Foreign Minister Keizo Obuchi was chosen by Japan’s ruling party to be prime minister at a time of economic malaise that has brought global demands for swift action. Obuchi, 61, the LDP’s establishment candidate, beat back challenges from veteran politician Seiroku Kajiyama, 72, the favourite of the financial markets, and Health Minister Junichiro Koizumi, 56, the choice of young party reformers. Dubbed by party insiders as “bonjin” or “ordinary man” because of his bland image, Obuchi takes over one of the toughest jobs in politics, dragging the world’s second-largest economy out of its worst recession since Second World War. Obuchi won the backing of 225 of 411 LDP delegates who took part in the vote, which took place in full view of the nation via national television.
Other important events
1911 Yale University professor Hiram Bingham discovers Machu Picchu in Peru.
1946 US makes first underwater test of an atomic bomb off atoll of Bikini in Pacific Ocean.
1963 Victor Marijnen becomes Prime Minister of the Netherlands.
1969 The US Apollo 11 astronauts, the first men to walk on Moon, splash down safely in the Pacific Ocean.
1974 Konstantinos Karamanlis returns from exile and is sworn in as prime minister of Greece.
1976 US spacecraft Viking 1 lands on Mars and starts tests to determine whether life exists on the planet.
1997 Scotland to get its first parliament for almost 300 years.
2001 Tamil rebels attack Colombo international airport and the adjoining air base, destroying 13 aircraft and leaving 20 people dead.
2002 Nine coal miners in southwestern Pennsylvania are rescued after more than three days trapped 240 feet below the surface.
2010 Nineteen people are killed and hundreds injured in a stampede at the Love Parade music festival in Duisburg, Germany.
2013 Gunmen attacks a complex housing Pakistani security agencies in the southern town of Sukkur, killing five people.
2014 All 116 people are killed in Air Algerie crash in northern Mali.
2017 At least 26 people are killed in blast near a vegetable market in Lahore, Pakistan.
