Reuters historical calendar - May 26

LONDON, May 25 (Reuters) Following are some of the major events to have occurred on May 26 since 1900: 1923 - The first Le Mans 24-hour motor race took place.

1940 - Britain launched a huge sea-borne operation to evacuate defeated Allied troops from the beaches of Dunkirk.

1948 - The hardline white Nationalist Party won power in South African elections.

1972 - The United States and the Soviet Union signed the first Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (SALT 1) curbing nuclear weapons.

1997 - Australian Prime Minister John Howard made a personal apology to tens of thousands of Aborigines forcibly taken from their parents under a past government policy of assimilation.

2003 - Lhakpa Gelu, a Nepali sherpa, set a record for the fastest ascent of Mount Everest by reaching the top in 10 hours and 56 minutes, smashing the earlier record of 12 hours and 45 minutes set just three days earlier by Pemba Dorjie Sherpa.

2004 - The Sudan government and the rebel Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) signed agreements in Kenya on how to share power and manage disputed strategic areas.

2006 - Bulgaria's parliament approved an agreement allowing the United States to establish three military bases in the former Soviet satellite despite strong opposition to foreign troops.

REUTERS SM KN1142