1996 was designated as: International Year for the Eradication of Poverty Events January January 8 – A Zairean cargo plane crashes into a crowded market in the center of the capital city of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kinshasa, killing 300 people. January 9–20 – Serious fighting breaks out between Russian soldiers and rebel fighters in Chechnya. January 11 – Ryutaro Hashimoto, leader of the Liberal Democratic Party, becomes Prime Minister of Japan. January 13 – Italy's Prime Minister, Lamberto Dini, resigns after the failure of all-party talks to confirm him. New talks are initiated by President Oscar Luigi Scalfaro to form a new government. January 14 – Jorge Sampaio is elected President of Portugal. January 16 – President of Sierra Leone Valentine Strasser is deposed by the chief of defence, Julius Maada Bio. Bio promises to restore power following elections scheduled for February. January 19 The North Cape oil spill occurs as an engine fire forces the tugboat Scandia ashore on Moonstone Beach in South Kingstown, Rhode Island. The North Cape Barge is pulled along with it and leaks 820,000 gallons of home heating oil. An Indonesian ferry sinks off the northern tip of Sumatra, drowning more than 100 people. January 20 – Yasser Arafat is re-elected president of the Palestinian Authority. January 21 – France undertakes its last nuclear weapons test. January 22 – Andreas Papandreou, Prime Minister of Greece, resigns due to health problems; a new government forms under Costas Simitis. January 24 – Polish Premier Józef Oleksy resigns amid accusations that he spied for Moscow. He is replaced by Włodzimierz Cimoszewicz. January 27 – Colonel Ibrahim Baré Maïnassara deposes the first democratically elected President of Niger, Mahamane Ousmane, in a military coup. January 31 Colombo Central Bank bombing: an explosives-filled truck rams into the gates of the Central Bank in Colombo, Sri Lanka, killing at least 86 people and injuring 1,400. An amateur astronomer from southern Japan discovers Comet Hyakutake; it will pass very close to the Earth in March. February February 3 – The 6.6 earthquake near Lijiang in South-west China kills up to 322 people, injures 17,000, and leaves 300,000 homeless. February 6 – Birgenair Flight 301, on a charter flight from the Caribbean to Germany, crashes into the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of the Dominican Republic, killing all 189 passengers and crew. February 7 – René Préval succeeds Jean-Bertrand Aristide as