1999-11-25
The United Nations establishes the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women to commemorate the murder of three Mirabal Sisters for resistance against the Rafael Trujillo dictatorship in Dominican Republic.
|
1999-02-23
An avalanche destroys the Austrian village of Galtür, killing 31.
|
1999-12-07
The Recording Industry Association of America files a lawsuit against the Napster file-sharing client alleging copyright infringement.
|
1999-12-03
Six Firefighters killed in the Worcester Cold Storage Warehouse fire in Worcester Mass.
|
1999-07-16
John F. Kennedy, Jr., piloting a Piper Saratoga aircraft, dies when his plane crashes into the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Martha's Vineyard. His wife Carolyn Bessette Kennedy and sister-in-law Lauren Bessette are also killed.
|
1999-08-11
The Salt Lake City Tornado tears through the downtown district of the city, killing one.
|
1999-02-12
President Bill Clinton is acquitted by the United States Senate in his impeachment trial.
|
1999-02-19
President Bill Clinton issues a posthumous pardon for U.S. Army Lt. Henry Ossian Flipper.
|
1999-09-14
Kiribati, Nauru and Tonga join the United Nations.
|
1999-05-07
In Guinea-Bissau, President João Bernardo Vieira is ousted in a military coup.
|
1999-03-27
An F-117 Nighthawk is shot down during the Kosovo War.
|
1999-03-11
Infosys becomes the first Indian company listed on the NASDAQ stock exchange.
|
1999-12-02
Glenbrook rail accident near Sydney, New South Wales.
|
1999-09-23
Qantas Flight 1 overruns the runway in Bangkok during a storm. While some passengers only receive minor injuries, it is still the worst crash in Qantas's history since 1960.
|
1999-06-09
Kosovo War: the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and NATO sign a peace treaty.
|
1999-08-09
Russian President Boris Yeltsin fires his Prime Minister, Sergei Stepashin, and for the fourth time fires his entire cabinet.
|
1999-06-12
Kosovo War: Operation Joint Guardian begins when a NATO-led United Nations peacekeeping force (KFor) enters the province of Kosovo in Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.
|
1999-11-18
In College Station, Texas, 12 are killed and 27 injured at Texas A&M University when the 59 foot tall Aggie Bonfire, under construction for the annual football game against the University of Texas, collapses at 2:42am.
|
1999-11-06
Australians vote to keep the Head of the Commonwealth as their head of state in the Australian republic referendum.
|
1999-03-12
Former Warsaw Pact members the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland join NATO.
|
1999-08-31
A LAPA Boeing 737-200 crashes during takeoff from Jorge Newbury Airport in Buenos Aires, killing 65, including 2 on the ground.
|
1999-04-08
Haryana Gana Parishad, a political party in the Indian state of Haryana, merges with the Indian National Congress.
|
1999-02-15
Abdullah Öcalan, leader of the PKK (Kurdistan Workers Party), is arrested in Kenya.
|
1999-07-20
Falun Gong is banned in the People's Republic of China, and a large scale crackdown of the practice is launched.
|
1999-05-07
A jury finds The Jenny Jones Show and Warner Bros. liable in the shooting death of Scott Amedure, after the show purposely deceived Jonathan Schmitz to appear on a secret same-sex crush episode. Schmitz later killed Amedure and the jury awarded Amedure's family $25 million USD.
|
1999-05-28
In Milan, Italy, after 22 years of restoration work, Leonardo da Vinci's masterpiece The Last Supper is put back on display.
|
1999-05-25
The United States House of Representatives releases the Cox Report which details the People's Republic of China's nuclear espionage against the U.S. over the prior two decades.
|
1999-02-04
Unarmed West African immigrant Amadou Diallo is shot dead by four plainclothes New York City police officers on an unrelated stake-out, inflaming race-relations in the city.
|
1999-03-26
The "Melissa worm" infects Microsoft word processing and e-mail systems around the world.
|
1999-09-23
NASA announces that it has lost contact with the Mars Climate Orbiter.
|
1999-10-12
The Day of Six Billion: The proclaimed 6 billionth living human in the world is born.
|
1999-10-31
EgyptAir Flight 990 traveling from New York City to Cairo crashes off the coast of Nantucket, Massachusetts, killing all 217 on-board.
|
1999-09-30
Japan's worst nuclear accident at a uranium reprocessing facility in Tōkai-mura, northeast of Tokyo.
|
1999-07-26
Cessation of combat activities after the Kargil War; Celebrated as Kargil Vijay Diwas in India.
|
1999-02-23
Kurdish rebel leader Abdullah Öcalan is charged with treason in Ankara, Turkey.
|
1999-08-20
Tony Martin confronts two burglars in his farmhouse in Emneth Hungate, Norfolk. Martin shoots both Brendon Fearon and Fred Barras with a pump-action shotgun, with Barras later dying of his injuries.
|
1999-04-20
Columbine High School massacre: Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold kill 13 people and injure 24 others before committing suicide at Columbine High School in Jefferson County, Colorado.
|
1999-10-31
Yachtsman Jesse Martin returns to Melbourne after 11 months of circumnavigating the world, solo, non-stop and unassisted.
|
1999-01-22
Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two sons are burned alive by radical Hindus while sleeping in their car in Eastern India.
|
1999-11-12
The Düzce earthquake strikes Turkey with a magnitude of 7.2 on the Richter scale.
|
1999-09-21
Chi-Chi earthquake occurs in central Taiwan, leaving about 2,400 people dead.
|
1999-12-22
Korean Air Cargo Flight 8509, a Boeing 747-200F crashes shortly after take-off from London Stansted Airport due to pilot error. All 4 crew members are killed.
|
1999-05-02
Panamanian election, 1999: Mireya Moscoso becomes the first woman to be elected President of Panama.
|
1999-06-10
Kosovo War: NATO suspends its air strikes after Slobodan Milošević agrees to withdraw Serbian forces from Kosovo.
|
1999-09-07
A 5.9 magnitude earthquake rocks Athens, rupturing a previously unknown fault, killing 143, injuring more than 500, and leaving 50,000 people homeless.
|
1999-01-03
Israel detains, and later expels, 14 members of Concerned Christians.
|
1999-07-31
Discovery Program: Lunar Prospector – NASA intentionally crashes the spacecraft into the Moon, thus ending its mission to detect frozen water on the moon's surface.
|
1999-11-30
In Seattle, Washington, United States, protests against the WTO meeting by anti-globalization protesters catch police unprepared and force the cancellation of opening ceremonies.
|
1999-05-07
Pope John Paul II travels to Romania becoming the first pope to visit a predominantly Eastern Orthodox country since the Great Schism in 1054.
|
1999-07-09
Days of student protests begin after Iranian police and hardliners attack a student dormitory at the University of Tehran.
|
1999-03-20
Legoland California, the only Legoland outside of Europe, opens in Carlsbad, California.
|
1999-02-16
Across Europe, Kurdish rebels take over embassies and hold hostages after Turkey arrests one of their rebel leaders, Abdullah Öcalan.
|
1999-03-21
Bertrand Piccard and Brian Jones become the first to circumnavigate the Earth in a hot air balloon.
|
1999-12-31
The United States Government hands control of the Panama Canal (as well all the adjacent land to the canal known as the Panama Canal Zone) to Panama. This act complied with the signing of the 1977 Torrijos-Carter Treaties.
|
1999-04-14
A severe hailstorm strikes Sydney, Australia causing A$2.3 billion in insured damages, the most costly natural disaster in Australian history.
|
1999-02-24
The State of Arizona executes Karl LaGrand, a German national convicted of murder during a botched bank robbery, in spite of Germany's legal action to attempt to save him.
|
1999-01-03
The Mars Polar Lander is launched.
|
1999-12-31
Boris Yeltsin, the first president of Russia, resigns as President of Russia, leaving Prime Minister Vladimir Putin as the acting President.
|
1999-02-07
Crown Prince Abdullah becomes the King of Jordan on the death of his father, King Hussein.
|
1999-05-29
Space Shuttle Discovery completes the first docking with the International Space Station.
|
1999-01-04
Gunmen open fire on Shiite Muslims worshipping in an Islamabad mosque, killing 16 people and injuring 25.
|
1999-10-27
Gunmen open fire in the Armenian Parliament, killing Prime Minister Vazgen Sargsyan, Parliament Chairman Karen Demirchyan, and 6 other members.
|
1999-10-22
Maurice Papon, an official in the Vichy France government during World War II, is jailed for crimes against humanity.
|
1999-08-09
The Diet of Japan enacts a law establishing the Hinomaru and Kimi Ga Yo as the official national flag and national anthem.
|
1999-03-24
Kosovo War: NATO commences air bombardment against Yugoslavia, marking the first time NATO has attacked a sovereign country.
|
1999-11-19
In Istanbul, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe ends a two-day summit by calling for a political settlement in Chechnya and adopting a Charter for European Security.
|
1999-06-01
American Airlines Flight 1420 slides and crashes while landing at Little Rock National Airport, killing 11 people on a flight from Dallas to Little Rock.
|
1999-01-04
Former professional wrestler Jesse Ventura is sworn in as governor of Minnesota.
|
1999-05-29
Olusegun Obasanjo takes office as President of Nigeria, the first elected and civilian head of state in Nigeria after 16 years of military rule.
|
1999-03-26
A jury in Michigan finds Dr. Jack Kevorkian guilty of second-degree murder for administering a lethal injection to a terminally ill man.
|
1999-04-07
The World Trade Organisation rules in favor of the United States in its long-running trade dispute with the European Union over bananas.
|
1999-02-16
In Uzbekistan, a bomb explodes and gunfire is heard at the government headquarters in an apparent assassination attempt against President Islom Karimov.
|
1999-12-03
NASA loses radio contact with the Mars Polar Lander moments before the spacecraft enters the Martian atmosphere.
|
1999-04-30
Cambodia joins the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) bringing the number of members to 10.
|
1999-12-21
The Spanish Civil Guard intercepts a van loaded with 950 kg of explosives that ETA intended to use to blow up Torre Picasso in Madrid.
|
1999-07-23
Crown Prince Mohammed Ben Al-Hassan is crowned King Mohammed VI of Morocco on the death of his father.
|
1999-07-23
ANA Flight 61 is hijacked in Tokyo, Japan.
|
1999-05-03
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma is slammed by an F5 tornado killing forty-two people, injuring 665, and causing $1 billion in damage. The tornado is one of 66 from the 1999 Oklahoma tornado outbreak. This is the strongest tornado ever recorded with wind speeds of up to 318 mph.
|
1999-11-30
British Aerospace and Marconi Electronic Systems merge to form BAE Systems, Europe's largest defense contractor and the fourth largest aerospace firm in the world.
|
1999-06-02
The Bhutan Broadcasting Service brings television transmissions to the Kingdom for the first time.
|
1999-12-02
The United Kingdom devolves political power in Northern Ireland to the Northern Ireland Executive.
|
1999-01-01
The Euro currency is introduced in 11 countries - members of NATO (with the exception of the United Kingdom, Denmark, Greece and Sweden).
|
1999-01-07
The Senate trial in the impeachment of U.S. President Bill Clinton begins. He had been impeached by the House of Representatives on December 19.
|
1999-04-29
The Avala TV Tower near Belgrade is destroyed in the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia.
|
1999-09-12
Indonesia announces it will allow international peace-keepers into East Timor.
|
1999-11-27
The left-wing Labour Party takes control of the New Zealand government with leader Helen Clark becoming the first elected female Prime Minister in New Zealand's history.
|
1999-02-27
Olusegun Obasanjo becomes Nigeria's first elected president since mid-1983.
|
1999-08-07
Second Chechen War began.
|
1999-05-07
Kosovo War: In Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, three Chinese citizens are killed and 20 wounded when a NATO aircraft bombs the Chinese embassy in Belgrade.
|
1999-03-23
Gunmen assassinate Paraguay's Vice President Luis María Argaña.
|
1999-10-05
The Ladbroke Grove rail crash in west London kills 31 people.
|
1999-10-12
Pervez Musharraf takes power in Pakistan from Nawaz Sharif through a bloodless coup.
|
1999-04-01
Nunavut is established as a Canadian territory carved out of the eastern part of the Northwest Territories.
|
1999-07-05
U.S. President Bill Clinton imposes trade and economic sanctions against the Taliban regime in Afghanistan.
|
1999-07-08
Allen Lee Davis is executed by electric chair by the state of Florida, the last use of the electric chair for capital punishment in Florida.
|
1999-08-19
In Belgrade, tens of thousands of Serbians rally to demand the resignation of Federal Republic of Yugoslavia President Slobodan Milošević.
|
1999-10-26
Britain's House of Lords votes to end the right of hereditary peers to vote in Britain's upper chamber of Parliament.
|
1999-02-24
A China Southern Airlines Tupolev TU-154 airliner crashes on approach to Wenzhou airport in eastern the People's Republic of China, killing 61.
|
1999-10-09
The last flight of the SR-71.
|
1999-11-19
Shenzhou 1: The People's Republic of China launches its first Shenzhou spacecraft.
|
1999-03-08
The Supreme Court of the United States upholds the murder convictions of Timothy McVeigh for the Oklahoma City bombing.
|
1999-02-04
The New Carissa runs aground near Coos Bay, Oregon.
|
1999-07-06
U.S. Army private Barry Winchell dies from baseball-bat injuries inflicted in his sleep the previous day by a fellow soldier, Calvin Glover, for his relationship with transgender showgirl and former Navy Corpsman Calpernia Addams.
|
1999-08-15
Beni Ounif massacre in Algeria; some 29 people are killed at a false roadblock near the Moroccan border, leading to temporary tensions with Morocco.
|
1999-06-06
In Australian Rules Football, Tony Lockett breaks the record for career goals, previously 1299 by Gordon Coventry and which had stood since 1937.
|
1999-10-13
The United States Senate rejects ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT).
|
1999-03-29
The Dow Jones Industrial Average closes above the 10,000 mark (10,006.78) for the first time, during the height of the internet boom.
|
1999-08-17
A 7.4-magnitude earthquake strikes İzmit, Turkey, killing more than 17,000 and injuring 44,000.
|
1999-04-12
US President Bill Clinton is cited for contempt of court for giving "intentionally false statements" in a sexual harassment civil lawsuit.
|
1999-01-21
War on Drugs: In one of the largest drug busts in American history, the United States Coast Guard intercepts a ship with over 4,300 kilograms (9,500 lb) of cocaine on board.
|
1999-01-25
A 6.0 Richter scale earthquake hits western Colombia killing at least 1,000.
|
1999-05-06
First elections to the devolved Scottish Parliament and Welsh Assembly held.
|
1999-03-05
Paul Okalik is elected first Premier of Nunavut.
|
1999-12-14
Kiribati, Nauru and Tonga join the United Nations.
|
1999-04-05
Two Libyans suspected of bringing down Pan Am flight 103 in 1988 are handed over for eventual trial in the Netherlands.
|
1999-04-19
The German Bundestag returns to Berlin, the first German parliamentary body to meet there since the Reichstag was dissolved in 1945.
|
1999-09-03
87-automobile pile-up on Highway 401 freeway just east of Windsor, Ontario, Canada after an unusually thick fog from Lake St. Clair.
|
1999-10-29
A large cyclone devastates Orissa, India.
|
1999-12-20
Macau is handed over to the People's Republic of China by Portugal.
|
1999-12-31
Five hijackers, who had been holding 155 hostages on an Indian Airlines plane, leave the plane with two Islamic clerics that they had demanded be freed.
|
1999-12-18
NASA launches into orbit the Terra platform carrying five Earth Observation instruments, including ASTER, CERES, MISR, MODIS and MOPITT.
|
1999-09-08
United States Attorney General Janet Reno names former Senator John Danforth to head an independent investigation of the 1993 fire at the Branch Davidian church near Waco, Texas in response to revelations in the film Waco: The Rules of Engagement that contradicted the official government stories.
|
1999-05-27
The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague, Netherlands indicts Slobodan Milošević and four others for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Kosovo.
|
1999-07-05
Wolverhampton, England is hit by storms which include a tornado. The area is hit again with severe storms on August 1.
|
1999-01-20
The China News Service announces new government restrictions on Internet use aimed especially at Internet cafés.
|
1999-04-14
NATO mistakenly bombs a convoy of ethnic Albanian refugees – Yugoslav officials say 75 people are killed.
|
1999-08-31
The first of a series of bombings in Moscow, killing one person and wounding 40 others.
|
1999-01-15
The Racak incident: 45 Albanians in the Kosovo village of Racak are killed by Yugoslav security forces.
|
1999-01-02
A brutal snowstorm smashes into the Midwestern United States, causing 14 inches (359 mm) of snow in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and 19 inches (487 mm) in Chicago, where temperatures plunge to -13 °F (-25 °C); 68 deaths are reported
|
1999-01-19
British Aerospace agrees to acquire the defence subsidiary of the General Electric Company plc, forming BAE Systems in November 1999.
|
1999-05-28
Two Swedish police officers are murdered with their own fire arms by the bank robbers Jackie Arklöv and Tony Olsson after a car chase.
|
1999-07-01
The Scottish Parliament is officially opened by Queen Elizabeth on the day that legislative powers are officially transferred from the old Scottish Office in London to the new devolved Scottish Executive in Edinburgh.
|