1908

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• Bulgaria becomes independent of the Ottoman empire.

• On 8 April, H H Asquith becomes British Liberal prime minister after Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman resigns because of ill health (dies 22 April).

• In October, Austrian troops occupy Bosnia-Herzegovina in the Balkans.

• On 3 November, in the US presidential election, the Republican candidate William Howard Taft is elected.

• The Belgian parliament annexes the Congo following an international outcry over King Leopold II's savage exploitation of its people, who were subject to his personal rule.

• American industrialist Henry Ford builds the first Model-T car on an assembly line in Detroit. The availability of cheap cars revolutionises transport.

• French militant Georges Sorel publishes his Reflections on Violence, which becomes an influential book for political radicals.

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