NATO offered the prospect of a long-term relationship that the alliance said could build a peaceful future for the world. In a statement adopted at conclusion of the NATO Foreign Ministers conference in Brussels and officially described as an “important political signal,” the alliance members addressed the Soviet Union as a potential partner and said, “for the benefit of mankind, we advocate an open comprehensive political dialogue, as well as cooperation based on mutual advantage.”
President Reagan participates in a National Security Planning Group meeting where the President is briefed on Soviet offensive power.
Actions from the Soviet bloc have raised doubts among Western diplomats in Vienna as to whether the Russians and their Warsaw Pact allies intend to continue the decade-old talks on reduction of conventional arms in Central Europe. One of the indications, the diplomats said, was that the Warsaw Pact side has not accepted a date for resuming the discussions after Christmas.
An Iraqi missile hit a Greek cargo ship in the Persian Gulf on Thursday in the second such incident in two months, the ship’s owners said today. The freighter Iapetos, carrying 20,000 tons of steel from Norway to Iran, was hit during an Iraqi air attack on a convoy 30 miles from Bandar Khomeini, its destination, said a spokesman for the owners, Stravelakis Shipping. “We don’t yet know whether the vessel sank,” the spokesman said. He said the 12 crewmen were safe on another Greek-owned ship. Iraq announced Thursday that its forces had sunk six Iranian naval targets in the Persian Gulf. Last month the freighter Antigoni went down off the Iranian port of Bushire.
Yasser Arafat, seeking safe passage from Tripoli, appealed to the United Nations for more guarantees of security on the outbound sea lanes after an attack on a Palestinian position by Israeli gunboats backed by helicopters. He also asked France and Greece to reinforce their warship escort for the Greek transport vessels that are expected to take him and about 4,000 of his men out of Tripoli, possibly next week.
Congressional support is diminishing for President Reagan’s Middle East policy. This was apparent after an Administration briefing on Lebanon that apparently failed to placate members of Congress. They said that the President’s position was also losing support around the country and predicted that Congress would renew the debate over the Marines’ mission in Lebanon in January.
The death toll in the bombing of a Jerusalem bus on Tuesday rose to five today when a 16-year-old girl died of her wounds, the Israeli radio said. The bombing wounded 45 people.
President Reagan said earlier this week that up to 1,000 terrorists in Lebanon are “willing to sacrifice their lives in a kamikaze attack” against American and Lebanese positions. He made the remark Wednesday in a private comment to a Republican group, Citizens for America. “We have information right now,” he said, “that they have marshaled a force, particularly of Iranians in Lebanon, that numbers up to 1,000 who are all willing to sacrifice their lives in a kamikaze attack.” Administration officials said Mr. Reagan was probably referring to training bases in Lebanon in which Iranians are known to have undergone training in terrorist methods. Officials said there was no connection between this problem, which is limited to Lebanon, and the added security precautions that have been taken recently at the White House.
Britain was assured by Secretary of State George P. Shultz that the United States would consult “very carefully” with it before selling any arms to Argentina now that the American bn on such sales has been lifted. Britain has repeatedly urged Washington not to provide Argentina with any arms that could be used in a new attack on the Falklands.
Parliament today rejected an opposition motion demanding the dismissal of Economics Minister Otto Lambsdorff, who is accused of accepting bribes to influence a decision on tax waivers for the Flick holding company. He has denied the charge. By a vote of 274 to 196, Parliament defeated the motion by the opposition Social Democrats, who said Mr. Lambsdorff, whether innocent or guilty, stained the Government’s reputation by remaining in his post. The Government appears to be hoping the Lambsdorff affair will subside during the long legal procedure of indictment.
President Reagan participates in a Signing Ceremony for International Human Rights Day.
Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany Willy Brandt weds Brigitte Seebacher.
Two North Korean Army officers were sentenced to death today for the bombing October 9 that killed 17 South Korean Government officials and 4 Burmese. The bombing, at the Martyr’s Mausoleum, narrowly missed President Chun Doo Hwan of South Korea, who was on a state visit. An execution date will be set later for the North Koreans, Major Zin Mo and Captain Kang Min Chul. In a confession, Mr. Kang said that he, Mr. Zin and a colleague who was slain when they were captured had been ordered by senior North Korean Army officers to assassinate President Chun. North Korea has denied involvement.
Central American nations have postponed the scheduled signing of a regional peace treaty until next year, Panama announced today. Foreign Ministers from El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala, Costa Rica and Nicaragua were scheduled to sign the treaty during talks December 20 and 21 in an accord negotiated by Mexico, Panama, Colombia and Venezuela — the so called Contadora group. A Panamanian Foreign Ministry spokesman announced today that the joint meeting was postponed until January because one of the Central American officials was unable to attend. The spokesman did not disclose which minister could not attend or the reason.
Despite American objections, the General Assembly adopted resolutions today accusing El Salvador, Chile and Guatemala of human rights violations.
The annual human rights debate, which lasted 10 days, centered on these three nations, as it has in previous years. The resolutions all expressed concern for violations of human rights in each country and called on their governments to “take effective measures” to insure “fundamental freedoms.” The vote on the resolution on El Salvador was 78 to 13 with 41 abstentions; on the Guatemala resolution, 80 to 14 with 36 abstentions, and on Chile, 86 to 15 with 36 abstentions.
Several European countries, including the Netherlands, Sweden, Greece, Norway, Spain, Italy and France, joined Cuba, Mexico and Yugoslavia in sponsoring some or all of of the resolutions. The United States called the resolutions “unbalanced and one-sided.” “It is true that we would like to condemn other countries,” Edward Craanen, a spokesman for the Netherlands said. “But because of the political constellation of the United Nations, it isn’t possible.” A representative of Sweden pointed out that his delegation’s speeches urged the General Assembly to examine human rights more evenhandedly.
In a speech Thursday night, the United States chief delegate, Jeane J. Kirkpatrick, asked why only Chile, El Salvador and Guatemala were criticized when, she said, there were other countries in the region – she mentioned Cuba – whose human rights record was worse. There are, Mrs. Kirkpatrick contended, more political prisoners, less freedom of the press and less judicial independence in Cuba than in Chile. “Trade union rights are limited in Chile and we deplore that fact, but they are nonexistent in Cuba,” she said. Mrs. Kirkpatrick went on, “Chile is a focus of attention in this body, therefore, not because of human rights concerns but – let us be clear – because it is a political target.’
Space shuttle computer failures, which delayed the Columbia’s home landing Thursday, will keep shuttles on the ground until the problems are understood and corrected, officials of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration announced. Two malfunctioning computers were removed from the Columbia here and shipped to the vehicle manufacturer for a “failure analysis,” the National Aeronautics and Space Administration announced. Meanwhile, engineers at the Johnson Space Center in Houston pored over flight data for clues to the breakdowns that briefly disrupted the shuttle’s navigation systems and delayed its landing on Thursday.
Edwin Meese said yesterday that people go to soup kitchens “because food is free & that’s easier than paying for it.” Comments by Edwin Meese 3rd, the Presidential counselor, on reports of hunger in America produced a storm of controversy yesterday. Democratic leaders and some experts on hunger called the remarks outrageous, but the White House said they had been blown out of proportion. In an interview Thursday with news agency reporters, Mr. Meese was asked, “How do you balance the need for spending reductions with judgments by authoritative organizations that, for instance, there are too many hungry children in America?” Mr. Meese said he had not seen “authoritative” evidence of hungry children and added that some allegations of hunger “are purely political.” He said the Government was “spending more on food assistance than it ever has in history” and added that a Presidential study group had been formed to determine the facts on hunger.
Democratic leaders, including candidates for the party’s Presidential nomination, ridiculed Mr. Meese’s remarks. “That’s disgraceful,” former Vice President Walter F. Mondale said, adding that he would visit a soup kitchen in Alabama today to ask people if they could afford to eat elsewhere. “An outrage,” Senator John Glenn of Ohio said of Mr. Meese’s remarks. “The tragedy is that I think Ed Meese doesn’t know any better and, worse still, I think he’s accurately reflecting the attitude of Ronald Reagan and his Administration.” The Rev. Jesse Jackson, the black activist from Chicago who recently entered the Presidential race, called Mr. Meese’s remarks “a slap at the dignity of working people and poor people, unkind and mean-spirited.”
The home computer is No. 1 on the Christmas gift list, replacing food processors and video games of previous Christmases. A marketing survey concern expects that 2.5 million computers will be sold this Christmas, twice as many as last year, when they cost more.
The U.S. is suing Shell Oil to recover nearly $1.9 billion in damages to the environment it says were caused by Shell’s manufacturing operations at the Army’s Rocky Mountain Arsenal near Denver. This is the largest sum ever sought by the Government for damages to natural resources, according to an official of the Justice Department. Meanwhile, the Environmental Protection Agency announced that the Justice Department is also suing the Occidental Chemical Company to recover nearly $45 million spent by the E.P.A. and other federal agencies to clean up hazardous wastes at Love Canal in Niagara Falls, New York, deposited by the Hooker Chemical and Plastics Company, now an Occidental subsidiary.
High-handed leadership tactics in the Massachusetts Legislature are being protested by a growing number of legislators. They believe the Democratic-dominated Legislature has become the most autocratic in the country under Thomas W. McGee, Speaker of the House, and William M. Bulger, President of the Senate. As a result, the House has adopted somewhat more democratic procedures, but the Senate has not.
John W. Jenrette Jr., former Democratic Representative from South Carolina, was sentenced to two years in prison and fined $20,000 three years after his conviction of accepting a $50,000 bribe from an undercover agent posing as an Arab sheik. He said in an appeal for mercy at his sentencing in Washington that alcoholism made him “lose my judgment” and led to his involvement in the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Abscam inquiry.
An espionage indictment was returned today against a man charged in October with selling military secrets to a Polish spy. James Durward Harper Jr., 49 years old, of Mountain View, California, had already been charged in a complaint with delivering military information to aid a foreign government. The indictment additionally charges him with conspiring to deliver such information to aid a foreign government, unlawfully obtaining and retaining such information, delivery of the material, income tax evasion and making a false income tax return. The indictment itself contains little information than had not been disclosed in an FBI affidavit in October.
In Reno, Nevada, Joseph Conforte, the key witness in a bribery case against a federal district judge, pleaded guilty today to bribing a former District Attorney and was sentenced to 18 months in prison. Mr. Conforte, 57 years old, was also fined $10,000 for the bribery of John Giomi, the former District Attorney of neighboring Lyon County, in 1979. The maximum sentence for the conviction was 10 years. According to the indictment, Mr. Conforte gave Mr. Giomi $1,400 in exchange for help in obtaining a brothel license. Mr. Conforte, who fled to Brazil three years ago to escape a five-year sentence for income tax evasion, told State District Judge James Guinan that he had returned to testify against Federal District Judge Harry Claiborne of Las Vegas. Judge Claiborne was indicted by a Federal grand jury on Thursday on seven counts of bribery, wire fraud, obstruction of justice and filing false income tax returns and false financial disclosures.
A former city official and a ward leader in Boston Mayor Kevin H. White’s political organization was charged Thursday in Federal District Court with mail fraud in connection with his claims for a city disability pension. Robert L. Toomey Sr., who was operations manager for the city’s Public Facilities Department, pleaded not guilty to 22 counts of mail fraud and was released on a personal bond. Each of the counts carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison and a $1,000 fine. In December 1981, Mr. Toomey was awarded a lifetime disability retirement pension of $30,240 a year from the City of Boston after he was reported to have been injured in a traffic accident. Several months later, after Mr. Toomey received $25,000 in benefits, the Boston Retirement Board reviewed his claims and revoked his pension.
Three guilty verdicts were returned today by a federal district court jury in a bribery case that Detroit Mayor Coleman Young has called an effort to discredit his administration. Mayor Young was not implicated in the case. The jury convicted Darralyn C. Bowers, Michael J. Ferrantino and Sam Cusenza of conspiracy in connection with the awarding of a multimillion-dollar sludge-hauling contract to Vista Disposal Inc. The jury told Federal District Judge Robert DeMascio it had no verdict yet on 36 counts against the three and their co-defendants, Charles Beckham, Charles J. Carson and Joseph Valentini. Deliberations resume Tuesday.
The U.S. performs a nuclear test at the Nevada Test Site.
Dow Jones Industrial Average: 1260.05 (-1.83).
Died:
David Rounds, 53, American actor (Terence-“Beacon Hill”, “Alice”, “The Blue and The Grey”), of cancer.
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