Four killed in Paris Metro blast
1995 - Four people were killed and at least 40 wounded when a bomb ripped through a rush-hour under-ground train in a central Paris Metro station. French Prime Minister Alain Juppe visited the scene and said: “There are very strong suspicions that it was a terrorist attack.” If confirmed, it would be the first such attack in France since President Jacques Chirac took office in May, embarking on a robust foreign and nuclear policy that have made him numerous enemies. The bomb exploded in a carriage of the southbound RER suburban rapid transit system at the Saint-Michel station beside Notre Dame cathedral. Four of the wounded had limbs amputated by emergency medical services at a makeshift field hospital set up in a cafe outside the Metro station.
July 25
1894 - The Japanese navy defeats a Chinese fleet in Kanghwa Bay, sparking a Sino-Japanese war.
1909 - French aviator Louis Bleriot becomes the first person to fly across the English Channel.
1920 - French forces occupy Damascus, Syria.
1943 - Benito Mussolini is forced to resign as Prime Minister of Italy during the Second World War.
1952 - Puerto Rico becomes a self-governing commonwealth of the United States.
1957 - Tunisia becomes independent from France.
1963 - United States, Soviet Union and Britain conclude treaty prohibiting nuclear testing in atmosphere, space or under water.
1968 - Pope Paul VI bans all artificial birth control methods for Roman Catholics.
1978 - The world’s first test-tube baby, Louise Brown, is born in Britain.
1979 - Fire guts the entire southern end of the Dnata building, one of Dubai’s showpiece projects.
1984 - Soviet cosmonaut Svetlana Savitskaya becomes the first woman to walk in space.
1994 - Jordan and Israel seal the end of a 46-year state of war.
1998 - Saudi Arabia and Yemen reach an agreement on the principles of a solution to a border conflict.
1999 - Northern Ireland’s Eddie Irvine wins Austrian Grand Prix in Spielberg.
2000 - An Air France Concorde travelling to New York crashes into a hotel outside Paris shortly after take-off, killing 113 people.
2002 - Floods ravage South Asia, leaving more than seven million homeless and 288 dead in Bangladesh, Nepal and India.
2007 - Pratibha Patil makes history as she is sworn in as India’s first woman President.
