The Soviet Communist Party newspaper Pravda accused the West of blocking progress at European force reduction talks in Vienna by insisting on larger cuts by Communist countries than by North Atlantic Treaty Organization states. The accusation was made in what observers saw as a basically pessimistic article on the prospects for movement when the 3-year-old Geneva-based negotiations resume September 30.
The Supreme Soviet, the Soviet Parliament, will hold its delayed summer session at the end of October, it was officially announced today. The two‐chamber body is due to approve the five‐year plan for 1976‐1980 that was unveiled in February at the 25th Congress of the Communist Party. The Supreme Soviet normally meets twice a year for a two‐or three‐day session, and it had been announced that it would meet in September. But the session is understood to have been delayed by problems with the final version of the plan.
A Soviet pilot flew a light single‐engine mail plane into Iran Thursday and asked authorities for political asylum in the United States, official sources said today. The sources said the pilot, 32‐year‐old Lieutenant Valentin I. Zasimov, landed the four‐seat passenger aircraft on a small landing strip in Ahar in the Iranian province of Azerbaijan, 63 miles south of the Soviet border. A spokesman for the United States Embassy here said the embassy had received no word of the request for asylum. The Soviet Embassy confirmed that a pilot had defected but gave no details. The defection was the second by a Soviet pilot this month. on September 6, Lieutenant Viktor I. Belenko flew his supersonic MIG‐25 to Japan. He has been granted asylum in the United States.
The North Atlantic alliance has responded to changes in the East‐West strategic balance with a series of exercises intended to tighten the combat readiness of its military forces. General Alexander M. Haig, NATO’s commander, said in an interview that the changes had resulted from what he called the relentless improvement in the capabilities of the Soviet Union and other Warsaw Pact countries and the reduction in the warning time the West can expect in the event of Soviet attack. NATO’s response this summer and autumn has been a series of 27 overlapping exercises involving a quarter of a million people, 1,500 aircraft and 400 naval vessels. The exercises extended from Norway and the eastern Atlantic Ocean across Western Europe to the eastern basin of the Mediterranean. Of the alliance’s 15 members, only Iceland, which has no military forces, and Greece, which has ended military integration in NATO, will not be represented. The French, discreetly edging back to cooperation if not integration, will be represented in the Mediterranean exercises. “We in the West are faced with a situation in which we will have reduced warning time,” General Haig said. “That places upon us the requirement to tighten up our combat readiness.”
Opposition to nuclear power is gathering force throughout Western Europe and has slowed the pace of reactor building. Denmark and Norway have delayed the building of their first nuclear plants and the Netherlands has put off a decision on whether to build more plants. Public opposition has snarled utilities in West Germany and Switzerland through protracted legal skirmishes.
The new Maltese Cabinet, formed after the victory of Prime Minister Dom Mintoff’s Labor Party in last Sunday’s general election, was sworn in last night by President Anthony Mamo. The Cabinet includes two newcomers, Dr. Vincent Moran, a medical practitioner who becomes Minister of Health and the Environment, and Danny Cremona, former chairman of the government‐controlled Bank of Valletta, Who has been made Minister of Industry, Fisheries and Agriculture. All the ministers in the previous 10-member Cabinet were reappointed but given new portfolios or have had new duties added.
A local organizer of the Women’s Peace Movement in Northern Ireland was shot in the face by a masked gunman and critically wounded, police said. Mrs. Bridget McKenna, 60, was standing with a 16-year-old girl in the doorway of a shop in Belfast when a young man approached and fired two shotgun blasts, police reported. The girl was also critically injured. Meanwhile, in other sectarian violence, two Protestant men were killed when gunmen sprayed bullets at customers in a West Belfast bar.
A fishing town in southwest England was a sodden mess after a flash flood broke months of drought. Police said one man drowned, cars were overturned and buildings choked with mud by a wall of water that raced from parched hills through a valley and surged through the south Cornwall resort community of Polperro on its way to the sea.
American journalist Jack L. Begon, a former correspondent for the American Broadcasting Co. who disappeared for a month in 1973 and said he had been kidnaped by the Mafia, has again vanished, his wife said in Rome. Italian-born Maria Begon told reporters that her 65-year-old husband left home last Thursday and had not been heard from since.
The Turkish research ship Sismik 1 may have found oil near the Greek island of Thassos in the Aegean Sea, Turkish officials said. Greece discovered oil deposits at Thassos several years ago, and the two nations have been disputing oil rights in the Aegean since 1973. Earlier this month, the International Court of Justice denied a Greek application for a temporary ban on Turkish oil exploration in the Aegean. Turkish and Greek foreign ministers are expected to meet in New York next week for talks on the oil question and other issues.
Israel is at the beginning of an election year that is expected to bring a debate on the nation’s precarious economic state and on the future of the occupied Arab territories. The question of the Arab lands was revived last week with the publication in the October issue of Foreign Affairs magazine of an article by Foreign Minister Yigal Allon. He proposed a withdrawal from most of the Arab territory and the creation of a joint Jordanian‐Palestinian entity in demilitarized zones on the West Bank and in the Gaza Strip. Mr. Allon’s proposal, though not new, led to a special session of Parliament that turned into a shouting match on Tuesday. The article was also said to have irked Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin because it had not been cleared with his office. The session of Parliament was called by the rightist Likud opposition bloc, led by Menahem Begin, which opposes territorial concessions. The Likud sought the resignation of Mr. Allon, who at the time was on his way to New York for the United Nations General Assembly.
Lebanese President Elias Sarkis accepted the resignation of Prime Minister Rashid Karami and his Cabinet today, the first step toward putting together a new government. Mr. Sarkis, inaugurated two days ago, met with right‐wing Christian leaders in hopes of their acceptance of a truce offered by the Palestinian guerrilla chief, Yasser Arafat, and he talked with the Arab League’s mediator, Dr. Hassan Sabry el-Kholy, about a new peace plan. On the battle fronts, the civil war slackened in some areas but intensified in others, including Beirut, where Christian gunners shelled the Muslim western sector during the afternoon. Mr. Sarkis asked Mr. Karami to stay on in a caretaker role until he found a successor. Although Mr. Karami’s resignation was mandatory, it left Mr. Sarkis with the problem of finding a prime minister capable of putting together a cabinet acceptable to Lebanon’s many political parties and militia groups.
Thailand reinstated Seni Pramoj as prime minister, ending a two-day leadership crisis. King Bhumibol Adulyadej signed a royal decree confirming action by parliament to rename Seni, 71, who resigned Thursday. He will lead a coalition for a four-year term. His decision to resign stemmed from a controversy over the return of exiled military ruler, Thanom Kittikachorn. Thanom, back from exile in Singapore, entered a Buddhist monastery and was ordained as a monk.
Initial results of a referendum on the status of Palau in the Caroline Islands showed that about 80% of the islanders favored separation from the U.S. Pacific Trust Territory. U.S. officials expect the Palau leadership to approach the U.S. government with the results of the referendum and ask for commonwealth status.
Air Canada said it would abide by a recent court ruling ordering the state‐owned airline to permit the use of French in some circumstances by its pilots. The airline had sought a delay in implementing the ruling, which also included an order that the airline translate its English‐only training and operations manual into French within two years. A Quebec Court of Appeals turned down the airline’s appeal for a delay on introducing a second language into the English‐only operations. The airline has also been ordered to permit the use of French among crews in flight when all crew members are bilingual.
The Gulf Oil Co. has been told all its assets in Ecuador would revert to the state without compensation unless it paid $33 million in back taxes by the end of the month, a government statement said. Gulf’s manager in Ecuador said earlier that Gulf was withholding the taxes, due on exports since February, to induce Ecuador to pay a $14 million debt to Gulf.
The plight of political prisoners in Latin America worsened during 1975 and 1976, particularly in Chile, Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay, Amnesty International said in London. In its annual report on torture, the independent organization for the defense of political prisoners estimated that about 30,000 political prisoners are held in the four countries, making up 90% of such prisoners held in all South American jails, excluding Cuba.
Black African leaders began to gather in Zambia to discuss Rhodesian Prime Minister Ian Smith’s acceptance of the proposals for majority rule in Rhodesia. Publicly, the leaders of the five “front-line” nations made no comment; but Tanzanian leaders privately voiced reservations about Mr. Smith’s plans for a temporary government that would leave a good deal of power in the hands of whites. Zambian officials seemed to favor the plan.
Joshua Nkomo, a Rhodesian nationalist leader, told a group of supporters in Salisbury that a turning point may have been reached in Rhodesia. Mr. Nkomo, who spent five months traveling abroad in search of backing for black majority rule, is thought to be playing a key role in the formation of the interim biracial government. In his remarks, he played down reports of splits among the nationalist groups.
The Soviet press agency Tass described the proposed Rhodesian settlement today as fraudulent, contending that it would create a pro-Western government to deflect the African national liberation movement. The wording of dispatches from Washington, New York and Maputo, the Mozambique capital, seemed to raise the possibility that Moscow might urge black African leaders and guerrilla organizations to resist the proposal. “The imperialist circles,” the dispatch from Maputo said, are trying at this stage to use the diplomacy of fraud and palliatives to give breathing space to the Rhodesian racists in order to strengthen their positions in the, course of the so-called transition period.”
Plans for an international fund to help Rhodesia make the transition to black rule will be worked out in detail by officials from the United States, Britain and South Africa. The fund, which Secretary of State Kissinger said would amount to more than a billion dollars, will be used to train blacks in skills previously denied them and to aid the Rhodesian economy. Another major purpose of the money will be to compensate whites who leave the country.
The South African Government remained silent today on the settlement plan for Rhodesia, apart from an assertion by the Information Minister, Connie P. Mulder, that Prime Minister John Vorster deserved the Nobel Peace Prize for his contribution to the accord. “If ever justice was done on earth, then the people who award the peace prize should present it this year to Mr. Vorster,” Mr. Mulder told cheering supporters at a political rally in Vereeniging, 35 miles southeast of here. “Even if it is not awarded to him officially, his supporters and followers across party and color lines award it to him in their hearts.”
The mechanical arm of the Viking 2 lander was commanded to reach out today and scoop up another sample of Martian soil for a chemical test that could be crucial to the search for life on Mars. Signals from the spacecraft, received here this afternoon, confirmed that the scoop had delivered a full sample to an automated laboratory inside the Viking lander. Analysts of the new soil sample will look for evidence of organic materials in the soil as a possible sign of past or present life on Mars. Such chemical compounds, large molecules consisting of carbon and hydrogen atoms, are associated with all life forms on earth.
Sales of nuclear fuels and nuclear power technology to foreign nations would be halted under his administration, Jimmy Carter said, unless the nation agreed not to build nuclear weapons or its own fuel-reprocessing plant. The Democratic candidate said that the United States must provide leadership in an attempt to guard against nuclear weapons proliferation and accused the Ford administration of not doing so.
Whistle-steaming down the Mississippi, President Ford opened a three-day campaign trip through the South. During a six-hour steamboat trip down the river to New Orleans, Mr. Ford sought to portray his Democratic opponent as a big spender. While leaving his audiences to deduce that Mr. Carter would spend more of the government’s money than he would, he attacked Senator Walter Mondale, the Democratic running mate, as the “biggest spender in the United States Senate.”
An investigation into reports that President Ford may have received funds from two maritime unions that had been laundered through Michigan Republican committees is said by federal officials to be under way. Charles Ruff, the Watergate special prosecutor, apparently began the inquiry the day after Mr. Ford was nominated.
Majority Democrats on the Congressional Joint Economic Committee concluded today that Congress would probably have to act early next year to spur the pace of expansion of the economy and keep the unemployment rate heading downward. In a “midyear report,” the majority said that the outlook was for only modest growth of the economy in 1977, with an unemployment rate averaging 7 percent for the year. The Democrats called this “not a satisfactory outlook.”
The Federal Bureau of Reclamation ignored several warning signs that should have prompted it to halt construction of the ill-fated Teton Dam, according to a House panel. The earth‐filled dam in eastern Idaho collapsed on June 5, causing 11 deaths and property losses estimated at $1 billion. A report by a House Government Operations subcommittee that investigated the collapse said Bureau of Reclamation officials, in their determination to build the Teton Dam, were “blinded to dangers and hazards” presented bythe project. The Associated Press obtained a copy of the report today. “The exact cause of the dam’s collapse is not known, “ said the panel’s chairman, Representative Leo Ryan, Democrat of California, in a statement prepared for release with the report. He added, “It was a manmade disaster that should be prevented from ever happening again at any other place in the future.”
Top bargainers for the United Auto Workers and the Ford Motor Co. met for just over two hours, trying to break an impasse in negotiations in the nearly two-week-old strike by 170,000 workers. The negotiators included UAW President Leonard Woodcock and Sidney McKenna, a Ford vice president. In a printed statement, McKenna made his first comment in a week, saying the negotiations “continue to progress on both economic and noneconomic matters. A great many tough issues remain to be resolved and we are working diligently toward that goal.”
Just 17 days after proposing that motor vehicle speedometers be limited to a top reading of 85 mph, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration withdrew the plan. A spokesman said the proposal would be evaluated further and might be resubmitted. The agency maintains that lowering the top speedometer reading would lessen drivers’ temptation to test the top speeds of their cars.
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People began a legal counterattack yesterday to try to avoid the necessity of raising an estimated $1.5 million bond to appeal an adverse court ruling in Mississippi. The 67‐year‐old civil rights organization filed petitions seeking reduced bond and a rehearing on a chancery court decision awarding more than $1.2 million in damages to white merchants in Port. Gibson who were hit by a black economic boycott in the late 1960’s.
A gun control law that virtually freezes the number of legally owned handguns in the District of Columbia went into effect and police were bracing for a crush of owners seeking to register and reregister their firearms by the Nov. 22 deadline. The new law, one of the toughest in the nation, forbids residents to possess, trade or buy new pistols, and only persons who register them by the deadline are legally permitted to own handguns. Police estimated there were 63,060 weapons of all kinds registered to about 22,000 persons in the nation’s capital.
About 73,000 electric weed cutters manufactured by Weed Eaters, Inc., of Houston may have a defect that could cause a plastic part to fly off and possibly hit the user, the Consumer Product Safety Commission warned. The machine is a Weed Eater, model No. 500 Needi. The manufacturer has offered to repair the defective plastic hub through hardware stores that sell the machine, an agency spokesman said.
A St. Louis Teamsters union local filed for bankruptcy, saying it faced more than $6 million in debts. Local 600 represents 6,200 workers in St. Louis and in over-the-road hauling. The bankruptcy petition, believed to be the first ever filed by a union local in the United States, said the local lost 45% of its dues for more than a year as a result of a $5.8 million court judgment in 1974. The petition said the union faced $6.69 million in debts against assets of $85,999.
Union and transit district negotiators have reached a tentative agreement on a contract to end a Los Angeles bus strike, that has stranded 760,000 bus riders for 33 days. The 1,100 mechanics and yard workers, represented by the Amalgamated Transit Union will vote on the proposal tomorrow and the Southern California Rapid Transit District board of directors will vote Monday.
A search of the Ocala National Forest in Florida for a kidnaped Jacksonville woman was called off with no trace of her being found. The woman, Sheri Linda Jaffa, 35, has been missing since Wednesday. Her husband, real estate developer Richard Jaffa, 36, received a phone call from a man who demanded ransom but has not heard from the kidnapers since then. The FBI has issued a description of a man who might have witnessed the kidnaping.
A cross-country tug-of-war that will decide the fate of two children flown out of Vietnam in “Operation Babylift” during the panic-filled closing days of the Vietnam War got under way this week as attorneys for both the children’s natural mother and their foster father began legal proceedings. The battle for custody of 9‐year‐old Vo Huy Khan and 6‐year‐old Vo Anh Tuan is typical of cases beginning to crop up in state courts in the United States as refugee parents who turned their children over to orphanages and adoption agencies now ask for their children back, contending that they never meant to give them up permanently. Lawyers and child‐welfare agency officials involved with the Vietnamese estimate that 2,500 children were airlifted out of Saigon in April 1975 and brought to the United States.
The largest increase in the number of poor persons in the United States since the government began keeping statistics in 1959 occurred during 1975. The Bureau of the Census said the increase, 2.5 million persons, was proportionately the largest among whites, families with a male head and those not elderly. The government defined the poverty level in 1975 as an income of $5,500 or less for a nonfarm family of four.
Revival of George Gershwin, DuBose Heyward, and Ira Gershwin’s folk opera “Porgy and Bess” opens at the Uris Theater, New York City, and runs for 122 performances.
The Irish rock band U2 was formed after drummer Larry Mullen, Jr., then 14, posted a note seeking members for a band on the notice board of the Mount Temple Comprehensive School, his school in the Clontarf section of Dublin. Mullen was joined by vocalist Paul Hewson, better known by his stage name of “Bono”; brothers David Evans (“The Edge”) and Dik Evans; and Adam Clayton. The band initially called itself “Feedback” and then “The Hype” before adopting the name “U2” in 1978.
The championship game of the 12-team Victorian Football League was played in Melbourne and attended by 110,143 spectators. The Hawthorn Hawks defeated the North Melbourne Kangaroos, 100 to 70, to win the VFL title, the premier Australian rules football competition. Both teams are now part of the 18-team Australian Football League.
Vince Evans’ passing and Ricky Bell’s running led USC past Purdue, 31–13.
Wendell Tyler got a ground-gaining record and UCLA got its 300th victory — a 40–7 rout of the Air Force.
Missouri, the upset team of the year, beat Ohio State in the last 12 seconds, 22-21.
Major League Baseball:
Dick Ruthven (14–16), who had not been a winner since August 8, gained credit for the victory when the Atlanta Braves defeated the Padres, 11–8. The Braves had to call on two relievers, Pablo Torrealba and Adrian Devine, to nail down Ruthven’s third decision over the Padres without a loss this season. Jerry Royster led the Braves’ attack, driving in two runs with a single in the second inning and two more with another single in the third. Bob Owchinko, making his major league debut with the Padres, lasted only 1 ⅔ innings.
Luis Tiant (21–11) pitched a two-hitter and Dwight Evans smashed a homer in the fifth inning to give the Red Sox a 1–0 victory over the Orioles and clinch the East Division title for the Yankees. With this defeat, the Orioles dropped eight games behind the Yankees with only seven left to play.
Homers by Claudell Washington, Ron Fairly and Gene Tenace accounted for five runs and powered the Athletics to a 7–4 victory over the White Sox. Washington hit his homer in the second inning after Sal Bando singled and Don Baylor was hit by a pitch. Fairly broke a 4–4 tie with a solo swat in the seventh and Tenace added a run with a round-tripper in the eighth.
Although held to only five hits, the Indians were able to defeat the Brewers, 3–1. The Indians scored on a double by Rick Manning, a wild pitch and infield out by Larvell Blanks in the fourth inning. Buddy Bell homered in the fifth and an extra run counted in the seventh while the Brewers were executing a double play.
In Detroit, the Yankees jump off to an 8–0 lead after 2 innings and hang on for a 10–6 win over the Tigers. Fred Stanley and Willie Randolph each batted in two runs in the Yanks’ opening attack on rookie southpaw Ed Glynn. Thurman Munson hit a homer off reliever Bill Laxton, plus a sacrifice fly, and drove in three runs. Chris Chambliss collected a homer, double and single. Chuck Scrivener accounted for most of the Tigers’ scoring with a homer and single for three RBIs. The Yankees lead the 2nd-place Orioles by 8 games.
A two-run homer by Tony Perez in the seventh inning and run-scoring singles by Ken Griffey and Joe Morgan in the eighth enabled the Reds to defeat the Dodgers, 4–3. Davey Lopes and Reggie Smith hit homers for the Dodgers in the first inning. The Reds were shut out on two hits by Al Downing until the seventh when George Foster walked and Perez tied the score with his round-tripper. With Elias Sosa on the mound for the Dodgers in the eighth, Mike Lum doubled batting for winner Gary Nolan (14–9). Griffey’s single plated pinch-runner Ed Armbrister. Griffey took second on the throw and also came home on Morgan’s single. The Dodgers fell short with a run off Pedro Borbon on singles by Smith, Steve Garvey and Ron Cey in their half of the eighth.
Nolan Ryan (15–18) set a major league record for strikeouts, going over the 300 mark for the fourth time in his career, but the Angels’ fireballer also walked eight and lost to the Twins, 6–0. Ryan fanned 11, bringing his season’s total to 302. The Twins collected only three hits off Ryan in his seven innings on the mound, but they included a homer by Dan Ford in the third and two-run double by Steve Braun in the fourth. Dave Goltz (14–14) posted the shutout on a two-hitter.
Led by the batting of Mike Schmidt and Jerry Martin, the Phillies defeated the Expos, 6–5, and were assured of at least a tie for the East Division title when the Pirates were beaten by the Cardinals. Schmidt cracked a homer with Dave Cash on base in the first inning. After the Expos pushed three runs across the plate in the second, Schmidt tied the score with a double in the third, driving in Cash. Martin, who was also on base, stopped at third and scored on a sacrifice fly by Greg Luzinski. The Expos pulled even in their half of the third when Earl Williams doubled to drive in Andre Dawson. The Phillies broke the deadlock with two runs in the fifth. Wayne Twitchell, pitching in relief of Tom Underwood, doubled for his first hit of the season and advanced to third on a single by Cash, who had a perfect night with 4-for-4. Cash stole second and then scored along with Twitchell when Martin singled. Gene Garber pitched the last three innings for the the Phillies and saved the game after the Expos tightened the score with an RBI single by Wayne Garrett in the eighth.
With help from Skip Lockwood, Craig Swan (6–8) gained his first victory since July 4 when the Mets defeated the Cubs, 5–2. Billy Baldwin batted in the Mets’ first two runs with a triple in the first inning and scored himself on a three-bagger by Jerry Grote. Baldwin gave two runs back to the Cubs in the third, dropping a fly ball by Pete LaCock and allowing an unearned pair to score. The Mets then profited from two errors to post their clinching runs in the seventh.
Jim Barr (15–11), who pitched his third shutout of the season and beat the Astros, 10–0, had to share honors with Gary Matthews, who became the first Giants’ batter to hit three homers in one game since Willie McCovey accomplished the feat September 17, 1966. Matthews hit a two-run homer in the first inning, added a solo swat in the fourth and topped off his big day with a two-run blow in the fifth.
The Pirates collected only four hits off Lynn McGlothen (13–14) and lost to the Cardinals, 3–0, leaving them with an almost hopeless chance of finishing in a tie with the Phillies for the East Division title. McGlothen singled off Jerry Reuss in the third inning to pave the way for two runs. After taking second on a wild pitch, McGlothen scored when Jerry Mumphrey singled to right field and Dave Parker booted the bouncing ball. Mumphrey advanced to second and, on a run-and-hit play, scored on an infield single by Garry Templeton. The other run counted in the fifth when Templeton reached second on an error by Richie Hebner and crossed the plate on a single by Ted Simmons.
The Royals’ West Division lead over the Athletics was cut to five games with seven left to play after a 1–0 loss to the Rangers while the A’s were defeating the White Sox. Bert Blyleven (13–16) pitched the shutout, allowing only four hits and striking out 11. A spell of wildness proved costly to Andy Hassler, who walked three batters in the fourth inning and gave up a run-scoring single by Tom Grieve.
San Diego Padres 8, Atlanta Braves 11
Boston Red Sox 1, Baltimore Orioles 0
Oakland Athletics 7, Chicago White Sox 4
Milwaukee Brewers 1, Cleveland Indians 3
New York Yankees 10, Detroit Tigers 6
Cincinnati Reds 4, Los Angeles Dodgers 3
California Angels 0, Minnesota Twins 6
Philadelphia Phillies 6, Montreal Expos 5
Chicago Cubs 2, New York Mets 5
Houston Astros 0, San Francisco Giants 10
Pittsburgh Pirates 0, St. Louis Cardinals 3
Kansas City Royals 0, Texas Rangers 1
Born:
Chauncey Billups, NBA point guard and shooting guard (Hall of Fame, inducted 2024; NBA Champions-Pistons, 2004 [NBA Finals MVP]; NBA All-Star, 2006–20010; Boston Celtics, Denver Nuggets, Minnesota Timberwolves, Detroit Pistons, New York Knicks, Los Angeles Clippers) in Denver, Colorado.
Bobbie Williams, NFL guard (NFL Champions, Super Bowl 47-Ravens; Philadelphia Eagles, Cincinnati Bengals, Baltimore Ravens), in Jefferson, Texas.
Juan Cerros, Mexican MLB pitcher (Cincinnati Reds), in Monterrey, Mexico.
Santigold (stage name for Santi White), American new wave singer; in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Died:
Red Faber, 88, American Baseball HOF pitcher (World Series 1917; AL ERA leader 1921, 22; Chicago White Sox 1914-33), from heart disease.
