From: xu@hydra.maths.unsw.oz.au ()
Subject: CND-Europe/Pacific, January 1, 1991
Organization: school of Mathematics UNSW
Distribution: aus
Date: Sat, 2 Jan 1993 05:00:58 GMT


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===================  Europe / Pacific Section (CND-EP)  ===================

                             January 1, 1993

 *********  CND-EP Staff Wish Our Readers A Very Happy New Year  *********

---------------------------- Table of Contents ----------------------------
No. Subject                                                      # of Lines

1. New Year Celebrations Around the World .............................. 47

2. New Year's 1993 Brings a Not-So-New Europe ......................... 115

3.  1992 Year in Review : Landmark Events  ............................ 400
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1. New Year Celebrations Around the World .............................. 47
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Forwarded by: Jian
Source: NEWS 1/1/93

A New Year's celebration turned to tragedy in Hong Kong when 20 people were
killed and 69 injured in a stampede during the first half-hour of 1993.

Police said about 15,000 revelers were in the Lan Kwai Fong entertainment
district when the celebration got out of control and some people were
trampled to death.

Millions of Japanese thronged to shrines Friday to welcome the Year of the
Rooster after temple bells rang out the Year of the Monkey.

Pope John Paul II, his voice heavy with a cold, marked the end of 1992 by
offering a thanksgiving Mass. He planned to celebrate the New Year Friday
morning with another Mass devoted to world peace.

In Czechoslovakia, the bells at midnight were to ring in the country's
formal division into the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

Greater unity was coming to the European Community with the start of the new
year. The EC's single market plan to remove barriers to free trade and
travel becomes effective Friday after 7 years of hard bargaining between the
12 member states.

Across Europe, 1,000 fires were to brighten the midnight skies to welcome
the new, huge marketplace. Belgian customs agents have already shut down one
of their border posts with the Netherlands.

Traditional New Year's celebrations were readied in Paris, but with tough
new security. Police closed the Champs Elysees to traffic for the first time
to avoid gridlock and stepped up patrols against the lawlessness of years
past.

Chancellor Helmut Kohl said that right-wing violence was Germany's greatest
test in 1992, and he called on Germans to help end the attacks in the new
year. "Violence is a challenge to our conscience, a fact we cannot
escape," he said New Year's Eve.

Getting a head start on much of the rest of the world, Australians greeted
the new year with a huge fireworks display over Sydney Harbor. In Canberra,
police arrested more than 50 people, mostly on charges of drinking or
disorderly conduct.

Russians were lamenting high prices as they bought gifts and champagne to
celebrate their main holiday.

China and Taiwan don't welcome in the new year until Jan. 23, this year's
date for the new year as calculated by the old lunar calendar.

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2. New Year's 1993 Brings a Not-So-New Europe ......................... 115
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Forwarded by:  A CND Reader
Source: UPI 12/31/92

PARIS  -- The New Europe arrived at the stroke of midnight, but Europeans
will have to look long and hard to find anything different about their
world.

After years of promises and warnings on how life would be transformed by the
arrival of the European Single Market on New Year's Day 1993, the date took
on almost mythic importance.

But for many Europeans, its arrival Friday brought about a sense of the
anti-climatic.

In theory, the Single Market marks the removal of barriers among the 12
member countries of the European Community to allow the free movement of
goods, services, money and people across borders. But in practice Europe's
345 million consumers will have to wait a little while longer for the dream
of a "Europe without frontiers" to be realized.

The biggest disappointment for EC citizens, particularly those traveling to
Britain, is that passport controls will not be eliminated. Britain contends
that there is no legal obligation to end checks on visitors and, along with
Denmark and Ireland, has not signed the Schengen Treaty on removing border
controls agreed to by the other nine states. This treaty is unlikely to be
ratified before the summer and airports will continue with passport controls
on internal EC flights until the end of 1993.

Nevertheless, a significant scaling down of passport controls for EC
citizens arriving in Britain is expected and checks at the borders of
Schengen Treaty countries such as France and Spain are likely to disappear
before ratification.

Changes will be more dramatic for the movement of goods and for internal EC
trade, however. As long as goods are for their own personal use, shoppers
will be able to buy as much as they like in another EC country without
filling in customs forms.

French supermarkets in channel port towns, such as Calais and Boulogne,
already are preparing for an influx of British customers who have made
reservations on January ferry crossings to take advantage of lower excise
taxes on cigarettes and alcohol. A similar invasion is expected by German
shops near the Danish border.

The demise of customs declaration forms has been welcomed by European
companies, which no longer are required to fill out several documents every
time goods are dispatched to another EC country. Truck drivers, too, are
hoping that long delays at border crossings will become a thing of the past.

Legislation to create a single market in banking and financial services also
has been agreed upon, although only part of it takes effect Jan. 1. A single
banking license will allow banks to operate in other EC countries. A similar
system for insurance companies will be phased in over the next 18 months.

Increased competition among financial institutions should give consumers
more choice, but the Brussels-based European Commission acknowledges that
this sector is unlikely to see change overnight.

It still is too early to tell whether people will entrust their money to
foreign companies. Fears may be alleviated if the commission responds to
demands by consumer groups, which argue that the opening up of financial
services should be accompanied by legislation to protect customers dealing
with institutions based in other countries.

Banks also are under pressure to introduce cheaper, more efficient ways of
transferring money across borders. Brussels has threatened to introduce
legislation if the banks refuse to co-operate voluntarily.

Transportation also is due for a shake-up.

With European airlines free to set their own fares beginning Jan. 1, a fare
war erupted. Lufthansa, KLM, SAS and British Airways lowered fares by as
much as 50 percent within Europe, effective New Year's Day.

Despite the air fare skirmish the European Consumers' Organization points
out that the safeguards the EC has written into its deregulation laws will
make it easy for "governments to continue pursuing high air fares in order
to protect their national carriers".

To encourage consumers who want to buy cars in another country, Brussels has
persuaded manufacturers to publish price lists for their models in different
member states. But the selective distribution system that some EC officials
believe is responsible for the wide variation in price tags on cars across
Europe will remain in force until 1995. In addition, a Frenchman buying a
car in Italy, for example, will still have to pay French rather than Italian
registration and value added taxes.

But in other areas, red tape is being swept aside.

Applying for jobs in other EC countries will become easier since member
states will recognize each other's university degrees and professional and
vocational diplomas. As of Jan. 1, a Danish pharmacist is free to work in
Ireland or a Belgian lawyer can practice in Spain. Other professions are
expected to follow suit, including doctors engaged in general medicine.

If the Single Market promises greater mobility, lower prices and broad
consumer choices, it also ushers in a myriad of anxieties. Many fear the
increased competition will add to Europe's already rocketing unemployment
levels and business leaders are unlikely to welcome the prospect of foreign
competitors muscling in on their territory.

But for French Minister for European Affairs Elizabeth Guigou, the Single
European Market is vital protection against international competition and
what she described as the "veiled protectionism" of the United States and
Japan.

"The Single Market is no miracle cure," she said. "It is an area of 345
million consumers, all potential customers. It is good for employment."

The way out of the economic crisis was not for each EC country to turn in on
itself but to look towards Europe, she added.

Despite delays and disagreements much of the Single Market envisioned by
Brussels in 1985 will be in place Jan. 1.

"Europe," as British Prime Minister John Major said at December's EC summit
in Edinburgh, "is now open for business".

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3.  1992 Year in Review : Landmark Events  ............................ 400
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Forwarded by: Jian
Source: NEWS 1/1/93

Jan. 1 - El Salvador announced peace accord ending 12-year civil war.

Jan. 2 - Russia, Belarus and Ukraine lift price controls to stimulate
production. President Ayaz Mutalibov of Azerbaijan imposed direct rule on
Nagorno-Karabakh.

Jan. 7 - Yugoslav military planes shoot down European Community helicopter
killing five truce observers.

Jan. 8 - President Bush collapses during state dinner in Japan suffering
from stomach flu. EC suspends monitoring operations in Yugoslavia.

Jan. 11 - Algerian President Chadli Bendjedid resigns.

Jan. 13 - North and South Korea sign agreement calling for nuclear weapons
ban. Serial killer Jeffrey L. Dahmer pleads guilty but insane to 15
mutilation killings.

Jan. 14 - Israel opens peace talks with Jordan and resumes bargaining with
Palestinians.

Jan. 15 - EC recognizes Slovenia and Croatia as independent states.

Jan. 19 - Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir's coalition government loses
its parliamentary majority following pullout of two far-right parties
opposed to peace talks.

Jan. 20 - Zhelyu Zhelev wins Bulgaria's first direct presidential election.
Two former East German border guards convicted in last killing at Berlin
Wall.

Jan. 21 - U.N. Security Council urges Libya to surrender two agents indicted
by U.S. and Britain in bombing of Pan Am Flight 103.

Jan. 23 - U.N. Security Council imposes an arms embargo against Somalia.
Jan. 25 - Russian President Boris Yeltsin says Russia will stop targeting
U.S. cities with nuclear missiles.

Jan. 27 - R.H. Macy & Co. Inc. files for Chapter 11 protection from
creditors.

Jan. 28 - Leadership of National Liberation Front that won Algeria's
independence and ruled for three decades resigns.

Jan. 29 - Bush sends Congress a trillion-and-a-half dollar budget.

Jan. 31 - TWA files for Chapter 11. U.N. Security Council holds summit of
world leaders.

Feb. 1 - Salvadorans mark their first day of official peace in a decade.
Bush and Yelstin sign Camp David declaration that Russia and U.S. don't
regard themselves adversaries.

Feb. 4 - Rebel troops attempt overthrow of Venezuelan President Carlos
Andres Perez.

Feb. 5 - U.N. declines deployment of 10,000-member U.N. peacekeeping force
in Yugoslavia.

Feb. 6 - C-130 military transport plane crashes into restaurant and hotel in
Evansville, Ind.; 16 killed.

Feb. 8 - U.S.-European Ulysses space probe passes Jupiter.

Feb. 9 - Army-backed ruling council of Algeria declares state of emergency
to quell spreading violence.

Feb. 10 - Former heavyweight champion Mike Tyson convicted of raping Black
Miss America contestant; later sentenced to six years.

Feb. 14 - Dahmer found to be sane when he killed and dismembered 15 men and
boys; later sentenced to 15 consecutive life terms.

Feb. 20 - Billionaire Ross Perot says he will run for president if his name
is placed on ballot in all 50 states.

Feb. 24 - General Motors reports record $4.5 billion loss in 1991.

Feb. 27 - House approves election-year tax cut for 90 million wage earners.

Feb. 29 - U.N. Security Council authorizes sending 22,000 peacekeepers to
Cambodia.

March 2 - All-white jury selected in Los Angeles taped beating trial.

March 10 - NATO allies welcome 10 former Soviet republics into special forum
giving one-time adversaries chance to discuss security concerns.

March 13 - Quake of 6.2 rocks Turkey, killing at least 570 people.

March 15 - U.N. peacekeeping forces begin missions in Yugoslavia and
Cambodia. A second strong earthquake hits eastern Turkey.

March 22 - USAir jet crashes into Flushing Bay, N.Y., 27 of 51 people aboard
killed.

March 26 - Britain's Prince Andrew, the queen's second son, and wife, the
former Sarah Ferguson, separate.

March 29 - Bill Clinton acknowledges publicly that he experimented with
marijuana as student.

March 31 - U.N. Security Council imposes sanctions on Libyan air traffic and
arms trade.

April 1 - Bush pledges United States will help finance $24 billion
international aid fund for former Soviet Union.

April 2 - John Gotti convicted of murder and racketeering; later sentenced
to life in prison.

April 5 - Peru's President Alberto Fujimori suspends constitution and
Congress.

April 8 - Arthur Ashe discloses he has AIDS.

April 9 - Manuel Noriega found guilty of drug and racketeering.

April 15 - Sanctions go into effect against Libya for refusing to surrender
two suspects in bombing of Pan Am Flight 103. Leona Helmsley begins serving
4-year jail term for tax evasion.

April 16 - Ban on nearly all abortions in U.S. territory of Guam is
overturned.

April 22 - Robert F. Kelly Jr, owner of Farmville, N.C., day-care center,
convicted on 99 of 100 charges of sexually abusing children under his care.
Guadalajara, Mexico devastated by sewer explosion; more than 200 killed.

April 23 - Quake measuring 6.1 jolts Southern California.

April 25 - Quake measuring 7.0 rocks Northern California.

April 26 - Moscovites celebrate first Russian Orthodox Easter in 74 years.
Aftershocks measuring 6.0 and 6.5 shake Northern California.

April 27 - Russia and 12 other former Soviet republics win entry into
International Monetary Fund and World Bank.

April 29 - Four Los Angeles cops are acquitted of most charges in beating of
Rodney King, touching off deadly riots. Exxon executive Sidney Reso
disappears; later found dead.

May 2 - Bush dispatches 4,500 federal troops into riot-torn Los Angeles with
authorization to fire if fired upon.

May 6 - Last trainload of short-range nuclear weapons crosses border from
Ukraine, putting all tactical weapons from former Soviet arsenal on Russian
soil.

May 12 - Four Los Angeles men arrested in televised beating of white trucker
during riot. Last EC observers flee Bosnia.

May 13 - Bush gives Los Angeles $600 million loan package for rebuilding.

May 14 - Government panel overrides the Endangered Species Act by permitting
limited logging in several areas inhabited by northern spotted owl.

May 20 - Vice President Dan Quayle calls TV character Murphy Brown
irresponsible for have baby out of wedlock.

May 21 - Johnny Carson retires from "The Tonight Show."

May 23 - U.S. and four former Soviet republics sign agreement to implement
START missile-reduction treaty.

May 24 - Bush orders Coast Guard to intercept Haitian refugees at sea and
return them to Haiti. Thailand's prime minister, Suchinda Kraprayoon,
resigns.

May 26 - Jay Leno takes over "The Tonight Show."

May 27 - Carolyn Warmus convicted of murder of her lover's wife.

May 30 - U.N. Security Council imposes trade sanctions on Serbia and
Montenegro.

June 3 - Diplomats from 180 countries open Earth Summit in Rio De Janeiro.
Bill Clinton wins Democratic presidential nomination after six-state sweep.

June 4 - Elvis' younger self is immortalized on US postage stamp.

June 8 - Earth Summit delegates approve new U.N. body to monitor compliance
with environmental treaties. U.N. Security Council approves sending 60
military observers to Sarajevo.

June 11 - United States announces $1.4 billion fund to monitor climate
change and a plan to assess world's plant and animal species. NASA announces
scientists have found evidence seven stars in our galaxy may be orbited by
planets.

June 15 - Parliament gives final approval to use of Japanese troops overseas
for first time since World War II.

June 16 - Former Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger indicted on felony
charges in connection with Iran-Contra affair.

June 17 - Czech and Slovak leaders agree to separate Czechoslovakia. Former
Exxon security guard Arthur Seale and his wife, Irene, are charged with
kidnapping and murder of Exxon executive Sidney Reso.

June 22 - Supreme Court rules hate crime laws, banning cross burning and
similar expressions of racial bias, violate free-speech rights.

June 25 - Shuttle Columbia blasts off on 13-day mission.

June 26 - Navy Secretary H. Lawrence Garrett III resigns in the wake of the
Tailhook scandal. Supreme Court rules airports may prohibit religious groups
from soliciting donations in terminals; must allow distribution of free
literature.

June 28 - Two powerful earthquakes hit Southern California.

June 29 - Supreme Court rules states cannot ban most abortions, upholding
core of Roe vs. Wade. U.N. Security Council votes to send 1,000 Canadian
peacekeepers to Yugoslavia. Mohamed Boudfiaf, head of Algerian ruling
council assassinated. Man receives liver transplant from baboon; lives 71
days.

June 30 - Irene J. Seale pleads guilty in kidnap of Exxon executive. Fidel
Ramos is sworn in as Philippine president.

July 2 - Unemployment rate hits eight-year high of 7.8 percent.

July 3 - U.S. military joins international airlift to Yugoslavia. Braniff
airlines shuts down for third time in a decade.

July 5 - First U.N. peacekeepers arrive in Somalia to moniter cease-fire in
capital.

July 9 - Clinton selects Sen. Albert Gore Jr. as running mate. Israeli Labor
Party leader Yitzhak Rabin forms new government.

July 11 - Manuel Noriega sentenced to 40 years in prison. Jury finds Pan Am
guilty of "willful misconduct" in terrorist bombing of Flight 103.

July 13 - Bush announces United States will no longer produce plutonium and
highly enriched uranium for weapons.

July 16 - Ross Perot drops out of presidential race.

July 17 - Accord for cuts in tanks and other nonnuclear arms in Europe takes
effect.

July 20 - Vaclav Havel steps down as Czechoslovakia's president.

July 23 - Scientists announce discovery of virus that may cause AIDS
symptoms in people not infected by either known AIDS virus.

July 25 - Italian government sends 7,000 soldiers to Sicily in Mafia
crackdown.

July 30 - TWA L1011 catches fire on takeoff at JFK; 291 on board spared.

July 31 - Moscow releases names of 39 Americans imprisoned during World War
II.

Aug. 1 - Supreme Court permits Bush administration to continue to return
Haitians to Haiti.

Aug. 3 - Russia and Ukraine agree to put Black Sea fleet under joint
command.

Aug. 4 - Senate votes to curb nuclear testing; ending it entirely in four
years.

Aug. 5 - Federal civil-rights charges filed against four police officers
acquitted in the beating of Rodney King; they later plead innocent.

Aug. 6 - Bush grants full diplomatic recognition to Bosnia- Herzegovina,
Slovenia, and Croatia.

Aug. 7 - House votes to overturn Bush's "gag rule" on abortion counceling at
federally funded clinics.

Aug. 12 - U.S., Canada and Mexico reach a free-trade agreement. Somalia
agrees to let 500 U.N. troops be deployed to protect food shipments.

Aug. 13 - James Baker named White House chief of staff. Seventy-four people
are injured when Amtrak train derails in Virginia. U.N. authorizes use of
force to safeguard aid deliveries to Bosnia.

Aug. 17 - Woody Allen confirms that he is in love with Soon-Yi Farrow
Previn, 21-year-old adopted daughter of his lover Mia Farrow.

Aug. 18 - Larry Bird retires from basketball.

Aug. 20 - Republican convention nominates George Bush and Dan Quayle for
second term. Quake measuring 7.5 on Richter scale hits Kyrgyzstan.

Aug. 24 - Hurricane Andrew hits Florida leaving thousands without shelter
and causing record damage. 55 deaths related directly to storm.

Aug. 25 - Hurricane Andrew thrashes Louisiana coast.

Aug. 27 - Bush orders federal troops to Florida for emergency relief.

Aug. 29 - U.N. Security Council agrees to send 3,000 more relief troops to
Somalia.

Sept 1 - Randy Weaver surrenders in Naples, Idaho, after 11-day siege with
federal authorities that killed his wife and teen-age son at their
mountain-top cabin.

Sept 3 - Italian relief plane shot down by ground-to-air missles outside of
Sarajevo.

Sept. 6 - Troops in South Africa fire on ANC supporters near the Transkei
homeland, killing 28 and wounding 200.

Sept. 11 - Hurricane Iniki strikes Hawaiian islands of Kauai, Oahu, and
Niilau; six dead.

Sept. 19 - U.N. Security Council drops Yugoslavia from General Assembly.

Sept. 20 - Belgian balloonists reach Europe winning first trans-Atlantic
balloon race. European union treaty approved.

Sept. 22 - Bush vetoes family leave bill. Veto later sustained by House.

Sept. 24 - Pentagon report on Tailhook scandal finds sexual abuse of women
at naval aviators' conventions not rare.

Sept 28 - Magic Johnson announces he will return to the basketball.

Oct. 1 - USS Saratoga accidentally fires missiles at Turkish destroyer
Muavenet in Aegean Sea; five killed, 12 wounded.

Oct. 2 - Prison riot leaves at least 111 inmates dead and 34 riot troops
injured in Carandiru Penitentiary in Sao Paulo Brazil.

Oct. 3 - Relief flights to Yugoslavia resume.

Oct. 4 - Israeli El Al 747 cargo jet crashes into suburban apartment complex
after takeoff in Amsterdam; 43 dead.

Oct. 5 - For the first time, Congress overrides a Bush veto - the cable bill.

Oct. 6 - Abimael Guzman, leader of Peru's Shining Path guerrillas, convicted
and sentenced to life in prison without parole.

Oct. 12 - Cairo suffers quake registering 5.9 on the Richter scale; 550
dead. Nobel Prize in medicine or physiology awarded to Americans Edmond H.
Fischer and Edwin G. Krebs.

Oct. 13 - Air France supersonic jetliner sets record for commercial flight
for circling globe; 33 hours, 1 minute.

Oct. 14 - Serial killer Andrei Chikatilo is convicted of 52 murder counts in
Russia.

Oct. 15 - Gunman opens fire in Schuyler County Department of Social Services
Support Collection Unit in Watkins Glen, N.Y.; five dead including gunman.

Oct. 30 - Five American nuns slain in Liberia.

Nov. 2 - Magic Johnson retires from NBA a second time.

Nov. 3 - Arkansas governor Bill Clinton elected president.

Nov. 6 - Robodoc becomes first robot actively used in this country for
surgery; also first linked to computer imaging.

Nov. 11 - Yelstin says Americans were held in prison camps after World War
II and some were "summarily executed" but others still live in his country
voluntarily.

Nov. 16 - U.N. Security Council authorizes naval blockade of Yugoslavia.

Nov. 19 - Dorothy Walker Bush, mother of President Bush, dies.

Nov. 20 - Private chapel in Windsor Castle burns.

Nov. 27 - Rebel troops fail in coup attempt against Venezuelan President
Carlos Andres Perez.

Dec. 3 - U.N. Security Council approves military intervention in Somalia.
Dec. 7 - Hindu-Muslim riot follows destruction of 430-year-old mosque on
Sunday; 1,200 dead nationwide.

Dec. 8 - U.S. troops hit beach in Mogadishu, Somalia, beginning Operation
Restore Hope.

Dec. 9 - British Prime Minister John Major announces the separation of
Prince Charles and Princess Diana.

Dec. 11 - Northeast battered by "greatest northeastern storm of the
century."

Dec. 14 - Dr. Alvarez acquitted in Camarena torture-murder case.

Dec. 15 - NASA suffers another setback when the space Shuttle Determined,
attempting to deploy a military satellite, is found to be unmaneuverable
due to the fact that a previous commander accidentally left "The Club"
on the steering wheel.

Dec. 31 - Bands of white men in dark suits are converging on New Hampshire
to prepare for the 1996 presidential campaign, which starts next week.
Until then, have a Happy New Year.


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