The stock market jumped after Arabs relaxed their oil boycotts in Western Europe and Japan. Analysts believe that investors feel more optimistic about the possibility of avoiding a worldwide recession, but even lifting the oil embargo to the United States won’t solve all of America’s problems.
Following the announcement that the Persian Gulf oil‐producing states would restore 10 per cent of their oil cutbacks, Japan postponed its scheduled emergency reduction of oil and electric power to industry. Despite the promised increase in oil shipments, Japan will still be 10 to 20 per cent short of its oil needs, officials in Tokyo estimated.
President Nixon and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger met to discuss general U.S. foreign policy. Soviet ambassador Dobrynin joined Kissinger and the President later. No details of the meeting were released. Ambassador Anatoly F. Dobrynin of the Soviet Union met with President Nixon and Secretary of State Kissinger to discuss “general foreign policy matters,” according to the White House spokesman, Gerald R. Warren. A spokesman for Mr. Kissinger described the talks as “a review of Soviet-American relations, general international affairs and some discussion of the Middle East.” It was the Soviet Ambassador’s second visit with Mr. Nixon in 5 days.
A bill providing emergency aid to Israel was signed by President Nixon.
Israeli and Egyptian military officers met in Geneva to discuss troop disengagement along the Suez front. The head of United Nations peacekeeping forces, General Siilasvuo, presided over the meeting. Israel and Egypt resumed negotiations in Geneva aiming at the separation of their forces on the Suez Canal front, as generals of the two countries met for 90 minutes. A United Nations spokesman said that the talks “will facilitate productive discussions in future meetings.” The session was a revival of negotiations that were broken off November 29 at the 101‐Kilometer marker on the Cairo‐Suez Road.
Daily outbreaks of fighting between Israeli and Egyptian forces have seriously restricted the movement of supplies to Egypt’s isolated III Corps in the Sinai Peninsula. The nonmilitary supplies must move through Israeli lines under the auspices of the United Nations Emergency Force, and continual exchanges of gunfire in the area disrupt the movement, according to Rudolf Stajduhar, a United Nations spokesman. Supplies to the city of Suez are continuing without difficulty.
Israel will hold national elections next week. Golda Meir’s government may be replaced with a right-wing government. The key issue of the election deals with the Geneva peace conference. Opposition leader Menachem Begin remains uncompromising regarding troop disengagement, and Begin’s party has gained ground in polls.
French security agents arrested 13 pro-Palestinian terrorists who hoped to launch more attacks in Western Europe; weapons were confiscated also. United Press International reported that the Arab guerrillas who were responsible for the firebombing and hijacking in Rome originally intended to assassinate Secretary of State Henry Kissinger.
A fierce battle deep in the Mekong Delta claimed 18 South Vietnamese soldiers killed, 81 wounded and 42 missing, government military sources said. Those killed included the commander and deputy commander of a South Vietnamese battalion advancing on Communist troops near Vị Thanh, about 100 miles southwest of Saigon. About 1,500 reinforcements were sent in and battled through the night. Saigon sources said 25 Communists were killed.
Chinese Communist party leader Mao Tse-tung celebrated his 80th birthday.
Long Boret took office as the sixth, and last, Prime Minister of Khmer Republic in Cambodia, after accepting an appointment by President Lon Nol to form a government to succeed In Tam. He tried, unsuccessfully, to negotiate peace with the Khmer Rouge invaders during the Cambodian Civil War, and elected to stay in Phnom Penh while other officials were able to escape before the Communist takeover of the Asian nation. He would be arrested and executed on April 17, 1975.
Thousands of West Berliners moved through the Communist wall for visits to East Berlin and the East German countryside. Western border officers at various points agreed the flow was off considerably from a year ago. “How much less we cannot say, but in any case considerably fewer than in 1972,” a senior customs office spokesman said.
A bomb blast shattered windows and woodwork in a pub adjacent to the crowded Victoria Palace Theater in London, but the female star of the theater show drew a standing ovation for refusing to let the incident disrupt her act. Police said the bomb, apparently another in the Irish Republican Army terror campaign, was planted in a window box of the Stage Door Pub. No one was injured. Singer-comedienne Barbara Windsor, appearing in “Carry on London,” continued singing “You Made Me Love You.” When she was congratulated later for carrying on, she said, “Don’t be daft. I was a war baby, you know.”
The capture of two young women armed with pistols shortly after snipers fired at soldiers in Belfast could indicate the Irish Republican Army is using women because of manpower shortages, a British army spokesman said. They were the first women activists captured since the IRA launched a drive for women volunteers in Londonderry two weeks ago. In Belfast’s Maze Prison George Hyde, a 19-year-old Protestant extremist, was found beaten to death. He was awaiting trial for the attempted murder of a Roman Catholic but an army spokesman discounted sectarian motives for his slaying.
National elections were held in Denmark earlier this month. Denmark’s military will be abolished along with the country’s income tax. Mogens Glistrup of the New Progress party says he plans to cut politicians, authors and university teachers from the public payroll if he gets his way. Glistrup admitted that Denmark may be unsafe without armed forces, but he added that it is not safe with them either. The nation’s new defense system will consist of a Russian language recording announcing Denmark’s surrender.
Mexican police announced the capture of the head of a gang allegedly responsible for more than 20 kidnappings over the last two years, and identified him as an ex-policeman. Marciano Espinoza Gonzalez, who was seized with two accomplices — one of them his brother — is accused of having extorted about $1 million in a series of kidnappings in the Pacific Coast state of Sinaloa since December, 1971.
Leftist guerrillas of the People’s Revolutionary Army (ERP) in Argentina announced belatedly that they were responsible for the kidnapping of Swissair director Kurt Schmid — who was freed November 29 — and said they collected a “tax” of $3.8 million to be used in fighting imperialism. The ERP’s clandestine magazine Red Star, which carried the announcement, also had a photo of kidnapped U.S. oil executive Victor Samuelson on its cover with the slogan “No truce for imperialist companies.” The ERP said Esso Co., the Argentine subsidiary of Exxon, must pay $10 million to charity for the release of Samuelson, kidnapped December 6.
Iran’s anti-drug squad seized 9,553 pounds of opium — estimated at $2 million worth at New York street prices — and arrested two leaders of an international smuggling ring, police said. The drug had been smuggled from Afghanistan and carried on camels across desert to Kashan, 250 miles south of Tehran, then transferred to a truck. The truck and its occupants were seized near Tehran by police who had been watching the gang’s movements. Iranian law authorizes execution for anyone caught with more than 4.4 pounds of opium or half an ounce of heroin, and 194 persons have been executed since 1970.
President Nixon met with his chief energy adviser, William Simon. The President hinted that gasoline rationing will not be necessary to deal with the energy crisis. Simon will announce the government’s final plans regarding rationing tomorrow.
U.S. President Nixon became the only incumbent American president to fly on a commercial airliner, as he, wife Pat and daughter Tricia Nixon Cox boarded United Air Lines Flight 55 at Washington’s Dulles International Airport and traveled across the country to the Los Angeles International Airport. During the flight, Nixon sat in the first-class section of the DC-10 and then surprised passengers by walking down the aisle to the back of the aircraft to shake hands.
The few gas stations which remained open on Christmas named their own prices. Prices were highest in Brooklyn — 99.9 cents per gallon. That station was closed today only because no fuel was left in the tanks. Other station owners in the area may raise their prices since one station got away with it. But the IRS announced that the station owner in Brooklyn may be fined $2,500 for violating the price limit. The IRS checked gasoline stations across the country in November and December and discovered 10,000 violations.
The Christmas holiday death toll on the nation’s highways was remarkably low. The National Transportation Safety Council attributed the low figure to lower speeds and less travel. In Rhode Island, the state ordered auto insurance rates covering injuries be reduced 10% because of changing driving patterns.
The special Watergate prosecutor said that White House tapes and documents do not support the dairy industry’s charge against the Nixon administration.
An aide to Republican Senator Edward Gurney reported that Gurney will not leave the Senate Watergate Committee; Gurney is now under investigation.
Nearly half of the $175 million voted by Congress for 1974 farm conservation subsidies has been impounded by the White House, the Department of Agriculture disclosed in Washington. Only $90 million will be spent on the renamed Rural Environmental Conservation Program, which replaces the old Rural Environmental Assistance Program. The White House Office of Management and Budget impounded $85 million of the conservation fund, officials said. Clearance was given to spend $10 million on reviving a water bank program to preserve farm marshlands for migratory birds. About $10 million will be available for a reforestation program.
Just before he was appointed by Ohio Governor John Gilligan to fill the vacated Senate seat of William Saxbe, Democrat Howard Metzenbaum paid back taxes he owed to the IRS.
A couple in Schenectady, New York, may have frozen to death after the power company turned off their heat. Frank and Catherine Baker were both in their 90’s. A neighbor said that she recalled a man from the power company cutting electricity to the Baker home. The company reported than an employee’s personal decision led to the power being turned off. Handfuls of cash were found in the home of the elderly couple, police said. Some of the money, found under mattresses and wrapped in toilet paper, was in $10 and $20 bills. It did not exceed $1,000, police said. Frank Baker, 93, and his wife, Catherine, 92, were found dead Christmas Eve by a grandson, Basil Heise.
A Justice Department civil suit filed against the State of Nevada charged that certain state employment laws illegally discriminate against women. The suit charged that the laws would prevent women from working more than eight hours a day and more than six days a week and thereby restrict their employment opportunities. The state has “taken no steps to repeal or limit enforcement of the laws, despite a conflict with the 1964 Civil Rights Act, the suit said.
The U.S. Court of Appeal in Chicago voided a negotiated settlement between two airlines and their cabin attendants that would have permitted about 600 stewardesses who lost their jobs when they became pregnant to return to work. The ruling reversed a 1971 U.S. District Court decision approving a settlement between American and TransWorld Airlines (TWA) and the Airline Stewards and Stewardesses Association. The appeals court ruled that collective bargaining should not be used to negotiate civil rights issues.
A knife-wielding passenger fatally wounded the driver of a Continental Trailways bus as he drove along U.S. 82 near New Boston, Texas, with about 20 passengers aboard. The driver, Billy Fred Young, reportedly edged his bus off the highway and brought it to a halt while struggling with his assailant. Then Young stumbled out of the bus and collapsed. After a night-long search, police arrested a hitchhiker, James Edward Morris, 31, of Salem, Virginia, and charged him with murder.
A 40-year-old native of Hungary was arrested on the international bridge at Brownsville, Texas, for allegedly threatening to kill U.S. Senator Mark O. Hatfield (R-Oregon), the FBI reported. Held on $75,000 bond in Cameron County jail was Istvan Kispal Kovacs, a resident of Beaverton, Oregon.
New York City decided to provide a system to save on gasoline and see the sights. “Culture Loop” buses go past or near tourist attractions in the city. The buses visit Manhattan and Brooklyn but not Queens.
Scientists are reaching an understanding of obesity that promises more effective treatment and prevention of the problem of being overweight, which now effects nearly 70 million Americans. Research shows that obesity may be predestined from childhood in many people grossly overweight. For most other people, the victims of creeping obesity who become overweight as adults, recent studies indicate that this is largely a side effect of modern living.
A heavy rainstorm packing damaging winds spawned flooding in the South. At least five deaths were connected with the winter storm. Mrs. Jesse Bridges Jr., in her 20s, was killed when winds overturned her trailer home in Jefferson County, Mississippi. A truck and city bus collided during a violent thunderstorm in Birmingham, Alabama, killing four persons and injuring eight. About 50 persons, including 50 children, were evacuated from homes along the Rock River in Moline, Illinois, when an ice jam backed up the river 3 feet above flood stage.
The eight-day spaceflight of Soyuz 13 ended with cosmonauts Pyotr Klimuk and Valentin Lebedev landing early, apparently because of a malfunction in the capsule’s equipment. The ship landed in a heavy snowstorm near Karaganda in the Kazakh SSR.
The controversial horror film “The Exorcist,” directed by William Friedkin and starring Ellen Burstyn and Linda Blair, premiered in the United States.
Dow Jones Industrial Average: 837.56 (+22.75, +2.79%).
Born:
Ryan Berube, American swimmer (800m freestyle relay, Olympic gold, 1996), in Tequesta, Florida.
Died:
Harold B. Lee, 74, U.S. Mormon Church religious leader, 11th President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Lee was succeeded by Spencer W. Kimball on December 31.
Steven Geray, 69, American actor (“French Line”).
William Haines, 73, American actor (“Little Annie Rooney”), of cancer.
History Diaries 