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World Population: 4.378
billion
Vietnam and Vietnam-backed Cambodian insurgents announce fall of Cambodian capital Phnom Penh and collapse of Pol Pot regime (Jan. 7).
Shah leaves Iran after year of turmoil (Jan. 16); revolutionary forces under Muslim leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, take over (Feb. 1 et seq.).
Conservatives win British election; Margaret Thatcher becomes new prime minister (May 3).
Carter and Brezhnev sign SALT II agreement (June 14).1979: Leaders agree arms reduction treaty United States President Jimmy Carter and Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev have signed Salt II, the first arms-reduction treaty between the two super powers.
Mob destroys US embassy in
Pakistan *
A mob in the Pakistani capital
Islamabad burns the US Embassy to the ground in a five-hour attack in which
a US marine is killed.
Execution of a prime
minister
The execution of Pakistan's
former Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto in 1979 provoked international
condemnation. Mr Bhutto, 51, who had been Pakistan's leader since 1973,
was deposed in an army coup in 1977. He was sentenced to death for the
murder of a political opponent following a trial which was widely condemned
as unfair. And, despite international appeals for clemency, he was hanged
in Rawalpindi district jail in north-east Pakistan on 4 April 1979.
Jan.8,1979-Vietnam forces
Khmer Rouge retreat
Hundreds of Khmer Rouge
troops have fled Cambodia after being crushed by Vietnamese-led rebel forces.
The capital, Phnom Penh, has been seized and Pol Pot and many of his soldiers
forced to retreat into the countryside. It signals the end of nearly four
years of brutal domination by the guerrillas. Defeated soldiers crossed
the border into Thailand where they were taken to prison as illegal immigrants.
The Thai authorities have said they will not be forcibly returned to Cambodia.
Thousands more are reported
to be seeking refuge in an enclave of North West Cambodia.
The retreat is a serious
blow for the Khmer Rouge, which having itself captured Phnom Penh four
years ago began torturing and killing its opponents.
10-26-79 South Korean President killed-The President of South Korea, Park Chung Hee, has been "accidentally" shot dead by the chief of his intelligence service, Kim Jea Kyu. Five other people, including the president's bodyguard, were also killed. The incident took place at the Korean Central Intelligence Agency's headquarters during a dinner being held by Kim in honour of the president. A government statement revealed that an argument broke out between Kim Jae Kyu and Park's chief bodyguard, Cha Chi Chul, during which a shot was fired by Kim which hit the president as he tried to intervene.
July 11, 1979: Skylab tumbles
back to Earth The US space laboratory, Skylab I, plunged to Earth this
evening scattering debris across the southern Indian Ocean and sparsely
populated Western Australia. All week there has been mounting speculation
over where the spacecraft would come down. It has been in orbit six years
- for the past five of those it has been unoccupied.
Skylab's last signal was
recorded at 1611 GMT. Less than an hour later a tracking station at Ascension
Island in the South Atlantic confirmed the solar panels were beginning
to peel off as the craft descended. The 77.5 ton Skylab could break into
as many as 500 pieces, including a 5,100lb (2,310kg) airlock shroud and
a 3,900lb (1,767kg) lead safe to protect film from radiation, which are
expected to survive the heat of re-entry into the earth's atmosphere. Head
of the Nasa task force monitoring Skylab, Richard Smith, said they had
already received reports of hot debris, which had lit up the night sky,
from several points in Western Australia.
Jul.17,1979: Sandinista rebels
take Nicaraguan capital Fighters of the left-wing Sandinista National Liberation
Front have overthrown the regime in the central American republic of Nicaragua
and taken the capital, Managua. The notorious US-trained National Guard
has crumbled and its surviving commanders are negotiating a surrender.
In the last six weeks Sandinista fighters have gained control of 27 cities
around the capital as well as the southern part of Nicaragua that borders
Costa Rica. President Anastasio Somoza Debayle - the third member of the
Somoza dynasty to rule Nicaragua since 1933 - has fled to the United States.
This evening he abandoned
the battle-torn capital with about 45 other people in five planes that
landed at Homestead US Air Force base near Miami, Florida. Earlier, he
had presented his resignation to the Congress and handed over to the chairman
of the lower house, Francisco Urcuyo, who is now caretaker president. Mr
Urcuyo has declared the Sandinistas will have no part in his new government
and demanded they lay down their arms. But the Sandinista-backed provisional
government currently based in the city of Leon is expected to force Mr
Urcuyo to resign.
The Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty - agreed in Vienna - commits both sides to a limit of 2,400 missile launchers.
Negotiations for the deal followed Salt I signed by President Richard Nixon and Mr Brezhnev in 1972. It froze the deployment of land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles and banned the construction of any new submarine-based missiles.
Nicaraguan President General Anastasio Somoza Debayle resigns and flees to Miami (July 17); Sandinistas form government (July 19).
Iranian militants seize US embassy in Teheran and hold hostages (Nov. 4).
14 April1979: New president
for war-torn Uganda. A man driven into exile by former Uganda dictator
Idi Amin has been sworn in as the country's new president. Yusufu Lule
was greeted by cheering crowds when he arrived back in Uganda yesterday
from neighbouring Tanzania.
On Saturday Mr Lule took
his presidential oath in a ceremony on the steps of the parliament building
in Uganda's capital, Kampala. The new president then called for a moment's
silence for the estimated half a million people who had died under General
Amin's rule.
Flanked by Tanzanian army
commanders whose troops drove Idi Amin from Kampala, Mr Lule appealed to
his countrymen not to seek vengeance. "We must not indulge in the evil
acts of the regime we have just removed," he said. President Lule condemned
the former leader as a rebel and ordered commando squads to track him down.
He urged troops still loyal to Idi Amin to surrender saying they would
be "protected" if they handed over their weapons.
9 May1979: El Salvador cathedral bloodbath. At least 18 demonstrators have been killed and many wounded after police opened fire on anti-government protesters outside the Metropolitan Cathedral in San Salvador, capital of El Salvador. The protest in the Central American country was organised by the left-wing group known as the Popular Revolutionary Bloc. People started screaming and running to the church but many were hit before they could get there Ken Hawkins, eyewitness. Witnesses said the steps of the cathedral were littered with bodies. Freelance photographer Ken Hawkins told the Los Angeles Times there had been no warning from government forces before the shooting started.
26 March 1979: Israel and
Egypt shake hands on peace deal. Israel and Egypt have ended 30 years of
war with an historic peace treaty brokered by the United States. The ceremony
on the White House lawn in Washington was broadcast live on television.
The two leaders sealed the deal with a firm handshake, watched by a smiling
President Jimmy Carter. Both President Anwar al-Sadat of Egypt, and the
Israeli Prime Minister, Menachem Begin, described the ceremony as an "historic
turning point". We must not minimalise the obstacles that lie ahead-US
President Jimmy Carter. Mr Sadat praised President Carter as "the man who
performed the miracle".
"Without exaggeration,"
he said, "what he did constitutes one of the greatest achievements of our
time". Mr Carter, however, was more cautious, saying the treaty was "a
first step on a long and difficult road." "We must not minimalise the obstacles
that lie ahead," he said.
Deep divisions between the
two sides remain, and even in their speeches following the ceremony the
two presidents revealed how far there is still to go.
Mr Begin spoke emotionally
of how the city of Jerusalem could never be divided; while Mr Sadat was
unreservedly frank about the question of Palestinian autonomy.
News of the signing ceremony
was greeted with angry demonstrations throughout the Arab world. Crowds
stormed the Egyptian Embassy in Kuwait, and there was a strike in the West
Bank.
The PLO leader, Yasser Arafat,
told a rally in West Beirut: "Let them sign what they like. False peace
will not last." He accused President Sadat of betraying the Egyptian people,
and said they would eventually eliminate him. The normally moderate King
Hussein of Jordan has now joined President Assad of Syria and President
Hassen al Bakr of Iraq in calling a summit conference of opponents of the
treaty. Egypt is thought likely to be expelled from the Arab League as
a symbolic gesture of anger at the decision to go it alone in negotiating
peace with Israel.
Even in the West, the response
to the treaty has been lukewarm. A statement from the nine European Community
nations praised the efforts of President Sadat and President Begin to make
peace. But, in a comment bound to anger the Israelis, it added that a settlement
could only happen if the Palestinian people were given a homeland.
Soviet invasion of Afghanistan stirs world protests (Dec. 27).
Lord Soames to govern Rhodesia. Cabinet minister Lord Soames has been named transitional governor of Rhodesia to oversee its progress into legal independence.(Dec.7,1979)
Ohio agrees to pay $675,000 to families of dead and injured in Kent State University shootings (Jan. 4).
Europe launches first rocket. European-built rocket, Ariane 1, successfully completed its maiden flight. The space launcher finally took off from the Kourou Space Centre in French Guiana on its third attempt. Test flight technicians have declared the flight an almost complete success. All three stages seemed to have fired and separated correctly and its tiny payload, an automatic tracking device, was put into the right orbit. The success of Ariane 1's maiden flight is a major boost for the European Space Agency which first gave the go-ahead for the rocket in 1973.(Dec.24,1979)
Nuclear power plant accident
at Three Mile Island, Pa., releases radiation (March 28).
World Series=Pittsburgh d. Baltimore (4-3)
NBA Championship=Seattle d. Washington Bullets (4-1)
Stanley Cup=Montreal d. NY Rangers (4-1)
Wimbledon=Women: Martina
Navratilova d. C. Evert Lloyd (6-4 6-4)
Men: Bjorn Borg d. R. Tanner
(6-7 6-1 3-6 6-3 6-4)
Kentucky Derby Champion=Spectacular Bid
NCAA Basketball Championship=Michigan St. d. Indiana St. (75-64)
NCAA Football Champions=Alabama (12-0-0)
On 2 February 1979, former
Sex Pistol Sid Vicious was found dead in his New York apartment by his
mother. He had died of a heroin overdose while awaiting trial for the murder
of his girlfriend.
Chemistry: Herbert C. Brown (US) and Georg Wittig (West Germany), for developing a group of substances that facilitate very difficult chemical reactions
Physics: Steven Weinberg, Sheldon L. Glashow (both US), and Abdus Salam (Pakistan), for developing theory that electromagnetism and the ""weak"" force, which causes radioactive decay in some atomic nuclei, are facets of the same phenomenon
Physiology or Medicine: Allan McLeod Cormack (US) and Godfrey Newbold Hounsfield (UK), for developing computed axial tomography (CAT scan) X-ray technique
An overheated reactor at the Three Mile Island nuclear facility in Pennsylvania threatens to melt down. It does not, but 144,000 residents of nearby Middletown are evacuated.
The first human-powered aircraft
flies across the English Channel: Bryan Allen pilots the Gossamer Albatross
from Folkestone, England, to Cap Gris-Nez, France (June 12). Background:
Famous Firsts in Aviation
The accidental release of
anthrax spores at a Soviet bioweapons facility in Sverdlovsk kills several
hundred.