This Day in History – June 12
Today is the 163rd day of 2013. There are 202 days left in the year.
TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT
1964: Nelson Mandela, Walter Sisulu and other anti-apartheid leaders are sentenced to life in prison in South Africa.
OTHER EVENTS
1667: A 15-year-old boy becomes the first to receive a blood transfusion when Jean-Baptiste Denys, physician of French King Louis XIV, treats his fever with lamb’s blood.
1798: French forces capture island of Malta.
1901: Cuban Convention makes that nation virtually a protectorate of the US.
1935: Paraguay and Bolivia sign a truce ending bloody three-year Chaco War. Paraguay gets most of the disputed Chaco region, while Bolivia gets a river port.
1937: Stalin’s purge of Russian generals begins.
1940 – Japanese planes bomb Chungking, China, capital of the Nationalist movement.
1952: Nordic nationals are for the first time able to cross the borders between their countries without passports.
1967: Israel declares it will keep some of territory won from Egypt, Jordan and Syria in Six-Day War.
1976: A military coup in Uruguay overthrows civilian president Juan Bordaberry, beginning a nine-year dictatorship.
1987: Central African Republic’s former Emperor Jean-Bedel Bokassa is sentenced to death for murder, arbitrary arrest and embezzlement of public funds.
1988: Demonstrations erupt over controversial constitutional amendment making Islam the state religion in Bangladesh.
1991: Boris Yeltsin is elected president of Russia; Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines erupts for the first time in centuries, causing widespread damage and 700 deaths.
1993: UN forces launch offensive against Somali warlord Mohammed Farah Aidid.
1994: The ex-wife of US football star OJ Simpson and one of her friends are found murdered. The trial consumes American media for months.
1997: The US announces it will try to limit NATO expansion to Hungary, the Czech Republic and Poland, snubbing Slovenia and Romania.
2000: Municipal elections in Montenegro leave Serbia’s small partner divided between backers of the pro-Western government and supporters of Serb leader Slobodan Milosevic.
2003: The UN Security Council passes a US-backed resolution that grants immunity from prosecution by the International Criminal Court (ICC) to US and other citizens on UN missions from countries that had not ratified the court’s founding treaty.
2005: Palestinian authorities carry out their first executions since 2002, killing four convicted murderers by firing squad in a campaign meant to halt a growing wave of lawlessness.
2007: Yugoslav war crimes tribunal convicts former Croatian Serb leader Milan Martic of mass murders, torture and persecution of non-Serbs from 1991-95.
2008: Nepalese officials take control of the main royal palace in Katmandu, a day after deposed King Gyanendra left to begin life as a civilian. The Narayanhiti palace will soon be turned into a museum.
2009: The UN Security Council imposes new sanctions on North Korea, toughening an arms embargo and authorising ship searches on the high seas in an attempt to thwart the reclusive nation’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs.
2010: Ethnic riots wrack southern Kyrgyzstan, forcing thousands of Uzbeks to flee as their homes are torched by roving mobs of Kyrgyz men. The interim government begs Russia for troops to stop the violence, but the Kremlin offers only humanitarian assistance.
2011: Turkey’s ruling party surges to a third term in parliamentary elections, setting the stage for the rising regional power to pursue economic growth, assertive diplomacy and an overhaul of the military-era constitution.
TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS
Charles Kingsley, British author-social reformer (1819-1875); Sir Anthony Eden, British prime minister (1897-1977); Anne Frank, German-Jewish Holocaust diarist (1929-1945); George HW Bush, former US president (1924-); Richard Sherman, US film composer (1928-); Chick Corea, US jazz keyboardist (1941-); Jenilee Harrison, US actress (1958-); Grandmaster Dee, US rapper (1962-); Paula Marshall, US actress (1964-).
— AP