Milestones

Monday, Jan. 20, 2003 By AIKO STEVENSON

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DIED. MAURICE GIBB, 53, bass player and keyboardist in the sibling disco trio the Bee Gees, from cardiac arrest following intestinal surgery; in Miami Beach, Florida. The hat-loving Gibb (pictured in the middle) was the least flamboyant of the brothers, whose string of 1960s hits was followed by the chart-busting 1977 soundtrack for the film Saturday Night Fever, which made them the most commercially successful trio in pop history. Believing Maurice died "unnecessarily," his brothers vowed to investigate his death. Although three-part harmony is integral to the Bee Gees' sound, the brothers plan to continue as a duo.

DIED. LEOPOLDO GALTIERI, 76, former Argentine military dictator who in 1982 ordered the invasion of the Falkland Islands, and who was implicated in Argentina's own "dirty war" against left-wing subversion; in Buenos Aires. Galtieri was imprisoned in 1986 for his "incompetence" during the Falklands war, and before his death was under house arrest. About 15,000 dissidents perished during the eight-year "dirty war," according to human-rights groups. Galtieri once said he had "no regrets."

DIED. GEORGE WATERS, 87, executive who turned the American Express card into the company's flagship product; in Fair Haven, New Jersey. Until 1961, when Waters was hired, charge cards were used mostly by restaurants, Visa and MasterCard did not exist, and the American Express card lagged behind one offered by Diners Club. One of his first moves was to persuade American Airlines to accept the American Express card; other airlines and businesses followed quickly.

DIED. MEL BOURNE, 79, Hollywood production designer who worked with Woody Allen on Annie Hall (1977) and whose artistic flair won Oscar nominations for Interiors (1978), The Natural (1984) and The Fisher King (1991); in New York City.

ACQUITTED. SU CHIEN-HO, 30, LIU PING-LANG, 30, and chuang lin-hsun, 30, known as the "Hsichih trio," who were convicted in 1991 of a high-profile murder of a Taiwanese couple in the Taipei suburb of Hsichih, and who served 12 years on death row; by a retrial judge citing insufficient evidence; in Taipei. The case had been taken up by human-rights activists who said the three men's confessions had been coerced through torture.

HOSPITALIZED. EMPEROR AKIHITO, 69, for prostate cancer treatment; in Tokyo. A tumor was discovered last December, and the Emperor is expected to remain in hospital for about a month after an operation to remove it. The news came as a surprise to a Japanese public accustomed to being kept in the dark about their monarch's health; Akihito is long credited with trying to modernize the royal family.

UPHELD. EXTENSION OF U.S. COPYRIGHT LAW; by the U.S. Supreme Court; in Washington, D.C. The 1998 law, sponsored by then Congressman Sonny Bono, extended copyright protection for 20 years, preventing thousands of well-known works, including early Mickey Mouse cartoons and the Gershwin classic Rhapsody in Blue, from passing into the public domain.

ARRESTED. PETE TOWNSHEND, 57, legendary guitarist of the seminal 1960s rock group the Who; on suspicion of possessing, making and incitement to distribute indecent images of children; in London. Townshend admitted to visiting child-porn websites as part of research for an autobiography exploring the possibility of his own childhood sexual abuse.

Numbers
1,600 people died in Nepal, Bangladesh and northern India during a four-week cold spell that saw temperatures hit 3°C

$2 million was spent by the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh�Xwhere 645 people died from the cold�Xto entertain 25,000 guests at Chief Minister Mayawati Kumari's birthday celebrations last Wednesday

$52.7 billion is the record amount of foreign investment China attracted in 2002

1,500 patients in the U.S. have surgical tools left in their bodies each year, says the New England Journal of Medicine

204 is the world ranking FIFA gave Afghanistan's soccer team after it played and lost its first three matches in two decades

Omen
Pathologists warn that the banana's days are numbered. The fruit lacks the genetic diversity to ward off diseases and could eventually vanish unless biotechnology is used to save it