Cable Briefs

Press, 29 August 1980, Page 6

Cable Briefs

Policeman killed

A police sub-inspector who was allegedly involved in the police gang rape of a woman at Bagnpat in northern India in June has been shot dead, the Press Trust of India reports. The officer, S u b-Inspector Narinder Singh, was shot from a passing oar while riding on a motor-cycle near Meerut. The Baghpat affair, in which policemen were alleged to have shot dead a woman’s husband and then paraded her naked through the streets before raping her, resulted in stormy debates in Parliament and anti-police demonstrations. — India.

: Sailing ship found ' A British sailing ship I crushed by encroaching ice '127 years ago has been found apparently well preserved in the freezing ; waters of the Canadian Arctic, the National Geographic Society 4 has announced. (H.M.S. Breadaibane was dis- ‘ covered by scientists using special sonar aboard a Canadian Coast Guard er. The National Geographic, which' funded the work, said the Breadaibane was the northernmost-known shipwreck so far discovered, it lay about 201 km from the magnetic North Pole. Sonar images showed that Breadaibane was resting upright in 92m of water with two of her three 30m masts still standing, apparently draped with sails and rigging. — Washington.

10 p.c. U.S. inflation The United States economy faces particularly unfavourable conditions over the next 18 months with a persistently high inflation, rising unemployment and low growth, the Organisation for Economic Co-oper-ation and Development has said. Its annual review of the economy forecasts inflation of 9 to 10 per cent continuing through next year. “If the forecasts prove accurate, the next economic expansion will begin with historically high inflation. The priority for economic policy must be to reverse this trend. — Paris. Seventh hijack

An Eastern Airlines jet hijacked to Cuba has returned from Havana after its hijackers surrendered to Cuban authorities. The Lockheed Tristar, with 241 people on board, was seized by three armed men soon after take-off for Miami from New York. The three threatened the 13-member crew with what appeared to be Molotov cocktails — bottles apparently containing petrol — which they said they would ignite if their orders were not followed. Cuban refugees disappointed with conditions in the United States and wanting to return since the mass exodus to Florida earlier this year have been responsible for a recent spate of hijackings. — Miami.

Fishermen dispersed Seaborne police fired teargas to scatter fishermen blockading the French ; oil port of Fos-Sur-Mer with their trawlers again yesterday, and the Government vowed to keep its important harbours open. Gendarmes aboard French Navy tugboats moved in a few hours before dawn firing tear-gas grenades at the picket line of trawlers in Fos-Sur-Mer Harbour near Marseilles on the Mediterranean. The fishermen fought back with rpeks. and bolts, . four of them' were injured. It was the third time, in the 15-day-old strike that Government forces have been ordered to break the- blockade where it affects oil supplies. — Paris. Airliner alert

Four smouldering suitcases were found aboard an Indonesian airliner yesterday shortly after the crash of another also on a domestic route, airline sources have said. The police are checking the contents of the suitcases, discovered when passengers complained of an acrid smell aboard a turbo-prop Electra of Mandala Airlines. Only a few hours before a turboprop Vickers Viscount of another domestic airline had plunged out of control into marshland 27km from Jakarta, killing. 25 passengers and six crew. — Jakarta.