• January 3 - Former leader of Panama Manuel Noriega surrenders to American forces.
• January 7 - The Leaning Tower of Pisa is closed to the public due to safety concerns.
• January 9 - Lt Gen Bazilio Olara Okello The man who led the coup aginst Dr Apolo Milton Obote's government dies in Ormduruman Hospital in Khartoum, Sudan.
• January 10 - Time Warner is formed from the merger of Time Inc. and Warner Communications Inc.
• January 11 - Massive (200,000) demonstration in favor of Lithuanian independence.
• January 13 - Douglas Wilder becomes the first elected African American governor as he takes office in Richmond, Virginia.
• January 18 - Former preschool operators Raymond Buckey and his mother Peggy McMartin Buckey are acquitted in a Los Angeles, California court of 52 child molestation charges.
• January 18 - Washington, DC, Mayor Marion Barry is arrested for drug possession in an FBI sting.
• January 22 - Robert Tappan Morris is convicted of releasing the 1988 Internet worm.
• January 29 - The trial of the former skipper of the Exxon Valdez, Joseph Hazelwood, begins in Anchorage, Alaska. He is accused of negligence that resulted in America's worst oil spill.
• January 31 - The first McDonald's opens in Moscow, Russia.
• February 2 - Apartheid: In South Africa President F.W. de Klerk allows the African National Congress to legally function again and promises to set Nelson Mandela free.
• February 7 - Collapse of the Soviet Union: The Central Committee of the Soviet Communist Party agrees to give up its monopoly of power
• February 10 - South African President F.W. de Klerk announces that Nelson Mandela would be released the next day.
• February 11 - James "Buster" Douglas KOs Mike Tyson to win world heavyweight boxing crown.
• February 11 - Nelson Mandela is released from Victor Verster prison, near Cape Town, South Africa
• February 13 - German reunification: An agreement is reached for a two-stage plan to reunite Germany.
• February 15- The United Kingdom and Argentina restore diplomatic links after 8 years. The UK had broken off links in response to Argentina's invasion of the Falkland Islands, a British Dependent Territory.
• February 26 - The Sandinistas are defeated in Nicaraguan elections
• February 27 - Exxon Valdez oil spill: Exxon and its shipping company are indicted on five criminal counts.
• March 1 - A fire at the Sheraton Hotel in Cairo kills 16.
• March 1 - Steve Jackson Games is raided by the U.S. Secret Service, prompting the later formation of the EFF.
• March 9 - Dr. Antonia Novello is sworn in as Surgeon General of the United States, becoming the first female and Hispanic to serve in that position.
• March 9 -Newfoundland and Labrador Premier Clyde Wells confirms he will rescind Newfoundland's approval of the Meech Lake Accord, effectively killing the Accord.
• March 10 - 18 months after seizing power in a coup, Prosper Avril is ousted in Haiti.
• March 11 - Lithuania becomes independent from the Soviet Union.
• March 11 - Patricio Aylwin is sworn-in as the first democratically-elected Chilean president since 1973.
• March 15 - Gulf War: Iraqis hang British journalist Farzad Bazoft for spying.
• March 15 - Mikhail Gorbachev is elected as the first executive president of the Soviet Union.
• March 15 - The Soviet Union announces that Lithuania's declaration of independence is invalid.
• March 18 - 12 paintings, collectively worth $100 million, are stolen by two thieves posing as police officers from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, Massachusetts. This is the largest art theft in US history and the paintings (as of 2003) have not been recovered.
• March 20 - Ferdinand Marcos's widow, Imelda Marcos, goes on trial for bribery, embezzlement, and racketeering.
• March 21 - After 75 years of South African rule Namibia becomes independent.
• March 25 - In New York City, a fire at an illegal social club called "Happy Land" kills 87.
• March 27 - Propaganda: The United States begins broadcasting TV Marti to Cuba
• March 28 - President George H. W. Bush presents Jesse Owens with the Congressional Gold Medal.
• April 7 - Iran Contra Affair: John Poindexter is found guilty of five charges for his part in the scandal but the convictions were later reversed after an appeal.
• April 24 - The Space Shuttle Discovery places the Hubble Space Telescope into orbit.
• May 15 - Portrait of Doctor Gachet by Vincent van Gogh is sold for a record $82.5 million.
• May 20 - The first post- Communist presidential and parliamentary elections are held in Romania.
• May 22 - Yemen is unified.
• May 22 - Windows 3.0 is released by Microsoft
• July 16 - In the Philippines, an earthquake measuring 7.7 on the Richter Scale kills over 1600.
• July 28 - Alberto Fujimori becomes president of Peru
• August 2 - Gulf War: Iraq invades Kuwait, eventually leading to the Gulf War
• August 6 - Gulf War: The United Nations Security Council orders a global trade embargo against Iraq in response to Iraq's invasion of Kuwait.
• October 3 - German reunification, East Germany became part of Germany
• October 5 - After one hundred and fifty years, ten months and two days, The Herald broadsheet newspaper in Melbourne, Australia is published for the last time as a separate newspaper. Founded in 1840 as The Port Phillip Herald, it is merged with its morning tabloid sister paper The Sun News Pictorial and the first issue of the new Herald-Sun, described by owner Rupert Murdoch as "The world's first 24-hour newspaper", with morning and afternoon editions, is published on the 8th.
• October 8 - Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: In Jerusalem, Israeli police kill 17 Palestinians and wound over 100 near the Dome of the Rock mosque on the Temple Mount.
• October 15 - Soviet Union leader Mikhail Gorbachev is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to lessen Cold War tensions and open up his nation.
• November 1 Mary Robinson defeats odds-on favourite Brian Lenihan to become the first woman President of Ireland
• November 5 - Rabbi Meir Kahane, founder of the far-right Kach movement, is shot dead after a speech at a New York City hotel.
• November 11 - Gulf War: The U.N. Security Council passes resolution 678, giving Iraq until January 15, 1991 to withdrawal its forces from Kuwait.
• November 12 - Crown Prince Akihito becomes the 125th Japanese monarch and takes the title Emperor Akihito of Japan.
• November 12 - Tim Berners-Lee publishes a more formal proposal for the World Wide Web. [1]
• November 13 - The first known web page is written. [1]
• November 14 - Germany and Poland sign a treaty confirming the border at the Oder-Neisse line.
• November 15 - Space Shuttle program: Space Shuttle Atlantis launches with flight STS-38.
• November 21 - The Super Famicom is released in Japan
• November 22 - Margaret Thatcher resigns as the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.
• November 27 - The UK Conservative party chooses John Major to succeed Margaret Thatcher as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.
• November 29 - Gulf War: The United Nations Security Council passes UN Security Council Resolution 678, authorizing military intervention in Iraq if that nation did not withdraw its forces from Kuwait and free all foreign hostages by January 15, 1991.
• December 1 - Channel Tunnel workers from the United Kingdom and France meet 40 meters beneath the English Channel seabed, establishing the first ground connection between the island of Great Britain and the mainland of Europe since the last Ice Age.
• December 2 - A coalition led by Chancellor Helmut Kohl wins the first free all-German elections since 1932.
• December 3 - At Detroit Metropolitan Airport, a McDonnell Douglas DC-9 carrying Northwest Airlines Flight 1482 collides with a Boeing 727 carrying Northwest Airlines Flight 299 on the runway, killing 8 passengers and 4 crewmembers aboard flight 1482.
• December 3 - Mary Robinson is elected the first female President of Ireland.
• December 31 - Russian Gary Kasparov holds his title by winning the World Chess Championship match against his countryman Anatoly Karpov.
• Jean-Bertrand Aristide is elected president of Haiti, ending three decades of military rule

Year in topic

• 1990 in film
  • Dances With Wolves starring Kevin Costner
  • Awakenings starring Robin Williams and Robert De Niro
  • Ghost starring Demi Moore
  • Goodfellas
• 1990 in literature
• 1990 in music
• 1990 in sports
• 1990 in television
  • Legislation signed into law requiring close captioning decoders in all large color TVs manufactured after July 1, 1993
• 1990 in video games and computing

Births

• April 15 - Emma Watson, English actress.
• December 28 - Sarah Marple-Cantrell, American student and later suicide victim.

Deaths

• January 7 - Bronko Nagurski, American football star
• January 8 - Terry-Thomas, actor, comedian
• January 19 - Herbert Wehner, German politician
• January 20 - Barbara Stanwyck, actress
• January 25 - Ava Gardner, actress
• January 26 - Lewis Mumford, philosopher, writer
• February 8 - Del Shannon, entertainer (suicide)
• February 23 - Jose Napoleon Duarte, President of El Salvador
• February 24 - Malcolm Forbes, publisher
• March 13 - Bruno Bettelheim, child psychologist, psychiatrist
• March 15 - Tom Harmon, American football star, broadcaster
• March 17 - Capucine, actress
• March 20 - Lev Yashin, Soviet football goalkeeper
• March 24 - An Wang, computer pioneer
• March 26 - Halston, fashion designer
• April 3 - Sarah Vaughn, singer
• April 15 - Greta Garbo, Swedish film star.
• April 25 - Dexter Gordon, jazz musician
• May 10 - Walker Percy, author
• May 16 - Jim Henson, creator of the Muppets
• May 16 - Sammy Davis, Jr, singer, actor, comedian
• May 22 - Rocky Graziano, boxer
• June 2 - Rex Harrison, actor
• July 7 - Bill Cullen, game show host
• August 25 - Morley Callaghan, Canadian writer
• October 13 - Le Duc Tho, Nobel Peace Prize recipient (born 1911)
• October 14 - Leonard Bernstein, American composer and conductor
• October 16 - Art Blakey, jazz drummer
• October 23 - Louis Althusser, French Marxist philosopher
• October 27 - Elliott Roosevelt, author, personality
• December 2 -- Aaron Copland, American composer
• December 14 - Friedrich Dürrenmatt, writer
• December 31 - Vasili Lazarev, cosmonaut

Nobel Prizes

• Physics - Jerome I. Friedman, Henry W. Kendall, Richard E. Taylor
• Chemistry - Elias James Corey
• Medicine - Joseph E Murray, E Donnall Thomas
• Literature - Octavio Paz
• Peace - Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev (Михаил Горбачев)
• Economics - Harry Markowitz, Merton Miller, William Sharpe