- Asia
Retreating Iraqis torch the oil fields
As they withdrew, Iraqi forces set fire to and damaged over 700 Kuwaiti oil wells, causing a vast environmental disaster that took until November to fully extinguish.
Era: The Iraqi Invasion and the Liberation of 1991
Sources: Towering Infernos: The Kuwait Oil Fires · Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training
- Africa
Famine and Operation Restore Hope
Drought and civil war cause a famine that kills several hundred thousand people; the UN sets up UNOSOM and a US-led force launches Operation Restore Hope in December to safeguard relief.
Era: State Collapse, Civil War and the Federal Republic
Sources: 1992 famine in Somalia · Wikipedia, Unified Task Force (Operation Restore Hope) · Wikipedia
- Asia
The Arduous March famine
A famine driven by the loss of Soviet support, reduced Chinese aid and flooding kills an estimated several hundred thousand or more North Koreans, a defining national trauma.
Era: Famine and the Second Succession
Sources: History of North Korea · Encyclopaedia Britannica, North Korea: A Country Study · U.S. Library of Congress, Federal Research Division
- Africa
The killing begins
Within hours of the plane crash, the Presidential Guard and Interahamwe militias begin murdering Tutsi and moderate Hutu in Kigali, using roadblocks and prepared lists; the violence spreads nationwide.
Era: The Genocide against the Tutsi
Sources: Outreach Programme on the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda and the United Nations · United Nations, Massacre of the Tutsi Minority · United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, The Genocide · United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (IRMCT)
- Africa
Genocide against the Tutsi
Over roughly 100 days an estimated 800,000 to one million people, overwhelmingly Tutsi, are systematically murdered, and an estimated 150,000–250,000 women are raped.
Era: The Genocide against the Tutsi
Sources: Outreach Programme on the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda and the United Nations · United Nations, Outreach Programme on the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda — Historical Background · United Nations, Massacre of the Tutsi Minority · United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, The Genocide · United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (IRMCT)
- Europe
Pyramid scheme collapse and unrest
The collapse of fraudulent pyramid investment schemes in early 1997 wiped out the savings of many Albanians and triggered armed unrest that brought the state close to anarchy before order was restored.
Era: Transition, the 1997 Crisis, NATO and Europe
Sources: History of Albania · Encyclopaedia Britannica, Albania · Encyclopaedia Britannica
- North America
Hurricane Mitch
One of the deadliest Atlantic hurricanes devastates Honduras, killing some 7,000 people and ruining infrastructure and crops.
Era: Military Rule and the Cold-War Frontier
Sources: Hurricane Mitch · Encyclopaedia Britannica, Honduras: History · Encyclopaedia Britannica
- Europe
Mass expulsion of Kosovo Albanians
Serbian and Yugoslav forces forcibly expelled some 862,000 ethnic Albanians from Kosovo, uprooting more than 80 percent of the population, with thousands killed in a systematic campaign later prosecuted as war crimes.
Era: War, NATO Intervention and UN Administration
Sources: Under Orders: War Crimes in Kosovo (1998-99 expulsions and killings) · Human Rights Watch
Catastrophe in the 1990s
Every event in the Terralore archive tagged catastrophe — plague, famine, earthquake and other disasters, narrowed to the 1990s — 8 of them, drawn from 7 nations, running from 1991 to 1999. Each entry keeps the sources it was verified against and links back to the chronicle it came from.
- Events
- 8
- Nations
- 7
- Earliest
- 1991
- Latest
- 1999
- Africa
- 3
- Asia
- 2
- Europe
- 2
- North America
- 1
Every entry below is the same record, with the same sources, as the one on its nation’s chronicle.