Today in History - August 18
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472 Aug 18, Flavius Ricimer, general of the Western Roman Empire, kingmaker, was born.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1227 Aug 18, Genghis Khan (Chinggis), Mongol conqueror, died in his sleep at his camp, during his siege of Ningxia, the capital of the rebellious Chinese kingdom of Xi Xia. Subotai was one of Genghis Khan's ablest lieutenants, and went on to distinguish himself after the khan's death. In Khan's lifetime he and his warriors had conquered the majority of the civilized world, ruling an empire that stretched from Poland down to Iran in the west, and from Russia's Arctic shores down to Vietnam in the east. Russian archaeologist Peter Kozloff uncovered the tomb of Genghis Khan in the Gobi Desert in 1927. In 2006 Zhu Yaoting, a Beijing academic, authored a biography of Genghis Khan.
(AP, 8/18/97)(HN, 10/29/98)(Econ, 12/23/06, p.61)
1503 Aug 18, Pope Alexander VI (1492-1503), born in Spain as Rodrigo di Borgia (1431), died. He had recently authorized the building of a prison in the cellars of Castel Sant’Angelo in Rome.
(PTA, p.424)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Alexander_VI)(SSFC, 7/22/07, p.G2)
1564 Aug 18, Spanish king Philip II joined the Council of Trent.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1587 Aug 18, In the Roanoke Island colony, Ellinor and Ananias Dare became parents of a baby girl whom they name Virginia Dare, the first English child born on what is now Roanoke Island, N.C., then considered Walter Raleigh’s second settlement in Roanoke, Virginia. Virginia Dare, born to the daughter of John White, became the first child of English parents to be born on American soil. However, the colony she was born into ended up mysteriously disappearing.
(HN, 8/18/98)(PC, 1992, p.203)(AP, 8/18/07)
1588 Aug 18, A storm struck the remaining 60 ships of the Spanish Armada under the Duke of Medina Sidonia after which only 11 were left. Many of the ships went to Ireland where most of the Spaniards were killed by the English.
(ON, 3/02, p.6)
1674 Aug 18, Jean Racine's "Iphigenie," premiered in Versailles.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1698 Aug 18, After invading Denmark and capturing Sweden, Charles XII of Sweden forced Frederick IV of Denmark to sign the Peace of Travendal.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1735 Aug 18, The Evening Post began publishing in Boston, Mass.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1750 Aug 18, Antonio Salieri (d.1825), Italian composer (Tatare), was born.
(WSJ, 1/14/04, p.D10)(MC, 8/18/02)
1759 Aug 18, The French fleet was destroyed by the British under "Old Dreadnought" Boscawen at the battle of Lagos Bay.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1769 Aug 18, Gunpowder in Brescia, Italy, church exploded and some 3,000 were killed.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1774 Aug 18, Meriwether Lewis, American explorer, was born in Charlottesville, VA. He led the Corps of Discovery with William Clark.
(HN, 8/18/00)(MC, 8/18/02)
1782 Aug 18, Poet and artist William Blake married Catherine Sophia Boucher.
(HN, 8/18/00)
1792 Aug 18, Lord John Russel, Prime Minister of England from 1846 to 1852 and 1865 to 1866, was born.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1807 Aug 18, Charles Francis Adams (d.1886), U.S. diplomat and public official whose father was John Quincy Adams, was born.
(AHD, 1971, p.14)(HN, 8/18/98)
1807 Aug 18, Robert Stevenson (1772-1850) began work on the 117-foot Bell Rock lighthouse at the mouth of Scotland’s Firth of Forth based on a proposal he submitted in 1800. The lighthouse began operating on Feb 1, 1811.
(ON, 5/06, p.6)
1812 Aug 18, Returning from a cruise into Canadian waters Captain Isaac Hull's USS Constitution of the fledgling U.S. Navy encountered British Captain Richard Dacre's HMS Guerriere about 750 miles out of Boston. After a frenzied 55-minute battle that left 101 dead, Guerriere rolled helplessly in the water, smashed beyond salvage. Dacre struck his colors and surrendered to Hull's boarding party. In contrast, Constitution suffered little damage and only 14 casualties. The fight's outcome shocked the British Admiralty while it heartened America through the dark days of the War of 1812. [see Aug 19]
(HNPD, 8/18/98)
1817 Aug 18, Gloucester, Mass., newspapers told of a wild sea serpent seen offshore.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1834 Aug 18, Mt. Vesuvius erupted.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1835 Aug 18, The last Potawatomi Indians left Chicago.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1838 Aug 18, Six US Navy ships departed Hampton Roads, Va., led by Lt. Charles Wilkes on a 3-year mission called the US South Seas Exploring Expedition, the "U.S. Ex. Ex." The mission proved Antarctica to be a continent. Wilkes was tried in a military court for abuses of power, but was generally acquitted. In 2003 Nathaniel Philbrick authored "Sea of Glory," an account of the expedition.
(Econ, 11/8/03, p.80)(WSJ, 11/12/03, p.D12)(www.sil.si.edu/DigitalCollections/usexex/)
1846 Aug 18, U.S. forces led by Gen. Stephen W. Kearney captured Santa Fe, N.M.
(AP, 8/18/97)
1849 Aug 18, Benjamin Louis Paul Godard, composer, was born in Paris.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1850 Aug 18, Honore de Balzac (b.1799), French novelist, died at age 51.
(WUD, 1994, p.115)(MC, 8/18/02)
1856 Aug 18, In SF thousands of armed men paraded through the streets and then formally dissolved the second Committee of Vigilance. They had run SF for nearly 4 months much to the distress of Mayor James Van Ness and militia officer William T. Sherman.
(SFC, 8/18/06, p.B1)
1862 Aug 18, Confederate General J.E.B. Stuart’s headquarters was raided by Union troops of the 5th New York and 1st Michigan cavalries.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1862 Aug 18, A Sioux Uprising began uprising in Minnesota. It resulted in more than 800 white settlers dead and 38 Sioux Indians condemned and hanged. The Minnesota Uprising began when four young Sioux murdered five white settlers at Acton. The Santee Sioux, who lived on a long, narrow reservation on the south side of the Minnesota River, were reacting to broken government promises and corrupt Indian agents. a military court sentenced 303 Sioux to die, but President Abraham Lincoln reduced the list. The 38 hangings took place on December 26, 1862, in Mankato, Minn.
(MC, 8/18/02)(HNQ, 1/4/00)
1864 Aug 18, Union General William T. Sherman sent General Judson Kilpatrick to raid Confederate lines of communication outside Atlanta. The raid was unsuccessful. Union General William Sherman considered Judson Kilpatrick, his cavalry chief, 'a hell of a damn fool.'
(HN, 8/18/98)
1864 Aug 18, Day 1 of 3 day Petersburg Campaign-Battle of Weldon Railroad, Va.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1870 Aug 18, Prussian forces defeated the French at the Battle of Gravelotte during the Franco-Prussian War. French Commander Bazaine's efforts to break his soldiers through the German lines were bloodily defeated at Mars-la-Tour and Gravelotte. The Prussians advanced on Chalons.
(HN, 8/18/98)(www.marxists.org/history/france/paris-commune/timeline.htm)
1873 Aug 18, Leo Slezak, Austria tenor, actor (Othello), was born.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1873 Aug 18, Otto Harbach, songwriter (Smoke Gets in Your Eyes), was born in, SLC, Utah.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1894 Aug 18, US Congress established the Bureau of Immigration.
(AP, 8/18/97)
1896 Aug 18, Adolph Ochs (39) took over the New York Times. He served as publisher until 1935.
(HN, 8/18/00)(SFC, 4/6/01, p.D3)
1896 Aug 18, The northern California Mount Tamalpais and Muir Woods railroad was completed. It was 8 ½ miles long. The Mount Tamalpais Scenic Railroad attracted visitors to what later became known as Stinson Beach. The railway continued operating to 1930.
(SFC, 8/17/96, p.A17)(SFC, 11/27/07, p.A13)(SFC, 2/24/09, p.B1)
1904 Aug 18, [Francis] Max Factor (d.1996), cosmetics manufacturer (Max Factor), was born. His father, Max Factor (d.1938), was born in Lodz, Russia, in 1877 and came to the US with his family in 1902.
(MC, 8/18/02)(Internet)
1908 Aug 18, Edgar Faure (d.1988), thriller writer, PM of France (1952, 52-56), was born.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1911 Aug 18, Britain’s Parliament Act of 1911 was given Royal Assent. It asserted the supremacy of the House of Commons by limiting the legislation-blocking powers of the House of Lords (the suspensory veto).
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parliament_Acts_1911_and_1949)(Econ, 3/3/12, p.68)
1914 Aug 18, President Wilson issued his Proclamation of Neutrality, aimed at keeping the United States out of World War I.
(AP, 8/18/97)
1914 Aug 18, Germany declared war on Russia.
(HN, 8/18/00)
1918 Aug 18, Elsa Morante, Italian writer and author of "History: A Novel," was born.
(HN, 8/18/00)
1919 Aug 18, Anti-Cigarette League of America formed in Chicago, Illinois.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1920 Aug 18, Tennessee became the 36th state to ratify the 19th Amendment to the Constitution, which guaranteed the right of all American women to vote. This completed the three-quarters necessary to put the amendment into effect. Aaron Sargent, who wrote the 19th amendment, also built Grandmere's Inn in Nevada City. Carrie Chapman Catt, founder of the League of Women Voters, played a crucial role in its passage. She also held some very racist views: she called the ballots of proletarian voters "undesirable" and referred to Indians as "savages." [see Aug 26, 1920]
(SFC, 4/14/96, T-3)(SFC, 6/9/96, p.B-11)(AP, 8/18/97)(HN, 8/18/01)
1922 Aug 18, Shelly Winters, actress who won an Academy Award for The Diary of Anne Frank, was born.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1923 Aug 18, Jimmy Witherspoon, blues singer, was born.
(HN, 8/18/00)
1927 Aug 18, Rosalynn Smith Carter, 1st lady (1977-1981), was born in Plains, Georgia.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1929 Aug 18, The first cross-country women's air derby began. Louise McPhetride Thaden won first prize in the heavier-plane division, while Phoebe Fairgrave Omlie finished first in the lighter-plane category.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1930 Aug 18, Eastern Airlines began passenger service.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1932 Aug 18, Luc Montagnier, virologist, was born. He discovered the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV).
(HN, 8/18/00)
1932 Aug 18, Auguste Piccard and Max Cosijns reached 16,201m in a balloon.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1933 Aug 18, Roman Polanski, Polish film director best known for Rosemary's Baby and Chinatown, was born.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1934 Aug 18, Vincent Bugliosi, attorney, author (Helter-Skelter), was born in Hibbing, Minn.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1936 Aug 18, Federico Garcia Lorca was shot and killed by a Francoist squad on the outskirts of Grenada and buried in an unmarked grave along with 3 other prisoners. His dramatic works included "Blood Wedding," "Yerma," Dona Rosita the Spinster," and "The House of Bernarda Alba." In 1998 the biography "Lorca: A Dream of Life" by Leslie Stainton was published in London.
(MT, Spg. ‘99, p.3)
1937 Aug 18, Robert Redford, actor (Sting, Candidate, Natural, Great Gatsby), was born in Calif.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1938 Aug 18, President Roosevelt and Canadian PM William Lyon Mackenzie King dedicated the Thousand Islands Bridge connecting the United States and Canada.
(AP, 8/18/07)
1940 Aug 18, Walter Chrysler (b.1875), the founder of Chrysler Corporation, died. He was a locomotive mechanic who founded Chrysler in 1924 with money and experience gained as general manager of Buick and executive VP of GM. He oversaw the purchase of Dodge Brothers, which was much bigger than Chrysler at the time. In 2000 Vincent Curcio authored "Chrysler: The Life and Times of an Automotive Genius."
(WSJ, 6/19/96, Adv. Supl)(HNQ, 8/21/99)(WSJ, 8/10/00, p.A16)
1940 Aug 18, The Duke of Windsor (1894-1972), was installed as Governor of the Bahamas. He had served as Britain’s King Edward VIII in 1936. Edward continued as governor of the Bahamas to 1945.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_VIII)
1940 Aug 18, 71 German aircraft were shot down above England.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1941 Aug 18, The concentration camp at Amersfoort, Netherlands, opened.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1942 Aug 18, Carlson's Raiders landed on Makin (Kiribati) in the Gilbert islands and killed 350 Japanese. [see Aug 17]
(MC, 8/18/02)
1942 Aug 18, Japan sent a crack army to Guadalcanal to repulse the U.S. Marines fighting there.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1943 Aug 18, The Royal Air Force Bomber Command completed the first major strike against the German missile development facility at Peenemunde.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1943 Aug 18, Final convoy of Jews from Salonika, Greece, arrived at Auschwitz.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1943 Aug 18, The Heinkel-111 of Otto Skorzeny, Waffen SS commander, was shot down at Sardinia.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1943 Aug 18, Hans Jeschonnek, German air force general, chief-staff, committed suicide.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1943 Aug 18, Shukri Kouatly was elected president of Syria.
(http://tinyurl.com/m6qhfyp)
1945 Aug 18, Subhas Chandra Bose (b.1897), a leader of the Indian Independence Movement, died after his overloaded Japanese plane crashed in Japanese-occupied Formosa. He had led some 40,000 soldiers against the British during WWII as an ally of Hitler and imperial Japan.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subhas_Chandra_Bose)(Econ, 5/23/09, p.92)(Econ, 12/20/14, p.57)
1945 Aug 18, Indonesia adopted a new Constitution. It was later described as a “dictator’s dream." This Constitution (usually referred to by the Indonesian acronym UUD'45) remained in force until it was replaced by the Federal Constitution on December 27, 1949.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constitution_of_Indonesia)(Econ, 6/21/14, p.40)
1947 Aug 18, The Hewlett-Packard Company was incorporated and reported revenues of $1.5 million. The 111 employees recorded sales of $679,000. In 2007 Michael S. Malone authored “Bill & Dave: How Hewlett and Packard Built the World’s Greatest Company."
(SFC, 3/3/99, p.A11)(SFC, 1/13/01, p.A15)(SSFC, 4/22/07, p.M3)
1947 Aug 18, Naval torpedo and mine factory exploded at Cadiz, Spain, killing 300.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1949 Aug 18, China’s Mao Zedong published an essay titled “Farewell, Leighton Stewart!" Stewart, China’s American ambassador, was leaving amid escalating tension with the nearly victorious Communist Party.
(Econ, 3/8/14, p.47)
1951 Aug 18, The 1st transcontinental wireless phone call was made from SF to NYC by Mark Sullivan, president of PT&T, and H.T. Killingworth of AT&T.
(SFC, 8/17/01, p.WB6)
1952 Aug 18, Chile, Ecuador and Peru signed the Declaration on the Maritime Zone. On Jan 27 the Int’l. Court of Justice ruled on the sea border between Chile and Peru. It confirmed Chile’s hold over inshore waters rich in fish.
(http://tinyurl.com/nx4o9uz)(Econ, 2/1/14, p.30)
1954 Aug 18, Assistant Secretary of Labor James E. Wilkins became the first black to attend a meeting of a president's Cabinet as he sat in for Labor Secretary James P. Mitchell.
(AP, 8/18/97)
1955 Aug 18, South Sudanese openly open fire and told the government in Khartoum that enough is enough. Southern Sudanese were transported in thousands to Port Sudan to dig salt for the survival of the northern government. Regions in South Sudan come together to give support to Torit mutineers. The Torit mutiny resulted into the Anya-nya I war that ended with the Addis Ababa Agreement in 1972.
(www.sudantribune.com/18-August-1955-South-Sudan-heroes,23627)
1956 Aug 18, Elvis Presley's "Hound Dog" and "Don't Be Cruel" reached #1.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1958 Aug 18, The 1st US edition of the novel "Lolita" by Vladimir Nabokov was published by Putnam. The 1st French edition was in 1955.
(WSJ, 3/20/97, p.A14)(www.loa.org/volume.jsp?RequestID=9§ion=notes)
1958 Aug 18, An American TV game show scandal investigation started.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1958 Aug 18, Fidel Castro made a speech on Cuban pirate radio Rebelde.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1959 Aug 18, A magnitude 7.3 quake near Hebgen Lake, Montana, just west of Yellowstone National Park triggered a landslide that killed 28 people.
(http://earthquake.usgs.gov/regional/states/events/1959_08_18.php)
1960 Aug 18, Enovid 10, the 1st commercial oral contraceptive, debuted in Skokie, Ill.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1960 Aug 18, Beatles gave their 1st public performance at Kaiser Keller in Hamburg.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1961 Aug 18, Learned Hand (b.1872), Chief judge of US court of Appeals, died. In 1994 Stanford Prof. Gerald Gunther (d.2002) authored the biography "Learned Hand, the Man and the Judge."
(AP, 12/13/97)(SFC, 8/2/02, p.A27)
1962 Aug 18, Peter, Paul and Mary released their 1st hit "If I Had a Hammer."
(MC, 8/18/02)
1962 Aug 18, Pres. J.F. Kennedy led the official groundbreaking ceremonies for the San Luis Joint-Use Complex, Ca. In 1961 the state and feds had agreed to the project which required the B.F. Sisk San Luis Dam for storage of flows pumped from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. The Sisk Dam was named after Congressman B.F. Sisk of Fresno.
(CDWR, brochure)
1962 Aug 18, In Iran brothers, Ahmad and Mahmoud Khayami founded "Iran National" to manufacture cars. After the 1979 Islamic Revolution it became known as Iran Khodro. Their later Paykan design was based on the 1967 Hillman Hunter, which was originally designed and manufactured by the British Rootes Group. Mahmoud Khayami is also known for starting the Kourosh Department Stores: the first large retail chain stores of Iran, not unlike their American counterparts Sears and Kmart.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmoud_Khayami)
1963 Aug 18, James Meredith became the first black to graduate from the University of Mississippi.
(AP, 8/18/97)(HN, 8/18/98)
1964 Aug 18, South Africa was banned from Olympic Games because of apartheid policies.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1965 Aug 18, Operation Starlite marked the beginning of major U.S. ground combat operations in Vietnam.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1966 Aug 18, Australians bloodily repulsed a Viet Cong attack at Long Tan, South Vietnam.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1969 Aug 18, Two concert goers died at the Woodstock Music and Art Fair in Bethel, New York, one from an overdose of heroin, the other from a burst appendix. The Woodstock Music and Art Fair ended in Sullivan County, NY, with a mid-morning set performed by Jimi Hendrix.
(HN, 8/18/99)(AP, 8/18/07)
1971 Aug 18, Joel David Kaplan (44), a NY businessman and Carlos Antonio Contreras Castro, a Venezuelan counterfeiter, escaped by helicopter from Mexico’s Santa Maria Acatitla Federal Prison. Vasilios Basil Choulos (d.2003), SF lawyer, plotted out the helicopter jailbreak. Kaplan was allegedly framed and serving 28 years for murder in the Mexican prison. The successful break led to the 1973 book "Ten-Second Jailbreak" and the 1975 film "Breakout."
(SFC, 1/21/02, p.A21)(www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,909935,00.html)
1971 Aug 18, In Germany a twin-engine Boeing CH-47A Chinook exploded in mid-air before plunging about (180 meters) 600 feet to the ground. The helicopter's crew of four and 33 members of the 56th Artillery Brigade died in the crash in Pegnitz, Bavaria. This was the worst training accident involving American troops in West Germany since the end of World War II.
(AP, 8/18/21)
1973 Aug 18, Gene Krupa (1909-1973), drummer, played for the final time with Benny Goodman Quartet.
(www.drummerman.net/)
1976 Aug 18, Two U.S. Army officers were killed in Korea's demilitarized zone as a group of North Korean soldiers wielding axes and metal pikes attacked U.S. and South Korean soldiers. Major Arthur G. Bonifas was attacked and beaten to death by North Korean soldiers as he attempted to cut down a poplar tree in the DMZ.
(SFEC, 6/25/00, p.T8)(AP, 8/18/02)
1977 Aug 18, In South Africa Steve Biko and Peter Jones were picked up by police at Grahamstown. They were arrested at a police roadblock under the Terrorism Act No 83 of 1967. Biko suffered a major head injury while in police custody, was chained to a window grille for a day and died on Sep 12.
(WSJ, 2/6/97, p.A9)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Biko)
1979 Aug 18, In Los Angeles singer Nick Lowe married singer Carlene Carter, the stepdaughter of Johnny Cash.
(http://tinyurl.com/2s4gxj)
1979 Aug 18, Iran Ayatollah Khomeini sent the army to attack and occupy Paveh, Sanandaj and Saghez. Having defeated the Kurds in the cities, he appointed Khalkhali, as head of security for Kurdistan, who proceeded with a series of summary trials and executions.
(www.sarbazan.com/Massacre.asp)
1979 Aug 18, USSR performed a nuclear test at Eastern Kazakh, Semipalitinsk, USSR.
(www.iss.niiit.ru/ksenia/catal_nt/3_8.htm)
1981 Aug 18, Anita Loos (b.1888), American writer, died. Her novels included “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes" (1925). It was made into eponymous films in 1928 and 1953. Loos started writing scenarios for D. W. Griffith while in her teens, and eventually worked on over sixty films.
(WSJ, 6/24/06, p.P13)(http://imdb.com/name/nm0002616/)
1982 Aug 18, For the first time, volume on the New York Stock exchange topped the $100 million level as 132.69 million shares were traded.
(AP, 8/18/02)
1983 Aug 18, Hurricane Alicia slammed into the Texas coast, leaving 21 dead and causing more than $1 billion damage.
(AP, 8/18/08)
1983 Aug 18, Samantha Druce earned a place in the Guinness Book of Records as the youngest person to swim the English Channel. She completed the crossing in 15 hours 26 minutes at the age of 12 years 118 days.
(http://tinyurl.com/6kgow4)
1983 Aug 18, Nikolaus Pevsner (b.1902, German-born British architectural researcher, died. His work included the 46 volume series “The Buildings of England" (1951-1974).
(Econ, 11/5/11, p.103)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikolaus_Pevsner)
1984 Aug 18, A Triangle Oil Corp. above-ground storage tank at Jacksonville, Fla., spilled 2.5 million gallons of oil and burned after lightning sparked a fire.
(www.jacksonvillefiremuseum.com/history_1951.html)(http://tinyurl.com/2pwmtm)
1985 Aug 18, In San Francisco George Bender (32) and brother Columbus Bender (33) stole over $65,000 in quarters from a Brink’s offices at 970 Illinois Street. They were caught after carrying $3,400 in quarters from a Reno casino, saying they had made a killing at the MGM Grand Hotel. A year later they were sentenced to 4 years in jail.
(SSFC, 10/16/11, DB p.42)
1985 Aug 18, Peter and Barbara Pan were found in their blood-soaked bed in Lake Merced, a housing development in San Francisco. Both had been shot in the head. Peter Pan (66), an accountant, was pronounced dead at the scene. Mrs. Pan (64) survived but would be an invalid for the rest of her life. Scrawled on the wall in lipstick were an inverted pentagram and the words "Jack the Knife." The murder was later attributed to Richard Ramirez, the “night stalker."
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Ramirez#Peter_and_Barbara_Pan)(SSFC, 8/22/10, DB p.42)
1987 Aug 18, American journalist Charles Glass escaped his kidnappers in Beirut after 62 days in captivity. Glass had been abducted June 17 with two Lebanese, who were released after a week.
(AP, 8/18/97)
1988 Aug 18, Indiana Sen. Dan Quayle was nominated to be George Bush's running mate during the Republican convention in New Orleans; meanwhile, questions were being raised about Quayle's service in the Indiana National Guard during the Vietnam War.
(AP, 8/18/98)
1988 Aug 18, Frederick Ashton (b.1904), Ecuador-born dancer and choreographer, died in England.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_Ashton)
1988 Aug 18, Hamas published a manifesto calling for a holy war to create an Islamic state from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, including Israel. It challenged the PLO's claim as the sole representative of the Palestinian people. The Hamas founding charter declared that all Palestine is Islamic trust land, can never be surrendered to non-Muslims and is an integral part of Muslim world.
(SFC, 3/23/04, p.A11)(www.mideastweb.org/hamashistory.htm)
1989 Aug 18, The US Labor Department reported that the Consumer Price Index rose only 0.2% in July 1989, easing fears of a recession.
(AP, 8/18/99)
1989 Aug 18, In Colombia, leading presidential hopeful Luis Carlos Galan was assassinated outside Bogota; the Medellin drug cartel was strongly suspected. On May 12, 2005, Alberto Santofimio Botero, former justice minister, was arrested in connection with the assassination. In 2008 a court overturned the conviction of Alberto Santofimio for lack of evidence. In 2010 Colombian prosecutors issued an arrest warrant for retired Gen. Miguel Maza Marquez (73), a former domestic security chief, who they say participated in the assassination of Galan. In 2011 the Supreme Court reinstated Galan’s murder conviction and reinstated the 24-year prison sentence a lower court imposed in 2007 on Alberto Santofimio.
(AP, 8/18/99)(AP, 12/22/05)(AP, 10/22/08)(AP, 11/25/10)(AP, 9/1/11)
1990 Aug 18, A US frigate fired warning shots across the bow of an Iraqi oil tanker in the Gulf of Oman, apparently the first shots fired by the US in the Persian Gulf crisis.
(AP, 8/18/00)
1991 Aug 18, Soviet hard-liners (State Emergency Committee), led in part by PM Valentin Pavlov, launched a coup aimed at toppling President Mikhail S. Gorbachev, who was vacationing in the Crimea. They were unhappy with the drift toward the collapse of the USSR. Gorbachev and members of his family remained effectively imprisoned until the coup collapsed three days later.
(AP, 8/18/97)(HN, 8/18/98)(AP, 4/1/03)
1992 Aug 18, Basketball star Larry Bird announced his retirement after 13 years with the Boston Celtics.
(AP, 8/18/97)
1992 Aug 18, On the second night of the Republican National Convention in Houston, U.S. Sen. Phil Gramm, R-Texas, delivered the keynote address, denouncing Bill Clinton's economic program as "worse than sleaze."
(AP, 8/18/97)
1992 Aug 18, Christopher McCandless (b.1968), a former student from Harvard, starved to death in the wilderness of Alaska. His story was later told by Jon Krakauer in the book “Into the Wild." In 2007 Sean Penn directed a film of the same name based on the book. In 2020 an abandoned bus that was used by McCandless was removed for public safety.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_McCandless)(Econ, 11/17/07, p.102)(SFC, 6/20/20, p.A4)
1992 Aug 18, John Sturges (82), director (Gunfight at OK Corral), died of emphysema.
(www.imdb.com/name/nm0836328/)
1993 Aug 18, A judge in Sarasota, Fla., ruled that Kimberly Mays, the 14-year-old girl switched at birth with another baby, need never see her biological parents again, in accordance with her stated wishes. However, she later moved in with Ernest and Regina Twigg.
(AP, 8/18/98)
1994 Aug 18, Florida Gov. Lawton Chiles declared an immigration emergency and demanded federal help to cope with the largest surge of Cuban refugees since the 1980 Mariel boat-lift.
(AP, 8/18/99)
1994 Aug 18, Stella Liebeck, who spilled scalding coffee from McDonald’s on her lap in 1992, was awarded $2.7 million in punitive damages. She ended up getting only $480,000. The Liebeck v. McDonald's Restaurants product liability lawsuit became a flashpoint in the debate in the US over tort reform.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liebeck_v._McDonald%27s_Restaurants)(Econ, 12/10/11, p.38)(Econ, 10/10/15, p.27)
1994 Aug 18, Gottlob Frick (b.1906), German operatic basso, died.
(www.iclassics.com/artistBio?contentId=304)
1995 Aug 18, Shannon Faulkner, who’d won a two-and-a-half-year legal battle to become the first female cadet at The Citadel, quit the South Carolina military college after less than a week, most of it spent in the infirmary. After her departure, the male cadets openly celebrated on the campus. By May 2005, The Citadel's Corps of Cadets included 118 female cadets, 6% of the total student population.
(AP, 8/18/00)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shannon_Faulkner)
1995 Aug 18, Premier John Swan of Bermuda promised to resign after voters rejected a vote for independence from Britain with 76% voice.
(WSJ, 8/18/95, p.A-1)
1996 Aug 18, "Dinosaurs of the Flaming Cliffs" by Michael Novacek was reviewed. It told of the author’s work as a fossil hunter in the Mongolian valley of Ukhaa Tolgod.
(SFEC, 8/18/96, BR p.5)
1996 Aug 18, "Where Wizards stay Up Late, The Origins of the Internet" by Katie Hafner and Matthew Lyon was reviewed.
(SFEC, 8/18/96, BR p.3)
1996 Aug 18, The film "The Spitfire Grill" with Ellen Burstyn was the most popular movie at the Sundance Film Festival. It was produced by a religious group, Gregory Productions, owned by the Mississippi-based Sacred Heart League.
(SFEC, 8/18/96, PM p. 2)
1996 Aug 18, On the eve of his 50th birthday, President Clinton was guest of honor at a trio of events in New York that combined celebrating with fund-raising. Ross Perot, the presidential nominee of the Reform Party, launched his campaign with a speech in which he criticized the Republican and Democratic parties as captives of special interests.
(AP, 8/18/97)
1996 Aug 18, In Pakistan 18 people were killed when 7 masked gunmen opened fire on a group of Shiite worshipers in central Punjab province. 100 were injured. The militant Sunni group Sipah-e-Sahaba, or Guardians of the Friends of the prophet were blamed.
(SFC, 8/19/96, p.A9)
1996 Aug 18, In South Korea police cut off food and medicine to students and raided the offices of the largest student organization.
(WSJ, 8/19/96, p.A1)
1997 Aug 18, The Lutheran Church approved a Formula of Agreement document that called for closer cooperation with the Presbyterian Church (USA), the United Church of Christ and the Reformed Church in America. A separate document called the Concordat of Agreement for closer ties with the Episcopal Church was 6 votes short of a required majority.
(SFC, 8/19/97, p.A3)
1997 Aug 18, UPS management agreed to a tentative contract with the striking Teamsters Union to end a 15-day-old strike. New full-time jobs and pay raises were part of the settlement.
(SFC, 8/19/97, p.A1)(AP, 8/18/98)
1997 Aug 18, In Virginia the VMI class of 2001 included 30 women among the 460 freshman students. Beth Ann Hogan became the first coed in the Virginia Military Institute's 158-year history.
(SFC, 8/18/97, p.A3)(AP, 8/18/98)
1997 Aug 18, Burnum Burnum (b.1936 as Henry James Penrith), Australian Aboriginal activist, died at age 61. He had been a member of the "stolen generation," Aborigine children taken from their families into government welfare.
(SFC, 8/19/97, p.A20)
1997 Aug 18, Militiamen under the South Lebanon Army, a key ally of Israel, shelled the port city of Sidon and killed at least 6 people while injuring over 3 dozen. In apparent retaliation northern Israel was hit by dozens of Katyusha rockets fired from Lebanon.
(SFC, 8/19/97, p.A8)
1997 Aug 18, In Taiwan typhoon Winnie swept over the island and left 24 people dead.
(SFC, 8/19/97, p.A9)
1997 Aug 18, In Tajikistan government forces killed 50 mutinous troops in a battle over a bridge on the Vakhsh River.
(SFC, 8/19/97, p.A9)
1998 Aug 18, A day after his grand jury testimony, President Clinton left Washington on a vacation with his family. Meanwhile, some lawmakers called for Clinton to resign in the wake of his admissions concerning Monica Lewinsky while a spokeswoman for Hillary Rodham Clinton said the first lady "believes in this marriage."
(AP, 8/18/99)
1998 Aug 18, In China the Songhua River rose to 397 1/2 feet and threatened the provincial capital of Harbin.
(SFC, 8/19/98, p.C16)
1998 Aug 18, In India a flash flood swept up some 100 Hindu pilgrims in Uttar Pradesh. 182 people were feared dead.
(SFC, 8/19/98, p.C16)
1998 Aug 18, In Kenya FBI agents, acting on a tip from Mohammed Saddiq Odeh, raided The Hilltop Hotel in Nairobi and confiscated 175 pounds of TNT. The room was reported to have been occupied by 2 Palestinians, a Saudi and an Egyptian from Aug 3 to Aug 7.
(SFC, 8/19/98, p.A1)
1998 Aug 18, In Mexico police nabbed Daniel Arizmendi (39) and 9 others. Arizmendi was the leader of a kidnapping gang that sent the ears of victims to their families to pressure for ransom.
(SFC, 8/19/98, p.A12)
1998 Aug 18, In Northern Ireland a splinter group claimed responsibility for the bombing in Omagh. The group offered apologies for the dead and declared an immediate cease-fire.
(SFC, 8/19/98, p.A12)
1998 Aug 18, In Paraguay newly elected Pres. Grau freed Linio Oviedo, the leader of a 1996 coup attempt, and within days faced a move by Congress for impeachment.
(WSJ, 8/21/98, p.A1)
1999 Aug 18, Ramos Horta of Indonesia, 1996 Nobel Prize winner, warned the government that computer hackers would wreak electronic mayhem on the country if voting in the East Timor referendum is hampered.
(SFC, 8/19/99, p.D10)
1999 Aug 18, Russian forces lost 8 soldiers in Dagestan as they tried to storm Tando village.
(SFC, 8/19/99, p.D10)
1999 Aug 18, In Singapore S.R. Nathan was declared president without elections.
(WSJ, 8/20/99, p.A1)
1999 Aug 18, In Turkey the Tupras oil refinery near Ismit burned out of control as the death toll passed 4,000 from the 7.4 earthquake centered on Izmit. A day after a deadly earthquake struck western Turkey, survivors denounced the rescue effort as sluggish and disorganized. The death toll eventually topped 17,000.
(SFC, 8/19/99, p.A1,15)(AP, 8/18/00)
1999 Aug 18, In Uzbekistan 6 members of a banned opposition group, Erk (Freedom), were convicted for involvement in several bombings and sentenced to 8-15 years in prison.
(SFC, 8/19/99, p.D10)
2000 Aug 18, Fresh from the Democratic National Convention, Al Gore and Joseph Lieberman shoved off from the banks of the Mississippi on a riverboat cruise to stir excitement for their freshly launched White House campaign.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2000 Aug 18, In Chechnya rebels killed 8 Russian soldiers in several attacks on checkpoints and roadblocks.
(SFC, 8/19/00, p.A10)
2000 Aug 18, Alberto Orlandez Gamboa, a Colombian drug cartel leader known as "The Snail," was extradited to the US to stand trial for drug trafficking and money laundering.
(SFC, 8/19/00, p.A10)
2000 Aug 18, In Indonesia the 700-member People’s Consultative Assembly passed a decree that allowed the security forces to keep 38 seats in the legislature until 2009 and banned retroactive prosecution of human rights cases.
(SFC, 8/19/00, p.A8)
2000 Aug 18, In Japan the Mount Oyama volcano erupted for a 5th time on the island of Miyake. The eruptions began July 9 after 17 years of dormancy.
(SFC, 8/19/00, p.A9)
2000 Aug 18, In Mexico at least 4 people were killed when violence broke out during the inauguration of Mayor Jesus Tolentino in Chimalhuacan, a suburb of Mexico City and part of the area known as the misery belt.
(SFC, 8/19/00, p.A9)
2000 Aug 18, In the Philippines 3 Malaysians were released by Abu Sayyaf rebels.
(WSJ, 8/21/00, p.A12)
2000 Aug 18, Government forces seized 5 tons of cocaine as part of the "Orinoco 2000" probe financed by the US DEA. Another 5 tons was discovered at the Doble Uno ranch just days later. The cocaine was suspected to have been dropped from Colombia.
(SFC, 8/21/00, p.A10)(SFC, 8/26/00, p.A10)
2001 Aug 18, It was reported that a month-long drought ravaged Central America. Honduras lost 80% of its basic grains, El Salvador lost 80% of grains in its eastern provinces, Nicaragua lost 50% and Guatemala lost 80% of its beans in the eastern provinces. Hundreds of thousands of peasants were affected.
(SFC, 8/18/01, p.A1)
2001 Aug 18, In Luanda, Angola, some 10,000 people marched in a government-organized protest against the Aug 11 train ambush.
(SSFC, 8/19/01, p.A16)
2001 Aug 18, In the Philippines a pre-dawn fire swept through the Manor Hotel in Quezon City and 75 people, trapped behind security bars, were killed
(SFC, 8/18/01, p.A10)(AP, 8/18/02)
2001 Aug 18, In Spain a Basque rebel car bomb exploded outside 2 resort hotels in Salou.
(WSJ, 8/20/01, p.A1)
2002 Aug 18, Rich Beem beat Tiger Woods to capture the PGA Championship.
(AP, 8/18/03)
2002 Aug 18, US federal agents said they had seized over 2,300 unregistered missiles at a counter-terrorism school, High Energy Access Tools (HEAT), in Roswell, New Mexico, that was training students from Arab countries and arrested its Canadian leader.
(Reuters, 8/18/02)(WSJ, 8/19/02, p.A1)
2002 Aug 18, In Britain detectives announced that two bodies found in a nature reserve almost certainly belong to a pair of missing 10-year-olds. Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman had been missing since August 4.
(AP, 8/19/02)(www.trutv.com/library/crime/serial_killers/predators/ian_huntley/index.html)
2002 Aug 18, Turpal-Ali Atgeriyev (b.1969), a former Chechen rebel commander and top official in the region's rebel government, died of complications from leukemia while serving a 15-year prison term for terrorism in Yekaterinburg.
(AP, 8/22/02)
2002 Aug 18, Israel agreed to a partial withdrawal from Palestinian territory in exchange for reduced tensions in the areas.
(SFC, 8/19/02, p.A1)
2002 Aug 18, In a tearful, farewell Mass in his beloved Krakow, Pope John Paul II told more than 2 million Poles that he would like to return one day — but that "this is entirely in God's hands."
(AP, 8/18/03)
2002 Aug 18, In central Russia a bus drove into a ditch in the republic of Chuvashia and overturned, killing 22 people and injuring 38.
(AP, 8/18/02)
2003 Aug 18, Suspected Taliban insurgents killed at least nine policemen in an ambush in Logar province's Kharwar village, about 55 miles south of Kabul.
(AP, 8/19/03)
2003 Aug 18, A 24-year-old woman from China tipped over 303,621 dominos, breaking a long-standing record for the world's longest solo domino topple.
(AP, 8/18/03)
2003 Aug 18, In Shanxi province, China, there was a gas explosion in a coal mine where 27 miners were working. At least 25 were killed.
(AP, 8/20/03)
2003 Aug 18, Lucien Abenhaim, a senior French health official resigned after the health minister admitted that up to 5,000 people, many of them elderly and alone, might have died in the recent heat wave.
(AP, 8/19/03)
2003 Aug 18, All of Georgia was without power for the entire day, and officials in the impoverished former Soviet republic were struggling to determine the cause of the blackout.
(AP, 8/19/03)
2003 Aug 18, Israel delayed plans to hand over Jericho and Qalqiliya, two West Bank towns to Palestinian control.
(AP, 8/19/03)
2003 Aug 18, In Accra, Ghana, Liberia's government and rebels signed a peace accord to end 14 years of vicious war with plans for elections in 2 years.
(AP, 8/19/03)
2003 Aug 18, A six-month ordeal for 14 European tourists kidnapped by Islamic extremists while on desert safaris in Algeria has ended with their release to officials in neighboring Mali.
(AP, 8/19/03)
2003 Aug 18, In Venezuela 9 workers died as 8 tried to rescue a comrade who was felled by toxic industrial gases at an animal feed plant outside Caracas.
(WSJ, 8/19/03, p.A1)
2004 Aug 18, Google said it now expects its stock to trade between $85 and $95 per share, down from its old forecast of between $108 and $135. It also said the total number of shares to be sold will be cut to 19.6 million, down from 25.7 million.
(AP, 8/18/04)
2004 Aug 18, In California federal agents raided a farm in lake County where Charles Lepp grew over 32,000 marijuana plants. He said he had informed local authorities that his land would be used to enable patients who didn’t own land to grow marijuana for medical purposes. In 2009 Lepp (56) was sentenced to 10 years in prison under federal law that required a 10-year term for growing at least 1,000 marijuana plants.
(http://fugitive.com/archives/6212)(SFC, 5/19/09, p.B4)
2004 Aug 18, Two campers were found slain in their sleeping bags at Fish Head Beach in Sonoma Ct., Ca. Lindsay Cutshall (22) of Fresno, Ohio, and Jason Allen (26) of Zeeland, Mich., were found with gunshots to the head on a Jenner beach. Both were believed to have been killed after nightfall on August 14. They had planned a wedding for next month. On March 24, 2017, Shaun Gallon (38) of Forestville killed his younger brother, was swiftly arrested and confessed enough to tie him to the 2004 Jenner beach murders. In 2018 Gallon was charged with the Jenner beach murders. In 2019 Gallon pleaded no contest to his crimes and faced consecutive life sentences.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jenner,_California_Double-Murder_of_2004)(SFC, 8/21/04, p.A1)(SFC, 5/6/17, p.A1)(SFC, 5/17/18, p.D1)(SFC, 6/14/19, p.C3)
2004 Aug 18, Elmer Bernstein (82), film composer, died in Ojai, Ca. His work included over 200 film and TV scores. He received an Academy Award in 1967 for his score in “Thoroughly Modern Millie."
(SFC, 8/20/04, p.B6)
2004 Aug 18, Hiram L. Fong (97), Hawaii's first U.S. senator, died.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2004 Aug 18, Afghan President Hamid Karzai's 17 rivals in the presidential race threatened to boycott landmark October 9 elections unless he stepped down before the vote.
(AP, 8/18/04)
2004 Aug 18, In El Salvador rival inmates fought each other with knives and sticks at a San Salvador prison, leaving at least 31 people dead and two dozen injured.
(AP, 8/18/04)
2004 Aug 18, In South Ossetia 3 Georgian peacekeepers were killed in overnight shooting.
(AP, 8/18/04)
2004 Aug 18, In Athens Paul Hamm won the men's gymnastics all-around Olympic gold medal by the closest margin ever in the event; controversy followed after it was discovered a scoring error might have cost Yang Tae-young of South Korea the title.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2004 Aug 18, Indian shares slid as oil prices surged to a new high of $47 a barrel, threatening domestic demand and growth in Asia's fourth-largest economy.
(AP, 8/18/04)
2004 Aug 18, Iraq's new air force took to the skies for the 1st time since the 2003 US invasion. The limited operations were intended to protect infrastructure facilities and borders.
(AP, 8/21/04)
2004 Aug 18, In Iraq a rocket slammed into a busy market in the northern city of Mosul, killing at least five civilians. U.S. forces clashed with insurgents southeast of Baghdad in fighting that left up to five civilians dead.
(AP, 8/18/04)
2004 Aug 18, Communist rebels isolated Nepal's capital from the rest of the country, stopping all road traffic near Katmandu by threatening to attack vehicles. The campaign, announced last week, was aimed at pressuring the government to free jailed guerrillas.
(AP, 8/18/04)
2004 Aug 18, Five Palestinians were killed in a blast outside the house of a well-known Hamas militant in Gaza City.
(AP, 8/17/04)
2004 Aug 18, In Venezuela opposition leaders charged that as many as 500 of 8,900 polling stations used voting machines that were programmed with an artificial cap to limit the number of votes cast in favor of recalling Pres. Chavez. In 2003 the Chavez regime has purchased 28% of Bizta Software, owned and operated by 2 Venezuelans, who also supplied the election machinery (Smartmatic Corp). Bizta bought back the shares after the story broke and after the 2 companies received a significant part of the $91 million referendum contract.
(WSJ, 8/19/04, p.A11,12)
2005 Aug 18, It was reported that US Defense Dept. data-mining operation, Able Danger, had identified Mohamed Atta and 3 other Sep 11 hijackers by name in mid-2000.
(SFC, 8/17/05, p.A5)
2005 Aug 18, Cindy Sheehan, who'd started an anti-war demonstration near President Bush's Texas ranch nearly two weeks earlier, left the camp after learning her mother had suffered a stroke, but told supporters the protest would go on.
(AP, 8/18/06)
2005 Aug 18, In Kansas BTK killer Dennis Rader (60) was sentenced to 10 consecutive life terms after a hearing where family members spoke of their grief and loss from his 1974-1991 murder spree.
(AP, 8/19/05)(WSJ, 8/19/05, p.A1)
2005 Aug 18, Ohio Gov. Bob Taft pleaded no contest to charges that he broke state ethics law by failing to report golf outings and other gifts. A judge found him guilty and fined him $4,000.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, It was reported that an anthrax outbreak had killed hundreds of cattle in parts of the Great Plains, forcing quarantines and devastating Dakota ranchers who worry how they will recover financially. Two ranches in Texas were quarantined last month after anthrax was found in cattle, horses and deer.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, In Afghanistan a US Marine and an Afghan soldier were killed during battles with militants in eastern Kunar province ahead of next month's landmark elections. 2 American soldiers were killed in the south.
(AP, 8/19/05)
2005 Aug 18, British bank Royal Bank of Scotland (RBoS) announced that it would lead a consortium to buy a 10-percent stake in Bank of China for 3.1 billion dollars (2.5 billion euros).
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, Andronico Luksic (78), Chilean billionaire, died. His holding included beach resorts in Croatia, where his father was born.
(SFC, 8/30/05, p.B4)
2005 Aug 18, China and Russia began unprecedented joint military exercises involving air, sea and land forces, as commanders from both nations insisted the war games weren't meant to intimidate other countries.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, In rural Colombia gunmen dragged a Catholic priest out of a classroom and shot him to death, bringing to 3 the number of clergy killed there this week.
(AP, 8/19/05)
2005 Aug 18, Ecuador’s president said protests have completely halted national oil production despite imposition of emergency rule in 2 Amazon provinces.
(WSJ, 8/19/05, p.A1)
2005 Aug 18, Egyptian police detained Hassan el-Arishi, a suspected mastermind behind the July 23 deadly attacks in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheik.
(AP, 8/19/05)
2005 Aug 18, Pope Benedict XVI began his first foreign trip as pontiff, leaving Rome to take part in the Roman Catholic Church's World Youth Day in Cologne, Germany.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, In India the death toll in an encephalitis outbreak in Uttar Pradesh rose to 90 with more deaths being reported due to the water-born disease.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, In Iraq 4 American soldiers were killed by a roadside bomb in Samarra, 60 miles north of Baghdad. Jasim Waheeb, an investigative judge from Baghdad, was shot to death with his.
(AP, 8/18/05)(SFC, 8/19/05, p.A3)
2005 Aug 18, Israeli forces stormed the synagogue Neve Dekalim to remove about 1,500 protesters inside. This was the main synagogue of the Gaza Strip Jewish settlement and one of the last bastions of resistance to the Gaza pullout.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, The three IRA-linked fugitives who fled convictions in Colombia surrendered to Irish police after eight months on the run.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, In Nicaragua Miskito Indian leaders asked government and human rights investigators to probe allegations that at least 150 of their people were killed under the Sandinistas during the 1980s.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, Nigerian media quoted Pres. Obasanjo as saying police violations "ranged from extra-judicial killings to torture and unlawful detention." He singled out an incident in June in which policemen in the capital, Abuja, allegedly killed six people returning from a night outing after branding them armed robbers. Six policemen were charged in the killings. Among those accused is Danjuma Ibrahim, the second-ranking policeman in the city.
(AP, 8/23/05)
2005 Aug 18, In Pakistan a homemade bomb exploded near a polling station as clashes between supporters of rival candidates in Pakistani municipal elections left 7 dead and 82 injured.
(AP, 8/19/05)
2005 Aug 18, In Peru US Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, seeking to promote stability in Latin America, met with Pres. Alejandro Toledo.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, Saleh Mohammed al-Aoofi, Al-Qaida's leader in Saudi Arabia, was killed along with 5 others during clashes with police in the western city of Medina. Majed Hamed Abdullah al-Haasiri (29), who was No. 14 on a list of 36 most wanted terrorists sought for connection to terror attacks in the kingdom dating back to 2003, was killed in a shootout with police in Riyadh.
(AP, 8/18/05)(AP, 8/27/05)
2005 Aug 18, Western Sahara guerrillas released their last Moroccan prisoners, 404 soldiers held for up to 20 years from a long-ended war over the barren but phosphate-rich region.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, A pride of lions attacked a Japanese woman (50) visiting the Lion and Cheetah Park at Norton, a Zimbabwe wildlife park. She died the next day.
(AP, 8/21/05)
2006 Aug 18, President George W. Bush criticized a federal court ruling the day before that his warrantless wiretapping program was unconstitutional, declaring that opponents "do not understand the nature of the world in which we live."
(AP, 8/18/07)
2006 Aug 18, The US FDA approved a mix of bacteria-killing viruses for spraying on cold cuts, hot dogs and sausages to combat deadly microbes.
(SFC, 8/19/06, p.A4)
2006 Aug 18, Raymond Payne, a former HSBC Bank USA vice president, pleaded guilty in Manhattan federal court to a conspiracy charge over his role in a $30 million telemarketing fraud targeting low-income people with poor credit histories. Prosecutors said First Choice, run by Canadian co-defendants Stephen Clark and Leslie Pinsky, extracted $30 million from people, and transferred the money to the HSBC account. In 2007 Clark was sentenced just over 11 years in prison.
(Reuters, 8/18/06)(Reuters, 6/15/07)
2006 Aug 18, In western Missouri bone fragments from at least two people were found on a three-acre wooded property northeast of Drexel. Michael Lee Shaver Jr. (33) was arrested the next day and charged with murder for a killing in 2001. Shaver claimed that he had killed, dismembered and burned 7 men in his home following drug transactions.
(AP, 8/20/06)(SFC, 8/21/06, p.A3)
2006 Aug 18, In Bristow, Oklahoma, Donald Thompson (59), a former judge convicted of exposing himself while presiding over jury trials, was sentenced to four years in prison and ordered to pay a fine of $40,000.
(SFC, 8/19/06, p.A2)
2006 Aug 18, The Washington Post reported that sprinter Marion Jones had tested positive for the endurance drug EPO at the US Track and Field Championships on June 23. A 2nd test came back negative and cleared the allegations. On October 5, 2007, Jones pleaded guilty to using steroids before the Sydney 2000 Summer Olympics and acknowledged that she had, in fact, lied when she previously denied steroid use. Her sanction required disqualification of all her competitive results obtained after September 1, 2000, and forfeiture of all medals, results, points and prizes. On January 11, 2008, Jones was sentenced to 6 months in jail. She began her sentence on March 7, 2008 and was released on September 5, 2008.
(SFC, 8/19/06, p.A1)(SFC, 9/7/06, p.A1)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marion_Jones)
2006 Aug 18, Ford Motor Co. announced sharp cuts in its North American production that would force it to partially shut down plants in the US and Canada in the fourth quarter.
(AP, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, Boeing took steps toward shutting down production of its C-17 military cargo plane. Production would continue until mid-2009 for the $200 million planes.
(WSJ, 8/19/06, p.A8)
2006 Aug 18, Afghanistan Education Minister Mohammed Hanif Atmar said attacks have closed more than 208 schools, including 144 burned down, in the past year as militants changed tactics to hit soft targets. At least 41 teachers and students have been killed over the past 12 months in a wave of attacks on the country's schools.
(Reuters, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, Anglo-Australian resources giant BHP Billiton closed its operations at the world's biggest copper mine in Chile and ended negotiations with striking workers. The strike began on August 7 at the Escondida Mine, majority owned by BHP. The Chilean government has signaled it was ready to intervene.
(AP, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, The Financial Times reported that Britain has agreed to a multi-billion-dollar defense deal to supply 72 Eurofighter Typhoon aircraft to Saudi Arabia.
(AP, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, In Canada the 16th International AIDS Conference ended in a firestorm with vitriol hurled at G8 countries and South Africa over lapses in the battle against the disease that has claimed 25 million lives.
(Reuters, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, Chile's Supreme Court voted to strip Gen. Augusto Pinochet of immunity from prosecution, allowing him to be tried on corruption charges for his once-secret multimillion dollar overseas bank accounts.
(AP, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, China’s central bank announced its 2nd interest rate hike in 4 months to choke off excess investment. The benchmark lending rate rose .27% to 6.12% effective Aug 19.
(WSJ, 8/19/06, p.A4)
2006 Aug 18, The death toll from Typhoon Saomai, the strongest storm to hit China in more than five decades, jumped to 436 after more than 100 new deaths were confirmed in the country's east.
(AP, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, In southwest Ethiopia search and rescue teams kept up frantic efforts to save thousands marooned by fatal flash floods, where relief workers reported near-total devastation. Some 73,000 people had been affected by raging waters from unusually heavy seasonal rains.
(AFP, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, In Greece a 700-year-old icon, said to have the power to work miracles, was discovered stolen from the cliff-side Elona Monastery. In September police arrested a Romanian national in Crete and recovered the Madonna and Child icon.
(SSFC, 10/8/06, p.A26)(http://tinyurl.com/grxc8)
2006 Aug 18, The United Liberation Front of Asom announced that it would stop attacking the forces of the Indian government, which announced a unilateral cease-fire Aug. 13. It was the first truce announced by the rebel group since its formation in 1979.
(AP, 8/19/06)
2006 Aug 18, In Iraq 7 pilgrims heading to a major Shiite religious gathering were shot dead in a Sunni neighborhood.
(AP, 8/19/06)
2006 Aug 18, Steorn, an Irish company, said it has developed technology that it claims produces free energy. The company said its discovery is based on the interaction of magnetic fields and allows the production of clean, free and constant energy.
(AFP, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, Israeli soldiers killed 3 Palestinian gunmen and wounded 2 others in confrontations in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.
(WSJ, 8/19/06, p.A1)
2006 Aug 18, At least 10 people died and as many as 40 were feared missing when a small boat packed with illegal immigrants sank off Sicily, prompting Italy to call for greater cooperation to fight human trafficking.
(Reuters, 8/19/06)
2006 Aug 18, The Lebanese army reached the country's southern border with Israel for the first time in decades, sending a lone jeep on patrol through Kfar Kila, a battered stronghold of support for Hezbollah militants. At least 845 Lebanese were killed in the 34-day war: 743 civilians, 34 soldiers and 68 Hezbollah. Israel says it killed about 530 guerrillas. On the Israeli side, 157 were killed, 118 soldiers and 39 civilians, many from the 3,970 Hezbollah rockets. The Lebanese government estimated infrastructure damages at $2.5 billion. The Lebanese death toll was later raised to 1200 and economic costs put to some $12 billion.
(AP, 8/18/06)(SFC, 8/19/06, p.C1)(Econ, 11/11/06, p.51)
2006 Aug 18, In Lesotho a 14-nation southern Africa summit closed with a pledge to speed up regional economical integration, even as leaders expressed concern about crisis-plagued member-state Zimbabwe.
(AFP, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, Nigeria’s military launched a crackdown on suspected militants in the oil-rich south as militants released another foreign hostage taken in a spate of kidnappings.
(AP, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, Greenpeace warned a sunken Philippine oil tanker was a pollution timebomb as oil from its punctured tanks destroyed coral reefs and washed up blackened fish on pristine beaches. Oil trapped in the tanks of the Solar I, which went down last week with 500,000 gallons of industrial oil on board, could pour out at any time. To date some 50,000 gallons had leaked into the sea close to the central island of Guimaras.
(AP, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, The UN said more than 41,000 people on Sri Lanka’s Jaffna peninsula, about 10 percent of its population, were believed to have fled their homes and warned that supplies in the area had reached "alarmingly low levels".
(AFP, 8/19/06)
2006 Aug 18, A bus carrying Iranian tourists crashed into a truck in eastern Turkey, killing 18 and injuring 29.
(AP, 8/18/06)
2007 Aug 18, A seven-alarm fire ripped through the former Deutsche Bank next to ground zero in Lower Manhattan, killing two firefighters who were responding to the blaze.
(AP, 8/19/07)(Econ, 9/8/07, p.34)
2007 Aug 18, Michael K. Deaver (69), adviser to President Reagan, died in Bethesda, Md.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2007 Aug 18, Hurricane Dean barreled across the eastern Caribbean and took aim at Hispaniola, Jamaica and Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula, with forecasters saying it could turn into a monster Category 5 storm within 72 hours. Dean claimed at least six lives as it began sweeping past the Dominican Republic and Haiti.
(AP, 8/18/07)
2007 Aug 18, In southern Afghanistan a suicide car bomber detonated near a convoy of private security forces, killing four Afghan guards and 11 civilians, including 3 women and 2 children. Armed assailants abducted a German woman from a restaurant in Kabul.
(AP, 8/18/07)
2007 Aug 18, It was reported that Albanian migrants sent home almost $1 billion a year to support jobless family members and to build homes. New business was said to be discouraged by blackmail and intimidation from existing firms with licenses going to political cronies in the face of a corrupt judiciary.
(Econ, 8/18/07, p.46)
2007 Aug 18, In Britain a man died and six other people were missing after a fire gutted a hotel in the popular seaside resort of Newquay.
(AP, 8/18/07)
2007 Aug 18, Chile’s national poverty line was reported to be $90 per month. The richest tenth of the population garnered 38.6% of the national income.
(Econ, 8/18/07, p.23)
2007 Aug 18, It was reported that China faced a major shortage of skilled talent including doctors with only 4,000 general practitioners. Lawyers numbered about 122,000. An average of 2,200 new pilots per year will be needed to keep up with the growth in air travel. Accountants, technicians and good managers were also reported to be in short supply.
(Econ, 8/18/07, p.59)
2007 Aug 18, UNESCO said a joint mission of several UN agencies is conducting an emergency investigation into the shooting of endangered mountain gorillas in a Democratic Republic of Congo national park. In the last two months, seven of the primates have been killed in separate incidents in the Virunga park.
(AP, 8/19/07)
2007 Aug 18, Two men hijacked a Turkish passenger plane from Cyprus bound for Istanbul, holding several people hostage for more than four hours before surrendering.
(AP, 8/18/07)
2007 Aug 18, Ethiopia freed 32 opposition members who had been detained for post-election violence in 2005.
(AP, 8/18/07)
2007 Aug 18, In Germany 2 Africans were attacked by right-wing extremists in Mainz, the same night as a brutal mob assault on eight Indians in the country's former communist east.
(AFP, 8/25/07)
2007 Aug 18, About 16 mortar shells rained on houses in the Sharqiya residential area in Khalis, a Shiite enclave north of Baghdad, killing at least 7 people. Overnight a series of bombs struck commercial areas in Kirkuk, killing at least four people and wounding 38.
(AP, 8/18/07)
2007 Aug 18, Kazakhs headed to the polls in parliamentary elections seen as a key test of authoritarian Pres. Nursultan Nazarbayev's pledge to boost democracy in this oil-rich nation. Nur Otan, the party of President Nursultan Nazarbayev, won all 98 available seats in the lower parliament. The tally was quickly condemned by the opposition.
(AFP, 8/18/07)(AP, 8/19/07)(Econ, 8/25/07, p.42)
2007 Aug 18, In northern Lebanon gunbattles with Islamic extremists in a Palestinian refugee camp left one soldier dead. Another died of wounds the next day.
(AP, 8/19/07)
2007 Aug 18, In Peru President Alan Garcia called for the orderly distribution of emergency supplies as desperate victims of a magnitude-8 earthquake on the southern coast looted markets and blocked arriving aid trucks. The death toll climbed to 540.
(AP, 8/18/07)(AP, 8/20/07)
2007 Aug 18, In the Philippines 16 troops and dozens of Muslim extremists were killed in clashes between government forces and Al-Qaeda-linked rebels on the southern island of Basilan.
(AP, 8/18/07)
2007 Aug 18, Rival clan militias fought over scarce pasture land and wells in central Somalia, leaving 18 people dead and 15 wounded.
(AP, 8/18/07)
2007 Aug 18, A powerful typhoon slammed into Taiwan, killing at least one person, forcing thousands to evacuate and disrupting power supplies across the already-saturated landscape.
(AP, 8/18/07)
2008 Aug 18, US and Liberian officials said US Peace Corps volunteers will return to Liberia for the first time since civil war broke out in this West African nation nearly two decades ago.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, California’s supreme court barred doctors from denying medical care to gays and lesbians based on religious beliefs.
(WSJ, 8/19/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 18, In eastern Afghanistan a suicide car bomb blew up outside Camp Salerno, a US military base in Khost, killing 12 civilian laborers, as the country marked Independence Day. A mine blew up a police vehicle in the province of Nangarhar and killed two policemen. About 100 insurgents ambushed a group of French paratroopers, killing 10 soldiers in an area outside the capital known as a militant stronghold. An Afghan official said insurgents kidnapped four of the soldiers and later killed them. 13 militants were reported killed [see Oct 15, 2009].
(AFP, 8/18/08)(AP, 8/19/08)(Econ, 8/34/08, p.34)
2008 Aug 18, Argentina announced its first nationwide gay-rights measure: granting same-sex couples the right to claim their deceased partners' pensions.
(AP, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 18, In southeastern Bangladesh chunks of earth loosened by heavy rains buried several hillside thatched huts, killing five people and injuring seven.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, In Britain Philip Thompson (27), a pedophile who acted as a "librarian" for a global Internet child abuse ring, was jailed after one of the biggest undercover police investigations into online abuse.
(Reuters, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, State media reported that Chinese authorities have not approved any of the 77 applications they received from people who wanted to hold protests during the Beijing Olympics.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, In northeast China a gas explosion tore through a coal mine, leaving 24 workers trapped.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, Equatorial Guinea's exiled opposition leader Severo Moto was released from a Spanish jail four months after he was detained for allegedly trying to send weapons to the oil-rich African nation.
(AFP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, In southern Iraq masked gunmen ambushed a bus carrying electoral officials south of Basra, killing two and seriously wounding a third. A suicide bombing killed 7 policemen in Ramadi.
(AP, 8/18/08)(WSJ, 8/19/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 18, Tens of thousands of Muslims waving green and black protest flags gathered in Indian Kashmir's main city for a march to UN offices demanding freedom from India and intervention by the world body.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, The river Kosi, a tributary to the Ganges, burst an embankment on the Nepali side of the border with India and flowed into a channel it had abandoned a century earlier. Water flooded into Bihar state and displaced over 3 million people.
(Econ, 9/6/08, p.51)
2008 Aug 18, Mexican soldiers rescued 25 Central Americans kidnapped in the Gulf coast state of Veracruz. One man was arrested in the raid in Tierra Blanca.
(AP, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 18, Mexico’s Cemex SAB rejected Venezuela’s bid for the company’s assets in Venezuela. At midnight oil workers and Venezuelan soldiers occupied Cemex facilities around the country.
(WSJ, 8/19/08, p.A10)
2008 Aug 18, The leader of Nepal's Maoists, Prachanda, was sworn in as prime minister, finalizing his transformation from warlord to the country's most powerful politician.
(AFP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, Niger's Tuareg rebel leader Aghaly ag Alambo said his fighters would lay down their guns and, together with neighboring Mali's Tuareg rebellion, submit to mediation by Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.
(AP, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 18, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf announced that he will resign, just days ahead of impeachment in parliament over attempts by the US-backed leader to impose authoritarian rule on his turbulent nation.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, Peru's government declared a state of emergency in remote jungle regions where Indian groups are blocking highways and oil and gas installations to protest a law that makes it easier to sell their lands.
(AP, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 18, In the southern Philippines separatists of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) attacked several towns and villages on Mindanao and killed 38 people.
(SFC, 8/19/08, p.A9)(AP, 8/20/08)
2008 Aug 18, Heads of state and other dignitaries from African countries and Turkey started an economic cooperation summit in Istanbul.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, Russia said its military began to withdraw from the conflict zone in Georgia, but left unclear exactly where troops and tanks will operate under the cease-fire that ended days of fighting in the former Soviet republic.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2009 Aug 18, Robert Novak (78), political columnist, died in Washington DC after a battle with brain cancer that was diagnosed in July 2008. He was a conservative, pugilistic debater and proud owner of the "Prince of Darkness" moniker, which he used in his 2007 memoir: "The Prince of Darkness: 50 Years Reporting in Washington." A column of his in 2003 outed Valerie Plame as a CIA agent.
(AP, 8/18/09)
2009 Aug 18, A Taliban suicide bomber attacked a NATO convoy on the outskirts of Kabul, killing 8 people and wounding more than 50, just days before the presidential election that the militant group has vowed to disrupt. A suicide bomber struck the gates of an Afghan army base in the southern Uruzgan province, killing 3 Afghan soldiers and two civilians. Two US soldiers were killed and 3 wounded in a separate blast in eastern Afghanistan.
(AP, 8/18/09)(SFC, 8/19/09, p.A3)
2009 Aug 18, An international claims commission in The Hague awarded Ethiopia slightly more than Eritrea as it settled mutual claims worth hundreds of millions of dollars for death, injury, rape, looting and destruction during their two-year border conflict. This concluded a complex arbitration that was part of the 2000 peace agreement closing out a border conflict that cost tens of thousands of lives.
(AP, 8/19/09)
2009 Aug 18, In Indonesia a dump truck, packed with more than 60 plantation workers and their families, overturned and killing at least 25 with dozens injured. At least three children were among the dead near Sampit town in Central Kalimantan.
(AP, 8/19/09)
2009 Aug 18, Iraqi forces seized a launcher loaded with 13 Iranian-made rockets after an attack the previous day against the US base outside the southern city of Basra.
(AP, 8/18/09)
2009 Aug 18, Israeli government officials said Israel has quietly stopped approving new building projects in the West Bank while publicly still refusing US demands for an official settlement freeze.
(AP, 8/18/09)
2009 Aug 18, In Lebanon 8 members of an al-Qaida-inspired group sawed bars off their cell windows in a high-security prison, scaled down the building using blankets tied together, then stood on each other's shoulders to help one jump over a wall and escape. Prison guards managed to stop the other seven from fleeing. Officials described the escaped prisoner, Taha al-Hajj Suleiman, as a Syrian militant and a "dangerous" member of the Fatah Islam group. Suleiman was caught the next day in the woods just north of the Roumieh prison.
(AP, 8/18/09)(AP, 8/19/09)
2009 Aug 18, In Mexico gunmen shot up the offices of the Siglo de Torreon newspaper in Torreon, Coahuila state.
(SFC, 8/19/09, p.A2)
2009 Aug 18, In Mozambique an overcrowded ferry with 50 people went down off the coast in a northern province. 17 people were feared drowned.
(AP, 8/19/09)
2009 Aug 18, Pakistani government and UN officials said flash floods have killed at least 27 people in the northwest, and that more than 80,000 have seen their homes or crops destroyed.
(AP, 8/18/09)
2009 Aug 18, Russia's President Dmitry Medvedev hosted Israeli counterpart Shimon Peres for talks that were expected to focus on the Middle East and the Iranian nuclear standoff.
(AP, 8/18/09)
2009 Aug 18, Former South Korean Pres. Kim Dae-jung (85) died. He spent years as a dissident under a military dictatorship and later won the Nobel Peace Prize for seeking reconciliation with communist North Korea.
(AP, 8/18/09)
2009 Aug 18, In Sudan clashes between rival militias broke out in the southern oil-rich Unity state, the latest to hit a region still recovering from two decades of civil war.
(AFP, 8/18/09)
2009 Aug 18, In Zimbabwe a truck hit a bus head-on, killing 11 people including six members of a family returning from a funeral.
(AP, 8/19/09)
2010 Aug 18, CIA Director Leon Panetta said the CIA is opening a counterproliferation center to combat the spread of dangerous weapons and technology, a move that comes as Iran is on the verge of fueling up a new nuclear power plant.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange said the US Army has expressed willingness to discuss the online whistleblower's request for help in reviewing classified documents from the Afghan war and removing information that could harm civilians. The Pentagon said it would not negotiate with WikiLeaks to create "a sanitized version" of a second batch of classified Afghan war documents the whistleblower website plans to release.
(AP, 8/18/10)(AFP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, The US FDA said some 380 million eggs have been recalled nationwide due to salmonella contamination. Officials soon confirmed that over 2,000 people had been sickened by salmonella from May to July and over 500m eggs were recalled. The affected eggs were all traced back to two farms in Iowa.
(SFC, 8/19/10, p.C3)(Econ, 9/4/10, p.32)
2010 Aug 18, The North Carolina justice system shook as an audit commissioned by Attorney General Roy Cooper revealed that the State Bureau of Investigation withheld or distorted evidence in more than 200 cases at the expense of potentially innocent men and women. 3 defendants in botched cases have been executed.
(SFC, 8/19/10, p.A6)
2010 Aug 18, In Wisconsin the bodies of a couple, their 13-month-old daughter, and their three dogs were found dead at their home in Superior. Matthew Magdzas (23), an Iraq war veteran, apparently shot and killed his pregnant wife and young daughter before turning the gun on himself. He left behind no clues to explain what might have prompted the bloodshed.
(AP, 8/20/10)
2010 Aug 18, In Afghanistan a suicide bomber rammed a car into a police vehicle, killing a district police chief, two other policemen and a civilian on a bridge leading into Kandahar city. An American service member was killed in fighting in the south. A joint Afghan and NATO force killed 12 insurgents in Puli Alam district of Logar province.
(AP, 8/18/10)(AP, 8/19/10)
2010 Aug 18, Anglo-Australian mining giant BHP Billiton launched an enormous hostile takeover bid for Canada's Potash Corp which values the world's largest fertilizer producer at 40 billion dollars.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, In the Democratic of Republic of Congo 3 Indian UN peacekeepers were killed in a surprise attack on their base by 50 fighters armed with machetes, spears and traditional weapons. The next day Congolese soldiers arrested two suspects in the killing of the Indian peacekeepers.
(Reuters, 8/18/10)(AFP, 8/19/10)
2010 Aug 18, Crowds of Egyptians angered by daily power outages at the height of a scorching summer blocked a major highway south of Cairo with barricades of burning tires.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, In Germany a former Rwandan mayor living in Germany was charged for allegedly organizing massacres and inciting killings during the African country's 1994 genocide. Prosecutors alleged that the former Hutu mayor, identified as Onesphore R. (53), called for pogroms against the Tutsi minority on three occasions. Prosecutors asserted that the man ordered and coordinated three massacres between April 11 and 15, 1994, in which at least 3,730 Tutsis were killed.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, Indian tycoon Anil Ambani's Reliance Broadcast Network Ltd and CBS Studios International announced plans to launch three new television channels in India and South Asia.
(AFP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, In northern India a mudslide triggered by heavy rains demolished a school building, killing at least 18 children.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, Iran took its case against the United States to the UN and strongly condemned the top US military chief for saying military action remains a possibility if the country develops nuclear weapons.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, In Iraq 3 farmers were killed and leaflets pinned to their bodies warning against cooperation with American and Iraqi forces in a brutal act of intimidation as thousands of US troops leave.
(AFP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, Officials with Nigeria's security services say they've intercepted 52 Kalashnikov rifles and tens of thousands of ammunition rounds heading for Kos, an area that has been the scene of religious violence. They said five men were arrested for trying to bring the weapons from neighboring Chad.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, Shell in Nigeria said it has warned it may not meet contractual obligations on Bonny Light crude, after oil thieves sabotaged two pipelines in the country's south.
(AFP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, In Pakistan militants exploiting the flooding chaos clashed with police overnight, as desperately needed international donations for the millions of victims picked up pace three weeks after the deluge began.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, In Peru American activist Lori Berenson, convicted of aiding leftist rebels, surrendered to police after a court struck down a decision granting her parole and ordered her to return to prison, where she is to remain with her 15-month-old son for the time being.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, In the Philippines a packed passenger bus negotiating a downhill curve plunged off a Philippine mountain highway into a 100-foot (30-meter) ravine, killing 41 people.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev offered Pakistan support in dealing with catastrophic floods as he hosted the leaders of Afghanistan, Pakistan and Tajikistan for talks on efforts to stabilize the region.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, In South Africa teachers left their classrooms and trials were postponed after court workers walked out when hundreds of thousands of civil servants went on strike for higher wages across the country.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, In Spain a bull leapt into the packed grandstands of a bullring at the Tafalla arena in the northern region of Navarra and ran amok, charging and trampling spectators and leaving 40 people injured.
(AP, 8/19/10)
2010 Aug 18, Sudan's government confirmed it will expel a number of international aid workers from the restive western region of Darfur, without specifying how many.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, A leading Venezuelan newspaper replaced front-page photos with the word "censored" to protest a court's monthlong ban on the publication of information and photos about violence.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, In Yemen a woman was killed and two police officers wounded when a wanted southern militant fired at a security patrol which was attempting to arrest him in Al-Afar area of the Lahj province. Five policemen were wounded in an explosion when a masked biker hurled a hand grenade through the window of a police station in Zinjibar.
(AFP, 8/19/10)
2011 Aug 18, US federal officials said they have busted a drug trafficking gang in El Cahon, southern California. Many of the 60 suspects were Iraqi Chaldeans suspected of being affiliated with the Chaldean Organized Crime Syndicate based in Detroit, Michigan.
(SFC, 8/19/11, p.A11)
2011 Aug 18, US mortgage rates fell the lowest rate in more than half a century as the average rate for a 30-year fixed loan dropped to 4.15%.
(SFC, 8/19/11, p.D1)
2011 Aug 18, Stock markets around the world plunged as rising signs of a US recession combined with renewed worries over the financial health of Europe's banks. The DJIA closed at 10,990.58, down 419.63.
(AP, 8/18/11)(SFC, 8/19/11, p.D1)
2011 Aug 18, Kansas City, Mo., authorities passed an ordinance that sets curfews as early as 9 p.m. for people under age 18, following the weekend shooting of three teenagers at a large late-night "flash mob" gathering. Three youths aged 13 to 16 were injured by apparently random gunshots at the Country Club Plaza.
(AP, 8/20/11)
2011 Aug 18, Hewlett-Packard said that it would exit the personal computer business.
(SFC, 8/19/11, p.A1)
2011 Aug 18, US researchers reported that the drug, SRT-1720, protects mice from the usual diseases of obesity. The drug is one of a set designed by Sirtris, a small pharmaceutical company in Cambridge, Mass.
(SFC, 8/19/11, p.A13)
2011 Aug 18, In western Afghanistan a roadside bomb killed at least 21 passengers traveling on a minibus. In the east a suicide car bomber attacked a coalition base, killing two Afghan security guards.
(AP, 8/18/11)
2011 Aug 18, Chile officially recognized 9,800 more victims of the Pinochet dictatorship (1973-1990), increasing the total number of people killed, tortured or imprisoned for political reasons to 40,018. Victims, relatives of those killed and survivors were entitled to benefits and compensation.
(AP, 8/18/11)
2011 Aug 18, In China a fight broke out in Beijing between the visiting Georgetown University men's basketball team and the Bayi Rockets, the army's Chinese Basketball Association team, forcing play to end early. Video footage spread on the Internet and worldwide TV news.
(AP, 8/19/11)
2011 Aug 18, Four EU countries (Austria, Netherlands, Slovakia, Slovenia) said they want hundreds of millions of euros in collateral as security for a bailout of Greece. Finland had just struck a deal with Greece for cash collateral on Aug 16.
(SFC, 8/19/11, p.A2)
2011 Aug 18, In Germany 9 cars were torched in Berlin in the third consecutive night of arson attacks that have outraged Germans and drawn condemnation from Chancellor Angela Merkel. Police offered a euro5,000 ($7,180) reward to anyone who helps them find the perpetrators.
(AP, 8/18/11)
2011 Aug 18, In India Anna Hazare, who has been fasting since Aug 16, reached an agreement with police to hold a 15-day demonstration fast starting Aug 19 to push for tough new anti-corruption legislation, after a two-day standoff at a New Delhi jail.
(AP, 8/18/11)
2011 Aug 18, In southern Israel assailants armed with heavy weapons, guns and explosives launched three attacks in quick succession near the border with Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, killing 8 people and wounding about a dozen more. Israeli security forces tracked down some of the assailants and are engaged in an ongoing gunbattle with them. 3 Egyptian security personnel died as a result of the gunbattles. 2 more died from wounds the next day. A 6th died from wounds in September. Israel responded hours after the border attack with an airstrike in Gaza that killed five members of the Palestinian group that Israel said was behind it, an organization known as the Popular Resistance Committees. The dead included the group's leader.
(AP, 8/18/11)(AP, 8/19/11)(AFP, 9/11/11)
2011 Aug 18, Ivory Coast's former strongman Laurent Gbagbo was charged with economic crimes including aggravated theft and embezzlement of public funds.
(AP, 8/18/11)
2011 Aug 18, In Libya 5 loud explosions shook the center of Tripoli, as rebels in the western mountains claimed control of the Zawiya oil refinery. Gadhafi troops were still in control of Gamal Abdel-Nasser Street and were hiding in the hospital there. PM al-Baghdadi Ali al-Mahmoudi said the government was in negotiations with rebels. NATO planes took out five tanks in Zawiya. NATO hit four military facilities in Tripoli.
(AP, 8/18/11)(AP, 8/19/11)
2011 Aug 18, Mexican soldiers killed eight gunmen in a clash in the northern border state of Nuevo Leon. Police in Acapulco reported finding two ice chests, one of which held a man's head and the other containing what appeared to be his leg and right foot. Guerrero state police said three other coolers were found in another part of the city with other body parts. 3 men were found shot to death in Acapulco city buses.
(AP, 8/18/11)
2011 Aug 18, Myanmar's state-run media said the government has officially invited armed ethnic groups to join peace talks for the first time.
(AP, 8/18/11)
2011 Aug 18, In Nigeria attackers shot dead Tafai Saifudeen (55), a Lebanese auto parts dealer, in front of his shop on Murtala Mohammed Way in the city of Kano.
(AP, 8/19/11)
2011 Aug 18, In Pakistan suspected gang members killed 22 mostly Urdu-speaking people in Karachi. Many of the victims were tortured, shot and stuffed in sacks that were dumped on the streets.
(AP, 8/18/11)
2011 Aug 18, The chief of Russia's state arms trader Rosoboronexport, Anatoly Isaikin, said Moscow will keep supplying combat jets and other military gear to Syria under contracts totaling about $3.5 billion (euro2.43 billion).
(AP, 8/19/11)
2011 Aug 18, Russia lost contact with its Express-AM4 communications satellite shortly after its launch, the latest in a series of failures that has dogged the nation's space program. Failure of the upper stage, the Briz-M, resulted in the loss of communications.
(AP, 8/18/11)
2011 Aug 18, In South Sudan 125 people were killed in a cattle raid during which tribesmen stole 2,000 cattle in the country's east. 8 villages were destroyed when warriors from the Murle tribe in Pidor county attacked the Lou-Nuer tribe of Uror county. On Aug 22 the numbers rose to at least 600 people killed and up to 985 people injured in the clashes. The UN later said over 25,000 cows were stolen in the attack.
(AP, 8/21/11)(AFP, 8/22/11)(AFP, 9/28/11)
2011 Aug 18, Spanish authorities arrested Aeromexico co-pilot Ruben Garcia Garcia for attempting to smuggle 93 pounds of cocaine into the European country.
(AP, 8/23/11)
2011 Aug 18, Pope Benedict XVI arrived in Spain for a nearly 4-day visit to celebrate World Youth Day.
(SFC, 8/18/11, p.A2)
2011 Aug 18, Syrian President Bashar Assad told the UN chief that military operations in his country have ended. The EU urged Syria's President Assad to resign amid a mounting crackdown on an anti-government revolt. Activists reported intense shooting around noon in the flashpoint city of Latakia.
(AP, 8/18/11)
2011 Aug 18, In southern Turkey the PKK attacked police and military stations in simultaneous overnight rocket strikes in Siirt province, killing two soldiers and wounding three civilians. Turkey's air force attacked 28 suspected Kurdish rebel targets in northern Iraq, in a second day of cross-border strikes in retaliation for stepped up attacks by the guerrillas.
(AP, 8/19/11)
2011 Aug 18, Vietnam’s government warned that it would no longer tolerate weekly demonstrations that have taken place in Hanoi for the past 10 weekends over disputed territory in the South China Sea.
(AP, 8/21/11)
2012 Aug 18, Philadelphia police Officer Moses Walker (40) was shot to death, while out of uniform, by a suspected street robber near his station.
(SSFC, 8/19/12, p.A12)
2012 Aug 18, Scott McKenzie (73), pop singer born as Philip Blondheim, died at his home in LA. In 1967 he sang “San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair)" with the Mamas and Papas, a song written by John Phillips, leader of the Mamas and the Papas. McKenzie also co-wrote “Kokomo" (1988), a No. 1 hit for the Beach Boys.
(SFC, 8/21/12, p.C3)
2012 Aug 18, In Afghanistan a bomb in a busy market killed four people in the western province of Herat. The director of a prison in Helmand province's Grish district, Mohammad Ismail, died when a bomb attached to his car exploded.
(AP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, In China Yu Wenxia, Miss China, won the Miss World crown for 2012, defeating more than 100 other hopefuls the world's biggest beauty pageant in at a glittering ceremony in Ordos, a Chinese mining city on the edge of the Gobi desert.
(AFP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, In Egypt militants wounded three policemen in the Sinai Peninsula in an ambush of their vehicle with a rocket propelled grenade.
(AFP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, In Indonesia a magnitude-6.3 quake struck near Palu city on Sulawesi Island. At least 6 people were killed.
(AP, 8/20/12)
2012 Aug 18, In northern Iraq gunmen raided two family homes in Mosul, killing six people. Mosul was once an al-Qaida stronghold.
(AP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, In Iraq Maryam Rajavi, president of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, which includes the People's Mujahedeen Organization of Iran (PMOI), said: “As a gesture of goodwill, the residents of Ashraf will commence the 6th convoy of 400 residents from Camp Ashraf to Camp Liberty on August 23."
(AFP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, In Ivory Coast armed men attacked former president Laurent Gbagbo's party headquarters, abducting two people and wounding three. The party blamed the raid on supporters of President Alassane Ouattara. PM Jeannot Kouadio Ahoussou called on the perpetrators of attacks against the army to disarm and not block the country's "revival."
(AFP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, A flotilla of boats carrying Japanese nationalists and lawmakers set sail for islands, known as Senkaku in Japan and as Diaoyu in China, at the heart of a vitriolic diplomatic row with China, despite warnings from Beijing. China demanded that Japan cease actions "harming" its territorial sovereignty.
(AFP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, Lebanese security officials said that five more Syrians were abducted in Beirut's southern suburbs overnight.
(AP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, In Mozambique Southern African leaders slammed Rwanda for supporting rebels in the Democratic Republic of Congo as a threat to regional stability and urged Kigali to immediately stop its "interference." The Southern African Development Community (SADC) mandated a mission to Rwanda to urge them to stop support for the M23.
(AFP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, In Nigeria an ocean surge crashed into waterfront shanties in Lagos, leaving at least one person dead and 15 missing.
(AFP, 8/19/12)
2012 Aug 18, In Pakistan A US drone attack killed at least six militants in a remote tribal town in North Waziristan as local people celebrated the Muslim festival of Eid al-Fitr.
(AFP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, Philippine Interior Secretary Jesse Robredo and his two pilots went missing after their small plane crashed into the sea while attempting an emergency landing in Masbate province. An aide of Robredo made a dramatic escape from the plane.
(AP, 8/19/12)
2012 Aug 18, In southern Russia’s republic of Dagestan, two masked gunmen burst into a Shiite mosque during evening prayers and opened fire, wounding eight people.
(AFP, 8/19/12)
2012 Aug 18, In South Korea 8 people were stabbed by a man wielding a box cutter after a man and woman confronted him for spitting in a train.
(SSFC, 8/19/12, p.A4)
2012 Aug 18, Syrian activists said government troops shelled and carried out air raids at rebel areas across the country, including the southern province of Daraa, the northern region of Aleppo and the suburbs of the capital, Damascus. A Syrian warplane bombed a small town partially controlled by anti-regime fighters near the Turkish border, killing eight people and wounding at least 20.
(AP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, In Vietnam at least 17 people were killed as Typhoon Kai-Tak, now downgraded to a tropical depression, barreled across northern Vietnam bringing high winds and floods to several areas including the capital Hanoi. The typhoon had already left 2 dead in China and 4 dead in the Philippines.
(AFP, 8/18/12)(AFP, 8/19/12)(AFP, 8/20/12)
2012 Aug 18, In Yemen suspected al-Qaida militants attacked a government headquarters, killing 21 people in a bold attack in the country's main southern city of Aden.
(AFP, 8/18/12)(AFP, 8/19/12)
2013 Aug 18, In Redwood City, Ca., the Malibu Grand Prix amusement park closed after 35 years of operation.
(SSFC, 8/18/13, p.C1)
2013 Aug 18, Albert Murray, American jazz critic, poet and novelist, died in Harlem. His books included "The Omni-Americans" (1970), "South to a Very Old Place" (1971), "Train Whistle Guitar" (1974) and "Stomping the Blues" (1976).
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Murray_(writer))(Econ., 8/22/20, p.67)
2013 Aug 18, In Afghanistan 11 members of the Afghan Public Protection Force and 21 insurgents were killed in a two separate gun battles in Farah province.
(AP, 8/19/13)
2013 Aug 18, China’s Xinhua News Agency said 12 deaths reported in Liaoning province. That added to a total of 25 deaths reported earlier in Heilongjiang and Jilin, the other two provinces in China's northeast. In the south, six people were reported were killed by flooding and landslides in Guangdong province.
(AP, 8/18/13)
2013 Aug 18, Egyptian authorities raided homes of Muslim Brotherhood members in an apparent attempt to disrupt the group ahead of mass rallies by supporters of country's ousted president. 36 people were killed when Muslim Brotherhood detainees tried to escape from a prison truck convoy in northern Cairo. The convoy trucks were carrying more than 600 detainees rounded up in earlier street violence between security forces and supporters of ousted President Mohammed Morsi.
(AP, 8/18/13)
2013 Aug 18, In Iraq two separate bomb attacks in commercial areas of predominantly Sunni neighborhoods of Baghdad killed at least 4 civilians.
(AP, 8/18/13)
2013 Aug 18, An Israeli military official said Israeli forces have hit a target inside Syria that was the source of mortar fire into the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. At least three shells had landed near the Syrian frontier the previous evening, causing no injuries.
(AP, 8/18/13)
2013 Aug 18, Libya's Interior Minister Mohammed Khalifa al-Sheikh stepped down in protest against what he saw as interference in his work by PM Ali Zeidan and parliament.
(Reuters, 8/18/13)
2013 Aug 18, Spanish fishermen in some 60 fishing boats protested the building of an artificial reef near the disputed British territory of Gibraltar.
(AP, 8/18/13)
2013 Aug 18, A team of UN chemical weapons experts arrived in Damascus to investigate the possible use of chemical weapons in Syria's civil war.
(Reuters, 8/18/13)
2014 Aug 18, The US Dept. of Agriculture said two parents and one child could expect to spend $245,340 to raise a second child born in 2013 to the age of 17.
(SFC, 8/19/14, p.D1)
2014 Aug 18, Police in South Pasadena, Ca., said they have thwarted a mass shooting plot with the arrest of two teenagers (16 and 17) who were conspiring to kill several staffers and as many fellow students as possible at South Pasadena High School.
(Reuters, 8/18/14)(SFC, 8/20/14, p.A14)
2014 Aug 18, In Missouri police and protesters collided in the streets of Ferguson again late today, a day after Gov. Jay Nixon summoned the National Guard to help restore calm to the St. Louis suburb. The violence left six wounded and led to 31 arrests. A third and final autopsy was performed on Michael Brown (18), shot and killed on Aug 9, for the Justice Department by one of the military's most experienced medical examiners.
(AP, 8/19/14)(AFP, 8/19/14)
2014 Aug 18, In Ohio an estimated 5-8 thousand gallons of fuel oil spilled into the Ohio River from the Duke Energy power plant in New Richmond. A 15-mile section of the river was closed for cleanup.
(SFC, 8/20/14, p.A8)
2014 Aug 18, James Jeffords (80), former US Senator from Vermont, died in DC. In 2001 he declared that he would leave the Republicans and caucus with Democrats. This cost Republicans their control of the Senate.
(SFC, 8/19/14, p.A6)
2014 Aug 18, China's government said it has concluded Mercedes-Benz violated anti-monopoly law and charged excessive prices for parts, adding to a growing number of global automakers snared in an investigation of the industry.
(AP, 8/18/14)
2014 Aug 18, China’s CNOOC discovered a gas field at a depth of about 1,500 meters, about 150 km south of Hainan island. It was unclear whether the discovery would become commercially viable.
(AP, 9/16/14)
2014 Aug 18, In Egypt gunmen shot and killed a policeman on patrol and wounded another in the Nile Delta province of Gharbiya.
(AP, 8/18/14)
2014 Aug 18, In Cairo Israeli and Palestinian negotiators agreed to a 24-hour ceasefire late today.
(AP, 8/19/14)
2014 Aug 18, Indian and Nepalese officials said that flooding and torrential rains have left at least 100 dead in Nepal and 84 dead in India.
(SFC, 8/19/14, p.A5)
2014 Aug 18, Iraqi Kurdish forces said they had recaptured the country's biggest dam from Islamic State militants, although an employee at the site said jihadist fighters still controlled key points on the vulnerable structure.
(Reuters, 8/18/14)
2014 Aug 18, Israeli troops demolished the homes of Hussam Kawasme and Amar Abu Aysha, suspected of the abduction and killing of three Israeli teenagers in the occupied West Bank in June. Kawasme, a 40-year-old resident of the West Bank city of Hebron, was arrested on July 11, but the other two suspects remained at large.
(Reuters, 8/18/14)
2014 Aug 18, Human Rights Watch said it has documented at least 10 cases of unlawful killings and 10 cases of enforced disappearances carried out by the Kenya Anti-Terror Police Unit from last November to June.
(SFC, 8/19/14, p.A2)
2014 Aug 18, In Libya unidentified warplanes bombed militia positions in Tripoli. They were later identified as aircraft based in Egypt and flown by pilots from the UAE.
(Reuters, 8/18/14)(Reuters, 8/19/14)(Econ, 8/30/14, p.44)
2014 Aug 18, Saudi Arabia executed four people from the same family for attempting to smuggle "large quantities" of hashish into the kingdom.
(AP, 8/18/14)
2014 Aug 18, The Syrian authorities and rebels agreed to a truce in the southern Damascus district of Qadam which was a battlefield for more than a year.
(AFP, 8/18/14)
2014 Aug 18, In eastern Ukraine government forces pressed pro-Russian separatists in fighting overnight, encircling the rebel-held town of Horlivka and taking control of smaller settlements. 17 civilians were killed in a rebel attack on a convoy of people on the main road leading to Russia from the besieged rebel-held city of Luhansk.
(Reuters, 8/18/14)(AP, 8/18/14)(Reuters, 8/21/14)
2014 Aug 18, In Yemen tens of thousands of people joined an anti-government rally in Sanaa in response to a call by Shiite rebel commander Abdulmalik al-Huthi.
(AFP, 8/18/14)
2015 Aug 18, In Alaska 3 men were believed buried by a landslide at a construction site in Sitka. Six landslides hit the city following 2.5 inches of rain over the last 24 hours.
(SFC, 8/20/15, p.A7)
2015 Aug 18, Bangladesh authorities arrested three lawyers for funding a newly founded militant group. Sakila Farzana, Hasanuzzaman Liton and Mahfuz Chowdhury Bopon allegedly channeled more than 10 million takas ($129,870) to the Shaheed Hamza Brigade for the new militant group to buy weapons and fund its operation.
(AP, 8/19/15)
2015 Aug 18, In Burundi 4 people were killed in Bujumbura as violence persisted following the controversial re-election of President Pierre Nkurunziza.
(AP, 8/19/15)
2015 Aug 18, China’s Ministry of Public Security said police have arrested 15,000 people on suspicion of cybercrimes as the government tightens its control over the Internet.
(AP, 8/18/15)
2015 Aug 18, The Greek government gazette said reported an agreement to sell to a German company the rights to operate 14 regional airports.
(AP, 8/18/15)
2015 Aug 18, Haitian electoral officials disqualified nine candidates for engaging in violence or inciting chaos during the August 9 parliamentary elections.
(AP, 8/18/15)
2015 Aug 18, In the Indian-controlled portion of Kashmir suspected rebels opened fire at a police post, killing a police constable and a civilian.
(AP, 8/18/15)
2015 Aug 18, In northern Iraq Fadhil Ahmad al-Hayali, also known as Haji Mutaz, was killed in a US air strike. He was IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi's senior deputy and second-in-command of the Islamic State jihadist group.
(AFP, 8/21/15)
2015 Aug 18, Myanmar's parliament voted to again extend martial law for three months in a restive area along the country's border with China, where there have been clashes between the military and an armed ethnic group since February.
(Reuters, 8/18/15)
2015 Aug 18, In the southern Philippines a motorcycle-riding gunman killed Gregorio Ybanez, the publisher of a small newspaper. Colleagues said they suspect his killing could be linked to his other job as a director of an electric cooperative.
(AP, 8/19/15)
2015 Aug 18, Russian police said they had detained an "international criminal gang" that produced contraband cheese worth some $30 million using banned Western ingredients. An unnamed source in law enforcement said that the rennet used by the ring had been imported illegally from countries including Latvia, Lithuania and Poland, which are subject to Russian sanctions.
(AFP, 8/18/15)
2015 Aug 18, Syrian government forces recaptured four northwestern villages as they pounded the area with air strikes in a counter-attack on insurgents threatening strongholds of President Bashar al-Assad.
(Reuters, 8/18/15)
2015 Aug 18, In Syria Islamic State militants beheaded Khaled al-Asaad (81), a leading antiquities scholar who spent most of his life looking after the ancient ruins of Palmyra, then hung his body from a pole in a main square of the historic town and then reportedly cut into pieces.
(AP, 8/19/15)(AFP, 8/23/15)
2015 Aug 18, Six Syrian migrants, including an infant, drowned off the Turkish coast as they tried to reach the Greek island of Kos.
(SFC, 8/19/15, p.A2)
2015 Aug 18, In Turkey Muslim scholars and environmental advocates from about 20 countries called for a global phase-out of greenhouse gas emissions by mid-century.
(AP, 8/18/15)
2015 Aug 18, Uganda told South Sudan's warring factions to put their egos aside and make peace, a day after President Salva Kiir refused to sign a deal to end a 20-month-old conflict.
(Reuters, 8/18/15)
2015 Aug 18, In Yemen warplanes from a Saudi-led coalition hit the Houthi-controlled Red Sea port of Hodeida, destroying cranes and warehouses in the main entry point for aid supplies to the north. Houthi rebels ambushed pro-government forces. Fighting near the Aqaba-Tharaa area left 65 anti-rebel forces dead along with 15 Shiite rebels. In the north a Saudi-led coalition air strike killed 13 teaching staff and four children in Amran province. 5 Huthis were also killed in the strike.
(Reuters, 8/18/15)(SFC, 8/19/15, p.A3)(AFP, 8/20/15)
2016 Aug 18, The US State Department said it released $400 million in cash to Iran under a tribunal settlement only once it was assured that American prisoners had been freed and had boarded a plane. It was the first time the administration has said publicly that it used the payment as leverage to ensure the prisoners were released by Iran.
(Reuters, 8/19/16)
2016 Aug 18, The US Justice Department filed a brief in a Georgia lawsuit that said holding a defendant in jail simply because they can’t afford a fixed bail amount is unconstitutional.
(CSM, 8/21/16)
2016 Aug 18, Uber said it is acquiring Otto, a startup for self-driving trucks co-founded by Anthony Levandowski, a former Google employee. The acquisition cost $680 million.
(https://newsroom.uber.com/rethinking-transportation/)(Econ 5/6/17, p.58)
2016 Aug 18, In southern California weary firefighters battled a raging inferno that was threatening the homes of more than 82,000 people and sent flaming "firenadoes" tearing across the brush. Governor Jerry Brown declared a state of emergency for San Bernardino County, just 60 miles (100 km) east of Los Angeles, where the so-called Bluecut Fire was quickly growing.
(AFP, 8/18/16)
2016 Aug 18, In Afghanistan a mortar attack killed two people and wounded more than 50 in the eastern province of Kunar. The shells struck a market where crowds had gathered to celebrate independence day.
(AP, 8/18/16)
2016 Aug 18, Brazilian cyclist Kleber Ramos and Chinese swimmer Chen Xinyi were disqualified from the Olympic Games for having failed doping tests. Ramos tested positive for the banned blood booster EPO Cera while Chen took the diuretic hydrochlorothiazide.
(AFP, 8/18/16)
2016 Aug 18, Kimia Alizadeh won the first ever Olympic medal by an Iranian woman after claiming taekwondo bronze in Rio.
(AFP, 8/18/16)
2016 Aug 18, Prominent Crimean Tatar activist Ilmi Umerov (59) was incarcerated in a psychiatric hospital in Simferopol to undergo forced sanity testing. He was charged with calling for extremism in the Russian-annexed peninsula. Earlier this month he was forcibly moved from an ordinary hospital where he was receiving treatment for a suspected heart attack.
(AFP, 8/26/16)
2016 Aug 18, Ernst Nolte (93), German historian, died in Berlin. He had set off a dispute among his peers by arguing three decades ago that Nazism was a reaction to an "existential threat" to Germany from the Russian revolution.
(AP, 8/18/16)
2016 Aug 18, In Mauritania thirteen anti-slavery activists, arrested beween June 30 and July 9 for "rebellion and use of violence," were sentenced to between three and 15 years in prison, despite criticism of the case against them by international rights groups. On August 15 they told a court they had been tortured while in custody.
(AFP, 8/15/16)(AFP, 8/19/16)
24,
2016 Aug 18, The New Zealand government launched an inquiry into the contamination of a regional water supply that has left thousands of people sick with vomiting and diarrhoea. The outbreak of campylobacter bacteria, a form of gastroenteritis, has affected around 3,000 people on North Island.
(Reuters, 8/18/16)
2016 Aug 18, Two Palestinian police officers were slain by criminals the West Bank, who were killed the next day in a shootout in Nablus.
(AP, 8/19/16)
2016 Aug 18, Aides said South Sudan's former rebel leader and ex-vice president Riek Machar has left the country following violent clashes last month and is now in a "safe" country in the region.
(AFP, 8/18/16)
2016 Aug 18, Turkey ordered the seizure of the assets of 187 businessmen suspected of links to US-based Islamic preacher Fethullah Gulen, accused by Ankara of masterminding last month's attempted coup. Police detained 10 senior figures of the Revolutionary People's Liberation Party-Front (DHKP-C), a far-left militant group that has in the past targeted Turkish and US interests.
(AFP, 8/18/16)(Reuters, 8/18/16)
2016 Aug 18, In Turkey 3 police officers were killed and 170 people wounded by a car bomb at a police station in the eastern city of Elazig.
(Reuters, 8/18/16)
2016 Aug 18, The United Nations said for the first time that it was involved in the introduction of cholera to Haiti and needs to do "much more" to end the suffering of those affected, estimated at more than 800,000 people.
(AP, 8/19/16)
2016 Aug 18, In northern Vietnam Pham Duy Cuong, head of the Communist Party organization in Yen Bai province and Ngo Ngoc Tuan, chief of the provincial legislature, were shot in their offices by fellow officials Do Cuong Minh, who then shot himself dead.
(AP, 8/18/16)
2016 Aug 18, Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) said it was evacuating its staff from six hospitals in northern Yemen after a Saudi-led coalition air strike hit a health facility operated by the group killing 19 people.
(Reuters, 8/19/16)
2017 Aug 18, US White House Chief of Staff John Kelly and Steve Bannon (63), the chief strategist and key campaign ally of US president Donald Trump, agreed that this would be Bannon’s last day in the Trump administration.
(AFP, 8/19/17)(SFC, 8/19/17, p.A1)
2017 Aug 18, Carl Icahn said in a letter to Trump released today said that he is stepping down to prevent "partisan bickering" about his unofficial role that Democrats suggested could benefit him financially.
(AP, 8/19/17)
2017 Aug 18, In California Nery Israel Estrada Margos (38) entered the lobby of police headquarters in Santa Rosa and said he had assaulted his girlfriend, Veronica Cabrera Ramirez, and thought that she might be dead. Margos had been jailed earlier on suspicion of felony domestic violence, but was released on bail on Aug 3. Margos was subject to deportation to his native Guatemala.
(SFC, 8/31/17, p.A3)
2017 Aug 18, In Florida Everett Miller (45) shot and killed police Officer Matthew Baxter (27) during a scuffle in the downtown area of Kissimmee. Officer Sam Howard (36) was wounded and died of his wounds the next day. Another two officers were shot and wounded in Jacksonville.
(SFC, 8/19/17, p.A6)(SSFC, 8/20/17, p.A9)
2017 Aug 18, In Maryland three young girls were found stabbed to death inside a home in Clinton. Suspect Antonio Williams (24) confessed and faced murder charges.
(SSFC, 8/20/17, p.A9)
2017 Aug 18, Texas authorities said a monthlong sting operation in Houston has led to the arrest of more than 250 sex buyers and traffickers.
(SFC, 8/19/17, p.A5)
2017 Aug 18, NASA launched the 13th and last of its Tracking and Data Relay Satellite network from Cape Canaveral.
(SFC, 8/19/17, p.A5)
2017 Aug 18, The expedition crew of Research Vessel Petrel, owned by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, located the wreckage of the Indianapolis on the floor of the North Pacific Ocean, more than 18,000 feet (5,500 meters) below the surface. The World War II heavy cruiser played a critical role in the atomic bombing of Hiroshima before being struck by Japanese torpedoes in 1945.
(AP, 8/20/17)
2017 Aug 18, In Afghanistan Taliban insurgents attacked a police checkpoint in the southern Helmand province late today, killing five Afghan police.
(AP, 8/19/17)
2017 Aug 18, Australia's widening citizenship crisis entangled a seventh politician, a key independent senator whose support is critical for PM Malcolm Turnbull to pass legislation through a hostile Senate. Senator Nick Xenophon said he may hold dual citizenship, Australian and British, which would make him ineligible to sit in parliament.
(Reuters, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, In northwestern Austria an intense storm ripped through a beer tent, killing two people and injuring at least 40 more.
(Reuters, 8/19/17)
2017 Aug 18, The Turan agency, Azerbaijan’s only independent news agency, said the government has frozen its bank accounts, in a step that could shutter the outlet. Director Mehman Aliyev said the move was part of a criminal probe into an alleged $22,000 (19,000 euros) in unpaid taxes, a charge he said was false.
(AFP, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, Brazilian authorities announced two new phases of their Car Wash operation, ensnaring US asphalt maker Sargeant Marine, six Greek shipping companies and a former Brazilian congressman in the wide-ranging graft probe.
(Reuters, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, Cambridge University Press, one of Britain's most respected academic publishers, said it has blocked online access in China to hundreds of scholarly articles and book reviews on Chinese affairs after coming under pressure from Beijing. On Aug 21 The China Quarterly said the publisher has agreed to restore more than 300 politically sensitive articles that had been removed.
(Reuters, 8/18/17)(SFC, 8/22/17, p.A4)
2017 Aug 18, Sir Bruce Forsyth (b.1928), dancer and star of British TV variety shows, died. Forsyth came to national attention from the mid-1950s through the ITV series Sunday Night at the London Palladium. He went on to host several game shows, including The Generation Game, Play Your Cards Right, The Price Is Right and You Bet!.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Forsyth)(Econ, 8/26/17, p.74)
2017 Aug 18, China launched its first "cyber court" to settle online disputes, as the legal system attempts to keep up with the explosion of mobile payment and e-commerce.
(AFP, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, China's State Council released a document saying the government is moving to curb domestic companies' investments abroad in property, sports, entertainment and other fields, following a series of high-profile, multibillion-dollar acquisitions by Chinese firms.
(AP, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, Furious Chinese businesspeople said that Beijing's decision to enforce UN sanctions on North Korean seafood imports would hobble the economy of the entire northeastern city of Hunchun, sparking a rare public protest earlier this week after the surprise move suddenly choked off border trade.
(AP, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, Police in Finland shot a Moroccan asylum-seeker in the leg after he was suspected of stabbing several people in the western city of Turku. Two women were killed and seven other people wounded. Police over the next hours arrested five people in a Turku apartment overnight in their investigation into the stabbings. The attacker was later identified as Abderrahman Bouanane (18). Police later said he had become radicalized some three months before the attack, and although he acted alone, he thought of himself as an IS fighter.
(AP, 8/18/17)(AP, 8/19/17)(AFP, 8/19/17)(AP, 8/21/17)(AP, 2/7/18)
2017 Aug 18, French police evicted thousands of migrants living on sidewalks in an area of northern Paris. Interior Minister Gerard Collomb said the latest action proved the system for handling migrants is "dysfunctional".
(Reuters, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, The Iraqi military said its forces have moved into positions around the city of Tal Afar, their next objective in the US-backed campaign to defeat Islamic State militants.
(Reuters, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, In Kenya suspected members of Somalia's al Shabaab Islamist group beheaded at least three men overnight in an attack at Maleli village in Lamu county.
(Reuters, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, The forces of Libyan military strongman Khalifa Haftar said they had detained senior commander Mahmoud Mustafa Busayf al-Werfalli two weeks before the International Criminal Court issued a warrant for his arrest over unlawful killings in the flashpoint city of Benghazi.
(AFP, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, Former Malian Islamist police chief Aliou Mahamane Toure, who cut off people's hands as part of a harsh form of Islamic law during an occupation of the north in 2012-13 by jihadi rebels, was handed a 10-year jail term.
(Reuters, 8/19/17)
2017 Aug 18, Nigeria’s government said more than 100 girls who were kidnapped by Boko Haram militants in the town of Chibok in 2014 are ready to return to normal life after being released and receiving psychological and medical treatment.
(Reuters, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, In Romania Corneliu Barladeanu (51), the Bishop of Husi, stepped down at the end of a two-day Holy Synod where a sex scandal was discussed for the first time in its 92-year history. Barladeanu was seen on video engaging in sexual acts with a male student, but maintained his innocence.
(AP, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, Rwandan President Paul Kagame (59) was sworn for a third term in office after a crushing election win that rights groups criticized over irregularities and voter intimidation.
(AFP, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, In Sierra Leone aid workers warned of a humanitarian crisis as the official death toll passed 400, with more than a hundred children among the victims -- and a similar number orphaned.
(AFP, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, South Africa moved to halt an online auction of rhino horn starting next week, as outraged conservationists said the sale would undermine the global ban on rhino trade. The Pretoria High Court was expected to make a decision on Aug 20.
(AFP, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, A South African government source said South Africa is planning to grant diplomatic immunity to Zimbabwe's First Lady Grace Mugabe, allowing her to return to Harare and avoid prosecution for the alleged assault of a 20-year-old model.
(Reuters, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, South Africa grounded an Air Zimbabwe flight at Johannesburg's main international airport after South African authorities concluded it was not in compliance with civil aviation rules.
(AP, 8/19/17)
2017 Aug 18, In South Africa a man walked into a police station, saying he was tired of eating human flesh and produced part of a human leg and a hand. Five people were soon arrested on charges related to cannibalism, including murder and possession of human body parts in KwaZulu-Natal province.
(AP, 8/23/17)(AFP, 9/28/17)
2017 Aug 18, Syria’s state media, a Hezbollah military media unit and a war monitor said the Syrian army and its allies have encircled an Islamic State (IS) pocket in central Syria after a series of advances in the desert region.
(Reuters, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, Venezuela’s newly-created constituent assembly, elected in late July to re-write the crisis-hit country's constitution, said it would supersede congress and pass laws on its own. A group of 12 regional nations plus the United States rejected Venezuela's new government-allied legislative superbody, saying they would continue to regard the opposition-controlled congress as the country's only legitimate law maker.
(Reuters, 8/19/17)
2017 Aug 18, Venezuela's ousted chief prosecutor and her husband, two of President Nicolas Maduro's most outspoken critics, fled the country and landed in Colombia.
(AP, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, Vietnam’s Ministry of Health said 10,000 new infections of dengue fever have been reported over the past week. 24 deaths have been recorded in the latest outbreak that has infected over 90 thousand people.
(SFC, 8/19/17, p.A2)
2017 Aug 18, In Vietnam six people, including four children in a family, were killed when a Vietnam War-era mortar shell they were sawing for scrap metal exploded.
(AP, 8/18/17)
2018 Aug 18, In San Francisco Lance Silva (39) was arrested in connection with the case of Brian Egg (65), who had disappeared in July. A day before Silva's arrest a headless corpse was found at Egg's home at 228 Clara St. DNA testing later identified the body of Brian Egg, found in a slurry of water and household chemicals on Clara St. Egg's hand had also been removed and were missing.
(SFC, 8/28/18, p.A1)(SFC, 9/28/18, p.D4)
2018 Aug 18, In Afghanistan Taliban leader Maulvi Haibatullah said there will be no peace in Afghanistan as long as the foreign "occupation" continues, reiterating the group's position that the 17-year war can only be brought to an end through direct talks with the United States.
(AP, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, Hundreds of people gathered in Buenos Aires to oppose the influence of religion on Argentine politics and encourage people to quit the Roman Catholic Church in the wake of a Senate vote not to legalize some abortions.
(AP, 8/19/18)
2018 Aug 18, Belarus press reported that Pres. Alexander Lukashenko (63) has dismissed the country's prime minister and other top ministers. Lukashenko named Sergei Rumas, the head of the country's Development Bank, as new prime minister. He also named four new deputy prime ministers, as well as new ministers of the economy, communications and industry, among other posts.
(Reuters, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, Brazil's "queer museum," forced to close last year after conservatives attacked it for allegedly promoting pedophilia, blasphemy and bestiality, reopened in the shadow of Rio de Janeiro's iconic Christ the Redeemer statue. A crowdfunding campaign raised more than a million reais ($275,000) allowing it to reopen for a month, with free admission, at the School for Visual Arts in Rio de Janeiro's Parque Lage.
(AFP, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, In northern Brazil a local merchant was robbed and severely beaten in an incident blamed on Venezuelan suspects, in Pacaraima, where an estimated 1,000 immigrants are living on the street. Dozens of locals then attacked the two main immigrant makeshift camps and burned their belongings, leading Venezuelans to cross the border back into their home country. Brazilian federal police, in charge of immigration, estimated that about 500 Venezuelans cross over to Brazil every day.
(AFP, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, British investigators found a "sophisticated" illegal gun factory in Sussex, southern England, and made three arrests as part of an inquiry into the criminal production of firearms.
(Reuters, 8/22/18)
2018 Aug 18, China said it has sacked six senior officials at its food and drug regulator after a safety scandal at vaccine maker Changsheng Biotechnology Co Ltd revealed failings at the government body including inadequate supervision.
(Reuters, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, In China Malaysia's PM Mahathir Mohamad courted Chinese e-commerce investment in his country at the start of his first trip to China since his stunning electoral victory three months ago.
(AP, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, CongoDRC's government said deadly Ebola outbreak has now claimed 49 lives since the start of the month. A day earlier the World Health Organization said it expects more cases.
(AFP, 8/19/18)
2018 Aug 18, Cyprus extradited Seif Eddin Mustafa, an Egyptian man who hijacked a domestic EgyptAir flight in March, 2016, and ordered it to land in Cyprus. He was transferred to Egyptian custody and flown to Egypt after giving up a drawn-out legal fight.
(AP, 8/19/18)
2018 Aug 18, In India thousands of stranded people were waiting for rescue and officials pleaded for more help as relentless monsoon floods battered the southern state of Kerala, where more than 190 have died in a little over a week.
(AP, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, In Indonesia the 18th Asian Games officially opened in Jakarta.
(AP, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, Iran said it would resist the pressures of US sanctions by relying on its natural and human resources, as Washington pushes allies to cut economic ties with Tehran.
(Reuters, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, Iranian police detained human rights lawyer Ghasem Sholeh-Saadi (64) after he appeared outside parliament in an "illegal gathering." A day earlier and on his Instagram account, Sholeh-Saadi posted that he will stage a sit-in protest in front of parliament to demand free elections.
(AP, 8/19/18)
2018 Aug 18, Namibian President Hage Geingob (77), who is hosting a summit of southern African leaders, strongly rejected criticism of Africa by the West saying there was undue pressure on the continent. The two-day Southern African Development Community (SADC) summit ends today.
(AFP, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, Pakistan's cricket star-turned-politician Imran Khan was sworn in as prime minister despite protests by opposition parties, which accuse the security services of intervening on his behalf in last month's elections.
(AP, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, Qatar accused Saudi Arabia of barring its citizens from this year's haj, something Riyadh denies, saying a diplomatic dispute is not stopping Qataris from making the pilgrimage to Mecca. Saudi Arabia has said Qatari pilgrims can arrive on any airline other than Qatar Airways.
(Reuters, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, Kofi Annan (80) of Ghana, a former UN Secretary-General (1997-2006) and Nobel peace laureate (2001), died in Switzerland. He was the first black African to assume the world's top diplomatic post.
(AP, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, Defense experts said Taiwan is responding to China's arms buildup by developing missiles and interceptors of its own that could reduce Beijing's military advantage over the self-ruled island.
(AP, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, Tanzania's ruling party (CCM) said Tanzania is an "independent" country and will not be "intimidated", after the US expressed concern about the conduct of 70 recent by-elections.
(AFP, 8/19/18)
2018 Aug 18, Uncertainty reigned in Venezuela after President Nicolas Maduro unveiled a major economic reform plan aimed at halting the spiraling hyperinflation that has thrown the oil-rich, cash-poor South American country into chaos.
(AFP, 8/18/18)
2019 Aug 18, The US military successfully tested a ground-launched, intermediate-range, nuclear-capable cruise missile. It was exactly the kind of kind of missile that the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces treaty, or INF, had banned before the administration of US Pres. Donald Trump in early August 2019 formally withdrew from the treaty.
(The National Interest, 8/19/19)
2019 Aug 18, In Florida a fatal hit-and-run that killed a 13-year-old boy and a 47-year-old man walking along US 19 early today. A man called the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office after seeing the story on the news saying he did not stop is because he thought he hit a deer.
(Miami Herald, 8/19/19)
2019 Aug 18, Former Louisiana Governor Kathleen Babineaux Blanco (76), whose tenure was dominated by the trauma of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005, died from complications of cancer. Blanco, a Democrat, was the first woman elected to lead the state, serving as governor from 2004 to 2008.
(Reuters, 8/19/19)
2019 Aug 18, London announced that it had ordered the repeal of the European Communities Act, which took Britain into the forerunner to the EU 46 years ago and gives Brussels law supremacy. The order, signed by Brexit Secretary Steve Barclay on Aug. 16, was set to take effect on October 31.
(AFP, 8/17/19)
2019 Aug 18, Cambodia said it is banning online gambling, which helped propel a wave of Chinese investment in casinos in the country, saying that the industry had been used by foreign criminals to extort money.
(Reuters, 8/18/19)
2019 Aug 18, Authorities in Gibraltar said they are rejecting the United States' renewed request that the British overseas territory not release an Iranian supertanker. Gibraltar's government said the ship would be free to go, as US sanctions on Iran had no equivalent in the United Kingdom or the rest of the EU.
(AP, 8/18/19)
2019 Aug 18, In Greece Metropolitan Amvrosios of Kalavryta (81), a fiery conservative Orthodox bishop known for criticizing, often in intemperate terms, those who he believed acted in a "non-Christian" or "non-Greek" way, including gays, migrants and politicians, resigned.
(AP, 8/18/19)
2019 Aug 18, In Hong Kong hundreds of thousands of anti-government protesters joined a mass rally, filling major thoroughfares in heavy rain in the eleventh week of what have been often violent demonstrations in the Asian financial hub.
(Reuters, 8/18/19)
2019 Aug 18, Iceland honored the passing of Okjokull, its first glacier lost to climate change, as scientists warn that some 400 others on the subarctic island risk the same fate.
(AFP, 8/19/19)
2019 Aug 18, Indian authorities reimposed restrictions on movement in major parts of Kashmir's biggest city, Srinagar, after violent overnight clashes between residents and police in which dozens were injured.
(Reuters, 8/18/19)
2019 Aug 18, In Indonesia police fired tear gas into the dormitory before arresting 43 students in Surabaya, East Java.
(Reuters, 8/19/19)
2019 Aug 18, The Iranian supertanker Adrian Darya 1, previously named Grace 1, with $130 million worth of light crude oil that the US suspects is tied to a sanctioned organization, left Gibraltar late today and headed east into the Mediterranean Sea, with its next destination reported to be Greece.
(AP, 8/19/19)
2019 Aug 18, Israeli forces opened fire at a group of Palestinian gunmen overnight as they tried to cross the Gaza border. Palestinian health officials said three of the men were killed.
(Reuters, 8/18/19)
2019 Aug 18, In Romania a patient (38) at a psychiatric hospital beat to death five patients with a drip stand in Sapoca and wounded several more.
(SFC, 8/20/19, p.A2)
2019 Aug 18, Senegalese Jacques Diouf (81), who headed the UN food agency for 18 years, died in France following a long illness.
(AFP, 8/18/19)
2019 Aug 18, Syrian state media and an opposition war monitor said government forces have gained more ground in the country's northwest, almost reaching the western outskirts of Khan Sheikhoun, a major rebel-held town. A car bomb killed one member of a security force and wounded two others in the Kurdish-controlled city of Qamishli.
(AP, 8/18/19)(Reuters, 8/18/19)
2019 Aug 18, In central Turkey Emine Bulut (38) was stabbed in the neck by her former husband at a restaurant in Kirikkale. 18. A video posted on social media reportedly shows her crying: "I don't want to die" as her traumatized daughter shouts: "Mommy, please don't die." On August 23 Turkey's ruling party vowed to tackle violence against women and children.
(AP, 8/23/19)
2019 Aug 18, In western Uganda at least 19 people were killed when a fuel truck exploded after losing control and ramming into three cars. Later today 10 people were killed and four others critically injured when a speeding minivan crashed into a passenger bus on an eastern highway.
(Reuters, 8/19/19)(AP, 8/19/19)
2019 Aug 18, The UN mission in Libya condemned airstrikes by the self-styled Libyan National Army on a militia-run airport west of, Tripoli, saying the facility had no military targets.
(AP, 8/18/19)
2020 Aug 18, President Donald Trump said that he will pardon Susan B. Anthony, a women's suffrage leader arrested for voting in 1872 in violation of laws permitting only men to vote.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, The Republican-led Senate intelligence committee on the Russia investigation concluded that Trump campaign's interactions with Russian intelligence services during the 2016 presidential election posed a “grave" counterintelligence threat as it detailed how associates of the Republican candidate had regular contact with Russians and expected to benefit from the Kremlin's help. Trump immediately denounced the 1,300-page report as “a hoax."
(AP, 8/18/20)(The Daily Beast, 10/5/20)
2020 Aug 18, Several Democratic state attorneys general said they will announce legal action against President Donald Trump's administration over Postal Service changes that may affect mail-in voting in the November US presidential election.
(Reuters, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, Postmaster General Louis DeJoy said that he would suspend cost-cutting measures and operational changes at the Postal Service until after the November election.
(NY Times, 8/19/20)
2020 Aug 18, On Wall Street the S&P 500 index closed at an all-time high at 3389.78. The Nasdaq composite index also made a record close at 11,210.84.
(SFC, 8/19/20, p.C1)
2020 Aug 18, Democrats formally nominated Joe Biden for the presidency on the second night of their national convention, in a virtual roll call vote.
(NY Times, 8/19/20)
2020 Aug 18, The US government sued Israeli drugmaker Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd, accusing the firm of causing the submission of false claims to Medicare by using kickbacks to boost sales of its multiple sclerosis drug Copaxone.
(Reuters, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, The United States and Russia concluded two days of arms control talks with the two sides still at odds over the US demand to include China in any new treaty.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency in response to wildfires in California, as the state battled the effects of a sweltering heat wave, rolling blackouts and the coronavirus pandemic.
(NY Times, 8/19/20)
2020 Aug 18, California to date had 636,833 cases of coronavirus and 11,390 deaths. The SF Bay Area had 74,020 cases and 987 deaths. Total cases nationwide reached over 5,480,487 with the death toll at 171,679.
(sfist.com, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, An independent inquiry reported that for-profit nursing homes in Connecticut had significantly more cases and deaths from COVID-19 than non-profit ones, shedding new light on the shortfalls of the state's pandemic response.
(Reuters, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, US prosecutors alleged that New York attorney Jason Kurland (46), the self-dubbed “Lottery Lawyer," was actually stealing tens of millions of dollars from his clients with the help of three other individuals—including a mafia member—to fund their extravagant lifestyles. The indictment charged Kurland with conspiracy, wire fraud and money laundering.
(https://tinyurl.com/y6bhxl7z)(SFC, 8/20/20, p.A4)
2020 Aug 18, In Oregon protesters lit fires, threw rocks and smashed windows at county government offices in Portland, prompting police to declare a riot, after weeks of mostly peaceful anti-racism demonstrations.
(Reuters, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, South Dakota transportation officials said that this year’s Sturgis Motorcycle Rally drew more than 460,000 vehicles during the 10-day event. The South Dakota Department of Health issued a warning that one person who spent several hours at a bar on Main Street in Sturgis has tested positive for COVID-19 and may have spread it to others. The city plans to conduct mass COVID-19 testing in an effort to catch outbreaks.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, Vanda Pharmaceuticals said COVID-19 patients with pneumonia improved faster when treated with the company's experimental therapy than those on placebo, citing an interim analysis of data from a late-stage study.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, In Belarus more factories joined a growing strike turning up pressure on Pres. Alexander Lukashenko to resign.
(SFC, 8/19/20, p.A2)
2020 Aug 18, Sinopharm chairman Liu Jingzhen said a potential coronavirus vaccine being developed by the unit of China National Pharmaceutical Group could cost no more than 1,000 yuan ($144.27) for two shots.
(Reuters, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, It was reported that Dubai again has loosened laws governing alcohol sales and possession of liquor as the sheikhdom tries to claw its way out of an economic depression worsened by the coronavirus pandemic.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, France's labor ministry announced that face masks will be required in enclosed shared office spaces starting Sept. 1, citing an "upsurge" in COVID-19 cases.
(AP, 8/19/20)
2020 Aug 18, Chancellor Angela Merkel warned there could be no further relaxation of coronavirus restrictions while the country grapples with a surge in new infections. Germany has recorded a total of 225,404 coronavirus cases and 9,236 fatalities.
(AFP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, German authorities arrested a Syrian national (Khaled A.) on suspicion he was a member of two militant groups that fought against the government of President Bashar Assad during the early stages of the conflict in Syria.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, In Germany Sarmad D., an Iraqi man (30), drove his car into motorcycles along a stretch of Berlin highway. Six people were injured, three of them severely in what officials soon called a terror attack.
(AP, 8/19/20)
2020 Aug 18, Ireland's health minister warned that the country is at a "tipping point" in the face of rising coronavirus cases, as the cabinet reintroduced some restrictions on public meetings.
(The Telegraph, 8/19/20)
2020 Aug 18, The Special Tribunal for Lebanon based in the Hague found one of the four members of the Iran-backed militia and political party Hezbollah guilty of the 2005 car bomb assassination of Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri and 21 others. Only Salim Ayyash was found guilty of assassination by truck bomb. The other defendants, Hussein Oneissi, Assad Sabra, and Hassan Merhi were acquitted of a barrage of charges including conspiracy to commit a terrorist attack and international homicide with explosives. A fifth man, Mustafa Badreddine was killed in Syria in 2016, after which charges against him were dropped.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, Rumors of a coup d'etat and of the arrest of Mali's President Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta drew hundreds of anti-government protesters into the streets of the capital, Bamako. President Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta of Mali resigned after the country’s military mutinied, arresting him and other government officials. The West African nation has been gripped by unrest for weeks, driven by charges that Keïta stole an election in March.
(The Telegraph, 8/18/20)(NY Times, 8/19/20)
2020 Aug 18, Sunil Kumar Nandeshwar, the Indian captain of a ship that spilled about 1,000 metric tons of oil into the Indian Ocean, endangering world-renowned coral reefs and lagoons in Mauritius, was arrested alongside the chief officer of the ship, Tilak Ratna Suboda, a Sri Lankan.
(NY Times, 8/19/20)(SSFC, 8/23/20, p.B10)
2020 Aug 18, The Norwegian Refugee Council said that a record one million people are displaced by violence in Burkina Faso amid the COVID-19 outbreak. More than 450,000 people were newly displaced in 2020, with 184 attacks against civilians recorded according to new figures by the Burkinabe Council for Emergency Relief and Rehabilitation.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, Oman's sultan named foreign and finance ministers for the first time, putting officials in positions long wielded by his late predecessor. Sultan Haitham bin Tariq Al Said also issued 28 decrees renaming and reorganizing ministries in a nation he took over in January.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, It was reported that Pakistan's drug regulator has greenlit the country's first Phase 3 clinical trial for a potential COVID-19 vaccine, which is being developed by China's CanSino Biologics (CanSino) and Beijing Institute of Biotechnology.
(Reuters, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, Gaza's sole power plant shut down, leaving the territory's 2 million residents with only around four hours of electricity a day after Israel cut off fuel supplies in response to incendiary balloons launched by Palestinian militants.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, In the Philippines a mild coronavirus lockdown was eased in Jakarta and four outlying provinces to further reopen the country's battered economy. The Philippines has reported more than 164,000 cases including 2,681 deaths.
(SFC, 8/19/20, p.A6)
2020 Aug 18, In Somalia two soldiers were executed after being convicted of raping a 10-year-old boy who died from the bleeding.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, South Africans were again are allowed to buy alcohol and cigarettes as the government relaxed lockdown restrictions introduced to curb the spread of coronavirus.
(BBC, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, A senior UN official warned that war-torn Yemen is sliding toward famine as the coronavirus spreads and its economy implodes — all amid a funding crisis that is forcing the United Nations to make deeper aid cuts, including stopping treatment for 250,000 severely malnourished children.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, A Zimbabwean magistrate barred Beatrice Mtetwa, a top human rights lawyer, from representing jailed journalist Hopewell Chin’ono and ordered that Mtetwa be prosecuted for comments she posted on a Facebook page run by an American filmmaker.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2021 Aug 18, The Biden administration moved on multiple fronts to fight back against the surging Delta variant, strongly recommending booster shots for most vaccinated American adults and using federal leverage to force nursing homes to vaccinate their staffs. President Biden also directed his education secretary to “use all of his authority, and legal action, if appropriate," to deter states from banning universal masking in classrooms.
(NY Times, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, The Biden administration announced that it is banning the use of chlorpyrifos on food. The common pesticide, widely used since 1965 on fruits and vegetables, because it has been linked to neurological damage in children. The new rule will take effect in six months.
(NY Times, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, The US government said it plans to make COVID-19 vaccine booster shots widely available starting on Sept. 20 as infections rise from the coronavirus Delta variant.
(Reuters, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said it is creating a new disease forecasting center to improve the ability to use data to predict and gauge emerging health threats.
(Reuters, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, Total US COVID-19 cases reached over 37,059,718 with the death toll at 623,690.
(sfist.com, 8/19/21)
2021 Aug 18, Doctors reported that blood plasma from COVID-19 survivors didn’t help newly infected patients when tested against a dummy infusion.
(AP, 8/19/21)
2021 Aug 18, The US Justice Department filed a statement of interest in an ongoing lawsuit in Cole County, Missouri, saying the state's Second Amendment Preservation Act, also known as "HB85," should be declared unconstitutional and that the court should issue a injunction barring its enforcement. HB85, which was signed into law in June, purports to nullify various federal firearms laws.
(Reuters, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, It was reported that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has been flying around the state promoting a monoclonal antibody treatment for COVID-19 sold by Regeneron. Ken Griffin, CEO of Citadel, a Chicago-based hedge fund, has donated 10.75 million to a political committee that supports DeSantis. Citadel has $15.9 million shares of Regeneron.
(SFC, 8/19/21, p.A4)
2021 Aug 18, Mississippi opened its 2nd field hospital to treat COVID-19 patients. Only 34% of the state was fully vaccinated.
(Fox News, 8/18/21)(SFC, 8/19/21, p.A4)
2021 Aug 18, A US federal appeals court threw out what it called a "shockingly low" four-year prison term for a Brooklyn woman (26) who admitted to supporting Islamic State, and ordered that she be resentenced. Ceasar was sentenced in June 2019, and has been free since July 2020 after receiving credit for time served.
(AP, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, A US federal appeals court upheld a Texas law banning the most common form of second-trimester abortion.
(NY Times, 8/19/21)
2021 Aug 18, In Utah the bodies of Kylen Schulte (24) and Crystal Turner (38) were discovered by a friend after they’d been missing several days. They’d allegedly told friends and family that a “creepy" man was camping near them in the La Sal mountains. Schulte and Turner reportedly went missing on Aug. 14.
(https://tinyurl.com/55u4hmfz)(The Independent, 8/25/21)
2021 Aug 18, In the latest edition of DC comics' series "Batman: Urban Legends," character Tim Drake, who is the third version of Robin, is seen accepting an offer of a date from a male friend. Robin first appeared as Batman's sidekick in 1940.
(Reuters, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, Cigna Corp said it requires its employees working remotely to be fully vaccinated before entering any US worksite from Sept. 7, as infections from the Delta variant of the coronavirus rise in the country.
(Reuters, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, PayPal Holdings Inc said it will no longer charge customers late fees when they miss payments on buy now, pay later (BNPL) purchases globally, as competition heats up in the fast-growing sector. The changes will be effective from October in the United States, the United Kingdom and France.
(Reuters, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, In Afghanistan Taliban militants attacked protesters in Jalalabad killing at least one person. Taliban fighters reportedly killed the family member of an Afghan journalist working for German's Deutsche Welle.
(SFC, 8/19/21, p.A2)(AP, 8/20/21)
2021 Aug 18, The US evacuated 2,000 people from Kabul in 24 hours, mostly Afghans and NATO personnel. Outside the airport, the Taliban let some Afghans with visas and tickets enter but turned others away. Most of the Afghan central bank’s reserves are frozen at the US Federal Reserve. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) said that it would block Afghanistan’s access to about $460 million in emergency reserves.
(NY Times, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, In Belgium pilot Zara Rutherford (19) took off at the start of a three-month bid to become the youngest woman to fly solo round the world.
(Reuters, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, In northern Burkina Faso suspected Islamic extremists ambushed a convoy killing at least 30 civilians along with 17 soldiers and volunteer defense fighters.
(SFC, 8/19/21, p.A3)
2021 Aug 18, In western Ethiopia gunmen, reportedly from the Oromo Liberation Army (OLA), killed at least 150 people in an attack against local residents.
(Reuters, 8/26/21)
2021 Aug 18, Hong Kong police arrested four members of a university student union for allegedly advocating terrorism by paying tribute to a person who stabbed a police officer and then killed himself.
(AP, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, An Israeli healthcare provider said a third dose of Pfizer/BioNTech's COVID-19 vaccine was found to be 86% effective in people aged over 60.
(AP, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, Italy reported 69 coronavirus-related deaths against 54 the day before. The daily tally of new infections increased to 7,162 from 5,273.
(AP, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, Authorities in Gibraltar said they have seized 2.6 metric tons of cannabis resin with a street value of 15 million euros ($18 million) after a boat carrying the illicit substance rammed a Customs vessel during a high-speed chase at sea. Four men were arrested.
(AP, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, Malta’s attorney general indicted Yorgen Fenech, a leading Maltese businessman, in the murder of investigative journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia nearly four years ago. The murder triggered an international outcry against attempts to silence reporters.
(AP, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, It was reported that Malta has donated 40,000 AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine doses to Libya.
(https://tinyurl.com/xkxfjbw)(SFC, 8/19/21, p.A4)
2021 Aug 18, Workers at a General Motors Co pickup-truck plant in central Mexico voted to scrap their collective contract, opening the door for them to oust one of Mexico's largest labor organizations as their union under a new trade deal.
(Reuters, 8/19/21)
2021 Aug 18, Myanmar reported a total of more than 365,000 coronavirus cases and 13,945 deaths.
(SFC, 8/20/21, p.A5)
2021 Aug 18, The Assistance Association for Politifcal Prisoners said it has confirmed two more deaths in Myanmar bringing the total killed by security forces over the laset six months to 1001.
(SFC, 8/19/21, p.A3)
2021 Aug 18, Norway said it will offer all 16- and 17-year-olds their first COVID-19 vaccine dose after those over 18 are fully vaccinated.
(Reuters, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, Defense Minister Mariusz Blaszczak Poland has deployed hundreds of troops and is laying barbed wire along its border with Belarus to stop the arrival of migrants seeking to enter the country.
(AP, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, Syrian air defense units reportedly downed 22 of the 24 missiles launched by the Israeli warplanes with Russia-supplied air defense systems Pantsyr-S and Buk-M2. Six Israeli fighter jets had targeted facilities in the provinces of Damascus and Homs from Lebanon's airspace.
(AP, 8/20/21)
2021 Aug 18, Turkey-backed Syrian forces and Syrian Kurdish fighters shelled one another’s positions in northern Syria, leaving at least five people dead and more than a dozen wounded.
(AP, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, It was reported that Uganda is to take in 2,000 Afghan refugees.
(BBC, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, World Health Organization officials said circulation of the Delta variant in areas of low vaccination is driving transmission of COVID-19 around the world.
(Reuters, 8/18/21)
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For Asia History: https://www.asiaobserver.org/category/news/on-this-day-in-asian-history
472 Aug 18, Flavius Ricimer, general of the Western Roman Empire, kingmaker, was born.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1227 Aug 18, Genghis Khan (Chinggis), Mongol conqueror, died in his sleep at his camp, during his siege of Ningxia, the capital of the rebellious Chinese kingdom of Xi Xia. Subotai was one of Genghis Khan's ablest lieutenants, and went on to distinguish himself after the khan's death. In Khan's lifetime he and his warriors had conquered the majority of the civilized world, ruling an empire that stretched from Poland down to Iran in the west, and from Russia's Arctic shores down to Vietnam in the east. Russian archaeologist Peter Kozloff uncovered the tomb of Genghis Khan in the Gobi Desert in 1927. In 2006 Zhu Yaoting, a Beijing academic, authored a biography of Genghis Khan.
(AP, 8/18/97)(HN, 10/29/98)(Econ, 12/23/06, p.61)
1503 Aug 18, Pope Alexander VI (1492-1503), born in Spain as Rodrigo di Borgia (1431), died. He had recently authorized the building of a prison in the cellars of Castel Sant’Angelo in Rome.
(PTA, p.424)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Alexander_VI)(SSFC, 7/22/07, p.G2)
1564 Aug 18, Spanish king Philip II joined the Council of Trent.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1587 Aug 18, In the Roanoke Island colony, Ellinor and Ananias Dare became parents of a baby girl whom they name Virginia Dare, the first English child born on what is now Roanoke Island, N.C., then considered Walter Raleigh’s second settlement in Roanoke, Virginia. Virginia Dare, born to the daughter of John White, became the first child of English parents to be born on American soil. However, the colony she was born into ended up mysteriously disappearing.
(HN, 8/18/98)(PC, 1992, p.203)(AP, 8/18/07)
1588 Aug 18, A storm struck the remaining 60 ships of the Spanish Armada under the Duke of Medina Sidonia after which only 11 were left. Many of the ships went to Ireland where most of the Spaniards were killed by the English.
(ON, 3/02, p.6)
1674 Aug 18, Jean Racine's "Iphigenie," premiered in Versailles.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1698 Aug 18, After invading Denmark and capturing Sweden, Charles XII of Sweden forced Frederick IV of Denmark to sign the Peace of Travendal.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1735 Aug 18, The Evening Post began publishing in Boston, Mass.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1750 Aug 18, Antonio Salieri (d.1825), Italian composer (Tatare), was born.
(WSJ, 1/14/04, p.D10)(MC, 8/18/02)
1759 Aug 18, The French fleet was destroyed by the British under "Old Dreadnought" Boscawen at the battle of Lagos Bay.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1769 Aug 18, Gunpowder in Brescia, Italy, church exploded and some 3,000 were killed.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1774 Aug 18, Meriwether Lewis, American explorer, was born in Charlottesville, VA. He led the Corps of Discovery with William Clark.
(HN, 8/18/00)(MC, 8/18/02)
1782 Aug 18, Poet and artist William Blake married Catherine Sophia Boucher.
(HN, 8/18/00)
1792 Aug 18, Lord John Russel, Prime Minister of England from 1846 to 1852 and 1865 to 1866, was born.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1807 Aug 18, Charles Francis Adams (d.1886), U.S. diplomat and public official whose father was John Quincy Adams, was born.
(AHD, 1971, p.14)(HN, 8/18/98)
1807 Aug 18, Robert Stevenson (1772-1850) began work on the 117-foot Bell Rock lighthouse at the mouth of Scotland’s Firth of Forth based on a proposal he submitted in 1800. The lighthouse began operating on Feb 1, 1811.
(ON, 5/06, p.6)
1812 Aug 18, Returning from a cruise into Canadian waters Captain Isaac Hull's USS Constitution of the fledgling U.S. Navy encountered British Captain Richard Dacre's HMS Guerriere about 750 miles out of Boston. After a frenzied 55-minute battle that left 101 dead, Guerriere rolled helplessly in the water, smashed beyond salvage. Dacre struck his colors and surrendered to Hull's boarding party. In contrast, Constitution suffered little damage and only 14 casualties. The fight's outcome shocked the British Admiralty while it heartened America through the dark days of the War of 1812. [see Aug 19]
(HNPD, 8/18/98)
1817 Aug 18, Gloucester, Mass., newspapers told of a wild sea serpent seen offshore.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1834 Aug 18, Mt. Vesuvius erupted.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1835 Aug 18, The last Potawatomi Indians left Chicago.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1838 Aug 18, Six US Navy ships departed Hampton Roads, Va., led by Lt. Charles Wilkes on a 3-year mission called the US South Seas Exploring Expedition, the "U.S. Ex. Ex." The mission proved Antarctica to be a continent. Wilkes was tried in a military court for abuses of power, but was generally acquitted. In 2003 Nathaniel Philbrick authored "Sea of Glory," an account of the expedition.
(Econ, 11/8/03, p.80)(WSJ, 11/12/03, p.D12)(www.sil.si.edu/DigitalCollections/usexex/)
1846 Aug 18, U.S. forces led by Gen. Stephen W. Kearney captured Santa Fe, N.M.
(AP, 8/18/97)
1849 Aug 18, Benjamin Louis Paul Godard, composer, was born in Paris.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1850 Aug 18, Honore de Balzac (b.1799), French novelist, died at age 51.
(WUD, 1994, p.115)(MC, 8/18/02)
1856 Aug 18, In SF thousands of armed men paraded through the streets and then formally dissolved the second Committee of Vigilance. They had run SF for nearly 4 months much to the distress of Mayor James Van Ness and militia officer William T. Sherman.
(SFC, 8/18/06, p.B1)
1862 Aug 18, Confederate General J.E.B. Stuart’s headquarters was raided by Union troops of the 5th New York and 1st Michigan cavalries.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1862 Aug 18, A Sioux Uprising began uprising in Minnesota. It resulted in more than 800 white settlers dead and 38 Sioux Indians condemned and hanged. The Minnesota Uprising began when four young Sioux murdered five white settlers at Acton. The Santee Sioux, who lived on a long, narrow reservation on the south side of the Minnesota River, were reacting to broken government promises and corrupt Indian agents. a military court sentenced 303 Sioux to die, but President Abraham Lincoln reduced the list. The 38 hangings took place on December 26, 1862, in Mankato, Minn.
(MC, 8/18/02)(HNQ, 1/4/00)
1864 Aug 18, Union General William T. Sherman sent General Judson Kilpatrick to raid Confederate lines of communication outside Atlanta. The raid was unsuccessful. Union General William Sherman considered Judson Kilpatrick, his cavalry chief, 'a hell of a damn fool.'
(HN, 8/18/98)
1864 Aug 18, Day 1 of 3 day Petersburg Campaign-Battle of Weldon Railroad, Va.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1870 Aug 18, Prussian forces defeated the French at the Battle of Gravelotte during the Franco-Prussian War. French Commander Bazaine's efforts to break his soldiers through the German lines were bloodily defeated at Mars-la-Tour and Gravelotte. The Prussians advanced on Chalons.
(HN, 8/18/98)(www.marxists.org/history/france/paris-commune/timeline.htm)
1873 Aug 18, Leo Slezak, Austria tenor, actor (Othello), was born.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1873 Aug 18, Otto Harbach, songwriter (Smoke Gets in Your Eyes), was born in, SLC, Utah.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1894 Aug 18, US Congress established the Bureau of Immigration.
(AP, 8/18/97)
1896 Aug 18, Adolph Ochs (39) took over the New York Times. He served as publisher until 1935.
(HN, 8/18/00)(SFC, 4/6/01, p.D3)
1896 Aug 18, The northern California Mount Tamalpais and Muir Woods railroad was completed. It was 8 ½ miles long. The Mount Tamalpais Scenic Railroad attracted visitors to what later became known as Stinson Beach. The railway continued operating to 1930.
(SFC, 8/17/96, p.A17)(SFC, 11/27/07, p.A13)(SFC, 2/24/09, p.B1)
1904 Aug 18, [Francis] Max Factor (d.1996), cosmetics manufacturer (Max Factor), was born. His father, Max Factor (d.1938), was born in Lodz, Russia, in 1877 and came to the US with his family in 1902.
(MC, 8/18/02)(Internet)
1908 Aug 18, Edgar Faure (d.1988), thriller writer, PM of France (1952, 52-56), was born.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1911 Aug 18, Britain’s Parliament Act of 1911 was given Royal Assent. It asserted the supremacy of the House of Commons by limiting the legislation-blocking powers of the House of Lords (the suspensory veto).
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parliament_Acts_1911_and_1949)(Econ, 3/3/12, p.68)
1914 Aug 18, President Wilson issued his Proclamation of Neutrality, aimed at keeping the United States out of World War I.
(AP, 8/18/97)
1914 Aug 18, Germany declared war on Russia.
(HN, 8/18/00)
1918 Aug 18, Elsa Morante, Italian writer and author of "History: A Novel," was born.
(HN, 8/18/00)
1919 Aug 18, Anti-Cigarette League of America formed in Chicago, Illinois.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1920 Aug 18, Tennessee became the 36th state to ratify the 19th Amendment to the Constitution, which guaranteed the right of all American women to vote. This completed the three-quarters necessary to put the amendment into effect. Aaron Sargent, who wrote the 19th amendment, also built Grandmere's Inn in Nevada City. Carrie Chapman Catt, founder of the League of Women Voters, played a crucial role in its passage. She also held some very racist views: she called the ballots of proletarian voters "undesirable" and referred to Indians as "savages." [see Aug 26, 1920]
(SFC, 4/14/96, T-3)(SFC, 6/9/96, p.B-11)(AP, 8/18/97)(HN, 8/18/01)
1922 Aug 18, Shelly Winters, actress who won an Academy Award for The Diary of Anne Frank, was born.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1923 Aug 18, Jimmy Witherspoon, blues singer, was born.
(HN, 8/18/00)
1927 Aug 18, Rosalynn Smith Carter, 1st lady (1977-1981), was born in Plains, Georgia.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1929 Aug 18, The first cross-country women's air derby began. Louise McPhetride Thaden won first prize in the heavier-plane division, while Phoebe Fairgrave Omlie finished first in the lighter-plane category.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1930 Aug 18, Eastern Airlines began passenger service.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1932 Aug 18, Luc Montagnier, virologist, was born. He discovered the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV).
(HN, 8/18/00)
1932 Aug 18, Auguste Piccard and Max Cosijns reached 16,201m in a balloon.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1933 Aug 18, Roman Polanski, Polish film director best known for Rosemary's Baby and Chinatown, was born.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1934 Aug 18, Vincent Bugliosi, attorney, author (Helter-Skelter), was born in Hibbing, Minn.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1936 Aug 18, Federico Garcia Lorca was shot and killed by a Francoist squad on the outskirts of Grenada and buried in an unmarked grave along with 3 other prisoners. His dramatic works included "Blood Wedding," "Yerma," Dona Rosita the Spinster," and "The House of Bernarda Alba." In 1998 the biography "Lorca: A Dream of Life" by Leslie Stainton was published in London.
(MT, Spg. ‘99, p.3)
1937 Aug 18, Robert Redford, actor (Sting, Candidate, Natural, Great Gatsby), was born in Calif.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1938 Aug 18, President Roosevelt and Canadian PM William Lyon Mackenzie King dedicated the Thousand Islands Bridge connecting the United States and Canada.
(AP, 8/18/07)
1940 Aug 18, Walter Chrysler (b.1875), the founder of Chrysler Corporation, died. He was a locomotive mechanic who founded Chrysler in 1924 with money and experience gained as general manager of Buick and executive VP of GM. He oversaw the purchase of Dodge Brothers, which was much bigger than Chrysler at the time. In 2000 Vincent Curcio authored "Chrysler: The Life and Times of an Automotive Genius."
(WSJ, 6/19/96, Adv. Supl)(HNQ, 8/21/99)(WSJ, 8/10/00, p.A16)
1940 Aug 18, The Duke of Windsor (1894-1972), was installed as Governor of the Bahamas. He had served as Britain’s King Edward VIII in 1936. Edward continued as governor of the Bahamas to 1945.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_VIII)
1940 Aug 18, 71 German aircraft were shot down above England.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1941 Aug 18, The concentration camp at Amersfoort, Netherlands, opened.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1942 Aug 18, Carlson's Raiders landed on Makin (Kiribati) in the Gilbert islands and killed 350 Japanese. [see Aug 17]
(MC, 8/18/02)
1942 Aug 18, Japan sent a crack army to Guadalcanal to repulse the U.S. Marines fighting there.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1943 Aug 18, The Royal Air Force Bomber Command completed the first major strike against the German missile development facility at Peenemunde.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1943 Aug 18, Final convoy of Jews from Salonika, Greece, arrived at Auschwitz.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1943 Aug 18, The Heinkel-111 of Otto Skorzeny, Waffen SS commander, was shot down at Sardinia.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1943 Aug 18, Hans Jeschonnek, German air force general, chief-staff, committed suicide.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1943 Aug 18, Shukri Kouatly was elected president of Syria.
(http://tinyurl.com/m6qhfyp)
1945 Aug 18, Subhas Chandra Bose (b.1897), a leader of the Indian Independence Movement, died after his overloaded Japanese plane crashed in Japanese-occupied Formosa. He had led some 40,000 soldiers against the British during WWII as an ally of Hitler and imperial Japan.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subhas_Chandra_Bose)(Econ, 5/23/09, p.92)(Econ, 12/20/14, p.57)
1945 Aug 18, Indonesia adopted a new Constitution. It was later described as a “dictator’s dream." This Constitution (usually referred to by the Indonesian acronym UUD'45) remained in force until it was replaced by the Federal Constitution on December 27, 1949.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constitution_of_Indonesia)(Econ, 6/21/14, p.40)
1947 Aug 18, The Hewlett-Packard Company was incorporated and reported revenues of $1.5 million. The 111 employees recorded sales of $679,000. In 2007 Michael S. Malone authored “Bill & Dave: How Hewlett and Packard Built the World’s Greatest Company."
(SFC, 3/3/99, p.A11)(SFC, 1/13/01, p.A15)(SSFC, 4/22/07, p.M3)
1947 Aug 18, Naval torpedo and mine factory exploded at Cadiz, Spain, killing 300.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1949 Aug 18, China’s Mao Zedong published an essay titled “Farewell, Leighton Stewart!" Stewart, China’s American ambassador, was leaving amid escalating tension with the nearly victorious Communist Party.
(Econ, 3/8/14, p.47)
1951 Aug 18, The 1st transcontinental wireless phone call was made from SF to NYC by Mark Sullivan, president of PT&T, and H.T. Killingworth of AT&T.
(SFC, 8/17/01, p.WB6)
1952 Aug 18, Chile, Ecuador and Peru signed the Declaration on the Maritime Zone. On Jan 27 the Int’l. Court of Justice ruled on the sea border between Chile and Peru. It confirmed Chile’s hold over inshore waters rich in fish.
(http://tinyurl.com/nx4o9uz)(Econ, 2/1/14, p.30)
1954 Aug 18, Assistant Secretary of Labor James E. Wilkins became the first black to attend a meeting of a president's Cabinet as he sat in for Labor Secretary James P. Mitchell.
(AP, 8/18/97)
1955 Aug 18, South Sudanese openly open fire and told the government in Khartoum that enough is enough. Southern Sudanese were transported in thousands to Port Sudan to dig salt for the survival of the northern government. Regions in South Sudan come together to give support to Torit mutineers. The Torit mutiny resulted into the Anya-nya I war that ended with the Addis Ababa Agreement in 1972.
(www.sudantribune.com/18-August-1955-South-Sudan-heroes,23627)
1956 Aug 18, Elvis Presley's "Hound Dog" and "Don't Be Cruel" reached #1.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1958 Aug 18, The 1st US edition of the novel "Lolita" by Vladimir Nabokov was published by Putnam. The 1st French edition was in 1955.
(WSJ, 3/20/97, p.A14)(www.loa.org/volume.jsp?RequestID=9§ion=notes)
1958 Aug 18, An American TV game show scandal investigation started.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1958 Aug 18, Fidel Castro made a speech on Cuban pirate radio Rebelde.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1959 Aug 18, A magnitude 7.3 quake near Hebgen Lake, Montana, just west of Yellowstone National Park triggered a landslide that killed 28 people.
(http://earthquake.usgs.gov/regional/states/events/1959_08_18.php)
1960 Aug 18, Enovid 10, the 1st commercial oral contraceptive, debuted in Skokie, Ill.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1960 Aug 18, Beatles gave their 1st public performance at Kaiser Keller in Hamburg.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1961 Aug 18, Learned Hand (b.1872), Chief judge of US court of Appeals, died. In 1994 Stanford Prof. Gerald Gunther (d.2002) authored the biography "Learned Hand, the Man and the Judge."
(AP, 12/13/97)(SFC, 8/2/02, p.A27)
1962 Aug 18, Peter, Paul and Mary released their 1st hit "If I Had a Hammer."
(MC, 8/18/02)
1962 Aug 18, Pres. J.F. Kennedy led the official groundbreaking ceremonies for the San Luis Joint-Use Complex, Ca. In 1961 the state and feds had agreed to the project which required the B.F. Sisk San Luis Dam for storage of flows pumped from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. The Sisk Dam was named after Congressman B.F. Sisk of Fresno.
(CDWR, brochure)
1962 Aug 18, In Iran brothers, Ahmad and Mahmoud Khayami founded "Iran National" to manufacture cars. After the 1979 Islamic Revolution it became known as Iran Khodro. Their later Paykan design was based on the 1967 Hillman Hunter, which was originally designed and manufactured by the British Rootes Group. Mahmoud Khayami is also known for starting the Kourosh Department Stores: the first large retail chain stores of Iran, not unlike their American counterparts Sears and Kmart.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmoud_Khayami)
1963 Aug 18, James Meredith became the first black to graduate from the University of Mississippi.
(AP, 8/18/97)(HN, 8/18/98)
1964 Aug 18, South Africa was banned from Olympic Games because of apartheid policies.
(MC, 8/18/02)
1965 Aug 18, Operation Starlite marked the beginning of major U.S. ground combat operations in Vietnam.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1966 Aug 18, Australians bloodily repulsed a Viet Cong attack at Long Tan, South Vietnam.
(HN, 8/18/98)
1969 Aug 18, Two concert goers died at the Woodstock Music and Art Fair in Bethel, New York, one from an overdose of heroin, the other from a burst appendix. The Woodstock Music and Art Fair ended in Sullivan County, NY, with a mid-morning set performed by Jimi Hendrix.
(HN, 8/18/99)(AP, 8/18/07)
1971 Aug 18, Joel David Kaplan (44), a NY businessman and Carlos Antonio Contreras Castro, a Venezuelan counterfeiter, escaped by helicopter from Mexico’s Santa Maria Acatitla Federal Prison. Vasilios Basil Choulos (d.2003), SF lawyer, plotted out the helicopter jailbreak. Kaplan was allegedly framed and serving 28 years for murder in the Mexican prison. The successful break led to the 1973 book "Ten-Second Jailbreak" and the 1975 film "Breakout."
(SFC, 1/21/02, p.A21)(www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,909935,00.html)
1971 Aug 18, In Germany a twin-engine Boeing CH-47A Chinook exploded in mid-air before plunging about (180 meters) 600 feet to the ground. The helicopter's crew of four and 33 members of the 56th Artillery Brigade died in the crash in Pegnitz, Bavaria. This was the worst training accident involving American troops in West Germany since the end of World War II.
(AP, 8/18/21)
1973 Aug 18, Gene Krupa (1909-1973), drummer, played for the final time with Benny Goodman Quartet.
(www.drummerman.net/)
1976 Aug 18, Two U.S. Army officers were killed in Korea's demilitarized zone as a group of North Korean soldiers wielding axes and metal pikes attacked U.S. and South Korean soldiers. Major Arthur G. Bonifas was attacked and beaten to death by North Korean soldiers as he attempted to cut down a poplar tree in the DMZ.
(SFEC, 6/25/00, p.T8)(AP, 8/18/02)
1977 Aug 18, In South Africa Steve Biko and Peter Jones were picked up by police at Grahamstown. They were arrested at a police roadblock under the Terrorism Act No 83 of 1967. Biko suffered a major head injury while in police custody, was chained to a window grille for a day and died on Sep 12.
(WSJ, 2/6/97, p.A9)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Biko)
1979 Aug 18, In Los Angeles singer Nick Lowe married singer Carlene Carter, the stepdaughter of Johnny Cash.
(http://tinyurl.com/2s4gxj)
1979 Aug 18, Iran Ayatollah Khomeini sent the army to attack and occupy Paveh, Sanandaj and Saghez. Having defeated the Kurds in the cities, he appointed Khalkhali, as head of security for Kurdistan, who proceeded with a series of summary trials and executions.
(www.sarbazan.com/Massacre.asp)
1979 Aug 18, USSR performed a nuclear test at Eastern Kazakh, Semipalitinsk, USSR.
(www.iss.niiit.ru/ksenia/catal_nt/3_8.htm)
1981 Aug 18, Anita Loos (b.1888), American writer, died. Her novels included “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes" (1925). It was made into eponymous films in 1928 and 1953. Loos started writing scenarios for D. W. Griffith while in her teens, and eventually worked on over sixty films.
(WSJ, 6/24/06, p.P13)(http://imdb.com/name/nm0002616/)
1982 Aug 18, For the first time, volume on the New York Stock exchange topped the $100 million level as 132.69 million shares were traded.
(AP, 8/18/02)
1983 Aug 18, Hurricane Alicia slammed into the Texas coast, leaving 21 dead and causing more than $1 billion damage.
(AP, 8/18/08)
1983 Aug 18, Samantha Druce earned a place in the Guinness Book of Records as the youngest person to swim the English Channel. She completed the crossing in 15 hours 26 minutes at the age of 12 years 118 days.
(http://tinyurl.com/6kgow4)
1983 Aug 18, Nikolaus Pevsner (b.1902, German-born British architectural researcher, died. His work included the 46 volume series “The Buildings of England" (1951-1974).
(Econ, 11/5/11, p.103)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikolaus_Pevsner)
1984 Aug 18, A Triangle Oil Corp. above-ground storage tank at Jacksonville, Fla., spilled 2.5 million gallons of oil and burned after lightning sparked a fire.
(www.jacksonvillefiremuseum.com/history_1951.html)(http://tinyurl.com/2pwmtm)
1985 Aug 18, In San Francisco George Bender (32) and brother Columbus Bender (33) stole over $65,000 in quarters from a Brink’s offices at 970 Illinois Street. They were caught after carrying $3,400 in quarters from a Reno casino, saying they had made a killing at the MGM Grand Hotel. A year later they were sentenced to 4 years in jail.
(SSFC, 10/16/11, DB p.42)
1985 Aug 18, Peter and Barbara Pan were found in their blood-soaked bed in Lake Merced, a housing development in San Francisco. Both had been shot in the head. Peter Pan (66), an accountant, was pronounced dead at the scene. Mrs. Pan (64) survived but would be an invalid for the rest of her life. Scrawled on the wall in lipstick were an inverted pentagram and the words "Jack the Knife." The murder was later attributed to Richard Ramirez, the “night stalker."
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Ramirez#Peter_and_Barbara_Pan)(SSFC, 8/22/10, DB p.42)
1987 Aug 18, American journalist Charles Glass escaped his kidnappers in Beirut after 62 days in captivity. Glass had been abducted June 17 with two Lebanese, who were released after a week.
(AP, 8/18/97)
1988 Aug 18, Indiana Sen. Dan Quayle was nominated to be George Bush's running mate during the Republican convention in New Orleans; meanwhile, questions were being raised about Quayle's service in the Indiana National Guard during the Vietnam War.
(AP, 8/18/98)
1988 Aug 18, Frederick Ashton (b.1904), Ecuador-born dancer and choreographer, died in England.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_Ashton)
1988 Aug 18, Hamas published a manifesto calling for a holy war to create an Islamic state from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, including Israel. It challenged the PLO's claim as the sole representative of the Palestinian people. The Hamas founding charter declared that all Palestine is Islamic trust land, can never be surrendered to non-Muslims and is an integral part of Muslim world.
(SFC, 3/23/04, p.A11)(www.mideastweb.org/hamashistory.htm)
1989 Aug 18, The US Labor Department reported that the Consumer Price Index rose only 0.2% in July 1989, easing fears of a recession.
(AP, 8/18/99)
1989 Aug 18, In Colombia, leading presidential hopeful Luis Carlos Galan was assassinated outside Bogota; the Medellin drug cartel was strongly suspected. On May 12, 2005, Alberto Santofimio Botero, former justice minister, was arrested in connection with the assassination. In 2008 a court overturned the conviction of Alberto Santofimio for lack of evidence. In 2010 Colombian prosecutors issued an arrest warrant for retired Gen. Miguel Maza Marquez (73), a former domestic security chief, who they say participated in the assassination of Galan. In 2011 the Supreme Court reinstated Galan’s murder conviction and reinstated the 24-year prison sentence a lower court imposed in 2007 on Alberto Santofimio.
(AP, 8/18/99)(AP, 12/22/05)(AP, 10/22/08)(AP, 11/25/10)(AP, 9/1/11)
1990 Aug 18, A US frigate fired warning shots across the bow of an Iraqi oil tanker in the Gulf of Oman, apparently the first shots fired by the US in the Persian Gulf crisis.
(AP, 8/18/00)
1991 Aug 18, Soviet hard-liners (State Emergency Committee), led in part by PM Valentin Pavlov, launched a coup aimed at toppling President Mikhail S. Gorbachev, who was vacationing in the Crimea. They were unhappy with the drift toward the collapse of the USSR. Gorbachev and members of his family remained effectively imprisoned until the coup collapsed three days later.
(AP, 8/18/97)(HN, 8/18/98)(AP, 4/1/03)
1992 Aug 18, Basketball star Larry Bird announced his retirement after 13 years with the Boston Celtics.
(AP, 8/18/97)
1992 Aug 18, On the second night of the Republican National Convention in Houston, U.S. Sen. Phil Gramm, R-Texas, delivered the keynote address, denouncing Bill Clinton's economic program as "worse than sleaze."
(AP, 8/18/97)
1992 Aug 18, Christopher McCandless (b.1968), a former student from Harvard, starved to death in the wilderness of Alaska. His story was later told by Jon Krakauer in the book “Into the Wild." In 2007 Sean Penn directed a film of the same name based on the book. In 2020 an abandoned bus that was used by McCandless was removed for public safety.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_McCandless)(Econ, 11/17/07, p.102)(SFC, 6/20/20, p.A4)
1992 Aug 18, John Sturges (82), director (Gunfight at OK Corral), died of emphysema.
(www.imdb.com/name/nm0836328/)
1993 Aug 18, A judge in Sarasota, Fla., ruled that Kimberly Mays, the 14-year-old girl switched at birth with another baby, need never see her biological parents again, in accordance with her stated wishes. However, she later moved in with Ernest and Regina Twigg.
(AP, 8/18/98)
1994 Aug 18, Florida Gov. Lawton Chiles declared an immigration emergency and demanded federal help to cope with the largest surge of Cuban refugees since the 1980 Mariel boat-lift.
(AP, 8/18/99)
1994 Aug 18, Stella Liebeck, who spilled scalding coffee from McDonald’s on her lap in 1992, was awarded $2.7 million in punitive damages. She ended up getting only $480,000. The Liebeck v. McDonald's Restaurants product liability lawsuit became a flashpoint in the debate in the US over tort reform.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liebeck_v._McDonald%27s_Restaurants)(Econ, 12/10/11, p.38)(Econ, 10/10/15, p.27)
1994 Aug 18, Gottlob Frick (b.1906), German operatic basso, died.
(www.iclassics.com/artistBio?contentId=304)
1995 Aug 18, Shannon Faulkner, who’d won a two-and-a-half-year legal battle to become the first female cadet at The Citadel, quit the South Carolina military college after less than a week, most of it spent in the infirmary. After her departure, the male cadets openly celebrated on the campus. By May 2005, The Citadel's Corps of Cadets included 118 female cadets, 6% of the total student population.
(AP, 8/18/00)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shannon_Faulkner)
1995 Aug 18, Premier John Swan of Bermuda promised to resign after voters rejected a vote for independence from Britain with 76% voice.
(WSJ, 8/18/95, p.A-1)
1996 Aug 18, "Dinosaurs of the Flaming Cliffs" by Michael Novacek was reviewed. It told of the author’s work as a fossil hunter in the Mongolian valley of Ukhaa Tolgod.
(SFEC, 8/18/96, BR p.5)
1996 Aug 18, "Where Wizards stay Up Late, The Origins of the Internet" by Katie Hafner and Matthew Lyon was reviewed.
(SFEC, 8/18/96, BR p.3)
1996 Aug 18, The film "The Spitfire Grill" with Ellen Burstyn was the most popular movie at the Sundance Film Festival. It was produced by a religious group, Gregory Productions, owned by the Mississippi-based Sacred Heart League.
(SFEC, 8/18/96, PM p. 2)
1996 Aug 18, On the eve of his 50th birthday, President Clinton was guest of honor at a trio of events in New York that combined celebrating with fund-raising. Ross Perot, the presidential nominee of the Reform Party, launched his campaign with a speech in which he criticized the Republican and Democratic parties as captives of special interests.
(AP, 8/18/97)
1996 Aug 18, In Pakistan 18 people were killed when 7 masked gunmen opened fire on a group of Shiite worshipers in central Punjab province. 100 were injured. The militant Sunni group Sipah-e-Sahaba, or Guardians of the Friends of the prophet were blamed.
(SFC, 8/19/96, p.A9)
1996 Aug 18, In South Korea police cut off food and medicine to students and raided the offices of the largest student organization.
(WSJ, 8/19/96, p.A1)
1997 Aug 18, The Lutheran Church approved a Formula of Agreement document that called for closer cooperation with the Presbyterian Church (USA), the United Church of Christ and the Reformed Church in America. A separate document called the Concordat of Agreement for closer ties with the Episcopal Church was 6 votes short of a required majority.
(SFC, 8/19/97, p.A3)
1997 Aug 18, UPS management agreed to a tentative contract with the striking Teamsters Union to end a 15-day-old strike. New full-time jobs and pay raises were part of the settlement.
(SFC, 8/19/97, p.A1)(AP, 8/18/98)
1997 Aug 18, In Virginia the VMI class of 2001 included 30 women among the 460 freshman students. Beth Ann Hogan became the first coed in the Virginia Military Institute's 158-year history.
(SFC, 8/18/97, p.A3)(AP, 8/18/98)
1997 Aug 18, Burnum Burnum (b.1936 as Henry James Penrith), Australian Aboriginal activist, died at age 61. He had been a member of the "stolen generation," Aborigine children taken from their families into government welfare.
(SFC, 8/19/97, p.A20)
1997 Aug 18, Militiamen under the South Lebanon Army, a key ally of Israel, shelled the port city of Sidon and killed at least 6 people while injuring over 3 dozen. In apparent retaliation northern Israel was hit by dozens of Katyusha rockets fired from Lebanon.
(SFC, 8/19/97, p.A8)
1997 Aug 18, In Taiwan typhoon Winnie swept over the island and left 24 people dead.
(SFC, 8/19/97, p.A9)
1997 Aug 18, In Tajikistan government forces killed 50 mutinous troops in a battle over a bridge on the Vakhsh River.
(SFC, 8/19/97, p.A9)
1998 Aug 18, A day after his grand jury testimony, President Clinton left Washington on a vacation with his family. Meanwhile, some lawmakers called for Clinton to resign in the wake of his admissions concerning Monica Lewinsky while a spokeswoman for Hillary Rodham Clinton said the first lady "believes in this marriage."
(AP, 8/18/99)
1998 Aug 18, In China the Songhua River rose to 397 1/2 feet and threatened the provincial capital of Harbin.
(SFC, 8/19/98, p.C16)
1998 Aug 18, In India a flash flood swept up some 100 Hindu pilgrims in Uttar Pradesh. 182 people were feared dead.
(SFC, 8/19/98, p.C16)
1998 Aug 18, In Kenya FBI agents, acting on a tip from Mohammed Saddiq Odeh, raided The Hilltop Hotel in Nairobi and confiscated 175 pounds of TNT. The room was reported to have been occupied by 2 Palestinians, a Saudi and an Egyptian from Aug 3 to Aug 7.
(SFC, 8/19/98, p.A1)
1998 Aug 18, In Mexico police nabbed Daniel Arizmendi (39) and 9 others. Arizmendi was the leader of a kidnapping gang that sent the ears of victims to their families to pressure for ransom.
(SFC, 8/19/98, p.A12)
1998 Aug 18, In Northern Ireland a splinter group claimed responsibility for the bombing in Omagh. The group offered apologies for the dead and declared an immediate cease-fire.
(SFC, 8/19/98, p.A12)
1998 Aug 18, In Paraguay newly elected Pres. Grau freed Linio Oviedo, the leader of a 1996 coup attempt, and within days faced a move by Congress for impeachment.
(WSJ, 8/21/98, p.A1)
1999 Aug 18, Ramos Horta of Indonesia, 1996 Nobel Prize winner, warned the government that computer hackers would wreak electronic mayhem on the country if voting in the East Timor referendum is hampered.
(SFC, 8/19/99, p.D10)
1999 Aug 18, Russian forces lost 8 soldiers in Dagestan as they tried to storm Tando village.
(SFC, 8/19/99, p.D10)
1999 Aug 18, In Singapore S.R. Nathan was declared president without elections.
(WSJ, 8/20/99, p.A1)
1999 Aug 18, In Turkey the Tupras oil refinery near Ismit burned out of control as the death toll passed 4,000 from the 7.4 earthquake centered on Izmit. A day after a deadly earthquake struck western Turkey, survivors denounced the rescue effort as sluggish and disorganized. The death toll eventually topped 17,000.
(SFC, 8/19/99, p.A1,15)(AP, 8/18/00)
1999 Aug 18, In Uzbekistan 6 members of a banned opposition group, Erk (Freedom), were convicted for involvement in several bombings and sentenced to 8-15 years in prison.
(SFC, 8/19/99, p.D10)
2000 Aug 18, Fresh from the Democratic National Convention, Al Gore and Joseph Lieberman shoved off from the banks of the Mississippi on a riverboat cruise to stir excitement for their freshly launched White House campaign.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2000 Aug 18, In Chechnya rebels killed 8 Russian soldiers in several attacks on checkpoints and roadblocks.
(SFC, 8/19/00, p.A10)
2000 Aug 18, Alberto Orlandez Gamboa, a Colombian drug cartel leader known as "The Snail," was extradited to the US to stand trial for drug trafficking and money laundering.
(SFC, 8/19/00, p.A10)
2000 Aug 18, In Indonesia the 700-member People’s Consultative Assembly passed a decree that allowed the security forces to keep 38 seats in the legislature until 2009 and banned retroactive prosecution of human rights cases.
(SFC, 8/19/00, p.A8)
2000 Aug 18, In Japan the Mount Oyama volcano erupted for a 5th time on the island of Miyake. The eruptions began July 9 after 17 years of dormancy.
(SFC, 8/19/00, p.A9)
2000 Aug 18, In Mexico at least 4 people were killed when violence broke out during the inauguration of Mayor Jesus Tolentino in Chimalhuacan, a suburb of Mexico City and part of the area known as the misery belt.
(SFC, 8/19/00, p.A9)
2000 Aug 18, In the Philippines 3 Malaysians were released by Abu Sayyaf rebels.
(WSJ, 8/21/00, p.A12)
2000 Aug 18, Government forces seized 5 tons of cocaine as part of the "Orinoco 2000" probe financed by the US DEA. Another 5 tons was discovered at the Doble Uno ranch just days later. The cocaine was suspected to have been dropped from Colombia.
(SFC, 8/21/00, p.A10)(SFC, 8/26/00, p.A10)
2001 Aug 18, It was reported that a month-long drought ravaged Central America. Honduras lost 80% of its basic grains, El Salvador lost 80% of grains in its eastern provinces, Nicaragua lost 50% and Guatemala lost 80% of its beans in the eastern provinces. Hundreds of thousands of peasants were affected.
(SFC, 8/18/01, p.A1)
2001 Aug 18, In Luanda, Angola, some 10,000 people marched in a government-organized protest against the Aug 11 train ambush.
(SSFC, 8/19/01, p.A16)
2001 Aug 18, In the Philippines a pre-dawn fire swept through the Manor Hotel in Quezon City and 75 people, trapped behind security bars, were killed
(SFC, 8/18/01, p.A10)(AP, 8/18/02)
2001 Aug 18, In Spain a Basque rebel car bomb exploded outside 2 resort hotels in Salou.
(WSJ, 8/20/01, p.A1)
2002 Aug 18, Rich Beem beat Tiger Woods to capture the PGA Championship.
(AP, 8/18/03)
2002 Aug 18, US federal agents said they had seized over 2,300 unregistered missiles at a counter-terrorism school, High Energy Access Tools (HEAT), in Roswell, New Mexico, that was training students from Arab countries and arrested its Canadian leader.
(Reuters, 8/18/02)(WSJ, 8/19/02, p.A1)
2002 Aug 18, In Britain detectives announced that two bodies found in a nature reserve almost certainly belong to a pair of missing 10-year-olds. Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman had been missing since August 4.
(AP, 8/19/02)(www.trutv.com/library/crime/serial_killers/predators/ian_huntley/index.html)
2002 Aug 18, Turpal-Ali Atgeriyev (b.1969), a former Chechen rebel commander and top official in the region's rebel government, died of complications from leukemia while serving a 15-year prison term for terrorism in Yekaterinburg.
(AP, 8/22/02)
2002 Aug 18, Israel agreed to a partial withdrawal from Palestinian territory in exchange for reduced tensions in the areas.
(SFC, 8/19/02, p.A1)
2002 Aug 18, In a tearful, farewell Mass in his beloved Krakow, Pope John Paul II told more than 2 million Poles that he would like to return one day — but that "this is entirely in God's hands."
(AP, 8/18/03)
2002 Aug 18, In central Russia a bus drove into a ditch in the republic of Chuvashia and overturned, killing 22 people and injuring 38.
(AP, 8/18/02)
2003 Aug 18, Suspected Taliban insurgents killed at least nine policemen in an ambush in Logar province's Kharwar village, about 55 miles south of Kabul.
(AP, 8/19/03)
2003 Aug 18, A 24-year-old woman from China tipped over 303,621 dominos, breaking a long-standing record for the world's longest solo domino topple.
(AP, 8/18/03)
2003 Aug 18, In Shanxi province, China, there was a gas explosion in a coal mine where 27 miners were working. At least 25 were killed.
(AP, 8/20/03)
2003 Aug 18, Lucien Abenhaim, a senior French health official resigned after the health minister admitted that up to 5,000 people, many of them elderly and alone, might have died in the recent heat wave.
(AP, 8/19/03)
2003 Aug 18, All of Georgia was without power for the entire day, and officials in the impoverished former Soviet republic were struggling to determine the cause of the blackout.
(AP, 8/19/03)
2003 Aug 18, Israel delayed plans to hand over Jericho and Qalqiliya, two West Bank towns to Palestinian control.
(AP, 8/19/03)
2003 Aug 18, In Accra, Ghana, Liberia's government and rebels signed a peace accord to end 14 years of vicious war with plans for elections in 2 years.
(AP, 8/19/03)
2003 Aug 18, A six-month ordeal for 14 European tourists kidnapped by Islamic extremists while on desert safaris in Algeria has ended with their release to officials in neighboring Mali.
(AP, 8/19/03)
2003 Aug 18, In Venezuela 9 workers died as 8 tried to rescue a comrade who was felled by toxic industrial gases at an animal feed plant outside Caracas.
(WSJ, 8/19/03, p.A1)
2004 Aug 18, Google said it now expects its stock to trade between $85 and $95 per share, down from its old forecast of between $108 and $135. It also said the total number of shares to be sold will be cut to 19.6 million, down from 25.7 million.
(AP, 8/18/04)
2004 Aug 18, In California federal agents raided a farm in lake County where Charles Lepp grew over 32,000 marijuana plants. He said he had informed local authorities that his land would be used to enable patients who didn’t own land to grow marijuana for medical purposes. In 2009 Lepp (56) was sentenced to 10 years in prison under federal law that required a 10-year term for growing at least 1,000 marijuana plants.
(http://fugitive.com/archives/6212)(SFC, 5/19/09, p.B4)
2004 Aug 18, Two campers were found slain in their sleeping bags at Fish Head Beach in Sonoma Ct., Ca. Lindsay Cutshall (22) of Fresno, Ohio, and Jason Allen (26) of Zeeland, Mich., were found with gunshots to the head on a Jenner beach. Both were believed to have been killed after nightfall on August 14. They had planned a wedding for next month. On March 24, 2017, Shaun Gallon (38) of Forestville killed his younger brother, was swiftly arrested and confessed enough to tie him to the 2004 Jenner beach murders. In 2018 Gallon was charged with the Jenner beach murders. In 2019 Gallon pleaded no contest to his crimes and faced consecutive life sentences.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jenner,_California_Double-Murder_of_2004)(SFC, 8/21/04, p.A1)(SFC, 5/6/17, p.A1)(SFC, 5/17/18, p.D1)(SFC, 6/14/19, p.C3)
2004 Aug 18, Elmer Bernstein (82), film composer, died in Ojai, Ca. His work included over 200 film and TV scores. He received an Academy Award in 1967 for his score in “Thoroughly Modern Millie."
(SFC, 8/20/04, p.B6)
2004 Aug 18, Hiram L. Fong (97), Hawaii's first U.S. senator, died.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2004 Aug 18, Afghan President Hamid Karzai's 17 rivals in the presidential race threatened to boycott landmark October 9 elections unless he stepped down before the vote.
(AP, 8/18/04)
2004 Aug 18, In El Salvador rival inmates fought each other with knives and sticks at a San Salvador prison, leaving at least 31 people dead and two dozen injured.
(AP, 8/18/04)
2004 Aug 18, In South Ossetia 3 Georgian peacekeepers were killed in overnight shooting.
(AP, 8/18/04)
2004 Aug 18, In Athens Paul Hamm won the men's gymnastics all-around Olympic gold medal by the closest margin ever in the event; controversy followed after it was discovered a scoring error might have cost Yang Tae-young of South Korea the title.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2004 Aug 18, Indian shares slid as oil prices surged to a new high of $47 a barrel, threatening domestic demand and growth in Asia's fourth-largest economy.
(AP, 8/18/04)
2004 Aug 18, Iraq's new air force took to the skies for the 1st time since the 2003 US invasion. The limited operations were intended to protect infrastructure facilities and borders.
(AP, 8/21/04)
2004 Aug 18, In Iraq a rocket slammed into a busy market in the northern city of Mosul, killing at least five civilians. U.S. forces clashed with insurgents southeast of Baghdad in fighting that left up to five civilians dead.
(AP, 8/18/04)
2004 Aug 18, Communist rebels isolated Nepal's capital from the rest of the country, stopping all road traffic near Katmandu by threatening to attack vehicles. The campaign, announced last week, was aimed at pressuring the government to free jailed guerrillas.
(AP, 8/18/04)
2004 Aug 18, Five Palestinians were killed in a blast outside the house of a well-known Hamas militant in Gaza City.
(AP, 8/17/04)
2004 Aug 18, In Venezuela opposition leaders charged that as many as 500 of 8,900 polling stations used voting machines that were programmed with an artificial cap to limit the number of votes cast in favor of recalling Pres. Chavez. In 2003 the Chavez regime has purchased 28% of Bizta Software, owned and operated by 2 Venezuelans, who also supplied the election machinery (Smartmatic Corp). Bizta bought back the shares after the story broke and after the 2 companies received a significant part of the $91 million referendum contract.
(WSJ, 8/19/04, p.A11,12)
2005 Aug 18, It was reported that US Defense Dept. data-mining operation, Able Danger, had identified Mohamed Atta and 3 other Sep 11 hijackers by name in mid-2000.
(SFC, 8/17/05, p.A5)
2005 Aug 18, Cindy Sheehan, who'd started an anti-war demonstration near President Bush's Texas ranch nearly two weeks earlier, left the camp after learning her mother had suffered a stroke, but told supporters the protest would go on.
(AP, 8/18/06)
2005 Aug 18, In Kansas BTK killer Dennis Rader (60) was sentenced to 10 consecutive life terms after a hearing where family members spoke of their grief and loss from his 1974-1991 murder spree.
(AP, 8/19/05)(WSJ, 8/19/05, p.A1)
2005 Aug 18, Ohio Gov. Bob Taft pleaded no contest to charges that he broke state ethics law by failing to report golf outings and other gifts. A judge found him guilty and fined him $4,000.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, It was reported that an anthrax outbreak had killed hundreds of cattle in parts of the Great Plains, forcing quarantines and devastating Dakota ranchers who worry how they will recover financially. Two ranches in Texas were quarantined last month after anthrax was found in cattle, horses and deer.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, In Afghanistan a US Marine and an Afghan soldier were killed during battles with militants in eastern Kunar province ahead of next month's landmark elections. 2 American soldiers were killed in the south.
(AP, 8/19/05)
2005 Aug 18, British bank Royal Bank of Scotland (RBoS) announced that it would lead a consortium to buy a 10-percent stake in Bank of China for 3.1 billion dollars (2.5 billion euros).
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, Andronico Luksic (78), Chilean billionaire, died. His holding included beach resorts in Croatia, where his father was born.
(SFC, 8/30/05, p.B4)
2005 Aug 18, China and Russia began unprecedented joint military exercises involving air, sea and land forces, as commanders from both nations insisted the war games weren't meant to intimidate other countries.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, In rural Colombia gunmen dragged a Catholic priest out of a classroom and shot him to death, bringing to 3 the number of clergy killed there this week.
(AP, 8/19/05)
2005 Aug 18, Ecuador’s president said protests have completely halted national oil production despite imposition of emergency rule in 2 Amazon provinces.
(WSJ, 8/19/05, p.A1)
2005 Aug 18, Egyptian police detained Hassan el-Arishi, a suspected mastermind behind the July 23 deadly attacks in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheik.
(AP, 8/19/05)
2005 Aug 18, Pope Benedict XVI began his first foreign trip as pontiff, leaving Rome to take part in the Roman Catholic Church's World Youth Day in Cologne, Germany.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, In India the death toll in an encephalitis outbreak in Uttar Pradesh rose to 90 with more deaths being reported due to the water-born disease.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, In Iraq 4 American soldiers were killed by a roadside bomb in Samarra, 60 miles north of Baghdad. Jasim Waheeb, an investigative judge from Baghdad, was shot to death with his.
(AP, 8/18/05)(SFC, 8/19/05, p.A3)
2005 Aug 18, Israeli forces stormed the synagogue Neve Dekalim to remove about 1,500 protesters inside. This was the main synagogue of the Gaza Strip Jewish settlement and one of the last bastions of resistance to the Gaza pullout.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, The three IRA-linked fugitives who fled convictions in Colombia surrendered to Irish police after eight months on the run.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, In Nicaragua Miskito Indian leaders asked government and human rights investigators to probe allegations that at least 150 of their people were killed under the Sandinistas during the 1980s.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, Nigerian media quoted Pres. Obasanjo as saying police violations "ranged from extra-judicial killings to torture and unlawful detention." He singled out an incident in June in which policemen in the capital, Abuja, allegedly killed six people returning from a night outing after branding them armed robbers. Six policemen were charged in the killings. Among those accused is Danjuma Ibrahim, the second-ranking policeman in the city.
(AP, 8/23/05)
2005 Aug 18, In Pakistan a homemade bomb exploded near a polling station as clashes between supporters of rival candidates in Pakistani municipal elections left 7 dead and 82 injured.
(AP, 8/19/05)
2005 Aug 18, In Peru US Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, seeking to promote stability in Latin America, met with Pres. Alejandro Toledo.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, Saleh Mohammed al-Aoofi, Al-Qaida's leader in Saudi Arabia, was killed along with 5 others during clashes with police in the western city of Medina. Majed Hamed Abdullah al-Haasiri (29), who was No. 14 on a list of 36 most wanted terrorists sought for connection to terror attacks in the kingdom dating back to 2003, was killed in a shootout with police in Riyadh.
(AP, 8/18/05)(AP, 8/27/05)
2005 Aug 18, Western Sahara guerrillas released their last Moroccan prisoners, 404 soldiers held for up to 20 years from a long-ended war over the barren but phosphate-rich region.
(AP, 8/18/05)
2005 Aug 18, A pride of lions attacked a Japanese woman (50) visiting the Lion and Cheetah Park at Norton, a Zimbabwe wildlife park. She died the next day.
(AP, 8/21/05)
2006 Aug 18, President George W. Bush criticized a federal court ruling the day before that his warrantless wiretapping program was unconstitutional, declaring that opponents "do not understand the nature of the world in which we live."
(AP, 8/18/07)
2006 Aug 18, The US FDA approved a mix of bacteria-killing viruses for spraying on cold cuts, hot dogs and sausages to combat deadly microbes.
(SFC, 8/19/06, p.A4)
2006 Aug 18, Raymond Payne, a former HSBC Bank USA vice president, pleaded guilty in Manhattan federal court to a conspiracy charge over his role in a $30 million telemarketing fraud targeting low-income people with poor credit histories. Prosecutors said First Choice, run by Canadian co-defendants Stephen Clark and Leslie Pinsky, extracted $30 million from people, and transferred the money to the HSBC account. In 2007 Clark was sentenced just over 11 years in prison.
(Reuters, 8/18/06)(Reuters, 6/15/07)
2006 Aug 18, In western Missouri bone fragments from at least two people were found on a three-acre wooded property northeast of Drexel. Michael Lee Shaver Jr. (33) was arrested the next day and charged with murder for a killing in 2001. Shaver claimed that he had killed, dismembered and burned 7 men in his home following drug transactions.
(AP, 8/20/06)(SFC, 8/21/06, p.A3)
2006 Aug 18, In Bristow, Oklahoma, Donald Thompson (59), a former judge convicted of exposing himself while presiding over jury trials, was sentenced to four years in prison and ordered to pay a fine of $40,000.
(SFC, 8/19/06, p.A2)
2006 Aug 18, The Washington Post reported that sprinter Marion Jones had tested positive for the endurance drug EPO at the US Track and Field Championships on June 23. A 2nd test came back negative and cleared the allegations. On October 5, 2007, Jones pleaded guilty to using steroids before the Sydney 2000 Summer Olympics and acknowledged that she had, in fact, lied when she previously denied steroid use. Her sanction required disqualification of all her competitive results obtained after September 1, 2000, and forfeiture of all medals, results, points and prizes. On January 11, 2008, Jones was sentenced to 6 months in jail. She began her sentence on March 7, 2008 and was released on September 5, 2008.
(SFC, 8/19/06, p.A1)(SFC, 9/7/06, p.A1)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marion_Jones)
2006 Aug 18, Ford Motor Co. announced sharp cuts in its North American production that would force it to partially shut down plants in the US and Canada in the fourth quarter.
(AP, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, Boeing took steps toward shutting down production of its C-17 military cargo plane. Production would continue until mid-2009 for the $200 million planes.
(WSJ, 8/19/06, p.A8)
2006 Aug 18, Afghanistan Education Minister Mohammed Hanif Atmar said attacks have closed more than 208 schools, including 144 burned down, in the past year as militants changed tactics to hit soft targets. At least 41 teachers and students have been killed over the past 12 months in a wave of attacks on the country's schools.
(Reuters, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, Anglo-Australian resources giant BHP Billiton closed its operations at the world's biggest copper mine in Chile and ended negotiations with striking workers. The strike began on August 7 at the Escondida Mine, majority owned by BHP. The Chilean government has signaled it was ready to intervene.
(AP, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, The Financial Times reported that Britain has agreed to a multi-billion-dollar defense deal to supply 72 Eurofighter Typhoon aircraft to Saudi Arabia.
(AP, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, In Canada the 16th International AIDS Conference ended in a firestorm with vitriol hurled at G8 countries and South Africa over lapses in the battle against the disease that has claimed 25 million lives.
(Reuters, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, Chile's Supreme Court voted to strip Gen. Augusto Pinochet of immunity from prosecution, allowing him to be tried on corruption charges for his once-secret multimillion dollar overseas bank accounts.
(AP, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, China’s central bank announced its 2nd interest rate hike in 4 months to choke off excess investment. The benchmark lending rate rose .27% to 6.12% effective Aug 19.
(WSJ, 8/19/06, p.A4)
2006 Aug 18, The death toll from Typhoon Saomai, the strongest storm to hit China in more than five decades, jumped to 436 after more than 100 new deaths were confirmed in the country's east.
(AP, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, In southwest Ethiopia search and rescue teams kept up frantic efforts to save thousands marooned by fatal flash floods, where relief workers reported near-total devastation. Some 73,000 people had been affected by raging waters from unusually heavy seasonal rains.
(AFP, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, In Greece a 700-year-old icon, said to have the power to work miracles, was discovered stolen from the cliff-side Elona Monastery. In September police arrested a Romanian national in Crete and recovered the Madonna and Child icon.
(SSFC, 10/8/06, p.A26)(http://tinyurl.com/grxc8)
2006 Aug 18, The United Liberation Front of Asom announced that it would stop attacking the forces of the Indian government, which announced a unilateral cease-fire Aug. 13. It was the first truce announced by the rebel group since its formation in 1979.
(AP, 8/19/06)
2006 Aug 18, In Iraq 7 pilgrims heading to a major Shiite religious gathering were shot dead in a Sunni neighborhood.
(AP, 8/19/06)
2006 Aug 18, Steorn, an Irish company, said it has developed technology that it claims produces free energy. The company said its discovery is based on the interaction of magnetic fields and allows the production of clean, free and constant energy.
(AFP, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, Israeli soldiers killed 3 Palestinian gunmen and wounded 2 others in confrontations in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.
(WSJ, 8/19/06, p.A1)
2006 Aug 18, At least 10 people died and as many as 40 were feared missing when a small boat packed with illegal immigrants sank off Sicily, prompting Italy to call for greater cooperation to fight human trafficking.
(Reuters, 8/19/06)
2006 Aug 18, The Lebanese army reached the country's southern border with Israel for the first time in decades, sending a lone jeep on patrol through Kfar Kila, a battered stronghold of support for Hezbollah militants. At least 845 Lebanese were killed in the 34-day war: 743 civilians, 34 soldiers and 68 Hezbollah. Israel says it killed about 530 guerrillas. On the Israeli side, 157 were killed, 118 soldiers and 39 civilians, many from the 3,970 Hezbollah rockets. The Lebanese government estimated infrastructure damages at $2.5 billion. The Lebanese death toll was later raised to 1200 and economic costs put to some $12 billion.
(AP, 8/18/06)(SFC, 8/19/06, p.C1)(Econ, 11/11/06, p.51)
2006 Aug 18, In Lesotho a 14-nation southern Africa summit closed with a pledge to speed up regional economical integration, even as leaders expressed concern about crisis-plagued member-state Zimbabwe.
(AFP, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, Nigeria’s military launched a crackdown on suspected militants in the oil-rich south as militants released another foreign hostage taken in a spate of kidnappings.
(AP, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, Greenpeace warned a sunken Philippine oil tanker was a pollution timebomb as oil from its punctured tanks destroyed coral reefs and washed up blackened fish on pristine beaches. Oil trapped in the tanks of the Solar I, which went down last week with 500,000 gallons of industrial oil on board, could pour out at any time. To date some 50,000 gallons had leaked into the sea close to the central island of Guimaras.
(AP, 8/18/06)
2006 Aug 18, The UN said more than 41,000 people on Sri Lanka’s Jaffna peninsula, about 10 percent of its population, were believed to have fled their homes and warned that supplies in the area had reached "alarmingly low levels".
(AFP, 8/19/06)
2006 Aug 18, A bus carrying Iranian tourists crashed into a truck in eastern Turkey, killing 18 and injuring 29.
(AP, 8/18/06)
2007 Aug 18, A seven-alarm fire ripped through the former Deutsche Bank next to ground zero in Lower Manhattan, killing two firefighters who were responding to the blaze.
(AP, 8/19/07)(Econ, 9/8/07, p.34)
2007 Aug 18, Michael K. Deaver (69), adviser to President Reagan, died in Bethesda, Md.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2007 Aug 18, Hurricane Dean barreled across the eastern Caribbean and took aim at Hispaniola, Jamaica and Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula, with forecasters saying it could turn into a monster Category 5 storm within 72 hours. Dean claimed at least six lives as it began sweeping past the Dominican Republic and Haiti.
(AP, 8/18/07)
2007 Aug 18, In southern Afghanistan a suicide car bomber detonated near a convoy of private security forces, killing four Afghan guards and 11 civilians, including 3 women and 2 children. Armed assailants abducted a German woman from a restaurant in Kabul.
(AP, 8/18/07)
2007 Aug 18, It was reported that Albanian migrants sent home almost $1 billion a year to support jobless family members and to build homes. New business was said to be discouraged by blackmail and intimidation from existing firms with licenses going to political cronies in the face of a corrupt judiciary.
(Econ, 8/18/07, p.46)
2007 Aug 18, In Britain a man died and six other people were missing after a fire gutted a hotel in the popular seaside resort of Newquay.
(AP, 8/18/07)
2007 Aug 18, Chile’s national poverty line was reported to be $90 per month. The richest tenth of the population garnered 38.6% of the national income.
(Econ, 8/18/07, p.23)
2007 Aug 18, It was reported that China faced a major shortage of skilled talent including doctors with only 4,000 general practitioners. Lawyers numbered about 122,000. An average of 2,200 new pilots per year will be needed to keep up with the growth in air travel. Accountants, technicians and good managers were also reported to be in short supply.
(Econ, 8/18/07, p.59)
2007 Aug 18, UNESCO said a joint mission of several UN agencies is conducting an emergency investigation into the shooting of endangered mountain gorillas in a Democratic Republic of Congo national park. In the last two months, seven of the primates have been killed in separate incidents in the Virunga park.
(AP, 8/19/07)
2007 Aug 18, Two men hijacked a Turkish passenger plane from Cyprus bound for Istanbul, holding several people hostage for more than four hours before surrendering.
(AP, 8/18/07)
2007 Aug 18, Ethiopia freed 32 opposition members who had been detained for post-election violence in 2005.
(AP, 8/18/07)
2007 Aug 18, In Germany 2 Africans were attacked by right-wing extremists in Mainz, the same night as a brutal mob assault on eight Indians in the country's former communist east.
(AFP, 8/25/07)
2007 Aug 18, About 16 mortar shells rained on houses in the Sharqiya residential area in Khalis, a Shiite enclave north of Baghdad, killing at least 7 people. Overnight a series of bombs struck commercial areas in Kirkuk, killing at least four people and wounding 38.
(AP, 8/18/07)
2007 Aug 18, Kazakhs headed to the polls in parliamentary elections seen as a key test of authoritarian Pres. Nursultan Nazarbayev's pledge to boost democracy in this oil-rich nation. Nur Otan, the party of President Nursultan Nazarbayev, won all 98 available seats in the lower parliament. The tally was quickly condemned by the opposition.
(AFP, 8/18/07)(AP, 8/19/07)(Econ, 8/25/07, p.42)
2007 Aug 18, In northern Lebanon gunbattles with Islamic extremists in a Palestinian refugee camp left one soldier dead. Another died of wounds the next day.
(AP, 8/19/07)
2007 Aug 18, In Peru President Alan Garcia called for the orderly distribution of emergency supplies as desperate victims of a magnitude-8 earthquake on the southern coast looted markets and blocked arriving aid trucks. The death toll climbed to 540.
(AP, 8/18/07)(AP, 8/20/07)
2007 Aug 18, In the Philippines 16 troops and dozens of Muslim extremists were killed in clashes between government forces and Al-Qaeda-linked rebels on the southern island of Basilan.
(AP, 8/18/07)
2007 Aug 18, Rival clan militias fought over scarce pasture land and wells in central Somalia, leaving 18 people dead and 15 wounded.
(AP, 8/18/07)
2007 Aug 18, A powerful typhoon slammed into Taiwan, killing at least one person, forcing thousands to evacuate and disrupting power supplies across the already-saturated landscape.
(AP, 8/18/07)
2008 Aug 18, US and Liberian officials said US Peace Corps volunteers will return to Liberia for the first time since civil war broke out in this West African nation nearly two decades ago.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, California’s supreme court barred doctors from denying medical care to gays and lesbians based on religious beliefs.
(WSJ, 8/19/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 18, In eastern Afghanistan a suicide car bomb blew up outside Camp Salerno, a US military base in Khost, killing 12 civilian laborers, as the country marked Independence Day. A mine blew up a police vehicle in the province of Nangarhar and killed two policemen. About 100 insurgents ambushed a group of French paratroopers, killing 10 soldiers in an area outside the capital known as a militant stronghold. An Afghan official said insurgents kidnapped four of the soldiers and later killed them. 13 militants were reported killed [see Oct 15, 2009].
(AFP, 8/18/08)(AP, 8/19/08)(Econ, 8/34/08, p.34)
2008 Aug 18, Argentina announced its first nationwide gay-rights measure: granting same-sex couples the right to claim their deceased partners' pensions.
(AP, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 18, In southeastern Bangladesh chunks of earth loosened by heavy rains buried several hillside thatched huts, killing five people and injuring seven.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, In Britain Philip Thompson (27), a pedophile who acted as a "librarian" for a global Internet child abuse ring, was jailed after one of the biggest undercover police investigations into online abuse.
(Reuters, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, State media reported that Chinese authorities have not approved any of the 77 applications they received from people who wanted to hold protests during the Beijing Olympics.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, In northeast China a gas explosion tore through a coal mine, leaving 24 workers trapped.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, Equatorial Guinea's exiled opposition leader Severo Moto was released from a Spanish jail four months after he was detained for allegedly trying to send weapons to the oil-rich African nation.
(AFP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, In southern Iraq masked gunmen ambushed a bus carrying electoral officials south of Basra, killing two and seriously wounding a third. A suicide bombing killed 7 policemen in Ramadi.
(AP, 8/18/08)(WSJ, 8/19/08, p.A1)
2008 Aug 18, Tens of thousands of Muslims waving green and black protest flags gathered in Indian Kashmir's main city for a march to UN offices demanding freedom from India and intervention by the world body.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, The river Kosi, a tributary to the Ganges, burst an embankment on the Nepali side of the border with India and flowed into a channel it had abandoned a century earlier. Water flooded into Bihar state and displaced over 3 million people.
(Econ, 9/6/08, p.51)
2008 Aug 18, Mexican soldiers rescued 25 Central Americans kidnapped in the Gulf coast state of Veracruz. One man was arrested in the raid in Tierra Blanca.
(AP, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 18, Mexico’s Cemex SAB rejected Venezuela’s bid for the company’s assets in Venezuela. At midnight oil workers and Venezuelan soldiers occupied Cemex facilities around the country.
(WSJ, 8/19/08, p.A10)
2008 Aug 18, The leader of Nepal's Maoists, Prachanda, was sworn in as prime minister, finalizing his transformation from warlord to the country's most powerful politician.
(AFP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, Niger's Tuareg rebel leader Aghaly ag Alambo said his fighters would lay down their guns and, together with neighboring Mali's Tuareg rebellion, submit to mediation by Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.
(AP, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 18, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf announced that he will resign, just days ahead of impeachment in parliament over attempts by the US-backed leader to impose authoritarian rule on his turbulent nation.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, Peru's government declared a state of emergency in remote jungle regions where Indian groups are blocking highways and oil and gas installations to protest a law that makes it easier to sell their lands.
(AP, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 18, In the southern Philippines separatists of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) attacked several towns and villages on Mindanao and killed 38 people.
(SFC, 8/19/08, p.A9)(AP, 8/20/08)
2008 Aug 18, Heads of state and other dignitaries from African countries and Turkey started an economic cooperation summit in Istanbul.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 18, Russia said its military began to withdraw from the conflict zone in Georgia, but left unclear exactly where troops and tanks will operate under the cease-fire that ended days of fighting in the former Soviet republic.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2009 Aug 18, Robert Novak (78), political columnist, died in Washington DC after a battle with brain cancer that was diagnosed in July 2008. He was a conservative, pugilistic debater and proud owner of the "Prince of Darkness" moniker, which he used in his 2007 memoir: "The Prince of Darkness: 50 Years Reporting in Washington." A column of his in 2003 outed Valerie Plame as a CIA agent.
(AP, 8/18/09)
2009 Aug 18, A Taliban suicide bomber attacked a NATO convoy on the outskirts of Kabul, killing 8 people and wounding more than 50, just days before the presidential election that the militant group has vowed to disrupt. A suicide bomber struck the gates of an Afghan army base in the southern Uruzgan province, killing 3 Afghan soldiers and two civilians. Two US soldiers were killed and 3 wounded in a separate blast in eastern Afghanistan.
(AP, 8/18/09)(SFC, 8/19/09, p.A3)
2009 Aug 18, An international claims commission in The Hague awarded Ethiopia slightly more than Eritrea as it settled mutual claims worth hundreds of millions of dollars for death, injury, rape, looting and destruction during their two-year border conflict. This concluded a complex arbitration that was part of the 2000 peace agreement closing out a border conflict that cost tens of thousands of lives.
(AP, 8/19/09)
2009 Aug 18, In Indonesia a dump truck, packed with more than 60 plantation workers and their families, overturned and killing at least 25 with dozens injured. At least three children were among the dead near Sampit town in Central Kalimantan.
(AP, 8/19/09)
2009 Aug 18, Iraqi forces seized a launcher loaded with 13 Iranian-made rockets after an attack the previous day against the US base outside the southern city of Basra.
(AP, 8/18/09)
2009 Aug 18, Israeli government officials said Israel has quietly stopped approving new building projects in the West Bank while publicly still refusing US demands for an official settlement freeze.
(AP, 8/18/09)
2009 Aug 18, In Lebanon 8 members of an al-Qaida-inspired group sawed bars off their cell windows in a high-security prison, scaled down the building using blankets tied together, then stood on each other's shoulders to help one jump over a wall and escape. Prison guards managed to stop the other seven from fleeing. Officials described the escaped prisoner, Taha al-Hajj Suleiman, as a Syrian militant and a "dangerous" member of the Fatah Islam group. Suleiman was caught the next day in the woods just north of the Roumieh prison.
(AP, 8/18/09)(AP, 8/19/09)
2009 Aug 18, In Mexico gunmen shot up the offices of the Siglo de Torreon newspaper in Torreon, Coahuila state.
(SFC, 8/19/09, p.A2)
2009 Aug 18, In Mozambique an overcrowded ferry with 50 people went down off the coast in a northern province. 17 people were feared drowned.
(AP, 8/19/09)
2009 Aug 18, Pakistani government and UN officials said flash floods have killed at least 27 people in the northwest, and that more than 80,000 have seen their homes or crops destroyed.
(AP, 8/18/09)
2009 Aug 18, Russia's President Dmitry Medvedev hosted Israeli counterpart Shimon Peres for talks that were expected to focus on the Middle East and the Iranian nuclear standoff.
(AP, 8/18/09)
2009 Aug 18, Former South Korean Pres. Kim Dae-jung (85) died. He spent years as a dissident under a military dictatorship and later won the Nobel Peace Prize for seeking reconciliation with communist North Korea.
(AP, 8/18/09)
2009 Aug 18, In Sudan clashes between rival militias broke out in the southern oil-rich Unity state, the latest to hit a region still recovering from two decades of civil war.
(AFP, 8/18/09)
2009 Aug 18, In Zimbabwe a truck hit a bus head-on, killing 11 people including six members of a family returning from a funeral.
(AP, 8/19/09)
2010 Aug 18, CIA Director Leon Panetta said the CIA is opening a counterproliferation center to combat the spread of dangerous weapons and technology, a move that comes as Iran is on the verge of fueling up a new nuclear power plant.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange said the US Army has expressed willingness to discuss the online whistleblower's request for help in reviewing classified documents from the Afghan war and removing information that could harm civilians. The Pentagon said it would not negotiate with WikiLeaks to create "a sanitized version" of a second batch of classified Afghan war documents the whistleblower website plans to release.
(AP, 8/18/10)(AFP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, The US FDA said some 380 million eggs have been recalled nationwide due to salmonella contamination. Officials soon confirmed that over 2,000 people had been sickened by salmonella from May to July and over 500m eggs were recalled. The affected eggs were all traced back to two farms in Iowa.
(SFC, 8/19/10, p.C3)(Econ, 9/4/10, p.32)
2010 Aug 18, The North Carolina justice system shook as an audit commissioned by Attorney General Roy Cooper revealed that the State Bureau of Investigation withheld or distorted evidence in more than 200 cases at the expense of potentially innocent men and women. 3 defendants in botched cases have been executed.
(SFC, 8/19/10, p.A6)
2010 Aug 18, In Wisconsin the bodies of a couple, their 13-month-old daughter, and their three dogs were found dead at their home in Superior. Matthew Magdzas (23), an Iraq war veteran, apparently shot and killed his pregnant wife and young daughter before turning the gun on himself. He left behind no clues to explain what might have prompted the bloodshed.
(AP, 8/20/10)
2010 Aug 18, In Afghanistan a suicide bomber rammed a car into a police vehicle, killing a district police chief, two other policemen and a civilian on a bridge leading into Kandahar city. An American service member was killed in fighting in the south. A joint Afghan and NATO force killed 12 insurgents in Puli Alam district of Logar province.
(AP, 8/18/10)(AP, 8/19/10)
2010 Aug 18, Anglo-Australian mining giant BHP Billiton launched an enormous hostile takeover bid for Canada's Potash Corp which values the world's largest fertilizer producer at 40 billion dollars.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, In the Democratic of Republic of Congo 3 Indian UN peacekeepers were killed in a surprise attack on their base by 50 fighters armed with machetes, spears and traditional weapons. The next day Congolese soldiers arrested two suspects in the killing of the Indian peacekeepers.
(Reuters, 8/18/10)(AFP, 8/19/10)
2010 Aug 18, Crowds of Egyptians angered by daily power outages at the height of a scorching summer blocked a major highway south of Cairo with barricades of burning tires.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, In Germany a former Rwandan mayor living in Germany was charged for allegedly organizing massacres and inciting killings during the African country's 1994 genocide. Prosecutors alleged that the former Hutu mayor, identified as Onesphore R. (53), called for pogroms against the Tutsi minority on three occasions. Prosecutors asserted that the man ordered and coordinated three massacres between April 11 and 15, 1994, in which at least 3,730 Tutsis were killed.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, Indian tycoon Anil Ambani's Reliance Broadcast Network Ltd and CBS Studios International announced plans to launch three new television channels in India and South Asia.
(AFP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, In northern India a mudslide triggered by heavy rains demolished a school building, killing at least 18 children.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, Iran took its case against the United States to the UN and strongly condemned the top US military chief for saying military action remains a possibility if the country develops nuclear weapons.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, In Iraq 3 farmers were killed and leaflets pinned to their bodies warning against cooperation with American and Iraqi forces in a brutal act of intimidation as thousands of US troops leave.
(AFP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, Officials with Nigeria's security services say they've intercepted 52 Kalashnikov rifles and tens of thousands of ammunition rounds heading for Kos, an area that has been the scene of religious violence. They said five men were arrested for trying to bring the weapons from neighboring Chad.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, Shell in Nigeria said it has warned it may not meet contractual obligations on Bonny Light crude, after oil thieves sabotaged two pipelines in the country's south.
(AFP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, In Pakistan militants exploiting the flooding chaos clashed with police overnight, as desperately needed international donations for the millions of victims picked up pace three weeks after the deluge began.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, In Peru American activist Lori Berenson, convicted of aiding leftist rebels, surrendered to police after a court struck down a decision granting her parole and ordered her to return to prison, where she is to remain with her 15-month-old son for the time being.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, In the Philippines a packed passenger bus negotiating a downhill curve plunged off a Philippine mountain highway into a 100-foot (30-meter) ravine, killing 41 people.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev offered Pakistan support in dealing with catastrophic floods as he hosted the leaders of Afghanistan, Pakistan and Tajikistan for talks on efforts to stabilize the region.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, In South Africa teachers left their classrooms and trials were postponed after court workers walked out when hundreds of thousands of civil servants went on strike for higher wages across the country.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, In Spain a bull leapt into the packed grandstands of a bullring at the Tafalla arena in the northern region of Navarra and ran amok, charging and trampling spectators and leaving 40 people injured.
(AP, 8/19/10)
2010 Aug 18, Sudan's government confirmed it will expel a number of international aid workers from the restive western region of Darfur, without specifying how many.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, A leading Venezuelan newspaper replaced front-page photos with the word "censored" to protest a court's monthlong ban on the publication of information and photos about violence.
(AP, 8/18/10)
2010 Aug 18, In Yemen a woman was killed and two police officers wounded when a wanted southern militant fired at a security patrol which was attempting to arrest him in Al-Afar area of the Lahj province. Five policemen were wounded in an explosion when a masked biker hurled a hand grenade through the window of a police station in Zinjibar.
(AFP, 8/19/10)
2011 Aug 18, US federal officials said they have busted a drug trafficking gang in El Cahon, southern California. Many of the 60 suspects were Iraqi Chaldeans suspected of being affiliated with the Chaldean Organized Crime Syndicate based in Detroit, Michigan.
(SFC, 8/19/11, p.A11)
2011 Aug 18, US mortgage rates fell the lowest rate in more than half a century as the average rate for a 30-year fixed loan dropped to 4.15%.
(SFC, 8/19/11, p.D1)
2011 Aug 18, Stock markets around the world plunged as rising signs of a US recession combined with renewed worries over the financial health of Europe's banks. The DJIA closed at 10,990.58, down 419.63.
(AP, 8/18/11)(SFC, 8/19/11, p.D1)
2011 Aug 18, Kansas City, Mo., authorities passed an ordinance that sets curfews as early as 9 p.m. for people under age 18, following the weekend shooting of three teenagers at a large late-night "flash mob" gathering. Three youths aged 13 to 16 were injured by apparently random gunshots at the Country Club Plaza.
(AP, 8/20/11)
2011 Aug 18, Hewlett-Packard said that it would exit the personal computer business.
(SFC, 8/19/11, p.A1)
2011 Aug 18, US researchers reported that the drug, SRT-1720, protects mice from the usual diseases of obesity. The drug is one of a set designed by Sirtris, a small pharmaceutical company in Cambridge, Mass.
(SFC, 8/19/11, p.A13)
2011 Aug 18, In western Afghanistan a roadside bomb killed at least 21 passengers traveling on a minibus. In the east a suicide car bomber attacked a coalition base, killing two Afghan security guards.
(AP, 8/18/11)
2011 Aug 18, Chile officially recognized 9,800 more victims of the Pinochet dictatorship (1973-1990), increasing the total number of people killed, tortured or imprisoned for political reasons to 40,018. Victims, relatives of those killed and survivors were entitled to benefits and compensation.
(AP, 8/18/11)
2011 Aug 18, In China a fight broke out in Beijing between the visiting Georgetown University men's basketball team and the Bayi Rockets, the army's Chinese Basketball Association team, forcing play to end early. Video footage spread on the Internet and worldwide TV news.
(AP, 8/19/11)
2011 Aug 18, Four EU countries (Austria, Netherlands, Slovakia, Slovenia) said they want hundreds of millions of euros in collateral as security for a bailout of Greece. Finland had just struck a deal with Greece for cash collateral on Aug 16.
(SFC, 8/19/11, p.A2)
2011 Aug 18, In Germany 9 cars were torched in Berlin in the third consecutive night of arson attacks that have outraged Germans and drawn condemnation from Chancellor Angela Merkel. Police offered a euro5,000 ($7,180) reward to anyone who helps them find the perpetrators.
(AP, 8/18/11)
2011 Aug 18, In India Anna Hazare, who has been fasting since Aug 16, reached an agreement with police to hold a 15-day demonstration fast starting Aug 19 to push for tough new anti-corruption legislation, after a two-day standoff at a New Delhi jail.
(AP, 8/18/11)
2011 Aug 18, In southern Israel assailants armed with heavy weapons, guns and explosives launched three attacks in quick succession near the border with Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, killing 8 people and wounding about a dozen more. Israeli security forces tracked down some of the assailants and are engaged in an ongoing gunbattle with them. 3 Egyptian security personnel died as a result of the gunbattles. 2 more died from wounds the next day. A 6th died from wounds in September. Israel responded hours after the border attack with an airstrike in Gaza that killed five members of the Palestinian group that Israel said was behind it, an organization known as the Popular Resistance Committees. The dead included the group's leader.
(AP, 8/18/11)(AP, 8/19/11)(AFP, 9/11/11)
2011 Aug 18, Ivory Coast's former strongman Laurent Gbagbo was charged with economic crimes including aggravated theft and embezzlement of public funds.
(AP, 8/18/11)
2011 Aug 18, In Libya 5 loud explosions shook the center of Tripoli, as rebels in the western mountains claimed control of the Zawiya oil refinery. Gadhafi troops were still in control of Gamal Abdel-Nasser Street and were hiding in the hospital there. PM al-Baghdadi Ali al-Mahmoudi said the government was in negotiations with rebels. NATO planes took out five tanks in Zawiya. NATO hit four military facilities in Tripoli.
(AP, 8/18/11)(AP, 8/19/11)
2011 Aug 18, Mexican soldiers killed eight gunmen in a clash in the northern border state of Nuevo Leon. Police in Acapulco reported finding two ice chests, one of which held a man's head and the other containing what appeared to be his leg and right foot. Guerrero state police said three other coolers were found in another part of the city with other body parts. 3 men were found shot to death in Acapulco city buses.
(AP, 8/18/11)
2011 Aug 18, Myanmar's state-run media said the government has officially invited armed ethnic groups to join peace talks for the first time.
(AP, 8/18/11)
2011 Aug 18, In Nigeria attackers shot dead Tafai Saifudeen (55), a Lebanese auto parts dealer, in front of his shop on Murtala Mohammed Way in the city of Kano.
(AP, 8/19/11)
2011 Aug 18, In Pakistan suspected gang members killed 22 mostly Urdu-speaking people in Karachi. Many of the victims were tortured, shot and stuffed in sacks that were dumped on the streets.
(AP, 8/18/11)
2011 Aug 18, The chief of Russia's state arms trader Rosoboronexport, Anatoly Isaikin, said Moscow will keep supplying combat jets and other military gear to Syria under contracts totaling about $3.5 billion (euro2.43 billion).
(AP, 8/19/11)
2011 Aug 18, Russia lost contact with its Express-AM4 communications satellite shortly after its launch, the latest in a series of failures that has dogged the nation's space program. Failure of the upper stage, the Briz-M, resulted in the loss of communications.
(AP, 8/18/11)
2011 Aug 18, In South Sudan 125 people were killed in a cattle raid during which tribesmen stole 2,000 cattle in the country's east. 8 villages were destroyed when warriors from the Murle tribe in Pidor county attacked the Lou-Nuer tribe of Uror county. On Aug 22 the numbers rose to at least 600 people killed and up to 985 people injured in the clashes. The UN later said over 25,000 cows were stolen in the attack.
(AP, 8/21/11)(AFP, 8/22/11)(AFP, 9/28/11)
2011 Aug 18, Spanish authorities arrested Aeromexico co-pilot Ruben Garcia Garcia for attempting to smuggle 93 pounds of cocaine into the European country.
(AP, 8/23/11)
2011 Aug 18, Pope Benedict XVI arrived in Spain for a nearly 4-day visit to celebrate World Youth Day.
(SFC, 8/18/11, p.A2)
2011 Aug 18, Syrian President Bashar Assad told the UN chief that military operations in his country have ended. The EU urged Syria's President Assad to resign amid a mounting crackdown on an anti-government revolt. Activists reported intense shooting around noon in the flashpoint city of Latakia.
(AP, 8/18/11)
2011 Aug 18, In southern Turkey the PKK attacked police and military stations in simultaneous overnight rocket strikes in Siirt province, killing two soldiers and wounding three civilians. Turkey's air force attacked 28 suspected Kurdish rebel targets in northern Iraq, in a second day of cross-border strikes in retaliation for stepped up attacks by the guerrillas.
(AP, 8/19/11)
2011 Aug 18, Vietnam’s government warned that it would no longer tolerate weekly demonstrations that have taken place in Hanoi for the past 10 weekends over disputed territory in the South China Sea.
(AP, 8/21/11)
2012 Aug 18, Philadelphia police Officer Moses Walker (40) was shot to death, while out of uniform, by a suspected street robber near his station.
(SSFC, 8/19/12, p.A12)
2012 Aug 18, Scott McKenzie (73), pop singer born as Philip Blondheim, died at his home in LA. In 1967 he sang “San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair)" with the Mamas and Papas, a song written by John Phillips, leader of the Mamas and the Papas. McKenzie also co-wrote “Kokomo" (1988), a No. 1 hit for the Beach Boys.
(SFC, 8/21/12, p.C3)
2012 Aug 18, In Afghanistan a bomb in a busy market killed four people in the western province of Herat. The director of a prison in Helmand province's Grish district, Mohammad Ismail, died when a bomb attached to his car exploded.
(AP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, In China Yu Wenxia, Miss China, won the Miss World crown for 2012, defeating more than 100 other hopefuls the world's biggest beauty pageant in at a glittering ceremony in Ordos, a Chinese mining city on the edge of the Gobi desert.
(AFP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, In Egypt militants wounded three policemen in the Sinai Peninsula in an ambush of their vehicle with a rocket propelled grenade.
(AFP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, In Indonesia a magnitude-6.3 quake struck near Palu city on Sulawesi Island. At least 6 people were killed.
(AP, 8/20/12)
2012 Aug 18, In northern Iraq gunmen raided two family homes in Mosul, killing six people. Mosul was once an al-Qaida stronghold.
(AP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, In Iraq Maryam Rajavi, president of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, which includes the People's Mujahedeen Organization of Iran (PMOI), said: “As a gesture of goodwill, the residents of Ashraf will commence the 6th convoy of 400 residents from Camp Ashraf to Camp Liberty on August 23."
(AFP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, In Ivory Coast armed men attacked former president Laurent Gbagbo's party headquarters, abducting two people and wounding three. The party blamed the raid on supporters of President Alassane Ouattara. PM Jeannot Kouadio Ahoussou called on the perpetrators of attacks against the army to disarm and not block the country's "revival."
(AFP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, A flotilla of boats carrying Japanese nationalists and lawmakers set sail for islands, known as Senkaku in Japan and as Diaoyu in China, at the heart of a vitriolic diplomatic row with China, despite warnings from Beijing. China demanded that Japan cease actions "harming" its territorial sovereignty.
(AFP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, Lebanese security officials said that five more Syrians were abducted in Beirut's southern suburbs overnight.
(AP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, In Mozambique Southern African leaders slammed Rwanda for supporting rebels in the Democratic Republic of Congo as a threat to regional stability and urged Kigali to immediately stop its "interference." The Southern African Development Community (SADC) mandated a mission to Rwanda to urge them to stop support for the M23.
(AFP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, In Nigeria an ocean surge crashed into waterfront shanties in Lagos, leaving at least one person dead and 15 missing.
(AFP, 8/19/12)
2012 Aug 18, In Pakistan A US drone attack killed at least six militants in a remote tribal town in North Waziristan as local people celebrated the Muslim festival of Eid al-Fitr.
(AFP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, Philippine Interior Secretary Jesse Robredo and his two pilots went missing after their small plane crashed into the sea while attempting an emergency landing in Masbate province. An aide of Robredo made a dramatic escape from the plane.
(AP, 8/19/12)
2012 Aug 18, In southern Russia’s republic of Dagestan, two masked gunmen burst into a Shiite mosque during evening prayers and opened fire, wounding eight people.
(AFP, 8/19/12)
2012 Aug 18, In South Korea 8 people were stabbed by a man wielding a box cutter after a man and woman confronted him for spitting in a train.
(SSFC, 8/19/12, p.A4)
2012 Aug 18, Syrian activists said government troops shelled and carried out air raids at rebel areas across the country, including the southern province of Daraa, the northern region of Aleppo and the suburbs of the capital, Damascus. A Syrian warplane bombed a small town partially controlled by anti-regime fighters near the Turkish border, killing eight people and wounding at least 20.
(AP, 8/18/12)
2012 Aug 18, In Vietnam at least 17 people were killed as Typhoon Kai-Tak, now downgraded to a tropical depression, barreled across northern Vietnam bringing high winds and floods to several areas including the capital Hanoi. The typhoon had already left 2 dead in China and 4 dead in the Philippines.
(AFP, 8/18/12)(AFP, 8/19/12)(AFP, 8/20/12)
2012 Aug 18, In Yemen suspected al-Qaida militants attacked a government headquarters, killing 21 people in a bold attack in the country's main southern city of Aden.
(AFP, 8/18/12)(AFP, 8/19/12)
2013 Aug 18, In Redwood City, Ca., the Malibu Grand Prix amusement park closed after 35 years of operation.
(SSFC, 8/18/13, p.C1)
2013 Aug 18, Albert Murray, American jazz critic, poet and novelist, died in Harlem. His books included "The Omni-Americans" (1970), "South to a Very Old Place" (1971), "Train Whistle Guitar" (1974) and "Stomping the Blues" (1976).
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Murray_(writer))(Econ., 8/22/20, p.67)
2013 Aug 18, In Afghanistan 11 members of the Afghan Public Protection Force and 21 insurgents were killed in a two separate gun battles in Farah province.
(AP, 8/19/13)
2013 Aug 18, China’s Xinhua News Agency said 12 deaths reported in Liaoning province. That added to a total of 25 deaths reported earlier in Heilongjiang and Jilin, the other two provinces in China's northeast. In the south, six people were reported were killed by flooding and landslides in Guangdong province.
(AP, 8/18/13)
2013 Aug 18, Egyptian authorities raided homes of Muslim Brotherhood members in an apparent attempt to disrupt the group ahead of mass rallies by supporters of country's ousted president. 36 people were killed when Muslim Brotherhood detainees tried to escape from a prison truck convoy in northern Cairo. The convoy trucks were carrying more than 600 detainees rounded up in earlier street violence between security forces and supporters of ousted President Mohammed Morsi.
(AP, 8/18/13)
2013 Aug 18, In Iraq two separate bomb attacks in commercial areas of predominantly Sunni neighborhoods of Baghdad killed at least 4 civilians.
(AP, 8/18/13)
2013 Aug 18, An Israeli military official said Israeli forces have hit a target inside Syria that was the source of mortar fire into the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. At least three shells had landed near the Syrian frontier the previous evening, causing no injuries.
(AP, 8/18/13)
2013 Aug 18, Libya's Interior Minister Mohammed Khalifa al-Sheikh stepped down in protest against what he saw as interference in his work by PM Ali Zeidan and parliament.
(Reuters, 8/18/13)
2013 Aug 18, Spanish fishermen in some 60 fishing boats protested the building of an artificial reef near the disputed British territory of Gibraltar.
(AP, 8/18/13)
2013 Aug 18, A team of UN chemical weapons experts arrived in Damascus to investigate the possible use of chemical weapons in Syria's civil war.
(Reuters, 8/18/13)
2014 Aug 18, The US Dept. of Agriculture said two parents and one child could expect to spend $245,340 to raise a second child born in 2013 to the age of 17.
(SFC, 8/19/14, p.D1)
2014 Aug 18, Police in South Pasadena, Ca., said they have thwarted a mass shooting plot with the arrest of two teenagers (16 and 17) who were conspiring to kill several staffers and as many fellow students as possible at South Pasadena High School.
(Reuters, 8/18/14)(SFC, 8/20/14, p.A14)
2014 Aug 18, In Missouri police and protesters collided in the streets of Ferguson again late today, a day after Gov. Jay Nixon summoned the National Guard to help restore calm to the St. Louis suburb. The violence left six wounded and led to 31 arrests. A third and final autopsy was performed on Michael Brown (18), shot and killed on Aug 9, for the Justice Department by one of the military's most experienced medical examiners.
(AP, 8/19/14)(AFP, 8/19/14)
2014 Aug 18, In Ohio an estimated 5-8 thousand gallons of fuel oil spilled into the Ohio River from the Duke Energy power plant in New Richmond. A 15-mile section of the river was closed for cleanup.
(SFC, 8/20/14, p.A8)
2014 Aug 18, James Jeffords (80), former US Senator from Vermont, died in DC. In 2001 he declared that he would leave the Republicans and caucus with Democrats. This cost Republicans their control of the Senate.
(SFC, 8/19/14, p.A6)
2014 Aug 18, China's government said it has concluded Mercedes-Benz violated anti-monopoly law and charged excessive prices for parts, adding to a growing number of global automakers snared in an investigation of the industry.
(AP, 8/18/14)
2014 Aug 18, China’s CNOOC discovered a gas field at a depth of about 1,500 meters, about 150 km south of Hainan island. It was unclear whether the discovery would become commercially viable.
(AP, 9/16/14)
2014 Aug 18, In Egypt gunmen shot and killed a policeman on patrol and wounded another in the Nile Delta province of Gharbiya.
(AP, 8/18/14)
2014 Aug 18, In Cairo Israeli and Palestinian negotiators agreed to a 24-hour ceasefire late today.
(AP, 8/19/14)
2014 Aug 18, Indian and Nepalese officials said that flooding and torrential rains have left at least 100 dead in Nepal and 84 dead in India.
(SFC, 8/19/14, p.A5)
2014 Aug 18, Iraqi Kurdish forces said they had recaptured the country's biggest dam from Islamic State militants, although an employee at the site said jihadist fighters still controlled key points on the vulnerable structure.
(Reuters, 8/18/14)
2014 Aug 18, Israeli troops demolished the homes of Hussam Kawasme and Amar Abu Aysha, suspected of the abduction and killing of three Israeli teenagers in the occupied West Bank in June. Kawasme, a 40-year-old resident of the West Bank city of Hebron, was arrested on July 11, but the other two suspects remained at large.
(Reuters, 8/18/14)
2014 Aug 18, Human Rights Watch said it has documented at least 10 cases of unlawful killings and 10 cases of enforced disappearances carried out by the Kenya Anti-Terror Police Unit from last November to June.
(SFC, 8/19/14, p.A2)
2014 Aug 18, In Libya unidentified warplanes bombed militia positions in Tripoli. They were later identified as aircraft based in Egypt and flown by pilots from the UAE.
(Reuters, 8/18/14)(Reuters, 8/19/14)(Econ, 8/30/14, p.44)
2014 Aug 18, Saudi Arabia executed four people from the same family for attempting to smuggle "large quantities" of hashish into the kingdom.
(AP, 8/18/14)
2014 Aug 18, The Syrian authorities and rebels agreed to a truce in the southern Damascus district of Qadam which was a battlefield for more than a year.
(AFP, 8/18/14)
2014 Aug 18, In eastern Ukraine government forces pressed pro-Russian separatists in fighting overnight, encircling the rebel-held town of Horlivka and taking control of smaller settlements. 17 civilians were killed in a rebel attack on a convoy of people on the main road leading to Russia from the besieged rebel-held city of Luhansk.
(Reuters, 8/18/14)(AP, 8/18/14)(Reuters, 8/21/14)
2014 Aug 18, In Yemen tens of thousands of people joined an anti-government rally in Sanaa in response to a call by Shiite rebel commander Abdulmalik al-Huthi.
(AFP, 8/18/14)
2015 Aug 18, In Alaska 3 men were believed buried by a landslide at a construction site in Sitka. Six landslides hit the city following 2.5 inches of rain over the last 24 hours.
(SFC, 8/20/15, p.A7)
2015 Aug 18, Bangladesh authorities arrested three lawyers for funding a newly founded militant group. Sakila Farzana, Hasanuzzaman Liton and Mahfuz Chowdhury Bopon allegedly channeled more than 10 million takas ($129,870) to the Shaheed Hamza Brigade for the new militant group to buy weapons and fund its operation.
(AP, 8/19/15)
2015 Aug 18, In Burundi 4 people were killed in Bujumbura as violence persisted following the controversial re-election of President Pierre Nkurunziza.
(AP, 8/19/15)
2015 Aug 18, China’s Ministry of Public Security said police have arrested 15,000 people on suspicion of cybercrimes as the government tightens its control over the Internet.
(AP, 8/18/15)
2015 Aug 18, The Greek government gazette said reported an agreement to sell to a German company the rights to operate 14 regional airports.
(AP, 8/18/15)
2015 Aug 18, Haitian electoral officials disqualified nine candidates for engaging in violence or inciting chaos during the August 9 parliamentary elections.
(AP, 8/18/15)
2015 Aug 18, In the Indian-controlled portion of Kashmir suspected rebels opened fire at a police post, killing a police constable and a civilian.
(AP, 8/18/15)
2015 Aug 18, In northern Iraq Fadhil Ahmad al-Hayali, also known as Haji Mutaz, was killed in a US air strike. He was IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi's senior deputy and second-in-command of the Islamic State jihadist group.
(AFP, 8/21/15)
2015 Aug 18, Myanmar's parliament voted to again extend martial law for three months in a restive area along the country's border with China, where there have been clashes between the military and an armed ethnic group since February.
(Reuters, 8/18/15)
2015 Aug 18, In the southern Philippines a motorcycle-riding gunman killed Gregorio Ybanez, the publisher of a small newspaper. Colleagues said they suspect his killing could be linked to his other job as a director of an electric cooperative.
(AP, 8/19/15)
2015 Aug 18, Russian police said they had detained an "international criminal gang" that produced contraband cheese worth some $30 million using banned Western ingredients. An unnamed source in law enforcement said that the rennet used by the ring had been imported illegally from countries including Latvia, Lithuania and Poland, which are subject to Russian sanctions.
(AFP, 8/18/15)
2015 Aug 18, Syrian government forces recaptured four northwestern villages as they pounded the area with air strikes in a counter-attack on insurgents threatening strongholds of President Bashar al-Assad.
(Reuters, 8/18/15)
2015 Aug 18, In Syria Islamic State militants beheaded Khaled al-Asaad (81), a leading antiquities scholar who spent most of his life looking after the ancient ruins of Palmyra, then hung his body from a pole in a main square of the historic town and then reportedly cut into pieces.
(AP, 8/19/15)(AFP, 8/23/15)
2015 Aug 18, Six Syrian migrants, including an infant, drowned off the Turkish coast as they tried to reach the Greek island of Kos.
(SFC, 8/19/15, p.A2)
2015 Aug 18, In Turkey Muslim scholars and environmental advocates from about 20 countries called for a global phase-out of greenhouse gas emissions by mid-century.
(AP, 8/18/15)
2015 Aug 18, Uganda told South Sudan's warring factions to put their egos aside and make peace, a day after President Salva Kiir refused to sign a deal to end a 20-month-old conflict.
(Reuters, 8/18/15)
2015 Aug 18, In Yemen warplanes from a Saudi-led coalition hit the Houthi-controlled Red Sea port of Hodeida, destroying cranes and warehouses in the main entry point for aid supplies to the north. Houthi rebels ambushed pro-government forces. Fighting near the Aqaba-Tharaa area left 65 anti-rebel forces dead along with 15 Shiite rebels. In the north a Saudi-led coalition air strike killed 13 teaching staff and four children in Amran province. 5 Huthis were also killed in the strike.
(Reuters, 8/18/15)(SFC, 8/19/15, p.A3)(AFP, 8/20/15)
2016 Aug 18, The US State Department said it released $400 million in cash to Iran under a tribunal settlement only once it was assured that American prisoners had been freed and had boarded a plane. It was the first time the administration has said publicly that it used the payment as leverage to ensure the prisoners were released by Iran.
(Reuters, 8/19/16)
2016 Aug 18, The US Justice Department filed a brief in a Georgia lawsuit that said holding a defendant in jail simply because they can’t afford a fixed bail amount is unconstitutional.
(CSM, 8/21/16)
2016 Aug 18, Uber said it is acquiring Otto, a startup for self-driving trucks co-founded by Anthony Levandowski, a former Google employee. The acquisition cost $680 million.
(https://newsroom.uber.com/rethinking-transportation/)(Econ 5/6/17, p.58)
2016 Aug 18, In southern California weary firefighters battled a raging inferno that was threatening the homes of more than 82,000 people and sent flaming "firenadoes" tearing across the brush. Governor Jerry Brown declared a state of emergency for San Bernardino County, just 60 miles (100 km) east of Los Angeles, where the so-called Bluecut Fire was quickly growing.
(AFP, 8/18/16)
2016 Aug 18, In Afghanistan a mortar attack killed two people and wounded more than 50 in the eastern province of Kunar. The shells struck a market where crowds had gathered to celebrate independence day.
(AP, 8/18/16)
2016 Aug 18, Brazilian cyclist Kleber Ramos and Chinese swimmer Chen Xinyi were disqualified from the Olympic Games for having failed doping tests. Ramos tested positive for the banned blood booster EPO Cera while Chen took the diuretic hydrochlorothiazide.
(AFP, 8/18/16)
2016 Aug 18, Kimia Alizadeh won the first ever Olympic medal by an Iranian woman after claiming taekwondo bronze in Rio.
(AFP, 8/18/16)
2016 Aug 18, Prominent Crimean Tatar activist Ilmi Umerov (59) was incarcerated in a psychiatric hospital in Simferopol to undergo forced sanity testing. He was charged with calling for extremism in the Russian-annexed peninsula. Earlier this month he was forcibly moved from an ordinary hospital where he was receiving treatment for a suspected heart attack.
(AFP, 8/26/16)
2016 Aug 18, Ernst Nolte (93), German historian, died in Berlin. He had set off a dispute among his peers by arguing three decades ago that Nazism was a reaction to an "existential threat" to Germany from the Russian revolution.
(AP, 8/18/16)
2016 Aug 18, In Mauritania thirteen anti-slavery activists, arrested beween June 30 and July 9 for "rebellion and use of violence," were sentenced to between three and 15 years in prison, despite criticism of the case against them by international rights groups. On August 15 they told a court they had been tortured while in custody.
(AFP, 8/15/16)(AFP, 8/19/16)
24,
2016 Aug 18, The New Zealand government launched an inquiry into the contamination of a regional water supply that has left thousands of people sick with vomiting and diarrhoea. The outbreak of campylobacter bacteria, a form of gastroenteritis, has affected around 3,000 people on North Island.
(Reuters, 8/18/16)
2016 Aug 18, Two Palestinian police officers were slain by criminals the West Bank, who were killed the next day in a shootout in Nablus.
(AP, 8/19/16)
2016 Aug 18, Aides said South Sudan's former rebel leader and ex-vice president Riek Machar has left the country following violent clashes last month and is now in a "safe" country in the region.
(AFP, 8/18/16)
2016 Aug 18, Turkey ordered the seizure of the assets of 187 businessmen suspected of links to US-based Islamic preacher Fethullah Gulen, accused by Ankara of masterminding last month's attempted coup. Police detained 10 senior figures of the Revolutionary People's Liberation Party-Front (DHKP-C), a far-left militant group that has in the past targeted Turkish and US interests.
(AFP, 8/18/16)(Reuters, 8/18/16)
2016 Aug 18, In Turkey 3 police officers were killed and 170 people wounded by a car bomb at a police station in the eastern city of Elazig.
(Reuters, 8/18/16)
2016 Aug 18, The United Nations said for the first time that it was involved in the introduction of cholera to Haiti and needs to do "much more" to end the suffering of those affected, estimated at more than 800,000 people.
(AP, 8/19/16)
2016 Aug 18, In northern Vietnam Pham Duy Cuong, head of the Communist Party organization in Yen Bai province and Ngo Ngoc Tuan, chief of the provincial legislature, were shot in their offices by fellow officials Do Cuong Minh, who then shot himself dead.
(AP, 8/18/16)
2016 Aug 18, Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) said it was evacuating its staff from six hospitals in northern Yemen after a Saudi-led coalition air strike hit a health facility operated by the group killing 19 people.
(Reuters, 8/19/16)
2017 Aug 18, US White House Chief of Staff John Kelly and Steve Bannon (63), the chief strategist and key campaign ally of US president Donald Trump, agreed that this would be Bannon’s last day in the Trump administration.
(AFP, 8/19/17)(SFC, 8/19/17, p.A1)
2017 Aug 18, Carl Icahn said in a letter to Trump released today said that he is stepping down to prevent "partisan bickering" about his unofficial role that Democrats suggested could benefit him financially.
(AP, 8/19/17)
2017 Aug 18, In California Nery Israel Estrada Margos (38) entered the lobby of police headquarters in Santa Rosa and said he had assaulted his girlfriend, Veronica Cabrera Ramirez, and thought that she might be dead. Margos had been jailed earlier on suspicion of felony domestic violence, but was released on bail on Aug 3. Margos was subject to deportation to his native Guatemala.
(SFC, 8/31/17, p.A3)
2017 Aug 18, In Florida Everett Miller (45) shot and killed police Officer Matthew Baxter (27) during a scuffle in the downtown area of Kissimmee. Officer Sam Howard (36) was wounded and died of his wounds the next day. Another two officers were shot and wounded in Jacksonville.
(SFC, 8/19/17, p.A6)(SSFC, 8/20/17, p.A9)
2017 Aug 18, In Maryland three young girls were found stabbed to death inside a home in Clinton. Suspect Antonio Williams (24) confessed and faced murder charges.
(SSFC, 8/20/17, p.A9)
2017 Aug 18, Texas authorities said a monthlong sting operation in Houston has led to the arrest of more than 250 sex buyers and traffickers.
(SFC, 8/19/17, p.A5)
2017 Aug 18, NASA launched the 13th and last of its Tracking and Data Relay Satellite network from Cape Canaveral.
(SFC, 8/19/17, p.A5)
2017 Aug 18, The expedition crew of Research Vessel Petrel, owned by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, located the wreckage of the Indianapolis on the floor of the North Pacific Ocean, more than 18,000 feet (5,500 meters) below the surface. The World War II heavy cruiser played a critical role in the atomic bombing of Hiroshima before being struck by Japanese torpedoes in 1945.
(AP, 8/20/17)
2017 Aug 18, In Afghanistan Taliban insurgents attacked a police checkpoint in the southern Helmand province late today, killing five Afghan police.
(AP, 8/19/17)
2017 Aug 18, Australia's widening citizenship crisis entangled a seventh politician, a key independent senator whose support is critical for PM Malcolm Turnbull to pass legislation through a hostile Senate. Senator Nick Xenophon said he may hold dual citizenship, Australian and British, which would make him ineligible to sit in parliament.
(Reuters, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, In northwestern Austria an intense storm ripped through a beer tent, killing two people and injuring at least 40 more.
(Reuters, 8/19/17)
2017 Aug 18, The Turan agency, Azerbaijan’s only independent news agency, said the government has frozen its bank accounts, in a step that could shutter the outlet. Director Mehman Aliyev said the move was part of a criminal probe into an alleged $22,000 (19,000 euros) in unpaid taxes, a charge he said was false.
(AFP, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, Brazilian authorities announced two new phases of their Car Wash operation, ensnaring US asphalt maker Sargeant Marine, six Greek shipping companies and a former Brazilian congressman in the wide-ranging graft probe.
(Reuters, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, Cambridge University Press, one of Britain's most respected academic publishers, said it has blocked online access in China to hundreds of scholarly articles and book reviews on Chinese affairs after coming under pressure from Beijing. On Aug 21 The China Quarterly said the publisher has agreed to restore more than 300 politically sensitive articles that had been removed.
(Reuters, 8/18/17)(SFC, 8/22/17, p.A4)
2017 Aug 18, Sir Bruce Forsyth (b.1928), dancer and star of British TV variety shows, died. Forsyth came to national attention from the mid-1950s through the ITV series Sunday Night at the London Palladium. He went on to host several game shows, including The Generation Game, Play Your Cards Right, The Price Is Right and You Bet!.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Forsyth)(Econ, 8/26/17, p.74)
2017 Aug 18, China launched its first "cyber court" to settle online disputes, as the legal system attempts to keep up with the explosion of mobile payment and e-commerce.
(AFP, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, China's State Council released a document saying the government is moving to curb domestic companies' investments abroad in property, sports, entertainment and other fields, following a series of high-profile, multibillion-dollar acquisitions by Chinese firms.
(AP, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, Furious Chinese businesspeople said that Beijing's decision to enforce UN sanctions on North Korean seafood imports would hobble the economy of the entire northeastern city of Hunchun, sparking a rare public protest earlier this week after the surprise move suddenly choked off border trade.
(AP, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, Police in Finland shot a Moroccan asylum-seeker in the leg after he was suspected of stabbing several people in the western city of Turku. Two women were killed and seven other people wounded. Police over the next hours arrested five people in a Turku apartment overnight in their investigation into the stabbings. The attacker was later identified as Abderrahman Bouanane (18). Police later said he had become radicalized some three months before the attack, and although he acted alone, he thought of himself as an IS fighter.
(AP, 8/18/17)(AP, 8/19/17)(AFP, 8/19/17)(AP, 8/21/17)(AP, 2/7/18)
2017 Aug 18, French police evicted thousands of migrants living on sidewalks in an area of northern Paris. Interior Minister Gerard Collomb said the latest action proved the system for handling migrants is "dysfunctional".
(Reuters, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, The Iraqi military said its forces have moved into positions around the city of Tal Afar, their next objective in the US-backed campaign to defeat Islamic State militants.
(Reuters, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, In Kenya suspected members of Somalia's al Shabaab Islamist group beheaded at least three men overnight in an attack at Maleli village in Lamu county.
(Reuters, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, The forces of Libyan military strongman Khalifa Haftar said they had detained senior commander Mahmoud Mustafa Busayf al-Werfalli two weeks before the International Criminal Court issued a warrant for his arrest over unlawful killings in the flashpoint city of Benghazi.
(AFP, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, Former Malian Islamist police chief Aliou Mahamane Toure, who cut off people's hands as part of a harsh form of Islamic law during an occupation of the north in 2012-13 by jihadi rebels, was handed a 10-year jail term.
(Reuters, 8/19/17)
2017 Aug 18, Nigeria’s government said more than 100 girls who were kidnapped by Boko Haram militants in the town of Chibok in 2014 are ready to return to normal life after being released and receiving psychological and medical treatment.
(Reuters, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, In Romania Corneliu Barladeanu (51), the Bishop of Husi, stepped down at the end of a two-day Holy Synod where a sex scandal was discussed for the first time in its 92-year history. Barladeanu was seen on video engaging in sexual acts with a male student, but maintained his innocence.
(AP, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, Rwandan President Paul Kagame (59) was sworn for a third term in office after a crushing election win that rights groups criticized over irregularities and voter intimidation.
(AFP, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, In Sierra Leone aid workers warned of a humanitarian crisis as the official death toll passed 400, with more than a hundred children among the victims -- and a similar number orphaned.
(AFP, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, South Africa moved to halt an online auction of rhino horn starting next week, as outraged conservationists said the sale would undermine the global ban on rhino trade. The Pretoria High Court was expected to make a decision on Aug 20.
(AFP, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, A South African government source said South Africa is planning to grant diplomatic immunity to Zimbabwe's First Lady Grace Mugabe, allowing her to return to Harare and avoid prosecution for the alleged assault of a 20-year-old model.
(Reuters, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, South Africa grounded an Air Zimbabwe flight at Johannesburg's main international airport after South African authorities concluded it was not in compliance with civil aviation rules.
(AP, 8/19/17)
2017 Aug 18, In South Africa a man walked into a police station, saying he was tired of eating human flesh and produced part of a human leg and a hand. Five people were soon arrested on charges related to cannibalism, including murder and possession of human body parts in KwaZulu-Natal province.
(AP, 8/23/17)(AFP, 9/28/17)
2017 Aug 18, Syria’s state media, a Hezbollah military media unit and a war monitor said the Syrian army and its allies have encircled an Islamic State (IS) pocket in central Syria after a series of advances in the desert region.
(Reuters, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, Venezuela’s newly-created constituent assembly, elected in late July to re-write the crisis-hit country's constitution, said it would supersede congress and pass laws on its own. A group of 12 regional nations plus the United States rejected Venezuela's new government-allied legislative superbody, saying they would continue to regard the opposition-controlled congress as the country's only legitimate law maker.
(Reuters, 8/19/17)
2017 Aug 18, Venezuela's ousted chief prosecutor and her husband, two of President Nicolas Maduro's most outspoken critics, fled the country and landed in Colombia.
(AP, 8/18/17)
2017 Aug 18, Vietnam’s Ministry of Health said 10,000 new infections of dengue fever have been reported over the past week. 24 deaths have been recorded in the latest outbreak that has infected over 90 thousand people.
(SFC, 8/19/17, p.A2)
2017 Aug 18, In Vietnam six people, including four children in a family, were killed when a Vietnam War-era mortar shell they were sawing for scrap metal exploded.
(AP, 8/18/17)
2018 Aug 18, In San Francisco Lance Silva (39) was arrested in connection with the case of Brian Egg (65), who had disappeared in July. A day before Silva's arrest a headless corpse was found at Egg's home at 228 Clara St. DNA testing later identified the body of Brian Egg, found in a slurry of water and household chemicals on Clara St. Egg's hand had also been removed and were missing.
(SFC, 8/28/18, p.A1)(SFC, 9/28/18, p.D4)
2018 Aug 18, In Afghanistan Taliban leader Maulvi Haibatullah said there will be no peace in Afghanistan as long as the foreign "occupation" continues, reiterating the group's position that the 17-year war can only be brought to an end through direct talks with the United States.
(AP, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, Hundreds of people gathered in Buenos Aires to oppose the influence of religion on Argentine politics and encourage people to quit the Roman Catholic Church in the wake of a Senate vote not to legalize some abortions.
(AP, 8/19/18)
2018 Aug 18, Belarus press reported that Pres. Alexander Lukashenko (63) has dismissed the country's prime minister and other top ministers. Lukashenko named Sergei Rumas, the head of the country's Development Bank, as new prime minister. He also named four new deputy prime ministers, as well as new ministers of the economy, communications and industry, among other posts.
(Reuters, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, Brazil's "queer museum," forced to close last year after conservatives attacked it for allegedly promoting pedophilia, blasphemy and bestiality, reopened in the shadow of Rio de Janeiro's iconic Christ the Redeemer statue. A crowdfunding campaign raised more than a million reais ($275,000) allowing it to reopen for a month, with free admission, at the School for Visual Arts in Rio de Janeiro's Parque Lage.
(AFP, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, In northern Brazil a local merchant was robbed and severely beaten in an incident blamed on Venezuelan suspects, in Pacaraima, where an estimated 1,000 immigrants are living on the street. Dozens of locals then attacked the two main immigrant makeshift camps and burned their belongings, leading Venezuelans to cross the border back into their home country. Brazilian federal police, in charge of immigration, estimated that about 500 Venezuelans cross over to Brazil every day.
(AFP, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, British investigators found a "sophisticated" illegal gun factory in Sussex, southern England, and made three arrests as part of an inquiry into the criminal production of firearms.
(Reuters, 8/22/18)
2018 Aug 18, China said it has sacked six senior officials at its food and drug regulator after a safety scandal at vaccine maker Changsheng Biotechnology Co Ltd revealed failings at the government body including inadequate supervision.
(Reuters, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, In China Malaysia's PM Mahathir Mohamad courted Chinese e-commerce investment in his country at the start of his first trip to China since his stunning electoral victory three months ago.
(AP, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, CongoDRC's government said deadly Ebola outbreak has now claimed 49 lives since the start of the month. A day earlier the World Health Organization said it expects more cases.
(AFP, 8/19/18)
2018 Aug 18, Cyprus extradited Seif Eddin Mustafa, an Egyptian man who hijacked a domestic EgyptAir flight in March, 2016, and ordered it to land in Cyprus. He was transferred to Egyptian custody and flown to Egypt after giving up a drawn-out legal fight.
(AP, 8/19/18)
2018 Aug 18, In India thousands of stranded people were waiting for rescue and officials pleaded for more help as relentless monsoon floods battered the southern state of Kerala, where more than 190 have died in a little over a week.
(AP, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, In Indonesia the 18th Asian Games officially opened in Jakarta.
(AP, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, Iran said it would resist the pressures of US sanctions by relying on its natural and human resources, as Washington pushes allies to cut economic ties with Tehran.
(Reuters, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, Iranian police detained human rights lawyer Ghasem Sholeh-Saadi (64) after he appeared outside parliament in an "illegal gathering." A day earlier and on his Instagram account, Sholeh-Saadi posted that he will stage a sit-in protest in front of parliament to demand free elections.
(AP, 8/19/18)
2018 Aug 18, Namibian President Hage Geingob (77), who is hosting a summit of southern African leaders, strongly rejected criticism of Africa by the West saying there was undue pressure on the continent. The two-day Southern African Development Community (SADC) summit ends today.
(AFP, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, Pakistan's cricket star-turned-politician Imran Khan was sworn in as prime minister despite protests by opposition parties, which accuse the security services of intervening on his behalf in last month's elections.
(AP, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, Qatar accused Saudi Arabia of barring its citizens from this year's haj, something Riyadh denies, saying a diplomatic dispute is not stopping Qataris from making the pilgrimage to Mecca. Saudi Arabia has said Qatari pilgrims can arrive on any airline other than Qatar Airways.
(Reuters, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, Kofi Annan (80) of Ghana, a former UN Secretary-General (1997-2006) and Nobel peace laureate (2001), died in Switzerland. He was the first black African to assume the world's top diplomatic post.
(AP, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, Defense experts said Taiwan is responding to China's arms buildup by developing missiles and interceptors of its own that could reduce Beijing's military advantage over the self-ruled island.
(AP, 8/18/18)
2018 Aug 18, Tanzania's ruling party (CCM) said Tanzania is an "independent" country and will not be "intimidated", after the US expressed concern about the conduct of 70 recent by-elections.
(AFP, 8/19/18)
2018 Aug 18, Uncertainty reigned in Venezuela after President Nicolas Maduro unveiled a major economic reform plan aimed at halting the spiraling hyperinflation that has thrown the oil-rich, cash-poor South American country into chaos.
(AFP, 8/18/18)
2019 Aug 18, The US military successfully tested a ground-launched, intermediate-range, nuclear-capable cruise missile. It was exactly the kind of kind of missile that the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces treaty, or INF, had banned before the administration of US Pres. Donald Trump in early August 2019 formally withdrew from the treaty.
(The National Interest, 8/19/19)
2019 Aug 18, In Florida a fatal hit-and-run that killed a 13-year-old boy and a 47-year-old man walking along US 19 early today. A man called the Manatee County Sheriff’s Office after seeing the story on the news saying he did not stop is because he thought he hit a deer.
(Miami Herald, 8/19/19)
2019 Aug 18, Former Louisiana Governor Kathleen Babineaux Blanco (76), whose tenure was dominated by the trauma of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005, died from complications of cancer. Blanco, a Democrat, was the first woman elected to lead the state, serving as governor from 2004 to 2008.
(Reuters, 8/19/19)
2019 Aug 18, London announced that it had ordered the repeal of the European Communities Act, which took Britain into the forerunner to the EU 46 years ago and gives Brussels law supremacy. The order, signed by Brexit Secretary Steve Barclay on Aug. 16, was set to take effect on October 31.
(AFP, 8/17/19)
2019 Aug 18, Cambodia said it is banning online gambling, which helped propel a wave of Chinese investment in casinos in the country, saying that the industry had been used by foreign criminals to extort money.
(Reuters, 8/18/19)
2019 Aug 18, Authorities in Gibraltar said they are rejecting the United States' renewed request that the British overseas territory not release an Iranian supertanker. Gibraltar's government said the ship would be free to go, as US sanctions on Iran had no equivalent in the United Kingdom or the rest of the EU.
(AP, 8/18/19)
2019 Aug 18, In Greece Metropolitan Amvrosios of Kalavryta (81), a fiery conservative Orthodox bishop known for criticizing, often in intemperate terms, those who he believed acted in a "non-Christian" or "non-Greek" way, including gays, migrants and politicians, resigned.
(AP, 8/18/19)
2019 Aug 18, In Hong Kong hundreds of thousands of anti-government protesters joined a mass rally, filling major thoroughfares in heavy rain in the eleventh week of what have been often violent demonstrations in the Asian financial hub.
(Reuters, 8/18/19)
2019 Aug 18, Iceland honored the passing of Okjokull, its first glacier lost to climate change, as scientists warn that some 400 others on the subarctic island risk the same fate.
(AFP, 8/19/19)
2019 Aug 18, Indian authorities reimposed restrictions on movement in major parts of Kashmir's biggest city, Srinagar, after violent overnight clashes between residents and police in which dozens were injured.
(Reuters, 8/18/19)
2019 Aug 18, In Indonesia police fired tear gas into the dormitory before arresting 43 students in Surabaya, East Java.
(Reuters, 8/19/19)
2019 Aug 18, The Iranian supertanker Adrian Darya 1, previously named Grace 1, with $130 million worth of light crude oil that the US suspects is tied to a sanctioned organization, left Gibraltar late today and headed east into the Mediterranean Sea, with its next destination reported to be Greece.
(AP, 8/19/19)
2019 Aug 18, Israeli forces opened fire at a group of Palestinian gunmen overnight as they tried to cross the Gaza border. Palestinian health officials said three of the men were killed.
(Reuters, 8/18/19)
2019 Aug 18, In Romania a patient (38) at a psychiatric hospital beat to death five patients with a drip stand in Sapoca and wounded several more.
(SFC, 8/20/19, p.A2)
2019 Aug 18, Senegalese Jacques Diouf (81), who headed the UN food agency for 18 years, died in France following a long illness.
(AFP, 8/18/19)
2019 Aug 18, Syrian state media and an opposition war monitor said government forces have gained more ground in the country's northwest, almost reaching the western outskirts of Khan Sheikhoun, a major rebel-held town. A car bomb killed one member of a security force and wounded two others in the Kurdish-controlled city of Qamishli.
(AP, 8/18/19)(Reuters, 8/18/19)
2019 Aug 18, In central Turkey Emine Bulut (38) was stabbed in the neck by her former husband at a restaurant in Kirikkale. 18. A video posted on social media reportedly shows her crying: "I don't want to die" as her traumatized daughter shouts: "Mommy, please don't die." On August 23 Turkey's ruling party vowed to tackle violence against women and children.
(AP, 8/23/19)
2019 Aug 18, In western Uganda at least 19 people were killed when a fuel truck exploded after losing control and ramming into three cars. Later today 10 people were killed and four others critically injured when a speeding minivan crashed into a passenger bus on an eastern highway.
(Reuters, 8/19/19)(AP, 8/19/19)
2019 Aug 18, The UN mission in Libya condemned airstrikes by the self-styled Libyan National Army on a militia-run airport west of, Tripoli, saying the facility had no military targets.
(AP, 8/18/19)
2020 Aug 18, President Donald Trump said that he will pardon Susan B. Anthony, a women's suffrage leader arrested for voting in 1872 in violation of laws permitting only men to vote.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, The Republican-led Senate intelligence committee on the Russia investigation concluded that Trump campaign's interactions with Russian intelligence services during the 2016 presidential election posed a “grave" counterintelligence threat as it detailed how associates of the Republican candidate had regular contact with Russians and expected to benefit from the Kremlin's help. Trump immediately denounced the 1,300-page report as “a hoax."
(AP, 8/18/20)(The Daily Beast, 10/5/20)
2020 Aug 18, Several Democratic state attorneys general said they will announce legal action against President Donald Trump's administration over Postal Service changes that may affect mail-in voting in the November US presidential election.
(Reuters, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, Postmaster General Louis DeJoy said that he would suspend cost-cutting measures and operational changes at the Postal Service until after the November election.
(NY Times, 8/19/20)
2020 Aug 18, On Wall Street the S&P 500 index closed at an all-time high at 3389.78. The Nasdaq composite index also made a record close at 11,210.84.
(SFC, 8/19/20, p.C1)
2020 Aug 18, Democrats formally nominated Joe Biden for the presidency on the second night of their national convention, in a virtual roll call vote.
(NY Times, 8/19/20)
2020 Aug 18, The US government sued Israeli drugmaker Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd, accusing the firm of causing the submission of false claims to Medicare by using kickbacks to boost sales of its multiple sclerosis drug Copaxone.
(Reuters, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, The United States and Russia concluded two days of arms control talks with the two sides still at odds over the US demand to include China in any new treaty.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency in response to wildfires in California, as the state battled the effects of a sweltering heat wave, rolling blackouts and the coronavirus pandemic.
(NY Times, 8/19/20)
2020 Aug 18, California to date had 636,833 cases of coronavirus and 11,390 deaths. The SF Bay Area had 74,020 cases and 987 deaths. Total cases nationwide reached over 5,480,487 with the death toll at 171,679.
(sfist.com, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, An independent inquiry reported that for-profit nursing homes in Connecticut had significantly more cases and deaths from COVID-19 than non-profit ones, shedding new light on the shortfalls of the state's pandemic response.
(Reuters, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, US prosecutors alleged that New York attorney Jason Kurland (46), the self-dubbed “Lottery Lawyer," was actually stealing tens of millions of dollars from his clients with the help of three other individuals—including a mafia member—to fund their extravagant lifestyles. The indictment charged Kurland with conspiracy, wire fraud and money laundering.
(https://tinyurl.com/y6bhxl7z)(SFC, 8/20/20, p.A4)
2020 Aug 18, In Oregon protesters lit fires, threw rocks and smashed windows at county government offices in Portland, prompting police to declare a riot, after weeks of mostly peaceful anti-racism demonstrations.
(Reuters, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, South Dakota transportation officials said that this year’s Sturgis Motorcycle Rally drew more than 460,000 vehicles during the 10-day event. The South Dakota Department of Health issued a warning that one person who spent several hours at a bar on Main Street in Sturgis has tested positive for COVID-19 and may have spread it to others. The city plans to conduct mass COVID-19 testing in an effort to catch outbreaks.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, Vanda Pharmaceuticals said COVID-19 patients with pneumonia improved faster when treated with the company's experimental therapy than those on placebo, citing an interim analysis of data from a late-stage study.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, In Belarus more factories joined a growing strike turning up pressure on Pres. Alexander Lukashenko to resign.
(SFC, 8/19/20, p.A2)
2020 Aug 18, Sinopharm chairman Liu Jingzhen said a potential coronavirus vaccine being developed by the unit of China National Pharmaceutical Group could cost no more than 1,000 yuan ($144.27) for two shots.
(Reuters, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, It was reported that Dubai again has loosened laws governing alcohol sales and possession of liquor as the sheikhdom tries to claw its way out of an economic depression worsened by the coronavirus pandemic.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, France's labor ministry announced that face masks will be required in enclosed shared office spaces starting Sept. 1, citing an "upsurge" in COVID-19 cases.
(AP, 8/19/20)
2020 Aug 18, Chancellor Angela Merkel warned there could be no further relaxation of coronavirus restrictions while the country grapples with a surge in new infections. Germany has recorded a total of 225,404 coronavirus cases and 9,236 fatalities.
(AFP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, German authorities arrested a Syrian national (Khaled A.) on suspicion he was a member of two militant groups that fought against the government of President Bashar Assad during the early stages of the conflict in Syria.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, In Germany Sarmad D., an Iraqi man (30), drove his car into motorcycles along a stretch of Berlin highway. Six people were injured, three of them severely in what officials soon called a terror attack.
(AP, 8/19/20)
2020 Aug 18, Ireland's health minister warned that the country is at a "tipping point" in the face of rising coronavirus cases, as the cabinet reintroduced some restrictions on public meetings.
(The Telegraph, 8/19/20)
2020 Aug 18, The Special Tribunal for Lebanon based in the Hague found one of the four members of the Iran-backed militia and political party Hezbollah guilty of the 2005 car bomb assassination of Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri and 21 others. Only Salim Ayyash was found guilty of assassination by truck bomb. The other defendants, Hussein Oneissi, Assad Sabra, and Hassan Merhi were acquitted of a barrage of charges including conspiracy to commit a terrorist attack and international homicide with explosives. A fifth man, Mustafa Badreddine was killed in Syria in 2016, after which charges against him were dropped.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, Rumors of a coup d'etat and of the arrest of Mali's President Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta drew hundreds of anti-government protesters into the streets of the capital, Bamako. President Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta of Mali resigned after the country’s military mutinied, arresting him and other government officials. The West African nation has been gripped by unrest for weeks, driven by charges that Keïta stole an election in March.
(The Telegraph, 8/18/20)(NY Times, 8/19/20)
2020 Aug 18, Sunil Kumar Nandeshwar, the Indian captain of a ship that spilled about 1,000 metric tons of oil into the Indian Ocean, endangering world-renowned coral reefs and lagoons in Mauritius, was arrested alongside the chief officer of the ship, Tilak Ratna Suboda, a Sri Lankan.
(NY Times, 8/19/20)(SSFC, 8/23/20, p.B10)
2020 Aug 18, The Norwegian Refugee Council said that a record one million people are displaced by violence in Burkina Faso amid the COVID-19 outbreak. More than 450,000 people were newly displaced in 2020, with 184 attacks against civilians recorded according to new figures by the Burkinabe Council for Emergency Relief and Rehabilitation.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, Oman's sultan named foreign and finance ministers for the first time, putting officials in positions long wielded by his late predecessor. Sultan Haitham bin Tariq Al Said also issued 28 decrees renaming and reorganizing ministries in a nation he took over in January.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, It was reported that Pakistan's drug regulator has greenlit the country's first Phase 3 clinical trial for a potential COVID-19 vaccine, which is being developed by China's CanSino Biologics (CanSino) and Beijing Institute of Biotechnology.
(Reuters, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, Gaza's sole power plant shut down, leaving the territory's 2 million residents with only around four hours of electricity a day after Israel cut off fuel supplies in response to incendiary balloons launched by Palestinian militants.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, In the Philippines a mild coronavirus lockdown was eased in Jakarta and four outlying provinces to further reopen the country's battered economy. The Philippines has reported more than 164,000 cases including 2,681 deaths.
(SFC, 8/19/20, p.A6)
2020 Aug 18, In Somalia two soldiers were executed after being convicted of raping a 10-year-old boy who died from the bleeding.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, South Africans were again are allowed to buy alcohol and cigarettes as the government relaxed lockdown restrictions introduced to curb the spread of coronavirus.
(BBC, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, A senior UN official warned that war-torn Yemen is sliding toward famine as the coronavirus spreads and its economy implodes — all amid a funding crisis that is forcing the United Nations to make deeper aid cuts, including stopping treatment for 250,000 severely malnourished children.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2020 Aug 18, A Zimbabwean magistrate barred Beatrice Mtetwa, a top human rights lawyer, from representing jailed journalist Hopewell Chin’ono and ordered that Mtetwa be prosecuted for comments she posted on a Facebook page run by an American filmmaker.
(AP, 8/18/20)
2021 Aug 18, The Biden administration moved on multiple fronts to fight back against the surging Delta variant, strongly recommending booster shots for most vaccinated American adults and using federal leverage to force nursing homes to vaccinate their staffs. President Biden also directed his education secretary to “use all of his authority, and legal action, if appropriate," to deter states from banning universal masking in classrooms.
(NY Times, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, The Biden administration announced that it is banning the use of chlorpyrifos on food. The common pesticide, widely used since 1965 on fruits and vegetables, because it has been linked to neurological damage in children. The new rule will take effect in six months.
(NY Times, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, The US government said it plans to make COVID-19 vaccine booster shots widely available starting on Sept. 20 as infections rise from the coronavirus Delta variant.
(Reuters, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said it is creating a new disease forecasting center to improve the ability to use data to predict and gauge emerging health threats.
(Reuters, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, Total US COVID-19 cases reached over 37,059,718 with the death toll at 623,690.
(sfist.com, 8/19/21)
2021 Aug 18, Doctors reported that blood plasma from COVID-19 survivors didn’t help newly infected patients when tested against a dummy infusion.
(AP, 8/19/21)
2021 Aug 18, The US Justice Department filed a statement of interest in an ongoing lawsuit in Cole County, Missouri, saying the state's Second Amendment Preservation Act, also known as "HB85," should be declared unconstitutional and that the court should issue a injunction barring its enforcement. HB85, which was signed into law in June, purports to nullify various federal firearms laws.
(Reuters, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, It was reported that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has been flying around the state promoting a monoclonal antibody treatment for COVID-19 sold by Regeneron. Ken Griffin, CEO of Citadel, a Chicago-based hedge fund, has donated 10.75 million to a political committee that supports DeSantis. Citadel has $15.9 million shares of Regeneron.
(SFC, 8/19/21, p.A4)
2021 Aug 18, Mississippi opened its 2nd field hospital to treat COVID-19 patients. Only 34% of the state was fully vaccinated.
(Fox News, 8/18/21)(SFC, 8/19/21, p.A4)
2021 Aug 18, A US federal appeals court threw out what it called a "shockingly low" four-year prison term for a Brooklyn woman (26) who admitted to supporting Islamic State, and ordered that she be resentenced. Ceasar was sentenced in June 2019, and has been free since July 2020 after receiving credit for time served.
(AP, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, A US federal appeals court upheld a Texas law banning the most common form of second-trimester abortion.
(NY Times, 8/19/21)
2021 Aug 18, In Utah the bodies of Kylen Schulte (24) and Crystal Turner (38) were discovered by a friend after they’d been missing several days. They’d allegedly told friends and family that a “creepy" man was camping near them in the La Sal mountains. Schulte and Turner reportedly went missing on Aug. 14.
(https://tinyurl.com/55u4hmfz)(The Independent, 8/25/21)
2021 Aug 18, In the latest edition of DC comics' series "Batman: Urban Legends," character Tim Drake, who is the third version of Robin, is seen accepting an offer of a date from a male friend. Robin first appeared as Batman's sidekick in 1940.
(Reuters, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, Cigna Corp said it requires its employees working remotely to be fully vaccinated before entering any US worksite from Sept. 7, as infections from the Delta variant of the coronavirus rise in the country.
(Reuters, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, PayPal Holdings Inc said it will no longer charge customers late fees when they miss payments on buy now, pay later (BNPL) purchases globally, as competition heats up in the fast-growing sector. The changes will be effective from October in the United States, the United Kingdom and France.
(Reuters, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, In Afghanistan Taliban militants attacked protesters in Jalalabad killing at least one person. Taliban fighters reportedly killed the family member of an Afghan journalist working for German's Deutsche Welle.
(SFC, 8/19/21, p.A2)(AP, 8/20/21)
2021 Aug 18, The US evacuated 2,000 people from Kabul in 24 hours, mostly Afghans and NATO personnel. Outside the airport, the Taliban let some Afghans with visas and tickets enter but turned others away. Most of the Afghan central bank’s reserves are frozen at the US Federal Reserve. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) said that it would block Afghanistan’s access to about $460 million in emergency reserves.
(NY Times, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, In Belgium pilot Zara Rutherford (19) took off at the start of a three-month bid to become the youngest woman to fly solo round the world.
(Reuters, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, In northern Burkina Faso suspected Islamic extremists ambushed a convoy killing at least 30 civilians along with 17 soldiers and volunteer defense fighters.
(SFC, 8/19/21, p.A3)
2021 Aug 18, In western Ethiopia gunmen, reportedly from the Oromo Liberation Army (OLA), killed at least 150 people in an attack against local residents.
(Reuters, 8/26/21)
2021 Aug 18, Hong Kong police arrested four members of a university student union for allegedly advocating terrorism by paying tribute to a person who stabbed a police officer and then killed himself.
(AP, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, An Israeli healthcare provider said a third dose of Pfizer/BioNTech's COVID-19 vaccine was found to be 86% effective in people aged over 60.
(AP, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, Italy reported 69 coronavirus-related deaths against 54 the day before. The daily tally of new infections increased to 7,162 from 5,273.
(AP, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, Authorities in Gibraltar said they have seized 2.6 metric tons of cannabis resin with a street value of 15 million euros ($18 million) after a boat carrying the illicit substance rammed a Customs vessel during a high-speed chase at sea. Four men were arrested.
(AP, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, Malta’s attorney general indicted Yorgen Fenech, a leading Maltese businessman, in the murder of investigative journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia nearly four years ago. The murder triggered an international outcry against attempts to silence reporters.
(AP, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, It was reported that Malta has donated 40,000 AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine doses to Libya.
(https://tinyurl.com/xkxfjbw)(SFC, 8/19/21, p.A4)
2021 Aug 18, Workers at a General Motors Co pickup-truck plant in central Mexico voted to scrap their collective contract, opening the door for them to oust one of Mexico's largest labor organizations as their union under a new trade deal.
(Reuters, 8/19/21)
2021 Aug 18, Myanmar reported a total of more than 365,000 coronavirus cases and 13,945 deaths.
(SFC, 8/20/21, p.A5)
2021 Aug 18, The Assistance Association for Politifcal Prisoners said it has confirmed two more deaths in Myanmar bringing the total killed by security forces over the laset six months to 1001.
(SFC, 8/19/21, p.A3)
2021 Aug 18, Norway said it will offer all 16- and 17-year-olds their first COVID-19 vaccine dose after those over 18 are fully vaccinated.
(Reuters, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, Defense Minister Mariusz Blaszczak Poland has deployed hundreds of troops and is laying barbed wire along its border with Belarus to stop the arrival of migrants seeking to enter the country.
(AP, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, Syrian air defense units reportedly downed 22 of the 24 missiles launched by the Israeli warplanes with Russia-supplied air defense systems Pantsyr-S and Buk-M2. Six Israeli fighter jets had targeted facilities in the provinces of Damascus and Homs from Lebanon's airspace.
(AP, 8/20/21)
2021 Aug 18, Turkey-backed Syrian forces and Syrian Kurdish fighters shelled one another’s positions in northern Syria, leaving at least five people dead and more than a dozen wounded.
(AP, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, It was reported that Uganda is to take in 2,000 Afghan refugees.
(BBC, 8/18/21)
2021 Aug 18, World Health Organization officials said circulation of the Delta variant in areas of low vaccination is driving transmission of COVID-19 around the world.
(Reuters, 8/18/21)
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