Sunday, December 7, 1997
Today's events
The Eleventh International Conference on AIDS and Sexually
Transmitted Diseases in Africa opens.
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On the horizon
On Monday. December 8, amnesty hearings resume into the death
in detention of South African black activist Steve Biko.
On Tuesday, December 9, the Steering Board of Bosnia's Peace
Implementation Council meets in Germany.
On Wednesday, December 10, the 1997 Nobel Peace Prize is
presented in Oslo.
On Thursday, December 11, European Union foreign ministers
meet in Geneva.
On Friday, December 12, U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine
Albright is to arrive in Democratic Republic of Congo,
formerly known as Zaire, from Rwanda as part of a six-country
tour of Africa.
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On this day
In 43 B.C., Marcus Tullius died. Known as Cicero, he was a
statesman, writer and is remembered as Rome's greatest
orator.
In 1787, Delaware voted to adopt the newly created federal
constitution, the first state to do so.
In 1815, Michel Ney, the most famous of Napoleon's marshals,
was executed by firing squad for treason.
In 1842, the New York Philharmonic Society gave its first
public concert.
In 1889, Gilbert and Sullivan's comic opera "The Gondoliers"
premiered in London.
In 1916, Herbert Asquith resigned as British prime minister
and was replaced by David Lloyd George, the war secretary,
with a commitment to wage all-out war on Germany.
In 1941, Japanese planes attacked the U.S. Pacific fleet at
Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, destroying many aircraft and ships and
precipitating U.S. declaration of war on Japan.
In 1953, David Ben Gurion, who had been prime minister of
Israel since its foundation, resigned.
In 1965, Ecumenical Patriarch Athenagoras of the Greek Church
formally annulled the excommunication pronounced on the
Church of Rome in 1054.
In 1972, the United States launched Apollo 17, the last
Apollo, on its way to the moon.
In 1982, Charlie Brooks Jr., a prisoner on death row at Fort
Worth prison, Texas, was executed by lethal injection, the
first to die by this method in the United States.
In 1988, a magnitude 6.9 quake struck Armenia, killing more
than 25,000 people.
In 1989, Czech President Gustav Husak accepted the
resignation of Communist Prime Minister Ladislav Adamec.
In 1989, President Corazon Aquino asked the Philippine
Congress for extra powers to rule the country after a six-day
coup attempt.
In 1995, a probe from the spacecraft Galileo successfully
entered the atmosphere of the planet Jupiter.
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Newslink
More than 150 nations are working in Kyoto, Japan, to devise
a plan to curb global warming. For an in-depth conference
background and various reports from a New Scientist
correspondent in Kyoto, check out Global Warming: Special Report from Kyoto .
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Holidays and more
Armenia marks 1988 Earthquake Memorial Day. The quake killed
more than 25,000 people.
Cuba celebrates Independence War Veterans Day.
Basketball legend Larry Bird is 41.
Singer Gregg Allman is 50.
Baseball legend Johnny Bench is 50.
Actress Ellen Burstyn is 65.
Actor C. Thomas Howell is 31.
Actor Eli Wallach is 82.
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Sources: Associated Press,
Chase's Calendar of Events 1997, J.P. Morgan
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