Word: standoff
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...allowed three men to board a commercial jetliner with pistols and hand grenades. Then there were the Soviet and Afghan authorities at Kabul airport, where the hijacked plane stayed for six days. Despite repeated entreaties from Islamabad and Washington, they had shown little willingness to work toward ending the standoff. There were the Syrian officials in Damascus, who refused to let Zia send a Pakistani antiterrorist unit and also declined to launch a Syrian commando raid against the hijackers. There was Zia himself, who apparently had no military option left and therefore chose to give in to the demands...
...hijacking. Afghan authorities at Kabul airport had not only refused to let Pakistani negotiators talk to the hijackers, for instance, but had actively encouraged Islamabad to capitulate. Though their troops clearly controlled the airport, Soviet authorities turned down at least five U.S. requests that they help end the standoff. The Soviet claim: they had no responsibility for "the actions of the Afghan government." So flagrant had Moscow's obstructionism appeared that State Department Spokesman William Dyess concluded: "I don't see how the Soviets can entirely escape responsibility for what took place...
...Soviet Union is a land power. We can live with stable parity in strategic terms [i.e., intercontinental nuclear forces] and even with disparity in the other side's favor in land forces. But we must have clear superiority in naval forces. By definition, we would lose a standoff with the Soviet navy." The mission of the U.S. Navy is to keep sea lanes open, while that of the Soviet navy might be to interdict those lanes in a conflict. The American mission is more difficult and requires more force...
Warsaw prevented an embarrassing standoff by reversing a previous refusal to negotiate and dispatching the Minister of Union Affairs, Stanislaw Ciosek, to Rzeszow. Ciosek informed the strikers the government was ready to talk. With that, Walesa and a handful of dissidents left for bargaining sessions in Warsaw. At week's end, after a 13-hour negotiating marathon, both sides announced agreement on the work week and access to the media. The government accepted the 40-hour week in principle but would only allow three free Saturdays a month this year; in addition, Solidarity would be granted a one-hour...
...Rzeszow chapter of Solidarity appears to have the authorities there stymied. On the one hand, they have been unable to coax the occupiers out. On the other, they are equally unwilling to grant their main demand: negotiations toward legitimizing the farmers' union. The result is a standoff. Last week TIME Correspondent Richard Hornik visited the sit-in at Rzeszow. His report...