Today is the 201 day of 2016. There are 165 days left in the year.

TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT

2012: A gunman hurls a gas canister inside a crowded movie theatre in Colorado during a midnight showing of the new Batman movie and then opens fire, killing 12 people and wounding nearly 60 others.

OTHER EVENTS

1810: Bogota rises against Spanish rule. The day is now Independence Day in Colombia.

1922: League of Nations Council approves mandates for Cameroon, Togoland (now divided between Togo and Ghana) and Tanganyika (which later merged with Zanzibar to form Tanzania).

1944: Adolf Hitler is injured by a bomb in an attache case, an assassination attempt by German officers that leads to a brutal purge.

1945: US flag is raised over Berlin as US troops prepare to occupy Germany after World War II.

1958: United Arab Republic, the brief union of Egypt and Syria, severs relations with Jordan.

1968: The first International Special Olympics Summer Games, organised by Eunice Kennedy Shriver, are held in Chicago.

1969: US astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin became the first men to walk on the moon after reaching the surface in their Apollo 11 lunar module.

1976: US spacecraft Viking I lands on Mars after 11-month flight and begins sending back clear pictures of the red planet.

1985: Treasure hunters begin hauling off US$400 million in coins and silver ingots from the wreck of the Spanish galleon, Nuestra Senora de Atocha, which sank off the coast of Key West, Florida, in 1622.

1999: After 38 years at the bottom of the Atlantic, astronaut Gus Grissom’s Liberty Bell 7 Mercury capsule was lifted to the surface.

2004: The UN General Assembly demands that Israel tear down the barrier it was building to seal off the West Bank; Israel vows to continue construction.

2005: Hurricane Emily slams into north-eastern Mexico, knocking out power and forcing thousands to flee small fishing villages after leaving hundreds homeless and destroying luxury hotels in the Yucatan Peninsula.

2013: Americans rally in dozens of US cities, urging authorities to press federal civil rights charges against George Zimmerman, the former neighbourhood watch leader found not guilty in the shooting death of unarmed teen Trayvon Martin.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS

Francesco Petrarca, Italian poet (1304-1374); Alberto Santos-Dumont, Brazilian aviator (1872-1932); Theda Bara, US silent-film actress (1885-1955); Diana Rigg, English actress (1938- ); Carlos Santana, Mexican guitarist (1947- )

— AP