2000 Explained

2000 (MM) was a leap year that started on Saturday of the Common Era, in accordance with the Gregorian calendar. 2000 was also the first century leap year since 1600.

2000 was designated as:

International Year for the Culture of Peace.
World Mathematical Year.

The year 2000 was the target of Y2K concerns, fearing computers could not shift from 2-digit "99" to "2000"; however, many companies had already converted their software, even obtaining Y2K certification, and relatively few problems occurred.

Popular culture also holds the year 2000 as the first year of the 21st century and the third millennium. In the Gregorian Calendar, however, this distinction falls to the year 2001, because the first century began with year AD 1 (there was no year zero), and the thousand years spanned to years 1-1001 (see more at: millennium).

Events

January

January 1 - Y2K passes without serious, widespread computer failures, despite fears to the contrary.
January 3–10 - Israel and Syria hold inconclusive peace talks.
January 4 - Alan Greenspan is nominated for a fourth term as U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman.
January 5–8 - The 2000 al-Qaeda Summit of several high-level al-Qaeda members (including 2 9/11 American Airlines hijackers) is held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
January 10 - America Online announces an agreement to purchase Time Warner for $162 billion (the largest-ever corporate merger).
January 11 - The armed wing of the Islamic Salvation Front concludes its negotiations with the government for an amnesty and disbands in Algeria (see Algerian Civil War).
January 11 - The trawler Solway Harvester sinks off the Isle of Man.^[1]
January 12 - 9/11 hijackers Mohammed Atta and Ziad Jahrah read their wills in the Martyrdom Video.
January 14 - A United Nations tribunal sentences 5 Bosnian Croats to up to 25 years in prison for the 1993 killing of over 100 Bosnian Muslims in a Bosnian village.^[2]
January 14 - The Dow Jones Industrial Average closes at 11,722.98 (at the peak of the Dot-com bubble).
January 16 - In Sacramento, California, a commercial truck carrying evaporated milk is driven into the State Capitol building, killing the driver.
January 18 - The Tagish Lake meteorite impacts the Earth.
January 24 - God's Army, a Karen militia group led by twins Johnny and Luther Htoo, takes 700 hostages at a Thai hospital near the Burmese border.
January 26 - The rap-metal band Rage Against the Machine plays in front of Wall Street, prompting an early closing of trading due to the crowds.
January 30 - Super Bowl XXXIV: The St. Louis Rams win the NFL Championship for the first time since 1951, defeating the Tennessee Titans 23-16.
January 30 - Kenya Airways Flight 431 crashes off the coast of Côte d'Ivoire into the Atlantic Ocean, killing 169.
January 31 - Alaska Airlines Flight 261 crashes off the California coast into the Pacific Ocean, killing 88.
January 31 - Dr. Harold Shipman is found guilty of murdering 15 patients between 1995 and 1998 and sentenced to life imprisonment.

February

February 4 - German extortionist Klaus-Peter Sabotta is jailed for life for attempted murder and extortion, in connection with the sabotage of German railway lines.
February 6 - Tarja Halonen is elected the first female president of Finland.
February 7 - Stipe Mesic is elected president of Croatia.
February 9 - Torrential rains in Africa lead to the worst flooding in Mozambique in 50 years, which lasts until March and kills 800 people.
February 11 - A blast from an improvised explosive device in front of a Barclay's Bank, across from the New York Stock Exchange on Wall Street, wounds dozens but kills none.
February 13 - The final original Peanuts comic strip is published, following the death of its creator, Charles Schulz.
February 17 - Microsoft releases Windows 2000.
February 21 - UNESCO holds the inaugural celebration of International Mother Language Day.

March

March 1 - The Constitution of Finland is rewritten.
March 2 - Hans Blix assumes the position of Executive Chairman of UNMOVIC.
March 7 - George W. Bush and Al Gore emerge victorious in the Republican and Democratic caucuses and primaries of the United States presidential election.
March 8 - Tokyo train disaster: A sideswipe collision of 2 Tokyo Metro trains kills 5 people.
March 9 - The FBI arrests art forgery suspect Ely Sakhai in New York City.
March 9 - Nupedia, predecessor to Wikipedia, is created.
March 10 - The NASDAQ Composite Index reaches an all-time high of 5,048.^[3]
March 12 - Pope John Paul II apologises for the wrongdoings by members of the Roman Catholic Church throughout the ages.
March 18 - ROC presidential election, 2000: Chen Shui-bian is elected President of the Republic of China (Taiwan); the Democratic Progressive Party ends Kuomintang rule for the first time.
March 20 - Jamil Abdullah Al-Amin (H. Rap Brown), a former Black Panther, is captured after a gun battle in Atlanta, Georgia that leaves a sheriff's deputy dead.
March 21 - Pope John Paul II begins the first official visit by a Roman Catholic pontiff to Israel.
March 21 - The U.S. Supreme Court rules that the government lacks authority to regulate tobacco as an addictive drug, throwing out the Bill Clinton administration's main anti-smoking initiative.
March 26 - Vladimir Putin is elected President of Russia.
March 27 - The Phillips explosion of 2000 kills 1 and injured 71 in Pasadena, Texas.
March 31 - Myra Hindley loses a High Court appeal against her life imprisonment sentence.

April

April 1 - Japanese prime minister Keizo Obuchi suffers a stroke, falls into a coma, and dies.
April 3 - United States v. Microsoft: Microsoft is ruled to have violated United States antitrust laws by keeping "an oppressive thumb" on its competitors.
April 5 - Yoshiro Mori replaces Keizo Obuchi as prime minister of Japan.
April 16 - Sultan Hisamuddin Alam Shah, Sultan of Selangor, dies after a reign of 55 years. He was the longest-reigning monarch in the world since the death of Prince Franz Joseph II of Liechtenstein.
April 17 - Tuanku Syed Sirajuddin becomes Raja of Perlis.
April 22 - Brazil officially celebrates its 500th anniversary, with protests, especially from native and black populations.
April 22 - In a predawn raid, federal agents seize 6-year old Elián González from his relatives' home in Miami, Florida and fly him to his Cuban father in Washington, DC, ending one of the most publicized custody battles in U.S. history.
April 25 - The State of Vermont passes HB847, legalizing civil unions for same-sex couples.
April 28 - Richard Baumhammers begins a 2-hour racially-motivated shooting spree in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, leaving 5 dead and 1 paralyzed.

May

May 3 - A rare conjunction of 7 celestial bodies (Sun, Moon, planets Mercury-Saturn) occurs on the New Moon.
May 3 - In San Antonio, Texas, computer pioneer Datapoint files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
May 4 - ILOVEYOU computer virus spreads quickly throughout the world originating in Philippines.
May 11 - The billionth living person in India is born.
May 12 - The Tate Modern Gallery opens in London.
May 13 - A fireworks factory disaster in Enschede Netherlands, kills 23.
May 17 - A bomb in Glorietta Mall in Makati City, Philippines injures 13.
May 20 - Chinese (ROC) president Chen Shui-bian makes the Four Noes and One Without pledge to Taiwan.
May 25 - Israel withdraws IDF forces from southern Lebanon after 22 years.

June

June 5 - 405 The Movie, the first short film widely distributed on the Internet, is released.
June 13 - South Korean President Kim Dae Jung visits North Korea to participate in the first North-South presidential summit.
June 17 - A centennial earthquake (6.5 on Richter scale) hits Iceland on its national day.
June 21 - Section 28, a law preventing the promotion of homosexuality, is repealed by the Scottish Parliament.
June 26 - A preliminary draft of genomes, as part of the Human Genome Project, is finished.
June 28 - Elian Gonzalez returns to Cuba with his father, Juan Miguel Gonzalez, ending a protracted custody battle.
June 30 - At the Roskilde Festival near Copenhagen, Denmark, 9 die and 26 are injured on a set while the rock group Pearl Jam performs.

July

July 2 - France beats Italy 2-1 to win Euro 2000 with a golden goal.
July 2 - Vicente Fox is elected President of Mexico, as candidate of the rightist PAN (National Action Party), ending 71 years of PRI (Institutional Revolutionary Party) rule.
July 10 - In southern Nigeria, a leaking petroleum pipeline explodes, killing about 250 villagers who were scavenging gasoline.
July 10 - Bashar al-Assad is confirmed as Syria's leader in a national referendum.
July 11–25 - Israel's prime minister Ehud Barak and PLO head Yasser Arafat meet at Camp David, but fail to reach an agreement.
July 18 - Alex Salmond resigns as the leader of the Scottish National Party.
July 18 - Sussex police launch a murder investigation after the body of a girl found near Pulborough is confirmed to be that of Sarah Payne, who was reported missing on July 1.
July 21–23 - G-8 Nations hold their 26th Annual Summit; issues include AIDS, the 'digital divide', and halving world poverty by 2015.
July 22 - News of the World urges its readers to sign a petition for Sarah's Law, new legislation in response to the murder of Sarah Payne, which would give parents the right to know whether a convicted paedophile was living in their area.
July 25 - Air France Flight 4590, a Concorde aircraft, crashes into a hotel in Gonesse just after takeoff from Paris, killing all 109 aboard and 4 in the hotel.
July 30 - Venezuela's president Hugo Chávez is reelected with 59% of the vote.
July 31 – August 3 - The Republican National Convention in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania nominates George W. Bush for U.S. President and Dick Cheney for Vice President.

August

August 3 - Rioting erupts on the Paulsgrove estate in Portsmouth, Hampshire, England, after more than 100 people besiege the home of a block of flats allegedly housing a convicted paedophile. This is the latest vigilante violence against suspected sex offenders since the beginning of the "naming and shaming" anti-paedophile campaign by the tabloid newspaper News of the World.
August 8 - The Confederate submarine H.L. Hunley is raised to the surface after 136 years on the ocean floor.
August 12 - The Russian submarine K-141 Kursk sinks in the Barents Sea, resulting in the deaths of all 118 men on board.
August 14 - Tsar Nicholas II and his family are canonized by the synod of the Russian Orthodox Church.
August 14–17 - The Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles nominates U.S. Vice President Al Gore for President and Senator Joe Lieberman for Vice President.
August 23 - John Anthony Kaiser a Roman Catholic priest was murdered in Morendat, Kenya.
August 27 - The Ostankino Tower fire in Moscow kills 3.

September

September 5 - Tuvalu joins the United Nations.
September 5 - The Haverstraw-Ossining Ferry makes its maiden voyage.
September 6 - In Paragould, Arkansas, Breanna Lynn Bartlett-Stewart is stillborn to Scott Stewart and Lisa Bartlett. Breanna Lynn's stillbirth is notable for being the first stillbirth to be resolved by means of the Kleihauer-Betke test.
September 6 - The last wholly Swedish-owned arms manufacturer, Bofors, is sold to American arms manufacturer United Defense.
September 6–8 - World leaders attend the Millennium Summit at UN Headquarters.
September 7–14 - The UK fuel protests take place, with refineries blockaded, and supply to the country's network of petrol stations halted.
September 8 - Albania officially joins the World Trade Organization.
September 14 - Microsoft releases Windows ME.
September 15 – October 1 - The 2000 Summer Olympics are held in Sydney, Australia.
September 16 - Ukrainian journalist Georgiy Gongadze is last seen alive; this day is taken as the commemoration date of his death.
September 16 - Peru's president Alberto Fujimori calls for new elections in which he will not run.
September 26 - The Greek ferry Express Samina sinks off the coast of the island of Paros; 80 out of a total of over 500 passengers perish in one of Greece's worst sea disasters.
September 26 - Anti-globalization protests in Prague (some 15,000 protesters) turn violent during the IMF and World Bank summits.
September 28 - Israeli opposition leader Ariel Sharon visits the Temple Mount, protected by a several-hundred-strong Israeli police force. Palestinian riots erupt, leading to a full-fledged armed uprising (called the Al-Aqsa Intifada by sympathizers and the Oslo War by opponents).
September 29 - The Long Kesh prison in Northern Ireland is closed.

October

October 1 - The 2000 Summer Olympics close in Sydney, Australia.
October 5 - President Slobodan Milošević leaves office after widespread demonstrations throughout Serbia.
October 6 - The last Mini is produced in Longbridge.
October 11 - 250 million gallons of coal sludge spill in Martin County, Kentucky (considered a greater environmental disaster than the Exxon Valdez oil spill).
October 12 - In Aden, Yemen, the USS Cole is badly damaged by two Al-Qaeda suicide bombers, who place a small boat laden with explosives alongside the United States Navy destroyer, killing 17 crew members and wounding at least 39.
October 21 - Fifteen Arab leaders convene in Cairo, Egypt, for their first summit in 4 years; the Libyan delegation walks out, angry over signs the summit will stop short of calling for breaking ties with Israel.
October 22 - The Mainichi Shinbun newspaper exposes Japanese archeologist Shinichi Fujimura as a fraud; Japanese archaeologists had based their treatises on his findings.
October 23 - Madeleine Albright holds talks with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il.
October 26 - Pakistani authorities announce that their police have found an apparently ancient mummy of a Persian princess in the province of Balochistan. Iran, Pakistan and the Taliban all claim the mummy until Pakistan announces it is a forgery on April 17, 2001.
October 26 - The New York Yankees defeat the New York Mets in Game 5 of the 2000 World Series, 4-1, to win their 26th World Series title (and latest to date). This is the first Subway Series matchup between the 2 crosstown rivals. It is their 4th World Series win in the last 5 years under Manager Joe Torre.
October 30 - This is the final date during which there is no human presence in space; on October 31, Soyuz TM-31 launches, carrying the first resident crew to the International Space Station. The ISS has been continuously crewed since.
October 31 - Singapore Airlines Flight 006 collides with construction equipment in the Chiang Kai Shek International Airport, resulting in 83 deaths.

November

November - Iraq disarmament crisis: Iraq rejects new U.N. Security Council weapons inspections proposals.
November 2 - The first resident crew enters the International Space Station.
November 3 - Widespread flooding occurs throughout England and Wales after days of heavy rain.
November 7 - United States presidential election, 2000: Republican candidate Texas Governor George W. Bush defeats Democratic Vice President Al Gore in the closest election in history, but the final outcome is not known for over a month because of disputed votes in Florida.
November 7 - In London, a criminal gang raids the Millennium Dome to steal The Millennium Star diamond, but police surveillance catches them in the act.
November 7 - Hillary Rodham Clinton is elected to the United States Senate, becoming the first First Lady of the United States to win public office.
November 11 - Kaprun disaster, Austria: A cable car fire in an Alpine tunnel kills 155 skiers and snowboarders.
November 14 - Netscape Navigator 6.0 is launched, following 2 years of open source development, creating a stable Mozilla web browser upon which it is based.
November 15 - A new Indian state called Jharkhand is formed, carving out the South Chhota Nagpur area from Bihar in India.
November 16 - Bill Clinton becomes the first sitting U.S. President to visit Vietnam.
November 17 - A catastrophic landslide in Log pod Mangartom, Slovenia, kills 7, and causes millions of SIT of damage. It is one of the worst catastrophes in Slovenia in the past 100 years.
November 17 - Alberto Fujimori is removed from office as president of Peru.
November 25 - The Rugby League World Cup in England is ended, with Australia winning 40-12 over the New Zealand Kiwis.
November 26 - The British Columbia Lions win the CFL Championship for the first time since 1994, defeating the Montreal Alouettes 28-26 in the 88th Grey Cup at McMahon Stadium in Calgary, Alberta.
November 27 - Jean Chrétien is re-elected as Prime Minister of Canada, as the Liberal Party increases its majority in the House of Commons.
November 28 - Ukrainian politician Oleksander Moroz touches off the Cassette Scandal by publicly accusing President Leonid Kuchma of involvement in the murder of journalist Georgiy Gongadze.

December

December 1 - Vicente Fox takes office as President of Mexico.
December 13 - Bush v. Gore: The U.S. Supreme Court stops the Florida presidential recount, effectively giving the state, and the Presidency, to George W. Bush.
December 13 - The Texas 7 escape from their prison unit in Kenedy, Texas, and start a crime spree.
December 24 - The Texas 7 rob a sports store in Irving, Texas; police officer Aubrey Hawkins is shot dead.
December 24 - Christmas Eve 2000 Indonesia bombings: 18 people are killed in multiple Islamist bomb attacks on churches across Indonesia.
December 25 - A shopping center fire at Luoyang, Henan, China kills 309.
December 28 - U.S. retail giant Montgomery Ward announces it is going out of business after 128 years.
December 30 - Rizal Day Bombings: A series of bombs explode in various places in Metro Manila, Philippines, within a span of a few hours, killing 22 and injuring about 100.
December 31 - The Millennium Dome closes its doors one year to the day of its opening.

World population

World population^[4]
	2000	1995			2005
World	6,070,581,000	5,674,380,000	+396,201,000	+6,98%	6,453,628,000	+383,047,000	+6,31%
Africa	795,671,000	707,462,000	+88,209,000	+12,47%	887,964,000	+92,293,000	+11,60%
Asia	3,679,737,000	3,430,052,000	+249,685,000	+7,28%	3,917,508,000	+237,771,000	+6,46%
Europe	727,986,000	727,405,000	+581,000	+0,08%	724,722,000	align="right"	-3,264,000	align="right"	-0,45%
Latin America	520,229,000	481,099,000	+39,130,000	+8,13%	558,281,000	+38,052,000	+7,31%
Northern America	315,915,000	299,438,000	+16,477,000	+5,50%	332,156,000	+16,241,000	+5,14%
Oceania	31,043,000	28,924,000	+2,119,000	+7,33%	32,998,000	+1,955,000	+6,30%

Births

January 4 - Rhiannon Leigh Wryn, American actress
May 2 - Angel Sy, Filipina Child Actor
May 10 - Shyann McClure, American actress and model
August 5 - Maya Bond, Japanese-born American singer and musician
July 27 - Kali Rodriguez, American actress
September 6 - Breanna Lynn Bartlett-Stewart, notable American stillborn baby girl (d. 2000)
September 9 - Victoria Federica de Marichalar y de Borbón, granddaughter of King Juan Carlos I of Spain.
September 26 - Princess Salma bint Al Abdullah II
November 20 - Connie Talbot, English singer
November 30 - Destiny Norton, American crime victim (d. 2006)
December 6 - Pablo Nicolás Urdangarín y de Borbón, grandson of King Juan Carlos I of Spain.

Deaths

See main article: Deaths in 2000.