01|Typhoon Rusa cuts across the southern half of the Korean peninsula, wiping out bridges and destroying thousands of buildings. The storm, the worst to hit South Korea since 1959, dumps nearly 36 inches (1 meter) of rain, triggering massive flooding and landslides that kill more than 130 people. Another 16 people drown under enormous waves crashing across the beaches and docks at Pusan, a port near Seoul, the capital.|
02|Eight men in the Netherlands are charged with being members of a terrorist organization and with recruiting and raising funds for the al-Qa'ida terrorist network. Dutch authorities believe the eight men are either from North Africa or the Middle East and have been in the Netherlands for an undetermined period of time. Experts on international terrorism suggest that the Netherlands is Europe's center of militant Islamic activities and may be home base to a number of al-Qa'ida fighters who escaped from Afghanistan after the U.S.-led invasion in 2001.|
02|Russia's foreign minister, Igor S. Ivanov, announces at a meeting with Iraq's foreign minister, Naji Sabri al-Hadithi, in Moscow that the government of the United States has yet to produce a solid argument to support its contention that Iraq poses a threat to U.S. and international security. Ivanov notes that a U.S. military action against Iraq is likely to "undermine the already difficult situation in the Persian Gulf and the Middle East."|
03|The Dow Jones average of 30 leading stocks on the New York Stock Exchange falls 355 points. The Dow index has dropped for five consecutive months, the longest decline since 1981. The Standard & Poor's index of 500 stocks on the exchange drops by 4.2 percent, falling below 900 for the first time in a month.|
03|The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is overhauling its scheduling system so that severely ill or disabled veterans will receive medical treatment before veterans will less serious health problems, announces Department Secretary Anthony J. Principi. The department's current policy provides medical treatment on a first-come-first-served basis. Secretary Principi estimates that as many as 300,000 U.S. veterans are currently forced to wait six months on average to see a physician at a VA medical facility. The backlog, according to the secretary, is due to a 1996 decision to provide medical care to all U.S. veterans, regardless of whether they had been wounded or disabled while in service.|
04|U.S. President George W. Bush, meeting with leaders of the Senate and House of Representatives, pledges that he will seek congressional approval before launching any military campaign in Iraq and promises to present his case against Iraqi President Saddam Hussein at the United Nations. The Bush administration accuses Hussein of endangering world stability by stockpiling weapons of mass destruction.|
04|California's prized coast redwoods are infected with a highly contagious disease known as Sudden Oak Death, announce scientists at the University of California at Berkley and Davis. Biologists describe Sudden Oak Death as a fungus-like pathogen that already has killed tens of thousands of oaks in the United States since the disease was first detected in California in 1995. At least 17 species of trees are known to be susceptible to Sudden Oak Death, including Douglas firs, the predominate tree in western U.S. forests.|
05|President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan survives an assassination attempt during a visit to the southern Afghan city of Kandahar. The unknown gunman, wearing an Afghan army uniform, is shot and killed by Karzai's personal guard, which consists of U.S. special forces. The assassination attempt comes hours after two powerful bombs exploded in downtown Kabul, the capital, killing 26 people and injuring more than 100 others. Afghan officials believe the attacks were carried out by members of the al-Qa'ida terrorist network.|
05|The U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee votes 10-9, along party lines, to reject President George W. Bush's nomination of Priscilla Owen as judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in New Orleans. Democrats on the committee characterized Owens as extreme in her political views and complained that President Bush was attempting to "pack" federal courts with staunch conservatives. Republicans on the committee claimed that Owens, a member of the Texas Supreme Court, was well qualified and accused Democrats of distorting her record.|
06|The U.S. unemployment rate dropped from 5.9 percent in July to 5.7 percent in August, reports the U.S. Department of Labor. However, nearly 3 million people in the United States have been out of work for at least 15 months, an increase of 50 percent between 2001 and 2002. Approximately half of the total have been out of work for more than one year. Unemployment is highest in the Pacific Northwest. In Washington and Oregon, the rate of unemployment topped 7 percent in July.|
06|An earthquake of a magnitude of 5.5 shakes the mountains of central Taiwan while Typhoon Sinlaju slams into northeastern Taiwan with winds of 90 miles (145 kilometers) per hour and heavy rains.|
07|British Prime Minister Tony Blair, meeting with U.S. President George W. Bush, endorses the president's drive to topple Iraqi President Saddam Hussein from power. Blair is the first European leader to back the president's contention that Iraq's stockpile of weapons of mass destruction must be destroyed. A spokesperson for the Bush administration announces that U.S. intelligence officials have uncovered evidence that Iraqi agents are combing the world for the materials necessary to complete a nuclear weapon.|
08|All violent crime in the United States except murder fell by 9 percent between 2000 and 2001, report officials with the Bureau of Justice Statistics, a division of the U.S. Department of Justice. The 2001 decline pushes the crime rate nationwide to its lowest level since the government began tracking violent crime in 1973. The 2001 National Crime Victimization Survey reveals, however, that murders increased by 3.1 percent between 2000 and 2001. Criminologists attribute the overall decline in the crime rate to the strong economy of the 1990's and to tougher sentencing laws that have steadily increased the number of people incarcerated in U.S. prisons and jails.|
08|Maoist rebels in Nepal kill 58 people in Sandhikharaka, a remote town 185 miles (300 kilometers) west of Katmandu, the capital. On September 7, rebels killed 49 police officers during an attack in eastern Nepal.|
09|Austria's chancellor, Wolfgang Schussel, calls for early parliamentary elections to end a government crisis triggered by the resignation of several ministers from the ruling coalition government. The ministers resigned when far-right politician Jorg Haider attempted to reassert control of the Freedom Party, which he founded. Haider's party joined the coalition in February 2000 on the condition that Haider, who many Austrians consider an extremist, give up leadership of the party.|
10|U.S. President George W. Bush orders the country's military to a high state of alert, which includes loading surface-to-air missiles into launchers that ring Washington, D.C. The order comes after the U.S. Homeland Security Office raised its nationwide terror warning system to the second-highest level, Code Orange. The level signifies a high risk of terrorist attack. According to Attorney General John Ashcroft, U.S. agents uncovered the possibility of attacks against targets in the United States, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia, where a number of U.S. embassies have been ordered closed.|
10|Senator Bob Smith loses to John Sununu in New Hampshire's Republican primary. Sununu is the son of John H. Sununu, a chief of staff during President George H. W. Bush's administration. Elizabeth Dole wins the Republican primary for the senate seat currently held by retiring Senator Jessie Helms. Dole served in the administrations of Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush. In Florida, Bill McBride, a Tampa attorney with no political experience, leads former U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno for the Democratic nomination for governor in a race yet to be determined due to irregularities at the polls.|
10|At least 90 people are killed and 180 others injured when one of India's crack express trains, which runs from Calcutta to New Delhi, the capital, jumps its tracks near the town of Rafiganj, 420 miles (675 kilometers) east of New Delhi. The derailment plunges one car 300 feet (90 meters) into the Dhave River and leaves two others cars dangling from a bridge. Indian authorities suspect sabotage by Communist rebels active in that area of eastern India.|
11|Communities across the United States commemorate the first anniversary of the terrorist attacks on the United States on Sept. 11, 2001. In New York City, the names of more than 2,800 victims of the attack on the World Trade Center are read as victims' families descend into the crater referred to as Ground Zero to lay flowers around a circular memorial. In ceremonies at the Pentagon outside Washington, D.C., President George W. Bush l, standing before the restored facade of the Pentagon Building, pays tribute to the more than 180 victims of the attack on the headquarters of the U.S. armed services and renews the nation's commitment to the war on terrorism. President Bush and First Lady Laura Bush later visit with more than 500 people who gathered in a field outside Shanksville, Pennsylvania, for a ceremony of remembrance for their relatives who died when a hijacked United Airlines Boeing 757 crashed there in 2001.|
11|The Palestinian parliament uses the threat of a no-confidence vote to force Palestinian leader Yasir Arafat to dissolve his cabinet, which Palestinian critics have long accused of corruption. Experts on Middle East affairs describe the parliamentary demand for reform as a major challenge that has weakened Arafat's hold on his position as leader of the Palestinian people.|
12|U.S. President George W. Bush presents his rationale for military action against Iraq in an address before the United Nations (UN) General Assembly in New York City. The president contends that President Saddam Hussein of Iraq has consistently shown contempt for the international organization by refusing to cooperate with UN weapons inspectors. According to the president, Hussein for 11 years has ignored a series of UN resolutions ordering him to destroy weapons of mass destruction, including stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons. Bush challenges the UN to force Hussein to disarm and end the repression of the Iraqi people. The president warns that the United States cannot stand by and do nothing while "dangers gather."|
13|A high-ranking member of the al-Qa'ida terrorist network and one of the few persons still alive who was involved in planning the terrorist attacks on the United States in 2001, has been captured in Pakistan, announce U.S. officials. Pakistani agents captured Ramzi bin al-Shibh was a close associate of Mohamed Atta, who experts believe planned the hijacking of four commercial airliners on Sept. 11, 2001.|
14|Five Arab-American men are charged with operating an active al-Qa'ida terrorist cell in western New York State and providing material support and resources to terrorists. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents arrested the five men, all of whom were born in the United States, on September 13 in Lackawanna, New York, a suburb of Buffalo, where all five resided. The men, who are of Yemeni descent, are believed to have received intensive weapons training in Afghanistan during the spring and summer of 2001. According to FBI officials, the al-Qa'ida organization in western New York is the first active cell that federal agents have detected in the United States since Sept. 11, 2001.|
15|Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents arrest a sixth man who U.S. officials believe was involved in an al-Qa'ida terrorist cell in western New York State. Mukhtar al-Bakri is arrested in Bahrain, where he was preparing for an arranged marriage. Bakri, who is of Yemeni descent, is a U.S. citizen living in Lackawanna, New York, near five other Arab Americans who were charged on September 14 for providing support and resources to terrorists. According to U.S. officials, the six men traveled to Pakistan in 2001 to attend an assembly of an Islamic sect known as the "Group of the Proselytizers." Federal agents contend that the men also traveled to Afghanistan, where they received instruction from al-Qa'ida terrorists.|
15|A bus in Argentina filled with Roman Catholic pilgrims returning home from a visit to a religious shrine plunges 490 feet (150 meters) into a gorge some 600 miles (965 kilometers) northwest of Buenos Aires, the capital, killing 47 of the 72 people aboard the bus.|
16|The government of Iraq agrees to allow United Nations (UN) weapons inspectors into the country for the first time since December 1998.|
17|The representatives of China, France, and Russia inform the United Nations (UN) Security Council that their countries disagree with U.S. demands that the council issue an ultimatum to Iraq to disarm itself of weapons of mass destruction or face military action. China, France, and Russia, which each hold veto power in the Security Council, insist that Iraq's offer on September 16 to readmit UN weapons inspectors should be enough to satisfy the UN for the present.|
17|Japan and North Korea end more than 50 years of hostility with an agreement to reestablish diplomatic relations. Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and North Korean leader Kim Jong Il, meeting in Pyongyang, the North Korean capital, sign an agreement in which North Korea promises to keep its missile and suspected nuclear weapons programs in check. Japan promises North Korea billions of dollars in economic aid and issues an apology for its actions in Korea before and during World War II (1939-1945) .|
17|L. Dennis Kozlowski, the former chief executive of Tyco International Ltd., a Bermuda-based manufacturing and service corporation, used more than $60 million in company funds to purchase, renovate, and furnish for himself two apartments in New York City and a mansion in Boca Raton, Florida, report Tyco officials. Kozlowski also awarded dozens of employees with unauthorized compensation and loans that were later forgiven.|
17|Former U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno concedes defeat in her bid for the Democratic nomination for governor of Florida. Political newcomer Bill McBride beat Reno by less than 5,000 votes out of the 1.3 million cast in the September 10 primary. The election was marred by voting problems in two of the state's largest counties.|
18|Officials with the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) were aware as early as 1998 that the al-Qa'ida terrorist network planned to fly hijacked jets into the World Trade Center, discloses Eleanor Hill, the staff director of a joint U.S. Senate and House inquiry into the terrorist attacks on the United States on Sept. 11, 2001. Hill testifies before a joint U.S. Senate and House intelligence committee that while the heads of the FBI and CIA did not take the report seriously, both agencies did pass the threat and 17 other such warnings on to senior government officials. Hill notes that the CIA informed "senior government leaders" in July 2001 that al-Qa'ida leader Osama bin Laden planned a "significant terrorist attack against U.S. or Israeli interests in coming weeks." Officials with the George W. Bush administration neither confirm nor deny that they received warnings of terrorist attacks, noting that that the receipt of such information is classified as top secret.|
19|U.S. President George W. Bush asks Congress to pass a resolution giving him the authority to use "all means he determines to be appropriate, including force" to disarm Iraq and topple the regime of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. The president notes that "If the United Nations Security Council won't deal with the problem, the United States and some of our friends will."|
19|Federal health officials confirm that West Nile virus has been transmitted through blood transfusions. In Mississippi, a 24-year-old woman was stricken with West Nile encephalitis, a potentially fatal swelling of the brain, after receiving a transfusion. Federal health officials advice blood banks to ask donors if they had experienced a mild fever or flulike symptoms.|
19|Israeli tanks encircle Palestinian leader Yasir Arafat's compound in Ram Allah in the West Bank, demanding that he surrender various men wanted by Israeli authorities. The incursion comes hours after a Palestinian suicide bomber detonated an explosive device on a Tel Aviv bus, killing himself and five Israelis and injuring dozens of people outside the city's man synagogue.|
19|A coup (overthrow) attempt on the government of President Laurent Gbagbo of Cote d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast) leaves 19 people dead on the streets of Abidjan, the nation's commercial center and main port on Africa's West Coast. Interior minister Emile Boga Doudou, in charge of the national police force, is killed when rebels soldiers attack his house. Government troops kill General Robert Geui, a former army chief who led a similar uprising in 1999. Authorities believe Geui was involved in the latest insurgency.|
20|A massive wall of ice some 330 feet (100 meters) thick breaks free from the enormous Maili Glacier and roars down a gorge in the Caucasus Mountains in the southern Russian republic of North Ossetia. At least 150 people are killed, including the inhabitants of the village of Karmadon, which is buried under 500 feet (150 meters) of ice and debris. Scientists suggest global warming may have caused the break up of the glacier.|
21|The United States Department of Defense has provided President George W. Bush with a detailed proposal on the use of military force against the regime of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, announces a senior official with the department. General Tommy Franks, who would command any operation against Iraq, hand delivered the plan to the president in early September. According to officials with the Department of Defense, the plan outlines the number of troops and amount of war material necessary to capture Baghdad, the Iraqi capital.|
22|Gerhard Schroder retains his position as chancellor of Germany despite the fact that his party, the Social Democrats, receives only 38.4 percent of the vote in parliamentary elections, compared with the Christian Democrats' 38.6 percent. Schroder's coalition with Germany's powerful Green Party allows him to retain control of the government with 305 seats in the Bundestag to the opposition's 294 seats. The bitter campaign centered around German attitudes toward immigrants, particularly Islamic immigrants, and Schroder's promise to keep Germany out of a possible war between the United States and Iraq.|
22|Israeli forces stop demolition of Yasir Arafat's headquarters, leaving the Palestinian leader holed up with 200 of his followers in the last structure to remain standing in Arafat's compound in Ram Allah in the West Bank. Israeli police, attempting to enforce curfews in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, shoot and kill four Palestinians during a second night of massive demonstrations triggered by Israel's siege of the Palestinian Authority headquarters. The blockade began on September 19 after a suicide bomber killed himself and five Israelis on a Tel Aviv bus.|
23|The El Paso Corporation, the largest supplier of natural gas in the United States, illegally drove up the price of natural gas in California in 2000 and 2001, contributing to that state's energy crisis, rules the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. The ruling marks the first time that any federal regulatory agency has backed the assertions of California officials that the state's energy crisis of 2000 and 2001 was produced through the manipulation of markets by energy suppliers.|
23|Three retired four-star U.S. Army generals, testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee, warn against a U.S. attack on Iraq without a United Nations (UN) resolution supporting the offensive. Former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff John M. Shalikashvili; former NATO military commander Wesley K. Clark; and former chief of the U.S. Central Command Joseph P. Hoar inform members of the committee that attacking Iraq without UN backing could energize the radical Islamic movement and interfere with the war on terrorism.|
24|The United Nations (UN) Security Council approves a resolution condemning the current Israeli siege of Palestinian leader Arafat's headquarters in Ram Allah in the West Bank. The UN resolution calls on Israel to remove its tanks and end the destruction of the compound. U.S. Ambassador John Negroponte abstains from the voting after characterizing the resolution as flawed and one-sided because it does not address Israeli security concerns or condemn as terrorists the Palestinian militant groups Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and the al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade.|
24|British Prime Minister Tony Blair informs the House of Commons, meeting in an emergency session, that the Iraqi military is capable of launching warheads armed with biological or chemical weapons within 45 minutes of receiving the order from Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. The prime minister asserts that Hussein is extending the range of Iraqi ballistic missiles in order to reach the whole of the Arab Middle East as well as Israel, Turkey, Cyprus, and Greece. According to Blair, Iraq is one to five years away from completing a nuclear weapon and is known to have approached various African countries with offers to buy substantial quantities of uranium that could be used to make nuclear weapons.|
24|Gunmen armed with automatic weapons open fire in a Hindu temple in Gandhinagar, in the Indian state of Gujarat, killing 32 people and wounding 50 others. The Indian government blames the attack on Pakistan.|
24|The U.S. Department of Defense dispatches 200 soldiers stationed in Germany to West Africa to protect hundreds of U.S. citizens, including 161 schoolchildren, endangered by civil unrest in Cote d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast). The violent uprising began on September 19 when rebels attempted to overthrow the government of President Laurent Gbagbo.|
25|The United States is reestablishing diplomatic relations with North Korea, announces a spokesperson for President George W. Bush's administration. Assistant U.S. Secretary of State James Kelly is scheduled to visit Pyongyang, North Korea's capital, in October to reopen official lines of communication.|
25|U.S. Senator Tom Daschle (D., South Dakota), speaking on the floor of the Senate, demands an apology from President George W. Bush for questioning the patriotism of Democrats in the Senate, especially the veterans of World War II (1939-1945) and the Vietnam War (1957-1975). On September 23, the president had remarked that Senate Democrats were "uninterested in the security of the American people" and were "more interested in special interests" than in passing legislation to create the proposed Homeland Security Department. The legislation is stalled in the Senate because Democrats insist that employees of the new department be covered under the Civil Service system. President Bush insists that the head of the proposed department have the power to freely hire and fire employees.|
26|The Islamic militant group Hezbollah in southern Lebanon has amassed thousands of surface-to-air missiles capable of striking Israeli cities, reveal senior Israeli security officials. The Israeli government accuses Iran of supplying Hezbollah with the weapons.|
26|More than 970 people are killed when a ferry sinks in a violent storm in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Gambia in western Africa. The ferry, with an official capacity of 500 people, carried at least 1,000 passengers, all from neighboring Senegal.|
26|Tropical Storm Isidore hits the Gulf Coast of the United States with heavy rain and winds of up to 65 miles (105 kilometers) per hour, causing severe flooding in coastal areas of Louisiana and leaving as many as 200,000 residents of the state without power. The storm triggers waves 10 feet (3 meters) high in Biloxi, Mississippi, and spawns a series of tornadoes that tear across Mississippi and the Florida Panhandle. As a hurricane, Isidore pummeled Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula on September 21 and 22, leaving at least two people dead and millions of dollars in damage in its wake.|
27|The administration of U.S. President George W. Bush proposes a United Nations (UN) resolution that calls on Iraq to give UN weapons inspectors immediate access to all sites in Iraq, including Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's palaces. The United States also proposes that the UN authorize the use of military force if the government of Iraq interferes in any way with inspections.|
27|The Dow Jones Industrial average of 30 major corporations traded on the New York Stock Exchange closes at 7,701.45, down 295.67 points. The Dow Jones average is down by 11.1 percent for the month, a greater decline than the drop that followed the terrorist attacks on the United States on Sept. 11, 2001.|
27|New guidelines issued by the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush for government-subsidized health care under the Children's Health Insurance Program define a child as an "individual under the age of 19, including the period from conception to birth." Previous guidelines defined a child as an individual between birth and the age of 19. Tommy Thompson, secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, notes that the new rules will increase the level of medical care received by low-income mothers during pregnancies.|
28|Thousands of young Palestinians in Gaza City in the Gaza Strip and in Ram Allah in the West Bank rally to mark the two-year anniversary of the Palestinian conflict with Israel. Yasir Arafat, speaking by telephone from his besieged compound in Ram Allah, tells Palestinian television viewers to remain steadfast in their demands for territory and promises that Jerusalem will become the capital of a Palestinian nation.|
28|Iraq rejects a U.S. proposal that United Nations (UN) weapons inspectors be allowed immediate and complete access to all Iraqi installations, including the presidential palaces of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. Iraqi Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan announces in Baghdad, the capital, that Iraq has agreed to provide access to weapons inspectors under guidelines previously laid down by the United Nations and that it would not accept new conditions posed by the United States.|
29|The number of people in the United States without medical insurance rose from 39.8 million people in 2000 to 41.2 million in 2001, announces the U.S. Census Bureau. The proportion of the population without health insurance grew from 14.2 percent in 2000 to 14.6 percent in 2001.|
30|The Dow Jones Industrial average of 30 major corporations traded on the New York Stock Exchange closes at 7591.93, down 1.4 percent for the day. The decline of the market during the third quarter of 2002 was the greatest since the fourth quarter of 1987.|
30|Operators of all ports on the West Coast of the United States, from Seattle, Washington, to San Diego, California, shut down operations over a contract dispute with union dock workers. The shutdown leaves hundreds of cargo and passenger ships bottled up in 29 West Coast ports, which annually handle about half of all U.S. oceangoing cargo worth approximately $300 billion.|
30|The foreign ministers of the 15 member nations of the European Union agree to exempt U.S. soldiers and government officials from prosecution for war crimes by the International Criminal Court located in The Hague, Netherlands. U.S. President George W. Bush hadrefused to sign the treaty ratifying the court and demanded blank immunity for all U.S. government personnel on the grounds that U.S. officials could become targets of politically motivated persecution.|
