PORTRAIT OF THE WEEK
Mr Kenneth Clarke, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, indicated that public sector workers would not get pay rises if they did not improve productivity. Headline infla- tion fell further. There was more talk of putting VAT on newspapers and books. Conservative Party members are putting down motions against Government failures on law and order and the imposition of VAT on fuel for the party conference next month. British Rail is cutting about 10,000 trains and closing 50 stations on Sundays in its winter timetable. The InterCity part of British Rail was said to have cancelled orders for £150 million of new rolling-stock for the west coast route to Scotland when the suppliers, GEC, said it would cost near- ly fl 2 million per train. The money (from the Government) may go to Kent routes; this annoyed the Scots. About 57 per cent of women said they would prefer to wait till 65, instead of the present 60, to receive state pensions. Divorced husbands would have to pay their ex-wives part of their pen- sions under Government proposals, British survivors of Japanese prisoner of war camps called upon Mr Major to bring up their claim for compensation when he visits Japan this weekend. Creditor banks came up with a £1.1 billion package to save the Canary Wharf development in east Lon- don; Mirror Group newspapers want to move there, partly, according to a spokesman, to sever their links from their late crooked controller, Robert Maxwell. The biggest known hoard of Iron Age coins — nearly 1,000 — was found by a man with a metal-detector in a ploughed field in Worcestershire. Andy Roxburgh, Scot- land's soccer manager, resigned when his team failed to qualify for the World Cup. Kew's first crop of coconuts to be grown in this country was threatened by a plague of mice.
ISRAEL AND the Palestine Liberation Organisation signed an accord intended to bring peace. The signatories were Mr Shi- mon Peres, the Israeli foreign minister, and Mr Mahmoud Abbas, his Palestinian coun- terpart. The ceremony took place on the lawn of the White House where Presidents Clinton, Bush and Carter and hundreds of foreign representatives also saw a symbolic shaking of hands between Mr Yitzhak Rabin, the Israeli Prime Minister, and Mr Yassir Arafat, the PLO leader. The agree- ment set out a timetable in principle for the withdrawal of direct Israeli rule from the Gaza Strip and Jericho, with Palestinian control of policing, health and education there, while Israel is to retain control of overall security. The next day an agreement was signed between Israel and Jordan
(where about 60 per cent of the people are Palestinian) on an agenda for talks about `land for peace'. Meanwhile the World Bank proposed a $4,300 billion aid pro- gramme for the new Palestinian areas, to which several countries have already pledged money. President Clinton offered to host a conference of donor nations. Mr Rabin visited Morocco on the way home, but diplomatic relations were not immedi- ately established. Saudi Arabia is persecut- ing minority Shia Muslims and Christian migrant workers, according to Amnesty International. There was a five-day artillery battle between Serb and Croat forces in the so-called Krajina area of the former Yugoslavia. The 11 bishops of Cuba com- plained of the 'omnipresent ideology' of President Castro's regime. China released one of its most prominent dissidents, Wei Jingsheng, though thousands more remain imprisoned. Chinese women athletes made suspiciously fast times in the National Games in Peking. Another British tourist was shot dead in Florida. His girlfriend was wounded. The remains of the wartime Pol- ish Prime Minister in exile General Wladis- law Sikorski was returned from England to Krakow: the Duke of Edinburgh attended the ceremony. Raymond Burr, who played Perry Mason on television, died, aged 76.
CSH
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