Britain and the World 1999

BRITAIN AND THE WORLD SINCE 1953

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	1999
Jan7	Impeachment trial of President William Jefferson Clinton begins in Senate. Chief Justice William Rehnquist sworn in to preside. He swears in the 100 senators as jurors
Feb4	Amadou Diallo, an unarmed West African immigrant, was shot and killed in front of his Bronx home by four plainclothes New York City police officers.
Feb8	The novelist Iris Murdoch dies. Murdoch was also for many years a philosophy tutor at Oxford University, and published several idiosyncratic philosophical works. In her later years, she succumbed to Alzheimer's Disease, a mental decline poignantly described by her husband, John Bayley, in his memoir **Iris, published in the year before her death. The book was made into a successful film (2001)**
Feb12	The US Senate voted to acquit President Clinton of perjury and obstruction of justice. Clinton told Americans he was "profoundly sorry" for what he had said and done in the Monica Lewinsky affair that triggered the impeachment drama.
Feb16	Kurds seized embassies and held hostages across Europe following Turkey's arrest of Kurdish rebel leader Abdullah Ocalan.
	Testimony began in the Jasper, Texas, trial of John William King, charged with murder in the gruesome dragging death of James Byrd Junior. (King was later convicted and sentenced to death.)
Feb18	The Clinton administration warned Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic to choose peace with ethnic Albanians in Kosovo, or face a devastating military strike.
Mar2	After suffering from breast cancer for over five years, the singer Dusty Springfield dies at the age of 59
Mar6	Director Stanley Kubrick dies. Famed for his meticulous directing style, controversial subject matter and often ground-breaking technical advances, Kubrick made some of the best films of the 50s and 60s such as Paths of Glory, Dr. Strangelove and the sci-fi epic 2001: A Space Odyssey
Mar8	New York Yankees baseball star Joe DiMaggio died in Hollywood, Florida, at age 84.
Mar13	Evander Holyfield, the WBA / IBF champion, and Lennox Lewis, the WBC champion, kept their respective titles after fighting to a controversial draw in New York
Mar20	Bertrand Piccard of Switzerland and Brian Jones of Britain became the first aviators to fly a hot-air balloon around the world nonstop.
Mar21	At the Academy Awards,"Shakespeare in Love" won seven Oscars, including best picture and best actress for Gwyneth Paltrow; Roberto Benigni won best actor for"Life is Beautiful," while Steven Spielberg won best director for "Saving Private Ryan."
Mar22	Dr. Jack Kevorkian went on trial on murder charges for the first time, telling a jury in Pontiac, Michigan, he was merely carrying out his professional duty in a videotaped assisted death shown on "60 Minutes." (Kevorkian was convicted of second-degree murder.)
Mar24	Thirty-nine people were killed when fire erupted in the Mont Blanc tunnel in France and burned for two days.
Mar28	NATO broadened its attacks on Yugoslavia to target Serb military forces in Kosovo in the fifth straight night of airstrikes; thousands of refugees flooded into Albania and Macedonia from Kosovo
Apr1	A New Jersey man was arrested and charged with originating the "Melissa" e-mail virus. (David L. Smith later pleaded guilty to various state and federal charges.)
	A legally-binding minimum rate of pay is introduced in Britain for the first time.All adults must be paid at least £3.60 an hour and workers under the age of 22 must get no less than £3 an hour.A government body was set up to ensure employers comply with the new wage levels with fines for non compliance. Needless to say enforcement was less than robust
Apr3	Theodore Kaczynski was arrested, accused of being the Unabomber.
Apr5	The United Nations suspended sanctions against Libya after Moammar Gadhafi surrendered two suspected Libyan intelligence agents for trial in the 1988 Pan Am bombing over Lockerbie. In Laramie, Wyoming, Russell Henderson pleaded guilty to kidnapping and felony murder in the death of Matthew Shepard, a gay college student.
Apr10	Bobbyjo ridden by Paul Carberry and trained by his father Tommy wins the Aintree Grand National, the first Irish-trained winner since 1974
Apr14	The last ever FA Cup Replay takes place in a Semi-Final between Manchester United and Arsenal After a 0-0 draw in the first game Man Utd win the replay 2-1 after extra time
Apr17	A nail bomb explodes in the middle of a busy market in Brixton South London. The police are initially reluctant to attach racial motives to the attack but as events were to prove they were the actions of a militant right wing extremist
Apr20	On the 110th anniversary of Hitler's birthdate, staff and students are massacred at a Columbine High School in Denver Colorado by two students Eric Harris and Dylan Theobald. The final death toll of 15, including the two attackers. In April 2001 the families of most of the victims of the Columbine school shootings were awarded $2.5m (£1.8m) after suing the gunmen's parents and the men who sold them the weapons.
Apr26	Jill Dando the TV Presenter and Journalist is murdered outside her house in Fulham by a gunman. Despite widespread publicity the killer remained at large for over twelve months before police arrested Barry George. He was later found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment although many people harbored doubts about the validity of the verdict
Apr30	A bomb explodes at 6.30p.m. at the Admiral Duncan Public House in OId Compton Street Soho London killing three people and severely injuring many more customers. It is connected to two earlier bombs that exploded in Brixton. The explosions proved to be the work of right-wing extremist David Copeland, 22, who was captured shortly after the pub bombing.In June 2000 he was found him guilty of murder and jailed for life
May22	Manchester United beat Newcastle United 2 - 0 in the F.A.Cup Final and secure their third "double" in five years (Previously achieved in 1994 and 1996). Four days later they achieved an unprecedented treble when they beat Bayern Munich 2-1 in the European Cup Final
May26	The first Welsh Assembly for over 600 years is opened in Cardiff by the Queen.
Jun18	More than 4,000 people took to the streets of London in protest at the burden of debt owed by the world's poorest countries to the Group of Eight nations. The peaceful gathering became violent after a small crowd of demonstrators began attacking buildings and smashing windows - widespread damage was caused
Jul1	The Scottish parliament opens in Edinburgh
Jul16	Search began for the missing plane that was carrying John F. Kennedy Jr., his wife, Carolyn, and her sister, Lauren Bessette, on a flight from New Jersey to Massachusetts. (The plane had crashed near Martha's Vineyard the night before, killing all three aboard.) The most famous picture of “Jo-Jo” was taken on his third birthday. It showed a little boy saluting his assassinated father’s coffin on its way to Arlington National Cemetery.
Aug 9	Helen Rollason the TV Sports Presenter dies from cancer at the age of 43
Aug 11	The last total eclipse of the millenium and the last to be seen in the U.K until 2nd September 2090.
Oct 5	An horrific train cash occurs when two trains collide at Ladbroke Grove on the Paddington mainline. 31 people are killed and many more injured in the disaster. An inevitable public enquiry is announced
Oct25	US golfer and 1999 US Open Champion Payne Stewart is killed in air crash
Nov 28	A man wielding a samurai sword enters St Andrews Catholic Church Thornton Heath and injures 11 churchgoers,four severely
Nov30	The beef-on-the-bone ban was lifted by the Labour Government - putting T-bone steaks back on British menus.
Dec10	American Lafitt Pincay Jnr, who has been riding for 36 years, broke Bill Shoemaker's long-standing world's record with his 8,834th winner
Dec30	Michael Anram breaks into the house of ex-Beatle George Harrison in Henley-on-Thames and stabs him in the chest. He is arrested and charged with attempted murder

Last Updated 19/09/06 11:26

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