Today is the 223th day of 2011. There are 142 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlight

1962: Jamaica’s National Stadium opens for its first ever event — the 9th Central American and Caribbean Games which last until the 25th, and in which 14 countries paticipate.

Other Events

1863: French establish protectorate over Cambodia.

1929: Arabs launch attacks on Jews in Palestine over disputes on Jewish use of Wailing Wall in Jerusalem, considered holy by both Jews and Arabs.

1935: Nazi storm troopers stage mass demonstrations against Jews in Germany.

1937: Iraqi dictator Bakr Sidqi is assassinated, a year after he staged the first-ever military coup in modern Arab history.

1950: King Leopold III of Belgium abdicates because of criticism of his actions during World War II. His son Baudouin becomes king the next year.

1952: Prince Hussein is proclaimed King Hussein of Jordan on termination of King Talal’s reign.

1954: Formal peace announcement in Indochina ends more than seven years of fighting with the French and Communist Vietminh. Vietnam is partitioned into North and South.

1973: US officially ends combat involvement in Indochina, the same day the Viet Cong charge that 71 prisoners of war turned over to them by South Vietnam are not Communist supporters but want to return to Saigon.

1983: The US Agency for International Development agrees to send US$75 million in aid to Peru, Ecuador and Bolivia to help reconstruction efforts following the worst droughts and floods in four decades.

1992: Heavy fire blasts Sarajevo, and UN officials say about 28,000 people, mostly Muslims, are being forced from their homes in northern Bosnia in one of the biggest single acts of “ethnic cleansing”.

1997: An international meeting called to rescue Thailand’s shaky economy offers the country US$16 billion in loans.

1998: Congolese rebels fighting President Laurent Kabila say they are closing in on the capital, while the government rounds up Tutsis, suspected of supporting the rebellion.

2003: Liberian President Charles Taylor resigns and leaves the country for exile in Nigeria. Taylor’s departure was seen as a major step in bringing peace to the nation, which had been plagued by civil war for 14 years.

2007: Sierra Leone holds its first presidential elections since UN peacekeepers withdrew two years ago.

2009: Myanmar’s generals again succeed in isolating democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, but her fleeting emergence during a gruelling trial on charges of violating her house arrest show that her steely resolve and charisma remain intact.

2010: Reasearchers say two ancient animal bones from Ethiopia show signs of butchering by human ancestors, moving back the earliest evidence for the use of stone tools by about 800,000 years.

Today’s Birthdays

James Bryan Herrick, US cardiologist (1861-1954); Bertram Mills, English circus entrepreneur (1873-1938); Enid Blyton, British author (1897-1968); Alex Haley, US author (1921-1992); Ian Charleston, British actor (1949-1990); Angus Wilson, British author (1913-1991); Hulk Hogan, US wrestler/actor (1953-); Ali Shaheed Muhammad, hip-hop artist (1970-).