01|In Kentucky, U.S.A., a schoolboy aged 14 opens fire on pupils at his school as they leave a prayer meeting. Three girls aged 14, 15, and 17 die in the attack at Heath High School, and five other pupils are injured. The boy, wearing earplugs, fires more than ten shots from a .22 calibre gun before surrendering to the school principal. The boy, who has not been named, is described as an average student who has not been in trouble before.|
01|The Spanish Supreme Court sentences 23 leaders of the Herri Batasuna party to seven years each in prison on charges of collaborating with terrorists. The Herri Batasuna party is the political wing of the terrorist ETA group, a Basque separatist movement. The judgment has put police in the Basque region of northern Spain on full alert for fear of reprisals.|
02|Farooq Ahmed Khan Leghari resigns as president of Pakistan, leaving Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in sole authority. Leghari's decision to step down is a show of support for his chief justice. The government had insisted that the president dismiss the chief justice who was attempting to try the prime minister for contempt of court.|
02|The winner of the Turner Prize for art is announced at the Tate Gallery in London. British artist Gillian Wearing is awarded the 20,000-pounds-sterling prize for her work, including a video art sequence which features a group of actors, dressed in police uniforms, posing motionless for sixty minutes.|
02|A three-day conference to decide how to distribute more than five metric tons of gold stolen by the Nazis during World War II opens in London. France, the United States, and the United Kingdom are the joint administrators of the gold that was recaptured in 1945. The conference aims to investigate what happened to the gold during and after the war, and also to ensure satisfactory compensation is paid to those who lost their fortune in the Holocaust (see also May 7, February 5).|
03|Russian president Boris Yeltsin pledges a drastic reduction in his military forces, especially along the country's northwest border, in order to reassure the Baltic region that Russia no longer poses a threat. Yeltsin promises that, by 1999, he will have reduced Russian forces by 40 per cent in the northwest region.|
03|In Ottawa, Canada, 125 countries sign a treaty banning antipersonnel landmines. Three of the world's largest military powers, China, Russia, and the U.S.A., attend only as observers, but pledge to help clear landmines and find alternatives to landmine use.|
04|In the United Kingdom, farmers protest against the government's ban on the sale of beef on the bone which was introduced yesterday. Ports in England, Scotland, and Wales are blockaded by farmers arguing that the new ban will devastate their livelihoods. The government pledges to implement an emergency aid package for the beef industry.|
04|About 300 Hutu militiamen raid a prison in Rwanda and free more than 500 Hutu prisoners charged with murdering Tutsis in a massacre three years ago. At least 10 people are killed in the attack.|
04|In Nicaragua, the country's last officially recognized rebel group, the Andres Castro United Front, disarms after signing a peace accord.|
05|At the Pretoria Supreme Court in South Africa, Moses Sithole is found guilty on 38 counts of murder and 40 counts of rape committed between July 1994 and October 1995. He is sentenced to 2,410 years in prison.|
05|In Israel, more than 700,000 people refuse to work as the strike that began on December 2 intensifies. The strike centres around pension and privatization issues, but the government has suspended negotiations until the protesters follow the instructions of a court order to return to work.|
05|In Zimbabwe, the opposition leader Ndabaningi Sithole is found guilty of conspiring to murder the country's president, Robert Mugabe, and of plotting to overthrow the state.|
06|A military aircraft crashes into a block of flats in Irkutsk-2, Siberia, killing at least sixty people. The Antonov-124, one of the world's largest cargo planes, crashes only 20 seconds after takeoff. Fifteen people are taken to hospital, but rescuers fear that their attempts to find more survivors will be in vain.|
06|Bombs explode in three trains near Chennai, India, killing ten people and injuring more than 80. The attack coincides with the fifth anniversary of the destruction of the Ayodhya mosque by Hindus.|
07|In Hong Kong, the government puts the medical profession on alert for a new form of influenza known as "bird flu". The new strain of the illness, officially known as H5N1, was identified four months ago, and is caused by a chicken virus. It has already caused two deaths in the country since June, and there are fears that the new virus may be the start of a flu pandemic.|
07|Two bombs left from World War II, each weighing 450 kilograms, are made safe, necessitating the evacuation of almost 20,000 people from a town outside Berlin and a Parisian suburb.|
08|It is announced that a five-day-old girl became the world's youngest transplant patient after receiving a new liver in an operation at King's College Hospital, London. Baebhen Schuttke, from Dublin, was born with neonatal haemochromatosis and developed liver failure shortly after her birth, five months ago. She was given only a section of the donor liver, which was divided to provide a smaller, fully-functioning organ. The section is now adapting to her body and growing normally.|
08|In Hong Kong, a specially selected committee choose 36 people to represent the colony in China's parliament. The committee of 424 fail to choose any members of the country's most popular party, the Democratic party. They do, however, select Jiang Enzhu, a long-time supporter of Peking, even though he is technically ineligible to stand for election as he does not fulfil the seven-year residency criterion.|
09|The United Kingdom's oldest woman, Lucy Askew, dies at the age of 114 at her nursing home in Essex, UK.|
09|In Geneva, talks begin between North and South Korea, China, and the United States in an attempt to end almost 50 years of tension between the parties. This is the first gathering of the four countries for negotiations since the end of the Korean War in 1953.|
09|In Harare, Zimbabwe, thousands of people riot on the streets in protest against tax increases to pay for pensions for war veterans. The Zimbabwe Council of Trade Unions calls the day of strike action, and the protest begins peacefully until police charge at the protesters. Many people are injured as cars are overturned and fires lit, and some are arrested. Riot police use tear gas and clubs to break up the demonstration, which had been banned by the government.|
10|The COP3 environment summit which opened in Kyoto, Japan, on December 1, comes to a close with 38 nations agreeing to a deal which aims to reduce the industrial world's emissions of greenhouse gases. Industrial countries are to reduce their pollution by 5.2 per cent overall between 2008 and 2012, according to the new agreement which will be known as the Kyoto Protocol. Many environmentalists are disappointed by the agreement as they feel it does not go far enough to combat the problem of global warming.|
10|In Rwanda, 271 people are killed and a further 227 wounded by Hutu rebels armed with rifles, grenades, and machetes. The rebels attack the Tutsi refugees at the Mudende camp, north of Kigali, at night.|
10|In South Africa, more than 400 white farmers protest outside an agricultural hall in Newcastle, KwaZulu-Natal, against the ruling African National Congress. The protest is based on fears over the murder of 15 fellow farmers in the past six weeks, as well as concern that the ANC will speed up its redistribution of white-owned farmland to blacks.|
11|The prime minister of the United Kingdom, Tony Blair, holds talks with the Sinn Fein leaders Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness over the future of the Northern Ireland peace process. The meeting is seen as an important step in the negotiations for peace between the UK government and Sinn Fein.|
11|In Portsmouth, UK, the Royal Yacht Britannia is decommissioned in a ceremony attended by the Queen, Prince Philip, and other members of the Royal Family. The Britannia has been in service since 1953, and is the last in the line of royal yachts that dates from the 1660's.|
12|The world's most notorious terrorist, Carlos the Jackal, goes on trial in a court in Paris accused of the murder of two secret service agents in 1975. Carlos, whose real name is Ilich Ramirez Sanchez, has been connected with about 80 further murders, allegedly committed in support of the Palestinian cause during the 1970's and 1980's.|
12|Archaelogists announce the discovery of the 500-year-old mummy of a young Inca. It is thought that the body, found near the summit of Mount Ampato, Peru, was a sacrifice to the gods. It has been well preserved by the icy conditions of the region.|
13|Giovanni Alberto Agnelli, the heir to the Fiat empire, dies in Turin, Italy, at the age of 33. The powerful Agnelli family are revered in Italy, and Giovanni was expected to take over the Fiat business before the turn of the millennium. Italy is in mourning, and messages from the country's president and prime minister are sent in tribute.|
13|European beef and lamb is banned by the U.S.A. because of fears that it may be contaminated with BSE, more commonly known as "mad cow disease". The U.S. Agriculture Department states that the ban will be lifted for any country that introduces an effective BSE surveillance programme.|
14|In Mexico, freak weather conditions bring heavy snowfall and blizzards which kill 12 people and cause chaos on roads and at ports. The snow reaches as far south as Guadalajara, the first time the city has seen snow since 1881.|
14|A white man convicted of the murder of an Asian student becomes the first person to be sentenced to death for a racist crime in California, U.S.A. Gunner Lindberg stabbed his victim more than 50 times, and receives the death penalty because of a new law that includes racist killings among the list of capital crimes.|
15|Only one man survives the crash of an airliner flying from Tajikistan to Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates. The plane crashes in the desert eight miles short of the airport in Sharjah, killing all 77 passengers and all but one of the nine flight crew.|
15|Comic actor Stubby Kaye, best known for his stage and film roles in the musical comedy "Guys and Dolls", dies in California, U.S.A. at the age of 79. He had been suffering from lung cancer.|
16|In South Africa, President Nelson Mandela retires as leader of the African National Congress. He is replaced by Thabo Mbeki, who is now effectively president as the ANC is South Africa's ruling party. Mandela is expected to act as a ceremonial state president until his retirement from politics at the next general election in 1999.|
16|The World Wide Fund for Nature announces that more forests were burnt in 1997 than in any other year in recorded history, with large-scale fires burning on every continent except Antarctica.|
16|More than 700 children are treated in hospital in Japan after a cartoon broadcast causes convulsions in the viewers. One scene of the "Pocket Monsters" cartoon is thought to be responsible for the epilepsy-like fits, whose symptoms include vomiting, eye irritation, and breathing difficulties.|
17|A United States judge rules in favour of the families of three Cuban-American pilots who were shot down and killed by a Cuban jet fighter in early 1996. The judge's decision holds the Cuban government and air force responsible for the three deaths, and orders the payment of more than 187-million-U.S.-dollars compensation to the pilots' families.|
18|Pope John Paul II announces that he has cancelled Christmas Day Mass because his doctors have advised him to rest. Later in the day, the pope is presented with B. B. King's favourite guitar during an audience he gives to the famous blues singer.|
18|Kim Dae Jung becomes the first opposition politician to be elected president of South Korea. Jung, who was once imprisoned and tortured for his political beliefs, is elected in preference to the military-backed parties that have ruled the country since its establishment in 1948.|
18|Myra Hindley, a notorious prisoner in the United Kingdom, loses her appeal against the decision made by the British home secretary earlier this month that she must spend the rest of her life in prison. Hindley was jailed for life in 1966 for the murder of two children, and has already served the 30-year minimum prison term for a life sentence.|
18|In Jamaica, P. J. Patterson is reelected as prime minister for an unprecedented third consecutive term in office. His People's National Party claim victory over the conservative Jamaica Labour Party, and Patterson pledges to end political violence which claimed five lives during the day of voting.|
19|Former president of South Africa, P. W. Botha, is charged for failing to appear before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) in Johannesburg. The TRC want to question him on his activities whilst president during the apartheid era in South Africa. Botha now faces either a fine or two years in prison.|
19|A plane travelling from Jakarta to Singapore crashes in Sumatra, Indonesia, and all 104 passengers are feared dead. The Boeing 737 is thought to have been affected by loss of visibility, caused by forest fires, prior to its crash in a swampy area near the city of Palembang.|
20|The south of France is badly affected by heavy rains which cause the Herault River to burst its banks. Many villages in the area are swamped and hundreds of people are evacuated from their homes.|
20|Juzo Itami, the Japanese film director who made "Tampopo" and "Mimbo no Onna" jumps from his office building and dies in hospital. His suicide may have been in response to allegations in Flash magazine, due to be published on December 22, that he had been conducting an affair with a younger woman.|
21|In Kenya, the country's president, Daniel arap Moi, is implicated in rioting between Masai and Kisii ethnic groups. Government opponents claim that Moi's ruling Kenya African National Union Party is inciting violence in their Masai supporters, in some cases causing Kisiis to flee their hometown and thus preventing them from voting in the coming elections.|
21|In Monte Carlo, the "world's largest Christmas tree" burns down after a decorative light on it short-circuits and causes an explosion. The constructed tree, made of 450 trees positioned around a 30-metre-high frame, was made to mark the 700th anniversary of Grimaldi family rule in Monaco.|
21|In Serbia, Milan Milutinovic is elected president amid allegations of vote-rigging by his nationalist opponents. Milutinovic was backed by Slobodan Milosevic's Serbian Socialist Party after Milosevic resigned as president earlier this year.|
22|In Cairo, Egypt, rival Somali leaders end 40 days of negotiations with the signing of a peace deal. The deal is signed by Hussein Mohamed Aidid and his main opponent Ali Mahdi Mohamed, and sets out terms for a reconciliation conference to be held in February to elect a presidential council, prime minister, and parliament. All but two of the leaders of the 26 Somali faction groups sign the agreement.|
22|In the Chiapas state of Mexico, at least 45 Indian refugess are killed by paramilitaries armed with machetes and automatic weapons. More than 20 other people are injured in the attack, thought to have been carried out by up to 60 anti-Zapatista gunmen.|
23|A Bangladeshi airliner crash-lands in a paddy field but the 89 people on board survive with only minor injuries. The plane was en route to Sylhet from the capital, Dhaka, when poor visibility forced the emergency landing. Officials have described the escape of the 85 passengers and four crew as "miraculous".|
23|The trial of Carlos the Jackal ends with his conviction on three counts of murder in a court in Paris. Carlos is sentenced to life in prison, and is led away from the courtroom shouting "Viva la Revolucion" (see also December 12).|
24|President Laurent Kabila of the renamed Democratic Republic of the Congo appeals for exiled politicians of the Zaire era to return to the country and invest their embezzled funds in the reconstruction of the state. He guarantees that no charges will be brought against those who fled after the collapse of the old regime under Mobutu's rule.|
24|The World Bank approves a loan of 27-million-U.S.-dollars to Bosnia to improve the country's gas, electrical, water, and agriculture systems in order to allow Bosnia to meet its international obligations and secure reliable supplies. The loan is approved a week after Bosnia succeeded in clearing its debts to the International Monetary Fund.|
24|A United Nations report chronicling the damage caused by the El Nino weather effect during 1997 states that the phenomenon has affected almost 10,000 people, damaged 1,400 houses and destroyed hectares of crops. |
25|In the United Kingdom, six people are killed and tens of thousands of homes left without electricity as winds of up to 160-kilometres-per-hour cause severe damage. Road and rail links are disrupted by the storms which hit the northwest regions of the U.K. and Ireland.|
25|Police in Zambia arrest and imprison Kenneth Kaunda, former president of the country, in the Zambian capital Lusaka. Kaunda is arrested without charge five days after his return to the country following his escape after a failed coup attempt.|
25|The people of Cuba celebrate Christmas for the first time in 30 years after Cuban president, Fidel Castro, declares December 25 an official holiday in honour of the Pope's visit to the island during January. Pope John Paul II will be the first pope to visit Cuba.|
26|In Japan, the leader of the main opposition disbands his political party, the New Frontier Party, in order to launch a new organization. Ichiro Ozawa is thought to have broken up the NFP in order to create a stronger opposition to the immensely unpopular current government.|
26|The South Korean currency, the won, makes gains of almost 24 per cent after its value was halved during the country's financial crisis in July. The recovery is the result of a 10-billion-U.S.-dollar cash transfusion from the International Monetary Fund and 13 other countries. Although South Korea is now safe from debt default, its total foreign debt could be as high as 200 billion dollars.|
27|Northern Ireland's most notorious terrorist is shot dead by fellow prisoners in the Maze prison, near Belfast. Billy Wright, also known as King Rat, was suspected of responsibility for more than 80 murders during the troubles in the country, and was the leader of the militant Loyalist Volunteer Force. On the evening of his murder, fellow LVF terrorists attack a Catholic public house in County Tyrone, leaving four men seriously injured with gunshot wounds.|
27|More than 800 illegal immigrants are rescued after their ship runs aground near Calabria, southern Italy. The immigrants, mostly Kurds from Iraq and Turkey, are taken to accommodation centres in the province of Catanzaro.|
28|In Hong Kong, the government announces that the territory's population of 1.2 million chickens are to be slaughtered within 24 hours in an attempt to combat the "bird flu" that has claimed 4 lives and affected 16 other people (see also December 7).|
28|In Chiapas state, Mexico, more than 4,000 Mayan Indians flee their homes amid fears of more violence following last week's massacre. The mayor of Acteal, Mexico, is charged with the December 22 massacre of 45 Indian villagers. Jacinto Arias Cruz is alleged to have provided the weapons for the attack and to have attempted to conceal the incident.|
29|Afghanistan's Islamic clerics are given permission by Taliban leaders to negotiate a peace agreement. Mullah Omar, the Taliban's supreme leader, and ousted president Burhanuddin Rabbani, both agree to the plan which requires each of the opposing factions to elect an Islamic scholar to the peace conference.|
29|It is announced by researchers at the University of Michigan, U.S.A., that a vaccine against the deadly Ebola virus has been developed in mice and guinea pigs. It is hoped the vaccine can be developed for human application.|
29|A report in Germany's "Der Spiegel" magazine reveals that a former East German athlete has laid charges against Dr Hans Joachim Wendler, her former physician, claiming he forced her to take massive doses of anabolic steroids that effectively turned her into a man. Heidi Krieger, the 1986 European shot-put champion, has had to undergo a sex-change operation after the drugs altered her physique and voice, and claims she has suffered psychological damage. She is now living as Andreas Krieger in Berlin.|
30|In the Kosovo province in Serbia, riot police break up a demonstration by ethnic Albanian students and teachers protesting against the authority's suspension of tutoring in the Albanian language. The protest is peaceful, but is broken up violently by the Serbian police and 16 people are injured.|
30|In the United Kingdom, Prime Minister Tony Blair announces the New Year's Honours List. Among those receiving an honorary title is the pop singer Elton John who receives a knighthood for his work in helping raise funds and awareness for AIDS charities. His record-breaking song "Candle in the Wind" has so far raised 20 million pounds sterling for the Princess of Wales Memorial Fund (see September 13).|
30|In Algeria, the official death toll of three separate attacks on civilians in the western province of Relizane is 78. The massacres, carried out by Muslim rebels, coincide with the first day of the holy month of Ramadan, which is historically a time of increased violence in the region.|
31|A siege on a prison near Sao Paulo, Brazil, ends after three days as armed police and troops storm the prison. Prison inmates had been holding more than 600 visitors and prison guards hostage, and had been demanding transfer to a less crowded prison. The decision to storm the prison was taken when the authorities became aware that their guards were being tortured by the prisoners.|
31|In Pakistan, Mohammad Rafiq Tarar is elected as president by a huge majority, having been nominated by the prime minister, Nawaz Sharif. Tarar is still fighting a legal battle over the legitimacy of his candidacy, as he has been accused of defaming the judiciary. If he is found guilty, he will be unseated and a new election will be fought.|
