7 May 1559

A draft sequence of the Neanderthal genome was published, demonstrating that most living humans have Neanderthal ancestors.

Police in Napier, New Zealand, began a 40-hour siege of the home of a former New Zealand Army member who had shot at officers during the routine execution of a search warrant.

Kosovo War: NATO bombing of Yugoslavia, the United States bombed the Chinese embassy in Belgrade.

A convoy of circus wagons carrying lions, horses, ponies and an ass lost control and overturned into some shop fronts in Dungannon, Northern Ireland.

Masaru Ibuka and Akio Morita founded the telecommunications corporation Tokyo Tsushin Kogyo, later renamed Sony.

A three-day debate began in the House of Commons that resulted in British prime minister Neville Chamberlain being replaced by Winston Churchill (pictured).

Employees at Fleischer Studios in New York City went on strike in the animation industry's first major labor strike.

War of the First Coalition: A British garrison repelled a French attack on the Îles Saint-Marcouf off the Normandy coast, inflicting heavy losses.

French Revolution: Maximilien Robespierre established the Cult of the Supreme Being as the new state religion of the French First Republic.

The 13th-century castle of Tre Kronor in Stockholm burned down; plans for the current royal palace were presented within the year.

During the Rough Wooing, an English army carried out the Burning of Edinburgh.

Granada War: Forces of Aragon and Castile began a siege of Málaga, a Muslim city in the south of the Iberian Peninsula.

Jews in the Roman province of Syria Palaestina rebelled against the rule of Constantius Gallus (pictured), caesar of the Eastern Roman Empire.

The Indian Army and the Indian Air Force conduct surgical strikes code-named Operation SINDOOR on terrorist hideouts in Pakistan in response to the Pahalgam Attack that killed 26 people.

American businessman Nick Berg is beheaded by Islamist militants. The act is recorded on videotape and released on the Internet.

An EgyptAir Boeing 737-500 crashes on approach to Tunis–Carthage International Airport, killing 14 people.

A China Northern Airlines MD-82 plunges into the Yellow Sea, killing 112 people.

Vladimir Putin is inaugurated as president of Russia.

Pope John Paul II travels to Romania, becoming the first pope to visit a predominantly Eastern Orthodox country since the Great Schism in 1054.

Kosovo War: Three Chinese citizens are killed and 20 wounded when a NATO aircraft inadvertently bombs the Chinese embassy in Belgrade, Serbia.

In Guinea-Bissau, President João Bernardo Vieira is ousted in a military coup.

Mercedes-Benz buys Chrysler for US$40 billion and forms DaimlerChrysler in the largest industrial merger in history.

Edvard Munch's painting The Scream is recovered undamaged after being stolen from the National Gallery of Norway in February.

Michigan ratifies a 203-year-old proposed amendment to the United States Constitution making the 27th Amendment law. This amendment bars the U.S. Congress from giving itself a mid-term pay raise.