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As a part of Arab Spring, the Bahraini uprising begins with a 'Day of Rage'.
Northern Illinois University shooting: A gunman opened fire in a lecture hall of the DeKalb County, Illinois university resulting in six fatalities (including gunman) and 21 injuries.
YouTube is launched by a group of college students, eventually becoming the largest video sharing website in the world and a main source for viral videos.
Seven people are killed and 151 wounded in a series of bombings by suspected al-Qaeda-linked militants that hit Makati, Davao City, and General Santos City, all in the Philippines.
Lebanese self-made billionaire and business tycoon Rafic Hariri is assassinated in Beirut, along with 21 other people, when the equivalent of around 1,000 kg of TNT is detonated as his motorcade drove near the St. George Hotel.
In a suburb of Moscow, Russia, the roof of the Transvaal water park collapses, killing more than 25 people, and wounding more than 100 others.
The spacecraft NEAR Shoemaker enters orbit around asteroid 433 Eros, the first spacecraft to orbit an asteroid.
An oil tanker train collides with a freight train in Yaoundé, Cameroon, spilling fuel oil. One person scavenging the oil created a massive explosion which kills 120.
The Voyager 1 spacecraft takes the photograph of planet Earth that later become famous as Pale Blue Dot.
Ninety-two people are killed when Indian Airlines Flight 605 crashes in Bangalore, India.
Iranian leader Ruhollah Khomeini issues a fatwa encouraging Muslims to kill Salman Rushdie, author of The Satanic Verses.
Union Carbide agrees to pay $470 million to the Indian government for damages it caused in the 1984 Bhopal disaster.
United American Bank of Knoxville, Tennessee collapses. Its president, Jake Butcher, is later convicted of fraud.
In Kabul, Setami Milli militants kidnap the American ambassador to Afghanistan, Adolph Dubs who is later killed during a gunfight between his kidnappers and police.
Discovery of the chemical elements: Element 103, Lawrencium, is first synthesized at the University of California.
The 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union begins in Moscow. On the last night of the meeting, Premier Nikita Khrushchev condemns Joseph Stalin's crimes in a secret speech.
Chinese Civil War: The National Revolutionary Army instigates the unsuccessful Battle of Tianquan against the People's Liberation Army.
The Asbestos Strike begins in Canada. The strike marks the beginning of the Quiet Revolution in Quebec.
President Franklin D. Roosevelt meets with King Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia aboard the USS Quincy, officially beginning U.S.-Saudi diplomatic relations.
World War II: Mostar is liberated by Yugoslav partisans
World War II: Navigational error leads to the mistaken bombing of Prague, Czechoslovakia by an American squadron of B-17s assisting in the Soviet's Vistula-Oder Offensive.
World War II: On the first day of the bombing of Dresden, the British Royal Air Force and the United States Army Air Forces begin fire-bombing Dresden.
World War II: In the Action of 14 February 1944, a British submarine sinks a German-controlled Italian submarine in the Strait of Malacca.
World War II: Tunisia Campaign: General Hans-Jürgen von Arnim's Fifth Panzer Army launches a concerted attack against Allied positions in Tunisia.
Battle of Pasir Panjang contributes to the fall of Singapore.
Saint Valentine's Day Massacre: Seven people, six of them gangster rivals of Al Capone's gang, are murdered in Chicago.
The Computing-Tabulating-Recording Company changes its name to International Business Machines Corporation (IBM).
The Soviet Union adopts the Gregorian calendar (on 1 February according to the Julian calendar).
The US Navy commissions its first class of diesel-powered submarines.
The United States Department of Commerce and Labor is established (later split into the Department of Commerce and the Department of Labor).
British forces begin the Battle of the Tugela Heights in an effort to lift the Siege of Ladysmith.
Voting machines are approved by the U.S. Congress for use in federal elections.
The War of the Pacific breaks out when Chilean armed forces occupy the Bolivian port city of Antofagasta.
Alexander Graham Bell applies for a patent for the telephone, as does Elisha Gray.
Texas is linked by telegraph to the rest of the United States, with the completion of a connection between New Orleans and Marshall, Texas.
Great Ormond St Hospital for Sick Children, the first hospital in England to provide in-patient beds specifically for children, is founded in London.
In New York City, James Knox Polk becomes the first serving President of the United States to have his photograph taken.
The original Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, in the Latter Day Saint movement, is formed in Kirtland, Ohio.
Ras Marye of Yejju marches into Tigray and defeats and kills Dejazmach Sabagadis in the Battle of Debre Abbay.
Karađorđe leads the First Serbian Uprising against the Ottoman Empire.
French Revolutionary Wars: Battle of Cape St. Vincent: John Jervis, (later 1st Earl of St Vincent) and Horatio Nelson (later 1st Viscount Nelson) lead the British Royal Navy to victory over a Spanish fleet in action near Gibraltar.
James Cook is killed by Native Hawaiians near Kealakekua on the Island of Hawaii.
American Revolutionary War: The Battle of Kettle Creek is fought in Georgia.
The United States flag is formally recognized by a foreign naval vessel for the first time, when French Admiral Toussaint-Guillaume Picquet de la Motte renders a nine gun salute to USS Ranger, commanded by John Paul Jones.
Arauco War: The Mapuche under their elected military leader, Clentaru, rise up against the Spanish in an insurrection in present-day central Chile.
Spanish conquistadores, led by Nuño de Guzmán, overthrow and execute Tangaxuan II, the last independent monarch of the Tarascan state in present-day central Mexico.
Spanish Inquisition: The Catholic Monarchs issue a decree forcing Muslims in Granada to convert to Catholicism or leave Spain.
Richard II of England dies, most probably from starvation, in Pontefract Castle, on the orders of Henry Bolingbroke.
Several hundred Jews are burned to death by mobs while the remaining Jews are forcibly removed from Strasbourg.
Pope Gregory VII excommunicates Henry IV, Holy Roman Emperor.
Pope Benedict VIII crowns Henry of Bavaria, King of Germany and of Italy, as Holy Roman Emperor.
Charles the Bald and Louis the German swear the Oaths of Strasbourg in the French and German languages.
Abbasid Revolution: The Hashimi rebels under Abu Muslim Khorasani take Merv, capital of the Umayyad province Khorasan, marking the consolidation of the Abbasid revolt.
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