A daily pick of news events that happened on this day in history from the pages of Gulf News dated December 25, 1978.

Violence flares in Iran again

US marines guarding the American Embassy in Teheran fired tear gas at Iranian students demonstrating outside the building. The marines fired tear gas cannisters after the students, shouting anti-American slogans, set fire to an official embassy car.

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Embassy sources said no one appeared to be injured and the protesters were dispersed when Iranian troops also fired tear gas at them. But reliable eyewitnesses said four demonstrators were shot in the legs by Iranian soldiers and taken to hospital. Several thousand students had paraded to the Embassy chanting slogans against the Shah of Iran and US president Jimmy Carter.

Riots hit Bombay

Supporters of former Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi went on rampage in Bombay, burning buses, cars and stoning suburban train. But few violent incidents were reported from the rest of the country as the nation-wide agitation over Mrs Gandhi's arrest generally subsided. So far, 19 people have been killed and nearly 100,000 arrested in the riots.

Frogmen search for disaster plane wreckage

Frogmen searched for the wreckage of the Alitalia airliner which plunged into the sea killing 108 of its 129 passengers in Italy's worst air disaster for six years. The bodies of 80 passengers are still believed trapped in the fuselage of the twin-engined DC-9 jet, resting on the seabed at a depth only 50-metres just north of Palermo in Sicily.