Today is the 217th day of 2021. There are 148 days left in the year.

TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT

1962: At midnight the Union Jack flag is lowered and the new flag of Independent Jamaica unfurled.

OTHER EVENTS

1772: In St Petersburg, rulers of Russia, Prussia, and Austria sign the first of three partitions ending Poland’s sovereign rule until 1918.

1810: Napoleon Bonaparte imposes tax on all colonial imports into France.

1861: The US federal government levies an income tax for the first time.

1884: Cornerstone of Statue of Liberty is laid at entrance to New York harbour.

1944: More than 1,000 Japanese, taken as prisoners of war by Australia, unsuccessfully attempt to escape from a camp in Cowra, New South Wales; 234 are killed and 108 wounded.

1949: Earthquake in Ecuador takes about 6,000 lives.

1954: Iran and eight Western oil companies agree to reactivate Iran’s frozen oil industry, ending a three-year battle that bankrupted the country and severed its relations with Britain.

1962: US movie star Marilyn Monroe is found dead in the bedroom of her Los Angeles home. Anti-apartheid fighter Nelson Mandela is arrested at a police roadblock.

1963: United States, Britain, and Soviet Union sign a treaty outlawing nuclear tests in atmosphere, in space, and under water.

1965: Cook Islands in South Pacific granted internal self-government by New Zealand.

1967: Laurel Williams is crowned Miss Jamaica.

1969: The US space probe Mariner 7 flies by Mars sending back unprecedented photographs and scientific data.

1973: Palestinian “Black September” guerrillas attack a line of travellers at Greece’s Athens airport with grenades and machine guns, killing three and wounding 55.

1977: Ten family members of the late Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie escape from house arrest in Addis Ababa and reach Sweden. There are reprisals against Selassie’s family and political associates since his overthrow in 1974.

1991: Iraq admits to UN inspection team that it carried out germ warfare research for four years, but claims it abandoned research shortly after the 1990 invasion of Kuwait.

1992: Nelson Mandela leads 100,000 blacks in Pretoria in a protest to end white rule.

1996: US President Bill Clinton signs a Bill to punish foreign businesses that invest in Iran and Libya.

1997: Korean Air jumbo jet carrying 254 people slams into a mountain in Guam while trying to land during a night-time thunderstorm. Only 26 people survive.

2001: Afghanistan’s ruling Taliban jail eight foreign aid workers for allegedly preaching Christianity in the Muslim nation.

2008: An American woman receives five puppies cloned from her beloved late pitbull, becoming the inaugural customer of a South Korean company that says it is the world’s first successful commercial canine cloning service.

2011: Italy pledges to work swiftly for a constitutional amendment requiring the Government to balance its budget, as Rome feverishly tries to assure domestic and foreign investors its finances are sound and calm nervous markets in Europe.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS

Guy de Maupassant, French writer (1850-1893); John Huston, US film director (1906-1987); Neil Armstrong, US astronaut and first man to set foot on Moon (1930-2012); Loni Anderson, US actress (1945- ); Tawny Kitaen, US actress (1961- ); Maureen McCormick, US actress (1956-2021)

— AP