Photograph: Queen Elizabeth II, in Bangladesh, with Ahsanuddin ‘AFM’ Chowdhury, President of Bangladesh, 14th November 1983.
A revised arms control proposal was made by the United States at the Geneva talks. The American delegation offered a refinement of its previous plan for limiting medium-range missiles. In Moscow, the government press agency Tass called the offer “patently unacceptable.”
The quest for a technology to defend the United States from assault by missiles is focusing on a device that is smaller, cheaper and more powerful than the other futuristic devices proposed in response to President Reagan’s “Star Wars” speech. The device, called an X-ray laser, takes the power of a nuclear explosion and channels it into laser rods that emit lethal bursts of radiation.
President Reagan returns to the White House from his state visits to Japan and South Korea.
President Reagan attends a National Security Planning Group meeting on the situation in Beirut, Lebanon.
Security around Beirut is deteriorating again and disputes are arising over some of the political issues on which a consensus had begun to emerge at the Geneva talks between Lebanon’s factional leaders. The Beirut radio reported that heavy clashes broke out for the second successive day between the Lebanese Army and Druze-led anti-government militiamen around the mountain-ridge village of Suk al Gharb.
The International Society for Human Rights has launched a campaign to free Soviet dissident and Nobel Peace Prize winner Andrei D. Sakharov from internal exile by the end of the year. A society official said in Bonn that about 30 groups in Europe, the United States and Australia will hold demonstrations until December 31 on Sakharov’s behalf. The noted physicist has been restricted to the Soviet city of Gorky since his arrest in January, 1980.
A man who set himself on fire last week in Moscow’s Red Square after a military parade marking the 66th anniversary of the Communist revolution has died of his burns, police sources reported. The man, identified only as being from the Stevrapolski region of southern Russia, died of third-degree burns in a military hospital, they said. The man was apparently despondent because he could not find an apartment, the sources said.
The city council chairman in Armagh, Northern Ireland, was killed when a bomb blew up his car. “All human life is sacred. Murder, for whatever reason, must be condemned,” Charles Armstrong, a member of the predominantly Protestant Ulster Defense Regiment, had said in council debate less than an hour before the bombing. No one claimed responsibility for the attack, but police sources blamed the outlawed Irish Republican Army. Armstrong was the sixth security officer killed in less than two weeks.
Outraged former French Resistance leaders demanded today that the lawyer for Klaus Barbie, the Nazi war criminal, prove assertions that an underground hero killed himself after comrades betrayed him to the Germans. Mr. Barbie is in a prison in Lyons awaiting trial on charges of “crimes against humanity.” His lawyer, Jacques Verges, said Saturday that Jean Moulin committed suicide after being arrested on June 21, 1943, when Nazis raided a meeting of underground leaders outside Lyons. He said he would prove the assertion later. Postwar tribunals convicted Mr. Barbie in the death and ordered him executed. France has since abolished the death penalty and he cannot be retried for the same crime. Former Prime Minister Jacques Chaban-Delmas, a Resistance leader, denounced Mr. Verges’s assertion as “abominable.”
A martial-law court in Istanbul sentenced 18 leaders of the Turkish Peace Association to eight years in prison today for establishing an organization to overthrow the Government. Of the 30 leaders of the organization who were tried, 5 were acquitted, 5 were given five-year prison terms, 2 were not sentenced and 18 were given eight-year prison terms to be followed by 30 months of probation. The indictment described the peace association as a “pro-U.S.S.R. organization working toward the establishment of a Communist state in Turkey.”
Washington told the O.A.S. that the American-led invasion of Grenada was justified under the Organization of American States’s Charter and “was undertaken to resolve a condition of anarchy, not to alter a functioning political system.” The Reagan Administration also implied that the invasion did not constitute a precedent for American action against Nicaragua.
Fidel Castro said the opponents of Grenada’s Prime Minister Maurice Bishop who ousted and killed him “sank the revolution and opened the doors to imperialist aggression.” In a 90-minute address in Havana’s Revolution Square, Mr. Castro repeatedly denounced the United States-led invasion of Grenada.
Argentina urged the United States and its European allies to bring pressure on Britain to end what it called the British militarization of the Falkland Islands. Speaking in a U.N. General Assembly debate characterized by sharp exchanges between representatives of the two opponents in last year’s Falklands war, Argentine Foreign Minister Juan Aguirre Lanari said, “The decolonization and recovery of the Malvinas (Falklands) is a priority that no Argentine can give up.”
Robert L. Vesco is living in Cuba, according to a federal prosecutor. The prosecutor also said that the fugitive financier was the instigator of a $729,000 plot to smuggle United States goods into Cuba.
Michael K. Deaver, White House deputy chief of staff, arrived in Peking to work out details of Premier Zhao Ziyang’s scheduled January visit to Washington. Deaver, accorded VIP treatment normally reserved for foreign dignitaries, flew to the Chinese capital instead of returning to Washington with President Reagan, who completed a weeklong visit to Japan and South Korea on Monday. Reagan is expected to pay his first visit to China next April.
A Chinese pilot who landed his MIG-17 jet fighter at Taipei airport said that he defected because he was disillusioned with the Communist system. Wang Xuecheng, 28, who gave his rank as squad commander in the Chinese naval air corps, told a press conference that he flew from Tai Shan, an island about 75 miles southeast of Shanghai, to Taipei. Wang, who earned a salary of $42 a month with the Chinese navy, is to receive a reward in gold worth about $1.5 million, according to a program for defectors announced earlier by Taiwan. Wang was the eighth Chinese pilot to defect to Taiwan since 1960.
Brigadier Tin Oo, once one of the most powerful political figures in Burma, was sentenced to five life terms in prison today for misuse of state funds and property. The defense attorney said Brigadier Tin Oo, formerly regarded as a possible successor to the Burmese leader, U Ne Win, would appeal the verdict. Before the trial, Brigadier Tin Oo was removed from his powerful positions as joint general secretary of the ruling Burma Socialist Program Party and a member of the Council of State. Several Western and Asian diplomats in neighboring Thailand had suggested the real cause of Brigadier Tin Oo’s downfall was his rapidly growing popularity and power.
Bangladesh’s military ruler announced that presidential elections will be held next May 24 and parliamentary elections will be held six months later, on November 25, 1984. In a speech to the nation before the arrival of Queen Elizabeth II of Britain for a three-day visit, Lieutenant General Hussain Mohammed Ershad also announced the lifting of a ban on outdoor political activity.
A state court in India sentenced two police officials to three years of hard labor for deliberately blinding suspected criminals with bicycle spokes and sulfuric acid. The convictions were the first stemming from a 1980 police scandal in the town of Bhagalpur, in Bihar state, 185 miles northeast of Calcutta. Officials have said at least 33 young men were blinded in the town.
Members of the largest federal government employees union went on strike against its own labor federation, accusing it of anti-labor negotiating practices. About 120 members of Local 2 of the Office and Professional Employees Union walked off the job at noon at the Washington headquarters of the American Federation of Government Employees. The strike centered on job security and employee disciplinary issues, rather than economic matters. It was the first walkout in the 51-year history of the AFGE, which has 220,000 dues-paying members in the federal work force and is the certified bargaining agent for 480,000 others.
The Food and Drug Administration approved the drug cyclosporine, whose use dramatically increases the survival rate for patients receiving organ transplants, an FDA spokesman said. Cyclosporine previously had preliminary approval as an experimental drug. The final approval means it will be available at any pharmacy, instead of just at experimental centers, and will be covered by Medicare, spokesman Bill Grigg said. Cyclosporine must be taken as often as twice a day for the rest of a patient’s life and is estimated to cost between $5,000 and $6,000 a year.
The equal rights amendment is scheduled for House action today with no chance to amend the proposal, a parliamentary maneuver that has infuriated Republicans and perhaps jeopardized passage for this year because Congress has targeted Friday for adjournment of this year’s session. Democratic leaders decided the constitutional amendment will be brought up under suspension of the rules. That procedure provides only a yes or no vote with 40 minutes of debate divided between supporters and opponents.
The court-ordered release of inmates from city jails has been halted, at least until the new year, New York Mayor Edward I. Koch said. To ease an overcrowding crisis in its jails, the city in the last two weeks has released 610 inmates — all adult men awaiting trial — under an order imposed by U.S. District Judge Morris Lasker.
The hospital where a severely retarded infant born October 11 with an open spine is being treated is obligated to release her medical records because it receives federal funds, federal authorities contended in supplementary court papers filed in New York City. The Reagan Administration has requested the records of “Baby Jane Doe” to determine whether the infant’s civil rights have been violated. The parents and the state have contended that release of the records would be an invasion of the parents’ right to privacy.
The House approved a Senate-passed resolution opposing the Reagan Administration’s proposal to sell the government’s civil weather satellites to private interests. The decision supplements an earlier amendment that prohibits the transfer of weather or remote land-sensing satellites. The House Science and Technology Committee has opposed the sale because of the public-service nature of weather information and the possible impact on national security, among other reasons.
Chicago Mayor Harold Washington proposed a $1.9-billion austerity budget that freezes wages while providing $119 million in new taxes and fees. The 1984 budget, the first presented by Washington, is a 2.5% decrease from the $1.95-billion 1983 budget the City Council approved under former Mayor Jane M. Byrne. Washington’s budget includes a 6% tax on commercial real estate leases that will produce $78 million, elimination of the employee head tax and a freeze of property levies. It provides no salary increases for municipal employees but pledges an end to budget-balancing layoffs. Washington said he foresees 1984 as a time of “attrition management.”
Public schools can get private funds from a new breed of “educational foundation” that helps finance specific educational programs. About 350 such foundations have been established. Most focus on relatively small projects. The foundations have generally been welcomed by school officials, but critics say the trend might influence the policies of elected officials and undermine gains in equalizing rich and poor districts.
A reconstructed civil rights panel was approved, 78-3, by the Senate. Observers said the action assured the continued life and independence of the agency, the United States Commission on Civil Rights. The legislation provides that members of the commission may be dismissed only for cause.
Jurors today convicted Angelo Buono Jr. of the one remaining murder count against him. The jurors had convicted the 49-year-old Mr. Buono of eight of the 10 murders involving rape and strangling in 1977 and 1978, and acquitted him of one charge, but then they reported that they were “hopelessly deadlocked” on the final count. Judge Ronald M. George, who is presiding in Superior Court, ordered the jury, which began deliberations October 21, to keep trying. Late this afternoon, the jury found the former automobile upholsterer guilty of the murder of Cindy Lee Hudspeth, 20, a college student who had lived across the street from Kenneth Bianchi, Mr. Buono’s cousin and a major witness against him. Mr. Buono became eligible for the death penalty under the multiple murder rule November 5 when he was convicted of the second murder in the case. The penalty phase of the trial begins Wednesday.
Illegal aliens contribute far more to the economy of Texas in taxes than they take out in health, welfare and other publicly financed services, according to a new study. But the researchers reported that Texas cities with many illegal immigrants suffered a net loss. They urged the state to make up the difference.
Ginny Foat took the witness stand in her murder trial and denied ever having met the victim, an Argentine businessman, or killing him. He died in 1965 on a trip to New Orleans. As the defense attorney questioned her closely about her life with John Sidote, the state’s main witness, Mrs. Foat, a former feminist leader, hesitated frequently while tears interrupted her testimony.
The Farmers Home Administration may not foreclose on borrowers in 44 states without informing them of their right to seek a loan deferral and offering them a hearing, a federal district judge ruled today. Judge Bruce Van Sickle imposed a temporary injunction, effective nationwide, against the agency until he could hear arguments on granting a permanent order and on the merits of a suit against the agency. Last month, Judge Van Sickle agreed that a suit filed against the agency by nine North Dakota farmers should have nationwide application. Farmers in other states have the same protection Judge Van Sickle granted the North Dakota borrowers when he issued a statewide injunction in May. Sarah Vogel, a lawyer for the farmer-plaintiffs, said that an agency document indicates foreclosures are pending against 1,800 farmers in 44 states.
Men who have had vasectomies are just as healthy as those who have not 10 years later, according to a major new study. Researchers reported that more than 10,000 sterilized men surveyed showed no increased risk of developing any of 54 disorders, including heart disease, cancer, impotence, blood clots or diseases involving the immune system.
British theatrical composer Andrew Lloyd Webber (35) divorces Sarah Hugill after more than 11 years of marriage.
NFL Monday Night Football:
Eric Dickerson, the Rams’ rookie running star, rushed for 146 yards and scored two touchdowns, and Vince Ferragamo threw two scoring passes as Los Angeles routed the Atlanta Falcons, 36-13, tonight. The victory improved the Rams’ record to 7-4 and kept them in a first- place tie with San Francisco in the National Football Conference’s Western Division. The Falcons, who fell to 4-7, are last in the West. Dickerson, who did not carry the ball in the fourth quarter, scored on runs of 1 and 7 yards, and broke two club records. His 146 yards on 21 carries lifted his league-leading total for the season to 1,369 yards. He bettered the club’s season rushing mark of 1,238, set in 1977 by Lawrence McCutcheon. And the two touchdowns by the 222-pounder from Southern Methodist University gave him 19, two more than the previous club mark, which was shared by Elroy Hirsch and Wendell Tyler.
Ferragamo, who completed 15 of 22 pass attempts for 173 yards, put the Rams ahead to stay late in the first quarter when he fired a 61-yard touchdown pass to Preston Dennard, who broke free for the reception at the Atlanta 18. Ferragamo came back with a 9-yard scoring pass to George Farmer in the third quarter. The Rams also got a 27-yard field goal from Chuck Nelson and a 40-yard touchdown run by Barry Redden with 1:52 remaining. Redden carried 11 times in the last three series for the Rams. He finished with 110 yards on 17 carries. Atlanta scored on a pair of first-half field goals by Mick Luckhurst. Gerald Riggs scored on a 1-yard run to cap a 71-yard drive in the fourth quarter, helped by two pass-interference infractions that netted 21 and 12 yards, the last one to the Los Angeles 1.
Los Angeles Rams 36, Atlanta Falcons 13
Dow Jones Industrial Average: 1254.06 (+3.86).
Born:
Guillermo Moscoso, Venezuelan MLB pitcher (Texas Rangers, Oakland A’s, Colorado Rockies, San Francisco Giants), in Maracay, Venezuela.
Clete Thomas, MLB outfielder (Detroit Tigers, Minnesota Twins), in Jacksonville, Florida.
Chelsea Wolfe, American singer-songwriter and musician, in Roseville, California.
History Diaries 