Word: brinks
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Poland has been on the brink of defaulting on its loans for almost a year. During the summer and fall, private bankers and Polish authorities negotiated a program to give Warsaw more time to pay off its debts. In an agreement reached in November, the Western bankers said that they would give the Poles an additional seven years to repay $2.4 billion that was due this year...
...troubles that have brought the proud, highly civilized and immensely accomplished Poles near the brink of social chaos and economic collapse are both deeper in their origins and wider in their ramifications than the many problems that beset the industrialized democracies of the West. In Poland, the system is not just failing to perform properly - failure is built into the system. Communism stifles the best while rewarding, or at least exploiting, the worst in human nature. Imagination, initiative and man's natural inclination to improve his own lot have all been sacrificed to the abstract and deceptive goal...
...Solidarity was on the verge of seizing control of the state. Yet, by moving so forcefully against the union, whose 10 million members represent 28% of the Polish population, Jaruzelski could only have deepened the resentments that fueled Solidarity's growth and brought his country to the brink of civil war. Poland's Catholic bishops declared last week that "an entire nation" had been "terrorized by military force," and demanded the release of the Solidarity leaders. The army appeared loyal, but its ranks include large numbers of draftees who are sympathetic to Solidarity and sensitive to the country's problems...
Politically, Italy is, as ever, teetering on the brink of instability. Spadolini became Prime Minister last summer after Christian Democrat Arnaldo Forlani was forced out by a scandal involving the membership of high government officials in a mysterious Masonic lodge. So far, Spadolini seems to be faring reasonably well In a recent poll, 62% of those interviewed approved of the way he is handling his job, a high figure in a notoriously cynical electorate. But the jovial Prime Minister has a handicap. A member of the small center Republican Party, he is the first non-Christian Democrat to head...
With stunning swiftness, the $6.5 billion battle between Mobil Corp. and U.S. Steel for control of Marathon Oil turned nasty last week. Mobil, still frustrated and angry over its defeat by Du Pont earlier this year in the struggle to take over Conoco, seemed on the brink of losing again. Then Mobil suddenly went on the offensive with a daring ploy. The oil company announced that it intended to buy up to 25% of its bidding rival, U.S. Steel. Said one banker involved in the dealing: "They have tried to put a gun on the head of U.S. Steel...