For French rap group, see 1995 (rap band)

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1995 (MCMXCV) was a common year that started on a Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. The year 1995 was the 1995th year of Anno Domini, the 995th year of the 2nd millennium, the 95th year of the 20th century, and the 6th year of the 1990s.

Events[link]

January[link]

• January 1
  • The World Trade Organization (WTO) is established to replace the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT).
  • Austria, Finland & Sweden act to join the European Union.
  • The Draupner wave in the North Sea in Norway is detected, confirming the existence of rogue waves.
• January 6–January 7 – A chemical fire occurs in an apartment complex in Manila, Philippines. Policemen led by watch commander Aida Fariscal and investigators find a bomb factory and a laptop computer and disks that contain plans for Project Bojinka, a mass-terrorist attack. The mastermind, Ramzi Yousef, is arrested 1 month later.
• January 9 – Valeri Polyakov completes 366 days in space while aboard the Mir space station, breaking a duration record.
• January 16 – An avalanche hits the village Súðavík in Iceland, killing 14 people.
• January 17 – A magnitude 6.8 earthquake called the "Great Hanshin earthquake" occurs near Kobe, Japan, causing great property damage and killing 6,434 people.
• January 25 – Norwegian rocket incident: A rocket launched from the space exploration centre at Andøya, Norway is briefly interpreted by the Russians as an incoming attack.
• January 30 – John Howard becomes leader of the Liberal Party of Australia to challenge Paul Keating for the 1996 Federal Election and the position of Prime Minister of Australia.
• January 31 – U.S. President Bill Clinton invokes emergency powers, to extend a $20 billion loan to help Mexico avert financial collapse.

February[link]

• February 1 – Lyricist/guitarist Richey Edwards of the Welsh alternative rock band Manic Street Preachers goes missing from a hotel in Bayswater, London on the eve of a planned tour of the United States. His car is found 2 weeks later at Severn View services in Aust.
• February 9 – STS-63: Dr. Bernard A. Harris, Jr. and Michael Foale became the first African American and Briton, respectively, to walk in space.
• February 13 – A United Nations tribunal on human rights violations in the Balkans charges 21 Bosnian Serb commanders with genocide and crimes against humanity.
• February 15
  • Hacker Kevin Mitnick is arrested by the FBI and charged with penetrating some of the United States' most "secure" computer systems.
  • Taiwan's deadliest fire, at a karaoke restaurant in Taichung, kills 64.
• February 17
  • Colin Ferguson is convicted of 6 counts of murder for the December 1993 Long Island Rail Road shootings and later receives a 25-year sentence for each of the 6 murders.
  • The creative program for children's poetry, "LITER~Art" originated in the Valley of the Poets, North Andover, MA.
• February 21
  • Serkadji prison mutiny in Algeria: Four guards and 96 prisoners are killed in a day and a half.
  • Ibrahim Ali, a 17-year-old Comorian living in France, is murdered by 3 far-right National Front activists.
  • Steve Fossett lands in Leader, Saskatchewan, Canada, becoming the first person to make a solo flight across the Pacific Ocean in a balloon.
• February 23 – The Dow Jones Industrial Average gains 30.28 to close at 4,003.33 – the Dow's first ever close above 4,000.
• February 25 – Amazon Cooperation Treaty Organization (ACTO) (Organización del Tratado de Cooperación Amazónica [OTCA]).
• February 26 – The United Kingdom's oldest investment banking firm, Barings Bank, collapses after securities broker Nick Leeson loses $1.4 billion by speculating on the Tokyo Stock Exchange
• February 27 – In Denver, Colorado, Stapleton Airport closes and is replaced by the new Denver International Airport, the largest in the United States.
• February 28 – Members of the group Patriot's Council are convicted in Minnesota of manufacturing ricin.

March[link]

• March 1
  • Polish Prime Minister Waldemar Pawlak resigns from Parliament and is replaced by ex-communist Jozef Oleksy.
  • In Moscow, Russian anti-corruption journalist Vladislav Listyev is killed by a gunman.
• March 2 – Nick Leeson is arrested for his role in the collapse of Barings Bank.
• March 3 – In Somalia, the United Nations peacekeeping mission ends.
• March 6 – On an episode of The Jenny Jones Show ("Same-Sex Crushes"), Scott Amedure reveals a crush on his heterosexual friend Jonathan Schmitz. Schmitz kills Amedure several days after the show.
• March 13 – David Daliberti and William Barloon, two Americans working for a military contractor in Kuwait, are arrested after straying into Iraq.
• March 14 – Astronaut Norman Thagard becomes the first American to ride into space aboard a Russian launch vehicle (the Soyuz TM-21), lifting off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.
• March 16 – Mississippi ratifies the Thirteenth Amendment, becoming the last state to approve the abolition of slavery. The amendment was nationally ratified in 1865.
• March 20 – Sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway. Members of the Aum Shinrikyo religious cult release sarin gas on 5 subway trains in Tokyo, killing 13 and injuring 5,510.
• March 22 – Cosmonaut Valeri Polyakov returns after setting a record for 438 days in outer space.
• March 24 – For the first time in 26 years, no British soldiers patrol the streets of Belfast, Northern Ireland.
• March 26 – The Schengen Agreement, easing cross-border travel, goes into effect in several European countries.
• March 30 – A police officer tries to assassinate Takaji Kunimatsu, chief of the National Police Agency of Japan.

April[link]

• April 1 – Dialog Telekom launches Sri Lanka's first GSM mobile phone network.
• April 2 – An explosion in Gaza kills 8, including a Hamas leader.
• April 5 – The U.S. House of Representatives votes 246–188 to cut taxes for individuals and corporations.
• April 7 – House Republicans celebrate passage of most of the Contract with America.
• April 19 – Oklahoma City bombing: 168 people, including 8 Federal Marshals and 19 children, are killed at the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building. Timothy McVeigh and one of his accomplices, Terry Nichols, set off the bomb.
• April 24 – A Unabomber bomb kills lobbyist Gilbert Murray in Sacramento, California.
• April 28 – In Daegu, South Korea, a gas explosion at a subway construction site kills 101 people, mostly teenage schoolboys.