The Michigan Daily-Friday, May 4, 1979-Page 15
General elections slated across Europe
LONDON (AP) - The British
general election yesterday was the first
of several key parliamentary votes in
Europe over the next few weeks.
General elections are set in Austria
Sunday and in Italy June 3-4.
And about 180 million eligible electors
in the nine-nation European Common
Market will vote for the first time June
10 to elect a 410-member European
Assembly for the community's 260
million citizens. _
HERE ARE thumbnail sketches of
the elections, based on reports from
Associated Press bureaus in European
capitals: At
Austria
The basic question before Austria's
5.1 million eligible voters Sunday will
be whether Socialist Chancellor Bruno
Kreisky - who has led the country sin-
ce 1970 - will stay at the helm.
"Kreisky. Austria Needs Him," say his
campaign posters around the country.
Kreisky, 68, is defending the Socialist
Party's 93 seats, which give it an ab-
solute majority in Parliament. The
main opposition comes from the
People's Party, led by Josef Taus, who
until 1975 ran the country's second-
largest bank, Girozentrale, The
People's Party has 80 deputies in
Parliament and the smaller Freedom
Party has 10.
POLITICAL observers expect a close
race, with the Socialists just main-
taining or just losing their absolute
majority.
Kreisky's supporters contend his
nine-year tenure has brought
prosperity and little inflation, com-
bined with labor peace and inter-
national recognition for the small cen-
tral European country.
The opposition contends an annual
growth rate of almost four per cent
from 1970 to 1978 has been paid for with
huge budget deficits and a jump in the
federal debt.
Italy
ITALY'S GENERAL elections June
3-4 were called two years ahead of
schedule after the Communists pulled
out of a five-party agreement that had
supported Premier Giulio Andreotti's
Christian Democrat minority gover-
nment, forcing Andreotti to resign Jan.
31. Attempts to form a coalition failed.
The election is viewed as a referen-
dum on whether the Communist Party,-
which ran only four percentage points
behind the Christian Democrats in 1976,
should be given a place in the gover-
nment. Andreotti's Christian
Democrats have refused.
Politicians don't expect any iajor
shifts. The polls indicate the Christian
Democrats may make small gains,
while the Communists may lose a few
points.
Common Market
CITIZENS OF the nine member-
nations of the European Common
Market will vote June 10 for 41 mem-
bers of a European Assembly which
will sit in Strasbourg, France.
Britain, France, West Germany and
Italy will each have 81 seats. The
Netherlands will have 25, Belgium 24,
Denmark 16, Ireland 15, and Luxem-
bourg 6.
Rome terrorist bomb
rips campaign office
ROME (AP)-In a daring daylight
attack a month before elections,
terrorists raided the Rome headquar-
ters of the dominant Christian
Democrat party yesterday, exploded
bombs in the building and escaped, af-
ter killing one police officer and
critically wounding two others.
They fled into the narrow, cob-
blestone streets of downtown Rome af-
ter the midmorning attack on the
building six blocks from Piazza
Navona, a popular tourist spot.
The gang, which may have numbered
as many as 15, scrawled the five-
pointed star of the Red Brigades,
Italy's most feared terrorist gang, on
the walls of the building and sprayed in
red letters: "We will transform the
electoral fraud into a class war."
IN MARCH 1978 the Red Brigades
kidnapped Christian Democrat leader
Aldo Moro and left his bullet-riddled
body in downtown Rome May 9.
Yesterday's attack came two weeks
after a powerful bomb destroyed the
portal of Rome's Michelangelo-
designed city hall on the Capitoline Hill.
There were conflicting claims -of
responsibility, both from the right and
left extremes, for that incident.
The attacks heightened fears of
widespread violence during the
policital campaign leading up to
general elections June 3-4. The vote is
viewed as a referendum on whether the
strong Communist Party should get a
place in government. The Christian
Democrats in this NATO country have
refused the Communists a Cabinet spot
up to now.
FORMER PRESIDENT Giuseppe
Saragat called yesterday's attack
"civil war" and the Communist Party
denounced it as an attempt to disrupt
the election campaign and create a
ENERGY.
I V C
afford to
waste it.
"guerrilla climate."
Eyewitness accounts said the
terrorists, armed with sub-machine
guns and silencer-equipped pistols,
struck around 9:45 a.m.
They first disarmed and handcuffed
two policemen on security detail out-
side the building near the Tiber River,
then went up to the first-floor campaign
offices of the party.
CHRISTIAN DEMOCRAT official
Bruno Lazzaro told reporters the gang
declared "This is a proletarian incur-
sion" and ordered the seven officials
and party workers present to stand
against the wall with their hands up. Af-
ter taking their wallets, the terrorists
bound them one to another with black
plastic handcuffs and said "Get out of
the building, bombs are about to go
off."
As the terrorists stepped out into a
small square, they spotted three
policemen and fired. The officers
sought shelter behind their car but were
hit by sub-machine gun fire from one or
two other terrorists, including a
woman, who had been standing guard
outside. The three offices fell in a pool
of blood, one on top of another, while the
blast of bombs inside the building
roared in the air.
The terrorists fled into side streets,
some speeding away on high-powered
motorcycles and others in waiting cars.
Witnesses said all wore wigs and false
mustaches.
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