Donald Trump becomes the first president of the United States to be elected to a non-consecutive second term in 132 years, since Grover Cleveland won the 1892 election.
India launches the Mars Orbiter Mission, its first interplanetary probe.
China's first lunar satellite, Chang'e 1, goes into orbit around the Moon.
The Android mobile operating system is unveiled by Google.
Saddam Hussein, the former president of Iraq, and his co-defendants Barzan Ibrahim al-Tikriti and Awad Hamed al-Bandar, are sentenced to death in the al-Dujail trial for their roles in the 1982 massacre of 148 Shia Muslims.
Pakistani President Farooq Leghari dismisses the government of Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto and dissolves the National Assembly.
Bill Clinton is reelected President of the United States.
USS Rentz, USS Reeves and USS Oldendorf visit Qingdao, China; the first US naval visit to China since 1949.
Richard Nixon is elected as 37th President of the United States.
After being destroyed in World War II, the rebuilt Vienna State Opera reopens with a performance of Beethoven's Fidelio.
World War II: The British armed merchant cruiser HMS Jervis Bay is sunk by the German pocket battleship Admiral Scheer.
Franklin D. Roosevelt is the first and only President of the United States to be elected to a third term.
Secret agent Sidney Reilly, the first "super-spy" of the 20th century, is executed by the OGPU, the secret police of the Soviet Union.
World War I: France and the British Empire declare war on the Ottoman Empire.
Woodrow Wilson is elected the 28th President of the United States, defeating incumbent William Howard Taft.
After declaring war on the Ottoman Empire on September 29, 1911, Italy annexes Tripoli and Cyrenaica.
George B. Selden is granted the first U.S. patent for an automobile.
Women's suffrage in the United States: In defiance of the law, suffragist Susan B. Anthony votes for the first time, and is later fined $100.
American Civil War: Abraham Lincoln removes George B. McClellan as commander of the Army of the Potomac.