1940 - Four teenagers follow their dog when it disappears into a cave near Lascaux, France, and discover 17,000-year-old paintings now known as the Lascaux cave paintings.
1943 - Italian dictator Benito Mussolini is rescued by German paratroopers.
1974 - Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie is overthrown in a military coup after ruling since 1930.
1977 - Steve Biko, leader of the Black civil rights movement in South Africa, dies while in police custody. He was among at least 90 Black leaders who were killed or went missing under white rule.
1999 - Indonesia agrees to allow United Nations peacekeeping forces to enter East Timor to help end the violence there.
2001 - NATO activates its collective defense clause for the first time in its 52-year history, paving the way for a potential military response to the attacks in the United States.
2002 - Brazilian diplomat Sergio Vieira de Mello takes over as the new United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, succeeding Mary Robinson. De Mello was among 22 people killed when the United Nations office in Baghdad was bombed in August 2003.
2003 - Johnny Cash, the "Man in Black" country music singer, dies, silencing the voice that had sung sad tales of coal miners, farmers, convicts, and cowboys for nearly 50 years.
2006 - At least 51 people are killed and 238 others injured in a stampede at a stadium in Yemen's Ibb governorate during a rally addressed by President Ali Abdullah Saleh.
2007 - Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe suddenly announces his resignation after a year in office marred by scandals, an electoral defeat, and a crisis over Japan's support for U.S.-led operations in Afghanistan.
