April 1976

Month of 1976

The following events occurred in April 1976:

The identities of members of the Organización Primero de Marzo (OPM), a guerrilla group fighting against the dictatorship of General Alfredo Stroessner in Paraguay, were given away when medical student and OPM member Carlos Brañas was captured by border guards in the city of Encarnación while trying to enter the South American nation after crossing over the Paraná River from Argentina. After being found to have OPM documents, Brañas was tortured and revealed the names of most of the organization's members and the location of their headquarters in the nation's capital, Asunción. OPM founder Juan Carlos Da Costa died later that day in a gunbattle with Asunción police, but not before shooting and killing its police commissioner, Alberto Buenaventura Cantero. Two other OPM leaders— Mario Schaerer Prono and his wife Guillermina Kannonikoff— escaped but would later be turned in by a local priest. Over the next several weeks, Paraguayan law enforcement would arrest more than 1,500 people and kill 20 of them. The Eurovision Song Contest 1976 was held at The Hague, Netherlands, and was won by Brotherhood of Man, representing the United Kingdom, with "Save Your Kisses for Me". The first ever César Awards, France's version of the Oscar, were presented by the Académie des Arts et Techniques du Cinéma at a ceremony at the Palais des congrès de Paris. The award for Best French Film of 1975 went to Le Vieux Fusil, Best Actor went to its star Philippe Noiret and Best Actress went to Romy Schneider for L'important c'est d'aimer. Rigoberto Riasco of Panama won the first World Boxing Council super bantamweight championship, defeating Philip Waruinge of Kenya.

In elections for municipal government offices in the West Bank in Israel, the Palestine Liberation Organization was successful on a turnout of 72.3% (about 63,000 voters). The election was the first in the West Bank, occupied by Israel since the Six Day War of 1967, to allow women to vote. Ronald Wayne, who had co founded the Apple Computer Company on April 1 with Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, sold his 10 percent share of the company back to Jobs and Wozniak for only $800. The Israeli Air Force intercepted a C 130 military transport plane from Saudi Arabia and forced it to land in Tel Aviv after the Saudi aircraft had strayed into Israeli airspace during a flight from Riyadh toward the Syrian capital, Damascus. The C 130, with 36 people on board (including 25 Syrian Army airmen) had been seen over Rosh HaNikra on the Israeli side of the border with Lebanon. The Saudi plane was allowed to leave the next morning after Israel concluded that the American crew and its Saudi navigator had strayed because of a navigational error. After more than 50 years, the "Russell baby case" in the United Kingdom was resolved with a unanimous decision by the nine members of the House of Lords Committee for Privileges and Conduct that Geoffrey Russell was the rightful holder of the hereditary peerage of Baron Ampthill, despite claims in 1921 by the late John Russell, 3rd Baron Ampthill and by his wife Christabel Hulme Hart (Geoffrey Russell's mother) that John Russell was not the father. After John Russell's death in 1973, his son John Hugo Russell had challenged the legitimacy of Geoffrey's birth and the entitlement to the peerage. Lord Wilberforce of the Committee states in the ruling, "If ever there was a case for closing the chapter in a family's history, the case for closing this in 1926 after the distressing revelations and divisions over so many years, must be one."

In Australia, a gang of six robbers stole as much as $16 million from bookmakers at the Victorian Club in Melbourne. "Twelve man gang— big raid theory", by John Allin and Steve Harris. According to the victims, two getaway cars were used and six gunmen carried out the armed robbery. Melbourne police speculated that the other accomplices were the two drivers, two lookout men, and possibly two masterminds. The money was never recovered and most of the thieves would never be apprehended. Egypt signed a military pact with the People's Republic of China to purchase or be given jet engines and spare parts for the MiG jet fighters that had been supplied five years earlier by the Soviet Union. The Soviet refusal to supply spare parts had been cited by Egypt's President Anwar Sadat as the reason for his break with the USSR. What was called, at the time, "the largest and most intensive immunization program ever attempted in the United States" began with the first vaccines administered for the swine flu, with 200 million doses prepared in an effort to reach every resident of the U. S.; Dr. Harry M. Meyer Jr., an official with the U. S. Food and Drug Administration, received the first shot, which was administered by Dr. Theodore Cooper.

Barbara Walters, a reporter and co host of the Today show on NBC, accepted a contract to become the world's highest paid newscaster and the first woman to ever anchor an evening news program for a major television network. Walters agreed to a five year contract and a salary of $1,000,000 per year to serve as co anchor, with Harry Reasoner, of the ABC Evening News, beginning in September. Newspapers in Italy identified the nation's three most prominent political leaders — Prime Minister Aldo Moro, President Giovanni Leone and Foreign Minister Mariano Rumor — as suspects in the Lockheed bribery scandals. In the U. S. state of Massachusetts, a dynamite explosion at the Suffolk County Courthouse in Boston injured 21 people, seven of them seriously. The bomb, which exploded at 9:12 in the morning, knocked down an interior wall and a ceiling, shattered windows and tore a three foot wide hole in a marble floor. South African Prime Minister John Vorster announced plans for a Ministerial Joint Committee comprising representatives of South Africa and Israel.

The Palast der Republik opened in East Berlin to provide the chambers and offices of East Germany's parliament, the Volkskammer and to provide cultural attractions for East German citizens. Because of the use of asbestos in its construction, the Palace would be closed from 1990 to 2004 after German reunification. Claudio Sánchez Albornoz, who had led the opposition to Francisco Franco outside of Spain and who led the Spanish Republican government in exile from 1962 to 1971, returned to his homeland for the first time in 40 years. Sánchez Albornoz, who had served as a minister in the Second Spanish Republic for President Niceto Alcalá Zamora, had been Spain's Ambassador to Portugal until Portugal declared its support for General Franco in the Spanish Civil War. Ray Reardon defeated Alex Higgins in the final of the 1976 World Snooker Championship. The Ramones, the foremost punk rock band in the U. S., released their first album, Ramones.

The controversial "Greek language question" (Γλωσσικό ζήτημα, glossiko zitimea) was decided the Parliament of Greece with the implementation of Article 2 of Law 309. The law provided that, in official government documents and public educational instruction shall use Demotic Greek ("Demotiki"), the modern colloquial form of the Greek language used by most of the population of Greece, rather than "Katharevousa" an updated version of Ancient Greek that had been used in literature and government documents. A deported Turkish migrant worker hijacked a Turkish Airlines Douglas DC 10 10 after take off from Orly Airport, Paris. He demanded to be flown to Marseille or Lyon, but the plane returned to Orly, where he surrendered. The 264 people on board were released unharmed. The Icelandic Coast Guard patrol vessel ICGV Óðinn was rammed by the British fishing trawler Arctic Corsair in one of the more violent confrontations in the "Cod Wars" over fishing rights in the North Atlantic Ocean. World heavyweight boxing champion Muhammad Ali narrowly defended his title in a bout against challenger Jimmy Young. When the three judges' decision after the 15 round bout was unanimously in favor of Ali, the crowd at the Capital Centre in Landover, Maryland booed and the ABC TV network received calls of protest. Ali conceded afterward that he was overweight and that he had underestimated Young, a 15 to 1 underdog in betting. Rock music singer Bruce Springsteen, touring in the Memphis area of Tennessee, tried to gain admission to Elvis Presley's mansion, "Graceland", by climbing a wall. Security guards told him that Elvis was out of town and escorted him off the premises.