PORTRAIT OF THE WEEK
The miracle worker.
Mr John Major, the Prime Minister, and Mr Albert Reynolds, the Irish Prime Minister, issued a joint declaration on Northern Ireland. Some Unionists called it a 'surrender'. A 10001b bomb was defused in Belfast. The IRA shot dead two police- men; the UFF shot one man dead. Some 100,000 rail commuters were delayed by a bomb near Woking. Mr Yasser Arafat, the PLO leader, visited Britain for the first time. Three Britons and a Frenchman were released by Iraq. In evidence to the Scott Inquiry, Mr Alan Clark, the former Trade and Defence Minister, suggested that Par- liament should have been told about changes to rules governing exports to Iraq. He disagreed with evidence that had been given by Mr William Waldegrave, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, say- ing: 'One is back to a slightly Alice in Won- derland situation. I remember Mr Walde- grave saying that because something hadn't been announced, it hadn't happened.' The Government commissioned the Thermal Oxide Reprocessing Plant (Thorp) for nuclear fuel. Fishermen succeeded in get- ting the Government to revoke its ban on fishing days in the face of court action in the EC. Trafalgar House, which owns the
Ritz Hotel, lost £347 million in the year to 30 September; it has been bailed out by a £300 million loan from the Hongkong & Shanghai Bank. Police reopened inquiries into the death of Jimi Hendrix in 1970. There is no eternal damnation and Christ will not come again, according to Dr David Jenkins, the Bishop of Durham, aged 68. The Revd Wilbert Awdry, aged 82, was said to have earned £7 million out of his Thomas the Tank Engine series since it was put on television.
THE RIGHT-WING Liberal Democrats led by Mr Vladimir Zhirinovsky became the largest party in the Russian Duma after the general election. The leaders of the Baltic states immediately held a summit in view of Mr Zhirinovsky's ambitions to re- establish a Russian empire. The powers of President Yeltsin were also strengthened by a referendum that approved a new constitu- tion. A Soyuz TM-10 capsule fetched £1.3 million in an auction of second-hand for- mer Soviet space hardware. The European Community and the United States decided, to Hollywood's outrage, to remove audio- visual products from the schedule of the Uruguay round of talks on the General Agreement on Tariffs and Wednesday's deadline. The crew of Endeavour returned to Earth after 11 days and five space-walks during an operation to mend the Hubble telescope. Israel delayed withdrawal from the Gaza strip. The last of the Palestinians expelled last year by Israel to a no-man's land in southern Lebanon was allowed to return. Mr Chris Patten, the Governor of Hong Kong, pressed ahead with reforms to the colony's election mechanism, despite Chinese threats to dismantle any legislature he put in place when it takes over in 1997. Jozsef Antall, the first post-communist leader of Hungary, died, aged 61; he was succeeded as Prime Minister by Mr Peter Boros. Mr Eduardo Frei, a Christian Democrat, led a centre-left coalition to victory in the Chilean elections. In Andor- ra's first elections, the party of its leader, Mr Oscar Ribas, failed to gain a majority. Mryna Loy, who appeared in more than 100 films, died, aged 88. Mr Walter Briggs, aged 38, a fisherman, passed his driving test in Timaru, New Zealand, but failed a breath-test after having drunk two pints of beer to steady his nerves. The Pope is to visit South Africa.
CSH
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