01|Researchers at New York City's Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center announce that levels of a protein, p27, may determine whether a man's prostate cancer is aggressive or relatively harmless. Oncologists Carlos Cordan-Cardo and Howard Scher announced that p27 appears to act as a brake on cell growth and that low levels of the protein in the body allow the rapid proliferation of cells indicative of highly aggressive cancers. Earlier research at other institutions had linked low levels of p27 to highly aggressive breast, lung, and colon cancers. The Sloan-Kettering findings also supported the theory that prostate enlargement is unrelated to prostate cancer.|
02|All 229 people aboard Swissair Flight 111, bound for Geneva, Switzerland, from New York City, die when the plane crashes into the Atlantic Ocean off the southeast shore of Nova Scotia. The MD-11 jet was minutes away from an emergency landing at Halifax.|
02|Indonesian troops halt their withdrawal from the province of Aceh, on the island of Sumatra, and return to the industrial city of Lhokseumauwe to put down rioting and looting of Chinese-owned shops. The riots, which began on August 31 and resulted in the death of 2 people, were the first major civil unrest in Indonesia since the widespread violence in Jakarta, the capital, in May left 1,2000 dead and triggered the fall of President Suharto.|
03|Toa Steel Company announces in Tokyo that, with debts exceeding assets by about 46 billion yen, it is forced to liquidate. The bankruptcy is the largest failure of a Japanese manufacturer since World War II (1939-1945). The giant electrical machinery and semiconductor manufacturer Hitachi announces that its expects to lose 1.81 billion U.S. dollars in 1998 and plans to restructure, beginning with the elimination of 4,000 jobs.|
03|With the value of the Russian rouble at a new low of 13.4 to the U.S. dollar, the Russian government places a two-month freeze on the withdrawal of personal funds from six major banks in Moscow. The combined deposits at the six banks total 980 billion dollars at the current rate. Two weeks ago, the same deposits equalled nearly 2 trillion dollars when the value of the rouble stood at 6.25 to the dollar.|
04|Alan Binder, chief scientist with the Lunar Prospector project, announces in the U.S. that the lunar spacecraft currently orbiting the moon has relayed data confirming an abundant supply of hydrogen at both lunar poles. Binder notes that the hydrogen suggests the likely presence of as much as 10 billion tons of water, sufficient to supply a lunar village or the needs of a spacecraft refuelling before exploring deeper into space.|
04|Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, speaking at the University of California in Berkeley, U.S.A., notes that policy makers at the U.S. central bank might lower interest rates in an attempt to forestall negative effects of the Asian and Russia economy crisis on the American economy. When Greenspan testified before a Congressional committee in July, he had ruled out the possibility of lowering interest rates, citing the threat of inflation. Economists note that a reduction by the Federal Reserve in the prime rate would reduce the cost of borrowing worldwide and might shore up confidence in international markets, which have severely shaken by recent massive sell-offs.|
05|North Korea, the first Communist country in history in which power over the government is transferred from one generation to another within a family dynasty, officially declares Kim Jong Il its "Great Leader". Kim Jong Il is the eldest son of Kim Il Sung, "Great Leader" from 1948 until his death in 1994. Most experts agree that conditions in rigidly controlled North Korea are likely desperate, with the economy largely in collapse and millions of citizens near starvation.|
06|Leaders of the Taliban, a group of militant fundamentalist Muslims in control of much of Afghanistan, announce that they and their followers are prepared to go to war to fend off an Iranian invasion of Afghanistan. Iran is deploying troops in a major build-up on its Afghani border in response to the disappearance and probable death in August of scores of Iranians, including 10 diplomats, in the Afghani city of Mazar-i-Sharif. The city, which was the headquarters of various rebel groups, was taken by the Taliban on August 8. Iran has regularly flown into Mazar-i-Sharif with military supplies to aid the rebels in their civil war against the Taliban, an extreme arm of the Sunni branch of Islam. Iran, dominated by Shiite Muslim clerics, has accused the Taliban of giving Islam a bad name.|
07|Russian central bank chairman Sergei Dubinin resigns in the wake of the current financial crisis in which the value of the ruble has fallen from 6 to the U.S. dollar to 20 in less than one month. In a parallel crisis, the lower house of the Russian parliament, the Duma, rejects Russian President Boris Yeltsin's nominee for prime minister, Viktor Chernomyrdin, for the second time in a matter of days. If Yeltsin renominates Chernomyrdin for a third time, the president will trigger a constitutional crisis that will force the dissolution of parliament.|
08|In Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, summit talks to end the civil war in Congo collapse. Uganda and Rwanda both support the rebels, who began the war five weeks ago. Angola, Zimbabwe, and Namibia have sent military assistance to Kinshasa, saving the capital from a rebel assault. At the summit of regional leaders, summoned by Zimbabwean president Robert Mugabe, the six presidents refused to let the rebel delegation act as full partners in the peace talks. Snubbed rebel leader Bizima Karaha stated his determination to continue the fight to topple President Laurent Kabila.|
08|Governor Roberto Albores Guillen declares the state of Chiapas, Mexico, a disaster zone after six days of heavy rain have caused 15 rivers to jump their banks, producing massive flooding that has left at least 120 people dead and 25,000 homeless.|
09|Independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr sends to the U.S. Congress 18 cartons of grand-jury testimony, videotapes, and a 500-page report that summarizes his investigation into President Bill Clinton's relationship with Monica Lewinsky, a former White House intern. The report claimed that during the investigation Clinton committed crimes that could be grounds for impeachment, including perjury, obstruction of justice, witness tampering, and abuse of power.|
10|Russian President Boris Yeltsin withdraws Viktor Chernomyrdin from parliamentary consideration for prime minister and submits the name of Foreign Minister Yevgeny Primakov, who is backed by a wide range of political interests, including the Communists in the Duma. The substitution, a rare concession of political weakness for Yeltsin, averts further political crisis in a country that is deeply troubled by economic crisis.|
10|Iran announces that it holds the militant Taliban movement, currently in control of much of Afghanistan, responsible for the deaths of nine Iranian diplomats killed on August 8 in a consulate in Mazar-i-Sharif, a city in northern Afghanistan. The Taliban, a fundamentalist Islamic group, overran the city as part of its continuing drive to exert control over the entire country. The Iranian government has described the Taliban's push to govern Afghanistan on "principles of Islam" as extreme.|
11|The lower house of the Russian parliament, the Duma, confirms Yevgeny Primakov as prime minister. Political experts see Primakov's swift confirmation as a signal that Russia is turning back toward the socialist principles of its Communist past. Before being confirmed, Primakov, in a speech before the Duma, promised to end unbridled capitalism in Russia while continuing President Yeltsin's program of free-market reforms.|
12|Flood waters in Bangladesh, which have covered much of the country for more than two months, begin to recede, according to the Flood Forecast and Warning Center. The massive flooding of the Brahmaputra, Ganges, and Jamuna rivers has displaced one quarter of the country's 124 million people since July 10, killing at least 900 people. Government officials in the capital, Dhaka, which is also flooded, estimate that as much as 4 million metric tons of food has been destroyed, a situation that is likely to drive thousands of hungry farmers and villagers looking for work into already over-crowded cities.|
13|Residents of the Congolese capital, Kinshasa, enjoying the resumption of normal electricty supplies after a month of disruption by rebels, see their city paralysed for 24 hours when rebels again cut electricity supplies in the late afternoon. Such disruption is a serious setback to President Laurent Kabila's efforts to convince his people that his forces, backed by Angolan, Zimbabwean, and Namibian troops, have full control of the western region. The earlier disruption followed a takeover of Inga hydroelectric dam near Matadi by rebels fighting Kabila's government since August 2. Kabila's forces and their allies regained control of the dam under a safe-passage deal with rebels. Power workers restored full supplies to the capital on September 8.|
14|Thousands of protesters, firing weapons into the air, take to the streets of Tirana, Albania, after government forces fired into a crowd, killing three supporters of the former president, Sali Berisha. The crowd, which had seized the parliament building and office of Prime Minister Fatos Nano, carried the three bodies into Nano's office, demanding his resignation. After police recapture the state TV and radio station from armed men who seized it earlier in the day, Interior Minister Perikli Teta announces on national television that the Albanian government is back in control.|
14|Israel sucessfully launches its Arrow anti-missile missile from a military base on the coast south of Tel Aviv, out across the Mediterranean Sea. It is the first reported successful launch of the Arrow, originally part of the U.S. 'Star Wars' programme, since August 1997. Israeli officials expect the first operational Arrow missile battery to be deployed in 1999. Israel hopes the Arrow, designed to intercept missiles between 10 and 40 kilometres above the ground, will be able to counter any ballistic missile threat from Iran. In July, Iran test-launched a surface-to-surface missile with sufficient range to reach the Jewish state.|
15|In Pasadena, U.S.A., astronomers announce that the three rings around the planet Jupiter are formed of tiny dust particles. The particles, created as space rocks collide with Jupiter's four inner moons, are dragged into orbit around the planet. The rings were detected by the Voyager 1 space probe in 1979, but until now their origins had been a mystery.|
15|A 100 metre plume of black ash, gas, and lava erupts from the 3,200-metre crater of Mount Etna on the Italian island of Sicily. The eruption is accompanied by strong earth tremors, part of a series of earthquakes that have shaken the volcano since August. Scientists said a major eruption of Mount Etna could occur within the next two years.|
15|In Shanghai, the Wenhui Daily newspaper announces that China has formed its biggest university, Zhejiang University, by merging the former Hangzhou University, Zhejiang University, Zhejiang Agriculture University, and Zhejiang Medical University. This new seat of learning in Hangzhou, capital of Zhejiang province, will cater for about 35,000 undergraduate and graduate students and 10,000 teachers and administrators.|
16|In the United States, Terry Wallace, a University of Arizona professor who uses seismology to analyse nuclear explosions, publishes the results of a study concluding that both India and Pakistan exaggerated the number and size of nuclear weapons the two countries tested in May 1998. Wallace believes that two of the five tests announced by the Indian government never took place, and only two of the seven nuclear weapons Pakistan claimed to have detonated actually involved nuclear devices. Researchers at Los Alamos National Laboratory, Princeton University, and the Incorporated Research Institutions for Seismology concur with Wallace's conclusions.|
16|In London, a government spokesman announces that the United Kingdom's unemployment rate dropped to 4.6 per cent last month, its lowest level since July 1980. About 1.3 million people are unemployed.|
17|The deputy head of the Russian central bank reveals to reporters that the bank has been authorized to pay off government debts and bail out faltering financial institutions by "emission," that is, by printing whatever money is needed. Deputy Secretary of the U.S. Treasury Lawrence Summers and Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott respond to the announcement with warnings that Russia is headed for the same four-digit inflation that brought down President Boris Yeltsin's government in 1993.|
17|U.S. and European astronomers announce they have regained control of the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory spacecraft (SOHO) orbiting the sun. The satellite, which had been drifting out of control since June 24, is now facing the right direction, so its solar panels can start generating power again. SOHO orbits 1.5 million kilometres out in space, always staying on the sunward side of the Earth. It monitors solar eruptions and warns of electromagnetic storms that can disrupt telecommunications on Earth.|
17|The Basque separatist group ETA announces an indefinite cease-fire in its 30-year battle for independence from Spain. More than 800 deaths have been attributed to terrorist attacks by ETA and other militant Basque nationalist parties. More than 500 members of such groups are currently interred in Spanish and French prisons. The Basque people live in the Pyrenees Mountains on both sides of the border between France and Spain.|
18|At dawn in Bangkok, Thailand, more than 20,000 poor and unemployed people brave the heavy monsoon rains as they wait for free food, clothing, and medicine. The Hau Kiaw Poh Teck Tung Foundation in central Bangkok who organize "Charity Basket" day triples the number of 'baskets' it distributes because of a huge increase in demand from Bangkok's poor.|
18|Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi announces that leaders of Japan's two largest political parties have agreed on a series of radical economic reforms, including the nationalization of insolvent banks, in an effort to prop up Japan's economy, which is undergoing its worst recession since World War II (1939-1945). If carried out, the measures could result in the closure of several major banks. American economists have estimated that Japanese banks may hold as much as 1 trillion U.S. dollars in bad loans, that is, loans made in the boom of the 1980's that are unlikely to ever be repaid.|
19| At least 125 people drown in heavy seas swept by tropical storm Vicki when a ferry with 430 people aboard sinks in Manila Bay, 64 kilometres south of Manila, capital of the Philippines.|
20|Malaysian police, wearing black ski masks and brandishing machine guns, arrest former Deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim hours after Anwar led a political demonstration that was described as the largest in the city's history. Demanding reform of the government of Prime Minister Mahathir bin Mohamad, Anwar has attracted increasing bigger crowds in the weeks since Mahathir fired his former deputy on charges of corruption, treason, sedition, and sexual indecency. Anwar responded with demands that Mahathir resign, claiming his former mentor has orchestrated a smear campaign against him.|
20|Officials in Dhaka, Bangladesh, thank international donors for their generous response to their recent appeal for flood relief. At least 1,228 people are known to have died in the floods which have ravaged Bangladesh since early July. (See September 11.)|
21|In the U.S.A., President Bill Clinton's August 17 grand jury testimony regarding the nature of his relationship with a former White House intern, Monica Lewinsky, is broadcast in its entirety on national television. The four-hour video tape was released to television networks by the of House of Representatives Judiciary Committee, which is currently reviewing material supplied by independent counsel Kenneth Starr to decide if the House should initiate impeachment proceedings against the president.|
21|President Bill Clinton receives a standing ovation before addressing the United Nations General Assembly in New York City. Diplomats attending the session interpret the unusual display as a show of sympathy and support for the president during the political crisis that currently threatens his presidency.|
21|American athletics star Florence Griffiths Joyner, 38, dies in her sleep at her home at Mission Viejo, California, U.S.A. At the 1988 Olympic Games in Seoul, "Flo-Jo", as she was affectionately known, won three gold medals and a silver medal. The cause of her death is believed to be heart failure. Griffiths Joyner, who held world records in the 100- and 200-metre events, also suffered a heart seizure two years ago while on a flight from California to St. Louis, Missouri.|
22|In Kinshasa, the United Nations World Food Program supplies food to about 43,000 people affected by fighting in the Congolese capital. The food relief progamme, begun yesterday, will extend to the Kimbanseke, Masina, and N'Djili districts over the next few days.|
22|Hurricane Georges, the strongest storm to hit Puerto Rico in 70 years, batters the island with 185-kilometre per hour winds, destroying the electricity supply and leaving most of Puerto Rico's 4 million people without drinking water. Governor Pedro Rossello estimates damages in excess of 1 billion U.S. dollars.|
22|President Mohammad Khatami of Iran announces that his government has lifted the death threat imposed on the Indian-born, British novelist Salman Rushdie. Shortly before leaving New York, where he had addressed the U.N. General Assembly, he announced "We should consider the Salman Rushdie issue as completely finished." In 1989, the Ayatollah Khomeini, who headed the revolutionary government of Iran, branded Rushdie's novel "The Satanic Verses" blasphemous to Islam and issued a fatwa, or religious edict, that offered a reward to anyone who assassinated the author. Rushdie has spent much of the last nine years in hiding, appearing in public only when accompanied by a squad of bodyguards.|
23|Diplomats in Teheran say although the government may consider the Salman Rushdie issue "completely finished", a wealthy revolutionary foundation in Iran still has a 2.5 million-U.S.-dollar bounty on the head of British author. (See September 22.)|
23|In the United States, Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan warns the Senate Budget Committee that the country's central bank is seriously considering cutting interest rates to counteract the effects of the current global economic crisis on the U.S. economy. In a rare move, the Federal Reserve brokered an agreement between some of the world's largest banks and brokerage houses to rescue an investment fund, Long-Term Capital Management L.P., which is to receive a 3.5 billion U.S. dollars cash infusion. Capital Management, a hedge fund that puts investors' money into highly risky ventures in the hopes of spectacular returns, recently racked up staggering loses on international markets, particularly with the collapse of the Russian rouble. Economists theorize that the Federal Reserve arranged the bailout to try to head off panic selling on world markets that could ensue if the fund were forced to dump its 90-billion dollar portfolio.|
23|Hurricane Georges rampages across the Caribbean island of Hispaniola, leaving at least 130 people dead and thousands homeless in the Dominican Republic. Sugar, banana, rice, and coffee crops are severely damaged in the Dominican Republic and Haiti.|
24|Saudi Arabia expels the Afghan charge d'affaires, Afghanistan's chief ambassador to the Saudi capital of Riyadh, and recalls its own envoy from the Afghan capital, Kabul. Afghanistan is charged with providing a haven to a known terrorist, Osama bin Laden, who Saudi Arabia banished for attempting to overthrow the monarchy. The United States has accused bin Laden of organizing the August bombings of American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, which resulted in the deaths of more than 260 people.|
25|Hurricane Georges crashes across the Florida Keys with winds over 161 kilometres per hour, causing widespread flooding, but no reported deaths. In its rampage across the Caribbean before hitting the Keys, Georges left nearly 300 people dead and billions of dollars in damage in its wake.|
26|In Los Angeles, U.S.A., scientists at Agouron Pharmaceuticals have unravelled the structure of the human rhino (common cold) virus and found an enzyme, 3C protease, responsible for its growth and spread through the body. Having produced a drug which can conquer the virus in a test tube, they are hopeful of beginning clinical trials on humans before the end of the year.|
26|Former Albanian president Sali Berisha blames the political turmoil in the country on Prime Minister Fatos Nino, whom he holds responsible for the murder of an opposition leader outside Berisha's Democratic Party headquarters on September 12. Speaking in the capital, Tirano, he promised thousands of supporters that street protests will continue until the government resigns.|
27|German voters elect liberal Social Democrat Gerhard Schroeder chancellor, ousting Helmut Kohl. A conservative , Kohl supervised the unification of East and West Germany and held power for 16 years, longer than any German chancellor since Otto von Bismarck. The election is the first since World War II (1939-1945) in which voters have failed to return a sitting chancellor to office. Certain German states, particularly in the former East Germany, have suffered in recent years from unemployment as high as 17 per cent. Within hours of his victory, Chancellor-elect Schroeder, 54, met informally with leaders of the ecologist Greens, potential coalition partners, to begin building Germany's first centre-left government in 16 years.|
27|In the United States, Mark McGwire, first baseman with the St. Louis Cardinals, ends the last game of the Cardinals' season with two additional home runs, bringing his total for the 1998 baseball season to 70. The previous single-season homerun record was 61, set by Roger Maris in 1961, which McGwire broke on Sept. 8, 1998. Maris established his record, which held for 37 years, on the last day of a 163-game season. The previous record holder, Babe Ruth, hit 60 home runs in 1927 on the final day of a 154-game season.|
28| In Srinagar, Indian police announce that two Indians are wounded when Pakistani troops fire artillery shells across the disputed Kashmir border. Shooting between Indian and Pakistani troops stationed along the 720-kilometre ceasefire line has escalated since the two rival countries conducted nuclear tests in May. Since then, more than 100 people have died because of shelling in Kashmir, two-thirds of which is controlled by India and one-third is held by Pakistan.|
28| In Arusha, Tanzania, Jean Paul Akayesu dismisses his lawyers and pleads his own case at a pre-sentencing hearing at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. Akayesu was the mayor of Taba commune, where around 2,000 ethnic Tutsis were massacred in the three months following the 1994 assassination of Rwanda's President Juvenal Habyarimana. He was found guilty earlier this month of nine counts of genocide and crimes against humanity.|
28|Researchers at Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, U.S.A, announce the discovery of a gene that is linked to cancer. HPCX, (standing for human prostate cancer and the X chromosome) is the first example of a common cancer gene found on the X chromosome, and suggests that the disease may be passed from mother to son. (See September 1.)|
29| Reporting on Asia's year-old financial crisis, the Washington-based World Bank warns that the number of poor people in Asia could more than double to 90 million unless the situation improves. Millions of unemployed, landless poor and dispossessed have fallen below the poverty line. Prices of necessities such as food and medicine have risen dramatically because of currency devaluations. Unemployment is at a 20-year high in virtually every country in the region, and Thailand, South Korea, Indonesia, and Malaysia are entering deep recessions that could worsen.|
30|In the U.S.A., the Washington Post newspaper reports that pieces of a type of thermal and sound insulation blanket implicated in at least four other airline fires, have been found in the wreckage of Swissair Flight 111. The blankets meet all Federal Aviation Administration standards for fire retard properties. However, in 1997, the makers of the fated Swissair MD-11 recommended that the blankets be replaced at the "earliest practical maintenance period" on at least 1,000 jets. (See also September 2.)|
30|Following the deepening recessions in Asia and Japan and the spreading of the economic crisis to Russia, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) slashes its estimates of total world growth. Figures are down by more than one percentage point for both this year and 1999, compared to a forecast made just five months ago. The new forecast is 2% growth this year, and 2.5% next.|
