Washington Report, January 14, 1985, Page 8

Facts For Your Files: A Chronology of U.S.-Middle East Relations

December 13:

The more than 1,000 Americans living in Libya again were advised to leave, because, State Department spokesman Alan Romberg said, Libyan "hostility" toward the U.S. has "not diminished" and Americans there continue to face "potential danger." The U.S. government first called on Americans to leave Libya in December, 1981.

December 18:

In response to Iran's announcement that it would try the four men who killed two Americans and tortured two others—along with several other non-Americans—after hijacking a Kuwaiti airliner December 4, State Department spokesman Alan Romberg said: "We expect that trial to be open, and the sooner it is held the better." The Reagan Administration had been urging Iran either to put the four men on trial or to extradite them to another country where a trial could be heId.

December 20:

Michael Armacost, Assistant Secretary of State for Political Affairs, said that Soviet troops, which have been occupying Afghanistan since invading it in 1979, "may have lost some ground" in 1984 to rebel forces opposing Soviet rule. Mr. Armacost refused to discuss the nature of covert U.S. assistance to the rebels, which has cost an estimated $300 million since 1979.

December 21:

State Department spokesman John Hughes announced that the U.S. will "defer" a decision on whether to grant Israel's recent request for $800 million in emergency economic aid for fiscal 1985—on top of the $2.6 billion it is already getting—"pending the adoption of an effective Israeli economic stabilization program and a determination of the utility of such additional U.S. assistance in supporting such a program." Mr. Hughes said that proposed economic aid for Israel in fiscal 1986 will probably be about $1.2 billion, a sum it is getting now, but that military assistance may be increased from the current level of $1.4 billion. All this money is given in grant form and does not have to be repaid to the U.S.

December 25:

Israel's Prime Minister Shimon Peres acknowledged that he had received a "talking paper" (letter) from U.S. Secretary of State George Shultz, urging his new unity government to take more effective steps toward curing Israel's shattered economy. According to Mr. Peres, Mr. Shultz said that "if you don't do more, and more quickly, you will face serious and urgent economic problems."

December 25:

A U.S. Air Force cargo plane arrived in Khartoum, Sudan with emergency supplies to help some of the hundreds of thousands of refugees who have entered Sudan from Chad and Ethiopia, neighboring countries beset by wars and severe drought. The supplies included 17 3,000-gallon water tanks, 35 cartons of 5-gallon water jugs, 160 rolls of plastic sheeting and 607 containers of blankets. Two days earlier another U.S. cargo plane brought eight water tanks, 3,200 blankets and six hospital tents.

January 8:

Gunmen in West Beirut kidnapped the Rev. Lawrence Martin Jenco, an American priest who directs Catholic Relief Services in Lebanon. He is the fifth American to be seized in Lebanon in the past 11 months. So far, none have been found.