- April 14
- 1,100,000,000th Chinese born. [1]
- In the Iran-Contra trial, Oliver North's case goes to the jury. [1]
- April 15
- At the Sheffield Soccer Stadium in England, 96 Liverpool fans are crushed to death. [1] [43] [425.61]
- Students in Beijing pro-democracy protests. [1]
- Largest lottery win to date in North America (US$69 million) drawn in Illinois. [1]
- April 16
- Berendrechtsluis opens in Antwerp, biggest flood lock in world. [1]
- The Dilbert comic strip is syndicated for the first time. [43]
- April 17
- Polish labor union granted legal status. [1]
- April 19
- Seven crew members die when a gun turret explodes on the U.S. battleship Iowa. [1] [43]
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- April 20
- NATO debates modernising short range missiles; although the U.S. and UK are in favour, West German chancellor Helmut Kohl obtains a concession deferring a decision. [43]
- April 21
- Thousands of students from Beijing, Shanghai, Xian, and Nanjing begin protesting in China's Tiananmen Square, demanding greater political freedom. [1] [43]
- Nintendo begins selling the Game Boy handheld video game system in Japan. [43]
- April 22
- Huey Newton, American Black Panther leader, shot dead at age 47. [1]
- April 23
- Students in Beijing, China announce class boycotts. [1]
- April 24
- Tens of thousands of students strike in Beijing, China. [1]
- April 25
- Motorola introduces the Motorola MicroTAC Personal Cellular Telephone, the world's smallest mobile phone. [43]
- The term of Baginda Almutawakkil Alallah Sultan Iskandar Al-Haj ibni Almarhum Sultan Ismail as the 8th Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia ends. [43]
- Near the coast of Guerrero, Mexico, a magnitude 7.1 earthquake occurs. [53]
- April 26
- Sultan Azlan Muhibbudin Shah ibni Almarhum Sultan Yusuff Izzudin Shah Ghafarullahu-lahu, Sultan of Perak, becomes the 9th Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia. [43]
- April 27
- Beijing students take over Tiananmen Square in China. [1]
- Hurricane in Bangladesh kills 500. [1]
- Mandatory automobile seatbelt law goes into effect in Italy. [1]
- April 28
- Argentina, hit by rocketing inflation, runs out of money. [1]
- Iran protests sale of Satanic Verses by Salman Rushdie. [1]
- April 29
- Second Netherlands government of Ruud Lubbers falls. [1]
- April 30
- Pope John Paul II beatifies Victoire Rasoamanarivo of Madagascar. [1]
- May 1
- The Disney-MGM Studios Theme Park at Walt Disney World opens to the public. It covers 135 acres. Total construction costs were over US$500 million. Advertising and promotions for the opening cost US$30 million. Entrance prices are US$29 for adults, and US$23 for children aged 3-9. [6]
- David Webster, South African white anti-apartheids activist, murdered. [1]
- May 2
- The first crack in the Iron Curtain - Hungary dismantles 150 miles of barbed wire fencing along the border with Austria. [43]
- May 7
- Panamanian voters reject dictator Manuel Noriega's bid for presidency. [1]
- In the Burma-China border region, a magnitude 5.6 earthquake occurs. At least one person killed, 91 injured and 5,300 houses destroyed. [53]
- May 9
- Journalists petition Chinese Government for freedom of press. [1]
- Andrew Peacock deposes John Howard as Australian federal opposition leader. [43]
- May 10
- General Manuel Noriega's Panama government nullifies country's elections, which the opposition had won by a 3-1 margin. [1]
- May 11
- France performs nuclear test at Muruora Island. [1]
- Kenya announces worldwide ban on ivory to preserve its elephant herds. [1]
- President Bush orders nearly 2,000 troops to Panamá. [1]
- The Australian Capital Territory Legislative Assembly meets for the first time. [43]
- May 12
- Retired British pilot Jack Mann is kidnapped by Islamic fundamentalists. [1]
- May 13
- Approximately 2,000 students begin hunger strike in Tiananmen Square, China. [1]
- May 14
- Demonstration for democratic reforms in Beijing's Tiananmen square, China. [1]
- May 15
- Australia's first private tertiary institution, Bond University, opens on the Gold Coast. [43]
- May 16
- Hassan Khaled, sheik of Lebanon, is murdered. [1]
- Soviet President Mikhail S Gorbachev and Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping end a 30-year rift when they formally meet in Beijing. [1] [43]
- May 17
- Longest taxicab ride ever: 14,000 miles, cost $16,000. [1]
- May 19
- Dow Jones average passes 2,500 mark for first time, closes at 2,501.1. [1]
- United States Senator Albert Gore introduces a U$1.75 billion bill in Congress to finance creation of a nationwide "data super highway" to link supercomputers. [16.47]
- In China, Zhao Ziyang meets the demonstrators in Tiananmen Square. [43]
- May 20
- The Chinese government declares martial law in Beijing. [1] [43] [46.226]
- Walter McConnel, 57, is oldest to reach 27,000-foot Mount Everest top. [1]
- May 22
- In Russia, the Nordland Days in Leningrad region (Leningrad oblast) opens. [43]
- May 23
- Angela Visser, 22, of Holland, crowned 38th Miss Universe. [1]
- Richard von Weizäcker is re-elected president of the Federal Republic of Germany. [37]
- May 24
- Paramount releases the film Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade to theaters. (Total world gross ticket sales: $474 million (1st for 1989).) [946]
- In Nice, France, French police arrest Paul Touvier. He was charged in 1973 with crimes against humanity in connection with deportation of Jews from France to German death camps, and persecution of Resistance leaders. Touvier was head of intelligence for a pro-German militia in Lyons during the war. [1] [10]
- May 25
- Mikhail Gorbachev is elected Executive President in the Soviet Union. [1]
- May 26
- Danish parliament allows legal marriage among homosexuals. [1]
- May 30
- Student protesters in Tiananmen Square, China unveil a 10m (33 feet) high Goddess of Democracy statue. [43] (May 29 [1])
- June 3
- Chinese troops kill hundreds of pro-democracy students in Beijing. [1] [46.226]
- Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, Supreme Leader of Iran, dies at age 86 of internal bleeding (born 1900). [43] (June 4 [1])
- June 4
- The Tiananmen Square massacre takes place in Beijing on the army's approach to the square, and the final stand-off in the square is covered live on television. [5] [43]
- Beijing cop shoots and wounds Chinese priemer Li Ping. [1]
- Solidarity victorious in the first partly free parliamentary elections in post-war Poland. [1] [43] [46.229]
- Ali Khamenei is elected the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran after the death of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. [5]
- At the Consumer Electronics Show in Chicago, Nintendo introduces the Game Boy portable hand-held video game system, with monochrome display. Price is US$89.95, including the Tetris game cartridge. [9]
- A natural gas explosion near Ufa, Russia kills 645 as two trains passing each other throw sparks near a leaky pipeline. [43]
- June 5
- The Unknown Rebel halts the progress of a column of advancing tanks for over half an hour after the Tiananmen Square protests. [5]
- June 7
- 176 people are killed in Surinam's worst air disaster. [43]
- June 8
- A group aboard the Star Hercules ship finds the final resting place of the German battleship Bismarck, 15,617 feet down in the North Atlantic ocean, 600 miles west of Brest, France. [10] (June 13 [43])
- Kurt Waldheim is elected president of Austria. [43]
- June 9
- Rare tornado in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA kills one. [1]
- June 14
- Ground-breaking begins in Minnesota on the world's largest mall. [1]
- June 15
- Ronald Reagan is knighted by Queen Elizabeth II. [1]
- June 16
- A crowd of 250,000 gathers at Heroes Square in Budapest for the historic reburial of Imre Nagy, the former Hungarian prime minister who had been executed in 1958. [43]
- June 18
- Comet Churyunov-Gerasimenko at perihelion. [1]
- June 21
- Walt Disney World welcomes its 300-millionth guest, Matt Gleason. [6]
- British police arrest 250 people for celebrating the summer solstice at Stonehenge. [43]
- June 22
- Ireland's first universities established since independence in 1922 open: Dublin City University and the University of Limerick. [43]
- June 26
- In Hawaii, a magnitude 6.2 earthquake occurs. Two events about 5 seconds apart. Five people injured slightly, 5 homes destroyed and about 100 homes damaged. [53]
- June 30
- US Attorney General Thornburgh orders Joseph Doherty deported to the United Kingdom. [1]
- NASA closes down tracking stations in Santiago, Chile, and Guam. [1]
- (month unknown)
- The Dexter pedigree 1804 US dollar coin sells for US$990,000, a world record price for a rare coin. [352.24] [525.78] [604.49]
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