Cable Briefs

Press, 29 December 1980, Page 8

Cable Briefs

Airliner blast traced There was an explosion 'in one of the two restrooms on the jetliner that crashed in northern Colombia last week and the blast may have been caused by a bomb, the. manager of the airline has said. All 68 people aboard died in the , crash. The possibility of the explosion being caused by ; a possible cargo of fireworks shipped illegally by a passenger is not being discounted. — Bogota. Berlin violence Gangs Of youths supporting a "squatters’ . rights" housing movement shattered windows, vandalised stores, and set several fires in downtown .West > Berlin during the two-day Christmas holiday, authorities have said: The violence broke out despite -a., truce between city authorities • and ■ squatters after ; ’a' series. of . street battles. and apartment take* overs that left scortsZ-ih-jured. The youths are -protesting against X housing shortage, which exists; while blocks of apartments stand empty,. awaiting renovation or destruction. They blame real-estate, speculation'for the shortage. — Wes;t Berlin. ? Papers appeal A South African Supreme Court judge has put off until today a ruling on a. newspaper chain’s urgent application for restoration of registration certificates on three of its newspapers catering for black readers. The Argus publishing company was told by the Ministry of Interna! Affairs last Tuesday that the registration certificates of four of its newspapers had lapsed because they had not been printed for more ,than a month owing to a journalists’ strike. The company re* ceived the order only hours after settlement of the twomonth strike over pay, con* ditions and union recognition. A lawyer for Argus told the Supreme Court that the company had. published one-sheet copies of three of the papers during the strike and sent them to the statutory publication bodies. He added that the fourth would not be published again. — Johannesburg. Soviet latest Seismic signals believed to be from a Soviet underground nuclear explosion have been recorded by a United States Atomic Energy detection system, the Department of Energy has re* ported. The signals originated at 5.9 p.m. Saturday (NZ time) at the Semipalatinsk nuclear test area in Siberia: The test was the tenth so far this year for the Soviet Union, compared to 14 for the United States. —Washington. Doctors reprimanded . Six doctors at the University of California Los Angeles medical school have Men reprimanded for performing experimental bone-marrow transplants on.. . dying patients without approval from a school committee entrusted with safeguarding patients, the "Los Angeles Times has reported. But members of the human subject protection committee are dissatisfied with reprimands and are demanding a full investigation by the school’s administrators,' the newspaper said. Under Federal law as well 'as univer* sity rules, all such .experiments must be approved by. the committee before being performed. One doctor complained that ; the committee oh occasion delayed important research and experiments because of such i things as spelling ' or grammatical errors in filling put forms. — Los Angeles,