What’s Happening Today?

World Humanitarian Day. This is an international day dedicated to recognizing humanitarian personnel and those who have lost their lives working for humanitarian causes. It marks the day on which the then Special Representative of the Secretary-General to Iraq, Sérgio Vieira de Mello and 21 of his colleagues were killed in the bombing of the UN Headquarters in Baghdad.

Independence Day (Afghanistan). Afghan Independence Day is celebrated as a national holiday in Afghanistan on 19 August to commemorate the Anglo-Afghan Treaty of 1919 and relinquishment from protected state status. The treaty granted a complete neutral relation between Afghanistan and Britain. Afghanistan had become a British protectorate after it was defeated in the Second Anglo-Afghan War.

World Photo Day. The main aim of World Photo Day is to inspire positive change across the world. Connecting people and raising awareness through the use of photography.

Founded in 2009 by the Australian photographer Korske Ara, the date of the 19th was chosen to celebrate World Photo Day as it is the date that the patent of the daguerreotype (an early method of photography) was purchased by the French government, 

What Happened Today?

1. In 1964, the world’s first geostationary satellite was launched. Syncom 3, a communications satellite was launched from Cape Canaveral in Florida. A geostationary satellite is a manmade object that follows the Earth’s rotation around its axis. Because of this, it looks like it is not moving in the sky for observers on Earth. Like all geostationary satellites, Syncom 3 was placed in orbit about 2,200 miles from Earth, above the Equator and near the International Date Line. The 1964 Tokyo Olympics were broadcast to the United States with the help of this satellite.

2. In 1991, violent race riots broke out between African-American and Orthodox Jewish residents of Crown Heights, New York, after 2 children were accidentally run down by the motorcade of Menachem Mendel Schneerson, a leader of the Orthodox Jews. This resulted in a 3-day long riot that ended in the death of 2 men and several injuries.

3. In 1996, Uganda rejoined the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (CPA). The CPA’s executive committee accepted Uganda's application for re-entry into the CPA. The decision was made at a three-day executive committee meeting held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Uganda had lost her membership after the 1985 coup that ousted President Milton Obote but the CPA granted Uganda’s re-entry after the country’s first democratic elections in June 1996.

Birthdays

1. 1946 – Bill Clinton, former American President.

2. 1970 – Fat Joe, American rapper.

Sources: Wikipedia, checkiday, bornglorious & New Vision