PORTRAIT OF THE WEEK
Reagan's Last Stand Dear Editor and Readers,' Lord Rothschild wrote to the Daily Telegraph: `Since at least 1980 up to the present time there have been innuendoes in the press to the effect that I am "the fifth man", in other words a Soviet agent. The director general of MI5 should state publicly that it has unequivocal, repeat unequivocal, evi- dence that I am not, and never have been. . . Mrs Thatcher replied, a day later: 'I am advised that we have no evidence that he was ever a Soviet agent.' In Sydney, the former MI5 officer Mr Peter Wright, whom the British Govern- ment is trying to stop from publishing his memoirs, started to give evidence. He said he first met Lord Rothschild in 1958 and was absolutely certain that he never work- ed for the Russians. But he also said the British Establishment had been penetrated en masse by Russia, that people in power had turned 'a blind eye' and that Mrs Thatcher had misled Parliament, having perhaps been misled herself by MI5. The British Government's evidence was found, Mr Wright's counsel said, to contain 'fairly startling' discrepancies. The merchant bank N. M. Rothschild announced that £12 billion had been subscribed for British Gas shares, of which £5.6 billion-worth were available, and that British private investors had been allocated 64 per cent of the shares. Investors quickly began to sell at a profit. Mr Kinnock unveiled the Labour Party's non-nuclear defence policy. The Bishop of Whitby said clergy in depressed areas of the north were close to breaking point, and mentioned, among more hor- rifying cases, a priest unable to put his slippers on at night for fear of what will happen next. A priest in America had to go into hiding after telling parishioners' chil- dren that Father Christmas does not exist, and there was a riot at the Cutest Kid in the World Contest in Louisiana.
PARIS suffered its worst student violence since 1968, initially in protest at govern- ment proposals to restrict university ent- rance and put up fees, then in protest at the death of a student, allegedly beaten to death by the police. The Prime Minister, M. Chirac, appealed for calm, saying the government would not put up with `attempts by helmeted minorities to de- stabilise society'. Then he withdrew the proposals for university reform and accepted the resignation of the minister for higher education. American troops inter- vened in fighting on the border between Nicaragua and Honduras, ferrying Hon- duran troops, reportedly to repel an incur- sion by Sandinistas. In Bogota, a veteran of the Vietnam war killed 29 people, including his mother and some of her neighbours, before shooting himself. In Washington, President Reagan for the first time conceded that his dealings with Iran had been 'flawed', but was reported to have said to his wife, when she recom- mended that he sack his chief of staff, Mr Donald Regan: 'Get off my goddam back: Mr Robert McFarlane, formerly the Presi- dent's national security adviser, told a congressional inquiry that President Reagan had authorised the delivery of arms to Iran in August 1985, earlier than the administration has admitted. The last national security adviser to resign, Admiral Poindexter, and one of his staff, Colonel North, refused to tell congressional investi- gators anything. In Peking, Sir Edward Youde, Governor of Hong Kong, died; in Yorkshire, Christopher Sykes. , AJSG
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