2002 - Longtime heir in waiting Hu Jintao became the head of China’s ruling Communist Party, but retiring President Jiang Zemin was set to keep a grip on power after packing the new leadership with allies and remaining as armed forces chief. Up to seven Jiang associates were named in the nine-man Politburo Standing Committee, China’s top ruling body, installed after the country’s first smooth transition of power in half a century of communist rule. And crucially Jiang, 76, who stepped down as party head is due to retire as state president next spring, hung on to the vital post as head of the Central Military Commission. The stage is set for Jiang to wield enormous influence over Hu, a shadowy 59-year-old career engineer who is currently vice-president.
Other important events
1865 - The first gold certificates are issued in US.
1889 - Brazil’s King Pedro II abdicates and Brazil is proclaimed a republic.
1920 - League of Nations Assembly holds first meeting in Geneva.
1926 - The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) radio network is launched in the US.
1928 - Fascist Grand Council becomes part of Italian constitution.
1935 - The Philippines becomes a self-governing commonwealth.
1936 - The San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge opens to traffic.
1940 - The Queens-Midtown Tunnel opens in New York City.
1941 - The first heredity clinic in the US opens at the University of Michigan.
1948 - Louis Stephen St Laurent becomes Prime Minister of Canada.
1956 - Morocco, Sudan and Tunisia join the United Nations.
1961 - UN bans nuclear arms.
1969 - A Vietnam War protest gathers 250,000 people in Washington.
1976 - Syrian army takes control of Beirut, bringing a lull to the civil war in Lebanon.
1985 - Britain and Ireland sign an accord on governing Northern Ireland.
1986 - UAE and Yugoslavia establish diplomatic relations at ambassadorial level.
1988 - The independent state of Palestine is proclaimed in Algiers.
1993 - Gunmen in Lebanon kill Mouin Shabaytah, a senior aide of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.
1994 - The German parliament re-elects Helmut Kohl as chancellor.
1996 - Voters in Sao Paulo, Brazil, elect Celso Pitta as their first black mayor.
2000 - Abu Dhabi Securities Market trading floor opens.
2006 - RTA announces toll system on Shaikh Zayed Road and Al Garhoud Bridge in Dubai.
2009 - Kosovo citizens vote for the first time since the ethnic Albanian majority declared independence from Serbia.
2013 - Former Cyprus president Glafcos Clerides dies at the age of 94.
2015 - Nico Rosberg wins the Brazilian Grand Prix at the Interlagos racetrack in Sao Paulo.
