;Article Updates:up199812.001 - Tue, Feb 2, 1999 at 09:16:20 - make_updates v8.0
Algeria|012820|up129805
Arctic|028820|up129812
Baltic Sea|044200|up129813
Bolivia|068200|up129810
Car racing|094055|up129816
Climate|119200|up129807
Clinton, Bill|119390|up129814
Clone|119610|up129802
Cocaine|121040|up129810
Cuba|142820|up129811
Environmental pollution|182428|up129812|up129813
Euthanasia|187040|up129818
Ireland, Government of|281032|up129808
Ireland, History of|281034|up129808
Multiple birth|377360|up129809
Northern Ireland|395000|up129808
Popocatepetl|439620|up129806
Prehistoric people|444300|up129803
Space exploration|522553|up129801
Switzerland|542580|up129804
Tennis|551080|up129817
United Kingdom, Government of the|575747|up129808
United Kingdom, History of the|575750|up129808
United States, History of the|576000|up129814
Venezuela|582560|up129819
Volcano|587920|up129806
Weather|596160|up129807
up129801|International space station progresses|<strong>International space station progresses</strong><p>In December, 1998, the space shuttle Endeavour carried into orbit the first U.S.-built section of a planned international space station, which was expected to cost more than 100 billion U.S. dollars. During the 12-day mission, astronauts on board Endeavour attached the U.S. module to a Russian-built section of the station already in orbit.</p>
up129802|Eight calves cloned|<strong>Eight calves cloned</strong><p>In December, 1998, scientists in Japan reported that they had cloned eight calves from cells gathered from a single cow. Only four of the calves survived.</p>
up129803|Prehistoric skeleton found|<strong>Prehistoric skeleton found</strong><p>In December, 1998, scientists in South Africa announced the discovery of what they described as the best preserved skeleton yet found of an early member of the human family. The scientists estimated the age of the skeleton at between 3.2 million and 3.6 million years old.</p>
up129804|First female president for Switzerland|<strong>First female president for Switzerland</strong><p>In December, 1998, nearly 30 years after Swiss women won the right to vote, Switzerland elected Interior Minister Ruth Dreifuss as its first female president. Dreifuss was also the country's first Jewish president.</p>
up129805|Algerian well used as a mass grave|<strong>Algerian well used as a mass grave</strong><p>In December, 1998, Algerian security forces, acting on information supplied by a member of the radical Armed Islamic Group, retrieved about 110 partially decomposed bodies from a well at a farm in Meftah, about 16 kilometres south of Algiers. The well was used as a mass grave, probably in 1996 or 1997. The murders were a result of the unrest which began in January, 1992, when the government cancelled elections which the fundamentalist Islamic Salvation Front expected to win. More than 75,000 people have died in the troubles.</p>
up129806|Popocatepetl erupts|<strong>Popocatepetl erupts</strong><p>In December, 1998, Popocatepetl volcano, situated about 80 kilometres southeast of Mexico City, erupted. A 5-kilometre-high column of ash hung over the volcano, and red-hot rocks were tossed more than 3 kilometres, setting numerous bush and forest fires. Although the fires burned for several hours, the 300,000 people living on the slopes of Popocatepetl escaped serious injury.</p>
up129807|Record temperatatures announced|<strong>Record temperatatures announced</strong><p>In December, 1998, the World Meteorological Organization, a specialized United Nations agency located in Geneva, Switzerland, reported that average surface temperature on Earth in 1998 was the highest since temperature was first measured by a thermometer in the mid-1800's and that 7 of the 10 warmest years on record had occurred since 1990.</p>
up129808|Coalition government agreed for Northern Ireland|<strong>Coalition government agreed for Northern Ireland</strong><p>In December, 1998, politicians agreed that the new coalition government, promised in the 1998 April peace accord, will comprise a cabinet-style administration made up of 10 departments. It will replace the current British government system, which has directly ruled Northern Ireland since 1972. It was also agreed that Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic, which won independence from the United Kingdom in 1922, are to cooperate informally on policies concerning agriculture, education, environment, health, tourism, and transport. Following this announcement, members of the Loyalist Volunteer Force surrendered a number of illegal firearms and challenged the Irish Republican Army to do the same. It was the first time any paramilitary group in Northern Ireland had surrendered weapons since April's peace accord.</p>
up129809|Octuplets born|<strong>Octuplets born</strong><p>On December 20, 1998, a American woman, Nkem Chukwu, who had taken fertility drugs, gave birth to seven children by Caesarean section. Another child, a girl, had been born prematurely on December 8. The five girls and two boys were the only known living set of octuplets. The smallest girl died a week later, at which time her siblings were given an 80 per cent chance of surviving.</p>
up129810|Bolivian cocaine trade diminished|<strong>Bolivian cocaine trade diminished</strong><p>In December, 1998, President Hugo Banzer of Bolivia announced that nearly a quarter of the country's coca leaf crop, vital to the cocaine processing industry, had been destroyed. His government had paid compensation to farmers of established coca fields but new, illegal, coca crops had been forcibly destroyed by the police and army. The president hoped to eradicate the cocaine trade in Bolivia by 2002.</p>
up129811|Catholics celebrate Christmas in Cuba|<strong>Catholics celebrate Christmas in Cuba</strong><p>In December, 1998, several hundred Cubans gathered in the plaza outside Havana Cathedral for the first concert of Christmas music to be held there since 1969. To mark the visit of Pope John Paul II in January 1998, the government granted a Christmas holiday in December 1997. In November, 1998, the government decided to make the holiday permanent.</p>
up129812|Radioactive waste leaks out|<strong>Radioactive waste leaks out</strong><p>In December, 1998, Russian officials reported that radioactive waste sealed in containers and dumped by the Soviet Union in Arctic waters in the 1960's was leaking. Radiation levels were reported to be 100 times above normal in some areas.</p>
up129813|Chemical waste leaks out|<strong>Chemical waste leaks out</strong><p>In December, 1998, Russian officials reported that chemical weapons dumped by the Soviet Union were leaking, contaminating the Baltic Sea with heavy metals and arsenic.</p>
up129814|U.S. House Impeaches President Clinton|<strong>U.S. House Impeaches President Clinton</strong><p>On Dec. 19, 1998, the United States House of Representatives approved two articles of impeachment against President Bill Clinton. The two articles alleged that Clinton lied before a federal grand jury and obstructed justice when he tried to conceal his extramarital affair with Monica Lewinsky, a former White House intern. The House defeated two other articles charging Clinton with lying in a legal deposition in a sexual harassment case filed by Paula Corbin Jones and abusing his presidential power.</p>
up129816|Mika Hakkinen wins 1998 Grand Prix title|<strong>Mika Hakkinen wins 1998 Grand Prix title</strong><p>In November 1998, Mika Hakkinen of Finland won the Formula One title during the Japanese Grand Prix.</p>
up129817|Sweden wins 1998 Davis Cup|<strong>Sweden wins 1998 Davis Cup</strong><p>On Dec. 6, 1998, Sweden defeated Italy in the finals of the Davis Cup competition in Milan, Italy.</p>
up129818|Kevorkian charged with murder for euthanasia|<strong>Kevorkian charged with murder for euthanasia</strong><p>In December 1998, a district judge in Oakland County, Michigan, U.S.A., ordered Jack Kevorkian to stand trial on first-degree murder and assisted-suicide charges in the euthanasia death of a terminally ill man. Kevorkian had videotaped himself performing euthanasia on a 52-year-old man who suffered from Lou Gehrig's disease and gave the tape to the television news show "60 Minutes." The television show was broadcast on Nov. 22, 1998.</p>
up129819|Chavez elected president of Venezuela|<strong>Chavez elected president of Venezuela</strong><p>On Dec. 6, 1998, Hugo Chavez Frias, a retired army colonel and leader of a failed 1992 coup, was elected president of Venezuela. Chavez, a leftist, was a member of the Patriotic Pole coalition. </p>
