TODAY IN HISTORY -August 5

Reuters 

Following are some of the major events to have occurred on August 5:

1940 - Latvia was absorbed into the Soviet Union as the Latvian Soviet Socialist Republic.

1962 - American film actress Marilyn Monroe died in Los Angeles at the age of 36.

1984 - British actor Richard Burton died at the age of 58.

1995 - The United States and Vietnam declared an end to decades of enmity, formally established diplomatic ties and pledged a new era of cooperation.

1995 - Croatian government forces seized the rebel Serb "capital" of Knin in a lightning assault designed to win back the breakaway region of Krajina after 4 years.

1998 - Todor Zhivkov, Bulgarian communist ruler from 1954-89, died aged 86.

2003 - Bomb blast at Marriott hotel in Jakarta.

2007 - South Asia's catastrophic flood's death toll climbed to 330 amid fears of epidemics and criticism of relief efforts.

2012 - China's Zhou Lulu sets new world record and Olympic record in the clean and jerk weightlifting event.

2012 - Fatal shooting at a Sikh temple in Oak Creek, Wisconsin.

2013 - World's first lab-grown beef, the in-vitro burger, is launched in London.