Today is Tuesday, March 30, the 89th day of 2010. There are 276 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlight

2006: Portia Simpson Miller is sworn in as Prime Minister of Jamaica. She is the country’s first female head of government and the seventh prime minister after PJ Patterson who resigns a year before the end of his third term in office.

Other Notable Events

1820: Duc de Richelieu re-establishes censorship of French press.

1842: Ether is used as anaesthetic for the first time, by Dr Crawford Long in the US.

1858: The eraser-topped pencil is patented by H L Lipman of Philadelphia.

1867: US Secretary of State William H Seward reaches an agreement with Russia to purchase the territory of Alaska for $7.2 million, a deal roundly ridiculed as “Seward’s Folly”.

1870: The 15th amendment to the US Constitution, giving black men the right to vote, is declared in effect.

1912: Sultan of Morocco signs treaty making Morocco a French protectorate.

1940: Japan establishes puppet government in occupied China.

1949: Syrian Gen Hosni al-Zaim seizes power in CIA-backed coup.

1967: North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) formally closes its military headquarters in France.

1974: Chinese jetliner arrives in New York in what is described as first civilian flight from Chinese mainland to the US.

1991: Albania’s Communist leaders free more than 250 political prisoners on the eve of multi-party elections.

1992: The UN starts an effort to return nearly 370,000 refugees to Cambodia.

1993: After the worst wave of violence in years, Israel closes the occupied West Bank and the Gaza Strip. The closure lasts for months.

1994: Irish Republican Army announces a three-day cease-fire and calls for direct talks with the British government.

1995: Fleeing violence in Burundi, thousands of Rwandan refugees trek toward Tanzania; Pope John Paul II issues the 11th encyclical of his papacy in which he condemns abortion and euthanasia as crimes that no human laws could legitimise.

1998: Rolls-Royce is purchased by German automaker BMW for $570 million.

2002: Britain’s Queen Mary, widow of King George VI and mother of his successor to the throne, Queen Elizabeth II, dies at 101.

2003: Worldwide anti-war protests continue during the second week of the US-led invasion of Iraq, with major demonstrations in Indonesia, Pakistan and South Korea.

2005: British lawmakers say the death toll in Sudan’s Darfur region has been underestimated and is likely to be around 300,000, calling attacks against civilians “no less serious” than genocide.

2007: Nepal’s seven ruling political parties and the country’s former Maoist rebels agree to form a joint government, the latest step in ending a decade of civil war.

2008: A group of 200 Tibetan exiles and monks try to storm the Chinese embassy visa office in the Nepali capital, but police beat them back with bamboo batons. At least 130 protesters are arrested.

Today’s Birthdays

Francisco Goya, Spanish artist (1746-1828); Paul Verlaine, French author (1844-1896); John Astin, US actor (1930-); Warren Beatty, US actor (1937-); Eric Clapton, British guitarist/singer (1945-), Tracy Chapman, US singer (1964-); Celine Dion, Canadian singer (1968-); Norah Jones, US singer (1979-).