Reuters historical calendar - November 29

LONDON, Nov 28 (Reuters) Following are some of the major events to have occurred on November. 29 since 1900: 1924 - Giacomo Puccini, who wrote the operas ''La Boheme'' and ''Tosca'', died.

1929 - The American explorer Richard Byrd and the Norwegian-born aviator Bernt Balchen completed the first flight over the South Pole.

1939 - The Soviet Union broke off diplomatic relations with Finland prior to attacking it.

1945 - Yugoslavia's newly elected Constituent Assembly proclaimed a federal republic.

1947 - The UN General Assembly voted to partition Palestine into Jewish and Arab land, leading to the creation of the Jewish state of Israel the following year.

1963 - US President Lyndon B Johnson appointed a commission under Chief Justice Earl Warren to investigate the assassination of President John F Kennedy a week earlier.

1966 - Burundi's King Ntare IV was overthrown and a republic was proclaimed.

1974 - A bill to outlaw the Northern Irish nationalist guerrilla group the Irish Republican Army became law in Britain.

1975 - The British racing driver Graham Hill, world champion in 1962 and 1968, died in an air crash outside London.

1981 - The American actress Natalie Wood died. She was best known for her childhood role in the film ''Miracle on 34th Street'', and later as Maria in ''West Side Story''.

1999 - Pro-British Unionists and Irish nationalist Republicans assembled to form a landmark power-sharing government for Northern Ireland.

2001 - Former Beatle George Harrison, who made his solo mark after the band's break-up with the hit single ''My Sweet Lord'', died of cancer aged 58.

2001 - John Knowles, the American author of ''A Separate Peace'', died aged 75.

2002 - The Hague war crimes tribunal jailed the Bosnian Serb Mitar Vasiljevic for 20 years for the 1992 murder of five Muslims near the town of Visegrad.

2003 - The Chechen rebel leader Akhmed Zakayev, charged with murder and kidnapping by Russia, was granted political asylum in Britain.

2005 - In the first major ruling of Pope Benedict's reign, the Vatican imposed restrictions on homosexuals entering the Catholic priesthood, saying men must first overcome any ''transitory'' gay tendencies.

REUTERS SP PM1025