September 2, 2004 (Thursday)
- A night-time fire breaks out in the Duchess Anna Amalia Library (a UNESCO World Heritage Site) in Weimar, Thuringia, Germany. Damage is estimated in the millions of dollars and 40,000 to 50,000 books were destroyed. An authentic Lutheran Bible from 1534 was saved. The library contains more than 1,000,000 volumes, including the Duchess' 13,000-volume music collection, the world's largest collection of materials relating to Goethe's masterpiece Faust, and an important collection of Shakespeariana. (BBC) (Jerusalem Post)[permanent dead link]
- U.S. presidential election: George W. Bush accepts the Republican nomination for a second term in office as the party's National Convention concludes, signaling the beginning of all-out campaigning by Bush and Senator John Kerry.
- Two security guards at MI5's headquarters in London are attacked by a man carrying a machete. (BBC)
- Alex Salmond is re-elected as leader of the Scottish National Party. (BBC)
- Beslan school hostage crisis: Armed men and women continue to hold over 1,300 adults and children hostage in Beslan, North Ossetia, Russia. Russian authorities announce that they have, for the moment, ruled out the use of force to end the standoff, while Chechen rebel leader Aslan Maskhadov denies that his forces are responsible. Late in the day, 26 women and children are released by the hostage-takers. (BBC: 1, 2)
- Conflict in Iraq: The U.S. military bombs a site in Fallujah, in what the U.S. describes as a "precision" attack on a militant safe house. Hospital officials say that at least seventeen civilians, including up to three children, were killed. (BBC)
- Former Malaysian opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim is freed from jail after his sodomy conviction is overturned by the country's highest court. (Bloomberg) (BBC)
- The UN war crimes tribunal in The Hague declares former Yugoslav President Slobodan Miloševic unfit to represent himself in his trial, and appoints two lawyers to his defense. (BBC News)
- South Korea admits that, in 2000, its scientists secretly enriched uranium to near nuclear-weapon level. (BBC)