June 11

Margaret Thatcher has won a third term 1987: Thatcher wins record third term England have Conservative Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher has been celebrating her third general election win after beating Labour by 376 to 229 seats. The victory makes her the first prime minister for more than 160 years to win three successive terms of office. Mrs Thatcher said she was "raring to go" back to work, while defeated Labour leader Neil Kinnock vowed to fight "on and on" to secure victory at the next election. The SDP Liberal Alliance again failed to become the second largest party and "break the mould" of British politics, and questions are now being asked about its future viability. Basking in her achievement on the steps of Conservative Party headquarters, Mrs Thatcher said: "It is wonderful to be entrusted with the government of this great country once again. "The greater the trust, the greater the duty upon us to be worthy of that trust, and we will indeed endeavour to serve the people of these islands in the future as we have in the past." The new government is expected to take measures to privatise water and electricity industries and airport authorities. Local rates are to be replaced by a community charge, or 'poll tax'. Mr Kinnock, who was widely believed to have led the better campaign, said the election result would lead to "an even greater abyss of division than that which we witnessed previously." Insisting that Labour party morale was still high, he said: "Any feeling that we have of depression is outweighed by the feeling of enormous concern about what the consequences of the re-election of a Conservative government will mean". David Steel, speaking of the Alliance's poor performance, said: "It is a setback, it's a disappointment, and I don't disguise that. But to write it off as a disaster would be very foolish".

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A child suffering through famine 1998: UN warns of famine in Sudan Artificially 1969: The More than a million people in Sudan are facing starvation, prompting the United Nations to declare an official famine in the region. It estimates that up to 1.2 million people could die in the south of the country - many more than previously thought. The dramatic increase has prompted the World Food Programme to call for an unprecedented relief operation to target those most at risk in several areas it describes as "famine zones". Aid workers have been saying for weeks that the situation was out of control and that many more people than expected were needing food. The news came as Sudanese authorities met in the southern state of Bahr al-Ghazal to discuss the crisis, according to the Suna news agency. "We have failed to respond in a timely fashion again." Save the Children Fund's Nick Southern The first warnings that many parts of rebel and government-held southern Sudan were likely to face extreme food shortages came in November last year. Child feeding centres, run by the medical group, are full of skeletal children, and adults are little better off. Save the Children Fund's Nick Southern said: "We have failed to respond in a timely fashion again". David Fletcher, who works for the World Food Programme, says from next month it hopes to increase food deliveries by air. Mr Fletcher has also said that the WFP's Sudan operation is now suffering from a shortfall in donor funding of $117m.

Vocabulary:

viability: 生存能力 abyss: a yawning gulf（深渊）