December
19
United
Nations Day for South-South Cooperation
South-South
cooperation, as an important element of international cooperation
for development, offers viable opportunities for developing
countries and countries with economies in transition in their
individual and collective pursuit of sustained economic growth
and sustainable development.
Developing
countries have the primary responsibility for promoting and
implementing South-South cooperation, not as a substitute for
but rather as a complement to North-South cooperation, and in
this context reiterating the need for the international community
to support the efforts of the developing countries to expand
South-South cooperation.
By resolution
58/220 of 23 December 2003, the General Assembly decided to
declare 19 December, United Nations Day for South-South Cooperation.
This was the date on which the General Assembly endorsed the
Buenos Aires Plan of Action for Promoting and Implementing Technical
Cooperation among Developing Countries.
The Assembly
also urged all relevant United Nations organizations and multilateral
institutions to intensify their efforts to effectively mainstream
the use of South-South cooperation in the design, formulation
and implementation of their regular programmes and to consider
increasing allocations of human, technical and financial resources
for supporting South-South cooperation initiatives.
Events
211 – Publius
Septimius Geta, co-emperor of Rome, is lured to come without
his bodyguards to meet his brother Marcus Aurelius Antoninus
(Caracalla), to discuss a possible reconciliation. When he arrives
the Praetorian Guard murders him and he dies in the arms of
his mother Julia Domna.
324 – Licinius abdicates his position as Roman Emperor.
1154 – Henry II of England is crowned at Westminster Abbey.
1490 – Anne, Duchess of Brittany, is married to Maximilian I,
Holy Roman Emperor by proxy.
1606 – The Susan Constant, the Godspeed, and the Discovery depart
England carrying settlers who found, at Jamestown, Virginia,
the first of the thirteen colonies that became the United States.
1776 – Thomas Paine publishes one of a series of pamphlets in
the Pennsylvania Journal titled The American Crisis.
1777 – American Revolutionary War: George Washington's Continental
Army goes into winter quarters at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania.
1796 – French Revolutionary Wars: Two British frigates under
Commodore Horatio Nelson and two Spanish frigates under Commodore
Don Jacobo Stuart engage in battle off the coast of Murcia.
1828 – Nullification Crisis: Vice President of the United States
John C. Calhoun pens the South Carolina Exposition and Protest,
protesting the Tariff of 1828.
1843 – Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol goes on sale.
1900 – Hopetoun Blunder: The first Governor-General of Australia
John Hope, 7th Earl of Hopetoun, appointed Sir William Lyne
as premier of the new state New South Wales, but he is unable
to persuade other colonial politicians to join his government
and is forced to resign.
1907 – A group of 239 coal miners die during a mine explosion
in Jacobs Creek, Pennsylvania.
1912 – William H. Van Schaick, captain of the steamship General
Slocum which caught fire and killed over 1,000 people, is pardoned
by U.S. President William Howard Taft after three-and-a-half-years
in Sing Sing prison.
1916 – World War I: Battle of Verdun – On the Western Front,
the French Army successfully holds off the German Army and drives
it back to its starting position.
1920 – King Constantine I is restored as King of the Hellenes
after the death of his son Alexander I of Greece and a plebiscite.
1924 – The last Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost is sold in London,
England.
1927 – Three Indian revolutionaries viz. Ram Prasad Bismil,
Roshan Singh and Ashfaqulla Khan were executed by the British
government.
1932 – BBC World Service begins broadcasting as the BBC Empire
Service
1941 – World War II: Adolf Hitler becomes Supreme Commander-in-Chief
of the German Army.
1941 – World War II: Limpet mines placed by Italian divers sink
the HMS Valiant (1914) and HMS Queen Elizabeth (1913) in Alexandria
harbour.
1946 – Start of the First Indochina War.
1956 – Irish-born physician John Bodkin Adams is arrested in
connection with the suspicious deaths of more than 160 patients.
Eventually he is convicted only of minor charges.
1961 – India annexes Daman and Diu, part of Portuguese India.
1963 – Zanzibar gains independence from the United Kingdom as
a constitutional monarchy, under Sultan Jamshid bin Abdullah.
1964 – The South Vietnamese military junta of Nguyen Khanh dissolved
the High National Council and arrested some of the members.
1967 – Prime Minister of Australia Harold Holt is officially
presumed dead.
1972 – Apollo program: The last manned lunar flight, Apollo
17, crewed by Eugene Cernan, Ron Evans and Harrison Schmitt,
returns to Earth.
1975 – John Paul Stevens is appointed a justice of The United
States Supreme Court.
1981 – Sixteen lives are lost when the Penlee lifeboat goes
to the aid of the stricken coaster Union Star in heavy seas.
1983 – The original FIFA World Cup trophy, the Jules Rimet Trophy,
is stolen from the headquarters of the Brazilian Football Confederation
in Rio de Janeiro.
1984 – The Sino-British Joint Declaration, stating that the
People's Republic of China would resume the exercise of sovereignty
over Hong Kong and the United Kingdom would restore Hong Kong
to China with effect from July 1, 1997 is signed in Beijing
by Deng Xiaoping and Margaret Thatcher.
1986 – Mikhail Gorbachev, leader of the Soviet Union, releases
Andrei Sakharov and his wife from exile in Gorky.
1995 – The United States Government restores federal recognition
to the Nottawaseppi Huron Band of Potawatomi Indian tribe.
1997 – SilkAir Flight 185 crashes into the Musi River, near
Palembang in Indonesia, killing 104.
1998 – Lewinsky scandal: The United States House of Representatives
forwards articles I and III of impeachment against President
Bill Clinton to the Senate.
2000 – The Leninist Guerrilla Units wing of the Communist Labour
Party of Turkey/Leninist attack a Nationalist Movement Party
office in Istanbul, killing one person and injuring three.
2001 – A record high barometric pressure of 1085.6 hPa (32.06
inHg) is recorded at Tosontsengel, Khövsgöl Province, Mongolia.
2001 – Argentine economic crisis: December 2001 riots – Riots
erupt in Buenos Aires.
Holidays
and observances
Christian
Feast Day:
O Radix
Pope Anastasius I
Liberation day (Goa)
Opalia (Roman Empire)
United Nations Day for South-South Cooperation (International)
For details, contact Datacentre
|