page_title: 1998
section_title: January
hierarchical_section_title: 1998 / Events / January
context_page_description: 1998 was a common year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar, the 1998th year of the Common Era and Anno Domini designations, the 998th year of the 2nd millennium, the 98th year of the 20th century, and the 9th year of the 1990s decade.
  1998 was designated as the International Year of the Ocean.
context_section_description: January 2 – Russia begins to circulate new rubles to stem inflation and promote confidence.
  January 4 – Wilaya of Relizane massacres of 4 January 1998 in Algeria: over 170 are killed in 3 remote-villages.
  January 6 – The Lunar Prospector spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for frozen water, in soil in permanently shadowed craters near the Moon's poles.
  January 8 – Ramzi Yousef is sentenced to life in prison for planning the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993.
  January 11 – Over 100 people are killed in the Sidi-Hamed massacre in Algeria.
  January 12 – Nineteen European nations agree to forbid human cloning.
  January 17 – The Drudge Report breaks the story about U.S. President Bill Clinton's alleged affair with Monica Lewinsky, which would lead to the House of Representatives' impeachment of him.
  January 22 – "Unabomber" Ted Kaczynski pleads guilty in the United States, and accepts a sentence of life without the possibility of parole.
caption: New rubles
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