February 20, 1973

Saigon mil authorities rept, Feb 20, that fighting in S Vietnam declines substantially during last 24 hrs; appeal by Joint Mil Comm to end all hostilities believed to be having some effect at last; decline in fighting is first since appeal was issued Feb 17; Saigon repts 134 Communist cease-fire violations in 24 hrs ended 6 AM Feb 20; Internatl Control Comm says, Feb 19, it will begin deploying truce inspection teams around the country; will begin moving to 14 'subregional' sites Feb 21; under terms of Paris accord inspection teams are supposed to be in place in 26 subregional sites by Feb 26; M Gauvin chides mil comm for having failed to live up to terms of Paris accord; says control comm relies to a large degree on mil comm's cooperation to fulfill its tasks under the accord; lists sites to which inspection teams will be sent; says control comm will begin probe of shooting down of an Amer helicopter; map; Gauvin illus

Italian authorities are conducting 2 separate investigations to determine if vase, which is now reptd as costing originally $1.3-million, was smuggled out of Italy; may request US cooperation in returning it if investigation is successful; are convinced vase, a calyx krater, was found in Etruscan tomb within last 2 yrs and later smuggled out of Italy; have received rept that 2d vase, now missing, was found in same tomb; if authorities recover it, they may not insist Met Museum return its vase, if they prove it was smuggled; experts say theory of 2d vase is quite plausible because tombs of important Etruscans often had more than 1 valuable vase placed in them; 2d investigation involves R E Hecht Jr, who sold krater to museum, saying he was acting for anonymous owner; Italy had previously cleared Hecht of charges that he bought illegally excavated antiquities

D von Bothmer discloses on Feb 19 that Greek vase purchased by museum in 72 was owned by Armenian collector; latter, whose name von Bothmer will soon reveal, purchased vase in '20 and kept it in family until R E Hecht Jr, acting for him, sold it to museum; von Bothmer also says that he, and not Hecht, had asked F Buerki to restore vase; says he did not think vase had been smuggled out of Italy; regards its acquisition as peak of his career; expresses deep resentment about Archeological Inst of Amer's rebuke at last Dec's convention, in which he was nominated but not elected to trustee bd; delegates felt that von Bothmer, in buying vase, had violated inst's stand opposing purchase of objects whose origins were not clearly licit; also felt that high price paid for vase, about $1-million, would 'serve only to incite resentment and encourage' illegal traffic in antiquities; von Bothmer por

Official investigating group repts on Feb 19 that coffin containing body of late Marshall H P Petain, World War I hero who became controversial when he headed French Govt that collaborated with Ger occupiers in World War II, has been stolen from tomb on Ile d'Yeu; Petain was brought to trial in '45 after he returned voluntarily to France from Ger and was sentenced to be shot; sentence was later commuted to imprisonment for life in prison on Ile d'Yeu; pol implications stemming from controversy over burial place described; illus of tomb; map

Recent lifting of all Fed rent controls has brought tenants in NYC met area to intensify pressures for alternative forms of rent control; NJ has had best organized tenant movement but now tenants in other suburban areas are speaking out; Suffolk County, NY, and most areas of Conn have oversupply of housing so these areas have no cause for rent control but in areas such as Long Island and Westchester County, various towns have asked NYS Legis for power to limit rent increases; NJ Assembly recently passed bill giving local govts option of tying rent increases to rise in cost-of-living index