Story by The Associated Press

Slovakia’s Prime Minister Robert Fico was seriously wounded in an apparent assassination attempt just weeks before a Europe-wide election that has been deeply divisive. He was shot multiple times in an attack in the town of Handlova that authorities described as politically motivated, although they said the suspect did not belong to any political groups.

Here’s a global look at other notable assassinations and assassination attempts during the 21st century:

— Sept. 1, 2022: Argentina’s then-Vice President Cristina Fernández is targeted by a man who reportedly aimed a handgun at point-blank range toward the politician in what government ministers characterize as an assassination attempt.

— July 8, 2022: Japanese former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is assassinated by a gunman who opened fire on him as he delivered a campaign speech on a street in western Japan.

— Nov. 6, 2021: Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi survives an assassination attempt when two armed drones target his residence in Baghdad’s Green Zone area. While al-Kadhimi is uninjured, seven of his security guards are injured in the attack.

— Oct. 15, 2021: British lawmaker David Amess is stabbed to death by an Islamic State supporter while meeting with voters.

— July 7, 2021: Haitian President Jovenel Moïse is assassinated by gunmen in an overnight raid on his Port-au-Prince home. His widow, Martine, ex-prime minister Claude Joseph and the former chief of Haiti’s National Police, Léon Charles, among others, are indicted in his killing in February 2024.

— April 20, 2021: Chad President Idriss Deby Itno is killed while battling rebels in the north. Hours earlier he had been declared the winner of an election that would have given him another six years in power.

— Aug. 4, 2018: Drones armed with explosives detonate near Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro in an apparent assassination attempt while he is delivering a speech to hundreds of soldiers being broadcast live on television. Six people are later arrested in connection with the attack.

— Dec. 19, 2016: Russia’s ambassador to Turkey Andrei Karlov is shot dead by a Turkish policeman shouting condemnation of Russia’s military role in Syria, in front of a shocked gathering at a photo exhibit. The gunman was later killed in a shootout with police.

— July 15, 2016: A group of Turkish soldiers using tanks, warplanes and helicopters launch a plot to overthrow Turkey’s president and government. The coup attempt fails. One year later, 40 people are sentenced to life in prison after being convicted on charges that include attempting to kill President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

— June 16, 2016: British lawmaker Jo Cox is shot and stabbed to death by a far-right supporter in the English village of Birstall, part of her constituency.

— Feb. 6, 2013: Tunisian left-wing opposition leader Chokri Belaid is fatally shot outside his Tunis home. His killing — followed six months later by that of another left-wing leader, Mohammed Brahmi — plunged Tunisia into political chaos. Four people are sentenced to death and two others to life in prison in March 2024 for their roles in his death.

— Oct. 20, 2011: Longtime Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi is hunted and summarily killed by insurgents after being toppled in a NATO-backed uprising.

— Jan. 8, 2011: U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords survives an assassination attempt after being shot by a man in an Arizona grocery store parking lot while meeting with constituents. Giffords’ injuries are so significant that she has to re-learn how to walk and talk. The attack kills six other people and wounds 11 more.

— March 2, 2009: Guinea-Bissau President Joao Bernardo Vieira is killed by renegade soldiers in his palace, hours after a bomb blast killed his rival in the West African nation.

— December 27, 2007: Benazir Bhutto, the first female prime minister in a Muslim-majority country as well as Pakistan’s second nationally elected prime minister, is shot at and then fatally attacked by a suicide bomber at a political rally in Rawalpindi, Pakistan.

— Feb. 14, 2005: Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri is killed by a suicide truck bomb on a seaside boulevard in Beirut. Another 21 people die and 226 are wounded in the attack, which is seen by many in Lebanon as the work of neighboring Syria.

— March 12, 2003: Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic is shot dead in front of the Serbian government headquarters in Belgrade. He was a key leader of the revolt that toppled former President Slobodan Milosevic in October 2000. Twelve people are later convicted in connection with the killing, which was carried out to halt his pro-Western reforms, according to a Serbian court ruling.

— July 2, 2002: French President Jacques Chirac survives an assassination attempt by a far-right right supporter who shoots at him and misses during Bastille Day celebrations on Paris’ Champs-Elysees. Chirac is uninjured.

— May 6, 2002: Dutch politician Pim Fortuyn is gunned down in a northern Netherlands city, days before a general election in which he was a candidate, by an animal rights activist.

— June 1, 2001: Nepal’s King Birendra is killed when his son, Crown Prince Dipendra, opens fire on his family in the royal palace. The dead include Queen Aiswarya, a prince and five others. Officials said the shooting followed a dispute over the prince’s marriage.

— Jan. 18, 2001: Congo President Laurent Kabila is assassinated in the presidential palace in the capital, Kinshasa, by one of his bodyguards, who is killed minutes later by security forces.

READ MORE AT MSN.COM

Dr. Cyril H. Wecht

1931 – 2024

Dr. Cyril H. Wecht, an indefatigable force of nature who defined his life through action and integrity, has died at the age of 93. America’s most prominent forensic pathologist, Dr. Wecht consulted on many high-profile cases and was perhaps best known as an articulate and passionate critic of the JFK autopsy and of the lone assassin findings of the Warren Commission. He was past president of both the American Academy of Forensic Sciences and the American College of Legal Medicine and sat on the board of trustees of the American Board of Legal Medicine. He served in Pittsburgh, Pa. at various times as County Commissioner, Allegheny County Coroner & Medical Examiner. He was the distinguished Professor of Pathology at Carlow University. High-profile cases he worked on include Senator Robert F. Kennedy, Sharon Tate, Brian Jones, The Symbionese Liberation Army shootout, President John F. Kennedy, The Legionnaires’ Disease panic, Elvis Presley, Jon Benét Ramsey, Dr. Herman Tarnower (the Scarsdale diet guru), Danielle van Dam, Sunny von Bülow, the Branch Davidian incident, Vincent Foster, Laci Peterson and most recently Daniel and Anna Nicole Smith. During his career, Dr. Wecht performed more than 14,000 autopsies. He was a clinical professor at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and an adjunct professor of law at Duquesne University. He served on the U.S. House of Representatives Select Committee on Assassinations, Forensic Pathology Panel, and participated as a consultant for Oliver Stone’s 1991 film JFK. In 1982 he was the Democratic candidate for the U.S. Senate opposing John Heinz. Wecht fiercely contested the official government conclusion that a single bullet caused seven non-fatal wounds to President Kennedy and Governor Connally and emerged in nearly pristine condition. In the fall of 2000, the Duquesne University School of Law established the Cyril H. Wecht Institute of Forensic Science and Law. He was founder and president of Citizens Against Political Assassination (CAPA). He was a dedicated and inspiring educator, speaker; an advocate of reason and principle who played a visible and leading role within the JFK assassination research community.

LISTEN to Alan Dale’s JFK Conversation with Dr. Wecht by clicking HERE.

13 May, 2024

Dr. Cyril H. Wecht

1931 – 2024

Dr. Cyril H. Wecht, an indefatigable force of nature who defined his life through action and integrity, has died at the age of 93. America’s most prominent forensic pathologist, Dr. Wecht consulted on many high-profile cases and was perhaps best known as an articulate and passionate critic of the JFK autopsy and of the lone assassin findings of the Warren Commission. He was past president of both the American Academy of Forensic Sciences and the American College of Legal Medicine and sat on the board of trustees of the American Board of Legal Medicine. He served in Pittsburgh, Pa. at various times as County Commissioner, Allegheny County Coroner & Medical Examiner. He was the distinguished Professor of Pathology at Carlow University. High-profile cases he worked on include Senator Robert F. Kennedy, Sharon Tate, Brian Jones, The Symbionese Liberation Army shootout, President John F. Kennedy, The Legionnaires’ Disease panic, Elvis Presley, Jon Benét Ramsey, Dr. Herman Tarnower (the Scarsdale diet guru), Danielle van Dam, Sunny von Bülow, the Branch Davidian incident, Vincent Foster, Laci Peterson and most recently Daniel and Anna Nicole Smith. During his career, Dr. Wecht performed more than 14,000 autopsies. He was a clinical professor at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and an adjunct professor of law at Duquesne University. He served on the U.S. House of Representatives Select Committee on Assassinations, Forensic Pathology Panel, and participated as a consultant for Oliver Stone’s 1991 film JFK. In 1982 he was the Democratic candidate for the U.S. Senate opposing John Heinz. Wecht fiercely contested the official government conclusion that a single bullet caused seven non-fatal wounds to President Kennedy and Governor Connally and emerged in nearly pristine condition. In the fall of 2000, the Duquesne University School of Law established the Cyril H. Wecht Institute of Forensic Science and Law. He was founder and president of Citizens Against Political Assassination (CAPA). He was a dedicated and inspiring educator, speaker; an advocate of reason and principle who played a visible and leading role within the JFK assassination research community.

LISTEN to Alan Dale’s JFK Conversation with Dr. Wecht by clicking HERE.

CLICK HERE TO READ Cyril Wecht and the Magic Bullet by Dr. Donald B. Thomas.

 

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8 May, 2024

 

Adam Walinsky 

1937 – 2023

Attorney, speechwriter and aide to Senator Robert F. Kennedy.  A proponent of peace, a passionate advocate for civil rights and progressive social policies, whose eloquence and idealism equaled his directness and pragmatism. He was perceived by many to have been to RFK what Ted Sorensen was to President Kennedy.  Many of his words and phrases will live in perpetuity. He is credited with primary authorship of Senator Edward M. Kennedy’s eulogy of his brother, delivered at St. Patrick’s Cathedral, 8 June, 1968:

My brother need not be idealized, or enlarged in death beyond what he was in life; to be remembered simply as a good and decent man who saw wrong and tried to right it, saw suffering and tried to heal it, saw war and tried to stop it.  Those of us who loved him, and who take him to his rest today, pray that what he was to us and what he wished for others, will some day come to pass for all the world. As he said many times, in many parts of this nation, to those he touched and who sought to touch him, ‘Some men see things as they are and say, why? I dream things that never were and say, why not?’

Click on this title for AARC Board member David Talbot’s remembrance:  Adam Walinsky, Restless in Peace

 

Press release: for immediate release

UK and US accused of obstruction in UN inquiry on Dag Hammarskjöld plane crash

 

Allegations that the UK and US are obstructing a United Nations investigation into the 1961 plane crash that killed UN Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjöld and fifteen others has sparked renewed demands for accountability and transparency.

 

At a conference held in London on 29 February 2024, followed worldwide online, leading experts accused the US and UK of major obstructions to the ongoing UN investigation into the crash and agreed that the mandate must be extended. Lord Boateng, former UK high commissioner to South Africa, in closing the conference, stated that there must be no hiding place for murderers.

 

Susan Williams’s book “Who Killed Hammarskjöld?” and recommendations from a group of eminent jurists in 2013 prompted the UN to reopen its inquiry, appointing Justice Mohamed Chande Othman to lead investigations. There is consensus that the plane crash was not an accident or caused by pilot error. Recognising the likelihood of key information held in member states’ intelligence and security archives, Justice Othman requested independent officials be appointed to conduct thorough searches. While Belgium, Sweden, and Zimbabwe demonstrated serious efforts, the US and UK responses were wholly inadequate and showed contempt for the UN inquiry.

 

Despite overwhelming support for Justice Othman’s mandate within the UN General Assembly, the UK and US have consistently declined to co-sponsor further resolutions for renewal. This underscores the challenges faced in obtaining transparency and cooperation from key UN Member States.

 

In contrast, firm support was demonstrated by the presence of the Zambian High Commissioner to the UK, Ms Macenje Mazoka, and others from the global south, especially from Africa, including the Archbishop of Cape Town, Most Revd Thabo Makgoba. This highlights the dividing line in current geopolitics: Efforts to uncover the truth are hindered by insufficient cooperation and transparency from the US and UK, both permanent members of the Security Council, while the Global South is among the 142 UN Member States in support of the investigations. Yet, the persistence of Justice Othman and the growing support from independent investigators signal a commitment to uncovering the truth behind this historic tragedy.

 

Lord Boateng said “The work must continue because it is part of a wider struggle to support democracy, the international rule of law, and the UN, all under increasing threat. There must be no stone unturned to get at the truth. The suspected murder of a UN Secretary General is a crime too grave to be obliterated by time.”

 

Professor Kingsley Abbott, Director of the Institute of Commonwealth Studies, said: “It is unfortunate that the apparent killing of a United Nations Secretary General has revealed yet another example of the Global North – South divide”.

 

The conference was organised by the Institute of Commonwealth Studies at the School of Advanced Study, University of London and the Westminster United Nations Association.

 

Notes to editors

 

• For more information and interviews with the conference organisers, contact: Siobhan Pipa in the University of London press office – pipa@london.ac.uk

Dag Hammarskjöld’s Plane Crash:
The Continuing Search for Truth

Next Steps for the UN Commission of Inquiry

 

“From the totality of the information at hand, it appears plausible that an external attack or threat may have been a cause of the crash, whether by way of a direct attack … or by distracting the pilots at the critical stage of preparing to land.”

Justice Mohamed Chande Othman, Eminent Person leading the continuing UN Commission of Inquiry (2022 Report)

School of Advanced Study, University of London
Senate House, London WC1E 7HU
and online

Thursday 29 February 2024

BOOK RESERVATION NOW

Hosted by
The Institute of Commonwealth Studies (ICwS),
School of Advanced Study, University of London, &
Westminster United Nations Association (Westminster UNA)

Convenors
Mandy Banton (Senior Research Fellow, ICwS), Susan Williams (Senior Research Fellow, ICwS),
David Wardrop (Chair, Westminster UNA)
————————————————————————————————————
UK time
1020 Open for online attendees to join
1030 Welcome and Introduction
Professor Kingsley Abbott, Director, ICwS
Her Excellency Ms Macenje Florence Mazoka, High Commissioner for the
Republic of Zambia to the UK
1045 Session 1: The Continuing Search for the Truth: Decades waiting
for the answer
Chair: Professor Kingsley Abbott
• Mama Chibesa Kankasa: An important voice from the night of 17-18 September
1961, Ndola
A recording of the late Mama Kankasa, Zambia’s Minister for Women’s Affairs
between 1969 and 1988. Introduced by Dr Stuart Mole, Senior Research Fellow, ICwS
• Conducting a judicious inquiry
Sir Stephen Sedley, Chair, 2012-13 independent Hammarskjöld Commission.
Presentation introduced and read aloud by Dr Stuart Mole
1100 • Sweden’s policy change: from passivity to activism
Dr Henning Melber, Director Emeritus, Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation, Uppsala, and
author, Dag Hammarskjöld, the United Nations and the Decolonisation of Africa
1115 • The UN mission in Congo and the mysterious case of the Fouga jet
Dr Alanna O’Malley, Associate Professor, Institute for History, Leiden University,
author of The Diplomacy of Decolonisation. America, Britain and the United Nations
during the Congo crisis 1960-1964
1135 Q&A
1150 Session 2: Keynote address
Dag Hammarskjöld – The Incomplete File
Ambassador Jan Eliasson, Former UN Deputy Secretary-General and Swedish Foreign
Minister, author of Ord och Handling: ett liv i diplomatins tjänst (Words and Action : a
life in service of diplomacy)
Chair: Dr Ian Martin, Former Special Representative of the UN Secretary General,
author of All Necessary Measures? The United Nations and International Intervention
in Libya
1210 Q&A
1230 Lunch break
1330 Session 3: Statesmen and their incomplete legacy
Chair: Dr Henning Melber
• “That life be conducted with dignity”: Dag Hammarskjöld as statesman and man
of spirit
Dr Roger Lipsey, author of Hammarskjöld. A Life
1345 • U Thant and the Congo 1960-1964: A lost episode in United Nations history
Dr Thant Myint-U, Distinguished Visiting Scholar, Christ’s College, University of
Cambridge; UN Special Adviser on Humanitarian Diplomacy
1400 • The UK imperial archives mountain: A failure to deliver
Dr Mandy Banton, Senior Research Fellow, ICwS
1415 • Hammarskjöld the Peacemaker
The Rt. Revd. Dr Trevor Musonda Mwamba, President, United National Independence
Party (UNIP), Zambia, and former Bishop of Botswana
1430 Session 4: Different routes to the truth: will they lead to it?
Chair: Dr Stuart Mole, Senior Research Fellow, ICwS
• The French officers’ plot against the UN and a hostile OAS cell in Katanga
Maurin Picard, US correspondent, Le Figaro and Le Soir; author, Ils ont tué Monsieur H
1445 • Searching for answers in US government records
Dr Susan Williams, Senior Research Fellow, ICwS, and author, Who Killed
Hammarskjöld? and White Malice
1505 • The investigation into the circumstances of the tragic death of Dag
Hammarskjöld and the party accompanying him: A UN perspective
Stephen D Mathias, United Nations Assistant Secretary-General for Legal Affairs
1515 • A progress report in joining the dots
David Wardrop, Chair, Westminster UNA; Editor, hammarskjöldinquiry.info
1530 Q&A for sessions 3 and 4
1540 Tea break
1600 Session 5: Round Table: What Next?
Chair: The Rt Hon the Lord Boateng, Former UK High Commissioner to South Africa,
and Cabinet Minister
Joe Lauria, Editor-in-Chief Consortium News, former UN correspondent at The Wall
Street Journal
Dr Henning Melber
Dr Alanna O’Malley
Maurin Picard
1700 Closing Remarks
Lord Boateng and Professor Kingsley Abbott