The Sydney Morning Herald from Sydney, New South Wales, Australia • Page 6

4 Tha Sydney Morning Herald, Friday, few 12, 1973 WORLD NEWS I' Watergate' man pleads guilty US court reverses judgment on Hughes rr Bugging' evidence may not come out U.S. PLANS GIANT HOVER SHIP LONDON Thursday. The US Navy is considering developing a 30,000 ton air-cushion vehicle, for use as a mobile missile launcher in frozen Arctic regions, according to the magazine "Hoverfoil News." It said a top-secret US military research department had been working on the concept for five years. The Navy was expected to announce shortly that it was placing study contracts for the vehicle. From ROY MACARTNEY, Staff Correspondent WASHINGTON, Thursday.

Howard Hunt a former White House consultant, CIA agent and author of mystery nov. els offered to plead guilty yesterday to three charges of espionage at the Democratic Party headquarters last year. Judge John Sirica reserved his decision on the plea until today. Hunt faces a maximum sentence of 25 years and $20,000 in fines. It' his plea is accepted, ho would not give evidence at the trial in which he is one of seven men charged with conspiracy, burglary, and wiretapping in what has become known as the "Watergate affair." Hunt is the most mysterious of the seven.

His wifo Dorothy was killed when an airliner crashed at Chicago last month. used its business with TWA to establish itself at a supplier to other airlines. TWA said it had suffered financially because under the company's dominance it had been prevented from acquiring an adequate jet fleet in the 1950s. In yesterday's decision, Mr Justice Douglas, giving a majority opinion, said the transactions that TWA challenged as anti-trust violations were under the Civil Aeronautics Board's jurisdiction and by law immune from anti-trust action. TWA issued a statement in New York yesterday on the fining: UPI picturt were wearing masks and carried electronic eavesdropping devices.

The five who were captured were James McCord, a retired CIA agent and security official of the reelection committee, Bernard Barker, a real estate agent who also was involved in the Bay of Pigs invasion, Frank Sturgis, who once fought for the Cuban Prime Minister, Dr Castro, then turned against him, and two Cuban exiles, Euginio Martinez and Virgilio Gonzalez. Mr Silbert said that a university student had been hired to infiltrate the staffs of Senator Edmund Muskie and later Senator George McGovern, the Democratic Presidential candidate, on the pretext of "off-campus studies." The student had become disillusioned as the extent of his intelligence-gathering duties unfolded. After four months of work he had quit and left Washington. Mr Silbert said: 'There obviously was a political motive here. "There was a political Presidential campaign.

The operation was directed at the Democratic Party, particularly against Senator George McGovern because of his left-wing views." (AAP) science fiction novels under several pseudonyms. Before Hunt's lawyer had entered his guilty plea, the prosecution had outlined its case against ths seven defendants. It charged that the Republican Committee to Reelect the President had allotted $235,000 in Nixon campaign funds for security and intelligence operations. Gordon Liddy, one of the defendants and a former member of the committee, had been placed in charge of the operation. The charges Hunt is willing to admit are conspiracy to break into the Democrats' Watergate Building offices, breaking into the headquarters and listening to private telephone conversations of Democratic officials.

Hunt and Liddy, another former White House aide, were alleged by the prosecution to be key figures in the case. The prosecutor, Mr Earl Silbert, said in his opening statement that Liddy had been asked by Mr Nixon's re-election committee in late 1971 to run a political intelligence gathering operation and was provided with $235,000 expenses. Five of the seven defendants were caught at gunpoint by police inside the Democratic headquarters on June 17. They Her purse, containing $10,000 in a roll of $100 bills held together with a rubber band, was found in the wreckage. Hunt said at the time that she was flying there from Washington for a "business deal." She left four children.

The Hunts lived in a $200,000 house, in the Washington suburb of Potomac. A 1940 graduate of Brown University, Hunt served in the Navy and Army Air Force before working for the CIA from 1949 to 1970 in Paris, Vienna, Mexico City and Montevideo. He was one of the planners of the abortive Bay of Pigs invasion. He has written more than 40 detective, sex and negotiation now and backdating to January 1, has been frozen by the Gov ernment as part of its anti-inflation strategy. But it was all very decorous.

Clerks and secretaries from dozens of Government offices sat or stood in orderly rows at their protest meetings called during working hours. Mr' McCord Senator McGovern Fin crashes: two live LONDON, Thursday. Two US Air Force men baled out safely when their Fl 1 1 jet plane crashed near Britain's busiest motorway today. The jet smashed into open country a mile from the central England town of Newport Pagnell, which lies just off the Ml motorway. The jet was the second Mil to crash in Britain the first went down in Scotland last year, killing the two men aboard.

(AAP-Reuier) v- Former White House aide Mr Howard Hunt leaves the court in Washington after pleading guilty in the Watergate case. WASHINGTON, Thursday. A multi-million dollar judgment in favour of Trans World Airlines against Mr Howard Hughes and the Hughes Tool Co was reversed yesterday by the US Supreme Court. TWA filed its suit In 1961 and named Mr Hughes as a defendant. But he could never be found to be legally served as a party to the case.

The tool company wholly owned by Mr Hughes and Mr Raymond Holiday, a tool company vice-president and TWA director, were the other defendants. At that time, the company had a 78 per cent interest in TWA's outstanding stock and until six months previously had acted as a supplier and lessor of planes to the airline. The company sold its TWA stock in 1966. The Second US Circuit Court of Appeals had upheld Judge Metzner's ruling and raised the interest from 6 to 7i per cent. But the court stayed the effect of the ruling on November 6, 1971.

pending the tool company's appeal. The Supreme Court ruling reversed the decisions of boh lower courts. TWA was awarded SUSI38 million (about SA1I0 million) in 1963 by Judge C. Metzer of the New York US District Court. Mr Huphes did not attend the hearing.

Interest has been increasing the amount by about a month. TWA had sued for treble damages under the Clayton Anti-Monopoly Law on the grounds that Hughes Tool Co illegally servants protest From a Staff Correspondent Civil LONDON, Thursday. Thousands of civil servants abandoned their filing cabinets, rubber stamps and forms yesterday to take part in a protest against the freezing of a pay increase. The industrial action closed the British Museum's reading room for the country, immigration and Customs men and air traffic assistants attended meetings, causing flight delays of about an hour. The civil servants are angry because their biennial pay review, due for the first time since 1753.

About 40 Cabinet Office staff marched to No 10 Downing Street to present a letter of complaint to the Prime Minister, Mr Heath. At London Airport, and other airports throughout The report gave no source, but it is understood the information came from a British contractor who talked with US Navy officials last month. The contractor said he believed the study contracts would be announced in March. Other reports of the project have been circulating in the air-cushion craft industry. The proposed vehicles would supplement the US Polaris and Poseidon submarine fleet.

They would be armed with similar medium-range ballistic missiles. The amphibious, air-cushion carriers would be able to operate with great flexibility over land, ice or sea, obviating many of the problems encountered by submarines in the Arctic's frozen wastes. The biicest amphibian vehicle now in service is Britain's cross-Channel pnssenser-car ferry, the 168-ton SRN4. The air-cushion vehicle was a British invention. But the US Navy already is seeking designs for a vehicle.

Other recently announced contracts include two totalling SUS50 million (SA40 million) to Bell Aerospace and Aerojet- General, who will build two prototype amphibious assault landing ships each. If study contracts for the 30.000-ton vehicle are awarded this spring, British experts believe it will be tour years at least before the prototype is in action, with production starting probably in the 1980s. By then, many of the British patents on air-cushion craft design will have expired in the United Slates. The experts say that British contractors can hope to cash in on US de velopments only to a fairly limited extent. Most of the US monev will be buying British knowledge of air-cushion craft development, which is acknowledged to be ahead of the United States.

"Hoverfoil News" said mat the bntish were beginning to realise only now the wide military potential of air-cushion craft. (AAP-Reuter) King wants holy war on Israel I WASHINGTON, Thursday. American Airlines is considering filing a suit against Senator Hubert Humphrey for unpaid bills from his 1968 presidenu'al campaign, the "Washington Star-News" reported. The debt is part of more than still owed to the airline by the Democratic National Committee. This includes debts from the Humphrey pre-nomination campaign, the Humphrey-Muskie presidential campaign, and $415,000 owed by the late Senator Robert Kennedy from his campaign for the 1968 nomination.

Senator Humphrey still suffering from (Israeli) attacks." On Monday Syria called on Arab nations to give immediate military support in the confrontation with Israel. The Syrian call was directed primarily at Egypt, whose President, Mr Sadat, is believed to have ordered military authorities to prepare for a renewal of action against Israel. Mr Sadat is not thought to be too eager, though, to commit Egypt to another war. Syria's appeal followed a day of air and land battles (AAP) About a dozen serious casualties were taken to Santa Fe for hospital treatment, but police said San Justo's hospitals had coped with the rest. It was Argentina's second disaster in three days.

On Monday a Paraguayan ferry carrying about 60 passengers sank in flames in the storm-lashed Parana River on the frontier between the two countries. The latest confirmed death toll in the sinking is 25, but no hope is held for the 13 others believed still missing. It is not known exactly how many were aboard the ferry. (AAP-Reuter) 1 ACRE LAND OS 'S Qr, 50 DIE, 300 HURT IN 3-MINUTE TORNADO RIYADH, Thursday. King Faisal of Saudi Arabia called on Moslems last night to declare jihad (holy war) against Israel "in defence of our holy places and homelands." The King was speaking at a party in Mecca attended by diplomatic envoys of Arab and Moslem countries.

He said: "I previously asked our Morlem brothers to declare holy jihad in defence of our holy places, homelands, creed and dignity. "I reiterate this call because several years have pasted and Moslems are heavy rain and lack of power. Power and communication lines were cut by the tornado, which destroyed buildings all along its path. Among the wrecked buildings was San Justo's biggest hotel. Transport aircraft from as far away as Buenos Aires, 300 miles southwest of the town, flew in medicine, food and clothing for the injured and homeless.

Firemen, ambulances and troops were sent from Santa Fe and other cities nearby to help in rescue work. People in San Justo and Santa Fe formed queues to donate blood for those who needed transfusions. BUENOS AIRES, Thursday. A 100 mph tornado killed at least SO people and injured 300 in three minutes yesterday in the farming town of San Justo. It was feared more bodies were still buried under the mounds of rubble in a mile-long, 300 yard-wide strip of devastation left by the storm.

San Justo, a township of 50.000. 60 miles from Same Fe, was declared a military emergency zone and troops took over rescue operations. The search for survivors and injured and dead continued through the night but was hampered by WAHROONGAu? EXECUTIVE RESIDENCE OVER INSPECT SATURDAY II 12.30 or by OTC means you can see Elvis in 'Aloha from Hawaii' 9-30 Sunday night on Channel 9. Sydney Melbourne. Live via satellite.

iUUUiU 3lg1t4f" YUaT UAKVii MJC tW nvmn nURE 1 FINEST HOMES It's a world wide telecast from the Holiday Inn, Hawaii. It's an entertainment first. It's Elvis Presley at his best. And it's brought to you "live via satellite" by OTC. Whenever you see those words on your television screen it means OTC is at work bringing you a in news, international events, or world class entertainment.

include! rectptton forrr. loom. tMn. Mudi L. xraijra.

room. 4 btthroom hnutr ktekt Urt nrai I 4 raoou. Oulir hicliJom. AUCTION DATE 24th JANUARY OTC helps you see It happen. Australia's International Communications Enterprise.

IH CMlSMrttM With CRUICKSHANK CO. 2 RAILWAY AVENUf, N527 -74M 44 MARTIN PLACE SY0NEV 2000 WAHROONCA. At 1074.