Cable briefs

Press, 14 April 1984, Page 10

Cable briefs

P.M. killed The Tanzanian Prime Minister, Mr Edward Sokoine, has been killed in a road accident near Dodoma, Tanzania’s future capital. He was 46. Mr Sokoine, who took over as Prime Minister last year after having once resigned the post in 1980 because of ill-health, was widely expected to be the main contender to succeed the President, Mr Julius Nyerere. Mr Nyerere has hinted strongly in recent years that he will retire and the most recent indications are that he plans to do so next year.—Dar es Salaam. No trace The Japanese Foreign Ministry has not been able to trace a Japanese citizen, alleged by the Soviet Embassy in Bangkok to be a United States Central Intelligence Agency (C.1.A.) spy, a Ministry spokesman says. A Japanese citizen identified by the embassy as Ichiro Uesugi had not registered with the Japanese Embassy in Bangkok, the spokesman said. “We also carinot trace a company called Toho Industries Corporation, which the Soviet Embassy in Bangkok said Uesugi claimed to represent.”—Tokyo. Murderer declined A convicted murderer has failed in a bid to become a trainee minister in the Church of Scotland. James Nelson, who served nine years of a life term for killing his mother, was rejected by the Church elders of St Andrews, near Edinburgh, after a heated debate. One member of the town’s presbytery, Norman Warnock, dismissed suggestions that Mr Nelson had repented, asking: “If the Yorkshire Ripper repented, would he be eligible?” Mr Nelson can appeal to the

Church’s general assembly.—Edinburgh. A wee whopper A woman has delivered a healthy 171 b 3oz (7.Bkg) girl. “Somebody must have had their finger on the scale,” said Robert Himes after his wife, Dorothy, gave birth to Jennifer. The 24-inch-long (61cm) baby was delivered by Caesarean section. The “Guinness Book of Records” lists the world’s largest baby as a 241 b 4oz (11kg) boy born in 1961 in Turkey.—Erie, Pennsylvania. Laws liberalised Pakistan’s highest Islamic court has directed authorities to liberalise the country’s press laws. The official Associated Press of Pakistan news agency reported that the amendments would liberalise the existing provisions about the granting of Government permission to publish a newspaper or start a printing press, or cancel such permission. Security deposit requirements would also be liberalised.—lslamabad. Death in a toilet A man, aged 72, bled to death after a toilet collapsed beneath his weight in a hotel. An inquiry, after the discovery of Colin Huxman’s body, was closed when police established that his death had been caused by a haemorrhage. He received deep cuts to his legs and buttocks from the shattered porcelain, the inquiry found. A spokesman for the South African Bureau of Standards said that it would be difficult for the insurers to decide who had been to blame for the accident because the collapse of the toilet could have been due either to a manufacturingdefect or to “age and abuse.”—Cape Town.