01|The 27th Olympiad of the modern era concludes with a spectacular fireworks display from Australia's famed Sydney Harbor Bridge. Many sports enthusiasts describe the Sydney games as among the most successful in history, despite the disqualification of a number of athletes, including gold-medal winners, who tested positive to performance-enhancing drugs.|
01|Sustained gun battles between Palestinian rioters and Israeli army troops in the West Bank and Gaza leave 10 Palestinians dead, bringing the death toll among Palestinians to 29 since the latest round of clashes began on September 28.|
02|The Human Rights Act, which incorporates the European Convention on Human Rights into English law, goes into effect in the United Kingdom. Many legal experts compare the Act to the U.S. Bill of Rights and predict that it will profoundly affect the British court system by unleashing challenges to existing laws governing state secrets, employment practices, and libel.|
03|Al Gore, the Democratic candidate for president of the United States, and George W. Bush, the Republican candidate, meet in Boston for the first of three televised debates sponsored by the bipartisan Commission on Presidential Debates. Although watched by an estimated 75 million people, the debate fails to alter either candidate's ratings in the polls, which remain tied with approximately 45 percent of the vote each.|
04|Rules, popularly known as the "Fairness Doctrine," requiring radio and television stations and networks to provide equal air time to political candidates are suspended for 60 days by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). Media experts hail the temporary suspension as an opportunity for stations to take editorial positions and to encourage debate on an array of issues during the presidential election.|
05|The government of Slobodan Milosevic collapses amid chaos in the streets of Belgrade, the Yugoslav capital. While tens of thousands of Serbs converge on the capital, protesters rush the steps of the federal parliament and wrench control of the now-burning building from state police in a melee of gunfire and tear gas. A second fire burns at the state broadcasting service, where television transmission fails during a fierce gun battle. At the Belgrade City Hall, Vojislav Kostunica tells a crowd of one-half million people that he is proud to have been elected their president, and he declares Serbia liberated from the Milosevic regime.|
06|Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic resigns in the face of a massive popular revolt against his regime, which lasted 13 years. The resignation takes place after Russia's foreign minister, Igor Ivanov, arrived in Belgrade, capital of Yugoslavia, to inform Vojislav Kostunica that Russian President Vladimir Putin recognized Kostunica as Yugoslavia's legitimately elected president. Russia, a traditional ally of Serbia, is the first international power to officially acknowledge Kostunica.|
06|The unemployment rate in the United States in September fell to 3.9 percent, matching a 30-year low, announce officials of the U.S. Department of Labor.|
07|Vojislav Kostunica, a 56-year-old constitutional lawyer, is sworn in as president of Yugoslavia.|
07|Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak issues an ultimatum to Palestinian leader Yasir Arafat to rein in the current violent public protests by Palestinians within 48 hours or Barak would authorize Israeli troops to use "all available means" to quell the disorder.|
08|The cloned embryo of an endangered species, the Asian gaur, has been implanted into a cow in Iowa, announces Robert Lanza, vice president of the Worcester, Massachusetts, based Advanced Cell Technology corporation. Scientists at the biotechnology firm expect the cow to give birth to the gaur, a native of India and Southeast Asia, in November. Lanza urges wildlife and zoo officials to collect and freeze the tissue of endangered species as a way of saving them.|
09|Public health officials warn residents of southern Chile to avoid the midday sun because of dangerously high levels of ultraviolet radiation, caused by depletion of the protective ozone layer over Antarctica. Officials with the United Nations announced October 6 that the ozone hole over the Southern Hemisphere, including the southern tip of Chile and Antarctica, was the largest--11 million square miles (28 million square kilometers)--since measurements were first made in the mid-1980's.|
10|A high-ranking official of the government of North Korea presents President Bill Clinton of the United States with a letter from North Korean leader Kim Jong Il, outlining proposals to further ease tensions on the Korean peninsula. The meeting, with takes place at the White House, is the first between a U.S. president and any official representing North Korea, which has remained technically at war with its neighbor, South Korea, since the end of the Korean War (1950-1953).|
11|Vice President Al Gore, the Democratic candidate for president of the United States, and Texas Governor George W. Bush, the Republican candidate, meet on the campus of Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, for the second of three presidential debates. The focus of the debate is on the scope of government and what role the United States should play internationally.|
12|A small boat packed with explosives rams into the side of the <I>USS Cole</I>, a U.S. Navy destroyer refueling in the Yemeni port of Aden. The explosion rips a 40-by-40 foot (12-by-12 meter) hole in the hull of the 505-foot (154-meter) ship, killing 17 U.S. sailors. Navy authorities characterize the attack as a suicide bombing carried out by unknown terrorists.|
12|Violence between Palestinian protesters and Israeli soldiers escalates across the West Bank and Gaza. Israel launches strikes on police facilities and the antenna of the Voice of Palestine radio station in the West Bank city of Ramallah after two captured Israeli soldiers are lynched by a Palestinian mob.|
13|President Kim Dae Jung of South Korea is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to forge peace and reconciliation with North Korea. The Nobel Committee also cites Kim's contributions to "democracy and human rights in South Korea and East Asia in general."|
14|Two men armed with explosives hijack a Saudi Arabian passenger jet bound for London and force the pilot to land at Saddam International Airport in Baghdad, where the hijackers request political asylum. Among the 90 passengers and 15 crew members are 40 British citizens and an American.|
15|Crime rates in the United States in 1999 fell for the eighth consecutive year, reports the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Serious crime was down 7 percent in 1999, and the murder rate declined to 5.7 per 100,000 people, the lowest level since 1966.|
16|Leaders of Yugoslavia's Socialist Party, formerly headed by Slobodan Milosevic, agree to join in a transitional government headed by the country's new president, Vojislav Kostunica. The coalition government also includes representatives of Kostunica's Democratic Opposition of Serbia party and a third party, the Serbian Renewal Movement. The government has scheduled parliamentary elections for December 23. Although Kostunica has the support of the people, Yugoslavia's government ministries, bureaucracy, police, courts, and news media remain in the hands of Socialist Party leaders.|
16|The New York Mets win the National League baseball championship by defeating the St. Louis Cardinals 7-0 in Game 5 of the series. The Mets advance to the World Series for the first time since 1986.|
16|Missouri Governor Mel Carnahan, his son, and a political aide are killed when the small, private plane Carnahan used for his U.S. Senate campaign crashes.|
17|Violence between Palestinian protesters and Israeli troops continues across the West Bank and Gaza despite a cease-fire agreed to by Prime Minister Ehud Barak of Israel and Palestinian leader Yasir Arafat. The cease-fire, brokered at Sharm el-Sheik, Egypt, by U.S. President Bill Clinton, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, and King Abdullah II of Jordan, calls for both sides to renounce the use of violence and to take concrete measures to end the confrontation. More than 100 people have died and 3,000 people have been injured since the violence began on September 28.|
17|More than 40,000 people are evacuated from villages and farms along the swollen Po and Ticino rivers in northern Italy. Flooding and mudslides, caused by torrential rains, have killed at least 31 people in Italy and southern Switzerland since October 14.|
17|The New York Yankees capture the American League pennant for the fourth time in five years by beating the Seattle Mariners 9-7 in the sixth game of the championship. The Yankees square off in the World Series against New York City's other baseball team, the Mets.|
18|The Social Security Administration plans a 3.5 percent increase in payments in 2001, report officials with the U.S. Department of Labor. The cost-of-living increase is the largest since 1992. According to Labor Department estimates, each retiree will receive approximately $29 more per month. A number of economists warn that the hike reflects an increase in the rate of inflation, which could threaten the current economy.|
19|The U.S. House of Representatives votes 394 to 14 to approve a $7.8-billion plan to renew the Florida Everglades, including the restoration by 2040 of the natural flow of water through south Florida's swamp region. The U.S. Senate approved a similar restoration plan in September 2000.|
20|Islamic militants have killed at least 50 people in three days of random violence across Algeria, report two daily newspapers in Algiers, the capital. According to government officials, police killed nine militants in three separate gun battles on October 19. The skirmishes took place after militants attacked a family in their house near Chlef, 125 miles (200 kilometers) west of Algiers, and killed 12 people, including 5 children. An estimated 100,000 people have been killed in the insurgency in Algeria since 1992 when the army canceled elections that an Islamic fundamentalist party expected to win.|
21|The death toll from an outbreak of ebola in northern Uganda rises to 51, reports an official with Uganda's national health service. Health officials believe as many as 88 people in the area around the city of Gulu, which is 225 miles (362 kilometers) north of Kampala, the capital, are infected with the virus.|
22|High winds at Cape Canaveral, Florida, prevent the space shuttle Discovery and its crew of seven astronauts from landing after an 11-day construction mission on the international space station. The Discovery, which has enough fuel to stay in orbit through October 25, left Earth on October 11 on the 100th flight in space shuttle history.|
22|Two buses collide in Pakistan's eastern Punjab province, killing at least 40 passengers and injuring 77 others. According to witnesses, one of the drivers swerved into the opposite lane in an attempt to avoid hitting a donkey.|
23|U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright meets with Kim Jong-Il, leader of North Korea, in Pyongyang, the capital. Albright attends an enormous spectacle, involving 100,000 performers, celebrating the authoritarian rule of her host, who enjoys a cult-like status in Communist North Korea. Albright is the most senior U.S. official to ever visit North Korea, which is attempting to improve its relations with South Korea and various Western nations.|
23|The U.S. Department of Defense places U.S. troops stationed in Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and Qatar on the highest state of alert due to the threat of terrorist attack. Defense officials believe that U.S. embassies and military installations in the region may be targets of Al Qaeda, a terrorist organization headed by Saudi financier Osama bin Laden. According to Richard Clarke, a counterterrorism coordinator on the U.S. National Security Council, the sophisticated planning and equipment used in the October 12 bombing of the U.S. Navy destroyer Cole were strikingly similar to the bombings of U.S. embassies in East Africa in 1998, which U.S. officials believe were carried out by bin Laden's organization.|
24|Approximately 59 percent of new mothers in the United States return to work within one year of giving birth, announce officials with the U.S. Census Bureau. In 1976, only 31 percent of new mothers returned to work within a year of giving birth. The percentage of working mothers in the general U.S. population in 1999 was the highest since the Census Bureau began tracking such data in 1976.|
25|Laurent Gbagbo declares himself president of the Cote d'Ivoire after General Robert Guei, the former military dictator, flees the presidential palace in Abidjan, the capital. Guei disappeared amid tens of thousands of people who were rioting in the streets. The riot began in response to Guei's announcement on October 24 that he had beaten Gbagbo in the October 22 presidential election and dissolved the commission overseeing the tabulation of votes.|
26|A note found on the body of a seaman recovered from the Russian atomic submarine Kursk, which sank in August, reveals that 23 members of the 188-man crew survived the onboard explosions that caused the submarine to sink to the floor of the Barents Sea. The chief of the Russian Navy, Admiral Vladimir Kuroyedov, tells reporters that the 23 sailors who survived the initial blast probably lived only hours before either drowning or freezing to death.|
26|The New York Yankees win their third consecutive World Series by beating the New York Mets 4-2 in Game 5 of the series.|
27|The violence in Ramallah, on the West Bank, between Palestinian protesters and Israeli soldiers escalates from the throwing of rocks and lobbing of tear gas canisters into a full-scale gun battle. At least 145 people, most of whom were Palestinians, have been killed in the latest round of strife, which began on September 28.|
28|The United States Congress meets in an unusual Saturday session to pass a temporary spending measure to keep the government operating for another 24 hours. The stopgap bill is necessary because the authority of the federal government to spend money expired on September 30, the close of the fiscal year, without Congressional passage of a 2000-2001 budget. In an attempt to pressure Congress into passing a budget, President Clinton has refused to sign any stopgap measures that run for more than 24 hours, forcing Congress to meet daily.|
29|The <I>USS Catawba</I>, a Navy tugboat, tows the <I>USS Cole</I> out of the port of Aden in Yemen 17 days after the Navy destroyer was attacked by terrorist bombers. The explosion, which killed 17 sailors, left the ship with a 40-by-40 foot (12-by-12 meter) hole in its side. According to Navy officials, the 8,300-ton (7,530-metric ton) vessel is scheduled to be scooped up by a Norwegian "heavy-lift" ship and transported to the United States for repairs and refitting, which are expected to exceed $150 million.|
30|Prime Minister Ehud Barak of Israel orders missile attacks on the offices of Palestinian leader Yasir Arafat's political organization and personal security force. Addressing the Israeli parliament, the Knesset, Barak describes Arafat as no longer a "partner for peace." The prime minister declares that "Israel will not stand by and accept attacks on its citizens and soldiers," referring to the shooting in East Jerusalem of two Israeli security guards and the murder and mutilation of a third Israeli civilian earlier in the day. A group calling itself the Saladin Brigades claims responsibility for the latest attacks. The name Saladin refers to a Muslim leader who captured Jerusalem in the 1100's.|
31|A Singapore Airlines jumbo jet, attempting to take off during a typhoon, skids off the runway at Taiwan's Chiang Kai-shek International Airport. The Boeing 747-400 breaks in three pieces and bursts into flames, scattering wreckage across the tarmac. At least 79 of the 179 passengers and crew members are killed, including 23 Americans. Flight SQ006 was enroute from Taipei, the Taiwanese capital, to Los Angeles.|
31|Three astronauts, an American and two Russians, take off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan aboard a Soyuz rocket for the international space station. U.S. Navy Captain William M. Shepherd and cosmonauts Yuri Gidzenko and Sergei Krikalev are scheduled to become the first residents of the $60-billion space station, which is a joint venture between the United States, Russia, Canada, Japan, and 10 member nations of the European Space Agency. Officials with NASA estimate that the space station, which is being assembled in stages, will be completed by 2006.|
