Today in History

1141        Jan 31, Pope Innocent II authorized Bishop Henry of Moravia to preach Catholicism in Prussia. (LHC, 1/31/03)1560        Jan 31, Spanish king Philip II married Elisabeth de Valois. (MC, 1/31/02)1573        Jan 31, Giulio Cesare Monteverdi, composer, was born. (MC, 1/31/02)1606          Jan 31, Guy Fawkes (35), convicted for his part in the “Gunpowder Plot” against the English Parliament and King James I, was hanged, drawn and quartered. (AP, 1/31/98) (HN, 1/31/99)1620          Jan 31, Virginia colony leaders wrote to the Virginia Company in England, asking for more orphaned apprentices for employment. (HN, 1/31/99)1675        Jan 31, Cornelia Dina Olfaarts was found not guilty of witchcraft. (MC, 1/31/02)1679        Jan 31, Jean-Baptiste Lully’s opera “Bellerophon” premiered in Paris. (MC, 1/31/02)1696        Jan 31, An uprising of undertakers took place after funeral reforms in Amsterdam. (MC, 1/31/02)1734        Jan 31, Julien-Amable Mathieu, composer, was born. (MC, 1/31/02) 1734          Jan 31, Robert Morris, Declaration of Independence signer, was born. (HN, 1/31/99)1759        Jan 31, Francois Devienne, composer, was born. (MC, 1/31/02)1788          Jan 31, Charles Edward Stuart (67), The Young Pretender, died. (HN, 1/31/99) (MC, 1/31/02)1797          Jan 31, Franz Schubert, Austrian composer, was born in Lichtenthal, Austria. His works included the C Major Symphony and The Unfinished Symphony. (SFEC, 1/5/97, p.B11) (AP, 1/31/98) (HN, 1/31/99) (MC, 1/31/02)1804        Jan 31, British vice-admiral William Bligh (of HMS Bounty infamy) fleet reached Curacao (Antilles). (MC, 1/31/02)1828        Jan 31, Alexandros Ypsilanti (35), Greek resistance fighter, died. (MC, 1/31/02)1835        Jan 31, Richard Lawrence misfired at President Andrew Jackson (aka ‘Old Hickory’) at the White House. Lawrence fired 2 pistols at Pres. Andrew Jackson during funeral services for Rep. Warren Davis. Jackson wasn’t hit and Lawrence, who thought he was the king of England and that Jackson owed him money, was found to be insane. (SFC, 7/25/98, p.A6) (HN, 1/31/99) (SFC, 2/5/00, p.B3)1851        Jan 31, Gail Borden announced the invention of evaporated milk. (MC, 1/31/02)1863        Jan 31, The 1st South Carolina Volunteers, later called the 33rd U.S. Colored Troops was officially recognized. Components of the regiment had been in training since early 1962. (Smith., 4/95, p.14) (MC, 1/31/02)1865        Jan 31, The House of Representatives approved a constitutional amendment (121-24) abolishing slavery. It would become the 13th amendment to the US Constitution. It was ratified on December 6. (www.loc.gov/rr/program/bib/ourdocs/13thamendment.html)(WSJ, 7/16/01, p.A10) 1865          Jan 31, Gen. Robert E. Lee was named general-in-chief of the Confederate armies. (AP, 1/31/98)1868        Jan 31, Theodore William Richards (d.1928), chemist (atomic weights, Nobel-1914), was born. (WUD, 1994 p.1231) (MC, 1/31/02)1872        Jan 31, Zane Grey, American West novelist (Riders of the Purple Sage), was born. (MC, 1/31/02)1874        Jan 31, Jesse James gang robbed a train at Gads Hill, Missouri. (MC, 1/31/02)1882        Jan 31, Anna Pavlova, ballerina, choreographer, was born in St. Petersburg, Russia. (MC, 1/31/02)1891        Jan 31, Jean-Louis-Ernest Meissonier (b.1815), French academic painter, died. His painting “Friedland, 1807,” begun in 1863, was completed in 1875. (www.newadvent.org/cathen/10149a.htm)1895        Jan 31, Jose Marti and others left NYC for invasion of Spanish Cuba. (MC, 1/31/02)1900        Jan 31, Scottish peer Sir John Sholto Douglas (56), 8th Marquis of Queensberry, died. He supervised the formulation by John Graham chambers of the rules of boxing, which became known as the Queensberry Rules. In 1895 Irish writer Oscar Wilde had unsuccessfully sued the Marquis for libel following allegations of a homosexual relationship with Queensberry’s son Lord Alfred Douglas, allegations which ultimately led to Wilde’s imprisonment in Reading Gaol, England. (HC, 2003, p.64)1901        Jan 31, Chekhov’s “Three Sisters” opened at Moscow Art Theater. (MC, 1/31/02)1902        Jan 31, In the US it was tax freedom day, the day by which citizens met their financial obligations to the government. By 1999 it had shifted to May 10. (SFEC, 4/18/99, BR p.7) 1902        Jan 31, A French soccer team played in England for the first time: Paris lost, 4-0, to Marlow FC. (HC, 2003, p.64)1905        Jan 31, John O’Hara, novelist (Appointment at Samarra), was born in Pottsville, Penn. (SSFC, 8/31/03, p.M2)1906        Jan 31, A magnitude 8.8 quake off the coast of Ecuador and Colombia. It generated a tsunami that killed at least 500 people. (AP, 2/27/10)1911          Jan 31, The German Reichstag exempted royal families from tax obligations. (HN, 1/31/99)1915        Jan 31, Thomas Merton (d.1968), French Trappist monk, poet, essayist , was born. “A happiness that is sought for ourselves alone can never be found; for a happiness that is diminished by being shared is not big enough to make us happy.” (AP, 4/17/01) (MC, 1/31/02) 1915          Jan 31, Germans used poison gas for the 1st time on the Russians at Bolimov. (HN, 1/31/99) (MC, 1/31/02) 1915          Jan 31, German U-boats sank two British steamers in the English Channel. (HN, 1/31/99)1916          Jan 31, President Woodrow Wilson refused the compromise on Lusitania reparations. (HN, 1/31/99)1917          Jan 31, Germany resumed unlimited sub warfare, saying that all neutral ships that are in the war zone would be attacked. (AP, 1/31/98) (HN, 1/31/99)1919          Jan 31, Jackie Robinson, first black major league baseball player, was born. (HN, 1/31/99)1921        Jan 31, Carol Channing, actress (Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, Hello Dolly), was born. (MC, 1/31/02) 1921        Jan 31, Mario Lanza (d.1959), actor, singer (Great Caruso, Toast of New Orleans), was born in Philadelphia. (MC, 1/31/02)1923        Jan 31, Norman Mailer (d.2007), NYC mayoral candidate, novelist (Naked and the Dead), was born in NJ. In 1999 Mary V. Dearborn published “Norman Mailer: A Biography.” (SFEC, 12/26/99, BR p.7) (SSFC, 11/11/07, p.A7)1925          Jan 31, Benjamin Hooks, civil rights leader, was born. (HN, 1/31/99)1926        Jan 31, Jean Simmons, actress (Thorn Birds, Guys and Dolls), was born in London, England. (MC, 1/31/02) 1926        Jan 31, Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) was established by Wahab Chasbullah with support from Hasyim Asy’ari, the most respected Muslim scholar in East Java. By 2010 NU was one of the largest independent Islamic organizations in the world. (Econ, 1/9/10, p.85) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ulema)1928        Jan 31, Scotch tape was 1st marketed by 3-M Company. (MC, 1/31/02)1929        Jan 31, Leon Trotsky was expelled from Russia to Turkey. (WSJ, 2/29/96, p. A-14) (MC, 1/31/02)1931        Jan 31, Leonarde Keeler (1904-1949) was awarded a patent for his Keeler Polygraph, a device for lie detection. In 2007 Ken Alder authored “The Lie Detectors: The History of an American Obsession.” (WSJ, 3/24/07, p.P13) (www.kenalder.com/liedetectors/index.htm)1934        Jan 31, President Roosevelt devalued the dollar in relation to gold. He raised the price of gold to $35. The United States Gold Reserve Act required that all gold and gold certificates held by the Federal Reserve be surrendered and vested in the sole title of the United States Department of the Treasury. (AP, 1/31/00) (WSJ, 11/9/00, p.A24) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gold_Reserve_Act) 1934        Jan 31, President Roosevelt signed the Farm Mortgage Refinancing Act. (SSFC, 1/18/09, p.D6)1935        Jan 31, The San Francisco emergency relief committed said there are 80,491 people on relief. 20,000 were employed, 10,000 were on direct relief and 550 were unemployable. (SSFC, 1/31/10, DB p.42) 1935          Jan 31, The Soviet premier told Japan to get out of Manchuria. (HN, 1/31/99)1938        Jan 31, James G. Watt, US Secretary of Interior (1981-83), was born in Colorado. (MC, 1/31/02)1943        Jan 31, Chile broke contact with Germany and Japan. (MC, 1/31/02) 1943          Jan 31, The Battle of Stalingrad ended as small groups of German soldiers of the Sixth Army under Gen Friedrich von Paulus surrendered to the victorious Red Army forces. (HN, 1/31/99) (MC, 1/31/02)1944        Jan 31, Operation Overlord (D-Day) was postponed until June. (MC, 1/31/02) 1944          Jan 31, During World War II, U.S. forces under Vice Adm. Spruance began invading Kwajalein Atoll and other parts of the Japanese-held Marshall Islands. (AP, 1/31/98) (HN, 1/31/99) 1944        Jan 31, U-592 sank off Ireland. (MC, 1/31/02)1945          Jan 31, Private Eddie Slovik (b.1920) became the only US soldier since the Civil War to be executed for desertion, as he was shot by an American firing squad near the village of Ste-Marie aux Mines, France. In 1954 William Bradford authored “The Execution of Private Slovik.” In 1987 Slovik’s body was exhumed and returned to Detroit, Mi., his hometown. (AP, 1/31/04) (SSFC, 7/8/12, DB p.42)1949          Jan 31, The first TV daytime soap opera, “These Are My Children,” was broadcast from the NBC station in Chicago. (AP, 1/31/98)1950          Jan 31, President Truman announced that he had ordered full-speed development of the hydrogen bomb. (TMC, 1994, p.1950) (AP, 1/31/98) 1950          Jan 31, Paris protested the Soviet recognition of Ho Chi Minh’s Democratic Republic of Vietnam. (HN, 1/31/99)1953        Jan 31-1953 Feb 1, A powerful storm breached sea dikes in the south of the Netherlands, killing more than 1,800 people and cementing a deep resolve among the Dutch that their ancient enemy, water, would never kill again. 307 people died in eastern England. (SSFC, 3/25/01, p.C3)(www.metoffice.com/education/secondary/students/flood.html)1954        Jan 31, Edwin H. Armstrong (d.1890), US radio inventor of frequency modulation (FM), committed suicide. (www.britannica.com) (SSFC, 10/24/04, Par p.5)1955        Jan 31, A document thus dated stated that Yuri Rastvorov, a Soviet defector, told Eisenhower administration officials in a private Jan 28 meeting that US and other UN POWs were held in Siberia during the 1950-1953 Korean War. (SFEC, 5/5/96, World p.1) 1955        Jan 31, RCA chairman David Sarnoff  announced the Mark I music synthesizer. Harry Olson and Belar, both working for RCA, invented the Electronic Music Synthesizer (aka the Olson-Belar Sound Synthesizer). This synth used sawtooth waves that were filtered for other types of timbres. (It is rumored to have been built for the artificial creation of human speech) This synth became the RCA Electronic Music Synthesizer Mark I. (www.davidsarnoff.org/04142005.htm) (www.synthmuseum.com/rca/)1956        Jan 31, British author A.A. Milne (74), creator of “Winnie-the-Pooh,” died. He left the rights to the honey-loving bear to five beneficiaries that included the Garrick Club, Westminster School, The Royal Literary Fund, his own family and illustrator E.H. Shepard. (SFEC, 8/16/98, p.A20)(AP, 1/31/06)1958          Jan 31, Explorer 1, the first successful US satellite, was launched by a Jupiter-C rocket and the United States entered the Space Age. It discovered the “Van Allen radiation belts” around Earth named after James Van Allen. Radio signals from the transmitter aboard the 30.8 pound satellite were picked up in California within a few minutes after the launch. Two months earlier, the first attempt to launch a satellite had failed. (SFEC, 9/28/97, p.A14) (AP, 1/31/98) (SFC, 8/10/06, p.B7)1961        Jan 31, In South Carolina 10 black men were arrested for ordering lunch from a whites-only counter at Mc Crory’s variety store in Greensboro. One man paid a fine and the rest became known as the “Friendship Nine.” In 2015 prosecutors sought to vacate their arrests and convictions. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friendship_Nine) (SFC, 1/28/15, p.A10) 1961        Jan 31, Chimpanzee Ham landed safely and became the 1st primate in space after a 16 minute flight aboard a Mercury-Redstone 2 rocket. (AH, 2/06, p.14)1962        Jan 31, At the Eighth Meeting of Consultation of Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the OAS, held in Punta del Este, Uruguay, ministers suspended Cuba’s membership. (www.cidh.oas.org/countryrep/Cuba79eng/intro.htm) (Econ, 4/11/09, p.34)1964        Jan 31, A US report, “Smoking & Health,” connected smoking to lung cancer. (MC, 1/31/02)1966          Jan 31, U.S. planes resumed bombing of North Vietnam after a 37-day pause. (HN, 1/31/99) 1966        Jan 31, The Soviets launched Luna 9, the first spacecraft to land softly on the moon. (HC, 2003, p.64)1968        Jan 31, In Vietnam, the Tet Offensive continued as Viet Cong and North Vietnamese soldiers attacked strategic and civilian locations throughout South Vietnam. The Viet Cong, under General Vo Nguyen Giap (b.1911), seized part of the US embassy in Saigon for 6 hours. They attacked more than 100 cities in South Vietnam with many US casualties. Although the Communists were beaten back, the offensive was seen as a major setback for the US and its allies. During the Tet Offensive, the Communist troops who took control of the ancient capital of Hue killed an estimated 6,000 civilians before they again lost control of the city. (www.vwam.com/vets/tet/tet.html) (SFC, 2/3/00, p.A25) (AP, 1/30/08)1971          Jan 31, Astronauts Alan B. Shepard Jr., Edgar D. Mitchell and Stuart A. Roosa blasted off aboard Apollo 14 on a mission to the moon. (AP, 1/31/98)1972        Jan 31, Howard Barlow (b.1892), American radio pioneer and CBS music director (1927-1943), died. In 1943 He moved to NBC to become conductor of the long-running Voice of Firestone. (www.barlowgenealogy.com/FairfieldFamilies/HDB-obit.html)1974        Jan 31, Samuel Goldwyn (b.1879), Polish-born US film magnate (MGM), died. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Goldwyn) 1974        Jan 31, Gold hit a record high of $195.5 an ounce. (www.finfacts.ie/Private/curency/goldmarketprice.htm)1975        Jan 31, The 1974 song “Mandy” by Barry Manilow (b.1943 as Barry Alan Pincus) went gold. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mandy_%28song%29) (www.barrynet.com/bn22sngl.html)1976          Jan 31, Ernesto Miranda, famous from the Supreme Court ruling on “Miranda Rights,” was stabbed to death in Arizona. (HN, 1/31/99)1980        Jan 31, In Guatemala the Spanish Embassy was attacked and 37 people were killed. The dead included the father of Rigoberta Menchu, who later filed charges in Spain against Rios Montt, 5 Guatemalan generals and 2 civilians for war crimes. Peasant, labor and student activists had taken over the Spanish Embassy in Guatemala City to protest the rule of Pres. Lucas Garcia (1925-2006). (AP, 5/29/06)(www.onwar.com/aced/nation/sat/spain/fguatemala1980.htm)1981          Jan 31, Lech Walesa announced an accord in Poland, giving labor Saturdays off. (HN, 1/31/99)1986        Jan 31, Following weeks of unrest, White House spokesman Larry Speakes announced the collapse of the Duvalier government, a report that was later denied by Haitian and US officials. (AP, 1/17/11)1987        Jan 31, Discount airline pioneer People Express flew its last flights before merging into Continental Airlines. (AP, 1/31/00)1988          Jan 31, The Washington Redskins beat the Denver Broncos, 42-10, to win Super Bowl XXII at Jack Murphy Stadium in San Diego. (AP, 1/31/98) 1988        Jan 31, Robert Mishell, UC Berkeley immunologist, and his wife were bludgeoned at their home by Enrique Zambrano, a waterfront commissioner, who had built them a deck 3 years earlier. Zambrano was arrested after Luis Reyna, a UC administrative assistant, informed police that Zambrano had confessed the crime to him. Zambrano was released on bail and hours later Reyna vanished. Reyna’s headless body was found a week later in the Lafayette hills. Zambrano, arrested in 1989 in Palm Springs, was later convicted and sentenced to death. (SFC, 4/5/08, p.B3)1989          Jan 31, Jury selection began in the trial of former National Security Council aide Oliver North, charged in connection with the Iran-Contra affair. He was later convicted on three counts, but those convictions were set aside, and the case was not retried. (AP, 1/31/99) 1989        Jan 31, Jack Douglas (b.1908), humorist and comedy writer, died. His several books included “My Brother Was an Only Child” (1960), “Never Trust a Naked Bus Driver” (1960), and “Rubber Duck” (1979). (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Douglas_%28writer%29)1990          Jan 31, McDonald’s Corp. opened its first fast-food restaurant in Moscow. (AP, 1/31/98)1991        Jan 31, During the Gulf War, Army Specialist Melissa Rathbun-Nealy and Army Specialist David Lockett were captured by Iraqi forces near the Kuwaiti-Saudi border; both were eventually released. Allied forces claimed victory against Iraqi attackers at Khafji, Saudi Arabia. (AP, 1/31/01)1992        Jan 31, Leaders of the U.N. Security Council’s member states held an unprecedented summit, after which they issued a declaration on collective security, arms control and nuclear non-proliferation. (AP, 1/31/02)1993          Jan 31, The Dallas Cowboys defeated the Buffalo Bills 52-17 in Super Bowl XXVII, played at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, Calif. (AP, 1/31/98) 1993          Jan 31, A gamma ray burst that exceeded the NASA’s detector capability for measurement took place on the same day as the football Super Bowl. (SFC, 1/28/97, p.E1) (NH, 6/97, p.79)1994        Jan 31, Barcelona opera theater “Gran Teatro del Liceo” burned down. (http://www.wyastone.co.uk/nrl/pvoce/7869c.html) 1994          Jan 31, In Somalia, a convoy of U.S. soldiers opened fire on hundreds of Somali civilians outside a food distribution center, killing at least eight. (AP, 1/31/99) 1994          Jan 31, Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams arrived in New York after being granted a 48-hour visa so that he could take part in a conference on Northern Ireland. (AP, 1/31/99)1995        Jan 31, President Clinton scrapped a $40 billion rescue plan for Mexico, announcing instead that he would act unilaterally to provide Mexico with $20 billion from a fund normally used to defend the U.S. dollar. (AP, 1/31/00) 1995        Jan 31, The Mt. Calvary Baptist Church in Hardeman Co., Tenn., burned down. Arson was suspected and investigations by the FBI and ATF were later begun. (SFC, 6/11/96, p.A16) 1995        Jan 31, George Abbott (b.1887), legendary Broadway producer-director, died in Miami Beach, Florida, at age 107. (AP, 1/31/00)1996        Jan 31, The last Cubans held in refugee camps at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base boarded a plane for Florida. (AP, 1/31/01) 1996        Jan 31, Japanese astronomer, Hyakutake, first sighted the comet that now bears his name. It came to within ten-million miles of the Earth on its closest approach on Mar 26. Later analysis showed that the comet contained about 50 million tons of frozen ethane or about 1% of its total mass. (Nat. Hist., 4/96, p.62) (SFC, 5/31/96, A4) 1996        Jan. 31, In Sri Lanka an explosive-packed truck crashed into the Central Bank in Colombo and killed at least 55 and injured at least 1400 people. The Tamil Tigers rebel group were blamed. They had been fighting for independence for 12 years. A Tiger suicide bomber blew up the Central Bank and killed almost 100 people. The bombing killed 88 and injured 1,400. After 73 people were killed in the Central Bank bombing the US declared the Tamil Tigers a terrorist organization. (WSJ, 2/1/96, p.A-1) (SFC, 7/24/96, p.A9) (SFC,10/15/97, p.C4) (SFC, 3/11/00, p.A10) 1996        Jan 31, In Switzerland 5 people died in the Bernese Alps when their hot air balloon crashed into a mountainside at a height of 2,400 meters. (AP, 2/26/13)1997          Jan 31, Three days of deliberations in the O.J. Simpson civil trial in Santa Monica, Calif., were scrapped after the only black woman on the panel was replaced because of misconduct. The jury started over. (AP, 1/31/98) 1997          Jan 31, A US federal judge sentenced cocaine lord Juan Garcia Abrega to serve 11 life terms and to pay fines totaling more than $128 million. The penalties also allowed the US government to seize $350 million in Abrega’s assets. (SFC, 2/1/97, p.A3) 1997          Jan 31, In Liberia this was the deadline for some 14,000 rebels to hand in their weapons. (SFC, 1/30/97, p.A9) 1997          Jan 31, In Madagascar a constitutional court said that Didier Ratsiraka edged out Albert Zafy in last year’s elections. (SFC, 2/1/97, p.C1) 1997          Jan 31, In Vietnam a Communist Party member and three associates were sentenced to death after being convicted of bribery, embezzlement and gambling. They were responsible for losses of $27 million at the state-run Tamexco import-export company. (SFC, 2/1/97, p.A13)1998          Jan 31, The space shuttle Endeavour returned from Mir with its crew of 7. Astronaut David Wolf returned to Earth after four months on the Russian space station Mir. (SFEC, 2/1/98, p.A2) (AP, 1/31/99) 1998          Jan 31, In Japan the XVIII Winter Olympic Games opened in Nagano. (SFC, 2/4/98, p.C3) 1998          Jan 31, In Mexico, three Indian villagers were found hanged in the Chiapas town of Ocosingo. Also Antonio Gomez Flores, an Ocosingo peasant leader, died when a truck smashed into his car as he left the funeral of Rubicel Ruiz Gamboa. (SFEC, 2/1/98, p.A22)1999        Jan 31, In Florida the Denver Broncos, led by quarterback John Elway, beat the Atlanta Falcons 34-19 in Super Bowl XXXIII. There were 127.5 million viewers for Fox Broadcasting. (WSJ, 2/2/99, p.B7) 1999        Jan 31, Scientists from the University of Alabama at Birmingham reported that the AIDS virus originated from a subspecies of chimpanzee in western Africa and that it jumped to humans in the last 50 years. (SFC, 2/1/99, p.A1) (AP, 1/31/00) 1999        Jan 31, Kofi Annan called on large corporations to enact and uphold standards of conduct for themselves and sub-contractors for investments and operations in poor countries. (SFC, 2/1/99, p.A6) 1999        Jan 31, From Azerbaijan it was reported that Vafa Gulkuzade, chief foreign affairs advisor, had asserted that the country needed a military protector. He said Turkish or American military bases would be welcomed. (SFEC, 1/31/99, p.A20) 1999        Jan 31, Marshall Islands foreign minister, Phillip Muller, said his government would seek a rent increase from the US for the use of the Kwajalein Atoll. (SFC, 3/8/99, p.A16) 1999        Jan 31, In Sierra Leone rebels freed 11 Indian nationals abducted a week ago. The government said that as many as 3,000-5000 people died during the fighting in Freetown. The number of dead was raised to 6,350. (WSJ, 2/1/99, p.A1) (SFC, 2/12/99, p.A8) (SFC, 3/26/99, p.A14)2000        Jan 31, Atlanta Braves pitcher John Rocker was suspended by baseball commissioner Bud Selig for disparaging foreigners, homosexuals and minorities in a Sports Illustrated interview. (AP, 1/31/01) 2000        Jan 31, Pro Bowl linebacker Ray Lewis was charged with murder in the deaths of two people outside an Atlanta nightclub hours after the Super Bowl. Lewis ended his trial early by pleading guilty to obstruction of justice; two co-defendants were acquitted at trial. (AP, 1/31/01) 2000        Jan 31, The US persuaded Puerto Rico to continue use of the Navy firing range off Vieques Island with dummy bombs in exchange for $40 million. A vote by islanders to approve live ammunition would bring Puerto Rico an additional $50 million. A no vote would require clean up and a halt to training by May 1, 2003. (SFC, 2/1/00, p.A3) 2000        Jan 31, It was reported that nitrogen-based fertilizers were likely suspects in the rapid decline of the spotted frog in the Pacific Northwest. (SFC, 1/31/00, p.A6) 2000        Jan 31, Alaska Airlines Flight 261, an MD-83 jet with 88 people bound for Seattle from Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, crashed about 2.7 miles north of Anacapa Island, Ca. There were no survivors. A stop had been scheduled in SF. (SFC, 2/1/00, p.A1)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alaska_Airlines_Flight_261) 2000        Jan 31, The European Union warned Austria that its 14 members would diplomatically isolate Austria if the Freedom Party of Joerg Haider entered into a coalition government. (SFC, 2/1/00, p.A10) 2000        Jan 31, In Indonesia a government commission issued a report that accused the military and militia surrogates of mass killing, torture, deportation and rape in East Timor. (SFC, 2/1/00, p.A10) 2000        Jan 31, In southern Lebanon a Hezbollah rocket attack killed 3 Israeli soldiers. (SFC, 2/3/00, p.A13)2001        Jan 31, The US Federal Reserve cut interest rates .5% to 5.5%. (SFC, 2/1/01, p.A1) 2001        Jan 31, The state of Georgia hoisted its new flag above its statehouse, one featuring a smaller Confederate battle emblem. (AP, 1/31/02) 2001        Jan 31, Gordon Dickson, Science-fiction author of over 80 books, died at age 77 in Richfield, Minn. His “Lost Dorsai” series spanned from 1400-2400AD. (SFC, 2/3/01, p.A16) 2001        Jan 31, Michel Navratil, one of the last known survivors of the sinking of the Titanic, died in Montpellier, France, at age 92. (AP, 1/31/02) 2001        Jan 31, Germany announced plans to destroy 400,000 cattle due to the mad cow crises. (SFC, 2/2/01, p.D4) 2001        Jan 31, In India the death count from the Jan 26 earthquake reached 12,000 and an additional 13,000 were believed still buried. (SFC, 2/1/01, p.A9) 2001        Jan 31, In the Netherlands a Scottish court sentenced Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi, a Libyan intelligence officer, to life in a Scottish prison for the 1998 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103. A second Libyan was acquitted. (SFC, 1/31/01, p.A11) (SFC, 2/1/01, p.A1) (WSJ, 2/1/01, p.A1) (AP, 12/19/03)2002        Jan 31, The Bush administration handed abortion opponents a symbolic victory, classifying a developing fetus as an “unborn child” as a way of extending prenatal care to low-income pregnant women under the State Children’s Health Insurance Program. (SFC, 2/1/02, p.A1) (AP, 1/31/03) 2002        Jan 31, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said in a speech that the United States had to prepare for potential surprise attacks “vastly more deadly” than the Sept. 11 terrorist hijackings. (AP, 1/31/03) 2002        Jan 31, Some 3,000 participants met at the 31st World Economic Forum in NYC at the Waldorf-Astoria with scattered demonstrations outside. (SFC, 1/31/02, p.A3) (SFC, 2/1/02, p.A10) 2002        Jan 31, Kentucky, cited by the NCAA for more than three dozen recruiting violations, was placed on three years’ probation. (AP, 1/31/03) 2002        Jan 31, The central US was hit by a winter storm that left at least 15 dead. (WSJ, 2/1/02, p.A1) 2002        Jan 31, It was reported that the US and Kazakstan planned a joint venture to use a former Soviet nuclear weapons plant to process uranium for power plants and absorb atomic workers. (WSJ, 1/31/02, p.A1) 2002        Jan 31, US troops began a 6-month exercise for Filipino soldiers on Zamboanga, who were hunting Abu Sayyaf extremists. (SFC, 2/1/02, p.A24) 2002        Jan 31, In Afghanistan warlord Saifullah defeated troops under Padsha Khan Zadran in Gardez and some 50 people were killed. (SFC, 2/1/02, p.A24) 2002        Jan 31, Ecuador designated a 557 sq-km (215 sq-mi) area in the Amazon rainforest the Cofan Ecological Reserve. Field Museum scientists from Chicago assisted Cofan Indians and Ecuadoran scientists by cataloging the species in the area and declaring it to be the most biologically diverse mountain range in the world. (EB, 2002, p.11) 2002        Jan 31, In Indonesia the number of people killed during two days of widespread flooding grew to at least 33. Flooding in Jakarta eventually killed about 60 people. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/1791623.stm) (Econ, 3/17/12, p.48) 2002        Jan 31, An interview was published in which Israeli PM Ariel Sharon said that he regrets that Israel failed to take the opportunity to kill Palestinian leader Yasir Arafat in Lebanon 20 years ago. (EB, 2002, p.11) 2002        Jan 31, Crossair, a regional carrier and successor airline to the bankrupt Swissair, announced plans that will make it Europe’s 4th largest international airline, under the new name Swiss. (EB, 2002, p.11) (Econ, 2/14/04, p.10) 2002        Jan 31, Zimbabwe enacted a new media law that required local media people to be licensed and restricted foreign reporters from working freely. (SFC, 2/1/02, p.A15)2003        Jan 31, President Bush and British PM Tony Blair met at the White House; Bush said he would welcome a second UN resolution on Iraq but only if it led to the prompt disarming of Saddam Hussein. Pushing for a new resolution, Blair called confronting Iraq “a test of the international community.” In 2006 British author Phillippe Sands said in a new edition of his 2005 ”Lawless World” that Pres. Bush commented during the 2003 meeting with Blair that the US intended to go to war even if inspectors failed to find evidence of a banned weapons program. (AP, 1/31/04) (AP, 2/3/06) 2003        Jan 31, A federal jury in SF found Ed Rosenthal (58), a marijuana advocate, guilty of felony conspiracy and cultivation charges. Judge Charles Breyer did not allow testimony citing 1996 California state voter approval of medical marijuana. On Feb 4 jurors claimed they were duped and called for a new trial. (SFC, 2/1/03, p.A1) (SFC, 2/5/03, p.A1) 2003        Jan 31, In Afghanistan, a bomb destroyed the Rambasi Bridge near Kandahar, and killed at least 15 people traveling by bus. Police blamed Taliban and al-Qaida fugitives. (AP, 1/31/03) (SFC, 1/31/03, p.A11) 2003        Jan 31, In Australia a commuter train derailed south of Sydney and 9 people were killed. (AP, 1/31/03) 2003        Jan 31, Top UN arms inspectors said they would not agree to new talks in Baghdad unless Iraq demonstrated more cooperation and met unspecified conditions. (AP, 1/31/03) 2003        Jan 31, Israeli undercover troops killed a fugitive Islamic militant and a Palestinian night watchman in a two-hour gun battle at a Jenin firehouse. (AP, 1/31/03) (SFC, 2/1/03, p.A11) 2003        Jan 31, In Mexico City tens of thousands of farmers clogged main streets, demanding greater protection against U.S. imports and seeking more government aid. (AP, 1/31/03) 2003        Jan 31, A Russian cargo plane crashed while landing in fog near an airport on East Timor’s north coast, killing all six people aboard. (AP, 1/31/03)2004        Jan 31, The Mars rover Opportunity rolled off its landing pad onto the surface of Mars. (SSFC, 2/1/04, p.A1) 2004        Jan 31, In Deh Rawood, Afghanistan, a remote-controlled bomb, thought to have been planted by Taliban or al-Qaida fighters, exploded as a southern Afghan mayor and his family drove by, killing him and seven relatives. (AP, 2/1/04) 2004        Jan 31, British Airways and Air France announced the cancellation of seven flights to and from the United States because of security concerns. (AP, 1/31/04) 2004        Jan 31, China’s oil-refining boss signed a deal to buy crude oil from Gabon. Pres. Hu Jintao visited Gabon the next day. (Econ, 2/7/04, p.45) 2004        Jan 31, Pres. Oscar Berger said Guatemala will distribute 970 tons of food to some 77,000 people in a bid to alleviate hunger in poverty-stricken towns. (AP, 1/31/04) 2004        Jan 31, In Iraq a car bomb targeting a police station in Mosul killed nine people and injured 45 others, while three American soldiers died when a roadside bomb ripped through their convoy near the oil-rich city of Kirkuk. (AP, 1/31/04) 2004        Jan 31, In southern Scotland a fire broke out at nursing home, killing 10 residents and injuring six others. (AP, 1/31/04)2005        Jan 31, US energy officials said Enron Corp. made over $1.6 billion during the energy crises in 11 Western states from Jan 16, 1997 to June 25, 2003. (SFC, 2/1/05, p.E1) 2005        Jan 31, The US government released a list of 17 new carcinogens that included X-rays, some viruses and chemicals used in frying and grilling meat. (SFC, 2/1/05, p.A1) 2005        Jan 31, Marsh & McClennan Cos. reached an $850 million settlement of civil fraud charges with NY state’s attorney Eliot Spitzer and the state insurance department. (WSJ, 1/31/05, p.C1) 2005        Jan 31, The Bond Market Association (BMA) began displaying prices of municipal bond trades within 15 minutes of completion. Real time for virtually all corporate bond prices was expected by Feb 7. (Econ, 2/5/05, p.70) 2005        Jan 31, Jury selection began in Santa Maria, Calif., for Michael Jackson’s child molestation trial. Jackson was later acquitted. (AP, 1/31/06) 2005        Jan 31, SBC Communications Inc. announced it was acquiring AT&T Corp. for $16 billion. (AP, 1/31/06) 2005        Jan 31, In Brazil leftist activists opposed to the spread of American influence ended the fifth World Social Forum with a protest against unfettered capitalism and the war in Iraq. (AP, 1/31/05) 2005        Jan 31, EU foreign ministers agreed to restore normal diplomatic relations with the Cuban government while pledging to increase contacts with critics of Pres. Fidel Castro. (AP, 1/31/05) 2005        Jan 31, in Egypt Ayman al-Nur, the head of an opposition party, denounced his arrest on forgery charges, telling a court it was a strike against political reform, while human rights groups said the moves against him could be a message to other opposition groups. (AP, 2/1/05) 2005        Jan 31, France Telecom, Europe’s second-largest telecommunications operator, announced plans to cut 8,000 jobs in 2005, mostly in France. (AP, 1/31/05) 2005        Jan 31, Kamal Nath, India’s Commerce and Industry Minister, said the Indian parliament will shortly ratify new legislation protecting drug patents, paving the way for the country to become a major pharmaceutical research centre. (AP, 1/31/05) 2005        Jan 31, A UN official said nearly 800,000 people will need food aid in Indonesia’s Aceh province in the aftermath of the devastating Dec. 26 tsunami as the country’s death toll from the disaster jumped by 5,000 for the 2nd day in a row. The overall death toll stood between 156,000 and 178,000 across 11 nations, with an estimated 26,500 to 142,000 missing, most of whom are presumed dead. (AP, 1/31/05) 2005        Jan 31, Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, Iraq’s interim leader, called on his countrymen to set aside their differences, while local precincts finished a first-phase count of millions of ballots from the weekend election. (AP, 1/31/05) 2005        Jan 31, US guards in southern Iraq opened fire on prisoners during a riot at the detention facility for security detainees at Umm Qasr, killing 4 of them. 6 other prisoners were injured. (AP, 1/31/05) 2005        Jan 31, Jewish settlers and their supporters protested outside parliament for a 2nd day against Israel’s planned withdrawal from Palestinian territories. Palestinian officials said a 10-year-old Palestinian girl was shot and killed by Israeli tank fire at a UN school in the Rafah refugee camp. (AP, 1/31/05) 2005        Jan 31, Kuwaiti police stormed several suspected terror hideouts, arresting a reputed terror leader and sparking a gunbattle that killed five people, including four of his followers. (AP, 1/31/05) 2005        Jan 31, In Nigeria African leaders pledged to send more peacekeeping troops to conflict zones, especially the western Sudan region of Darfur, and to boost their role in world affairs. (AP, 2/1/05) 2005        Jan 31, A UN-appointed commission accused the Sudanese government of gross, systematic human rights violations in Darfur, but stopped short of labeling the violence in the region as genocide. (AP, 1/31/05)2006        Jan 31, Pres. Bush in his State of the Union address appeared to tone down his criticism of North Korea and concerns over the growing competitiveness of China and India. Bush had harsh words for Iran and the militant Palestinian group Hamas and raised concerns over Indonesia. He also defended the legality of his wiretaps program and called for the US to quit its addiction to oil. (AP, 2/1/06) (SFC, 2/1/06, p.A1) (WSJ, 2/1/06, p.A1) 2006        Jan 31, The US Senate confirmed Samuel Alito as the 110th Supreme Court justice. The 58-42 vote tilted the court rightward. (WSJ, 2/1/06, p.A1) 2006        Jan 31, Alan Greenspan (79) served the last day of his 18-year tenure as chairman of the US Federal Reserve. At Greenspan’s final meeting, the central bank voted to boost its target for the federal funds rate to 4.5 percent. It was the 14th quarter-point move in a credit-tightening campaign that began 19 months ago. The US Senate approved Ben Bernanke (52), Princeton Univ. prof. of economics, as chairman of the Federal Reserve. (SFC, 1/31/06, p.E1) (Econ, 9/3/05, p.63) (AP, 1/31/07) 2006        Jan 31, In Arkansas Tom Coughlin (57), a former Wal-Mart Stores Inc. vice chairman who was a protege of founder Sam Walton, pleaded guilty to fraud and tax charges, admitting that he stole money, gift cards and merchandise from the world’s largest retailer. (AP, 1/31/06) 2006        Jan 31, In El Cerrito, Ca., Edward Wycoff (37) stabbed and bludgeoned to death his sister Julie Wycoff Rogers (47) and her husband Paul Rogers (48) at their home 1467 Rifle Range Road. He had hoped to adopt his niece and nephew after the killings. In 2009 Wycoff was convicted of murder with special circumstances and was sentenced by a jury to die by lethal injection. (SFC, 2/1/06, p.B3) (SFC, 10/28/09, p.D2) (SFC, 11/6/09, p.C2) 2006        Jan 31, In Texas opening arguments began in the Enron trial against former Chairman Kenneth Lay and former Pres. Jeffrey Skilling. (WSJ, 1/31/06, p.C1) 2006        Jan 30, Coretta Scott King (78), the widow of Martin Luther King Jr, died of respiratory failure at a clinic in Mexico. She had turned a life shattered by her husband’s assassination into one devoted to enshrining his legacy of human rights and equality. (AP, 1/31/06) (SFC, 2/1/06, p.A1) 2006        Jan 31, Moira Shearer, ballerina and film star (Red Shoes), died in England. (WSJ, 2/2/06, p.A1) 2006        Jan 31, Envoys from nearly 70 nations and international bodies vowed to maintain their financial support for Afghanistan, which is still plagued by violence and poverty more than four years after the fall of the Taliban. (AP, 1/31/06) 2006        Jan 31, Dr. Christian Schwarz-Schilling (b.1930), former German cabinet minister, was appointed as the EU’s High Representative in Bosnia, succeeding Lord Ashdown. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Schwarz-Schilling) (Econ, 6/30/07, p.60) 2006        Jan 31, British lawmakers watered down a bill banning religious hate speech, then narrowly voted it into law. (AP, 1/31/06) 2006        Jan 31, Chile received two US F-16 warplanes out of 10 it had ordered as part of a major military upgrade that has worried some of its South American neighbors. (AP, 1/31/06) 2006        Jan 31, In Colombia thousands of right-wing paramilitary fighters accused of drug trafficking by the US turned over more than 1,000 weapons in one of the largest disarmament ceremonies to date. (AP, 1/31/06) 2006        Jan 31, In Egypt 14 tourists from Hong Kong were killed and 30 wounded when their bus spun off the road along the Red Sea coast in one of the deadliest crashes involving foreign nationals in recent years. (AP, 1/31/06) 2006        Jan 31, An international human rights group said thousands of school and college students have been detained over the past three months in continued unrest in Ethiopia. (AP, 1/31/06) 2006        Jan 31, French PM Dominique de Villepin made a televised address urging French and other European chief executives to be better organized to resist attacks by foreign companies. The statement was made in response to the takeover of Arcelor by Mittal Steel. (Econ, 2/4/06, p.56) 2006        Jan 31, An official said India’s air force was ready to handle civilian air traffic control as protesting airport workers threatened to strike after the government opened bids to privatize the two biggest airports. (AP, 1/31/06) 2006        Jan 31, India and Pakistan signed an agreement to restart a second cross-border train service next month, the latest step in peace talks between the nuclear-armed rivals. (AP, 1/31/06) 2006        Jan 31, Iran struck back at the Big Five’s decision to refer the country’s nuclear file to the Security Council, saying the move has no legal justification and would be the end of diplomacy. (AP, 1/31/06) 2006        Jan 31, A British soldier was killed in a roadside bombing, the second member of the country’s armed forces to die in Iraq in as many days and the 100th fatality since the conflict began nearly three years ago. (AP, 1/31/06) 2006        Jan 31, In Iraq the bodies of 11 men were found in western Baghdad. Some had been shot repeatedly and bore marks of torture. Gunmen killed 2 members of the Dawra district council. Gunmen killed Malik Razoki Abd, a district council member in western Baghdad. (SFC, 2/1/06, p.A8) 2006        Jan 31, Israeli troops killed two Islamic Jihad militants, including Nidal Abu Saada, the group’s top leader in the West Bank, during a shootout that erupted during an arrest raid. (AP, 1/31/06) 2006        Jan 31, Japan said it will begin withdrawing its troops from Iraq in March and complete the pullout by May, ending its largest military mission since the end of World War II. (AP, 1/31/06) 2006        Jan 31, Myanmar’s military government adjourned a constitution-drafting convention after almost two months of deliberations, delegates said, amid growing frustration with the slow pace of democratic reforms. Karen insurgents, marking nearly six decades of fighting, said there was little chance Myanmar’s military rulers would come to the negotiating table and end their bloody campaign against the ethnic minorities. (AP, 1/31/06) 2006        Jan 31, NATO ended its earthquake relief operation in Pakistan, the first big disaster mission involving ground troops outside an alliance country. (AP, 1/31/06) 2006        Jan 31, North Korea renewed its commitment to stalled nuclear disarmament talks, while at the same time vowing to strengthen its stockpile of atomic weapons to counter what it called extreme US hostility. (AP, 1/31/06) 2006        Jan 31, In the Economist Intelligence Unit’s biannual survey Oslo was reported to have overtaken Tokyo as the world’s most expensive city. Tokyo had held the top spot for 14 years. Of 17 US cities featured in the survey, the most expensive were New York (27th), Chicago and Los Angeles (tied for 35th), and San Francisco (40th). (AP, 2/1/06) 2006        Jan 31, The Philippine health department warned that an AIDS crisis threatens the country as the number of people who are HIV carriers has doubled in just over three years. (AP, 1/31/06) 2006        Jan 31, Philippines troops killed at least 18 communist rebels in their bloodiest clash in months. The clash happened outside Santa Ignacia town in Tarlac province, about 80 miles north of Manila. (AP, 1/31/06) 2006        Jan 31, George Koval (1913), American-born Soviet spy, died in Moscow. In 1932 his family moved from Iowa to Birobidzhan, a Siberian city that Stalin promoted as a secular Jewish homeland. From 1940 to 1948 Koval, groomed as a Russian spy, was able to infiltrate the Manhattan Project. He fled the US after the war. In 2007 Pres. Putin posthumously awarded him Russia’s highest award. (SFC, 11/12/07, p.A12) 2006        Jan 31, Saudi Arabia and Jordan pressed the Islamic militant group Hamas to moderate its stand on Israel and to entice the defeated Fatah party into a deal to share power. (AP, 1/31/06) 2006        Jan 31, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan offered a grim assessment of Kosovo’s progress toward stability, saying in a report that the region had fallen behind in efforts to create a multiethnic and democratic society. (AP, 1/31/06)2007        Jan 31, President Bush, visiting Wall Street, delivered his “State of the Economy” speech in which he took aim at lavish salaries and bonuses for corporate executives. (AP, 1/31/08) 2007        Jan 31, Delaware Sen. Joe Biden formally launched his bid for the Democratic presidential nomination. (AP, 1/31/08) 2007        Jan 31, The New York Stock Exchange announced a cooperative agreement with the Tokyo Stock Exchange. (AP, 2/1/07) 2007        Jan 31, The Ziff Davis Games Group handed out the 4th annual 1Up Awards for computer games. Nintendo’s “Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess” won the top prize as selected by 13 million Ziff Davis users. (SFC, 2/2/07, p.C3) 2007        Jan 31, A special committee, invited by IMF managing director Rodrigo de Rato, proposed new ways for the IMF to fund itself. A loan to Turkey at this time accounted for two-thirds of the IMF’s outstanding credit. (Econ, 2/3/07, p.75) 2007        Jan 31, Molly Ivins (b.1944), political columnist for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, died of breast cancer. (SFC, 2/1/07, p.B7) 2006        Jan 31, Jennifer Merritt (31) was shot in the arm and head while riding a bicycle in the San Francisco Ingleside Heights neighborhood. She died from her wounds on Feb 11. Police had no explanation. (SFC, 2/12/07, p.E6) 2007        Jan 31, The Afghan Parliament voted for an amnesty for leaders accused of war crimes during a quarter-century of fighting, arguing that it would help heal deep divisions. (AP, 2/1/07) 2007        Jan 31, A senior AU official said 3 battalions of peacekeepers from Uganda and Nigeria are ready to be deployed in Somalia and will be airlifted in as soon as possible. (AP, 1/31/07) 2007        Jan 31, The caretaker government of Bangladesh approved a deal with an Indian company to build a 240MW power station. (Econ, 2/10/07, p.39) 2007        Jan 31, British counterterrorism police arrested nine men in an alleged kidnapping plot. The plan reportedly involved torturing and beheading a British Muslim soldier and broadcasting the killing on the Internet. (AP, 1/31/07) 2007        Jan 31, Canada’s former Secretary of State for the Asia Pacific region David Kilgour and human rights lawyer David Matas released a report saying China’s military is harvesting organs from prison inmates, mostly Falungong practitioners, for large scale transplants including for foreign recipients. (AFP, 1/31/07) 2007        Jan 31, Chinese President Hu Jintao arrived in Cameroon to begin his second African tour to boost ties with a continent that has many of the oil and commodity reserves the Asian giant needs for its ballooning economy. (Reuters, 1/31/07) 2007        Feb 1, Zhengzhou city authorities put Gao Yaojie under house arrest to stop her from traveling to Washington to be honored by a charity backed by Sen. Hillary Clinton. The retired Chinese doctor helped expose blood-buying schemes that infected thousands with HIV. (AP, 2/4/07) 2007        Jan 31, In Congo at least 37 people were killed in clashes between security forces and opposition supporters protesting against the results of governorship polls in western Bas-Congo province. (Reuters, 2/1/07) 2007        Jan 31, Tata Steel said its $11.3 billion offer to acquire European steel maker Corus (formerly British Steel) is strategic to its global ambitions, even as the winning bid raised concerns that the deal’s high cost could undermine the combined company’s financial health. (AP, 1/31/07) (SSFC, 2/11/07, p.C3) 2007        Jan 31, Unidentified gunmen opened fire on a car carrying the chief Muslim leader in Ingushetia, seriously wounding the mufti and his son. (AP, 1/31/07) 2007        Jan 31, A series of car bombs struck mostly Shiite areas in Baghdad, killing eight people, while a mortar attack on a Sunni neighborhood killed four in more retaliatory sectarian violence. The bodies of three Sunni professors and a student also turned up in the morgue, three days after they were abducted by gunmen from a law school in a predominantly Shiite area in northern Baghdad. A suicide bomber driving an oil truck blew himself up after he was stopped at a checkpoint near an Iraqi army headquarters north of Baghdad, wounding 9 soldiers. A parked car bomb also struck a police patrol in the northern city of Mosul killing one policeman and wounding two others. In the cities of Fallujah and Ramadi at least eight bodies were found with their hands and legs bound and showing signs of torture. (AP, 1/31/07) 2007        Jan 31, In Mexico City some 75,000 unionists, farmers and leftists marched to protest price increases in basic foodstuffs like tortillas, a direct challenge to the new president’s market-oriented economic policies blamed by some for widening the gulf between rich and poor. (AP, 2/1/07) 2007        Jan 31, In Mexico a lesbian couple registered what officials called Mexico’s first gay civil union in the northern city of Saltillo. (AP, 1/31/07) 2007        Jan 31, A human rights group said its study of one of Nigeria’s oil-producing states found that officials squandered or stole public money, some hospitals required patients to bring their own beds, and schools were running out of chalk. (AP, 1/31/07) 2007        Jan 31, In a northwestern Pakistan a mortar round struck a home in Hangu, killing two men and wounding another amid sectarian tensions. (AP, 1/31/07) 2007        Jan 31, Two Spanish men, both charged with providing explosives for Islamist train bombings in Madrid in 2004, were given jail sentences in a separate trial for selling explosives in 2001. The court in Asturias said it jailed former miner Jose Emilio Suarez-Trashorras and his brother-in-law, Antonio Toro, for 10 and 11-1/2 years respectively on charges of drugs and explosives trafficking. (Reuters, 1/31/07) 2007        Jan 31, In eastern Sri Lanka suspected separatist Tamil rebels detonated a roadside bomb, killing six policemen and one civilian. (AP, 1/31/07) 2007        Jan 31, A Congress wholly loyal to President Hugo Chavez met at a downtown plaza to give the Venezuelan leader authority to enact sweeping measures by presidential decree. (AP, 1/31/07) 2007        Jan 31, Officials said Vietnam’s ruling Communist Party and the military will relinquish control of dozens of companies, ranging from hotels to telecoms, as part of an ongoing government overhaul. An oil spill from an unidentified source hit Vietnam’s central coast, blackening popular resort beaches as thousands of local people help with the cleanup. (AP, 1/31/07) (AP, 2/1/07) 2007        Jan 31, Zimbabwe’s central bank chief Gideon Gono unveiled a battery of belt-tightening measures which include slashing the money supply and state spending to put the brakes on four-digit inflation. The Zimbabwe dollar traded at 250 against the greenback on the official market while fetching up to 4,200 on the black market. (AFP, 1/31/07)2008        Jan 31, The US Navy test fired an incredibly powerful new big gun designed to replace conventional weaponry aboard ships. Navy officials called it the “world’s most powerful electromagnetic railgun.” (www.livescience.com/technology/080201-electromagnetic-record.html) 2008        Jan 31, US Army Maj. John Cockerham and his wife pleaded guilty to bribery, conspiracy and money laundering committed while he was a contracting officer in Kuwait (2004-2006, during which time he made over $9 million. Maj. James Momon Jr., his successor, later pleaded guilty to pocketing over $1 million. Cockerham and his wife were initially indicted on Aug 22, 2007. (SSFC, 10/26/08, Par p.6) (www.usdoj.gov/atr/cases/f225400/225441.htm) 2008        Jan 31, Human Rights Watch charged that Europe and the US increasingly tolerate autocrats posing as democrats out of pure self-interest, in countries such as Pakistan, Kenya, Nigeria and Russia, as human right abuses go on. (AFP, 1/31/08) 2008        Jan 31, The Sewerage Agency of Southern Marin, Ca., let nearly 3 million gallons of treated and raw sewage spill into the SF Bay. A week later it was reported that a spill on Jan 25 had released 2.5 million gallons. Over the next 2 weeks at least 65 birds were found dead on the shores of Richardson Bay Audubon Center. (SFC, 2/6/08, p.B7) (SFC, 2/9/08, p.B1) 2008        Jan 31, Dorothy Dixon (29), 6 months pregnant, was found dead at a home in Alton, Ill. Housemates had used her for target practice with BBs, burned her with a glue gun and doused her with scalding liquid that peeled away her skin. Investigators put much of the blame on Michelle Riley (35), who they said befriended Dixon but pocketed monthly Social Security checks she got because of her developmental delays. In 2009 Riley pleaded guilty to the torture and killing of Dixon. (AP, 3/22/08) (SFC, 10/27/09, p.A4) 2008        Jan 31, The Mideast and India suffered a 2nd day of telecom woes after two undersea Internet cables in the Mediterranean sustained damage. (WSJ, 2/1/08, p.A1) 2008        Jan 31, In southern Afghanistan a suicide bomber blew himself up inside a mosque, killing Helmand province’s deputy governor and five other people. A car bomb exploded next to an Afghan army bus in Kabul, wounding four civilians and a solider. (AP, 1/31/08) 2008        Jan 31, In China a top agriculture official warned that snow battering central China has dealt an “extremely serious” blow to winter crops, raising the likelihood that future shortages would exaggerate already surging food prices. China said it had stopped production and exports from a company whose insecticide-tainted frozen dumplings sickened 10 people in Japan. Tens of thousands of Chinese massed impatiently near a railway station in Guangzhou, desperate to get on trains home for a major holiday after days of delay caused by snow. (AP, 1/31/08) (Reuters, 1/31/08) 2008        Jan 31, The EU ordered Italy to clean up Naples within a month, or face legal action. (AP, 1/31/08) 2008        Jan 31, It was reported that the EU is suing Malta for permitting residents to hunt 2 species of birds in the spring. The Maltese government said it qualifies for an exemption under EU rules. (WSJ, 2/1/08, p.A6) 2008        Jan 31, India’s Tata Chemicals, part of tea-to-steel conglomerate Tata Group, announced it was buying US-based soda-ash producer General Chemical Industrial Products for over one billion dollars. (AP, 1/31/08) 2008        Jan 31, In Iraq militants fired 20 rockets at Britain’s airport base in Basra. British gunners responded with artillery fire and 10 Iraqi civilians were killed or wounded. A bomb-rigged car blew up in Baghdad killing at least 5 people in a Shiite enclave. 2 US soldiers were killed, one by a roadside bomb in Baghdad and another by a rocket or mortar attack on a convoy support center south of the capital. (AP, 2/1/08) (SFC, 2/1/08, p.A13) 2008        Jan 31, In Kenya an opposition lawmaker was gunned down by a police officer in the second fatal shooting of an opposition legislator this week. National police chief Hussein Ali said the police officer, who has been arrested, shot David Too in a dispute over the officer’s girlfriend. The opposition said it was an assassination plot. Kenyan police killed four people as mobs set scores of houses and businesses ablaze in a western Kenyan town. In Kisumu police fired tear gas and then live rounds at scores of protesters trying to block the main road. Kofi Annan suspended crisis talks aimed at ending Kenya’s political crisis after the lawmaker was shot dead, triggering further clashes. In Ethiopia UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon met with Pres. Kibaki at the African Union summit and warned that the violence in Kenya could spiral out of control unless quick action was taken. (AP, 1/31/08) (AFP, 1/31/08)(AP, 2/1/08) 2008        Jan 31, In Mexico tens of thousands of demonstrators marched through downtown Mexico City to protest recent trade openings that removed the last tariff protections for ancestral Mexican crops like corn and beans. (AP, 1/31/08) 2008        Jan 31, Thousands of Pakistani lawyers burned effigies of President Pervez Musharraf during nationwide protests to press for the release of the country’s deposed chief justice. Two Pakistani soldiers were killed and two others wounded when a bomb exploded near their convoy in Wana in South Waziristan. (AFP, 1/31/08) (AP, 2/1/08) 2008        Jan 31, In the southern Philippines Abu Sayyaf commander Wahab Upao, a Muslim militant who allegedly gunned down a Roman Catholic priest in a raid on a school, was killed in a clash with troops pursuing an Indonesian terror suspect. (AP, 1/31/08) 2008        Jan 31, Romania’s Constitutional Court struck down the 1999 law that opened Romania’s secret police archives. It effectively forced the Council for the Study of the Securitate Archives to shut down, and makes its previous decisions null. (AP, 2/1/08) 2008        Jan 31, In South Korea a court ruled against Samsung and  its chairman Lee Kun-hee in the nation’s biggest civil lawsuit. It ordered them to pay $2.7 billion to the creditors of Samsung Motors. (Econ, 2/9/08, p.71) 2008        Jan 31, In northern Sri Lanka a bomb being transported by a suicide bomber on a bicycle exploded prematurely, killing 4 people and injuring 13. Separate clashes across the north killed 15 Tamil rebels. Japan cautioned it will review its aid policy unless the violence subsided. (AP, 1/31/08) (AFP, 1/31/08)(AP, 2/1/08) 2008        Jan 31, In Turkey an explosion ripped through an unlicensed fireworks factory in an industrial section of Istanbul, killing 20 people and injuring 117. (AP, 1/31/08) 2008        Jan 31, An official at the UN labor agency said more than 5 million people will lose their jobs this year as the world economy slows. (AP, 1/31/08)2009        Jan 31, President Barack Obama promised to lower mortgage costs, offer job-creating loans for small businesses, get credit flowing and rein in free-spending executives as he readies a new road map for spending billions from the second installment of the financial rescue plan. (AP, 1/31/09) 2009        Jan 31, In Maryland Goucher College President Sanford Ungar told faculty and students in an e-mail that Professor Leopold Munyakazi (59) was removed from teaching after officials learned he had been indicted in 2006 on genocide charges in Rwanda. (AP, 2/3/09) 2009        Jan 31, John Lipsky, deputy head of the IMF, announced that the fund would double its lending capacity to $500 billion. Montek Singh Ahluwalia, India’s chief economic planner, deemed the proposal too modest and suggested that member triple their quotas. (Econ, 2/7/09, p.67) 2009        Jan 31, Afghanistan’s interior minister announced a US-backed plan to create militias and give them guns to fight the Taliban. It drew criticism from local authorities in areas where the first units are being rolled out. An Afghan tribal leader from southeastern Paktika province was fatally shot by a NATO patrol after the vehicle he was in failed to stop in response to signals from soldiers. A second Afghan was wounded. A Canadian soldier was killed when his armored vehicle hit an explosive device on a road west of Kandahar. (AP, 2/1/09) (Reuters, 1/31/09) (AP, 2/4/09) 2009        Jan 31, On the streets of Birmingham, the queen’s English is now the queens English. This week the city council made it official. England’s second-largest city decided to drop apostrophes from all its street signs, saying they’re confusing and old-fashioned. (AP, 1/31/09) 2009        Jan 31, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao arrived in London in the latest leg of a European tour aimed at tackling the global financial and economic crisis and improving relations between the trading partners. (Reuters, 1/31/09) 2009        Jan 31, In southern China revelers celebrating a birthday set off fireworks just before midnight inside a bar, triggering a blaze that killed 15 people and injured 22. (AP, 2/1/09) 2009        Jan 31, Security sources said Egypt has begun installing cameras and motion sensors along its border with the Gaza Strip to try to combat smuggling to the Hamas-run territory. (Reuters, 1/31/09) 2009        Jan 31, Porsche’s new museum in Stuttgart, a sprawling monument to 60 years of German engineering, opened to the public. (AP, 1/30/09) 2009        Jan 31, Roxana Saberi (31), Iranian-American journalist, was detained in Tehran. In April she was charged with espionage, two days after her parents visited their daughter in prison. The government had revoked her press credentials in 2006. On April 13, 2009, she was tried and soon sentenced to 8 years in jail for spying. Her lawyer appealed. She was released in May and in 2010 authored “Between Two Worlds” My Life and Captivity In Iran.” (www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=101315579) (AP, 4/8/09)(AP, 4/18/09) (SSFC, 4/18/10, p.F7) 2009        Jan 31,  Iraq’s provincial elections wrapped up without any reports of serious violence. The polls decided who sits on the councils that run 14 of Iraq’s 18 provinces. The turnout was 51% of the 7.5 million eligible voters. US soldiers killed two Iraqi policemen after coming under fire during an operation against al-Qaida in northern Iraq. An American soldier died of a noncombat-related injury in the northern city of Kirkuk. (AP, 1/31/09) (AP, 2/1/09) (Econ, 1/24/09, p.54) (Econ, 2/7/09, p.40) 2009        Jan 31, In Kenya an overturned gasoline tanker exploded as hundreds of people tried to scoop up free fuel. Some 120 people were killed and 200 injured in the inferno. Several witnesses said some police were charging 1,000 Kenya shillings ($13) for 60 liters of fuel, an amount that usually costs about $65, which enraged the crowd. (AP, 2/1/09) (AP, 2/2/09) (AP, 2/3/09) 2009        Jan 31, In Pakistan two motorcyclists lobbed a hand grenade at a police patrol in Baluchistan’s Khuzdar district, but hit bystanders instead, killing one person and wounding 5 others. (AP, 2/1/09) 2009        Jan 31, Palestinian militants fired a rocket from Gaza that exploded close to the southern Israeli town of Ashkelon without causing any damages or injuries. (AP, 1/31/09) 2009        Jan 31, Thousands of protesters rallied across Russia to criticize the government’s economic course and its response to the global financial crisis. In Moscow minutes after protesters unfurled anti-Kremlin banners and chanted “Down with KGB power” and “Russia without Putin,” a dozen young men jumped out of cars and started to beat them with fists and metal rods. Police ignored the attacks by alleged members of “Young Russia,” a pro-Kremlin youth group. (AP, 1/31/09) (AP, 2/13/09) 2009        Jan 31, In Somalia moderate Islamist leader Sheikh Sharif Sheik Ahmed was sworn in. The next day in a published interview he called for a united front against violent extremists and signaled his intent to try to bring together the country’s feuding Islamic factions. (AP, 2/1/09) 2009        Jan 31, Sudan’s state media reported that a US aid group has been thrown out of the Darfur region after officials found thousands of Arabic-language bibles stacked in its office. The Texas-based Thirst No More website described its work in Darfur as focused on repairing and drilling water wells and makes no mention of evangelism or other faith-based work. (Reuters, 1/31/09) 2009        Jan 31, In Geneva, Switzerland, riot police fired tear gas after some 1000 demonstrators began throwing bottles protesting against the annual World Economic Forum meeting at Davos. (AP, 1/31/09) 2009        Jan 31, In Thailand some 30,000 supporters of ousted premier Thaksin Shinawatra gathered in Bangkok, promising to fight on indefinitely unless the new Thai government leaves office within 15 days. In northeastern Thailand a grenade blast killed eight people and wounded 27 others during an outdoor celebration next to a Buddhist temple. (AFP, 1/31/09) (AP, 2/1/09) 2009        Jan 31, The Vatican announced that the Pope has tapped the Rev. Gerhard Maria Wagner (54) to be auxiliary bishop in Linz, the capital of Upper Austria province. Wagner caused a stir in 2005 when he was quoted as saying that he was convinced that the death and destruction of Hurricane Katrina earlier that year was “divine retribution” for tolerance of homosexuals and laid-back sexual attitudes in New Orleans. (AP, 2/1/09)2010        Jan 31, Beyonce, pop’s reigning diva, earned six Grammys, more than any woman on a single night of the 52-year-old awards show. (AP, 2/1/10) 2010        Jan 31, Afghanistan’s Pres. Karzai appealed to Taliban fighters to lay down their weapons and accept Afghan laws as the government and its international allies push a program to entice militants away from the insurgency. Karzai also said  that Afghanistan, one of the world’s poorest countries, is sitting on mineral and petroleum reserves worth an estimated one trillion dollars. (AP, 1/31/10) (AFP, 1/31/10) 2010        Jan 31, In Argentina Tomas Eloy Martinez (75), author and journalist famed for his writings about former President Juan Domingo Peron and his glamorous wife Eva, died. (AP, 1/31/10) 2010        Jan 31, An Egyptian security official said 25 Egyptians were arrested on suspicion of planning a bombing attack against Jewish pilgrims in the country and belonging to a militant Islamist group. The suspects, rounded up over the past few weeks in the Nile Delta governorate of Daqahlia, were found in possession of explosives and rudimentary rocket warheads. (AFP, 1/31/10) 2010        Jan 31, In Ethiopia UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon attended the AU’s annual summit in Addis Ababa and again failed to pledge peacekeepers for Somalia. Ban Ki-Moon criticized power-grabs in Africa in a speech to the continent’s leaders as Libya’s Moamer Kadhafi reluctantly handed over the presidency of the African Union to Malawian President Bingu wa Mutharika. The AU agreed to consider a Senegalese proposal to resettle Haiti’s earthquake homeless and possibly create a state for them in Africa. (Reuters, 1/31/10) (AFP, 1/31/10) (Reuters, 1/31/10) 2010        Jan 31,  Ten American Baptists were being held in the Haitian capital after trying take 33 children out of Haiti at a time of growing fears over possible child trafficking. Doctors skirted a bureaucratic logjam to save the life of two critically ill child victims of Haiti’s earthquake, flying them to US hospitals on a private jet to avoid a military suspension of medical evacuation flights. (AP, 1/31/10) 2010        Jan 31, In the Indian-controlled portion of Kashmir Wamiq Farooq (14), a Muslim boy, died after being struck by a shell fired by police to quell a demonstration by separatists in Srinagar. (AFP, 2/2/10) (AP, 2/13/10) 2010        Jan 31, Mexican President Felipe Calderon arrived in Japan for a three-day visit, as the countries mark 400 years of official ties. (AFP, 1/31/10) 2010        Jan 31, A Jordanian security official said more than 40 alleged Islamist extremists have been arrested in Jordan since a Jordanian blew himself up in Afghanistan in December, killing seven CIA agents. (AFP, 1/31/10) 2010        Jan 31, A Libyan appeal court overturned a jail term slapped on Swiss businessman Rashid Hamdani on a charge of overstaying his visa, easing a Tripoli-Bern diplomatic spat. (AFP, 1/31/10) 2010        Jan 31, In New Zealand Xiao Zhen killed Auckland taxi driver Hiren Mohini (39) and then fled to China. Zhen was arrested in Shanghai and tried for murder in 2011. Xiao (24) expressed remorse over the killing, which he said was in self-defense when an argument escalated after he refused to pay Mohini adequate cab fare. On Aug 17 Xiao Zhen was sentenced to 15 years in prison. (AP, 8/2/11) (www.police.govt.nz/operation-edgewater-hiren-mohini-homicide) (AP, 8/17/11) 2010        Jan 31, In northwest Pakistan fighter jets and helicopters pounded a district where a suicide bomber in Khar killed 17 people a day earlier. A roadside bomb exploded in the town of Safi, killing two security personnel who were riding in a water tanker. Militants blew up a government-run girls’ primary school on the outskirts of the northwestern garrison town of Bannu. State television reported that TTP chief Hakimullah Mehsud was dead, reviving rumors that he was killed in a US missile strike in mid-January. But the Taliban denied the report and the army only said it was investigating. (AFP, 1/31/10) 2010        Jan 31, In Russia several hundred demonstrators shouting “Shame!” gathered in a central Moscow square, defying a ban imposed by authorities. Moscow police detained dozens of people at an anti-Kremlin protest, including several prominent opposition leaders. A separate demonstration was held by dozens of residents of the Rechnik settlement to protest the demolition of their homes ordered by Mayor Yury Luzhkov. (AP, 1/31/10) (Econ, 2/6/10, p.57) 2010        Jan 31, In Somalia heavy mortar fire between African Union peacekeepers and Islamist insurgents killed at least 12 civilians and left scores wounded in Mogadishu. (AFP, 2/1/10) 2010        Jan 31, Switzerland’s justice minister warned in an interview that top bank UBS could collapse if sensitive talks with the US over a high-profile tax fraud investigation fall through. (AP, 1/31/10) 2010        Jan 31, In Davos, Switzerland, the world’s foremost gathering of business and government leaders wrapped up a five-day meeting with widespread agreement that a fragile recovery is under way but no consensus on what’s going to spur job growth and prevent another global economic meltdown. (AP, 1/31/10) 2010        Jan 31, Yemen said it would stop its war on Shiite northern rebels only if they agree to a six-point truce offer, including a pledge not to attack Saudi Arabia, as fighting raged on 3 fronts. (AP, 1/31/10)2011        Jan 31, The US and the EU imposed sanctions against Belarus Pres. Lukashenko and scores of other officials for a broad crackdown on the opposition following fraudulent elections last year. (SFC, 2/1/11, p.A2) 2011        Jan 31, A federal judge in Florida struck down President Barack Obama’s landmark healthcare overhaul as unconstitutional in the biggest legal challenge yet to federal authority to enact the law. (Reuters, 1/31/11) 2011        Jan 31, John Wrenshall (64), a former resident of Calgary, Canada, was sentenced in federal court in New Jersey to 25 years in prison after admitting to running a brothel for pedophiles in Thailand. (SFC, 2/1/11, p.A5) 2011        Jan 31, In eastern Afghanistan a roadside bomb killed a NATO service member. (AP, 1/31/11) 2011        Jan 31, Leaders of 53 African countries met In Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, to tackle festering conflicts in Sudan and Somalia at a summit overshadowed by Egypt’s popular uprising and the leadership crisis in Ivory Coast. The African Union named a panel of six African presidents to mediate Ivory Coast’s political crisis. (AFP, 1/31/11) (AP, 1/31/11) 2011        Jan 31, In Shanghai, China, relatives of Liu Yonghua, a patient who died, rampaged with knives through a hospital, seriously wounding six people and trying to throw a doctor out a window. (AP, 2/1/11) 2011        Jan 31, Egypt’s Pres. Mubarak named a new government, but the lineup dominated by regime stalwarts was greeted with scorn by protesters camped out for the fourth day in the capital’s central Tahrir Square. A coalition of opposition groups called for a million people to take to Cairo’s streets Feb 1 to demand the removal of Mubarak.  The official death toll from the crisis stood at 97, with thousands injured, but reports from witnesses across the country indicated the actual toll was far higher. Mubarak appointed General Murad Mowafi, former north Sinai governor, as head of Egyptian intelligence. The military promised on state TV late in the day that it would not fire on protesters answering a call for a million people to demonstrate the next day. Vice President Omar Suleiman, appointed by Mubarak only two days earlier in what could be a succession plan, went on state TV to announce the offer of a dialogue with “political forces” for constitutional and legislative reforms. (AP, 1/31/11) (AFP, 1/31/11) (AP, 2/1/11) 2011        Jan 31, The EU said that the World Trade Organization found US aid to Boeing violated international rules, confirming a preliminary ruling in the long-running subsidy battle between the Chicago-based plane maker and European rival Airbus. (AP, 1/31/11) 2011        Jan 31, European Union foreign ministers agreed to freeze the assets of Tunisia’s former President Zine-al Abidine Ben Ali and his wife. (Reuters, 1/31/11) 2011        Jan 31, India rejected Canada-based Research In Motion’s (RIM) offer to allow it only partial access to its BlackBerry data services, while neighboring Pakistan reversed its earlier decision to restrict the popular smartphone’s services. (Reuters, 1/31/11) 2011        Jan 31, India gave approval to South Korea’s POSCO to build a giant $12 billion steel plant, in the country’s biggest foreign investment deal since market reforms launched in 1991. (AFP, 1/31/11) 2011        Jan 31, In Indonesia popstar Nazril “Ariel” Irham was sentenced to 3½  years in prison after sex tapes with his celebrity girlfriends found their way to the Internet. (SFC, 2/1/11, p.A2) 2011        Jan 31, Iran’s prosecutor general said US hiker Sarah Shourd, freed on bail last year, has been summoned for trial in Iran along with her two American friends who remain in custody. (AFP, 1/31/11) 2011        Jan 31, Italy’s PM Silvio Berlusconi said he wanted to drop from the constitution a clause imposing social obligations on entrepreneurs. He also promised tax breaks for the south and offered cooperation with the opposition. (Econ, 2/5/11, p.63) 2011        Jan 31, Japanese ruling party powerbroker Ichiro Ozawa was charged over a funding scandal, adding to PM Naoto Kan’s woes as he struggles to survive in the face of a divided parliament and sagging support. (Reuters, 1/31/11) 2011        Jan 31, Jordan’s King Abdullah II fired his government in the face of smaller street protests, named an ex-prime minister to form a new Cabinet and ordered him to launch political reforms. King Abdullah II named Marouf Bakhit (64), a career soldier and former prime minister, after sacking the government of Samir Rifai (43). (AP, 2/1/11) (AFP, 2/2/11) (Econ, 2/5/11, p.32) 2011        Jan 31, In Kashmir attackers carrying automatic rifles whisked Arifa (17) and Akhtara (19) away from their home. Police say the men were rebels, though their mother, Fracha Begum, has said only that they were gunmen. Less than an hour later, police recovered their bodies riddled with bullets about a mile away. Residents seemed convinced the rebels killed the sisters for their alleged association with government forces deployed in the town. (AP, 2/16/11) 2011        Jan 31, In Mexico a girl (16) died after being shot by federal police in the same Ciudad Juarez neighborhood where gunmen massacred 15 youths at a party a year ago. She was shot two days earlier while riding in a car. Police said someone in the vehicle had opened fire at officers shortly beforehand. A drug gunman shot to death Maribel Hernandez, a woman who distributed newspapers in the border city of Ciudad Juarez, because his gang thought she threatened their control over street vendors. (AP, 2/1/11) (AP, 2/2/11) 2011        Jan 31, In Myanmar an elected parliament convened for the first time in half a century but inspired scant enthusiasm among a skeptical public convinced it is just a smokescreen for continued military rule. (Reuters, 1/31/11) 2011        Jan 31, Niger, an impoverished country on the edge of the Sahara, took another stab at democracy as it voted for a new president and parliament that are expected to take over leadership from the military. (AP, 1/31/11) 2011        Jan 31, In Pakistan a pair of bombings targeting police in the northwestern city of Peshawar killed five people, including a senior police officer. (AP, 1/31/11) 2011        Jan 31, Pakistan wildlife authorities said they have found the carcasses of six endangered river dolphins in Pakistan over the last month. Sindh Wildlife Department deputy head Ghulam Mohammad accused local fisherman, saying their poison and nets were to blame for the deaths of the blind Indus River Dolphin. A 2006 survey put the number left at 1,300. (AP, 1/31/11) 2011        Jan 31, In Russia several hundred people demonstrated on a central Moscow square to call for the ouster of PM Vladimir Putin. The demonstrations are held on the last day of every month with 31 days to call attention to the 31st Article of Russia’s Constitution, which guarantees freedom of assembly. (AP, 1/31/11) 2011        Jan 31, In Somalia fighting between government troops and police killed 16 people in Mogadishu, underscoring the weak UN-backed government’s inability to control its armed forces. The fighting began when police executed a plainclothes soldier they suspected of being an Islamist insurgent. (AP, 1/31/11) 2011        Jan 31, A major Spanish savings bank born from a merger of seven institutions, Banco Financiero y de Ahorros, announced plans to list on the market to tap private capital. (AFP, 1/31/11) 2011        Jan 31, In Sri Lanka a group of men broke into the offices of a website critical of the government and set fire to it. A journalist from the publication said that he suspected a government role in the attack. (AP, 1/31/11) 2011        Jan 31, Syria’s president Assad, who has resisted calls for political freedoms and jailed critics of his regime, said in an interview published today that his nation is immune from the kind of unrest roiling Tunisia and Egypt. (AP, 1/31/11)2012        Jan 31, The US government said it will give financial aid to Guatemala to help safely dispose of seized chemicals that were destined for use in methamphetamine manufacturing. (AP, 1/31/12) 2012        Jan 31, Mitt Romney won the Florida Republican primary with 47% of the vote. Newt Gingrich was second with 32%. Rick Santorum got 13 % and Ron Paul 7%. (AP, 2/1/12) 2012        Jan 31, Daly City’s Redevelopment Agency ceased to exist following a decision by the California Supreme Court handed down on Dec 29, 2011, to dissolve redevelopment agencies across the state. (Fog Cutter, Spring, 2012, p.2) 2012        Jan 31, In northern California two men broke into the Siskiyou County Courthouse and stole $1.26 million worth of gold nuggets, jewelry and other artifacts. On Sep 12, 2013, Scott Bailey (51) of San Pablo, Ca., pleaded guilty to burglary and was sentenced to 5 years in prison. David Dean Johnson (49) of El Sobrante was scheduled for trial on Nov 19. (SSFC, 9/15/13, p.C3) 2012        Jan 31, Mike Kelley (b.1954), Michigan-born artist, committed suicide in southern California. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Kelley_%28artist%29) (Econ, 1/4/14, p.66) 2012        Jan 31, In southern Afghanistan a man wearing an Afghan army uniform shot and killed a NATO service member, the latest in a rising number of similar attacks. (AP, 2/1/12) 2012        Jan 31, Britain stripped Fred Goodwin, the former head of Royal Bank of Scotland, of his knighthood. He had steered one of Britain’s largest banks to near collapse with the catastrophic buyout of a Dutch bank, a disaster that helped bring on the global financial crisis. (Reuters, 2/1/12) 2012        Jan 31, China said that it has detained seven company executives after tons of industrial waste including cadmium, a toxic metal, polluted some 200 miles of the Longjiang river, threatening water supplies for millions of people. Unnamed experts were quoted saying that the amount of illegally released waste in the waterway was unprecedented at an estimated 20 tons. (AFP, 1/31/12) (SSFC, 2/5/12, p.A6) 2012        Jan 31, Dominica said Bernard Wiltshire, a former attorney general (2000-2002), has been arrested on suspicion of conspiring with others to fraudulently obtain and sell passports. (AP, 1/31/12) 2012        Jan 31, Egypt’s newly elected lawmakers took aim at the country’s military rulers Tuesday, accusing them of trampling on democratic norms and overstepping their powers by passing laws, including a crucial one regulating presidential elections. Several hundred protesters rallied outside parliament, calling on lawmakers to press the military rulers to hold speedier and fair trials for former regime officials and settle retribution claims by the families of those killed during protests. (AP, 1/31/12) 2012        Jan 31, Egyptian Bedouins took 25 Chinese factory workers hostage in the northern Sinai Peninsula. The group demanded the release of militants jailed for a 2005 bombing in Sharm el-Sheikh at the tip of the Egyptian Sinai. All 25 workers were released by the next day. (AFP, 1/31/12) (AFP, 2/1/12) 2012        Jan 31, Rafale, made by Dassault, emerged as preferred bidder in the contest to supply India with 126 warplanes in what will be a $15 billion (9 billion pounds) deal. Its competitor, the Eurofighter Typhoon, is developed by a consortium comprising the German and Spanish branches of EADS, Britain’s BAE Systems and Italy’s Finmeccanica. (Reuters, 2/1/12) 2012        Jan 31, Haiti’s Pres. Michel Martelly awarded actor Sean Penn the honor of ambassador at large. (SFC, 2/1/12, p.A2) 2012        Jan 31, Iraqi MPs from the secular Iraqiya bloc returned to parliament, ending a boycott begun last month to protest the prime minister’s alleged centralization of power. (AFP, 1/31/12) 2012        Jan 31, Iraq executed 17 convicted criminals today, bringing to at least 51 the number so far this year. Death sentences in Iraq must be signed by the country’s president, currently Jalal Talabani, but the chief executive may delegate that authority to either of the two vice presidents. As Talabani is an ardent opponent of the death penalty, that is what he does. (AFP, 2/1/12) 2012        Jan 31, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu won a solid victory over his sole opponent for the leadership of his Likud party, bolstering his position ahead of possible early elections. (AFP, 2/1/12) 2012        Jan 31, Israel’s Interior Ministry said some 7,000 people from South Sudan must leave or face deportation. Spokeswoman Sabine Haddad said the South Sudanese will be offered voluntary deportation and around $1,300. After March 31 they will be deported. (AP, 1/31/12) 2012        Jan 31, Ivory Coast’s top court annulled the election of 11 lawmakers from Pres. Ouattara’s party in a December vote after complaints that they breached campaign laws. (AFP, 1/31/12) 2012        Jan 31, In Mali Tuareg separatist rebels extended their reach, attacking a sixth town, Niafunke, in the country’s remote north. (AP, 2/1/12) 2012        Jan 31, In Mexico political rivals slammed each other over $1.9 million in wads of cash found stuffed into a state official’s luggage on a Jan 27 private flight to Toluca, the capital of the home state of leading presidential candidate Enrique Pena Nieto. The money came from Veracruz, a Gulf coast state governed by Pena Nieto’s Institutional Revolutionary Party, known as the PRI. (AP, 1/31/12) 2012        Jan 31, Mexico’s Interior Secretary Alejandro Poire confirmed that an army general and 29 soldiers under his command in a town on the border with Texas are being tried on charges of torture, homicide, drug trafficking and other crimes. Details about Gen. Manuel Moreno Avina and his subordinates’ alleged reign of terror in the town of Ojinaga, across from Presidio, Texas, were first reported by the newspaper Reforma, which had access to some of the soldiers’ testimony. (AP, 1/31/12) 2012        Jan 31, In Mexico every one of the 2,500 police officers in Ciudad Juarez were ordered to leave home and stay in a hotel after the killing of five officers by a local drug cartel. The gang threatened a week ago to kill one policeman a day unless Police Chief Julian Leyzaola resigns. (AP, 2/2/12) 2012        Jan 31, In northern Mexico the bodies of missionaries John Casias (76) and wife Wanda (67), a Texas couple, were discovered strangled in their home in Santiago. (AP, 2/2/12) 2012        Jan 31, WFP officials said the World Food Program (WFP) will give emergency food to more than 80,000 people in Mozambique after twin cyclones left 32 dead. (AP, 1/31/12) 2012        Jan 31, NUPENG, a Nigerian oil workers’ union, launched a strike over a dispute with Shell, sparking fears of petrol shortages. The National Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers, the smaller of Nigeria’s two oil industry unions, represents blue-collar workers, including tanker drivers. (AFP, 1/31/12) 2012        Jan 31, In Pakistan dozens of heavily armed Taliban militants attacked a military post, sparking clashes that killed eight soldiers and wounded another 15. A government official said fighting between soldiers and Taliban militants over a strategic mountaintop in the northwestern Kurram tribal area has killed more than 60 people. At least 10 people were gunned down in the past 24 hours in the southern city of Karachi. (AFP, 1/31/12) (AP, 1/31/12) 2012        Jan 31, In Somalia two guards and a suicide bomber were killed in an attack on the home of Abdi Hasan Qeybdid, a senior militia commander in the central town of Galkayo. (AFP, 1/31/12) 2012        Jan 31, South African Airways launched non-stop flights to Beijing. China became South Africa’s top trade partner in 2009. (AFP, 1/31/12) 2012        Jan 31, Syrian government forces moved into Zamalka and Arbeen, the two remaining towns still in rebel hands. Army defectors gained full control of the central town of Rastan after days of intense clashes. Activists said the day’s death toll was at least seven, although the LCC put the figure at up to 28. (AP, 1/31/12) 2012        Jan 31, Ukrainian authorities said that the number of people who died of hypothermia in recent days has reached 30 as the country grapples with an unusually severe cold spell. In all, at least 58 people have died from the cold in Europe over the last week. (AP, 1/31/12) 2012        Jan 31, The ship, Vera, with 10 Ukrainian and one Georgian crew, was sailing to Turkey’s Aliaga port from Russia when it sank off the coast of Eregli in stormy waters. 8 of the crew were reported missing following the rescue of 3 people. (AP, 2/1/12) 2012        Jan 31, Yemeni armed tribesmen from the al-Mahweet province kidnapped six UN workers. The assailants demanded that the government release fellow tribesmen from prison. (AP, 1/31/12) 2012        Jan 31, Zimbabwe’s health minister said up to 50 cases of typhoid were being reported per day. More than 1,500 people have been treated in an outbreak blamed on poor water and sanitation facilities. (AFP, 1/31/12)2013        Jan 31, The US Congress sent Pres. Obama legislation raising the debt ceiling, averting a government default until later this year. (SFC, 2/1/13, p.A9) 2013        Jan 31, The US Navy said it has decided to scrap the $277 million mine-sweeper Guardian stuck since Jan 17 on the sensitive Tubbataha Reef in the Philippines. (SFC, 2/1/13, p.A6) 2013        Jan 31, A US government report showed that California’s Hispanic population will equal that of whites this year before becoming the state’s largest demographic group in 2014. (AP, 2/1/13) 2013        Jan 31, The Catholic archdiocese of Los Angeles published 12,000 pages of personnel documents on 122 priests accused of sexual abuse dating back to the 1940s. (Econ, 2/23/13, p.31) 2013        Jan 31, Genelle Conway-Allen (13) of Suisun City, Ca., was last seen alive. Her body was found the next day 4 miles away in Allan Witt Park, Fairfield. On Feb 8 police arrested Anthony Lamar Jones (32), a local Fairfield barber. (SFC, 2/7/13, p.A9) (SFC, 2/9/13, p.C1) 2013        Jan 31, The NY Times said Chinese hackers repeatedly penetrated its computer systems over the past four months, stealing reporters’ passwords and hunting for files on an investigation into the wealth amassed by the family of a top Chinese leader. (AP, 1/31/13) 2013        Jan 31, In Texas prosecutor Mark Hasse (57) was shot and killed in the parking lot behind the Kaufman County Courthouse. (SFC, 2/1/13, p.A7) (SSFC, 3/31/13, p.A12) 2013        Jan 31, Armenian Paruir Airikian (63), one of eight candidates in the Feb. 18 presidential race, was shot and wounded by an unidentified assailant outside his home in Yerevan, just before midnight two suspects were arrested on Feb 7. (AP, 2/1/13) (AP, 2/8/13) 2013        Jan 31, Australia’s government received confirmation that the Shonan Maru No. 2, a support vessel for the Japanese whaling fleet, had entered Australia’s exclusive economic zone near Macquarie Island in the Antarctic Ocean. The Australian embassy in Tokyo protested to the Japanese government. (AP, 2/1/13) 2013        Jan 31, Chinese courts convicted eight Tibetans over accusations they incited others to self-immolate in the first such prosecutions to become publicly known, showing Beijing’s resolve to stamp out the protests by criminalizing both the protesters and their supporters. (AP, 1/31/13) 2012        Jan 31, Chinese police detained Liu Hui, the brother-in-law of jailed Nobel Peace Prize winner Liu Xiaobo, on fraud charges in what the family said is the latest act of official retaliation. In March he was formally charged over a real estate dispute. (AP, 3/29/13) 2013        Jan 31, Egypt’s opposition National Salvation Front held a meeting with Pres. Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood under the aegis of Egypt’s premier Islamic institution, Al-Azhar, in their first ever meeting. They and other politicians signed a joint statement denouncing violence. (AP, 2/1/13) 2013        Jan 31, Germany’s Parliament voted to extend the country’s military mission in Afghanistan by 13 months. (AP, 1/31/13) 2013        Jan 31, In Ghana former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan launched a commission to tackle drug trafficking in West Africa. Annan blamed the international community for ignoring the threat posed by corrupted states like Guinea-Bissau. (AP, 1/31/13) 2013        Jan 31, Greek doctors, port workers and public transport staff in the country’s capital walked off the job in strikes against deeply unpopular austerity measures that have seen incomes slashed as the country struggles to emerge from a deep financial crisis. Farmers in central Greece parked their tractors along the country’s main highway for a second day, under the watchful eye of riot police, threatening to shut the road to protest spending cuts and high fuel taxes. (AP, 1/31/13) 2013        Jan 31, In Iceland a 15-year-old Icelandic girl was granted the right to legally use the name “Blaer,” which means “light breeze,” given to her by her mother, despite the opposition of authorities and a strict law on names. (AP, 1/31/13) 2013        Jan 31, Iran announced plans to install and operate advanced uranium enrichment machines, in what would be a technological leap allowing it to significantly speed up activity the West fears could be put to developing a nuclear weapon. (AP, 1/31/13) 2013        Jan 31, An Iraqi official said security forces arrested French journalist  Nadir Dendoune several days ago while he was taking photos  of a security location in Baghdad’s southern Dora neighborhood. (AP, 1/31/13) 2013        Jan 31, The book “They Promised Me Paradise” by Turkish gunman Mehmet Ali Agca, who shot and wounded Pope John Paul in 1981, was released in Italy. In the book Agca writes that Iran’s late leader Ayhatollah Ruhollah Khomeini told him to kill John Paul in the name of God. (SFC, 2/1/13, p.A2) 2013        Jan 31, In Mexico City an office building blast killed 37 people and injured 121 at the headquarters of Petroleos Mexicanos, the state-owned oil company. On Feb 4 authorities said the basement explosion in an administrative building next to the 51-story Pemex tower was caused by a gas buildup ignited by an electrical spark or other heat source. (AP, 2/1/13) (AP, 2/4/13) 2013        Jan 31, In southern Mexico vigilantes who have taken up arms against drug cartel violence and common crime announced they will bring charges ranging from organized crime to kidnapping and extortion against 50 men and three women who they have been holding prisoner at improvised jails in Ayutla, Guerrero state. (AP, 1/31/13) 2013        Jan 31, In Pakistan a roadside bomb killed two polio workers on their way to vaccinate children in the northwestern Kurraml region near the Afghan border. (AP, 1/31/13) 2013        Jan 31, Volgograd, the southern Russian city where the Red Army decisively turned back Nazi forces in a key World War II battle, passed a measure to use the name Stalingrad in city statements on the commemoration day, on Russia’s May 9 Victory Day and on four other days connected with the battle. (AP, 1/31/13) 2013        Jan 31, South African officials said that 57 rhinos have been killed by poachers across the country so far this year. A record 668 rhinos were killed in South Africa in 2012, an increase of nearly 50 percent over the previous year. (AP, 1/31/13) 2013        Jan 31, Syria threatened to retaliate for an Israeli airstrike and its ally Iran said there will be repercussions for the Jewish state over the attack. (AP, 1/31/13) 2013        Jan 31, The United Nations demanded that Egyptian authorities act to bring perpetrators of sexual assaults to justice, saying it had reports of 25 sexual assaults on women in Tahrir rallies over the past week. (AP, 2/2/13) 2013        Jan 31, In Yemen two days of clashes in the south between al-Qaida militants and pro-government fighters killed 14 on both sides. (AP, 1/31/13)2014        Jan 31, Former basketball star Dennis Rodman said he was willing to trade places with Kenneth Bae, an American missionary imprisoned in North Korea, the next time he visits his friend, North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un. (Reuters, 1/31/14) 2014        Jan 31, A US federal judge gave Hosam Amara, a former Agriprocessors Inc. manager, a 41-month prison term for exploiting immigrant workers at a kosher slaughterhouse in Postville, Iowa. 389 workers were arrested in a May, 2008, raid at the plant. (SFC, 2/1/14, p.A6) 2014        Jan 31, A man shot two students at Michigan State Univ. in East Lansing. Dominique Nolff was pronounced dead the next morning. (SFC, 2/3/14, p.A4) 2014        Jan 31, The Roman Catholic Diocese of Helena, Montana, filed for bankruptcy protection in advance of proposed settlements for two lawsuits that claim clergy members sexually abused 362 people over decades and the church covered it up. (AP, 1/31/14) 2014        Jan 31, Christopher Jones, former actor and film star, died in Orange Ct., Ca. His films included Three in the Attic” (1968), “Wild in the Streets” (1968), “The Looking Glass War” (1969) and “Ryan’s Daughter” (1970). (SFC, 2/10/14, p.C6) 2014        Jan 31, In Afghanistan the Taliban attacked three police checkpoints overnight in the southern province of Helmand, killing one officer before police repelled the attackers. 4 policemen were killed when a roadside bomb explosion hit a police vehicle in Kandahar province. (AP, 1/31/14) (AP, 2/1/14) 2014        Jan 31, In Australia a government agency approved a plan to dump sediment within the area of the Great Barrier Marine Park in an expansion project of the Abbot Point coal port in northern Queensland. (SFC, 2/1/14, p.A2) 2014        Jan 31, Red Cross officials warned that Central African Republic’s capital of Bangui is experiencing “unprecedented levels of violence” with at least 30 people killed in the last three days. (AP, 1/31/14) 2014        Jan 31, China celebrated Lunar New Year, the year of the horse, a celebration also known as the Spring Festival. (Econ, 1/25/14, p.36) 2014        Jan 31, Activists from around China began arriving at the eastern town of Qufu during the Chinese New Year holiday to demand an investigation into the death of a fellow activist’s father at a government building on Jan 29. (AP, 2/7/14) 2014        Jan 31, Egyptian military aircraft struck suspected positions of al-Qaida-inspired fighters overnight in villages of the Sinai Peninsula, killing 13 people. (AP, 1/31/14) 2014        Jan 31, Hungarian filmmaker Miklos Jancso (b.1921), winner of the best director award at the 1972 Cannes Film Festival, died. Jancso won his Cannes award for “Red Psalm,” about a 19th-century peasant revolt. (AP, 1/31/14) 2014        Jan 31, In India Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal named a string of high-ranking Indian politicians he described as corrupt and said his anti-graft Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) would target them in an upcoming general election. (Reuters, 1/31/14) 2014        Jan 31, In Iraq a suicide car bomb killed 5 soldiers and destroyed a bridge in Hit, Anbar province. (SFC, 2/1/14, p.A2) 2014        Jan 31, In Libya Abdel Fatah Al Barasi, a retired police colonel, died after being shot in the head while in his car in the eastern city of Benghazi. Salah Abd Al Razak and Zakaria Abdullah Al Darsi, both sons of colonels, were also shot and killed in the street by assailants. (AP, 2/1/14) 2014        Jan 31, Humanitarian groups warned that more than 800,000 Malians are desperate for food while another three million risk going without meals as the country struggles to emerge from months of armed conflict. (AP, 1/31/14) 2014        Jan 31, In Nigeria gunmen ransacked the mainly Christian village of Sabon Garin Yamdula in Adamawa state, killing a pastor before vigilante youths firing guns set them to flight and soldiers later deployed. A bus set off an improved explosive device on the highway through nearby Kuthra village, Borno state, killing 7 passengers. (AP, 2/1/14) 2014        Jan 31, Philippine officials said 3 child soldiers recruited by hardline Muslim rebels were among 53 people killed in a five-day military offensive in the restive south. (AFP, 1/31/14) 2014        Jan 31, In Senegal a judge sentenced two men to six months’ jail in a rare conviction of a gay couple on criminal charges. (AP, 2/1/14) 2014        Jan 31, In northern Serbia strong winds created meters-high snow drifts, trapping up to 60 people in cars and buses. (Reuters, 1/31/14) 2014        Jan 31, The Syrian Observatory for Human Right said fighting in Syria has killed nearly 1,900 people, including at least 430 civilians, during the week of UN-hosted peace talks in Switzerland. Negotiations in Geneva wrapped up and were likely to resume from February 10. (AP, 1/31/14) (AFP, 1/31/14) 2014        Jan 31, The UN distributed food in the Syrian capital’s besieged Yarmuk Palestinian refugee camp for a second day in a bid to help tens of thousands of trapped civilians. Government shelling killed at least 16 people in a rebel-held area of the northern city of Aleppo. (AFP, 1/31/14) (AP, 1/31/14) 2014        Jan 31, A Thai court ordered more than $1.4 million in assets seized from a former top civil servant whose wealth was revealed when burglars robbed his house. The Civil Court said former Transport Ministry Permanent Secretary Supoj Saplom could not prove his wealth was honestly earned. (AP, 1/31/14) 2014        Jan 31, Ukraine President Viktor Yanukovych signed a measure offering amnesty to those arrested in two months of protests, but only if demonstrators vacate most of the buildings they occupied, and repealed anti-protest legislation. (AP, 1/31/14) (Reuters, 2/1/14) 2014        Jan 31, In southern Yemen suspected al-Qaida militants launched a surprise attack on an army checkpoint in Shibam, Hadramawt province, killing 15 soldiers and wounding five others. (AP, 1/31/14) http://www.timelinesdb.com  

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