Today in History - April 2
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742 Apr 2, Charlemagne (d.814), Charles I the Great, King of the Franks and first Holy Roman emperor (800-14), was born. His capital was at Aachen (Acquisgrana in Latin).
(V.D.-H.K.p.105)(SFEM, 10/12/97, p.46)(HN, 4/2/98)
1118 Apr 2, Boudouin I of Bologne and Edessa, 1st crusader, king of Jerusalem, died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1305 Apr 2, French Queen Jeanne de Navarre (b.1273) died. In 1919 a “Book of Hours" prayer book, that was made for her, sold for a record price at Sotheby’s.
(http://tinyurl.com/zw23x5r)(Econ, 9/17/16, p.78)
1416 Apr 2, Ferdinand I (52) the Justified, king of Aragon and Sicily, died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1502 Apr 2, Arthur, English crown prince, husband of Catharina of Aragon, died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1513 Apr 2, Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de Leon landed in Florida. Juan Ponce de Leon, Spanish explorer, discovered Florida and planted orange and lemon trees there. [see March 27, 1512 entry] He also discovered the Dry Tortugas west of Key West.
(TL-MB, p.10)(NH, 4/97, p.317)(AP, 4/2/97)
1550 Apr 2, Jews were expelled from Genoa, Italy. [see Jun 15, 1567]
(MC, 4/2/02)
1595 Apr 2, Cornelis de Houtman's ships departed to Asia around Cape of Good Hope.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1602 Apr 2, Maria de Jesus de Agreda (Maria Coronel), Spanish Franciscan, was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1618 Apr 2, Francesco M. Grimaldi, mathematician, physicist (light diffraction), was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1645 Apr 2, Robert Devereux resigned as parliament supreme commander.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1672 Apr 2, Pedro Calungsod (b.1654), a Filipino teenager, was killed in Tumon, Guam, along with Diego Luis de San Vitores, his Jesuit missionary priest, by natives resisting their conversion efforts. In 2012 Pedro was named a saint in the Catholic church.
(AP, 10/20/12)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedro_Calungsod)
1725 Apr 2, Giovanni Casanova, Italian adventurer, was born. [see Apr 5]
(HN, 4/2/01)
1728 Apr 2, Franz Asplmayr, composer, was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1758 Apr 2, Johann Balthasar Konig (67), composer, died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1763 Apr 2, Giacomo Gotifredo Ferrari, composer, was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1772 Apr 2, Father Juan Crespi looked out over a bay, later called Suisun Bay, and believed he had found the fabled Northwest Passage, a shortcut to the Colorado River. After Father Serra established a mission in Monterey, Ca, Pedro Fages and Father Juan Crespi had set out to explore the SF Bay by land.
(SFEC, 3/1/98, p.W34)(SFC, 5/3/13, p.D1)
1784 Apr 2, Pierre Leclair (74), composer, died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1792 Apr 2, Congress passed the Coinage Act, which authorized establishment of the U.S. Mint. It established the US dollar defined in fixed weights of gold and silver. State chartered banks issued paper money convertible to gold or silver coins to ease business transactions. U.S. authorized $10 Eagle, $5 half-Eagle & 2.50 quarter-Eagle gold coins & silver dollar, dollar, quarter, dime & half-dime.
(HFA, '96, p.28)(AP, 4/2/97)(WSJ, 1/13/98, p.A1) (HN, 4/2/98)
1796 Apr 2, Haitian revolt leader Toussaint L’Ouverture commanded French forces at Santo Domingo.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1800 Apr 2, 1st performance of Ludwig van Beethoven's 1st Symphony in C.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1801 Apr 2, The British navy defeated the Danish at the Battle of Copenhagen.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1805 Apr 2, Hans Christian Andersen (d.1875), author of 150 fairy tales, was born in Odense, Denmark.
(CFA, '96, p.44)(HN, 4/2/98)(AP, 4/2/99)
1814 Apr 2, Henry Lewis "Old Rock" Benning, Brig General in Confederate Army, was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1827 Apr 2, William Holdman Hunt, English painter (Light of the World), was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1827 Apr 2, Joseph Dixon began manufacturing lead pencils.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1834 Apr 2, Frederic-Auguste Bartholdi, sculptor (Statue of Liberty), was born in Colmar, France.
(HN, 4/2/01)
1840 Apr 2, The Association of American Geologists held its first meeting in Philadelphia.
(www.lib.uwaterloo.ca/society/history/1840aagn.html)
1840 Apr 2, Emile Zola (d.1902), French novelist, reporter (Nana), was born. He tried to wake the consciousness of the fin de siecle.
(HN, 4/2/98)(SFC, 12/29/00, p.C6)(V.D.-H.K.p.279)
1845 Apr 2, H.L. Fizeau and J. Leon Foucault took the 1st photo of Sun.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1851 Apr 2, Rama III (b.1788), King Phra Nangklao, died. King Phra Nangklao reformed the tax and treasury system and oversaw a boom in trade with China during his 27-year rule from 1824. Siam renewed official contacts with western powers for the first time since the late Ayutthaya period, and supported the British in their first Anglo-Burmese War in 1824. The king did not name a successor and the throne passed to his half-brother.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rama_III)(Reuters, 5/2/19)
1853 Apr 2, Lucie de la Tour du Pin (83), born as Henriette-Lucie Dillon and former lady-in-waiting to Marie Antoinette, died Paris. Her memoir, “Journal of a Woman of Fifty Years," was not published until 1906. In 2009 Caroline Moorhead authored “Dancing to the Precipice: Lucie de la Tour du Pin and the French Revolution."
(Econ, 3/7/09, p.91)(http://tinyurl.com/co3xor)
1860 Apr 2, The first Italian Parliament met at Turin. Italy was unified. The Rothschild banking empire bankrolled Italy’s independence.
(AP, 4/2/97) (SFC, 6/11/96, p.A16)(SFC, 7/12/96, p.A11)
1863 Apr 2, In Richmond, Va., a large crowd of hungry women from one of Richmond's working-class neighborhoods demanded bread from Governor John Letcher. When the governor did not respond favorably to the rioters' demands, the women marched down Main Street, shouting "Bread" as they made their way to the commissary, where they smashed store windows and grabbed food and anything else they could get their hands on. Not until the mob faced President Davis and his troops did the rampage end. Varina Howell Davis wrote an account of the riots after her husband’s death in 1889.
(HNQ, 5/8/02)(AH, 6/02, p.24)
1864 Apr 2, Skirmish at Crump's Hill (Piney Woods), Louisiana.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1864 Apr 2, Skirmish at Spoonville-Antoine, Arkansas.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1865 Apr 2, Confederate President Davis and most of his Cabinet fled the Confederate capital of Richmond, Va. Grant broke Lee’s line at Petersburg. President Jefferson Davis moved his government headquarters to Danville, Va., when its previous capital, Richmond, became engulfed in flames. Though it would have been safer to secure a location further south, Danville was naturally protected by the Dan and Staunton rivers, and it was in close proximity to Gen. Robert E. Lee’s army to the north and Gen. Joseph E. Johnston’s army to the south. The Piedmont Railroad connected Danville and Greensboro, N.C. and offered easy access to supplies.
(AP, 4/2/97)(HN, 4/2/98)(HNQ, 11/1/01)
1865 Apr 2, Battle of Petersburg, Va. (Ft Gregg, Sutherland's Station).
(MC, 4/2/02)
1865 Apr 2, Battle of Ft. Blakely, AL. and Selma, AL.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1865 Apr 2, Ambrose Powell Hill (39), Confederate general, was killed in action.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1865 Apr 2, Richard Cobden (b.1804), English manufacturer and Radical and Liberal statesman, died. He had advocated for free trade and led the campaign against Corn Laws, which were repealed in 1846.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Cobden)(Econ, 10/1/16, SR p.16)
1866 Apr 2, Pres. Johnson ended war in Ala, Ark, Fla, Ga, Miss, La, NC, SC, Ten and Va.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1870 Apr 2, Victoria Claflin Woodhull (1838-1927) became the first woman to run for president of the United States when she announced her candidacy for the 1872 election, but she spent Election Day in jail for sending obscene literature through the mail. Articulate and radical in her beliefs, she boldly challenged convention in Victorian-era America. Victoria and her sister, Tennessee Claflin, got their start as spiritual advisors to financier Cornelius Vanderbilt. With his backing, the sisters became the first women to open their own successful brokerage firm. Woodhull was the first woman newspaper publisher, a feminist and a militant suffragist, but most shocking to Victorian sensibilities, she also advocated free love.
(HNPD, 4/28/99)
1872 Apr 2, George B. Brayton patented a gasoline powered engine.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1872 Apr 2, Samuel F.B. Morse (80), developer of the electric telegraph, died in New York. In 2003 Kenneth Silverman authored "Lightning Man," a biography of Morse.
(AP, 4/2/99)(MC, 4/2/02)(WSJ, 10/28/03, p.A1)
1875 Apr 2, Walter Chrysler, founder of Chrysler automobile company, was born. He grew up in Ellis, Kansas.
(HN, 4/2/98)(WSJ, 8/10/00, p.A16)
1875 Apr 2, In San Francisco a painting of a dead maiden titled “Elaine" by Toby Rosenthal (1848-1917), was discovered stolen from the Snow & May art gallery on Kearny St. The Prussia-born artist had been raised in San Francisco before he went to study art in Germany. On April 4 police arrested William Donohue and three cronies and recovered the painting at a shanty on Langton St.
(SFC, 12/9/17, p.C2)
1884 Apr 2, The London prison for debtors closed.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1891 Apr 2, Max Ernst, German painter and sculptor, founder of surrealism, was born. [see Jan 24]
(HN, 4/2/98)
1896 Apr 2, Theodore Robinson (b.1852), American Impressionist painter, died in NYC.
(WSJ, 10/1/04, p.W2)(http://97.1911encyclopedia.org)
1900 Apr 2, Heinrich Besseler, German musicologist, was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1902 Apr 2, Thomas L. Talley set up the first moving picture theater as part of a carnival in Los Angeles.
(SFEC, 5/23/99, Z1 p.10)(MC, 4/2/02)
1905 Apr 2, Kurt Adler (d.1988), American conductor, was born. "Tradition is what you resort to when you don't have the time or the money to do it right."
(HN, 4/2/01)(AP, 8/25/99)
1905 Apr 2, Serge Lifar, dancer and opera director, was born.
(HN, 4/2/01)
1908 Apr 2, Buddy Ebsen (d.2003), actor-dancer, was born in Belleville, Ill. He played Jed Clampett in the popular television series The Beverly Hillbillies.
(AP, 4/2/08)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddy_Ebsen)
1910 Apr 2, Karl Harris perfected the process for the artificial synthesis of rubber.
(HN, 4/2/98)
1910 Apr 2, Boyd Alexander (37), English explorer (Niger to the Nile), was murdered.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1912 Apr 2, Titanic underwent sea trials under its own power.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1912 Apr 2, Sun Yet Sen formed the Kuomintang-Party in China.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1914 Apr 2, Alec Guinness, English stage and film actor, was born illegitimate and spent his early years in penury.
(WSJ, 8/15/00, p.A26)
1914 Apr 2, Federal Reserve Board announced plans to divide country into 12 districts. [see Nov 16, 1914]
(HN, 4/2/98)
1916 Apr 2, German troops overtook Bois de Caillette.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1917 Apr 2, At 8:30 p.m. President Woodrow Wilson, delivered his message before a joint session of Congress and recommended that a state of war be declared between the United States and the imperial German government. Realizing that the war looming ahead would be a costly one, Wilson said, "the day has come when America is privileged to spend her blood and her might for the principles that gave her birth and happiness and the peace which she has treasured…" and "The world must be made safe for democracy."
(AP, 4/2/97)(HN, 4/2/98)(http://condor.stcloudstate.edu/~brixr01/theTIMEMACHINE.html)
1917 Apr 2, Jeannette Pickering Rankin was sworn in as the first woman to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives.
(HN, 4/2/01)
1919 Apr 2, Ian Hunter, impresario, was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1920 Apr 2, Jack Webb, actor (Joe Friday-Dragnet), was born in Santa Monica, Calif.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1921 Apr 2, Einstein (1879-1955) made his first visit to the US on a fundraising tour with Zionist leader Chaim Weizman. Prof. Albert Einstein lectured in NYC on his new theory of relativity. In 2007 Jurgen Neffe authored “Einstein: A Biography;" and Jozsef Illy edited “Albert Meets America."
(SSFC, 5/13/07, p.M6)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Einstein)
1925 Apr 2, George MacDonald Fraser, poet, author (Flashman at the Charge), was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1926 Apr 2, Riots took place between Moslems and Hindus in Calcutta.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1930 Apr 2, Girolamo Arriego, composer, was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1930 Apr 2, Ethiopia’s Empress Zauditu died and Ras Tafari assumed the title of Emperor.
(www.ethiopianembassy.org/history.shtml)
1931 Apr 2, Virne "Jackie" Mitchell became the 2nd woman to play for an all-male pro baseball team. In an exhibition game against the New York Yankees, she struck out both Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig in an exhibition game in Chattanooga, Tennessee.
(HN, 4/2/01)(www.exploratorium.edu/baseball/mitchell.html)
1932 Apr 2, Aviator Charles A. Lindbergh and Dr. John F. Condon turned over $50,000 in ransom to an unidentified man in a New York City cemetery in the Bronx, in exchange for Lindbergh's kidnapped son. The infant was not returned, and was found dead the following month.
(AP, 4/2/97)(HN, 4/2/98)
1935 Apr 2, Sharon Acker, actress (Della Street-Perry Mason 1973), was born in Toronto, Canada.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1935 Apr 2, Sir Watson-Watt patented RADAR.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1939 Apr 2, Marvin P. Gaye Jr, singer (Sexual Healing), was born in Wash, DC.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1941 Apr 2, USS Hornet with Jimmy Doolittle's B-25s departed from SF.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1942 Apr 2, Glenn Miller and his orchestra recorded "American Patrol" at the RCA Victor studios in Hollywood.
(AP, 4/2/97)
1944 Apr 2, Soviet forces entered Romania, one of Germany's allied countries.
(HN, 4/2/01)
1945 Apr 2, Linda Hunt, actress (Bostonians, Eleni, Silverado), was born in Morristown, NJ.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1945 Apr 2, 1st US units reached the east coast of Okinawa.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1948 Apr 2, Emmylou Harris, American singer, was born.
(HN, 4/2/01)
1951 Apr 2, William McChesney Martin (1906-1998) began to serve as chairman of the US Federal Reserve and continued to 1970. Pres. Harry Truman pressed him to keep interest rates low despite the inflationary consequences of the Korean War. Martin refused.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_McChesney_Martin)(Econ, 4/29/17, p.58)
1953 Apr 2, Jean Epstein (56), French director (Vive la Vie), died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1956 Apr 2, The soap operas "As the World Turns" and "The Edge of Night" premiered on CBS television. Actress Helen Wagner (1918-2010) opened "As the World Turns" with the words: "Good morning, dear."
(AP, 4/2/99)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Edge_of_Night)(AP, 5/3/10)
1956 Apr 2, Peter Ustinov's "Romanoff and Juliet," premiered in Manchester.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1958 Apr 2, National Advisory Council on Aeronautics was renamed NASA.
(HN, 4/2/98)
1960 Apr 2, Cuba bought oil from USSR.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1961 Apr 2, Wallingford Riegger (75), US composer (Bacchangle), died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1963 Apr 2, Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King began the first non-violent campaign in Birmingham, Alabama.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1964 Apr 2, A military coup in Brazil by Gen. Humberto Castello Branco ousted Pres. Joao Goulart and altered the traditional power structure. Gen'l. Golbery do Couto e Silva was a leader in the coup. Business interests led by Jorge Oscar de Mello Flores (d.2000 at 88) supported the military coup.
(WSJ, 12/4/95, p.A-9)(WSJ, 7/7/99, p.A17)(SFC, 8/3/00, p.D2)(MC, 4/2/02)
1965 Apr 2, Rodney King, black motorist brutally beaten by LA cops, was born in Sacramento, Calif.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1965 Apr 2, Rolf Hochhuth's play "The Deputy," which blamed Pope Pius XII for war crimes, was banned in Italy.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1966 Apr 2, Cecil Scott Forester (66), English author (Horatio Hornblower), died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1968 Apr 2, The influential science-fiction film "2001: A Space Odyssey," produced and directed by Stanley Kubrick, had its world premiere in Washington.
(AP, 4/2/08)
1968 Apr 2, Senator Eugene McCarthy won the Democratic primaries in Wisconsin. In 2004 Dominic Sandbrook authored "Eugene McCarthy: The Rise and Fall of Postwar American Liberalism."
(http://news.minnesota.publicradio.org/features/2005/06/15_newsroom_mccarthytimeline/)(SSFC, 4/11/04, p.M6)
1968 Apr 2, In West Germany the Baader-Meinhof gang was formed and named after its founders, Andreas Baader and Ulrike Meinhof. Both later committed suicide in prison. The gang became known as the Red Army Faction and led assassinations, bombings and bank robberies in West Germany through the 1970s and 1980s. The RAF published a letter to Reuters in 1998 and declared to have disbanded.
(SFC, 4/21/98, p.A18)(www.baader-meinhof.com/timeline/1968.html)
1970 Apr 2, In Nepal 2 men began an ascent of south face of Annapurna I, the highest final stage in a wall climb in world.
(MC, 4/2/02)\
1971 Apr 2, The ABC sci-fi soap opera "Dark Shadows," which premiered in 1966, aired for the last time.
(www.tv.com/Dark-Shadows/show/2374/summary.html)
1972 Apr 2, Tennessee Williams' "Small Craft Warnings," premiered in NYC.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_Craft_Warnings)
1972 Apr 2, In response to the North Vietnamese Easter Offensive, President Nixon authorized the US 7th Fleet to target NVA troops massed around the Demilitarized Zone with air strikes and naval gunfire.
(www.historyplace.com/unitedstates/vietnam/index-1969.html)
1973 Apr 2, CBS radio began on hour news 24 hours a day.
(http://tinyurl.com/5hvvw4)
1974 Apr 2, In the 46th Academy Awards "Sting," Glenda Jackson and Jack Lemmon win. Robert Opel (33) of SF streaked naked across the stage. Opel was shot and killed 5 years later during a robbery in SF.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/46th_Academy_Awards)(SFEC, 3/14/99, DB p.37)
1974 Apr 2, French President Georges Pompidou (62) died in Paris. Alain Pohrer (1909-1996) as president of the Senate then served as interim president for 7 weeks.
(SFC, 12/12/96, p.C8)(AP, 4/2/97)
1975 Apr 2, In Oakland, Ca., a World Airways plane landed with 52 Vietnamese orphans as part of Operation Babylift. The Presidio of San Francisco served as an impromptu crossroads for over 1,500 Vietnamese orphans to be sent to American families for adoption.
(SFC, 4/18/15, p.C1)
1978 Apr 2, TV show "Dallas" premiered on CBS as a 5 week mini-series. It was produced by Leonard Katzman (1927-1996) and ran through May, 1991. [see Mar 2]
(SFC, 9/9/96, p.A26)(MC, 4/2/02)
1979 Apr 2, Israeli PM Menachem Begin visited Cairo, Egypt, and met with Pres. Sadat.
(www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/time70s.html#1979)
1979 Apr 2, Anthrax was found to have leaked from the secret lab of Compound 19 in Sverdlovsk (later renamed Yekaterinburg) in the Ural Mountains. It caused a local epidemic that killed at least 64/66 people. Pres. Yeltsin acknowledged the leak in 1992 and allowed a team of researchers to investigate the site. In 2000 Jeanne Guillemin authored "Anthrax: The Investigation of a Deadly Outbreak." [see Mar 30]
(SFC, 2/19/00, p.A14)(SFEC, 8/13/00, BR p.7)(WSJ, 9/18/01, p.B1)
1981 Apr 2, Heavy battle took place between Christian militia and Syrian army in East Lebanon. Casualties and injuries were in the hundreds.
(www.2la.org/lebanon/ee/terrorlb.htm)
1982 Apr 2, Several thousand troops from Argentina seized the disputed Falkland Islands, located in the south Atlantic, from Britain but Lady Thatcher had Britain take them back the following June. Britain fought with Argentina in the Falkland Islands War, also known as the Falklands War, the Malvinas War and the South Atlantic War. The short, undeclared war between the two nations was fought over claims to the Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas) and neighboring islands. Argentina had laid claims to the territories since the 19th century, but spurred by a related dispute on South Georgia island and political expediency, the military government of Argentina invaded the Falkland Islands. A British naval task force was assembled and headed towards the war zone by late April. British forces established a beachhead on the Falklands in late May. With the surrender of the Argentine garrison at Stanley on June 14, the conflict was essentially over.
(TMC, 1994, p.1982)(WSJ, 12/12/95, p.A-15)(AP, 4/2/99)(HNQ, 1/10/01)
1985 Apr 2, Ronnie Gardner shot and killed Utah attorney Michael Burdell during an escape attempt at the Metropolitan Hall of Justice in Salt Lake City. Gardner was convicted of murder and sentenced to death. In 2010 Gardner (49) chose to die by firing squad, an option which was removed by state lawmakers in 2004, but still available to him.
(SFC, 4/24/10, p.A5)
1986 Apr 2, George Corley Wallace (1919-1998), Governor of Alabama (Dem.), announced his retirement.
(http://tinyurl.com/fuobf)(http://tinyurl.com/eegg3)
1986 Apr 2, Four American passengers were killed when a bomb exploded aboard a TWA jetliner en route from Rome to Athens, Greece.
(AP, 4/2/98)
1987 Apr 2, IBM announced the upcoming release of the PS/2 and OS/2 computers featuring the Microsoft MS OS/2 and Windows 2.0 computer operating systems.
(Wired, 12/98, p.196)(http://pages.prodigy.net/michaln/history/pr/87apr_m3592.html)
1987 Apr 2, Buddy Rich (b.1917), jazz drummer, died.
(www.drummerworld.com/drummers/Buddy_Rich.html)
1988 Apr 2, Secretary of State George P. Shultz briefed Pope John Paul II on his Middle East peace proposals during a private audience at the Vatican.
(AP, 4/2/98)
1989 Apr 2, Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev began a visit to Cuba amid differences with President Fidel Castro over the type of reforms Gorbachev was instituting in the Soviet Union.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1990 Apr 2, The University of Nevada at Las Vegas won the NCAA college basketball championship, defeating Duke 103-73.
(AP, 4/2/00)
1990 Apr 2, Saddam Hussein of Iraq threatened to hit Israel with binary chemical weapons.
(http://tinyurl.com/oz5my)
1990 Apr 2, In a conciliatory gesture, the president of Lithuania invited Kremlin officials to discuss the republic's secession drive.
(AP, 4/2/00)
1991 Apr 2, Iraqi state media reported that only a few more days were needed to stamp out fighting with Kurdish rebels, who reported renewed skirmishes around the strategic oil center of Kirkuk.
(AP, 4/2/01)
1992 Apr 2, John Gotti (d.2002), Mafia boss, was convicted in New York City of 5 murders and racketeering. Underboss Sammy “the Bull" Gravano provided testimony. The murders included the 1985 hit on Paul Castellano, head of the Gambino family. He was sentenced to life in prison on June 23.
(AP, 4/2/98)(USAT, 9/24/98, p.11A)(SFC, 6/11/02, p.A2)(SSFC, 8/11/02, Par p.4)
1992 Apr 2, The space shuttle Atlantis returned from a nine-day mission.
(AP, 4/2/02)
1992 Apr 2, French Premier Edith Cresson, who had served 10 turbulent months as France's first woman prime minister, resigned after election setbacks for the ruling Socialists.
(AP, 4/2/02)
1993 Apr 2, President Clinton presided at a daylong conference in Portland, Ore., on how much logging should be allowed on federal land.
(AP, 4/2/98)
1993 Apr 2, Ellie Nesler (1952-2008) shot and killed Daniel Driver in a Jamestown, Ca., courtroom. Driver had been accused of molesting her son and three other boys. She was sentenced to 10 years in prison. She later admitted to investigators that she had taken “crank" that morning. She was freed in 1997 after serving 3 and 1/2 years in prison. The events were made into a 1999 TV movie. In 2002 she was sentenced to 6 years in prison for selling and possessing illegal drugs. In 2005 her son Willy was convicted of 1st degree murder for the stomping death in 2004 of a man on their property.
(SFC, 11/21/96, p.A22)(SFC, 8/22/97, p.A1)(SFC, 6/23/99, p.B1)(SFC, 6/6/06, p.B8)(SFC, 12/30/08, p.B1)
1993 Apr 2, In Illinois Andy Ascher (22) was killed in Rockford. In 1994 Patrick Pursley was convicted in the murder of Ascher based on ballistic evidence from the crime scene. In 2017 technological advances eroded confidence in the evidence and Pursley faced a new trial.
(SFC, 8/10/17, p.A7)
1993 Apr 2, The Bosnian Serb parliament rejected a peace plan drafted by U.N. and European mediators and already approved by Bosnian Muslims and Croats.
(AP, 4/2/98)
1994 Apr 2, President Clinton warned Americans against "demagogues of division" in his weekly radio address, while calling for greater personal responsibility and cooperation to overcome the nation's problems.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1994 Apr 2, In California Preston Tate was shot and killed by guards during an allegedly staged fight at the Corcoran State Prison.
(SFC, 11/22/96, p.A26)
1994 Apr 2, Consumer reporter Betty Furness died in Hartsdale, N.Y., at age 78.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1995 Apr 2, Baseball owners accepted the players' union offer to play without a contract, ending the longest and costliest strike in the history of professional sports.
(AP, 4/2/98)
1995 Apr 2, The NYC Police Dept and Transit Police merged into one organization.
(www.nyc.gov/html/nypd/html/transportation/tpd.html)
1995 Apr 2, Members of the extremist group Hamas accidentally set off a bomb that tore through their hideout in the Gaza Strip, killing six people.
(AP, 4/2/00)
1996 Apr 2, A federal appeals court rejected New York state laws banning doctor-assisted suicide, saying it would be discriminatory to let people disconnect life support systems while refusing to let others end their lives with medication.
(AP, 4/2/01)
1996 Apr 2, In Colombia architect Juan Carlos Gaviria, brother of former pres. Cesar Gaviria was kidnapped by a group called Dignity for Colombia.
(SFC, 6/13/96, p.C3)
1996 Apr 2, If the Indian Hindu Nationalist Party wins elections, it will move toward testing a nuclear bomb.
(WSJ, 4/2/96, p.A-1)
1996 Apr 2, N. Korea appealed for food. $2 million in aid was lost last month when a ship sank off Taiwan.
(WSJ, 4/2/96, p.A-1)
1996 Apr 2, More than 100 Haitians died when a ferry sank.
(WSJ, 4/3/96, p.A-1)
1997 Apr 2, The White House released documents showing how eager it had been to exploit the money-drawing powers of President Clinton and Vice President Gore during the 1996 campaign while coordinating with the Democratic Party's fund-raising machine.
(AP, 4/2/98)
1997 Apr 2, An Air Force A-10 Thunderbolt jet with four 500- pound bombs was lost over the Colorado Rockies. It was piloted by Capt. Craig Button (32). Wreckage of the plane was found Apr 20 on the sheer face of New York Mountain [Gold Dust Peak], 15 miles from Vail. It was later suspected that he committed suicide due to a possible revelation of homosexuality. A 1998 official report cited unrequited love for a former girlfriend and his mother's Christian pacifist faith.
(SFE, 4/9/97, p.A16)(SFC, 4/21/97, p.A1)(WSJ, 4/21/97, p.A1)(SFC, 5/3/97, p.A3)(SFC, 12/25/98, p.A3)(SFC, 8/26/99, p.A3)
1997 Apr 2, Tomoyuki Tanaka (86), producer (Godzilla), died of a stroke.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1998 Apr 2, California agreed to settle a sexual harassment lawsuit brought by 3 female prison workers for $4.3 million.
(SFC, 4/3/98, p.A26)
1998 Apr 2, In Kansas City it was reported that the SubTropolis underground business complex had some 4.3 million sq. feet of mine space converted to warehouse, office and factory use with 50 enterprises employing 1300 people. The underground industrial park began in 1945 as a limestone mine.
(WSJ, 4/2/98, p.A1)
1998 Apr 2, In Burma ethnic Karen rebels launched attacks against Burmese troops and killed 30 people.
(SFC, 4/4/98, p.A16)
1998 Apr 2, In Columbia Thomas Fiore (43), one of the hostages captured Mar 27, escaped captivity by the FARC rebel group.
(SFC, 4/3/98, p.B5)
1998 Apr 2, A French court found Maurice Papon (1910-2007), a career civil servant, guilty of deporting Jews from Bordeaux in 1942-1943, when he was secretary-general of the Gironde Prefecture. He was sentenced to 10 years in prison, but served only 3 due to ill health.
(SFC, 4/2/98, p.C2)(SFC, 4/3/98, p.B2)(Econ, 2/24/07, p.99)
1998 Apr 2, Iran and Iraq began a war prisoner exchange involving nearly 6000 men, mostly Iraqis.
(WSJ, 4/3/98, p.A1)
1998 Apr 2, In Northern Ireland police intercepted a 980-pound bomb at Dublin’s ferry port.
(SFC, 4/3/98, p.B8)
1998 Apr 2, In Israel three Arab homes were demolished in the Bedouin village of Suweij. Clashes with Israeli police occurred over the next few days as the Arabs attempted to rebuild their homes.
(SFC, 4/6/98, p.A12)
1998 Apr 2, In Latvia the only Jewish synagogue in Riga was bombed.
(SFC, 4/798, p.A14)
1998 Apr 2, Shaking their fists in rage, thousands of mourners marched in a funeral procession in the West Bank for a top Hamas bombmaker, Mohiyedine Sharif, hailed by Palestinians as a martyr and condemned by Israel as a terrorist.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1998 Apr 2, In Romania Radu Vasile, an economist and leader of the national Peasant Party, was named by Pres. Emil Constantinescu as the new prime minister. He soon began reforms with an economic program to restore domestic and foreign confidence.
(SFC, 4/3/98, p.B5)(WSJ, 5/6/98, p.A18)
1998 Apr 2, Sudanese soldiers shot and beat to death 74 student conscripts who tried to flee the Ailafoon military camp. At least 55 others drowned when their boat capsized on the blue Nile while they tried to escape.
(SFC, 4/13/98, p.A12)
1999 Apr 2, The US Labor Department reported that the nation's unemployment rate fell to a 29-year low of 4.2 percent in March 1999.
(AP, 4/2/00)
1999 Apr 2, Sec. of Energy Bill Richardson ordered the computer systems at Los Alamos laboratory to be shut down due to security leaks.
(SFEC, 5/2/99, p.A24)
1999 Apr 2, David L. Smith (30), a New Jersey computer programmer, was arrested and charged with writing and unleashing the Melissa computer virus.
(SFC, 4/3/99, p.A3)
1999 Apr 2, At least 7 people died in a freak snowstorm while trying to cross the Mexican border into California in the Cleveland National Forest.
(SFC, 4/3/99, p.A1)
1999 Apr 2, NATO planners began preliminary discussions about the possibility of sending ground troops into Kosovo.
(SFC, 4/3/99, p.A1)
1999 Apr 2, Allied aircraft resumed bombing in Iraq after a 2 week lull.
(SFC, 4/3/99, p.A4)
1999 Apr 2, In Albania Hashim Thaci, a leading nationalist politician, named a new government with himself in charge. Moderates loyal to Ibrahim Rugova were excluded after no candidates were put forth.
(SFC, 4/3/99, p.A6)
1999 Apr 2, From West Kalimantan, Indonesia, it was reported Malays and indigenous Dayaks had killed over 200 people over the last 2 weeks. Nearly 30,000 Muslim people, originally from Madura, were reported to have fled their villages.
(WSJ, 4/2/99, p.A9)
1999 Apr 2, In Russia Pres. Yeltsin ordered the dismissal of Prosecutor Gen'l. Yuri Skuratov just hours after Skuratov appeared on TV announcing that he had the names of Russian officials who had illegally transferred dirty money into Swiss bank accounts. Skuratov was earlier caught on video cavorting with 2 prostitutes.
(SFC, 4/3/99, p.A3)
1999 Apr 2, At least 55 people were gunned down by Serbian police and militiamen in the Kosovo city of Djakovica.
(SFC, 4/29/99, p.D2)
2000 Apr 2, Connecticut won its second women’s NCAA national championship with a 71-to-52 victory over Tennessee.
(AP, 4/2/01)
2000 Apr 2, More than 600 people set out on a five-day, 120-mile protest march to Columbia, South Carolina, to urge state lawmakers to move the Confederate flag from the Statehouse dome.
(AP, 4/2/01)
2000 Apr 2, It was reported that a Nov. 1999, 79-page CIA report: “International Trafficking in Women to the United States: A Contemporary Manifestation of Slavery," claimed 50,000 victims per year in the US.
(SFEC, 4/2/00, p.A3)
2000 Apr 2, In Japan Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi suffered a stroke and Mikio Aoki took over as Acting Premier. He died more than a month later.
(SFC, 4/3/00, p.A8)(AP, 4/2/01)
2000 Apr 2, In Rwanda Tutsi leader Paul Kagame assumed office as the country’s 4th president.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Kagame)
2000 cApr 2, South Korea said it would slaughter 350,000 hoofed livestock to stem public concerns over an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease.
(WSJ, 4/3/00, p.A21)
2000 Apr 2, In Sri Lanka a rebel attack launched 7 days earlier had left 78 fighters dead. Rebels said 700 government troops had been killed since the attack began with 71 rebels dead. The army admitted to 102 deaths and claimed 210 rebels killed. Thousands of residents were stranded near the Elephant Pass causeway.
(SFC, 4/3/00, p.A9)
2001 Apr 2, Duke won its third national men's basketball championship (NCAA) with an 82-to-72 victory over Arizona for the.
(WSJ, 4/4/01, p.A18)(AP, 4/2/02)
2001 Apr 2, Pres. Bush demanded that the Chinese release the US Navy crew and spy plane that had made an emergency landing on China’s Hainan Island after colliding with a Chinese fighter.
(SFC, 4/3/01, p.A1)(WSJ, 4/3/01, p.A1)(AP, 4/2/02)
2001 Apr 2, Pres. Bush met with Egypt’s Pres. Mubarak and both pledged to continue searching for an end to Middle East violence.
(WSJ, 4/3/01, p.A1)
2001 Apr 2, Vincent Cianci Jr. (59), mayor of Providence, RI, was indicted by a federal grand jury on racketeering charges. Cianci was convicted on a single count of racketeering conspiracy in Jun, 2002, and sentenced to 5 years and 4 months in jail on Sep 6. In 2003 Mike Stanton authored "The Prince of Providence," a biography of Cianci.
(SFC, 4/3/01, p.A2)(SFC, 6/25/02, p.A4)(SFC, 9/7/02, p.A3)(WSJ, 8/5/03, p.D5)
2001 Apr 2, The town of Edgar Springs, Mo., was named the population center of the US. It marked the point where the US would balance if its 281 million population were equally distributed. The actual center was 3 miles east of town.
(SFC, 4/3/01, p.A2)
2001 Apr 2, Scientists reported new evidence for “dark energy" and believed that it was causing the universe to expand faster with time.
(SFC, 4/3/01, p.A1)
2001 Apr 2, An Israeli helicopter rocketed a truck and killed an Islamic Jihad militant. In Bethlehem a sniper killed an Israeli soldier.
(WSJ, 4/3/01, p.A1)
2001 Apr 2, In Japan the new freedom of information law went into effect 2 years after it was approved by Parliament.
(SSFC, 4/15/01, p.D4)
2001 Apr 2, In Nepal a Maoist insurgency killed at least 38 people.
(SFC, 4/3/01, p.A9)
2002 Apr 2, In California a SF jury awarded $33.7 million to a former Navy electrician who acquired mesothelioma from asbestos exposure. Foster Wheeler Corp. was the defendant.
(SFC, 4/3/02, p.A13)
2002 Apr 2, In Illinois federal prosecutors indicted the campaign committee of Gov. George Ryan and 2 former top aids on charges of racketeering, mail fraud and conspiracy to obstruct justice.
(SFC, 4/3/02, p.A3)
2002 Apr 2, Prof. John Pierce (92), communications engineer and author, died in Mountain View, Ca. He authored about 20 books, invented the Pierce Gun, a vacuum tube that transmits electrons, received some 90 patents and provided the transistor its name.
(SFC, 4/9/02, p.A18)
2002 Apr 2, Argentina marked the 20th anniversary of the Falklands War and Pres. Duhalde said the Falkland Islands would be regained through diplomacy.
(SFC, 4/3/02, p.A7)
2002 Apr 2, The Israeli army attacked the headquarters of Jibril Rajoub, security chief of the Palestinian Authority. The Israeli Army said it found a letter in Arafat’s compound that detailed money requests for building bombs. PM Sharon offered Yasser Arafat a one-way ticket to exile and battles with Palestinian militiamen continued and at least 13 Palestinians were killed.
(SFC, 4/2/02, p.A1)(SFC, 4/3/02, p.A1,10)(WSJ, 4/3/02, p.A1)
2002 Apr 2, Israel seized control of Bethlehem; Palestinian gunmen forced their way into the Church of the Nativity, the traditional birthplace of Jesus, where they began a 39-day standoff.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, In the 15th day of Operation Iraqi Freedom American forces crossed the Tigris River in the drive toward the Iraqi capital and destroyed the Baghdad Division of Iraq's Republican Guard. Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, supported the war plan along with Defense Sec. Donald Rumsfeld against criticism. US Marines took Numaniya, a city of 80,000. American forces fought their way to within sight of the Baghdad skyline; Iraqi soldiers discarded their military uniforms by the roadside to hide their identity.
(SFC, 4/2/03, p.A1)(SFC, 4/4/03, p.W1)(AP, 4/2/08)
2003 Apr 2, A US B-52 bomber dropped 2 new CBU-105 bombs on the first 30 vehicles of an Iraqi armored convoy approaching a small American reconnaissance unit. The bombs each released 10 submunitions, each of which ejected 4 disks that used infra-red scanners to locate the vehicles. Soldiers in the remaining 70 vehicles surrendered immediately.
(Econ, 1/30/10, p.88)
2003 Apr 2, A Navy F/A-18C Hornet after his fighter jet went down during a bombing run over Karbala. In 2004 it was reported that the jet was shot down by an Army Patriot missile. 7 US Army soldiers were killed when their Black Hawk helicopter was shot down.
(AP, 4/3/03)(SFC, 4/3/03, p.A1)(SFC, 12/11/04, p.A12)
2003 Apr 2, Polish troops fighting with the US-led coalition in Iraq reported encountering many Iraqi combatants in civilian clothes.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, Saddam Hussein declared that "victory is at hand," and issued a new statement urging Iraqis to fight on and defend their towns according to a broadcast on Iraqi satellite television.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, Mirko Sarovic, a Bosnian Serb who was the chairman of the country's three-member multiethnic presidency, resigned after being implicated in a local company's violation of the UN arms embargo against Iraq.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, Burundi said Ethiopia, Mozambique and South Africa will send 3,500 peacekeepers to enforce a truce ending nearly 10 years of civil war.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, Guatemala City police raided the house of a suspected drug lord and found $14 million in cash.
(SFC, 4/4/03, p.A18)
2003 Apr 2, In Indian-controlled Kashmir the chief of the largest militant group was killed in a shootout with police in the strife-torn Himalayan province.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, Israeli forces raided Gaza and 6 Palestinians were killed.
(SFC, 4/3/03, p.A12)(WSJ, 4/3/03, p.A1)
2003 Apr 2, The Japanese government said a Japanese whaling fleet killed 400 minke whales during a five-month scientific expedition in Antarctic waters.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, In Mexico 9 people were found tortured and killed near the border city of Nuevo Laredo in apparent drug-related violence.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, In the southern Philippine city of Davao a bomb exploded near a bustling wharf, and killed 16 people including two children.
(AP, 4/3/03)(SFC, 4/3/03, p.A11)
2003 Apr 2, The UN health agency advised travelers to avoid going to Hong Kong and the Chinese province of Guangdong because of the deadly outbreak of SARS.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, Vietnam's PM Phan Van Khai spoke with Thich Huyen Quang, the leader of a banned Buddhist church, about religious freedoms. Quang has been under house arrest in 1982.
(AP, 4/3/03)
2004 Apr 2, Washington announced plans to fingerprint and photograph millions of travelers to the United States. The measure, which will take effect by Sept. 30, affected citizens in 27 countries who had been allowed to travel within the US without a visa for up to 90 days.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, The US Labor Dept. reported a 308,000 increase in jobs along with a rise in unemployment from 5.6 to 5.7%. The DJIA rose 97 points in response to close at 10,470.
(SFC, 4/3/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 2, The Pentagon said it released 15 people held as terrorism suspects at a U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, reducing the number confined there to 595.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, The 6-month Tyco trial ended with a hung jury. A threatening letter to a lone dissident juror prompted the judge to call a mistrial. A retrial was planned.
(SFC, 4/3/04, p.C1)
2004 Apr 2, Sun Microsystems announced that Microsoft would pay it nearly $2 billion to settle a legal dispute. Sun also announced layoffs of 3,300 and a business partnership with Microsoft.
(SFC, 4/3/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 2, In Brussels an official ceremony welcomed Bulgaria, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia into the NATO alliance.
(SFC, 4/3/04, p.A11)
2004 Apr 2, In Brazil Jociel Conceicao dos Santos (20), a handyman, recanted a confession and denied he killed an American couple (Nov 30, 2003). He blamed two other Brazilians for the crime.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, Police in France captured the elusive former leader of the Basque ETA rebel group as well as the separatist group's logistics chief.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, Georgian authorities reported that they had detained four men on suspicion of plotting to assassinate the president, and officials accused the autonomous province of Adzharia of being behind the alleged plot.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, In India a crowded bus veered off a mountain road and fell into a ravine in Jammu-Kashmir state, killing 34 passengers and injuring 35 others.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, Two Indian Air Force fighter jets went missing and were believed to have crashed during routine flights over Kashmir.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, PM Ariel Sharon revealed the scope of his withdrawal plan, saying Israel will leave all of the Gaza Strip and dismantle four West Bank settlements.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, Pakistan's 2-week operation in South Waziristan wound down. The military said 63 foreign and local militants had been killed along with at least 46 security forces.
(SFC, 4/2/04, p.A11)
2004 Apr 2, A Spanish railroad inspector found a 26-pound bomb hidden in a bag on a busy high-speed line. Police said the device may contain the same dynamite used in last month's Madrid train bombings.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, In Sri Lanka Pres. Kumaratunga's political alliance won the most seats in parliamentary elections, indicating deep popular support for its tough stance toward Tamil Tiger rebels.
(AP, 4/3/04)(WSJ, 4/5/04, p.A1)
2005 Apr 2, In Florida Terri Schiavo's body was cremated as disagreements continued between her husband and her parents, who were unable to have their own independent expert observe her autopsy.
(AP, 4/2/06)
2005 Apr 2, In southern Afghanistan Taliban militants stormed a government building in Deshu district and killed 3 Afghan soldiers in a two-hour gunbattle before fleeing. A Western security source in Kandahar linked the attack to an ongoing counter-narcotics drive in Helmand province and said security was deteriorating there.
(AFP, 4/3/05)(SSFC, 4/3/05, p.A9)
2005 Apr 2, An Australian navy helicopter crashed on the earthquake-devastated Indonesian island of Nias. Media reported that nine people were killed and two were rescued.
(AP, 4/2/05)
2005 Apr 2, Brazilian state police detained 2 police officers in the Mar 31 shooting spree that left 30 dead in Rio’s north side.
(SSFC, 4/3/05, p.A9)
2005 Apr 2, UN troops killed up to 38 militia fighters during a raid by hundreds of peacekeepers backed by helicopter gunships in the Ituri district of eastern Congo.
(Reuters, 4/2/05)
2005 Apr 2, The Czech information minister resigned, becoming the 4th Czech government member to do so this week in fallout over a scandal surrounding PM Stanislav Gross' luxury apartment.
(AP, 4/2/05)
2005 Apr 2, Ecuador's former president Abdala Bucaram returned home after spending eight years in exile in Panama, telling thousands that he plans to lead a "revolution of the poor" modeled after President Hugo Chavez' Venezuela.
(AP, 4/3/05)
2005 Apr 2, In central Iraq a car bomb exploded, killing five people, including 4 police officers on patrol. A gunmen killed an education official in Baghdad. A US Marine was killed in Ramadi. 40-60 insurgents attacked the Abu Ghraib prison but were repelled by US forces.
(AP, 4/2/05)(SSFC, 4/3/05, p.A3)
2005 Apr 2, Pope John Paul II, born in Poland in 1920 as Karol Wojtyla, died in Rome at age 84. He was elevated to Pope in 1978 and was the first non-Italian pope in 455 years. In November Viking published “John Paul the Great: Remembering a Spiritual Father" by Peggy Noonan.
(AP, 4/2/05)(WSJ, 11/22/05, p.D8)
2005 Apr 2, President Robert Mugabe's ruling party won 78 out of 120 contested seats in Zimbabwe's disputed parliamentary elections, giving him enough seats to press ahead with plans to change the constitution to strengthen his grip on power. The Opposition for Democratic Change (MDC) won 35 seats.
(AP, 4/2/05)(SFC, 4/2/05, p.A12)(Reuters, 4/2/05)
2006 Apr 2, Thunderstorms packing tornadoes and hail as big as softballs ripped through eight US states, killing at least 27 people. Tennessee was hit hardest, with tornadoes striking five western counties and killing 23 people, including an infant. Severe thunderstorms, many producing tornadoes, also struck parts of Iowa, Kentucky, Arkansas, Missouri, Ohio, Illinois and Indiana. Strong wind was blamed or at least three deaths in Missouri.
(AP, 4/3/06)
2006 Apr 2, It was reported that Cecilia Fire Thunder, president of the Oglala Sioux Tribe in South Dakota, had joined with 14 co-chairs to form the South Dakota Campaign for Healthy Families. The group planned a referendum in favor of abortion.
(SSFC, 4/2/06, p.A4)
2006 Apr 2, Alcatel SA and Lucent Technologies Inc. said that the French telecom equipment maker would acquire its US rival. The deal valued Lucent at about $13.5 billion (11.1 billion euros) in a stock swap that would form a major new global player. Headquarters would be in Paris and about 8,800 jobs would be cut.
(AP, 4/2/06)(Econ, 4/8/06, p.63)
2006 Apr 2, In Afghanistan suspected Taliban militants shot dead 9 policemen and wounded three others. Insurgents fatally shot a Turkish road engineer and burned his body in Nimroz province.
(AP, 4/2/06)(WSJ, 4/3/06, p.A1)
2006 Apr 2, The World Health Organization (WHO) confirmed that four Egyptians have caught bird flu, including two who died from the virus.
(Reuters, 4/3/06)
2006 Apr 2, In France the contested First Job Contract appeared in the Official Journal, where new laws are recorded.
(WSJ, 4/3/06, p.A8)
2006 Apr 2, Iran announced its second major new missile test within days, saying it has successfully fired a high-speed torpedo called Hoot (whale), capable of destroying huge warships and submarines.
(AP, 4/3/06)(SFC, 4/3/06, p.A3)
2006 Apr 2, Iraqi police reported that at least 3 more bodies were found in several neighborhoods of Baghdad. A Sunni clerical association announced that gunmen had assassinated a Sunni Arab sheik, Abdul-Minaam Awad, in his village of Zobaa 40 miles west of Baghdad. 6 insurgents died while manufacturing a homemade bomb inside a house in Madain, about 15 miles southeast of Baghdad. Drive-by shooters killed a police captain outside his home in Baghdad's Dora neighborhood. 5 Marines were killed and one was injured when the seven-ton US military truck rolled over in a flash food. 4 American troops were killed by hostile fire. Gunmen killed a Shiite man and three of his relatives at their home in southern Baghdad. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw made a surprise trip to Iraq to urge its leaders to form a unified government.
(AP, 4/2/06)(AP, 4/3/06)(AP, 4/2/07)
2006 Apr 2, Mauritanian officials said a boat packed with West Africans trying to reach Europe collided with a fishing vessel, leaving 32 of the migrants missing and believed drowned.
(CP, 4/2/06)
2006 Apr 2, In Pakistan’s neighboring South Waziristan the bullet-riddled body of Maulana Zahir Shah, was found. The cleric was killed by suspected Islamic militants over suspicion he was a spy for the US and Britain. Ten people including five tribal police were killed and 13 injured in separate bomb blasts in the restive southwestern Pakistani province of Baluchistan.
(AP, 4/2/06)(AFP, 4/2/06)
2006 Apr 2, Thailand citizens voted in snap parliamentary elections. Thailand's PM urged citizens to ignore an opposition boycott, saying the vote was crucial to ending the country's deepening political stalemate amid demands for his resignation. Bombs exploded at three polling stations in restive southern Thailand, injuring four soldiers and a police officer.
(AP, 4/2/06)
2006 Apr 2, In southeastern Turkey one protester died after police opened fire to disperse Kurdish demonstrators, raising the death toll in six days of street violence to nine. A group of men stopped a passenger bus and tossed gasoline bombs at it, sending the vehicle careening into pedestrians and killing 3 in Istanbul as pro-Kurdish riots continued to spread. The countrywide death toll from nearly a week of unrest climbed to 15.
(AP, 4/2/06)(AP, 4/3/06)
2007 Apr 2, The US asked Tehran for information on the disappearance of a former FBI agent who went missing on a private business trip to Iran.
(WSJ, 4/3/07, p.A1)
2007 Apr 2, The US Supreme Court ruled that a US government agency, the EPA, has the power under the clean air law to regulate greenhouse gas emissions that spur global warming. In its first case on climate change, the Supreme Court declared in a 5-4 ruling that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases were air pollutants under the Clean Air Act.
(Reuters, 4/2/07)(AP, 4/2/08)(Econ, 2/12/11, p.36)
2007 Apr 2, Florida won its second consecutive college basketball championship, beating Ohio State 84-75; the Gators became the first team to repeat since Duke in 1991-92.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2007 Apr 2, Chicago’s police superintendent, Philip Cline, announced his retirement after 2 videos emerged of off-duty police officers beating civilians.
(Econ, 10/20/07, p.42)(http://tinyurl.com/2tt8en)
2007 Apr 2, Sam Zell, billionaire real estate investor, reached an agreement to buy the Chicago-based Tribune Co. in a 2-stage deal valued at $8.2 billion. The buyout was completed in December and saddled the firm with $8 billion in new debt. In 2008 the Tribune slid into bankruptcy.
(SFC, 4/3/07, p.C1)(Econ, 3/23/13, p.36)
2007 Apr 2, First Data Corp. said it is being acquired by an affiliate of private equity firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. for about $27 billion.
(SFC, 4/3/07, p.C3)
2007 Apr 2, In Afghanistan 3 police died when militants attacked a checkpoint on the road linking the southern town of Kandahar with Spin Boldak on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, A UN conference on climate change opened in Belgium with the EU's top environment official calling on the US to join efforts to curb global warming.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Canada's controversial annual seal hunt opened in the southern Gulf of St. Lawrence, where the worst ice conditions in more than two decades have nearly wiped out the herd there.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, China’s first deadline for income taxes was extended a few days because of low compliance. Anyone earning over 120,000 yuan ($15,500) annually was supposed to file a return. In southwestern China developers tore down a stubborn couple's house after a three-year standoff that hindered a construction project and captivated the nation. The couple reportedly negotiated a deal with the real estate developer that gives them a new apartment and a sizable compensation package.
(Econ, 4/14/07, p.49)(AP, 4/3/07)(Econ, 4/7/07, p.39)
2007 Apr 2, In Iraq a suicide truck bomber targeted a police station in the oil-rich northern city of Kirkuk, killing at least 13 people and wounding dozens, including many children from a nearby school. A parked car exploded in a garage near a governmental property registration agency in western Baghdad, killing three people and wounding 10. A suicide bomber drove his car into a police checkpoint in the southern insurgent stronghold of Dora, killing four people, including two policemen. A roadside bomb killed four civilians and wounded 20 in the Shiite town of Khalis. A roadside bomb struck an Iraqi military convoy, killing one soldier and wounding 7 in the Qazaniyah area northeast of Baghdad. 4 US soldiers were killed in combat.
(AP, 4/2/07)(Reuters, 4/3/07)
2007 Apr 2, Jordan's military court convicted six alleged militants of planning suicide attacks against Jordan's main international airport and against hotels hosting Israeli and American tourists.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Gunmen in Nigeria's southern Bayelsa State kidnapped two Lebanese nationals.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Around 5,000 tribesmen gathered in a Pakistani border area to enlist for ongoing battles against foreign Al-Qaeda militants.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Palestinian journalists began a three-day strike to protest the kidnapping of British Broadcasting Corp. correspondent Alan Johnston, the longest-held reporter ever abducted in the Gaza Strip.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Russia's foreign spy service released previously classified files on a double agent who, under the codename "Britt", passed secrets to Moscow from inside British intelligence in the 1940s.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Saudi Arabia signaled it is unlikely to accept an Israeli invitation to a regional peace conference, saying that Israel must first stop mistreating Palestinians and move to withdraw from Arab lands.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Tsunami waves churned by an undersea earthquake crashed ashore in the Solomon Islands, wiping away entire villages and triggering alerts from Australia to Hawaii. At least 50 people were killed.
(AP, 4/3/07)(AP, 4/2/08)
2007 Apr 2, In Somalia a human rights organization said fierce fighting between Ethiopian-backed government forces and Islamic insurgents has killed 381 people over four days.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, South Korea and the US agreed to a trade pact with only minutes to go before a deadline. Last-minute haggling meant missing two self-imposed deadlines over the weekend. Some estimates say the agreement could add $20 billion to the already more than $70 billion of two-way trade each year.
(Reuters, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, In eastern Sri Lanka at least 16 people, including three children, were killed and 25 wounded when a bomb ripped through a crowded bus. Sri Lankan security forces killed at least 23 Tamil Tiger rebels in fresh fighting in the island's east.
(AP, 4/2/07)(AFP, 4/3/07)
2007 Apr 2, In Sudan 53 people were killed in a gruesome pair of minibus accidents north of Khartoum.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Thailand's premier hailed ties with Japan as he prepared to sign a free-trade agreement with his country's top investor, easing international isolation of the kingdom since last year's coup. Army-installed PM Surayud Chulanont will sign the deal April 3, which Thailand hopes will boost investment from Japan.
(AFP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Ukraine’s president called early elections for May 27 amid a standoff with the pro-Russian premier, who vowed to fight what he called a coup.
(WSJ, 4/3/07, p.A1)
2008 Apr 2, Arkansas Gov. Mike Beebe singed legislation to repeal a botched marriage law, and reinstated 17 as the minimum age to marry for boys and 16 for girls.
(AP, 4/3/08)
2008 Apr 2, In Arkansas 3 men were presumed drowned when scaffolding underneath an Arkansas River bridge collapsed. They were working on a project to install a water main beneath the bridge for the Central Arkansas Water utility.
(AP, 4/3/08)
2008 Apr 2, Argentine farmers, rebelling over soaring export taxes on their crops, declared a 30-day truce suspending a three-week-long strike that has stripped grocery shelves of beef and produce, granting Cristina Fernandez a reprieve in the first major crisis of her presidency.
(AP, 4/3/08)(WSJ, 4/3/08, p.A1)
2008 Apr 2, Australia began pumping carbon dioxide underground to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, using a technology that locks dangerous gases deep in the Earth.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Chad's main rebel group urged former colonial ruler France to stop backing President Idriss Deby Itno and cease flying over rebel positions in the central African nation's restive east.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Diplomats said that China has given the UN nuclear watchdog intelligence linked to Tehran's alleged attempts to make nuclear arms.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Cubans snapped up DVD players, motorbikes and pressure cookers for the first time as Raul Castro's new government loosened controls on consumer goods and invited private farmers to plant tobacco, coffee and other crops on unused state land.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Norberto Collado Abreu, the helmsman of the Granma yacht that carried Fidel Castro from Mexico to Cuba to launch his revolution in 1956, died in Havana.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Newspapers reported that Egypt has ordered the seizure of the March 25 special edition of the German news magazine Der Spiegel after it was deemed to be insulting to Islam and the Prophet Mohammed.
(AFP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, France pledged to send up to 1,000 troops to Afghanistan in a move that will avert a Canadian threat to pull its contingent out of NATO's war in the violent south.
(Reuters, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, In northern Iraq, a suicide bomber attacked an Iraqi checkpoint west of Mosul, killing seven people, including a woman and a 5-year-old child. A US airstrike destroyed a house in the southern city of Basra, killing a militant, the US military said, and Iraqi witnesses and hospital officials said at least three civilians were among the dead. A roadside bomb targeting a US convoy exploded near a restaurant in Baghdad's main Shiite district of Sadr City, killing at least 3 Iraqi civilians and wounding 13. 4 US-allied fighters were killed and 4 others abducted at a fake checkpoint near Duluiyah.
(AP, 4/2/08)(AP, 4/3/08)
2008 Apr 2, Irish PM Bertie Ahern, one of Europe's longest serving leaders, announced that he will resign next month amid growing pressure over alleged financial irregularities.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, In Kazakhstan Zhaksybek Kulekeyev, a former government minister and head of the state railway company, was formally charged with taking a $100,000 bribe.
(Econ, 4/12/08, p.49)
2008 Apr 2, Myanmar democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi's opposition party urged voters to reject a military-backed draft constitution, saying it was undemocratic and drafted under the junta's direct control.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, In New Zealand new government population figures showed that the Asian population is growing faster than any other ethnic group and will outnumber indigenous Maori by 2026.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Russia's foreign minister said that Moscow will not allow newly independent Kosovo to become a member of the UN.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Pyotr Kuznetsov, leader of a Russian doomsday cult, apparently tried to kill himself after most of his followers abandoned a bunker where they had been awaiting the end of the world for five months. The last 9 of 35 cult members emerged on May 16.
(Reuters, 4/4/08)(SFC, 5/17/08, p.A3)
2008 Apr 2, In Sri Lanka government troops captured a strip of land from Tamil Tigers. 2 civilians were shot dead by suspected Tamil Tiger rebels in the Wilpattu wildlife park.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Thailand's Health Ministry ordered hospitals and medical clinics to temporarily stop performing castrations for non-medical reasons, saying that the procedure performed on transsexuals needs stricter monitoring.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, In Yemen security forces killed one demonstrator and wounded four others in the fourth day of rioting that has engulfed the country's south.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, In Zimbabwe the main opposition party claimed outright victory for its leader Morgan Tsvangirai, saying he had won 50.3 percent of the vote compared to 43.8 percent for President Robert Mugabe.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2009 Apr 2, Washington expressed no interest in an offer by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to take in any of the 240 remaining Guantanamo detainees after they are released from the US military prison.
(AP, 4/2/09)
2009 Apr 2, A US federal judge has ruled that some inmates at a US military base in Afghanistan can challenge their detention in US courts, a legal right granted to Guantanamo Bay prisoners.
(AFP, 4/3/09)
2009 Apr 2, US and Mexico officials said they are creating a cross-border group to develop strategies for stopping the illegal flow of guns and drugs between the two countries.
(AP, 4/3/09)
2009 Apr 2, The director of the US Mint unveiled the first US coin with an inscription in Spanish, a quarter honoring Puerto Rico as the "Isla del Encanto" (Island of Enchantment).
(AP, 4/2/09)
2009 Apr 2, The US Environmental Working Group issued a press release drawing attention to a study by scientists at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention which looked for the chemical, perchlorate, in different brands of powdered baby formula. The study was published last month.
(AP, 4/3/09)
2009 Apr 2, A federal grand jury issued a 75-page indictment charging former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich with racketeering, extortion and fraud.
(SFC, 4/3/09, p.A8)
2009 Apr 2, In Connecticut a judge, citing DNA evidence, dropped murder charges against Miguel Roman, who served 20 years of a 60-year sentence after being convicted of the 1988 slaying of Carmen Lopez (17), his pregnant girlfriend. The same DNA tests that exonerated Roman implicated led police in December to charge another man, Pedro Miranda of New Britain. He is accused in the killings of Lopez, 16-year-old Rosa Valentin in 1986 and 13-year-old Mayra Cruz in 1987. Miranda (51) faced the possibility of the death penalty if convicted.
(SFC, 4/3/09, p.A6)
2009 Apr 2, Bud Shank (b.1926), innovative jazz musician, died. He played the 33-second flute solo on the 1965 hit “California Dreamin," by the Mamas and Papas.
(SFC, 4/10/09, p.B5)
2009 Apr 2, G20 countries authorized the IMF to issue $250 billion in new SDRs.
(Econ, 4/11/09, p.70)
2009 Apr 2, Human rights groups and some Afghan lawmakers criticized President Hamid Karzai for signing into law legislation that some believe legalizes the rape of a wife by her husband and prevents women from leaving the house without a man's permission. Article 132 of the law says: "As long as the husband is not traveling, he has the right to have sexual intercourse with his wife every fourth night." Critics said Karzai signed the legislation in the past month only for political gains several months before the country's presidential election. Coalition and Afghan forces killed 12 militants and one civilian in Logar province in a mission that included airstrikes. a member of the NATO-led force was killed in violence in the east. In central Ghazni province, a roadside bomb killed four construction workers, while a battle between militants and police elsewhere in the province killed two militants.
(AP, 4/2/09)(AP, 4/3/09)
2009 Apr 2, Austrian authorities arrested British-born Julius Meinl V (b.1959), head of Meinl Bank, for suspected breach of trust and deception of investors in a potential $4 billion fraud case involving a real estate fund created by the bank. He had spun much of his family’s property portfolio into Meinl European Land (MEL). By 2007 MEL had lost €1.8 billion in an attempt to support its share price. He was released after posting a €100 million bail.
(Econ, 8/1/09, p.60)(WSJ, 4/3/09, p.C1)
2009 Apr 2, A Bangladesh official said the government will strictly enforce a new ban on begging that aims to fully eliminate it within five years.
(AP, 4/2/09)
2009 Apr 2, In London G20 leaders pledged $1.1 trillion in loans and guarantees to struggling countries and agreed to crack down on tax havens and hedge funds, but failed to reach sweeping accord on more stimulus spending to attack the global economic decline.
(AP, 4/2/09)
2009 Apr 2, The annual Canadian harp seal hunt opened. Up to 280,000 baby seals were expected to be slaughtered in Quebec and Newfoundland.
(http://network.bestfriends.org/canada/news/13925.html)(SFC, 4/18/09, p.D12)
2009 Apr 2, Greek public services closed down and transport was disrupted across the country as thousands of workers went on strike to protest government spending cuts.
(AP, 4/2/09)
2009 Apr 2, An Iraqi military spokesman said the government will next week start paying Sunni paramilitary groups in the Baghdad area despite weekend clashes with one of the units. In Baghdad two gunmen firing from a car killed an Iraqi army officer in the Mansour district. One of the gunmen was killed and the other captured. Militants hurled a grenade at an American patrol on Palestine Street in east Baghdad, wounding two civilians. In Mosul a roadside bomb exploded near a small restaurant frequented by police, wounding four of them and a civilian. A US aircraft attacked a group of men believed to be members of a government-allied Sunni paramilitary group as they were planting a roadside bomb at night north of Baghdad, killing one and wounding two. Two gay men were killed Sadr City by relatives who were shamed by their behavior, after a leading cleric repeatedly condemned homosexuality. The killings come weeks after Iraqi police found four bodies near Sadr City with the word pervert written on their chests.
(AP, 4/2/09)(AP, 4/3/09)(AP, 4/4/09)
2009 Apr 2, Malaysia's PM Abdullah Ahmad Badawi (69), in office for 5½ lackluster years, resigned to make way for Deputy PM Najib Razak, who must now fix an economy close to recession, heal the country's deep racial divisions and revive a moribund ruling party.
(AP, 4/2/09)
2009 Apr 2, Mexico's Senate unanimously approved legislation that would allow the government to seize property from suspected drug traffickers and other criminals before they are convicted.
(AP, 4/3/09)
2009 Apr 2, Morocco transferred to Spain Hassan Al Haski, an Islamist convicted in both countries for terrorist acts, apparently to resume serving time behind bars there.
(AFP, 4/3/09)
2009 Apr 2, Pakistani authorities ordered an investigation into a video showing a man flogging a screaming woman in the country's northwest where the government recently agreed to introduce Islamic law to end a rebellion by Taliban militants. President Asif Ali Zardari was yet to sign the bill introducing Islamic law in the Swat Valley. A would-be suicide bomber shot himself dead when mourners confronted him at the funeral of a Pakistani police officer recently killed by militants.
(AP, 4/2/09)(AP, 4/3/09)
2009 Apr 2, A Palestinian militant went on a rampage in the Bat Ayin Jewish settlement in the West Bank, killing an Israeli boy (13) with a pickax and wounding another boy (7) before fleeing the area. On April 14 Israeli authorities detained suspect Moussa Tayet (26).
(AP, 4/2/09)(AP, 4/26/09)
2009 Apr 2, In the southern Philippines Islamic militants released a Filipina Red Cross aid worker, leaving a Swiss and an Italian still held captive.
(AFP, 4/2/09)
2009 Apr 2, In Puerto Rico FBI agents and police arrested at least 35 suspects in an alleged drug trafficking ring blamed for seven murders.
(AP, 4/2/09)
2009 Apr 2, In Sudan new US special envoy Scott Gration told journalists he had come to "look, learn and listen" and hoped for its friendship and cooperation, indicating a shift in tone by Washington under President Barack Obama.
(Reuters, 4/2/09)
2009 Apr 2, Venezuelan authorities arrested retired Gen. Raul Baduel, a former defense minister and a prominent critic of President Hugo Chavez, on corruption charges. The former ally of Pres. Chavez went into opposition 18 months earlier.
(AP, 4/2/09)(Econ, 4/11/09, p.36)
2010 Apr 2, The US economy posted its largest job gain in three years in March, while the unemployment rate remained at 9.7 percent for the third straight month.
(AP, 4/2/10)
2010 Apr 2, A federal grand jury in San Francisco indicted Michael Anthony Nelson (38) of Orlando, Florida, on charges of mail fraud, wire fraud, computer fraud and aggravated identity theft for allegedly hijacking a New York attorney’s good name. In 1999 Nelson had stolen over $700,000 in loans by creating a fake bank and served 5 years in prison.
(SFC, 4/3/10, p.A1)
2010 Apr 2, In Minnesota a fire swept through a 2-story building that housed several apartments and an Irish pub killing 6 people including 3 children in Minneapolis.
(SFC, 4/3/10, p.A5)
2010 Apr 2, In Washington state an explosion at a Tesoro Corp. refinery killed 4 people in Anacortes, about 70 miles north of Seattle.
(SFC, 4/3/10, p.A5)
2010 Apr 2, In northern Afghanistan 3 German soldiers were killed in heavy fighting and five were severely wounded southwest of Kunduz city. German soldiers traveling to the scene of the deadly firefight with Taliban insurgents accidentally killed six Afghan troops.
(AP, 4/2/10)(AP, 4/3/10)
2010 Apr 2, Cambodia bristled at a US decision to cut a small military aid program to protest the December deportation of Muslim asylum seekers to China, saying if they deserved protection the United States could have offered it.
(AP, 4/2/10)
2010 Apr 2, In northeastern Central African Republic troops killed 10 rebels in a clash in the region of Ndele. Teachers there were protesting the murder of a pregnant teacher killed on March 30 by members of the Convention of Patriots for Justice and Peace (CPJP), which was behind the attack on the march. The Association of Residents of Upper Mbomou (Assoredehmbo), grouping people in three eastern CAR districts, said that the number of local people kidnapped by the LRA was more than 400, while the number killed in rebel attacks was more than 200 since February 2008. In an open letter to PM Faustin-Archange Touadera the group recommended the forming of self-defense militias and urged the government to set up an army base.
(AFP, 4/2/10)(AFP, 4/5/10)
2010 Apr 2, In Egypt former UN nuclear watchdog chief Mohamed ElBaradei issued a public call for change in defiance of an emergency law banning gatherings critical of the authorities.
(Reuters, 4/2/10)
2010 Apr 2, Iran's top nuclear envoy called for negotiations without threat of sanctions, following meetings in Beijing in the wake of US reports saying China had dropped its opposition to possible new UN measures against Iran.
(AP, 4/2/10)
2010 Apr 2, In Iraq Ammar al-Hakim, who heads the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, offered support for Ayad Allawi, a secular candidate for prime minister in Iraq, a major blow to the incumbent Nouri al-Maliki. Gunmen trying to pass themselves off as US and Iraqi soldiers raided a Sunni village outside Baghdad and killed at least 24 people in an execution-style attack.
(AP, 4/2/10)(http://tinyurl.com/yb6qm8d)
2010 Apr 2, It was reported that researchers, at Israeli weapons maker Rafael, were putting the final touches on a tank-mounted miniature anti-missile system, Trophy, that detects incoming projectiles and shoots them down before they reach tanks equipped with the system.
(AP, 4/2/10)
2010 Apr 2, In southern Kazakhstan a Russian rocket carrying 2 Russian and one American astronauts blasted off, kicking off a tightly packed schedule at the International Space Station in the coming days.
(AP, 4/2/10)
2010 Apr 2, In Mexico 5 gunmen died in a shootout with soldiers in the northern border city of Reynosa, Tamaulipas state. A shootout between rival gangs at a nightclub in Tampico left seven people dead. At least 15 people were killed throughout Tamaulipas. In the border city of Tijuana police found the bodies of 3 men who had been shot to death in a residential area. 13 inmates escaped when armed men stormed a prison in the northern border city of Reynosa. A shootout in Nuevo Laredo between soldiers and suspected drug cartel gunmen killed two children and wounded five of their relatives who were caught in the crossfire. Two suspected gunmen were also killed.
(AP, 4/2/10)(AP, 4/3/10)(AP, 4/4/10)(AP, 4/6/10)
2010 Apr 2, Pakistan submitted to parliament a sweeping package of landmark constitutional reforms, stripping Pres. Asif Ali Zardari of key powers in a move to bolster parliamentary democracy. Pakistan's attorney general resigned, accusing the government of preventing him from carrying out Supreme Court orders to reopen old graft investigations into Pres. Zardari.
(AFP, 4/2/10)
2010 Apr 2, In northeastern Peru landslides caused by heavy rains hit Porvenir, killing at least 23 people and leaving 25 others missing. At least 54 people were injured.
(AP, 4/2/10)
2010 Apr 2, In the Philippines at least 23 devotees were nailed to crosses in San Fernando city to mark Good Friday.
(SFC, 4/3/10, p.A2)
2010 Apr 2, The Russian Kommersant newspaper reported that Dzhanet Abdurakhmanova (17) of Dagestan, a widow of a slain Islamist rebel, was one of the two female suicide bombers who attacked Moscow's subway on March 31. Her husband, Umalat Magomedov, was described as an Islamist militant leader killed by government forces in December. The paper said the 2nd subway bomber has been has been tentatively identified as Markha Ustarkhanova (20) from Chechnya, the widow of a militant leader killed last October while he was preparing to assassinate Chechen Pres. Ramzan Kadyrov. The 2nd female was later identified as Maryam Sharipova (28), a teacher from Dagestan.
(AP, 4/2/10)(AP, 4/6/10)
2010 Apr 2, Russia’s PM Vladimir Putin made his first visit to Venezuela. Pres. Chavez, ahead of the visit, said Russia has offered to help Venezuela set up its own space industry, including a satellite launch site. Officials planned to sign new agreements for energy projects in Venezuela, as well as industrial, commercial and agriculture projects. Putin also planned to hold talks with Bolivian President Evo Morales.
(AP, 4/2/10)
2010 Apr 2, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon pushed Turkmenistan to improve its human rights record, opening a trip through ex-Soviet Central Asia where complaints of violations are extensive.
(AP, 4/2/10)
2010 Apr 2, In Yemen Elham Assi (13) bled to death hours after she spoke to her mother and just days after she was married to a 23-year-old man, in the deeply poor village of Shueba. She was tied down and forced to have sex by her husband, according to later interviews with the child's mother, police and medical reports. A February 2009 law set the minimum age for marriage at 17, but it was repealed and sent back to parliament's constitutional committee for review after some lawmakers called it un-Islamic. The committee is expected to make a final decision on the legislation this month.
(AP, 4/10/10)
2011 Apr 2, In California the Half Moon Bay City Council voted to shut down its police department and turn its duties over to the San Mateo County Sheriff.
(SSFC, 4/3/11, p.A12)
2011 Apr 2, In New Mexico four Gulfstream employees died in a crash of a test twin-engine business aircraft at the airport in Roswell. In 2012 the National Transportation Safety Board ruled that pressure to speed flight tests for the new $65 million G650 was to blame for the crash.
(SSFC, 4/3/11, p.A9)(SFC, 10/12/12, p.A5)
2011 Apr 2, In Afghanistan at least 10 people were killed and 83 wounded in Kandahar city, on a 2nd day of violent protests over the burning of a Koran by a radical fundamentalist Christian in the US. A suicide attack also hit a NATO military base in the capital Kabul. The attacks were sparked by the actions of Christian preacher Terry Jones who supervised the burning of the Koran in front of about 50 people at a church in Florida on March 20.
(Reuters, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, Azerbaijan police arrested dozens of protesters who rallied for democratic reforms in the authoritarian republic. Human rights activist Vivadi Iskenderov was among those arrested in Baku. In August he was sentenced to three years in prison for interfering in parliamentary elections. He told the court that he is being persecuted for reporting vote rigging in Azerbaijan's 2010 parliamentary election.
(AP, 4/2/11)(AP, 8/27/11)
2011 Apr 2, Brazil’s Veja magazine, in its online edition, reported that at least 20 people affiliated with al Qaeda as well as the Lebanese Shi'ite Muslim group Hezbollah, the Palestinian group Hamas and two other organizations have been hiding out in the South American country.
(Reuters, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, Chinese officials said over 500 of the country’s 1,176 dairies were being shut down in an attempt to clean up the scandal-plagued dairy industry.
(SSFC, 4/3/11, p.A4)
2011 Apr 2, A Danish assault team backed by helicopters freed 16 Pakistanis and 2 Iranians held by suspected Somali pirates.
(SFC, 4/12/11, p.A2)
2011 Apr 2, In Germany several thousand people took part in nation-wide demonstrations demanding an end to nuclear power.
(SSFC, 4/3/11, p.A4)
2011 Apr 2, Indian police charged a former telecom minister with abuse of power and conspiracy in an alleged mobile spectrum fraud that cost the country billions of dollars in lost revenue. A. Raja was also accused of cheating, forgery and criminal misconduct on a charge sheet and annexed documents that ran to 80,000 pages and were carried to New Delhi court in seven steel trunks.
(AFP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, In India separatist rebels in Assam state ambushed paramilitary soldiers on a patrol in the insurgency-wracked northeast and fatally shot three of them.
(AP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, In southern Iraq 2 US soldiers were killed in a rocket attack that struck their unit.
(AP, 4/3/11)
2011 Apr 2, Israeli aircraft killed 3 Palestinian militants who were planning to abduct Israelis over the upcoming Jewish festival of Passover.
(AP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, In Ivory Coast an offensive aiming to unseat strongman Laurent Gbagbo appeared to encounter resistance, as soldiers loyal to the entrenched ruler seized back the state television station and broadcast a call to arms.
(AP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, In Japan highly radioactive water spilled into the ocean from the tsunami-damaged Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear complex as PM Naoto Kan surveyed the damage in a town gutted by the wave.
(AP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, Libyan government forces killed six civilians in the city of Misrata in an unrelenting campaign aimed at driving rebels from the main city they hold in the west. Rebels claimed victory in the battle for Brega as heavy fighting ensued around the oil town. A British delegation arrived in Benghazi, nearly a month after a special forces team was seized in a bungled mission to contact the rebels. 13 rebels died in an air strike near Brega.
(AP, 4/2/11)(AFP, 4/2/11)(AFP, 4/3/11)(AP, 4/7/11)
2011 Apr 2, Malawi officials closed two university campuses indefinitely because of violent protests over what students and professors call threats to academic freedom.
(AP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, Malaysia's government said it would allow Malay-language Bibles to be printed locally, in a major concession to the country's minority Christian community to soothe anger over seized shipments of their holy books.
(AP, 4/3/11)
2011 Apr 2, In Mexico Jose Manuel Garcia Soto, alias "El Safado," or "The Crazy One," was arrested in the northern state of San Luis Potosi for participating in the Feb. 15 killing of Jaime Zapata and wounding of Victor Avila. Both men were agents with US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
(AP, 4/5/11)
2011 Apr 2, In Mexico an explosion and fire hit a factory that distills raw alcohol, killing three people and injuring three others near Orizaba, Veracruz state.
(AP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, In Nicaragua at least four police officers were injured in clashes as some 1000 demonstrators protested President Daniel Ortega's bid to win re-election.
(AP, 4/3/11)
2011 Apr 2, Nigeria postponed parliamentary elections until April 4 after voting materials failed to arrive in many areas, a major blow to hopes of a break with a history of chaotic polls. Attackers stormed three villages In central Nigeria killing at least two people and setting a number of houses ablaze.
(Reuters, 4/2/11)(AFP, 4/3/11)
2011 Apr 2, In Northern Ireland Catholic officer Ronan Kerr (25) was killed by a bomb placed under his car outside his home in Omagh, the scene of Northern Ireland's worst ever terror atrocity. He had completed his training only three weeks ago. A 33-year-old man was later charged with terrorism-related offences related to the mruder. On May 10 police arrested a woman in connection with the car bomb.
(AFP, 4/3/11)(AFP, 5/10/11)
2011 Apr 2, In Oman dozens of protesters staged a sit-in in Muscat to demand probes into alleged state abuses after clashes with security forces in Sohar left at least one person dead and sharply boosted tensions in the strategic Gulf nation.
(AP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, Peruvian officials said a British couple has been arrested at Lima's international airport as they boarded a plane to London with over 11 kg of cocaine and 100 heroin capsules. Roxana Laercia (37) stashed the cocaine (24 pounds) between her clothes and Michael Eguonoghen (28) had swallowed the heroin capsules, the equivalent of 1.5 kg (3.3 pounds).
(AFP, 4/3/11)
2011 Apr 2, South African judge Richard Goldstone said he had been wrong to say Israel had targeted civilians in his 2009 report on Israel’s 2008-2998 offensive in Gaza. He had faced down enormous criticism in Israel at the time over the report which accused both Israel and the Hamas rulers of Gaza of potential war crimes during the 22-day conflict. He said his assessment had also been changed by the fact that whereas Israel had thoroughly investigated the concerns raised by his panel, Hamas had not.
(AFP, 4/3/11)
2011 Apr 2, In Spain tens of thousands of people demonstrated in the troubled Basque region, calling for the government to legalize a new pro-independence party that says it rejects violence by armed separatist group ETA.
(AP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, Swedish wireless equipment maker LM Ericsson said it is suing Chinese rival ZTE Corp. for alleged infringement of several of its patents in handset and network technology.
(AP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, Syrian security forces made dawn arrests as mourners prepared to bury the first of at least nine people killed in anti-government protests on the Muslim day of rest.
(AFP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, In the UAR Iftikhar Ahmed Khan was shot five times in the head in Ajman, an emirate east of Dubai where he was operating a construction company. Khan, a former mayor of Haripur town in northwestern Pakistan, was held in the 2008 slaying of a provincial official in the region. He was granted bail and left for the UAE.
(AP, 4/4/11)
2011 Apr 2, In Yemen thousands of anti-government protesters hurled stones at anti-riot police backed by tanks in the southern province of Aden.
(AP, 4/2/11)
2012 Apr 2, The United States announced a $10 million bounty on Hafiz Mohammad Saeed, the founder of Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), the Islamist terror group blamed for the 2008 Mumbai attacks. He lived openly in Pakistan. Washington also posted a $2 million reward for Hafiz Abdul Rahman Makki, described as LeT's second-in-command.
(AFP, 4/3/12)
2012 Apr 2, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement said it has arrested 3,168 criminal aliens and fugitives in a six-day nationwide sweep in every state including Puerto Rico and The District of Colombia.
(ABCNews, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation gave a $12-million grant to a project aimed at boosting yam production and doubling the income of west African farmers of the crop. The initial focus is on 200,000 smallholder farm families in Ghana and Nigeria.
(AFP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, US federal agents raided the Oakland, Ca., business and apartment of Richard Lee, the wheelchair-bound founder of Oaksterdam Univ.
(SFC, 4/3/12, p.A1)
2012 Apr 2, In Oakland, California, gunman One Goh (43) opened fire at the Christian Oikos University, a small private school, which serves the Korean community with courses from theology to Asian medicine. 7 people were killed, and 3 more wounded. A manhunt ended hours later with his capture at a shopping center. On Jan 7, 2013, a judge ruled that Goh was incompetent to stand trial because of paranoid schizophrenia. On May 2, 2017, Goh pleaded no contest to all charges in the rampage. Goh died in prison on March 20, 2019.
(AP, 4/2/12)(SFC, 4/3/12, p.A1)(SFC, 1/8/13, p.A1)(SFC, 5/3/17, p.D1)(SFC, 3/28/19, p.C1)
2012 Apr 2, San Francisco police evicted nearly 80 Occupy activists from a building owned by the Catholic Archdiocese of SF.
(SFC, 4/3/12, p.C1)
2012 Apr 2, In Louisville, Kentucky, Mary Montfort (54) pleaded guilty to embezzling over $360,000 from the Little sister of the Poor charity. She faced up to 3 years in prison.
(SFC, 4/3/12, p.A7)
2012 Apr 2, Sculptor and printmaker Elizabeth Catlett (b.1915), a US expatriate renowned for her dignified portrayals of African-American and Mexican women, died in Cuernavaca, Mexico. She was barred from her home country for political activism during the McCarthy era. In 1962 the US State Department banned her from returning to the United States for nearly a decade because of her political affiliations.
(AP, 4/3/12)
2012 Apr 2, America’s Federal Trade commission (FTC) voted 3-1 to let Express Scripts acquire Medco, America’s 2nd-biggest and biggest pharmacy managers.
(Econ, 4/7/12, p.76)
2012 Apr 2, In Afghanistan a motorcycle bomb killed one police officer and wounded two others in Kandahar city. Twin bomb blasts in the city of New Baghlan wounded 23 people, including eight police officers near a market selling computer equipment. Insurgents attacked a checkpoint in the Nahri Sarraj district of Helmand province. Four police officers were killed and two were wounded in the attack. The bodies of two civilians also were found at the checkpoint. Insurgents killed three police officers and abducted 11 in an attack on a checkpoint in Wardoj district of Badakhshan province.
(AP, 4/2/12)(AP, 4/3/12)
2012 Apr 2, Human Rights Watch urged Angolan authorities to end their violent crackdown on anti-government protests, which have mushroomed this year ahead of polls.
(AFP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, China International Mining Group Corporation said it will invest $21.2 million (€15.8 million) to restart the Bindura Nickel Corporation's Trojan mine in Zimbabwe, which closed in 2008 during the country’s political turmoil.
(AFP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, Colombia's main rebel group (FARC) freed what it says were its last 10 military and police captives, a goodwill gesture that President Juan Manuel Santos praised but called insufficient to merit a peace dialogue.
(AP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, Egypt's official MENA news agency reported that the Coptic Orthodox church has decided to boycott an Islamist-dominated panel charged with drafting the future constitution.
(AFP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, Hungarian President Pal Schmitt (69) resigned because of a plagiarism scandal regarding a doctoral dissertation he had written 20 years ago.
(AP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, Iraq said that Qatar hosting fugitive Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi was "unacceptable" and called on Doha to hand him over, a demand he said was unconstitutional after talks with Qatar's emir.
(AFP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, Iraq’s Kurdish region said it has halted oil exports over a payment quarrel with the central government, which reportedly has failed to send any money since May even as the region has been exporting 50,000 barrels per day.
(SFC, 4/3/12, p.A2)
2012 Apr 2, Ireland estimated that about 50% of its 1.6 million homeowners failed to pay a new, flat-rate $133 property tax by the march 31 deadline.
(SFC, 4/3/12, p.A2)
2012 Apr 2, The Israeli military ordered dozens of Jewish settlers to evacuate a three-story building they occupied last week in Hebron, the West Bank's most volatile city, saying they had entered it without receiving approval from defense authorities. Israel's Supreme Court threw out an appeal by a Palestinian family seeking to block construction of Jewish settler homes on a site owned by the family for generations
(AP, 4/2/12)(AFP, 4/3/12)
2012 Apr 2, A Libyan police brigade moved to quell clashes that broke out between two rival towns, brokering a cease-fire and securing the release of hostages. The fighting erupted after fighters from Ragdalein said they took 34 brigade men hostage from the neighboring town of Zwara a day earlier.
(AP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, In Mali the junta was slapped with crippling sanctions from its neighbors demanding a return to constitutional rule. (ECOWAS) slapped Mali with a total embargo and cut off the putschists from the regional central bank, affecting their ability to pay public wages.
(AFP, 4/3/12)
2012 Apr 2, In Nigeria gunmen shot dead a secret police officer at a barber's shop in the northeastern city of Maiduguri.
(AFP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, In Pakistan dozens of Taliban militants coming from Afghanistan attacked border posts in Olai, part of the Mohmand tribal area, killing four paramilitary soldiers. Soldiers reportedly retaliated, killing 15 militants.
(AP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, A Pakistani court convicted Osama bin Laden's three widows and two of his daughters of illegally entering and living in the country and sentenced them to 45 days in prison, with credit for time served.
(AP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, A Russian passenger plane, an ATR-72 turboprop operated by UTair, crashed into a snowy field in Siberia shortly after takeoff from Tyumen, killing 31 of the 43 people on board. The 12 survivors were hospitalized in serious condition.
(AP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, Senegal's new President Macky Sall was sworn in as leader of the west African nation.
(AFP, 4/3/12)
2012 Apr 2, The Swazi home affairs minister said King Mswati III, Africa's last absolute monarch, has ordered his impoverished subjects to give him cows for his birthday celebrations on April 19. Mswati was rated by Forbes magazine as among the world's 15 richest monarchs, with a personal fortune of more than $100 million. He has 13 wives, each with their own palace.
(AFP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, Syria pressed its deadly bid to crush dissent, reportedly targeting rebels near Turkey as it brushed off an Istanbul meeting of the "Friends of Syria" as a failure. Violence across the country killed at least 18 people. Gunmen in Aleppo attacked the home of the head of military institutions late today and killed two guards.
(AFP, 4/2/12)(AP, 4/3/12)
2012 Apr 2, In Turkey Neslisah Osmanoglu (b.1921), an Ottoman princess who married an Egyptian prince (1940), died. She was twice forced into exile when both royal households were abolished.
(AFP, 4/3/12)
2012 Apr 2, UN-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan said Syrian President Bashar al-Assad had accepted an April 10 deadline to start implementing a peace plan, as more than 30 people died in new clashes.
(AFP, 4/2/12)
2013 Apr 2, Pres. Obama unveiled the so-called Brain Initiative, a plan to map the human brain and study how it is wired up at all levels.
(SFC, 4/3/13, p.A1)
2013 Apr 2, In Arizona the Bisbee City Council approved an ordinance recognizing civil unions for same-sex couples. State Attorney General Tom Horne said the next day that he would go to court to block the artist’s community’s ordinance.
(SFC, 4/4/13, p.A6)
2013 Apr 2, In Oakland, Ca., Quinn Boyer (34), a Santa Clara County paramedic, was shot as teenagers attempted to hijack his car. He died of his wounds two days later. On April 18 Christian Burton (16) was charged as an adult with special circumstances murder. 5 other teenagers (13-15) were charged as juveniles.
(SFC, 4/19/13, p.D5)
2013 Apr 2, Six New York politicians were arrested for their alleged role in a bribery scandal in which Democratic state Senator Malcolm Smith paid 5 top Republicans for permission to run on their ticket in NYC’s city's upcoming mayoral race.
(Reuters, 4/2/13)
2013 Apr 2, In Texas inmates Brian Allen Tucker and John Martin King, both with long criminal histories, escaped a jail in Sulphur Springs.
(SFC, 4/3/13, p.A4)
2013 Apr 2, In Utah survivalist Troy James Knapp (45) was arrested after eluded authorities for 6 years. He had moved from cabin to cabin across the Utah mountains, taking food and weapons and leaving notes to brag about it.
(AP, 4/3/13)
2013 Apr 2, Virginia state police arrested Charles R. Smith III, a former volunteer firefighter, and his girlfriend for all but a handful of the 77 arsons set on Virginia's Eastern Shore over the past five months.
(AP, 4/2/13)
2013 Apr 2, Cyprus finance minister Michalis Sarris resigned after only 5 weeks on the job. He had agreed in negotiations with the EU to impose a “haircut" on samll savers with less than €100,000 in their accounts.
(Econ, 4/16/13, p.61)
2013 Apr 2, In India the film actors of Tamil Nadu held an anti-Sri Lanka hunger strike. Most of the state’s 72 million people are ethnic Tamils.
(Econ, 4/6/13, p.51)
2013 Apr 2, Israeli prison guards fired tear gas to quell disturbances in cell blocks after Palestinian prisoners protested following the news of a fellow inmate's death of cancer. Maysara Abu Hamdiyeh (64), who died earlier today, was serving a life sentence for his role in a foiled attempt to bomb a busy cafe in Jerusalem in 2002.
(AP, 4/2/13)
2013 Apr 2, Staff members at Libya's state TV news channel suspended work indefinitely after an employee was allegedly assaulted by a member of a militia guarding their building.
{Libya, Journalism}
(AP, 4/2/13)
2013 Apr 2, In Mexico taco vendor Carlos Sanchez (36) was shot and wounded after he resisted a kidnapping in Teloloapan, Guerrero state. He and his wife and sister and cousin, Armando de la Cruz, were then kidnapped by state police as they drove to Iguala for medical assistance. Carlos and Armando were later killed at the hands of the police.
{Mexico}
(SFC, 11/28/15, p.A12)
2013 Apr 2, In Myanmar a pre-dawn fire swept a religious dormitory, killing 13 children in eastern Yangon.
(AP, 4/2/13)
2013 Apr 2, North Korea said it will restart its long-shuttered plutonium reactor and increase production of nuclear weapons material. Outsiders saw this as North Korea’s latest attempt to extract US concessions.
(AP, 4/2/13)
2013 Apr 2, In northwestern Pakistan several dozen militants armed with assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenades attacked a power grid station, killing 7 people and taking 4 hostage on the outskirts of Peshawar. Attackers threw a grenade at a vehicle carrying paramilitary security officers in Karachi, killing three of them and wounding three others.
(AP, 4/2/13)(AP, 4/3/13)
2013 Apr 2, Philippine authorities arrested 16 Taiwanese, 15 males and a female, in connection with an online scam that mostly targeted retirees living in China and Taiwan.
(AP, 4/3/13)
2013 Apr 2, South Africa said most of its 200 troops in the Central African Republic have been withdrawn from the country where 13 died as rebels ousted the president.
(AP, 4/2/13)
2013 Apr 2, Syrian activists reported heavy government shelling and air raids in Damascus and its suburbs. They also reported heavy shelling of rebel-held areas in the central city of Homs and the northern city of Aleppo.
(AP, 4/2/13)
2013 Apr 2, A Tibetan spokesman said Jigme Gyatso, a noted political prisoner, was released by Chinese authorities after 17 years in prison on charges of endangering national security and separatism.
(SFC, 4/3/13, p.A2)
2013 Apr 2, The 193-nation UN General Assembly overwhelmingly approved the first treaty on the global arms trade, which seeks to regulate the $70 billion business in conventional arms and keep weapons out of the hands of human rights abusers. The Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) will come into legal force 90 days after the 50th country has ratified it.
(Reuters, 4/2/13)(Econ, 4/6/13, p.69)
2014 Apr 2, A federal appeals court granted a temporary stay on Arizona’s new restrictions on the use of abortion drugs, which had gone into effect a day earlier.
(SFC, 4/3/14, p.A8)
2014 Apr 2, In Detroit, Michigan, Steve Utash (54) was punched and kicked by several people as he stopped to check on a boy (10) who was struck when he stepped in front of Utash’s pickup truck. On Apr 12 a boy (16) was charged with assault and ethnic intimidation in the beating of Utash, who remained in critical condition. On June 16, 2014, Bruce Wimbush (18) acknowledged that he punched Utash during the attack and agreed to testify against others. On June 19 three others pleaded guilty to the assault on Utash. On July 7, 2014, Wonzey Saffold (30) was sentenced to up to ten years in prison for his role in the attack.
(SSFC, 4/13/14, p.A8)(SFC, 6/17/14, p.A7)(SFC, 6/20/14, p.A6)(SFC, 7/8/14, p.A5)
2014 Apr 2, In Texas soldier Ivan Lopez gunned down 3 people before killing himself at the Fort Hood Army base. He was under psychiatric care but had showed no signs of violence or suicidal tendencies.
(AP, 4/3/14)
2014 Apr 2, Washington DC Councilwoman Muriel Bowser defeated Mayor Vincent Gray in a mayoral primary leaving Gray to serve nine months as a lame duck. Weeks earlier federal prosecutors said Gray knew of an illegal $668,000 slush fund that helped him defeat incumbent Adrian Fenty in 2010.
(SFC, 4/3/14, p.A11)
2014 Apr 2, In Washington state the official death toll from the March 22 mudslide, based on the number of victims' remains sent to the coroner's office, rose to 29, up from 28 a day earlier.
(Reuters, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, In Afghanistan a suicide bomber wearing a military uniform killed 6 police officers inside the heavily fortified Interior Ministry compound in Kabul. Candidate Hussain Nazari and 8 members of his entourage were killed overnight by their abductors in Sar-i-Pul province.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Britain summoned the Spanish ambassador to condemn what it called a provocative incursion by Spanish boats into Gibraltar's territorial waters a day earlier.
(Reuters, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, British authorities warned people with heart or lung conditions to avoid exertion as a combination of European emissions and Sahara dust created a "perfect storm" of pollution that blanketed the country in smog.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, In Chile a 7.6-magnitude aftershock struck just before midnight. No new major damage or casualties were reported.
(AP, 4/3/14)
2014 Apr 2, In southern China local authorities said torrential rains have left 14 people dead. Rains have battered Guangdong and Hong Kong since March 29, grounding some flights in Guangzhou and Shenzhen.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, In Croatia Marina Lovric Merzel, prefect of Sisak county for the ruling Social Democrat party, was arrested on corruption charges.
(Reuters, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, In Egypt a series of explosions outside Cairo University killed two people, including a police brigadier-general.
(Reuters, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, The EU and the US sought ways to reduce the political clout Russia gets from its vast energy reserves by promising to wean Ukraine and the rest of the continent off those supplies.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, The European Union's antitrust authority said it is imposing a 302 million-euro ($416 million) fine against 11 producers of high voltage power cables for operating a cartel. Six European companies, three Japanese and two South Korean producers reportedly colluded to allocate customers between themselves from 1999 for about 10 years on an almost worldwide scale.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, A study by Europe’s Red List of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) said almost a quarter of Europe's bumblebees are at risk of extinction due to loss of habitats and climate change, threatening pollination of crops worth billions of dollars.
(Reuters, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Germany's antitrust authority said it has fined a group of brewers 231.2 million euros ($319 million) for allegedly fixing the price of beer, the second round of punishments it has made in the case.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel's Cabinet approved a national minimum wage, guaranteeing workers at least 8.50 euros per hour ($11.75) starting next year.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Lufthansa canceled almost 900 domestic and intercontinental flights after the pilots' union started a three-day strike in a wage dispute with Germany's largest airline.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, In Iraq a series of bombings killed 8 people, including army recruits, as the country prepared for April 30 parliamentary elections.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Italian police arrested 24 alleged separatists for terrorism after thwarting a plan to take over St Mark's Square in Venice armed with guns and a rudimentary "tank" made from a digger.
(AFP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Kazakhstan PM Seri Akhmetov (55) unexpectedly announced his resignation and was swiftly replaced by Karim Masimov (49), his influential predecessor. Masimov had stepped down as prime minister in 2012 after occupying the position for five years, during which he shepherded the country's economy through the global financial crisis.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Lebanese troops moved into a restive Sunni area in the northern city of Tripoli, in the second stage of a plan aimed at quelling deadly Syria-linked violence there.
(AFP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, In Libya employees at state-owned Jumhuriya, one of Libya's biggest banks, began a two-day strike demanding greater protection after a colleague was shot dead at work a day earlier.
(Reuters, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Palestinian foreign minister Riyad al-Malki said he has delivered requests for membership of several UN agencies, as part of a move that shook a fragile Middle East peace process.
(AFP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Suspected Filipino Abu Sayyaf insurgents seized Gao Huayuan (29) a Chinese tourist, and Marcy Dayawan (40), a hotel receptionist, from the Singamata Reef Resort in eastern Malaysia and then fled in a speed boat. The kidnappers soon demanded a ransom of 500 million pesos ($11.3 million). On May 30 Malaysia’s PM Najib Razak said both victims have been freed.
(AP, 4/3/14)(AFP, 4/5/14)(AP, 4/10/14)(AP, 5/30/14)
2014 Apr 2, Qatar's emir held talks in Sudan at a time of strained ties with his country's Gulf neighbors over its perceived support for the Egypt-based Muslim Brotherhood. After the emir's departure, Sudan's Finance Minister Badraldin Mahmoud Abbas told reporters that Qatar will provide Sudan with $1 billion to help boost its reserves of hard currency.
(AFP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, A Russian soldier shot dead Ukrainian naval officer Stanislav Karachevsky in eastern Crimea, the second Ukrainian death reported since Russia took control of the Black Sea peninsula.
(Reuters, 4/7/14)
2014 Apr 2, A Saudi Arabian court sentenced Faris al-Zahrani, a top al-Qaeda strategist, to death and jailed 15 others for their role in a series of attacks in the kingdom last decade. Zahrani was arrested in Abha, a city near the Yemeni border, in August 2004.
(Reuters, 4/3/14)
2014 Apr 2, The Swiss government said it has decided not to adopt European Union sanctions against 33 people in connection with Russia's annexation of Crimea, but will prevent them from using Switzerland to get around the visa bans and asset freezes.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, In Syria Brahim Benchakroun, a former Guantanamo detainee, was reportedly killed while fighting government forces in Latakia province. He was better known in Syria as Abu Ahmad al-Maghribi.
(AP, 4/3/14)
2014 Apr 2, In Thailand workers at a scrap shop in Bangkok accidentally detonated a large bomb believed to have been dropped during World War II, killing at least 7 people and injuring 19 others.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Ukraine took the first step toward granting more powers to the regions in line with Western wishes but stopped well short of creating the federation sought by Russia.
(AFP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Ukraine's ousted president, Viktor Yanukovych, said that he was "wrong" to invite Russian troops into Crimea, and vowed to try to persuade Russia to return the Black Sea peninsula.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, In Yemen al-Qaeda attacked an army headquarters in a heavily patrolled district of Aden, leaving 11 people dead, including three attackers, despite recent government measures to improve security.
(AFP, 4/2/14)
2015 Apr 2, A US jury ordered automaker Chrysler to pay $150 million to the family of a four-year-old boy who was killed when their Jeep exploded into flames. Remington Walden was killed in March 2012 in the US state of Georgia when a car rear-ended the 1999 Jeep Grand Cherokee he was in, causing the fuel tank behind the car's rear axle to leak and set the car on fire.
(AP, 4/3/15)
2015 Apr 2, In Alabama Jefferson County Circuit Court Judge Laura Petro dismissed all charges against Anthony Ray Hinton after he spent close to three decades in jail over the 1985 murder of two men in two separate restaurant hold-ups.
(AFP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, The US states of Arkansas and Indiana passed amended versions of religious freedom laws following a nationwide outcry that the original legislation effectively legalized discrimination against homosexuals.
(AFP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, Rev. Robert Schuller (88), southern California televangelist, died in Artesia. His “Hour of Power," inaugurated in 1970, became the nation’s most watched weekly religious program in the 1980s. His Crystal Cathedral in Garden Grove opened in 1980.
(SFC, 4/3/15, p.A12)
2015 Apr 2, In Florida three Ku Klux Klan members, who worked in a state prison, were arrested on conspiracy to commit murder. They had allegedly plotted to kill a black inmate after his release in retaliation for a fight.
(SFC, 4/3/15, p.A7)
2015 Apr 2, In Hawaii police arrested 20 protesters as some 300 gathered at Mauna Kea to protest the construction of a new telescope. Eleven more arrested at the top of the peak.
(SFC, 4/4/15, p.A4)
2015 Apr 2, In NYC Noelle Velentzas and Asia Siddiqui were arrested on charges they plotted to wage violent jihad by building a homemade bomb and using it for a Boston Marathon-type attack.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, In Oklahoma Eric Courtney Harris, a black man, died after being shot by Robert Charles Bates (73), a white deputy, after selling drugs to an undercover officer in Tulsa County. The reserve deputy in an apparent error used a gun instead of an intended Taser.
(SFC, 4/13/15, p.A5)
2015 Apr 2, Delphi Corp. announced that an autonomous car, equipped by the company, had completed a 3,400 mile coast-to-coast US road trip with 99% of the trip driven without human assistance.
(SFC, 4/3/15, p.C3)
2015 Apr 2, In eastern Afghanistan a suicide bomber attacked an anti-corruption demonstration, killing 17 people and wounding up to 60 in Khost. In Helmand province the police chief of a restive district was killed by a roadside bomb.
(AP, 4/2/15)(Reuters, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, Albania’s The parliament voted overwhelmingly to lift immunity for Mark Frroku following an international arrest warrant issued for him by Belgian prosecutors relating to the 1999 murder of Aleksander Kurti in Brussels.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, In Brazil 5 people were killed when their helicopter crashed into a house on the outskirts of Sao Paulo. The dead included Thomaz Rodrigues Alckmin (31), the son of Sao Paulo state Gov. Geraldo Alckmin.
(AP, 4/3/15)
2015 Apr 2, Canadian authorities said seven members of an Asia-based organized crime syndicate have been arrested for exploiting more than 500 women mostly from China and Korea in a prostitution ring that spanned the country.
(AP, 4/3/15)
2015 Apr 2, In China Guangdong police arrested 22 people after demonstrators forced their way into a high-speed rail station in a protest about land and housing issues.
(Reuters, 4/4/15)
2015 Apr 2, The Cyprus parliament legislated to criminalize the denial of the massacre of an estimated 1.5 million Armenians by Ottoman Turks a century ago.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, Dubai-based port operator DP World said it has reached a deal to acquire the Fairview container terminal in Canada from Deutsche Bank for 580 million Canadian dollars, or about $457 million.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, Jihadists in Egypt's Sinai killed 15 soldiers and 3 civilians in attacks on five checkpoints. Military sources said 15 militants also died in an exchange of fire but the toll could not be verified by medics. The Islamic State's branch in Egypt soon claimed responsibility.
(AFP, 4/2/15)(AP, 4/3/15)
2015 Apr 2, In France two men, who worked as cleaners for a pair of elderly sisters, were detained for stealing hundreds of thousands of euros the women kept in cash in their home near Lyon. A two-year police investigation had begun shortly after the bodies of the sisters were discovered in their home in the suburb of Bron in April 2013.
(AFP, 4/5/15)
2015 Apr 2, In Greece supporters of 21 hunger strikers in prisons said they have refused to give up their month-long protest against anti-terrorism laws, despite concessions promised by the country's new left-wing government.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, A judge in Guyana temporarily blocked the South American country from accessing a $32 million loan from the Inter-American Development Bank because there is no Parliament.
(AP, 4/3/15)
2015 Apr 2, In northeastern India armed insurgents ambushed an army convoy in Arunachal Pradesh state, killing 3 soldiers and wounding four others. Suspected Kashmiri rebels killed two Indian security personnel and wounded two soldiers and a civilian in a fierce gun battle in the northern Himalayan territory.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, An Indonesian court sentenced Canadian teacher Neil Bantleman (45) to 10 years in jail on charges of sexually abusing three young children at a prestigious international school in Jakarta. The principal and a number of other teachers have said they believe Bantleman is innocent. Ferdinant Tjiong, an Indonesian teaching assistant, was also sentenced to 10 years and both men planned to appeal.
(AP, 4/2/15)(AP, 4/3/15)
2015 Apr 2, In southern Iran gunmen killed 3 police officers in Hamidiyeh near the Iraqi border.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, In Kenya 148 people, including 6 police and soldiers, were killed when Islamist militant group al Shabaab stormed the Garissa University College campus, taking Christians hostage and engaging security forces in an extended shootout. All four of the gunmen wore suicide vests packed with explosives, detonating themselves in huge blasts as the dramatic assault finally ended after some 16 hours. It was later reported that all four gunmen were themselves Kenyan. On June 4 four men from Kenya and one from Tanzania were charged in court in connection with the attack.
(AFP, 4/3/15)(AFP, 4/4/15)(AFP, 4/16/15)(Econ., 4/11/15, p.46)(Reuters, 6/4/15)
2015 Apr 2, It was reported that somebody was systematically poisoning the dogs of Hermosillo, an industrial city in northern Mexico, and not just strays: At least 64 dogs, all with owners, have died of a similar poison since mid-March.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, In northeastern Nigeria an explosion near the Bauchi motor park, a bus station in Gombe, left 10 people dead.
(AP, 4/3/15)
2015 Apr 2, A Pakistani military courts’ statement said six Islamic militants have been sentenced to death on charges including terrorism, murder, suicide bombing and kidnapping for ransom. It said a seventh suspect was sentenced to life imprisonment.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, Super typhoon Maysak, blamed for the deaths of at least 4 people on islands in the western Pacific Ocean, weakened after reaching Philippine waters and was expected to further lose strength as it approaches the country's northeastern coast.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, In the southern Philippines a passenger boat overloaded with 55 people and heavy cargo capsized, leaving at least 5 dead and one missing.
(AP, 4/3/15)
2015 Apr 2, In Portugal a rail strike began. The Federation of Transport and Communications Unions says rail company Comboios de Portugal is not paying the full amount due to workers for vacation pay and for working on public holidays.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, In Portugal Manoel de Oliveira (b.1908), celebrated movie director, died. His work included over 30 feature films and dozens of short films and documentaries.
(SFC, 4/3/15, p.A2)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manoel_de_Oliveira)
2015 Apr 2, The Russian fishing trawler Dalny Vostok sank in minutes in the icy waters off Russia's Far East coast, killing at least 56 of the 132 people. At least 13 others were missing. Investigators later said greed and corruption were to blame for the sinking.
(AP, 4/2/15)(Reuters, 4/8/15)
2015 Apr 2, Sierra Leone police raided a funeral and arrested 13 people suspected of organizing an unsafe burial, risking the spread of Ebola.
(AFP, 4/7/15)
2015 Apr 2, In Switzerland negotiators reached a framework for a nuclear accord with Iran and US President Barack Obama hailed an "historic understanding", but senior global diplomats cautioned that hard work lies ahead to strike a final deal.
(Reuters, 4/3/15)
2015 Apr 2, Syrian rebels and fighters from the al-Qaida-affiliated Nusra Front captured the Nasib crossing, the only functioning border crossing with Jordan, as well as three nearby military posts. Palestinian fighters and Syrian rebels retook control of large parts of a refugee camp in Damascus that had been seized by IS jihadists.
(AP, 4/2/15)(AFP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, Tunisia's foreign minister said that diplomatic relations with Syria will be restored at a consular level, following a long hiatus that began during the Arab Spring.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, Turkish police launched early morning raids against suspected members of an ultra-leftist group in Istanbul. At least 10 people were arrested in the raids in the Okmeydani district of Istanbul.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, A major sandstorm whipped through the Mideast's commercial hub of Dubai and other Gulf cities, reducing visibility, diverting flights and making breathing outside a challenge.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, In Vietnam workers at a major footwear factory for Nike and Adidas ended a weeklong strike after the government agreed to their demands on retirement payouts.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, Yemen's Houthi fighters and their allies seized a central Aden district striking a heavy blow against the Saudi-led coalition which has waged a week of air strikes to try to stem advances by the Iran-allied Shi'ite group. AQAP fighters stormed the central prison in Mukalla and freed 150 prisoners, some of them al Qaeda detainees. AQAP was led by Nasser al-Wuhayshi.
(Reuters, 4/2/15)(Econ., 4/25/15, p.46)
2016 Apr 2, Latin Jazz saxophonist Leandro "Gato" Barbieri (83) died in NYC. He composed the Grammy-winning music for the steamy Marlon Brando film "Last Tango in Paris" and recorded dozens of albums over a career spanning more than seven decades.
(AP, 4/3/16)
2016 Apr 2, Heavy fighting erupted between Armenian and Azerbaijani forces over the separatist region of Nagorno-Karabakh. Azerbaijan said 12 of its soldiers were killed and claimed to have inflicted heavy casualties on the Armenian forces.
(AP, 4/2/16)
2016 Apr 2, A Belgian national named only as Y.A. (33) was charged with participating in the activities of a terrorist group in connection with a joint Belgian-French investigation into an apparently foiled attack plot. Two others have been named as Rabah N. and Abderrahmane A.
(Reuters, 4/2/16)
2016 Apr 2, Central African Republic President Faustin Archange Touadera announced late today that campaign manager Simplice Sarandji (61) was the new prime minister.
(AP, 4/3/16)
2016 Apr 2, In Colombia tens of thousands of people protested in more than 20 cities across the country against President Juan Manuel Santos and his government's peace process with the FARC guerrillas.
(AFP, 4/2/16)
2016 Apr 2, In western India around 25 female activists were prevented from entering the Shani Shingnapur temple in Maharashtra state, traditionally open only to men, a day after a Mumbai court ruled that women have a fundamental right to enter and pray inside temples.
(AP, 4/2/16)
2016 Apr 2, In Indonesia a teenage girl was raped and murdered by 14 men. This went largely unnoticed at a national level until social media users began highlighting its brutality. The rape and murder reignited calls for Parliament to pass the Elimination of Sexual Violence Act.
(AP, 5/3/16)
2016 Apr 2, Iraq's PM Haider al-Abadi ordered an investigation into corruption allegations against senior oil officials following an expose into bribe-taking published in international media outlets.
(AP, 4/2/16)
2016 Apr 2, Libya's National Oil Corporation said it was working with the U.N.-backed unity government, which arrived in Tripoli this week, to coordinate future oil sales.
(Reuters, 4/2/16)
2016 Apr 2, In Spain 7 people died in a pre-dawn crash between two cars near the northern city of Figueres. 5 people of a car with French license plates were between 19 and 22 and not wearing seatbelts.
(AP, 4/2/16)
2016 Apr 2, Syria's partial cease-fire was unravelling, as fierce fighting between government forces and opposition fighters, including members of the al-Qaida affiliated Nusra Front, erupted outside the country's second largest city of Aleppo. At least 25 pro-government fighters died in clashes south of Aleppo, where the Nusra Front and rebel militias captured a hill overlooking a major highway.
(AP, 4/2/16)
2017 Apr 2, The Federal Emergency management Agency (FEMA) said disaster relief will be made available for 42 California counties to help repair hundreds of millions of dollars in damage incurred by February’s flooding, storms and mudslides.
(SFC, 4/3/17, p.C3)
2017 Apr 2, It was reported that an investigation by the NY Times found five women who have received payouts from either Bill O’Reilly or Fox News that totaled about $13 million.
(SSFC, 4/2/17, p.A5)
2017 Apr 2, In Louisiana a tornado demolished a mobile home killing a woman and her daughter (3) in Breaux Bridge.
(SFC, 4/3/17, p.A4)
2017 Apr 2, In Afghanistan at least four provincial intelligence service agents were killed in an attack by Taliban insurgents in eastern Ghazni province.
(AP, 4/3/17)
2017 Apr 2, Armenia held legislative polls for the first time since the 2015 adoption of constitutional reforms. Opposition parties denounced electoral violations. The pro-Russian ruling Republican Party beat the main opposition coalition, led by wealthy politician Gagik Tsarukyan, by 49.15 percent to 27.37 percent. On April 3 European observers said there was "credible information" that the parliamentary elections were marred by "vote-buying" and pressure on voters.
(AFP, 4/2/17)(AP, 4/3/17)
2017 Apr 2, Ecuador held presidential elections. Business-friendly former bank boss Guillermo Lasso (b.1955) faced leftist government candidate Lenin Moreno (b.1953). Lenin Moreno won the presidential election 51% to 49%, but his conservative challenger demanded a recount as supporters took to the streets in protest.
(Reuters, 4/2/17)(Reuters, 4/3/17)(Econ 5/20/17, p.30)
2017 Apr 2, An Egyptian court ruled that a judicial decision to block the transfer of two Red Sea islands to Saudi Arabia is void, potentially reviving a deal that triggered protests. The decision by the Court of Urgent Matters was subject to appeal and any final deal must be approved by parliament.
(Reuters, 4/2/17)
2017 Apr 2, In Germany a Ghanaian man (31) reportedly raped a camper at knife-point in front of her boyfriend days after being denied asylum, while the couple was camping near Bonn. He was arrested five days later after DNA evidence linked him to the crime.
(AP, 9/25/17)
2017 Apr 2, Indian PM Narendra Modi inaugurated an 11-km (7-mile) tunnel through the Himalayan terrain to help ease travel on a highway linking the troubled Kashmir Valley with the rest of India. Separatist leaders fighting for the region's independence from India or its merger with neighboring Pakistan shut businesses and public transport in the region and said the construction of tunnels and roads would not succeed in appeasing them.
(AP, 4/2/17)
2017 Apr 2, In southern India a German tourist was raped in the beach town of Mamallapuram, Tamil Nadu state. Police searched for two men suspected in the rape.
(AP, 4/3/17)
2017 Apr 2, In Nigeria three suicide bombers blew themselves up attempting to get into the northeastern city of Maiduguri. A dog grappled with a suicide bomber at a wedding in Belbelo village near Maiduguri until her explosives detonated, killing the animal as well.
(AP, 4/2/17)(SFC, 4/6/17, p.A2)
2017 Apr 2, In Pakistan 20 people were tortured and then murdered with clubs and knives at a Sufi shrine, in an attack purportedly carried out by Abdul Waheed, the shrine's custodian, and several accomplices at the edge of Sargodha, Punjab province.
(Reuters, 4/2/17)
2017 Apr 2, Philippine soldiers killed "more than 10" Islamic State-linked Abu Sayyaf militants in an attempt to free 6 Vietnamese captives held on a remote southern island. 32 soldiers were also wounded in the assault in Talipao town. There was no word on the fate of the captives.
(Reuters, 4/3/17)
2017 Apr 2, In Russia police detained more than 20 anti-corruption protesters who took to the streets of Moscow in a follow-up of last week's large-scale demonstrations.
(Reuters, 4/2/17)
2017 Apr 2, Serbia held presidential elections. Conservative PM Aleksandar Vucic (47) was the runaway favorite despite opposition warnings about the extent of his domination. Vucic won the presidency in the first round, enabling him to push forward with his plan to lead the Balkan country into the European Union.
(Reuters, 4/2/17)(AFP, 4/3/17)
2017 Apr 2, In central Sweden a bus carrying high school students to a ski resort crashed south of Sveg, killing three people and injuring 20 others — seven of them seriously.
(AP, 4/2/17)
2017 Apr 2, In Syria US backed forces repelled a major counter-attack by Islamic State militants holding out at the country's largest dam and in the nearby town of Tabqa. Dozens of their fighters were reported killed. Hundreds of families with their cattle, property, motor bikes and vans continued to flee from villages under Islamic State control.
(Reuters, 4/2/17)
2017 Apr 2, In Syria rebels said jets believed to be Russian hit a northwestern outpost run by moderate rebel forces, killing at least one fighter and wounding several people. War jets also believed to be Russian also struck Urum al Kubra town in rebel-held western Aleppo countryside where five civilians were killed.
(Reuters, 4/2/17)
2018 Apr 2, The US Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that car dealerships' service advisers, like car salesmen and mechanics, are exempt under federal law from overtime pay requirements.
(SFC, 4/3/18, p.D3)
2018 Apr 2, The US Dept. of Justice said it is filing a suit against California over a law that gives the state power to veto sales of federal lands to private interests. A 2017 state law gave state officials the right to purchase any federal land in California that the government tries to sell to private ownership.
(SFC, 4/3/18, p.A12)
2018 Apr 2, The West Hollywood-based gay dating app Grindr was under fire for sharing information about users' HIV status or locations with two companies enlisted to optimize its software. A day later the company announced a policy change to stop sharing users' HIV statuses
(AP, 4/3/18)(SFC, 4/4/18, p.C5)
2018 Apr 2, In Kentucky teachers filled the state Capitol protesting pension changes and demanding generous school funding.
(SFC, 4/3/18, p.A6)
2018 Apr 2, Thousands of Oklahoma teachers walked out of classrooms in a campaign for higher pay. State Gov. Mary Fallin signed legislation last week granting teachers pay raises of 15-18 percent, but some educators said that wasn't good enough.
(SFC, 4/3/18, p.A6)
2018 Apr 2, A cyberattack hobbled the electronic communication system used by Energy Transfer Partners LP, a major US pipeline network. The EDI platform, provided by Energy Services Group, was shut down, but there was no effect on the flow of natural gas.
(SFC, 4/3/18, p.D2)
2018 Apr 2, An Afghan airstrike on a Taliban training camp killed at least five civilians, 35 insurgents and wounded many more in Kunduz province. The Taliban claimed the strike hit a madrassa, or a religious school, during a graduation ceremony, killing dozens of civilians. The UN later said a total of 36 people were killed in the attack in the Dashti Archi district of Kunduz province.
(AFP, 4/2/18)(AP, 4/3/18)(AP, 4/11/18)
2018 Apr 2, In Afghanistan a total of 36 people were killed in the attack, which the UN said targeted a religious ceremony attended by hundreds of men and boys in the Dashti Archi district of the northern Kunduz province.
(AP, 5/7/18)
2018 Apr 2, Bangladesh officials said Myanmar authorities have lured dozens of mainly Buddhist Bangladeshi tribal families to cross the border and resettle on land abandoned by fleeing Muslim Rohingya.
(AFP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, A rights group said farmers from Cambodia have filed a lawsuit in a Thai civil court against Mitr Phol, Asia's largest sugar producer, accusing it of rights abuses after it allegedly kicked farmers off their land.
(Reuters, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, Five Cameroonian soldiers were killed in an attack on a military post in the village of Sagme in the far north of the country. Security forces freed 18 hostages, including 12 European tourists, who had been seized by separatists fighting for the independence of English-speaking regions. Six municipal counsellors in the northwest also were freed.
(AFP, 4/3/18)(AP, 4/4/18)
2018 Apr 2, China raised import duties on a $3 billion list of US pork, apples and other products in an escalating dispute with Washington over trade and industrial policy.
(AP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, China's defunct Tiangong 1 space station mostly burned up on re-entry into the atmosphere over the central South Pacific.
(AP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, Official results showed that Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi was re-elected with 97 percent of votes, the same proportion that the former military commander secured four years ago for his first term. Turnout was lower at 41 percent. Some 1.76 million invalid ballots were cast, about 7.2% of the total.
(Reuters, 4/2/18)(SFC, 4/4/18, p.A2)
2018 Apr 2, Ethiopia's new PM Abiye Ahmed promised to push through democratic reforms in an effort to end three years of unrest that first erupted in the province of Oromiya from where he hails.
(Reuters, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, A Fiji disaster management official said weekend floods caused by Cyclone Josie have killed four people, with another presumed drowned.
(Reuters, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, French emergency doctor and mountain guide Emmanuel Cauchy (58), whose high-altitude work earned him the nickname "Doctor Vertical," was killed in an avalanche in the Alps. He was among a group of off-piste skiers caught up in the avalanche in the Aiguilles Rouges area around the resort of Chamonix.
(AFP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, In India low-caste Dalits fought street battles with police that left at least six dead as protests against a Supreme Court rights ruling swept across large swathes of the country.
(AFP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, A security clampdown and a strike sponsored by separatists fighting against Indian rule shut down most of Indian-administered Kashmir.
(AP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, An Iraqi court in Baghdad sentenced six Turkish women to death and a seventh to life in prison for membership of the Islamic State jihadist group. Iraq in February condemned another 15 Turkish women to death on the same charge.
(AFP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, Israel announced it had reached a deal with the UN refugee agency to cancel a controversial plan to deport African migrants and replace it with a new one that will see thousands sent to Western countries. PM Benjamin Netanyahu said that Canada, Italy and Germany will take in some of Israel's African migrants under an agreement Israel reached with the UN refugee agency.
(AfP, 4/2/18)(Reuters, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, Malaysia approved a law against "fake news" that would allow for prison of up to six years for offenders, shrugging off critics who say it was aimed at curbing dissent and free speech ahead of a general election.
(Reuters, 4/2/18)
018 Apr 2, In Nigeria Boko Haram extremists attacked two villages on the outskirts of Maiduguri, killing at least 15 people and wounded 83, in the biggest strike since the government said it was in talks with the Islamist militant group.
(Reuters, 4/2/18)(SFC, 4/3/18, p.A2)
2018 Apr 2, Pakistan's army chief confirmed death sentences for 10 convicted militants, including the killer of well-known Sufi singer Amjad Sabri in 2016.
(AP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, The Palestinian death toll in last week's mass protest on the Gaza-Israel border rose to 18 after a 29-year-old man died today of his injuries.
(AP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, Russia's foreign ministry said a diplomat from Montenegro will be expelled, after Montenegro expelled a Russian diplomat over a nerve agent attack in England that the British government has blamed on Russia.
(Reuters, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, Spying on your spouse's phone in Saudi Arabia now carries a hefty fine and up to a year in prison, under a new law that aims to "protect morals of individuals and society and protect privacy".
(Reuters, 4/3/18)
2018 Apr 2, In South Africa six miners were burnt to death when the bus taking them to work at the Modikwa platinum mine was set alight by a petrol bomb thrown by unknown attackers near the town of Burgersfort in northern Limpopo province.
(Reuters, 4/3/18)
2018 Apr 2, In South Africa anti-apartheid activist Winnie Madikizela-Mandela (81), wife to Nelson Mandela during his decades of imprisonment, died in a Johannesburg hospital after a long illness.
(AFP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir vowed to launch a "war on corruption" in a bid to revive the ailing economy and curb food price rises.
(AFP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, The last Syrian rebel group in eastern Ghouta near Damascus began withdrawing from Douma under an agreement with the government. A military source said a group of insurgents were still rejecting the deal.
(Reuters, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, Police in Thailand confiscated an estimated $54 million worth of methamphetamine in one of their biggest-ever drug seizures and arrested 11 people in recent days as illegal drug cases surge in the country.
(AP, 4/3/18)
2018 Apr 2, Turkey's Haberturk newspaper said the government has ordered the arrest of US-based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen and seven others over the 2016 assassination of the Russian envoy to Turkey, a day before Russian Pres. Vladimir Putin visits the country.
(Reuters, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, In Yemen an air strike by the Saudi-led coalition, killed 16 people near the port of Hodeida in a building where Huthi rebels were gathering. There were conflicting reports on the number of rebels versus civilians killed.
(AP, 4/2/18)(AFP, 4/2/18)
2019 Apr 2, In Hawaii Master Halbert (44), a Micronesia government official, pleaded guilty in US District Court in Honolulu to conspiring to launder bribe money he accepted from the president of Lyon Associates Inc., a Hawaii civil engineering company.
(AP, 4/4/19)
2019 Apr 2, In Chicago Lori Lightfoot (56), a former federal prosecutor, was elected mayor, becoming the city's first black woman and openly gay person to lead the city.
(SFC, 4/3/19, p.A6)
2019 Apr 2, The Supreme Court in Comoros confirmed Azali Assoumani as the winner of the disputed presidential election held last week in the volatile Indian Ocean archipelago.
(AFP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, Czech police extradited to Austria two suspects who allegedly formed a terror cell with a man detained by Austrian authorities over unsuccessful attacks on trains in Germany.
(AP, 4/3/19)
2019 Apr 2, Congo DRC's army captured Masudi Alimasi Kokodiko, leader of the widely feared Raia Mutomboki militia, in South Kivu's Shabunda territory. He has been accused of orchestrating mass rapes and other atrocities.
(Reuters, 4/4/19)
2019 Apr 2, The World Health Organization said Ebola is on the rise in eastern Congo following a series of attacks on health facilities. A total of 73 new cases were reported last week, compared to 57 the week before.
(AP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, Egypt sentenced more than 70 suspected members of the Muslim Brotherhood group to prison on terror-related charges. Nearly half of the defendants were tried in absentia.
(AP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, An Egyptian policeman found guilty of killing a Christian man and his son in a case that outraged the minority Coptic community was sentenced to death. Rabee Khalifa, posted as an armed police guard outside a church, killed construction workers Imad Kamal Sadeq (49) and his son David (21) after an argument last December.
(Reuters, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, In Egypt Ahmed Abdallah, the governor of Hurghada province, said a ban on disposable plastics, prohibiting everything from single use straws to plastic bags in an effort to fight pollution and protect the environment, will go into effect in June.
(AP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, The leaders of Greece and North Macedonia hugged, took selfies and signed a new agreement for air patrols in a display of newly-friendly relations since a nearly three-decade name dispute was settled earlier this year.
(Reuters, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, An Iraqi official said several million Muslims have travelled to the shrine of Imam Musa al-Kadhim in Baghdad in recent days to commemorate the revered Shiite figure's death in 799.
(AFP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, Israeli authorities arrested Hassan Yousef, a co-founder of Hamas, at his home in the occupied West Bank. On April 8 he was handed down a six-month detention order without trial.
(AFP, 4/8/19)
2019 Apr 2, In Israel Brazil's right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro said "there is no doubt" that Nazism was a leftist movement, just after visiting the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial and museum in Jerusalem.
(Reuters, 4/3/19)
2019 Apr 2, In Kashmir Pakistan and India traded fire in the disputed Himalayan region, leaving seven people dead.
(AP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, Mozambique officials said cholera cases have risen above 1,400 as hundreds of thousands of vaccine doses arrived in an attempt to limit the rapid spread of the disease.
(AP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, New Zealand lawmakers voted overwhelmingly in favor of new gun restrictions during the first stage of a bill they hope to rush into law by the end of next week.
(AP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, In North Macedonia a small private plane with four members of a Bulgarian family on board crashed into a mountain in a central region of the country. There were no survivors.
(AP, 4/3/19)
2019 Apr 2, Panama's President Juan Carlos Varela visited Hong Kong amid ambitious plans and proposals for Chinese-built bridges and rail lines in pan in Panama.
(AP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, The Philippine Supreme Court ordered the release of police documents on thousands of killings of suspects in the president's anti-drug crackdown, in a ruling that human rights groups say could shed light on allegations of extrajudicial killings.
(AP, 4/2/19)(SFC, 4/3/19, p.A4)
2019 Apr 2, Senegalese President Macky Sall said he would prioritize the environment, youth employment and women's rights during his second term in office.
(Reuters, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, In eastern Syria US-backed Syrian fighters battled the Islamic State group 10 days after declaring victory over the extremists. The SDF were rooting out groups of militants who were hiding in caves in and near the village of Baghouz. Four Islamic State militants clashed with the US-backed SDF and local security forces before blowing themselves late today in Raqqa.
(AP, 4/2/19)(AP, 4/3/19)
2019 Apr 2, The air hanging over Thailand's far north has become so polluted, PM Prayuth Chan-ocha went to see in person what is being called a severe health crisis.
(AP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's ruling party appealed the results of local elections in Istanbul where preliminary results give the opposition a razor-thin victory, sounding confident that a recount will alter the outcome of the vote.
(AP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, In Uganda a US woman (35) and a local driver were abducted by four gunmen in Queen Elizabeth National Park. The kidnappers demanded a $500,000 ransom.
(AP, 4/3/19)
2019 Apr 2, The UN said more than 113 million people across 53 countries experienced "acute hunger" last year because of wars and climate disasters, with Africa the worst-hit region.
(AFP, 4/2/19)
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For Asian History: http://www.asiaobserver.org/2019/04/2
742 Apr 2, Charlemagne (d.814), Charles I the Great, King of the Franks and first Holy Roman emperor (800-14), was born. His capital was at Aachen (Acquisgrana in Latin).
(V.D.-H.K.p.105)(SFEM, 10/12/97, p.46)(HN, 4/2/98)
1118 Apr 2, Boudouin I of Bologne and Edessa, 1st crusader, king of Jerusalem, died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1305 Apr 2, French Queen Jeanne de Navarre (b.1273) died. In 1919 a “Book of Hours" prayer book, that was made for her, sold for a record price at Sotheby’s.
(http://tinyurl.com/zw23x5r)(Econ, 9/17/16, p.78)
1416 Apr 2, Ferdinand I (52) the Justified, king of Aragon and Sicily, died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1502 Apr 2, Arthur, English crown prince, husband of Catharina of Aragon, died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1513 Apr 2, Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de Leon landed in Florida. Juan Ponce de Leon, Spanish explorer, discovered Florida and planted orange and lemon trees there. [see March 27, 1512 entry] He also discovered the Dry Tortugas west of Key West.
(TL-MB, p.10)(NH, 4/97, p.317)(AP, 4/2/97)
1550 Apr 2, Jews were expelled from Genoa, Italy. [see Jun 15, 1567]
(MC, 4/2/02)
1595 Apr 2, Cornelis de Houtman's ships departed to Asia around Cape of Good Hope.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1602 Apr 2, Maria de Jesus de Agreda (Maria Coronel), Spanish Franciscan, was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1618 Apr 2, Francesco M. Grimaldi, mathematician, physicist (light diffraction), was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1645 Apr 2, Robert Devereux resigned as parliament supreme commander.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1672 Apr 2, Pedro Calungsod (b.1654), a Filipino teenager, was killed in Tumon, Guam, along with Diego Luis de San Vitores, his Jesuit missionary priest, by natives resisting their conversion efforts. In 2012 Pedro was named a saint in the Catholic church.
(AP, 10/20/12)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedro_Calungsod)
1725 Apr 2, Giovanni Casanova, Italian adventurer, was born. [see Apr 5]
(HN, 4/2/01)
1728 Apr 2, Franz Asplmayr, composer, was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1758 Apr 2, Johann Balthasar Konig (67), composer, died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1763 Apr 2, Giacomo Gotifredo Ferrari, composer, was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1772 Apr 2, Father Juan Crespi looked out over a bay, later called Suisun Bay, and believed he had found the fabled Northwest Passage, a shortcut to the Colorado River. After Father Serra established a mission in Monterey, Ca, Pedro Fages and Father Juan Crespi had set out to explore the SF Bay by land.
(SFEC, 3/1/98, p.W34)(SFC, 5/3/13, p.D1)
1784 Apr 2, Pierre Leclair (74), composer, died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1792 Apr 2, Congress passed the Coinage Act, which authorized establishment of the U.S. Mint. It established the US dollar defined in fixed weights of gold and silver. State chartered banks issued paper money convertible to gold or silver coins to ease business transactions. U.S. authorized $10 Eagle, $5 half-Eagle & 2.50 quarter-Eagle gold coins & silver dollar, dollar, quarter, dime & half-dime.
(HFA, '96, p.28)(AP, 4/2/97)(WSJ, 1/13/98, p.A1) (HN, 4/2/98)
1796 Apr 2, Haitian revolt leader Toussaint L’Ouverture commanded French forces at Santo Domingo.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1800 Apr 2, 1st performance of Ludwig van Beethoven's 1st Symphony in C.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1801 Apr 2, The British navy defeated the Danish at the Battle of Copenhagen.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1805 Apr 2, Hans Christian Andersen (d.1875), author of 150 fairy tales, was born in Odense, Denmark.
(CFA, '96, p.44)(HN, 4/2/98)(AP, 4/2/99)
1814 Apr 2, Henry Lewis "Old Rock" Benning, Brig General in Confederate Army, was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1827 Apr 2, William Holdman Hunt, English painter (Light of the World), was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1827 Apr 2, Joseph Dixon began manufacturing lead pencils.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1834 Apr 2, Frederic-Auguste Bartholdi, sculptor (Statue of Liberty), was born in Colmar, France.
(HN, 4/2/01)
1840 Apr 2, The Association of American Geologists held its first meeting in Philadelphia.
(www.lib.uwaterloo.ca/society/history/1840aagn.html)
1840 Apr 2, Emile Zola (d.1902), French novelist, reporter (Nana), was born. He tried to wake the consciousness of the fin de siecle.
(HN, 4/2/98)(SFC, 12/29/00, p.C6)(V.D.-H.K.p.279)
1845 Apr 2, H.L. Fizeau and J. Leon Foucault took the 1st photo of Sun.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1851 Apr 2, Rama III (b.1788), King Phra Nangklao, died. King Phra Nangklao reformed the tax and treasury system and oversaw a boom in trade with China during his 27-year rule from 1824. Siam renewed official contacts with western powers for the first time since the late Ayutthaya period, and supported the British in their first Anglo-Burmese War in 1824. The king did not name a successor and the throne passed to his half-brother.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rama_III)(Reuters, 5/2/19)
1853 Apr 2, Lucie de la Tour du Pin (83), born as Henriette-Lucie Dillon and former lady-in-waiting to Marie Antoinette, died Paris. Her memoir, “Journal of a Woman of Fifty Years," was not published until 1906. In 2009 Caroline Moorhead authored “Dancing to the Precipice: Lucie de la Tour du Pin and the French Revolution."
(Econ, 3/7/09, p.91)(http://tinyurl.com/co3xor)
1860 Apr 2, The first Italian Parliament met at Turin. Italy was unified. The Rothschild banking empire bankrolled Italy’s independence.
(AP, 4/2/97) (SFC, 6/11/96, p.A16)(SFC, 7/12/96, p.A11)
1863 Apr 2, In Richmond, Va., a large crowd of hungry women from one of Richmond's working-class neighborhoods demanded bread from Governor John Letcher. When the governor did not respond favorably to the rioters' demands, the women marched down Main Street, shouting "Bread" as they made their way to the commissary, where they smashed store windows and grabbed food and anything else they could get their hands on. Not until the mob faced President Davis and his troops did the rampage end. Varina Howell Davis wrote an account of the riots after her husband’s death in 1889.
(HNQ, 5/8/02)(AH, 6/02, p.24)
1864 Apr 2, Skirmish at Crump's Hill (Piney Woods), Louisiana.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1864 Apr 2, Skirmish at Spoonville-Antoine, Arkansas.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1865 Apr 2, Confederate President Davis and most of his Cabinet fled the Confederate capital of Richmond, Va. Grant broke Lee’s line at Petersburg. President Jefferson Davis moved his government headquarters to Danville, Va., when its previous capital, Richmond, became engulfed in flames. Though it would have been safer to secure a location further south, Danville was naturally protected by the Dan and Staunton rivers, and it was in close proximity to Gen. Robert E. Lee’s army to the north and Gen. Joseph E. Johnston’s army to the south. The Piedmont Railroad connected Danville and Greensboro, N.C. and offered easy access to supplies.
(AP, 4/2/97)(HN, 4/2/98)(HNQ, 11/1/01)
1865 Apr 2, Battle of Petersburg, Va. (Ft Gregg, Sutherland's Station).
(MC, 4/2/02)
1865 Apr 2, Battle of Ft. Blakely, AL. and Selma, AL.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1865 Apr 2, Ambrose Powell Hill (39), Confederate general, was killed in action.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1865 Apr 2, Richard Cobden (b.1804), English manufacturer and Radical and Liberal statesman, died. He had advocated for free trade and led the campaign against Corn Laws, which were repealed in 1846.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Cobden)(Econ, 10/1/16, SR p.16)
1866 Apr 2, Pres. Johnson ended war in Ala, Ark, Fla, Ga, Miss, La, NC, SC, Ten and Va.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1870 Apr 2, Victoria Claflin Woodhull (1838-1927) became the first woman to run for president of the United States when she announced her candidacy for the 1872 election, but she spent Election Day in jail for sending obscene literature through the mail. Articulate and radical in her beliefs, she boldly challenged convention in Victorian-era America. Victoria and her sister, Tennessee Claflin, got their start as spiritual advisors to financier Cornelius Vanderbilt. With his backing, the sisters became the first women to open their own successful brokerage firm. Woodhull was the first woman newspaper publisher, a feminist and a militant suffragist, but most shocking to Victorian sensibilities, she also advocated free love.
(HNPD, 4/28/99)
1872 Apr 2, George B. Brayton patented a gasoline powered engine.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1872 Apr 2, Samuel F.B. Morse (80), developer of the electric telegraph, died in New York. In 2003 Kenneth Silverman authored "Lightning Man," a biography of Morse.
(AP, 4/2/99)(MC, 4/2/02)(WSJ, 10/28/03, p.A1)
1875 Apr 2, Walter Chrysler, founder of Chrysler automobile company, was born. He grew up in Ellis, Kansas.
(HN, 4/2/98)(WSJ, 8/10/00, p.A16)
1875 Apr 2, In San Francisco a painting of a dead maiden titled “Elaine" by Toby Rosenthal (1848-1917), was discovered stolen from the Snow & May art gallery on Kearny St. The Prussia-born artist had been raised in San Francisco before he went to study art in Germany. On April 4 police arrested William Donohue and three cronies and recovered the painting at a shanty on Langton St.
(SFC, 12/9/17, p.C2)
1884 Apr 2, The London prison for debtors closed.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1891 Apr 2, Max Ernst, German painter and sculptor, founder of surrealism, was born. [see Jan 24]
(HN, 4/2/98)
1896 Apr 2, Theodore Robinson (b.1852), American Impressionist painter, died in NYC.
(WSJ, 10/1/04, p.W2)(http://97.1911encyclopedia.org)
1900 Apr 2, Heinrich Besseler, German musicologist, was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1902 Apr 2, Thomas L. Talley set up the first moving picture theater as part of a carnival in Los Angeles.
(SFEC, 5/23/99, Z1 p.10)(MC, 4/2/02)
1905 Apr 2, Kurt Adler (d.1988), American conductor, was born. "Tradition is what you resort to when you don't have the time or the money to do it right."
(HN, 4/2/01)(AP, 8/25/99)
1905 Apr 2, Serge Lifar, dancer and opera director, was born.
(HN, 4/2/01)
1908 Apr 2, Buddy Ebsen (d.2003), actor-dancer, was born in Belleville, Ill. He played Jed Clampett in the popular television series The Beverly Hillbillies.
(AP, 4/2/08)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddy_Ebsen)
1910 Apr 2, Karl Harris perfected the process for the artificial synthesis of rubber.
(HN, 4/2/98)
1910 Apr 2, Boyd Alexander (37), English explorer (Niger to the Nile), was murdered.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1912 Apr 2, Titanic underwent sea trials under its own power.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1912 Apr 2, Sun Yet Sen formed the Kuomintang-Party in China.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1914 Apr 2, Alec Guinness, English stage and film actor, was born illegitimate and spent his early years in penury.
(WSJ, 8/15/00, p.A26)
1914 Apr 2, Federal Reserve Board announced plans to divide country into 12 districts. [see Nov 16, 1914]
(HN, 4/2/98)
1916 Apr 2, German troops overtook Bois de Caillette.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1917 Apr 2, At 8:30 p.m. President Woodrow Wilson, delivered his message before a joint session of Congress and recommended that a state of war be declared between the United States and the imperial German government. Realizing that the war looming ahead would be a costly one, Wilson said, "the day has come when America is privileged to spend her blood and her might for the principles that gave her birth and happiness and the peace which she has treasured…" and "The world must be made safe for democracy."
(AP, 4/2/97)(HN, 4/2/98)(http://condor.stcloudstate.edu/~brixr01/theTIMEMACHINE.html)
1917 Apr 2, Jeannette Pickering Rankin was sworn in as the first woman to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives.
(HN, 4/2/01)
1919 Apr 2, Ian Hunter, impresario, was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1920 Apr 2, Jack Webb, actor (Joe Friday-Dragnet), was born in Santa Monica, Calif.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1921 Apr 2, Einstein (1879-1955) made his first visit to the US on a fundraising tour with Zionist leader Chaim Weizman. Prof. Albert Einstein lectured in NYC on his new theory of relativity. In 2007 Jurgen Neffe authored “Einstein: A Biography;" and Jozsef Illy edited “Albert Meets America."
(SSFC, 5/13/07, p.M6)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Einstein)
1925 Apr 2, George MacDonald Fraser, poet, author (Flashman at the Charge), was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1926 Apr 2, Riots took place between Moslems and Hindus in Calcutta.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1930 Apr 2, Girolamo Arriego, composer, was born.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1930 Apr 2, Ethiopia’s Empress Zauditu died and Ras Tafari assumed the title of Emperor.
(www.ethiopianembassy.org/history.shtml)
1931 Apr 2, Virne "Jackie" Mitchell became the 2nd woman to play for an all-male pro baseball team. In an exhibition game against the New York Yankees, she struck out both Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig in an exhibition game in Chattanooga, Tennessee.
(HN, 4/2/01)(www.exploratorium.edu/baseball/mitchell.html)
1932 Apr 2, Aviator Charles A. Lindbergh and Dr. John F. Condon turned over $50,000 in ransom to an unidentified man in a New York City cemetery in the Bronx, in exchange for Lindbergh's kidnapped son. The infant was not returned, and was found dead the following month.
(AP, 4/2/97)(HN, 4/2/98)
1935 Apr 2, Sharon Acker, actress (Della Street-Perry Mason 1973), was born in Toronto, Canada.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1935 Apr 2, Sir Watson-Watt patented RADAR.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1939 Apr 2, Marvin P. Gaye Jr, singer (Sexual Healing), was born in Wash, DC.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1941 Apr 2, USS Hornet with Jimmy Doolittle's B-25s departed from SF.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1942 Apr 2, Glenn Miller and his orchestra recorded "American Patrol" at the RCA Victor studios in Hollywood.
(AP, 4/2/97)
1944 Apr 2, Soviet forces entered Romania, one of Germany's allied countries.
(HN, 4/2/01)
1945 Apr 2, Linda Hunt, actress (Bostonians, Eleni, Silverado), was born in Morristown, NJ.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1945 Apr 2, 1st US units reached the east coast of Okinawa.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1948 Apr 2, Emmylou Harris, American singer, was born.
(HN, 4/2/01)
1951 Apr 2, William McChesney Martin (1906-1998) began to serve as chairman of the US Federal Reserve and continued to 1970. Pres. Harry Truman pressed him to keep interest rates low despite the inflationary consequences of the Korean War. Martin refused.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_McChesney_Martin)(Econ, 4/29/17, p.58)
1953 Apr 2, Jean Epstein (56), French director (Vive la Vie), died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1956 Apr 2, The soap operas "As the World Turns" and "The Edge of Night" premiered on CBS television. Actress Helen Wagner (1918-2010) opened "As the World Turns" with the words: "Good morning, dear."
(AP, 4/2/99)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Edge_of_Night)(AP, 5/3/10)
1956 Apr 2, Peter Ustinov's "Romanoff and Juliet," premiered in Manchester.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1958 Apr 2, National Advisory Council on Aeronautics was renamed NASA.
(HN, 4/2/98)
1960 Apr 2, Cuba bought oil from USSR.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1961 Apr 2, Wallingford Riegger (75), US composer (Bacchangle), died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1963 Apr 2, Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King began the first non-violent campaign in Birmingham, Alabama.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1964 Apr 2, A military coup in Brazil by Gen. Humberto Castello Branco ousted Pres. Joao Goulart and altered the traditional power structure. Gen'l. Golbery do Couto e Silva was a leader in the coup. Business interests led by Jorge Oscar de Mello Flores (d.2000 at 88) supported the military coup.
(WSJ, 12/4/95, p.A-9)(WSJ, 7/7/99, p.A17)(SFC, 8/3/00, p.D2)(MC, 4/2/02)
1965 Apr 2, Rodney King, black motorist brutally beaten by LA cops, was born in Sacramento, Calif.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1965 Apr 2, Rolf Hochhuth's play "The Deputy," which blamed Pope Pius XII for war crimes, was banned in Italy.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1966 Apr 2, Cecil Scott Forester (66), English author (Horatio Hornblower), died.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1968 Apr 2, The influential science-fiction film "2001: A Space Odyssey," produced and directed by Stanley Kubrick, had its world premiere in Washington.
(AP, 4/2/08)
1968 Apr 2, Senator Eugene McCarthy won the Democratic primaries in Wisconsin. In 2004 Dominic Sandbrook authored "Eugene McCarthy: The Rise and Fall of Postwar American Liberalism."
(http://news.minnesota.publicradio.org/features/2005/06/15_newsroom_mccarthytimeline/)(SSFC, 4/11/04, p.M6)
1968 Apr 2, In West Germany the Baader-Meinhof gang was formed and named after its founders, Andreas Baader and Ulrike Meinhof. Both later committed suicide in prison. The gang became known as the Red Army Faction and led assassinations, bombings and bank robberies in West Germany through the 1970s and 1980s. The RAF published a letter to Reuters in 1998 and declared to have disbanded.
(SFC, 4/21/98, p.A18)(www.baader-meinhof.com/timeline/1968.html)
1970 Apr 2, In Nepal 2 men began an ascent of south face of Annapurna I, the highest final stage in a wall climb in world.
(MC, 4/2/02)\
1971 Apr 2, The ABC sci-fi soap opera "Dark Shadows," which premiered in 1966, aired for the last time.
(www.tv.com/Dark-Shadows/show/2374/summary.html)
1972 Apr 2, Tennessee Williams' "Small Craft Warnings," premiered in NYC.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_Craft_Warnings)
1972 Apr 2, In response to the North Vietnamese Easter Offensive, President Nixon authorized the US 7th Fleet to target NVA troops massed around the Demilitarized Zone with air strikes and naval gunfire.
(www.historyplace.com/unitedstates/vietnam/index-1969.html)
1973 Apr 2, CBS radio began on hour news 24 hours a day.
(http://tinyurl.com/5hvvw4)
1974 Apr 2, In the 46th Academy Awards "Sting," Glenda Jackson and Jack Lemmon win. Robert Opel (33) of SF streaked naked across the stage. Opel was shot and killed 5 years later during a robbery in SF.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/46th_Academy_Awards)(SFEC, 3/14/99, DB p.37)
1974 Apr 2, French President Georges Pompidou (62) died in Paris. Alain Pohrer (1909-1996) as president of the Senate then served as interim president for 7 weeks.
(SFC, 12/12/96, p.C8)(AP, 4/2/97)
1975 Apr 2, In Oakland, Ca., a World Airways plane landed with 52 Vietnamese orphans as part of Operation Babylift. The Presidio of San Francisco served as an impromptu crossroads for over 1,500 Vietnamese orphans to be sent to American families for adoption.
(SFC, 4/18/15, p.C1)
1978 Apr 2, TV show "Dallas" premiered on CBS as a 5 week mini-series. It was produced by Leonard Katzman (1927-1996) and ran through May, 1991. [see Mar 2]
(SFC, 9/9/96, p.A26)(MC, 4/2/02)
1979 Apr 2, Israeli PM Menachem Begin visited Cairo, Egypt, and met with Pres. Sadat.
(www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/time70s.html#1979)
1979 Apr 2, Anthrax was found to have leaked from the secret lab of Compound 19 in Sverdlovsk (later renamed Yekaterinburg) in the Ural Mountains. It caused a local epidemic that killed at least 64/66 people. Pres. Yeltsin acknowledged the leak in 1992 and allowed a team of researchers to investigate the site. In 2000 Jeanne Guillemin authored "Anthrax: The Investigation of a Deadly Outbreak." [see Mar 30]
(SFC, 2/19/00, p.A14)(SFEC, 8/13/00, BR p.7)(WSJ, 9/18/01, p.B1)
1981 Apr 2, Heavy battle took place between Christian militia and Syrian army in East Lebanon. Casualties and injuries were in the hundreds.
(www.2la.org/lebanon/ee/terrorlb.htm)
1982 Apr 2, Several thousand troops from Argentina seized the disputed Falkland Islands, located in the south Atlantic, from Britain but Lady Thatcher had Britain take them back the following June. Britain fought with Argentina in the Falkland Islands War, also known as the Falklands War, the Malvinas War and the South Atlantic War. The short, undeclared war between the two nations was fought over claims to the Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas) and neighboring islands. Argentina had laid claims to the territories since the 19th century, but spurred by a related dispute on South Georgia island and political expediency, the military government of Argentina invaded the Falkland Islands. A British naval task force was assembled and headed towards the war zone by late April. British forces established a beachhead on the Falklands in late May. With the surrender of the Argentine garrison at Stanley on June 14, the conflict was essentially over.
(TMC, 1994, p.1982)(WSJ, 12/12/95, p.A-15)(AP, 4/2/99)(HNQ, 1/10/01)
1985 Apr 2, Ronnie Gardner shot and killed Utah attorney Michael Burdell during an escape attempt at the Metropolitan Hall of Justice in Salt Lake City. Gardner was convicted of murder and sentenced to death. In 2010 Gardner (49) chose to die by firing squad, an option which was removed by state lawmakers in 2004, but still available to him.
(SFC, 4/24/10, p.A5)
1986 Apr 2, George Corley Wallace (1919-1998), Governor of Alabama (Dem.), announced his retirement.
(http://tinyurl.com/fuobf)(http://tinyurl.com/eegg3)
1986 Apr 2, Four American passengers were killed when a bomb exploded aboard a TWA jetliner en route from Rome to Athens, Greece.
(AP, 4/2/98)
1987 Apr 2, IBM announced the upcoming release of the PS/2 and OS/2 computers featuring the Microsoft MS OS/2 and Windows 2.0 computer operating systems.
(Wired, 12/98, p.196)(http://pages.prodigy.net/michaln/history/pr/87apr_m3592.html)
1987 Apr 2, Buddy Rich (b.1917), jazz drummer, died.
(www.drummerworld.com/drummers/Buddy_Rich.html)
1988 Apr 2, Secretary of State George P. Shultz briefed Pope John Paul II on his Middle East peace proposals during a private audience at the Vatican.
(AP, 4/2/98)
1989 Apr 2, Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev began a visit to Cuba amid differences with President Fidel Castro over the type of reforms Gorbachev was instituting in the Soviet Union.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1990 Apr 2, The University of Nevada at Las Vegas won the NCAA college basketball championship, defeating Duke 103-73.
(AP, 4/2/00)
1990 Apr 2, Saddam Hussein of Iraq threatened to hit Israel with binary chemical weapons.
(http://tinyurl.com/oz5my)
1990 Apr 2, In a conciliatory gesture, the president of Lithuania invited Kremlin officials to discuss the republic's secession drive.
(AP, 4/2/00)
1991 Apr 2, Iraqi state media reported that only a few more days were needed to stamp out fighting with Kurdish rebels, who reported renewed skirmishes around the strategic oil center of Kirkuk.
(AP, 4/2/01)
1992 Apr 2, John Gotti (d.2002), Mafia boss, was convicted in New York City of 5 murders and racketeering. Underboss Sammy “the Bull" Gravano provided testimony. The murders included the 1985 hit on Paul Castellano, head of the Gambino family. He was sentenced to life in prison on June 23.
(AP, 4/2/98)(USAT, 9/24/98, p.11A)(SFC, 6/11/02, p.A2)(SSFC, 8/11/02, Par p.4)
1992 Apr 2, The space shuttle Atlantis returned from a nine-day mission.
(AP, 4/2/02)
1992 Apr 2, French Premier Edith Cresson, who had served 10 turbulent months as France's first woman prime minister, resigned after election setbacks for the ruling Socialists.
(AP, 4/2/02)
1993 Apr 2, President Clinton presided at a daylong conference in Portland, Ore., on how much logging should be allowed on federal land.
(AP, 4/2/98)
1993 Apr 2, Ellie Nesler (1952-2008) shot and killed Daniel Driver in a Jamestown, Ca., courtroom. Driver had been accused of molesting her son and three other boys. She was sentenced to 10 years in prison. She later admitted to investigators that she had taken “crank" that morning. She was freed in 1997 after serving 3 and 1/2 years in prison. The events were made into a 1999 TV movie. In 2002 she was sentenced to 6 years in prison for selling and possessing illegal drugs. In 2005 her son Willy was convicted of 1st degree murder for the stomping death in 2004 of a man on their property.
(SFC, 11/21/96, p.A22)(SFC, 8/22/97, p.A1)(SFC, 6/23/99, p.B1)(SFC, 6/6/06, p.B8)(SFC, 12/30/08, p.B1)
1993 Apr 2, In Illinois Andy Ascher (22) was killed in Rockford. In 1994 Patrick Pursley was convicted in the murder of Ascher based on ballistic evidence from the crime scene. In 2017 technological advances eroded confidence in the evidence and Pursley faced a new trial.
(SFC, 8/10/17, p.A7)
1993 Apr 2, The Bosnian Serb parliament rejected a peace plan drafted by U.N. and European mediators and already approved by Bosnian Muslims and Croats.
(AP, 4/2/98)
1994 Apr 2, President Clinton warned Americans against "demagogues of division" in his weekly radio address, while calling for greater personal responsibility and cooperation to overcome the nation's problems.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1994 Apr 2, In California Preston Tate was shot and killed by guards during an allegedly staged fight at the Corcoran State Prison.
(SFC, 11/22/96, p.A26)
1994 Apr 2, Consumer reporter Betty Furness died in Hartsdale, N.Y., at age 78.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1995 Apr 2, Baseball owners accepted the players' union offer to play without a contract, ending the longest and costliest strike in the history of professional sports.
(AP, 4/2/98)
1995 Apr 2, The NYC Police Dept and Transit Police merged into one organization.
(www.nyc.gov/html/nypd/html/transportation/tpd.html)
1995 Apr 2, Members of the extremist group Hamas accidentally set off a bomb that tore through their hideout in the Gaza Strip, killing six people.
(AP, 4/2/00)
1996 Apr 2, A federal appeals court rejected New York state laws banning doctor-assisted suicide, saying it would be discriminatory to let people disconnect life support systems while refusing to let others end their lives with medication.
(AP, 4/2/01)
1996 Apr 2, In Colombia architect Juan Carlos Gaviria, brother of former pres. Cesar Gaviria was kidnapped by a group called Dignity for Colombia.
(SFC, 6/13/96, p.C3)
1996 Apr 2, If the Indian Hindu Nationalist Party wins elections, it will move toward testing a nuclear bomb.
(WSJ, 4/2/96, p.A-1)
1996 Apr 2, N. Korea appealed for food. $2 million in aid was lost last month when a ship sank off Taiwan.
(WSJ, 4/2/96, p.A-1)
1996 Apr 2, More than 100 Haitians died when a ferry sank.
(WSJ, 4/3/96, p.A-1)
1997 Apr 2, The White House released documents showing how eager it had been to exploit the money-drawing powers of President Clinton and Vice President Gore during the 1996 campaign while coordinating with the Democratic Party's fund-raising machine.
(AP, 4/2/98)
1997 Apr 2, An Air Force A-10 Thunderbolt jet with four 500- pound bombs was lost over the Colorado Rockies. It was piloted by Capt. Craig Button (32). Wreckage of the plane was found Apr 20 on the sheer face of New York Mountain [Gold Dust Peak], 15 miles from Vail. It was later suspected that he committed suicide due to a possible revelation of homosexuality. A 1998 official report cited unrequited love for a former girlfriend and his mother's Christian pacifist faith.
(SFE, 4/9/97, p.A16)(SFC, 4/21/97, p.A1)(WSJ, 4/21/97, p.A1)(SFC, 5/3/97, p.A3)(SFC, 12/25/98, p.A3)(SFC, 8/26/99, p.A3)
1997 Apr 2, Tomoyuki Tanaka (86), producer (Godzilla), died of a stroke.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1998 Apr 2, California agreed to settle a sexual harassment lawsuit brought by 3 female prison workers for $4.3 million.
(SFC, 4/3/98, p.A26)
1998 Apr 2, In Kansas City it was reported that the SubTropolis underground business complex had some 4.3 million sq. feet of mine space converted to warehouse, office and factory use with 50 enterprises employing 1300 people. The underground industrial park began in 1945 as a limestone mine.
(WSJ, 4/2/98, p.A1)
1998 Apr 2, In Burma ethnic Karen rebels launched attacks against Burmese troops and killed 30 people.
(SFC, 4/4/98, p.A16)
1998 Apr 2, In Columbia Thomas Fiore (43), one of the hostages captured Mar 27, escaped captivity by the FARC rebel group.
(SFC, 4/3/98, p.B5)
1998 Apr 2, A French court found Maurice Papon (1910-2007), a career civil servant, guilty of deporting Jews from Bordeaux in 1942-1943, when he was secretary-general of the Gironde Prefecture. He was sentenced to 10 years in prison, but served only 3 due to ill health.
(SFC, 4/2/98, p.C2)(SFC, 4/3/98, p.B2)(Econ, 2/24/07, p.99)
1998 Apr 2, Iran and Iraq began a war prisoner exchange involving nearly 6000 men, mostly Iraqis.
(WSJ, 4/3/98, p.A1)
1998 Apr 2, In Northern Ireland police intercepted a 980-pound bomb at Dublin’s ferry port.
(SFC, 4/3/98, p.B8)
1998 Apr 2, In Israel three Arab homes were demolished in the Bedouin village of Suweij. Clashes with Israeli police occurred over the next few days as the Arabs attempted to rebuild their homes.
(SFC, 4/6/98, p.A12)
1998 Apr 2, In Latvia the only Jewish synagogue in Riga was bombed.
(SFC, 4/798, p.A14)
1998 Apr 2, Shaking their fists in rage, thousands of mourners marched in a funeral procession in the West Bank for a top Hamas bombmaker, Mohiyedine Sharif, hailed by Palestinians as a martyr and condemned by Israel as a terrorist.
(AP, 4/2/99)
1998 Apr 2, In Romania Radu Vasile, an economist and leader of the national Peasant Party, was named by Pres. Emil Constantinescu as the new prime minister. He soon began reforms with an economic program to restore domestic and foreign confidence.
(SFC, 4/3/98, p.B5)(WSJ, 5/6/98, p.A18)
1998 Apr 2, Sudanese soldiers shot and beat to death 74 student conscripts who tried to flee the Ailafoon military camp. At least 55 others drowned when their boat capsized on the blue Nile while they tried to escape.
(SFC, 4/13/98, p.A12)
1999 Apr 2, The US Labor Department reported that the nation's unemployment rate fell to a 29-year low of 4.2 percent in March 1999.
(AP, 4/2/00)
1999 Apr 2, Sec. of Energy Bill Richardson ordered the computer systems at Los Alamos laboratory to be shut down due to security leaks.
(SFEC, 5/2/99, p.A24)
1999 Apr 2, David L. Smith (30), a New Jersey computer programmer, was arrested and charged with writing and unleashing the Melissa computer virus.
(SFC, 4/3/99, p.A3)
1999 Apr 2, At least 7 people died in a freak snowstorm while trying to cross the Mexican border into California in the Cleveland National Forest.
(SFC, 4/3/99, p.A1)
1999 Apr 2, NATO planners began preliminary discussions about the possibility of sending ground troops into Kosovo.
(SFC, 4/3/99, p.A1)
1999 Apr 2, Allied aircraft resumed bombing in Iraq after a 2 week lull.
(SFC, 4/3/99, p.A4)
1999 Apr 2, In Albania Hashim Thaci, a leading nationalist politician, named a new government with himself in charge. Moderates loyal to Ibrahim Rugova were excluded after no candidates were put forth.
(SFC, 4/3/99, p.A6)
1999 Apr 2, From West Kalimantan, Indonesia, it was reported Malays and indigenous Dayaks had killed over 200 people over the last 2 weeks. Nearly 30,000 Muslim people, originally from Madura, were reported to have fled their villages.
(WSJ, 4/2/99, p.A9)
1999 Apr 2, In Russia Pres. Yeltsin ordered the dismissal of Prosecutor Gen'l. Yuri Skuratov just hours after Skuratov appeared on TV announcing that he had the names of Russian officials who had illegally transferred dirty money into Swiss bank accounts. Skuratov was earlier caught on video cavorting with 2 prostitutes.
(SFC, 4/3/99, p.A3)
1999 Apr 2, At least 55 people were gunned down by Serbian police and militiamen in the Kosovo city of Djakovica.
(SFC, 4/29/99, p.D2)
2000 Apr 2, Connecticut won its second women’s NCAA national championship with a 71-to-52 victory over Tennessee.
(AP, 4/2/01)
2000 Apr 2, More than 600 people set out on a five-day, 120-mile protest march to Columbia, South Carolina, to urge state lawmakers to move the Confederate flag from the Statehouse dome.
(AP, 4/2/01)
2000 Apr 2, It was reported that a Nov. 1999, 79-page CIA report: “International Trafficking in Women to the United States: A Contemporary Manifestation of Slavery," claimed 50,000 victims per year in the US.
(SFEC, 4/2/00, p.A3)
2000 Apr 2, In Japan Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi suffered a stroke and Mikio Aoki took over as Acting Premier. He died more than a month later.
(SFC, 4/3/00, p.A8)(AP, 4/2/01)
2000 Apr 2, In Rwanda Tutsi leader Paul Kagame assumed office as the country’s 4th president.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Kagame)
2000 cApr 2, South Korea said it would slaughter 350,000 hoofed livestock to stem public concerns over an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease.
(WSJ, 4/3/00, p.A21)
2000 Apr 2, In Sri Lanka a rebel attack launched 7 days earlier had left 78 fighters dead. Rebels said 700 government troops had been killed since the attack began with 71 rebels dead. The army admitted to 102 deaths and claimed 210 rebels killed. Thousands of residents were stranded near the Elephant Pass causeway.
(SFC, 4/3/00, p.A9)
2001 Apr 2, Duke won its third national men's basketball championship (NCAA) with an 82-to-72 victory over Arizona for the.
(WSJ, 4/4/01, p.A18)(AP, 4/2/02)
2001 Apr 2, Pres. Bush demanded that the Chinese release the US Navy crew and spy plane that had made an emergency landing on China’s Hainan Island after colliding with a Chinese fighter.
(SFC, 4/3/01, p.A1)(WSJ, 4/3/01, p.A1)(AP, 4/2/02)
2001 Apr 2, Pres. Bush met with Egypt’s Pres. Mubarak and both pledged to continue searching for an end to Middle East violence.
(WSJ, 4/3/01, p.A1)
2001 Apr 2, Vincent Cianci Jr. (59), mayor of Providence, RI, was indicted by a federal grand jury on racketeering charges. Cianci was convicted on a single count of racketeering conspiracy in Jun, 2002, and sentenced to 5 years and 4 months in jail on Sep 6. In 2003 Mike Stanton authored "The Prince of Providence," a biography of Cianci.
(SFC, 4/3/01, p.A2)(SFC, 6/25/02, p.A4)(SFC, 9/7/02, p.A3)(WSJ, 8/5/03, p.D5)
2001 Apr 2, The town of Edgar Springs, Mo., was named the population center of the US. It marked the point where the US would balance if its 281 million population were equally distributed. The actual center was 3 miles east of town.
(SFC, 4/3/01, p.A2)
2001 Apr 2, Scientists reported new evidence for “dark energy" and believed that it was causing the universe to expand faster with time.
(SFC, 4/3/01, p.A1)
2001 Apr 2, An Israeli helicopter rocketed a truck and killed an Islamic Jihad militant. In Bethlehem a sniper killed an Israeli soldier.
(WSJ, 4/3/01, p.A1)
2001 Apr 2, In Japan the new freedom of information law went into effect 2 years after it was approved by Parliament.
(SSFC, 4/15/01, p.D4)
2001 Apr 2, In Nepal a Maoist insurgency killed at least 38 people.
(SFC, 4/3/01, p.A9)
2002 Apr 2, In California a SF jury awarded $33.7 million to a former Navy electrician who acquired mesothelioma from asbestos exposure. Foster Wheeler Corp. was the defendant.
(SFC, 4/3/02, p.A13)
2002 Apr 2, In Illinois federal prosecutors indicted the campaign committee of Gov. George Ryan and 2 former top aids on charges of racketeering, mail fraud and conspiracy to obstruct justice.
(SFC, 4/3/02, p.A3)
2002 Apr 2, Prof. John Pierce (92), communications engineer and author, died in Mountain View, Ca. He authored about 20 books, invented the Pierce Gun, a vacuum tube that transmits electrons, received some 90 patents and provided the transistor its name.
(SFC, 4/9/02, p.A18)
2002 Apr 2, Argentina marked the 20th anniversary of the Falklands War and Pres. Duhalde said the Falkland Islands would be regained through diplomacy.
(SFC, 4/3/02, p.A7)
2002 Apr 2, The Israeli army attacked the headquarters of Jibril Rajoub, security chief of the Palestinian Authority. The Israeli Army said it found a letter in Arafat’s compound that detailed money requests for building bombs. PM Sharon offered Yasser Arafat a one-way ticket to exile and battles with Palestinian militiamen continued and at least 13 Palestinians were killed.
(SFC, 4/2/02, p.A1)(SFC, 4/3/02, p.A1,10)(WSJ, 4/3/02, p.A1)
2002 Apr 2, Israel seized control of Bethlehem; Palestinian gunmen forced their way into the Church of the Nativity, the traditional birthplace of Jesus, where they began a 39-day standoff.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, In the 15th day of Operation Iraqi Freedom American forces crossed the Tigris River in the drive toward the Iraqi capital and destroyed the Baghdad Division of Iraq's Republican Guard. Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, supported the war plan along with Defense Sec. Donald Rumsfeld against criticism. US Marines took Numaniya, a city of 80,000. American forces fought their way to within sight of the Baghdad skyline; Iraqi soldiers discarded their military uniforms by the roadside to hide their identity.
(SFC, 4/2/03, p.A1)(SFC, 4/4/03, p.W1)(AP, 4/2/08)
2003 Apr 2, A US B-52 bomber dropped 2 new CBU-105 bombs on the first 30 vehicles of an Iraqi armored convoy approaching a small American reconnaissance unit. The bombs each released 10 submunitions, each of which ejected 4 disks that used infra-red scanners to locate the vehicles. Soldiers in the remaining 70 vehicles surrendered immediately.
(Econ, 1/30/10, p.88)
2003 Apr 2, A Navy F/A-18C Hornet after his fighter jet went down during a bombing run over Karbala. In 2004 it was reported that the jet was shot down by an Army Patriot missile. 7 US Army soldiers were killed when their Black Hawk helicopter was shot down.
(AP, 4/3/03)(SFC, 4/3/03, p.A1)(SFC, 12/11/04, p.A12)
2003 Apr 2, Polish troops fighting with the US-led coalition in Iraq reported encountering many Iraqi combatants in civilian clothes.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, Saddam Hussein declared that "victory is at hand," and issued a new statement urging Iraqis to fight on and defend their towns according to a broadcast on Iraqi satellite television.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, Mirko Sarovic, a Bosnian Serb who was the chairman of the country's three-member multiethnic presidency, resigned after being implicated in a local company's violation of the UN arms embargo against Iraq.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, Burundi said Ethiopia, Mozambique and South Africa will send 3,500 peacekeepers to enforce a truce ending nearly 10 years of civil war.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, Guatemala City police raided the house of a suspected drug lord and found $14 million in cash.
(SFC, 4/4/03, p.A18)
2003 Apr 2, In Indian-controlled Kashmir the chief of the largest militant group was killed in a shootout with police in the strife-torn Himalayan province.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, Israeli forces raided Gaza and 6 Palestinians were killed.
(SFC, 4/3/03, p.A12)(WSJ, 4/3/03, p.A1)
2003 Apr 2, The Japanese government said a Japanese whaling fleet killed 400 minke whales during a five-month scientific expedition in Antarctic waters.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, In Mexico 9 people were found tortured and killed near the border city of Nuevo Laredo in apparent drug-related violence.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, In the southern Philippine city of Davao a bomb exploded near a bustling wharf, and killed 16 people including two children.
(AP, 4/3/03)(SFC, 4/3/03, p.A11)
2003 Apr 2, The UN health agency advised travelers to avoid going to Hong Kong and the Chinese province of Guangdong because of the deadly outbreak of SARS.
(AP, 4/2/03)
2003 Apr 2, Vietnam's PM Phan Van Khai spoke with Thich Huyen Quang, the leader of a banned Buddhist church, about religious freedoms. Quang has been under house arrest in 1982.
(AP, 4/3/03)
2004 Apr 2, Washington announced plans to fingerprint and photograph millions of travelers to the United States. The measure, which will take effect by Sept. 30, affected citizens in 27 countries who had been allowed to travel within the US without a visa for up to 90 days.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, The US Labor Dept. reported a 308,000 increase in jobs along with a rise in unemployment from 5.6 to 5.7%. The DJIA rose 97 points in response to close at 10,470.
(SFC, 4/3/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 2, The Pentagon said it released 15 people held as terrorism suspects at a U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, reducing the number confined there to 595.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, The 6-month Tyco trial ended with a hung jury. A threatening letter to a lone dissident juror prompted the judge to call a mistrial. A retrial was planned.
(SFC, 4/3/04, p.C1)
2004 Apr 2, Sun Microsystems announced that Microsoft would pay it nearly $2 billion to settle a legal dispute. Sun also announced layoffs of 3,300 and a business partnership with Microsoft.
(SFC, 4/3/04, p.A1)
2004 Apr 2, In Brussels an official ceremony welcomed Bulgaria, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia into the NATO alliance.
(SFC, 4/3/04, p.A11)
2004 Apr 2, In Brazil Jociel Conceicao dos Santos (20), a handyman, recanted a confession and denied he killed an American couple (Nov 30, 2003). He blamed two other Brazilians for the crime.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, Police in France captured the elusive former leader of the Basque ETA rebel group as well as the separatist group's logistics chief.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, Georgian authorities reported that they had detained four men on suspicion of plotting to assassinate the president, and officials accused the autonomous province of Adzharia of being behind the alleged plot.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, In India a crowded bus veered off a mountain road and fell into a ravine in Jammu-Kashmir state, killing 34 passengers and injuring 35 others.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, Two Indian Air Force fighter jets went missing and were believed to have crashed during routine flights over Kashmir.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, PM Ariel Sharon revealed the scope of his withdrawal plan, saying Israel will leave all of the Gaza Strip and dismantle four West Bank settlements.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, Pakistan's 2-week operation in South Waziristan wound down. The military said 63 foreign and local militants had been killed along with at least 46 security forces.
(SFC, 4/2/04, p.A11)
2004 Apr 2, A Spanish railroad inspector found a 26-pound bomb hidden in a bag on a busy high-speed line. Police said the device may contain the same dynamite used in last month's Madrid train bombings.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 2, In Sri Lanka Pres. Kumaratunga's political alliance won the most seats in parliamentary elections, indicating deep popular support for its tough stance toward Tamil Tiger rebels.
(AP, 4/3/04)(WSJ, 4/5/04, p.A1)
2005 Apr 2, In Florida Terri Schiavo's body was cremated as disagreements continued between her husband and her parents, who were unable to have their own independent expert observe her autopsy.
(AP, 4/2/06)
2005 Apr 2, In southern Afghanistan Taliban militants stormed a government building in Deshu district and killed 3 Afghan soldiers in a two-hour gunbattle before fleeing. A Western security source in Kandahar linked the attack to an ongoing counter-narcotics drive in Helmand province and said security was deteriorating there.
(AFP, 4/3/05)(SSFC, 4/3/05, p.A9)
2005 Apr 2, An Australian navy helicopter crashed on the earthquake-devastated Indonesian island of Nias. Media reported that nine people were killed and two were rescued.
(AP, 4/2/05)
2005 Apr 2, Brazilian state police detained 2 police officers in the Mar 31 shooting spree that left 30 dead in Rio’s north side.
(SSFC, 4/3/05, p.A9)
2005 Apr 2, UN troops killed up to 38 militia fighters during a raid by hundreds of peacekeepers backed by helicopter gunships in the Ituri district of eastern Congo.
(Reuters, 4/2/05)
2005 Apr 2, The Czech information minister resigned, becoming the 4th Czech government member to do so this week in fallout over a scandal surrounding PM Stanislav Gross' luxury apartment.
(AP, 4/2/05)
2005 Apr 2, Ecuador's former president Abdala Bucaram returned home after spending eight years in exile in Panama, telling thousands that he plans to lead a "revolution of the poor" modeled after President Hugo Chavez' Venezuela.
(AP, 4/3/05)
2005 Apr 2, In central Iraq a car bomb exploded, killing five people, including 4 police officers on patrol. A gunmen killed an education official in Baghdad. A US Marine was killed in Ramadi. 40-60 insurgents attacked the Abu Ghraib prison but were repelled by US forces.
(AP, 4/2/05)(SSFC, 4/3/05, p.A3)
2005 Apr 2, Pope John Paul II, born in Poland in 1920 as Karol Wojtyla, died in Rome at age 84. He was elevated to Pope in 1978 and was the first non-Italian pope in 455 years. In November Viking published “John Paul the Great: Remembering a Spiritual Father" by Peggy Noonan.
(AP, 4/2/05)(WSJ, 11/22/05, p.D8)
2005 Apr 2, President Robert Mugabe's ruling party won 78 out of 120 contested seats in Zimbabwe's disputed parliamentary elections, giving him enough seats to press ahead with plans to change the constitution to strengthen his grip on power. The Opposition for Democratic Change (MDC) won 35 seats.
(AP, 4/2/05)(SFC, 4/2/05, p.A12)(Reuters, 4/2/05)
2006 Apr 2, Thunderstorms packing tornadoes and hail as big as softballs ripped through eight US states, killing at least 27 people. Tennessee was hit hardest, with tornadoes striking five western counties and killing 23 people, including an infant. Severe thunderstorms, many producing tornadoes, also struck parts of Iowa, Kentucky, Arkansas, Missouri, Ohio, Illinois and Indiana. Strong wind was blamed or at least three deaths in Missouri.
(AP, 4/3/06)
2006 Apr 2, It was reported that Cecilia Fire Thunder, president of the Oglala Sioux Tribe in South Dakota, had joined with 14 co-chairs to form the South Dakota Campaign for Healthy Families. The group planned a referendum in favor of abortion.
(SSFC, 4/2/06, p.A4)
2006 Apr 2, Alcatel SA and Lucent Technologies Inc. said that the French telecom equipment maker would acquire its US rival. The deal valued Lucent at about $13.5 billion (11.1 billion euros) in a stock swap that would form a major new global player. Headquarters would be in Paris and about 8,800 jobs would be cut.
(AP, 4/2/06)(Econ, 4/8/06, p.63)
2006 Apr 2, In Afghanistan suspected Taliban militants shot dead 9 policemen and wounded three others. Insurgents fatally shot a Turkish road engineer and burned his body in Nimroz province.
(AP, 4/2/06)(WSJ, 4/3/06, p.A1)
2006 Apr 2, The World Health Organization (WHO) confirmed that four Egyptians have caught bird flu, including two who died from the virus.
(Reuters, 4/3/06)
2006 Apr 2, In France the contested First Job Contract appeared in the Official Journal, where new laws are recorded.
(WSJ, 4/3/06, p.A8)
2006 Apr 2, Iran announced its second major new missile test within days, saying it has successfully fired a high-speed torpedo called Hoot (whale), capable of destroying huge warships and submarines.
(AP, 4/3/06)(SFC, 4/3/06, p.A3)
2006 Apr 2, Iraqi police reported that at least 3 more bodies were found in several neighborhoods of Baghdad. A Sunni clerical association announced that gunmen had assassinated a Sunni Arab sheik, Abdul-Minaam Awad, in his village of Zobaa 40 miles west of Baghdad. 6 insurgents died while manufacturing a homemade bomb inside a house in Madain, about 15 miles southeast of Baghdad. Drive-by shooters killed a police captain outside his home in Baghdad's Dora neighborhood. 5 Marines were killed and one was injured when the seven-ton US military truck rolled over in a flash food. 4 American troops were killed by hostile fire. Gunmen killed a Shiite man and three of his relatives at their home in southern Baghdad. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw made a surprise trip to Iraq to urge its leaders to form a unified government.
(AP, 4/2/06)(AP, 4/3/06)(AP, 4/2/07)
2006 Apr 2, Mauritanian officials said a boat packed with West Africans trying to reach Europe collided with a fishing vessel, leaving 32 of the migrants missing and believed drowned.
(CP, 4/2/06)
2006 Apr 2, In Pakistan’s neighboring South Waziristan the bullet-riddled body of Maulana Zahir Shah, was found. The cleric was killed by suspected Islamic militants over suspicion he was a spy for the US and Britain. Ten people including five tribal police were killed and 13 injured in separate bomb blasts in the restive southwestern Pakistani province of Baluchistan.
(AP, 4/2/06)(AFP, 4/2/06)
2006 Apr 2, Thailand citizens voted in snap parliamentary elections. Thailand's PM urged citizens to ignore an opposition boycott, saying the vote was crucial to ending the country's deepening political stalemate amid demands for his resignation. Bombs exploded at three polling stations in restive southern Thailand, injuring four soldiers and a police officer.
(AP, 4/2/06)
2006 Apr 2, In southeastern Turkey one protester died after police opened fire to disperse Kurdish demonstrators, raising the death toll in six days of street violence to nine. A group of men stopped a passenger bus and tossed gasoline bombs at it, sending the vehicle careening into pedestrians and killing 3 in Istanbul as pro-Kurdish riots continued to spread. The countrywide death toll from nearly a week of unrest climbed to 15.
(AP, 4/2/06)(AP, 4/3/06)
2007 Apr 2, The US asked Tehran for information on the disappearance of a former FBI agent who went missing on a private business trip to Iran.
(WSJ, 4/3/07, p.A1)
2007 Apr 2, The US Supreme Court ruled that a US government agency, the EPA, has the power under the clean air law to regulate greenhouse gas emissions that spur global warming. In its first case on climate change, the Supreme Court declared in a 5-4 ruling that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases were air pollutants under the Clean Air Act.
(Reuters, 4/2/07)(AP, 4/2/08)(Econ, 2/12/11, p.36)
2007 Apr 2, Florida won its second consecutive college basketball championship, beating Ohio State 84-75; the Gators became the first team to repeat since Duke in 1991-92.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2007 Apr 2, Chicago’s police superintendent, Philip Cline, announced his retirement after 2 videos emerged of off-duty police officers beating civilians.
(Econ, 10/20/07, p.42)(http://tinyurl.com/2tt8en)
2007 Apr 2, Sam Zell, billionaire real estate investor, reached an agreement to buy the Chicago-based Tribune Co. in a 2-stage deal valued at $8.2 billion. The buyout was completed in December and saddled the firm with $8 billion in new debt. In 2008 the Tribune slid into bankruptcy.
(SFC, 4/3/07, p.C1)(Econ, 3/23/13, p.36)
2007 Apr 2, First Data Corp. said it is being acquired by an affiliate of private equity firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. for about $27 billion.
(SFC, 4/3/07, p.C3)
2007 Apr 2, In Afghanistan 3 police died when militants attacked a checkpoint on the road linking the southern town of Kandahar with Spin Boldak on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, A UN conference on climate change opened in Belgium with the EU's top environment official calling on the US to join efforts to curb global warming.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Canada's controversial annual seal hunt opened in the southern Gulf of St. Lawrence, where the worst ice conditions in more than two decades have nearly wiped out the herd there.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, China’s first deadline for income taxes was extended a few days because of low compliance. Anyone earning over 120,000 yuan ($15,500) annually was supposed to file a return. In southwestern China developers tore down a stubborn couple's house after a three-year standoff that hindered a construction project and captivated the nation. The couple reportedly negotiated a deal with the real estate developer that gives them a new apartment and a sizable compensation package.
(Econ, 4/14/07, p.49)(AP, 4/3/07)(Econ, 4/7/07, p.39)
2007 Apr 2, In Iraq a suicide truck bomber targeted a police station in the oil-rich northern city of Kirkuk, killing at least 13 people and wounding dozens, including many children from a nearby school. A parked car exploded in a garage near a governmental property registration agency in western Baghdad, killing three people and wounding 10. A suicide bomber drove his car into a police checkpoint in the southern insurgent stronghold of Dora, killing four people, including two policemen. A roadside bomb killed four civilians and wounded 20 in the Shiite town of Khalis. A roadside bomb struck an Iraqi military convoy, killing one soldier and wounding 7 in the Qazaniyah area northeast of Baghdad. 4 US soldiers were killed in combat.
(AP, 4/2/07)(Reuters, 4/3/07)
2007 Apr 2, Jordan's military court convicted six alleged militants of planning suicide attacks against Jordan's main international airport and against hotels hosting Israeli and American tourists.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Gunmen in Nigeria's southern Bayelsa State kidnapped two Lebanese nationals.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Around 5,000 tribesmen gathered in a Pakistani border area to enlist for ongoing battles against foreign Al-Qaeda militants.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Palestinian journalists began a three-day strike to protest the kidnapping of British Broadcasting Corp. correspondent Alan Johnston, the longest-held reporter ever abducted in the Gaza Strip.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Russia's foreign spy service released previously classified files on a double agent who, under the codename "Britt", passed secrets to Moscow from inside British intelligence in the 1940s.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Saudi Arabia signaled it is unlikely to accept an Israeli invitation to a regional peace conference, saying that Israel must first stop mistreating Palestinians and move to withdraw from Arab lands.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Tsunami waves churned by an undersea earthquake crashed ashore in the Solomon Islands, wiping away entire villages and triggering alerts from Australia to Hawaii. At least 50 people were killed.
(AP, 4/3/07)(AP, 4/2/08)
2007 Apr 2, In Somalia a human rights organization said fierce fighting between Ethiopian-backed government forces and Islamic insurgents has killed 381 people over four days.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, South Korea and the US agreed to a trade pact with only minutes to go before a deadline. Last-minute haggling meant missing two self-imposed deadlines over the weekend. Some estimates say the agreement could add $20 billion to the already more than $70 billion of two-way trade each year.
(Reuters, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, In eastern Sri Lanka at least 16 people, including three children, were killed and 25 wounded when a bomb ripped through a crowded bus. Sri Lankan security forces killed at least 23 Tamil Tiger rebels in fresh fighting in the island's east.
(AP, 4/2/07)(AFP, 4/3/07)
2007 Apr 2, In Sudan 53 people were killed in a gruesome pair of minibus accidents north of Khartoum.
(AP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Thailand's premier hailed ties with Japan as he prepared to sign a free-trade agreement with his country's top investor, easing international isolation of the kingdom since last year's coup. Army-installed PM Surayud Chulanont will sign the deal April 3, which Thailand hopes will boost investment from Japan.
(AFP, 4/2/07)
2007 Apr 2, Ukraine’s president called early elections for May 27 amid a standoff with the pro-Russian premier, who vowed to fight what he called a coup.
(WSJ, 4/3/07, p.A1)
2008 Apr 2, Arkansas Gov. Mike Beebe singed legislation to repeal a botched marriage law, and reinstated 17 as the minimum age to marry for boys and 16 for girls.
(AP, 4/3/08)
2008 Apr 2, In Arkansas 3 men were presumed drowned when scaffolding underneath an Arkansas River bridge collapsed. They were working on a project to install a water main beneath the bridge for the Central Arkansas Water utility.
(AP, 4/3/08)
2008 Apr 2, Argentine farmers, rebelling over soaring export taxes on their crops, declared a 30-day truce suspending a three-week-long strike that has stripped grocery shelves of beef and produce, granting Cristina Fernandez a reprieve in the first major crisis of her presidency.
(AP, 4/3/08)(WSJ, 4/3/08, p.A1)
2008 Apr 2, Australia began pumping carbon dioxide underground to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, using a technology that locks dangerous gases deep in the Earth.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Chad's main rebel group urged former colonial ruler France to stop backing President Idriss Deby Itno and cease flying over rebel positions in the central African nation's restive east.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Diplomats said that China has given the UN nuclear watchdog intelligence linked to Tehran's alleged attempts to make nuclear arms.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Cubans snapped up DVD players, motorbikes and pressure cookers for the first time as Raul Castro's new government loosened controls on consumer goods and invited private farmers to plant tobacco, coffee and other crops on unused state land.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Norberto Collado Abreu, the helmsman of the Granma yacht that carried Fidel Castro from Mexico to Cuba to launch his revolution in 1956, died in Havana.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Newspapers reported that Egypt has ordered the seizure of the March 25 special edition of the German news magazine Der Spiegel after it was deemed to be insulting to Islam and the Prophet Mohammed.
(AFP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, France pledged to send up to 1,000 troops to Afghanistan in a move that will avert a Canadian threat to pull its contingent out of NATO's war in the violent south.
(Reuters, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, In northern Iraq, a suicide bomber attacked an Iraqi checkpoint west of Mosul, killing seven people, including a woman and a 5-year-old child. A US airstrike destroyed a house in the southern city of Basra, killing a militant, the US military said, and Iraqi witnesses and hospital officials said at least three civilians were among the dead. A roadside bomb targeting a US convoy exploded near a restaurant in Baghdad's main Shiite district of Sadr City, killing at least 3 Iraqi civilians and wounding 13. 4 US-allied fighters were killed and 4 others abducted at a fake checkpoint near Duluiyah.
(AP, 4/2/08)(AP, 4/3/08)
2008 Apr 2, Irish PM Bertie Ahern, one of Europe's longest serving leaders, announced that he will resign next month amid growing pressure over alleged financial irregularities.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, In Kazakhstan Zhaksybek Kulekeyev, a former government minister and head of the state railway company, was formally charged with taking a $100,000 bribe.
(Econ, 4/12/08, p.49)
2008 Apr 2, Myanmar democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi's opposition party urged voters to reject a military-backed draft constitution, saying it was undemocratic and drafted under the junta's direct control.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, In New Zealand new government population figures showed that the Asian population is growing faster than any other ethnic group and will outnumber indigenous Maori by 2026.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Russia's foreign minister said that Moscow will not allow newly independent Kosovo to become a member of the UN.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Pyotr Kuznetsov, leader of a Russian doomsday cult, apparently tried to kill himself after most of his followers abandoned a bunker where they had been awaiting the end of the world for five months. The last 9 of 35 cult members emerged on May 16.
(Reuters, 4/4/08)(SFC, 5/17/08, p.A3)
2008 Apr 2, In Sri Lanka government troops captured a strip of land from Tamil Tigers. 2 civilians were shot dead by suspected Tamil Tiger rebels in the Wilpattu wildlife park.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, Thailand's Health Ministry ordered hospitals and medical clinics to temporarily stop performing castrations for non-medical reasons, saying that the procedure performed on transsexuals needs stricter monitoring.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, In Yemen security forces killed one demonstrator and wounded four others in the fourth day of rioting that has engulfed the country's south.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2008 Apr 2, In Zimbabwe the main opposition party claimed outright victory for its leader Morgan Tsvangirai, saying he had won 50.3 percent of the vote compared to 43.8 percent for President Robert Mugabe.
(AP, 4/2/08)
2009 Apr 2, Washington expressed no interest in an offer by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to take in any of the 240 remaining Guantanamo detainees after they are released from the US military prison.
(AP, 4/2/09)
2009 Apr 2, A US federal judge has ruled that some inmates at a US military base in Afghanistan can challenge their detention in US courts, a legal right granted to Guantanamo Bay prisoners.
(AFP, 4/3/09)
2009 Apr 2, US and Mexico officials said they are creating a cross-border group to develop strategies for stopping the illegal flow of guns and drugs between the two countries.
(AP, 4/3/09)
2009 Apr 2, The director of the US Mint unveiled the first US coin with an inscription in Spanish, a quarter honoring Puerto Rico as the "Isla del Encanto" (Island of Enchantment).
(AP, 4/2/09)
2009 Apr 2, The US Environmental Working Group issued a press release drawing attention to a study by scientists at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention which looked for the chemical, perchlorate, in different brands of powdered baby formula. The study was published last month.
(AP, 4/3/09)
2009 Apr 2, A federal grand jury issued a 75-page indictment charging former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich with racketeering, extortion and fraud.
(SFC, 4/3/09, p.A8)
2009 Apr 2, In Connecticut a judge, citing DNA evidence, dropped murder charges against Miguel Roman, who served 20 years of a 60-year sentence after being convicted of the 1988 slaying of Carmen Lopez (17), his pregnant girlfriend. The same DNA tests that exonerated Roman implicated led police in December to charge another man, Pedro Miranda of New Britain. He is accused in the killings of Lopez, 16-year-old Rosa Valentin in 1986 and 13-year-old Mayra Cruz in 1987. Miranda (51) faced the possibility of the death penalty if convicted.
(SFC, 4/3/09, p.A6)
2009 Apr 2, Bud Shank (b.1926), innovative jazz musician, died. He played the 33-second flute solo on the 1965 hit “California Dreamin," by the Mamas and Papas.
(SFC, 4/10/09, p.B5)
2009 Apr 2, G20 countries authorized the IMF to issue $250 billion in new SDRs.
(Econ, 4/11/09, p.70)
2009 Apr 2, Human rights groups and some Afghan lawmakers criticized President Hamid Karzai for signing into law legislation that some believe legalizes the rape of a wife by her husband and prevents women from leaving the house without a man's permission. Article 132 of the law says: "As long as the husband is not traveling, he has the right to have sexual intercourse with his wife every fourth night." Critics said Karzai signed the legislation in the past month only for political gains several months before the country's presidential election. Coalition and Afghan forces killed 12 militants and one civilian in Logar province in a mission that included airstrikes. a member of the NATO-led force was killed in violence in the east. In central Ghazni province, a roadside bomb killed four construction workers, while a battle between militants and police elsewhere in the province killed two militants.
(AP, 4/2/09)(AP, 4/3/09)
2009 Apr 2, Austrian authorities arrested British-born Julius Meinl V (b.1959), head of Meinl Bank, for suspected breach of trust and deception of investors in a potential $4 billion fraud case involving a real estate fund created by the bank. He had spun much of his family’s property portfolio into Meinl European Land (MEL). By 2007 MEL had lost €1.8 billion in an attempt to support its share price. He was released after posting a €100 million bail.
(Econ, 8/1/09, p.60)(WSJ, 4/3/09, p.C1)
2009 Apr 2, A Bangladesh official said the government will strictly enforce a new ban on begging that aims to fully eliminate it within five years.
(AP, 4/2/09)
2009 Apr 2, In London G20 leaders pledged $1.1 trillion in loans and guarantees to struggling countries and agreed to crack down on tax havens and hedge funds, but failed to reach sweeping accord on more stimulus spending to attack the global economic decline.
(AP, 4/2/09)
2009 Apr 2, The annual Canadian harp seal hunt opened. Up to 280,000 baby seals were expected to be slaughtered in Quebec and Newfoundland.
(http://network.bestfriends.org/canada/news/13925.html)(SFC, 4/18/09, p.D12)
2009 Apr 2, Greek public services closed down and transport was disrupted across the country as thousands of workers went on strike to protest government spending cuts.
(AP, 4/2/09)
2009 Apr 2, An Iraqi military spokesman said the government will next week start paying Sunni paramilitary groups in the Baghdad area despite weekend clashes with one of the units. In Baghdad two gunmen firing from a car killed an Iraqi army officer in the Mansour district. One of the gunmen was killed and the other captured. Militants hurled a grenade at an American patrol on Palestine Street in east Baghdad, wounding two civilians. In Mosul a roadside bomb exploded near a small restaurant frequented by police, wounding four of them and a civilian. A US aircraft attacked a group of men believed to be members of a government-allied Sunni paramilitary group as they were planting a roadside bomb at night north of Baghdad, killing one and wounding two. Two gay men were killed Sadr City by relatives who were shamed by their behavior, after a leading cleric repeatedly condemned homosexuality. The killings come weeks after Iraqi police found four bodies near Sadr City with the word pervert written on their chests.
(AP, 4/2/09)(AP, 4/3/09)(AP, 4/4/09)
2009 Apr 2, Malaysia's PM Abdullah Ahmad Badawi (69), in office for 5½ lackluster years, resigned to make way for Deputy PM Najib Razak, who must now fix an economy close to recession, heal the country's deep racial divisions and revive a moribund ruling party.
(AP, 4/2/09)
2009 Apr 2, Mexico's Senate unanimously approved legislation that would allow the government to seize property from suspected drug traffickers and other criminals before they are convicted.
(AP, 4/3/09)
2009 Apr 2, Morocco transferred to Spain Hassan Al Haski, an Islamist convicted in both countries for terrorist acts, apparently to resume serving time behind bars there.
(AFP, 4/3/09)
2009 Apr 2, Pakistani authorities ordered an investigation into a video showing a man flogging a screaming woman in the country's northwest where the government recently agreed to introduce Islamic law to end a rebellion by Taliban militants. President Asif Ali Zardari was yet to sign the bill introducing Islamic law in the Swat Valley. A would-be suicide bomber shot himself dead when mourners confronted him at the funeral of a Pakistani police officer recently killed by militants.
(AP, 4/2/09)(AP, 4/3/09)
2009 Apr 2, A Palestinian militant went on a rampage in the Bat Ayin Jewish settlement in the West Bank, killing an Israeli boy (13) with a pickax and wounding another boy (7) before fleeing the area. On April 14 Israeli authorities detained suspect Moussa Tayet (26).
(AP, 4/2/09)(AP, 4/26/09)
2009 Apr 2, In the southern Philippines Islamic militants released a Filipina Red Cross aid worker, leaving a Swiss and an Italian still held captive.
(AFP, 4/2/09)
2009 Apr 2, In Puerto Rico FBI agents and police arrested at least 35 suspects in an alleged drug trafficking ring blamed for seven murders.
(AP, 4/2/09)
2009 Apr 2, In Sudan new US special envoy Scott Gration told journalists he had come to "look, learn and listen" and hoped for its friendship and cooperation, indicating a shift in tone by Washington under President Barack Obama.
(Reuters, 4/2/09)
2009 Apr 2, Venezuelan authorities arrested retired Gen. Raul Baduel, a former defense minister and a prominent critic of President Hugo Chavez, on corruption charges. The former ally of Pres. Chavez went into opposition 18 months earlier.
(AP, 4/2/09)(Econ, 4/11/09, p.36)
2010 Apr 2, The US economy posted its largest job gain in three years in March, while the unemployment rate remained at 9.7 percent for the third straight month.
(AP, 4/2/10)
2010 Apr 2, A federal grand jury in San Francisco indicted Michael Anthony Nelson (38) of Orlando, Florida, on charges of mail fraud, wire fraud, computer fraud and aggravated identity theft for allegedly hijacking a New York attorney’s good name. In 1999 Nelson had stolen over $700,000 in loans by creating a fake bank and served 5 years in prison.
(SFC, 4/3/10, p.A1)
2010 Apr 2, In Minnesota a fire swept through a 2-story building that housed several apartments and an Irish pub killing 6 people including 3 children in Minneapolis.
(SFC, 4/3/10, p.A5)
2010 Apr 2, In Washington state an explosion at a Tesoro Corp. refinery killed 4 people in Anacortes, about 70 miles north of Seattle.
(SFC, 4/3/10, p.A5)
2010 Apr 2, In northern Afghanistan 3 German soldiers were killed in heavy fighting and five were severely wounded southwest of Kunduz city. German soldiers traveling to the scene of the deadly firefight with Taliban insurgents accidentally killed six Afghan troops.
(AP, 4/2/10)(AP, 4/3/10)
2010 Apr 2, Cambodia bristled at a US decision to cut a small military aid program to protest the December deportation of Muslim asylum seekers to China, saying if they deserved protection the United States could have offered it.
(AP, 4/2/10)
2010 Apr 2, In northeastern Central African Republic troops killed 10 rebels in a clash in the region of Ndele. Teachers there were protesting the murder of a pregnant teacher killed on March 30 by members of the Convention of Patriots for Justice and Peace (CPJP), which was behind the attack on the march. The Association of Residents of Upper Mbomou (Assoredehmbo), grouping people in three eastern CAR districts, said that the number of local people kidnapped by the LRA was more than 400, while the number killed in rebel attacks was more than 200 since February 2008. In an open letter to PM Faustin-Archange Touadera the group recommended the forming of self-defense militias and urged the government to set up an army base.
(AFP, 4/2/10)(AFP, 4/5/10)
2010 Apr 2, In Egypt former UN nuclear watchdog chief Mohamed ElBaradei issued a public call for change in defiance of an emergency law banning gatherings critical of the authorities.
(Reuters, 4/2/10)
2010 Apr 2, Iran's top nuclear envoy called for negotiations without threat of sanctions, following meetings in Beijing in the wake of US reports saying China had dropped its opposition to possible new UN measures against Iran.
(AP, 4/2/10)
2010 Apr 2, In Iraq Ammar al-Hakim, who heads the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, offered support for Ayad Allawi, a secular candidate for prime minister in Iraq, a major blow to the incumbent Nouri al-Maliki. Gunmen trying to pass themselves off as US and Iraqi soldiers raided a Sunni village outside Baghdad and killed at least 24 people in an execution-style attack.
(AP, 4/2/10)(http://tinyurl.com/yb6qm8d)
2010 Apr 2, It was reported that researchers, at Israeli weapons maker Rafael, were putting the final touches on a tank-mounted miniature anti-missile system, Trophy, that detects incoming projectiles and shoots them down before they reach tanks equipped with the system.
(AP, 4/2/10)
2010 Apr 2, In southern Kazakhstan a Russian rocket carrying 2 Russian and one American astronauts blasted off, kicking off a tightly packed schedule at the International Space Station in the coming days.
(AP, 4/2/10)
2010 Apr 2, In Mexico 5 gunmen died in a shootout with soldiers in the northern border city of Reynosa, Tamaulipas state. A shootout between rival gangs at a nightclub in Tampico left seven people dead. At least 15 people were killed throughout Tamaulipas. In the border city of Tijuana police found the bodies of 3 men who had been shot to death in a residential area. 13 inmates escaped when armed men stormed a prison in the northern border city of Reynosa. A shootout in Nuevo Laredo between soldiers and suspected drug cartel gunmen killed two children and wounded five of their relatives who were caught in the crossfire. Two suspected gunmen were also killed.
(AP, 4/2/10)(AP, 4/3/10)(AP, 4/4/10)(AP, 4/6/10)
2010 Apr 2, Pakistan submitted to parliament a sweeping package of landmark constitutional reforms, stripping Pres. Asif Ali Zardari of key powers in a move to bolster parliamentary democracy. Pakistan's attorney general resigned, accusing the government of preventing him from carrying out Supreme Court orders to reopen old graft investigations into Pres. Zardari.
(AFP, 4/2/10)
2010 Apr 2, In northeastern Peru landslides caused by heavy rains hit Porvenir, killing at least 23 people and leaving 25 others missing. At least 54 people were injured.
(AP, 4/2/10)
2010 Apr 2, In the Philippines at least 23 devotees were nailed to crosses in San Fernando city to mark Good Friday.
(SFC, 4/3/10, p.A2)
2010 Apr 2, The Russian Kommersant newspaper reported that Dzhanet Abdurakhmanova (17) of Dagestan, a widow of a slain Islamist rebel, was one of the two female suicide bombers who attacked Moscow's subway on March 31. Her husband, Umalat Magomedov, was described as an Islamist militant leader killed by government forces in December. The paper said the 2nd subway bomber has been has been tentatively identified as Markha Ustarkhanova (20) from Chechnya, the widow of a militant leader killed last October while he was preparing to assassinate Chechen Pres. Ramzan Kadyrov. The 2nd female was later identified as Maryam Sharipova (28), a teacher from Dagestan.
(AP, 4/2/10)(AP, 4/6/10)
2010 Apr 2, Russia’s PM Vladimir Putin made his first visit to Venezuela. Pres. Chavez, ahead of the visit, said Russia has offered to help Venezuela set up its own space industry, including a satellite launch site. Officials planned to sign new agreements for energy projects in Venezuela, as well as industrial, commercial and agriculture projects. Putin also planned to hold talks with Bolivian President Evo Morales.
(AP, 4/2/10)
2010 Apr 2, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon pushed Turkmenistan to improve its human rights record, opening a trip through ex-Soviet Central Asia where complaints of violations are extensive.
(AP, 4/2/10)
2010 Apr 2, In Yemen Elham Assi (13) bled to death hours after she spoke to her mother and just days after she was married to a 23-year-old man, in the deeply poor village of Shueba. She was tied down and forced to have sex by her husband, according to later interviews with the child's mother, police and medical reports. A February 2009 law set the minimum age for marriage at 17, but it was repealed and sent back to parliament's constitutional committee for review after some lawmakers called it un-Islamic. The committee is expected to make a final decision on the legislation this month.
(AP, 4/10/10)
2011 Apr 2, In California the Half Moon Bay City Council voted to shut down its police department and turn its duties over to the San Mateo County Sheriff.
(SSFC, 4/3/11, p.A12)
2011 Apr 2, In New Mexico four Gulfstream employees died in a crash of a test twin-engine business aircraft at the airport in Roswell. In 2012 the National Transportation Safety Board ruled that pressure to speed flight tests for the new $65 million G650 was to blame for the crash.
(SSFC, 4/3/11, p.A9)(SFC, 10/12/12, p.A5)
2011 Apr 2, In Afghanistan at least 10 people were killed and 83 wounded in Kandahar city, on a 2nd day of violent protests over the burning of a Koran by a radical fundamentalist Christian in the US. A suicide attack also hit a NATO military base in the capital Kabul. The attacks were sparked by the actions of Christian preacher Terry Jones who supervised the burning of the Koran in front of about 50 people at a church in Florida on March 20.
(Reuters, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, Azerbaijan police arrested dozens of protesters who rallied for democratic reforms in the authoritarian republic. Human rights activist Vivadi Iskenderov was among those arrested in Baku. In August he was sentenced to three years in prison for interfering in parliamentary elections. He told the court that he is being persecuted for reporting vote rigging in Azerbaijan's 2010 parliamentary election.
(AP, 4/2/11)(AP, 8/27/11)
2011 Apr 2, Brazil’s Veja magazine, in its online edition, reported that at least 20 people affiliated with al Qaeda as well as the Lebanese Shi'ite Muslim group Hezbollah, the Palestinian group Hamas and two other organizations have been hiding out in the South American country.
(Reuters, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, Chinese officials said over 500 of the country’s 1,176 dairies were being shut down in an attempt to clean up the scandal-plagued dairy industry.
(SSFC, 4/3/11, p.A4)
2011 Apr 2, A Danish assault team backed by helicopters freed 16 Pakistanis and 2 Iranians held by suspected Somali pirates.
(SFC, 4/12/11, p.A2)
2011 Apr 2, In Germany several thousand people took part in nation-wide demonstrations demanding an end to nuclear power.
(SSFC, 4/3/11, p.A4)
2011 Apr 2, Indian police charged a former telecom minister with abuse of power and conspiracy in an alleged mobile spectrum fraud that cost the country billions of dollars in lost revenue. A. Raja was also accused of cheating, forgery and criminal misconduct on a charge sheet and annexed documents that ran to 80,000 pages and were carried to New Delhi court in seven steel trunks.
(AFP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, In India separatist rebels in Assam state ambushed paramilitary soldiers on a patrol in the insurgency-wracked northeast and fatally shot three of them.
(AP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, In southern Iraq 2 US soldiers were killed in a rocket attack that struck their unit.
(AP, 4/3/11)
2011 Apr 2, Israeli aircraft killed 3 Palestinian militants who were planning to abduct Israelis over the upcoming Jewish festival of Passover.
(AP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, In Ivory Coast an offensive aiming to unseat strongman Laurent Gbagbo appeared to encounter resistance, as soldiers loyal to the entrenched ruler seized back the state television station and broadcast a call to arms.
(AP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, In Japan highly radioactive water spilled into the ocean from the tsunami-damaged Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear complex as PM Naoto Kan surveyed the damage in a town gutted by the wave.
(AP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, Libyan government forces killed six civilians in the city of Misrata in an unrelenting campaign aimed at driving rebels from the main city they hold in the west. Rebels claimed victory in the battle for Brega as heavy fighting ensued around the oil town. A British delegation arrived in Benghazi, nearly a month after a special forces team was seized in a bungled mission to contact the rebels. 13 rebels died in an air strike near Brega.
(AP, 4/2/11)(AFP, 4/2/11)(AFP, 4/3/11)(AP, 4/7/11)
2011 Apr 2, Malawi officials closed two university campuses indefinitely because of violent protests over what students and professors call threats to academic freedom.
(AP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, Malaysia's government said it would allow Malay-language Bibles to be printed locally, in a major concession to the country's minority Christian community to soothe anger over seized shipments of their holy books.
(AP, 4/3/11)
2011 Apr 2, In Mexico Jose Manuel Garcia Soto, alias "El Safado," or "The Crazy One," was arrested in the northern state of San Luis Potosi for participating in the Feb. 15 killing of Jaime Zapata and wounding of Victor Avila. Both men were agents with US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
(AP, 4/5/11)
2011 Apr 2, In Mexico an explosion and fire hit a factory that distills raw alcohol, killing three people and injuring three others near Orizaba, Veracruz state.
(AP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, In Nicaragua at least four police officers were injured in clashes as some 1000 demonstrators protested President Daniel Ortega's bid to win re-election.
(AP, 4/3/11)
2011 Apr 2, Nigeria postponed parliamentary elections until April 4 after voting materials failed to arrive in many areas, a major blow to hopes of a break with a history of chaotic polls. Attackers stormed three villages In central Nigeria killing at least two people and setting a number of houses ablaze.
(Reuters, 4/2/11)(AFP, 4/3/11)
2011 Apr 2, In Northern Ireland Catholic officer Ronan Kerr (25) was killed by a bomb placed under his car outside his home in Omagh, the scene of Northern Ireland's worst ever terror atrocity. He had completed his training only three weeks ago. A 33-year-old man was later charged with terrorism-related offences related to the mruder. On May 10 police arrested a woman in connection with the car bomb.
(AFP, 4/3/11)(AFP, 5/10/11)
2011 Apr 2, In Oman dozens of protesters staged a sit-in in Muscat to demand probes into alleged state abuses after clashes with security forces in Sohar left at least one person dead and sharply boosted tensions in the strategic Gulf nation.
(AP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, Peruvian officials said a British couple has been arrested at Lima's international airport as they boarded a plane to London with over 11 kg of cocaine and 100 heroin capsules. Roxana Laercia (37) stashed the cocaine (24 pounds) between her clothes and Michael Eguonoghen (28) had swallowed the heroin capsules, the equivalent of 1.5 kg (3.3 pounds).
(AFP, 4/3/11)
2011 Apr 2, South African judge Richard Goldstone said he had been wrong to say Israel had targeted civilians in his 2009 report on Israel’s 2008-2998 offensive in Gaza. He had faced down enormous criticism in Israel at the time over the report which accused both Israel and the Hamas rulers of Gaza of potential war crimes during the 22-day conflict. He said his assessment had also been changed by the fact that whereas Israel had thoroughly investigated the concerns raised by his panel, Hamas had not.
(AFP, 4/3/11)
2011 Apr 2, In Spain tens of thousands of people demonstrated in the troubled Basque region, calling for the government to legalize a new pro-independence party that says it rejects violence by armed separatist group ETA.
(AP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, Swedish wireless equipment maker LM Ericsson said it is suing Chinese rival ZTE Corp. for alleged infringement of several of its patents in handset and network technology.
(AP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, Syrian security forces made dawn arrests as mourners prepared to bury the first of at least nine people killed in anti-government protests on the Muslim day of rest.
(AFP, 4/2/11)
2011 Apr 2, In the UAR Iftikhar Ahmed Khan was shot five times in the head in Ajman, an emirate east of Dubai where he was operating a construction company. Khan, a former mayor of Haripur town in northwestern Pakistan, was held in the 2008 slaying of a provincial official in the region. He was granted bail and left for the UAE.
(AP, 4/4/11)
2011 Apr 2, In Yemen thousands of anti-government protesters hurled stones at anti-riot police backed by tanks in the southern province of Aden.
(AP, 4/2/11)
2012 Apr 2, The United States announced a $10 million bounty on Hafiz Mohammad Saeed, the founder of Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), the Islamist terror group blamed for the 2008 Mumbai attacks. He lived openly in Pakistan. Washington also posted a $2 million reward for Hafiz Abdul Rahman Makki, described as LeT's second-in-command.
(AFP, 4/3/12)
2012 Apr 2, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement said it has arrested 3,168 criminal aliens and fugitives in a six-day nationwide sweep in every state including Puerto Rico and The District of Colombia.
(ABCNews, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation gave a $12-million grant to a project aimed at boosting yam production and doubling the income of west African farmers of the crop. The initial focus is on 200,000 smallholder farm families in Ghana and Nigeria.
(AFP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, US federal agents raided the Oakland, Ca., business and apartment of Richard Lee, the wheelchair-bound founder of Oaksterdam Univ.
(SFC, 4/3/12, p.A1)
2012 Apr 2, In Oakland, California, gunman One Goh (43) opened fire at the Christian Oikos University, a small private school, which serves the Korean community with courses from theology to Asian medicine. 7 people were killed, and 3 more wounded. A manhunt ended hours later with his capture at a shopping center. On Jan 7, 2013, a judge ruled that Goh was incompetent to stand trial because of paranoid schizophrenia. On May 2, 2017, Goh pleaded no contest to all charges in the rampage. Goh died in prison on March 20, 2019.
(AP, 4/2/12)(SFC, 4/3/12, p.A1)(SFC, 1/8/13, p.A1)(SFC, 5/3/17, p.D1)(SFC, 3/28/19, p.C1)
2012 Apr 2, San Francisco police evicted nearly 80 Occupy activists from a building owned by the Catholic Archdiocese of SF.
(SFC, 4/3/12, p.C1)
2012 Apr 2, In Louisville, Kentucky, Mary Montfort (54) pleaded guilty to embezzling over $360,000 from the Little sister of the Poor charity. She faced up to 3 years in prison.
(SFC, 4/3/12, p.A7)
2012 Apr 2, Sculptor and printmaker Elizabeth Catlett (b.1915), a US expatriate renowned for her dignified portrayals of African-American and Mexican women, died in Cuernavaca, Mexico. She was barred from her home country for political activism during the McCarthy era. In 1962 the US State Department banned her from returning to the United States for nearly a decade because of her political affiliations.
(AP, 4/3/12)
2012 Apr 2, America’s Federal Trade commission (FTC) voted 3-1 to let Express Scripts acquire Medco, America’s 2nd-biggest and biggest pharmacy managers.
(Econ, 4/7/12, p.76)
2012 Apr 2, In Afghanistan a motorcycle bomb killed one police officer and wounded two others in Kandahar city. Twin bomb blasts in the city of New Baghlan wounded 23 people, including eight police officers near a market selling computer equipment. Insurgents attacked a checkpoint in the Nahri Sarraj district of Helmand province. Four police officers were killed and two were wounded in the attack. The bodies of two civilians also were found at the checkpoint. Insurgents killed three police officers and abducted 11 in an attack on a checkpoint in Wardoj district of Badakhshan province.
(AP, 4/2/12)(AP, 4/3/12)
2012 Apr 2, Human Rights Watch urged Angolan authorities to end their violent crackdown on anti-government protests, which have mushroomed this year ahead of polls.
(AFP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, China International Mining Group Corporation said it will invest $21.2 million (€15.8 million) to restart the Bindura Nickel Corporation's Trojan mine in Zimbabwe, which closed in 2008 during the country’s political turmoil.
(AFP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, Colombia's main rebel group (FARC) freed what it says were its last 10 military and police captives, a goodwill gesture that President Juan Manuel Santos praised but called insufficient to merit a peace dialogue.
(AP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, Egypt's official MENA news agency reported that the Coptic Orthodox church has decided to boycott an Islamist-dominated panel charged with drafting the future constitution.
(AFP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, Hungarian President Pal Schmitt (69) resigned because of a plagiarism scandal regarding a doctoral dissertation he had written 20 years ago.
(AP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, Iraq said that Qatar hosting fugitive Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi was "unacceptable" and called on Doha to hand him over, a demand he said was unconstitutional after talks with Qatar's emir.
(AFP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, Iraq’s Kurdish region said it has halted oil exports over a payment quarrel with the central government, which reportedly has failed to send any money since May even as the region has been exporting 50,000 barrels per day.
(SFC, 4/3/12, p.A2)
2012 Apr 2, Ireland estimated that about 50% of its 1.6 million homeowners failed to pay a new, flat-rate $133 property tax by the march 31 deadline.
(SFC, 4/3/12, p.A2)
2012 Apr 2, The Israeli military ordered dozens of Jewish settlers to evacuate a three-story building they occupied last week in Hebron, the West Bank's most volatile city, saying they had entered it without receiving approval from defense authorities. Israel's Supreme Court threw out an appeal by a Palestinian family seeking to block construction of Jewish settler homes on a site owned by the family for generations
(AP, 4/2/12)(AFP, 4/3/12)
2012 Apr 2, A Libyan police brigade moved to quell clashes that broke out between two rival towns, brokering a cease-fire and securing the release of hostages. The fighting erupted after fighters from Ragdalein said they took 34 brigade men hostage from the neighboring town of Zwara a day earlier.
(AP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, In Mali the junta was slapped with crippling sanctions from its neighbors demanding a return to constitutional rule. (ECOWAS) slapped Mali with a total embargo and cut off the putschists from the regional central bank, affecting their ability to pay public wages.
(AFP, 4/3/12)
2012 Apr 2, In Nigeria gunmen shot dead a secret police officer at a barber's shop in the northeastern city of Maiduguri.
(AFP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, In Pakistan dozens of Taliban militants coming from Afghanistan attacked border posts in Olai, part of the Mohmand tribal area, killing four paramilitary soldiers. Soldiers reportedly retaliated, killing 15 militants.
(AP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, A Pakistani court convicted Osama bin Laden's three widows and two of his daughters of illegally entering and living in the country and sentenced them to 45 days in prison, with credit for time served.
(AP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, A Russian passenger plane, an ATR-72 turboprop operated by UTair, crashed into a snowy field in Siberia shortly after takeoff from Tyumen, killing 31 of the 43 people on board. The 12 survivors were hospitalized in serious condition.
(AP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, Senegal's new President Macky Sall was sworn in as leader of the west African nation.
(AFP, 4/3/12)
2012 Apr 2, The Swazi home affairs minister said King Mswati III, Africa's last absolute monarch, has ordered his impoverished subjects to give him cows for his birthday celebrations on April 19. Mswati was rated by Forbes magazine as among the world's 15 richest monarchs, with a personal fortune of more than $100 million. He has 13 wives, each with their own palace.
(AFP, 4/2/12)
2012 Apr 2, Syria pressed its deadly bid to crush dissent, reportedly targeting rebels near Turkey as it brushed off an Istanbul meeting of the "Friends of Syria" as a failure. Violence across the country killed at least 18 people. Gunmen in Aleppo attacked the home of the head of military institutions late today and killed two guards.
(AFP, 4/2/12)(AP, 4/3/12)
2012 Apr 2, In Turkey Neslisah Osmanoglu (b.1921), an Ottoman princess who married an Egyptian prince (1940), died. She was twice forced into exile when both royal households were abolished.
(AFP, 4/3/12)
2012 Apr 2, UN-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan said Syrian President Bashar al-Assad had accepted an April 10 deadline to start implementing a peace plan, as more than 30 people died in new clashes.
(AFP, 4/2/12)
2013 Apr 2, Pres. Obama unveiled the so-called Brain Initiative, a plan to map the human brain and study how it is wired up at all levels.
(SFC, 4/3/13, p.A1)
2013 Apr 2, In Arizona the Bisbee City Council approved an ordinance recognizing civil unions for same-sex couples. State Attorney General Tom Horne said the next day that he would go to court to block the artist’s community’s ordinance.
(SFC, 4/4/13, p.A6)
2013 Apr 2, In Oakland, Ca., Quinn Boyer (34), a Santa Clara County paramedic, was shot as teenagers attempted to hijack his car. He died of his wounds two days later. On April 18 Christian Burton (16) was charged as an adult with special circumstances murder. 5 other teenagers (13-15) were charged as juveniles.
(SFC, 4/19/13, p.D5)
2013 Apr 2, Six New York politicians were arrested for their alleged role in a bribery scandal in which Democratic state Senator Malcolm Smith paid 5 top Republicans for permission to run on their ticket in NYC’s city's upcoming mayoral race.
(Reuters, 4/2/13)
2013 Apr 2, In Texas inmates Brian Allen Tucker and John Martin King, both with long criminal histories, escaped a jail in Sulphur Springs.
(SFC, 4/3/13, p.A4)
2013 Apr 2, In Utah survivalist Troy James Knapp (45) was arrested after eluded authorities for 6 years. He had moved from cabin to cabin across the Utah mountains, taking food and weapons and leaving notes to brag about it.
(AP, 4/3/13)
2013 Apr 2, Virginia state police arrested Charles R. Smith III, a former volunteer firefighter, and his girlfriend for all but a handful of the 77 arsons set on Virginia's Eastern Shore over the past five months.
(AP, 4/2/13)
2013 Apr 2, Cyprus finance minister Michalis Sarris resigned after only 5 weeks on the job. He had agreed in negotiations with the EU to impose a “haircut" on samll savers with less than €100,000 in their accounts.
(Econ, 4/16/13, p.61)
2013 Apr 2, In India the film actors of Tamil Nadu held an anti-Sri Lanka hunger strike. Most of the state’s 72 million people are ethnic Tamils.
(Econ, 4/6/13, p.51)
2013 Apr 2, Israeli prison guards fired tear gas to quell disturbances in cell blocks after Palestinian prisoners protested following the news of a fellow inmate's death of cancer. Maysara Abu Hamdiyeh (64), who died earlier today, was serving a life sentence for his role in a foiled attempt to bomb a busy cafe in Jerusalem in 2002.
(AP, 4/2/13)
2013 Apr 2, Staff members at Libya's state TV news channel suspended work indefinitely after an employee was allegedly assaulted by a member of a militia guarding their building.
{Libya, Journalism}
(AP, 4/2/13)
2013 Apr 2, In Mexico taco vendor Carlos Sanchez (36) was shot and wounded after he resisted a kidnapping in Teloloapan, Guerrero state. He and his wife and sister and cousin, Armando de la Cruz, were then kidnapped by state police as they drove to Iguala for medical assistance. Carlos and Armando were later killed at the hands of the police.
{Mexico}
(SFC, 11/28/15, p.A12)
2013 Apr 2, In Myanmar a pre-dawn fire swept a religious dormitory, killing 13 children in eastern Yangon.
(AP, 4/2/13)
2013 Apr 2, North Korea said it will restart its long-shuttered plutonium reactor and increase production of nuclear weapons material. Outsiders saw this as North Korea’s latest attempt to extract US concessions.
(AP, 4/2/13)
2013 Apr 2, In northwestern Pakistan several dozen militants armed with assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenades attacked a power grid station, killing 7 people and taking 4 hostage on the outskirts of Peshawar. Attackers threw a grenade at a vehicle carrying paramilitary security officers in Karachi, killing three of them and wounding three others.
(AP, 4/2/13)(AP, 4/3/13)
2013 Apr 2, Philippine authorities arrested 16 Taiwanese, 15 males and a female, in connection with an online scam that mostly targeted retirees living in China and Taiwan.
(AP, 4/3/13)
2013 Apr 2, South Africa said most of its 200 troops in the Central African Republic have been withdrawn from the country where 13 died as rebels ousted the president.
(AP, 4/2/13)
2013 Apr 2, Syrian activists reported heavy government shelling and air raids in Damascus and its suburbs. They also reported heavy shelling of rebel-held areas in the central city of Homs and the northern city of Aleppo.
(AP, 4/2/13)
2013 Apr 2, A Tibetan spokesman said Jigme Gyatso, a noted political prisoner, was released by Chinese authorities after 17 years in prison on charges of endangering national security and separatism.
(SFC, 4/3/13, p.A2)
2013 Apr 2, The 193-nation UN General Assembly overwhelmingly approved the first treaty on the global arms trade, which seeks to regulate the $70 billion business in conventional arms and keep weapons out of the hands of human rights abusers. The Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) will come into legal force 90 days after the 50th country has ratified it.
(Reuters, 4/2/13)(Econ, 4/6/13, p.69)
2014 Apr 2, A federal appeals court granted a temporary stay on Arizona’s new restrictions on the use of abortion drugs, which had gone into effect a day earlier.
(SFC, 4/3/14, p.A8)
2014 Apr 2, In Detroit, Michigan, Steve Utash (54) was punched and kicked by several people as he stopped to check on a boy (10) who was struck when he stepped in front of Utash’s pickup truck. On Apr 12 a boy (16) was charged with assault and ethnic intimidation in the beating of Utash, who remained in critical condition. On June 16, 2014, Bruce Wimbush (18) acknowledged that he punched Utash during the attack and agreed to testify against others. On June 19 three others pleaded guilty to the assault on Utash. On July 7, 2014, Wonzey Saffold (30) was sentenced to up to ten years in prison for his role in the attack.
(SSFC, 4/13/14, p.A8)(SFC, 6/17/14, p.A7)(SFC, 6/20/14, p.A6)(SFC, 7/8/14, p.A5)
2014 Apr 2, In Texas soldier Ivan Lopez gunned down 3 people before killing himself at the Fort Hood Army base. He was under psychiatric care but had showed no signs of violence or suicidal tendencies.
(AP, 4/3/14)
2014 Apr 2, Washington DC Councilwoman Muriel Bowser defeated Mayor Vincent Gray in a mayoral primary leaving Gray to serve nine months as a lame duck. Weeks earlier federal prosecutors said Gray knew of an illegal $668,000 slush fund that helped him defeat incumbent Adrian Fenty in 2010.
(SFC, 4/3/14, p.A11)
2014 Apr 2, In Washington state the official death toll from the March 22 mudslide, based on the number of victims' remains sent to the coroner's office, rose to 29, up from 28 a day earlier.
(Reuters, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, In Afghanistan a suicide bomber wearing a military uniform killed 6 police officers inside the heavily fortified Interior Ministry compound in Kabul. Candidate Hussain Nazari and 8 members of his entourage were killed overnight by their abductors in Sar-i-Pul province.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Britain summoned the Spanish ambassador to condemn what it called a provocative incursion by Spanish boats into Gibraltar's territorial waters a day earlier.
(Reuters, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, British authorities warned people with heart or lung conditions to avoid exertion as a combination of European emissions and Sahara dust created a "perfect storm" of pollution that blanketed the country in smog.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, In Chile a 7.6-magnitude aftershock struck just before midnight. No new major damage or casualties were reported.
(AP, 4/3/14)
2014 Apr 2, In southern China local authorities said torrential rains have left 14 people dead. Rains have battered Guangdong and Hong Kong since March 29, grounding some flights in Guangzhou and Shenzhen.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, In Croatia Marina Lovric Merzel, prefect of Sisak county for the ruling Social Democrat party, was arrested on corruption charges.
(Reuters, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, In Egypt a series of explosions outside Cairo University killed two people, including a police brigadier-general.
(Reuters, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, The EU and the US sought ways to reduce the political clout Russia gets from its vast energy reserves by promising to wean Ukraine and the rest of the continent off those supplies.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, The European Union's antitrust authority said it is imposing a 302 million-euro ($416 million) fine against 11 producers of high voltage power cables for operating a cartel. Six European companies, three Japanese and two South Korean producers reportedly colluded to allocate customers between themselves from 1999 for about 10 years on an almost worldwide scale.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, A study by Europe’s Red List of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) said almost a quarter of Europe's bumblebees are at risk of extinction due to loss of habitats and climate change, threatening pollination of crops worth billions of dollars.
(Reuters, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Germany's antitrust authority said it has fined a group of brewers 231.2 million euros ($319 million) for allegedly fixing the price of beer, the second round of punishments it has made in the case.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel's Cabinet approved a national minimum wage, guaranteeing workers at least 8.50 euros per hour ($11.75) starting next year.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Lufthansa canceled almost 900 domestic and intercontinental flights after the pilots' union started a three-day strike in a wage dispute with Germany's largest airline.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, In Iraq a series of bombings killed 8 people, including army recruits, as the country prepared for April 30 parliamentary elections.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Italian police arrested 24 alleged separatists for terrorism after thwarting a plan to take over St Mark's Square in Venice armed with guns and a rudimentary "tank" made from a digger.
(AFP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Kazakhstan PM Seri Akhmetov (55) unexpectedly announced his resignation and was swiftly replaced by Karim Masimov (49), his influential predecessor. Masimov had stepped down as prime minister in 2012 after occupying the position for five years, during which he shepherded the country's economy through the global financial crisis.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Lebanese troops moved into a restive Sunni area in the northern city of Tripoli, in the second stage of a plan aimed at quelling deadly Syria-linked violence there.
(AFP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, In Libya employees at state-owned Jumhuriya, one of Libya's biggest banks, began a two-day strike demanding greater protection after a colleague was shot dead at work a day earlier.
(Reuters, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Palestinian foreign minister Riyad al-Malki said he has delivered requests for membership of several UN agencies, as part of a move that shook a fragile Middle East peace process.
(AFP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Suspected Filipino Abu Sayyaf insurgents seized Gao Huayuan (29) a Chinese tourist, and Marcy Dayawan (40), a hotel receptionist, from the Singamata Reef Resort in eastern Malaysia and then fled in a speed boat. The kidnappers soon demanded a ransom of 500 million pesos ($11.3 million). On May 30 Malaysia’s PM Najib Razak said both victims have been freed.
(AP, 4/3/14)(AFP, 4/5/14)(AP, 4/10/14)(AP, 5/30/14)
2014 Apr 2, Qatar's emir held talks in Sudan at a time of strained ties with his country's Gulf neighbors over its perceived support for the Egypt-based Muslim Brotherhood. After the emir's departure, Sudan's Finance Minister Badraldin Mahmoud Abbas told reporters that Qatar will provide Sudan with $1 billion to help boost its reserves of hard currency.
(AFP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, A Russian soldier shot dead Ukrainian naval officer Stanislav Karachevsky in eastern Crimea, the second Ukrainian death reported since Russia took control of the Black Sea peninsula.
(Reuters, 4/7/14)
2014 Apr 2, A Saudi Arabian court sentenced Faris al-Zahrani, a top al-Qaeda strategist, to death and jailed 15 others for their role in a series of attacks in the kingdom last decade. Zahrani was arrested in Abha, a city near the Yemeni border, in August 2004.
(Reuters, 4/3/14)
2014 Apr 2, The Swiss government said it has decided not to adopt European Union sanctions against 33 people in connection with Russia's annexation of Crimea, but will prevent them from using Switzerland to get around the visa bans and asset freezes.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, In Syria Brahim Benchakroun, a former Guantanamo detainee, was reportedly killed while fighting government forces in Latakia province. He was better known in Syria as Abu Ahmad al-Maghribi.
(AP, 4/3/14)
2014 Apr 2, In Thailand workers at a scrap shop in Bangkok accidentally detonated a large bomb believed to have been dropped during World War II, killing at least 7 people and injuring 19 others.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Ukraine took the first step toward granting more powers to the regions in line with Western wishes but stopped well short of creating the federation sought by Russia.
(AFP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, Ukraine's ousted president, Viktor Yanukovych, said that he was "wrong" to invite Russian troops into Crimea, and vowed to try to persuade Russia to return the Black Sea peninsula.
(AP, 4/2/14)
2014 Apr 2, In Yemen al-Qaeda attacked an army headquarters in a heavily patrolled district of Aden, leaving 11 people dead, including three attackers, despite recent government measures to improve security.
(AFP, 4/2/14)
2015 Apr 2, A US jury ordered automaker Chrysler to pay $150 million to the family of a four-year-old boy who was killed when their Jeep exploded into flames. Remington Walden was killed in March 2012 in the US state of Georgia when a car rear-ended the 1999 Jeep Grand Cherokee he was in, causing the fuel tank behind the car's rear axle to leak and set the car on fire.
(AP, 4/3/15)
2015 Apr 2, In Alabama Jefferson County Circuit Court Judge Laura Petro dismissed all charges against Anthony Ray Hinton after he spent close to three decades in jail over the 1985 murder of two men in two separate restaurant hold-ups.
(AFP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, The US states of Arkansas and Indiana passed amended versions of religious freedom laws following a nationwide outcry that the original legislation effectively legalized discrimination against homosexuals.
(AFP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, Rev. Robert Schuller (88), southern California televangelist, died in Artesia. His “Hour of Power," inaugurated in 1970, became the nation’s most watched weekly religious program in the 1980s. His Crystal Cathedral in Garden Grove opened in 1980.
(SFC, 4/3/15, p.A12)
2015 Apr 2, In Florida three Ku Klux Klan members, who worked in a state prison, were arrested on conspiracy to commit murder. They had allegedly plotted to kill a black inmate after his release in retaliation for a fight.
(SFC, 4/3/15, p.A7)
2015 Apr 2, In Hawaii police arrested 20 protesters as some 300 gathered at Mauna Kea to protest the construction of a new telescope. Eleven more arrested at the top of the peak.
(SFC, 4/4/15, p.A4)
2015 Apr 2, In NYC Noelle Velentzas and Asia Siddiqui were arrested on charges they plotted to wage violent jihad by building a homemade bomb and using it for a Boston Marathon-type attack.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, In Oklahoma Eric Courtney Harris, a black man, died after being shot by Robert Charles Bates (73), a white deputy, after selling drugs to an undercover officer in Tulsa County. The reserve deputy in an apparent error used a gun instead of an intended Taser.
(SFC, 4/13/15, p.A5)
2015 Apr 2, Delphi Corp. announced that an autonomous car, equipped by the company, had completed a 3,400 mile coast-to-coast US road trip with 99% of the trip driven without human assistance.
(SFC, 4/3/15, p.C3)
2015 Apr 2, In eastern Afghanistan a suicide bomber attacked an anti-corruption demonstration, killing 17 people and wounding up to 60 in Khost. In Helmand province the police chief of a restive district was killed by a roadside bomb.
(AP, 4/2/15)(Reuters, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, Albania’s The parliament voted overwhelmingly to lift immunity for Mark Frroku following an international arrest warrant issued for him by Belgian prosecutors relating to the 1999 murder of Aleksander Kurti in Brussels.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, In Brazil 5 people were killed when their helicopter crashed into a house on the outskirts of Sao Paulo. The dead included Thomaz Rodrigues Alckmin (31), the son of Sao Paulo state Gov. Geraldo Alckmin.
(AP, 4/3/15)
2015 Apr 2, Canadian authorities said seven members of an Asia-based organized crime syndicate have been arrested for exploiting more than 500 women mostly from China and Korea in a prostitution ring that spanned the country.
(AP, 4/3/15)
2015 Apr 2, In China Guangdong police arrested 22 people after demonstrators forced their way into a high-speed rail station in a protest about land and housing issues.
(Reuters, 4/4/15)
2015 Apr 2, The Cyprus parliament legislated to criminalize the denial of the massacre of an estimated 1.5 million Armenians by Ottoman Turks a century ago.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, Dubai-based port operator DP World said it has reached a deal to acquire the Fairview container terminal in Canada from Deutsche Bank for 580 million Canadian dollars, or about $457 million.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, Jihadists in Egypt's Sinai killed 15 soldiers and 3 civilians in attacks on five checkpoints. Military sources said 15 militants also died in an exchange of fire but the toll could not be verified by medics. The Islamic State's branch in Egypt soon claimed responsibility.
(AFP, 4/2/15)(AP, 4/3/15)
2015 Apr 2, In France two men, who worked as cleaners for a pair of elderly sisters, were detained for stealing hundreds of thousands of euros the women kept in cash in their home near Lyon. A two-year police investigation had begun shortly after the bodies of the sisters were discovered in their home in the suburb of Bron in April 2013.
(AFP, 4/5/15)
2015 Apr 2, In Greece supporters of 21 hunger strikers in prisons said they have refused to give up their month-long protest against anti-terrorism laws, despite concessions promised by the country's new left-wing government.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, A judge in Guyana temporarily blocked the South American country from accessing a $32 million loan from the Inter-American Development Bank because there is no Parliament.
(AP, 4/3/15)
2015 Apr 2, In northeastern India armed insurgents ambushed an army convoy in Arunachal Pradesh state, killing 3 soldiers and wounding four others. Suspected Kashmiri rebels killed two Indian security personnel and wounded two soldiers and a civilian in a fierce gun battle in the northern Himalayan territory.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, An Indonesian court sentenced Canadian teacher Neil Bantleman (45) to 10 years in jail on charges of sexually abusing three young children at a prestigious international school in Jakarta. The principal and a number of other teachers have said they believe Bantleman is innocent. Ferdinant Tjiong, an Indonesian teaching assistant, was also sentenced to 10 years and both men planned to appeal.
(AP, 4/2/15)(AP, 4/3/15)
2015 Apr 2, In southern Iran gunmen killed 3 police officers in Hamidiyeh near the Iraqi border.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, In Kenya 148 people, including 6 police and soldiers, were killed when Islamist militant group al Shabaab stormed the Garissa University College campus, taking Christians hostage and engaging security forces in an extended shootout. All four of the gunmen wore suicide vests packed with explosives, detonating themselves in huge blasts as the dramatic assault finally ended after some 16 hours. It was later reported that all four gunmen were themselves Kenyan. On June 4 four men from Kenya and one from Tanzania were charged in court in connection with the attack.
(AFP, 4/3/15)(AFP, 4/4/15)(AFP, 4/16/15)(Econ., 4/11/15, p.46)(Reuters, 6/4/15)
2015 Apr 2, It was reported that somebody was systematically poisoning the dogs of Hermosillo, an industrial city in northern Mexico, and not just strays: At least 64 dogs, all with owners, have died of a similar poison since mid-March.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, In northeastern Nigeria an explosion near the Bauchi motor park, a bus station in Gombe, left 10 people dead.
(AP, 4/3/15)
2015 Apr 2, A Pakistani military courts’ statement said six Islamic militants have been sentenced to death on charges including terrorism, murder, suicide bombing and kidnapping for ransom. It said a seventh suspect was sentenced to life imprisonment.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, Super typhoon Maysak, blamed for the deaths of at least 4 people on islands in the western Pacific Ocean, weakened after reaching Philippine waters and was expected to further lose strength as it approaches the country's northeastern coast.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, In the southern Philippines a passenger boat overloaded with 55 people and heavy cargo capsized, leaving at least 5 dead and one missing.
(AP, 4/3/15)
2015 Apr 2, In Portugal a rail strike began. The Federation of Transport and Communications Unions says rail company Comboios de Portugal is not paying the full amount due to workers for vacation pay and for working on public holidays.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, In Portugal Manoel de Oliveira (b.1908), celebrated movie director, died. His work included over 30 feature films and dozens of short films and documentaries.
(SFC, 4/3/15, p.A2)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manoel_de_Oliveira)
2015 Apr 2, The Russian fishing trawler Dalny Vostok sank in minutes in the icy waters off Russia's Far East coast, killing at least 56 of the 132 people. At least 13 others were missing. Investigators later said greed and corruption were to blame for the sinking.
(AP, 4/2/15)(Reuters, 4/8/15)
2015 Apr 2, Sierra Leone police raided a funeral and arrested 13 people suspected of organizing an unsafe burial, risking the spread of Ebola.
(AFP, 4/7/15)
2015 Apr 2, In Switzerland negotiators reached a framework for a nuclear accord with Iran and US President Barack Obama hailed an "historic understanding", but senior global diplomats cautioned that hard work lies ahead to strike a final deal.
(Reuters, 4/3/15)
2015 Apr 2, Syrian rebels and fighters from the al-Qaida-affiliated Nusra Front captured the Nasib crossing, the only functioning border crossing with Jordan, as well as three nearby military posts. Palestinian fighters and Syrian rebels retook control of large parts of a refugee camp in Damascus that had been seized by IS jihadists.
(AP, 4/2/15)(AFP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, Tunisia's foreign minister said that diplomatic relations with Syria will be restored at a consular level, following a long hiatus that began during the Arab Spring.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, Turkish police launched early morning raids against suspected members of an ultra-leftist group in Istanbul. At least 10 people were arrested in the raids in the Okmeydani district of Istanbul.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, A major sandstorm whipped through the Mideast's commercial hub of Dubai and other Gulf cities, reducing visibility, diverting flights and making breathing outside a challenge.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, In Vietnam workers at a major footwear factory for Nike and Adidas ended a weeklong strike after the government agreed to their demands on retirement payouts.
(AP, 4/2/15)
2015 Apr 2, Yemen's Houthi fighters and their allies seized a central Aden district striking a heavy blow against the Saudi-led coalition which has waged a week of air strikes to try to stem advances by the Iran-allied Shi'ite group. AQAP fighters stormed the central prison in Mukalla and freed 150 prisoners, some of them al Qaeda detainees. AQAP was led by Nasser al-Wuhayshi.
(Reuters, 4/2/15)(Econ., 4/25/15, p.46)
2016 Apr 2, Latin Jazz saxophonist Leandro "Gato" Barbieri (83) died in NYC. He composed the Grammy-winning music for the steamy Marlon Brando film "Last Tango in Paris" and recorded dozens of albums over a career spanning more than seven decades.
(AP, 4/3/16)
2016 Apr 2, Heavy fighting erupted between Armenian and Azerbaijani forces over the separatist region of Nagorno-Karabakh. Azerbaijan said 12 of its soldiers were killed and claimed to have inflicted heavy casualties on the Armenian forces.
(AP, 4/2/16)
2016 Apr 2, A Belgian national named only as Y.A. (33) was charged with participating in the activities of a terrorist group in connection with a joint Belgian-French investigation into an apparently foiled attack plot. Two others have been named as Rabah N. and Abderrahmane A.
(Reuters, 4/2/16)
2016 Apr 2, Central African Republic President Faustin Archange Touadera announced late today that campaign manager Simplice Sarandji (61) was the new prime minister.
(AP, 4/3/16)
2016 Apr 2, In Colombia tens of thousands of people protested in more than 20 cities across the country against President Juan Manuel Santos and his government's peace process with the FARC guerrillas.
(AFP, 4/2/16)
2016 Apr 2, In western India around 25 female activists were prevented from entering the Shani Shingnapur temple in Maharashtra state, traditionally open only to men, a day after a Mumbai court ruled that women have a fundamental right to enter and pray inside temples.
(AP, 4/2/16)
2016 Apr 2, In Indonesia a teenage girl was raped and murdered by 14 men. This went largely unnoticed at a national level until social media users began highlighting its brutality. The rape and murder reignited calls for Parliament to pass the Elimination of Sexual Violence Act.
(AP, 5/3/16)
2016 Apr 2, Iraq's PM Haider al-Abadi ordered an investigation into corruption allegations against senior oil officials following an expose into bribe-taking published in international media outlets.
(AP, 4/2/16)
2016 Apr 2, Libya's National Oil Corporation said it was working with the U.N.-backed unity government, which arrived in Tripoli this week, to coordinate future oil sales.
(Reuters, 4/2/16)
2016 Apr 2, In Spain 7 people died in a pre-dawn crash between two cars near the northern city of Figueres. 5 people of a car with French license plates were between 19 and 22 and not wearing seatbelts.
(AP, 4/2/16)
2016 Apr 2, Syria's partial cease-fire was unravelling, as fierce fighting between government forces and opposition fighters, including members of the al-Qaida affiliated Nusra Front, erupted outside the country's second largest city of Aleppo. At least 25 pro-government fighters died in clashes south of Aleppo, where the Nusra Front and rebel militias captured a hill overlooking a major highway.
(AP, 4/2/16)
2017 Apr 2, The Federal Emergency management Agency (FEMA) said disaster relief will be made available for 42 California counties to help repair hundreds of millions of dollars in damage incurred by February’s flooding, storms and mudslides.
(SFC, 4/3/17, p.C3)
2017 Apr 2, It was reported that an investigation by the NY Times found five women who have received payouts from either Bill O’Reilly or Fox News that totaled about $13 million.
(SSFC, 4/2/17, p.A5)
2017 Apr 2, In Louisiana a tornado demolished a mobile home killing a woman and her daughter (3) in Breaux Bridge.
(SFC, 4/3/17, p.A4)
2017 Apr 2, In Afghanistan at least four provincial intelligence service agents were killed in an attack by Taliban insurgents in eastern Ghazni province.
(AP, 4/3/17)
2017 Apr 2, Armenia held legislative polls for the first time since the 2015 adoption of constitutional reforms. Opposition parties denounced electoral violations. The pro-Russian ruling Republican Party beat the main opposition coalition, led by wealthy politician Gagik Tsarukyan, by 49.15 percent to 27.37 percent. On April 3 European observers said there was "credible information" that the parliamentary elections were marred by "vote-buying" and pressure on voters.
(AFP, 4/2/17)(AP, 4/3/17)
2017 Apr 2, Ecuador held presidential elections. Business-friendly former bank boss Guillermo Lasso (b.1955) faced leftist government candidate Lenin Moreno (b.1953). Lenin Moreno won the presidential election 51% to 49%, but his conservative challenger demanded a recount as supporters took to the streets in protest.
(Reuters, 4/2/17)(Reuters, 4/3/17)(Econ 5/20/17, p.30)
2017 Apr 2, An Egyptian court ruled that a judicial decision to block the transfer of two Red Sea islands to Saudi Arabia is void, potentially reviving a deal that triggered protests. The decision by the Court of Urgent Matters was subject to appeal and any final deal must be approved by parliament.
(Reuters, 4/2/17)
2017 Apr 2, In Germany a Ghanaian man (31) reportedly raped a camper at knife-point in front of her boyfriend days after being denied asylum, while the couple was camping near Bonn. He was arrested five days later after DNA evidence linked him to the crime.
(AP, 9/25/17)
2017 Apr 2, Indian PM Narendra Modi inaugurated an 11-km (7-mile) tunnel through the Himalayan terrain to help ease travel on a highway linking the troubled Kashmir Valley with the rest of India. Separatist leaders fighting for the region's independence from India or its merger with neighboring Pakistan shut businesses and public transport in the region and said the construction of tunnels and roads would not succeed in appeasing them.
(AP, 4/2/17)
2017 Apr 2, In southern India a German tourist was raped in the beach town of Mamallapuram, Tamil Nadu state. Police searched for two men suspected in the rape.
(AP, 4/3/17)
2017 Apr 2, In Nigeria three suicide bombers blew themselves up attempting to get into the northeastern city of Maiduguri. A dog grappled with a suicide bomber at a wedding in Belbelo village near Maiduguri until her explosives detonated, killing the animal as well.
(AP, 4/2/17)(SFC, 4/6/17, p.A2)
2017 Apr 2, In Pakistan 20 people were tortured and then murdered with clubs and knives at a Sufi shrine, in an attack purportedly carried out by Abdul Waheed, the shrine's custodian, and several accomplices at the edge of Sargodha, Punjab province.
(Reuters, 4/2/17)
2017 Apr 2, Philippine soldiers killed "more than 10" Islamic State-linked Abu Sayyaf militants in an attempt to free 6 Vietnamese captives held on a remote southern island. 32 soldiers were also wounded in the assault in Talipao town. There was no word on the fate of the captives.
(Reuters, 4/3/17)
2017 Apr 2, In Russia police detained more than 20 anti-corruption protesters who took to the streets of Moscow in a follow-up of last week's large-scale demonstrations.
(Reuters, 4/2/17)
2017 Apr 2, Serbia held presidential elections. Conservative PM Aleksandar Vucic (47) was the runaway favorite despite opposition warnings about the extent of his domination. Vucic won the presidency in the first round, enabling him to push forward with his plan to lead the Balkan country into the European Union.
(Reuters, 4/2/17)(AFP, 4/3/17)
2017 Apr 2, In central Sweden a bus carrying high school students to a ski resort crashed south of Sveg, killing three people and injuring 20 others — seven of them seriously.
(AP, 4/2/17)
2017 Apr 2, In Syria US backed forces repelled a major counter-attack by Islamic State militants holding out at the country's largest dam and in the nearby town of Tabqa. Dozens of their fighters were reported killed. Hundreds of families with their cattle, property, motor bikes and vans continued to flee from villages under Islamic State control.
(Reuters, 4/2/17)
2017 Apr 2, In Syria rebels said jets believed to be Russian hit a northwestern outpost run by moderate rebel forces, killing at least one fighter and wounding several people. War jets also believed to be Russian also struck Urum al Kubra town in rebel-held western Aleppo countryside where five civilians were killed.
(Reuters, 4/2/17)
2018 Apr 2, The US Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that car dealerships' service advisers, like car salesmen and mechanics, are exempt under federal law from overtime pay requirements.
(SFC, 4/3/18, p.D3)
2018 Apr 2, The US Dept. of Justice said it is filing a suit against California over a law that gives the state power to veto sales of federal lands to private interests. A 2017 state law gave state officials the right to purchase any federal land in California that the government tries to sell to private ownership.
(SFC, 4/3/18, p.A12)
2018 Apr 2, The West Hollywood-based gay dating app Grindr was under fire for sharing information about users' HIV status or locations with two companies enlisted to optimize its software. A day later the company announced a policy change to stop sharing users' HIV statuses
(AP, 4/3/18)(SFC, 4/4/18, p.C5)
2018 Apr 2, In Kentucky teachers filled the state Capitol protesting pension changes and demanding generous school funding.
(SFC, 4/3/18, p.A6)
2018 Apr 2, Thousands of Oklahoma teachers walked out of classrooms in a campaign for higher pay. State Gov. Mary Fallin signed legislation last week granting teachers pay raises of 15-18 percent, but some educators said that wasn't good enough.
(SFC, 4/3/18, p.A6)
2018 Apr 2, A cyberattack hobbled the electronic communication system used by Energy Transfer Partners LP, a major US pipeline network. The EDI platform, provided by Energy Services Group, was shut down, but there was no effect on the flow of natural gas.
(SFC, 4/3/18, p.D2)
2018 Apr 2, An Afghan airstrike on a Taliban training camp killed at least five civilians, 35 insurgents and wounded many more in Kunduz province. The Taliban claimed the strike hit a madrassa, or a religious school, during a graduation ceremony, killing dozens of civilians. The UN later said a total of 36 people were killed in the attack in the Dashti Archi district of Kunduz province.
(AFP, 4/2/18)(AP, 4/3/18)(AP, 4/11/18)
2018 Apr 2, In Afghanistan a total of 36 people were killed in the attack, which the UN said targeted a religious ceremony attended by hundreds of men and boys in the Dashti Archi district of the northern Kunduz province.
(AP, 5/7/18)
2018 Apr 2, Bangladesh officials said Myanmar authorities have lured dozens of mainly Buddhist Bangladeshi tribal families to cross the border and resettle on land abandoned by fleeing Muslim Rohingya.
(AFP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, A rights group said farmers from Cambodia have filed a lawsuit in a Thai civil court against Mitr Phol, Asia's largest sugar producer, accusing it of rights abuses after it allegedly kicked farmers off their land.
(Reuters, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, Five Cameroonian soldiers were killed in an attack on a military post in the village of Sagme in the far north of the country. Security forces freed 18 hostages, including 12 European tourists, who had been seized by separatists fighting for the independence of English-speaking regions. Six municipal counsellors in the northwest also were freed.
(AFP, 4/3/18)(AP, 4/4/18)
2018 Apr 2, China raised import duties on a $3 billion list of US pork, apples and other products in an escalating dispute with Washington over trade and industrial policy.
(AP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, China's defunct Tiangong 1 space station mostly burned up on re-entry into the atmosphere over the central South Pacific.
(AP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, Official results showed that Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi was re-elected with 97 percent of votes, the same proportion that the former military commander secured four years ago for his first term. Turnout was lower at 41 percent. Some 1.76 million invalid ballots were cast, about 7.2% of the total.
(Reuters, 4/2/18)(SFC, 4/4/18, p.A2)
2018 Apr 2, Ethiopia's new PM Abiye Ahmed promised to push through democratic reforms in an effort to end three years of unrest that first erupted in the province of Oromiya from where he hails.
(Reuters, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, A Fiji disaster management official said weekend floods caused by Cyclone Josie have killed four people, with another presumed drowned.
(Reuters, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, French emergency doctor and mountain guide Emmanuel Cauchy (58), whose high-altitude work earned him the nickname "Doctor Vertical," was killed in an avalanche in the Alps. He was among a group of off-piste skiers caught up in the avalanche in the Aiguilles Rouges area around the resort of Chamonix.
(AFP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, In India low-caste Dalits fought street battles with police that left at least six dead as protests against a Supreme Court rights ruling swept across large swathes of the country.
(AFP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, A security clampdown and a strike sponsored by separatists fighting against Indian rule shut down most of Indian-administered Kashmir.
(AP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, An Iraqi court in Baghdad sentenced six Turkish women to death and a seventh to life in prison for membership of the Islamic State jihadist group. Iraq in February condemned another 15 Turkish women to death on the same charge.
(AFP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, Israel announced it had reached a deal with the UN refugee agency to cancel a controversial plan to deport African migrants and replace it with a new one that will see thousands sent to Western countries. PM Benjamin Netanyahu said that Canada, Italy and Germany will take in some of Israel's African migrants under an agreement Israel reached with the UN refugee agency.
(AfP, 4/2/18)(Reuters, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, Malaysia approved a law against "fake news" that would allow for prison of up to six years for offenders, shrugging off critics who say it was aimed at curbing dissent and free speech ahead of a general election.
(Reuters, 4/2/18)
018 Apr 2, In Nigeria Boko Haram extremists attacked two villages on the outskirts of Maiduguri, killing at least 15 people and wounded 83, in the biggest strike since the government said it was in talks with the Islamist militant group.
(Reuters, 4/2/18)(SFC, 4/3/18, p.A2)
2018 Apr 2, Pakistan's army chief confirmed death sentences for 10 convicted militants, including the killer of well-known Sufi singer Amjad Sabri in 2016.
(AP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, The Palestinian death toll in last week's mass protest on the Gaza-Israel border rose to 18 after a 29-year-old man died today of his injuries.
(AP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, Russia's foreign ministry said a diplomat from Montenegro will be expelled, after Montenegro expelled a Russian diplomat over a nerve agent attack in England that the British government has blamed on Russia.
(Reuters, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, Spying on your spouse's phone in Saudi Arabia now carries a hefty fine and up to a year in prison, under a new law that aims to "protect morals of individuals and society and protect privacy".
(Reuters, 4/3/18)
2018 Apr 2, In South Africa six miners were burnt to death when the bus taking them to work at the Modikwa platinum mine was set alight by a petrol bomb thrown by unknown attackers near the town of Burgersfort in northern Limpopo province.
(Reuters, 4/3/18)
2018 Apr 2, In South Africa anti-apartheid activist Winnie Madikizela-Mandela (81), wife to Nelson Mandela during his decades of imprisonment, died in a Johannesburg hospital after a long illness.
(AFP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir vowed to launch a "war on corruption" in a bid to revive the ailing economy and curb food price rises.
(AFP, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, The last Syrian rebel group in eastern Ghouta near Damascus began withdrawing from Douma under an agreement with the government. A military source said a group of insurgents were still rejecting the deal.
(Reuters, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, Police in Thailand confiscated an estimated $54 million worth of methamphetamine in one of their biggest-ever drug seizures and arrested 11 people in recent days as illegal drug cases surge in the country.
(AP, 4/3/18)
2018 Apr 2, Turkey's Haberturk newspaper said the government has ordered the arrest of US-based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen and seven others over the 2016 assassination of the Russian envoy to Turkey, a day before Russian Pres. Vladimir Putin visits the country.
(Reuters, 4/2/18)
2018 Apr 2, In Yemen an air strike by the Saudi-led coalition, killed 16 people near the port of Hodeida in a building where Huthi rebels were gathering. There were conflicting reports on the number of rebels versus civilians killed.
(AP, 4/2/18)(AFP, 4/2/18)
2019 Apr 2, In Hawaii Master Halbert (44), a Micronesia government official, pleaded guilty in US District Court in Honolulu to conspiring to launder bribe money he accepted from the president of Lyon Associates Inc., a Hawaii civil engineering company.
(AP, 4/4/19)
2019 Apr 2, In Chicago Lori Lightfoot (56), a former federal prosecutor, was elected mayor, becoming the city's first black woman and openly gay person to lead the city.
(SFC, 4/3/19, p.A6)
2019 Apr 2, The Supreme Court in Comoros confirmed Azali Assoumani as the winner of the disputed presidential election held last week in the volatile Indian Ocean archipelago.
(AFP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, Czech police extradited to Austria two suspects who allegedly formed a terror cell with a man detained by Austrian authorities over unsuccessful attacks on trains in Germany.
(AP, 4/3/19)
2019 Apr 2, Congo DRC's army captured Masudi Alimasi Kokodiko, leader of the widely feared Raia Mutomboki militia, in South Kivu's Shabunda territory. He has been accused of orchestrating mass rapes and other atrocities.
(Reuters, 4/4/19)
2019 Apr 2, The World Health Organization said Ebola is on the rise in eastern Congo following a series of attacks on health facilities. A total of 73 new cases were reported last week, compared to 57 the week before.
(AP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, Egypt sentenced more than 70 suspected members of the Muslim Brotherhood group to prison on terror-related charges. Nearly half of the defendants were tried in absentia.
(AP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, An Egyptian policeman found guilty of killing a Christian man and his son in a case that outraged the minority Coptic community was sentenced to death. Rabee Khalifa, posted as an armed police guard outside a church, killed construction workers Imad Kamal Sadeq (49) and his son David (21) after an argument last December.
(Reuters, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, In Egypt Ahmed Abdallah, the governor of Hurghada province, said a ban on disposable plastics, prohibiting everything from single use straws to plastic bags in an effort to fight pollution and protect the environment, will go into effect in June.
(AP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, The leaders of Greece and North Macedonia hugged, took selfies and signed a new agreement for air patrols in a display of newly-friendly relations since a nearly three-decade name dispute was settled earlier this year.
(Reuters, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, An Iraqi official said several million Muslims have travelled to the shrine of Imam Musa al-Kadhim in Baghdad in recent days to commemorate the revered Shiite figure's death in 799.
(AFP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, Israeli authorities arrested Hassan Yousef, a co-founder of Hamas, at his home in the occupied West Bank. On April 8 he was handed down a six-month detention order without trial.
(AFP, 4/8/19)
2019 Apr 2, In Israel Brazil's right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro said "there is no doubt" that Nazism was a leftist movement, just after visiting the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial and museum in Jerusalem.
(Reuters, 4/3/19)
2019 Apr 2, In Kashmir Pakistan and India traded fire in the disputed Himalayan region, leaving seven people dead.
(AP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, Mozambique officials said cholera cases have risen above 1,400 as hundreds of thousands of vaccine doses arrived in an attempt to limit the rapid spread of the disease.
(AP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, New Zealand lawmakers voted overwhelmingly in favor of new gun restrictions during the first stage of a bill they hope to rush into law by the end of next week.
(AP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, In North Macedonia a small private plane with four members of a Bulgarian family on board crashed into a mountain in a central region of the country. There were no survivors.
(AP, 4/3/19)
2019 Apr 2, Panama's President Juan Carlos Varela visited Hong Kong amid ambitious plans and proposals for Chinese-built bridges and rail lines in pan in Panama.
(AP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, The Philippine Supreme Court ordered the release of police documents on thousands of killings of suspects in the president's anti-drug crackdown, in a ruling that human rights groups say could shed light on allegations of extrajudicial killings.
(AP, 4/2/19)(SFC, 4/3/19, p.A4)
2019 Apr 2, Senegalese President Macky Sall said he would prioritize the environment, youth employment and women's rights during his second term in office.
(Reuters, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, In eastern Syria US-backed Syrian fighters battled the Islamic State group 10 days after declaring victory over the extremists. The SDF were rooting out groups of militants who were hiding in caves in and near the village of Baghouz. Four Islamic State militants clashed with the US-backed SDF and local security forces before blowing themselves late today in Raqqa.
(AP, 4/2/19)(AP, 4/3/19)
2019 Apr 2, The air hanging over Thailand's far north has become so polluted, PM Prayuth Chan-ocha went to see in person what is being called a severe health crisis.
(AP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's ruling party appealed the results of local elections in Istanbul where preliminary results give the opposition a razor-thin victory, sounding confident that a recount will alter the outcome of the vote.
(AP, 4/2/19)
2019 Apr 2, In Uganda a US woman (35) and a local driver were abducted by four gunmen in Queen Elizabeth National Park. The kidnappers demanded a $500,000 ransom.
(AP, 4/3/19)
2019 Apr 2, The UN said more than 113 million people across 53 countries experienced "acute hunger" last year because of wars and climate disasters, with Africa the worst-hit region.
(AFP, 4/2/19)
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