The French Foreign Ministry said today that “Libya seems to bear the responsibility” for the attack in Chad in which a French plane was downed Wednesday by anti-Government forces. The attack was followed, officials said, by a reinforcement of French air strength in Chad. According to a French official here, the Foreign Ministry statement was “not necessarily saying that Libyan troops were there” at the time of the attack on a Chadian Government position at Ziguey, about 200 miles north of the capital, Ndjamena. The official said the ministry’s statement reflected the French view that Libya, the major backer of the Chadian rebels, was behind the outbreak of fighting. The attack broke the virtual cease-fire that had held in Chad for nearly six months since the arrival of French troops last August.
French Defense Ministry officials reported that four Jaguar jets were flown to Chad today from a French base in Gabon. These reinforcements were said to increase the French air contingent in Chad to seven Jaguars and four Mirage F-1’s. The downed French plane, a Jaguar, was lost Wednesday during a three- plane reconnaissance mission after an anti-Government column of about 20 vehicles had crossed the informal boundary between Government- and rebel-controlled territory and attacked the Ziguey position. The pilot died when he ejected from the plane, which reportedly was struck by a Soviet-made SAM-7 missile, and his parachute failed to open. Rebel sources said Wednesday that two French planes were shot down. The Defense Ministry here acknowledged today that a second plane, a Mirage F-1 escort, was also hit but said it managed to return to its base after attacking the rebel column.
Iraqi warplanes roared over Tehran and 17 other Iranian cities, setting off sonic booms and sending thousands of people fleeing into basement shelters. The jets did not carry out attacks. In Baghdad, the Iraqi News Agency quoted a military spokesman as saying that the jets returned safely and that “these (mock) raids and missions prove the capability of Iraq… to reach any target deep inside Iranian territory, and constitute a warning to the Iranian regime against any aggressive attack against us.” The two nations have been warring since September, 1980, when Iraq invaded Iran.
Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, in a meeting with visiting West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, questioned the morality of the possible sale of West German weapons to Saudi Arabia. “It would be inconceivable to us that German arms would again be used against Jews,” a spokesman said Shamir told Kohl, in a reference to the mass killing of Jews during Germany’s Nazi era. A West German spokesman said there have been no specific Saudi requests for West German weapons, although the West German media have carried reports that the Saudis are interested in purchasing a variety of arms.
Jordanian military plan will be renewed, according to Reagan Administration officials. They said the Administration had told Israel that it plans to revive efforts to supply Jordan with equipment for an 8,000-man strike force for use in emergencies in the Persian Gulf.
A resolution urging a withdrawal of the American marines from Lebanon will be approved by the House, Speaker Thomas P. O’Neill Jr. predicted. He made the statement as Senate Democrats reaffirmed their opposition to the 18-month deployment of the force in Beirut.
The Soviet Union has supplied two warships to Cuba’s navy and increased the country’s MIG-23 fighter force, U.S. intelligence sources reported. They said that a 2,300-ton Koni class frigate and a 2,100-ton Foxtrot class diesel-powered submarine were delivered recently to Havana to reinforce Cuba’s navy of about 125 vessels, the largest of any nation in the Caribbean region. Most of the Cuban vessels are missile-armed attack boats, torpedo boats and patrol craft. Meanwhile, crates believed to contain fuselages of three new MIG-23 Flogger jets were spotted early this month at an airfield near Havana, the sources said. The new aircraft would bring to 35 the number of modern fighters in the Cuban air force, the sources said.
A Pentagon investigation has determined that a “navigational error compounded by strong winds” may have put a U.S. Army helicopter into Nicaraguan airspace two weeks ago, making it a target for Sandinista gunners. The report said the helicopter was “on a routine administrative flight” when it strayed about 20 miles south and east of its planned course. The chopper was shot down by Nicaraguan troops and crashed just inside Honduras. The pilot was killed, but two passengers escaped major injury.
A crackdown on Salvadoran exiles in the United States who may be linked to death squad activities in El Salvador has made little progress, according to Federal law enforcement officials. Two months after the Reagan Administration announced the effort, officials said in interviews that the investigation had produced few substantive leads and they said they saw no prospect for taking action against any suspected Salvadorans.
Indonesian President Suharto called for stronger government control of the news media in developing nations to counter what he called domination by Western news agencies. He told representatives of 68 nations at the first Nonaligned Information Ministers Conference in Jakarta that the Western media are flooding the world with news that benefits the interests of advanced industrial countries while harming the image of developing nations. The Indonesian government has tightened control over the domestic press in recent years, shutting down news organizations and firing employees involved in “controversial” reporting.
Prince Norodom Sihanouk, head of the Cambodian coalition opposing the Vietnamese occupying his nation, received ambassadors from Egypt and Yugoslavia and accepted their credentials at a jungle camp in Cambodia several hundred yards from the border with Thailand. “Very few ambassadors can present their credentials on the front line,” Sihanouk said as he welcomed the two diplomats to “liberated Cambodia.”
A boycott against Nestle, the world’s principal supplier of infant formula, has been suspended, the American leaders of the seven-year-old protest announced. They acted, they said, after reaching an accord with the company over its marketing practices in developing countries.
The Greek Government today defended the integrity and motivations of all foreign correspondents working in Greece and criticized a new wave of local press accusations that the reporters were undermining Greece and the government. Constantine Tsatsaronis, president of the Foreign Press Association, had said in a protest that “in the last few days there has been a new wave of defamatory reports against foreign correspondents, accusing us of being racist, anti-Greek, of working against the government and even giving us instructions as to how we should conduct our work.” The government spokesman, Dimitrios Maroudas, replied: “The government has honored and respects the work of foreign correspondents in Athens. You are free to express your views as you see fit, without any hindrance, without any discrimination against you, and we respect your journalistic status.”
Millions of Poles watched a television broadcast tonight of the United States nuclear war movie “The Day After,” the official press agency said. The film was introduced by a commentator who blamed the United States for accelerating the arms race. “Washington chose the arms race,” the commentator said. “President Reagan does not exclude nuclear war. He wants to limit it to Europe.” The movie, with shocking scenes of mass destruction, had been shown in western Europe but never before at full length in a Communist country.
More than 10,000 people were arrested on rioting charges as farmers demanding land clashed with the police today in the southern state of Karanataka, state officials reported. They said 350 people were injured and a 70-year-old farmer died of a heart attack in jail. Farmers blocked highways and railroads and hurled rocks at the police, the officials said.
The demonstrations came on Republic Day. In New Delhi, the Government marked 34 years of independence with a show of new weapons and a plea to citizens to help stem the growing tide of violence in the world’s largest democracy. “There is no place for violence in a democracy,” President Zail Singh declared in a nationwide broadcast. “It is painful to see that violence is resorted to in the name of religion.
President Reagan has ordered a new “low-level research effort” to determine if laser beams and other possible space-based “Star Wars” weapons can be used to defend the country against incoming enemy missiles, White House spokesman Larry Speakes said. The long-expected decision will add between $250 million and $300 million in fiscal 1985 to the cost of research into ballistic missile defenses. The Defense Department reportedly sought $600 million in new funds, but that was cut back by the White House. Details of the new effort will be disclosed in the federal budget, to be presented next week.
The United States is 10 years ahead of the Soviet Union in developing the technology for building permanent space stations, said James M. Beggs, the top-ranking official of the U.S. space program. He predicted that the lead will be maintained with the space station project announced by President Reagan in his State of the Union speech Wednesday night. The Soviet Union, which now has an unmanned space station in orbit, is believed to be working toward orbiting a permanent station with a capacity of 10 to 20 persons before the end of this decade. The development of a space station will enable private industry to open the frontier to a wide range of promising commercial ventures, according to the national space agency. The agency said that President Reagan’s commitment to develop a permanent manned space station would also bring about a vast expansion of the nation’s space enterprise.
President Reagan addresses a stadium of free enterprise supporters at the “Spirit of America” rally. Walter F. Mondale was accused by President Reagan of trying to “buy support” with costly promises to special interest groups. Mr. Reagan told a crowd of several thousand at the Republican rally in Atlanta that his Administration was “refusing to balance the budget on your backs” with a tax increase.
A Mondale economic program would substantially reduce tax benefits for the wealthy and increase Government revenues by more than $60 billion by 1989, the former Vice President declared. Mr. Mondale, campaigning in Boston, said the Reagan Administration’s programs were marked by “unfairness” toward middle-class Americans. Mr. Mondale said that if elected President, he would reduce the Federal budget deficit “by more than half.”
The President and First Lady attend the Republican Eagles’ Third Anniversary Dinner-Dance.
A Presidential initiative must be made if negotiations to reduce the budget deficit are to get anywhere, Congressional Democrats insisted. Mr. Reagan must make the first move because, House Speaker Thomas P. O’Neill Jr. said, “We want to find out where he is.”
The Senate, not without a fight, voted to kill an election-year pay raise of $2,443 that all members of Congress began receiving January 1. The legislation passed 66 to 19 in the Senate, where nearly a third of the members are facing reelection, and was sent to the House. Prospects for passage are also good in the House, where virtually all members face campaigns this year. The 3.5% pay increase, which went into effect January 1, raised the salaries of members of Congress from $89,800 to $72,243.
A key tax benefit for nonworking spouses will be proposed by President Reagan, according to Treasury Secretary Donald T. Regan. The proposal, to be included next week in the President’s budget for the fiscal year 1985, would make the spouses eligible for the full $2,000 retirement investment, deductible from taxable income, that working people have been able to take for two years.
In an effort to shore up his sagging campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination, Ohio Sen. John Glenn replaced his campaign manager, longtime aide William White, with his Iowa coordinator, Jerry Vento. “Now maybe the trains will run on time,” said a Glenn aide who asked not to be identified. Campaign Press Secretary Michael McCurry said Vento will take over day-to-day operation of the campaign while White, who I will have the title of campaign chairman, will concentrate on fund-raising and general duties.
Several private consumer groups failed in their effort to have the new artificial sweetener aspartame removed from store shelves until health questions about the product can be answered. A federal judge in Washington refused to issue a temporary restraining order against the sweetener because, he said, the consumer groups had not made a convincing enough argument about its harmful effects. Approved last summer by the Food and Drug Administration, aspartame is widely used in foods and soft drinks.
Autonomous state food aid programs using Federal funds, a proposal offered by a Presidential commission, was rejected by Democratic and Republican members of three Congressional committees. Some of the lawmakers also criticized President Reagan’s Task Force on Food Assistance for what they said was an ambiguous, inconclusive report on the extent of hunger in America.
The United States may lose its world leadership in the commercial application of gene-splicing research to Japan, according to a new study prepared for Congress. The field has major potential applications, including the development of new drugs, foods, agricultural and chemical products and new means for disposing of toxic wastes.
Florida’s oldest Death Row inmate died in the electric chair for arranging the 1975 killing in Tampa of a private detective. He was the third man executed in the state in less than five years. “The only thing is, ‘Forgive them, Father, for in their ignorance they know not what they do. And that’s it,” Anthony Antone, 66, said. He was pronounced dead at 4:08 a.m. PST.
Racketeering in southern Florida is carried out by hundreds of Canadians active in organized crime, according to law-enforcement officials. Federal and state investigators said that in the last four years ranking members of two crime groups from Montreal had moved extensively into narcotics trafficking and other rackets in Florida and now appear eager to battle American gangsters for the underworld profits.
A woman forbidden to bear children for 15 years as a condition of parole after her son died of malnutrition has been sent to jail for giving birth. In March 1982, Judge Wayne L. Cobb of Pasco Circuit Court ordered Jackie Fourthman, then 20 years old, not to have children for 15 years after she pleaded guilty to third-degree murder and aggravated child abuse. Later she was permitted to leave Florida for Monticello, Indiana. A warrant filed by probation officers says she left Indiana without permission and gave birth June 17 in Phoenix to a son. Since Christmas Day, she has been in the Pasco County Jail.
A jury of four men and two women was chosen today to hear the manslaughter trial of Luis Alvarez, a Cuban-born policeman charged in the fatal shooting of a black man that set off three days of rioting in 1982. After the jury was chosen, one of the jurors told Judge David Gersten that he had received threats he “would be shot” if he served on the jury. The judge recessed court while he looked into the claim. Mr. Alvarez, 24 years old, killed Nevell Johnson Jr., 20, in a video arcade in the Overtown area December 29, 1982, setting off a three-day riot that left another man dead and 26 injured. He says the shooting was accidental. His lawyers had said it would be impossible to find an impartial jury in Miami.
Floodwaters churning chunks of ice washed through several towns in the Pacific Northwest again as rivers bloated by heavy rain and melting snow breached their banks, cutting off hundreds of people from their homes. About 400 persons have been forced to flee-most of them in the town of Salmon, Idaho, where floating chunks of ice banged against mobile homes. Glacier, Washington, was isolated. There was flooding along the Grande Ronde River in Oregon. Southern Utah was hit by a near-blizzard as heavy snow returned to the Rockies and northern Plains. Elsewhere, travelers’ advisories prompted by the fog covered northeast Arkansas, northeast Louisiana, the northern two-thirds of Mississippi, northern Alabama, Tennessee and Kentucky.
The U.S. Navy exhibits Piasecki helistat-4 helicopters and a blimp able to lift 26 tons in Lakehurst, New Jersey.
Nordiques’ Michel Goulet scored on 9th penalty shot against Islanders.
Dow Jones Industrial Average: 1229.69 (-2.20).
Born:
Luo Xuejuan, Chinese swimmer (Olympic gold, women’s 100m breaststroke, 2004; World Championship gold x 5), in Hangzhou, China.
Jeremy Williams, Canadian NHL right wing (Toronto Maple Leafs, New York Rangers), in Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada.
History Diaries 