Energy czar William Simon and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger held a news conference focusing on the worldwide energy crisis. Kissinger outlined plans for a conference of oil-consuming nations and, later, oil-producing nations. If the cooperative effort fails, economic catastrophe is a real possibility. Kissinger stated that unrestricted bilateral competition would be ruinous for all countries concerned. Kissinger leaves for the Mideast tonight. Kissinger said that he hopes to transform general ideas into a concrete proposal. After a proposal exists, serious negotiations between Israel and Egypt may occur regarding troop disengagement.
President Nixon’s call for a conference of major oil-consuming nations drew a generally favorable response, although the Common Market countries said they would have to consult before accepting the invitation to the February 11 talks in Washington. Japan and West Germany both welcomed the invitation, but France is reported not enthusiastic about the conference, which is designed to prepare for talks with producing countries.
Iran has reportedly agreed to buy 30 Grumman F-14A fighter planes at a total cost of $900 million, including spare parts. The decision to accept the United States offer was good news for the 6,000 workers assigned to the project on Long Island, where Grumman is by far the largest employer. Company officials said the order would keep the project’s workers busy at least until early 1977.
A United Nations spokesman in Cairo said that Egyptian troops had kept United Nations observers from patrolling the cease-fire line at two points and that tension at the city of Suez had been “heightened” because of an Egyptian advance to a new troop position. The spokesman said that United Nations officers had persuaded Israeli troops not to fire on the advancing Egyptians.
An Israeli military spokesman disclosed that a missile which was fired at an Egyptian plane set oil wells ablaze in the Israeli-held are of the Gulf of Suez. The amount of oil lost was not released.
The chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, Admiral Thomas Moorer, revealed that Russia has provided Syria with missiles capable of hitting Tel Aviv and other cities. Moorer was interviewed on “Today.”
The body of a Roman Catholic businessman was discovered dumped in bushes at a Belfast Catholic cemetery, police said. An anonymous caller who told a newspaper he belonged to the Official wing of the Irish Republican Army said he had opposed the murder of John Crawford, 52. In other actions, bomb explosions broke windows in a downtown courthouse and cut the main rail link between Belfast and Dublin.
Soviet news commentator Yuri Zhukov, after a prime time television denunciation of novelist Alexander I. Solzhenitsyn, invited American reporters to his Pravda office where he read excerpts from “several hundred” letters he had received from Soviet citizens critical of the author and dissident physicist Andrei D. Sakharov. The letters urged they be tried or expelled from the country. Western diplomats saw his remarks as official policy and expected no further measures against the dissidents. In a second declaration of support for the novelist, Sakharov said “Solzhenitsyn and I love the country in which we both live.”
The United States has granted an emergency entry visa to a 26-year-old Russian seaman who was rescued from a rubber raft by a Japanese ferryboat off northern Japan last week, the State Department announced. The Russian, who was interviewed by U.S. Embassy officials in Japan, was identified as Peter Nikolayevich Kaoroyko, a navigator, third class, who apparently jumped off a Soviet fisheries research vessel.
The third major earthquake in two weeks rumbled across the south west Pacific Ocean, the University of California Seismographic Station at Berkeley reported. There was no word on whether the tremor caused injuries or damage. The quake, measuring 7.4 on the Richter scale, hit in the sparsely populated New Hebrides Islands, about 1,100 miles northeast of Australia. Quakes with readings of 7.4 and 7.8 struck December 28. A reading of 7 is considered a major earthquake, capable of widespread damage.
Philippine President Ferdinand E. Marcos granted a general amnesty for persons who failed to register or vote in last July’s national referendum on whether he should continue in office past the end of 1973. The amnesty put an end to a court battle involving members of the Jehovah’s Witnesses, a religious association claiming 60,000 members in the country. They sought a Supreme Court decision to uphold their right to refuse to register or vote in any election on religious grounds.
All 31 persons aboard a Colombian airliner that crashed into a mountain Wednesday were killed, police confirmed. No survivors were seen by rescue teams who said the wreckage was spread along a deep gorge and recovery of the bodies might be impossible. All those aboard were believed to be Colombians.
A Mexican guerrilla leader claimed his band killed 13 soldiers in two southern Mexico ambushes, a leftist magazine said. The ambushes were part of “a rehearsal… for the revolution of the poor which is forthcoming in the country to achieve true equality for all Mexicans,” said the magazine, Por Q in Mexico City. It was quoting from a statement allegedly signed by the guerrilla leader, Lucio Cabanas.
In Los Mochis, Sinaloa in Mexico, the Universidad Autónoma de Occidente (UdeO) was established as the Centro de Estudios Superiores de Occidente (CESO).
In solidarity with the protest by engineering school students at the University of Ahmedabad in India, university students of the Navnirman Andolan movement called for a bandh, leading to a violent two-day riot in Ahmedabad and Vadodara, and police firing on the crowd.
Indian army troops were called out to quell violence that erupted during a strike in central India to protest rising prices, the government radio in New Delhi reported. Two persons reportedly were slain by police in Gujarat state in the second outbreak of strike-related violence in India this month. Students and opposition politicians called the latest strike.
Rhodesia has moved more than 8,000 African tribesmen out of northeast border areas of the country where guerrilla activity has been high, the Information Ministry said. The Africans had been moved “voluntarily into protected villages built for them as part of the government’s policy to establish “no-go” areas in the northeast.
Étienne Eyadéma, President of the Togolese Republic in west Africa, announced the nationalization of the nation’s phosphate mining industry and of the privately-owned Compagnie Togolaise des Mines du Bénin. Two weeks later, his presidential plane would crash on landing near Sarakawa, an incident that Eyadéma believed was an assassination attempt by saboteurs paid by company shareholders.
The crew of Skylab 4 was granted a day off. Edward Gibson spent most of the day conducting solar observations using the station’s coronagraph, while Gerald Carr and William Pogue relaxed.
Joe Remiro, a co-founder of the Symbionese Liberation Army U.S. terrorist group, was arrested along with Russell Little on suspicion of committing the November 6 murder of Marcus Foster, the superintendent of public schools in Oakland, California. Little and Remiro were stopped for a traffic violation while driving a vehicle filled with weapons and SLA propaganda materials. They were questioned regarding Foster’s murder and were promptly arrested and incarcerated. Later that day, fellow SLA member Nancy Ling Perry, having heard about the arrests, set fire to the group’s Concord, California safe house in an effort to destroy any evidence that might be useful to the police. When officers arrived at the house, they found it damaged but not burned down—and thus, with a significant amount of evidence still intact. Remiro would be sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder, while Little’s conviction would be overturned.
William Johnson, the administration’s top policy analyst dealing with the oil shortage, announced that the shortage may not be as severe as predicted, but a fuel crisis still exists. Energy czar William Simon stated that the federal government will audit the records of all the nation’s refiners to get the facts regarding oil availability; Texaco released statistics on its inventories.
Texaco became the first company to respond to mounting criticism of secrecy in the oil industry by releasing supply statistics. According to the company’s figures, it had more heating oil, aviation fuel and diesel fuel on January 1 than a year ago but much less crude oil.
William Simon, the nation’s energy chief, said that his investigators were helping the Internal Revenue Service audit the price, profit and supply records of every refinery in the nation to make sure that price increases were limited to a pass-through of higher costs. Mr. Simon said the audit would also help verify the accuracy of industry statistics on supplies.
A petition has been filed with the Federal Trade Commission to force oil companies and utilities to substantiate their advertising claims regarding the energy shortage. Representative Benjamin Rosenthal said that oil companies and utilities are using commercials to rid themselves of any guilt feelings regarding the energy crisis. Senator Birch Bayh charged the companies with limiting energy supplies and causing price increases. Exxon spokesman Tryg Tonnesson defended his company’s ads. Amoco spokesman Walter Pierson insisted that no evidence of false advertising exists. The FTC has made no response regarding the petition so far.
The Federal Energy Office reported that trains and buses will be given 100% of their diesel fuel needs. Two thousand employees of Walt Disney World were laid off before today’s announcement.
President Nixon has impounded $3 billion of $7 billion allocated by Congress to help communities build sewage treatment plants. The action follows presidential impoundment of $6 billion of the $11 billion allocated by Congress over the last two years to clean up waterways.
The White House contention that President Nixon increased milk price supports in 1971 because of political considerations and Congressional pressure apparently contradicts a sworn statement by the Secretary of Agriculture at the time. In his affidavit, former Secretary Clifford Hardin said “statutory criteria” were the sole reasons he ordered the increase.
It has now been 10 years since the Surgeon General of the Public Health Service issued a report citing cigarette smoking as a major health hazard. Over the last decade, an estimated 10 million Americans have quit smoking; but on the anniversary of the historic Surgeon General’s report, cigarette sales are at an all-time high; 40% of the nation’s men and 30% of its women smoke and 3,000 teenagers are picking up the habit every day.
A man who Delaware state police say murdered four persons in a shooting spree across the state died of a gunshot wound after a high-speed chase in the night. Ronald W. Hoffecker, 30, was pronounced dead at a Wilmington hospital. Police said they believed he shot himself after shooting two women with him in the car. One of the two women, a hostage, Mrs. Richard Katcher, 25, was in fair condition. The other woman, Barbara Johnson, 19, was among the dead. Police said that Hoffecker earlier had shot to death three persons, wounded a fourth and had taken Mrs. Katcher hostage.
The Agriculture Department has announced a new round of increases in federal subsidies to help hold down costs of school lunches and other child-nutrition programs. Officials said the subsidy rates were being increased effective January 1 by 5.1%, with the lunch subsidy rising to 10.5 cents. An extra subsidy to help cover the cost of free lunches to needy children was raised to 47.25 cents a lunch. It had been 45 cents.
Claims that a meat or poultry product is high in nutritional value would have to be substantiated on the label under regulations proposed by the Agriculture Department. Processors also would have to tell consumers about any nutritional boosters that are added. Labeling would be voluntary for products not claimed to be highly nutritious or containing added vitamins, minerals or proteins. The proposals, open for public comment until April 19, come after an earlier nutrition label action by the Food and Drug Administration for other food products.
The federal government has admitted conducting a “Socialist Workers Party disruption program” and spying on the party since 1945 in responding to a $27 million suit against the government, the party announced. The government’s admissions were contained in a document filed in federal court in New York City in which it conceded that any person who “indicated” he was a member of the SWP was subject to investigation by the FBI. U.S. Attorney Paul Curran, in the court paper, added that FBI agents “may have” asked questions of SWP members’ employers or landlords that could have precipitated action against the people investigated. The government claimed it was conducting the “disruption program” in the interest of national security.
A dozen prominent black Democrats complained to Robert Strauss, the Democratic national chairman, that the party was falling behind in its commitment to blacks. Mayor Richard Hatcher of Gary, Indiana, said their message was that the blacks do not intend to get “lost in the shuffle” as the party rebuilds itself. Hatcher said after the group met for several hours in Washington with Strauss that blacks went 87% Democratic in 1972. “We feel we are entitled to a minimum of 25% of the action of anything and everything the Democratic Party does,” he said. Strauss had no specific comment on the discussions, although he said, “There was no pap in the meeting… On balance, I gave myself a very good report card.”
As part of its Operation Arbor nuclear test series at the Nevada Test Site, the U.S. carried out three simultaneous nuclear explosions at the same site.
Dow Jones Industrial Average: 823.11 (-11.68, -1.40%).
Born:
Hollis Thomas, NFL defensive tackle (Philadelphia Eagles, New Orleans Saints, Carolina Panthers, St. Louis Rams), in Abilene, Texas.
Hrithik Roshan, Indian film and TV actor known as star of the sci-fi film “Koi… Mil Gaya” and in the title role of the superhero film “Krrish” film series, and as a judge on TV’s “Just Dance”; in Bombay (now Mumbai), India.
Kelly Marcel, British screenwriter of the film “Fifty Shades of Grey”; in London, England, United Kingdom.
Jemaine Clement, New Zealand actor, musician and comedian known for Flight of the Conchords; in Masterton.
Johan Botha, South African Olympic middle-distance runner; 1999 champion in the 800-meter race; in Pretoria, Republic of South Africa.
Beata Sokołowska-Kulesza, Polish Olympic sprint canoer, 1999 world champion in the women’s K-2 500 meters; in Gorzów Wielkopolski, Lubusz Voivodeship, Poland.
Onyok Velasco (born Mansueto Velasco, Jr.), Filipino Olympic boxer; in Bago, Negros Occidental, Philippines.
Died:
Martin Scherber, 66, German composer.
Eddie Safranski, 55, American jazz double bassist, composer and arranger.
Richard F. Cleveland, 76, American lawyer, son of U.S. President Grover Cleveland, known as investigator for the Alger Hiss case.
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