01|Iraqi officials, meeting in Vienna with representatives from the United Nations (UN), agree to allow UN weapons inspectors into Iraq. However, the U.S. Secretary of State, Colin Powell, urges the UN not to resume inspections until the Security Council passes a new, tough resolution threatening military action if Iraq blocks UN inspectors from searching presidential palaces or other installations previously off limits to UN officials.|
01|New Jersey Democrats select former Senator Frank R. Lautenberg to run for the U.S. Senate seat currently held by Robert G. Torricelli. Torricelli dropped out of the race on September 30. He announced that he believed he could not win reelection. Frank R. Lautenberg retired from the Senate in 2000, after representing New Jersey for 18 years.|
02|Federal Bureau of Investigation agents arrest Andrew S. Fastow, former chief financial officer of Enron Corp., the Houston-based energy trading company that declared bankruptcy in late 2001. Fastow is charged with fraud, money laundering, and conspiracy for his alleged participation in a series of complicated schemes to artificially inflate Enron profits. Federal prosecutors also allege that Fastow enriched himself at company expense by as much as $45 million.|
02|U.S. Army officials launch the largest operation undertaken by U.S. ground troops in Afghanistan in six months. As many as 2,000 soldiers from the 82nd Airborne Division are moving into Paktia province in southeast Afghanistan to search for Taliban or al-Qa'ida forces that U.S. intelligence agents believe are hiding in the mountainous region.|
03|Hurricane Lili smashes into the gulf coast of the United States about 140 miles (225 kilometers) west of New Orleans, Louisiana. Winds of 100 miles (160 kilometers) per hour uproot trees, peel roofs off buildings, and snap power lines, leaving about 345,000 people in southwest Louisiana without electricity.|
03|The United States lost 2 acres (.80 hectares) of farmland per minute to suburban development in the years between 1997 and 2001, concludes the authors of a study sponsored by the nonprofit American Farmland Trust. Alabama, Arkansas, Illinois, Mississippi, and New York top the list of state's that have lost the greatest percentage of agricultural land in the last five years.|
04|A sniper armed with a high-powered rifle shoots a woman outside a strip mall in Fredericksburg, Virginia, a suburb of Washington, D.C. Police believe the same person gunned down a 73-year-old man in Washington, D.C., on October 3 and five people in suburban Montgomery County, Maryland, on October 2.|
04|King Gyanendra of Nepal dismisses his prime minister, Sher Bahadur Deuba, after the prime minister cancels parliamentary elections scheduled for November. The prime minister postponed elections for a year, citing the threat of Maoist attack. Attempts by Prime Minister Deuba to bring Nepal's Maoist rebels under control have largely failed in the six-year uprising that has left more than 5,000 people dead.|
05|An Islamic militant stabs the mayor of Paris, Bertrand Delanoe, in the abdomen while the mayor entertained guests in his office at city hall. The attacker tells French authorities that he disapproves of the mayor's lifestyle.|
06|An explosion aboard a French oil tanker off the southeastern coast of Yemen sets the vessel on fire and releases thousands of barrels of oil into the sea. Intelligence agents attribute the explosion to terrorists and describe it as similar to the attack by the al-Qa'ida terrorist network in October 2000 on the U.S.S. Cole, which was in the port of Aden, Yemen.|
07|U.S. President George W. Bush declares in a nationally televised address that Iraq's biological and chemical weapons are an immediate and deadly threat to the United States as well as to U.S. allies in the Middle East and Europe. The president argues that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein is tied to the al-Qa'ida terrorist network and must be disarmed.|
07|A sniper shoots a 13-year-old boy as he entered his middle school in Bowie, Maryland, a suburb of Washington, D.C. The shooting is the eighth in Washington and its suburbs since October 2.|
08|A United States marine is killed and another severely wounded when two Kuwaitis, armed with AK-47 automatic rifles, open fire on a group of marines conducting training exercises on the Kuwaiti island of Failaka in the Persian Gulf. The gunmen are killed when they attempt to attack a second group of marines. Kuwaiti officials identify the gunmen as Islamic militants connected to the al-Qa'ida terrorist network.|
09|U.S. President George W. Bush invokes the Taft-Hartley Act to halt the lockout of 10,500 dock workers at 29 West Coast ports. Management shut down the ports on September 29 over a contract dispute with union dockworkers. Bush won a court order to reopen the ports after citing the economic and military importance of the ports, which handle about half of all U.S. oceangoing cargo. Some economists have estimated that the shutdown has cost the U.S. economy more than $10 billion.|
09|The U.S. Department of Justice indicts the head of one of the leading Islamic charities in the United States on charges of conspiracy and racketeering. Justice Department officials allege that Enaam M. Arnaout, executive director of the Benevolence International Foundation, of Palos Hills, Illinois, funneled money collected for humanitarian purposes to Islamic terrorist organizations and to Islamic militants fighting in Afghanistan, Chechnya, and Bosnia.|
09|A 53-year-old man is shot and killed while pumping gas at a station near Manassas, Virginia, 25 miles (40 kilometers) west of Washington, D.C. Police confirm the man is the ninth victim of a sniper who began randomly shooting people in and around Washington, D.C. on October 2.|
10|The administration of U.S. President George W. Bush is developing plans to install a military-led government in Iraq after the U.S. military topples Saddam Hussein's regime, according to Bush administration officials. The plan is based on the kind of government set up by U.S. Army General Douglas MacArthur in Japan after World War II (1939-1945).|
10|The World Court in The Hague, Netherlands, rules that Cameroon is the rightful owner of the oil-rich Bakassi Peninsula in the Gulf of Guinea on Africa's West Coast. Nigerian and Cameroon forces clashed over the territory through much of the 1990's.|
11|The United States Senate votes 77 to 23 in favor of a resolution authorizing President George W. Bush to use military force against Iraq, completing Congressional action on the measure. The House of Representatives had voted 296 to 133 on October 10 in favor of the resolution to use the military "against the continuing threat" posed by the regime of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.|
11|The Washington, D.C.-area sniper kills an eighth person. The latest victim is shot while filling his car with gas at a station near Fredericksburg, Virginia. Thousands of police patrol all roads south of Washington, D.C., in a massive manhunt.|
11|Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter wins the Nobel Peace Prize for his "untiring effort to find peaceful solutions to international conflicts" as well as his promotion of human rights. The Norwegian Nobel Committee also cite the former president's "vital contribution" to the Camp David Accords between Israel and Egypt.|
12|A car bomb explodes at Kuta Beach on the Indonesian island of Bali, destroying two nightclubs. At least 180 people are killed, and more than 300 others are injured. Most of the victims are tourists, primarily from Australia and Europe. A second, smaller bomb explodes near the U.S. consulate on Bali but causes no injuries. Authorities describe the attacks as typical of Islamic militant groups that is known to be operating in Indonesia. The group targets non-Muslim communities with the intent of destroying the country's multibillion dollar tourist industry.|
12|A collision involving at least 45 vehicles near Cedar Grove, Wisconsin, leaves 10 people dead and at least 38 others injured. Police blame the crash, the worst in the state's history, on heavy fog.|
13|The Australian Air Force evacuates Australian tourists from the Indonesian island of Bali, amid fears that the bombings that left at least 180 tourists dead at Kuta Beach on October 12 was the work of the al-Qa'ida terrorist network. The majority of the victims were Australian. The U.S. Department of State orders all dependents of U.S. diplomats in Indonesia to return to the United States, and the U.S. ambassador to Indonesia advises tourists to leave Indonesia.|
13|The Anaheim Angels beat the Minnesota Twins 13 to 5 in Game 5 of baseball's American League Championship to win the team's first pennant.|
14|The British government for the fourth time in three years resumes control of Northern Ireland's elected government, which is shared by the Roman Catholic minority and Protestant majority. The elected government collapsed when Protestant unionist ministers resigned after evidence surfaced that the Irish Republican Army (IRA) remains engaged in military activities and espionage. The Unionist officials demand that the IRA disarm and disband as stipulated in the 1998 peace agreement.|
14|Kenya's Africa National Union (KANU), which has ruled since Kenya gained independence from Great Britain in 1963, nominates Uhuru Kenyatta, son of Kenya's first president, Jomo Kenyatta, as its candidate for president in elections scheduled for December. Political experts believe that Kenyatta was personally chosen by President Daniel arap Moi, who is retiring after 25 years in office. Dissident members in KANU claim Moi will use the politically inexperienced Kenyatta to maintain Moi's rule over Kenya.|
14|The San Francisco Giants capture the National League Championship by beating the St. Louis Cardinals 2-1 in Game 5 of the series. The Giants face off against the Anaheim Angels in baseball's first all-California World Series.|
15|U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld provides military surveillance aircraft to police authorities in Washington, D.C., and its suburbs in Virginia and Maryland to help search for the sniper who has shot 11 people since October 2. The latest victim was shot and killed in the parking lot of a shopping center in Falls Church, Virginia, on October 14.|
15|U.S. intelligence agents repeatedly warned the Indonesian government weeks before the October 12 bombings on Bali that a group linked to the al-Qa'ida terrorist network was planning an attack on U.S. citizens and other Westerners in Indonesia, announce U.S. government officials. The U.S. Ambassador to Indonesia, Ralph C. Boyce, personally warned Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri of the likelihood of an attack one day before the bombing, which resulted in the deaths of more than 180 people.|
16|The government of North Korea admitted to U.S. officials that it has conducted a secret nuclear-weapons program in defiance of a 1994 agreement with the United States to freeze all nuclear activity, reveal U.S. government officials. North Korea also informed the United States that it is terminating the 1994 nuclear-freeze agreement. North Korea's disclosure was made after a senior U.S. diplomat confronted North Korean officials with evidence gathered by U.S. intelligence agents of a continuing nuclear-arms program.|
16|Removing a small portion of breast tissue is as effective in the treatment of breast cancer as the removal of an entire breast, report the leaders of two independent studies conducted by scientists at various universities in the United States and Italy. The studies tracked 2,552 women with breast cancer over a 20-year period. The results of both studies indicated that mastectomies are no more affective than lumpectomies in saving the lives of women with breast cancer in the vast majority of cases.|
17|A former top energy trader for Enron Corp, the failed Houston-based energy trading company, pleads guilty in federal court in San Francisco to charges of fraud. Thomas Belden, who headed Enron's West Power Trading Division in Portland, Oregon, admits to federal prosecutors that he conspired to drive up electricity prices in California during that state's energy crisis in 2000 and 2001. Belden, who claimed to have acted on the orders of Enron executives in Houston, agrees to forfeit the more than $2 million he made in bonuses that were tied to the fraud. He also faces a maximum prison sentence of five years.|
17|The director of the Central Intelligence Agency, George J. Tenet, tells the joint session of the U.S. Senate and House intelligence committees that the risk of a terrorist attack against the United States is currently as great as it was immediately before the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. Mr. Tenet warns that the recent attacks in Yemen, Kuwait, and Bali demonstrate a resurgence in activity by the al-Qa'ida terrorist network.|
18|United Airlines, the second largest U.S. air passenger carrier, lost $889 million in the third quarter of 2002, reports United's parent company UAL Corp., of Elk Grove Village, Illinois. During the third quarter, United's daily operating costs exceeded daily revenue by $7 million, up from $1 million a day during the second quarter of the year. A company spokesperson attributes the increase to escalating prices for jet fuel.|
19|A 37-year-old man is shot outside a restaurant in Ashland, Virginia, near Richmond. A letter left behind the restaurant ties the shooting to the Washington, D.C.-area sniper.|
19|Irish voters pass by a wide margin a referendum on Irish ratification of a European Union (EU) treaty that clears the way for the EU to admit 10 additional nations, all in eastern Europe. The treaty has been ratified by the EU's 14 other member nations.|
20|Iraqi President Saddam Hussein issues a mass amnesty, releasing tens of thousands of prisoners from Iraqi jails. A government spokesperson describes the amnesty as a gesture of gratitude made in response to Hussein's reelection as president on October 16 with 100 percent of the vote.|
21|An unusually powerful electronic attack of unknown origin strikes 9 of the 13 computer servers that manage global Internet traffic. The attack, which consists of data transmissions at levels 30 to 40 times greater than normal, disables seven servers for one hour and causes intermittent problems on two others. The 13 so-called root server computers are operated by the United States government and by various universities, corporations, and organizations. The computers are located around the world as a precaution against physical disasters.|
21|A Palestinian suicide bomber drives a sports utility vehicle loaded with more than 200 pounds (90 kilograms) of explosives into the back end of a commuter bus in Jerusalem, killing at least 14 passengers and wounding 43 other people. The radical Islamic Jihad claims responsibility.|
22|The sniper who has killed nine people and wounded three others since October 2 shoots and kills a bus driver in Silver Spring, Maryland, a Washington, D.C., suburb.|
22|Oil tankers shifting about in high waves on the Caspian Sea cause a ferry to capsize, killing at least 40 of the 51 people aboard.|
23|Some 50 Chechen guerrillas, armed with automatic rifles, storm a crowded theater in Moscow and take more than 750 people hostage. The guerillas wire themselves and the three-story music hall with high powered explosives and announce that they will begin killing hostages unless the Russian government withdraws its troops from Chechnya.|
24|Police arrest a 41-year-old U.S. Army veteran and his 17-year-old companion at a Maryland rest stop along Interstate 70 in connection with the sniper shootings in the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area. John Allen Muhammad and John Lee Malvo, a citizen of Jamaica, are accused of the random shooting of 13 people, 10 of whom died, during a 21-day spree that terrorized the residents of Washington, D.C., and its suburbs. Police identify a .223-caliber, semiautomatic assault rife, found in the car where the two men had been sleeping, as the murder weapon. They also discover what they describe as a gun port cut into the car's trunk lid.|
25|Senator Paul Wellstone (D., Minnesota), his wife, and their daughter are killed when Wellstone's campaign plane crashes in freezing rain near the town of Eveleth in northeastern Minnesota. Three campaign aids and the plane's two pilots are also killed. Wellstone was in a close reelection fight against his Republican opponent, Norm Coleman.|
25|A hurricane with sustained winds of 140 miles (225 kilometers) per hour slams into Mexico's West Coast near Puerto Vallarta, crashing waves 20 feet (6 meters) in height into the resort town. Meteorologists describe the storm as the third strongest to strike Mexico from the Pacific Ocean in recorded history.|
26|Russian commandos free several hundred people from a Moscow theater occupied by some 50 heavily-armed Chechen rebels since October 23. Before storming the theater, the commandos pumped a narcotic-based gas, which physicians use as an anesthetic, through the ventilation system. The gas, which was intended to incapacitate the rebels, killed nearly all them and 115 of the more than 700 hostages. The Chechen guerrillas warned Russian President Vladimir Putin on October 25 that they would begin killing hostages if Putin failed to meet their demands that Russian troops leave Chechnya.|
27|Brazilian voters elect Luis Igancio Lula da Silva, of the leftist Workers' Party, president with more than 60 percent of the vote. Da Silva's chief opponent in the run-off election, Jose Serra of the centrist Brazilian Social Democratic Party, receives 38.6 percent of the vote. Political experts in Brazil describe da Silva, who is known as Lula, as Brazil's first working-class president.|
27|An unusually violent storm out of the North Atlantic gathers strength as it sweeps across Great Britain and slams into continental Europe with winds exceeding 99 miles (160 kilometers) per hour. The storm leaves at least 34 people dead in Britain, France, and Germany and wreaks millions of dollars in damage.|
27|The Anaheim Angels collects the team's first World Series championship with a 4-1 victory over the San Francisco Giants 4-1 in Game 7 of the series. Angels third baseman Troy Glaus is named most valuable player of the series, at which records were set for most combined runs (85), home runs (21), and extra-base hits (45).|
28|A senior U.S. diplomat in Jordan is assassinated outside his house in Amman, the capital. An unknown gunman shoots Laurence Foley eight times at close range before fleeing the scene.|
28|Violent crime in the United States increased in 2001 after 10 years of decline, report officials with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Murder rose by 2.5 percent and armed robberies increased by 3.7 percent between 2000 and 2001. Overall crime increased regionally in 2001 by 3 percent in the West, 1.1 percent in the Midwest, and 0.3 percent in the South. Overall crime decreased by 1.9 percent in the Northeast. While the murder rate dropped by 3.6 percent in New York City and 3.1 percent in Philadelphia in 2001, it increased by 48 percent in Las Vegas and 37.5 percent in Phoenix.|
29|U.S. President George W. Bush signs legislation that places federal standards on election procedures and gives the 50 states a total of $3.9 billion to replace outdated voting machines. The law is designed to prevent a repeat of the ballot disputes that plagued the presidential election in 2000.|
29|A wooden freighter with at least 220 Haitian passengers aboard runs aground off Key Biscayne, Florida. Most of the passengers attempt to escape U.S. authorities by jumping overboard into the shallow waters of Biscayne Bay. Immigration officials believe that the Haitians were to be illegally smuggled into the United States, probably through Miami.|
30|Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's coalition government collapses with the resignation of Labor Party ministers. The Labor Party protests the $145 million Sharon has earmarked for Israeli settlers in the West Bank and Gaza Strip in his proposed budget.|
30|Former U.S. Vice President Walter F. Mondale accepts the Democratic nomination as a candidate for a U.S. Senate seat from Minnesota. He replaces Senator Paul Wellstone, who died in a plane crash on October 25.|
31|At least 29 people are killed when an earthquake of 5.9 magnitude rocks southeastern Italy. In the village of San Giuliano di Puglia, 26 school children are crushed when the roof of their grammar school collapses.|
31|Louisiana police charge John Allen Muhammad and John Lee Malvo with the killing of a beauty shop owner in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, on September 23. Muhammad and Malvo are accused of the random shooting of 13 people in and around Washington, D.C., during a 21-day shooting spree in October. The two men are also prime suspects in a murder that occurred during a robbery in Montgomery, Alabama, on September 21.|
31|Federal prosecutors indict former Enron Corp. Chief Financial Officer Andrew Fastow on 78 counts of fraud, money laundering, conspiracy, and obstruction of justice. Fastow is accused of artificially inflating Enron profits in order to skim off millions of dollars at the expense of stockholders.|
