Return to home1219 Jan 16,
Floods followed a storm in Northern Netherlands and thousands were
1493 Jan 16, Columbus aboard
the Nina departed Hispaniola along with the Pinta to return to
(ON, 8/09, p.2)
1547 Jan 16, Ivan IV, popularly
known as "Ivan the Terrible," crowned himself the new Czar of Russia
in Assumption Cathedral in Moscow. He was the first Russian ruler to
assume that title.
(TL-MB, 1988, p.17)(HN, 1/16/99)(AP, 1/16/08)
1581 Jan 16, English parliament
passed laws against Catholicism.
1707 Jan 16, Scotland ratified
the Treaty of Union by a majority of 110 votes to 69. The Acts
created a new state, the Kingdom of Great Britain, by merging the
Kingdom of England and the Kingdom of Scotland together.
1749 Jan 16, Vittorio Alfieri
(d.1803), Italian dramatist and tragic poet famous for Cleopatra and
Parigi Shastigliata, was born. "Often the test of courage is not to
die but to live."
1757 Jan 16, Samuel McIntire,
architect of Salem, Massachusetts, was born.
1776 Jan 16, Continental
Congress approved the enlistment of free blacks. This led to the
all-black First Rhode Island Regiment, composed of 33 freedmen and
92 slaves, who were promised freedom if they served to the end of
the war. The regiment distinguished itself at the Battle of Newport.
(SFEC,11/23/97, Par p.19)(MC, 1/16/02)
1786 Jan 16, The Council of
Virginia passed the Virginia Act for Establishing Religious Freedom.
Thomas Jefferson had drafted The Virginia Act for Establishing
Religious Freedom in 1779 three years after he wrote the
Declaration of Independence.
(HN, 1/16/99)(WSJ, 12/14/02,
1847 Jan 16, US Navy commodore
Robert Stockton appointed John C. Fremont (1830-1890), the famed
"Pathfinder" of Western exploration, as governor of California.
Fremont, explorer, soldier and politician, earned his nickname "The
Pathfinder" because of his explorations of the Pacific Northwest,
California, and Nevada during the 1840s.
(HN, 1/16/99)(HNQ, 3/11/00)(SSFC, 7/1/07, p.M4)
1850 Jan 16, The first real
play in San Francisco, “The Wife," was staged at the modest
Washington Hall theater. This was located on the 2n d floor of a
building that later became the city’s swankiest brothel.
(SFC, 5/24/14, p.C2)
1853 Jan 16, Andre Michelin,
French industrialist and tire manufacturer (Michelin), was born.
1865 Jan 16, General Sherman
began a march through the Carolinas. During the march Sherman issued
Field Order No. 15 that set aside land, “40 acres and a mule," in
Georgia and South Carolina for freed slaves.
(HN, 1/16/99)(SFC, 6/20/00, p.A6)(SFC, 4/5/02,
1865 Jan 16, Charles (19) and
Michael de Young (17) started a free theater-program sheet in SF
called The Daily Dramatic Chronicle. Early quarters were at Clay and
Montgomery. They borrowed a $20 gold piece from Capt. William
Hinkley, who owned the building where they lived, to start the
(SFC, 7/18/96, p.A1)(SFEC, 3/8/98, BR p.1)(SFC,
8/7/99, p.A1)(SFC, 1/16/09, Extra p.1)
1868 Jan 16, The refrigerated
railroad car was patented by William Davis, a fish dealer in
Detroit. [see Nov 26, 1867]
1878 Jan 16, Harry Carey Sr.,
actor (Aces Wild, Border Cafe, Air Force), was born in Bronx, NY.
1883 Jan 16, The U.S. Civil
Service Commission was established. The US Civil Service Reform Act
prohibited federal employees from contributing to political
(AP, 1/16/98)(SFEC, 10/5/97, p.D9)
1889 Jan 16, An Australian
record temperature of 128.5F, or 53.1C, was recorded in Cloncurry,
Queensland. Later investigations revealed that this temperature was
measured in an improvised screen made from a beer crate and that it
equated to 47–49 °C under standard conditions.
1900 Jan 16, The U.S. Senate
consented to the Anglo-German treaty of 1899 by which the UK
renounced its rights to the Samoan Islands.
1901 Jan 16, Fulgencio Batista
(d.1973), later president and dictator of Cuba (1933-44, 1952-59),
was born. He was overthrown by Fidel Castro and died in Spain.
1906 Jan 16, Marshall Field
(71), Chicago department store founder, died in NYC.
1909 Jan 16, Ethel Merman, U.S.
singer and actress, was born. She was known as the “Queen of
Broadway." [2nd source says 1908]
(HN, 1/16/99)(MC, 1/16/02)
1909 Jan 16, One of Ernest
Shackleton's polar exploration teams reached the Magnetic South
1910 Jan 16, David McCampbell,
US pilot and captain (WW II-Pacific-downed 34 Japanese planes), was
1911 Jan 16, Jay Hanna Dean,
aka “Dizzy Dean," one of baseball's greatest pitchers, hall of fame,
1912 Jan 16, British explorer
Robert Falcon Scott wrote in his diary after reaching the South Pole
on January 16, 1912, "Great God this is an awful place and terrible
enough for us to have labored to it without the reward of priority."
Robert Scott, attempting to lead the first exploration party to the
South Pole, wrote the passage after finding the black flag of
Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen. Thoroughly demoralized, the five
members of the Scott party died during their 800-mile trek back to
their base camp. [see Jan 18]
1913 Jan 16, Prof. Thaddeus
Lowe (80), balloonist pioneer, died.
1914 Jan 16, Maxim Gorky was
authorized to return to Russia after an eight year exile for
1919 Jan 16, Nebraska, Wyoming
and Missouri became the 36th, 37th and 38th states to ratify
Prohibition, which went into effect a year later. Prohibition became
law in the US with the passage of the Volstead Act on Oct 28, which
enforced and defined the 18th Amendment. It was passed over
President Wilson's veto with the necessary two-thirds majority of
(WSJ, 8/22/96, p.A14)(AP, 1/16/98)
1920 Jan 16, Prohibition began
as the 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution took effect. It was
later repealed by the 21st Amendment. Alcohol was outlawed in the US
with the passage of the 18th amendment. It was made law on Jan
16,1919, but became effective on this day. At the time US
authorities expected few violations of the new law. Over the next
fourteen years, Prohibition corrupted all levels of society, swamped
the judiciary, killed thousands of people, and gave rise to
underworld syndicates that still exist.
1/16/98)(SFC, 4/7/96, p.B-11)
1920 Jan 16, The League of
Nations held its first meeting in Paris.
1920 Jan 16, Allies lifted the
blockade on trade with Russia.
1924 Jan 16, Katy Jurado
(d.2002), Mexican-US film actress, was born as Maria Cristina Jurado
Garcia in Guadalajara.
(SFC, 7/6/02, p.A19)
1925 Jan 16, Leon Trotsky was
dismissed as CEO of Russian Revolution Military Council. Stalin took
power over Trotsky.
(TMC, 1994, p.1925)(MC, 1/16/02)
1928 Jan 16, The 4 Marx
Brothers arrived at the Columbia Theater in SF to perform in the
Kaufman and Berlin musical “The Cocoanuts." The farce dealt with the
Florida land boom.
(SFC, 1/10/03, p.E6)
1933 Jan 16, Oleg Grigoryevich
Makarov (d.2003 at 70), USSR cosmonaut (Soyuz 12, 18A, 27, T-3), was
(MC, 1/16/02)(SFC, 5/31/03, p.A21)
1935 Jan 16, US federal agents
killed gangsters Ma Barker and Freddy, one of her 4 sons, at Lake
(AH, 2/05, p.16)
1938 Jan 16, The Benny Goodman
Carnegie Hall Jazz Concert featured an outstanding solo by
saxophonist Lester Young. Goodman performed at Carnegie Hall along
with Count Basie, Harry James, Lester Young, Gene Krupa, Johnny
Hodges, Lionel Hampton and 17 others. The concert was recorded and
in 2000 Columbia issued a remastered edition of the performance.
(WSJ, 8/29/96, A11)(WSJ, 1/12/00, p.A20)
1939 Jan 16, The comic strip
1939 Jan 16, Franklin D.
Roosevelt asked for an extension of the Social Security Act to more
women and children.
1939 Jan 16, Albert Fish, mass
murderer, was executed.
1940 Jan 16, Hitler canceled an
attack in the West due to bad weather and the capture of German
attack plans in Belgium.
1941 Jan 16, US vice admiral
Bellinger warned of an assault on Pearl Harbor.
1941 Jan 16, The US War Dept
formed the 1st Army Air Corps squadron for black cadets.
1942 Jan 16, William Knudsen
became the 1st civilian appointed as general in US army.
1942 Jan 16, Actress Carole
Lombard and her mother were among some 20 people killed when their
plane crashed near Las Vegas while returning from a tour to promote
1942 Jan 16, Japan’s advance
into Burma began. [see Jan 19]
1943 Jan 16, A state record of
-60F (-51C) was recorded in Island Park Dam, Idaho.
1944 Jan 16, Gen. Dwight D.
Eisenhower assumed supreme command of the Allied Expeditionary Force
(AP, 1/16/98)(HN, 1/16/99)
1944 Jan 16, The U.S. First and
Third armies link up at Houffalize, effectively ending the Battle of
1944 Jan 16, In Leon Province,
Spain, train wrecks in the Torro Tunnel killed more than 500 people.
(AP, 2/18/04)(SFC, 6/4/98, p.A15)
1945 Jan 16, The U.S. First and
Third armies linked up at Houffalize, effectively ending the Battle
of the Bulge. In 1997 Charles B. MacDonald authored “A Time for
Trumpets: The Untold Story of the Battle of the Bulge."
(HN, 1/16/99)(WSJ, 12/7/04, p.D11)
1948 Jan 16, Anatoli
Yakovlevich Solovyov, cosmonaut (TM-5,9,15,26, STS 71), was born in
1951 Jan 16, World's largest
gas pipeline opened from Brownsville Tx, to 134th St, NYC.
1951 Jan 16, French forces
repulsed a Viet Minh offensive near Hanoi.
1954 Jan 16, "South Pacific"
closed at Majestic Theater, NYC, after 1928 performances.
1954 Jan 16, Mexico closed its
borders to all farm laborers heading for the US following a
breakdown in negotiations with the US over renewal of an annual
agreement on labor flow.
(SFC, 1/16/04, p.E5)
1956 Jan 16, Egyptian Pres.
Nasser pledged to reconquer Palestine. His government made Islam the
(HN, 1/16/99)(MC, 1/16/02)
1957 Jan 16, Three B-52's
(accompanied at first by two spare aircraft) took off from Castle
Air Force Base in California on the first nonstop, round-the-world
flight by jet planes, which lasted 45 hours and 19 minutes.
1957 Jan 16, Arturo Toscanini
(b.1867), Italian-US conductor (NBC), died in NYC. He led the NBC
Symphony from 1937-1954. In 1978 Harvey Sachs wrote his biography.
In 2002 Sachs edited "The Letters of Arturo Toscanini," his
correspondence with Ada Mainardi.
3/25/01)(WSJ, 4/30/02, p.D7)
1962 Jan 16, R.H. Tawney,
English economic historian, died. His books include “Equality"
(1931). It was here that he wrote “Freedom for the pike is death to
1963 Jan 16, Nikita Khrushchev
claimed the USSR had a 100-megaton nuclear bomb.
1964 Jan 16, The musical
"Hello, Dolly!," starring Carol Channing, opened on Broadway at the
St. James Theater, beginning a run of 2,844 performances.
Jan 16, Pres. Johnson approved OPLAN 34A-64, calling for stepped up
infiltration and covert operations against North Vietnam to be
transferred from the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to the
1965 Jan 16, "Outer Limits"
last aired on ABC-TV.
1965 Jan 16, Eighteen were
arrested in Mississippi for the murder of three civil rights
1967 Jan 16, Alan S. Boyd was
sworn in as the first US secretary of transportation.
1967 Jan 16, Gov. Reagan met
with FBI agents at his governor’s mansion in Sacramento, Ca., for
information on UC campus radicals.
(SSFC, 6/9/02, p.F1)
1973 Jan 16, NBC presented the
440th and final showing of "Bonanza."
1974 Jan 16, NY Yankees Mickey
Mantle and Whitey Ford were elected to Hall of Fame.
1975 Jan 16, The Irish
Republican Army called an end to a 25-day cease fire in Belfast.
1978 Jan 16, NASA named 35
candidates to fly on the space shuttle, including Sally K. Ride, who
became America's first woman in space, and Guion S. Bluford Jr., who
became America's first black astronaut in space. Six women, out of
some 3,000 original applicants, graduated from NASA's rigorous
training program to become the 1st female astronauts in the space
1979 Jan 16, Aaliyeh (d.2001),
R&B singer and actress, was born in Brooklyn and grew up in
Detroit. In 2001 she was killed (22) in a plane crash in the
(SFC, 8/27/01, p.A16)
1979 Jan 16, Shah Mohammed Reza
Pahlevi fled Iran for Egypt as millions united with Ayatollah
Khomeini calling for his death. The Shah of Iran was overthrown in a
revolution led from exile by the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, who
established a Muslim Theocracy. Iran was overwhelmingly Shiite,
which believes that authority is invested only in descendants of
Muhammad’s son-in-law, Ali, who is buried in An Najaf, Iraq. The
Shah of Iran fled and the Ayatollah Khomeini took charge.
(NG, 5/88, p.653)(TMC, 1994, p.1979)(HN,
1980 Jan 16, Paul McCartney was
arrested in Tokyo for marijuana possession. He was released and
deported on Jan 25.
1981 Jan 16, Leon Spinks
b.1953), former heavyweight boxing champion (1978), was mugged. His
assailants even took his gold teeth.
1981 Jan 16, In Northern
Ireland, Protestant gunmen shot and wounded Irish nationalist leader
Bernadette Devlin McAliskey and her husband.
1987 Jan 16, China’s Communist
Party chief Hu Yaobang became the scapegoat for student protests and
was forced to resign. He was succeeded by Zhao Ziyang.
(SFC, 2/20/96, p.A4)
1987 Jan 16, In Spain Jose
Ignacio De Juana Chaos (b.1955), a former police officer who joined
one of ETA's most active commando units, was arrested. In 1989 he
was convicted of killing 25 people in a string of attacks, including
the Madrid car bombing that killed 12 Civil Guard policemen on July
14, 1986. In 2008 De Juana Chaos (52) was released from prison after
serving 21 years.
1988 Jan 16, Jimmy "The Greek"
Snyder was fired as a CBS Sports commentator one day after telling a
TV station in Washington, D.C., that, during the era of slavery,
blacks had been bred to produce stronger offspring. He was fired
because he claimed blacks were superior to whites in athletics, and
he traced it back to how blacks were bred. To make matters worse, he
also said "if blacks take over coaching like everybody wants them
to, there is not going to be anything left for the white people."
1988 Jan 16, Andrija Artukovic
(b.1899), a Croatian Ustasha and a convicted war criminal for
the crimes committed against minorities in the WWII Independent
State of Croatia (NDH), died in a prison hospital in Zagreb.
(SSFC, 4/4/10, Par.
1989 Jan 16, Three days of
rioting erupted in Miami when a police officer fatally shot a black
motorcyclist, causing a crash that also claimed the life of a
1990 Jan 16, Two Bank of Credit
and Commerce (BCCI) members pleaded guilty to money laundering.
1990 Jan 16, The Soviet Union
sent more than 11,000 reinforcements to the Caucasus to halt a civil
war between Armenians and Azerbaijanis.
1991 Jan 16, The White House
announced the start of Operation Desert Storm to drive Iraqi forces
out of Kuwait. President Bush said in a nationally broadcast address
“the battle has been joined" as fighter bombers pounded Iraqi
targets. Because of the time difference, it was early January 17th
in the Persian Gulf when the attack began. At 4:30 P.M. EST, the
first fighter aircraft are launched from Saudi Arabia and off of
U.S. and British aircraft carriers in the Persian Gulf on bombing
missions over Iraq.
(AP, 1/16/01)(MC, 1/16/02)
1992 Jan 16, Officials of the
government of El Salvador and rebel leaders signed a pact in Mexico
City ending 12 years of civil war that had left at least 75,000
1993 Jan 16, US Attorney
General-designate Zoe Baird and her husband paid a $2,900 fine for
employing illegal aliens in their home. Controversy over the hirings
derailed her nomination.
1993 Jan 16, Glenn Corbett
(63), US actor (Shenandoah, Chisum, Midway), died.
1994 Jan 16, President Clinton
held marathon talks in Geneva with Syrian President Hafez Assad, who
offered Israel "normal, peaceful relations" in exchange for land.
1994 Jan 16, In Moscow, Yegor
Gaidar, first deputy prime minister and architect of Russia's market
reforms, announced his resignation.
1995 Jan 16, In Union, S.C., a
prosecutor announced he would seek the death penalty for Susan
Smith, the woman accused of drowning her sons, 3-year-old Michael
and 14-month-old Alex. Smith was later convicted of murder and
sentenced to life in prison.
1996 Jan 16, Chechens hijacked
a ferry with 165 passengers and crew from the Turkish port of
Trabzon bound for the Russian city of Sochi. Gunmen in Trabzon,
Turkey, hijacked a Black Sea ferry with more than 200 people on
board, and demanded that Russian troops stop fighting Chechen rebels
in Pervomayskaya. The hostages were released three days later after
the Russian troops stormed Pervomaiskoye.
(WSJ, 1/17/96, p.A-1)(AP, 1/16/01)
1997 Jan 16, Enis Cosby (27),
son of Bill Cosby, was murdered in Los Angeles while changing a tire
in an apparent roadside robbery. A Ukrainian émigré teenager, Mikail
Markhasev, was picked up and charged for the murder in March. Eli
Zakaria and girlfriend Sara Peters were in a car with Markhasev.
Markhasev was convicted and sentenced to life in prison. Markhasev
admitted his guilt in 2001 and made a public apology.
(SFC, 2/1/97, p.E4)(WSJ, 3/14/97, p.A1)(SFC,
3/15/97, p.A3)(AP, 1/16/98)(SFC, 6/27/98, p.A5)(WSJ, 8/12/98,
p.A1)(WSJ, 2/12/00, p.A1)
1997 Jan 16, In Atlanta, two
bomb blasts an hour apart rocked a building containing an abortion
clinic, injuring six people.
(SFC, 1/17/97, p.A1)(AP, 1/16/98)
1997 Jan 16, Maurice Strong,
Canadian millionaire businessman and environmentalist, was appointed
by Kofi Annan to coordinated UN reform for a salary of $1 per year.
(SFC, 1/17/97, p.A14)
1997 Jan 16, In the SF Bay Area
Peninsula Open Space Trust negotiated an agreement to purchase 1,626
acres of Bair Island for $15 million from Redwood Shores Properties.
The land would be restored to marshland with no billboards. The
Peninsula Open Space Trust was formed in this year to purchase and
set aside land for open space.
(SFC, 1/16/96, p.A1)(SFC, 4/8/99, p.A19)(SFC,
1997 Jan 16, In Haiti strikes
swept the country and protestors demanded the resignation of premier
Rosny Smarth and an end to IMF-backed austerity measures..
(WSJ, 1/17/97, p.A1)
1997 Jan 16, Israeli soldiers
dismantled their military headquarters in Hebron, marking the
beginning of the end of Israel's 30-year-old rule in the West Bank
city. A 5th of the city where 500 militant settlers live will
maintain a force of some 2,500.
(SFC, 1/17/97, p.A12)(AP, 1/16/98)
1998 Jan 16, Texas settled with
the tobacco industry for $15.3 billion.
(SFC, 1/17/98, p.A6)(AP, 1/16/99)
1998 Jan 16, NASA officially
announced that John Glenn, the first American to orbit the Earth,
would fly aboard the space shuttle later in the year.
1998 Jan 16, Baltic leaders
signed an agreement, the US-Baltics Charter of Partnership, at the
White House strengthening US and NATO ties with Latvia, Lithuania,
and Estonia. The leaders also established a $15 million fund with
equal contributions from the Agency for Int’l. Development and
George Soros to promote nongovernmental organizations (NGOs).
(WSJ, 1/16/98, p.A1)(SFC, 1/17/98, p.A8)
1998 Jan 16, In El Salvador
Israel Job Pineda, a fisherman in La Herradura, was shot and killed
by a pirate intruder. Pirates had become a growing threat to the
local shrimp fisherman. Police later arrested nine fishermen linked
to the attack.
(SFEC, 2/8/98, p.A26)
1998 Jan 16, In Germany the
Bonn Parliament took steps to allowing private phones to be bugged.
The Bundestag (lower house) voted to secure a 2/3 majority needed to
change the constitution to give police greater powers.
(SFC, 1/17/98, p.A8)
1998 Jan 16, In Guatemala 13
college students and 3 faculty members from St. Mary's College of
Maryland were robbed and 5 women were raped after their bus was
ambushed near Santa Lucia. 4 suspects were later arrested and 3 more
were sought by police. In 1999 three men, Cosbi Gamaliel Ortiz (38),
Rony Leonel Polanco Sil (29) and Reyes Guch Ventura (25), were
convicted and sentenced to 28 years in prison.
(SFC, 1/19/98, p.A8)(SFC, 2/9/99, p.A8)
1998 Jan 16, From Indonesia it
was reported that Pres. Suharto and his six children have an
estimated net worth of $40 billion, equal to about half the
country’s gross domestic product.
(SFC, 1/16/98, p.B3)
1998 Jan 16, In Kenya the WHO
recommended that travelers take precautions against Rift Valley
Fever, a mosquito born disease that has killed 300 people.
(SFC, 1/17/98, p.A10)
1998 Jan 16, It was reported
that Nevis planned to withdraw from St. Kitts if 2/3 of the voters
approved a midyear referendum. The 9,000 citizens of Nevis lived on
36 square miles, while the 35,000 people of St. Kitts lived on 65
square miles. Nevisians were particularly upset about drug barons on
St. Kitts, especially Charles “Little Nut" Miller.
(SFC, 1/16/98, p.B2)
1998 Jan 16, In Turkey the
Islamist Welfare Party was banned by the Constitutional Court for
“activities against the secular regime." Former Welfare deputies
created the Virtue Party.
(SFC, 1/17/98, p.A1)(AP, 11/4/02)
1999 Jan 16, Closing three days
of opening arguments, House prosecutors demanded President Clinton's
removal from office, telling a hushed Senate that otherwise the
presidency itself may be "deeply and perhaps permanently damaged."
1999 Jan 16, Methodist
ministers in Sacramento, Ca., blessed the union of 2 lesbians in
contradiction to Church law.
(SFEC, 1/17/99, p.C1)
1999 Jan 16, The US and North
Korea opened talks on inspections of a suspected underground nuclear
(SFEC, 1/17/99, p.A10)
1999 Jan 16, In Kosovo 45
ethnic Albanians were found massacred at Racak. It was later
reported that the killing was ordered by senior Serbian officials,
who attempted to orchestrate a cover-up.
(SFEC, 1/17/99, p.A1)(SFC, 1/22/99, p.A10)(SFC,
2000 Jan 16, In Kosovo an
American soldier, Staff Sgt. Frank J. Ronghi (35), was charged with
the rape and murder of an 11-year-old Albanian girl.
(SFC, 1/17/00, p.A10)(WSJ, 1/17/00, p.A1)
2000 Jan 16, Nelson Mandela
addressed peace talks in Arusha, Tanzania, and admonished the
leaders of Burundi for having failed their people and all of Africa.
(SFC, 1/20/00, p.A12)
2000 Jan 16, In Chechnya
Russian warplanes bombarded the area around Grozny and federal
forces reported 120 rebels killed. Islamic militants reported at
least 18 civilians killed.
(SFC, 1/17/00, p.A10)
2000 Jan 16, In Chile Socialist
Ricardo Lagos (61) won the presidential elections in a 51.3% to
48.7% vote over Joaquin Lavin, a former aide to Gen. Pinochet.
(SFC, 1/17/00, p.A10)(WSJ, 1/17/00, p.A1)
2000 Jan 16, In Colombia at
least 13 guerrillas were killed in Bolivar state. Rebel bombings of
power lines left Medellin out of power for several hours. Rebels
blew up 22 high-voltage pylons that took out power in Antioquia,
Choco and Cordoba provinces.
(SFC, 1/18/00, p.A9)(WSJ, 1/18/00, p.A1)
2000 Jan 16, Prince Ernst
August of Hannover (b.1954), a great-grandson of the last German
emperor, Wilhelm II, slapped hotel owner Josef Brunlehner on Lamu
Island, Kenya, allegedly as a symbolic reproach over noise from a
disco. He was pursued in Germany where the law allows prosecutors to
charge citizens who commit crimes abroad. August was convicted in
2004 and fined $633,000. In 2010 August was retried on charges of
causing serious bodily harm. On march 9, 2010, a German judge
sentenced Prince August to pay a fine of euro200,000 ($270,000)
after convicting him for the decade-old altercation.
(AP, 1/13/10)(SFC, 1/14/10,
2000 Jan 16, In Lhasa, Tibet,
Soinam Puncog (2), was designated the 7th Reting Lama in a ceremony
presided over by Chinese authorities.
(SFC, 1/18/00, p.A8)
2000 Jan 16, In Uganda a
weekend rebel attack by Allied Democratic Forces killed 25 civilians
and 3 soldiers at the Kirindi camp, 186 miles west of Kampala.
(SFC, 1/18/00, p.A12)
2001 Jan 16, Dave Winfield and
Kirby Puckett were elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame on their
2001 Jan 16, Confirmation
hearings for Attorney General-designate John Ashcroft opened in
Washington with Senate Democrats throwing jabs at him over abortion
and civil rights.
2001 Jan 16, Leonard Woodcock,
former head of the United Auto Workers union, died in Ann Arbor,
Mich., at age 89.
2001 Jan 16, In China the
Shenzhou II unmanned space craft landed after 108 orbits.
(WSJ, 1/17/01, p.A1)
2001 Jan 16, In Congo Pres.
Kabila was assassinated by one of his bodyguards, Rashidi Kasereka,
who was immediately killed. In 2003 a military court sentenced 26
people to death for the assassination.
(SFC, 1/17/01, p.A1)(SFC, 1/24/01, p.A12)(SFC,
2001 Jan 16, The Ecuadoran
tanker Jessica with 243,000 gallons of fuel, ran aground on San
Cristobal island in the Galapagos and began leaking fuel 3 days
(SFC, 1/20/01, p.A11)(SFC, 1/22/01, p.A10)
2001 Jan 16, In Kashmir 11
people died when militants attacked the airport at Srinagar. The
Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba guerrillas claimed responsibility.
The group was later banned in Pakistan but reappeared under the name
(SFC, 1/17/01, p.A11)(Econ, 7/29/06, p.39)
2001 Jan 16, Luther and Johnny
Htoo, twin adolescent leaders of an ethnic Karen rebel group in
Myanmar, surrendered to Thai border police.
(WSJ, 1/17/01, p.A1)
2001 Jan 16, In the Philippines
the prosecution against Pres. Estrada quit after the Senate voted to
deny access to crucial evidence.
(SFC, 1/17/01, p.A10)
2001 Jan 16, In Sri Lanka a
government offensive left 41 people dead including 22 rebels and 18
(SFC, 1/17/01, p.A11)
2002 Jan 16, Richard Reid, the
al Qaeda trained shoe-bomber, was indicted on 9 counts in Boston.
Reid pleaded guilty Oct 4.
(SFC, 1/17/02, p.A1)(AP, 10/4/02)
2002 Jan 16, Mokhtar Haouari
was sentenced to 24 years in prison for providing fake ID and $3,000
to Ahmed Ressam in 1999. Ressam planned to detonate explosives at
the LA Int’l. Airport during millennium celebrations.
(SFC, 1/17/02, p.A12)
2002 Jan 16, Four former SLA
members, Sara Jane Olson, William Harris, Emily Harris and Michael
Bortin, were arrested in California for the 1975 slaying of Myrna
(SFC, 1/17/02, p.A1)
2002 Jan 16, In Grundy, Va.,
Peter Odighizuwa shot and killed the dean, a professor and a student
at the Appalachian School of Law following suspension due to low
grades. He was later found incompetent to stand trial.
(SFC, 1/17/02, p.A3)(AP, 1/16/03)
2002 Jan 16, In Afghanistan
Hamid Karzai issued a decree that banned the cultivation of opium
(SFC, 1/17/02, p.A12)
2002 Jan 16, In Cyprus rival
leaders, Glafcos Clerides and Rauf Denktash, met on the border in
Nicosia in the 1st formal negotiation in 4 years.
(SFC, 1/17/02, p.A8)
2002 Jan 16, In Indonesia a
Boeing 737-300 with 60 people crash-landed on a river in Java. One
person was killed and 23 injured.
(SFC, 1/17/02, p.A10)
2002 Jan 16, In Pakistan the
government announced electoral reforms and freed non-Muslims to vote
along with the Islamic majority. Lower house seats were increased to
350 from 237 and college graduation was made a requirement for
(SFC, 1/17/02, p.A13)
2002 Jan 16, Pakistan police
arrested 5 al Qaeda members in Punjab province as they attempted to
flee disguised under burqas.
(SFC, 1/18/02, p.A18)
2002 Jan 16, In the West Bank a
Palestinian killed another Palestinian, who was mistaken for an
(SFC, 1/17/02, p.A11)
2003 Jan 16, The Bush
administration urged the Supreme Court to strike down admissions
policies at the University of Michigan and its law school, arguing
that university admissions programs that gave an edge to minority
students were unconstitutional.
2003 Jan 16, The US government
announced that men from Bangladesh, Egypt, Jordan, Indonesia and
Kuwait will be subject to fingerprints, photographs and interviews
in addition to men from 18 other Arab and Muslim countries.
(SFC, 1/16/03, p.A6)
2003 Jan 16, AOL Time Warner
chief executive Dick Parsons was tapped to be the media
conglomerate's new chairman, succeeding Steve Case.
2003 Jan 16, Microsoft
announced its 1st dividend along with a stock split.
(SFC, 1/17/03, p.A1)
2003 Jan 16, The shuttle
Columbia carried a crew of 7 for a 16-day mission. Col. Ilan Ramon
was aboard as Israel's 1st astronaut. The mission ended in tragedy
on Feb. 1, when the shuttle broke up during its return descent,
killing all seven crew members.
(SFC, 1/17/03, p.A2)(AP, 1/16/04)
2003 Jan 16, Argentina reached
a preliminary agreement with the International Monetary Fund to
2003 Jan 16, In Brazil
mudslides killed at least 36 people in Minas Gerais and Espirito
(SFC, 1/17/03, p.A10)(AP, 1/18/03)
2003 Jan 16, In Colombia a car
bomb exploded outside the attorney general's office in Medellin,
killing three people and wounding at least 19. Gunmen entered the
tiny village of Dos Quebradas and killed a dozen people, leaving
surviving villagers terrified and waiting for government forces to
arrive. At least 16 people were killed by FARC rebels in villages
around San Carlos.
(AP, 1/16/03)(AP, 1/18/03)(AP, 1/19/03)
2003 Jan 16, The European
Union's Court of Justice ordered Spain and Italy to drop national
rules on what constitutes chocolate, saying they can no longer bar
British and Irish confections made with vegetable fats instead of
2003 Jan 16, In Greenland
Premier Hans Enoksen, head of the social democratic Siumut party,
struck a deal with the island's liberal Atassut party. 2 days
earlier Enoksen evicted the left-wing Inuit Ataqatigitt party,
leaving the Arctic island of 56,000 without a government. A spat had
developed over the use of a healer to chase away evil spirits from
2004 Jan 16, Pres. Bush
sidestepped Congress and installed Mississippi judge Charles
Pickering to the federal appeals court after a two-year battle
filled with racial, religious and regional argument.
2004 Jan 16, Paul Bremmer, the
U.S. administrator in Iraq, said the US will revise its plan to
create self-rule in Iraq, following consultations with President
2004 Jan 16, The US Army
awarded Halliburton a 2-year contract worth up to $1.2 billion to
rebuild the oil industry in southern Iraq.
(SFC, 1/17/04, p.A8)
2004 Jan 16, Pop star Michael
Jackson pleaded innocent to child molestation charges during a court
appearance in Santa Maria, Calif. The judge scolded Jackson for
being 21 minutes late.
2004 Jan 16, Starbucks opened
its 1st coffee shop in France.
(Econ, 1/17/04, p.67)
2004 Jan 16, Bone-chilling
arctic winds and record low temperatures swept the US Northeast.
(WSJ, 1/16/04, p.A1)
2004 Jan 16, NASA said it would
not send another shuttle mission to service and repair the Hubble
(SFC, 1/17/04, p.A1)
2004 Jan 16, A Canadian
regulator ruled that a song lauding the joys of an "enormous penis"
is not obscene because the object of the lyric's affection isn't
2004 Jan 16, Kalevi Sorsa (73),
Finland's longest serving prime minister, died. Sorsa headed
four coalition governments from 1972 to 1987 and led the Social
Democrats, Finland's largest party, for 12 years.
2004 Jan 16, In Bombay, India,
activists gathered for the 6-day World Social Forum. The meeting,
which attracts activists, political workers and intellectuals from
around the world, is meant to be a counterpoint to the World
Economic Forum in Switzerland later this month.
2004 Jan 16, Hamas founder
Ahmed Yassin brushed off warnings by a top Israeli official that he
is "marked for death" and, in a defiant appearance at a Gaza City
mosque, and said his Islamic militant group will continue to attack
2005 Jan 16, At the 62nd annual
Golden Globe Awards winners included “The Aviator" for best drama
picture with Leonardo DiCaprio as best actor. Hillary Swank won the
best actress award for her role in “Million Dollar Baby."
(SFC, 1/17/05, p.D2)
2005 Jan 16, Acclaimed prison
journalist Wilbert Rideau spent his first full day of freedom after
being released from prison, where he'd spent nearly 44 years for the
1961 killing of Louisiana bank teller Julia Ferguson. During his
time in prison Rideau received national fame for his work editing
the prison newspaper, the Angolite. In 2010 Rideau authored “In the
Place of Justice: A Story of Punishment and Deliverance."
(AP, 1/16/06)(SSFC, 5/2/10, p.F2)
2005 Jan 16, Marjorie Williams
(b.1958), American journalist and political writer, died of liver
cancer. In 2008 her husband Timothy Noah published “Reputation:
Portraits in Power," an anthology of her work.
2005 Jan 16, The US military
freed 81 Afghan prisoners, and the Afghan government was negotiating
the release of hundreds more from American custody.
(AP, 1/16/05)(WSJ, 1/17/05, p.A1)
2005 Jan 16, Algeria's
government signed an agreement to end years of conflict with the
restive Berber minority, pledging to accept long-standing demands
including greater recognition of the Berber language.
2005 Jan 16, Australian born
and bred Charlie Bell (44), the first non-American to head the
McDonald's chain of 30,000 burger restaurants in 119 countries, died
in Sydney from cancer.
2005 Jan 16, Croatians returned
to the polls for presidential runoff. Pres. Stipe Mesic won a 2nd
term in the runoff election with 66% of the vote.
2005 Jan 16, Indonesia
increased its tsunami death toll by 5,000, raising the overall
number of people who died in the Dec. 26 disaster to more than
2005 Jan 16, In Iraq a total of
17 people were killed in the Baghdad area, including three Iraqi
policemen and three Iraqi National Guard soldiers killed in separate
attacks. As mourners gathered for the policemen's funeral, a suicide
bomber killed another seven people.
2005 Jan 16, A 25-hour
stand-off between Islamic guerrillas and Indian forces in Srinagar,
Kashmir, ended after two militants holed up inside an indoor stadium
were killed by troops.
2005 Jan 16, The first Kuwaiti
released from Guantanamo Bay was taken into government custody after
he arrived home.
2005 Jan 16, A top PLO
decision-making body called on Palestinian militants to halt attacks
against Israel, charging that the violence gives Israel an excuse to
carry out military operations.
2005 Jan 16, Qatar Gas
Transport planned the country’s largest share flotation. They
recently unveiled a large LNG project with Exxon.
(Econ, 1/8/05, p.54)
2005 Jan 16, A 66-year-old
Romanian woman became the world's oldest woman recorded to give
birth when she delivered a daughter by cesarean section.
2005 Jan 16, In Russia protests
by retirees against the loss of welfare benefits swept President
Vladimir Putin's home city for the second straight day.
2005 Jan 16, The armed Basque
separatist group ETA threw its weight behind an initiative by its
political wing to open dialogue with the Spanish government on
solving the Basque problem.
2005 Jan 16, The Sudanese
government and an alliance of opposition groups reached a tentative
agreement on Sudan's political future that builds on a peace accord
already signed with southern rebels.
2006 Jan 16, The Palestinian
film "Paradise Now," which explores the lives of a pair of suicide
bombers, won the Golden Globe for best foreign film. "Brokeback
Mountain" won four Golden Globes, including best motion picture
drama; "Lost" won best dramatic television series while "Desperate
Housewives" won for best musical or comedy series.
(AP, 1/17/06)(AP, 1/16/07)
2006 Jan 16, A suicide bomber
on a motorbike drove up to a crowd watching a wrestling match in
Spin Boldak, an Afghan border town, killing 23 people and wounding
at least 30 others. A bomb hit a convoy of Afghan army trucks loaded
with troops as they were driving through Kandahar, killing four
people and wounding 16.
(AP, 1/16/06)(SSFC, 7/30/06, p.A18)
2006 Jan 16, A lawyer told a
government inquiry that Australia's wheat exporter, AWB Ltd.,
knowingly provided hundreds of millions of dollars in kickbacks to
Saddam Hussein's regime and deceived the United Nations about the
payments under the oil-for-food program.
2006 Jan 16, Chinese state
media reported that foreign currency reserves rose 34% last year to
a record $818.9 billion.
(SFC, 1/17/06, p.C5)
2006 Jan 16-2006 Jan 18, In
southwestern China workers protesting the sale of a factory in
Chengdu clashed for three days with baton-wielding police. According
to Boxun.com, an overseas-hosted Chinese-language Web site, the
factory was worth $37 million, but was going to be sold for $9.9
2006 Jan 16, Colombia's
president ordered an investigation into allegations that outlawed
paramilitary groups have infiltrated congressional campaigns using
illegal drug money.
2006 Jan 16, In Strasbourg,
France, demonstrators fought with police and smashed windows at the
European Parliament building during a protest over a proposal to
make port operations in the European Union more competitive.
2006 Jan 16, A US-registered
private jet crashed in the French Alps outside Bourdeau and 4 people
2006 Jan 16, State radio
reported that Iran has allocated the equivalent of $215 million for
the construction of what would be its second and third nuclear power
2006 Jan 16, In Baghdad, Iraq,
a car bomb detonated next to a police convoy, killing a 6-year-old
child and five police officers. A US military helicopter crashed
north of Baghdad killing the two crew members. It was the third
American chopper to go down in 10 days.
2006 Jan 16, Israeli police
seized buildings and rooftops in a Jewish settler enclave in Hebron,
restoring order after three days of riots sparked by plans to evict
Israeli squatters from an abandoned Palestinian market.
2006 Jan 16, Galymzhan
Zhakiyanov (41), a Kazakh opposition leader jailed for more than
three years, returned home, to the cheers of hundreds of supporters.
The leader of the now-disbanded Democratic Choice party, was
sentenced to seven years in prison in 2002 on abuse-of-office
2006 Jan 16, Ellen Johnson
Sirleaf pledged a "fundamental break" with Liberia's violent past as
she was sworn in as president, carving her name into history as
Africa's first elected female head of state.
2006 Jan 16, In Mongolia some
2,000 people gathered in the main square of Ulan Bator, demanding
their president resign.
2006 Jan 16, Deputy PM
Alexander Zhukov said more money entered Russia than left it last
year for the first time in the country's post-Soviet history.
2006 Jan 16, Turkish health
officials said preliminary tests have confirmed that a girl (12) who
died was infected with the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu, raising
Turkey's death toll to four.
2007 Jan 16, The US Senate
voted to shine more light on thousands of expensive pet projects
buried in legislation after the new Democratic majority bowed to a
successful push by Republicans to make new disclosure rules even
tougher than originally planned.
2007 Jan 16, Sen. Barack Obama
(D-Ill.) launched his bid for the White House.
2007 Jan 16, Ron Carey
(b.1935), TV and film actor, died in Los Angeles. He played Officer
Carl Levitt in the Barney Miller (1976-1982) TV sitcom. His 15
movies included “High Anxiety" (1977) and “History of the World:
Part I" (1981), both with Mel Brooks.
(SFC, 1/23/07, p.B4)
2007 Jan 16 Pookie Hudson (72),
lead singer for the Spaniels doo-wop group, died in Capitol Heights,
2007 Jan 16, In southern
Afghanistan NATO-led troops and Afghan forces detained a prominent
Taliban commander during a raid on a compound.
2007 Jan 16, Canadian Trade
Minister David Emerson signed a technology deal with China, on a
visit aimed at reinvigorating relations with the Asian superpower
that have been dented by Canada's blunt talk on human rights.
2007 Jan 16, Chinese search
engine Baidu.com and EMI Music launched an Internet venture that
will let users listen to streaming music for free, adding to Baidu's
growing entertainment business.
2007 Jan 16, Colombian police
found about $19 million belonging to a drug trafficking group buried
under a house in the southwestern city of Cali. On Jan 12 police
found $16 million hidden in a modest house in Cali.
2007 Jan 16, The European
Parliament elected German conservative Hans-Gert Poettering as
president of the chamber to replace outgoing Spanish Socialist Josep
2007 Jan 16, Indian PM Manmohan
Singh reiterated his government's offer for talks with separatist
rebels in restive northeast Assam state after recent violence left
73 people dead.
2007 Jan 16, An Indonesian
passenger train jumped its tracks, sending a crowded rail car
plunging nearly 20 feet near the central Javanese town of
Purwokerto. Five people were reported killed and more than 250
2007 Jan 16, Baghdad was struck
by two bombings apparently targeting Shiite neighborhoods one near a
university as students were leaving classes for the day that killed
at least 31, and another at a used motorcycle marketplace that
killed at least 15 people. The death toll across Iraq approached 150
including four who died when a roadside bomb struck a police patrol
in a predominantly Shiite area of downtown Baghdad. Gianni
Magazzeni, the chief of the UN Assistance Mission for Iraq in
Baghdad, said 34,452 civilians were killed and 36,685 were wounded
(AP, 1/16/07)(WSJ, 1/17/07, p.A1)
2007 Jan 16, In Israel Abir
Aramin, a 10-year-old Palestinian girl, was hit by a rubber-coated
bullet as she stood some distance from a demonstration. She died two
days later in a Jerusalem hospital. In 2010 a Jerusalem court
decided in a ruling that the Israeli state was responsible for the
death of the girl. In 2011 an Israeli court ordered the government
to pay $432,000 to the family of Abir.
2007 Jan 16, In Kenya deaths
due to Rift Valley fever (hemorrhagic fever) had climbed to at least
95 for the past month.
2007 Jan 16, Pedro Diaz Parada,
a drug cartel leader, was arrested in the southern state of Oaxaca
and taken to Mexico City. This was the first major drug arrest under
the administration of President Felipe Calderon.
2007 Jan 16, King Mohammed VI
of Morocco launched work on a major road linking Fez to the Algerian
border as part of construction on a north African highway stretching
from Mauritania to Libya. Construction of the 328-kilometer road
(204-mile) from Fez to the eastern city of Oudja, on the border with
Algeria, is expected to cost 820 million euros (one billion
2007 Jan 16, Royal Dutch Shell
evacuated staff from two oil installations in southern Nigeria and
the military boosted troop levels in the volatile area after a dozen
village elders were killed in a riverboat attack.
2007 Jan 16, Pakistan's army
destroyed suspected al-Qaida hideouts in an airstrike near the
Afghan border, killing 10 people. A resident said the slain men were
2007 Jan 16, In the Philippines
Jainal Antel Sali Jr. (41), popularly known as Abu Sulaiman, a top
al-Qaida-linked militant, was killed. He was accused of kidnapping
three Americans in 2001 and of masterminding one of Southeast Asia's
worst terror attacks three years later. DNA evidence soon confirmed
(AP, 1/17/07)(AP, 1/20/07)
2007 Jan 16, Russia said it had
delivered new anti-aircraft missile systems to Iran and would
consider further requests by Tehran for defensive weapons.
2007 Jan 16, Spanish court
officials said Spain has issued an international arrest warrant for
three US soldiers after reopening a murder investigation into the
killing of Spanish television cameraman Jose Couso in Iraq on Apr
2007 Jan 16, In Sri Lanka
fierce clashes for control of a stretch of rebel-held-land in
eastern Batticaloa district left at least 16 dead. The military said
it lost four soldiers and that 29 more were wounded during the
battle. A pro-rebel Web site said only 12 guerrillas died. TamilNet
said 40 Sri Lankan soldiers were killed.
2007 Jan 16, Rebels said
Sudanese government planes bombed Darfur rebel areas despite a
2007 Jan 16, Benon Sevan (69)
of Cyprus, former UN oil-for-food chief, was charged with taking a
$160,000 bribe to influence who could buy Iraqi oil during the $64
billion program that ran from 1996-2003. This brought to 14 the
number of people charged in the case.
(WSJ, 1/17/07, p.A6)
2008 Jan 16, CIA analyst Tom
Donahue disclosed that criminals have been able to hack into
computer systems via the Internet and cut power to several cities
outside the US. He offered few specifics on what actually went
2008 Jan 16, US District Judge
Charles Breyer sentenced Gregory Reyes, former CEO of Brocade
Communications Systems Inc., to 21 months in prison and fined him
$15 million for ordering options grants to employees to be changed
to look as though they were made on days when the stock's value was
lower. On March 26, 2010, Reyes was convicted in a 2nd jury trial
over backdating employee stock options.
(AP, 1/16/08)(SFC, 3/27/10, p.D1)
2008 Jan 16, A US District
court in Kansas City, Mo., unsealed a 42-count indictment that
accused the Islamic Relief Agency of paying Mark Deli Siljander, a
former Michigan congressman (1981-1987), $50,000 for lobbying funds
that were sent to terrorists.
(SFC, 1/17/08, p.A4)
2008 Jan 16, In Georgia 2
off-duty DeKalb County police officers were killed in what appeared
to be an ambush at an apartment complex in what residents described
as a high-crime neighborhood.
2008 Jan 16, BEA Systems
accepted an $8.5 billion offer to be acquired by Oracle Corp.
(SFC, 1/17/08, p.C1)
2008 Jan 16, Sun Microsystems
agreed to buy MySQL AB, a Swedish-based database firm, for $1
(SFC, 1/17/08, p.C3)
2008 Jan 16, Texas was ranked
as the biggest polluter in the US, making it the 7th worst in the
world if it were its own nation.
(WSJ, 1/17/08, p.A1)
2008 Jan 16, A British cultural
organization accused Russian authorities of harassing its staff and
said it had temporarily closed its offices in St. Petersburg.
2008 Jan 16, Chile's congress
backed a pension reform bill to ensure the country's landmark social
security program for the first time covers every citizen.
2008 Jan 16, Pres. Bush visited
Egypt. Stalled reforms and bitterness over the jailing of hundreds
of dissidents haunted his visit. Bush promised to stay engaged in
pulling Israelis and Palestinians toward a peace pact by the end of
2008 Jan 16, In Iraq a woman
wearing a vest lined with explosives blew herself up near a popular
market and Shiite mosque in turbulent Diyala province, killing eight
civilians. Small arms fire killed 3 US soldiers conducting
operations in Salahuddin province.
2008 Jan 16, In Israel a
hawkish faction in PM Ehud Olmert's coalition pulled out of the
government, weakening him at a time when he needs broad support to
reach a peace deal with the Palestinians by the end of the year.
Israeli forces evacuated two makeshift settlement outposts in the
West Bank. Israeli aircraft targeting Palestinian rocket squads hit
a wrong vehicle killing a boy (12), along with his father and uncle.
(AP, 1/16/08)(SFC, 1/17/08, p.A10)
2008 Jan 16, Italian police
arrested scores of suspected mobsters in Palermo in the latest raid
on suspected Sicilian Mafia hideouts.
2008 Jan 16, Japan's whaling
fleet in the Antarctic halted its operations and scrambled to
arrange the turnover of two activists who boarded one of its harpoon
ships after a tense, high-seas chase, accusing the Sea Shepherd
conservation group of piracy.
2008 Jan 16, In Kenya police
fired tear gas and bullets to disperse thousands of protesters in
several cities at the start of three days of opposition rallies that
reignited post-election violence. At least one person was fatally
shot by police.
2008 Jan 16, In Morocco 16
people were killed and 30 injured when an apartment block being
built in Kenitra collapsed.
2008 Jan 16, In New Zealand
Hone Tuwhare (86), the first Maori poet to be published in English
and one of New Zealand's most celebrated verse writers, died.
2008 Jan 16, Niger authorities
formally charged two French journalists with threatening state
security for attempting to report on rebel groups in Niger's
volatile north, a crime punishable by death in the West African
2008 Jan 16, Russia warned
Kosovo's leaders that if they declare independence the territory
will never become a member of the UN or other international
2008 Jan 16, South Korea's
conservative president-elect Lee Myung-bak revealed plans to scrap
the government ministry that has preached reconciliation with North
Korea, after pledging to be tougher on Pyongyang than his liberal
2008 Jan 16, In southeastern
Sri Lanka a bomb and shooting attack blamed on Tamil separatists
ripped through a packed civilian bus, killing 27 people as the
government officially withdrew from a cease-fire with the rebels.
Commandoes advanced into rebel territory in Mannar and destroyed a
bunker, killing 4 female rebels. 9 rebels were killed in a clash
elsewhere in Mannar.
(AP, 1/16/08)(AP, 1/17/08)
2008 Jan 16, Turkey's PM
Erdogan challenged a ban on women wearing head scarves in
universities and public offices, saying there is no need to wait for
a constitutional change to remove the ban.
2008 Jan 16, Uzbekistan's
President Islam Karimov was sworn in for a third presidential term,
despite a constitutional two-term limit. Freedom House, a US-based
democracy watchdog, said in its annual report that Uzbekistan
remains among the world's most repressive societies.
2008 Jan 16, The UN Security
Council imposed sanctions on three Kuwaitis who allegedly help
finance al-Qaida operations and recruit fighters for the terrorist
network. The three men, Hamid Al-Ali, Jaber Al-Jalamah and Mubarak
Mushakhas Sanad Al-Bathali, will be added to a list of some 480
individuals and businesses with purported links to al-Qaida and the
2008 Jan 16, The Venezuelan
Observatory of Prisons said more than an inmate a day died violently
in Venezuela's crowded prisons last year. Some 498 prisoners were
killed in riots and other violent acts in 2007, up from 412 in 2006.
2009 Jan 16, A US government
watchdog said 83 of the nation's 100 largest corporations, including
Citigroup, Bank of America and News Corp., had subsidiaries in
offshore tax havens in 2007, and some of the companies received
federal bailout funding.
2009 Jan 16, The US Treasury
Dept. froze the assets of 4 key al-Qaida operatives including Saad
bin Laden, Osama bin Laden’s 3rd son. Mike McConnell, US Director of
National Intelligence, said Saad bin Laden is no longer under arrest
in Iran and is probably in Pakistan.
(WSJ, 1/17/09, p.A2)
2009 Jan 16, Citigroup said it
is splitting into two businesses as it reported a fourth-quarter net
loss of $8.29 billion, its fifth straight quarterly loss.
2009 Jan 16, Bank of America
Corp , posted its first quarterly loss in 17 years and slashed its
dividend, hours after winning a multibillion-dollar lifeline from
the US government to help absorb Merrill Lynch, which lost a record
$15.31 billion in the quarter.
2009 Jan 16, Kellogg Co. of
Battle Creek, Mich., recalled 16 products containing peanut butter
due to possible salmonella contamination as federal officials
confirmed contamination at a Georgia facility that ships peanut
products to 85 food companies. On Jan 21 federal health authorities
confirmed that peanut butter and paste made by a Virginia company
were the sole sources of the outbreak. The Blakely, Ga., facility
was owned by Peanut Corp. of America, based in Lynchburg, Va. In
2013 four former executives of Peanut Corp. were indicted for the
outbreak that left 9 people dead and hundreds sickened.
(SFC, 1/17/09, p.A2)(WSJ, 1/22/09, p.A4)(SFC,
2009 Jan 16, Circuit City, a
bankrupt electronics retailer based in Richmond, Va., said it failed
to find a buyer and will liquidate its 567 US stores resulting in
the loss of some 30,000 jobs. Circuit city’s last day of sales was
on March 8.
(SFC, 1/17/09, p.C1)(SFC, 3/9/09, p.B1)
2009 Jan 16, Artist Andrew
Wyeth (b.1917), American artist, died at his home in the
Philadelphia suburb of Chadds Ford. He had portrayed the hidden
melancholy of the people and landscapes of Pennsylvania's Brandywine
Valley and coastal Maine in works such as "Christina's World."
2009 Jan 16, In Afghanistan 10
people were killed and more than 30 others had to be rescued when
avalanches buried their vehicles in the Salang pass north of Kabul.
2009 Jan 16, An Algerian
customs officer was killed by armed Islamists west of Algiers. The
35-year-old official had his throat slit after being stopped at a
fake barricade put up and manned by about 10 armed Islamists at
Miliana near Ain Defla.
2009 Jan 16, Australia granted
asylum to 28 people from Afghanistan and Iran, in the first such
move since relaxing tough rules on asylum seekers.
2009 Jan 16, British pop star
Boy George (47) was sentenced to 15 months in jail for imprisoning a
Norwegian male escort (29) after a nude photoshoot. The singer and
disc jockey, who stood trial under his real name George O'Dowd,
admitted to police to handcuffing Audun Carlsen to his bed on April
28, 2007, as he investigated the Norwegian's alleged tampering with
2009 Jan 16, Farhad Hakimzadeh,
a wealthy US businessman with a passion for books about the Middle
East, was sentenced to two years in jail for stealing pages from
rare texts at two of Britain's most venerable libraries.
2009 Jan 16, John Mortimer
(b.1923), British lawyer and writer, died. He was the creator of the
curmudgeonly criminal lawyer Rumpole of the Bailey.
2009 Jan 16, In eastern Congo
the leader of a splinter rebel faction said his forces would stop
fighting the government and the two sides would work together to
battle Rwandan militias at the heart of the conflict. Ugandan
rebels, according to the UN, massacred 100 civilians in Tora, a
village in northeast Congo, the latest atrocity blamed on the
(AP, 1/16/09)(AP, 1/29/09)
2009 Jan 16, The EU threatened
new sanctions against Robert Mugabe's government in Zimbabwe, blamed
for political deadlock, a surging cholera epidemic and runaway
inflation. The UN said the death toll from the cholera outbreak had
risen to 2,201 and that the epidemic is still not under control.
2009 Jan 16, Frenchman Lluis
Colet broke the world record for the longest speech after rambling
nonstop for 124 hours about Spanish painter Salvador Dali, Catalan
culture and other topics.
2009 Jan 16, In India a herd of
nearly 150 hungry elephants rampaged through a village in the remote
northeast, trampling to death a young family as they slept in their
2009 Jan 16, In Iraq a Shiite
candidate for provincial elections was assassinated while
campaigning south of Baghdad, underscoring fears that political
rivalries will lead to a spike in violence ahead of a Jan. 31 vote.
2009 Jan 16, Israel said it was
close to winding up its offensive against Hamas, and diplomats in
Washington said the US will provide assurances on ending weapons
smuggling into Gaza as part of a cease-fire. More than 1,100
Palestinians have been killed since the war began on Dec. 27,
including 346 children. Khaled Mashaal, Hamas' political chief,
rejected Israeli conditions for a Gaza cease-fire and demanded an
immediate opening of the besieged territory's borders. Dr. Ezzeldeen
Abu al-Aish (Izzeldin Abuelaish) told Channel 10 that his house in
the northern Gaza strip town of Jebalia had been hit by Israeli
shells and his daughters, ages 22, 15 and 14, were killed along with
a neighbor girl. In 2011 Dr. Abuelaish authored “I Shall Not Hate: A
Gaza Doctor’s Journey on the Road to Peace and Human Dignity.
(AP, 1/16/09)(AP, 2/5/09)(Econ, 2/26/11, p.91)
2009 Jan 16, Kenya's president
declared the country's food crisis a national disaster and asked
international donors to contribute $406 million toward emergency
food aid. The US and Britain signed legal agreements with Kenya,
essentially extradition treaties, in which Kenya agreed to try
(AP, 1/16/09)(WSJ, 2/17/09, p.A8)
2009 Jan 16, In Lithuania
police used tear gas and rubber bullets to disperse some
7,000anti-government protesters throwing rocks and eggs at the
Parliament building. They had gathered to demonstrate against
unpopular reforms aimed at combating the Baltic state's deepening
economic crisis. The Finance Ministry announced it intended to
borrow 1 billion euros (US$1.3 billion) from the European Investment
Bank to help plug a yawning budget gap.
2009 Jan 16, Mauritania and
Qatar suspended contacts with Israel to protest the Gaza bloodshed
at an Arab summit that deepened the divisions between pro-US Arab
nations and their rivals in the Middle East.
2009 Jan 16, Mexico’s central
bank, the Bank of Mexico, cut its benchmark interest rate a half
point to 7.75%.
(Econ, 1/24/09, p.42)
2009 Jan 16, Nicaragua’s
Supreme Court overturned former President Arnoldo Aleman's
conviction and 20-year prison sentence for money laundering, ending
a long-running legal saga that has been colored by Nicaragua's
political landscape. Hours later Mr. Aleman’s Liberal Constitutional
Party ended a filibuster in the National Assembly and voted to let
the Sandinistas run the legislature’s affairs.
(AP, 1/16/09)(Econ, 2/21/09, p.40)
2009 Jan 16, South African
police and game park rangers said they have arrested 11 suspects in
an international rhinoceros poaching ring. Some of the rhinos had
their horns hacked from them while they were still alive.
2009 Jan 16, In South Korea
Yonhap news agency said Busan District Court handed a man named Lim
(42) a suspended 30-month sentence for raping his wife (25) at
knifepoint. It was the first time a man in traditionally
male-dominated South Korea has been convicted of marital rape. Lim
was found dead of apparent suicide on Jan 20.
(AP, 1/16/09)(AP, 1/20/09)
2009 Jan 16, The UN Security
Council unanimously adopted a resolution expressing its intention to
establish a UN peacekeeping force in Somalia, but putting off a
decision for several months in order to assess the volatile
situation in the Horn of Africa nation.
2009 Jan 16, In Venezuela a
takeover of the Caracas City Hall began violently when dozens of
armed Chavez supporters wearing ski masks stormed in after shooting
at the building and tying up security guards. Chavez backers
occupied the civil registry and other municipal buildings to protest
Ledezma's decision to cut them off the city payroll. Caracas Mayor
Antonio Ledezma took to working from an undisclosed friend's office.
2010 Jan 16, President Barack
Obama declared one of the largest relief efforts in US history to
help Haiti four days after an earthquake killed up to 200,000 people
and devastated the Caribbean nation's capital.
2010 Jan 16, A small boat
packed with illegal immigrants overturned off the San Diego coast at
Torrey Pines State Park. 2 people died and 5 were injured. 16
people, all Mexican citizens, were accounted for. On Jan 28 two men
were indicted on charges of illegal smuggling.
(SSFC, 1/17/10, p.A14)(SFC, 1/18/10, p.A6)(SFC,
2010 Jan 16, Afghanistan's
parliament rejected more than half of President Hamid Karzai's
second list of Cabinet nominees, including two of three women,
dealing him a fresh political blow as his government struggles to
face the growing Taliban threat. The Taliban kidnapped two Chinese
engineers and four Afghans accompanying them in the north of the
(AP, 1/16/10)(AFP, 1/17/10)
2010 Jan 16, A small part of
Antarctica turned green as the ice-covered continent's biggest wind
farm, which can generate enough electricity to power 500 homes, was
formally switched on in a joint New Zealand-US project on
Antarctica's Ross Sea coast.
2010 Jan 16, Egypt's largest
opposition movement, the Muslim Brotherhood announced its new
leader, Mohammed Badie (66), a member of the group's conservative
faction. He was chosen by the movement's 30-member international
council and becomes the group's eighth supreme leader since its
foundation in 1928.
2010 Jan 16, In Iraq gunmen in
a speeding car opened fire on a police checkpoint in the western
neighborhood of Baiyaa, killing two policemen.
2010 Jan 16, In Israel the
Yediot Ahronot daily reported that Lillian Peretz, who worked as the
Netanyahu family housekeeper in their beachside home in the town of
Caesaria for six years, has filed a lawsuit accusing Sara Netanyahu,
the Israeli prime minister's 3rd wife, of abusing her in the first
scandal to hit Benjamin Netanyahu's year-old administration. Peretz
claims Sara Netanyahu verbally abused her and forced her to change
clothes and shower several times a day to keep a "sterile"
environment. It also alleges she was paid less than minimum wage and
forced to work on the Jewish Sabbath even though she is an observant
(AP, 1/17/10)(Econ, 1/23/10, p.45)
2010 Jan 16, Mexican
authorities seized over 3 1/2 tons of pseudoephedrine, a chemical
used in the illicit manufacture of methamphetamine, found hidden in
a shipment of fire extinguishers at the Pacific coast seaport of
2010 Jan 16, Pakistan,
Afghanistan and Iran said they had agreed to work together more
closely to combat extremism, illegal weapons trading and drug
2010 Jan 16, In the Pakistani
section of Kashmir a suicide bomber attacked an army vehicle,
wounding two soldiers.
2010 Jan 16, In the Philippines
a fire raced through a slum near the main port Manila, leaving 4,000
people homeless and killing a 5-year-old girl.
2010 Jan 16, Senegal offered
free land to Haitians wishing to "return to their origins" following
this week's devastating earthquake, which has destroyed the capital
and buried thousands of people beneath rubble.
2010 Jan 16, Sudanese warplanes
and artillery pounded insurgents in the troubled western region of
2010 Jan 16, Venezuelan
authorities said they have captured Salomon Camacho Mora (65), a
prominent Colombian drug trafficker wanted by the United States.
Venezuelan intelligence and counter-drug agents captured Mora during
the past week in the city of Valencia.
2011 Jan 16, The 68th Golden
Globes ceremony gave 4 awards to the film “The Social Network," best
picture (drama), best director, best screenplay and best score.
Natalie Portman won best actress for her role in “Black Swan." Colin
Firth won best actor for his role in “The King’s Speech."
(SFC, 1/17/11, p.D1)
2011 Jan 16, In northern
Afghanistan a roadside bomb destroyed a car carrying nine people to
a wedding in Baghlan province, killing everyone inside including a
child. A joint Afghan and NATO force killed 3 more militants in
2011 Jan 16, In Brazil
survivors of mudslides that have killed 611 carried food, water and
blankets to friends, neighbors and relatives still stranded in
remote, stricken villages.
2011 Jan 16, Chinese President
Hu Jintao, ahead of a visit to Washington, urged an end to a "zero
sum" Cold War relationship with the United States and proposed new
cooperation, but resisted US arguments about why China should let
its currency strengthen.
2011 Jan 16, France's far-right
National Front party elected the daughter of its founder, Jean-Marie
Le Pen, as its new leader, who says she wants to broaden the appeal
of a party known best for its anti-immigration, anti-Islam platform.
2011 Jan 16, Greek authorities
said a ship carrying a reported 263 migrants has sunk west of the
island of Corfu and 22 passengers are missing. The passengers in the
ship were rescued by a Dutch cargo ship about seven hours after the
call that alerted the coast guard. The ship's captain reported he
took 241 people on board and that the Italy-bound Hasan Reis sank.
2011 Jan 16, Jean-Claude "Baby
Doc" Duvalier (59) returned to Haiti after nearly 25 years in exile.
The human rights groups Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch
issued statements urging Haiti to hold Duvalier accountable for the
torture and killing of civilians during his 15-year rule.
2011 Jan 16, The Int’l.
Campaign for Human Rights said Iran has hanged at least 47 prisoners
since Jan 1.
(SFC, 1/17/11, p.A2)
2011 Jan 16, In Iraq a bomb
planted near offices of the military wing of one of Iraq's dominant
Shiite political parties exploded, killing one worker and wounding
three people. The afternoon bomb followed two earlier explosions in
Baghdad that police and health officials said wounded 10 people
during the morning rush hour.
2011 Jan 16, Israeli
authorities said they are moving ahead with a new proposal to build
1,400 apartments in a contested part of Jerusalem, enraging
Palestinians who denounced the plan as another settler land grab.
2011 Jan 16, A Mauritania court
sentenced three women for keeping children in slave-like conditions.
The women included the mothers of the two girls, 10 and 14, and were
convicted of negligence and of participating in the exploitation of
minors for selling their children. Each woman was given six months'
imprisonment. Mauritania outlawed slavery in 2007.
2011 Jan 16, In Mexico City
Juan Vasconcelos, a reputed local gang assassin, killed 8 people. He
had allegedly gone on a cocaine- and alcohol-fueled killing spree
that ended with his arrest in February. His first attack left five
people dead on Jan. 8. Another killed eight people Jan. 16 and the
third left seven dead Feb. 13.
2011 Jan 16, In Paraguay a bomb
injured five people just before midnight in the third bombing in a
week. It raised alarm about increasing activity by the self-styled
Paraguayan People's Army. The leftist guerrilla group EPP soon
2011 Jan 16, A group of Saudi
activists launched a campaign, named My Country, to push the kingdom
to allow women to run in upcoming municipal election, scheduled this
2011 Jan 16, Southern Sudan's
Pres. Salva Kiir offered a prayer of forgiveness for northern Sudan
and the killings that occurred during a two-decade civil war, as the
first results from a weeklong independence referendum showed an
overwhelming vote for secession.
2011 Jan 16, Swiss
whistleblower Rudolf Elmer is planning to handover to WikiLeaks two
CDs containing data of around 2,000 bank clients who may have been
evading taxes, according to an interview published today.
2011 Jan 16, Syria’s first
American ambassador since 2005 arrived in Damascus at a time of
regional turmoil and with Syrian-US relations still mired in mutual
2011 Jan 16, Tunisian
authorities struggled to restore order, arresting the top
presidential security chief and trying to stop gunfights that
erupted across the capital. One clash broke out near Tunisia's main
opposition party building, another by the dreaded Interior Ministry.
2012 Jan 16, Bounty hunter
Leonard Padilla told paroled killer Loren Herzog that his partner in
crime, Wesley Shermantine, was prepared to disclose the location of
missing bodies and was trying to pin the murders on him. Hours later
Herzog was found dead in his Lassen County, Ca., trailer.
Investigators believed that the two men, dubbed the “speed freak
killers," killed as many as 19 people during a methamphetamine spree
in the 1980-1990s.
(SFC, 1/19/12, p.C6)
2012 Jan 16, Gelareh
Bagherzadeh (30), a Texas medical student well-known in her
community as an Iranian activist, was mysteriously shot and killed
in her car around midnight, just yards from her home in Houston.
2012 Jan 16, In southern
Afghanistan a civilian helicopter crashed, killing all three people
on board. Police said the Russian-made aircraft probably went down
because of a technical malfunction. At least 14 people died in
avalanches after heavy snowfall in the mountainous Badakhshan
(AP, 1/16/12)(AP, 1/17/12)
2012 Jan 16, An Algerian court
sentenced Nadji Abdelaziz (38), a former Guantanamo Bay detainee, to
three years in jail for membership of an extremist group active
2012 Jan 16, Belgian
authorities raided the administrative offices of three Catholics
bishops, part of an ongoing child abuse investigation that has
previously raised the ire of the Vatican and church officials.
2012 Jan 16, Britain's deputy
prime minister Nick Clegg accused Israel of carrying out "deliberate
vandalism" by continuing to build settlements on land the
Palestinians hope will form part of a future state.
2012 Jan 16, Canada charged
Navy Sub-Lieutenant Jeffrey Paul Delisle with giving "a foreign
entity" secret information between July 6, 2007 and Jan 13, 2012. He
was arrested in Halifax, Nova Scotia. On Jan 20 the Globe and Mail
newspaper said two diplomats and two technical staff at the Russian
embassy had been dropped from the official list of diplomatic,
consular and foreign government representatives recognized by
2012 Jan 16, Egypt’s Muslim
Brotherhood, the big winner in the first election since the ousting
of President Hosni Mubarak last February, said it has joined several
other parties in backing Saad el-Katatni. He's the secretary-general
of the Brotherhood's own party.
2012 Jan 16, El Salvador Pres.
Mauricio Funes apologized for the 1981 El Mozote massacre of 936
civilians in an army counterinsurgency operation. Funes also
commemorated the 20th anniversary of the 1992 peace accords that put
an end to the country's 12-year civil war.
2012 Jan 16, German dairy giant
Mueller Group said it has bought Britain's biggest supplier of fresh
milk, Robert Wiseman Dairies, for almost £280 million.
2012 Jan 16, In Haiti 29 people
died and 67 were injured after a truck's brakes failed and the
vehicle crashed on Route Delmas, one of the busiest streets of
2012 Jan 16, All 158 Peace
Corps volunteers in Honduras left the country, weeks after the
United States announced that it would pull them out for safety
2012 Jan 16, In India Khonra
Badshah, accused of making toxic home-brewed alcohol that killed 172
people, surrendered to authorities after a month-long hunt by
2012 Jan 16, In Indonesia 30
Pakistani and Afghan immigrants tunneled their way out of an
detention center in Surabaya using spoons, nails and wooden sticks.
Police soon arrested 11 of the escapees leaving 19 at large.
2012 Jan 16, In Iraq car bombs
ripped through Mosul and Hillah, killing at least 11 people.
2012 Jan 16, Israeli defense
officials said the Israeli and US militaries have postponed
large-scale war games, scheduled for April, in part to avoid
aggravating mounting tensions between the international community
and Iran over its disputed nuclear program.
2012 Jan 16, International
election monitors said that Kazakhstan's parliamentary election
failed to meet the fundamental principles of a democratic vote.
2012 Jan 16, The Maldives'
military arrested the chief justice of the country's criminal court
after he released an opposition leader who had been detained without
a warrant for allegedly defaming the government. A day later the
arrest of Judge Abdulla Mohamed prompted all courts to boycott
2012 Jan 16, Al-Qaida's North
African branch issued a new video that shows a Mauritanian officer
who was recently captured by the terror group during a raid in the
2012 Jan 16, Mexican
investigators detained three more women in the city of Guadalajara
in connection with an apparent child-trafficking ring that aimed to
supply babies to Irish couples. Authorities last week detained four
women and seized nine children, all of them between two months and
two years of age. At least 11 Irish couples are involved in the
case. On Jan 18 a Mexican official said four of 10 children seized
showed signs of sexual abuse.
(AP, 1/16/12)(AP, 1/18/12)
2012 Jan 16, In Mexico 7 gunmen
were killed following a pre-dawn shootout with police on a highway
in the city of Cuernavaca.
2012 Jan 16, Gustav Leonhardt
(b.1928), Dutch keyboard player and father of the early-music
movement, died in Amsterdam.
(Econ, 1/28/12, p.90)
2012 Jan 16, Nigerian unions
ended a week-old nationwide strike after President Goodluck Jonathan
agreed to lower petrol prices, while security forces shot into the
air and fired tear gas to disperse protesters. An unidentified
gunmen shot dead three Chadian builders and stole their mobile
phones in the northeastern city of Damaturu. 2 people were killed
when gunmen invaded their homes in Borno state.
(AFP, 1/16/12)(AFP, 1/17/12)(AP, 1/17/12)
2012 Jan 16, Pakistan's top
court found PM Yousuf Raza Gilani in contempt for failing to re-open
corruption cases, exacerbating a crisis likely to force early
2012 Jan 16, In the Philippines
a historic impeachment trial of the nation’s top judge began in one
of Pres. Benigno Aquino's boldest yet most divisive moves to tackle
pervasive corruption. Renato Corona was accused of violating the
constitution in his efforts to protect graft-tainted former
president Gloria Arroyo from prosecution, while also for allegedly
amassing a personal fortune above the limits of his salary.
2012 Jan 16, In Romania dozens
of demonstrators gathered in downtown Bucharest as PM Emil Boc
warned that violent protests, that left 59 injured over the weekend,
could jeopardize stability and economic growth.
2012 Jan 16, A hacker network
that claims to be based in Saudi Arabia paralyzed the websites of
Israel's stock exchange and national airline. El Al Israel Airlines
took down its website after hacker OxOmar, who has been linked to
the Saudi group, warned that both sites would be targeted by allied
2012 Jan 16, In southern
Somalia at least nine people were reportedly killed after jets
bombed an al-Shabab militant camp in the town of Afmadow.
2012 Jan 16, The South Korea
Customs Service said 8 men allegedly transformed $260,000 in gold
bars into small beads and smuggled them in their rectums to Japan
two times in 2010 to avoid import taxes.
2012 Jan 16, In South Sudan
members of the Murle community attacked a Lou Nuer community called
Duk Padiet in Jonglei state. 47 people were killed.
2012 Jan 16, The Sudanese Media
Center said intelligence officers have broken up a ring preparing to
smuggle Eritreans to Israel, just days after UN officials voiced
concern over the gangs.
2012 Jan 16, In Sudan rebels in
South Kordofan reportedly captured El-Ahmier, a key outpost near the
state capital. The country's armed forces denied even being in the
2012 Jan 16, In Syria an "armed
terrorist group" reportedly launched rocket-propelled grenades at an
army checkpoint, killing an officer and five army personnel about 6
miles (9 km) southwest of Damascus.
2012 Jan 16, In Thailand a
foreign suspect, identified as Atris Hussein, with alleged links to
Hezbollah militants led police to a warehouse filled with materials
commonly used to make bombs. Hussein, a Lebanese man, was carrying a
valid Swedish passport when he was arrested on Jan 12. On Sep 18,
2013, Hussein was convicted and sentenced to 2 years and 8 months
for illegal possession of ammonium nitrate.
(AP, 1/16/12)(SFC, 9/19/13, p.A4)
2012 Jan 16, In Yemen some 200
al-Qaida militants seized full control of Radda, a town 100 miles
south of the Yemeni capital Sanaa. They stormed the local jail and
freed 150-200 inmates, including an unspecified number of militants
loyal to al-Qaida. At least 3 people were killed in clashes with
soldiers and armed tribesmen.
2013 Jan 16, Pres. Obama signed
23 gun-related executive orders. One nominated acting ATF Director
B. Todd Jones to lead the agency permanently.
(SFC, 1/17/13, p.A12)
2013 Jan 16, The US federal
government grounded Boeing’s new 787s until the risk of battery
fires is addressed. The FAA emergency order affected only United
Airlines, the lone US carrier to operate the 787 Dreamliners.
(SFC, 1/17/13, p.A7)
2013 Jan 16, Chief Judge Royce
Lamberth of the US District Court ruled that Russia should pay a
$50,000 fine until it complies with his 2010 order to return
thousands of religious books and manuscripts stolen from Jews during
the Russian revolution and World War II to the Brooklyn-based
Chabad-Lubavitch group. Following Lamberth's 2010 ruling, Russia
completely halted the loan of its art treasures for exhibit in the
US, for fear that they would be seized and held hostage in the court
2013 Jan 16, In Afghanistan
Taliban suicide bombers in Kabul attacked the gates of the Afghan
intelligence agency, killing one person and wounding dozens. 6
suicide bombers died in the attack.
(AP, 1/16/13)(SFC, 1/17/13, p.A4)
2013 Jan 16, In Algeria gunmen
attacked the gas complex at Ain Amenas in retaliation for France's
military intervention against al-Qaida-linked rebels in neighboring
Mali. The attack was carried out by militants from across northern
Africa and two from Canada. Gas processing was stopped because of
the terrorist attack. The attack left 37 hostages and 29 militants
dead. Moktar Belmoktar (41), aka MBM, orchestrated the attack.
(AP, 1/16/13)(AP, 1/20/13)(AP, 1/21/13)(SFC,
2013 Jan 16, British PM David
Cameron condemned horse meat found in beef burgers sold by Tesco and
said this was likely to prove both embarrassing and costly for the
2013 Jan 16, A helicopter
crashed into a crane and fell on a crowded street in central London,
sending flames and black plumes of smoke into the air. The pilot and
one person on the ground were killed and 13 others injured.
2013 Jan 16, An Egyptian
prosecutor said ousted President Hosni Mubarak and his family paid
back 18 million Egyptian pounds ($3 million) for gifts they received
from a state newspaper while he was still in office.
2013 Jan 16, In Egypt an
8-story apartment building collapsed, killing 26 people in the
Mediterranean port city of Alexandria — the second tragic accident
in the country as many days.
(AP, 1/16/13)(AP, 1/17/13)
2013 Jan 16, French troops
pressed northward in Mali toward territory occupied by radical
Islamists. The start of the land assault put soldiers in direct
2013 Jan 16, Andre Cassagnes,
inventor and renowned kite maker, died in France. He was the
inventor of the Etch-a-Sketch toy (1959), which he sold to Ohio Art
(Econ, 2/16/13, p.90)
2013 Jan 16, A Germany court in
Regensburg fined British bishop Richard Williamson $2,400 for
denying the Holocaust in a television interview some 4 years ago.
(SFC, 1/17/13, p.A2)
2013 Jan 16, India and Pakistan
agreed to ease tensions in disputed Kashmir after recent clashes
2013 Jan 16, In northern Iraq a
suicide bomber driving a vehicle packed with explosives blew himself
up outside the offices of a major Kurdish party in Kirkuk killing at
least 19 people. A 3rd bomb at a nearby facility used by Kurdish
security forces killed 4 more. Morning attacks across the country
killed at least 33 people.
(AP, 1/16/13)(AP, 1/17/13)(SFC, 1/17/13, p.A5)
2013 Jan 16, Armed men hijacked
the ITRI, a Panamanian-flagged tanker carrying 5,000 tons of oil,
from the Ivory Coast port at Abidjan. Officials later located the
vessel off neighboring Ghana.
2013 Jan 16, Japan's two
leading airlines grounded their fleets of Boeing 787s after one of
the Dreamliner passenger jets made an emergency landing.
2013 Jan 16, In Jordan a civil
defense spokesman said a fire in a center for Syrian refugees has
killed seven members of a family.
2013 Jan 16, In Kenya hundreds
of demonstrators angered at the conduct of outgoing Kenyan
legislators doused 221 coffins with gasoline and set them on fire,
causing an inferno outside parliament's main entrance.
2013 Jan 16, A Kenyan official
said gunmen suspected to belong to Somalia's al-Qaida-linked rebels
have shot dead five people and seriously wounded three others at a
restaurant in Garissa town.
2013 Jan 16, In the Netherlands
Alexander Dolmatov (36), a rocket engineer who feared arrest in
Russia after an opposition protest turned violent in May, was taken
to the prison-like deportation center in Rotterdam. The next morning
he was found dead in his cell. Dutch authorities had denied his
asylum request on Dec 14.
2013 Jan 16, In Pakistan
several thousand people rallied in Peshawar, denouncing the killing
of 18 local villagers in an overnight raid in northwest Khyber
Pakhtunkhwa province, which they blamed on security forces.
2013 Jan 16, Somalia's most
dangerous militant group reportedly killed French hostage Denis
Allex, whom French military forces tried to rescue last weekend
during a botched raid. French officials have said they believe Allex
was killed the night of the raid and that claims by al-Shabab of an
execution were simply propaganda.
2013 Jan 16, In northern Syria
suicide bombers driving vehicles packed with explosives blew
themselves up near security targets, killing at least 22 people in
2013 Jan 16, Senior UN
investigators opened a new round of talks with Iranian officials in
Tehran in the hopes of restarting a probe into allegations that the
Islamic Republic carried out atomic bomb trigger tests and other
suspected weapons-related studies.
2013 Jan 16, In Yemen gunmen on
a motorcycle killed Col. Abdullah al-Mushki, the deputy police chief
of Damar, in a drive-by shooting south of the capital city of Sanaa.
2014 Jan 16, The Catholic
diocese of Stockton, Ca., filed for bankruptcy after pauing millions
of dollars to plaintiffs who made sexual abuse allegations during
the past two decades.
(SFC, 1/17/14, p.A8)
2014 Jan 16, Albrecht Muth
(49), an eccentric German who pretended to be an Iraqi general, was
convicted in DC of killing his socialite and journalist wife, Viola
Drath (91) in August, 2011. On April 30 Muth was sentenced to 50
years in prison.
(SFC, 1/17/14, p.A7)(SFC, 5/1/14, p.A8)
2014 Jan 16, Bud Spangler
(b.1938), jazz drummer, DJ and producer, died in Oakland, Ca.
(SFC, 1/20/14, p.C4)
2014 Jan 16, In northern
Indiana a man fatally shot two women in a grocery store and was
waving a gun at a kneeling store manager when police arrived and
killed the gunman in Elkhart.
(SFC, 1/17/14, p.A7)
2014 Jan 16, Judge Steven
Rhodes overseeing Detroit’s bankruptcy turned down a $169 compromise
with major banks saying the amount was too high.
(SFC, 1/17/14, p.A7)
2014 Jan 16, In Ohio Dennis
McGuire (53) was executed by a new combination of lethal drugs for
the 1989 rape and murder of Joy Stewart (22), who was pregnant. The
execution took nearly 25 minutes from injection to death and left
him gasping for air in the final minutes.
p.A5)(http://tinyurl.com/kdp2x6z)(SFC, 1/17/14, p.A8)
2014 Jan 16, In Utah 5 people
were found dead after co-workers reported that police officer Joshua
Boren (34) failed to show up for his shift at the Lindon Police
Dept. Boren had shot and killed his wife, mother-in-law and two
children before killing himself. Kelly Boren had just confronted her
husband about raping her and told him their marriage was over.
(SFC, 1/18/14, p.A4)(AP, 7/8/14)
2014 Jan 16, American actor
Russell Johnson (89), best known for his role a the Professor on
“Gilligan’s Island" (1964-1967), died at his home on Bainbridge
Island, Washington state.
(SFC, 1/17/14, p.D5)
2014 Jan 16, British police
working alongside counterparts in the Philippines and Australia said
they had dismantled a paedophile ring that streamed live sexual
abuse of Filipino children as young as six over the Internet, with
victims' parents involved in some cases.
2014 Jan 16, It was reported
that a study by Canadian researchers identified seven nations as the
top sources for global warming. The report said Brazil, Britain,
China, Germany, India, Russia and the US accounted for over 60% of
all heat-trapping gas emissions between 1750 and 2005.
(SFC, 1/16/14, p.C6)
2014 Jan 16, In the Central
African Republic at least 7 people were killed in overnight clashes
2014 Jan 16, Egypt's state
media said the new constitution was overwhelmingly approved in a
referendum. A senior official said an overwhelming majority of
Egyptians who voted on the country's new constitution have backed
the draft charter. An international monitoring group criticized the
clampdown ahead of the vote and said authorities had imposed "severe
limits" on freedom of expression.
(Reuters, 1/16/14)(AP, 1/16/14)
2014 Jan 16, Indian police said
that they were closing in on six homeless men in the Jan 14 gang
rape of a 51-year-old Danish tourist in New Delhi.
2014 Jan 16, Israeli air
strikes in the Gaza Strip overnight wounded a woman and four
children, with Israel saying it had struck in retaliation for rocket
2014 Jan 16, In Kenya an
explosive device blew up a trash can and part of the ceiling of the
Java House restaurant near the entrance of an international
departure terminal at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport.
Four suspects, including a man identified as a Somali diplomat, were
2014 Jan 16, In Lebanon a
suicide car bomber killed 3 people in a Hezbollah stronghold on the
northern border with Syria.
2014 Jan 16, Nigerian President
Goodluck Jonathan replaced his entire military leadership without
explanation as he struggles with an Islamist insurgency and
political crisis within his ruling party.
2014 Jan 16, In northwestern
Pakistan a bomb ripped through a crowded Sunni Islamic seminary,
killing seven people and wounding 55 at the Tableeghi Jamaat
religious school on the outskirts of Peshawar.
2014 Jan 16, Human Rights Watch
(HRW) released a report detailing atrocities in South Sudan and
warning that "appalling crimes have been committed against civilians
for no other reason than their ethnicity."
2014 Jan 16, In Spain Catalan
lawmakers voted in favor of asking for the right to hold a
referendum on independence.
2014 Jan 16, Supporters of
Ukrainian Pres. Viktor Yanukovich rammed a sweeping law through
parliament in an attempt to curb anti-government protests, sparking
an outcry from the opposition and raising tensions on the streets.
2014 Jan 16, In central Yemen
suspected al-Qaida militants attacked a military camp on the
outskirts of Radda. Militants killed 10 soldiers in three
simultaneous attacks on army positions in the central province of
(AP, 1/16/14)(AFP, 1/16/14)