Today in history
1653 — Oliver Cromwell becomes lord protector of England, Scotland and Ireland.
1773 — American colonists, dressed as Indians, dump 342 chests of tea overboard from a British ship in the Boston Harbour, staging a protest against British taxation. The event becomes known as the Boston Tea Party.
1809 — Napoleon Bonaparte divorces Empress Josephine by an act of the French Senate.
1879 — Transvaal Republic is proclaimed in what is now South Africa.
1916 — Gregory Rasputin, a monk who wielded powerful influence over the Russian tsar, is murdered by a group of noblemen in St Petersburg.
1950 — United States President Harry Truman proclaims a national state of emergency in order to fight Communist imperialism.
1960 — A United Air Lines DC-8 and a TWA Super Constellation collide over New York City, killing 134 people.
1966 — UN Security Council votes 11-0 to invoke economic sanctions against white minority government in Rhodesia.
1971 — Pakistani troops surrender East Pakistan after a war with its rebels and their Indian allies. The territory soon becomes the independent nation of Bangladesh.
1979 — Five British soldiers are killed and another wounded in two Irish Republican Army bomb attacks in Northern Ireland after the group claims it would never take part in a Christmas ceasefire.
1991 — The UN General Assembly rescinds its 1975 resolution equating Zionism with racism by an 111-25 vote.
1997 — A UN team in Afghanistan reports finding mass graves with the bodies of what are thought to be 2000 Taliban soldiers captured by the Northern Alliance.
2009 — Iran test fires an upgraded version of an advanced missile capable of hitting Israel and parts of Europe, an apparent show of strength aimed at discouraging attacks on its nuclear facilities.
2012 — A 23-year-old woman is brutally gang-raped on the private bus she boarded in Delhi. She died from her injuries 13 days later. The incident sparked national and international outrage.
2014 — A 16-hour siege inside a Lindt cafe in Sydney ends with three deaths – hostages Tori Johnson and Katrina Dawson, and hostage taker Man Haron Monis. Today’s Birthdays: Jane Austen, English novelist (1775-1817); Sir Noel Coward, English dramatist-composer (1899-1973); Margaret Mead, American anthropologist (1901-1978); Benny Andersson, Swedish musiciancomposer, former member of ABBA (1946-); Miranda Otto, Australian actress (1967-).