EVENTS
RISE IN WORLD UNEMPLOYMENT FORECAST
Unemployment in the major industrialized democracies will rise next year to its highest level in 10 years because of unexpectedly sluggish growth, according to a global economic survey released in Paris yesterday. The Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development, in the latest of its twice-yearly assessments, said 12 of its 24 members were likely to have double-digit jobless rates by the end of 1993. Only four of the countries had double-digit unemployment in mid-1990. Titanic relics offered
Eighty years after the Titanic sank, 1,800 salvaged objects including jewelry, wallets, razors, and medicine containers were offered Tuesday to survivors or their families - for a price. The French government said the items could be acquired by helping pay the cost of the salvage operation. The French government estimated the cost of the salvage at $6.2 million. Bombs explode in London
Two suspected IRA bombs exploded moments apart yesterday in London, one in a department store and the other on a nearby street. Four people were reported slightly injured. Police said anonymous telephone calls to three news agencies shortly before the blasts warned that a bomb had been planted in the Oxford Street shopping district. US trade envoy to China
US Commerce Secretary Barbara Franklin, the highest-ranking US official to visit China in more than a year, arrived in Beijing yesterday on a fence-mending trip. The stated plan is to push specific American projects. Bobby Fischer indicted
Chess champion Bobby Fischer was indicted Tuesday in Washington on charges of violating United States economic sanctions against Yugoslavia by participating in a highly publicized match with Boris Spassky. Fischer was paid $3.35 million for last month's match, which he won. Fischer was told by Treasury Department officials in August that his participation in the match would be a violation of US law. A warrant has been issued for his arrest. He reportedly has remained in Yugoslavia. US House bank update
A special counsel concluded yesterday that a small number of past and present US lawmakers may have broken the law in the House bank scandal and recommended that the Justice Department consider prosecution. Malcolm R. Wilkey's report to Attorney General William P. Barr means the scandal, in which lawmakers wrote thousands of bad checks with no penalty, is over for all but a few members of Congress. Navy scraps radar project
The US Navy is calling it quits on an electronic radar- jamming system that was in development for 15 years at a cost of $1.5 billion but repeatedly failed its flight tests. In a statement issued Tuesday, the Navy said it had canceled $835 million worth of contracts related to the program. Housing starts rise
US housing starts rose 1.5 percent in November to the highest level in eight months, the government said yesterday. The November increase was the largest in three months. The improvement was concentrated in the South and West.
