PORTRAIT OF THE WEEK
The countryside in May Mr John Major, the Prime Minister, would still lead the Tories into the next election despite their poor showing in the local elections, according to Mr Michael Heseltine, who likes to call himself the First Secretary of State. Mr Major had ear- lier said that Eurosceptics were living 'in cloud-cuckoo-land'. Later, during a visit by Chancellor Kohl of Germany, when asked if the Government would win support in a referendum on Europe, he said, 'We would not win such a referendum today.' Mr Douglas Hurd, the Foreign Secretary, attacked in a speech Sir James Goldsmith's Referendum Party in strong terms: 'The Government's policy must not be put at the mercy of millionaires who play with British politics as a hobby,' he said. 'Is it the Europe of 1945 he wants, or 1935?' His speech was said to have had the support of Mr Major. Mr Douglas Hogg, the Agricul- ture Minister, flew to Luxembourg offering to slaughter 42,000 cows if only the Euro- pean Community would lift a worldwide ban on British beef exports: 'I am not anx- ious to arouse expectations,' he said. Four Cabinet Ministers were among Tories who ensured a Government defeat on the Divorce Bill. A bomb planted by the Irish Republican Army, containing more than 301bs of high explosives, was discovered under Hammersmith Bridge before it could go off; the IRA had last tried to blow it up on 29 March 1939, when a bomb was found by a hairdresser. Sinn Fein, the political face of the IRA, said that it would take part on 30 May in elections to a new assembly in Northern Ireland; the British Government said that it would not then be allowed to take part in all-party talks planned for 30 June. The Treasury may have to pay back billions of pounds' worth of VAT to shops which used interest-free credit, if a Court of Appeal judgment is upheld by the Lords; the overpaid tax goes back to 1973. National Power and Power- Gen had their plans to buy regional elec- tricity companies blocked by Mr Ian Lang, the Secretary of State for Trade and Indus- try. P.L. Travers, the inventor of Mary Poppins, died, aged 96.
THOUSANDS of refugees from southern Lebanon returned to their homes after a ceasefire between Israel and the Hezbollah Islamic guerrillas; this had come about after Mr Warren Christopher, the United States Secretary of State, spent a week fly- ing about the Middle East talking to lead- ers in Israel, Syria and Lebanon. The Unit- ed States then offered Israel new defence systems. A man with a gun shot dead at random 32 people in Port Arthur, Tasma- nia, and then shot dead three hostages he had taken before police arrested him. Mr Imran Khan confirmed that he was setting up a movement in Pakistan to fight corrup- tion which could then become a political party. A bomb in a bus near Lahore killed 37 people. One of the five wives of the King of the Zulus was shot and stabbed by politi- cal rivals. In Paraguay a coup attempt blew over after President Juan Carlos Wasmosy rescinded his offer of the defence ministry to General Lino Oviedo. In Spain the Par- tido Popular, which belongs to the Centre- Right, finally made a pact with Catalan nationalists that should allow Mr Jose Maria Aznar to become prime minister. Russia signed a debt-deferment agreement with creditor nations covering £20 billion. The coalition that rules Germany decided to cut spending by £11 billion. Lufthansa revolutionised the boarding of aeroplanes by letting people with window seats on first. A sale of possessions of the late Mrs Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis raised $34 mil- lion, with $1 million being given for Presi- dent Kennedy's golf clubs. Czech farmers dumped three tons of onions outside the agriculture ministry building in Prague in protest against cheap imports from the European Community; some were taken home by grateful civil servants. Fires raged over vast areas of Mongolia.
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