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Deaths on April 14

2003Apr, 14

Jyrki Otila

Jyrki Otila, Finnish politician (b. 1941)
Jyrki Ilari Otila (2 September 1941, in Helsinki – 14 April 2003, in Tampere) was a Finnish quiz show judge and a member of the European Parliament.

Otila graduated as an economist. He became popular as the judge of several quiz shows on television. Otila worked as assistant office chief for the Finnish national public broadcasting company Yle from 1965 to 1970, in the United Nations in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, from 1970 to 1973, in Yle in 1974, in the Ministry for Foreign Affairs as a development aid expert in Tanzania from 1975 to 1977, and as a factory chief for the Orion Corporation in Arusha, Tanzania, from 1977 to 1980.

Otila wrote questions for Yle TV2's quiz show Thilia Thalia Tallallaa from 1982 until moving to work on quizzes for the new channel Kolmoskanava. He worked as assistant chairman of the board of Oy VipVision Finland Ltd. from 1995. Thilia Thalia Tallallaa was continued in 1998. At the Kolmoskanava and Neloskanava channels, Otila was involved in the production of the quiz shows Kolmosvisa, Tietopörssi and Nelosvisa. He was often paired with the television presenter Reijo Salminen. Otila was himself a skilled quiz show contestant and finished in third place in the Suomen Tietoviisas quiz in 1994.

Otila was elected as a member of the European Parliament from Finland for the years 1996 to 1999 (National Coalition Party), where he was a member of the Committee on Regional Policy and an alternate member of the Committee on Agricultural Policy.

Otila died of long-time cancer on 14 April 2003.

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Events on 2003

  • 17Mar

    2003 invasion of Iraq

    Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs Robin Cook, resigns from the British Cabinet in disagreement with government plans for the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
  • 7Apr

    Saddam Hussein

    U.S. troops capture Baghdad; Saddam Hussein's regime falls two days later.
  • 27Aug

    North Korea and weapons of mass destruction

    The first six-party talks, involving South and North Korea, the United States, China, Japan and Russia, convene to find a peaceful resolution to the security concerns of the North Korean nuclear weapons program.
  • 12Sep

    Pan Am Flight 103

    The United Nations lifts sanctions against Libya after that country agreed to accept responsibility and recompense the families of victims in the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103.
  • 12Nov

    2003 invasion of Iraq

    Iraq War: In Nasiriyah, Iraq, at least 23 people, among them the first Italian casualties of the 2003 invasion of Iraq, are killed in a suicide bomb attack on an Italian police base.