Today is the 331st day of 2023. There are 34 days left in the year.

TODAY’S HIGHLIGHTS

1993: Lisa Hanna is crowned the 43rd Miss World at the pageant event held in Sun City, South Africa.

OTHER EVENTS

602: Roman Emperor Maurice and his sons are beheaded at Chalcedon in Asia Minor.

1582: William Shakespeare marries Anne Hathaway.

1703: Coastal storm in England takes estimated 8,000 lives.

1919: Bulgaria signs World War I peace treaty, which yields territory to Greece and Yugoslavia.

1948: The United Nations Security Council gives full authority to continue negotiations with India and Pakistan for a truce and plebiscite in Kashmir.

1961: Soviet Union proposes immediate ban on nuclear testing without international controls.

1962: Britain agrees to provide arms to India to resist Chinese aggression.

1967: Israeli forces raze Arab buildings in the Gaza Strip and on the West Bank in response to Arab attacks while the return of some Arab refugees from the East Bank to the Israeli-occupied West Bank resumes.

1973: The US Senate votes 92-3 to confirm Gerald R Ford as vice-president, succeeding Spiro T Agnew, who resigned.

1979: Iranian students occupying the US Embassy in Tehran surround the building with explosives and claim to have planted mines in the compound to ward off any attack by the US in an attempt to free the hostages.

1990: John Major is elected prime minister of Britain.

1992: Rebels who try to take over Venezuela by bombing the presidential palace are defeated by troops 12 hours later.

1993: After weeks of denial, the British Government admits contact with the Irish Republican Army.

1998: Sensing growing popular pressure to get troops out of Lebanon, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu promises a thorough review of Israel’s policy.

1999: Northern Ireland’s biggest party clears the way for the formation of an unprecedented Protestant-Catholic Administration, the long-elusive goal of the 1998 Good Friday peace accord.

2000: The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (Tamil Tigers) rebels prepare to hold unconditional peace negotiations with the Government to end Sri Lanka’s 17-year-long civil war.

2002: Prominent Pakistani doctor, Dr Amer Azia, who admitted to treating Osama bin Laden and other al-Qaeda leaders before and after the September 11, 2001 attacks, says that the terrorist mastermind is in excellent health and shows no signs of kidney failure.

2007: The Dalai Lama announces that the Tibetan people will hold a referendum before he dies to decide whether a new system of leadership would better serve the struggle for self-determination.

2009: Star golfer Tiger Woods is slightly injured in an early morning car accident outside his mansion, the start of one of the swiftest descents ever in public esteem for a major celebrity after reports emerge of serial marital infidelity that lead to a divorce from his Swedish wife Elin Nordegren.

2011: In an unprecedented move against an Arab nation, the Arab League approves economic sanctions on Syria to pressure Damascus to end its deadly suppression of an eight-month-old uprising against President Bashar Assad.

2012: France announces that it plans to vote in favour of recognising a Palestinian State at the UN General Assembly, becoming the first major European country to come out in favour and dealing a setback to Israel.

2014: Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries decides to keep its output target on hold and sit out falling crude oil prices that will likely spiral even lower as a result.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS

Anders Celsius, Swedish astronomer and inventor of Celsius scale (1701-1744); Bruce Lee, Chinese-American actor (1940-1973); Jimi Hendrix, American rock guitarist (1942-1970); Michael Vartan, French actor (1968- )

— AP/Jamaica Observer