Today is the 20th day of 2023. There are 345 days left in the year.

TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT

1998: Dr James Robl at the University of Massachusetts and Dr Steven Stice of Advanced Cell Technology Inc announce that they have successfully cloned two identical, genetically engineered calves.

OTHER EVENTS

1265: England’s Parliament meets for first time.

1841: The island of Hong Kong is ceded to Great Britain.

1887: US Senate approves leasing Pearl Harbor in Hawaii as naval base.

1921: The new Parliament in Ankara declares that the country will be called Turkey, and vests executive power in a council led by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk.

1934: Fujifilm is founded. The Japanese photography and electronics company soon became a global player in its field.

1936: Britain’s King George V dies and is succeeded by Edward VIII.

1942: Nazi officials hold the notorious Wannsee conference, during which they arrive at their “final solution” that calls for exterminating Europe’s Jews.

1945: Franklin D Roosevelt sworn-in for an unprecedented (and never to be repeated) 4th term as US president.

1958: Soviet Union threatens Greece with economic sanctions if it agrees to the installation of NATO missile bases on Greek territory.

1965: Muriel Carnegie is appointed custos rotulorum for the parish of Westmoreland, becoming the country’s first female custos.

1986: The United States observes the first federal holiday in honour of slain civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.

1989: George H W Bush is sworn in as the 41st president of the United States.

1990: Soviet troops storm Azerbaijani capital of Baku, leaving dozens dead and wounded, as President Mikhail Gorbachev defends action on national television.

1991: In Moscow, hundreds of thousands of Soviet citizens protest bloody crackdown on Lithuania and demand resignation of President Mikhail Gorbachev.

1992: Two former East German border guards are convicted in last killing at Berlin Wall.

1993: Bill Clinton is inaugurated as president of the United States, taking over from George H W Bush.

1995: The Bosnian Government and rebel Serbs exchange nearly 100 prisoners in a move instilling hope in a fragile truce.

1997: Bill Clinton begins his second term as US president.

2001: Civil rights leader Rev Jesse Jackson, appears in public in Chicago for the first time since acknowledging he fathered a child in an extramarital affair.

2003: Former Serbian President Milan Milutinovic surrenders to the UN International Criminal Tribunal in The Hague, the Netherlands, to face charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity for his role in a 1999 crackdown on ethnic Albanians in Kosovo.

2006: Japan halts all imports of US beef because of mad cow fears threatening millions of dollars in American exports and sending officials scrambling to repair delicate trade relations.

2008: A Turkish court again blocks access to the popular video-sharing website YouTube because of clips allegedly insulting the country’s founding father, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. It is illegal in Turkey to insult the revered figure.

2009: Barack Hussein Obama becomes the 44th president — and first black chief executive — of the United States.

2010: An international team of scientists say they think they have found the body of Princess Eadgyth (pronounced Edith) — a 10th-century English noblewoman known for her charity and charm and who has been compared to Princess Diana.

2011: The UN weather agency says the warmest year on record is a three-way tie: 2010, 2005 and 1998, providing further evidence that the planet is slowly but surely heating up.

2012: France’s threat to withdraw early from Afghanistan after an Afghan soldier killed four French troops and wounded 15 is a setback for the US-led coalition’s efforts to build a national army and allow foreign troops to go home. Etta James, American singer-songwriter, dies.

2013: Barack Obama begins his second term as US president.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS

Paul Cambon, French statesman (1834-1924); George Burns, US comedian (1896-1996); Federico Fellini, Italian film director (1920-1993); Patricia Neal, US actress (1926-2010); David Lynch, US director (1946- ); Bill Maher, US television talk show host (1956- ); Skeet Ulrich, US actor (1969- ); Rainn Wilson, US actor (1966- )

— AP/Jamaica Observer