Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - April 13, 1981, Winnipeg, Manitoba 8 Winnipeg free press monday april 13, 1981 Black youths overturn police vehicle in Brixton area of South London saturday. About 200 people including 165 police officers were injured in that Day s riot. British race relations plunge further scenes reminiscent of riots in american Black ghettos Mark third major clash in two years by Leonard Downie the Washington Post London race relations in Brit Ain already deteriorating were fur ther damaged by the weekend of Vio Lent Battles Between mostly Black Young people and riot police in South London. In scenes reminiscent of riots in american Black ghettos the violence began with a contained confrontation Between police and bottle throwing youths Friday became a full scale riot saturday night and flared up seriously again last night. When Deputy prime minister Wil Liam Whitelaw and London police com missioner David Mcnee toured the area by foot under heavy escort yester Day afternoon they were taunted with shouts of Sieg then while they visited injured police officers in a near by Hospital a few Hundred youths again pelted police with bricks and bottles it was the third major clash Between Blacks and the police in Britain in the past two years. As in the previous incidents Brixton residents Community leaders and local politicians yester Day blamed the violence on police harassment in the racially mixed neighbourhood where immigrants from the West indies first settled in the 1950s. Mistreatment denied denying mistreatment police officials blame social problems beyond their control including racial discrimination and. Britain s economic decline. Assistant police commissioner Wilford Gibson said these problems included unemployment housing conditions and discrimination against Young West indians by employers All things beyond police Many Brixton Blacks complained however that they have been stopped repeatedly on the Street or while driving their cars for minor violations like not signalling turns and that the police abuse them verbally and physically. They especially resent frequent police use of the so called sus Law to Stop question and even jail a suspicious person loitering with intent to commit an arrestable government studies show that Many More Blacks than Whites Are arrested under this and an All party parliamentary committee has recommended its immediate abolishment. They re antagonizing said a Black shopkeeper in Brixton. If i left blood runs Down face of policeman injured in Brixton rioting. My shop and wandered Down the Street i d be stopped eight to 10 residents claimed the police made matters worse Over the weekend by flooding the area with officers after the Brief clash Friday night in a misunderstanding Over police treatment of a Black youth found stabbed on the Street. Police said they responded in a fairly Low key manner and that things got out of hand Only after brix ton s streets filled with youths on Satur Day and someone badly injured a policeman with a thrown Brick. Gibson added that Brixton has to be policed with greater intensity because it has Britain s highest crime rate including 50 to 80 robberies a week double the next worst area in the country. Asked about Community Lead ers suggestions that the police should have been less visible As tension built Over the weekend and withdrawn Dur ing the height of the violence Gibson added we have to maintain Law and order. There is no question of there defects in West Germany Nuremberg. West Germany a soviet conductor Maxim Shostakovich son of one of Russia s great composers and a popular artist in his own right has requested political Asylum in West Germany police said yesterday the conductor 42, on tour with the soviet radio symphony orchestra led its final performance saturday night at the City theatre in nearby Fuerth then requested police Protection and per Mission to remain in the country a spokesman for the bavarian state police said. He made the same request for his 19-year-old son Dmitri the famous composer s namesake who is a pianist with the orchestra. The late Dmitri Shostakovich who once told colleagues that the soviet artist should be a lighter for is acclaimed As one of the world s great composers. Federal authorities in Bonn and fed eral police in the Northern bavarian City of Nuremberg declined to give details on the defection or say where the two Are staying. He just told the police he did t want to go Back and said his son wanted to stay said a Federal f police officer who declined to be identified. A Friend of the family who requested anonymity said Maxim Shostakovich left the soviet Union earlier this month for several performances outside the country and had been scheduled to return in a few Days. West Germany has one of the world s most Liberal political Asylum Laws. Re quests by soviet bloc citizens to remain in the country Are rarely refused and Are sometimes granted in a mat Ter of weeks. Informed sources said Young Dmitri is the Only child of Maxim Shostakovich who is divorced from his wife. Popular artist the handsome bespectacled conductor was one of the soviet Union s most popular artists making frequent appearances on Moscow television at the podium of the soviet radio symphony orchestra. In 1979, he was involved in a Contro Versy Over a Book purported to be the memoirs of his father who died of a heart ailment in a Moscow Hospital aug. 9, 1975, seven years after illness forced him to resign As head of the soviet composer s Union. The Book which appeared in the West under the title text irony was denounced in the soviet press As a fake. Maxim told reporters his father had nothing to do with the Book which editor Sirion v Zolkov had described As the fruit of our years of interviews with the composer. The memoirs pictured Dmitri Shonto Kov Icli As less than enchanted with the soviet system despite his Public sup port. The elder Shostakovich composed his first symphony at age 19 and is remembered Hue. Nationally for a wide Range of symphonies ballets operas concer tos and other works. He twice lost and regained favor with soviet author Ines in a career that spanned some 50 years. His seventh symphony the Lenin Grad first played in that City during the nazi siege of the second world War became revered in the soviet Union As an Anthem in 1968, the composer having sur Vived attacks or. His reputation in the 1930s and again in the late 1940s, called on soviet composers to fight for communism with their music. The ideology of the enemy must not penetrate our he said. Every soviet artist must always feel himself a fighter for t being a no go area anywhere in London. Both Mcnee and Gibson also suggested there May have been advanced planning or outside assistance for the rioting. Mcnee said police Are investigating unconfirmed reports of this. We have no idea whether it was organized but it seemed very coincidental that Large numbers of Black youth suddenly appeared on the Gibson said. Large stocks of Molotov cocktails were appearing at will. Somebody had a Supply of Gaso line and milk Gibson said police also noticed a Large number of White people who were not known and press photographers who appeared to be Busy photograph ing every move the police were Mak Mcnee has previously suggested that militants had been motivating and urging the Black Community to confront the while this underestimates Black suspicions of the police there is evidence that left Wing activists have been trying to capitalize on growing Black alienation while Neo nazi groups on the far right have been recruiting White youths for marches and attacks against Blacks. Four per cent non White Only about four per cent of Britain s population is non White consisting Pri Marily of nearly two million West indians pakistanis and other asians and africans. But they Are concentrated in Industrial inner City areas where they were sought after the second world War for heavy work disdained by britons. Now they face unemployment rates two to five times higher than the rest of the population. Brixton is about two thirds White but Young Blacks account for More than half its steadily increasing number of unemployed. Although immigration of non Whites has been slowed to a trickle in recent years by increasingly restrictive Laws and regulations and an increasing num Ber of Blacks Are British by birth they still face considerable antagonism made Clear by opinion polls Public statements by prominent anti Immi Grant politicians and the actions of racist extremist groups. Only two weeks ago in a speech reported on Many newspaper front pages Here member of parliament Enoch Powell again pointed to the growing proportion of Blacks in British cities warned of violence on a scale which can Only be described As civil War and urged that they be moved out of the country in a re immigration hardly less massive than the immigration that occurred in the first neighbourhoods swamped prime minister Margaret Thatcher while stating her opposition to racism or has herself said she can understand How britons in some neighbourhoods could feel swamped by non White newcomers. Her government has sent legislation to parliament to change the country s citizenship Laws that would end the British tradition of automatically granting citizenship to everyone born Here. Black Community and civil rights leaders fear this will prevent a Large number of children of non while immigrants from becoming British citizens. Meanwhile members of Neo nazi groups like the National front and British movement have attacked Blacks on the streets and terrorized their Homes in some areas. They also have staged frequent provocative marches through immigrant neighbor hoods. Some Black asians have responded by joining vigilante groups and staging counter protests often organized by White left Wing activists. The govern ment recently banned Neo nazi marches at least temporarily in London and some other cities. Discrimination of various kinds against Blacks in employment and housing has been documented by government reports and the police have increasingly been accused of treating them unequally. Black residents of a South London area near Brixton be came so convinced that a Home fire that killed 13 Black teen agers at a party recently was arson and that the police were refusing to investigate that they staged an angry protest March of people through London that was marred by clashes with police. The Brixton violence also was pre ceded by a similar riot in the West Indian Section of Bristol a year ago and a Battle Between police and thou Sands of asian youths protesting a National front March through their West London neighbourhood in 1979. Graffiti that appeared on a Wall in Brixton shortly after the smaller scale Bristol riot was still there yesterday. In Large letters it said Bristol yester Day Brixton 8 Lebanon ceasefire ignored Beirut a despite an Armi Stice syrian and lebanese Christian forces battled today for control of strategic Hills around the Christian City of Zahl. Sniper fire continued in Beirut. The lighting did not Stop the red Cross evacuation of wounded lebanese from Zahl a City of about 50 Kilometres East of Beirut. The syrian military command said the ceasefire with the militia of the rightist Christian phalanges party applied Only to the City of Zahl and not to the Hills around it sources close to the lebanese govern ment reported. The sources explained that the Syri ans Are trying to drive the Phalanx its from the Hills Northeast of the City to Block the Mountain trails Over which the militiamen in the area were getting supplies from Christian areas North of Beirut. In Beirut sniper fire across the so called Green line dividing the City kept traffic to a minimum Between the mos Lem and Christian sectors of the Capi Tal. First since attack the ceasefire last wednesday was the 18th ordered by lebanese president Elias Sarkis and the first to take hold since syrian artillery attacked Zahl april 1. The fighting spread to Beirut the next Day. The lebanese police reported 265 lebanese killed and about wounded in the two cities police reported. Syria did not report casualties. Zahl has the largest roman Catholic Community in the Middle East and Pope John Paul led a crowd of in prayers for peace in Lebanon. The pontiff celebrating Palm sunday mass in St. Peter s Square also condemned the attacks in Southern Lebanon by Israel and the Christian militia. In Jerusalem israeli prime minister Menachem begin said his government supports proposals to enlarge the Man in peacekeeping Force in South Era Lebanon but will continue to raid palestinian guerrilla bases there. In undersecretary general Brian Urquhart was to discuss a French american proposal for a wider in role in Lebanon with begin and foreign minister Yitzhak Shamir today. Congress told Poland facing a severe test the Washington Post East Berlin a member of the polish leadership told communists gathered Here from All Over the world yesterday his country is attempting to Advance the development of social polish politburo member Kazimierz Barcikowski told the 10th Congress of the East German communist party that counter revolutionaries Are at tempting to disturb the renewal pro Cess begun in his country. Barcikowski made no mention of the Solidarity Independent labor move ment. Instead he suggested that the party itself had begun the process of socialist Barcikowski said that the renewal process was facing disruptions from counter revolutionary elements which allow themselves to be supported and inspired by imperialist observers Here described the polish representative s speech As a cleverly worded one that sought to reassure the East european delegations without making any rhetorical concessions. All indications Are that Poland s allies in the soviet bloc and the soviet Union itself have decided to provide the leadership in Warsaw with a breathing spell during which the polish government will take unspecified Steps to restore order. The present difficulties Are for our party a severe Barcikowski said. They demand i Preat Effort and a complicated political struggle struggle aimed at creating the conditions for the further development of the polish official went on to say that it was his country s patriotic and International duty to press ahead but he added that the polish party is and remains the leading Force of the people and the socialist Barcikowski in describing the roots of the current crisis blamed it on the previous polish government s Down playing of the economic Laws of social and on the worsening social and economic crisis in Poland. Rates a cars body work poor in internal study Detroit a the body work Quality of general motors corp s highly touted a cars May not be As High As the company had claimed. Says a pm report disclosed in a copyright Story in the Detroit free a routine pm Quality inspection of the Willow run Plant in Ypsilanti mich., last month rated the body work of the a cars produced there at 38 on a scale of Zero to 145, says the internal report obtained by the news paper and published yesterday. The a cars front wheel drive automobiles which pm called revolutionary when they were introduced in 1979 been recalled at least nine times because of prob lems with turn signals seats clutch cables fuel hoses suspension sys tems transmissions steering sys tems and electrical cables the paper quoted pm As saying. Pm spokesman Clifford Merriott said yesterday any internal report measuring Quality at plants has a top and ranking. Internally this ranking provides an incentive for the 26 pm Assem Bly plants to strive to do he said. All of the Assembly plants produce vehicles of acceptable Quality Levels or the cars and trucks would not be shipped to pm president James Mcdonald said the techniques used to produce a cars including the Chevrolet citation Pontiac Phoenix Oldsmobile Omega and Buick Skylark Are not As revolutionary As its design. The a car was revolutionary but the procedures for How we make the doors for How we Hung the doors for How we fit the Sheet Metal All those things were Mcdonald said. Sales of the car have been Success Ful but a cars have not been rated highly by owners for Quality and reliability. A report by the j. D. Power and associates automotive Survey firm found 61 per cent of Early production a cars owners re ported mechanical troubles. John Pietrowski recording Secre tary for the United Auto workers local 1776, blamed the car s prob lems on workers and management citing absenteeism and what he called pm s practice of overloading some jobs there Are so heavy that people can t keep up with said Pietrowski. He also cited a number of management changes As a source of the difficulties. The newspaper reported pm is instituting some changes to improve Quality ;