Portal:Current events/2008 August 13

August 13, 2008 (Wednesday)

Bill Gwatney, the current state Chairman of the Democratic Party of Arkansas is shot and killed at the Party headquarters in Little Rock, Arkansas. The man who shot Gwatney is later shot dead by police during a pursuit. (CNN)
Princess Lilian of Sweden is taken to hospital after falling and breaking her hip. (The Local)
American swimmer Michael Phelps breaks the record for most Olympic gold medals won by an individual athlete at the Beijing Olympics. (ESPN)
2008 South Ossetia war:
- The Russian President Dmitry Medvedev announces a national day of mourning in Russia in connection with the Battle of Tskhinvali and the death of a large number of Russian citizens there. Georgian Orthodox Church Patriarch Ilia II announced the national day of mourning for soldiers and civilians who died during the 2008 South Ossetia war. (ITARTass) (24.UA) (AOL news India) (Newsgeorgia via NitaPress)
- The investigation of what Russian officials called a 'genocide' started in South Ossetia. Some witnesses say that a church with civilians inside was burned by the Georgian Army in the captured Ossetian village in the first day of Georgian attack. (Mail On Sunday)
  - Journalists may again enter the South Ossetian capital Tskhinvali as the city is mostly secured after Georgian retreat. The articles give new evidence of what the city looks like and what people in Tskhinvali think of the recent events. (The Guardian) (BBC News) (AP)
- No reports of fighting after ceasefire in the war between Georgia and Russia holds.(HRW) (The Times) (Guardian)
- Saakashvili accused Russia of bombing Tskhinvali, South Ossetia's capital, and invading Gori. However, journalists in Gori report no Russian tanks seen on the streets. Anatoly Nagovitsyn, the Russian military's deputy chief of staff, categorically denied that there were any tanks on the streets of Gori, saying Russian forces were at an abandoned Georgian artillery base near Gori, dismantling it, but not inside the town. (BBC News) (BBC News) (CNN)
  - Sky's Jason Farrell claims he witnessed Russian armor moving at the outskirts of the Georgian town of Gori. (Sky News)
  - British television's Sky Team was robbed near the Georgian town of Gori by a man who 'did not seem to be Russian'. The journalist Andrew Wilson claims 'he could not be sure the men who had pulled their car over were South Ossetian' either. (Sky News)
- An unnamed 'senior U.S. NATO official' says that USA may withdraw from a major NATO naval exercise with Russia that is to begin on Friday. (Fox News)
- President George W Bush has said the United States will use military aircraft and naval forces to deliver aid to Georgia. (BBC News)
  - President Bush sends United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to Paris and then Tbilisi. (AP via Google News)
A Fokker F27-500 cargo aircraft operated by Fly540 Logistics Ltd. crashes in Somalia. Three people died. (Bloomberg)
An explosion at a police station in the Pakistani city of Lahore kills at least three people, on the eve of the 61^st anniversary of independence. (BBC News)