Libyan revolutionary committees will “react violently” against Britons living in Libya if British courts bring “false charges” against Libyans in Britain, the official Libyan news agency Jana reported. A number of Libyans in Britain have been ordered to appear in court in connection with bombings in London and Manchester. Meanwhile, Libya’s deputy leader, Major Abdel-Salam Jalloud, said Libya is considering cutting economic ties with “imperialists” for allegedly trying to isolate the nation. Britain recently broke relations with Libya over the fatal shooting of a policewoman outside the Libyan Embassy in London.
The Solomon Islands tightened security and deported 11 people after being warned by Britain of a possible Libyan-backed plot to seize the British Embassy. Police took up positions around the capital of Honiara and at the airport to screen incoming passengers expected for Pope John Paul II’s visit Wednesday. Seven of those deported were reported to be Americans.
The FBI is investigating whether Libyan leader Moammar Khadafi has illegally given money and other assistance to black community activists and black nationalist groups in the United States, the Washington Post reported. Quoting unidentified U.S. government officials, the Post said Khadafi’s government may have given the assistance to influence American domestic affairs. The government sources did not identify American individuals or organizations that received money from the Libyan government.
An Afghan rebel spokesman said yesterday that the Soviet Union’s spring offensive in Afghanistan, although most intense in a key valley north of the capital, had expanded into heavy attacks against insurgents around the country. The spokesman, Abdul Rahim, a political officer for the Islamic Society rebel organization, said at a news conference in Manhattan that the Soviet objective appeared to be to wipe out resistance in the Panjshir Valley, 50 miles north of Kabul, and in other areas of north-central Afghanistan. “This is the time for the American people to press Congress for more aid for our cause,” Mr. Rahim said at Freedom House, in New York. He said the rebels did not have the heavy weapons needed to shift from the defensive to the offensive.
Meanwhile, Western intelligence analysts said the Soviet tactics in their attacks, which are being pressed in all parts of Afghanistan, showed a flexibility not before associated with the Soviet Army in Afghanistan since it entered the country in December 1979. The intelligence experts said the favorite Soviet operation was heavy bombing of a village or position followed by advances by light tanks and infantry. Mr. Rahim said that Jalalabad, on the main road from Kabul to Peshawar, Pakistan, was surrounded and that the highway was cut by such tactics. Elsewhere, airborne troops have been used to surround and cut off villages believed to harbor insurgents. In some cases, the Soviet forces have landed light tanks from helicopters.
The rebel spokesman estimated that there were 200,000 Soviet soldiers and airmen in Afghanistan. This figure is higher than the 105,000 accepted by North Atlantic Treaty Organization analysts, but some of these analysts suggested the Russians could have temporarily raised troop strength to meet the demands of the offensive and would thin out the forces should they gain their objectives. Mr. Rahim said that, in fighting around the Salang Pass and tunnel north of Kabul, on one of the main roads to the Soviet Union, Soviet forces lost 35 tanks, 15 armored personnel carriers, 90 fuel-tank trucks and 100 other vehicles. He said 250 Soviet troops and 60 Afghan Government soldiers were killed. He said also that in other recent action north of the tunnel and pass, 30 tanks, 5 armored personnel carriers and 50 fuel-tank trucks had been destroyed.
The top Ethiopian diplomat in the United States said he had decided to seek political asylum here. The diplomat, Tesfaye Demeke, said he based his decision on what he called the increasingly hostile stance of Ethiopia’s Marxist Government toward the United States and because of death threats made in Ethiopia against him and his family. The top Ethiopian diplomat in the United States said he applied for political asylum Friday because the pro-Soviet government in his African homeland has demanded that he return, which “can only mean grave consequences for me and my family.” Tesfaye Demeke, 40, Ethiopia’s charge d’affaires in Washington for the last four years, said he made the decision to remain in the United States because did not want his two children “to be the victims of a ruthless regime.”
A Muslim Shiite leader who had refused to join the 10-member coalition Government in Lebanon changed his mind after he was named Minister of State in charge of southern Lebanese affairs and of rebuilding war-damaged areas.
President Chaim Herzog marked Israel’s 36th independence day by issuing a tough warning against terrorism by Jews in the occupied Arab territories. “These are treasonous acts that imperil the independence we celebrate today.” Herzog said. Herzog blamed “insane people” for the planting of bombs on Arab buses in East Jerusalem last month. The bombs were dismantled. and 20 people have since been arrested for involvement in an alleged terrorist network.
Britain plans to propose giving Ireland a share of authority over some key functions in Northern Ireland, including economic development and the largely Protestant police force, the Times of London and other British newspapers reported. They also said Britain’s Northern Ireland secretary. James Prior hopes to revive the province’s Parliament, dismantled in 1972 amid escalating violence, to restore limited local autonomy. Ulster authorities refused comment but wire service sources said the reports were largely correct. Ian Paisley, hardline Northern Ireland Protestant leader, vowed “all-out resistance” to any such plan.
French Communist trustees were empowered to select inmates for extermination in the German Nazi concentration camp at Buchenwald, a camp survivor testified. The former prisoner and resistance leader, Roger Foucher-Creteau, 73, submitted testimony in a libel case in Paris. The testimony supported accusations against the late Marcel Paul, a Communist inmate of Buchenwald who became French industry minister after World War II. Foucher-Creteau said Paul headed the privileged group of prisoners.
The Polish government indicted two policemen, two physicians and two ambulance attendants for the second time in connection with the controversial beating death of a 19-year-old Solidarity supporter, Grzegorz Przemyk, in Warsaw a year ago. Trial of the six was postponed in January due to “new evidence.” In the new indictments, the police appear to be charged with a lesser offense of endangering “the life or health of another.” Authorities say Przemyk was hurt while resisting arrest for drunkenness, but friends say he was beaten for backing the banned Solidarity union.
A statement distributed by the official press agency said two policemen, identified only as Ireneusz K. and Arkadiusz D., were indicted on charges of “taking part in a brawl which endangers the life or health of another.” The maximum prison sentence on the charge is three years. The ambulance attendants were charged with “taking part in a brawl which leads to the death of another,” and the doctors were accused of negligence in failing to treat the young man’s injuries, the press agency said.
Jose Napoleon Duarte declared himself the winner of El Salvador’s runoff Presidential election. Mr. Duarte, the candidate of the moderate Christian Democratic Party, called on all Salvadorans to work to bring peace to the country.
Violence marred Panama’s election. Government officials said one person was killed and eight were wounded in shooting that erupted between backers of rival candidates who both claimed they had won the presidential election.
Two members of a Maoist guerrilla group were wounded in a shootout in Lima with civil guardsmen outside the residence of U.S. Ambassador David Jordan. Jordan was home at the time but was not hurt, and no embassy personnel were involved in the shooting, an embassy spokesman said. Police said the two assailants, identified as Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path) guerrillas, opened fire with pistols when Peruvian guardsmen stopped their car for an identity check.
Leprosy has reached the “epidemic stage” in the United States trust territory of Micronesia, with the number of cases more than twice the 1977 total, health officials say. A total of 1,102 cases of leprosy, in a population of about 100,000, were found in the territory’s four states in a survey that ended in January, according to a health official for the Federated States of Micronesia. “The leprosy is in alarming proportions,” the federation’s President, Tosiwo Nakayama, said Sunday.
The Summer Olympics pageantry begins at the United Nations today when runners start the Olympic torch on a 9,000-mile, cross-country relay to Los Angeles. The journey will cover 33 states and take 82 days.
Veterans won an Agent Orange case. Averting as long-scheduled trial, the Dow Chemical Company and six other makers of the herbicide agreed to create a $180 million fund for thousands of Vietnam veterans and their families who said that Agent Orange had harmed them. In turn, the veterans’ lawyers dropped damage claims against the companies totaling billions of dollars. The settlement of the lawsuit involving claims against the makers of Agent Orange did not resolve the Government’s liability for paying millions of dollars in compensation, according to federal officials.
President Reagan hosts a luncheon to award the third annual Volunteer/Action awards to exemplary volunteers and organizations.
No changes in Social Security will be sought by President Reagan if he is re-elected, the White House said. John A. Svahn, the former commissioner of Social Security who is now Mr. Reagan’s assistant for policy development, said of the Social Security System, “It’s in good shape well into the next century.”
Democratic Presidential aspirants campaigned vigorously on the eve of four primaries expected to decide whether the party’s nomination battle continues or begins to wind down toward an inevitable victory for Walter F. Mondale. Many party leaders believe that a Mondale sweep in today’s contests in Ohio, North Carolina, Indiana and Maryland would virtually assure his nomination and deal a possibly fatal blow to the candidacy of Gary Hart.
Walter F. Mondale made an extra trip to Cleveland after his polls showed that his lead over Gary Hart in today’s Democratic Presidential primary might have evaporated over the weekend. For more than two weeks, the Mondale staff has polled 400 to 650 potential voters by telephone each evening in an effort to determine where his resources could best be allocated.
Gary Hart has made Indiana a crucial battleground in the Democratic Presidential race. Senator Hart has had a strong organization in Indiana for more than a year and, in the last two weeks he has made seven swings through the state, compared with four by Walter F. Mondale and three by the Rev. Jesse Jackson.
Arizona National Guard troops hauled tents and supplies into the copper mining region around Morenci and Clifton as authorities doubled the forces of state troopers patrolling the two strike-torn towns. “Both workers and strikers are armed,” said Sgt. Allen Schmidt of the state Department of Public Safety. “Everybody here seems to be armed.” There were at least 11 arrests over the weekend in the latest outburst of violence. The strike against Phelps Dodge, the state’s biggest copper producer, began July 1, 1983. Union members said the outbreak erupted Saturday when a worker pointed a gun at a striker.
The Environmental Protection Agency expects to propose “something like a ban” on leaded gasoline in regulations that could be issued in final form by late this year or early 1985, Assistant EPA Administrator Joseph Cannon said. It was the first time officials have set forth a timetable for fulfilling a promise made last month by EPA Administrator William D. Ruckelshaus to “do something” soon to ban or sharply curtail use of gasoline containing lead that poisons the atmosphere and causes brain damage.
The Bureau of Reclamation slightly increased water releases through three Colorado River dams. but officials said there was plenty of storage capacity to handle higher-than-normal runoff from the Rocky Mountains into the river. Unlike the summer of 1983, the possibility of flooding along the California-Arizona line is remote, officials said. John Newman, a hydraulic engineer for the bureau in Salt Lake City, said last week that no matter how fast the runoff rushes into tributaries. Arizonans are likely to notice little change in the Colorado.
An anatomy professor was sentenced to 18 to 20 years in prison in Dedham, Massachusetts, for killing his young lover with a sledgehammer. William H. Douglas, 42, a former Tufts University professor, was originally charged with first-degree murder. but pleaded guilty to manslaughter on April 27 after admitting he killed Robin Benedict, a 21-year-old graphic artist who prosecutors say led a double life as a prostitute. Douglas said he beat her over the head with a hammer, then dumped the body in a trash container behind a shopping mall in Rhode Island. The body has not been found.
A Federal mediator met today with negotiators for striking unions and Las Vegas’s second-largest hotel as a bitter, costly hotel strike entered its sixth week. After talks with negotiators for the Culinary Union failed Saturday, officials of the M-G-M Grand Hotel asked that Clinton Brame, a federal mediator, and Frank McDonald, the Nevada Labor Commissioner, sit in on the latest talks. Unions representing culinary workers, bartenders, stagehands and musicians remain on strike against 24 hotels and one casino. Jeff McColl, secretary-treasurer of the Culinary Union, has said contracts signed Thursday with two Hilton hotels would be the standard used for any future settlements. Those contracts call for an increase of $1.46 an hour in wages and benefits over four years. The California Hotel and Sam’s Town ran advertisements Sunday warning strikers they would be dismissed if they did not return to work. Advertisements today solicited job applicants, saying striking workers were being replaced.
The AFL-CIO charged that corporate executive bonuses “have reached scandalous levels” while workers’ pay has risen only modestly or not at all. “The Reagan ‘recovery’ is spawning benefits for the rich, powerful and the privileged” the executive council of the 13.8-million-member federation said in a statement at the opening of a meeting in Piney Point, Maryland. The leadership pointed to more than $7 million in pay, stock options and bonuses paid to Ford Motor Corp. Chairman Philip Caldwell, and to pay and bonuses awarded to other top industry executives.
A judge today dismissed six murder charges against a British man accused of slaying members of two San Fernando Valley families who disappeared after their homes were burglarized. Judge Nancy Brown of Municipal Court dismissed the charges against Ashley Paulle following a five-day preliminary hearing that was closed to press and public, the judge’s clerk said. The judge also dismissed two burglary counts against Mr. Paulle. Deputy District Attorney Ronald Coen immediately filed an appeal in Superior Court. He declined comment because of the judge had ordered both sides not to discuss the case publicly. There was no immediate word on whether Mr. Paulle would remain in custody.
The Chicago Theater, an opulent 1921 movie palace, is the focus of a dispute between its owners and the city and preservationists. The owners have sued Chicago, charging that the building’s landmark status has caused them to lose money.
George Balanchine’s death last year at 79 years of age has been diagnosed by means of microscopic studies of his brain cells. The choreographer was afflicted with one of the world’s most unusual diseases — Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, a so-called ‘slow virus’ disease with an extremely long incubation period.
Devil’s Bag was retired from racing after X-rays revealed a chipped bone in his right front knee. The 3-year-old colt was an early favorite for the Kentucky Derby but was withdrawn from the race.
Dow Jones Industrial Average: 1166.56 (+1.25).
Born:
Alex Smith, NFL quarterback (Pro Bowl, 2013, 2016, 2017; San Francisco 49ers, Kansas City Chiefs, Washington Redskins), in Seattle, Washington.
Drew Stanton, NFL quarterback (Detroit Lions, Arizona Cardinals), in Okemos, Michigan.
James Loney, MLB first baseman (Los Angeles Dodgers, Boston Red Sox, Tampa Bay Rays, New York Mets), in Houston, Texas.
Kim Smith, Canadian WNBA forward (Sacramento Monarchs), in Surrey, British Columbia, Canada.
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