University Daily Kansan / Thursday, March 24, 1988
7
NationWorld
Reagan, Gorbachev to meet at Moscow summit May 29
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — President Reagan announced yesterday that he would go to Moscow from May 29 to June 2 for his fourth summit meeting with Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev. It will be his first visit to the Soviet Union.
The five-day visit also will mark the first trip to the Soviet Union by a U.S. president since Richard Nixon's 1974 meeting with Leonid Brezhnev.
The summit's intended centerpiece is the signing of a treaty to scrap 30 percent to 50 percent of the superpowers' long-range bombers, missiles and submarines. However, Reagan already has suggested that an agreement would not be ready.
Asked yesterday if a treaty would be completed, he said, "I have no way of answering that." He added that the two nations were committed to the cutback.
Visiting Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shewardnadze, asked if a treaty would be ready, said through a translator, 'It is possible. This is not an easy task. This is a very complicated task, but we are becoming convinced that it can be done.
The summit announcement capped three days of meetings between Shevardnadze and Secretary of State George P. Shultz.
"There are many difficult questions of a technical nature, mostly in verification, but in principle this can be done," the foreign minister said as he left the White House after two hours of talks and lunch with Reagan.
The president was expected to spend all of his time in the Soviet Union in the Soviet capital, just as Gorbachev spent all his time in Washington in December. Nancy Reagan is planning a day trip to Leningrad.
Rocket strikes U.S. embassy in Bogota
The Associated Press
BOGOTA, Colombia — At least two rockets were fired from a bazaook at the U.S. Embassy on yesterday night and one hit the building and exploded, police and a U.S. Embassy official said.
official said:
Steven Gangstead, a spokesman
for the embassy, said no one was
injured.
Police said two men in front of the diplomatic mission fired the rockets from a distance of about 150 feet.
Gangster told The Associated Press in a telephone interview one
missile hit the embassy roof, causing minor damage.
He said the other one missed.
The embassy is in a section of downtown Bogota known as The Bunker, for the elaborate security systems designed to protect the homes and diplomatic missions in the area.
In Washington, State Department spokeswoman Sondra McCarthy said the agency he press reports about the attack but she did not immediately have any information or comment.
Panama expels second U.S. diplomat
The Associated Press
PANAMA CITY, Panama — A U.S. diplomat was given 48 hours to leave Panama yesterday, the third day of a general strike that has virtually shut down the country but not loosened Gen. Manuel Antonio Noriega's grip on power.
The diplomat, David Miller, an economics counselor, was the second U.S. diplomat ordered out by the CIA to force which gave no reason for his decision.
Panama is out of cash because Washington cut off the supply of U.S. dollars, the Panamanian national currency, in its effort to drive Noriega into exile. Federal grand juries in Florida indicted Noriega last month on narcotics and money laundering charges.
The U.S. State Department said yesterday that it would ignore the order because the United States considered the government that issued it illegitimate. It gave the same reason for rejecting the previous expulsion order against Terence Kanebone, head of the U.S. Information Service in Panama. Kanebone remains in the country.
A U.S. medical battalion truck returning from maneuvers with a dozen soldiers was surrounded and stopped by national police after straying onto a city highway yesterday afternoon.
A Panamanian soldier outside the military police office where the U.S. soldiers were taken would not allow reporters inside and said the incident was being handled as an administrative process. Under U.S.-Panama treaties, such military trucks are prohibited outside the former Canal Zone.
Police to resume IRA funeral patrols
The Associated Press
BELFAST, Northern Ireland — Police said yesterday that they were abandoning their policy of staying away from IRA funerals. The decision came after the slayings of five people — including two British soldiers — at rites last week.
In central Belfast, police mounted heavy patrols at an emotional service, attended by 25,000 people, for the
soldiers.
The two corporals were dragged from their unmarked car, beaten, stripped and shot after they drove up to an Irish Republican Army funeral on Saturday. No police had been assigned to the funeral.
The Royal Ulster Constabulary, the province's police force, announced yesterday that security chiefs will resume their presence at the funerals of IRA members.
Food stamps limited for strikers Supreme Court says benefits can't be labor dispute weapon
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court, in a decision three justices called anti-union, said yesterday the government may limit a family's eligibility for food stamps when a family member is on strike.
The court said a 1981 federal law imposing such limits didn't violate any constitutional rights. The 5-3 decision reversed a federal judge's 1986 ruling that had struck down the law.
Justice Byron R. White wrote for the court that the law represents a rational effort by Congress to remain neutral in labor disputes. But the court's three dissenters, led by Justice Thurgood Marshall, said the law "amounts to a penalty on strikers, not neutrality."
The 1981 law, amending the Food Stamp Act, generally bars a family from becoming eligible for food stamps at a time when one of its members is on strike. Families already receiving food stamps when a member goes on strike aren't dropped from the program but are barred from receiving additional food stamps despite the loss of income.
The law was challenged by the United Auto Workers, the United Mine Workers and some of their members. They said the law violated
strikers' freedom of association and speech, and denied equal protection to strikers' families.
But White said, "Exercising the right to strike inevitably risks economic hardship, but we are not inclined to hold that the right to association requires the government to minimize that result by qualifying the strikers for food stamps.
"Union strike funds should be responsible for providing support and benefits to strikers during labor-management disputes. It was no part of the purposes of the Food Stamp Act to establish a program that would serve as a weapon in labor disputes."
UAW President Owen Bieber called the decision a blow to working families throughout the United States.
He said his union would urge Congress to do away with the 1981 amendment.
Justices William J. Brennan and Harry A. Blackmun joined Marshall's dissenting opinion.
White was joined in upholding the law by Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist and Justices John Paul Stevens, Sandra Day O'Connor and Antonin Scalia.
Justice Anthony M. Kennedy did not participate in the decision.
Panama tries arms deal with U.S. man
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — The Panamanian military is trying to buy 5,000 semiautomatic pistols immediately and an additional 25,000 over the next year from a U.S. arms dealer, Panama's ambassador disclosed yesterday.
State Department officials said the attempted purchase and recent purported shipments of military supplies to Panama by Cuba, indicate that Panama's military strong man Manuel Antonio Norigae may be intent on using force in his struggle to survive
The proposed purchase came after allegations by a Panamanian Defense Forces major that Cuba has provided Panama with 94,000 pounds of weapons, including AK-47 assault rifles.
Panamanian Ambassador Juan B. Sosa, who is loyal to opposition forces, said that a U.S. arms dealer telephoned him last Saturday unaware that Sosa had broken with
Noriega.
He said that the phone call was made by Leo Wanta, president of AmeriCina Global Management Group, based in Appleton, Wis.
Sosa provided a copy of the proposed transaction to The Associated Press. It was marked "urgent" and "confidential" and was addressed to both Noriega and Lt. Col. Eugenio Corro, identified as chief of ordance service.
Wisconsin office, Wanta asked how the AP had obtained a copy and was indignant when he was told of Sosa's role.
"You tell Sosa he will have a lot of explaining to do in about 12 minutes," Wanta said. He then hung up.
State Department officials, who asked not to be identified, said there was no legal way that the United States could block the sale because the weapons were not of U.S. origin.
When reached by telephone at his
Defendants in Iran-contra lawsuit label accusations 'legal terrorism'
WASHINGTON
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — A nearly two-year-old lawsuit that accuses several Iran-contra figures of collaborating with Colombian drug lords is under attack by the defendants, who call the complaint "legal terrorism."
The lawsuit, filed in May 1986, names some of the people in the private network that marred Lt. Col. Joseph Marne to help the Nicaraguan contras.
The allegations in the civil lawsuit.
set for trial June 26 in federal court in Miami, are significantly different from and much broader than the issues raised by Lawrence Walsh, the independent counsel in the Iran-contra case.
Last week, a federal grand jury indicted four men on charges of conspiring to defraud the U.S. government in the program to sell weapons to Iran and divert the proceeds to the contrasts.
They are John M. Poindexter,
former national security adviser; North, Pointexter's one-time aide; and Richard V. Secord and Albert Hakim, arms dealers who helped North run the Iran-contra program.
Secord and Hakim are among the 29 defendants in the Miami lawsuit, which does not cite any U.S. government officials. Central to the lawsuit is the claim that the defendants conspired to traffic in drugs and to plot assassinations in Central America and elsewhere.
Northwest airline bans all smoking on domestic trips
The Associated Press
NEW YORK - In a move some analysts called risky, Northwest Airlines announced yesterday that it would become the first major U.S. airline to ban smoking on all domestic flights except those to and from Hawaii.
the ban by Northwest, the nation's fifth-largest airline, goes beyond federal regulations that take effect next month for domestic flights lasting two hours or less.
News Roundup
COLOMBIAN GUNMEN STRIKE: Colombian gunmen yesterday ambushed and killed the security chief for a newspaper that urged the government not to back down in its war on drug traffickers, police said. Jorge Alberto Stefan Gomez's 10-month-old daughter was grazed by a bullet in the attack near their home in Medellin, Colombia. Stefan and family were waiting for a taxi near their home when three men on motorcycles opened fire with pistols and a submachine gun. Stefan's wife was not hurt.
ARMENIAN DEMANDS REJECTED: The Kremlin yesterday rejected demands by Armenians who want to control an area of neighboring Azerbaijan and threatened to crack down on Armenian activists who cause further ethnic unrest. At least 32 people were killed in riots after Armenians demanded that the predominantly Azeribian section of Azerbaijan be united with Armenia. Armenians are mostly Christian, and the Azeris are mostly Muslim.
ISRAELIS ARREST HUNDREDS. The Israeli army made overnight raids throughout the occupied lands yesterday, arresting hundreds of Palestinians as part of its latest strategy for ending a rebellion in which more than 100 Arabs and an Israeli soldier have been killed. Israel warplanes flew their second raid in six days against guerrilla targets in south Lebanon. Arab reports said about 500 rounded-up hostages were defeated. Defense Minister Rabin said 3,000 had been detained since riots began Dec. 8 in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip.
CALIFORNIAN WATER SHORTAGE: Officials have declared a water shortage emergency in the communities east of San Francisco and are warning that they may ration water to 1.1 million customers for the first time in a decade. If a voluntary conservation plan approved Tuesday by the East Bay Municipal Utility District fails, the agency may impose water
restrictions of up to 25 percent for homes and businesses in the burgeoning Alameda and Contra Costa counties from May through September
HONDA TO PAY UP: About 370 blacks and women who were turned down for jobs by Honda of America Manufacturing Inc. will receive a total of $6 million from the car maker in a settlement of a federal discrimination investigation, the government and Honda announced yesterday.
TEXACO PLAN APPROVED: Texaco Inc. yesterday won final bankruptcy court approval for a plan that would settle its multibillion-dollar dispute with Pennzoil Co. and bring it out of Chapter 11 protection next month. After $1½ days of closing arguments, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Howard Schwartzberg confirmed the reorganization plan, in which Texaco would pay Pennzoil Co. $3 billion to drop a $10.3 billion judgment held by Pennzoil.
WEATHER FORECAST see page 2
NEHRU EXHIBITION
A pictorial biography of Nehru; India's first prime minister, a dreamer, planner, and philosopher.
Venue: Gallery East, Kansas Union
Inauguration: Friday March 25, at 8 pm, by Dr. Shanti Gandhi M.D., followed by reception (open house) hosted by Prof. T. P. Srinivasan.
Timings: 9 am to 7 pm on Saturday, and Monday , March 26, and 28.
11 am to 4 pm on Sunday March 27
Sponsored by: Air India and K.U. India Club
Kansan Classified (913) 864-4358