Cable Briefs

Press, 2 March 1981, Page 8

Cable Briefs

*Observer 9 call The British Press Council has called for the planned take-over of the British nat- ■ ional Sunday newspaper, the f “Observer,” by the Lonrho '3 company, to be referred to the Monopolies and Mergers . ’ Commission. The council said that the clear intention of the Fair Trading Act and J the Monopolies and Mergers 3 Act was that newspaper take-overs involving circulations of more than 500,000 if should be subject to Govem-i ' menf. approval and scrutiny. - by the Monopolies Commission. The exception- waswhere, without , the take- | over,, a newspaper would a die. There was no suggestion that this was the case with > the “Observer,” and no | warning of its sale, it Jsaid.—London. . ; i Head found 1 The New South’ Wales ♦ police are investigating the , discovery of a human head « near where the headless » body of a girl was dis-» ‘ covered last month. The Wollongong police said the ' severed head was found by c ! man walking his dogs. It J » was skm from the site I J where 19-year-old Kim ! Barry’s body was dis* - covered.—Wollongong, ‘ j * Lennon’s estate * John Lennon, shot dead,* outside his New York apart- * ? ment on December 8, left an jtestate in England and Wales V valued at $6.2 million, ‘J according to his will.- In the u. will, dated November 22, ( 1979, Lennon left half his j estate to his wife, Yoko J* Ono, and the rest to be held '* in a trust fund. Details oft, the trust fund were not dis- ■ i closed but Lennon’s son,- Ju* lian, by his first/, wife, -J Cynthia, was believed to be i the main beneficiary of the f British estate.—London. £ Oil loophole move i A black nationalist • leaden » from South Africa has said ’• his movement had asked ; Arab States to close the loop- ?. holes through which his 3 * country received oil. Ahmed: i Gora Ebrahim, a central committee member of the banned Pan-Africanist Con* i gress, said: “We have asked i?-': Arab countries through the 4/ Organisation of Petroleum / Exporting Countries to com- - pile a blacklist of companies |? who are supplying oil to ; South Africa oa the high’ .»< seas.” South Africa got SO : per cent of its oil from Iran j, before the revolution, and f now paid up to $BO a barrel f for oil which it bought at f - sea or through Caribbean • suppliers. This is more than ’: double the average O.P.E.C, * price,—Addis Ababa, Exercise in Poland | About 35,000 Warsaw Pact ; troops will begin a week of manoeuvres in. Poland today, j ( The exercise, named Tarza : ’Bl (Shield ’81), will involve ! troops; drawn mainly from ; Soviet units stationed in Po* / • land and from the Polish > ’ Army. West Berlin sources v said the manoeuvres appeared to be part of the regular pro- ; gramme of Warsaw Pact exer-1.-. 1 cises. But it was unusual that lit should be held only six ; > months after 'the big Brother- ; hood-in-Arms .’BO exercise ! staged in East Germany c i September. Meanwhile the »• / dependent trade union federa- z ■ tion Solidarity is willing to g • observe the three-month lab- g > our truce appealed for by the J Polish Government if the re-, & t giine makes some concessions £ > soon two top labour ■ have said in a newspaper; g interview.— -Warsaw. ■?■ ■*£