PORTRAIT OF THE WEEK
`I'm putting together the leader of the next third party, Miss Benson, it's the only answer.'
AT a by-election in Richmond, North Yorkshire, the Conservatives suffered their biggest drop in support since Mrs Thatcher came to power with a majority reduced from 19,000 to 2,000. Dr Owen's SDP and Mr Ashdown's SLD won between them the most votes. A 'candidate pact' proposed by Mr Ashdown whereby these two parties would select a common candi- date in future by-elections was received with cool scepticism by Dr Owen. Labour held its majority in the Pontypridd by- election and the death of the Conservative MP Sir Raymond Gower means a by- election in the Vale of Glamorgan. Ham- mersmith and Fulham council was warned by its auditors that it faces potential losses of up to £60 million because of its dealings in the money markets. The legality of the council's dealings will be questioned in the courts. Sir John Hoskyns, formerly head of the Policy Unit in 10 Downing Street warned the Government that the creation of a single European Market in 1992 could prove a fiasco. Three former senior execu- tives and one current employee of Marco- ni, a subsidiary of GEC, were charged with offences involving theft, deception and false accounting after a two year Ministry of Defence fraud investigation into con- tracts involving billions of pounds. The Old Bailey heard how a Czech spy, Erwin Van Haarlem, was receiving coded Morse mes- sages from Prague when Special Branch officers burst into his North London flat. More than 201b of Semtex plastic explosive was found abandoned in a North London waterworks reservoir. Mr Edward Heath and Mrs Joan Ruddock were among MPs who joined a three-mile line of protestors from Kent. They delivered a protest scroll to 10 Downing Street against the proposed high speed rail link to the Channel Tunnel: A report by British Telecom engineeis disclosed that faults in metering equipment may be resulting in the company over- charging subscribers by million of pounds for calls which did not connect. Hereford Cathedral abandoned plans to auction the `Mappa Mundi'. Frank Bruno failed to win the World Heavyweight title, when his courageous performance against Mike Tyson was stopped after five rounds.
EMPEROR Hirohito was entombed in the Imperial Mausoleum in Tokyo after 13 hours of obsequies, attended by dignitaries from 163 foreign states. President Bush left Japan for a state visit to Peking. China's leading dissident, Mr Fang Lizhi was stop- ped from attending a banquet to which he had been invited by President Bush in a gesture of goodwill. Venezuela's govern- ment suspended civil rights after two days of rioting against austerity measures im- posed to curb imports and contract the economy. The Iranian leader, Ayatollah Khomeini, held talks with Mr Eduard Shevardnadze and spoke of the forging of strong ties between Moscow and Teheran in 'confronting the devilish acts of the West'. In Paris, speaking after the annual Anglo-French summit, Mrs Thatcher praised the unified response of EEC coun- tries to condemn the Ayatollah's threat against Mr Rushdie. Bombay police fired on a mob of 10,000 Muslims demonstrating against Mr Rushdie's bOok, killing ten and injuring up to 50 people. Nine 'people were sucked out to their deaths when a hole was torn in the fuselage of a Boeing 747 jumbo. jet after it took off from Honolulu. Senator John Tower, President Bush's embattled Defense Secretary nominee took a pledge on ABC News never to touch a drop of alcohol should the full Senate endorse his
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