Cable briefs

Press, 9 April 1981, Page 8

Cable briefs

Coach defects Bela Karoly, the Rumanian gymnastics trainer] t who coached Nadia ’ Comaneci to six medals ac the 1976 Montreal . has defected to the'United) States. State Department] officials have said. Mr r Karoly said he defected be- . cause'Rumania interfered in r his coaching of Comaneci. > Mr Karoly, who is 38. his wife, Marta, and Geza Poz- • sar, the top choreographer [ for the Rumanian national gymnastics team, told Rui manian officials of their decision in a meeting at the State Department. The officials said the Karolys left their seven-year-old daughter and Mr Pozsar left his wife and infant daughter in Rumania. They have asked that the Rumanian Government permit their families to join them.—Washington. Mountbatten line Lord Mountbatten in a. previously unpublished interview, confirmed in 1978 that he had been approached to take over power from the) Harold Wilson Labour gov-i ernment in Britain in 1968, | according to the “Daily Tele-! graph.” He gave his account of a meeting with Cecil King,! then the International Publishing Corporation’s chair-j man, and Lord Zuckerman, i then chief scientific adviser, to the British Government,-in ' a tape-recorded interview ■ with “Time” magazine, the) “Telegraph” said. The “Tele-; graph” reported that Lord Mountbatten had said in the J interview, published in this week’s issue of “Time;” “Cecil King came to see me, at his own request; and said would I take over the country, to which my retort was to kick him out?’—London. Shuttle repair Launch crews have made repairs on the first space shuttle, Columbia, and put iti back on schedule for lift-off tomorrow night with two American astronauts aboard. “Everything here seems to, be going ’ smoothly at this time,” a Space Agency spokesman said just before the countdown resumed. The, countdown had stopped for : 12 hours repair. The astro- ] nauts on the flight will be John Young and Robert Crippen.—Cape Canaveral. , Disease scare A suspected case of fodi and-mouth disease is being investigated at’a mid-Wales farm. Agriculture Ministry'' veterinary officers have been called to the farm, near Newtown. The latest scare came only, hours after the Ministry said it was?“cau- ■ tiously optimistic” that the disease farmers fear most| had been.beaten in Britain.; The farmer, Mr Eddy Jones, i. raised the alert when he* noticed that some of hjs 500- ‘ strong flock of breeding ewes had gone lame.—Cardiff. ! Radiation claim Radiation poisoning may be threatening the population of a mid-New South Wales north coast town, according to a doctor. Dr John Mackay, of Port Macquarie, said he was treating eight people for what he believed was radiation poisoning as a result of a highway accident late last year. A truck carrying what he said Was radioactive material overturned on the Pacific Highway at Laurieton, and one of the containers broke open. “The containers- were labelled ‘Strip XX: fatal if absorbed through the skin’,” he said. The authorities were covering up the exact contents of the containers, he alleged.—Sydney. . , ) Reagan recovery i President Ronald Reagan, his recovery from a bullet wound in the left lung perhaps slowed by his age, may have to stay in the hospital another week until his fever is gone and he is off antibiotics, according to doctors. Dr Dennis O’Leary, Dean of Clinical Affairs at the hospital, said Mr Reagan may be there longer than had been expected. Mr Reagan had a slight fever last night and doctors wanted him to remain in hospital until his temperature was normal and he was off antibiotics. That could be another week. Dr O’Leary said there was a “four or five day spread” in which Mr Reagan could leave, depending upon his progress.—Washington.