- January 17
- The eruption of Mount Nyiragongo in the Democratic Republic of the Congo displaces an estimated 400,000 people. [23]
- January 18
- A Canadian Pacific Railway train carrying anhydrous ammonia derails outside of Minot, North Dakota, killing one. [23]
- January 23
- Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl is kidnapped in Pakistan, accused of being a US Central Intelligence Agency agent by his captors. [23]
- January 28
- The Dutch guilder expires as valid currency. [605.185]
- January 31
- A large section of the Antarctic Larsen Ice Shelf begins disintegrating, eventually consuming about 3,250 km (1,254 miles) over a 35-day period. [23]
- February 1
- Kidnapped Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl is murdered in Karachi, Pakistan. [23]
- February 2
- Crown Prince Willem-Alexander of the Netherlands marries Máxima, Princess of Orange in Amsterdam. [23]
- February 9
- A cargo ship carrying over 815,000 litres of fuel oil runs aground near the north island port of Gisborne, New Zealand, sending an oil slick drifting to shore, rivers, and beaches. [522]
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- The Irish pound expires as valid currency. [605.185]
- February 12
- The trial of former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic begins at the United Nations war crimes tribunal in The Hague, Netherlands, on charges of genocide and war crimes in Bosnia, Croatia and Kosovo. [23] [129]
- The U.S. Secretary of Energy makes the decision that Yucca Mountain is suitable to be the United States' nuclear waste repository. [5] [23]
- February 13
- Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom gives former New York City mayor Rudolph Giuliani an honorary knighthood. [23]
- February 16
- Rachel Thaler, 16, is blown up at a pizzeria in an Israeli shopping mall following a suicide bombing attack on a crowd of teens. [23]
- February 17
- The French franc expires as valid currency. [605.185]
- February 19
- NASA's Mars Odyssey space probe begins to map the surface of Mars using its thermal emission imaging system. [5] [23]
- February 20
- In Reqa Al-Gharbiya, Egypt, a fire on a train injures over 65 and kills at least 370. [23]
- February 22
- Angolan political and rebel leader Jonas Savimbi is killed in a military ambush. [23]
- A Norwegian-facilitated ceasefire begins in Sri Lanka. [23]
- February 23
- FARC kidnaps Ingrid Betancourt in Colombia while she campaigns for the presidency. [23]
- February 27
- A series of riots leaves hundreds dead, after 59 Hindu pilgrims die aboard a train burned by a Muslim mob in Godhra, India. [23]
- February 28
- The Austrian schilling, Belgian franc, Finnish mark, German mark, Greek drachm, Italian lira, Luxembourg franc, Portuguese escudo, and Spanish peseta expires as valid currencies. [23] [605.185]
- March 1
- In eastern Afghanistan, Operation Anaconda begins. [23]
- Continuing violence in Ahmedabad kills 28; police shoot and kill five rioters. [23]
- The Envisat environmental satellite successfully reaches an orbit 800 km above the Earth using an Ariane 5 on its 11th launch, carrying the heaviest payload to date at 8500kg. [23]
- Space Shuttle Columbia flies the Hubble Space Telescope service mission, its last before STS-107. [23]
- The Peseta is discontinued as the official currency of Spain and is replaced with the euro. [23]
- March 3
- São Tomé and Príncipe hold legislative elections. [23]
- March 6
- France agrees to return the remains of Saartjie Baartman to South Africa. [23]
- March 10
- Colombia holds legislative elections. [23]
- Togo holds parliamentary elections. [23]
- March 11
- BBC 6 Music, the first new BBC music radio station in decades, is launched. [23]
- March 12
- In Houston, Texas, Andrea Yates is found guilty of drowning her five children on June 20, 2001. She is later sentenced to life in prison. [23]
- March 14
- 125 vehicles are involved in a massive pile-up on Interstate 75 in Ringgold, Georgia, USA. [23]
- March 16
- The Walt Disney Studios Park opens next to Disneyland Paris in France. [6]
- March 17
- Portugal holds parliamentary elections. [23]
- In Islamabad, Pakistan, the International Protestant Church attack occurs. [23]
- March 19
- Operation Anaconda in Afghanistan ends (started on March 1) after killing 500 Taliban and al Qaeda fighters, with 11 allied troop fatalities. [23]
- March 21
- In Pakistan, Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh along with three other suspects are charged with murder in the kidnapping and killing of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl. [23]
- March 27
- A suicide bomber kills 28 people in Netanya, Israel. [23]
- March 31
- Ukraine holds parliamentary elections. [23]
- A Belize-registered cargo ship collides with a fishing boat and sinks, leaving a 10km long oil slick. [522]
- April 2
- Israeli forces besiege the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, when militants take shelter there. [23]
- April 6
- A ship spills 340,000 litres of crude oil off the southeast Louisiana coast, USA. [522]
- April 8
- Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing changes its company name to 3M Company. [228]
- April 11
- (to April 14) Failed military coup d'état against Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez. [23] [240.111]
- April 13
- In Caracas, Venezuela, poor people protest in the streets against the military coup against Hugo Chávez, resulting in his return to power. [240.112]
- April 15
- An Air China Boeing 767-200 crashes into a hillside during heavy rain and fog near Pusan, South Korea, killing 128. [23]
- April 16
- Dr. Bernd Pischetsrieder becomes the seventh CEO of the Volkswagen automobile company, succeeding Dr. Ferdinand Piech. [23]
- April 17
- Four Canadian infantrymen are killed in Afghanistan by friendly fire from two US F-16s. [23]
- April 18
- A new insect order, Mantophasmatodea, is announced. [23]
- April 21
- French presidential election: The first round results in a runoff between Jacques Chirac and the leader of the main French far-right party, Jean-Marie Le Pen. [23]
- April 22
- At a special session of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, Director-General Jose Bustani is fired. [23]
- April 25
- Soyuz TM-34: South African Mark Shuttleworth blasts off from the Baikonur cosmodrome; he had paid £15 million for the trip. [23]
- April 26
- Robert Steinhäuser opens fire on his former teachers and other students in Erfurt, Germany and then kills himself; 16 are dead. [23]
- April 30
- Pakistani voters approve a referendum granting a five-year term for Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf. [23]
- May 5
- In the second round of the French presidential election, Jacques Chirac is re-elected. [23]
- May 6
- In the Netherlands, politician Pim Fortuyn is killed by Volkert van der Graaf. [23]
- May 9
- The 38-day stand-off in the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem comes to an end when the Palestinians inside agree to have 13 suspected militants among them deported to several different countries. [23]
- The German city of Aachen presents its Charlemagne (Karl) prize to the Euro. The prize is accepted by the president of the European Bank, Wim Duisenberg. [37]
- In Kaspiysk, Russia, a remote-control bomb explodes during a holiday parade, killing 43 and injuring at least 130. [23]
- May 10
- FBI agent Robert Hanssen is sentenced to life without the possibility of parole for selling American secrets to Moscow for $1.4 million in cash and diamonds. [23]
- May 11
- Ray Charles takes part - with other musicians - in a peace concert in Rome, which is the first event to take place inside the city's ancient Colosseum since 404 A.D. The event was organized in partnership with the Glocal Forum and the Quincy Jones Listen Up Foundation. [23]
- May 12
- Former President Jimmy Carter arrives in Cuba for a five-day visit with Fidel Castro, becoming the first U.S. President, in or out of office, to visit the island since Castro's 1959 revolution. [23]
- The Russian Shuttle Buran is destroyed when the roof of the hangar collapses, killing eight workers. [23]
- May 15
- The Netherlands holds elections for the Lower House. [23]
- May 20
- East Timor (Timor-Leste) regains its independence. [23] [285.501]
- May 21
- The US State Department releases a report naming seven state sponsors of terrorism: Iran, Iraq, Cuba, Libya, North Korea, Sudan, and Syria. [23]
- May 23
- Estonia hosts the first Eurovision Song Contest in a former Soviet republic. [23]
- May 25
- China Airlines Flight 611 breaks up near the Penghu Islands at Taiwan Strait, killing all 225 people on board. [23]
- May 26
- The Mars Odyssey finds signs of huge water ice deposits on the planet Mars. [23]
- May 28
- The Mars Odyssey finds signs of large ice deposits on the planet Mars. [5]
- June 3
- The "Party in the Palace" takes place at Buckingham Palace, London for Queen Elizabeth II's Golden Jubilee celebrations. [23]
- June 4
- The planetoid Quaoar is discovered orbiting the Sun in the Kuiper belt. [23]
- Queen Elizabeth II and the Duke of Edinburgh ride in the gold state coach from Buckingham Palace to Saint Paul's Cathedral for a special service marking the Queen's 50 years on the throne. In New York, the Empire State Building is lit in purple for her honor. [23]
- June 6
- An asteroid or comet estimated at 5-10 metres in diameter explodes over the Mediterranean Sea between Greece and Libya with an estimated force slightly more powerful than the Nagasaki atomic bomb. [5] [23] [521]
- June 10
- An annular solar eclipse occurs. [23]
- In the United Kingdom, Kevin Warwick carries out the first direct electronic communication experiment between the nervous systems of two humans. [5]
- June 11
- Antonio Meucci is recognized as the first inventor of the telephone by the United States Congress. [23]
- June 12
- Thailand-registered freighter MV Hermion and Singapore-registered bunker tanker Neptank VII collide off Singapore, spilling about 525,000 litres of marine fuel oil. [522]
- June 14
- In Karachi, Pakistan, a car bomb in front of the U.S. Consulate kills 12 Pakistanis and injures 50. [23]
- June 15
- Near Earth Asteroid 2002 MN misses our planet by 75,000 miles (120,000 km) about one third the distance to the moon. [23]
- June 18
- Arizona experiences its worst forest fire, burning 462,606 acres (1,872 square km) near the Mogollon Rim. [23]
- June 24
- The Igandu train disaster in Dodoma Region, Tanzania, kills 281 people in the worst rail accident in African history. [23]
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