PORTRAIT OF THE WEEK
Lord Justice Gibson and his wife Cecily were murdered by the IRA when an abandoned car containing between 400 and 5001bs of explosive was detonated as the couple were driving past it. A review of security procedures was ordered im- mediately by the British authorities. The Independent published an account of Mr Peter Wright's memoirs, in which he tells of an attempt by MI5 to overthrow Harold Wilson when Prime Minister in the mid- Seventies. It said that Mr Wright ends his book 'in some bitterness over his failure to get a full pension'. The Attorney General responded by instituting proceedings against the newspaper for contempt of court. The Prime Minister refused to insti- tute an inquiry, but told the House of Commons that Sir Maurice Oldfield, a former head of MI6, had been a homosex- ual. Nurses were awarded a 9.5 per cent pay rise in line with their independent review body's recommendations. The rise for 'top people' — judges, civil servants, etc — will be only 4.8 per cent this year, much less than in the recent past. This announcement led opposition MPs to re- new their claims that the Government is preparing for a general election. The CBI said industry was more optimistic than for many years past. The high street banks cut their interest rates to 9.5 per cent. Rolls- Royce put a price of 170p on its shares. The Herald of Free Enterprise was success- fully refloated and towed back into the outer harbour at Zeebrugge. At the in- quiry into the disaster the owners, Town- send Thoresen, accepted full responsibility for their ship's sinking. A survey showed that almost one third of Britons at any one moment claim that they are ill. Mr James Callaghan, the former Labour Prime Minister, was made a Knight of the Garter by the Queen. Mr John Silkin, a former Labour Chief Whip, died. The Rastafarian poet, Mr Benjamin Obadiah Zephania, was put forward as a visiting fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge.
FOLLOWING a violent terrorist attack on a bus station in Colombo, in which 111 people were killed, the Sri Lankan govern- ment responded with a five-day offensive against Tamil bases in which 400 people died. In South Africa, the Natal Supreme Court overturned emergency restrictions on reporting violence and unrest. The Japanese Prime Minister, Mr. Yashiro Nakasone, prepared for his visit to Washington this week by describing the current dispute over microchips with the United States as 'a thorn embedded in one's little finger'. It was announced that the Austrian President, Kurt Waldheim, has been put on the United States' watch list' as a suspected Nazi. This means that he will find it difficult to enter the country in which he lived for some years as Secietary General of the United Nations. On a visit to Nicaragua Mr Graham Greene was awarded the Sandinista gov- ernment's highest decoration for literary achievement, the Ruben Dario Medal. A report from Vanderbilt University, Nash- ville, Tennessee, entitled Tears and Weep- ing among Professional Women, said that 80 per cent of women cry at work. This was not because they could not cope or wanted to manipulate their bosses, but because `they want to be heard'. A huge barge loaded with 3,000 tons of rotting New York garbage was turned away from the port of Campeche in the Yucatan peninsula by the Mexican navy and air force. The barge is said to be oozing liquid waste and cannot find anywhere to unload.
MStJT
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