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News stories from Saturday January 26, 1980
Summaries of the stories the major media outlets considered to be of particular importance on this date:
- President Carter told a sports official that he was pessimistic about chances for a Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan in time for American participation this summer in the Olympics Games in Moscow. Gene Edwards, president of the United States Soccer Federation, said that at a meeting with Mr. Carter, the President said that he did not believe an American boycott of the Games could be averted. [New York Times]
- The possibility of a Vietnamese attack on the hundreds of thousands of Cambodian refugees in camps just inside the Thailand border has caused concern in Washington. The State Department reportedly was told by a high-level defector from the Vietnamese-backed government in Phnom Penh that an attack would take place at about the end of January. [New York Times]
- The apparent landslide victory of Finance Minister Abolhassan Bani-Sadr in Iran's first presidential election raises as many questions as it answers. The major question for Iran is whether the charismatic power fueling the revolution, which has been in the hands of Ayatollah Khomeini, can be institutionalized into a functioning government. According to unofficial estimates, Mr. Bani-Sadr, among eight official candidates, appears to have won about 69 percent of the vote. [New York Times]
- The American Embassy's fall in Teheran was hastened because high-ranking officers made a series of decisions intended to minimize bloodshed, according to the accounts of hostages who have returned home and of an American who escaped the day, 12 weeks ago, when Iranians took over the embassy. A former hostage confirmed that the Iranians had no need to use force to get into the second floor of the embassy, where most of the Americans were trapped, because an American official had decided to open the six-inch-thick doors protecting it.
Further details of the take over were given by two Marine Corps guards who were released by their Iranian captors. When the Iranians were storming the embassy most of the Americans took refuge in a room with a heavy security guard. The guards opened the door under orders from superiors. [New York Times]
- The Egypt-Israel border was opened as the two countries formally began normal relations manadated by the peace treaty signed 10 months ago. Starting today, travelers with visas will be able to cross at the border at a checkpoint near the town of el-Arish. [New York Times]
- Major petroleum deposits off Alaska have been indicated by recent seismic exploration undertaken by the United States Geological Survey. [New York Times]
- A new scientific-industrial revolution may result from gene-splicing techniques that in the past year have induced laboratory bacteria to grow three vital products of living human cells: human insulin, human growth hormone and the natural antivirus substance, human interferon. Within the next few days the government is expected to announce new rules relaxing guidelines on gene-splicing experiments and an arrangement to accept research data from industry. [New York Times]
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