01|China celebrates the 50th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China with a huge military parade through the streets of. The parade includes thousands of goose-stepping soldiers and a massive display of military hardware, including fighter jets and short- and medium-range ballistic missiles. President Jiang Zemin, wearing the style of suit favored by the late Chairman Mao, presides over the massive celebrations from the spot where Mao declared the birth of a "new China" in 1949. Below in Tiananmen Square, half a million party faithful accompany a procession of floats portraying the achievements of 50 years of Communist rule while a human billboard of 100,000 school children flash colored squares spelling out party slogans.|
02|The Russian military, with 200,000 troops concentrated along its border with Chechnya, crosses into the breakaway republic for the first time in the current hostilities. After several clashes with bands of Islamic insurgents, the Russians seize a Chechen village 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) inside the border. Russia began a bombing campaign against Chechnya in September after Chechen Islamic militants, intent on establishing an Islamic state, invaded neighboring Dagestan, a former Soviet republic that remains part of Russia. Chechnya successfully fought a war of independence against Russia between 1994 and 1996.|
03|More than 44 million U.S. citizens, 16.3 percent of the population, lack health insurance of any kind, reports the U.S. Census Bureau. Since 1992, when President Bill Clinton proposed universal health coverage, the number of citizens without insurance has increased by 4.5 million people.|
04|The second largest long-distance telephone company in the United States, MCI Worldcom, announces that it will buy the nation's third largest telephone company, the Sprint Corporation, in an exchange of stock valued at $108 billion. Although the acquisition is the largest in corporate history, MCI in combination with Sprint will remain smaller than AT&T in terms of revenues.|
05|A high-speed express, enroute to London's Paddington Station with 500 passengers, plows through a smaller train filled with morning rush hour commuters. More than 30 passengers are killed and 175 injured when the front cars burst into flames after jackknifing into the air.|
06|Russian troops seize control of northern Chechnya above the Terek River and virtually encircle the retreating Chechen army, a Chechen commander reports from the field.|
06|The National Electric Power Authority of Nigeria, overwhelmed by rising waters on the Niger River, open floodgates on two dams approximately 300 miles (500 kilometers) north of Lagos, the capital, flooding 400 villages. The News Agency of Nigeria estimates that the flood killed 500 people and left 300,000 others homeless.|
07|Days of ceaseless rain trigger flooding and mudslides in nine Mexican states, driving hundreds of thousands of people from their homes. Approximately 350 people are confirmed dead, including dozens of people buried under mudslides in a string of villages in a mountainous stretch approximately 100 miles (160 kilometers) east and northeast of Mexico City.|
07|India's Hindu-first Party, leader of a coalition of 24 political parties, emerges with a clear victory in parliamentary elections. The triumph guarantees that Atal Behari Vajpayee will continue as prime minister. The Congress Party, which governed India for much of the 52 years since India's independence from Great Britain, suffers another humiliating defeat, further eroding its importance on the national scene.|
08|A British court rules that General Augusto Pinochet can be extradited to Spain to stand trail on charges that he committed torture when he was dictator of Chile.|
09|U.S. troops land in East Timor as part of a United Nations peacekeeping mission. Anti-independence gangs burned, looted, and killed thousands of people between August 30, when the East Timorese voted to secede from Indonesia, and September 20, when Australian and British infantry troops landed under a United Nations commission to bring an end to the violence.|
10|Colt's Manufacturing Company, the West Hartford, Connecticut, concern that invented the fabled six-shooter, announces that it is abandoning retail sale of handguns to civilians and will concentrate on large-scale sales to the military and law enforcement agencies. A company spokesperson notes that the corporate repositioning is the direct result of lawsuits.|
11|California Governor Gray Davis signs legislation that requires all hospitals in the state to meet a fixed nurse-to-patient ratio. The legislation, which passed over the objections of the state's health-care industry, is the first of its kind in the United States. In recent years, hospitals have increased profits by laying off registered nurses and turning over tasks traditional performed by nurses to less-qualified aids. California's state legislature also passed measures increasing access to mental health care and expanding the rights of patients to sue health insurance companies and to seek outside reviews of decisions regarding the denial of insurance coverage.|
12|The human population of the Earth hits 6 billion, according to estimates made by population experts at the United Nations based upon national birth and death rates. The world's population was 2 billion in 1927, 4 billion in 1974, and 5 billion in 1987.|
12|General Pervaiz Musharraf leads a bloodless military coup in Pakistan that topples the government of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. Troops seize control of the nation's central television facility and begin broadcasting footage of military parades. The army isolates Islamabad, the capital, by cutting international phone lines and canceling airplane flights. Crowds of Pakistanis who blame Sharif for the country's poor economy and corruption in government gather in the streets and sing "Long live the army." Sharif had removed Musharraf from his post as chief general of Pakistan's army hours before the coup.|
13|The U.S. Senate votes against the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. International relations experts call the vote a major defeat for President Bill Clinton, who became the first head of state to sign the agreement at the United Nations in 1996. Most senators vote along party lines, with Republicans--who hold a majority of the seats in the Senate--voting against the treaty, and Democrats voting in favor of it. This vote marks the first time that the Senate has rejected an arms control treaty. The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty is designed to build upon the 1963 Limited Test Ban Treaty, which prohibits testing of nuclear weapons in the atmosphere, in outer space, or underwater. The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty extends these prohibitions to testing underground. In order to take effect, it must be both signed and ratified by all 44 of the world's countries that have nuclear reactors.|
14|Tanzania's former president Julius Nyerere dies in a London hospital at the age of 77. Nyerere helped free Tanzania from British colonial rule during the early 1960's. He served as president from 1962 until his retirement in 1985. After retiring, Nyerere remained a powerful influence in the politics of Tanzania and Africa.|
15|General Pervaiz Musharraf declares martial law in Pakistan, suspends the constitution, dissolves parliament, and names himself chief executive. Musharraf led a coup against Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on October 12.|
16|Doctors Without Borders, a volunteer medical group dedicated to treating people in danger from war, disease, civil strife, or natural disasters, receives the Nobel Peace Prize. French doctors founded the organization in 1971. Doctors Without Borders consists of about 2,000 physicians working in about 80 countries.|
17|The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) issues a report showing a 7 percent drop in homicides in 1998. The murder rate--6.3 per 10,000--is the lowest since 1967. Violent crimes and property crimes each dropped 6 percent, and robberies dropped 10 percent.|
18|Robert Ray, a career federal prosecutor, is sworn in to replace independent counsel Kenneth Starr. Ray will continue the 5-year investigation that began in response to concerns over the Whitewater real estate deal made by the Clintons in 1978.|
19|Using a filibuster, Republicans in the U.S. Senate block a final vote on proposed legislation that would overhaul the campaign finance system. The measure would have banned "soft money"--that is, unlimited and unregulated donations to political parties, rather than to specific candidates.|
20|The People's Consultative Assembly of Indonesia chooses Abdurrahman Wahid as the first democratically elected president in the country's history. Wahid pledged to pursue economic and democratic reforms that would steer the country toward recovery from its political and financial turmoil of the late 1990's. Wahid, who is a Muslim clergyman and scholar as well as a popular political figure, also promised a government based on moderation and inclusion of Indonesia's diverse political and ethnic groups. He will replace outgoing president B. J. Habibie.|
21|Swiss officials turn war criminal Maurice Papon over to the French government hours after France's highest court announces its decision to uphold Papon's conviction. As an official of the pro-Nazi Vichy government during World War II (1939-1945), Papon authorized the deportation of about 1,500 people to Nazi concentration camps. Papon had fled to Switzerland in an attempt to evade a 10-year prison sentence imposed by a French court after he was found guilty of crimes against humanity in 1998.|
22|Scientists announce that they may have found the world's oldest known dinosaur fossils in Madagascar, an island country in the Indian Ocean off the coast of Africa. Researchers found jawbones from two kangaroo-sized dinosaurs, classified as prosauropods, according to a report published in the journal Science. Prosauropods share a common ancestor with--or are themselves ancestors of--sauropods, a class of huge dinosaurs that includes the brachiosaurus and the apatosaurus.|
22|Construction begins on a national memorial to Japanese Americans who were imprisoned in internment camps or fought on behalf of the United States in World War II (1939-1945). The memorial, a park in Washington, D.C., will feature a sculpture of two cranes. In Japan, these graceful birds are a traditional symbol of peace, long life, and good fortune.|
23|Russian tanks and armored cars seize control of the Chechnya-Ingushetia border and advance on Grozny, Chechnya's capital city. Russian authorities say that the goal of the current drive toward the capital is to eliminate Chechen rebels that Russia has accused of carrying out recent terrorist and guerrilla activities. More than 160,000 refugees fled from Chechnya into Ingushetia, a neighboring republic, in recent weeks.|
24|Fernando de la Rua, the mayor of Buenos Aires, wins a landslide victory in Argentina's presidential elections. The centrist Radical Party and the more liberal Frepaso Party supported De la Rua. He will replace outgoing president Carlos Saul Menem, who represents the populist Judicialist Party.|
25|The United Nations (UN) Security Council votes unanimously to establish a temporary government under the UN flag in East Timor. The temporary UN government will serve until East Timor is able to function as a stable, self-governing state. In order to function independently, the East Timorese must draft a constitution and establish a government, a legal system, a police force, and other institutions of self-rule.|
25|Israel opens some of its roads to serve as a safe passage route between the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, two Palestine-occupied territories that lie on opposite sides of Israel. Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) leader Yasir Arafat agreed to the route in September as part of the ongoing Mideast peace process. Opening the safe passage will enable Palestinians to travel freely--although still subject to security precautions--between the two territories for the first time in years.|
26|Teen-age birth rates in the United States fell in 1998, officials for the National Center for Health Statistics report. Births in the 15-to-19 age group fell 5 percent from 1997. The birth rate among girls aged 10 to 14 decreased by 6 percent. The 1998 decrease continues a seven-year trend.|
27|The New York Yankees beat the Atlanta Braves to win the World Series, 4-1. The victory marks the 25th championship for the Yankees.|
27|Five gunmen storm the parliament building in Armenia, killing the country's prime minister, parliament speaker, and six others. The assailants also take 40 people hostage. The gunmen surrender several hours after the attack.|
28|Leaders of the Falun Gong spiritual movement in China talk secretly with international journalists. They say that many of the movement's members have been arrested or fired from their jobs in recent weeks because of their devotion to Falun Gong. The government banned Falun Gong on July 22, claiming that the group has secret political motives.|
29|An extremely powerful cyclone hits Orissa, a state on the northeastern coast of India. The cyclone reaches wind speeds of 160 miles (260 kilometers) per hour and brings tidal waves as high as 15 feet (5 meters) to India's shore. It wipes away hundreds of villages and leaves more than a million people without homes. Officials estimate that thousands of people are killed by the storm.|
30|Twenty-three years after Indonesia invaded East Timor, the last group of Indonesian soldiers leave the region. Indonesia has formally given up control over the East Timorese, who voted overwhelmingly for independence on August 30.|
31|Egyptair Flight 990, traveling from New York City to Cairo, plunges into the Atlantic Ocean near Massachusetts. The plane was carrying 217 people. The U.S Coast Guard recovers some debris from the crash site, but finds no survivors.|
