Today in History - December 6
Return to home
1160 Dec 6,
Jean Bodel's "Jeu de St Nicholas," premiered in Arras, France.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1240 Dec 6, Mongols under Batu
Khan occupied and destroyed Kiev.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1421 Dec 6, Henry VI, the
youngest king of England, was born. He acceded the thrown at 269
days of age.
(HN,
12/6/02)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_VI_of_England)
1424 Dec 6, Don Alfonso V of
Aragon granted Barcelona the right to exclude Jews.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1527 Dec 6, Pope Clemens VII
fled to Orvieto.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1531 Dec 6, John Volkertsz
Trimaker, Dutch Anabaptist leader, was beheaded.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1534 Dec 6, Quito, Ecuador, was
founded by Spanish.
(http://worldfacts.us/Ecuador-Quito.htm)
1608 Dec 6, George Monck
(Monk), English general and gov. of Scotland, was born.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1631 Dec 6, The 1st predicted
transit of Venus took place. It had been predicted by Kepler, but he
died a year before the event.
(MC, 12/6/01)(Econ, 5/29/04, p.78)
1640 Dec 6, Matthijs Elsevier
(75), Flemish-Dutch book publisher and merchant, died.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1648 Dec 6, Pride's Purge:
Thomas Pride prevented 96 Presbyterians from sitting in English
Parliament.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1732 Dec 6, Warren Hastings,
England, 1st governor-General of India (1773-84), was born.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1741 Dec 5-6, Russian princess
Elisabeth Petrovna grabbed power. Petrovna (31), the daughter of
Peter the Great, and her husband led a coup d’etat, deposed the
infant Czar Ivan VI, had him imprisoned and reigned until her death
in 1762.
(PCh, 1992, p.294)(MC, 12/5/01)
1743 Dec 6, Franz Nikolaus
Novotny, composer, was born.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1745 Dec 6, Bonnie Prince
Charlie's army retreated to Scotland.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1756 Dec 6, British troops
under Robert Clive occupied Fulta, India.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1741 Dec 6, In Russia Elizabeth
Petrovna (31), the daughter of Peter the Great, and her husband led
a coup d’etat. She deposed the infant Czar Ivan VI, had him
imprisoned and reigned until her death in 1762.
(PCh, 1992, p.294)
1775 Dec 6, Nicolas Isouard,
composer, was born.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1779 Dec 6, Jean-Baptiste
Simeon Chardin (80), French still life painter, died.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1790 Dec 6, Congress moved from
New York City to Philadelphia.
(AP, 12/6/97)
1793 Dec 6, Marie Jeanne Becu,
Comtesse du Barry, flamboyant mistress of Louis XV, was guillotined
in Paris.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1805 Dec 6, Nicholas-Jacques
Conti (b.1755), French pencil maker, died in Paris. He created the
number system used to rate pencil lead hardness: the higher the
number, the harder the graphite.
(SSFC, 1/23/05, p.C2)
1806 Dec 6, The African Meeting
House was dedicated in Boston. It was later used by Frederick
Douglass and other prominent abolitionists to rail against slavery.
In 1974 it was named as a National History Landmark. In 2011 a $9
million restoration was completed.
(SFC, 11/28/11,
p.A5)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_Meeting_House)
1812 Dec 6, The majority of
Napoleon Bonaparte's Grand Armeé staggered into Vilnius,
Lithuania, ending the failed Russian campaign. An estimated 50,000
soldiers reached Lithuania and as many as 20,000 died there. As many
as 450,000 soldiers from France, Italy, Spain, Croatia, Germany and
at least 15 other countries died in the Russian campaign.
(HN, 12/6/99)(Arch, 9/02, p.41)
1820 Dec 6, James Monroe, the
5th US president, was elected for a 2nd term.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1822 Dec 6, John Eberhard was
born. He built the 1st large-scale pencil factory in US.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1833 Dec 6, John Singleton
Mosby (d.1916), lawyer and Col. ("Grey Ghost" of Confederate Army),
was born. He later gave riding lessons to young George Patton.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1833 Dec 6, HMS Beagle and
Charles Darwin departed Rio de la Plata.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1841 Dec 6, Robert Schumann's
4th Symphony in D, premiered.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1846 Dec 6, Hector Berlioz'
opera "La Damnation de Faust" was produced in Paris.
(MC, 12/6/01)(WSJ, 7/1/03, p.D8)
1849 Dec 6, Harriet Tubman
escaped from slavery in Maryland.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1861 Dec 6, Union General
George G. Meade led a foraging expedition to Gunnell’s farm near
Dranesville, Va.
(HN, 12/6/98)
1862 Dec 6, President Lincoln
ordered the hanging of 39 of the 303 convicted Indians who
participated in the Sioux Uprising in Minnesota. They were to be
hanged on Dec. 26. The Dakota Indians were going hungry when food
and money from the federal government was not distributed as
promised. They led a massacre that left over 400 white people dead.
The uprising was put down and 300 Indians were sentenced to death.
Pres. Lincoln reduced the number to 39, who were hanged. The
government then nullified the 1851 treaty.
(WSJ, 2/5/98, p.A6)(HN, 12/6/98)
1863 Dec 6, The monitor
Weehawken sank in the Charleston Harbor.
(HN, 12/6/98)
1866 Dec 6, Chicago’s water
supply tunnel into Lake Michigan was completed.
(SSFC, 8/18/02,
p.C12)(http://tinyurl.com/7zmyr6v)
1867 Dec 6, Giovanni Pacini
(71), composer, died.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1876 Dec 6, US Electoral
College picked Republican Hayes as president, although Tilden won
the popular election. A questionable vote count in Florida ended and
Hayes was ahead by 924 votes. The Democratic attorney general
validated the Tilden electors.
(WSJ, 12/11/00, p.A18)(MC, 12/6/01)
1876 Dec 6, The 1st US
crematorium began operation in Washington, Penn.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1876 Dec 6, Jack McCall was
convicted for the murder of Wild Bill Hickok and sentenced to hang.
(HN, 12/6/98)
1877 Dec 6, Washington Post
published its 1st edition.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1877 Dec 6, Thomas A. Edison
made the first sound-recording when he recited “Mary had a Little
Lamb” into his phonograph machine.
(HN, 12/6/98)
1882 Dec 6, Anthony Trollope
(b.1815), English writer, died. His autobiography “An
Autobiography,” was published in 1883. He wrote harshly about his
mother and made her out to be a second-rate writer.
(WUD, 1994 p.1517)(WSJ, 12/11/98, p.W10)(WSJ,
6/9/00, p.W17)(MC, 12/6/01)
1884 Dec 6, The Washington
Monument was completed by Army engineers 101 years after George
Washington himself approved the location halfway between the
proposed sites of the Capitol and the White House. Construction did
not begin on the 555-foot Egyptian obelisk until July 4, 1848, when
a private citizens' group, the Washington National Monument Society,
raised enough money to begin the project. The original design called
for the familiar obelisk surrounded by a large building with a
statue of Washington driving a Roman chariot on top. Construction
was halted in 1854 when the money ran out and for 22 years the
monument stood embarrassingly unfinished, looking, as Mark Twain put
it, like "a factory chimney with the top broken off." In 1876,
President Ulysses S. Grant authorized the funds to complete the
construction--but without the ornate building and classical statue.
When the final capstone and 9-inch aluminum pyramid were set in
place in 1884, the Washington Monument was the tallest structure in
the world.
(AP, 12/6/97)(HNPD, 12/6/98)
1886 Dec 6, Joyce Kilmer
(d.1918), American poet best known for his poem "Trees," was born.
Kilmer was killed by a sniper in WW I.
(HN, 12/6/98)(WUD, 1994 p.786)
1898 Dec 6, Alfred Eisenstaedt,
photojournalist, was born.
(HN, 12/6/00)
1898 Dec 6, Gunnar Myrdal,
Swedish economist and sociologist, was born.
(HN, 12/6/00)
1889 Dec 6, Jefferson Davis
(81), the first and only president of the Confederate States of
America (1861-1865), died in New Orleans. In 2001 William J. Cooper
Jr. authored “Jefferson Davis, American.”
(AP, 12/6/97)(SSFC, 1/28/01, Par p.12)(MC,
12/6/01)
1892 Dec 6, E. Werner von
Siemens (75), German industrialist (Siemens AG), died.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1896 Dec 6, Ira Gershwin
(d.1983), lyricist ('S Wonderful, I Got Rhythm), was born. Together
with his brother, George, he wrote 14 Broadway musicals. Many of his
700 songs were written with other composers.
(SFC, 12/4/96, p.E1)(SFC, 5/10/97, p.E1)
1898 Dec 6, Alfred Eisenstaedt,
photojournalist, was born.
(HN, 12/6/02)
1898 Dec 6, Gunnar Myrdal,
Swedish economist and sociologist, was born.
(HN, 12/6/00)
1901 Dec 6, Eliot Porter,
nature photographer, was born.
(HN, 12/6/00)
1904 Dec 6, Theodore Roosevelt
confirmed the Monroe-doctrine (Roosevelt Corollary).
(MC, 12/6/01)
1906 Dec 6, Lt. Thomas E.
Selfridge flew a powered, man-carrying kite that carried him 168
feet in the air for seven minutes at Baddeck, Nova Scotia.
(HN, 12/6/98)
1907 Dec 6, The worst mining
disaster in U.S. history occurred as 362 men and boys died in a coal
mine explosion in Monongah, W.Va.
(AP, 12/6/07)
1908 Dec 6, First flight of the
Silverdart with Canadian JAD McCurdy at the controls.
(HN, 12/6/98)
1913 Dec 6, President Woodrow
Wilson signed the Raker Act into law. It authorized SF rights to dam
the Tuolumne River in Yosemite National Park for water-collection
and power-generation facilities.
(www.sfwater.org/)
1914 Dec 6, German troops over
ran Lodz.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1917 Dec 6, Finland declared
independence from Russia (National Day).
(SFEM, 8/8/99, p.44)(MC, 12/6/01)
1917 Dec 6, Former Czar
Nicholas II and family were made prisoners by the Bolsheviks in
Tobolsk.
(HN, 12/6/98)
1917 Dec 6, In Nova Scotia some
2000 people were killed and thousands wounded following an explosion
in Halifax harbor. The Imo, a Norwegian freighter ship, had collided
with the French munitions ship Mont Blanc and a fire soon caused a
massive explosion. A local court found Captain Le Medec of the Mont
Blanc and other defendants guilty of the collision. Canada’s Supreme
Court ruled that the captains of both ships were equally to blame. A
Privy Council in London ruled that Le Medec had done nothing
illegal.
(EWH, 4th ed, p.1054)(ON, 7/05, p.7)(AP, 12/6/07)
1918 Dec 6, Harold Horace
Hopkins, inventor (Endoscope), was born.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1920 Dec 6, Dave Brubeck, jazz
pianist and composer, was born.
(HN, 12/6/00)
1920 Dec 6, In Boston, Mass., a
dog with spectacles was shown at the annual fair of the Animal
Rescue League.
(http://tinyurl.com/5hbur6)
1921 Dec 6, James Showan, a
wealthy NY shipbuilder, was arrested after his palatial yacht was
seized off the California coast with more than 100 cases of whiskey.
(SFC, 10/14/99, p.C5)
1921 Dec 6, British and Irish
representatives signed a treaty in London providing for creation of
an Irish Free State a year later on the same date. The partition
created Northern Ireland. [see Jul 8] Ireland’s 26 southern counties
became independent from Britain forming the Irish Free State.
(HN, 12/6/00)(AP, 12/6/06)
1922 Dec 6, The Irish Free
State came into being under terms of the Anglo-Irish Treaty.
(AP, 12/6/08)
1922 Dec 6, Mussolini
threatened the Italian newspapers with censorship if they kept
reporting "false" information.
(HN, 12/6/98)
1923 Dec 6, A presidential
address was broadcast on radio for the first time as President
Coolidge spoke to a joint session of Congress.
(AP, 12/6/97)
1929 Dec 6, Turkey introduced
female suffrage.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1933 Dec 6, Henryk Mikolaj
Gorecki, composer, was born.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1933 Dec 6, The US ban on James
Joyce' "Ulysses" was lifted.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1934 Dec 6, American Ambassador
Davis said Japan was a grave security threat in the Pacific.
(HN, 12/6/98)
1935 Dec 6, The San Francisco
Chronicle reported that rats now exceeded city’s population of
people by a factor of 3 to 1.
(SSFC, 12/5/10, DB p.50)
1938 Dec 6, France and Germany
signed a treaty of friendship.
(HN, 12/6/98)
1939 Dec 6, The Cole Porter
musical comedy "Du Barry Was a Lady" opened on Broadway.
(AP, 12/6/99)
1939 Dec 6, Britain agreed to
send arms to Finland.
(HN, 12/6/98)
1940 Dec 6, The Gestapo
arrested Helen Ernst, German resistance fighter and poster artist.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1941 Dec 6, John Nelson,
conductor (Les Troyens of Berlioz), was born in San Jose, Costa
Rica.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1941 Dec 6, Richard Speck, mass
murderer (killed 8 student nurses in 1966), was born.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1941 Dec 6, President Franklin
D. Roosevelt issued a personal appeal to Emperor Hirohito to use his
influence to avoid war.
(HN, 12/6/98)
1941 Dec 6, NYC Council agreed
to build Idlewild (Kennedy) Airport in Queens.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1941 Dec 6, Dutch and British
pilots saw Japanese invasion fleet at Singapore.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1942 Dec 6, Peter Handke,
playwright and poet, was born.
(HN, 12/6/00)
1944 Dec 6, US 95th Infantry
division reached Westwall.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1945 Dec 6, U.S. extended a $3
billion loan to Britain to help compensate for the termination of
Lend-Lease.
(HN, 12/6/98)
1947 Dec 6, Everglades
National Park in Florida was dedicated by President Truman.
(AP, 12/6/97)
1948 Dec 6, The "Pumpkin spy
papers" were found on the Maryland farm of Whittaker Chambers. They
became evidence that State Department employee Alger Hiss was spying
for the Soviet Union.
(HN, 12/6/01)
1949 Dec 6, Leadbelly (64),
[Huddie William Ledbetter], blues singer, died. He was born January
29, 1885, on the Jeter Plantation near Mooringsport, Louisiana.
(http://leadbelly.lanl.gov/leadbelly.html)
1953 Dec 6, Thomas Hulce, actor
(Amadeus, Equus, Echo Park), was born Plymouth, Mi.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1955 Dec 6, NY psychologist
Joyce Brothers (28) won the CBS "$64,000 Question," by answering 7
questions on boxing.
(SFC, 12/2/05, p.F2)
1956 Dec 6, B.R. Ambedkar
(b.1891), a Dalit and chief architect of India’s 1949 constitution,
died. “What is the village but a sink of localism, a den of
ignorance, narrow-mindedness and communalism.”
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B._R._Ambedkar)(Econ, 12/18/10, p.60)
1956 Dec 6, Nelson Mandela and
156 others were arrested for political activities in South Africa.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1957 Dec 6, AFL-CIO members
voted to expel the International Brotherhood of Teamsters. The union
had been expelled because of racketeering by its executives,
including union president Dave Beck and vice president James R.
Hoffa. The criminal activity was disclosed during a special Senate
committee investigation of racketeering and organized crime in
labor-management relations. The Teamsters were readmitted in Oct,
1987, but disaffiliated themselves from the AFL-CIO in 2005.
(HNQ, 1/8/99)(AP, 12/6/07)
1957 Dec 6, America's first
attempt at putting a satellite into orbit failed as Vanguard TV3
rose only about four feet off a Cape Canaveral, Fla., launch pad
before crashing back down and exploding.
(AP, 12/6/08)
1967 Dec 6, Dr. Adrian
Kantrowitz (1918-2008) performed the first US human heart transplant
on a baby in Brooklyn, who died 6 hours later.
(SFC, 11/21/08, p.B6)
1968 Dec 6, The original Malian
constitution was abrogated after a military coup d'etat and replaced
by a new fundamental law.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constitution_of_Mali)
1969 Dec 6, The Rolling Stones
staged a rock concert at the Altamount Speedway in Livermore, Ca.
for some 300,000 fans. The Stones hired the Hells Angels for
security. Fans were beaten and one person, Meredith Hunter, was
stamped and stabbed to death by a Hell's Angel during the show. Alan
Passaro (21) was tried and found not guilty because Hunter was
carrying a gun. One man drowned in a nearby canal and2 people were
crushed to death by a runaway car. The 1970 documentary film “Gimme
Shelter” was about the Rolling Stones concert at Altamount.
(SFEC, 5/23/99, Z1 p.4)(AP, 12/6/99)(SFC,
6/10/00, p.B5)(SFC, 5/26/05, p.B2)
1971 Dec 6, The US Senate
confirmed Lewis Franklin Powell as a Supreme Court justice.
(www.glapn.org/sodomylaws/bowers/bonews03.htm)
1971 Dec 6, Bangladesh became
independent from Pakistan following a 9-month war in a struggle led
by Sheik Mujibar Rahman. Sheik Rahman was nominated as president on
Dec 20 and released from prison on Dec 22; he returned to Bangladesh
Jan 10.
(SFC, 5/21/96, p.A-10)
1971 Dec 6, India recognized
the Democratic Republic of Bangladesh and Pakistan broke off
diplomatic relations. Bangladesh later accused Pakistan of war
atrocities that led to the death of some 3 million people during the
9-month war.
(WUD, 1994, p. 1688)(SFC, 12/31/00, p.B3)
1973 Dec 6, House minority
leader Gerald R. Ford was sworn in as vice president, succeeding
Spiro T. Agnew. Agnew, vice president to President Richard M. Nixon,
resigned from his office and pleaded no contest to one charge of
income tax evasion in return for the dropping of all other charges.
Agnew, the only US Vice President to resign in disgrace, was fined
$10,000 and given three year's probation.
(AP, 12/6/97)(SFC, 12/27/06, p.A11)
1975 Dec 6, US President Ford
and Secretary of State Kissinger met with Indonesian President
Suharto and explicitly approved Indonesia’s invasion of East Timor.
This information was only made public in 2005.
(AFP,
12/02/05)(www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB62/)
1975 Dec 6, The US Congress
authorized a $2.3 billion emergency loan to save New York City from
bankruptcy.
(http://tinyurl.com/6axxe2)
1975 Dec 6, Robert Dole
(b.1923) of Kansas, Republican presidential candidate in 1996,
married Mary Elizabeth Hanford.
(www.medaloffreedom.com/BobDole.htm)
1976 Dec 6, Democrat Tip
O’Neill was elected speaker of the House of Representatives. He went
on to serve the longest consecutive term as speaker.
(HN, 12/6/00)
1976 Dec 6, Dutch War criminal
Pieter Menten (1899-1987) was arrested in Switzerland after fleeing
there in November.
(http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pieter_Menten)
1977 Dec 6, SF FBI agents
arrested James “Jimmy the Weasel” Fratianno (64), a reportedly
leading West Coast Mafia figure.
(SFC, 12/6/02, p.E16)
1981 Dec 6, Harry Harlow
(b.1905), psychologist, died. He spent his entire professional
career teaching at the University of Wisconsin from 1930-1974. His
focus of research was on the learning abilities in primates and he
observed the phenomenon of 'learning to learn.' His work with infant
monkeys and their surrogate mothers (terrycloth dummies)
demonstrated the importance of bonding between primate mothers and
infants for emotional health and growth. In 2003 Deborah Blum
authored "Love at Goon Park: Harry Harlow and the Science of
Affection."
(CW, 6/03,
p.51)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Harlow)
1982 Dec 6, In Northern Ireland
11 soldiers and six civilians were killed when a bomb planted by the
Irish National Liberation Army exploded in a pub in Ballykelly.
(AP, 12/6/97)
1982 Dec 6-1982 Dec 8, In
Guatemala a government massacre wiped out the village of Dos Erres.
In 2000 two witnesses gave evidence that some 300 men, women and
children were killed, tortured and raped by specialists called
kaibiles. In 2011 Pedro Pimentel Rios (54), a former member of an
elite Guatemalan military force suspected of carrying out the
massacre, was extradited from the United States back to Guatemala.
(SFEC, 4/9/00, p.C14)(AP, 7/12/11)
1983 Dec 6, The SF Golden Gate
Bridge closed for the 2nd December in a row as winds at the toll
plaza measured 77.2 mph.
(SSFC, 11/30/08, DB p. 58)
1983 Dec 6, A bomb planted on a
bus in Jerusalem exploded and killed 6 Israelis.
(http://preview.tinyurl.com/3a3tyk)
1985 Dec 6, The San Francisco
Chronicle described a “super cocaine,” known on the streets as
crack, rock or base, which was being smoked in a pipe to produce an
intense euphoria. Crack cocaine was first discovered in use in New
York City.
(SSFC, 12/5/10, DB p.50)(SFC, 6/24/96, p.A5)
1987 Dec 6, In Moscow security
agents roughed up Jewish activists and journalists during
demonstrations over Kremlin policy one day before the arrival of
Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev to the US, where hundreds of
thousands of demonstrators pressing for free emigration of Soviet
Jews marched in Washington.
(AP 12/6/97)
1987 Dec 6, In Missouri 3
Satanist teenagers bludgeoned Steven Newberry (19), a
learning-disabled youth, to death and blamed the incident on heavy
metal inspired Satanism.
(http://tinyurl.com/k36su)(www.creationism.org/csshs/v15n1p03.htm)
1987 Dec 6, In Moscow security
agents roughed up Jewish activists and journalists during rival
demonstrations over Kremlin policy.
(AP 12/6/97)
1988 Dec 6, Soviet President
Mikhail Gorbachev arrived for his second U.S. visit to address the
United Nations and meet with President Reagan and President-elect
Bush.
(AP, 12/6/98)
1988 Dec 6, The space shuttle
Atlantis landed in California.
(AP, 12/6/98)
1988 Dec 6, Rock-and-roll
pioneer Roy Orbison died near Nashville, Tenn., at age 52.
(AP, 12/6/98)
1988 Dec 6, Arafat met
prominent American Jews in Stockholm, Sweden.
(http://openweb.tvnews.vanderbilt.edu/1988-12/1988-12-06-NBC-15.html)
1989 Dec 6, In Canada 14 women
were shot to death at the University of Montreal's school of
engineering by Marc Lepine, who then took his own life.
(AP, 12/6/97)
1989
Dec 6, Egon Krenz resigned as leader of East Germany. In 1997 Krenz
was convicted with 2 colleagues of manslaughter for the shooting
deaths of those who tried to flee across the Berlin Wall prior to
its demise.
(WSJ, 11/9/99, p.A14)(http://tinyurl.com/akpba)
1990 Dec 6, Shoeless Joe
Jackson's signature was sold for $23,100.
(www.baseballlibrary.com/baseballlibrary/ballplayers/J/Jackson_Joe.stm)
1990 Dec 6, In Bangladesh an
opposition campaign led by Khaleda Zia and Sheikh Hasina forced
Pres. Hossain Mohammad Ershad to resign.
(Econ, 11/4/06,
p.16)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hossain_Mohammad_Ershad)
1990 Dec 6, Iraq announced that
it would release all its hostages, saying foreigners could begin
leaving in two days.
(AP, 12/6/00)
1991 Dec 6, Sen. Edward
Kennedy, D-Mass., testifying at the trial of his nephew, William
Kennedy Smith, denied hearing screams the night Patricia Bowman said
she was raped by Smith at the Kennedy estate in West Palm Beach,
Fla.
(AP, 12/6/01)
1991 Dec 6, Gen. Pavle Strugar
led the Yugoslav attack on Dubrovnik. At least 43 civilians were
killed in the attack. Serbs had opened bombardment of the Croatian
port of Dubrovnik in early October. In 2001 Strugar (68) turned
himself into the war crimes tribunal at the Hague. In 2005 Strugar
was convicted of two counts of willful destruction of Dubrovnik and
attacking civilians. In 2008 appeals judges added two more
convictions for unjustified devastation of the town and attacking
civilian sites. They also cut his original sentence from eight years
to seven and a half years because of his deteriorating health.
(SFC, 6/11/96, p.A14)(SFC, 10/22/01, p.B1)(AP,
7/17/08)
1992 Dec 6, Bowing to
anti-foreigner sentiment, Germany's main political parties agreed to
tighten postwar asylum laws.
(AP, 12/6/97)
1992 Dec 6, In Uttar Pradesh,
India, thousands of Hindu kar sevaks, soldiers of the Ram Temple
movement, destroyed the Babri Mosque and 4 people were killed. This
set off two months of Hindu-Muslim rioting that claimed at least
2,000 lives. Attackers set off 13 bomb blasts in Bombay that
destroyed skyscrapers and killed 600 people. The Bharatiya Janata
Party (BJP) inspired Hindus to raze a 16th century mosque in the
northern town of Ayodhya. The demolition caused Hindu-Muslim riots
across India and 3,000 people were killed. Hindus believe that the
site was the birthplace of the god Ram and that Mogul invaders tore
down a temple at the site to build the Babri Mosque. In 1998 the
Congress Party apologized for the mosque destruction. In 2009 an
inquired into the destruction of the Babri Mosque concluded that
senior members of the opposition Bharatatiya Janata Party (BJP) were
complicit in the vandalism.
(WSJ, 5/6/96, p.A-9)(WSJ, 5/7/96, p.A-14)(AP,
12/6/97)(SFEC, 1/25/98, p.A20)(SFC, 3/15/02, p.A16)(Econ, 11/28/09,
p.43)
1993 Dec 6, Don Ameche (85),
actor (Cocoon), died in Scottsdale, Ariz., of prostate cancer.
(AP, 12/6/98)
1993 Dec 6, A judge in New
Bedford, Mass., sentenced former priest James R. Porter, who'd
admitted molesting 28 children in the 1960s, to 18 to 20 years in
prison for sexual assault.
(AP, 12/6/98)
1993 Dec 6, In South Africa
crimes committed up to this date became eligible for amnesty as set
up by special constitutional legislation that set up the Truth and
Reconciliation Commission. A 1996 extension was requested to move
the deadline to May 10, 1994.
(SFC, 10/19/96, A10)
1994 Dec 6, Former US Associate
Attorney General Webster Hubbell pleaded guilty to defrauding his
former law partners and clients of nearly $400,000.
(AP, 12/6/99)
1994 Dec 6, US Treasury
Secretary Lloyd Bentsen announced his resignation.
(AP, 12/6/99)
1994 Dec 6, The Maltese Falcon
film statuette was auctioned for $398,590.
(MC, 12/6/01)
1994 Dec 6, Orange County,
Calif., filed for bankruptcy protection due to investment losses of
about $2 billion. Orange County, Ca., filed bankruptcy after losing
nearly $1.7 billion on risky investments [derivatives]. In 1997 a
former ass’t. treasurer, Matthew Raabe, was sentenced to 3 years in
prison for diverting $88.5 million in public funds to conceal
investment schemes that led to the nation’s biggest municipal
bankruptcy.
(SFEC, 11/10/96, Z1 p.1)(SFC, 10/4/97, p.A7)(AP,
12/6/99)
1995 Dec 6, President Clinton
vetoed a seven-year Republican budget-balancing plan.
(AP, 12/6/00)
1995 Dec 6, The US House ethics
committee sent a highly critical letter to House Speaker Newt
Gingrich, saying he had committed three ethics violations.
(AP, 12/6/00)
1995 Dec 6, New York Times
columnist James Reston died in Washington at age 86.
(AP, 12/6/00)
1995 Dec 6, Dmitri Antonovich
Volkogonov (67), ex-Soviet soldier and historian, died.
(www.msu.edu/~daggy/cop/bkofdead/obits-vo.htm)
1996 Dec 6, Stock markets
around the world plunged after comments by Federal Reserve Chairman
Alan Greenspan were taken to mean that U.S. stock prices were too
high.
(AP, 12/6/06)
1996 Dec 6, Former NFL
commissioner Pete Rozelle died in Rancho Santa Fe, Calif., at age
70.
(AP, 12/6/97)
1997 Dec 6, An asteroid was
discovered by J.V. Scotti at the Univ. of Arizona. It was recognized
as one of 108 potentially hazardous asteroids.
(NH, 10/98, p.88)
1997 Dec 6, In Siberia a
Russian Antonov-124 jet cargo aircraft crashed seconds after takeoff
on the edge of Irkutsk into an apartment building and killed at
least 62 (68-69) people.
(SFEC,12/797, p.A19)(WSJ, 12/8/97, p.A1)(AP,
12/6/98)(SFC, 7/4/01, p.A10)
1998 Dec 6, The astronauts of
the Endeavour space shuttle attached Node 1 of the new space station
to the cargo block Zarya.
(SFC, 12/7/98, p.A2)
1998 Dec 6, Clayton “Peg Leg”
Bates, a tap dancer who lost a leg in childhood, died at age 91.
(WSJ, 12/8/98, p.A1)
1998 Dec 6, In Gabon Pres. Omar
Bongo (63) won the election for a new 7-year term. He received 66%
of the vote with clear ballot stuffing.
(SFC, 12/9/98, p.B8)(SFC, 12/18/98, p.D2)
1998 Dec 6, In Nigeria it was
reported that 14 people died in poll-related violence.
(WSJ, 12/9/98, p.A1)
1998 Dec 6, Hundreds of
Palestinian prisoners in Israel started a hunger strike and
demanded to be freed.
(SFC, 12/7/98, p.A14)
1998 Dec 6, In Sierra Leone at
least 51 rebels were killed in fierce fighting north of Freetown.
(WSJ, 12/9/98, p.A1)
1998 Dec 6, In Taiwan the
ruling Nationalists enlarged their legislative majority and captured
the mayoralty in Taipei.
(WSJ, 12/7/98, p.A1)
1998 Dec 6, In Venezuela
national presidential elections were scheduled. Hugo Chavez, a
former army officer who staged a bloody coup attempt against the
government six years earlier, won by a landslide. He faced a
$22 billion foreign debt and planned a constitutional assembly to
replace the Congress and to rewrite the constitution.
(WSJ, 12/3/98, p.A1)(SFC, 12/7/98, p.A1)(AP,
12/6/99)
1999 Dec 6, The Supreme Court,
reconsidering its landmark Miranda ruling, agreed to decide whether
police still must warn criminal suspects that they have a “right to
remain silent.” The justices upheld that right the following June.
(AP, 12/6/04)
1999 Dec 6, SabreTech, an
aircraft maintenance company, was convicted of mishandling the
oxygen canisters blamed for the cargo hold fire that caused the 1996
ValuJet crash in the Everglades that killed 110 people. Eight of the
nine counts were later thrown out on appeal.
(AP, 12/6/04)
1999 Dec 6, AT&T agreed in
principle to give competing Internet providers access to its
high-speed cable lines.
(SFC, 12/6/99, p.A3)
1999 Dec 6, In Oklahoma a boy
(13) opened fire with a semiautomatic handgun and injured 4
classmates at Fort Gibson Middle School.
(SFC, 12/7/99, p.A3)
1999 Dec 6, In Chechnya Russian
planes dropped leaflets warning civilians in Grozny to leave or face
heavy air and artillery strikes on Dec 11.
(SFC, 12/7/99, p.A1)
1999 Dec 6, In Tanzania a UN
court convicted Georges Rutaganda on 3 of 8 charges of genocide
against Tutsis committed when he was vice president of the
Interhamwe death squads in Rwanda in 1994.
(SFC, 12/7/99, p.B2)
2000 Dec 6, Pres. Clinton gave
the US Presidential Medal of Freedom to Alexander Aris, the son of
Aung San Suu Kyi of Burma, on behalf of his mother who was held
under house arrest.
(SFC, 12/7/00, p.C10)
2000 Dec 6, Florida Republican
leaders announced the Legislature would convene in special session
to appoint its own slate of electors in the state's contested
presidential race; Democrats denounced the action as unnecessary.
(AP, 12/6/01)
2000 Dec 6, A Pentagon
investigation concluded in a 168-page report that 3 top Army Corps
of Engineers officials manipulated a study to justify a construction
binge on the Mississippi and Illinois Rivers.
(SFC, 12/7/00, p.A3)
2000 Dec 6, Iridium Satellite
won a 1-year, $36 million Pentagon contract for unlimited use.
(WSJ, 12/7/00, p.A1)
2000 Dec 6, Actor Werner
Klemperer died in New York at age 80.
(AP, 12/6/01)
2000 Dec 6, A European Union
summit began in Nice to prepare for expansion to 27 or more members.
(SFC, 12/6/00, p.C5)
2000 Dec 6, The IMF agreed to
grant Turkey $7.5 billion in emergency loans.
(SFC, 12/7/00, p.C12)
2000 Dec 6, In Colombia a FARC
attack in Granada left at least 29 dead.
(SFC, 12/9/00, p.A18)
2000 Dec 6, The Israeli
Betselem human-rights group condemned the Israeli army for excessive
force in combating the Palestinian intifada.
(SFC, 12/7/00, p.A12)
2000 Dec 6, A Russian court
found Edmond Pope (54) guilty of espionage. Pope was sentenced to 20
years' imprisonment by a Moscow court for espionage; however, he was
pardoned by Russian President Vladimir Putin and released eight days
after his sentencing.
(SFC, 12/7/00, p.A1)(AP, 12/6/01)
2000 Dec 6, In Ukraine the last
working reactor at Chernobyl was shut down due to a malfunction 9
days before a scheduled permanent shut down.
(SFC, 12/7/00, p.C10)
2000 Dec 6, The World Bank
approved a $12 million grant to help Palestinians.
(SFC, 12/7/00, p.A12)
2001 Dec 6, President George W.
Bush dedicated the national Christmas tree to those who died on
Sept. 11 and to GIs who died in the line of duty.
(AP, 12/6/02)
2001 Dec 6, The House of
Representatives, by a one-vote margin, gave President Bush more
power to negotiate global trade deals.
(AP, 12/6/02)
2001 Dec 6, Anthrax tainted
mail turned up at a sorting site outside the Federal building in
Washington DC. It had been received Dec 5.
(WSJ, 12/7/01, p.A1)
2001 Dec 6, In Indiana Robert
L. Wissman, an employee of the Nu-Wood Decorative Millwork plant on
the edge of Goshen killed manager Greg Oswald, wounded 6 others, and
then killed himself. A love triangle was later aid to be the cause.
(SFC, 12/7/01, p.A3)(SFC, 12/8/01, p.A7)
2001 Dec 6, In Afghanistan
Mullah Mohammed Omar, the Taliban leader, vowed to surrender
Kandahar.
(SFC, 12/7/01, p.A1)
2001 Dec 6, An int’l. team of
doctors flew to Congo to investigate the deaths of 17 people with
Ebola-like symptoms in Dekese. Ebola was confirmed in Gabon on Dec
9.
(WSJ, 12/7/01, p.A1)(SFC, 12/10/01, p.A3)
2001 Dec 6, Japan went into
recession officially for the 4th time in 10 years as the GDP shrank
0.5%.
(WSJ, 12/7/01, p.A14)(SFC, 12/30/01, p.D8)
2001 Dec 6, In Nepal the
anti-rebel campaign was reported to have left 250 dead since rebel
attacks began Nov 23.
(WSJ, 12/7/01, p.A1)
2001 Dec 6, Palestinian leader
Yasser Arafat continued a roundup of Hamas militants based on a list
of 36 suspects provided by Israel. His crackdown on Islamic
militants met angry resistance as 1,500 Hamas supporters battled
Palestinian riot police outside the home of the group's leader.
Israeli warplanes bombed a Gaza police station and 15 Palestinians
were wounded.
(SFC, 12/7/01, p.A3)(WSJ, 12/7/01, p.A1)(AP,
12/6/02)
2002 Dec 6, President Bush
pushed Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill and economic adviser Larry
Lindsey from their jobs in a Cabinet shakeup as the unemployment
rate hit 6%.
(AP, 12/6/02)(SFC, 12/7/02, p.A1)
2002 Dec 6, Actress Winona
Ryder was sentenced to community service as part of a probationary
term for stealing more than $5,500 worth of merchandise from a Saks
Fifth Avenue store in Beverly Hills, Calif.
(AP, 12/6/03)
2002 Dec 6, Philip Berrigan
(79), former Catholic priest, died in Baltimore. He helped galvanize
opposition to the Vietnam War in the late 1960s.
(SFC, 12/7/02, p.A3)
2002 Dec 6, In Brazil South
American leaders set a timetable for creating a free trade agreement
to cover South America and possibly the Caribbean.
(AP, 12/7/02)
2002 Dec 6, The EU agreed to
ban single-hull tankers, likely to be effective in 2010.
(SFC, 12/7/02, p.A15)
2002 Dec 6, Ten Palestinians,
including two U.N. employees, were killed in chaotic battles that
erupted when Israeli troops, tanks and helicopter gunships poured
into a Gaza Strip refugee camp, searching for a fugitive militant
allegedly involved in a fatal bombing.
(AP, 12/6/02)
2002 Dec 6, A U.N. envoy
wrapped up an inspection of Uzbekistan's prisons by saying he found
signs of systematic torture despite being denied full access to two
of the most notorious jails.
(AP, 12/6/02)
2002 Dec 6, In Venezuela at
least one gunman opened fire on a Caracas square packed with
opponents of Pres. Hugo Chavez, killing three people as strikers
trying to force a change of government. Captains and officers of 12
of the nation's 13 oil tankers joined the strike.
(Reuters, 12/6/02)(SFC, 12/7/02, p.A1)
2003 Dec 6, Army became the
first team to finish 0-13 in major college history after a 34-6 loss
to Navy.
(AP, 12/6/04)
2003 Dec 6, Defense Secretary
Donald H. Rumsfeld met with senior American commanders in Iraq, and
was assured that a recent switch to more aggressive anti-insurgency
tactics had begun to pay off.
(AP, 12/6/04)
2003 Dec 6, The Northeast's
first major snowstorm of the season threatened near whiteout
conditions from Pennsylvania to Maine after piling up nearly a foot
of snow, delaying flights and creating hazardous driving conditions
blamed for at least 10 deaths.
(AP, 12/6/03)(WSJ, 12/8/03, p.A1)
2003 Dec 6, In Kandahar,
Afghanistan, a bomb exploded in a bazaar, wounding about 20 people,
at least three seriously, in an attack that a Taliban spokesman said
targeted, but missed, American soldiers who shop there.
(AP, 12/6/03)
2003 Dec 6, In eastern
Afghanistan a US air strike apparently killed 9 children and a
suspected militant near the village of Hutala.
(AP, 12/7/03)(SFC, 12/8/03, p.A12)
2003 Dec 6, In the beach resort
of Sanya, China, Miss Ireland, 19-year-old Rosanna Davison, won the
Miss World competition. Second place went to Miss Canada, Nazanin
Afshin-Jam, while the host country's Miss China, Guan Qi, took
third.
(AP, 12/6/03)
2003 Dec 6, The Europe and
North Africa summit ended a 2-day meeting in Tunisia. The group,
formed in 1990, gathered leaders from North Africa — Algeria,
Tunisia, Morocco, Mauritania and Libya — with leaders from France,
Italy, Spain, Portugal and Malta.
(AP, 12/6/03)
2003 Dec 6, Paul Louis Halley
(b.1934) French founder of Promodes (later Carrefour SA), died in a
light plane crash.
(WSJ, 4/15/08,
p.B2)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Louis_Halley)
2003 Dec 6, Guatemala former
president and Gen. Carlos Arana Osorio (85), a hard-line
conservative who ruled from 1970 to 1974, died in a Guatemala City
military hospital.
(AP, 12/6/03)
2003 Dec 6, Hundreds of
thousands of people marched through Rome to protest government plans
to reform Italy's pension system, which economists say can no longer
sustain itself.
(AP, 12/6/03)
2003 Dec 6, Saudi Arabia issued
the names and photos of its 26 most wanted terrorist suspects and
increased protection around Western housing compounds in the
capital.
(AP, 12/7/03)
2003 Dec 6, Sudan's vice
president and the leader of rebels fighting a 20-year civil war
resumed their talks on a comprehensive peace deal, boosted by a
landmark visit by rebels to the capital, Khartoum.
(AP, 12/6/03)
2004 Dec 6, Ohio certified
President Bush's victory over John Kerry, even as the Kerry campaign
and third-party candidates prepared to demand a statewide recount.
Bush won Ohio by 118,600 votes.
(AP, 12/06/05)(Econ, 8/2/08, p.31)
2004 Dec 6, Mediaweek reported
that 99.8% of indecency complaints to the FCC came from one group,
the Parents Television Council.
(SFC, 12/13/04, p.E1)
2004 Dec 6, Arson fires hit a
new housing development in Charles County, Md., 25 miles south of
Washington, DC. 14 homes, priced from $400-500k, were damaged. A
security guard and 5 others were later arrested on arson charges.
Damages were estimated at $10 million. On Sep 2, 2005, Patrick Walsh
(21) was found guilty of masterminding the fires.
(SFC, 12/8/04, p.A2)(SFC, 12/17/04, p.A3)(SFC,
12/21/04, p.A3)(SFC, 9/3/05, p.A3)
2004 Dec 6, China and Germany
signed contracts worth $2.1 billion for Airbus jets and other
industrial goods. Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder called for an end to
a 15-year-old European arms embargo on China.
(AP, 12/6/04)
2004 Dec 6, A Beijing newspaper
reported that 9 out of 10 Chinese calling into a suicide-prevention
hotline in the capital are getting the busy tone, adding that
nationwide four people were killing themselves every minute.
(Reuters, 12/6/04)
2004 Dec 6, The Dubai Int’l.
Film Festival (DIFF) opened its first season.
(www.dubaifilmfest.com/en/about-diff/diff-facts-figures.html)
2004 Dec 6, In Haiti gunfire
erupted in a stronghold of ousted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide
overnight, leaving at least three dead.
(AP, 12/7/04)
2004 Dec 6, In Iraq 5 U.S.
troops were reported killed in separate clashes in a volatile
western province. Insurgents blew up part of a domestic oil pipeline
in northern Iraq.
(AP, 12/6/04)
2004 Dec 6, President Vicente
Fox fired Mexico City's police chief for allegedly bungling the
response to a mob attack that killed two federal police officers.
(AP, 12/6/04)(WSJ, 12/7/04, p.A1)
2004 Dec 6, In Saudi Arabia
Islamic militants threw explosives at the gate of the heavily
guarded US consulate in Jiddah in a bold assault, then forced their
way into the building, prompting a gunbattle that left 9 people dead
and several injured. In 2005 two AK-47 assault rifles used in the
attack were later traced to Yemen’s Ministry of Defense.
(AP, 10/12/05)(AP, 12/06/05)
2004 Dec 6, In Spain bombs
injured at least 18 people in 7 cities following warnings from
callers claiming to represent the Basque separatist group ETA.
(WSJ, 12/7/04, p.A1)
2005 Dec 6, US Sec. of State
Condoleeza Rice signed an agreement with Romania to open US military
bases there. One site was identified by Human Rights Watch as the
site for a clandestine prison.
(WSJ, 12/7/05, p.A16)
2005 Dec 6, Sami Al-Arian, a
former Florida professor accused of helping lead a terrorist group
that carried out suicide bombings against Israel, was acquitted on
nearly half the charges against him by a federal court jury in
Tampa, Fla.; the jury deadlocked on the other charges.
(AP, 12/6/06)
2005 Dec 6, Philadelphia won
the first NHL scoreless game that was decided by a shootout, beating
Calgary 1-0.
(AP, 12/6/06)
2005 Dec 6, The NYSE voted to
acquire Archipelago Holdings in a $9 billion transaction that would
transform the Big Board into a for-profit company with new,
high-tech trading capabilities.
(SFC, 12/7/05, p.C1)
2005 Dec 6, SF hired Nathaniel
Ford Sr. to run the Municipal Transportation Agency (MUNI) for a
5-year contract with a base salary of $298,000. Ford was enticed
away from the Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority where his base was
$205,000.
(SFC, 12/7/05, p.B4)
2005 Dec 6, In SF police
officer Andrew Cohen (39) was suspended for producing department
videos that mocked minorities. 24 other officers were soon suspended
for their involvement in the video productions. In 2006 18 officers
filed a $20 million lawsuit against SF for defamation and
discrimination.
(SFC, 12/8/05, p.A1,16)(SFC, 12/10/05,
p.A11)(SFC, 8/11/06, p.B7)
2005 Dec 6, In Spokane, Wash.,
voters said Mayor James E. West (1951-2006) must leave office this
month in a special election sparked by allegations he used a city
computer to woo gay men over the Internet. Certification of the vote
was expected on Dec 16.
(AP, 12/07/05)(SSFC, 7/23/06, p.B6)
2005 Dec 6, Afghan government
forces killed nine Taliban insurgents and arrested six others in a
raid on a rebel camp in a volatile southern province.
(AP, 12/06/05)
2005 Dec 6, Microsoft Corp.
said it would set up 30 new innovation centers around the world,
adding to its existing 60, in partnership with local governments,
academic institutions and industry organizations.
(AP, 12/06/05)
2005 Dec 6, A German man filed
a lawsuit in Virginia claiming he was held captive and tortured by
US government agents after being mistakenly identified as an
associate of the Sept. 11 hijackers. Khaled El-Masri said he was
arrested Dec 31, 2003 while attempting to enter Macedonia for a
holiday trip and flown to Afghanistan. During five months in
captivity he was subjected to "torture and other cruel, inhuman or
degrading treatment.
(AP, 12/06/05)
2005 Dec 6, Britain's
Conservative Party crowned David Cameron (39) as its new leader,
hoping to end an election losing streak as PM Tony Blair's power and
popularity sag.
(AP, 12/06/05)
2005 Dec 6, Canada’s central
bank raised interest rates for the 3rd time in a row by a quarter
point to 3.25%, its highest point in nearly 2½ years.
(WSJ, 12/7/05, p.A16)
2005 Dec 6-2005 Dec 7, In
southern China police allegedly killed as many as 10-20 protesters
in a dispute over land use in Dongzhou. Villagers were angry over
land confiscations and plans to construct a wind power plant. Armed
police sealed off the village following the violent clashes. State
news later reported 3 villagers killed and 8 wounded.
(AP, 12/09/05)(SFC, 12/9/05, p.A15)(SSFC,
12/11/05, p.A2)
2005 Dec 6, China reported that
a 10-year old girl in the Guangxi region had tested positive for
bird flu, its 4th case of the deadly H5N1 strain.
(WSJ, 12/7/05, p.A1)
2005 Dec 6, Indonesia’s central
bank raised interest rates by one-half percentage point to 12.75%
signaling a continuation of its tight monetary policy.
(WSJ, 12/7/05, p.A16)
2005 Dec 6, The World Wildlife
Fund said a catlike creature photographed by camera traps on Borneo
Island is likely to be a new species of carnivore.
(AP, 12/07/05)
2005 Dec 6, A C-130 Iranian
military transport plane crashed into a 10-story apartment building
as it was trying to make an emergency landing, ripping open the top
of the structure and igniting a huge fire. At least 115 people were
killed including 21 on the ground in the Azadi suburb of Tehran.
(AP, 12/06/05)(SFC, 12/7/05, p.A3)
2005 Dec 6, In Iraq 2 suicide
bombers struck Baghdad's police academy, killing at least 43 people
and wounding at least 72 more. Al-Jazeera broadcast an insurgent
video claiming to have kidnapped a US security consultant.
(SFC, 12/7/05, p.A1)(AP, 12/6/06)
2005 Dec 6, Israel clamped an
open-ended closure on the West Bank and Gaza, banning virtually all
Palestinians from Israel, and arrested 15 Palestinian militants in a
first response to the suicide bombing that killed five Israelis
outside a shopping mall.
(AP, 12/06/05)
2005 Dec 6, Japan's Cabinet
approved measures to demolish buildings designed using falsified
earthquake safety data and to relocate residents amid a widening
construction scandal. Some 60 of over 200 hotels and condominium
complexes designed by Hidetsugu Aneha were ordered to be pulled down
due to faked earthquake-resistance data.
(AP, 12/06/05)(Econ, 12/10/05, p.46)
2005 Dec 6, Kyodo News said
Japan plans to extend its humanitarian military mission to Iraq into
2006 but could pull its ground forces in the middle of the year if
the British and Australian troops guarding them leave.
(AP, 12/06/05)
2005 Dec 6, Morocco's national
airline completed an order for four Boeing Co. 787 jets and took out
an option for one more.
(AP, 12/06/05)
2005 Dec 6, Separatist radicals
faced off against heavily-armed Nigerian police in eastern cities as
a protest to demand an independent homeland for the
40-million-strong Igbo people entered its second day.
(AFP, 12/06/05)
2005 Dec 6, In Saudi Arabia
representatives of Islamic countries met ahead of a two-day summit,
with delegates saying the world's largest Islamic organization must
reform to face new challenges.
(AP, 12/06/05)
2005 Dec 6, South Africa
charged ex-Deputy Pres. Jacob Zuma with rape.
(WSJ, 12/7/05, p.A1)(Econ, 12/10/05, p.56)
2005 Dec 6, In Sri Lanka a land
mine blast killed 6 soldiers in the northern city of Jaffna.
(AP, 12/06/05)
2005 Dec 6, The UN top election
official, Carina Perelli of Uruguay, vowed to fight her dismissal
over sexual harassment charges, which she rejected as false and
complained that she was being denied due process.
(AFP, 12/07/05)
2006 Dec 6, The US Senate
confirmed Robert Gates as the new secretary of defense.
(WSJ, 12/7/06, p.A1)
2006 Dec 6, The top-level
bipartisan Baker-Hamilton panel, the Iraq Study Group (ISG), called
for a complete overhaul of US policy in Iraq. This included talks
with Iran and Syria, a withdrawal of most combat troops by 2008, and
threats to press Iraqi leaders to quell violence.
(AFP, 12/6/06)(WSJ, 12/7/06, p.A1)(Econ, 12/9/06,
p.31)
2006 Dec 6, The US indicted
Charles McArthur Emmanuel (29), son of former Liberian President
Charles Taylor, with committing torture in Liberia. This was the
Justice Department's first case under a 12-year-old anti-torture
law. The indictment came the day before Emmanuel, He currently in
federal custody was scheduled to be sentenced on the passport fraud
charges in Miami.
(Reuters, 12/6/06)
2006 Dec 6, Cisco CEO John
Chambers Network said equipment maker Cisco Systems Inc. will set up
a center in India to support all aspects of its worldwide
operations.
(AP, 12/6/06)
2006 Dec 6, NASA scientists
reported evidence of water at 2 Martian craters.
(SFC, 12/7/06, p.A1)
2006 Dec 6, James Kim, a San
Francisco man who struck out alone to find help for his family after
their car got stuck on a snowy, remote road in Oregon was found
dead, bringing an end to what authorities called an extraordinary
effort to stay alive.
(AP, 12/7/06)
2006 Dec 6, In California the
inaugural class to the state Hall of Fame included: Ronald Reagan,
Cesar Chavez, Walt Disney, Amelia Earhart, Clint Eastwood, Frank
Gehry, David D. Ho, M.D., Billie Jean King, John Muir, Sally K.
Ride, Ph.D., Alice Walker and the Hearst and Packard Families.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Hall_of_Fame)
2006 Dec 6, In Wisconsin a
propane gas leak led to a huge explosion in a west side Milwaukee
industrial area, killing three people at the Falk Corp. transmission
parts plant. 46 others were injured.
(SFC, 12/7/06, p.A3)
2006 Dec 6, A suicide bomber
killed two Americans and five Afghans outside a security
contractor's southern Afghan compound.
(AP, 12/6/06)
2006 Dec 6, Australia's
Parliament lifted a four-year ban on cloning human embryos for stem
cell research despite opposition from the prime minister and other
party leaders.
(AP, 12/6/06)
2006 Dec 6, Britain’s PM Tony
Blair has conceded that US-led forces are not winning the war in
Iraq, as he headed for Washington to discuss strategic options in
the war-scarred country.
(AP, 12/6/06)
2006 Dec 6, Scotland Yard
announced it was treating the death of former spy Alexander
Litvinenko as a homicide. British investigators spoke with Dmitry
Kovtun, one of at least two Russians who met Litvinenko in a London
hotel on November 1. Litvinenko died on November 23 from radiation
poisoning caused by polonium 210. Andrei Lugovoi, hospitalized in
Moscow and being tested for possible polonium contamination, was
scheduled to be interviewed by British investigators, but the
interview was postponed. British officials said traces of the
radioactive isotope polonium-210 have been detected at a London
stadium that hosted a soccer game attended by Lugovoi.
(AP, 12/6/06)(Reuters, 12/6/06)(AP, 12/7/06)
2006 Dec 6, Lawmakers in
Bulgaria adopted a much-delayed law to open the archives of its
former communist secret service, but also voted to keep a small
portion of the files secret for "national security reasons."
(AP, 12/6/06)
2006 Dec 6, In Chad an
association of radio broadcasters said private radio stations began
a three-day protest of government censorship of their reporting on
Chad's volatile east.
(AP, 12/6/06)
2006 Dec 6, Far-right
paramilitary groups pulled out of a peace process with the Colombian
government following a decision by President Alvaro Uribe's
administration to transfer jailed militia leaders to a maximum
security prison.
(AP, 12/7/06)
2006 Dec 6, Congo inaugurated
Joseph Kabila as its first freely elected president in more than
four decades.
(AP, 12/6/06)
2006 Dec 6, Hector Palacios, a
well-known dissident jailed in a Cuban government crackdown on the
opposition three years ago, was unexpectedly released from prison.
(AP, 12/6/06)
2006 Dec 6, Egypt’s Pres. Hosni
Mubarak arrived in Dublin at the start of a five-day European tour
that will also include France and Germany. He said renewing the
Middle East peace process is top of his agenda.
(AFP, 12/7/06)
2006 Dec 6, Commodore Frank
Bainimarama, the military ruler who led a coup against Fiji's
elected government, forcibly dissolved the South Pacific island's
parliament, installed a new prime minister and warned that he could
use force against dissenters.
(AP, 12/6/06)
2006 Dec 6, France went
head-to-head with CNN and the BBC with the launch of its
state-funded 24/7 news channel, part of President Jacques Chirac's
efforts to make his country's voice heard. The France 24 news
channel was a joint venture between TF1, a private firm, and the
state-owned France Televisions.
(AP, 12/6/06)(Econ, 12/2/06, p.63)
2006 Dec 6, In Iraq a mortar
attack killed at least eight people and wounded dozens in a
secondhand goods market in a shelling in the Sadr City Shiite
district of Baghdad. Soon after a suicide bomber on a bus in Sadr
City detonated explosives hidden in his clothing, killing two people
and wounding 15. A bomb also exploded near a shop in Iskandariyah,
30 miles south of Baghdad, killing four people and wounding 12.
Drive-by shootings and mortar attacks north and south of the capital
killed four Iraqis and wounded five. US ground and air forces
conducted a raid targeting foreign insurgents near the Iranian
border, killing a militant who opened fire on an aircraft. At least
75 people were killed or found dead across Iraq, including 48 whose
bullet-riddled bodies were found in different parts of Baghdad. 11
US troops were killed in 5 separate incidents in Iraq. An Iraqi
court sentenced a Libyan member of al-Qaida in Iraq to death after
he admitted taking part in eight attacks on US-led coalition forces
and Iraqi targets.
(AP, 12/6/06)(AP, 12/7/06)(AP, 12/16/06)
2006 Dec 6, Philippe
Douste-Blazy, the French foreign minister, said that Iran will face
UN sanctions for refusing to halt its nuclear program but that major
world powers remain divided over their extent.
(AP, 12/6/06)
2006 Dec 6, A US serviceman
fatally shot a civilian at the US air base in Kyrgyzstan "in
response to a threat."
(AP, 12/6/06)
2006 Dec 6, A conference on
bird flu opened in Mali. Experts were increasingly concerned for
Africa as an international conference heard that Egypt, Nigeria, and
Sudan continued to record outbreaks of the deadly disease.
(AFP, 12/6/06)
2006 Dec 6, Mexico’s President
Felipe Calderon announced a program to help Mexico's 100 poorest
communities, responding to leftist critics who accuse the
conservative leader of wanting to help only the rich.
(AP, 12/7/06)
2006 Dec 6, Cardinal Jozef
Glemp (76) stepped down after more than 25 years as archbishop of
Warsaw. He headed Poland's powerful Roman Catholic Church through
the dark days of martial law and the country's later jump to
free-market democracy.
(AP, 12/6/06)
2006 Dec 6, In Doha, Qatar,
Midway through day five of the Asian Games, China had 67 gold medals
to Japan's 18 and South Korea's 14. Kazakhstan, thanks to its
shooters and weightlifters, had 10.
(AFP, 12/6/06)
2006 Dec 6, Russian President
Vladimir Putin signed into law a bill dropping a minimal turnout
threshold in polls, which critics say will make them less fair,
despite a plea by his human rights adviser not to do so.
(Reuters, 12/7/06)
2006 Dec 6, Saudi Arabia said
it had fired a security adviser who wrote in The Washington Post
that the world's top oil exporter would intervene in Iraq once the
United States withdraws troops. Saudi Arabia beheaded a Pakistani
citizen and his daughter for smuggling heroin into the kingdom. The
kingdom beheaded 83 people in 2005 and 35 people in 2004.
(AP, 12/6/06)(Reuters, 12/7/06)
2006 Dec 6, In Somalia Sheik
Hussein Barre Rage, an Islamic courts official in Bulo Burto, said
residents who do not pray five times a day will be beheaded, adding
the edict will be implemented in three days. Hoping to head off a
regional proxy war, the UN Security Council came to the aid of
Somalia's virtually powerless government, authorizing hundreds of
East African troops to train and protect the interim administration
in its conflict with an Islamic militia.
(AP, 12/6/06)(AP, 12/7/06)
2006 Dec 6, South Korea
mobilized 45,000 riot police to thwart banned protests as crucial
talks on forging a free trade agreement with the United States
faltered. The US and South Korea reached agreement on sharing costs
for the deployment of US troops on the Korean peninsula.
(AP, 12/6/06)
2006 Dec 6, Sudanese newspapers
reported that Salva Kiir, Sudan's first vice president, demanded the
arrest of two pro-Khartoum generals involved in deadly clashes in
the southern town of Malakal last month. Pro-government janjaweed
militiamen in the Darfur region killed 2 students in El Fasher, a
day after another student was killed. Rebel groups massed nearby in
preparation for a possible attack against the forces.
(AP, 12/6/06)(AP, 12/7/06)
2006 Dec 6, A Ugandan army
spokesman said at least 12,000 refugees fleeing fighting in eastern
Congo DRC have crossed over the border into southwest Uganda.
(AP, 12/6/06)
2007 Dec 6, It was reported
that the Bush administration has developed a voluntary plan to
freeze interest rates for five years for thousands of strapped
homeowners whose mortgages were scheduled to rise in the coming
months. The plan called for a 5-year freeze for mortgages made from
Jan 2005 to July 30, 2007.
(AP, 12/6/07)(SFC, 12/6/07, p.B1)
2007 Dec 6, CIA Director
Michael Hayden revealed the agency had videotaped its interrogations
of two terror suspects in 2002 and destroyed the tapes three years
later out of fear they would leak to the public and compromise the
identities of US questioners.
(AP, 12/6/08)
2007 Dec 6, Republican
Mitt Romney said his Mormon faith should neither help nor hinder his
quest for the White House and vowed to serve the interests of the
nation, not the church, if elected president.
(AP, 12/6/08)
2007 Dec 6, Former CEO William
McGuire of UnitedHealth Group Inc agreed to forfeit more than $400
million in stock options and other compensation and pay a $7 million
fine to settle an investigation into the health insurer's options
practices.
(Reuters, 12/6/07)
2007 Dec 6, IBM reported that
it has made a breakthrough in converting electrical signals into
light pulses that brings closer the day when supercomputing, which
now requires huge machines, will be done on a single chip.
(Reuters, 12/6/07)
2007 Dec 6, A gas blast at mine
in northern China killed at least 105 people.
(AP, 12/7/07)
2007 Dec 6, A French
anti-terrorist judge filed preliminary charges against Guillaume
Dasquie, an investigative journalist and author, accused of
publishing defense secrets.
(AP, 12/7/07)
2007 Dec 6, A parcel bomb
exploded at a lawyer's office in central Paris, killing a secretary
and seriously injuring an attorney, but a motive was not immediately
clear.
(AP, 12/6/07)
2007 Dec 6, India overturned a
1914 law that banned women from tending bar in New Delhi. A ruling
in New Delhi in January said women could do bar work in hotels and
restaurants, ended a 92-year-old law barring their employment. In
August the Delhi government sought a ban on such jobs for women.
Each of India’s 29 states has its own laws governing the sale of
alcohol, and many restrict women working behind the bar.
(SFC, 12/22/07,
p.A15)(http://in.news.yahoo.com/071206/211/6o422.html)
2007 Dec 6, In Indonesia
American climate negotiators refused to back down in their
opposition to mandatory cuts in greenhouse gas emissions, even as a
US Senate panel endorsed sharp reductions in pollution blamed for
global warming.
(AP, 12/6/07)
2007 Dec 6, Iraq suspended
parliamentary sessions for the year. Drive-by shootings killed at
least two people in separate attacks in Baghdad and Muqdadiyah. In
Muqdadiyah suspects gunned down a US-backed security volunteer.
Clashes broke out between Kurdish peshmerga soldiers and alleged
al-Qaida gunmen who attacked a Kurdish checkpoint near Khanaqin,
close to the Iranian border. A peshmerga spokesman said 8 Kurdish
troops were killed and 5 wounded. 3 militants also died. The US
military said its troops killed three suspected insurgents and
captured 19 in raids targeting al-Qaida in Iraq along the Tigris
River valley. US forces raided a house in the al-Hayy area south of
Kut, killing two suspects and wounding two others. Two men were
killed in Mosul, one who, wielding a knife, lunged at American
soldiers as they entered a building, and another who was wrapped in
blanket with wires protruding from it.
(AP, 12/6/07)(WSJ, 12/7/07, p.A1)
2007 Dec 6, In southern Mexico
Jose Luis Aquino (33), a trumpet player, was found dead with his
hands and feet bound and a nylon bag over his head, in what
authorities said was apparently the country's third murder of a
musician in less than a week.
(AP, 12/7/07)
2007 Dec 6, A New Zealand judge
sentenced two Chinese students to 18 1/2 years in prison for the
ransom kidnapping and slaying of a fellow student, saying the two
fell into "cyber sloth" and greed during their studies abroad.
(AP, 12/6/07)
2007 Dec 6, Thousands of
lawyers boycotted courts across Pakistan while police blocked former
PM Nawaz Sharif and his supporters from marching to the heavily
guarded home of the deposed Supreme Court chief justice.
(AP, 12/6/07)
2007 Dec 6, In the Philippines
14 Muslim Abu Sayyaf were sentenced to life in prison for the 2001
kidnapping of a US missionary couple and 18 others in a yearlong
jungle ordeal that prompted US-backed offensives against the
guerrillas.
(AP, 12/6/07)(SFC, 12/7/07, p.A4)
2007 Dec 6, The 24th Southeast
Asian Games officially opened in Korat, Thailand.
(AFP, 12/6/07)
2007 Dec 6, Zimbabwean
President Robert Mugabe arrived in Lisbon for an EU-Africa summit,
which British Prime Minister Gordon Brown is boycotting because he
would not "sit down at the same table" as him.
(Reuters, 12/6/07)
2008 Dec 6, Indicted Democratic
US Rep. William Jefferson was ousted from his New Orleans area
district, while Republicans narrowly held on to the seat vacated by
a retiring incumbent. Republican attorney Anh "Joseph" Cao won 50%
of the vote to Jefferson's 47% and will become the first
Vietnamese-American in Congress.
(AP, 12/7/08)
2008 Dec 6, A Montana a state
judge ruled that doctor assisted suicides are legal in the state.
(SSFC, 12/7/08, p.A4)
2008 Dec 6, The Univ. of Hawaii
activated the Panoramic Survey Telescope & Rapid Response System
(PS1) to search for dangerous asteroids.
(Econ, 12/6/08, p.100)
2008 Dec 6, Martha "Sunny" von
Bulow (b.1932), daughter of utilities tycoon George Crawford, died
in New York. The heiress spent the last 28 years of her life in
oblivion after what prosecutors alleged in a pair of sensational
trials were two murder attempts by her husband. In 19082 Claus von
Bulow was convicted of trying twice to kill her by injecting her
with insulin at their estate in Newport, R.I. That verdict was
thrown out on appeal, and he was acquitted at a second trial in
1985.
(AP, 12/6/08)
2008 Dec 6, Okay Airways,
China's first private airline, began a planned one-month suspension
of passenger service 10 days early after skittish airports insisted
on cash to refuel its planes. The airline suffered from financial
and management woes.
(AP, 12/6/08)
2008 Dec 6, In Denmark
"Gomorra," a movie by Italian director Matteo Garrone about Naples'
criminal underworld, won the best film prize at the 21st annual
European Film Awards.
(AP, 12/6/08)
2008 Dec 6, Greek police shot
and killed Alexis Grigoropoulos (15). His death sparked two weeks of
the worst rioting the country has seen in decades. In 2010 a court
sentenced a police officer to life in prison for Grigoropoulos'
death, and a second officer to 10 years.
(AP, 12/6/11)
2008 Dec 6, India’s central
bank cuts its benchmark short term lending and borrowing rates by
one percentage point. The next day the government unveiled a
stimulus package that included increased spending and easing of some
taxes.
(WSJ, 12/8/08, p.A8)
2008 Dec 6, A series of attacks
targeted Iraqi security forces in Baghdad and in the north, killing
at least six people, including a senior member of an anti-al-Qaida
group.
(AP, 12/6/08)
2008 Dec 6, The Irish
government ordered the recall of all pig meat products made in the
Republic of Ireland after dioxins were discovered in slaughtered
pigs thought to have eaten contaminated feed.
(AFP, 12/7/08)
2008 Dec 6, Mexican soldiers
found at least eight bodies buried in a shallow grave in Michoacan
state.
(AP, 12/8/08)
2008 Dec 6, Amsterdam unveiled
plans to close brothels, sex shops and marijuana cafes in its
ancient city center as part of a major effort to drive organized
crime out of the tourist haven.
(AP, 12/6/08)
2008 Dec 6, Palestinians packed
into cars to leave the West Bank city of Nablus after Israel eased
restrictions on residents leaving the town in vehicles for the first
time in six years.
(AP, 12/6/08)
2008 Dec 6, In the Philippines
gunmen armed with automatic weapons and grenades fired on police
officers who were tailing them, leaving at least 17 people dead in a
fierce shootout in a Manila suburb.
(AP, 12/6/08)
2008 Dec 6, In Moscow, Russia,
ultranationalist attacked 2 migrant workers, one of whom escaped. On
Dec 10 the severed head of Salekh Azizov (20), the other Tajik
migrant worker, was found in a trash bin. A group calling itself the
Militant Organization of Russian Nationalists claimed
responsibility. For the year some 85 people were reported killed by
violent nationalists.
(SSFC, 12/14/08, p.A25)
2008 Dec 6, Sri Lanka's
military captured a rebel-held village, bringing half of a main
highway leading to the rebels' de facto capital of Kilinochchi under
government control.
(AP, 12/6/08)
2008 Dec 6, Zimbabwe's
President Robert Mugabe came under fresh international pressure over
his country's economic collapse as his government announced plans to
introduce a 200 million dollar bill.
(AFP, 12/6/08)
2009 Dec 6, The Kennedy Center
Honors, the top US arts awards, were presented by Pres. Obama to
rock star Bruce Springsteen (60), actor Robert De Niro (66),
comedian Mel Brooks (83), jazz composer and pianist Dave Brubeck
(89) and opera singer Grace Bumbry (72).
(SFC, 12/7/09, p.A11)
2009 Dec 6, The play “Race,” by
David Mamet, opened on Broadway.
(Econ, 12/12/09, p.95)
2009 Dec 6, In Pennsylvania
parolee Ronald Robinson (32) fatally shot a man in Penn Hills over a
$500 drug debt and then shot and killed police officer Michael
Crawshaw (32).
(SFC, 12/8/09, p.A12)
2009 Dec 6, In eastern
Afghanistan a NATO airstrike killed six militants who were planting
bombs along a road in Laghman province. A group of militants
attacked a police convoy on a main road. Mullah Amiruddin, a key
Taliban leader in northern Faryab province's Ghormach district. 4
police officers were killed in the gunbattle.
(AP, 12/6/09)(AP, 12/7/09)
2009 Dec 6, In southwestern
Bangladesh two passenger buses collided head-on, leaving 21 people
dead and 50 injured.
(AP, 12/6/09)
2009 Dec 6, In Belarus men
appearing to be law enforcement officers abducted four opposition
activists in an attempt to scare them away from political activity
in the repressive former Soviet republic. The activists were held
for several hours in an imitation execution, before being released
in the woods dozens of miles (km) from the capital, Minsk.
(AP, 12/9/09)
2009 Dec 6, Bolivia held
elections. President Evo Morales, a coca-grower at odds with
Washington but hugely popular at home for empowering the
long-suppressed indigenous majority, easily won re-election.
(AP, 12/6/09)(AP, 12/7/09)
2009 Dec 6, Brazilian thieves
tunneled their way to a money transport firm in Sao Paulo and made
off with nearly $6 million. A day later 6 men were arrested for the
robbery.
(AP, 12/7/09)(AP, 12/8/09)
2009 Dec 6, In Greece masked
youths hurled firebombs and jagged chunks of marble at police as
violence erupted during a march in Athens to mark the first
anniversary of the police shooting of a teenager whose death sparked
massive riots.
(AP, 12/6/09)
2009 Dec 6, In Guatemala a mob
in Panahachel beat a suspected criminal to death and threatened to
burn three women who were with the victim. It was Guatemala's fifth
vigilante killing in three days.
(AP, 12/6/09)
2009 Dec 6, Iranian authorities
slowed Internet connections to a crawl or choked them off completely
before expected student protests on Dec 7, to deny the opposition a
vital means of communication. Authorities also ordered journalists
working for foreign media organizations not to leave their offices
to cover the demonstrations.
(AP, 12/6/09)
2009 Dec 6, In Iraq gunmen
killed four policemen at a checkpoint west of Baghdad in an early
morning attack.
(AP, 12/6/09)
2009 Dec 6, Israeli settlers
blocked roads, scuffled with police and pelted officers with eggs,
in the most aggressive display of resistance yet to the government's
ban on new housing construction in West Bank settlements.
(AP, 12/6/09)
2009 Dec 6, In Mexico thousands
of people dressed in white demanded soldiers leave Ciudad Juarez,
the country's most violent city, accusing troops of provoking a
surge in drug-war killings and running protection rackets.
(Reuters, 12/6/09)
2009 Dec 6, In Nepal Maoists
imposed a strict nationwide strike in protest of the killing of 3
landless laborers on Dec 4.
(Econ, 12/12/09, p.46)
2009 Dec 6, Pakistani police
commandos acting on a tip killed one militant and arrested five
others in a raid against a bombing cell accused in recent attacks
around the northwest city of Peshawar. A roadside bomb killed two
elders in the Bajur tribal region and left two other tribesmen
wounded. Pakistani security forces killed 13 suspected militants,
including a prominent commander identified as Gul Maula, in
gunbattles in two other parts of the northwest over the weekend.
(AP, 12/6/09)
2009 Dec 6, The Palestinian
Authority signed an agreement with the World Bank and other donors
for $64 million to help it prepare for statehood.
(AP, 12/6/09)
2009 Dec 6, Philippine troops
arrested 62 people and discovered another major weapons cache after
martial law was imposed in southern Maguindanao province following
the country's worst political massacre on Nov 23. About 20-30 armed
followers of the Ampatuan clan, the main suspect in massacre, opened
fire on police commandos while they were patrolling Datu Unsay
township, near the site of the massacre. Government negotiators were
trying to convince the gunmen to surrender to avoid bloodshed that
could harm civilians.
(AP, 12/6/09)(AP, 12/7/09)
2009 Dec 6, Romanians voted in
a presidential run-off hoping to put an end to a political standoff
holding up crucial international aid to the recession-wracked EU
member. Center-right President Traian Basescu, a former sea captain
promising tough state reforms, faced Social-Democrat Mircea Geoana,
an ex-diplomat who has pledged to maintain jobs and "reunite
Romania" after years of political squabbling. Basescu won with
50.33% of the vote. Supporters of Geoana charged that the election
was marred by fraud. The final result was determined by Romanians
abroad who favored Basescu by 78%.
(AFP, 12/6/09)(SFC, 12/8/09, p.A4)(Econ,
12/12/09, p.60)
2010 Dec 6, The US, South Korea
and Japan all urged China to help rein in its ally North Korea and
vowed solidarity in defending Seoul from any further attacks from
the North.
(AFP, 12/7/10)
2010 Dec 6, The US government
provided estimates showing the US population grew to somewhere
between 306 million and 313 million over the past decade.
(SFC, 12/7/10, p.A8)
2010 Dec 6, Internet giant
Google fielded a new champion on the mobile phone market
battlefield, a "Nexus S" smartphone made by South Korea's Samsung.
It included built-in support for Near Field Communication, a
wireless standard that enables customers to make payments over an
electronic reader.
(AP, 12/6/10)(SFC, 12/7/10, p.D1)
2010 Dec 6, It was reported
that Fiji Water, owned by billionaire Stewart Resnick, will acquire
Justin Vineyards and Winery in Paso Robles, Ca.
(SFC, 12/6/10, p.D1)
2010 Dec 6, In Virginia the
body of Tina Smith (41) was found slain in her home near Salem. Her
daughter Brittany Mae Smith (12) was missing as well was the
suspected killed Jeffrey Scott Easley (32). He had been living with
the Smiths since meeting tina online last October. On Dec 9 police
in California arrested Easley in San Francisco and rescued the girl.
(SFC, 12/11/10, p.A1)
2010 Dec 6, The African Union
appointed Guinea's interim president Sekouba Konate to drive forward
plans for an African military force which had been due to be
operational by this year.
(AFP, 12/7/10)
2010 Dec 6, Argentina announced
that it recognizes the Palestinian territories as a free and
independent state within their 1967 borders, a step it said reflects
frustration at the slow progress of peace talks with Israel.
(AP, 12/6/10)
2010 Dec 6, Belgium's central
bank chief, Guy Quaden, urged the rudderless country's divided
politicians to speedily form a government to allay financial market
fears about its future.
(AP, 12/6/10)
2010 Dec 6, British researchers
said they may have found a way to reverse damage in the central
nervous system caused by multiple sclerosis, in a study hailed by
campaigners as a major breakthrough.
(AFP, 12/6/10)
2010 Dec 6, Cuba’s Supreme
Court, for the second time this month, commuted the death sentence
of a Salvadoran man convicted of plotting a series of Havana hotel
bombings in 1997, leaving just one person left on the island's death
row. Otto Rene Rodriguez Llerena's sentence was reduced to 30 years
in prison.
(AP, 12/7/10)
2010 Dec 6, European nations
wrestled over whether to commit more money to help stabilize the
euro, as finance ministers gathered in Brussels to find ways to
fight the debt crisis that has rocked the currency bloc.
(AP, 12/6/10)
2010 Dec 6, A coalition of
Egyptian rights groups urged President Hosni Mubarak to nullify the
results of the country's parliamentary election because of
widespread vote rigging. Election monitors charged that Egypt's
polls were marked by widespread fraud, as Mubarak's party prepared
to take almost 100-percent control of parliament.
(AP, 12/6/10)(AFP, 12/6/10)
2010 Dec 6, Haitian medical
sources said fully 140 people have died of cholera in recent days in
the southwest, a region that had been largely spared the epidemic.
Officials raised the death toll to over 2,000 since the outbreak
began in October.
(AFP, 12/6/10)(SFC, 12/7/10, p.A2)
2010 Dec 6, A motorboat
overloaded with mostly Haitian migrants slammed into a reef off the
British Virgin Islands and capsized as it tried to evade
authorities. At least 8 people were killed, including two infants.
25 people were rescued. Police in St. Maarten arrested three
Haitians and said they will be charged with human smuggling in the
case.
(AP, 12/7/10)(AP, 12/8/10)
2010 Dec 6, India and France
signed a multibillion agreement to build two nuclear power plants in
India as French President Nicolas Sarkozy worked to drum up business
for his nation during his four-day visit.
(AP, 12/6/10)
2010 Dec 6, In Ireland Tony
Walsh (56) was convicted of raping 3 boys over a 5-year period three
decades earlier. Investigators had concluded that Walsh actually
raped and molested hundreds of boys and girls while serving as a
Dublin priest from 1978 to 1996. Investigators also reported that
the Vatican had tried to stop the Dublin church from defrocking
Walsh.
(SFC, 12/18/10, p.A4)
2010 Dec 6, Israel's top
policewoman, who had clung to life for four days after her patrol
car was trapped in a burning Israel forest, died of her wounds as
the last of the flames subsided in the worst fire in Israel's
history.
(AP, 12/6/10)
2010 Dec 6, New Zealand
officials attackers wielding bats or clubs slaughtered two dozen fur
seals, including newborn pups, over several days at the Ohau Point
colony, one of the country’s most popular sanctuaries for watching
the animals. Oahu Point was only reoccupied for breeding in 1990,
and about 600 fur seal pups were born there in 2004.
(AP, 12/6/10)
2010 Dec 6, In Nigeria's Niger
Delta a militant faction said it had ruptured an oil pipeline in
response to what it said was the killing of innocent civilians
during a military offensive last week.
(Reuters, 12/6/10)
2010 Dec 6, In Pakistan twin
suicide bombers in police uniform killed 43 people in Ghalanai, the
main town in the tribal district of Mohmand, attacking an
anti-Taliban militia and pro-government elders near the Afghan
border. US drone missile strikes killed 7 people in the tribal
region.
(AP, 12/6/10)(AP, 12/8/10)
2010 Dec 6, Poland's parliament
got notice of its first ever African lawmaker, a teacher and
Christian pastor from Nigeria who has lived in Poland for 17 years
and proven himself a popular local leader. John Abraham Godson (40),
a councilman in the central city of Lodz, will fill a seat in the
national parliament vacated by a fellow lawmaker from the Civic
Platform party.
(AP, 12/7/10)
2010 Dec 6, In Russia Yegor
Sviridov (28) was shot dead with rubber bullets during a fight in
northwest Moscow. A suspect arrested in the shooting was from
Kabardino-Balkaria in the Caucasus. Russian media later said
Sviridov was a member of the Spartak Ultras, a group linked to
soccer fan violence in the past. In Oct 2011 a jury at Moscow City
Court convicted Aslan Cherkesov of premeditated murder. The court's
Judge sentenced him to 20 years in prison. Five other people who
took part in the brawl were sentenced to five years in jail each for
hooliganism and inflicting light bodily injury.
(AP, 12/11/10)(SSFC, 12/12/10, p.A10)(AP,
10/28/11)
2010 Dec 6, Saudi Arabia's Rani
Investment Group said it would break ground on a 100-million-dollar
(75-million-euro) resort on a Mozambique island next year, aiming to
cash in on foreign tourists.
(AFP, 12/6/10)
2010 Dec 6, In Somalia 18
people were reported killed in weekend fighting. Mogadishu ambulance
service chief Ali Muse said that 66 civilians were also wounded in
the fighting. In central Somalia clashes between rival Majerteen and
the Sa'ad clans killed at least 20 people.
(AP, 12/6/10)(AP, 12/7/10)
2010 Dec 6, A South African
newspaper, The New Age, debuted with denials it is an agent of the
governing African National Congress. The owners, members of the
Gupta family, which has mining, computer and other businesses in
South Africa and India, was seen as close to President Jacob Zuma.
(AP, 12/6/10)
2010 Dec 6, In Sudan aircraft
from the northern Sudanese military began 3 days of bombings in
western Bahr el Ghazal state. No casualties were reported. They
follow multiple bombing runs by the north in November in a disputed
region on the border between neighboring northern Bahr el Ghazal
state and southern Darfur state. A committee with representatives
from the UN mission in Sudan and the northern and southern Sudanese
militaries later found that the bombings violated the 2005 agreement
that ended more than 20 years of civil war.
(AP, 12/16/10)
2010 Dec 6, In Switzerland six
world powers held their first meeting in 14 months with Iran over
its disputed nuclear program, sounding out Tehran's intentions after
it claimed to have taken a new step in making fissile material.
(AFP, 12/6/10)
2010 Dec 6, In Tanzania the
International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda handed down a life
sentence to Ildephonse Hategekimana, a lieutenant from the former
Rwandan army, after finding him guilty of genocide, murder and rape
in the 1994 massacre of Tutsis.
(AP, 12/6/10)
2010 Dec 6, Venezuelan soldiers
took charge at several privately owned hotels to help accommodate
some of the thousands of people who have been forced from their
homes by flooding and mudslides following weeks of torrential rains.
(AP, 12/6/10)
Go to
http://www.timelinesdb.com
Go to December 7