LEAD: Mikhail S. Gorbachev, the Soviet leader, announced today that the Soviet Union had decided to halt production of enriched uranium and reduce production of enriched plutonium, both key elements of nuclear weapons.

GORBACHEV PLANS TO STOP PRODUCING URANIUM FOR ARMS

LEAD:  Bush Orders the Military To Help Clean Up Spill

INSIDE

LEAD: Federal officials have begun investigating private insurance companies that they believe may have avoided tens of billions of dollars in medical bills by passing them on to Medicare, Government officials said today.

U.S. Inquiry Opens on Billions in Medicare Losses

LEAD: A nuclear-powered Soviet submarine, reportedly armed with cruise missiles, caught fire while submerged today, then surfaced and later disappeared in the Norwegian Sea, American and Norwegian officials said.

A Soviet Nuclear Sub Catches Fire And Reportedly Sinks Off Norway

LEAD: The State Attorney General today put forth a plan that would make California the first state to establish a computerized genetic data base of everyone convicted of a violent crime. The data base, created through blood and saliva samples, would be used to help solve future crimes.

California Urged to Take Lead In Genetic Tracking of Crime

LEAD: Last month, when the owners of major league baseball teams met at the Bonaventure Hotel in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., Carl R. Pohlad, owner of the Minnesota Twins, and Peter V. Ueberroth, the baseball commissioner, slipped away for a private chat.

The Sale of Eastern Airlines: Baseball Connection Pays Off

LEAD: New credits from American and international lending organizations are among the economic rewards being considered by Washington in response to Poland's latest moves toward greater democracy, Administration officials said today.

U.S. IS CONSIDERING LOANS AND CREDITS TO REWARD POLAND

LEAD: An armed man who said he had dynamite gave up and released his hostages today after he hijacked a New York-bound Greyhound bus and kept the police at bay for five hours on Parliament Hill.

A Bus Headed for New York Is Briefly Hijacked in Canada

LEAD: ''I was raised to know the difference between right and wrong. I knew it wasn't right not to tell the truth about those things. But I didn't think it was unlawful.'' - Oliver L. North.  [ 9:1. ]

Quotation of the Day

LEAD: A prominent young Chinese dissident who had been detained in Shanghai for 36 hours was escorted to the airport today and put on a flight to Hong Kong.

China Ousts Prominent Dissident

LEAD:  International 2-6  Moscow will stop making enriched uranium and reduce production of enriched plutonium, both vital components of nuclear weapons, Mikhail Gorbachev announced. Page 1  United States reaction to Soviet move is divided 6  Disturbances in Soviet Georgia brought troops to the streets of Tbilisi, the capital, in the wake of nationalist strikes and demonstrations, the Georgian press agency said.

NEWS SUMMARY

LEAD: An obituary in some editions yesterday about Bayard Schieffelin, a former executive officer of the New York Public Library, listed his survivors incompletely. They include his wife, the former Virginia Loomis of Short Hills, N.J.

Corrections

LEAD: The countries espousing nonalignment have become bitterly critical of the way the United Nations is carrying out a plan for guiding Namibia to independence from South Africa next year.

U.N. Actions in Namibia Under Fire

LEAD: Investigators today charged four Sikhs, including a dismissed senior policeman, in the assassination of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi.

4 SIKHS CHARGED IN GANDHI'S DEATH

LEAD: In a rare appeal from his prison home, Nelson R. Mandela, the jailed leader of the African National Congress, has called for black unity in South Africa and an end to three years of fighting between factions of the Zulu tribe.

Mandela Pleads for Black Unity

LEAD: An article on Sunday in the Long Island Weekly gave an incorrect date for ''Dancescapes,'' a joint performance by the Circle of Dance Repertory Company and Plainedge High School students. It is tonight at 8 at the high school in North Massapequa; it was not last night.

LEAD: An article yesterday reported on a rape case in Stony Brook, L.I., that has set off a bitter debate about race relations at the State University of New York. The victim, who is white, has identified a black student as her attacker; the suspect says he can prove he was nowhere near the campus on that night, March 24, and several people have backed up his account.

Editors' Note

LEAD: Prime Minister Noboru Takeshita's beleaguered Government was dealt another blow today by new reports that Mr. Takeshita received secret payments from the company at the center of a widening influence-peddling scandal.

New Payment to Takeshita Is Reported in Japan Press

LEAD: An article on Wednesday about the Ravenmaster at the Tower of London misstated the year of Queen Elizabeth's coronation. It was 1953; she succeeded to the throne in 1952.

LEAD: With little debate or dissent, the Polish Parliament today approved six laws agreed to at the talks between the Government and Solidarity to restore the banned union's legal status and introduce broad changes in public life.

Poland's Changes Officially Adopted

LEAD: A parcel bomb mailed to a policeman exploded today, blowing off the arms of one person and also wounding two others, local officials and hospital officials said. The attack in the Basque town of Irun was the first in the region since Basque guerrillas last week called off a three-month truce in their 21-year campaign for a separate state.

Basque Mail Bomb Hurts 3

LEAD: A melee erupted outside al-Aqsa mosque in the Old City today as hundreds of Palestinians leaving noon prayers at the start of the Muslim holiday of Ramadan pelted police officers and passers-by with rocks after the police fired tear gas at the protesters.

Arabs Battle Police at Mosque in Jerusalem

LEAD: Mariam Abdelmihsem walked to the edge of this tiny Arab village one recent morning, a gusting wind whipping her white headscarf, and pointed across a narrow valley to a cluster of trailers sitting on freshly bulldozed earth.

Janiyeh Journal; Who Owns the Land, Arab or Settler?

LEAD: The State Department today accused the Soviet Union of installing listening devices in the United States Consulate in Leningrad. A State Department spokesman said it was too early to tell if any highly classified information was obtained.

U.S. Says Soviets Put Bugs in Its Consulate

LEAD: The Bush Administration today dismissed a Soviet cutback in the production of nuclear materials as an empty gesture. But some arms control advocates, including members of Congress, were encouraged by the announcement and said they intended to press for a negotiated cutoff in the production of bomb material.

U.S. Reaction to Soviet Move Is Divided

Matthew Timothy Healy is an English singer-songwriter and record producer who is the lead vocalist and principal songwriter of the pop rock band the 1975. He is recognised for his lyricism, musical eclecticism, provocative onstage persona characterised as performance art, and influence on indie pop music.

April 8, 1989

Headlines from April 8, 1989

GORBACHEV PLANS TO STOP PRODUCING URANIUM FOR ARMS

INSIDE

U.S. Inquiry Opens on Billions in Medicare Losses

A Soviet Nuclear Sub Catches Fire And Reportedly Sinks Off Norway

California Urged to Take Lead In Genetic Tracking of Crime

Billboard 200

Electric Youth

Don't Be Cruel

Loc-ed After Dark

Traveling Wilburys

Mystery Girl

Notable Births

Historical Context for April 8, 1989