News stories from Saturday August 23, 1975
Summaries of the stories the major media outlets considered to be of particular importance on this date:
- The Federal Reserve System, the nation's central bank, is prepared to head off a widespread financial crisis that could result from a default by New York City, but its assistance would be heavily qualified, Dr.. Arthur Burns, the Federal Reserve's chairman, indicated in an interview. [New York Times]
- A spokesman for the Internal Revenue Service said the agency was conducting an "intensive internal investigation" to determine whether there were any law violations in secretly providing the Central Intelligence Agency with information from individual tax returns. He said the I.R.S. was following up a section of the Rockefeller commission report that disclosed that in at least 14 instances tax return information concerning 16 persons had been given to the C.I.A. out of normal channels. [New York Times]
- Secretary of State Kissinger and Foreign Minister Yigal Allon of Israel both said last night after another round of talks that the latest exchanges between Egypt and Israel had moved the two sides nearer conclusion of a new Sinai agreement. it appeared to newsmen that both men were clearly satisfied with the way the final stage of the negotiations was going. "We are continuing to make progress," Mr. Kissinger said. "Difficulties continue to be removed. And we have encountered no unexpected obstacles." [New York Times]
- Former President George Papadopoulos of Greece and two officers who helped him bring about the 1967 military coup were sentenced to death by firing squad for insurrection and high treason. But within hours of the court verdict, the government indicated that it might commute the sentences and touched off a political furor. George Mavros, head of the leading opposition party, the Center Union, said: "The government act is outright intervention in the cause of justice and takes on heavy responsibility." Andreas Papandreou, leader of the Panhellenic Socialist Movement, called on President Constantine Tsatsos to dissolve Parliament and call elections. [New York Times]
- Laos celebrated the final takeover by the Communist-led Pathet Lao, the last chapter of the rise to power of the Communists in Indochina. About 300,000 people gathered on a parade ground in Vientiane, the capital, to "welcome the people's revolutionary administration," according to broadcasts of the Vientiane radio and the Pathet Lao news agency, monitored in Bangkok and Hong Kong. [New York Times]
- President Francisco da Costa Gomes of Portugal summoned Premier Vasco Goncalves and the leaders of the military forces opposing the pro-Communist Premier to an emergency meeting in an apparent effort to prevent a bloody conflict between the Premier's supporters and his opposition. Complex political and military maneuvering in the battle to oust the Premier kept the country on edge. [New York Times]
- The Portuguese Minister of Economy in Angola's transition government warned in Lisbon that if a political solution was not reached within the next 10 days, there could be general civil war in the West African territory. The minister, Vasco Vieira de Almeida, one of the Portugal's three delegates in the coalition government that, with the nationalist movements, was to rule Angola until independence on Nov. 11, made his remarks in an interview with the independent Lisbon weekly, Expresso. His report confirmed accounts brought out of Angola by Portuguese refugees. [New York Times]