Today in History - September 12
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490BC Sep 12, Athenian and Plataean Hoplites commanded by General Miltiades drove back a Persian invasion force under General Datis at Marathon, Greece, about this time. A hemerodromi or long-distance foot messenger, was dispatched to run 26 miles from Marathon to Athens to announce the victory. He reached Athens and proclaimed: "Rejoice! We conquer!" In the Battle of Marathon the forces of Darius the Great of Persia were defeated by the Greeks. The Greeks initiated the war when Persia, the strongest power in western Asia, established rule over Greek-speaking cities in Asia Minor. The first known written account of a run from Marathon to Athens occurs in the works of the Greek writer Plutarch (46–120), in his essay On the Glory of Athens. Plutarch attributes the run to a herald called either Thersippus or Eukles. Lucian, a century later, credits one "Philippides."
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Marathon)(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pheidippides)
352 CE Sep 12, Maximinus van Trier, bishop of Trier, saint, died.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1015 Sep 12, Lambert I with the Beard, count of Leuven, died in battle at about age 65.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1185 Sep 12, Andronicus I Comnenus, Byzantine emperor (1183-85), was lynched.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1213 Sep 12, Simon de Montfort defeated Raymond of Toulouse and Peter II of Aragon at Muret, France.
(HN, 9/12/98)
1297 Sep 12, The town of Olivenza (Olivença) came under Portuguese sovereignty with the Treaty of Alcanices. In 1801 it was ceded to Spain under the Treaty of Badajoz. In the 1815 Vienna convention Spain agreed to return it to Portugal, but this never happened.
(Econ, 8/31/13, p.14)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olivenza)
1494 Sep 12, Francois I of Valois-Angoulome, king of France (1515-47), was born.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1556 Sep 12, Emperor Charles resigned and his brother Ferdinand of Austria took over. Charles V resigned and ended his days in a Spanish monastery. He bequeathed Spain to his son Philip II, and the Holy Roman Empire to his brother Ferdinand I. A few years of peace in Europe followed. The event formed the basis for a later historical play by Friedrich Schiller, which was in turn used by Verdi for his opera "Don Carlos."
(TL-MB, 1988, p.19)(WSJ, 3/21/96, p.A-12)(MC, 9/12/01)
1591 Sep 12, Richard Grenville (b.1542), English vice-admiral and cousin of Sir. Walter Ralegh (Raleigh), died in battle against Spanish ships at age 49. He made 2 voyages to Roanoke Island in 1585 and 1586.
(MC, 9/12/01)(www.nps.gov/fora/grenville.htm)
1609 Sep 12, English explorer Henry Hudson sailed his ship, the Half Moon, into the river that later took his name. Hudson sailed for the Dutch East India Company in search of the Northwest Passage, a water route linking the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.
(AP, 9/12/97)(Econ, 7/4/09, p.28)
1612 Sep 12, Russia’s Tsar Vasili IV (b.1552) died.
(www.etoile.co.uk/Romanov/Timeline.html)
1624 Sep 12, The 1st submarine was tested in London.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1642 Sep 12, Cinq Mars, French plotter, was executed.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1662 Sep 12, Gov. Berkley of Virginia was denied his attempts to repeal the Navigation Acts.
(HN, 9/12/98)
1683 Sep 12, A combined Austrian and Polish army defeated the Ottoman Turks at Kahlenberg and lifted the siege on Vienna, Austria. The severed head of Kara Mustapha, Turkish grand vizier, was preserved by Austria as a souvenir of the siege of Vienna.
(WSJ, 3/27/96, p.A-16)(HN, 9/12/98)(SFEC, 2/6/00, p.A1)
1683 Sep 12, Prince Eugene of Savoy repelled an invasion of Vienna, Austria, by Turkish forces.
(Hem., Dec. '95, p.69)(WSJ, 3/27/96, p.A-16)
1683 Sep 12, Marco d'Aviano, sent by Pope Innocent XI to unite the outnumbered Christian troops, spurred them to victory. The Turks left behind sacks of coffee which the Christians found too bitter, so they sweetened it with honey and milk and named the drink cappuccino after the Capuchin order of monks to which d'Aviano belonged. An Austrian baker created a crescent-shaped roll, the Kipfel, to celebrate the victory. Empress Maria Theresa later took it to France where it became the croissant.
(Reuters, 4/28/03)(WSJ, 6/3/03, p.D5)
1695 Sep 12, New York Jews petitioned governor Dongan for religious liberties.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1720 Sep 12, Frederick Philipse III, land owner (Bronx, Westchester & Putnam), was born in NYC.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1722 Sep 12, The Treaty of St. Petersburg put an end to the Russo-Persian War.
(HN, 9/12/98)
1733 Sep 12, Francois Couperin "Le Grand", French composer, died at 64.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1751 Sep 12, Amsterdam refused to establish a Jewish ghetto.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1758 Sep 12, Charles Messier observed the Crab Nebula and began a catalog.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1764 Sep 12, Jean Philippe Rameau, French composer (Castor en Pollux), died at 80.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1776 Sep 12, Nathan Hale left Harlem Heights Camp (127th St) for a spy mission.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1786 Sep 12, Despite his failed efforts to suppress the American Revolution, Lord Cornwallis was appointed governor general of India. [see Feb 24]
(HN, 9/12/98)
1789 Sep 12, Franz Xaver Richter, composer, died at 79.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1808 Sep 12, Jose Celestino Mutis (b.1732-1808), Spanish naturalist, died in Santa Fe de Bogote (Colombia). He spent 40 years on his unfinished work “Flora de Nueva Granada."
(www.famousamericans.net/josecelestinomutis/)
1812 Sep 12, Richard March Hoe was born in NYC. He built the first successful rotary printing press.
(HN, 9/12/00)
1814 Sep 12, A British fleet under Sir Alexander Cochrane began the bombardment of Fort McHenry, the last American defense before Baltimore. Lawyer Francis Scott Key had approached the British attackers seeking the release of a friend who was being held for unfriendly acts toward the British. Key himself was detained overnight on September 13 and witnessed the bombardment of Fort McHenry from a guarded American boat.
(www.nps.gov/history/history/online_books/hh/5/hh5h.htm)
1814 Sep 12, The Battle of North Point was fought near Baltimore during War of 1812. British General Ross was killed by a sniper’s bullet in a skirmish just prior to the main battle. The battle proved to be strategic American victory, but since they left the field in the hands of the British, tactically it was a defeat for the Americans.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_North_Point)
1818 Sep 12, Richard Gatling (d.1903), American inventor, was born. The Gatling gun, an early type of machine gun, was named after him.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Jordan_Gatling)
1829 Sep 12, Charles Dudley Warner, essayist and novelist who, with Mark Twain, wrote "The Guilded Age," was born.
(HN, 9/12/98)
1836 Sep 12, Mexican authorities crushed the revolt which broke out on August 25.
(HN, 9/12/98)
1840 Sep 12, Composer Robert Schumann married Clara Wieck.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1857 Sep 12, A wooden-hulled steamship, the SS Central America under Capt. William L. Herndon, sank off Cape Romain, SC. The ship carried 21 tons of gold from California to New York. The brig Marine and the Norwegian bark Ellen rescued some 141 people. 425 (428) of 528 (578) passengers were drowned. The survivors included Ansel Ives Easton (d.1868) and his new wife Adeline. The wreck was in 8,000 feet of water and in 1987-1988 salvage operations were begun by Tommy Thompson. He hauled in $500 million worth of gold bars, coins and nuggets. After a court battle he was awarded 92% of the gold. The story is told in the 1998 book "Ship of Gold in the Deep Blue sea" by Gary Kinder. The loss of the gold sparked "The Panic of 1857." The SS Central America sank off Cape Romain, SC. Thompson became a federal fugitive in 2012 after he failed to show up for several court hearings. Odyssey Marine Exploration was awarded a contract by a court appointed receiver and in 2014 recovered additional treasure valued in the millions.
(WSJ, 5/22/98, p.W3)(WSJ, 6/19/98, p.W9)(SFEC, 6/28/98, BR p.3)(WSJ, 12/3/99, p.W16)(WSJ, 1/28/00, p.B1)(ON, 7/01, p.2)(Ind, 12/1/01, 5A)(SFC, 7/18/14, p.D3)
1860 Sep 12, William Walker (b.1824), conqueror of Nicaragua, was convicted and executed by the government of Honduras. The British had arrested him and turned him over to the government. In 2008 Stephen Dando-Collins authored “Tycoon’s War: How Cornelius Vanderbilt Invaded a Country to Overthrow America's Most Famous Military Adventurer."
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Walker_(soldier))(SSFC, 4/10/05, p.F4)
1862 Sep 12, The Battle of Harpers Ferry took place in Virginia.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1866 Sep 12, The first burlesque show opened in NYC. The show was a four act performance called "The Black Crow", running for 475 performances and made a reported $1.3 million for its producers.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1869 Sep 12, Peter M. Roget, English physician and lexographer, died. In 2008 Joshua Kendall authored “The Man Who Made Lists: Love, Death, Madness, and the Creation of Roget’s Thesaurus" (1852).
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Roget)(WSJ, 3/22/08, p.W10)
1874 Sep 12, François Pierre Guillaume Guizot (b.1787), French historian, orator, and statesman, died.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fran%C3%A7ois_Guizot)
1880 Sep 12, H.L. Mencken (Henry Louis Mencken, d.1956), American author, social satirist, was born in Baltimore, Md. He worked for the "Baltimore Sun" and later edited the "Smart Set" magazine with George Jean Nathan. He wrote a philological work entitled "The American Language." Nietzschean iconoclast H.L. Mencken referred to "Boobus Americanus" and was cynical about American democracy. Mencken won fame as a journalist with the Baltimore Morning Herald and Baltimore Sun, editor of The American Mercury magazine and as a literary critic. Mencken's criticism was often directed at the American middle class and members of what he called...the "boobeoisie (BOOB-WA-ZEE)." Very popular in the post-WWI period, Mencken’s literary criticism was instrumental in bringing writers such as D.H. Lawrence, Ford Madox Ford and Sherwood Anderson to the fore.
(AP, 9/12/97)(HNQ, 6/20/98)(HN, 9/12/98)(www.todayinliterature.com)
1860 Sep 12, William Walker (b.1824), US adventurer, was convicted and executed by the government of Honduras. The British had arrested him and turned him over to the government.
(SSFC, 4/10/05, p.F4)(www.sfmuseum.org/hist1/walker.html)
1888 Sep 12, Maurice Chevalier (d.1972), actor, was born in Paris, France.
(HN, 9/12/00)(www.jimpoz.com)
1892 Sep 12, Alfred A. Knopf, American publisher, was born. In 1966 he received the Alexander Hamilton Medal.
(HN, 9/12/98)(MC, 9/12/01)
1897 Sep 12, Irene Joliot-Curie, French physicist (neutron, Nobel 1935), was born.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1898 Sep 12, Ben Shahn (d.1969), American painter (1964 Arts & Letters), was born In Kaunas, Lithuania.
(WSJ, 12/1/98, p.A20)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Shahn)
1902 Sep 12, The Yacolt Fire burned 238,000 acres in Oregon and Washington and killed 38 people.
(SFC, 10/30/03, p.A15)
1906 Sep 12, Dmitri Dmitriyevich Shostakovich, composer, was born in St. Petersburg, Russia. [see Sep 25]
(MC, 9/12/01)
1910 Sep 12, Alexander D. Langmuir, epidemiologist, was born. He created and led the U.S. Epidemic Intelligence Service.
(HN, 9/12/00)
1910 Sep 12, Gustav Mahler's 8th Symphony premiered in Munich with 1028 musicians.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1913 Sep 13, Jesse Owens, track and field athlete, was born. He was a four-gold medal winner at the 1936 Olympic games at Berlin.
(HFA, '96, p.38)(AHD, 1971, p.938)(HN, 9/12/98)
1914 Sep 12, During World War I, the First Battle of the Marne ended in an Allied victory against Germany.
(AP, 9/12/06)
1918 Sep 12, British troops retook Havincourt, Moeuvres, and Trescault along the Western Front.
(HN, 9/12/98)
1918 Sep 12, During World War I, U.S. forces led by Gen. John J. Pershing launched an attack on the German-occupied St. Mihiel salient north of Verdun, France.
(AP, 9/12/97)
1919 Sep 12, Adolf Hitler joined the German Worker's Party. In 2004 Robert O. Paxton authored "The Anatomy of Fascism," on the rise and fall of Hitler and Mussolini.
(HN, 9/12/98)(SSFC, 4/4/04, p.M3)
1927 Sep 12, Sigmund Romberg's musical "My Maryland," premiered in NYC.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1928 Sep 12, Actress Katharine Hepburn (b.1907) made her stage debut in "The Czarina."
(MC, 9/12/01)
1931 Sep 12, Kristin Hunter, author, was born. Her work included "God Bless the Child" and “The Survivors."
(HN, 9/12/00)
1931 Sep 12, George Jones, country singer, was born.
(HN, 9/12/00)
1931 Sep 12, Ian Holm, actor (Henry V), was born in Ilford, Essex, England.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1931 Sep 12, In Honolulu, Hawaii, Thalia Massie, wife of a Navy officer, accused 5 nonwhite island men of gang rape. A trial that followed resulted in a hung jury. On Jan 8, 1932 a vigilante group that included the Massie’s killed, Joseph Kahahawai, one the rape suspects.
(SFC, 5/28/05, p.E1)
1932 Sep 12, The German Reichstag under the new chairmanship of Hermann Goring gave a vote of no confidence to Franz von Papen and his government. Just before that vote was taken, Papen had slapped an order on Göring's desk dissolving the Reichstag and calling yet again for new elections.
(www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/riseofhitler/collapse.htm)
1934 Sep 12, Estonia, Latvia & Lithuania signed the Baltic Entente in Geneva against the USSR.
(LC, 1998, p.24)(MC, 9/12/01)
1935 Sep 12, Millionaire Howard Hughes flew his own designed plane at 352.46 mph.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1936 Sep 12, Bill Sam (34) was hanged at San Quentin Prison for the murder of his wife in Stockton 2 years earlier. The Chinese man said he killed her to spare his son the stigma of having estranged parents.
(SSFC, 9/11/11, DB 46 p.46)
1938 Sep 12, Tatiana Troyanos, mezzo-soprano (Octavian-Der Rosenkavalier), was born in NYC.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1938 Sep 12, In a speech in Nuremberg, Adolf Hitler demanded self-determination for the Sudeten Germans in Czechoslovakia.
(AP, 9/12/97)
1939 Sep 12, In response to the invasion of Poland, the French Army advanced into Germany and on this day made their furthest penetration-five miles.
(HN, 9/12/00)
1940 Sep 12, The Lascaux Caves in France, with their prehistoric wall paintings, were discovered in the Dordogne region. 4 teens, following their dog down a hole near Lascaux France discover 17,000-year-old drawings now known as Lascaux Cave Paintings. The paintings consisting mostly of animal representations (horses), are among the finest examples of art from the Paleolithic period.
(SFEC, 5/30/99, p.T4)(HN, 9/12/00)(MC, 9/12/01)
1941 Sep 12, The US ship Busko captured the 1st German ship in WW II.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1942 Sep 12, Free-Poland & Belgium asked Pope to condemn Nazi-war crimes. He did not.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1943 Sep 12, Michael Ondaatje, Canadian novelist and poet, was born. His work included "The English Patient."
(HN, 9/12/00)
1943 Sep 12, German paratroopers took Benito Mussolini from the hotel where he was being held by Italian resistance forces. 107 Waffen-SS troops under Otto Skorzeny (1908-1975) freed Mussolini at Gran Sasso in the Abruzzi Mountains. Paratroopers in 12 gliders took the Italian Carabinieri guards by surprise without firing a single shot, and whisked ex-dictator Mussolini away in a Storch airplane to Rome. The rest of the commando team escaped by cable car. Skorzeny then flew Mussolini to meet with Hitler.
(AP, 9/12/97)(SFC, 4/25/97, p.A15)(The National Interest, 8/26/19)
1944 Sep 12, The second Quebec Conference opened with President Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill in attendance.
(AP, 9/12/06)
1944 Sep 12, During World War II, U.S. Army troops entered Germany for the first time, near Trier.
(AP, 9/12/97)(HN, 9/12/98)
1944 Sep 12, A US submarine patrol that included the USS Pampanito, the Growler and the Sealion II, came upon a Japanese convoy carrying war material. The Japanese transport Kachidoki Maru, carrying over 900 British soldier, was sunk by the Pampanito. Much of the convoy was sunk including most of some 2,000 Allied prisoners of war. The subs after chasing stragglers of the convoy returned to find 159 British and Australian survivors clinging to wreckage [see Sep 14]. Some 1000 POWs from Australia were on the Japanese freighter Enoura Maru sunk by the USS Sealion. Alistair Urquhart of Scotland, a prisoner on the Kachidoki Maru, was picked up 5 days later by a Japanese whaling ship and taken to Japan, where he was forced to work in a coal mine. Kachidoki Maru had been captured earlier in the war as the President Harrison home ported in SF. The Pampanito was later berthed as a visitor attraction in SF. In 2008 Urquhart (89) visited the Pampanito.
(SFC, 5/27/97, p.A17)(SFC,12/5/97, p.C3)(SFC, 9/17/08, p.B1)
1945 Sep 12, French troops landed in Indochina.
(HN, 9/12/98)
1949 Sep 12, In Germany Theodor Heuss (b.1884) was elected as the first President of the Federal Republic of Germany and continued to 1959.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theodor_Heuss)
1949 Sep 12, Irina Rodnina, USSR, pairs figure skater (Olympic-gold-1972, 76, 80), was born in Moscow.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irina_Rodnina)
1952 Sep 12, Noel Coward's "Quadrille," premiered in London.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1953 Sep 12, Senator John Fitzgerald Kennedy (36) of Massachusetts married Jacqueline Lee Bouvier (24).
(AP, 9/12/03)
1953 Sep 12, Nikita Khrushchev became the 1st Secretary of USSR Communist Party. His glass and marble Palace of Congresses obliterated the last vestiges of the 17th century palace of Tsarina Natalie Kirilovna Naryshkina, the mother of Peter the Great. [see Sep 13]
(MC, 9/12/01)(AM, Jul/Aug ‘97 p.33)
1954 Sep 12, Lassie premiered on CBS-TV.
(AP, 9/12/04)
1956 Sep 12, The big money quiz show "Twenty-One" began on TV. It let contestants choose questions on a 1-11 scale of difficulty and created a star player in college professor Charles Van Doren. It was later found that the shows were rigged. A 1994 film "Quiz Show," was based on the resulting scandal.
(SFEC, 5/24/98, DB p.38)(WSJ, 1/3/03, p.W4)
1956 Sep 12, British Prime Minister Eden announced a British, French, US agreement to establish an association to operate the Suez. Nasser dubbed this as an attempt to provoke war.
(EWH, 1968, p.1242)
1956 Sep 12, In Haiti under pressure of a general strike Magloire gave up the presidency.
(EWH, 1968, p.1220)
1957 Sep 12, James Vicary (b.1915), a market researcher, announced that he had invented a new way to get people to buy things, whether they wanted them or not. He called it subliminal advertising and said that he had tested the process at a New Jersey movie theater. In 1962 he admitted that his results were fabricated in order to drum up business for his market research firm. A subliminal projector called a tachistoscope had been used during World War II in training soldiers to recognize enemy aircraft. A book published in 1898 (The New Psychology by E.W. Scripture) laid out most of the principles of subliminal response.
(WSJ, 11/5/07, p.B1)(www.straightdope.com/classics/a1_187.html)
1957 Sep 12, Detroit Mayor Albert Cobo died of a heart attack, just months before his last term in office would have ended.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Cobo)
1957 Sep 12, Archbishop Makarios of Cyprus visited the US.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1958 Sep 12, The science-fiction movie "The Blob," starring Steve McQueen, billed as "Steven," was released.
(AP, 9/12/08)
1958 Sep 12, The US Supreme Court, in Cooper v. Aaron, unanimously ruled that Arkansas officials who were resisting public school desegregation orders could not disregard the high court's rulings.
(AP, 9/12/08)
1959 Sep 12, NBC launched "Bonanza," the first color western on TV. 428 episodes were produced and the show ran to 1973. 431 episodes were filmed at the 570-acre site in Incline Village, Nevada. Michael Landon (d.1991) played Little Joe, Lorne Greene (d.1987) played Ben Cartwright (d.1987 at 72), and Dan Blocker (d.1972) played Hoss.
(SFC, 9/3/98, p.A12)(SSFC, 6/9/02, p.A29)(SSFC, 8/8/04, p.D2)(SFC, 6/28/13, p.D8)
1959 Sep 12, The Luna 2, a Soviet space probe, was launched for the moon.
(SFEC, 9/28/97, p.A14)
1960 Sep 12, Democratic presidential candidate John F. Kennedy addressed the issue of his Roman Catholic faith, telling a Protestant group in Houston, "I do not speak for my church on public matters, and the church does not speak for me."
(AP, 9/12/00)
1964 Sep 12, Typhoon Gloria struck Taiwan killing 330, with $17.5 million damage.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1966 Sep 12, "The Monkees" debuted on NBC TV. "Hey, hey we're the Monkees- and we don't monkey around." The show ran to 1868 and won an Emmy.
(WSJ, 1/9/97, p.A8)(AP, 9/12/01)
1966 Sep 12, The situation comedy Family Affair'' premiered on CBS.
(AP, 9/12/06)
1966 Sep 12, The Beatles received a gold record for "Yellow Submarine."
(MC, 9/12/01)
1970 Sep 12, US professor Timothy Leary, LSD proponent, escaped from a California jail. Leary escaped from the State Men’s Colony in San Luis Obispo with the help of his third wife, Rosemary and the Weather Underground. He went to Algiers and joined Black Panther leader Eldridge Cleaver, who kidnapped the Learys after a political disagreement. They soon escaped and made their way to Afghanistan. In 1974 he was caught and revealed his collaborators to the FBI.
(http://tinyurl.com/4ncp8t)(SFC, 6/1/96, p.A7)(SFC, 7/1/99, p.A9)
1970 Sep 12, The Univ. of Alabama under coach Bear Bryant football team played against an integrated opponent for the 1st time losing to the Univ. of Southern California 42-21.
(WSJ, 9/8/05, p.D10)
1970 Sep 12, The Soviet Union launched its unmanned Soviet Luna 16. It was the first robotic probe to land on the Moon and return a sample to Earth.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luna_16)
1972 Sep 12, The TV situation comedy "Maude" premiered on CBS and continued to 1978. Bill Macy (1922-2019) played Walter Findlay, the husband of Bea Arthur.
(AP, 9/12/02)(SFC, 1/17/13, p.D6)(SSFC, 10/20/19, p.B9)
1972 Sep 12, William Lawrence Boyd (b.1895), American film actor best known for portraying Hopalong Cassidy, died.
(www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?GRid=2123&page=gr)
1974 Sep 12, The start of court-ordered busing to achieve racial integration in Boston's public schools was marred by violence in South Boston. The Boston desegregation plan had been drafted by Robert Dentler (1928-2008) and Marvin Scott of Boston Univ.
(AP, 9/12/99)(SFC, 4/8/08, p.B5)
1974 Sep 12, Haile Selassie I, "King of Kings, Lord of Lords, and Conquering Lion of the Tribe of Judah," was deposed by the military from the Ethiopian throne. A military committee (known as the Dergue) was established from several divisions of the Ethiopian Armed forces. General Aman Amdon was elected as spokesperson for the Dergue and implemented policies for the country, which included land distribution to peasants, nationalizing industries and services under public ownership and led Ethiopia into the Socialism.
(AP, 9/12/99)(http://tinyurl.com/7lnnz)
1974 Sep 12, In its 1st major attack ETA killed 12 people with a bomb at a Madrid cafe.
(AP, 3/22/06)
1977 Sep 12, Robert Lowell (b.1917), US poet (Near the Ocean), died of a heart attack in NYC. In 2003 Frank Bidart and David Gewanter edited "Robert Lowell: Collected Poems." In 2005 Saskia Hamilton edited “The Letters of Robert Lowell."
(www.kirjasto.sci.fi/rlowell.htm)(SSFC, 7/13/03, p.M6)(Econ, 7/25/05, p.73)
1977 Sep 12, In South Africa Steven Biko died while under police custody. He headed the Black Consciousness Movement and was the country’s best known political dissident. He was detained and held in Port Elizabeth and later driven naked in a truck 700 miles to Pretoria where he died in a prison cell. In 1997 the five police officers involved in his detention filed for amnesty. They were retired Col. Harold Snyman, retired Lt. Col. Gideon Nieuwoudt, Ruben Marx, Johan Beneke, and then Capt. Daantjie Siebert. In 1999 former Detective Sgt. Gideon Nieuwoudt was denied amnesty because he denied any crime. This killing was the breaking point and led to international protests and a UN imposed arms embargo.
(SFC, 1/28/97, p.A7)(WSJ, 2/6/97, p.A9)(AP, 9/12/97)(SFEC, 1/10/99, p.A23)(MC, 9/12/01)
1978 Sep 12, The TV sitcom "Taxi" premiered on ABC television.
(http://www.timvp.com/taxi.html)
1978 Sep 12, The first annual "Day of Martyrs" was held in South Africa to remember those who gave their lives in the struggle against apartheid.
(http://tinyurl.com/3xydbn)
1980 Sep 12, Yao Ming was born in Shanghai, China. He grew to 7’6’’ and in 2002 was drafted to play for the Houston Rockets basketball team.
(SSFC, 5/22/05, p.24)
1980 Sep 12, Turkish military took over in coup after factional fighting. All political parties were abolished. Gen. Kenan Evren led a bloodless coup in response to years of street battles between left and right-wing radical groups that left some 5,000 dead.
(AP, 11/4/02)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1980_Turkish_coup_d'%C3%A9tat)
1981 Sep 12, George Leong, poet, organized the first Annual Asian American Jazz Festival.
(SFC, 5/12/96, p.C-1)
1981 Sep 12, The TV show "People's Court" (1981-1993) premiered with retired Judge Joseph Wopner premiered. Rusty Burrell was the bailiff (d.2002).
(www.tv.com/the-peoples-court/show/12330/summary.html)(SFC, 4/20/02, p.A23)
1983 Sep 12, Filiberto Ojeda Rios (d.2005), a Puerto Rican nationalist leader, was involved in the robbery of a Connecticut armored truck. It was considered an act of domestic terrorism because the money was used to fund activities by the Puerto Rican nationalist Macheteros, or Cane Cutters. Only about $80,000 of the $7 million was recovered. In 2005 Rios was shot and killed by FBI agents in Puerto Rico. In 2008 Avelino Gonzalez Claudio (65), a Puerto Rican militant suspected in the Connecticut robbery, was arrested in Puerto Rico, where he lived quietly under an assumed name. In 2011 FBI agents arrested Norberto Gonzalez Claudio, one of two remaining fugitives from the robbery.
(www.amw.com/fugitives/case.cfm?id=24432)(AP, 9/25/05)(AP, 2/8/08)(SFC, 5/11/11, p.A2)
1983 Sep 12, The USSR vetoed a UN resolution deploring its shooting down of South Korea’s KAL flight 007 plane.
(www.globalpolicy.org/security/membship/veto/vetosubj.htm)
1985 Sep 12, In Nebraska Michael Ryan (1948-2015), a cult leader, was convicted and sentenced to death in the 1984 torture and killing of James Thimm (26) and in the 1982 beating death of Luke Stice, the 5-year-old son of a cult member. Ryan's son, Dennis Ryan, and cult member Timothy Haverkamp were sentenced to life in prison for second-degree murder in Thimm's death.
(http://murderpedia.org/male.R/r/ryan-michael-wayne.htm)(AP, 5/25/15)
1986 Sep 12, Joseph Cicippio, the acting comptroller at the American University in Beirut, was kidnapped; he was released in December 1991.
(AP, 9/12/97)
1986 Sep 12, Frank Nelson (b.1911), actor (Jack Benny Show), died in Hollywood, Ca.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Nelson)
1986 Sep 12, The United States released Soviet physicist Gennady Zakharov. On Sep 29 the Soviet Union released journalist Nicholas Daniloff. Both had been accused of espionage.
(http://www.russianlife.net/article.cfm?Number=407)(AP, 9/29/01)
1987 Sep 12, Reports surfaced that Democratic presidential candidate Joseph Biden had borrowed, without attribution, passages of a speech by British Labor Party leader Neil Kinnock for one of his own campaign speeches. The Kinnock report, along with other damaging revelations, prompted Biden to drop his White House bid.
(AP, 9/12/97)
1988 Sep 12, Hurricane Gilbert, called the storm of the century, smashed into the Gulf coast. It slammed into Jamaica with torrential rains and winds of 145 mph, killing 45 people and causing damage estimated at up to $1 billion. It also devastated the Yucatan peninsula and left 225 people dead. The storm hit the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Jamaica, Cuba, Cayman Islands and Mexico before striking Texas.
(NOHY, 3/90, p.181)(AP, 9/12/97)(SFC, 10/10/97, p.A15)
1989 Sep 12, David Dinkins, Manhattan borough president, won New York City's Democratic mayoral primary, defeating incumbent Mayor Ed Koch and two other candidates on his way to becoming the city's first black mayor.
(AP, 9/12/99)
1990 Sep 12, The TV drama “Gabriel’s Fire" premiered with James Earl Jones as Gabriel Bird.
(LSA, Fall, 2007, p.27)(www.imdb.com/title/tt0098801/)
1990 Sep 12, Representatives of the World War Two allies and West and East Germany signed the Two Plus Four Treaty in Moscow giving international sanction to German unity.
(AP, 9/12/00)(www.foothill.fhda.edu/divisions/unification/finalset.html)
1991 Sep 12, Saying Middle East peace negotiations might be in jeopardy, President Bush told reporters he would use his veto authority, if necessary, to delay action on Israel's call for $10 billion in housing loan guarantees.
(AP, 9/12/01)
1991 Sep 12, The space shuttle Discovery blasted off on a mission to deploy an observatory designed to study the Earth's ozone layer.
(AP, 9/12/01)
1992 Sep 12, The space shuttle Endeavour blasted off, carrying with it Mark Lee and Jan Davis, the first married couple in space; Mae Jemison, the first black woman in space; and Mamoru Mohri, the first Japanese citizen to fly on a U.S. spaceship.
(AP, 9/12/97)
1992 Sep 12, Actor Anthony Perkins died from AIDS in Hollywood at age 60.
(AP, 9/12/97)(www.imdb.com/name/nm0000578/bio)
1992 Sep 12, Ed Peck, actor (Zoot Suit, Bullitt), died of heart attack at 75.
(www.imdb.com/name/nm0669653/)
1992 Sep 12, In Peru the Shining Path guerilla leader Abimael Guzman was captured by police chief Ketin Vidal with help from a CIA operative nick-named “Superman." Oscar Ramirez, aka Feliciano, took over the leadership. Guzman, a former philosophy professor, was tried by a military court and sentenced to life in jail. The verdict was overturned in Jan 2003.
(SFE, 9/17/96, p.A11)(SFC, 7/14/99, p.C10)(SFC, 12/8/00, p.A20)(Econ, 10/30/04, p.44)
1993 Sep 12, The space shuttle Discovery blasted off from Cape Canaveral on a 10-day mission.
(AP, 9/12/98)
1993 Sep 12, Actor Raymond Burr (76) died of liver cancer at his Northern California ranch.
(AP, 9/12/98)
1993 Sep 12, In San Antonio, Texas, Rodolfo Rodriguez (72), his wife Virginia (62) and Paula Moran (90), a former nanny, were fatally stabbed in a robbery that netted about $300. A grand-nephew of the couple later implicated himself, his brother and Arnold Prieto. In Jan 21, 2015, Prieto (41) was executed for his role in the killings.
(SFC, 1/22/15, p.A7)(http://tinyurl.com/mv4k33j)
1994 Sep 12, A stolen, single-engine Cessna crashed into the South Lawn of the White House, coming to rest against the executive mansion; the pilot, Frank Corder, was killed.
(AP, 9/12/99)
1994 Sep 12, Tom Ewell (S. Yewell Tompkins), US actor (7 Year Itch), died at 85.
(www.imdb.com/name/nm0263885/)
1994 Sep 12, In Canada the Parti Quebecois won a parliamentary election.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quebec_general_election,_1994)
1995 Sep 12, The Belarussian military border guards shot down a hydrogen balloon during an international race, killing its two American pilots.
(SFC, 9/2/96, p.A12)(AP, 9/12/00)
1995 Sep 12, Jeremy Brett, English actor (Sherlock Holmes), died at 59.
(www.imdb.com/name/nm0107950/)
1996 Sep 12, Last-minute intervention by Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole led to Senate postponement of action on a treaty designed to eliminate chemical weapons. President Clinton said the agreement was threatened by "a bitter partisan debate."
(AP, 9/12/97)
1996 Sep 12, The first African-American civil War memorial was dedicated in Washington DC.
(SFC, 9/11/96, p.C1)
1996 Sep 12, The Turkish government agreed to allow some 2,500 Iraqi Kurds, former US employees and their families, to enter Turkey and be evacuated to the US.
(SFC, 9/13/96, p.A13)
1996 Sep 12, In Columbia government officials promised to halt forcible destruction of small coca plantations for the time being in order to end protests.
(SFC, 9/13/96, p.A13)
1996 Sep 12, In Taiwan a five-year-old girl's remains were found in a drain outside a toilet at the Air Force Command headquarters in Taipei. In 1997 Taiwanese soldier Chiang Kuo-ching was found guilty of rape and murder and executed by firing squad. A task force found that Chiang had masturbated in the toilet and some drops of his semen fell onto the tissue. He had been tortured into confessing, but was not the murderer. Chiang Kuo-ching was posthumously acquitted by a military court in September, 2011, followed by a ruling that his family be paid Tw$131.85 million ($4.4 million) in compensation. A court in November launched legal action to bar former minister Chen Chao-min and seven other ex-military officers involved in the case from transferring their assets.
(AFP, 11/29/11)
1997 Sep 12, Pres. Clinton named Dr. David Satcher, 56, as the new surgeon general.
(SFC, 9/13/97, p.A20)
1997 Sep 12, With little to show after three days of shuttle diplomacy, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright declared she wouldn't return to the Mideast until Israeli and Palestinian leaders made the "hard decisions" necessary to restart peace talks.
(AP, 9/12/98)
1997 Sep 12, Senate Foreign Relations Chairman Jesse Helms, exercising iron control, prevented any committee hearing on William Weld's nomination to be ambassador to Mexico.
(AP, 9/12/98)
1997 Sep 12, Edwin Lawrence Njuguna of Kenya was stabbed to death in Napa, Calif., after being dragged with two friends from a car by skinheads.
(SFC, 10/1/97, p.A12)
1997 Sep 12, It was reported that Comoros government troops under Pres. Mohamed Taki were routed on Anjouan and half of a force of 300 were killed or captured by people who demanded to be French again.
(SFC, 9/12/97, p.A12)
1997 Sep 12, In southeast Congo a plane crashed enroute to a religious meeting. All 20 aboard were killed.
(SFEC, 9/14/97, p.A24)
1997 Sep 12, The Chinese Communist Party Congress opened under Pres. Jiang Zemin and embraced a program of bold economic reform. The event was held every 5 years. Jiang Zemin was expected to stay as general-secretary. The positions of Li Peng and Qiao Shi were in question. Jiang issued a call to use layoffs, bankruptcies, shareholding and other capitalist policies to attack the nation’s industrial ills.
(SFC, 8/28/97, p.C2)(SFC, 9/13/97, p.A8)(SFC, 9/15/97, p.A10)
1997 Sep 12, In Mexico a crowd of tens of thousands rallied in the central square of Mexico City in support of the Zapatista movement.
(SFEC, 9/14/97, p.A24)
1998 Sep 12, Sammy Sosa of the Chicago Cubs became the fourth major league baseball player to hit 60 home runs in a single season.
(AP, 9/12/99)
1998 Sep 12, Lindsay Davenport won the U.S. Open, defeating defending champion Martina Hingis, 6-3, 7-5.
(AP, 9/12/99)
1998 Sep 12, The White House responded to Kenneth Starr's graphic report on President Clinton by calling it a "hit-and-run smear campaign."
(AP, 9/12/03)
1998 Sep 12, Leaders of striking pilots at Northwest Airlines ratified a new contract, ending a walkout that began August 28.
(AP, 9/12/03)
1998 Sep 12, In Albania Democratic Party leader Azem Hajdari (35) was assassinated.
(WSJ, 9/14/98, p.A1)(USAT, 9/15/98, p.12A)(SFC, 9/14/98, p.A12)
1998 Sep 12, In Chile the anniversary of the 1973 coup was marked by weekend clashes with police and 2 people were killed and 77 injured.
(WSJ, 9/14/98, p.A1)
1998 Sep 12, In Israel as many as 100,000 people rallied in Tel Aviv demanding that the government move the peace process forward.
(SFEC, 10/4/98, p.T11)
1999 Sep 12, "The Practice" and "Ally McBeal," both created by writer-producer David E. Kelley, were named best drama series and best comedy series at the 51st Emmy Awards.
(AP, 9/12/00)
1999 Sep 12, Andre Agassi captured his second US Open title, dominating Todd Martin 6-4, 6-7 (5-7), 6-7 (2-7), 6-3, 6-2.
(AP, 9/12/00)
1999 Sep 12, In Bangladesh police clashed with protestors seeking the resignation of Prime Minister Hasina. Opposition parties called for a 3-day general strike.
(WSJ, 9/13/99, p.A1)
1999 Sep 12, In Dagestan Russian troops seized control of the villages of Karamakhi and Chabanmakhi.
(SFC, 9/13/99, p.A13)
1999 Sep 12, In Indonesia Pres. Habibie under intense international pressure said he will allow armed foreign peacekeepers into East Timor. Reports had reached Jakarta that troops had attacked 30,000 people in the seminary town of Dare.
(SFC, 9/13/99, p.A1,10)(AP, 9/12/00)
1999 Sep 12, North Korea agreed indirectly to freeze its missile testing program.
(SFC, 9/13/99, p.A10)
2000 Sep 12, Hillary Rodham became the first first lady to win an election as she claimed victory in the New York Democratic Senate primary, defeating little-known opponent Dr. Mark McMahon.
(AP, 9/12/01)
2000 Sep 12, Chase Manhattan agreed to acquire J.P. Morgan for about $36 billion in stock.
(WSJ, 9/13/00, p.A1)
2000 Sep 12, Stanley Turrentine, saxophonist, died at age 66.
(SFC, 9/13/00, p.A23)
2000 Sep 12, A series of clashes between police and protesters marred a generally peaceful second day of the three-day Asia-Pacific Economic Summit in Melbourne, Australia.
(AP, 9/12/01)
2000 Sep 12, The EU lifted diplomatic sanctions against Austria.
(SFC, 9/13/00, p.A12)
2000 Sep 12, In Chechnya a truck bomb killed a woman and her daughter in the Oktyabrsky market in Grozny.
(SFC, 9/14/00, p.C7)
2000 Sep 12, In the Netherlands a bill was passed that converted same-sex partnerships into full-fledged marriages.
(SFC, 9/13/00, p.A12)
2000 Sep 12, In Zimbabwe the stock exchange made a record 500 point gain after the IMF announced that it would not resume financial assistance. The official inflation was 53.6% and local cash could not be moved out of the country.
(WSJ, 9/15/00, p.A17)
2001 Sep 12, Pres. Bush called Tuesday’s terrorist attacks "acts of war." Stunned rescue workers continued to search for bodies in the World Trade Center's smoking rubble a day after a terrorist attack that shut down the financial capital, badly damaged the Pentagon and left thousands dead. The US began building a broad int’l. coalition for a possible military retaliation against those responsible for the terrorist attacks on Sep 11. Federal authorities said followers of Osama bin Laden were responsible for airline hijackings directed at NYC and the Pentagon. The US air system remained grounded and financial markets closed.
(SFC, 9/13/01, p.A1,16)(AP, 9/12/02)
2001 Sep 12, The FAA gave airlines a 3-page security directive to guard against further terrorist attacks. It included a ban on curbside checking and effectively eliminated the jobs of thousands of skycaps.
(WSJ, 9/13/01, p.A1)(WSJ, 9/17/01, p.A6)
2001 Sep 12, In Afghanistan Mohammad Omar, the Taliban leader, went into hiding. The Taliban military repositioned weaponry in anticipation of a US strike.
(SFC, 9/13/01, p.A12)
2001 Sep 12, An Israeli woman was killed by a Palestinian shooting ambush in the West Bank.
(SFC, 9/13/01, p.A12)
2001 Sep 12, In Mexico a twin-engine LET 410 plane crashed in the Yucatan and all 19 people aboard were killed. The 16 passengers were all Seattle-area tourists on a Holland America cruise.
(SFC, 9/13/01, p.C3)(SFC, 9/14/01, p.A32)
2001 Sep 12, In Nigeria fighting resumed in Jos and the death toll estimate was raised to 165. Police moved to quell the violence.
(SFC, 9/13/01, p.C2)
2002 Sep 12, Pres. Bush addressed the UN and laid out his case against Iraq's Pres. Saddam Hussein. Bush told skeptical world leaders at the United Nations to confront the "grave and gathering danger" of Saddam Hussein's Iraq, or to stand aside as the United States acted. Bush was expected to announce US plans to rejoin Unesco, headquartered in Paris. France favored a demand for weapons inspectors in Iraq along with force if Iraq resisted.
(WSJ, 9/12/02, p.A1,4)(SFC, 9/13/02, p.A1)(AP, 9/12/03)
2002 Sep 12, L. Dennis Kozlowski (55), former CEO of Tyco Int'l. was indicted along with Mark Swartz, financial adviser, for a $600 million racketeering scheme. 3 former Tyco International executives were charged with looting the conglomerate of hundreds of millions of dollars; all three pleaded innocent at their arraignment in New York.
(SFC, 9/13/02, p.B1)(AP, 9/12/03)(WSJ, 10/30/03, p.C1)
2002 Sep 12, Tahitian authorities found a 55-foot catamaran, the Hakuna Matata, that belonged to former NBA star Bison Dele (b.1969 as Brian Carson Williams). His brother, Kevin Williams (Miles Dabord) was seen docking the catamaran on July 16 in Taravao, Tahiti. Williams met his girlfriend on July 8 in Papeete and described a scuffle that left 3 people dead. He was last seen Sept. 5 in Phoenix, when he tried to pick up an order for $500,000 in American Double Eagle coins using his brother's passport. A comatose Williams was arrested Sep 19 at a San Diego hospital and died Sep 27.
(SFC, 9/14/02, p.A15)(SFC, 9/17/02, p.A1)(SFC, 9/19/02, p.A7)(SFC, 9/20/02, p.A1)(SFC, 9/21/02, p.A1)(SFC, 9/28/02, p.A5)
2002 Sep 12, In Maine 14 guest workers from Honduras and Guatemala were drowned when their van fell off a bridge into the Allagash Wilderness Waterway.
(SFC, 9/13/02, p.A3)
2002 Sep 12, The World Bank pledged $120 million to help Angola rebuild after more than two decades of civil war, but told its leaders they must take measures to dispel suspicion of high-level corruption.
(AP, 9/12/02)
2002 Sep 12, In western Guatemala heavy rains loosened a mountainside, burying about 30 homes and killing at least 17 people. Officials said that nearly two dozen others were missing.
(AP, 9/13/02)
2002 Sep 12, In Nicaragua prosecutors have filed new corruption charges against Amelia Aleman, sister of former President Arnoldo Aleman, accusing her of embezzling funds from a state-owned construction company and ordering its work force to handle her private home-improvement projects.
(AP, 9/13/02)
2003 Sep 12, A climate prediction experiment, expected to involve two million people around the world, was launched. The program, downloaded from (www.climateprediction.net) and ran on an ordinary desktop or laptop computer.
(Reuters, 9/11/03)
2003 Sep 12, Johnny Cash (71), singer, died. His rough, unsteady voice championed the downtrodden and reached across generations with songs like "Ring of Fire," "I Walk the Line" and "Folsom Prison Blues." In 2013 Robert Hilburn authored “Johnny Cash: The Life."
(AP, 9/12/03)(SFC, 9/13/03, p.A12)(Econ, 11/23/13, p.83)
2003 Sep 12, In Colombia 4 Israelis, 2 Britons, a German and a Spaniard were kidnapped near archaeological ruins high in the Sierra Nevada, about 465 miles north of Bogota. 2 of the tourists were freed Nov 24. The other 4 were released Dec 22. In 2004 the German government billed Reinhilt Weigel $17,630 to cover the cost of a helicopter used to bring her part of the way home, after she was released by rebels. In 2009 she lost her appeal.
(AP, 9/15/03)(WSJ, 11/25/03, p.A1)(AP, 12/23/03)(SFC, 5/29/09, p.A2)
2003 Sep 12, In Bombay (Mumbai), India, police shot and killed a man believed to have masterminded car bombings in Bombay last month that killed 53 people. Naseer and his aide were traveling in a car that carried explosives, guns and detonators when police intercepted it.
(AP, 9/12/03)
2003 Sep 12, US soldiers mistakenly opened fire on uniformed Iraqi policemen chasing highway bandits at night, killing eight officers and a Jordanian security guard in Fallujah.
(AP, 9/12/04)
2003 Sep 12, The Palestinians urged the UN Security Council to demand that Israel not expel Yasser Arafat and halt any threats to his safety.
(AP, 9/12/03)
2003 Sep 12, In Portugal's Madeira Islands a small airplane crashed into the sea, apparently killing all nine people on board. The Beechcraft 200 was carrying eight Spaniards and a British pilot from the islands off northwest Africa to the southern Spanish city of Malaga.
(AP, 9/12/03)
2003 Sep 12, In Rwanda Paul Kagame took the oath of office as the nation's first popularly elected president since the 1994 genocide.
(AP, 9/12/03)
2003 Sep 12, Typhoon Maemi, the most powerful ever to ever hit South Korea, flipped over a floating hotel, twisted massive cranes, killed at least 117 people. The main port of Busan reported $1.3 billion in damage.
(WSJ, 9/16/03, p.A1)(AP, 9/13/04)
2003 Sep 12, The UN Security Council lifted 11-year-old sanctions on Libya after Moammar Gadhafi's government took responsibility for bombing a Pan Am jet over Scotland and agreed to pay the victims' families $2.7 billion.
(AP, 9/12/03)
2004 Sep 12, The US fiscal gap, measured as future receipts minus future obligations, was reported to be between $40 and 72 trillion. The debt portended a severe economic decline or financial collapse.
(SSFC, 9/12/04, p.A1)
2004 Sep 12, US Airways filed for bankruptcy protection for the second time in two years.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2004 Sep 12, In Columbus, Ohio, a suspected arson fire in an apartment complex left 10 people dead.
(SFC, 9/13/04, p.A3)
2004 Sep 12, Jerome Chodorov (93), playwright, died in Nyack, N.Y.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2004 Sep 12, In southern Afghanistan US forces backed by helicopter gunships killed 22 insurgents, including 3 Arab fighters.
(AP, 9/13/04)(SFC, 9/14/04, p.A7)
2004 Sep 12, In Heart, Afghanistan, mobs loyal to Gov. Khan burned a half dozen int’l. aid compounds and as many as 7 people were killed.
(SFC, 9/13/04, p.A3)(WSJ, 9/13/04, p.A1)
2004 Sep 12, Hurricane Ivan skirted Grand Cayman with winds near 155 mph as it churned toward Cuba. The storm has been blamed for 56 deaths across the Caribbean so far, including 34 in Grenada and 11 in Jamaica.
(AP, 9/12/04)
2004 Sep 12, People in Hong Kong turned out in large numbers for a legislative election, many venting anger at their leaders and hoping to hand pro-democracy opposition politicians unprecedented clout in the Chinese territory. Pro-democracy opposition figures gained more clout in Hong Kong's legislature with three new seats, but they fell short of expectations.
(AP, 9/12/04)(AP, 9/13/04)
2004 Sep 12, Militants pounded central Baghdad with intense mortar barrages, targeting the Green Zone and destroying a U.S. vehicle along a major street. At least 25 people were killed, including an Arab television journalist, some of them when a US helicopter fired at crowds around the burning vehicle. The death toll across Iraq reached 59.
(AP, 9/12/04)(SFC, 9/13/04, p.A1)
2004 Sep 12, Three Polish soldiers were killed in Iraq when they were attacked with grenades and machine-gun fire as they returned to their base from a demining operation.
(AP, 9/12/04)
2004 Sep 12, Pakistani security forces and militants clashed in fighting that killed at least nine people in the mountains near the Afghan border.
(AP, 9/13/04)
2005 Sep 12, Michael Brown, the director of the US Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), resigned after being recalled to Washington amid criticism of the federal response to Hurricane Katrina. Officials reported that 45 bodies were found at Memorial Hospital in New Orleans. This raised the official death toll from Hurricane Katrina in Louisiana to 280.
(Reuters, 9/12/05)(SFC, 9/13/05, p.A8)
2005 Sep 12, At the start of his confirmation hearing, US Supreme Court nominee John Roberts pledged to judge with humility and without fear or favor'' if approved as the nation's 17th chief justice.
(AP, 9/12/06)
2005 Sep 12, In California worker error at Toluca Lake caused a power outage in the LA area. Most of the power was restored within 90 minutes.
(SFC, 9/13/05, p.A3)
2005 Sep 12, Oracle Corp. confirmed that CEO Larry Ellison would pay $100 million to a charity to settle charges of insider trading.
(SFC, 9/13/05, p.D1)
2005 Sep 12, EBay has agreed to buy fast-growing Internet start-up Skype for up to $4.1 billion in cash and shares, in a move to tap new sources of growth and add free Web telephone calls to its online auctions. Niklos Zennstrom of Sweden and Janus Friis of Denmark founded Skype using a programming team from Estonia.
(AP, 9/12/05)(Econ, 9/17/05, p.69)
2005 Sep 12, Business software maker Oracle Corp. is buying its struggling rival Siebel Systems Inc. for about $5.85 billion, continuing a recent shopping spree that has eliminated two of its biggest competitors in nine months.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, An official said China will no longer consider death tolls and other relevant information about natural disasters to be state secrets in a move aimed at boosting government transparency.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, In Colombia Porfirio Ramirez (42) and his son, Linsen Ramirez (22), hijacked a Colombian airline. The father in a wheelchair dodged a checkpoint and smuggled grenades onto a plane. All passengers and crew were eventually freed unharmed. The elder hijacker said he hijacked the plane to bring attention to a case in which he was partially paralyzed by a police bullet during a raid on his house some 14 years ago and had unsuccessfully sought government compensation.
(AP, 9/13/05)
2005 Sep 12, An international environmental group warned that only 887 hippos are left in Congo, and that they will be extinct in the African country. The latest aerial survey puts the hippopotamus population in northeastern Congo's Virunga National Park down to under 1,000 animals, compared to some 29,000 in 1974.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, President Jacques Chirac, following a weeklong hospital stay, met with India's PM Singh.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, The new Hong Kong Disneyland theme park on Lantau Island opened. Zeng Qinghong, China’s vice-president, presided over opening ceremonies.
(SSFC, 9/18/05, p.C2)(Econ, 9/17/05, p.44)
2005 Sep 12, A huge car bomb exploded outside a popular restaurant in Baghdad's upscale Mansour neighborhood. At least one person was killed and 17 were wounded.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, In Japan PM Junichiro Koizumi's triumph in parliamentary polls handed the leader a new mandate to harness his revitalized ruling party and turn promises into action for a range of sweeping economic reforms.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, King Abdullah II of Jordan paid Pope Benedict XVI a visit, saying he wanted to foster an honest dialogue between the West and moderate Islam.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, In Mexico Chinese President Hu Jintao promised Mexican leaders that he would crack down on the millions of dollars worth of Chinese contraband entering their nation, goods that undermine Mexican businesses ranging from sandal makers to religious icon sellers.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, Armed men broke into an upscale Amsterdam home and kidnapped Claudia Melchers (37), the daughter of a millionaire whose fortune came from selling chemicals, including to Iraq in the 1980s. Her children were left unharmed.
(AP, 9/13/05)
2005 Sep 12, Protestant extremists attacked Northern Ireland police and British troops into a third day, littering streets with rubble and burned-out vehicles in violence sparked by anger over a restricted parade.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, Norwegians lined up at polling stations in what promised to be a close race between a governing center-right coalition advocating lower taxes and a left-leaning opposition that wants to spend more of the Nordic nation's oil wealth on the welfare system. Jens Stoltenberg, head of the Labor Party, and 2 allied parties won 87 of the parliament’s 169 seats.
(AP, 9/12/05)(Econ, 9/17/05, p.51)
2005 Sep 12, Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf offered to construct a security fence to deter incursion of militants and drug merchants from Afghanistan.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, Joyous Gazans flooded into empty Jewish settlements and Palestinians climbed ropes and clambered over walls to the Egyptian side of Rafah to join a chaotic celebration of the end of 38 years of Israeli military rule over the Gaza Strip. Palestinians set fire to abandoned synagogues.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, Samsung Electronics of South Korea unveiled the world's first 16-gigabit NAND flash memory chip, a device the firm said will usher in a new era in data storage.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, Syria consented to a UN investigator's request to question top officials about the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, a probe that increases the pressure on an increasingly isolated Damascus.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, Turkey sold a 51% stake in Tupras, an oil refinery, for $4.1 billion to a consortium of Koc Holding and Royal Dutch/Shell.
(Econ, 9/17/05, p.64)
2005 Sep 12, A senior UN official said traffickers have been shifting to the manufacture of amphetamine-type drugs in Asia as cultivation and production of heroin drops sharply.
(AP, 9/13/05)
2005 Sep 12, Uzbekistan, increasingly hostile toward foreign non-governmental organizations it accuses of fomenting revolution in the ex-Soviet state, shut a second US charity in four days.
(AP, 9/13/05)
2006 Sep 12, In California Gov. Schwarzenegger signed a minimum wage bill that will boost the hourly rate by 75 cents in January and another 50 cents a year later to $8 an hour.
(SFC, 9/13/06, p.B3)
2006 Sep 12, Hewlett-Packard named CEO Mark Hurd to succeed Patricia Dunn as board chairman as of mid-January 2007 following the recent furor over phone probes of board members.
(WSJ, 9/13/06, p.A1)
2006 Sep 12, Joan Valerie Bondurant, former spy and UC prof. of political science, died in Tucson, Az. She had translated documents for the CIA in India where she met Gandhi and grew fascinated by satyagraha, a thesis of nonviolent resistance. Her books included “Conquest of Violence: The Gandhian Philosophy of Conflict" (1958).
(SFC, 9/21/06, p.B5)
2006 Sep 12, Hurricane Florence headed toward north Atlantic shipping lanes after blowing out windows, peeling away roofs and knocking out power to thousands in Bermuda.
(AP, 9/12/06)
2006 Sep 12, Afghan forces killed 12 suspected Taliban militants in a shootout south of Kabul. More than 30 suspected insurgents were detained as security forces fought back against a deadly spike in violence. The UN urged NATO forces to take military action to destroy the opium industry in southern Afghanistan, saying cultivation of the crop is out of control.
(AP, 9/12/06)
2006 Sep 12, In Bangladesh police in Dhaka baton-charged thousands of opposition supporters in violent clashes outside the prime minister's office that left at least 110 people injured. A 14-party opposition alliance led by the Awami League is demanding electoral reforms ahead of January's national elections.
(AP, 9/12/06)
2006 Sep 12, Canada and the United States formally signed an agreement to end a protracted dispute over Canadian softwood lumber.
(Reuters, 9/12/06)
2006 Sep 12, Pope Benedict XVI delivered a speech at Regensburg Univ. that included brusque words about Islam. He quoted a 14th century Byzantine emperor as saying “Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." The speech quickly provoked criticism from the world’s Muslim communities. The pontiff later said he regretted that Muslims were offended.
(SFC, 9/15/06, p.A17)(AP, 9/12/07)
2006 Sep 12, Iraqi PM Nouri al-Maliki made his first official visit to Iran since taking office and planned to ask Tehran to prevent al-Qaida members believed to be in Iran from crossing into Iraq to carry out attacks. A parked car bomb detonated in Baghdad's upscale Mansour neighborhood, killing at least six people and wounding 18 others. Bombings, mortar attacks and shootings overnight and during the day left at least 24 people dead and dozens wounded around the country.
(AP, 9/12/06)
2006 Sep 12, An Israeli military court ordered the release of 18 imprisoned Hamas lawmakers, including three Cabinet ministers, and raised questions about the army's case. A spokesman for the outgoing Hamas-led administration said the group is prepared to back peace efforts with Israel as part of the new coalition government being formed by the Palestinians. Hamas militants killed an Israeli soldier during a gunbattle in the Gaza Strip.
(AP, 9/12/06)
2006 Sep 12, In Mexico gunmen ambushed and killed Enrique Barrera, police chief of the town of Linares in the border state of Nuevo Leon, in the latest slaying of a law officer in a region ravaged by a war between drug gangs.
(AP, 9/13/06)
2006 Sep 12, Montenegro's election authorities said the governing pro-Western coalition led by Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic won last weekend's parliamentary elections.
(AP, 9/12/06)
2006 Sep 12, Serbia toughened its stand on Kosovo as parliament decided that a planned new constitution would refer to the disputed province as an "integral" part of Serbia, regardless of U.N.-led negotiations on whether to grant it independence.
(AP, 9/12/06)
2006 Sep 12, In Syria armed Islamic militants attempted to storm the US Embassy in Damascus. Four people were killed, including three of the assailants. One of Syria's anti-terrorism forces was killed and 11 other people were wounded. The only Islamic militant arrested in the attack died from his wounds, and authorities were unable to question him.
(AP, 9/12/06)(AP, 9/13/06)
2006 Sep 12, In Turkey a bomb exploded near a park in a primarily residential area of Diyarbakir and 10 people were killed. 7 children were among the dead. The bomb was made by hand, placed in a thermos and went off as it was being transported.
(AP, 9/13/06)
2006 Sep 12, Uganda extended a September 12 deadline for the rebel Lord's Resistance Army to agree to a peace deal or lose an amnesty offer for war crimes charges its leaders face.
(AFP, 9/13/06)
2006 Sep 12, In Yemen a stampede during a campaign rally for President Ali Abdullah Saleh killed at least 51 people and injured more than 230, most of them schoolchildren and teenagers.
(AP, 9/12/06)
2007 Sep 12, The US SEC said it had filed civil fraud charges against Douglas Hamilton, Craig Johnson, James Kinney and Kenneth Taylor, the former vice presidents of finance for Toronto-based Nortel's optical, wireline, wireless and enterprise business units.
(AP, 9/13/07)
2007 Sep 12, Exxon Mobil Corp. said in a filing with the SEC that it had filed a request with the Int’l. Center for Settlement of Investment Disputes for arbitration over compensation from the Venezuelan government for seized oil production assets.
(WSJ, 9/14/07, p.A9)
2007 Sep 12, Oil prices briefly topped a record $80 a barrel.
(AP, 9/12/08)
2007 Sep 12, The World Conservation Union's 2007 Red List of Threatened Species reported that more than 16,300 species of animals and plants are on the verge of disappearing from the planet, with nearly 200 more species approaching extinction within the last year. Gorillas and orangutans were both classified as Critically Endangered.
(www.livescience.com/animals/070912_red_list.html)
2007 Sep 12, Phil Frank (b.1943), creator of the Farley and Elderberries comic strips, died from a brain tumor in Bolinas, Ca. His Farley strip had run in the SF Chronicle for decades.
(SFC, 9/14/07, p.A1)
2007 Sep 12, Qari Yousef Ahmadi, a Taliban spokesman, said that US and other military forces must leave Afghanistan before the militant group would consider holding peace talks with the Afghan government, backtracking from an earlier statement. Fighting in Afghanistan killed some 75 people as the Muslim holy month of Ramadan began, including 45 suspected Taliban militants who died in airstrikes and Afghan army gunfire.
(AP, 9/12/07)(AP, 9/13/07)
2007 Sep 12, The specter of foot and mouth disease returned to haunt Britain after a new suspected outbreak was detected close to last month's outbreak site.
(AFP, 9/12/07)
2007 Sep 12, Canada’s defense minister said Canada will give a one-time payment of $19,200 to people who say their health was harmed by US military Agent Orange spray programs at a base in eastern Canada 40 years ago. The US military tested Agent Orange, Agent Purple and several other powerful defoliants on a small section of the base in Gagetown, New Brunswick, over seven days in 1966 and 1967. Roughly 4,500 people were expected to be eligible for the payment, at a total cost of $92 million.
(AP, 9/13/07)
2007 Sep 12, Police in Chile battled rampaging youths over night on the anniversary of the 1973 military coup. One officer was killed, 41 people injured with some 304 people arrested.
(SFC, 9/13/07, p.A4)
2007 Sep 12, Beijing showed off its new multibillion-dollar airport terminal, a mammoth structure of glass and steel with a gracefully sloping roof that the owners said is meant to impress visitors to China's capital for the 2008 Olympics.
(AP, 9/12/07)
2007 Sep 12, Li Changjiang, the head of China's product safety agency, said the Chinese-made toys children receive for Christmas this year will be safe, pledging that problems over the use of dangerous lead paint will be resolved in time for holiday exports.
(AP, 9/12/07)
2007 Sep 12, Akmal Shaikh (51), a British citizen, was arrested in Urumqi, in China's western Xinjiang region, with four kg (8.8 pounds) of heroin. He was later convicted and sentenced to die on Dec 29, 2009. Supporters of Shaikh said he was duped into carrying the drugs for a criminal gang. If the death penalty is carried out, Shaikh would become the first national from a European Union country to be executed in China in 50 years.
(AFP, 12/22/09)(www.amnesty.org.uk/actions_details.asp?ActionID=638)
2007 Sep 12, The Republic of Congo, the smaller, oil-rich western neighbor of the Democratic Republic of Congo, numbered about 3.7 million inhabitants.
(AFP, 9/12/07)
2007 Sep 12, Ethiopia entered the third millennium 7 years after the rest of the world, amid lavish celebrations, religious fervor and messages of hope from the troubled country's leaders.
(AFP, 9/12/07)
2007 Sep 12, A massive 8.4 earthquake struck Indonesia, killing at least 10 people, injuring dozens and triggering a tsunami that hit one city on the island of Sumatra.
(AP, 9/12/07)(Reuters, 9/13/07)
2007 Sep 12, Gunmen ambushed an Iraqi police checkpoint in the Gayara area south of Mosul before dawn, killing six officers in a sophisticated attack on fledgling Iraqi security installations. In Diyala's al Salam area, gunmen opened fire on a car at 9 a.m. killing two and wounding two others. An hour later in another area, assailants shot into a crowd in central Muqdadiyah killing two and wounding two. Other scattered violence left at least five other Iraqis dead, including a civilian killed by a roadside bomb on Palestine Street, a popular shopping district in Baghdad. The bomb targeted a passing convoy of SUVs, and left five other people wounded. Robbers dressed as police commandos hijacked an armored truck in eastern Baghdad, bound and gagged its guards, and made off with about $550,000 in Iraqi currency.
(AP, 9/12/07)
2007 Sep 12, Japanese PM Shinzo Abe announced he will resign, ending a troubled year-old government that has suffered a string of damaging scandals and a humiliating electoral defeat.
(AP, 9/12/07)
2007 Sep 12, Allies of Pakistan's military ruler blocked opposition leader Imran Khan from entering, Karachi, the country's biggest city, just days after the government sent a former prime minister back into exile. City police chief Azher Farooqi said the former cricket star was barred because his presence could cause unrest. Rebels armed with rocket launchers surrounded a security post on the outskirts of the troubled city of Bannu, which borders North Waziristan. They wounded a policeman and a soldier before whisking away 12 paramilitary troops. Pakistani helicopter gunships and artillery pounded pro-Taliban militant hideouts in a tribal region near the Afghan border, killing up to 40 insurgents.
(AP, 9/12/07)(AFP, 9/12/07)
2007 Sep 12, In the Philippines a court found former Pres. Joseph Estrada guilty of taking more than $85 million in bribes and kickbacks and sentenced him to life imprisonment, ending a trial that spanned 6 years.
(SFC, 9/12/07, p.A19)
2007 Sep 12, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin dismissed his long-serving PM Mikhail Fradkov and nominated little-known Cabinet official Victor Zubkov (b.1941) to replace him in a surprise move that could put Zubkov in the running to replace Putin next year.
(AP, 9/12/07)(WSJ, 9/13/07, p.A3)(Econ, 9/15/07, p.64)
2007 Sep 12, Serbia warned the EU it would not accept any decision on Kosovo taken outside the UN, and its ally Russia told the US to stop backing Kosovo independence while talks continue.
(AP, 9/12/07)
2007 Sep 12, Turkish troops killed 4 Kurdish guerrillas in the southeastern province of Siirt.
(AP, 9/12/07)
2008 Sep 12, The US accused Rodriguez Chacin and 2 other top aides to Venezuela’s Pres. Chavez of helping Colombian guerrillas traffic cocaine and procure weapons for FARC. Chacin had just resigned on Sep 8 from Venezuela’s Interior Ministry.
(SFC, 9/13/08, p.A5)
2008 Sep 12, The SF Opera said it had received a commitment from board chairman John A. Gunn (64) and wife Cynthia Fry Gunn for a gift of $40 million. John Gunn served as chairman and CEO of Dodge and Cox Investment Managers.
(SFC, 9/13/08, p.A2)
2008 Sep 12, In southern California a commuter train smashed head-on into a freight train killing at least 25 people in the deadliest US passenger train accident in 15 years. Officials the next day attributed the accident to failure of the passenger train engineer to stop at a red light. It was later found that engineer Robert Sanchez, who died in the crash, had sent a text message 22 seconds before the crash.
(AP, 9/13/08)(Reuters, 9/13/08)(WSJ, 10/2/08, p.A11)
2008 Sep 12, David Foster Wallace (b.1962), the author best known for his 1996 novel "Infinite Jest," was found dead in his home in Claremont, Ca. In 2012 D.T. Max authored “Every Love Story Is a Ghost Story: A Life of David Foster Wallace."
(AP, 9/13/08)(SSFC, 9/14/08, p.B7)(SSFC, 9/2/12, p.F1)
2008 Sep 12, Taliban militants attacked a logistics convoy in western Afghanistan, sparking a clash that killed 10 insurgents and five Afghan guards. Afghan police said they had arrested three suspects accused of giving the US military false information that led to the August 22 bombardment of the village of Azizabad.
(AP, 9/12/08)(AP, 9/14/08)
2008 Sep 12, Bolivian President Evo Morales decreed a state of siege and sent troops to the eastern province of Pando where at least 16 people were killed in street battles between pro- and anti-government activists. Another 2 people were killed at Pando's main airfield as government troops took control, opening fire to disperse protesters.
(AP, 9/12/08)(AP, 9/14/08)
2008 Sep 12, British and French firefighters extinguished a 1,000-degree inferno in the Channel Tunnel but tens of thousands of travelers faced more delay as they waited for the undersea link to reopen.
(AP, 9/12/08)
2008 Sep 12, Shops throughout China pulled a milk powder, suspected sickening babies, from shelves in the latest safety scandal to rock the country's food industry. Investigators soon detained 19 people and were questioning 78 to find out how melamine was added to milk supplied to Sanlu Group Co., China's biggest milk powder producer. On Sep 15 Zhang Zhenling, vice president of Sanlu Group, read a letter of apology at a news briefing in Shijiazhuang, capital of Hebei Province, where the corporation is based. China later reported that more than 6,000 babies had fallen ill and three died after drinking contaminated milk powder. Consumer complaints to Sanlu Group regarding its baby milk formula had begun as early as last December. By the end of the year 6 children had died and tens of thousands were made ill from milk powder tainted with melamine.
(AP, 9/12/08)(AP, 9/13/08)(AFP, 9/15/08)(AFP, 9/17/08)(SFC, 9/24/08, p.A12)(Econ, 5/25/13, p.67)
2008 Sep 12, Pope Benedict XVI urged France to take Christianity into account despite its secular tradition, saying on his first visit there as pontiff that church and state should be open to each other.
(AP, 9/12/08)
2008 Sep 12, Tens of thousands of Muslims joined pro-independence rallies across Indian-controlled Kashmir, leading to scattered clashes with police that left at least two protesters dead and dozens injured.
(AP, 9/12/08)
2008 Sep 12, Mexican police found the bodies of 24 men with their hands bound and shot to death execution-style outside the capital. On Nov 27 prosecutors charged a municipal police commander and an alleged drug cartel member with homicide in the September massacre.
(AP, 9/13/08)(AP, 11/28/08)
2008 Sep 12, In Pakistan a US Predator drone fired 2 missiles at a home in the village of Tolkhel, North Waziristan, killing at least 12 people.
(SFC, 9/13/08, p.A3)
2008 Sep 12, Poland's last communist leader, General Wojciech Jaruzelski, and seven other Soviet-era officials went on trial over the declaration of martial law more than a quarter of a century ago. The 1981 decision led to the deaths of dozens of people and the jailing of hundreds more.
(Reuters, 9/12/08)
2008 Sep 12, Russia’s Itar-Tass news reported that Syria’s Tartous port is being renovated to provide a permanent facility for the Russian navy.
(SFC, 10/3/08, p.A14)
2008 Sep 12, A South African judge ruled that prosecutors were wrong to charge ANC President Jacob Zuma with corruption, effectively clearing way for the 66-year-old former freedom fighter to become the country's next president.
(AP, 9/12/08)
2008 Sep 12, The Sudanese government army and Janjaweed militias launched new attacks in a mountainous area of south Darfur according to rebel claims made the next day. UN boss Ban Ki-moon welcomed the establishment of an Arab League panel led by Qatar that will work with the African Union and United Nations to sponsor peace talks in Sudan's Darfur region.
(AFP, 9/12/08)(AFP, 9/13/08)
2008 Sep 12, Samak Sundaravej ended his bid to return to power as Thailand's prime minister, after a revolt within the ruling party torpedoed his re-election in parliament.
(AFP, 9/12/08)
2009 Sep 12, Researchers reported finding dangerous methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) bacteria in sand and water for the first time at five public beaches along the coast of Washington state.
(AP, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, William E. Sparkman (51), a US census worker, was found bound with duct tape and a rope around his neck near a cemetery in Clay County in a remote patch of Kentucky’s Daniel Boone National Forest. The word "fed" was scrawled on his chest. The area where Sparkman was found has a history of problems with prescription drug and methamphetamine trading. State police later said evidence at the death scene indicated that it was staged as a murder and that Sparkman had committed suicide.
(AP, 9/24/09)(SFC, 11/25/09, p.A4)
2009 Sep 12, Dr. Norman Borlaug (b.1914), Nobel Prize winner (1970), died at his Dallas home. He was known as the father of the “green revolution" for his work in high-yield crop varieties, which helped to more than double food production between 1960 and 1990.
(SFC, 9/14/09, p.A7)
2009 Sep 12, Christopher Kelly (51), former chief fundraiser for ousted Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, died in Chicago after being found slumped over in his car the previous evening. An overdose of drugs was suspected. Kelly faced at least 8 years in prison after pleading guilty to fraud charges in 2 separate cases.
(SFC, 9/14/09, p.A4)
2009 Sep 12, In Afghanistan a Taliban ambush killed six private security guards working for a construction company in the eastern province of Kunar. In Khost province a suspected militant rocket attack killed three civilians in Sabari district. In Kandahar 3 suicide bombers tried to attack an office of the country's intelligence agency. Officers and the bombers traded gunfire. One bomber blew himself up and killed an intelligence officer, while the other bombers’ explosives went off but didn't kill anyone. Coalition and Afghan forces killed 11 militants during an overnight raid in northern Kunduz province. In Kunduz province a turncoat policeman poisoned 8 other officers at a guard post, killed his commander and called in the Taliban who beheaded or shot 7 other policemen. A roadside bomb killed two US troops in the east. In western Afghanistan 3 US soldiers were killed following a roadside bomb attack and small arms fire. Altogether 50 civilians, security forces and militants were killed in the spate of attacks, including 20 noncombatants killed in two roadside bomb explosions. In western Farah province a battle that included airstrikes killed about 50 Taliban militants after an insurgent ambush left 3 US troops and 7 Afghan soldiers dead.
(AP, 9/12/09)(AP, 9/13/09)(SSFC, 9/13/09, p.A4)(SFC, 9/14/09, p.A2)
2009 Sep 12, Australia intercepted a boat carrying 83 suspected asylum seekers off its northwest coast after it was spotted from the air by a military patrol plane. Later in the day the Australian navy intercepted a suspected people-smuggling boat carrying 65 asylum seekers off the country's northwest coast.
(AFP, 9/12/09)(AFP, 9/13/09)
2009 Sep 12, President Evo Morales said Bolivia has decided to buy a presidential plane from Russia after Moscow offered to set up an aircraft maintenance center in the South American nation. Defense Minister Walker San Miguel announced in early August that Bolivia had agreed to purchase an Antonov presidential plane with satellite phone, Internet links and a meeting room from Russia for $30 million.
(AP, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, In Chechnya three police were wounded when a suicide bomber blew himself up in Grozny. An alleged militant was killed in a separate incident in Chechnya.
(AP, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, China decried a US decision to impose added duty on Chinese-made tires, saying the move sent a dangerous protectionist signal before a G20 summit and could stoke reactions impeding global recovery. The tire duty was the first time Washington has applied special "safeguard" provisions Beijing agreed to before joining the WTO in 2001.
(Reuters, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, A court in western China's Xinjiang region sentenced three people to up to 15 years in prison in the first trials over a series of mysterious syringe attacks that led to mass protests against the local government. In eastern China 3 people died and an additional 17 required medical treatment after they were exposed to bags of a toxic chemical illegally dumped by a factory in Dongyang.
(AP, 9/12/09)(AP, 9/16/09)
2009 Sep 12, Costa Rican authorities detained 54 US-bound migrants from Africa and Nepal after their boat arrived on the country's coast. Authorities also took into custody three suspected Colombian smugglers who were traveling with them.
(AP, 9/13/09)
2009 Sep 12, In Dagestan security forces besieged a home and killed four alleged militants.
(AP, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, Willy Ronis (99), the last of the great French photographers, died. Lovers, nudes and scenes from Paris streets were the mainstay of Ronis' photographs in an award-winning career that began in the 1930s.
(AP, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, In Iraq 2 bombs exploded moments apart near the tomb of a revered Shiite religious figure in central Baghdad, killing three people and wounding 22. A bomb attached to a civilian car exploded in the northwest of Baghdad, killing the driver and wounding two passengers. 4 people were killed by a roadside bomb in Diyala province. In the northern city of Mosul, a roadside bomb went off near an Iraqi army patrol, prompting soldiers to open fire to scare off any attackers. A stray bullet from the shooting killed a traffic policeman.
(AP, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, In Indian-administered Kashmir suspected Islamic militants set off a powerful bomb blast killing three people and wounding at least seven others.
(AP, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, In Lebanon Salah Ezzedine (47), a Shiite businessman with connections to Hezbollah, and his partner Youssef Faour were arrested on suspicion of cheating investors of hundreds of millions of dollars. They charged with fraudulent embezzlement.
(www.nytimes.com/2009/09/16/world/middleeast/16lebanon.html?_r=3&ref=world)
2009 Sep 12, Mexican police said they have found the bodies of five men dumped in a landfill near the resort city of Acapulco. The men had been shot to death and officers found a note with the bodies signed "The boss of bosses."
(AP, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, In Pakistan paramilitary troops destroyed three militant hide-outs and killed 22 insurgents. Officials said hundreds of tribal police in the northwestern Khyber region have quit their jobs because of militant threats.
(AP, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, Uganda’s army killed five rebels in the CAR, including Arit Santos, a commander of the LRA insurgent group. Soldiers also seized 24 sub-machineguns, several rounds of ammunition, medicine and laptop computers in the operation.
(AFP, 9/14/09)
2009 Sep 12, In Venezuela opposition Mayor Lluvane Alvarez was shot by unidentified assailants as he entered his home in western Tachira state, which is plagued by crime related to drug trafficking and other illicit activities.
(AP, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, Zimbabwe’s President Robert Mugabe welcomed the first top-level European Union delegation to visit in seven years with "open arms" and said talks on implementing a power-sharing deal went well.
(Reuters, 9/12/09)
2010 Sep 12, The 2010 MTV Video Music Awards were presented in Los Angeles.
(AP, 9/13/10)
2010 Sep 12, In Afghanistan 2 protesters were shot and killed in Logar province and 4 were injured as Afghans protested for a third day against a plan by an American pastor to burn copies of the Islamic holy book, despite his decision to call off the action. A series of NATO airstrikes killed 14 insurgents after a joint patrol with Afghan soldiers came under fire in Uruzgan province. A rocket was fired by militants toward an Afghan army supply base in Jalalabad city, in eastern Nangarhar province. The rocket missed its target and slammed into a house, wounding nine civilians, including four children, all members of one family.
(Reuters, 9/12/10)(AP, 9/13/10)
2010 Sep 12, In Cameroon six hostages, four Ukrainians, a Croatian, and a Filipino, were kidnapped by unidentified gunmen off the port city of Douala. On Sep 30 the hostages were freed following a secret operation by Cameroon security forces.
(AP, 10/1/10)
2010 Sep 12, An Egyptian security official said 16 Russians and Moldovans, who killed an Egyptian smuggler, have handed themselves over to police. Some of the would-be migrants to Israel attacked and fatally stabbed smuggler Massud Salim (31) after he attempted to rape one of the female members of the group.
(AFP, 9/12/10)
2010 Sep 12, Germany's top bank, Deutsche Bank, announced a rights issue worth around 10 billion euros ($13 billion), saying it sought fresh capital to take over retail bank Postbank.
(AFP, 9/12/10)
2010 Sep 12, In Conakry, Guinea, one person was killed and dozens were wounded in clashes between supporters of rival candidates just days before the country's historic presidential runoff vote.
(Reuters, 9/12/10)
2010 Sep 12, In Indonesia assailants stabbed Asia Sihombing, a Christian worshipper, in the stomach and pounded Rev. Luspida Simanjuntak in the head with a wooden plank when she tried to help him as they headed to morning prayers in Bekasi, 25 miles east of Jakarta.
(AP, 9/12/10)
2010 Sep 12, A senior Iranian prosecutor said that authorities will release Sarah Shourd, a jailed American woman, on $500,000 bail because of health problems, another sudden about-face by Iran in a case that has added to tension with the United States.
(AP, 9/12/10)
2010 Sep 12, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu reiterated his demand for the Palestinians to recognize Israel as a Jewish state, in remarks ahead of a second round of US-backed peace talks. A rocket fired by Palestinian militants in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip struck Israel without causing any casualties or damage. A burst of Israeli tank fire killed three civilians in the northern Gaza town of Beit Hanun, a man (91), his grandson (17) and another man (20). A senior commander on Sep 14 said the killing was a mistake.
(AFP, 9/12/10)(AFP, 9/14/10)
2010 Sep 12, In Indian-administered Kashmir hundreds of stone-throwing protesters defied a curfew and attacked security forces in two towns, injuring 9 police officers and 4 soldiers. The protests erupted hours after police formally accused Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, a key separatist leader, of treason for allegedly inciting participants in a massive rally to torch government offices a day earlier.
(AP, 9/12/10)
2010 Sep 12, The Venice film festival ended with an awards ceremony. Jury president Quentin Tarantino faced charges of favoritism after he handed out two major awards to his friends, including best picture to his ex partner Sofia Coppola's "Somewhere."
(Reuters, 9/12/10)
2010 Sep 12, In Kosovo a French Gendarme was shot and wounded during clashes between ethnic Albanians and Serbs in the ethnically divided city of Mitrovica as European Union police fired tear gas to disperse the violent crowd.
(AP, 9/12/10)
2010 Sep 12, Mexican marines captured Sergio Villarreal Barragan (“the Child-eater"), a presumed leader of the embattled Beltran Leyva cartel, along with 2 accomplices in a raid in the central state of Puebla.
(AP, 9/12/10)(Econ, 9/18/10, p.53)
2010 Sep 12, In Pakistan a suspected US missile strike in North Waziristan killed at least five associates of warlord Hafiz Gul Bahadur, who was fighting Western troops in Afghanistan.
(AP, 9/12/10)
2010 Sep 12, Philippine authorities at Manila's airport found a newborn baby in a garbage bag that was apparently unloaded from an airplane that landed from the Middle East. On Sep 16 Rep. Lani Mercado said she met with the mother, who told her that she had been raped by her employer while working as a maid in Qatar and became pregnant.
(AP, 9/12/10)(AP, 9/16/10)
2010 Sep 12, Turks voted on whether to amend a military-era constitution in what the government says is a key step in Turkey's path to full democracy, despite opposition claims that the proposed reforms would shackle the independence of the courts. Some 58 percent of voters approved a package of 26 amendments to the constitution crafted after a 1980 military coup, making the military more accountable to civilian courts, backing gender equality and other citizens' rights and lifting immunity from prosecution of the coup leaders.
(AP, 9/12/10)(AP, 9/13/10)
2011 Sep 12, Human Rights Watch (HRW) published a report saying the Afghan police force, funded and supported by the United States, is getting away with serious abuses including rape and murder.
(AFP, 9/12/11)
2011 Sep 12, Algeria passed sweeping media reforms, ending a state monopoly on the broadcast sector and the imprisonment of journalists for libel. No timetable was announced, however, putting on hold any new television or radio stations for now.
(AP, 9/13/11)
2011 Sep 12, In the Central African Republic two days of fighting between the rebel Convention of Patriots for Justice and Peace (CPJP) and former militants of the Union of Democratic Forces for Unity (UFDR) left at least 12 people dead.
(AFP, 9/13/11)
2011 Sep 12, In southern France the Centraco nuclear waste site had an explosion that killed one person, seriously burned another and slightly injured three others. Centraco is located on the 300-hectare Marcoule site, which also houses a research center and four industrial sites, including one that makes Mox, a fuel made from plutonium and uranium.
(AP, 9/12/11)
2011 Sep 12, Indian officials said at least 23 children who received blood transfusions have tested positive for HIV, as authorities launched an investigation into a government hospital.
(AFP, 9/12/11)
2011 Sep 12, Indian officials said heavy rains and flooding have killed 16 people in Orissa state leaving nearly 100,000 others homeless.
(SFC, 9/13/11, p.A2)
2011 Sep 12, Iran media said state regulators have blocked the assets a mega-tycoon Amir-Mansour Aria, accused of masterminding a $2.6 billion bank fraud. Last week Bank Saderat, revealed it uncovered the alleged fraud in early August and informed security and judicial authorities. The newspaper Kayhan, which often reflects the views of Iran's ruling clerics, said Aria had links with Ahmadinejad's top ally, Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei. Iran hanged five convicted drug traffickers jailed in the central city of Shahroud.
(AP, 9/12/11)(AFP, 9/12/11)
2011 Sep 12, Iraq's former anti-corruption chief, Rahim Hassan al-Uqailee (44), slammed the nation’s leaders, describing graft as "part of the struggle for power" in what international monitors say is one of the world's most corrupt countries. 22 Shiite pilgrims were executed by gunmen who hijacked their bus at a fake checkpoint in Anbar province.
(AFP, 9/12/11)(AP, 9/13/11)
2011 Sep 12, In Italy an explosion at a fireworks factory in Arpino killed 6 people.
(SFC, 9/13/11, p.A2)
2011 Sep 12, In Kenya a leaking gasoline pipeline in Nairobi exploded, turning part of a slum into an inferno. At least 95 people were killed and more than 100 hurt.
(AP, 9/12/11)(AFP, 9/13/11)(AP, 9/14/11)
2011 Sep 12, Kurdish rebels attacked a police station and a paramilitary police headquarters near Turkey’s border with Iraq killing 5 people including 3 civilians.
(SFC, 9/13/11, p.A2)
2011 Sep 12, In Libya suspected Moammar Gadhafi's loyalists staged twin attacks at the key Ras Lanuf oil refinery in possibly coordinated strikes that suggest revolutionary forces still face resistance in areas under their control. At least 15 attackers were killed. Rebels captured most of the northern half of Bani Walid.
(AP, 9/12/11)
2011 Sep 12, A Mali government source said that 4 people were killed in the desert between Mali and Algeria in a clash between the rival gangs, who did not agree on how to share the spoils from ferrying a ton of cocaine and hashish through the desert.
(AFP, 9/14/11)
2011 Sep 12, Mexican police arrested Oscar Osvaldo Garcia Montoya (36) overnight. He was the suspected leader of a brutal drug gang called The Hand with Eyes and has confessed to helping carry out or ordering more than 600 murders.
(SSFC, 9/18/11, p.A4)
2011 Sep 12, In Mozambique a group of 15 Ethiopian athletes, after competing at the 10th All Africa Games, went missing and left some of their possessions in the athletes' village outside the capital Maputo.
(AFP, 9/15/11)
2011 Sep 12, In northern Nigeria gunmen firing assault rifles bombed a police station and robbed a nearby bank, killing at least five people in Misau, Bauchi state. Members of Boko Haram, a radical Muslim sect shot, and killed four people at a beer parlor in Maiduguri.
(AP, 9/12/11)(AP, 9/13/11)
2011 Sep 12, Pakistani officials said 209 people have been killed by recent devastating rains, as the country still struggled to rebuild after last year's worst floods in living memory.
(AP, 9/12/11)
2011 Sep 12, A South African judge said Julius Malema (30), the black man who leads the youth wing of the governing party, has no right to sing "Shoot the Boer," a song some whites find offensive. The next day the ANC said it would appeal the decision.
(AP, 9/12/11)(AFP, 9/14/11)
2011 Sep 12, In Syria raids around Hama began after security forces cut all roads leading to the area along with electricity and telephone lines. Security forces shot dead 17 people and arrested more than 60 around Hama. 3 others were reported killed in Douma and Al Rastan. Russia’s President Dmitry Medvedev defended the Russian position for “open direct talks" in talks in Moscow with British PM David Cameron even as the Syrian security forces pressed their deadly crackdown on dissent.
(AP, 9/12/11)(AFP, 9/13/11)
2011 Sep 12, The Thai government announced a new campaign against illegal drugs but said it will not repeat the mistakes of an earlier push in 2003 when at least 2,300 accused dealers were killed.
(AP, 9/13/11)
2011 Sep 12, Thai PM Yingluck Shinawatra, in her fist state visit to Indonesia, vowed to improve economic cooperation with Indonesia, particularly in the agriculture, energy and tourism sectors.
(AFP, 9/12/11)
2011 Sep 12, In Vietnam Truong Van Suong (68), a political prisoner, died in Ha Nam province outside Hanoi after more than three decades in detention.
(AP, 9/13/11)
2011 Sep 12, Yemeni state news said Pres. Saleh has authorized his deputy to negotiate a transfer of power with the opposition to put an end to a months-long political crisis. However, Saleh retained the right to reject the deal. 4 tribesmen were killed in clashes in Arhab between tribal fighters opposed to President Saleh and an elite military unit loyal to him.
(AFP, 9/12/11)(AP, 9/13/11)(AFP, 9/13/11)
2012 Sep 12, It was reported that ex-UBS banker Bradley Birkenfeld has secured a whistle- blower award for $104 million. He had told authorities how UBS bankers came to the US to woo rich Americans and help them cheat the IRS. He pleaded guilty to conspiracy in 2008 and was imprisoned until Aug 1, 2012, when he was put on home confinement.
(SFC, 9/12/12, p.E3)
2012 Sep 12, The City Council of Portland, Oregon, voted to fluoridate its water beginning in 2014. It had been the largest US city to refuse the process, which resulted in some of the worst tooth decay in the nation.
(SFC, 9/13/12, p.A7)
2012 Sep 12, UC Berkeley chemical engineer Jay Keasling, founder of Amyris Biotechnology, won the prestigious Heinz Award of $250,000 for developing an inexpensive way to mass-produce artemisinin, a plant based drug to treat malaria. The Heinz Awards were established by Teresa Heinz in 1993 to honor the memory of her late husband, US Senator John Heinz.
(http://chemistry.berkeley.edu/publications/news/2012/keasling-wins-heinz-award.php)
2012 Sep 12, Authorities in Bosnia launched what they called a major operation against several organized crime groups suspected of involvement in at least six murders, several major robberies, illegal money transfers and drug trafficking.
(AP, 9/12/12)
2012 Sep 12, British privacy activists, citing findings gathered via freedom-of-information requests, identified King Ecgbert as one of more than 200 high schools across Britain that have installed surveillance cameras in bathrooms or locker rooms.
(AP, 9/12/12)
2012 Sep 12, Germany’s constitutional court gave a qualified yes to the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), a big rescue fund for troubled members of the Eurozone.
(Economist, 9/15/12, p.49)
2012 Sep 12, Greek justice minister Antonis Roupakiotis said Greece will toughen sentencing for hate crimes, following a surge in attacks against immigrants and violence involving members of a far-right political party. A fresh wave of anti-austerity strikes hit the country as the leaders of the governing coalition struggled to finalize further spending cuts for the coming two years — without which the country will lose its vital rescue loans.
(AP, 9/12/12)
2012 Sep 12, In Guatemala Julio Saquil (35) entered an elementary school in the northern province of Alta Verapaz and slit the throats of two children with a machete. Authorities said he was drunk. A mob lynched Saquil inside the school and then set him on fire in the school's patio and he burned to death.
(AP, 9/12/12)
2012 Sep 12, In Japan Toru Hashimoto (43), the right-wing populist mayor of Osaka, formally launched his national party, Nihon Ishin no Kai (the Japan Restoration Party, or JRP).
(Economist, 9/15/12, p.14)
2012 Sep 12, Libya's parliament elected Mustafa Abu-Shakour, a leading member in the country's oldest opposition movement, to be its new prime minister.
(AP, 9/1/12)
2012 Sep 12, In Mexico Jorge Eduardo Costilla Sanchez (41), a man believed to be the leader of the Gulf drug cartel, was arrested by Mexican marines in the Gulf port of Tampico. He and 10 bodyguards were presented to the public the next morning. US authorities have offered $5 million for information leading to his arrest.
(AP, 9/13/12)
2012 Sep 12, The Netherlands held national elections. Dutch caretaker PM Mark Rutte led his conservative VVD party to victory. The VVD was forecast to take 41 seats in the 150-member Dutch parliament, compared to Labor's 39 seats.
(AP, 9/12/12)(AP, 9/13/12)
2012 Sep 12, Nigeria’s Finance Ministry said China is offering it $1.1 billion in loans to help the West African nation build airport terminals, a light rail line for its capital city and communication system improvements.
(AP, 9/12/12)
2012 Sep 12, Dozens of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip burned American flags and chanted "Death to America," protesting an American film that mocks the Muslim Prophet Muhammad.
(AFP, 9/12/12)
2012 Sep 12, In the Philippines Pres. Aquino III signed the new Cybercrime Prevention Act of 2012.
(SFC, 10/4/12, p.A2)
2012 Sep 12, In Russia’s far east an Antanov-28 plane crashed into a forest in western Kamchatka killing 10 people and injuring four.
(AP, 9/12/12)
2012 Sep 12, In Somalia a day after the election of the new president, two explosions at the gate of his temporary residence killed at least five people and wounded three others.
(AP, 9/12/12)
2012 Sep 12, South Africa’s labor unrest grew. Police said 1,000 strikers were blocking access to the main shaft at Anglo American Platinum, stopping some operations at the world's largest platinum mine.
(AP, 9/12/12)
2012 Sep 12, In Syria an explosion targeting regime forces killed at least three people in northern Syria, and possibly up to 18, amid rising violence ahead of a visit by the new UN-Arab League envoy who is trying to end the country's civil war. The Observatory and another activist group, the Local Coordination Committees, said at least 11 bodies were found in the central town of Halfaya in Hama province. They said the bodies were found in fields a day after government troops stormed the town.
(AP, 9/12/12)
2012 Sep 12, In Turkey hundreds of Kurds began a hunger strike in prisons across the country.
(Econ, 11/17/12, p.2)
2013 Sep 12, The California Legislature overwhelmingly approved renaming the western span of the Bay Bridge in honor of former SF Mayor and Assembly Speaker Willie Brown.
(SFC, 9/13/13, p.A1)
2013 Sep 12, Ray Dolby (80), sound pioneer, died at his home in San Francisco. He pioneered the elimination of static noise on cassette tapes.
(SFC, 9/13/13, p.A1)
2013 Sep 12, In Colorado heavy rains and scarring from recent wildfires sent water crashing down mountainsides along the front range from Colorado Springs to Fort Collins. At least 4 people were killed.
(SFC, 9/13/13, p.A8)(Reuters, 9/13/13)
2013 Sep 12, In New Jersey a fire engulfed dozens of businesses on the Seaside Park portion of the Jersey Shore boardwalk. 32 businesses were destroyed.
(SFC, 9/13/13, p.A10)
2013 Sep 12, A Pennsylvania judge ordered a suburban Philadelphia court clerk to stop issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples. 174 licenses were already issued.
(SFC, 9/13/13, p.A8)
2013 Sep 12, In Tennessee the bodies of a young woman and 3 teenagers were found in a car some 50 miles west of Knoxville. Suspect Jacob Allen Bennett (26) was soon arrested on a parole violation.
(SFC, 9/14/13, p.A5)
2013 Sep 12, Dell CEO Michael Dell won shareholder approval for a planned $24.9 buyout to take the company private.
(SFC, 9/13/13, p.C3)
2013 Sep 12, Britain's government officially launched plans to privatize more than half of Royal Mail, saying an initial sale of shares in the state-run postal service would occur within weeks.
(AFP, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, Burkina Faso's government said it's lowering taxes for civil servants and increasing student loans amid growing unrest over the high cost of education and living.
(AP, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, China's government said it will protect from retribution and attacks people who use the internet to report corruption, but only those who use an officially sanctioned website to do so.
(Reuters, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, A court in China's far western region of Xinjiang sentenced three ethnic Uighurs to death for acts of "violent terrorism", including murder and being part of a terrorist organization.
(Reuters, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, Egypt’s Interim president Adly Mansour extended by two months the state of emergency in force since mid-August.
(AFP, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, An Egyptian court acquitted all 14 defendants, including policemen, accused of killing 17 protesters during the bloodiest day of a revolt that toppled autocrat Hosni Mubarak over two years ago.
(Reuters, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, French car makers Bollore and Renault said they would collaborate in the field of electric vehicles.
(Econ, 9/21/13, p.68)
2013 Sep 12, In Iraq a spate of attacks across the country killed 7 people, including three who died when a suicide car bomber struck as recruits were leaving a military base.
(AFP, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, In Libya fighting in Derj between border guards from the western tribe of Zintan and Garamna tribesmen killed 11, and forced several residents to flee.
(AP, 9/13/13)
2013 Sep 12, The Netherlands sought to "close a difficult chapter" with its former colony Indonesia by publicly apologising for mass killings carried out by the Dutch army in the 1940s war of independence.
(AFP, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, In the Philippines fighting between security forces and rogue Muslim rebels seeking to declare an independent state escalated in Zamboanga City on Mindanao Island, and spread to Basilan island. The attacks involved the Abu Sayaf and the recently formed Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters. Rebels held over 100 hostages in Zamboanga.
(Reuters, 9/12/13)(SFC, 9/13/13, p.A7)(SSFC, 9/15/13, p.A6)
2013 Sep 12, Serbia’s deputy PM Aleksandar Vucic said former IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn, who faces aggravated pimping charges in France, will serve as an economic adviser for Serbia's top officials.
(AP, 9/13/13)
2013 Sep 12, Somali militants said a rapping jihadi from Alabama was killed in an ambush ordered by al-Shabab. Omar Hammami had ascended the ranks of Somalia's al-Qaida-linked militant group and was on the FBI's Most Wanted list with a $5 million reward for his capture.
(AP, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, Syrian President Bashar Assad publicly agreed to a Russian plan to secure and destroy his chemical weapons, but said the proposal would work only if the US halts threats of military action. Syria filed documents at the UN seeking to join the international convention banning chemical weapons.
(AP, 9/12/13)(AFP, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said clashes between Kurdish fighters and members of the al-Qaida-linked Nusra Front and the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant in the past two days left 13 Kurdish gunmen and 35 militants dead.
(AP, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, A UN official said at least 25,000 Burundian refugees living in Tanzania have been forcibly repatriated over the past month, describing a "dramatic" humanitarian situation.
(AFP, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, The UN urged the international community, especially Gulf states, to increase aid to impoverished Yemen, saying that more than 10 million people in the country go hungry.
(AFP, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro launched a state council to counter economic "sabotage" by opposition-linked business leaders he accuses of artificially creating product shortages.
(Reuters, 9/12/13)
2014 Sep 12, The US imposed sanctions on Gazprom, Gazprom Neft, Lukoil, Surgutneftegas and Rosneft, banning Western firms from supporting their activities in exploration or production from deep water, Arctic offshore or shale projects.
(Reuters, 9/13/14)
2014 Sep 12, Two F/A-18 Hornet jets collided west of Wake Island, about 2,300 miles (3,700 km) west of Hawaii. Lieutenant Nathan Poloski (26) of Lake Arrowhead, Ca., was missing.
(Reuters, 9/14/14)
2014 Sep 12, In Pennsylvania a deadly ambush at a state police barracks in Blooming Grove left Cpl. Bryon Dickinson dead and trooper Alex Douglass critically wounded. Police soon identifed Eric Frein (31) as the prime suspect.
(SFC, 9/15/14, p.A6)(SFC, 9/18/14, p.A7)
2014 Sep 12, The Australian government raised its terrorism threat level to the second-highest warning in response to the domestic threat posed by Islamic State movement supporters.
(AP, 9/14/14)
2014 Sep 12, A boat from the northern China seaport city of Dalian, with six crew on board, was seized by North Koreans while fishing in the Yellow Sea between China and the Korean Peninsula. The North Koreans demanded a fine of 250,000 yuan ($40,700) for releasing the boat and its crew, but on September 17th the six crew returned to their fishing village with wounds on their bodies from being beaten.
(Reuters, 9/23/14)
2014 Sep 12, Ian Paisley (88), Northern Ireland preacher and politician, died.
(Econ, 9/20/14, p.86)
2014 Sep 12, Nigerian soldiers reportedly killed some 200 militants in Konduga town. The dead included a Boko Haram commander named Amir. Insurgents attacked a market outside Maiduguri. At least 4 people were killed.
(AFP, 9/13/14)(SSFC, 9/14/14, p.A5)
2014 Sep 12, In Nigeria a multistory building serving as a shopping mall and guesthouse at the sprawling campus of televangelist T.B. Joshua's Synagogue, Church of All Nations, collapsed on the outskirts of Lagos. Four days later one woman was saved from the rubble. The final death toll was 115 people killed. 74 of the dead were from South Africa.
(AFP, 9/14/14)(AP, 9/16/14)(AP, 9/22/14)(AP, 11/16/14)
2015 Sep 12, In California the so-called Valley Fire erupted and spread quickly to a cluster of small communities in the hills and valleys north of the Napa Valley wine country. Thousands of residents were forced from their homes in the area. By Sep 14 the blaze had devoured about 61,000 acres (24,690 hectares), and was only about 5 percent contained. By Sep 21 the fire was 70% contained. At least 1,783 structures were consumed making it the third-most destructive inferno in state history. Five people were killed by the fire which started due to faulty hot tub wiring.
(Reuters, 9/14/15)(SFC, 9/18/15, p.A9)(SFC, 9/22/15, p.C2)(SFC, 12/20/17, p.D2)
2015 Sep 12, Jeremy Corbyn was elected leader of Britain's opposition Labour party by 59% of the party’s electorate.
(Reuters, 9/12/15)(Econ, 10/3/15, p.59)
2015 Sep 12, The foreign ministers of Colombia and Venezuela agreed to renew diplomatic contacts that had been interrupted by an ongoing border crisis between the two neighbors.
(AFP, 9/12/15)
2015 Sep 12, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi accepted the resignation of the government under PM Ibrahim Mehleb after it was rocked by a corruption scandal, and tasked oil minister Sharif Ismail with forming a new cabinet.
(AFP, 9/12/15)(Econ, 9/19/15, p.44)
2015 Sep 12, In western Germany 5 young men were killed when a train hit their car at a crossing in Monzingen.
(AP, 9/12/15)
2015 Sep 12, The Greek coastguard picked up 25 survivors after a dinghy carrying them and other migrants sank off the island of Samos. 4 children were missing. A vessel of the EU's Frontex border agency plucked 32 people out of the sea off the Greek island of Lesbos. A man believed to be about 20 years old was missing.
(Reuters, 9/12/15)
2015 Sep 12, Max Beauvoir (79), Haitian biochemist and voodoo high priest, died.
(Econ, 9/19/15, p.90)
2015 Sep 12, In central India 90 people were killed at a restaurant when a cooking gas cylinder exploded and triggered a second blast of mine detonators stored illegally nearby in the town of Petlawad, Madhya Pradesh state. Police looked to arrest contractor Rajendra Kashawa for illegally storing the detonators.
(AP, 9/12/15)(SFC, 9/14/15, p.A3)(SFC, 9/14/15, p.A3)
2015 Sep 12, In India two trains derailed, killing at least four passengers, including two British tourists near Kalka, Himachal Pradesh state.
(AP, 9/12/15)
2015 Sep 12, A Russian space capsule landed safely in Kazakhstan, bringing home a three-person crew from the International Space Station, including a record-breaking Russian cosmonaut. Gennady Padalka completed his fifth mission for a world record of 879 total days in space.
(AP, 9/12/15)
2015 Sep 12, Thai authorities issued an arrest warrant for a 12th suspect in connection with last month's bombing at a Bangkok landmark that killed 20 people, identifying him as a 27-year-old ethnic Uighur from China.
(AP, 9/12/15)
2015 Sep 12, Hundreds of Tunisians marched through the capital under heavy security to protest a law offering amnesty for those accused of corruption.
(AP, 9/12/15)
2015 Sep 12, In Yemen Saudi-led raids killed at least 16 civilians nationwide. A suspected US drone strike killed at least 5 al Qaeda fighters, including mid-level commander Othman al-Sanaani, gathered inside a military base outside the eastern coastal city of Mukalla.
(Reuters, 9/13/15)
2015 Sep 12, In Zambia at least 17 people died when a bus and lorry collided west of Lusaka, after the lorry cut in front of the bus.
(Reuters, 9/12/15)
2016 Sep 12, The five-star Trump Int’l. Hotel opened in Washington, DC, in the Old Post Office building.
(Econ, 1/14/17, p.77)
2016 Sep 12, Former California Assemblyman Thomas Calderon was sentenced to one year in prison for helping his brother, state senator Ron Calderon, hide bribes from an undercover FBI agent to support tax credits for the film industry.
(SFC, 9/13/16, p.A5)
2016 Sep 12, In the SF Bay Area police officer Sgt. Doug Ulrich fired four shots at Eugene Craig (86) during a welfare check at the man's home in Saratoga. Craig had a gun in hand and refused to drop it. In 2018 the Santa Clara district attorney's office found the shooting justified.
(SFC, 3/7/18, p.D4)
2016 Sep 12, US-based Hewlett-Packard said it is buying Samsung Electronics Co.'s printer business in a transaction worth $1.05 billion. HP Inc. said that it is the largest print acquisition in the company's history and will help it go from traditional copiers to multifunction printers.
(AP, 9/12/16)
2016 Sep 12, In southern Afghanistan two militants stormed into a hospital in the city of Kandahar, killing at least one civilian before security forces killed the assailants.
(AP, 9/12/16)
2016 Sep 12, Austria delayed a re-run of a presidential election as faulty glue on postal ballots scuppered its second attempt to organize a ballot that could give the European Union its first far-right head of state.
(Reuters, 9/12/16)
2016 Sep 12, In Brazil the Chamber of Deputies stripped the congressional seat from Eduardo Cunha in a 450-10 vote. He had been accused of numerous corruption allegations and obstructing justice. Cunha was in his fourth term and just months ago was considered one of the most powerful men in Brazil.
(AP, 9/13/16)
2016 Sep 12, A gay Chinese student activist lodged a suit against the Ministry of Education over school textbooks describing homosexuality as a mental disorder, the latest step by China's small but growing gay rights movement.
(Reuters, 9/12/16)
2016 Sep 12, China's main border post with reclusive North Korea was packed with trucks carrying everything from bricks to exhaust pipes, as it re-opened for business for the first time since Pyongyang angered the world with its fifth nuclear test.
(Reuters, 9/12/16)
2016 Sep 12, The Chinese and Russian navies launched eight days of war games in the South China Sea, in a sign of growing cooperation between their armed forces against the backdrop of regional territorial disputes.
(AP, 9/12/16)
2016 Sep 12, India's technology hub of Bengaluru deployed riot police and banned public gatherings to rein in protests as a water dispute turned violent. The violence erupted after India's Supreme Court ordered Karnataka state, where Bengaluru is based, to release 12,000 cubic feet of water per second every day from the Cauvery river to neighboring Tamil Nadu until Sept. 20. Police gunfire killed one protester and injured another after rampaging mobs set fire to dozens of buses, trucks and cars and attacked shops and businesses in Bangalore and other parts of the state. Police arrested nearly 400 people for looting and vandalism after the curfew was imposed to quell violence.
(Reuters, 9/12/16)(AP, 9/13/16)(Econ, 9/17/16, p.40)
2016 Sep 12, A government source said Italy will set up a military hospital and deploy 300 doctors, nurses and soldiers in Libya at the request of the United Nations-recognized government in Tripoli.
(Reuters, 9/12/16)
2016 Sep 12, About 10,000 Taiwan tourism operators and workers marched to a square in front of the presidential hall to demand that the government take steps to help their businesses, hard hit by worsening ties with mainland China.
(Reuters, 9/12/16)
2016 Sep 12, A Vietnamese court approved a Malaysian request for the extradition of eight Indonesians suspected of hijacking a Malaysian oil tanker more than a year ago, and rejected a similar request from Indonesia. The eight were arrested in June last year when they arrived on Tho Chu island off Vietnam's southern coast and admitted that they had hijacked the oil tanker MT Orkim Harmony.
(AP, 9/12/16)
2017 Sep 12, Hillary Clinton’s “What Happened," an account of her 2016 presidential campaign loss to Donald Trump, was published.
(SFC, 9/21/17 p.A6)(Econ, 9/16/17, p.28)
2017 Sep 12, Edith Windsor (b.1929), a key figure in the legalization of same-sex marriage, died in New York City. She was the lead plaintiff in the Supreme Court of the United States case United States v. Windsor (2013), which successfully overturned Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act and was considered a landmark legal victory for the same-sex marriage movement in the United States.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edith_Windsor)(SFC, 9/14/17 p.D2)
2017 Sep 12, In Texas Alfred Lockett (48) was shot and killed in an Austin drug store parking lot. Witnesses said the shooting culminated a high-speed confrontation involving two cars that ended in the store lot. Suspect Juan de Dios Carbajal-Jaimes (18) fled to Mexico.
(http://tinyurl.com/y73wxaa9)(AP, 11/2/17)
2017 Sep 12, British authorities approved plans for a contentious road tunnel under Stonehenge, but altered its route so it won't impede views of the sun during the winter solstice. Critics said the tunnel will disturb the rich archaeological site.
(AP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, A British junior minister said over 100 high-risk prisoners had escaped in the British Virgin Islands during Hurricane Irma. He raised the death toll in British territories to nine, with five in the BVI and four in Anguilla.
(AFP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, The European Union escalated its case against Poland over what it sees as democratic backsliding, moving a step closer to a possible court case that could result in financial penalties for Warsaw. The EU gave Warsaw one month to address judicial changes which it believes violate the rule of law.
(AP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, In France tens of thousands of protesters marched against President Emmanuel Macron's flagship economic reforms in the first major demonstrations against his pro-business agenda. Riot police clashed with hooded youths on the fringe of a protest in central Paris against Macron's reforms to loosen labor regulations.
(AFP, 9/12/17)(Reuters, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, In Germany carmakers at the Frankfurt auto show unveiled low-emissions vehicles and technology strategies that they hope will let them profit from the sweeping changes expected to hit the auto industry in the next few years.
(AP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, Bankrupt German airline Air Berlin said its existence is threatened by an apparent wildcat strike, after 200 pilots called in sick at short notice.
(AP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, Iraq's parliament voted to reject a referendum on Kurdish independence planned for Sept. 25, authorizing the prime minister to "take all measures" to preserve Iraq's unity.
(Reuters, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, Iraq sentenced a Russian Islamic State fighter to death by hanging, a rare conviction of a foreign militant on terrorism charges. The Russian was a member of Daesh operating in Mosul since 2015.
(Reuters, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, In Israel a Supreme Court decision struck down a law exempting ultra-Orthodox men engaged in religious study from military service.
(AFP, 9/13/17)
2017 Sep 12, The posthumous memoir "No Room for Small Dreams" by Shimon Peres came out as Israel began marking the anniversary of his passing at the age of 93.
(AP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, The private Japan Art Association announced the winners of this year’s Praemium Imperiale arts prizes. Ballet legend Mikhail Baryshnikov and Senegalese music star Youssou N'Dour were among the winners.
(AFP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, The Lebanese Shi'ite group Hezbollah declared victory in the Syrian war while Russia said government forces had driven militants from 85 percent of the country where President Bashar al-Assad's rule seemed in danger two years ago.
(Reuters, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, A Moroccan appeals court increased the prison sentence of a journalist to one year for inciting an unauthorized protest. Hamid El Mahdaoui, who heads the Badil online news site, was arrested in July at the start of a banned demonstration in the restive northern city of Al-Hoceima.
(AFP, 9/13/17)
2017 Sep 12, North Korea condemned "vicious" new UN sanctions imposed over its sixth and largest nuclear test, warning it would make the US "suffer the greatest pain" it has ever experienced.
(AP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, Philippine lawmakers allied with President Rodrigo Duterte voted to allocate an annual budget of just 1,000 pesos ($20) to the Commission on Human Rights, a public body that has clashed repeatedly with Duterte over his bloody war on drugs. The budget requires another vote, then Senate approval before it becomes final.
(AP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, In the Philippines at least four people died and six were missing after a major storm caused flooding in and around Manila, forcing schools, government offices and businesses to shut down.
(AFP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, Saudi Arabia urged its people to report subversive comments spotted on social media via a phone app. The move was soon denounced by a human rights watchdog as "Orwellian".
(Reuters, 9/13/17)
2017 Sep 12, Scotland's devolved government recommended that its parliament at Holyrood withhold consent for legislation to withdraw Britain from the European Union, on the grounds that it could water down their powers.
(Reuters, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, In Spain a policeman was stabbed to death in Valencia after entering a building during an investigation into the finding of human remains in a suitcase. The attacker was shot dead.
(Reuters, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, Spanish prosecutors in Catalonia ordered police to seize ballot boxes, election flyers or any item that could be used in a banned independence referendum called by the Spanish region's separatist executive. By law the police have to follow prosecutors' orders but they are also directly dependent on the regional government against which they have been told to act.
(AFP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, Syria's government signed a contract with an Iranian company to import five gas-fired power plants to the war-battered city of Aleppo.
(AP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, Syrian opposition activists and witnesses said that several thousand Syrians stranded on the border with Jordan have fled the Hadalat camp for the Rukban camp further east, running from shelling and nearby fighting between Syrian rebels and government forces.
(AP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said air strikes likely to have been carried out by Russian warplanes have killed 69 people since Sep 10 near the Euphrates River in the eastern Syrian province of Deir al-Zor.
(Reuters, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, In Togo opposition lawmakers forced the adjournment of parliament in protest at a constitutional reform bill being left off the day's agenda, despite days of anti-government protests.
(AFP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, Turkey’s Pres. Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced a deal to purchase a Russian surface-to-air missile system.
(SFC, 9/13/17 p.A2)
2017 Sep 12, Turkish authorities detained on "terror" charges at least 15 lawyers from the legal association representing two imprisoned teachers on a hunger strike to protest their sacking in an ongoing purge.
(AFP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, Uganda’s ruling party backed plans to remove the presidential age limit, which would allow Pres. Yoweri Museveni (73) to extend his rule.
(SFC, 9/13/17 p.A2)
2017 Sep 12, The International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) said Venezuela's Supreme Court has progressively dismantled the rule of law, becoming an instrument of President Nicolas Maduro's government in what amounts to a coup against the constitutional order. It called on the UN Human Rights Council to take action.
(Reuters, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, The World Health Organization said Hurricane Irma has left about 17,000 people in desperate need of shelter and has devastated hospitals and health clinics across the eastern Caribbean islands. At least 43 were left dead in the Caribbean and at least 11 in Florida, Georgia and South Carolina.
(AP, 9/12/17)(Reuters, 9/12/17)
2018 Sep 12, Pres. Donald Trump signed an executive order authorizing sanctions against foreigners who meddle in US elections.
(SFC, 9/13/18, p.A10)
2018 Sep 12, The US Treasury Department said it has targeted Ibrahim Jathran, the leader of a Libyan militia with sanctions for directing attacks on oil facilities in the country.
(Reuters, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, US lawmakers Sen. Marco Rubio and Rep. Chris Smith urged the extension of tougher American export restrictions to prevent sales of equipment that could be used in China's massive security clampdown targeting the Xinjiang region's native Muslim population.
(AP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, The US Food and Drug Administration launched its largest coordinated enforcement action in the agency’s history, aimed at the marketing and selling of e-cigarettes to teenagers in an effort to protect teens from becoming addicted to nicotine. The FDA said e-cigarette makers have 60 days to tell federal regulators how they plan to reduce sales to teens.
(CSM, 9/13/18)(SFC, 9/13/18, p.A1)
2018 Sep 12, A federal court in Washington, DC, ruled against Education Sec. Betsy DeVos over her 2017 decision to suspend rules meant to protect students from abuse by for-profit colleges.
(SFC, 9/14/18, p.A6)
2018 Sep 12, The FBI arrested Puerto Rico Sen. Abel Nazario, who has been indicted by a federal grand jury on corruption charges. The case is related to funds Nazario received when he was mayor of the southwest town of Yauco.
(AP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, In Bakersfield, Ca., Xavier Casarez (54) shot and killed five people, including his wife, and then killed himself as he was confronted by a sheriff's deputy.
(SFC, 9/13/18, p.A11)(SFC, 9/15/18, p.A8)
2018 Sep 12, The San Francisco Board of Appeals voted unanimously for the removal of the "Early Days" statue in the Civic Center. The statue depicting a vaquero and a missionary standing over a fallen American Indian was one of five that make up 800-ton Pioneer Monument shrine.
(SFC, 9/13/18, p.A11)
2018 Sep 12, In southern California Dr. Grant Robicheaux (38) of Newport Beach Cerissa Riley of Brea were arrested after being charged with rape by use of drugs, oral copulation by anesthesia or controlled substances, and other crimes. The two later denied allegations that they had preyed on two intoxicated women and then drugged and raped them. In 2020 prosecutors dropped multiple rape charges against Grant Robicheaux and Riley, after finding key video evidence never actually existed.
(SFC, 9/20/18, p.A4)(AP, 2/5/20)
2018 Sep 12, In Michigan Tanaya Lewis (17) fatallystabbed classmate Danyna Gibson (16) at Detroit's Warren Fitzgerald High School in an alleged dispute over a boy.
(SFC, 12/22/18, p.A5)
2018 Sep 12, In Brazil countries on both sides of the whaling divide voted to renew quotas for limited whale hunts for indigenous communities in Alaska, Russia, Greenland and the Caribbean -- taking into account their cultural and subsistence needs.
(AFP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, In central China an SUV crashed into a crowd at a public square, killing at least 3 people and injuring more than 40 others in the town of Mishui, Hunan province. The suspect jumped out of the SUV and attacked victims with a dagger and shovel. He was soon identified as Yang Zanyun (54) and had served several prison sentences for convictions including arson and assault. The death toll soon rose to 11 with another 44 people hospitalized
(AP, 9/12/18)(AP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, DR Congo's navy accused Ugandan troops of killing four Congolese fishermen, whose bound and bullet-riddled bodies surfaced a day earlier on Lake Edward, which is shared by the two neighboring countries.
(AFP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, Egypt's chief prosecutor said tests showed that E.coli bacteria were behind the August 21 deaths of two British tourists in a hotel in the Red Sea resort of Hurghada.
(AP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, An Egyptian court suspended a ruling that allowed the return to work of policemen with beards which are usually reserved for pious Muslims.
(AFP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, In El Salvador former Pres. Tony Saca (53) was sentenced to 10 years in prison for corruption after pleading guilty to diverting more than $300 million in state funds. His former private secretary, Elmer Charlaix, was also sentenced to ten years.
(SFC, 9/13/18, p.A2)
2018 Sep 12, In Ethiopia an agreement, brokered by regional bloc the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), was signed late today by South Sudan's President Salva Kiir and rebel leader Riek Machar in Addis Ababa.
(AFP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, The European Parliament voted 448-197 to sanction Hungary for flouting EU rules on democracy, civil rights and corruption in an unprecedented step that left PM Viktor Orban isolated from powerful allies.
(Reuters, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, France-based Algerian singer Rachid Taha (59) died overnight after suffering a heart attack at his home in the Paris suburbs.
(AP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, Germany's Catholic Church said it was "dismayed and ashamed" by decades of child sex abuse by priests, after a report was leaked showing that thousands of minors were assaulted. The report said 3,677 people were abused by clergy between 1946 and 2014.
(AFP, 9/13/18)(SFC, 9/13/18, p.A2)
2018 Sep 12, In northern India three men reportedly drugged, kidnapped and raped a teenage girl while she was on her way to a test-preparation course. The girl was able to name the suspects.
(AP, 9/15/18)
2018 Sep 12, Iran's semi-official ISNA news agency reported that a court has sentenced Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei, a close ally of former hard-line president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, to six-and-a-half years in prison for plotting and conspiring to commit crimes against national security and for propaganda against the Islamic Republic system and for insulting officials.
(AP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, In Iraq jihadists attacked a restaurant north of the Iraqi capital with a car bomb, killing five people and wounding more than 30 near Tikrit city.
(AFP, 9/12/18)
2018 Sep 12, Irish budget carrier Ryanair was defiant as dozens of flights were disrupted in a walkout by German pilots and cabin crew, the latest flare-up in a bitter Europe-wide battle for better pay and conditions.
(AFP, 9/12/18)
2018 Sep 12, Libya closed the only functioning airport in the capital Tripoli after rockets were fired in its direction, only five days after flights had resumed following a previous shutdown forced by fighting among rival armed groups.
(Reuters, 9/12/18)
2018 Sep 12, President Vladimir Putin said Russia had found the two men accused by British prosecutors of trying to murder ex- Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Britain, but that there was nothing criminal about them.
(Reuters, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, Russian news media reported that Pyotr Verzilov, a member of the Pussy Riot punk protest group, was been hospitalized in grave condition for what could be a possible poisoning.
(SFC, 9/13/18, p.A2)
2018 Sep 12, Spain's El Periodico newspaper said Spain will go ahead with the sale of 400 laser-guided bombs to Saudi Arabia, a contract it had decided to halt last week because of the Saudis' role in the war in Yemen. Saudi Arabia had reportedly threatened to cancel a 1.8 billion euro contract with Spain to buy warships if the bomb sale did not take place.
(Reuters, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, Rebel sources in Syria said Turkey has stepped up arms supplies to help them stave off an expected offensive by the Syrian army and its Russian and Iran-backed allies in the northwest near the Turkish frontier.
(Reuters, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, Thailand enacted laws that set in motion a countdown leading to new elections by next May.
(AP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, A Turkish security official said Turkish intelligence has seized Yusuf Nazik (34) in Latakia, Syria. He has reportedly confessed to coordinating the May 11, 2013, bombing that killed 53 people in the southern border town of Reyhanli.
(AP, 9/12/18)
2018 Sep 12, A court in central Vietnam sentenced activist Nguyen Trung Truc (44) to 12 years in prison after finding him guilty of associating with the Brotherhood for Democracy, an outlawed dissident group.
(AP, 9/12/18)
2018 Sep 12, The World Health Organization's cancer research arm estimated there will be about 18 million new cases of cancer globally this year and more than 9 million cancer deaths.
(AP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, In Yemen a Saudi-led coalition launched air strikes on the outskirts of the port city of Hodeidah as heavy fighting resumed days after UN-sponsored talks between the warring parties collapsed.
(Reuters, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, Zimbabwe banned public gatherings in the capital Harare following a cholera outbreak which has claimed at least 21 lives and left hundreds of people ill over the past week.
(AFP, 9/13/18)
2019 Sep 12, The US said that it will disclose the name of a Saudi citizen sought by lawyers for victims of the Sept. 11 attacks who want to link the kingdom to the terrorist plot. Justice Department lawyers said in a court filing that the FBI will make the name available to a limited circle of people that includes lawyers for survivors and victims' relatives as well as to attorneys for the Saudi government.
(AP, 9/13/19)
2019 Sep 12, The Trump administration rolled back a key provision of the Clean Water Act, doing away with protections for many wetlands and streams across the country and making it easier for farmers, builders and industry execs to develop their land.
(SFC, 9/13/19, p.C1)
2019 Sep 12, The Democratic-led US House of Representatives Judiciary Committee voted to intensify its investigation of Republican President Donald Trump, as lawmakers edged closer to deciding whether to recommend his impeachment.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, More than 100 chief executives of some of the nation's most well-known companies called on the US Senate to take action to tackle gun violence, including expanding background checks and strengthening so-called red flag laws.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, This year's Ig Nobel winners included: Dutch and Turkish researchers who figured out which nation has the yuckiest money, an Italian scientist who urges consumption of pizza for its health benefits, and an Iranian engineer who obtained a US patent for a diaper-changing machine.
(AP, 9/13/19)
2019 Sep 12, The US Dept. of Education's Office for Civil Rights found that Chicago public schools' handling of sexual abuse complaints to be "tragic and inexcusable" and required a major overhaul. Student complaints had dated back several years.
(SFC, 9/13/19, p.A5)
2019 Sep 12, In New Mexico five people were killed, and six others wounded late today at three shooting scenes that occurred over a 90-minute span in Albuquerque.
(AP, 9/13/19)(SFC, 9/14/19, p.A6)
2019 Sep 12, Ohio-based Sherwin-Williams, a Fortune 500 paint company, announced it's searching for a new location for its global headquarters and research-and-development facility. Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson soon replied that the city is working to keep Sherwin-Williams from leaving town.
(AP, 9/14/19)
2019 Sep 12, A US federal judge blocked Tennessee's new restrictions for registering voters from taking effect on October 1, saying any benefit from the law probably won't outweigh its potential harm.
(SFC, 9/13/19, p.A5)
2019 Sep 12, In Texas the Democratic primary debate was the first to bring all of the top contenders together on one stage. Presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke stood by his call for a mandatory government buyback program for AK-47 and AR-15 rifles during this night’s presidential primary debate in Houston, saying “Hell yes" the government would take the firearms from their owners.
(Yahoo News, 9/13/19)
2019 Sep 12, United Auto Workers (UAW) President Gary Jones and his predecessor were unnamed officials listed in a federal criminal complaint detailing alleged corruption and embezzlement by union leaders. The complaint was released just two days before the UAW's contracts with Detroit's automakers GM, Ford Motor Co and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV expire on Sept. 14, raising questions about the status of ongoing contract talks.
(Reuters, 9/13/19)
2019 Sep 12, The Roman Catholic Diocese of Rochester in New York filed for bankruptcy because of financial fallout from the church's decades-long sex abuse scandal. A New York law that went into effect last month gives victims of childhood sexual abuse one year to file lawsuits that had previously been barred because the allegations were too old.
(AP, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, The US Coast Guard closed part of the Houston Ship Channel to vessel traffic near Baytown, Texas, after 11 Greenpeace USA protesters suspended themselves by cables over the key oil export waterway.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, Google said it has agreed to pay close to 1 billion euros ($1.10 billion) to French authorities to settle a fiscal fraud probe that began four years ago in a deal that may create a legal precedent for other large tech companies present in the country.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, A Bahamas preliminary report estimated that Hurricane Dorian caused about $7 billion in damage. About 2,500 people were now listed as missing.
(SFC, 9/13/19, p.A4)
2019 Sep 12, Belgian and French researchers said they have detected high accumulations of industrial fluids and mercury in the blubber and skin of the rare bottlenose dolphins off the northwest coast of France.
(AP, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, One of Bosnia's two regional governments designated the Una river a nature park, seeking to head off plans being considered by Croatia to build a landfill site for radioactive waste near the border between the two countries.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, PM Boris Johnson also vowed that Britain will be ready for a no-deal departure from the EU on October 31 despite his own government's assessment that planning remained "at a low level." Johnson also denied that he had lied to Queen Elizabeth II when requesting she suspend parliament this month in the run-up to Brexit.
(AFP, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, Anglo-Dutch consumer goods giant Unilever released a list of its global tea suppliers, bolstering a drive to stamp out worker exploitation and modern-day slavery on plantations.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, In Congo DRC up to 50 people were reported killed when a cargo train derailed in the southeastern province of Tanganyika early today.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, The European Central Bank delivered a new blast of monetary stimulus to help the shaky economy in the face of uncertainties like the US-China trade conflict and Brexit.
(AP, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, A French court found Princess Hessa bint Salman, the only daughter of Saudi Arabia's King Salman, guilty of complicity in violence for ordering her bodyguard to detain and strike a plumber in 2016 for taking photos at the Saudi royal family's apartment in Paris. The court also found the bodyguard, Rani Saida, guilty on charges of violence, sequestration and theft.
(AP, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu threatened war in Gaza and then flew to Russia to discuss Israeli freedom of action in Syria with President Vladimir Putin as a frenetic election race neared its end.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, Kenya's acting finance minister said the government plans "brutal" cuts to spending, including on government officials' overseas trips, in an effort to rein in the fiscal deficit.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, A conservation expert in Malaysia said soaring Chinese demand for the stinky durian fruit is turning into the next big threat to Malaysia's depleted rainforest.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, Mexico took issue with a US Supreme Court ruling granting a Trump administration request to fully enforce a new rule curtailing asylum applications by immigrants at the US-Mexico border.
(AP, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, OPEC agreed to trim oil output by asking over-producing members Iraq and Nigeria to bring production in line with their targets as the group strives to prevent a glut amid soaring US production and a slowing global economy. Oil prices have dropped below $60 per barrel in recent weeks from their 2019 peaks of $75.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, Russia's Pres. Vladimir Putin signed new protocols to clarify how authorities will monitor "compliance with the law on Lake Baikal's conservation and environmental rehabilitation".
(South China Morning Post, 9/22/19)
2019 Sep 12, Russian investigators raided dozens of regional offices of top protest leader Alexei Navalny as well as the homes of his supporters after mass opposition rallies this summer.
(AFP, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, A large area of southeast Spain was battered by what was forecast to be its heaviest rainfall in more than a century, with the storms wreaking widespread destruction and killing at least two people.
(AP, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, Sudan's new PM Abdalla Hamdok flew to South Sudan on a two-day visit to cement a new plan for peace talks with many of the rebel groups fighting against the government, brokered the previous day by Sudan's southern neighbor.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, In Sudan thousands protested outside the presidential palace in Khartoum, calling for the appointment of top judicial officials and justice for demonstrators killed since December.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, In Syria air strikes pounded the south of the Idlib region, despite a ceasefire that had halted a fierce army offensive against the rebel stronghold two weeks ago.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, In southeastern Turkey Kurdish rebels reportedly detonated an improvised explosive device on a road near the town of Kulp, killing four people and wounding 13 others.
(AP, 9/13/19)
2019 Sep 12, The UN Security Council voted unanimously to ease the arms embargo on the Central African Republic's government following its signing of a peace agreement with 14 armed groups in February and progress in reforming its security sector.
(AP, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, The UN Security Council unanimously adopted a resolution renewing its mission in Libya for another year and pledging to support struggling efforts to build a ceasefire in the war-torn country.
(AFP, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, In Uzbekistan the body of Shokir Shavkatov (25), a gay man, was found stabbed to death inside his flat in Tashkent. A suspect (28) was soon taken in custody and charged with premeditated murder. The murder cast the spotlight on the treatment of LGBT+ people in the country and raised questions over government reforms aimed at attracting foreign investment.
(Reuters, 9/27/19)(http://tinyurl.com/yyl9k5mn)
2020 Sep 12, President Trump traveled to Nevada for a campaign rally in Douglas County as he sets his sights on winning over the state he narrowly lost in 2016.
(The Week, 9/13/20)
2020 Sep 12, Two Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department deputies — a female (31) and a male (24) — were shot this evening while sitting in their patrol vehicle in Compton. Both deputies were left in critical condition with multiple gunshot wounds. The suspect ran away.
(The Week, 9/13/20)
2020 Sep 12, Search and rescue workers found three more bodies in the rubble of a Northern California wildfire, raising the death toll in that fire to 12 and total deaths in the state's recent blazes to 22. 29 major wildfires were burning around the state.
(AP, 9/12/20)(SSFC, 9/13/20, p.A6)
2020 Sep 12, California to date had 755,854 cases of coronavirus and 14,252 deaths. The SF Bay Area had 93,917 cases and 1,284 deaths. Total cases nationwide reached over 6,466,012 with the death toll at 193,351.
(sfist.com, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, It was reported that coronavirus infections in the Dakotas are growing faster than anywhere else in the nation, fueling impassioned debates over masks and personal freedom after months in which the two states avoided the worst of the pandemic.
(AP, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, South Dakota Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg struck and killed a man walking along a rural stretch of highway. He returned to the scene the next day and discovered the body. On Feb. 18, 2021, Ravnsborg was charged with three misdemeanors. on August 26 he pleaded no contest to two misdemeanor traffic charges and was fined $500 for each count.
(AP, 9/14/20)(SFC, 2/20/21, p.A4)(SFC, 8/27/21, p.A11)
2020 Sep 12, The first direct peace talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban began in Doha, Qatar. The actual face-to-face negotiations to end the nation's nearly two-decades old conflict will start on Sept. 14.
(The Week, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, In Belarus about 10,000 women marched through Minsk with riot police violently detaining dozens of the marchers.
(The Week, 9/13/20)
2020 Sep 12, AstraZeneca announced that it received confirmation from the United Kingdom's Medicines Health Regulatory Authority that it was safe to resume clinical trials for the company's coronavirus vaccine in the UK after they were paused over safety concerns earlier this week.
(The Week, 9/13/20)
2020 Sep 12, In France police stopped more than 200 people and detained over 25 in Paris as activists sought to revive the "yellow vest" movement.
(SSFC, 9/13/20, p.A3)
2020 Sep 12, Greece's PM Kyriakos Mitsotakis announced plans to buy 18 French Rafale fighter jets, most of the "slightly used," plus four helicopters and advanced weapons to go with them.
(Econ., 9/19/20, p.51)
2020 Sep 12, India reported a record rise in new coronavirus infections for the second consecutive day after registering 97,570 new cases. The world's second most populous country now has 4.65 million confirmed cases.
(The Week, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, Iranian state news media reported the state execution of Navid Afkari, a 27-year-old wrestler, at a prison in the southern city of Shiraz. He was accused of fatally stabbing a water supply company employee during a 2018 antigovernment protest in Shiraz. Afkari can be heard on an audio tape smuggled from prison saying that he had been tortured until he falsely confessed.
(The Week, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, Thousands of Israelis demonstrated outside PM Benjamin Netanyahu’s official residence in central Jerusalem late Saturday, demanding he resign over his trial on corruption charges and what is widely seen as his mishandling of the coronavirus pandemic.
(AP, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, At the Venice film festival "Nomadland", a US movie about a community of van dwellers traversing the vast American West, won the Golden Lion award for best film.
(Reuters, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, In the Ivory Coast thousands of opposition supporters gathered in the city of Yamoussoukro to support Henri Konan Bedie becoming their candidate for the Oct. 31 presidential election.
(AP, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, Lebanese soldiers fired rubber bullets and live rounds in the air to disperse hundreds of protesters trying to march to the presidential palace during an anti-government demonstration.
(AP, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, It was reported that Mali's new military leaders have agreed to establish an 18-month transition government until an election can take place, following last month's coup.
(BBC, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, Thousands of people protested in Mauritius again over the government’s handling of an offshore oil spill that has become the Indian Ocean island nation’s worst environmental disaster in years.
(AP, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, Mexico reported 5,674 new confirmed cases of coronavirus infection and 421 additional fatalities, bringing its totals to 663,973 infections and 70,604 deaths.
(Reuters, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, Puerto Rico's Gov. Wanda Vazquez reopened beaches, casinos, gyms and movie theaters across the US territory following a drop in coronavirus cases. As of the next day the island reported 539 deaths and 37,000 cases.
(SFC, 9/14/20, p.A4)
2021 Sep 12, Total US COVID-19 cases reached over 40,937,891 with the death toll at 659,770.
(sfist.com, 9/13/21)
2021 Sep 12, Daniil Medvedev (25) of Russia won the US Open men’s title, ending Novak Djokovic’s quest to win all four majors in one year.
(NY Times, 9/13/21)
2021 Sep 12, An explosion in suburban Atlanta caused the partial collapse of a 3-story structure in Dunwoody. A strong odor of gas had been reported before the blast. Two people were unaccounted for.
(SFC, 9/13/21, p.A8)
2021 Sep 12, John Shelby Spong (90), a charismatic Episcopal bishop, died at his home in Richmond, Va. He pushed his followers to accept women and L.G.B.T.Q. clergy, and later called on them to reject sacrosanct ideas like Jesus’ virgin birth and the existence of heaven and hell.
(NY Times, 9/20/21)
2021 Sep 12, US-trained Afghan pilots and other personnel held in an Uzbek camp for about a month began leaving the country, under a US deal that came despite Taliban demands for the return of the Afghans and their aircraft. The first group is at least initially heading to the UAE.
(Reuters, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, The Taliban's new Higher Education minister said women in Afghanistan will be allowed to study in universities as the country seeks to rebuild after decades of war but gender-segregation and Islamic dress code will be mandatory.
(Reuters, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, Argentines headed to the polls for midterm primaries in a litmus test for the center-left Peronist government of Alberto Fernandez, which has been hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic, economic crises and rising poverty. The main opposition party landed a blow against the ruling Peronists, winning key races in a congressional primary vote that is a strong leading indicator of how voters will cast ballots in the midterm election in November.
(Reuters, 9/12/21)(Reuters, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, PM Scott Morrison said Australia has purchased an additional 1 million doses of Moderna's COVID-19 vaccine from the European Union, as the country accelerates its inoculation program to fight record high infections.
(Reuters, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, Bangladesh reopened schools and other educational institutions after 543 days of closure as its virus situation eases and more people are vaccinated. The government says most Bangladeshi adults will be vaccinated by the end of this year.
(AP, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, China's southern city Putian told the public not to leave town, suspended bus and train service and closed cinemas, bars and other facilities in an effort to contain a coronavirus outbreak. 19 new infections, believed to have been acquired locally, were reported in the last 24 hours.
(AP, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi pledged $270 million in aid and three million more COVID-19 vaccine doses to Cambodia.
(Reuters, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, The slaughter of 1,428 white-sided dolphins, part of a four-century-old traditional drive of sea mammals into shallow water where they are killed for their meat and blubber, reignited a debate on the small Faeroe Islands, a semi-independent and part of the Danish realm.
(AP, 9/14/21)
2021 Sep 12, Pope Francis arrived in Hungary early for an unusually short stay that underlines differences with the anti-immigrant PM Viktor Orban. After 7 hours Francis moved on to Slovakia.
(Reuters, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, Iran said it will is to allow the UN nuclear watchdog to service monitoring cameras at Iranian nuclear sites following talks with IAEA head Rafael Grossi. Iran agreed to allow international inspectors to install new memory cards into surveillance cameras at its sensitive nuclear sites and to continue filming there.
(Reuters, 9/12/21)(AP, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, Israel carried out air strikes in the Gaza Strip in response to Palestinian rocket fire into its territory. There were no reports of casualties.
(Reuters, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, Japan’s government said more than 50% of the population has been fully vaccinated. About 60% is expected to be fully vaccinated by the end of September.
(AP, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, New Zealand reported 20 locally acquired COVID-19 cases in Auckland. PM Jacinda Ardern said New Zealand has purchased 500,000 doses of Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine from Denmark, as the country struggles with a cluster of infections in its largest city.
(Reuters, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, In south-central Nigeria heavily armed gunmen raided a jail in Kabba late today, blowing up the perimeter fence and freeing 266 inmates. Many of the inmates in Kabba were suspected Boko Haram fighters.
(Reuters, 9/13/21)(BBC, 9/13/21)
2021 Sep 12, Norwegians went to the polls for the first of two days of voting in a parliamentary election dominated by the widening gap between rich and poor, climate change and how the oil-producing nation should adapt to the energy transition.
(Reuters, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, In Pakistan monsoon rains and mudslides destroyed homes and left at least 17 people dead in the Tor Ghar district.
(SFC, 9/13/21, p.A4)
2021 Sep 12, Poland's top political leaders gathered in a Warsaw church for the beatification of two revered figures of the Catholic church: Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski, who led the Polish church's resistance to communism and Mother Elzbieta Roza Czacka, a blind nun who devoted her life to helping others who couldn't see.
(AP, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, In Singapore the number of patients requiring oxygen, however, doubled to a record 54 from two days before. The percentage of unvaccinated who became severely ill or died was 5.2%. For the fully vaccinated that percentage was 1%.
(Reuters, 9/13/21)
2021 Sep 12, South Africa reported 3,961 new coronavirus cases, compared with a peak of about 26,500 per day in early July.
(Reuters, 9/13/21)
2021 Sep 12, Spain deployed soldiers to help fight a blaze in Malaga province that has scorched more than 17,000 acres over the lat 4 days.
(SFC, 9/13/21, p.A4)
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490BC Sep 12, Athenian and Plataean Hoplites commanded by General Miltiades drove back a Persian invasion force under General Datis at Marathon, Greece, about this time. A hemerodromi or long-distance foot messenger, was dispatched to run 26 miles from Marathon to Athens to announce the victory. He reached Athens and proclaimed: "Rejoice! We conquer!" In the Battle of Marathon the forces of Darius the Great of Persia were defeated by the Greeks. The Greeks initiated the war when Persia, the strongest power in western Asia, established rule over Greek-speaking cities in Asia Minor. The first known written account of a run from Marathon to Athens occurs in the works of the Greek writer Plutarch (46–120), in his essay On the Glory of Athens. Plutarch attributes the run to a herald called either Thersippus or Eukles. Lucian, a century later, credits one "Philippides."
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Marathon)(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pheidippides)
352 CE Sep 12, Maximinus van Trier, bishop of Trier, saint, died.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1015 Sep 12, Lambert I with the Beard, count of Leuven, died in battle at about age 65.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1185 Sep 12, Andronicus I Comnenus, Byzantine emperor (1183-85), was lynched.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1213 Sep 12, Simon de Montfort defeated Raymond of Toulouse and Peter II of Aragon at Muret, France.
(HN, 9/12/98)
1297 Sep 12, The town of Olivenza (Olivença) came under Portuguese sovereignty with the Treaty of Alcanices. In 1801 it was ceded to Spain under the Treaty of Badajoz. In the 1815 Vienna convention Spain agreed to return it to Portugal, but this never happened.
(Econ, 8/31/13, p.14)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olivenza)
1494 Sep 12, Francois I of Valois-Angoulome, king of France (1515-47), was born.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1556 Sep 12, Emperor Charles resigned and his brother Ferdinand of Austria took over. Charles V resigned and ended his days in a Spanish monastery. He bequeathed Spain to his son Philip II, and the Holy Roman Empire to his brother Ferdinand I. A few years of peace in Europe followed. The event formed the basis for a later historical play by Friedrich Schiller, which was in turn used by Verdi for his opera "Don Carlos."
(TL-MB, 1988, p.19)(WSJ, 3/21/96, p.A-12)(MC, 9/12/01)
1591 Sep 12, Richard Grenville (b.1542), English vice-admiral and cousin of Sir. Walter Ralegh (Raleigh), died in battle against Spanish ships at age 49. He made 2 voyages to Roanoke Island in 1585 and 1586.
(MC, 9/12/01)(www.nps.gov/fora/grenville.htm)
1609 Sep 12, English explorer Henry Hudson sailed his ship, the Half Moon, into the river that later took his name. Hudson sailed for the Dutch East India Company in search of the Northwest Passage, a water route linking the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.
(AP, 9/12/97)(Econ, 7/4/09, p.28)
1612 Sep 12, Russia’s Tsar Vasili IV (b.1552) died.
(www.etoile.co.uk/Romanov/Timeline.html)
1624 Sep 12, The 1st submarine was tested in London.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1642 Sep 12, Cinq Mars, French plotter, was executed.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1662 Sep 12, Gov. Berkley of Virginia was denied his attempts to repeal the Navigation Acts.
(HN, 9/12/98)
1683 Sep 12, A combined Austrian and Polish army defeated the Ottoman Turks at Kahlenberg and lifted the siege on Vienna, Austria. The severed head of Kara Mustapha, Turkish grand vizier, was preserved by Austria as a souvenir of the siege of Vienna.
(WSJ, 3/27/96, p.A-16)(HN, 9/12/98)(SFEC, 2/6/00, p.A1)
1683 Sep 12, Prince Eugene of Savoy repelled an invasion of Vienna, Austria, by Turkish forces.
(Hem., Dec. '95, p.69)(WSJ, 3/27/96, p.A-16)
1683 Sep 12, Marco d'Aviano, sent by Pope Innocent XI to unite the outnumbered Christian troops, spurred them to victory. The Turks left behind sacks of coffee which the Christians found too bitter, so they sweetened it with honey and milk and named the drink cappuccino after the Capuchin order of monks to which d'Aviano belonged. An Austrian baker created a crescent-shaped roll, the Kipfel, to celebrate the victory. Empress Maria Theresa later took it to France where it became the croissant.
(Reuters, 4/28/03)(WSJ, 6/3/03, p.D5)
1695 Sep 12, New York Jews petitioned governor Dongan for religious liberties.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1720 Sep 12, Frederick Philipse III, land owner (Bronx, Westchester & Putnam), was born in NYC.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1722 Sep 12, The Treaty of St. Petersburg put an end to the Russo-Persian War.
(HN, 9/12/98)
1733 Sep 12, Francois Couperin "Le Grand", French composer, died at 64.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1751 Sep 12, Amsterdam refused to establish a Jewish ghetto.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1758 Sep 12, Charles Messier observed the Crab Nebula and began a catalog.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1764 Sep 12, Jean Philippe Rameau, French composer (Castor en Pollux), died at 80.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1776 Sep 12, Nathan Hale left Harlem Heights Camp (127th St) for a spy mission.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1786 Sep 12, Despite his failed efforts to suppress the American Revolution, Lord Cornwallis was appointed governor general of India. [see Feb 24]
(HN, 9/12/98)
1789 Sep 12, Franz Xaver Richter, composer, died at 79.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1808 Sep 12, Jose Celestino Mutis (b.1732-1808), Spanish naturalist, died in Santa Fe de Bogote (Colombia). He spent 40 years on his unfinished work “Flora de Nueva Granada."
(www.famousamericans.net/josecelestinomutis/)
1812 Sep 12, Richard March Hoe was born in NYC. He built the first successful rotary printing press.
(HN, 9/12/00)
1814 Sep 12, A British fleet under Sir Alexander Cochrane began the bombardment of Fort McHenry, the last American defense before Baltimore. Lawyer Francis Scott Key had approached the British attackers seeking the release of a friend who was being held for unfriendly acts toward the British. Key himself was detained overnight on September 13 and witnessed the bombardment of Fort McHenry from a guarded American boat.
(www.nps.gov/history/history/online_books/hh/5/hh5h.htm)
1814 Sep 12, The Battle of North Point was fought near Baltimore during War of 1812. British General Ross was killed by a sniper’s bullet in a skirmish just prior to the main battle. The battle proved to be strategic American victory, but since they left the field in the hands of the British, tactically it was a defeat for the Americans.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_North_Point)
1818 Sep 12, Richard Gatling (d.1903), American inventor, was born. The Gatling gun, an early type of machine gun, was named after him.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Jordan_Gatling)
1829 Sep 12, Charles Dudley Warner, essayist and novelist who, with Mark Twain, wrote "The Guilded Age," was born.
(HN, 9/12/98)
1836 Sep 12, Mexican authorities crushed the revolt which broke out on August 25.
(HN, 9/12/98)
1840 Sep 12, Composer Robert Schumann married Clara Wieck.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1857 Sep 12, A wooden-hulled steamship, the SS Central America under Capt. William L. Herndon, sank off Cape Romain, SC. The ship carried 21 tons of gold from California to New York. The brig Marine and the Norwegian bark Ellen rescued some 141 people. 425 (428) of 528 (578) passengers were drowned. The survivors included Ansel Ives Easton (d.1868) and his new wife Adeline. The wreck was in 8,000 feet of water and in 1987-1988 salvage operations were begun by Tommy Thompson. He hauled in $500 million worth of gold bars, coins and nuggets. After a court battle he was awarded 92% of the gold. The story is told in the 1998 book "Ship of Gold in the Deep Blue sea" by Gary Kinder. The loss of the gold sparked "The Panic of 1857." The SS Central America sank off Cape Romain, SC. Thompson became a federal fugitive in 2012 after he failed to show up for several court hearings. Odyssey Marine Exploration was awarded a contract by a court appointed receiver and in 2014 recovered additional treasure valued in the millions.
(WSJ, 5/22/98, p.W3)(WSJ, 6/19/98, p.W9)(SFEC, 6/28/98, BR p.3)(WSJ, 12/3/99, p.W16)(WSJ, 1/28/00, p.B1)(ON, 7/01, p.2)(Ind, 12/1/01, 5A)(SFC, 7/18/14, p.D3)
1860 Sep 12, William Walker (b.1824), conqueror of Nicaragua, was convicted and executed by the government of Honduras. The British had arrested him and turned him over to the government. In 2008 Stephen Dando-Collins authored “Tycoon’s War: How Cornelius Vanderbilt Invaded a Country to Overthrow America's Most Famous Military Adventurer."
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Walker_(soldier))(SSFC, 4/10/05, p.F4)
1862 Sep 12, The Battle of Harpers Ferry took place in Virginia.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1866 Sep 12, The first burlesque show opened in NYC. The show was a four act performance called "The Black Crow", running for 475 performances and made a reported $1.3 million for its producers.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1869 Sep 12, Peter M. Roget, English physician and lexographer, died. In 2008 Joshua Kendall authored “The Man Who Made Lists: Love, Death, Madness, and the Creation of Roget’s Thesaurus" (1852).
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Roget)(WSJ, 3/22/08, p.W10)
1874 Sep 12, François Pierre Guillaume Guizot (b.1787), French historian, orator, and statesman, died.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fran%C3%A7ois_Guizot)
1880 Sep 12, H.L. Mencken (Henry Louis Mencken, d.1956), American author, social satirist, was born in Baltimore, Md. He worked for the "Baltimore Sun" and later edited the "Smart Set" magazine with George Jean Nathan. He wrote a philological work entitled "The American Language." Nietzschean iconoclast H.L. Mencken referred to "Boobus Americanus" and was cynical about American democracy. Mencken won fame as a journalist with the Baltimore Morning Herald and Baltimore Sun, editor of The American Mercury magazine and as a literary critic. Mencken's criticism was often directed at the American middle class and members of what he called...the "boobeoisie (BOOB-WA-ZEE)." Very popular in the post-WWI period, Mencken’s literary criticism was instrumental in bringing writers such as D.H. Lawrence, Ford Madox Ford and Sherwood Anderson to the fore.
(AP, 9/12/97)(HNQ, 6/20/98)(HN, 9/12/98)(www.todayinliterature.com)
1860 Sep 12, William Walker (b.1824), US adventurer, was convicted and executed by the government of Honduras. The British had arrested him and turned him over to the government.
(SSFC, 4/10/05, p.F4)(www.sfmuseum.org/hist1/walker.html)
1888 Sep 12, Maurice Chevalier (d.1972), actor, was born in Paris, France.
(HN, 9/12/00)(www.jimpoz.com)
1892 Sep 12, Alfred A. Knopf, American publisher, was born. In 1966 he received the Alexander Hamilton Medal.
(HN, 9/12/98)(MC, 9/12/01)
1897 Sep 12, Irene Joliot-Curie, French physicist (neutron, Nobel 1935), was born.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1898 Sep 12, Ben Shahn (d.1969), American painter (1964 Arts & Letters), was born In Kaunas, Lithuania.
(WSJ, 12/1/98, p.A20)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Shahn)
1902 Sep 12, The Yacolt Fire burned 238,000 acres in Oregon and Washington and killed 38 people.
(SFC, 10/30/03, p.A15)
1906 Sep 12, Dmitri Dmitriyevich Shostakovich, composer, was born in St. Petersburg, Russia. [see Sep 25]
(MC, 9/12/01)
1910 Sep 12, Alexander D. Langmuir, epidemiologist, was born. He created and led the U.S. Epidemic Intelligence Service.
(HN, 9/12/00)
1910 Sep 12, Gustav Mahler's 8th Symphony premiered in Munich with 1028 musicians.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1913 Sep 13, Jesse Owens, track and field athlete, was born. He was a four-gold medal winner at the 1936 Olympic games at Berlin.
(HFA, '96, p.38)(AHD, 1971, p.938)(HN, 9/12/98)
1914 Sep 12, During World War I, the First Battle of the Marne ended in an Allied victory against Germany.
(AP, 9/12/06)
1918 Sep 12, British troops retook Havincourt, Moeuvres, and Trescault along the Western Front.
(HN, 9/12/98)
1918 Sep 12, During World War I, U.S. forces led by Gen. John J. Pershing launched an attack on the German-occupied St. Mihiel salient north of Verdun, France.
(AP, 9/12/97)
1919 Sep 12, Adolf Hitler joined the German Worker's Party. In 2004 Robert O. Paxton authored "The Anatomy of Fascism," on the rise and fall of Hitler and Mussolini.
(HN, 9/12/98)(SSFC, 4/4/04, p.M3)
1927 Sep 12, Sigmund Romberg's musical "My Maryland," premiered in NYC.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1928 Sep 12, Actress Katharine Hepburn (b.1907) made her stage debut in "The Czarina."
(MC, 9/12/01)
1931 Sep 12, Kristin Hunter, author, was born. Her work included "God Bless the Child" and “The Survivors."
(HN, 9/12/00)
1931 Sep 12, George Jones, country singer, was born.
(HN, 9/12/00)
1931 Sep 12, Ian Holm, actor (Henry V), was born in Ilford, Essex, England.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1931 Sep 12, In Honolulu, Hawaii, Thalia Massie, wife of a Navy officer, accused 5 nonwhite island men of gang rape. A trial that followed resulted in a hung jury. On Jan 8, 1932 a vigilante group that included the Massie’s killed, Joseph Kahahawai, one the rape suspects.
(SFC, 5/28/05, p.E1)
1932 Sep 12, The German Reichstag under the new chairmanship of Hermann Goring gave a vote of no confidence to Franz von Papen and his government. Just before that vote was taken, Papen had slapped an order on Göring's desk dissolving the Reichstag and calling yet again for new elections.
(www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/riseofhitler/collapse.htm)
1934 Sep 12, Estonia, Latvia & Lithuania signed the Baltic Entente in Geneva against the USSR.
(LC, 1998, p.24)(MC, 9/12/01)
1935 Sep 12, Millionaire Howard Hughes flew his own designed plane at 352.46 mph.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1936 Sep 12, Bill Sam (34) was hanged at San Quentin Prison for the murder of his wife in Stockton 2 years earlier. The Chinese man said he killed her to spare his son the stigma of having estranged parents.
(SSFC, 9/11/11, DB 46 p.46)
1938 Sep 12, Tatiana Troyanos, mezzo-soprano (Octavian-Der Rosenkavalier), was born in NYC.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1938 Sep 12, In a speech in Nuremberg, Adolf Hitler demanded self-determination for the Sudeten Germans in Czechoslovakia.
(AP, 9/12/97)
1939 Sep 12, In response to the invasion of Poland, the French Army advanced into Germany and on this day made their furthest penetration-five miles.
(HN, 9/12/00)
1940 Sep 12, The Lascaux Caves in France, with their prehistoric wall paintings, were discovered in the Dordogne region. 4 teens, following their dog down a hole near Lascaux France discover 17,000-year-old drawings now known as Lascaux Cave Paintings. The paintings consisting mostly of animal representations (horses), are among the finest examples of art from the Paleolithic period.
(SFEC, 5/30/99, p.T4)(HN, 9/12/00)(MC, 9/12/01)
1941 Sep 12, The US ship Busko captured the 1st German ship in WW II.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1942 Sep 12, Free-Poland & Belgium asked Pope to condemn Nazi-war crimes. He did not.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1943 Sep 12, Michael Ondaatje, Canadian novelist and poet, was born. His work included "The English Patient."
(HN, 9/12/00)
1943 Sep 12, German paratroopers took Benito Mussolini from the hotel where he was being held by Italian resistance forces. 107 Waffen-SS troops under Otto Skorzeny (1908-1975) freed Mussolini at Gran Sasso in the Abruzzi Mountains. Paratroopers in 12 gliders took the Italian Carabinieri guards by surprise without firing a single shot, and whisked ex-dictator Mussolini away in a Storch airplane to Rome. The rest of the commando team escaped by cable car. Skorzeny then flew Mussolini to meet with Hitler.
(AP, 9/12/97)(SFC, 4/25/97, p.A15)(The National Interest, 8/26/19)
1944 Sep 12, The second Quebec Conference opened with President Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill in attendance.
(AP, 9/12/06)
1944 Sep 12, During World War II, U.S. Army troops entered Germany for the first time, near Trier.
(AP, 9/12/97)(HN, 9/12/98)
1944 Sep 12, A US submarine patrol that included the USS Pampanito, the Growler and the Sealion II, came upon a Japanese convoy carrying war material. The Japanese transport Kachidoki Maru, carrying over 900 British soldier, was sunk by the Pampanito. Much of the convoy was sunk including most of some 2,000 Allied prisoners of war. The subs after chasing stragglers of the convoy returned to find 159 British and Australian survivors clinging to wreckage [see Sep 14]. Some 1000 POWs from Australia were on the Japanese freighter Enoura Maru sunk by the USS Sealion. Alistair Urquhart of Scotland, a prisoner on the Kachidoki Maru, was picked up 5 days later by a Japanese whaling ship and taken to Japan, where he was forced to work in a coal mine. Kachidoki Maru had been captured earlier in the war as the President Harrison home ported in SF. The Pampanito was later berthed as a visitor attraction in SF. In 2008 Urquhart (89) visited the Pampanito.
(SFC, 5/27/97, p.A17)(SFC,12/5/97, p.C3)(SFC, 9/17/08, p.B1)
1945 Sep 12, French troops landed in Indochina.
(HN, 9/12/98)
1949 Sep 12, In Germany Theodor Heuss (b.1884) was elected as the first President of the Federal Republic of Germany and continued to 1959.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theodor_Heuss)
1949 Sep 12, Irina Rodnina, USSR, pairs figure skater (Olympic-gold-1972, 76, 80), was born in Moscow.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irina_Rodnina)
1952 Sep 12, Noel Coward's "Quadrille," premiered in London.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1953 Sep 12, Senator John Fitzgerald Kennedy (36) of Massachusetts married Jacqueline Lee Bouvier (24).
(AP, 9/12/03)
1953 Sep 12, Nikita Khrushchev became the 1st Secretary of USSR Communist Party. His glass and marble Palace of Congresses obliterated the last vestiges of the 17th century palace of Tsarina Natalie Kirilovna Naryshkina, the mother of Peter the Great. [see Sep 13]
(MC, 9/12/01)(AM, Jul/Aug ‘97 p.33)
1954 Sep 12, Lassie premiered on CBS-TV.
(AP, 9/12/04)
1956 Sep 12, The big money quiz show "Twenty-One" began on TV. It let contestants choose questions on a 1-11 scale of difficulty and created a star player in college professor Charles Van Doren. It was later found that the shows were rigged. A 1994 film "Quiz Show," was based on the resulting scandal.
(SFEC, 5/24/98, DB p.38)(WSJ, 1/3/03, p.W4)
1956 Sep 12, British Prime Minister Eden announced a British, French, US agreement to establish an association to operate the Suez. Nasser dubbed this as an attempt to provoke war.
(EWH, 1968, p.1242)
1956 Sep 12, In Haiti under pressure of a general strike Magloire gave up the presidency.
(EWH, 1968, p.1220)
1957 Sep 12, James Vicary (b.1915), a market researcher, announced that he had invented a new way to get people to buy things, whether they wanted them or not. He called it subliminal advertising and said that he had tested the process at a New Jersey movie theater. In 1962 he admitted that his results were fabricated in order to drum up business for his market research firm. A subliminal projector called a tachistoscope had been used during World War II in training soldiers to recognize enemy aircraft. A book published in 1898 (The New Psychology by E.W. Scripture) laid out most of the principles of subliminal response.
(WSJ, 11/5/07, p.B1)(www.straightdope.com/classics/a1_187.html)
1957 Sep 12, Detroit Mayor Albert Cobo died of a heart attack, just months before his last term in office would have ended.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Cobo)
1957 Sep 12, Archbishop Makarios of Cyprus visited the US.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1958 Sep 12, The science-fiction movie "The Blob," starring Steve McQueen, billed as "Steven," was released.
(AP, 9/12/08)
1958 Sep 12, The US Supreme Court, in Cooper v. Aaron, unanimously ruled that Arkansas officials who were resisting public school desegregation orders could not disregard the high court's rulings.
(AP, 9/12/08)
1959 Sep 12, NBC launched "Bonanza," the first color western on TV. 428 episodes were produced and the show ran to 1973. 431 episodes were filmed at the 570-acre site in Incline Village, Nevada. Michael Landon (d.1991) played Little Joe, Lorne Greene (d.1987) played Ben Cartwright (d.1987 at 72), and Dan Blocker (d.1972) played Hoss.
(SFC, 9/3/98, p.A12)(SSFC, 6/9/02, p.A29)(SSFC, 8/8/04, p.D2)(SFC, 6/28/13, p.D8)
1959 Sep 12, The Luna 2, a Soviet space probe, was launched for the moon.
(SFEC, 9/28/97, p.A14)
1960 Sep 12, Democratic presidential candidate John F. Kennedy addressed the issue of his Roman Catholic faith, telling a Protestant group in Houston, "I do not speak for my church on public matters, and the church does not speak for me."
(AP, 9/12/00)
1964 Sep 12, Typhoon Gloria struck Taiwan killing 330, with $17.5 million damage.
(MC, 9/12/01)
1966 Sep 12, "The Monkees" debuted on NBC TV. "Hey, hey we're the Monkees- and we don't monkey around." The show ran to 1868 and won an Emmy.
(WSJ, 1/9/97, p.A8)(AP, 9/12/01)
1966 Sep 12, The situation comedy Family Affair'' premiered on CBS.
(AP, 9/12/06)
1966 Sep 12, The Beatles received a gold record for "Yellow Submarine."
(MC, 9/12/01)
1970 Sep 12, US professor Timothy Leary, LSD proponent, escaped from a California jail. Leary escaped from the State Men’s Colony in San Luis Obispo with the help of his third wife, Rosemary and the Weather Underground. He went to Algiers and joined Black Panther leader Eldridge Cleaver, who kidnapped the Learys after a political disagreement. They soon escaped and made their way to Afghanistan. In 1974 he was caught and revealed his collaborators to the FBI.
(http://tinyurl.com/4ncp8t)(SFC, 6/1/96, p.A7)(SFC, 7/1/99, p.A9)
1970 Sep 12, The Univ. of Alabama under coach Bear Bryant football team played against an integrated opponent for the 1st time losing to the Univ. of Southern California 42-21.
(WSJ, 9/8/05, p.D10)
1970 Sep 12, The Soviet Union launched its unmanned Soviet Luna 16. It was the first robotic probe to land on the Moon and return a sample to Earth.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luna_16)
1972 Sep 12, The TV situation comedy "Maude" premiered on CBS and continued to 1978. Bill Macy (1922-2019) played Walter Findlay, the husband of Bea Arthur.
(AP, 9/12/02)(SFC, 1/17/13, p.D6)(SSFC, 10/20/19, p.B9)
1972 Sep 12, William Lawrence Boyd (b.1895), American film actor best known for portraying Hopalong Cassidy, died.
(www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?GRid=2123&page=gr)
1974 Sep 12, The start of court-ordered busing to achieve racial integration in Boston's public schools was marred by violence in South Boston. The Boston desegregation plan had been drafted by Robert Dentler (1928-2008) and Marvin Scott of Boston Univ.
(AP, 9/12/99)(SFC, 4/8/08, p.B5)
1974 Sep 12, Haile Selassie I, "King of Kings, Lord of Lords, and Conquering Lion of the Tribe of Judah," was deposed by the military from the Ethiopian throne. A military committee (known as the Dergue) was established from several divisions of the Ethiopian Armed forces. General Aman Amdon was elected as spokesperson for the Dergue and implemented policies for the country, which included land distribution to peasants, nationalizing industries and services under public ownership and led Ethiopia into the Socialism.
(AP, 9/12/99)(http://tinyurl.com/7lnnz)
1974 Sep 12, In its 1st major attack ETA killed 12 people with a bomb at a Madrid cafe.
(AP, 3/22/06)
1977 Sep 12, Robert Lowell (b.1917), US poet (Near the Ocean), died of a heart attack in NYC. In 2003 Frank Bidart and David Gewanter edited "Robert Lowell: Collected Poems." In 2005 Saskia Hamilton edited “The Letters of Robert Lowell."
(www.kirjasto.sci.fi/rlowell.htm)(SSFC, 7/13/03, p.M6)(Econ, 7/25/05, p.73)
1977 Sep 12, In South Africa Steven Biko died while under police custody. He headed the Black Consciousness Movement and was the country’s best known political dissident. He was detained and held in Port Elizabeth and later driven naked in a truck 700 miles to Pretoria where he died in a prison cell. In 1997 the five police officers involved in his detention filed for amnesty. They were retired Col. Harold Snyman, retired Lt. Col. Gideon Nieuwoudt, Ruben Marx, Johan Beneke, and then Capt. Daantjie Siebert. In 1999 former Detective Sgt. Gideon Nieuwoudt was denied amnesty because he denied any crime. This killing was the breaking point and led to international protests and a UN imposed arms embargo.
(SFC, 1/28/97, p.A7)(WSJ, 2/6/97, p.A9)(AP, 9/12/97)(SFEC, 1/10/99, p.A23)(MC, 9/12/01)
1978 Sep 12, The TV sitcom "Taxi" premiered on ABC television.
(http://www.timvp.com/taxi.html)
1978 Sep 12, The first annual "Day of Martyrs" was held in South Africa to remember those who gave their lives in the struggle against apartheid.
(http://tinyurl.com/3xydbn)
1980 Sep 12, Yao Ming was born in Shanghai, China. He grew to 7’6’’ and in 2002 was drafted to play for the Houston Rockets basketball team.
(SSFC, 5/22/05, p.24)
1980 Sep 12, Turkish military took over in coup after factional fighting. All political parties were abolished. Gen. Kenan Evren led a bloodless coup in response to years of street battles between left and right-wing radical groups that left some 5,000 dead.
(AP, 11/4/02)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1980_Turkish_coup_d'%C3%A9tat)
1981 Sep 12, George Leong, poet, organized the first Annual Asian American Jazz Festival.
(SFC, 5/12/96, p.C-1)
1981 Sep 12, The TV show "People's Court" (1981-1993) premiered with retired Judge Joseph Wopner premiered. Rusty Burrell was the bailiff (d.2002).
(www.tv.com/the-peoples-court/show/12330/summary.html)(SFC, 4/20/02, p.A23)
1983 Sep 12, Filiberto Ojeda Rios (d.2005), a Puerto Rican nationalist leader, was involved in the robbery of a Connecticut armored truck. It was considered an act of domestic terrorism because the money was used to fund activities by the Puerto Rican nationalist Macheteros, or Cane Cutters. Only about $80,000 of the $7 million was recovered. In 2005 Rios was shot and killed by FBI agents in Puerto Rico. In 2008 Avelino Gonzalez Claudio (65), a Puerto Rican militant suspected in the Connecticut robbery, was arrested in Puerto Rico, where he lived quietly under an assumed name. In 2011 FBI agents arrested Norberto Gonzalez Claudio, one of two remaining fugitives from the robbery.
(www.amw.com/fugitives/case.cfm?id=24432)(AP, 9/25/05)(AP, 2/8/08)(SFC, 5/11/11, p.A2)
1983 Sep 12, The USSR vetoed a UN resolution deploring its shooting down of South Korea’s KAL flight 007 plane.
(www.globalpolicy.org/security/membship/veto/vetosubj.htm)
1985 Sep 12, In Nebraska Michael Ryan (1948-2015), a cult leader, was convicted and sentenced to death in the 1984 torture and killing of James Thimm (26) and in the 1982 beating death of Luke Stice, the 5-year-old son of a cult member. Ryan's son, Dennis Ryan, and cult member Timothy Haverkamp were sentenced to life in prison for second-degree murder in Thimm's death.
(http://murderpedia.org/male.R/r/ryan-michael-wayne.htm)(AP, 5/25/15)
1986 Sep 12, Joseph Cicippio, the acting comptroller at the American University in Beirut, was kidnapped; he was released in December 1991.
(AP, 9/12/97)
1986 Sep 12, Frank Nelson (b.1911), actor (Jack Benny Show), died in Hollywood, Ca.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Nelson)
1986 Sep 12, The United States released Soviet physicist Gennady Zakharov. On Sep 29 the Soviet Union released journalist Nicholas Daniloff. Both had been accused of espionage.
(http://www.russianlife.net/article.cfm?Number=407)(AP, 9/29/01)
1987 Sep 12, Reports surfaced that Democratic presidential candidate Joseph Biden had borrowed, without attribution, passages of a speech by British Labor Party leader Neil Kinnock for one of his own campaign speeches. The Kinnock report, along with other damaging revelations, prompted Biden to drop his White House bid.
(AP, 9/12/97)
1988 Sep 12, Hurricane Gilbert, called the storm of the century, smashed into the Gulf coast. It slammed into Jamaica with torrential rains and winds of 145 mph, killing 45 people and causing damage estimated at up to $1 billion. It also devastated the Yucatan peninsula and left 225 people dead. The storm hit the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Jamaica, Cuba, Cayman Islands and Mexico before striking Texas.
(NOHY, 3/90, p.181)(AP, 9/12/97)(SFC, 10/10/97, p.A15)
1989 Sep 12, David Dinkins, Manhattan borough president, won New York City's Democratic mayoral primary, defeating incumbent Mayor Ed Koch and two other candidates on his way to becoming the city's first black mayor.
(AP, 9/12/99)
1990 Sep 12, The TV drama “Gabriel’s Fire" premiered with James Earl Jones as Gabriel Bird.
(LSA, Fall, 2007, p.27)(www.imdb.com/title/tt0098801/)
1990 Sep 12, Representatives of the World War Two allies and West and East Germany signed the Two Plus Four Treaty in Moscow giving international sanction to German unity.
(AP, 9/12/00)(www.foothill.fhda.edu/divisions/unification/finalset.html)
1991 Sep 12, Saying Middle East peace negotiations might be in jeopardy, President Bush told reporters he would use his veto authority, if necessary, to delay action on Israel's call for $10 billion in housing loan guarantees.
(AP, 9/12/01)
1991 Sep 12, The space shuttle Discovery blasted off on a mission to deploy an observatory designed to study the Earth's ozone layer.
(AP, 9/12/01)
1992 Sep 12, The space shuttle Endeavour blasted off, carrying with it Mark Lee and Jan Davis, the first married couple in space; Mae Jemison, the first black woman in space; and Mamoru Mohri, the first Japanese citizen to fly on a U.S. spaceship.
(AP, 9/12/97)
1992 Sep 12, Actor Anthony Perkins died from AIDS in Hollywood at age 60.
(AP, 9/12/97)(www.imdb.com/name/nm0000578/bio)
1992 Sep 12, Ed Peck, actor (Zoot Suit, Bullitt), died of heart attack at 75.
(www.imdb.com/name/nm0669653/)
1992 Sep 12, In Peru the Shining Path guerilla leader Abimael Guzman was captured by police chief Ketin Vidal with help from a CIA operative nick-named “Superman." Oscar Ramirez, aka Feliciano, took over the leadership. Guzman, a former philosophy professor, was tried by a military court and sentenced to life in jail. The verdict was overturned in Jan 2003.
(SFE, 9/17/96, p.A11)(SFC, 7/14/99, p.C10)(SFC, 12/8/00, p.A20)(Econ, 10/30/04, p.44)
1993 Sep 12, The space shuttle Discovery blasted off from Cape Canaveral on a 10-day mission.
(AP, 9/12/98)
1993 Sep 12, Actor Raymond Burr (76) died of liver cancer at his Northern California ranch.
(AP, 9/12/98)
1993 Sep 12, In San Antonio, Texas, Rodolfo Rodriguez (72), his wife Virginia (62) and Paula Moran (90), a former nanny, were fatally stabbed in a robbery that netted about $300. A grand-nephew of the couple later implicated himself, his brother and Arnold Prieto. In Jan 21, 2015, Prieto (41) was executed for his role in the killings.
(SFC, 1/22/15, p.A7)(http://tinyurl.com/mv4k33j)
1994 Sep 12, A stolen, single-engine Cessna crashed into the South Lawn of the White House, coming to rest against the executive mansion; the pilot, Frank Corder, was killed.
(AP, 9/12/99)
1994 Sep 12, Tom Ewell (S. Yewell Tompkins), US actor (7 Year Itch), died at 85.
(www.imdb.com/name/nm0263885/)
1994 Sep 12, In Canada the Parti Quebecois won a parliamentary election.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quebec_general_election,_1994)
1995 Sep 12, The Belarussian military border guards shot down a hydrogen balloon during an international race, killing its two American pilots.
(SFC, 9/2/96, p.A12)(AP, 9/12/00)
1995 Sep 12, Jeremy Brett, English actor (Sherlock Holmes), died at 59.
(www.imdb.com/name/nm0107950/)
1996 Sep 12, Last-minute intervention by Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole led to Senate postponement of action on a treaty designed to eliminate chemical weapons. President Clinton said the agreement was threatened by "a bitter partisan debate."
(AP, 9/12/97)
1996 Sep 12, The first African-American civil War memorial was dedicated in Washington DC.
(SFC, 9/11/96, p.C1)
1996 Sep 12, The Turkish government agreed to allow some 2,500 Iraqi Kurds, former US employees and their families, to enter Turkey and be evacuated to the US.
(SFC, 9/13/96, p.A13)
1996 Sep 12, In Columbia government officials promised to halt forcible destruction of small coca plantations for the time being in order to end protests.
(SFC, 9/13/96, p.A13)
1996 Sep 12, In Taiwan a five-year-old girl's remains were found in a drain outside a toilet at the Air Force Command headquarters in Taipei. In 1997 Taiwanese soldier Chiang Kuo-ching was found guilty of rape and murder and executed by firing squad. A task force found that Chiang had masturbated in the toilet and some drops of his semen fell onto the tissue. He had been tortured into confessing, but was not the murderer. Chiang Kuo-ching was posthumously acquitted by a military court in September, 2011, followed by a ruling that his family be paid Tw$131.85 million ($4.4 million) in compensation. A court in November launched legal action to bar former minister Chen Chao-min and seven other ex-military officers involved in the case from transferring their assets.
(AFP, 11/29/11)
1997 Sep 12, Pres. Clinton named Dr. David Satcher, 56, as the new surgeon general.
(SFC, 9/13/97, p.A20)
1997 Sep 12, With little to show after three days of shuttle diplomacy, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright declared she wouldn't return to the Mideast until Israeli and Palestinian leaders made the "hard decisions" necessary to restart peace talks.
(AP, 9/12/98)
1997 Sep 12, Senate Foreign Relations Chairman Jesse Helms, exercising iron control, prevented any committee hearing on William Weld's nomination to be ambassador to Mexico.
(AP, 9/12/98)
1997 Sep 12, Edwin Lawrence Njuguna of Kenya was stabbed to death in Napa, Calif., after being dragged with two friends from a car by skinheads.
(SFC, 10/1/97, p.A12)
1997 Sep 12, It was reported that Comoros government troops under Pres. Mohamed Taki were routed on Anjouan and half of a force of 300 were killed or captured by people who demanded to be French again.
(SFC, 9/12/97, p.A12)
1997 Sep 12, In southeast Congo a plane crashed enroute to a religious meeting. All 20 aboard were killed.
(SFEC, 9/14/97, p.A24)
1997 Sep 12, The Chinese Communist Party Congress opened under Pres. Jiang Zemin and embraced a program of bold economic reform. The event was held every 5 years. Jiang Zemin was expected to stay as general-secretary. The positions of Li Peng and Qiao Shi were in question. Jiang issued a call to use layoffs, bankruptcies, shareholding and other capitalist policies to attack the nation’s industrial ills.
(SFC, 8/28/97, p.C2)(SFC, 9/13/97, p.A8)(SFC, 9/15/97, p.A10)
1997 Sep 12, In Mexico a crowd of tens of thousands rallied in the central square of Mexico City in support of the Zapatista movement.
(SFEC, 9/14/97, p.A24)
1998 Sep 12, Sammy Sosa of the Chicago Cubs became the fourth major league baseball player to hit 60 home runs in a single season.
(AP, 9/12/99)
1998 Sep 12, Lindsay Davenport won the U.S. Open, defeating defending champion Martina Hingis, 6-3, 7-5.
(AP, 9/12/99)
1998 Sep 12, The White House responded to Kenneth Starr's graphic report on President Clinton by calling it a "hit-and-run smear campaign."
(AP, 9/12/03)
1998 Sep 12, Leaders of striking pilots at Northwest Airlines ratified a new contract, ending a walkout that began August 28.
(AP, 9/12/03)
1998 Sep 12, In Albania Democratic Party leader Azem Hajdari (35) was assassinated.
(WSJ, 9/14/98, p.A1)(USAT, 9/15/98, p.12A)(SFC, 9/14/98, p.A12)
1998 Sep 12, In Chile the anniversary of the 1973 coup was marked by weekend clashes with police and 2 people were killed and 77 injured.
(WSJ, 9/14/98, p.A1)
1998 Sep 12, In Israel as many as 100,000 people rallied in Tel Aviv demanding that the government move the peace process forward.
(SFEC, 10/4/98, p.T11)
1999 Sep 12, "The Practice" and "Ally McBeal," both created by writer-producer David E. Kelley, were named best drama series and best comedy series at the 51st Emmy Awards.
(AP, 9/12/00)
1999 Sep 12, Andre Agassi captured his second US Open title, dominating Todd Martin 6-4, 6-7 (5-7), 6-7 (2-7), 6-3, 6-2.
(AP, 9/12/00)
1999 Sep 12, In Bangladesh police clashed with protestors seeking the resignation of Prime Minister Hasina. Opposition parties called for a 3-day general strike.
(WSJ, 9/13/99, p.A1)
1999 Sep 12, In Dagestan Russian troops seized control of the villages of Karamakhi and Chabanmakhi.
(SFC, 9/13/99, p.A13)
1999 Sep 12, In Indonesia Pres. Habibie under intense international pressure said he will allow armed foreign peacekeepers into East Timor. Reports had reached Jakarta that troops had attacked 30,000 people in the seminary town of Dare.
(SFC, 9/13/99, p.A1,10)(AP, 9/12/00)
1999 Sep 12, North Korea agreed indirectly to freeze its missile testing program.
(SFC, 9/13/99, p.A10)
2000 Sep 12, Hillary Rodham became the first first lady to win an election as she claimed victory in the New York Democratic Senate primary, defeating little-known opponent Dr. Mark McMahon.
(AP, 9/12/01)
2000 Sep 12, Chase Manhattan agreed to acquire J.P. Morgan for about $36 billion in stock.
(WSJ, 9/13/00, p.A1)
2000 Sep 12, Stanley Turrentine, saxophonist, died at age 66.
(SFC, 9/13/00, p.A23)
2000 Sep 12, A series of clashes between police and protesters marred a generally peaceful second day of the three-day Asia-Pacific Economic Summit in Melbourne, Australia.
(AP, 9/12/01)
2000 Sep 12, The EU lifted diplomatic sanctions against Austria.
(SFC, 9/13/00, p.A12)
2000 Sep 12, In Chechnya a truck bomb killed a woman and her daughter in the Oktyabrsky market in Grozny.
(SFC, 9/14/00, p.C7)
2000 Sep 12, In the Netherlands a bill was passed that converted same-sex partnerships into full-fledged marriages.
(SFC, 9/13/00, p.A12)
2000 Sep 12, In Zimbabwe the stock exchange made a record 500 point gain after the IMF announced that it would not resume financial assistance. The official inflation was 53.6% and local cash could not be moved out of the country.
(WSJ, 9/15/00, p.A17)
2001 Sep 12, Pres. Bush called Tuesday’s terrorist attacks "acts of war." Stunned rescue workers continued to search for bodies in the World Trade Center's smoking rubble a day after a terrorist attack that shut down the financial capital, badly damaged the Pentagon and left thousands dead. The US began building a broad int’l. coalition for a possible military retaliation against those responsible for the terrorist attacks on Sep 11. Federal authorities said followers of Osama bin Laden were responsible for airline hijackings directed at NYC and the Pentagon. The US air system remained grounded and financial markets closed.
(SFC, 9/13/01, p.A1,16)(AP, 9/12/02)
2001 Sep 12, The FAA gave airlines a 3-page security directive to guard against further terrorist attacks. It included a ban on curbside checking and effectively eliminated the jobs of thousands of skycaps.
(WSJ, 9/13/01, p.A1)(WSJ, 9/17/01, p.A6)
2001 Sep 12, In Afghanistan Mohammad Omar, the Taliban leader, went into hiding. The Taliban military repositioned weaponry in anticipation of a US strike.
(SFC, 9/13/01, p.A12)
2001 Sep 12, An Israeli woman was killed by a Palestinian shooting ambush in the West Bank.
(SFC, 9/13/01, p.A12)
2001 Sep 12, In Mexico a twin-engine LET 410 plane crashed in the Yucatan and all 19 people aboard were killed. The 16 passengers were all Seattle-area tourists on a Holland America cruise.
(SFC, 9/13/01, p.C3)(SFC, 9/14/01, p.A32)
2001 Sep 12, In Nigeria fighting resumed in Jos and the death toll estimate was raised to 165. Police moved to quell the violence.
(SFC, 9/13/01, p.C2)
2002 Sep 12, Pres. Bush addressed the UN and laid out his case against Iraq's Pres. Saddam Hussein. Bush told skeptical world leaders at the United Nations to confront the "grave and gathering danger" of Saddam Hussein's Iraq, or to stand aside as the United States acted. Bush was expected to announce US plans to rejoin Unesco, headquartered in Paris. France favored a demand for weapons inspectors in Iraq along with force if Iraq resisted.
(WSJ, 9/12/02, p.A1,4)(SFC, 9/13/02, p.A1)(AP, 9/12/03)
2002 Sep 12, L. Dennis Kozlowski (55), former CEO of Tyco Int'l. was indicted along with Mark Swartz, financial adviser, for a $600 million racketeering scheme. 3 former Tyco International executives were charged with looting the conglomerate of hundreds of millions of dollars; all three pleaded innocent at their arraignment in New York.
(SFC, 9/13/02, p.B1)(AP, 9/12/03)(WSJ, 10/30/03, p.C1)
2002 Sep 12, Tahitian authorities found a 55-foot catamaran, the Hakuna Matata, that belonged to former NBA star Bison Dele (b.1969 as Brian Carson Williams). His brother, Kevin Williams (Miles Dabord) was seen docking the catamaran on July 16 in Taravao, Tahiti. Williams met his girlfriend on July 8 in Papeete and described a scuffle that left 3 people dead. He was last seen Sept. 5 in Phoenix, when he tried to pick up an order for $500,000 in American Double Eagle coins using his brother's passport. A comatose Williams was arrested Sep 19 at a San Diego hospital and died Sep 27.
(SFC, 9/14/02, p.A15)(SFC, 9/17/02, p.A1)(SFC, 9/19/02, p.A7)(SFC, 9/20/02, p.A1)(SFC, 9/21/02, p.A1)(SFC, 9/28/02, p.A5)
2002 Sep 12, In Maine 14 guest workers from Honduras and Guatemala were drowned when their van fell off a bridge into the Allagash Wilderness Waterway.
(SFC, 9/13/02, p.A3)
2002 Sep 12, The World Bank pledged $120 million to help Angola rebuild after more than two decades of civil war, but told its leaders they must take measures to dispel suspicion of high-level corruption.
(AP, 9/12/02)
2002 Sep 12, In western Guatemala heavy rains loosened a mountainside, burying about 30 homes and killing at least 17 people. Officials said that nearly two dozen others were missing.
(AP, 9/13/02)
2002 Sep 12, In Nicaragua prosecutors have filed new corruption charges against Amelia Aleman, sister of former President Arnoldo Aleman, accusing her of embezzling funds from a state-owned construction company and ordering its work force to handle her private home-improvement projects.
(AP, 9/13/02)
2003 Sep 12, A climate prediction experiment, expected to involve two million people around the world, was launched. The program, downloaded from (www.climateprediction.net) and ran on an ordinary desktop or laptop computer.
(Reuters, 9/11/03)
2003 Sep 12, Johnny Cash (71), singer, died. His rough, unsteady voice championed the downtrodden and reached across generations with songs like "Ring of Fire," "I Walk the Line" and "Folsom Prison Blues." In 2013 Robert Hilburn authored “Johnny Cash: The Life."
(AP, 9/12/03)(SFC, 9/13/03, p.A12)(Econ, 11/23/13, p.83)
2003 Sep 12, In Colombia 4 Israelis, 2 Britons, a German and a Spaniard were kidnapped near archaeological ruins high in the Sierra Nevada, about 465 miles north of Bogota. 2 of the tourists were freed Nov 24. The other 4 were released Dec 22. In 2004 the German government billed Reinhilt Weigel $17,630 to cover the cost of a helicopter used to bring her part of the way home, after she was released by rebels. In 2009 she lost her appeal.
(AP, 9/15/03)(WSJ, 11/25/03, p.A1)(AP, 12/23/03)(SFC, 5/29/09, p.A2)
2003 Sep 12, In Bombay (Mumbai), India, police shot and killed a man believed to have masterminded car bombings in Bombay last month that killed 53 people. Naseer and his aide were traveling in a car that carried explosives, guns and detonators when police intercepted it.
(AP, 9/12/03)
2003 Sep 12, US soldiers mistakenly opened fire on uniformed Iraqi policemen chasing highway bandits at night, killing eight officers and a Jordanian security guard in Fallujah.
(AP, 9/12/04)
2003 Sep 12, The Palestinians urged the UN Security Council to demand that Israel not expel Yasser Arafat and halt any threats to his safety.
(AP, 9/12/03)
2003 Sep 12, In Portugal's Madeira Islands a small airplane crashed into the sea, apparently killing all nine people on board. The Beechcraft 200 was carrying eight Spaniards and a British pilot from the islands off northwest Africa to the southern Spanish city of Malaga.
(AP, 9/12/03)
2003 Sep 12, In Rwanda Paul Kagame took the oath of office as the nation's first popularly elected president since the 1994 genocide.
(AP, 9/12/03)
2003 Sep 12, Typhoon Maemi, the most powerful ever to ever hit South Korea, flipped over a floating hotel, twisted massive cranes, killed at least 117 people. The main port of Busan reported $1.3 billion in damage.
(WSJ, 9/16/03, p.A1)(AP, 9/13/04)
2003 Sep 12, The UN Security Council lifted 11-year-old sanctions on Libya after Moammar Gadhafi's government took responsibility for bombing a Pan Am jet over Scotland and agreed to pay the victims' families $2.7 billion.
(AP, 9/12/03)
2004 Sep 12, The US fiscal gap, measured as future receipts minus future obligations, was reported to be between $40 and 72 trillion. The debt portended a severe economic decline or financial collapse.
(SSFC, 9/12/04, p.A1)
2004 Sep 12, US Airways filed for bankruptcy protection for the second time in two years.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2004 Sep 12, In Columbus, Ohio, a suspected arson fire in an apartment complex left 10 people dead.
(SFC, 9/13/04, p.A3)
2004 Sep 12, Jerome Chodorov (93), playwright, died in Nyack, N.Y.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2004 Sep 12, In southern Afghanistan US forces backed by helicopter gunships killed 22 insurgents, including 3 Arab fighters.
(AP, 9/13/04)(SFC, 9/14/04, p.A7)
2004 Sep 12, In Heart, Afghanistan, mobs loyal to Gov. Khan burned a half dozen int’l. aid compounds and as many as 7 people were killed.
(SFC, 9/13/04, p.A3)(WSJ, 9/13/04, p.A1)
2004 Sep 12, Hurricane Ivan skirted Grand Cayman with winds near 155 mph as it churned toward Cuba. The storm has been blamed for 56 deaths across the Caribbean so far, including 34 in Grenada and 11 in Jamaica.
(AP, 9/12/04)
2004 Sep 12, People in Hong Kong turned out in large numbers for a legislative election, many venting anger at their leaders and hoping to hand pro-democracy opposition politicians unprecedented clout in the Chinese territory. Pro-democracy opposition figures gained more clout in Hong Kong's legislature with three new seats, but they fell short of expectations.
(AP, 9/12/04)(AP, 9/13/04)
2004 Sep 12, Militants pounded central Baghdad with intense mortar barrages, targeting the Green Zone and destroying a U.S. vehicle along a major street. At least 25 people were killed, including an Arab television journalist, some of them when a US helicopter fired at crowds around the burning vehicle. The death toll across Iraq reached 59.
(AP, 9/12/04)(SFC, 9/13/04, p.A1)
2004 Sep 12, Three Polish soldiers were killed in Iraq when they were attacked with grenades and machine-gun fire as they returned to their base from a demining operation.
(AP, 9/12/04)
2004 Sep 12, Pakistani security forces and militants clashed in fighting that killed at least nine people in the mountains near the Afghan border.
(AP, 9/13/04)
2005 Sep 12, Michael Brown, the director of the US Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), resigned after being recalled to Washington amid criticism of the federal response to Hurricane Katrina. Officials reported that 45 bodies were found at Memorial Hospital in New Orleans. This raised the official death toll from Hurricane Katrina in Louisiana to 280.
(Reuters, 9/12/05)(SFC, 9/13/05, p.A8)
2005 Sep 12, At the start of his confirmation hearing, US Supreme Court nominee John Roberts pledged to judge with humility and without fear or favor'' if approved as the nation's 17th chief justice.
(AP, 9/12/06)
2005 Sep 12, In California worker error at Toluca Lake caused a power outage in the LA area. Most of the power was restored within 90 minutes.
(SFC, 9/13/05, p.A3)
2005 Sep 12, Oracle Corp. confirmed that CEO Larry Ellison would pay $100 million to a charity to settle charges of insider trading.
(SFC, 9/13/05, p.D1)
2005 Sep 12, EBay has agreed to buy fast-growing Internet start-up Skype for up to $4.1 billion in cash and shares, in a move to tap new sources of growth and add free Web telephone calls to its online auctions. Niklos Zennstrom of Sweden and Janus Friis of Denmark founded Skype using a programming team from Estonia.
(AP, 9/12/05)(Econ, 9/17/05, p.69)
2005 Sep 12, Business software maker Oracle Corp. is buying its struggling rival Siebel Systems Inc. for about $5.85 billion, continuing a recent shopping spree that has eliminated two of its biggest competitors in nine months.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, An official said China will no longer consider death tolls and other relevant information about natural disasters to be state secrets in a move aimed at boosting government transparency.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, In Colombia Porfirio Ramirez (42) and his son, Linsen Ramirez (22), hijacked a Colombian airline. The father in a wheelchair dodged a checkpoint and smuggled grenades onto a plane. All passengers and crew were eventually freed unharmed. The elder hijacker said he hijacked the plane to bring attention to a case in which he was partially paralyzed by a police bullet during a raid on his house some 14 years ago and had unsuccessfully sought government compensation.
(AP, 9/13/05)
2005 Sep 12, An international environmental group warned that only 887 hippos are left in Congo, and that they will be extinct in the African country. The latest aerial survey puts the hippopotamus population in northeastern Congo's Virunga National Park down to under 1,000 animals, compared to some 29,000 in 1974.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, President Jacques Chirac, following a weeklong hospital stay, met with India's PM Singh.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, The new Hong Kong Disneyland theme park on Lantau Island opened. Zeng Qinghong, China’s vice-president, presided over opening ceremonies.
(SSFC, 9/18/05, p.C2)(Econ, 9/17/05, p.44)
2005 Sep 12, A huge car bomb exploded outside a popular restaurant in Baghdad's upscale Mansour neighborhood. At least one person was killed and 17 were wounded.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, In Japan PM Junichiro Koizumi's triumph in parliamentary polls handed the leader a new mandate to harness his revitalized ruling party and turn promises into action for a range of sweeping economic reforms.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, King Abdullah II of Jordan paid Pope Benedict XVI a visit, saying he wanted to foster an honest dialogue between the West and moderate Islam.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, In Mexico Chinese President Hu Jintao promised Mexican leaders that he would crack down on the millions of dollars worth of Chinese contraband entering their nation, goods that undermine Mexican businesses ranging from sandal makers to religious icon sellers.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, Armed men broke into an upscale Amsterdam home and kidnapped Claudia Melchers (37), the daughter of a millionaire whose fortune came from selling chemicals, including to Iraq in the 1980s. Her children were left unharmed.
(AP, 9/13/05)
2005 Sep 12, Protestant extremists attacked Northern Ireland police and British troops into a third day, littering streets with rubble and burned-out vehicles in violence sparked by anger over a restricted parade.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, Norwegians lined up at polling stations in what promised to be a close race between a governing center-right coalition advocating lower taxes and a left-leaning opposition that wants to spend more of the Nordic nation's oil wealth on the welfare system. Jens Stoltenberg, head of the Labor Party, and 2 allied parties won 87 of the parliament’s 169 seats.
(AP, 9/12/05)(Econ, 9/17/05, p.51)
2005 Sep 12, Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf offered to construct a security fence to deter incursion of militants and drug merchants from Afghanistan.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, Joyous Gazans flooded into empty Jewish settlements and Palestinians climbed ropes and clambered over walls to the Egyptian side of Rafah to join a chaotic celebration of the end of 38 years of Israeli military rule over the Gaza Strip. Palestinians set fire to abandoned synagogues.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, Samsung Electronics of South Korea unveiled the world's first 16-gigabit NAND flash memory chip, a device the firm said will usher in a new era in data storage.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, Syria consented to a UN investigator's request to question top officials about the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, a probe that increases the pressure on an increasingly isolated Damascus.
(AP, 9/12/05)
2005 Sep 12, Turkey sold a 51% stake in Tupras, an oil refinery, for $4.1 billion to a consortium of Koc Holding and Royal Dutch/Shell.
(Econ, 9/17/05, p.64)
2005 Sep 12, A senior UN official said traffickers have been shifting to the manufacture of amphetamine-type drugs in Asia as cultivation and production of heroin drops sharply.
(AP, 9/13/05)
2005 Sep 12, Uzbekistan, increasingly hostile toward foreign non-governmental organizations it accuses of fomenting revolution in the ex-Soviet state, shut a second US charity in four days.
(AP, 9/13/05)
2006 Sep 12, In California Gov. Schwarzenegger signed a minimum wage bill that will boost the hourly rate by 75 cents in January and another 50 cents a year later to $8 an hour.
(SFC, 9/13/06, p.B3)
2006 Sep 12, Hewlett-Packard named CEO Mark Hurd to succeed Patricia Dunn as board chairman as of mid-January 2007 following the recent furor over phone probes of board members.
(WSJ, 9/13/06, p.A1)
2006 Sep 12, Joan Valerie Bondurant, former spy and UC prof. of political science, died in Tucson, Az. She had translated documents for the CIA in India where she met Gandhi and grew fascinated by satyagraha, a thesis of nonviolent resistance. Her books included “Conquest of Violence: The Gandhian Philosophy of Conflict" (1958).
(SFC, 9/21/06, p.B5)
2006 Sep 12, Hurricane Florence headed toward north Atlantic shipping lanes after blowing out windows, peeling away roofs and knocking out power to thousands in Bermuda.
(AP, 9/12/06)
2006 Sep 12, Afghan forces killed 12 suspected Taliban militants in a shootout south of Kabul. More than 30 suspected insurgents were detained as security forces fought back against a deadly spike in violence. The UN urged NATO forces to take military action to destroy the opium industry in southern Afghanistan, saying cultivation of the crop is out of control.
(AP, 9/12/06)
2006 Sep 12, In Bangladesh police in Dhaka baton-charged thousands of opposition supporters in violent clashes outside the prime minister's office that left at least 110 people injured. A 14-party opposition alliance led by the Awami League is demanding electoral reforms ahead of January's national elections.
(AP, 9/12/06)
2006 Sep 12, Canada and the United States formally signed an agreement to end a protracted dispute over Canadian softwood lumber.
(Reuters, 9/12/06)
2006 Sep 12, Pope Benedict XVI delivered a speech at Regensburg Univ. that included brusque words about Islam. He quoted a 14th century Byzantine emperor as saying “Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." The speech quickly provoked criticism from the world’s Muslim communities. The pontiff later said he regretted that Muslims were offended.
(SFC, 9/15/06, p.A17)(AP, 9/12/07)
2006 Sep 12, Iraqi PM Nouri al-Maliki made his first official visit to Iran since taking office and planned to ask Tehran to prevent al-Qaida members believed to be in Iran from crossing into Iraq to carry out attacks. A parked car bomb detonated in Baghdad's upscale Mansour neighborhood, killing at least six people and wounding 18 others. Bombings, mortar attacks and shootings overnight and during the day left at least 24 people dead and dozens wounded around the country.
(AP, 9/12/06)
2006 Sep 12, An Israeli military court ordered the release of 18 imprisoned Hamas lawmakers, including three Cabinet ministers, and raised questions about the army's case. A spokesman for the outgoing Hamas-led administration said the group is prepared to back peace efforts with Israel as part of the new coalition government being formed by the Palestinians. Hamas militants killed an Israeli soldier during a gunbattle in the Gaza Strip.
(AP, 9/12/06)
2006 Sep 12, In Mexico gunmen ambushed and killed Enrique Barrera, police chief of the town of Linares in the border state of Nuevo Leon, in the latest slaying of a law officer in a region ravaged by a war between drug gangs.
(AP, 9/13/06)
2006 Sep 12, Montenegro's election authorities said the governing pro-Western coalition led by Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic won last weekend's parliamentary elections.
(AP, 9/12/06)
2006 Sep 12, Serbia toughened its stand on Kosovo as parliament decided that a planned new constitution would refer to the disputed province as an "integral" part of Serbia, regardless of U.N.-led negotiations on whether to grant it independence.
(AP, 9/12/06)
2006 Sep 12, In Syria armed Islamic militants attempted to storm the US Embassy in Damascus. Four people were killed, including three of the assailants. One of Syria's anti-terrorism forces was killed and 11 other people were wounded. The only Islamic militant arrested in the attack died from his wounds, and authorities were unable to question him.
(AP, 9/12/06)(AP, 9/13/06)
2006 Sep 12, In Turkey a bomb exploded near a park in a primarily residential area of Diyarbakir and 10 people were killed. 7 children were among the dead. The bomb was made by hand, placed in a thermos and went off as it was being transported.
(AP, 9/13/06)
2006 Sep 12, Uganda extended a September 12 deadline for the rebel Lord's Resistance Army to agree to a peace deal or lose an amnesty offer for war crimes charges its leaders face.
(AFP, 9/13/06)
2006 Sep 12, In Yemen a stampede during a campaign rally for President Ali Abdullah Saleh killed at least 51 people and injured more than 230, most of them schoolchildren and teenagers.
(AP, 9/12/06)
2007 Sep 12, The US SEC said it had filed civil fraud charges against Douglas Hamilton, Craig Johnson, James Kinney and Kenneth Taylor, the former vice presidents of finance for Toronto-based Nortel's optical, wireline, wireless and enterprise business units.
(AP, 9/13/07)
2007 Sep 12, Exxon Mobil Corp. said in a filing with the SEC that it had filed a request with the Int’l. Center for Settlement of Investment Disputes for arbitration over compensation from the Venezuelan government for seized oil production assets.
(WSJ, 9/14/07, p.A9)
2007 Sep 12, Oil prices briefly topped a record $80 a barrel.
(AP, 9/12/08)
2007 Sep 12, The World Conservation Union's 2007 Red List of Threatened Species reported that more than 16,300 species of animals and plants are on the verge of disappearing from the planet, with nearly 200 more species approaching extinction within the last year. Gorillas and orangutans were both classified as Critically Endangered.
(www.livescience.com/animals/070912_red_list.html)
2007 Sep 12, Phil Frank (b.1943), creator of the Farley and Elderberries comic strips, died from a brain tumor in Bolinas, Ca. His Farley strip had run in the SF Chronicle for decades.
(SFC, 9/14/07, p.A1)
2007 Sep 12, Qari Yousef Ahmadi, a Taliban spokesman, said that US and other military forces must leave Afghanistan before the militant group would consider holding peace talks with the Afghan government, backtracking from an earlier statement. Fighting in Afghanistan killed some 75 people as the Muslim holy month of Ramadan began, including 45 suspected Taliban militants who died in airstrikes and Afghan army gunfire.
(AP, 9/12/07)(AP, 9/13/07)
2007 Sep 12, The specter of foot and mouth disease returned to haunt Britain after a new suspected outbreak was detected close to last month's outbreak site.
(AFP, 9/12/07)
2007 Sep 12, Canada’s defense minister said Canada will give a one-time payment of $19,200 to people who say their health was harmed by US military Agent Orange spray programs at a base in eastern Canada 40 years ago. The US military tested Agent Orange, Agent Purple and several other powerful defoliants on a small section of the base in Gagetown, New Brunswick, over seven days in 1966 and 1967. Roughly 4,500 people were expected to be eligible for the payment, at a total cost of $92 million.
(AP, 9/13/07)
2007 Sep 12, Police in Chile battled rampaging youths over night on the anniversary of the 1973 military coup. One officer was killed, 41 people injured with some 304 people arrested.
(SFC, 9/13/07, p.A4)
2007 Sep 12, Beijing showed off its new multibillion-dollar airport terminal, a mammoth structure of glass and steel with a gracefully sloping roof that the owners said is meant to impress visitors to China's capital for the 2008 Olympics.
(AP, 9/12/07)
2007 Sep 12, Li Changjiang, the head of China's product safety agency, said the Chinese-made toys children receive for Christmas this year will be safe, pledging that problems over the use of dangerous lead paint will be resolved in time for holiday exports.
(AP, 9/12/07)
2007 Sep 12, Akmal Shaikh (51), a British citizen, was arrested in Urumqi, in China's western Xinjiang region, with four kg (8.8 pounds) of heroin. He was later convicted and sentenced to die on Dec 29, 2009. Supporters of Shaikh said he was duped into carrying the drugs for a criminal gang. If the death penalty is carried out, Shaikh would become the first national from a European Union country to be executed in China in 50 years.
(AFP, 12/22/09)(www.amnesty.org.uk/actions_details.asp?ActionID=638)
2007 Sep 12, The Republic of Congo, the smaller, oil-rich western neighbor of the Democratic Republic of Congo, numbered about 3.7 million inhabitants.
(AFP, 9/12/07)
2007 Sep 12, Ethiopia entered the third millennium 7 years after the rest of the world, amid lavish celebrations, religious fervor and messages of hope from the troubled country's leaders.
(AFP, 9/12/07)
2007 Sep 12, A massive 8.4 earthquake struck Indonesia, killing at least 10 people, injuring dozens and triggering a tsunami that hit one city on the island of Sumatra.
(AP, 9/12/07)(Reuters, 9/13/07)
2007 Sep 12, Gunmen ambushed an Iraqi police checkpoint in the Gayara area south of Mosul before dawn, killing six officers in a sophisticated attack on fledgling Iraqi security installations. In Diyala's al Salam area, gunmen opened fire on a car at 9 a.m. killing two and wounding two others. An hour later in another area, assailants shot into a crowd in central Muqdadiyah killing two and wounding two. Other scattered violence left at least five other Iraqis dead, including a civilian killed by a roadside bomb on Palestine Street, a popular shopping district in Baghdad. The bomb targeted a passing convoy of SUVs, and left five other people wounded. Robbers dressed as police commandos hijacked an armored truck in eastern Baghdad, bound and gagged its guards, and made off with about $550,000 in Iraqi currency.
(AP, 9/12/07)
2007 Sep 12, Japanese PM Shinzo Abe announced he will resign, ending a troubled year-old government that has suffered a string of damaging scandals and a humiliating electoral defeat.
(AP, 9/12/07)
2007 Sep 12, Allies of Pakistan's military ruler blocked opposition leader Imran Khan from entering, Karachi, the country's biggest city, just days after the government sent a former prime minister back into exile. City police chief Azher Farooqi said the former cricket star was barred because his presence could cause unrest. Rebels armed with rocket launchers surrounded a security post on the outskirts of the troubled city of Bannu, which borders North Waziristan. They wounded a policeman and a soldier before whisking away 12 paramilitary troops. Pakistani helicopter gunships and artillery pounded pro-Taliban militant hideouts in a tribal region near the Afghan border, killing up to 40 insurgents.
(AP, 9/12/07)(AFP, 9/12/07)
2007 Sep 12, In the Philippines a court found former Pres. Joseph Estrada guilty of taking more than $85 million in bribes and kickbacks and sentenced him to life imprisonment, ending a trial that spanned 6 years.
(SFC, 9/12/07, p.A19)
2007 Sep 12, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin dismissed his long-serving PM Mikhail Fradkov and nominated little-known Cabinet official Victor Zubkov (b.1941) to replace him in a surprise move that could put Zubkov in the running to replace Putin next year.
(AP, 9/12/07)(WSJ, 9/13/07, p.A3)(Econ, 9/15/07, p.64)
2007 Sep 12, Serbia warned the EU it would not accept any decision on Kosovo taken outside the UN, and its ally Russia told the US to stop backing Kosovo independence while talks continue.
(AP, 9/12/07)
2007 Sep 12, Turkish troops killed 4 Kurdish guerrillas in the southeastern province of Siirt.
(AP, 9/12/07)
2008 Sep 12, The US accused Rodriguez Chacin and 2 other top aides to Venezuela’s Pres. Chavez of helping Colombian guerrillas traffic cocaine and procure weapons for FARC. Chacin had just resigned on Sep 8 from Venezuela’s Interior Ministry.
(SFC, 9/13/08, p.A5)
2008 Sep 12, The SF Opera said it had received a commitment from board chairman John A. Gunn (64) and wife Cynthia Fry Gunn for a gift of $40 million. John Gunn served as chairman and CEO of Dodge and Cox Investment Managers.
(SFC, 9/13/08, p.A2)
2008 Sep 12, In southern California a commuter train smashed head-on into a freight train killing at least 25 people in the deadliest US passenger train accident in 15 years. Officials the next day attributed the accident to failure of the passenger train engineer to stop at a red light. It was later found that engineer Robert Sanchez, who died in the crash, had sent a text message 22 seconds before the crash.
(AP, 9/13/08)(Reuters, 9/13/08)(WSJ, 10/2/08, p.A11)
2008 Sep 12, David Foster Wallace (b.1962), the author best known for his 1996 novel "Infinite Jest," was found dead in his home in Claremont, Ca. In 2012 D.T. Max authored “Every Love Story Is a Ghost Story: A Life of David Foster Wallace."
(AP, 9/13/08)(SSFC, 9/14/08, p.B7)(SSFC, 9/2/12, p.F1)
2008 Sep 12, Taliban militants attacked a logistics convoy in western Afghanistan, sparking a clash that killed 10 insurgents and five Afghan guards. Afghan police said they had arrested three suspects accused of giving the US military false information that led to the August 22 bombardment of the village of Azizabad.
(AP, 9/12/08)(AP, 9/14/08)
2008 Sep 12, Bolivian President Evo Morales decreed a state of siege and sent troops to the eastern province of Pando where at least 16 people were killed in street battles between pro- and anti-government activists. Another 2 people were killed at Pando's main airfield as government troops took control, opening fire to disperse protesters.
(AP, 9/12/08)(AP, 9/14/08)
2008 Sep 12, British and French firefighters extinguished a 1,000-degree inferno in the Channel Tunnel but tens of thousands of travelers faced more delay as they waited for the undersea link to reopen.
(AP, 9/12/08)
2008 Sep 12, Shops throughout China pulled a milk powder, suspected sickening babies, from shelves in the latest safety scandal to rock the country's food industry. Investigators soon detained 19 people and were questioning 78 to find out how melamine was added to milk supplied to Sanlu Group Co., China's biggest milk powder producer. On Sep 15 Zhang Zhenling, vice president of Sanlu Group, read a letter of apology at a news briefing in Shijiazhuang, capital of Hebei Province, where the corporation is based. China later reported that more than 6,000 babies had fallen ill and three died after drinking contaminated milk powder. Consumer complaints to Sanlu Group regarding its baby milk formula had begun as early as last December. By the end of the year 6 children had died and tens of thousands were made ill from milk powder tainted with melamine.
(AP, 9/12/08)(AP, 9/13/08)(AFP, 9/15/08)(AFP, 9/17/08)(SFC, 9/24/08, p.A12)(Econ, 5/25/13, p.67)
2008 Sep 12, Pope Benedict XVI urged France to take Christianity into account despite its secular tradition, saying on his first visit there as pontiff that church and state should be open to each other.
(AP, 9/12/08)
2008 Sep 12, Tens of thousands of Muslims joined pro-independence rallies across Indian-controlled Kashmir, leading to scattered clashes with police that left at least two protesters dead and dozens injured.
(AP, 9/12/08)
2008 Sep 12, Mexican police found the bodies of 24 men with their hands bound and shot to death execution-style outside the capital. On Nov 27 prosecutors charged a municipal police commander and an alleged drug cartel member with homicide in the September massacre.
(AP, 9/13/08)(AP, 11/28/08)
2008 Sep 12, In Pakistan a US Predator drone fired 2 missiles at a home in the village of Tolkhel, North Waziristan, killing at least 12 people.
(SFC, 9/13/08, p.A3)
2008 Sep 12, Poland's last communist leader, General Wojciech Jaruzelski, and seven other Soviet-era officials went on trial over the declaration of martial law more than a quarter of a century ago. The 1981 decision led to the deaths of dozens of people and the jailing of hundreds more.
(Reuters, 9/12/08)
2008 Sep 12, Russia’s Itar-Tass news reported that Syria’s Tartous port is being renovated to provide a permanent facility for the Russian navy.
(SFC, 10/3/08, p.A14)
2008 Sep 12, A South African judge ruled that prosecutors were wrong to charge ANC President Jacob Zuma with corruption, effectively clearing way for the 66-year-old former freedom fighter to become the country's next president.
(AP, 9/12/08)
2008 Sep 12, The Sudanese government army and Janjaweed militias launched new attacks in a mountainous area of south Darfur according to rebel claims made the next day. UN boss Ban Ki-moon welcomed the establishment of an Arab League panel led by Qatar that will work with the African Union and United Nations to sponsor peace talks in Sudan's Darfur region.
(AFP, 9/12/08)(AFP, 9/13/08)
2008 Sep 12, Samak Sundaravej ended his bid to return to power as Thailand's prime minister, after a revolt within the ruling party torpedoed his re-election in parliament.
(AFP, 9/12/08)
2009 Sep 12, Researchers reported finding dangerous methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) bacteria in sand and water for the first time at five public beaches along the coast of Washington state.
(AP, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, William E. Sparkman (51), a US census worker, was found bound with duct tape and a rope around his neck near a cemetery in Clay County in a remote patch of Kentucky’s Daniel Boone National Forest. The word "fed" was scrawled on his chest. The area where Sparkman was found has a history of problems with prescription drug and methamphetamine trading. State police later said evidence at the death scene indicated that it was staged as a murder and that Sparkman had committed suicide.
(AP, 9/24/09)(SFC, 11/25/09, p.A4)
2009 Sep 12, Dr. Norman Borlaug (b.1914), Nobel Prize winner (1970), died at his Dallas home. He was known as the father of the “green revolution" for his work in high-yield crop varieties, which helped to more than double food production between 1960 and 1990.
(SFC, 9/14/09, p.A7)
2009 Sep 12, Christopher Kelly (51), former chief fundraiser for ousted Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, died in Chicago after being found slumped over in his car the previous evening. An overdose of drugs was suspected. Kelly faced at least 8 years in prison after pleading guilty to fraud charges in 2 separate cases.
(SFC, 9/14/09, p.A4)
2009 Sep 12, In Afghanistan a Taliban ambush killed six private security guards working for a construction company in the eastern province of Kunar. In Khost province a suspected militant rocket attack killed three civilians in Sabari district. In Kandahar 3 suicide bombers tried to attack an office of the country's intelligence agency. Officers and the bombers traded gunfire. One bomber blew himself up and killed an intelligence officer, while the other bombers’ explosives went off but didn't kill anyone. Coalition and Afghan forces killed 11 militants during an overnight raid in northern Kunduz province. In Kunduz province a turncoat policeman poisoned 8 other officers at a guard post, killed his commander and called in the Taliban who beheaded or shot 7 other policemen. A roadside bomb killed two US troops in the east. In western Afghanistan 3 US soldiers were killed following a roadside bomb attack and small arms fire. Altogether 50 civilians, security forces and militants were killed in the spate of attacks, including 20 noncombatants killed in two roadside bomb explosions. In western Farah province a battle that included airstrikes killed about 50 Taliban militants after an insurgent ambush left 3 US troops and 7 Afghan soldiers dead.
(AP, 9/12/09)(AP, 9/13/09)(SSFC, 9/13/09, p.A4)(SFC, 9/14/09, p.A2)
2009 Sep 12, Australia intercepted a boat carrying 83 suspected asylum seekers off its northwest coast after it was spotted from the air by a military patrol plane. Later in the day the Australian navy intercepted a suspected people-smuggling boat carrying 65 asylum seekers off the country's northwest coast.
(AFP, 9/12/09)(AFP, 9/13/09)
2009 Sep 12, President Evo Morales said Bolivia has decided to buy a presidential plane from Russia after Moscow offered to set up an aircraft maintenance center in the South American nation. Defense Minister Walker San Miguel announced in early August that Bolivia had agreed to purchase an Antonov presidential plane with satellite phone, Internet links and a meeting room from Russia for $30 million.
(AP, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, In Chechnya three police were wounded when a suicide bomber blew himself up in Grozny. An alleged militant was killed in a separate incident in Chechnya.
(AP, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, China decried a US decision to impose added duty on Chinese-made tires, saying the move sent a dangerous protectionist signal before a G20 summit and could stoke reactions impeding global recovery. The tire duty was the first time Washington has applied special "safeguard" provisions Beijing agreed to before joining the WTO in 2001.
(Reuters, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, A court in western China's Xinjiang region sentenced three people to up to 15 years in prison in the first trials over a series of mysterious syringe attacks that led to mass protests against the local government. In eastern China 3 people died and an additional 17 required medical treatment after they were exposed to bags of a toxic chemical illegally dumped by a factory in Dongyang.
(AP, 9/12/09)(AP, 9/16/09)
2009 Sep 12, Costa Rican authorities detained 54 US-bound migrants from Africa and Nepal after their boat arrived on the country's coast. Authorities also took into custody three suspected Colombian smugglers who were traveling with them.
(AP, 9/13/09)
2009 Sep 12, In Dagestan security forces besieged a home and killed four alleged militants.
(AP, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, Willy Ronis (99), the last of the great French photographers, died. Lovers, nudes and scenes from Paris streets were the mainstay of Ronis' photographs in an award-winning career that began in the 1930s.
(AP, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, In Iraq 2 bombs exploded moments apart near the tomb of a revered Shiite religious figure in central Baghdad, killing three people and wounding 22. A bomb attached to a civilian car exploded in the northwest of Baghdad, killing the driver and wounding two passengers. 4 people were killed by a roadside bomb in Diyala province. In the northern city of Mosul, a roadside bomb went off near an Iraqi army patrol, prompting soldiers to open fire to scare off any attackers. A stray bullet from the shooting killed a traffic policeman.
(AP, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, In Indian-administered Kashmir suspected Islamic militants set off a powerful bomb blast killing three people and wounding at least seven others.
(AP, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, In Lebanon Salah Ezzedine (47), a Shiite businessman with connections to Hezbollah, and his partner Youssef Faour were arrested on suspicion of cheating investors of hundreds of millions of dollars. They charged with fraudulent embezzlement.
(www.nytimes.com/2009/09/16/world/middleeast/16lebanon.html?_r=3&ref=world)
2009 Sep 12, Mexican police said they have found the bodies of five men dumped in a landfill near the resort city of Acapulco. The men had been shot to death and officers found a note with the bodies signed "The boss of bosses."
(AP, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, In Pakistan paramilitary troops destroyed three militant hide-outs and killed 22 insurgents. Officials said hundreds of tribal police in the northwestern Khyber region have quit their jobs because of militant threats.
(AP, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, Uganda’s army killed five rebels in the CAR, including Arit Santos, a commander of the LRA insurgent group. Soldiers also seized 24 sub-machineguns, several rounds of ammunition, medicine and laptop computers in the operation.
(AFP, 9/14/09)
2009 Sep 12, In Venezuela opposition Mayor Lluvane Alvarez was shot by unidentified assailants as he entered his home in western Tachira state, which is plagued by crime related to drug trafficking and other illicit activities.
(AP, 9/12/09)
2009 Sep 12, Zimbabwe’s President Robert Mugabe welcomed the first top-level European Union delegation to visit in seven years with "open arms" and said talks on implementing a power-sharing deal went well.
(Reuters, 9/12/09)
2010 Sep 12, The 2010 MTV Video Music Awards were presented in Los Angeles.
(AP, 9/13/10)
2010 Sep 12, In Afghanistan 2 protesters were shot and killed in Logar province and 4 were injured as Afghans protested for a third day against a plan by an American pastor to burn copies of the Islamic holy book, despite his decision to call off the action. A series of NATO airstrikes killed 14 insurgents after a joint patrol with Afghan soldiers came under fire in Uruzgan province. A rocket was fired by militants toward an Afghan army supply base in Jalalabad city, in eastern Nangarhar province. The rocket missed its target and slammed into a house, wounding nine civilians, including four children, all members of one family.
(Reuters, 9/12/10)(AP, 9/13/10)
2010 Sep 12, In Cameroon six hostages, four Ukrainians, a Croatian, and a Filipino, were kidnapped by unidentified gunmen off the port city of Douala. On Sep 30 the hostages were freed following a secret operation by Cameroon security forces.
(AP, 10/1/10)
2010 Sep 12, An Egyptian security official said 16 Russians and Moldovans, who killed an Egyptian smuggler, have handed themselves over to police. Some of the would-be migrants to Israel attacked and fatally stabbed smuggler Massud Salim (31) after he attempted to rape one of the female members of the group.
(AFP, 9/12/10)
2010 Sep 12, Germany's top bank, Deutsche Bank, announced a rights issue worth around 10 billion euros ($13 billion), saying it sought fresh capital to take over retail bank Postbank.
(AFP, 9/12/10)
2010 Sep 12, In Conakry, Guinea, one person was killed and dozens were wounded in clashes between supporters of rival candidates just days before the country's historic presidential runoff vote.
(Reuters, 9/12/10)
2010 Sep 12, In Indonesia assailants stabbed Asia Sihombing, a Christian worshipper, in the stomach and pounded Rev. Luspida Simanjuntak in the head with a wooden plank when she tried to help him as they headed to morning prayers in Bekasi, 25 miles east of Jakarta.
(AP, 9/12/10)
2010 Sep 12, A senior Iranian prosecutor said that authorities will release Sarah Shourd, a jailed American woman, on $500,000 bail because of health problems, another sudden about-face by Iran in a case that has added to tension with the United States.
(AP, 9/12/10)
2010 Sep 12, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu reiterated his demand for the Palestinians to recognize Israel as a Jewish state, in remarks ahead of a second round of US-backed peace talks. A rocket fired by Palestinian militants in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip struck Israel without causing any casualties or damage. A burst of Israeli tank fire killed three civilians in the northern Gaza town of Beit Hanun, a man (91), his grandson (17) and another man (20). A senior commander on Sep 14 said the killing was a mistake.
(AFP, 9/12/10)(AFP, 9/14/10)
2010 Sep 12, In Indian-administered Kashmir hundreds of stone-throwing protesters defied a curfew and attacked security forces in two towns, injuring 9 police officers and 4 soldiers. The protests erupted hours after police formally accused Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, a key separatist leader, of treason for allegedly inciting participants in a massive rally to torch government offices a day earlier.
(AP, 9/12/10)
2010 Sep 12, The Venice film festival ended with an awards ceremony. Jury president Quentin Tarantino faced charges of favoritism after he handed out two major awards to his friends, including best picture to his ex partner Sofia Coppola's "Somewhere."
(Reuters, 9/12/10)
2010 Sep 12, In Kosovo a French Gendarme was shot and wounded during clashes between ethnic Albanians and Serbs in the ethnically divided city of Mitrovica as European Union police fired tear gas to disperse the violent crowd.
(AP, 9/12/10)
2010 Sep 12, Mexican marines captured Sergio Villarreal Barragan (“the Child-eater"), a presumed leader of the embattled Beltran Leyva cartel, along with 2 accomplices in a raid in the central state of Puebla.
(AP, 9/12/10)(Econ, 9/18/10, p.53)
2010 Sep 12, In Pakistan a suspected US missile strike in North Waziristan killed at least five associates of warlord Hafiz Gul Bahadur, who was fighting Western troops in Afghanistan.
(AP, 9/12/10)
2010 Sep 12, Philippine authorities at Manila's airport found a newborn baby in a garbage bag that was apparently unloaded from an airplane that landed from the Middle East. On Sep 16 Rep. Lani Mercado said she met with the mother, who told her that she had been raped by her employer while working as a maid in Qatar and became pregnant.
(AP, 9/12/10)(AP, 9/16/10)
2010 Sep 12, Turks voted on whether to amend a military-era constitution in what the government says is a key step in Turkey's path to full democracy, despite opposition claims that the proposed reforms would shackle the independence of the courts. Some 58 percent of voters approved a package of 26 amendments to the constitution crafted after a 1980 military coup, making the military more accountable to civilian courts, backing gender equality and other citizens' rights and lifting immunity from prosecution of the coup leaders.
(AP, 9/12/10)(AP, 9/13/10)
2011 Sep 12, Human Rights Watch (HRW) published a report saying the Afghan police force, funded and supported by the United States, is getting away with serious abuses including rape and murder.
(AFP, 9/12/11)
2011 Sep 12, Algeria passed sweeping media reforms, ending a state monopoly on the broadcast sector and the imprisonment of journalists for libel. No timetable was announced, however, putting on hold any new television or radio stations for now.
(AP, 9/13/11)
2011 Sep 12, In the Central African Republic two days of fighting between the rebel Convention of Patriots for Justice and Peace (CPJP) and former militants of the Union of Democratic Forces for Unity (UFDR) left at least 12 people dead.
(AFP, 9/13/11)
2011 Sep 12, In southern France the Centraco nuclear waste site had an explosion that killed one person, seriously burned another and slightly injured three others. Centraco is located on the 300-hectare Marcoule site, which also houses a research center and four industrial sites, including one that makes Mox, a fuel made from plutonium and uranium.
(AP, 9/12/11)
2011 Sep 12, Indian officials said at least 23 children who received blood transfusions have tested positive for HIV, as authorities launched an investigation into a government hospital.
(AFP, 9/12/11)
2011 Sep 12, Indian officials said heavy rains and flooding have killed 16 people in Orissa state leaving nearly 100,000 others homeless.
(SFC, 9/13/11, p.A2)
2011 Sep 12, Iran media said state regulators have blocked the assets a mega-tycoon Amir-Mansour Aria, accused of masterminding a $2.6 billion bank fraud. Last week Bank Saderat, revealed it uncovered the alleged fraud in early August and informed security and judicial authorities. The newspaper Kayhan, which often reflects the views of Iran's ruling clerics, said Aria had links with Ahmadinejad's top ally, Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei. Iran hanged five convicted drug traffickers jailed in the central city of Shahroud.
(AP, 9/12/11)(AFP, 9/12/11)
2011 Sep 12, Iraq's former anti-corruption chief, Rahim Hassan al-Uqailee (44), slammed the nation’s leaders, describing graft as "part of the struggle for power" in what international monitors say is one of the world's most corrupt countries. 22 Shiite pilgrims were executed by gunmen who hijacked their bus at a fake checkpoint in Anbar province.
(AFP, 9/12/11)(AP, 9/13/11)
2011 Sep 12, In Italy an explosion at a fireworks factory in Arpino killed 6 people.
(SFC, 9/13/11, p.A2)
2011 Sep 12, In Kenya a leaking gasoline pipeline in Nairobi exploded, turning part of a slum into an inferno. At least 95 people were killed and more than 100 hurt.
(AP, 9/12/11)(AFP, 9/13/11)(AP, 9/14/11)
2011 Sep 12, Kurdish rebels attacked a police station and a paramilitary police headquarters near Turkey’s border with Iraq killing 5 people including 3 civilians.
(SFC, 9/13/11, p.A2)
2011 Sep 12, In Libya suspected Moammar Gadhafi's loyalists staged twin attacks at the key Ras Lanuf oil refinery in possibly coordinated strikes that suggest revolutionary forces still face resistance in areas under their control. At least 15 attackers were killed. Rebels captured most of the northern half of Bani Walid.
(AP, 9/12/11)
2011 Sep 12, A Mali government source said that 4 people were killed in the desert between Mali and Algeria in a clash between the rival gangs, who did not agree on how to share the spoils from ferrying a ton of cocaine and hashish through the desert.
(AFP, 9/14/11)
2011 Sep 12, Mexican police arrested Oscar Osvaldo Garcia Montoya (36) overnight. He was the suspected leader of a brutal drug gang called The Hand with Eyes and has confessed to helping carry out or ordering more than 600 murders.
(SSFC, 9/18/11, p.A4)
2011 Sep 12, In Mozambique a group of 15 Ethiopian athletes, after competing at the 10th All Africa Games, went missing and left some of their possessions in the athletes' village outside the capital Maputo.
(AFP, 9/15/11)
2011 Sep 12, In northern Nigeria gunmen firing assault rifles bombed a police station and robbed a nearby bank, killing at least five people in Misau, Bauchi state. Members of Boko Haram, a radical Muslim sect shot, and killed four people at a beer parlor in Maiduguri.
(AP, 9/12/11)(AP, 9/13/11)
2011 Sep 12, Pakistani officials said 209 people have been killed by recent devastating rains, as the country still struggled to rebuild after last year's worst floods in living memory.
(AP, 9/12/11)
2011 Sep 12, A South African judge said Julius Malema (30), the black man who leads the youth wing of the governing party, has no right to sing "Shoot the Boer," a song some whites find offensive. The next day the ANC said it would appeal the decision.
(AP, 9/12/11)(AFP, 9/14/11)
2011 Sep 12, In Syria raids around Hama began after security forces cut all roads leading to the area along with electricity and telephone lines. Security forces shot dead 17 people and arrested more than 60 around Hama. 3 others were reported killed in Douma and Al Rastan. Russia’s President Dmitry Medvedev defended the Russian position for “open direct talks" in talks in Moscow with British PM David Cameron even as the Syrian security forces pressed their deadly crackdown on dissent.
(AP, 9/12/11)(AFP, 9/13/11)
2011 Sep 12, The Thai government announced a new campaign against illegal drugs but said it will not repeat the mistakes of an earlier push in 2003 when at least 2,300 accused dealers were killed.
(AP, 9/13/11)
2011 Sep 12, Thai PM Yingluck Shinawatra, in her fist state visit to Indonesia, vowed to improve economic cooperation with Indonesia, particularly in the agriculture, energy and tourism sectors.
(AFP, 9/12/11)
2011 Sep 12, In Vietnam Truong Van Suong (68), a political prisoner, died in Ha Nam province outside Hanoi after more than three decades in detention.
(AP, 9/13/11)
2011 Sep 12, Yemeni state news said Pres. Saleh has authorized his deputy to negotiate a transfer of power with the opposition to put an end to a months-long political crisis. However, Saleh retained the right to reject the deal. 4 tribesmen were killed in clashes in Arhab between tribal fighters opposed to President Saleh and an elite military unit loyal to him.
(AFP, 9/12/11)(AP, 9/13/11)(AFP, 9/13/11)
2012 Sep 12, It was reported that ex-UBS banker Bradley Birkenfeld has secured a whistle- blower award for $104 million. He had told authorities how UBS bankers came to the US to woo rich Americans and help them cheat the IRS. He pleaded guilty to conspiracy in 2008 and was imprisoned until Aug 1, 2012, when he was put on home confinement.
(SFC, 9/12/12, p.E3)
2012 Sep 12, The City Council of Portland, Oregon, voted to fluoridate its water beginning in 2014. It had been the largest US city to refuse the process, which resulted in some of the worst tooth decay in the nation.
(SFC, 9/13/12, p.A7)
2012 Sep 12, UC Berkeley chemical engineer Jay Keasling, founder of Amyris Biotechnology, won the prestigious Heinz Award of $250,000 for developing an inexpensive way to mass-produce artemisinin, a plant based drug to treat malaria. The Heinz Awards were established by Teresa Heinz in 1993 to honor the memory of her late husband, US Senator John Heinz.
(http://chemistry.berkeley.edu/publications/news/2012/keasling-wins-heinz-award.php)
2012 Sep 12, Authorities in Bosnia launched what they called a major operation against several organized crime groups suspected of involvement in at least six murders, several major robberies, illegal money transfers and drug trafficking.
(AP, 9/12/12)
2012 Sep 12, British privacy activists, citing findings gathered via freedom-of-information requests, identified King Ecgbert as one of more than 200 high schools across Britain that have installed surveillance cameras in bathrooms or locker rooms.
(AP, 9/12/12)
2012 Sep 12, Germany’s constitutional court gave a qualified yes to the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), a big rescue fund for troubled members of the Eurozone.
(Economist, 9/15/12, p.49)
2012 Sep 12, Greek justice minister Antonis Roupakiotis said Greece will toughen sentencing for hate crimes, following a surge in attacks against immigrants and violence involving members of a far-right political party. A fresh wave of anti-austerity strikes hit the country as the leaders of the governing coalition struggled to finalize further spending cuts for the coming two years — without which the country will lose its vital rescue loans.
(AP, 9/12/12)
2012 Sep 12, In Guatemala Julio Saquil (35) entered an elementary school in the northern province of Alta Verapaz and slit the throats of two children with a machete. Authorities said he was drunk. A mob lynched Saquil inside the school and then set him on fire in the school's patio and he burned to death.
(AP, 9/12/12)
2012 Sep 12, In Japan Toru Hashimoto (43), the right-wing populist mayor of Osaka, formally launched his national party, Nihon Ishin no Kai (the Japan Restoration Party, or JRP).
(Economist, 9/15/12, p.14)
2012 Sep 12, Libya's parliament elected Mustafa Abu-Shakour, a leading member in the country's oldest opposition movement, to be its new prime minister.
(AP, 9/1/12)
2012 Sep 12, In Mexico Jorge Eduardo Costilla Sanchez (41), a man believed to be the leader of the Gulf drug cartel, was arrested by Mexican marines in the Gulf port of Tampico. He and 10 bodyguards were presented to the public the next morning. US authorities have offered $5 million for information leading to his arrest.
(AP, 9/13/12)
2012 Sep 12, The Netherlands held national elections. Dutch caretaker PM Mark Rutte led his conservative VVD party to victory. The VVD was forecast to take 41 seats in the 150-member Dutch parliament, compared to Labor's 39 seats.
(AP, 9/12/12)(AP, 9/13/12)
2012 Sep 12, Nigeria’s Finance Ministry said China is offering it $1.1 billion in loans to help the West African nation build airport terminals, a light rail line for its capital city and communication system improvements.
(AP, 9/12/12)
2012 Sep 12, Dozens of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip burned American flags and chanted "Death to America," protesting an American film that mocks the Muslim Prophet Muhammad.
(AFP, 9/12/12)
2012 Sep 12, In the Philippines Pres. Aquino III signed the new Cybercrime Prevention Act of 2012.
(SFC, 10/4/12, p.A2)
2012 Sep 12, In Russia’s far east an Antanov-28 plane crashed into a forest in western Kamchatka killing 10 people and injuring four.
(AP, 9/12/12)
2012 Sep 12, In Somalia a day after the election of the new president, two explosions at the gate of his temporary residence killed at least five people and wounded three others.
(AP, 9/12/12)
2012 Sep 12, South Africa’s labor unrest grew. Police said 1,000 strikers were blocking access to the main shaft at Anglo American Platinum, stopping some operations at the world's largest platinum mine.
(AP, 9/12/12)
2012 Sep 12, In Syria an explosion targeting regime forces killed at least three people in northern Syria, and possibly up to 18, amid rising violence ahead of a visit by the new UN-Arab League envoy who is trying to end the country's civil war. The Observatory and another activist group, the Local Coordination Committees, said at least 11 bodies were found in the central town of Halfaya in Hama province. They said the bodies were found in fields a day after government troops stormed the town.
(AP, 9/12/12)
2012 Sep 12, In Turkey hundreds of Kurds began a hunger strike in prisons across the country.
(Econ, 11/17/12, p.2)
2013 Sep 12, The California Legislature overwhelmingly approved renaming the western span of the Bay Bridge in honor of former SF Mayor and Assembly Speaker Willie Brown.
(SFC, 9/13/13, p.A1)
2013 Sep 12, Ray Dolby (80), sound pioneer, died at his home in San Francisco. He pioneered the elimination of static noise on cassette tapes.
(SFC, 9/13/13, p.A1)
2013 Sep 12, In Colorado heavy rains and scarring from recent wildfires sent water crashing down mountainsides along the front range from Colorado Springs to Fort Collins. At least 4 people were killed.
(SFC, 9/13/13, p.A8)(Reuters, 9/13/13)
2013 Sep 12, In New Jersey a fire engulfed dozens of businesses on the Seaside Park portion of the Jersey Shore boardwalk. 32 businesses were destroyed.
(SFC, 9/13/13, p.A10)
2013 Sep 12, A Pennsylvania judge ordered a suburban Philadelphia court clerk to stop issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples. 174 licenses were already issued.
(SFC, 9/13/13, p.A8)
2013 Sep 12, In Tennessee the bodies of a young woman and 3 teenagers were found in a car some 50 miles west of Knoxville. Suspect Jacob Allen Bennett (26) was soon arrested on a parole violation.
(SFC, 9/14/13, p.A5)
2013 Sep 12, Dell CEO Michael Dell won shareholder approval for a planned $24.9 buyout to take the company private.
(SFC, 9/13/13, p.C3)
2013 Sep 12, Britain's government officially launched plans to privatize more than half of Royal Mail, saying an initial sale of shares in the state-run postal service would occur within weeks.
(AFP, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, Burkina Faso's government said it's lowering taxes for civil servants and increasing student loans amid growing unrest over the high cost of education and living.
(AP, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, China's government said it will protect from retribution and attacks people who use the internet to report corruption, but only those who use an officially sanctioned website to do so.
(Reuters, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, A court in China's far western region of Xinjiang sentenced three ethnic Uighurs to death for acts of "violent terrorism", including murder and being part of a terrorist organization.
(Reuters, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, Egypt’s Interim president Adly Mansour extended by two months the state of emergency in force since mid-August.
(AFP, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, An Egyptian court acquitted all 14 defendants, including policemen, accused of killing 17 protesters during the bloodiest day of a revolt that toppled autocrat Hosni Mubarak over two years ago.
(Reuters, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, French car makers Bollore and Renault said they would collaborate in the field of electric vehicles.
(Econ, 9/21/13, p.68)
2013 Sep 12, In Iraq a spate of attacks across the country killed 7 people, including three who died when a suicide car bomber struck as recruits were leaving a military base.
(AFP, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, In Libya fighting in Derj between border guards from the western tribe of Zintan and Garamna tribesmen killed 11, and forced several residents to flee.
(AP, 9/13/13)
2013 Sep 12, The Netherlands sought to "close a difficult chapter" with its former colony Indonesia by publicly apologising for mass killings carried out by the Dutch army in the 1940s war of independence.
(AFP, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, In the Philippines fighting between security forces and rogue Muslim rebels seeking to declare an independent state escalated in Zamboanga City on Mindanao Island, and spread to Basilan island. The attacks involved the Abu Sayaf and the recently formed Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters. Rebels held over 100 hostages in Zamboanga.
(Reuters, 9/12/13)(SFC, 9/13/13, p.A7)(SSFC, 9/15/13, p.A6)
2013 Sep 12, Serbia’s deputy PM Aleksandar Vucic said former IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn, who faces aggravated pimping charges in France, will serve as an economic adviser for Serbia's top officials.
(AP, 9/13/13)
2013 Sep 12, Somali militants said a rapping jihadi from Alabama was killed in an ambush ordered by al-Shabab. Omar Hammami had ascended the ranks of Somalia's al-Qaida-linked militant group and was on the FBI's Most Wanted list with a $5 million reward for his capture.
(AP, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, Syrian President Bashar Assad publicly agreed to a Russian plan to secure and destroy his chemical weapons, but said the proposal would work only if the US halts threats of military action. Syria filed documents at the UN seeking to join the international convention banning chemical weapons.
(AP, 9/12/13)(AFP, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said clashes between Kurdish fighters and members of the al-Qaida-linked Nusra Front and the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant in the past two days left 13 Kurdish gunmen and 35 militants dead.
(AP, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, A UN official said at least 25,000 Burundian refugees living in Tanzania have been forcibly repatriated over the past month, describing a "dramatic" humanitarian situation.
(AFP, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, The UN urged the international community, especially Gulf states, to increase aid to impoverished Yemen, saying that more than 10 million people in the country go hungry.
(AFP, 9/12/13)
2013 Sep 12, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro launched a state council to counter economic "sabotage" by opposition-linked business leaders he accuses of artificially creating product shortages.
(Reuters, 9/12/13)
2014 Sep 12, The US imposed sanctions on Gazprom, Gazprom Neft, Lukoil, Surgutneftegas and Rosneft, banning Western firms from supporting their activities in exploration or production from deep water, Arctic offshore or shale projects.
(Reuters, 9/13/14)
2014 Sep 12, Two F/A-18 Hornet jets collided west of Wake Island, about 2,300 miles (3,700 km) west of Hawaii. Lieutenant Nathan Poloski (26) of Lake Arrowhead, Ca., was missing.
(Reuters, 9/14/14)
2014 Sep 12, In Pennsylvania a deadly ambush at a state police barracks in Blooming Grove left Cpl. Bryon Dickinson dead and trooper Alex Douglass critically wounded. Police soon identifed Eric Frein (31) as the prime suspect.
(SFC, 9/15/14, p.A6)(SFC, 9/18/14, p.A7)
2014 Sep 12, The Australian government raised its terrorism threat level to the second-highest warning in response to the domestic threat posed by Islamic State movement supporters.
(AP, 9/14/14)
2014 Sep 12, A boat from the northern China seaport city of Dalian, with six crew on board, was seized by North Koreans while fishing in the Yellow Sea between China and the Korean Peninsula. The North Koreans demanded a fine of 250,000 yuan ($40,700) for releasing the boat and its crew, but on September 17th the six crew returned to their fishing village with wounds on their bodies from being beaten.
(Reuters, 9/23/14)
2014 Sep 12, Ian Paisley (88), Northern Ireland preacher and politician, died.
(Econ, 9/20/14, p.86)
2014 Sep 12, Nigerian soldiers reportedly killed some 200 militants in Konduga town. The dead included a Boko Haram commander named Amir. Insurgents attacked a market outside Maiduguri. At least 4 people were killed.
(AFP, 9/13/14)(SSFC, 9/14/14, p.A5)
2014 Sep 12, In Nigeria a multistory building serving as a shopping mall and guesthouse at the sprawling campus of televangelist T.B. Joshua's Synagogue, Church of All Nations, collapsed on the outskirts of Lagos. Four days later one woman was saved from the rubble. The final death toll was 115 people killed. 74 of the dead were from South Africa.
(AFP, 9/14/14)(AP, 9/16/14)(AP, 9/22/14)(AP, 11/16/14)
2015 Sep 12, In California the so-called Valley Fire erupted and spread quickly to a cluster of small communities in the hills and valleys north of the Napa Valley wine country. Thousands of residents were forced from their homes in the area. By Sep 14 the blaze had devoured about 61,000 acres (24,690 hectares), and was only about 5 percent contained. By Sep 21 the fire was 70% contained. At least 1,783 structures were consumed making it the third-most destructive inferno in state history. Five people were killed by the fire which started due to faulty hot tub wiring.
(Reuters, 9/14/15)(SFC, 9/18/15, p.A9)(SFC, 9/22/15, p.C2)(SFC, 12/20/17, p.D2)
2015 Sep 12, Jeremy Corbyn was elected leader of Britain's opposition Labour party by 59% of the party’s electorate.
(Reuters, 9/12/15)(Econ, 10/3/15, p.59)
2015 Sep 12, The foreign ministers of Colombia and Venezuela agreed to renew diplomatic contacts that had been interrupted by an ongoing border crisis between the two neighbors.
(AFP, 9/12/15)
2015 Sep 12, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi accepted the resignation of the government under PM Ibrahim Mehleb after it was rocked by a corruption scandal, and tasked oil minister Sharif Ismail with forming a new cabinet.
(AFP, 9/12/15)(Econ, 9/19/15, p.44)
2015 Sep 12, In western Germany 5 young men were killed when a train hit their car at a crossing in Monzingen.
(AP, 9/12/15)
2015 Sep 12, The Greek coastguard picked up 25 survivors after a dinghy carrying them and other migrants sank off the island of Samos. 4 children were missing. A vessel of the EU's Frontex border agency plucked 32 people out of the sea off the Greek island of Lesbos. A man believed to be about 20 years old was missing.
(Reuters, 9/12/15)
2015 Sep 12, Max Beauvoir (79), Haitian biochemist and voodoo high priest, died.
(Econ, 9/19/15, p.90)
2015 Sep 12, In central India 90 people were killed at a restaurant when a cooking gas cylinder exploded and triggered a second blast of mine detonators stored illegally nearby in the town of Petlawad, Madhya Pradesh state. Police looked to arrest contractor Rajendra Kashawa for illegally storing the detonators.
(AP, 9/12/15)(SFC, 9/14/15, p.A3)(SFC, 9/14/15, p.A3)
2015 Sep 12, In India two trains derailed, killing at least four passengers, including two British tourists near Kalka, Himachal Pradesh state.
(AP, 9/12/15)
2015 Sep 12, A Russian space capsule landed safely in Kazakhstan, bringing home a three-person crew from the International Space Station, including a record-breaking Russian cosmonaut. Gennady Padalka completed his fifth mission for a world record of 879 total days in space.
(AP, 9/12/15)
2015 Sep 12, Thai authorities issued an arrest warrant for a 12th suspect in connection with last month's bombing at a Bangkok landmark that killed 20 people, identifying him as a 27-year-old ethnic Uighur from China.
(AP, 9/12/15)
2015 Sep 12, Hundreds of Tunisians marched through the capital under heavy security to protest a law offering amnesty for those accused of corruption.
(AP, 9/12/15)
2015 Sep 12, In Yemen Saudi-led raids killed at least 16 civilians nationwide. A suspected US drone strike killed at least 5 al Qaeda fighters, including mid-level commander Othman al-Sanaani, gathered inside a military base outside the eastern coastal city of Mukalla.
(Reuters, 9/13/15)
2015 Sep 12, In Zambia at least 17 people died when a bus and lorry collided west of Lusaka, after the lorry cut in front of the bus.
(Reuters, 9/12/15)
2016 Sep 12, The five-star Trump Int’l. Hotel opened in Washington, DC, in the Old Post Office building.
(Econ, 1/14/17, p.77)
2016 Sep 12, Former California Assemblyman Thomas Calderon was sentenced to one year in prison for helping his brother, state senator Ron Calderon, hide bribes from an undercover FBI agent to support tax credits for the film industry.
(SFC, 9/13/16, p.A5)
2016 Sep 12, In the SF Bay Area police officer Sgt. Doug Ulrich fired four shots at Eugene Craig (86) during a welfare check at the man's home in Saratoga. Craig had a gun in hand and refused to drop it. In 2018 the Santa Clara district attorney's office found the shooting justified.
(SFC, 3/7/18, p.D4)
2016 Sep 12, US-based Hewlett-Packard said it is buying Samsung Electronics Co.'s printer business in a transaction worth $1.05 billion. HP Inc. said that it is the largest print acquisition in the company's history and will help it go from traditional copiers to multifunction printers.
(AP, 9/12/16)
2016 Sep 12, In southern Afghanistan two militants stormed into a hospital in the city of Kandahar, killing at least one civilian before security forces killed the assailants.
(AP, 9/12/16)
2016 Sep 12, Austria delayed a re-run of a presidential election as faulty glue on postal ballots scuppered its second attempt to organize a ballot that could give the European Union its first far-right head of state.
(Reuters, 9/12/16)
2016 Sep 12, In Brazil the Chamber of Deputies stripped the congressional seat from Eduardo Cunha in a 450-10 vote. He had been accused of numerous corruption allegations and obstructing justice. Cunha was in his fourth term and just months ago was considered one of the most powerful men in Brazil.
(AP, 9/13/16)
2016 Sep 12, A gay Chinese student activist lodged a suit against the Ministry of Education over school textbooks describing homosexuality as a mental disorder, the latest step by China's small but growing gay rights movement.
(Reuters, 9/12/16)
2016 Sep 12, China's main border post with reclusive North Korea was packed with trucks carrying everything from bricks to exhaust pipes, as it re-opened for business for the first time since Pyongyang angered the world with its fifth nuclear test.
(Reuters, 9/12/16)
2016 Sep 12, The Chinese and Russian navies launched eight days of war games in the South China Sea, in a sign of growing cooperation between their armed forces against the backdrop of regional territorial disputes.
(AP, 9/12/16)
2016 Sep 12, India's technology hub of Bengaluru deployed riot police and banned public gatherings to rein in protests as a water dispute turned violent. The violence erupted after India's Supreme Court ordered Karnataka state, where Bengaluru is based, to release 12,000 cubic feet of water per second every day from the Cauvery river to neighboring Tamil Nadu until Sept. 20. Police gunfire killed one protester and injured another after rampaging mobs set fire to dozens of buses, trucks and cars and attacked shops and businesses in Bangalore and other parts of the state. Police arrested nearly 400 people for looting and vandalism after the curfew was imposed to quell violence.
(Reuters, 9/12/16)(AP, 9/13/16)(Econ, 9/17/16, p.40)
2016 Sep 12, A government source said Italy will set up a military hospital and deploy 300 doctors, nurses and soldiers in Libya at the request of the United Nations-recognized government in Tripoli.
(Reuters, 9/12/16)
2016 Sep 12, About 10,000 Taiwan tourism operators and workers marched to a square in front of the presidential hall to demand that the government take steps to help their businesses, hard hit by worsening ties with mainland China.
(Reuters, 9/12/16)
2016 Sep 12, A Vietnamese court approved a Malaysian request for the extradition of eight Indonesians suspected of hijacking a Malaysian oil tanker more than a year ago, and rejected a similar request from Indonesia. The eight were arrested in June last year when they arrived on Tho Chu island off Vietnam's southern coast and admitted that they had hijacked the oil tanker MT Orkim Harmony.
(AP, 9/12/16)
2017 Sep 12, Hillary Clinton’s “What Happened," an account of her 2016 presidential campaign loss to Donald Trump, was published.
(SFC, 9/21/17 p.A6)(Econ, 9/16/17, p.28)
2017 Sep 12, Edith Windsor (b.1929), a key figure in the legalization of same-sex marriage, died in New York City. She was the lead plaintiff in the Supreme Court of the United States case United States v. Windsor (2013), which successfully overturned Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act and was considered a landmark legal victory for the same-sex marriage movement in the United States.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edith_Windsor)(SFC, 9/14/17 p.D2)
2017 Sep 12, In Texas Alfred Lockett (48) was shot and killed in an Austin drug store parking lot. Witnesses said the shooting culminated a high-speed confrontation involving two cars that ended in the store lot. Suspect Juan de Dios Carbajal-Jaimes (18) fled to Mexico.
(http://tinyurl.com/y73wxaa9)(AP, 11/2/17)
2017 Sep 12, British authorities approved plans for a contentious road tunnel under Stonehenge, but altered its route so it won't impede views of the sun during the winter solstice. Critics said the tunnel will disturb the rich archaeological site.
(AP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, A British junior minister said over 100 high-risk prisoners had escaped in the British Virgin Islands during Hurricane Irma. He raised the death toll in British territories to nine, with five in the BVI and four in Anguilla.
(AFP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, The European Union escalated its case against Poland over what it sees as democratic backsliding, moving a step closer to a possible court case that could result in financial penalties for Warsaw. The EU gave Warsaw one month to address judicial changes which it believes violate the rule of law.
(AP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, In France tens of thousands of protesters marched against President Emmanuel Macron's flagship economic reforms in the first major demonstrations against his pro-business agenda. Riot police clashed with hooded youths on the fringe of a protest in central Paris against Macron's reforms to loosen labor regulations.
(AFP, 9/12/17)(Reuters, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, In Germany carmakers at the Frankfurt auto show unveiled low-emissions vehicles and technology strategies that they hope will let them profit from the sweeping changes expected to hit the auto industry in the next few years.
(AP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, Bankrupt German airline Air Berlin said its existence is threatened by an apparent wildcat strike, after 200 pilots called in sick at short notice.
(AP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, Iraq's parliament voted to reject a referendum on Kurdish independence planned for Sept. 25, authorizing the prime minister to "take all measures" to preserve Iraq's unity.
(Reuters, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, Iraq sentenced a Russian Islamic State fighter to death by hanging, a rare conviction of a foreign militant on terrorism charges. The Russian was a member of Daesh operating in Mosul since 2015.
(Reuters, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, In Israel a Supreme Court decision struck down a law exempting ultra-Orthodox men engaged in religious study from military service.
(AFP, 9/13/17)
2017 Sep 12, The posthumous memoir "No Room for Small Dreams" by Shimon Peres came out as Israel began marking the anniversary of his passing at the age of 93.
(AP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, The private Japan Art Association announced the winners of this year’s Praemium Imperiale arts prizes. Ballet legend Mikhail Baryshnikov and Senegalese music star Youssou N'Dour were among the winners.
(AFP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, The Lebanese Shi'ite group Hezbollah declared victory in the Syrian war while Russia said government forces had driven militants from 85 percent of the country where President Bashar al-Assad's rule seemed in danger two years ago.
(Reuters, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, A Moroccan appeals court increased the prison sentence of a journalist to one year for inciting an unauthorized protest. Hamid El Mahdaoui, who heads the Badil online news site, was arrested in July at the start of a banned demonstration in the restive northern city of Al-Hoceima.
(AFP, 9/13/17)
2017 Sep 12, North Korea condemned "vicious" new UN sanctions imposed over its sixth and largest nuclear test, warning it would make the US "suffer the greatest pain" it has ever experienced.
(AP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, Philippine lawmakers allied with President Rodrigo Duterte voted to allocate an annual budget of just 1,000 pesos ($20) to the Commission on Human Rights, a public body that has clashed repeatedly with Duterte over his bloody war on drugs. The budget requires another vote, then Senate approval before it becomes final.
(AP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, In the Philippines at least four people died and six were missing after a major storm caused flooding in and around Manila, forcing schools, government offices and businesses to shut down.
(AFP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, Saudi Arabia urged its people to report subversive comments spotted on social media via a phone app. The move was soon denounced by a human rights watchdog as "Orwellian".
(Reuters, 9/13/17)
2017 Sep 12, Scotland's devolved government recommended that its parliament at Holyrood withhold consent for legislation to withdraw Britain from the European Union, on the grounds that it could water down their powers.
(Reuters, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, In Spain a policeman was stabbed to death in Valencia after entering a building during an investigation into the finding of human remains in a suitcase. The attacker was shot dead.
(Reuters, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, Spanish prosecutors in Catalonia ordered police to seize ballot boxes, election flyers or any item that could be used in a banned independence referendum called by the Spanish region's separatist executive. By law the police have to follow prosecutors' orders but they are also directly dependent on the regional government against which they have been told to act.
(AFP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, Syria's government signed a contract with an Iranian company to import five gas-fired power plants to the war-battered city of Aleppo.
(AP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, Syrian opposition activists and witnesses said that several thousand Syrians stranded on the border with Jordan have fled the Hadalat camp for the Rukban camp further east, running from shelling and nearby fighting between Syrian rebels and government forces.
(AP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said air strikes likely to have been carried out by Russian warplanes have killed 69 people since Sep 10 near the Euphrates River in the eastern Syrian province of Deir al-Zor.
(Reuters, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, In Togo opposition lawmakers forced the adjournment of parliament in protest at a constitutional reform bill being left off the day's agenda, despite days of anti-government protests.
(AFP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, Turkey’s Pres. Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced a deal to purchase a Russian surface-to-air missile system.
(SFC, 9/13/17 p.A2)
2017 Sep 12, Turkish authorities detained on "terror" charges at least 15 lawyers from the legal association representing two imprisoned teachers on a hunger strike to protest their sacking in an ongoing purge.
(AFP, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, Uganda’s ruling party backed plans to remove the presidential age limit, which would allow Pres. Yoweri Museveni (73) to extend his rule.
(SFC, 9/13/17 p.A2)
2017 Sep 12, The International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) said Venezuela's Supreme Court has progressively dismantled the rule of law, becoming an instrument of President Nicolas Maduro's government in what amounts to a coup against the constitutional order. It called on the UN Human Rights Council to take action.
(Reuters, 9/12/17)
2017 Sep 12, The World Health Organization said Hurricane Irma has left about 17,000 people in desperate need of shelter and has devastated hospitals and health clinics across the eastern Caribbean islands. At least 43 were left dead in the Caribbean and at least 11 in Florida, Georgia and South Carolina.
(AP, 9/12/17)(Reuters, 9/12/17)
2018 Sep 12, Pres. Donald Trump signed an executive order authorizing sanctions against foreigners who meddle in US elections.
(SFC, 9/13/18, p.A10)
2018 Sep 12, The US Treasury Department said it has targeted Ibrahim Jathran, the leader of a Libyan militia with sanctions for directing attacks on oil facilities in the country.
(Reuters, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, US lawmakers Sen. Marco Rubio and Rep. Chris Smith urged the extension of tougher American export restrictions to prevent sales of equipment that could be used in China's massive security clampdown targeting the Xinjiang region's native Muslim population.
(AP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, The US Food and Drug Administration launched its largest coordinated enforcement action in the agency’s history, aimed at the marketing and selling of e-cigarettes to teenagers in an effort to protect teens from becoming addicted to nicotine. The FDA said e-cigarette makers have 60 days to tell federal regulators how they plan to reduce sales to teens.
(CSM, 9/13/18)(SFC, 9/13/18, p.A1)
2018 Sep 12, A federal court in Washington, DC, ruled against Education Sec. Betsy DeVos over her 2017 decision to suspend rules meant to protect students from abuse by for-profit colleges.
(SFC, 9/14/18, p.A6)
2018 Sep 12, The FBI arrested Puerto Rico Sen. Abel Nazario, who has been indicted by a federal grand jury on corruption charges. The case is related to funds Nazario received when he was mayor of the southwest town of Yauco.
(AP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, In Bakersfield, Ca., Xavier Casarez (54) shot and killed five people, including his wife, and then killed himself as he was confronted by a sheriff's deputy.
(SFC, 9/13/18, p.A11)(SFC, 9/15/18, p.A8)
2018 Sep 12, The San Francisco Board of Appeals voted unanimously for the removal of the "Early Days" statue in the Civic Center. The statue depicting a vaquero and a missionary standing over a fallen American Indian was one of five that make up 800-ton Pioneer Monument shrine.
(SFC, 9/13/18, p.A11)
2018 Sep 12, In southern California Dr. Grant Robicheaux (38) of Newport Beach Cerissa Riley of Brea were arrested after being charged with rape by use of drugs, oral copulation by anesthesia or controlled substances, and other crimes. The two later denied allegations that they had preyed on two intoxicated women and then drugged and raped them. In 2020 prosecutors dropped multiple rape charges against Grant Robicheaux and Riley, after finding key video evidence never actually existed.
(SFC, 9/20/18, p.A4)(AP, 2/5/20)
2018 Sep 12, In Michigan Tanaya Lewis (17) fatallystabbed classmate Danyna Gibson (16) at Detroit's Warren Fitzgerald High School in an alleged dispute over a boy.
(SFC, 12/22/18, p.A5)
2018 Sep 12, In Brazil countries on both sides of the whaling divide voted to renew quotas for limited whale hunts for indigenous communities in Alaska, Russia, Greenland and the Caribbean -- taking into account their cultural and subsistence needs.
(AFP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, In central China an SUV crashed into a crowd at a public square, killing at least 3 people and injuring more than 40 others in the town of Mishui, Hunan province. The suspect jumped out of the SUV and attacked victims with a dagger and shovel. He was soon identified as Yang Zanyun (54) and had served several prison sentences for convictions including arson and assault. The death toll soon rose to 11 with another 44 people hospitalized
(AP, 9/12/18)(AP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, DR Congo's navy accused Ugandan troops of killing four Congolese fishermen, whose bound and bullet-riddled bodies surfaced a day earlier on Lake Edward, which is shared by the two neighboring countries.
(AFP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, Egypt's chief prosecutor said tests showed that E.coli bacteria were behind the August 21 deaths of two British tourists in a hotel in the Red Sea resort of Hurghada.
(AP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, An Egyptian court suspended a ruling that allowed the return to work of policemen with beards which are usually reserved for pious Muslims.
(AFP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, In El Salvador former Pres. Tony Saca (53) was sentenced to 10 years in prison for corruption after pleading guilty to diverting more than $300 million in state funds. His former private secretary, Elmer Charlaix, was also sentenced to ten years.
(SFC, 9/13/18, p.A2)
2018 Sep 12, In Ethiopia an agreement, brokered by regional bloc the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), was signed late today by South Sudan's President Salva Kiir and rebel leader Riek Machar in Addis Ababa.
(AFP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, The European Parliament voted 448-197 to sanction Hungary for flouting EU rules on democracy, civil rights and corruption in an unprecedented step that left PM Viktor Orban isolated from powerful allies.
(Reuters, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, France-based Algerian singer Rachid Taha (59) died overnight after suffering a heart attack at his home in the Paris suburbs.
(AP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, Germany's Catholic Church said it was "dismayed and ashamed" by decades of child sex abuse by priests, after a report was leaked showing that thousands of minors were assaulted. The report said 3,677 people were abused by clergy between 1946 and 2014.
(AFP, 9/13/18)(SFC, 9/13/18, p.A2)
2018 Sep 12, In northern India three men reportedly drugged, kidnapped and raped a teenage girl while she was on her way to a test-preparation course. The girl was able to name the suspects.
(AP, 9/15/18)
2018 Sep 12, Iran's semi-official ISNA news agency reported that a court has sentenced Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei, a close ally of former hard-line president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, to six-and-a-half years in prison for plotting and conspiring to commit crimes against national security and for propaganda against the Islamic Republic system and for insulting officials.
(AP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, In Iraq jihadists attacked a restaurant north of the Iraqi capital with a car bomb, killing five people and wounding more than 30 near Tikrit city.
(AFP, 9/12/18)
2018 Sep 12, Irish budget carrier Ryanair was defiant as dozens of flights were disrupted in a walkout by German pilots and cabin crew, the latest flare-up in a bitter Europe-wide battle for better pay and conditions.
(AFP, 9/12/18)
2018 Sep 12, Libya closed the only functioning airport in the capital Tripoli after rockets were fired in its direction, only five days after flights had resumed following a previous shutdown forced by fighting among rival armed groups.
(Reuters, 9/12/18)
2018 Sep 12, President Vladimir Putin said Russia had found the two men accused by British prosecutors of trying to murder ex- Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Britain, but that there was nothing criminal about them.
(Reuters, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, Russian news media reported that Pyotr Verzilov, a member of the Pussy Riot punk protest group, was been hospitalized in grave condition for what could be a possible poisoning.
(SFC, 9/13/18, p.A2)
2018 Sep 12, Spain's El Periodico newspaper said Spain will go ahead with the sale of 400 laser-guided bombs to Saudi Arabia, a contract it had decided to halt last week because of the Saudis' role in the war in Yemen. Saudi Arabia had reportedly threatened to cancel a 1.8 billion euro contract with Spain to buy warships if the bomb sale did not take place.
(Reuters, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, Rebel sources in Syria said Turkey has stepped up arms supplies to help them stave off an expected offensive by the Syrian army and its Russian and Iran-backed allies in the northwest near the Turkish frontier.
(Reuters, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, Thailand enacted laws that set in motion a countdown leading to new elections by next May.
(AP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, A Turkish security official said Turkish intelligence has seized Yusuf Nazik (34) in Latakia, Syria. He has reportedly confessed to coordinating the May 11, 2013, bombing that killed 53 people in the southern border town of Reyhanli.
(AP, 9/12/18)
2018 Sep 12, A court in central Vietnam sentenced activist Nguyen Trung Truc (44) to 12 years in prison after finding him guilty of associating with the Brotherhood for Democracy, an outlawed dissident group.
(AP, 9/12/18)
2018 Sep 12, The World Health Organization's cancer research arm estimated there will be about 18 million new cases of cancer globally this year and more than 9 million cancer deaths.
(AP, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, In Yemen a Saudi-led coalition launched air strikes on the outskirts of the port city of Hodeidah as heavy fighting resumed days after UN-sponsored talks between the warring parties collapsed.
(Reuters, 9/13/18)
2018 Sep 12, Zimbabwe banned public gatherings in the capital Harare following a cholera outbreak which has claimed at least 21 lives and left hundreds of people ill over the past week.
(AFP, 9/13/18)
2019 Sep 12, The US said that it will disclose the name of a Saudi citizen sought by lawyers for victims of the Sept. 11 attacks who want to link the kingdom to the terrorist plot. Justice Department lawyers said in a court filing that the FBI will make the name available to a limited circle of people that includes lawyers for survivors and victims' relatives as well as to attorneys for the Saudi government.
(AP, 9/13/19)
2019 Sep 12, The Trump administration rolled back a key provision of the Clean Water Act, doing away with protections for many wetlands and streams across the country and making it easier for farmers, builders and industry execs to develop their land.
(SFC, 9/13/19, p.C1)
2019 Sep 12, The Democratic-led US House of Representatives Judiciary Committee voted to intensify its investigation of Republican President Donald Trump, as lawmakers edged closer to deciding whether to recommend his impeachment.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, More than 100 chief executives of some of the nation's most well-known companies called on the US Senate to take action to tackle gun violence, including expanding background checks and strengthening so-called red flag laws.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, This year's Ig Nobel winners included: Dutch and Turkish researchers who figured out which nation has the yuckiest money, an Italian scientist who urges consumption of pizza for its health benefits, and an Iranian engineer who obtained a US patent for a diaper-changing machine.
(AP, 9/13/19)
2019 Sep 12, The US Dept. of Education's Office for Civil Rights found that Chicago public schools' handling of sexual abuse complaints to be "tragic and inexcusable" and required a major overhaul. Student complaints had dated back several years.
(SFC, 9/13/19, p.A5)
2019 Sep 12, In New Mexico five people were killed, and six others wounded late today at three shooting scenes that occurred over a 90-minute span in Albuquerque.
(AP, 9/13/19)(SFC, 9/14/19, p.A6)
2019 Sep 12, Ohio-based Sherwin-Williams, a Fortune 500 paint company, announced it's searching for a new location for its global headquarters and research-and-development facility. Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson soon replied that the city is working to keep Sherwin-Williams from leaving town.
(AP, 9/14/19)
2019 Sep 12, A US federal judge blocked Tennessee's new restrictions for registering voters from taking effect on October 1, saying any benefit from the law probably won't outweigh its potential harm.
(SFC, 9/13/19, p.A5)
2019 Sep 12, In Texas the Democratic primary debate was the first to bring all of the top contenders together on one stage. Presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke stood by his call for a mandatory government buyback program for AK-47 and AR-15 rifles during this night’s presidential primary debate in Houston, saying “Hell yes" the government would take the firearms from their owners.
(Yahoo News, 9/13/19)
2019 Sep 12, United Auto Workers (UAW) President Gary Jones and his predecessor were unnamed officials listed in a federal criminal complaint detailing alleged corruption and embezzlement by union leaders. The complaint was released just two days before the UAW's contracts with Detroit's automakers GM, Ford Motor Co and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV expire on Sept. 14, raising questions about the status of ongoing contract talks.
(Reuters, 9/13/19)
2019 Sep 12, The Roman Catholic Diocese of Rochester in New York filed for bankruptcy because of financial fallout from the church's decades-long sex abuse scandal. A New York law that went into effect last month gives victims of childhood sexual abuse one year to file lawsuits that had previously been barred because the allegations were too old.
(AP, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, The US Coast Guard closed part of the Houston Ship Channel to vessel traffic near Baytown, Texas, after 11 Greenpeace USA protesters suspended themselves by cables over the key oil export waterway.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, Google said it has agreed to pay close to 1 billion euros ($1.10 billion) to French authorities to settle a fiscal fraud probe that began four years ago in a deal that may create a legal precedent for other large tech companies present in the country.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, A Bahamas preliminary report estimated that Hurricane Dorian caused about $7 billion in damage. About 2,500 people were now listed as missing.
(SFC, 9/13/19, p.A4)
2019 Sep 12, Belgian and French researchers said they have detected high accumulations of industrial fluids and mercury in the blubber and skin of the rare bottlenose dolphins off the northwest coast of France.
(AP, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, One of Bosnia's two regional governments designated the Una river a nature park, seeking to head off plans being considered by Croatia to build a landfill site for radioactive waste near the border between the two countries.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, PM Boris Johnson also vowed that Britain will be ready for a no-deal departure from the EU on October 31 despite his own government's assessment that planning remained "at a low level." Johnson also denied that he had lied to Queen Elizabeth II when requesting she suspend parliament this month in the run-up to Brexit.
(AFP, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, Anglo-Dutch consumer goods giant Unilever released a list of its global tea suppliers, bolstering a drive to stamp out worker exploitation and modern-day slavery on plantations.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, In Congo DRC up to 50 people were reported killed when a cargo train derailed in the southeastern province of Tanganyika early today.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, The European Central Bank delivered a new blast of monetary stimulus to help the shaky economy in the face of uncertainties like the US-China trade conflict and Brexit.
(AP, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, A French court found Princess Hessa bint Salman, the only daughter of Saudi Arabia's King Salman, guilty of complicity in violence for ordering her bodyguard to detain and strike a plumber in 2016 for taking photos at the Saudi royal family's apartment in Paris. The court also found the bodyguard, Rani Saida, guilty on charges of violence, sequestration and theft.
(AP, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu threatened war in Gaza and then flew to Russia to discuss Israeli freedom of action in Syria with President Vladimir Putin as a frenetic election race neared its end.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, Kenya's acting finance minister said the government plans "brutal" cuts to spending, including on government officials' overseas trips, in an effort to rein in the fiscal deficit.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, A conservation expert in Malaysia said soaring Chinese demand for the stinky durian fruit is turning into the next big threat to Malaysia's depleted rainforest.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, Mexico took issue with a US Supreme Court ruling granting a Trump administration request to fully enforce a new rule curtailing asylum applications by immigrants at the US-Mexico border.
(AP, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, OPEC agreed to trim oil output by asking over-producing members Iraq and Nigeria to bring production in line with their targets as the group strives to prevent a glut amid soaring US production and a slowing global economy. Oil prices have dropped below $60 per barrel in recent weeks from their 2019 peaks of $75.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, Russia's Pres. Vladimir Putin signed new protocols to clarify how authorities will monitor "compliance with the law on Lake Baikal's conservation and environmental rehabilitation".
(South China Morning Post, 9/22/19)
2019 Sep 12, Russian investigators raided dozens of regional offices of top protest leader Alexei Navalny as well as the homes of his supporters after mass opposition rallies this summer.
(AFP, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, A large area of southeast Spain was battered by what was forecast to be its heaviest rainfall in more than a century, with the storms wreaking widespread destruction and killing at least two people.
(AP, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, Sudan's new PM Abdalla Hamdok flew to South Sudan on a two-day visit to cement a new plan for peace talks with many of the rebel groups fighting against the government, brokered the previous day by Sudan's southern neighbor.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, In Sudan thousands protested outside the presidential palace in Khartoum, calling for the appointment of top judicial officials and justice for demonstrators killed since December.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, In Syria air strikes pounded the south of the Idlib region, despite a ceasefire that had halted a fierce army offensive against the rebel stronghold two weeks ago.
(Reuters, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, In southeastern Turkey Kurdish rebels reportedly detonated an improvised explosive device on a road near the town of Kulp, killing four people and wounding 13 others.
(AP, 9/13/19)
2019 Sep 12, The UN Security Council voted unanimously to ease the arms embargo on the Central African Republic's government following its signing of a peace agreement with 14 armed groups in February and progress in reforming its security sector.
(AP, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, The UN Security Council unanimously adopted a resolution renewing its mission in Libya for another year and pledging to support struggling efforts to build a ceasefire in the war-torn country.
(AFP, 9/12/19)
2019 Sep 12, In Uzbekistan the body of Shokir Shavkatov (25), a gay man, was found stabbed to death inside his flat in Tashkent. A suspect (28) was soon taken in custody and charged with premeditated murder. The murder cast the spotlight on the treatment of LGBT+ people in the country and raised questions over government reforms aimed at attracting foreign investment.
(Reuters, 9/27/19)(http://tinyurl.com/yyl9k5mn)
2020 Sep 12, President Trump traveled to Nevada for a campaign rally in Douglas County as he sets his sights on winning over the state he narrowly lost in 2016.
(The Week, 9/13/20)
2020 Sep 12, Two Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department deputies — a female (31) and a male (24) — were shot this evening while sitting in their patrol vehicle in Compton. Both deputies were left in critical condition with multiple gunshot wounds. The suspect ran away.
(The Week, 9/13/20)
2020 Sep 12, Search and rescue workers found three more bodies in the rubble of a Northern California wildfire, raising the death toll in that fire to 12 and total deaths in the state's recent blazes to 22. 29 major wildfires were burning around the state.
(AP, 9/12/20)(SSFC, 9/13/20, p.A6)
2020 Sep 12, California to date had 755,854 cases of coronavirus and 14,252 deaths. The SF Bay Area had 93,917 cases and 1,284 deaths. Total cases nationwide reached over 6,466,012 with the death toll at 193,351.
(sfist.com, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, It was reported that coronavirus infections in the Dakotas are growing faster than anywhere else in the nation, fueling impassioned debates over masks and personal freedom after months in which the two states avoided the worst of the pandemic.
(AP, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, South Dakota Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg struck and killed a man walking along a rural stretch of highway. He returned to the scene the next day and discovered the body. On Feb. 18, 2021, Ravnsborg was charged with three misdemeanors. on August 26 he pleaded no contest to two misdemeanor traffic charges and was fined $500 for each count.
(AP, 9/14/20)(SFC, 2/20/21, p.A4)(SFC, 8/27/21, p.A11)
2020 Sep 12, The first direct peace talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban began in Doha, Qatar. The actual face-to-face negotiations to end the nation's nearly two-decades old conflict will start on Sept. 14.
(The Week, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, In Belarus about 10,000 women marched through Minsk with riot police violently detaining dozens of the marchers.
(The Week, 9/13/20)
2020 Sep 12, AstraZeneca announced that it received confirmation from the United Kingdom's Medicines Health Regulatory Authority that it was safe to resume clinical trials for the company's coronavirus vaccine in the UK after they were paused over safety concerns earlier this week.
(The Week, 9/13/20)
2020 Sep 12, In France police stopped more than 200 people and detained over 25 in Paris as activists sought to revive the "yellow vest" movement.
(SSFC, 9/13/20, p.A3)
2020 Sep 12, Greece's PM Kyriakos Mitsotakis announced plans to buy 18 French Rafale fighter jets, most of the "slightly used," plus four helicopters and advanced weapons to go with them.
(Econ., 9/19/20, p.51)
2020 Sep 12, India reported a record rise in new coronavirus infections for the second consecutive day after registering 97,570 new cases. The world's second most populous country now has 4.65 million confirmed cases.
(The Week, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, Iranian state news media reported the state execution of Navid Afkari, a 27-year-old wrestler, at a prison in the southern city of Shiraz. He was accused of fatally stabbing a water supply company employee during a 2018 antigovernment protest in Shiraz. Afkari can be heard on an audio tape smuggled from prison saying that he had been tortured until he falsely confessed.
(The Week, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, Thousands of Israelis demonstrated outside PM Benjamin Netanyahu’s official residence in central Jerusalem late Saturday, demanding he resign over his trial on corruption charges and what is widely seen as his mishandling of the coronavirus pandemic.
(AP, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, At the Venice film festival "Nomadland", a US movie about a community of van dwellers traversing the vast American West, won the Golden Lion award for best film.
(Reuters, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, In the Ivory Coast thousands of opposition supporters gathered in the city of Yamoussoukro to support Henri Konan Bedie becoming their candidate for the Oct. 31 presidential election.
(AP, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, Lebanese soldiers fired rubber bullets and live rounds in the air to disperse hundreds of protesters trying to march to the presidential palace during an anti-government demonstration.
(AP, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, It was reported that Mali's new military leaders have agreed to establish an 18-month transition government until an election can take place, following last month's coup.
(BBC, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, Thousands of people protested in Mauritius again over the government’s handling of an offshore oil spill that has become the Indian Ocean island nation’s worst environmental disaster in years.
(AP, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, Mexico reported 5,674 new confirmed cases of coronavirus infection and 421 additional fatalities, bringing its totals to 663,973 infections and 70,604 deaths.
(Reuters, 9/12/20)
2020 Sep 12, Puerto Rico's Gov. Wanda Vazquez reopened beaches, casinos, gyms and movie theaters across the US territory following a drop in coronavirus cases. As of the next day the island reported 539 deaths and 37,000 cases.
(SFC, 9/14/20, p.A4)
2021 Sep 12, Total US COVID-19 cases reached over 40,937,891 with the death toll at 659,770.
(sfist.com, 9/13/21)
2021 Sep 12, Daniil Medvedev (25) of Russia won the US Open men’s title, ending Novak Djokovic’s quest to win all four majors in one year.
(NY Times, 9/13/21)
2021 Sep 12, An explosion in suburban Atlanta caused the partial collapse of a 3-story structure in Dunwoody. A strong odor of gas had been reported before the blast. Two people were unaccounted for.
(SFC, 9/13/21, p.A8)
2021 Sep 12, John Shelby Spong (90), a charismatic Episcopal bishop, died at his home in Richmond, Va. He pushed his followers to accept women and L.G.B.T.Q. clergy, and later called on them to reject sacrosanct ideas like Jesus’ virgin birth and the existence of heaven and hell.
(NY Times, 9/20/21)
2021 Sep 12, US-trained Afghan pilots and other personnel held in an Uzbek camp for about a month began leaving the country, under a US deal that came despite Taliban demands for the return of the Afghans and their aircraft. The first group is at least initially heading to the UAE.
(Reuters, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, The Taliban's new Higher Education minister said women in Afghanistan will be allowed to study in universities as the country seeks to rebuild after decades of war but gender-segregation and Islamic dress code will be mandatory.
(Reuters, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, Argentines headed to the polls for midterm primaries in a litmus test for the center-left Peronist government of Alberto Fernandez, which has been hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic, economic crises and rising poverty. The main opposition party landed a blow against the ruling Peronists, winning key races in a congressional primary vote that is a strong leading indicator of how voters will cast ballots in the midterm election in November.
(Reuters, 9/12/21)(Reuters, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, PM Scott Morrison said Australia has purchased an additional 1 million doses of Moderna's COVID-19 vaccine from the European Union, as the country accelerates its inoculation program to fight record high infections.
(Reuters, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, Bangladesh reopened schools and other educational institutions after 543 days of closure as its virus situation eases and more people are vaccinated. The government says most Bangladeshi adults will be vaccinated by the end of this year.
(AP, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, China's southern city Putian told the public not to leave town, suspended bus and train service and closed cinemas, bars and other facilities in an effort to contain a coronavirus outbreak. 19 new infections, believed to have been acquired locally, were reported in the last 24 hours.
(AP, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi pledged $270 million in aid and three million more COVID-19 vaccine doses to Cambodia.
(Reuters, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, The slaughter of 1,428 white-sided dolphins, part of a four-century-old traditional drive of sea mammals into shallow water where they are killed for their meat and blubber, reignited a debate on the small Faeroe Islands, a semi-independent and part of the Danish realm.
(AP, 9/14/21)
2021 Sep 12, Pope Francis arrived in Hungary early for an unusually short stay that underlines differences with the anti-immigrant PM Viktor Orban. After 7 hours Francis moved on to Slovakia.
(Reuters, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, Iran said it will is to allow the UN nuclear watchdog to service monitoring cameras at Iranian nuclear sites following talks with IAEA head Rafael Grossi. Iran agreed to allow international inspectors to install new memory cards into surveillance cameras at its sensitive nuclear sites and to continue filming there.
(Reuters, 9/12/21)(AP, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, Israel carried out air strikes in the Gaza Strip in response to Palestinian rocket fire into its territory. There were no reports of casualties.
(Reuters, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, Japan’s government said more than 50% of the population has been fully vaccinated. About 60% is expected to be fully vaccinated by the end of September.
(AP, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, New Zealand reported 20 locally acquired COVID-19 cases in Auckland. PM Jacinda Ardern said New Zealand has purchased 500,000 doses of Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine from Denmark, as the country struggles with a cluster of infections in its largest city.
(Reuters, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, In south-central Nigeria heavily armed gunmen raided a jail in Kabba late today, blowing up the perimeter fence and freeing 266 inmates. Many of the inmates in Kabba were suspected Boko Haram fighters.
(Reuters, 9/13/21)(BBC, 9/13/21)
2021 Sep 12, Norwegians went to the polls for the first of two days of voting in a parliamentary election dominated by the widening gap between rich and poor, climate change and how the oil-producing nation should adapt to the energy transition.
(Reuters, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, In Pakistan monsoon rains and mudslides destroyed homes and left at least 17 people dead in the Tor Ghar district.
(SFC, 9/13/21, p.A4)
2021 Sep 12, Poland's top political leaders gathered in a Warsaw church for the beatification of two revered figures of the Catholic church: Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski, who led the Polish church's resistance to communism and Mother Elzbieta Roza Czacka, a blind nun who devoted her life to helping others who couldn't see.
(AP, 9/12/21)
2021 Sep 12, In Singapore the number of patients requiring oxygen, however, doubled to a record 54 from two days before. The percentage of unvaccinated who became severely ill or died was 5.2%. For the fully vaccinated that percentage was 1%.
(Reuters, 9/13/21)
2021 Sep 12, South Africa reported 3,961 new coronavirus cases, compared with a peak of about 26,500 per day in early July.
(Reuters, 9/13/21)
2021 Sep 12, Spain deployed soldiers to help fight a blaze in Malaga province that has scorched more than 17,000 acres over the lat 4 days.
(SFC, 9/13/21, p.A4)
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