This Day in History - July 24

Today is the 205th day of 2010. There are 160 days left in the year.

Today's Highlight

1997: After 290 years of union, the British government offers Scots the power to legislate, to tax and to speak for themselves in the European Union.

Other Notable Events

1923: Greece gives up Smyrna, eastern Thrace and two islands to Turkey under the Treaty of Lausanne, which settles the borders of modern-day Turkey. The countries agree to exchange their minority populations.

1942: British bombers devastate German cities of Frankfurt and Mannheim in World War II.

1969: The US Apollo II astronauts, the first men to walk on the Moon, splash down safely in the Pacific Ocean.

1974: Konstantinos Karamanlis returns from exile and is sworn in as prime minister of Greece after the junta relinquishes control.

1992: The Mexican government accuses the US of excessive interference in anti-drug efforts and declines aid earmarked to combat narcotics.

1993: Russia says it will invalidate billions of old rubles to combat inflation.

1994: Rwandan refugees trickle into Zaire -- now Congo -- after the border is opened, to escape filthy, crowded camps where death from cholera and dehydration abound.

2004: Iraq's interim leader says diplomatic relations between Syria and Baghdad likely will be restored soon, after years of hostility and recent tension over foreign fighters sneaking into Iraq along their shared border.

2007: Five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor return home after secretive talks lead to their release by Libya after eight 1/2 years in prison -- much of it under sentence of death -- for widely rejected charges of infecting children with HIV.

2008: Zvonko Busic, who served 32 years in a US prison for hijacking a TWA jetliner and planting a bomb that killed a policeman, is paroled and returns home to Croatia.

2009: Ousted President Manuel Zelaya steps across the border into his homeland Friday, vowing to reclaim his post a month after soldiers flew him into exile.

Today's Birthdays

Simon Bolivar, leader of South American independence (1783-1830); Alexandre Dumas, French writer (1802-1870); Ernst Bloch, Swiss-born composer (1880-1959); Tanizaki Jun'ichiro, Japanese writer (1886-1965); Amelia Earhart, US aviation pioneer (1898-1937); Cootie Williams, US jazz musician (1908-1985); Bella Abzug, US lawyer, politician and activist (1920-1998); Gus Van Sant, US director (1952-); Jennifer Lopez, US actress/singer (1968-).

--AP