Link made over lunch

we 'Deep fraternal friendship' says Chou En-lai pit talks by Gormley NCB chief Derek Ezra (I) meeting the NUM's Joe Gormley (r) for pre-lunch drinks yesterday. Both later bowed their heads as this grace was spoken : 'The Lord be thanked for all his blessings. God preserve the Queen, the church and this honourable assembly and grant us peace. Amen.' Bhutto tries to plug holes in economy UNDER THE guise of wholesale nationalization Pakistan President Zulfigar Ali Bhutto has moved to plug the holes in his economy caused by wealthy families taking their money out of the country.

Though he described the takeover of 20 firms as 'the command and control of the people being asserted', he stressed there would be no further 'nationalization'.

The industries to be taken basic metal industry, engineering, heavy electricals assembly and manufacture of motor vehicles, tractor manuservices electricity generation, transmission and distribution and gas and oil refineries.

In fact the government has taken over only a very small proportion of the country's industrial assets and stocks and shares will continue to be held by private individuals.

Pakistan's economy is in a ruinous state and Bhutto has Mrs Lilan Tunne: "It's dis- said repeatedly in the past few days that 'everything in COAL BOARD chiefs will today meet leaders of the National Union of Mineworkers to discuss the national pits strike due to start at midnight on Saturday. the country must be harnessed' to the post-war recovery and the restoration of business Significantly at the weekend he warned 30 of the wealthiest business families that they will be imprisoned and their property confiscated if they do not bring home deposits he alleged they held in foreign banks.

He has already placed the heads of two of the richest industrial families under house arrest for six months.

The limited state intervention in the economy is an expression of the absolute necessity of compelling businessmen to put their money and energy into economic reconstruction.

In a bid to calm overseas fear, Bhutto said the new arrangements will not affect foreign investment and foreign credit'.

Yesterday Bhutto told a Karachi rally that BanglaDesh President Sheikh Mujibur Rahman will be released unconditionally.

Bhutto asked the 100,000strong rally wanted mlib released they they answered with a yes Afterwards he told them: I am trying to save a ship that was sinking, trying to bring it to the surface and trying to understand the problems of E and W Pakistan and what sort of relations we should have with India.' Bangla Desh leaders said last night they were delighted their 'beloved leader had been released unconditionally'.

This surprise move came after a Coal Industry Society lunch in London's plush Hyde Park Hotel yesterday, at which union president Joe Gormley claimed that every member of his executive wanted to avoid a strike.

He told assembled dignitaries including National Coal Board chairman Derek Ezra:

'We don't want a strike if it can be avoided. I say this on behalf of every member executive, Of the national With just five days to go before he is supposed to lead 280,000 miners into battle for their £5-£9 pay claim, Gormley added that the differences between union and board could be 'narrowed and settled. people of Britain that the I have to tell the gap negotiations nowhere near as wide as the papers try to make out.' NO COMMITMENT But the NCB, which has offered only £1.90-f2, later stressed that today's talks commitment, Place 'without And the interviews with Yorkshire miners on page four of today's the union leaders are under watchful pressure from a vast majority of their members.

Miners in Yorkshire and elsewhere will read with amazement Gormley's arguminers stopped work and won a high settlement this might persuade members that strike action was the way to secure big increases and the only way to settle disputes, he said.

"That is not the way for British society today.' In Yorkshite on Thursday, the union's area council will be pressed by men from the county's northern panel of pits to pull out safety men in denance ol the union's national policy Forward to a weekly 'Keep Left' in ANNUAL GENERAL East India Hall, East India Dock

INSIDE

TODAY interview with BERNADETTE DEVLIN MP Order your copy now part 2 tomorrow Tel.: 01-622 7029 Explosion case woman 'harassed' -claim A WOMAN lecturer acquitted yesterday of bomb charges had been a victim of 'a deplorable case of political persecution', her defence counsel said.

Lord Gifford said his client believed her telephone had been tapped and that she was subjected to 'an extreme amount of harassment' which she feared would continue.

At Lambeth magistrates' court yesterday Miss Pauline Conroy (25) of Powis Square, Notting Hill, and Christopher Allen (23), play leader, of Talbot Rd, Paddington, were acquitted of charges of conspiring to cause explosions.

The court was told Attorney-General Sir Peter Rawlinson would offer no evidence.

Lord Gifford, for Miss Conroy, asked for an order to prevent harassment and also for the • destruction of fingerprints.

The magistrate said the harassment application was 'quite ill-conceived'; fingerprints were automatically destroyed when a prisoner was discharged, he said.

120 FARM - MACHINERY workers in Mold, N Wales, yesterday took over a factory which is due to close next month, putting them out of work. The 120 office staff and manual workers, who have refused to accept redundancy notices from Allis-Chalmers, said they had occupied the factory and would stay until the notices were withdrawn. They want the company to find another manufacturer to buy, the plant and provide work for the labour force. Works convenor Hugh Hughes said the staff were 100 per cent behind the occupation. apecial Eveningi Altacta 7.80 гр. ал. 110.4Бкріт.

PETE BANKSISOUNDiand THIAD WORLD WARI