1679 – Habeaus Corpus Act (strengthening person’s right to challenge unlawful arrest & imprisonment) passes in England
1703 – Saint Petersburg (Leningrad) founded by Russian Tsar Peter the Great
1873 – Heinrich Schliemann discovers “Priam’s Treasure” a cache of gold and other objects in Hisarlik (Troy) in Anatolia
1905 – Japanese fleet destroys the Russian East Sea fleet in the Battle of Tsushima, the only decisive clash between modern steel battleships in history
1940 – British and Allied forces begin the evacuation of Dunkirk (Operation Dynamo) during WWII
1963 – Jomo Kenyatta elected 1st Prime Minister of Kenya
1994 – Writer Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn returns to Russia after 20 years in exile
1999 – The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia indicts Slobodan Milošević and four others for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Kosovo
2006 – Earthquake strikes Java, Indonesia at 5:53:58 AM local time (22:53:58 UTC May 26) devastating Bantul and the city of Yogyakarta, killing over 6,600 people
2013 – 75 people are killed and 200 are injured in a wave of bombings across Iraq
2018 – Ireland votes to repeal their 8th amendment to allow legalized abortion, 66.4% vote yes
2019 – Nine climbers die in a week on Mt Everest after overcrowding leads to a huge queue to reach the summit
2020 – Costa Rica becomes the first county in Central America to legalize same-sex marriage
Film & TV:
1933 – Walt Disney’s short film “3 Little Pigs” released (Academy Award Best Animated film 1934)
1977 – The Sex Pistols release “God Save the Queen”, sparking major controversy and leading to a ban on the song by the BBC
Music:
2018 – South Korean boy band BTS are the first K-pop group to top the US Billboard 200 with their album “Love Yourself: Tear”
Sport:
1961 – Fiorentina of Italy win 1st European Cup Winner’s Cup against Glasgow Rangers 4-2 in Florence (2nd leg)
