Thirty killed as Naxals attack bus in India
2002 - Some 30 people were killed in the south Indian state of Andhra Pradesh when guerrillas blew up a busload of innocent passengers. Police said Naxalite rebels of the outlawed People’s War Group (PWG) used a remote-controlled device to blow up the bus in a village about 140km from Warangal town, believing the passengers to be police. Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu announced compensation of Rs300,000 for each of the families of the dead, a plot of land and a job for one of the family members. He also announced compensation of Rs100,000 for each of the seriously injured and Rs50,000 for those who sustained minor injuries. Naidu, however, ruled out reviving peace talks with the PWG. He said, “Dialogue in the past did not yield any result.”
November 18
1820 - US Navy Captain Nathaniel Palmer is the first person to reach Antarctica.
1830 - National Congress in Belgium decrees independence.
1903 - US and Panama sign treaty granting the US rights to build the Panama Canal.
1905 - Prince Charles of Denmark is elected the first king of Norway after independence is restored.
1928 - Mickey Mouse makes his debut in the US in the first successful sound-synchronised cartoon, Steamboat Willie.
1941 - British troops launch attack in the West African desert during the Second World War.
1970 - West Germany and Poland agree to restore relations, ending 31 years of enmity.
1976 - Spain’s parliament approves a bill to establish democracy after 37 years of dictatorship.
1977 - Egyptian embassy in Athens is stormed by Palestinian students.
1978 - A total of 912 people die in Jonestown, Guyana, after Peoples Temple cult leader Jim Jones convinces most followers to commit mass suicide by drinking a cyanide-laced punch.
1982 - A new exhibition hall is officially inaugurated at the Dubai International Trade Centre.
1987 - A wooden escalator catches fire and pours flames and smoke into London’s busiest subway station, killing at least 30 people.
1996 - Italian boxer Fabrizio De Chiara dies from ring injuries.
2005 - Two suicide bombings kill more than 77 people at Shiite mosques during Friday prayers in a north-eastern Iraq town.
2007 - A methane blast rips through a coal mine in eastern Ukraine, killing at least 70 miners.
2011 - An Italian prototype plane crashes off Dubai’s coast on its way home after taking part in the Dubai Airshow.
2012 - A massive fire rips though 34-storey Tamweel Tower in Jumeirah Lakes Towers, leaving hundreds homeless.
2013 - At least 26 people are killed when a train ploughs into a truck and a mini-bus at a railway crossing in Dahshour, Egypt.
2014 - Sharjah opens plot sales to expatriates with valid UAE residence visas for the first time.
2015 - Dr Amal Al Qubaisi becomes first woman speaker of UAE Federal National Council.
