Following are some of the major events to have occurred on May 17:
\n1900 \u2013 A small British cavalry force finally relieved the garrison under Colonel Robert Baden-Powell at Mafeking (now Mafikeng) in South Africa after 217 days\u2019 siege by Dutch-speaking Boer settlers.
\n1989 \u2013 Hundreds of thousands of protesters fill Tiananmen Square in biggest popular upheaval in China since the Cultural Revolution of the 1960s.
\n1997 \u2013 Laurent Kabila said he had taken power as head of state in Zaire. His forces took control of the capital Kinshasa. Kabila also renamed the country the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
\n2000 \u2013 Foday Sankoh, the rebel leader at the centre of a U.N. hostage crisis in Sierra Leone, was captured in the capital Freetown.
\n2001 \u2013 A Russian-built Yak-40 plane carrying 30 people including Iranian Transport Minister Rahman Dadman and other deputy ministers crashed in northern Iran, killing all on board.
\n2004 \u2013 Massachusetts became the first U.S. state to allow same-sex marriage.
\n2005 \u2013 A ferry with about 200 people on board sank in the Jamuna River in Bangladesh. Only 50 survived.
\n2006 \u2013 Romano Prodi was sworn in as Italian prime minister.
\n2007 \u2013 North and South Korea sent trains across heavily-armed border for first time since their 1950-1953 war.
\n2011 \u2013 First Pillow Fighting World Championships takes place in New York.
\n2016 \u2013 World\u2019s largest cruise ship, Harmony of the Seas, arrives in port for its maiden voyage.
\n(Reuters)siege. Mafeking relief, Tiananmen Square protest, same-sex marriage<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
On May 17, 1900, a small British cavalry force relieved the garrison at Mafeking after a 217-day siege by Dutch-speaking Boer settlers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":12126,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"Default","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[589,6462,7129,461,7397,486,269,5255,6458,3343,658,5138,146,9833,10295,3889,429,393,659,1220,1004,1792,8641,577,3839,6748,5438,1513,124,317,948,7967,10296,114,8239,907,293,18],"class_list":["post-12125","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-other","tag-africa","tag-bangladesh","tag-border","tag-british","tag-championships","tag-china","tag-congo","tag-crisis","tag-cruise","tag-events","tag-history","tag-hostage","tag-iran","tag-killing","tag-mafeking-relief","tag-maiden-voyage","tag-marriage","tag-new-york","tag-on-this-day","tag-port","tag-power","tag-prime-minister","tag-protesters","tag-protests","tag-river","tag-same-sex-marriage","tag-settlers","tag-sex","tag-ship","tag-south-africa","tag-south-korea","tag-state","tag-tiananmen-square-protest","tag-top-news","tag-transport","tag-transport-minister","tag-war","tag-world"],"acf":{"keyphrase":"","keywords":"","sourceimg":"","country-category":""},"yoast_head":"\n