***************************************************************** 01/08/06 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 14.6 ***************************************************************** RADBULL IS PRODUCED BY THE ABALONE ALLIANCE CLEARINGHOUSE ***************************************************************** Send News Stories to news@energy-net.org with title on subject line and first line of body NUCLEAR POLICY 1 US: azstarnet.com: Insider recalls hunt for WMD 2 [NYTr] Why the US Is So Squirrely about Iran 3 Observer Bullying Iran is not an option 4 Sunday Times: Iran's nuclear ambitions pose the next big test 5 IRNA: N-claims against Iran not trustworthy, says UK professor 6 BBC: Russia and Iran in nuclear talks 7 BBC: Iran to resume nuclear research 8 IRNA: Iran in close contact with IAEA to start nuclear research 9 Xinhua: EU regrets Iran's decision to resume suspended nuclear activ 10 Xinhua: Nuclear fuel research not to hinder talks with EU: Iran 11 Guardian Unlimited: Iran, Russia Begin Joint Enrichment Talks 12 Guardian Unlimited: Iran to Resume Nuclear Research on Monday 13 AFP: Russia-Iran talks on nuclear compromise plan 14 ITAR-TASS: Russian delegation to discuss nuclear cooperation with Ir 15 AFP: Iran sets date for nuclear research despite EU appeal - 16 Guardian Unlimited: Iran Says U.N. to Remove Nuclear Seals 17 KCNA: DPRK Demands Total Nuclear Disarmament 18 Korea Herald: N.K. learns international law through latest clash, Ba 19 INSIDE JoongAng Daily: [EDITORIALS]Protect the KEDO site 20 INSIDE JoongAng Daily: A death knell sounds for 1994 idealism 21 Japan Times: Japan assures U.S. on plans for N. Korea 22 Korea Times: Pyongyang Beefs Up Offensive 23 Guardian Unlimited: U.S., S. Korea Withdraw Power Plant Staff 24 US: WorldNetDaily: Gray Lady's nonsense 25 US: SF Chron: Environmentalists finally get down to very serious bus 26 Sunday Times: Pay up or dance to tune of foreign energy suppliers 27 TheStar.com: Province misses point of renewable energy 28 Japan Times: Rokkasho tests break plutonium pledge, activists tell I 29 Telegraph: Westinghouse deal will net Britain £1.7bn 30 Observer: Red alert as Russia floats its oil giant NUCLEAR REACTORS 31 IRNA: India's nuke plan sent to US without Union cabinet's approval 32 US: San Luis Obispo Tribune: Diablo powers PG&E to big year 33 US: SLO Trib: SLO County supervisor wants study of Diablo Canyon spe 34 US: Fredericksburg.com: Cooling reactor concerns at North Anna 35 Korea Herald: KEDO's reactor project in N.K. closes, workers return 36 US: Portsmouth Herald: Lawmakers eye 2nd reactor at Seabrook 37 US: PBP: FPL-Constellation merger needs close eye of regulators 38 US: toledoblade.com: DAVIS-BESSE Regulators scale back inspectors fr 39 US: toledoblade.com: Davis-Besse ex-workers barred from nuke jobs 40 US: JOURNAL NEWS: Indian Point 2's leak stops; probe continues 41 US: APP.COM: Public must pressure NRC on Oyster Creek safety 42 Xinhua: KEDO workers pull out of DPRK light-water reactor project 43 Independent: Labour kicks off energy review as Russia darkens the ou 44 US: APP.COM: Power down merger plan 45 AFP: Fossil-fuel crisis drives Europe to nuclear, green energy - 46 Japan Times: Pluthermal to use 6.5 tons a year 47 AFP: US, S.Korea pull out of North's light-water reactor site - 48 US: Odessa American Online: Meetings set to discuss nuke reactor in 49 CNIC: Japanese NGOs send petition to IAEA NUCLEAR SECURITY 50 Observer: UK cleared nuclear cargo to Iran 51 AFP: Britain allowed nuclear cargo to be sent to Iran NUCLEAR SAFETY 52 US: WQAD: Researchers to examine history of ammunition plant workers 53 US: Journal Star News: Ex-military director speaks out - NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE 54 US: Deseret News: U.S. judge is pondering touchy Goshute dispute 55 US: Deseret: News: Here's some hefty answers to hot political questi 56 US: Deseret News: Cedar Mountain OK dents nuclear plans 57 BBC: Dounreay particle plans outlined 58 reviewjournal.com: EDITORIAL: Yucca Mountain woes 59 US: Deseret News: New Utah caucus leans to the right 60 US: Salt Lake Tribune: Bush approves Cedar Mountain Wilderness Area 61 US: Salt Lake Tribune: Radiation board puts off Envirocare expansion 62 US: Salt Lake Tribune: Lawyer says suit against tribe isn't ripe 63 US: Daily Herald: Envirocare expansion appeal on hold 64 US: KUTV: Envirocare Expansion Appeal On Hold 65 US: canada.com: Alberta's uranium rush PEACE US DEPT. OF ENERGY 66 ContraCostaTimes.com: State supreme court to rule on LLNL whistleblo 67 SF Chron: LIVERMORE / State top court takes ex-lab workers' case / 68 lamonitor.com: Chromium source traced ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** FULL NEWS STORIES ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** 1 azstarnet.com: Insider recalls hunt for WMD Scott Ritter says in his book that Iraq disarmed its weapons of mass destruction as early as 1991. The Associated Press IRAQ CONFIDENTIAL: THE UNTOLD STORY OF THE INTELLIGENCE CONSPIRACY TO UNDERMINE THE U.N. AND OVERTHROW SADDAM HUSSEIN By Scott Ritter (Nation Books, $26) Former U.N. inspector faults CIA in his book By Walter Putnam the Associated Press Tucson, Arizona | Published: 01.08.2006 Former U.N. weapons inspector Scott Ritter provides an insider's view into the hunt for weapons of mass destruction during the 1990s in "Iraq Confidential: The Untold Story of the Intelligence Conspiracy to Undermine the U.N. and Overthrow Saddam Hussein." Ritter writes that American policy to rid the Middle East of Saddam, spanning three administrations, prevented the inspections from demonstrating Iraq's compliance with United Nations Security Council resolutions that could have led to the lifting of economic sanctions, which continued largely unabated until the U.S.-led invasion 12 years after the 1991 Persian Gulf War. Ritter, a former U.S. Marine officer and ballistic missile expert who led numerous teams by the U.N. Special Commission charged with assessing Iraqi compliance, discusses his relationship with Israeli intelligence to aid the inspection process — a revelation that could have had serious consequences at the time because of distrust of Israel throughout the Arab world, and especially in Iraq. He also provides in unprecedented detail accounts of close U.S. intelligence involvement with the inspections, and puts his focus on an aborted CIA coup plot in Baghdad in 1996. The Iraqis contended almost from the commission's beginning that it was being manipulated, if not controlled, by the CIA. In his book, the former inspector faults the agency for insisting that Iraq continued to have hidden long-range missiles and at least a capability of producing biological, chemical and nuclear weapons long after it had actually been disarmed — which he says was as early as 1991. "The reality was that there were many in the U.S. government who simply did not want UNSCOM to succeed," he writes. "In this perverse formulation, a failed UNSCOM would forever justify the continuation of economic sanctions against Iraq." For their part, Ritter writes, the Iraqis failed to help matters by concealing information about weapons programs, which added to the distrust of U.N. officials, as well as intelligence agencies. He says the Iraqis unilaterally destroyed SCUD missiles during the summer of 1991, without being able to provide documentation, and ran a concealment operation that may have been aimed primarily at preventing the inspectors from obtaining secret information on Saddam Hussein's security but instead caused the commission to continue believing that weapons material or data was being withheld. Ritter was one of the most hard-line inspectors in his seven years with the commission, which ended in August 1998. Still, he was one of the few who was outspoken with claims that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction. He largely provides a gripping outline of his role in the hunt for weapons of mass destruction through an account that often reads like a spy novel. But there are flaws. The book traces a complex conundrum of plots and counter-plots that lends to confusion and — perhaps inevitably — unanswered questions. For example, at one point Ritter refers to a " 'lethal finding,' signed in October 1991, that authorized the CIA to create conditions inside Iraq to facilitate the elimination of Saddam Hussein." Yet he is not clear on his source for knowledge of such a policy or who signed it. Presumably, it was the first President Bush, whose public stance that the Iraqi president must be removed before lifting of sanctions eroded Iraq's incentive to cooperate with the U.N. Overall, Ritter provides a view through trained eyes of an unprecedented international effort to rid a rogue regime of weapons of mass destruction, and of a determination by hidden forces to prevent that effort from being acclaimed as a success. "Intelligence, to me, has always been about the facts," Ritter writes. "When intelligence is skewed to fit policy, then the entire system of trust that is fundamental in a free and democratic society is put at risk." [Email this story] Email this story [Print this story] Print this story[Letter to the editor] Letter to the editor [Discuss this story] DiscussCopyright © 2005Go Back ***************************************************************** 2 [NYTr] Why the US Is So Squirrely about Iran Date: Sat, 7 Jan 2006 15:53:55 -0600 (CST) http://olm.blythe-systems.com/pipermail/nytr/Week-of-Mon-20060102/029685.html sent by Peter Bell - Jan 6, 2006 [Outstanding. From the endless "secret success" casefiles in Langley, another corker. The CIA used a Russian they'd turned to deliver warhead plans to the Iranians. The warhead design they furnished was a very good one; they'd introduced a small flaw so that (they hoped) the Iranians would ultimately build a dud device. Problem being, the Russian was trained in this stuff, and the knuckleheads explained the design flaw to him. Which he, in turn, told the Iranians about, so they'd know which part to research on their own. Rather than slowing down Iran's ability to defend itself against the only country ever to use nukes in wartime, the spooks look to have helped in her defense. Boo-ya, boys. The relevant Federal authorities rushed out to confirm the story by claiming there were "inaccuracies" in every chapter of the book in question, without detailing what the purported inaccuracies were. -Peter] Extract from "State of War: The Secret History of the CIA and the Bush Administratin," by James Risen (Free Press, 2006). The Guardian - Jan 5, 2006 http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1678134,00.html http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,12858,1678220,00.html [George Bush insists that Iran must not be allowed to develop nuclear weapons. So why, six years ago, did the CIA give the Iranians blueprints to build a bomb? In an extract from his explosive new book, New York Times reporter James Risen reveals the bungles and miscalculations that led to a spectacular intelligence fiasco.] Why Did the CIA Give Iran Blueprints to Build a Bomb? by James Risen She had probably done this a dozen times before. Modern digital technology had made clandestine communications with overseas agents seem routine. Back in the cold war, contacting a secret agent in Moscow or Beijing was a dangerous, labour-intensive process that could take days or even weeks. But by 2004, it was possible to send high-speed, encrypted messages directly and instantaneously from CIA headquarters to agents in the field who were equipped with small, covert personal communications devices. So the officer at CIA headquarters assigned to handle communications with the agency's spies in Iran probably didn't think twice when she began her latest download. With a few simple commands, she sent a secret data flow to one of the Iranian agents in the CIA's spy network. Just as she had done so many times before. But this time, the ease and speed of the technology betrayed her. The CIA officer had made a disastrous mistake. She had sent information to one Iranian agent that exposed an entire spy network; the data could be used to identify virtually every spy the CIA had inside Iran. Mistake piled on mistake. As the CIA later learned, the Iranian who received the download was a double agent. The agent quickly turned the data over to Iranian security officials, and it enabled them to "roll up" the CIA's network throughout Iran. CIA sources say that several of the Iranian agents were arrested and jailed, while the fates of some of the others is still unknown. This espionage disaster, of course, was not reported. It left the CIA virtually blind in Iran, unable to provide any significant intelligence on one of the most critical issues facing the US - whether Tehran was about to go nuclear. In fact, just as President Bush and his aides were making the case in 2004 and 2005 that Iran was moving rapidly to develop nuclear weapons, the American intelligence community found itself unable to provide the evidence to back up the administration's public arguments. On the heels of the CIA's failure to provide accurate pre-war intelligence on Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction, the agency was once again clueless in the Middle East. In the spring of 2005, in the wake of the CIA's Iranian disaster, Porter Goss, its new director, told President Bush in a White House briefing that the CIA really didn't know how close Iran was to becoming a nuclear power. But it's worse than that. Deep in the bowels of the CIA, someone must be nervously, but very privately, wondering: "Whatever happened to those nuclear blueprints we gave to the Iranians?" The story dates back to the Clinton administration and February 2000, when one frightened Russian scientist walked Vienna's winter streets. The Russian had good reason to be afraid. He was walking around Vienna with blueprints for a nuclear bomb. To be precise, he was carrying technical designs for a TBA 480 high-voltage block, otherwise known as a "firing set", for a Russian-designed nuclear weapon. He held in his hands the knowledge needed to create a perfect implosion that could trigger a nuclear chain reaction inside a small spherical core. It was one of the greatest engineering secrets in the world, providing the solution to one of a handful of problems that separated nuclear powers such as the United States and Russia from rogue countries such as Iran that were desperate to join the nuclear club but had so far fallen short. The Russian, who had defected to the US years earlier, still couldn't believe the orders he had received from CIA headquarters. The CIA had given him the nuclear blueprints and then sent him to Vienna to sell them - or simply give them - to the Iranian representatives to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). With the Russian doing its bidding, the CIA appeared to be about to help Iran leapfrog one of the last remaining engineering hurdles blocking its path to a nuclear weapon. The dangerous irony was not lost on the Russian - the IAEA was an international organisation created to restrict the spread of nuclear technology. The Russian was a nuclear engineer in the pay of the CIA, which had arranged for him to become an American citizen and funded him to the tune of $5,000 a month. It seemed like easy money, with few strings attached. Until now. The CIA was placing him on the front line of a plan that seemed to be completely at odds with the interests of the US, and it had taken a lot of persuading by his CIA case officer to convince him to go through with what appeared to be a rogue operation. The case officer worked hard to convince him - even though he had doubts about the plan as well. As he was sweet-talking the Russian into flying to Vienna, the case officer wondered whether he was involved in an illegal covert action. Should he expect to be hauled before a congressional committee and grilled because he was the officer who helped give nuclear blueprints to Iran? The code name for this operation was Merlin; to the officer, that seemed like a wry tip-off that nothing about this programme was what it appeared to be. He did his best to hide his concerns from his Russian agent. The Russian's assignment from the CIA was to pose as an unemployed and greedy scientist who was willing to sell his soul - and the secrets of the atomic bomb - to the highest bidder. By hook or by crook, the CIA told him, he was to get the nuclear blueprints to the Iranians. They would quickly recognise their value and rush them back to their superiors in Tehran. The plan had been laid out for the defector during a CIA-financed trip to San Francisco, where he had meetings with CIA officers and nuclear experts mixed in with leisurely wine-tasting trips to Sonoma County. In a luxurious San Francisco hotel room, a senior CIA official involved in the operation talked the Russian through the details of the plan. He brought in experts from one of the national laboratories to go over the blueprints that he was supposed to give the Iranians. The senior CIA officer could see that the Russian was nervous, and so he tried to downplay the significance of what they were asking him to do. He said the CIA was mounting the operation simply to find out where the Iranians were with their nuclear programme. This was just an intelligence-gathering effort, the CIA officer said, not an illegal attempt to give Iran the bomb. He suggested that the Iranians already had the technology he was going to hand over to them. It was all a game. Nothing too serious. On paper, Merlin was supposed to stunt the development of Tehran's nuclear programme by sending Iran's weapons experts down the wrong technical path. The CIA believed that once the Iranians had the blueprints and studied them, they would believe the designs were usable and so would start to build an atom bomb based on the flawed designs. But Tehran would get a big surprise when its scientists tried to explode their new bomb. Instead of a mushroom cloud, the Iranian scientists would witness a disappointing fizzle. The Iranian nuclear programme would suffer a humiliating setback, and Tehran's goal of becoming a nuclear power would have been delayed by several years. In the meantime, the CIA, by watching Iran's reaction to the blueprints, would have gained a wealth of information about the status of Iran's weapons programme, which has been shrouded in secrecy. The Russian studied the blueprints the CIA had given him. Within minutes of being handed the designs, he had identified a flaw. "This isn't right," he told the CIA officers gathered around the hotel room. "There is something wrong." His comments prompted stony looks, but no straight answers from the CIA men. No one in the meeting seemed surprised by the Russian's assertion that the blueprints didn't look quite right, but no one wanted to enlighten him further on the matter, either. In fact, the CIA case officer who was the Russian's personal handler had been stunned by his statement. During a break, he took the senior CIA officer aside. "He wasn't supposed to know that," the CIA case officer told his superior. "He wasn't supposed to find a flaw." "Don't worry," the senior CIA officer calmly replied. "It doesn't matter." The CIA case officer couldn't believe the senior CIA officer's answer, but he managed to keep his fears from the Russian, and continued to train him for his mission. After their trip to San Francisco, the case officer handed the Russian a sealed envelope with the nuclear blueprints inside. He was told not to open the envelope under any circumstances. He was to follow the CIA's instructions to find the Iranians and give them the envelope with the documents inside. Keep it simple, and get out of Vienna safe and alive, the Russian was told. But the defector had his own ideas about how he might play that game. The CIA had discovered that a high-ranking Iranian official would be travelling to Vienna and visiting the Iranian mission to the IAEA, and so the agency decided to send the Russian to Vienna at the same time. It was hoped that he could make contact with either the Iranian representative to the IAEA or the visitor from Tehran. In Vienna, however, the Russian unsealed the envelope with the nuclear blueprints and included a personal letter of his own to the Iranians. No matter what the CIA told him, he was going to hedge his bets. There was obviously something wrong with the blueprints - so he decided to mention that fact to the Iranians in his letter. They would certainly find flaws for themselves, and if he didn't tell them first, they would never want to deal with him again. The Russian was thus warning the Iranians as carefully as he could that there was a flaw somewhere in the nuclear blueprints, and he could help them find it. At the same time, he was still going through with the CIA's operation in the only way he thought would work. The Russian soon found 19 Heinstrasse, a five-storey office and apartment building with a flat, pale green and beige facade in a quiet, slightly down-at-heel neighbourhood in Vienna's north end. Amid the list of Austrian tenants, there was one simple line: "PM/Iran." The Iranians clearly didn't want publicity. An Austrian postman helped him. As the Russian stood by, the postman opened the building door and dropped off the mail. The Russian followed suit; he realised that he could leave his package without actually having to talk to anyone. He slipped through the front door, and hurriedly shoved his envelope through the inner-door slot at the Iranian office. The Russian fled the mission without being seen. He was deeply relieved that he had made the hand-off without having to come face to face with a real live Iranian. He flew back to the US without being detected by either Austrian security or, more importantly, Iranian intelligence. Just days after the Russian dropped off his package at the Iranian mission, the National Security Agency reported that an Iranian official in Vienna abruptly changed his schedule, making airline reservations to fly home to Iran. The odds were that the nuclear blueprints were now in Tehran. The Russian scientist's fears about the operation seemed well founded. He was the front man for what may have been one of the most reckless operations in the modern history of the CIA, one that may have helped put nuclear weapons in the hands of a charter member of what President George W Bush has called the "axis of evil". Operation Merlin has been one of the most closely guarded secrets in the Clinton and Bush administrations. It's not clear who originally came up with the idea, but the plan was first approved by Clinton. After the Russian scientist's fateful trip to Vienna, however, the Merlin operation was endorsed by the Bush administration, possibly with an eye toward repeating it against North Korea or other dangerous states. Several former CIA officials say that the theory behind Merlin - handing over tainted weapon designs to confound one of America's adversaries - is a trick that has been used many times in past operations, stretching back to the cold war. But in previous cases, such Trojan horse operations involved conventional weapons; none of the former officials had ever heard of the CIA attempting to conduct this kind of high-risk operation with designs for a nuclear bomb. The former officials also said these kind of programmes must be closely monitored by senior CIA managers in order to control the flow of information to the adversary. If mishandled, they could easily help an enemy accelerate its weapons development. That may be what happened with Merlin. Iran has spent nearly 20 years trying to develop nuclear weapons, and in the process has created a strong base of sophisticated scientists knowledgeable enough to spot flaws in nuclear blueprints. Tehran also obtained nuclear blueprints from the network of Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan, and so already had workable blueprints against which to compare the designs obtained from the CIA. Nuclear experts say that they would thus be able to extract valuable information from the blueprints while ignoring the flaws. "If [the flaw] is bad enough," warned a nuclear weapons expert with the IAEA, "they will find it quite quickly. That would be my fear" ) James Risen 2006 * ================================================================ .NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems . Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us . .339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org .List Archives: https://olm.blythe-systems.com/pipermail/nytr/ .Subscribe: https://olm.blythe-systems.com/mailman/listinfo/nytr ================================================================ ***************************************************************** 3 Observer Bullying Iran is not an option Comment | [UP] Before Western leaders seek sanctions against Iran, they should put their own houses in order on nuclear weapons and nuclear power Mary Riddell Sunday January 8, 2006 The Observer This week, barring a last-minute climb-down, Iran may get back to building a nuclear bomb. It is a small moment, and a big one. Small because the threat has lingered for years; big because the consequences could convulse the region and the world. If Iran ends its 30-month freeze on uranium tests, the long diplomatic mission by the West will be in ruins. The Foreign Office says all bets will be off; Condoleezza Rice signals that Iran is heading for the UN Security Council, and thus for resolutions and sanctions. Every diplomat and onlooker knows the steps of that quadrille. They danced it for Iraq. As Iran moves towards the ultimate in WMD, George W Bush must be thinking he fought the wrong war. Now, as Israel says Iran's nuclear missile programme 'can be destroyed', the scent of another conflict hangs in the air. Even if President Ahmadinejad steps back from the brink, as he is prone to, there is a wider threat. In the last few days, a 55-page European intelligence assessment has surfaced. This document is an audit of the quest, by rogue states, to buy the kit to make weapons of mass destruction. Syria and North Korea have been stocking up, along with Pakistan, and Iran is allegedly working towards a long-range missile that would reach Italy. In addition, New York Times reporter James Risen claims in a new book that the CIA inadvertently helped Iran build a nuclear bomb by supplying flawed blueprints that the country's scientists may have corrected and used. Obviously, leaked intelligence on WMD comes with some health warnings. How dodgy, exactly, are these dossiers? Maybe the CIA is daft enough to offer up DIY bomb manuals, though this sounds implausible. The Tesco-isation of the nuclear trade raises another caveat. According to the leaked European report, the world is a shopping mall for nukes and the boardrooms and universities of Europe are the bombers' Bond Street. Hardly any of this is top secret or new. Dubious regimes have indeed been stockpiling illicit technology, as if buying beans in Waitrose. A briefing for the Carnegie Endowment think-tank, published in September 2005, two months after the leaked report was written, lists a worldwide history of nuclear deals, including Iran's links with the rogue Pakistani scientist, Abdul Qadeer Khan. Nuclear arms never held many surprises. J Robert Oppenheimer, their inventor, called himself 'the destroyer of worlds'; hopes that lavish death could forge a better universe faded faster than the prayers of the pastor who commended to God the Enola Gay, bound for Hiroshima. Sixty years on, the notion of nuclear nemesis has not sunk in. Last year's make-or-break US conference to revive the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty achieved nothing. The pact, ratified in 1970 and signed by 187 countries, was designed to ensure that unarmed states never acquired weapons and that armed nations, in return, would wind down their arsenals. That cornerstone of a peaceful world is crumbling, partly because Bush wants new weapons while demanding that other regimes forswear them, but also because the treaty is fatally flawed. Its aims, to eradicate nuclear weapons while championing the spread of nuclear energy, are irreconcilable. Atoms for Peace, suspect in Eisenhower's day, is an oxymoron in a globalised age. Any rogue state can build up a civil programme, opt out of the treaty with six months' notice and begin making weapons. Iran has always claimed, to universal disbelief, that it is only exercising its right to enrich uranium for peaceful purposes. Pakistan, a non-signatory, was last week reported to be buying up to eight reactors from China, which has long been suspected of helping with its weapons programme. On the campuses of Tehran, even moderately minded students are aggrieved. Who are Bush and Blair to preach while laying in new nukes and welcoming India, with its illicit weapons, into their nuclear club? Israel is stacked with unauthorised nukes, a Nato base sits at Herat and the US Fifth Fleet trawls the Persian Gulf. Why should Iran, so besieged, not have a deterrent? One answer is that Ahmadinejad is a Holocaust-denier who thinks Israel should be 'wiped off the map'. No one could sleep easy with his finger trembling on a nuclear button. But there are more dangerous prospects even that the Iran bomb. Professor Paul Rogers, of Bradford University, thinks it conceivable that Israel could launch a pre-emptive attack against its loose-mouthed neighbour. Ariel Sharon's successor, needing to look tough, may be keener than his predecessor to do so. Israel would have to move fast, though. A few months from now, Iran's powerful Bushehr reactor could be up and running and few attackers would dare unleash a reprise of Chernobyl. Such a threat may seem far-fetched, but the tolerance of George W Bush for a regime he calls 'the world's primary sponsor of terror' is as thin as skin. What a year for Britain to announce a £25 billion replacement for the Trident missile, plus a new generation of nuclear power stations. Tony Blair, intent on both schemes, is braced for protest on weapons but foresees little trouble over energy. Britain is not keen on taking fewer cheap flights and turning out the bathroom light. Nuclear power, touted as a painless option, is costly, risky and produces waste that stays dangerous for 240,000 years. A combination of renewables, energy saving, fossil fuels and carbon storage could provide an alternative. Besides, Britain has a duty to set some example. On nuclear power, the case is far from made. Trident, by contrast, is straightforward. Its replacement should be fought by everyone bothered about world security. More weapons for Britain would be a come-on to every failed state on the planet. In Israel, a leader lies in hospital. In Iraq, 130 people were blown up last Thursday. In North Korea, promises of nuclear disarmament have withered. In Iran, the nuclear scientists resume their work. This may be the most dangerous time since superpowers threatened mutually assured destruction. The world, once an atomic Athenaeum, has become a bomber's eBay, full of murky bidders with pseudonyms and of nukes for auction. The nuclear aristocracy is dead, destruction is democratised and Iran, angry at the West's hypocrisy on the nuclear race, believes that what's good for Totnes is good for Tehran. There is also hope. Iran's theocrats might oust Ahmadinejad. American voters may elect a President who realises, as Blair must too, that the West has to reduce its own arms if it is to persuade others to do likewise. But, for now, Cold War politics looks easy. The abyss was always safer than the quicksand. This time, we cannot simply walk away. mary.riddell@observer.co.uk [UP] Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006 ***************************************************************** 4 Sunday Times: Iran's nuclear ambitions pose the next big test The Sunday Times January 08, 2006 Uzi Mahnaimi Israel's acting leader has already been briefed on plans to strike at atomic facilities DECIDING how to deal with Iran's nuclear programme will be one of the main challenges faced by Ehud Olmert, who has taken over as acting prime minister at a time when Tehran appears to be stepping up its attempts to make an atomic bomb. There have been persistent suggestions in Israel that, in the weeks before his stroke, Ariel Sharon was involved in talks with the military about a possible strike on Iran's nuclear facilities, perhaps even before Israel's election this March. Sharon reportedly visited special force and strategic airforce squadrons and was given details of military plans. Although Israeli authorities have neither denied nor confirmed such plans, the mood in the country appears to be hardening. A columnist in The Jerusalem Post, noting the rumours, described Iran's nuclear weapons programme last week as "the greatest challenge facing the state of Israel today". "There is no room for doubt," wrote the columnist, Caroline Glick. "The need to conduct a military strike against Iran's nuclear programme increases with each passing day." Concerns have been intensified by the announcement last week by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran's hardline president, that he will press ahead with atomic fuel research and development shelved more than a year ago at the insistence of the West. Security sources said that since taking over as acting leader, Olmert has been given details of the attack plans. Unlike Sharon, however, he does not have a military background and any decision on action would be taken by an ad hoc three-man body set up this weekend, which also includes Shaul Mofaz, the defence minister, and General Dan Halutz, the armed forces chief of staff. The precise nature of any Israeli attack is a secret, but a security source said it would employ highly sophisticated weaponry and involve the targeting of at least 10 Iranian installations. There is a precedent in Israel's strike on Iraq's Osirak plant in 1981, credited with destroying the nuclear programme of Saddam Hussein. No such move would be taken without consulting Shimon Peres, 83, the former prime minister and the country's senior statesman. "It all depends on Peres's influence," said one source. "It is unlikely that Olmert will make such a decision against his recommendations." Peres, who opposed the attack on Osirak, is believed still to oppose an attack on Iran. It is thought his position may change, however, if Ahmadinejad continues to try to realise his nuclear ambitions. The tense relations between Israel and Iran have been further poisoned by Ahmadinejad's reaction to Sharon's stroke. The Iranian president called him a criminal and said he hoped news that he "has joined his ancestors is correct". Amid growing international concern, it emerged this weekend that the world's five major nuclear powers - America, Britain, France, Russia and China - are working on a joint statement urging Iran not to go ahead with enrichment but to return to the negotiating table. Their statement, known as a d‚marche, is not expected to contain specific threats but officials said it could still have significant political impact. According to one American official it would allow the five to "show unity and cohesion, which has not always been there". Any decision on referring Iran to the security council and possible sanctions would be taken by the International Atomic Energy Agency. Its next scheduled meeting is not until March 6, but an emergency session could be called before then. Hopes of a solution, in the meantime, have been pinned on a possible compromise under which Russia would enrich uranium mined in Iran to ensure that it is processed only into the low-grade fuel needed for power stations. The Times and The Sunday Times. Copyright 2006 Times Newspapers Ltd. ***************************************************************** 5 IRNA: N-claims against Iran not trustworthy, says UK professor London, Jan 7, IRNA Iran-UK-Iraq A British professor Friday criticized a local print media for publishing claims about Iran's nuclear activities, saying the allegations suggested the daily had not learned the important lessons derived from the false allegations about Iraq. "After recent intelligence failures over WMDs, editors should be doubly wary of `leaked intelligence,' its timing and the motives of those who provided the information," the executive director of the Oxford Research group, John Sloboda, said. In a letter to Britain's Guardian newspaper, he said that its frontpage coverage of a secret service's report about Iran's nuclear "ambitions" contains "little new" information. "It is mainly rehashed information available from public sources," said the psychology professor at the University of Keele in central England. "Your publication of this material helps those who seek to demonize Iran, makes peaceful resolution of the dispute even more difficult, and means that proper scrutiny of the failure of the EU and US policy has once again been avoided," warned the professor, who co-founded and manages the website www.iraqbodycount.net. ***************************************************************** 6 BBC: Russia and Iran in nuclear talks Last Updated: Saturday, 7 January 2006 By Paul Anderson BBC News [Technicians measure part of the reactor of Iran's Bushehr nuclear power plant] Talks over Iran's nuclear activities with the IAEA have stalled The Iranians say a first day of talks between their officials and Russian diplomats and experts on Iran's nuclear programme has ended satisfactorily. These centre on a proposal to transfer all of Iran's uranium enrichment programme to Russian territory. It is backed by the European Union and the United States, which suspect Iran is trying to develop an atomic bomb. The Iranians strenuously deny this. The talks come two days before Iran is due to resume its nuclear research. 'Satisfactory and suitable' The Iranians insist on carrying out some enrichment in their country. Enriched uranium is used for nuclear power generation as well nuclear weapons. Despite prompting condemnation from the West, Iran insists its nuclear research - which had been suspended - will resume as scheduled on Monday. Talks designed to break the stalemate between the international atomic watchdog, the IAEA, and Iran have been fixed for later this month. The outcome of the opening session of the latest effort to break the deadlock over Iran's nuclear programme was, according to one Iranian official, satisfactory and suitable. There were no clues as to what that means precisely. Officials on both sides are keeping tight-lipped. Clearly there is plenty to negotiate to iron out what the same official called ambiguities over the key issue: the proposal to transfer the enrichment of the uranium mined in Iran to Russia. Secret for decades The idea is to deny the Iranians the remotest chance to produce the highly enriched uranium needed for nuclear weapons. Iran appears to accept the principle of a joint enrichment project, for power generation, on Russian soil. But it insists on preserving the right to carry out some enrichment in Iran. For Western countries deeply suspicious of Iran's long term nuclear ambitions, that would defeat the purpose of establishing transparency in a nuclear programme which remained secret for decades. As Western leaders and diplomats return from the new year holiday, they are discovering that this crisis has ballooned. Iran announced this week it would resume its nuclear research. It has confirmed that will happen on schedule. Washington talked tough in response, so too the EU, which warned that Iran's step could jeopardise the talks it is leading. All the while, the day, this March, when the IAEA board of governors meets to discuss whether to refer Iran to the UN Security Council for possible sanctions, gets ever closer. ***************************************************************** 7 BBC: Iran to resume nuclear research Last Updated: Sunday, 8 January 2006 [Technicians measure part of the reactor of Iran's Bushehr nuclear power plant] Iran says its nuclear programme is for peaceful purposes only Iran says it will resume nuclear fuel research on Monday, despite international appeals to desist. Officials say seals at nuclear research centres will be removed, ending a two-year suspension. The European Union has warned such a move could jeopardise a return to negotiations on Iran's sensitive nuclear ambitions. Resuming the research would mean all of Iran's nuclear activities, apart from uranium enrichment, are active again. Talks between Iran and the EU broke off last August after Iran resumed uranium conversion activity which it had suspended in 2004. The US claims Iran is seeking to develop nuclear weapons, but Iran says its nuclear programme is for peaceful civilian use only. The latest move threatens to overshadow talks between Russia and Iran on proposals to transfer Iran's uranium enrichment activities to Russian soil. EU 'surprised' Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi confirmed Iran will press ahead with the research work. "We will remove the seals and we have announced that we are ready to start research from tomorrow," he told a news conference. Mr Asefi said the resumption of nuclear research was Iran's right and would be done under the supervision of international inspectors. He refused to say what kind of research was planned or which sites were involved. Austria, which currently holds the EU's rotating presidency, said the bloc regretted Iran's move. "It finds it surprising and unreasonable that Iran proposes to do this at a moment when... Britain, France and Germany with the EU were exploring with Iran the possibility of a return to negotiations," a statement said. The US has warned Iran it might seek to refer the country to the UN if nuclear research resumes. The board of governors of the IAEA - UN's nuclear watchdog - is due to meet in March to discuss whether to pass the case to the Security Council, which could impose sanctions on Iran. ***************************************************************** 8 IRNA: Iran in close contact with IAEA to start nuclear research Tehran, Jan 7, IRNA Iran-IAEA-Contact Spokesman of the Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) Hossein Entezami said, "Iran is in close contact with International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to prepare the necessary preliminaries to start nuclear research." Speaking to IRNA here Saturday evening, Entezami said all measures to make the groundwork ready to start nuclear research are being taken in the presence of IAEA's representatives. IAEA's inspectors arrived here on Friday. Entezami said, "Our future research would be also in coordination with IAEA." He added Iran will cooperate with IAEA upon safeguard agreements. SNSC's spokesman concluded, "Iran is an active member of Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and welcomes all kinds of cooperation with the UN body". ***************************************************************** 9 Xinhua: EU regrets Iran's decision to resume suspended nuclear activities www.xinhuanet.com www.chinaview.cn 2006-01-07 20:00:47 BRUSSELS, Jan. 7 (Xinhuanet) -- The European Union (EU) on Saturday said that it regreted Iran's decision to resume suspended nuclear activities. "The EU regrets that Iran has chosen to announce this unilateral move at a moment when international confidence in the peaceful nature of its program is far from restored," said the EU in a written statement in the name of its presidency Austria. The EU said it views "with serious concern" Iran's intention to resume suspended nuclear activities. The EU also said in the statement that "it is surprising and unreasonable that Iran proposes to do this at a moment when Britain, France and Germany were exploring with Iran the possibility of a return to negotiations." In November, Iran's top nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani sent a letter to the EU-3, Britain, France and Germany, urging to resume talks on Iran's nuclear issue. The EU thus urged Iran not to take the step of resuming nuclear activities, for that would "violate both the letter and the spirit of the eight previous resolutions" of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Iran made its most recent announcement to resume nuclear fuel research on Jan. 3, which drew the IAEA's decision to postpone its talks with Iran over the nuclear issue. On Jan. 5, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice warned that the United States is prepared to bring Iran before the U.N. Security Council should Teheran carry out its latest threat to resume nuclear fuel research. Enditem Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 10 Xinhua: Nuclear fuel research not to hinder talks with EU: Iran www.xinhuanet.com www.chinaview.cn 2006-01-08 03:25:16 TEHRAN, Jan. 7 (Xinhuanet) -- Iran said on Saturday that coming nuclear negotiations with the European Union (EU) should not be influenced by Tehran's decision to resume nuclear fuel research, stressing that there was no legal basis to oppose the move. "Iran's decision to restart nuclear research, which is a right of every member state to the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), should not have any influence on the process of the talks," Deputy Foreign Minister Mahdi Mostafavi was quoted by the semi-official Mehr news agency as saying. Mostafavi said there was no legal obstruction to the resumption, reiterating that Iran will continue its "close cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) as before." "We have announced that we want to restart nuclear research work, in line with our rights in the NPT and under the full supervision of the IAEA, and the agency is tasked with helping us in this regard," Mostafavi added. Mostafavi's comments came as the EU said in a statement that Tehran's decision to resume fuel research "can only seriously jeopardize the possibility of a return to negotiations." The decision was announced by Mohammad Saidi, deputy chief of the country's Atomic Energy Agency, on Tuesday, and in the meantime the IAEA confirmed that it was informed the resumption will take place on Jan. 9. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Wednesday that the Islamic Republic would "not retreat even one step" from its decision, while Ali Larijani, Iran's chief nuclear negotiator, said that the decision was "not negotiable." Iran and the EU trio of Britain, France and Germany are due to hold a new round of negotiations on Jan. 18, during which the EU is expected to pressurize Tehran on a recent Russian proposal to conduct its uranium enrichment in Russia. The nuclear negotiations were stranded for months due to Iran's resumption of uranium conversion activities, a precursor to uranium enrichment, last August, but the Russian proposal created an opportunity for the two sides to return to the negotiating table. However, Iran has remained tough on its position that uranium enrichment must be performed in its own territory, terming it as a principle to accept any proposal. Earlier in the day, Hossein Entezami, spokesman for Iran's Supreme National Security Council, was quoted by the state television as saying that a Russian delegation had arrived in Tehran as planned and in the morning began talks with Iranian officials on the proposal. Entezami's remarks denied a previous media report that the meeting had been postponed. He said the two sides would "discuss Russia's proposal for joint uranium enrichment and also enrichment on the Iranian soil." Based on Washington's accusation that Iran is seeking nuclear weapons secretly, the EU insists that Iran's complete command of uranium enrichment could lead to military use of the technology. Enditem Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 11 Guardian Unlimited: Iran, Russia Begin Joint Enrichment Talks From the Associated Press [UP] Saturday January 7, 2006 11:47 PM By ALI AKBAR DAREINI Associated Press Writer TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - Iran and Russia began talks Saturday on Moscow's proposal that the two nations enrich uranium in Russian territory, days after Tehran said it needed to clarify ``ambiguities'' in the offer, state-run television reported Saturday. Meanwhile, inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N. nuclear watchdog, arrived in Tehran on Saturday to remove seals from nuclear research facilities. The Russian proposal, backed by the Europeans and the United States, is aimed at getting Iran to move uranium enrichment completely out of its territory to ensure that its nuclear program cannot produce weapons. Enrichment can produce either fuel for a nuclear reactor or the material needed for a warhead. A top Russian delegation held talks with Iranian officials about the Russian proposal, the television quoted the spokesman for Iran's Supreme National Security Council, Hossein Entezami, as saying. The council, Iran's highest security decision-making body, handles Iran's nuclear negotiations with the international community. ``The two sides are expected to discuss the Russian proposal about joint uranium enrichment (in Russia) and also uranium enrichment in Iran,'' Entezami was quoted as saying. Iran, which is under intense pressure to accept the deal, has said it needs Moscow to clarify ``ambiguities'' in its proposal, insisting that it must not deny Iran the ability to enrich uranium domestically. Tehran says its nuclear program is for electricity generation, despite U.S. and European Union concerns that it is moving to produce nuclear bombs. EU foreign and security affairs chief Javier Solana told Iran on Saturday that it may doom further negotiations with the EU about economic aid and other issues if it resumes uranium enrichment. The Europeans are hoping the compromise would foster a breakthrough in deadlocked negotiations aimed at ensuring Iran cannot produce nuclear weapons. Talks between Iran and Britain, France and Germany, which resumed last month, have made little progress, but are to continue later this month. Iran informed the IAEA Tuesday that it has decided to resume research into nuclear fuel production on Jan. 9, a step that has only increased concerns in the West that Iran is moving toward production of nuclear weapons. Tehran has not specified the type of research. ``IAEA inspectors have arrived in Tehran to remove the seals from nuclear research facilities,'' the television quoted Entezami as saying. Entezami did not elaborate but said the inspectors will also hold talks with top Iranian nuclear officials. In Vienna, IAEA spokeswoman Melissa Fleming said Saturday that Iran had provided some details on its planned work with enrichment equipment but suggested the agency was still not satisfied. ``We are seeking more information,'' she said, but did not elaborate. The nuclear program is a source of national pride in Iran, and any government that abandons enrichment likely would lose public support. Meanwhile, Washington is pushing for Tehran to be brought before the United Nations Security Council, where it could face economic sanctions over the dispute. Russia and China, which have vetoes on the council, oppose referral and the West has stopped short of forcing the matter. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006 ***************************************************************** 12 Guardian Unlimited: Iran to Resume Nuclear Research on Monday From the Associated Press [UP] Sunday January 8, 2006 11:32 AM By NASSER KARIMI Associated Press Writer TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - Iran said Sunday that inspectors from the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency would remove seals from some nuclear facilities by Monday, opening the way for Tehran to resume research on fuel production. The development heightened concerns in the West that Iran was moving toward building atomic weapons. ``Iran is ready to resume the research activities after the inspectors remove the seals,'' Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said. ``It is our right as (much as) other members of the Nonproliferation Treaty. Iran should not be exempted.'' Inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency arrived in Tehran on Saturday to remove seals from the research sites. Iran told the IAEA last week it would resume research Monday. Iranian officials said talks with the inspectors over restarting the research could wrap up by Monday, the official Islamic Republic News Agency said. Iran has not specified what research it will resume. Tehran says its nuclear program is for electricity generation, while the U.S. and Europe suspect Iran is moving to produce nuclear bombs. The U.S. and France have pushed for taking Iran before the U.N. Security Council, which could impose sanctions if Tehran is found in violation of the Nonproliferation Treaty. Asefi said Iran's research would respect regulations set by the U.N. watchdog and the treaty. ``The activities will be under supervision of the agency, therefore there is nothing to be worried about,'' he said. Javier Solana, the EU foreign and security affairs chief, warned Iran on Saturday that if it resumes its uranium enrichment program, it may doom any further negotiations with the EU over economic aid and other issues. Russian officials were also in Iran for talks on Moscow's proposal that the two countries conduct uranium enrichment on Russian territory. The process can produce nuclear fuel for reactors or atomic weapons depending on the degree of enrichment. The Russian proposal, backed by the European Union and the United States, was designed to ease concerns that Iran would use the fuel to build a bomb. Iran still has ``questions on the proposal that the Russian side could not convincingly answer,'' the official news agency reported, without providing details. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006 ***************************************************************** 13 AFP: Russia-Iran talks on nuclear compromise plan Sat Jan 7, 7:14 AM ET TEHRAN (AFP) - Russian envoys held talks with Iranian officials on a proposed compromise to end a stand-off with the West over Tehran's determination to press ahead with uranium enrichment. "The Russian delegation has started talks about joint enrichment on Russian territory and also enrichment on Iranian soil," the spokesman of Iran" /> Iran's top security body, Hossein Entezami, was quoted as saying Saturday. Russian media said the delegation included deputy foreign minister Sergei Kisliak, security council deputy secretary Valentin Sobolev, and representatives of the Russian atomic energy organization Rosatom. Moscow is proposing that Tehran carry out uranium enrichment on its territory to allay Western fears that the technology could allow Iran to produce a nuclear bomb. Both the European Union" /> European Unionand the United States have backed the proposal in principle. In recent weeks, Iranian officials have blown hot and cold about the proposed compromise, first suggesting that they might consider it and then insisting that they would do so only if any deal explicitly recognized its right to carry out enrichment on Iranian soil. "If it says that enrichment can only happen in Russia, it's not acceptable," foreign ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said Tuesday. "But if it's a parallel and complementary plan we will consider that." Asefi said talks with the Russians were necessary to discuss what he described as "ambiguities" in the plan. "It's not a structured proposal it is still an idea, we have to discuss it," he said. The same day, Iran's Supreme Council for National Security further complicated efforts to find a compromise with an announcement that it was preparing to resume research into the nuclear fuel cycle after a suspension of more than two years. The move prompted Washington to warn it was considering seeking to refer Tehran to the UN Security Council for enforcement action over its nuclear programme. "If negotiations have been exhausted, we have the votes, there is a resolution sitting there on the Security Council, we'll vote it," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice" /> Condoleezza Ricesaid Thursday. The European Union has been looking for a way to resume talks, broken off last August, on securing safeguards from Iran that its nuclear programme is exclusively for energy needs in return for economic or other rewards. Copyright © 2006 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. The ***************************************************************** 14 ITAR-TASS: Russian delegation to discuss nuclear cooperation with Iran. 07.01.2006, 04.49 TEHRAN, January 7 (Itar-Tass) -- A Russian delegation led by Deputy Security Council Secretary Valentin Sobolev will visit Iran to discuss a wide range of issues between the two countries. “The talks in the Iranian capital will begin today behind closed doors,” the Russian embassy in Iran told Itar-Tass. The delegation includes Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Kislyak, officials from the Foreign Ministry and the Atomic Energy Agency. Local observers believe that the talks will focus on Russia’s proposal to create a joint uranium-enrichment enterprise in Russia. On December 24, the Russian Embassy in Tehran gave a note to Iran, which confirmed that “Russia’s earlier proposal to Iran regarding the creation of a joint venture for uranium enrichment remains in force,” the Foreign Ministry said. “This proposal is Russia’s contribution to the search for mutually advantageous decisions to solve Iran’s nuclear problem by political and diplomatic methods,” the ministry said. Iranian authorities confirmed their interest in the project ahead of the upcoming talks but insisted that it should be implemented on Iranian soil. The head of the Iranian parliamentary commission on national security and foreign policy, Alaeddin Borujerdi, said the proposal is “positive in essence” but stressed the need for negotiations with the Russian side in order to convince it to create the joint venture in Iran. Earlier, Deputy Secretary of the Iranian Supreme National Security Council Javad Vaidi said Teheran would study Russia’s proposal “in earnest and with enthusiasm”. “The Russian proposal can be examined, taking into account the earlier contract on the nuclear power station in Bushehr, under which Russia is to supply, within the next year, nuclear fuel for the first Iranian nuclear power station and to return the spent fuel back to the Russian territory,” he said. A ranking official, who is leading the Iranian delegation to the talks with the European Trio (Britain, Germany and France) on the Iranian nuclear programme, noted that from Teheran’s viewpoint, “the Russian project can promote the spread of peaceful nuclear technologies in the framework of scientific interpretation of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty”. He also noted that the proposal to enrich uranium jointly in Russia “gives a chance to implement the treaty’s provisions and to break up the monopoly that has developed in the sphere of nuclear technologies”. “The share of the Iranian side’s participation in the project will be an important indicator,” Vaidi noted. © ITAR-TASS. All rights reserved. You undertake not to copy, ***************************************************************** 15 AFP: Iran sets date for nuclear research despite EU appeal - Sunday January 8, 09:38 AM TEHRAN (AFP) - Iran is to end its two-and-a-half year suspension of nuclear fuel research Monday or Tuesday, a senior official announced, overshadowing the launch of talks with Russia on compromise proposals to end the nuclear stand-off with the West. Saturday's announcement came despite appeals for restraint from the European Union and warnings of a possible UN Security Council referral from Washington. "The inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency are in Tehran to remove the seals on the research centres Monday or Tuesday," the spokesman of Iran's top security body, Hossein Entezami, told AFP. "Our research activities will be under the supervision of the agency's cameras." An IAEA spokeswoman in Vienna said the UN agency had received a letter from Iran, but they were still seeking more information. "We received some information in a letter from Iran. It did not satisfy our information requirements, we still need information in more details," the agency's spokeswoman Melissa Flemming told AFP. The agency expected to receive as soon as Saturday evening another letter from Tehran explaining in more detail their intentions, she added. Earlier an IAEA spokesman said the agency's inspectors were in Iran "on a routine basis." Austria, the current holders of the European Union's rotating presidency, called on Iran not to resume its nuclear research as planned, as it would violate IAEA resolutions and jeopardize any resumption of talks with the bloc, which were broken off last August. "The EU regrets that Iran has chosen to announce this unilateral move at a moment when international confidence in the peaceful nature of its programme is far from restored," a statement said. "It finds it surprising and unreasonable that Iran proposes to do this at a moment when ... Britain, France and Germany with the EU were exploring with Iran the possibility of a return to negotiations." Washington had warned Thursday that it would consider seeking Iran's referral to the UN Security Council if it went ahead with renewed research. "If negotiations have been exhausted, we have the votes, there is a resolution sitting there on the Security Council, we'll vote it," said Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. The wrangle over the resumption of fuel cycle research overshadowed the launch of talks with a Russian delegation Saturday on a proposed compromise on Iran's desire to resume uranium enrichment. "The Russian delegation has started talks about joint enrichment on Russian territory and also enrichment on Iranian soil," the spokesman of Iran's top security body, Hossein Entezami, was quoted as saying. Russian media said the delegation included deputy foreign minister Sergei Kisliak, security council deputy secretary Valentin Sobolev, and representatives of the Russian atomic energy organization Rosatom. Moscow is proposing that Tehran carry out uranium enrichment on its territory to allay Western fears that the technology could allow Iran to produce a nuclear bomb. Both the European Union and the United States have backed the proposal in principle. But Iranian officials have blown hot and cold about the proposed compromise, first suggesting that they might consider it and then insisting that they would do so only if any deal explicitly recognized its right to carry out enrichment on Iranian soil. "If it says that enrichment can only happen in Russia, it's not acceptable," foreign ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said Tuesday. "But if it's a parallel and complementary plan we will consider that." Asefi said talks with the Russians were necessary to discuss what he described as "ambiguities" in the plan. "It's not a structured proposal it is still an idea, we have to discuss it," he said. Copyright © 2006 AFP. All rights reserved. All information ***************************************************************** 16 Guardian Unlimited: Iran Says U.N. to Remove Nuclear Seals From the Associated Press [UP] Sunday January 8, 2006 10:32 PM AP Photo VAH102 By NASSER KARIMI Associated Press Writer TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - Iran said Sunday that inspectors from the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency would remove seals from some nuclear facilities by Monday, opening the way for Tehran to resume research on fuel production. The development heightened concerns in the West that Iran was moving toward building atomic weapons. ``Iran is ready to resume the research activities after the inspectors remove the seals,'' Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said. ``It is our right as (much as) other members of the Nonproliferation Treaty. Iran should not be exempted.'' Inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency arrived in Tehran on Saturday to remove seals they had affixed to the research sites after Iran voluntarily agreed to stop all enrichment-related activities more than two years ago as a confidence-building measure. The Iranians have maintained they will never give up their right under the Nonproliferation Treaty to enrich uranium and produce nuclear fuel, but the IAEA and most of its members want Tehran to maintain the freeze because of growing fears it will misuse enrichment to make weapons. Iran told the IAEA last week it would resume research Monday, and officials said talks with the inspectors over restarting the research could wrap up by Monday at the latest, the official Islamic Republic News Agency said. Iran has not specified the type of research. Tehran says its nuclear program is for electricity generation, while the U.S. and Europe suspect Iran is moving to produce nuclear bombs. The U.S. and France have pushed for taking Iran before the U.N. Security Council, which could impose sanctions if Tehran is found in violation of the Nonproliferation Treaty. Asefi said Iran's research would respect regulations set by the U.N. watchdog and the treaty. ``The activities will be under supervision of the agency, therefore there is nothing to be worried about,'' he said. In Vienna, Austria, the tug of war continued Sunday between Iran and the IAEA, which asked for additional details about what Tehran planned to do with its enrichment equipment. IAEA spokeswoman Melissa Fleming said the agency had received additional information since Saturday, when Tehran first gave the agency some specifics, but it still sought more. On Thursday, a high-ranking Iranian delegation failed to show up for a scheduled meeting with IAEA head Mohamed ElBaradei, reneging on a pledge to provide full details of its plans. Russian officials in Iran, meanwhile, continued talks about Moscow's proposal that the two countries conduct uranium enrichment, a process that can produce nuclear fuel for reactors or atomic weapons depending on the degree of enrichment, on Russian territory. Officials from the two countries plan to meet again in Moscow on Feb. 16, state-run Iranian TV said. The Russian proposal, backed by the European Union and the United States, was designed to ease concerns that Iran would use the fuel to build a bomb. But Iran's senior nuclear negotiator said the country still wants the fuel cycle on its own soil. ``Iran's right on nuclear fuel, especially enrichment, inside the country has to be guaranteed in any proposal,'' Javad Vaidi told state-run radio. IRNA said Iran still had questions about what it has called ``ambiguities'' in the proposal, adding ``Iran has raised new questions on the proposal that the Russian side could not convincingly answer.'' Hossein Ghafourian, head of the nuclear research center of Iran's atomic energy organization, pledged to press on with plans to continue its peaceful program. ``Blocking research activities is similar to blocking the light,'' Ghafourian told state-run radio on Sunday. Javier Solana, the European Union foreign and security affairs chief, told Iran on Saturday that if it resumes its uranium enrichment program, it may doom any further negotiations with the 25-nation bloc about economic aid and other issues. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006 ***************************************************************** 17 KCNA: DPRK Demands Total Nuclear Disarmament PYONGYANG, November 15 (KCNA) The results of debates on disarmament at the recent session of the UN General Assembly prove that the nuclear disarmament, total dismantlement of the nuclear weapons in particular, is urgent for preserving peace in the world and that it is nothing but a tittle-tattle to discuss the issue of nuclear non-proliferation apart from this principle. Commenting on the fact that at the meeting (disarmament and security) of the first committee of the 60th Session of the UN General Assembly that dealt with the issue of implementing the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) there were divergent opinions on whether the nuclear disarmament is essential or nuclear non-proliferation is a priority, a news analyst of Rodong Sinmun on November 15 said: In the UN and international arena those countries asserting that the nuclear non-proliferation is first are the United States and other Western countries. They raised a gresolutionh aimed to intensify ginternational monitoring systemh to prevent grouge statesh from gacquiring and using weapons of mass destructionh repeating stereotyped phrases that non-proliferation premises nuclear disarmament, and have worked hard to put it into practice. It is because of the U.S. nuclear policy for supremacy that the danger of nuclear war is increasing as the days go by and the NPT has been reduced to a dead document. The U.S. highhanded nuclear policy makes the NPT useless and compels the non-nuclear states to build nuclear deterrent. Nuclear disarmament is essential for removing the danger of nuclear war and ensuring world peace and security. The U.S. stand of giving priority to non-proliferation, in essence, cannot be construed as anything but an attempt to monopolize nuclear weapons and use them as a card for world supremacy. The issue of nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation can never be resolved by bluster or threat. It can be realized only through the efforts to build a nuclear-free world with a peace-loving stand. Availing itself of this opportunity, the DPRK cannot but say that it is urgent to remove the U.S. nuclear threat from Korea in ensuring peace of the Korean Peninsula, too. The more the U.S. nuclear threat increases, the stronger the countermeasure of the DPRK will be. The DPRK builds nuclear deterrent for defending itself, not for threatening or attacking others. The result of discussion of disarmament at the session of the UN General Assembly clearly proved once again that the principled stand of the DPRK over the nuclear issue with the U.S. is just. The U.S. forcible attitude only stirs up the hatred of the Korean army and people for the U.S. If the U.S. truly wants to opt for preventing nuclear proliferation and ensuring peace, it should make switchover toward the total dismantlement of nuclear weapons. Copyright © 2005 The People's Korea. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 18 Korea Herald: N.K. learns international law through latest clash, Ban says [HERALD INTERVIEW] By Lee Joo-hee 2006.01.09 South Korea's top diplomat said North Korea would learn the importance of international regulations through the latest clash with the United States over its alleged counterfeiting of U.S. dollars. "North Korea would learn about international rules, about things that it should do and should not do," Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon, 62, said in an interview with The Korea Herald. North Korea and the United States are at odds over U.S.-imposed sanctions against a Macau-based bank for allegedly laundering North Korea's counterfeited U.S. dollars. The North has threatened to boycott the next round of the six party talks on the nuclear standoff until Washington lifts the sanctions. South Korea has been taking a neutral position in the conflict, contending that the facts must be first verified. Ban said that a dispute over counterfeiting and money laundering is a global issue that involves supranational crimes. Although he is optimistic about the prospects of the nuclear talks, Ban said that it would be difficult for the nuclear talks to resume before a meeting between South Korea and the United States slated for this month. The six party talks involving the two Koreas, the United States, China, Japan and Russia are yet to resume since they went into recess last November. "Even a small clue can help solve a problem ... we are looking for all possible means to solve it," Ban said. A veteran diplomat since entering the Foreign Ministry in 1970 and now internationally-renowned for his refined diplomatic skills, Ban is currently in his third year as foreign minister. He is considered among observers as a gentle yet charismatic figure with an unrivaled ability to harmonize and integrate his organization's mechanisms. During the interview, Ban emphasized the importance of Korea's new role in the international community as a country with a high status. "I believe the rate (of the Official Development Assistance) should be increased to at least 0.2 percent of the nation's gross domestic income by the end of President Roh Moo-hyun's tenure (ending in Feb. 2008)." Korea, which ranks the 11th largest economy among the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development members, annually devotes a mere 0.06 percent of its GNI to help underdeveloped countries as of last year. The average ODA rate per GNI of OECD members is 0.2 percent. The recommended rate set by the United Nations is 0.7 percent. "We have the lowest GNI rate among the OECD members. The international community points out that the participation by Korea is far lower compared to the expectation," Ban said, emphasizing that Korea's high status follows with responsibilities. The top diplomat also said that keen interest from the public and the government on the matter was imminent. He pointed out Korea's unusual situation because it also invests a lot in assisting North Korea, which is not defined as ODA. Responding to a question on the alliance between Seoul and Washington, Ban expressed great confidence. "Both in terms of the framework and the substance, I view the Korea-U.S. alliance as more successful than other countries." Ban explained that the issues that rise between the two countries were due to the change in time, where South Korea was becoming less dependent on the United States. "Over 50 years, Korea has become the 11th largest economy, democratized itself and has raised the bar of people's political involvement. On this note, the alliance is viewed not with the paradigm of the past but with the paradigm of the changed generation." Explaining that all the conflicts such as the move of U.S. military camps have been solved, Ban said only new issues will be rising between the two allies now, such as resuming U.S. beef imports and signing a free trade agreement. "It is not that there is a problem between Korea and the United States, but an amplification of discord that is created within the transformation phase." As part of a fortified foreign policy of the government, Ban said relevant ministries and organizations were discussing launching a new headquarters for the Korean Peninsula's peace and foreign policy. (angiely@heraldm.com) ***************************************************************** 19 INSIDE JoongAng Daily: [EDITORIALS]Protect the KEDO site January 9, 2006 KST 12:24 (GMT+9) All the remaining 57 South Korean workers, the last at the light water reactor project in Sinpo, northeastern North Korea, left the site on Sunday. The 12-year long project, which was implemented under the 1994 Geneva Agreed Framework in an attempt to end North Korea's nuclear ambitions, was abandoned. The United States, insisting that North Korea violated the Geneva agreement by promoting an uranium enriched nuclear development program, decided to terminate the light-water reactor project and South Korea and Japan agreed with Washington's decision. The light-water reactor project has been terminated without a solution to the North's nuclear problem, so the risk index on the Korean Peninsula may go up. It is even more worrisome because the prospects for a new round of six-party talks is in doubt due to the conflict between the United States and North Korea over the North's counterfeiting. South Korea has other problems. Who should pay the termination costs of 200 billion won ($200 million) for the project? At present, Washington and Tokyo maintain that they are not in a position to share the cost, while our government wants equal sharing. A controversy has begun. It will be difficult for the government to get a public consensus if it should shoulder most of the clean-up costs, since it has already poured 1.3 trillion won ($1.3 billion) into the project. Rhee Bong-jo, South Korea's vice unification minister, said, "The government will closely cooperate with the United States and Japan so that the amount that the South Korean government has already spent on the project will not become useless." That is a good approach, but the government should carefully seek ways to restart the project in the future. The United States now opposes building the light water reactors in the North, but experts here say that if the six-party talks are concluded and the United States and its allies decide to provide North Korea with light-water reactors, there is practically no alternative to Sinpo as a building site. In this respect, we have to get North Korea's attention to properly preserve the construction site. Most of the concrete facilities where the nuclear reactors were to have been installed have already started to rust because the construction of the project has been suspended since December 2003. A plan to cope with the problem is urgently needed. If necessary, Seoul must supply equipment, but it must also deliver to the North a clear message on the reason why the construction site should be well-preserved. 2006.01.08 Copyright by Joins.com, Inc. Terms of Use | ***************************************************************** 20 INSIDE JoongAng Daily: A death knell sounds for 1994 idealism January 9, 2006 KST 12:24 ( KEDO abandons site in North as a costly nuclear gamble fails January 09, 2006 ¤Ñ The final group of workers who were maintaining the site of the suspended light-water nuclear reactor construction project in North Korea packed up and left the communist country yesterday, leaving all their equipment, vehicles and construction material behind. The group of 57 people arrived at the port of Sokcho in Gangwon province yesterday after a four-hour sea voyage from the site, along the coast of South Hamgyong province. Their departure was the last hurrah for an international project that began ambitiously in 1997 as a test case of constructive engagement with North Korea on nuclear issues. The Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization, which was overseeing the project, suspended work on the two light-water nuclear reactors in 2003 and decided late last year to terminate it. As reported in the JoongAng Daily on Dec. 13, the North Koreans then ordered KEDO to evacuate its personnel at the site within 30 days. Despite visits to the site by KEDO and Korean government officials, and in the face of threats to end the site workers' immunity from North Korean laws, KEDO completed its pullout yesterday. Under the 1994 Geneva Agreed Framework, the United States agreed to oversee the delivery of the reactors in return for Pyongyang's agreement to freeze its nuclear activities. Construction at the site began in 1997, but was suspended in 2003 after the North was discovered to have begun new, clandestine attempts to develop nuclear weapons. A caretaker force of about 120 people was at the site a month ago, but more than half of them returned to the South before the end of the year. The final group to leave included 18 security guards, seven Korea Electric Power Corp. managers and an American KEDO official. KEDO left behind equipment and material worth an estimated 45.5 billion won ($46 million) after Pyongyang barred it from being removed. The equipment includes construction cranes, 190 passenger vehicles and nearly 100 assorted dump trucks, cement mixers and other construction vehicles. Seventy-five apartment buildings, a gymnasium with swimming pool, three dining halls, electrical power generators with a capacity of 8,000 kilowatts, a barge docking facility and a water treatment facility were also abandoned. South Korean officials said the keys to all the facilities were left at the site, which at the peak of construction in 2003 bustled with about 1,400 workers. A KEDO official told the JoongAng Daily last month that the North Koreans had demanded that KEDO train its personnel in the operation of the water and power plants, but it was not clear whether KEDO had complied. Korea Electric Power Corporation, KEDO's prime contractor for the project, has already provided partial compensation, 21.8 billion won, to its subcontractors for the seizure of the equipment. Additional compensation will be required, officials here said, except in the unlikely event that North Korea relents and allows the equipment to be repatriated. The project will have substantial termination costs and will be the subject of heated debate among Japan, Korea and the United States. Seoul wants to split the estimated $200 million in wrapping-up costs equally; Tokyo and Washington have refused. "The United States thinks the light-water reactor project was a failed nuclear policy of its previous administration," a Seoul official said. "It is unclear if Washington is willing to try to persuade the Congress to pay the termination costs." Japan has said it would ask North Korea to pay for losses incurred from the failed project under repayment procedures that were to have been invoked after the completion of the reactors. The $4.6 billion project was about 35 percent complete in November 2003, when construction was halted. Many nuclear components, never delivered to the site, are warehoused in Japan and South Korea and will have to be disposed of as well. Seoul has poured more than $1.1 billion into the project, Japan $406 million and the United States $373 million. by Ser Myo-ja myoja@joongang.co.kr> Copyright by Joins.com, Inc. Terms of Use | ***************************************************************** 21 Japan Times: Japan assures U.S. on plans for N. Korea Sunday, January 8, 2006 WASHINGTON (Kyodo) Senior Vice Foreign Minister Yasuhisa Shiozaki said Friday he has assured the United States that Japan will not normalize ties with North Korea unless the abduction, missile, nuclear and other pending issues are comprehensively resolved. Shiozaki said he offered the assurance while briefing senior U.S. officials about Japan's talks with North Korea last month, during which the two nations agreed to set up three separate but parallel working groups to address diplomatic normalization, the North's past abductions of Japanese nationals and security-related problems. Speaking at a news conference in Washington, Shiozaki said he has also agreed with the senior U.S. officials to continue cooperating closely on moving the six-party talks on North Korea's nuclear ambitions forward and achieving U.N. reforms. Shiozaki met with Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Christopher Hill on Thursday, and Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Nicholas Burns, State Department Counselor Philip Zelikow and White House Deputy National Security Adviser Jack Crouch on Friday. According to Shiozaki, Hill said North Korea's demand that the United States remove its financial sanctions should not be linked with the six-party talks, because the sanctions are a law enforcement matter. Pyongyang has repeatedly said it will not return to the six-party talks unless Washington removes the sanctions on a Macau-based bank suspected for laundering money for North Korea and also against North Korea entities allegedly dealing in weapons of mass destruction. Shiozaki said he agreed with Hill on urging North Korea to return to the six-party talks and to abandon its nuclear weapons and problems in a verifiable way. The six-party talks -- also involving China, South Korea and Russia -- were last held in September in Beijing. Turning to U.N. reforms, Burns explicitly reiterated Washington's support for Japan's bid to become a permanent member of the U.N. Security Council, Shiozaki said, noting that he and the U.S. officials agreed to step up working-level consultations to realize an overhaul of the U.N. The Japan Times: Jan. 8, 2006 (C) All rights reserved ***************************************************************** 22 Korea Times: Pyongyang Beefs Up Offensive Hankooki.com > The Korea Times > Opinion Return to Six-Party Talks to Find Solution to Sanctions In the midst of the mounting tension between Washington and Pyongyang over the Bush administration's financial sanctions against the Kim Jong-il regime, North Korea is stepping up its attack on the United States, further threatening the six-party nuclear negotiations. The North came up with its strongest invective against Washington on Saturday, singling out the U.S. as its main enemy in its struggle to achieve its national independence and reunification of the Korean Peninsula. In a commentary by its official paper Rodong Sinmun, Pyongyang insisted that the entire Korea stage a vigorous struggle to smash the U.S. imperialist' move to strengthen global domination and block the reunification of the peninsula. The North's bitterest attack on the U.S. is its reaction to Washington's refusal to its call for the lift of the financial strictures in exchange for its return to the six-party negotiations which have been suspended since last November. Upon the order of President George W. Bush, Washington imposed the punitive financial action against Pyongyang in October in its belief that the communist country was engaged in counterfeiting American banknotes and laundering money. However, the sanctions have been even contested by Seoul, visibly straining relations between South Korea and the U.S, with its lowtone complaints that there is no evidence of the North's manufacture of bogus American banknotes. Brushing aside the North's persistent demands since the briefly-held fifth round of the six-party talks in early November, Washington made it clear that the financial punishment would remain intact, saying that it is different from the three-year nuclear standoff. However, it is generally accepted that Washington will change its intransient stance if Pyongyang returns to the negotiating table without any condition and shows sincere efforts to fulfill its nuclear obligations envisaged in the Sept. 19 agreement. Made in the fourth round of the six-party dialogue, the agreement was greeted by the international community as it paved the way for a peaceful resolution to the second nuclear crisis on the peninsula. But the global enthusiasm turned into disappointment a day later when the North dishonored the accord, saying that it will not execute any of its nuclear requirements before the U.S. provides it with light water reactors for its civilian nuclear use. It is not hard to imagine that the North's betrayal of the agreement prompted Washington to slap the financial sanctions against it. As the North invited the financial punishment with its notorious unreliability, Pyongyang ought to return to the forum of the six-party negotiations as early as possible. There is no other way to induce Washington to consider lifting the financial strictures. 01-08-2006 21:13 ***************************************************************** 23 Guardian Unlimited: U.S., S. Korea Withdraw Power Plant Staff From the Associated Press [UP] Sunday January 8, 2006 1:47 PM By JAE-SOON CHANG Associated Press Writer SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - The United States and South Korea withdrew their last remaining staff from the site of two North Korean nuclear reactors Sunday, ending a decade-old construction project amid rekindled tension over the North's nuclear ambitions. Fifty-six South Korean officials and workers and one U.S. representative returned from the northeastern coastal town of Sinpo, where a U.S.-led international consortium had been building two light-water reactors for power generation, said Seol Dong-geun, a manager with the South Korean government office responsible for the project. The reactors - a type difficult to use for unintended military purposes - were a reward to the North, along with free fuel oil supplies, for agreeing to freeze and dismantle its nuclear program under a 1994 deal with the United States. The project stopped after a dispute in late 2002 over U.S. allegations that North Korea pursued a clandestine atomic bomb program in violation of the 1994 accord. The energy development consortium run by the United States, South Korea, Japan and the European Union decided in November to terminate the moribund project. It was about 35 percent complete when halted. About $1.5 billion has been spent so far of the $4.6 billion reactor project, which was funded mainly by South Korea and Japan. The consortium and its member nations did not comment on their withdrawal from North Korea. North Korea protested the consortium's decision and demanded unspecified compensation from the United States, barring the removal of 93 pieces of heavy construction equipment and about 190 South Korean cars and some buses from the site, about 125 miles north of the South Korean border. Since 2003, the United States and the North have participated in negotiations with South Korea, China, Japan and Russia to try to resolve the crisis over the North's nuclear ambitions. North Korea agreed to give up its nuclear program in September in exchange for aid and security assurances. But follow-up talks have stalled as the North put forward new conditions for disarming that Washington says are unacceptable. The latest talks recessed in November. The participants agreed to meet again but did not set a date. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006 ***************************************************************** 24 WorldNetDaily: Gray Lady's nonsense SATURDAY JANUARY 7 2006 Supercritical Thoughts] [Gordon Prather] Posted: January 7, 2006 1:00 a.m. Eastern If the publisher and editors of the New York Times thought the soon-to-be released book – entitled "State of War: The Secret History of the CIA and the Bush Administration" – by their reporter James Risen will undo the damage done to the reputation of the "newspaper of record" by disgraced neo-crazy media sycophant Judith Miller, they may be in for a surprise. True, President Bush was so desperate to prevent their publishing a story based on a "revelation" in Risen's book he summoned publisher Arthur Sulzberger and executive editor Bill Keller to the Oval Office in a futile attempt to suppress it. And, in another section, Risen reports that the CIA recruited and sent to Iraq – as spies – more than 30 relatives of Iraqi scientists alleged by the neo-crazies to be involved in nuke and chembio weapon programs. According to Risen, all of them – including American anesthesiologist Sawsan Alhaddad of Cleveland – returned to tell the CIA that all of those programs had been killed years before and never resuscitated. But, of course, the CIA already knew that. In 1995, Saddam's son-in-law, Gen. Kamel, the man in charge of all Saddam's nuke and chem-bio programs, had defected to Jordan and told the CIA and the U.N. Special Commission that every trace of those programs had been destroyed, either during the Gulf War or – at Kamel's direction – in the immediate aftermath. Quoth Kamel: "Nothing is left." Hans Blix – then director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency and later chairman of the entire U.N. arms inspectorate in Iraq – was able to verify by 1997 that Kamel told the truth. But, the CIA disregarded the reports of the IAEA experts about Iraq. Now, it turns out the CIA disregarded the reports of IAEA experts about Iran. According to Risen, back in February 2000, the CIA recruited a Russian "defector," sent him to IAEA headquarters in Vienna "with blueprints for a nuclear bomb" with instructions to give them to the Iranian delegate to the IAEA. "Nuclear bomb"? Well, according to Risen, the Russian "scientist" was actually "carrying technical designs for a TBA 480 high-voltage block, otherwise known as a 'firing set,' for a Russian-designed nuclear weapon." It's obvious that what Risen is referring to is a "fire-set," not a "nuclear bomb." A fire-set is an electrical device that "holds back" the enormous charge built up relatively slowly on a capacitor until the precise millisecond that charge-pulse is needed – the fire-set is "triggered" – to vaporize the "bridge wires" in one or more high-explosive detonators. Leaving aside the extremely interesting assertion that the CIA has the blueprints for a Russian nuke fire-set, let Risen continue: He [Russian] held in his hands the knowledge needed to create a perfect implosion that could trigger a nuclear chain reaction inside a small spherical core. It was one of the greatest engineering secrets in the world, providing the solution to one of a handful of problems that separated nuclear powers such as the United States and Russia from rogue countries such as Iran that were desperate to join the nuclear club but had so far fallen short. Iran has spent nearly 20 years trying to develop nuclear weapons, and in the process has created a strong base of sophisticated scientists knowledgeable enough to spot flaws in nuclear blueprints. Tehran also obtained nuclear blueprints from the network of Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan, and so already had workable blueprints against which to compare the designs obtained from the CIA. Nuclear experts say that they would thus be able to extract valuable information from the blueprints while ignoring the flaws. Now, that is all nonsense or neo-crazy misleading statements. Or both. In particular, after almost three years of exhaustive go-anywhere see-anything interview-anyone inspections, IAEA inspectors have yet to find any indication that Iran has – or ever had – a nuclear weapons program. Furthermore, there is no evidence whatsoever that Iran obtained "workable blueprints" for a fire-set, much less for a nuclear weapon, from the Pakistanis. And there is no sense in which a fire-set is "one of the greatest engineering secrets in the world." According to the IAEA final report to the U.N. Security Council, Iraqi engineers had developed – but had not tested – in about a two-year effort a complete 32-point implosion system, including an "electronic firing system," detonators and associated high-explosive lenses. So, Risen joins Judith Miller in "reporting" neo-crazy misinformation – in complete disregard of the reports of IAEA experts – on the front pages of the New York Times. Gray Lady, indeed. Physicist James Gordon Prather has served as a policy implementing official for national security-related technical matters in the Federal Energy Agency, the Energy Research and Development Administration, the Department of Energy, the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the Department of the Army. Dr. Prather also served as legislative assistant for national security affairs to U.S. Sen. Henry Bellmon, R-Okla. -- ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee and member of the Senate Energy Committee and Appropriations Committee. Dr. Prather had earlier worked as a nuclear weapons physicist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California and Sandia National Laboratory in New Mexico. © 2006 WorldNetDaily.com, Inc. webmaster@worldnetdaily.com --> news@worldnetdaily.com--> Contact WND ***************************************************************** 25 SF Chron: Environmentalists finally get down to very serious business Rather than pressure the federal government and affix blame, activists seek cooperative solutions with local and corporate leaders [San Francisco Chronicle] Peter Asmus Sunday, January 8, 2006 I've always considered myself an environmentalist, railing against the big corporations that always seem to put their own profits over social progress. These days, however, guidance on solutions to pressing problems such as global climate change are coming from some of the very same companies we once loved to hate. Rather than trying to institute change through the federal government, activists are shaking hands with chief executives who now see the light when it comes to preserving our precious, yet fragile world for future generations. Don't get me wrong: many oil companies and other corporations are still villains. Yet some, such as British Petroleum, have doubled their already substantial investments in renewable energy, while our elected officials in Washington introduced legislation making it more difficult to build new wind farms. Products such as Toyota's gas-electric hybrid Prius exceed what our federal government mandates in fuel efficiency. This has the potential to transform the auto market into a better eco-actor much faster than our wimpy federal government can. Financial markets, once viewed as anathema to ecological values, are now recognizing the risks of global climate change when evaluating the stock value of a company. A Harris poll conducted in October shows that 75 percent of U.S. adults agree that "environmental standards cannot be too high and continuing improvements must be made regardless of cost." Yet, after more than 30 years of government intervention, the quality of air most Americans breathe is still considered unhealthy. The water in nearly half of our rivers, lakes and streams is unfit to drink, swim in or fish in. Legions of self-described "environmentalists" seem powerless to stop assaults on our natural heritage. No doubt part of the blame rests with environmentalists. We have often presented ourselves in ways that became offensive to blue-collar workers, minorities and the elderly. Possessed by a religious zeal equal to rabid free-market ideologues or evangelical Christians, environmental activists focused on stopping bad things. Typically, we did not get into the nitty-gritty of how to implement solutions. Instead, we left those details to government. We often demonized the companies that created pollution, not recognizing that our economy was an interrelated system that needed fixing in order to encourage more intelligent behavior by everybody. Writers Michael Shellenberger and Ted Nordhaus proclaimed the environmental movement dead in 2004. They pointed to the fact that since 1970's Earth Day and the passage of a series of new environmental laws during the Nixon administration, environmentalists had evolved into just another special interest group. There is some validity to this claim. Like others vying for political capital in Washington, most environmental groups tend to frame issues in ways that do not recognize how efforts to save the environment need to be connected to efforts to reduce poverty, lift up the developing world, and transform the economy into something that values, instead of threatens, our long-term survival. Yet critics of environmentalism also fail to see that a few pioneers are showing how environmental concerns fit into the bigger picture. Take, for example, Randy Hayes, a Mill Valley resident who once headed the San Francisco-based Rainforest Action Network. Like Greenpeace, the Rainforest Action Network engaged in public demonstrations and developed successful consumer boycotts against Burger King, Mitsubishi Motors and other companies. These boycotts resulted in agreements that changed corporate behavior for the better. "It is funny. Back in the late 1980s, I declared to the world that I was resigning from the environmental movement," Hayes told me. "Instead of the environment, the cause was now sustainability." Sustainability is the new buzzword of the 21st century. It encompasses both economic and social dimensions in the problem-solving process. If we really want to save the planet, we have to create a system that supports all other living creatures, along with the legions of human beings that will be filling up the globe. Once the debate moved from environmentalism to sustainability, growing numbers of corporate executives began to join in the conversation. Yet sustainability is a vague word. DuPont, a company with an environmentally negative image, now proclaims that "sustainable growth" is its core mission. The company is now dedicated to getting down to zero injuries, illnesses, incidents, wastes and emissions, yet it is busy developing genetically modified products opposed by many who consider themselves green. Having lived with the Hopi Indian tribe in Arizona for about a decade, Hayes has a big-picture "systems theory" view of the world that guides his thinking about corporations. He argues that our markets need to recognize the bona fide but currently unrecognized costs associated with pollution or sweatshop labor. "Without recognition of these real and external costs in the market, we will still have the 'cheater capitalists.' What we need to do is ecologize capitalism. When you do that, the cleanest suddenly becomes the cheapest and most profitable." Hayes' Rainforest Action Network settlements with Mitsubishi Motors and Mitsubishi Electronics helped spur other companies, including Home Depot, to offer consumers wood products that do not destroy rain forests. Just before the holidays, Rainforest Action Network applauded Goldman Sachs for being the first global investment bank to adopt a comprehensive environmental policy that acknowledges the value of "ecosystem services." What this concept recognizes is how much more valuable a living forest or ocean is than a destroyed habitat. Goldman Sachs has pledged to present to lawmakers public policies on biodiversity conservation and global climate change. As an owner of fossil-fuel power plants, the firm has agreed to reduce emissions contributing to global climate change. Goldman Sachs -- like Citigroup, Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase -- has also instituted prohibitions against financing industrial activity in ecological "no-go" zones that could harm indigenous peoples. Another hopeful trend is a shift toward solutions that spring from the local level instead of being dictated from higher up. Living in Sacramento in the '80s -- when the fate of the Rancho Seco nuclear power plant hung in the balance -- opened my eyes to the power of people at the grassroots level. This was, after all, the only nuclear reactor to be shut down by a local ballot initiative. The local municipal utility with the unfortunate acronym of SMUD (Sacramento Municipal Utility District) then went on to lead the nation in efficiency and solar and wind power. Again, Hayes serves as a good example of this shift to the local. "I came to realize," he said, "that I had spent 20 years on the international front trying to save rain forests and that the international conventions were not getting the job done. Our nation-state is ungovernable. And this is why I began exploring opportunities at the county and city levels of government, first with the city of San Francisco and now with the city of Oakland. I believe it is at the city and county level that the flexibility and the public governance are strong enough to make changes." Still, Hayes has found it frustrating trying to push sustainability in a city where crime, poverty and other issues crowd the agenda. Hayes now splits his time between trying to institute change at the local level and finding antidotes to globalization as executive director of the International Forum on Globalization, headquartered in San Francisco's Presidio. Today, the most exciting environmental developments are happening at large corporations and local governments. Like Hayes, my work has increasingly migrated to these realms, too. I push for solar energy and other renewable energy sources in Marin County, while engaging in conversations with idealistic entrepreneurs and corporate executives concerned about the world their children will live in. Right now, Wall Street, large multinationals (such as Intel, General Electric, the Gap and Sharp Electronics) and Bay Area local governments are leaders in integrating environmental concerns into the bigger economic picture. If we are going to win this war to save the world from global climate change, as well as from terrorism and poverty, then we environmentalists need to stop pretending that it is all about us. We need to look to nature for solutions and then lead by example. We need to talk to labor unions, chief executives and struggling farmers from the developing world. Is the environmental movement dead? No, it is just in the process of transforming itself into something larger than the next frightening direct-mail fundraiser or the next plea to write letters to members of Congress. Perhaps 2006 will go down in history as the year that our strong concern for the environment translates into individual, government and corporate actions that reflect a new sense of responsibility and connection to our still wild and wonderful world. Peter Asmus is author of "In Search of Environmental Excellence: Moving Beyond Blame" and other books on the environment. Contact us at insight@sfchronicle.com. Page D - 4 The San Francisco Chronicle] ***************************************************************** 26 Sunday Times: Pay up or dance to tune of foreign energy suppliers January 08, 2006 IRWIN STELZER UKRAINE is the West writ small. Its confrontation with Russia over energy supplies, during which President Vladimir Putin gave "cold war" a new definition, is a warning to big energy-consuming countries that their long-term prosperity is in the hands of very dangerous people. The Opec cartel is not the most reliable supplier of the oil that advanced economies need to keep their trucks moving, their planes flying, and some of their homes heated. These oil-producing countries have combined to keep prices above competitive levels, and did not hesitate to stop supplies in 1973-74 when dissatisfied with American foreign policy. They include, most notably, Saudi Arabia, which nevertheless tries to pass itself off as a reliable supplier of energy, as does Putin. Putin kept a straight face when he announced that his willingness to restore gas supplies proved that Russia was a reliable supplier. Never mind that it was on his orders that Gazprom cut off supplies to Ukraine, and by extension to Germany, France and other countries, despite contracts that run until 2009. Remember: this dispute was not only about prices. Belarus, the former Soviet republic that elected to stay within Russia's sphere of influence, has not faced the heavy price increases that Gazprom has imposed on the more western-orientated Ukraine, Georgia and Moldova. Putin's message is clear: Russia's energy resources, now completely under state control, provide it with a new weapon, petropower - and he will use it to restore Russia's influence to the level it enjoyed when it was a superpower. That's what the destruction of Yukos was all about, and that's what the renationalisation of Russia's energy infrastructure is all about. Putin reasons that if oil could be used for decades to mute American criticism of Saudi domestic policies, Russian oil and gas can be used to stifle western criticism of his increasingly dictatorial policies at home. Cutting gas supplies to Europe had no direct effect on America. But it served as a warning that what is left of the nation's energy security strategy is in tatters. The Bush administration had hoped that Iraq would return to world markets as a large, American-friendly oil producer. The Pentagon had predicted that Iraq would ratchet up its production to more than twice the pre-war level of 2m barrels a day. In the event, output has stalled at a little more than 1m barrels as sabotage and decades of underinvestment combine to limit production, and virtually free petrol for Iraqis keeps domestic consumption so high that there is little left to export. The second strand of Bush's policy was to persuade Congress to open up parts of Alaska for drilling. Congress refused. Finally, the White House sought to reduce its exposure to Opec by increasing purchases from Russia. That, too, has come a cropper: Putin has invited Opec representatives to a meeting to co-ordinate their policies with his. And there's worse. Venezuela, one of America's top crude-oil suppliers, had always been a reliable business partner, even honouring its contracts when the Arab members of Opec instituted their boycott. Now, the country is run by the rabidly anti-American, pro-Castro Hugo Chavez. He has raised taxes, sued for back-taxes (shades of Putin's assault on Yukos), forced international oil companies to give Venezuela's state-owned PDVSA majority ownership of their concessions, and forged an anti-Yankee alliance with other Latin-American oil producers such as Bolivia's Evo Morales. All this is bad news for countries such as America and Britain where companies such as Exxon and BP operate within the constraints of shareholder-imposed requirements to maximise profits. They are players in a game that is increasingly dominated by state-run entities pursuing aims that have nothing to do with simply maximising profits. Putin keeps prices to favoured allies below market levels; Chavez makes cheap oil available to Cuba; Middle Eastern countries, except possibly Kuwait, refuse to let western oil companies invest capital and expertise to develop new reserves even though the host countries would benefit. And China pumps $1.2 billion into Sinopec, a listed company, to cover its losses. These are the acts of power-maximisers, not profit-maximisers. These geopolitical players have raised the price of the premiums that policymakers in Western oil- and gas-consuming countries should be willing to pay for energy security. Since the risk of supply interruptions and price rises has increased, so must the willingness of consuming countries to pay for insurance against those higher risks. That probably means taking these risks into account when calculating the viability of nuclear power and other non-hydrocarbon energy sources. It means, too, being willing to finance on generous terms the construction of the proposed oil pipeline to bring Caspian oil to market. And for America, it means both adopting a carbon tax and taking a tougher line with Mexico. The Mexican government, rich in oil and natural gas, won't allow American firms to help develop those resources. So its economy stalls and job-hungry Mexicans stream across the border to find work in the United States. It might be time for President Bush to explain to his Mexican counterpart that immigration policy will henceforth only be as open as Mexico's oil investment policy. None of these steps, or any being proposed by Andris Piebalgs, EU energy commissioner, will soon reduce the risk created by dependence on suppliers who are more than mere profit-maximising sellers. Too bad Western Europe's gas-consuming nations didn't heed Ronald Reagan when he tried to persuade them not to build gas pipelines to Russia. Irwin Stelzer is a business adviser and director of economic policy studies at the Hudson Institute. He has served as a consultant to many energy companies and advises a leading developer of wind farms. The Times and The Sunday Times. ***************************************************************** 27 TheStar.com: Province misses point of renewable energy Sat. Jan. 7, 2006. | Updated at 04:07 AM AMCAMERON SMITH At Queen's Park, they still don't get it: Big is not beautiful in supplying electricity. Big means long transmission lines, which lose 8 per cent of their energy in transporting electrical current  representing almost 2,000 megawatts of peak generating capacity, enough to power about a million of Ontario's average homes. Big also means centralized power sources, especially nuclear plants that are costly to build, nightmarishly expensive to maintain, and become a curse when they break down by reducing electricity supplies. Most importantly, big shifts the focus away from displacing electricity consumption. All of this is evident in recommendations from the Ontario Power Authority to the minister of energy on what should be the electricity supply mix for the province over the next 20 years. The power authority's report calls for a dozen or more nuclear reactors that would replace or refurbish reactors at a cost of $30 billion to $40 billion. (Ontario's existing generating stations each have four reactors.) And it lays out proposals for generating renewable energy, principally by building wind farms and adding to hydroelectric generation. However, it ignores geothermal energy, and all but ignores the potential of producing electricity from biomass (plant fibre, manure, organic garbage) and solar energy. This affects how the OPA would balance the system, skewing it toward nuclear power, even to the point of rejecting an additional 2,000 to 4,000 megawatts of wind-power capacity that could be built in areas the authority designated as prime sites for wind turbines. Biomass, the report says, can contribute only an additional 470 MW of power and solar energy just 40 MW. These are outlandishly low estimates. According to a detailed analysis prepared in 2004 by the David Suzuki Foundation, geothermal, biomass and solar energy can supply or displace about 11,000 MW of power generation by 2025. It says geothermal energy alone could displace more than 4,300 MW of electricity if it were used for heating and cooling buildings. (Existing nuclear reactors range from 515 MW to 881 MW. The OPA's recommendations call for 15,000 MW of nuclear capacity by 2025.) The Suzuki report is at . Click on climate change reports, and on Smart Generation: Powering Ontario with Renewable Energy. The OPA report largely dismisses biomass because it says, "growing crops specifically for electricity production is unlikely to be viable"  a statement that is wrong and, at the same time, misses the point. The point is to use biomass for co-generation  to produce heat and electricity. In other words, to obtain a double bonus by displacing electricity used for such purposes as creating hot water and, at the same time, by generating electricity for use elsewhere. Roger Samson of REAP-Canada (Resource Efficient Agricultural Production) in Montreal says switchgrass, a native plant that can grow to 2.5 metres, or 8 feet, and thrives anywhere hay can, is a perfect candidate for biomass fuel, once it is turned into pellets or briquettes. Lest anyone think this is pie in the sky, the Suzuki report notes that biomass provides Finland with 19.4 per cent of its primary energy supply and Sweden with 15 per cent. There's an old maxim that says, "If you don't change the way you think, everything stays the same." Ontario can't afford to stay the same. Next week: Decentralization. Legal Notice: Copyright Toronto Star Newspapers Limited. ***************************************************************** 28 Japan Times: Rokkasho tests break plutonium pledge, activists tell IAEA Friday, January 6, 2006 By ERIC JOHNSTON Staff writer OSAKA -- Antinuclear activists in Japan warned in a letter sent Thursday to the International Atomic Energy Agency that tests at the Rokkasho, Aomori Prefecture, reprocessing plant scheduled for early next month will violate the government's policy of holding no surplus plutonium. "The government of Japan made a written and unequivocal pledge to the IAEA in December 1997 to uphold the principle of no surplus plutonium. Despite this commitment, Japan will separate out four tons of plutonium at the Rokkasho plant if active testing using spent nuclear fuel begins in February," the letter says. The letter was sent by the Tokyo-based Citizens' Nuclear Information Center and Greenpeace Japan, along with Kyoto-based Green Action. It calls on the IAEA Secretariat and Board of Governors to begin immediate discussions on the matter and to take "appropriate action" before active testing begins next month. IAEA officials were not immediately available for comment for this article. However, privately, some have expressed concern about what the operation of the Rokkasho fuel reprocessing plant, scheduled to come into commercial operation in 2007, would mean for the proliferation of nuclear materials. IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei has proposed that new reprocessing facilities be placed under international control in order to ease proliferation concerns. But the government's position is that even though Rokkasho has yet to go into operation, it is an existing facility and therefore outside the ElBaradei proposals. Some local political leaders are also concerned about the possible proliferation risks of operating Rokkasho. In August, Fukushima Gov. Eisaku Sato asked the Atomic Energy Commission why Rokkasho was necessary when the government has yet to determine how the roughly 43 tons of plutonium it already possesses would be disposed of. The Japan Times: Jan. 6, 2006 (C) All rights reserved ***************************************************************** 29 Telegraph: Westinghouse deal will net Britain £1.7bn The auction of Westinghouse is set to be concluded by the end of this month and, with three weeks to go, bids are already exceeding expectations. The subsidiary had originally been expected to fetch close to $2bn, but competition between Mitsubishi and Toshiba, the Japanese groups, and GE and Shaw Group of the US has pushed up the price of the strategically important nuclear company. A banker close to the auction process said: "Things are very hot right now. I expect Westinghouse to fetch a very hefty price." A report in the US on Friday said Mitsubishi had taken the lead in the bidding. However, that was denied yesterday by a spokesman for BNFL. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) in the US recently gave Westinghouse a design certification approval for its next generation AP1000 nuclear plant design. The award permits nuclear plant developers to submit licence applications to build reactors using the concept plant. Westinghouse claims the design cuts the time required to build a nuclear station to about three years. The company is bidding to build nuclear plants in China and hopes its design will be used in the UK. Tony Blair is expected to push the start button for a new generation of nuclear power stations this summer following a consultation on the issue. Blair supports nuclear power because he believes it is the best way to reduce emissions of the gases that cause global warming. © Copyright of Telegraph Group Limited 2006. Terms &Conditions ***************************************************************** 30 Observer: Red alert as Russia floats its oil giant [UP] With Putin flexing his muscle in the energy market, investors should think twice before taking a stake in state-controlled Rosneft, writes Conal Walsh Sunday January 8, 2006 The Observer Sergei Bogdanchikov, president of Rosneft, laughed when The Observer asked whether his Kremlin-controlled company was an example of 'state capitalism'. 'I'm not a politician,' he replied. 'I don't really care what kind of capitalism it is.' That was 15 months ago, and as Rosneft prepares for a London and Moscow flotation, Western investors don't seem to care either. Russia's biggest oil firm plans to make around a fifth of its stock available at IPO, and to raise up to $20bn (£11.4bn). It will probably succeed - even though the Russian government will retain a majority shareholding. It may seem ironic that the London market is being asked to finance one Kremlin-run company just as another - gas giant Gazprom - has been engaged in an alarming dispute over energy supplies to neighbouring Ukraine that threatened to disrupt Western Europe's own supplies. But high oil and gas prices have created huge investor appetite for Russian energy stocks. The Russian government is keen to capitalise on this demand. As well as planning the Rosneft float, the president, Vladimir Putin, allowed Gazprom to make 49 per cent of its stock available to foreign investors. Russia is set to become the principal provider of energy to Western Europe, and Putin is busy giving his corporate monoliths a friendlier face, hiring Gerhard Schroder, Germany's former chancellor, to chair Gazprom's $5bn Baltic Sea pipeline project, and trying (though failing) to recruit US politician Donald Evans to Rosneft. But Gazprom and Rosneft will both remain under state control, which raises questions about how productive either is going to be, and how well run. 'There is plenty of fat to be cut, especially at Gazprom,' says Stephen O'Sullivan, an analyst at Moscow-based United Financial Group. 'But painful cost- cutting and efficiencies aren't greatest priorities when gas prices are so high.' Minority shareholders will also be powerless to prevent Putin using the companies for political and diplomatic ends, as he appears to have done in the recent Ukraine dispute. Some, including Merrill Lynch, saw Russia's dramatic decision to withdraw the heavily subsidised gas supplies Ukraine has hitherto enjoyed as sound commercial logic, and the inevitable consequence of Ukraine's growing political independence from Moscow. But the episode has cast doubt on Russia's reliability as an energy supplier, not least because it led to temporary supply cuts to several countries further west. Both the EU and America accused Russia of heavy-handedness. In Britain, the incident will boost calls for nuclear power and a lessening of our dependence on foreign imports. Analysts agree that the Kremlin is determined to extract full political capital from Russia's emerging dominance in world energy markets. To that end, it has used fair means and foul to bring more of the country's oil and gas assets under state control. It spent $7.5bn last year bringing its shareholding in Gazprom up to 51 per cent - money that subsequently helped the gas giant buy Sibneft from Roman Abramovich. It barred foreign companies from owning energy assets deemed 'strategic'. Most controversially, it jailed oil oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky for fraud and effectively renationalised Yukos, his highly profitable oil firm. Yukos's assets were confiscated and sold to Rosneft, tripling its asset base in a stroke for the allegedly knock-down price of $9.5bn. Putin's tightening grip on the energy sector has commercial as well as geopolitical implications. Private companies, which have driven exploration and development in recent years, will now find it more difficult to win licences and concessions; the Kremlin can be expected to award the most lucrative work to Gazprom and Rosneft. And while that is no bad thing if you are a minority investor in Gazprom and Rosneft, there are doubts that either firm will exploit its favoured status as effectively as it could. Neither, despite its size, is famed for its productivity or profit margins: while Yukos and Sibneft used to enjoy 25 per cent annual growth in private hands, government-owned Gazprom and Rosneft were stuck in single digits. O'Sullivan believes their inefficiencies will be factored into their share prices. But he adds that Rosneft might have more trouble finding takers for its mooted plan to sell a further 25 per cent to a 'strategic investor': 'I don't see the likes of Exxon or Shell taking part in a Rosneft auction. I think the state having a dominant stake might put them off.' Chris Weafer, an analyst at Alfa Bank, takes comfort from recent moves on the Kremlin's part to restructure the energy industry, introducing tax breaks and involving Gazprom in liquefied natural gas, which can be shipped for export. But Weafer finishes with a word of caution for would-be Rosneft shareholders: the company is still facing litigation from Yukos's old shareholders, who argue that the break-up of their company was illegal. Should their claim succeed, it would have a devastating effect on the company's share price. 'An [out-of-court] deal will have to be done before Rosneft's IPO,' Weafer says. [UP] Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006 ***************************************************************** 31 IRNA: India's nuke plan sent to US without Union cabinet's approval - Jan 7, IRNA -- India's plan to separate its military and civilian nuclear facilities was submitted to the United States government without prior approval by the Union cabinet. The plan, which include the names of facilities that India is willing to put under international inspection, are part of a highly secretive exercise that sent Foreign Secretary Shyam Saran rushing to Washington to personally hand the plan over to the Bush administration, the leading English daily `Asian Age' reported here today. Significantly, National Security Adviser M K Narayanan had indicated recently that the plan submitted by the government to segregate military and civilian facilities was not final and was open to "negotiations" after it was examined by the Bush administration. US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice recently said in Washington, "We have been very clear that while we want India very much to have access to civil nuclear technology, we also want to do this in a way that strengthens non-proliferation and so that is why the arrangement is designed as it should be -- the negotiations are ongoing." There is no word from the government as to which facility has been placed under the civilian and which under the military category, and this has led to visible unease among nuclear experts here. Brahma Chellaney, a political analyst, said that it was his view that "America is using the ongoing negotiations to try to limit the size of India's deterrence, control its fast breeder program and bring a maximum number of Indian nuclear facilities under international inspections." The worry has in a sense been confirmed by US Secretary of State Rice who remarked that the Bush administration was trying to ensure that the separation plan submitted by India is "transparent, credible and defensible." US Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Nicholas Burns will be arriving here later this month to continue discussions with Indian officials based on the plan that was submitted by the foreign secretary in December. Experts have pointed out that the separation plan submitted by the Manmohan Singh government without taking the nation into confidence will be the basis for hard negotiations with the Americans. It is not a final plan as further negotiations are still to be held. There has also been no word from the government about the basic provision. ***************************************************************** 32 San Luis Obispo Tribune: Diablo powers PG&E to big year 01/07/2006 | Tribune staff reports The Tribune Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant finished 2005 with its second highest year ever in electricity generation, in part because of turbine upgrades at one of its units. Pacific Gas and Electric Co.'s power plant sent more than 17.7 million megawatt hours of electricity to the grid this year, just shy of the 18.1 million megawatt hours generated in 2001. One megawatt of electricity is sufficient to power 750 homes. Two units at Diablo Canyon produce about 20 percent of the electricity used by PG&E customers and about 10 percent of the electricity generated in the state. In early December, Diablo Canyon finished its replacement of one of the unit's low-pressure turbines with larger, more-efficient units to provide additional power. Sharon Gavin, a spokesperson for PG&E, also credited the strong performance to limited scheduled outages for maintenance, minimal unforeseen events that limit capacity and its own operating experience. The power plant ran at more than 99 percent of capacity in 2005. "It was really an exceptional year for us," she said. The turbines in the second unit are slated to be replaced this spring. Replacement takes generally one month. Plant officials estimate that the improved efficiency at both units will translate into electricity for about 48,000 additional homes and businesses without the need for more fuel. -- Ermina Karim 781-7905, by e-mail to or mailed to Biz Buzz, The Tribune, P.O. Box 112, San Luis Obispo, CA 93406-0112. email this print this ***************************************************************** 33 SLO Trib: SLO County supervisor wants study of Diablo Canyon spent fuel San Luis Obispo Tribune | 01/08/2006 | Skeptics of a facility planned for Yucca Mountain worry about the safety of storing waste locally By David Sneed The Tribune Every 18 months, operators at Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant shut down one of the plant's two reactors and replace a third of its fuel. The highly radioactive spent fuel removed from the reactors is among the world's most toxic substances. Used fuel assemblies must sit in storage pools for at least five years before they can safely be loaded into dry storage casks. County supervisor Shirley Bianchi believes that a proposed national underground storage facility for permanent disposal of such high-level nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain in Nevada will never open. She wants to send a letter on behalf of the county to state officials asking them to evaluate safety questions surrounding the storage of such waste at Diablo Canyon for the foreseeable future. The Board of Supervisors will discuss sending such a letter when it meets Tuesday. The item is scheduled to be heard at 2 p.m., after the board's lunch break. "We really do need to evaluate the long-term implications," Bianchi said. "In order to deal with it on a rational level, we need to evaluate what to do with it." For example, Bianchi said she wants more information about how the safety of Diablo Canyon's dry casks will be evaluated after 40 years. Federal officials license dry-cask facilities for 20 years, and utilities can renew them for an additional 20 years. Bianchi has drafted a two-page letter for the board to consider. It supports the state Energy Commission's recommendation to "evaluate the long-term implications associated with the continuing accumulation of spent fuel at California's operating nuclear power plants, including a case-by-case evaluation of public safety and ratepayer costs of on-site storage of spent fuel versus transporting spent fuel off-site for interim storage." The letter contains quotes from U.S. Sen. Robert Bennett, R-Utah, and Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, stating opposition to both the Yucca Mountain facility and a temporary storage facility on the Goshute Indian reservation in Utah. It also has comments from two Yucca Mountain consultants stating that the proposed dump there "is in deep trouble" and unlikely to ever open. Diablo Canyon owner Pacific Gas and Electric Co. disagrees. It points out that taxpayers have spent hundreds of millions of dollars on studying and designing the Yucca Mountain facility. "PG believes, as many others do, that Yucca Mountain can be built safely and will be," said Jeff Lewis, Diablo Canyon spokesman. "In the meantime, we are building a safe and secure interim storage facility." Several months ago, nuclear watchdog groups, including the San Luis Obispo Mothers for Peace, asked supervisors to send a letter to the state about the nuclear waste issue. "We think the county supervisors and the Energy Commission are responsible for protecting our health and safety, and this is one way they can do this," said Morgan Rafferty, a Mothers for Peace activist. While nuclear power critics believe storing used fuel in dry casks is safer than keeping it in the pools, they want the dry casks spread out over several locations, among other steps to be taken, to make the fuel less of an appealing target for terrorist attacks. To read a county request of the state to evaluate long-term effects of storing nuclear waste at Diablo Canyon, go to http://www.co.slo.ca.us/Board_of_Supervisors_Inter.nsf/ByDominoFi lename/Agendas_011006_d-1.pdf/$FILE/d-1.pdf. To see a staff report on steam generator replacement project at Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant, go to http://www.sanluisobispo.com/multimedia/sanluisobispo/archive/Ste am.pdf. ***************************************************************** 34 Fredericksburg.com: Cooling reactor concerns at North Anna Free Lance-Star Dominion power outlines plan to cool planned third reactor at its North Anna plant Date published: 1/7/2006 By RUSTY DENNEN Dominion power has settled on a new cooling-system design for a possible third nuclear reactor at North Anna Power Station that addresses lake temperatures and levels during summer months. Dominion announced in October that it would change the design to use cooling towers rather than the existing water-intensive cooling lagoon. That was done in response to concerns expressed by state regulators and by a lake residents group. Yesterday, Eugene S. Grecheck, Dominion's vice president for nuclear support services, outlined the plan during a meeting at the plant. About 50 people attended, including representatives of Dominion, the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality, the Louisa County Board of Supervisors, the Lake Anna Civic Association, Friends of Lake Anna, and state Sen. Edd Houck, D-Spotsylvania County. Grecheck said Dominion initially sought to address the cooling issues in the next stage of the federal permit process. However, in light of concerns expressed by residents and the DEQ, "It made sense to resolve them now." Grecheck said the decision--if a third reactor is built at the Louisa plant on Lake Anna--would cost the company another $200 million. Dominion engineers want to use a combination of wet and dry cooling towers, which would cool hot water exiting the reactor without affecting the 13,000-acre lake. Heat from Unit 3 would initially be cooled in a self-contained dry tower, in which fans blow on a myriad of pipes. Next, the water would pass through a series of wet towers, in which air would cool sprayed water. Currently, water from the plant's two existing reactors flows into a cooling lagoon known as the waste-heat treatment facility or "hot side" of the lake. Heat is dissipated there before the water re-enters the main lake. Grecheck said the new design would have a minimal effect on overall lake water levels and temperatures on the hot side. "The plant has been here a long time. We're trying to be good neighbors and be sensitive to the community," he said. Critics of the original plan argued that if Unit 3 had to use lake water for cooling, lake levels could fall significantly during drought periods, and water temperatures--particularly on the hot side--would rise to levels harmful to aquatic life and swimmers. Several members of Friends of Lake Anna who live on the hot side of the lake questioned whether enough is being done there to protect homeowners and wildlife. Because it's a receptacle for heated water from the plant, the lagoon falls under the same regulations as sewage treatment plants. So there is no water-quality monitoring. "No one from the state is looking out for us," said Harry Ruth, co-founder of Friends of Lake Anna. He said there are about 2,000 lots along the hot-side lagoon, with more homes in the planning stages. Jeffrey A. Steers, director of the DEQ's Northern Virginia office, said the agency may be able to step up monitoring there, "for information and educational purposes." Houck suggested that Dominion and the state could do more to inform lake residents. "Dominion has [answered] a lot of individual concerns, but I'm leaving with new concerns about the warm side and the health and safety of the people who live there," Houck said after the session. Dominion has applied to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for an early site permit for up to two additional reactors at the Louisa plant. That would allow the utility to resolve site, safety and environmental issues prior to making a decision to build. It would be able to bank the site for up to 20 years. The NRC is expected to rule on the application later this year. If that's approved, the company will apply for a combined operation and license permit sometime in early 2007, Grecheck said. He said that if the company decides to build, it would take another 10 years, at least, for Unit 3 to be built. To reach RUSTY DENNEN: + 540/374-5431 Date published: 1/7/2006 Fredericksburg.com, 605 William Street, Fredericksburg, VA 22401 Comments? Send us Feedback, Phone: 540-368-5055 To contact all other newspaper departments, please call 540-374-5000. Copyright 2006, The Free Lance-Star Publishing Co. of Fredericksburg, Va. ***************************************************************** 35 Korea Herald: KEDO's reactor project in N.K. closes, workers return to South (aibang@heraldm.com) By Annie I. Bang 2006.01.09 South Korea and the United States yesterday withdrew all remaining staff from a construction site of nuclear reactors in North Korea, putting an end to the decade-old project. The Unification Ministry said one American and 56 South Koreans arrived at the South's eastern port of Sokcho by ship yesterday afternoon from the North's eastern coastal town of Sinpo. They are the last contingent of staff of the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization, an international consortium which managed the project to build two light-water reactors in Sinpo. The pullout follows KEDO's decision during an executive meeting in New York in November to end the project. The consortium, however, has yet to settle other legal and financial issues ensuing the termination. "The executive members of the KEDO council have consulted to resolve the financial and legal problems in a bid to end the light-water reactor project, and especially our government is trying its best for the reasonable final agreement as soon as possible," Yang Chang-seok, the ministry's spokesman said in a statement. Chang Sun-sup (right), the chief South Korean delegate to the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization, talks to other officials of the international consortium at Sokcho Port yesterday. All the remaining 57 staff members of the nuclear reactor construction project returned to the South yesterday. [The Korea Herald] Pyongyang demanded Washington pay off billions of dollars in compensation for breaking a 1994 deal to build power plants for the energy-starved country. The 57 people, including KEDO officials and engineers, left behind construction equipment, vehicles and materials worth more than $45 million because Pyongyang refused to return them. "For now, we have to wait and see what KEDO and the North will decide to do with (the remaining facilities,)" said Ryu Jin-young, director of the bureau for policy coordination for the project at the Unification Ministry. The construction work started in August 1997 to implement an agreement between the United States and North Korea. Under the 1994 accord, the North agreed to freeze its nuclear program in exchange for two light-water reactors - considered less capable of producing weapons-grade plutonium - and fuel oil supplies. It has been suspended since late 2003 after U.S. officials accused Pyongyang of running enriched uranium-based nuclear programs. Most of the KEDO staff members, with the number once exceeding 1,400, have left the site with the project on hold. For the $4.6 billion project, South Korea has provided the greatest share of funding with $3.2 billion. The United States and the European Union have also pledged to contribute funds, and Japan signed a contract in 1999 to provide $1 billion to KEDO as an action to delay North Korea's missile test in August 1998. Seoul has already spent over $1.1 billion on the Sinpo project, Woo said. Experts have raised concerns that the construction might be resumed to carry out the Sept. 19 Joint Declaration on the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula. The Joint Declaration was signed by the United States, Japan, Russia, China, Russia and the two Koreas, and under the declaration, they have agreed to discuss the subject of the provision of a light-water reactor to the North "at an appropriate time." "But that might be not the case. That light-water reactor could be a new one within the six parties," Ryu said. The government has said it expects it will cost about $200 million to clear the Sinpo project, and more for the "financial and legal problems" to be solved. ***************************************************************** 36 Portsmouth Herald: Lawmakers eye 2nd reactor at Seabrook Sun. January 8, 2006 By Elizabeth Kenny news1@seacoastonline.com PORTSMOUTH - A notion of rebuilding Seabrook Station’s previously cancelled second nuclear reactor had environmentalists fuming Saturday and Seabrook officials questioning what the decision could mean to their small town. Seabrook Town Manager Fred Welch said town officials had not been contacted by state lawmakers before they publicly discussed the issue as a way to address the state’s energy needs - a fact he said could be "a point of contention." On Friday, Senate Majority Leader Bob Clegg said the state needed to increase its power generation and raised the possibility of rebuilding the station’s second reactor. "If we had built the second reactor, New England wouldn’t be in the problem it’s in now," Clegg said. "We’re going to lose businesses because they can’t afford the increases." However, environmentalists called the notion foolish. "It doesn’t make economic sense or environmental sense," said Herb Moyer, president of the Seacoast Anti-Pollution League. "We plan to ask the Centers for Disease Control to do a health study, and we’re contemplating our own data collection effort." Moyer, an Exeter resident, said there are routine radiation releases from every nuclear reactor, so building a second at Seabrook would increase the radiation in the area. Rather than focusing on how to meet the energy needs, Moyer said it is time to focus on conservation. "The focus has always been on finding more resources and consuming more," he said. The Seabrook plant was originally designed for two reactors; however, cost prohibited the completion of the second unit and the second facility was torn down. Karen Knight, chairwoman of the Seabrook Board of Selectmen, said rebuilding the second reactor was an interesting proposal. The Board of Selectmen this week decided to ask voters to support a study on the feasibility of the town buying the power plant. "If we buy it and they get it up and operating, that’s a good deal," Knight said. "It would be better to have as opposed to the rusty structure they have right now." The Associated Press contributed to this report. Seacoast Online is owned and operated by Seacoast Media Group. Copyright © 2005 Seacoast Online. All rights reserved. Please ***************************************************************** 37 PBP: FPL-Constellation merger needs close eye of regulators Palm Beach Post Saturday, January 07, 2006 About the article "FPL deal navigates seas of unregulated power" (Dec. 25, Business) regarding the merger of FPL Group with Constellation Energy Group: This merger, apparently done without any contribution from the shareholders or the Public Service Commission, appears to be a done deal. The last time FPL attempted to take over another utility, Entergy, we as stockholders and ratepayers learned that high management got large bonuses as a result of simply initiating the proposed merger, payable even if the merger failed to take place. It didn't, but the bonuses were distributed as the creators had planned. James Broadhead, retiring with generous (too generous to list) compensations as FPL chairman and chief executive officer, got in addition a payment of about $28 million for his part in the failed merger. Lesser executives got millions for their part in being there, I guess. As a utility investor, I was appalled. I wrote to the PSC, and the response was almost equally appalling. PSC officials assured me that the ratepayers were not bearing the expense of these bonuses; the stockholders were. In a little-publicized trial, of a lawsuit brought by two other stockholders braver and more persistent than me, Mr. Broadhead and his followers were made to return about half of the Entergy non-merger payments. This remains appalling, but I don't think it was appealed. With this recent history of shabby performance still in mind, I think that the merger documents should be scrutinized with the public interest in mind. The last time, we heard the usual words like the favorite synergy, and teamwork, partnership, etc.; nowhere was the million-dollar word bonus. The FPL-Constellation merger cries out for scrutiny. DONALD E. CLARK Fort Pierce Editor's note: The FPL-Constellation merger will be subject to the approval of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the Maryland Public Service Commission. Good luck changing state regulation of pesticides Once again, The Post is to be commended for stating that the cozy relationship between the regulators and the regulated, this time concerning pesticide use and application by vegetable growers and regulation of these chemicals and practices by the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, is hurting people in our community ("The politics of pesticides," Dec. 26 editorial). The recommendation that Florida's Department of Health take over the responsibility of regulation and oversight of pesticide application and use from the agriculture department is a great start on a solution. Unless the direction and emphasis of the Legislature and the governor's office change to require results instead of political payback, nothing will change. Expect to see bureaucratic lethargy at the health department because its professional staff will be threatened and intimidated by legislators serving agribusiness; the department's budget will be cut to curtail implementation of effective remedies; and the department will be reorganized annually for "efficiency" to root out bureaucrats who believe regulations serve a purpose. Then we will be showered with announcements of new studies while people in our community continue to be poisoned. This is a pessimistic outlook, but this same mentality has been guiding the restoration of the Everglades since the early 1990s. JANET K. GETTIG Tequesta Editor's note: Janet K. Gettig is a former Martin County commissioner. Illegal wiretaps may just overburden analysts Why does President Bush need illegal wiretaps on American citizens when we have a backlog of untranslated communications intercepts dating back many months ("Terror defendants to challenge wiretaps," Dec. 28)? Mr. Bush is usurping powers and tilting the balance that has served American's democracy well. We had useful and legally obtained intelligence about the 9/11 hijackers that was ignored. Legally, the president can order communications intercepts for a 14-day period without a court order. Financing war debt by borrowing from Communist China to install a democracy in Iraq, while destroying our freedoms, makes no sense at all to me. SAM KARNATZ Vero Beach Fuss about warrants? It's about obeying the law I read the letter "Bush's reason for espionage simple; Democrats don't get it" (Jan. 2). Please! No one has suggested that government agents should not spy on people suspected of terrorism. All they need is a warrant before they do so. Why do so many people think that opponents are suggesting that the government shirk its responsibility to protect citizens? Just do it legally. There even is a secret court set up that can issue warrants without them becoming public record. If the government can eavesdrop on a suspected terrorist without a warrant, it can do that to you and me, too. KAREN GRAMENZ Lake Worth Judge 'ill-informed'; 'fact' of evolution denies God The only "ill-informed" person in Tom Blackburn's column " 'Ill-informed' pick wrong fight" (Dec. 26) is U.S. District Judge John Jones III, who was convinced by the witnesses that there is no conflict between Darwinian evolution and religion. Many Darwinists spew this propaganda as a public relations ploy so the public is not alarmed, but in their writings they tell another tale. Cornell biology Professor William Provine has said that free will does not exist, that there are no inherent moral or ethical laws and that when we die, that is the end of us. Darwinism is a product of philosophical naturalism or materialism, according to which matter and energy are all that exists. There is no supernatural God. Religion, then, has nothing to say about reality. To a Darwinist, Darwinian evolution, regardless of its flaws, must be responsible for our existence because there is simply no alternative. This is why Darwinists can refer to evolution as a "fact," because to them, there can be no other possible explanation. TIMOTHY W. COX Palm Beach Gardens Cut loose utility dinosaur; let Drautz become moot The recent article "Palm Springs rethinks utilities" (Dec. 27) is exactly the kind of real threat that Lake Worth needs to hear, again and again. Mayor Marc Drautz's flippant remark that the idea concerning Palm Springs is moot is a good indication of how secure the city feels. This is why those municipalities and/or homeowner association communities that have the ability to drop Lake Worth utilities should. Lake Worth Utilities is a has-been that the city cannot afford to let go of. Between its contractual obligation to pay into a utility cooperative for years to come and the city's dependence on utility income to offset other expenses, Lake Worth Utilities is the city's cash cow. Don't expect Lake Worth to initiate any real solutions until city officials' backs are against a wall. This will happen only when those who can opt out of Lake Worth Utilities do and those who can't say "enough is enough" and stop paying their egregious electric bills. Then, elementary teacher/Mayor Drautz himself will be moot. PETER REJUNE Royal Palm Beach www.palmbeachpost.com Copyright © 2006, The Palm Beach Post. All rights reserved. By using PalmBeachPost.com, you accept the terms of our visitor agreement. Please read it. ***************************************************************** 38 toledoblade.com: DAVIS-BESSE Regulators scale back inspectors from 3 to 2 Article published Friday, January 6, 2006 By TOM HENRY BLADE STAFF WRITER OAK HARBOR, Ohio - Davis-Besse will soon be scaled back to the industry norm of having two resident inspectors from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission assigned to it - one of the final stages left for it to return to normal oversight. Since the fall of 2003, it has been the nation's only nuclear plant to have three. Resident inspectors are essentially the agency's eyes and ears. They work inside their assigned nuclear plant, rather than at the NRC's headquarters or one of its four regional offices. They spend a fair amount of time walking around their plant and doing a number of assigned checks. The agency counts on their observations to follow up on what seems out of kilter, in both operations and equipment. Scott Thomas, the NRC's senior resident inspector at Davis-Besse, begins work Jan. 22 in an identical agency position at the Monticello nuclear plant 30 miles northwest of Minneapolis. The NRC usually avoids having resident inspectors work more than three to five years at a given plant. Mr. Thomas had been at Davis-Besse about four. Jan Strasma, NRC spokesman, said the agency has decided it no longer needs a third resident inspector at Davis-Besse. Records show no major safety issues have arisen since the plant got its restart authorization on March 8, 2004. Jack Rutkowski, one of Davis-Besse's two remaining on-site inspectors, has been promoted to replace Mr. Thomas as the plant's senior resident inspector. He will be assisted by Richard Smith, who in October replaced Monica Salter-Williams, another of Davis-Besse's former resident inspectors. Until July 1, the NRC had a special oversight panel to keep area residents updated on plant activities. That panel was formed about six weeks after Davis-Besse's problems were made public in 2002. The Toledo Blade Company, 541 N. Superior St., Toledo, OH 43660 , (419) 724-6000 ***************************************************************** 39 toledoblade.com: Davis-Besse ex-workers barred from nuke jobs Article published Friday, January 6, 2006 NRC says 4 misled agency on problems By TOM HENRY BLADE STAFF WRITER OAK HARBOR, Ohio - Four people who worked at the Davis-Besse nuclear power plant in the fall of 2001 have been barred from further employment in the nuclear industry or any related field for up to five years because the Nuclear Regulatory Commission believes they deliberately misled the agency about the plant's status prior to its Feb. 16, 2002, shutdown. The NRC said yesterday it imposed the sanctions, effective Wednesday, against David Geisen, Dale Miller, Steven Moffitt, and Prasoon Goyal. Mr. Geisen, FirstEnergy Corp.'s former manager of design engineering at Davis-Besse, was barred for five years. So were Mr. Miller and Mr. Moffitt. Mr. Miller was the plant's regulatory affairs compliance supervisor; Mr. Moffitt was its technical services director. Mr. Goyal, a former senior design engineer at Davis-Besse, was barred from work in any nuclear-related industry for a year. The NRC regulates nuclear activities at universities, hospitals, and other facilities in addition to the nation's 104 commercial nuclear power plants. The NRC yesterday put the blame for FirstEnergy Corp.'s inaccurate and incomplete information about Davis-Besse squarely on the laps of the four men. James Caldwell, the NRC's Midwest regional administrator, said the information they withheld was vital for judging the plant's safety as it was operating in the fall of 2001. Back then, FirstEnergy Corp. attorneys were fighting a shutdown order that was the first of its kind written by the government agency since 1987. NRC brass balked and never executed that order. They wound up publicly regretting their decision after learning the plant was one of the most dangerous that had been allowed to operate for years. The steel reactor head was so thinned out by corrosion that it had nearly burst open with radioactive steam. The four men had information about the condition of 69 long, thin nozzles implanted in the reactor head, the NRC said. All four have left FirstEnergy since 2002. Three resigned or were terminated following an the company's internal investigation. Mr. Miller was removed from plant operations but allowed to remain at the station in another capacity until his retirement in 2004, Richard Wilkins, a spokesman for the utility, said. The NRC said two got jobs elsewhere in the nuclear industry. Mr. Strasma told The Blade he was advised by the agency's legal counsel not to reveal which two. The Blade has learned one of them was Mr. Geisen, and that he took a job as an engineer at the Kewaunee nuclear plant 27 miles east of Green Bay, Wis., on Jan. 15, 2003. A spokesman for that plant, Joe Reid, said Mr. Geisen worked there until Wednesday, when the plant's owner, Dominion Generation, abided by the NRC's instructions to halt his employment and bar access to the plant. Mr. Geisen, reached at his home, said he was "not at liberty to comment" about the NRC's sanction because of pending litigation. Efforts to reach the other three were unsuccessful. The four have 20 days to request a hearing. On April 21, the NRC issued the largest fine in nuclear history against FirstEnergy for violations association with the degraded reactor head and other safety issues. The agency said that $450,000 of the $5.45 million fine was a direct result of misleading information. FirstEnergy eventually decided against following through with an appeal it vowed to file. It paid the fine on Sept. 14, the NRC said. NRC investigators turned over evidence they had gathered about the four who were named yesterday, plus others, several months ago to the U.S. Department of Justice for possible use in a criminal probe. A grand jury in Cleveland heard evidence for two years. U.S. Attorney Greg White said last week he expects a decision soon. Contact Tom Henry at: thenry@theblade.com or 419-724-6079. The Toledo Blade Company, 541 N. Superior St., Toledo, OH 43660 , (419) 724-6000 ***************************************************************** 40 JOURNAL NEWS: Indian Point 2's leak stops; probe continues By GREG CLARY gclary@thejournalnews.com (Original publication: January 7, 2006) BUCHANAN  Federal nuclear regulators confirmed yesterday that a radioactive water leak at Indian Point 2 has stopped, more than four months after it was first discovered, but plant officials will continue to install a collection system on the outside of a 400,000-gallon storage tank as a precaution. The cause of the leak from the spent-fuel pool still has not been determined, a Nuclear Regulatory Commission spokesman said, and the agency will continue its special investigation indefinitely. NRC spokesman Neil Sheehan said the agency and the state Department of Environmental Conservation also have verified through off-site water sampling that there was no detectable radiological contamination from tritium, a radioactive isotope of hydrogen detected in larger concentrations near the leak. "The flow appears to be in the direction of the spent-fuel pools," Sheehan said. Since the leak was discovered, Indian Point and NRC officials have said there was no evidence it was a threat to public safety. As recently as last month, the amount of contaminated water captured was down to about an ounce every two days. At its worst, the leak produced up to two liters per day. "We saw pretty significant dropoff after it was first identified," Sheehan said. "Now they're not seeing any new moisture coming out of there." Sheehan said new wells drilled since the leak appeared in late August were being monitored to find the extent to which the underground plume has spread. Seven of nine wells have been drilled so far. Jim Steets, a spokesman for plant owner Entergy Nuclear Northeast, said the company would continue to investigate the cause and effect of the leak, even to the point of drilling a second group of wells to pinpoint more exactly where the plume is located. "We want to corral this thing 360 degrees," Steets said. "The leak has dried up now, and we're getting a better picture of the impact, but we want to be very confident about our findings." Last month, engineers and hydrologists determined that the radioactive water had moved into a storm sewer line but wasn't a threat to drinking water. The movement was expected, company officials said at the time, because of the sewer pipes' proximity to the testing wells. NRC officials also determined that the amount of tritium that reached the Hudson River fell within acceptable discharge levels for the nuclear plant. Workers first discovered two hairline cracks at the base of Indian Point's spent-fuel tank Aug. 22 while building a foundation for a new crane to handle spent-fuel assemblies as they're being moved in and out of water for storage. Tritium, which emits a relatively weak radiation that can increase the risk of cancer, is routinely found in the water used in the 40-foot-deep tanks. Anthony Sutton, Westchester County's emergency services commissioner, yesterday said a delay in finding and reporting the leak to local officials last summer showed the need for a full and complete analysis of what happened and what can be done to prevent such a problem in the future. The leak wasn't reported to the NRC until Sept. 2, and local officials weren't notified for an additional three weeks. Entergy and NRC officials said at the time that the leak didn't pose enough of a safety hazard to rise to the level of immediate notification. "We're confident now that there's no threat to public safety," Sutton said. "However, it is troublesome that there was a leak here that appears to have gone undetected for quite some period of time. Had they not been engaged in (the excavation) project in this location and dug down to discover the leak, how long would it have gone undetected?" Rockland County Executive C. Scott Vanderhoef expressed relief that at least the leak had stopped. "Thank goodness," Vanderhoef said. "This has been a long process to stop this thing, but we're glad it's done." Copyright 2005 The Journal News, a Gannett Co. Inc. newspaper serving Westchester, Rockland and Putnam Counties in New York. ***************************************************************** 41 APP.COM: Public must pressure NRC on Oyster Creek safety Asbury Park Press Online Sunday, January 8, 2006 01/8/06 BY JANET TAURO Ihave become a player in the theater of the absurd. As the intervention process to oppose the relicensing application of the Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station in Lacey by its owner, Exelon/AmerGen, unfolds, the roles and plots have become so twisted that a program is useless. Our coalition of citizen activists and environmental groups has petitioned the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission to require ultrasonic testing of the drywell liner that holds the reactor and acts as a shield in the event of a nuclear accident. In the 1980s, a bathtub ring of corrosion was found along the bottom of the drywell line. At several points along the line, it measured within one-sixteenth of an inch outside of the safety code. If corrosion occurs at enough of these points, the vessel risks buckling and the reactor could fall through this barrier. The drywell liner was last tested about 10 years ago. Although it is hard to fathom why not, the NRC does not require ultrasonic testing as part of its relicensing evaluation. Herein lies the basis for our contention, which was filed last month. AmerGen recently partially capitulated to this contention and stated it would conduct one test in one location of the drywell liner sometime before its license expires in 2009. But company executives have also said they will not release the measurements for public review. This is unacceptable. Without this data, the public will not know how much of a toll salt water corrosion is taking on the drywell liner. And our coalition is demanding a schedule of periodic testing of the entire vessel, not just a single spot, before any license extension is granted. State and federal elected officials cannot feign ignorance to this issue, which has been reported by the Asbury Park Press, and was the subject of a Dec. 26 editorial that demanded immediate testing of the drywell liner. The public also needs all of our New Jersey representatives to band together in a bipartisan effort to get the National Academy of Sciences to evaluate a host of other concerns that the NRC refuses to include in its review: Ocean County's expanding population and future development (10,000 homes in 10 years, as well as strip malls and megastores) in towns around Oyster Creek and its impact on an already impossible evacuation plan. Vulnerability to terrorist attack as highlighted by a 2005 NAS report. Storage of thousands of pounds of radiated fuel rods on site and within a short distance of schools. Both Rep. H. James Saxton, R-N.J., and Gov.-elect Jon S. Corzine have introduced bills to have an independent review of plant safety. However, it's been more than two years since Saxton's bill has been introduced and it's gone nowhere. The Corzine bill was introduced last summer, and we haven't heard a peep since. Oyster Creek warrants a stealthy use of our representatives' political skills. If they don't want to take our word for it, they should meet with the state Department of Environmental Protection. Outgoing commissioner Bradley M. Campbell set a national precedent last month when his agency sent the NRC its contention of serious safety concerns at the plant. There are 3.5 million people living within a 50-mile radius of Oyster Creek. The human devastation that would ensue during a nuclear accident is unimaginable, to say nothing about the havoc it would wreak on the Shore's tourism industry, which brings in $32 billion in revenues to the state. The federal Energy Bill passed last spring allocates $200 million to the nuclear industry to deal with citizens and environmental groups that are fighting relicensing applications. The Bush administration wants us to be quiet and go away, and it is putting money into AmerGen's hands to help them pay for its high-powered Washington law firm and team of experts. Our coalition, now being represented by the Rutgers Environmental Law Clinic, stands ready to fight. We will have to do considerable fund raising to pay for the corrosion experts who will help us prove our case, and to pick up the slack of our elected leaders. In this theater of the absurd, it has come down to this: The safety of millions and the irreplaceable beauty of the Jersey Shore will depend on the success of bake sales. Janet Tauro, Brick, is a member of GRAMMES (Grandmothers, Mothers and More for Energy Safety). [E-mail] E-mail Copyright © 2006 Asbury Park Press. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 42 Xinhua: KEDO workers pull out of DPRK light-water reactor project www.xinhuanet.com www.chinaview.cn 2006-01-08 17:56:50 SEOUL, Jan. 8 (Xinhuanet) -- All the remaining workers of the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization (KEDO) left the site of a suspended project for the construction of light-water reactors in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) on Sunday and arrived in South Korea. Five representatives of the KEDO, 52 South Korean workers including seven officials from (South) Korea Electric Power Corp. and 18 guards arrived at Sokcho port of South Korea, some 250 kilometers east of Seoul, Sunday afternoon, South Korean Yonhap News Agency reported. Those people departed from the construction site near the DPRK's northeast port of Sinpo earlier Sunday. The pullout came as the 4.6 billion-U.S. dollar project is now on the verge of being scrapped. The construction of the two light-water reactors (LWRs) has been suspended since November 2003, one year after the nuclear issue on the Korean Peninsula erupted. The KEDO extended its suspension of the project by another year in 2004. The KEDO's board of governors met in New York in late November 2005 to decide the fate of the project. However, the four-member executive board, comprising the United States, Japan, South Korea and the European Union, was unable to reach a final decision, mainly due to a difference of opinion over who should shoulder the costs to cancel the project, which is expected to reach at least 200 million dollars. The South Korean side claimed that 1.56 billion dollars has been spent on the project so far, of which 1.3 billion dollars has been shouldered by it. The reactor project was part of an agreement between the United States and the DPRK in 1994, in which the United States agreed to help the DPRK build two 1,000-megawatt LWRs to produce electricity the DPRK needed. In return, the DPRK agreed to freeze all nuclear facilities under the scrutiny of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). China, the DPRK, the United States, Russia, South Korea and Japan have held five rounds of talks aiming to resolve the nuclear issue on the Korean Peninsula. In a joint statement adopted at the fourth round of the six-party nuclear talks on Sept. 19, 2005, the five parties agreed to discuss the subject of the provision of light water reactor to the DPRK at an appropriate time. South Korea also reaffirmed its proposal of July 12, 2005, concerning the provision of 2 million kilowatts of electric power to the DPRK in the statement. Enditem Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 43 Independent: Labour kicks off energy review as Russia darkens the outlook Consultation to begin on ways of replacing old nuclear reactors and coal-fired stations By Tim Webb Published: 08 January 2006 The Government is set to launch its long-awaited energy review this month. Officials at the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) have pencilled in 16 January for the launch of the public consultation, which is expected to last around three months, but the date could slip towards the end of the month. Tony Blair announced the broad terms of reference for the review in November. Ministers want it completed by the middle of this year. The dispute over gas supplies between Russia and Ukraine, which threatened supplies to the rest of Europe last week, has not accelerated the timetable. But DTI officials concede the scare will focus minds on the review, which will decide how to replace Britain's ageing nuclear reactors and the old and dirty coal-fired power stations which are being shut down. Russian officials also delayed an important meeting with their counterparts from the EU last month over how to ensure Russian gas exports reach Europe. This was part of the round of talks initiated last year by Britain, which held the EU presidency at the time, to foster closer ties between Russia and the EU on energy issues. The first Permanent Partnership Council - the standard forum for ministers to discuss EU-Russia affairs - was held on the subject in October. But some meetings of the energy working groups of EU and Russian officials working beside the council have been delayed. One of the meetings, which usually take place every two months, was supposed to happen in December but did not because the Russians could not agree a time. One UK government source blamed "Russian bureaucracy" while a senior EU official admitted that the Russians were only "more or less co-operative". "They have their position, we have ours," he said. Russia, which now holds the G8 presidency, has not set a new date for the working group to meet. The continuing delay will not ease fears about the sincerity of the country's promises that it will maintain supplies of gas to Europe and not hold it to ransom over energy. A new row also appeared to be brewing at the end of last week between Russian gas monopoly Gazprom and Bulgaria over higher gas prices. The EU official conceded that the row between Russia and Ukraine was embarrassing for UK and EU ministers, who have been highlighting the need for closer ties with Russia over energy issues. Britain's Energy minister, Malcolm Wicks, told a delegation of Western oil executives in Moscow in September: "Reliable energy supplies for Europe for decades to come are dependent on strong, durable relations with Russia." A report published in October on the EU-Russia Energy Dialogue also praised it for "strengthening the security of energy supplies" and for helping to solve a "number of important misunderstandings". Ian Whitlock, a partner of the energy practice at accountants Ernst & Young, said: "The dispute between Russia and Ukraine is timely, with the energy review in the UK coming up, to get people thinking about energy supplies." If nuclear reactors and coal-fired power stations are allowed to close, around 80 per cent of Britain's electricity will be generated from gas, most of it coming from mainland Europe. Proponents of nuclear power claim that the row between Russia and Ukraine underlined the need for more nuclear generation, while a former environment minister, Michael Meacher, said that renewable forms of energy, such as wind power, have not been given a chance to fill the gap. © 2006 Independent News and Media Limited ***************************************************************** 44 APP.COM: Power down merger plan | Asbury Park Press Online Sunday, January 8, 2006 Hearings into the $12 billion merger of Public Service Energy Group and Exelon Corp. will continue this week before an administrative law judge. His ears will still be ringing from last week's torrent of objections from opponents of the plan — a group that seems to include everyone but the executives and stockholders who will grow obscenely rich from the merger. Although the hearings are expected to continue for at least another week, we have heard enough: The Board of Public Utilities should reject the proposal. It will create a virtual energy monopoly in the region that would allow the new company to manipulate rates. Some say a merger could cost New Jersey customers $2.3 billion a year in higher energy bills. We oppose the merger for other reasons as well. We are unimpressed with the way Exelon has managed its Oyster Creek nuclear power plant in Lacey and are disturbed by its lack of responsiveness to the safety concerns posed by the public, environmental groups and the state. That attitude is not likely to translate into improved customer service should a merger occur. We also are uncomfortable about seeing PSE, which has been one of New Jersey's best corporate citizens for decades, subsumed by an Illinois-based company with a track record for putting profits ahead of people. A merger sounds like anything but good news for PSE's 10,500 employees. Further, we are concerned about the BPU's loss of regulatory control over the new company, which would be based in Chicago rather than Newark, home to PSE. The state agency should not cede review power over the cost and quality of service to PSE's 2 million electric and 1.6 million gas customers. Lastly, there is good reason to be skeptical about the commitment to alternative energy sources of a merged utility company that would generate 95 percent of its energy from coal-burning and nuclear plants. Exelon and Public Service executives insist that customers would benefit in the long run from the economies of scale of a merger. Savings that resulted from increased efficiencies would be passed on to ratepayers, they say. We'd like to see that one in writing. State Ratepayer Advocate Seema Singh is among those opposed to the merger. "Simply put," she says, "the risks are too great and the rewards too small." We agree. The BPU should turn off the switch on this idea. Copyright © 2006 Asbury Park Press. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 45 AFP: Fossil-fuel crisis drives Europe to nuclear, green energy - Sun Jan 8, 4:31 PM ET PARIS (AFP) - Surging oil prices, deepening concern about carbon pollution and sudden worries over Russia's reliability as a gas supplier have been a windfall for Europe's nuclear and renewable energy industries. Both sectors are looking to 2006 and beyond to widen their share of Europe's energy market, where oil and gas remain firmly enthroned. The biggest beneficiary could be the continent's nuclear firms, whose fortunes have been blighted for nearly two decades. The 1986 Chernobyl disaster, which sent a pall of radioactive fallout over much of Europe, was a hallmark. It blocked the construction of new nuclear plants across Western Europe, caused others to be mothballed or scrapped, encouraged a shift to wind energy and other clean sources and prompted the rise of Europe's powerful green movement. Things, though, are changing. Little by little, nuclear's time in the wilderness is coming to an end. "Over the past two years, we have seen a perceptible shift in public opinion about nuclear power... people are much more positive," Laurent Furedi, a spokesman for the industry's lobby association, Foratom, in Brussels, told AFP. "There are various factors for it, namely security of supply, the rising price of (fossil-fuel) energy, and concern about climate change from carbon gases. The public mood is changing a lot, and is overtaking fears about nuclear." Last year Finland became the first European country in 15 years to start building a new nuclear power plant, a facility scheduled to go into operation in 2009. Bulgaria put out tenders for the construction of a nuclear plant to replace Soviet-era reactors being closed for safety reasons at Kozloduy. France pushed ahead with plans for a so-called third-generation design, like that being built in Finland, to replace its existing stable of nuclear reactors. On Wednesday, President Jacques Chirac" /> President Jacques Chiracunveiled a scheme for a "fourth-generation" prototype reactor, designed to be more efficient and produce less waste, that would start up by 2020. In the coming months, Britain is facing a major energy review that British Prime Minister Tony Blair" /> Tony Blairsaid will include whether to renew nuclear power stations built in the 1970s and 80s. The decisions will be "difficult and controversial," warned Blair, noting indirectly that nuclear plants were negligible emitters of carbon dioxide (CO2), the main greenhouse gas. Across the 25 EU states, 148 nuclear reactors account for 32 percent of electricity needs, a figure that ranges from just four percent in the Netherlands to 78 percent in France, according to Foratom. Some countries have already phased out nuclear or promised to do so, but in several of them there are signs of a change of heart. Sweden has scrapped plans to phase out its 12 nuclear reactors by 2010 in line with a referendum made in 1980, and opinion polls say two-thirds of voters either want the plants to continue until their operational lifespan ends or be replaced by new plants in the future. Germany's new coalition government, too, is wrangling over the commitment to phase out nuclear plants by 2020, with two ministers publicly disagreeing last week over what to do. In Italy, whose four power stations were closed down after a post-Chernobyl referendum, Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi kindled a nationwide debate last year by calling for nuclear to be included in a major review of energy supplies. A similar debate was unleashed in 2004 in Belgium, where N-plants are scheduled to be phased out by 2015. Despite this, there remains strong anti-nuclear sentiment in Europe. Fission may be back, but it is not yet in fashion -- and even if that were to happen, no-one sees a return to nuclear's glory years of the 1950s and 60s, when the energy was billed as cheap, safe and endless. Memories remain scarred by Chernobyl and, even if there has not been a major nuclear accident in Europe since that time, the safety issue will not go away. Green campaigners point to an intensifying public debate about how to safely store highly radioactive waste that has quietly built after half a century of nuclear power. A survey of 24,700 European citizens last year by the European Commission" /> European Commissionfound that only 37 percent were in favour of nuclear power but 55 percent were against it. Eight percent voiced no opinion. That means the ground is also fertile for Europe's green-energy firms, which have built a world lead in some areas of renewables, notably wind and biofuels. Corin Millais, chief executive of the European Wind Energy Association (EWEA), said the scare over EU gas imports from Russia, triggered by last week's showdown on gas prices between Moscow and Ukraine, "made wind even more attractive" for easing Europe's costly, vulnerable dependence on fossil fuels. "Wind farms are a mature technology, have low costs and can be installed swiftly," he said, noting that a nuclear plant can take years of construction before it delivers the first watt. Six percent of the EU's energy needs are met today by wind and other renewables, half of which comes from wind, although the proportion varies greatly among member states. The European Commission has set a goal of 12 percent from renewables by 2010, and the European Parliament last September demanded a mandatory benchmark of 20 percent by 2020. Millais said that the market for renewables remained hedged with regulations that made it difficult to sell green electricity across borders. If such problems could be fixed, wind farms could provide 12 percent of EU electricity by 2020 "and probably 25 percent by 2030," he said. Copyright © 2006 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. The ***************************************************************** 46 Japan Times: Pluthermal to use 6.5 tons a year Sunday, January 8, 2006 Power companies have announced that as much as 6.5 tons of plutonium will be burned annually at nuclear plants after the so-called pluthermal power-generation project gets under way. The 11 companies released for the first time their plans on how they will use plutonium, hoping to address possible domestic and overseas concerns that Japan may hold a surplus inventory of a key ingredient for nuclear weapons. But the plans fall short of providing concrete figures to convince critics the nation will consume through peaceful purposes all the plutonium it keeps and produces. Moreover, not one of the companies has yet gotten local communities to give final consent to the pluthermal plan due to lingering uncertainties over details. The 11 firms comprise Tokyo Electric Power Co. -- the nation's largest utility -- nine other power companies that run nuclear power plants and power wholesaler Electric Power Development Co., which is planning to build one. The plutonium consumption plans are subject to approval by the governmental Atomic Energy Commission, which had urged the firms to disclose the data. The electric utilities envisage using plutonium at nuclear reactors for the plutonium-thermal power generation method in which mixed uranium and plutonium oxide fuel, or MOX fuel, is burned. The Federation of Electric Power Companies of Japan plans to get the pluthermal power generation under way at 16 or 18 power plants by the end of fiscal 2010. The companies said Friday they plan to first use plutonium produced overseas such as in Britain and France at the pluthermal plants and start burning domestically produced plutonium in 2012 or later. According to the estimates, the companies plan to obtain a combined 1.6 tons of plutonium to be reprocessed from spent nuclear fuel at a plant in Rokkasho, Aomori Prefecture, by the end of fiscal 2006. Japan Nuclear Fuel Ltd., which runs the reprocessing plant, will start a test operation to extract plutonium by March so plutonium can be produced as early as this spring. Japan Nuclear Fuel envisages the reprocessing plant producing more than 4 tons of plutonium a year at full operation in the future. The companies currently keep a total of about 30 tons of plutonium which has been reprocessed in Britain and France, an amount which they say can be burned at the pluthermal reactors within about 15 years. Commenting on the plan, Niigata Gov. Hirohiko Izumida stressed a need for electric firms to win approval from municipalities which will host pluthermal nuclear plants under the scheme. The Japan Times: Jan. 8, 2006 (C) All rights reserved ***************************************************************** 47 AFP: US, S.Korea pull out of North's light-water reactor site - Sun Jan 8, 5:22 AM ET SEOUL (AFP) - The United States and South Korea" /> South Koreahave withdrawn their last personnel from the site of two partly-built North Korean light-water reactors after a US-North Korean nuclear deal was officially scrapped. A 57-strong final contingent, including a US citizen and 56 South Korean engineers and workers, returned by ship to South Korea's east coast from North Korea" /> North KoreaSunday afternoon, the unification ministry said Sunday. The Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization (KEDO) officially terminated the project two months ago amid a fresh nuclear standoff. The two light-water reactors were promised, along with replacement fuel supplies, under a 1994 US-brokered deal to end a crisis over North Korea's nuclear weapons efforts. The Stalinist state had been using a heavy-water reactor capable of producing plutonium for nuclear bombs. KEDO was set up to finance and run the project to build the light-water reactors, which are far more proliferation-proof, with the US, South Korea, Japan and the European Union" /> European Unionas the key members. But construction of the new reactors had been in limbo ever since Washington accused Pyongyang in October 2002 of violating the accord by running a separate and secret uranium-enrichment nuclear programme. The reactors were only about one-third completed, with some 1.5 billion dollars spent. Work started on the project at Kumho near the town of Sinpo on North Korea's east coast in 1998. North Korea has since accused the US of breaking its word under the 1994 deal. It has also reactivated its Soviet-era reactor producing weapons-grade plutonium at its main nuclear complex in Yongbyon, expelled international inspectors and withdrawn from the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. It is now engaged in six-nation nuclear disarmament talks to resolve the fresh standoff. Following five rounds of talks, North Korea has agreed in principle to dismantle its nuclear weapons programmes. However, it is insisting that the new light-water reactors be constructed before it honours its pledge. In the latest twist, the North refuses to return to talks unless the US lifts financial sanctions. South Korea footed most of the bill for the defunct KEDO project, the unification ministry in Seoul said. South Korea has paid 1.1 billion dollars and Japan 400 million dollars for the project. KEDO left behind its construction equipment and materials worth 45.5 billion won (46 million dollars) at the North Korean site as Pyongyang refused to ship them back, the ministry said. Copyright © 2006 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. The ***************************************************************** 48 Odessa American Online: Meetings set to discuss nuke reactor in Andrews Serving the Permian Basin of West Texas Saturday, January 07, 2006 By Jennifer Edwards Odessa American ANDREWS A series of meetings next week could help position West Texas at the cutting edge of nuclear energy development. In October, officials from technology corporation General Atomics met with officials, community leaders and residents to discuss the possibility of locating a high-temperature nuclear reactor here. It would be the first such facility built on U.S. soil in a generation. That reactor would be the first built in the United States in 30 years, Craig Stevens, press secretary for the U.S. Department of Energy, said. We havent had a reactor because there have been some Not in my backyard concerns, he said, And because there has been considerable risk with the (money) investment. But if Andrews, by now known for its willingness to accommodate nuclear waste, decides to host the project, the reactor would also be the first of its type built in North America. It could put West Texas at the cutting edge of (energy) developments, David Watts, president of the University of Texas of the Permian Basin said. From coal to electricity  it is that kind of leap. On Monday, officials from five branches of the University of Texas system will meet with representatives of General Atomics to discuss the benefits of such a reactor. Public meetings are also scheduled Monday and Tuesday to discuss the option. Watts said the construction has the backing of the University of Texas because its primary purpose would be research into an advanced technology. What makes it cutting edge, he said, is that it creates more heat than any other reactor operating within the United States. It would, he said, allow research on high heat and materials developed to withstand that heat. The facility would also supply an inexhaustible form of energy in the form of hydrogen, he said. We know were eventually no longer going to rely on oil and gas for fueling our economies, he said. Stevens said construction of such a reactor also had the backing of the Bush Administration for similar reasons. The & administration recognizes that nuclear fuel has to be a stronger component of our energy, he said. We realize it needs to grow. We know eventually, we are going to have to rely on other sources. And this supply is infinite. And DOE press secretary Craig Stevens said the technology presents few safety risks. Its safe, he said. It is impossible for it to meltdown, to have the kind of reaction that occurred at Chernobyl or Three-Mile Island. DOE press secretary Stevens agreed. The technology has gotten better over the last few years, he said. Now, the technology is sound and it is a clean source of energy  there are no emissions, except for spent nuclear fuel  which the U.S. government takes care of. If approved, the reactor would be the first very high temperature reactor constructed within the United States, although similar reactors have been built in Asia. Andrews City Manager Glen Hackler said the Andrews community seemed to express support for the project at the initial October meeting, but that more meetings were needed to determine residents concerns. What we have tried to do is put our ear to the ground and sense what the communitys initial feedback is, he said. We asked for a town hall meeting so we could provide a better forum. Hackler called the proposal intriguing, and said it would be in line with the citys decisions to store nuclear waste and to support the Louisiana Energy Facility. Nuclear research & fits some of the early plans (from) 10 to 15 years ago when Andrews County got into discussing nuclear issues, he said. Nuclear waste has been processed and stored by Waste Control in Andrews since 1997, according to Odessa American reports. It is Andrews decision to allow nuclear waste processing that recommended the community to General Atomics, said Mike George, president of the Odessa Chamber of Commerce. The Odessa and Midland chambers are hosting Tuesdays meeting. The fact that low-level nuclear waste is available in Andrews County is a major plus for wanting to locate close to that, he said. Thats one of the major criteria. Some of that nuclear waste could be the feed stock for the test reactor. George said the Odessa and Midland chambers support the project, and residents of the two communities seem to support the idea so far. It would be a tremendous economic development boon for this area  up to $400 million in construction costs alone, he estimated. He said the annual operating budget might then be between $10 and $40 million. THE NEXT STEP While community support is essential to the construction of the reactor, it will not in itself bring about its creation. Instead, community approval would simply begin the process. After that, $3 million would need to be raised to create what Watts termed a preconceptual design for the reactor. That design would then answer logistical questions such as what the reactor would look like, where it would be located, how large it would be, and what it would end up costing. The preconceptual design is a feasibility study and will allow us to answer a lot of questions, he said. That design would also be used to win funding for the costly project. (The) document will be used to approach Congress and the U.S. Department of Energy to fund the actual design and construction of this reactor, he said. We are not talking about building a reactor in the next month, Watts said. Depending upon what the nature of discussion at the Andrews meeting and Midland-Odessa meeting, there may be other meetings possible & we are not seeking a license. American Online: c /o Odessa American 222 E. 4th Street P.O. Box 2952 Odessa, TX 79760 Copyright © 1999-2006 Odessa American. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 49 CNIC: Japanese NGOs send petition to IAEA (Citizens' Nuclear Information Center) 5 January 2006 Introduction to Petition Petition Background Briefing PRESS RELEASE Urge International Body to Take Action to Ensure Japan Upholds International Commitment to not Produce Surplus Plutonium 5 January 2006 (Kyoto, Japan) Japanese NGOs today sent a letter to IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei and the Board of Governors urging the inter-governmental body to discuss and take action to ensure Japan upholds its 1997 commitment made to the international organization not to produce surplus plutonium. Testing scheduled to take place next month at the Rokkasho reprocessing plant will separate out 4 tons of plutonium from spent nuclear fuel. This will violate the commitment Japan made to the IAEA because the plutonium cannot be consumed. The petition sent to the IAEA by Green Action, Citizens' Nuclear Information Center and Greenpeace Japan states, "Japan originally made this commitment in the interests of nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament, a field in which it is a valuable leader. Given the heightened political tension around disarmament and non-proliferation in North East Asia, and its role as Chair of the IAEA Board of Governors, Japan should not renege on this commitment." Green Action director Aileen Mioko Smith stated, "Japanese utilities will shortly be going public with a fabricated plutonium utilization plan. The Japanese government is intending to approve it. Instead Japan should keep its promise to the IAEA and indefinitely postpone testing at the Rokkasho reprocessing plant." Japan already has over 42 tons of surplus plutonium in Europe and Japan. Contact: Green Action, Aileen Mioko Smith Cell: 090-3620-9251 Citizens' Nuclear Information Center Tel: 03-5330-9520 INTRODUCTION TO PETITION Petition urging IAEA Action: Ensure Japan Upholds its International Commitment To Not Produce Surplus Plutonium The government of Japan made a written and unequivocal pledge to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in December 1997 to uphold the "principle of no surplus plutonium."*1 Despite this commitment, Japan will separate out 4 tons of plutonium at the Rokkasho reprocessing plant, if active testing using spent nuclear fuel begins as scheduled in February 2006. The stark fact is that the Japanese nuclear power program has no use for this plutonium, now or in the foreseeable future. The Plutonium Utilization Plan of Japan presented to the IAEA in 1997 stated that mixed plutonium-uranium oxide (MOX) fuel in light water reactors would be the "principle way of utilizing plutonium in Japan over the next few decades." The program, however, has never gotten off the ground due to public opposition, data falsification scandals in 1999 and 2002 and the fatal accident at the Mihama nuclear power plant in 2004. Today, not a single electric utility has the go ahead to consume MOX fuel. Furthermore, a fundamental technical problem exists. Japan lacks the capability to turn any plutonium produced at Rokkasho into MOX fuel. There is only a government "expectation" that a MOX fuel fabrication plant be fully operational by fiscal 2012.*2 Therefore, if active testing begins at Rokkasho this year, any separated plutonium will languish at the facility. Moreover, a massive cache of Japanese plutonium already exists: thirty-seven tons sit in Europe. Japan's Framework for Nuclear Energy Policy issued in October 2005 gives priority to the consumption of this plutonium in Europe over any produced at Rokkasho *3. Japan allowed the stockpile in Europe to grow even after the MOX program fell apart, although it was clear the plutonium could not be consumed. Now, it is set to accumulate more plutonium, this time in Japan. Simply put, Japan already has tons of plutonium and no way to burn it. Further stockpiling is not only irresponsible but also a clear break with Japan's pledge to produce no surplus plutonium. Japan originally made this commitment in the interests of nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament, a field in which it is a valuable leader. Given the heightened political tension around disarmament and non-proliferation in North East Asia, and its role as Chair of the IAEA Board of Governors, Japan should not renege on this commitment. For these reasons, Japan should indefinitely postpone active testing at the Rokkasho reprocessing plant. *1. International Atomic Energy Agency, "Communication Received from Certain Member States Concerning their Policies Regarding the Management of Plutonium", INFCIRC/549/Add. 1, 31 March 1998. Available at *2. Japan Atomic Energy Commission, "Framework for Nuclear Energy Policy", 14 October 2005, p.34. Available at *3. Ibid, p.11. PETITION To ensure that Japan does not breach its international commitment to the "principle of no surplus plutonium", we urge the IAEA Secretariat and Board of Governors to immediately discuss this matter and quickly take appropriate action before active testing begins at Rokkasho and plutonium is accumulated. 5 January 2006 Hideyuki Ban (Co-Director) Aileen Mioko Smith (Director) Atsuko Nogawa (Nuclear Campaigner) BACKGROUND BRIEFING (Compiled 5 January 2006 by Green Action) Statements on Rokkasho, Surplus Plutonium and MOX Fuel Fukushima governor Eisaku Sato’s statement to the Japan Atomic Energy Commission about the Rokkasho reprocessing plant and surplus plutonium: "Why rush to operate a new reprocessing facility when there is still no solution for disposing the 40 tons of plutonium Japan already possesses?" (Submission to Public Comment on draft of “Framework for Nuclear Energy Policy”, August 2005) Of the 430 tons of spent nuclear fuel to be reprocessed during the active testing scheduled to start at the Rokkasho reprocessing plant in February, 310 tons belong to the two largest electric utilities in Japan - 170 tons from Tokyo Electric and 140 tons from Kansai Electric. Neither utility, however, can consume the plutonium that will be produced at Rokkasho. All seventeen Tokyo Electric nuclear power plants are located in two prefectures, Niigata and Fukushima. As a result of public opposition and Tokyo Electric's safety data falsification in 2002, both prefectures withdrew authorization for MOX fuel use. Their opposition remains adamant. Niigata Governor Hirohiko Izumida: “The Pluthermal (MOX fuel utilization) issue is not even at a stage for discussion. It would be deplorable and damage the trust of the public and Niigata regional authorities if the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear power plant site were to be included in plutonium utilization plans and announced to the public.” (Excerpt from December 2005 letter submitted to Tokyo Electric president Tsunehisa Katsumata. Source: Kyodo “Niigata Governor Lodges Warning to Tokyo Electric Regarding Pluthermal (MOX utilization) Plans” 26 December, 2005) “In the middle of all of this, we have heard that the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear power plant site is being listed in the company's Plutonium Utilization Plans....It is deplorable* that the Atomic Energy Commission is calling for public release of plutonium utilization plans at this time... We petition your committee that you understand this situation in our prefecture and take it into consideration in some manner.” (Excerpt from letter submitted to Shunsuke Kondo, Chair, Japan Atomic Energy Commission 27 December 2005) Fukushima Governor Eisaku Sato: “I do not care what Tokyo Electric says. It is inconceivable that MOX fuel utilization takes place in this prefecture. I believe that Tokyo Electric understands the (prefecture's) position.” (Excerpt from governor’s regular monthly press conference 26 December 2005. Source: Fukushima Minyu Newspaper (Morning News) “Pluthermal (MOX fuel utilization) Inconceivable” 27 December 2005) “The governor, in giving his reasons, referred to the statement he had made during the September 2002 prefectural legislative session in which he stated, ‘Prior consent (for MOX fuel utilization) has been withdrawn because the necessary conditions for granting it have collapsed.’ This statement by the governor was made after revelations in August (2002) that Tokyo Electric had concealed problems at its nuclear power plants. The governor (also) referred to the prefectural legislative assembly’s resolution in opposition and stated, ‘We have decided not to have the program implemented in our prefecture in accordance with the collective will of our citizens.’” (Excerpt from the Fukushima Minyu Newspaper article “Pluthermal (MOX fuel utilization) Inconceivable” 27 December 2005) Meanwhile, due to the 2004 accident at Kansai Electric’s Mihama nuclear power plant, the utility itself admits implementing the MOX program is at present impossible. Kansai Electric on MOX Program Status: “At present we are concentrating fully on Mihama Unit 3 post-accident measures and are therefore not in the position to consider MOX fuel use.” (Kansai Electric Osaka Headquarters 20 October 2005 (Repeated 20 December 2005)) [Thanks to for putting together the petition, press release and background briefing materials. Informal English translation of news articles and statements are by Green Action.] Status of Light Water Reactors using MOX Fuel in Japan No electric utility in Japan has the go-ahead to consume MOX fuel. Click here for tables detailing the status for light water reactors using MOX fuel. Citizens' Nuclear Information Center TEL.03-5330-9520 FAX.03-5330-9530 ***************************************************************** 50 Observer: UK cleared nuclear cargo to Iran [UP] Defence experts demand tightening of export regulations on potential weapon materials Antony Barnett Sunday January 8, 2006 The Observer British officials have allowed the export to Iran of a cargo of radioactive material that experts believe could be used in a nuclear weapons programme, The Observer can reveal. The disclosure has prompted calls for an inquiry into how the international trade in such compounds is controlled. On 31 August a truck carrying 1,000kg of zirconium silicate supplied by a British firm was stopped by Bulgarian customs at the Turkish border on its way to Tehran, after travelling 2,400 kilometres (1,500 miles) from Britain, through Germany and Romania, without being stopped. Zirconium can be used as a component of a nuclear programme. According to one expert, it is used in nuclear reactors to stop fuel rods corroding and can also be used as part of a nuclear warhead. The metal can be extracted from zirconium silicate. It is because the compound can be used for military purposes that its trade is usually tightly controlled. The fact that a British firm was allowed to sell the compound without scrutiny will raise questions for the British government over its controls on sensitive materials. Intelligence documents disclosed last week in the Guardian detailed how Iran is creating agencies and middlemen to procure equipment and know-how in Europe in a covert attempt to build nuclear weapons. The Iranian President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is expected this week to order the resumption of tests on machinery that can be used to make weapons-grade uranium. The official who stopped the truck was alerted after its cargo emitted unusual radioactivity levels. Bulgarian officials said that the Turkish driver was arrested on 31 August. He was investigated 'for violating international treaties... by transferring across the border dangerous wastes, toxic chemical substances, biological agents, toxics and radioactive materials'. The Bulgarians discovered the exporter was a British firm and alerted the UK embassy in Sofia, which informed London on 7 September. There are technical rules that control the trade in zirconium silicate. These controls focus on how much of the material contains hafnium, another rare metal. The British view is that zirconium sulphate with more than 0.05 per cent of hafnium does not require a licence, as it is difficult to refine - although this is challenged by some experts. After a two-month investigation involving the British and Bulgarian authorities, it was agreed that the British cargo did not need an export licence and could be released and driven to Iran. A Department of Trade and Industry spokeswoman said: 'The DTI informed the Bulgarian authorities that the goods as described were not controlled under UK export control (as the hafnium content of the sand was 1.1 per cent by weight) and did not therefore require an export licence... this particular case raised no WMD end-use concerns.' However, John Large, an independent nuclear consultant, said: 'It is not a very sophisticated process to extract the zirconium from such material. Even though it appears that technically this cargo does not fall within the international controls, I would still be concerned. Zirconium is used for two purposes: one for cladding nuclear fuel rods inside a reactor and as material for a nuclear weapon. If Iran wanted this material for any illicit purposes, this would be one way it could get its hands on it.' Labour MP Andrew Mackinlay has asked a number of parliamentary questions on the export of zirconium silicate from the UK, and wants the DTI to review its rules governing the export of the material. · Additional reporting by Matthew Brunwasser in Sofia. antony.barnett@observer.co.uk [UP] Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006 ***************************************************************** 51 AFP: Britain allowed nuclear cargo to be sent to Iran Sun Jan 8, 4:22 AM ET LONDON (AFP) - Britain has allowed the export to Iran" /> Iranof a cargo of radioactive material that experts believe could be used by the Islamic Republic as part of a nuclear weapons programme. The newspaper said a truck carrying 1,000 kilogrammes (2,204 pounds) of zirconium silicate from a British firm was stopped by customs officials in Bulgaria at the border with Turkey. It quoted an expert as saying that zirconium metal can be extracted from the substance, whose trade is usually tightly regulated, and used to prevent fuel rods corroding in nuclear reactors and as part of a nuclear warhead. But the truck, which had travelled unchecked from Britain through Germany and Romania without being stopped, was allowed to continue its journey to Tehran after a two-month investigation found an export licence was not needed. British and Bulgarian officials in Sofia reportedly looked into whether the cargo had breached technical rules on how much of the substance contained another rare metal, hafnium. The Observer Sunday quoted a Department of Trade and Industry spokeswoman as saying analysis of levels of hafnium in the substance meant a licence was not required. "This particular case raise no WMD (weapons of mass destruction) end-use concerns," she added. The Observer's dispatch came as Iran looked set to end its two-and-a-half year suspension of nuclear fuel research Monday or Tuesday, despite calls not to from the international community, including the European Union. Talks with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's government are currently deadlocked over the issue, with the West fearing Iran's fledgling nuclear programme is a front for developing atomic weapons. Independent nuclear consultant John Large told The Observer: "It is not a very sophisticated process to extract the zirconium from such material. "Even though it appears that technically this cargo does not fall within the international controls, I would still be concerned. "Zirconium is used for two purposes: one for cladding nuclear fuel rods inside a reactor and as a material for a nuclear weapon. "If Iran wanted this material for any illicit purposes, this would be one way it could get its hands on it." Copyright © 2006 Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved. Questions or ***************************************************************** 52 WQAD: Researchers to examine history of ammunition plant workers January 8, 2006 IOWA CITY, Iowa Health and death records of more than 30-thousand workers at the Iowa Army Ammunition Plant will be examined by researchers in the University of Iowa College of Public Health. The study will determine if conventional weapons workers at the plant in southeast Iowa near Burlington have elevated rates of death or adverse health effects, such as cancer.Doctor Laurence Fuortes ia a University of Iowa professor of occupational and environmental health. He says the first year of the study is funded by a 775-thousand dollar grant from the Department of Defense. The total project is expected to cost five (M) million dollars over five years. The ammunition plant in Middletown housed a secret federal nuclear weapons program, which was revealed after many former workers developed cancer. In 1975, production of nuclear weapons was transferred to Texas. Copyright 2005 Associated Press. All rights All content © Copyright 2001 - 2006 WorldNow and WQAD. All ***************************************************************** 53 Journal Star News: Ex-military director speaks out - PJStar.com - Sunday, January 8, 2006 BY KELLY MAHONEy OF THE JOURNAL STAR PEORIA - A former military director on Saturday accused the United States of war crimes for its use of depleted uranium in warfare. Peace activist Dr. Doug Rokke, a Gulf War veteran and former director of the U.S. Army's Depleted Uranium Project, presented his thoughts on the military's alleged use of depleted uranium to about 50 people in the basement auditorium of the Peoria Public Library's main Downtown branch. Rokke's presentation was sponsored by the local chapter of Peace Action, which is dedicated to creating a world "free from violence and war," according to its Web site, www.peace-action.org. Rokke, who has a Ph.D in physics and technology education, claimed the U.S. government continues to use uranium against the mandates of the United Nations. "The United States Department of Defense continues to use uranium emissions," he said. "It is a radioactive defense item, it's a dirty bomb." Rokke said the government continues to use uranium because of its effectiveness. "It's incredibly effective as a weapons system." By the Office of Homeland Security's own definition, use of depleted uranium is radiological warfare and thus a war crime, Rokke said. "It's an act of terror," he said. "It's in their own guidelines. I don't think they realized what they did when they did it." Depleted uranium exposure causes a variety of symptoms and, Rokke claimed, is a contributing factor in Gulf War syndrome, a malady among veterans of that military action against Iraq in 1991. Once uranium is used in an area, studies show the particulate matter can travel at least 30 miles, Rokke said. Those in the area can continue to infect others as well. "Any military personnel that has been near the contamination will bring it back," Rokke said. "We have proven incidents when contamination has been brought back." There is no way to effectively remove this contamination, Rokke said. "You cannot decontaminate clothing," Rokke said. "We could never, ever get it down to permissible levels." Furthermore, Rokke said there is no way to treat exposure if it is not dealt with in the first 24 hours. "I mean, you can do basic stabilization," Rokke said. "When the rash breaks out, the doctor gives me a salve." Even on the other side of the globe from war, central Illinois residents have been exposed, Rokke said. "Have troops in Illinois gone over and been exposed? Absolutely," Rokke said. "Have central Illinois people died as a result of this? Absolutely." Kelly Mahoney can be reached at 686-3114 or news@pjstar.com. ----------------------------------------------------------------- Click here and receive 4 weekends of the Journal Star home delivered absolutely FREE! [Win $100 Gas Card!] [Soderstrom Dermatology] | Copyright | Start Here | Subscribe | Contact Us | Archives | © 2005 PEORIA JOURNAL STAR, INC. :: ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 1 News Plaza, Peoria, IL 61643 :: 1-309-686-3000 ***************************************************************** 54 Deseret News: U.S. judge is pondering touchy Goshute dispute [deseretnews.com] Saturday, January 7, 2006 Geoffrey Fattah Deseret Morning News A federal judge said he must decide whether he will force the Bureau of Indian Affairs to put a stop to the ongoing political dispute among members of the Skull Valley Band of Goshutes, effectively putting an end to the friction over the nuclear waste storage controversy that has resulted in anger and animosity among its members. But the touchy issue of whether the federal government should infringe on the sovereignty of an Indian nation has prompted U.S. District Judge Dale Kimball to pause and consider. The issue came up during a motion hearing Friday in a suit filed by several Goshutes against the U.S. Department of Interior and the Bureau of Indian Affairs over BIA's decision to accept at face value that there was proper approval by tribal members when band executive director Leon Bear inked a deal with Private Fuel Storage for a conditional lease to store high-level nuclear waste. That decision has driven a wedge between band members as well as has Bear's delay in holding tribal elections for chairman since 2001. Because the band is one of the smallest tribes in the United States, it has no tribal court to determine whether Bear has followed tribal law, said attorney Paul EchoHawk. EchoHawk said his clients, comprised of Goshutes opposed to Bear's continued rule, are asking the court to have BIA investigate if Bear has followed tribal law. "The lease has never been shown to some tribal members," EchoHawk said, so how can Bear give legitimate tribal approval? There is also evidence that Bear is favoring his political supporters by giving them unequal shares of PFS advances. "You go out there and Bear's supporters have new homes," while others still live in less-prosperous circumstances, EchoHawk said. But an attorney for the Department of the Interior said it is not the government's job to resolve or interfere with tribal disputes. "It's an unfortunate and tragic circumstance," said assistant U.S. Attorney Jeanette Swent, but the federal government's duty to Indian tribes is to oversee the "day-to-day" tribal operations while tribes must resolve their own internal differences. Kimball questioned this philosophy, asking what options tribal members have if BIA refuses to get involved and there is no tribal court? Swent compared the situation to the United States going into France and telling the French people whom to elect as their leader. EchoHawk countered that unlike France, the U.S. government has a special trust and obligation to help Indian tribes. Outside court, Goshute member Margene Bullcreek said since Bear was re-elected in October 2001 his supporters have thwarted attempts to have a tribal council quorum to set up an election. To her knowledge, Bullcreek said there have been four attempts, the most recent last April. Another attempt is being made this month. For a brief time in 2003, Bear attempted to banish political opponents on the grounds of treason, including several of Bullcreek's family members and herself. EchoHawk said that attempt was dropped when the members appealed to a federal court. Kimball is expected to issue a ruling in the following weeks. After the hearing, EchoHawk said he finds it ironic that BIA has historically become involved when tribes try to lease land for something as small as a cell phone tower but refuses to touch the nuclear-waste issue. "This is one of the smallest tribes in the country," EchoHawk said. "But the lease would have the largest impact on Indians ever." E-mail: gfattah@desnews.com © 2006 Deseret News Publishing Company [ /] ***************************************************************** 55 Deseret: News: Here's some hefty answers to hot political questions [deseretnews.com] Sunday, January 8, 2006 Here's some hefty answers to hot political questions By Frank Pignanelli &LaVarr Webb With a brand spanking new year ahead, enquiring minds want answers to the hot political questions of 2006. Here's our take on the future. Note: Please don't save this column. Question: Will the Legislature pass a big tax cut? Answer: Pignanelli: 2006 is an election year, so there will be a tax cut, and it will be big. Webb: If revenue projections come in even higher during the session (which is quite possible), then we'll see a big tax cut. Otherwise, it will be more modest, in the range the governor is proposing. Question: Will the sales tax be removed from food? Answer: Pignanelli:Despite the work by Speaker Greg Curtis and House leadership, unfortunately the Legislature will not remove the regressive tax. Webb: Eventually. But phased in. Question: Will banks and credit unions get along this year? Answer: Pignanelli: About as well as the Israelis and Palestinians. Webb: Lawmakers have resolved this issue to their satisfaction, and anyone who tries to fiddle further will be shot. Question: Will USTAR (a major economic development initiative) be fully funded? Answer: Pignanelli: There is a direct correlation between what this program will receive and the personal investment of time and political capital made by Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. in its support. Webb: It will do well because it has such solid support in the business community as a means to keep Utah's economy vibrant. Question: Will transportation get the lion's share of surplus money? Answer: Pignanelli: Probably a lion's snack, but not the full meal that will be feasted on by a tax cut. Webb: It's transportation vs. a big tax cut. Utah faces an enormous transportation funding deficit, and voters would rather have their roads fixed. It's also a good place to spend surplus money without boosting agency base budgets. Transportation wins. Question: Will Curt Bramble run for Congress? Answer: Pignanelli: No, he's having too much fun stirring it up in the Legislature. Webb: Eventually, but the stars aren't quite lined up this cycle. Question: Will Chris Cannon be re-elected? Answer: Pignanelli: If history is an indication, he will face a brutal convention battle and eventually succeed in the primary. Webb: It's 50/50. He's the most vulnerable member of the congressional delegation. Question: Who will run against Jim Matheson? Answer: Pignanelli: It doesn't matter what poor soul is finally drafted to run, it is too late to attract the attention of national PACs and local support. Webb: Rep. LaVar Christensen will run. Radio host Doug Wright is serious about running, but probably won't because it's getting late and fund raising is extremely difficult. Question: Will Matheson be re-elected? Answer: Pignanelli: The question is not "if" but "by what margin?" (I predict 67 percent against whomever.) Webb: Beating Matheson will require the perfect candidate and the perfect campaign. Not this year. Question: Will Rob Bishop be re-elected? Answer: Pignanelli: The silver-haired educator scored points with Utahns of every political affiliation with his efforts to stop storage of high-level nuclear waste. Webb: The acerbic-tongued lawmaker will win easily. Question: Will Bush regain some popularity in 2006? Answer: Pignanelli: Yes. All basements have stairs, and little else remains for the Bush administration to bungle. Webb: Voters are tiring of Democrats' whining. They respect a president with convictions willing to make tough decisions. Here comes the Comeback Kid. Question: Will Democrats take either the U.S. House or Senate? Answer: Pignanelli: Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi has such a nice ring (especially with an Italian surname). Webb:"Pelosi for Speaker" is the GOP's best campaign battle cry. Demos have nothing to offer. GOP maintains control. Question: Will Democrats make inroads in the Utah House or Senate? Answer: Pignanelli: I predict a net gain. Webb: Status quo. Question: Will Democrats consolidate power in Salt Lake County? Answer: Pignanelli: Yes. County Mayor Peter Corroon is perceived as a fair and competent administrator, and the well-respected County Councilman Jim Bradley will be heading the ticket. Webb: With a focus on fundamental grass-roots politics, this is the year Republicans make a comeback in Salt Lake County, up and down the ballot. Question: Will Orrin Hatch cruise to victory? Answer: Pignanelli: Presumptive Democrat nominee Pete Ashdown is pursuing a vigorous campaign, especially through the Internet, and will offer a spirited challenge and clear alternative. Webb: Hatch wins big. The Steve Urquhart challenge was good for him, and his campaign is rolling. Question: Will Chris Cannon get caught up in the Abramoff scandal? Answer: Pignanelli: All the publicized antics of Abramoff's buddies (i.e. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, Rep. Robert Ney, Ralph Reed) will deflect attention. Webb: He'll take some hits, but nothing serious. Question: Will the Legislature require "intelligent design" instruction in public schools? Answer: Pignanelli: No, other than a handful of right-wing evangelicals, no one seems to care. Webb: No one is even proposing that. Question: Will Mitt Romney emerge as a legitimate presidential contender? Answer: Pignanelli: No, but he will play the game as long as he can for a shot at the No. 2 spot. Webb: Yes. He's in the top tier of GOP candidates and is winning more credibility and respect. Question: Will Arnold Schwarzenegger lose the California governorship? Answer: Pignanelli: So far, his strongest challengers are fellow actors (and nut cases) Warren Beatty and Mel Gibson; thus Arnold may survive. Webb:Even Californians are smart enough to know that an all-Democratic power structure leads to disaster. Arnold wins. Question: Will Pignanelli ever become a conservative Republican? Answer: Pignanelli: At about the time LaVarr slaps a "Hillary '08" bumper sticker on his car. Webb: That would make my bumper a big target in the parking lot, but the conversion of Pig would be worth it. Question: Will BYU beat Utah in football this fall? Answer: Pignanelli: After Utah's performance at the Emerald Bowl (a foreshadowing of things to come), it will be an honor for the Y. just to play in Rice-Eccles Stadium. Webb: Bush and Bronco. They'll both be known as Comeback Kids. Question: Will Utah finally win the battle against high-level nuclear waste?? Answer: Pignanelli: Yes. Private Fuel Storage is too unstable a company, and our congressional delegation is now united in its opposition. Webb: Agreed. Republican LaVarr Webb was policy deputy to Gov. Mike Leavitt and Deseret News managing editor. He now is a political consultant and lobbyist. E-mail: lwebb@exoro.com. Democrat Frank Pignanelli is a Salt Lake attorney, lobbyist and political adviser. A former candidate for Salt Lake mayor, Pignanelli served 10 years in the Utah House of Representatives, six years as House minority leader. Pignanelli's spouse, D'Arcy Dixon Pignanelli, is executive director of the state Department of Administrative Services in the Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. administration. E-mail: frankp@xmission.com. © 2006 Deseret News Publishing Company [ /] ***************************************************************** 56 Deseret News: Cedar Mountain OK dents nuclear plans [deseretnews.com] Saturday, January 7, 2006 By Suzanne Struglinski Deseret Morning News WASHINGTON — President Bush's signature on a huge defense bill late Friday sealed the Cedar Mountain Wilderness Area into law and supporters hope it will help seal the fate of a planned nuclear-waste storage project in the west desert's Skull Valley. ['Photo'] Deseret Morning News graphic Congress approved the new wilderness area in the Defense Authorization Bill last month after stressful weeks of negotiations by the Utah congressional delegation to keep it in the bill. Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, authored the provision last year creating the wilderness to protect the Utah Test and Training Range, where military pilots train, and to stop Private Fuel Storage from building a railroad to its proposed nuclear-waste site in Tooele County. "I'm proud of our delegation and governor who worked together at every level to finally get this done," Bishop said. "The key support we had from congressional leadership and outside groups also cannot be overlooked. This was a good team effort and good policy, and I appreciate the president signing it into law." The wilderness designation was not in the Senate version of the bill and some senators, including Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., did not want to include it. But the White House sent negotiators to talk with the opponents and a final meeting with Bishop, Hatch and Ensign convinced the Nevada senator to be on Utah's side. With Bush's signature about 100,000 acres of land will become federal wilderness area, giving it protection from motorized vehicles, roads, mining and other intrusions. The land includes a portion of BLM that Private Fuel Storage wants to use as part of its railroad to the proposed nuclear-waste site. By including it in the wilderness area, it cuts off that transportation option, which "substantially hinders" the project, Bishop said. Bishop's Chief of Staff Scott Parker said the final law "represents the single largest legislative victory against efforts to bring nuclear waste to Utah's west desert." But the delegation acknowledges that this does not stop the PFS plan outright, but it does change its overall idea. Private Fuel Storage can still use a trucking transportation plan, although it prefers the rail route. Its license application included both transportation options. PFS spokeswoman Sue Martin has said that it would be safer to move waste on a train in an isolated area rather than on trucks but it will still use that option if needed. With the legislative portion over, the Bureau of Land Management's work on the newly designated land begins. It will now take several months and about a dozen people to get everything in order. "It's fairly labor-intensive," said Laura Williams, a spokeswoman for Utah's BLM office in Salt Lake City. Employees at BLM headquarters will study the exact wording. "The verbiage is extremely important," Williams said. "Every wilderness area is a little different." BLM will draw an official map and hang signs showing what areas are protected in the new area. Williams said some of it has been used by off-road vehicles in the past so BLM will have to conduct an education program to teach people which places are now off limits. The agency also will create a management plan, defining what it needs to be done to protect the land according to the law. Williams said this will include studying wildlife and other natural elements to ensure the area "remains in as natural a state as possible." E-mail: suzanne@desnews.com © 2006 Deseret News Publishing Company [ /] ***************************************************************** 57 BBC: Dounreay particle plans outlined Last Updated: Sunday, 8 January 2006 [Dounreay] Radioactive particles have been traced in the sea and on beaches Options for dealing with radioactive particles from the Dounreay nuclear plant in Caithness are to be put forward to the public. The particles have been discovered on the seabed and beaches near Dounreay over the past two decades. Site operators, the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority, are holding a public exhibition ahead of putting forward plans in the autumn of 2006. The events will take place in Thurso and Wick over the next week. Public beach A UKAEA spokesman said: "The exhibitions reflect the results of recent research and monitoring costing in the region of £10m. "The outcome of this will help to determine if there is a better strategy than the current approach, which is to monitor local beaches and remove those particles that can be detected." More than 50 particles have been found on Sandside public beach in Caithness since monitoring of the area began. Options being put forward range from doing nothing to spending billions of pounds dredging the entire seabed. The technical feasibility, environmental impact as well as the cost of each option will also be available. b ***************************************************************** 58 reviewjournal.com: EDITORIAL: Yucca Mountain woes Jan. 08, 2006 Last week, the Department of Energy suspended planning work on key segments of the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump -- including technical work on new designs for an above-ground complex to handle arriving nuclear canisters -- after the DOE confirmed whistle-blower reports that a management contractor is again coming up short in the areas of work documentation and quality control. Observers differed on how significant the problems are. "This is more of a, 'Let's hold on and collect where we are, complete our review and move forward on the right path,' " contends Jason Bohne, spokesman for the contractor, Bechtel SAIC. DOE spokesman Allen Benson seemed to disagree. "This is a tough response," Mr. Benson said, "when you tell a contractor they no longer have the authority to submit work they are contractually required to submit because they are not following procedure." "This is a stop work order, plain and simple," confirms Steve Frishman, a full-time technical consultant for the state of Nevada. "It's back to a problem they have had for years and years, which is design control. This is a chronic screwup in this program." Even the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, poised to evaluate an application for the repository whenever the Energy Department manages to finalize one, considers this "a significant issue," according to Elmo Collins, a NRC licensing and inspection official. If it were really a matter of national urgency to get Yucca Mountain finished as quickly as possible, it would be hard to know whether to laugh or cry. No one is proposing that corners be cut on safety and documentation. But this is the nation that successfully completed the Manhattan Project -- to develop the first deployable nuclear bomb -- in less than four years. Cliche though it has become, we put a man on the moon in less than a decade. The project has been under way for a dozen years. Not a single canister has been delivered -- they haven't even surveyed the rail line from Caliente. The government -- originally ordered to start burying waste in 1998 -- long clung to the assertion that storage would begin in 2010, though the window "2012 to 2017" is now more commonly mentioned. The meter has already rolled past $4 billion spent, and it's still running. Government bureaucrats now need eight months to plan and install a desperately needed stoplight, and more than six years to build a downtown courthouse. But Yucca Mountain -- to call the project glacial would be an insult to glaciers -- will be finished in little more time than it took to build the Clark County Regional Justice Center? But it's only the taxpayers who pay and pay. A few billion here, a few billion there -- didn't Sen. Dirksen once have something to say about that? Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal, 1997 - 2006 Stephens Media GroupPrivacy Statement ***************************************************************** 59 Deseret News: New Utah caucus leans to the right [deseretnews.com] Saturday, January 7, 2006 House members' PAC will soon have $40,000-plus Deseret Morning News By Bob Bernick Jr. Deseret Morning News A group of conservative state House members has formed a new caucus and founded a political action committee — a first for Utah politics — that soon will have more than $40,000 to be used to promote its own campaigns and limited-government agenda. ['Photo'] Deseret Morning News graphic The political action committee, whose maiden report was filed this week, is called the Conservative Caucus PAC, said caucus chairman and organizer Rep. Greg Hughes, R-Draper. The caucus already has one notch on its political belt, Hughes believes — helping lead the 56 House Republicans to recommend a $230 million tax cut next year. The new PAC report has just one donation, a $10,000 gift from the hazardous-waste firm Envirocare. But Hughes says the caucus — which boasts around 25 members from the House Republican majority — is not tied to Envirocare's agenda, which includes expanded land and authority to store more radioactive waste. "As a group we have many conservative issues" that the group will espouse, said Hughes. Envirocare's check just came in at the end of 2005 — the PAC reporting deadline. Hughes said he already has a few other checks and promises of donations of "at a minimum, another $30,000." The new caucus has some heavy political hitters in its ranks, including House Majority Whip Steve Urquhart, R-St. George, who briefly challenged U.S. Sen. Orrin Hatch last summer, and Rep. Dave Clark, R-Santa Clara, a banker who is seen as a state financial expert for House Republicans. Like the old Cowboy Caucus, which has more or less faded in recent years as some of its most powerful members moved up to the Senate or retired from the Legislature, the Conservative Caucus' first test of strength deals with the state's growing revenues. "A group of us just believe we can't grow government beyond our means to sustain it" when Utah's economic good times turn down, said Hughes. Between one-time surpluses this year and projected new tax revenue growth for the next fiscal year, the 2006 Legislature — which convenes Jan. 16 — will have an extra $1 billion to spend, a record sum that has some legislators concerned. Republican Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr.'s recommended 2006-2007 budget calls for 14 percent growth in major state funds, said Hughes. "We say it should be more like 5.5 percent growth — around the growth in population and inflation." There have been other informal caucuses in the Republican-dominated Utah House, but none has had its own PAC or raised any cash. The Conservative Caucus may well re-energize the so-called "mainstream" caucus of moderate GOP House members, which was formed in the mid-1990s as a political counterweight to the then-powerful Cowboy Caucus of rural House members. "We may be more active, yes," said Rep. Sheryl Allen, R-Bountiful, who, along with current House Speaker Greg Curtis, R-Sandy, was one of the original founders of the "mainstream" caucus. The mainstream caucus only met three times last year, Allen noted, and hasn't pushed its own agenda recently. Both Allen and Curtis said Friday that while they recognize any group of legislators has the right to form its own caucus or associations, the new element of a PAC/caucus raises concerns. "I worry that all of us — Republicans, Democrats, House members, senators — are out there asking the same group (of businesses and lobbyists) for the same dollars," said Allen. Curtis said: "Will we see more money coming into the political process, into campaigns, or the same money going to different places?" Curtis said he's met with Hughes, whom he considers a friend, over the new caucus and PAC. Curtis said he told Hughes that he welcomes any and all kinds of political associations, but warned that in the end legislative Republicans, as the majority party, have to come together to make state policy and budgets. "It takes 38 votes (a majority in the 75-member House) to pass anything," said Curtis. "And no caucus — whether the mainstream or Conservative or any other — has 38 solid votes all the time. We need to come together." Hughes said the Conservative Caucus has about 25 founding members, but more could certainly join. Democrats are welcome if they espouse conservative ideals, said Hughes. Not all the GOP members will ask for or expect some of the $40,000-plus to spend on their own re-election campaigns. Nor will they ask for help with constituent services, another caucus goal. The caucus has hired former Sutherland Institute staffer Laura Lee Adams to work with the caucus on constituent and fund-raising issues, said Hughes. The Institute is a nonprofit entity which, in recent years, has played a greater and greater role in Utah GOP/conservative political research, philosophy and politics. In fact, Hughes said one early measure of the Conservative Caucus' influence and interest will be a Jan. 14 dinner and seminar, to be held at the Institute's downtown headquarters, that will feature Grover Norquist of the national Americans For Tax Reform think-tank. Norquist and the ATR have consulted with President Bush and Congressional Republicans over tax policy. "That should be an interesting evening," said Allen, "considering that Grover — for whom I have great respect — and the Americans For Tax Reform are under the cloud (of association) with the Mr. (Jack) Abramoff scandal." Washington, D.C., lobbyist Abramoff, now under indictment, may be key to federal investigations of Congressional corruption. It is against Utah law for legislators to personally raise funds for their own campaigns during the 45-day general session. But PACs may raise funds all year long. Hughes said the Jan. 14 dinner, to which local lobbyists and business representatives will be invited, is not a fund-raiser. And the Conservative Caucus PAC will not raise funds during the Legislature's general session, even though it could. "We want to stay clear of any of that," said Hughes. Hughes said that on the morning of a daylong House GOP caucus meeting in mid-December, the Conservative Caucus met and talked about how state government can't grow by $1 billion next year. The later debate in the closed 56-member GOP caucus went along the lines of the Conservative Caucus spending thinking, and conservatives were pleased with the $230 million tax cut recommendation, he added. Curtis sees the events a bit differently. He said more than 40 House Republicans voted for the big tax cut in the main caucus meeting, and the speaker doesn't see budget decisions driven by one group or another. "I don't think the Conservative Caucus can take credit," said Curtis. "I just ask that no (House Republicans) become dogmatic in their positions so we can't get things done" as a whole GOP House caucus. Finally, Hughes said the Conservative Caucus PAC is a reorganization of a "loose-jointed" effort that actually started earlier in 2005, when a few conservatives hired Adams to help with their own constituent work. Adams formed a PAC, called the Sage Brush PAC, that raised and spent $1,700. Hughes said when conservatives decided in December to raise considerably more funds — and get involved in financially supporting not only their own re-elections but other conservative issues as well — the Sage Brush PAC was closed and the new Conservative Caucus PAC founded. Contributing: Lisa Riley Roche © 2006 Deseret News Publishing Company [ /] ***************************************************************** 60 Salt Lake Tribune: Bush approves Cedar Mountain Wilderness Area Article Last Updated: 01/07/2006 08:41:50 AM Dump derailed: The signature marks a victory for Utahns fighting plans for a storage facility By Robert Gehrke The Salt Lake Tribune WASHINGTON - President Bush signed legislation into law Friday creating a wilderness area in Utah's west desert, dealing a blow to plans to store high-level nuclear waste in the state. The language, included in a broad defense policy bill, would establish a 100,000-acre Cedar Mountain Wilderness Area near the Skull Valley Goshute Indian Reservation, complicating plans by a group of electric utilities known as Private Fuel Storage to store nuclear waste on the reservation. "This has been years in the making, and it's nice to see it finally become law," said Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, who introduced the Cedar Mountain bill. "We protected the test and training range, a major military asset, we created wilderness the right way and we have significantly impeded the transportation of high-level nuclear waste to the Goshute Reservation." PFS had planned to build a rail line through the area to deliver 44,000 tons of spent nuclear reactor waste to the site, but the wilderness designation prevents the rail line construction. The company has said repeatedly that other options are available, including trucking the waste to the reservation down the Skull Valley Highway. "This is very, very good for the state and it's very, very bad for Private Fuel Storage," said Mike Lee, counsel to Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. "It's a real blow for PFS. It may not be a kill but it's a mortal wound. PFS is a seriously wounded animal right now." The Nuclear Regulatory Commission authorized a license for PFS in September, but the document has yet to be issued. Utah's delegation also touted the bill as a move that would protect the military's access to the vast Utah Test and Training Range, a key asset for the state's military mission. There was concern that storing the waste near the site or restrictions on flying over a wilderness area could hinder access. The bill explicitly allows flights over the Cedar Mountain Wilderness. The Cedar Mountain language was nearly dropped from the final version of the bill, after Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., objected to it. However, House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., said he would hold up passage of the bill until Ensign at least met with Bishop and Sen. Orrin Hatch to discuss his objections, and after a series of discussions, Ensign eventually agreed to allow a somewhat watered down version of the bill. The compromise version included the wilderness language, but not proposed restrictions on other land surrounding the reservation. The original version would have created a moat around the tribe's land to restrict access. © Copyright 2005, The Salt Lake Tribune. ***************************************************************** 61 Salt Lake Tribune: Radiation board puts off Envirocare expansion decision Article Last Updated: 01/08/2006 02:39:08 AM By Judy Fahys The Salt Lake Tribune A state advisory board Friday stopped just short of signing off on Envirocare of Utah's plans to double the size of its radioactive and hazardous waste facility. The state Radiation Control Board took more than four hours to consider Envirocare's request to throw out an appeal of the expansion plan. The Healthy Environment Alliance of Utah (HEAL) contends that state law requires a more in-depth review of the license change. Members were poised to allow the expansion when they balked over confusion about the state's authority to regulate waste on the newly-added 536 acres. The question came up because Envirocare insisted repeatedly that the board was only expanding the site's boundary, not its ability to take, bury or treat waste in the new area. Given that assertion, it appears Envirocare would be barred from handling waste inside the new boundary - even hauling it across the newly "licensed" land, as the company has always done - board members reasoned. "That has the potential of being a regulatory quagmire," said Dianne Nielson, who serves on the board and is director of the Department of Environmental Quality. The board appeared resolved to grant the boundary change once agency lawyers and technical staff clarify the issue. They set a Jan. 26 meeting to look at final wording. The board's intentions are a blow to HEAL. Its appeal ends once the board votes uphold the change, and the environmental group says the board's action is likely to look like a stamp of approval for full use of the site, even though the new acreage just north of its existing Tooele County facility has not been analyzed for its suitability to hold waste. Meanwhile, Envirocare's supporters in the state Legislature are poised to ask lawmakers and the governor to consider a resolution validating the expansion. Rep. Jim Gowans, D-Tooele, had prepared the resolution for approval by a legislative interim committee in October. "It's sitting there," he said of the bill file Friday. "We'll decide later what to to do with it." The pending license change would be Envirocare's 23rd in its 18-year life, but the first deemed significant enough to require approval by the Legislature and the governor. Envirocare was established in 1988 with the signature of a state regulator who was later sentenced to federal prison for his role in a corruption scandal with the company's former owner; Utah political leaders did not have a say in its creation. They could not say, however, whether the legislature will ever have another opportunity to vote on the company's future. HEAL's lawyers said there is enough confusion about what the license signifies that lawmakers and the governor might be misled into thinking the site already has been certified to withstand earthquakes, groundwater impacts and other engineering concerns. fahys@sltrib.com © Copyright 2005, The Salt Lake Tribune. ***************************************************************** 62 Salt Lake Tribune: Lawyer says suit against tribe isn't ripe Article Last Updated: 01/08/2006 01:15:12 AM By Patty Henetz The Salt Lake Tribune A lawsuit asking a federal court to intervene in the Skull Valley Band of Goshutes tribal leadership dispute and a contested lease that would allow private utilities to store 44,000 tons of nuclear waste on the Goshute reservation ought to be dismissed, an assistant U.S. attorney argued Friday. Jeannette Swent, who represented the federal Interior Department, its secretary, Gale Norton, and two Bureau of Indian Affairs officials, said the lawsuit isn't ripe for court action and argued federal court wasn't the proper place for the complaints to be heard. The lawsuit was brought by six members of the Skull Valley Band and an organization called Ohngo Guadedeh Devia. Their attorney, Paul Echohawk, argued that the BIA, as the federal agent for all Indian tribes, needed to intervene in the sovereign band's affairs because those who argue the current tribal leader holds the office illegally don't have any other recourse. U.S. District Judge Dale Kimball did not immediately rule. At issue is Leon Bear's hold on the tribe and the secrecy surrounding a 1997 agreement that would allow Private Fuel Storage, a consortium of nuclear power companies, to store 4,000 concrete and steel casks on an open-air concrete slab on 100 acres of reservation land 45 miles southwest of Salt Lake City. On Sept. 9, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Agency ruled it would issue PFS a license to build and operate its storage compound, billed as a way station for spent nuclear fuel rods on their way to a federal waste repository in Nevada. The plan still needs to satisfy other federal regulatory requirements. Tribal members Abby Bullcreek, Lisa Bullcreek, Margene Bullcreek, Lena Knight, Daniel Moon, Delford Moon and Ongho Guadedeh Devia sued in March after exhausting BIA administrative routes to kill the PFS proposal. They argue Bear wasn't the legitimate tribal leader when he and two others signed the PFS agreement, and that the agreement never was properly approved by the 80 or so voting tribal members. Bear refuses to release it for tribal scrutiny. The lawsuit claims BIA superintendents who conditionally approved the lease agreement acted beyond their authority because they did not first make sure the lease had received proper tribal support. The Interior Board of Indian Appeals intensified the dispute when it dismissed several appeals without settling the leadership questions, the plaintiffs say. Because the Skull Valley Band has no court of its own, and because Interior has declined to sort out the disputes, the federal court is the plaintiff's last resort, Echohawk said. The crux of the government's request to dismiss the case was that BIA approval of the lease agreement was conditional, and that any harm is therefore conjectural. "There is nothing concrete about a facility that may never be built," Swent said. The plaintiffs, however, say they already have been harmed by Bear's refusal to respond to their requests for dispute resolution. They also allege he hands out PFS money and federal allotments unequally, depending on whether tribal members support him and the PFS deal. Bear, not named in lawsuit, denied that claim Friday. Federal funds are administered according to contracts with the government, he said. "The PFS money goes into a general fund. Once it goes into the general fund, the tribe breaks it down into a tribal budget," he said. Annual profits then are allocated according to a formula set by the General Council, which is made up of all adult Goshutes. Some tribal members who owe the tribe money may receive less than others, Bear said. © Copyright 2005, The Salt Lake Tribune. ***************************************************************** 63 Daily Herald: Envirocare expansion appeal on hold Saturday, January 07, 2006 BROCK VERGAKIS - The Associated Press SALT LAKE CITY -- A proposal to double the size of a low-level radiation and hazardous waste site about 80 miles west of Utah's capital city is on hold while the state Radiation Control Board awaits clarification on how land at the expanded site would be regulated. The board heard nearly four hours of testimony Friday from attorneys of the waste site's owner, Envirocare, and the Healthy Environment Alliance of Utah, which opposes granting Envirocare a permit to expand. The Division of Radiation Control has already granted Envirocare a permit to expand its boundaries, but HEAL is challenging that. The board is expected to make a final decision on Jan. 26. Envirocare contends that the permit would allow it to simply move its fence, and that no hazardous waste would be handled on the site until additional permit amendments were granted by the Division of Radiation Control. The Legislature and Gov. Jon Huntsman also must give their approval before Envirocare can change its boundaries. But HEAL attorneys argued that, by definition, expanding the waste site boundaries would mean that the facility will be able to accept nuclear waste. Radiation Control Board members were in the process of denying HEAL's appeal when a question arose about whether a train carrying hazardous waste through the expanded site would be allowed to anymore. Because the new parcel isn't designated to handle the waste, it could create regulatory problems, board members said. "It helped us focus in on some final things we want to know," said Karen Langley, chairwoman of the Radiation Control Board. The waste delivered to the Envirocare facility comes by train and crosses over the parcel the company wants to include as part of its waste site. But the new parcel isn't subject to the same regulation. If the expanded site were to receive the board's approval and that of the Legislature and governor, it's possible Envirocare could receive an amended permit to allow the transportation of waste on that land, said Dane Finerfrock, director of the Division of Radiation. But HEAL attorneys argued that, by definition, expanding the waste site boundaries means radioactive waste is received, transferred or stored there. If the Legislature and governor approve the expansion, it remains unclear whether their approval would be needed again if Envirocare tries to amend its permit to begin accepting waste on the site. "Envirocare will comply with the legislative process," said Envirocare attorney Craig Galli. Envirocare is one of three U.S. sites licensed to take commercial low-level radioactive waste. Envirocare handles much of the commercial radioactive waste that comes from nuclear power plants, as well as from medical and research facilities. The Utah site also counts on federal cleanup waste for about half of its revenue. Envirocare has said it has adequate capacity at the landfill to accept low-level radioactive and hazardous waste for up to 20 years. Galli said Envirocare isn't applying for permits to accept new hazardous waste on the site now because its needs to make sure it can get beyond the process of site expansion first. This story appeared in The Daily Herald on page D3. (C) 2006 Daily Herald, is Free Software released under the ***************************************************************** 64 KUTV: Envirocare Expansion Appeal On Hold [clock] Jan 6, 2006 10:28 pm US/Mountain SALT LAKE CITY, Utah A proposal to double the size of a low-level radiation and hazardous waste site about 80 miles west of Utah's capital city is on hold while the state Radiation Control Board awaits clarification on how land at the expanded site would be regulated. The board heard nearly four hours of testimony Friday from attorneys of the waste site's owner, Envirocare, and the Healthy Environment Alliance of Utah, which opposes granting Envirocare a permit to expand. The Division of Radiation Control has already granted Envirocare a permit to expand its boundaries, but HEAL is challenging that. The board is expected to make a final decision on Jan. 26. Envirocare contends that the permit would allow it to simply move its fence, and that no hazardous waste would be handled on the site until additional permit amendments were granted by the Division of Radiation Control. The Legislature and Gov. Jon Huntsman must also give their approval before Envirocare can change its boundaries. But HEAL attorneys argued that, by definition, expanding the waste site boundaries would mean that the facility will be able to accept nuclear waste, even if it doesn't have permits to do so on that particular piece of land. Radiation Control Board members were in the process of denying HEAL's appeal when a question arose about whether a train carrying hazardous waste through the expanded site would be allowed to anymore. Because the new parcel isn't designated to handle the waste, it could create regulatory problems, board members said. ``It helped us focus in on some final things we want to know,'' said Karen Langley, chairwoman of the Radiation Control Board. The waste delivered to the Envirocare facility comes by train and crosses over the parcel the company wants to include as part of its waste site. But the new parcel isn't subject to the same regulation. If the expanded site were to receive the board's approval and that of the Legislature and governor, it's possible Envirocare could receive an amended permit to allow the transportation of waste on that land, said Dane Finerfrock, director of the Division of Radiation. But HEAL attorneys argued that, by definition, expanding the waste site boundaries means radioactive waste is received, transferred or stored there. If the Legislature and governor approve the expansion, it remains unclear whether their approval would be needed again if Envirocare tries to amend its permit to begin accepting waste on the site. ``Envirocare will comply with the legislative process,'' said Envirocare attorney Craig Galli. Tichy, however, said Galli's wording makes it clear Envirocare doesn't intend to approach the Legislature again if it can help it, because it would be a tough battle getting permits to accept more waste. Envirocare is one of three U.S. sites licensed to take commercial low-level radioactive waste. Envirocare handles much of the commercial radioactive waste that comes from nuclear power plants, as well as from medical and research facilities. The Utah site also counts on federal cleanup waste for about half of its revenue. Envirocare has said it has adequate capacity at the landfill to accept low-level radioactive and hazardous waste for up to 20 years. Galli said Envirocare isn't applying for permits to accept new hazardous waste on the site now because its needs to make sure it can get beyond the process of site expansion first. (© 2006 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material ***************************************************************** 65 canada.com: Alberta's uranium rush the canada.com NEW ENERGY BONANZA? / With uranium prices climbing and supply dwindling, prospectors are scurrying around southern Alberta in a high-stakes quest for new sources of nuclear fuel Photograph by : Jenelle Schneider, Calgary Herald, Gina Teel, CanWest News Service Published: Sunday, January 08, 2006 CALGARY -- At the bottom of a coulee near Whiskey Gap in southern Alberta, two drillers pull a core sample from the ground. Hovering nearby, Charles Desjardins, president of North American Gem Inc., waits as the core is eased into a sample box. A high-stakes treasure hunt for uranium is underway in southern Alberta, and Desjardins's company is the first to drill the region's depths in search of sandstone-hosted deposits of the radioactive ore used as a feedstock for nuclear reactors. Uranium's spot price has roared to $36.25 US per pound from $20.20 last November. That's more than five times the $7.10 fetched five years ago. Running uranium up the charts is a global supply gap that's anticipated to widen as nuclear energy regains popularity. For Desjardins, the exploratory drilling isn't just about finding uranium, but finding it in the right kind of geological structure to be produced through in situ leaching (ISL). Similar to water injection for oil recovery, ISL pumps an oxidizing solution into an injection well that loosens uranium from sandstone, then pumps the mixture back to the surface through a retrieval well. Unlike an open-pit mine, ISL leaves the underground and surface largely undisturbed. "If we find the right situation in place, then I think the game's on for the area," Desjardins says. Uranium is responsible for about 16 per cent of the world's energy supply, but the amount of uranium available to fuel the world's 440 reactors, never mind those planned or being built in emerging economies like India and China, is dwindling. Last year, total global demand for uranium was 178 million pounds, while the total supply was 105.5 million pounds, said analyst Ray Goldie of Salman Partners. While part of the gap was filled by recycled uranium and weapons uranium from Russia, totalling some 38 million pounds, that still left a shortfall of 35 million pounds, he said. Meanwhile, demand is growing at 1.1 per cent a year. The uptick in the uranium market last year sparked a staking rush in southern Alberta, as a half dozen junior companies staked claims on a swath of land totalling some 4,000 square kilometres running south of Calgary to the Montana border and east toward the Cypress Hills on the border with Saskatchewan. And while prospectors over the years have turned up plenty of surface indicators to support the theory that sandstone-hosted uranium deposits may lurk below southern Alberta, nothing of significance has been found to date. Desjardins hopes exploration of the Whiskey Gap Project, comprised of some 17,800 hectares located southeast of Cardston near the Alberta-Montana border, will change all of that. Finding uranium in sandstone is no easy task, however. "It's a very difficult target to define by geophysics and by almost any classical exploration technique other than drilling," says geologist Glenn Hartley, who is directing the Whiskey Gap Project for North American Gem. Whether North American Gem finds a deposit right here or not is not really the point, says Desjardins. © 2005 CanWest Interactive, a division of . All rights ***************************************************************** 66 ContraCostaTimes.com: State supreme court to rule on LLNL whistleblower suit 01/06/2006 | By Betsy Mason CONTRA COSTA TIMES LIVERMORE - The State Supreme Court agreed this week to decide whether two former Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory employees can pursue a whistleblower lawsuit against the UC regents. The two computer scientists claim they lost their jobs in 2003 for raising safety concerns about the National Ignition Facility, a partially completed $3.5-billion dollar superlaser project at the Livermore lab site. Les Miklosy was fired in February 2003 and Luciana Messina quit soon afterward. They said the software that controls the target area of the laser was faulty and would lead to collisions of expensive robotic equipment. "When they raised safety concerns, they were rather summarily fired," said Gary Gwilliam, a lawyer for Miklosy and Messina. After the lab heard and dismissed their complaint, Miklosy and Messina filed suit in 2004 in Alameda County Superior Court against the University of California, which manages the Livermore Lab. Messina was a full-time, regular employee who had worked at the lab since November 2001. Miklosy was a "flex term" employee, who could be let go at any time, who had worked there for one year. The two seek back wages and lost future wages, and punitive damages for the lab's alleged violation of the California Whistleblower Protection Act, for wrongful termination and intentional infliction of emotional distress. The university has claimed the two were not retaliated against for raising concerns. Lab officials said Miklosy was fired for bad performance after being notified several times of problems, and that Messina was asked to remain in her lab job. The suit was thrown out by the Alameda County Superior Court, which said that under state law, employees are not allowed to sue once the university has reviewed and rejected a claim. "That would emasculate the whistleblower statute," Gwilliam said. This week, the California Supreme Court voted 7 to 4 to hear the case. "That's good news for us, but it doesn't mean we're going to win," Gwilliam said. "We're hopeful that the Supreme Court will right this wrong." The University of California is interested in having a whistleblower decision on the books to clarify the rules for future cases. "This case will present the opportunity for the court to confirm the application of the California whistleblower law as it applies to the university," UC counsel Jeff Blair said Friday in a statement. "The university had previously sought publication of the court of appeal decision because it wanted published law on the subject - this will provide that opportunity." Betsy Mason covers science and the national laboratories. Reach her at 925-847-2158 or . ***************************************************************** 67 SF Chron: LIVERMORE / State top court takes ex-lab workers' case / 2 scientists say they were fired after safety complaints [San Francisco Chronicle] Friday, January 6, 2006 The state Supreme Court will decide whether to revive a suit by two former Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory scientists who say they were fired for complaining about safety problems, in a case that could determine the scope of whistle-blower protections at the University of California. The court agreed Wednesday to hear the appeal of Les Miklosy and Luciana Messina. Lower courts had dismissed their damage suit, saying state law does not allow such suits once the university considers and rejects an employee's grievance. Chief Justice Ronald George and Justices Joyce Kennard, Kathryn Mickle Werdegar and Carlos Moreno voted to take up the case, providing the majority needed for review by the seven-member court. The case will decide "whether the University of California may retaliate against whistle-blowing employees with complete impunity,'' lawyers for Miklosy and Messina said in papers filed with the court. The university, which manages the lab under a federal contract, denied that the employees had been punished for speaking out. It said UC protected the rights of its workers to bring problems to light without risking retribution. Miklosy and Messina worked on a project called the National Ignition Facility, a superlaser for investigating nuclear fusion. According to their lawyers, they found potential safety problems in the laser's target chamber and concluded the entire project was poorly managed. Miklosy said he raised his concerns at a meeting in February 2003 and was fired two weeks later. Messina quit a week after that, saying she had learned she was about to be fired. Lab officials have said that Miklosy was fired for poor performance and that Messina was not about to be dismissed when she left voluntarily. They also said the U.S. Department of Energy had looked into Miklosy's concerns and found them to be groundless. The pair filed grievances with the lab, which investigated and found no retaliation. Then they tried to sue in court under the state's whistle-blower law, which allows employees who are punished for speaking out on matters of public concern to win a wide range of damages, including punitive damages. But a Superior Court judge in Alameda County and a state appeals court ruled that the law allows damage suits by UC employees only if the university sits on their complaints of retaliation without taking action, and not if UC has rejected a complaint. A state Supreme Court ruling in another case last year suggested a similar interpretation but did not settle the issue. "We should interpret the law in favor of people who step forward and risk their careers to point out wrongdoing,'' Gary Gwilliam, a lawyer for the former employees, said Thursday. But Patrick Glenn, a lawyer for the university, said wrongly fired whistle-blowers have the right to reinstatement and back pay under the UC policy. He said an employee can also ask a judge to overturn a university decision that was arbitrary or biased. Gwilliam countered that the university's grievance policy does not allow the types of damages or jury trial available under the whistle-blower law. The case is Miklosy vs. Regents, S139133. Page B - 3 The San Francisco Chronicle] ***************************************************************** 68 lamonitor.com: Chromium source traced The Online News Source for Los Alamos ROGER SNODGRASS, roger@lamonitor.com, Monitor Assistant Editor Two weeks after the announcement that high levels of chromium were found in the regional aquifer, official stakeholders at Los Alamos National Laboratory and regulators have stepped up efforts to find the cause. Elevated counts of chromium were first detected in the deep ground water in January 2004, shortly after development of well R-28 in Mortandad Canyon, about a quarter mile north of the laboratory's boundary with San Ildefonso pueblo. Updated to include samples from 2005, the readings are considered significant by all the parties. They were reported to the New Mexico Environment Department and came to public attention shortly before a 10-day break for Christmas late last month. The drinking water standard in New Mexico is .05 parts per million (ppm); the federal standard, the Maximum Contaminant Level (MCL), as set by the Environmental Protection Agency, is .1 ppm. The initial detection in early 2004 was .27 ppm, increasing in subsequent samples to .375 in May 2005 (with a duplicate sample reading .373 ppm), and to .404 in the most recent test on Nov. 10, as reported to NMED on Dec. 23. Typical background levels for naturally occurring chromium in the Pajarito Plateau are around .003 ppm. NMED Communication Director Adam Rankin said Friday that the state was taking the issue very seriously and had given the laboratory 90 days to respond with a plan for determining the nature and extent of the problem. Tim Glasco, Los Alamos County deputy utilities manager said the county would increase monitoring on three of the county's drinking water wells to quarterly checks. He affirmed that current samples from the county's wells have shown no excessive contamination. He said the county has insurance against environmental damages in the drinking water and legal remedies with the Department of Energy to recover costs of treatment or recovery of any contaminated water source. "Until the day that the MCL is exceeded, we don't have a legal recourse, because we haven't been harmed," he said. Danny Katzman, the laboratory's lead manager for the canyon investigations, said Friday that the interim report required by NMED, was now the focus of efforts to review possible sources, primarily in Sandia and Mortandad Canyons. A memorandum by Stephen Yanicak of the NMED Oversight Bureau in White Rock on Jan. 3, identified a possible source coming from Sandia Canyon or Tensite Canyon. After looking at the historical data, Yanicak suggested the problem might originate with industrial and sanitary sewage releases and cooling tower effluent. He noted that "many thousands of acre feet" of waste fluids were released into Sandia and Tensite canyons, "but the fate of these waters is unknown" because they "seem to 'disappear' through some type of subsurface recharge/discharge sink." "Groundwater characterization and monitoring at these discharge-sink areas have not occurred at LANL; hence the lack of knowledge concerning these releases," Yanicak wrote. Katzman said cooling tower sources in upper Sandia Canyon discharged up to 36 pounds of chromate, phosphate and zinc-type corrosion inhibitors daily from the 50s to the early 70s, but that the investigators are not sure if that was truly a "daily" amount, day after day. Cooling towers in the main administrative area are associated with a power plant, he said, and the chromate association has been specifically monitored at points of interest. "Cooling towers are part of the steam generation process," he said, which have been investigated and watched for years. "What we are apparently discovering," he added, "is that a mobile form of this (contaminant) may have worked its way into the groundwater." Tom Widner, the director of the Los Alamos Historical Document Retrieval and Assessment (LAHDRA) Project, said his team has collected relevant documents and will also be examining new data. He said that cooling towers were also associated with Technical Area 2, the site of the old Omega West reactor, which was shut down some decades ago. "Anywhere there was water in a cooling system, there was chromium to reduce corrosion and prevent scaling," he said. "You have to get rid of the water. That's called a blow-out and it usually went into one canyon or another." He recalled that on a tour of that area in about 1999, he had observed trees changing colors, which was attributed to airborne releases of chromium, called "cooling tower drift." LAHDRA is a multi-year project under the direction of the Centers for Disease Control, examining hazardous radiological and chemical releases at the lab. Widner said he intended to provide a report on the environmental measurements of chromium from the project's data at a public meeting in the next couple of months. The laboratory's techniques for well drilling have been criticized recently by DOE's Inspector General and the Environmental Protection Agency, adding another layer of concern to the investigation. Bob Gilkeson, an independent hydrologist and former contractor to the laboratory, has reported that the R-28 well was a more recent installation and was more likely to detect chromium than some of the lab's other characterization wells in the wet canyons. At four times the EPA standard, he wrote, "The chromium groundwater contamination in well R-28 is serious because the contamination is in a very productive aquifer strata" discharging "100,000 gallons per day per foot of aquifer thickness" and because it is so close to the pueblo boundary. Gilkeson's critiques of the drilling engineering and sampling techniques employed in the lab's hydrology project, along with the IG and EPA reviews, have prompted DOE to reevaluate the quality of the monitoring wells. NMED has also asked for a full accounting. "In a recent note of deficiency," Katzman said, "they've asked us to write during this calendar year a plan for what we're going to do about the drilling process." The Northern New Mexico Citizens Advisory Board, chartered by DOE to review environmental issues at LANL, requested a presentation on the chromium findings from the laboratory at an Environmental Monitoring Remediation and Surveillance Committee meeting in Santa Fe on Wednesday. Other high chromium indicators in regional, intermediate and surface water samples from the monitoring data will be discussed. A form of chromium, known as hexavalent chromium was the subject of a lawsuit in California that was dramatized in the movie, "Erin Brockovich." The film, released in 2000, starred Julia Roberts. The case was, at length, settled out of court for $333 million. © 2003 Los Alamos Monitor All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only. For more information go to: *****************************************************************