01|The euro, the common currency of the European Union (EU), goes into general use in 12 of the 15 EU member nations. In anticipation of the changeover, the EU distributes a total of $640 billion in euros to European banks and businesses, which economists describe as the biggest transaction in the history of money.|
01|Argentina's National Congress approves Senator Eduardo Duhalde of the Peronist Party as president, the country's fifth since Fernando de la Rua resigned on December 20.|
01|A convoy of 200 U.S. Marines, backed by helicopter gunships and Harrier jets, leave the Qandahar (Kandahar) airport the for neighboring Helmand Province, where they are to secure an abandoned Taliban compound. U.S. officials describe the mission as the most extensive U.S. ground operation in the war. U.S. Army Special Operations troops are also on the ground in the mountainous Baghran region of northern Helmand, where they and Afghan soldiers are searching for Mullah Muhammad Omar, the Taliban spiritual leader who ruled Afghanistan from 1996 until December 2001.|
02|Levy Mwanawasa is sworn in as president of Zambia in the capital, Lusaka, in the face of widespread opposition and accusations that his election on Dec. 27, 2001, was rigged. Mwanawasa, one of 12 candidates for president, received 29 percent of the vote, compared with his nearest rival, who took 27 percent. Zambia's new president was handpicked by his predecessor, Frederick Chiluba, who was barred constitutionally from running for another term.|
02|Authorities in Australia discover what they believe are the remains of homemade bombs used by arsonists to ignite wildfires in the tinder-dry forests of New South Wales. Police have arrested 21 arson suspects, including 14 teen-agers and boys as young as 9 years old, who are believed to have set at least half of the more than 100 fires that have burned out of control since Dec. 24, 2001, in Australia's most populous state. The wildfires have destroyed at least 170 houses and forced the evacuation of thousands of people. Hot, dry winds continue to drive smoke from the fires into the center of Sydney, Australia's largest city.|
02|A magnitude 6 earthquake shakes portions of Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India. The quake is centered in the Hindu Kush mountain range in northern Afghanistan about 70 miles (110 kilometers) west of Chitral, Pakistan.|
03|A blizzard that meteorologists describe as the "worst in years" paralyzes much of central Europe, blocking roads and railroads and downing power lines. At least five people are killed in avalanches in mountain resorts in Poland.|
03|A unusual snow storm moving in a northeast direction from the Gulf of Mexico hits much of the southern United States, leaving from 1 inch (2.5 centimeters) to 9 inches (22.9 centimeters) of snow on the ground in a swath from eastern Louisiana to southeastern Virginia. Slick, unplowed roads trigger hundreds of traffic accidents, causing at least nine deaths in four states. More than 70,000 people lose electricity because of downed power lines. The storm causes airports to close, resulting in the cancellation of hundreds of flights. Some 4,000 people are stranded at Hartsfield International Airport in Atlanta. In South Carolina, Governor Jim Hodges sends home all state employees and calls out the National Guard.|
04|The government of Israel accuses Yasir Arafat, leader of the Palestinian Authority, of attempting to smuggle 50 tons (45 metric tons) of antitank missiles, mines, rockets, and other munitions from Iran to Arafat's forces in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The arms were discovered when Israeli Navy commandos seized a ship in the Red Sea off the coast of Saudi Arabia. According to the chief of staff of the Israeli Army, Lieutenant General Shaul Mofaz, the ship is owned by the Palestinian Authority. A Palestinian spokesperson dismisses the Israeli accusations as anti-Palestinian propaganda.|
05|The government of Pakistan steps up the arrest of Islamic militants in Pakistan in an attempt to ease tensions with India. Both countries have troops massed along their common border and their missile systems on full alert. In the last week, Pakistan has arrested at least 400 militants belonging to groups accused of using violence to drive India out of Jammu and Kashmir, an area claimed by both countries. India blames militants based in Pakistan for the attack on December 13 on the Indian Parliament in New Delhi, the capital, which resulted in the deaths of nine Indians and the attackers.|
06|The government of Argentina devalues the peso by nearly 30 percent, abandoning a policy linking its value to the U.S. dollar on a one-to-one basis. The devaluation is an attempt to jump start the Argentine economy, which has been in recession for nearly four years. A number of economists fear that the devaluation will trigger inflation, which was rampant in Argentina before the value of the peso was pegged to the dollar in 1991.|
07|The commander of the U.S. offensive in Afghanistan, General Tommy Franks, calls off the search for Osama bin Laden and the fugitive Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar in Afghanistan's mountainous Tora Bora region. Franks notes that U.S. troops in eastern Afghanistan found evidence that suggested that bin Laden and his supporters had used caves in Tora Bora as a hideout, but the search had uncovered no evidence that the leader of the al-Qaida terrorist network is still in the region.|
08|U.S. special forces in Afghanistan capture two men suspected of being senior members of the al-Qaida terrorist network. The men are discovered near a huge cave complex called Zhawar Kili in eastern Afghanistan, where U.S. troops also uncover laptop computers, cell phones, and a cache (hidden deposit) of documents that U.S. intelligence agents believe may be of great importance.|
08|The U.S. Supreme Court rules unanimously that lower courts must apply a "demanding standard" when assessing what qualifies as a disability under the 1990 Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). The act protects individuals with handicaps by forbidding discrimination based on physical or mental disabilities. The Supreme Court decision involved a case in which a woman with carpal tunnel syndrome sued a former employer, claiming the company had failed to accommodate her disability. Carpal tunnel syndrome is a disorder of the median nerve as it passes through the carpal tunnel in the wrist. The syndrome, which is often caused by repetitive wrist motions, such as typing, causes pain and interferes with the use of the hand. The court's ruling, written by Justice Susan Day O'Connor, specifies that a person must have substantial limitations on abilities "central to daily life," not just to specific tasks, to qualify for ADA protection.|
08|U.S. President George W. Bush signs an education reform bill that was a major priority for his administration before the terrorist attacks on the United States on Sept. 11, 2001. The bill authorizes the federal government to spend $26.5 billion on public elementary and high schools in the 2002 fiscal year, an increase of $8 billion over fiscal year 2001. Among other provisions, the law mandates annual state tests in reading and math in grades 3 through 8 and requires public schools nationwide to raise the reading and math proficiency of all students over the next 12 years.|
09|The center of the Milky Way Galaxy, home to our own solar system, is far more turbulent and complicated than scientists had once believed, reports Daniel Wang of the University of Massachusetts in Amherst. Images from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, which went into orbit in 1999, reveal an enormous array of white dwarf, or dying, stars that have collapsed in on themselves; highly volatile, spinning neutron stars that produce massive amounts of energy; supernovae, or exploding stars, that are hundreds of times brighter than our own sun; and many black holes, whose gravitational forces are so strong that they swallow everything that comes near, including stars, X rays, and light. A gigantic cloud of incredibly hot dust blows outward from a supermassive black hole that is the size of 3 million suns. Wang notes that scientists have long known that enormous amounts of energy emanates from the galaxy's center, but they had no knowledge of what created it. Images from Chandra have allowed astronomers to detect more than 1,000 sources of energy at the center of the galaxy, which Wang characterizes as "more fearsome" than anyone suspected.|
09|One fifth of the population of the 22 nations that make up the Arab League, approximately 68 million people, are illiterate, announces Mongi Bousnina, director general of the Arab League Educational, Cultural, and Scientific Organization.|
10|A spokesperson for the Bush administration discloses that Kenneth L. Lay, chairman of the bankrupt Enron Corporation of Houston, warned Secretary of Commerce Donald Evans and Secretary of the Treasury Paul O'Neill in October that the energy-trading company was teetering on the edge of collapse. Enron, then the seventh largest corporation in the United States, filed for bankruptcy protection on December 2. According to Secretary Evans, Lay lobbied for government help to save the company . Lay, who is a friend of President George W. Bush, contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars to Bush's election campaign and to the Republican Party in 2000. The Bush administration announcement is made shortly after U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft disqualified himself from supervising a criminal investigation into the Enron collapse. Kenneth Lay contributed more than $57,000 to Ashcroft's failed re-election campaign for the U.S. Senate in 2000. The entire legal staff at the U.S. attorney's office in Houston also declined to participate in the investigation, citing close ties with people affected by Enron's bankruptcy claim.|
10|Officials at Arthur Andersen LLP of Chicago, the accounting firm that annually audited Enron Corporation, discloses to federal agents that individuals at Andersen had destroyed a "significant but undetermined number" of paper and electronic documents pertaining to Enron. In late December 2001, Andersen officials, testifying before a congressional committee, defended their failure to detect Enron's precarious financial situation by stating that Enron executives had overstated profits and hidden billions of dollars in debt through questionable accounting practices. Enron's sudden fall ruined the retirement accounts of many of the company's 20,000 employees who were heavily invested in Enron stock but barred from selling even as the value of their shares plummeted. Enron executives, however, sold more than $1 billion of company stock in the months before Enron filed for bankruptcy protection in early December. The executives also received $100 million in bonuses in November.|
11|A spokesperson for the U.S. Department of the Treasury announces that the president of the failed Houston-based Enron Corporation, Lawrence "Greg" Whalley, asked Undersecretary for Domestic Finance Peter Fisher to intervene with bankers for a credit extension that Enron needed to avoid bankruptcy. Undersecretary Fisher, who believes he spoke with Whalley six or eight times in late October and early November 2001, did not intervene on behalf of the company, which filed for bankruptcy on December 2.|
11|The Senate Governmental Affairs Committee's Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations issues 51 subpoenas for information concerning the financial collapse of the Enron Corporation, an energy-trading company based in Houston. The committee demands documents dating back to January 1991 from Enron as well as from Enron's accountants, Arthur Andersen LLP of Chicago. Enron and Arthur Andersen executives are also subpoenaed.|
11|Bill Ford, Jr., chief executive of Ford Motor Co. of Dearborn, Michigan, unveils a restructuring plan that calls for cutting 35,000 jobs worldwide and closing at least five auto plants in North America. The 35,000 jobs represent 10 percent of Ford's total workforce worldwide. The plan also calls for the elimination of four models, including the Ford Escort, the Mercury Cougar, and the Lincoln Continental, which has been in production since 1940.|
12|Government-backed militants in Zimbabwe continue to attack and loot farms in the Raffingora area, about 60 miles (97 kilometers) northeast of Harare, the capital. According to a spokesperson for the Commercial Farmers's Union, 23 landowners have been forced from their property in the last week. Since 2000, militants have driven the owners of hundreds of white-owned farms from their land. President Robert Mugabe describes the actions of the militants as a justified response to the inequitable land ownership resulting from Zimbabwe's colonial past.|
13|The Fantasticks, the longest running play in American theater history, closes after more than 41 years. The play, a slight, romantic musical about young love, opened in a small Greenwich Village theater in New York City in 1960 and ran for 17,162 performances. Only Agatha Christie's The Mousetrap, which continues to play in London after nearly 50 years, outdistanced The Fantasticks, which opened to tepid reviews and poor ticket sales until word-of-mouth turned it into an off-Broadway hit.|
14|Police in Pakistan have arrested nearly 1,500 Islamic militants, announces a spokesperson for the Pakistani government in Islamabad, the capital. Most of the arrests have been carried out since January 12, when President Pervez Musharraf pledged to purge Pakistan of Islamic extremism in an attempt to prevent the country from being used as a base for international terrorism. Among the arrested are members of five Islamic militant groups banned by Musharraf as "purveyors of intolerance and hatred." According to international affairs experts, Musharraf ordered the arrests to defuse tensions with neighboring India, which claims that terrorists based in Pakistan attacked the Parliament in India's capital, New Delhi, on Dec. 13, 2001. Indian officials continue to voice skepticism that Pakistan is truly committed to wiping out terrorism in the region and announce that Indian troops stationed along the two country's common border will remain on high alert.|
14|Great Britain is declared free of foot-and-mouth disease 11 months after the initial outbreak of the disease occurred in Northumberland in northeast England. Foot-and-mouth is a highly contagious viral infection that affects animals with cloven (divided) hoofs, such as cattle, hogs, and sheep. Officials with the British Department for the Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs declare the country free of the disease after more than 3 million sheep are tested for signs of infection. Since hoof-and-mouth disease was initially uncovered in February 2001, 4 million of Great Britain's 55 million head of livestock were slaughtered to contain the outbreak.|
15|A force of more than 600 U.S. soldiers, including 160 Special Operations troops, is being sent to the Philippines to stamp out what U.S. intelligence agents describe as a "dangerous terrorist cell in Southeast Asia." U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld announces that the U.S. force, which leaves for the Philippines in February, is to train members of the Philippine Army in counterterrorism tactics. The terrorist cell involves an Islamic extremist group known as Abu Sayyaf based on Basilan Island. The group has used bombings, murder, and kidnapping for ransom in its drive to establish a separate Islamic nation in the southern Philippines. Abu Sayyaf, which currently holds two American missionaries hostage, is connected to the al-Qaida terrorist network in Afghanistan, where a number of Abu Sayyaf members allegedly were trained in terrorist tactics.|
15|Arthur Andersen LLP of Chicago, the auditor for Enron Corporation, an energy-trading company based in Houston, dismisses the executive in charge of the Enron account. A spokesperson for the accounting firm announces that David B. Duncan, an Andersen partner, was forced out of the company for ordering the destruction of thousands of Enron-related documents and e-mails. Duncan gave the order to destroy the documents on Oct. 23, 2001, one day after the Securities and Exchange Commission opened an investigation into Enron's accounting practices and asked Andersen for documents. The Securities and Exchange Commission is an independent U.S. government agency that administers and enforces federal laws governing the purchase and sale of stocks and bonds. Enron was the seventh largest corporation in the United States when it filed for bankruptcy protection in early December.|
16|Investigators in the financial collapse of the Enron Corporation, an energy-trading company based in Houston, disclose that Enron paid no U.S. income taxes in four out of five years between 1996 and 2000. The company avoided taxes by setting up nearly 900 subsidiaries in tax havens (places without income taxes), such as the Cayman Islands, Mauritius, and Bermuda. During the same period, Enron claimed $382 million in tax refunds from the U.S. Internal Revenue Service by deducting the expense of the stock options with which Enron rewarded its executives. A stock option is an option given to an employee, usually an executive, to purchase company stock at a certain time and at a certain price, regardless of the stock's value at that point in time.|
17|A Palestinian gunman armed with a semiautomatic rifle opens fire in a crowded reception hall in the Israeli town of Hadera. He kills six people and wounds at least 25 others before being subdued by the guests at a bat mitzvah, or coming-of-age, ceremony for a 12-year-old Israeli girl. The Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, a Palestinian militant group, claims responsibility for the attack, calling it revenge for the bombing death on January 14 of Raed al-Karmi, one of the group's leaders. The Israeli government neither admits nor denies responsibility for Karmi's death.|
17|Scientists announce the discovery of a community of microscopic one-celled organisms that thrive without sunlight or oxygen. The microbes were found approximately 600 feet (180 meters) below the surface of the Lidy Hot Springs in Idaho. Geochemist Francis H. Chapelle of the United States Geological Survey in Columbia, South Carolina, reports that the microbes generate energy by combining carbon dioxide with hydrogen produced by hot water reacting with bedrock. They release methane as a by-product. The microbes belong to a group of microbes called Archaea, which in most environments account for only about 3 percent of the microbial population. The Lidy Hot Springs microbe population contains 90 percent Archaea. Scientists suggest that microbes similar to those found in the geothermal hot spring in Idaho could exist on Mars and other planets with hostile environments.|
18|Israeli warplanes destroy a Palestinian security compound in the West Bank town of Tul Karm, killing a Palestinian policeman and injuring about 20 others. The strike was made in response to an attack by a Palestinian gunman at an Israeli reception hall on January 17.|
18|Hundreds of thousands of people in Congo (Kinshasa) flee their houses as a river of lava from Mount Nyiragongo flows at a depth of 6 feet (1.8 meters) through Goma, a city of 500,000 people near the Rwanda border. Lava has destroyed at least 14 villages near Goma since the volcano began erupting on January 15. Witnesses describe Goma split in half by the lava flow. A Rwandan official reports that as many as 500,000 Congolese have crossed into neighboring Rwanda to escape the volcano.|
19|Chinese aviation and military officials contend that listening devices have been discovered hidden on a new Boeing 767 refitted in the United States specifically for China's president, Jiang Zemin. The Chinese claim the devices, which can be operated by satellite, were planted by U.S. intelligence agents while a series of upgrades were being carried out on the aircraft at facilities in San Antonio, Texas.|
19|The Republican National Committee confirms Marc Racicot as chairman of the Republican Party. Racicot, a former governor of Montana, was selected for the position by U.S. President George W. Bush. Most recently, Racicot was employed as a lobbyist in Washington, D.C., for Enron Corp., the Houston-based energy trading company that filed for bankruptcy on Dec. 2, 2001.|
20|Representatives of 60 nations meeting in Tokyo, Japan, pledge $1.5 billion for the rebuilding of war-torn Afghanistan. U.S. Secretary of State Colin L. Powell announces that the United States will provide $296.7 million in 2002 in addition to the $400 million in humanitarian aid already allocated by the U.S. government for Afghanistan relief. European Union officials pledge $500 million for 2002; Japan promises $500 million over the next three years; and Saudi Arabia pledges $220 million over the same three-year-period. Officials with the United Nations estimate that Afghanistan needs $1.7 billion in the next year for refugee relief and for rebuilding the nation's agriculture, health, and security systems.|
21|More than two dozen biological laboratory specimens, including anthrax spores (an inactive form of the bacterium), turned up missing from the U.S. Army's top biological warfare laboratory in 1992, announces C. J. Peters, the former deputy commander of the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute for Infectious Diseases at Fort Detrick, Maryland. Peters describes working relationships at the facility during the time of the thefts as "dysfunctional" and reveals that unknown individuals carried out anthrax research in the laboratory at night and on weekends in February 1992. Peters emphasizes that the anthrax that turned up missing in 1992 could not have played a role in the bioterrorism attacks on newsrooms and political offices in New York City and Washington, D.C., in October 2001 because the missing spores had been rendered harmless through sterilization. He did not, however, rule out the possibility that the anthrax mailed to U.S. Senate and media offices, which resulted in the deaths of five people, had been produced at Fort Detrick.|
21|Lava flows from the eruption of Mount Nyiragongo in eastern Congo (Kinshasa) ignites a gas station, causing the station's fuel tanks to explode. The massive explosion, which leaves an enormous black cloud over the city of Goma, kills about 50 people who are siphoning fuel from elevated diesel and gasoline tanks. The station was located by one of two lava flows that have destroyed much of Goma. A new volcanic crater on the Rwandan border has released a third flow, threatening additional villages in the area. United Nations relief officials estimate that at least 40 people died as a result of the eruption before the explosions at the gas station.|
21|Executives at Enron Corp. of Houston continued to have company documents destroyed even after the U.S. government began investigations into the company's finances, announces a former executive, Maureen Castaneda, who headed Enron's foreign investments sections. The Securities and Exchange Commission began its investigations into Enron in mid-October 2001, after which Enron officials issued directives that relevant documents should be preserved. The U.S. Department of Justice opened a criminal investigation of the company's dealings during the week of Jan. 7, 2002. Castaneda contends that Enron executives began destroying company documents in November 2001 and were still shredding paper when she left the company on Jan. 11, 2002. Enron filed for bankruptcy protection in early December 2001. Federal authorities are already investigating the deliberate destruction of documents pertaining to Enron by executives at the energy trading company's former auditor, Arthur Andersen LLP of Chicago.|
22|Discount department store chain operator Kmart Corporation of Troy, Michigan, files for Chapter 11 protection in what economists describe as the largest bankruptcy of a retailer in U.S. history. A spokesperson for the company announces that Kmart will continue to operate its 2,100 stores while it restructures its business, but retail analysts note that many wholesalers are demanding cash payments before shipping their products to Kmart.|
22|At least 114,800 men and women from the Middle East reside in the United States illegally, announce officials with the U.S. Bureau of the Census. Demographers (population experts) at the bureau estimate that there are more than 58,000 men from the Middle East living illegally in the country. The figure does not include illegal aliens from Israel, the countries of North Africa, or Pakistan. The U.S. Department of Justice currently seeks the whereabouts in the United States of some 6,000 Middle Eastern men for ignoring deportation orders.|
23|U.S. President George W. Bush announces that he is seeking an additional $48 billion for defense spending in his proposed fiscal year 2002-2003 budget, which is to be sent to the U.S. Congress in February. The increase in defense spending is the largest since the U.S. military buildup during the Ronald Reagan administration in the early 1980's.|
23|Kenneth L. Lay resigns as chairman of the board and chief operating officer of Enron Corp., an energy trading company based in Houston. Lay tells the Enron board of directors that government investigations into and lawsuits resulting from Enron's financial collapse make it impossible for him to "concentrate fully on what is most important to Enron's stockholders." Lay plans to remain on the board of directors.|
24|U.S. Army Special Forces attack two Taliban camps north of Kandahar, Afghanistan, killing at least 15 Taliban soldiers and capturing 27 others. Military experts believe the raids, surprise attacks carried out shortly after midnight, are an attempt by U.S. forces to capture high-ranking Taliban leadership and to obtain computer hard drives and other information that could be used to track down terrorist groups. U.S. Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld says the attacks prove that pockets of Taliban and al-Qaida resistance fighters continue to operate in Afghanistan.|
25|Anti-British militant Colm Murphy is sentenced to 14 years in prison for conspiring in the deadliest terrorist bombing in the history of Northern Ireland. Murphy supplied cellular phones used in the 1998 Omagh car bombing, which killed 29 people. Murphy is the first person to be imprisoned for his involvement in the attack.|
26|Under heavy security, India celebrates Republic Day, the anniversary of the country's birth as a republic. Fearing Muslim militants may launch an attack during the parades and festivities, thousands of police and paramilitary soldiers remain on high alert. However, Indian authorities report no major violence.|
27|An 81-year-old man is killed and dozens of people are injured in Jerusalem when a bomb carried by a Palestinian woman explodes on Jaffa Street. The attack marks the first time that a woman acts as a suicide bomber in the current Israeli-Palestinian conflict.|
27|Hundreds of people are killed when a fire in Lagos, Nigeria, spreads to a weapons depot, causing dozens of explosions. Most of the victims drown in a nearby drainage canal as they attempt to flee the blasts.|
28|U.S. special forces and Afghan militiamen raid a hospital in Kandahar, Afghanistan, where 6 al-Qaida fighters have been holed up since early December 2001. All 6 al-Qaida fighters are killed during the 10-hour battle. Five Afghan militiamen are wounded.|
29|U.S. President George W. Bush delivers his first State of the Union Address. Bush focuses on national security issues, vowing to continue the war against terror not only against terrorist networks, but also against hostile countries trying to develop weapons of mass destruction. The president singles out three nations, Iran, Iraq and North Korea, labeling them "an axis of evil." Bush also discusses economic issues, saying that one of his main priorities will be to bring the U.S. economy out of the current recession. He also urges all Americans to commit two years of their lives to volunteer service.|
30|The U.S. General Accounting Office (GAO), an investigative arm of Congress, announces it will file a lawsuit to force Vice President Richard Cheney to turn over documents detailing meetings between an energy task force chaired by Cheney and energy industry executives. David Walker, the comptroller general of the United States and director of the GAO, says he will file the suit against the administration of President George W. Bush within the next few weeks if Cheney does not release the names of the executives who helped the task force formulate a national energy policy in 2001. Cheney has refused the GAO's requests to turn over documents since May 2001, when Congress began to investigate whether campaign contributors influenced White House energy proposals. The matter has gained new prominence because of the numerous investigations of Enron Corp., the energy company that in 2001 filed the largest bankruptcy claim in U.S. history. Some experts believe that Enron's large campaign contributions to many members of the Bush administration may have given the company undue influence over U.S. energy policy.|
31|More than 100 U.S. troops begin participating in military training exercises with Philippine soldiers in the province of Mindanao. The troops are the first wave of more than 600 soldiers the United States has promised to send to the Philippines to train the Philippine army in counterterrorism tactics and to provide technical assistance in the army's battle against Abu Sayyaf, a militant Muslim group on the island of Basilan.|
