HIGHLIGHTS IN HISTORY ON THIS DATE
1667 - The first known successful blood transfusion is carried out by Jean-Baptiste Denys, personal physician to Louis XIV of France, on a 15-year-old-boy using blood from a sheep.
1683 - Plot to assassinate King Charles II of Britain and his brother James, Duke of York, is uncovered.
1798 - Captain Arthur Phillip names Hawkesbury River in NSW.
1798 - French forces under Napoleon Bonaparte capture island of Malta.
1872 - Royal Mint opens in Melbourne.
1897 - Swiss cutlery maker Carl Elsener patents his penknife, later to become known as the Swiss army knife.
1902 - The enactment of the Commonwealth Franchise Act gives all Australian women aged over 21 the right to vote in national elections and stand for federal parliament.
1949 - Australian Prime Minister Ben Chifley delivers his "light on the hill" at the NSW Labor Party Conference.
1963 - US civil rights leader Medgar Evers is fatally shot in front of his home in Jackson, Mississippi.
1963 - One of Hollywood's costliest failures, Cleopatra, starring Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton and Rex Harrison, premieres in New York. 1964 - Nelson Mandela, Walter Sisulu and other anti-apartheid leaders are sentenced to life in prison.
1976 - A military coup in Uruguay overthrows civilian president Juan Bordaberry, beginning a nine-year dictatorship.
1991 - Boris Yeltsin is elected president of the Russian Republic.
1993 - United Nations Forces launch offensive against Somali warlord Mohammed Farrah Aideed.
1994 - Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman are found stabbed to death in Brentwood, California; her ex-husband, former American football star OJ Simpson, is later acquitted of their murder.
996 - Eighteen Australian servicemen die when two army Blackhawk helicopters collide and burst into flames during training exercises near Townsville, Queensland.
2001 - Mohamed Rashed Daoud Al-'Owhali, an Osama bin Laden follower, receives life in prison without parole for the 1998 bombing of the US Embassy in Kenya, which killed 213 people.
2002 - A three-judge panel in the New Jersey State Superior Court rules the US government may keep secret the names of immigrants detained in the wake of September 11 attacks.
2003 - Gregory Peck, one of the last great stars from Hollywood's golden era, dies aged 87.
2005 - Kuwait appoints its first woman cabinet member, naming veteran women's rights activist Massouma al-Mubarak as planning minister.
2007 - Yugoslav war crimes tribunal convicts former Croatian Serb leader Milan Martic of mass murders, torture and persecution of non-Serbs from 1991-95.
2008 - Nepalese officials take control of the main royal palace in Katmandu, a day after deposed King Gyanendra left to begin life as a civilian.
2009 - The UN Security Council imposes punishing new sanctions on North Korea, toughening an arms embargo and authorising ship searches on the high seas in an attempt to thwart the reclusive nation's nuclear and ballistic programs.
2011 - Turkey's ruling party surges to a third term in parliamentary elections, setting the stage for the rising regional power to pursue trademark economic growth, assertive diplomacy and an overhaul of the military-era constitution.
2012 - The US accuses Russia of escalating the Syrian conflict by sending attack helicopters to President Bashar Assad's regime and UN observers are attacked with stones, metal rods and gunfire that blocks them from getting to a rebel-held town where civilians were feared trapped by government shell fire.
2013 - Turkey's government offers a first concrete gesture aimed at ending nearly two weeks of street protests.
2014 - Ukraine's president rallies support for his plan to end fighting in the country's east in phone calls with the Russian and German leaders; Essendon players issued with show-cause notices by ASADA. Club launches Federal Court challenge aiming to kill off anti-doping disciplinary action against 34 AFL players.
2015 - EU officials address the possibility of a Greek debt default for the first time, as negotiations between Athens and its creditors stall ahead of the repayment deadline.
2016 - Unprecedented new details of medieval cities hidden under jungle in Cambodia near Angkor Wat have been revealed using lasers, shedding new light on the civilisation behind the world's largest religious complex.
2017 - A Moscow court sentences opposition leader and Putin critic Alexei Navalny to a second prison term.
