Cable briefs

Press, 3 May 1984, Page 10

Cable briefs

Bern holds firm The efforts of the Lebanese Prime Minister, Mr Rashid Karami, to get a 10man Cabinet into office looked stalled after a Shi’ite Muslim leader, Nabeh Berri, said that his objections to taking part still stood. Mr Berri, head of the Shi’ite militia, Amal, and one of the four “magnates” whose consent is crucial to Mr Karami’s success, told reporters in Damascus, “I am sticking to my position . . . I am afraid that this Government does not live up to the ambitions of the Lebanese.” Mr Karami offered Mr Berri the Justice, and Water and Electricity portfolios in the Cabinet, but he rejected him on the ground that he had not been properly consulted and that Mr Karami had overridden an agreement reached in Damascus last week.—Beirut. Farmers protest About 400 French farmers used barbed wire and burning tyres and straw to cut off access to Government offices in the north-eastern city of Metz in protest against European Economic Community farm policies. The demonstrators set up their road-blocks just before dawn on the four bridges leading to the offices. They were protesting against a 5 per cent price increase recently agreed on by Brussels for French farmers for 1984-85, saying that in real terms, they would only get a rise of between 0 and 2 per cent. The farmers are also angry about Community cuts on milk production.—Metz. Airport meeting A five-hour airport confrontation between U.S. officials and Soviet diplomats in Washington ended when a visiting Soviet mathematician decided to remain in the United States, at least for the time being. State Department and immigration officials questioned Sergei Kozlov as the Soviets looked on and concluded that he was not under duress and was free to leave the country. Mr Kozlov, who was to have spent the next six weeks as a guest lecturer in California, complained to the police in Pasadena that he was being followed and that someone had tried to gas him.—Washington. British N-test A nuclear weapons test conducted for Britain has been detonated under the Nevada Desert. The test, in a vertical shaft 567 metres deep, had an explosive yield equivalent to between 20,000 and 150,000 tons of TNT. All tests are listed only as less than 20 kilotons or 20 to 150 kilotons.—Las Vegas. Vows renewed The Philippines President, Mr Ferdinand Marcos, and his wife, Imelda, renewed their marriage vows on their thirtieth wedding anniversary this week in front of 8000 supporters in a Government theatre. The ceremony, held during a special Mass for the Marcoses, preceded a pro-Gov-ernment May Day rally in the theatre. They were married in 1954, when Mr Marcos was 36 and the then Imelda Romualdez was 25.—