Events in August 2005
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Aug. 1
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Saudi Arabia’s King Fahd bin Abdul Aziz (84), dies ending a 23-year reign. His half-brother, Crown Prince Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz, is sworn in monarch and Crown Prince Sultan the first Deputy Prime Minister. |
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Dr. V. Shanta, Chairperson, Cancer Institute, Adyar in Chennai wins the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Public Service for 2005. |
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The U.S. President, George Bush, bypasses Senate and appoints John R. Bolton Ambassador in the United Nations. |
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Salva Kiir Mayardit is installed chairman of the Sudan People’s Liberation Army. Thirtysix persons die in riots following John Garang’s death. |
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Aug. 2
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Zimbabwean prosecutors scrap treason charges against the Opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai over the 2003 mass protests. |
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Aug. 3
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Astronaut Stephen K. Robinson fixes Discovery shuttle problem pulling off strips of fabric from the belly during a spacewalk. |
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The Mauritanian President, Maaouyia Sid Ahmed Ould Taya, in power since 1984, is ousted in a coup. |
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Aug. 4
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The Pakistan Supreme Court opines clauses of the Hasba Bill introducing a Taliban-style moral code in the North Western Frontier Province unconstitutional. |
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Aug. 6
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The former British Foreign Secretary Robin Cook dies in a hospital in Inverness, Scotland after being taken ill during a walk. |
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Discovery undocks from the International Space Station. |
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Japan’s Prime Minister, Junichiro Koizumi, reaffirms adherence to nuclear pacifism as the nation observes the 60th anniversary of the American bombing of Hiroshima. |
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Senior Congress leader, Margaret Alva is presented with the Nelson Mandela Award for Minority Empowerment at the United Nations Church Center in New York. |
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The West African nation of Niger is stalked by famine and takes a toll of over 700 children since January. |
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Aug. 7
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The Israeli Cabinet approves Gaza Strip pullout and Finance Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, quits in protest. |
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The Mauritanian Premier, Sghair Ould M’Bareck, quits along with his Cabinet after talks with the coup leader Ely Ould Mohamed Vall. |
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Militants kill 32 persons in a series of attacks in Iraq. |
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All seven crew members stranded on a Russian mini-submarine are rescued by a British probe off the Kamchatka Peninsula. |
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Aug. 9
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The Discovery space shuttle makes a flawless touchdown in the Mojave desert, California after a 14-day trip covering 9.28 million km. |
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Iraqi leaders resume talks on Constitution. |
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Aug. 10
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U.N. inspectors remove final seals from equipment at a uranium conversicn plant in Isfahan, Iran. |
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Aug. 11
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Pakistan testfires its first-ever Ground Launched Cruise Missile Hatf VII Babur with a range of 500 km. |
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Scientists decipher the genetic code of rice. |
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Aug. 12
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Sri Lankan Foreign Minister, Lakshman Kadirgamar (73), is shot dead by a sniper near his residence in Colombo. |
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The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter blasts off from Cape Canaveral, Florida on a $ 720 million seven-month mission to the Red Planet. |
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Aug. 13
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The Sri Lankan Government declares a state of emergency to track down the assassins of Lakshman Kadirgamar. |
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Aug. 14
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A Cypriot airliner ploughs into a hill near Athens killing all 121 persons on board. |
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Kurmanbek Bakiyev is sworn in Kyrgyzstan President. |
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Iranian President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad names a 21-member hardline Cabinet. |
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Aug. 15
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Israel begins a historic pullout from the Gaza Strip marking the end of 38 years of occupation of a part of Palestinian land. |
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The Indonesian Government and the Free Aceh Movement sign their third peace pact in Helsinki, Finland. |
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Aug. 16
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One hundred and sixty persons are killed after a Colombian airliner on a chartered flight from Panama to Martinique crashes in the mountains of western Venezuela. |
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A 7.2 magnitude earthquake strikes northeastern Japan triggering a small tsunami. |
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Aug. 17
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Thirtyseven persons are killed in three massive car bomb attacks in Baghdad. |
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One hundred and four people are killed as an Ecuadorean ship sinks in the Pacific Ocean off Colombia. |
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More than 250 small bombs go off across Bangladesh. |
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Aug. 18
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Russia and China launch the first-ever joint war games, dubbed ‘Peace Mission 2005’ in Vladivostok. |
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Pakistan’s Supreme Court upholds the death sentence given to an Indian Sarabjit Singh (41) who is held responsible for the 1990 blasts in Lahore and Multan. |
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Aug. 19
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Pierre Nkurunziza is elected Burundi’s President culminating a three-year peace process. |
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Aug. 20
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A Pakistani soldier, Abdul Salam Siddiqui, is hanged to death in a Multan jail for his role in the bid on the life of President, Pervez Musharraf on December 14, 2003. |
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Aug. 21
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The spacecraft Spirit rover completes its year-long ascent to the peak of Husband Hill on Mars. |
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Aug. 22
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Anura Bandaranaike is named Sri Lanka’s new Foreign Minister. |
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Israeli military evacuates all settlements in Gaza. |
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Kurdish rebels declare a one-month ceasefire after Turkey acknowledges mistreatment of the community. |
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At least 14 persons are killed in Coimbra City in Portugal’s worst forest fires on record. |
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Iraqi Parliament receives an incomplete draft of the first post-Saddam Constitution. |
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Aug. 23
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At least 41 persons die after a Peruvian jetliner crashes in a storm near the Amazonian rain forest city of Pucallpa near Lima. |
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Aug. 24
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The U.S. releases nearly 1,000 Iraqi prisoners from the Abu Ghraib jail near Baghdad. |
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Aug. 25
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The first China-Russia joint military exercises come to an end in Weifang, China. |
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Aug. 26
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King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden presents the 2005 Stockholm Water Prize to Sunita Narain, Director of the Centre of Science and Environment at the Stockholm City Hall. |
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Seventeen persons are killed after a fire rages through an apartment housing African immigrants in Paris. |
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Turkmenistan pulls out of the post Soviet Union bloc Commonwealth of Independent States. |
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Aug. 28
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India and Afghanistan moot a Turkmenistan gas pipeline that would pass through Kabul and Pakistan after a meeting between the Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh and President, Hamid Karzai in Kabul. Kabul keen on joining SAARC. |
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Sunnis reject draft Iraqi statute. Parliament adjourns without voting. |
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The Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh, announces a $50-million aid for Afghanistan’s reconstruction during his visit, the first by an Indian Premier to Kabul in 29 years. |
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Omri Sharon, eldest son of the Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, is indicted on corruption charges. |
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Aug. 29
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The Ramon Magsaysay Award 2005 is presented to six persons, among them India’s Dr. V. Shanta for public service. The others are Jon Ungphakorn of Thailand, Teten Magduki (Indonesia), Somphone (Laos), Matiur Rahman (Bangladesh) and Yoon Hye-ran (South Korea) at a function in the Philippines capital Manila. |
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India has shown that democracy is not the preserve of the Western world alone, says the Afghanistan President, Hamid Karzai, at a function in Kabul where the former King Zahir Shah lays the foundation stone for a new Parliament building. |
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Aug. 30
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Thousands are killed as Hurricane Katrina pounds the U.S. Gulf coast leaving over a million persons without power in New Orleans, in Mississippi, Louisiana and Alabama, causing a $9 billion damage. |
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Dutch woman Hendrikje van Andel-Schipper (115), the world’s oldest person dies at a home for the elderly in Westerkin, Amsterdam. |
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Forty seven persons are killed in U.S. air strikes on Iraqi cities of Husayaba and Karabila, close to Qaim on the Syrian border. |
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Aug. 31
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At least 1,000 Shia pilgrims are killed after a stampede on a bridge over the Tigris river in Iraq while on their way to the Imam Mousa al-Kadim shrine in Baghdad’s Kadhimiya district. Alarm over a suicide bomber leads to the panic reaction. |
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Events 2005
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May
Jun
Jul
Aug
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Oct
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Dec
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