Cable briefs

Press, 7 May 1981, Page 6

Cable briefs

I Somali appeal I Hundreds of thousands of I Somalians face starvation I because of floods that ended I three years of drought and I the Somali Government has I appealed to the world for I aid. “Hundreds of thousands I of people are isolated in I . their home villages and are I on the verge of starvation. I Malaria is already spreading I at an alarming rate and I there is grave concern for I the lives of inhabitants of the I flood-stricken areas,” the I Government said. It asked I for helicopters, light planes, I rubber boats, tents, blankets, I food, fuel, drugs and medical I teams. Several tonnes of | high-protein relief supplies were on their way to Somalia by the French-based | relief organisation “Doctors * Without Frontiers” to ease' ; the situation in refugee ? camps.—Mogadishu. Judge's fresh start The former chief justice of Idi Amin, the deposed Ugandan dictator, is working as a magistrate in Hong Kong. Mr Muhammad Said, who became head of the Ugandan High Court in 1974, joined Hong Kong’s Sanpokong Bench in January this year. Admitting that it was a step down to work as a magistrate after having been a chief justice, Mr Said said that he took up the new job because it gave him a chance to start his judicial career afresh. He did not discuss his relations with Idi Amin, but said he had headed a fourmember commission of inquiry into the disappearance of many people in Uganda.— ( Hong Kong. Riot town quiet About 1600 men of the para-military Border Security Force are patrolling the northern Indian town of Biharsharif where 42 people have died in communal violence. The Home Minister (Mr Zail Singh) told Parliament that the B.S.F. had taken prompt action and the Bihar state town was being brought under control. He also urged opposition leaders to co-operate with the Gov-; ernment in restoring normalcy. Mr Singh said the riots, in which 62 people have been injured and more ’ than 250 arrested, were sparked by a drunken 1 brawl.—New Delhi. Old Vie mourned Lord Olivier and many other leading British actors mourn the demise of London’s Old Vic Theatre. The famous former home of British Shakespearean theatre said it would close indefinitely next week after 163 years because of shortage of funds. Lord Olivier, aged 73;. who ran Britain’s National • Theatre from the Old Vic from 1962 to 1973, when the National transferred to its modernistic home on the , south bank of the River Thames, said he was “very \ much saddened.” He played : leading roles in many of the Old Vic’s Shakespearean productions.—London. Dissident withdraws Disenchantment with poll- . tical dissidents appears to be gaining momentum in some sections of Poland’s independent trade union, Solidarity, according to a union bulletin. Activists in the' union’s Warsaw branch "took ’ exception to allowing nonmembers of factory committees to run for union offices, and a leading dissident has withdrawn his candidacy, the; bulletin said.—Warsaw. »