INSERT INTO `corpora` VALUES (453,2,'Federal investigators have concluded their four-day hearing into the cause of a Continental jet crash that killed 28 people, but their findings probably won\'t be released until sometime around the accident\'s first anniversary in November. ``We have not eliminated any issue\'\' in the suspected cause of the Nov. 15 crash of Flight 1713, board of inquiry chairman Joseph T. Nall said Friday after investigators heard the final testimony in the National Transportation Safety Board hearings. Flight 1713, bound for Boise, Idaho, began rocking violently moments after taking off from Stapleton International Airport during a snowstorm. It flipped over on its back and crashed on the runway, breaking into three pieces. Fifty-four of the 82 people on board survived. Some of those survivors were among the 33 witnesses who testified at the hearing. The NTSB investigators were looking into flight characteristics of the DC-9-10 aircraft, especially in snow and ice conditions; air traffic control; cold weather operations by Continental; turbulence; and Continental\'s pilot training, pilot selection and crew pairing. ``I anticipate our board will determine a probable cause and contributing causes to the crash\'\' by November, Nall said. The pilot and co-pilot, Capt. Frank Zvonek, 43, and First Officer Lee Bruecher, 26, both were killed in the crash. Bruecher was at the controls. The brief flying time in the DC-9 by both pilots has been one area of study by the investigation. Zvonek had 12,135 total hours flying time, with 33 hours as a DC-9 captain. Bruecher had a total of 3,186 hours, with 12 hours as a DC-9 first officer. At Friday\'s hearings, Richard Hillman, Continental vice president for flight operations, said that since the crash, the carrier had adopted a Federal Aviation Administration bulletin recommendation that the co-pilot not be allowed to make takeoffs or landings until he or she had 100 hours in that type of aircraft. The hearings also delved into Continental\'s use of a flight simulator in pilot training that is based on the DC-9-30 _ a different model of DC-9 from the ``Dash 10\'\' flown by Zvonek and Bruecher. The main difference between the two DC-9 models is the ``Dash 30\'\' has wing slats to improve the wing\'s lift. The Dash 10 is an older model with a wing design considered more susceptiable to loss of lift from ice buildup. James E. Madsen, Continental\'s assistant chief DC-9 pilot at Denver, minimized handling difference between the Dash 10 and Dash 30s in his testimony. ``A DC-9 is a DC-9. There are some differences they (pilots) should be aware of,\'\' Madsen said. Early theories of what caused Flight 1713 to roll violently and crash seconds after liftoff included ice buildup on the wings, turbulence from a jumbo jet that had just landed on a parallel runway 1,600 feet away, and pilot error. Continental\'s de-icing procedures at Stapleton also came under scrutiny. Flight 1713 waited between 24 and 27 minutes for takeoff after it had been de-iced. Survivors offered conflicting testimony on the amount of snow and ice buildup on the wings. ``I wondered at one point, `Is that ice?\' But I decided it was just wet,\'\' said Dr. Fred Helpenstall of Nampa, Idaho, who suffered broken ribs in the crash. Airman Greg Wadsworth of Mountain Home Air Force Base in Idaho said he had a clear view of the wing before takeoff. ``It was like the snow was starting to pile up (on the wings). I was very concerned but I said it under my breath,\'\' he testified. Other testimony attributed Flight 1713\'s delay between de-icing and takeoff on miscommunciation in the control tower and between the tower and aircraft. NTSB investigators refused to speculate on any of the suspected causes. ``Our minds are still open. We will make no final conclusion until the time we make our final report,\'\' Nall said.\r\n'),(454,2,'James R. Mellor was elected Wednesday as president and chief operating officer of General Dynamics Corp., effective Jan. 1. Mellor, 60, is executive vice president of marine, land systems and international at General Dynamics corporate offices in St. Louis. He will succeed President and CEO Herbert F. Rogers, 65, who will continue on special assignment as general manager of the company\'s Fort Worth Division. Rogers will become vice chairman on Jan. 1. William A. Anders, General Dynamics\' vice chairman, will succeed Stanley Pace as chairman and CEO when Pace retires at the end of the year. Mellor joined General Dynamics in 1981 as executive vice president of commercial systems and corporate planning and as a member of the board. Before joining General Dynamics he was president and chief operating officer of AM International Inc.\r\n'),(455,2,'Rising costs last year forced a record 79 hospitals to close their doors, the American Hospital Association reported today. The closings, most in hospitals with fewer than 100 beds, were heavy in four southern states but were evenly split overall between rural and urban areas, the hospital group said. ``Hospitals that barely break even or continually lose money cannot buy needed medical equipment, replace deteriorating buildings or add important services,\'\' Carol McCarthy, president of the Chicago-based organization, said in a statement. Federal Medicare payments, which represent 40 percent of a hospital\'s income, may be partly to blame for the closings, she added. ``Hospitals saw the price of goods and services they purchase rise 22 percent between 1984 and 1988 while Medicare raised the prices its pays hospitals ... only 11 percent,\'\' she said. Of the 79 hospitals that closed in 30 states, 35 were for-profit, 30 were non-profit and 14 were government-owned, the association said. Twenty-five hospitals closed in four states: Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma and Texas. Most of the closed hospitals ranged from 25 beds to 99. ``In the past year, nearly seven in 10 rural hospitals in this country lost money caring for patients, and 50 percent of urban hospitals operated in the red,\'\' Ms. McCarthy said. Jan Shulman, an AHA spokeswoman, said the 42 hospitals that closed in 1986 was the previous record. In addition to the 79 hospitals that shut down, 17 speciality outlets also closed in 13 states in 1987. Most were rehabilitation or long-term care centers, said the association.\r\n'),(456,2,'An attorney formerly with a prestigious corporate law firm was accused Thursday of selling inside information about planned takeovers in a multimillion-dollar trading scheme. The lawyer, Steven L. Glauberman, was charged with four counts of conspiracy, securities fraud and wire fraud in a criminal information brought by the U.S. attorney\'s office in Manhattan. Glauberman, 39, of Manhattan, was an associate at the firm, Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, where he specialized in mergers and acquisitions. The government alleged he leaked inside information about clients involved in some of the best-known takeovers of the 1980s to a stock broker, who passed it along to others. Glauberman simultaneously settled a civil complaint by the Securities and Exchange Commission, agreeing to pay back $221,000 in his alleged illegal profits. The SEC said he tipped off Eban Smith, a former broker-dealer at the Stamford, Conn., office of Smith Barney & Co., to 29 planned or pending corporate transactions between 1984 and 1989. These included Bristol Meyers\' 1985 bid for Genetic Systems, a management leveraged buyout of National Gypsum, also in 1985, Black and Decker\'s 1988 unsolicited bid for American Standard, Walt Disney Co.\'s offer for Gibson Greetings, and K mart\'s bid for Payless Drugstore Stores Northwest Inc. The SEC said Smith paid Glauberman $50,000 for the information and also traded in a special account for Glauberman\'s benefit. Glauberman\'s attorney, Martin Perschetz, said he had no comment on behalf of his client. Smith, 41, of Greenwich, Conn., was charged in a separate criminal indictment with using the information he obtained from Glauberman to buy and sell securities for his own account and to solicit more business for his firm. In addition, two other investors who allegedly were tipped off by Smith were charged criminally with making trades based on the information from Glauberman. They are Peter H. Jeffer, 44, a Manhattan money manager, and Stanley P. Patrick, 43, of Old Lyme, Conn., a former stock trader. Jeffer Management Corp., a New York corporation created by Jeffer that stopped doing business in 1988, was also named in the indictment. Court papers said Smith, Jeffer and Patrick earned a total $3.75 million in illegal profits through the trades. The SEC said Smith\'s portion of profits was more than $1.1 million. Smith, Jeffer and Patrick also were named in the SEC civil complaint. Jeffer settled, but Smith and Patrick did not, meaning the commission is still trying to recover their alleged profits in the scheme. In addition, Glauberman\'s sister Lori, an associate director in the preferred stock department of Bear Stearns & Co., was accused by the SEC of trading in the securities of at least 11 of the deals. According to the SEC, without admitting or denying wrongdoing, Glauberman agreed to disgorge $221,098; his sister, Lori, 36, agreed to disgorge $19,135. Jeffer and his company would have been liable to disgorge $1.77 million but the SEC said that penalty was waived based on affidavits that they were unable to pay. A sixth defendant in the SEC complaint, Anthony Correra, 55, of Albuquerque, N.M., a former analyst and portfolio manager, will pay back $496,842.\r\n'),(457,2,'Heavyweight boxing champ Mike Tyson and actress Robin Givens have discussed dissolving their stormy nine-month marriage with a quick divorce in the Dominican Republic, Tyson\'s lawyer said. Tyson, 22, is eager to ``get on with his life,\'\' lawyer Howard Weitzman told the New York Post in Saturday\'s editions. Lawyers for Miss Givens, 23, and Tyson met Nov. 6 in Las Vegas to discuss the possibility of filing for a divorce on the Caribbean island, where divorces can be obtained in about two days, the newspaper reported. Weitzman said an offshore divorce would be quicker than the annulment request Tyson filed Oct. 14 in New Jersey, which could take a year to resolve. Tyson claimed that Miss Givens, an actress on the ABC-TV series ``Head of the Class,\'\' manipulated him into marriage by saying falsely that she was pregnant.\r\n'),(458,2,'George Bush met with television evangelist Jim Bakker at a time when he was gearing up for his presidential run against another TV preacher, Pat Robertson, but a Bush spokesman said Monday the vice president ``didn\'t ask for anything or promise anything.\'\' Comments by White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater and Bush\'s onetime press secretary Pete Teeley left some confusion over the purpose for the November 1985 meeting at Bakker\'s headquarters in Charlotte, N.C. Fitzwater, who attended the meeting, initially told a White House press briefing Monday that it was to seek support for Bush\'s forthcoming presidential race. But later he said he had misspoken and that the meeting was not political, but rather was in Bush\'s capacity as vice president _ ``a standard meeting of the kind that we had hundreds of. The vice president didn\'t ask for anything or promise anything.\'\' Fitzwater, who was Bush\'s vice presidential press secretary and will be White House press secretary when Bush takes office in January, made the comments at his daily briefing at the White House where he is currently President Reagan\'s spokesman. His account conflicted with that of Teeley, who at the time of the Bush-Bakker meeting was working as a marketing consultant for Bakker\'s PTL ministry. Teeley said Monday that Bush\'s meeting with Bakker was part of ``coalition building\'\' for the future presidential race and that the vice president met with many evangelical leaders for the same purpose, including the Rev. Billy Graham, the Rev. Jerry Falwell and the Rev. Robert Schuler. ``Those things were done every day. ... It didn\'t matter where you were _ Pittsburgh, Charlotte or Miami _ if you could meet with some people who were active politically, you tried to sit down and talk with them,\'\' Teeley said in telephone interview. Fitzwater, answering questions at Monday\'s briefing, initially had said Bush ``was seeking his support for the campaign, absolutely. ... You have hundreds of meetings like that when you\'re running for president.\'\' Later Fitzwater said that was not the correct characterization, that the only support Bush sought was for the Reagan administration\'s policies. In March 1987, Bakker stepped down from his PTL ministry, as his sexual involvement with former church secretary Jessica Hahn created headlines. At the time Bush met him, there had been no disclosure of such activity by Bakker. A report Sunday in The Washington Post contained an allegation by former Bakker bodyguard Don Hardister that Bush and Bakker talked about a possible admihistration job for Bakker. Asked about that report, Fitzwater told reporters, ``I don\'t know what Bakker thought. There was no talk of jobs or payoffs or anything else. It was a simple meeting as the vice president had with hundreds of other people and individuals asking their support ... asking his support for various policies and so forth. ``They talked about their Christian beliefs. They talked about the Robertson campaign. It was just a friendly discussion,\'\' Fitzwater told the briefing. Bush met with Bakker and his wife, Tammy Faye, in November 1985, as he was looking ahead to his race for the GOP presidential nomination. Eventually he defeated Robertson, host of the popular ``700 Club\'\' Christian television show, in the primaries. The Bush forces had been concerned about Robertson\'s unknown potential to pull votes from the religious right. Besides Bush\'s own meeting with Bakker, the vice president had three close associates whom Bakker hired as consultants: Teeley; Doug Weed, a sometime guest host on the ``700 Club\'\' who worked as a liaison for Bush\'s campaign with religious groups; and Dean Burch, former head of the Federal Communications Commission and the Republican National Committee. Weed currently works for the Bush presidential transition staff as a liaison with religious groups. Teeley, who acknowledged earning $120,000 for his PTL work, said his work for Bakker pertained to marketing and had no relation to Bush or politics.\r\n'),(459,2,'The nation\'s economy grew at a sluggish annual rate of 1.3 percent from January through March, far slower than previously believed, the government reported today. The Commerce Department said that the increase in the broadest measure of economic health _ the gross national product _ was much weaker than an initial estimate it made one month ago. At that time, it put GNP growth at a faster 2.1 percent rate. The weak growth was accompanied by a spurt in inflation as a price index tied to the GNP climbed at steep annual rate of 6.7 percent, the biggest inflationary surge in more than eight years. The increase was revised from an initial estimate of 6.5 percent. Although surprised by the size of the downward GNP revision, economists said they did not believe it indicated the country was in danger of toppling into a recession. They noted that the weakness came from a big reduction in the estimate of how much business inventories grew during the first three months of the year. Slower inventory growth was viewed as a favorable sign for future growth because it means businesses will have less of a backlog of unsold goods to work down before they can start ordering again. ``The first quarter was a time of major inventory correction and actually a healthy correction,\'\' said Allen Sinai, chief economist of the Boston Co. ``It was setting the economy up for sustained growth provided that sales stay up.\'\' The 1.3 percent first quarter GNP increase was only a slight improvement from a 1.1 percent GNP growth rate in the final three months of 1989. The growth rates in both quarters were the slowest since the summer of 1986 when the economy grew at a 0.8 percent annual rate. The inflation rate was the highest since it raced ahead at an annual rate of 7.7 percent in the final quarter of 1981. The GNP price guage rose 4.5 percent for all of 1989. Many economists expect inflation to moderate as the year progresses. They contend the first-quarter report was skewed by unusual winter weather that killed crops and drove up fuel prices. Indeed, Commerce said ``about one-half of the step-up was due to food and energy prices; large increases in January followed unusually cold weather in December.\'\' The growth rate was lowered today because of new information on business inventories, which were revised down $8.5 billion from the original report. The weaker economic growth means reduced tax revenues and adds to the problems confronting administration and congressional budget negotiators. Talks resume today on developing a formula to cut the deficit to the $64 billion mandated by the Gramm-Rudman balanced budget law for the fiscal year beginning Oct. 1. Nevertheless, it was proof the current expansion, which began at the end of the last recession in November 1982, continued _ although slowly. A recession generally is defined as two straight declines in the GNP. The various changes means the GNP, after adjusting for inflation, totaled $4.188 trillion after the first three months of the year. ``The revision (in the GNP) was more than accounted for by change in business inventories,\'\' the department said. It said exports were revised up $9.9 billion, ``but this revision was largely offset in GNP by an upward revision of $9.0 billion in imports.\'\' In a companion report, the department said after-tax profits of U.S. corporations slowed to a 0.2 percent increase in the first quarter after rising 2.8 percent in the October-December period of 1989. Corporate profits had fallen during each of the first three quarters of last year, including a 1.1 percent drop during the comparable months of January through March. Surveys show that most economists believe overall growth during 1990 will total 2.0 percent, down from the 3.0 percent level of activity in 1989 and the slowest since activity declined 2.5 percent during the recession year of 1982. But many of the nation\'s top economic forecasters predict the economy will avoid a recession for another three years and are crediting Federal Reserve monetary policies for the extended growth. Sixty-three percent of the 68 professional forecasters responding to a survey by the National Association of Business Economists said they foresee no recession during the next three years. And 46 percent of those respondents said the primary reason for the economic expansion is ``effective monetary policy,\'\' James F. Smith, NABE president and professor of finance at the University of North Carolina, told a news conference earlier this week. The central bank\'s Federal Open Market Committee has tried for two years to stem inflation by keeping a tight grip on credit without slowing the economy so much that it skids into a recession.\r\n'),(460,2,'A military official said Tuesday that renegade soldiers loyal to ousted President Ferdinand Marcos have organized a new strike force to try to topple President Corazon Aquino. Col. Guilleromo Ruiz, chief of staff of the National Capital Region Defense Command, told reporters in the capital that the new group called itself ``Marcos Army Lost Command.\'\' Ruiz said the force was made up of troops who deserted the Presidential Security Command after Marcos fled to Hawaii after the 1986 civilian-military uprising toppled his administration. ``Lost Command\'\' is a Filipino term for military units which desert and hire out as ``private armies\'\' of politicians, businessmen and others. Military officials gave no estimate of the size of the group. They said the renegades were believed linked to forces loyal to renegade former Lt. Col. Reynaldo Cabauatan, who has been sought since a coup attempt in January 1987. Troops in the Manila area went on alert Saturday to guard against coup attempts while President Aquino visited Brunei. She was expected to return Wednesday after a three-day visit. On Monday, troops raided suspected right-wing hideouts in the Manila area and arrested three renegades believed linked to former Brig. Gen. Jose Marie Zumel. The former superintendent of the Philippine Military Academy is also sought in the January 1987 coup attempt. The government said that coup attempt, which included the seizing of military and media facilities in the capital, was designed to pave the way for Marcos to return from exile in Hawaii.\r\n'),(461,2,'In the two decades since an Army ammunition depot closed and stripped this town of more than 500 jobs, Edgemont has tried to find another healthy payroll, even courting a string of potentially hazardous industries. A uranium mining and milling operation succeeded for a while, then closed. Town leaders also wooed companies that proposed a low-level nuclear waste dump, a sewage ash processing plant, a munitions testing site and, most recently, a landfill for municipal waste from Northeastern cities. For various reasons, including opposition from environmental groups, all the proposals failed. A farmer raised pigs on the base for a time but recently pulled out because of falling pork prices. ``We need more jobs, and we\'re still looking,\'\' Mayor Pete Ziemet said. ``The only thing we have going for us, which I guess is both bad and good, is the notoriety Edgemont has had.\'\' Other civic leaders fear they may never find the industry needed to fill the empty houses and stores in this town sitting on the southern edge of the Black Hills, where pine-covered mountains give way to rough grasslands covered with sagebrush and yucca plants. ``Everything just seemed to go haywire. ... Just little by little, everything went wrong,\'\' said former Mayor Matt Brown. ``I\'ve been here all my life, and so help me God, I can\'t put my finger on anything that will salvage the town. Maybe we can be lucky.\'\' A Defense Department survey of 100 communities that lost military bases from 1961 to 1977 reported that some towns prospered by converting the bases to other uses. But Edgemont is one of the places that has never recovered after the military left town. The Black Hills Army Depot, which stored ammunition in concrete bunkers at a place called Igloo eight miles south of Edgemont, was opened in the 1940s and closed in 1967. Brown said Edgemont not only lost 500-odd civilian jobs but also many long-time Edgemont residents who were transferred to civilian jobs at other military bases. Four local businessmen bought the 15,000-acre base to prepare it for other uses, but it still lies empty. Rows of concrete igloos sit like loaves of bread on the prairie. Near the base entrance, houses and administrative buildings are falling apart. Edgemont\'s population grew to 1,772 by 1960, but fell to less than 1,200 within a few years of the base\'s closing. The town\'s economy and population recovered in the 1970s, with the uranium mill and a Burlington Northern Railroad crew-shift station both busy. Ziemet estimates Edgemont now has only 1,130 people, a drop of about 20 percent since 1980. The mayor said 70 houses out of several hundred in town are empty, and 27 should be razed because they\'re falling apart. People trying to sell homes will be lucky to get 50 cents on the dollar, he said. The railroad is still a bright spot in the local economy. Burlington Northern switches crews at Edgemont and provides a good national connection, Ziemet said. The uranium operation closed due to lack of demand, and the 110 people now cleaning up uranium tailings will be out of work when the cleanup is completed next year, he said. City and state officials have provided financing to help re-open a factory that makes wooden bowls and other items from walnut, and the plant should employ up to 30 people. But the town has yet to find an industrial use for the abandoned ammunition depot. Cattle are grazed on the base, but an operation that raised hogs in the concrete igloos has been stopped at least temporarily. A plan to use the igloos for grain storage also washed out, Ziemet said. In 1983, Chem-Nuclear Systems Inc. proposed burying up to one-third of the nation\'s low-level nuclear waste at the base. The plan was scrapped after geological tests showed the site was unsuitable, and state voters rejected a proposed multi-state compact that would have allowed the dump. Consolidated Management Corp. of Reno, Nev., last year hauled almost 300,000 tons of incinerated sewage from St. Paul, Minn., to the old base, where the company planned to build a plant to extract gold and other precious metals from the ash. The company missed several deadlines to start the plant, however, and the state now is searching for a way to dispose of the ash. Honeywell Inc. wanted to set up a munitions testing operation in a canyon near Edgemont but abandoned the plan after a coalition of Indians and others opposed it. Edgemont now is working with South Dakota Disposal Systems Inc., headquartered in Colorado, on a plan to bury 1 million tons of municipal garbage a year. Edgemont could get more than $1 million a year from the plan, which also would create up to 50 jobs, company officials have said. The succession of proposals dealing with hazardous materials has angered some local residents and environmental groups across South Dakota. Ruth Kern, who lives on a ranch south of town and opposes all the waste disposal ideas, said Edgemont is gaining a reputation as a place willing to become the nation\'s dumping ground. Kern said residents are partly responsible for the base closing 20 years ago because they complained all the time and didn\'t want the ``riffraff\'\' from the base in town. She criticized Edgemont officials for seeking hazardous dumps that she said wouldn\'t provide enough jobs to save the town in any event. ``I don\'t want to see it go under, but neither can I support it when they want to do something to pollute my environment,\'\' Kern said. ``I\'m tired of having everybody in the United States look at us as someplace they can bring in stuff to dump.\'\' Kern\'s stance has drawn criticism from townspeople who want jobs, whatever the industry. Brown is upset that environmental groups have been able to block virtually all the town\'s industrial proposals. ``For some reason, we can\'t seem to whip it,\'\' he said. ``I\'d like to win one for a change.\'\' Ziemet, who\'s been mayor for the past decade, said he wouldn\'t support any industry that would contaminate ground, air or water, but he believes state and federal officials can make sure the proposed garbage dump is operated safely. Some of the national publicity has upset Ziemet and others. A recent Wall Street Journal story said the state and town acted too hastily when they allowed the Minnesota sewage ash to be hauled to the abandoned base. Ziemet said no one could know the company would run out of money before it built the processing plant, which he said would have been an environmentalist\'s dream had it succeeded in tranforming sewage into worthwhile products. He compared the town\'s situation to someone without a job. No one would criticize the person for taking a job on a garbage truck, he said. ``All we want is a job,\'\' he repeated. ``I believe something is going to come.\'\'\r\n'),(462,2,'The value of U.S. farm exports should increase slightly to $36.5 billion this year but the volume of sales will fall about 8 percent lagely because of last summer\'s drought, the Agriculture Department reported Tuesday. Export values are predicted to grow by $1 billion in fiscal 1989, while volume will drop to 136 million metric tons, down from a six-year high of 147.5 million metric tons in the year ended Sept. 30, according to Richard W. Goldberg, acting undersecretary of agriculture for international affairs and commodity programs. Goldberg delivered what he described as a ``bright\'\' agricultural trade forecast at the opening session of USDA\'s Agricultural Outlook Conference, an annual event in which government analysts outline prospects for the coming year for farmers and agribusiness. ``Export volume is forecast smaller as the U.S. share of world trade shrinks for drought-affected products,\'\' Goldberg said. Overall, the United States is expected to account for 48 percent of world total grain trade in 1989, down from 50 percent. One of the hardest hit commodities is soybeans, with the U.S. share of world soybean trade forecast to drop to 35 percent in 1989 from 49 percent. Although the U.S. share of world wheat trade is expected to show a small gain in 1989, the volume of American wheat and flour exports is forecast to fall by about 3 percent while corn exports should grow by 2 percent, said James R. Donald, chairman of the World Agricultural Outlook Board. In general, farm prices are rising because of lower global grain stocks, mostly from the drought in North America, and Goldberg said world prices for wheat, corn and soybeans should be their highest since 1985. Goldberg said a $2.6 billion increase in the value of U.S. grain and feed exports will offset declines for cotton and oilseeds in 1989. ``For U.S. agriculture, the challenge in the coming year will be to sustain the momentum in overseas sales which has been regained over the past few years,\'\' Goldberg said. ``This will require more competitive prices, aggressive market development, persistent trade policy efforts and a market-oriented trade philosophy.\'\' Donald reported that U.S. farmers probably will receive less cash income but higher net income next year in the aftermath of the summer drought. Consumers are expected to pay 3 percent to 5 percent more for food in 1989, compared with about a 4 percent increase this year. Smaller crop supplies, firm demand and higher prices are shaping the global agricultural outlook for 1989, according to Donald. Expanded output appears likely in the second half of 1989, and he said continued large supplies of animal products probably will dampen livestock price increases. Still, American farmers can expect slightly higher receipts when they market their crops and livestock in 1989, Donald said. ``But they will be getting less in direct government payments and their production expenses will rise with expanded acreage and costlier production inputs,\'\' Donald said. Cash income therefore is likely to decline by about 10 percent from this year\'s record-tying estimated level of $56 billion to $58 billion, he said. In contrast, Donald said, net farm income is expected to about 20 percent above this year\'s estimated level of $38 billion to $40 billion. ``The 1989 outlook favors the food shopper, even though the drought trimmed potential meat output,\'\' Donald said. He said meat supplies would be the second largest ever, boosted by sizable pork supplies and even greater poultry supplies.\r\n'),(463,2,'Democrat Michael Dukakis on Wednesday criticized Republicans for using their convention for ``a trip down memory lane\'\' while ignoring GOP policies that have hurt American families and failed to help economically depressed regions. Dukakis, during a lakefront rally on Minnesota\'s Iron Range, also touted the qualifications of his running mate, Texas Sen. Lloyd Bentsen, and implied that Indiana Sen. Dan Quayle, the certain Republican vice presidential nominee, was not qualified to be president. ``Nobody ever asked any questions about whether Lloyd Bentsen was qualified to be president of the United States,\'\' Dukakis said a day after George Bush tapped Quayle, a 41-year-old conservative, to fill out the Repubican ticket. Dukakis told the rally the Republicans were using their convention in New Orleans to celebrate the Reagan presidency because they did not want to discuss rising interest rates, the soaring trade and budget deficits and economic distress in the Midwest and other parts of the country. ``The Republican Party has been celebrating the past,\'\' he said. ``When you think about what\'s going to happen to them in November, you can\'t blame them. ``While they\'re partying on Bourbon Street, we\'re talking to people on Main Street,\'\' Dukakis said. ``While they\'re talking about labels, we\'re talking about jobs. While they take a trip down Memory Lane, we\'re looking to the future.\'\' In Boston, the Massachusetts governor\'s campaign office issued a statement saying Dukakis was saddened by the plane crash that claimed the lives of Pakistani President Mohammed Zia ul-Haq, U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan Arnold L. Raphel and 35 others. ``President Zia will be remembered for his steadfast opposition to the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan and for ensuring that 3 million Afghans had a place of refuge in Pakistan,\'\' Dukakis said in the statement. Dukakis, on the first day of a four-day campaign trip designed to help him steal some of the spotlight from the GOP gathering, went to great lengths to praise Bentsen, 67. Referring to legislation to give workers 60 days\' notice before a plant closing, Dukakis told the rally: ``We\'ve got to have a vice president who led the fight and didn\'t oppose the fight.\'\' Quayle opposed the plant-closing measure, along with Reagan and Bush. Reagan allowed it to became law without his signature. At a news conference after the rally, Dukakis used praise of Bentsen to criticize Quayle. ``I think Senator Bentsen is a tremendous asset to me and to the Democratic ticket because he is so steady and so mature and has demonstrated a capacity for leadership,\'\' Dukakis said. The Democratic nominee said ``that\'s a judgment the American people are going to have to make\'\' when asked if he thought Quayle was qualified to step in as president in the event of a tragedy. But he then left little doubt about his true feelings. ``I would just point out that nobody ever asked any questions about whether Lloyd Bentsen would be qualified to be president of the United States,\'\' the Massachusetts governor said. He cited Bentsen\'s leadership in winning passage of the plant-closing law, a major trade bill, welfare reform and catastrophic health care legislation, something Dukakis referred to as a ``legislative grand slam.\'\' Among those appearing at the rally with Dukakis were former Vice President Walter Mondale, Rep. James Oberstar and Hubert H. ``Skip\'\' Humphrey III, Minnesota attorney general and Senate candidate. Dukakis used the event to reiterate his support for Oberstar\'s National Economic Development Act, which would create a fund to invest in economically weak areas of the country. Dukakis has endorsed spending $500 million on such a program. ``Prosperity in some places and depression in others is not acceptable,\'\' said Dukakis, who earlier had mentioned the loss of 8,000 jobs on the Iron Range in the last 10 years. ``That\'s something the Republican Party might want to take a look at.\'\' The rally was interrupted for several minutes when an anti-abortion protester screamed, ``What about the unborn\'\' into an amplified bullhorn. ``Here\'s someone who wants to debate,\'\' Dukakis said as a Secret Service agent and several people at the rally forcibly removed the man from the crowd. ``Maybe we can get the vice president to debate.\'\' From the Iron Range, Dukakis flew to Minneapolis for a private fund-raiser for the Democratic National Committee and then was headed to Miami, where he was to spend the night before addressing a Greek-American organization\'s convention. Other stops on his trip this week include Alabama, Missouri, Illinois, Arkansas, Texas and Tennessee. He returns to Boston on Saturday night.\r\n'),(464,2,'A British soldier has died of injuries suffered at the Ramstein air show disaster on Aug. 28, bringing the death toll to 70, officials said Wednesday. The 40-year-old soldier, who was not identified, died over the weekend in a hospital in Hanover, said Juergen Dietzen, a spokesman for the Interior Ministry of Rhineland Palatinate state. Dietzen said 24 people remain hospitalized in 10 facilities, and four are in critical condition. The accident occurred when three Italian stunt planes collided at an annual air show at the Ramstein U.S. Air Force base. One of the planes plunged into the crowd. Authorities gave the following nationality breakdown for the dead: 60 West Germans, four Americans, one Dutch citizen, one French citizen, the British soldier and the three Italian pilots.\r\n'),(465,2,'The Soviet Union is seeking a deal with the Philippines to allow repair of Soviet military vessels at a shipyard adjacent to the strategic U.S. naval base at Subic Bay, government officials say. Dan Howard, the Pentagon\'s chief spokesman, said Tuesday the United States ``would not look favorably\'\' on any such arrangement because of ``the opportunities it might afford the Soviets to spy on our activities at Subic Bay.\'\' ``The Philippine government is well aware of our feelings on that,\'\' he said. At the same time, Howard said he could not confirm that negotiations between the Filipinos and the Soviets were taking place. There were conflicting reports Tuesday about the status of the reported Soviet request. One official said a deal between the two countries had already been signed, while another that the Philippines was ``tempted\'\' by the offer but had made no decision. A third official said there was considerable confusion about the intentions of both the Soviets and the Philippines. All the officials asked that their names not be used. The Philippines has rejected previous Soviet requests for access to the Philseco repair yard. But economic and political factors appear to be prompting it to reassess that position, the officials said. The Philseco yard, a joint venture between Philippine and Japanese interests, has been losing money. In addition, the new Soviet proposal comes at a time when many Filipinos are seeking a relationship more independent of the United States. But the officials said close Soviet access to Subic Bay would not only be an intelligence-gathering bonus for Moscow but would also enable Soviet vessels to remain longer in the region, thus enhancing the Soviets\' military capability, the officials said. The desire for ship repair facilities apparently reflects a major Soviet military buildup in the Pacific in recent years. According to the Pentagon, the Kremlin has increased the number of ships and submarines in its Pacific fleet by 40 vessels to a total of 860 since the end of 1984. Approval of the Soviet proposal also would be seen as further evidence of the Philippines\' desire to dissociate itself from the United States. A more independent Filipino stance was apparent during recent base negotiations with the United States, which frequently were marked by bitter acrimony. A week ago, the two countries signed an agreement to provide the Philippines with $962 million in military and economic aid over the next two years in exchange for continued U.S. access to Subic and to Clark Air Base. They are the largest U.S. military installations overseas. As a reflection of the continuing strain in relations, both the Philippines and the United States have left open the possibility that their 1947 base agreement will not be renewed when it expires in 1991. Reaction in the Philippines to the aid agreement has been hostile, partly because Filipino negotiators backed away from their original demand for more than $1 billion annually in assistance. Still, the $481 million in annual aid agreed to for 1990 and 1991 represented a sharp increase from the $180 million the United States had been pledging since 1983. As U.S. officials see it, Philippine President Corazon Aquino could seek to placate opposition to the aid agreement by approving the Soviet request for a ship repair deal at Philseco.\r\n'),(466,2,'Four U.S. soldiers were recovering today from wounds sustained when a carload of men hurled bombs and fired guns at a group of off-duty American servicemen in a discotheque parking lot, officials said. Authorities had no suspects and were ``intensively investigating\'\' the attack early Sunday outside the Confetti disco in San Pedro Sula, said a police official who spoke on condition of anonymity. U.S. Embassy spokesman Charles Barclay said no group had claimed responsibility for the attack, which occurred at about 1 a.m. in Honduras\' second-largest city. Barclay, in a telephone interview, said the four soldiers wounded in the attack were hospitalized in satisfactory condition. Embassy officials refused to identify them until their families were notified. A U.S. official, speaking on condition he not be identified, said the wounded men ``were out of danger.\'\' He did not elaborate. The soldiers were on leave from Palmerola Air Force Base, 41 miles northeast of the capital of Tegucigalpa, and were in civilian clothes and carrying no weapons at the time of the attack, Barclay said. ``The American soldiers were on a one-day recreation trip to San Pedro Sula,\'\' he said. They were leaving the nightspot\'s parking lot in a civilian vehicle rented from a Honduran company when the attackers threw small bombs and opened fire from inside another car in the parking lot, U.S. officials said. The vehicle with the soldiers immediately sped away. ``The attackers threw explosive bombs and shot at them with small-caliber weapons,\'\' Barclay said. In Washington, Pentagon spokeswoman Maj. Kathy Wood said nine soldiers were attacked as they drove out of the discotheque\'s parking lot. She said there were 10 or 12 attackers. ``I guess if there\'s a hero in this, it\'s the driver,\'\' Wood said. ``He took evasive action. He drove away fast. He did things right.\'\' The driver\'s name was not available. The Confetti disco is frequented by U.S. military personnel. San Pedro Sula, is 125 miles north of the capital. The injured were taken to a hospital in San Pedro Sula and later flown to Palmerola. Maj. Wood said about 150 soldiers were on the one-day leave and that all returned to Palmerola as a precautionary measure. The United States has maintained a varying numbers of American troops in Honduras since the leftist Sandinistas seized power in neighboring Nicaragua in 1979. At least 30 American troops in Honduras have been killed or wounded in accidents or incidents of violence since the United States began joint military maneuvers with the Honduran military in 1982. Ten soldiers were injured in a helicopter crash during the deployment of about 1,500 American troops to Honduras in March following a reported incursion by Nicaraguan troops into Honduras. In August 1987, a pipe bomb exploded at a restaurant in Comayagua, 12 miles north of Palmerola, seriously injuring five U.S. soldiers and six civilians, including one American. The Honduran military said four suspects picked up in connection with that bombing told them the attack was part of a campaign directed by a ``foreign leftist organization.\'\' A wave of anti-American protests broke out in April following the deportation to the United States of a reputed international drug baron. Juan Ramon Matta, 43, was taken to the United States to face drug trafficking charges and questioning for the 1986 slaying in Mexico of U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agent Enrique Camarena. The Honduran constitution forbids the deportation of Honduran nationals. Demonstrators burned the U.S. Consulate and U.S. Information Service office in the capital to protest Matta\'s deportation and the U.S. military presence in Honduras. The violence prompted the government to temporarily impose a state of emergency restricting civil liberties.\r\n'),(467,2,'Neil Kinnock, leader of Britain\'s opposition Labor Party, will be challenged for the post by veteran leftist Tony Benn at the party conference in the fall, a Labor coalition said Wednesday. The Campaign Group, composed of about 40 leftist party lawmakers, said Kinnock\'s deputy, moderate Roy Hattersley, will be challenged by leftist Eric Heffer. The announcement came after a meeting of the party\'s national executive committee. Kinnock, 46, and Hattersley are considered not as left wing as Benn and Heffer. Benn, 62, a former Cabinet minister, has accused Kinnock of watering down socialism after the party\'s three defeats in nine years by the Conservative Party of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. Kinnock and Hattersley have worked for a united party and cracked down on militants in hopes of making a broader appeal to voters. They say a leadership contest will distract the party from opposing the government. Kinnock and Hattersley denounced the challenge in a joint statement as ``futile and selfish\'\' and predicted ``massive defeat\'\' for Benn and Heffer. Benn told reporters: ``Democracy is about choice.\'\' Heffer said: ``The time has come for a crusade for socialism. The working people of this country are getting a worse and worse deal.\'\'\r\n'),(468,2,'A new wave of strikes has hit this communist nation, and thousands of shoe workers marched on Parliament today in heavy rain to protest the plummeting living standards. A triple cordon of police officers guarded the doors of the Parliament building as about 3,000 shoe workers, mostly female, chanted: ``You are afraid of women, shame on you!\'\' and ``Thieves, Thieves!\'\' At the Labin coal pits, 148 miles southwest of Zagreb, about 1,000 miners stopped working Monday to demand payment of a bonus for having fulfilled the annual production quota one month ahead of schedule, Belgrade newspapers reported. Also Monday, several hundred workers at the Bor copper mines, about 90 miles southwest of Belgrade, staged a brief work stoppage for the same reason as the Labin miners, newspapers reported. More than 3,000 employees of a fertilizer factory in Sabac, about 50 miles west of Belgrade, staged a street protest Monday, accusing municipal Communist Party leaders of inefficiency and dishonesty. As a result of the protest, the entire municipal leadership was replaced, press reports said. In Belgrade, a total of about 7,000 shoe workers went on strike today. About 3,000 of them marched almost 3 miles in the rain to reach the Parliament building, chanting anti-government slogans and demanding salary raises. ``We want proper wages, don\'t torment us!\'\' the crowd chanted, pressing against the police cordon. After several hours, the workers were allowed to enter Parliament, where they spoke with party officials. ``I can\'t feed myself and my children with $45 a month,\'\' Gvozdenka Pavlovic said. The average Yugoslav salary is about $100 a month. The demonstrators dispersed peacefully after Serbian Communist Party leader Slobodoan Milosevic promised he would visit their factory. Yugoslavia is facing increasing social and labor unrest as a result of the worst economic crisis in the country\'s postwar history, including a 236 percent annual inflation rate and a $21 billion foreign debt. According to official figures, workers\' buying power has declined by 25 percent since the beginning of this year and living standards have dropped to 1960s levels. In the past 10 months, there have been more than 1,000 strikes, many of them involving street demonstrations, the government said. Official Belgrade trade unions today called on citizens to refuse to pay electricity bills if the latest 31 percent price raise was not canceled. News reports said about one-fourth of Belgrade\'s 2 million people have been unable to pay their electricity, water and heating bills. According to the reports, power companies have begun cutting off supplies in an effort to force people to pay. State-run newspapers said railroad workers in the capital said they would stage a strike Wednesday if their salaries were not raised by 50 percent. The strike would paralyze all rail traffic coming in and going out of the capital.\r\n'),(469,2,'Independent counsel Lawrence E. Walsh is being attacked in opposite directions by the Iran-Contra defendants, with one claiming he improperly ignored congressional testimony and the other three saying he illegally used it. Attorneys representing former national security adviser John M. Poindexter, Lt. Col. Oliver L. North and arms dealer Albert Hakim moved Thursday to dismiss the indictment against them, claiming Walsh illegally relied on testimony the three gave last year to the Iran-Contra congressional committees after being granted limited immunity. Because of the immunity grants, Walsh was required to collect all of his evidence independently. North, Piondexter and Hakim claim that, given the massive publicity surrounding the hearings, Walsh\'s case was inevitably tainted by exposure to their immunized _ regardless of efforts to insulate investigators and grand jurors from that evidence. But lawyers for retired Air Force Maj. Gen. Richard V. Secord, the fourth defendant, claim that Walsh unfairly ignored the congressional testimony of North and Poindexter. They say that testimony would have led the grand jury to decline to name their client in the 23-count indictment. Secord, who brokered the arms sales with Hakim, was the lead witness at last year\'s televised hearings of the House and Senate Iran-Contra committees and testified without any immunity. All four defendants are accused of conspiring to divert profits illegally from the U.S.-Iran arms sales to the Nicaraguan rebels. The so-called ``use immunity\'\' grants conferred by Congress on North, Poindexter and Hakim prohibit Walsh from using evidence obtained directly or indirectly from their congressional testimony. Walsh imposed special precautions to prevent his staff and the grand jury from being exposed to the extensive publicity surrounding the hearings. Prosecutors and grand jurors alike were told to ignore news reports or conversations with friends about the hearings. Evidence was filed under seal in U.S. District Court to prove that it was obtained independently of the immunized testimony. But in pleadings filed with U.S. District Judge Gerhard A. Gesell, lawyers for North, Poindexter and Hakim said those precautions were not enough. ``Never in the history of this nation has the immunized testimony of putative defendants been broadcast live, on all major networks, to tens of millions of viewers and listeners,\'\' the defense said. ``Given the widespread dissemination of immunized testimony throughout our society, the broad use of immunized testimony has been inevitable, undeniable, and so pervasive that the indictment must be dismissed as a matter of law,\'\' the defense argued. As an alternative to dismissing the charges, the defense asked Gesell to conduct a hearing to determine if immunized congressional testimony influenced Walsh\'s investigation. The defense says it wants to question grand jurors to determine if they learned about the congressional hearings from friends, relatives or news broadcasts or from grand jury witnesses. Secord\'s lawyers are taking a different course. They contend that Walsh unfairly refused to consider the congressional testimony of North and Poindexter, which they contend would vindicate their client of any wrongdoing. The grand jury should have had an opportunity to consider this testimony before returning an indictment against Secord, his lawyers said. ``The independent counsel\'s decision to exalt prosecutorial convenience above General Secord\'s Fifth Amendment right to a fair and informed grand jury taints the proceedings against him and requires, as a matter of fundamental fairness, that the indictment be dismissed,\'\' Secord\'s lawyers said. Gesell has scheduled a hearing next Tuesday to discuss the immunity issue, which could take months to resolve.\r\n'),(470,2,'A former postman who pleaded guilty to stealing $2.50 from an envelope should be ordered to clean up his neighborhood with a ``broom, dustbin and plastic sack,\'\' a federal judge recommended. U.S. District Judge Thomas A. Higgins on Thursday also ordered Leon Watson, 33, to repay $315 that a January indictment charged he removed from envelopes carried on his route. Watson pleaded guilty to one count in a plea bargain calling for a maximum prison sentence of three years. That count charged him with stealing $2.50 from an envelope planted in a mailbox by U.S. Postal Service officials, who became suspicious of Watson after residents complained that they had received envelopes that were supposed to contain money but did not. ``I want Mr. Watson to become a custodian,\'\' Higgins said. ``He should be given a broom, dustbin and plastic sack and be made to keep good and clean\'\' parks and other public property near his home as community service work, the judge said. Higgins also ordered Watson to perform 300 hours of community service work and gave him a three-year suspended sentence.\r\n'),(471,2,'The newest gadgets that box, sort, tape and buffer are on display at a packaging industry trade show that looks grass-green in its support of sound environmental policies. ``It\'s the environmental revolution,\'\' said Craig Todd, district manager of Better Packages. ``Everybody\'s gotten on the bandwagon.\'\' Better Packages isn\'t offering a new product at the show but is exhibiting new packaging for its old products. The Shelton, Conn., company\'s tape machines, which use glue rather than adhesives which don\'t decompose, ``just happen to be the right thing at the right time,\'\' Todd said. More than 55,000 people were on hand Wednesday for the packaging industry\'s Pack Expo, which ends Friday at McCormick Place. Dozens of this year\'s 900 exhibitors included environmentally sensible products, which ran from mailing envelopes made of recycled materials to packaging ``peanuts\'\' made nearly entirely of cornstarch. The new ``peanuts,\'\' manufactured by American Excelsior Co. of Arlington, Texas, will give the environmentally conscious consumer an alternative to the standard polystyrene packaging peanut, the company said. The product, called Eco-Foam, is more than 95 percent cornstarch, and the rest is a water-soluble organic polymer, said Robert Asselin of National Starch and Chemical Co. of Bridgewater N.J. It handles the peanuts\' production for American Excelsior. The product dissolves in water and is safe enough to eat, said Asselin, who did just that while chatting with a reporter. American Excelsior will keep making polystyrene peanuts, said company Vice President Ken Starrett. ``We\'ve serviced this market for about 30 years or more,\'\' said Starrett. ``We\'re not competing with ourselves, and we don\'t see a conflict by making both products. Eco-Foam is still the newcomer to the market.\'\' Some companies said thir customers aren\'t fully converted to the idea that environmentally sound is best. ``They\'ll buy it if the cost is the same and the quality\'s the same. But if the price is higher or the quality\'s affected, forget it,\'\' said Peter Dauphinais, whose company, Polyair Corp., introduced ``Eco-Lite\'\' mailing envelopes this year. The envelopes are made from 100 percent recycled paper and plastic and, while they cost the same as non-recycled, they\'re less strong, said Dauphinais, sales man for the Toronto company. Cantech Industries Inc., of Johnson City, Tenn., introduced a new unbleached masking tape at the show. The new tape is free of caustic chemicals used in other tape manufacture but is not quite as white as its bleached counterpart, said Cantech\'s Jim Petruzzi. Petruzzi said manufacturers tend to have a natural inclination toward packaging materials which are the newest and white-est of whites - a tendency that dies hard. ``You spend your whole life on making things look good, then environmental issues come up,\'\' said Petruzzi. ``Not that they\'re not good issues.\'\'\r\n'),(472,2,'A leading Soviet Bible scholar said Wednesday a Soviet magazine plans to serialize the New Testament in an effort to boost its sales. ``At first, I was shaken by such an indecency,\'\' said Sergei S. Averintzev, ``but then I thought, it\'s good.\'\' Averintzev, 61, said he was commissioned to write footnotes to the New Testament, which is to be published in the magazine In the World of Books. He said a Soviet publishing house also was preparing a book edition of the New Testament with his notes. The scholar, who is in Israel with a delegation of Soviet filmmakers, is a member of the Soviet Academy of Sciences and has written books and articles on ancient Greek and Byzantine culture and the Bible. In a lecture at Hebrew University in Jerusalem, Averintzev said said the magazine wanted to print the New Testament ``to enlarge its circulation.\'\'\r\n'),(473,2,'Campeau Corp. has extended until midnight Friday its $66-a-share offer for a friendly merger with Federated Department Stores Inc. Meanwhile, a federal judge Monday threw out an Ohio anti-takeover law enacted to protect Federated from the Toronto-based developer. Campeau said in a statement Monday that without a friendly merger it would continue its hostile tender offer at $61 a share, or $5.4 billion. The friendly offer, which previously expired Sunday, totals $5.8 billion. A Federated representative had no comment on the renewed offer. The Cincinnati-based retailer twice last week rejected the $66-a-share bid, saying Campeau had not shown it had adequate financing. Federated\'s board has delayed implementing a company shareholder-rights plan until midnight Thursday. The rights plan, a so-called ``poison pill\'\' defense, is designed to make a hostile takeover too expensive. A Campeau representative said the retail and real estate company was renewing its offer ``to remind (Federated\'s) board we\'re very interested in signing a transaction.\'\' At the same time, Chief U.S. District Court Judge Carl B. Rubin ruled unconstitutional the state\'s anti-takeover law enacted Feb. 12. Federated had no comment when asked if an appeal was planned. Rubin said that while states have a role in the regulation of commerce, the new law ``is discriminatory on its face.\'\' The act required that certain foreign businesses attempting to acquire companies with major operations in Ohio inform the state of the acquisition\'s impact on employment, tax revenues and details of its financing.\r\n'),(474,2,'An encouraging report on the U.S. trade deficit has helped catapult the dollar to recent highs against several key foreign currencies. The Commerce Department reported Friday that the United States posted a $10.9 billion trade deficit in May, the second smallest shortfall in almost three years. The news helped the dollar make its best showing since October against the British pound. The pound finished at $1.6605 in late New York trading, far cheaper than Thursday\'s $1.6875. The dollar\'s surge lifted bond prices, pushing interest rates lower. The yield on the Treasury\'s closely watched 30-year bond slipped to 9.14 percent from 9.17 percent late Thursday. The favorable trade news also sparked a moderate gain in stock prices on Wall Street. The Dow Jones average of 30 industrials rose 15.83 points to 2,129.45, finishing the week with a net gain of 23.30. In another key economic report, the Labor Department said wholesale prices rose a moderate 0.4 percent in June _ but analysts saw cause for worry in the steep, drought-induced climb in raw food prices. The hot, dry weather searing much of the nation sent prices of unprocessed grain and poultry soaring by more than 20 percent last month, pushing raw food prices 4.2 percent higher than in May. It was the biggest jump since October 1985. Grain futures closed mixed while soybeans posted strong gains on the Chicago Board of Trade amid conflicting weather forecasts for the drought-stricken Farm Belt. In other economic developments Friday: _The Federal Reserve reported that U.S. industrial production, boosted by heavy demand for electricity during the summer heat wave, climbed 0.4 percent in June, the ninth consecutive month without a decline. _The Commerce Department said business inventories climbed in May for the 17th consecutive month. Sales also rose strongly, easing economists\' worries that too many goods are accumulating on shelves and back lots. The Reagan administration and private economists were in agreement that the May trade report offered conclusive proof that the government\'s efforts to deal with one of the country\'s biggest economic problems, a seemingly intractable trade deficit, were beginning to show results. The May deficit was actually $627 million higher than a revised April imbalance of $10.3 billion. But the April figure was the smallest imbalance since a $9.9 billion deficit in August 1985 and the May deficit was the second smallest imbalance since that time. Commerce Secretary C. William Verity noted that for the first five months of this year, U.S. exports have surged by 31 percent compared with the same period in 1987, reflecting the boom conditions in the nation\'s manufacturing brought on by the weaker dollar. ``The merchandise trade figures for May are consistent with the trend toward a lower trade deficit,\'\' Verity said. ``The improvement in the trade balance in the first five months has been widespread geographically.\'\' The administration launched an effort three years ago with major U.S. allies to devalue the dollar as a way of making American goods more competitive on overseas markets.\r\n'),(475,2,'Three contestants in the Mrs. America pageant have complained about being given a survey to fill out on their love lives. According to Mrs. Alabama Diane Gamble, Mrs. Wisconsin Gale Coleman and Mrs. North Carolina Connie Hedrick, the survey included such questions as ``Can you be in love with two men at the same time?\'\' and ``Outside of the bedroom, where is the most unusual place you have had romance with your husband?\'\' Pageant president David Marmel said he had not seen the survey, adding that they were used in the past to find out types of products used by contestants for the product-marketing purposes of pageant sponsors. Marmel said the women were not obliged to answer the questions. The three contestants also complained Tuesday about the use of bikinis, saying the skimpy attire was degrading for a pageant featurng mothers and professional women. ``How is it going to look for my fellow workers to see me bumping and grinding in a bikini on national television? It\'s demeaning, said Mrs. Gamble, a marketing director for an engineering firm. Only single-piece suits were used in state contests leading to the national pageant, she said. Jennifer Kline, 21, of Minnesota, won the pageant that ended Sunday and was televised Tuesday by ABC.\r\n'),(476,2,'Bond prices rose sharply Friday, rallying after the successful completion of the Treasury Department\'s $30 billion quarterly refunding auction. The newly issued 30-year government bond surged 1 25-32 points, or $17.81 per $1,000 in face amount, from its level at Thursday\'s auction. Its yield tumbled to 8.33 percent from 8.50 percent. Bond prices and yields move in opposite directions. The jump in the price of the long bond, the most widely watched of government securities, was the largest since last Oct. 13, when it rose 2 9-16 points in response to a sharp sell-off in the stock market. Credit market strategists attributed Friday\'s large increase to two factors: relief over the completion of the Treasury\'s three-day auction this week and a government report indicating that wholesale inflation in January was low, excluding volatile food and energy prices. The government sold $10 billion each of three-year notes, 10-year notes and 30-year bonds on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. The market had viewed the auctions with concern that low foreign buying would push yields up and prices down to stimulate interest. The United States has come to depend on foreign investors, particularly the Japanese, to help finance the federal deficit and pay interest on the total public debt. Instead, the auction was completed successfully, with adequate foreign interest propped up by strong domestic buying. Demand slackened only in the final leg, the 30-year bond. ``There\'s a lot of relief the refunding is over and the auctions by and large went well _ at least better than expected at the beginning of the week,\'\' said Steven A. Wood, money market economist with BankAmerica Capital Markets Group in San Francisco. In addition, the credit markets were pleased with an increase of just 0.1 percent in wholesale inflation for January excluding a spurt in food and energy prices due to severe cold around the country. Overall, the Producer Price Index for Janaury rose 1.8 percent, the sharpest rise since 1974. But the ``core rate\'\' excluding food energy is viewed as a better measure of underlying inflationary pressure. Economists said the low core rate was interpreted to indicate that the Federal Reserve Board would not likely raise interest rates to try to cool off the economy and curb increasing costs. High inflation tends to erode prices of fixed-income securities such as bonds. ``It\'s now viewed the Fed does not have to overreact to the energy and food situation and it can probably continue to hold policy pretty steady,\'\' Wood said. In the secondary market for Treasury securities, prices of short-term government issues rose &lsqb; point to 5-16 point, intermediate maturities gained 13-32 point to 27-32 point and long-term issues climbed 29-32 point to 1 point, according to figures provided by Telerate Inc., a financial information service. The movement of a point is equivalent to a change of $10 in the price of a bond with a $1,000 face value. The Shearson Lehman Hutton Daily Treasury Bond Index, which measures price movements on all outstanding Treasury issues with maturities of a year or longer, gained 6.52 to 1,166.99. Yields on three-month Treasury bills fell to 7.99 percent as the discount declined 6 basis points to 7.74 percent. Yields on six-month bills slipped to 8.07 percent as the discount lost 7 basis points to 7.66 percent. Yields on one-year bills declined to 8.01 percent as the discount declined 7 basis points to 7.49 percent. A basis point is one-hundredth of a percentage point. The yield is the annualized return on an investment in a Treasury bill. The discount is the percentage that bills are selling below the face value, which is paid at maturity. The federal funds rate, the interest rate banks charge each other on overnight loans, was quoted at 8\\ percent, up from 8 3-16 percent late Thursday. In the tax-exempt market, the Bond Buyer index of 40 actively traded municipal bonds closed at 92\\, up 9-16 point. The average yield to maturity fell to 7.38 percent from 7.43 percent late Thursday.\r\n'),(477,2,'Gov. Evan Mecham broke the law and lied about it to the state Senate, a prosecutor said today in urging the Senate to convict the impeached first-term Republican and remove him from office. Prosecutor William French said in closing arguments that Mecham broke the law in borrowing $80,000 from the governor\'s protocol fund for his auto dealership. ``He has violated the law ... He has uttered untruths to you,\'\' French said. Earlier, prosecutor Paul Eckstein accused Mecham of showing ``a lifetime of reckless disregard for the reputation of anyne who has stood in his path to political power.\'\' ``Respondent (Mecham) has demonstrated for all the world to see his plain inability to tell the truth,\' Eckstein said. ``How much proof is required to demonstrate that respondent puffed, exaggerated, misremembered, dissembled and out-and-out lied.\'\' Eckstein said Mecham\'s conduct in office ``was not just offensive, it was grossly offensive.\'\' Senators must decide whether to convict Mecham on two impeachment charges issued by the Arizona House. A third charge was dismissed. A vote could come late today or Tuesday, climaxing five weeks of trial, lawmakers said. A conviction would force the first-term Republican out of office. The first impeachment count accuses the governor of trying to thwart an investigation of an alleged death threat by a state official. Mecham contended he did not intend to beak the law and that he was not fully informed of the seriousness of the alleged threat. ``Ignorance of the law is no defense,\'\' Eckstein told senators. But Mecham\'s defense lawyer, Fred Craft, told senators, ``You\'re being asked to politically assassinate the governor.\'\' ``He doesn\'t resign (as Mecham has been urged to) because he\'s not guilty of these charges,\'\' Craft said. ``He dares to right city hall and he\'s doing it at great cost to himself.\'\' Craft said in his closing argument that the allegation was based on a 90-second conversation with Department of Public Safety Director Ralph Milstead. Craft accused prosecutors of seeking to ``twist and torture it in such a way that it accounts for an obstruction of justice.\'\' As closing arguments proceeded, a trumpeter played ``Taps\'\' outside the Senate building as a group of men carried a mock coffin labeled, ``Herein Lies the Right to an Elected Governor.\'\' The prosecutor accused Mecham of making a number of statements during his Senate testimony that ``are either wrong\'\' or were contradicted by other witnesses. Among the examples cited by Eckstein was the governor\'s testimony, recanted a day later, that his former chief bodyguard had stolen a report from the governor\'s office. Nonetheless, Eckstein said, Mecham and Department of Public Safety Director Ralph Milstead gave ``remarkably similar\'\' accounts of their Nov. 15 conversation in which Mecham allegedly ordered Milstead not to cooperate with the attorney general\'s investigation of the alleged threat. Mecham admitted in Senate testimony that he told Milstead, ``The attorney general is out to get me and I\'m not going to help him in any way.\'\' Mecham sat at the defense table during closing arguments. When he arrived at the Capitol, he was cheered by a group of well-wishers as he walked into the Senate building behind bodyguards. He said nothing but smiled and flashed a thumbs-up signal at the crowd. Mecham, 63, who took office in January 1987, has maintained he is innocent of wrongdoing. He also is accused of misusing $80,000 from the governor\'s protocol fund by loaning it to his auto dealership. Last week the Senate dismissed a third charge that Mecham concealed a $350,000 campaign loan, the subject of the governor\'s April 21 criminal trial. Some senators said hearing testimony on that allegation could have prejudiced his criminal trial. However, Democrats acknowledged that the real reason they favored dismissing the charge was to ensure a Senate trial verdict well before the scheduled May 17 gubernatorial recall election. A two-thirds vote of the 30-member Senate is required for conviction. Lawmakers also could bar Mecham from holding any future public office. If convicted, Mecham would become the seventh U.S. governor removed from office by impeachment. The prosecution contends the governor\'s protocol fund _ created with inaugural ball proceeds _ was a public fund and that Mecham Pontiac needed the $80,000 loan to meet its July 1987 payroll. However, the defense said the fund was private money and that the loan was intended merely to provide a higher interest rate for the fund. Mecham Pontiac was in good financial shape and could have borrowed the money elsewhere, according to testimony by the governor\'s son, Dennis, who is general manager of the dealership. But the day after he testified last week, Dennis Mecham announced the dealership was being sold. Sales had suffered due to the ``avalanche of negative publicity\'\' about the governor, he said. The allegation regarding the death threat has boiled down to Mecham\'s word against that of Department of Public Safety Director Ralph Milstead. He testified that Mecham ordered him not to cooperate with the attorney general\'s investigation of the alleged threat by state official Lee Watkins against former top Mecham aide Donna Carlson. At the time of the alleged threat in November, Ms. Carlson was about to testify before the state grand jury regarding the $350,000 campaign loan. Senators, meanwhile, said they knew how important the impeachment vote will be. If the governor is allowed to return to his job, ``I think there\'ll be terrible chaos in state government,\'\' said Minority Leader Alan Stephens, a Democrat. Lawmakers\' own careers also may hang in the balance, some senators said.\r\n'),(478,2,'NASA\'s mission is ``probably more difficult than that of any other organization in the world,\'\' says a report by the advisory committee on the future of the U.S. space program. It offered this illustration of what makes the National Aeronautics and Space Adminstration\'s job so tough: ``Each Voyager spacecraft has the electronic circuitry of over 2,000 color television sets, yet is required to work for 12 years while traveling from Earth to Neptune. ``The two Voyager spacecraft schedules were absolutely unforgiving, the planets in their paths aligning themselves only once every 176 years. Yet by the time Voyager 2 reached Neptune, 4.4 billion miles away and 12 years later, the spacecraft was a mere 22 miles off its charted course and only one second off its updated flyby time. ``Mechanical challenges are equally impressive. Each space shuttle contains some 300 miles of electrical wiring, over 3,000 feet of welds and over 2.5 million lines of software code. Its pumps propel 65,000 gallons (the capacity of a large swimming pool) through its engines each minute. ``The power turbine on the shuttle operates at a temperature of 1,300 degrees Fahrenheit. Just four feet away, the pump turbine operates at minus 400 degrees Fahrenheit .... ``The Hubble Space Telescope involved a total of over 40 million hours of work. To process a space shuttle for flight requires that 1.2 million separate procedures be accomplished. ``Furthermore, NASA must do all that it does in the public spotlight - which is, of course, as it should be.\'\'\r\n'),(479,2,'U.S. Sen. Alan Simpson and Gov. Mike Sullivan handily won their primary races Tuesday, while GOP gubernatorial candidate Mary Mead took an early lead in an unusual two-woman race for her party\'s nomination. With 154 of the state\'s 471 precincts reporting, Mead had 69 percent of the vote to state Rep. Nyla Murphy\'s 31 percent. Simpson, the Senate minority whip, was easily winning his third Republican nomination with 83 percent of the early vote. It wasn\'t clear which of six little-known Democrats would win the right to challenge Simpson. Kathy Helling, a 32-year-old college student, and Al Hamburg, who was convicted last year of forging names on a campaign petition, were the top vote-getters in early returns. As it was four years ago, Sullivan walked away with the nomination Tuesday. He got 88 percent of the early vote in his primary contest with motorcycle mechanic Ron ``Suds\'\' Clingman. The governor said he would have preferred to face stiffer competition. ``I have to say that when you watch people debating the issues on the other side, you wish you had some primary opposition so you could talk about the issues,\'\' said Sullivan. The hunt for the GOP gubernatorial nomination pitted Mead, 55, the daughter of former Gov. and U.S. Sen. Cliff Hansen, against Murphy, a 59-year-old Casper woman who has served the past 12 years in the state House of Representatives. Mead\'s campaign stressed her skills as a rancher and businesswoman and attacked Sullivan\'s economic development efforts. Murphy, in turn, accused Mead of having a negative attitude toward Wyoming and of failing to propose solutions to the shortfalls she perceived. Sullivan largely ignored the primary campaign and stuck close to his gubernatorial duties. U.S. Rep. Craig Thomas was uncontested in the primary. Elected last year to fill Dick Cheney\'s unexpired term in office, Thomas is seeking his first full-term in the House this fall. Also unopposed was his Democratic challenger, Pete Maxfield, a University of Wyoming law professor.\r\n'),(480,2,'Dartmouth College says ``bullying tactics\'\' aimed at a black professor by staffers of a stridently conservative student publication led to suspensions that are now the subject of two lawsuits. The Dartmouth Review\'s lawsuits accuse the college of reverse discrimination against white students and of violating free speech rights for suspending three of its staffers. The Review staffers were suspended following a confrontation in a college classroom with a black music professor who earlier had been harshly criticized in the independent, off-campus newspaper. Review attorney Harvey D. Myerson said ``the facts clearly indicate that the students would not have been given such draconian penalties if they were black students criticizing a white professor.\'\' But officials at the private liberal arts college in Hanover, N.H., said Wednesday the disciplinary action against the students was taken to preserve the ``integrity\'\' of the classroom. Described by its critics as anti-minority, anti-women and anti-homosexual, the Review often has been the center of controversy since it was founded in 1980. In March of this year, Dartmouth President David Freedman blasted the paper, calling its staff ``ideological provocateurs posing as journalists.\'\' The faculty censured it in 1982 as racist and sexist after a critique of Dartmouth\'s affirmative action programs, written in what was intended to be black dialect and headlined: ``Dis Sho\' Ain\'t No Jive, Bro.\'\' In 1984, a Review reporter secretly tape-recorded a Gay Students Association meeting and published excerpts and the names of group leaders. A Dartmouth disciplinary panel ruled in March that the three Review staffers were guilty of disorderly conduct for failing to leave Professor William Cole\'s classroom after being asked to do so. The paper earlier had described Cole\'s music class as ``one of Dartmouth\'s most academically deficient courses.\'\' The paper\'s attorneys, who filed suits in federal and state courts in New Hampshire, announced the action at a Capitol Hill news conference Wednesday with support from three conservative lawmakers. Sen. Gordon Humphrey, R-N.H., called the disciplinary actions ``nothing less than a crude assault on freedom of expression and political diversity on campus.\'\' ``The elite Ivy League academics constantly proclaim themselves the champions of free speech and diversity of opinion. Yet here, when a small band of students express a viewpoint offensive to the prevailing orthodoxy, the college comes squarely down on the side of suppression and harsh persecution.\'\' Humphrey was joined at the news conference by Sen. William Armstrong, R-Colo., and Rep. Bob Smith, R-N.H. A state suit filed in New Hampshire Superior Court addresses the free speech issue, while a federal suit filed in U.S. District Court focuses on the reverse discrimination charge. Dartmouth spokesman Alex Huppe, who attended the news conference, said the disciplinary action had nothing to do with First Amendment rights. ``The sanctity of a classroom is what this is all about,\'\' Huppe said. ``Dartmouth College has got to protect the integrity of a classroom. They went in there to disrupt his classroom.\'\' Huppe accused the students of using ``bullying tactics\'\' in their confrontation with the professor and their refusal to leave. After the classroom incident, Freedman, the college president, said the paper had been ``irresponsible, mean-spirited, cruel and ugly\'\' and that it was trying to poison the ``intellectual environment\'\' of the campus.\r\n'),(481,2,'A group of Washington lobbyists have formed the capital-based National Vintners Association to promote and represent in Congress the wine interests in the 43 producing states. The NVA, in addition to representing the approximately 1,300 wineries in this country, also is targeting for membership thousands more winegrape growers at the start of the production chain, according to association Executive Director Richard Feeney. The NVA ``is a national trade association based on Capitol Hill...because the wine industry faces serious threats from federal regulation, because NVA members need to have timely, accurate information from Washington,\'\' Feeney said. Feeney, a Congressional lobbyist and onetime director of the National Meat Association, said his direct connection with wine was from 1970-74, when he was partner in a wine importing business. Feeney said the association, only a few weeks old, had no intention of vying for supremacy with California\'s 54-year-old Wine Institute, which directly represents for 520 of the state\'s 770 wineries. Most other wine-producing states have no organization, said Feeney, contending, ``The fact remains that if a vintner in Virginia or Oregon wants to join a national organization, there ain\'t any.\'\' Feeney said he did not think many other wine-producing states had adequate liaison with Congress and federal agencies affecting the industry. Vintners are worried about what they see as a wave of prohibitionist feeling in America, expressed in new label laws, restaurant posting of toxicity warnings for pregnant women, new taxes, and a widespread anti-alcohol surge. One of the NVA\'s most ambitious programs will be to lobby Congress to change the way federal law regards winegrapes, said Feeney, who said lawmakers might be ready ``to look at wine differently.\'\' Unlike many other agricultural products, grapes grown for wine get no subsidy, and the end product is regarded an alcoholic beverage subject to regulation by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. Feeney said, ``the time has come for wine to take its place with other agricultural products\'\' and to share benefits enjoyed by ``commodities such as soybeans, beef, dairy products, catfish and pork.\'\' He said he wants wine looked upon as food, a desire that coincides with ongoing efforts of California\'s major vintners, principally Robert Mondavi, who is about to launch a privately financed pro-wine program.\r\n'),(482,2,'Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev paid tribute to President Reagan on Wednesday for retracting his characterization of the Soviet Union as an ``evil empire,\'\' but he blamed the American side for the failure to make more tangible progress at the fourth superpower summit in 30 months. In the first nationally televised Moscow news conference by a Kremlin leader, Gorbachev hailed the continuing U.S.-Soviet dialogue and said ``it is vitally necessary\'\' that his meetings resume after Reagan\'s successor takes office in January. In a good-natured, wide-ranging session with Soviet and foreign reporters, the Communist Party chief held forth for nearly two hours, alternately praising the tone of U.S.-Soviet dialogue while criticizing specific U.S. positions. Gorbachev noted that ``within the walls of the Kremlin, next to the Czar\'s gun, right in the heart of the evil empire,\'\' Reagan had responded, ``No,\'\' when asked if the Soviet Union still deserved the appellation he gave it in March 1983. Reagan explained Tuesday that his characterization, one of the most-quoted of Reagan\'s presidency, was made in ``another time, another era.\'\' ``We take note of this,\'\' Gorbachev said, drawing on an ancient Greek saying to add, ``Everything flows, everything changes.\'\' Gorbachev said his meetings with Reagan were ``in-depth and at times intense discussions right up to the last minutes.\'\' He described the talks as respectful and productive, but indicated emotions ran high at times, saying he and Reagan were ``standing up at the table\'\' to make their points. ``I think that the meetings once again demonstrated the fact that we are indulging in realistic dialogue,\'\' the 57-year-old Soviet leader said. Gorbachev said he believed a treaty cutting strategic nuclear weapons by 30 percent to 50 percent was still possible this year, despite the failure to break the logjam that has blocked progress toward an agreement since the Washington summit last December. Asked if he expected to meet Reagan again before the president leaves office, Gorbachev said it was unlikely unless there is an unforeseen breakthrough in the strategic arms talks. He said the United States rejected several Soviet proposals for inclusion in a 24-page joint statement issued on conclusion of the talks. Both sides agreed there should be no war between them, yet the Americans objected to describing their goal as ``peaceful coexistence,\'\' or even ``coexistence,\'\' Gorbachev said. Gorbachev\'s remarks were contained in a 50-minute opening statement followed by a question-and-answer session that ran about an hour with questioners picked by Foreign Ministry spokesman Gennady I. Gerasimov from a show of hands of some 300 Soviet and foreign journalists. The general secretary reiterated his criticism of ousted Moscow party boss Boris Yeltsin, a one-time protege, and dismissed Yeltsin\'s suggestion that the Kremlin\'s No. 2 man, Yegor Ligachev, should resign. Last October, at a closed meeting of the Communist Party\'s policy-making Central Committee, Yeltsin criticized the slow pace of perestroika, Gorbachev\'s campaign to modernize the Soviet economy and society, and offered to resign. Gorbachev said Wednesday that his one-time protege, who had risen to non-voting membership on the ruling Politburo, was overruled by fellow members of the Central Committee. He said he had not seen Yeltsin\'s recent comments in interviews with Western television networks but would ``demand from Comrade Yeltsin explanations as to what it is all about and what he is after.\'\' As for Ligachev and reports he was being pushed from power, Gorbachev said ``no such problem exists\'\' with the man widely perceived as the leader of a conservative faction opposing Gorbachev in the Politburo. ``Perestroika will win out,\'\' he said of speculation that the reform movement could be in trouble. He also said he had heard no alternative to his reforms and concluded, ``There can be some maneuvers ... but we have undertaken irreversible change.\'\' Gorbachev, sitting at a table with key members of his summit negotiating team, dominated the session with a self-confident air. Speaking off the cuff much of the time, he made his points gesturing with his hands and flashing a smile. At one point, when he realized that some American correspondents couldn\'t understand because their translation devices weren\'t functioning, he directed a good-natured reorganization of the seating, telling Soviet reporters to take chairs where the earphones weren\'t working. Many reporters, including NBC anchor Tom Brokaw, whom Gorbachev singled out by name, stood up and switched seats in the just-renovated auditorium in the Soviet Foreign Ministry press center. The party chief indicated that the United States and Soviet Union had made a recent breakthrough in long-stalled conventional arms talks in Europe but accused the United States of ``incomprehensible maneuvers\'\' that scuttled any mention of that in the closing communique. Asked about the prospects for a fifth summit, Gorbachev said, ``I like the possibility for a meeting with just one problem, if we have an opportunity to achieve a treaty concerning offensive arms.\'\' He said the president\'s Strategic Defense Initiative was one sure obstacle, along with a dispute over limits on submarine-launched cruise missiles. Later he said he told Reagan the president\'s view that the so-called Star Wars program is strictly defensive was ``just not serious.\'\' Asked about the Middle East, Gorbachev said for the first time that as soon as an international conference on the region is convened, ``we are prepared to address ourselves to regularizing relations with Israel,\'\' severed in 1967. He cited the Afghanistan agreement as an example of what could be achieved if the superpowers worked together with warring parties to solve the conflicts, but noted that if Soviet forces now come under attack from rebels as they withdraw, ``we shall react accordingly and appropriately.\'\' On human rights, he said that when Reagan ``tried to persuade me to change my mind, I said, `Your explanations are not convincing ... I am not filled with admiration at this aspect of the visit.\'\'\' Reagan met with a group of dissidents and refuseniks during his five-day visit here but scrapped a plan to visit a family of would-be Jewish emigrants. Sources said the Soviets warned U.S. officials the family would never be permitted to leave the country if the Reagans followed through with their plan. After talking of what he called the contrary attitude of the United States on some issues, Gorbachev singled out economic relations. ``Authoritative parts of American business circles would like to do business,\'\' he said. ``They are faced with intimidation and all sorts of restrictions.\'\' He cited the Jackson-Vanik Amendment which links trade opportunities to emigration freedoms and said he told the president: ``Why should the dead drag on the coattails of the living? ... The amendment was passed in totally different circumstances a decade ago. We should base our policies on present-day realities.\'\' As he has before, Gorbachev described the agreement to eliminate intermediate range (INF) nuclear weapons as ``a watershed political event in the Soviet-American dialogue.\'\' Earlier, in remarks at the exchange of final INF papers, the Soviet leader summarized the proceedings as ``big politics ... worthy of new times.\'\' ``The era of nuclear disarmament has begun,\'\' Gorbachev said. In his news conference statement, Gorbachev was sharply critical of the U.S. stand on reducing the non-nuclear forces in Europe of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the Warsaw Pact. He said Reagan had rejected a Soviet proposal to exchange data on the troops as a first step toward a massive reduction, but ``the other side immediately tried to dodge the issue.\'\' Gorbachev said the United States engaged in ``incomprehensible maneuvers\'\' and ``we missed a chance to take an important step forward to a civil relationship.\'\'\r\n'),(483,2,'A refusenik family was embraced by tearful relatives Friday evening as they arrived in Boston after gaining permission to emigrate from the Soviet Union after the Moscow summit. ``I\'m overwhelmed with gratitude toward all the people who helped me all the 11 years,\'\' said Yuri Zieman at Boston\'s Logan International Airport. Zieman, his wife, Tatyana, and their 12-year-old daughter, Vera, were greeted by relatives and Jewish activists who worked to secure their exit visas. ``We\'ll drink champagne and I\'ll put them to bed, they didn\'t sleep for two days,\'\' said Zieman\'s older daughter, Galina Khatutsky, who emigrated in 1987 with her husband. ``I don\'t feel like it really happened because I was imagining it so many times,\'\' said Mrs. Zieman. ``It\'s still in a dream.\'\' U.S. diplomats said President Reagan had planned to visit the Zieman family at their Moscow apartment during the summit meeting to underscore U.S. concern for human rights in the Soviet Union. The visit was canceled after U.S. officials were warned it could jeopardize the family\'s chances of emigrating. After the summit, the Ziemans were told their request had been denied again, but a few weeks later they were granted permission to leave. Zieman, 49, a computer specialist who lost his job when he applied to emigrate in 1977, worked as a plumber until he became ill several months ago. Zieman had been told he was not permitted to leave the country for security reasons. He contended he never had access to state secrets and had no information that could threaten Soviet security. The Ziemans left Moscow on Wednesday and stayed in Vienna until they left for Boston. Khatutsky, of Boston, said her parents will stay in an apartment in suburban Belmont. A refusenik is a term applied to Soviet citizens _ usually Jewish _ who are refused permission to emigrate to another country. Among the gathering of about 30 people at Logan airport was Sheila Galland of the Waltham, Mass.-based Action for Soviet Jewry. She called the release of the Ziemans a victory for the refusenik cause but said much work remains. ``There are still people waiting 10 years, 12 years,\'\' Galland said. She called the decision to free the Ziemans, ``a P.R. ploy,\'\' for Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev.\r\n'),(484,2,'Two American human rights groups claimed today that Filipino soldiers may be linked to the killings of five human rights lawyers and the harassment of a dozen others since last year. A report by the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights and Asia Watch, both New York-based groups, claimed President Corazon Aquino\'s government ``has failed to respond adequately\'\' to attacks on human rights lawyers and that victims of abuses were afraid to seek legal redress. The 28-page report cited the unsolved killings of five human rights lawyers, who were slain in separate incidents from October 1987 until last June. It said evidence existed that the military or military-backed anti-Communist vigilante groups may have been involved in the killings. The report by the two groups said more than a dozen other lawyers have been subjected to threats, harassment and surveillance since 1987. It urged the Aquino government to ``publicly and unambiguously express its commitment to the protection of human rights lawyers and its condemnation of the killings, threats and harassment.\'\' ``Victims of abuses are often afraid to pursue legal redress,\'\' said the report, written by Norman Dorsen, professor of law at New York University, and Nadine Strossen, visiting professor of law at New York Law School. ``Those who do, often discover that those responsible are shielded from prosecution by the local military detachment,\'\' the report said. There was no comment from the government on the charges. Mrs. Aquino has vowed to curb human rights abuses. But last month, she said it was unfair to blame the entire military establishment for abuses by a few of its members. The report was released two days after the London-based Amnesty International human rights organization claimed more than 100 leftists, trade unionists and social activists were slain in the Philippines last year because of alleged links to Communist rebels. Human rights groups here claim such abuses are continuing despite Mrs. Aquino\'s pledge to protect civil liberties after the 1986 ouster of President Ferdinand Marcos. During a human rights seminar here Thursday, military officials and civil rights workers clashed over the government\'s plans to deploy a new civilian militia, the Citizens\' Armed Forces Geographical Unit, to help battle the rebels. Undersecretary of Defense Eduardo Ermita said the 160,000-member armed forces alone could not contend with the 25,000-strong New People\'s Army, Moslem insurgents and right-wing extremists. He said members of the new force would be carefully screened and would face court-martial for any human rights abuses. But Mariss Diokno, a prominent human rights activist, said the new force was ``anti-democratic\'\' and a step toward militarization that social activists hoped would be reversed following Marcos\' ouster.\r\n'),(485,2,'A French assault team today stormed a cave in this French Pacific territory and freed 22 gendarmes and a prosecutor held hostage by Melanesian separatists. An official said 17 people were killed. Bernard Pons, minister for overseas territories in the conservative government of Premier Jacques Chirac of France, said the dead included two members of the assault team and 15 kidnappers. He also said two members of the assault team were seriously injured. Pons said the hostages were freed after ``a particularly violent battle\'\' in the nearly seven-hour assault on a network of caves in Ouvea, an island off the northeast coast of New Caledonia. The assault team attacked the cave with tear gas, forcing most of the approximately 30 kidnappers out, Pons told a news conference after returning from Ouvea, where he had traveled for the operation. The hostages freed themselves from their handcuffs before the attack after a key was smuggled to them by Capt. Philippe Legorjus, chief of an anti-terrorism squad. Legorjus had been captured during earlier hostage negotiations with the separatists, then freed to act as an go-between with French authorities. Legorjus made several trips to and from the caves during negotiations and was told that the hostages would be killed if he did not return. Legorjus also smuggled to the caves two pistols with which hostages defended themselves during the attack. ``Profiting from the smoke created by tear gas bombs, the hostages were able to escape through a chimney in the back of the cave,\'\' Pons said. Police said the injured were taken to a hospital in Noumea, capital of this island territory 1,300 miles northeast of Australia. In Paris, Defense Minister Andre Giraud said in a television interview that the kidnappers\' chief was among those killed. Giraud told French radio that the attack was ordered by Chirac, with approval from President Francois Mitterrand, when negotiations with the kidnappers stalled. ``The situation inside the cave had become extremely dangerous,\'\' Giraud said. ``In any case, it was entirely intolerable that representatives of the forces of order might be held hostage.\'\' Jean-Marie Tjibaou, president of the Kanak Socialist National Liberation Front, the main Melanesian separatist organization, said the operation was ``a hard blow for the Kanak people.\'\' ``This will not stop the determination of the Kanak people in their demand for independence,\'\' Tjibaou told The Associated Press by telephone from his home in Hienghene at the northern end of New Caledonia. Asked if he expected to be arrested, Tjibaou replied: ``It\'s always possible. It would be completely logical, since the government thinks there is no political claim but only a terrorist band.\'\' Authorities had imposed a near total news blackout for several days, cut communications with Ouvea and would not allow journalists to go there. The Melanesian kidnappers had demanded negotiations toward independence for New Caledonia, the French Pacific island territory. Fifteen of the gendarmes had been held since they were kidnapped from a police station on Ouvea April 22. Four gendarmes were killed in that attack. Legorjus and seven other hostages were seized April 27 as they sought to negotiate the release of the other hostages. The militants were demanding that French troops be removed from Ouvea and that a mediator be sent to arrange a referendum on independence for New Caledonia, a French territory since 1853. They also had demanded the cancellation of elections, which took place during scattered violence April 24. As a result of that election, Mitterrand and Chirac will face each other in a presidential runoff election in France on Sunday. New Caledonia has become an issue in the campaign. Of New Caledonia\'s 145,000 inhabitants, 43 percent are native Melanesian, known as Kanaks, most of whom desire independence. European settlers make up 36 percent of the population, with the rest Asian and Polynesian. This group generally would prefer to remain part of France.\r\n'),(486,2,'Here is a brief economic rundown of the countries collectively referred to as Eastern Europe:\r\n'),(487,2,'Two Navy jets collided over the Atlantic on Thursday, killing one pilot and injuring the other, authorities said. The planes were taking part in an exercise around noon when the accident occurred 70 miles southeast of Jacksonville, the Navy said. The pilot killed was flying a single-engine A-4F attack jet from Oceana Naval Air Station in Virginia, said Bert Byers, a spokesman for Cecil Field Naval Air Station. The pilot\'s identity was not immediately released. The other pilot, Cmdr. David R. Miller, 39, of Orange Park, was rescued and was reported to be alert and talking at a hospital. Miller was flying a twin-engine, single-seat FA-18 Hornet, a strike fighter. The cause of the accident is under investigation.\r\n'),(488,2,'The first all-woman team to strike out for the South Pole hopes to return from the stark polar laboratory with valuable data on how women react to extreme cold and monotony. ``For us, it\'s not just a ski rally. We are trying to complete a science project,\'\' Soviet expedition member Irina Gureva said Monday. ``We strongly believe that women can live in the South Pole and, alongside men, can carry out scientific research.\'\' The expedition of three Americans, one Japanese and 12 Soviets is scheduled to reach Antarctica on Nov. 23 to begin the 70-day, 800-mile trek on skis from the Soviet scientific station at Vostok to the South Pole. Along the way, scientists will gather data on the women\'s medical, biological and psychological reactions. ``The cold and wind will be something to contend with. The altitude is something we\'re not sure of,\'\' said Julie Hyde, an Outward Bound instructor in Ely, Minn. ``That\'s the kind of thing that makes me most apprehensive. The monotony of the vast whiteness is something I\'ve never experienced before.\'\' Some scientists have argued that previous cold weather research on men should stand for women, but the expedition\'s researhers aren\'t convinced. ``We don\'t know that there is a difference. But how can you say there are no differences unless you\'ve looked?\'\' asked Dolly Lefever, a nurse-midwife from Alaska who will be studying changes in the women\'s menstrual cycles. Studies by the Soviet scientists will be of greater scope. A team of doctors will test blood and other bodily fluids to determine how a woman\'s metabolism is affected by the extreme cold and physically demanding conditions. A psychologist also will monitor how the women handle isolation and interact with other team members. The expedition should hold fewer surprises for some of the Soviet members who participated in a 1988-89 Antarctic expedition. ``After returning to Moscow, we could not accept external disturbances. We became more sensitive to outside noises, loud voices, cars,\'\' Gureva said. Such research could give insight into other situations where people live in closed, isolated quarters for long periods, such as in space and in submarines. ``The expedition allows us to study the human stress factor in real circumstances,\'\' said Irina Solovyova, a Soviet psychologist and cosmonaut. Besides the scientific goals, the women also hope to bring attention to next year\'s International Antarctica Treaty signing, which will determine if the continent will remain a world park. ``We are hoping that Antarctica will remain as it is, not belonging to anyone. We hope that mining exploration there can be kept at a level that will keep Antarctica pristine,\'\' Hyde said. Some of the participants conceded that the length and dangers of the journey caused some stress in their families. Gureva said her 10-year-old daughter was at first upset by the separation but became enthusiastic about the trip after seeing stories about it in the Soviet press. ``I think it\'s useful for a child when their parents can fulfill something great in their life. I think it\'s a great example for them,\'\' Gureva said. ``As for husbands ... they are not very glad, but I think their love does not decrease.\'\'\r\n'),(489,2,'The U.S. dollar closed mixed Monday against other major foreign currencies in European trading. Gold prices, meanwhile, were little changed. Currency dealers said news of a major loss by West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl\'s conservative Christian Democractic Union party in two state elections Sunday boosted the dollar against the mark. ``The election outcome wasn\'t really favorable for the D-mark,\'\' said a trader at a large European bank in Frankfurt. ``It looks like the dollar has recovered a bit from last week\'s weakness.\'\' European markets, however, didn\'t react to news that U.S. business inventories were unchanged in March, dealers said. The economic indicator was fully in line with expectations, they added. Traders predicted quiet trading before the release, later in the week, of several other U.S. economic indicators. The Japanese yen continued to recoup major losses suffered earlier this year, dealers said. One trader said the more stable Japanese stock exchange justifies a stronger yen. In Tokyo, the dollar fell to a closing 153.35 Japanese yen from 154.15 yen at Friday\'s close. Later, in London, it fell to 152.75 yen. In London, the British pound was unchanged from Friday\'s close at $1.6817. By midday in New York it traded at $1.68025. Other late dollar rates in Europe, compared with late Friday: 1.6442 West German marks, up from 1.6300; 1.3952 Swiss francs, down from 1.3955; 5.5430 French francs, up from 5.5096; 1.8472 Dutch guilders, up from 1.8330; 1,209.75 Italian lire, up from 1,200.40; and 1.1767 Canadian dollars, down from 1.1783. Selected midday dollar rates in New York, included: 152.845 Japanese yen, 1.6470 West German marks, 1.39475 Swiss francs, 1,209.60 Italian lire, and 1.17575 Canadian dollars. Gold bullion dealers said gold was locked in a narrow range and they predicted trading volume would remain thin. Gold rose in London to a late bid price of $369.75 a troy ounce, up from $369.05 bid late Friday. In Zurich, gold fell to $368.75 an ounce, down from $368.80 Friday. Earlier, in Hong Kong, gold fell 0.97 cents to close at a bid $369.10 an ounce. Silver bullion rose in London to a late bid price of $5.09 a troy ounce, up from $5.06 Friday.\r\n'),(490,2,'Czechoslovakia began talks today with the Soviet Union on the withdrawal of about 75,000 Soviet troops, and one source said Czechoslovak officials want at least half of the force out by May. On the eve of the talks, about 6,000 people protested in the town of Pohorany, demanding the entire Soviet force leave by Aug. 21 _ the 22nd anniversary of the Soviet-led invasion that crushed the Prague Spring reforms. Foreign Ministry spokesman Lubos Dobrovsky said last week that the Soviet forces should leave Czechoslovakia by the end of the year. ``The idea is to have them (Soviets) make a political commitment during these talks that all the troops will leave by the end of the year,\'\' the source said on condition of anonymity. ``The rough idea of the time frame on the Czechoslovak side is to see a 50 to 60 percent withdrawal by mid-May,\'\' the source said, adding the talks should focus on technical details of the pullout as well as its precise timing. No details emerged from the talks, led by Deputy Foreign Minister Evzen Vacek and his Soviet counterpart, Ivan Aboimov. The source said demands for the complete withdrawal before Aug. 21 were ``technically out of the question.\'\' He noted it took a year to withdraw 5,300 soldiers, 708 tanks and 200 planes from Czechoslovakia in 1989 as part of a Kremlin move to withdraw about 50,000 troops from Eastern Europe. A peaceful revolution in November and December toppled the hard-line Communist government. Dissident playwright Vaclav Havel is now president and Alexander Dubcek, the former Communist Party chief who sponsored many of the Prague Spring reforms in 1968, is head of Parliament. In another development today, a South Korean government delegation arrived in Prague to discuss establishing diplomatic relations, the state CTK news agency reported. The delegation was invited by the Foreign Ministry, CTK said. South Korea, which is staunchly anti-Communist, has established formal diplomatic ties with Hungary, Poland and Yugoslavia in recent months. In December, South Korea and Czechoslovakia agreed to open trade offices in each other\'s countries.\r\n'),(491,2,'Gov. Roy Romer on Friday reluctantly recommended a permit for a dam that would guarantee a water supply for the growing metropolitan area at the cost of flooding a scenic canyon. ``Colorado should build Two Forks, in my judgment, only as a last resort,\'\' the governor told a packed news conference at the state Capitol. The proposed Two Forks dam and reservoir southwest of Denver would flood Cheesman Canyon, which Romer would like to see preserved as a state recreational area. ``I am challenging the state to find an alternate solution,\'\' said Romer, who attached attached several conditions to his recommendation and said he favored building a smaller dam and reservoir at Estabrook. Romer said the Two Forks permit was ``an insurance policy\'\' for metropolitan Denver to be used only if other water sources and conservation proved insufficient, which he said is unlikely. ``We do not need to sacrifice that canyon in order to have water,\'\' the governor said. The dam project was proposed by the Denver Water Board and a consortium of 42 metropolitan area water providers and municipalities. Proponents have portrayed the project as crucial to metropolitan growth. They project that the region\'s population will grow from its present 1.5 million to 2.5 million by 2035, outstripping its supply of water. Environmentalists and sportsmen say the project would needlessly wipe out 20 miles of trout fishing and recreation, and would threaten whooping crane habitat and irrigators along the Platte River in Nebraska. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers must decide whether to issue a permit, and is accustomed to considering a governor\'s recommendation as an important factor. At the Corps of Engineers district office in Omaha, Col. Steven G. West said Romer\'s statement was ``one of great importance in the Corps\' decision,\'\' which he expected in late summer or early fall. The 615-foot-high dam and 300-foot-deep reservoir would be built downstream from the confluence of the South Platte River and its North Fork, about 25 miles southwest of Denver. If permits for the project were issued immediately, it could be ready for use in 1995, providing 98,000 acre-feet of water to the area, officials have said. One acre-foot is about 325,000 gallons. Romer said he would recommend a 25-year shelf life for the project, meaning it could be built anytime during that period. Romer pegged his approval on several conditions, including the creation of a metropolitan-area water conservation program and a Metropolitan Water Authority to plan distribution of water supplies. He also would require a plan to replace lost wildlife habitat and recreational facilities if Two Forks is built. He also said he would seek a full study of his proposal to build a smaller dam and reservoir at Estabrook, about 20 miles west of Two Forks up the North Fork. ``Handing the decision over the Legislature to save the canyon is a cop-out,\'\' said Carse Pustmueller, Platte River coordinator for the National Audubon Society. ``We\'re extremely pleased that the governor endorsed the issuance of permits and the 25-year shelf life for Two Forks,\'\' said Ed Pokorney of the Denver Water Department. Nebraska Gov. Kay Orr said Romer appeared to want to have it both ways. ``Gov. Romer, I think, has been acknowldedged as somebody who is a great compromiser,\'\' she said. ``But with his statement today, I\'d say he is a great fence-straddler.\'\'\r\n'),(492,2,'The Soviets are expanding naval facilities in the Syrian port of Tartus and the neighboring island of Arwad to counter the U.S. presence in the Mediterranean, Israeli analysts said today. The Soviet Union\'s installations in Tartus include submarine and surface ship maintenance facilities and constitute the largest Soviet naval base in the Mediterranean, said Dore Gold of Tel Aviv University\'s Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies. According to Aharon Levran, editor of The Middle East Military Balance published this week by the center, the facilities extend to Arwad island and include recreation facilities for Soviet crews. Gold said there was no declassified information available on the current or planned size of the Soviet base but said the general trend has been one of expansion at least since 1987. In addition, the Soviets use land installations in Syria for naval and air intelligence-gathering, the two analysts said in separate interviews with The Associated Press. Gold said that the main objective of the Tartus base expansion was to counter the presence of the U.S. 6th Fleet in the Mediterranean. The Soviets had to find new arrangements in the region after Albania shifted its alliance to China in 1961 and Egypt abrogated its friendship treaty with Moscow in 1976, he said. He said the Tartus facility was important for prolonged deployment of Soviet attack submarines in the Mediterranean. In an article published today in the English-language daily Jerusalem Post, Gold noted that the London-based Jane\'s Defense Weekly in May referred to Tartus as ``the primary maintenance facility for Soviet submarines operating in the Mediterranean.\'\' Levran said the Soviets have been using Tartus for at least five years and that the base\'s expansion apparently was a price Syria had to pay for purchasing Soviet weapons. In spite of the Kremlin\'s recent reluctance to supply Syria with advanced weapons systems, he said, ``Syria is still the Soviet Union\'s strategic asset in the Middle East.\'\' He said the base replaced the Soviet practice of using Mediterranean Squadron\'s mother-ships for maintenance. But he said the base was less important than the recently developed Soviet Far Eastern base in Cam Ranh Bay, Vietnam. Syria\'s navy, Levran wrote in the 1987-88 Middle East Military Balance, ``underwent a radical facelift\'\' due to supplies, training and maintenance cooperation from the Soviet Union. The Soviet base in Tartus could ``create a problem\'\' for Israel in wartime because Israel may be reluctant to harm a Soviet-flagged facility, he said.\r\n'),(493,2,'The Senate Foreign Relations Committee voted 12-4 Thursday for a bill that would impose sanctions on Iraq because of human rights violations. The measure said the Iraqi government has ``systematically detained, tortured and executed\'\' thousands of citizens, depopulated Kurdish areas of the country and murdered and tortured children to punish their parents. The fate of the bill in the Senate is uncertain. The Bush administration has opposed the measure. The legislation would require the United States to oppose any lending to Iraq by international financial institutions and bar U.S. government credits to the country. That would cost Iraq $200 million a year in credits through the Export-Import Bank as well as even larger amounts in loan guarantees used to buy U.S. farm products.\r\n'),(494,2,'The White House said today its naval barricade of Iraqi ships is taking hold as the United States and its allies squeeze Saddam Hussein economically so the Iraqis cannot ``maintain their war machine.\'\' The Bush administration said bluntly today that even food would be withheld from Iraq. ``You don\'t give them the essentials that enable them to carry on the war,\'\' White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater said. In Saudi Arabia, where American troops are building a massive defense against any further Iraqi aggression, the acting chief of staff for U.S. troop operations told reporters, ``I think our position grows stronger with each day that goes by.\'\' As Maj. Gen. Don L. Kaufman spoke, the steady drone of planes brought more soldiers and hardware to the Saudi desert. Kaufman said planes were landing virtually every 10 minutes or so with their military cargo. On the economic front, Fitzwater said the sanctions endorsed by the United Nations are hurting Baghdad. ``The purpose of the embargo is to put the pinch of them,\'\' Fitzwater said in Kennebunkport, where President Bush is vacationing. ``We assess the impact of the embargo as excellent.\'\' He said the White House had ``obvious humanitarian concerns\'\' about prohibiting food imports into Iraq. But he added: ``The purpose of the sanctions and the embargo is to put the pinch on them. It seems fairly obvious to me you don\'t let foodstuffs and other things go in that are subject to the sanctions. The purpose is not to let supplies go in that allow them to maintain the war machine, allow them to maintain their aggressive takeover of Kuwait.\'\' Asked about reports that Jordan was allowing Iraqi shipments through, Fitzwater said, ``We are hopeful that Jordan will comply. They have said they will abide by the sanctions.\'\' Fitzwater also said the White House reported ``two or three ships in recent hours that have turned away or been turned away or at least have otherwise not landed with their cargo.\'\' An Iraqi tanker tried to dock at a Saudi terminal to take on oil, but was turned away by Saudi officials, diplomatic sources in the region reported. Bush and his top aides are avoiding the word ``blockade\'\' to describe a U.S. decision to use whatever means necessary to choke off Iraq\'s oil trade and imports of other goods, including food. But their intention was clear. ``I consider interdiction of shipping to be in accord\'\' with United Nations economic sanctions, Bush told reporters Sunday. ``No point getting into all these semantics. The main thing is to stop the oil from coming out of there and that is what we\'re going to do.\'\' Diplomatic sources at the oil terminal near Yanbu, Saudi Arabia, said the Iraqi tanker al-Qadissiyah, which could carry up to 900,000 barrels of oil, failed in its attempt to moor Sunday night because three tug boats that normally would help have been taken out of the water. The sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the tanker sailed away today, after its apparent attempt to defy a U.S. declaration that its warships would enforce a U.N. embargo aimed at forcing Iraq\'s Saddam Hussein to give up his forced annexation of Kuwait. Prince Bandar Bin Sultan, the Saudi ambassador to Washington, said on ``Good Morning America\'\' that Saddam should not try to make the Israeli territories a part of the Kuwait crisis. ``He is mixing the issues,\'\' the ambassador said. ``That is not an excuse for an Arab country to go an invade another Arab country.\'\' The United States intensified its military fortification of Saudi Arabia and the surrounding seas over the weekend, sending in Marine and Army air assault troops and shipping Patriot surface-to-air missiles and other sophisticated air-deployed weapons to the region. Sources who disclosed the movements said Pentagon planners assumed that, in the event of an Iraqi attack, an initial air battle could be decisive. The commander of the U.S. military action, Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf, briefed reporters at MacDill Air Force Base in Florida on the logistical difficulties of transporting troops and backup equipment 7,000 miles by air and 12,000 miles by sea. Schwarzkopf said the Iraqis are ``dug in right now for a strong defense.\'\' ``We have built up a great deal of force over there now ... and if they do make an attack they are going to pay a price for it,\'\' he said. Schwarzkopf said troops would be on guard against terrorists as well as Iraqi guns and gas. An estimated 50,000 troops are committed to Saudi Arabia in the initial deployment, with contingency plans for a force up to 250,000. ``I would never tell you that the American forces that are there are 100 percent out of harm\'s way,\'\' the general said. Indeed, the Pentagon reported the first casualty of the military action on Sunday. Air Force Staff Sgt. John Campisi, a 30-year-old aircraft mechanic from Covina, Calif., was klled when he was hit by a truck on a darkened runway. While soldiers took up their stations in the Saudi deserts, the White House pressed forward with its economic isolation of Iraq. Secretary of State James A. Baker III said the United States would begin ``almost instantly\'\' to ``take measures that are necessary and proportionate in order to enforce the (United Nations) sanctions.\'\' Asked if the United States was mounting a naval blockade, Baker _ appearing on ABC-TV\'s ``This Week With David Brinkley,\'\' _ said: ``Let\'s simply say that we now have the ability, the legal basis for interdicting those kinds of shipments.\'\' He declined to use the word blockade. Bush, vacationing in Kennebunkport, Maine, said the U.N.-approved embargo ``gave us broad authority, working in conjunction with others, to do whatever is necessary to see no oil goes out.\'\' Asked if the United States would block shipments of food as well as oil, the president said, ``Just watch. Everything.\'\' The Washington Post today quoted a senior administration official as saying, ``We will fire on a ship if it won\'t stop. We\'ll do the usual things _ warn them off, fire a shot across the bow. But if it comes to that, there is no question what we will do.\'\' The U.S. pledge to stop the flow of goods in and out of Iraq came after Kuwait\'s exiled leader, Sheik Jaber Alahmed Al-Saba, asked that the United States take steps to ensure the U.N. economic sanctions take hold. As the Bush administration vowed to quarantine Iraq, Saddam, in a statement read by a spokesman on television in Baghdad, urged his people to prepare for hardships that may result from the international economic sanctions. He also linked any Iraqi withdrawal from Kuwait to an Israeli withdrawal from the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip and a Syrian withdrawal from Lebanon. Israel seized the occupied territories from Egypt and Jordan in 1967. The White House ``categorically\'\' rejected Saddam\'s proposals, press secretary Marlin Fitzwater said, calling them ``another attempt at distracting from Iraq\'s isolation and at imposing a new status quo.\'\' Only the unconditional withdrawal of Iraqi forces from Kuwait will satisfy the United States, he said.\r\n'),(495,2,'Swift criticism Friday did not keep Education Secretary Lauro Cavazos from repeating his assertion that students who don\'t speak English are not ready for public education. ``Parental involvement and language competency are basic,\'\' Cavazos told about 1,500 teachers and principals in this city on the Mexican border. ``If that child cannot speak English the first day of school, that child is not ready to learn.\'\' In a panel discussion later, South Texas superintendents criticized Cavazos, saying students were capable of learning in other languages. ``The comment that we heard this morning that students who are not speaking English are not ready to learn is a disabling comment,\'\' said Robert Zamora, superintendent of the La Joya school district. Later Friday, during a news conference across the border in Nuevo Laredo, Cavazos repeated the comment and added: ``We work with the parents, with the schools to prepare the youngsters in English so they will learn ... My final point that I always make is that they not forget that other language and that culture.\'\' Cavazos, former president of Texas Tech University, said he supports bilingual education, but that its goal should be encouraging students to speak English so they do not miss opportunities in the United States. It was not the first time Cavazos drew criticism from fellow Hispanics for his comments on Hispanic education. In April, the League of United Latin American Citizens criticized him for blaming Hispanic parents for the high dropout rate among their children. In March, he angered some Hispanic lawmakers when he told the state Legislature that money was not the answer to education problems. Cavazos repeated that stance Friday, saying that education could be improved by giving teachers more freedom and allowing local schools more control. ``The new bottom line in education is not how much do we need to spend by how much are our students learning,\'\' Cavazos said. He stressed that he was referring to public schools across the nation, not just in Texas, and acknowledged ``there have been some inequities\'\' in school finance in the state. In Nuevo Laredo, Cavazos and Mexican Education Secretary Manuel Bartlett Diaz signed an agreement calling for closer educational ties between the two countries. The agreement paves the way for a ``border conference\'\' on education next winter.\r\n'),(496,2,'Costa Rica and a group of U.S. banks signed an accord Saturday restructuring the Central American country\'s $1.8 billion commercial debt. The accord, which is expected to save Costa Rica $150 million a year, was signed by James Jardine of the Bank of America, and Eduardo Lizano of the Costa Rican Central Bank. Jardine acted as the representative of the creditor banks. President Oscar Arias hailed the agreement as an historic event that removes one of the main obstacles to his country\'s economic growth. Eduardo Lizano, president of the Central Bank, said earlier that under the agreement, Costa Rica will repurchase 64 percent of its commercial debt at 16 cents on the dollar. Costa Rica now will have until May 21 to pay $253 million to bring itself up to date in payments and repurchase the old debt. Costa Rica was one of the earliest countries to reach agreement in principle on new financing packages under a U.S. plan unveiled in March 1989 by Treasury Secretary Nicholas Brady. It focuses on enticing commercial banks to write off some of their loans to Third World nations or reduce the interest charged in return for guarantees that the remaining debt will be paid.\r\n'),(497,2,'Demonstrators protesting the United States\' ``interventionist conduct\'\' in Central American hurled paint bombs at the U.S. Consulate on Friday, and two people were arrested, police said. One policeman was slightly injured in scuffles that broke out during the incident. Police spokesman Klaas Wilting said about 200 people took part in the protest. He said one or two paint bombs hit the consulate building near Amsterdam\'s famous Rijksmuseum. A spokesman for the demonstrators said the protest was aimed at ``recent U.S. interventionist conduct in Nicaragua, Panama ... and an imminent action in El Salvador.\'\' The spokesman was referring to U.S. government support for the anti-Sandinista forces in Nicaragua and the U.S. invasion of Panama in December. In El Salvador, the United States backs the government in its civil war with leftist insurgents. The spokesman did not elaborate on his claim of ``imminent action\'\' in that country.\r\n'),(498,2,'A Coast Guard monitor on duty the night of the Exxon Valdez disaster testified today he could not have ordered the ship to change course even if he had seen it was headed for a rocky reef. Gordon Taylor said it would have taken the authority of a higher Coast Guard officer to order Joseph Hazelwood to make a course change. However, Taylor said the matter never became an issue because the Exxon Valdez vanished from his radar screen shortly before the accident. Taylor said he struggled to adjust the radar but could not bring the ship back into his viewing range. ``So when you left, it was off the screen, and you didn\'t see it anymore?\'\' asked Hazelwood attorney Dick Madson. ``That\'s correct,\'\' said Taylor, who went off duty at 11:45 p.m. on March 23. He said he notified the monitor who took over for him that the vessel was outbound but had disappeared from the radar. Madson has maintained that Taylor and Bruce Blandford, the monitor who replaced Taylor at the Coast Guard\'s Vessel Traffic System on the night of the Exxon Valdez disaster, were not watching the radar screen. Madson says if they had alerted Hazelwood that his ship was moving perilously close to jagged Bligh Reef, the accident never would have happened. Scoring a key legal point, Madson won permission to raise the Coast Guard responsiblity issue after Superior Court Judge Karl Johnstone initially vetoed the tactic. Johnstone reversed himself after considering case law on the issue. But the lawyer was barred from exploring another matter _ whether Taylor and Blandford were using drugs or alcohol on March 24 when the accident happened. Blood and urine tests administered between 15 hours and three days after the grounding showed that Blandford had a blood-alcohol level more than twice the legal limit for driving and Taylor showed a small quantity of marijuana in his system. Johnstone called the marijuana issue ``a red herring\'\' but said he would reconsider admitting the alcohol test if Madson can show its relevance. Blandford\'s alcohol reading of .203 was recorded 15 hours after the Exxon Valdez went aground in scenic Prince William Sound. Hazelwood, 43, of Huntington, N.Y., is being tried on a felony charge of second-degree criminal mischief and misdemeanor charges of reckless endangerment, negligent discharge of oil and operating a vessel while intoxicated. The maximum penalty for conviction on all counts is seven years, three months in prison and $61,000 in fines. Prosecution witnesses have said Hazelwood spent much of the day before the accident drinking vodka at a bar in the port town of Valdez. But his shipmates said Hazelwood didn\'t appear drunk and appeared in command of his ship. The 987-foot tanker, which ripped open on the rocky reef, spilled nearly 11 million gallons of Alaska crude oil, killing thousands of birds and other wildlife and blackening hundreds of miles of rocky coast. Exxon says the cleanup has cost $2 billion so far.\r\n'),(499,2,'The chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee says presidents should be sworn in earlier because the 2{ months between Election Day and Inauguration Day creates an unnecessary ``period of vulnerability.\'\' ``The incumbent president no longer has real political authority and the incoming president lacks constitutional authority, and the whole world knows it,\'\' Sen. Claiborne Pell, D-R.I., said Friday. ``It is a period of vulnerability which can and should be eliminated.\'\' In a Senate floor speech introducing a resolution for a constitutional amendment, Pell said the change would eliminate ``10 weeks of crippled leadership\'\' and avoid an ``unhealthy and unnecessary situation.\'\' The senator wants to move up Inauguration Day for the president and vice president from Jan. 20 to Nov. 20. The constitutional amendment also would move the swearing-in day for Congress from Jan. 3 to Nov. 15. Pell has introduced similar measures in the past. With time quickly running out in this session of Congress, action this year appears unlikely. From 1793 to 1933, the swearing in of new presidents took place March 4. The 20th Amendment pushed it back to Jan. 20 beginning in 1937. Pell, who introduced the resolution along with Sen. William V. Roth Jr., R-Del., said the move also would avoid `@lame duck\'\' administrations in which officials might be ``tempted to expend funds, make contracts and grants and promulgate regulations that may be either politically motivated or inspired by sheer self-interest.\'\' Pell said the development of voting machines and instant election result tabulations eliminates the justification for the long lag time between elections and inaugurations.\r\n'),(500,2,'An attorney for retired Ohio autoworker John Demjanjuk today challenged the admissibility of two photo lineups used to identify Demjanjuk as a sadistic death camp guard and convict him of Nazi war drimes. In his appeal before a five-judge Supreme Court panel, defense attorney Yoram Sheftel also attacked the trial court for failing to halt prejudicial press coverage of the trial. A three-judge panel in April 1988 found Demjanjuk, 70, guilty of committing crimes against humanity and crimes against Jews, and sentenced him to death. The trial judges accepted the testimony of survivors who identified the Ukrainian-born Demjanjuk with the help of photographs as ``Ivan the Terrible,\'\' who operated gas chambers at Treblinka death camp in Nazi-occupied Poland. More than 850,000 Jews perished there in 1942-43. Demjanjuk claims he is a victim of mistaken identity and that he was incarcerated in German POW camps after being captured while serving in the Soviet Red Army. Sheftel began the appeal Monday by challenging the Israeli court\'s jurisdiction to try an extradited suspect for war crimes and accusing the trial judges of being biased. He expanded on the bias argument today, blaming the judges for the emotional atmosphere surrounding the trial, including a Dec. 1, 1988, attack in which a Holocaust survivor threw acid in Sheftel\'s face at a funeral. Sheftel suffered an eye injury and still wears dark glasses as a result. He said the assault followed a spate of inflammatory press accounts of the trial. He cited an article that questioned his credibility and readiness as a Jew to defend an alleged Nazi collaborator. ``This was a bloodletting report,\'\' Sheftel said. ``The court didn\'t intercede or say anything. After such reports, the message is that such an action (attacking Sheftel) would be heroic.\'\' He also disputed the admissibility of two photograph lineups. Aided by the photos, eight Treblinka survivors singled out Demjanjuk as the notorious guard ``Ivan.\'\' Sheftel displayed a poster containing blowups of the lineups and said there were seven flaws in the identifiction process. One lineup involved a page containing eight photographs, including a 1951 shot of Demjanjuk that he had filed with his application for a U.S. immigration visa. The second included a disputed picture of Demjanjuk from a 1942 identity card that the Soviet Union supplied to Israel. It purportedly is from the Trawniki camp, which trained death camp guards. Sheftel has claimed the Trawniki document is a forgery. He said today the photographs were improperly shown to the survivors. Demjanjuk, for example, was never called for an in-person lineup, Sheftel argued. He noted rulings in both the United States and Israel that a suspect should participate in person in criminal indentificaton procedures. Only if a suspect refuses should photographs be used, Sheftel said. Another flaw, Sheftel said, was that none of the other head shots in either lineup resembled Demjanjuk. Hair color, shape and size of faces were clearly different. ``It is like putting a photograph of a black suspect among seven white men. Where have you heard of such a thing?\'\' Sheftel said. Demjanjuk, wearing a brown prison uniform, sat flanked by two police guards and listened grim-faced to the daylong proceedings. His wife, Vera, and his son, John Jr., watched from the front row. Asked about the appeal\'s chances, John Jr. said he was hopeful. ``They have the courage to make a decision based on the facts and the law, and the conviction will be overturned.\'\'\r\n'),(501,2,'Renewed worries about inflation and the Persian Gulf squeezed the financial markets Thursday, pushing stocks, bonds and the dollar lower. Gold and oil prices rose. The Dow Jones average of 30 industrial stocks fell 66.83 to 2,681.44, its lowest close since the Mideast crisis began. Stocks declining in price outnumbered advancing ones by about 4 to 1 in nationwide trading of New York Stock Exchange-listed stocks. Analysts blamed a worse-than-expected government report on inflation and disappointing news about the Iraq-U.S. standoff. The Dow index dropped about 20 points after the Labor Department reported that consumer prices rose 0.4 percent, higher than the 0.3 percent most economists expected. Meanwhile, Iraqi President Saddam Hussein charged that President Bush has lied to the American people about the Middle East situation, and warned there would be American deaths in the region if the United States continues to intervene. Also, President Bush met with Jordan\'s King Hussein, but afterward the king said he had not made up his mind about complying with a United Nations embargo of Iraq. In addition, the king said he did not carry a letter from the Iraqi leader to Bush, as was previously reported. ``The market was expecting something positive from the meeting,\'\' said Yuichi Abe, a vice president in the New York office of Nikko Securities Co. International Inc. In the credit markets, interest rates rose and prices fell in nervous trading. The Treasury\'s key 30-year bond fell 1 23-32 points, or $17.19 per $1,000 in face amount. The bond\'s yield jumped to 8.92 percent from 8.76 percent late Wednesday. It was the highest yield since it flirted with 9 percent in early May. ``What you\'re looking at here are straight worries about inflation,\'\' said Lincoln Anderson, an economist for Bear Stearns & Co., a Wall Street investment firm. ``The CPI report was not a good one.\'\' Bond investors generally sell on bad inflation news because higher prices erode the value of fixed-income investments. In the oil market, the September contract for U.S. crude closed up 90 cents at $27.36 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, mostly on disappointment over King Hussein\'s mission. Crude oil\'s recent rise had stalled earlier in the week on news that King Hussein would meet with Bush and initiate a peaceful solution to the Gulf situation. The dollar, which seems to have lost some of its allure as a safe haven, tumbled to an all-time low against the German mark during U.S. trading. The dollar was quoted at 1.5525 marks in late New York trading, down from 1.566 marks late Wednesday and from 1.5645 marks Tuesday, the previous low in the modern mark\'s 42-year history. Gold prices moved in the other direction, rising $6.60 an ounce to $409.20 on the Commodity Exchange in New York.\r\n'),(502,2,'Winter wheat planted last fall for harvest this summer is in ``mostly good to fair\'\' condition in some of the nation\'s major production areas, a government report said Tuesday. The Joint Agricultural Weather Facility said wheat during the week of Feb. 29 through March 6 was not quite in such good shape in the northern Great Plains, Delta and Rocky Mountain states, however. ``Snow cover was virtually nonexistent in the central and northern Great Plain and Rocky Mountain states, but mild temperatures kept damage at a minimum,\'\' the report said. ``Snow, preceding freezing temperatures, prevented severe winter damage to small grain (including wheat) in eastern Kansas, northern Oklahoma, Illinois, Missouri, Indiana and Ohio.\'\' Crop development by early March ranged from greening in Colorado to jointing of plants in Mississippi and Oklahoma, and heading in Arizona, the report said. The facility is operated by the departments of Commerce and Agriculture. Reports do not forecast actual production of crops, only the condition of fields and plants.\r\n'),(503,2,'Some 2,200 registered nurses from six hospitals will return to work this week after ending a four-week strike that at one point involved 4,000 nurses from eight hospitals, union officials said. Of the 1,200 California Nurses Association members who voted Sunday, 77 percent approved a new contract, which offers a 21 percent wage increase over 34 months. The pact differs little from one rejected 11 days ago. The nurses are set to return to work on Wednesday, said CNA spokeswoman Maureen Anderson. Although 10 other hospitals were unaffected by the walkout, hundreds of patients were inconvenienced as some of the struck medical facilities closed emergency rooms, delayed surgeries and consolidated many other services. While many nurses weren\'t elated with the agreement, they said they demonstrated labor solidarity. ``We\'ve put this message out to the hospitals: That nurses are serious about the issues facing them and we intend to be listened to,\'\' said Mary Scheib, a CNA nurse at Mt. Zion Hospital. ``We\'re going to be continuing our efforts (to improve pay and working conditions) when we go back to work,\'\' she added. ``Today is really day one of organizing for 1991, when the contract expires.\'\' A proposed CNA contract voted down Aug. 19 by a 2-1 margin offered 20 percent over 36 months. CNA went into the strike Aug. 2 demanding a 21 percent wage increase over two years. Karen Henry, chief negotiator for Affiliated Hospitals, the group representing the affected medical facilities, said Sunday that the CNA contract ``accomplished the hospitals\' bargaining objectives.\'\' She defined that mainly as avoiding large pay raises in a two-year period. Under the CNA contract, a dayshift nurse at top scale will make $21.99 an hour by the end of the contract, or $45,700 annually. The 1,700 members of Local 250 of the Hospital and Health Care Workers Union, who went on strike July 26, began returning to work Wednesday. They walked out mainly over health benefits. CNA\'s negotiating committee unanimously endorsed the latest contract. The latest proposal was an unsolicited offer submitted Friday to Affiliated. The two sides had not met at the bargaining table for nearly a week. CNA nurses struck at Children\'s, Marshal Hale, St. Mary\'s, St. Francis and Mount Zion hospitals in San Francisco and Seton Medical Center in Daly City. Local 250 accepted a contract last week that provides up to 6 percent pay raises for nurses and some other hospital workers over two years. Some other workers will not receive raises, but bonuses ranging up to $300 by the end of the contract. About 100 nurses and service workers remain on strike at French Hospital, where talks have been held separately. A settlement there is expected to be routine.\r\n'),(504,2,'The former Armed Forces Radio disc jockey portrayed by Robin Williams in the hit movie ``Good Morning, Vietnam\'\' says Hollywood distorted his original idea for a screenplay and his life. ``No, I did not try to meet girls on street corners. No, I did not teach American slang to the Vietnamese. No, I was not thrown out of Vietnam and to my knowledge, no Vietnamese friends of mine were Viet Cong,\'\' Adrian Cronauer told students Wednesday at Mississippi State University. But he praised Williams\' performance, which has been nominated for an Academy Award. Cronauer, 49, a law student at the University of Pennslyvania, bellowed ``Goooood Mooooorning, Vietnam\'\' at the beginning of his popular ``Dawn Buster\'\' 1965 Saigon radio show. His trademark sign-on was adopted by succeeding Saigon DJs, including ``Wheel Of Fortune\'\' host Pat Sajak.\r\n'),(505,2,'Northwest Airlines is offering flight attendants two free first-class tickets anywhere in the world for reporting as scheduled for holiday duty. It\'s an attempt to cut down on sick calls over the holidays. In a recent letter to workers, Northwest in-flight services chief Lloyd Warren thanked flight attendants in advance for reporting for holiday duty. And as ``a token of our thanks,\'\' Warren said, two free round-trip tickets in first-class seating would be given to flight attendants who report as scheduled between Dec. 15 and Jan. 1. Northwest employs more than 8,000 flight attendants. To qualify, workers must be scheduled for flights on Dec. 24, Dec. 25, Dec. 31 or Jan. 1. Service charges that normally accompany worker flight-pass privileges would be waived. Northwest spokesman Doug Miller said that last year, flight attendants were offered a $100 cash bonus for working through the holidays. Miller said the offer does not reflect a problem with holiday sick leave in the ranks of flight attendants. ``It\'s just that when we\'re in crunch time like we are around the holidays, every single person is key to our success,\'\' he said.\r\n'),(506,2,'A lament by Connecticut\'s poet laureate about his village grocery store may have lost the store. ``November Ode,\'\' a poem by James Merrill, winner of the Pulitzer Prize, has won him some admirers in the old center of this eastern Connecticut community, but also the animosity of the grocer and others who found his portrayal unfair. Merrill said his work was, in many ways, a generalized commentary on how community life everywhere has declined with the disappearance of small neighborhood stores and shops. While several people called him to say how the poem ``expressed their own feelings\'\' about life in Stonington, Merrill said the controversy has left him ``wondering if I shouldn\'t go back to incomprehensibility, which I have been accused of.\'\' To those who live in Stonington borough, which has fewer than 3,000 residents, there is no mistaking the ``dear dim local grocery\'\' mentioned unflatteringly in the poem. It is Roland\'s Market, the borough\'s last grocery. There are also other references to life in the borough, which was established in 1752 and is part of the town. Once a fishing village and major port, its late 18th- and early 19th-century homes and shops have been rehabilitated and there are a number of antique stores for visitors. Ronald Albamonti, 39, is the first to admit that life is changing in the borough, and that at the market, ``things just haven\'t been the same\'\' since his father, Roland, died last year and he took over. But he said he was deeply hurt by Merrill\'s poem, which he views as a personal attack. The poem reads, in part: ``The son picked to succeed him never lived up to the seigneurial old man. Yet his clientele kept brightly toeing the line of least resistance, taking with a grain of salt (Aisle 3) all talk of heavy drugs and light women, closing Republican eyes to dead mouse and decimated shelves, the padded statement ...\'\' With three large supermarkets within 12 miles of the borough, Albamonti said he decided to make Roland\'s more like a deli than a full-service grocery. The poem was the final straw for Albamonti. Gauging that the public generally shared the sentiments expressed by Merrill, Albamonti said he reached a tenative agreement this week to sell the business and the property. If the store is closed and the two-story building used for another purpose, Merrill\'s poem, written a year ago and published last month in The New York Review of Books, will have proven itself to be prophetic: ``Plainer than day was how, next summer, this prime square footage would be developed in the usual way.\'\' Merrill, who lives only two blocks from Roland\'s Market but hasn\'t been back to the store since the poem controversy erupted, moved to Stonington from New York City in the 1950s, partly to be part of a small community. At Keane\'s newstand a block from Roland\'s Market, Francis Keane, 78, who has been selling newspapers in the borough for 50 years, said some customers thought Merrill had been unfair in his criticism of Ronald Albamonti. At the same time, he said he agreed Merrill was right when he spoke of the decline of community life. ``It was a reflection of what is happening in small towns. It is a different environment now. Years ago everybody was more friendly and stayed in town. Now they come here just to sleep and eat and then go off in their cars to work,\'\' he said.\r\n'),(507,2,'With memories still fresh of a bridge collapsing into a rushing creek and killing 10 people, Gov. Mario Cuomo is asking voters to approve the biggest bond issue in New York history to repair roads. The $3 billion bond issue on the ballot Nov. 8 comes five years after voters agreed to Cuomo\'s proposal to borrow $1.25 billion to ``rebuild New York.\'\' With the money from the earlier bond issue due to run out in March, New York has 1,600 miles of highway deemed to be in poor condition by its inspectors, 660 miles of roads too small to handle the traffic and 7,400 bridges rated unacceptable. ``Everybody concedes the need,\'\' said Cuomo. ``I hear no one arguing (against) the absolute necessity of investing billions and billions of dollars in our roads and bridges.\'\' A coalition of construction and labor officials supporting the bond issue is reminding voters of the April 1987 collapse of the New York State Thruway bridge over the rushing Schoharie Creek west of Albany. ``Where will you be the next time the worst case happens?\'\' asks one TV commercial. Conservative rural upstate politicians, the New York chapter of the American Automobile Association and the New York Farm Bureau are among the opponents of the bond issue. They agree roads are in disrepair but are pressing for a pay-as-you-go system with New York dedicating all highway, gasoline and automobile-related taxes and fees to road construction and repair. ``Borrowing begets borrowing,\'\' said James McGowan, vice president of the 1.8 million-member state AAA. ``The \'83 bond issue begat the \'88 bond issue. Then where do we go? The next logical step is for a $7.5 billion bond issue in 1992 and then maybe a $15 billion bond issue in 1995. That\'s the way we\'re going.\'\' Cuomo has told New Yorkers that if enough of them don\'t vote ``yes\'\' in November, they may face an increase of as much as 20 cents on New York\'s 8-cent-per-gallon gasoline tax to pay for needed highway work. AAA officials contend taxes will have to be raised anyway. ``The enormous costs of the debt service from the bonds are going to have be borne by somebody,\'\' said McGowan.\r\n'),(508,2,'Researchers have discovered small quantities of a radioactive substance in material dredged from Savannah Harbor about 100 miles downstream from the Savannah River Plant. Cesium 137, a radioactive isotope, was found in material taken from the harbor and dumped on the South Carolina side of the Savannah River, which forms the border with Georgia. Tests found tiny amounts of the material, insufficient to create a health hazard, The Charleston News & Courier reported today. The tests were done for the South Carolina Wildlife and Marine Resources Department by researchers at the University of Georgia. The wildlife agency is sampling dredged material for pollutants because of water quality problems believed to be caused by industrial discharges into the river, agency officials said. Cesium 137 is produced as a byproduct of nuclear fission, and is generally associated with radioactive waste. It emits beta and gamma radiation, both of which can produce a variety of ill effects, depending on the dosage. Lou Gordell, acting director of the U.S. Department of Energy\'s environmental division at the nuclear plant, said he had not been informed of the study results, but acknowledged Monday that the material probably originated at the Savannah nuclear plant. The complex near Aiken produces the radioactive materials plutonium and tritium for nuclear weapons. The government-owned plant has been under scrutiny in recent months since it was revealed that a series of accidents at the site over the past 30 years went unreported to the public. Gordell said sediment tests in Savannah Harbor for a 1984 study showed traces of Cesium 137, and that recent monitoring upstream found similar traces both in the water and river sediment. Much of the material leaked from SRP apparatus in the 1950s, but some is the result of continued discharge into the river, Gordell said. The level of contamination is far below EPA\'s maximum allowable level for drinking water, he said. Savannah and Beaufort-Jasper counties pump water from the Savannah River for drinking water. Traces of tritium also are found in the river, but also are below the maximum allowable levels, Gordell said. Cesium 137, with a half-life of 30 years, persists in the environment longer than tritium, with a half-life of 12 years. A half-life is the time it takes half the atoms of a radioactive material to disintegrate. The Savannah Harbor is periodically dredged by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to maintain its depth for the port of Savannah.\r\n'),(509,2,'The Soviet Union has notified the United States it is destroying radar facilities at Gomel that President Reagan told Congress violated a superpower arms control treaty, the State Department said Wednesday. However, the installation at Krasnoyarsk remains in dispute. Department spokesman Charles E. Redman again called for its destruction. Redman said the United States would not reciprocate for the Soviet decision on Gomel. ``A violation is a violation,\'\' he said. Reagan claimed in his report to Congress last week that portable equipment had been moved to the Byelorussian city in violation of the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. The treaty limits U.S. and Soviet radar on the theory a nuclear attack is less likely to be launched if devastating retaliation would follow. Redman said destruction of the Gomel radar ``when fully carried out and verified will satisfy our concerns regarding the illegal deployment of these radars.\'\' The Soviets informed the United States that destruction of the Gomel installation began last Friday, according to a U.S. official who spoke only on condition of anonymity. Redman said the Soviet decision underscored the importance of continuing the Reagan administration\'s policy ``of firmness\'\' with regard to Soviet treaty violations. ``However,\'\' Redman said, ``the more crucial issue of the Soviet violation at Krasnoyarsk remains unresolved. The Krasnoyarsk radar is a significant violation of a central element of the ABM treaty, which will continue to make it impossible for the US to conclude any future strategic arms agreements.\'\' The two sides had agreed in Geneva last month to resume work on a treaty o sharply reduce long-range nuclear bombers, missiles and submarines. Redman rejected again a Soviet proposal to turn the Krasnoyarsk installation in Siberia into an international space research facility. ``It would not remove the treaty-prohibited radar capability,\'\' he said. ``Nor would it restore the lead time\'\' the Reagan administration contends Krasnoyarsk would provide for mounting a defense against U.S. ballistic missiles. ``What the Soviets propose would allow them to move forward with work on the illegal radar, with no guarantees that the `international scientists\' could not be expelled at a moment\'s notice,\'\' Redman said.\r\n'),(510,2,'U.S. Commerce Secretary C. William Verity on Thursday voiced opposition to suggestions that the Soviet Union should be allowed to join an international trade organization. But Verity said the U.S. government\'s opposition to Soviet participation in the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) could change as the Soviet Union moves toward a market-oriented economy. Some American businessmen supported admitting the Soviets to the group. Verity spoke at a news conference after signing a protocol endorsing joint Soviet-American business ventures. In September 1986, the United States led the opposition to a Soviet effort to join GATT, a 95-nation group that sets international trading rules. ``It would be inappropriate, perhaps impossible, to make any progress if the Soviet Union was a member of GATT,\'\' Verity said. But he added that ``in time, as the Soviet Union moves towards a market economy, that would be different.\'\' Verity said Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev\'s ``perestroika,\'\' or restructuring program, is designed ``to move the Soviet economy toward a market economy, and that is important to the Soviet side and to all other nations of the world who would like to see movement in that direction.\'\' Verity\'s trip to Moscow comes in advance of President Reagan\'s five-day visit to the Soviet capital scheduled to begin May 29. Trade frequently comes up during summit talks with Gorbachev, who wants access to American technology and services to help improve his country\'s ailing economy. Verity and Alexander I. Kachanov, Soviet first deputy minister of foreign economic relations, signed a protocol adding joint ventures to the types of cooperation encouraged by a 1974 trade agreement. Verity\'s three days of talks with Kachanov coincided with a Moscow meeting of the U.S.-U.S.S.R. Trade and Economic Council, which attracted more than 400 American businessmen. Seven major U.S. companies said Wednesday they formed a consortium to work out business deals with the Soviets. Another company, Honeywell Inc., announced a joint venture on Monday to supply automated production controls for Soviet fertilizer factories. Verity said he stressed to Soviet officials that improvements in trade depended on Soviet easing of emigration restrictions. He said the Soviets had agreed to ``marketing glasnost,\'\' using the Russian word for openness that characterizes Gorbachev\'s drive for freer expression.\r\n'),(511,2,'Nov. 24 The Capital Times, Madison, Wis., on Congress: Here\'s a saga of pettiness and arrogance run amok. Last February, the in-house magazine of the National Park Service contained a column by the agency\'s legislative specialist. The column began by needling Congress for raising its members\' pay. That offended the congressional staff member who handles the agency\'s budget. When Park Service officials learned that Neal Sigmon of the House Appropriations Interior subcommittee was upset, they went out of their way to apologize to him. A lot of good it did them. When the House and Senate worked out a compromise version of the Interior appropriations bill for the coming year, $75,000 was deleted from the Park Service budget - the $75,000 allocated for publishing the magazine. On the record, everyone claims to be mystified by the deletion. Off the record, one congressional staff member said, ``From time to time, signals are sent to agencies when they\'ve been bad.\'\' It did not seem to matter whether or not the in-house newsletter served a useful function in communicating with Park Service employees who, of course, are scattered all across the country. All that mattered was that a congressional staff member felt that congressional pride had been wounded. --- Nov. 22 Roswell (N.M.) Daily Record on Congress: Despite all the talk about American voters throwing the bums out of Congress on Nov. 6, fully 96 percent of House members and 97 percent of senators who sought re-election were victorious. ... Members of Congress are so entrenched that there literally is more turnover in the Supreme Soviet. And this undemocratic situation will continue as long as big money corrupts the electoral process. ... The cleanest way to put an end to vote buying by special interests is to outlaw political action committee contributions in federal elections. If a flat ban proves to be unconstitutional, there should at least be strictly enforced caps on such contributions. No less important a reform is shutting down the soft-money system that enables political parties to launder large contributions through generic get-out-the-vote drives. These efforts are unfair because they almost always benefit incumbents. Also, let\'s end the widespread abuse of the congressional frank, or free mailers, at election time. --- Nov. 22 Daily News, Los Angeles, on Michael Milken: Michael R. Milken learned a tough lesson ... : The more power you get, the more you are obliged not to abuse it. U.S. District Judge Kimba M. Wood said essentially that in handing out a stiff, but appropriate, sentence of 10 years in prison to the former junk-bond financier, who pleaded guilty earlier this year to six felony charges of securities fraud and conspiracy. ... Legitimate investors can do without the contempt for the rules that Milken brought with him in his pursuit of profit. Whatever contributions Milken made to the financial world, those were offset by a combination of greed, ego and deceit that turned securities markets into personal playgrounds for the unethical. --- Nov. 24 The Providence (R.I.) Journal-Bulletin on legal services: A recent issue of The Economist, the British news weekly, said of the ever-growing demand for legal services in the United States: ``Much of the `demand\' for the output of this swollen industry is created not by clients but by other members of the (lawsuit) industry, as if doctors went around injecting diseases for other doctors to cure. Is this really a boost to living standards?\'\' That\'s a good question, to which we suspect the answer might be no. So it\'s a good sign for our economy that at least some big American companies are trying to do something about this disease. The same magazine enthusiastically reports that earlier this month the chief executives of 17 of the country\'s biggest companies sent out a group letter urging their fellow executives ``to negotiate and settle (disputes) early before litigation takes on a life of its own.\'\' ... The endless use of lawsuits, threatened and actual, to resolve disputes in our society has diverted time and money from what are usually more productive ends. Let us hope that in taking a pledge to try to avoid litigation, big business provides some useful suggestions to individuals of the numerous ways in which arguments can be resolved to everyone\'s satisfaction without lawsuits. An America with less litigation would probably be a richer and happier country. ---\r\n'),(512,2,'The Bush administration has its first payoff after 10 months of pressuring the Japanese to buy more American products, but members of Congress are warning much more needs to be done. The administration announced Friday an agreement designed to boost sales of U.S.-manufactured supercomputers in Japan by removing some restrictions imposed by the Japanese government. The agreement, which is expected to be formally signed in April, should open a $130 million-market for supercomputers purchased by Japanese universities and other government agencies. The breakthrough came late Thursday night following two days of intensive negotiations. U.S. Trade Representative Carla Hills said the new pact ``should give us full and effective access\'\' to the Japanese government market. It marked the first success for the administration since it put Japan on a ``hit list\'\' last April of countries accused of erecting unfair barriers to sales of American goods. Treasury Secretary Nicholas Brady, in Los Angeles for talks Friday with Japanese Finance Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto, said that with the agreement, ``We\'re showing that we can make some progress.\'\' Supercomputers were among three product areas singled out for negotiations. Little progress has been reported so far in talks on American-made satellites and wood products. ``Are (supercomputer concessions) all we want?\'\' Brady said. ``No. Are we going to get more? Yes. When, I can\'t say. I hope soon.\'\' The Japanese are facing a June 19 deadline to show a willingness to open their markets or face possible U.S. retaliation in increased tariffs on Japanese products sold in America. Members of Congress have been pushing the administration to take a tougher line in the trade negotiations with Tokyo, pointing to the $49 billion deficit the United States is running with Japan. That is close to half the total U.S. trade deficit last year. Sen. John Danforth, R-Mo., said the supercomputer agreement was encouraging but would have to be followed by increased sales. ``Japan must recognize that promises without performance are simply unacceptable,\'\' Danforth said. Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., noted a 1987 agreement by the Japanese to buy more American supercomputers had not produced results. He said U.S. negotiators shouldn\'t declare victory too soon. ``Nonetheless, progress is always encouraging. I hope this is a sign that the United States and Japan can jointly work out their trade frictions,\'\' said Baucus, who is chairman of the Senate Finance trade subcommittee. In addition to the product talks, the administration is conducting separate discussions on broader structural impediments to trade such as exclusionary Japanese business practices. Brady met with Hashimoto as a follow-up to trade discussions held by President Bush and Japanese Prime Minister Toshiki Kaifu. A U.S. trade official, briefing reporters in Washington on Friday, said the Japanese showed new urgency in the latest round of computer talks, apparently reflecting the impact of the Bush-Kaifu meeting. ``Their negotiators came with instructions to make a deal,\'\' said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. ``We hope the Japanese will perceive the same kind of guidance in the other issues.\'\' Negotiators handling the structural impediments talks met at a remote hideaway in the Virginia countryside earlier this week in advance of more formal discussions in Washington April 2-3. However, U.S. officials said the discussions near Warrenton, Va., failed to make any progress. There have been reports from Tokyo that Kaifu is preparing trade concessions in these areas in hopes of dampening growing protectionist sentiment in Congress. Under the computer agreement announced Friday, the Japanese promised to open the procurement process for supercomputers to foreign firms and to base government purchase decisions on quality as well as price.\r\n'),(513,2,'The head of America\'s Roman Catholic bishops declared, ``We are in a most serene time,\'\' even though they had just ended a week that included open dispute with the Vatican and revival of their sniping at the government. Archbishop John L. May of St. Louis was referring in particular on Thursday to the U.S. church\'s relations with Pope John Paul II and the Vatican. He pronounced the pope ``bullish on the church in the United States\'\' and dismissed public spats with Rome as merely ``signs of a church that is essentially open.\'\' In fact, he and fellow members of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops seemed little troubled by any of the controversy that swirled about them during their annual meeting that concluded Thursday. During the week, the bishops: _Took on the Soviet Union, decrying ``sustained and comprehensive\'\' religious persecution in Eastern Europe and encouraging the U.S. government to hold out prospects of better overall relations as an incentive to win greater religious freedom. _Blasted a U.S. immigration law they say leads employers to discriminate in hiring and firing Hispanics out of ignorance concerning potential penalties. _Criticized the Reagan administration for sending out thousands of foreclosure warnings to family farmers a week after the presidential election and just before the holiday season. _On their own turf, accepted but only grudgingly a Vatican intervention that kept them from voting on guidelines they had prepared for resolving disputes with theologians. _Approved rules for lay preachers that either, according to which bishop you asked, made it easier for lay men and women to preach during masses or took one more slap at Catholic women by reiterating that they may not give the main sermon interpreting the gospel. _Finally, sent back a Vatican draft document as ``unsuitable as a basis for discussion,\'\' thus rejecting both the scholarship of the draft and its contention that national bishops conferences have no real authority in the church. May had started the week by congratulating President-elect George Bush but then in the next breath assuring him the bishops would continue to speak out on public issues and not ``only in praise and appreciation.\'\' ``We are sometimes criticized for being too concerned about the world, of pursuing an agenda that in the minds of some critics is secular, leftist or in some way `ideological,\'\'\' May said. But he added that the pope\'s own example showed it is not possible to have ``too much social consciousness.\'\' On Wednesday, former conference president John Roach, bishop of St. Paul-Minneapolis, was asked about the arguing that preceded passage of the bishops\' response to the Vatican document on conference authority, and about the relatively high number of ``no\'\' votes _ 59 among the 264 voting. He acknowledged differences of opinion within the organization, and suggested some of the negative votes might have included bishops getting a secret-vote chance to ``take a shot\'\' at the recent past presidents who prepared the response. But in proclaiming the bishops\' serenity on Thursday, May said there was no big dispute with the Vatican. And he quoted the pope to support his own contention. ``The pope is bullish on the church in the United States _ that\'s what he says,\'\' May declared. In recent meetings with U.S. bishops, the pope had said, ``You are a superpower,\'\' May told reporters. He said the pope merely asked the Americans to weigh their words with the knowledge that ``the church in the United States has tremendous international influence, and the people of the world watch what is said there.\'\' ``There are disagreements from time to time\'\' with the Vatican, May said, but he added that he didn\'t see them ``as a tug-of-war or an ongoing fight or crisis or any of these words that are used.\'\' He said the pope often uses the term ``solidarity\'\' in regard to the church helping build bridges with the people of the world, including the most vulnerable as well as the powerful. This year\'s bishops\' meeting was significant, May said, partly because ``we tried to demonstrate solidarity across an amazingly broad spectrum.\'\' Such efforts, he suggested, indicated the conference was alive and well, whatever the final draft of the Vatican document might say as to its theological authority.\r\n'),(514,2,'Eight bombs exploded today in the stronghold of Moslem militants seeking independence for the Himalayan valley of Kashmir, authorities said. No one was injured. Authorities said the blasts, at two banks, a post office and other shops and businesses, occurred hours after fire swept through a shopping complex in Srinagar, the summer capital of Jammu-Kashmir state. No one claimed responsibilty for the explosions. Police said they believe the blaze was an accident since it occurred before dawn while a curfew was still in force. But other officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, blamed the fire and the bombs on the Jammu-Kashmir Liberation Front, the militant group leading the four-decade-old drive for the country\'s only Moslem majority state to secede from predominantly Hindu India. India routinely blames neighoring Pakistan of arming, training and supporting the militants. Pakistan denies the charge but says the Kashmiri people have a right to self-determination. At least 82 people have been killed since Jan. 20 in frequent street clashes between militants and security forces in Srinagar and adjoining areas. Most of the victims have been protesters shot while defying curfew imposed by government forces to stem rising violence. The curfew was relaxed during the day from 5 a.m. to 6 p.m., except in the areas where the explosions occurred. Kashmir, once a princely state, was divided between India and Pakistan after the two countries were partitioned following the end of British colonial rule in 1947. Srinagar and the surrounding areas of the valley became part of Jammu-Kashmir. Sixty-four percent of the state\'s 5 million people are Moslems, but Moslems make up 12 percent of the 880 million population nationwide. Kashmiri militants had earlier campaigned for union with Pakistan, which claims Kashmir because of its predominant Moslem population, but the militants now demand independence and the status of a neutral country. India has fought two wars with Pakistan over Kashmir.\r\n'),(515,2,'Atlantis\' five astronauts on Thursday successfully completed a test that simulated an engine start and cut off moments before liftoff, NASA said. The shuttle is scheduled for a secret military mission in mid-July. NASA spokeswoman Lisa Malone said the two-day drill went smoothly. The countdown clock was stopped at four seconds before the mock liftoff. On Monday, Atlantis was moved from the hangar to the launch pad previously occupied by Columbia. Columbia was returned to the hangar last week for repair of a hydrogen leak that has delayed the shuttle\'s astronomy mission until at least mid-August. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration plans to conduct a special tanking test on Wednesday, partly filling Atlantis\' external tank with super-cold liquid hydrogen to make sure there are no leaks. A similar test was performed on Columbia a week after a hydrogen leak was detected during fueling for a May 30 launch. A launch date for Atlantis will be set at the conclusion of a two-day flight readiness review on June 28 and 29.\r\n'),(516,2,'Strongman Gen. Manuel Antonio Noriega has offered to resign before next year\'s presidential elections if opponents agree to talks with his regime, Panama\'s chief of state told his countrymen Monday. The opposition, whose general strike Monday paralyzed the nation, and the United States, which has kept up steady pressure to force a Noriega resignation, immediately rejected the general\'s offer. Elections are scheduled for May 1989. ``There will be no dialogue,\'\' said Aurelio Barria, the main leader of the National Civic Crusade, an anti-Noriega coalition of 200 business, professional, labor and political groups that called the indefinite work stoppage. He added: ``The general has to go _ immediately, not eventually. The strike will continue.\'\' Manuel Solis Palma, installed last month as the minister in charge of the presidency, made the announcement of Noriega\'s offer in a nationally broadcast speech. He said Noriega had given his word ``as an officer and a gentleman\'\' to step down if his conditions are met. In Washington, State Department spokesman Anita Stockman said: ``We believe the offer is little more than one, a ploy to attempt to legitimize the illegal Solis Palma regime by calling for negotiations between it and opposition groups and two, an effort on the part of Noriega to maintain direct or indirect control of the Panamanian Defense Forces. ``We stand by our previous view that Noriega should go, and the sooner the better for Panama.\'\' Noriega is under indictment on federal drug charges in Florida. The United States has dried up the flow of money to Panama, which uses the U.S. dollar as its currency, in the effort to force him out, and the economy is near collapse. The general put down a coup attempt by dissident officers last week and rejected a U.S. plan for him to leave Panama and live in Spain. In Washington, White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater said earlier Monday that there were no plans for further talks with Noriega after the return of two administration officials from Panama City. ``I think they have a pretty good reading of the general\'s attitude,\'\' Fitzwater said. ``It didn\'t seem to include further conversations, at least at this point.\'\' The strike included Panama City\'s central commercial district, where the small shops that cater to the lower and middle classes had not joined previous shutdowns by wealthier businesmen and industrialists. ``We\'re sending Noriega a message,\'\' said the owner of a shoe store, who asked not to be identified for fear of reprisals. ``We hope he\'s listening.\'\' Noriega commands the military and police as head of the 15,000-member Defense Forces and is the power behind the civilian government. The secretary of the Panamanian Human Rights Foundation said a man died Monday of wounds suffered when he was hit in the face and chest by birdshot fired by police during disturbances in Panama City last Wednesday. It was the fourth protest-related death since anti-government demonstrations began last summer. Noriega\'s opponents hailed the strike as their greatest triumph so far. ``It\'s completely successful,\'\' said Guillermo Cochez, vice president of the Christian Democratic Party. ``Today has been a very special day ... in the capital as well as the provinces. We hope Noriega\'s advisers and the people surrounding him will help him to see the reality.\'\' ``The paralyzation is total in industry, finance and commerce,\'\' said Carlos Gonzalez de la Lastra, a business leader. Gonzalez and Cochez are directors, along with Barria, of the National Civic Crusade. Noriega made another move Monday to strengthen his control of the Defense Forces by announcing the promotions of 98 officers to ranks ranging from colonel to lieutenant. Among those promoted to colonel was Eros Ramiro Cal, who was named last week to replace Col. Leonidas Macias, the leader of the foiled coup, as the nation\'s police chief. The Defense Forces also said administrative discipline would be taken against 17 officers implicated in last Wednesday\'s attempted coup, but did not give details. It previously acknowledged eight or nine officers had joined in the attempt and said only five were being detained. Gustavo Gonzalez of the striking dockworkers said leaders of all major unions were summoned to a meeting Sunday night with Solis Palma, and told the military would not interfere if the strike remained peaceful. He said union leaders were told the government, which could not meet its payroll two weeks ago, also would be unable to cover semi-monthly paychecks due next week. Solis Palma replaced Eric Arturo Delvalle, who was dismissed by the legislature after he tried to fire Noriega and still is recognized by the United States as Panama\'s president. Delvalle is in hiding in Panama. Because the government has silenced opposition newspapers and broadcast stations, thousands of people went to work without knowing a strike had been called. Most went home when they found stores and offices closed. By midday, the city was a ghost town patrolled by helmeted soldiers in combat gear. The government said they were providing security for businesses that chose to open. Panama\'s ailing economy came apart after Feb. 25, when Delvalle tried to fire Noriega and the legislature fired Delvalle. Banks closed the following week and the government could not meet a $33 million payroll for 130,000 public employees. Washington has cut off economic and military aid and millions of dollars in Panamanian funds have been frozen in U.S. banks by legal actions.\r\n'),(517,2,'UAL Corp. directors announced today they have agreed to sell the parent of United Airlines to its employees for $201 a share, or $4.38 billion. The move heads off a threatened proxy fight with the company\'s largest shareholder but puts UAL back in a familiar position _ floating a deal with uncertain financing. Under the agreement, employees will exchange $155 in cash, $35 in UAL notes and an estimated $11 worth of securities in UAL subsidiary Covia Corp. for each UAL share. There was no immediate word on how the deal was to be financed. But a source close to the negotiations told The Associated Press the parties had no firm financing for the deal. UAL, parent of United Airlines, said it expects to conclude a final agreement promptly with United Employee Acquisition Corp., a new company organized by United\'s pilots, flight attendants and Machinists. At a news conference today in New York, representatives of the unions said the agreement calls for employees to give up $2 billion in concessions over five years, including $300 million in the first year and $500 million in the fifth year. The breakdown of ownership in the new company would be as follows: pilots owning about 37.9 percent; Machinists owning about 35.7 percent, non-union employees about 14.3 percent and flight attendants about 12 percent, the unions said. Machinists\' union Vice President John Peterpaul predicted banks would look favorably on the deal. ``We\'re very optimistic about the financing,\'\' he said. UAL\'s largest shareholder, Coniston Partners, immediately called off its threatened proxy fight to oust the company\'s board at the April 26 annual shareholder meeting. Coniston holds an 11.8 percent stake. ``We think it\'s a fair deal,\'\' said Coniston general partner Paul Tierney, adding that employees and stockholders alike will gain from the agreement. The announcement met with a lukewarm reaction, however, from some analysts, who questioned how the deal would be financed and whether banks would be willing to back the bid without a strong management group behind it. The fate of UAL Chairman Stephen Wolf has been in doubt because of union indications made before today that they would dump Wolf in the event of an employee buyout. Pilots union head Frederick Dubinsky said in New York today that Wolf would be replaced. ``It\'s our intention to put together a top-notch senior management team ... and that will include a new (chief executive officer),\'\' he said. ``There\'s not a financed bid, and there\'s a lot of skepticism,\'\' said Edward Starkman, an airline analyst for PaineWebber Inc. in New York. UAL\'s stock opened up $3.50 a share at $169 on the New York Stock Exchange but by midday had slid back to $165.50, unchanged from Thursday. The agreement marks another chapter in a takeover saga that began in August when Los Angeles investor Marvin Davis made a $5.4 billion offer for the company. Davis said earlier this week he would not make another bid. But his initial offer sent United\'s pilots and management scrambling to come up with their own bid. In September, UAL directors accepted a $6.75 billion offer from the pilots, management and British Airways PLC that also included labor and wage concessions. The proposal was killed after the would-be purchasers were unable to line up enough financing. Failure of that deal contributed to a 190-point plunge in the Dow Jones industrial average on Oct. 13 and was seen as the end of the takeover boom of the 1980s. The stakes were raised again in November when Coniston announced it had amassed a large block of UAL stock and wanted to reduce the number of directors on the company\'s board. After UAL directors told financial advisers to consider a recapitalization plan in January, United\'s three labor unions proposed buying 75 percent of the stock. That proposal resulted in a $185-a-share, $3.8 billion buyout offer from the unions that the UAL board rejected two weeks ago. The bid was reportedly opposed strongly by UAL Chairman Stephen Wolf. Earlier this week, the board met at least twice by telephone, presumably on the buyout scenario. United is the nation\'s largest carrier behind American Airlines.\r\n'),(518,2,'The Supreme Court today let stand a $3.5 million punitive-damages award won by a San Diego gas station operator against Atlantic Richfield Co. The justices, without comment, refused to hear arguments that the award, believed to be the second largest of its kind ever upheld in California courts, is unconstitutionally excessive. John V. Nielsen had operated an ARCO station as an independent dealer for 12 years before agreeing to convert his service station to a mini-market and self-service station in 1979. His lawsuit charged ARCO with fraudulently misrepresenting facts in connection with the conversion of his station. A state court jury awarded Nielsen $525,788 in compensatory damages _ $79,061 in out-of-pocket losses, $396,727 in lost anticipated profits and $50,000 for emotional distress. The jury also awarded him $3.5 million in punitive damages against ARCO. A state appeals court upheld the award except for the emotional-distress damages, and the California Supreme Court refused to hear ARCO\'s appeal. In the appeal acted on today, lawyers for ARCO argued that the huge punitive-damages award _ seven times the compensatory-damages award _ violates the Eighth Amendment\'s ban on ``excessive fines.\'\' No court has ever applied that constitutional principle to non-criminal cases. The Supreme Court in May passed up deciding in a Mississippi case whether the constitutional ban on ``excessive fines\'\' can be applied to personal-injury lawsuits. Some state legislatures, reacting to soaring insurance rates, in recent years have imposed ceilings on how much money can be recovered in personal-injury lawsuits. Lawyers for ARCO urged the justices to ``send a clear signal that the state courts must stop these gargantuan awards.\'\' But lawyers for Nielsen argued that the ARCO appeal should not be granted because the oil company\'s lawyers had not raised the ``excessive fines\'\' argument in state courts. The justices refused to address the punitive-damages issue in the Mississippi case decided earlier this month after noting that it had not been raised in state courts. ARCO\'s appeal did not challenge the $475,000 compensatory-damages award won by Nielsen. The case is Atlantic Richfield vs. Nielsen, 87-1196.\r\n'),(519,2,'Julio Gallo, 79-year-old co-owner of the world\'s largest winery and one of the wealthiest men in America, was in stable condition Wednesday after a highway collision that killed a woman in the other car. Gallo and his 74-year-old wife, Eileen, were injured Tuesday as their car crossed the center line and struck another on the perilous, winding Pacheco Pass Highway about 80 miles south of San Francisco, the California Highway Patrol said. Investigating officer Tom Melden said an early probe of the wreck indicated Mrs. Gallo was driving and that the accident was her fault, but no charges were immediately filed. Alcohol did not appear to be a factor, he said. Gallo is president of the $1 billion-a-year, privately owned E&J Gallo Winery of Modesto; his brother, Ernest, is its chairman. The accident killed 27-year-old Sharon Kauk of San Jose, the Santa Clara County coroner\'s office reported. Her husband, Timothy, and 3-month-old son, Matthew, were airlifted to a Santa Clara Valley Medical Center. Kauk was listed in stable condition Wednesday with minor injuries, which weren\'t disclosed, said Medical Center spokesman George Pavicich. Matthew, who had been in a seat restraint, was in serious condition with undetermined injuries, he said. The child had earlier been reported unhurt. The Gallos were admitted to San Jose Medical Center. He was listed in stable condition Wednesday, upgraded from guarded condition, and she was under observation and being treated for a hand injury. Last October, Forbes magazine listed Julio Gallo as the nation\'s 283 richest man. In 1933, with $5,900 of pooled money, he and his brother started making wine with a library recipe. Today, with Julio as master winemaker and Ernest as the marketing chief, E&J Gallo bottles some 250,000 cases of wine a day and sells nearly 27 percent of the wine in the United States. Sixteen brands carry their logo. Gallo spokesman Dan Solomon said Ernest Gallo had been informed of the accident but had no comment.\r\n'),(520,2,'NASA has agreed to help pick a landing site on Mars for a robot craft that the Soviets will launch in 1994, American and Soviet scientists announced Thursday at a joint news conference. Samuel W. Keller, the head of the NASA delegation that has been negotiating with Soviet scientists, said that the Soviets have picked four candidate landing sites after the United States provided detailed maps of the Martian surface. Keller said the Soviets have now asked for more data and details on the candidate sites. He made the comment at a news conference marking the end of a week of negotiations between representatives of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and a delegation representing the Soviet solar system exploration program. The two groups met to work out areas of cooperation. Academician Valeriy L. Barsukov, head of the Soviet delegation, said that the four candidate Mars landing sites are all located within 30 degrees of the equator, but he declined to be more specific. NASA accumulated a vast amount of detailed images and maps of Mars during Viking spacecraft missions between 1975 and 1980. The Viking program put two craft in orbit of Mars and two on the surface. The Soviets plan to launch a spacecraft in 1994 that will orbit Mars and drop a lander that will scoop up soil and return it to Earth. Barsukov said that in picking a landing site the Soviets are considering such issues as a search for water and life, getting comprehensive samples of the geology, and gaining insights into the Martian evolution. Keller said other agreements reached during negotiations this week included: _Using the American Deep Space Network to help track and communicate with Soviet Mars probes. _An exchange of scientific personnel for work on specific missions. _An exchange of data on Venus, a planet extensively explored by both countries. Keller said the U.S.-Soviet studies are being combined to produce four detailed maps. _An exchange of lunar material gathered by the Apollo program for meteorite material collected by the Soviets. _An exchange of scientific instruments for use on planetary probes. Barsukov said that the Soviets feel that a manned Mars landing is ``inevitable\'\' and that it probably will take place in the middle of the next century. But before a manned mission to Mars is attempted, Barsukov said there probably will be new manned flights to the moon. He declined to elaborate.\r\n'),(521,2,'A cyclone packing winds up to 155 mph zeroed in on the south Indian coast Tuesday night, and authorites evacuated 100,000 families from a low-lying plain. Live electrical wires knocked down by winds preceeding the storm killed three people in the southern city of Madras, Indian news reports said. A building collapse injured eight others in the city, which is about 1,050 miles south of New Delhi. Waves 20 feet above normal crashed against parts of India\'s southeastern coast Tuesday night as the storm approached. Weather officials said the cyclone appeared to be stronger than a 1977 storm that killed thousands in southern India. Press Trust of India reported that 2,000 people had been evacuated from Madras. Weather officials said the core of the storm was 87 miles east of Madras over the Bay of Bengal and would cross into India by early Wednesday. A heavily populated, low-lying coastal plain in Andhra Pradesh state, just north of Tamil Nadu state, was expected to take the brunt of the storm. Authorities evacuated more than 100,000 families from the area and placed them in 300 camps inland, news reports said. Meteorologists said they expected ``very heavy damage to houses and installations and disruption of communications,\'\' Press Trust of India said. Andhra Pradesh\'s chief minister, M. Chenna Reddy, said army and navy helicopters and boats had been prepared for rescue operations. Heavy winds and rain were reported in several townships along the coastal plain, he said. One town, Kota, had seven inches of rain in the past 24 hours. Cyclones are the Indian Ocean\'s equivalent of hurricanes. They usually come in the spring just before the monsoon season begins.\r\n'),(522,2,'Harrison Ford worked as a carpenter before he struck gold as an actor, and finding a month to do nothing but make furniture is now one of his unfulfilled fantasies. Ford took up carpentry to pay the bills before landing a role in ``Star Wars\'\' in 1977, he tells US magazine in its Aug. 20 issue. His most recent foray into carpentry was about a year ago when he built a bed for his 3-year-old son, Malcolm. ``He watched me make it. But I\'m sure he thinks that everybody\'s dad makes their bed,\'\' Ford said. Today, after an Oscar nomination for ``Witness\'\' and with the ``Indiana Jones\'\' series on his resume, he earns about $10 million per film. His latest is ``Presumed Innocent,\'\' in which he plays a big-city prosecutor accused of murdering a colleague-lover. Ford, 48, says carpentry is something he\'d like more time for. ``I\'d like to actually have a month and actually not do anything else but work on some furniture, work on honing those skills which I haven\'t practiced for so long,\'\' he said.\r\n'),(523,2,'``This is our last forest,\'\' said ranger Veerawat Dheeraprasart, pointing down a deep river valley. ``If the dam is built here, all this will vanish, and nobody will ever be able to replace it.\'\' Veerawat, the chief ranger of this rich wildlife sanctuary astride the border with Burma, is among thousands who have joined what unquestionably has become the greatest environmental battle in Thailand\'s history _ a fight to persuade the government not to build a dam in Thailand\'s last virgin forest. In a country that once was jungle-carpeted and teeming with wildlife, it is rare today to see a tract of undisturbed forest, an unpolluted river, white-handed gibbons or free-ranging tigers. Anti-dam groups have held rock concerts and demonstrations, some featuring life-like models of crucified animals, in their campaign. Newspapers are probing the issue in unprecedented detail. Former Prime Minister Kukrit Pramoj says the government could face a mass uprising if it approves the Nam Choan dam. The dam\'s proponents say Nam Choam needs to be built, in what is the largest remaining area of protected forest in Southeast Asia, to increase Thailand\'s energy supply by about 2 percent. The government\'s Electric Generating Authority of Thailand has described the proposed, 580-megawatt dam as the ``last possible exploitable source of hydro power\'\' in the country. It says it will create a reservoir that would also help irrigate farm land and assure water supplies in times of drought. The projected dam site is still hard to get to: a lurching, nine-hour drive over dirt roads from Bangkok, the Thai capital, followed by a four-hour jungle trek. When monsoons lash the countryside, a three-day elephant ride offers the only access. But dam opponents claim construction of Nam Choan, with the necessary approach roads, facilities and ensuing human encroachment, would spell doom for what they say is also the last area in Thailand large enough to ensure the survival of a wide variety of wildlife. Found in the Thung Yai and the adjacent Huay Kha Khaeng Sanctuary, an area about the size of Delaware, are large mammals, such as elephant, gaur, tiger and clouded leopard; some 350 species of birds, and a wide range of plant life. A number of the species are classified as endangered in Thailand, some worldwide. Foreign conservation groups have written letters expressing concern to the Thai government. In December, Britain\'s Prince Philip, head of the World Wildlife Fund, urged an independent environmental impact study before a final decision is reached. A similar plea came from more than 1,300 conservationists and scientists at the general assembly in February of the Swiss-based International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources. The Electric Generating Authority maintains that Nam Choan would degrade only 4 percent of the area. But ranger Veerawat, who has served for 10 years in the sanctuary, contends the 47-mile-long dam reservoir would not only eradicate a biologically vital riverine valley but also disrupt the migration routes of animals, forcing them into smaller habitats. Opponents also dispute the 4 percent degradation estimate, saying that in Thailand roads built into remote, forested areas have inevitably been followed by massive logging, with collusion between businessmen and corrupt officials circumventing protective legislation. Loggers are already felling the rich forests along the park boundary. Pisit na Patalung, secretary-general of Wildlife Fund Thailand, one of some 30 private organizations opposing the proposal, said the dam issue has raised an environmental awareness among Thais. Until recent years, the public appeared apathetic as the country\'s once teeming wildlife was slaughtered and forests that blanketed about 70 percent of the country a generation ago were reduced to around 15 percent of total area today. The dam was first proposed in the early 1970s but plans were shelved in 1983 in wake of protests and charges that environmental impact studies were sloppy and improper. In 1986, the Electric Generating Authority asked that the project be reconsidered and the government appointed a 40-man committee headed by Deputy Prime Minister Thienchai Sirisamphan to come up with a decision, which is expected soon. Some opponents believe government leaders will be impressed by their arguments that Thailand now has enough alternate energy sources, including offshore natural gas and lignite, to scrap the dam proposal. Others, however, feel that too many key bureaucrats and politicians are still little concerned over environmental problems. Another wildlife ranger, Sueb Nakhasathien, didn\'t sound optimistic. ``Thais haven\'t yet put a price on the environment,\'\' he said. ``They don\'t realize that trees and water have a price, that wildlife has a price.\'\'\r\n'),(524,2,'The dollar sank today and interest rates rose after the government reported a jump in the nation\'s trade deficit to $12.2 billion. The stock market defied pessimism, though. Prices were mixed in early trading and the Dow Jones average of 30 industrial stocks was 6.03 points higher at 2,132.29 an hour after the New York Stock Exchange opening. A record level of American exports was swamped by an all-time high in imports, the Commerce Department announced. The imbalance between what the United States imports and what it sells abroad climbed by $2.7 billion over a July deficit of $9.5 billion. The July figure had been the smallest monthly imbalance in more than three years. Economists had expected an increase for August, but the actual result was worse than the $11.3 billion imbalance many forecasters had predicted. From the point of view of inflation-wary investors, the combination of strong exports and strong imports was ``probably the worst combination you could get\'\' because it signals possible overheating of the economy, said Michael Moran, chief economist of Daiwa Securities America Inc. Even before the figures were released, financial markets headed lower because of unease over what the government would report. The Dow Jones industrial average fell by 30.23 points on Wednesday, its biggest decline in nearly two months. The dollar\'s decline was not huge because the dollar had already fallen steadily this week in response to investors\' fears of a bad trade number. A big deficit increases the likelihood that the dollar will need to decline to make American goods cheaper in world markets. Moments after the release of trade figures at 8:30 a.m. EDT, the dollar fell to just above 126 Japanese yen and less than 1.82 West German marks. But traders had second thoughts and the currency recovered part of its lost ground. Two hours after the trade figures\' release, the dollar was traded at a little over 127 yen and under 1.82 marks, down from more than 129 yen and 1.83 marks Wednesday. The dollar has now retreated to its levels of late June and early July. Long-term interest rates rose. That reflected investors\' concerns about inflation and a declining dollar, which would prompt investors to switch money from dollars into other currencies. The yield on the Treasury\'s 30-year Treasury bond, a key measure of long-term rates, rose to 8.95 percent from 8.90 percent late Wednesday. That reflected a decline in its price as inflation-wary bondholders sold the securities.\r\n'),(525,2,'The U.S. dollar was slightly lower in European trading this morning as attention turned to other major currencies. Gold prices were slightly higher. ``There is no evidence of a trend in the dollar right now,\'\' one Milan trader said. Traders said attention continued to focus on the weakness of the Japanese yen. Anticipation was strong that monetary authorities would move to shore up the Japanese currency after the market shrugged off an increase in Japanese interest rates earlier this week. Traders said the West German mark was suffering from continuing uncertainty about the costs of German reunification. In Tokyo, where trading ends as Europe\'s business day begins, the dollar rose 0.24 yen to a closing 155.07 yen. Later in London, it was quoted at a lower rate of 155.00 yen. In London, the dollar fell against the British pound, which was quoted at $1.6040, compared with $1.6015 late Thursday. Other dollar rates at midmorning in Europe, compared with late Thursday\'s rates included: 1.7050 West German marks, down from 1.7054; 1.5105 Swiss francs, down from 1.5150; 5.7490 French francs, down from 5.7505; 1.9177 Dutch guilders, down from 1.9210; 1,256 Italian lire, up from 1,255.50, and 1.1765 Canadian dollars, up from 1.1757. Gold opened in London at a bid price of $393.40 a troy ounce, up from $393.05 bid late Thursday. At midmorning, the city\'s major bullion dealers fixed a recommended price of $393.60. In Zurich, the bid price was $393.75, up from $393 late Thursday. Earlier in Hong Kong, gold rose 13 cents to close at a bid $393.65. Silver rose in London to a bid price of $5.09 a troy ounce, from Thursday\'s $5.08.\r\n'),(526,2,'A U.S. House subcommittee is investigating allegations of attempts to influence senior Internal Revenue Service officials in Washington and six other cities, a panel aide says. ``The allegations of misconduct concern high-level people at district and regional office levels,\'\' Peter Barash, staff director of the Commerce Consumer and Monetary Affairs subcommittee of the House Government Operations Committee, told the Lawrenceville-based Gwinnett Daily News on Friday. For seven weeks, subcommittee investigators and the General Accounting Office have been looking into charges of abuse by senior staffers in Los Angeles; Cincinnati; Newark, N.J.; San Francisco; Chicago; and Dallas, as well as Washington, Barash said. The investigators also are trying to determine if top officials at IRS headquarters in Washington failed to act against senior regional officials who allegedly misused their authority, Barash said. Barash said the subcommittee, chaired by Rep. Doug Barnard, D-Ga., received a number of allegations in the spring about misconduct within the agency. ``We checked out some things and found out that the allegations appear at this preliminary stage of the investigation to be true enough to begin a formal investigation,\'\' he said. ``It looks like some people, some top IRS senior staffers, were involved in misconduct, abusing of their power for private, personal gain or enrichment.\'\' Barnard\'s subcommittee will conduct hearings by early October on the results of its investigation, Barash said. The staff director described one case in Los Angeles involving a senior criminal investigator who went to work for Guess Jeans Inc. after leaving the federal agency. ``The allegation with regards to Guess Jeans is it had an IRS senior employee in Los Angeles under its control and influence and got this employee to either initiate criminal tax fraud investigations (against a competing jeans company) or to kill criminal tax fraud investigations at the behest of Guess Jeans,\'\' said Barash. The Gwinnett Daily News quoted a spokesman for the jeans maker as saying the company did nothing wrong and has agreed to cooperate with federal investigators.\r\n'),(527,2,'Here are the prime-time TV ratings as compiled by the A.C. Nielsen Co. for the week of March 19-25. Top 20 listings include the week\'s ranking, with full season-to-date ranking in parentheses, rating for the week, and total homes. An ``X\'\' in parentheses denotes one-time-only presentation. A rating measures the percentage of the nation\'s 92.1 million TV homes. 1. (2) ``The Cosby Show,\'\' NBC, 23.2 rating, 21.4 million homes. 2. (5) ``America\'s Funniest Home Videos,\'\' ABC, 22.6, 20.8 million homes. 3. (1) ``Roseanne,\'\' ABC, 22.4, 20.6 million homes. 4. (7) ``60 Minutes,\'\' CBS, 21.1, 19.4 million homes. 5. (4) ``A Different World,\'\' NBC, 20.8, 18.4 million homes. 6. (3) ``Cheers,\'\' NBC, 20.5, 18.9 million homes. 7. (6) ``Golden Girls,\'\' NBC, 20.3, 18.7 million homes. 8. (9) ``Empty Nest,\'\' NBC, 19.4, 17.9 million homes. 9. (8) ``Wonder Years\'\' ABC, 19.3, 17.8 million homes. 10. (16) ``L.A. Law,\'\' NBC, 18.7, 17.4 million homes. 11. (19) ``Coach,\'\' ABC, 18.0, 16.6 million homes. 12. (10) ``Murder, She Wrote,\'\' CBS, 17.4, 16.0 million homes. 13. (48) ``Married...With Children,\'\' FOX, 17.0, 15.7 million homes. 14. (14) ``Unsolved Mysteries,\'\' NBC, 16.9, 15.6 million homes. 14. (31) ``Simpsons,\'\' FOX, 16.9, 15.6 million homes. 16. (17) ``In The Heat of the Night,\'\' NBC, 16.6, 15.3 million homes. 17. (20) ``Matlock,\'\' NBC, 16.5, 15.2 million homes. 18. (15) ``Grand,\'\' NBC, 16.3, 15.0 million homes. 19. (22) ``Full House,\'\' ABC, 16.1, 14.8 million homes. 20. (12) ``Who\'s the Boss?\'\', ABC, 15.7, 14.5 million homes.\r\n'),(528,2,'Air France said Friday it has agreed to acquire a controlling interest in the privately held airline Union de Transports Aeriens, in a move that values UTA at almost 7 billion French francs, or around $1.2 billion. Air France, the government-owned airline, said it will buy initially a block of 930,000 UTA shares representing 54.58 percent of UTA\'s capital from Chargeurs SA, a holding company with transportation and textile interests. Air France said it will pay 4,083 francs, or $714, for each UTA share. Trading in UTA shares was suspended on the Paris Stock Exchange Friday at 2,770 francs, or $484. The Societe des Bourses Francaises, which regulates securities trading, announced the halt amid rumors that Air France would be purchasing a major stake in UTA, France\'s biggest private airline. Air France said it is offering the same terms to UTA\'s minority shareholders. Chargeurs controls 82.9 percent of UTA\'s capital, and Air France will have first refusal rights if Chargeurs decides on any future dilution of its stake in UTA. UTA has a fleet of only 19 jets, six of which are owned by its charter subsidiary Aeromaritime. UTA operates on long-haul routes, mainly to the Pacific and Africa. Chargeurs Chairman Jerome Seydoux had said on several occasions that he would sell UTA if the French government did not authorize it to operate on European and transatlantic routes. In late 1988, the French government rejected UTA\'s request for new routes and said it was opposed to allowing UTA to fly to Newark, N.J., although two years ago UTA won the right to operate between Paris and San Francisco. Air France said the takeover will create an air transport group that will be able to compete on an even footing with big international competitors. Several of Air France\'s European rivals, notably British Airways PLC and KLM Royal Dutch Airlines, have considered or made investments in foreign airlines as a way to position themselves to exploit the Common Market deregulation set to begin in 1992. The deal also gives Air France control of the French domestic airline Air Inter. UTA holds 35.8 percent of Air Inter stock and Air France has 37 percent. Transport Minister Michel Delebarre issued a statement praising the deal. But the takeover could spark a political debate, because Socialist President Francois Mitterrand had promised there would be neither nationalizations nor privatizations during his current 7-year term. As part of the deal, UTA will acquire the 49 percent minority stake in Aeromaritime that is held by Chargeurs, giving UTA full control of the charter operation. Financial analysts said Air France\'s purchase of 54.6 percent of UTA will give Chargeurs an immediate cash injection of almost 3.8 billion francs, or $665 million. Chargeurs\' 1989 earnings were affected by a strike by UTA pilots that lasted several months.\r\n'),(529,2,'The disposition of an individual\'s estate need not be a guessing game. Yet many people are unaware that by establishing a sound estate plan they easily may shelter many holdings from probate. Still more don\'t know the principles behind assessing their estate. But by better understanding how the federal government governs estate taxes, people may avoid or reduce the future federal tax liabilities. This tax savings can preserve assets in the estate that otherwise might be used to pay death taxes. These assets then may be passed on to a spouse, children, or charity. There are several steps to take in evaluating your estate. First, determine the nature and the value of your estate\'s assets. Assts may include: your residence, other property such as a vacation home, household furnishings, savings bonds, stocks, checking and savings accounts, pension benefits, life insurance policies, automobiles. For federal tax purposes, there are several exceptions to determining the value of an asset: - For jointly owned assets held by spouses, only half the value of the asset is included in your estate if you are the first spouse to die. - For life insurance policies, the amount included in your estate is the face amount of the policy rather than its replacement cost or present cash value (if whole life) at the date of your death. - If you die before retirement, you receive none of your pension. However, half the value of the pension is payable to your spouse and half the vested plan benefits - what would have been available to you had you lived to retirement - are included in your gross estate. - Finally, Series EE bonds are included at their present value when they mature. - All other assets generally are included at fair market value. Second, determine your deductions when calculating federal estate tax. Include funeral expenses, costs of the last illness of the decendent, if applicable; unpaid debts and mortgages; and administrative expenses for the estate. You\'ll incur fewer administrative expenses for assets transferred outside of the probate. To avoid probate, you may set up a living trust, although it will create some trust administration costs. In addition, property held in joint tenancy with right of survivorship automatically passes to the surviving joint tenant outside the probate process. Other property of a contractual nature - such as life insurance policies or qualified pension plans - also will transfer to the beneficiary outside of probate. Step three, determine which property qualifies for the marital deduction or charitable deduction. Three factors make a difference: - If your will transfers property to your spouse, this property qualifies for the marital deduction. - If any property is held in joint tenancy with right of survivorship, the property passes to the surviving spouse and qualifies for the marital deduction. - If any life insurance or qualified pension plan names your spouse as policy beneficiary or plan benificiary, this, too, qualifies. The same kinds of arrangements will qualify property for the charitable estate tax deduction if property is left to the charity as a result of a will, a specific property designation such as a joint tenancy, or a contractual benificiary designation. Any property qualifying for the marital deduction or the charitable deduction is not subject to federal estate tax liability. Remaining property is referred to as the taxable estate. The fourth, and final, step is to determine estimated federal tax liability on the taxable estate. The unified estate and gift transfer tax rates apply to the taxable estate when calculating the amount of federal estate tax. Every individual, regardless of the size of his or her estate, is entitled to a unified credit of $192,800 that absorbs, dollar for dollar, the amount of that individual\'s federal estate tax liability up to that amount. This assumes that you did not make any lifetime gifts to an individual in any one year while alive that exceeded the amount of the gift tax annual exclusion amount of $10,000. Here, a rule of thumb applies. For your federal estate tax liability to be greater than $192,800, your taxable estate must be greater than $600,000. As long as a husband and wife each hold $600,000 in separately owned assets, the couple can own a total of $1.2 million in assets and the entire amount for both estates avoids federal estate tax liability. The process of rearranging property ownership for estate assets, so that each spouse\'s estate takes maximum advantage is known as ``estate equalization.\'\' Many people assume they won\'t have assets exceeding $600,000, but in these days of appreciated home values and sizable pension plans or life insurance policies, estates are often of surprising size. --- EDITOR\'S NOTE - Paul Lochray is an academic associate in the estate planning division of the College for Financial Planning in Denver.\r\n'),(530,2,'Nearly 10 million Americans lost their jobs due to plant closings or layoffs from 1983 to 1988 despite the longest peacetime economic expansion in the nation\'s history, the government reports. Of 9.7 million displaced workers during the period, 4.7 million were so-called ``tenured\'\' workers who had held their jobs for three years or more, the Bureau of Labor Statistics says in the latest of its biennial reports on worker displacement. That was a slight decline from earlier BLS studies of overlapping five-year periods _ 1979-84 and 1981-86 _ which both had shown that 5.1 million tenured workers lost their jobs during the respective periods. But each of those periods also included the severe recession of 1981-82. As a result, government and private economists say the new figures show a persisting displacement problem. Larry Mishel, an economist for the Economic Policy Institute, a liberal Washington think tank, called the decline in job displacement after the recession years ``surprisingly small.\'\' The BLS began conducting the displacement surveys in 1984 at the request of the Labor Department\'s Employment and Training Administration. The latest report was released over the weekend. While the 1984 and 1986 surveys showed 50 percent of the displaced workers coming out of factories, only 40 percent of the tenured workers losing their jobs in 1983-88 had been employed in manufacturing. In conjunction, the distribution of the layoffs has shifted somewhat from blue-collar occupations such as machine operators, laborers and repairmen during the recession periods to white-collar management and sales occupations from 1983 to 1988. ``This was the lean-and-mean era, when companies went after middle-level managers and other white-collar workers,\'\' said Mishel. ``But a lot of it, especially in retail trade, is also somewhat related to these leveraged buyouts. It\'s probably the better-paid retail workers who lost their jobs.\'\' One thing that hasn\'t changed is the percentage of workers who were given some kind of advance notice before losing their jobs. In all three surveys, roughly six of every 10 displaced workers had been told in advance to ``expect a layoff.\'\' But only two of every 10 in the latest survey said they had received a written notice of their impending dismissals _ a trend bound to change in view of a new law requiring 60 days written notice of plant closings and large layoffs beginning in 1989. Of the 4.7 million tenured workers who lost their jobs from 1983 to the end of 1987, 71 percent or approximately 3.2 million of them had new jobs as of January last year and 14 percent of them said they were looking for work. That compares favorably with re-employment rates of 67 percent and 60 percent and unemployment rates of 18 percent and 25 percent in the respective 1986 and 1984 surveys. Of those re-employed full-time, 56 percent reported making as much or more money in their new jobs while 44 percent reported making less _ in current dollars unadjusted for inflation. About 28 percent reported that their earnings had increased by 20 percent or more in their new jobs. Taking inflation into account, analysts said, that represents the workers who definitely are better off in their new jobs than they were in their old ones. But a slightly larger group, 30 percent, reported suffering an income loss of at least 20 percent from their old jobs. ``That\'s much deeper than in the previous surveys,\'\' said Mishel. ``It confirms a continuing trend of high-paid workers having no alternative but to shift to the poorer-paying jobs being created by this recovery.\'\'\r\n'),(531,2,'Koppers Co. Inc. and Beazer PLC said today their top executives conducted talks toward a merger agreement during the Memorial Day weekend. ``Such negotiations are expected to continue although there can be no assurance that such negotiations will result in a mutually acceptable agreement,\'\' the companies said. Beazer has offered to pay $60 per share, or a total of $1.7 billion, for Koppers. The companies\' announcement said the talks would allow Beazer\'s affiliate, BNS Inc., to acquire the Pittsburgh-based Koppers. In the meantime, BNS extended the deadline for its tender offer until midnight Wednesday. Earlier, Beazer said a federal appeals court in California had lifted one of the roadblocks to BNS\' hostile takeover bid of Koppers. Beazer said the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Friday BNS may proceed with its attempt to acquire Koppers\' stock once a trustee is appointed to control Koppers\' Sunny-Miller Contracting Co. road materials subsidiary in Irwindale, Calif. Koppers spokesman Robert O\'Gara said the decision imposes further delays on the attempted takeover bid. A hearing is scheduled on the issue Wednesday before Chief U.S. District Court Judge Manuel Real in Los Angeles, according to O\'Gara.\r\n'),(532,2,'A classics professor who received Ohio State University\'s highest teaching award plunged 12 stories to his death from a parking garage in an apparent suicide, police said. John Vaughn, 41, taught a class in mythology that attracted hundreds of students and sometimes had a waiting list. A parking attendant saw Vaughn pacing the top floor of the garage Wednesday and approached to see if he needed help, said manager Charles Bruns. Without a word, Vaughn took off his coat, sat on a ledge and fell backward, the attendant reported. Vaughn received an alumni award for distinguished teaching in 1981, one of eight professors so honored that year, university spokesman Steve Sterrett said. Franklin County Coroner William Adrion tentatively ruled the death a suicide.\r\n'),(533,2,'Congressional approval of President Bush\'s new budget would allow the Internal Revenue Service to increase the number of tax returns it audits _ but not by much. IRS Commissioner Fred T. Goldberg Jr. told reporters the agency anticipates auditing 102 returns per 10,000 that will be filed in 1990 and 103 per 10,000 next year. That compares with an all-time low of 97 per 10,000 returns for the 1989 tax year. ``The fact remains that there has been a continuing decline in audit coverage for a number of years, but now we are seeing a reversal of the trend,\'\' Goldberg said after Bush\'s proposed budget for the 1991 fiscal year was made public Monday. Although IRS officials agree that more returns should be audited, they point to concerted efforts over the past few years to target larger returns, those involving tax shelters and others likely to yield more revenue. Even so, Goldberg said, the audit statistics do not tell the whole story. He noted, for example, about 40 million couples and individuals file returns that are based almost entirely on income from wages, interest and dividends. IRS computers now automatically check those returns against backup documents filed by employers, banks and brokers to ensure that all income is reported. While those computer matches are not audits, Goldberg said, they are thorough enough to make it difficult for taxpayers to under-report such income. The agency\'s proposed budget for 1991 is $6.14 billion, up 11.6 percent from this year\'s $5.5 billion. A big part of that increase represents another installment on the agency\'s plan to replace an outmoded computer system. Goldberg said the new system will cost up to $6 billion over the next decade. One aim of the new system is to allow taxpayers to get answers to questions about their tax accounts as easily as they get information about a bill from a credit card company. The Bush administration estimates the IRS will collect an additional $3 billion next year because of management initiatives and the increase in the agency\'s own spending. Goldberg said the IRS will spend an additional $56 million and assign about 1,000 new staff members to reducing accounts receivable from a record level of nearly $60 billion. Those are taxes that have been assessed but not paid. The agency expects to spend $330 million in the new year for taxpayer service, which includes answering telephoned tax questions. That figure is up from $317 million this year, principally because last year IRS employees gave the wrong answer to one of every three telephoned questions.\r\n'),(534,2,'The dollar fell against the Japanese yen Tuesday, while the key index on the Tokyo Stock Exchange gained moderately, the first advance in three trading days. The dollar closed at 152.40 yen, down 0.85 yen from Monday\'s close of 153.25 yen. After opening at 153.36 yen, the dollar ranged between 152.30 yen and 153.36 yen. The Nikkei Stock Average of 225 selected issues rose 173.25 points to close at 31,938.30 points. Tuesday\'s advance followed a 248.67-point decline on Monday and a 47.88 point-slip last Friday. In the bond market, the price of the benchmark No. 119 10-year Japanese government bonds inched down to 87.34 points as of 3 p.m. (2:00 a.m. EDT), down from Monday\'s close of 87.39. The yield stood at 7.095 percent, up from the previous day\'s 7.085 percent. Currency dealers said the dollar opened slightly higher following its overnight upswing in New York, where it finished at 153.73 yen, up from 153 yen Friday. ``The dollar weakened as it was affected by cross-trading\'\' between the yen and the West German mark, said Kozo Yoshida, a dealer with Mitsui Taiyo Kobe Bank. Yoshida said otherwise there was no major market-affecting news. The yen\'s rebound triggered an upswing in stocks, dealers said. ``Share prices as a whole dropped in early trading on index-related selling, but the yen\'s recovery against the dollar encouraged many investors,\'\' said Yu Yoshida, a stock analyst with Yamaichi Securities. In the bond market, the price of the benchmark No. 119 10-year Japanese government bond edged higher to 87.33 from Monday\'s close of 87.09. That lowered the yield to 7.10 percent from 7.15 percent.\r\n'),(535,2,'American Ballet Theater dancers looked wonderful on the second night of the company\'s season at the Metropolitan Opera. The program was two New York premieres, a dazzling ``Black Swan\'\' pas de deux and ``Lilac Garden\'\' starring Carla Fracci. The Italian ballerina returned to American Ballet Theater as a guest to perform in an excerpt from ``Lilac Garden\'\' at Monday\'s gala opening and the entire Antony Tudor ballet on Tuesday night. The entire ballet, to Chausson\'s ``Poeme,\'\' was as achingly romantic as it is meant to be. The young bride-to-be, danced by Miss Fracci with subtlety and gentle beauty, is stoical but suffering because in love with a younger man. He was danced with romantic yearning by Kevin McKenzie. Ross Stretton as the Man She Must Marry was stiff with his bride-to-be but softer when he met An Episode in His Past in the lilac garden. She, danced by Martine Van Hamel, seemed a strong survivor but she was hurting, too. The evening began with ``Birthday Offering,\'\' which Frederick Ashton choreographed for the 25th anniversary of the British Royal Ballet. It gives important solos to seven ballerinas, showing each one\'s strength. Ballet Theater added it to its repertory last October in Houston. On Tuesday, the star ballerina was Susan Jaffe, partnered by Stretton. The others were Cheryl Yeager, Amanda McKerrow, Julie Kent, Leslie Browne, Alessandra Ferri and Christine Dunham. All looked good. Fernando Bujones, back this season as a guest, having been greatly missed, and Cynthia Harvey danced the ``Black Swan\'\' pas de deux. Both were in the highest, exciting form. Toward the end of the duet, Miss Harvey danced only 16 of the famous 32 fouettes, whipped-leg turns. The audience murmured, fearing she had felt a muscle tear, but she finished the duet flawlessly. The evening ended with the half-hour ``Brief Fling\'\' which Twyla Tharp choreographed for the company. This eclectic, quite enjoyable ballet had its premiere in February in San Francisco. In it, Cheryl Yeager and Julio Bocca, in Navy, do formal ballet dancing to ``I\'m a Little Teapot\'\' played on amplified piano. Shelley Washington, loose-limbed as Miss Tharp was as a dancer, looked like an urchin being tossed around by Jamie Bishton, Kevin O\'Day and Keith Roberts in mini-kilts. Claudia Alfieri, Isabella Padovani, Gil Boggs and Robert Wallace wore red plaid. During the 10 sections of ``Brief Fling\'\' there also was a jig and music which sounded like minimalism meeting a cement mixer. The music was by Michel Colombier. Clever costumes were by Isaac Mizrahi. Dennis Cleveland played the violin solo in ``Lilac Garden.\'\' The orchestra sounded thin, as though too small for the requirements of the music.\r\n'),(536,2,'Beverly Hills must install a Christmas tree next to a 28-foot Hanukkah menorah or move the menorah next to an existing tree, a federal judge ruled Thursday in a lawsuit between two Jewish groups. U.S. District Judge Terry J. Hatter said a U.S. Supreme Court decision concerning religious symbols on public property clearly allows such displays but only if both the menorah and the Christmas tree are represented and are close together. ``What I am going to order is that the menorah be moved so that it is next to the tree that has been designated to symbolize a secular Christmas tree and that no religious ceremonies be held (there),\'\' Hatter said. Marshall Grossman, an attorney for Chabad, a movement of Hasidic Jews, said the group paid $25,000 to install the menorah - an array of nine candles - on a permanent foundation and could not easily move it. Hatter said a large Christmas tree could be brought to the site and could be lighted next to the menorah. ``Your honor, I can probably do that myself,\'\' said Grossman. ``It may be the first time I\'ve purchased a Christmas tree but I think I can get rabbinical approval.\'\' The American Jewish Congress and four Jewish residents of Beverly Hills, backed by the American Civil Liberties Union, filed a civil rights lawsuit seeking the menorah\'s removal. They claimed that having the menorah on public property was a violation of First Amendment guarantees of separation of church and state. They also drew support Thursday from the Union of American Hebrew Congregations. Grossman protested when the judge ruled that no religious ceremonies could be held in front of the menorah, which stands across the street from City Hall. Hatter denied a request from Beverly Hills attorney Mitchell Abbott to stay his temporary restraining order from taking effect until further arguments could be made. ACLU lawyers Carol Sobel and Douglas Mirell pressed for quick action, saying any delay would allow the menorah to stand alone through the eight-night celebratin of Hanukkah, which began Tuesday night. Although the city has two official Christmas trees and lighted street decorations, the attorneys said they are not close enough to the menorah to provide equal representation. Hatter suggested that the presence of two symbols might help to spread holiday cheer. ``Our society is in need of any sustenance of a positive nature,\'\' the judge said. ``The court is abiding by the letter of what the Supreme Court said,\'\' ACLU attorney Mirell said outside court. He called the ruling ``a clear victory\'\' for the plaintiffs. Grossman disagreed. ``The net result of this misguided effort ... is that this year instead of there being two Christmas trees and one menorah in Beverly Hills, there will now be an additional Christmas tree,\'\' he said.\r\n'),(537,2,'The House approved a $1.8 billion 1989 appropriations bill for Congress\' own expenses Thursday, an election-year measure devoid of a pay raise that many lawmakers had talked about giving themselves. The measure was approved on a 253-133 vote and sent to the Senate for final congressional approval. The appropriations bill was one of five remaining that legislators are racing to complete by Saturday\'s start of federal fiscal year 1989. If all 13 are enacted by Saturday, it would be the first time since 1948 that all of the spending measures that finance government agencies were in place in time for the new year. Members of Congress have received base annual salaries of $89,500 since February 1987. But lawmakers have been coming under increasing public criticism for the large sums of money most of them receive for giving speeches to industry, labor and other groups. The amount of the payments _ called honoraria _ legislators can keep each year can total up to 30 percent of each representative\'s salary, and up to 40 percent of each senator\'s pay. Lawmakers have discussed lowering or eliminating the amount of honoraria permitted in exchange for increasing the base pay. After House-Senate negotiators working on the bill discussed the proposals briefly on Wednesday, they agreed not to address the issue in the spending measure. President Reagan is scheduled to propose salary adjustments for Congress and top federal officials in January. His proposal will be based on the recommendations that a special federal salary commission are scheduled to make in December. The money in the bill represents a 3 percent, or $59 million, increase over 1988 legislative spending. Of the total package, $506 million is for the House and $341 million for the Senate. The rest is for joint items such as the Capitol Police and for congressional agencies such as the Library of Congress.\r\n'),(538,2,'Today is Wednesday, June 22, the 174th day of 1988. There are 192 days left in the year. Today\'s Highlight in History: Fifty years ago, on June 22, 1938, heavyweight boxing champion Joe Louis knocked out German boxer Max Schmeling just two minutes, four seconds into the first round of their rematch at New York\'s Yankee Stadium, two years after Schmeling knocked out Louis. (In addition to gaining a personal triumph, Louis dealt a body blow to Adolf Hitler\'s doctrine of ``Aryan supremacy.\'\' In 1981, when Louis died, Schmeling hailed his one-time adversary as a ``boxing genius\'\' and ``the greatest opponent I ever faced in the ring.\'\') On this date: In 1611, English explorer Henry Hudson, his son and several other people were set adrift in present-day Hudson Bay by mutineers. In 1815, Napoleon Bonaparte abdicated a second time. In 1868, Arkansas was re-admitted to the Union. In 1870, Congress created the Department of Justice. In 1911, Britain\'s King George V was crowned at Westminster Abbey. In 1937, Joe Louis began his reign as world heavyweight boxing champion by knocking out Jim Braddock in Chicago. In 1940, Adolf Hitler gained a stunning victory as France was forced to sign an armistice eight days after German forces overran Paris. In 1941, Germany invaded the Soviet Union during World War II. In 1944, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the GI Bill of Rights. In 1969, singer-actress Judy Garland died in London at the age of 47. In 1970, President Richard M. Nixon signed a measure lowering the voting age to 18. In 1977, John N. Mitchell became the first former U.S. Attorney General to go to prison as he began serving a sentence for his role in the Watergate cover-up. (He was released 19 months later.) In 1981, Mark David Chapman pleaded guilty to killing rock star John Lennon outside Lennon\'s New York City apartment building the previous December. Ten years ago: A group of neo-Nazis called off plans to march in the predominantly Jewish community of Skokie, Ill., after winning a year-long battle for legal permission to demonstrate, but also said they would go ahead with plans for a rally in Chicago. Five years ago: The crew of the space shuttle Challenger released a West German satellite into space, then retrieved it with the shuttle\'s robot arm a total of five times _ demonstrating the shuttle\'s ability to retrieve and put back into orbit satellites in need of repair. One year ago: Dancer Fred Astaire, whose elegance and fancy footwork graced more than 30 movies, died at Century City Hospital in Los Angeles at age 88. Today\'s Birthdays: Movie director Billy Wilder (``Some Like It Hot\'\') is 82. Author Anne Morrow Lindbergh is 82. Broadway producer Joseph Papp is 67. Fashion designer Bill Blass is 66. Actor Ralph Waite is 60. Former San Francisco Mayor Dianne Feinstein is 55. Singer-actor Kris Kristofferson is 51. CBS news correspondent Ed Bradley is 47. Singer-musician Todd Rundgren is 40. Actress Meryl Streep is 39. Actress Lindsay Wagner is 39. Thought for Today: ``The best compliment to a child or a friend is the feeling you give him that he has been set free to make his own inquiries, to come to conclusions that are right for him, whether or not they coincide with your own.\'\' _ Alistair Cooke, British-born American journalist and broadcaster.\r\n'),(539,2,'Bondholders who had pursued the Washington Public Power Supply System through the courts for five years have let WPPSS off the hook just before trial, claiming ``you can\'t get blood out of a turnip.\'\' Plaintiff attorneys said the deal with the supply system announced Wednesday will gain the cooperation of WPPSS employees, who will be leading witnesses when the securities fraud trial starts Sept. 7 in Tucson, Ariz. WPPSS agreed this week to settle litigation against it over the system\'s $2.25 billion bond default in 1983. The bonds were sold to finance construction of two nuclear power plants, which were never completed. The trial was moved to Tucson after judges in Seattle excused themselves because of possible perceived conflicts of interest and because some feared it would be impossible to get an impartial jury to hear the case. Thousands of people in Washington lost money because of the default. Bondholders agreed to drop claims against WPPSS in return for access to accounts for the terminated power plants, Nos. 4 and 5, containing millions of dollars. Remaining defendants include 20 public utilities in Washington and one in Oregon that participated in building the plants, three engineering firms and a firm that had provided WPPSS with financial advice. The abrupt pullout of WPPSS caught other defendants by surprise, and one acknowledged consideration was being given to requesting a trial delay. ``We\'re surprised they (WPPSS) didn\'t stay and defend their actions ...,\'\' said Chuck Shigley, administrator for the Snohomish County Public Utility District. WPPSS paid no money in the tentative settlement, but agreed that it has an obligation to pay the face value and interest on the bonds _ which total about $3 billion. ``Since you can\'t get blood out of a turnip, why not get all the other benefits you can,\'\' said Mel Weiss, representing class action plaintiffs in the giant lawsuit. However, the agreement noted that because of limited assets pledged to secure the bonds, there was ``no expectation\'\' the money would ever be paid. The WPPSS Executive Board was expected to approve the agreement when it meets Friday in Richland, Wash., in a special meeting, said Carl Halvorson, board chairman. ``It\'s a very favorable settlement for the supply system,\'\' he said. The tentative settlement, which also requires the approval of presiding U.S. District Judge William D. Browning, protects WPPSS\' other assets against any further judgments in the case. In the legal action, bondholders sued the supply system, 88 utilities, bond underwriters, various directors and managers, engineering firms and advisors after WPPSS defaulted on $2.25 billion worth of bonds. Many defendants have settled over the past year, including bond underwriters and more than 60 utilities. They have agreed to pay a total of $331 million and may face further liabilities. The terminated plants are located at the Hanford nuclear reservation and Satsop, west of Olympia. Meanwhile, Browning ruled Wednesday in Tucson that bondholders are permitted to try to prove they should be fully refunded for the bonds they bought. Common law and state law permit rescission, or refund, damages, Browning said in his nine-page order. Claims under the federal Securities Act allow only for out-of-pocket losses, Browning said. That means the difference between what the bondholder paid and what the value of the bonds were. In both instances, the bondholders will be allowed to try to prove that because of misrepresentations, they bought bonds that otherwise would not have been put on the market and therefore should get full refunds plus interest.\r\n'),(540,2,'A federal appeals court today upheld a judge\'s dismissal of charges against an Iran-Contra scandal defendant because the government refused to allow the defense to use classified materials. Joseph Fernandez, the CIA station chief in Costa Rica from 1984-86, was entitled to the material to defend himself against charges that he lied to investigators about a scheme to send military aid to Contra rebels in Nicaragua, said a three-judge panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Fernandez planned to use the classified evidence to argue that he did not lie about his knowledge of former National Security Council official Oliver North\'s involvement in the scheme and the type of supplies being sent to the Contras. ``Whether a jury would believe Fernandez\'s defense is speculation. But to preclude the jury from considering evidence relevant to this defense would be to deprive him of fundamental constitutional protections,\'\' said the opinion by Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III. He was joined by Judges William W. Wilkins Jr. and Robert F. Chapman. The 40-page opinion deletes numerous mentions of sensitive national security information. U.S. District Judge Claude M. Hilton of Alexandria dismissed the case last November after the government refused to submit the classified material sought by Fernandez. The former CIA station chief had been indicted on two counts of lying to investigators and two counts of obstructing justice. He was accused of telling investigators that a Costa Rican airstrip was for training that country\'s military in case of an invasion by Nicaragua when in fact the airstrip was used to illegally resupply the Contras. He also was accused of falsely saying he did not know of North\'s involvement and did not know that supplies he helped deliver to the Contras in 1986 contained military aid. Fernandez asked to disclose nearly 5,000 classified documents at his trial.\r\n'),(541,2,'A federal has board ordered a Postal Service contract with Texas computer billionaire H. Ross Perot voided because the way in which the contract was awarded violated proper procedures. The contract had been suspended on July 8 after a preliminary ruling which the Postal Service is challenging in the U.S. Court of Appeals. The board concluded Friday that the Postal Service violated federal rules by failing to provide any advance notice of the contract and awarding the contract to Perot without seeking competitive bids.\r\n'),(542,2,'Max Robinson, the country\'s first black network television anchor, knows that people think his recent life-threatening illness might be AIDS, but he refuses to discuss it. ``I take the position that my health is a private matter,\'\' he told The Washington Post in an interview at his home in Chicago. The Post, in a three-page profile of Robinson published Thursday, noted that ``it is widely rumored that Robinson has AIDS, and he\'s aware of that.\'\' ``The curiosity has at times annoyed me,\'\' Robinson said. ``I\'m just not going to get into the subject of what I have.\'\' Robinson, whose TV career took off when he became an anchorman in Washington in 1969, moved to the ABC network in 1978 when he, Frank Reynolds and Peter Jennings were the three anchors on ``World News Tonight.\'\' His relations with ABC wer sometimes stormy; he once accused the network of racism and in 1983 embarrassed ABC executives by missing Reynolds\' funeral service at which he was expected to escort President and Mrs. Reagan. He left the network in 1984 and worked briefly at WMAQ-TV in Chicago. He has not worked much since, and said he is selling his Afro-American art collection which has been valued at a half-million dollars. Robinson was hospitalized on Dec. 4 last year in critical condition and complaining about weight loss. When he was released nearly two months later, officials refused to discuss his illness. ``While in intensive care, he lay in an isolated room, and when he was moved to another ward, a warning was posted outside his room to medical personnel to gown and glove before performing certain tasks in caring for him,\'\' the newspaper said. ``I feel pretty good,\'\' Robinson said. Asked if he was terminally ill, the 49-year-old Robinson replied, ``We all are.\'\'\r\n'),(543,2,'Oil prices rallied Friday as traders speculated President Bush might scrap diplomatic meetings with Iraq, then crude fell back sharply when Bush\'s news conference rhetoric was not so harsh. Light sweet crude oil settled at $26.55 per barrel, up 13 cents, at the New York Mercantile Exchange on contracts for delivery in January. Crude for delivery in most later months closed lower. In early trading, crude had jumped up by $1.68 per barrel amid continued quarreling between the United States and Iraq over a date for Secretary of State James A. Baker III to visit Baghdad. Two senators said in Washington that Bush might be ready to abandon the idea of the talks, adding to oil\'s rally. After Bush said in the afternoon that he was discouraged but still hoped the talks could be held, crude plunged more than $1 per barrel in about a half hour. ``It was probably a little over-bought on the whole situation,\'\' said Ann-Louise Hittle, a senior oil analyst with Shearson Lehman Brothers Inc. ``Once he came out and didn\'t do anything, it was easy to sell off, probably a little bit of buy-the-rumor, sell-the-fact.\'\' Oil traders often run up prices by buying crude futures contracts when rumors hit the market, because they don\'t want to run the risk of getting left out of a rally. They are more likely to sell off their oil contracts on the basis of facts that indicate adequate supplies or sluggish demand. During the week, crude hit its lowest prices since Aug. 3, the day after Iraq invaded Kuwait. But after the close of $25.35 per barrel on Wednesday, it began moving higher. Oil had been steadily dropping since Nov. 30, when Bush first proposed the talks with Iraq and traders began believing a peaceful solution to the crisis could be at hand. Once the diplomats showed they could not even agree on dates to meet, the war fears began resurfacing. ``The last few days, it seemed like the peace talk has diminished,\'\' said Ed Kevelson, a trader with Dean Witter Reynolds Inc. For the week, crude finished 3 cents higher on January delivery contracts. Refined petroleum products moved in tandem with crude on Friday, rising in early trading then dropping to show little change at the close. Home heating oil was up .67 cent at 75.24 cents a gallon for January delivery. Unleaded gasoline was up .61 cent at 66.18 cents a gallon for January delivery. Heating oil has shown the most weakness of late, with supplies adequate and demand sluggish amid unseasonably warm fall weather. ``It won\'t get cold,\'\' said Thomas P. Blakeslee, an energy analyst with Pegasus Econometric Group Inc., in Hoboken, N.J. ``It\'s a little chilly out there today, but there\'s no forecast for any types of freezing temperatures.\'\' For the week, heating oil fell 3.93 cents for next-month delivery, while gasoline fell .29 cent. Natural gas for January delivery closed Friday at $2.262 per 1,000 cubic feet, up 4.2 cents for the day but down 8.8 cents for the week.\r\n'),(544,2,'Two suspected Colombian drug traffickers were extradited to the United States on Tuesday, the first such extraditions since President Cesar Gaviria took office last month. Jose Hilario Ortiz and Raul Hernan Buchelli, who both face drug trafficking charges in the United States, were placed on board a U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration plane bound for Miami, national police chief Gen. Miguel Gomez said in remarks broadcast by the RCN radio network. Ortiz faces drug trafficking charges in Connecticut and Buchelli is wanted in Florida, said a police spokesman, requesting anonymity. No further details were immediately available. Buchelli is wanted on charges of conspiracy to smuggle and distribute heroin and money laundering, while Ortiz pleaded guilty to a cocaine trafficking conspiracy charge and fled the country before sentencing, according to U.S. court records. Buchelli\'s brother, Guido Lucio, also faces drug trafficking charges in the United States. But he was released last week after the government rejected a U.S. request for his extradition, citing insufficient evidence. Colombia has extradited 24 suspected drug traffickers to the United States since August 1989, when the government launched a major anti-drug crackdown after the murder of a presidential candidate. Twelve of those extradited have either been convicted at trial or pleaded guilty; one was acquitted. An additional nine are awaiting trial. The crackdown prompted the Medellin cocaine cartel to declare ``total war\'\' on the government a year ago. Tuesday\'s extraditions were the first of suspected drug traffickers to the United States since Gaviria was inaugurated Aug. 7. He has pledged to continue the war against the cocaine cartels waged by his predecessor, Virgilio Barco. Last Wednesday, Gaviria modified the country\'s extradition policy. In a nationally televised speech, Gaviria said drug traffickers who turn themselves in and confess their crimes would be tried in Colombia and not face extradition to the United States. Under the decree announced by Gaviria, Colombian judges would be also empowered to impose shorter sentences for suspects who confess and cooperate with local investigations. The country\'s drug barons have so far offered no reply to Gaviria\'s offer. Gaviria\'s offer appeared to be, at least in part, a response to repeated offers from the drug traffickers to surrender to Colombian judges in return for a promise to end the extraditions that had been resumed last year by Barco. The drug traffickers have feared extradition to the United States because they would have little influence over the judicial process there. Cocaine cartel members have traditionally been able to either bribe or threaten their way out of Colombian jails. Judges who refuse to be intimidated have often been slain. In his speech last week, Gaviria announced that three Colombians would soon be extradited to the United States, but he said three other U.S. extradition requests had been turned down. The third suspect set to be extradited, Joaquin Oswaldo Gallo Chamorro, was still being held in Colombia on Tuesday. Authorities did not say why he was not sent to the United States with Ortiz and Buchelli. With the latest extraditions, the U.S. Justice Department is still seeking to extradite 14 suspected drug traffickers held in Colombia. Colombia\'s Cali and Medellin drug cartels supply most of the cocaine consumed in the United States and Europe. Authorities blame the Medellin for killing about 550 Colombians the past year, including three presidential candidates.\r\n'),(545,2,'Three men planting explosives near a British military barracks today fired at a guard before fleeing their bungled bombing attempt, officials said. Investigators later found 65 pounds of the high-powered explosive Semtex in three satchels outside a housing block at the British army\'s Langenhagen Barracks in Hanover, British military officials said. It was not known who was responsible. A Ministry of Defense spokesman in London said: ``We cannot say the men were IRA at this moment in time. All we can say is that they were terrorists.\'\' The Irish Republican Army has been blamed for numerous attacks against British military installations in West Germany over the past few years. The IRA has waged a campaign to drive the British from Northern Ireland and unite the Protestant-dominated province with the overwhelming Roman Catholic Irish Republic. According to police, a civilian guard making the rounds with a security dog noticed three suspicious people on the barracks grounds about 2 a.m. Three shots were fired by the people, said a British military spokesman, who spoke on condition of anonymity. He said the guard was not injured. Col. Henry Day, Chief of Public Information for the British Forces in Germany, said the attackers had cut a hole in the barracks\' perimeter fence. He told British Broadcasting Corp. radio that 70 soldiers were moved from the building. ``It was Semtex, with a wire timing device,\'\' Day said. He said one satchel contained 10 blocks of explosives, and the second nine blocks. He said he had no details on the third.\r\n'),(546,2,'After 10 months, one of the many unanswered questions in the criminal investigation of Attorney General Edwin Meese III is whether he benefited financially from his efforts on behalf of an Iraqi oil pipeline project or scandal-plagued Wedtech Corp., sources familiar with the probe say. Last May 11, independent counsel James McKay launched his inquiry of Meese\'s assistance to Wedtech and the probe has spread to the attorney general\'s involvement with the pipeline. In both instances, McKay\'s investigators have been examining stock trades made on Meese\'s behalf by his investment manager, W. Franklyn Chinn. Chinn and Meese were brought together by Meese\'s longtime friend E. Robert Wallach, a central figure in both the Wedtech scandal and the pipeline project. It was disclosed earlier this month that: _In connection with the $1 billion proposed pipeline, Swiss oilman Bruce Rappaport paid $150,000 to his attorney Wallach, who directed the funds to an account owned by Chinn. Rappaport was a partner in the project with San Francisco-based Bechtel Group Inc., which was going to build the pipeline. Rappaport was brought into the deal in 1985 primarily because of his close ties to then-Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres. _The money from the Meese Partners account, Wallach\'s $150,000 placed in the Chinn account and several hundred thousand dollars from Chinn\'s biggest customer, Marymount College of Palos Verdes, Calif., were used as capital by Chinn to buy hard-to-get, brand-new stock issues, which Chinn sold later the same day. It would have been difficult for Chinn to obtain such stock with Meese\'s money alone. ``Without using the holdings of the other accounts he controlled, ... Mr. Chinn may not have been able to conduct the number of trades he did ... on behalf of Meese Partners,\'\' a congressional subcommittee said in a report this month. _Once the stock was sold and the profit and loss determined, Chinn assigned profits and losses to his various customers. Overall, Meese invested $50,000 and came away 18 months later with $95,000, almost all of it gained through a total of 23 one-day stock trades. Eighteen of the trades were profitable. In seven of the trades, the attorney general didn\'t have enough money in his account to generate the profits and losses that were assigned him. Chinn\'s biggest customer, Marymount College, didn\'t fare nearly as well as Meese. Was the stock trading actually a well-disguised payoff to Meese? That question is one that McKay\'s office has been unable to resolve, say the sources, speaking on condition of anonymity. Central to the criminal investigation is whether there was a plan to steer the proceeds of Chinn\'s stock transactions to Meese and whether the attorney general knew about it. The attorney general says he knew nothing about the transactions because he had set up a limited blind partnership with Chinn\'s company under which details were to be kept secret from Meese as a way to protect the attorney general from violating rules against conflict of interest. The investigators face a wall of silence from the others involved in setting up the financial arrangements, Chinn and Wallach, who are both under indictment for racketeering in the Wedtech scandal. Wallach denied to McKay\'s investigators that he gave anything of value to Meese, but Wallach refused to tell McKay anything about his dealings with Wedtech, his knowledge of the Meese-Chinn partnership and his dealings with Chinn. McKay said that after the Wedtech trial expected later this year of Wallach, Chinn and business associate R. Kent London, the independent counsel may seek their testimony again. The attorney general\'s good fortune in stock trading began months after he smoothed the way for Wallach to discuss the pipeline with then-National Security Adviser Robert McFarlane, who met with Wallach and Rappaport in June 1985. Later in the year, Meese and Wallach met with Peres about the pipeline, which was never built. Also during the period the stock trading was taking place, Chinn sat on the board of directors of Wedtech, the Bronx, N.Y., defense contractor that allegedly paid out millions of dollars to lawyers and lobbyists in an attempt to influence various public officials, including Meese, in the awarding of federal contracts. One of those lawyers was Wallach, who was paid $1.3 million from 1981 through 1986 by Wedtech. The stock trades that made profits for the attorney general took place some four years after Meese, then White House counselor, arranged for his deputy, James Jenkins, to intervene on behalf of Wedtech in connection with a $32 million no-bid contract to build small engines for the Army. Despite the misgivings of Army officials over what they regarded as a high price, Wedtech was awarded the contract following a White House meeting called by Jenkins. Meese ended the financial arrangement with Chinn last year after the investment adviser came under criminal investigation in the Wedtech scandal and after public disclosure that Chinn had sat on Wedtech\'s board of directors.\r\n'),(547,2,'Defense Secretary Frank C. Carlucci says he hopes to curb Pentagon purchasing abuses by ordering new limits on the number of ``final offers\'\' that defense contractors can make on a single deal. Carlucci said at a news conference Monday that he was surprised to learn how frequently companies were allowed to revise supposedly final bids, although he described it as ``the exception\'\' rather than the rule. In the past, contractors have been allowed to amend their final offers in consultation with the Pentagon to change prices or technical specifications to meet military needs. The Pentagon has been rocked in recent weeks by allegations that private consultants working for defense contractors bribed top military purchasing officials for secret contract information. Many of the alleged abuses disclosed in the Justice Department investigation involve contractors who, through the consultants, learned the price or other specifics of bids by competing companies, and then submitted a new ``best and final offer\'\' tailored to win contracts, some of them worth billions of dollars. ``It is the `best and final offer\' that seems to us to create the most intensive point in the competitive cycle. And that means that information is at a premium,\'\' Carlucci said. ``We intend to continue with our competitive process. But when you repeat it once, twice, or three times, then it can readily become subject to abuse,\'\' Carlucci added. Carlucci, who was scheduled to testify before the House Armed Services Committee today, also said his aides had drawn up a ``protocol\'\' for the military to follow as more information is disclosed from the Justice Department investigation. Carlucci said the department has: _Required that 17 companies implicated in the investigation certify they did not engage in ``illegal or improper activity\'\' to obtain a defense contract; _Required those 17 to agree, in any new contract greater than $100,000, to include a clause allowing the government to recover profits or 10 percent of the contract value if the deal is tainted; _Started procedures to lift the security clearances of six people, including one suspended without pay from the Navy Department and five others transferred to other duties pending results of the investigation; _Sent letters to the top 200 defense contractors urging them to implement strong internal ethics programs, ``stringent management controls, and asking them to report back to us on their self-governance programs;\'\' _Reviewed federal acquisition regulations to tighten controls on consultants employed by defense contractors; _Formed an audit task force to review the cost imposed on the military budget by consultants employed by private defense contractors. Carlucci said the certification requirement was being applied only to the 17 implicated companies to avoid penalizing contractors who were not under suspicion. ``This is a rifle action. It is not a shotgun action,\'\' he said. ``We are directing this at certain contractors. We do not intend to apply it indiscriminately, because it does impose a burden on people. ``And where there are burdens, there are costs, and those costs may come back to the Pentagon and the U.S. taxpayer,\'\' he said. ``It is only where we have reason to believe that people are under suspicion that we are doing this.\'\' Carlucci declined to identify people whose security clearances were being lifted, saying only that ``we are taking steps to revoke the security clearances of individuals who have been involved in illegal or improper actions.\'\' In a related development, the White House announced that President Reagan intends to nominate Milton L. Lohr to the new position of deputy undersecretary of defense for acquisition. Since 1983, Lohr has been president of the Defense Research Corp. in La Jolla, Calif. Before that, he was executive vice president of Flight Systems Inc., from 1969-83. Lohr, a 63-year-old native of Revere, Mass., graduated from the University of Southern California in 1949 and the University of California at Los Angeles in 1964.\r\n'),(548,2,'Social Security officials say a quadriplegic who won a seat in the Legislature has been warned he could lose his medical benefits if he takes his newly won seat and begins drawing expense reimbursements. Bill Boharski, a Kalispell Republican, defeated Democrat Gordon Hall in November, to win his first term in the Montana House. But after drawing expense reimbursements for attending legislative caucuses in November, Boharski said he was notified the reimbursements were ``unearned income\'\' that would make him ineligible for continued medical benefits under Medicare and Medicaid. And Boharski, who is paralyzed from injuries he suffered in an automobile accident five years ago, says he can\'t afford to lose the money. He estimates his medical expenses at $15,000 a year. ``That put me in a position where I had to seriously consider whether or not I had to resign my position,\'\' the 27-year-old legislator-elect said. ``That amount of medical bills isn\'t something you can just pay.\'\' Boharski said the situation is not desperate because state and federal officials are trying to help. Legislative leaders say they\'re considering a change in state compensation law to redefine the reimbursements, and Boharski said Social Security has advised him the case is under review. Boharski also said he will ask Congress for help if need be. Montana legislators earn $52.13 for each working day in the session plus $50 a day during the session as reimbursement for living expenses in Helena. The 1989 session begins Monday. It\'s the expense reimbursement that concerns Social Security Administration officials. Mark Fredenberg, operations supervisor for the agency\'s Kalispell office, said that under federal law, the expense allowances are considered unearned income. Social Security disability benefits are reduced by the amount of unearned income over $20 that a person receives, he said. And a person who loses eligibility for those payments because of unearned income also loses eligibility for medical coverage, he said. Most people receiving disability payments don\'t work or don\'t travel to work, Fredenberg noted, saying a situation such as Boharski\'s arises ``very, very seldom.\'\' Boharski said he checked into the federal regulations before he filed for office last spring. He said he was told then he would qualify for continued medical benefits if elected, under a program that allows people to continue receiving medical coverage even if they are working. Boharski said Social Security officials have since told him he should be able to continue receiving his medical benefits. But, he said, he hasn\'t yet received written verification. Fredenberg said he could not comment directly on Boharski\'s case because of federal privacy laws. Boharski said if legislation at the state level doesn\'t resolve the problem, he will try to have changes made at the federal level so he can retain his legislative seat. ``I\'m counting on staying,\'\' he said. ``Anyone who knows me knows I don\'t quit that easy.\'\'\r\n'),(549,2,'In a major blow to Prime Minister Noboru Takeshita, the man appointed to investigate a widening scandal resigned today after saying he had accepted political donations from the company at the center of the controversy. Takeshita today named a political outsider, former Supreme Court Judge Masami Takatsuji, 78, to replace Justice Minister Takashi Hasegawa. Hasegawa announced he was stepping down just three days after Takeshita appointed him to a new Cabinet supposedly untainted by a stock-dealing scandal that had already forced the resignation of 17 politicians and business leaders. Opposition parties and analysts say Takeshita should follow the lead of those leaders and resign. Hasegawa\'s resignation, which occurred the day after Takeshita publicly reaffirmed his support for him, was the second Cabinet casualty. Finance Minister Kiichi Miyazawa stepped down on Dec. 9. Takeshita made no comment on the resignation of Hasegawa, 76. Takatsuji, a constitutional expert and former bureaucrat, served as a Supreme Court justice from 1973 to 1980. He is an unusual choice as a Cabinet member because he is not a career politician, the background of nearly all Cabinet ministers. Takeshita apparently decided it was necessary to go outside politics to find someone without links to the Recruit Co., the information conglomerate at the heart of the scandal over charges it sold unlisted stocks in a subsidiary to scores of politicians and business leaders at bargain prices. Asked at a news conference today if he had any connection to the Recruit affair, the new justice minister said: ``None at all.\'\' ``I don\'t really have anything to say about Recruit,\'\' Takatsuji said. ``My attitude toward it is no different from that of the people in general.\'\' His predecessor had been given a mandate to reform political ethics and head the legal probe of the Recruit scandal. But one day after Hasegawa\'s appointment, it was disclosed that Recruit had given money for 12 years to a group that financed his campaign and political activities. ``There is nothing wrong with politicians accepting donations made from the good will of their supporters,\'\' Hasegawa told reporters earlier today. ``However, as minister in charge of clearing up the Recruit problem in the Takeshita administration, which is trying to heighten trust in government, it is regrettable that I received donations from Recruit,\'\' he said. ``I apologize deeply and resign from my post as justice minister.\'\' The scandal has engulfed the Liberal Democrats, as several senior party lawmakers or their aides purchased shares in the subsidiary before the shares were offered publicly and later sold them at large tax-free profits. The transactions were legal but have generated a storm of controversy over business and political ethics. Prosecutors also are invesigating possible bribery. Leaders of the opposition Clean Government Party and the Democratic Socialist Party said Hasegawa\'s resignation was only natural, while the Communist Party called for the entire Cabinet to resign and new parliamentary elections. ``Takeshita should step down because he is connected to the Recruit affair himself and as long as he is appointing Cabinet ministers, government won\'t be clean,\'\' said Masayuki Fukuoka, a professor of political science at Komazawa University in Tokyo. ``There is no way for the Takeshita administration to regain its public support as more people will probably be arrested as the Recruit investigation advances next year,\'\' he said. It is widely perceived that the premier should consider resigning when public support dips below 20 percent, Fukuoka said. A newspaper poll this month found Takeshita\'s public support was 18 percent, down from 30 percent when he took office 13 months ago. An aide to Takeshita and one of his relatives also profited in the stock transactions, but the prime minister has denied any personal involvement. ``Takeshita cannot escape the responsibility of political reform that he has pledged, and he should resign,\'\' said Jiro Kamijima, professor of government at Tokyo\'s Rissho University. ``The entire parliament has been hijacked (by Recruit).\'\' Hasegawa confirmed Thursday that his political support organization received $46,000 from Recruit over the last 12 years, but Hasegawa said he had no knowledge of the donations. Other new Cabinet members have received donations from Recruit, including the agriculture and economic planning agency chiefs and Chief Cabinet Secretary Keizo Obuchi, who has acknowledged his political support group received monthly donations of $160 from Recruit.\r\n'),(550,2,'With lessons learned from the Grenada evacuation, Charleston County officials are preparing for the possibility of a hasty civilian evacuation from Central America. ``I guess that the national network interviews of Americans in Panama made me think in terms of that. Basically, it\'s just headlines until you start seeing people and their concerns about things like that,\'\' William J. Knowles, director of Charleston County\'s Department of Social Services, said Friday. During the past three weeks, social services employees have been assembling ``survival boxes\'\' containing items ranging from registration forms to diapers. They also have a stockpile of quarters for any new arrival who might need to make a telephone call. The repatriation would be similar to the last-minute handling of the more than 500 evacuees flown to the Charleston Air Force Base after the 1983 invasion of Grenada, said Knowles. Though the Charleston Air Force Base has not been designated a civilian evacuation landing zone, Knowles said it is the most logical and convenient for the large aircraft known to supply American bases in Central America. ``We were very lucky with Grenada because this line of government dealt with that line of government right up to the State Department. But with something like an evacuation, you never know what may happen,\'\' he said. ``It\'s just been a prudent ground effort to muster the resources of an agency at a minute\'s notice,\'\' he said. ``We don\'t want to be in a position of having to run around looking for this and that.\'\'\r\n'),(551,2,'Two of the 14 Cubans who sought refuge in Czechoslovakia\'s embassy in Havana earlier this week have left the mission, the Foreign Ministry said today. According to a report carried by the state CTK news agency, one refugee left without notifying the embassy and the other asked to be released. The two apparently left without explanation. ``They left Friday afternoon, sometime between 4 and 4:30 p.m. local time,\'\' said Marcel Cintalan, a Foreign Ministry official. ``We don`t know why. They did not give any reasons.\'\' A senior official said Friday that Czechoslovakia would not turn the Cuban refugees in the Havana embassy over to authorities and that Prague was prepared for long and complicated talks over their fate. Three other asylum-seekers have sought refuge in Spain\'s Havana embassy. The Czechoslovak deputy foreign minister, Lubos Dobrovsky, met with Cuban Ambassador Mario Rodriguez Martinez Friday and asked Cuba to grant the refugees free passage. Dobrovsky also met with senior Soviet, West German and Italian diplomats to seek their help in resolving the situation. Tension has been growing between the two former Communist allies since a democratic revolution swept Czechoslovakia\'s Communist rulers from power last winter. Earlier this week, Prague said it suspected the influx of Cuban refugees might be a deliberate provocation by Havana to underline the growing strain between the nations.\r\n'),(552,2,'Iraq said today it had moved Western detainees to vital military targets, making good on its threat to use them as human shields against a potential American attack. The message came after Iraq warned its own people not to hide foreigners or they would face the ``severest punishment.\'\' Iraq had threatened earlier to use the trapped foreigners as shields, and today\'s statement by the official Iraqi News Agency said some had already been scattered at the target sites. The agency, monitored in Nicosia, quoted a spokesman for the Iraqi National Council as saying: ``Iraq\'s foreign guests have been in fact moved to all vital and military installations. They have been provided with all modern facilities and they are all in good physical condition.\'\' The three-line dispatch provided no further details, such as how many foreigners had been moved or to what installations. Earlier, President Bush demanded that Iraq release all foreigners detained in Iraq and Kuwait, and for the first time he referred to them as hostages. ``There can be little doubt that whatever these innocent citizens are called, they are in fact hostages,\'\' he said in a speech to war veterans in Baltimore. Also today, two senior U.N. officials headed for Baghdad to urge Iraq to free foreigners held captive in Kuwait and Iraq. U.N. Secretary-General Javier Perez de Cuellar said Iraqi President Saddam Hussein requested the envoys be sent. In his speech, Bush repeated U.S. demands that Iraq withdraw from Kuwait, which it invaded Aug. 2. He also likened Saddam Hussein to Adolf Hitler. An Iraqi official also referred to World War II today, reminding the United States that it had once interned members of its own ethnic Japanese population. ``In response to the official American and Western declarations regarding Iraq\'s hosting of foreigners ... We would like to recall that America, during World War II, held about 100,000 of its own citizens of Japanese origin in detention camps to avert a potential Japanese attack on its western coast,\'\' said the statement carried by the state-run Iraqi News Agency. It was attributed to the Speaker of the Iraqi National Council, or parliament, Sadi Mehdi Saleh. The United States, meanwhile, picked up another ally in its military thrust against Iraq with Defense Secretary Dick Cheney\'s announcement today that U.S. C-130 cargo transports have begun operating from the United Arab Emirates. Cheney\'s statement in Abu Dhabi marked an important show of cooperation from a gulf nation with international efforts to force Iraq out of Kuwait. Also today, OPEC said there was not enough support among its members to call an emergency meeting to consider Saudi Arabia\'s request to boost oil production. A brief statement said OPEC\'s president would meet with some other oil ministers before the end of the month. Saudi Arabia said Saturday it would boost oil production by as much as 2 million barrels a day. Iraq said today that diplomats who fail to close their missions in Kuwait by Friday will be treated as any other foreign citizen. But in London, the Foreign office said Britain will attempt to keep an embassy in Kuwait. Austria, Britain, Denmark, Finland, Italy, Sweden, and West Germany said they had no plans to close their missions in Kuwait. The Iraqi radio message, monitored in Nicosia, warned Iraqi citizens against secretly sheltering foreigners to protect them. ``Hosting a foreigner in an Iraqi\'s place of residence is considered a flagrant violation of the law, for which the severest punishments will be given,\'\' it said. It said the law applied ``with (Iraq\'s) entire administrative border\'\' _ apparently including annexed Kuwait. On Sunday, Saddam offered to free foreigners if the United States withdraws its forces from the Persian Gulf region and guarantees the economic embargo will be lifted. U.S. officials dismissed the offer. He later said he would free citizens of nations that remain neutral in the conflict, including those of Austria, Switzerland, Sweden, Finland and Portugal. They account for only about 600 of the 21,000 foreigners in Iraq and Kuwait. There was growing international anxiety over the fate of the remaining foreign captives, including 3,000 Americans and 4,000 Britons, held for almost three weeks. Saddam said Sunday Westerners will be held at vital Iraqi installations to deter U.S. attacks on the facilities. ``Our people are seeking to avert a catastrophe,\'\' Saddam said, in comments read on Iraqi television. ``The presence of the foreigners with Iraqi families at vital targets might prevent an attack.\'\' Iraqi authorities also ordered Westerners in Kuwait to assemble at hotels or face the consequences. In other developments: _The White House said U.S. warships were still ``shadowing\'\' two Iraqi tankers, which ignored warning shots fired by the U.S. vessels on Saturday. _U.S. warships off the United Arab Emirates were challenging by radio practically every commercial ship coursing up and down the Persian Gulf, shipping executives reported today. _Iraq said today that Indonesian and some Argentine citizens may leave. _China\'s official Xinhua News Agency said the first group of 97 Chinese would be evacuated from Iraq today, with Baghdad\'s help. Also today, 122 Soviet citizens crossed into Jordan, the official Soviet news agency Tass reported. _The British Foreign Office said today that 82 Britons were taken Sunday by Iraqi authorities from a hotel in Kuwait city. A day earlier, 41 British citizens were taken from the Kuwait International hotel. _Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal arrived in Damascus, Syria today to discuss the Gulf crisis with the Syrian leadership. _Two Dutch Navy frigates were leaving today for the Persian Gulf to join the multinational force arrayed against Iraq. The air defense frigate Witte de With and the standard frigate Pieter Florisz were to take two weeks to reach the region. _ Greece also said it would send a frigate. _Iraqi soldiers today continued their withdrawal from occupied Iranian territory, the official Iranian news agency said, freeing up thousands of battle-hardened troops to face U.S. forces. Iraq and Iran were also repatriating prisoners from their eight-year war, which effectively ended with a cease-fire in August of 1988. _Iranian newspapers today attacked the U.S. military presence in Saudi Arabia. The Jomhuri Islami said in an editorial the United States had virtually annexed Saudi Arabia, just as Iraq did Kuwait. But the newspaper stressed that although it opposes the U.S. military presence, it also opposes the Iraqi takeover of Kuwait. United Arab Emirates, an alliance comprising seven sheikdoms, today became the first of the moderate Arab governments in the southern gulf region to publicly announce overt military cooperation with the United States. On Sunday, the United Arab Emirates announced it would allow the deployment of Arab and ``friendly\'\' forces on its territory as part of multinational efforts to defend the Persian Gulf region. On Saturday night, the U.N. Security Council unanimously demanded that Iraq let all foreigners held in Iraq and Kuwait leave. CBS News said from Baghdad that 35 Americans, including four women and three children, took refuge at U.S. diplomatic ``quarters\'\' in the Iraqi capital Sunday. Asked about the report, a spokesman at the State Department said: ``We can\'t make a comment on that at this time.\'\'\r\n'),(553,2,'A $76,000 appropriation for ``fuel management systems\'\' at two highway patrol stations raised eyebrows at a meeting of the state Building Commission. ``What\'s a fuel management system?\'\' Lt. Gov. John Wilder, commission vice chairman, asked Thursday. ``That\'s a gasoline pump,\'\' replied Safety Commissioner Robert Lawson. ``And you call it a fuel management system?\'\' Wilder asked. ``Yes,\'\' Lawson said. ``You\'re pumping gasoline into a vehicle?\'\' Wilder asked. ``Yes,\'\' Lawson said. ``Why don\'t you call it that?\'\' Wilder asked. ``I won\'t use the term again,\'\' Lawson promised.\r\n'),(554,2,'Syndicated columnist Carl T. Rowan, calling himself a pawn in a larger gun-control debate, pleaded innocent Monday to charges he used an unregistered weapon to shoot a teen-ager who took an uninvited dip in his backyard pool. Rowan has been charged with one count each of possessing an unregistered weapon, and possessing ammunition for the gun, in connection with the June 14 shooting. Both are misdemeanors. District of Columbia Superior Court Hearing Commissioner Kaye Christian scheduled trial for Sept. 22, and released Rowan on his own recognizance. Rowan requested a jury trial. If he is convicted on both charges, the columnist could face a maximum penalty of two years in prison and a $2,000 fine. The district\'s 1976 handgun ordinance essentially bans posession of handguns and ammunition not owned at the time the law was passed, except for law officers. After his court appearance, Rowan lashed out at those who say he is hypocritical for using a handgun. ``I am aware that I am the pawn in a brutal game between those who favor and those who oppose handgun control,\'\' Rowan said, reading a prepared statement to dozens of reporters and television camera crews. ``I want to make it clear that I still favor a strict national law to control the availability of handguns. ``There is no hypocrisy in advocating a national policy that no one seems to be able to get through Congress,\'\' he said. The columnist also asserted that he has received additional death threats since the shooting incident. He had previously told police that he obtained the weapon used in the shooting after receiving similar threats in 1982. Rowan has said that the gun and ammunition were originally owned by his son, Carl Jr., who was told that he did not need to register them because he was serving as an FBI agent at the time. Outside the courthouse, a half-dozen handgun advocates rallied in support of the columnist\'s right to bear arms. ``We think that Carl Rowan may be guilty of raving hypocrisy, but he shouldn\'t be charged in a court of law today for protecting his home with a gun,\'\' said Lee Bellinger, the leader of Action for America, a conservative activist group that champions the right to private handgun ownership. ``We welcome him into the family of people protecting their home with guns.\'\' Other supporters carried posters reading, ``Warning: This home protected by Carl Rowan,\'\' coupled with a Rambo-like drawing of Rowan\'s head atop a muscle-bound, gun-toting torso. Still others displayed signs reading, ``Leave Carl Rowan alone.\'\' ``It (the Rowan shooting) shows what can happen in a moment of panic,\'\' said Sarah Brady, wife of James Brady, President Reagan\'s press secretary. She was not at the rally, but said in a telephone interview, ``With the handgun, in most cases you see more cases of misuse than you do anything else.\'\' Brady became president of Handgun Control, an anti-handgun group, after her husband suffered permanent brain damage when he was wounded during John Hinckley Jr.\'s attempt to assassinate Reagan in 1981. Rowan, 62, was cleared last month of assault charges in the shooting incident after an investigation by federal prosecutors. U.S. Attorney Jay Stephens said at the time that he thought Rowan should be prosecuted on the weapons charges, but deferred that decision to District of Columbia officials, who normally decide whether to prosecute such cases. The shooting occurred, Rowan said, when he heard noises in his backyard, called police, and discovered Benjamin Smith, 18, of suburban Chevy Chase, Md., and three other youths by his pool. Rowan shot Smith in the wrist when, he said, the youth lunged at him. Smith and a companion Laura Bachman, 19, were charged with unlawful entry, but prosecutors dropped the misdemeanor charges in exchange for 40 hours of community service work.\r\n'),(555,2,'Opposition leaders and Communist officials have tentatively set national elections for June, government television reported. ``According to unofficial information, the first round of (parliamentary) elections should take place on June 8,\'\' Czechoslovak TV said Thursday. The report came as the Communists, other political parties and the opposition Civic Forum met to review procedures for the elections and the status of independent political parties. ``The draft elections law is aimed at having the elections for the Federal Assembly and both National Councils (parliament) first ... and in the second half of the year the elections to the lower levels of representative bodies should take place,\'\' the television said. The 35O-member Czechoslovak Parliament is so far dominated by Communists. The discussions are expected to produce a solution to balancing its membership to reflect the current political situation. The talks are being attended by all five political parties existing before the revolution and the loosely organized opposition group, Civic Forum. About 20 new political parties have been created in Czechoslovakia the past two months, but none is represented at the current talks. The peaceful revolution in Czechoslovakia led to the ouster of Communist party chief Milos Jakes and his hard-line colleagues in late November. Dissident playwright Vaclav Havel became president last month.\r\n'),(556,2,'Here are highlights of Thursday\'s session of the 28th Communist Party congress, its 10th day. The congress is scheduled to continue Friday.\r\n'),(557,2,'U.S. Rep. James A. Traficant Jr., whose avowed campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination has yet to take shape, has failed to make the ballot in two more Ohio congressional districts. The problems disclosed Thursday brought to four the number of Ohio districts in which Traficant\'s name will not be on the ballot. Ohio has 21 congressional districts. In the sprawling 6th District of Southern Ohio, Traficant needed 150 signatures, and 159 were submitted. Every signature was ruled invalid, said Nancy Stapleton, director of the Warren County Board of Elections. Elections officials in the 2nd District in suburban Cincinnati said Thursday that Traficant did not meet petition requirements there, either. Traficant already was off the ballot in two other districts.\r\n'),(558,2,'The number of white blood cells infected by the AIDS virus rises sharply in the year before virus-infected males actually develop the disease, says a study that may lead to speedier treatment for AIDS victims. While the existing test to detect the increase in AIDS-infected cells is too time-consuming and expensive for routine use, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control is trying to develop a simpler test that could predict when an infected person will get full-blown AIDS, said the CDC\'s Janet Nicholson. Such a test would help doctors decide when the benefits of giving patients certain toxic anti-AIDS drugs outweigh the risks, said Dr. Paul Volberding, associate professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, and AIDS program director at San Francisco General Hospital. ``If we knew that somebody was getting close to the point of developing AIDS, we would want to treat the person at that point, even if he hadn\'t developed full-blown AIDS,\'\' he said. Nicholson, the CDC\'s clinical immunology chief, presented her findings Monday during the annual meeting of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology. She and her colleagues spent three years regularly testing blood cells from 15 homosexual Atlanta men who were infected by the virus and had chronic swelling of lymph glands but didn\'t suffer AIDS. Six of the 15 subsequently developed AIDS, Nicholson said. She said in the year before those symptoms became apparent, the six showed a 25-fold increase in the number of AIDS virus-infected peripheral blood mononuclear cells _ a class of white blood cells. If a simple test could show that someone infected with the virus soon will get AIDS, doctors could better decide when to prescribe AZT and antibiotics that prevent pneumocystis pneumonia and other infections that kill AIDS patients once the virus has crippled their immune systems, Volberding said. AZT, or azidothymidine, is believed to slow progression of AIDS. From a scientific standpoint, ``learning what a person\'s risk of developing AIDS is over time is a very important one,\'\' he said. But Nicholson and Volberding acknowledged that some AIDS-infected people may not want to learn that they soon will develop disease symptoms. Nicholson said researchers previously knew that people infected with AIDS show reduced numbers of one type of disease-fighting white blood cell, called T4-helper cells, while the infection progresses. Her study found that the number of helper cells decreases more quickly and the number of AIDS-infected cells rises sharply in infected patients who go on to develop overt AIDS symptoms. ``It\'s not clear yet whether everyone who is infected will develop disease,\'\' she said, adding that her findings point the way toward determining which patients are likely to do so. AIDS, or acquired immune deficiency syndrome is caused by a virus that damages the body\'s immune system, leaving victims susceptible to death from infections and cancer. The CDC estimates that 1 million to 1.5 million Americans have been infected with the virus, and of that total, 20 percent to 30 percent will develop AIDS by the end of 1991.\r\n'),(559,2,'Michael Dukakis was back in his home base of Boston today, ready for a final round of deliberations on who will join him on the Democratic ticket. Jesse Jackson says he expects to speak privately with Dukakis in the coming week about the vice presidency. As the running drama over a running mate for Dukakis plays on, Democrats were preparing for the opening of their convention a week from today in Atlanta. Republican George Bush, meanwhile, was returning to Washington today after a weekend at his seaside retreat in Kennebunkport, Maine. Aides speaking on condition of anonymity said the vice president, the certain Republican nominee, was preparing to propose a strict new conflict-of-interest code for public officials. Dukakis has frequently attacked Bush over the ethics of Reagan administration officials including Attorney General Edwin Meese III, who last week announced plans to step down. Meese, who was under investigation for a year, declared himself vindicated after an independent counsel decided not to seek an indictment of him. With Meese on the way out, campaign sources said the vice president hopes to take the offensive on the ethics issue. They said he would spell out his proposals later this month. Bush himself was the target of accusations last week from Democratic Party chief Paul Kirk, who accused him of using public funds to pay for campaign appearances. Bush aides denied the allegations. The vice president\'s only public appearance over the weekend was at a Lithuanian festival on Sunday near his vacation home. He said reforms in the Soviet Union signal a ``time of hope,\'\' but warned against ``complacency or weakness\'\' in dealing with Moscow. Bush and Jackson were speaking to the same agricultural group this afternoon in Washington. And all three contenders had appearances set at the NAACP\'s convention in Washington, Bush and Jackson on Tuesday and Dukakis on Wednesday. Dukakis, who is struggling to resolve a budget crunch in his home state, was turning his attention to gubernatorial business today after a four-day Western trip. In a string of appearances during his last pre-convention campaign swing, Dukakis took Bush to task on a variety of issues, from the Pentagon procurement scandal to the vice president\'s no-tax-hike pledge. Dukakis says Bush\'s support for higher fees for some government services amounts to backing higher taxes. Bush disputes that. Even as he sought to turn up the heat on Bush, Dukakis responded coolly to talk of possible convention disputes with Jackson. ``I think Jesse Jackson can do anything he wants to do,\'\' Dukakis told reporters in Estes Park, Colo., on Sunday. ``I\'m going to the convention and I\'m going to win it.\'\' Although Dukakis has the delegates to win the nomination on the first ballot, Jackson said over the weekend that ``my name will be in nomination.\'\' ``Let no one mislead you. This is not the time for the campaign to wind down,\'\' Jackson told his Texas delegates in Forth Worth on Sunday night. He suggested that some disagreements with the Dukakis camp would be aired at the convention. ``When you have unresolved matters, you have created tension,\'\' he told the delegates. However, he denied reports his forces might stage a walkout at the convention over platform disputes. ``It would not be to our advantage to walk out,\'\' Jackson said Saturday in Los Angeles. ``The threat is not that we\'re going to walk out. The threat is that we\'re going to stay and expand and build and grow and make a difference.\'\' Although Jackson has met several times with Dukakis in recent weeks, he says the two have yet to discuss in depth the possibility of Jackson being on the ticket. Jackson said he expects to have such a private talk before the start of the convention on July 18. The leading contenders for the vice presidential nomination are believed to be Sens. John Glenn of Ohio, Bob Graham of Florida, Lloyd Bentsen of Texas and Albert Gore Jr. of Tennessee, along with Reps. Richard Gephardt of Missouri and Lee Hamilton of Indiana. The Republicans, for their part, intend to fight for a share of the spotlight during the Democratic convention. Bush intends to campaign next week during the gathering, but spokeswoman Sheila Tate says details of his schedule have not yet been set.\r\n'),(560,2,'``It is a magnitude that no one in their wildest imagination or scientific predictions could have suggested.\'\' _ Yellowstone National Park spokeswoman Joan Anzelmo, discussing a complex of wildfires.\r\n'),(561,2,'The Bush administration will unveil a national transportation policy this week calling for more local government and private help to improve air, ground and water transportation into the next century. The long-awaited outline could lead to more toll roads, higher airline ticket fares, increased gasoline taxes in some areas and higher bus and mass transit fares. Major elements of the policy already have been disclosed by Transportation Secretary Samuel Skinner, who says he wants to ``remove the heavy hand of government\'\' from transportation industries. Formal release is set for Thursday. Skinner\'s department faces formidable problems: overcrowded airports with about 30 percent of all flights delayed; a maritime industry in a record slump; highway bridges in need of billions of dollars in repairs; and an estimated $1 trillion to $3 trillion demand for airport, railroad, highway and mass transit construction over the next 20 years. Skinner\'s solutions focus on increasing the nation\'s reliance for transport on the private sector and state and local governments by ``stimulating competition and allowing the magic of the marketplace to work.\'\' But Skinner has said the policy also will commit the federal government to ``fully using the funds that people have paid in user charges for transportation, for investments in transportation.\'\' The unspent $7.6 billion in the aviation trust fund, collected from an airline ticket tax, and the $10.1 billion in the highway trust fund, have been a sore point with transportation industry officials who say the money is going to offset the federal deficit rather than to help transportation. Some of the strategies Skinner has said will be promoted in the new policy are increased user fees, which he does not call tax hikes; increased private investment, including private construction of toll roads; extending deregulation to the trucking and maritime industries; and promotion of new technologies, including high-speed rail systems and ``smart cars\'\' that are less likely to crash. Major points Skinner has disclosed so far from the policy include: _ Promotion of a ``stronger, healthier partnership among federal, state and local governments,\'\' with ``regulatory flexibility,\'\' which Skinner has said could include new powers to levy local highway tolls. _ A concentration of federal assistance on ``projects of national significance,\'\' although the projects will not be identified in the policy document. _ Preservation of existing transportation systems, including the interstate highway system. _ A focus on ``moving people and goods _ not just vehicles,\'\' with promotion of high-occupancy vehicle lanes for crowded commuter routes. _ Encouragement of technology and innovation in all modes of transportation. Even before it has been released, the policy has attracted criticism, although Skinner is widely praised for undertaking the task. ``Flexibility sounds like a euphemism for `take care of yourself,\'\'\' Sen. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J., told Skinner as the secretary unveiled a portion of his plan before a Senate appropriations subcommittee last week. Sen. Alfonse D\'Amato of New York, ranking Republican on the same subcommittee, said he feared the new policy would not help the continued development of large mass transit systems that take cars off the roads and decrease pollution. Carole Perkins, spokeswoman for the Association of American Railroads, said the rail industry supports Skinner\'s efforts and appreciates his commitment to treat all industries evenly and get rid of unneeded regulations. But she said railroad officials are looking for specifics and that it appears the policy will deal mostly in generalities. Airline industry officials have said they would like to see a separate policy outline from the Federal Aviation Administration, since Skinner\'s plan will give equal importance to all means of moving goods and people around the country. One problem airline officials say the policy is unlikely to address is the need for unified noise standards at airports. The new transportation policy is contained in a document that has passed the scrutiny of the White House\'s fiscal office, the Office of Management and Budget. Skinner told a congressional committee last week that reports that OMB would impose significant changes in the policy were not true. He described White House changes as ``wordsmithing\'\' only. The policy is the result of 117 ``town meeting\'\'-style hearings held in 48 cities over the past year. Parts of it already are being implemented, according to Transportation Department officials, and some of its proposals are contained in Bush\'s fiscal 1991 budget, including calls for airport passenger fees and other increases in revenue from transportation users.\r\n'),(562,2,'Westminster College, where Winston S. Churchill\'s ``Iron Curtain speech\'\' signaled the start of the Cold War in 1946, hopes Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev will deliver an epilogue. ``We\'re hoping that a world figure who has played such a major role in East-West politics would see the importance of returning to the place where the Cold War was first defined,\'\' college president Harvey Saunders said. Fulton, a community of 11,000, has asked Sen. Christopher S. Bond, R-Mo., to help try to get Gorbachev to speak at Westminster in June when he visits the United States for a summit meeting with President Bush. While out of office as Britain\'s prime minister, Churchill was persuaded by President Truman to come to Fulton to accept an honorary degree. In his March 1946 lecture, Churchill said, ``From Stettin in the Baltic, to Trieste in the Adriatic, an iron curtain has descended across the (European) continent.\'\' The phrase drew little immediate attention from the media, but soon it became part of the Cold War glossary.\r\n'),(563,2,'American business will spend more than $100 billion on travel and entertainment by 1990, according to an American Express survey of business travel management. By comparison, an estimated $85 billion was spent in 1986, which American Express says is one-third more than business paid in taxes. The travel expense figure was $2 billion in 1985. Nearly 2,500 companies were surveyed and 28 percent responded, says American Express. According to the survey, air travel accounted for the largest portion of the travel and entertainment expenses, 41 percent of every travel dollar. Lodging (22 percent) and meals (17 percent) were next highest, followed by entertainment (14 percent) and car (6 percent). In the future, competition for business customers will focus on quality of service, according to American Express Travel Management Services. ``The competition for business customers is going to be won on quality of service, not price, as travel vendors respond to a high level of consumer discontent and focus on service issues,\'\' said Tomasso Zanzotto, president of Travel Management Services, in a 1988 business travel forecast. Brian Froehlich, of American Express Travel Management Services, says, ``There\'s a definite interest in delivering high quality service to companies and their travelers. We understand that quality is directly related to our success.\'\' A recent booklet from the American Society of Travel Agents, a trade association, reminded customers to plan ahead and ask questions of their travel agents: What is included in the price? What restrictions apply on discounted fare travel? What about passports and foreign currency? Travelmasters, a Chicago-based agency, is among those who have created information services to help customers make decisions. The agency has a Travel Line for special and last minute details for leisure travel customers and Fare Update, a monthly newsletter for corporate travelers and a Travelmaster Market Pack, containing travel costs, tour information, maps and weather information. ``As our business has become more computerized,\'\' says agency executive Peggy Blitz, ``it\'s more important than ever that we give meaningful service to each other.\'\' In another report, Runzheimer International said business travel prices rose sharply during 1987, increasing by 16.5 percent over the previous year. Runzheimer is a consulting firm based in Rochester, Wis. ``The reason for the big increase is due mostly to rising costs in air travel,\'\' said Brad Burris, executive vice president. ``The airlines tightened restrictions for travelers in 1987, making discount fares less available than in the past. Therefore, business travelers had difficulty fitting their schedules around the available low fare flights. Air fares rose 30.5 percent during the year, according to Runzheimer.\r\n'),(564,2,'A prostitute who says she posed naked for evangelist Jimmy Swaggart will show those poses in the July issue of Penthouse magazine, a spokeswoman for the publication said today. ``From what I understand, the photographs will recreate the precise poses and actions that Jimmy Swaggart paid for during the long affair,\'\' said Leslie Jay, vice president and director of public relations for the magazine. ``I also understand that the interview will review every episode in the relationship that ruined this most powerful TV preacher in the world,\'\' she said in a telephone interview from her New York office. Jay said she had not seen the interview or the pictures. Swaggart stepped down from the pulpit Feb. 21 after tearfully confessing to an unspecified sin against his wife, family and church. Church leaders have said he was photographed with a reputed prostitute outside a seedy New Orleans motel. Debra Murphree says she is the woman in those photographs. Jay said she did not know how much Murphree was paid or about the editorial deliberations behind Penthouse\'s decision to use the photographs and interview. The National Enquirer decided last month not to use an interview with Murphree after she failed a lie detector test. She told New Orleans television station WVUE she failed the test because she had taken drugs the day before. Paul Levy, the Enquirer\'s senior editor, said Murphree\'s companion, John Martinez, 28, offered her story to the Enquirer for $100,000. Martinez has said he also tried to peddle the story to People magazine and ABC-TV\'s Nightline. Murphree, also known as Debra Arleen Hedge, has three children living with her parents in Indiana and an arrest record in Florida, Tennessee and Louisiana, mainly involving prostitution charges.\r\n'),(565,2,'A man sitting in his living room was shot and killed by a bullet that was fired through the floor of the apartment above his, police said. Vernon Russell, 76, of Greece, a Rochester suburb, was shot Tuesday, said police Commander Michael Murray. Clifton Jackson, 52, who lives in the apartment above Russell\'s, was charged with second-degree manslaughter, police said. Jackson pleaded innocent before Gates Town Justice John Pisaturo. He was sent to the Monroe County Jail in lieu of $5,000 cash or $10,000 bond. There was no dispute between the neighbors, and Jackson did not intend to shoot Russell, Murray said. He declined to say why the firearm was pointed at the floor.\r\n'),(566,2,'After six weeks of searching for 13{ tons of stolen coffee, this was the break authorities were looking for. A police officer became suspicious of a trailer that had been parked along a freeway for nearly two weeks in this San Bernardino County city and ran the license plate through a computer. The computer found nothing wrong, but the notion that something wasn\'t quite right kept percolating in Officer Tim Lane\'s police mind. Finally, on Saturday, he ran the trailer\'s vehicle identification number, and the case of the missing Folgers was cracked. The computer showed the refrigerated trailer was stolen last April in North Hollywood. Inside, officers found about 9,000 three-pound packages of Folgers, which was unloaded Monday. Capt. George Westcott said police traced the lot numbers of the coffee and determined it had been stolen May 2 in San Francisco. It was not immediately known why the coffee was abandoned.\r\n'),(567,2,'In other business and economic news this past week: _Mobil Corp. said it would sell its Montgomery Ward division for $3.8 billion to an investor group led by Bernard Brennan, the man credited with restoring the 115-year-old department store chain to profitability. _Italian tire manufacturer Pirelli launched a $1.86 billion offer for Firestone Tire & Rubber Co., urging Firestone to scrap a plan to sell 75 percent of its tire-making business to Bridgestone of Japan. _General Electric Co. announced a $423 million offer for Roper Corp., which only last month signed a merger agreement with Whirlpool Corp. _Investor Marvin Davis made an unsolicited $780.3 million offer for loss-plagued Lorimar Telepictures Corp., which had said it was discussing the possibility of being acquired by Warner Communications Inc. _United Artists Communications Inc. and United Cable Television Corp. announced a merger agreement that would produce a concern ranking among the nation\'s biggest cable companies. _R.H. Macy & Co. Inc. began its $6.1 billion tender offer for Federated Department Stores Inc. and went to court in hopes of torpedoing the competing $6.18 billion offer by Campeau Corp. _Dart Group Corp. abandoned its $1.03 billion takeover bid for Stop & Shop Cos. The chain is to be taken private in a $1.23 billion leveraged buyout. _USG Corp., a leading producer of building materials, urged stockholders to reject a $1.9 billion hostile acquisition offer from a partnership led by two Texas oilmen. _Canadian liquor giant Seagram Co. Ltd. proposed buying orange juice producer Tropicana Products Inc. for $1.2 billion to expand Seagram\'s share of the beverage market. _Farmers Group Inc., a leading insurer, said its board unanimously rejected a $4.4 billion tender offer from the U.S. subsidiary of Britain\'s BAT Industries PLC. _Colt Industries Inc., a large defense contractor, accepted a $660 million cash buyout offer from a group led by senior management and a unit of Morgan Stanley Group Inc. _Investor Burt Sugarman said two companies he controls had boosted their stake in Media General Inc. to 10 percent from 9.8 percent and would seek a shareholder vote on his $1.75 billion takeover offer. _Texaco Inc. asked a federal bankruptcy judge to authorize a credit agreement allowing the company to borrow up to $3 billion to finance its Chapter 11 reorganization plan, and Carl C. Icahn threw his support behind the plan. _The Supreme Court handed investors a victory, placing a heavy burden of proof on companies sued for denying they are holding merger negotiations after informal talks have begun. _A federal judge cleared the way for the regional Bell telephone companies to offer certain new computerized information services, including voice storage and electronic mail. _The U.S. Postal Service governors postponed a final decision on the effective date of new postage rates, including an increase in first class to 25 cents. _A federal appellate panel upheld a lower court\'s finding that there was no evidence General Motors Corp. knowingly sold 1.1 million 1980 X-cars with alleged brake defects. _Ford Motor Co. handed thousands of profit-sharing checks to U.S. workers as their share of the company\'s industry record profit of $4.6 billion for 1987. _The United Auto Workers union agreed to early contract negotiations with Chrysler Corp. and the two sides soon will set a date for the start of talks. _Cheating on federal income taxes has declined by as much as 20 percent, Internal Revenue Service Commissioner Lawrence B. Gibbs said. _Treasury Secretary James A. Baker III said the Federal Reserve should be independent, but the central bank does not have to be ``totally sheltered from outside advice or criticism.\'\' _The government said retail sales, boosted by strength in autos, rose 0.6 percent in February, following a January decline. _Wholesale prices fell 0.2 percent in February, pushed downward by drops in both food and energy costs. _A business research company said more than 2.4 million jobs are expected to be created in the United States this year, fewer than the 3 million created in 1987 but ``still a very healthy number.\'\' _The Federal Reserve said Americans took out $5.42 billion more in installment debt than they paid off in January, the biggest monthly increase in four months and the second strong month in a row.\r\n'),(568,2,'Investigators have determined it was a 72mm anti-tank missile that hit the fifth floor of the U.S. AID office, officials said Friday. No one was injured in the attack Thursday evening on the six-story building, which is surrounded by a concrete wall about six feet high. Henry Bassford, head of the local office of the Agency for International Development, said police told him the projectile was fired from about 200 yards. Bassford said the rocket damaged an external wall on the fifth floor of the building in a residential district of the capital. He said U.S. and Salvadoran AID employees were at work at the time but no one was on the fifth floor. No one claimed responsibility for the attack, but officials suspect leftist guerrillas who have been fighting El Salvador\'s U.S.-backed government for nine years. The Defense Ministry called it an act of terrorism. Military sources said the rocket, known as a LAW anti-tank missile, is a relatively small-caliber weapon readily available on the black market. It was the first attack on an AID office, but the U.S. Embassy in El Salvador has been attacked several times.\r\n'),(569,2,'Stock prices drifted lower today in selling apparently prompted by impatience over the market\'s recent sluggish performance. The Dow Jones average of 30 industrials dropped 5.15 to 2,085.35 by noontime on Wall Street. Losers outnumbered gainers by about 3 to 2 in nationwide trading of New York Stock Exchange-listed issues, with 488 up, 731 down and 564 unchanged. Analysts said the market\'s sluggish recent behavior apparently convinced some investors that stocks were unable to break out of the trading range in which they have fluctuated for several months now. They also noted an absence of conviction about the business outlook to encourage any buying. Some prominent analysts and policymakers, including Chairman Alan Greenspan of the Federal Reserve Board, have been warning of the dangers of revived inflation. Yet the price of gold, a primary gauge of inflationary expectations, has fallen below $400 an ounce this week for the first time in more than a year and a half. Similarly, brokers say, there is widespread confusion and uncertainty among investors about prospects for continued economic growth in 1989 under a new administration whose makeup and policies are not yet known. Among actively traded blue chips, International Business Machines rose \\ to 113{; American Express was unchanged at 27~, and American Telephone & Telegraph slipped [ to 26]. Reebok International, which reported a higher order backlog than a year ago, rose ] to 11 in active trading. The NYSE\'s composite index of all its listed common stocks dropped .17 to 152.47. At the American Stock Exchange, the market value index was down .63 at 298.34. Volume on the Big Board came to 76.28 million shares at noontime, up from 57.29 million Wednesday, when activity was diminished somewhat by the observance of the Jewish holiday Yom Kippur.\r\n'),(570,2,'Auto speed king Mickey Thompson and his wife were shot to death this morning in the driveway of their exclusive hillside home in what authorities said was ``an assassination\'\' by two gunmen who fled on bicycles. Thompson, 59, and his wife, Trudy, were found dead at dawn by Los Angeles County Sheriff\'s deputies responding to reports of gunfire, said Deputy Doug Gatlin. ``It was a double homicide, an assassination,\'\' said Deputy Richard Dinsmoor. Neighbors said they heard 6 or 8 shots before the bodies were found about 6 a.m. on the driveway in front of the couple\'s Spanish-style home on Woodlyn Road in a high-security, gated community 20 miles northeast of downtown Los Angeles. They were shot to death, but the type of weapon wasn\'t disclosed, Dinsmoor said. The Thompsons were walking out to their van when they were ambushed. ``We don\'t know a motive,\'\' said Deputy Dan Cox. Doug Stokes, spokesman for Thompson Entertainment Group in Anaheim, said the Thompson\'s were apparently leaving the house for work when the shooting occurred. He said he didn\'t know of any threats against the Thompsons. Thompson became famous as the ``Speed King\'\' in the 1950s when he set the first of his nearly 500 auto speed and endurance records. In 1960 he became the first to travel over 400 mph on land when he drove a four-engine streamlined car to a speed of 406.6 mph at the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah. He later turned to drag racing, Indianapolis car racing, won a national economy championship and was a top competitor in road racing and off-road championships in the United States and Mexico. He was a drag racing innovator, building and driving the sport\'s first ``slingshot\'\' dragster. He worked in the 1950s to take the sport off the streets onto sanctioned drag racing strips, and he was honored by the California Senate for his contributions to the youth of the state as well as the automotive industry. He was also well known as a promoter and his other sports activities included stunt flying and management of prizefighters. In pursuit of his land speed and Indy-car projects, Thompson often teamed with one of the auto industry\'s leading figures, Semon ``Bunkie\'\' Knudsen. Knudsen was a top executive with General Motors Corp. when he backed the Thompson effort to break 400 mph. Later, when Knudsen moved from GM to become president of Ford Motor Co., Thompson got company help with his own design of a Ford-powered dune buggy racer. As a racer, Thompson often failed to finish events because of mechanical breakdowns. He failed to finish in the first 27 powerboat races that he entered. He brought custom machines to Indianapolis racing in the early 1960s, but again the cars he designed were fast but not durable. Longtime friend Carroll Shelby described him as ``one of the greatest hot-rodders we\'ve ever had\'\' and ``the dominant figure in off-road racing.\'\' ``He certainly had a colorful career,\'\' Shelby said. ``We\'re all going to miss him.\'\' When he was 12, Thompson ended his first race at Lakeland Park in nearby El Monte by crashing his four-cylinder Ford Model B hot rod against a wall during the first lap. He wasn\'t hurt because he was wearing a football helmet and was strapped inside with clothesline rope since he couldn\'t afford a real crash helmet or seat belts. Racing put him in the hospital 27 times, including a seven-month stay when he was paralyzed from the waist down after a boat racing accident. It was two years before he walked again. Thompson had a variety of other careers. He swept floors at the Los Angeles Times and later wrote sports articles there (``Just to see if I could.\'\'), sold 10-cent hamburgers at a drive-in, produced and directed racing movies, owned 29 different businesses (``Every one of them has made money\'\') and was mayor of Rolling Hills. Danny Thompson, the couple\'s 37-year-old son who is also an off-road racer, wasn\'t immediately available for comment, said his publicist Carolyn Williams.\r\n'),(571,2,'Oct. 7 Waco (Texas) Tribune-Herald on the vice presidential debate: By all criteria _ style or substance _ Lloyd Bentsen was a lopsided winner in (the) vice presidential debate. Dan Quayle\'s only claim was that he was still standing. Call it a technical knockout. Sure, Bentsen overplayed the need for a ``tough\'\' trade policy (a trade war perhaps?) as a miracle cure for the American economy. But in other policy matters _ like welfare reform, the environment and defense burden-sharing by American allies _ he was resonant. Bentsen was perhaps most convincing in explaining that he can differ in degree with Michael Dukakis. On Contra aid (which he favors and Dukakis opposes), Bentsen criticized the Reagan administration for banking so heavily on military force that regional diplomacy is disregarded outright. Bentsen was also right on the shaky foundations of Reaganomics _ an economy propped up by foreign debt and deficit spending (``$200 billion in hot checks\'\'). Quayle was left to give a testimonial to foreign entrepreneurs. Dukakis still has a lot of convincing to do to show his mettle as a leader, but Bentsen\'s performance helps him a lot. The senator from Texas came off as a real Dukakis asset _ a man of competence and moderation.\r\n'),(572,2,'Expectations of a buildup in petroleum supplies in the nation\'s storage tanks sent oil futures prices tumbling Tuesday on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Analysts said investors sold energy contracts ahead of the American Petroleum Institute\'s weekly inventory report, which was released after the close of trading. The report showed, as investors expected, increases in heating oil and gasoline stocks. Crude oil supplies declined. In trading on the New York Merc, the March contract for West Texas Intermediate, the main grade of U.S. crude oil, fell 17 cents to $21.60 per 42-gallon barrel. The April crude oil contract declined 13 cents to $21.02 and May lost 12 cents to $20.63. Among refined products, heating oil for February delivery fell 1.71 cents to 59.28 cents a gallon, March declined 0.93 cent to 57.07 cents and April ended 0.32 cent lower at 55.18 cents a gallon. Wholesale unleaded gasoline for February delivery dropped 1.02 cents to 59.62 cents a gallon, while March lost 0.74 cent to 60.58 cents and April slipped 0.43 cent to 61.51 cents a gallon. Analysts said imports and continued strong refinery output in the face of weakening demand contributed to the buildup in energy inventories. ``Looks like a lack of demand for heating oil because of the warmer weather,\'\' said Tom Bentz, director of futures trading for United Energy Inc. ``On crude, it\'s imports and refinery runs.\'\' According to the API, a trade association representing mainly large oil refiners, gasoline stocks rose 4.6 million barrels in the week ended Jan. 19 to 219.5 million barrels; heating oil stocks rose 3.4 million barrels to 111.8 million; and crude oil declined 1 million barrels to 344 million. Most of the decrease in crude oil was from one geographic area, while inventories in other regions rose, analysts said.\r\n'),(573,2,'Junk bond financier Michael Milken was sentenced today to 10 years in prison for breaking federal securities and tax laws in the most celebrated case of financial corruption in Wall Street history. Milken, who sobbed at points during the sentencing, stood with his head down as U.S. District Judge Kimba Wood pronounced the stiffest punishment yet in the fraud scandals that have gripped Wall Street since the mid-1980s. In addition, she sentenced him to three years\' probation during which he must work 1,800 hours a year in community service. Milken, 44, faced a maximum of 28 years but Wood\'s sentence is far stiffer than many had predicted. He must serve at least one-third of his prison term before he can be considered for release. ``I believe that a prison term is required for the purposes of general deterrence,\'\' Wood told a court crammed with 200 spectators, including many of Milken\'s friends and supporters. Wood said Milken\'s misuse of his leadership position constituted ``serious crimes warranting serious punishment and the discomfort of being removed from society.\'\' She said Milken was a man of ``talent and industry\'\' but that a long prison term was required to send a message to other possible securities-law violators. The judge said she considered evidence of additional crimes, including obstruction of justice by Milken in handing down the sentence. He was ordered to begin his sentence March 4, 1991. No federal prison was designated. The sentence capped the long, tumultuous saga of the former Drexel Burnham Lambert Inc. executive who was first implicated in an aggressive government insider trading investigation by speculator Ivan Boesky in 1986. Milken of Encino, Calif., personally made more than $1 billion through a junk bond empire that altered American corporate finance in the 1980s. Sobbing at times during the 90-minute hearing, he told the judge: ``What I did violated not just the law but all of my principles and values and I will regret it for the rest of my life. I am truly sorry.\'\' Before Wood issued the sentence, Milken\'s attorney Arthur Liman asked her to consider the financier\'s more than $360 million in charitable contributions and other acts of generosity. ``He will never repeat his mistakes. He is a changed person,\'\' Liman said. Assistant U.S. Attorney Jess Fardella countered that ``despite his talents and opportunities, Mr. Milken sought to multiply his success through the vehicle of fraud.\'\' Milken pleaded guilty in April to six counts of conspiracy and fraud related to illegal securities trading after denying a much broader array of accusations. None of the charges involved insider trading or junk bonds, the risky debt securities Milken turned into a tool for capital raising and corporate takeovers. As part of his plea bargain, Milken also agreed to pay $600 million in fines and restitution to defrauded investors, the largest penalty against an individual in U.S. history. The Wall Street fraud probe revealed seamy pockets of corruption at top firms during major investment deals and resulted in about 50 indictments. Boesky, by comparison, was sentenced to three years in prison and penalized $100 million after pleading guilty to one criminal count of lying to federal regulators. He served 18 months in prison. Before he was sentenced, Milken wrote an 11-page letter to Wood apologizing for his crimes and asking for a chance to rebuild his life by performing community service. ``I never dreamed I could do anything that would result in being a felon,\'\' Milken wrote. ``But I did break the law. I was wrong, and no matter how sorry I am I have to accept that fact.\'\' Wood delayed sentencing, originally scheduled for Oct. 1, for a hearing into government charges of additional crimes beyond Milken\'s guilty plea. Prosecutors revealed that Drexel paid Milken a total of $1.1 billion from 1984 to 1987, including $550 million the final year. That $550 million paycheck put him in the Guinness Book of World Records. Drexel in February filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. The firm was hurt by its 1989 guilty plea to six felonies, its agreement to pay $650 million in penalties and the collapse of the junk bond market. Regulators have pinned much of the blame for the savings and loan crisis on Drexel, accusing it of plundering S&Ls through its junk bond practices.\r\n'),(574,2,'Loma Linda Medical Center said Friday has accepted a fourth baby born with most of his brain missing and will keep it alive for up to a week in hopes that its organs can be used for transplant. The boy, identified only as Baby D, was born at an unidentified Southern California hospital Thursday and transferred to Loma Linda University Medical Center, said Anita Rockwell, a spokeswoman for the center. Baby D suffers from anencephaly, in which most of the brain is missing. The condition almost always leads to death within days or weeks. ``His parents want to donate their baby\'s organs when brain death occurs,\'\' Rockwell said. Dr. Joyce Peabody, Loma Linda chief of neonatology, said Baby D was resting comfortably Friday and receiving nutrition and water as needed. Rockwell said the newborn will be cared for for a seven-day period that began Thursday night. Under Loma Linda policy, Baby D will be placed on life support if needed to prevent damage to organs. If Baby D is declared brain-dead within seven days, the hospital will give notice that his organs are available for transplant. If he isn\'t brain dead within seven days, he will be allowed to die. The time limit was developed to alleviate ethical concerns that doomed anencephalics not be kept alive indefinitely merely so their organs can be donated. Rockwell said anonymity was requested by Baby D\'s parents and officials of the hospital where he was born. Baby D is the fourth anencephalic newborn accepted as a possible organ donor at the hospital. The first was stillborn Dec. 23, thwarting her parents\' desire to have her major organs donated. Her corneas and heart valves were given to infants needing them. The second anencephalic was declared brain-dead Feb. 18. Attempts to donate his liver failed because potential recipients either weren\'t suitable matches or couldn\'t be operated on in time. He was disconnected from life-support Feb. 20. Most recently, a girl was transferred to Loma Linda after birth Feb. 20. Because she never met brain-death criteria within the seven-day limit, she was disconnected from a respirator and allowed to die on Feb. 28. However, her eyes, corneas and heart valves were later donated to infants needing organs. Loma Linda gained worldwide attention in 1984 when Dr. Leonard Bailey, frustrated at the lack of heart donors for babies, transplanted a baboon\'s heart into a girl known as Baby Fae. She died 20{ days later. Bailey, whose baboon transplant was sharply criticized by many doctors, subsequently urged the use of anencephalics as donors of hearts and other organs.\r\n'),(575,2,'A woman who pleaded guilty to shooting her former psychologist and two members of his family was sentenced to life in prison and ordered to pay her victims $10,000. ``You I believe are a dangerous person who should be locked up . .. for as long as you remain a threat,\'\' Superior Court Judge David A. Horowitz told Kimberly A. Gracyalny in sentencing her Tuesday. She will be eligible for parole in 10 to 11 years, said Deputy District Attorney Sharon Matsumoto. Ms. Gracyalny wounded neuropsychology specialist David Fox, his wife and daughter Dec. 20 as they returned to their home in the Fairfax area about 10 miles west of downtown Los Angeles. She hid in the Fox family\'s front yard and opened fire with a handgun, chasing them around the house to the back yard before the couple was able to subdue her, authorities said. During the attack, Fox, 34, was shot in the arm, his wife Deborah, 31, was shot in both legs and their 6-year-old daughter was shot in the left leg. The couple\'s three sons, ages 9, 11 and 18 months, were uninjured. Fox asked that Ms. Gracyalny be given the maximum sentence. ``My wife has five bullet holes in her leg,\'\' Fox told the judge. His 7-year-old daughter has a bullet lodged in her leg which cannot be removed, and he has suffered nerve damage to one hand, he said. ``The situation that my family and I have endured has gone beyond that of vandalism and harassment. It can only be compared to being held hostage in your own home,\'\' he said. Fox\'s eldest son, Abraham, 11, also asked that Ms. Gracyalny receive the maximum term. ``We have been afraid to play in our own yard due to the presence of Miss Gracyalny. We have also been afraid to walk to our schools and synagogue,\'\' he said. Fox treated Ms. Gracyalny between November 1982 and March 1983 for an undisclosed problem. The patient began harassing the therapist soon afterward, according to court records.\r\n'),(576,2,'Georgia schools must provide sex education courses beginning in the first grade and AIDS education beginning in the sixth grade, the state Board of Education decided Thursday. The board approved the Quality Core Curriculum, a revision that will bring the schools into compliance with a 1988 law making sex education mandatory. It currently is left to school districts\' discretion. The law stipulates courses must stress abstinence, although the QCC language gives school systems the option of teaching methods of contraception in grades nine through 12. AIDS education will begin in the sixth grade with instruction on communicable diseases. The instruction is to emphasize abstinence from sex and drugs as the best prevention. The law gives parents the right to prevent their children from participating in sex education courses. ``It\'s a monumental step for Georgia and in the nation because we are one of the first states in the nation to have a state-mandated curriculum,\'\' said Peyton Williams, associate superintendent for instruction. ``We are excited about the equity it will provide in classrooms around the state.\'\' School districts will be required to adhere to the QCC as it is phased in over a period of years. State officials will encourage teachers to begin adhering to the guidelines this fall, but the full curriculum will be phased in over five years when textbooks and other materials are reordered.\r\n'),(577,2,'A man who opened fire on Red Square during the Revolution Day parade has been charged with committing a terrorist act, a spokesman for the KGB secret police said Thursday. Alexander A. Shmonov, 38, of Leningrad, will undergo psychiatric tests to determine whether he was sane at the time of the shooting Wednesday, said Alexei Kandaurov, deputy director of the KGB public relations office. He gave no other details on the case. No one was hurt in the incident, in which the man pulled out the hunting rifle in the heavily guarded square about 80 yards from President Mikhail S. Gorbachev. The shooting came during a Communist Party march that followed the military parade. A plainclothes officer knocked the weapon away as the man fired once into the air and again into the ground, newspapers said. He then was subdued by about 20 plainclothes officers and carried into the GUM department store across the square from Gorbachev. Foreign Minister Eduard A. Shevardnadze played down what may have been an assassination attempt, categorically denying that it indicated a loss of public support for Gorbachev\'s ``perestroika\'\' reform policies. ``I don\'t think this incident should be taken very seriously,\'\' Shevardnadze told reporters before meeting with visiting Secretary of State James A. Baker III. ``This is a huge country where something is always happening somewhere.\'\' Shmonov was interrogated and spoke in detail about his preparations for the act, the official Tass news agency quoted KGB investigator Pyotr Sokolov as saying. Soviet Deputy Prosecutor Janis Dzenitis on Thursday sanctioned Shmonov\'s arrest, Tass reported. Shomonov is charged with committing ``an attempted terrorist act,\'\' the news agency quoted Sokolov as saying. Kandaurov could not confirm a report by one newspaper that the gunman was carrying a light explosive in addition to the rifle. The conservative labor newspaper Trud said Shmonov was carrying a small explosive usually used for military rehearsals that could cause no serious damage. Kandaurov said the man was carrying at least one device, but added that laboratory tests would have to confirm whether it was an explosive. ``It is hard to tell now whom he was aiming at,\'\' Trud said. ``But one thing is clear: If it were not for the immediate reaction of a policeman, who succeeded in knocking the gun into the air, a disaster might have happened.\'\' KGB chief Vladimir Kryuchkov indicated Wednesday night that officials believed the man was deranged. Shmonov is being held in the KGB\'s isolation ward, Tass reported. Shmonov is an unemployed metal craftsman who last worked at the Izhorsky metal working factory in Leningrad, Kandaurov said. Soviet newspapers on Thursday carried front-page pictures of the gunman being subdued by plainclothes security. Newspapers were filled with glowing reports about the celebrations across the country Wednesday, the 73rd anniversary of the Bolshevik Revolution. There were only brief reports about anti-Gorbachev rallies by hard-liners and radicals, which the Communist Party newspaper Pravda criticized as ``extravagant escapades verging on simple hooliganism.\'\'\r\n'),(578,2,'Here are the members of the House of Representatives who will be attending the Democratic National Convention in Atlanta, July 18-21, as ``super delegates\'\' and their public presidential preference. There are some super delegates who have told The Associated Press privately whom they are supporting.\r\n'),(579,2,'The London firm Ward White Group PLC has said it is not interested in pursuing the acquisition of Payless Cashways Inc. after reviewing information about the building materials firm. ``Any interest we had is withdrawn,\'\' David Bick, a spokesman for Ward White, said Monday. Molson Cos. Ltd., a diversified Canadian company, also said Monday that it did not have any interest in acquiring Payless after examining public information about the company. Sanjib Choudhuri, senior vice president of corporate development and planning, declined to say why his company lost interest. Senior management of Payless has offered $27 a share to take the company private. The offer was made to thwart an unfriendly takeover attempt by New York investor Asher Edelman and Sutherland Lumber-Southwest Inc., a competitor of Payless. The offer by Payless management is worth $909 million. Bick said Ward White was approached by an investment banking firm two or three weeks ago about Payless. He said Ward White agreed to request information about Payless because a takeover seemed worth considering, but Ward White\'s interest was never great. ``We no longer need nor want the information,\'\' Bick said. Ward White owns the third-largest building materials retailing chain in the United Kingdom. The Edelman-Sutherland group is Payless\' largest shareholder with 8.1 percent of the stock. It had said for weeks that it is interested in acquiring Payless, but has not made a formal offer. The offer from Payless management requires the approval of two-thirds of the shareholders, who have until 3 to respond. Payless has 200 stores in 26 states.\r\n'),(580,2,'Israeli officials today said Jordan\'s decision to cancel a $1.3 billion development plan for the Israeli-occupied territories would have no practical effect because the plan existed primarily on paper. Palestinian leaders in the West Bank were divided on the impact. Some said it would seriously hurt some residents already struggling financially because of the 8-month-old Palestinian uprising in the occupied lands. Jordan announced Thursday it was canceling the development program in a move to hand over more responsibility for the 1.5 million Arabs in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip to the Palestine Liberation Organization. Meron Benvenisti, an Israeli expert on the West Bank, said he thought the move was the first step toward a decision by Jordan\'s King Hussein eventually to cut ties with the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip altogether. ``He wants to see how people react. But ultimately he has no choice but to cut ties,\'\' Benvenisti, head of the West Bank Data Bank, a U.S.-funded research project, said in an interview. ``If he doesn\'t, he gives money to people who in the long run are his enemies,\'\' said Benvenisti, referring to a growing anti-Jordanian slant among West Bank Palestinians. He said Hussein\'s plan ``was a bubble. King Hussein didn\'t have the money for the project. He hoped to get foreign governments to donate funds.\'\' It is difficult to gauge how much of the $1.3 billion has reached the occupied territories. Deposed Gaza City Mayor Rashad Shawaa said the Gaza Strip had received about $6.6 million. Foreign Minister Shimon Peres said the Jordanian measure would not affect his approach to a Middle East peace settlement based on Israeli-Jordanian negotiations. Hussein and Peres, of the left-leaning Labor Party, agreed last year to hold direct talks in the framework of an international peace conference. The accord was vetoed by Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, head of the right-wing Likud Bloc. Peres, speaking on Israel radio, said Jordan remained crucial to a resolution of the Palestinian problem because the 850,000 West Bank Palestinians hold Jordanian passports, the West Bank and Jordan have strong trade links, and Israel and Jordan share a long border. In Gaza City, Shawaa, known for his pro-Jordanian views, said in an interview that the move was ``regrettable because people here need help, and this was an important source of help.\'\' But Mustafa Natsche, deposed mayor of the West Bank city of Hebron and a PLO supporter, said ``the Amman decision will not affect anybody.\'\' Natsche said the Palestinians in the West Bank needed contributions from all the Arab countries, not just Jordan. But he said what they needed most was to be steadfast in their struggle to end Israeli occupation. The five-year project was set up by Jordan in 1986 under an agreement with Yasser Arafat\'s PLO. It was to improve health, education, housing, cultural and other services in the territories. Israel took the West Bank from Jordan and the Gaza Strip from Egypt during the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. Two-thirds of Jordan\'s 3.5 million people are of Palestinian origin.\r\n'),(581,2,'National Semiconductor Corp. has been granted a temporary restraining order against Cypress Semiconductor Corp. and Aspen Semiconductor, a new Cypress subsidiary. The order granted on Thursday bars the companies from using proprietary information of National or Fairchild Semiconductor, which Fairchild bought last year. ``We are not willing to subsidize research and development for our competitors,\'\' said James Smaha, executive vice president of National\'s semiconductor group. National filed suit in Santa Clara County Superior Court earlier Thursday against Cypress, charging theft of trade secrets. Narpat Bhandari, a former Fairchild manager, is accused in the suit of taking confidential Fairchild documents to the new subsidiary. The suit involved a major new chipmaking technology developed over five years by Fairchild.\r\n'),(582,2,'A businessman with ties to the Iran-Contra affair has been sentenced to two years probation for his role in a conspiracy to sell confidential Ashland Oil Inc. documents to Iran. U.S. District Judge Miriam G. Cedarbaum on Monday also ordered Roy M. Furmark, a private consultant in the oil industry, to pay Ashland $15,000 in restitution. Furmark pleaded guilty in March to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud. Furmark, of Brooklyn, testified to Congress in 1987 that he was involved in the sale of American arms to Iran. In the Ashland case, Furmark cooperated with prosecutors for more than a year before his plea and helped implicate former Ashland chairman Orin E. Atkins in the conspiracy. On Friday, Atkins, who also pleaded guilty to conspiracy, was sentenced to two years probation and 600 hours of community service for his role in the scheme. Furmark admitted that he agreed to help Atkins arrange meetings with representatives of the Iranian National Oil Co., which was contemplating a lawsuit against Ashland for the company\'s decision not to pay $283 million for crude oil purchased in 1979. Atkins has said he wanted to sell to the Iranians confidential documents involving the disputed oil deal that he obtained after he was forced to resign as chairman in 1981 but remained as a paid Ashland consultant. While the Iranians never bought the documents, they later sued Ashland and last year obtained a $325 million settlement, which with interest was worth more than $500 million. ``This episode in my life has been totally uncharacteristic to my life and what I stand for,\'\' Furmark told Cedarbaum. ``I am deeply sorry.\'\' Cedarbaum said she considered Furmark\'s cooperation in deciding his sentence. Furmark set up a meeting with Atkins in 1988 where they discussed renewed efforts to sell the documents Iran. A videotape of that meeting made by investigators led to charges against Atkins.\r\n'),(583,2,'Presidential candidate Jesse Jackson, saying that ``people are coming alive\'\' to his presidential candidacy, campaigned Saturday before racially diverse, overflow crowds of New Yorkers. He avoided direct bickering with Mayor Ed Koch over Jewish concerns, but he did take a sideswipe at Koch when asked if the mayor\'s negative comments were hurting him in New York. Jackson said his campaign is focused on ``healing,\'\' and without mentioning Koch\'s name, suggested the mayor is heightening black-Jewish tension. In light of various recent incidents of racial violence, he said, ``We are already in a very tender situation. And responsible leadership must move to heal people and not extend their fears.\'\' Jackson told each of his enthusiastic audiences from Crown Heights to Coney Island, ``I love you very much.\'\' As New York\'s April 19 primary looms, Jackson also said that in fairness, he should be the overall leader not only in the popular vote to date, but in presidential delegates. He said he earned the at-large delegates from the Illinois primary last month but is being kept from receiving them by Sen. Paul Simon of Illinois, who is no longer an active candidate but is clinging to his delegates. Jackson suggested Simon should withdraw formally and said, ``I\'m simply appealing for consistency and fairness.\'\' Jackson devoted the day of rallies and speeches in Brooklyn to discussing his ``economic justice\'\' message and emphasizing his positions on the Caribbean, Haiti, Panama and South Africa. Crowds that could not fit into the churches and halls where he spoke lined the streets and stood on fire escapes. Security around Jackson was intense as he waded into the throngs of people who mobbed him, shaking hands and holding babies. Jackson called his campaign ``hope reborn\'\' and said, ``People are coming alive.\'\' In trendy Park Slope, Jackson addressed a racially mixed outdoor rally of a few thousand. In Crown Heights, he was greeted by a steel drum Calypso band, and he delighted the sidewalk crowd by taking up a tambourine and bouncing to the beat. In Coney Island, several hundred screaming supporters lined the block outside the church where he was to speak, chanting ``Go Jesse.\'\' But he was dogged by questions about Koch\'s criticisms, most recently in Saturday\'s New York Times where Koch was quoted as saying Jackson is evading talking about issues of concern to Jews. As the candidate emerged from speaking to a wildly enthusiastic black audience in St. Mark\'s Episcopal Church, about two dozen dark-suited Orthodox Jewish men stood somberly at the edge of about 200 supporters waiting outside. They listened quietly while the rest of the onlookers cheered Jackson wildly as he talked about brotherhood. The group said they came out of curiosity. One, who declined to give his name because he said he should not give interviews on the Sabbath, said he planned to vote for Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis, and that if Jackson wins the Democratic nomination, ``I\'ll vote Republican.\'\' Another said he was supporting Sen. Albert Gore Jr. of Tennessee, but of Jackson, he said, ``I think he\'s great. I just wish he knew more about the Middle East.\'\' In an impromptu address to the crowd, Jackson shouted without a microphone about New York\'s multicultural, multi-ethnic character. ``We seek to draw people together across lines of race and sex and religion,\'\' he said to rapt cheers from the largely black crowd. ``We know what makes us different _ our race, our sex, our religion, our culture. But what binds us together?\'\' In answer, he listed central issues of his candidacy: economic justice, fighting drugs, improving child care and education. Later, Jackson told reporters seeking his reaction to Koch\'s remarks, ``We are dealing with a highly politicized situation and you expect some of that but we\'ll keep our eyes on our real agenda.\'\' He refused to be drawn into a tit-for-tat with Koch. ``Our campaign is an outreach campaign,\'\' he said. ``We\'re going to keep it at that level.\'\' However, he denied evading any issues, noting that he has spoken often about the Middle East. He supports a Palestinian homeland and repeated Saturday his call for recognition of Israel by the Arab states. On foreign policy, Jackson said the United States should demand free and fair elections and human rights in Haiti. He called for U.S. humanitarian aid to the Panamanian people who are suffering under U.S. sanctions aimed at ousting Panamanian strong man General Manuel Noriega. He said he supports the sanctions, but also said there should be a congressional investigation of the CIA \'s past role with Noriega.\r\n'),(584,2,'Winnie Mandela on Friday condemned ``necklacing\'\' and said a statement she made on South African militants\' practice of killing with burning tires had been reported out of context. The wife of African National Congress leader Nelson Mandela made the comment in a morning interview with Phil Donahue, whose syndicated talk show was to air in some areas of the country Friday and others on Monday. Mrs. Mandela later had lunch with the U.N. African Mothers\' Association, and in the afternoon spoke at a Brooklyn church symposium of about 200 women active in civic and religious organizations. They included Joyce Dinkins, the mayor\'s wife; Manhattan Borough President Ruth Messinger; Comptroller Elizabeth Holtzman; Hazel Dukes, head of the local NAACP; Betty Shabazz, Malcolm X\'s widow; and ``Mother\'\' Clara Hale, founder of a Harlem home for babies sick from crack, AIDS and other maladies. Mrs. Mandela later attended a tribute at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, where she listened to Sweet Honey in the Rock, an acapella group known for its songs calling for black liberation. In brief remarks, Mrs. Mandela said the ANC would go to war if negotiations to end apartheid stall. ``If talks fall apart and they very well might, we know you will be there to take up arms with us,\'\' Mrs. Mandela told the sold-out crowd of 2,000. Much of the audience jumped out of their seats with shouts of support for her statement. Speaking at the earlier church meeting, Mrs. Mandela described the social problems encumbering blacks in South Africa, including a high infant mortality rate, inadequate health care and schools. ``Poverty and disease are the everyday companions of our people,\'\' she said. ``This is our legacy, a legacy of apartheid.\'\' ``In South Africa, we believe that if the women were in the forefront, we would have long won our freedom,\'\' she said, winning a roar of appreciation from the 200 women. In her comments on the Donahue program, Mrs. Mandela condemned ``necklacing\'\' _ killing government collaborators by putting a gasoline-soaked burning tire around his neck _ as ``brutal and barbaric.\'\' The practice has been employed by some militants in confrontations between rival groups in South Africa\'s black shantytowns. Mrs. Mandela was quoted as telling a rally in South Africa in 1986: ``With our boxes of matches and our necklaces, we shall liberate this country.\'\' She reiterated Friday her claim that the comment was quoted out of context. ``Our children have been so oppressed and met up with such violence from the government that they have resorted to that method of eliminating their enemies,\'\' she said. ``That was not the form or method approved by the ANC. No sane person would ever approve of that.\'\'\r\n'),(585,2,'Schoolgirls who survived a bloody bus hijacking sang hymns Thursday at a Mass celebrated by Pope John Paul II but still felt the terror from the night before, when police stormed the bus in a hail of bullets. One survivor said the hijackers, opposed to the military government, sang and prayed with the 71 hostages before shooting at the captives and lobbing grenades when police moved in to end the 27-hour ordeal on Wednesday night. Three hijackers and a 14-year-old girl were killed immediately. On Thursday, a second passenger died of a bullet wound to the head and the fourth hijacker died, the South African Broadcasting Corp. said. Officials said 20 people were injured by bullets and by shrapnel from the hijackers\' grenades. Some of the hostages said they saw the hijackers setting up some type of explosive device. The independent South African Press Association, quoting ``well-placed sources who watched the saga at close range\'\' said a explosive device, to be triggered electronically, was found fixed to the door of the bus. The government, which earlier denied South African forces were invited to help end the hijacking, said South African police and Lesotho soldiers assaulted the bus after the gunmen ordered the driver to crash into the grounds of the British High Commission, or embassy. Vitilina Quoaoho, 18, said the hijackers ``told us to lay under the chairs and they ordered the driver to pass through the locked gate\'\' of the embassy. ``We saw a big light (a flare fired by police) and then the soldiers started shooting at the bus and the men (the hijackers) were shooting at us,\'\' she said. ``We were very frightened. We are still frightened,\'\' she said, with her friends echoing her words. As they spoke, men and women, singing hymns to the beat of drum, walked by to take communion during a brief, sunny moment in a Mass that had been punctuated by thunder, rain and cold winds. The schoolgirls and several nuns who were aboard the bus were among a crowd of about 15,000 who gathered at the Maseru racecourse to see the pope beatify a French missionary who worked in Lesotho until his death in 1914. Four of the girls, wearing plastic bags as rainhats and blue uniforms from Pope John XXII High School, said that during the hijacking police appeared ready several times to fire at the bus during the journey to Maseru from the hijack point at Quacha\'s Neck. ``The men (the hijackers) prevented them, saying, `If you shoot you will be shooting your own people,\' \'\' said one of the girls. One unanswered question was why the hijackers suddenly tried to force the bus into the British embassy compound. It happened less than a half hour after the pope\'s motorcade, with police escort, had driven through the capital. He arrived by road from South Africa, where his plane was diverted due to bad weather in Maseru. Monica Morori, 36, who injured her feet jumping from the bus\'s shattered windows during the shootout, said the hijackers were joining passengers in singing and praying. Two of the hijackers were in their late teens and two were grown men. After the Mass, the pope rode through the capital\'s main street to the Queen Elizabeth II hospital, where he gave medals and crucifixes to some of the injured, including children and two nuns. The pope urged his followers at Thursday\'s youth rally to ``renounce every form of violence and hatred.\'\' ``The increase of violence in the world can never be halted by responding with more of the same,\'\' he said. In an apparent criticism of some militants, including activists who contend passive resistance alone cannot overcome South Africa\'s system of racial segregation, John Paul said: ``There could be nothing further from the truth. There is nothing passive about non-violence.\'\' The pope commented Thursday on the bus hijacking, remarking, ``I am saddened to learn that others on their way to join me on this pilgrimage have been victims of a hijack that has caused such anguish and ended in bloodshed.\'\' One of the nuns he visited, Sister Florina Nyogar, who had a bruised face, later told a reporter how she felt during the shooting. ``We saw that it was our end, and we accepted to die,\'\' she said. She said reports from the government that the hijackers refused to accept food for the hostages were inaccurate. ``We didn\'t feel like eating or drinking, we only felt like praying,\'\' she said. Several hostages said the hijackers, who brandished a Soviet-designed AK-47 automatic rifle, pistols and hand grenades, claimed to be members of the Lesotho Liberation Army, a dissident group that for years was based in South Africa but staged few operations. Lesotho\'s ruling military council also blamed the dissident group for the hijacking. The group\'s political commissar, Matladi Sehlabaka, told The Star newspaper of Johannesburg that his organization was not responsible. ``We could not have undertaken such an operation because we are on talking terms with the Lesotho regime,\'\' Sehlabaka said. The hijackers reportedly demanded an end to military rule and asked for a meeting with the pope and King Moshoeshoe II. The organization was also opposed to the leftist government of the late Prime Minister Leabua Jonathan, who was ousted by the current military council in a bloodless coup in January 1986.\r\n'),(586,2,'The stock market hovered in a narrow range today as Wall Streeters voiced mixed feelings about the inflation outlook. The Dow Jones average of 30 industrials rose 3.65 to 2,003.15 by 3 p.m. on Wall Street. Losers outnumbered gainers by about 9 to 5 in the overall tally of New York Stock Exchange-listed issues, with 518 up, 933 down and 482 unchanged. The Labor Department reported this morning that the consumer price index rose 0.5 percent in March. That marked the biggest monthly increase in the inflation gauge since it jumped 0.7 percent in January 1987. But analysts said there was a general sense of relief on Wall Street that the figure wasn\'t worse. Rumors and conjecture that the increase might run close to a full percentage point sent both stock and bond prices lower in late trading on Tuesday. Columbia Gas System fell 1{ to 28] in active trading. The company cut its quarterly dividend from 79.5 cents a share to 50 cents a share. American Telephone & Telegraph gained ] to 26~. The company reported higher first-quarter profits and said it was aiming to sustain earnings growth at a 15 percent rate for the remainder of the year. B.F. Goodrich was unchanged at 52\\ after trading as high as 54{. The company said it had been notified by Sir James Goldsmith, the British financier, that he was a ``passive investor\'\' in Goodrich and was not interested, as rumored, in acquiring it. The NYSE\'s composite index of all its listed common stocks lost .17 to 146.00. At the American Stock Exchange, the market value index was down 1.99 at 297.93. Volume on the Big Board came to 120.56 million shares with an hour to go.\r\n'),(587,2,'About 406,000 hourly General Motors Corp. workers soon will receive performance bonus payments that average $900 to $1,000 per worker, the automaker says. Distribution of the checks, which total about $307 million, began Thursday, GM said. Each worker receives 3 percent of his or her earnings from the previous year, based on the rate of pay and the number of hours worked. The payments are part of the three-year GM-United Auto Workers union contract that went into effect last year. ``These special payments recognize the relationship between an improved standard of living, technological progress and the cooperative spirit and teamwork attitude of all employees in achieving that program,\'\' said Alfred Warren Jr., GM\'s vice president for industrial relations.\r\n'),(588,2,'Financial disclosure forms indicate a $1 million trust fund in which Democratic presidential candidate Michael Dukakis is co-beneficiary sold stock worth up to $65,000 last year from companies with ties to South Africa. The forms, filed with the Federal Election Commission, are consistent with but more detailed than state financial disclosure forms filed by the Massachusetts governor last month. Dukakis gained no income in 1987 from the family trust established by his late father, whose equal beneficiaries are Dukakis and Bates College, the elder Dukakis\' alma mater. The trust drew attention last year when similar forms filed with the FEC disclosed that until 1986 it included stock in companies that do business in South Africa. Dukakis has no role in investment decisions of the trust but in 1986, when questioned about its holdings during a gubernatorial re-election campaign, told the bank which controls the account to divest any stock in companies with South African dealings. Stock in 10 such companies was immediately sold. The trust gained between $15,001 and $50,000 last year by selling stock in Unisys Corp., which maintains operations in South Africa. Dukakis campaign spokesman Steven Akey said the trust had owned stock in a company acquired by Unisys last year and sold it because of Unisys\' ties to South Africa. The trust also reported capital gains of between $5,001 and $15,000 from the sale of Pepsico Inc. stock. The company maintains indirect ties to South Africa through its Kentucky Fried Chicken subsidiary. Three companies in which the trust has holdings have indirect ties to racially segregated South Africa, largely through distribution agreements and spare parts sales contracts, according to the Washington-based Investor Responsibility Research Center. They are IBM Corp., General Electric Corp. and American Telephone & Telegraph. Akey said the trust\'s investment policy is to not acquire stock in any company on the Washington group\'s list of companies with direct dealings in South Africa. Dukakis is also a potential co-beneficiary of another $1 million trust left by his father. But that trust is not considered part of his net worth because Dukakis\' 84-year-old mother controls it and could decide to alter arrangements which currently call for that fund to be split by Dukakis and Bates. The FEC forms, which cover the period from Jan. 1, 1987, to March 31, 1988, show Dukakis\' principal source of income during that period was $106,310 from his salary as governor. The forms were filed Friday. He and his wife, Kitty, also earned between $1,001 and $2,500 in interest from a savings account that holds between $15,001 and $50,000; between $101 and $1,000 in interest from a smaller bank account in Mrs. Dukakis\' name; and between $5,000 and $15,000 in interest from the governor\'s holdings in the state retirement plan. Mrs. Dukakis also earned $20,000 last year in salary from a Harvard University program that cleans up and preserves public grounds. An investment account in the name of the couple\'s three children earned between $2,600 and $5,100 last year, according to the FEC forms. The couple also owns a home in suburban Brookline that is worth more than $100,000. Dukakis and his wife, who do not use credit cards, listed no liabilities. The largest investment in the Panos Dukakis trust is a tax-exempt money market fund worth between $100,001 and $250,000. Five of the trust\'s investments are worth between $50,001 and $100,000: holdings in Maine municipal bonds, a tax-exempt bank trust fund, General Electric, AT&T and Atlantic Richfield Corp.\r\n'),(589,2,'The Soviet Union has agreed to a ``joint venture\'\' with American Jews for the opening of a Jewish cultural center in Moscow, Jewish sources said Friday. Details of the project will be discussed next week in Moscow between Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze and Edgar Bronfman, president of the World Jewish Congress, the sources said. The decision, which contrasts sharply with decades of official repression of Jewish cultural and religious life, reflects the widesweeping changes undertaken by President Mikhail S. Gorbachev in the Soviet society and economy. Until recently, the teaching of Hebrew and practice of Jewish culture often resulted in jail terms on trumped-up charges ranging from anti-Soviet propaganda to drug possession. An understanding in principle on the cultural center was reached last May in talks Bronfman held with Soviet officials, including Shevardnadze and Konstantin Kharchev, chairman of the state committee on religious affairs, said the sources. ``The Soviets have given the green light for this joint venture,\'\' said one source, who declined to be further identified. What remains to be discussed are the funding and exact location of the center, he said. The center will include a library, museum and rooms for celebration of weddings, bar mitzvahs and other religious ceremonies, the sources said. If the Moscow project is successful, similar centers will be opened in Kiev and other Soviet cities, they said. The center will be run by Soviet, American and European Jewish groups in a building supplied by the government, the sources said. The handful of synagogues allowed to operate in the Soviet Union are run by the state under close supervision. The agreement is the latest in a series of changes affecting the lives of the estimated 2.5 million Jews living in the Soviet Union. Authorities allowed some 12,000 Jews to emigrate this year, up from the 8,700 allowed to leave last year and a significant increase over the estimated 900 exit visas granted in 1986. The easing of restrictions also has affected other ethnic and religious minorities, who are enjoying greater freedom under Gorbachev. The changes also have extended to Soviet relations with Israel, which Moscow cut off in 1967. An official Soviet delegation went to Israel last year and an Israeli consular team is in Moscow now.\r\n'),(590,2,'Nelson Mandela leaves the capital today assured of some political support and buoyed by a tumultuous rally where he was serenaded, praised and nearly worshipped by more than 19,000 Washingtonians. ``We thank you, America. We thank you for being true to your responsibility ... We thank you for responding to our cause,\'\' the black South African leader told the cheering crowd Tuesday night. Mandela was leaving today for Atlanta after a three-day Washington visit during which he won assurances from President Bush and members of Congress of continuing U.S. economic sanctions against South Africa\'s white government. The 71-year-old African National Congress leader also called Tuesday for financial assistance to his country once the apartheid system of racial segregation is abolished.\r\n'),(591,2,'Iraq\'s invasion of Kuwait continued to shake financial markets today, but stock and bond prices got another jolt from a disappointing report on unemployment that worsened fears about inflation and a recession in the United States. The Dow Jones average of 30 industrial stocks tumbled more than 100 points at one time during the session on the double dose of bad news before recouping slightly. Oil prices, which shot up Thursday after the Iraqi attack, continued to climb today. Prices were boosted by the possibility the invasion eventually could affect output from the two nations or other members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries. The September contract for West Texas Intermediate, the benchmark grade of U.S. crude, was up $1.94 to $25.05 a barrel by mid-afternoon on the New York Mercantile Exchange after jumping $1.57 on Thursday. In London, the spot price of North Sea Brent Blend, the most widely traded international crude, was quoted at $23.25 a barrel today, up 86 cents from Thursday, when the price rose $2 a barrel. The surge in oil prices came as a blow to other financial markets already concerned about the weakening U.S. economy. With oil and other energy sources crucial for every segment of the economy, rising crude prices can reinvigorate inflation. That would make the Federal Reserve _ which considers fighting inflation one of its top priorities _ less likely to move interest rates lower as a means of stimulating the economy. ``The Fed is caught between a rock and a hard place,\'\' said Jack Barbanel, president of First Global Asset Management Inc. ``They\'re trying to support a weakening economy and at the same time keep interest rates at a level to support foreign capital and keep inflation under control.\'\' The outlook worsened today as the Labor Department announced the unemployment rate rose a sharp 0.3 percent to 5.5 percent in July. The jump indicated a continuing slowing of the economy as private companies lost 45,000 jobs from their payrolls. The report also carried bad inflation news: Average hourly earnings posted a 0.6 percent rise to $10.09, up from the $10.03 the average worker earned per hour in June. The double blow of rising oil prices and a negative economic outlook sent stock prices sharply lower. On Wall Street, the Dow industrial average skidded more than 100 points before rebounding slightly at mid-afternoon. The indicator was down about 81 points at 2:30 p.m. EDT, at 2,783.42. The Dow Jones average, which tracks the movement of 30 blue chip stocks, skidded 34.66 points on Thursday as traders grew uneasy about the effect oil prices would have on corporate profits. Stock prices also tumbled overseas in response to the Iraqi invasion. In Tokyo, the Nikkei Stock Average of 225 selected issues shed 729.42 points, ending the day at 29,515.76. The index lost nearly 593 points on Thursday. Japan is especially vulnerable to the possibility of a disruption of energy sources because it imports 99 percent of its oil. Traders there are concerned that the oil price rise will take a heavy toll on Japanese business. Bond prices were also hit hard by the unemployment report and the prospect of higher inflation from rising oil prices. At midday today, the Treasury\'s bellwether 30-year bond was down about $3.43 per $1,000 in face value after plunging more than $12 on Thursday. The bond\'s yield, considered a benchmark for interest rates throughout the economy, rose to 8.48 percent from 8.46 percent late Thursday. Bond traders are concerned that inflation will erode the value of their fixed-income holdings. They\'re also worried that interest rates won\'t be dropping soon, as bond prices rise when rates decline, so higher rates depress prices. The dollar first soared Thursday in response to the Iraqi invasion and then gave up ground amid concern about the U.S. economy. Today the dollar was little changed against most foreign currencies, but made its biggest moves against the Japanese yen. In early New York trading, the dollar was worth 149.965 yen, up from 149.30 late Thursday.\r\n'),(592,2,'Ten opposition lawmakers began a hunger strike Sunday to force the government to solve a crisis in Israel\'s public health system, plagued by months of labor disputes. In an unusual show of unity, lawmakers from opposite ends of the political spectrum gathered in the hallway of Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir\'s office to launch their protest. They said they would fast for a week unless an agreement was reached before then between the Finance and Health ministries on how to meet demands by doctors for drastic salary increases. ``We are doing this because there is no other alternative,\'\' legislator Yossi Sarid of the left-wing Citizens Rights Movement told Israel radio. ``Maybe now the government will listen.\'\' Added Geula Cohen of the right-wing Tehiya Party: ``The common denominator is human suffering which doesn\'t distinguish between left-wingers from right-wingers.\'\' The protest was organized by the left-wing Mapam party. In the past few months, doctors in Israeli hospitals have repeatedly gone on strike and performed only emergency surgery to press demands for higher wages. Doctors make about $750 a month. As a result of the persistent labor disputes, thousands of Israelis have waited for months to be scheduled for crucial operations. Doctors have acknowledged they expect some patients to die because of delays in treatment. In a scenario typical of the past few months, doctors said they would strike Monday in Israel\'s northern hospitals, and in other regions during the remainder of the week. The Health Ministry has agreed in principle to the doctors\' demands, but Finance Minister Moshe Nissim has refused to allocate additional funds to the Health Ministry to cover salary raises. The Finance Ministry is concerned a wage increase would trigger across-the-board wage hikes in the public health system and fuel inflation. Officials from the Finance and Health ministries were scheduled to meet Monday with union representatives in another attempt to solve the crisis. Israel television quoted Shamir as saying if no agreement is reached at Monday\'s meeting he would convene a special ministerial committee to make a decision this week.\r\n'),(593,2,'California will require aspirin makers to warn women against taking the drug in the late stages of pregnancy, a state science panel has decided. The panel on Friday classified aspirin a ``reproductive toxin\'\' under Proposition 65, the landmark toxics initiative law that requires public warnings for substances that pose a risk of cancer or birth defects. The warnings _ probably on aspirin labels _ must appear within one year after a substance is formally listed in keeping with the panel\'s decision. In making its recommendation, the panel rejected a $500,000 report prepared by the aspirin industry. That report said it found no evidence that aspirin taken in the last three months of pregnancy could cause excessive bleeding during delivery and other pregnancy complications. The panel unanimously ruled that such risks have been shown, based on studies involving high aspirin dosage. But panel members also acknowledged recent studies that aspirin in very low doses _ half a tablet or less _ may relieve certain medical problems suffered by pregnant women. They said the aspirin warning should be qualified to advise women against taking aspirin in the last three months of pregnancy ``... unless directed to do so by your doctor.\'\' Aspirin products have carried a general warning label since 1982 and certain over-the-counter aspirin substitutes also carry a label that reads: ``It is especially important not to use aspirin during the last three months of pregnancy unless specifically directed to do so by your doctor because it may cause problems in the unborn child or complications during delivery.\'\' Proposition 65 mandates public warnings but does not dictate warning labels on specific products. However, a spokesman for the aspirin industry said a warning label seemed likely in about a year. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration notified state authorities last week that it planned to require a new warning on over-the-counter aspirin products similar to the warning under review by the Proposition 65 panel. But science panel members said they saw no point in waiting for federal action. Aspirin industry representatives said the FDA was pushed into action by Proposition 65, which has served as a model for toxics legislation across the country.\r\n'),(594,2,'Robby, a $1 million robot rover vehicle designed to explore Mars, successfully picked its way along a rocky dry river bed without human help, NASA said. ``This is the first time that an autonomous vehicle has ever navigated rugged terrain using video cameras,\'\' said Roger Bedard, planetary rover program manager at the space agency\'s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. ``Robby himself wouldn\'t go to Mars. He\'s a test vehicle.\'\' NASA called the Sept. 13 test ``a significant milestone\'\' in developing a planet-roving, computer-guided vehicle that would explore Mars to find suitable landing sites for a manned mission to the red planet. It will be about 1995 before engineers fully develop rover technology, and about 2000 before one can be built to go to Mars, Bedard said Wednesday. During the test, Robby took four hours, 20 minutes to crawl along a 109-yard course in the rugged Arroyo Seco, a dry river bed in a canyon next to the laboratory. NASA wants a real Mars rover to travel about 13 miles daily. Bedard said engineers told Robby where it was and where it was supposed to go, but the six-wheeled vehicle used its twin television cameras and computer to navigate a safe course around boulders and other obstacles. Other tests were conducted last week. Robby is about 15 feet long, 6 feet wide and 6 feet tall. It was named after Robby the Robot in ``Forbidden Planet,\'\' a 1956 science fiction film. The robot\'s television cameras give it stereoscopic vision, allowing it a three-dimensional look at objects about 6{ feet in front of it. Robby moves about 6{ feet at a time, then stops to survey another 6{-foot stretch of terrain before proceeding. Robby runs on a battery recharged by an onboard gasoline generator. A Mars rover would be powered by the radioactive decay of plutonium, Bedard said. The only unmanned rovers to explore another planet were two Soviet Lunakod vehicles that explored the moon in the early 1970s, Bedard said. NASA astronauts used a manned vehicle on the moon. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration doesn\'t yet have specific plans to put rovers on Mars, Bedard said. The Soviets are considering using rovers and terrain-hopping balloons during a 1994 mission to Mars. During the past week, 30-foot-tall balloons that would repeatedly rise and settle on Mars\' surface were tested in California\'s desert by engineers from France, the Soviet Union and the Planetary Society, a group that advocates space exploration. Balloons have the advantage of not needing to navigate rough terrain, rising during the heat of day and settling to the Martian surface at night to take measurements. Bedard said rovers can be directed to explore areas of scientific interest, rather than taking a route that depends on prevailing winds.\r\n'),(595,2,'While first-year associates at the city\'s 20 largest law offices can expect to pull down about $71,000 a year, paychecks for the most senior associates vary by as much as 56 percent, according to a new survey. The study published in Monday\'s edition of the New York Law Journal found that 17 of the 20 firms pay first-year associates $70,000, $71,000 or $72,000. However, by the seventh year, base salaries vary from Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft\'s $108,000 to $169,000 at Sullivan & Cromwell. George D. Reycraft, a partner at Cadwalader, told the newspaper that associates normally get a bonus at his firm. ``You see similar salaries in the early years because the firms are all competing for the same scarce resource coming out of the top law schools,\'\' said William C. Cobb, a Houston-based legal consultant. In its survey, the publication found average compensation for lawyers at the 20 firms are: $71,700, first year; $80,000, second year; $85,800, third year; $101,900, fourth year; $114,800, fifth year; $126,200, sixth year; and $139,000, seventh year.\r\n'),(596,2,'Christian and Moslem militiamen today exchanged mortar fire across Beirut\'s dividing Green Line. No casualties were reported. The two-hour battle in downtown Beirut came amid reports of growing tension between a Christian militia and the Lebanese army. There was no word on what caused the battle, the fourth between civil war antagonists in Beirut in two weeks. The clashes have strained a 14-month-old truce in the war that began in 1975. The fighting coincided with a state of alert proclaimed by the 6,000-strong Lebanese Forces, the Christians\' main militia, in east Beirut and the Christian heartland north of the capital. Christian militiamen set up checkpoints and roadblocks all over the Christian sector of Beirut and along the main coastal highway running north from the city, witnesses reported. Fighters in battle fatigues and carrying automatic weapons searched cars and frisked occupants, said the witnesses, who spoke on condition of anonymity. The militia gave no explanation for the alert. But the Christian-owned Ad-Diyar daily said it stemmed from tension between the militia and the Lebanese army, which is controlled by Christian officers. The newspaper said the militia was putting on a muscle-flexing show to demonstrate it controls the Christian enclave, not the army. The commander of the 37,000-man army, Gen. Michel Aoun, has been quoted by several Beirut newspapers recently as saying the military could finish off the militia any time it wanted. Newspapers said his remarks were part of a campaign by the Maronite Catholic commander to become the next president of Lebanon after President Amin Gemayel\'s six-year term expires in September. Aoun, who has not denied the statements, has not offically proclaimed his candidacy.\r\n'),(597,2,'Jesse Jackson\'s campaign said today common ground had been reached with Michael Dukakis\' forces on most of Jackson\'s minority platform planks but the Jackson camp will press floor debate on three issues. Today\'s Democratic Convention session was moved up to allow more time for debate. Jackson officials, in a written notice, said today there would be debate on three planks for which he had filed minority versions _ higher taxes on the wealthy, no first use of nuclear weapons and Palestinian self-determination in the Middle East. However, they said they would not press the Middle East issue to a vote. The Dukakis delegates were expected to easily defeat Jackson on the higher-taxes and nuclear-weapons issues, but today\'s convention starting time was moved up from 4:30 p.m. to 3 p.m. EDT to allow time to air the issues. The Jackson campaign\'s major concession was to drop a call for a five-year freeze on Pentagon spending. Eleanor Holmes Norton, Jackson\'s chief platform negotiator, told a news conference, ``Jackson has had a grater impact on this platform than any candidate other than a nominee in memory.\'\' She said of the Palestinian homeland issue on CBS-TV today, ``Our supporters were anxious to have the issue debated, not necesssarily voted. ... What was sought was an agreement that would keep our party together and avoid the dissonance.\'\' But she said in regard to the Jackson plank that would pledge no first use of nuclear weapons, ``We are going to the floor on that. The Soviet Union has said it. It\'s much more in the American tradition to say that.\'\' Current U.S. and NATO policy would allow first use in the event of a Soviet invasion of Europe. The Jackson campaign, in its written update, said, ``We have reached common ground on nine of the minority planks advocated by our campaign,\'\' including acceptance of Jackson\'s minority plank on the budget. That plank says, ``Investing in America and reducing the deficit requires that the wealthy and corporations pay their fair share and that we restrain Pentagon spending.\'\' Other Jackson proposals will be included in the platform compromise language, including expanded support for prenatal care, Head Start and education. The platform negotiators resumed their talks Monday after a six-day hiatus caused by tension between Jackson and Dukakis. The Jackson campaign said that ``our major impact on the platform has been in the document itself (which) already reflects the guiding principles of our campaign: declaring South Africa a terrorist state, our five-point program to fight drugs, political empowerment and many more.\'\' Campaign lieutenants negotiated late into the night over the details of resolving the minority positions Jackson wanted in the streamlined, 4,500-word platform. ``I expect we won\'t have a marathon session,\'\' Michigan Gov. James J. Blanchard, chairman of the platform committee, said Monday. Blanchard says the platform, shorn of the usual special-interest rhetoric, is compact enough to fit on a poster. The agreement not to wage a drawn-out platform fight followed a Monday morning meeting in which Jackson pledged party unity and Michael Dukakis promised to increase Jackson\'s role in the party. The platform talks had been suspended last Tuesday when Dukakis failed to give Jackson early notice of his selection of Lloyd Bentsen as a running mate. Both Dukakis and Jackson said they anticipated some issues would be left to the 4,162 delegates to decide. Jackson said Monday night on the Cable News Network: ``There will be key planks to be debated tomorrow night. ... We are committed to having new budget priorities.\'\' Rep. Bill Richardson of New Mexico, a co-chair of the Platform Committee, said early today he thought there would be just ``a slight floor fight.\'\' Richardson said defense was where the Jackson forces had ``the chance to make the most inroads\'\' on Dukakis\' majority. In a Platform Committee session in Denver June 25, the Dukakis forces rejected several cornerstone Jackson campaign positions, including his call for higher taxes on the wealthy, a Pentagon budget freeze, Palestinian self-determination and a U.S. policy of no first use of nuclear weapons. Actor Ed Begley of television\'s ``St. Elsewhere,\'\' a Dukakis delegate from California, was among many delegates sporting ``No First Use\'\' stickers at Monday night\'s opening session. Other Jackson minority planks called for full funding of Head Start and the Women, Infants and Children nutrition program, and doubling the education budget. AFL-CIO President Lane Kirkland told the 751 labor delegates they were free ``to dance with the candidates you came with\'\' on platform fights. The National Education Association, which has 291 delegates, voted Sunday to take Jackson\'s side on the education plank. The 4,500-word proposed platform is the Democrats\' shortest in five decades. Borrowing a phrase from Republican nominee-to-be George Bush, it promises to reverse the ``voodoo economics\'\' of the Reagan administration, bolster programs for the needy and maintain ``more stable defense budgets.\'\' Tailored largely to Dukakis\' specifications, it includes many of Jackson\'s positions as well, including a condemnation of South Africa as ``a terrorist state.\'\' The platform is the main order of convention business today before a prime-time speech by Jackson.\r\n'),(598,2,'In a raid on a rural drug refuge, the army arrested more than 100 alleged traffickers, seized about 1,900 pounds of pure cocaine, discovered huge coca fields and destroyed laboratories, an army official said. The cocaine seized in Monday\'s operation near Colombia\'s northern coast was hidden among cargo bags and ready to be exported to the United States, said regional army commander Col. Carlos Castro. He said troops destroyed six cocaine-processing laboratories, arrested 103 suspected drug traffickers and found nearly 5,000 acres of coca leaf, the raw material used to make cocaine. Soldiers also seized 30 vehicles, all with Venezuelan license plates, which had been used to transport drugs, Castro said. Also confiscated were cocaine- processing chemicals and a cache of weapons, he said. The bust was considered one of the year\'s most important. So far in 1990 security forces have confiscated about 45 tons of cocaine, compared to 33 tons in all of 1989. Colombia\'s Medellin and Cali cocaine cartels supply most of the cocaine consumed in the United States. The coca leaf is mostly grown in Bolivia and Peru, then processed in Colombia. The Medellin cartel has been blamed for a long series of terrorist attacks in which at least 550 people have died in the past 14 months.\r\n'),(599,2,'Investigators found ``promising evidence\'\' in the slayings of five college students when they searched the lodgings and car of a suspect, a spokeswoman said today. On Thursday, investigators searched the apartment of the suspect, 18-year-old part-time student Edward Lewis Humphrey, as well as the home of his grandmother and his car. They also took blood and hair samples from Humphrey. ``We did not leave empty-handed,\'\' Lt. Sadie Darnell, Gainesville police spokeswoman, told a news briefing today. Besides calling the evidence promising, she declined to elaborate. On Thursday, she had said that while she was not prepared to label Humphrey a prime suspect, ``it is obvious we have a lot of information on Mr. Humphrey.\'\' Humphrey, whom police describe as one of eight suspects in last month\'s grisly slayings, has not been charged in the deaths. He remained jailed today on $1 million bond in connection with an assault on his grandmother shortly after the killings. And Thursday, University of Florida police announced they issued a warrant charging Humphrey with two counts of aggravated assault in another incident Aug. 25, a day before the first two bodies were found. Police would not give details of the incident, but The Miami Herald reported today that two freshmen, both 18-year-old male fraternity pledges, were threatened with a knife at the Pi Lambda Phi house. Also Thursday, a judge in Sharpes cited Humphrey\'s bizarre behavior when he upheld a $1 million bond on the charge that Humphrey assaulted his 79-year-old grandmother. ``I see before me a very disturbed individual,\'\' Circuit Judge Martin Budnick said. ``I see a great deal of acting out ... neurotic or psychotic behavior.\'\' Budnick ruled that Humphrey is a danger to the community. But he indicated he would consider another request for bond reduction and wanted to hear medical testimony about Humphrey\'s mental condition. Humphrey\'s grandmother testified she didn\'t want to press charges and would welcome Humphrey back into her home, where Humphrey\'s mother also lives. ``I want it dropped ... definitely,\'\' Elna Hlavaty, her right cheek and right eye badly bruised, said as Humphrey looked on. She said she didn\'t fear her grandson, although she had called police repeatedly. Ms. Hlavaty said she couldn\'t remember details of the night she was hurt, other than that she bruised her right side when she fell on a concrete floor. Sheriff\'s Deputy Douglas Hammack testified she told him the night of the arrest that she feared Humphrey would beat her again. Warrants also have been issued for Humphrey in Indian River County for attempted sexual battery and armed burglary in an attack on a woman two years ago. Four women and a man, all students at the University of Florida or Santa Fe Community College, were slain last month in three attacks. Three victims were mutilated; one was decapitated, police said. Humphrey and Stephen Michael Bates, a 30-year-old Lakeland short-order cook, have been mentioned publicly as suspects. Bates has been held in the Polk County Jail on $100,500 bail since his Aug. 29 arrest in an unrelated assault. In Colorado, meanwhile, authorities disclosed Thursday that Humphrey was arrested two weeks before the Gainesville killings began on charges of theft and disorderly conduct for failing to pay for $12 worth of gasoline at a convenience store near Ordway, a town about 160 miles southeast of Denver. When he was booked into the county jail, Humphrey began ``hollering, yelling and flipping out,\'\' Sgt. Allan Turner of the Crowley County sheriff\'s department said. Humphrey also threatened suicide but didn\'t threaten anyone else, Turner said.\r\n'),(600,2,'NBC won the U.S. television rights to the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona, Spain, The Associated Press learned today. NBC, which televised the Summer Olympics in Seoul, had been considered a longshot to get the Barcelona rights. CBS was favored because it already owns the TV rights to the 1992 Winter Games in Albertville, France. The International Olympic Committee and the Barcelona Olympic Organizing Committee scheduled a news conference later today for the official announcement.\r\n'),(601,2,'Here are some key quotes from Monday\'s session of the 28th Communist Party congress:\r\n'),(602,2,'A brush fire fanned by fierce Santa Ana winds raced through a neighborhood of expensive homes early today, burning at least 20 homes and forcing evacuations of up to 5,000 people. It was the second day wind reached speeds above 60 mph. On Thursday, fires destroyed at least 22 homes and cut power to half a million people. Today\'s brush fire was in the Porter Ranch district, 25 miles northwest of downtown, where many homes have flammable wooden shake shingle roofs, authorities said. Ten homes were destroyed and 10 were damaged as the fire spread through canyons in the Santa Susana Mountains and into foothill neighborhoods, said Fire Department spokesman Gary Svider. No injuries were reported. ``One of the major problems up here is that we have a lot of wood shingle roofs and they go up like matchsticks,\'\' said Battalion Chief Dean Cathey. Cause of the blaze, which blackened at least 1,800 acres, was not immediately known. Wind gusted to 60 mph, and the National Weather Service said the relative humidity was 15 percent, compared to a normal 60 percent in the early morning. Police began evacuating a residential area of four to six square miles after the fire broke out about 5:45 a.m., said police Sgt. Doug Boka. He said thousands of people would be forced from their homes near the northern foothills of the San Fernando Valley. Porter Ranch residents were awakened by choking smoke and an orange glow in the sky. ``It was just like raining fire,\'\' said Tim Dinsmore, 16, who helped his father wet down the family\'s home before they had to flee several blocks away. ``As I was spraying water the neighbors\' houses started to burn; that\'s when I got scared.\'\' The Dinsmores\' home survived the onslaught. ``Thousands of embers were coming down on us as we left,\'\' said Hank Piorek, who fled the neighborhood with his family of four. At least three schools in the area were closed and some sections of boulevard and freeway access ramps were closed because of smoke. The hot, dry ``devil winds\'\' from the desert gusted to 69 mph Thursday, causing damage estimated at $10 million but no serious injuries, although some residents had to dash through flames to safety, officials said. ``We saw sparks, showers of sparks, like rain,\'\' said Ruben Cabadas, 18, recounting his family\'s flight from their Baldwin Park home on Thursday. Hardest hit were the Los Angeles suburbs of Baldwin Park and La Verne, where fires blamed on wind-downed power lines destroyed at least 22 homes and damaged 12 others and five businesses. The winds toppled at least a dozen tractor-trailers and a motor home on freeways obscured by blowing dirt and sand. About 500,000 people were without power at various times. By nightfall Thursday, 30,800 remained in the dark in Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties, utility officials said. Electricity was out in the La Canada-Flintridge School District, where schools were closed today. The Santa Ana winds blow through the deserts on their way to Southern California at this time of year, picking up both speed and warmth and increasing the fire danger in areas left dry by lack of rain. The forecast held little relief. The high-pressure system causing the turbulence, in combination with a low-pressure system off Baja California, appeared to be stuck over southern Idaho, the National Weather Service said. ``I can see these winds continuing, although not as strong as today, into the early part of next week,\'\' weather service meteorologist Mark McKinley said Thursday. Fourteen homes were destroyed in Baldwin Park 20 miles northeast of downtown Los Angeles and five were damaged along with five commercial buildings when 75 mph gusts snapped power lines, igniting a fire at Allan Paper Co., fire officials said. Damage was estimated at $4.5 million. In La Verne and neighboring unincorporated parts of Claremont, eight homes were devastated and seven damaged in wind-driven fires. Damage was estimated at $5 million. ``We lost everything _ the house, the cars,\'\' said Dan Hanlon, 49, of La Verne, who fled with his wife. ``We were lucky to get out. We had to drive through flames.\'\' An artificial Christmas tree wrapped in colored lights and tinsel lay on the driveway of Roy and Elinor Livingston\'s home, the only thing salvaged from the ruins. Awakened by a neighbor, the couple found a row of palm trees and a nearby home ablaze, and battled fires on their roof until they were overwhelmed. ``It was just like the air was full of these giant sparks,\'\' said Mrs. Livingston, 56. In the San Fernando Valley community of Chatsworth, six men were arrested for investigation of arson as firefighters doused a five-acre brushfire, a ridge into Glendale, Wells said. The powerful winds caused turbulence that jolted a Piedmont Airlines jet approaching Los Angeles International Airport, slightly injuring two flight attendants and four passengers. Damage was estimated at $40,000 to five floats being built for Pasadena\'s Tournament of Roses Parade. The floats\' chicken-wire skeletons were crushed when a giant tent housing them in Azusa collapsed. They were expected to be rebuilt by the Jan. 2 event. In La Jolla to the south, a wind-fanned brush fire burned about 60 acres in a steep coastal canyon and threatened the Scripps Clinic hospital and other businesses before about 100 area firefighters contained it, said San Diego fire spokesman Larry Stewart. The California Highway Patrol warned Southern California motorists to exercise caution _ particularly those with campers, trailers and other high-profile vehicles vulnerable to wind.\r\n'),(603,2,'RJR Nabisco Inc. is adding another element to the epic takeover battle for the food and tobacco conglomerate, with its board of directors considering the possible sale of its food businesses in advance of any takeover. The possible sale of the food businesses, which last year accounted for about 60 percent of the company\'s $15.8 billion in net sales, was announced Monday by the special committee appointed by the board to evaluate the unprecedented multibillion-dollar buyout offers already made for RJR Nabisco. The committee also said it had set a Nov. 18 deadline for submission of any proposals to acquire either the entire company or just its tobacco businesses, and warned bidders that it would not consider their offers if they did not agree to the terms it set for the auction. RJR Nabisco already is the target of a record $20.3 billion tender offer _ worth $90 a share _ by the New York investment firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts Inc. and a rival proposal by Nabisco management to acquire the company for $20.7 billion, or $92 a share. The New York buyout firm Forstmann Little & Co. announced last week it led an investor group _ including consumer products giant Procter & Gamble Co., the investment firm Goldman, Sachs & Co. and Ralston Purina Co. _ interested in a possible counteroffer that would surpass both existing bids. RJR stock rose $1.75 a share to $87.37{ in New York Stock Exchange composite trading on Monday. The special committee said that if the board decided to sell RJR\'s food businesses, the after-tax proceeds would be paid to shareholders before any acquisition of RJR. ``Accordingly, parties are invited to submit proposals on a basis which, in effect, would involve acquiring RJR Nabisco as a stand-alone tobacco company,\'\' the committee stated. Furthermore, the committee has ordered its financial advisers to explore available alternatives other than a buyout of the company. Industry analysts have estimated RJR Nabisco\'s food businesses would bring a sale price ranging from $12.5 billion to $15.5 billion. Atlanta-based RJR Nabisco makes such well-known brands as Winston and Camel cigarettes, Oreo cookies and Del Monte vegetables. The committee said it had made no final decision on whether to sell the company or any of its parts, and that the board had decided to take no position on the pending tender offer by Kohlberg Kravis. In addition, the committee stated it was inviting the inclusion in bids of a ``substantial common stock-related equity component.\'\' The panel\'s announcement did not elaborate on the reasons for the request, although including stock in their offers would enable bidders to increase the value of their bids without having to come up with more cash. The panel also warned that it would consider any attempt to bid for the company outside of its guidelines would be considered a hostile overture, and neither the special committee nor the board would consider offers from any bidders that had not agreed to those terms. A buyout of the RJR Nabisco food businesses would mirror the recent trend that has seen the acquisitions and sometimes breaking up of the nation\'s biggest food companies. Last month, Kraft Inc. agreed to be acquired by food and tobacco giant Philip Morris Companies Inc. in a $13.1 billion buyout, the second-biggest U.S. corporate acquisition ever. There also is a battle being waged by Pillsbury Co. against a $5.2 billion hostile buyout offer by Britain\'s Grand Metropolitan PLC, a food, liquor and real estate conglomerate. The big food companies are considered attractive because of their established brand names and relative steady businesses, which are regarded as recession proof.\r\n'),(604,2,'A 28-year-old man who hijacked a Brazilian jetliner with more than 100 people aboard has died following a five-hour police interrogation, hospital officials said. Raimundo Conceicao, described by authorities as a ``psychopath,\'\' died Tuesday of kidney failure after five days of steady progress, according to a medical report released by the Santa Genoveva hospital in Goiania, 850 miles northwest of Rio. On Sep. 29, Conceicao underwent surgery to stop internal bleeding caused by police bullet wounds suffered as the hijacking drew to a close. On Sunday, Conceicao underwent five hours of intense questioning by police on the hijacking. Late Monday afternoon, Conceicao was rushed to the hospital\'s intensive care unit with soaring blood pressure. The causes of Conceicao\'s sudden change in condition were unknown, according to the medical report, but a doctor who asked not to be identified said Conceicao\'s soaring blood pressure could have been prompted by a build-up of intestinal gases during the interrogation. Doctors on Monday refused to let police talk to Conceicao, saying his health had deteriorated. The contents of Conceicao\'s police deposition were not made public. On Sep. 29, Conceicao burst into the cockpit of a Brazilian jetliner on a routine flight from western Brazil to Rio and demanded the plane be flown to the federal capital of Brasilia. He reportedly told negotiators he wanted to crash the plane into a government building to ``settle accounts\'\' with the government over its economic policies. The plane was forced to land 125 miles southwest of the capital, in Goiania, where Conceicao shot and killed the co-pilot and wounded two others before being wounded by police as he prepared to change planes. On Monday, government officials announced passengers at major Brazilian airports will now have their baggage checked before boarding domestic flights. Previously, only passengers boarding international flights were subject to police checks.\r\n'),(605,2,'With decolonization complete, African leaders are turning to conflicts within their own countries that have killed millions of people, maimed countless more and created 5 million refugees. Those internal wars, some decades old, have been largely ignored by the Organization of African Unity, which devoted itself to supporting guerrilla movements in South Africa and colonies ruled by Europeans. Civil wars were considered beyond the bounds of the OAU, whose charter forbade meddling in the internal affairs of member states. Last month, a change began. For the first time since its birth in 1963, the organization declared that ballots should determine the future of the continent\'s 550 million people, not force of arms. It did not change the charter, but clearly shifted emphasis. ``The issue of restoring peace and stability to African countries and of dismantling the apartheid system was the dominant theme of discussion during the 26th OAU summit,\'\' the English-language daily Ethiopian Herald said in an editorial. The paper is published in Addis Ababa, headquarters of the OAU. In African eyes, the continent became free of colonies when Namibia gained independence from South Africa in March. Africans viewed Namibia, which South Africa governmed under a U.N. mandate withdrawn in 1966, as a colony of the white-ruled country. The OAU and United Nations have long recognized South Africa as an independent nation, but have tried to end the apartheid racial policy that maintains supremacy for 5 million whites over 28 million blacks. In previous years, the OAU has committed itself to financing guerrilla armies in areas ranging from Cape Verde, when it was a Portuguese colony, to the British territory of Rhodesia, now black-ruled Zimbabwe. It ended the June summit with the usual condemnation of apartheid, but for the first time omitted mention of continuing to support guerrilla-backed movements like the African National Congress or Pan-Africanist Congress. Instead, Africa\'s leaders committed themselves to increasing democracy within their own countries and finding peaceful solutions to civil wars in progress from the Western Sahara in the far northwest to Mozambique in the southeast. Here is a look at the long-running wars: ANGOLA _ Portugal, the colonial power, pulled out of this agriculturally rich West African territory in 1975, leaving three anti-colonial guerrilla armies to fight for the spoils. The Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola won. Since then, the Marxist government has battled Jonas Savimbi\'s National Union for the Total Independence of Angola, which has U.S. support. Zaire is mediating peace talks. CHAD _ This landlocked desert nation in north central Africa, independent from France since 1960, has been torn by rebellions and three civil wars. Virtually all involved meddling and military incursions by Chad\'s northern neighbor, Libya, with which it has a border dispute. President Hissen Habre\'s army scored a major victory over the Libyans in 1987, but skirmishing continues between government forces and Libyan-backed rebels. ETHIOPIA _ For 29 years, Africa\'s longest civil war has raged in northernmost Eritrea Province, where rebels of the Eritrean People\'s Liberation Front control virtually all the countryside and the port of Massawa, one of Ethiopia\'s two Red Sea harbors. The Eritreans, loosely allied with the Tigre People\'s Liberation Front in neighboring Tigre province, want independence for Eritrea, a former Italian colony federated with Ethiopia in 1952. The Tigreans want to overthrow the central government of President Mengistu Haile Mariam. The two conflicts and the famines they spawned have claimed more than 1 million lives. MOZAMBIQUE _ After Portugal granted independence in 1975, a rebel army called the Mozambique National Resistance, known as Renamo, was organized within Mozambique by the white military of neighboring Rhodesia. Mozambique was the main springboard for incursions by guerrillas bent on toppling Rhodesia\'s white-minority government. White-ruled South Africa took over Renamo after Rhodesia became Zimbabwe in 1980, but now says it has ended support of the guerrillas. Hundreds of thousands of people have died and other hundreds of thousands have fled Mozambique. Preliminary peace talks began last year, but no real progress is evident. SOMALIA _ Since 1969, when he took power in a military coup, President Mohammed Siad Barre has ruled this Horn of Africa nation with what human rights groups describe as nearly unmatched brutality. Insurgents in the north have fought his regime for a decade and new rebel organizations sprang up in the south last year. The president has promised a referendum on a new constitution later this year and multiparty elections early in 1991. SUDAN _ For seven years, southern rebels who are mainly Christian or animist have been fighting for autonomy from the Moslem-dominated central government in Khartoum. Former President Jimmy Carter arranged peace talks last year that failed to settle the conflict. As in Ethiopia, the fighting has led to periodic famine and the loss of hundreds of thousands of lives. WESTERN SAHARA _ Morocco and the Polisario Front, a Marxist group, have been at war since 1977 over the desolate Western Sahara. Spain as the colonial power, granted the region to Morocco and Mauritania in 1975, but Mauritania later abandoned its claim. The Morocco-Polisario conflict has been largely at stalemate in recent years.\r\n'),(606,2,'Swiss police on Saturday freed a Turkish businessman reported kidnapped in Geneva and said they were holding three Turkish nationals as suspects. Police spokesman Marcel Vaudroz told a press conference that 28-year-old Mehmet Reyhan was freed unharmed shortly before noon in a Geneva apartment following a tip from a Geneva resident. Vaudroz said Reyhan was found in one room and that he was under guard by two of the suspects who were in another room. He said they had no firearms but carried knives. A third suspect was detained at another unspecified location. The abductors, who had demanded $3.3 million ransom, were identified by Vaudroz as Turkish nationals who had been in Switzerland for several years pending a decision on their request for political asylum. Their names were not disclosed. Vaudroz said it was too early to say whether the alleged kidnappers were affiliated to any group opposed to the Turkish government. Reyhan\'s family said the abductors identified themselves in telephone calls as members of a group called ``Vengeance Brigade\'\' of the outlawed Kurdish Labor Party, who are seeking to set up an independent Kurdish state. ``I am very happy to free again,\'\' Mehmet Reyhan told reporters. ``At some point I feared for my life.\'\' He said he was held up at gunpoint on Tuesday after he had stepped out of his downtown hotel and then was taken away. He said that attackers spoke Turkish but declined to say more about their identity. He looked pale but in good health as he spoke briefly at the police press conference where he was joined by his father, Ugur Reyhan, and his twin-brother, Ali, who had come to Geneva at the demand of the kidnappers. Ugur Reyhan is a member on the executive board of the conservative Istanbul daily Tercuman, which broke the story of the kidnapping. Mehmet is based in Luxembourg but travels to Switzerland frequently on business.\r\n'),(607,2,'A man convicted of buying LSD with $20,000 he received from a state fund for crime victims has been sentenced to four years in prison and fined $14,000, federal court officials said Wednesday. James B. Miller, 29, of South Charleston, pleaded guilty in January to two counts of distributing the hallucinogenic drug, admitting he sold 3,300 ``hits\'\' of LSD to police agents in 1986. He appeared Tuesday before U.S. District Judge John T. Copenhaver Jr. Compensation fund records show Miller was awarded the maximum personal-injury payment of $20,000 in 1985 after he was shot in 1983. Miller apparently had just arrived at a beach party when he was shot in the right arm by someone using a .30-caliber rifle, police records show. Miller lost his arm and incurred about $38,000 in medical bills, according to state officials. State officials said the crime victims\' fund now can pay claims directly to hospitals.\r\n'),(608,2,'The U.S. Navy has boarded ``a handful\'\' of ships in its week-old effort to halt Iraqi shipping, the Pentagon said Thursday. Spokesman Pete Williams, asked to be more specific, said ``a handful would have to be less than 10.\'\' He said he could not give a definitive number nor say when or where the boardings occurred. In recent days, the United States has been urging swift approval of a U.N. resolution allowing military force to support the international body\'s sanctions against Iraq over its invasion of Kuwait, but the Soviet Union has been counseling that caution be used before military force is applied. At a Pentagon briefing, Williams said he was not aware of any more shots having been fired, but said ``dozens\'\' of ships were involved in the interdiction operations. ``We continue to monitor ships,\'\' Williams said. Ships belonging to the two aircraft carrier battle groups in the Red Sea, one carrier battle group in the Gulf of Oman and the ships of the Middle East Task Force in the Persian Gulf are involved in the operation. Boarding parties have been issued shotguns, pistols and specialized instructions on how to board and search vessels suspected of carrying cargo bound to or from Iraq. The sailors carry plastic cards in French, Arabic and English telling the ships\' crews to remain calm and that no harm will come to them if they cooperate with the U.S. boarding parties. Williams said there was a ``high degree of voluntary compliance\'\' with the effort, and that ``many ships have turned back.\'\' Again, he said he had no specific number. Williams said the two Iraqi tankers involved in Saturday\'s shooting incident _ the first of the operation _ were ``still being shadowed\'\' by U.S. Navy ships. The fast frigate USS Reid fired six warning shots across the bow of the Iraqi-flagged vessel Khanaqin in the Gulf of Oman after it refused repeated requests to halt. In a separate incident, the USS Bradley fired three warning shots across the bow of another Iraqi tanker. The Khanaqin unloaded ``a portion of its cargo\'\' in Aden, Yemen, on Tuesday and has left port, Williams said. ``The Yemenis have assured the United Sates that the off-loading stopped before it was completed,\'\' the spokesman said. Williams referred reporters to the State Department when they asked whether it had been determined that the cargo involved items that would break the U.N.-sanctioned embargo against Iraq. Asked whether any other ships had been challenged and had sailed on, Williams replied: ``Not that I know of.\'\'\r\n'),(609,2,'The government Wednesday pressed ahead with the trial of a Palestinian whose detention may have provoked a cruise ship massacre and said it would not allow Greece to become an arena for terrorist battles. A previously unknown group linked with Palestinians claimed responsibility for Monday\'s attack on the City of Poros cruise ship. The Organization of the Martyrs of the Popular Revolution in Palestine, took responsibility in a statement delivered Wednesday to a Western news agency in west Beirut. Radio France-Inter in Paris, meanwhile, reported that an anonymous caller said in a rambling conversation that the pro-Iranian group Islamic Jihad carried out the attack to avenge the U.S. downing of an Iranian passenger plane. There was no way to authenticate either claim. The PLO has condemned the attack on the City of Poros. Tourists were sunbathing and strolling on the ship\'s deck Monday when several terrorists pulled machine guns and began shooting and throwing hand grenades. Nine people were killed, and 98 were wounded. Merchant Marine Minister Evangelos Yiannopoulos told Parliament Wednesday that the terrorists returned to shore in rescue boats and had not escaped in a waiting speedboat as police initially reported. Many vessels rushed to the ship\'s aid and rescued panicked passengers who had jumped overboard to escape the attack. An Athens radio station reported that one of the terrorists was a woman who received treatment in the hospital for a foot injury after the attack. The station identified her as Aysal Lampsalmi, a Moroccan passport-holder, and said she checked out of the Tzanneion Hospital in Piraeus on Monday night with other survivors who sustained slight injuries. Greek authorities believe the guerrillas who carried out the attack may have intended to hijack the ship to win freedom for Mohammed Rashid, a Palestinian. Rashid is wanted by the U.S. government for allegedly planting a bomb on a Pan Am jet in 1982 that killed one person and injured 15. He is charged in Greece with entering the country on a forged passport. His trial had been delayed until the end of July, but Justice Minister Agamemnon Koutsogiorgas overruled that decision Wednesday and ordered proceedings to begin. Rashid told reporters at the courthouse that he was not a terrorist and claimed the ship attack was ``an American operation ... to distract attention from the shooting down of the Iranian plane and the Palestinian uprising\'\' against Israel\'s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. ``The Americans can say what they like ... I had nothing to do with anything,\'\' he said. Rashid\'s trial was held over until Thursday because his lawyer and interpreter were unavailable. The deputy minister for tourism, Nikos Skoulas, said Greece was determined not to become ``an arena for different groups or factions to settle their differences.\'\' ``We are not soft or weak on anyone. That accusation has been leveled at us,\'\' he added, referring to past criticism by the United States for laxity in combating terrorism. Skoulas said security officers were being posted on the one-day Greek island cruises operated by the City of Poros and other vessels. Confusing and sometimes contradictory information obscured many details about the attack. The statement signed by The Organization of the Martyrs of the Popular Revolution in Palestine said the attack was ``in retaliation for the escalation in the operations of murder and extermination by the murderous Zionist-American gangs in Palestine, Lebanon, the gulf and all over the world.\'\' It also claimed responsibility for a car bomb that killed two men near the liner\'s home dock of Piraeus about six hours before the ship attack. Police speculated that automatic weapons, grenades and explosives found in the car were intended for hijacking the ship. In Baghdad, Iraq, Bassam Abu Sharif, spokesman for PLO chief Yasser Arafat, declared, ``The Palestine Liberation Organization and the Palestinian people, being themselves victims of state-organized terrorism, strongly condemn this criminal attack on the Greek ship and the car bombing.\'\' Security police backtracked on an earlier claim that a young woman with a French passport was among the terrorists. But they said a woman was still believed to be among the terrorists. It remained unclear how many terrorists were involved. Most accounts by survivors and authorities varied between three and four. The death toll has also varied. The harbor authority initially said 11 people died, and the coroner said there were 10 bodies. On Wednesday, the government finally said the official death count was nine. It said confusion apparently arose because bodies were badly charred and some were dismembered.\r\n'),(610,2,'Greyhound Lines Inc. agreed to resume talks with the union representing its bus drivers for the first time since the violence-marred walkout began nearly two weeks ago. The Dallas-based company said Tuesday it had agreed to begin the talks Saturday in Phoenix at the request of Bernard DeLury, head of the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service. The company\'s announcement seemed to catch union officials off guard. ``If this is true, we welcome the opportunity to talk to the company. This is what we have been seeking all along,\'\' said James La Sala, international president of the Amalgamated Transit Union. At least seven shooting incidents have been reported since the strike began March 2, including one in Florida where eight people were injured. A picketing driver was crushed to death by a bus on the second day of the strike. On Tuesday, a sniper shot at a moving Greyhound bus in Chicago. In Fresno, Calif., a Greyhound-owned Trailways bus parked in a storage yard was set on fire Monday night, police said. No one was injured in either episode. Greyhound had refused to resume negotiations unless the union offered new proposals. Spokesman George Gravley had said Tuesday he did not know if the union had changed its offer. ``There\'s no point in our speculating what may happen,\'\' Gravley said. ``We are going back to the bargaining table and that speaks for itself.\'\' Greyhound, the only nationwide bus company, has been operating on a reduced schedule to the 9,600 communities it serves, using permanent replacements and union members willing to cross the picket line. Greyhound has said it cannot afford more than the $63 million, three-year pact it offered. The company valued the union\'s last offer at $207 million, although the union said it would cost much less. The differences apparently stem from questions over the cost of measures such as benefits, safety pay incentives and productivity raises. In the shooting, at 1:15 a.m., two bullets hit the front end of the bus, one hit the door and one went through a window and ``just missed a fellow\'s head by a couple inches,\'\' said Master Sgt. John Meduga of the Illinois State Police. ``Everybody started to scream,\'\' Meduga said. Gravley said he had no evidence to connect the latest shooting to the strike, but added, ``We don\'t have buses shot at when we\'re not negotiating a contract.\'\' Union officials have condemned the violence, which has included three shootings in Chicago and shootings in Ohio, Arizona, Florida and Connecticut. Greyhound spokeswoman Liz Hale said a $25,000 reward remained in effect for information on a sniper who shot a bus Sunday in Jacksonville, Fla., injuring eight passengers with shrapnel and other debris. In Pittsburgh, meanwhile, the city council issued a resolution encouraging residents to boycott Greyhound buses until the strike is over. The council accused Greyhound of an ``utter lack of good faith toward its employees.\'\'\r\n'),(611,2,'Mickey Mouse celebrated his 60th birthday two days early Wednesday with balloons, a four-tiered cake and a jazz band party, where his tailless friends disclosed he\'s a contented bachelor and a closet Republican. ``I think he\'s been a Republican,\'\' said Roy Disney, who ought to know. No sooner had Walt Disney\'s nephew uttered the R-word than Michael Eisner, board chairman of Disney\'s $3 billion corporate empire, grabbed the microphone and said, ``No, he\'s non-partisan.\'\' But the elephant was out of the bag, and Mickey didn\'t deny it. Fat, sleek and eternally grinning, he merely bowed and waved a white-gloved hand at his adoring fans at the Smithsonian Institution\'s National Museum of American History. It was 60 years ago Friday, on Nov. 18, 1928, at the Colony Theater in New York City, that Mickey made his film debut in ``Steamboat Willie,\'\' the first synchronized sound cartoon in black and white. To mark the anniversary, museum director Roger Kennedy was given six original pencil drawings of Mickey Mouse sketched by Disney\'s chief animator, Ub Iwerks, for ``Steamboat Willie,\'\' along with a replica of an animation cel, or celluloid painting, used in the film. Mickey also gave Kennedy a happy birthday T-shirt and a hug. The drawings and cel were put on display in the museum\'s collection of pop culture memorabilia, which also includes Archie Bunker\'s armchair, John Philip Sousa\'s baton and Dorothy\'s ruby red slippers. Kennedy said Mickey Mouse was ``a terribly important figure in American mythology,\'\' whose enormous worldwide popularity ``scared all those Wall Streeters\'\' who once rejected Disney\'s pleas for financial backing. Walt Disney, who died a multimillionaire in 1966, always said Mickey captivated the public because ``he\'s just a nice little guy,\'\' noted Roy Disney, a former Disney filmmaker who is corporate vice chairman. Mickey didn\'t seem to mind that Minnie, his ever-faithful girlfriend, had missed the party, even though tiny figures of the two cartoon mice topped the birthday cake. Does Mickey ever entertain thoughts of getting married and raising a family? ``He\'s only dating these days,\'\' Eisner said. ``At 60, it\'s too late for little mice.\'\'\r\n'),(612,2,'About 400 leftists rampaged through a working class section of Berlin, smashing windows, erecting barricades and pelting police with rocks, officials said Monday. Police said 134 people were arrested and 53 police officers injured in the violence in West Berlin\'s Kreuzberg district. But the city policemen\'s union said that 87 officers had been injured. City officials said the violence late Sunday and early Monday was a sign of what officials could expect in September, when finance chiefs gather in West Berlin for a World Bank meeting. ``This was just a trial run for the World Bank meeting,\'\' city interior affairs chief Wilhelm Kewenig said. Some stores were looted after the windows were smashed, a police statement said. Police said one group of hooded men broke into an apartment and roughed up a 21-year-old man who had been photographing the melee. The vandalism started after an estimated 8,000 people marched in a May Day parade in the working class neighborhood of Kreuzberg. Young leftists in the Kreuzberg district, an area of high unemployment, stage protests nearly every year on May Day. Demonstrations are anticipated during the World Bank meeting here. Leftists maintain Western bankers should forgive the debts of heavily indebted developing nations.\r\n'),(613,2,'The Supreme Court today permitted the prosecution of an alleged Honduran drug dealer who said U.S. officials kidnapped and tortured him. The court, over one dissenting vote, rejected arguments that the defendant should be freed because U.S. officials violated international law and the U.S. and Honduras constitutions. Only Justice Byron R. White voted to hear arguments in the case. The 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in February refused to bar prosecution of Juan Ramon Matta-Ballesteros, who faces drug charges in Arizona and California and was sentenced in a federal court in Florida to three years in prison for an earlier escape. Matta escaped from the Eglin Air Force Base prison in Florida in 1971 and fled to his native Honduras, which does not extradite its own citizens. He was arrested by Honduran authorities at his home in Tegucigalpa on April 5, 1988, and was turned over to U.S. marshals. Matta said the marshals, who took him to a federal prison in Marion, Ill., beat him severely and burned him with a stun gun that uses electric pulses to immobilize victims. U.S. officials denied those allegations and said any mistreatment Matta suffered while in custody was the work of his Honduran captors. Matta was transferred from Illinois to Florida, where he was convicted of escaping from federal custody. The 7th Circuit court ruled that even if Matta\'s rights were violated, he is not entitled to be freed. ``For the past 100 years, the Supreme Court has consistently held that the manner in which a defendant is brought to trial does not affect the ability of the government to try him,\'\' the appeals court said. If Matta was mistreated, the appeals court said, his remedy is to sue the government and the officials who allegedly violated his rights. A related issue has been raised by the arrest of a Mexican suspect in the 1985 murder of U.S. drug agent Enrique Camarena. A federal judge has ruled that U.S. officials violated an extradition treaty with Mexico when they seized Dr. Humberto Alvarez Machain, a gynecologist accused of administering drugs to Camarena while the agent was tortured. Justice Department lawyers are appealing the judge\'s ruling. The Mexican government protested Alvarez\'s arrest, in contrast to Matta\'s capture in which the Honduran government cooperated. The Supreme Court last February bolstered the fight against drug smuggling and terrorism when it ruled that U.S. agents do not need warrants to search in other countries. The court upheld the warrantless search of the home of a suspected Mexican drug smuggler. The case acted on today is Matta-Ballesteros v. Henman, 89-1797.\r\n'),(614,2,'Leftist guerrillas hijacked six busloads of people in Medellin Tuesday and harrangued their approximately 300 captives to support a general strike called by a union for later this month, police said. About 100 guerrillas of the National Liberation Army took part, the national police in Medellin, a city of 2.5 million people in northwest Colombia, said in a communique. Drivers and passengers said in broadcast reports that the guerrillas forced the buses to Medellin\'s outskirts Tuesday morning and made everyone get out and assemble to form an audience. ``They made us listen to a speech in favor of the general strike and against the government\'s peace proposal,\'\' bus driver Oswaldo Correa said in a broadcast interview with the Colombian radio chain RCN. The entire episode took about two hours. The guerrillas took the bus keys with them when they left to immobilize the vehicles until police arrived. Colombia\'s largest labor union, the Workers\' Unitary Central, has called a general strike for Oct. 27. It asked guerrillas not to interfere to avoid the strike\'s leading to violence. The last big general strike in Colombia was in 1977. Police and soldiers fired on rioters in the capital of Bogota, killing 29 people. The Workers\' Unitary Central is protesting inflation and is demanding higher wages, a price freeze and an end to right-wing death squads that have killed about 180 union members in the last two years. The inflation rate has been running at about 22 percent. The minimum wage is about $90 a month for a six-day work week. All six of Colombia\'s leftist guerrilla groups last month turned down a peace plan proposed by President Virgilio Barco. He called for a cease-fire with the nation\'s estimated 10,000 guerrillas; negotiations, and pardons for all guerrillas who surrendered.\r\n'),(615,2,'Scores of residents of a poor neighborhood fired shots and hurled bottles and bricks at cars, venting anger over what they said was footdragging by police in responding to a teen-ager\'s hit-and-run death. Twelve people were arrested and six residents suffered minor injuries during the two-hour melee Tuesday night, authorities said. Several shots were fired from the crowd of at least 100 people that gathered at the intersection where 16-year-old Chris Crawford was struck and killed by a car Monday night, said. The shots apparently were fired into the air, and no one was hit, police said. Police said they fired no shots. State and county police and prison officers were sent to help city police control the crowd. Police used dogs to help clear the streets. The disturbance stemmed from the death of Crawford and the wounding of his cousin Michael Cain, 17. Crawford\'s death resulted from a confrontation among some 30 youths, police said. Cain said he and Crawford were assaulted as they stood near a video arcade. Cain said his cousin was forced into the street, then hit by a car. Cain said he was shot in the side as the vehicle passed. He was treated at a hospital and released. Crawford\'s death brought accusations from some residents who say police respond faster to calls from more affluent neighborhoods. Vince Wodard, a neighborhood resident, said police took more than an hour to reach the scene. ``We called them on 911, and they didn\'t come,\'\' he said. Mayor Robert Behler said the first squad car arrived within 30 seconds after police dispatchers received a call for help. About two hours before the incident, Anthony T. Gooden, 20, of Gary, was arrested on murder charges in Crawford\'s death, Drake said.\r\n'),(616,2,'Several thousand demonstrators chanted Islamic slogans after Moslem prayer services today, and authorities reported 900 arrests and an unspecified number of deaths in three days of rioting. Police and troops were blocking the demonstrators, estimated by reporters to number at least 6,000, in the Belcourt district in eastern Algiers. They chanted ``God is Great\'\' and other slogans and called for establishment of an Islamic republic. Earlier today, Algerians formed long lines for bread after an overnight curfew that was almost universally obeyed. On Thursday, the government declared a national state of emergency and put all police and administrative authorities under the military. Occasional gunshots broke the early morning silence. It was not clear whether the shots were fired at protesters or were warnings to chase away the few people in the streets. Protesters this week have included youths protesting an austerity program that has sharply increased prices, Islamic fundamentalists who oppose the government\'s secular orientation and rioters whose political stance was not known. The military command said 900 people were arrested in the three previous days and were caught ``red-handed in pillage and vandalism.\'\' In a separate statement, the command said street battles caused ``losses of human life among the demonstrators as well as in the ranks of the forces of order.\'\' It said the deaths occurred Thursday during the day and night. It did not say where in Algiers they happened. More than 30 people seriously injured in the clashes were admitted to Mustapha Hospital in Algiers, medical sources said today on condition of anonymity. They said the worst injuries occurred Wednesday night. President Chadli Bendjadid proclaimed a state of emergency on Thursday and ordered a curfew from midnight to 6 a.m. The army was given responsibility for public order for the first time since Algeria won independence from France 26 years ago. Bakeries were among the few shops open today, as other food stores remained closed either for lack of supplies or for fear of renewed violence. While prices of meats and other goods have soared, bread remains heavily subsidized by the government. Army convoys escorted trucks carrying flour to bakeries early in the morning to assure supplies. ``Getting provisions to the citizens is one of our main concerns, along with security,\'\' an army officer on one of the escorts told The Associated Press. He declined to give his name. The national airline Air Algerie announced today it was canceling all its flights, but international airlines continued to operate flights in and out of Algiers\' Houari Boumediene airport. Government offices and other businesses were closed as usual today, the Moslem day of prayer. Former President Ahmed Ben Bella, who lives in exile in Geneva, was quoted in the Paris daily Le Figaro as saying some people were killed in the disturbances, without specifying how many or providing details. ``It was predictable that young people would rise up against the corruption, the bad management and the total lack of freedom,\'\' Ben Bella, who was president from independence in 1962 until he was overthrown in a military coup in 1965, was quoted as saying. The French news agency Agence France-Presse reported that two brothers, aged 14 and 23, were killed in the El-Biar neighborhood and quoted a relative as saying she saw their bodies at the Birtraria hospital. A hospital official, refusing to identify himself, denied the report today. The protests began last week with a series of strikes in industries _ which are nearly all government-controlled _ as well as the postal and telephone service and Air Algerie. By unofficial estimates, unemployment is above 40 percent in the capital. Under the government\'s economic reform program, prices for basic food staples other than bread have risen sharply. Slightly more than two pounds of beef sell for $25 or more.\r\n'),(617,2,'President Reagan was ``just being realistic\'\' in saying that there isn\'t enough time to finish work on a U.S.-Soviet strategic weapons treaty before his planned summit meeting in Moscow, White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater said today. Reagan, in an interview published in today\'s Washington Post, also said he believes it is still possible for the treaty to be completed and signed before he leaves office in January. U.S. and Soviet negotiatiors had hoped to have the treaty ready for Reagan to sign with Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev when the two meet in Moscow in May or June. Fitzwater said the president\'s statements did not represent any major change in the U.S. position. ``The president said the same thing that I have said here many times, that Secretary (of State George) Shultz and others have said, and that is that we are working on a START agreement; if we can get one that will be done in time to sign at the summit, that would be great; but, realistically, it doesn\'t appear that\'s likely to happen.\'\' ``The president was just being realistic,\'\' Fitzwater said. During a 30-minute Oval Office interview with the Post on Thursday, Reagan was asked whether he expected to sign the treaty to reduce strategic, or long-range, nuclear weapons by 50 percent during the summit. ``That would be nice, if it could happen, but I have to tell you that common sense indicates that the time is too limited for us to really think that we could bring a treaty ready for signature to that meeting,\'\' Reagan said. ``We\'re not at this moment anticipating that it would be ready for signature then,\'\' he said. Reagan said the negotiations being conducted by representatives of both sides at the Strategic Arms Reductions Talks in Geneva are far more complex than those that preceded the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces treaty, which was signed by the two leaders during the Washington summit in December. The INF treaty eliminated short-and intermediate-range missiles from Europe. It is awaiting action by the Senate. ``This one is so much more complicated with regard to verification and everything else than the INF Treaty, which we were able to bring together. But even that took a few months to do,\'\' Reagan said. ``I believe with the amount of time that would still be remaining that, if there is sincerity on both sides with regard to getting such an agreement _ and I think there is _ I think that could be done ... before my time expired,\'\' he said. He reiterated that he would not use the Strategic Defense Initiative _ known as Star Wars _ as a bargaining chip in negotiations with the Soviet Union. ``I have told him (Gorbachev) every time. ... If it is that good, we are going to deploy it. We see it as the basis then for eliminating the strategic ballistic missiles on both sides. And I have even told him that I would be willing to see this shared,\'\' the president said. Reagan also said National Security Adviser Lt. Gen. Colin Powell and Secretary of State George P. Shultz are convinced the Soviets want to pull out of Afghanistan, where they have been battling U.S.-backed rebels. ``I think that a large part of that could be the economic situation in the Soviet Union and the fact that, after going on nine years, it\'s still a stalemate. So I think that there\'s reason to believe that they really want out,\'\' he said. A group of senators back from a tour of NATO capitals said they won assurances from Reagan on Thursday that the strategic arms treaty would not be rushed through simply to have it ready for signing at the Moscow summit. ``I am very concerned that the START agreement not be based on the calendar, the day of the month, that it not be governed by meeting a deadline,\'\' said Senate Majority Leader Robert C. Byrd, D-W.Va. He said he was assured that would not be the case. On Monday, during Shultz\'s talks with Soviet leaders in Moscow, U.S. and Soviet negotiators at the START talks in Geneva had been directed to prepare within a month three draft agreements for a treaty to reduce long-range nuclear weapons by 30 percent to 50 percent. Draft accords on verification, disposing of weapons and exchange of information are to be ready for the next meeting between Shultz and Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard A. Shevardnadze, scheduled for March 22-23 in Washington. Other issues covered during the Post interview included: _The U.S. budget deficit: ``It\'s a burden. There\'s no question about that. But ... not the disaster some people proclaim. ... One of the major factors in our budget right now is the interest. But who gets that interest? And you find out then that a great many institutions, universities, educational institutions of all kinds, that part of their endowment are government bonds. And so a lot of that interest is going to them ... (and) to individual Americans.\'\' _Former White House aides Michael Deaver, convicted of perjury for lying about his lobbying activities, and Lyn Nofziger, convicted of illegal lobbying, and Attorney General Edwin Meese III, who is being investigated by an independent counsel: ``Of course, I am saddened. ... I found all those individuals to be the very soul of integrity in the more than 20 years that I have known them.\'\'\r\n'),(618,2,'The Communist Party leadership has blazed the way to a brave new world of Soviet politics, where it will be forced to compete with other parties and people will directly choose the nation\'s leader for the first time. ``There will be a multiparty system. There will be a normal democracy,\'\' is how Communist Party member Svyatoslav Fyodorov, a noted eye surgeon, approvingly summed up a three-day meeting of the party\'s Central Committee, which voted Wednesday to end the party\'s legal monopoly on power. The decisions won\'t assume force of law until they are adopted by the Soviet legislative system, a process that could begin next week. They are the boldest steps yet in President Mikhail S. Gorbachev\'s campaign to get the party he heads out of the day-to-day business of running the country and provide greater freedom for political action. A Central Committee source said the platform approved Wednesday calls for a president elected by the people instead of the Congress of People\'s Deputies or another legislative body _ a revolutionary transformation for Soviet politics. That would allow Gorbachev to bypass the Moscow bureaucracy and take his case directly to the people. ``The party does not assume full government authority,\'\' Vice President Anatoly I. Lukyanov told a news conference called to explain the new platform, which was to be published later. ``Its role is to be a political leader with no particular role to be included in the constitution.\'\' Following the lead of its fraternal parties in Eastern Europe, the Soviet party will propose repeal of its constitutionally guaranteed monopoly on power, Lukyanov said. British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher praised the vote as a great decision but added there was ``a lot still to be done.\'\' President Bush made no direct reference to the vote but credited Gorbachev for ``handling some extraordinarily complicated internal problems ... with a certain restraint and finesse that I think demonstrates a real commitment to peaceful change.\'\' Gorbachev has been struggling for nearly five years to transform the Soviet Union into a modern democracy, to save the badly ailing economy and to keep the union from dissolving under the weight of nationalist upheaval. His new proposals are unlikely to bring about the rapid collapse of Communist power. Unlike Eastern Europe, where alternative political groups have been at least marginally active for years and sprang quickly into genuine opposition parties during last year\'s peaceful revolutions, the Soviet Union has no nationwide alternative to the Communists. The party also holds uncounted financial resources and controls much of the nation\'s press, from Pravda, the party\'s flagship daily, to small-circulation tabloids printed for reindeer herders in Siberia. It has long held veto power on appointments to important jobs on every level. The vast majority of Soviets now living have never known anything but Communist Party rule, established after the 1917 revolution swept the czar from power. Voters are unlikely to immediately oust the Communists from control except in a few regions such as the independence-minded Baltic republics, where there are strong local political movements. ``We Communists are not going to surrender our positions. Just like any party in the world, we shall be waging a struggle for our rights,\'\' Politburo member Vitaly I. Vorotnikov told a group of Brazilian legislators in remarks reported by the official Tass news agency. Fellow Politburo member Alexander N. Yakovlev, a close Gorbachev ally, told the news conference he hopes new parties will share the socialist ideal. But he said the adopted platform calls for banning only groups that condone ethnic strife or violent overthrow of the government. The actual constitutional change must be approved by the Supreme Soviet legislature, which opens its next session on Wednesday, and by the Congress, which is to meet this spring but could be called into special session. At its last meeting in December, the Congress heeded Gorbachev\'s plea for delay and blocked an effort by reformers to strike the Communists\' leading role from the constitution. The issue achieved greater urgency after Lithuania\'s Communists broke with Moscow later that month and formed a new party. Gorbachev dropped his public opposition to alternative political parties just three weeks ago, so it was a surprise when he proposed Monday that the possibility should be put into law. Gorbachev packed the meeting of the 249-member Central Committee with more than 700 other officials, many of them progressives who took the floor to demand radical reform. In two votes, first by the Central Committee and then by the entire assembly, there was only one ``no\'\' vote _ maverick Communist Boris N. Yeltsin, who had favored an even more radical program demanding a virtual apology by the party for decades of totalitarian rule, the Central Committee source said. The committee also agreed to advance the start of the next party Congress from October to June. For the first time, delegates to the Congress, the most powerful party body, will be elected by the nation\'s 20 million Communists. Previously they were approved by the leadership, thus ensuring the status quo. Congress then will elect a new Central Committee and could either choose the party leader _ now Gorbachev _ or allow the rank-and-file to choose, Yakovlev said. The Central Committee is considered by reformers to be the bastion of conservatives wary of Gorbachev\'s reform program and the Congress would offer Gorbachev another chance to reform the committee to his liking. The committee scolded Lithuania\'s Communist Party for declaring independence from Moscow and backed a small group of Lithuanian Communists who remain loyal to the Kremlin. Lithuanian officials said the break was a precursor to secession by the Baltic republic and said it was necessary for them to prevent defeat in local elections Feb. 24.\r\n'),(619,2,'The commander of U.S. forces in the Middle East said today there will be no war unless Iraq starts one, a move he said would be ``an awfully stupid mistake.\'\' Army Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf, in his first news conference since moving his command post to Saudi Arabia, repeatedly ducked questions about specific U.S. military options under consideration. But he said the United States was not looking to start hostilities. ``There\'s not going to be any war unless the Iraqis attack,\'\' Schwarzkopf told reporters after spending the day visiting American troops in northeast Saudi Arabia. Schwarzkopf called the Aug. 2 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait ``not only a mugging but a rape.\'\' He said said Iraqi forces in Iraq and Kuwait appeared to be in defensive posture but were capable of taking the offense. ``They certainly have the capability to attack, although I think if they were to do so it would be an awful stupid mistake,\'\' Schwarzkopf said. The general glanced at the floor before answering a question about how much impact Iraq\'s holding of American and other Western hostages had on his military planning. ``I would tell you that obviously I am just as concerned as anyone else about every single human life,\'\' Schwarzkopf said. But, he added: ``What I have to do is plan the military component and not concern myself with the hostages.\'\' He refused to answer a question about whether his early declaration about war prospects meant that the United States would not make an offensive push to drive Iraqi forces from Kuwait. He also refused to say whether the military was aiding the Kuwaiti resistance. There have been reports that Army special operations forces are helping the resistance movement. There has been speculation that the United States would seek a permanent military foothold in Saudi Arabia regardless of the outcome of the current staandoff _ a delicate subject because of anti-American sentiment in parts of the Arab world. When asked about such prospects, Schwarzkopf said: ``We have no intention of establishing a permanent base in Saudi Arabia.\'\' Schwarzkopf laughed when asked who was in charge of the multinational forces. ``This is not NATO,\'\' he said. ``This is not a single command and there doesn\'t need to be.\'\' The United States has by far the biggest military presence in Saudi Arabia and many nations that have committed forces to the region have not yet sent them, or sent only small contingents. Asked by a French reporter if France should send more forces, Scwarzkopf said only: ``I would like all the help I can get.\'\' Schwarzkopf is a bear of a man and can be gruff at times. But he was grandfatherly during stops at several U.S. staging areas, filling the troops in on the latest developments in the crisis and promising them more newspapers and radios. After a briefing by commanders of the 101st Airborne Division\'s air assault brigade, Schwarzkopf walked into a garage area and immediately encountered Staff Sgt. John Frady, of Sylva, N.C., a member of a maintenance platoon who was in the process of receiving a haircut. The general asked him: ``Ready to do the job?\'\' Frady answered: ``Ready to go to war, sir.\'\' He next visited the 354th Tactical Fighter Wing from Myrtle Beach, S.C., telling them the arrival of the wing\'s A-10 tank-killers had made him more confident of the deterrent power of the U.S. deployment. He said the United States was there to defend Saudi Arabia but ready to fight back if Saddam Hussein ordered Iraqi forces to invade the kingdom. ``Let\'s face it, if he dares come across that border and comes down here, I\'m completely confident that we\'re going to kick his butt when he gets here,\'\' Schwarzkopf said. Speaking to a group of officers in an air-conditioned tent at the same airstrip, Schwarzkopf said. ``Every now and then people have to go to war and ask themselves whether they are on the right side or the wrong side. There is no doubt that we are on the right side now, because the whole world is telling us that.\'\' His next and last stop was a Marine support camp in northeast Saudi Arabia, where Schwarzkopf received yet another briefing and visited with Marines digging a sandbag-lined foxhole. ``Our attitude has to be to be in this for the long haul,\'\' Schwarzkopf told a small group of Marines who had asked him about the latest developments in the crisis. One Marine said he had heard a rumor about the C-5 crash in Germany this week. Schwarzkopf told the group the transport indeed had crashed, killing 13 people. As the Marines shook their heads, Schwarzkopf said: ``That\'s 13 more counts against Saddam Hussein.\'\'\r\n'),(620,2,'Gunmen who holed up in a bank after a foiled robbery in which five people died let their 42 captives go Thursday and were allowed to flee with three Red Cross workers as hostages. Police said the gunmen released the hostages 15 minutes later, when they abandoned an armored car in which they left the bank for a stolen pickup truck and station wagon. Hostage Rosario Angulo, who drove the armored car, said only five gunmen fled, one of whom had an arm wound. ``I think the other two mixed in among the crowd at the moment of leaving the bank,\'\' said Rosario, 20. Most police officers had withdrawn from around the bank just before the seven men left, apparently as part of an agreement ending the 24-hour standoff. Angulo said the robbers had ``goats horns (sawed-off machine guns), ammunition and dynamite sticks.\'\' When the armored car had roared away, a policemen shouted to hundreds of people outside the branch of the National Bank of Mexico: ``Thanks to you, the hostages are safe!\'\' Spectators had urged officials to end the crisis peacefully and some had shouted ``Freedom, freedom!\'\' in support of the gunmen. Gov. Francisco Labastida Ochoa told the Televisa network\'s afternoon news program the agreement allowed police to pursue the gunmen. ``We\'re not deceiving anyone,\'\' the governor said. ``We simply reached an agreement in which we could safeguard lives.\'\' The 42 hostages were taken to a hospital in Red Cross ambulances. Soldiers were seen checking vehicles on highways leading from the city. Ignacio Lara, a spokesman for the governor, said the gunmen demanded earlier that they be allowed to leave by air. Police said the robbers were in their late teens or early 20s and had no political motives. Labastida Ochoa said there were no injuries in a shooting incident Thursday morning when the gunmen grabbed weapons from a pickup truck outside the bank. News reports had said one gunman was wounded by police gunfire. The standoff in Los Mochis, a city of 120,000 on the Gulf of California, began at 12:45 p.m. Wednesday when the gunmen took hostages after an alarm alerted police to the attempted robbery. Bank robberies and other crime has increased in Mexico since 1982, when an economic crisis caused by plummeting oil prices began to erode purchasing power and drive up unemployment. Sinaloa is known as a crime center, particularly involving the illegal drug trade. Red Cross spokesmen said five people were killed and at least 15 wounded during the attempted robbery and ensuing standoff. They said the gunmen freed two men and two women Thursday morning. Hundreds of police had surrounded the bank. ``We are all going to die,\'\' one gunmen said by telephone to a radio station in Culiacan, capital of Sinaloa state. ``Let them give us the helicopter ... or we are going to blow up all of this. ... We don\'t want innocent people to die, but if we are going to die innocent people are going to as well,\'\' said the man, who identified himself only as Alfredo. Gov. Labastida Ochoa had offered in an interview with Televisa to let the gunmen meet with a committee of Red Cross officials, journalists, a Roman Catholic priest and state police to guarantee safety and due process of law. Another gunman, in an interview Televisa broadcast Thursday morning, said all the hostages were being treated well. Asked where they could go if given safe passage, he replied: ``I wouldn\'t be able to tell you where we could go. We can\'t turn ourselves in. They want to kill us.\'\' Hostages told the media by telephone during the siege the gunmen were getting them food and beverages. Jesus Acosta, a spokesman for the local Red Cross, said one of its rescue workers was among those killed in a gunfight Wednesday between police and the gunmen. He said the others slain were a customer, bank official and teller, and a policeman who was in the bank on business at the time of the robbery and tried to prevent it.\r\n'),(621,2,'Here is a rundown of the historical cost of mailing a first-class letter in the United States. In the first half of the 19th century the cost of sending a single sheet of paper 40 miles or less was between 6 cents and 8 cents, with the cost rising by distance. Letters going 400 miles and over cost 25 cents to send per sheet of paper. By the middle of that century postage stamps were introduced, along with standard rates regardless of distance traveled. These started at 2 cents per half-ounce in 1863, rising to 3 cents in 1883. In 1885 the current first-class standard based on 1 ounce was started. The 1 ounce rates since then have been: July 1, 1885: 2 cents. Nov. 3, 1917: 3 cents. July 1, 1919: 2 cents. July 6, 1932: 3 cents. Aug. 1, 1958: 4 cents. Jan. 7, 1963: 5 cents. Jan. 7, 1968: 6 cents. May 16, 1971: 8 cents. March 2, 1974: 10 cents. Dec. 31, 1975: 13 cents. May 29, 1978: 15 cents. March 22, 1981: 18 cents. Nov. 1, 1981: 20 cents. Feb. 17, 1985: 22 cents.\r\n'),(622,2,'A federal appeals court Tuesday overturned the nine-year sentence and most of the criminal convictions of former Guam Gov. Ricardo Bordallo, who allegedly exchanged political favors for payoffs. In a 3-0 decision, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said four bribery-related convictions had to be reversed because the federal crime of bribery applies only to state officials and Guam is a territory, not a state. The court also reversed four extortion-related convictions because the jury was not told that it must find Bordallo demanded or otherwise induced the payoffs, totaling $79,600 in cash. The court ruled recently in another Guam case that extortion does not cover payments that an official accepted without either a request or an understanding that the donor would get benefits in exchange. The ruling, if it stands, would entitle Bordallo to a retrial on those charges. The court upheld Bordallo\'s two other convictions: tampering with a witness, for asking a supporter to lie to the grand jury, and a related charge of conspiracy to obstruct justice. But according to Bordallo\'s lawyer, the entire nine-year prison sentence was for the extortion convictions. He was given suspended sentences on the other charges. Bordallo, a Democrat elected in 1982, was indicted a few days before the 1986 Democratic primary. He won the primary but was defeated in November 1986 by Republican Joseph Ada. He has been free on bail during his appeal. Prosecutors said Bordallo approved government contracts and permits for various firms in exchange for payments, mostly delivered to him in unmarked envelopes. The money was described by the donors as campaign contributions or gifts, but never was reported by Bordallo in his campaign statements, authorities said. He also was accused of approving a $103,000 government contract for a company that agreed to hire his campaign manager.\r\n'),(623,2,'Putting yourself in the proper frame of mind can help you beat the heat as much as plugging in the air conditioner, psychologists say. ``It\'s a time for people to learn to remain cool,\'\' said Michael R. Mantell, chief psychologist for the San Diego Police Department. He was attending the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association. ``Stop telling yourself it\'s awful. It\'s just hot,\'\' Mantell said. ``At the very worst, it\'s an inconvenience.\'\' ``It is very comforting to think and to realize that it could be worse,\'\' he said. Though rainfall eased drought conditions in parts of the Midwest, much of the nation continued to swelter Saturday, and power consumption and temperature records fell. ``This is like Brazil,\'\' said Mel Goldstein, director of the weather center at Western Connecticut State University in Danbury. ``It\'s tropical weather, with high heat and the water vapor just absolutely saturating the atmosphere.\'\' The temperature reached 90 degrees shortly after noon Saturday in Windsor Locks, Conn. It was the 12th day of the month with temperatures at 90 or above, breaking the August record of 11 days with more than half the month still to go. In New York City, Saturday was the 30th straight day with temperatures in the 90s. Consolidated Edison said electricity use set a record Friday, while in Boston, heat-related power outages affected more than 6,000 customers. Temperatures in that range may have an effect on the safety of a top summer pastime. A study released at the meeting Saturday suggests baseball batters get beaned by pitches more often when the temperature is in the 90s, maybe because the heat is making pitchers more aggressive. It\'s not so much that the beanballs are deliberate, but rather the pitchers may be trying to move batters back from the plate, prodded by discomfort from the heat, said researcher Alan Reifman. ``You might plan to throw it close, and your aim is a little off,\'\' he said. He and colleagues found that in 21 games analyzed for which the temperature was in the 90s, pitchers racked up an average of 0.57 hit batters per game. For the remainder of the total 215 games in the study, the highest average for cooler weather was 0.33, for games played in the 80s. Lower rates were found for games at lower temperatures. Mantell suggested that one strategy for coping with the heat is to spend some time alone and take an occasional break from life\'s stresses. ``During a heat wave you don\'t want to be a workaholic,\'\' he said. ``Your thinking can be an internal thermometer to lower the temperature to what it is outside, instead of what you\'ve exaggerated it to,\'\' he said. Parents should distract their children from focusing on the heat, and they should model a cool mental attitude for the children to see, he said. A good line of approach is, ``Boy, it sure is hot, it sure is uncomfortable, but it will pass. ... I can tolerate it,\'\' Mantell said. James Rotton, a psychologist at Florida International University in North Miami, recommended drinking plenty of water rather than alcohol. Alcohol tends to unleash aggression in hot weather, he said. Studies have given strong evidence that hot weather promotes assaults between acquaintances, homicides and rape, he said in a telephone interview. Humidity amplifies the effect of heat, but the main problem is that the body can\'t shed its own heat when the air is so warm, he said. To cope with heat, as with any stress, Rotton recommended staying in good physical shape. But don\'t overdo the exercise in hot weather, he added. Drinking water is important because during hot weather the body loses water faster than people can detect through thirst, he said. The result can be heat stroke.\r\n'),(624,2,'Alf Saliba wants to make a point. Actually, the human dartboard wants to make several points _ in his chest. Saliba, a 49-year-old stuntman who calls himself ``The Incredible Alf,\'\' said he\'s had as many as 20 darts hurled into his chest. He announced today that he\'s now shooting for 50 darts, which he figures ought to be good enough for his primary target of gaining entry into the Guinness Book of World Records. Saliba makes his living by pushing skewers through his cheeks, threading hooks through the fleshy parts of his body and hanging bricks from them. He said he accomplishes these things _ without bleeding _ through concentration and meditation. The current record holder isn\'t exactly sitting on pins and needles waiting for the record to fall. According to the Guinness Book of World Records, there isn\'t a current record holder.\r\n'),(625,2,'After a thunderous opening before thousands of fans in London\'s Wembley Stadium, Amnesty International today takes its star-filled rock show on a global road that runs from Argentina to Zimbabwe. More than 65,000 people packed Wembley on Friday to hear artists ranging from Bruce Springsteen to Sting sing for human rights. The six-hour concert climaxed with Springsteen leading the cheering fans in ``Chimes of Freedom,\'\' a Bob Dylan classic highlighting the theme of the show sponsored by Amnesty International, a Nobel Peace Prize-winning human rights group. The show heads for a weekend concert in Paris and then to communist Hungary, the first stops in a six-week journey to 20 cities across five continents. Organizers expressed delight at the sellout in London, launch pad for the tour being held to mark the 40th anniversary of the U.N. Universal Declaration on Human Rights. ``I couldn\'t be more pleased,\'\' said Jack Healey, Amnesty\'s U.S. director and a prime organizer of the tour. ``We\'re selling out all around the world and we\'re feeling quite confident about ourselves ... We have great artists, a great audience here and, I think, the greatest cause in the world.\'\' The crowd at Wembley was made up mainly youngsters attracted by the big stars. They are the generation to whom Amnesty is making a special appeal to back the human rights declaration, which is widely endorsed but frequently ignored by governments. Springsteen shares a bill for the entire tour with British stars Sting and Peter Gabriel, American folk singer Tracy Chapman and Senegal\'s Youssou N\'dour. From a podium surrounded by a turquoise and green global map emblazoned with ``Universal Declaration of Human Rights\'\' in red letters, the stars belted out well-known numbers. The crowd swayed and applauded wildly. Spectators in the grandstands rose as Gabriel rocked the podium with ``Sledgehammer\'\' and ``Don\'t Give Up,\'\' and then went wild as Springstreen came on with his hit ``Born in the USA.\'\' The organizers stress that the aim is not to raise funds, but to stir the consciences of the young people in the cause of human rights. Amnesty hopes the tour will break even. Thousands of fans signed slips of paper endorsing the human rights declaration. Amnesty officials plan to hand over the signatures at the U.N. headquarters in New York at the end of the tour. ``I\'m a big fan of Sting, I guess I really came to hear him. But it\'s also a very good cause,\'\' Ricky McCabe, a 21-year-old chef, told The Associated Press after signing the declaration. Ticket prices vary between rich and poor countries _ $37.60 in London and $3 in Budapest. Amnesty has had a tricky time getting the show to some countries the organization has sharply criticized. It monitors human rights abuses, particularly the plight of political prisoners, around the world. Healey is still trying to get the Kremlin to agree to a show in Moscow. ``I am hopeful that negotiations don\'t break down on our side or on theirs,\'\' Healey said. ``We are very anxious to play in the other superpower.\'\' Among the more contentious negotiations was a date in Harare, capital of Zimbabwe, whose government reacted angrily to Amnesty reports several years ago of brutal suppression of the minority Ndebele tribe. The date for Harare is Oct. 7 after what Healey called ``a careful negotiation.\'\' Other confirmed venues are Turin, Italy, on Sept. 8; Barcelona, Spain, Sept. 10; San Jose, Costa Rica, Sept. 13; Toronto and Montreal on Sept. 16-17; Philadelphia Sept. 19; Los Angeles Sept. 21; Tokyo Sept. 27; New Delhi Sept. 30; Sao Paulo, Brazil, Oct. 12; Mendoza, Argentina, Oct. 14; and Buenos Aires, the Argentine capital, for a finale Oct. 15.\r\n'),(626,2,'Carols filtered through loudspeakers and drifted across Manger Square, but few Christmas Eve pilgrims were on hand to hear them in this biblical town, where soldiers seemed to outnumber celebrants. A driving rain, a Palestinian general strike and heavy Israeli security kept crowds slim. As darkness fell, troops with automatic rifles stood guard on rooftops, including that of the Church of the Nativity, which marks the site where Jesus Christ is said to have been born. The few visitors who spent the afternoon in Bethlehem huddled under Manger Square\'s arcade, outside shops closed down by striking Palestinians. In other parts of the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip, five Palestinians were reported wounded, one in a clash with troops and four in a clash with an Arab village official accused of collaborating with Israel, Arab reports said. Israel radio quoted security sources as saying a family feud was behind the incident. Two Arabs also died and three others were wounded as they ``handled an explosive device\'\' in the small West bank village of Marj en Naja, an army spokesman said. The army had no further details. Bethlehem was quiet. Arab municipal officials canceled the traditional Christmas parade in an expression of solidarity with the year-old uprising against Israeli rule in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip. Slogans written on Bethlehem walls by the uprising\'s PLO-backed leadership ordered Palestinians to stay at home. But Israeli authorities went ahead with a choir concert before midnight Mass in St. Catherine\'s Church. Several hundred tourists and Christian pilgrims attended the performance, but the number was a considerable drop from the thousands who normally attend. ``Silent Night,\'\' sung in German and English by the Pueri Youth Chorus from Geneva opened the concert. Also on the program was another Swiss choir, two choirs from Spain and one from the Shiloh baptist church in Washington, which sang ``Let My People Go.\'\' The choir director, Charles W. Fleming, said the song was chosen to speak out for freedom from oppression all over the world. ``The idea is that people should be free. Christ came to bring us that freedom,\'\' he said. Official ceremonies began Saturday with the arrival of Michel Sabbah, the bishop of Jerusalem, in the afternoon. Sabbah, the Roman Catholic patriarch of Jerusalem, was greeted in Manger Square by the Israeli military governor of Bethlehem, Lt. Col. Shaltiel Levy, and the city\'s mayor, Elias Freij. The visitors and pilgrims who watched the bishop arrive near the Mosque of Omar were far outnumbered by journalists and hundreds of Israeli police, troops and plainclothes officers. A leaflet issued earlier this week by the PLO-backed underground leaders of the uprising called for a general strike on Christmas Eve, and complained of Israeli participation in the Christian ceremonies. But Israeli officials said they felt it was important to maintain the practice _ more than a century old _ in which rulers of the region greet church leaders as a symbol of the protection offered to minority Christians in the largely Moslem Middle East. The practice was followed by the British and Turkish rulers of Palestine. Sabbah, who is the first Palestinian appointed bishop of Jerusalem, was led into the church by traditional Moslem guards wearing red fezzes and carrying curved swords. Hundreds of people crowded into the church to attend after strict searches by Israeli security guards. More than 100 stood outside in the rain to watch the mass on a large screen set up on the wall of the Manger Square police station. Holy water was sprinkled at the doorway of the Church of the Nativity as the bishop, preceded by altar boys, entered amid a clowd of incense smoke. The midnight Mass, led by Sabbah, is held each year in St. Catherine\'s basilica next door because the Church of the Nativity, built over the grotto where Christ was born, is run by the Greek Orthodox church. The Greek Orthodox celebrate Christmas on Jan. 6, the Epiphany. Israeli troops blocked all streets around Manger Square, and pilgrims had to walk blocks to reach it. Before they could enter, they had to pass through metal detectors and were searched by Israeli security forces. Virginia Lankton, of Lansing, Mich., said she did not mind the heavy security because ``I realize it is for my own safety.\'\' She said her husband died recently and she came to the Holy Land at Christmas to realize a life-long dream. ``I was alone and I thought this was a good place to be, instead of being home alone,\'\' she said. Father Stephen Doyle, a Franciscan priest who is assistant rector at the nearby ecumenical institute, said he was discouraged by the deployment of many Israeli soldiers and police around Manger Square. ``It\'s extremely depressing to see something like this the day before we celebrate the birth of the Prince of Peace,\'\' said the Philadelphia-born priest. There was no violence in heavily-guarded Bethlehem, but in Nablus, 25 miles north, a 21-year-old Arab man who was shot in the head by soldiers last week died of his wounds Saturday. Doyle said he thought most Arab Christians from the West Bank would probably not attend midnight Mass because of the heavy security, but likely would fill the church on Christmas morning. About 35,000 Palestinan Christians live in the West Bank and Gaza, which Israel captured in the the 1967 Middle East war. At least 334 Palestinians have been killed during the revolt. Fourteen Israelis also have been killed.\r\n'),(627,2,'The hunt crossed three continents and required hundreds of computers, but a team of researchers captured a prize few thought possible _ the prime factors of the 100-digit number on mathematicians\' ``most wanted\'\' list. The breakthrough could have important implications for governments and banks, which use large-digit numbers in security systems on the assumption they provide a code too difficult to break. But the pleasure of the hunt concerned researchers more. ``Why did we go after it?\'\' University of Chicago computer scientist Arjen Lenstra said Wednesday. ``Because people compile lists.\'\' The number, which begins 9,412,343,607 ... and stretches on for 90 more digits, defied all previous efforts to find its prime factors. The factors of a number are two numbers that, when multiplied together, yield the larger number. A prime number is one that is evenly divisible only by 1 or itself. The prime factors of 21, for example, are 3 and 7. By comparison, the prime numbers that solved the 100-digit number are, respectively, 41 digits and 60 digits long. Finding the prime factors of such large numbers was thought to be so difficult, in fact, that many security systems assume such computations to be beyond the range of even the most powerful computers being applied for long periods of time. Governments transfer secret messages and banks transfer funds electronically by encoding the information in large-digit numbers that require the receiver to know its prime factors in order to decipher the information. ``Ten years ago, everybody suggested 80 digits were safe. Nowadays, that\'s trivial\'\' said Lenstra, co-director of the project with Dr. Mark Manasse of the Digital Equipment Corp.\'s Systems Research Center in Palo Alto, Calif. ``I think 150 is reasonable,\'\' he continued. ``But personally, I\'d go a little beyond 200 now.\'\' Computer scientists had theorized that a single computer doing a million calculations per second would have needed 25 years to solve the problem. Even a state-of-the-art supercomputer such as the Cray would need about 10 months of constant computing _ that at a cost of thousands of dollars per hour. Lenstra and Manasse, however, factored the number in just 26 days. They began their attack on the 100-digit number by breaking the problem into smaller tasks, then farmed them out to about 400 computers in the United States, Europe and Australia through an exisiting electronic mail network. All the computers used in the project worked on the factoring problem only when they were not being used for anything else. Each time a problem was solved, it was relayed by electronic mail to Digital\'s Palo Alto lab. The last sequence of numbers required to solve the entire problem flashed across a computer screen at 2:03 a.m. PDT Tuesday. ``One of the really nice things about this effort is that it cost us virtually nothing,\'\' Lenstra said. ``We contacted friends, other computer scientists, anybody that thought factoring was fun and got them to participate.\'\' Lenstra, 32, a visiting professor in Chicago\'s computer science department is unsure where the next horizon lies. He said every time the length of the number goes up by three digits, the time needed to compute the prime factors doubles. ``But we don\'t know what our problem-solving limit is until we find out how much interest is out there and how big an electronic mail network we can assemble. ``We\'ve already started on a 102-digit number,\'\' he concluded, ``just to keep us busy.\'\'\r\n'),(628,2,'A professor convicted of killing and dismembering a teen-age prostitute with a chain saw was sentenced Friday to 25 years to life in prison by a judge who said the educator was ``a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.\'\' Max Bernard Franc, 58, whose secret life as a homosexual voyeur was disclosed during his trial, coughed slightly but remained impassive as Superior Court Judge John Reid imposed the maximum sentence. Reid described the murder of Tracy Leroy Nute, 18, and the dismemberment of his body with a chain saw as ``hideous, cruel and callous.\'\' Franc was accused of shooting Nute, a runaway from Kansas City, Mo., chopping up the body and distributing it across 200 miles of California. Franc said a transient named Terry Adams committed the crime. But Adams was never found. ``Dr. Franc, the one thing that becomes very clear to me is you are two different people,\'\' said the judge. ``You\'re the scholar to your colleagues. Your students talk about you as if you were the second coming as a teacher. But none of them talk about what was going on in the Hollywood area of your life.\'\' Franc, who taught at Fresno State University until his arrest last August, had maintained an apartment in West Hollywood, some 200 miles away, where he paid young men to pose for nude photographs, his attorney has said. ``An analogy has to be drawn to Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,\'\' said the judge. He imposed the sentence after Franc\'s sister, Carol Waiters, a social worker from Philadelphia, made an impassioned plea for her brother, describing him as a brilliant, bilingual teacher who inspired his students. ``I ask, I beg of you, Judge Reid, do not let this mind go to waste in prison,\'\' Mrs. Waiters said in a trembling voice. ``He has so much to offer,\'\' she said. ``To shut him away and snuff out his creativity and productivity would be a terrible waste to society.\'\' Reid said he hoped Franc would use the time in prison to help uneducated inmates improve themselves. ``I hope you do something beneficial with the rest of your life,\'\' he said. ``I think it\'s a shame it had to come to this. But these are your acts, no one else\'s acts.\'\' Franc, a native of DePere, Wis., was arrested after a chain saw he had rented was returned with bits of flesh and blood in it. ``Even if the only thing you did was watch someone else kill Terry Nute, what type of person could go and rent a chain saw knowing it would be used to cut up a body?\'\' the judge asked Franc. ``There\'s no question that\'s exactly what you did.\'\' Deputy Public Defender Mark Kaiserman lost a bid for a new trial and reduction of the first-degree murder conviction. The judge said he felt the jury\'s verdict was proper even if Franc had only aided and abetted in the murder. He conceded that what actually happened was never clear and he could not conclude positively that Franc pulled the trigger to kill Nute. Deputy District Attorney Sterling Norris said Franc ``ought to feel lucky that he doesn\'t go to the gas chamber\'\' because special circumstances were not involved in the case. He said the pleas for leniency based on Franc\'s status as a college professor ``smacks to me of class distinction.\'\' Kaiserman said Franc will appeal his conviction.\r\n'),(629,2,'Archaeologists say the Moche people were a warring nation given to human sacrifice, highly skilled in metallurgy and proficient in using complex irrigation systems to make desert lands produce bountiful harvests of cotton and corn. The Moche dominated a 300-mile stretch of Peru\'s northern coast from about 100 to 800 A.D. Their civilization mysteriously disappeared long before the Spaniards arrived in the 1530s and destroyed the better known Inca empire, which held sway hundreds of years after the Moche. The Huaca Rajada pyramid apparently was a giant mausoleum for a succession of Moche rulers, and archaeologists have recently discovered a second tomb, now under excavation, of another warrior-priest, although of lesser rank than the Lord of Sipan. ``It is as if we were making the Moche live again,\'\' archaeologist Chero said of the discoveries. The Moche did not have a written language. But Chero, whose copper skin and high cheekbones are mirrored in the faces on Sipan\'s golden masks, said the carefully placed layers of ceramic vessels with descriptive scenes found in the first tomb were like ``the pages of a book.\'\' Valuable information about the relationship of one object to another in a tomb is irretrievably lost when it is plundered by grave robbers, known here as ``huaqueros,\'\' a word meaning looters that is a spinoff of the Quechua word ``huaca,\'\' for holy place. ``Pottery is not placed haphazardly in tombs,\'\' Chero explained. ``It always is meant to communicate something. What the huaqueros do is terrible. They destroy everything and take the pieces out of their context.\'\' Huaca Rajada is honeycombed with tunnels and pock-marked with looters\' pits. A vertical tunnel that Alva said was dug by huaqueros stops about 3 feet short of the burial chamber. Fifteen feet away near the top of the platform is another tunnel 20 feet straight down. It was there that huaqueros from the village of Sipan struck pay dirt in February 1987. Working day and night with guards posted to warn of the arrival of strangers, several dozen looters extracted what is believed to have been a treasure trove perhaps as great as that found by the archaeologists months later. Soon afterwards authorities noticed an influx of unusually fine gold and silver artifacts on the clandestine antiquities market. Some artifacts confiscated at the Los Angeles airport in April may include items stolen from Sipan. Alva has traveled to Los Angeles to study the pieces. Without a tip from jealous huaqueros, ``it would have been very difficult for the government to learn exactly where the gold was coming from,\'\' said Martinez. In a police raid in April 1987 at the home of one of the families looting the pyramid, a ringleader was shot and killed and some of the gold artifacts were rescued. When Alva and his assistants arrived at Sipan to excavate the pyramid, the villagers accused them of trying to take what was rightfully theirs and threatened them. The site is now protected by armed police and enclosed by a 10-foot-high barbed wire fence. ``Many people in Sipan say their families have dug through the temples around here for generations,\'\' Martinez said. Taking artifacts from ancient temples is prohibited, but Peru lacks the funds to enforce the laws or to finance archaeological excavations. ``There is no economic support in Peru by the government to conduct archaeological work on a large scale,\'\' said Martinez. ``The government is interested in projects that give quick returns.\'\' Chero said hundreds of temples on Peru\'s northern coast have never been excavated by archaeologists because of lack of money. ``Near Sipan alone, there are 15 pyramids. We have a good idea of where there may be tombs,\'\' he said. ``But without money, we can\'t excavate.\'\'\r\n'),(630,2,'A rogue computer program that steals electronic documents and covers its own tracks has invaded dozens of computers in a nationwide computer network, a published report said. The program has infiltrated the computers of corporations, non-classified military installations, government laboratories and several universities, The New York Times reported in today\'s editions. Los Alamos National Laboratory, Digital Equipment Corporation, Harvard University, Boston University and the University of Texas are among the affected institutions, unidentified investigators told the Times. The computer network is Internet, a worldwide collection of computer systems that links corporations, government projects and universities together. Government computer security teams have been unable to trace the source of the illegal program. Their job has been especially difficult because the program automatically erases computer files that would help them trace break-ins, the newspaper said. No classified military computers have been affected and damage has been slight to the Internet system, unidentified government officials told the newspaper. The computer attack is being run through a single hidden location. But in order to avoid detection, the hacker is connecting to Internet through a series of computers. The program is designed to find a file containing the system\'s passwords and copy the file into another computer for decoding. Some of the break-ins were traced to Texas and New Mexico before investigators lost the trail. Internet was thrown into chaos in November 1988 when a program written by Robert Tappan Morris, a graduate student at Cornell University, jammed the system. The new program is not the same as one that Morris used. That program, called a worm, copied itself from computer to computer, as a computer virus does. ``The computer virus frenzy is not the real problem,\'\' said Peter Neumann, a computer security expert at SRI International, a research center in Menlo Park, Calif. ``The real problem is the fact that the computers are so vulnerable, and whether the attack is by one person at a computer or a program like a worm or virus, they\'re all exploiting the same problem _ the vulnerability of our computer systems.\'\'\r\n'),(631,2,'The Senate voted 89-0 approval Wednesday of legislation paving the way for the United States to join a century-old agreement among 76 nations that grants global copyrights to literary and artistic works. ``Adherence to the convention will greatly benefit the United States,\'\' said Sen. Pat Leahy, D-Vt., chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee\'s subcommittee on patents, copyrights and trademarks. ``It will provide the guidelines which govern the copyright regulations between nations.\'\' Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, ranking Republican on the panel, agreed. ``Our participation will provide benefits to American copyright holders and artists.\'\' The bill would change U.S. copyright law, paving the way for Senate consent to ratification of the treaty, signed in Berne, Switzerland, on Sept. 9, 1886. Ratification will come on a separate vote. The Berne Convention, which has been signed by 76 nations, spells out minimum copyright standards, detailing what is protected and how long the protection lasts. The pact prohibits member nations from discriminating against copyrighted works of other member nations. It also provides for copyright protection to take effect in other countries automatically without the necessity of government formalities, such as providing official notice of a copyright. The chief dispute over the legislation involved how best to protect what are known as ``moral rights\'\' _ the authority of a writer or artist to guard the integrity of his work against what he thinks are damaging changes or misuse. Artists have generally argued for stiff coverage in U.S. law of moral rights. Critics have said that strong coverage is unnecessary, although they support the idea of protecting the artistic integrity of works. American copyright law doesn\'t cover moral rights. The Berne Convention requires signing nations to protect in law the right of an artist to ensure the integrity of his work. However, that protection doesn\'t have to be part of copyright law. The bill approved Wednesday sidesteps that issue, providing that neither the measure nor adherence to the Berne Convention expands or contracts a copyright holder\'s rights to object to any change in a protected work.\r\n'),(632,2,'President Bush, hailing moves toward democracy throughout Eastern Europe, said Monday that ``the world, increasingly, is on the side of God.\'\' Bush, in a speech to the annual convention of the National Religious Broadcasters, also said ``I believe with all my heart that one cannot be America\'s president without a belief in God, without the strength that your faith gives to you.\'\' He got a rousing response from the crowd of about 2,000, particularly when he expressed opposition to abortion, saying, ``I support the sanctity of life,\'\' and when he reiterated his support for a constitutional amendment permitting voluntary prayer in public schools. Bush has been a regular speaker at the broadcasters\' conventions. Monday\'s address marked his fourth appearance before the group. ``We believe that political values without moral values, a moral underpinning, cannot sustain a people,\'\' Bush said. He recalled his comment in his inaugural address that ``the day of the dictator is over,\'\' and said, ``Indeed, the last year has been a victory for the freedoms with which God has blessed the United States of America. We have seen the rights of man move mountains or _ as in East Berlin _ even move a wall. Bush said the changes in Eastern Europe ``were propelled by many things, faith not the least of them.\'\' He said that as pro-democracy demonstrations spread across Europe, ``the day of the dictator did end.\'\' The president praised the role of religious figures in democratic revolutions, and singled out a Romanian Orthodox priest, Gheorghe Calciu, who spent 21 of his 64 years in jail and was spared at the last minute from a death sentence. Addressing the priest, who was in the audience, Bush said, ``Father, it\'s an honor to salute you. ... I know, too, you hope to return to your native land.\'\' ``And in this season of miracles, who can doubt you will?,\'\' Bush said. ``For today, the times are on the side of peace, because the world, increasingly, is on the side of God.\'\'\r\n'),(633,2,'It was apparently late Wednesday night, unseasonably chilly even for November, when Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher faced the cold reality that most of her party wanted her to quit. Only hours before, she had strode confidently from 10 Downing Street, the official residence, to say she was intent on beating Michael Heseltine, the former defense secretary who had challenged her for leadership of the governing Conservative Party. ``I fight on, I fight to win!\'\' she had declared. According to statements by aides and allies, as well as accounts in Friday\'s newspapers, it was all downhill from there. The prime minister seemed in good form earlier Wednesday in the House of Commons, delivering a report on the European security summit in Paris. Then she surprised lawmakers with a rare appearance in the Commons\' tearoom to solicit support. Later, in her office at the House of Commons, she met one by one with a succession of Cabinet ministers and old allies. Most delivered the same brutal message: the rank-and-file were defecting after Mrs. Thatcher\'s failure to dispatch Heseltine cleanly in the first round of a party leadership vote. ``It\'s a funny old world,\'\' she told some of her messengers, according to The Times and The Daily Telegraph. Only a few of her staunchest allies encouraged the prime minister to push on. ``It took just a few hours for Mrs. Thatcher to realize she had lost touch with reality, that her supporters on the right of the party were seeing the world through eyes focused on her earlier triumphs,\'\' wrote Philip Stephens, the respected political writer of The Financial Times. To Thatcher loyalists, it looked like a palace coup. ``It\'s rank treachery. Our own people have done it,\'\' complained Tory lawmaker Edward Leigh. The agony began Tuesday evening when Mrs. Thatcher, in Paris for the 34-nation security summit, learned that she had narrowly failed to gain the margin of 56 votes needed to beat Heseltine in round one that day. Of the 372 Tory lawmakers, 204 voted for the prime minister, 152 for Heseltine and 16 abstained. She responded within minutes. ``Look, I have more than half the votes of the parliamentary party. It was not quite 15 percent above those of Mr. Heseltine. ... so it means we have to go forward for a second ballot,\'\' she told reporters. She then changed into a formal gown to join other government leaders for ballet and dinner at Versailles. She arrived a few minutes late, smiling radiantly. But she was sufficiently rattled to leave the summit early. Returning to London at midday Wednesday, she sacked her campaign manager and began drawing up new battle plans. She received some welcome advice from staunch allies Norman Tebbit and party chairman Kenneth Baker. According to Stephens, they convinced her that her first-round failure was simply ``due to a lack of lack of organization and commitment,\'\' and predicted she would win on the second ballot, when all she needed was an outright majority. But the Cabinet reportedly was becoming increasingly mutinous. John MacGregor, the leader of the House of Commons, ascertained that 12 of 21 Cabinet ministers thought Mrs. Thatcher should resign, Stephens said. Mrs. Thatcher, however, reportedly seized on the upbeat report from Tebbit and Baker. When Tim Renton, the government\'s chief vote-counter in the House of Commons, told her the rank-and-file support was collapsing, Stephens said that she snapped: ``Who else can beat Heseltine?\'\' That evening, in those one-on-one meetings, The Times said she old one visitor: ``I am coming under an awful lot of pressure.\'\' The final blow, according to Stephens, was delivered by John Wakeham, whom Mrs. Thatcher had installed earlier in the day to direct her campaign. Wakeham is an old and trusted friend. His first wife was one of five people killed in 1984 by an Irish Republican Army bomb that ripped through a hotel where Mrs. Thatcher was attending a party conference. ``Wakeham ... came back to report his soundings among members of parliament. Yes, the Cabinet was right. She had to withdraw,\'\' Stephens said. The next morning, she made the announcement to her Cabinet.\r\n'),(634,2,'The Federal Communications Commission took another big step toward a deregulated interstate long-distance phone business and proposed to loosen rules on AT&T because the onetime monopoly company now faces ``significant competition.\'\' The commission, in a 4-0 vote Thursday, adopted a staff proposal that, if finally approved, would give the American Telephone & Telegraph Co. the freedom it says it needs to maneuver against some 500 long-distance companies in the $55 billion long-distance marketplace.\r\n'),(635,2,'Florida agricultural officials today declared an end to a 3{-month Medfly infestation with a slap at California for taking so long to get rid of its pests. Helicopters sprayed up to 20 square miles of suburban Miami with malathion in eight aerial treatments to kill Mediterranean fruit flies, considered the most destructive farm pest because it can attack 250 fruits and vegetables. California\'s year-old infestation has spread to more than 900 square miles with limited aerial pesticide spraying at a cost of more than $38 million, said Florida Agriculture Commissioner Doyle Conner. ``It is absolutely vital to move quickly and aggressively, which is exactly what we did,\'\' he said. Florida\'s $1.6 million eradication effort began after a fly was trapped near Miami International Airport on April 16. By May 21, 23 Medflies were found at 21 locations. ``The bottom line is that we\'ve turned back a serious threat to our food supply in an environmentally sound program involving a limited geographic area,\'\' Conner said. Unlike California, where malathion spraying produced a public outcry, the spraying in Virginia Gardens, Miami Springs and parts of Hialeah went on with little fuss.\r\n'),(636,2,'Bank of New England Corp. named Lawrence K. Fish as its chairman and chief executive Friday as officials continued restructuring the troubled company in an effort to restore financial health and public confidence. ``While there has been considerable speculation about candidates, Mr. Fish was our first choice, and the only one to receive an offer from us,\'\' Peter L. Scott, head of the executive search, said in a statement. Analysts generally praised the decision to hire Fish, a former Bank of Boston Corp. executive vice president, but they warned he might not be able to rescue the bank. ``He\'s coming into a situation that\'s very grave,\'\' said Gerard Cassidy, an analyst with Tucker Anthony Inc. ``If the economy does not cooperate, a miracle worker is going to have a hard time. A major part of it is out of his hands.\'\' Fish, whose hiring was expected for more than a week, replaces Walter Connolly, who oversaw the bank\'s dramatic growth in the 1980s but was ousted this year after the company suffered massive losses. Much of the trouble has been traced to the bank\'s aggressive lending practices during a construction boom in the mid-1980s. When the economy slowed near the end of the decade, the real estate market tumbled, and the bank was saddled with a mountain of problem loans. Last month, the bank announced it lost $1.11 billion in 1989 and disclosed it was reviewing financial data from previous quarters to see whether larger provisions against bad loans should have been made earlier in the year. The bank also is operating under federal consent orders signed last week, which place the corporation under strict government oversight while it takes steps to fix its problems. Under the orders, the bank must tighten its lending practices, withhold stock dividends and review the work of its senior level management to see where changes should be made. ``(Fish) has to come down like a ton of bricks on some situations,\'\' Cassidy said. ``It\'s fresh blood. He can come in and make the decisions.\'\' Fish, 45, left Bank of Boston in 1988 to become president and chief operating officer of Columbia Savings & Loan Association in Beverly Hills, Calif. Part of his job at Columbia was to produce a plan to make the institution less reliant on high risk, high yield junk bonds. Fish resigned last August, and since then Columbia has suffered with a crash in the junk bond market. The newly appointed chairman said in a prepared statement Friday that he believed in the Bank of New England\'s ``soundness and strength,\'\' but acknowledged the road to financial recovery could be long. ``We ... have significant problems. I plan to be thoughtful but to make decisions promptly,\'\' said Fish, who was also named chairman and CEO of the Bank of New England\'s Massachusetts subsidiary.\r\n'),(637,2,'A radical reform economist, Gavriil Popov, was elected Moscow\'s mayor Friday by the new city council, the official Tass news agency reported. The city council was dominated by reformers in recent elections, which were the first multi-candidate elections for local representative bodies in the Soviet Union. The split between progressives and their opponents on the council was reflected in the 280-162 vote for Popov. He has captured national attention for his leadership of the country\'s first parliamentary opposition group, the progressive InterRegional Group of the Congress of People\'s Deputies. Soviet officials are allowed to hold two elected posts simultaneously. The election of the 54-year-old reformer portends drastic change for the Soviet capital, which has fallen into extreme disrepair under decades of neglect. He strongly supports a market economy and has suggested rationing during the transition period to allocate scarce items fairly. In a nationally televised speech in December, Popov harshly criticized Premier Nikolai Ryzhkov\'s economic reform plan for continuing central planning for five more years. He noted it went so far into micro-management as to set the number of eggs to be produced per person. Popov suggested that if bureaucrats want to increase egg production, they should raise chickens. Popov is a member of the Communist Party, but as a supporter of the Democratic Platform wing he is in danger of being ousted by hard-liners.\r\n'),(638,2,'Northwest Airlines has made headlines in recent years for a major jetliner crash, a change in ownership, the convictions of three of its pilots who were flying while intoxicated, and its efforts to eliminate smoking on planes. Here are details of those and other events: -Aug. 16, 1987: Northwest Flight 255 crashed near Detroit Metropolitan Airport, killing 156 people when the MD-80 failed to gain altitude during takeoff and slammed into a highway overpass. The National Transportation Safety Board ruled that the pilots didn\'t set the plane\'s wing flaps and slats properly for takeoff and that failure of a cockpit warning device contributed to the crash. -March 23, 1988: Northwest announced that it would ban smoking on all of its continental domestic flights effective April 23, the same day a federal law would take effect banning smoking on all flights of two hours or less. Northwest\'s policy went beyond the new law\'s requirements. -Aug. 3, 1989: Los Angeles investor Alfred Checchi signed acquisition papers to complete his group\'s $3.65 billion buyout of NWA Inc., the parent of Northwest Airlines. -Dec. 28, 1989: Northwest publicized a bomb threat it received for a Dec. 30 flight from Paris to Detroit. More than 100 people canceled their reservations for the flight; 28 passengers and 14 crew members made the trip. -Jan. 4, 1990: An engine fell off a three-engine Northwest plane flying from Miami to Minneapolis; the Boeing 727 landed safely in Tampa, Fla. Federal officials said improper maintenance was involved and proposed a $200,000 fine. -March 8, 1990: Three Northwest pilots flying a Boeing 727 from Fargo, N.D., were arrested at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport after authorities were alerted that the pilots had been drinking heavily the night before. The three became the first commercial pilots to be convicted for flying a jetliner while intoxicated. Their sentences ranged from one year to 16 months. -May 28, 1990: A Northwest pilot on his way to work was charged with driving under the influence of alcohol. He later pleaded guilty to a lesser charge and was fined $627. The pilot is appealing Northwest\'s decision to fire him for violating company rules against drinking within 12 hours of a scheduled flight. -Sept. 11, 1990: A Northwest captain\'s pilot\'s license was suspended after a hearing in which authorities said he buzzed a snowmobile race in one private plane and crash-landed another because of a fuel problem. -Sept. 20, 1990: Airbus Industrie said Northwest got a $500 million loan from Airbus and General Electric Co. The loan coincided with an order for 75 Airbus planes valued at $4.6 billion. Later, a spokeswoman for U.S. Trade Representative Carla Hills said Hills believed the loan could be an unfair inducement to get Northwest to buy the jets. Representatives of Airbus, a four-nation consortium, denied any unfairness. -Oct. 16, 1990: Checchi said layoffs and a reduced flight schedule were imminent since machinists rejected a temporary wage cut. Northwest announced it was implementing a third major fare increase in as many months due to higher jet fuel prices brought on by Iraq\'s Aug. 2 invasion of Kuwait. -Oct. 17, 1990: Northwest said ground workers in Atlanta filled the hydraulic systems of two DC-9 jets with a mixture of hand soap and hydraulic fluid. The airline called it a mistake, not sabotage. Fifty flights were canceled around the country and 12 DC-9s were grounded for inspections. -Nov. 12, 1990: Northwest said higher fuels costs associated with the Mideast crisis caused a 47 percent drop in its third-quarter earnings and will result in a fourth-quarter loss. -Nov. 16, 1990: The Saint Paul Pioneer Press reported that Checchi was exploring a buyout of Eastern Airlines using up to $150 million in pension funds of Eastern\'s union pilots. -Nov. 17, 1990: The Star Tribune of Minneapolis reported that the Federal Aviation Administration had ordered Northwest to examine 11 planes for possible safety defects. The FAA warned that an instrument critical to controlling the plane has jammed at least six times on A320s operated by foreign carriers and in test flights, the Star Tribune reported. -Dec. 3, 1990: Two Northwest jetliners collide on the ground at Detroit Metropolitan Airport, killing eight people.\r\n'),(639,2,'The Roman Catholic Church asked court permission to open a grave in an old church cemetery to make sure it holds the remains of Pierre Toussaint, a onetime slave from Haiti who could become the first black American saint. ``We want to be certain that what\'s down there is not sticks and stones and someone else\'s bones,\'\' said Monsignor Robert O\'Connell, who is directing the campaign to canonize Toussaint. On Thursday, the archdiocese of New York sought the order from state Supreme Court. Judge Phyllis Gangel-Jacob scheduled a hearing for Aug. 28 and pronounced the matter ``utterly fascinating. ... This is much more interesting than Trump.\'\' Although the Health Department routinely issues permits to unearth buried coffins _ mostly so they can be moved from one cemetery to another _ anyone who wants to actually open a coffin must obtain a court order. Those present when the coffin is opened, including pathologists, church officials and gravediggers, ``must take an oath to testify truthfully to what they saw,\'\' O\'Connell said. Church officials do not expect to find any supernatural evidence of Toussaint\'s sainthood, such as an unusually well-preserved corpse, he said. Toussaint apparently was buried 137 years ago in the cemetery of Old St. Patrick\'s Cathedral in Manhattan\'s Little Italy. The grave bears several markers, but O\'Connell said that ``if he is declared a saint, and there is a ceremony honoring him, we must be sure.\'\' He said there was another reason for positive identification: If Toussaint becomes a saint, the Vatican may distribute some of his bones or personal items to ``places where his faith was nourished,\'\' such as Haiti, or to prominent places of worship such as St. Patrick\'s Cathedral on Fifth Avenue. Toussaint was born a slave in Haiti in 1766, and moved to New York with his owner\'s family in 1787. He became one of the city\'s leading hairdressers, and was allowed to keep some of his income. When Toussaint\'s owner died, leaving his wife and child impoverished, Toussaint secretly supported them for about 20 years. The widow freed Toussaint shortly before her death in 1807. Toussaint gave lavishly to several charities, including an orphanage and the city\'s first school for black children, and entered quarantined sections of the city each August to help yellow fever victims. But he took no stand on slavery, and seems generally to have avoided controversy; according to a pamphlet released by the archdiocese: ``The famous phrase, `Only my hairdresser knows for sure,\' could well have had its origin in Pierre\'s discretion.\'\' When Toussaint died in 1853, the New York Post said he was ``spoken of by all who know him as a man of the warmest and most active benevolence.\'\' O\'Connell said the case for Toussaint\'s sainthood is buttressed by one reported miracle: the recovery of a young Haitian with cancer who refused medical care and relied solely on prayers to Toussaint. Even if Toussaint is deemed worthy of sainthood, canonization could be years away. Cardinal John O\'Connor has said he hopes Toussaint might be near sainthood by the time Pope John Paul II visits Haiti in 1992, but O\'Connell said he was told by Vatican officials that no timetable could be set.\r\n'),(640,2,'Unocal Corp., joining a growing contingent of oil companies with clean air ideas, announced Thursday it would offer to buy 7,000 older gas-eating cars in an effort to reduce smog in the Los Angeles basin. Unocal has allocated $5 million to purchase the cars, which must be at least 20 years old, and scrap them, said Richard J. Stegemeier, Unocal\'s chairman and chief executive. The plan would eliminate an estimated 6 million pounds of pollutant gases, he said. Owners would be offered $700 apiece for the locally registered junkers, Stegemeier said. ``We want to take the heaviest polluters off the road and hand them over to a scrap yard, which will shred and recycle the metal,\'\' Stegemeier said. Unocal executives noted that pre-1971 vehicles pollute from 15 to 30 times more than 1990 models, with about 410,000 such jalopies and bombs registered in the region. The program is scheduled to begin June 1. Another voluntary program, to take effect in July, offers free smog checks and emission control tune-ups for pre-1975 cars at participating Unocal 76 service stations. Such tune-ups could remove 17 million pounds of carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides and reactive organic gases from the Los Angeles basin, which has the worst air quality problem in the nation, the Los Angeles-based oil company said. A spokesman for Southern California\'s powerful air quality agency voiced support for Unocal\'s program, which was seen by one industry analyst as a growing trend of ``greening\'\' among oil companies. Unocal\'s approach also reflects a different philosophical approach to eliminating air pollution in the region. ``We want to demonstrate ways of reducing smog that are efficient and cost-effective,\'\' Stegemeier said. A similar proposal was suggested last year to regional smog control officials by the Claremont Institute, a conservative non-profit think tank. The institute had suggested paying about $1,500 apiece to remove 850,000 pre-1980 vehicles from the region, at a cost of $1.3 billion, said Lucas Morel, a research associate at the institute. It moves away from the command and control of a centralized bureaucracy by allowing industries in the marketplace to choose their own methods to achieve certain reductions of emissions, Morel said. While unusual in its approach, however, Unocal\'s announcement was hardly unique. ``They\'re all becoming environmentally pro-active,\'\' said Kenneth B. Funsten, an oil industry analyst with Wedbush Morgan Securities in Los Angeles. Funsten attributed the trend largely to Exxon\'s handling of the Alaskan oil spill, which has hardened political opposition to oil industry operations. Atlantic Richfield Co. last September introduced a reformulated low-emission gasoline to replace leaded regular in its pumps, and the Shell Oil Co. followed suit with a similar reformulation for premium gas.\r\n'),(641,2,'An FBI agent pleaded guilty today to manslaughter in the strangulation death of a pregnant woman with whom he purportedly was having an affair. Pike Circuit Judge Bayard Collier sentenced the agent, Mark Putnam, to 16 years in prison after Putnam accepted a plea bargain and pleaded guilty to killing Susan Daniels Smith, 28, of Freeburn, Ky., on June 8, 1989. Sources have said that Ms. Smith met Putnam when she was serving as an FBI informant. The Pike County grand jury indicted Putnam earlier today. The indictment said Putnam killed the woman ``while under extreme emotional duress.\'\' The FBI has said it has no record of any agent ever being convicted of killing someone in a similar case. Dressed in a starched white shirt, blue jeans and tennis shoes, Putnam said little during the 18-minute proceeding, except to answer Collier\'s questions. Ms. Smith\'s family on Monday bitterly denounced the pending plea agreement and asked the grand jury to indict him for murder. Shelby Ward, Ms. Smith\'s sister, and several sources say Putnam admitted killing Ms. Smith during an argument over support payments for the woman\'s expected child. The sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, and Ms. Smith\'s family say the agent described the killing and location of the woman\'s body in exchange for a plea bargain. The remains were found only last week. Mrs. Ward and her brother, Billy Joe Daniels, said Commonwealth\'s Attorney John Paul Runyon did not consult the family about the plea bargain. ``Because he was a big FBI, famous and everything, they don\'t want him to get justice,\'\' Mrs. Ward said after meeting with the grand jury. ``I\'d still like to have a murder trial. ... I don\'t care what that clique there says. To me it was a brutal murder. Brutal, brutal.\'\' Runyon declined to respond, saying only: ``I can\'t control what she says.\'\' Ms. Smith\'s family has retained Pikeville lawyer Larry Webster to file a lawsuit against the agent and possibly the FBI. Webster said he intends to file the suit today, seeking ``millions\'\' in damages and lost earnings. ``If she was working for them at the time and she lost her life, she could be entitled to get paid for that,\'\' Webster said.\r\n'),(642,2,'Beef imported from the United States will be sold in vending machines in Japan under a Japanese-U.S. joint venture project, a Japanese official said Tuesday. ``Our aim is to supply imported beef at a cheaper price to consumers by reducing the costs of distribution-related personnel,\'\' said Naoki Sakai, a spokesman for Jackson Co. Jackson is a Japanese meat dealer based in the western port city of Kobe. It joined with the Hamilton Meat Co., a meat packer based in San Diego, to set up the joint venture, Sakai said. Sakai said it will be first time in Japan that beef has been sold in vending machines. Seasoned beef for steak and sukiyaki will be processed in the United States before being imported in frozen vacuum packages for sale in Japan, Sakai said. The machines, equipped with freezers, will be set up at 1,000 locations, mainly near railway stations and convenience stores, Sakai said. The company plans to sell a pack containing 17.5 ounces of beef for about $11.30, about half the price of locally produced beef. The company will install the vending machines starting next week.\r\n'),(643,2,'Rioting broke out in the western city of Poona on Saturday after a man threw human waste on a Hindu idol at a temple during worship services, the United News of India reported. Officials imposed a 48-hour curfew on the city after shops were burned in clashes between Hindus and Moslems. Police said one boy was severely beaten by a mob and at least 41 arrests were made. United News of India said a man, believed to be a Moslem, threw the waste on a statue of Lord Ganesha during morning rituals at a temple in the Laxmi Road area of Poona, 75 miles southeast of Bombay. It reported worshipers caught the man and turned him over to police. The agency said about 20 vegetable and fruit shops owned by both Hindus and Moslems were set ablaze during street fighting. B.J. Misar, the city police commissioner, said police dispersed a crowd of hundreds of Hindus gathered near the temple to protest the incident. He told a ``peace committee\'\' meeting of all political parties that the man suspected of hurling the waste would be charged under the National Security Act that allows detention without trial for up to two years. Hundreds of people are killed every year in Hindu-Moslem violence in India, often provoked by minor fights or deliberate acts such as the one in Poona.\r\n'),(644,2,'Witnesses reported a 60th person was shot and killed as soldiers halted looting at a market in the city. One witness reported an exchange of gunfire in downtown Rangoon on Tuesday evening, but details could not be confirmed because of the 8 p.m. to 4 a.m. curfew imposed by Saw Maung. Sporadic clashes were reported in Mandalay in central Burma but no details were available. Telephone communications were out after the Communications Department\'s microwave dish was damaged by a rocket in the morning. One opposition leader, speaking on condition of anonymity, said street protests had been called off to avoid further bloodshed. Three key opposition leaders issued a statement Tuesday condemning the military crackdown, saying: ``Such suppression by force of arms will not stop the people\'s just demand for democracy.\'\' The statement was issued by former Brig. Gen. Aung Gyi, former Defense Minister Tin Oo and Aung San Suu Kyi, daughter of Burma\'s late independence leader. They demanded talks with Saw Maung ``to seek ways to correctly solve the current crisis.\'\' The statement also rebuffed offers from the country\'s myriad ethnic insurgents to support the pro-democracy uprising and told authorities to stop spreading rumors that the rebels had infiltrated the mass demonstrations, which have included millions of Buddhist monks, students and striking civil servants. The top Buddhist monks\' group also issued a statement Tuesday seeking a dialogue between demonstrators and the new government. State-run radio announced that a deadline for striking workers to return to their jobs was extended from Sept. 26 to Oct. 3. Most government employees walked off their jobs Aug. 8 following a call for a nationwide general strike. That strike and bloody protests earlier forced a quick end to Sein Lwin\'s presidency, which lasted only 16 days until Aug. 12. He had replaced Ne Win, the strongman who came to power in a 1962 coup. Ne Win quit after mounting unrest over the country\'s moribound economy and one-party rule. Some observers believe Ne Win still controls the leadership from behind the scenes.\r\n'),(645,2,'The Supreme Court today strengthened the right of criminal suspects to have lawyers present when they are questioned by police. By a 6-2 vote, the justices overturned the murder conviction of Mississippi death row inmate Robert S. Minnick, who confessed when he was questioned without his lawyer present. The court said Minnick\'s rights were violated even though he earlier had consulted with his lawyer and agreed to talk to authorities. Unless the suspect initiates such a talk with police, the court said, he may not be questioned outside the presence of his lawyer once he has invoked his right to a lawyer. In other action, the court: - Left intact a lawsuit settlement that eased restrictions on abortion clinics in Illinois. The court, without comment, rejected an appeal by two nurses and two expectant fathers who said the settlement does not adequately protect women or fetuses. - Refused to kill a lawsuit against a California community college\'s officials accused of unlawful censorship for blocking the on-campus performance of a racially charged play. The court, without comment, rejected an appeal by the college officials. - Shielded businesses from some big-money lawsuits filed by employees who claim they were fired so their employers would not have to pay pension benefits. The court ruled unanimously that fired employees may not sue4 in state courts over such allegations. The state suits are pre-empted by a federal law protecting pensions, the court said. Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, writing for the court in the confession case, said, ``There can be no doubt that the interrogation in question was initiated by the police. It was a formal interview which (Minnick) was compelled to attend.\'\' ``Since (Minnick) made a specific request for counsel before the interview, the police-initiated interrogation was impermissible.\'\' In a dissenting opinion, Justice Antonin Scalia said the majority was ``misguided\'\' to discourage ``an honest confession.\'\' He said the ruling undermines a ``belief in either personal responsibility or the moral claim of just government to obedience.\'\' He was joined by Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist. Justice David H. Souter did not take part in the case. Minnick and James ``Monkey\'\' Dyess escaped from Clarke County, Miss., jail in April 1986 and went looking for guns, authorities said. Police said the two men fatally shot Donald Ellis Thomas and Lamar Lafferty when the victims returned to Thomas\'s mobile home to find Minnick and Dyess there. Minnick was arrested in Lemon Grove, Calif., on Aug. 22, 1986. FBI agents ended their questioning of him when he asked for a lawyer. Minnick then met with an attorney who advised him not to answer any more questions. A few days later, Deputy Sheriff J.C. Denham of Clarke County flew to California and questioned Minnick. The suspect confessed, saying he shot Lafferty because Dyess was threatening to kill Minnick if he did not. Minnick was convicted in Mississippi and sentenced to death. The Mississippi Supreme Court, in upholding his conviction, said Denham\'s questioning of Minnick did not violate a rule the U.S. Supreme Court established in 1981. The high court barred police from questioning a suspect who has asked for a lawyer unless the suspect initiates the conversation. Today the high court extended that ruling to instances in which a suspect already has conferred with an attorney. Kennedy said the 1981 ruling is designed to prevent police from badgering a defendant into giving up the right to a lawyer provided by the court\'s famous Miranda ruling in 1966. The threat of badgering is no less after the suspect has talked to his lawyer, Kennedy said. ``A single consultation with an attorney does not remove the suspect from persistent attempts by officials to persuade him to waive his rights or from the coercive pressures that accompany custody and that may increase as custody is prolonged,\'\' he said. The case is Minnick vs. Mississippi, 89-6332.\r\n'),(646,2,'Regional fortunes seem to be constantly shifting, said Janet Norwood, labor statistics commissioner, in her monthly employment report to Congress. The striking stability of the national jobless rate over the past two years, she told the Joint Economic Committee, has disguised substantial and important regional shifts. During the past 12 months, for example, the nation\'s official monthly jobless rate has varied from 5.3 percent only three times _ in May 1989 and in March 1990 when it read 5.2 percent and in April 1990 when 5.4 percent was recorded. Remarkable stability indeed. But only when you average things out, and averages are not what people live by. The jobless rate in New England, for example, had been unusually low a year or so ago, in some communities as low as 3 percent, which statisticians believe is about as low as you can get. But in the past year, unemployment in that six-state New England region has risen 2 percentage points, bringing the situation there close to the national average. The Southern region also has been closing in on the national average, but from a different direction. Rates there, which had been among the highest in the nation, have been improving, i.e. going the opposite way. It is out of such differences that national averages come into being. They are official. They are highly publicized and analyzed. They produce profound documents on possible policy implications. But to residents of those two huge areas of America, especially jobseekers and jobholders, those official statistics mislead. Generally speaking, said Norwood, ``the last year has seen some convergence of state and regional unemployment rates, with the worse-off areas improving and the best deteriorating.\'\' This is a big country, statisticians explain, and some of them say it is about time the differences were recognized. U.S. regional economies, they say, are as big as the economies of major industrialized nations. Geographical differences aren\'t the only ones. Sector differences are just as pronounced. Job growth in manufacturing has been weak, but until the past few months it had been strong in services. Health-care costs and employment have been beating an independent path upward for years. It is in the geographical area, however, where the vastness of the separate American economies is most pronounced. While homebuilding is off in New England, where it had been booming, it is up in Houston, where it had collapsed. While economies of some Rocky Mountain and Southeast states are depressed, several Midwest states are well off. One well-known market research firm, Sindlinger & Co., claims that it is only a specific interpretation of statistical evidence that keeps the Commerce Department from recognizing that a national recession might already exist. It\'s not the first time such a situation has existed, says Albert Sindlinger, whose research suggests there are far more states in recession than are free of it, but that the national averages disguise their plight. Vivid contrasts always can be found among geographical and sectoral areas, and that poses an enormous challenge to those who handle the economic levers, such as Federal Reserve officials. The Fed mechanism, it has been demonstrated in the past few years, can be very sensitive to national statistics; it has used them, for example, to skirt the fine line between economic growth and shrinkage. But it is not nearly as adept at handling regional or sectoral statistics. One of its most effective tools, for instance, is the fine tuning of interest rates nationally, but interest rates and the availability of funds still vary greatly from area to area. National economics, not microeconomics, is its specialty and, with regional economies growing and going their independent ways, microeconomics might be the big challenge to be met.\r\n'),(647,2,'Anatoly Grishchenko, a Soviet helicopter pilot who contracted leukemia after what was hailed as a heroic effort to try to douse the fire at the Chernobyl nuclear plant, has died at age 53. Grishchenko had been in critical condition with a lung infection for more than two weeks at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, where he had received a bone-marrow transplant April 27 in an attempt to conquer his leukemia. He died late Monday of cardiopulmonary failure, said spokeswoman Susan Edmonds. Grishchenko in 1986 repeatedly flew his heavy-lift copter through the intensely radioactive gases spewing from the Chernobyl plant, dumping sand and cement in an overmatched effort to cap the crippled reactor. He and a handful of others in the operation were designated heroes of the Soviet Union, that country\'s highest honor. Despite lead shielding on the aircraft and other protective gear, Grishchenko suffered radiation sickness and was found to have radiation-related leukemia last year. He arrived in Seattle on April 11 for the marrow transplant, which was performed after chemotherapy and radiation treatment to kill off his own marrow. The transplant went smoothly, but Grischenko\'s condition suddenly deteriorated in mid-June. Antibiotics had failed to knock out the lung infection, which Grishchenko developed before coming to Seattle. The pre-transplant therapy leaves patients with no natural immunity against disease until the new marrow, which is transplanted intravenously, takes hold. ``There\'s a lot of sadness. It\'s been difficult watching him not progress, and as with all our patients, we hope they come here, be treated and go home and have a long life,\'\' Edmonds said. ``It was very sad to watch him have problems and grow worse.\'\' Grishchenko\'s wife of 27 years, Galina, was at his bedside, Edmonds said. At least 31 deaths are officially blamed on the April 26, 1986, explosion and fire at the plant in the Ukraine. Scientists say many more people may eventually be stricken with radiation-related diseases.\r\n'),(648,2,'This has been ``a decade of progress for women on television\'\' _ especially for female characters in prime time _ but the industry must be monitored to ensure further gains, the National Commission on Working Women said. The accolade and note of caution came Tuesday as the commission released a report entitled ``Ten Years in Prime Time: An Analysis of the Image of Women on Entertainment Television, 1979-1988,\'\' which examined the portrayal of women and compared the fictional panorama with the profile of real-life women during the decade. ``The 1980s mark a decade of progress for women on television. Their portrayals have become more diverse and, for the most part, more true-to-life,\'\' the report said. ``... The networks get a pat on the back,\'\' said the study\'s author, Sally Streenland. The study said 60 percent of female characters on the 25 top Nielsen rated shows in 1979 were portrayed as employed outside the home. By 1987, that figure had risen to 75 percent. By comparison, 1987 population statistics from the U.S. Census Bureau show that 56 percent of all women were in the labor force. Streenland\'s study also showed TV painting an unrealistically rosy picture of the types of jobs held by women. In 1979, more than 40 percent of television\'s women were employed in clerical or service jobs. By 1987 only 23 percent of the women on TV had the lower skilled jobs and more than half had professional careers. The real life situation is that 47 percent of working women have clerical and service occupations and only 24 percent work in professional or managerial jobs. The report also showed that black women have become more visible on TV. In 1979 there was only one black female character on television, but by 1987, 22 percent of women characters were black.\r\n'),