UAE | Media
From the pages of Gulf News dated January 6 to 11, 1979
News that grabbed your attention
- Compiled by Abdul Rahim Abdul Kareem, Head of Archives
- Published: 23:32 January 10, 2008
January 6
China is backing Britain in billion pound deal
Prospects for a multi-million dollar British trade deal with China, including the sale of military jets, were disclosed as the Western big four opened a two-day summit on major world issues. Prime Minister James Callaghan told US President Jimmy Carter, French President Valery Giscard D'Estaing and West German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt that British exports to China could amount to one billion sterling in 1979 alone.
January 07
Gulf war on mosquitoes
Malaria-carrying mosquitoes are to be wiped out in the UAE - no matter what it costs. Following a meeting of Gulf Health Ministers, in the Omani capital of Muscat, malarial mosquitoes have been declared public enemy number one. And to help stamp out the menace of malaria six Gulf States are to join forces in the battle against the flying pests.
Shah to leave for US
Iranian Prime Minister Shapur Baktiar (left) presented a Cabinet of 14 political unknowns to the Shah and later told reporters that the 59-year-old Monarch wanted to go abroad "shortly" for a rest. The Shah himself told the new Ministers that he had "endured for some time" the pressures of dealing with anti-government unrest which has brought the nation to the brink of ruin.
January 08, 1979
Strikes shut down Iran
A general strike called by opponents of the Shah of Iran turned Teheran into a ghost town. Shops, offices and banks all over Iran closed in response to a call from the opposition National Front to observe a day of mourning for victims of anti-Shah demonstrations. Streets were deserted apart from troops and small groups of demonstrators, who chanted "Death to the Shah" before being dispersed by troops.
Thrills and spills on Dubai's kart track
It was excitement all the way when members of the Dubai Roadrunners' Kart Club met on a newly laid track. A huge crowd turned up to watch more than 10 racing karts in each race. In the first T80 race Giles Cooper and Bruce McPhail were first off at start. But it was a short-lived lead as they both tried to take the same line into a corner and collided with each other. Paul Willey then took the lead and just managed to keep ahead of the rest of the pack.
January 09
Fifty die in ball of fire
Fifty people were killed when two explosions ripped through the 62,776 ton deadweight French tanker Betelgeuse at a Gulf oil terminal in Bantry Bay, Southern Ireland. Gulf Oil, in a statement from London, said 41 crewmen, two representatives of the tanker's owners, and seven local workers are missing, presumed dead. The blast cut the vessel in two, hurled the bodies of the crew into a sea of flaming oil and engulfed the local port workers in a ball of fire.
Heng Samrin is new head of Kampuchea
Rebel forces have liberated Kampuchea (Cambodia) after a lightning offensive and set up a People's Revolutionary Committee to govern the country under a pro-Vietnamese insurgent leader. Heng Samrin was named as chairman of the eight-man committee assuming power in Phnom Penh after the reported flight of Prime Minister Pol Pot and other Government leaders.
January 10
Carter tells Shah to go
US President Jimmy Carter (right) has advised the Shah of Iran that his country's dire political and economic situation could be improved if he left the country for a holiday. The new US advice marked a policy shift for the Carter administration, which has previously sought to avoid telling the Shah whether to stay or go.
Big Four to stop Russia's advance into the Gulf
In two days of summit talks the leaders of the US, France, Britain and West Germany mapped ways to check the creeping advance of the Soviet Union towards the Arabian Gulf. Agreement emerged that the balance of world power could be transformed if Moscow's forward policy gives it dominance in the triangle between Turkey, Afghanistan and Ethiopia.
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