February 12
1736 Nadir Shah becomes King of Persia
1818 Chile declares its independence from Spain.
1840 The Housatonic Railroad opens in Connecticut, US.
1870 Women in the Utah Territory gain the right to vote.
1885 German East Africa Company is chartered.
1912 Pu Yi, the last emperor of China, abdicates.
1935 The American airship USS Macon crashes and sinks in a storm off the coast of California.
1953 Britain and Egypt agree to end Anglo-Egyptian rule in Sudan
1973 First American prisoners of war from the Vietnam conflict are released.
1986 Britain and France sign treaty for building rail tunnel under the English channel.
1990 At least 18 die in ethnic rioting in Dushanbe, capital of Soviet republic of Tajikistan.
1993 Ousted Mali dictator Mousa Traore and three top aides are sentenced to death for ordering the killing of protesters.
1994 Norwegian Edvard Munch’s painting ‘The Scream’ is stolen from a museum in Oslo.
1996 Yasser Arafat is sworn in as the first elected Palestinian president.
1997 Hwang Jang Yop, a confidant of North Korean leader Kim Jong II, defects in Beijing and seeks asylum in South Korea.
1998 Sudan’s first vice-president Lt Gen Al Zubair Mohammad Saleh and at least seven others are killed in plane crash in southern Sudan.
1999 The US Senate acquit William Jefferson Clinton of perjury and obstruction of justice.
2000 Charles Schulz, creator of the immensely popular Peanuts comic strip dies.
2002 Iran Air Tours flight 956 crashes into a mountain in Iran killing 117 people.
2007 The 14th session of the UAE’s Federal National Council, the first to include elected members, is inaugurated.
2008 Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd apologises on behalf of Australian government to indigenous people for past injustices.
2009 49 killed after a Continental Connection aircraft crash-lands into a house in New York.
2011 Taliban attacks police headquarters in Kandahar, Afghanistan and killing 19 people.
2014 American Emmy-winning comedian and actor Sid Caesar dies at the age of 91.
2015 Germany, France, Russia and Ukraine agree a deal that offers a “glimmer of hope” for an end to fighting in eastern Ukraine.
2016 The DP World’s 330-metre berth at Nhava Sheva Gateway Terminal in Mumbai is inaugurated.
HIGHLIGHT
1998
Daehlie makes history in Winter Olympics
Norwegian cross-country hero Bjorn Daehlie became the greatest male athlete in Winter Olympic history by winning a record sixth gold medal in Nagano. Daehlie’s win in the men’s 10km classic style cross-country race. The victory, his sixth gold in three Winter Games, was sweet revenge for defeat earlier in the week when he and nearly all of the elite Norwegian team chose the wrong equipment. His golds equalled the women’s record haul of six held by Soviet speed skater Lydia Skoblikova and Russian cross-country skiier Lyubov Yegorova. The 30-year-old Norwegian reached his landmark sixth gold in style, leading from the start to win in 27 minutes 24.5 seconds. Austria’s Markus Gandler pulled off a surprise to snatch silver in 27:32.5 and Finn Mika Myllylae clocked 27:40.1 to add a bronze to the gold he won in the 30km race. The sixth day of the Nagano Games was marred as more bad weather forced new postponements of elite Alpine skiing events.
