Portugal President Calls Election

Portuguese President Antonio Ramalho Eanes today dissolved parliament and called elections for Oct. 6.

Eanes, who steps down in January after 10 years in office, decided on dissolution and early elections as the only way out of a political impasse caused by the collapse of Socialist Prime Minister Mario Soares’ ruling two-year coalition with the Social Democrats a month ago. It was Portugal’s 15th--and longest-lived--government since the overthrow of half a century of right-wing dictatorship in the 1974 armed forces revolution.