A Russian Tupolev Tu-154 airliner and a Boeing 757 operated by DHLcollide at 35,000 ft over Überlingen, due to failure of correct communication from ground-to-air. The 69 people aboard the Tupolev (mainly Russian schoolchildren) and the two pilots of the Boeing are all killed.
Michel Brunet, a paleontologist at the University of Poitiers, France, announced in the journal Nature that a 7-million-year-old skull found in the desert of Chad is the earliest hominidfossil ever found. But he was immediately met by a firestorm of criticism from other scientists who claim that it is merely the skull of an ape, possibly a proto-gorilla.
Patents: Forgent Networks asserts that it owns and will enforce patent rights on the widely used JPEGimage compression standard which is used widely on the World Wide Web. The announcement creates a furore remisicent of Unisys' attempts to assert its rights over the GIF image compression standard.
A few hours after the spiritual leader of Hamas, Ahmed Yassin, offered to halt all suicide attacks in exchange for full Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank and Gaza Strip, an Israeli F-16 jet dropped a bomb into a densely populated residential area of Gaza City. Fifteen people were killed, including Salah Shehade (the leader of Hamas's military wing, the Izz ad-Din el-Qasam Brigades), and more than 100 others were wounded. Nine of the dead were children, including Mohammed al-Huwaiti (aged 4), his brother Subhi (aged 3), Ayman Mattar (aged 1) and Dunya Rami Mattar (aged three months). The United Nations swiftly condemned the action as a flagrant violation of international law. Ariel Sharon, Israel's Prime Minister, said it was "one of our biggest successes", though the Prime Minister's office later added, "it is well known he regrets the killing of civilians."
An earthquake (magnitude 4.7) hits parts of Germany, Belgium, and the Netherlands.
Harry Potter. The director for the third Harry Potter film has been announced as Mexican-born Alfonso Cuarón. Cuarón will start directing "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban" next year.
A proposal by the United States to delay adoption of a new United Nations anti-torture pact was defeated 15–29, after which the pact was adopted by the Economic and Social Council. The United States cited concerns that, if adopted by the General Assembly, American state prisons and other facilities may become subject to inspection.
A series of bomb blasts have rocked the Christian districts of the city of Ambon in Indonesia in what appears to be a continuation of violence between Christian and Muslim inhabitants. Over the past five years more than 5000 people have been killed in this conflict.
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