Today in History - August 8
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70CE Aug 8,
Tower of Antonia was destroyed by the Romans.
(MC, 8/8/02)
117 Aug 8, Marcus Ulpius
Trajanus (Trajan), emperor of Rome (98-117), died.
(www.roman-emperors.org/hadrian.htm)
869 Aug 8, Lotharius II, King
of Middle-France (Lotharingen) (855-869), died.
(MC, 8/8/02)
1306 Aug 8, King Wenceslas of
Poland was murdered.
(HN, 8/8/98)
1562 Aug 8, Diego Te, a Maya
man in the Yucatec town of Sotuta, testified that a year earlier he
had witnessed a village leader and another man cut the hearts from 2
boys and hand them to a shaman, who rubbed the hearts onto the
mouths of two Maya idols. The account was preserved in the Archivo
General de Indias in Seville, Spain.
(AM, 7/05, p.43)
1567 Aug 8, Duke of Alba's army
entered Brussels, Belgium.
(MC, 8/8/02)
1570 Aug 8, Charles IX of
France signed the Treaty of St. Germain (Peace of St.
Germain-en-Laye), ending the third war of religion and giving
religious freedom to the Huguenots.
(TL-MB, 1988, p.22)(HN, 8/8/98)
1571 Aug 8, John Ward, English
composer, was born in Canterbury.
(MC, 8/8/02)(Internet)
1588 Aug 8, The English Navy
destroyed the Spanish Armada. 600 Spaniards were killed in the day’s
fighting and 800 badly injured. The Duke of Medina Sidonia led the
"invincible" Spanish Armada from Lisbon against England. It was
shattered around the coasts of the English Isles by an English fleet
under the command of Lord Howard of Effingham with the help of Sir
Francis Drake, Sir John Hawkins, and a violent storm (see Aug 18).
The victory opened the world for English trade and colonization. In
1959 Garrett Mattingly authored “The Armada.” In 1998 Geoffrey
Parker published "The Grand Strategy of Phillip II." In 2005 Neil
Janson authored “The Confident Hope of a Miracle: The True Story of
the Spanish Armada,” and James McDermott authored “England & the
Spanish Armada: The necessary Quarrel.”
(ON, 3/02, p.5)(SSFC, 2/20/05, p.B2)(Econ,
5/28/05, p.85)
1636 Aug 8, The invading armies
of Spain, Austria and Bavaria were stopped at the village of
St.-Jean-de-Losne, only 50 miles from France.
(HN, 8/8/98)
1648 Aug 8, Ibrahim, the sultan
of Istanbul, was thrown into prison, then assassinated.
(HN, 8/8/98)
1736 Aug 8, Mahomet Weyonomon,
a Mohegan sachem or leader, died of smallpox while waiting to see
King George II to complain directly about British settlers
encroaching on tribal lands in the Connecticut colony. The tribal
chief was buried in an unmarked grave in a south London churchyard.
(AP, 11/22/06)(http://tinyurl.com/ymbn3c)
1763 Aug 8, Charles Bulfinch,
1st US professional architect (Mass State House), was born in
Boston, Mass.
(MC, 8/8/02)
1776 Aug 8, John Paul Jones was
commissioned as a captain and appointed to command the Alfred. His
orders were to harass enemy merchant ships and defend the American
coast.
(ON, 2/04, p.6)(Internet)
1786 Aug 8, The US Congress
adopted the silver dollar and decimal system of money.
(MC, 8/8/02)
1786 Aug 8, Jacques Balmat and
Dr. Michel-Gabriel Paccard became the first men to climb Mont Blanc
in France.
(HN, 8/8/98)(ON, 4/04, p.1)
1788 Aug 8, King Louis XVI
called the French States and Generals together.
(MC, 8/8/02)
1788 Aug 8, Louis FAD Duke de
Richelieu (92), French marshal, died.
(MC, 8/8/02)
1815 Aug 8, Napoleon Bonaparte
set sail for St. Helena, in the South Atlantic, to spend the
remainder of his days in exile.
(AP, 8/8/97)
1844 Aug 8, Brigham Young was
chosen to head the Mormon church following the killing of Joseph
Smith in Illinois.
(AP, 8/8/97)(HN, 8/8/98)
1854 Aug 8, Smith and Wesson
patented metal bullet cartridges.
(MC, 8/8/02)
1860 Aug 8, Queen of Sandwich
Islands (Hawaii) arrived in NYC.
(MC, 8/8/02)
1862 Aug 8, Minnesota’s 5th
Infantry fought the Sioux Indians in Redwood, Minn., and 24 soldiers
were killed.
(SFC, 2/7/03, p.A23)
1863 Aug 8, Confederate
President Jefferson Davis refused General Robert E. Lee's
resignation.
(HN, 8/8/98)
1864 Aug 8, Union troops and
fleet occupied Fort Gaines, Alabama.
(MC, 8/8/02)
1864 Aug 8, The 1st Geneva
Convention was issued on protecting the war wounded.
(www.redcross.org)
1866 Aug 8, African-American
Matthew Alexander Henson was born in Maryland. He and four Inuits
accompanied U.S. Naval Commander Robert E. Peary when he planted the
U.S. flag at the North Pole on April 6, 1909. Henson became an
Arctic expert during Peary's first two failed expeditions. By the
third attempt, which began in July 1908, Henson's strength,
knowledge of the Eskimo language and dog driving skills made him an
essential member of the team. Whether Peary's party actually reached
the North Pole or missed it by as much as 60 miles due to a
navigational miscalculation remains controversial to this day.
(HNPD, 8//99)(Internet)
1876 Aug 8, Thomas A. Edison
received a patent for his mimeograph.
(AP, 8/8/97)
1879 Aug 8, Emiliano Zapata,
Mexican revolutionary who occupied Mexico City three times, was born
in Anenecuilco, Morelos state, Mexico.
(HN, 8/8/98)(WUD, 1994 p.1659)(Internet)
1881 Aug 8, Paul L.E. von
Kleist, German general-fieldmarshal (Eastern Front), was born.
(MC, 8/8/02)
1890 Aug 8, Daughters of
American Revolution (DAR) organized. [see Oct 11]
(MC, 8/8/02)
1896 Aug 8, Marjorie Kinnan
Rawlings (d.1953), author of "The Yearling," was born.
(HN, 8/8/00)
1897 Aug 8, Anarchist Miguel
Angiolillo assassinated Spanish PM Antonio Canovas del Castillo at
Santa Agueda, Spain. Práxides Mateo Sagasta became prime
minister of Spain.
(NG, 11/04,
p.76)(www.loc.gov/rr/hispanic/1898/chronpr.html)
1898 Aug 8, Adolph Sutro
(b.1830), former mayor of SF, died. He had acquired a 100,000 volume
private library, most of which was destroyed in the 1906 earthquake.
He served as the 24th mayor of SF (1895-1897).
(G, Winter 98/99,
p.2)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolph_Sutro)
1899 Aug 8, The first household
refrigerating machine was patented.
(SFEC, 8/8/99, Z1 p.8)(HN, 8/8/00)
1901 Aug 8, Ernest Orlando
Lawrence (d.1958), winner of the 1939 Nobel Prize for physics, was
born.
(HN, 8/8/98)
1901 Aug 8, Santos-Dumont flew
his powered dirigible around the Eiffel Tower a 2nd time but sprang
a leak and caught suspension wires in his propeller blades.
(ON, 3/03, p.11)
1902 Aug 8, Jean Y.Y. Tissot,
French painter, illustrator, died.
(MC, 8/8/02)
1907 Aug 8, Benny Carter, jazz
musician, composer and bandleader, was born in New York.
(AP, 8/8/07)
1908 Aug 8, Arthur J. Goldberg
(d.1990), labor lawyer, UN ambassador, Supreme Court justice
(1962-65), was born in, Chicago, Illinois. He was instrumental in
the merger of the American Federation of Labor and Congress of
Industrial Organizations.
(HN, 8/8/98)(AP, 8/8/08)
1909 Aug 8, In Australia Sister
Mary MacKillop (b.1842) died. She had founded the Sisters of St
Joseph at age 24 and spent her life educating the poor and taking
learning to the harsh Outback. In 2009 Pope Benedict XVI recognized
a miracle in which she apparently cured a woman of cancer, paving
the way to making her Australia’s first saint.
(AFP,
12/20/09)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_MacKillop)
1919 Aug 8, Dino De Laurentiis,
producer (King Kong), was born in Torre Annunziata, Italy.
(MC, 8/8/02)
1922 Aug 8, Rudi Gernreich,
designer (1st women's topless swimsuit, miniskirt), was born in
Vienna, Austria.
(MC, 8/8/02)(Internet)
1922 Aug 8, An Italian general
strike was broken by fascist terror.
(MC, 8/8/02)
1925 Aug 8, The first national
congress of the Ku Klux Klan opened. 200,000 members marched in
Washington, DC.
(HN, 8/8/98)(MC, 8/8/02)
1925 Aug 8, Alija Izetbegovic
(d.2003) was born in Bosanski Samac. He later led Bosnia's Muslims
during the 1992-95 war for independence and became one of the
republic's first postwar presidents.
(AP, 10/19/03)(SFC, 10/20/03, p.A18)
1929 Aug 8, Josef Suk,
violinist (Artist of Merit-1977), was born in Prague,
Czechoslovakia.
(MC, 8/8/02)
1929 Aug 8, The Graf Zeppelin
embarked from Lakehurst, New Jersey, on the first round-the-world
passenger voyage.
(Hem., 2/96, p.43)(MC, 8/8/02)
1937 Aug 8, Dustin Hoffman,
American actor, was born.
(HN, 8//00)
1937 Aug 8, The Japanese Army
occupied Beijing, China.
(HN, 8/8/98)
1940 Aug 8, The German
Luftwaffe attacked Great Britain for the first time, beginning the
Battle of Britain.
(HN, 8/8/98)
1942 Aug 8, U.S. Marines
captured the Japanese airstrip on Guadalcanal.
(HN, 8/8/98)
1942 Aug 8, Six convicted Nazi
saboteurs who had landed in the United States were executed in
Washington, D.C. Two others received life imprisonment.
(AP, 8/8/97)
1944 Aug 8, U.S. forces
completed the capture of the Marianas Islands.
(HN, 8/8/98)
1944 Aug 8, Erwin von Witzleben
(62), German fieldmarshal, was hanged.
(MC, 8/8/02)
1945 Aug 8, President Truman
signed the United Nations Charter.
(AP, 8/8/97)
1945 Aug 8, The Soviet Union
declared war against Japan. 1.5 million Soviet troops launched a
massive surprise attack (August Storm) against Japanese occupation
forces in northern China and Korea. Within days, Tokyo's million-man
army in the region had collapsed in one of the greatest military
defeats in history.
(SFC, 9/9/96, p.A19)(AP, 8/8/97)(AP, 8/6/05)
1950 Aug 8, U.S. troops
repelled the first North Korean attempt to overrun them at the
battle of Naktong Bulge, which continued for 10 days.
(HN, 8/8/98)
1950 Aug 8, Florence Chadwick
(1918-1995) swam the English Channel from France to Dover in 13
hours and 23 minutes. A year later she swam the reverse in 16:22.
(http://www.ishof.org/70fchadwick.html)
1950 Aug 8, Nicolai Yakovlevich
Miaskovsky (b.1891), Russian composer, died.
(http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0583975/)
1953 Aug 8, The song “Vaya con
Dios” recorded by Les Paul and his wife Mary Ford reached number one
on the Billboard magazine Best Seller Chart and stayed there for 9
weeks.
(SFC, 8/14/09, p.D6)
1953 Aug 8, The United States
and South Korea initialed a mutual security pact.
(AP, 8/8/99)
1953 Aug 8, In Russia Georgi
Malenkov reported the possession of hydrogen bomb.
(MC, 8/8/02)
1955 Aug 8, Fidel Castro formed
his "July 26th Movement."
(MC, 8/8/02)
1960 Aug 8, The pop song "Itsy
Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polkadot Bikini", sung by Brian Hyland
(16), hit #1. The song was written by Paul Vance and Lee Pockriss.
(www.popculturemadness.com/Music/Pop-Modern/1960.html)(SFC, 9/28/06,
p.A2)
1962 Aug 8, The Chilean TV
variety show "Sabados Gigantes" (Gigantic Saturdays) debuted with
Mario Luis Kreutzberger Blumenfeld (b.1940) as Don Francisco. In
April, 1986, the show got shortened to the singular version (Sabado
Gigante) went it went on air in Miami, Fla. Kreutzberger was the son
of German Jews who fled Nazi persecution.
(SSFC, 11/9/03, Par p.16)(SFC, 4/14/04,
p.E1)(www.imdb.com/title/tt0250920/)
1963 Aug 8, Britain's "Great
Train Robbery" took place as thieves made off with 120 mailbags with
2.62 million pounds in banknotes. 15 men under Bruce Reynolds held
up the Glasgow to London Royal Mail (Glasgow-Euston train) and took
off with $7.2 mil in sterling. They badly beat up train driver Jack
Mills. He never returned to work and died seven years later without
making a full recovery. Ronald Biggs claimed to be one of the 15 men
and later lived freely in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. His share of the
robbery was $2.8 mil but he was arrested just four weeks after the
robbery. He escaped from Wandsworth Prison in 1965 and was still
wanted in Britain. Only 1/8 of the money stolen was ever recovered.
Dinner at home with Mr. Biggs could be purchased for $50. In 1994
Biggs published an autobiography. In 1999 a video game was developed
based on the event. Biggs (71) returned to Britain in 2001 and in
2009 he was up for parole.
(SFE, 10/1/95, p.T-8)(AP, 8/8/97)(WSJ, 11/4/99,
p.A28)(WSJ, 5/7/01, p.A1)(AFP, 7/1/09)
1966 Aug 8, South African
Broadcasting banned the Beatles for Lennon's anti-Jesus remark.
(MC, 8/8/02)
1967 Aug 8, The Association of
Southeast Asian Nations or ASEAN was established in Bangkok by the
five original Member Countries, namely, Indonesia, Malaysia,
Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand. Brunei Darussalam joined
on 8 January 1984, Vietnam on 28 July 1995, Laos and Myanmar on 23
July 1997, and Cambodia on 30 April 1999.
(www.aseansec.org/64.htm)
1968 Aug 8, Richard M. Nixon
was nominated for president at the Republican National Convention in
Miami Beach. Later that day, Nixon chose Maryland Gov. Spiro T.
Agnew to be his running mate.
(AP, 8/8/97)
1968 Aug 8, In Florida a riot
broke out last night in several neighborhoods of Miami, including
one community just 10 miles from the Republican Convention. 3
negroes were killed by gunfire.
(www.project1968.com/august-4-10-1968.html)
1969 Aug 8, Actress Sharon Tate
(26) and four other people were brutally murdered in her Beverly
Hills home; cult leader Charles Manson and a group of his disciples
were later convicted of the crime. The best writing on the Manson
murders was by Joan Didion in "The White Album."
(SFEC, 3/16/97, z1 p.4)(AP, 8/9/97)(HN,
8/9/98)(SFEC, 9/19/99, BR p.6)
1972 Aug 8, A special meeting
of the Democratic National Committee chose R. Sargent Shriver, the
former director of the Peace Corps, as McGovern‘s running mate. The
Democrat ticket was swamped in the general election by incumbent
President Richard Nixon in the November 7 election.
(HNQ, 4/25/00)
1973 Aug 8, Vice President
Spiro T. Agnew branded as "damned lies" reports he had taken
kickbacks from government contracts in Maryland and vowed not to
resign. He eventually did resign.
(AP, 8/8/97)
1973 Aug 8, In Texas Elmer
Wayne Henley (17) called police in the Houston suburb of Pasadena to
report a shooting. The high school dropout said he had killed Dean
Corll after the 33-year-old electric company employee threatened to
rape and kill Henley and two other teenagers who had gone to party
at Corll's modest bungalow. By night's end 8 corpses were recovered
from makeshift graves inside the corrugated metal shed in southwest
Houston. The next day 9 more were discovered. Another 10 bodies were
found on remote High Island beach, 80 miles east of Houston, and in
a wooded area near Lake Sam Rayburn in East Texas. 27 dead Some as
young as 13, none older than 21, were all victims of one killer,
Dean Corll, and his two teenage accomplices, Elmer Wayne Henley and
David Owen Brooks. The boys had seemed to vanish over the previous
three years. In July, 1974, Henley was convicted in six of the
murders and sentenced to six life terms in prison.
(AP, 6/8/08)
1973 Aug 8, Secret agents of
the Korean Central Intelligence Agency kidnapped Kim Dae-jung from a
Tokyo hotel, just days before he was to launch a coalition of
Japan-based South Korean organizations to work for their country's
democratization. Conservative politician Kim Jong Pil (b.1926), the
father of the secret police agency, led the kidnapping and near
assassination of politician Kim Dae Jung (b.1925). In 2007 a
fact-finding panel of the National Intelligence Service said it
cannot rule out the possibility that former President Park Chung-hee
may have directly ordered the kidnapping of Kim, then his main
political rival.
(AP, 10/24/07)(SFC,12/15/97,
p.B1)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kim_Jong-pil)
1974 Aug 8, President
Nixon announced he would resign his office 12PM Aug 9, following
damaging revelations in the Watergate scandal.
(AP,
8/8/97)(www.watergate.info/nixon/resignation-speech.shtml)
1974 Aug 8, Baldur von Schirach
(b.1907), Nazi youth leader, died.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baldur_von_Schirach)
1975 Aug 8, Julian "Cannonball"
Adderley (b.1928), sax player, died of a stroke.
(SFC, 1/5/00,
p.C3)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cannonball_Adderley)
1978 Aug 8, The United States
launched Pioneer Venus II, which carried scientific probes to study
the atmosphere of Venus.
(HFA, '96, p.36)(AP, 8/8/99)
1978 Aug 8, James Ramp (52),
Philadelphia police officer, was killed during a standoff with MOVE.
9 members of MOVE, a Black group that espoused equality with animals
and preached against technology, were convicted. Members of the
group adopted the surname Africa.
(SFC, 3/16/98,
p.A20)(www.odmp.org/officer/10987-police-officer-james-j.-ramp)
1979 Aug 8, In Iran the
revolutionary prosecutor banned the leading left-wing newspaper,
Ayandegan. 5 days later hezbollahis broke up a Tehran rally called
by the National Democratic Front, a newly organized left-of-center
political movement, to protest the Ayandegan closing.
(http://tinyurl.com/3cssq4)
1979 Aug 8, Iraqi president
Saddam Hussein executed 21 political opponents.
(www.foreignaffairs.org/1979/2.html)
1983 Aug 8, In Guatemala Gen’l.
Efrain Rios Montt (b.1926) was overthrown and the military
government of Gen. Humberto Mejia Victores took power.
(SFC, 7/5/96,
p.A13)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Efra%C3%ADn_R%C3%ADos_Montt)
1985 Aug 8, Mary Louise Brooks
(b.1906), American silent film star, died. In 1982 she authored her
memoir “Lulu in Hollywood.”
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louise_Brooks)
1987 Aug 8, In the Persian
Gulf, a Navy F-14 "Tomcat" fighter fired two missiles at an Iranian
jet approaching an unarmed U.S. scout plane. Both missiles missed
their target and the Iranian plane flew off.
(AP, 8/8/97)
1988 Aug 8, A renovated NYC
Central Park Zoo reopened after 4 years.
(http://nyzoosandaquarium.com/czabout)
1988 Aug 8, Sec. of State
Shultz narrowly escaped an assassination attempt in Bolivia.
(www.tkb.org/MorePatterns.jsp?countryCd=BL&year=1988)
1988 Aug 8, U.N.
Secretary-General Javier Perez de Cuellar announced a cease-fire
between Iran and Iraq. This became a Iraqi national holiday until it
was abolished in 2003.
(SFC, 2/24/9, p.A9)(AP, 8/8/98)(AP, 7/13/03)
1988 Aug 8-1988 Aug 13, Police
in Burma (Myanmar) killed nearly 3,000 protesters in the streets of
Rangoon.
(SFEC, 1/19/96, Par. p.5)(SFEC, 10/22/00, p.T8)
1989 Aug 8, The space shuttle
Columbia blasted off from Cape Canaveral, Fla., on a secret,
five-day military mission to deploy a new Pentagon spy satellite.
(AP, 8/8/99)(SSFC, 2/2/03, p.A6)
1990 Aug 8, Pete Rose began a
5-month prison term at Marion (IL) Federal prison camp.
(www.baseballlibrary.com/baseballlibrary/ballplayers/R/Rose_Pete.stm)
1990 Aug 8, As the Persian Gulf
crisis deepened, American forces began taking up positions in Saudi
Arabia; Iraq announced it had annexed Kuwait as its 19th province;
President Bush warned Iraqi President Saddam Hussein that "a line
has been drawn in the sand."
(AP, 8/8/00)
1991 Aug 8, James B. Irwin
(b.1930), Col USAF, astronaut (Apollo 15), died. He was the 8th
person to walk on the moon.
(www.astronautix.com/astros/irwin.htm)
1991 Aug 8, Lebanese kidnappers
freed British TV producer John McCarthy, held hostage for more than
five years; however, a rival group abducted Frenchman Jerome
Leyraud, threatening to kill him if any more hostages were released
Leyraud was freed three days later.
(AP, 8/8/01)
1991 Aug 8, The 2,120-foot
8-inch Radio One tower in Poland fell down.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warsaw_radio_mast)
1992 Aug 8, The U.S. basketball
"Dream Team" clinched the gold at the Barcelona Summer Olympics,
defeating Croatia 117-85.
(AP, 8/8/97)
1992 Aug 8, The space shuttle
Atlantis returned from a problem-plagued mission.
(AP, 8/8/97)
1992 Aug 8, AIDS activist
Alison Gertz died in New York at age 26.
(AP, 8/8/97)
1993 Aug 8, Freddie Woodruff
(b.1947), CIA agent chief in Tbilisi, Georgia, was shot and killed
during an outing with friends. Georgian authorities charged Anzor
Sharmaidze (20), a volunteer soldier, with the murder. Sharmaidze
confessed under torture and later said he was framed for the murder.
In 2008 Sharmaidze was granted parole from prison.
(WSJ, 10/18/08,
p.A1)(http://public.cq.com/docs/hs/hsnews110-000002604568.html)(WSJ,
10/27/08, p.a12)
1993 Aug 8, In Somalia, four
U.S. soldiers were killed when a land mine was detonated underneath
their vehicle. This prompted President Clinton to order Army Rangers
to try to capture Somali warlord Mohamed Farrah Aidid.
(AP, 8/8/98)
1994 Aug 8, Israel and Jordan
opened the first road link between the two once warring countries.
(AP, 8/8/99)
1995 Aug 8, President Clinton,
during a visit to Baltimore, ordered all companies doing business
with the federal government to report the pollution they cause.
(AP, 8/8/00)
1995 Aug 8, Hussein Kamel
al-Majid, formerly Iraq's industry minister, defected to Jordan with
his brother and their wives, both of whom were daughters of Saddam
Hussein. He vowed to topple Saddam and said that Sadam Hussein had
planned to invade Kuwait and Saudi Arabia this month and that Iraq
had been three months away from testing an atomic bomb before the
Gulf War began.
(WSJ, 8/21/95, p.A-1)(SFC, 9/4/96, p.A8)
1996 Aug 8, President Clinton
belittled Bob Dole's tax plan, vowing to oppose tax cuts that he
said the country couldn't afford. Republican sources, meanwhile,
said Dole was seriously considering Jack Kemp to be his running
mate.
(AP, 8/8/97)
1996 Aug 8, Sir Neville Mott
(1906-1996), who shared the 1977 Nobel Prize in physics with Philip
Anderson and John van Vleck for research on the behavior of
electricity in non-crystalline or so-called "disordered" materials,
died in London.
(SFC, 8/11/96, p.D5)
1996 Aug 8, Medical researchers
successfully cured patients with sickle-cell anemia by using a risky
bone-marrow transplant technique.
(WSJ, 7/8/96,p.A1)
1996 Aug 8, In Cambodia the
government announced an internal power struggle and split in the
Khmer Rouge. Leng Sary, a Pol Pot chum and the Khmer Rouge foreign
minister, opposed Son Sen, the minister of defense and led
defections that grew to 10,000.
(SFC, 8/12/96, p.A13)(SFC, 6/14/97, p.A15)(WSJ,
4/17/98, p.A13)
1996 Aug 8, Food poisoning due
to E. coli bacteria in the city of Sakai, Japan, was attributed to
radish sprouts.
(WSJ, 7/8/96,p.A1)
1997 Aug 8, US Sec. of State
Madeleine Albright announced that the bulk of US aid to Cambodia
would be suspended.
(SFC, 8/9/97, p.A9)
1997 Aug 8, The Teamsters and
United Parcel Service completed a second day of federally mediated
talks, with neither side reporting progress toward ending a strike.
(AP, 8/8/98)
1997 Aug 8, It was reported
that researchers have discovered how the defective gene in
Huntington’s disease causes the disorder. A genetic "stutter"
inserts from 30 to 150 copies of the amino acid glutamine into key
proteins and alters their properties.
(SFC, 8/8/97, p.A3)
1997 Aug 8, In Ddjelfa,
Algeria, a bomb in a baby bassinet killed 9 people. In the village
of Zeboudja insurgents slit the throats of 21 people and 20 others
were shot and wounded.
(SFC, 8/11/97, p.A8)
1997 Aug 8, Gen’l. Eric
Shinseki, the American in charge of NATO forces in Bosnia, announced
a plan to force all paramilitary troops to disband or face arrest.
(SFC, 8/9/97, p.A9)
1997 Aug 8, In Columbia Senator
Jorge Cristo and a bodyguard were killed in Cucuta. Police said
leftist guerrillas were responsible.
(SFC, 8/9/97, p.C1)
1997 Aug 8, The resumption of
limited oil sales by Iraq was cleared by the UN Security Council.
The UN plan allows the sale of $2 billion in crude oil every 6
months.
(SFC, 8/9/97, p.C1)
1997 Aug 8, Fighting broke out
on the Israel-Lebanon border when guerrillas fired rockets into
northern Israel and Israeli warplanes struck back. 13 people have
died since Aug 4 when Israeli commandos set off bombs behind the
front line killing 3 guerrilla field commanders and 2 fighters.
(SFC, 8/9/97, p.A8)
1997 Aug 8, In Kenya a
nationwide strike was called and declared illegal by the government.
In Nairobi a crowd of some 2,000 gathered and killed Gilbert Simiyu,
a plainclothes police officer. The strike turned into a riot with
looting.
(SFC, 8/9/97, p.C1)
1997 Aug 8, The largest int’l.
military exercise in Latvia’s history took place over 5 days at the
Adazi training center organized by the Northwest Europe Command.
Troops from 15 countries were to participate.
(BN, 6/97)
1997 Aug 8, In Peru at least 20
bus passengers were killed in a crash in the province of Cuzco. Some
80 people have died in 4 bus crashes in the last week.
(SFC, 8/9/97, p.C1)
1997 Aug 8, On St. Vincent
James and Penny Fletcher were acquitted of the murder of Jerome
Joseph after 9 months of incarceration.
(SFC, 8/9/97, p.A8)
1998 Aug 8, Pres. Clinton in
weekly radio address vowed the bombers of 2 US embassies in Africa
would be brought to justice, "no matter how long it takes or where
it takes us.''
(AP, 8/8/99)
1998 Aug 8, A riot broke out in
Reno, Nv., during the annual "Hot Autumn Nights" festival. There was
some property damage and a few minor injuries. 130 people were
arrested.
(SFC, 8/10/98, p.A2)
1998 Aug 8, In Afghanistan the
Taliban overran Mazar-i-Sharif and killed 9 of 11 diplomats from
Iran. 8 of the dead were diplomats, the 9th was a journalist. Later
reports indicated that the Taliban killed as many as 4,000
civilians, mostly Hazaras, in a campaign partly designed to wipe out
the Shiite Muslim minority. Hazara residents were given 3 choices:
convert to Sunni Islam, leave for Shiite Iran, or die.
(SFC, 9/11/98, p.D4)(SFC, 9/18/98, p.D8)(SFC,
2/19/01, p.A9)(SFC, 2/12/02, p.A16)
1998 Aug 8, A group called the
Liberation Arm of the Islamic Sanctuaries claimed responsibility for
the bombing of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania and threatened
more attacks. Israeli troops began to arrive to assist in rescue
efforts.
(SFC, 8/8/98, p.A1)(SFEC, 8/9/98, p.A1)(SFC,
8/10/98, p.A13)
1998 Aug 8, In Iran the first
daily newspaper dedicated to women’s issues, the daily Zan, was
launched by Faezeh Hashemi. She was the daughter of former Pres.
Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani.
(SFEC, 8/9/98, p.A16)
1998 Aug 8, In Northern Ireland
some 15,000 Apprentice Boys marched through Londonderry with a few
minor scuffles.
(SFEC, 8/9/98, p.A17)
1998 Aug 8, In Serbia Slobodan
Milijkovic, a Serb wanted by the Int’l. War Crimes Tribunal, was
shot and killed by a policeman along with 2 others following insults
at an outdoor cafe in Belgrade. Milijkovic, a suspected member of
the Chetnicks ultra-nationalist paramilitary unit, had rejected
responsibility and said politicians were to blame for the war.
(SFEC, 8/9/98, p.A17)
1998 Aug 8, From Sri Lanka it
was reported that recent fighting has left some 1,800 guerrillas and
1,600 government troops dead.
(SFC, 8/8/98, p.B1)
1999 Aug 8, Opening a new
attack on the Republican tax-cut measure, President Clinton warned
the nation’s governors at their meeting in St. Louis that the $792
billion package would trigger "huge cuts" in Medicare, farm programs
and other spending critical to their voters.
(AP, 8/8/00)
1999 Aug 8, In Guyana Pres.
Janet Jagan (78) announced that she was resigning due to ill health
and that Bharat Jagdeo (35), her finance minister, would succeed
her.
(SFC, 8/9/99, p.A9)
1999 Aug 8, In Honduras the
government began investigating the El Aguacate air base where human
remains had been discovered 4 days earlier. The site was a former
training base for Nicaraguan Contras.
(SFC, 8/9/99, p.A8)
1999 Aug 8, In Jerusalem Yasser
Arafat accepted Ehud Barak's proposal to delay land transfers and
troop withdrawals until October.
(SFC, 8/9/99, p.A8)
1999 Aug 8, In southern Lebanon
Israeli warplanes bombed suspected rebel positions after
Hezbollah guerrillas struck an Israeli outpost at Blatt.
(SFC, 8/9/99, p.A10)
1999 Aug 8, In southern Russia
federal forces opened fire from the ground and air on Islamic
militants in Dagestan. Prime minister Stepashin was in the capital
Makhachkala. The state is home to some 33 ethnic groups including
Wahhabi militants backed by Chechen commanders. Shamil Basayev, a
Chechen militant, declared Dagestan an independent Islamic state
within days of seizing several villages.
(SFC, 8/9/99, p.A11)(SFC, 8/14/99, p.A10)
1999 Aug 8, In Sierra Leone
rebels freed at least 19 of 35 captives taken on Aug 5.
(SFC, 8/9/99, p.A10)
1999 Aug 8, In Sweden AB Volvo
reached a deal to acquire Scania AB for $7.3 billion.
(WSJ, 8/9/99, p.A13)
2000 Aug 8, Vice President Al
Gore formally introduced and celebrated his Jewish running mate,
Senator Joseph Lieberman, during an appearance in Gore’s home state
of Tennessee.
(AP, 8/8/01)
2000 Aug 8, Audiotapes recorded
Enron traders deliberately congesting Western power lines: “If you
can congest it, that’s a moneymaker no matter what.”
(SFC, 6/15/04, p.A1)
2000 Aug 8, Some 109 nuclear
waste sites in 27 states, Puerto Rico and territorial islands of the
Pacific would remain dangerous for centuries according to a new
report by the US National Research Council.
(WSJ, 8/8/00, p.A24)
2000 Aug 8, The Civil War
submarine Hunley was raised and returned to Charleston, SC. State
Sen. Glenn McConnell raised funds for the Hunley project, which by
2006 reached $13.8 million, with another $15.5 million committed.
(SFC, 8/9/00, p.A3)(Econ, 4/10/04, p.25)
2000 Aug 8, In Bhutan flash
floods and mudslides left at least 50 people dead.
(SFC, 8/9/00, p.A14)
2000 Aug 8, Chile’s Supreme
Court stripped General Augusto Pinochet’s immunity, clearing the way
for the former dictator to be tried on human rights charges.
However, an appeals court later ruled Pinochet unfit to stand trial
because of his deteriorating health and mental condition.
(SFC, 8/9/00, p.A10)(AP, 8/8/01)
2000 Aug 8, In northeast India
flash floods and mudslides left at least 80 people dead and 2
million homeless.
(SFC, 8/9/00, p.A14)
2000 Aug 8, In Iran the daily
Bahar newspaper was closed by the hard-line judiciary for
"disturbing public opinion."
(SFC, 8/9/00, p.A14)
2000 Aug 8, In Kashmir the
militant Hizbul Mujahedeen called off its cease-fire.
(SFC, 8/9/00, p.A11)
2000 Aug 8, In Russia a bomb
exploded through an underground walkway in Moscow’s Pushkin
Square and at least 13 people were killed. Another bomb was found
and defused.
(SFC, 8/9/00, p.A1)(AP, 8/8/01)
2000 Aug 8, In Spain a car bomb
exploded in Madrid, where 11 people were injured and in Zumaia where
1 man was killed. The ETA was blamed.
(SFC, 8/9/00, p.A14)
2001 Aug 8, Four American
Senators met with Pres. Jiang Zemin in China and warned him that the
continued sales of sensitive missile technology would trigger an
arms race and boost internal US support for a missile defense
system.
(SFC, 8/9/01, p.A10)
2001 Aug 8, US Federal
authorities announced the arrests of 100 people nationwide in an
Internet child pornography operation, Landslide Productions Inc.,
based in Fort Worth, Tx.
(SFC, 8/9/01, p.A3)
2001 Aug 8, Maureen Reagan
(b.1941), daughter of former Pres. Ronald Reagan, died of malignant
melanoma. She authored the 1989 autobiography "First Father, First
Daughter."
(SFC, 8/9/01, p.A20)(NW, 12/31/01, p.106)
2001 Aug 8, In Argentina
thousands of state workers, students and jobless marched on Buenos
Aires for a 2nd day to protest government plans to cut wages and
pensions.
(SFC, 8/9/01, p.A9)
2001 Aug 8, In Bangladesh a
stampede of textile workers was caused by a false fire alarm and 23
people were crushed to death.
(WSJ, 8/9/01, p.A1)
2001 Aug 8, Jacques Kerchache
(b.1942), French explorer and collector of primitive art, died in
Cancun, Mexico.
(Econ, 4/16/11, p.91)(http://tinyurl.com/3pyax8r)
2001 Aug 8, In Iran Mohammad
Khatami was sworn in as president for a second term. Political
in-fighting with conservatives delayed the ceremony by 3 days.
(SFC, 8/9/01, p.A9)(AP, 8/8/02)
2001 Aug 8, In Italy police
chief Gianni de Gennaro acknowledged that excessive force had been
used against protesters of the Group 8 summit.
(SFC, 8/9/01, p.A8)
2001 Aug 8, In Lebanon up to
250 people were arrested in protests that demanded Syrian withdrawal
from Lebanon.
(SFC, 8/9/01, p.A9)
2001 Aug 8, In Macedonia
political leaders initialed a peace agreement as rebels ambushed an
army convoy and killed 10 soldiers.
(SFC, 8/9/01, p.A8)
2002 Aug 8, The FCC ordered TV
manufacturers to install tuners for digital signals in new TV sets
by 2007.
(SFC, 8/9/02, p.A1)
2002 Aug 8, Bankrupt
telecommunications firm WorldCom said it had uncovered another $3.3
billion in bogus accounting, adding to the $3.85 billion fraud it
revealed in June.
(AP, 8/8/03)
2002 Aug 8, In Oregon the
Florence and Sour Biscuit fires merged and formed the largest active
fire in the nation. The fire soon covered 308,000 acres.
(SFC, 8/9/02, p.A9)(SFC, 8/10/02, p.A5)
2002 Aug 8, Australia's highest
court ruled that Aborigines do not have rights to oil or minerals
found under tribal land now being used by mining companies.
(AP, 8/8/02)
2002 Aug 8, The Chinese
government awarded an Australian consortium a 25-year natural gas
supply contract in Australia's biggest-ever foreign trade deal.
(AP, 8/8/02)
2002 Aug 8, In Colombia
President Alvaro Uribe pressed ahead with Plan Meteor to equip 1
million citizens with radios to report on rebel activity.
(AP, 8/9/02)(SFC, 8/9/02, p.A20)
2002 Aug 8, In Indonesia
Lorenzo Taddei (34), an Italian tourist, was shot dead in Central
Sulawesi when gunmen fired on the bus he was traveling in.
(Reuters, 8/9/02)
2002 Aug 8, In Northern
Ireland gunmen shot the son of Protestant extremist Johnny
"Mad Dog" Adair in both legs, an act known as kneecapping.
(WSJ, 8/9/02, p.A1)
2002 Aug 8, Saddam Hussein
organized a big military parade and then warned "the forces of evil"
not to attack Iraq as he sought once more to shift the debate away
from world demands that he live up to agreements that ended the Gulf
War.
(AP, 8/8/03)
2002 Aug 8, Israeli troops and
tanks briefly swept into a town in the northern Gaza Strip for the
second time in two days, killing a youth and wounding three others
in a clash with Palestinian stone throwers. Negotiators failed to
reach agreement, but scheduled more talks on a gradual Israeli troop
pullback from some Palestinian areas.
(AP, 8/8/02)
2002 Aug 8, In Nigeria police
freed 46 captives many of them chained and badly beaten in raids on
five "torture centers" run by a feared vigilante group.
(AP, 8/9/02)
2002 Aug 8, South Korea said 10
people were dead after four days of torrential rains that North
Korea reported had also caused scores of casualties and destroyed
crops in the hungry communist state.
(Reuters, 8/8/02)
2002 Aug 8, Taiwan said it may
forge ahead with legislation for a referendum on formal independence
from China, but sought to soften the blow with an assurance it would
not hold a vote unless forced into a corner.
(AP, 8/8/02)
2002 Aug 8, The bodies of two
Uzbek prisoners, Muzafar Avazov and Khusnuddin Olimov, who died in
custody while jailed for alleged religious extremism were returned
to their families for burial. Both men were jailed for membership in
the banned Islamic group Hizb-ut-Tahrir.
(AP, 8/8/02)
2003 Aug 8, George Soros
pledged $10 million to a political action committee called America
Coming Together to defeat George Bush in 2004.
(AP, 8/8/03)
2003 Aug 8, A US federal judge
ruled that some 264,000 square miles of submerged lands in the
Northern Mariana Islands, a US commonwealth, belong to the United
States.
(AP, 8/8/03)
2003 Aug 8, The Boston Roman
Catholic archdiocese offered $55 million to settle lawsuits stemming
from sex abuse by priests. The archdiocese later settled for $85
million.
(AP, 8/8/04)
2003 Aug 8, In eastern Colombia
suspected rebels set off a car bomb near the Saravena airport,
killing five civilians, including two children.
(AP, 8/8/03)
2003 Aug 8, In India workers
camped out at a mountain tunnel were hit by a fierce overnight
thunderstorm near a Himalayan resort in Himachal Pradesh state,
leaving at least 26 dead.
(AP, 8/8/03)
2003 Aug 8, Mahmud Dhiyab
Al-Ahmad, Saddam Hussein's former interior minister, (No. 29 on the
list of 55 most-wanted Iraqis) surrendered to coalition forces.
(AP, 8/10/03)
2003 Aug 8, A West Bank raid on
a bomb lab by Israeli troops killed 2 members of the Islamic
militant group Hamas. An Israeli soldier also was killed.
(AP, 8/9/03)
2003 Aug 8, Hezbollah
guerrillas shelled Israeli positions in a disputed Lebanese border
region for the first time in eight months, drawing Israeli
airstrikes and artillery fire.
(AP, 8/8/03)
2004 Aug 8, The US military
said 2 American soldiers and their Afghan interpreter died when a
bomb hit their Humvee.
(AP, 8/8/04)
2004 Aug 8, Alan Keyes, the
Republican two-time presidential hopeful, threw his hat into
Illinois' Senate race (he ended up losing to Democrat Barack Obama).
(AP, 8/8/05)
2004 Aug 8, Fay Wray (b.1907),
film actress, died. She was best known for her 1933 performance in
“King Kong.”
(SFC, 8/10/04, p.B7)
2004 Aug 8, Traces of the
anti-depressant Prozac have been found in Britain's drinking water
supply, setting off alarm bells with environmentalists concerned
about potentially toxic effects. In the decade up to 2001, overall
prescriptions of antidepressants in Britain rose from 9 million to
24 million a year.
(AP, 8/8/04)
2004 Aug 8, Iraq reinstated
capital punishment for people guilty of murder, endangering national
security and distributing drugs.
(AP, 8/8/04)
2004 Aug 8, Iraq's chief
investigating judge said Ahmad Chalabi, a former Governing Council
member with strong U.S. ties, was wanted in Iraq on counterfeiting
charges, while Salem Chalabi, head of the special tribunal in charge
of trying Saddam, faced an arrest warrant for murder.
(AP, 8/9/04)
2004 Aug 8, Militants in Iraq
said they had taken a top Iranian diplomat hostage. Faridoun Jihani
was identified as the "consul for the Islamic Republic of Iran in
Karbala."
(AP, 8/8/04)
2004 Aug 8, In San Juan
Chamula, Mexico, hundreds of enraged residents of this impoverished
Indian community locked the mayor and three other municipal
officials in jail, claiming they embezzled funds from public works
projects.
(AP, 8/8/04)
2004 Aug 8, In Pakistan 2 bombs
ripped through an Islamic school, killing 8 and injuring 42.
(AP, 8/9/04)
2004 Aug 8, Pakistan confirmed
that Qari Saifullah Akhtar, a senior bin Laden operative, had been
captured in the UAR and transferred to Lahore.
(SFC, 8/9/04, p.A1)
2004 Aug 8, The death toll from
monsoons in South Asia reached 1,972. At least 1,152 have died in
India, 691 in Bangladesh, 124 in Nepal and 5 in Pakistan.
(AP, 8/8/04)(SSFC, 8/8/04, p.A3)
2004 Aug 8, President Leonid
Kuchma, joined by other top officials, attended the startup of
nuclear reactor No. 2 at the Khmelnitskyi plant in western Ukraine.
(AP, 8/8/04)
2005 Aug 8, Pres. Bush signed
the Energy Policy Act. The bill gave billions in tax breaks to
encourage homegrown energy production. Under the new law, effective
March 2007, Daylight Saving Time would begin three weeks earlier
than previously, on the second Sunday in March. DST would be
extended by one week to the first Sunday in November.
(www.energy.ca.gov/daylightsaving.html)(AP,
8/8/06)
2005 Aug 8, After orbiting the
Earth for nearly two weeks, astronauts aboard space shuttle
Discovery were told to circle the planet for another day as bad
weather in Florida forced NASA to delay Monday's scheduled landing.
(AP, 8/8/05)
2005 Aug 8, In California 42
inmates were injured when a simmering dispute between two ethnic
groups erupted into the largest riot at San Quentin State Prison in
23 years.
(AP, 8/9/05)
2005 Aug 8, Crude-oil prices
rallied to a new high above $63 a barrel.
(AP, 8/8/05)
2005 Aug 8, Barbara Bel Geddes
(82), stage and screen actress, died in Maine. She was best known
for her role as the matriarch on the TV series “Dallas.”
(SFC, 8/10/05, p.B7)
2005 Aug 8, John H. Johnson
(b.1919) founding publisher of Ebony (1945), Jet (1951), and Ebony
Man (1985), died in Chicago.
(HN, 11/1/98)(SFC, 8/8/05, p.B4)(AP, 8/8/06)
2005 Aug 8, In southern
Afghanistan one US service member and at least 16 suspected Taliban
rebels were killed in fighting.
(AP, 8/9/05)
2005 Aug 8-2005 Aug 9, In
Afghanistan US airstrikes during operations against militants killed
civilians and wounded others, including an infant according to local
villagers.
(AP, 8/11/05)
2005 Aug 8, Milan Lukic, a
former Bosnia Serb paramilitary leader, was captured in Argentina.
He was wanted by a U.N. tribunal on charges of crimes against
humanity.
(AP, 8/8/05)
2005 Aug 8, The EU head office
gave its clearance for the import of a genetically modified corn
product made by American biotechnology company Monsanto Co. for use
in animal feed.
(AP, 8/8/05)
2005 Aug 8, India and Pakistan
agreed to extend a two-year-old cease-fire in disputed Kashmir, but
did not discuss the question of reducing their military presence
there.
(AP, 8/8/05)
2005 Aug 8, In eastern India
suspected rebels launched renewed attacks overnight on pipelines,
leaving oil operations in the remote region in critical shape.
(AP, 8/8/05)
2005 Aug 8, Health officials in
Indonesia reported 205 children with polio.
(WSJ, 8/9/05, p.A1)
2005 Aug 8, Iran resumed
uranium conversion activities at its Isfahan nuclear facility, a
step that Europeans and the US warned would prompt them to seek UN
sanctions against Tehran.
(AP, 8/8/05)
2005 Aug 8, In Iraq armed men
deposed Baghdad’s Mayor Alaa al-Tamini. They installed Hussein
al-Tahaan, a member of the Badr organization, and governor of
Baghdad province.
(SFC, 8/10/05, p.A3)
2005 Aug 8, Japanese lawmakers
rejected legislation to split up and sell the nation's postal
service, leading PM Junichiro Koizumi to call snap elections next
month. He promised to make the vote a referendum on his reform plan
and pledged to resign if it fails.
(AP, 8/8/05)
2005 Aug 8, In Saudi Arabia
King Abdullah pardoned 4 prominent activists who were jailed after
criticizing the strict religious environment and the slow pace of
democratic reform.
(AP, 8/8/05)
2006 Aug 8, The US Federal
Reserve halted interest rate hikes at 5.25%. the DJIA fell 45.79 to
11,173. Nasdaq fell 11.65 to 2,060. Jeffrey Lacker, head of the
Richmond Fed, voted against the decision halt rate hikes.
(SFC, 8/9/06, p.C1)(Econ, 8/12/06, p.59)
2006 Aug 8, Medicare said it
plans to cut doctor payment rates by 5.1% and force hospitals to
disclose financial data.
(WSJ, 8/9/06, p.A1)
2006 Aug 8, Voters in
Connecticut rejected three-term Sen. Joe Lieberman for Ned Lamont, a
political newcomer, in the nation's first major test of the depth of
anger over the Iraq war. Lieberman ended up winning re-election to
the Senate by running as an independent
(AP, 8/9/06)(AP, 8/8/07)
2006 Aug 8, Roger Goodell was
chosen as the NFL's next commissioner.
(AP, 8/8/07)
2006 Aug 8, In Indianapolis,
Indiana, a fatal stabbing boosted the homicides to 13 in just one
week in the midst of an upsurge of violence that has police working
longer shifts and saturating high-crime areas.
(AP, 8/8/06)
2006 Aug 8, In eastern
Afghanistan US military killed 15 insurgents who attacked a US base
in Nuristan province. 12 militants and 8 policemen were killed in
fighting in Kandahar.
(AP, 8/9/06)(AP, 8/10/06)
2006 Aug 8, Clive Goodman,
royal editor at Britain’s News of the World, and Glenn Mulcaire, a
private investigator, were arrested for hacking phones between
November 2005 and August 2006. Both men were jailed in January,
2007.
(Econ, 7/16/11, p.26)
2006 Aug 8, Chad and Sudan
agreed to reopen their borders and resume diplomatic relations that
they severed in a dispute four months ago.
(AP, 8/9/06)
2006 Aug 8, In Chile police
used tear gas and water cannons to disperse about 2,000
rock-throwing students seeking better equipment for 21 schools in
the Santiago area.
(AP, 8/8/06)
2006 Aug 8, Gustavo Arcos
Bergnes (79), who fought alongside Fidel Castro in the Cuban
revolution but was later imprisoned as a dissident, died in Havana.
(AP, 8/8/06)
2006 Aug 8, A car bomb killed a
prosecutor in Dagestan, Russia, and two police were shot dead as
they arrived on the scene.
(AP, 8/8/06)
2006 Aug 8, Eritrea announced
that Brigadier General Kemal Gelchu, a dissident Ethiopian general,
had defected to Eritrea, said that he would be joining the OLF to
fight for his Oromo people's rights.
(Econ, 8/19/06, p.44)
2006 Aug 8, Gunmen with
automatic weapons stormed Kaieteur News, Guyana's largest newspaper,
killing at least six people and wounding three in an attack that may
have been connected to a simultaneous protest at the nation's main
prison.
(AP, 8/9/06)
2006 Aug 8, Indian officials
said flooding caused by monsoon rains have killed 69 people in
western India in the past three days, and caused tens of thousands
to flee their homes.
(AP, 8/8/06)
2006 Aug 8, Indonesian health
officials said 2 teenagers have died of bird flu. This would bring
Indonesia's death toll to 44 and make it the world's hardest-hit
country.
(AP, 8/8/06)
2006 Aug 8, A series of
bombings and shootings killed at least 31 people in Baghdad and
other parts of Iraq as more US troops were seen in the capital as
part of Operation Together Forward, a campaign to reduce
Sunni-Shiite violence that threatened civil war. A US Army
helicopter crashed in Iraq's western Anbar province, leaving two
crew members missing and four injured. A policeman was killed and
another wounded when they were trying to defuse a roadside bomb in
Samarra. An explosion at a mosque in Baqouba left four people dead.
(AP, 8/8/06)(AP, 8/9/06)(Econ, 9/2/06, p.44)
2006 Aug 8, Israeli forces
battled Hezbollah guerrillas across southern Lebanon as diplomats at
the United Nations struggled to keep a peace plan from collapsing
over Arab demands for an immediate Israeli withdrawal. At least 19
Lebanese civilians were killed in Israeli airstrikes. Israel
reported five soldiers killed.
(AP, 8/8/06)(AP, 8/9/06)
2006 Aug 8, The Philippine
Congress began hearing new impeachment complaints against President
Gloria Arroyo, linking her to corruption and human rights abuses and
alleging she cheated in the 2004 election.
(AFP, 8/8/06)
2006 Aug 8, Russian officials
said drawings by the late architect Yakov Chernikhov (d.1951), worth
millions of dollars, had disappeared from the Russian State Archive
of Literature and Art. Chernikhov was widely admired for his
avant-garde and constructivist designs. Rosokhrankultura said it
became aware of the Chernikhov thefts after nine missing drawings
were sold at auction by auction house Christie's on June 22.
(AP, 8/8/06)
2006 Aug 8, In Sri Lanka Tamil
rebels released water from a disputed reservoir, ending a 19-day
blockade that sparked some of the worst fighting between government
troops and guerrillas in four years. In Colombo a car bomb killed
two people, including a 3-year-old girl.
(AP, 8/8/06)
2006 Aug 8, Turkey battled the
largest recorded outbreak of Crimean-Congo Hemorrhagic Fever, which
has killed at least 20 people this year, and experts said more cases
of the Ebola-like disease are inevitable in coming months.
(AP, 8/8/06)
2006 Aug 8, Five Yemeni army
officers were killed when their military helicopter crashed during a
heavy rainstorm.
(AP, 8/9/06)
2007 Aug 8, The US space
shuttle Endeavour and a crew of 7 took off from Cape Canaveral, Fl.,
on a special mission. Teacher-astronaut Barbara Morgan was part of
the crew.
(SFC, 8/9/07, p.A7)
2007 Aug 8, Researchers from
the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill reported that coral
coverage in the Indo-Pacific, an area stretching from Indonesia's
Sumatra island to French Polynesia, had dropped 20 percent in the
past two decades. They said the decline was driven by climate
change, disease and coastal development.
(AP, 8/8/07)
2007 Aug 8, In SF Donald Fisher
(78) and his wife Doris, founders of Gap (a chain of clothing
stores), announced plans to build the Contemporary Art Museum of the
Presidio.
(SFC, 8/8/07, p.A3)
2007 Aug 8, Virgin America,
part of Richard Branson’s Virgin Group, made its inaugural flight
from JFK to San Francisco. For the first nine months of 2008 Virgin
announced a $174.5 million loss on $259 million in revenue.
(SFC, 1/3/11, p.D2)
2007 Aug 8, A tornado struck
Brooklyn, NY. This was the first ever tornado in recorded history to
touch down in Brooklyn. It was the first tornado to hit New York
City since 2003, when a weak tornado touched down in Staten Island,
and only the sixth tornado recorded in the city since 1950.
(http://nymag.com/restaurants/features/37273/)(http://tinyurl.com/3a2npv)
2007 Aug 8, Melville Shavelson
(90), comedy writer, producer and director, died in Studio City, Ca.
His films included “Cast a Giant Shadow” (1966). His books included
“How to Make a Jewish Movie.”
(SFC, 8/10/07, p.B9)
2007 Aug 8, Argentine
authorities said they were investigating why Venezuelan businessman
Antonini Wilson was carrying $800,000 in undeclared cash aboard an
executive jet charted by Argentina's state energy company. In
December US prosecutors said that the suitcase full of Venezuelan
cash was intended to finance the presidential campaign of Cristina
Kirchner.
(AP, 8/8/07)(AP, 12/13/07)
2007 Aug 8, Australia's central
bank hiked interest rates 0.25 points to a decade-high 6.5 percent
in an unprecedented pre-election move that the government admitted
creates a political headache.
(AFP, 8/8/07)
2007 Aug 8, An Austrian federal
court rejected Kazakhstan's request to have its ex-ambassador to
Austria, a former son-in-law of the Central Asian nation's
autocratic president, extradited to face kidnapping charges in his
homeland.
(AP, 8/8/07)
2007 Aug 8, Researchers from
Belgium and China said a simple blood test can detect early stage
liver cancer and more accurately diagnose the disease that is a
major killer in Asia and Africa.
(Reuters, 8/9/07)
2007 Aug 8, A British air force
helicopter crashed near an army base in northern England, killing
two military personnel and injuring 10.
(AP, 8/9/07)
2007 Aug 8, Beijing began the
one-year countdown to the 2008 Olympics. Jacques Rogge, president of
the International Olympic Committee, acknowledged that Beijing's air
pollution could force the postponement of outdoor events during next
year's Olympics.
(AP, 8/7/07)(AP, 8/8/07)
2007 Aug 8, An international
team of researchers said the long-threatened Yangtze River dolphin
in China is probably extinct. They also said this would mark the
first whale or dolphin to be wiped out due to human activity.
(Reuters, 8/8/07)
2007 Aug 8, In southwest
Colombia families confirmed that two military officers kidnapped
four months ago by leftist rebels have died in captivity. Army Sgts.
Alexander Cardona and Jesus Sol were taken hostage by the
Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), while on patrol near
their homes.
(AP, 8/9/07)
2007 Aug 8, A report by the
Egyptian Organization for Human Rights detailed 567 cases of police
torture in the last 14 years, of which 167 led to the victim’s
death.
(Econ, 9/1/07, p.38)(www.eohr.org/)
2007 Aug 8, Ethiopia said it
had killed more than 500 rebels and captured 170 in the past two
months during an offensive in the volatile but energy-rich Ogaden
region bordering Somalia.
(AP, 8/8/07)
2007 Aug 8, Ma Lik (55), the
leader of Hong Kong's leading pro-Beijing political party, DAB, died
of complications from colon cancer.
(AP, 8/8/07)
2007 Aug 8, In northeastern
India's Assam state suspected separatist rebels fatally shot 12
people in two separate attacks. Police suspect the attack was
carried out jointly by the United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA)
and another local insurgent group, the Karbi Longri National
Liberation Front, which is fighting for autonomy for people of the
Karbi tribe.
(AP, 8/9/07)
2007 Aug 8, Millions of people
in Jakarta, the Indonesian capital, voted for governor for the first
time, the latest in a wave of local elections hailed as key to
strengthening democracy in the world's most populous Muslim nation.
(AP, 8/8/07)
2007 Aug 8, Iraqi PM Nouri
al-Maliki arrived in Iran for talks expected to focus on bilateral
relations and overcoming "terrorism challenges." Iraqis told they
will not get automatic asylum in Britain despite braving death
threats to work alongside British troops will now have their cases
reviewed. US-led forces swooped into the Shiite militia stronghold
of Sadr City, killing 32 suspected militants and detaining 12 others
in fighting and an airstrike targeting alleged smuggling networks
from Iran. Police and witnesses said 9 civilians were killed in the
attack.
(AP, 8/8/07)
2007 Aug 8, Israeli soldiers
shot and killed three Palestinian militants near Israel's border
with the Gaza Strip in two separate incidents.
(AP, 8/8/07)
2007 Aug 8, Mauritania passed a
law promising prison time for people who keep slaves, a monumental
step in the northwest African nation's push to eliminate the
long-standing practice. The government officially abolished slavery
in 1981, but no one has ever been prosecuted for it and no law
created a punishment.
(AP, 8/9/07)
2007 Aug 8, In Nigeria
kidnappers released a British and a Bulgarian hostage in the
southern oil region, while the young son of a local legislator was
seized in a separate incident and gunbattles raged for a third day.
(AP, 8/8/07)
2007 Aug 8, Pakistani security
forces killed three separatist militants after they were fired on
while surveying a flood-hit area in southwestern Baluchistan
province.
(Reuters, 8/8/07)
2007 Aug 8, In South Africa
Pres. Mbeki dismissed deputy health minister Nozizwe
Madlala-Routledge following reports that she had gone to Spain to
attend an AIDS conference without his permission. AIDS activists
have been highly critical of her boss, Health Minister Manto
Tshabalala-Msimang, who promoted garlic and lemons as a remedy for
AIDS and mistrusted antiretroviral medicines.
(AP, 8/10/07)
2007 Aug 8, Venezuela's
socialist President Hugo Chavez took a campaign of petrodollar
diplomacy to Uruguay, seeking stronger political ties while offering
energy aid from one of the world's largest oil producers.
(AP, 8/8/07)
2007 Aug 8, In Vietnam
officials said at least 34 people have died and 17 more were missing
and feared dead after Tropical Storm Pabuk lashed the country.
(AP, 8/8/07)
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)
2009 Aug 8, Sonia Sotomayor was
sworn-in as the first Hispanic on the US Supreme Court.
(AP, 8/8/09)
2009 Aug 8, In Dinuba, Ca., a
car fleeing from police ran a stop sign and slammed into a pickup,
killing three people in the car and four young children in the
truck.
(AP, 8/9/09)
2009 Aug 8, In Chino, Ca., a
2-day prison riot began. It housed almost twice as many prisoners as
it was designed for and was typical of California’s 33 state
prisons. At this time California spent about $49,000 a year on each
prisoner, almost twice the national average.
(Econ, 8/15/09, p.28)
2009 Aug 8, Continental Express
Flight 2816, en route with 47 passengers to Minneapolis from
Houston, was stranded overnight at Rochester, Minn., after being
forced to land due to storms. On Nov 24 the Dept. of Transportation
levied $175,000 in fines against Continental, ExpressJet and Mesaba
Airlines for keeping the plane on the tarmac.
(SFC, 11/25/09, p.A6)
2009 Aug 8, Near Hoboken, New
Jersey, 9 people died in an air collision over the Hudson River,
including 3 members of a Pennsylvania family in the private plane
and five Italian tourists and a pilot from New Jersey in a Liberty
Tours helicopter.
(AP, 8/9/09)(SSFC, 8/9/09, p.A9)
2009 Aug 8, NATO helicopters
wounded five Afghan police by mistake during a battle with
insurgents in Ghazni province. A British soldier, serving with
NATO's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), was killed by
an improvised explosive device (IED). A US soldier was killed in the
south in a hostile fire incident.
(Reuters, 8/8/09)(AFP, 8/9/09)(AP, 8/11/09)
2009 Aug 8, In China hundreds
of villagers rioted after news broke about the lead poisoning at the
Wugang Manganese Smelting Plant in Wenping township, central Hunan
province. A crowd of 600 to 700 people overturned four police cars
and smashed a local government sign. China later detained two
factory officials after 1,354 children were reported poisoned by
lead pollution from the manganese processing plant.
(AP, 8/20/09)
2009 Aug 8, India’s army said
its troops killed three Islamic militants along the de facto Kashmir
border, thwarting the seventh attempt by rebels to infiltrate from
Pakistan in a week.
(AFP, 8/8/09)
2009 Aug 8, In northern India
landslides triggered by heavy rains killed at least 43 people in
three remote villages in Pithoragarh district of Uttarakhand state.
(AP, 8/9/09)
2009 Aug 8, Indonesian police
reportedly killed Noordin Mohammad Top, the self-proclaimed
Southeast Asian commander of al-Qaida, in a 16-hour siege of a
village hide-out in Central Java. Authorities said they could not
confirm that a recovered body was that of the militant leader
without DNA tests. DNA tests failed to confirm Top’s death. Police
raided a house on the outskirts of Jakarta where they killed two
suspected militants and seized bombs and a car rigged to carry them.
The house was just 3 miles (5 kilometers) from the president's
residence.
(AP, 8/8/09)(AP, 8/9/09)(AP, 8/12/09)
2009 Aug 8, In northern Italy
rules for officially condoned vigilante groups took effect.
(Econ, 8/15/09, p.46)
2009 Aug 8, In Mauritania a
suicide bomber killed himself outside the French Embassy, wounding
two embassy guards and a woman in the street. An African branch of
Al-Qaida later said the attack was a response to the aggression of
"crusaders" including former colonial ruler France, and to
Mauritanian leaders against Islam and Muslims.
(AP, 8/8/09)(AP, 8/18/09)
2009 Aug 8, In Mexico
assailants in the state of Guerrero opened fire on a car carrying a
couple and their 3-year-old son, killing all three. In Chihuahua
gunmen killed four people in an attack in a bar.
(AP, 8/10/09)
2009 Aug 8, In Moldova the four
pro-Western parties that upset the Communists in recent elections
agreed on a coalition deal to form a new government.
(AP, 8/8/09)
2009 Aug 8, Myanmar government
troops seized a weapons factory near the Chinese border after being
informed about it during a ministerial meeting with China on
combating transnational crime. This triggered several days of
clashes with an ethnic militia that sent more than 30,000 refugees
fleeing across the border into China.
(AP, 9/9/09)
2009 Aug 8, In Pakistan a
gunfight between militants and supporters of a pro-government tribal
elder killed 6 militants and 2 tribesmen in the Mohmand tribal
region near the Afghan border.
(AFP, 8/9/09)
2009 Aug 8, Palestinian
President Mahmoud Abbas was named head of his Fatah movements at his
party's first conference in two decades, strengthening the hand of
the Western-backed leader in his bid to revive peace talks with
Israel.
(AP, 8/8/09)
2009 Aug 8, Russian President
Dmitry Medvedev hailed the Russian victory in a war with Georgia a
year ago, saying the war had redrawn the map of the Caucasus for
good.
(Reuters, 8/8/09)
2009 Aug 8, In Somalia’s pirate
stronghold of Harardhere, fighting over the last 24 hours killed at
least 12 people. A dispute over a car escalated as clan militias got
involved. Mortar shells slammed into a busy market in the capital,
Mogadishu, killing six people and wounding 18.
(AP, 8/8/09)
2009 Aug 8, In South Africa US
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and South African President Jacob
Zuma pledged to cement closer ties between their new
administrations.
(AFP, 8/8/09)
2009 Aug 8, Sri Lanka held
local elections near an area once dominated by the Tamil Tiger
rebels, but voters largely stayed away from the polls in the
violence-scarred region. Voter turnout was 22% in Jaffna and 52% in
Vavuniya, according to election monitors. The pro-Tiger Tamil
National Alliance (TNA) scored unexpected success with 8 of 23 seats
in Jaffna and 5 of 11 seats in Vavuniya.
(AP, 8/8/09)(Econ, 8/15/09, p.35)
2009 Aug 8, Typhoon Morakot
lashed Taiwan with powerful winds and downpours leaving at least one
person killed and five missing.
(AFP, 8/8/09)
2009 Aug 8, Venezuela’s
President Hugo Chavez said he's returning his ambassador to
Colombia, moving to resolve rising diplomatic tensions after weapons
sold to Venezuela were found in a rebel cache.
(AP, 8/8/09)
2010 Aug 8, In San Francisco
German tourist Mechthild Schroer was killed by a stray bullet
outside a comedy club at 414 Mason. On May 4, 2011, police arrested
7 of 8 young men accused of taking part in the gang gunbattle.
(SFC, 5/5/11, p.A1)
2010 Aug 8,
Patricia Neal (84), American actress, died at her home in
Massachusetts. Her films included “The Fountainhead” (1949), “The
Day the Earth Stood Still” (1951), “Hud” (1963) and “A Face in the
Crowd” (1957). Her 1988 autobiography was titled ”As I Am.”
(SFC, 8/9/10, p.A6)
2010 Aug 8, Matthew Simmons
(67), who rattled the energy industry by arguing the world was
rapidly approaching peak oil production capacity, died at his home
in North Haven, Maine. In his 2005 book "Twilight in the Desert,"
Simmons argued Saudi Arabia's oil reserves were nearing the highest
levels of production they were capable of achieving, after which
point the world's yearly oil supply would begin to decline.
(Reuters, 8/9/10)
2010 Aug 8, In Afghanistan
Pres. Karzai said foreign security companies should all be replaced
by Afghan police, the same day that the bodies of 10 members of a
medical team, killed on Aug 5, were returned to Kabul. 52 companies
employed about 30,000 people, most of them former military officers.
(SSFC, 8/15/10, p.E7)(http://tinyurl.com/34uqwfs)
2010 Aug 8, Arab League chief
Amr Moussa signed a letter asking for backing of a resolution urging
Washington and other powers to end support of Israel's nuclear
secrecy and to push the Jewish state to allow international
inspections of its program. Arab nations planned submit the request
to the September assembly of the International Atomic Energy Agency.
(AP, 8/15/10)
2010 Aug 8, In China landslides
in the northwestern province of Gansu left at least 337 people dead
in the deadliest incident so far in the country's worst flooding in
a decade. More than 1,148 were missing.
(AP, 8/10/10)
2010 Aug 8, In Iraq a suicide
car bomber struck a police patrol west of Baghdad and killed 8
people, mostly civilians. Gunmen armed with AK-47 rifles boarded 4
commercial ships in a two-hour time span in the vicinity of an oil
terminal in the northern Persian Gulf. The assailants took
computers, cell phones and money from crew members before fleeing.
The interrogation of two Iraqis arrested after the incident
indicated it was a robbery attempt without a larger agenda.
(SFC, 8/9/10, p.A2)(AP, 8/16/10)
2010 Aug 8, Libya's government
announced it will pay compensation to some people it had wrongfully
imprisoned, the latest step in an effort to draw a line under a
history of human rights abuses.
(Reuters, 8/8/10)
2010 Aug 8, Former Mexican
Pres. Vincente Fox, who was a key US ally in the war on drugs,
backed the legalization of drugs, saying prohibition has failed to
curb Mexico's spiraling violence and corruption.
(Reuters 8/910)
2010 Aug 8, North Korean
authorities seized a South Korean fishing boat and its 7-man crew.
North Korea freed the crew on Sep 7.
(SFC, 8/9/10, p.A2)(AP, 9/7/10)
2010 Aug 8, South African
journalists launched a campaign to fight what they say is an attempt
to curtail media freedoms in a nation known for one of Africa's
freest and most open constitutions.
(AP, 8/8/10)
2010 Aug 8, In Spain people
began complaining of jellyfish attacks. Over the next three days
some 700 people were stung at three beaches on the Costa Blanca near
Elche, where normally just a handful get stung daily.
(AP, 8/11/10)
2010 Aug 8, Gunmen in south
Sudan killed 23 people, including police officers, in an ambush on a
truck in the key oil producing state of Unity, Koch county.
(AFP, 8/11/10)
2010 Aug 8, Venezuela’s Pres.
Chavez rejected Larry Palmer as the US ambassador to Caracas citing
comments by Palmer regarding low morale in Venezuela’s military.
(SFC, 8/9/10, p.A1)
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