1290

Jews are exiled from England by proclamation of King Edward I.

1704

Forces of Russia's Czar Peter the Great take Narva in Russia.

1967

Diplomatic relations between Indonesia and Malaysia are re-established, following Indonesia's opposition to the formation of the Malaya federation.

1987

Government and opposition officials in South Korea agree on revising the constitution to clear the way for direct presidential elections and other reforms.

1990

After Armenian Republic's Parliament declares a state of emergency, 250 militant nationalists give up their weapons.

1991

Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan become the ninth and tenth Soviet republics to declare independence.

1994

Irish Republican Army declares an open-ended cease-fire in its 24-year campaign against British rule of Northern Ireland.

1998

North Korea launches a new, more powerful long-range ballistic missile that crosses over Japan's main island and crashes into the Pacific Ocean. The test draws strong protests from Japan and the United States.

2000

The United States decides to boycott several meetings in Japan dealing with science and the environment in a protest of the expansion of Japanese whaling.

2001

More than 430 refugees rescued from a sinking ferry, most of them Afghans, languish on a Norwegian cargo ship as Australia refuses them entry.

2003

Negotiators at a meeting of the World Trade Organisation in Geneva reach an agreement that would allow poor countries with severe epidemics of infectious diseases such as AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria to import generic drugs designed to fight them.

2004

The European Union makes a solemn appeal for the release of two French journalists held hostage in Iraq by gunmen demanding France overturn a ban on Islamic head scarves in public schools.

2005

Panicked by rumours of a suicide bomber, thousands of Shiite pilgrims break into a stampede on a bridge in Baghdad during a religious procession, crushing one another or plunging into the Tigris River. Nearly 1,000 die, mostly women and children.

2006

Police in Norway recover the Edvard Munch masterpieces The Scream and Madonna, two years after masked gunmen grabbed the national art treasures in front of stunned visitors at an Oslo museum.

2007

The 25th Anniversary of "Elk Cloner", regarded as the first virus to hit personal computers worldwide.

2008

Practitioners of the ancient Greek religion gather among the ruined temples at the Acropolis, praying to Athena to stop the removal of sculptures and pieces of the temples to museums. Participants claim it is the first such gathering since the religion was abolished late in the 4th century. — AFP/REUTERS/VNS