apparently paid the $120,000 entrance fee.
(SSFC, 8/10/08, p.B3)
2008 Aug 9, Bernie Mac (50),
the actor and comedian, died in Chicago. He had teamed up in the
casino heist caper "Ocean's Eleven" and gained a prestigious Peabody
Award for his sitcom "The Bernie Mac Show."
(AP, 8/9/08)
2008 Aug 9, Mahmoud Darwish
(67), a Palestinian poet, died, died in Houston, Texas. His poetry
eloquently told of his people's experiences of exile, occupation and
infighting. His 1973 work “Journal of an Ordinary Grief” was
translated to English in 2010.
(AP, 8/10/08)(Econ, 8/23/08, p.75)(Econ,
10/23/10, p.103)
2008 Aug 9, In Afghanistan
airstrikes and clashes north of Kabul killed 11 people, some of whom
were believed to be civilians.
(AP, 8/10/08)
2008 Aug 9, In Algeria a
suicide car bomb attack on security forces killed at least eight
people and injured 19 others in the coastal town of Zemmouri el
Bahri, east of Algiers, the second such blast this month.
(AFP, 8/10/08)
2008 Aug 9, AU spokesman
El-Ghassim Wane said the African Union has frozen Mauritania's
membership in the wake of a coup in the country.
(AP, 8/9/08)
2008 Aug 9, In northeast
England Xi Zhou and Zhen Xing Yang, both 25, were found murdered
with serious head injuries in Newcastle.
(AFP, 8/11/08)
2008 Aug 9, In Burkina Faso
heavy rains caused a mudslide at an illegal gold mine that killed at
least 31 people.
(SSFC, 8/10/08, p.A4)
2008 Aug 9, Tang Yongming (47),
a knife-wielding Chinese man, attacked two relatives of a coach for
the US Olympic men's volleyball team at a tourist site in Beijing,
killing Todd Bachman (62) and injuring his wife on the first day of
the Olympics. Yongming then committed suicide by throwing himself
from the second story of the site, the 13th century Drum Tower just
five miles from the main Olympics site.
(AP, 8/9/08)(SFC, 8/11/08, p.A12)
2008 Aug 9, Georgia, the third
largest contributor to the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq, said it's
pulling out its 2,000-strong contingent from Iraq to join the
fighting in the breakaway province of South Ossetia.
(AP, 8/9/08)
2008 Aug 9, Separatist forces
in Georgia's breakaway province of Abkhazia launched air and
artillery strikes to drive Georgian troops from their bridgehead in
the region. The Abkhazian move was prompted by Georgia's military
action to regain control over another breakaway province, South
Ossetia.
(AP, 8/9/08)
2008 Aug 9, In northeastern
Guatemala robbers armed with machetes hacked a US tourist to death
and seriously wounded his wife in an attack aboard the couple's
sailboat on Lake Izabal.
(AP, 8/10/08)
2008 Aug 9, In India an
official said monsoon rains had crumpled homes and triggered flash
floods in southern India, killing 18 people. Floods, mudslides,
house collapses and lightning strikes have killed at least 184
people across the country so far this year.
(AP, 8/9/08)
2008 Aug 9, In Iraq a bodyguard
who works for Youth and Sports minister Jassim Mohammed Ja'afar was
gunned down outside his home near the city of Kirkuk. Unidentified
gunmen shot dead a 50-year-old woman outside her home in the
al-Maamoun district in Mosul.
(AP, 8/9/08)
2008 Aug 9, Russia sent
hundreds of tanks and troops into the separatist province of South
Ossetia and bombed Georgian towns in a major escalation of the
conflict that has left scores of civilians dead and wounded. Russian
Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told reporters in Moscow that some
1,500 people have been killed, with the death toll rising. Russian
military aircraft bombed the Georgian town of Gori. Georgia's
President Mikhail Saakashvili proposed a cease-fire. As part of his
proposal, Georgian troops were pulled out of Tskhinvali and had been
ordered to stop responding to Russian shelling.
(AP, 8/9/08)
2008 Aug 9, In Sri Lanka air
force fighter jets pounded a Tamil Tiger supply base and an
intelligence operation center deep in rebel-held Mullaitivu
district. Separately, helicopter gunships overnight hit a radio
center operated by the Sea Tigers. Scattered battles in Vavuniya
killed 16 rebels and one soldier while three rebels died in
Mullaitivu. Separate clashes killed five insurgents in Welioya and
Jaffna.
(AP, 8/9/08)(AP, 8/10/08)
2008 Aug 9, Syria said it would
bar UN nuclear investigators from revisiting a site bombed by
Israeli jets on suspicion it was a secretly built atomic reactor.
(AP, 8/9/08)
2008 Aug 9, Disaster officials
said landslides and floods killed at least 101 people in northern
Vietnam, covering the homes of some victims as they slept in their
beds.
(AP, 8/10/08)(WSJ, 8/12/08, p.A8)
2008 Aug 10, Shelley Malil
(43), comic film and TV actor, stabbed his girlfriend more than 20
times in San Diego County. On Aug 13 he was charged with attempted
murder.
(AP, 8/13/08)
2008 Aug 10, Isaac Hayes
(b.1942), singer, died in Memphis. The baldheaded, baritone-voiced
soul crooner laid the groundwork for disco. His 1971 "Theme From
Shaft" won both Academy and Grammy awards.
(AP, 8/11/08)
2008 Aug 10, In Afghanistan
five civilians died when their vehicle struck a freshly planted mine
close to an Afghan military base in Zhari district in southern
Kandahar province. Australia's Defense Department said that its
troops had captured Mullah Bari Ghul, the Taliban's senior leader in
the central province of Uruzgan during a targeted operation last
week. 8 civilians held hostage by Taliban militants were killed in
an air strike by US-led troops during a battle that also left 25
rebel fighters dead in southern Uruzgan province.
(AP, 8/10/08)(AFP, 8/11/08)
2008 Aug 10, In southern
Australia some 5,000 people rallied to protest the dwindling water
levels of the Murray River, claiming the loss was causing an
environmental disaster.
(AFP, 8/10/08)
2008 Aug 10, Voters in Bolivia
vigorously endorsed President Evo Morales in a recall referendum he
devised to try to break a political stalemate and revive his leftist
crusade, partial unofficial results showed. More than 62 percent of
voters ratified the mandate.
(AP, 8/10/08)
2008 Aug 10, In Canada
explosions at a propane facility in Toronto forced thousands to
evacuate. One firefighter died at the scene. A riot broke out and an
officer was shot in the leg in a north Montreal neighborhood where a
Honduran teenager (18) was shot and killed by police a day earlier.
(SFC, 8/11/08, p.A3)(AP, 8/11/08)(SFC, 8/12/08,
p.A3)
2008 Aug 10, In northwest China
bombings and fierce clashes took place between police and attackers,
the second outbreak of deadly violence there in under a week. Two
women were among a squad of assailants accused of killing 12 people
when they hurled homemade bombs at government buildings and police.
(AFP, 8/10/08)(AP, 8/11/08)
2008 Aug 10, Welshwoman Nicole
Cooke handed Britain their first gold of the Beijing Olympic Games
when she won the women's cycling road race.
(AP, 8/10/08)
2008 Aug 10, Japan's Masato
Uchishiba has won his second straight Olympic gold medal, pinning
France's Benjamin Darbelet just seconds into their final match in
the men's 66-kilogram division and bringing Japan its first judo
gold of the Beijing Games.
(AP, 8/10/08)
2008 Aug 10, Georgian troops
retreated from the breakaway province of South Ossetia and their
government pressed for a truce, overwhelmed by Russian firepower as
the conflict threatened to set off a wider war. Georgia said it has
shot down 10 Russian planes, including four brought down Aug 9. It
also claimed to have captured two Russian pilots, who were shown on
Georgian television. Ukraine warned Russia it could bar Russian navy
ships from returning to their base in the Crimea because of their
deployment to Georgia's coast.
(AP, 8/10/08)
2008 Aug 10, In southern India
40 villagers riding on a truck were swept away by a flooded river
and feared dead. Monsoon rains have claimed at least 59 lives in the
past three days.
(AP, 8/10/08)
2008 Aug 10, Iraqi Foreign
Minister Hoshiyar Zebari said the US must provide a "very clear
timeline" to withdraw its troops from Iraq as part of an agreement
allowing them to stay beyond this year. A series of bombs struck
Iraqi security forces and commuters in the Baghdad area, killing at
least seven people and wounding 25 others. A female suicide bomber
killed a US soldier and at least four Iraqis in a complex attack in
Tarmiyah. An Iraqi police official said 17 Iraqis were killed in the
Tarmiyah attack, including 3 members of the Awakening Council.
(Reuters, 8/10/08)(AP, 8/10/08)(AP, 8/11/08)(SFC,
8/11/08, p.A5)
2008 Aug 10, Pakistani forces
bombed dozens of houses in Bajur, a tribal region near the Afghan
border, amid reports that days of clashes have killed at least 100
insurgents and nine paramilitary troops. Pakistani forces pulled out
of Bajur after 3 days of fighting. A Taliban spokesman said as many
as 100 Pakistani paramilitary troops were killed. Officials
acknowledged that 55 were missing.
(AP, 8/10/08)(SSFC, 8/11/08, p.A11)
2008 Aug 10, In the Philippines
nearly 3,000 troops and police launched an attack after guerrillas
defied an ultimatum to withdraw from five towns in North Cotabato
province.
(AP, 8/11/08)
2008 Aug 10, South African
President Thabo Mbeki spent more than eight hours in talks with
Zimbabwe's president and opposition leaders to try to resolve a
deadly political dispute.
(AP, 8/10/08)
2008 Aug 10, Sri Lankan
soldiers launched a pre-dawn attack on Tamil separatists in the
embattled north, killing 15 rebels, while other battles in the
region left 24 rebels and one soldier dead, said the military.
(AP, 8/10/08)
2008 Aug 11, President George
W. Bush said he used talks with China's leaders during the Beijing
Olympics to press them to use their influence with Sudan to help end
the humanitarian crisis in Darfur.
(Reuters, 8/11/08)
2008 Aug 11, California’s Gov.
Schwarzenegger sued state Controller John Chiang for refusing to
follow the governors order to slash pay for thousands of state
workers during the budget impasse.
(SFC, 8/12/08, p.B1)
2008 Aug 11, Federal
prosecutors in NYC charged Joseph Shereshevsky and Steven Byers,
partners in Chicago-based WexTrust Capital, with raising over $250
million through a Ponzi scheme, mainly from Orthodox Jews.
(WSJ, 8/15/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 11, Jurors in
Stockton, Ca., convicted William Choyce (54) for the murders of 3
prostitutes. He was serving time in state prison for rape when DNA
evidence linked him to the murders dating back to 1988.
(SFC, 8/13/08, p.B12)
2008 Aug 11, George Furth
(b.1932), writer and actor, died in Santa Monica. He wrote the book
for “Company,” a 1971 Broadway musical with music and lyrics by
Stephen Sondheim. As an actor he appeared in over 85 films and TV
show episodes.
(SFC, 8/12/08, p.B5)
2008 Aug 11, Don Helms (81),
steel guitarist, died in Nashville. Helms had played on over 100
Hank Williams songs.
(SSFC, 8/17/08, p.B4)
2008 Aug 11, An Afghan police
officer was killed and two others were injured in a roadside bomb
explosion on the southeastern outskirts of Kabul. 3 civilians were
killed and 15 people were wounded, including three NATO troops, when
a suicide car bomber rammed his vehicle into a NATO military convoy
in Kabul. In the northern province of Maimana meanwhile a Latvian
ISAF soldier was killed and three others wounded when their vehicle
hit a roadside bomb.
(AFP, 8/11/08)
2008 Aug 11, Fred Sinowatz (b.
1929) former Chancellor of Austria (1983 to 1986), died.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Sinowatz)
2008 Aug 11, In Belarus
Emmanuel Zeltser, an American lawyer, was sentenced to 3 years in
prison after being convicted at a closed trial for commercial
espionage and using false documents. He is an expert on organized
crime and money laundering. The US raised protests over his
detention and concerns about his health in custody. Zeltser (55) was
released on June 30, 2009, following a presidential pardon.
(AP, 8/12/08)(AP, 7/1/09)
2008 Aug 11, Brazil's
environment minister said he granted a license for the Santo Antonio
hydroelectric dam but attached stringent conditions to protect
Amazon Indian reservations and nature preserves. The dam is expected
to cost 9.5 billion reals (US$5.9 billion) and go online in 2012.
The dam is one of two planned for the Madeira river in the Amazon
state of Rondonia.
(AP, 8/11/08)
2008 Aug 11, In China the US
remained third in the medals table at the end of the third day of
Olympic competition with three gold medals behind hosts China with
nine after the completion of 34 events, and South Korea with four.
Abhinav Bindra became the first Indian to ever win a solo gold medal
at the Olympic Games after winning the men's 10m air rifle title.
(AP,
8/11/08)(www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2008/aug/14/olympicgames.shooting)
2008 Aug 11, Swarms of Russian
jets launched new raids on Georgian territory and Georgia faced the
threat of a second front of fighting as Russia demanded that Georgia
disarm troops near the breakaway province of Abkhazia.
(AP, 8/11/08)
2008 Aug 11, Indian troops shot
dead Sheikh Abdul Aziz (52), a prominent Kashmiri separatist leader,
and three other protesters. The shooting came as Indian security
forces tried to prevent about 100,000 Muslims from marching towards
the de facto border with Pakistan.
(AFP, 8/11/08)
2008 Aug 11, The Iraqi
government said it has halted military operations in Diyala province
for a week to give insurgents time to surrender. A female suicide
bomber (15) struck a market checkpoint in the provincial capital of
Baqouba, killing at least one policeman and wounding 14 other
people. Another bomb exploded in the Wijaihiyah area, about 12 miles
east of Baqouba, killing 5 Iraqi women. A bomb stuck under a car
exploded in eastern Baghdad, killing the driver and wounding two
other people.
(AP, 8/11/08)(SFC, 8/12/08, p.A7)
2008 Aug 11, Mauritania's
ousted PM Yahya Ould Ahmed Waqef defiantly refused to recognize the
African country's ruling military junta, after he was freed from
house arrest under international pressure.
(AP, 8/12/08)
2008 Aug 11, In Acapulco,
Mexico, gunmen traveling in a sport utility vehicle fired at a
hardware store killing a girl (14) and a man (35).
(AP,
8/12/08)(www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,402108,00.html)
2008 Aug 11, Pakistani forces
trained gunfire and dropped bombs on Islamic militants in and around
the main town of a tribal region next to the Afghan border, forcing
thousands of residents to flee. The bodies of two men beheaded by
militants were found about 12 miles north of Khar along with a note
accusing them of spying for US and Pakistani authorities. In
Peshawar an explosion killed one man and wounded another apparently
as they were planting a bomb near a private clinic.
(AP, 8/11/08)
2008 Aug 11, Philippine attack
aircraft and artillery bombed Muslim rebel positions for a second
day, raising fears of a humanitarian disaster in North Cotabato
province with nearly 130,000 refugees forced to flee. Members of the
Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) attacked a town on the island
of Basilan, around 200 km (125 miles) southwest of where the main
fighting was taking place, and disrupted voting in local elections
there.
(Reuters, 8/11/08)
2008 Aug 11, Thailand's Supreme
Court issued arrest warrants for ousted PM Thaksin Shinawatra and
his wife after they failed to appear at a hearing on corruption
charges and fled to London, saying they could not get justice in
their homeland.
(AP, 8/11/08)
2008 Aug 11, A roadside bomb
exploded in eastern Turkey, killing nine soldiers who were on their
way back from an operation against Kurdish rebels.
(AP, 8/11/08)
2008 Aug 11, Two Yemeni
security officers and five suspected al-Qaida militants died in a
gunbattle in Tarim, a southern Yemeni town.
(AP, 8/11/08)
2008 Aug 12, Two-thirds of US
corporations paid no federal income taxes between 1998 and 2005,
according to a new report by the Government Accountability Office.
(AP, 8/12/08)
2008 Aug 12, The US Navy agreed
to restrict loud sonar blasts from anti-submarine vessels in large
areas of the world’s oceans to protect whales and other vulnerable
creatures.
(SFC, 8/13/08, p.B4)
2008 Aug 12, In California
state and federal officials celebrated the official transfer of
3,300 acres from the US Army to the Fort Ord Reuse Authority, which
will oversee the redevelopment of the 28,000-acre base on Monterey
Bay.
(SFC, 8/13/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 12, Chicago’s
archdiocese agreed to pay over $12.6 million to settle suits by 16
people who accused priests of sex abuse. This brought the total thus
far $65 million for some 250 claims over the last 30 years.
(WSJ, 8/13/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 12, It was reported
that Akron inventor Charlie Grispin, chief technical officer of
PolyFlow Corp., had developed a new process to recycle plastic and
that a demonstration plant in Akron showed how the process broke all
manner of plastics into their base chemicals.
(http://tinyurl.com/6xfw5s)(www.polyflowcorp.com/)
2008 Aug 12, Michael Baxandall
(74), Wales-born renowned UC Berkeley art historian, died. His books
included “Painting and Experience in Fifteenth Century Italy”
(1972).
(SFC, 9/11/08,
p.B5)(www.longitudebooks.com/find/p/13716/mcms.html)
2008 Aug 12, Donald Erb
(b.1927), avant garde composer, died in Ohio. His work included
“Reconnaissance,” one of the first chamber works for live
synthesizer and acoustic instruments. It premiered in 1967 with
synthesizer pioneer Robert Moog on the synthesizer.
(SFC, 8/19/08, p.B5)
2008 Aug 12, Dorothy Wiltse
Collins (b.1923), star pitcher in women’s professional baseball in
the 1940s, died in Fort Wayne, Indiana from a stroke. Pitching for
six seasons in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League,
created in 1943 to provide home front entertainment while many major
leaguers were off to war, Collins dazzled opposing batters. The
All-American league went out of business after the 1954 season.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dottie_Wiltse_Collins)
2008 Aug 12, Tesco, the biggest
British retailer, announced plans to open wholesale grocery stores
in India that will supply goods to hypermarkets owned by Indian
conglomerate Tata Group.
(AFP, 8/12/08)
2008 Aug 12, Cambodia's
genocide tribunal formally indicted Kaing Guek Eav (aka Duch), a
former prison chief of the country's notorious Khmer Rouge, paving
the way for a historic trial.
(AP, 8/12/08)
2008 Aug 12, Knife-wielding
assailants attacked a road checkpoint in China's troubled far west,
killing three guards and raising the death toll to 31 from a surge
in violence coinciding with the Beijing Olympics. A bus accident in
western China killed 24 students and parents.
(AP, 8/12/08)(WSJ, 8/13/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 12, In the Dominican
Republic former Pan American Games wrestling medalist Wilson
Santiago Rojas (31) was shot to death when he tried to prevent his
cousin from being robbed inside a Santo Domingo electronics store.
(AP, 8/14/08)
2008 Aug 12, Security forces in
Gambia arrested Rear Adm. Bubo Na Tchuto, the suspected leader of an
alleged plot to topple the government in nearby Guinea-Bissau.
(AP, 8/12/08)
2008 Aug 12, Georgia's Pres.
Mikhail Saakashvili said his government will declare that its
breakaway regions are occupied territories and will designate
Russian peacekeepers as occupying forces. Russia ordered a halt to
military action in Georgia, after five days of air and land attacks
sent Georgia's army into headlong retreat and left towns and
military bases destroyed. More than 2,000 people were reported
killed. A Dutch television journalist was killed overnight when
Russian warplanes bombed the central Georgian city of Gori. Russia
later counted 133 civilian deaths in South Ossetia. Rights activists
later said fewer than 100 civilians were killed in South Ossetia.
(AP, 8/12/08)(Econ, 8/23/08, p.43)(WSJ, 9/12/08,
p.A1)
2008 Aug 12, Indian security
forces shot dead 15 Muslim demonstrators in Kashmir amid a wave of
anger against New Delhi's control over the disputed region.
(AP, 8/12/08)(Econ, 8/23/08, p.33)
2008 Aug 12, A male suicide
bomber, dressed as a woman, struck an Iraqi army convoy carrying
senior officials in Baqouba, killing at least two people. US
soldiers over the last 24 hours captured nine suspected militants
linked to what the military called an Iranian-backed group known as
the Hezbollah Brigades in northern Baghdad.
(AP, 8/12/08)(SFC, 8/13/08, p.A6)
2008 Aug 12, The Lebanese
parliament overwhelmingly approved the country's national unity
Cabinet after a five-day debate on a controversial policy that
upholds Hezbollah's right to keep its weapons.
(AP, 8/12/08)
2008 Aug 12, Nigerian militants
claimed they had destroyed a pipeline supplying gas to a key oil
refinery in southern Rivers state.
(AFP, 8/12/08)
2008 Aug 12, A roadside bomb
destroyed an air force truck on a bridge in Pakistan's volatile
northwest and killed up to 14 people. The Taliban claimed
responsibility for the attack, calling it "an open war" and
retaliation for recent military operations in the region. A
suspected American missile strike targeting an alleged militant
gathering point killed at least nine people, including foreigners
near Angore Adda in the South Waziristan. Two intelligence officials
said between 22 and 25 people died, including Arabs, Turkmen and
Pakistani militants.
(AP, 8/12/08)(AP, 8/13/08)(SFC, 8/14/08, p.A2)
2008 Aug 12, Muslim guerrillas
began withdrawing from several occupied southern Philippine villages
following fierce fighting with government troops that has displaced
nearly 160,000 civilians during harvest time.
(AP, 8/12/08)
2008 Aug 12, Somali pirates
hijacked the Thor Star, a Thai cargo ship with 28 crew members
onboard.
(AP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 12, South Korea
announced sweeping pardons for some of the country’s most powerful
businessmen, including Lee Myung-bak, the head of leading carmaker
Hyundai Motor, saying they were needed to help revive a troubled
economy. 341,863 others were also pardoned as South Korea celebrated
liberation from Japanese colonialism.
(Econ, 8/16/08,
p.46)(http://articles.latimes.com/2008/08/12/business/fi-skpardons12)
2008 Aug 12, Spanish officials
said local police acting on a tip-off from US authorities have
seized 1.4 tons of cocaine and arrested eight South American
suspects, 6 from Colombia and 2 from Venezuela.
(AP, 8/12/08)
2008 Aug 12, Sudan's army began
a massive operation to wipe out rebel bases in Darfur's far north.
The army attacked with more than 200 vehicles in Wadi Atron, near
the Sudanese-Libyan border and took control of areas which had for
years been under the control of rebels who want more autonomy for
the region. North Darfur is part of Sudan's oil Block 12A operated
by a consortium led by the Saudi Arabian company al-Qahtani. Chinese
companies dominate Sudan's budding oil sector which produces more
than 500,000 barrels per day of crude.
(Reuters, 8/13/08)
2008 Aug 12, Venezuela raised
the regulated prices of foods ranging from bread to beef by up to 50
percent and removed price controls from other goods in a bid to ease
sporadic shortages in supermarkets.
(AP, 8/12/08)
2008 Aug 13, In California
prison receiver Clark Kelso asked a federal judge to seize $8
billion from the state’s treasury over the next 5 years to build 7
medical facilities for inmates throughout the state.
(SFC, 8/14/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 13, In Little Rock,
Ark., Timothy Dale Johnson (50), described as a loner, drove more
than 30 miles to Arkansas' Democratic Party headquarters and fatally
shot its chairman, Bill Gwatney, hours after losing his job. Johnson
was later shot dead by officers.
(AP, 8/14/08)
2008 Aug 13, Michael Phelps
swam into history as the winningest Olympic athlete ever with his
10th and 11th career gold medals, and 5 world records in 5 events at
the Beijing Games.
(AP, 8/13/08)
2008 Aug 13, It was reported
that at least 150 fuel tanks, managed by the US Federal Emergency
management Agency (FEMA), needed inspection for leaks. It was
estimated that some 500,000 fuel storage tanks, both private and
publicly owned, were leaking.
(SFC, 8/13/08, p.A4)
2008 Aug 13, It was reported
that the red lionfish, a tropical native of the Indian and Pacific
oceans, was rapidly multiplying in the Caribbean. The maroon-striped
marauder with venomous spikes was swallowing native species,
stinging divers and generally wreaking havoc on the ecologically
delicate region.
(SFC, 8/14/08,
p.A6)(www.sanluisobispo.com/health/story/438289.html)
2008 Aug 13, Jack Weil (107),
patriarch of western clothing, died. He created the western style
shirt which sold after 1946 through his Denver-based company
Rockmount Ranch Wear.
(Econ, 8/30/08, p.82)
2008 Aug 13, Stuart Cary Welch
(b.1928), American teacher and collector of Indian and Islamic art,
died while traveling in Japan.
(Econ, 4/9/11,
p.94)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stuart_Cary_Welch)
2008 Aug 13, In Afghanistan
militants brandishing assault rifles ambushed a US relief
organization's vehicle, killing three aid workers and their Afghan
driver and leaving their white SUV riddled with hundreds of bullets.
The three women killed in Logar province worked for the New
York-based International Rescue Committee (IRC). In southern
Afghanistan militants began launching attacks on a coalition patrol.
Over 3 dozen militants were killed in the fighting.
(AP, 8/13/08)(SFC, 8/16/08, p.A6)
2008 Aug 13, Argentine senators
approved a bill declaring obesity and other eating disorders
diseases covered by the nation's public and private health care
programs.
(AP, 8/13/08)
2008 Aug 13, Bolivia and Libya
agreed to establish diplomatic relations and join efforts to develop
the nations' energy resources.
(AP, 8/13/08)
2008 Aug 13, Scientists from
Britain’s University of Reading unveiled Gordon, a neuron-powered
machine, whose grey matter was stitched together from cultured rat
neurons.
(AFP, 8/13/08)
2008 Aug 13, A Chinese team
beat the United States and clinched China's first women's team
Olympic gold in gymnastics, amid allegations that at least one
member, He Kexin, of the Chinese team was under age.
(AP, 8/14/08)
2008 Aug 13, Henri Cartan
(b.1904), French mathematician, died in Paris. In 1956 he and Samuel
Eilenberg wrote a fundamental textbook on homological algebra.
(SFC, 8/25/08, p.B3)
2008 Aug 13, Russian tanks
rolled into the crossroads city of Gori then thrust deep into
Georgian territory, violating the truce designed to end the six-day
war. Georgia said that 175 Georgians had died in five days of air
and ground attacks that left homes in smoldering ruins. EU foreign
ministers agreed in principle to send monitors to supervise a
French-brokered ceasefire between Russia and Georgia in the
breakaway Georgian region of South Ossetia. Finance Minister Alexei
Kudrin said Russia will spend at least $400 million in 2008 on
restoring South Ossetia's battered capital Tskhinvali.
(AP, 8/13/08)(Reuters, 8/13/08)
2008 Aug 13, The Indian army
said that it was investigating UN allegations its troops had engaged
in sexual abuse while on peacekeeping duties in the Democratic
Republic of Congo. A five-story building in a crowded residential
neighborhood of Mumbai, India's main financial city, collapsed after
monsoon rains, killing at least 20 people.
(AP, 8/13/08)
2008 Aug 13, In northwest Iran
three Kurdish separatists and one Iranian soldier were killed in a
shootout.
(AP, 8/14/08)
2008 Aug 13, A suicide truck
bomber targeted the mayor of a town near the oil-rich city of
Kirkuk, while another car bomb struck civilians elsewhere in
northern Iraq. A bomb in a parked car struck a local market in the
Qayara area south of the northern city of Mosul, killing at least
two people and wounding five.
(AP, 8/13/08)
2008 Aug 13, Riots erupted
across Indian-controlled Kashmir as Muslims mourned 15 people killed
in a day of bloody violence, as the protests spread to other parts
of India. Indian police say they have issued orders to shoot
protesters defying a curfew in the town of Kishtwar in
Indian-controlled Kashmir.
(AP, 8/13/08)
2008 Aug 13, In northern
Lebanese city a bomb ripped through a bus during morning rush hour
in Tripoli, killing 18 soldiers and civilians, raising fears that an
al-Qaida-inspired militant group is stepping up revenge attacks
against the military.
(AP, 8/13/08)
2008 Aug 13, In Mexico a
spokesman for the Attorney General's Office said 6 federal agents
have been arrested on suspicion of passing information to a group of
powerful drug lords.
(AP, 8/14/08)
2008 Aug 13, Nigerian officials
said flocks of quelea birds have invaded farmlands in northern Borno
state, destroying crops that were due for harvest in two months'
time.
(AFP, 8/13/08)
2008 Aug 13, In Lahore,
Pakistan, a bomber struck outside a mosque just before midnight as
Pakistanis poured into the streets to celebrate the nation's 61st
anniversary of its independence from Britain. 8 people were killed
and 18 wounded.
(AP, 8/14/08)
2008 Aug 13, An alleged assault
by Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal (b.1955) reportedly took place on
a young model (20) on a yacht on the Mediterranean island of Ibiza.
An investigating magistrate on the resort island closed the case in
2010 on grounds of insufficient evidence. In 2011 Spain reopened a
rape probe after tests done by a forensic lab found semen in the
woman and traces of a sedative called nordazepam.
(AP, 9/14/11)
2008 Aug 13, South African
President Thabo Mbeki left Zimbabwe after failing to secure a
power-sharing deal between its main rivals during marathon talks,
adding to doubts over chances of an agreement.
(Reuters, 8/13/08)
2008 Aug 13, In Sri Lanka a
wave of battles across the front lines in the 25-year-old civil war
killed 14 ethnic Tamil rebels and two government soldiers.
(AP, 8/14/08)
2008 Aug 14, The US and Poland
struck a deal to install a missile defense facility in the
ex-communist state.
(AP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 14, In the Virgin
Islands 2 former government officials faced prison after being found
guilty of running a million-dollar bribery and kickback scheme. Dean
Plaskett, former commissioner of the islands' planning and natural
resources department, was sentenced to nine years in prison. Marc
Biggs, former commissioner of the property and procurement office,
will serve seven years.
(AP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 14, The US Mint
planned to issue the Jackson dollar coin, the 7th of its
presidential dollar series.
(www.wsmv.com/money/17190311/detail.html?rss=nash&psp=news#-)
2008 Aug 14, American Airlines,
British Airways and Iberia of Spain said they had signed an
agreement to cooperate over flights between North America and Europe
to help them overcome soaring fuel costs.
(AP, 8/14/08)
2008 Aug 14, Scientists
reported that the number of oxygen-starved "dead zones" in coastal
waters around the world has roughly doubled every decade since the
1960s, killing fish, crabs and massive amounts of marine life at the
base of the food chain.
(SFC, 8/15/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 14, Afghan police
pulled back from posts in the Nad Ali district of Helmand province
after two weeks of clashes with militants. The Taliban claimed to
have taken over that district. An explosion targeting a foot patrol
in southern Afghanistan killed 3 members of the US-led coalition.
Afghan and foreign troops clashed with insurgents in the Shwak
district of eastern Paktika province.
(AP, 8/15/08)(SFC, 8/15/08, p.A11)(AP, 8/17/08)
2008 Aug 14, A colonel in the
Algerian army and another soldier were killed in a bomb attack in
the Jijel region.
(AFP, 8/16/08)
2008 Aug 14, Australian police
arrested a Catholic priest (65) and charged him with 30 counts of
sexual assault related to abuse allegations dating back three
decades.
(AP, 8/14/08)
2008 Aug 14, Chile’s central
bank said it is boosting its lending rate to 7.75%, warning that
additional adjustments will likely be necessary to ensure inflation
meets its 3 percent target in the next two years. Annual inflation
reached 9.5% in July, Chile's highest rate since 1994.
(AP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 14, A bomb exploded
during a crowded street fair in northwestern Colombia, killing seven
people and wounding 17.
(AP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 14, Georgian and
Russian troops faced off at a checkpoint outside the key city of
Gori, calling an already shaky cease-fire into question. An American
official said Russia appears to be sabotaging airfields and other
military infrastructure as its forces pull back. The Russian General
Prosecutor's office said it has formally opened a genocide probe
into Georgian treatment of South Ossetians. For its part, Georgia
this week filed a suit against Russia in the International Court of
Justice, alleging murder, rape and mass expulsions in both
provinces.
(AP, 8/14/08)
2008 Aug 14, India’s cabinet
approved a 21% average wage increase for federal-government
employees to be backdated to January 2006. In southern India at
least nine schoolchildren and two adults were killed after a
speeding school bus plunged into a river outside Mangalore.
(WSJ, 8/14/08, p.A8)(AP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 14, In Iraq 2 roadside
bombs went off in separate Baghdad locations, killing one policeman
and wounding 17 people, including 14 Shiite pilgrims headed on foot
to the holy city of Karbala for a major religious festival. Gunmen
shot dead an off-duty policeman and army soldier in separate
incidents in the northern city of Mosul. A female suicide bomber
blew herself up in Iskandariyah. The US military said 18 people were
killed in the attack, but Iraqi police in the area gave a higher
death toll of 26. An American Marine was killed during a small-arms
fire attack west of Baghdad.
(AP, 8/14/08)(AP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 14, A senior US
military intelligence officer said Iraqi Shiite assassination teams
are being trained in at least four locations in Iran by Tehran's
elite Quds force and Lebanese Hezbollah and are planning to return
to Iraq in the next few months to kill specific Iraqi officials as
well as US and Iraqi troops.
(AP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 14, Thousands of
Muslims poured into the streets of Kashmir, demanding independence
from India hours after archival Pakistan called on the United
Nations to stop what it characterized as gross human rights
violations in the divided Himalayan region. Police shot dead another
protester, bringing the death toll from days of rioting to 22 as
security was boosted on the eve of India's Independence Day
celebrations.
(AP, 8/14/08)(AFP, 8/14/08)
2008 Aug 14, Libya and the
United States settled all outstanding lawsuits by American victims
of terrorism, clearing the way for the full restoration of
diplomatic relations.
(AP, 8/14/08)
2008 Aug 14, Military leaders
in Mauritania named former EU ambassador Moulaye Ould Mohamed
Laghdaf as prime minister.
(WSJ, 8/15/08, p.A8)
2008 Aug 14, Nigeria
relinquished control of the oil-rich Bakassi peninsula to Cameroon
despite fears the handover will provoke attacks from local armed
groups who oppose it.
(Reuters, 8/14/08)
2008 Aug 14, Pakistan's PM
Yousuf Raza Gilani said in an Independence Day speech that the
country must defeat extremism to survive. Officials said some
135,000 residents have fled a Pakistani tribal area bordering
Afghanistan to escape clashes between troops and Taliban militants
that have left scores dead.
(AP, 8/14/08)(AFP, 8/14/08)
2008 Aug 14, In Sri Lanka
government jets hit a series of Tamil Tiger targets in the
Mullaittivu region in support of troops fighting on the ground.
Fighting between the two sides killed 27 rebels and two government
soldiers.
(AP, 8/14/08)(AP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 14, Syria agreed to a
longtime Lebanese demand to negotiate the demarcation of their
border a day after the countries said they would establish full
diplomatic relations for the first time.
(AP, 8/14/08)
2008 Aug 14, Taiwan's former
president Chen Shui-bian's admitted that he broke the law by not
truthfully declaring campaign donations he received, and said that
his wife sent an unspecified amount of money abroad.
(AP, 8/14/08)
2008 Aug 15, Cookie retailer
Mrs. Fields Famous Brands LLC said it plans to file for Chapter 11
bankruptcy protection to help restructure its business.
(Reuters, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 15, In Texas store
clerk Mindy Daffern (46) was abducted in the north Texas town of
Scotland. Wallace Bowman Jr. (30) was identified by a security
camera and led investigators to her body the next day.
(SFC, 8/18/08,
p.A3)(www.wafb.com/global/story.asp?s=8854535)
2008 Aug 15, Leroy Sievers
(b.1955), broadcast journalist, died of cancer. He was a former
executive producer of ABC’s “Nightline” and commented on his disease
on National Public Radio (NPR).
(SFC, 8/19/08, p.B5)
2008 Aug 15, Jerry Wexler
(b.1917), record producer, died. From 1953-1975 he worked for
NYC-based Atlantic Records and helped build the firm into a rhythm
and blues powerhouse. As a reported for Billboard magazine he coined
the term “rhythm and blues.”
(WSJ, 8/16/08, p.A7)
2008 Aug 15, Afghan security
forces withdrew from Nawa district in eastern Ghazni province after
days of fighting with Taliban, allowing the rebels to move in and
capture the area. In eastern Afghanistan a roadside bomb and small
arms fire killed 2 soldiers serving under the separate NATO-led
force. Taliban insurgents attacked police checkpoints in Nad Ali
district of southern Helmand province, sparking clashes that killed
23 militants.
(AFP, 8/15/08)(SFC, 8/16/08, p.A6)(AP, 8/17/08)
2008 Aug 15, In Canada
employees at a Wal-Mart Stores Inc. outlet won an arbitrator-imposed
contract, becoming the giant retailer's only location in North
America with a collective agreement in place.
(AP, 8/17/08)
2008 Aug 15, In Chad a court
sentenced former President Hissene Habre and 11 rebels to death.
Habre was awaiting trial in Senegal for torture and murder.
(SFC, 8/16/08, p.A5)
2008 Aug 15, In Beijing 2
positive dope tests by Asian athletes overshadowed Singapore's first
medal in 48 years and a podium for Malaysia with a North Korean
shooter and a Vietnamese gymnast exposed as cheats.
(AP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 15, Xinhua News said a
bus veered off the road and plunged into a ravine in central China,
killing 15 people.
(AP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 15, About 20 people,
including Italian tourists, were killed when two buses collided
head-on in the Dominican Republic.
(AP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 15, Iraqi security
forces began taking over checkpoints near the Iranian border
previously manned by Georgian troops before they redeployed home
following recent fighting with Russia. A roadside bomb struck a
minibus beginning the trip in eastern Baghdad morning, killing at
least one passenger and wounding 10 others. A passenger van packed
with explosives blew up at a bus station in Balad, north of Baghdad.
9 people were killed and 40 wounded.
(AP, 8/15/08)(AP, 8/16/08)
2008 Aug 15, Russian troops
allowed some humanitarian supplies into Georgia’s city of Gori but
kept up their blockade of the strategically located city, raising
doubts about Russia's intentions. Relief planes swooped into Tbilisi
with tons of supplies for the estimated 100,000 people uprooted by
the fighting. An international rights group said it has evidence
that Russian warplanes dropped cluster bombs in civilian areas in
Georgia.
(AP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 15, In India's part of
Kashmir tens of thousands of Muslims took to the streets again,
ignoring a plea by the country's prime minister for an end to weeks
of violence that has left 34 people dead.
(AP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 15, Officials said
Nepal's lawmakers have voted in Prachanda, the leader of the former
Maoist rebels, as the Himalayan country's new prime minister.
(AFP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 15, Twelve Nigerian
militants and a naval officer were killed in a gunbattle near a
Royal Dutch Shell natural gas plant in the oil-producing Niger
Delta.
(Reuters, 8/16/08)
2008 Aug 15, Coalition
government officials said Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf is
ready to resign rather than face impeachment, but is seeking
immunity from prosecution and agreement on a safe place to live.
President Pervez Musharraf's spokesman rejected reports that the
embattled Pakistani leader was set to resign. Pakistan's interior
ministry chief said that over 460 Islamic militants and 22 soldiers
have been killed in more than a week of fighting in a tribal area
bordering Afghanistan.
(Reuters, 8/15/08)(AFP, 8/15/08)(AP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 15, Leftist ex-bishop
Fernando Lugo was inaugurated as Paraguay's president, ending six
decades of one-party rule in a key step in the poor South American
nation's democratic transformation.
(AP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 15, Peruvians flooded
the streets to protest the slow pace of reconstruction a year after
a magnitude-8.0 earthquake left tens of thousands homeless.
(AP, 8/16/08)
2008 Aug 15, In the Philippines
at least 15 hitchhikers were killed and 14 others injured when the
truck they were riding in plunged into a ravine outside Monkayo
township in the southern gold mining area on Diwalawal mountain.
(AP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 15, South African
authorities closed camps that have housed thousands of foreigners
displaced by xenophobic violence, in a move that has drawn concern
they could face more attacks when they return home.
(AFP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 15, International aid
groups said tens of thousands of civilians have fled their homes in
northern Sri Lanka in recent weeks as the military ramped up its
offensive against the Tamil Tiger rebels' heartland.
(AP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 16, Afghan and foreign
troops clashed with militants in a mountainous area of Zabul
province, killing 7 militants. In Kandahar province a roadside blast
killed 10 police officers on patrol. In eastern Paktika province
police clashed with militants in the Shwak district, killing 4
insurgents. In Helmand province British troops accidentally killed 4
civilians during an operation against Taliban insurgents.
(AP, 8/17/08)(WSJ, 8/18/08, p.A9)(Reuters,
8/18/08)
2008 Aug 16, Jailed Belarusian
opposition leader Alexander Kozulin, considered in the West to be
the ex-Soviet state's most prominent political prisoner, was
released. Kozulin was one of two opposition candidates to run
against Lukashenko in a 2006 election and was jailed for 5 1/2 years
for helping stage mass protests against the official result
declaring the president the winner by a landslide.
(Reuters, 8/16/08)
2008 Aug 16, Dorival Caymmi
(b.1914), Brazilian composer, died. He had composed over 100 songs
and catapulted to fame when Carmen Miranda performed one of his
songs in 1938.
(AP, 8/17/08)
2008 Aug 16, A monthlong
standoff between Thailand and Cambodia appeared to be ending as both
sides pulled back their troops from disputed territory around a
temple near their shared border.
(AP, 8/16/08)
2008 Aug 16, Carol Huynh, whose
parents fled communist Vietnam in the 1970s, won Canada's first gold
of the Olympics in the women's 48 kg freestyle wrestling. Usain Bolt
of Jamaica was crowned the world's fastest man when he raced to
victory in the Olympic men's 100 meters final in a world record time
of 9.69 sec.
(AP, 8/16/08)(AFP, 8/16/08)
2008 Aug 16, Authorities in the
Central African Republic gave the green light for a leading rebel
group headed by a former defense minister to form a political party.
Both the rebel group and the new NAP party are headed by former
defense minister Jean-Jacques Demafouth, currently in exile in
France.
(AFP, 8/16/08)
2008 Aug 16, Dominican Republic
President Leonel Fernandez promised to boost agricultural production
and warned of dire economic times as he was sworn in for a third
term.
(AP, 8/16/08)
2008 Aug 16, Tropical Storm Fay
lashed Haiti and the Dominican Republic with torrential rains and
floods that killed at least 18 people including at least 14 people
in Haiti, feared to have died aboard a bus that tried to cross a
flooded river.
(AP, 8/17/08)(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 16, In India police
arrested the alleged leader of the July Ahmadabad bombings. Mufti
Abu Bashir was arrested in the northern Indian city of Lucknow.
(AP, 8/16/08)
2008 Aug 16, Tens of thousands
of Muslims marched in India's portion of Kashmir in honor of a
prominent separatist leader killed in a recent wave of violence that
has rocked the volatile Himalayan region.
(AP, 8/16/08)
2008 Aug 16, On Indonesia's
Sumatra island at least nine people have died and dozens were
injured when a slow-moving passenger train hit a parked freight
locomotive.
(AP, 8/16/08)
2008 Aug 16, Russian forces
pulled back from the center of a town not far from Georgia's capital
after Russia's president signed a cease-fire deal. Russia’s Foreign
Minister Sergey Lavrov later suggested there would be no immediate
broader withdrawal. Georgia's Foreign Ministry said Saturday that
Russian-backed separatists from the province of Abkhazia had taken
over 13 villages in Georgia and a power plant. Russian troops blew
up a key railroad bridge linking the Caucasus to the Black Sea
coast.
(AP, 8/16/08)(SSFC, 8/17/08, p.A4)
2008 Aug 16, In Iraq a car bomb
exploded as Shiite pilgrims were boarding minibuses in Baghdad,
killing at least 3 people, in a third straight day of attacks on
travelers heading to a religious ceremony in Karbala. Iraqi police
and hospital employees said six people were killed and 11 injured.
The US military put the toll at three dead and eight injured.
(AP, 8/16/08)
2008 Aug 16, In Mexico gunmen
killed 13 people at a family party in the border state of Chihuahua.
(AP, 8/17/08)
2008 Aug 16, A man used Semtex
in a rocket-propelled grenade attack against Northern Ireland police
officers, the first attack using the deadly explosive since
paramilitary groups agreed to hand in their weapons.
(AP, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 16, A top ruling party
official gave Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf a two-day
deadline to quit or face impeachment proceedings.
(AP, 8/16/08)
2008 Aug 16, In Rwanda Jozefina
Zaninka (75), a woman who lost nearly all her family in the 1994
genocide, was murdered, in the latest of several killings of
survivors of the slaughter. Some 167 survivors of the genocide have
been murdered between 1995 and mid-May 2008.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 16, In South Africa a
regional summit of southern African leaders opened with Zimbabwe's
crisis high on the agenda, and with the country's main political
rivals in attendance.
(AP, 8/16/08)
2008 Aug 16, In Sri Lanka a
series of raging battles across the northern war zone killed 27
Tamil Tiger fighters and seven government troops. Soldiers took
control of a rebel training base in Andankulam in the Welioya region
after Tamil Tiger fighters fled the area.
(AP, 8/17/08)
2008 Aug 17, In San Mateo, Ca.,
the final race was held at Bay Meadows after nearly 74 years of
horse racing.
(SFC, 8/18/08, p.B1)
2008 Aug 17, Dave Freeman (47),
co-author of "100 Things to Do Before You Die" (1999), a travel
guide and ode to odd adventures that inspired readers and imitators,
died after hitting his head in a fall at his home in Venice, Ca.
(AP, 8/26/08)
2008 Aug 17, In Afghanistan 32
Taliban fighters died during a four-hour battle in Zabul province. 9
private security guards also died in the attack on a NATO convoy.
About 7,000 police launched a massive security operation in Kabul as
the country prepared to celebrate independence day.
(AP, 8/17/08)
2008 Aug 17, In eastern Algeria
rebels linked to al Qaeda had killed eight policemen, three soldiers
and a civilian in successive ambushes. 4 Islamist militants were
killed in the attack.
(AFP, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 17, Two small planes
collided in midair and crashed near Coventry in central England,
killing five people.
(AP, 8/17/08)
2008 Aug 17, In Beijing Michael
Phelps won his 8th gold medal as team mate Jason Lezak brought it
home for a world record in the 400-meter medley relay.
(AP, 8/17/08)
2008 Aug 17, In Iraq Farooq
al-Obeidi, deputy head of a group of US-allied Sunni fighters, was
killed by a suicide bomber, dressed in a woman’s robe, along with at
least 9 other people in the Azamiyah neighborhood of northern
Baghdad.
(SFC, 8/18/08, p.A6)(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 17, Israel's Cabinet
approved the release of some 200 Palestinian prisoners as a goodwill
gesture to the government of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
(AP, 8/17/08)
2008 Aug 17, In the southern
Philippines Muslim guerrillas killed four soldiers and four
militiamen in an ambush of a military convoy.
(AP, 8/17/08)
2008 Aug 17, The Kremlin
promised to start withdrawing combat troops from Georgia on August
18, as Western pressure mounted on Russia to quit the ex-Soviet
republic.
(AFP, 8/17/08)
2008 Aug 17, Southern African
countries launched a regional trade zone at a Johannesburg summit
that aims to eliminate import tariffs, with plans for a common
currency by 2018. Eleven of the 14 countries that are part of the
Southern African Development Community (SADC) will participate in
the free trade area, including Zimbabwe. Angola, the Democratic
Republic of Congo and Malawi planned to join at a later date due to
weak economies.
(AFP, 8/17/08)
2008 Aug 17, A Sudanese court
sentenced to death a top Darfur rebel and seven others, bringing to
38 the number condemned to hang over an unprecedented attack on
Khartoum that killed more than 222 people.
(AP, 8/17/08)
2008 Aug 18, US and Liberian
officials said US Peace Corps volunteers will return to Liberia for
the first time since civil war broke out in this West African nation
nearly two decades ago.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, California’s
supreme court barred doctors from denying medical care to gays and
lesbians based on religious beliefs.
(WSJ, 8/19/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 18, In eastern
Afghanistan a suicide car bomb blew up outside Camp Salerno, a US
military base in Khost, killing 12 civilian laborers, as the country
marked Independence Day. A mine blew up a police vehicle in the
province of Nangarhar and killed two policemen. About 100 insurgents
ambushed a group of French paratroopers, killing 10 soldiers in an
area outside the capital known as a militant stronghold. An Afghan
official said insurgents kidnapped four of the soldiers and later
killed them. 13 militants were reported killed [see Oct 15, 2009].
(AFP, 8/18/08)(AP, 8/19/08)(Econ, 8/34/08, p.34)
2008 Aug 18, Argentina
announced its first nationwide gay-rights measure: granting same-sex
couples the right to claim their deceased partners' pensions.
(AP, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 18, In southeastern
Bangladesh chunks of earth loosened by heavy rains buried several
hillside thatched huts, killing five people and injuring seven.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, In Britain Philip
Thompson (27), a pedophile who acted as a "librarian" for a global
Internet child abuse ring, was jailed after one of the biggest
undercover police investigations into online abuse.
(Reuters, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, State media
reported that Chinese authorities have not approved any of the 77
applications they received from people who wanted to hold protests
during the Beijing Olympics.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, In northeast China
a gas explosion tore through a coal mine, leaving 24 workers
trapped.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, Equatorial
Guinea's exiled opposition leader Severo Moto was released from a
Spanish jail four months after he was detained for allegedly trying
to send weapons to the oil-rich African nation.
(AFP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, In southern Iraq
masked gunmen ambushed a bus carrying electoral officials south of
Basra, killing two and seriously wounding a third. A suicide bombing
killed 7 policemen in Ramadi.
(AP, 8/18/08)(WSJ, 8/19/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 18, Tens of thousands
of Muslims waving green and black protest flags gathered in Indian
Kashmir's main city for a march to UN offices demanding freedom from
India and intervention by the world body.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, The river Kosi, a
tributary to the Ganges, burst an embankment on the Nepali side of
the border with India and flowed into a channel it had abandoned a
century earlier. Water flooded into Bihar state and displaced over 3
million people.
(Econ, 9/6/08, p.51)
2008 Aug 18, Mexican soldiers
rescued 25 Central Americans kidnapped in the Gulf coast state of
Veracruz. One man was arrested in the raid in Tierra Blanca.
(AP, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 18, Mexico’s Cemex SAB
rejected Venezuela’s $500 bid for the companies assets in Venezuela.
At midnight oil workers and Venezuelan soldiers occupied Cemex
facilities around the country.
(WSJ, 8/19/08, p.A10)
2008 Aug 18, The leader of
Nepal's Maoists, Prachanda, was sworn in as prime minister,
finalizing his transformation from warlord to the country's most
powerful politician.
(AFP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, Niger's Tuareg
rebel leader Aghaly ag Alambo said his fighters would lay down their
guns and, together with neighboring Mali's Tuareg rebellion, submit
to mediation by Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.
(AP, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 18, Pakistani
President Pervez Musharraf announced that he will resign, just days
ahead of impeachment in parliament over attempts by the US-backed
leader to impose authoritarian rule on his turbulent nation.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, Peru's government
declared a state of emergency in remote jungle regions where Indian
groups are blocking highways and oil and gas installations to
protest a law that makes it easier to sell their lands.
(AP, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 18, In the southern
Philippines separatists of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF)
attacked several towns and villages on Mindanao and killed 38
people.
(SFC, 8/19/08, p.A9)(AP, 8/20/08)
2008 Aug 18, Heads of state and
other dignitaries from African countries and Turkey started an
economic cooperation summit in Istanbul.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, Russia said its
military began to withdraw from the conflict zone in Georgia, but
left unclear exactly where troops and tanks will operate under the
cease-fire that ended days of fighting in the former Soviet
republic.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 19, A US federal grand
jury handed down a new indictment against Puerto Rico Gov. Anibal
Acevedo Vila, charging him with four counts of wire fraud and one
count of conspiracy to commit money laundering in connection with
alleged campaign finance violations.
(AP, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 19, US scientists said
they have devised a way to grow large quantities of blood in the
laboratory using human embryonic stem cells.
(SFC, 8/20/08, p.A7)
2008 Aug 19, LeRoi Moore (46),
versatile saxophonist, died of complications from injuries he
suffered in an all-terrain vehicle accident. His signature staccato
fused jazz and funk overtones onto the eclectic sound of the Dave
Matthews Band.
(AP, 8/20/08)
2008 Aug 19, In Afghanistan a
team of suicide bombers tried unsuccessfully to storm a US base near
the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. NATO said 3 suicide bombers
detonated their vests and 3 more were shot dead and that 7 attackers
in total were killed.
(AP, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 19, A suicide car bomb
attack east of Algiers killed 43 people and wounded 45. The attack
targeted a paramilitary gendarmerie training school at Issers. Most
of the dead were young men aged between 18 and 20.
(Reuters, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 19, Aabid Khan (23), a
Briton who recruited Islamist extremists online to stage holy war
worldwide, including Britain's youngest terrorism convict, was
jailed for 12 years. Sultan Muhammad (23), one of his accomplices,
received a 10-year term.
(Reuters, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 19, In Bolivia leaders
in 5 opposition controlled states proclaimed a general strike. They
sought greater autonomy and a larger share of royalties from local
oil and gas.
(SFC, 8/20/08, p.A14)
2008 Aug 19, Iraqi troops
raided local government offices in the volatile Diyala province,
arresting two people, including a university president. They then
advanced to the provincial governor's office where exchanged fire
with the government forces, prompting a gunfight that killed the
governor's secretary, Abbas al-Tamimi, and injured four guards.
Iraqi troops detained the son of a prominent Sunni leader during a
raid in Baghdad.
(AP, 8/19/08)(AP, 8/20/08)
2008 Aug 19, The Dutch Navy and
a squad of US Coast Guard raiders seized 4.6 tons (4,200 kilograms)
of cocaine from a Panamanian-flagged freighter that had set sail
from Venezuela. The freighter was boarded on Aug 17 and it took 36
hours of searching to find the drugs.
(AP, 8/23/08)
2008 Aug 19, The 39th annual
Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) opened in Niue. Members at the 2-day
forum agreed to threaten Fiji with suspension unless elections are
held as scheduled by March 2009.
(Econ, 8/23/08,
p.34)(www.forumsec.org/event.cfm?cmd=list&sd=200808)
2008 Aug 19, Pakistan's ruling
coalition met to discuss a replacement for President Pervez
Musharraf. A suicide bomber killed 23 people at a hospital in a
northwestern town in the first attack since Musharraf stepped down.
5 soldiers and 13 Taliban militants died in clashes in a tribal area
bordering Afghanistan.
(AFP, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 19, A Palestinian
rocket attack on southern Israel violated a truce and led Israel to
close its cargo crossings with the Gaza Strip.
(AP, 8/20/08)
2008 Aug 19, Russian soldiers
took 20 Georgian troops prisoner at a key port in western Georgia
and commandeered American Humvees awaiting shipment back to the
United States after taking part in earlier US-Georgian military
exercises. Georgia and Russia exchanged prisoners captured during
their brief war.
(AP, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 19, Armed pirates
seized the MT Bunga Melati Dua, a Malaysian palm oil tanker with 39
crew, off the coast of Somalia, the fourth hijacking in a month.
(AP, 8/20/08)
2008 Aug 19, Turkey's President
Abdullah Gul urged Sudanese leader Omar al-Bashir, during talks at a
summit of African leaders, to act responsibly and to end the
suffering in the devastated Darfur region. A suicide bombing wounded
13 policemen outside the southern city of Mersin.
(AP, 8/19/08)(AP, 8/20/08)
2008 Aug 19, Vietnamese
authorities freed British glam rocker Paul Gadd, aka Gary Glitter,
after nearly three years in prison on child molestation charges,
then moved immediately to deport him.
(AP, 8/19/08)(Econ, 8/36/08, p.36)
2008 Aug 19, Zambia's President
Levy Mwanawasa (b.1948) died in France. He had been hospitalized at
a French military hospital since suffering a stroke in June.
(AP, 8/19/08)(SFC, 8/20/08, p.B4)
2008 Aug 20, Secretary of State
Condoleezza Rice and her Polish counterpart signed a deal to build a
US missile defense base in Poland, an agreement that prompted an
infuriated Russia to warn of a possible attack against the former
Soviet satellite. The deal included an American Patriot
anti-aircraft and anti-missile battery in Poland.
(AP, 8/20/08)(Econ, 8/23/08, p.44)
2008 Aug 20, In Alabama five
men were found killed, execution style in Shelby County. The
killings were soon identified as a retaliation hit over drug money
with ties to Mexico's notorious Gulf Cartel.
(AP, 4/19/09)
2008 Aug 20, Stephanie Tubbs
Jones (b.1949), Ohio’s first black congresswoman, died in Cleveland
following a brain hemorrhage. She was first elected in 1998.
(SFC, 8/21/08, p.A3)
2008 Aug 20, Gene Upshaw
(b.1945), former NFL Hall of Famer and union leader, died near lake
Tahoe.
(SFC, 8/22/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 20, In eastern
Afghanistan the US-led coalition killed more than 30 insurgents in a
battle whose fighters were said to be responsible for an attack that
killed 10 French troops earlier this week. 3 Polish soldiers were
killed when a roadside bomb exploded in the central province of
Ghazni. 3 Canadian soldiers were killed by a roadside bomb in
southern Afghanistan.
(AP, 8/21/08)(Reuters, 8/21/08)
2008 Aug 20, In eastern Algeria
2 car bomb attacks killed at least 11 people in Bouira with at least
31 people wounded. This followed a suicide bomber who killed 43
people a day earlier.
(AFP, 8/20/08)
2008 Aug 20, Bangladesh
prosecutors formally lodged new charges against ex-premier Sheikh
Hasina Wajed over her alleged role in a 130-million-dollar defense
deal with Russia.
(AP, 8/20/08)
2008 Aug 20, In Beijing
Rohullah Nikpai of Afghanistan won a bronze medal in taekwondo. This
was Afghanistan’s first Olympic medal ever.
(http://sports.espn.go.com/oly/summer08/news/story?id=3544339)
2008 Aug 20, Hua Guofeng
(b.1921), who succeeded Mao Zedong as chairman of China's ruling
Communist Party and briefly ruled the country (1976), died in
Beijing.
(AP, 8/20/08)
2008 Aug 20, The Red Cross
revised its emergency appeal for Ethiopia to five million euros (7.9
million dollars) as the situation in the drought-hit south of the
country got worse.
(AFP, 8/20/08)
2008 Aug 20, International and
domestic flights were disrupted across India as thousands of airport
employees went on strike to protest plans to privatize airports.
(AP, 8/20/08)
2008 Aug 20, Nigerian President
Umaru Musa Yar'Adua named new military chiefs dropping nearly all
appointees he inherited from his predecessor. MEND, the most
prominent armed group in Nigeria's volatile oil-rich Niger Delta,
accused the military of carrying out extra-judicial executions of 22
captured insurgents in the region. The insurgents had been captured
the previous day.
(AFP, 8/21/08)(AFP, 8/20/08)
2008 Aug 20, Pakistan’s
security officials said missiles fired from Afghanistan hit a
militant hideout in Pakistan's tribal belt, killing at least eight
people including some foreign extremists.
(AFP, 8/20/08)
2008 Aug 20, Panama’s President
Martin Torrijos signed an executive order creating a new
intelligence agency and a border police force to combat growing drug
crimes. This prompted concerns of a return to its militarized past.
(AP, 8/21/08)
2008 Aug 20, Abdurahman
Macapaar (aka Commander Bravo) of the Moro Islamic Liberation
Front (MILF), the Muslim rebel commander behind deadly raids in the
southern Philippines, declared an "all-out war" against the
government, saying his fighters were willing to die in battle.
(AFP, 8/20/08)
2008 Aug 20, Five people were
killed as Typhoon Nuri slammed into the northern Philippines,
triggering heavy rain and warnings of possible storm surges.
(AFP, 8/20/08)
2008 Aug 20, A top Russian
general said 64 of the country's soldiers were killed and 323
wounded in this month's fighting with Georgia. Russia informed
Norway that it plans to suspend all military ties with NATO, a day
after the military alliance urged Moscow to withdraw its forces from
Georgia. Georgia later reported that 170 of its soldiers were killed
in the war.
(AP, 8/20/08)(AP, 8/21/08)(SSFC, 8/24/08, p.A10)
2008 Aug 20, Serbian publisher
BeoBook said it has withdrawn a controversial book by American
writer Sherry Jones because of protests from the local Islamic
community. The book "Jewel of Medina" is about Aisha, one of the
Prophet Muhammad's wives.
(AP, 8/20/08)
2008 Aug 20, A Spanair MD-82
bound for the Canary Islands caught fire while trying to make an
emergency landing just after departing from Madrid airport leaving
153 people dead. This was the nation's worst air disaster in nearly
25 years. The toll rose to 154 on Aug 23 leaving 18 survivors. In
2010 authorities investigating the crash of Spanair flight 5022
discovered a central computer system used to monitor technical
problems in the aircraft was infected with malware.
(AP, 8/20/08)(AP, 8/21/08)(Reuters,
8/23/08)(http://tinyurl.com/2azr8zj)
2008 Aug 20, Swedish wireless
equipment maker LM Ericsson AB and Swiss chip-maker
STMicroelectronics NV unveiled plans to create a 50-50 joint venture
that will make a key component known as chipsets for mobile phones.
(AP, 8/20/08)
2008 Aug 20, In Turkey Sudan's
indicted president denied that his regime is orchestrating genocide
in the troubled western region of Darfur, and offered hope for an
end to the violence and the dawn of reconciliation by promising free
and fair elections next year.
(AP, 8/20/08)
2008 Aug 21, David Walker,
recently with the US Government Accountability Office (GAO), was the
subject of the film documentary I.O.U.S.A. The film focused on
America’s financial condition and that it is a lot worse than
advertised, as the US debt rose to $9.5 trillion. It was produced by
Sarah Gibson, Christine O'Malley; directed by Patrick Creadon;
written by Patrick Creadon, Christine O'Malley; music by Peter
Golub; distributed by Roadside Attractions.
(Econ, 8/16/08, p.68)(http://tinyurl.com/4t3r2g)
2008 Aug 21, The US government
said it will allow producers of fresh iceberg lettuce and spinach to
use irradiation to control food-borne pathogens and extend shelf
life.
(SFC, 8/22/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 21, Forbes magazine
reported that Thailand's King Bhumibol Adulyadej (80) is the world's
richest royal sovereign with a fortune estimated at 35 billion
dollars, and oil-rich Sheikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan (60) of Abu
Dhabi is far back at No. 2 with 23 billion.
(AFP, 8/21/08)
2008 Aug 21, Intel showed off a
wireless electric power system at the California firm's annual
developers forum in San Francisco. Analysts said it could
revolutionize modern life by freeing devices from transformers and
wall outlets.
(AFP, 8/22/08)
2008 Aug 21, In the US Virgin
Islands a judge imposed a life sentence on Daniel Castillo,
convicted of strangling Laquina Hennis, a 12-year-old girl, last
year.
(AP, 8/22/08)
2008 Aug 21, Tropical Storm Fay
forced the evacuation of more Florida residents as it made landfall
for a 3rd time this week.
(WSJ, 8/22/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 21, British PM Gordon
Brown visited Kabul after meeting with British troops in Helmand
province. Brown pledged more support for Afghanistan including 120
million dollars towards a development fund that would include paying
teachers' salaries and 17 million dollars for a radio station in
Helmand. 11 militants reportedly died in a clash in the south.
Afghan and international troops clashed with militants in Khas in
Uruzgan province, killing 11 militants.
(AP, 8/21/08)(AP, 8/22/08)
2008 Aug 21, Britain's
government confirmed that a contractor lost a memory device
containing information on every prison inmate in England and Wales.
(AP, 8/22/08)
2008 Aug 21, Greek police
announced the arrest of Vassilis Paleokostas, the country's most
wanted man, while tracking down the alleged kidnappers of
industrialist Giorgos Mylonas, who was freed in June after his
family paid a ransom.
(AP, 8/21/08)
2008 Aug 21, Monsoon rains
pummeled northern India, bringing dozens of buildings crashing down
and killing 74 people. The deaths were reported in Uttar Pradesh
state, bringing this monsoon season's death toll to more than 300
people across India.
(AP, 8/21/08)
2008 Aug 21, US Secretary of
State Condoleezza Rice and Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari
said they agree that timetables should be set for the withdrawal of
US troops. A key part of the US-Iraqi draft agreement envisions the
withdrawal of American forces from Iraq's cities by next June 30.
The US military released an Iraqi television cameraman for the
Reuters news agency and other news organizations without charges
after 26 days in detention.
(AP, 8/21/08)(AP, 8/22/08)
2008 Aug 21, Seif al-Islam
Gadhafi, the son of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi, said he will no
longer be involved in politics, defying in a surprise announcement
long-held expectations he was preparing to succeed his father.
(AP, 8/22/08)
2008 Aug 21, In Mexico Pres.
Calderon, congressional leaders, all state governors and a bevy of
others signed a “National Agreement for Security.”
(Econ, 9/6/08, p.44)
2008 Aug 21, A Montenegrin
court ordered three US citizens and seven other ethnic Albanians
back to prison after convicting them of plotting a rebellion to
establish an Albanian autonomous region within the Adriatic country.
(AP, 8/22/08)
2008 Aug 21, In Pakistan 2
suicide bombers blew themselves up outside the country’s main
defense industry complex in Wah, killing at least 67 people with 102
wounded.
(Reuters, 8/21/08)(AP, 8/22/08)
2008 Aug 21, Russian forces
blocked the only land entrance to Georgia's main port city, a day
before Russia promised to complete a troop pullout from its
ex-Soviet neighbor.
(AP, 8/21/08)
2008 Aug 21, Armed pirates
hijacked a Japanese chemical tanker with 19 crew, an Iranian bulk
carrier with 29 crew, and a German cargo ship with a crew of 9 off
Somalia's coast.
(AP, 8/21/08)(AP, 8/22/08)
2008 Aug 21, In Sri Lanka
helicopter gunships attacked a rebel fortification in the northern
district of Vavuniya. 21 rebels and two soldiers died in fighting.
(AP, 8/21/08)(AP, 8/22/08)
2008 Aug 22, The Outside Lands
rock festival opened in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park to a
capacity crowd of some 60,000. Altogether some 150,000 attended the
3-day event.
(SFC, 8/23/08, p.A1)(SFC, 8/25/08, p.E1)
2008 Aug 22, Florida state
officials said 7 people have been killed over the five days that
Tropical Storm Fay has been pounding the state with torrential rain
and powerful winds.
(AP, 8/23/08)
2008 Aug 22, In North Las
Vegas, Nevada, an experimental aircraft crashed into a house killing
the pilot of the Velocity 173 RG and 2 people in the home.
(SFC, 8/23/08, p.A4)
2008 Aug 22, US-led troops
attacked a compound where Taliban leaders were meeting in western
Afghanistan, and reportedly killed 30 militants. An Afghan human
rights group said that at least 78 people were killed, including
women and children, in the joint Afghan-US coalition military
operation in western Herat province. In eastern Afghanistan a
roadside bomb killed a US coalition service member. An investigation
later found that more than 90 civilians, mostly women and children,
were killed in the coalition air strikes in Herat. Officials later
said the US-led attack was based on misleading information by a
rival tribesman named Nader Tawakil. On Sep 2 the US-led coalition
said that its investigation into the controversial missile strike,
thought to have killed 90 civilians, had found that only seven
non-combatants died. After video images showing at least 10 dead
children and up to 40 other dead villagers surfaced, the US said it
would send a one-star general to investigate the strike.
(AP, 8/22/08)(AFP, 8/24/08)(WSJ, 8/29/08,
p.A1)(AFP, 9/2/08)(AP, 9/14/08)
2008 Aug 22, Brazil extradited
Colombian drug lord Juan Carlos Ramirez Abadia to the United States
to face racketeering charges.
(AP, 8/22/08)
2008 Aug 22, Aon Corp., the
world's biggest insurance broker, said it has agreed to buy
Britain's Benfield Group Ltd. for almost $1.6 billion in cash.
(AP, 8/22/08)
2008 Aug 22, Canadian health
officials said 3 people in Ontario have died in a food poisoning
outbreak that may be linked to listeria bacteria in sandwich meat
from one of the country's largest meat processors.
(Reuters, 8/22/08)
2008 Aug 22, Two Beijing
grandmothers remained defiant and in good spirits despite being
sentenced to one year of reeducation through labor for applying to
protest during the Olympics.
(AFP, 8/22/08)
2008 Aug 22, Hong Kong issued
its highest storm warning in five years as Typhoon Nuri brought
hurricane-force winds and heavy rain, halting trade on financial
markets and shutting down most of the city.
(AP, 8/22/08)
2008 Aug 22, Supporters of
Shiite leader Muqtada al-Sadr said Iraqi troops have raided an
al-Sadr stronghold, killing one of his guards and arresting another.
(AP, 8/22/08)
2008 Aug 22, Japanese
scientists said they had derived stem cells from wisdom teeth,
opening another way to study deadly diseases without the ethical
controversy of using embryos.
(AP, 8/22/08)
2008 Aug 22, In Indian Kashmir
hundreds of thousands of Muslims marched in Srinagar in the largest
protest against Indian rule in over a decade. Police estimated the
crowd at 275,000.
(AP, 8/22/08)(SFC, 8/23/08, p.A8)
2008 Aug 22, Mexican police
captured a man believed to be Ruben Rios Estrada, a key gunman for
the Arellano-Felix cocaine cartel, at the Caliente racetrack casino
in Tijuana after a chase through the city streets. Another suspected
gang member also was arrested. The bullet-riddled body of Jesus
Blanco Cano (40) was found at a ranch near Villa Ahumada in
Chihuahua state. He had just been on the job for one day as police
chief of Villa Ahumada.
(AP, 8/23/08)(SFC, 8/23/08, p.A3)
2008 Aug 22, Peru’s congress
voted to repeal two laws facilitating the sale of Indian lands that
had generated protests by dozens of tribes in the Amazon rain
forest. The laws had been passed by presidential decree in May to
promote private investment.
(SFC, 8/23/08, p.A3)(Econ, 8/30/08, p.37)
2008 Aug 22, A Russian armored
column moved away from a base in western Georgia and Russian forces
also were leaving the key central city of Gori, the day that
Russia's president had said a pullback would be complete.
(AP, 8/22/08)
2008 Aug 22, In Somalia
fighting between the Islamic militia and a clan militia killed 10
people in the southern port of Kismayo. Witnesses said a radical
Islamic militia controlled most of Somalia's third-largest city
after three days of fighting in which some 70 people died.
(AP, 8/22/08)(WSJ, 8/23/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 22, Sri Lankan troops
captured two strategic towns from Tamil Tigers as they closed in on
the rebels' political capital. With the fall of Thunukkai and
Uyilankulam, the military was just 12 kilometers (7.5 miles) south
of Kilinochchi.
(AFP, 8/22/08)
2008 Aug 23, Democrats
coalesced around Barack Obama's selection of Delaware Senator Joe
Biden (b.1942) as his running mate while Republicans quickly seized
on the Delaware senator's past criticism of the presidential
candidate's inexperience.
(AP, 8/23/08)
2008 Aug 23, In Utah a small
plane crashed and burned shortly after takeoff from Canyonlands
Field airport. All 10 aboard, including 9 employees of a Cedar City
dermatology company, who traveled to remote areas to provide medical
treatments.
(SSFC, 8/24/08, p.A2)
2008 Aug 23, Dr. Thomas Weller
(b.1915) co-winner of the 1954 Nobel Prize in Medicine, died in
Massachusetts. He shared the Nobel Prize with 2 co-workers for their
discovery of the ability of poliomyelitis viruses to grow in
cultures of various types of tissue.
(http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/1954/)(LSA,
Spring, 2009, p.56)
2008 Aug 23, Azizabad villagers
threw stones at Afghan soldiers who tried to give them food and
clothes. The soldiers fired into the crowd and wounded eight people,
including one child critically wounded. This was the village in
Herat province where the day before a US-Afghan operation took place
leaving many civilians dead.
(AP, 8/23/08)
2008 Aug 23, Public health
officials in Canada said they have linked a deadly bacterial
outbreak to recalled meat products from Maple Leaf Foods. At least
12 people died out of 26 confirmed cases of food poisoning.
(AP, 8/24/08)(Reuters, 8/25/08)
2008 Aug 23, In Beijing Angel
Matos, a Cuban taekwondo athlete, and his coach Leudis Gonzalez were
banned for life after Matos kicked the referee in the face following
his bronze-medal match disqualification.
(AP, 8/23/08)
2008 Aug 23, The US military
released Ahmed Nouri Raziak (38), a cameraman for Associated Press
Television News, without charges after detaining him for nearly
three months. Gunmen in Basra killed Haider al-Saymari (38), a
Shiite cleric and outspoken critic of sectarian militias, in an
ambush on a car that also carried his wife, mother and sister, who
were not harmed.
(AP, 8/23/08)(AP, 8/24/08)
2008 Aug 23, In Italy a gang of
men badly beat a Dutch couple and raped the woman while they camped
in an isolated field outside Rome during a cycling tour of Europe.
The attackers also stole some US$2,200. Two Romanian men were soon
arrested.
(AP, 8/23/08)(Reuters, 8/25/08)
2008 Aug 23, Environmental
experts said Nigeria and South Africa are the main emitters of
greenhouse gases in Africa, accounting for almost 90 percent of the
emissions in the continent.
(AFP, 8/23/08)
2008 Aug 23, Pakistani troops
pounded Islamic militants in the volatile northwest, killing 37 in
retaliation for suicide attacks that have put pressure on the new
government to counter a growing extremist threat. 2 soldiers were
killed. A civilian and her four children were killed when security
forces fired a mortar that accidentally hit a home in Khar, near the
Afghan border. A car packed with explosives rammed into a police
station in Swat, a former tourist destination, killing six officers
and injuring several others. A roadside bomb in the nearby village
of Bari Kot killed one civilian and injured four.
(AP, 8/23/08)
2008 Aug 23, Two boats carrying
dozens of international activists sailed into the Gaza Strip in
defiance of an Israeli blockade, receiving a jubilant welcome from
thousands of Palestinians. Israel said it would permit the boats to
dock in Gaza after determining the activists did not pose a security
threat. The group delivered a symbolic shipment of hearing aids and
balloons.
(AP, 8/23/08)
2008 Aug 23, The Philippine
government said at least 48 soldiers and civilians and scores of
Muslim rebels have been killed in the southern Philippines in a week
of fighting triggered by the collapse of a peace deal. Muslim rebels
urged the Philippine government to halt a military offensive they
say threatens a years-long peace process and escalates violence in
the archipelago's troubled south.
(Reuters, 8/23/08)(AP, 8/23/08)
2008 Aug 23, A top Russian
general said his country's forces will keep patrolling the key
Georgian Black Sea port of Poti even though it lies outside the
areas where Russia claims it has the right to station soldiers in
Georgia.
(AP, 8/23/08)
2008 Aug 23, Pirates fired on a
Japanese-operated cargo ship off Somalia and attempted to board the
vessel but failed to seize it.
(AP, 8/23/08)
2008 Aug 23, In Somalia 2
Western reporters were kidnapped near Mogadishu. The next day the
National Union of Somali Journalists (NUSOJ) named them as Amanda
Lindhout, a Canadian reporter based in Baghdad but freelancing for
French television and Canada's Global National News, and Nigel
Brennan, a freelance Australian photojournalist. Both were released
after 15 months and arrived in Kenya on Nov 25, 2009.
(Reuters, 8/24/08)(AP, 11/26/09)
2008 Aug 23, Sri Lanka staged
local elections under tight security as troops pushed deeper into
Tamil Tiger territory, closing in on the rebel capital in the
war-ravaged north. The defense ministry said a total of 28 rebels
and two soldiers were killed in clashes over the last 24 hours
across the island's north.
(AFP, 8/23/08)
2008 Aug 23, The Tibetan
spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, left Paris on a flight bound for
New Delhi after concluding a 12-day visit that fuelled tensions
between Paris and Beijing.
(AP, 8/23/08)
2008 Aug 23, A Tunisian court
convicted 13 Islamic militants on charges linked to plots to carry
out attacks in the north African country. 6 more were convicted on
Aug 26 for establishing a military camp in Tunisia's northeastern
Kef region designed to train fighters to be sent to Iraq.
(AP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 24, The US Democratic
national convention’s credentials committee ruled to give full
voting rights to delegates from Michigan and Florida, despite their
defying party rules and holding their primaries early.
(SFC, 8/25/08, p.A6)
2008 Aug 24, In New Mexico 8
inmates escaped from a county jail in Clovis. 3 were captured the
next day and 5 remained at large.
(AP, 8/26/08)
2008 Aug 24, Taliban militants
attacked a patrol of US-led coalition troops in northern
Afghanistan, while insurgents came under fire by NATO aircraft after
attacking an Afghan army outpost in the south. At least 10 militants
were killed in the fighting. In eastern Kunar province, a civilian
Mi-8 supply helicopter contracted by NATO-led troops crashed shortly
after takeoff, killing one person on board and wounding three
others.
(AP, 8/24/08)
2008 Aug 24, Algerian security
forces killed 10 Islamist rebels in a security operation southwest
of the capital.
(Reuters, 8/25/08)
2008 Aug 24, In Bolivia a truck
plunged off a cliff high in the Andes killing 21 people with 53 left
injured.
(AP, 8/26/08)
2008 Aug 24, In London some
40,000 people, including record-breaking swimmer Michael Phelps,
gathered to celebrate 2012 host London taking over from Beijing as
the Olympic city.
(AP, 8/24/08)
2008 Aug 24, The Beijing
Olympics, played out against a background of political intrigue and
featuring 16 days of compelling and controversial action, drew to a
spectacular close. China's haul of 51 gold medals was the largest
since the Soviet Union won 55 in Seoul in 1988. The US won 36 gold
medals and Russia came in 3rd with 23. Jamaica ended up with 11
medals including 6 gold. Cuba took home 24 medals, but only 2 gold.
(AP, 8/24/08)(Econ, 8/30/08, p.38)
2008 Aug 24, Kenya took home 14
medals from the Beijing Olympics, 5 of them gold.
(Econ, 9/6/08, p.55)
2008 Aug 24, A wall of snow in
the Mont Blanc range of the French Alps buried 3 Swiss and 5
Austrian climbers.
(AFP, 8/24/08)
2008 Aug 24, In Guatemala a
Cessna Caravan carrying humanitarian workers crashed about 60 miles
east of Guatemala City killing 10 people, including five Americans.
At least 2 people survived. The plane was headed to a village in the
area of El Estor to build homes for CHOICE Humanitarian, a group
based in West Jordan, Utah.
(AP, 8/25/08)
2008 Aug 24, The USS McFaul, a
US Navy warship carrying humanitarian aid, anchored at the Georgian
port of Batumi, sending a strong signal of support to an embattled
ally as Russian forces built up around two separatist regions. In
central Georgia, an oil train exploded and caught fire, sending
plumes of black smoke into the air. A Georgian official said the
train hit a land mine and blamed the explosion on departing Russian
forces.
(AP, 8/24/08)
2008 Aug 24, In India about
40,000 protesters surrounded the Tata Motors factory slated to
produce the Nano, the world's cheapest car, alleging land for the
site was forcibly taken from local farmers. A day earlier Ratan
Tata, whose Tata Motors is India's top vehicle-maker, warned he
would move the plant out of the state if the demonstrations kept up,
although his company has already invested 350 million dollars in the
project.
(AFP, 8/24/08)
2008 Aug 24, In India Swami
Laxmanananda Saraswati, a hard-line Hindu leader, was killed in the
eastern state of Orissa. His death triggered violence between Hindus
and Christians that left dozens dead. Right-wing Hindu groups blamed
Christians for killing, but a month later Maoist rebels say they had
murdered the Hindu leader.
(AP, 10/5/08)
2008 Aug 24, Iran's official
news agency said the country has begun designing its second
light-water nuclear power plant, a 360-megawatt facility in the
southwest.
(AP, 8/24/08)
2008 Aug 24, In Baghdad,
back-to-back roadside bombs targeting a police patrol killed three
Iraqi civilians and wounded 20, including six police officers. A
bomb in a pile of hay killed 3 farmers southeast of Baghdad. Three
separate attacks in Diyala province killed 9 people. A suicide
bomber struck west of Baghdad, killing at least 25 people. Raina, a
teenage Iraqi girl (b.1993) wearing a vest packed with explosives,
was captured on video as she turned herself in rather than go
through with a suicide bombing in Baquba. The US military announced
the arrest of Salim Abdallah Ashur Shujayri (aka Abu Uthman), a
Baghdad leader of al-Qaida in Iraq believed to have planned the 2006
abduction of US journalist Jill Carroll.
(AP, 8/24/08)(Reuters, 8/25/08)(SFC, 8/25/08,
p.A8)(SFC, 8/26/08, p.A3)
2008 Aug 24, In Kashmir
soldiers and police fired at Muslim protesters demanding an end to
Indian rule killing one person, as authorities arrested top
separatist leaders in a bid to quash unrest that has left at least
37 people dead since June.
(AP, 8/25/08)(SFC, 8/25/08, p.A3)
2008 Aug 24, In Kyrgyzstan a
Boeing 737 passenger jet carrying 90 people to Iran crashed near
Bishkek’s Manas Int’l. Airport. At least 65 people were killed.
(AP, 8/24/08)
2008 Aug 24, In Niger dozens of
land mines accidentally exploded during a ceremony in which a group
of former rebels were handing over arms, killing one person and
wounding about 40 including the regional governor.
(AP, 8/24/08)
2008 Aug 24, The "Benue", a
Nigerian ship with eight crew members, was hijacked. It was owned by
service and repair firm West African Offshore Ltd (WAO).
(AFP, 8/25/08)
2008 Aug 24, Pakistan rejected
a ceasefire offered by Taliban militants in the tribal belt near the
Afghan border as troops in the last 24 hours killed seven rebel
fighters. Officials said that Taliban militants in the area had slit
the throat of a 35-year-old man after accusing him of spying for US
troops across the border in Afghanistan.
(AFP, 8/24/08)
2008 Aug 24, In Somalia the
Shabab, the former military wing of the Islamic courts, and local
clan factions took control of the southern port of Kismayo. Muktar
Robow, a Shabab commander, wanted to merge with al-Qaeda.
(Econ, 9/6/08, p.56)
2008 Aug 24, In Sri Lanka
soldiers reportedly killed 12 Tamil separatists in fighting along
the front lines dividing government territory from the rebels de
facto state.
(AP, 8/25/08)
2008 Aug 25, The US Democratic
Convention opened in the Pepsi Center of Denver, Colorado, where
Sen. Edward Kennedy passed the party’s crown to Barack Obama.
(SFC, 8/26/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 25, US immigration
agents uncovered some 350 suspected undocumented workers in a raid
on the Howard Industries electrical equipment plant in Laurel,
Mississippi.
(SFC, 8/26/08, p.A4)
2008 Aug 25, The Afghan cabinet
demanded the renegotiation of agreements regulating the presence of
the international community in Afghanistan after more than 90
civilians were killed in US-led air strikes.
(AFP, 8/25/08)
2008 Aug 25, The Danish central
bank said it has taken over Roskilde Bank, the nation's 10th largest
bank. The 124-year-old institution had been struggling amid global
financial turmoil and mounting losses on mortgage loans as housing
prices fell in Denmark.
(AP, 8/25/08)
2008 Aug 25, Honduran Pres.
Manuel Zelaya signed adherence to the Bolivarian Alternative of the
Americas (ALBA), a trade alliance created in 2004 by Venezuela and
Cuba as a regional alternative to trade agreements with the US.
(WSJ, 8/27/08, p.A9)
2008 Aug 25, In India
authorities struggled to get aid to more than 1 million people
stranded by floods in northern Bihar state. A Bihar official
described the situation as a catastrophe. Bunty (whose real name was
Om Prakash), the notorious gang leader who terrorized New Delhi from
astride a motorcycle, died in a pre-dawn shootout with police. A
Roman Catholic nun was raped by a Hindu mob in Orissa state. On Oct
24 she said that she will not cooperate with local police, alleging
that they stood by idly during the attack. In Jan, 2009, police
charged 10 men with gang raping the Catholic nun.
(AP, 8/25/08)(AP, 8/26/08)(AP, 10/24/08)(AP,
1/29/09)
2008 Aug 25, Iranian state TV
said the country has launched production of a domestically built
submarine capable of firing missiles and torpedoes. Two other
submarines, which began production in 2005, have been delivered to
Iran's navy.
(AP, 8/25/08)
2008 Aug 25, Israel freed
nearly 200 jailed Palestinians, including a militant mastermind from
the 1970s, in a goodwill gesture just hours before US Secretary of
State Condoleezza Rice was to begin her latest peace mission to the
region.
(AP, 8/25/08)
2008 Aug 25, Former PM Nawaz
Sharif said he is withdrawing his party from Pakistan's ruling
coalition because it has failed to restore judges ousted by
ex-President Pervez Musharraf. Pakistan banned the Taliban,
toughening its stance after the Islamic militant group claimed
responsibility for deadly suicide bombings against one of its most
sensitive military installations. 8 people were killed in a pre-dawn
rocket-and-bomb strike on the home of provincial lawmaker Waqar
Ahmed Khan in Swat. A Geneva prosecutor dropped money laundering
charges against Asif Ali Zardari, head of the Pakistan People’s
Party.
(AP, 8/25/08)(SFC, 8/26/08, p.A15)
2008 Aug 25, A 41-year-old
Lockheed Martin C-130 military cargo plane crashed in the waters off
the southern Philippines. Two Philippine Air Force pilots and 7
crewmen were feared dead.
(AFP, 8/26/08)
2008 Aug 25, In Puerto Rico US
federal agents arrested 59 alleged members of a drug trafficking
ring in coordinated raids in a number of small towns, where some
housing projects were under siege by gangsters. Home to nearly 4
million people, Puerto Rico’s homicide rate was more than three
times the US national average. Authorities said drug trafficking was
behind the majority of the killings.
(AP, 8/25/08)
2008 Aug 25, Russia's
parliament voted unanimously to urge the president to recognize the
independence of Georgia's two breakaway regions, a move likely to
stoke further tensions between Moscow and the small Caucasus
nation's Western allies. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev warned
ex-Soviet Moldova against repeating Georgia's mistake of trying to
use force to seize back control of Transdniestria, a pro-Moscow
breakaway region.
(AP, 8/25/08)(Reuters, 8/25/08)
2008 Aug 25, In northern Sri
Lanka a series of gunbattles between government forces and the Tamil
Tigers killed 15 rebels and seven soldiers.
(AP, 8/26/08)
2008 Aug 25, Deadly clashes
broke out when Sudanese security forces thrust into Kalma, one of
the largest camps for displaced people in South Darfur, leaving at
least 33 and as many as 70 people dead.
(AFP, 8/25/08)(AP, 8/26/08)(SFC, 8/28/08, p.A9)
2008 Aug 25, Zimbabwe's
opposition won the vote for speaker of the first parliament since
disputed elections in March, claiming votes even from the ruling
party of autocratic President Robert Mugabe amid stalled talks over
sharing power.
(AP, 8/25/08)
2008 Aug 26, The Pentagon said
two men were cleared for release to Algeria from Guantanamo, Cuba,
where about 260 detainees remained.
(AP, 8/26/08)
2008 Aug 26, In the 2nd day of
the Democratic Convention in Denver Sen. Hillary Clinton endorsed
Sen. Barack Obama for the US presidential nomination.
(SFC, 8/27/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 26, California’s Gov.
Schwarzenegger signed a measure for a statewide bullet train system
to be placed on the November ballot.
(SFC, 8/27/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 26, California
Attorney General Jerry Brown said he expected raids on medical pot
clubs that sell for big profits in the Bay Area. He had recently
issued guidelines on sales of medical marijuana and state officials
over the weekend raided a club in Los Angeles County.
(SFC, 8/27/08, p.B1)
2008 Aug 26, An Ohio jury
convicted Andrew Siemaszko, a former nuclear plant engineer, of
hiding information in 2001 about reactor corrosion at the
Davis-Besse plant along Lake Erie. Siemaszko’s attorney’s said the
plant’s owner set him up as a scapegoat because he spoke out about
safety concerns.
(WSJ, 8/27/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 26, A UN team in
Herat, Afghanistan, said it found "convincing evidence" that 90
civilians, including 60 children, were killed in US-led air strikes
last week. Aerial bombardment was clearly evident with some 78
houses having been totally destroyed and serious damage to many
others. Kazuya Ito (31), a Japanese aid worker, was kidnapped at
gunpoint with his driver near Jalalabad. Ito was found killed the
next day. A group of Taliban fighters attacked a police checkpoint
in Nad Ali district of Helmand province, sparking a clash that
killed 18 militants. An air strike killed 30 Taliban in southeastern
Afghanistan close to the border with Pakistan.
(AP, 8/26/08)(AP, 8/27/08)(Reuters, 8/27/08)
2008 Aug 26, Brazil asked the
WTO for the right to impose $4 billion in annual sanctions against
US goods and services to penalize the US for handing out illegal
cotton subsidies.
(WSJ, 8/27/08, p.A9)
2008 Aug 26, In Brazil Olavo
Egydio Setubal (b.1923), industrialist and former mayor of Sao
Paulo, died. His industrial and financial empire, which grew up from
a metal shop, included Banco Itau Holding Financiera SA, Brazil’s
2nd largest bank.
(www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=29439734)(WSJ,
8/30/08, p.A5)
2008 Aug 26, In southwest China
explosions ripped through a chemical plant, killing at least 11
people, injuring dozens and forcing the evacuation of thousands of
nearby residents.
(AP, 8/26/08)
2008 Aug 26, In Dubai a
fire in a building packed with foreign laborers killed 11 people. 10
of the victims were Indian.
(AP, 8/27/08)
2008 Aug 26, Hurricane Gustav
hit Haiti and triggered flooding and landslides that killed 15
people before weakening to a tropical storm.
(AP, 8/27/08)(SFC, 8/28/08, p.A2)
2008 Aug 26, In India
Christians clashed with Hindu mobs who attacked churches, and eight
people died in the violence in Kandhamal district of Orissa state, a
region known for deadly religious fighting.
(AP, 8/27/08)
2008 Aug 26, Andhra Chiranjeevi
(53), Indian film star, launched his People’s Rule Party
(Prajarajyam) in southern Andhra Pradesh state.
(Econ, 3/14/09, p.43)
2008 Aug 26, In Iraq a suicide
bomber attacked police recruits in Jalula in Diyala province killing
28 people and wounding 25. A bomb planted in a parked car killed 5
people and wounded 8, including three policemen, in the city of
Tikrit.
(AP, 8/26/08)(SFC, 8/27/08, p.A7)
2008 Aug 26, Israel ordered the
Gaza Strip's border crossings closed after militants violated a
cease-fire by launching two rockets the previous evening, bringing
to 46 the number of rockets launched by militants since the truce
began.
(AP, 8/26/08)
2008 Aug 26, Malaysia's
opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim won a "landslide" victory in a
by-election to return him to parliament, and said he was on track to
oust a weakened government. The Malays National Organization (UMNO)
and its allies had ruled since independence in 1957.
(AFP, 8/26/08)(Econ, 8/30/08, p.39)
2008 Aug 26, A Maltese fishing
trawler rescued the migrants. Authorities said the survivors first
told the fishermen that 10 people were missing, but later said as
many as 70 people from Somalia, Eritrea and Sudan made the sea
voyage with them.
(AP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 26, In Mexico 3
decapitated bodies were found in an empty lot on the eastern
outskirts of Tijuana. The bodies had messages written on their backs
in permanent marker saying they worked for "the weakened
'engineer,'" a nickname for Francisco Sanchez Arellano, a top
lieutenant in Tijuana's powerful Arellano Felix drug cartel. A day
earlier 2 bodies were found in Tijuana, one with the head placed on
the upper back.
(AP, 8/27/08)(SFC, 8/27/08, p.A11)
2008 Aug 26, North Korea said
it has suspended work on disabling its nuclear facilities as of
August 14 and is considering restoration of the Yongbyon reactor
that can make material for atomic bombs, accusing the US of
violating a disarmament deal by failing to delist North Korea as a
state sponsor of terrorism.
(AP, 8/26/08)
2008 Aug 26, In Pakistan an
explosion on the outskirts of Islamabad killed at least seven people
and wounded 20. Around midnight 75-100 militants attacked the Tiarza
Fort in South Waziristan. The attack was repulsed with 11 militants
killed.
(AP, 8/27/08)(SFC, 8/28/08, p.A5)
2008 Aug 26, Russia formally
recognized Abkhazia and South Ossetia, the breakaway Georgian
territories at the heart of its war with Georgia, heightening
tensions with the West as the US dispatched a military ship bearing
aid to a port city still patrolled by Russian troops. In a direct
challenge to Russia, the US announced it intends to deliver
humanitarian aid to the beleaguered Georgian port city of Poti,
which Russian troops still control through checkpoints on the city's
outskirts.
(AP, 8/26/08)
2008 Aug 26, In Sri Lanka
ground battles in the northern regions of Jaffna, Vavuniya,
Mullaitivu, Kilinochchi and Welioya killed 27 rebels and two
soldiers.
(AP, 8/27/08)
2008 Aug 26, Sudanese hijackers
commandeered the Boeing 737 jetliner, which was carrying 95
passengers and crew, soon after it took off from the southern Darfur
town of Nyala, not far from a refugee camp that the Sudanese
military attacked a day earlier.
(AP, 8/27/08)
2008 Aug 26, In Thailand
thousands of anti-government demonstrators pushed into the Thai
prime minister's office compound and rallied outside several
ministries. A violent masked mob from the same protest group forced
a state-run TV station off the air.
(AP, 8/26/08)
2008 Aug 26, Zimbabwe's
opposition heckled Robert Mugabe in an unprecedented show of
defiance when the president opened parliament with traditional pomp
and his familiar denunciations of the West.
(AP, 8/26/08)
2008 Aug 27, In Colorado
Democrats officially made Barack Obama their presidential nominee
and Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., their vice presidential nominee,
following speeches by former Pres. Bill Clinton and Sen John Kerry,
the Democrat’s 2004 presidential candidate. Obama made a surprise
late visit to the convention, following Biden’s acceptance speech,
to praise his wife, his former rival, and former President Bill
Clinton for going to bat for him.
(AP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 27, In Honolulu Marcus
Eriksen and fellow eco-mariner Joel Paschal celebrated the end of
their 2,600-mile voyage on what they call the JUNK raft. They had
spent three months crossing the Pacific on a raft made of plastic
bottles to raise awareness of ocean debris. Research suggested that
every square kilometer of the ocean has an average of 13,000 pieces
of plastic floating in it. The floating portion was thought to make
up only 15% of marine litter.
(AP, 8/28/08)(Econ, 2/28/09, SR p.9)
2008 Aug 27, US scientists said
they have transformed ordinary pancreas cells in living mice into a
rarer type of cell that churns out insulin opening possibilities for
future treatment of disease.
(WSJ, 8/28/08, p.D3)
2008 Aug 27, In Afghanistan a
German soldier was killed and another three injured in a roadside
bomb attack in Kunduz province. Germany counted some 3,300 soldiers
as part of the international force in Afghanistan. US-led coalition
troops clashed and called in airstrikes against militants in Kunduz
province, killing more than a dozen insurgents. In southern
Afghanistan a roadside bomb killed a US coalition soldier on a
patrol. In the Nad Ali area of Helmand province, a fight between
police and militants killed 14 insurgents. More than a dozen
militants were killed after they attacked a coalition base in
Shaheed Hasas district of the southern Uruzgan province. Two Afghan
guards also died during the attack. About a dozen militants were
killed during a raid by coalition troops in eastern Paktika
province.
(AP, 8/27/08)(AP, 8/28/08)(AP, 8/30/08)
2008 Aug 27, The first outbreak
of violence in China's western region of Xinjiang since a pair of
high-profile attacks during the Olympics left 2 Chinese policemen
dead and 7 more wounded. In north China 9 miners in Hebei province
became trapped underground after the illegal mine they worked in
collapsed. Police were only informed 2 days later. All 9 were feared
dead.
(AP, 8/28/08)(AFP, 8/29/08)
2008 Aug 27, China and Iraq
signed a $3 billion deal revising a prewar agreement for China's
biggest oil company to help develop the Ahdab oil field. On Sep 2
Iraq’s Cabinet approved the deal with China National Petroleum Corp.
(AP, 8/28/08)(AP, 9/2/08)
2008 Aug 27, The Group of Seven
(G7) industrialized democracies condemned Russia for its actions in
Georgia, underlining the country's growing estrangement from the
West.
(AP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 27, A US military ship
docked at the southern Georgian port of Batumi. Meanwhile, Russia's
missile cruiser, the Aurora, and two missile boats, anchored at the
port of Sukhumi, the capital of Abkhazia. The moves by both sides
underscored an escalating standoff between Moscow and the West over
this small Caucasus nation devastated by war with Russia.
(AP, 8/27/08)
2008 Aug 27, Indian police were
ordered to shoot on sight to end Hindu-Christian clashes. Parts of
eastern Orissa state have been rocked by Hindu-Christian clashes
since Aug 23, when a hardline Hindu holy leader and four other
people were shot dead by unknown assailants.
(AFP, 8/27/08)
2008 Aug 27, American forces
arrested Ali al-Lami, a top Iraqi Shiite government official, as he
stepped off a plane at Baghdad's airport. The US said the man
arrested was a leader of Iranian-backed militias and was behind a
bombing that killed 10 people on June 24, including four Americans.
An American soldier died of wounds suffered in a roadside bombing a
day earlier in northeast Baghdad.
(AP, 8/27/08)(AP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 27, In
Indian-administered Kashmir police traded fire with militants
allegedly holding 8 people hostage, including 6 children, in a
building in Jammu. 3 soldiers and 3 civilians died in the violence.
The militants had illegally crossed into Indian Kashmir from
Pakistan a day earlier.
(AP, 8/27/08)(AP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 27, Abie Nathan (81),
the peace activist who made a dramatic solo flight to Egypt in a
rattletrap single-engine plane (1966) and later founded the
groundbreaking "Voice of Peace" radio station, died in Tel Aviv.
(AP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 27, The UN Security
Council voted unanimously to keep a peacekeeping force in Lebanon
for another year, calling for stepped-up efforts to achieve a
permanent cease-fire and long-term resolution of the 2006
Israel-Hezbollah war.
(AP, 8/27/08)
2008 Aug 27, In Mexico a
38-year-old man from Oregon was arrested in San Jose del Cabo
following a fight at an apartment complex. He died in jail hours
later. On Aug 31 six Mexican officers placed under house
arrest on suspicion of homicide.
(AP, 9/2/08)
2008 Aug 27, In Pakistan
security forces clashed with militants across the wild tribal belt,
trading fire with insurgents in a health center and repelling a
major assault on an outpost in a region known as an al-Qaida safe
haven. Officials claimed as many as 49 insurgents died as the
fighting spread to South Waziristan.
(AP, 8/27/08)(SFC, 8/28/08, p.A5)
2008 Aug 27, In Spain tens of
thousands of people from around the world hurled tons of ripe
tomatoes at each other in the annual food fight in the eastern
Spanish town of Bunol.
(AP, 8/27/08)
2008 Aug 27, Two hijackers, who
commandeered a jetliner from Sudan's Darfur region and diverted it
to a remote desert airstrip in southern Libya, surrendered after a
22-hour standoff.
(AP, 8/27/08)
2008 Aug 27, Thailand issued
arrest warrants for protest leaders besieging the main government
complex, as authorities scrambled to find a peaceful end to the
administration's most serious challenge yet.
(AP, 8/27/08)
2008 Aug 27, Zimbabwe's
opposition said it will not join any new government with President
Robert Mugabe until power-sharing talks are concluded, after the
84-year-old declared he would name his own cabinet.
(AFP, 8/27/08)
2008 Aug 28, In Denver Sen.
Barack Obama addressed the Democratic National Convention and
accepted the nomination for president of the US.
(AP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 28, The US-backed
coalition said a four-day battle that began with an ambush on a
joint US-Afghan patrol in southern Afghanistan has killed more than
100 militants. A dozen militants were killed in a gunbattle with
coalition forces in Paktika province.
(AP, 8/28/08)(AP, 8/29/08)
2008 Aug 28, An Argentine court
convicted two former generals for the murder of a senator during the
country's seven-year military dictatorship and sentenced them to
life in prison. Retired Gens. Antonio Bussi and Luciano Menendez
were found guilty of kidnapping, torturing and murdering Sen.
Guillermo Vargas Aignasse, who disappeared March 24, 1976, the day
of a military coup.
(AP, 8/29/08)
2008 Aug 28, Brazilian
authorities said more than 200 oil-slicked penguins had washed up
dead over the last 4 days on the beaches of Florianopolis, a popular
Brazilian island resort, and that they are searching for a cause.
(AP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 28, Grant Wilkinson
(34) was jailed for life for running Britain’s biggest-ever gun
factory which converted dozens of replica submachine guns into
deadly weapons used in nine gangland murders. He legally bought 90
replica Mac-10s in 2004, saying they were for use on the set of the
James Bond film "Casino Royale" and paying 55,000 pounds in cash.
(AFP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 28, State media
reported that Chinese government auditors have uncovered the misuse
of millions of dollars in disaster assistance as part of an
embezzlement probe spanning 10 central government departments.
(AP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 28, Government forces
fought Tutsi rebels in the fiercest clashes for months in eastern
Congo, threatening a struggling peace process.
(Reuters, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 28, It was reported
that Cuba had notified at least 2 foreign governments that it could
not meet debt payments.
(WSJ, 8/28/08, p.A8)
2008 Aug 28, In Greenland local
police said dozens of massacred narwhals, an Arctic whale with a
single long tusk, have been discovered on the east coast in what
could be a case of poaching. A scientific expedition from New
Zealand discovered the carcasses as they sailed along the coastline
about two weeks ago.
(AFP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 28, In India Hindu
mobs ransacked a church and clashed with Christian villagers in
eastern Orissa state. Hindu mobs had already destroyed over a dozen
churches following the murder of a Hindu leader in Kahdhamal.
(WSJ, 8/29/08, p.A10)
2008 Aug 28, Shiite cleric
Muqtada al-Sadr released a statement saying his largely disbanded
Mahdi Army militia would extend its cease-fire "until further
notice." An American soldier died of wounds he received after coming
under fire while patrolling northern Baghdad a day earlier.
(AP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 28, In Indian Kashmir
Government forces ended a hostage crisis in the mainly Hindu city of
Jammu when they killed the last of three rebels believed to have
seized eight people. 2 hostages died in the gunbattle.
(AP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 28, Iran’s Junior
trade minister Mohammadali Zeyghami said Iran is ready to share its
nuclear technology with Nigeria to help the energy-starved west
African powerhouse boost electricity generation.
(AFP, 8/29/08)
2008 Aug 28, Tropical Storm
Gustav bore down on Jamaica after leaving 67 people dead on
Hispaniola, including 59 in Haiti and 8 in the Dominican Republic.
(SFC, 8/29/08, p.A2)
2008 Aug 28, In Lebanon
attackers opened fire on a military helicopter, killing a Lebanese
army officer and forcing the craft to make an emergency landing. The
next day Hezbollah handed over a man suspected of firing on the
helicopter.
(AP, 8/28/08)(AP, 8/29/08)
2008 Aug 28, Libya announced an
amnesty for more than 3,000 prisoners, including Europeans and
Africans, to mark the 39th anniversary of Moamer Kadhafi's rule.
(AFP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 28, Mexico's Supreme
Court upheld the capital's abortion law, setting a precedent for the
rest of the country that could inspire other Latin American cities.
Twelve decapitated bodies bearing signs of torture were found in
eastern Mexico and authorities were still looking for the heads. 11
of the bodies were found in a suburb of Merida, a 12th in Buctzotz,
70 km to the northeast.
(AFP, 8/29/08)
2008 Aug 28, In Nigeria Rashid
Ladoja, ex-governor of Oyo state (2000-2007), was arrested for
embezzling some 16 million dollars (11 million euros).
(AFP, 8/29/08)
2008 Aug 28, A bomb near the
city of Bannu blew a bus carrying Pakistani police and government
workers off a high bridge, killing at least 11, as fighting between
security forces and extremists flared across the country's
northwest.
(AP, 8/28/08)(WSJ, 8/29/08, p.A10)
2008 Aug 28, A Russian military
spokesman said Russia successfully tested a long-range Topol
missile, designed to avoid detection by anti-missile defense
systems, from its Plesetsk launch site. The RS-12M Topol, called the
SS-25 Sickle by NATO, has a maximum range of 10,000 km (6,125 miles)
and can carry one 550-kiloton warhead.
(AP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 28, Russian forces
turned over 12 Georgian soldiers on the border of Abkhazia.
Georgia's foreign minister said ethnic Georgians were being cleared
from their homes in South Ossetia. A joint declaration from the
Shanghai Cooperation Organization denounced the use of force and
called for respect for every country's territorial integrity.
Mikhail Mindzayev, the interior minister of South Ossetia, said an
unmanned Georgian spy plane was shot down over South Ossetia by
local forces.
(AP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 28, Russia’s PM
Vladimir Putin said 19 US poultry producers will be barred from
exporting their products to Russia. He said the unnamed American
producers had ignored warnings from Russian inspectors who examined
poultry companies last year and that another 29 producers would
receive warnings.
(AP, 8/29/08)
2008 Aug 29, John McCain, on
his 72nd birthday, tapped little-known Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (44)
to be his vice presidential running mate.
(AP, 8/29/08)(SFC, 8/30/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 29, US banking
regulators shut down Integrity Bancshares Inc. of Alpharetta, Ga.,
and sold all deposits to Regions Financial Corp. of Birmingham, Ala.
This marked the 10th US bank to fail this year.
(WSJ, 8/30/08, p.B3)
2008 Aug 29, In SF the 4-day
Slow Food Nation opened at the Civic Center Plaza and continued at
Fort Mason, where tickets to the Taste Pavilion sold for $65. The
Slow Food movement had begun in Italy in 1986.
(SSFC, 8/31/08, p.A1)(Econ, 9/13/08, p.38)
2008 Aug 29, In Oklahoma a
train slammed into a propane tanker truck triggering an explosion
that killed 2 people.
(WSJ, 8/30/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 29, Tropical Storm
Gustav drenched Jamaica, killing at least 4 people, and rolled over
the Cayman Islands with fierce winds that tore down trees and power
lines, setting off alarm from Cuba to New Orleans, and at gas pumps
across the US.
(AP, 8/29/08)(AP, 8/30/08)(SFC, 8/30/08, p.A3)
2008 Aug 29, A Georgian Foreign
Ministry official says Georgia is to recall all diplomatic staff
from its embassy in Moscow because of the Russian military presence
in Georgia.
(AP, 8/29/08)
2008 Aug 29, Chinese police
investigating a spate of attacks this month in western Xinjiang
province shot dead six suspects and arrested three others near
Kashgar.
(AP, 8/30/08)
2008 Aug 29, French
neurosurgeons said they had successfully treated brain tumors
through ultra-keyhole surgery, using a tiny fiber-optic laser to
destroy cancerous cells.
(AFP, 8/29/08)
2008 Aug 29, In India Tata
Motors suspended work on its new plant in Mumbai, West Bengal, due
to ongoing demonstrations in support of local farmers who say they
were forced off their land to make way for the plant.
(WSJ, 8/30/08, p.A5)
2008 Aug 29, A gunmen killed a
member of a local US-allied Sunni group and his family in the
village of Withah, Diyala province. His father, mother and an infant
were also killed in the attack, which was in coordination with an
assault on a nearby Iraqi army checkpoint that wounded one Iraqi
soldier.
(AP, 8/30/08)
2008 Aug 29, Central Japan was
hit by heavy rains and flooding forcing the evacuation of over a
million people.
(WSJ, 8/30/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 29, Fighter jets
bombed Taliban hide-outs in Pakistan's Swat Valley while troops
pushed into militant territory on the ground, killing at least 40
insurgents in a 24-hour siege.
(AP, 8/30/08)
2008 Aug 29, The San Juan Star,
Puerto Rico's Pulitzer Prize-winning English-language newspaper,
closed. The owner blamed the union for not agreeing to benefit cuts
and layoffs to offset declining revenue.
(AP, 8/29/08)
2008 Aug 29, Pirates, believed
to be Somali, hijacked the Malaysian MT Bunga Melati 5 tanker and
its 41 crew members off Yemen's coast in the Gulf of Aden. It was
the second tanker owned by MISC Berhard to be hijacked in the gulf
in the last 10 days.
(AP, 8/30/08)
2008 Aug 29, In Sri Lanka
renewed fighting in the embattled north killed 18 rebels and 5
soldiers.
(AP, 8/30/08)
2008 Aug 29, In Zimbabwe
power-sharing talks over a unity government resumed as Mugabe's
government made good on a promise to allow aid agencies to resume
operations. Mugabe announced cash awards for Zimbabwe’s Olympic
winners. He called Kirsty Coventry, who won three silvers and a gold
at the Beijing games, Zimbabwe's "golden girl" and gave her
$100,000.
(AP, 8/29/08)(AP, 8/30/08)
2008 Aug 30, In Black Rock
City, Nevada, the 40-foot Burning Man was set aflame. This year’s
festival, themed the American Dream, was marked by a 10-story steel
frame tower built by union workers of recycled materials. The annual
guidebook reached 77 pages.
(SSFC, 8/31/08, p.B2)
2008 Aug 30, Raymond L. Danner,
American restaurateur, died at his home in Nashville, Tenn. In 1959
he had acquired his first Shoney’s franchise from founder Alex
Schoenbaum. By his retirement in 1987 he had built Shoney’s Inc.
into 1,600 restaurant outlet.
(WSJ, 9/13/08, p.A9)
2008 Aug 30, Brazilian
officials said Amazon deforestation jumped 69 percent in the past 12
months, the first such increase in three years, as rising demand for
soy and cattle pushes farmers and ranchers to raze trees.
(AP, 8/31/08)
2008 Aug 30, Gustav swelled to
a fearsome Category 3 hurricane with winds of 120 mph (195 kph) as
it shrieked toward the heartland of Cuba's cigar industry on a track
to hit the US Gulf Coast, three years after Hurricane Katrina. 78
people were already left dead in the Caribbean.
(AP, 8/30/08)
2008 Aug 30, China’s tallest
building, the 101-story, 1,614-foot Shanghai World Financial Center,
opened 14 years after Minoru Mori, its Japanese developer, began the
$1.13 billion project. The family owned Mori Building Co. owned 70%
of the project.
(SFC, 8/29/08, p.A1)(WSJ, 9/2/08, p.B2)
2008 Aug 30, A 6.1 earthquake
hit southwest China's Sichuan province, killing least 36 people and
turning tens of thousands of homes into rubble and cracked
reservoirs.
(Reuters, 8/30/08)(AP, 8/31/08)(AP, 9/1/08)
2008 Aug 30, Egypt opened its
Rafah border crossing with the Gaza Strip, allowing more than 2,500
people to leave the Hamas-controlled territory and about 1,000 to
enter in a goodwill gesture before the holy Muslim month of Ramadan
begins.
(AP, 8/30/08)(Reuters, 8/31/08)
2008 Aug 30, The UN says
Russian soldiers are telling thousands of refugees in Georgia who
want to return to their homes that their security can't be
guaranteed. All hoped to return to villages that are in the
"security zones" that Russia has claimed for itself. Russian PM
Vladimir Putin urged the EU to ignore calls to punish Moscow over
the Georgia conflict as Tbilisi appealed for targeted punishment of
the Russian leadership.
(AP, 8/30/08)(AFP, 8/30/08)
2008 Aug 30, In India,
officials said more than 300,000 people, trapped in India's worst
floods in 50 years, have been rescued but that nearly double that
number remained stranded without food or water. In eastern India 12
policemen were killed in a landmine blast triggered by suspected
Maoist rebels.
(AP, 8/30/08)(AFP, 8/30/08)
2008 Aug 30, The US military
said more than 11,000 Iraqis have been released from American
detention centers this year, leaving some 19,700 still in custody.
(AP, 8/30/08)
2008 Aug 30, Libyan leader
Muammar Gaddafi and Italian PM Silvio Berlusconi met in Libya to
sign a "friendship pact." Italy agreed to pay Libya US$5 billion as
compensation for its 30-year occupation of the country, which ended
in 1943. A provision stated that the parties commit themselves "not
to resort to threatening or using violence."
(Reuters, 8/30/08)(AP, 8/31/08)(AP, 2/27/11)
2008 Aug 30, Hundreds of
thousands of frustrated Mexicans, many carrying pictures of
kidnapped loved ones, marched across the country to demand
government action against a relentless tide of killings, abductions
and shootouts. Hours before the protests, the severed heads of two
women were found near the attorney general's offices in the city of
Durango.
(AP, 8/31/08)(AP, 9/1/08)
2008 Aug 30, Gilberto Rincon
Gallardo (69), a former socialist presidential candidate who gained
respect in Mexico for defending the rights of the disabled, gays and
other marginalized groups, died in Mexico City.
(AP, 8/31/08)
2008 Aug 30, Nigeria's main
militant group claimed that it killed at least 29 military personnel
in three separate attacks across the restive southern oil region.
The group reported that six of its own fighters were also killed in
the clashes.
(AP, 8/30/08)
2008 Aug 30, In Pakistan a
blast ripped through a home in Wana, a main town in the South
Waziristan tribal region, killing at least five militants.
(AP, 8/30/08)
2008 Aug 30, A bomb blast
blamed on separatist Tamil Tigers wounded 45 people in Colombo. A
clash killed three soldiers and a rebel in Anuradhapura district.
Rebels said that a shell fired by government forces hit a shelter
for civilians displaced by fighting in Kilinochchi, killing five
people and wounding three others.
(AP, 8/30/08)
2008 Aug 30, Thai PM Samak
Sundaravej vowed not to quit in the face of intensifying protests
aimed at toppling his seven-month-old government.
(Reuters, 8/30/08)
2008 Aug 31, John McCain, GOP
presidential nominee, directed party officials to drastically scale
back plans for their convention, set to begin Sep 1 in St. Paul,
Minn., and refocus efforts on helping potential victims of Hurricane
Gustav.
(SFC, 9/1/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 31, Estimates from
distributor Warner Brothers said "The Dark Knight" had become the
second movie in Hollywood history to top $500 million at the
domestic box office, raising its total to $502.4 million. "Titanic,"
the biggest modern blockbuster, remained No. 1 on the domestic
charts with $600.8 million.
(AP, 9/1/08)
2008 Aug 31, SF closed vehicle
traffic to 4.5 miles of its waterfront streets for the city’s first
Sunday Streets day encouraging thousands to come out for the 9 a.m.
to 1 p.m. event.
(SFC, 9/1/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 31, Cubans returned
from shelters to find flooded homes and washed-out roads, but no
deaths were reported after a monstrous Hurricane Gustav roared
across the island and into the oil-rich Gulf of Mexico.
(AP, 8/31/08)
2008 Aug 31, Allianz, a
Germany-based insurer, sold Dresdner, a German bank, to Commerzbank
for $14.2 billion.
(Econ, 9/6/08, p.88)
2008 Aug 31, Mexico’s President
Felipe Calderon promised to adopt several proposals from civic
groups who led more than 100,000 Mexicans in marches against daily
kidnappings and killings.
(AP, 9/1/08)
2008 Aug 31, Pakistan said it
will suspend its military operations against insurgents in a tribal
region along the Afghan border in honor of the Muslim holy month of
Ramadan. Pakistani Taliban said they will continue attacks during
Ramadan. A missile fired from an unmanned aircraft hit a house in
the North Waziristan tribal area, killing six people including a
woman and a young girl.
(AP, 8/31/08)(Reuters, 8/31/08)(AFP, 8/31/08)
2008 Aug 31, Palestinian
President Mahmoud Abbas rejected Israel's idea of an interim peace
agreement at a summit, insisting on an all-or-nothing approach that
virtually ruled out an accord by a January target date.
(AP, 8/31/08)
2008 Aug 31, Paraguay’s Pres.
Fernando Lugo said Paraguay will reverse its historic support for
Taiwan (since 1957) at the upcoming UN General Assembly, and also is
reconsidering its relations with communist regimes. In return for
Paraguay's 51 years of support, Taiwan has sent millions of dollars
to the impoverished country for low-income housing, agricultural
development and scholarships.
(AP, 9/1/08)
2008 Aug 31, President Dmitry
Medvedev says Russia will follow the recognition of Georgia's
breakaway provinces with agreements on economic and military aid.
(AP, 8/31/08)
2008 Aug 31, Police arrested
Magomed Yevloyev, the owner of the Ingushetiya.ru web site, taking
him off a plane that had just landed in Ingushetia province. Police
whisked Yevloyev away in a car and later dumped him on the road with
a gunshot wound in the head. Yevloyev died in a hospital shortly
afterward.
(AP, 8/31/08)
2008 Aug 31, In South Africa
strong winds fanned runaway fires across the country killing at
least 16 people, including two children.
(AFP, 9/1/08)
2008 Aug 31, Sri Lanka’s
defense ministry said troops killed 12 rebels in the north, while
three soldiers also died in combat.
(AP, 8/31/08)
2008 Aug 31, Thailand's
Parliament convened an emergency session at the request of the
country's prime minister, who acknowledged that his administration
cannot control spiraling anti-government protests.
(AP, 8/31/08)
2008 Aug 31, Venezuela rejected
US requests to resume cooperation in the war on drugs, saying it has
made progress despite an alleged fourfold-gain in the amount of
Colombian cocaine now passing through its territory.
(AP, 8/31/08)
2008 Aug 31, Zimbabwe's rival
parties returned home from talks in South Africa with no sign of a
power-sharing deal to resolve the country's bitter political crisis.
(AFP, 8/31/08)
2008 Aug, The population of
North Carolina stood at nearly 9 million people, up from 8 million
in 2000.
(Econ, 8/16/08, p.31)
2008 Aug, Utah began a trial
4-day work week for about 17,000 of the state's 24,000
executive-branch employees. Closing state offices on Fridays was
supposed to cut energy costs and reduce carbon emissions. The
program led to an increase in volunteer activities. In Sep, 2011,
the 4-day week program ended after less money was saved than hoped
and complaints from residents about not having access to services on
Fridays.
(AP, 7/11/09)(http://tinyurl.com/3ks2a9b)
2008 Aug, Samantha Orobator
(20), a British citizen, was arrested in Laos and charged with
trying to smuggle 1.5 pounds (680 grams) of heroin in her luggage.
In 2009 a government spokesman said she will not face the death
penalty because the law bans executing expectant convicts.
(AP, 5/5/09)
2008 Aug, Cambodia leased
agricultural land to Kuwaiti investors following mutual prime
ministerial visits.
(Econ, 5/23/09, p.62)
2008 Aug, Inflation in Latvia
stood at 17%.
(Econ, 8/16/08, p.53)
2008 Aug, Inflation in Pakistan
was running at an annual rate of 25%.
(Econ, 8/16/08, p.46)
2008 Aug, Puerto Rico passed an
animal protection law, nearly a year after authorities charged the
owner and two employees of a private animal control company with
taking away dozens of pet dogs and some cats from public housing
projects and throwing them off a bridge.
(AP, 9/16/10)
2008 Aug, In Puerto Rico FBI
agents and police officers launched the late-night raid in the city
of Carolina to free a Dominican man. Police say kidnappers were
holding him in the trunk of a car and demanding $650,000 in ransom.
A Puerto Rican policeman was killed by “friendly fire” during the
gunbattle with kidnappers. In 2009 authorities charged FBI agent
Jared Hewitt with negligent homicide for shooting 12-year police
veteran Orlando Gonzalez Ortiz.
(AP, 8/7/09)
2008 Aug, In South Africa
Sydney Maree (52), former US track star, was convicted and sentenced
earlier this month in Pretoria to 10 years, five of them suspended,
for stealing about 1 million rand from a government agency he headed
in 2003.
(AP, 8/30/08)
2008 Aug, Inflation in Sri
Lanka reached an annual rate close to 30%. The 25-year average
annual inflation rate was 12%.
(Econ, 8/16/08, p.44)
2008 Aug, St. Vincent and Iran
established ties after PM Gonsalves visited Iran for a summit of the
Nonaligned Movement, an organization of 120 developing nations. St.
Vincent later announced that it would receive US$7 million in aid
from Iran. A portion of that will go toward construction of a US$200
million international airport.
(AP, 9/16/08)
2008 Aug, The Baganda people of
Uganda numbered about 5 million of the country’s 31 million people.
(Econ, 7/26/08, p.57)
2008 Aug, In Vietnam several
people were arrested after they knocked down a section of the wall
surrounding a parcel of land once owned by Thai Ha Church and set up
an altar and a statue of the Virgin Mary. 7 of the defendants
received suspended sentences ranging from 12 to 15 months, and
another received a warning. They all got two years of probation.
(AP, 3/27/09)
2008 Sep 1, The GOP convention
opened at the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul, Minn., in an
abbreviated session due to Hurricane Gustav. Alaska’s Gov. Palin,
GOP candidate for the vice-presidency, disclosed that her daughter,
Bristol (17), is 5 months pregnant. Over 250 demonstrators were
arrested as splinter groups smashed department store and police car
windows. On March 11, 2009, Levi Johnson (19) announced he and
Bristol Palin had decided to end their relationship.
(SFC, 9/2/08, p.A1,5)(WSJ, 9/2/08, p.A4)(SFC,
3/12/09, p.A6)
2008 Sep 1, Hurricane Gustav
smashed into the Gulf coast as a Category 2 storm with 110-mph winds
just southwest of New Orleans, where levees held as waves splashed
over. Some 750,000 people were left without power in Louisiana. It
was later estimated that the storm caused at least $372 in damage to
crops.
(SFC, 9/2/08, p.A1)(Econ, 9/6/08, p.36)(Econ,
10/4/08, p.34)
2008 Sep 1, Roz Savage arrived
in Waikiki, Ha., after rowing 99 days from SF, Ca. The English-born
woman hoped to become the first woman to row alone across the
Pacific Ocean with the goal of raising awareness of the amount of
plastic pollution in the ocean.
(SFC, 9/2/08, p.B2)
2008 Sep 1, In Fairfield, Ca.,
councilman Matt Garcia (21) was critically wounded outside a
friend’s house. He was declared brain dead the next day. There were
no suspects and police had no idea why he was shot. Garcia was taken
off life support on Sep 5. On Sep 13 police announced the arrest of
2 suspects. On Sep 16 murder charges were filed against Henry Don
Williams (32), who remained at large. On Sep 18 murder charges were
filed against Gene Allen Combs (45). Police released Nicole Stewart
(33), who was pregnant by Williams and remained a witness. Garcia
appeared to be the innocent victim of an attempt to collect drug
debts. On May 28, 2010, Williams was convicted of first degree
murder. On Aug 30 Williams was sentenced to 50 years to life in
prison.
(SFC, 9/3/08, p.A1)(SFC, 9/6/08, p.B3)(SSFC,
9/14/08, p.B1)(SFC, 9/19/08, p.B6)(SFC, 5/29/10, p.C2)(SFC, 8/31/10,
p.C2)
2008 Sep 1, In Nevada an air
tanker being used to drop retardant on a wildfire in the Sierra
Nevada crashed after taking off for its last flight of the day,
killing all three crew members.
(AP, 9/2/08)
2008 Sep 1, Jerry Reed (71), US
singer and actor, died of complications from emphysema. He became a
good ol' boy actor in car chase movies like "Smokey and the Bandit."
(AP, 9/2/08)
2008 Sep 1, Foreign and Afghan
forces killed five children in two separate incidents, further
inflaming tensions over the killings of civilians by troops from the
US and other countries. The US military said US-led coalition and
Afghan troops killed more than 220 suspected Taliban militants in
strikes in southern Afghanistan last week.
(AP, 9/1/08)(Reuters, 9/1/08)
2008 Sep 1, Australian actor
Michael Pate (b.1920) died of respiratory failure. He had appeared
in more than 50 films and was a regular guest star on American TV
shows in the 1950s and 60s.
(AP, 9/1/08)
2008 Sep 1, Brazil's Pres. Lula
da Silva suspended the entire leadership of Abin, the nation’s
intelligence agency, after it was accused of tapping the phones of
the Supreme Court chief and members of Congress.
(AP, 9/2/08)(WSJ, 9/2/08, p.A14)(Econ, 9/6/08,
p.45)
2008 Sep 1, Thomas Bata (93),
the Czech-born industrialist who headed the global shoe empire
bearing his family's name from the 1940s to the 1980s, died in
Toronto. The company's headquarters were moved to Toronto under
Bata's leadership when the family's Czech factories were
nationalized by the communists. The company returned to the Czech
Republic in 1989 after the end of communist rule.
(Reuters, 9/2/08)
2008 Sep 1, In China a new tax
on gas guzzling cars took effect in an effort to reduce fuel
consumption and fight pollution. In June the tax on fuel was
increased by almost 20%.
(Econ, 8/23/08, p.54)
2008 Sep 1, In Colombia a car
bomb has exploded in front of the palace of justice in Cali, killing
at least four people and injuring 20 others.
(AP, 9/1/08)
2008 Sep 1, In east Democratic
Republic of Congo a humanitarian plane carrying 17 passengers and
crew crashed into a mountain with no sign of survivors.
(Reuters, 9/2/08)
2008 Sep 1, The top UN aid
official John Holmes called for greater international efforts to
help millions of Ethiopians suffering from a severe drought.
(AP, 9/1/08)
2008 Sep 1, Hundreds of
thousands of Georgians joined together in anti-Russian protests.
(Econ, 9/6/08, p.32)
2008 Sep 1, The US military
handed over control of once brutally violent Anbar province to Iraqi
forces, marking a major milestone in America's plan to eventually
send its troops home.
(AP, 9/1/08)
2008 Sep 1, Most of the Muslim
Mideast began the first day of Ramadan, but Iraqi Shiites, some
Lebanese Shiites and Iran will start observing the holy month of
fasting on Sep 2.
(AP, 9/1/08)
2008 Sep 1, Japan's chronically
unpopular PM Yasuo Fukuda (72), suddenly announced his resignation
after less than a year in office, throwing the world's
second-largest economy into political confusion.
(AP, 9/1/08)
2008 Sep 1, In Myanmar Saw
Myint Than, a magazine journalist, was arrested on a charge of
violating the Electronics Law, which regulates all forms of
electronic communication and carries a maximum five-year prison
term. He was freed on Oct 20 after police determined he had not
provided information to The Irrawaddy, a Thailand-based Web site run
by Myanmar exiles.
(AP, 10/22/08)
2008 Sep 1, North Korea began
reassembling its Yongbyon reactor that can make material for atomic
bombs in violation of US conditions for improved diplomatic
relations. Japan's Kyodo news agency reported the restart on Sep 3
citing sources in Beijing close to six-party nuclear talks on North
Korean.
(Reuters, 9/3/08)
2008 Sep 1, Pakistani officials
said that their forces had killed some 560 Pakistani and foreign
fighters and thwarted a push to make Bajur into a militant fortress.
Pakistan’s government opened an investigation into the killings of
five women who tried to choose their own husbands, after a
provincial lawmaker defended their deaths as a "centuries-old
tradition."
(AP, 9/1/08)
2008 Sep 1, In the southern
Philippines a homemade bomb exploded at a bus terminal, killing four
people and injuring more than a dozen in Digos city in Davao del Sur
province.
(AP, 9/1/08)
2008 Sep 1, A Spanish judge
began gathering information about people who disappeared during
Spain's civil war and subsequent dictatorship, seeking to produce a
reliable list of victims slain away from the battlefield during the
vicious fight between left and right.
(AP, 9/2/08)
2008 Sep 1, Sri Lanka’s defense
ministry said 33 rebels and four of its own troops were killed in
fighting across the north of the island. It said 49 guerrillas and
11 soldiers were also wounded in the fighting. Government troops
marched into Mallavi, a key LTTE bastion.
(AP, 9/2/08)
2008 Sep 1, A US-Vietnam
adoption agreement expired with the two sides unable to resolve
disagreements over fraud and corruption, disappointing hundreds of
prospective parents who will have to seek children elsewhere.
(AP, 9/1/08)
2008 Sep 1, Zimbabwe's main
opposition called on regional powers to pressure President Robert
Mugabe's ruling ZANU-PF party to be more flexible in power-sharing
talks.
(AP, 9/1/08)
2008 Sep 2, Pres. Bush
delivered a 6-minute televised speech to GOP delegates in St. Paul,
Minn., as the convention returned to its pre-hurricane schedule.
(WSJ, 9/3/08, p.A5)
2008 Sep 2, Google’s new Web
browser, named Chrome, became available for download.
(WSJ, 9/2/08, p.A1)
2008 Sep 2, New Orleans
residents were blocked from returning home due to damage from
Hurricane Gustav, but Mayor Nagin said they would be allowed back on
Sep 4.
(WSJ, 9/3/08, p.A1)
2008 Sep 2, In Oakland, Ca.,
police arrested 3 men involved in a spate of takeover robberies at
East Bay restaurants and small businesses.
(SFC, 9/4/08, p.A1)
2008 Sep 2, In SF, Ca., Mark
Guardado (45), president of the San Francisco chapter of the Hells
Angels Motorcycle Club, was shot and killed during a fight in the
Mission District. Christopher Ablett (37) of Modesto, a member of
the Mongols Motorcycle Club, was later identified as a suspect in
the killing.
(SFC, 9/4/08, p.B1)(SFC, 9/12/08, p.B1)
2008 Sep 2, In Washington state
a shooting rampage in Skagit County left 6 people dead. The suspect,
Isaac Zamora (28), was described as a person with a mental illness.
He turned himself in at the sheriff’s office in Mount Vernon. Mental
health experts later found Zamora to be incompetent to stand trial.
(SFC, 9/3/08, p.A4)(SFC, 9/4/08, p.A7)(WSJ,
11/28/08, p.A10)
2008 Sep 2, In Afghanistan 22
Taliban were killed in a clash in Zabul province's Naw Bahar
district. 7 Arab fighters were among the dead. Another 10 militants
died in clashes with Afghan and foreign troops in Nad Ali district
of Helmand province. NATO troops in Operation Oqab Tsuka (Eagle’s
summit) delivered a Chinese-built turbine for the power station at
Kajaki. Taliban insurgents opened fire on a patrol of Australian, US
and Afghan troops, as it returned to base. More than a dozen
coalition troops were wounded; none died. In 2009 Australian trooper
Mark Donaldson was awarded the Victoria Cross, the highest military
honor in the British Commonwealth, for his efforts to protect the
wounded during the attack.
(AP, 9/3/08)(Econ, 9/6/08, p.64)(AP, 1/16/09)
2008 Sep 2, Argentina’s Pres.
Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner promised to repay $6.7 billion that
Argentina owed to the Paris Club of 19 foreign governments following
its 2001 default, It will use part of its $47 billion in foreign
currency reserves to pay the debts. The government still refused to
negotiate with private holders of $20 billion of its bonds, who held
out against the 2005 debt restructuring.
(WSJ, 9/3/08, p.A12)(Econ, 9/6/08, p.45)
2008 Sep 2, Australia's central
bank cut interest rates for the first time in over six-and-a-half
years, pushing them down 25 basis points to 7% amid signs of cooling
economic growth.
(AP, 9/2/08)
2008 Sep 2, In Australia Brian
Spillane, a 65-year-old ex-priest, was arrested and charged in
Sydney with 60 counts relating to alleged sexual assaults against
eight people. Spillane was originally charged in May with 33 child
sex offenses against five people as a result of a police
investigation into allegations of abuse in the 1980s at St.
Stanislaus in the city of Bathurst.
(AP, 9/3/08)
2008 Sep 2, Bolivia and Iran
pledged cooperation and signed energy pacts, rebuffing US concerns
over improved ties.
(WSJ, 9/3/08, p.A1)
2008 Sep 2, The British
government slashed stamp duty, meaning homes worth up to 175,000
pounds would be exempt from the land sales tax for the next year in
a move aimed at reenergizing the housing market.
(AFP, 9/2/08)
2008 Sep 2, The Third High
Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness ppened in Accra, Ghana, for a 3-day
meeting. It aimed to record how much progress had been maderelative
to the Paris 2005 declaration for making aid work better and targets
set for 2010.
(Econ, 9/6/08,
p.69)(www.climate-l.org/2008/09/third-high-leve.html)
2008 Sep 2, Iran sentenced four
female activists to six months in prison for writings demanding
equality for women. Sweden had awarded a human rights prize to
Parvin Ardalan, one of the activists, earlier this year.
(AP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 2, Iraq’s Cabinet
approved an oil deal, signed August 27, with China National
Petroleum Corp. An American soldier died of non-combat related
causes in Baghdad. Ibrahim Jassam, an Iraqi freelance photographer
working for Reuters, was detained during a raid on his home in the
town of Mahmoudiya. A US military spokesman said Jassam was detained
because he was "assessed to be a threat" to Iraq and coalition
forces. Jassam was released after 17 months in detention.
(AP, 9/2/08)(AP, 9/3/08)(AP, 2/10/10)
2008 Sep 2, In Mozambique 2
days of fires killed at least 32 people and injured hundreds more in
blazes which devoured large swathes of arable land. The fires also
displaced thousands and ravaged around 16,000 hectares (40,000
acres) in the three central provinces of Manica, Sofala and
Zambezia.
(AP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 2, Pakistani Taliban
militants said they had kidnapped two Chinese telecoms engineers and
their entourage and would soon issue a list of demands. The
engineers went missing along with their local driver and a security
guard four days ago near the Afghan border where they had been
checking an installation.
(AFP, 9/2/08)
2008 Sep 2, Prime Minister
Vladimir Putin said that Russia will respond calmly to an increase
in NATO ships in the Black Sea in the aftermath of the short war
with Georgia, but promised that "there will be an answer."
(AP, 9/2/08)
2008 Sep 2, In Russia's
troubled North Caucasus journalist Telman Alishaev was shot in
Dagestan. Islamic TV reporter Telman Alishaev died at a hospital in
Makhachkala the next day. Journalist Miloslav Bitokov was left with
a fractured skull after a beating in Nalchik, Kabardino-Balkariya.
Police and co-workers said the two men were likely targeted for
their work.
(AP, 9/3/08)
2008 Sep 2, Sierra Leone's
President Ernest Koroma signed-off on legislation to fight
corruption, then fulfilled his obligations by handing over a
declaration of his assets. Abdul Tejan-Cole, head of the country’s
Anti-Corruption Commission, had introduced a system whereby every
public official must declare his or her assets.
(AFP, 9/2/08)(Econ, 11/21/09, p.51)
2008 Sep 2, South Africa signed
an energy agreement with oil-rich Venezuela as President Hugo Chavez
arrived on his first state visit. Political, trade and economic
relations were on the agenda with President Thabo Mbeki.
(AFP, 9/2/08)(AFP, 9/3/08)
2008 Sep 2, Sri Lanka's
government said it had dealt a major blow to Tamil rebels by
capturing the key northern town and guerrilla bastion of Mallavi
after heavy fighting that left dozens dead. Government forces
pounded rebel defenses with airstrikes, helicopter attacks and
ground assaults as heavy fighting across northern Sri Lanka killed
47 Tamil Tiger fighters and left 13 soldiers dead or missing. A
rebel affiliated Web site claimed the Tamil Tigers had killed as
many as 75 government soldiers in the recent fighting.
(AP, 9/2/08)(AP, 9/3/08)
2008 Sep 2, Thailand's prime
minister declared a state of emergency in the capital Bangkok after
a week of political tension exploded into violent street clashes
between supporters and opponents of the government that left one
person dead.
(AP, 9/2/08)
2008 Sep 2, Ukraine lawmakers
loyal to PM Yulia Tymoshenko sided with opposition parties to pass a
law weakening presidential powers and boosting those of the prime
minister.
(AP, 9/3/08)
2008 Sep 3, In St. Paul, Minn.,
Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and her Republican supporters held back
little as they issued dismissive attacks on Barack Obama and
flattering praise on her credentials. Palin seduced many on
television who had spent days doubting her VP candidacy.
(AP, 9/4/08)
2008 Sep 3, Albert J. Stanley
(65), former Halliburton executive, pleaded guilty in Houston to
orchestrating over $180 million in bribes to senior Nigerian
government officials from 1995-2004 for the construction of
liquefied natural gas facilities. The bribes began when Stanley
worked for M.W. Kellogg, a unit of Dresser Industries that was
acquired by Halliburton in 1998, when Dick Cheney served as CEO.
Stanley also pleaded guilty to taking $10.8 million in kickbacks
from a consortium of construction firms involved in the LNG
contracts between 1992-2003. Stanley was sentenced to 7 years in
prison and ordered to repay Halliburton $10.8 million.
(WSJ, 9/4/08, p.A1)(WSJ, 9/5/08, p.B1)
2008 Sep 3, Coca-Cola Co.
announced a bid to acquire China Huiyuan Juice Group in a $2.4
billion.
(WSJ, 9/4/08, p.B1)
2008 Sep 3, In Pasadena, Texas,
a suburb of Houston, Dannette Gillespie (38) orchestrated her
daughter (15) and Vanessa Anne Ocampo (19) in the robbery and
killing of Eugene Palma (75), which netted them $15. On Sep 7 all
three were charged with murder.
(www.truecrimereport.com/2008/09/mother_of_the_year_dannette_gi.php)
2008 Sep 3, US Vice President
Dick Cheney assured Azerbaijan of America's "abiding interest" in
the region's stability. It was the first stop on a tour of three
ex-Soviet republics that are wary of Russia's intentions after its
war with Georgia last month.
(AP, 9/4/08)
2008 Sep 3, A US Navy ship
loaded with humanitarian aid steamed through the Dardanelles on its
way to Georgia, as the Bush administration prepared to roll out a $1
billion economic aid package for the ex-Soviet republic.
(AP, 9/3/08)
2008 Sep 3, In Australia police
arrested a 66-year-old Catholic brother in connection with their
probe into St. Stanislaus and a 63-year-old former teacher of
another religious school in Bathurst that is also under
investigation.
(AP, 9/3/08)
2008 Sep 3-2008 Sep 4, In
China’s Hunan province, thousands of people demonstrated and clashed
with police in Jishou about a property company they said cheated
them of their money. News of the protests did not become public
until after the Olympics.
(Econ, 9/13/08, p.52)
2008 Sep 3, Cyprus' rival Greek
and Turkish leaders, Demetris Christofias and Mehmet Ali Talat,
started new peace talks and said they hoped for a deal soon aimed at
reuniting an island divided by war 34 years ago.
(AP, 9/3/08)(Econ, 9/6/08, p.68)
2008 Sep 3, In Dagestan
journalist Abdullah Alishayev died one day after he was attacked by
armed gunmen.
(http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/09/03/russia.journalist/index.html)
2008 Sep 3, A helicopter
carrying foreign contractors crashed into an oil platform off the
coast of Dubai, killing all seven people on board and halting
production in one of the emirate's four offshore oil fields.
(AP, 9/4/08)
2008 Sep 3, An Egyptian cargo
ship with 25 crew was hijacked by pirates in the Gulf of Aden near
Somalia, making it the 10th vessel to be hijacked in the area since
July 20.
(AP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 3, In Ethiopia an
explosion rocked a bar in Addis Ababa, killing 4 people. 2 more died
the next day.
(AFP, 9/4/08)
2008 Sep 3, Tropical Storm
Hanna drenched flood-plagued Haiti, adding to the miseries of a
country that has lost more than 100 lives to mudslides and flooding
since mid-August.
(AP, 9/3/08)
2008 Sep 3, A friendly fire
shootout between Iraqi security forces and American soldiers killed
six Iraqis in Tarmiyah, 30 miles north of Baghdad.
(AP, 9/3/08)
2008 Sep 3, Pakistan's
government says a cross-border raid involving US-led or NATO forces
killed several civilians. Women and children were among at least 20
people reportedly killed in the attack in Musa Nika village in South
Waziristan near the border with Afghanistan.
(AP, 9/3/08)(SFC, 9/4/08, p.A8)
2008 Sep 3, In Somalia mortar
shells slammed into Mogadishu as insurgents vowed to intensify
attacks during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. At least 4 people
were killed.
(AP, 9/3/08)
2008 Sep 3, Spanish authorities
found 13 bodies and 46 survivors on a packed migrant boat near one
of Spain's Canary Islands.
(AP, 9/3/08)
2008 Sep 3, In Sri Lanka
fighter jets bombed two rebel boats off the northeast coast in the
rebel stronghold of Mullaitivu, destroying one and causing heavy
damage to the other.
(AP, 9/3/08)
2008 Sep 3, French President
Nicolas Sarkozy encouraged Syria to pursue face-to-face peace talks
with Israel during his first trip to the Arab nation, a visit also
aimed at undercutting Iranian influence in Damascus.
(AP, 9/4/08)
2008 Sep 3, Swiss prosecutors
said police have broken up an Internet child pornography ring
operating in at least four European countries where men exchanged
details about their contacts with young girls. In all investigators
said they had identified 600 people in Germany, 40 in Austria, 13 in
Switzerland and four in Liechtenstein using the forum.
(AP, 9/3/08)
2008 Sep 3, Ukraine's Pres.
Yushchenko ordered the creation of a new governing coalition and
threatened fresh elections, accusing his rival prime minister and
opposition parties of attempting a "constitutional coup."
(AP, 9/3/08)
2008 Sep 4, The musical “Fela!”
premiered off-Broadway at 37 Arts Theatre B in New York City. It was
based on the work of Nigerian musician Fela Anikulapo-Fela
(1938-1997). In 2010 the show won 3 Tony awards.
(SFC, 8/3/11,
p.E3)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fela!)
2008 Sep 4, In St. Paul, Minn.,
John McCain claimed the GOP presidential nomination portraying
himself as a maverick warrior and agent of change.
(AP, 9/5/08)(SFC, 9/5/08, p.A1)
2008 Sep 4, Jack Abramoff (49),
once powerful DC lobbyist, was sentenced to 4 years in prison for
his part in a political corruption scandal. He had already spent 2
years in prison for a fraudulent casino boat deal in Florida. On Sep
10 a federal judge shaved 2 years from his Florida sentence
guaranteeing the Abramoff will serve no more that 4 additional
years. Abramoff was released from jail in June 2010.
(SFC, 9/5/08, p.A4)(SFC, 9/11/08, p.A7)(SFC,
6/23/10, p.A6)
2008 Sep 4, Detroit Mayor Kwame
Kilpatrick (38) pleaded guilty to a pair of felony obstruction
charges in a sex-and-misconduct scandal and will step down after
months of defiantly holding onto his job leading the nation's
11th-largest city. Kilpatrick’s sentence included 4 months behind
bars, a $1 million fine and forfeiture of his license to practice
law.
(AP, 9/4/08)(SFC, 9/5/08, p.A4)
2008 Sep 4, A US coast Guard
helicopter went down off Oahu, Ha., killing 4 crew members.
(SFC, 9/6/08, p.A3)
2008 Sep 4, Albanian artist
Saimir Strati in Tirana glued 229,764 corks of various shapes and
colors over a plastic banner measuring 12.94 meters by 7.1 meters to
make the art piece "Romeo with a crown of grapes playing the guitar
while dancing with the sea and the sun". He worked 14 hours a day
for 28 days to complete his project.
(Reuters, 9/4/08)
2008 Sep 4, Ethiopia unveiled
its famed Axum Obelisk after more than three years of work to
re-erect the 150-ton stela plundered by fascist Italy 70 years ago
and returned only in 2005.
(AFP, 9/4/08)
2008 Sep 4, Tropical Storm
Hanna roared along the edge of the Bahamas ahead of a possible
hurricane hit on the Carolinas, leaving behind at least 137 dead in
Haiti.
(AP, 9/4/08)
2008 Sep 4, In northeast China
24 people were killed and six injured in a coal mine gas explosion,
that left 3 miners trapped.
(AP, 9/4/08)
2008 Sep 4, In Georgia US Vice
President Dick Cheney condemned Russia for what he called an
"illegitimate, unilateral attempt" to redraw this US ally's borders
by force.
(AP, 9/4/08)
2008 Sep 4, German ministers
agreed to update data protection laws for the digital age in the
wake of scandals showing how easily personal details can be bought
on the Internet.
(AFP, 9/4/08)
2008 Sep 4, Some 20 Greek
anarchists stormed a supermarket in Thesaaloniki and handed out food
for free in the latest of a wave of raids provoked by soaring
consumer prices.
(Reuters, 9/4/08)
2008 Sep 4, The US military
arrested an Iraqi cameraman and three of his family members during a
raid on their home in Baghdad. Omar Husham (28) was arrested in the
predominantly Sunni neighborhood of Azamiyah.
(AP, 9/4/08)
2008 Sep 4, Pakistan’s
Parliament passed resolutions condemning an American-led attack in
Pakistani territory after the government summoned the US ambassador
to protest the unusually bold raid that officials say killed at
least 15 people. Four Islamist militants were killed and five
wounded in a missile attack by a suspected US drone in the village
of Char Khel in North Waziristan near Afghanistan.
(AP, 9/4/08)(Reuters, 9/4/08)
2008 Sep 4, Middle East envoy
Tony Blair toured a Palestinian aluminum factory in Beit Iba and was
told it runs at one-third capacity because of Israeli import
restrictions. He promised he'll take it up with Israeli authorities.
(AP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 4, In Moscow officials
said BP PLC and its billionaire Russian partners in the joint
venture TNK-BP have agreed on a deal that forces out its embattled
CEO and signals an end to a bitter struggle for control of the
Russian-British company.
(AP, 9/4/08)
2008 Sep 4, Russian troops
killed 5 suspected Muslim rebels in Dagestan.
(WSJ, 9/5/08, p.A1)
2008 Sep 4, Spanish police
arrested Vallejo-Guarin (47), a suspected Colombian drug trafficker,
listed among the most wanted by the US Drug Enforcement
Administration.
(AP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 4, Syrian President
Bashar Assad announced that his country has handed over proposals
for peace with Israel to Turkish mediators and would wait for
Israel's response before holding any face-to-face negotiations.
(AP, 9/4/08)
2008 Sep 4, Teachers in
Zimbabwe's public schools went on strike to press for higher pay,
despite a pay rise for civil servants announced by the government.
(AFP, 9/7/08)
2008 Sep 5, US bank regulators
shut down Silver State Bank, saying the Nevada bank failed because
of losses on soured loans, mainly in commercial real estate and land
development. It was the 11th failure this year of a federally
insured bank.
(AP, 9/6/08)
2008 Sep 5, In SF Western
artist Thom Ross displayed 100 wooden Indians on horseback on the
same stretch of Ocean Beach that was used in a 1902 photo of Buffalo
Bill Cody and his Wild West Show featuring live Indians on
horseback.
(SFC, 9/6/08, p.A1)
2008 Sep 5, In Berkeley, Ca.,
arborists began removed trees in preparation for a $124 million UC
athletic training center. 4 protesters continued a 21-month-old
protest in a lone redwood.
(SFC, 9/7/08, p.B1)
2008 Sep 5, In Lancaster, Ca.,
a road was paved, at the request of Honda’s Santa Monica advertising
agency, with grooves so that passing cars would hear a rendition of
Rossini’s William Tell Overture. On Sep 23, following complaints and
safety concerns the road was repaved.
(WSJ, 10/24/08, p.A1)
2008 Sep 5, Robert Giroux
(b.1914), NYC publisher (Farrar, Strauss & Giroux), died in New
Jersey. He had joined Farrar as editor in chief and was made a full
partner in 1964.
(SFC, 9/6/08, p.A2)
2008 Sep 5, In western
Afghanistan an overnight raid in Farah province killed six militants
and two civilians.
(AP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 5, Angolans voted for
the first time in 16 years in a parliamentary election expected to
extend the ruling party's hold of more than three decades in the
oil-rich African nation. A new quota required 30% of the candidates
to be women.
(AP, 9/5/08)(Econ, 9/20/08, p.76)
2008 Sep 5, Quentin Bryce was
sworn in as Australia's governor general, the first woman to act as
the British queen's representative Down Under. Morris Iemma (47),
the embattled premier of Australia's most populous state, New South
Wales, was forced to resign after his party withdrew support for him
over a dramatic reshuffle of his cabinet.
(AP, 9/5/08)(AFP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 5, In Bolivia
protesters stormed a small airport and blocked major highways across
eastern Bolivia in a standoff over central government reforms
designed to empower the nation’s indigenous majority.
(AP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 5, Canada joined the
US and EU in imposing sanctions on Zimbabwe's authoritarian regime
headed by President Robert Mugabe.
(AP, 9/6/08)
2008 Sep 5, EU nations called
for an international probe to find out which country should shoulder
responsibility for starting the conflict between Georgia and Russia.
(AP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 5, Rosetta, the
European deep space probe launched in 2004, completed a flyby of the
Steins asteroid in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.
(SFC, 9/7/08, p.A6)
2008 Sep 5, The flagship of the
US Navy's Mediterranean fleet anchored outside the key Georgian port
of Poti, bringing in tons of humanitarian aid to a port still
partially occupied by hundreds of Russian troops.
(AP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 5, The Iraqi
government reacted sharply to published allegations that the US
spied on Iraq's PM Maliki, warning that future ties with the United
States could be in jeopardy if the report were true. An explosion in
the western Baghdad neighborhood of Mansour killed six bodyguards of
ex-Iraqi deputy prime minister and former Pentagon favorite, Ahmad
Chalabi, who escaped the suicide car bomb attack on his convoy.
(AP, 9/6/08)
2008 Sep 5, An Israeli defense
official said Israel has allowed Palestinian security forces in the
West Bank to receive a shipment of about 1,000 Kalashnikov rifles
and tens of thousands of bullets in a step aimed at bolstering the
moderate Palestinian government there. The weapons shipment reached
the Palestinians through Jordan about one week ago.
(AP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 5, Mila Schoen
(b.1916), an Italian designer of elegant, impeccably tailored
clothes, died at her villa in northern Italy.
(AP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 5, In Japan
right-leaning former Foreign Minister Taro Aso announced that he
will run for ruling party president in a move that would put him on
track to take over as Japan's next prime minister.
(AP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 5, US Secretary of
State Condoleezza Rice met Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, once
reviled as a "mad dog" by President Reagan, on a historic visit
which she said proved that Washington had no permanent enemies. John
Foster Dulles was the last US Secretary of State to visit Tripoli,
in May 1953.
(Reuters, 9/6/08)
2008 Sep 5, Malaysia said it is
dispatching three navy vessels to the Gulf of Aden to protect its
merchant ships following a sharp surge in pirate attacks off the
coast of Somalia.
(AP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 5, In Mexico two 18th
century paintings, "The Adoration of the Three Kings" and "The Birth
of the Virgin," were stolen from the Santa Matilde church in
Pachuca, the capital of central Hidalgo state. In February, 2010,
they were found in an art gallery in Tlaquepaque, a town near the
city of Guadalajara, where they were on sale for $35,000.
(AP, 2/26/10)
2008 Sep 5, The political party
of detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi urged Myanmar's
military government to ensure her well-being as she continued to
refuse food deliveries to protest her detention.
(AP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 5, Nigeria said it has
set up a 40-member technical committee on peace talks to end the
crisis in the oil-rich Niger Delta.
(AFP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 5, Pakistan's Supreme
Court reinstated three judges ousted by Pervez Musharraf, cementing
political divisions in the country a day before it elects a new
president. An explosion possibly caused by a missile strike killed
five suspected foreign militants near the Afghan border in North
Waziristan.
(AP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 5, Palestinian
President Mahmoud Abbas pledged to try to reach a final status peace
agreement with Israel by the end of the year, but he admitted the
goal, set by US President George W. Bush, might not be achieved.
(AP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 5, In Poland police
detained Krzysztof B. (45), in the eastern city of Siedlce, after
his wife and daughter came forward with the allegations that he had
imprisoned and raped his daughter (21) for 6 years fathering 2
children, who were put up for adoption.
(AP, 9/9/08)
2008 Sep 5, In Sri Lankan
soldiers captured three Tamil Tiger rebel bunkers and killed 24
guerrillas in fighting across the island's restive north.
(AP, 9/6/08)
2008 Sep 5, Taiwan newspapers
said authorities in central Taiwan have turned off the red light at
the county's last legal brothel after the death of its pimp aged 87.
Prostitution has been illegal in Taiwan since 1997. Licensing of new
brothels stopped in 1974, but isolated illegal brothels can be found
all over the island. Brothels licensed prior to 1974 were allowed to
keep operating.
(Reuters, 9/8/08)
2008 Sep 5, Togo’s PM Komla
Mally unexpectedly resigned after less than a year in office. He had
been accused of lacking initiative and of being ineffective.
(SFC, 9/7/08, p.A3)
2008 Sep 5, In Kiev US Vice
President Dick Cheney pledged US support for Ukraine following last
month's war between neighboring Russia and Georgia.
(AP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 6, The $500 million
GeoEye-1, a super-sharp Earth-imaging satellite, was launched into
orbit from Vandenberg Air Force Base on the Central California
coast. GeoEye Inc. said that in black-and-white mode, the satellite
can distinguish objects on the Earth's surface as small as 16
inches.
(AP, 9/7/08)
2008 Sep 6, Tropical Storm
Hanna blew hard and dumped rain in eastern North Carolina and
Virginia, but caused little damage beyond isolated flooding and
power outages as it quickly headed north toward New England.
(AP, 9/6/08)
2008 Sep 6, In Martinez, Ca.,
Jose Felix Sandoval, in search of his estranged wife, killed her
cousin and a police sergeant, before he was fatally shot by police
officers.
(SFC, 9/7/08, p.A1)
2008 Sep 6, The 45 nation
Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) overcame fierce obstacles and approved
a landmark US plan to engage in atomic trade with India, a deal that
reverses more than three decades of American policy. The plan still
needs backing from US Congress.
(AP, 9/6/08)
2008 Sep 6, In Afghanistan a
suicide bomb attack by a fake beggar inside a regional prosecutor's
office and a shoot-out between police and Taliban militants killed
15 people.
(AP, 9/6/08)
2008 Sep 6, Angolan election
officials extended voting by a day in the capital, but said the
logistical problems that marred the first balloting in 16 years were
confined to Luanda.
(AP, 9/6/08)
2008 Sep 6, Thousands of
Armenians lined the streets of the Yerevan to protest the first-ever
visit by a Turkish leader and to demand that Turkey acknowledge the
World War I massacres of Armenian civilians as genocide.
(www.interfax.com/3/425662/news.aspx)
2008 Sep 6, Cuba politely
declined a US offer to send a disaster assessment team to the island
after Hurricane Gustav, saying it would rather Washington suspend
restrictions on travel and the sale of food and other materials it
needs to recover.
(AP, 9/6/08)
2008 Sep 6, In Egypt massive
boulders fell from the towering Muqattam cliffs onto a shanty town
outside Cairo and buried dozens of homes. The death toll rose on a
daily basis and reached 103 on Sep 19. According to residents, there
could be up to 500 people buried under the hundreds of tons of rock
that fell. In 2010 a court convicted the Cairo deputy governor for
the rock slide that killed 119 people and sentenced him to five
years in prison. The court found Mahmoud Yassin and seven lesser
officials guilty of manslaughter.
(AP, 9/6/08)(AP, 9/13/08)(AP, 9/20/08)(AP,
5/26/10)
2008 Sep 6, In Greece the body
of Amphithea Tanida (36) was found wrapped in sheets in a bathroom
in her parents' villa at Amarynthos on Evia. Masami Tanida (77), a
retired Japanese diplomat, and his wife Maria (67) were arrested the
next day and charged with murdering their daughter.
(AP, 9/8/08)
2008 Sep 6, In Iraq a suicide
car bomber blasted an outdoor market in northern Tal Afar city,
killing six people and wounding 54. Kurdish security forces raided a
house in Irbil province, killed a suspected member of an al-Qaida
front group and captured a 17-year-old girl wearing an explosives
vest.
(AP, 9/6/08)
2008 Sep 6, Yahoo! Japan
announced support for victimized users whose Yahoo IDs were used
illegally. The company admitted that its online auction site
suffered a huge security breach and agreed to reimburse users who
had been charged fees relating to fraudulent transactions.
(http://blog.trendmicro.com/caution-needed-jp-yahoo-auctions-site-phished/)(Econ,
10/18/08, p.76)
2008 Sep 6, In Indian Kashmir
thousands of angry people took to the streets to denounce the
killing of a protester by government troops, who fired rubber
bullets and tear gas shells at Muslim demonstrators chanting
anti-India slogans.
(AP, 9/6/08)
2008 Sep 6, Asif Ali Zardari,
the widower of slain former premier Benazir Bhutto, became
Pakistan's new president after winning a landslide election victory
in separate votes in the federal and provincial assemblies.
Overnight clashes left 24 people killed after residents of a village
in the volatile northwest foiled a militant kidnap attempt, then
were attacked. An explosives-packed pickup truck blew up at a police
checkpoint on the outskirts of Peshawar, killing 37 people.
(AP, 9/6/08)(AP, 9/7/08)(Econ, 9/20/08, p.55)
2008 Sep 6-2008 Sep 7, In the
southern Philippines 6 people were killed after a landslide
triggered by heavy rains buried houses in the village of Masara.
Another landslide the next day killed 5 more people there. At least
16 people were left missing.
(AFP, 9/6/08)(AP, 9/7/08)
2008 Sep 6, In Sri Lanka air
force helicopters bombed rebel bunkers in the rebel-held Mullaittivu
district to support advancing ground troops.
(AP, 9/6/08)
2008 Sep 6, Sudanese forces
launched ground and air attacks on two rebel bases in North Darfur,
killing an unknown number of people.
(AP, 9/6/08)
2008 Sep 6, Swaziland King
Mswati III celebrated his 40th birthday and the nation’s 40th year
of independence in a lavish extravaganza officially estimated at
$2.5 million, but widely believed to have cost 5 times more. Mswati
remained Africa’s last absolute monarch and lived a luxurious
lifestyle with his 13 wives. Some 70% of the population of 1 million
lived below the poverty line and nearly 40% of adults were infected
with the AIDS virus.
(SFC, 9/7/08, p.A9)
2008 Sep 6, Hurricane Ike
barreled toward the Turks and Caicos as a powerful Category 3 storm,
prompting an exodus of tourists and locals from the normally idyllic
Atlantic island chain.
(AP, 9/6/08)
2008 Sep 7, At the MTV Video
Music Awards on the show's 25th anniversary, the network threw its
full support behind Britney Spears' comeback. Spears won a leading
three awards, including video of the year for "Piece of Me."
(AP, 9/8/08)
2008 Sep 7, US Treasury
Secretary Henry Paulson announced plans to take control of troubled
mortgage finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and replace the
companies’ chief executives. This would effectively wipe out
shareholders' interest in the publicly traded companies. 27% of the
nation’s 8,500 banks lost a combined $10-15 billion from holdings in
preferred shares in Fannie and Freddie.
(Reuters, 9/7/08)(WSJ, 9/8/08, p.A1)(WSJ,
9/23/08, p.A4)
2008 Sep 7, In Afghanistan 2
suicide attackers detonated bombs inside the police headquarters in
Kandahar city, killing six policemen. In southern Afghanistan a
Canadian soldier was killed and seven wounded when their armored
vehicle struck an explosive device while on patrol.
(AP, 9/7/08)(Reuters, 9/8/08)
2008 Sep 7, The conservation
group WWF said Australian koalas are dying by the thousands as a
result of land clearing in the country's northeast, while millions
of birds and reptiles are also perishing. Queensland state last week
revealed that 375,000 hectares of bush were cleared in 2005-06, a
figure WWF said would have resulted in the deaths of two million
mammals.
(AP, 9/7/08)
2008 Sep 7, In London an urgent
inquiry was underway after a disc containing the personal details of
5,000 justice staff went missing in yet another embarrassing data
loss blunder. Private contractor EDS told the Prison Service in July
that the hard drive had gone astray. The missing disc was last seen
in July 2007.
(AP, 9/7/08)
2008 Sep 7, Canada’s PM Stephen
Harper called an election for October 14 in a bid to strengthen his
grip on power after 2-1/2 years in charge of a minority Conservative
Party government.
(Reuters, 9/7/08)
2008 Sep 7, In China a flood
swamped the mine in Yuzhou city of Henan province trapping 23
people.
(AP, 9/7/08)
2008 Sep 7, In Haiti at least
58 people died as Ike's winds and rain swept the impoverished
Caribbean nation. Officials also found three more bodies from a
previous storm, raising Haiti's death toll from four tropical storms
in less than a month to 319. A Dominican man was crushed by a
falling tree. Ike damaged most of the homes on Grand Turk island as
it roared onto the Bahamas and threatened the Florida Keys on its
way to Cuba as a ferocious Category 4 storm.
(AP, 9/7/08)(AP, 9/8/08)
2008 Sep 7, Hong Kong's
pro-democracy politicians lost several legislative seats in
elections, but held onto their veto power over major legislation as
they push for greater political freedoms in the Chinese territory.
Democratic parties won 23 of 60 legislative seats in the voting,
down from their previous 26.
(AP, 9/8/08)
2008 Sep 7, Italy's foreign
minister, after meeting US Vice President Dick Cheney, said the EU
wants to work closely with the United States in resolving the
Georgian crisis.
(AP, 9/7/08)
2008 Sep 7, Pakistan’s reserves
in the 1st week of September fell to $5.5 billion, enough to cover
just two months of imports. Reserves as of last November were about
$14 billion.
(Econ, 9/13/08, p.48)
2008 Sep 7, South Korean police
arrested four people over the theft of data on 11 million customers
of a local oil refiner in what is being called the country's
largest-ever data leak.
(AFP, 9/7/08)
2008 Sep 7-2008 Sep 8, Spanish
police said immigrants went on a rampage in the southern Spanish
town of Roquetas de Mar overnight, setting fire to homes and cars
and throwing stones at police, after a Senegalese man (28) was
stabbed to death in an apparent dispute over drugs. The Rampage
continued for a 2nd night.
(Reuters, 9/7/08)(AP, 9/8/08)
2008 Sep 7, A Darfur rebel
group says it has successfully repelled a government assault in
North Darfur, but the Sudanese government denies it carried out any
operations in the area.
(AP, 9/7/08)
2008 Sep 7, In the Virgin
Islands US federal agent William Clark (33) intervened in a couple's
drunken fight outside his apartment and shot Marcus Sukow to death.