Today is the 297th day of 2017. There are 68 days left in the year.TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT

2003: The last three Concorde supersonic passenger jet flights land at Heathrow airport outside London, ending the luxury plane’s 27 years of commercial service. The British Airways planes departed from New York City’s John F Kennedy International Airport.

OTHER EVENTS

1537: Jane Seymour, the third wife of England’s King Henry VIII, dies 12 days after giving birth to Prince Edward, later King Edward VI.

1648: The Peace of Westphalia ends the Thirty Years War and effectively destroys the Holy Roman Empire.

1795: Austria, Prussia and Russia partition Poland for the third time.

1860: Convention of Beijing makes Kowloon peninsula part of the British colony of Hong Kong.

1861: The first transcontinental telegraph message is sent as Justice Stephen J Field of California transmits a telegram to US President Abraham Lincoln.

1882: Dr Robert Koch discovers germ that causes tuberculosis.

1901: Anna Edson Taylor, a 43-year-old widow, becomes the first person to go over Niagara Falls in a barrel and live to tell about it.

1922: Irish Parliament adopts a constitution for an Irish Free State.

1929: “Black Thursday” — the New York Stock Exchange loses 12.8 per cent of its value in one day.

1935: Italy invades Ethiopia.

1939: Nylon stockings are sold to the public for the first time, in Wilmington, Delaware; Nazis require Jews to wear Star of David in Germany.

1940: The 40-hour work week goes into effect in the United States under the Fair Labour Standards Act of 1938.

1945: The United Nations officially comes into existence as its charter takes effect.

1959: More than 10,000 Muslims flee from Burma to East Pakistan to escape pressure from Burmese officials and Buddhist tribes.

1962: The US blockade of Cuba begins under a proclamation signed by President John F Kennedy.

1964: Zambia gains independence from Britain.

1970: Leftist Salvador Allende is elected president of Chile.

1973: Yom Kippur War ends with Israeli troops 100 kilometres (65 miles) from Cairo, Egypt, and 40 kilometres (25 miles) from Damascus, Syria.

1978: The US, which imposed an aid embargo in 1977 in response to Pakistan’s insistence on purchasing a nuclear facility from France, resumes economic assistance.

1980: Polish Government legalises independent labour union Solidarity.

1991: After more than a year of delays, the Brazilian Government begins its privatisation programme, selling 75 per cent of a state-owned steel company, for about US$1.17 billion.

1992: The Toronto Blue Jays win baseball’s World Series, becoming the first non-US team to capture the championship by defeating the Atlanta Braves 4-3 in Game 6.

1994: An elderly art lover in Zurich is robbed — for the second time in three years — of paintings by Pablo Picasso with an estimated value of US$40 million.

1997: UN officials say the Taliban rulers of Afghanistan have agreed to enforce a ban on opium production.

1998: For the first time, the world-champion South African rugby team accepts a black player.

1999: A Venezuelan constitutional assembly approves a measure calling for “truthful information” in the media, alarming critics who say it could result in an attack on the free press.

2000: Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak appeals to hawkish opposition leader Ariel Sharon to join a coalition government, further dashing hopes of reconciliation with the Palestinians.

2002: Police investigating a spate of sniper attacks in the Washington, D.C., area arrest two suspects.

2004: Iraqi insurgents waylay three minibuses carrying US-trained Iraqi soldiers heading home on leave and massacre about 50 of them — many of them shot in the head execution-style.

2006: Australia’s government announces that more than 70,000 farmers are eligible for special federal relief after the worst drought in a century has affected more than half of Australia’s farm and ranch land.

2007: Embarking on an ambitious 10-year moon exploration programme, China launches its first lunar probe — a leap forward in the Asian space race that gives a boost to national pride, and the promise of scientific and military payoffs.

2008: A Russian Soyuz capsule touches down in Kazakhstan after delivering the first two men to follow their fathers into space, a Russian and an American, to the international space station.

2011: The Obama Administration pulls its ambassador home from Syria, arguing that his support for anti-Assad activists put him in grave danger — the most dramatic action so far by the United States as it struggles to counter a Mideast autocrat who is withstanding pressure that has toppled neighbouring dictators.

2013: Syrian authorities release 61 women detainees, an activist group says, the latest in a three-way prisoner exchange that was one of the more ambitious negotiated deals in the country’s civil war in which rival factions remain largely opposed to any bartered peace.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS

Antonie van Leeuwenhoek, Dutch scientist (1632-1723); Bill Wyman, member of the Rolling Stones (1936- ); Kevin Kline, US actor (1947- ) — AP