1990s

January 01 - David Dinkins is sworn in as New York City's first black mayor. 02 - World population passes five billion. In 1960 it was...

January 08 - Def Leppard guitarist Steve Clark dies from a cocktail of drugs and alcohol at his home in Chelsea, London, UK. 08 - 15-year-old...

January 13 - Japan apologises for forcing tens of thousands of Korean women to serve as sex slaves for Japanese soldiers during World War II. 21...

January 01 - Czechoslovakia is peacefully divided into the Czech Republic and Slovakia. 03 - George Bush and Boris Yeltsin sign the second Strategic Arms Reduction...

January 01 - The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) comes into effect. 06 - Champion figure skater Nancy Kerrigan is attacked by a 'mystery assailant'...

January 01 - Fred West, the Gloucestershire builder charged with 12 murders, commits suicide in his prison cell. Prison officers discover the 53-year-old's body hanging...

January 05 - Yahya Ayyash - thought to be behind a wave of Islamic suicide bombings against Israel - is killed in Gaza by a...

January 09 - Yachtsman Tony Bullimore is found alive five days after his boat capsized in the freezing Southern Ocean, 2200 km off the coast...

January 01 - A new law comes into effect in California, prohibiting people from smoking in bars. 05 - Sonny Bono (of Sonny & Cher fame)...

January 01 - 11 European countries replace their national currencies with the newly created 'Euro', a single European currency. Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Holland, Belgium,...

The recession of 1990, after the boom of the 1980s, provided a rather inauspicious beginning to the new decade. By the end of the...