June
20
World
Refugee Day
For
years, many countries and regions have been
holding their own Refugee Days and even Weeks.
One of the most widespread is Africa Refugee
Day, which is celebrated on 20 June in several
countries.
The
UN General Assembly, on 4 December 2000, adopted
resolution 55/76 where it noted that 2001
marked the 50th anniversary of the 1951 Convention
relating to the Status of Refugees, and that
the Organization of African Unity (OAU) had
agreed to have International Refugee Day coincide
with Africa Refugee Day on 20 June.
The
General Assembly therefore decided that, from
2001, 20 June would be celebrated as World
Refugee Day.
The
theme of this year’s observance is “Home”
- and highlights the plight of the world’s
15 million refugees, more than three-quarters
of them in the developing world, who have
been uprooted from their homes by conflict
or persecution.
Events
451
– Battle of Chalons: Flavius Aetius' battles
Attila the Hun. After the battle, which was
inconclusive, Attila retreats, causing the
Romans to interpret it as a victory.
1214 – The University of Oxford receives its
charter.
1605 – After only three months as tsar, 16-year-old
Feodor II of Russia is assassinated.
1631 – The sack of Baltimore: the Irish village
of Baltimore is attacked by Algerian pirates.
1652 – Tarhoncu Ahmet Paşa is appointed grand
vezir of the Ottoman Empire.
1685 – Monmouth Rebellion: James Scott, 1st
Duke of Monmouth declares himself King of
England at Bridgwater.
1756 – A British garrison is imprisoned in
the Black Hole of Calcutta.
1782 – The U.S. Congress adopts the Great
Seal of the United States.
1787 – Oliver Ellsworth moves at the Federal
Convention to call the government the United
States.
1789 – Deputies of the French Third Estate
take the Tennis Court Oath.
1819 – The U.S. vessel SS Savannah arrives
at Liverpool, England, United Kingdom. She
is the first steam-propelled vessel to cross
the Atlantic, although most of the journey
is made under sail.
1837 – Queen Victoria succeeds to the British
throne.
1840 – Samuel Morse receives the patent for
the telegraph.
1862 – Barbu Catargiu, the Prime Minister
of Romania, is assassinated.
1863 – American Civil War: West Virginia is
admitted as the 35th U.S. state.
1877 – Alexander Graham Bell installs the
world's first commercial telephone service
in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.
1887 – Victoria Terminus, the busiest railway
station in India, opens in Bombay.
1893 – Lizzie Borden is acquitted of the murders
of her father and stepmother.
1895 – The Kiel Canal, crossing the base of
the Jutland peninsula and the busiest artificial
waterway in the world, is officially opened.
1900 – Boxer Rebellion: The Imperial Chinese
Army begins a 55-day siege of the Legation
Quarter in Beijing, China.
1919 – 150 die at the Teatro Yaguez fire,
Mayagüez, Puerto Rico.
1921 – Workers of Buckingham and Carnatic
Mills in the city of Chennai, India, begin
a four-month strike.
1942 – The Holocaust: Kazimierz Piechowski
and three others, dressed as members of the
SS-Totenkopfverbände, steal an SS staff car
and escape from the Auschwitz concentration
camp.
1943 – The Detroit Race Riot breaks out and
continues for three more days.
1944 – World War II: The Battle of the Philippine
Sea concludes with a decisive U.S. naval victory.
The lopsided naval air battle is also known
as the "Great Marianas Turkey Shoot".
1944 – Continuation war: the Soviet Union
demands an unconditional surrender from Finland
during the beginning of partially successful
Vyborg–Petrozavodsk Offensive. The Finnish
government refuses.
1948 – Toast of the Town, later The Ed Sullivan
Show, makes its television debut.
1956 – A Venezuelan Super-Constellation crashes
in the Atlantic Ocean off Asbury Park, New
Jersey, killing 74 people.
1959 – A rare June hurricane strikes Canada's
Gulf of St. Lawrence killing 35.
1960 – The Mali Federation gains independence
from France (it later splits into Mali and
Senegal).
1963 – The so-called "red telephone"
is established between the Soviet Union and
the United States following the Cuban Missile
Crisis.
1972 – Watergate scandal: An 18½-minute gap
appears in the tape recording of the conversations
between U.S. President Richard Nixon and his
advisers regarding the recent arrests of his
operatives while breaking into the Watergate
complex.
1973 – Ezeiza massacre in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Snipers fire upon left-wing Peronists. At
least 13 are killed and more than 300 are
injured.
1979 – ABC News correspondent Bill Stewart
is shot dead by a Nicaraguan soldier under
the regime of Anastasio Somoza Debayle. The
murder is caught on tape and sparks an international
outcry against the regime.
1982 – The Argentine base (Corbeta Uruguay)
on Southern Thule surrenders to Royal Marine
commandos in the final action of the Falklands
War.
1990 – Asteroid Eureka is discovered.
1991 – The German Bundestag votes to move
the capital from Bonn back to Berlin.
2003 – The WikiMedia Foundation is founded
in St. Petersburg, Florida.
2009 – During the Iranian election protests,
the death of Neda Agha-Soltan is captured
on video and spreads virally on the Internet,
making it "probably the most widely witnessed
death in human history".
Holidays
and observances
Christian
Feast Day:
Adalbert, Archbishop of Magdeburg
Florentina
Margareta Ebner (Beatified)
Pope Silverius
June 20 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics)
Day of the National Flag (Argentina)
Earliest date for the summer solstice, and
its related observance:
Earliest day on which Day of the Finnish Flag
can fall, while June 26 is the latest; celebrated
on Saturday of Midsummer's Day (Finland)
Litha / Midsummer celebrations in the northern
hemisphere, Yule in the southern hemisphere.
(Neopagan Wheel of the Year)
Martyrs' Day (Eritrea)
West Virginia Day (West Virginia)
World Refugee Day (International)
For details, contact Datacentre
|