Soviet arms negotiators in Geneva have indicated for the first time that they would be willing to accept a weapons treaty allowing research on a strategic missile defense, according to high-ranking Reagan Administration officials. Disagreement over the issue has been at the core of the deadlock in the arms talks. Until now, the Soviet Union has insisted on prohibiting all such research, and the United States has refused to discuss the possibility of placing any limitations on President Reagan’s strategic defense initiative, popularly known as “Star Wars.” The Administration officials said members of the Soviet team informally approached American negotiators two weeks ago to say that Moscow was no longer seeking to ban all research, but wanted to draw a line between laboratory and scientific research, which would be allowed, and development and testing, which would be banned.
Eduard A. Shevardnadze, in his first policy statement since replacing Andrei A. Gromyko last week as Soviet foreign minister, said he will concentrate on improving relations with the West. There are “real possibilities to curb the forces of imperialism, bring about a radical change in the course of developments and revive the process of detente,” Shevardnadze and Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Varkonyi said in a communique at the end of Varkonyi’s visit to Moscow.
The Greek government approved an $800-million program to modernize Athens airport, criticized for lax security after the hijacking last month of a TWA jet by Muslim terrorists who held 39 Americans hostage for 16 days. Transport and Communications Minister Evangelos Kouloumbis said the plan, approved by defense and foreign affairs officials, will involve installing “a large number of radars and computers” in the next decade. The United States had advised Americans to avoid the airport because of poor security.
The “Hitler diaries” led to convictions of fraud and forgery for a former reporter for a West German magazine and a dealer in Nazi memorabilia. A Hamburg judge handed down sentences of four years and eight months in prison for Gerd Heidemann, who obtained the bogus diaries for the magazine Stern, and four years and six months for Konrad Kujau, the forger of the documents.
President Reagan assailed Iran, Libya, North Korea, Cuba and Nicaragua as “a confederation of terrorist states” that had carried out “outright acts of war” against the United States. Mr. Reagan, in an address to the American Bar Association, called the five countries “outlaw states” and “a new, international version of Murder Inc.” But Mr. Reagan, in an address to the American Bar Association, pointedly omitted Syria from his list of nations abetting terrorism despite past comments deploring Syrian “terrorism and intimidation.” Syria has been cited by the State Department in its list of nations that “have repeatedly supported acts of international terrorism.” White House officials termed Mr. Reagan’s omission of Syria a gesture of gratitude to President Hafez al-Assad, who played a pivotal role in the release last week of 39 American hostages in Lebanon.
Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres defeated attempts by three opposition parties to topple his government because of its controversial economic, recovery plan, while three unions called for strikes today to protest the emergency measures. The three noconfidence challenges in Parliament by the left-wing Mapam, Citizen’s Rights Movement and the Communist Party were beaten by a show of hands. The planned strikes will affect telephones, electricity supply and the merchant marine.
Lebanese Muslim and Druze leaders met in Damascus, Syria, seeking ways to halt the bloodshed in their country and to counter U.S. sanctions imposed on Lebanon in retaliation for the hijacking of TWA Flight 847 by Lebanese terrorists. Syrian Vice President Abdel-Halim Khaddam, whose country is the power broker in Lebanon, met with the delegates for five hours in the first session of the two-day conference. In the northern Lebanese port of Tripoli, meanwhile, heavy fighting was reported between the Tawhid militia, a Sunni Muslim force, and militiamen of the pro-Syrian Arab Democratic Party, with five people killed, according to police.
The U.S. sought to head off a possible Arab boycott of American airlines and ships. The Reagan Administration said its attempt to isolate Beirut’s airport was not meant to be a punishment of Lebanon. The American plan to “isolate” the airport was announced a week ago in retaliation for the hijacking of a Trans World Airways plane and the ensuing Beirut hostage crisis. It included a ban on Lebanese planes landing at American airports and a prohibition on United States airlines from landing in Beirut, both of which remain in effect. The United States also urged other nations to bar Lebanese planes and sought an international agreement to deny landing rights to any government that allowed Lebanese planes to land.
Currently available security devices and procedures could foil nearly all airline hijackings and terrorism, according to experts. But they said few air carriers and countries apply them sufficiently. Hardware on the drawing boards could further reduce the risks by increasing the automation of the procedures, but lack of government financing has slowed that progress, according to researchers, manufacturers and officials at Federal agencies. Interest in improving anti-terrorist systems has surged since the June 14 hijacking of a Trans World Airlines plane after it left Athens airport, and a suspected bombing on June 23 that took 329 lives on an Air-India jet off Ireland. On that day also, a bomb took two lives at an airport in Tokyo. None of these incidents, or any of the hundreds of terrorist acts against airlines in recent years, involved methods so sophisticated that they could not have been stopped by available security procedures, those interviewed concluded.
U.S. Marines should forego trim haircuts in overseas assignments because the close crop distinguishes them from other people and makes them potential targets for terrorists, according to the Marine Corps.
Peace talks between the Sri Lankan government and Tamil separatists “got off to a good start” in the remote mountain kingdom of Bhutan, the Bhutanese Embassy in New Delhi reported. The talks are an attempt to resolve the 10year-old ethnic conflict between the Tamils, a mostly Hindu minority concentrated on the northern third of the island nation, and the majority Sinhalese Buddhist population that dominates the south.
Singapore has canceled plans to buy eight special export models of the F-16 jet fighter and instead will buy eight high-powered F-16s like those flown by the U.S. Air Force, the Defense Department said. Previous U.S. policy was to sell only the export version of the F-16, with General Electric J-79 engines, to Southeast Asian allies. But in April, the Reagan Administration agreed to sell a dozen of the high-powered F-16s, with Pratt & Whitney F-100 engines, to Thailand.
The Liberal Democratic Party of Japanese Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone scored important gains in Tokyo municipal assembly elections. Despite a record low voter turnout and a reapportionment of seats-both elements working against them-the Liberal Democrats won five more seats. Their new total, 57 of 127 seats, is seven short of a majority. The Komei (Clean Government) Party gained two seats, the Communists gained three and the Socialists lost four.
The emptiness of Pyongyang at hours when other capitals are thronged is among the most powerful impressions foreign visitors get of North Korea, a nation that has closed its doors to much of the world since its birth at the end of World War II. The life of the country is focused on the 40-year leadership of Kim Il Sung, the 73-year-old President.
About 600 homes belonging to supporters of the main opposition party were reported ransacked today by followers of Prime Minister Robert G. Mugabe. In some cases, according to the Government press agency and other sources, members of the opposition, the Zimbabwe African People’s Union, led by Joshua Nkomo, were thrown out of their houses and their belongings piled in the streets. In other cases, followers of Mr. Mugabe’s governing Zimbabwe African National Union Patriotic Front, most of them women, confiscated house keys and locked residents out.
After withholding all comment for several days, the South African police acknowledged today that four blacks were killed Friday in township violence east of Johannesburg in what seems to have been one of the worst incidents of its kind in months. Reports in newspapers with a mainly black readership had said police officers, wearing hoodlike knitted caps, began a house-to-house search in Duduza, near the town of Nigel, on Friday and shot dead at least two blacks. The newspaper City Press published photographs of white police officers standing next to what appeared to be the body of a black man and said the police had established a “makeshift prison” in a township hall. Over the weekend, police officials refused to comment on the reports. Normally, the police issue regular bulletins on violence in black townships, which has claimed over 450 lives since last September.
John A. Walker Jr. passed secrets to the Soviet intelligence agency in an elaborate scheme that Federal officials and intelligence analysts believe apparently involved espionage training in Austria and the use of Soviet couriers in Washington. In their most extensive account of how they believe the espionage operation was carried out, officials said that Mr. Walker almost certainly dealt with several agents of the K.G.B., the Soviet intelligence agency, in what they maintain was a 20-year spying career. While the officials and analysts say they do not as yet have much specific knowledge of how Mr. Walker may have operated, they have agreed on some theories, based on their familiarity with previous Russian-American spy cases. The officials said that Mr. Walker’s case seems to follow what one investigative source described as a “common pattern” of Soviet intelligence agencies. The intelligence analysts speculated, for example, that Mr. Walker was awarded a high rank in the Soviet armed forces, probably the Soviet Navy, and received decorations for his information. “He might very well have tried on his Soviet uniform,” said Robert T. Crowley, a retired senior official of the Central Intelligence Agency.
Taxes on benefits could rise next year because the White House said that such a plan aimed at high-income Social Security recipients might be accepted by President Reagan if it is sought by the House Democratic leadership. Donald T. Regan, the White House chief of staff, said that such acceptance by President Reagan would mark an attempt to gain speedy Congressional approval of a 1986 Federal budget.
President Reagan addresses the National Convention of the American Bar Association to discuss international terrorism.
President Reagan meets with Vice President George Bush to discuss the Vice President’s recent trip to Europe.
Louisiana’s law requiring that creation theory be given equal weight with the teaching of evolution in public schools was ruled unconstitutional by a federal appeals court in New Orleans. “The act’s intended effect is to discredit evolution by counterbalancing its teaching at every turn with the teaching of creationism, a religious belief,” the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals said in its ruling. The court upheld a lower court ruling against the 1981 law, which has never been enforced.
A fire emergency was in effect in San Luis Obispo, California. Governor George Deukmejian declared the emergency after a 30-foot-high wall of flames destroyed at least three more houses and forced about 10,000 residents to flee. The 60,000-acre blaze, creating its own wind as it expanded, crept over a ridge and swooped down on the northern edge of the central California coastal city.
New gun sales are sharply lower in the 1980’s than they were in the previous 20 years. Firearms dealers and manufacturers attribute the turnaround to declining crime rates, shrinking space for hunting, tighter gun-control laws, economic hard times for blue-collar workers and a waning interest by young people in hunting and target shooting.
Senator Howard M. Metzenbaum (D-Ohio) and a coalition of police officials joined forces against handgun legislation that Metzenbaum called “a guns-for-criminals bill.” The liberal Metzenbaum and other senators are opposing a bill,strongly supported by the National Rifle Association and the Administration, that would amend the Gun Control Act of 1968 by lifting the existing ban on the interstate sale of handguns. The ban was enacted in the wake of the assassinations of Robert F. Kennedy and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
The Pentagon has questioned the Air Force about increases of more than 40% in the prices of F-15 and F-16 fighters in the last five years, according to a memorandum obtained by United Press International. Both aircraft, which have been produced since the 1970s by two different contractors, form the backbone of the Air Force’s fighter strength. Acting Undersecretary of Defense James Wade noted that the price tags of the F-15 and F-16 jumped 41.8% and 5.5%, respectively, since 1980.
Charging that a Carter Administration study grossly overestimated the nation’s need to stockpile critical materials in case of war, the Reagan Administration announced it is slashing its reserve goals and plans to sell off $2.5 billion in surplus materials. The White House said the stocks being declared as surplus would be sold over a five-year period to minimize the impact on commodity markets. It said an interagency group also would try to “ensure that the stockpile sales do not cause undue market disruptions.”
A New York appeals court denied a bid for a new trial for Jean Harris, convicted of killing Dr. Herman Tarnower, creator of the “Scarsdale Diet.” In a 20-page opinion, the court also ruled against Harris’ claim that Westchester County Judge Russell Leggett should have held a competency hearing prior to her 1981 trial. Harris, the socialite headmistress of a private Virginia school, serving 15 years to life, was convicted in the 1980 Purchase, New York, shooting of Tarnower, her lover and author of the best-selling “The Complete Scarsdale Medical Diet.”
A Cook County circuit judge accused of accepting thousands of dollars between 1969 and 1983 to fix parking tickets and drunken driving cases refused to testify in Chicago and the defense rested its case. The judge, Richard F. LeFevour, 54, is the highest ranking judge to be indicted in the federal Operation Greylord investigation of corruption in Cook County courts.
Federal fuel economy standards for passenger cars are to be reduced for one year to an average of 26 miles per gallon from the present 27.5 milles per gallon, according to officials of the Transportation Department and industry sources. It would be the first time the department has reduced the passenger car standard since Congress enacted it in 1975.
One of the world’s largest dinosaur graveyards has been discovered at a remote Texas lakebed, containing the 100 million year-old remains of a previously unknown reptile, scientists announced. Paleontologists Louis Jacobs of Southern Methodist University and Phillip Murry of Tarleton State University, who are leading a project to excavate the bones from Proctor Lake, about 150 miles southwest of Dallas, said the skeletons represent at least one new kind of dinosaur. One of the dinosaur skeletons is related to plant-eating camptosaurids, reptiles that lived more than 100 million years ago and walked on two legs, the paleontologists said.
Agents for many unsigned National Football League draft picks, including more than 20 taken on the first round, vowed yesterday not to let their clients sign contracts for sums vastly below amounts paid to comparable draft choices of the past several years. Meeting for more than six hours in Chicago, the agents said they would continue to negotiate in good faith on behalf of their clients. But, said Leigh Steinberg, who represents four unsigned first-rounders, “we will not advise our clients to sign contracts that have been rolled back to 1983 and 1982 prices.”
Major League Baseball:
Marge Schott becomes president and CEO of the Cincinnati Reds.
The Braves topped the Expos, 7–1, as Dale Murphy hit his 21st home run of the season, and Rick Mahler scattered seven hits for his 12th victory as Atlanta broke a five-game losing streak. The Braves scored four times in the first, includingMurphy’s two-run shot. Milt Thompson led off with a single, stole second and scored when Murphy sent a 1-1 pitch over the right-field fence. Chris Chambliss and Ken Oberkfell then hit consecutive singles, and both scored on Glenn Hubbard’s double off Bill Gullickson (7-6), who was making his first appearance since coming off the disabled list.
Darryl Strawberry, despite an injured thumb, cracked a home run, one of four for the Mets, and New York beat the Reds, 7–5. The other homers were by Keith Hernandez, Howard Johnson, and George Foster. It was enough to get the win for Ed Lynch, despite being touched for nine hits and four runs in his six innings of work.
Joaquin Andujar scattered 12 singles tonight to win his major-league leading 15th game and help the St. Louis Cardinals defeat the San Francisco Giants, 6–1. Vince Coleman, Ozzie Smith and Terry Pendleton each had three hits to support Andujar (15-3), who pitched his third consecutive complete game. Andujar now has nine complete games for the season. He walked two and struck out two. The Cardinals’ right-hander has recorded a decision in all but one of his 19 starts. Coleman, who had missed the previous two games with a sore wrist, tripled to lead off the Cardinals’ first. He scored on a Willie McGee groundout. The Cardinals, in first place in the National League East, took a 2-0 lead in the second when Pendleton singled and scored on a double by Ozzie Smith. St. Louis chased the loser, Dave LaPoint (3-8), with a three-run sixth.
Houston rookie Mark Knudsen has a rocky debut as he goes 7 innings and gives up 14 hits against the Phillies. Philadelphia totals 20 hits as they hang of for a 7–4 win. Glenn Wilson drove in three runs with three singles, keying a 20-hit attack that powered Philadelphia past the Astros. Von Hayes, Ozzie Virgil and Rick Schu also contributed three hits apiece. Charles Hudson (4-7) gave up seven hits in seven and two-thirds innings for the victory. The Astros scored three times in the ninth before Kent Tekulve got the final three outs for his seventh save.
Fernando Valenzuela allowed eight hits, but only two after the third inning, and Dave Anderson hit a two-run single as Los Angeles rallied to beat Pittsburgh, 4–3. Valenzuela (9-8) won for the fourth time in his last five decisions, blanking Pittsburgh over the final six innings after the Pirates had taken a 3-2 lead in the third. Mike Scioscia walked and Steve Sax singled with one out in the Los Angeles fifth. The runners moved up on a wild pitch by Jose DeLeon (2-12), and after Valenzuela flied out, Anderson hit his single into left field to put the Dodgers ahead, 4-3.
Kevin McReynolds drove in four runs with a home run, triple and double to lead San Diego to a split, winning, 8–4. Before the regularly scheduled game, the Cubs took a 6–3 victory in the completion of a game suspended because of darkness after six innings May 5. McReynolds hit a two-run homer in the second inning, tripled and scored on a sacrifice fly by Garry Templeton in the sixth and doubled in two more runs in the seventh. The Padres also scored three runs in the fourth, when they took the lead for good. Steve Garvey doubled, went to third on a single by Graig Nettles and scored on a single by Terry Kennedy. Carmelo Martinez singled home Nettles and Templeton singled to drive in Kennedy and extend his hitting streak to 12 games.
George Brett collected three hits, one of them a game-breaking single in the seventh inning, and helped send the Royals to a 5–2 victory over the Yankees at the Stadium. The triumph was the first for the Royals in New York since the fabled “Pine Tar Game” of 1983, ending a Stadium losing streak of nine games. It also snapped the third-place Yankees’ victory streak at four. Brett’s key hit in the seventh came off Phil Niekro (7–8) with the score tied, 2–2, and with runners at first and third with two outs.
Carlton Fisk has a double and two homers, including a grand slam, as the White Sox roll by the Tigers, 9–4. Fisk, who entered the game with 19 homers, two behind the American League leader, Dave Kingman, belted his first of the night and 250th of his career with two out in the second inning to give the White Sox a 1-0 lead against Dan Petry (10-7). Fisk later capped a six-run, sixth inning with the bases loaded shot off Aurelio Lopez as Chicago took a 8-3 lead. Before Fisk’s slam, the White Sox had scored the tying and lead runs in the sixth inning on consecutive singles by Rudy Law, Bryan Little, Harold Baines and Greg Walker. Lopez relieved Petry and Chicago loaded the bases for Fisk when Oscar Gamble was safe on a fielder’s choice.
Dave Stieb and Jim Acker combined on a seven-hitter tonight, leading the Toronto Blue Jays to a 4–0 victory over the Seattle Mariners. Stieb (9-5) struck out five and walked one while allowing five hits over seven innings. He lowered his American League-leading earned run average to 1.84. In his last 11 starts, he has a 1.04 ERA. Ernie Whitt’s run-scoring triple keyed Toronto’s two-run seventh inning after Seattle’s Mike Moore (7-5) had blanked the Blue Jays over the first six innings.
Neal Heaton fired a six-hitter for his first shutout in over a year, and Carmen Castillo hit a solo home run to help Cleveland defeat Texas, 4–0. Heaton (5-10) snapped a personal six-game losing streak, striking out five and walking two for his second complete game of the year. His last shutout was June 21, 1984, against Minnesota. Cleveland took a 1-0 lead in the first inning on Pat Tabler’s single after the Indians loaded the bases against Mike Mason (5-8) on singles by Julio Franco and Brook Jacoby and a walk to Andre Thornton. Tabler, who had three hits, is 4-for-4 in bases-loaded situations this season and 20-for-32 in that situation since joining the Indians in 1983.
The Twins topped the Orioles, 7–4, as Mark Salas singled home the lead run in the 10th with his third hit for Minnesota. The Twins, who snapped a four-game losing streak, scored three times after Baltimore’s reliever, Don Aase (5-4), retired the first two batters. Gary Gaetti, who hit a two-run homer in the second, beat out an infield single; a pinch hitter, Mike Stenhouse, walked, and Salas followed with his second RBI of the game. After Sammy Stewart replaced Aase, Kirby Puckett walked to load the bases and Mickey Hatcher blooped a two-run single. The game had three rain delays totaling 76 minutes.
Doug DeCinces’ single with one out in the bottom of the 11th scored Brian Downing from second base and gave California a 3–2 victory over Milwaukee. Downing led off the inning with a walk off Bob Gibson (6-5) who took over after Danny Darwin went the first 10 innings. Downing was sacrificed to second by Mike Brown and, after an intenional walk to Ruppert Jones, scored when DeCinces lined a sharp single to center. Donnie Moore (6-3) retired the final two batters in the top of the 11th to pick up the victory.
Bruce Hurst, who brought a 5.56 earned run average into the game, scattered seven hits in 7 ⅓ shutout innings and right fielder Dwight Evans threw out the potential tying run at the plate to end the game as the Red Sox edged the A’s, 2–1, at Oakland. Hurst (5-7) walked one and struck out six before Steve Crawford came on and earned his second save thanks to Evans’ throw. Boston got its first run in the fifth inning when Glenn Hoffman singled, went to third on an errant pickoff attempt by A’s starter Chris Codiroli (8-5) and scored on Evans’ infield out. Codiroli’s wild pickoff throw snapped a 90-inning errorless streak by the A’s, a team record.
Montreal Expos 1, Atlanta Braves 7
Minnesota Twins 7, Baltimore Orioles 4
Milwaukee Brewers 2, California Angels 3
San Diego Padres 8, Chicago Cubs 4
New York Mets 7, Cincinnati Reds 5
Texas Rangers 0, Cleveland Indians 4
Chicago White Sox 9, Detroit Tigers 4
Philadelphia Phillies 7, Houston Astros 4
Kansas City Royals 5, New York Yankees 2
Boston Red Sox 2, Oakland Athletics 1
Los Angeles Dodgers 4, Pittsburgh Pirates 3
Toronto Blue Jays 4, Seattle Mariners 0
San Francisco Giants 1, St. Louis Cardinals 6
Dow Jones Industrial Average: 1328.41 (-6.04)
Born:
Jamie Cook, British guitarist (Arctic Monkeys – “I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor”), in High Green, Sheffield, England, United Kingdom.
Natasha Lacy, WNBA guard (Tulsa Shock, Los Angeles Sparks, Washington Mystics, Connecticut Sun, New York Liberty), in El Paso, Texas.
Died:
Simon Kuznets, 84, American economist (Nobel Prize, 1971).
Gardner Cowles Jr., 82, American publisher (Look Magazine).
Phil Foster, 72, American comedian (Frank De Fazio-“Laverne & Shirley”).
History Diaries 