News stories from Sunday June 5, 1977

Summaries of the stories the major media outlets considered to be of particular importance on this date:

Much of the "new information" on which Congress based its decision to reopen investigations into the assassinations of President Kennedy and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was wrong, according to a source connected with the House Select Committee on Assassinations. The committee, which spent eight months examining the so-called new information, has found virtually no new evidence, the source said. Mark Lane, writer and lecturer, provided most of the leads with which the committee reopened the investigations. [New York Times] The Carter administration will enter the court battle in New York over the Concorde jetliner with a statement defining its position on test flights to Kennedy International Airport. Authoritative sources said the statement would reiterate the administration's view that federal approval of the flights did not prohibit the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey from banning them. The administration is also expected to restate its firm support of the test flights. [New York Times] In monitoring college and university efforts to recruit and help minority-group students, the federal government "must rely on numerical goals," said Joseph Califano, Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare in a speech at New York City College's 131st commencement. He said that such goals and accompanying "timetables" would differ from "rigid, arbitrary, long-term quotas." [New York Times] Sporadic looting and vandalism followed the rioting Saturday night in Chicago's Humboldt Park section, in which two men were killed and more than 70 persons injured, including 38 policemen. A general riot by people in the Hispanic neighborhood erupted during a fight between two rival Puerto Rican gangs. Stores were looted and homes and cars, including police vehicles, were set on fire. At least 119 persons have been arrested. [New York Times] Nine men will challenge Governor Byrne for the Democratic nomination for Governor in New Jersey's primary on Tuesday. Four others are seeking to lead the Republican Party. Candidates for all 40 seats in the State Senate and 80 in the Assembly will also be on the ballot. A 10 percent unemployment rate in the state and a high cancer death rate that has been linked to pollution levels in New Jersey are among the serious problems that are confronting the voters. [New York Times] The United States will recall 6,000 troops from South Korea by the end of next year in the first phase of President Carter's troop withdrawal plan, administration officials said. Most of the first 6,000 troops will come from the Second Infantry Division stationed near the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea. [New York Times] Rebels led by the leftist Prime Ministers of the Seychelles Islands in the Indian Ocean overthrew the pro-Western government of President James Mancham. The government radio said that Prime Minister F. Albert Rene had taken over as President and that the Constitution and the National Assembly had been suspended. President Mancham, in London for a British Commonwealth Conference, said that Soviet subversion was behind the revolt, which, he said, he did not accept as a "fait accompli." [New York Times] Britain has been overcome by patriotic fervor in its celebration of Queen Elizabeth II's silver jubilee. Pomp and pageantry will reach its climax this week with six days of official events and lesser ones like street parties, village carnivals, fireworks and bonfires. [New York Times] A race war in southern Africa would inevitably precipitate racial conflict in the United States by causing whites "to panic" and to begin attacking blacks, Andrew Young said in a Playboy magazine interview. The chief United States representative at the United Nations said it was "terribly mistaken" to believe that American interests were not involved In southern Africa. "If you have a race war in Africa, there's no way we won't be affected," he said. "I think racial tensions in this country are always just below the surface." [New York Times] Two women were released from the train being held by South Moluccan extremists in the Netherlands. The release of the women, both of whom are pregnant, was taken as a sign that the mediation efforts begun Saturday were making progress. [New York Times] The World Bank says it is making a fundamental change in its economic development strategy by trying to focus more on projects that meet the needs of the very poorest people. An analysis made by the bank has concluded that because of the concentration of ownership and power, the absolute poor are not being helped. [New York Times] Exceptionally low interest rates on tax-free bonds have made offerings this week of $1.2 billion unusually interesting. Bond dealers and portfolio managers will watch the next few trading days with special care to find out whether the low rates -- close to their lowest levels in three years -- will hold, or whether rates must rise in order to attract investors. [New York Times] Beirut's businessmen question whether their city, with its economy wrecked by the Lebanese war, can ever regain its role as the business and financial center of the Middle East, but Beirut's banks have resumed business. A total of 79 banks are open in Beirut, but operations have been reduced to 35 percent of the pre-war total. The 65 foreign banking representatives who acted as intermediaries for business all over the Middle East are still hesitant about returning. [New York Times]