News stories from Saturday May 16, 1981

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

The Pope rested several hours at the Gemelli Hospital in Rome without the help of painkilling drugs but he had a slight fever, his physicians said. Though his condition was "stable and satisfactory," the doctors were keeping him on the critical list. [New York Times] The Pope's alleged assailant, Mehmet Ali Agca, a Turkish fugitive, has failed to provide satisfactory answers to key questions through three days of questioning by Italian magistrates. They were trying to learn where he got the money, the documents and the skill that enabled him to move around Europe for more than a year after he escaped from a maximum security prison in Istanbul. [New York Times] More cities will face fiscal collapse when the cutback in federal aid ordered by the Reagan administration is felt this fall, according to a study by Joint Economic Committee of Congress of 275 cities. More than half of the cities of more than 10,000 population now have operating expenses that exceed revenues, the committee said in the most pessimistic of its annual urban reports. [New York Times] School curriculums are being opposed increasingly by conservative parents' groups, emboldened by what they see as national trend toward conservatism. With the use of sophisticated lobbying techniques and the backing of such national organizations as Moral Majority, the Eagle Forum and the Christian Broadcasting Network, these parents are banding together to remove books from libraries, replace textbooks, eliminate sex education courses, and to place the Bibilical theory of creation on a par with Darwinism. [New York Times] A bomb explosion in the men's room of the Pan American World Airways terminal at Kennedy International Airport critically injured a 20-year-old man, who later died at a hospital. All Pan Am arrivals and departures at the airport were delayed. The Puerto Rican Armed Resistance took responsibility for the bombing, according to the Terrorist Task Force, which is made up of members of the New York City Police Department and the Federal Bureau of Investigation. [New York Times] The Saudi royal family's influence with Syria was another strategy taken taken by Philip Habib, the American special envoy to the Middle East, in his efforts to prevent a war between Israel and Syria over the Syrian missile emplacements in Lebanon. He went to Riyadh to urge the royal family to help maintain peace in the Middle East. Meanwhile, Syria again refused to remove its missiles from Lebanon's Bekaa Valley, which Israel threatens to destroy. [New York Times] Japan's Foreign Minister resigned as a result of a dispute over the degree of Japanese military cooperation with the United States, in which the Prime Minister is accused by Foreign Ministry officials of taking an ambiguous stand. Prime Minister Zenko Susuki appointed Sunao Sonoda to succeed Masayoshi Ito. Mr. Sonoda, who was the Health and Welfare Minister in the Susuki cabinet, was a former Foreign Minister. [New York Times] The U.S. asked South Africa for a "statement of commitment," to cooperate in the establishment of an independent Namibia through internationally supervised elections in South-West Africa, now under control of South Africa, a State Department official said. The statement was made after talks between President Reagan, Secretary of State Alexander Haig and Foreign Minister Roelof Botha of South Africa. [New York Times]