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University Daily Kansan, February 13, 1984
NATION AND WORLD
News briefs from UPI
68 injured at London party when dance floor collapses
LONDON — A floor collapsed yesterday under the weight of jumping dancers at a Valentine's Day party, dropping the partygoers onto their neighbors in the room below and injuring 68 people, police said.
Eight people were still hospitalized yesterday, including 17-year-old Gina Randall, who lapsed into a coma in intensive care after suffering head wounds.
"People were crying and shouting," said one neighbor. "The outside of the building looked all right but inside everything had collapsed."
In all, 68 people were treated for injuries after plunging to feet through the floor of an apartment onto other partygoers who had spilled water.
Reports said the floor had given way during a record in which it is customary for everyone to jump up and down at once.
Haitian soldier hijacks American jet
NEW YORK — A Haitian soldier, apparently seeking political asylum in the United States, hijacked a jetliner on a flight from Port-au-Prince to New York yesterday.
Gean Phillippe Windsor, 34, surrendered his grenades and submachine gun to the pilot of American Airlines Flight 658 before the plane landed shortly after midnight yesterday in New York.
Windsor, who said he was a corporal in the Haitian army, was taken to the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Manhattan, where he awaits arrangement on aerial piracy charges today at U.S. District Court in Brooklyn.
Passengers said Windsor told the crew he wanted political asylum.
Fourth panda falls victim to famine
PEKING — Three giant pandas were saved from starvation by a rescue operation in the mountains of Szechwan Province but a fourth panda died because of a severe bamboo famine, wildlife conservation officials said yesterday.
It brought to four the number of endangered giant pandas that have died of starvation in the last four months in China because of the famine caused by the withering of their staple food, the arrow bamboo.
Rescue efforts have intensified as experts expect the crisis to peak later this year. The Chinese government has allotted $1.3 million for the
Only about 1,000 wild pandas remain in the world, most of them living in the mountainous Wolong Panda Preserve in Szechwan Province.
Haitians disagree on voter turnout
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Haitians voted yesterday in the first countrywide congressional elections in five years amid reports that the only candidate not running on the government ticket was hiding in fear for his life.
The official Television National said at noon that between 80 and 90 percent of the people were participating in the balloting.
But witnesses said the turnout at most polling places was light to moderate, and independent radio stations received calls from around the country complaining of gross violations of the electoral law.
The Reagan administration has said further aid to Haiti, which is the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere, was conditional on an improvement in its human rights record.
Blizzards trap 1.500 in Yugoslavia
SARAJEVO, Yugoslavia — Rescuers dug through snowdrifts 16 feet high outside the Yugoslavian capital yesterday to reach 1,500 people trapped in cars by blizzards that have killed at least four people and disrupted the Winter Olympics.
More than 10,000 people have been rescued since blizzards driven by hurricane-force winds swept through Yugoslavia Thursday, wreaking havoc in parts of the country.
Snow fell for 60 hours in Sarajevo, site of the Winter Games, forcing repeated delays of the Alpine skiing events.
Rescuers used tractors, horses, bulldozers, snowplows, armored personnel carriers, tanks and helicopters to save people stranded on Yugoslavia's main road.
Burger calls for high legal standards
LAS VEGAS, Nev. — Lawyers who advertise their services like used-car salesman put the legal profession near "the bottom of the
the bottom of the United States
Warren Burger said yesterday.
Burger told the annual winter meeting of the American Bar Association that judges must wrest control of courtrooms from lawyers who inundate the legal system with petty lawsuits. Burger said that, although many lawyers said that they had high public obligations, others saw their profession as a trade that could be advertised like any commodity. He suggested fining lawyers who pursue frivolous claims.
"In current polls, lawyers and journalists rank roughly the same; both are near the bottom of the barrel," Burger said.
Hussein served in $400,000 lawsuit
VAIL, Colo. — Although Jordan's King Hussein refused to accept a summons notifying him of a $400,000 lawsuit, a Denver process server says she did her job.
Karyn Marcel said she attempted to personally serve a summons Saturday on the vacationing king, who is being sued in connection with her death.
Summa Corp., a Howard Hughes enterprise, had been trying to serve the summons for five years. Marcel said she sled the documents under his signature.
Hussein spent a week at former President Gerald Ford's mountain resort condominium and flew to Washington yesterday.
"I've never had to serve a king," said Marcel. "Kings usually don't get into this kind of financial trouble."
WEATHER FACTS
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE FORECAST to 7 PM EST 2-13-84
Today will be fair across the nation's midsection, with sunny to partly cloudy skies prevailing.
Locally, today will be mostly sunny with a high temperature of 57 degrees.
Tomorrow also will be fair, with a high around 60 degrees.
Tonight will be fair with a low of 34 degrees.
U.S. completes Beirut evacuation
Bv United Press International
BEIRUT, Lebanon — President Armin Gemayel said he would not give in to calls for his resignation yesterday as the first Red Cross convoy made it into war-torn West Beirut with supplies of food and medicine.
According to unofficial U.S. Embassy figures, 338 people arrived in Larnaca yesterday by ship and helicopter. The majority were in the force 2-day operation to 905.
Only 351 were U.S. citizens and the rest came from 28 other countries, including Britain, France, Canada, Lebanon and Syria, Embassy officials
Also, the last batch of American evacuates from Beirut landed in Cyprus
Saudi Arabia's Lebanon mediator, Rafik Hariri, flew back to Riyadh yesterday after spending 24 hours
shutting between leaders on both sides of the capital in hopes of ending their war.
Lebanese Foreign Minister Elie Salem said, "There is no Saudi plan, and nothing that Hariri brings is new." He also noted that Hariri could initiate a dialogue with Syrians.
IN OTHER DEVELOPMENTS,
BOTH the United States and Damascus said they were studying a French proposal that United Nation troops be used to replace the four-nation peace-keeping force.
The Syrians demanded the immediate withdrawal of all U.S., French, British and Italian troops as well as the withdrawal of Israeli forces and the abrogation of Lebanon's May 17 accord with the Jewish state.
IN JERUSALEM, PRIME MINISTER Yitzhak Shamir warned that any abrogation of the accord would be "totally unacceptable" and said that Israel would respond by taking umlat-
Gemayel told reporters in a hilltop Christian suburb east of Beirut that he counted on continued U.S. support. "I am sure President Reagan is fully committed to help the Lebanese," he said.
As Gamelyel spoke, army artillery struck at Druse rebel targets across the valley. Druse militia leader Walid Jumbulta has repeatedly called for its design, but Gamelyel implied that Jumbulta's influential ally Syria did not want this.
eral action to secure its northern border.
"SYRIA IS MORE REASONABLE than some of its friends," he said. "The presidential institution is more important than the person."
Sixteen-year-old twin sons of the Kuwait Embassy press attach were seized in a raid on the diplomat's west gate on Sunday. The boys said the boys were released yesterday.
An American engineering professor at the American University of Beirut, Frank Regier, has not been heard from since he was kidnapped Friday.
Competing radio stations kept up their propaganda war and explosions and gunfire from sporadic clashes echoed through the capital as U.S. warplanes flew reconnaissance missions throughout the day.
IN CALIFORNIA, WHITE HOUSE spokesman Larry Speaks said President Reagan thought the French proposal to replace the peacekeeping force in Lebanon with U.N. troops was "worth exploring."
But Sharara also demanded the "immediate and unconditional withdrawal" of the U.S., French, Italian and British peacekeeping forces
In Damascus, Syrian Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Farouk Sharraa was quoted by the Qatari news agency yesterday as saying the proposal to send in a U.N. peacekeeping force was "under consideration."
Japanese youth face 'examination hell'
By United Press International
TOKYO — Nervous Japanese students studied yesterday for competitive university entrance exams that largely require a high score to drive dozens of them to suicide.
Hours before exams begin today at Tokyo's prestigious Sophia University, candidates will arrive at the gates, sleepless from reviewing and worrying about the packet to address in rank-conscious Japan — admission to a top university.
"I feel strong mental pressure because I want to succeed this time," said 19-year-old Kazumi Hasegawa, a graduate of Kyoto University year. "All my friends are also anxious."
day," Hasegawa said. "The only time we relax is when we have meals."
According to 1982 police statistics, 259 Japanese youth — most between 15 and 24 years old — committed suicide due to excessive pressure caused by "school problems."
Only a few students made light of what many regard as the most crucial event of their youth. Some said they would sport headbands emblazoned with peppy phrases like "fighting spirit" and "certain victory."
"WE STUDY ALMOST 24 hours a
Others said they would carry cannels of "rarefied air" or tiny bottles of dirt, allegedly gathered from famous universities, for good luck.
Some contenders said they had purchased underwear printed with slogans like "I am a genius" and "100 percent success."
THE SOPHIA EXAMS ARE among a series of tests held around the country.
About 900,000 high school graduates will vie for about 450,000 places at Japan's 454 universities and 250 junior colleges this year, with only one out of 12 winning spots at elite schools like Sochia.
In Japan, preparation for "jucken jigoku" — examination hell — begins with competition for places in top kindergarten. From them on Japanese youngsters are bombarded with quizzes before them for college entrance exams.
Graduates of top colleges are guaranteed well-paid, high-status jobs and social prestige. Loose academic standings are being捞出 of college almost impossible.
Pressure to get into top schools has grown so extreme that a commercial subculture has developed to help cope with the grueling endeavor.
EXPENSIVE "CRAM" SCHOOLS now enroll about 230,000 students annually for a year of mock exams. Students will receive drills to pump students full of facts.
“It’s the school name that’s important here,” said Donald Harrington, a teacher at Yoyoi Zeminari, the largest of Japan's 205 schools cram
Another 100,000 high-school students a year up to take course courses
from our college.
Tokyo hotels often slash room rates during the February-March exam season to attract out-of-town students.
Brake failures recur during landing of shuttle
By United Press International
But landing director Bob Webster said he was "very confident" Challenger could be readied in record time for launch April 4 on a mission to deploy the re-launch a broken solar observatory with a $235 million replacement value.
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — A brake again failed during the landing of the space shuttle Challenger and 31 insulation tiles will have to be replaced, some possibly because of a collision with a bird. NASA engineers said yesterday.
Ken Colley, chief of orbiter mechan-
eal systems, said that despite the no damage, the ship's appearance was better than on its previous three flights and six flights of the shuttle Columbia.
Colley also said that a substantial amount of hazing was observed on two of Challenger's cockpit windows — possibly from being struck by tiny bits of volcanic debris pumped into the atmosphere from recent volcanoes.
ship to its first Florida landing Saturday from eight days in orbit fleek back to Houston later in the day and relaxed yesterday at their homes. They are scheduled to begin a week of de-brieffings today and will hold a news conference Feb. 21.
"THIS WAS VERY CLEAN COMPARED to previous ones," he said, referring primarily to less scorching heat of re-entry into the atmosphere.
"We're just taking it easy around the house," mission commander Vance Brand said yesterday morning.
HE. CO-PILOT ROBERT "HOOT" Gibson and mission specialists Ronald McNair, Bruce McCandless and Robert But Brum, at least, found time to join a
The five astronauts who brought the
champagne party his neighbors gave in his driveway.
Three arthritic rats that flew aboard Challenger have been examined and researchers said post-flight tests showed they were no different from three identical animals kept on the ground. This was in contrast to McNair's observations in orbit that the animals seemed better off in weightlessness than previous ones he had observed on Earth.
Colley said the most significant damage to the ceramic heat shield tiles centered on the ship's left engine pod near the tail. Four tires were lost from an impact of some kind.