Cable briefs

Press, 28 April 1981, Page 8

Cable briefs

Heathrow closed > All flights into Heathrow Airport were halted just , after 6.30 p.m. yesterday as a strike by air-traffic controllers took immediate effect. At the southern air-traffic control centre at West Drayton only 10 controllers and assistants turned up for the early shift instead of the normal 50. An. official there said: “We have one man operating on each air traffic control sector instead of five. At present all flying in to Heathrow is effectively stopped.” The strike is part of the industrial action campaign by civil service unions in support of their pay claim. The controllers’ action is scheduled to last for five weeks and will be switched each day so that all 16 airports in Britain covered by the Civil Aviation Authority will be hit.—London. Fourth cover-up Some 278 workers have been exposed to radiation while repairing leaking pipes at the Japan Atomic Power Company's Tsuruga nuclear power station, it was learned yesterday. According to the Natural Resources and Energy Agency, some of the workers were feared to have been subjected to radioactivity to a dangerous degree. The agency has ordered the Japan Atomic Power Company to make a full report on all past cases of radioactive leaks from its nuclear power station in Tsuruga. after the disclosure last Saturday that the company had covered up yet another instance of nuclear waste leakage from the plant. The new case, the fourth of its kind, occurred last January 24 and 76 people, mostly workers of subcontractors, spent six days cleaning up the spill.— Tokyo. Angolan pledge The Angolan Foreign Minister (Mr Paolo Jorge) has said in a “Washington Post” interview that Angola will send home the 20,000 Cuban troops in its country once neighbouring Namibia gains independence. He added, however, that early signals from the Reagan Administration dimmed hopes for a peaceful solution of the situation in Namibia. Mr •Jorge said the Cubans were in Angola, which shelters Namibian guerrillas, to protect it from full-scale invasion. by South Africa. The Foreign Minister said South African troops had killed 1800 Angolans in the last three years.—Washington. Saudis grow Soaring oil prices during the 1970 s helped Saudi Arabia nearly triple its gross domestic product measured in real terms. However, the desert kingdom’s non-oil sector outperformed the oil sector. according to the annual report of the Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency. The dec- < ade covered by the kingdom's first and second five- i year plans, ending in mid- ; 1980, saw non-oil real G.D.P. I soar to more than 3.5 times i its 1970 level. Real per.cap- „ ita income more than doubled during the period. Government spending rosebetween 1970 and 1980 from $1.5 billion to $56.5 billion.— I Riyadh. Reagan girl wed President Reagan’s 40-year-old daughter, Maureen, arrived in London yesterday at the start of a honeymoon with her 28-year-old husband, Dennis Revell. The couple were married at the weekend in a ceremony that the President was unable to attend. On the flight from Los Angeles to Heathrow they were accompanied by six American Secret Service men. On arrival they were met by a small army of security officers including American agents plus uniformed police.—London.