Israel launches assault against Palestinians
2002 - Israeli forces killed 30 Palestinians in their biggest offensive in the West Bank and Gaza since Israel captured the territories in the 1967 Middle East war. Israeli armour and infantry stormed refugee camps and the West Bank city of Ramallah, where Palestinian President Yasser Arafat has his headquarters, on the eve of a US truce mission. UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, in his harshest criticism of Israel, urged it to stop “the bombing of civilian areas, the assassinations, the unnecessary use of lethal force, the demolitions and the daily humiliation of ordinary Palestinians”. Witnesses said 150 tanks thrust overnight into Ramallah and nearby refugee camps, tearing up roads and crushing cars in the main Palestinian commercial and political hub in the West Bank.
March 12
1841 - English inventor Orlando Jones patents a process to produce starch from rice.
1854 - Britain and France conclude alliance with Turks against Russia.
1868 - Britain annexes Basutoland, South Africa.
1918 - Moscow becomes the capital of Russia again after St Petersburg held this status for 215 years.
1930 - Mohandas Gandhi begins a 320-kilometre march to protest a British tax on salt.
1939 - Pope Pius XII is formally crowned in ceremonies at the Vatican.
1940 - Finland and the Soviet Union conclude an armistice during Second World War.
1946 - The US Civil Aeronautics Administration issues the first commercial helicopter licence to the Bell Aircraft Corporation for its Model 47.
1947 - The Truman Doctrine is proclaimed to help stem the spread of Communism.
1967 - General Suharto is sworn in as acting president of Indonesia.
1968 - Indian Ocean island of Mauritius, a British colony, proclaims its independence.
1972 - Britain and China agree to exchange ambassadors, 22 years after London first recognised the Peking government.
1980 - A Chicago jury finds John Wayne Gacy Jr. guilty of murdering 33 men and boys. He is executed in 1994.
1986 - The Swedish parliament elects Social Democratic Party leader Ingvar Carlsson as Prime Minister.
1994 - The Church of England ordains its first women priests.
1999 - Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland join Nato.
2003 - Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic is assassinated in Belgrade.
2004 - South Korea President Roh Moo-hyun is impeached by the National Assembly, the first such impeachment in the nation’s history.
2006 - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez raises a new flag with symbols for indigenous people and labourers.
2007 - British journalist Alan Johnston is kidnapped in the Gaza Strip by unknown assailants.
2013 - Emirates airline launches a $1 billion (Dh3.67 billion) sukuk.
