February 2002

Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said today that the United States was willing to sign a treaty with Russia on limiting strategic nuclear weapons, indicating a possible shift in administration policy after withdrawing, last December, from the Antiballistic Missile Treaty of 1972. President George W. Bush and President Vladimir V. Putin are to hold an arms reduction summit meeting in Moscow this May. - Background material: nuclear disarmament, nuclear warfare, nuclear proliferation.

The opening ceremony of the 2002 Winter Olympic Games, which are held in Salt Lake City.

British Telecommunications plc starts its US federal court case relating to a controversial patent that it claims gives it a monopoly on the technology of web links.

Alicia Keys wins five Grammys.
Today is the centennial of John Steinbeck's birth.
"War on Terrorism": The U.S. sends Special Operations Forces to the former Soviet republic of Georgia to help combat guerrilla fighters, though Russia protests.
57 people die in Godhra when a Muslim mob sets fire to a carriage on the Sabarmati Express filled with Vishwa Hindu Parishad activists returning from Ayodhya en route to Ahmedabad. After detaching the burned carriage, the train continues to Vadodara, where Hindus beat and stab people leaving the train, killing one. A 17-year-old is later killed in Godhra by police trying to disrupt mobs.

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