Soviet premier Yuri Andropov died in Moscow. In February 1983, Andropov suffered total kidney failure. In August 1983, he entered Moscow’s Central Clinical Hospital, where he would spend the rest of his life. In late January 1984, Andropov’s health deteriorated rapidly. Due to growing toxicity in his blood, he had periods of falling into unconsciousness. He died on 9 February 1984 at 16:50, aged 69. No public announcement was made until the next day. Few of the top Soviet leaders learned of his death on this day. According to the Soviet post-mortem medical report, Andropov suffered from several medical conditions: interstitial nephritis, nephrosclerosis, residual hypertension and diabetes, worsened by chronic kidney deficiency. A four-day period of mourning across the USSR was announced the following day.
American naval gunners fired on Druze and Syrian artillery positions in Lebanon for a second day in retaliation for the shelling of mostly Christian East Beirut. An American Marine spokesman said a destroyer fired about 150 rounds from its five-inch guns.
Americans will not be evacuated from Lebanon at this time because of concern that such a move would send the wrong political signal, according to authorities close to the United States Embassy in Beirut. They said an evacuation would upset negotiations aimed at keeping President Amin Gemayel in power.
No progress in President Gemayel’s effort to end the political crisis in Lebanon can be reported, according to Secretary of State George P. Shultz. Testifying before a House committee, Mr. Shultz appeared gloomy about the prospects for President Gemayel to form a broadly-based government as urged by the Reagan Administration.
Former Israeli Defense Minister Ariel Sharon announced that he will run for Herut Party leader in hopes of eventually being elected prime minister, a post now held by Herut member Yitzhak Shamir. The party position is still nominally held by former Prime Minister Menachem Begin, who has been in seclusion since resigning last September. Sharon, 55, now a minister without portfolio, resigned his defense post in February, 1983, after an official inquiry blamed him for failing to stop Christian militiamen from killing hundreds of Palestinian refugees in Lebanon. The next national election in Israel is due in 1985.
West German Economics Minister Otto Lambsdorff denied corruption charges in an appearance before a parliamentary committee in Bonn. The committee is investigating a tax break granted to the Flick industrial group. Lambsdorff, formally charged with corruption last December, is awaiting a court ruling on whether he should go on trial. “Contrary to the utterly unfounded allegation in the charge, I have in my time as a minister neither received, demanded nor procured money from the Flick company.” he told the committee.
Two bomb blasts rocked central Athens, slightly injuring two people, and anonymous callers claimed responsibility on behalf of a group of Greek air force officers dissatisfied with their chief of staff. Callers to two daily newspapers said the explosions were the work of the “Yellow Secret Organization of Air Force Officers and Noncommissioned Officers,” a previously unknown group. “Airplanes may be brought down” unless the air force chief of staff, Gen. Nikos Kouris, is removed from his post, the callers said.
Honduras announced that up to 1,700 U.S. troops will stay on in that country to carry out activities that include air reconnaissance missions, now that joint maneuvers are officially over. “The number of U.S. military personnel will vary weekly … with later reductions until the next exercise begins,” a communique of the Honduran armed forces said. Joint U.S.-Honduran maneuvers dubbed Big Pine II officially ended Wednesday, but further joint exercises — Grenadier I and Big Pine III — will begin later this year.
Three private human rights groups charged that a U.S.-sponsored “militarization of everyday life” in Honduras is contributing to a worsening human rights situation there. The report by Americas Watch, Lawyers Committee for International Human Rights and the Washington Office on Latin America said Honduran security forces were responsible for 49 murders of civilians in the first half of 1983 and 28 disappearances. The Honduran government has denied that its forces engage in torture or other human rights abuses.
Leftist guerrillas reopened a western war front and dealt a new blow to the Salvadoran army at Atiocoyo, a farm cooperative community 40 miles northwest of San Salvador. Military officials said a rebel force of 500 to 600 overwhelmed government troops guarding the community and killed 29 soldiers and civil defense guards. It was the first major guerrilla attack in El Salvador’s western region in several months.
Grenada’s former Marxist government took steps to monitor or disrupt communications at foreign embassies and at the U.S.-owned medical school on the island, captured documents just released by the State Department disclosed. The papers also gave details of agreements with the Soviet Union, Cuba, Libya, Nicaragua and East Germany for military and economic assistance to the island nation. The United States, aided by several Caribbean nations, invaded Grenada last October, toppling the Marxist regime.
Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau told Parliament today that he would write letters to President Reagan and Yuri V. Andropov, the Soviet leader, urging them to build on 10 mutually acceptable principles that he said formed a common ground between East and West. Mr. Trudeau, reporting to the House of Commons on his effort to reduce nuclear arms, said visits to Western Europe, Asia and nations of the Warsaw Pact had shown that “areas of common interest are beginning to emerge.” These were among the principles: Both sides agree that nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought, both wish to be free of the risk of accidental war or surprise attack and are conscious of the consequences of being the first to use force against the other, both have an interest in increasing security while reducing the cost and in avoiding the spread of nuclear weapons to other countries, and both “realize that their security strategies cannot be based on the assumed political or economic collapse of the other side.”
[Ed: Might want to re-address that one to Moscow, Pierre…]
South Korea offered today to meet with North Korean representatives on Friday for the first time in four years and give them Seoul’s response to Pyongyang’s offer of peace talks. There was no immediate response from North Korea. North Korea proposed last month that peace talks be held between the United States and the two Koreas. South Korea rejected this, calling instead for direct talks with the North. A spokesman said the message to be carried to the border village of Panmunjom was expected to repeat the call for direct talks.
Prime Minister Zhao Ziyang said today that the United States should take part in talks proposed by North Korea but that China was not considering participation.
Malaysia’s hereditary rulers, ignoring the wishes of Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, today elected the Sultan of Johore to be King for the next five years. The Sultan, Mahmood Iskander, 51 years old, was convicted of culpable homicide after a shooting incident in 1977. He was later pardoned by his father, the Sultan, and was reinstated as crown prince before his father died in 1981. His election follows a compromise settlement of a bitter constitutional dispute over the powers of the sultans, who choose a new monarch every five years according to a system of seniority and rotation.
A senior U.S. State Department official said today that negotiations to win independence for South-West Africa and bring about a truce between South African and Angolan military forces had reached “a very fragile point.” The official told reporters that a recent round of intense talks had provided new hope that the 17-year-old struggle for independence might be headed toward resolution. South-West Africa, also known as Namibia, is controlled by South Africa in violation of a United Nations resolution declaring that it should be an independent country. South Africa says it will not surrender control until leftist guerrillas supported by Angola give up efforts to take over the territory.
Cuts in military spending must be accepted by the Reagan Administration before Congressional Democrats will discuss other spending reductions and tax increases, according to Representative Jim Wright, the House majority leader.
President Reagan places a call to Joseph Coors, President and CEO of Adolph Coors Company, Golden, Colorado.
Financial markets have overreacted to suggestions that federal budget deficits could sow a new recession, according to Paul A. Volcker, chairman of the Federal Reserve Board. Speaking with members of Congress, he also said he believed that, with so much attention now focused on the deficits, Congress and the Reagan Administration would be more likely to find a solution.
The Senate voted 65 to 26 to stop a filibuster by opponents of the death penalty. The move indicates that a bill to renew capital punishment for some federal crimes has a good chance of passage. The vote, spearheaded by proponents of the death penalty, places a maximum 100-hour limit on debate, which has featured tale after tale of grisly murders and mutilations. The 65 votes were five more than needed to limit debate. Senators will not vote on the bill until after a 10-day recess, which begins today.
Rep. James J. Florio (D-New Jersey) introduced legislation to extend and expand the “superfund” program and set up a mandatory schedule for cleaning up the nation’s hazardous waste sites. At a Washington news conference, Florio said the bill would make the program permanent and provide a minimum of $1.8 billion annually to clean up sites. The original program had a total of $1.6 billion and will expire in October, 1985.
When Air Force One swoops down on Des Moines on the afternoon of February 20, the party aboard will find some angry Democrats waiting below. The news that President Reagan will visit the Iowa capital has not been well received by the Iowa Democratic Party or by the eight Democrats who want Reagan’s job. State party officials learned that the Reagan visit could complicate matters in another way: The President’s Secret Service contingent will work out of the Hotel Savery in downtown Des Moines, the very place the Democratic Party plans to tabulate the results of its 2,500 caucuses statewide.
President Reagan asked Congress to provide $200 million this fiscal year for low-income home energy assistance because of the unexpectedly severe winter. At the same time, Reagan asked for $90 million this fiscal year for 245,000 tons of emergency food aid for African nations suffering a drought, the White House press office announced in Santa Barbara.
Two free-flying astronauts joked and turned somersaults in space and then practiced docking to a satellite berthed in the Challenger’s cargo bay. But a problem with the space shuttle’s mechanical arm kept them from fully rehearsing the techniques they plan to use for a satellite-repair mission in April.
David, “The Boy in the Bubble,” the 12-year-old immune-deficient boy removed this week from a germ-free environment for the first time in his life, showed signs today of overcoming a flu-like illness. But doctors were unsure of his long-term prognosis. Doctors at Texas Children’s Hospital restricted David, whose last name has been withheld to protect his privacy, to a bed in a special sterile hospital room near the room housing one of the huge plastic bags in which he had lived all his life. David’s last name has been withheld to protect his privacy.
Doctors were at this point optimistic, but David Phillip Vetter will soon take a turn for the worse. He had received a bone marrow transplant from his sister, Katharine, despite it not being a perfect match. The boy did not reject the transplant, but the flu-like illness turns out to be infectious mononucleosis and Burkitt lymphoma. Katherine’s bone marrow had contained traces of a dormant virus, Epstein–Barr, which was undetectable in the pre-transplant screening.
David has about two weeks to live.
Toxic EDB levels up to 70 times the government standard for ready-to-eat grain products have been found in the pulp of imported citrus fruit, a Food and Drug Administration spokesman said. FDA spokesman Emil Corwin said spot checks of orange pulp shipped from Mexico to Texas had residues of the cancer-causing pesticide ethylene dibromide as high as 2,173 parts per billion. The peel had EDB as high as 41,590 parts per billion, he said. Italian oranges sold in New York had 1,730 parts per billion in the pulp and 9,380 parts per billion in the peel, Corwin said. The Environmental Protection Agency permits 30 parts per billion in ready-to-eat grain, but has set no citrus standard.
Nearly 6,500 longshoremen in four East Coast cities went on strike after rejecting local versions of a proposed three-year contract. The action shut down ports in Baltimore and Boston. In Philadelphia and Wilmington, Delaware, union members unloaded only perishable goods. Also at issue in Baltimore was a contract provision exempting members of the International Longshoremen’s Association from working in the rain. The rejected pacts were based on a three-year master contract for East Coast longshoremen reached January 26, which calls for annual $1-an-hour pay increases. The pacts would have raised wages to $17 an hour.
A woman was convicted of involuntary manslaughter in the beating death of her 12-year-old son at a House of Judah religious cult camp last summer. Judge George Corsiglia reached his verdict in Allegan, Michigan, in the non-jury trial of Ethel Yarbough. Yarbough’s son, John, died July 4, one day after enduring a beating at the camp run by a cult of “Black Hebrew Israelite Jews.” Yarbough was the last of six cult members to be tried in the boy’s death. Corsiglia continued Yarbough’s bond and set sentencing for March 16. The charge carries a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison and a $7,500 fine.
A woman who asserts she was seduced by seven priests as a teenager and had a baby by one of them has filed a $21 million lawsuit against the priests and the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles. The suit by Rita Milla, 22 years old, and her mother contends that one of the priests suggested she have an abortion. The suit says she told two bishops of the situation but they did nothing. Miss Milla, who had been planning to become a nun, then “lost faith in the Catholic Church,” according to the suit, which was filed Tuesday.
[The lawsuit Allred filed on Milla’s behalf was tossed after a judge ruled the statute of limitations had expired. She did win a settlement related to a $6 million defamation action against a Catholic bishop who publicly claimed Milla was promiscuous in an apparent effort to discredit her. That provided a trust fund for her daughter, Jacqueline. The priest who started the cycle of rapes in seedy motels and revered church rectories – Father Santiago Tamayo – publicly apologized at a 1991 news conference. But Milla herself got no financial compensation for her ordeal from the church. In 2002, Allred lobbied for and won a one-year window under state law that suspended the statute of limitations. That allowed abuse victims to file suit for long ago crimes. It’s a tactic other states have employed in their search for justice and others are still pursuing. Milla eventually received $500,000 in 2007 as part of a record $660 million settlement against the church.]
Academic-industrial research to bolster American technological prowess is increasing. The tightening of links between academic and industrial research is symbolized by a building rising on the Stanford University campus that has also become a focus of debate over the proper relationship between the two.
The Synanon group was rebuffed by Federal District Judge Charles R. Richey in Washington. Judge Richey dismissed an appeal by the California-based organization to regain tax-exempt status as a drug rehabilitation program and religious group, ruling it had engaged in systematic fraud against the court.
A key link between a cancer gene and a natural substance that promotes cell growth within the body has been discovered by a team of scientists in Britain, Israel and the United States. Scientists say the discovery represents another leap forward in understanding the basis of cancer.
Czechoslovakia defeated Team USA, 4—1, in ice hockey, practically eliminating the United States from medal contention in the XIV Olympic Winter Games in Yugoslavia. In other sports, the first gold medals of the Games were won by Karin Enke of East Germany in the 1,500-meter speed skating event and Marja-Liisa Haemaelainen of Finland, who captured the women’s 10-kilometer cross-country race.
The Los Angeles Dodgers waive 2-time National League All-Star outfielder Dusty Baker, who had vetoed a trade to Oakland during the winter meetings. He will sign with the San Francisco Giants, play for one year, and end up managing them in the 90’s.
Dow Jones Industrial Average: 1152.74 (-3.56).
Born:
Dioner Navarro, Venezuelan MLB catcher (All-Star, 2008; New York Yankees, Los Angeles Dodgers, Tampa Bay Devil Rays, Cincinnati Reds, Chicago Cubs, Toronto Blue Jays, Chicago White Sox), in Caracas, Venezuela.
Maurice Ager, NBA shooting guard (Dallas Mavericks, New Jersey Nets, Minnesota Timberwolves), in Detroit, Michigan.
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