Today is the 93rd day of 2014. There are 272 days left in the year.

TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT

2003 – The World Health Organization reports 2,270 illnesses, including 79 deaths, from a spreading epidemic of a new respiratory ailment known as SARS, or severe acute respiratory syndrome.

OTHER EVENTS

1512: Beyazid II, Sultan of Turkey, abdicates in favor of son, Selim I.

1612: Protestant Union of Germany signs defensive alliance with England.

1833: Attempt by revolutionaries to take over Frankfurt Diet in Germany is crushed.

1882: Jesse James, an outlaw who killed and scalped his victims and an American folk hero of sorts, is killed by a member of his own gang.

1930: Ras Tafari becomes Emperor Haile Selassie of Abyssinia (Ethiopia).

1936: Bruno Hauptmann, convicted of the kidnapping and murder of aviator Charles Lindbergh’s baby, is executed.

1946: Lt General Masaharu Homma, the Japanese commander responsible for the Bataan Death March, is executed in the Philippines.

1948: United States creates the Marshall Plan, allocating $5.33 billion in aid to 16 European nations to help in rebuilding after World War II.

1978: US President Jimmy Carter decides not to produce the neutron bomb. His decision cancels development of a weapon designed to destroy living things while leaving buildings intact.

1982: British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher orders a naval task force to the Falkland Islands. The islands had been British territories since 1833 and Argentina’s seizure of the islands was considered an act of aggression.

1984: US President Ronald Reagan signs a policy directive designed to combat international terrorism.

1990: The Bulgarian parliament adopts legislation for free elections and appoints Petar Mladenov as president.

1992: Communist Ramiz Alia resigns as president of Albania, two weeks after a non-communist parliament is elected.

1995: At least 150 Hutus, mostly women and children, are massacred in a single village in north-eastern Burundi.

2000: A US judge deals a momentous legal setback to software giant Microsoft Corp, ruling that the company violated federal antitrust laws by building a monopoly and trying to take over the Web browser market.

2001: The death toll in a meningitis outbreak in Burkina Faso tops 1,000. The government and the World Health Organisation scramble to secure vaccine to control the epidemic from spreading to neighbouring countries.

2006: Thailand’s prime minister claims victory but acknowledges a strong protest vote in an election held after weeks of demonstrations demanding his resignation for alleged corruption and abuse of power.

2007: A French V150 train with a 25,000-horsepower engine and special wheels breaks the world speed record for conventional rail trains, reaching 357.2 mph (574.8 kph) in the French countryside.

2008: Greek and Turkish Cypriot authorities tear down barricades and open a border crossing at Ledra Street for the first time in 44 years, boosting hopes for peace talks to reunite the island.

2009: John Demjanjuk, accused of being a Nazi death camp guard, marks his 89th birthday by winning a reprieve of his ordered deportation from the US to Germany to face possible trial.

2010: President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says that new sanctions because of Iran’s nuclear defiance would only strengthen the country’s technological progress by encouraging it to become more self-sufficient.

2011: Demonstrators battle police in southern Afghanistan’s main city of Kandahar and take to the streets in the turbulent east for the first time as Western pleas fail to halt a third day of rage over a Florida pastor’s burning of the Quran.

2012: The United States issues travel restrictions for leaders of Mali’s recent coup and says they should restore civilian rule in the West African nation immediately.

2013: The United States says it will deploy a missile defence system to Guam to strengthen the Asian-Pacific region’s protections against a possible attack from North Korea in the face of escalating threats from the reclusive nation.

TODAY’S BITHDAYS

Washington Irving, US writer (1783-1859); James Hertzog, South African statesman-soldier (1865-1942); Camille Chamoun, Lebanese statesman (1900-1988); Marlon Brando, US actor (1924-2004); Doris Day, US actress-singer (1924- ); Helmut Kohl, German chancellor (1930- ); Eddie Murphy, US actor (1961- ); Alec Baldwin, US actor (1958- ); David Hyde Pierce, US actor (1959- )

–AP