PORTRAIT OF THE WEEK
An IRA bomb exploded in Whitehall: no one was injured. Part-time UDR sol- diers were called up to oppose an IRA bombing campaign against business premis- es in Northern Ireland. 1,5001b of IRA explosives were found in Belfast, and a Loyalist arms cache was uncovered in Co. Antrim, including a sub-machine-gun. Kevin and Ian Maxwell refused to answer questions from a Commons committee on pension funds mismanaged by Maxwell companies, opening themselves to a charge of contempt of Parliament. The pound slipped below its effective floor in the ERM for the first time, triggering a further round of calls for devaluation. Alison Halford, assistant chief constable of Merseyside Police, was suspended for a second time and a new enquiry into allegations against her began. An appeal began to protect barn owls: fewer than 5,000 breeding pairs are thought to survive. A report by four Angli- can bishops suggested that draft legislation to bring in women priests may have to be redrawn, delaying the move by several years. Leroy Wade was jailed for nine years for killing his baby by throwing her into the Thames, and disfiguring the child's mother for life. David Kirke, founder of the Dan- gerous Sports Club, was sentenced to nine
months in prison for fraud. Gerald Ratner resigned from his job as chairman of Rat- ners after large losses, the price of over- expansion, high borrowing, and an unusual- ly frank speech in which he called one of his own products 'crap'. The Jockey Club announced the introduction of Sunday rac- ing. Bristol magistrates fined Nestle of Croydon £3,500 after a teacher found a dead lizard in his morning muesli.
TROOPS and tanks were brought onto the streets of Algiers after Algeria's High Secu- rity Council cancelled the coming general election, which was likely to deliver power to Muslim fundamentalists, and the Presi- dent of Algeria resigned. EEC countries agreed to grant diplomatic recognition to the republics of Slovenia and Croatia, ren- dering the old federation of Yugoslavia obsolete. President Yeltsin of Russia reject- ed Ukrainian claims to the former USSR Black Sea fleet: he said it was Russian. The Ukraine said it might have to sell weapons technology on the world market unless it received £120 million in foreign aid to con- vert factories. Tengiz Sigua, Prime Minister of the provisional government in Georgia, said that the military commanders who led its coup would step down within a week. The United States said it was pushing ahead with its Star Wars programme because Soviet nuclear knowledge was now effectively for sale, and might fall into dan- gerous hands. EEC officials went to the Commonwealth of Independent States to try to set up a way of distributing food to the people, rather than officials and crimi- nals. President Bush was criticised for fail- ing to achieve anything useful when he returned to the United States after visiting Asia. Unemployment in the United States rose to 7.1 per cent. German trade unions warned that Europe's strongest economy was heading for recession, as talks between employers and the huge IG Metall steel union collapsed over demands for more than 10 per cent pay rises. Around 20,000 died in feuding between clans in Somalia. China rejected calls for an amnesty for dis- sidents jailed because of the pro-democracy movement in 1989. Reports in French newspapers suggested Robert Maxwell's body may have shown signs of beating before his death when it was examined in Israel, but a British Home Office patholo- gist who was present denied the reports. Murder charges were filed against Imelda Marcos over two youths killed by troops when she was Governor of Manila. SB
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