PORTRAIT OF THE WEEK
M r Edward Heath, the former Prime Minister, said he would visit Baghdad at the request of Mr Douglas Hurd, the Foreign Secretary, to persuade Saddam Hussein to release sick British hostages. Mr Hurd said he had made no such request. Mr John MacGregor, the Educa- tion Secretary, said that education vouchers might be proposed in the next Conservative manifesto. Mrs Thatcher met President de Klerk and said she hoped negotiations with the ANC would soon be under way. Mr Patrick Nicholls, a junior minister involved in the campaign against drunk driving, resigned after being charged with driving with excess alcohol following a late dinner during the Conservative party conference. The Princess of Wales was given a police warning after driving down Kensington High Street at 55 mph. The cost of the Royal Family in 1990 was expected to reach £56 million. Inflation reached 10.9 per cent. Rugby players were given permission to become fee-earning amateurs. One in four British sheep were said to be infected with scrapie, a brain disease. The number of people who were known to have caught Aids through heter- osexual intercourse was reported to have doubled, over the past 12 months, to 240. Most local councils were reported to be failing to reach their targets in collecting the poll tax. An 11-year-old girl was raped while in hospital in Carshalton, Surrey. Lester Piggott resumed his career as a jockey at the age of 54, and rode two winners on his second day. The Booker prize for fiction was won by A.S. Byatt for her novel Possession. A ferret which was tipped to become a British record holder was kidnapped from his cage.
ISRAEL refused to co-operate with a United Nations mission to investigate the killing of Palestinians in riots in Jerusalem. Mr Hurd visited Israel after condemning Israeli police for 'excessive use of force', and also had talks with Palestinians in Jerusalem. The Old City was flooded with police and soldiers to prevent further protests. President Bush proposed a budget comprised of higher income taxes for rich Americans in return for a cut in capital gains tax. US unemployment and prices continued to rise; US public support for risking its troops in the Gulf crisis began to wane. There were reports of large new oilfields being found in Saudi Arabia. The Speaker of Egypt's people's assembly, Dr Rifaat al Mahgoub, was assassinated. President Gorbachev was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Nelson Mandela, the deputy leader of the African National Congress, said he was not a socialist and that he wanted to see capitalism flourish among black South Africans. South Afri- can laws to keep blacks and whites apart in libraries, swimming pools and lavatories were abolished. More than 50,000 people marched on the Ukrainian parliament de- manding the resignation of the leadership and free elections. The husband of Benazir Bhutto, the former prime minister of Pakistan, was arrested on charges of mis- use of power. The High Court ruled that the President of Pakistan had acted legally in dismissing the Bhutto government. A Japanese businessman developed a device enabling parents to limit the time children spend watching television. Leonard Bern- stein died in New York aged 72. SB
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