A mayor with Communist affiliations was elected for the first time in Rome. Giulio Carlo Argan, an independent allied with the Communist Party, won the backing of 39 of the 80 members of the Rome City Council. Christian Democrats and Republican council members abstained. The Christian Democrats had ruled Rome since World War II. Argan, a professor of art history at Sapienza, Rome’s nearly eight-century-old university, was selected as the first Communist mayor of Rome, “completing a Marxist takeover of the major city halls in Italy” in the wake of recent legislative elections in which the PCI had won the second highest number of seats in the Chamber of Deputies. The Communists agreed to forgo participation in the national government in return for support by the Christian Democracy party and the Italian Socialist Party for rule on the local level. Argan, who took a leave from his job as the University of Rome, was selected by vote of the City Council rather than by direct vote.
There are growing signs that Poland’s Communist Party is seeking to become a bridge between the orthodoxy of Moscow and the dissident Western European Communist parties that say they no longer accept Moscow as their directing center. A member of the Polish Communist Party’s Central Committee told a correspondent recently that “we Polish Communists have an ambition to play an important part in Europe, creating a model of socialism acceptable to everyone, including our comrades in both directions.” The rift between the two Communist camps was evident before and during the meeting of European Communist leaders held in Berlin in June. The Soviet Communist Party had long wanted such a meeting to demonstrate the unity of European Communism. But when it finally took place. Moscow and its closest ideological allies — the Communist Parties of Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria and East Germany — found themselves at odds on key issues with the new bloc of “Euro-Communists.”
The Portuguese police announced today the arrest of nine persons suspected of responsibility for the bomb attacks that have troubled this country for a year. The group was accused of numerous acts of terrorism including the recent bomb attacks against the Cuban Embassy, the Lisbon airport radar towers, the Communist Party’s office on Lisbon’s main street, the Oporto University’s school of economics, and many others. In a communique issued tonight, the Oporto judiciary police, which handles criminal investigation, listed the prisoners and said they were being held in the prison fortress of Caxias outside of Lisbon. It was also announced that the military authorities had ordered the chief of the Oporto security police and his second in command to report to headquarters in Lisbon. No explanation was given for this order.
A Spanish military transport plane carrying 33 officers, wives and children crashed in flames near Spain’s southern coastal city of Cadiz on a flight to the Canary Islands. Police said 10 persons were killed and the other 23 aboard were injured. Air force officers said one of the DC-4’s four engines caught fire. The officers aboard were mechanics and pilots bound for a tour of duty at a Spanish base in Las Palmas.
A Roman Catholic member of the British Parliament from Ulster, revolver in hand, held a mob of 30 persons at bay in his home early today. “I do not think I have ever been closer to death,” he said afterward. Gerry Fitt, 50 years old, leader of the Ulster Social and Democratic Labor Party, the leading moderate Catholic group, his wife, Ann, and their 13‐year‐old daughter, Geraldine, were taken to a hospital and treated for shock. The attack followed a weekend of unrest in which thousands of supporters of the Irish Republican Army demonstrated to observe the fifth anniversary of the introduction of internment without trial for suspected I.R.A. guerrillas. This practice has since been stopped.
A seaman on the Soviet passenger liner Baikal was arrested in the slaying at sea of a Japanese coed. The seaman, Anatoly Timofeevich Vysokos, was not charged with the slaying but was held for questioning by Soviet authorities. The coed, Mariko Nagaoka, 21, was last seen alive leaving the ship’s bar with Vysokos. Her body was found floating in the Sea of Japan last week. She had been bound for a language seminar in the Soviet Union. Ship’s officers reported the incident to Japanese authorities when the Baikal returned to Yokohama this week.
Pope Paul VI reportedly decided against attending the 41st International Eucharistic Congress in Philadelphia, which ended Sunday night, for several reasons, among them his health and his desire to avoid dominating an event that he believed belonged to the people. The Pontiff did speak to the closing assembly in John F. Kennedy Stadium by satellite from Italy, telling the crowd of 100.000 worshipers that “all of us, at this moment, are in Philadelphia through a spiritual link‐up.”
USSR launches Luna 24, the last lunar flight by the Soviets. The 24th mission of the Luna series of spacecraft, the mission of the Luna 24 probe was the third Soviet mission to return lunar soil samples from the Moon (the first two sample return missions were Luna 16 and Luna 20). The probe landed in Mare Crisium (Sea of Crises). The mission returned 170.1 g (6.00 oz) of lunar samples to the Earth on 22 August 1976.
Right‐wing Lebanese Christian forces were reported today to be massing on two fronts to launch new attacks against Palestinian and leftist positions. News of the reported concentrations came from sources in the central leadership of the Palestinian groups and the Lebanese leftist‐Muslim alliance. A rightist radio station said that the area of AI Jamhour, a Christian stronghold about seven miles east of Beirut on the main Beirut‐Damascus highway, had been declared a military zone and that a dusk‐to‐dawn curfew had been put into force there. The leftist press said reconnaissance information received by the Palestinian‐leftist leadership indicated that the rightists had gathered as many as 100 military vehicles at Al Jamlour in addition to a large number of militiamen. The troops were said to have begun moving toward the Christian village of Al Louiza a few miles down the road. This force intends to attack Palestinian and leftist strongholds in the southern outskirts of Beirut to open the road for the rightists toward the Beirut international airport, the papers said. The airport, which has, been closed since late June after having been shelled, is now under control of the Arab League’s peacekeeping force.
The United States and Pakistan have agreed to seek a compromise that would prevent a confrontation over Pakistan’s plans to build a French-designed nuclear fuel-making plant, it was announced by Secretary of State Henry Kissinger after talks with Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto in Lahore. Mr. Bhutto consented to work out a formula that would insure that Pakistan would not be able to divert material into nuclear explosives, Mr. Kissinger said.
The Foreign Ministry called in the United States Embassy in Paris today to express surprise and displeasure at American efforts to block the sale of a uranium reprocessing plant to Pakistan, an embassy spokesman said. Sam Gammon, chargé d’affaires, was summoned to be told that France intended to go ahead with the deal. The French were particularly annoyed that Secretary of State Kissinger made a public threat to cut off American aid to Pakistan if the sale went through — a move causing domestic political embarrassment to the French Government since it was believed here to provide domestic political advantage to the Ford Administration.
The youth wing of India’s dominant political party today held rally apparently designed in part to promote Sanjay Gandhi, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s 29‐year‐old son. In the first national rally ever held by the Youth Congress, several thousand delegates gathered at a gaily‐decorated fairground here for two days of speeches, songs and cultural programs devoted to the theme of resurgent youth. “The elder politicians should encourage the youth to come up, and not stand in their way,” Mr. Gandhi said, setting the tone of the meeting at a weekend news conference.
The fifth conference of nonaligned nations, representing 84 countries and two-thirds of humanity, opened in Colombo, Sri Lanka (formerly Ceylon). After a planning session, foreign ministers will confer August 11–15, followed by a heads of state meeting August 16–19. “The focal point will be a new economic order emphasizing equality between the developed and developing world,” said V. L. B. Mendis of Sri Lanka, who is secretary general of the conference.
The secretary of former Japanese Prime Minister Kakuei Tanaka and two business executives were indicted in connection with the Lockheed payoff scandal. In addition, Japanese newspapers were predicting that Tanaka, 58, would be indicted within a week. Tanaka’s secretary, Toshio Enomoto, 50, and two former directors of Marubeni Corp., Toshiharu Okubo, 62, and Hiroshi Itoh, 49, were charged with violating foreign exchange regulations.
American shrimp fishing in Mexican waters will be cut 40% in the next year and phased out completely by 1980 under an agreement reached by the two countries. The agreement, which must be signed by President Ford, was announced in Florida by Harmon Shields, that state’s director of natural resources, who served as technical adviser to the negotiations. The talks began after Mexico extended its sea limits to 200 miles. The U.S. shrimp fleet is based primarily in Florida and Texas.
Sudanese President Gaafar al-Nimeiry indicated today that he thought the Soviet Union was behind an attempt last month, sponsored by Libya, to overthrow his Government. He did not name the Soviet Union directly. But his remarks during an interview made it clear that he was alluding to the Russians, who are major arms suppliers to the Libyan regime of Colonel Muammar el-Qaddafi.
Operation Eland, an invasion of Mozambique by Rhodesia to combat the Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army (ZANLA) began with an attack on the Pusgue refugee camp near Nyadzonya, and ultimately killed 1,028 people, most of them civilians.
A breakthrough apparently has been achieved in negotiations by delegates to a constitutional conference in Namibia (South-West Africa). Delegates claimed the breakthrough would lead to independence of Namibia not later than June 30, 1977, a multiracial government and an invitation to the militant guerrilla SouthWest Africa Peoples’ Organization to join the new government. The surprise developments came about, delegates said, because of an about-face by two white delegates and new support from the South Africa government. A full announcement was expected August 24.
Rioting in South Africa spread from Soweto, where it recently originated, to at least 11 other black areas. There were attacks on schools, government offices and commuter buses. The police opened fire in at least three townships and in Alexandra they killed two youths who, the police said, had attacked a police vehicle. The worst of the trouble was in Soweto and Alexandra, where gangs of youths renewed their attempts to stop blacks from going to work for white employers in Johannesburg. The gangs set up roadblocks to halt commuter buses. In the meantime, Prime Minister John Vorster, in a South African magazine interview, said the country was in a serious situation, but that it was not critical, as South African opponents of apartheid have suggested. He said the government would listen to back protests, but would not permit an insurrection.
Gerald R. Ford spent his second anniversary as the 38th President of the United States today facing the distinct possibility that there would be no third anniversary. Although it is virtually the eve of the Republican National Convention, Mr. Ford has not yet been able to sew up his party’s Presidential nomination, even though he enjoys the advantage of incumbency. He is favored to defeat Ronald Reagan for the nomination but currently is trailing far behind the Democratic nominee, Jimmy Carter, in the public opinion polls. As Mr. Ford himself frequently points out, the only poll that counts is the balloting on November 2. But after two years in office, he apparently still has not convinced the American people, or his own party, that he has earned a full term in the White House.
Tactical skirmishes between the partisans of President Ford and Ronald Reagan marked the opening of preliminary activities of the Republican National Convention in Kansas City, Missouri. Both sides proclaimed a strategy of party unity. Neither the supporters of the incumbent, who narrowly control the machinery of the convention, nor the backers of his conservative challenger, who are searching for means to demonstrate strength on some procedural question, appeared to have gained any significant advantage so far. The Ford forces decisively defeated an attempt by John P. Sears, Mr. Reagan’s chief strategist, to push through rule requiring Presidential aspirants to state in advance their Vice‐Presidential choices, as Mr. Reagan has done and as the President has said he will not do.
Well-placed officials in Washington said that if President Ford does not choose John Connally as his running mate he may appoint him as chairman of his election campaign. Putting Mr. Connally in charge of the campaign was said to have been suggested to the President by several of his associates who believe that a Ford-Connally ticket would make Watergate a bigger issue that ever among Democrats. Rogers C.B. Morton, the chairman of the President Ford Committee, supports Mr. Connally as his replacement.
Jimmy Carter visited Capitol Hill seeking Congressional support today, and members of the House of Representatives promptly handed him his first legislative defeat. In an unexpected turnabout, the House Democratic leadership, including Speaker Carl Albert, voted to drop key provisions of the voter registration bill that Mr. Carter had lobbied for in personal talks with members of the leadership. By a vote of 239 to 147, the House passed the bill, but without a feature that would have used the Postal Service to mail 140 million voter registration forms printed on postcards to every household in the country before the November general election.
Henry Guigni, administrative assistant for Senator Daniel K. Inouye (D-Hawaii), is being investigated by the Senate Ethics Committee in connection with his actions after accepting an illegal $5,000 contribution in 1973 from Claude C. Wild Jr., then a lobbyist for Gulf Oil Corp. Inouye has said he will cooperate with the investigation but when he was first approached last spring by the committee he said the matter was not proper to discuss. A committee member said this was the first time a staff member had been investigated without a request from the senator for whom he worked.
Although the CIA enlisted mobsters John Roselli and Sam (Momo) Giancana, the agency played no part in their gangland-style deaths, former CIA director William E. Colby said in an interview with a Washington television station. “I can guarantee you that the CIA had absolutely nothing to do with their deaths,” Colby said. Florida detectives say they are trying to determine whether there is a link between the death of Roselli, whose body was found in a bay off Miami Saturday, and that of Giancana, who was shot to death in Chicago June 19, 1975. Roselli had testified that the CIA had offered him and Giancana $100,000 to help Cuban dissidents kill Premier Fidel Castro in 1961.
Senator Howard H. Baker, Republican of Tennessee, said today he would ask the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Central Intelligence Agency to provide any information they had regarding the murder of John Roselli, an underworld figure who had testified he made several attempts under the direction of the C.I.A. to assassinate Cuban Premier Fidel Castro.
The Senate voted to pay legal expenses incurred by Senator William Proxmire (D-Wisconsin) in defending himself in a $6 million libel and slander suit. The suit was brought by Dr. Ronald R. Hutchinson of the Kalamazoo State Hospital after Proxmire attacked government-financed research awards to Hutchinson as a waste of money. In a speech on the Senate floor, Proxmire had awarded his “fleece of the month” award to the hospital for research on why monkeys gnash their teeth.
After eight and a half days of deliberation, a jury in Los Angeles found William and Emily Harris, companions of Patricia Hearst in the so-called Symbionese Liberation Army, guilty of kidnapping, robbery and auto theft. But the Harrises were acquitted of aiding and abetting Miss Hearst when she opened fire to assist them in avoiding arrest at a sporting goods store in 1974. Miss Hearst, awaiting sentencing on a Federal bank robbery conviction, faces trial next January on the same charges. The Harrises face sentencing August 30. The Harrises could receive one to 25 years in prison on each of the two kidnapping convictions as well as a minimum of five years in prison and a maximum of life for the armed robbery conviction.
Attorney General Edward H. Levi today defended Clarence M. Kelley’s performance as director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, including Mr. Kelley’s handling of charges of wrong doing by bureau personnel. “Director Kelley has had to meet revelations of what went on in the bureau over the last 30 years,” Mr. Levi said. The director has “pushed” full investigations, he said, and the investigations “take time.” Mr. Levi, speaking to a group of lawyers at the American Bai Association convention here suggested that newspapers sometimes get the facts “turned around” and make it seem as if the newspapers, rather than the bureau, are doing the investigations. In fact, he said, “their director has been pushing these investigations, and they are investigations in depth.”
Federal and Pennsylvania health officials, already investigating an outbreak of illness that followed an American Legion convention in Philadelphia three weeks ago, have also begun looking into a just-discovered outbreak of respiratory ailments that followed another organization’s convention in Philadelphia two years ago.
Haphazard management and a growing proportion of hardened young criminals contributed to a series of murders and assaults at one of the most dangerous federal prisons in the nation, a board of inquiry reported. The board was appointed in May to try to determine why eight inmates of the penitentiary at Lewisburg, Pennsylvania, had been killed by other inmates in two years. Nearly half of the inmates are under 30 and the younger prisoners “are more volatile,” the report pointed out. Top officials tolerate “totally unacceptable” staff performance, overlook lax enforcement of rules and seldom tour the institution, the board said.
Citizen band radio operators were warned by the Federal Communications Commission against using kits to convert 23-channel sets into 40-channel sets. Such “remanufactured sets may not meet standards designed to reduce CB interference with television signals, an FCC announcement said. New 40-channel sets will not go on sale until January 1, when the FCC completes testing to ascertain that they meet agency standards. Also on January 1, the 17 additional CB channels assigned to reduce airwave congestion go into operation.
An end to the 112-day rubber strike appeared near after the government made recommendations for a settlement. After 7 1⁄2 hours of talks in Washington, the session was recessed to give the parties involved -the United Rubber Workers and Firestone Tire Co., the target firm — time to consider the recommendations. Details were not disclosed. The strike by 60,000 rubber workers began April 21 and has idled 47 plants owned by Firestone, Goodyear, Goodrich and Uniroyal.
As modest back-to-work movements began in two United Mine Worker districts, the UMW governing board headed for Charleston, West Virginia, to meet with the local that began the wildcat strike, now in the fourth week. Local President Hays Holstein said he had heard reports that the board was considering revoking the local’s charter and placing the local under trusteeship. The strike has idled about half the nation’s 150,000 soft coal miners, although some reported back to work in Illinois and western Kentucky.
The bodies of two murder victims, Pamela Buckley and James Freund, were found near Lake City, South Carolina and would remain unidentified for more than 40 years until discovered through the work of the DNA Doe Project.
Hurricane Belle skirted the New Jersey coast last night, passing about 50 miles out to sea, but sent waves, gale-force winds and heavy rain ashore, flooding low-lying areas, smashing windows and knocking out electrical power in dozens of shore communities. The boardwalk at Atlantic City was reported awash. However, no major damage was reported as the storm swept by Cape May end Atlantic City between 9 and 10 PM, nor were there any reports of fatalities or injuries. As the hurricane began to pass the Barrier Islands around 11 PM, the storm took a more northeasterly course, carrying it farther out to sea. In its wake, it left some electrical power out for up to an hour in more than a dozen shore communities.
Major League Baseball:
In the Hall of Fame game following the inductions of Roberts, Lemon and others, the Brewers beat the Mets, 9–3.
George Hendrick had two singles, each driving in a run, to help the Indians defeat the White Sox, 4–2, and end their five-game losing streak. Larvell Blanks walked in the third inning, advanced on a groundout and scored what proved to be the winning run on Hendrick’s second single. Dave LaRoche squelched a White Sox uprising in the eighth to gain his 12th save and preserve the win for Jim Bibby (8–4).
A five-run outburst in the third inning sent the Rangers on their way to an 8–1 victory over the Tigers behind Nelson Briles (8–8), who posted his first victory since July 3. A two-run single by Juan Beniquez highlighted the third inning, which saw the Rangers capitalize on three walks by losing pitcher Dave Lemanczyk and one by reliever Bill Laxton.
A crowd of 40,435, largest at Royals Stadium since the 1973 All-Star Game, saw the Royals defeat the Yankees, 8–2, in a nationally televised matchup of division leaders. Amos Otis hit his first home run since June 15 and two run-scoring doubles, and Hal McRae belted a two-run homer for Kaycee. Dennis Leonard (14–4) beats Ken Holtzman (9–8).
Jose Morales delivered his 16th pinch-hit of the season, a single with two out in the ninth inning, to score pinch-runner Jerry White from third in the Expos’ 2–1 victory over the Giants. White was running for Earl Williams, who had singled, advanced to second on a single by Tim Foli and reached third on Del Unser’s sacrifice.
The Pirates staged a “Candy Night” promotion to salute John Candelaria and the lean righthander responded by pitching a no-hitter. Twenty-two-year-old John Candelaria survives a bases-loaded situation in the 3rd inning to hurl a no-hit game to beat the Dodgers 2–0. Candelaria improves his record to 11–4 for the 2nd-place Pirates.
Cesar Cedeno hit for the cycle with a triple in the first inning, home run in the sixth, double in the seventh and single in the eighth, scored four runs and drove in five to lead the Astros’ 13–4 rout of the Cardinals.
Chicago White Sox 2, Cleveland Indians 4
Texas Rangers 8, Detroit Tigers 1
New York Yankees 2, Kansas City Royals 8
San Francisco Giants 1, Montreal Expos 2
Los Angeles Dodgers 0, Pittsburgh Pirates 2
Houston Astros 13, St. Louis Cardinals 4
The stock market declined yesterday for the third consecutive session. Trading was cut by one hour because of the hurricane warning for early evening. At the 3 PM close, the Dow Jones industrial average showed a loss of 2.54 points at 983.46. The widely followed average moved in a narrow range throughout the session with the largest decline, 3.54 points, posted at 11:30 AM.
Dow Jones Industrial Average: 983.46 (-2.54, -0.26%)
Born:
Jessica Capshaw, American TV actress (“The Practice”, “Grey’s Anatomy”); in Columbia, Missouri.
Rhona Mitra, English TV actress (“The Practice”, “Boston Legal”; in Paddington, London, England, United Kingdom.
Audrey Tautou, French actress (“Venus Beauty Institute”, “Amélie”), in Beaumont, Puy-de-Dôme, France.
Josh Williams, NFL defensive tackle (Indianapolis Colts), in Denver, Colorado.
Aled Haydn Jones, Welsh radio producer (head of BBC Radio One), in Aberystwyth, Wales, United Kingdom.
Nawaf al-Hazmi, Saudi Arabian terrorist asshople and 9/11 hijacker, in Mecca, Saudi Arabia.
Died:
José Lezama Lima, 65, Cuban novelist and poet.
