International Events in March 1999
Mar. 2
Rebels kill eight of the 14 foreign tourists taken hostage by them in a remote national park in south- west Uganda.
Mar. 5
The Russian President fires the controversial tycoon, Mr. Boris Berezovsky, from his position as Executive Secretary of the Commonwealth of Independent States.
Mr. Thabo Mbeki, President of the African National Congress is among the 27 top ANC leaders who have been refused amnesty by the Amnesty Committee of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
Mar. 6
The West's top peace envoy to Bosnia, Mr. Carlos Westerndorp sacks the utranationalist Bosnian Serb President, Mr. Nikola Poplaseu, for obstructing the country's fragile peace process.
Mar. 9
The U.S. Department of Energy sacks a Los Alamos weapons designer suspected of being involved in smuggling nuclear secrets to China.
Mar. 11
NATO expands from 16 members to 19 with the inclusion of Belarus, Ukraine and Lithuania.
Mar. 12
Mr. Oscar Lafontaine, German Finance Minister and leader of the governing Social Democrat Party, quits from his posts.
Mar. 14
The Taliban and the Northern Alliance agree to form a broad-based coalition government in Afghanistan.
Mar. 20
The European Commission President, Mr. Jacques Santer and 20 Commissioners resign en masse, in response to a damning 144-page report by a five-person committee of independent experts, which criticised the Commission's administration ``up to the highest level of command''.
Ms. Rosemary Nelson, a human rights lawyer in Northern Ireland, is killed in a car bomb blast at Lurgan, Co Armagh.
Mar. 20
Fighting flares in Kosovo and Western embassies in Belgrade evacuate non-essential staff as the threat of NATO bombing looms.
A Swiss doctor and British pilot, cross an invisible line on Africa's map and drift on into immortality, the first to realise man's century-old dream of circling the world in a hot-air balloon.
Mar. 22
``Shakespeare in Love'' wins seven Oscar awards, including best picture and best actress for Gwyeneth Paltrow. Steven Speilberg's ``Saving Private Ryan'' wins the prize for direction. Roberto Benigni wins best actor for his role in ``Life is Beautiful''.
Mar. 24
NATO warplanes launch air strikes against Serbian targets in Yugoslavia.
Judges at the House of Lords, Britain's highest court of appeal, decide that the former Chilean dictator, Gen. Augusto Pinochet, will have to face extradition to Spain to face charges of murder and torture.
Mar. 25
A determined NATO mounts a fresh wave of air strikes against Yugoslavia.
Mar. 26
The Russian draft resolution demanding an immediate end to NATO air strikes on Yugoslavia and resumption of negotiations is defeated in the U.N. Security Council.
Mar. 28
NATO warplanes bomb Yugoslav targets while Serb forces down a U.S. F-117A Stealth fighter.
Mar. 29
Thousands of ethnic Albanians flee their homes in Kosovo and pour into neighbouring Macedonia and Montenegro.
Mar. 31
The NATO military alliance rejects a peace offer by the Yugoslav President, Mr. Slobodan Milosevic.