Today is the 72nd day of 2014. There are 293 days left in the year.

TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT

1881: Russia’s Czar Alexander II is assassinated by radical terrorists who demand a constitutional government in Russia. Ironically, the czar had just signed a bill to establish exactly what they wanted. When he died, so did the agreement.

OTHER EVENTS

1325: Tenochtitlan, the capital of the Aztec Empire, is founded.

1552: Turks invade Hungary.

1567: Margaret of Parma, Regent of the Netherlands, uses German mercenaries to annihilate 2,000 Calvinists.

1639: Harvard University is named for clergyman John Harvard.

1707: Holy Roman Empire agrees to Convention of Milan whereby French troops are to leave northern Italy.

1714: Battle of Storkyro leads to Russian domination of Finland.

1781: The planet Uranus is discovered by Sir William Herschel just past the planet Saturn. It was the first of three planets to be sighted during the next two hundred years.

1868: The impeachment trial of US President Andrew Johnson begins in the US Senate.

1884: Using Greenwich, England as the commencement point from which all time will be measured, an international time standard is adopted throughout the United States.

1900: British forces under Frederick Roberts capture Bloemfontein, South Africa.

1913: New Australian federal capital officially named Canberra.

1925: A law goes into effect in Tennessee prohibiting the teaching of evolution.

1938: Austria is annexed by Germany a day after Nazi troops march in.

1967: Peasant rioting is reported in China.

1974: The Arab nations agree to end their five-month oil embargo on sales to the US. Their sanction crippled both the American industry and economy.

1989: Christian army units and Syrian-backed Muslim militiamen shatter cease-fire in clash across Beirut’s dividing Green Line.

1991: Kuwait’s emir, Sheik Jeber al-Ahmed al-Sabah, returns from exile after his country is liberated from Iraqi occupation.

1992: A 6.2-magnitude earthquake rocks Turkey, claiming at least 570 lives.

1993: Hundreds of refugees pour into Srebrenica in Bosnia, and desperate crowds prevent a French UN commander General Philippe Morillon from leaving the war-battered Muslim enclave.

1996: A gunman in Dunblane, Scotland, shoots to death 16 children and a teacher.

1997: A military cargo plane crashes in the mountains in north-eastern Iran, killing all 88 people on board.

1998: South Korean President Kim Dae-jung, himself once imprisoned for his political beliefs, grants amnesty to some five million South Koreans, including six elderly political prisoners.

2000: Alcoa Inc settles a government lawsuit by agreeing to spend US$8.8 million to clean up the Mississippi River and reduce pollution.

2002: Angola’s government announces a ceasefire in its 27-year civil war against the rebel National Union for the Total Independence of Angola, known as UNITA.

2005: Voters in Kyrgyzstan cast ballots in parliamentary elections amid accusations of fraud and opposition concerns that the longtime leader of the former Soviet republic might seek to extend his rule beyond constitutional limits.

2006: A series of powerful storms in the US spawn numerous tornadoes, leaving nine people dead and generating miles of destruction across five states.

2007: Somalia’s President Abdullahi Yusuf comes under mortar attack in his palace just hours after moving in upon his return from southern stronghold Baidoa. He escapes unharmed in the assault, which kills seven people including a 12-year-old boy.

2008: Serbia’s president dissolves parliament and calls an early election that should determine whether the country aligns itself with the European Union and other Western groups or returns to its isolationist past.

2009: Under pressure from the US and other troubled economies, the Swiss government announces that it will cooperate in international tax investigations, breaking with a long-standing tradition of protecting wealthy foreigners accused of hiding billions of dollars.

2010: Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s political coalition takes an early vote lead in the election’s all-important battleground of Baghdad, pulling away from its two closest rivals in the latest indication that Iraqis want a moderate government.

2012: Former News International executive Rebekah Brooks and her racehorse trainer husband Charlie are arrested in dawn raids that also netted four other suspects in the spreading phone-hacking scandal.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS

Holy Roman Emperor Joseph II (1741-1790); Hugo Wolf, Austrian composer (1860-1903); George Seferis, Greek poet and diplomat, Nobel literature laureate (1900-1971); Kofi Awoonor, Ghanaian poet (1935-2013); Neil Sedaka, US singer (1939-); William H Macy, US actor (1950-); Dana Delany, US actress (1956- ); Adam Clayton, bassist with rock group U2 (1960- )

— AP