Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, August 29, 1995                   TAG: 9508290046
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

IN THE WORLD

BERN, Switzerland - Switzerland has ordered its banks to return nearly a half-billion dollars in accounts of the late Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos to the Philippines, which says the money was plundered from the national treasury.

But the money is to be held in an escrow account until Philippine courts determine who should get it - the government, the Marcos family or the 10,000 victims of Marcos' regime who were awarded $2 billion in a federal class-action lawsuit in Hawaii.

- Associated Press

Party leader won't seek re-election

TOKYO - Japan's foreign minister announced Monday that he won't seek re-election as leader of the country's largest party, virtually assuring trade hawk Ryutaro Hashimoto of the job and a shot at becoming prime minister.

Foreign Minister Yohei Kono's decision to give up the presidency of the Liberal Democratic Party could shake up Japan's ruling coalition, and it marks a turning point for the party that governed Japan alone from 1955-93.

The current prime minister, Tomiichi Murayama, is a Socialist. But the Liberal Democrats dominate the governing coalition and may regain full power in the next elections for Parliament's lower house, expected by next summer.

Kono's surprise announcement leaves the field open for Hashimoto, the 58-year-old trade minister, to win the party presidency in elections Sept. 22. That would put Hashimoto in the prime minister's chair if the Liberal Democrats win the election.

- Associated Press

N. Ireland party leader to resign

LONDON - The leader of Northern Ireland's largest political party said Monday that he will resign, creating new uncertainty about the course of peace moves.

James Molyneaux, who has led the Protestant-based Ulster Unionist Party since 1979, said he was stepping down now to let a new leader prepare for general elections in Britain, which must be held by April 1997.

Gerry Adams, president of the IRA-allied Sinn Fein party, said he hoped the new Ulster Unionist leader would provide ``effective pragmatic leadership which has so far been lacking.''

Within his party, Molyneaux had been criticized by some members for his openness to the British and Irish governments' joint effort to promote a political settlement in Northern Ireland.

- Associated Press