TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT

1959: Fidel Castro becomes premier of Cuba after the overthrow of Fulgencio Batista.

OTHER EVENTS

1804: US Marines slip into Tripoli harbour and burn US Navy frigate Philadelphia, which had been captured by pirates.

1862: General Ulysses Grant demands the Confederate forces’ unconditional surrender during America’s Civil War. Some 14,000 troops surrender.

1871: Franco-Prussian War ends in defeat for France.

1873: Republic is proclaimed in Spain, but only lasts two years.

1923: The burial chamber of King Tutankhamen’s recently unearthed tomb is unsealed in Egypt.

1933: Czechoslovakia, Romania and Yugoslavia, fearing German threats, reorganise Little Entente with permanent council.

1953: South Africa institutes emergency powers under Public Safety Bill.

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

1977: Anglican archbishop of Uganda and two government ministers are arrested in alleged plot to overthrow Ugandan President Idi Amin.

1983: ‘Ash Wednesday’ bush fires in Victoria and South Australia claim more than 70 lives.

1986: French warplanes bomb Libyan airfield in northern Chad used as support centre for rebels in their offensive against President Hissene Habre’s Government.

1989: Barrage of rockets hits two Afghan cities after last Soviet troops leave Afghanistan.

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

1997: Rebel leader Laurent Kabila, after a plea from the United Nations, 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.

1998: A China Airlines Airbus A-300 jetliner returning from Bali crashes short of Taipei’s airport, killing all 203 passengers and crew and seven people on the ground.

1999: Kurds occupy and take hostages at the Greek embassies in several European countries to protest Kurd leader Abdullah Ocalan’s capture by Turkish authorities after he left the Greek embassy in Kenya.

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

2007: A Turkish court sentences seven suspected al-Qaeda militants to life in prison for a pair of 2003 suicide bombings in Istanbul that killed 58 people; attacks prosecutors said were ordered by Osama bin Laden.

2008: Hundreds of Maoist militants attack six police compounds in eastern India, killing 13 police personnel, a village guard and a civilian and seizing at least 1,000 stolen pistols.

2009: France’s top judicial body formally recognises 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.

2010: The capture of the Afghan Taliban’s no 2 commander by a joint CIA and Pakistani team deals a fresh blow to insurgents under heavy US attack and raises hopes that Pakistani security forces are ready to deny Afghan militant leaders a safe haven.

2013: Reeva Steenkamp’s last wish for her family before she was shot dead at boyfriend Oscar Pistorious’s home was for them to watch her in a reality TV show that goes on the air in South Africa, two days after her killing.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS

Nicolaus Copernicus, Polish astronomer (1473-1543); G M 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