Reuters historical calendar - May 18

LONDON, May 17 (Reuters) Following are some of the major events to have occurred on May 18 since 1900: 1911 - The Czech-born Austrian composer Gustav Mahler died. He completed nine symphonies and several song cycles, notably ''Das Lied von der Erde'' (The Song of the Earth).

1944 - A Polish-led Allied force finally evicted German troops from Monte Cassino, Italy, after four months of assaults in World War Two.

1951 - The UN General Assembly adopted a resolution banning shipment of strategic materials to China.

1954 - The European Convention on Human Rights took effect.

1974 - India successfully tested its first nuclear device, in the Rajasthan Desert.

1977 - The United States, the Soviet Union and 29 other nations signed a UN pact banning artificial use of the weather as a weapon of war, pledging they would never attack each other by starting man-made storms, earthquakes or tidal waves.

1980 - The Mount St. Helens volcano in the US state of Washington erupted, creating a cloud of ash 2,500 miles (4,000 km) long and 1,000 miles wide.

1990 - East and West Germany signed a monetary union treaty, the first step on the road to unification.

1993 - The Danish people voted in a referendum to ratify the Maastricht Treaty, a year after rejecting it in a previous vote.

1999 - Britain and Iran ended years of dispute over the ''fatwa'' or religious death decree imposed on the Indian-born British author Salman Rushdie, and agreed to exchange ambassadors.

2001 - In Utah, polygamist and father-of-25 Tom Green was found guilty of four counts of bigamy in the first such case in the United States in 50 years.

2005 - US actor and master impressionist Frank Gorshin, best known for his maniacally menacing turn as the Riddler on the 1960s TV series ''Batman'', died aged 72.

2006 - Nepal's parliament approved a plan to curtail the powers of the king and take away his control over the army, an historic move for a country that has traditionally considered its king to be a god.

REUTERS DS PM1042