1997 - Algeria freed Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) leader Abassi Madani in what diplomats termed a dramatic step, but one unlikely to end violence in the North African country. The outlawed PIS leadership in Europe welcomed the move as a “positive act ...and a definite and effective contribution to solving the crisis and returning to peace and stability”. The military prosecutor’s office in Blida, where Madani had been sentenced to 12 years’ imprisonment in 1992, said the measure was a “release on parole. It’s a dramatic move in terms of the government relationship with the opposition and FIS,” said a senior diplomat in Algiers. “But it is not going to stop the violence ... There’s no reason to think that Madani can do that now. His time has gone by,” the diplomat said.
Other important events
1822 - Turkish invasion of Greece begins.
1888 - Mount Bandai volcano in Japan erupts, destroying villages and killing 461 people.
1909 - Mohammad Ali, shah of Persia, is deposed in favour of 12-year-old Sultan Ahmad Shah.
1916 - Boeing Co (Pacific Aero) is formed by William Boeing in Seattle, Washington.
1939 - American aviator Clara Adams becomes the first woman to complete a round-the-world flight.
1945 - Italy declares war on Japan.
1948 - UN Security Council orders truce in Palestine.
1954 - The first Boeing 707 jetliner takes off from Seattle, Washington.
1958 - South Africa resumes full membership in United Nations.
1965 - US Mariner IV spacecraft sends to Earth first close-up photographs of planet Mars.
1975 - United States’ Apollo and Soviet Union’s Soyuz spacecraft blast into orbit for rendezvous in space.
1979 - Indian Prime Minister Morarji Desai resigns.
1996 - A Belgian military aircraft crashes at Eindhoven in the Netherlands, killing 32 people.
1997 - Fashion designer Gianni Versace is shot dead.
1999 - China declares that it has invented its own neutron bomb.
2001 - Prime Minister Shaikh Hasina leaves her post after five years in office, longer than any other Bangladeshi leader.
2002 - A Pakistani court convicts four defendants in the kidnapping and murder of American journalist Daniel Pearl.
2004 - New Zealand freezes diplomatic ties with Israel.
2006 - Twitter, the online micro-blogging service, is publicly launched.
2010 - India joins a select band of elite currencies with the Indian rupee getting its unique symbol.
2012 - The Habshan-Fujairah crude oil pipe makes its inaugural 500,000 barrels of crude exported to Pakistan.
2014 - Twenty die in Moscow metro derailment.
2016 - 265 people are killed in a failed military coup against Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan government.
