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The Kokomo Tribune from Kokomo, Indiana • Page 1

Location:
Kokomo, Indiana
Issue Date:
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1
Extracted Article Text (OCR)

KOKOM Vol. 130 No. 311 4 Mctieni RIBUNE Monday, July 13,1981 0 copyright 198T Ulster march and riot BELFAST, Northern Ireland (AP) The death of a sixth Irish nationalist hunger striker today sparked renewed rioting by angry Catholics while an estimated 100,000 Protestants marched in the annual celebration of the defeat of Roman Catholic forces in 1890. Four soldiers and one civilian were wounded in two separate snlplngs and a policeman injured by a homemade grenade in Catholic areas of Belfast, authorities said. Mobs of rioters hurled bricks, stones and bottles at security forces in Londonderry, the province's second-largest city.

Renewed street battles broke out after the death of Martin Hurson, a 27-year-old Irish Republican Army guerrilla, In the 45th day of his fast at the Maze Prison outside Belfast. He was the sixth hunger striker to die since the protest began March 1 and the second in less than a week. The fasters were demanding political prisoner status for jailed nationalists. British officials have refused to meet their demands because they said to do so would legitimatize the outlawed IRA's bloody campaign to oust the British and unite the mostly Protestant province with the overwhelmingly Catholic Irish Republic to the south. The death came hours before Protestants staged 18 marches throughout the province in the 29lst celebration of the victory of William of Orange's forces over King James H's Catholic army in the Battle of the Boyne.

Organlxers said 100,000 people took part In the marches. Security forces marshaled every available man for the annual parade, symbol of Protestant domination In the province which has a million Protestants and 500,000 Catholics. Crowds of Protestants in Belfast estimated by police at 30,000 marched through the streets with military precision to the beat of fife and drum bands. Onlookers cheered and waved Union Jacks and Ulster flags. In Coalisland, County Tyrone, hundreds of IRA sympathizers sat In the road to block the path of an Orange march.

A Royal Ulster Constabulary police spokesman said the road was cleared with no violence and the march continued. Britain's Northern Ireland Office said Hurson "took his own life by refusing food for 45 days." Sinn Fein, the IRA's political wing, called on the British to "enter into immediate negotiations with the prisoners before more of our people are murdered:" Sinn Fein had reported a sudden deterioration in Hurson's health Sunday and prison authorities summoned his family to his bedside in the prison hospital wing. A Sinn Fein spokesman said Tom High, safe at third, at John Hurlock tells the ump, "I had him Blue tide drowns city administration It was a sad day for the city administration when it accepted the softball challenge offered by the Fraternal Order of Police slow-pitch team. The city team, coached by controller Bruce Carter, with attorney Ken Ferries and sewage plant manager Tom High trading off on the mound, went down in defeat in two games Sunday, 7-2 and 12-6. The FOP team, coached by detective Charlie Hackett, featured the pitching skills of accident investigator Jim Beck and chief Rodger Fain.

Many an administration swinger was daunted by the non-stop banter of Fain's battery mate, Larry Darlin, and although the city rallied briefly in the second game, they couldn't keep it up in the face of the blue tide. (Tribune photos by Greg Pawluk) 'Mighty Daily "at the bat Dave Minor's shirt didn't describe efforts Hurson had been unable to hold down water since Saturday and Sunday became incoherent and started hallucinating. Hurson was sentenced to 20 years in November 1977, convicted of bombings and conspiracy to kill security forces. Sinn Fein also said the condition of Kieran Doherty, 25, elected to the Irish Parliament June 11, was "extremely weak" after 52 days without food. He has been fasting the longest and had been expected to be the next man to die until Hurson's condition suddenly declined.

Hurson's death followed the death Wednesday of fellow hunger striker Joe McDonnell, which sparked four straight days of riot- ing In Catholic strongholds In Northern Ireland. On Sunday, fresh rioting erupted in Belfast, Londonderry and other towns, and police uncovered an IRA bomb factory near the center of the provincial capital, security authorities said. No casualties were reported among security forces, but a Royal Ulster Constabulary spokesman said two young Catholics were hospitalized with gunshot wounds in Belfast. It was not clear whether they had been shot by security forces or snipers who had been firing on the police and troops. In Londonderry, police fired plastic bullets at IRA supporters hurling gasoline bombs.

Prime minister visits port city hit by violence LIVERPOOL, England (AP) Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, on a surprise visit to this northwest English port today, got a first-hand look at one of the cities hardest hit by a 10-day outbreak of urban violence. Mrs. Thatcher arrived here after mobs and young blacks and whites took to the streets overnight in London and six provincial cities and, for the first time in the current wave of urban violence, rioting spread to Scotland. Travelling in a car with Liverpool Police Chief Kenneth Oxford, Mrs. Thatcher made a brisk 20- minute tour of the Toxteth district, getting out of the car only twice to talk with passers-by.

A small crowd, gathered at the town hall in the city center, booed as she arrived to confer with civic leaders. Police report flare-ups Police at Dundee, on the east coast of Scotland, reported two flare-ups late Sunday in low-income districts of the city, which unlike most of the trouble-torn English centers has virtually no non-white immigrant population. In Dundee's Menzieshill District, three miles west of the city center, a gang of youths hurled three "incendiary devices," at a passing car and smashed several shop windows, police said. Sixteen youths, believed all to be whites, were arrested two miles northeast of the city center, when a police car was overturned after police were summoned to disperse a gang of youths outside a discotheque, police said. Mrs.

Thatcher, who last week visited two riot-hit, high immigrant London districts, Southall and Brixton, arrived in Liverpool, 180 miles northwest of London, by car, taking city officials by surprise. "We didn't know she was coming until about 10 minutes before she arrived," a City Council spokesman said. She cancelled a proposed trip to Liverpool last week. Unconfirmed Today's chuckle What this country really needs is a bank where you can deposit a toaster and they give you $5,000. Tribune telephones Circulation 459-3121 Want ads 45C-3811 All other calls 459-3121 News-sporls (weekend Rights) Toll free from Upton 1-8M-382-M95 reports said police warned a visit then, soon after parts of Liverpool's rundown, multi-racial Tox- teth district were reduced to ruins by two nights of rioting, might spark further disturbances.

Overnight, screaming mobs overturned cars, hurled bricks and gasoline bombs at police, torched, buildings and looted shops in the 10th straight night of urban violence that reportedly has the government ready to announce tough new strategies today, including special "riot courts." Several Injuries reported Rioting and looting erupted in London and six other English cities Sunday night, with the worst violence reported in the Midlands city of Leicester, where 600 police confronted 500 rampaging youths. The trouble began in the city's mainly black Highfields area, but both black and white youths were involved. Several police and firemen were reported injured and 20 rioters were arrested, but the level of aggression was lower than on previous nights, authorities said. Violence also flared Sunday in the Midlands cities of Birmingham, Wolverhampton and Coventry, at Derby in the north, at Netting Hill, a decaying predominantly black quarter of west London, and at High Wycombe, 30 miles northwest of the capital. Police reported 187 arrests overnight in various districts of London.

Weekend riots were reported in at least 17 cities, many of them hit for the first time since England's worst riots in recent memory began over a week ago. Informed sources meanwhile said Mrs. Thatcher and her government are readying tough new measures to stamp out the urban warfare, including special "riot courts" to hand out swift punishment. The sources, who asked not to be identified, said Mrs. Thatcher and Home Secretary William Whitelaw were preparing to announce the establishment of the courts in the House of Commons today.

Weather Tonight and Tuesday warm with a slight chance for thundershowers. Page 8. Index Classified ads Comics 17 Editorials Entertainment 11 Living 12 Sports 9, Stocks, hospitals births and deaths 7 Polish party congress gears up amid turmoil WARSAW, Poland (AP) Intercity bus workers in Kutno staged a two-hour strike today to protest poor food supplies, and Kutno municipal bus workers threatened to strike later as the Communist Party congress prepared to convene. The walkout by members of the Independent Solidarity union came fresh reports of Soviet-bloc maneuvers in the Baltic Sea, one day before the party congress meets to elect new leaders and consider democratic reforms. Solidarity warned it would stage the strikes despite Sunday's release of an unusually frank report prepared for the congress, warn- ing that Soviet-bloc neighbors are anxious over "signs of anarchy" in Poland.

The report also tells of major defections from party ranks. "We are unworried by reactions of the fraternal countries," said a Solidarity spokesman reached by wire from Warsaw. "People here are perfectly aware of the political circumstances under which we are living." The official East German news agency ADN reported today that Soviet, Polish and East German warships were staging Baltic Sea training exercises, but did not say when the maneuvers and crews dem- onstrated high efficiency, readiness and tactical fitness in moving behind a (mine) sweeper screeen, in battle maneuvers and in battles against air and sea objectives," ADN said. Solidarity officials said the strike In Kutno, 43 miles west of Warsaw, began at 6 a.m. and disrupted service to Plock, a city on the Vistula River where Soviet crude oil is refined.

Branches of the Solidarity federation, which has an estimated 10 million members nationwide, held warning strikes last week that briefly shut down Baltic ports, the national airline and public tran- sportion in a northwest city. Observers here say renewed labor unrest may increase Soviet pressure on Communist Party chief Stanislaw Kania to take a tougher stand against the union or resign, but official sources predicted today he would be safely reelected by the congress. Kania, who rose to power daring the national strike wave that brought Solidarity into existence last summer, is expected to lead debate on Poland's future at the congress. In Moscow, the government news agency Tass reported a four- man Soviet delegation left today for Poland to attend the congress. Czechoslovakia's and Bulgaria's Communist Party newspapers spoke of the "great responsibility" of Polish Communists for the fate of socialism in Poland.

Official sources who asked to remain anonymous said today that the congress will debate a proposal to create a new political watchdog body, whose chief would be the country's second most powerful Communist. Sources described the proposed body as one which would try to prevent leadership problems, such as those party officials blame for Poland's economic and political crisis. The 1,964 congress delegates are preparing to discuss sweeping pro- posals for social and economic reforms demanded by workers in the wake of last summer's labor rebellion, which have raised fears of Soviet intervention. The report by the Communist Party Central Committee cited a mass desertion from old state-controlled unions and breakdown in press controls in the in the aftermath of last year's strikes. The report said nearly 200,000 Communists have turned in membership cards since the strikes.

It also said young people had turned against the party to a degree unmatched since the Communists took power in 1947..

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About The Kokomo Tribune Archive

Pages Available:
579,711
Years Available:
1868-1999