PORTRAIT OF THE WEEK
Lrd Sawyer, a former general secretary of the Labour party, said that Mr Tony Blair, the Prime Minister, was out of touch with the electorate; 'When Mrs Thatcher was at her prime, there was a feeling when she was at her best that she was very close to people,' he said. 'In a sense, people don't feel that about Tony.' Mr William Hague, the leader of the opposition, said that low standards in schools were all Labour's fault (even though it had not been in power for two decades) because Labour was 'in thrall to the obsessions of the liberal establishment' which had ruined edu- cation. The last large-scale wool yarn spin- ners in Scotland, Laidlaw and Fairgrieve, closed after 140 years. Mr Stephen Byers, the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, announced £15 million of aid to the textile and clothing industry while wearing a suit made in South Africa. Mr Gordon Brown, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, ordered two suits to be made for him, for which he will pay £2,000 each. The Queen met for the first time Mrs Camilla Parker Bowles, the constant friend of the Prince of Wales, at a birthday party for King Constantine of the Hellenes; a meeting between Mrs Parker Bowles and the Archbishop of Canterbury was also said to be significant of something or other. A small bomb, planted presumably by some Irish Republican terrorist group, exploded under Hammersmith Bridge at four in the morning injuring no one, but clos- ing the bridge to traffic for weeks. The Com- mons debated a Bill to reform the Royal Ulster Constabulary; police in Northern Ire- land said that the murder of Ed McCoy in Dunrnurry, Belfast, at the end of May was drug-related and the work of the IRA. More than 2,000 soldiers went absent without leave last year. British combat troops were with- drawn from Sierra Leone, still rent by fight- ing for control of its diamond production. Britain sought an embargo on diamonds from rebel sources. Britain, with an average life-expectancy at birth of 71.7 years, figured 14th on a table compiled by the World Health Organisation; top was Japan, with 74.5 years, the United States was 20th with 70, and bottom was Sierra Leone with 25.9.
PRESIDENT William Clinton of the United States met President Vladimir Putin of Rus- sia in Moscow, but Mr Putin would not give approval to America's plan to build a missile defence system. In Ukraine Mr Clinton said that the United States would help pay for the final closure of the Chernobyl nuclear- power station. Mr Putin then went to the Vatican and met the Pope. It remained unclear who was ruling Fiji after its coup three weeks before, but Fiji was expelled from the 'councils of the Commonwealth'. Another coup took place in the Solomon Islands, where a group called the Malaita Eagle Force captured Mr Bartholomew Ulaf alu, the Prime Minister; underlying the trouble in the Solomon Islands are anin101" ties between the people of Guadalcanal, the c main island, and people from the island °' Malaita, who have been migrating there' Mrs Glenys Kinnock escaped with Mr Mill. Corrie, a member of the European Parlia- ment, after their aeroplane was hit by 01' fire. Rwandan and Ugandan soldiers, for' merly allies, continued with renewed for their year-long fight for the city of Kisarl: gani, of strategic importance in saliva control of diamondproduction in the Democratic Republic of the Congo; 11,00u Zimbabwean troops were also busy fighttg for diamond production in Congo. Poland, Solidarity proposed continuing as " minority government after its main partner' the Freedom Union, abandoned attemPts save the coalition that it led. Iran gave bac,' to Iraq the bodies of 489 soldiers killed the Iran—Iraq war of 1980-88; Iraq retor sy 65 bodies to Iran. A Eurostar train —c t derailed in northern France at 150 mph, b1,41 only a handful of people were slightly lurs,,' An earthquake in Sumatra killed more th'i:t 100. Beijing University tried to stern studef unrest by extending the opening hours shower blocks from 7.30 p.m. to 9.30 p.olcs• 0
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