After Russia, the United States and China, India, through the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO), also launches and recovers its own satellite, an essential step towards human flight.

A team of scientists from Wake Forest University School of Medicine in Winston-Salem, North Carolina discovers the presence of stem cells in amniotic fluid.

Romania and Bulgaria officially join the European Union

Space Shuttle Discovery mission to the Int’l Space Station

Death of Augusto Pinochet

Historic visit of Benedict XVI to Türkiye

After 10 years and 240,000 photographs, all contact with the Mars Global Surveyor probe has been lost, but six other probes in orbit or on the surface of the red planet continue to study our neighbor.

Shinya Yamanaka and colleagues from Kyoto University published an article in Cell announcing that they had regressed adult mouse fibroblasts to the stage of embryonic stem cells; the research was confirmed in June 2007 by two American research groups.

Rocco Anthony Petrone died at his home in Palos Verdes Estates, a California seaside resort where he had retired for his studies of the American Civil War, after having been director of launch operations at NASA’s John F. Kennedy Space Center, and from 1969 director of the entire Apollo Program.

24 Muslims arrested in London in the final stages of preparations for a massive attack in which at least 10 American airliners were to be blown up in flight with liquid explosives in their hand luggage.

Mumbai, India. Eight simultaneous terrorist attacks on Indian commuter trains leave 209 dead and 700 injured. The attacks were never claimed.

Montenegro votes to secede from Serbia. This secession leaves the Serbian Navy, with 2,900 sailors, eight submarines, and three frigates, without access to the sea.

Record turnout (83%) at the polls for the elections in Italy, narrow majorities in the Chamber (23,000 votes, rewarded with 40 seats by the majority bonus) and in the Senate (overtaking thanks to the vote of Italians abroad) for the center-left

Bernardo Provenzano, the godfather of the mafia, is captured by the police in a farmhouse in the Sicilian countryside.

The European Venus Express probe enters Martian orbit

The organizer of the kidnapping of Italian journalist Giuliana Sgrena, Muhammed Hila Hammad Ubaydi, also known as Abu Ayman, linked to Al-Zarqawi, has been captured in Iraq.

Cassini probe discovers huge geysers of liquid water on Saturn’s moon Enceladus

The WTO (World Trade Organization) establishes Aid for Trade, with which, over ten years, it allocates over 300 billion USD to the economies of developing countries.

For the first time Moore’s Law is disproved: the trend in microprocessors is reversed, that is, now the aim is to reduce the power required and reduce the number of transistors and the frequency

The Franco-American Topex-Poseidon mission ceases operations; it was incredibly fruitful in scientific terms: 13 years and 62,000 orbits.

Iraqis elect their parliament, the success of the election day prompts several diplomatic visits and the beginning of the withdrawal of thousands of coalition soldiers; the Shiite party wins 128 of 275 seats, the Kurds 53, the Sunni parties combined reach 55 and the party of former Prime Minister Allawi 25.

The Hayabusa (Japanese: Falco) probe lands on the asteroid Itokawa, collects a sample, and departs on a return journey to Earth. It gets lost a few days later, but is then found and successfully lands in the Australian desert.

In Australia, 17 members of a group led by Abu Bakr, linked to Al Qaeda, who was planning a “catastrophic” attack in Australia, were arrested in Melbourne and Sydney; several similar attacks were foiled in England and the United States.

The outskirts of Paris are being ravaged by criminal gangs of North African immigrants; around a thousand people have been arrested, and several thousand cars and buses have been set on fire; the protests, sparked by the incident of two immigrants being electrocuted inside an electrical substation while fleeing the police, then spread to the rest of France; special laws on curfews and gatherings of people are passed.

Twins Lech and Jaroslaw Kaczynski of the right-wing Catholic Law and Justice party become president (beating another right-wing representative: Donald Tusk) and head of government respectively.

Angela Merkel of the Christian Democrats (CDU) and daughter of a Protestant pastor from the former GDR, becomes the first female German chancellor.

China. Second manned space launch. This time with the Shenzhou-6 spacecraft: it completes six orbits.

Parliamentary elections in Afghanistan are held without major incidents, with massive female voter turnout.

The Japanese Hayabusa spacecraft reaches the Near Earth asteroid Itokawa, the probe is ion-powered.

NASA launches the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. It houses the powerful Italian SHARAD radar, capable of measuring subsurface ice deposits.

Abu Zubair is captured in Mosul, a mastermind behind the July 7 attacks in London is captured in Pakistan, a mastermind behind the March 11, 2004 attacks in Madrid is captured in Belgrade, a mastermind behind the July 21 attacks in London is captured in Rome, and the head of Al Qaeda in the country is captured in Saudi Arabia.