March 8, 1986

The nation's unemployment rate soared six-tenths of a percentage point in February, the biggest monthly rise in almost six years, the Labor Department reported today. The increase pushed the jobless rate back up to the 7.2 percent level that prevailed through the first seven months of last year, wiping out the improvement posted since July. The rate in New York City leaped 1.1 points, to 8.4 percent. It was the third consecutive year that the February figure for the city rose by more than a point. [ Page 9. ] The official Federal employment figures include military personnel. A companion rate, which excludes the military, also rose six-tenths of a point in February, to 7.3 percent.

The Reagan Administration ordered the Soviet, Ukrainian and Byelorussian Missions to the United Nations today to reduce their personnel by more than a third, accusing them of espionage and calling the size of the missions ''a threat to national security.'' The unexpected announcement, which came in an official statement from the United States Mission to the United Nations, said the permanently assigned staffs would be cut from a total of 275 to 170 by April 1, 1988. The reduction will take place in four stages. By October of this year, when the first phase is to be completed, the three missions will be allowed to have no more than 243 permanent staff members.

Space agency officials today disclosed a series of problems with a booster rocket before the launching of the shuttle Challenger, more details of what then happened just before the spaceship's explosion, and some new hypotheses on what caused the disaster. The new theories hold that ice or bad seals between the joints of a booster rocket might have contributed to the explosion of the Challenger, which killed all seven crew members. At a public hearing held at the Kennedy Space Center here, the new hypotheses were greeted with some skepticism by members of the Presidential commission investigating the accident. The panel has so far seemed sympathetic to the testimony of contractor engineers who said it was too cold on the morning of Jan. 28 for the proper operation of the critical booster seals.

The Federal Reserve Board cut the interest rate it charges financial institutions today by half a percentage point, to 7 percent, its lowest level in almost eight years. In turn, banks nationwide cut their prime rate half a point, to 9 percent. Economists and bankers said the drop in the prime rate, to which a broad spectrum of loans are tied, would have a powerful impact on individuals and business, as well as on debtor nations. For consumers, the benefits will show up immediately in auto and home improvement loans. Lower interest rates will also put downward pressure on mortgages. But the lower rates are expected to translate into poorer returns on such personal investments as money market funds and Government securities.

South Africa rescinded its state-of-emergency decree today and released what it said were the last 327 of almost 8,000 people detained since last July, when the decree went into effect. Despite the action, the police may still detain people without charge and search their premises. But the security legislation that enables them to do so is said by police officers to require more bureaucratic procedures than the emergency decree. The security legislation also permits some access by lawyers to certain detainees, while the state of emergency decree did not permit contact with legal representatives.

The only person charged so far in the New York City corruption scandal has agreed to plead guilty and cooperate with investigators, law-enforcement officials said yesterday. The deal was outlined in a signed agreement, but putting it into effect was delayed by a dispute over when the guilty plea would be entered, the officials said. Prosecutors said they believed that the agreement of cooperation with Geoffrey G. Lindenauer, accused of extorting bribes while deputy director of the Parking Violations Bureau, would provide them with valuable information about allegations of corruption involving other city officials. They include Donald R. Manes, who resigned last month as Borough President and Democratic Party leader in Queens.

Jacob K. Javits, who began life in a Lower East Side tenement and, as a United States Senator for 24 years, became one of the most respected and influential political figures in the nation, died of a heart attack yesterday in Palm Beach, Fla. He was 81 years old and lived in Manhattan. Mr. Javits was on vacation in Florida when he suffered cardiac arrest in the late afternoon, according to Lily Javits, the widow of Mr. Javits's brother, Benjamin. The former Senator was taken by ambulance to Good Samaritan Hospital in West Palm Beach, where he was pronounced dead at 5:29 P.M. His wife, Marion, arrived at the hospital shortly after his death. Although Mr. Javits had been suffering from a degenerative nerve disease for five years, Lily Javits said he had been feeling in good health and high spirits recently, and had traveled to New York for business appointments.

Trans World Airlines canceled half its domestic and international flights yesterday and consolidated many others as striking flight attendants walked picket lines at more than 30 airports around the country. Negotiations between the company, the fifth-largest airline in the United States, and the Independent Federation of Flight Attendants, which represents about 6,000 T.W.A. employees, broke down Thursday night when the two sides failed to agree on wage concessions and changes in work rules sought by the airline. The line is experiencing heavy financial losses. No new talks have been scheduled. The company immediately hired 1,500 newly trained flight attendants it had standing by in the event of a strike. The airline also planned to shift 1,500 employees, ranging from reservation clerks to accountants, to flight attendants. They had been trained to fill in.

Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi ousted the leader of the Moslem-dominated state of Kashmir today and in effect placed it under his control. The move cleared the way for possible new elections in Kashmir, a northern state where there has been increasing violence between Moslems and Hindus. But at the same time, it appeared to create a host of new problems for the Prime Minister, whose political fortunes have recently started to ebb. It was the second time in two years that a Kashmir Chief Minister was ousted by a Prime Minister. The dismissal was seen as a symbol of continuing instability in India's only Moslem-dominated state, where there is a special sensitivity because of its border with Pakistan.

There is something awesome about the volume of words generated at a Soviet Communist Party congress. Over nine days, with a day off on Sunday, the 5,000 delegates to the 27th party congress sat stoically in their assigned rows in the cavernous Palace of Congresses through some 100 speeches, as well as 31 by foreign Communist leaders. Each speech was printed in pages of solid type in the party newspaper Pravda and the Government newspaper Izvestia, with ''applause,'' ''prolonged applause'' and sometimes ''tumultuous, prolonged applause'' marked in at appropriate spots. The only other interruptions at the congress, which ended Thursday, have been for ''votes,'' all unanimous, to adopt the party program, the economic guidelines, resolutions and other reports.

Chadian troops killed 864 rebels in fighting in the north of the country two days ago, Foreign Minister Gouara Lassou said today. He told the Ndjamena radio today that the Government forces were still pursuing remnants of the rebel force 40 miles north of Kalait, a town that the Libyan-backed supporters of former President Goukouni Oueddei had attacked for the second time in two weeks. Mr. Lassou said that the rebels suffered 456 wounded and that the Government forces suffered 18 dead and 64 wounded.

South Africa ordered the expulsion today of three representatives of CBS News, one of them an American. The action came after the network broadcast videotape footage this week of a mass funeral in a township near Johannesburg from which television cameras had been formally banned. The expulsion order, effective Tuesday, was by far the most drastic action against a foreign news organization in years and was viewed here as certain to be interpreted as a warning to others that they might also be expelled by the authorities. The expulsion coincided with the formal lifting of restrictions on television coverage of South Africa's unrest imposed in a seven-month emergency decree. [ In New York, CBS issued a protest, saying it was studying the expulsion order and intended ''to utilize all appropriate avenues of appeal.'' ] Those ordered to leave the country by Tuesday were Allen Pizzey, a reporter and Canadian national ordinarily based in Athens; William Mutschmann, an American who is manager of the CBS bureau here, and Wim de Vos, a cameraman and Dutch national who has lived in South Africa for 11 years.