Today is the 47th day of 2013. There are 318 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlight

1959: Fidel Castro becomes premier of Cuba after the overthrow of Fulgencio Batista and sets about expanding the communist ideology. It is the same day on which Kim Jong Il of North Korea, also communist, celebrates his 17th birthday.

Other Events

1942: German submarines fire upon oil refineries in Aruba, Dutch West Indies, during World War II.

1962: Anti-government riots break out in Georgetown, British Guyana.

1993: Russian President Boris Yeltsin and his rival, Parliament speaker Ruslan Khasbulatov, agree to negotiate a separation of powers.

1994: Greece declares a unilateral embargo on the former Yugoslav republic of Macedonia in a conflict over the use of the name Macedonia.

1995: Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin agrees to gradually lift the closure of the West Bank and Gaza Strip and permit 15,000 Palestinian workers to return to their jobs in Israel.

1996: Italian President Oscar Luigi Scalfaro dissolves Parliament to clear the way for national elections, three years ahead of schedule.

1997: Rebel leader Laurent Kabila, after a plea from the UN, agrees to delay an attack on Zaire’s largest refugee camp. The camp in Tingi-Tingi is attacked two weeks later, scattering 170,000 Rwandans.

2006: Haitians celebrate as word quickly spreads that René Preval, a former president who is hugely popular among the poor, is declared the winner of the presidential election.

2009: France’s top judicial body formally recognizes the nation’s role in deporting Jews to Nazi death camps during the Holocaust — but effectively rules out any more reparations for the deportees or their families.

Today’s Birthdays

Nicolaus Copernicus, Polish astronomer, (1473-1543); GM Travelyan, British historian (1876-1964); John Schlesinger, English film director (1926-2003); Kim Jong Il, North Korean leader (1942-2011); James Ingram, US singer (1952-); Ice-T, US actor/rapper (1958-); Andy Taylor, guitarist (1961-).

— AP