PORTRAIT OF THE WEEK
The big blipper Under pressure to uphold the value of the falling pound, the Chancellor, Nigel Lawson, raised British bank base rates by one per cent to 15 per cent. The move came one day after West German lending rates were similarly lifted, but by the end of the week sterling had fallen to its lowest point against the deutschmark for two years. Twenty-eight members of the Ulster Defence Regiment were arrested and ques- tioned in connection with the leaking of documents to loyalist paramilitaries. A report by the Friends of the Earth radia- tion monitoring unit recorded levels of contamination around the Sellafield nuc- lear reprocessing plant up to 13 times higher than the maximum levels recom- mended by the National Radiological Pro- tection Board, casting doubt on the validity of the nuclear industry's own figures. The new Secretary of State for the Environ- ment, Chris Patten, announced his `mindedness' to disapprove a scheme by developers to build a new town of 4,800 houses in an abandoned quarry in Hamp- shire, thus reversing the decision of his predecessor, Nicholas Ridley. Six elderly nuns at a monastery near Daventry, North- amptonshire, locked themselves into a hen-house to defy an attempt by Ministry of Agriculture officials to slaughter 5,000 hens which had been identified as being infected with salmonella. It was revealed that Marina Ogilvy, the unmarried daugh- ter of Princess Alexandra, is pregnant. The first crime on the Northern Scottish island of Foula for 81 years was recorded when a Land-Rover was found vandalised. Gra- ham Chapman, the satirical writer and actor, died of throat cancer on the eve of the 20th anniversary of the first edition of the television show Monty Python's Flying Circus, which made him famous.
IN EAST Berlin, riot police suppressed a pro-democracy march during the 40th anniversary celebrations of the founding of the German Democratic Republic. As 10,000 more East German emigrants caught trains to the West, the Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, invited as guest of honour to the anniversary celebra- tions, made a plea for any further would-be refugees to reconsider their plans, but warned the East German leader, Herr Honecker, that his country could not ignore the need for social and political reforms. The Hungarian Communist Party voted to remodel itself along the lines of a western European democratic party and to change its name to the Hungarian Socialist Party. The South African President, F W de Klerk, ordered the unconditional re- lease of eight black anti-apartheid activists, including Walter Sisulu, who was jailed for life alongside Nelson Mandela in 1964. Lhamo Dhondrub, the Dalai Lama, exiled leader of Tibet, was awarded the Nobel peace prize, drawing anger from the Chinese government, which claimed the choice was an interference in her domestic affairs, The caretaker government of Greece resigned to make way for fresh elections following three months spent clearing up the scandal that surrounded the administration of the former prime minis- ter, Andreas Papandreou. The Soviet news agency Tass reported the landing of several ten to 13 feet high aliens in the city of Voronezh in central Russia. The Hollywood actress Bette Davis died at the age of 81. The Moulin Rouge in Paris celebrated its 100th anniversary. RJC
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