March 1, 1994

The stock and bond markets of the developing countries have lured both big and small investors in search of higher returns in recent months, despite their reputation for high risk and volatility. That volatility was in evidence last week as these markets -- mainly in Latin America -- fell sharply, ending a phenomenal yearlong bull market and causing hundreds of millions of dollars in losses among leading banks and brokerage firms that deal in their securities.

Without warning the Board of Education, the Giuliani administration last week loaded software on a computer accounting system to block spending on school supplies. But the administration reversed the spending freeze yesterday after the Board considered legal action, and the Mayor's lawyers said the Mayor may have the computer power but not the legal power to cut off the spending.

With a new Federal law requiring background checks on buyers of handguns now in effect, the Clinton Administration today announced new restrictions on semiautomatic shotguns, favorite weapons in the drug trade. Treasury Secretary Lloyd Bentsen said three types of shotguns, one of which can supposedly fire 12 shells in three seconds, were being reclassified as "destructive weapons," a class that includes machine guns.

Recognizing that he could be vulnerable to a credible Republican challenge, Gov. Mario M. Cuomo has hired the political impresario David Garth to be media consultant for his 1994 re-election campaign, senior advisers to the Cuomo campaign said today. In hiring Mr. Garth, the Democratic Governor has forged an intriguing alliance with the man who last year helped Rudolph W. Giuliani, a Republican, defeat David N. Dinkins, New York City's first black Mayor. He also has joined forces with the strategist who ran two campaigns for Edward I. Koch against Mr. Cuomo, a successful race for mayor in 1977 and an unsuccessful one for governor in 1982.

THE Komodo dragon, the world's largest, ugliest and most dangerous lizard -- is on the endangered species list, and some would say that this unprepossessing creature would not be missed if it were to become extinct. But although the death in 1987 of a lone Komodo dragon at the San Diego Zoo temporarily wiped out America's entire surviving population of these fearsome reptiles, a new breeding program in Washington is mass-producing dragon chicks and has begun restocking zoos in this country and abroad. Komodo dragons are now hatching by the dozen at the National Zoo, the first time these animals have been bred in captivity outside Indonesia, the only nation in the world where Komodo dragons live in the wild.