And the gods have been kind: bringing Mediterranean sunshine that flatters the golden stone and turns

And the gods have been kind: bringing Mediterranean sunshine that flatters the golden stone and turns the city’s two rivers (Rhone and Saone) deep blue.
Here and there, however, are touching signs that Lyons is a second city, not (yet) a world city. The central streets are decked out like a ship on her maiden voyage. Lyons itself has pulled out all the stops: the national flags of the seven countries, plus the European flag, wave all over the city. Until the last minute, it was not known whether Mr Barre, who was France’s chief sherpa before the first G7 summit 21 years ago at Rambouillet, near Paris, would be invited to the opening heads of state dinner, even though it was in the precincts of his town hall. The result is a double press operation, with the Lyons publicity only just forbearing to say: “If you find the arrangements made by Paris unsatisfactory, try ours next door.” Another result is a degree of ambiguity about the position of the mayor of Lyons, Raymond Barre. The aspirations of Lyons to take its place on the world stage also appeared to have been underestimated by Paris, which found itself engaged in weeks of guerrilla warfare over arrangements for the visiting dignitaries and press. Europe accuses the US of trying to exercise extraterritorial authority by threatening to punish not just US companies that trade with Cuba, but foreign companies as well.Yesterday, in a significant toughening of the opposition to the law, President Chirac threatened that Europe could consider retaliatory measures if Washington persisted in applying the law, while Canada joined Europe in expressing its strong opposition, leaving the US effectively isolated.Although US spokesmen denied that Washington had any intention of changing the legislation, both the president of the European Commission, Jacques Santer, and senior French officials suggested that Washington recognised that the law presented a problem and might be prepared to soften it.In a pre-emptive move, Mr Santer obliquely warned the US against trying to use the Dhahran attack as justification either for the Helms-Burton law as it stands, or for its possible extension to Iran and Libya.In a statement forcefully condemning the latest attack, he said: “In clear cases where countries fund, promote or harbour terrorists, and if all the signs show that negotiation and dialogue will not work, then the international community must act, if necessary through sanctions.” He went on: “In such cases we must be careful to ensure that the punishment hits the criminal and fits the crime.” He subsequently defended the EU’s policy towards Iran, where it supports what he called “critical dialogue”.The growing pressure on the US over the Helms-Burton law adds to the differences that exist among the G7 countries, especially on economic topics, as they go into their first full day of discussions today.While a joint economic statement existed in draft, the question of employment divided countries like the US and Britain with more free-market labour policies, and lower unemployment, from those like France and Italy where labour is more protected, and unemployment is higher.Leading article, page 13.

It had earlier been announced that he was bringing forward his planned departure from France to Saturday evening, to attend Sunday church services in Florida with families of the dead servicemen.The decision to address terrorism at a separate forum also removes a factor that could have complicated discussion of the controversial new US legislation, the Helms-Burton law, which has already become a major point of discord at this summit. MARY DEJEVSKY

Lyons
Leaders of the world’s seven richest nations pledged last night to unite their efforts tocombat terrorism and agreed to hold a ministerial meeting next month in Paris to discuss specific measures.In an official statement, issued after the dinner inaugurating their annual summit inLyons, the Group of Seven industrialised countries condemned “the barbarous and unjustified” attack on US servicemen in Saudi Arabia earlier this week and expressed “total solidarity with the United States and Saudi Arabia”.The statement said that tragedies such as the killing at Dhahran “only strengthen our conviction that terrorism constitutes a major challenge for the security of all our societies and states”.The decision to call a meeting of ministers next month suggested that the host country, France, had resisted moves by the US to make the summit “an anti-terrorist summit” and had managed to save the original agenda, which includes subjects such as third world aid and employment which are dear to the French president, Jacques Chirac.Earlier in the day, President Clinton, looking uncharacteristically tired and drawn, had described terrorism as “the security challenge of the 21st century” and called for the summit to concentrate on terrorism. Besieged by the FBI at his Ranch Apocalypse near Waco, Texas, ending in a self-inflicted fire and suicide shootings which killed most of the group.JIM JONESJones (below) caused the mass suicide of more than 900 of his followers, at Jonestown, Guyana. He started out in Indiana as a “socialist worker God” (as opposed to what he called the “sky God”), and recruited many of his followers among black people who responded to his rejection of racial superiority.

He sexually abused male and female disciples, and subjected them to concentration camp conditions when he finally went crazy Storr concludes that these “evil madmen.. exhibited in exaggerated form.. all the worst possible characteristics of gurus.”. Subjected his followers to beatings and 15-hour harangues, as well as sex with any women (and girls) he chose. Developed Branch Davidian breakaway from Seventh Day Adventists, basing its belief on the idea that God would return to earth and establish a new kingdom in Israel with Koresh on the throne. and inflated with his own importance.”JESUSStorr says: “Perceiving Jesus as one example amongst many gurus actually emphasises his unique qualities; but those who regard him as their saviour may think this approach irreverent.

It is important to remember that Jesus was not a Christian.” Storr says: “In 20th-century England, an individual announcing that he was the son of God and would return after death in glory would probably attract psychiatric attention; but earlier generations might have regarded such claims as unsurprising.” However, Storr concludes that: “Few subsequent gurus seem to have matched the simplicity and directness of Jesus’s message.”DAVID KORESHKoresh (above) started life as Vernon Howell, son of a 14-year-old girl. Like many gurus, Rajneesh started on a road of good intent, and had some (to some people) useful ideas: loving yourself, saying “yes” to life, loosening inhibitions (particularly sexual). But he ended up watching films like Patton and The Ten Commandments all day, collected 93 Rolls-Royces, inflicted terrible privations on his orange-dressed sanyassin followers at his various ashram communities Storr says “Rajneesh descended into a monster of greed .. arrogant … He also did not believe human problems could be treated in a purely scientific way. He developed a theory of the unconscious, of symbolic archetypes, and the notions of extrovert and introverted personality types. Storr says: “Some of his beliefs bordered on delusion; but his period of mental illness opened doors of perception which are closed to normal people.”BHAGWAN SHREE RAJNEESHIndian mystic taken up by middle-class youth in the 1970s.