Cable Briefs

Press, 26 December 1979, Page 6

Cable Briefs

Researcher held The South African secur-l ity police have said they are! holding a university re-, searcher in connection with, what they called sensitive! documents concerning South! Africa’s energy potential.' Newspapers quoted police: sources as saying the documents concerned South Africa's highly controversial: ! nuclear development. including a nuclear power station being built by a French consortium north of Cape I Town. The security police ! chief. Brigadier Johann Coetzee, named the man being held as Dr Renfrew Christie, aged 30, a former, deputy president of the radi-j cal-leaning National Union I of South African Students.: —Johannesburg. Puma menace Scottish Highland sheep: are a hardy lot but they are! defenceless against an exotic: menace now stalking the! glens and heaths — pumas.' Bewildered farmers in Ayrshire, Invernesshire. and the far north-west of Scotland have been finding sheep bones stripped bare. Naturalists have confirmed the sightings of alsation-sized pumas. The big cats are thought to have been pets released into the wild when: the Government passed! legislation in 1976 requiring! expensive licences for such] exotic creatures. There is noj danger to humans, according to One expert. —London.

Blasts hit offices Three bombs exploded in central Rome at the weekend. one of them in a hostel for homeless people and the others at American and French airline offices. Noone was reported injured in the blasts, for which an Armenian nationalist group later took responsibility. A blast on November 8 badly damaged the Turkish Airlines office. The Armenians want independence from Turkey. — Rome.

Venice flooded Flood disasters are likely in Venice every few years if urgent protective measures are not taken, Venice city leaders have said. The Mayor of Venice, regional authorities. and members of Parliament met to consider plans after flood tides last week which caused millions of dollars worth of damage. Weather experts said the city was saved from disaster only by a change of wind. Before ” it came. shops, homes, and installations had been swamped, leaving many people temporarily homeless and traders ruined. The floods were the highest since the disaster of 196'6.— Venice.

39 die in crash Thirty-nine people are believed dead after a Turkish Airlines plane crashed and exploded in flames on a hill near Ankara on Sunday, airport officials said. They said three passengers and a stewardess had been rescued from the burning wreckage, but there was virtually no hope of finding any other survivors. The Fokker! F2B Fellowship jet aircraft had been flying from the Black Sea town of Samsun to Ankara with 39 passengers and four crew when it lost radio contact shortly before it was due to land.—Ankara.!