***************************************************************** 02/11/04 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 12.35 ***************************************************************** 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 [southnews] Aussie spooks to face new WMD inquiry 2 Blix says war leaders acted like salesmen 3 Update on Iraqi Weapons of Mass Destruction 4 US: Bush: EO 13327 - Commission on Intellegince Capabilities 5 Seattle Times: Opinion: Too easily persuaded into an unnecessary war 6 US: Las Vegas SUN: Editorial: Throwing ethics out the window 7 US: Washington Post: Study of Rhetoric On Iraq Is Urged 8 US: Washington Times: Intelligence has flaws, officials say 9 US: WorldNetDaily: A matter of trust 10 Hi Pakistan: Rumsfeld unaware of WMD claim 11 UK Independent: nuclear cheating 12 Daily Times: Pakistan suspected of supplying Iran over 10 years ago 13 Las Vegas SUN: Bush Official: N. Korea Buys Nuke Info 14 Korea Herald: 'No rewards for nuke freeze' 15 Daily Times: N Korea denies it got nuke tech from Dr Khan 16 Hi Pakistan: US invites China in anti-nuclear North Korea drive 17 Las Vegas SUN: Scientist May Have Info on N. Korea Nukes 18 KoreaTimes : 'NK Should Give Up All Nuke Plans' 19 US: Las Vegas SUN: Scalia Defends Hunting Trip With Cheney 20 Guardian Unlimited: Cheney's future at stake after leaking of CIA ag 21 US: SF Chronicle: New Bush budget stockpiles arms / Funding to preve 22 US: Washington post: Bush to Outline Plan for Limiting Nuclear Arms 23 US: GSPI: Drilling OK’d near nuclear blast site 24 US: Brattleboro Reformer: Bill would put Entergy funds in south stat 25 US: Online NewsHour: Newsmaker: Condoleezza Rice 26 Bush's Nuclear Proposal: Hypocrisy Charged 27 [NukeNet] Bush to Propose N-Fuel Ban to End Spread of A-Bombs 28 IPS-English POLITICS: New U.S. Plans for Nukes Hypocritical, 29 US: Future Warfare: Microwave Weapons From Bruce Gagnon 30 Russian Nuclear War Games Underway 31 [DU-WATCH] al-Quaeda's nukes 32 SMH: Bush to crack down on nuclear black market - 33 BBC: Radioactive matter missing in China 34 Economic Times: US says it provided nuke proliferation info to Pak 35 Daily Times: US confirms illicit nuclear activity in Pakistan has st 36 Daily Times: US not asking to share details of probe: FO 37 Daily Times: ‘I suspected Dr Khan’s activities for three years’ 38 Daily Times: Dr Khan and associates not scientists but bomb-makers - 39 Daily Times: ‘Pakistan’s nukes could fall into Qaeda hands’ 40 Daily Times: Not even Dr Khan is above the law - Kasuri 41 Hi Pakistan: Opposition demands debate on N-plan in the parliament 42 Hi Pakistan: U.S. Rebuts Pakistan on Nuclear Leaks 43 Hi Pakistan: Army never controlled N-plan except during military rul 44 SIFY: India was aware of Pak nuke proliferation 45 Boston Globe: Nuclear groups question terrorist threat 46 Las Vegas SUN: Pakistan Suspected Nuke Expert for Years 47 AU ABC: EU urges India, Israel, Pakistan to sign nuclear treaty. 48 AU ABC: Israeli nuclear whistleblower due to be released from jail 49 US: Tony Blankley: George W. Bush -- grand strategist (Ugh) 50 EUobserver: Ukraine tries to deflect nuclear allegations 51 Las Vegas SUN: Pakistan to Share Nuke Probe Evidence 52 Las Vegas SUN: AP: Pakistan, Nuclear Black Market Linked NUCLEAR REACTORS 53 US: NRC: Notice of Issuance of License Amendment 47 for Blended Low- 54 US: NRC: Agency Information Collection Activities: Proposed Collecti 55 US: NRC: Seeking Qualified Candidates for the Advisory Committee on 56 US: Brattleboro Reformer: A plan of reasonable action (VY) 57 US: News Item: NRC investigating loose bolts at nuke plant 58 BNN: Bulgaria to Seek for More EU Aid for Reactor Closures 59 SOFIA: EUR 9 B for Romania and Bulgaria After 2007 NUCLEAR SAFETY 60 [DU-WATCH] Amarie's critiques 61 [DU-WATCH] UK: British TV on child cancer cluster 62 US: Kerry, veterans, depleted uranium 63 [du-list] TV researcher finds new cluster of childhood cancers 64 [DU-WATCH] Karen Parker: Fighting to stop the use of illegal 65 [DU-WATCH] Returning troops get depleted uranium questions 66 [DU-WATCH] As The Danger of Depleted Uranium is Confirmed 67 [du-list] Fw: Isocyantes 68 [du-list] Scenes of horror at Iraqi hospital (AFP) 69 US: Tri-City Herald:c Few seek nuclear ailment compensation 70 Xinhuanet: Stolen radioactive material may be fatal 71 US: Newsday.com: Radioactive material reported missing from demoliti NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE 72 US: [du-list] Fw: Bill Bright's alert: UNC public notice to mine 73 UK The Times: Strike threat at Sellafield after BNFL cuts stewards 74 Las Vegas SUN: Nevada to inspect tailings at Yucca Mountain for dust 75 UKAEA: UKAEA cleans up in the west 76 US: Salt Lake Tribune: Not a dumping ground 77 US: Salt Lake Tribune: Hot waste goes cold 78 Las Vegas RJ: YUCCA MOUNTAIN: Official to check for toxic dust 79 Las Vegas RJ: Senator cool to Yucca change 80 US: deseretnews: No decision on N-waste bill 81 RGJ: SS Board OKs letter opposing nuke shipments 82 Herald: Dounreay aims for a shorter clean-up 83 Scotsman.com: Call for Scotland to Control Dumping of Radioactive Wa 84 Pahrump Valley Times: A nuclear leap 85 EDFP Opinion: A tale of two Yucca Mountains - Bob Loux NUCLEAR WEAPONS 86 Daily Times: EDITORIAL: Bring the de facto nuclear states into the l US DEPT. OF ENERGY 87 DOE: Environmental Management Site-Specific Advisory Board, Paducah 88 KGW: $8 million contract for local company and Hanford 89 Oak Ridger: Health hazards of White Oak Creek examined in report 90 ENS: Sick Nuclear Weapons Workers Overwhelm Energy Department - OTHER NUCLEAR 91 Google News Alert - nuclear 92 Daily Sentinel: Gas wells near old nuclear bomb-testing site approve ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** FULL NEWS STORIES ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** 1 [southnews] Aussie spooks to face new WMD inquiry Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2004 19:43:01 -0600 (CST) AUSTRALIA'S spy agencies can expect an external inquiry into their handling of intelligence on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction within months. *Spy agencies to face new WMD inquiry* By Dennis Shanahan, Political editor The Australian 12feb04 AUSTRALIA'S spy agencies can expect an external inquiry into their handling of intelligence on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction within months. The Howard Government is expected to agree to an independent inquiry into the Australian agencies' assessment of secret reports from US and British intelligence bodies after a parliamentary committee reports next month. The committee's findings are unanimous, without the usual dissenting report on political lines, and a recommendation for an independent inquiry is expected. The bipartisan parliamentary intelligence committee chaired by former Howard government minister David Jull and including former Labor leader and defence minister Kim Beazley is highly regarded, and its findings and recommendations will be hard for the Coalition to resist. The Government and intelligence agencies may not accept all the findings of the report, but John Howard is likely to follow the examples of US President George W.Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair and order an inquiry into the intelligence agencies' collection and analysis of information about Iraq's chemical weapons and nuclear capability. Pressure has grown for an independent inquiry and an explanation as to how Australian troops were committed to the war in Iraq, and why no evidence of chemical weapons stockpiles has been found since. The Prime Minister continued yesterday to defend the Government's decision and did not rule out an independent inquiry. "I take the opportunity of repeating that the decision taken by the Government was the right decision. It was based on the intelligence available to us at the time. I have no regrets of any description about that decision," Mr Howard told parliament. "The world is better off as a result of what we did and this Government has nothing to apologise for." Unlike the British and US examples, the external inquiry into Australia's intelligence assessment is not expected to include politicians. Nor is the inquiry likely to be conducted in as public a manner as the British and US inquiries. In the long tradition of investigations into the operation of intelligence services, the Australian inquiry could be conducted by a judge or a former intelligence official. It is also likely to be more secretive than the US inquiry, which is going to be run by a commission including experts and both Republican and Democrat politicians. Mr Blair's plan includes sitting members of the House of Lords examining any deficiencies in the British assessment of intelligence on Iraq. Mr Howard so far has resisted calls for an independent inquiry into Australia's intelligence agencies, arguing that most of the intelligence relied on came from US and attempts to rip off sensitive data such as bank account information. Australian banks have been plagued by phishing scams in recent months. With the digital world awash in viruses and worms that often exploit weaknesses in Microsoft software, Microsoft founder and chief software architect Bill Gates admitted last year that Microsoft had "a lot of work to do" in the security area. The software giant is under increasing pressure to improve its security threat response times, and this week's critical patches come on the eve of a submission from a US presidential advisory council report on how technology companies should respond to software vulnerabilities that could affect national security. The Prime Minister has also recently made the point that "of course" the Australian agencies assessed and reviewed the US and British raw material themselves. Mr Howard has refused to order an external inquiry until the findings of a parliamentary inquiry, due to be released in March, are made public. Mark Latham and Labor foreign affairs spokesman Kevin Rudd have both questioned the accuracy of Australia's intelligence on Iraq and raised the need for an external inquiry. But both the Opposition Leader and Mr Rudd have fallen short of demanding such an inquiry until the parliamentary committee reports. Yesterday the Coalition and the ALP joined forces in the Senate to block a Greens motion to hold a judicial inquiry into the intelligence agencies. Mr Howard told parliament that "for once I agree with the Leader of the Opposition" and that they should wait until the parliamentary inquiry reported before making a decision. *http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/printpage/0,5942,8657046,00.html ___________________________________________________________ * *Is Prince of Darkness Richard Perle About to Go Down in Flames?* * */By Andrew I. Killgore / Washington Report on Middle East Affairs *January/February 2004, pages 9, 95* RICHARD PERLE has played the American political system like an orchestra. In Tehran in 1973 he informed this writer that it was Sen. Henry (Scoop) Jackson of Washington state, for whom Perle was administrative assistant at the time, who got him interested in the Middle East. This was surely a prevarication since, from all indications, Perle has always been a fervent Zionist, a dyed-in-the-wool Israel-Firster. (Regrettably, he did not reveal the source of his fascination with the south of France, where he maintains a second home.) The senator from Boeing and his assistant had come to Tehran as part of a congressional delegation, and it was as a member of the U.S. Embassy staff that I had breakfast with the pair. Despite the Zionist lobbys intensive efforts to promote Jackson for president of the United States, the campaign sputtered out because of Jacksons flat personality. Perle has been in and out of the governmentand always active in Zionist organizationssince he first joined Jacksons staff in 1969. His most important assignment was as assistant secretary of defense for international security policy from 1981 to 1987, during the Reagan administration. In the first year of the current Bush administration, Perle was named chairman of the Pentagons advisory Defense Policy Board by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. In that capacity Perle arranged for a nonentity, Rand Corporation analyst Laurent Murawiec, to make a speechimmediately leakeddenouncing Saudi Arabia, the neocons favorite target. While the Prince of Darkness may be best known as a Zionist idealogue, on occasion he also has attracted press notice as a man interested in making money (after all, those French villas dont come cheap). Finally, however, in mid-November, his desire for profit may have gotten the better of ideology. Perle is seriously mixed up in the problems of Hollinger International and its founder, Sir Conrad Black, who gave up his Canadian citizenship to accept a British peerage. Blacks publishing empire includes the/ British Daily Telegraph/, the /Chicago Sun-Times/ and the /Jerusalem Post/. In his original incarnation as a Canadian wheeler-dealer, Conrad Black gobbled up most of that countrys daily newspapers. At one time, in fact, he had the fastest growing newspaper business in the world, according to the Nov. 18 /Financial Times/. He ingratiated himself with conservative elites such as Margaret Thatcher, Henry Kissinger (who also is on the board of Hollinger International), and William Buckley. A glance at Hollingers board and executives might give an impression that it was the Israel Lobby personified. Richard Perle is a board member of Hollinger International. According to the Nov. 19 /Washington Post,/ Hollingers tangled corporate structure paid/ /Black and his close associates $200 million in salary, management fees and non-compete compensationwhile the conglomerate itself made only $23 million in profit. Now the Securities and Exchange Commission has issued subpoenas to officials of Hollinger International. The SEC is looking for unauthorized payments by Black to current and former company executives. According to the Nov. 20 /Washington Post/, The regulators are likely to shine a brighter light on the actions of Black, the companys auditors and its other directors, who include Henry A. Kissinger and Richard N. Perle, the former chairman [and still member] of the National Defense Policy Board. According to the /Post, /Perle heads Hollinger Digital, which put $2.5 million into a venture capital firm called Trireme Partners that aimed to cash in on the huge post-9/11 U.S. military and homeland security buildup. Coincidentally, Triremes managing partner is Perle himselfwho, from his position on the Defense Policy Board, pushed for just such a military buildup. Gerald Hillman, managing partner of Hillman Capital, received $14 million from Hollinger, according to Londons /Financial Times./ Hillman also is a Trireme partner. The Dec. 10 /Financial Times /reported that a minority invester in Hollinger International is taking steps to file a lawsuit against its management and current and former board members, including former Illinois Gov. James Thompson and defense adviser Perle. Boeing, the American aircraft manufacturer, gained access to Perles Defense Policy board in 2002 by taking a $20 million stake in Trireme, according to the /Financial Times. /Boeing said it made the investment as part of a broad strategy to invest in companies with promising defense-related technology. This past* *August*,* according to the /Financial Times,/ Perle co-authored an op-ed piece in the /Wall Street Journal /arguing in favor of a controversial deal in which the Air Force would lease from Boeing one hundred of its 767 aircraft refueling tankers. Perle did not disclose Boeings $20 million stake in Trireme, and Boeing said it had no knowledge that Perle had advised the company on the leasing arrangement. Boeing chief executive Phil Condit recently stepped down following allegations of misconduct. Is the Teflon Perle also about to get caught in the web he so artfully has woven? *http://www.wrmea.com/archives/Jan_Feb_2004/0401009.html* The archives of South News can be found at http://southmovement.alphalink.com.au/southnews/ Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/southnews/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: southnews-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ***************************************************************** 2 Blix says war leaders acted like salesmen Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2004 07:06:08 -0600 (CST) .. A prominent Israeli MP said last week that his country's intelligence services knew claims that Saddam Hussein was capable of swiftly launching weapons of mass destruction were wrong but withheld the information from Washington. "It was known in Israel that the story that weapons of mass destruction could be activated in 45 minutes was an old wives' tale," Yossi Sarid, a member of the foreign affairs and defence committee, which is investigating the quality of Israeli intelligence on Iraq, told the Associated Press last week. http://www.guardian.co.uk/guardianweekly/story/0,12674,1145637,00.html The Guardian Weekly: from the latest issue Blix says war leaders acted like salesmen Guardian Weekly Sarah Hall and Richard Norton-Taylor The former United Nation chief weapons inspector, Hans Blix, has weighed into the controversy over weapons of mass destruction by accusing Tony Blair and George Bush of behaving like insincere salesmen who "exaggerated" intelligence in an attempt to win support for war. In a carefully worded attack Dr Blix said intelligence communities were too ready to believe the "tales" of defectors, and the British prime minister and US president, while not acting in bad faith, were too preoccupied with spin. Referring to the UK government's controversial dossier, with its suggestion that WMDs could be deployed within 45 minutes, he insisted: "The intention was to dramatise it, just as the vendors of some merchandise are trying to exaggerate the importance of what they have. "But from politicians or our leaders in the Western world, I think we expect more than that. A bit more sincerity." Dr Blix's intervention, on BBC television's Breakfast With Frost show last Sunday, was immediately rejected by the UK government. The leader of the Lords, Baroness Amos, insisted that Lord Hutton had cleared the government of dramatising the 45-minute claim, and the secretary for constitutional affairs, Lord Falconer, urged the country to wait for the Butler inquiry, which is due to report in the summer. But Robin Cook, the former leader of the Commons, ratcheted up his attack on Mr Blair's credibility, and the opposition called for Mr Blair to make a statement clarifying why he believed the 45-minute claim referred to long-range weapons when he took Britain to war. Mr Cook repeated his allegation that Mr Blair knew the intelligence only pointed to battlefield weapons when the two discussed the issue on March 5, 15 days before military action - a claim Downing Street denies. "I made it quite plain . . . that it was obvious from the briefings that Saddam had no weapons of mass destruction and had only battlefield weapons . . . I could not have been more blunt," he said. Meanwhile President Bush went on television to defend his administration's decision to go to war, arguing that although weapons of mass destruction had not been found, Saddam Hussein "had the capacity to have a weapon, make a weapon. We thought he had weapons". "I expected to find the weapons," he acknowledged. "Sitting behind this desk making a very difficult decision on war and peace; I made the decision on the basis of the best intelligence possible." Mr Bush last week named a seven-member commission to investigate US intelligence operations, but it will not deliver its report until after the November presidential election. Meanwhile a prominent Israeli MP said last week that his country's intelligence services knew claims that Saddam Hussein was capable of swiftly launching weapons of mass destruction were wrong but withheld the information from Washington. "It was known in Israel that the story that weapons of mass destruction could be activated in 45 minutes was an old wives' tale," Yossi Sarid, a member of the foreign affairs and defence committee, which is investigating the quality of Israeli intelligence on Iraq, told the Associated Press last week. ***************************************************************** 3 Update on Iraqi Weapons of Mass Destruction Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2004 15:00:43 -0600 (CST) National Security Archive Update, February 11, 2004 UPDATE ON IRAQI WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION For further information contact Jeffrey Richelson, 202/994-7000 http://www.nsarchive.org Washington, D.C. - Almost a year after the start of Operation Iraqi Freedom, the Bush administration faces growing skepticism over its claim that Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programs posed a gathering threat to the United States. The continued failure of Coalition forces to locate a single biological, chemical or nuclear weapon has called into question the original premise for the war. Recent statements by former officials and newly available intelligence analyses have heated up the controversy. In particular, testimony by senior weapons inspector David Kay that "we were all wrong, probably" has raised the stakes, contributing to President Bush's reluctant agreement to name an outside review panel to look at the pre-war intelligence process on Iraq's WMD program, and prompting CIA Director George Tenet to launch a highly public defense of the U.S. intelligence community. The controversy makes it possible to catch an unusual glimpse inside the intelligence process that underlay the administration's decision to go to war in Iraq. What was the U.S. intelligence community's assessment of Iraq's WMD program, and did it change over time? On what basis did CIA and other analysts arrive at their conclusions? How did the Bush administration make use of that intelligence? Was there any abuse of the process? What went wrong and how can the problems be fixed? To help sort out these questions, and try to understand the larger policy processes at work, the National Security Archive is today publishing an expanded collection of core documents relating to the Iraq WMD debate. This update, taken from U.S. and British sources that have become available in recent months, is part of the Archive's Saddam Hussein Sourcebook, first posted in December 2002 and updated in February 2003. Among the new materials added to the site are: * David Kay's public testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee on January 28, 2004 * CIA Director Tenet's February 4, 2004, speech to Georgetown University defending the CIA against David Kay's charge of a basic U.S. intelligence failure * The infamous forged correspondence on Iraq's alleged attempts to buy uranium from the Republic of Niger * The Top Secret key judgments section of the October 2002 National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) that had been released previously in its unclassified form * An internal CIA appraisal of the October 2002 NIE * Correspondence between the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee and CIA Director George Tenet concerning criticism of the agency's intelligence performance on Iraq * The British House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee report weighing the Blair administration's decision to go to war in Iraq Most of these materials have been made public before, but as often happens there is no guarantee they will not eventually be pulled from government or other web sites. Furthermore, by compiling these records in one location, the collection lets readers form a more detailed picture of how the process worked -- or failed. For those already familiar with our earlier postings on Iraqi WMD, the newest additions are Document Numbers 4, 10 (a-d), 12, 15, and 32-43. The National Security Archive is the world's largest non-profit user of the U.S. Freedom of Information Act and has won numerous awards and recognition for its web postings on U.S. foreign policy. In December 2001, the National Journal listed the Archive site as one of the top five online resources on terrorism. In December 2003, the Archive won its second "Cool Site of the Day" honor. http://www.nsarchive.org _________________________________________________________________________ THE NATIONAL SECURITY ARCHIVE is an independent non-governmental research institute and library located at The George Washington University in Washington, D.C. The Archive collects and publishes declassified documents acquired through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). A tax-exempt public charity, the Archive receives no U.S. government funding; its budget is supported by publication royalties and donations from foundations and individuals. _________________________________________________________________________ PRIVACY NOTICE The National Security Archive does not and will never share the names or e-mail addresses of its subscribers with any other organization. Once a year, we will write you and ask for your financial support. We may als ask you for your ideas for Freedom of Information requests, documentation projects, or other issues that the Archive should take on. We would welcome your input, and any information you care to share with us about your special interests. 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You can also unsubscribe from the list anytime by using the following link: ***************************************************************** 4 Bush: EO 13327 - Commission on Intellegince Capabilities FR Doc 04-3170 [Federal Register: February 11, 2004 (Volume 69, Number 28)] [Presidential Documents] [Page 6899-6903] From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr11fe04-161] [[Page 6899]] ----------------------------------------------------------------- ------ Part VI The President ----------------------------------------------------------------- ------ Executive Order 13328--Commission on the Intelligence Capabilities of the United States Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction Presidential Documents _________________________________________________________________ __ Title 3-- The President [[Page 6901]] Executive Order 13328 of February 6, 2004 Commission on the Intelligence Capabilities of the United States Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered as follows: Section 1. Establishment. There is established, within the Executive Office of the President for administrative purposes, a Commission on the Intelligence Capabilities of the United States Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction (Commission). Sec. 2. Mission. (a) The Commission is established for the purpose of advising the President in the discharge of his constitutional authority under Article II of the Constitution to conduct foreign relations, protect national security, and command the Armed Forces of the United States, in order to ensure the most effective counterproliferation capabilities of the United States and response to the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and the ongoing threat of terrorist activity. The Commission shall assess whether the Intelligence Community is sufficiently authorized, organized, equipped, trained, and resourced to identify and warn in a timely manner of, and to support United States Government efforts to respond to, the development and transfer of knowledge, expertise, technologies, materials, and resources associated with the proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction, related means of delivery, and other related threats of the 21st Century and their employment by foreign powers (including terrorists, terrorist organizations, and private networks, or other entities or individuals). In doing so, the Commission shall examine the capabilities and challenges of the Intelligence Community to collect, process, analyze, produce, and disseminate information concerning the capabilities, intentions, and activities of such foreign powers relating to the design, development, manufacture, acquisition, possession, proliferation, transfer, testing, potential or threatened use, or use of Weapons of Mass Destruction, related means of delivery, and other related threats of the 21st Century. (b) With respect to that portion of its examination under paragraph 2(a) of this order that relates to Iraq, the Commission shall specifically examine the Intelligence Community's intelligence prior to the initiation of Operation Iraqi Freedom and compare it with the findings of the Iraq Survey Group and other relevant agencies or organizations concerning the capabilities, intentions, and activities of Iraq relating to the design, development, manufacture, acquisition, possession, proliferation, transfer, testing, potential or threatened use, or use of Weapons of Mass Destruction and related means of delivery. (c) With respect to its examination under paragraph 2(a) of this order, the Commission shall: (i) specifically evaluate the challenges of obtaining information regarding the design, development, manufacture, acquisition, possession, proliferation, transfer, testing, potential or threatened use, or use of Weapons of Mass Destruction, related means of delivery, and other related threats of the 21st Century in closed societies; and [[Page 6902]] (ii) compare the Intelligence Community's intelligence concerning Weapons of Mass Destruction programs and other related threats of the 21st Century in Libya prior to Libya's recent decision to open its programs to inter national scrutiny and in Afghanistan prior to removal of the Taliban government with the current assessments of organizations examining those programs. (d) The Commission shall submit to the President by March 31, 2005, a report of the findings of the Commission resulting from its examination and its specific recommendations for ensuring that the Intelligence Community of the United States is sufficiently authorized, organized, equipped, trained, and resourced to identify and warn in a timely manner of, and to support United States Government efforts to respond to, the development and transfer of knowledge, expertise, technologies, materials, and resources associated with the proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction, related means of delivery, and other related threats of the 21st Century and their employment by foreign powers (including terrorists, terrorist organizations, and private networks, or other entities or individuals). The Central Intelligence Agency and other components of the Intelligence Community shall utilize the Commission and its resulting report. Within 90 days of receiving the Commission's report, the President will consult with the Congress concerning the Commission's report and recommendations, and will propose any appropriate legislative recommendations arising out of the findings of the Commission. Sec. 3. Membership. The Commission shall consist of up to nine members appointed by the President, two of whom the President shall designate as Co-Chairs. Members shall be citizens of the United States. It shall take two-thirds of the members of the Commission to constitute a quorum. Sec. 4. Meetings of the Commission and Direction of Its Work. The Co-Chairs of the Commission shall convene and preside at the meetings of the Commission, determine after consultation with other members of the Commission its agenda, direct its work, and assign responsibilities within the Commission. Sec. 5. Access to Information. (a) To carry out this order, the Commission shall have full and complete access to information relevant to its mission as described in section 2 of this order and in the possession, custody, or control of any executive department or agency to the maximum extent permitted by law and consistent with Executive Order 12958 of April 17, 1995, as amended. Heads of departments and agencies shall promptly furnish such information to the Commission upon request. The Attorney General and the Director of Central Intelligence shall ensure the expeditious processing of all appropriate security clearances necessary for the members of the Commission to fulfill their functions. (b) Promptly upon commencing its work, the Commission shall adopt, after consultation with the Secretary of Defense, the Attorney General, and the Director of Central Intelligence, rules and procedures of the Commission for physical, communications, computer, document, personnel, and other security in relation to the work of the Commission. The Secretary of Defense, the Attorney General, and the Director of Central Intelligence shall promptly and jointly report to the President their judgment whether the security rules and procedures adopted by the Commission are clearly consistent with the national security and protect against unauthorized disclosure of information required by law or executive order to be protected against such disclosure. The President may at any time modify the security rules or procedures of the Commission to provide the necessary protection. Sec. 6. General Provisions. (a) In implementing this order, the Commission shall solely advise and assist the President. (b) In performing its functions under this order, the Commission shall, subject to the authority of the President, be independent from any executive department or agency, or of any officer, employee, or agent thereof. [[Page 6903]] (c) Nothing in this order shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect the authorities of any department, agency, entity, officer, or employee of the United States under applicable law. (d) Nothing in this order shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect the functions of the Director of the Office of Management and Budget relating to budget, administrative, or legislative proposals. (e) The Director of the Office of Administration shall provide or arrange for the provision of administrative support and, with the assistance of the Director of the Office of Management and Budget, ensure funding for the Commission consistent with applicable law. The Director of the Office of Administration shall ensure that such support and funding meets the Commission's reasonable needs and that the manner of provision of support and funding is consistent with the authority of the Commission within the executive branch in the performance of its functions. (f) Members of the Commission shall serve without compensation for their work on the Commission. Members who are not officers or employees in the executive branch, while engaged in the work of the Commission, may be allowed travel expenses, including per diem in lieu of subsistence, as authorized by law for persons serving intermittently in Government service (5 U.S.C. 5701 through 5707), consistent with the availability of funds. (g) The Commission shall have a staff headed by an Executive Director. The Co-Chairs shall hire and employ, or obtain by assignment or detail from departments and agencies, the staff of the Commission, including the Executive Director. (h) The term ``Intelligence Community'' is given the same meaning as contained in section 3(4) of the National Security Act of 1947, as amended (50 U.S.C. 401a(4)). (i) The term ``Weapons of Mass Destruction'' is given the same meaning as contained in section 1403(1) of the Defense Against Weapons of Mass Destruction Act of 1996 (50 U.S.C. 2302(1)). Sec. 7. Judicial Review. This order is intended only to improve the internal management of the executive branch, and is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity, against the United States, its departments, agencies, or other entities, its officers or employees, or any other person. Sec. 8. Termination. The Commission shall terminate within 60 days after submitting its report. (Presidential Sig.)B THE WHITE HOUSE, February 6, 2004. [FR Doc. 04-3170 Filed 2-10-04; 8:50 am] Billing code 3195-01-P ***************************************************************** 5 Seattle Times: Opinion: Too easily persuaded into an unnecessary war Wednesday, February 11, 2004 - Page updated at 12:00 A.M. Bruce Ramsey / Times editorial columnist Why did we invade Iraq? One scene from "The Price of Loyalty," Ron Suskind's look through the eyes of Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill, helps answer that. The book is, of course, from the point of view of a man who was fired. But he was a man with a reputation for telling unpleasant truths. Furthermore, the president he describes does look like the president we see on television. O'Neill describes a meeting of the National Security Council, including George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Don Rumsfeld, Condi Rice and others. It was Jan. 30, 2001. Bush had been in office 10 days, and 9-11 was more than eight months off. CIA Director George Tenet rolled out a photograph onto the big table. It was an aerial photo, enlarged and grainy, of a factory in Iraq. He said it might be making chemical or biological weapons. "Here are the railroad tracks coming in," he said, pointing with a stick, "and here are the trucks lined up over here. They're bringing it in here and bringing it out there." "You have to take a look at this," said Cheney, and they crowded around. To O'Neill, who had recently retired as CEO of Alcoa Aluminum, it looked like just another industrial building. What was so suspicious about it? Trucks were coming in night and day, Tenet said. That meant nothing. But Bush was already sold. "Actual plans were already being discussed to take over Iraq and occupy it in an unspoken doctrine of preemptive war," the book says. On my way to work, I sometimes see people with a banner, "BUSH LIED." There is not a hint of that in Suskind's book. Looking at the man, I think: No, he believes this. Maybe I am being kind because I voted for him. Apologists now say Bush was "misled" by bad intelligence. He says in his defense that others in the U.S. and British governments saw the same intelligence, and reached the same conclusions. The French and Germans didn't. The intelligence people, including Tenet, now say they never asserted such certainty. A national commission will dig into the intelligence — and report after the election. Meanwhile, a thought from O'Neill: A president with a probing, restless mind, like Richard Nixon, would not have been so easily persuaded. O'Neill worked for Nixon. Bush, he says, does not have that sharp and demanding an intellect. That is the conclusion of the book, and the best explanation, I think, of why America started an unnecessary war. Bush had run as a candidate opposed to hegemonic war and the follow-on "nation-building." But he made the mistake of recruiting his father's men, who thought differently. By all appearances, he was sold on the war by the people around him. In turn, he sold the Congress by asserting that Iraq had chemical and biological weapons. Its soldiers did not. We know that for a fact. For months, it has been suggested Saddam Hussein hid his best weapons, which is a very odd thing to do before the great battle of one's life. We have spent months looking, and have found Saddam in his spider hole, but not the "weapons of mass destruction." It has been nearly a year. It's time for Bush's supporters to admit that there weren't any such weapons. Essentially, the president did this in the "Meet the Press" interview with Tim Russert this past weekend. That is a serious admission. It means America was led to war under false pretenses. It means that in the first instance of the new American doctrine of preemptive war, we preempted something that wasn't real. From the Bush camp comes much blowing of smoke over this. Bush says Saddam could have developed a nuclear weapon and given it to a private group to set off in the United States. A lot of things can be imagined, but the world's mightiest power cannot go to war over an imagination. The justification for killing people has to be stronger than that. There need to be facts — facts that stand in your path, shout in your face and block all paths other than that of mechanized violence. The president didn't have the facts. Some people said in his defense that he probably knew more than he was saying. They overestimated him. Bruce Ramsey's column appears regularly on editorial pages of The Times. His e-mail address is Copyright © 2004 The Seattle Times Company More opinion headlines ***************************************************************** 6 Las Vegas SUN: Editorial: Throwing ethics out the window Today: February 11, 2004 at 8:58:49 PST LAS VEGAS SUN Early last month Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia joined Vice President Dick Cheney on a duck hunting trip in Louisiana, but this was not your usual outing. They flew together from Washington to Louisiana, with Scalia as Cheney's guest aboard a government jet that doubles as Air Force Two. After landing in Patterson, La., two military helicopters hovered in the distance as a heavily guarded motorcade took them to a private hunting camp. It must have been quite a sight, but interestingly enough there were no photographers there to capture the moment. As the Los Angeles Times has reported, both the local sheriff and the operator of a flying center at the airport where the jet landed said that there were orders prohibiting pictures from being taken of those who left the plane. It's easy to understand why the camera-shy Cheney didn't want the public to see how chummy he was with Scalia. Cheney, you see, has a case before the U.S. Supreme Court involving, of all things, government secrecy. Two years ago the Sierra Club and Judicial Watch sued Cheney, the former oil industry executive, seeking the release of records from an energy task force he once headed for the Bush administration. A federal judge did the right thing in ordering Cheney to turn over the records, which would provide some answers as to what went on in the task force's secret meetings, but the vice president appealed the decision. On Dec. 15 the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case, a couple of weeks prior to the Cheney-Scalia hunting trip, which was held -- and we're not kidding -- on land owned by an oil industry executive. It doesn't take a legal ethics expert to know that Scalia should recuse himself from the case. Scalia refuses to do so, however, saying he doesn't see a reason why he should withdraw. It's almost as if Scalia believes he is above the law and, in a perverse way, he is. There really is no higher authority that someone could appeal to that could prevent Scalia from sitting on the case. So, unless Scalia's conscience gets the better of him, the public will rightly view the outcome of any Supreme Court decision favoring Cheney as a travesty. ***************************************************************** 7 Washington Post: Study of Rhetoric On Iraq Is Urged (washingtonpost.com) Kay: Panel Should Check for Distortion By Walter Pincus Washington Post Staff Writer Wednesday, February 11, 2004; Page A25 David Kay, the former chief U.S. arms inspector in Iraq, said yesterday that President Bush's new commission on intelligence should study how the president and his senior policymakers used the information they received from intelligence agencies. "The charges are out there," Kay said during a talk at the U.S. Institute of Peace, "and if there was misuse or distortion, we need to know it." He added that he did not believe that was the case and that he was told to "find the truth" when he was given the job of searching for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Bush's executive order creating the commission last week spelled out the panel's areas of inquiry, and did not list among them the question of whether the administration accurately portrayed the information in intelligence reports. The panel was directed to investigate prewar intelligence collection and the analysis of deposed president Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction, and to compare that analysis with what has since been found by the Iraq Survey Group and other agencies. Democrats accuse administration officials of exaggerating the threat from Hussein's nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programs as they built a case for war. No such weapons have been found in Iraq, and Democrats are calling for the commission to investigate whether the administration went too far in its rhetoric. Kay told his audience he knew partisan politics played a role in such demands but added, "The commission ought to examine everything." At the White House yesterday, a senior official would not comment on what the commission would do, but noted that the executive order permits the panel's co-chairmen to set the agenda and meetings after consultation with other members. Unlike the commission investigating the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, which was established by a congressional resolution, the executive order creating the intelligence commission does not mention subpoena power or the authority to take testimony under oath or even hold public hearings. A White House spokesman said yesterday that it was premature to say whether such subpoenas or the legal authority to take testimony under oath would be needed. The spokesman noted that the presidential order grants the panel "complete access to information relevant to its mission" and calls on heads of departments and agencies to "promptly furnish such information to the commission upon request." The Sept. 11 commission, which had a White House letter sent to all agencies calling for their full cooperation, nonetheless has been forced to use its subpoena power twice to get documents from the Bush administration. That commission has also had to negotiate complicated agreements with the White House for limited access to the President's Daily Brief (PDB), the highly classified intelligence material sent by the CIA to Bush each day. Reviewing prewar PDB items that dealt with Iraq's weapons program would inevitably be needed to determine whether there was any exaggeration by senior administration officials before the war, a retired senior intelligence official said yesterday. Meanwhile, the co-chairmen of the new commission, Laurence H. Silberman, a federal appeals court judge, and former senator Charles S. Robb (D-Va.), met with White House officials yesterday on administrative matters. Silberman said yesterday he would not comment on the commission. White House press secretary Scott McClellan told reporters Monday that the commission would probably not begin work until the final two members of the nine-person body were named, probably this week. Other administration officials said yesterday that one of the remaining two seats will be filled by Washington lawyer Carla Hills. Hills was secretary of Housing and Urban Development in the Ford administration and U.S. Trade Representative under President George H.W. Bush. She was in New York City yesterday and could not be reached for comment, a secretary in her office said. © 2004 The Washington Post Company ***************************************************************** 8 Washington Times: Intelligence has flaws, officials say February 11, 2004 U.S. intelligence agencies have a mixed record in supplying data to policy-makers and in the past have missed important events, senior defense and military leaders said yesterday. "We're living in a time of surprise and where it is possible to be surprised," Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld told reporters at the Pentagon. "And we were surprised on September 11, and 3,000 people lost their lives." Mr. Rumsfeld spoke after the announcement last week that President Bush has formed a commission to look into intelligence failures, including those related to Iraq's weapons. He said he uses intelligence cautiously in making decisions that involve the lives of military forces. Air Force Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that U.S. intelligence agencies have had both successes and failures. "It is not a perfect art, and it's certainly not a perfect science," said Gen. Myers, appearing with Mr. Rumsfeld. "But I am convinced they're trying to do the best work they can do for this country of ours. They have had great successes, and they sometimes miss the mark. That's the nature of their business." Former CIA weapons inspector David Kay disclosed recently that U.S. intelligence agencies were wrong in asserting that Iraq had large stockpiles of chemical and biological arms. The CIA has said arms inspectors in Iraq need more time to complete the search for hidden, chemical, biological and nuclear weapons in Iraq. Mr. Rumsfeld said three years ago he told Congress that shortcomings of U.S. intelligence are one of the things that "kept me up at night in this job." "I said it because I've been around long enough to know that in a big, complicated world with closed societies, people determined not to have you know something, and with the growing lethality of weapons and the increasing availability of those increasingly lethal weapons, your margin for error is less," he said. Mr. Rumsfeld said the presidential commission announced last week is looking to better arrange intelligence capabilities to "help defend the American people in this new century," and that both he and Gen. Myers have not made a decision in the past three years based on "perfect information." "Policy-makers end up giving advice based on the best information available at that time, and you constantly want to get the best information," he said. "So that's why you do lessons learned. That's why you have reviews of things." Mr. Rumsfeld said before the conflict that Iraq had chemical and biological weapons. So far, no weapons have been found. On Capitol Hill, House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, Texas Republican, yesterday said Mr. Bush did a "great job" on Sunday during a television interview of "bringing some perspective back" to the war on terror. Mr. Bush appeared on NBC's "Meet the Press." Mr. DeLay said the furor over weapons of mass destruction has "dumbed-down and diminished" the war on terror. "Saddam Hussein was the weapon of mass destruction," Mr. DeLay said. Mr. DeLay said he realizes that "a lot of things are sacrificed" in a presidential election year. "America's unity of purpose in this war on terror shouldn't be one of those things," he said. •Amy Fagan contributed to this report. ***************************************************************** 9 WorldNetDaily: A matter of trust FEBRUARY 11 2004 Most Americans yet believe President Bush did the right thing in ridding Iraq and the world of Saddam Hussein. Yet, how we were persuaded to go to war raises grave questions about the character and competence of those who led us into it. As we now know, Iraq had no tie to Osama, no role in 9-11, no nuclear program, no weapons of mass destruction, no plans to attack us. Its people did not threaten us and did not want war with us. By what right, then, did we invade their country, destroy their army and inflict thousands of casualties upon their people? Comes the answer: We acted under the Bush Doctrine, under which we will not permit the world's worst dictators to acquire the world's worst weapons. To eliminate such threats before they go critical, we reserve the right to take pre-emptive military action and to wage preventive wars. We cannot wait for tumors to become malignant before cutting them out, Bush was saying. After 9-11, most of America agreed. But why did Bush choose Iraq? Why not Iran, whose hand in terror attacks was more demonstrable and whose missile and nuclear programs were more advanced? Why not North Korea? The neoconservatives – Wolfowitz, Perle &Co. – we know, had been plotting war on Iraq and propagandizing for a U.S. invasion for years. But why did Bush sign on? Why did he make Iraq the first target of his doctrine? There was no tie between Saddam and 9-11, and Iraq seemed neither a grave nor an imminent threat. What appears to have happened is this. Sometime soon after 9-11, the neocons persuaded the president that invading Iraq was the next crucial step in winning the war on terror and evil in which Divine Providence had chosen him to be the Churchill of his generation. And if the country and Congress were unconvinced of the need for war, it was his job to convince them. And here is where the administration began to cross the line. To persuade us that Saddam was a mortal threat to which the only recourse was war, they needed evidence. But, apparently, there was little or no hard evidence to be had. No smoking guns. Saddam had been corralled in his box for a dozen years. America had flown 40,000 sorties over his country without losing a plane. The only case that could be made was by extrapolating from the weapons Iraq had had before the Gulf War, which the U.N. had failed to find before it left in 1998. What seems to have happened is this. Frustrated hawks in the Pentagon, impatient with the CIA's inability to find the evidence to clinch the case for a war they had already decided on, began demanding access to raw intelligence. They set up their own intelligence unit in the Pentagon, the Office of Special Plans. They solicited foreign intelligence agencies and Iraqi exiles to discover evidence that Saddam not only had stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons, he was working on nuclear ones. First, they decided on war. Then they sent everyone out on a global scavenger hunt to find the evidence to prove we had no alternative but war. And though the information that came back was suspicious and the sources suspect, at least it pointed, as desired, in the right direction. And, so, the hawks fed it to their propagandists in the press and "stovepiped" it to the White House, where it soon began to appear in the statements and speeches of the president and his War Cabinet. Thus, we were told an Iraqi intelligence agent in Prague had met with Muhammad Atta before 9-11, that Saddam was buying raw uranium for atomic bombs in Africa, that Iraq was testing drones and fitting them with biological weapons. Vice President Cheney told "Meet the Press" that Saddam "has been absolutely devoted to trying to acquire nuclear weapons. And we believe he has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons." Condi Rice warned us that if we waited too long for proof it might come in a "mushroom cloud" over an American city. Upon such "evidence," the White House stampeded Congress and the country into war, a war we now know was utterly unnecessary. We were misled, and the only question that lingers is: Were we deceived? For if Cheney, Rice, Rumsfeld and the president were truly relying on the ambiguous intelligence the CIA was providing, whence came their absolute certitude as to the gravity and immediacy of the threat? For the CIA was saying there was no imminent threat. History will record this as Bush's War. And he seems content with that judgment. But the price of victory has been the lost trust of many of his countrymen and of much of the world. The credibility of yet another administration has been compromised. Was it worth it? And if it was not the weapons, what was the real reason America went to war on Iraq? Patrick Buchannan [WorldNetDaily.com] ***************************************************************** 10 Hi Pakistan: Rumsfeld unaware of WMD claim February 12 2004 WASHINGTON: US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld says he cannot remember hearing the claim that Iraq could launch weapons of mass destruction within 45 minutes. The claim, part of the UK Government's case for war, was made in its September 2002 Iraq arms dossier presented to Parliament prior to the conflict. The claim is at the heart of recent debate in the UK about the invasion. Mr Rumsfeld told reporters at a Pentagon briefing: "I don't remember the statement being made, to be perfectly honest. Last week Prime Minister Tony Blair said he had not been aware the relevant weapons were not long range and capable of hitting British interests, such as military bases on Cyprus. In fact the claim only related to battlefield munitions such as mortars and shells. Copyright 1996-2002 . Hi Pakistan. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 11 UK Independent: nuclear cheating By Jasper Becker in Seoul 11 February 2004 North Korea had developed a nuclear bomb by the end of the 1980s and probably has many such weapons after pursuing its secret programme under the noses of international inspectors, according to defectors from the country. The defectors have revealed in interviews with The Independent the extent to which the impoverished communist state cheated on its international agreements as it diverted scarce resources into the clandestine programme. They also confirm that Pakistan provided crucial help for North Korea, which yesterday described a confession by Pakistan's top nuclear scientist that he had sold nuclear technology to North Korea as "nothing but mean and groundless propaganda". Details began to emerge in October 2002, when the United States forced North Korean officials to admit it had been running a uranium-enriching programme to build a bomb. Kim Dae Ho, who worked on the nuclear programme for 10 years until defecting in 1994, said: "I saw classified documents in 1987 in which (the then North Korean leader) Kim Il Sung said we have finally developed a highly enriched uranium programme in a self-reliant way. "Then in 1989 he announced that we finally have the centrifuge technology and are making weapons-grade uranium. He ordered the state to reward scientists with the best available gifts including Toshiba colour TVs." Mr Kim was smuggled out of China on a Chinese fishing vessel in great secrecy. Until recently he has been forced to keep a low profile, but is now publishing a book. Another eyewitness, a North Korean nuclear technician who left the country two years ago after working and living for years in North Korea's nuclear-research centre in Yongbyon, confirmed that the country had acquired nuclear weapons by enriching uranium and by extracting plutonium by spent fuel rods from the 5-MegaWatt (MW) experimental reactor at Yongbyon. He said: "By the end of the 1980s we had the bomb. They began hiding the research facilities in tunnels." He refused to go into details for fear of endangering relatives still in the country. Mr Kim said North Korea extracted 26.4lbs of plutonium from fuel rods during shutdowns of the reactor in 1989, 1990 and 1991 - enough to build three nuclear warheads. In 1994 Washington and Pyongyang signed a landmark deal under which North Korea agreed to freeze its nuclear-weapons programme in exchange for free oil deliveries and the gift of two light-water reactors worth $4.5bn (Ł2.4bn). But Mr Kim said: "The work intensified after 1994. It never stopped." The two technicians are part of a growing stream of North Koreans escaping to the South and providing evidence which undermines the position of the current South Korean government, which wants to present Kim Jong Il, the North Korean leader, as a reliable partner, and former members of the Clinton administration, who defend the 1994 deal and are horrified by the tough line taken by the current US government. The Bush administration is believed to have drawn on the testimony of such escapees to gather evidence that North Korea had never intended to stick to any of its promises nor treaties made to Seoul, Washington or the International Atomic Energy Authority (IAEA). The CIA had accumulated enough evidence of the uranium-enriching programme for James Kelly, the US Assistant Secretary of State, to take to Pyongyang in the autumn of 2002. North Korea first admitted the allegations were true butlater retracted the confession. The 1994 Agreed Framework collapsed and Pyongyang expelled the IAEA inspectors. North Korea had relied on Soviet help until the 1970s to develop a nuclear industry, but the programme was accelerated in 1984 when Kim Jong Il took control of the government after his father, Kim Il Sung, slipped into semi-retirement. "Kim Jong Il assigned two army regiments to exploit North Korea's natural deposits of uranium in Pyongyang province and set up a special fund called N710 to finance their work. They were given the very best of everything," Mr Kim said. More than 30,000 soldiers were assigned to the programme which had three key sites: an underground uranium mine, a subterranean nuclear-test centre, and the 5-MW Yongbyon nuclear reactor near Mount Yaksan. In the early 1990s, IAEA inspectors focused efforts on monitoring the 5-MW Yongbyon reactor and trying to determine if North Korea had diverted spent fuel rods to extract plutonium. "We spent months hiding the nuclear processing plant from the IAEA inspectors. The most difficult thing was preventing the release of tell-tale krypton into the atmosphere," Mr Kim said. Other defectors said North Korea became convinced from the 1991 Gulf war that the US might launch a pre-emptive strike against its nuclear facilities after Saddam Hussein was found to be much closer to building a bomb than suspected. North Korea did everything it could to fortify or hide its facilities. Although North Korea's leadership claimed that the achievements were the fruits of its self-reliant Juche philosophy, Mr Kim said the uranium-enrichment programme benefited from Chinese know-how and materials. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Pyongyang also recruited large numbers of unemployed former Soviet and East German weapons experts. Although Mr Kim said he knew little about Pakistan's help, North Korea might not have succeeded without it. In the early 1980s the two countries made a deal under which North Korea delivered medium-range missiles to Pakistan so it could threaten India. In return, Pakistan provided North Korea with the blueprints stolen by Abdul Qadeer Khan, the father of Pakistan's nuclear programme, when he worked in Europe in the 1970s. UK Independent Ltd. ***************************************************************** 12 Daily Times: Pakistan suspected of supplying Iran over 10 years ago Thursday, February 12, 2004 By Khalid Hasan WASHINGTON: Pakistan was suspected as a source of the centrifuge designs obtained by Iran as early as the early 1990s, although direct proof was lacking, according to David Albright, president of the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS), a nuclear think tank. Mr Albright said, “One senior European with deep knowledge of European companies who secretly aided centrifuge programmes, and who had also heard US intelligence officials’ briefings on Iranian procurement activities, told me in early 1995 that Pakistan might have sold Iran a drawing of a centrifuge assembly. He also said US intelligence believed that Iran acquired shipments of machine tools for its centrifuge programme through Pakistan. Jim Hoagland of the Washington Post reported on May 17, 1995 that Iran was pursuing a nuclear weapon acquisition “blueprint” drawn up at least four years before with the aid of Pakistani officials. In the mid-1990s, western intelligence agencies seem to have missed much of Iran’s success in acquiring a large number of centrifuge components and underestimated the programme’s progress. “However, US intelligence estimates about the time Iran needed to build a pilot plant have turned out to be reasonably accurate. Overall, the intelligence agencies correctly identified that they were seeing only the tip of the iceberg of Iran’s centrifuge programme and procurement efforts. But the “tip” was not viewed in Europe or Russia as convincing evidence of a secret, advanced gas centrifuge programme warranting a significant response,” explained Mr Albright. Because of this, the ISIS chief said, there was little concerted action until 2002 to stop Iran’s secret centrifuge programme or demand far more intrusive International Atomic Energy Agency inspections in Iran. Iran moved relatively freely and secretly from 1995 until 2002 toward building a domestic centrifuge industry that could enrich significant quantities of uranium. Home | National Daily Times - All Rights Reserved ***************************************************************** 13 Las Vegas SUN: Bush Official: N. Korea Buys Nuke Info Today: February 11, 2004 at 15:05:26 PST By BARRY SCHWEID ASSOCIATED PRESS WASHINGTON (AP) - Companies across Europe and Asia are providing North Korea with vital technology for its nuclear weapons program, probably without the knowledge of their governments, a senior Bush administration official said Wednesday. The equipment is being used for a uranium centrifuge system, the official told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity. The official said that equipment includes rotors - spinning tubes in which uranium gas is separated. Negotiations that the Bush administration hopes will end the program are due to resume Feb. 25 in Beijing. The administration estimates North Korea has produced at least one nuclear weapon and could turn out several more if the program is not halted. In the meantime, Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan has disclosed he ran a black market operation that provided weapons technology to North Korea, Iran and Libya. However, North Korea has been shopping worldwide, beyond Pakistan, and making a great effort to cover up its quest for nuclear weapons technology, the official said. Many companies in Europe and Asia have responded positively, providing the equipment, the official said. He declined to identify the countries where the companies are located. Kahn's operation, meanwhile, probably stretches beyond North Korea, Iran and Libya, he said. Under an arrangement worked out with the United States, the amnesty initially given to the scientist by Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf was made on condition that Kahn would provide more information about the network, the official said. That gives Kahn an incentive to reveal more. Otherwise, he could be prosecuted, the official said. The Bush administration has known about Kahn's operation for three years, but there could be parts of it still unknown to the United States, the official said. Musharraf said this week that the administration first provided evidence to his government last November. But State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said Tuesday that apart from general concerns, American officials have turned over "pieces of information" to Pakistan for some time. -- ***************************************************************** 14 Korea Herald: 'No rewards for nuke freeze' By Seo Hyun-jin (shj@heraldm.com) 2004.02.12 Seoul U.S. envoy urges N.K. to address uranium program South Korea, the United States and Japan will not offer rewards to North Korea for freezing its plutonium-based nuclear weapons program if it fails to address concerns on its uranium-based plans, Seoul's top envoy to Washington said yesterday. Ahead of six-party talks on its nuclear threat later this month, North Korea has reiterated its offer to freeze its nuclear facilities, without further elaboration, in exchange for political and economic concessions from the United States. "North Korea had already agreed to freeze its plutonium program in the past, so the three countries take the position that they cannot provide compensation only for doing that," Amb. Han Sung-joo told reporters. Han is attending an annual conference of overseas mission chiefs that kicked off its three-day run in Seoul yesterday. "If North Korea declares other nuclear programs, if it has any, as well as the plutonium program and promises to dismantle them and freeze them in that context, such a freeze would have a different meaning," Han said. Officials and experts believe Pyongyang and Washington will have heated disputes over Pyongyang's possession of a nuclear weapons program using highly enriched uranium when they meet at the second round of nuclear talks in Beijing on Feb. 25. Washington officials have said North Korea admitted to harboring the uranium program in October 2002, touching off the current tension. They also say the United States has hard evidence. But Pyongyang has denied the U.S. claims, which recently gained strength with a Pakistani nuclear scientist's revelation that he provided nuclear technology to the North. Amb. Han also backed the U.S. side. "The recent situation and evidence have confirmed suspicions about North Korea's uranium program, and even critics of the Bush administration who have seen the evidence do not question that the North has such a program," Han said. Asked whether the Seoul and Washington governments were sharing information about the evidence, he said, "I would answer positively." Han stressed that all participants in the talks other than North Korea agreed on the goal of complete, verifiable and irreversible dismantlement of North Korea's nuclear weapons development. "I am not sure whether North Korea will explicitly accept such a demand, but it definitely decided to face it when the country agreed on the second round of the six-party talks," Han said. A total of 104 ambassadors and consul-generals stationed in 95 countries are attending the conference at the Foreign Ministry's headquarters in central Seoul. ***************************************************************** 15 Daily Times: N Korea denies it got nuke tech from Dr Khan Thursday, February 12, 2004 SEOUL: Pakistan’s nuclear scientist Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan’s confession that he sold nuclear weapons technology to North Korea was a lie cooked up by the United States to justify an invasion, the communist North said on Tuesday. A Foreign Ministry spokesman said the United States had fabricated Dr Khan’s story to derail the nuclear talks and lay the groundwork for an Iraq-style invasion. “The United States is now hyping the story about the transfer of nuclear technology to the DPRK by a Pakistani scientist in a bid to make the DPRK’s enriched uranium programme sound plausible,” said the spokesman in a statement published by Pyongyang’s official KCNA news agency. “This is nothing but a mean and groundless propaganda,” the spokesman said, adding Dr Khan’s disclosures were such a “sheer lie that the DPRK does not bat an eyelid even a bit”. “This is aimed to scour the interior of the DPRK on the basis of a legitimate mandate and attack it just as it did in Iraq in the end and invent a pretext to escape isolation and scuttle the projected six-way talks,” KCNA said of Dr Khan’s disclosures. The spokesman said it had won the Chinese support for its proposal to freeze its nuclear weapons programs in exchange for economic concessions from the United States. The spokesman quoted Chinese officials as saying the proposal to help end the nuclear crisis was reasonable. “China and North Korea agreed to take joint actions to make substantial progress in the next round of six-nation talks,” KCNA news agency quoted the unnamed spokesman as saying. The United States, the two Koreas, China, Japan and Russia will begin a second round of talks on February 25 over US demands that North Korea dismantle its nuclear weapons programs in a complete, irreversible and verifiable manner. “They (China and North Korea) admitted the reasonability of the package proposal of simultaneous actions for the solution of the nuclear issue and the DPRK-proposed ‘reward in return for freeze,” KCNA quoted the Foreign Ministry spokesman as saying. Meanwhile, the Chinese Foreign Office spokesman on Tuesday denied suggestions that China was involved in the transfer of nuclear technology to North Korea. “China’s position is very clear. We attach great importance to, and resolutely oppose the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Zhang Qiyue told a regular briefing. Zhang said she did not believe Chinese technology might be included in what Mr Khan passed on to North Korea. “In recent years, China has adopted a series of measures to step up its control of the export of such technology. The measures we have adopted are now guaranteed by legal means,” she said. “Therefore, any suggestion or allegation accusing China of proliferation is baseless,” she said. —Agencies Scientists warned govt about Dr Khan ISLAMABAD: The Pakistani government was warned by nuclear scientists even before the country’s first public bomb test in 1998 that Abdul Qadeer Khan was involved in suspicious activities, a government official said on Tuesday. After Gen Pervez Musharraf took power in 1999, scientists repeated their concerns about Dr Khan over his personal wealth, including many properties around the capital, said the official who wished anonymity. International allegations about nuclear proliferation from Pakistan’s nuclear program and Dr Khan had dogged the country for years, but were repeatedly denied by the government and Dr Khan was shielded from international questioning. The official’s comments reveal Pakistan had internal information about Dr Khan’s suspect activities far earlier than previously known. Under strong international pressure, Pakistan began an investigation in late November after Iranian revelations to the UN nuclear watchdog. The official said that concerns about Dr Khan prompted Musharraf to set up a National Command Authority in February 2000 to oversee the nuclear program and prevent the spread of technology. —AP Home | National Daily Times - All Rights Reserved ***************************************************************** 16 Hi Pakistan: US invites China in anti-nuclear North Korea drive February 12 2004 BEIJING: The United States Wednesday said China recognised that North Korea had become a serious strategic problem and urged it to show solidarity in calls for Pyongyang to dismantle its entire nuclear program. Washington argues that upcoming six-party talks in Beijing must focus on North Korea's covert uranium-based program as well as on its well-documented plutonium-producing enterprise. North Korea says the uranium program does not exist and China too continues to view with scepticism the US allegations on uranium. About Us | Private Policy | Advertise on HiP | Copyright 1996-2002 . Hi Pakistan. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced without the written permission and prior consent of the webmaster. ***************************************************************** 17 Las Vegas SUN: Scientist May Have Info on N. Korea Nukes Today: February 11, 2004 at 6:10:09 PST By GEORGE GEDDA ASSOCIATED PRESS WASHINGTON (AP) - The United States and North Korea have been arguing for well over a year about the breadth of Pyongyang's nuclear program. Ironically, U.S. officials say that Pakistan's rogue scientist, Abdul Qadeer Khan, for all of his admitted misdeeds, may be ideally positioned to clarify the North's nuclear capabilities. Officials hope that Khan, Pakistan's ace bomb-builder and confessed proliferator of nuclear secrets, will set the record straight before key talks on the North Korean nuclear impasse start Feb. 25. Khan is uniquely qualified to address the issue, having been linked to the sale of nuclear secrets to North Korea, among other countries on the State Department's terrorism list. Given his flouting of the U.S. anti-proliferation campaign, it may seem out of character for the United States to accept without complaint the pardon that Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf gave Khan last week. To the extent there is indignation about Khan, officials are keeping it to themselves. Nowadays, they see Khan as more of an opportunity than a problem. At the same time, however, Secretary of State Colin Powell insisted this week that Pakistan tear out the nuclear black market network "by its roots." China has refused to accept the U.S. contention that North Korea is developing nuclear weapons based on highly enriched uranium. The United States first made the allegation in October 2002; Pyongyang has persistently denied it. Officials worry that North Korea, emboldened by China's backing, may not back away from those denials in the upcoming talks. If there is no break in the impasse, this could lead to the collapse of the prolonged U.S. effort to seek a negotiated settlement based on the U.S. demand that Pyonyang verifiably eliminate its nuclear weapons program. The administration is looking to six-nation talks in China that start Feb. 25 for progress toward that goal. Participants will include the United States, the two Koreas, China, Japan and Russia. As U.S. officials see it, no agreement is possible if Pyongyang insists that it has no nuclear ambitions beyond the plutonium-based nuclear program which it has publicly acknowledged. North Korea has expressed a willingness to dismantle that program under certain conditions. More highly enriched uranium is needed to make a nuclear weapon than to make one from plutonium, but enriching uranium is easier to do clandestinely, since it does not require a nuclear reactor. Moreover, uranium-based bombs are considered more reliable. Some experts believe that if the negotiations reach a dead end, a crisis could ensue, with the United States imposing a blockade on North Korea at some point - perhaps after the U.S. elections in November. The administration has declined to speculate on contingency plans. David Albright, head of the International Institute for Science and International Security, says Khan's links to North Korea involve assistance for a uranium program and not the country's plutonium program. Albright says no one would object if Khan had helped the North Koreans with research and development on uranium enrichment. It would be another matter, Albright adds, if Khan were to concede that he has been involved in the construction of centrifuges, an essential element in the development of a uranium bomb. Miriam Rajkumer, of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said that if Khan confirms what U.S. officials believe, "that would go a long way toward buttressing the U.S. in its conflict with North Korea." She adds that any such confession by Khan would have no meaning unless Pakistani investigators provide the details. U.S. officials wonder how long China could support North Korea's denial in the face of contradictory information from Khan. On the other hand, if Khan professes ignorance about the North Korean program, that could reinforce Pyongyang's stand - as well as China's backing for it. Last week, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher made clear the administration is counting on full disclosure from Pakistan concerning Khan's revelations to investigators. He said the United States expects that Pakistan "will share information that they're unearthing in their ongoing investigation with the international community." --- EDITOR'S NOTE - George Gedda has covered foreign affairs for The Associated Press since 1968. -- ***************************************************************** 18 KoreaTimes : 'NK Should Give Up All Nuke Plans' Hankooki.com > Korea Times > Nation Ambassador Han Expresses Optimistic View on Beijing Talks By Ryu Jin Staff Reporter North Korea will have to shut down all potential forms of nuclear programs and will not be rewarded for freezing only plutonium-based weapons, a top South Korean diplomat said on Wednesday. Han Seung-joo, the Korean Ambassador to the United States, said in a news conference in Seoul that halting plutonium-based nuclear projects should have been covered under past accords, so compensation for this concession alone is not feasible. ``The term ˇ®freezingˇŻ could be understood more positively only when Pyongyang reveals everything under its nuclear programs and vows to abandon them. That is the common position currently held by Seoul, Tokyo and Washington,ˇŻˇŻ he said. Han, who is paying a short visit to Seoul for the annual conference of overseas diplomatic mission chiefs, added it seemed quite evident that the North is using highly enriched uranium (HEU) for nuclear development, despite some opinions to the contrary. ``The U.S. raised the suspicion with strong conviction of the HEU program in talks with North Korea in October 2002. And it is now backed by various circumstantial evidence,ˇŻˇŻ Han said. ``There are few even among the critics of the Bush administration who doubt it.ˇŻˇŻ Last week, PakistanˇŻs top nuclear scientist admitted that he sold key nuclear weapons technology to North Korea, which called the confession a ``lieˇŻˇŻ cooked up by the U.S. ahead of the second round of six-party nuclear talks slated for Feb. 25. Han expected a certain degree of progress in the Beijing talks, since the North has decided to negotiate despite U.S. demands for a ``complete, irreversible and verifiable dismantlingˇŻˇŻ of its nuclear programs. jinryu@koreatimes.co.kr 02-11-2004 17:44 ***************************************************************** 19 Las Vegas SUN: Scalia Defends Hunting Trip With Cheney Today: February 11, 2004 at 10:45:23 PST By GINA HOLLAND ASSOCIATED PRESS WASHINGTON (AP) - Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia strongly indicated he will ignore calls to recuse himself from a court case involving his friend and hunting partner, Vice President Dick Cheney. Scalia told a gathering at Amherst College on Tuesday night there was nothing improper about his accompanying Cheney to Louisiana last month to hunt ducks. The trip came three weeks after the Supreme Court agreed to hear the Bush administration's appeal in a case involving private meetings of Cheney's energy task force. "It did not involve a lawsuit against Dick Cheney as a private individual," Scalia said in response to a question from the audience of about 600 people. "This was a government issue. It's acceptable practice to socialize with executive branch officials when there are not personal claims against them. That's all I'm going to say for now. Quack, quack." Cheney wants to keep private the details of closed-door White House strategy sessions that produced the administration's energy policy. The administration is fighting a lawsuit brought by watchdog and environmental groups that contend that industry executives helped shape the administration's energy policy. Democrats in Congress, some legal ethicists and dozens of newspaper editorials have called on Scalia to stay out of the case. None of the groups in the case has formally asked Scalia to recuse himself, though the Sierra Club has said it might. Supreme Court justices, unlike judges on other courts, decide for themselves if they have conflicts, and their decisions are final. Scalia had not publicly addressed the issue before his Tuesday speech in Amherst, Mass., where about a dozen people wearing black armbands protested. One held a sign that said "Let's go hunting." Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist had rebuffed Senate Democratic leaders last month who questioned the trip, saying that justices strive to follow federal laws that require judges to stay out of cases in which their impartiality might be questioned. Other justices have been asked about the Cheney appeal. In Hawaii on Tuesday, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg would not say whether she thought Scalia should stay out of the case. While Ginsburg is one of the more liberal members of the court, she and the conservative Scalia are longtime friends. Complimenting Scalia's hunting skills, Ginsburg told more than 300 people at a Rotary Club of Honolulu luncheon that a deer killed by her colleague made for mouthwatering venison served for New Year's, which the Scalias and Ginsburgs typically spend together. "Justice Scalia has been more successful at deer hunting than he has at duck hunting," Ginsburg said to laughter. --- Associated Press reporter Matt Sedensky in Honolulu contributed to this report. On the Net: Supreme Court: http:/www.supremecourtus.gov/ -- ***************************************************************** 20 Guardian Unlimited: Cheney's future at stake after leaking of CIA agent's name Julian Borger in Washington Wednesday February 11, 2004 The Guardian Vice President Dick Cheney's political future was at stake yesterday in Washington, where a grand jury investigation was questioning administration officials about his office's role in leaking the name of a CIA operative for political motives. The inquiry has already questioned the president's spokesman and one of his media advisers over the identification of Valerie Plame, which is developing into one of the administration's main headaches in an election year. However, informed sources said last night that three of the five officials who are the real targets of the probe work or worked for Mr Cheney. Until recently, President Bush has insisted that Mr Cheney would be his vice-presidential candidate in the November elections, despite his history of heart trouble. But recent polls conducted by the White House have suggested that growing unpopularity of the taciturn ex-businessman and powerful administration hawk threatens to sink the president. Mr Cheney is already under intense fire from Democrats for his personal role in shaping the case for war against Iraq, frequently visiting the CIA to question assessments that played down Saddam Hussein's arsenal. His former role as head of a giant oil services corporation, Halliburton, is also under scrutiny, as the company is under investigation for bribery when Mr Cheney was in charge and, more recently for war-profiteering in Iraq. But the grand jury investigation into the CIA leak is potentially the most explosive threat to his long-term political survival. The case centres around the leaking to the press in July of the name of Valerie Plame, apparently in response to public questioning of the US case for war against Iraq by her husband, Joseph Wilson, a former ambassador. The leaking of an undercover agent's identity is a serious crime under US law. The hearings are leading justice department investigators towards the vice president's office, according to a source familiar with the investigation. "Three of the five people who are targets work or worked in Cheney's office," the source said. He added that members of the defence policy board, a Pentagon advisory group, are also under scrutiny. Sensing the danger to the administration, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) chairman, Terry McCauliffe issued a statement to say: "Now that the FBI is getting closer to finding out who inside the Bush White House put the lives of CIA agents in danger, we hope that President Bush will keep his word and hold accountable those responsible for the White House leak - no matter how high their post." The chief White House spokesman, Scott McClellan, outlined the president's position. "The leak of classified information is a very serious matter," he said A parallel grand jury is looking into the forgery of a document that surfaced in Italy before the war, purporting to show Iraqi attempts to buy uranium in Niger. Despite doubts over its authenticity, the document underpinned US and British claims, since proved groundless, that Saddam was reconstituting his nuclear weapons programme. A third grand jury in Washington is looking into allegations that a Halliburton subsidiary paid $180m in bribes to secure lucrative contracts to build a gas plant in Nigeria, at the time Mr Cheney was chief executive, from 1995 to 2000. More recently the corporation has been caught overcharging millions of dollars for the delivery of petrol to the US military in Iraq. The vice president claims to have severed his ties with the controversial company but he continues to receive payments of about $150,000 a year in tax-minimising "deferred compensation" from his time as an executive. Guardian Newspapers Limited ***************************************************************** 21 SF Chronicle: New Bush budget stockpiles arms / Funding to prevent nuclear spread shrinks James Sterngold, Chronicle Staff Writer Wednesday, February 11, 2004 President Bush is scheduled to give a major address today outlining new initiatives to control the spread of nuclear arms, which he has described as one of the gravest threats confronting the country. But the budget he sent to Congress just last week would reduce spending on some important nonproliferation programs while sharply increasing funds for America's own stockpile of nuclear warheads. In his speech at the National Defense University, Bush is expected to propose new initiatives for preventing nuclear technology from falling into hostile hands -- a response, in part, to the damaging admissions that Pakistan's top weapons scientist sold nuclear technology over the past decade to a string of dangerous states, including North Korea, Iran and Libya. John Bolton, the undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, said in an interview on Monday that the administration was already in talks with key allies about tough new measures, including tightening controls on the use of radioactive fuel for commercial reactors, which can be transformed into bomb material. But a number of nuclear experts said that the president's proposed fiscal 2005 budget -- with its emphasis on building up America's own arsenal -- raises serious questions about the administration's priorities and the example it is setting. "That budget really does tell a different story, with most of the money going to build more weapons, not stop them from spreading," said Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association in Washington. "It's an aggressive budget, but in the wrong direction as far as I'm concerned." Overall spending on weapons activities at the National Nuclear Security Administration, which oversees the U.S. nuclear stockpile, was $6.2 billion in fiscal 1994 and is projected under Bush's proposed budget to increase to $6.6 billion in 2005 and $7.5 billion in fiscal 2009. Those increases are expected to finance a major revitalization of the country's nuclear weapons manufacturing complex as well as research into developing a new generation of warheads -- all of which the administration has fought for in Congress. Meanwhile, the president is requesting $1.4 billion in spending in fiscal 2005 for NNSA programs for the control of weapons of mass destruction around the globe, essentially unchanged from 2004. That budget item is projected to grow to only $1.5 billion in 2009, according to the administration's proposals. One key item, the administration's projected spending on nonproliferation and verification research, is expected to decline 5 percent this year, to $220 million. Spending on international nuclear material protection and cooperation, which involves securing weapons-grade materials in the old Soviet states, is projected to drop 8 percent to $238 million in fiscal 2005. "The most important game in town is to strengthen the nonproliferation regime, every part of it," said Sidney Drell, a professor emeritus of the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center and a high-level nuclear weapons adviser to the government. "We certainly don't do that by saying, as the budget does, that we need new nuclear weapons for limited missions and increasing that spending. We have to reduce our reliance on nuclear weapons." The picture changes dramatically in Bush's weapons budget. Despite resistance from Democrats and some Republican hawks in Congress, the president has proposed a 13 percent increase in spending for a facility to manufacture new plutonium cores for warheads, to $336 million in fiscal 2005. He has also asked for a 6 percent increase in work on maintaining and enhancing the current stockpile, to $1.4 billion, and a 32 percent increase in spending on rebuilding the weapons production complex, to $316 million. Even the areas that the Republican-controlled Congress have been most forceful in resisting are projected to grow substantially. So-called advanced concepts work, involving research into new types of warheads, is projected to grow from $6 million in fiscal 2004 to $9 million in 2005 and $29.5 million in fiscal 2009. And spending on the development of a new earth-penetrating nuclear weapon, to destroy deeply buried caches of illicit weapons in hostile hands, is projected to grow from $7.4 million this year - following steep cuts by Congress -- to $27.6 million in fiscal 2005 and $88.4 million in fiscal 2009. Bolton defended the budget, saying that the United States is taking numerous aggressive steps to staunch the leaks of weapons technology. "Our efforts on nonproliferation have been extremely robust around the world," said Bolton, the administration's chief arms control official. He added that the administration should be measured not just by what America spends, but also by how much its allies are spending. For instance, Bolton pointed out that the nation's allies were matching projected U.S. spending of $10 billion to secure stockpiles of weapons-grade material in the former Soviet Union and to transform the material into more benign reactor fuel. "You don't always have to spend American taxpayer dollars," he said. "Occasionally you can spend somebody else's taxpayer dollars." Bolton added that the increases in spending on America's nuclear arsenal are essential because of underfunding in the post-Cold War years. "That reflects a lack of expenditure in the 1990s that we need to make up," he said. "I think it's a question of proportion." E-mail James Sterngold at jsterngold@sfchronicle.com. ©2004 San Francisco Chronicle | Feedback | FAQ ***************************************************************** 22 Washington post: Bush to Outline Plan for Limiting Nuclear Arms (washingtonpost.com) Curbs on Legal Materials Could Stir Controversy By Peter Slevin Washington Post Staff Writer Wednesday, February 11, 2004; Page A22 President Bush intends to lay out a broad strategy today to stop the spread of nuclear weapons by cracking down on a burgeoning black market and denying sales of some legal equipment to countries that do not submit to close international supervision, a senior administration official said. In a speech that will detail the U.S.-led pursuit of the nuclear supply network run by Pakistani scientist A.Q. Khan, Bush will press for major changes in 30-year-old rules governing the delivery and verification of nuclear technology, the official said. Bush will try to prevent more states from becoming able to manufacture weapons-grade material by calling on governments to block transfers of nuclear components to nations that are not already equipped with enrichment and reprocessing facilities. The move would go against the Non-Proliferation Treaty, which permits enrichment for peaceful purposes. He will propose that countries professing a need for nuclear reactor fuel be able to buy it in a "reliable and cost-effective way," discouraging them from perfecting weapons programs under the guise of developing peaceful nuclear power, the official said. Bush, in his speech to the National Defense University, intends to declare that aspiring nuclear weapons states face a stark choice illustrated by recent history. They can choose the path of Libya's Moammar Gaddafi, who agreed to end his nuclear weapons program in December in return for assurances of economic investment and diplomatic engagement. Or they can persist and endure the isolation faced by North Korea or the regime change imposed on Iraq. Bush also intends to propose changes to the U.N. nuclear watchdog organization. The administration did not consult with the International Atomic Energy Agency's director general, Mohamed ElBaradei, who has been publicly discussing his own reform proposals for months. "Quite frankly, some of these proposals will be unsettling to some," said the U.S. official, who said ElBaradei will be briefed before Bush's speech. Bush's proposals tap into growing international worries about the availability of nuclear technology and the determination of some governments -- and perhaps terrorist organizations -- to develop atomic weapons. But many of Bush's steps may prove difficult to implement. The United States does not have the power to make many of the changes alone. A number of the proposals depend on voluntary action by other countries. Changes at the IAEA would require considerable consensus, something lacking in recent relations between the Bush administration and the United Nations. Bush wants to investigate and imprison nuclear suppliers and distributors, which would require countries to draft laws defining the crime. Many of the components essential to manufacturing weapons-grade fissile material have legal uses and little consensus exists on how to proceed. Bush's national security staff has long been considering a speech on proliferation, seen by the administration as one of its most vexing international challenges. Most of his Democratic presidential challengers have charged Bush with botching the proliferation account, arguing that he has harmed U.S. security by devoting too much energy to Iraq and too little to North Korea, Iran and other dangers of weapons proliferation. Recent revelations of a global network that reached Pakistan, Libya and Iran have forced a reassessment of counter-proliferation tactics and the nuclear threat itself. The world of nuclear nonproliferation has moved far beyond Cold War arms races, during which the superpowers targeted one another with huge missiles as satellites tracked every move. CONTINUED 1 2 Next > Print This Article © 2004 The Washington Post Company ***************************************************************** 23 GSPI: Drilling OK’d near nuclear blast site Glenwood Springs Post Independent - Valley News February 11, 2004 By Carrie Click Post Independent Staff GLENWOOD SPRINGS — The state of Colorado will allow natural gas drilling near the site of an underground nuclear explosion detonated in 1969 south of Battlement Mesa. The Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission unanimously approved natural gas drilling near “ground zero” of the test site during a meeting Tuesday in Glenwood Springs. Commissioner Tom Reagan explained the detonation experiment — dubbed Project Rulison — was part of a series of Atomic Energy Commission experiments begun in the 1950s. Called Project Plowshare, it was intended to “use weapons of war for tools of peace,” according to Reagan. That included using nuclear weapons to dig harbors, canals and tunnels, and free up valuable underground mineral deposits. At Project Rulison, the federal government used a 43-ton proton bomb in an attempt to unlock natural gas reserves locked in underground sandstone formations. No commercial drilling ever took place on the site. Modifications and conditions Now, more than 30 years later, commissioners approved a request made by Presco, Inc., a Houston-based oil and gas exploration company that wants to drill near the site. Presco asked the state agency to increase drilling density near Project Rulison from one well per 640 acres to one well every 40 acres on a total of 3,840 acres. Commissioners confirmed that drilling will not be allowed to go lower than 6,500 feet. The nuclear test occurred at a depth of 8,000 feet. Presco’s request also stipulated that 40 acres around “ground zero” of Project Rulison would be off limits to drilling. However, commissioners added modifications and conditions to Presco’s initial request, expanding the no-drill zone to a half-mile radius around the test site — the equivalent of 502 acres. This means that no well can be drilled within that half-mile radius zone without approval from the U.S. Department of Energy, which inherited the Atomic Energy Commission’s mission when it was formed. “I view this as the DOE’s baby to protect the public health,” said Brian Macke, oil and gas commission deputy director. “I don’t view this as passing the buck. I view it as being managed by people who understand it best. They created it and they have the responsibility for it.” Public comment completed Presco’s request went through an open hearing in mid-December when anyone opposed to it could voice concerns. By the time it was up for approval at Tuesday’s meeting, the request had been reviewed and recommended for approval by commission staff members. Macke conducted a study in 1989 of Project Rulison for Garfield County Commissioners, and used that research for his recommendation to approve the Presco’s initial request. But state Oil and Gas Commissioner John Ashby said Tuesday he wanted proof the test site was safe. “Can you give me a guarantee?” Ashby asked Macke. “As much as I can tell you that the sun will come up tomorrow,” said Macke. Ashby’s concerns over possible water contamination and the chances of radioactive material leaking out from what Macke described as a “Thermos,” a sealed underground cavity left behind after the nuclear explosion, led commissioners to expand the drilling restriction. “I wish we could have a picture of what this cavity looks like,” said Ashby. He added that he didn’t expect a problem with gas contamination, but is concerned about the possibility of radioactivity reaching underground aquifers. After more than a half hour of discussion, however, Ashby and the other commissioners felt comfortable enough with the larger no-drill zone to approve Presco’s request. “I don’t see any health and welfare issues,” said commissioner Brian Cree. “I’ve personally gone out to the site and I’ve listened to testimony for 10 years. That gives me enough comfort to recommend approval.” Contact Carrie Click: 945-8515, ext. 518 cclick@postindependent.com All contents © Copyright 2003 postindependent.com Glenwood Springs Post Independent - 2014 Grand Avenue - Glenwood Springs, CO 81601-4162 ***************************************************************** 24 Brattleboro Reformer: Bill would put Entergy funds in south state February 11, 2004 Brattleboro, VT By The Associated Press MONTPELIER (AP) -- House Speaker Walter Freed wants to redirect some money from a $20 million settlement with Entergy Nuclear, the parent company of Vermont Yankee, to help lower electricity rates in southern Vermont. The settlement between Entergy and the state stems from the company's plan to increase power production at the Vernon plant by 20 percent. The increase, or "uprate," requires state and federal approval. The state originally wanted to use $7.8 million of the $20 million settlement to help fund cleanup efforts on Lake Champlain, a plan favored by Gov. James Douglas. But a bill introduced by Freed would redirect that money to reduce energy costs for customers in Windsor and Windham counties. Freed, who was critical of the original settlement, said his bill would help stimulate growth in the region around Vermont Yankee, an area hit hard by job losses. Freed said the cleanup of Lake Champlain was "an admirable goal" but one that could be paid for with money from the state's general fund. Senate President Pro Tem Peter Welch, D-Windsor, also criticized the terms of the original agreement. "If the uprate is approved, there is no justification for any governor to be taking in $20 million as he wants to, as opposed to it going through the legislative process," Welch said. Freed's bill only changes the allocation of the $7.8 million and leaves untouched other aspects of the settlement, including a $4.5 million ratepayer protection plan and $2.2 million in fuel crisis assistance to low-income Vermonters. Robert Williams, a spokesman for Entergy Nuclear, said how the money from the settlement was divided was up to Vermont officials, not Entergy. "As for the specifics, it's a matter for the elected officials who make state policy," Williams said. Copyright © 2004 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This ***************************************************************** 25 Online NewsHour: Newsmaker: Condoleezza Rice -- February 11, 2004 [a NewsHour with Jim Lehrer Transcript] [Condoleezza Rice] President Bush said Wednesday that no more countries should have the ability to enrich or process nuclear material. National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice talks to Ray Suarez about the president's speech and the situation in Iraq, where some 50 people were killed in a suicide bombing Wednesday. [Ray Suarez] RAY SUAREZ: In his speech today at the National Defense University, President Bush offered proposals for cracking down on the international black market in nuclear weapons technology. The president called on countries with civilian or military nuclear enrichment and processing technology to stop selling it to non-nuclear nations. He also called for strengthening the International Atomic Energy Agency. To discuss the president's plan and other issues, we are joined by his national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice. Welcome back to the program. CONDOLEEZZA RICE: Thank you. Preventing nuclear secrets from getting out RAY SUAREZ: Well, in the plan offered this afternoon, what is contemplated to be the enforcement power? How is this going to work? CONDOLEEZZA RICE: Well, the plan as offered today that we hope that others will take up and discuss and add ideas to is really a plan to try and get serious about the problems of weapons proliferation. [Condoleezza Rice] And of course, the nonproliferation treaty provides -- the nuclear nonproliferation treaty provides the framework for doing that. And what the president talked about today were ways to close loopholes in the NNT; ways to strengthen the IAEA -- for instance, saying that it should have a special committee that is really capable of looking at verification and compliance issues; that there should be a U. N. Security Council resolution, which the United States is working very hard to have passed at the United Nations, which would criminalize in individual countries the trafficking in weapons of mass destruction technologies; and ultimately, that the world just has to be very serious about holding states to compliance with their international obligations. I will say that after 12 years of Iraq defying the international community, refusing to carry out its obligations that were entered into after Iraq lost a war of aggression, we did lose some of the credibility that the international community had for enforcement of its resolutions. Now, after the action in Iraq, which enforced the will of Resolution 1441, which told Iraq that if it did not disarm it would face serious consequences, now that Iraq has faced those serious consequences, I think we're on stronger ground in terms of other states recognizing that the continued pursuit of weapons of mass destruction will bring only isolation and unpleasant consequences, not great power status in international politics. And we're seeing, Ray, some very good effects of that, for instance in Libya, where Colonel Qaddafi has made the right choice to voluntarily give up his weapons of mass destruction. [Ray Suarez and Condoleezza Rice] RAY SUAREZ: What are the inducements for nations that may either be on the selling end or in the market place looking for either the materials or the technology, the inducements to comply? CONDOLEEZZA RICE: Well, the inducements are several. First of all, for states that are seriously simply trying to acquire civilian, peaceful, civilian nuclear power, the president's proposed that there be a source of fuel for them at a reasonable cost so that they do not have to enrich and reprocess fuels, which is the -- by which one can build a nuclear weapon. It's also the case that full enjoyment of membership in the international community, and all of the benefits that come with that, really should be for states that are in compliance and that are not dealing in these terrible weapons and trying to acquire them. I think that when we see a state like Libya that is trying to make amends -- it has said that it wants to voluntarily give up its weapons -- we will see that states like that do find an open door to better relations with the United States and others. So it really is both a carrot and a stick. On the stick side, if you are not living up to your obligations, if you are trading in these terrible technologies or if you are under the guise of civilian nuclear uses pursuing weapons of mass destruction, then you should be an international outlaw, outcast, and the international system should not deal with you. If, on the other hand, you are prepared to play by the rules, and in the case of a state like Libya, willing to try and reverse decades of bad behavior, then there ought to be an open door to better relations. Dealing with Iran and Pakistan RAY SUAREZ: Will you contemplate what you just called an "outcast" status for a country like Iran, which insists its program is peaceful, dedicated to the generation of electricity and also says it doesn't want international interference in its affairs? [Condoleezza Rice] CONDOLEEZZA RICE: Well, clearly, Iran is object number one, state number one that needs to be dealt with in this regard. The Iranians have said that they will try and get in line with their international obligation, signing the additional protocol, but they've not promised to give up their enrichment and reprocessing activities. And they need to do that, because if they want civilian nuclear power, they don't need to reprocess and enrich uranium. And absolutely, if Iran does not live up to its obligations, if it does not carry out the promises that it made to France and Great Britain and to Germany, if it does not carry out the obligations it's undertaken with the IAEA, then, indeed, it should be put in a category of states that are not complying and should suffer the consequences of that. RAY SUAREZ: Over the past couple of weeks, we found out that one of the greatest proliferators of recent times is probably Pakistan. Is the American administration confident at this point that Pakistan's military arsenal and its technology are both under lock and key in a way that they can't find their way into hostile hands? [Condoleezza Rice] CONDOLEEZZA RICE: Well, what we found is that there was a network operating out of Pakistan that represents a different path than a rogue state simply acquiring this technology on their own. But this A.Q. Khan network is, it's a kind of underworld, nuclear underworld -- entrepreneurs in the world's most dangerous technologies -- and operating out of Pakistan. But one has to understand that Pakistan has had a complete reorientation of its foreign policy under President Musharaff since Sept. 11, a reorientation that has made Pakistan a valuable, extremely important ally in the war on terror. It is, after all, how we caught Kalid Shaikh Mohammad, one of the most important of al-Qaida's field generals. It is a state that is moving to try and repair relations with India and to move to dialogue with India. It's a state where President Musharaff has given really remarkable statements about the importance of Pakistan refusing to be involved with extremism. It has withdrawn its support for the Taliban and we're clear that Pakistan is trying to be on the right side of these issues. And in this case of weapons of mass destruction and the Khan network, it is with Pakistan's very strong engagement that we have been able to now damage and hopefully put out of business the Khan network. Pakistan has given its assurances as recent as this weekend to Secretary Powell that it intends to cooperate fully and to give us access to all the information made available out of the interviews and investigations that it is doing of the Khan network. The goal now has to be to break up this network, to learn who its customers were, to know where its tentacles are and were, and to make certain that this doesn't happen again. And in that, we have a very good partner in Pakistan. The situation in Iraq [Ray Suarez and Condoleezza Rice] RAY SUAREZ: Turning now to Iraq, in the past two days, there have been two extremely bloody, very deadly car bomb attacks with a death toll of around 100. And they were targeting elements of Iraqi society that were cooperating with the American administration and starting to set up Iraqi institutions. If those kind of attacks continue, could that put the hand-over and the calendar for the hand-over in jeopardy? CONDOLEEZZA RICE: The Iraqis are making good progress toward the June 30 deadline, the June 30 transfer of sovereignty. It's an important date from the point of view of the Iraqis because it's a first step on the road to political development toward democracy. The people who are trying to stop that are clearly worried that when Iraq becomes prosperous and democratic and stable, that their grand designs to try and harm civilization, to try and roll back the clock to a day when freedom could not exist in this part of the world, they're clearly worried that their designs are going to be very much harmed by an Iraq that is stable. And that's what's happening. And we have every reason to believe that these are principally foreign terrorists, that these are people associated with al-Qaida. We saw recently the release of the memorandum about al-Zarqawi, a man who, by the way, was operating in Iraq before the war. Al-Zarqawi was operating -- his network operating in Baghdad, ordering, probably, the assassination of Mr. Foley, the U.S. aid worker in Jordan. This was the network that was planning poison attacks throughout Europe. He's known Iraq before. He's been there before. He's operated there before. And he and people like him have come back because this now is the central front in the war on terrorism, and when we succeed in Iraq, we will deal a very big blow to the designs of these terrorists. RAY SUAREZ: But in the case of some of these recent attacks, attacking police recruits, army trainees, if there is an attempt to keep the Iraqi populace from joining those institutions which would represent the new regime, could that endanger American plans in that region? [Condoleezza Rice] CONDOLEEZZA RICE: I believe the Iraqi people are tougher than that. I believe that the Iraqi people want a better future, that they understand that they are going to have to win their own freedom. They are going to have to win their own stability and their own prosperity. They are signing up and serving in the civil defense forces, signing up and serving in the police. Yes, they're taking enormous risks, and when we talk about the security situation we have to realize that Iraqis are taking tremendous risks for their own future. But they are aware that they are taking risks for a far better future. And I think you're going to continue to see the Iraqis sign up for those posts, continue to see the Iraqis try to make a better future for themselves and their children. But these are foreign terrorists. There are Iraqi Baathist, ex-Saddam loyalists who are still trying to do what they did to their fellow citizens for a long time, and that is oppress them and preserve their own privileges. But the entry of these foreign terrorists into Iraq means that they understand that this is the central front on the war on terror. And I can assure you that if they were not fighting the violent Jihad in Iraq, they would be fighting it someplace else. They're going to be defeated and we have every reason to believe that the Iraqi people are tough. And we will stay with them and by their side as they fight to achieve a free and democratic and prosperous Iraq. RAY SUAREZ: National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, thanks for being with us. CONDOLEEZZA RICE: Thank you, good to be with you. ***************************************************************** 26 Bush's Nuclear Proposal: Hypocrisy Charged Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2004 15:42:56 -0600 (CST) Institute for Public Accuracy 915 National Press Building, Washington, D.C. 20045 (202) 347-0020 * http://www.accuracy.org * ipa@accuracy.org ___________________________________________________ For Release 4:30 p.m. ET -- Wednesday, February 11, 2004 Bush's Nuclear Proposal: Hypocrisy Charged JOHN BURROUGHS, johnburroughs@lcnp.org, http://www.lcnp.org Burroughs is executive director of the New York-based Lawyers' Committee on Nuclear Policy. He said this afternoon: "While Bush proposes ad hoc measures to limit the capacity of other countries to produce nuclear materials usable in reactors or bombs, his administration has yet to agree to start negotiations on a verified treaty (the Fissile Materials Cutoff Treaty) that would bar all countries, including the United States, from their production for weapons purposes. All other major countries -- including China -- are ready to work on establishing such a ban.... In the 2005 budget he just proposed to Congress, spending would increase on planning for a facility to produce plutonium triggers for warheads..." JACQUELINE CABASSO, wslf@earthlink.net, http://www.wslfweb.org Cabasso is executive director of the Western States Legal Foundation and co-author of the report "Nuclear Weapons in a Changed World." She said today: "The central bargain of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty is indeed flawed. Under Article IV of the treaty, in exchange for giving up the right to possess nuclear weapons, the nonnuclear weapon states were promised an 'inalienable right' to develop nuclear technology for 'peaceful' purposes. In reality, that means that any country with a civilian nuclear power program has the potential to develop nuclear weapons. There are at least 44 of those countries -- not three, as Mr. Bush would have us believe. Only, at the moment, most of those countries, including our World War II enemies Japan and Germany, are our friends. Even more importantly, Article VI of the NPT requires the U.S., Russia, France, China and the U.K. to negotiate in good faith the total elimination of their nuclear arsenals...." GREG PALAST, greg@gregpalast.com, http://www.gregpalast.com In 2001, the BBC broadcast an expose co-investigated by Palast which reported that Bush's National Security Agency effectively stymied the probe of Khan Research Laboratories. ARJUN MAKHIJANI, arjun@ieer.org, http://www.ieer.org President of the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research, Makhijani said today: "President Bush said this afternoon that he wants North Korea to completely dismantle its nuclear weapons program; that he wants governments to stop making nuclear weapons 'under false pretenses.' But he seeks to maintain a huge U.S. arsenal and build new weapons. The consistent assertion by the United States that it needs nuclear weapons for its security and that it retains the prerogative to use them against any country, including non-nuclear states, is in violation of commitments given to them under the Nonproliferation Treaty. These U.S. policies have been a principal part of creating the desire, the demand for nuclear weapons...." FELICE COHEN-JOPPA, freevanunu@mindspring.com, http://www.nonviolence.org/vanunu, http://www.msnbc.com/news/wld/graphics/strategic_israel_dw.htm Cohen-Joppa is the coordinator of the U.S. Campaign to Free Mordechai Vanunu. She said today: "How can Bush pretend to seriously address nuclear weapons proliferation while the U.S. government continues to support the fiction that Israel does not have a massive nuclear arsenal? Israel's nuclear weapons have driven much of the proliferation problem in the Mideast. All the facts need to be on the table. Unfortunately Mordechai Vanunu -- the whistleblower who revealed the scale of Israel's nuclear capacity in 1986 -- has been silenced in an Israeli jail for 17 years, most of it in solitary confinement. He is scheduled for release on April 21, 2004, but there are moves in Israel to keep him imprisoned even longer, or to find some way of keeping him muzzled." For more information, contact at the Institute for Public Accuracy: Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; David Zupan, (541) 484-9167 _________________________________________________________________ You received this message as a subscriber on the list: public@lists.accuracy.org To be removed from the list, send any message to: public-unsubscribe@lists.accuracy.org For all list information and functions, including changing your subscription mode and options, visit the Web page: http://lists.accuracy.org/lists/info/public ***************************************************************** 27 [NukeNet] Bush to Propose N-Fuel Ban to End Spread of A-Bombs Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2004 19:12:14 -0800 Videos: http://www.envirovideo./com Mothersalert: http://www.mothersalert.org The administration officials said Mr. Bush would not call for a reopening of the 1970 treaty, which one said would be "too hard." Instead, he will appeal to the Nuclear Suppliers Group, 40 countries that sell most nuclear technology, to refuse to sell equipment to any country that is not already equipped to make nuclear fuel, either by enriching uranium or by reprocessing spent fuel for plutonium. But the officials did not describe any new enforcement mechanisms. http://www.nytimes.com http://snipurl.com/4fp0 http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/11/politics/11CND-PREX.html?hp Bush to Propose Fuel Ban to End Spread of A-Bombs By DAVID E. SANGER Published: February 11, 2004 ASHINGTON, Feb. 11 - President Bush is to announce a new proposal today to limit the number of nations allowed to produce nuclear fuel, senior administration officials said on Tuesday. He will declare that the global network in nuclear goods set up by Abdul Qadeer Khan, developer of Pakistan's bomb, exposed huge gaps in accords to stop the spread of nuclear weapons technology, they added. In an afternoon speech at the National Defense University, they said, Mr. Bush will call for a re-examination of what one official called the "basic bargain" underlying the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty: that those states that promise not to pursue nuclear weapons will receive help in producing nuclear fuel for power generation. Iran admitted last year that it had cheated on that agreement for 18 years, secretly building uranium enrichment facilities, though the country denied that it intended to produce weapons. North Korea abandoned the treaty last year and declared it was making nuclear arms. Dr. Khan's network secretly sold equipment to both countries, and to Libya, American and Pakistani officials have said. In a briefing on Tuesday evening, one administration official said Iran and North Korea were examples of "regimes which have cynically exploited loopholes in the existing treaty" to build up their capacity to produce weapons-grade nuclear fuel. While proliferation experts have long agreed that the treaty is flawed, Mr. Bush's proposal is bound to raise protests from developing nations, which say the United States and, by extension, the other declared nuclear states Britain, France, Russia and China are trying to extend their rights to produce weapons while denying that status to other states. In addition to those five, Israel, India and Pakistan have nuclear weapons, and North Korea is believed by American intelligence agencies to have at least two and perhaps several more. Israel is a particularly difficult case for the United States because it has never declared its nuclear ability and has never signed the nonproliferation treaty. Its Arab neighbors and Pakistan have said that any reopening of nuclear regulation should start with forcing Israel to sign the treaty. In the briefing, the official also said Mr. Bush would discuss for the first time the details of how Dr. Khan's network operated, being careful to praise President Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan and to portray Dr. Khan, the former head of Khan Research Laboratories, as a rogue scientist. Another administration official said Mr. Bush would cast the Khan case as a victory for American intelligence operations, describing "how we uncovered the reach of the network, how we identified the key individuals, how we followed the key transactions, and how we monitored the movement of material and recorded conversation and penetrated operations." The director of central intelligence, George J. Tenet, made a similar case last week, and administration officials clearly hope the story of the intelligence surrounding the Khan network will be a counterpoint to criticisms of how Iraq's weapons program was misjudged. The national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, was asked today in an interview on the NBC "Today" show whether the White House could explain how General Musharraf could have pardoned Dr. Khan after he admitted giving nuclear secrets to North Korea, Iran and Libya. "What President Musharraf has done is to give us the opportunity now to wrap up and to destroy what is one of the most active networks, the most active as we know it today, of this kind of shadowy underworld of nuclear entrepreneurs who are out there selling knowledge and expertise on the black market," Ms. Rice said. "And because of Pakistan's cooperation, because of Pakistan's action based on information that they've been receiving from a number of sources, and because of very good intelligence work by the United States, Great Britain and others, we really now have a chance to wrap up this group. And that's the most important thing." She said that the administration was pleased that General Musharraf had been willing to "go this far." "We have to understand that A.Q. Khan was a revered figure in Pakistan, extremely revered figure," she said. "Nonetheless, President Musharraf has taken these steps, and we're going to be able to make progress in an area that has been shadowy and very difficult to make progress in the past." Mr. Bush is also to identify B. S. A. Tahir, a Sri Lanka-born trader who moved to Dubai as a child, as the "other major node" in the Khan network. It was Mr. Tahir, who divides his time between Kuala Lumpur and Dubai, who negotiated with a Malaysian company called Scomi to produce parts for high-speed centrifuges, which enrich uranium, Scomi officials have said. It was the interception of one such shipment to Libya in October that allowed American intelligence officials to present Pakistan with evidence about Dr. Khan. In recent days, efforts to reach Mr. Tahir in Malaysia have been unsuccessful. He owns 49 percent of a computer company, S.M.B. Computers, in Dubai, according to Dubai government documents. Scomi officials have identified him as one of the men who negotiated the deal under which they produced the parts. Mr. Bush's speech will mark the first time Mr. Tahir has been publicly identified by the United States as a major player, though intelligence officials have mentioned, on background, what they say was his central role in arranging the transfer of centrifuge components from Malaysia to Dubai and on to Libya. Mr. Bush's proposals appear to be intended to crack down on states like North Korea and Iran without reopening negotiations that could limit the United States' own ability to produce nuclear fuel for weapons and power, or stop allies like Japan from producing such fuel for power plants. China says Japan's program could be diverted to weapons. He is expected to implicitly reject, for example, an alternative proposal by the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei, for an international organization to control the production of all nuclear fuel and how it is used. The Bush administration has already, in effect, dismissed that approach as unworkable, in part, experts say, because it would limit Washington's ability to produce fuel for its nuclear arsenal. Mr. Bush's insistence on moving ahead with research on a new class of so-called bunker-busting nuclear weapons has been cited by his opponents including many in Europe as an example of a double standard in which he seeks to stop other states from building weapons while continuing to improve the American arsenal. The official also said in the briefing that Mr. Bush would propose expanding the Nunn-Lugar program, in which Congress appropriates funds to destroy weapons and retrain former Soviet weapons experts. His plan would extend the program to scientists in other nations, including Iraq. But Mr. Bush will propose no new financing, and no expansion of the program is included in the budget he sent to Congress last week. Democrats say the existing program is underfinanced. Mr. Bush will also call for an expansion of the Proliferation Security Initiative, a loose affiliation of countries, organized by the United States, to intercept unconventional weapons. The seizure of the Libyan shipment in October was the biggest single success, though other equipment has been seized on the way to North Korea. In the briefing, the administration official said Mr. Bush would propose several changes to the internal operations of the International Atomic Energy Agency. The agency, which has had rocky relations with the Bush administration over Iraq, did not know that Mr. Bush planned to speak on nonproliferation until informed by a reporter on Tuesday. The official said Mr. Bush would call for a new committee within the agency to monitor compliance with "safeguards" agreements, which allow inspection where nuclear fuel or weapons work may be conducted. He will also call on the agency's board to bar from it any country under investigation. Iran was a board member throughout a confrontation last year over allowing full inspections of its facilities. _______________________________________________________________________ Subscribe/Unsubscribe Here: http://www.energyjustice.net/nukenet/ Change your settings at: http://chrome.nocdirect.com/mailman/listinfo/nukenet_energyjustice.net ***************************************************************** 28 IPS-English POLITICS: New U.S. Plans for Nukes Hypocritical, Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2004 18:43:03 -0800 ROMAIPS NA WD ML IP POLITICS: New U.S. Plans for Nukes Hypocritical, Say Experts By Thalif Deen UNITED NATIONS, Feb 11 (IPS) - Proposed new U.S. curbs on the proliferation of nuclear weapons are fundamentally hypocritical, U.S. academics, military analysts and peace activists said Wednesday. ''(U.S.) President George Bush seems committed to writing a new chapter in the grotesque saga of U.S. nuclear policy: 'do as we say, not as we do','' Norman Solomon, executive director of the Institute for Public Accuracy, told IPS. Solomon was responding to a major policy statement by Bush, who told the National Defence University on Wednesday that Washington plans to limit the number of nations permitted to produce nuclear fuel, in its attempt to curb the spread of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). ''We must confront the danger with open eyes and unbending purpose,'' Bush said. ''I've made clear to all the policy of this nation: America will not permit the terrorists and dangerous regimes to threaten us with the world's most dangerous weapons.'' Solomon said that throughout the nuclear era, ''the U.S. president has claimed the right to play "nuclear God", proclaiming which nations have a holy right to nuclear weapons, and which nations would be guilty of a terrible sin by acquiring nuclear weapons''. ''But even the world's only superpower cannot force the nations of the world to worship the edicts from Washington,'' said Solomon, co-author of 'Killing our Own: the Disaster of America's Experience with Atomic Radiation'. Currently, there are five declared nuclear powers, all permanent members of the U.N. Security Council -- the United States, Britain, France, China and Russia. The other three countries known to possess nuclear weapons are India, Pakistan and Israel. But U.S. intelligence believes that even North Korea has successfully gone nuclear. The Bush administration went to war with Iraq last March on the grounds that it had nuclear, biological and chemical weapons. But none have been found so far. The United States has also accused Iran and Syria of developing WMD. Both countries have denied the charge. Last week the head of Pakistan's nuclear weapons programme, Abdul Qadeer Khan, confessed he helped transfer nuclear technology to Libya. Last December, Libyan leader Muammar el-Qaddafi publicly proclaimed he was dismantling his proposed nuclear weapons programmes. ''The Bush administration is being hypocritical by criticising other countries for nuclear proliferation while it continues to develop nuclear weapons of its own,'' says Natalie Goldring, executive director of programmes on global security and disarmament at the University of Maryland. ''Preventing further proliferation of nuclear weapons is a vital national security. But the Bush administration has undermined its credibility by pursuing new nuclear weapons programmes, and moving towards resuming nuclear testing,'' Goldring told IPS. She said the Pakistani network might be just the tip of the iceberg. ''President Bush is correct to devote more attention to non-proliferation. But we also need to devote the financial resources necessary to control nuclear weapons material. The Bush administration has not done so,'' she added. Francis A. Boyle, professor of international law at the University of Illinois College of Law, told IPS the Bush administration's ''rank hypocrisy of nuclear non-proliferation'' could not be more apparent. The United States, he said, is already in ''material breach'' of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which says, ''each of the parties to the treaty undertakes to pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to the cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament, and on a treaty of general and complete disarmament under strict and effective international control.'' ''The Bush administration also stands in anticipatory breach of the so-called negative security assurances that the United States government gave to the NPT non-nuclear weapons states, that it would not use nuclear weapons against them in return for their renewal and indefinite extension of the NPT,'' said Boyle, author of 'The Criminality of Nuclear Deterrence.' He said Bush had already ordered the Pentagon to target several non-nuclear weapons states, a move that goes to the very heart of the bargain behind the NPT. Both Boyle and Solomon also pointed to the U.S.' double standard in curbing nuclear weapons in the Arab world but ignoring Israel's nuclear arsenal. ''In the Middle East, the big nuclear elephant in the living room -- which Bush refuses to acknowledge as a problem -- is Israel,'' said Solomon. When former chief U.N. arms inspector Hans Blix arrived in Baghdad in Nov 2002, he expressed hope for a ''zone free of weapons of mass destruction in the Middle East as a whole''. Solomon said Blix was referring to actions taken by the U.N. Security Council after the 1991 Gulf War that acknowledged the need for a nuclear-free zone for the entire region, including Iran and Israel. ''The U.S. government cannot make a reasonable case as to why it's OK for Israel to have a stockpile of about 200 nuclear warheads but it's not OK for any other nation in the Middle East to pursue nuclear weapons technology,'' he said. ''As for the U.S. government, it has arrogantly violated its obligations under the (non-proliferation) treaty by not only failing to work toward nuclear disarmament, but also by continuing to develop even more technologically advanced nuclear weapons, including the current push for 'bunker-busting' nuclear arms that reflect ongoing Pentagon interest in using nuclear weapons for war-fighting,'' he added. ***** +Institute for Public Accuracy (http://www.accuracy.org/) +University of Maryland (http://www.umd.edu/) (END/IPS/NA/WD/ML/IP/TD/ML/04) = 02112355 ORP019 NNNN ***************************************************************** 29 Future Warfare: Microwave Weapons From Bruce Gagnon Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2004 13:11:40 -0500 ----- Original Message ----- From: Global Network To: Global Network Against Weapons Sent: Wednesday, February 11, 2004 11:29 AM Subject: PROTEST AT WEAPONS SYMPOSIUM Bruce K. Gagnon Coordinator Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space PO Box 652 Brunswick, ME 04011 (207) 729-0517 (352) 871-7554 (Cell phone) http://www.space4peace.org globalnet@mindspring.com Current Issue: Wednesday, February 11, 2004 Home > News E-Bombs future for weaponry By Ryan Floersheim Published: Wednesday, February 11, 2004 Media Credit: Courtesy of Edl Schamiloglu Edl Schamiloglu, right, poses with a group of visiting Russian scientists next to one of UNM´s high-powered microwave sources. Portions of the University´s microwave research have been used for military weapon advancement. High-powered microwave weapons, capable of winning wars without causing human casualties, just may be the future of warfare. One UNM professor has been working quietly in a laboratory on campus since 1988, trying to work out the kinks in the new microwave technology. Edl Schamiloglu, a professor of electrical and computer engineering, has received more than $12 million for his research on the high-powered microwaves, called directed energy. He said the intense waves of energy have countless real-world applications, and one party interested in them is the Pentagon. In fact, a large portion of his funding has come from the Air Force Office of Scientific Research. It is that relationship with the military that has earned Schamiloglu more than his share of media attention lately. In 2003, articles regarding the potential military uses of the microwave technology sprung up in national publications such as The New York Times and the Washington Post. Schamiloglu admitted the technology can and may already be used in special microwave weapons that detonate near a target, and with their blasts of electromagnetic waves, melt communications circuitry without harming nearby humans. "However, a lot of what we do just goes to support science and engineering education," he said. "Most people just assume that when research is supported by the federal government that it is going toward the military." However, the Defense Department is already using his research to develop such weapons, he said. "When the DOD supports a research project, it usually means they have plans for it down the road," Schamiloglu said. The microwave research at UNM is closely linked to the Air Force's Research Laboratory at neighboring Kirtland Air Force Base, Schamiloglu said. The lab is the Pentagon's center for research on microwave weapons, more commonly called E-Bombs. The military presence on UNM's campus, regardless of its purpose, has drawn criticism and protest from many people in the community. "All these programs are basically the public subsidizing this country's military war machine," said Bruce Gagnon, coordinator of the Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space, a national coalition opposed to nuclear research. "It is ironic that the words humane and weapons are in the same sentence." Gagnon said it is ethically and morally wrong to develop weapons on college campuses, regardless of what kind they are. Schamiloglu is not the only UNM researcher whose work goes to furthering the military's technological goals. Mohamed El-Genk, a professor of chemical and nuclear engineering, has had a hand in the development of the Air Force's Prometheus nuclear rocket project, according to national news releases. Gagnon, the global network and protesters from across the world are in town this week to ask El-Genk and other nuclear researchers attending an annual nuclear symposium here to reconsider their work. El-Genk could not be reached for comment. "Bringing in profit at the expense of killing people is not what higher education is supposed to be about," said Bob Anderson, an adjunct professor at UNM, about the weapons research on campus. "The University is trying to increase its military contracts. There are more honorable ways to make money." Still, Schamiloglu said his research with the microwave technology can be used for many things other than the military. He said since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, U.S. officials have realized just how vulnerable the country's citizens are to similar weapons. While the microwave technology itself is very complex, Schamiloglu said it is possible for terrorist groups to construct a crude electromagnetic bomb capable of crippling the country's communications network. "We are at the forefront of knowledge," he said. "As always, that knowledge can be used for both good and evil purposes. We have to do our job the best we can and realize that we are just a small part of a bigger picture." ***************************************************************** 30 Russian Nuclear War Games Underway Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2004 13:45:21 -0500 http://www.nytimes.com http://snipurl.com/4fpg http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Russia-Military-Exercise.html Russia Tests Measures Vs. Missile Defense By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Published: February 10, 2004 Filed at 9:15 p.m. ET MOSCOW (AP) -- Russia is in the midst of a strategic military exercise motivated in part by Moscow's concerns about U.S. plans to develop new types of nuclear weapons, a top general said Tuesday. The exercise, which began in late January on the headquarters level, will later involve the launch of several ballistic missiles and flights by strategic bombers, said Col.-Gen. Yuri Baluyevsky, the first deputy chief of the General Staff of the Russian armed forces. Baluyevsky dismissed media reports that the exercise closely resembles Soviet-era simulations of an all-out nuclear war with the United States, saying that it's not directed against any specific country. ``The enemy is imaginary,'' Baluyevsky said at a news conference. ``There is no hint whatsoever that the enemy is the United States, or any other country.'' At the same time Baluyevsky said the exercise reflects Russia's concern about the development of low-yield nuclear weapons in the United States, which he described as destabilizing. ``Shouldn't we react to that?'' he said. ``I'm sure that we should and we are doing that.'' He said the maneuvers will also help Russia develop the means to penetrate missile defenses, another priority of the U.S. military. Moscow informed the U.S. government in advance of the exercise, in keeping with its arms control treaty obligations, Baluyevsky said. He added that Russia wasn't trying to scare anyone. ``It's not saber-rattling. It's not aimed at scaring our strategic partners, the United States and NATO,'' Baluyevsky said. ``We are doing what the military is intended for: getting ready for solving tasks in any possible conflict.'' He dismissed media reports that Russian strategic bombers would test-fire missiles over the north At lantic as part of the exercise, but refused to disclose their flight routes. During the Cold War, Soviet bombers routinely flew over the northern Atlantic on training missions that imitated a nuclear attack on the United States. Russia last sent its bombers there in 1999, after its relations with the United States had worsened sharply over the NATO air campaign against the former Yugoslavia. U.S.-Russian ties improved with President Vladimir Putin's support for Washington after the Sept. 11 2001 terror attacks, but have since soured over Moscow's opposition to the war in Iraq and U.S. concerns about Kremlin backsliding on democracy. A defense bill signed by President Bush in November lifts a decade-old ban on research into low-yield nuclear weapons. The so-called ``mininukes'' would have an explosive effect smaller than five kilotons, about a third the size of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Advocates of the low-yield weapons say they could limit the number of civilian deaths if nuclear weapons were used. Opponents say they would blur the distinction between nuclear and conventional weapons and increase the likelihood that nuclear weapons might be used. Baluyevsky dismissed media claims that the exercise was a political show aimed at bolstering President Vladimir Putin's popularity in the run-up to the March 14 presidential election, which he is expected to win easily. ``This is neither the opening of the election campaign nor a demonstration of our nuclear fist to the entire world,'' Baluyevsky said. ***************************************************************** 31 [DU-WATCH] al-Quaeda's nukes Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2004 01:25:55 -0600 (CST) Al-Qaida may have nuclear weapons Sunday 08 February 2004, 22:05 Makka Time, 19:05 GMT A pan-Arab newspaper has said al-Qaida bought tactical nuclear weapons from Ukraine in 1998 and is storing them in safe places for possible use. ..... ___________________________________ Source: http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/F660673E-66F7-48A0-868B- E4E9FBC7469F.htm ..There was no independent corroboration of the report on Sunday, which appeared in the newspaper al-Hayat under an Islamabad dateline and cited sources close to the Islamist network. The newspaper claimed al-Qaida bought the weapons in suitcases in a deal arranged when Ukrainian scientists visited the Afghan city of Kandahar in 1998. The city was then a stronghold of a Taliban government that refused to hand over Usama bin Ladin for trial abroad. The report claims al-Qaida could use the weapons inside the United States or anywhere else should the network face a "crushing blow" which threatened its existence. Feasible Ukraine inherited nuclear weapons from the Soviet Union but in 1994 it agreed to send 1900 nuclear warheads to Russia and sign up to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. After the Soviet Union broke up in 1991, a former Russian National Security Adviser, Alexander Lebed, said that up to 100 portable suitcase-sized bombs were unaccounted for. Moscow has denied such weapons existed, but Lebed said each one was equivalent to 1000 tons of TNT and could kill as many as 100,000 people. Al-Hayat did not say how many weapons al-Qaida bought or say who exactly had provided them. The United States has repeatedly said its worst fear is that a group like al-Qaida might obtain access to weapons of mass destruction and use them against the American people. ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~--> Buy Ink Cartridges or Refill Kits for your HP, Epson, Canon or Lexmark Printer at MyInks.com. Free s/h on orders $50 or more to the US & Canada. http://www.c1tracking.com/l.asp?cid=5511 http://us.click.yahoo.com/mOAaAA/3exGAA/qnsNAA/Sj.0lB/TM ---------------------------------------------------------------------~-> [Brought to you by HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK] Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/du-watch/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: du-watch-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ***************************************************************** 32 SMH: Bush to crack down on nuclear black market - www.smh.com.au [Sydney Morning Herald Online] February 12, 2004 US President George Bush is to announce a broad strategy to stop the spread of nuclear weapons. He plans to act against a booming black market and to deny sales of some legal equipment to countries that do not agree to close international supervision. In a speech today Mr Bush will detail the nuclear supply network run by Abdul Qadeer Khan, the creator of Pakistan's bomb, and press for changes in 30-year-old rules governing the delivery and verification of nuclear technology, US officials said. In the speech at the National Defence University, he will call for a re-examination of what one official called the "basic bargain" underlying the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty: that countries promising not to pursue nuclear weapons will receive help in developing nuclear power. Mr Bush will try to prevent more states from becoming able to manufacture weapons-grade material by calling on governments to block transfers of nuclear components to nations that are not already equipped with enrichment and reprocessing facilities. The move would go against the Non-Proliferation Treaty, which permits enrichment for peaceful purposes. He will propose that countries professing a need for nuclear reactor fuel be able to buy it in a "reliable and cost-effective way", discouraging them from perfecting weapons programs under the guise of developing peaceful nuclear power, one official said. Mr Bush intends to declare that aspiring nuclear weapons states face a stark choice. They can choose the path of Libya's Muammar Gaddafi, who agreed to end his nuclear weapons program in December in return for assurances of economic investment and diplomatic engagement. Or they can persist and endure the isolation faced by North Korea or the regime change imposed on Iraq. Mr Bush also intends to propose changes to the UN nuclear watchdog organisation. His proposals tap into growing international worries about the availability of nuclear technology and the determination of some governments - and perhaps terrorist organisations - to develop atomic weapons. However, many of the President's steps may prove difficult to implement. The US does not have the power to make many of the changes alone. A number of the proposals depend on voluntary action by other countries. Mr Bush wants to investigate and imprison nuclear suppliers and distributors, which would require countries to draft laws defining the crime. One challenge is to defeat shadowy networks of traders who have begun procuring, packaging and selling portable nuclear parts and expertise. Another is to solve the riddle of North Korea, which evicted international inspectors in 2002 and declared its determination to perfect its nuclear program. In his speech, Mr Bush will describe US efforts to put Khan and his supply network out of business. US and European authorities say the network supplied virtually all of Libya's nuclear weapons program. Mr Bush will describe the network's reach "and the fact that we followed their transactions, monitored their travel, recorded their conversations and penetrated their operations". Washington Post, New York Times Copyright © 2004. The Sydney Morning Herald. ***************************************************************** 33 BBC: Radioactive matter missing in China Last Updated: Wednesday, 11 February, 2004 Chinese police are urgently searching for a quantity of radioactive material stolen from a construction site. The football-sized lump of Caesium-137 may have been mistaken for scrap metal, the official China Daily said. The material explodes when brought into contact with water, and can cause blood diseases, tumours and birth defects, officials warned. Officials in central Shaanxi province have asked anyone who finds it not to open it and to put it in a safe place. Some 120 police officers and 80 local officials have started searching an area of more than 2 square km around the site of the theft, and have offered up to 5,000 yuan ($602) for clues as to its location, according to the China Daily. Caesium-137 has a wide variety of uses, from food and medical sterilisation to survey gauges and batteries. It is not clear what it was doing on a construction site in Pucheng County, Shaanxi. Zhu Guoying, at the Shanghai Radioactive Materials Research Institute, told the Associated Press that the amount of danger from the Cesium would depend on its purity. "In a worst-case scenario, it could severely pollute the environment in the area if were melted as waste metal," she said. ***************************************************************** 34 Economic Times: US says it provided nuke proliferation info to Pak Indiatimes>The Economic Times >Politics/Nation >Article TV PARASURAM PTI[ WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 11, 2004 09:43:41 AM ] WASHINGTON: Seeking to disprove Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf's claim that the US had not given him convincing proof about nuclear proliferation activities, the State Department has said that it provided "pieces of information" from time to time as part of the "ongoing dialogue" on the issue. "We have talked to them at different moments about different issues that might have arisen that we might have learned about. So it is not a single moment of information", State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said on Tuesday. "It's rather an ongoing dialogue that covered both the general concerns that we have had about possibilities, and then from time to time, pieces of information that related to different aspects of things that we might have encountered or known were going on," he said. In an interview with the New York Times on Monday, Musharraf shared blame for the delay with Washington, saying it was not until October that American officials provided him with evidence of the activities of the scientist, Abdul Qadeer Khan. But, Boucher said the US non-proliferation dialogue with Pakistan certainly goes back much farther than October (when Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage went to Pakistan) "What I would say is that we have had longstanding concerns about proliferation that could come from Pakistan. We have discussed non-proliferation issues with Pakistan repeatedly over a long period of time and it has been an issue of concern to us and President Musharraf as well", he said. Continued Copyright © 2004 Times Internet Limited. All rights reserved. | ***************************************************************** 35 Daily Times: US confirms illicit nuclear activity in Pakistan has stopped Thursday, February 12, 2004 * State Department reiterates confidence in Pakistan Staff Report WASHINGTON: Richard Boucher, the State Department spokesman, repeated on Tuesday that Pakistan had taken the nuclear question “seriously over time and particularly with regard to the current investigation”. He added that Pakistan was trying to make sure that it is not a source of proliferation. He told journalists at his daily briefing, “We welcome that progress and will continue to work with Pakistan as Pakistan investigates, and also works itself, with the international community.” He said, in answer to a question, “I’m not in a position to go into what we said to the Pakistani government at different moments, because that gets into what we knew at different times about activity that was going on. What I would say is that we have had longstanding concerns about proliferation that could come from Pakistan. We’ve discussed non-proliferation issues with Pakistan repeatedly over a long period of time and it’s been an issue of concern to us and to President Musharraf as well. “We have talked to them about the potential for onward proliferation from Pakistan. We have talked to them at different moments about different issues that might have arisen that we might have learned about. So it’s not a single moment of information.” Mr Boucher confirmed earlier that President Pervez Musharraf had “indeed stopped the activity that was going on” and his government’s statements made it clear that “they’re going to find out everything they can and share that information with the International Atomic Energy Agency”. He said President Musharraf had made clear that the pardon to Dr Qadeer Khan was conditional. The spokesman said Deputy Secretary Richard Armitage had indeed talked to the Pakistani government at various levels about non-proliferation issues. Mr Boucher said the proliferation issue had been worked on with Pakistan many times since the Bush administration came to office. He denied that Mr Armitage, during his October 2003 visit to Pakistan, had shared CIA intelligence about Dr AQ Khan with President Musharraf. He said the US had shared the information with other governments, but declined to name them. He said, “We can all learn about those involved in this operation throughout the world. We can learn where it went to and what capabilities they might have acquired through it. But even more than that, we can make sure it stops.” Asked if Pakistan would permit American troops to operate against Al Qaeda and the Taliban on its soil, the spokesman replied, “The goal is not to have US troops here, there or anywhere. The goal is to stop the terrorism and is to get rid of the remnants that are there. And the United States, along with Pakistan and Afghanistan, have worked very closely together to do that, and we will continue to do that in a way that meets the needs of all the parties to wipe out the remnants of Al Qaeda and Taliban.” About the security of Pakistan’s nuclear assets, Mr Boucher said the US had discussed with Pakistan the safety of its nuclear programme, “but we are prevented by law and the Non-proliferation Treaty, for that matter, from getting involved in the safety of nuclear weapons, questions involving nuclear weapons.” Home | Daily Times - All Rights Reserved Site developed and hosted by WorldCALL Internet Solutions ***************************************************************** 36 Daily Times: US not asking to share details of probe: FO Thursday, February 12, 2004 ISLAMABAD: Foreign Office Spokesman Masood Khan said on Tuesday that the US had not asked Pakistan to share details of investigations into the nuclear proliferation issue, with the rest of the world. “Nothing of this sort has been agreed during the telephone conversation between President Musharraf and US Secretary of State Colin Powell,” the spokesman told BBC radio. He said Mr Powell appreciated the investigation and the decision taken by the Pakistan government. The president told him about the steps taken by Pakistan and assured him that all channels of leaking information had been closed and the country’s nuclear programme was in safe hands. He said Pakistan had already been cooperating with the international community and would continue to do so. “We are in constant contact with the International Atomic Energy Agency and if we find any network like that, we will cooperate with the international community to unveil it,” he added. About the US secretary of state’s visit to Pakistan he said no date had been finalised yet. He said, “The US and Pakistan are cooperating in many fields. Whenever Mr Powell visits Pakistan we shall discuss bilateral relations with him.” —APP Home | Main Daily Times - All Rights Reserved ***************************************************************** 37 Daily Times: ‘I suspected Dr Khan’s activities for three years’ Thursday, February 12, 2004 * President says Pakistan ‘nipped proliferation in bud’ in 2001 by removing Dr Khan * Denies Pakistan provided N-tech to DPRK * Says ‘we will think about it’ whether to shield Dr Khan from IAEA NEW YORK: President Pervez Musharraf suspected for at least three years that Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan, the country’s top nuclear scientist, was transferring atomic technology to other nations and removed him as a head of a weapons lab because of those suspicions, The New York Times reported on Tuesday. Musharraf, in an interview with paper said that he forced Dr Khan to retire from the lab in March 2001. “We nipped the proliferation in the bud, we stopped the proliferation,” Gen Musharraf told the newspaper on Monday. “That is the important part.” Musharraf told the Times that he couldn’t act earlier on his suspicions because he didn’t have enough evidence to make the politically sensitive arrest of Dr Khan, a national hero because of his role in developing Pakistan’s nuclear weapons. “It was extremely sensitive,” he said. “One couldn’t outright start investigating as if he’s any common criminal.” Musharraf said he was concerned about the potential political backlash that an investigation against Dr Khan could have unleashed. It was not until October that US authorities provided Pakistan with specific evidence of wrongdoing by the scientist, Musharraf said. Musharraf denied allegations that Pakistan provided nuclear technology to North Korea in exchange for ballistic missile technology and he said his government was still trying to determine exactly what technology was turned over to Pyongyang. The president also seemed to retreat from his earlier position that he would shield Dr Khan from the International Atomic Energy Agency, the nuclear watchdog agency of the United Nations. “We need to think about it,” he said. —Agencies Home | National Daily Times - All Rights Reserved Site developed and hosted by WorldCALL Internet Solutions ***************************************************************** 38 Daily Times: Dr Khan and associates not scientists but bomb-makers - Hoodbhoy Thursday, February 12, 2004 * Dr Khan could not have transferred nuke technology on his own WASHINGTON: Noted Pakistani physicist Dr Pervez Hoodbhoy said here on Monday that to call Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan and his associates scientists was a “slur on science” as they were not scientists but “bomb-makers”. In a lecture at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Dr Hoodbhoy said Dr Khan was a metallurgist who was responsible for the enrichment of uranium required for a weapon, while the weapon was actually built by the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission people. He said Pakistan had made the bomb in 1985-86, while the first contacts with Iran started in 1987 and continued until 2000. The Pakistani anti-nuclear campaigner said it was not possible for Dr Khan to have passed on nuclear technology to other countries on his own. The level of security at Kahuta was “incredibly high” as he knew from his own students, some of whom worked there, said Dr Hoodbhoy, adding that all that could have gone out of there unnoticed was perhaps “an idea or two” but there was no question of any equipment leaving those nuclear facilities undetected by the security personnel, overseen by a Lt General of the army. Dr Hoodbhoy said in answer to a question that Pakistan would now be forced into accepting a monitoring system that the international community would consider reliable and reassuring. The country would be subjected to a “very high degree of pressure,” he added. There would be strict monitoring of the uranium enrichment process to determine what went in and what came out. There would be insistence that Pakistan institute an audit system governing fissile material. He said that the “ethos” of those involved in the nuclear establishment was solidly middle class and conservative. Their worldview was accordingly shaped, he pointed out. He said Pakistan’s defence budget was not transparent as it consisted on “just one line”. Dr Hoodbhoy said transferring technology to Libya was a strange decision as the country had no technical base and its decision-making was “quirky and idiosyncratic”. It was lucky for the world that what Libya was given did not get transformed into a weapon. He accused India of having triggered a nuclear race in South Asia, starting with its first bomb in 1974. India’s missile programme had caused Pakistan to follow suit. No amount of pressure, he predicted, would stop Pakistan from taking the necessary steps in missile development every time India went ahead with another upgrading or test of its missiles, one of which was Pakistan-specific. Asked about Dr Khan’s motivation, Dr Hoodbhoy called him a Pakistani nationalist who vowed in 1971 that he would do what he could to make Pakistan safe from further dismemberment. That was when he approached Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and was invited to come. He came and with him he brought the necessary uranium enrichment technology. He said he helped Pakistan make the bomb and he also made money for himself. He said Dr Khan had broken no law as Pakistan was not an NPT signatory. He also said that President Musharraf could not possibly have had knowledge of nuclear transfers to Libya as they had begun years earlier and came to an end in 2000. He said Libya bankrolled Pakistan’s nuclear programme at its inception. Saudi Arabia also provided financial help. Asked about Dr Khan’s exposure, Dr Hoodbhoy said President Musharraf had acted out of compulsion as the United States was “breathing down his neck”. He said the deal with Dr Khan could be called plea-bargaining. He predicted that this was “not the end of the matter” as further new revelations would come. He said the US used a double standard in nuclear matters. American satellites, for instance, were not permitted to take any photographs when they flew over Israel. Asked how thorough the Pakistani investigation into the nuclear leaks, sales and transfers was going to be, he replied that the investigation was being handled by the ISI, the very agency that was responsible for the security of the compromised programme. Dr Hoodbhoy warned that the danger did not lie in Pakistan but in Russia where there were hundreds of disassemble nuclear weapons just “rotting away.” Washington had stopped buying them as it had started to do because it had taken the position that this amounted to giving assistance to Russia. He said there was “tons of fissile uranium and plutonium” in Russia and that was posed “the real danger”. —Khalid Hasan Home | National Daily Times - All Rights Reserved ***************************************************************** 39 Daily Times: ‘Pakistan’s nukes could fall into Qaeda hands’ Thursday, February 12, 2004 NEW DELHI: Israel on Tuesday expressed concern that international terror groups such as Al Qaeda could access nuclear weapons through clandestine proliferation by scientists in countries like Pakistan. Visiting Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom told reporters that Israel was very concerned that “extreme organisations like Al Qaeda” could acquire nuclear weapons. This, he added could “destabilise the entire world”. “We believe this is a global threat and democracies around the world should take steps to disarm regimes that will bring destruction to their neighbours and others,” Mr Shalom said. Mr Shalom was responding to a question on the impact of clandestine proliferation of nuclear weapons by Pakistani scientists. Last week, Pakistan’s top nuclear boffin AQ Khan publicly admitted his role in black market operation trading in nuclear information with Iran, North Korea and Libya. Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, calling Khan a “national hero” for bringing technology for the nuclear bomb to Pakistan, granted him pardon on the federal cabinet’s recommendation on Thursday. On Friday, India called for “more responsible behaviour” by nuclear-capable states and sought a wider debate on the subject in international forums, including the International Atomic Energy Agency. Mr Shalom, who arrived in New Delhi late Monday from a day-long visit to Bombay, held talks on Tuesday with Indian Foreign Minister Yashwant Sinha and Deputy Prime Minister Lal Krishna Advani. After his meeting with Mr Sinha, Mr Shalom told a press conference that he welcomed the growing co-operation between Israel and India in the fight against terrorism. “Terror is an enemy which threatens our common values and our shared way of life. Israel and India are natural partners in the struggle against it,” he said. Mr Shalom said Israel appreciated the recent steps taken by Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee to improve relations with archrival Pakistan. On his part, Mr Shalom said he had briefed Mr Sinha on Israel’s efforts to achieve peace in the Middle East. “Israel is faithfully pursuing a very genuine opportunity to advance political arrangements that could lead to lasting peace in the region,” he said. Mr Sinha, meanwhile, said bilateral talks with Mr Shalom highlighted the “identity of views” on issues like terrorism. On the situation in the Middle East, Mr Sinha said, “India hopes for the early return of a just, comprehensive and durable peace in the region. In this regard, we have also noted the positive aspects of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s recent announcement proposing relocation of 20 settlements in the occupied territories.” Mr Shalom was due to meet premier Vajpayee, Defence Minister George Fernandes and President Abdul Kalam on Wednesday before returning home. —AFP Home | National Daily Times - All Rights Reserved Site developed and hosted by WorldCALL Internet Solutions ***************************************************************** 40 Daily Times: Not even Dr Khan is above the law - Kasuri Thursday, February 12, 2004 By Khalid Hasan WASHINGTON: Pakistani Foreign Minister Khurshid Mehmood Kasuri told the Washington Post in an interview published here on Tuesday that Dr Abdul Qadeer was not performing another service to the country by taking the rap for illicit nuclear transfers from Pakistan. In what is described as a long conversation by the newspaper’s columnist Jim Hoagland, Mr Kasuri told him that Pakistan was a responsible nuclear nation and “we had to demonstrate to the world that not even AQ Khan is above the law”. He said, “The US should take it into account and engage Pakistan fully on nuclear and defence matters.” The meeting between the minister and the columnist, who has often written in caustic and cynical terms about Pakistan, took place in Munich on the sidelines of the Conference on Security Policy. Mr Kasuri said, “Nobody could touch him. Imagine an American government doing this to Charles Lindbergh, or Albert Einstein, at the height of his popularity. Dr AQ Khan is that kind of national hero in Pakistan.” He added that Dr Khan’s “original nuclear larceny” gave Pakistan a “strategic balance”. The foreign minister provided the newspaper with a detailed description of the scientist’s operations, Musharraf’s tracking of and final confrontation with Khan, and Dr Khan’s confession of wrongdoing. Mr Kasuri asserted that Pakistani public opinion made it impossible for President Musharraf to impose legal penalties on Khan and survive. “Look, we knew we would be accused of knuckling under to the Americans,” he said. “We are not doing that. The Pakistani people must understand that there will be no nuclear rollback. We have scheduled new missile tests to make that point. We are a declared nuclear power and the world must accept it. We are, however, taking steps to control our nuclear assets more carefully and halt proliferation,” he added. According to the Post, “Musharraf became suspicious of Khan in 2001 and eased him out of control of the country’s nuclear laboratories, according to Kasuri. Up to that point, the government and the public seemed to accept Khan’s lavish lifestyle and grandiose philanthropy as Pakistani corruption as usual, as he had access to un-audited public funds. ‘But five months ago, international leaders came to President Musharraf with new information that made us understand we had to take measures. We were devastated,’ said Kasuri, who declined to be more precise. Others pinpoint a voluminous CIA file on Pakistani proliferation as the source of the damning intelligence that US officials passed to Musharraf.” Mr Kasuri dismissed as “nonsense” the view that the timing of the Khan affair had anything to do with the two assassination attempts on President Musharraf by extremists “with whom Khan and Pakistan’s intelligence service are suspected of sympathising”. According to Mr Hoagland, “Kasuri’s message was more diffuse but no less urgent: There is a one-year window of opportunity’ in an embryonic peace effort with India. While Musharraf is both president and chief of staff of the armed forces, we will be able to speak with one voice, and breakthroughs can be made. Musharraf’s recent actions give new credibility to such appeals for US support. But conditions should still be attached: An urgent one is to be sure that Pakistan has in fact learned everything about the networks of proliferation that have been centred there, and is fully disclosing that information to the United States.” Home | National Daily Times - All Rights Reserved ***************************************************************** 41 Hi Pakistan: Opposition demands debate on N-plan in the parliament February 12 2004 LAHORE: Opposition parties have demanded that the issue concerning country's nuclear programme, scientists and engineers should be presented to parliament. This would enable the people to know if the nuclear establishments were safe, PPP Senator Sardar Lateef Khan Khosa said at a news conference here on Tuesday. "We in the ARD have requisitioned a Senate session to agitate the issue because we feel that the regime is mishandling this extremely sensitive matter with impunity, making one party scapegoat and exonerating others who are equally responsible in making the biggest scandal of our history." Mr Khosa said the treatment meted out to Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan and other nuclear scientists amounted to insulting national heroes. The regime should have taken the representatives of the people into confidence, the PPP legislator said. PPP's MPA Raja Shafqat Abbasi, PML-N MPA Rana Mashhood Khan, People's Lawyers Forum leaders Malik Ghulam Rasool and Shahid Mahmood Bhatti, Muslim League Lawyers Forum's Abdul Wahid Khan and Sirajul Islam besides Punjab Bar Council's executive committee chairperson Pervez Inayat Malik were also present at the press conference. Senator Khosa said that the ARD had decided to work in unison not only in parliament but also at all other democratic institutions, including Bars across the country. Tuesday's meeting of ARD's lawyers was aimed at declaring their support to Azam Nazir Tarar, Zulfiqar Ali Bokhari and Sarfraz Khan who are contesting for different offices of the Lahore High Court Bar Association. Senator Khosa said the Indian government had elevated their nuclear scientist to the country's presidency but rulers in Pakistan had chosen to humiliate the father of the country's nuclear programme. Many participants expressed similar sentiments. Copyright 1996-2002 . Hi Pakistan. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 42 Hi Pakistan: U.S. Rebuts Pakistan on Nuclear Leaks February 12 2004 WASHINGTON: Contradicting President Pervez Musharraf, the State Department said today that for years it provided Pakistani officials with evidence of a black market in nuclear technology. Apart from general concerns, American officials turned over "pieces of information" from time to time, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said. While reluctant to expose U.S. intelligence activities, Boucher said "we have talked to them at different moments about different issues that might have arisen that we might have learned about." "We have discussed nonproliferation issues with Pakistan repeatedly over a long period of time, and it's been an issue of concern to us and to President Musharraf, as well," the spokesman said. Copyright 1996-2002 . Hi Pakistan. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 43 Hi Pakistan: Army never controlled N-plan except during military rule - Beg February 12 2004 ISLAMABAD: The former chief of the army staff, Gen (retired) Mirza Aslam Beg, claimed on Tuesday that army had "never been in control" of Pakistan's nuclear programme except in times of military rule. The former army chief made the claim in a BBC World's programme, Hardtalk Pakistan, a press release issued by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) said on Tuesday. In the programme broadcast on BBC World late on Tuesday night, Gen Beg insisted that he knew nothing of the leakage of nuclear secrets by Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan despite conceding that information was being passed to other nations while he was in charge of the army between 1988 and 1991. He said any country whose security was threatened by the nuclear capability of its neighbours had "a right" to own nuclear weapons, the press release said. In response to a specific question whether the nuclear leaks occurred when he led the country's army, Gen Beg replied: "Definitely. If it had not taken place Dr A.Q. Khan would not have confessed it." However, asked to clarify why he knew nothing of Dr Khan's activities, Gen Beg said: "A.Q. Khan had never been answerable to the army chiefs, whether it was me or the four army chiefs that had come after me." Pressed on the issue that as head of the army how he knew nothing when the military was controlling the programme very tightly, he replied: "No. But that is the wrong perception you have. Army has never been in control, unless there has been military rule like General Zia, during his period from 1977 to 1988, and now General Pervez Musharraf." Asked as to who was controlling the nuclear programme at the time he was the Chief of the Army Staff, Gen Beg said: "That was the Chief Executive, Benazir Bhutto. The then president, Ghulam Ishaq Khan, who had been part of the programme since 1976 when Mr Bhutto initially initiated (it) and he remained with the programme until '92 when he retired." Asked if he stood by his comments that the current international anti-proliferation measures were unfair to Muslim countries, Gen Beg said, "Yes. It is duplicity, heartburn and humiliation of the Muslim World. What right does Israel have to have such capability, having more than 400 nuclear warheads when their neighbours don't pose any threat to them?" The press release said after he described Israel as a threat to the entire region, he was asked whether Israel's neighbours should be allowed to own nuclear weapons to which he replied: "Of course, yes. They have a right to have the capabilities to defend themselves and their national interests. And that is certain. There is no doubt about that." The press release said the retired general justified his description of himself as "an Islamic nationalist." Copyright 1996-2002 . Hi Pakistan. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 44 SIFY: India was aware of Pak nuke proliferation Wednesday, 11 February , 2004, 19:38 New Delhi: Defence Minister George Fernandes on Wednesday said New Delhi was aware of nuclear proliferation from Pakistan. "What is now appearing in the media is what we always knew," Fernandes told the Press Trust of India and hoped that Islamabad would take steps in the future to prevent illegal transfer of its nuclear technology. "I am sure that Pakistani leadership will also understand the gravity of the situation and take appropriate steps to cope with it," Fernandes said. Last week, Pakistan's top nuclear scientist, AQ Khan publicly admitted his role in a black market operation trading in nuclear information with Iran, North Korea and Libya. Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, calling Khan a "national hero" for bringing technology for the nuclear bomb to Pakistan, pardoned him on the federal cabinet's recommendation on Thursday. On Friday, India called for "more responsible behaviour" by nuclear-capable states and sought a wider debate on the subject in international forums, including the International Atomic Energy Agency. Both India and Pakistan, who have fought three wars since 1947, stunned the world with tit-for-tat nuclear weapons tests in May 1998. Sify.com hosted at SifyHosting India's first Level 3 Internet Data Centre © Copyright Sify Ltd, 1998-2004. All rights reserved. See ***************************************************************** 45 Boston Globe: Nuclear groups question terrorist threat Contend NRC official, Bush's address offer divergent appraisals By Ross Kerber, Globe Staff, 2/10/2004 A top nuclear-safety official has said he wasn't aware that any American nuclear power plant diagrams were found in Afghanistan, despite a terrorist threat cited by President Bush in his State of the Union address two years ago. Edward McGaffigan Jr., a member of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, responding to an environmental group's query, said this month that he testified in 2002 after the speech in at least one closed congressional hearing that he was not aware of any evidence that " `diagrams of American nuclear power plants' had been found in Afghanistan." McGaffigan's statement has led some groups to assert that Bush either misled the country or mishandled the intelligence about the threat, because the NRC would be expected to play a pivotal role in safeguarding America's nuclear facilities. If plans of US nuclear plants had been discovered, then the NRC should have been alerted to help prepare a security response, said James P. Riccio, a Greenpeace policy analyst who exchanged correspondence with McGaffigan. "The Bush administration has once again failed to place the intelligence in the appropriate hands. The NRC needs to be able to take action against appropriate threats," Riccio said in a telephone interview yesterday. The White House press office did not return calls seeking comment. In his speech on Jan. 29, 2002, a major address in his campaign against terrorism, Bush said that "our cause is just, and it continues. Our discoveries in Afghanistan confirmed our worst fears and showed us the true scope of the task ahead. We have seen the depth of our enemies' hatred in videos where they laugh about the loss of innocent life. And the depth of their hatred is equaled by the madness of the destruction they design. We have found diagrams of American nuclear power plants and public water facilities, detailed instructions for making chemical weapons, surveillance maps of American cities, and thorough descriptions of landmarks in America and throughout the world." Bush's mention of nuclear diagrams has often been cited by opponents of the nuclear industry to call for tighter regulation and led nuclear-safety and environmental groups to ask for details and which facilities were threatened. In a Feb. 4 letter to Greenpeace's Riccio, McGaffigan stated that "I did at one or more closed congressional hearings state that I was aware of no evidence that `diagrams of American nuclear power plants' had been found in Afghanistan." The NRC said McGaffigan testified at a hearing on June 20, 2002, nearly five months after Bush's address. In his letter, McGaffigan added that based on available evidence, "there is a general credible threat by Al Qaeda toward American nuclear power plants" but that the vast majority of the evidence "is appropriately classified." "I use this letter to again urge all who engage in debates about the safety or security of US nuclear power plants to use accurate information in those debates," wrote McGaffigan, a Clinton appointee and a Boston native. His office said he wouldn't comment further on details of the matter, such as whether he should have had access to all security information. His term expires in 2005. There are two vacancies on the five-member commission. The NRC, an independent agency, oversees operations and safety rules at the nation's roughly 100 commercial nuclear power facilities, including the reactors in Plymouth and Seabrook, N.H., and at various research and fuel sites. The sites could endanger neighboring communities if they were attacked or sabotaged, though most are heavily guarded. Riccio said he believes Bush misspoke in his speech. He noted other administration claims haven't held up, including the warning that Saddam Hussein had sought to buy nuclear material in Africa. At the June 20 closed hearing before the Senate's committee for the environment and public works, McGaffigan was speaking on behalf of himself, not the commission, said Beth Hayden, an NRC spokeswoman. David Lochbaum, a nuclear engineer at the Union of Concerned Scientists, an advocacy group in Washington, said he was at another hearing in June of 2002, which was public, when McGaffigan told him something similar after a senator mentioned Bush's speech. Lochbaum said he remembers McGaffigan told him something like "Mr. Bush's speech writers got a little carried away with that one." "There's a disconnect somewhere," Lochbaum said. "Either President Bush didn't have an accurate account of what was found, or the NRC had the wrong picture. And the government needs to have an accurate picture in order to make the right calls. It's the old garbage in, garbage out syndrome." Ross Kerber can be reached at kerber@globe.com. Wayne Washington of the Globe staff contributed to this report. © Copyright 2004 Globe Newspaper Company. ***************************************************************** 46 Las Vegas SUN: Pakistan Suspected Nuke Expert for Years Today: February 11, 2004 at 6:15:10 PST By MATTHEW PENNINGTON ASSOCIATED PRESS ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) - Warnings from fellow scientists about the father of Pakistan's nuclear program and his ostentatious wealth raised suspicions Abdul Qadeer Khan was selling weapons technology abroad years before the government was compelled to take action against him, officials say. Scientists who worked in Pakistan's covert program to build a nuclear deterrent against rival India had warned the government even before its first bomb test in 1998 that Khan was involved in suspect activity, a government official told The Associated Press, speaking Tuesday on condition of anonymity. The official's comments revealed that Pakistan had internal information about Khan's suspect activities far in advance of his admission last week of nuclear transfers to Iran, Libya and North Korea, all of which are designated as sponsors of terror by the U.S. State Department. After President Gen. Pervez Musharraf took power in 1999, suspicions over Khan's activities prompted him to tighten controls on the nuclear program and in March 2001 to fire Khan from his top post at the laboratory that enriched uranium for the bomb. Khan was installed instead in a ceremonial position as government adviser. But Khan, who has a number of residences around the capital, Islamabad, and is reported to have a hotel in Mali, was only publicly exposed as profiting from the illicit nuclear trade after information provided by Iran to the International Atomic Energy Agency in November indicated a Pakistani connection to the nuclear black market. After a two-month Pakistani probe, Khan was faced with documentary evidence of his involvement in spreading nuclear hardware and designs to Iran, Libya and North Korea, forcing him to seek clemency to avoid prosecution. Musharraf told The New York Times in an interview published Tuesday that he couldn't act earlier against Khan because he didn't have enough evidence to make the politically sensitive arrest of the scientist - regarded as a national hero in Pakistan. "It was extremely sensitive," Musharraf said. "One couldn't outright start investigating as if he's any common criminal." The government official said Khan would be allowed to keep his wealth "untouched" as a result of a pardon granted Thursday by Musharraf - although the government has yet to make such an announcement. Musharraf's pardon is viewed by many as a strategy to avoid a public prosecution of Khan that could have exposed official involvement in nuclear transfers. The government denies it ever authorized such transactions, saying Khan was given a large amount of autonomy to build the bomb using clandestine suppliers after the nuclear program got started in the mid-1970s. But skepticism remains over how top military figures who oversaw the program remained in the dark over Khan's proliferation activities for so long. Once Musharraf took power, he set up in early 2000 the National Command Authority - made up of top military and civilian leaders, and senior figures in the nuclear program - to oversee the deterrent and prevent the spread of technology. Another government official, who also spoke on condition of anonymity, said suspicions that Khan was spreading nuclear technology to other countries prompted a raid in 2000 by intelligence agents on a C-130 transport plane at a military base at Rawalpindi near the capital, but no incriminating evidence was found. Instead, it was found to be loaded with furniture and other materials bound for Khan's hotel in Mali. The official said the proliferation to Iran, Libya and North Korea took place from 1989 to 2000 - meaning that it continued into Musharraf's rule, but stopped once the National Command Authority was in place. -- ***************************************************************** 47 AU ABC: EU urges India, Israel, Pakistan to sign nuclear treaty. 12/02/2004. ABC News Online "Australian Broadcasting Corporation Online"> The European Union's Irish presidency has urged India, Israel and Pakistan to sign "unconditionally" the nuclear non-proliferation treaty (NPT). Addressing the European Parliament, Irish Europe Minister Dick Roche welcomed the accession to the treaty by Cuba and East Timor in the past two years, which he said brought it closer to covering the whole world. "However, there are three countries, India, Israel and Pakistan, that remain outside the regime and we continue to call upon them to accede unconditionally to the NPT as non-nuclear weapon states," he said. "The EU has repeatedly stated that the NPT is the cornerstone of the global non-proliferation regime and the essential foundation for the pursuit of nuclear disarmament," Mr Roche added. EU External Relations Commissioner Chris Patten expressed concern at last week's admission by the father of Pakistan's nuclear program, AQ Khan, of his involvement in black-market operations trading in nuclear information. "Recent revelations on the proliferation of nuclear weapons technology to Iran, Libya and North Korea have highlighted the importance of maintaining and strengthening effective controls," he told the Strasbourg assembly. The Irish minister also restated the commitment of the EU, which includes nuclear powers Britain and France, to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT). He said the EU urged "all states with nuclear capability to abide by a moratorium on nuclear test explosions or any other nuclear explosions and refrain from any actions which are contrary to the CTBT". --AFP © 2004 Australian Broadcasting Corporation ***************************************************************** 48 AU ABC: Israeli nuclear whistleblower due to be released from jail AM - Thursday, 12 February , 2004 08:23:24 Reporter: Mark Willacy TONY EASTLEY: Mordechai Vanunu has spent 18 years in jail, much of it in solitary confinement, for telling a British newspaper about Israel's possession of atomic weapons. He's due for release from jail in about two months and according to his former lawyer, Vanunu may be looking at moving to Australia. But some security chiefs and politicians, all fearful that he could reveal more secrets about Israel's covert nuclear weapons program, want Vanunu gagged from talking to the media, and banned from leaving Israel. Middle East Correspondent Mark Willacy reports from Tel Aviv. MARK WILLACY: The story of Mordechai Vanunu reads like a best-selling spy novel. A nuclear technician at Israel's Dimona plant, Vanunu was laid off in 1985. He left Israel and wound up in Sydney, where he met a British journalist and agreed to reveal his knowledge of his homeland's nuclear program, including photos he'd secretly taken at Dimona. The story caused a sensation. But shortly after in London, Vanunu met an American tourist named "Cindy" who persuaded him to fly with her to Rome. Cindy turned out to be a Mossad agent, and Vanunu was drugged and returned to Israel on a freighter. He was tried in secret and condemned as a traitor. But in hindsight Mordechai Vanunu may have been lucky, because the then head of Mossad, Shabtai Shavit revealed this week he nearly had him killed. (Shabtai Shavit speaking) "I would be lying if I said that thought didn't pass through our heads", the former spy chief says. So why wasn't Vanunu killed? (Shabtai Shavit speaking) "Because Jews don't do that to other Jews", he says. Shimon Peres is Israel's Labor leader and one of the architects of the country's nuclear program. And he's no fan of Mordechai Vanunu. SHIMON PERES: I think he was a traitor to his country. He had his obligations, he didn't respect them. AVIGDOR FELDMAN: He's probably a whistleblower and not a traitor. MARK WILLACY: Avigdor Feldman was Mordechai Vanunu's lawyer until last year. He says the convicted Israeli traitor just wants to leave prison and begin a new life in either the United States or Australia. AVIGDOR FELDMAN: When he was in Australia, he likes the country, he likes the people. From time to time he's talked to me about going back to Australia. MARK WILLACY: But Mordechai Vanunu is unlikely to ever make it back to Australia, where his brother now lives. Some senior Israeli security chiefs and politicians want the former nuclear technician gagged from speaking to the media and confined to house arrest once he's released from prison. They argue the crusading Vanunu could reveal more secrets. Vanunu's former lawyer, Avigdor Feldman. AVIGDOR FELDMAN: That's ridiculous. I don't think he holds any more secrets, and even if he does, we are talking about things which happened 20, 21 years ago when he was working. MARK WILLACY: Israel maintains a policy of so-called "nuclear ambiguity", refusing to allow international supervision of its program, and even refusing to either confirm or deny that it has atomic weapons. This is Mark Willacy in Tel Aviv for AM. ***************************************************************** 49 Tony Blankley: George W. Bush -- grand strategist (Ugh) Townhall.com 214 Massachusetts Ave NE Washington, DC 20002 202-608-6099 Fax 202-544-7330 February 11, 2004 The Boston Globe -- the respected, liberal newspaper owned by the New York Times -- ran an article last week that Bush critics might wish to read carefully. It is a report on a new book that argues that President Bush has developed and is ably implementing only the third American grand strategy in our history. The author of this book, "Surprise, Security, and the American Experience" (Harvard Press), which is to be released in March, is John Lewis Gaddis, the Robert A. Lovett professor of military and naval history at Yale University. The Boston Globe describes Professor Gaddis as "the dean of Cold War studies and one of the nation's most eminent diplomatic historians." In other words, this is not some put up job by an obscure right-wing author. This comes from the pinnacle of the liberal Ivy League academic establishment. If you hate George W. Bush, you will hate this Boston Globe story, because it makes a strong case that George Bush stands in a select category with Presidents Franklin Delano Roosevelt and James Monroe (as guided by his secretary of state, John Q. Adams) in implementing one of the only three grand strategies of American foreign policy in our two-century history. As the Globe article describes, in reporting on the book and an interview with Professor Gaddis, "Grand strategy is the blueprint from which policy follows. It envisions a country's mission, defines its interests and sets its priorities. Part of grand strategy's grandeur lies in its durability: A single grand strategy can shape decades, even centuries of policy." According to this analysis, the first grand strategy by Monroe/Adams followed the British invasion of Washington and the burning of the White House in 1814. They responded to that threat by developing a policy of gaining future security through territorial expansion -- filling power vacuums with American pioneers before hostile powers could get in. That strategy lasted throughout the 19th and the early 20th centuries, and accounts for our continental size and historic security. FDR's plans for the post WWII period was the second grand strategy, and gained American security by establishing free markets and self determination in Europe as a safeguard against future European wars, while creating the United Nations and related agencies to help us manage the rest of the world and contain the Soviets. The end of the Cold War changed that and led, according to Professor Gaddis, to President Clinton's assumption that a new grand strategy was not needed because globalization and democratization were inevitable. "Clinton said as much at one point. I think that was shallow. I think they were asleep at the switch," Professor Gaddis observed. That brings the professor to George W. Bush, who he describes as undergoing "one of the most surprising transformations of an underrated national leader since Prince Hal became Henry V." Clearly, Professor Gaddis has not been a longtime admirer of George Bush. But he is now. He observes that Bush "undertook a decisive and courageous reassessment of American grand strategy following the shock of the 9/11 attacks. At his doctrine's center, Bush placed the democratization of the Middle East and the urgent need to prevent terrorists and rogue states from getting nuclear weapons. Bush also boldly rejected the constraints of an outmoded international system that was really nothing more than a snapshot of the configuration of power that existed in 1945." It is worth noting that John Kerry and the other Democrats' central criticism of President Bush -- the prosaic argument that he should have taken no action without U.N. approval -- is implicitly rejected by Professor Gaddis as being a proposed policy that would be constrained by an "outmoded international system." In assessing Bush's progress to date, The Boston Globe article quotes Professor Gaddis: "so far the military action in Iraq has produced a modest improvement in American and global economic conditions; an intensified dialogue within the Arab world about political reform; a withdrawal of American forces from Saudi Arabia; and an increasing nervousness on the part of the Syrian and Iranian governments as they contemplated the consequences of being surrounded by American clients or surrogates. The United States has emerged as a more powerful and purposeful actor within the international system than it had been on September 11, 2001." In another recent article, written before the Iraqi war, Professor Gaddis wrote that: "(Bush's) grand strategy is actually looking toward the culmination of the Wilsonian project of a world safe for Democracy, even in the Middle East. And this long-term dimension of it, it seems to me, goes beyond what we've seen in the thinking of more recent administrations. It is more characteristic of the kind of thinking, say, that the Truman administration was doing at the beginning of the Cold War ... " Is President Bush becoming an historic world leader in the same category as President Franklin Roosevelt, as the eminent Ivy League professor argues? Or is he just a lying nitwit, as the eminent Democratic Party chairman and Clinton fundraiser Terry McAuliffe argues? I suspect that as this election year progresses, that may end up being the decisive debate. You can put me on the side of the professor. ©2003 Creators Syndicate | Pre-order it now! Sean Hannity's In the two years since 9/11, says Sean Hannity, too many Americans have forgotten why we are fighting the war on terror and what's at stake. That's why his new book, , gives you Hannity's fresh and compelling conservative perspective on the harsh lessons America has learned in confronting evil in the past and the present -- in order to illuminate the course we must take now. and your book will ship as soon as the publisher releases it on February 17th. ***************************************************************** 50 EUobserver: Ukraine tries to deflect nuclear allegations 05:08 EU Central Time 12.02.2004 If true the allegations would seriously undermine the country’s aim of joining the EU (Photo: Ukraine's government) EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The Ukrainian government has said that allegations that its scientists supplied Al-Qaida with nuclear weapons are "absolutely groundless". The denial follows reports earlier this week in which a senior Al-Qaida official claimed his organisation bought nuclear weapons from Ukrainian officials in Afghanistan in 1998. If true, the allegations would seriously undermine the country’s attempts to remake its image in the eyes of the European public and policy makers, hampering its aim of eventually joining the EU. Pan-Arab daily Al-Hayat, reported on Sunday that Al-Qaida operatives bought tactical nuclear weapons carried in suitcases from Ukrainian representatives in the Afghan city of Kandahar, which was then under the control of the Taliban. Undermining Ukraine's image Ukraine’s foreign ministry said the article was "aimed at undermining Ukraine's image" and has not ruled out legal action against Al-Hayat. "At the moment of the USSR's collapse so called ‘nuclear ammunition in suitcases’ were not kept in Ukraine's territory and have never been under Ukraine's control", said a spokesperson. He added that detractors are attempting to weaken Ukraine's position not only in Iraq but also in the international arena. Last year the country was accused of supplying radar systems to Iraq. ['' WIDTH='1' HEIGHT='10'] Press Articles Korrespondent Reuters Dar Al-Hayat Haaretz Written by Andrew Beatty ***************************************************************** 51 Las Vegas SUN: Pakistan to Share Nuke Probe Evidence Today: February 11, 2004 at 8:45:23 PST By MUNIR AHMAD ASSOCIATED PRESS ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) - Pakistan pledged Wednesday to share information on black market deals that allegedly moved nuclear know-how to North Korea, data that could give other countries a better idea of the communist nation's atomic arsenal. During a meeting with a Japanese diplomat, President Gen. Pervez Musharraf said Pakistan will hand over information to Japan when its investigation is complete. Pakistani officials have shied away from saying directly that they will hand over evidence to the United States. Musharraf has drawn strong domestic criticism for his cooperation with the United States' anti-terror campaign in neighboring Afghanistan, and is keen to avoid any appearance that he is a U.S. puppet. Japan is one of six nations due to join a meeting on North Korea's nuclear program in Beijing later this month. The United States will also be there, and U.S. officials have expressed hope that information from Pakistan could help clarify details about North Korea's nuclear weapons program. "Pakistan would share with Japan the results of its internal investigations on any illegal transfers to North Korea when the investigations were completed," a Foreign Ministry statement said after the talks with Japanese Deputy Foreign Minister Ichiro Fujisaki. North Korea has denied receiving technology from Abdul Qadeer Khan, the father of Pakistan's nuclear program, who was pardoned by Musharraf last week after he confessed to leaking nuclear technology to Iran, Libya and North Korea. Pakistan began its investigation into alleged transfers of nuclear technology in November after the U.N. nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, requested help in determining if Pakistani scientists were involved in proliferation. Foreign Ministry spokesman Masood Khan said Pakistan was working with a range of groups interested in stopping the spread of nuclear technology. "Pakistan is a responsible state and will cooperate so that this underworld is unearthed," said military spokesman Maj. Gen. Shaukat Sultan. Six scientists and security officials remain in custody in the investigation, and Khan is being guarded under tight security at his Islamabad home. Sultan declined to say whether Khan was still being interrogated, or reveal any details of previous questioning on the scientist's ties to North Korea. "Whenever there is a need to question somebody it can be done," Sultan said. -- ***************************************************************** 52 Las Vegas SUN: AP: Pakistan, Nuclear Black Market Linked Today: February 11, 2004 at 12:45:21 PST By MATT KELLEY ASSOCIATED PRESS WASHINGTON (AP) - The black-market network that supplied nuclear weapons technology to Iran, Libya and North Korea relied on European businessmen convicted or investigated in the 1980s for selling similar equipment to Pakistan, U.S. officials say. The evidence developed by the United States points to at least two college friends of Abdul Qadeer Khan, the Pakistani nuclear scientist who admitted being the mastermind of the scheme, according to the officials familiar with the intelligence and to proliferation experts assisting the international effort. All spoke to The Associated Press only on condition of anonymity. One of the friends, Henk Slebos of the Netherlands, was convicted there in 1985 of trying to sell equipment to Pakistan's nuclear weapons program. Slebos' wife told the AP this week he would not talk to reporters. Some evidence came from Khan himself and from admissions that Iran made to U.N. inspectors, while other intelligence was developed during a covert CIA operation aimed at cracking the smuggling ring, the officials said. Khan last week admitted selling nuclear secrets and equipment. He was pardoned by Pakistan's president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf. U.S., international and Pakistani investigations continue into the extent of Khan's network and whether it provided equipment or information to anyone outside the three countries already named. That black market figures already suspected of smuggling in the 1980s re-emerged to play a role in Khan's effort has alarmed some weapons experts. "This should serve as a wake-up call for the need for much more alert and aggressive efforts to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons and materials to terrorists and other states," said Graham Allison, a Harvard professor and former top Pentagon arms control official under President Clinton. CIA Director George Tenet said agents worked for years to penetrate Khan's nuclear network; their efforts paid off in the October seizure of a ship full of nuclear components headed for Libya. That seizure helped prompt Libya to reveal - and renounce - its nuclear weapons program in December. The network Khan set up to peddle his nuclear knowledge became a comprehensive one-stop-shopping venue for countries wanting their own atomic bombs, experts from the United Nations' International Atomic Energy Agency and U.S. agencies have said. From the high-speed centrifuges needed to make uranium bomb fuel to designs for the bomb itself, Khan's network provided the know-how, the materials, even 24-hour technical support if problems cropped up, diplomats and intelligence officials have said. He even had glossy brochures - complete with his own photo - with color pictures and specifications of some of the centrifuge parts for sale. The network provided Libya and Iran with equipment and know-how to make a large centrifuge plant to separate bomb fuel from ordinary uranium. Libya also got a relatively unsophisticated but workable nuclear warhead design from Pakistan, U.S. intelligence officials and diplomats allege. The network evolved after Khan's black-market deals to supply Pakistan's nuclear program in the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s. The enterprise started with Khan stealing centrifuge designs while he worked in the early 1970s for Urenco, a European uranium enrichment consortium. He was convicted in absentia in the Netherlands for stealing the designs but the conviction was overturned because Khan was not properly served with court papers. Several of the European businessmen Pakistan tapped for nuclear help also are believed to have aided Libya and Iran, according to senior U.S. intelligence officials and outside nuclear experts who spoke on condition of anonymity. One of them was Slebos, who was convicted in 1985 of trying to ship high-tech equipment to Khan's laboratory in Pakistan. The U.S. officials said evidence points to Slebos as a participant in the Khan network that helped supply Libya with nuclear weapons equipment in the 1990s. Slebos now runs a company called Slebos Research, which was a corporate sponsor of a conference organized by Pakistan's Khan Research Laboratories last year. Dutch officials have said they intercepted five shipments to Pakistan from Slebos Research and another company in 1998. The Slebos Research Web site says it offers "solutions for unusual problems" and boasts, "We find hard to get objects for customers all over the world." Slebos did not respond to telephone and e-mail messages left at his firm. A woman who answered Slebos' home telephone and identified herself as his wife said Slebos would not talk to reporters. Iran identified to the IAEA three German businessmen among five middlemen who were sources for some of its centrifuge technology. The U.N. nuclear watchdog has not made their names public. The U.S. officials and outside experts say they included two former executives, Otto Heilingbrunner and Gotthard Lerch, of a company that made centrifuge components. German prosecutors investigated them in the 1980s for allegedly selling equipment and blueprints to Pakistan's nuclear program. The two men worked in the 1980s for Leybold AG, which got nuclear-related designs from Urenco while bidding on a centrifuge contract for the uranium enrichment consortium. Leybold has publicly acknowledged it also sold nuclear equipment directly to Iraq and Iran in the 1980s. Heilingbrunner, reached by telephone at his home near Cologne, said he was involved in selling aircraft engine parts to Iran in the 1980s but denied any involvement with nuclear sales. "I have nothing to do with Libya, Iraq, North Korea or any others," he said. Lerch could not be located for comment. Another German supplier named by Iran, the late Heinz Mebus, also was a college friend of Khan. Mebus worked in the early 1980s for Albrecht Migule, who was convicted in the former West Germany of selling equipment to Pakistan to help its uranium enrichment program. Khan's network also used at least five factories in Malaysia and other countries to make centrifuge components, the U.S. officials and outside nuclear experts said. The most sophisticated factory was near Malaysia's capital, Kuala Lumpur, owned by Scomi Precision Engineering, or SCOPE. The majority owner of SCOPE's parent company Scomi Group is Kamaluddin Abdullah, the only son of Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi. Scomi officials have said they did not know that the precision parts they made were destined for uranium centrifuges. Centrifuge parts made by SCOPE were aboard the ship bound for Libya seized in Italy last October. The middleman for that deal was B.S.A. Tahir, a Sri Lankan based in the United Arab Emirates port of Dubai, which is a hub for Khan's network, Malaysian national police chief Mohamed Bakri Omar has said. Malaysian authorities have questioned Tahir. Tahir ordered the centrifuge parts beginning in 2001 on behalf of a company called Gulf Technical Industries LLC, which calls itself a dealer in specialty steel products. The multi-million-dollar contract made GTI Scomi's biggest customer in fiscal 2002, according to Scomi's public financial reports. --- Associated Press writers Tony Czuczka in Berlin, Toby Sterling in Amsterdam and John Solomon in Washington contributed to this report. -- ***************************************************************** 53 NRC: Notice of Issuance of License Amendment 47 for Blended Low- FR Doc 04-2933 [Federal Register: February 11, 2004 (Volume 69, Number 28)] [Notices] [Page 6701] From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr11fe04-133] Enriched Uranium Processing Facility for Nuclear Fuel Services, Inc., Erwin, TN AGENCY: Nuclear Regulatory Commission. ACTION: Notice of issuance of license amendment. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Michael Lamastra, Fuel Cycle Facilities Branch, Division of Fuel Cycle Safety and Safeguards, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, DC 20555-0001. Telephone: (301) 415-8139; fax number: (301) 415-5390; e-mail: mxl2@nrc.gov. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: I. Introduction Pursuant to 10 CFR 2.106, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is providing notice of the issuance of Amendment 47 to Special Nuclear Material License SNM-124 to Nuclear Fuel Services, Inc. (NFS) authorizing the possession and use of special nuclear material in the Blended Low-Enriched Uranium (BLEU) Preparation Facility (BPF) at the licensee's site in Erwin, Tennessee. The NFS' request for the proposed action was previously noticed in the Federal Register on January 7, 2003 (68 FR 796) along with a notice of opportunity to request a hearing. This amendment complies with the standards and requirements of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, as amended, and NRC's rules and regulations as set forth in 10 CFR chapter 1. Accordingly, this amendment was issued on January 13, 2004, and was effective immediately. II. Further Information The NRC has prepared a non-proprietary (public) version of the Safety Evaluation Report (SER) that documents the information that was reviewed and NRC's conclusion. In accordance with 10 CFR 2.790 of the NRC's ``Rules of Practice,'' details with respect to this action, including the non-proprietary version of the SER and accompanying documentation included in the license amendment package, are available for inspection at the NRC's Public Electronic Reading Room at http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams.html (ADAMS accession numbers ML040280502, ML040280209, ML040130574, and ML040130530). These documents may also be viewed electronically on the computers located at the NRC Public Document Room (PDR), O1F21 One White Flint North, 11555 Rockville Pike, Rockville, MD 20852. The PDR reproduction contractor will copy documents for a fee. Persons who do not have access to ADAMS should contact the NRC PDR Reference Staff by telephone at 1-800-397-4209 or (301) 415-4737, or by e-mail at pdr@nrc.gov. Dated at Rockville, Maryland, this 4th day of January, 2004. For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Michael Lamastra, Project Manager, Fuel Manufacturing Section, Fuel Cycle Facilities Branch, Division of Fuel Cycle Safety and Safeguards, Office of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards. [FR Doc. 04-2933 Filed 2-10-04; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 7590-01-P ***************************************************************** 54 NRC: Agency Information Collection Activities: Proposed Collection; FR Doc 04-2935 [Federal Register: February 11, 2004 (Volume 69, Number 28)] [Notices] [Page 6700-6701] From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr11fe04-132] Comment Request AGENCY: Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). ACTION: Notice of pending NRC action to submit an information collection request to OMB and solicitation of public comment. SUMMARY: The NRC is preparing a submittal to OMB for review of continued approval of information collections under the provisions of the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (44 U.S.C. Chapter 35). Information pertaining to the requirement to be submitted: 1. The title of the information collection: Policy Statement for the ``Criteria for Guidance of States and NRC in Discontinuance of NRC Regulatory Authority and Assumption Thereof By States Through Agreement,'' Maintenance of Existing Agreement State Programs, Request for Information through the Integrated Materials Performance Evaluation Program (IMPEP) Questionnaire, and Agreement State Participation in IMPEP. 2. Current OMB approval number: 3150-0183. 3. How often the collection is required: There are four activities that occur under this collection: information collection activities required by the IMPEP questionnaire in preparation for an IMPEP review conducted no less frequently than every four years; while the following activities are all collected on an annual basis--policy statement addressing requirements for new Agreement States; participation by Agreement States in the IMPEP reviews; and annual requirements for Agreement States to maintain their programs. [[Page 6701]] 4. Who is required or asked to report: 33 Agreement States who have signed Section 274b Agreements with NRC. 5. The estimated number of annual respondents: 33. 6. The number of hours needed annually to complete the requirement or request: For States interested in becoming an Agreement State: Approximately 4,300 hours. For Agreement State participation in 11 IMPEP reviews (9 State, 1 NRC Region and 1 Follow-up Review): 396 hours (an average of 36 hours per review). For maintenance of existing Agreement State programs: 252,000 hours (an average of approximately 7,636 hours per State for 33 Agreement States). For Agreement State response to 9 IMPEP questionnaires annually: 477 hours (an average of 53 hours per program). The total number of hours expended annually is 257,173 hours. 7. Abstract: States wishing to become an Agreement State are requested to provide certain information to the NRC as specified by the Commission's Policy Statement, ``Criteria for Guidance of States and NRC in Discontinuance of NRC Regulatory Authority and Assumption Thereof By States Through Agreement.'' Agreement States need to ensure that the Radiation Control Program under the Agreement remains adequate and compatible with the requirements of Section 274 of the Atomic Energy Act (Act) and must maintain certain information. NRC conducts periodic evaluations through IMPEP to ensure that these programs are compatible with the NRC's, meet the applicable parts of the Act, and are adequate to protect public health and safety. Submit, by April 12, 2004, comments that address the following questions: 1. Is the proposed collection of information necessary for the NRC to properly perform its functions? Does the information have practical utility? 2. Is the burden estimate accurate? 3. Is there a way to enhance the quality, utility, and clarity of the information to be collected? 4. How can the burden of the information collection be minimized, including the use of automated collection techniques or other forms of information technology? A copy of the draft supporting statement may be viewed free of charge at the NRC Public Document Room, One White Flint North, 11555 Rockville Pike, Room O-1 F21, Rockville, MD 20852. OMB clearance requests are available at the NRC worldwide Web site: . The document will be available on the NRC home page site for 60 days after the signature date of this notice. Comments and questions about the information collection requirements may be directed to the NRC Clearance Officer, Brenda Jo. Shelton, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, T-5 F52, Washington, DC 20555-0001, by telephone at (301) 415-7233, or by Internet electronic mail to . Dated at Rockville, Maryland, this 4th day of February, 2004. For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Brenda Jo Shelton, NRC Clearance Officer Office of the Chief Information Officer. [FR Doc. 04-2935 Filed 2-10-04; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 7590-01-P ***************************************************************** 55 NRC: Seeking Qualified Candidates for the Advisory Committee on FR Doc 04-2936 [Federal Register: February 11, 2004 (Volume 69, Number 28)] [Notices] [Page 6703] From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr11fe04-135] Reactor Safeguards AGENCY: U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. ACTION: Request for r[eacute]sum[eacute]s. SUMMARY: The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission is seeking qualified candidates for appointment to its Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards (ACRS). ADDRESSES: Submit r[eacute]sum[eacute]s to: Ms. Sherry Meador, Administrative Assistant, ACRS/ACNW, Mail Stop T2E-26, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, DC 20555-0001, or e-mail SAM@NRC.gov. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Congress established the ACRS to provide the NRC with independent expert advice on matters related to the safety of existing and proposed nuclear power plants and on the adequacy of proposed reactor safety standards. The Committee work currently emphasizes safety issues associated with the operation of 103 commercial nuclear units in the United States; the pursuit of a risk- informed and performance-based regulatory approach; license renewal applications; risk-informed revisions to 10 CFR Part 50; power uprates; transient and accident analysis codes; materials degradation issues; use of mixed oxide and high burnup fuels; and advanced reactor designs. The ACRS membership includes individuals from national laboratories, academia, and industry who possess specific technical expertise along with a broad perspective in addressing safety concerns. Committee members are selected from a variety of engineering and scientific disciplines, such as nuclear power plant operations, nuclear engineering, mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, chemical engineering, metallurgical engineering, risk assessment, structural engineering, materials science, and instrumentation and process control systems. At this time, candidates are specifically being sought who have 15 years of experience in the areas of nuclear engineering, probabilistic risk assessment, and/or plant operations. Candidates with pertinent graduate level experience will be given additional consideration. Individuals should have a demonstrated record of accomplishments in the area of nuclear reactor safety. Criteria used to evaluate candidates include education and experience, demonstrated skills in nuclear safety matters, and the ability to solve problems. Additionally, the Commission considers the need for specific expertise in relationship to current and future tasks. Consistent with the requirements of the Federal Advisory Committee Act, the Commission seeks candidates with varying views so that the membership on the Committee will be fairly balanced in terms of the points of view represented and functions to be performed by the Committee. Because conflict-of-interest regulations restrict the participation of members actively involved in the regulated aspects of the nuclear industry, the degree and nature of any such involvement will be weighed. Each qualified candidate's financial interests must be reconciled with applicable Federal and NRC rules and regulations prior to final appointment. This might require divestiture of securities issued by nuclear industry entities, or discontinuance of industry- funded research contracts or grants. A r[eacute]sum[eacute] describing the educational and professional background of the candidate, including any special accomplishments, professional references, current address, and telephone number should be provided. All qualified candidates will receive careful consideration. Appointment will be made without regard to such factors as race, color, religion, national origin, sex, age, or disabilities. Candidates must be citizens of the United States and be able to devote approximately 80-100 days per year to Committee business. Applications will be accepted until March 15, 2004. Dated: February 5, 2004. Andrew L. Bates, Advisory Committee Management Officer. [FR Doc. 04-2936 Filed 2-10-04; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 7590-01-P ***************************************************************** 56 Brattleboro Reformer: A plan of reasonable action (VY) February 11, 2004 Brattleboro, VT As disagreements go, this one's got whiskers. As far back as 1982, residents of Marlboro turned their backs on Vermont Emergency Management's response plan. At a town meeting this week, VEM was rejected again, with several residents asking local officials to spurn state plans for local response procedures in case of an emergency at the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant. Geographically, only a piece of the town's southeast corner lies within the plant's 10-mile radius emergency planning zone. But that draws the entire town into the argument. Although VEM describes its offering as an all-or-nothing deal, many residents expressed interest in accepting free tone-alert radios, and then plotting individual courses of action. Their concern is that buying into the full plan could signal agreement with Vermont Yankee and the entire nuclear industry; to them an ideologically unacceptable position. Rugged individualism has a strong tradition and an honored place in our lives. But in the "unlikely" yet terrifying event of a nuclear accident, planning, training and coordination of services are necessary components of any reasoned response. The alternative is a hodge-podge of responses at best; chaos, at worst. The citizens of Marlboro should not have to be pressed into service as their own emergency planners. For more than two decades state planning has failed to inspire confidence that Marlboro's schoolchildren will be adequately protected. Does it make sense to drive students in the probable direction of the radiation plume? Of course not. Marlboro has pursued a more logical course of action on its own, with buses at the ready to take the children toward Bennington. But they shouldn't have to do this. Nor should their needs and concerns be held hostage to the state's emergency plan. State emergency planners have consistently failed to listen to the citizens who live in the emergency planning zone. It is impossible for them, from Waterbury or Montpelier, to devise a workable plan without the input of those who know these roads and towns. Can any plan "address the issue of Vermont Yankee?" as Rep. Richard Marek, D-Newfane, put it. No, unless it's a plan to make the plant disappear. A quick reality check says that won't happen. Residents in the emergency zone need a plan of reasonable dimension that provides prompt and clear notification, avenues of official action and enough information for residents to secure their own safety. A tone-alert radio in every kitchen falls far short of this, but we can start there. ***************************************************************** 57 News Item: NRC investigating loose bolts at nuke plant 02/11/2004 BERWICK — PPL Susquehanna fully supports the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s decision to send a team to the Luzerne County plant to assess PPL’s efforts to determine the underlying cause of loose bolts on diesel generators at the facility. The NRC announced Monday that it is sending a team to the site. The NRC team also is investigating two other events involving the diesel generators at the plant. In March 2003, a bolt on equipment that controls one diesel generator’s fuel supply fell off during routine testing, and on Jan. 30, PPL found a loose flange on one generator’s water supply line. Herbert D. Woodeshick, PPL’s special assistant to the president for Susquehanna, said the company is conducting a comprehensive evaluation of the problems. “We will fully support the NRC in this investigation and evaluate fully any recommendations made by the inspection team,” Woodeshick said. Both units at the Susquehanna plant continue to produce electricity, and all systems remained operable. “We are confident that the diesels would have performed their design function, but our commitment to identifying and correcting problems is an essential component of our operating philosophy at Susquehanna.” Diesels provide the plant’s backup electricity supply. During testing Jan. 25, of one of five diesel generators at the plant, a PPL crew noticed a slight vibration and a small amount of oil leakage. Further examination revealed loose bolts on a bracket supporting the generator’s governor, which controls the generator’s speed. The crew tightened the bolts, inspected the rest of the generator’s components and successfully conducted another equipment test. Woodeshick said the discovery of the problem led to expanded action. “When equipment is not operating properly, Susquehanna’s standard assessment process is to inspect similar equipment for similar problems and to determine the cause,” he said. “The crew immediately inspected similar bolts on the remaining four generators and found no problems.” The Susquehanna plant, located about 7 miles north of Berwick, is owned jointly by PPL Susquehanna LLC and Allegheny Electric Cooperative Inc. and is operated by PPL Susquehanna. ©The News Item 2004 ***************************************************************** 58 BNN: Bulgaria to Seek for More EU Aid for Reactor Closures Bnn, Bulgarian news network - online news agency \ Áíě, ['bulgarian news network' Thursday, 12.02.2004 SOFIA (bnn)— Bulgaria will try to persuade the EU to increase EUR 350 million in financial aid slated for early reactor closures at the country's only nuclear power plant, an official said Wednesday. "This is what the EU is proposing," Minister of Energy Milko Kovachev said. "The final figure is a matter of negotiations." Independent expert firms that the EU has hired are currently working in Bulgaria to evaluate the extent of the losses that the reactor closures will entail. The EU announced the aid amount Tuesday together with an EUR 4.2 billion financial aid package meant to help Bulgaria catch up with other EU members in the three years following its admission - planned for Jan. 1 2007. Bulgaria has closed the oldest two units in its Kozlodui nuclear plant on Dec. 31 2002 and has committed to close two similar reactors by 2006. The EU says the Soviet-designed reactors pose safety risk - as they have no safety encasement - and wants Bulgaria to shut them down permanently if it is serious about joining the EU. Bulgarian nuclear officials said Tuesday the aid that the EU was offering was some five times below the real needs. The EU has pledged another EUR 200 million for Kozlodui in 1999, when Bulgaria endorsed the first two closures. Kovachev has earlier said that the real losses Bulgaria would incur from the four closures would amount to EUR 1.7 billion - including forfeited electricity exports and costs of reactor decommissioning and nuclear waste storage. Kozlodui reactors slated for closure are 440-megawatt pressurised water units vintage 1974-1982. The plant has two newer 1,000-megawatt reactors with safety encasement that were installed in 1987 and 1989 and which are not a security issue. /bnn/ Copyright © 2002 Bulgarian News Network (BNN) ***************************************************************** 59 SOFIA: EUR 9 B for Romania and Bulgaria After 2007 SOFIA NEWS AGENCY novinite.com For the Record: 11 February 2004, Wednesday. EUobserver.com Romania and Bulgaria could receive EUR 9 B of EU assistance between 2007 and 2010. The Brussels executive called it "a fair and balanced share of the EU budget after their accession" - set to be in 2007. This sum of money will allow Bulgaria and Romania to conclude EU negotiations later this year or early in 2005. The package, of which just over two thirds will go to Romania and the rest to Bulgaria, includes regional and farm subsidies for the first three years of EU membership. Enlargement Commissioner Günter Verheugen said: "This offer is both generous and realistic. If approved, it will help Bulgaria and Romania make full use of their EU membership and play an active role as equal and respected members of the European Union". "This package of some EUR 15.4 B in commitments and EUR 9 B in actual payments follows the same principles and methodology that were applied for the ten acceding countries which will join the European Union at 1 May 2004", says a press release. Bulgarian Finance Minister Milen Velchev said that this proved the Commission's willingness to continue the enlargement process. The Romanian chief negotiator to the EU, Vasile Puscas, said he hoped that the sum of money for Romania would be enough to cover future reforms. He underlined that Bucharest has already undertaken expensive reforms. Agriculture, regional policy and nuclear safety On agriculture, the Commission has committed EUR 881 M in direct farm support payments for Romania and EUR 431 M for Bulgaria. Rural development in Romania could receive EUR 2,4 B and Bulgaria could see EUR 617 M over the three years Regional development would be funded by up to EUR 6 B for Romania from 2007-2009 and EUR 2,3 B for Bulgaria. The financial package also deals with nuclear safety and grants, which sets aside EUR 350 M for the closure of the Kozloduy nuclear plant in Bulgaria. Romania and EU funds The Commission's proposal comes in the midst of a European crisis for Romania - which could lead to its EU funds being suspended. Romania has been strongly criticised by both the European Parliament and the European Commission for having permitted adoption of Romanian children abroad. All Rights Reserved © Novinite Ltd., 2001-2004 - Copyright ***************************************************************** 60 [DU-WATCH] Amarie's critiques Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2004 01:30:45 -0600 (CST) Last week, a well informed, all-round and competent anonymous Amarie posted several comments to du-watch@yahoogroups.com. The postings concern current issues of weapons containing depleted uranium (DU) and non-depleted uranium. Amarie was right most of the time in the past, regarding corruption of public institutions, agent provocateurs, infiltration and manipulation of the movement. Therefore I assembled her/his recent comments, bcc to a wider audience. Please circulate. The issues are important for the success of anti-uranium weapons campaign and for the security of our movement. Anybody who is not on du-watch and does not wish to subscribe in order to reply to the critiques, may send his or her posting to me for re-posting to the list. Piotr Bein moderator, du-watch -------------------------------- 1. Hamburg and its decay progeny [Hamburg was the place of recent conference of the anti-U weapons movement.] 2. Pro-DU meeting @ MIT... most blatant and unadulterated example, yet [A pro-U weapons propaganda event at the Massachussets Institute of Technology. Note the names of speakers, check out their credentials.] 3. Will the real Sunny Miller please stand up [A challenge to Sunny Miller, Traprock Peace Center, attending the MIT event] 4. WISE Uranium Project works for defence ....Nazi's at work [WISE website published Dan Fahey's (a Pentagon propagandist) "paper" against the independent scientists and progressive activists. Now WISE continues with further propaganda.] 5. Litigation success ... is not anything to do with a DU Ban or Moratorium [Part of the anti-U weapon movement was drawn into an initiative to ban the weapons -- while they are already illegal, and a ban treaty process would "legalize" them, thus releasing the perpetrayots from liability to hundreds of thousands of victims and environment in many countries. Amarie argues for individual litigation cases, which do not require any pre-defined position on illegality of uranium weapons.] 6. DRPS /MOD hiding NDU contamination in OIF troops? [DRPS = UK Defence Radiology Protection Services MOD = UK Ministry of Defence NDU = non-depleted uranium OIF = Operation Iraqi Freedom, the 2003 attack of the Coalition on Iraq DUOB = UK Depleted Uranium Oversight Board] 7. MOD insults Busby, Hooper and vets ... resign, gentlemen [A call for independent scientists to resign from the UK Depleted Uranium Oversight Board.] 8. Stained shorts and sticky fingers ...Robinson / NGWRC [NGWRC = US National Gulf War Resource Centre, supposedly serving veterans - victims of uranium and other war-related contamination OSSGWI = US Office of the Special Assistant to the Deputy Secretary of Defense for Gulf War Illnesses? Steve = ? Charles = Charles Sheehan-Miles, Executive Director, Nuclear Policy Research Institute Dan = Dan Fahey Terra = Tara Thornton?] 9. ...straightening another record ... DF is not a lawyer [DF = Dan Fahey] 1111111111111111111111111111111 Sent: January 29, 2004 10:10 AM Subject: [DU-WATCH] Hamburg and its decay progeny ..... I realize that for the sincere, the enthusiastically altruistic and de-indoctrinated, that participating (eg, as guest speaker)in an event such as Hamburg carries with it a natural desire to imbue and preserve the character of its memory with reputatability and the presumption of integrity and credibility. I suggest though, that an honest appraisal of it reveals the event was hijacked by exploiting the egos of the organizers. In their naive self interested effort to achieve fame in their own lands, they succumbed to the same compromise and influence that plagues most of such programs. Sincerity is not proof of competence nor a defence against against infiltration/corruption. Neither does such an event overcome its basic character by allowing its chief antogonists to participate (eg; KP and PB in particular). The long lived dialogue about this event is pushing up through the ceiling of the box containing Hamburg's shakey credibility. It was designed and programmed (ie. speakers) to divide and slow down the progress of the work. If you need evidence,condider this: it is has not been criticized or attacked from the very quarters that were exorcised from participating/speaking. Does not clue you in? And why is this? Because it is remaining a very effective anchor, preventing the main legal and scientific/clinicial thrust from proceeding. The only parties under attack are the the ones who have seen through Hamburg (but for some reason are not yet willing to cut it lose). Its time folks to realize that drunkards and womanizers (eg DL) and self serving children, seeking adventure via activism (MK and her entourage), are not players and the products of their misadventures are not worthy of your attention. Hou long has it been now? What have they done? Where is the advancement of the (1) international law, (2) domestic litigation,(3) field research, (4) clincial studies, (5) recruitment of scientists, or (6) public/political/legislature education? I suggest they are in the business to be neutralized and they have been fully compromised by the CenCom and DoD reps from inside Iraq (Iraqi health care nationals trained in US and GB), friends-of-the IAEA (UN and international law courts affiliates seeking recognition from the perpetrtor of the crime), and do-gooding white men and women (who have no affection for the victims of uranium weapons, only anger towards their own authority figures). Cut them lose... wake up ... they waste your time and energy and keep you focused internally. More forward and those who are worthy will remain on board and stand upto the pressures and attacks. 222222222222222222222222222222 Sent: February 2, 2004 9:05 AM Subject: [DU-WATCH] Pro-DU meeting @ MIT... most blatant and unadulterated example, yet The network needs to inform MIT and do an APB to all appropriate organizations that the MIT event has not a single person or organization represented that has conducted a scientific or clinical study on uranium weapons. The speakers are effectively Pro-DU. Traprock et al should visibly and forthrightly criticise this event on web site front page. Those who recommend uranium inhalation for medicinal purposes can be found below: Alexandra Miller AFRRI's offering to the M Mcdiarmid sell-out science and medicine team. http://staff.washington.edu/ccarey/DU-honorable.men.htm#17 Ken Czerwinski industry and energy sector financed researcher http://neri.ne.doe.gov/abstracts/990127.pdf Kilpatrick no references required. On public record supporting use of DU and claiming its beneficial effects. Jan Snihs, UNEP another IAEA lap dog http://www.grid.unep.ch/btf/meetings/brussels.html Fahey self explanatory http://www.llrc.org/du/duframes.htm Jim Walsh, Belfer Center imperialist propagandist on WMD http://www.lawac.org/speech/walsh%20jim%202003.htm All City Editors and Science Editors of newspapers in the area should be sent a press release that exposes the event for what it is. 3333333333333333333333333333333 Sent: February 2, 2004 9:30 AM Subject: [DU-WATCH] Will the real Sunny Miller please stand up .... You have a chance to do the right thing or to join the enemy. Your attendance at the MIT event will signal your tacit recognition. Don't give us any "freedom of speach", "hear all sides of the arguement", "balanced reporting", "got to to know the enemy better" BS. Either you turn your back on them or you make them stronger. Either your conviction and your brain tell you this is a pro-DU propaganda, Republican spin-doctoring (pre-election) event or your intentionally blind. This opportunity of choice will test your's and Traprock's metal. Don't be surprised if upon your attendance you find yourself and Traprock isolated from some key information sources, locked out of some meetings and relegated to the ranks of pretenders like WISE Uranium. 4444444444444444444444444444444 Sent: February 8, 2004 5:45 AM Subject: [DU-WATCH] WISE Uranium Project works for defence ....Nazi's at work Check WISE Uranium Project's Uranium news section. Here it the most recent headline: "Fewer than 10 British Gulf war troops had uranium poisoning" .. "of the 70,000 British troops ..." This is another bold face misrepresentation of the facts, another "Faheyism". Show us anywhere where UK has tested 70,000 troops for total uranium, let alone DU isotopes. Explain how 50 ml of urine can be adequate sample size to accurately measure uranium isotopes by mass spectrometry. WISE has taken a lesson from its former occupying forces propaganda machine, Nazi Germany. For such a well reputed uranium speciality organization, WISE seems to be light on the facts, heavy on the support of Fahey/DOD/MOD postion, and has not recognized any independed science. WISE pretends to be anti-nuke. I suggest, no I declare, WISE is a mouthpiece for the nuclear industry in Europe, set up as the European activist/educator agent provacateur. Hail Peter Diehl (sp?) and whoever else pushes out the propoganda. Can anyone [list?] the Board members and staff names for WISE. We need to call them by name and inform the world. I bet World Nuclear Association is a funding sponsor of WISE. 5555555555555555555555555555555 Sent: February 3, 2004 11:40 AM Subject: [DU-WATCH] Litigation success ... is not anything to do with a DU Ban or Moratorium I have a different take on the matter. The success is due to litigating with clincial assessment data and has nothing to do with Bans and International Law. Damaged genetic material and biochemical proof of contamiantion is something that juries and judges can grapple with and identify with. They have no jurisdiction or personal identification with international activist movements. This confirms, again, as was done successfully in the US a couple of years ago (in an industrial case, not a military case), that the domestic courts, regulations and occupational health and safety liabilities are the best avenue for legal challenges - and therefore political clout. The bank book is always the hardest target but can be vulnerable to heavy metal penetrators... like damaged chromsomes. Best to shift effort and money to this tactic if you want to make progress in NATO nations. 666666666666666666666666666666 Sent: February 7, 2004 8:12 AM Subject: [DU-WATCH] DRPS /MOD hiding NDU contamination in OIF troops? According to Ron Brown, Chemist and Defence Radiology Protection Services rep on the DU Oversight Board, British Operation TELIC veterans stationed in Germany have urine uranium elevations at "several hundred nanograms per litre". Normal UK population levels are around 1 ng to 10 ng uranum/liter. Contrary to recent press releases by MOD, the DUOB has published its minutes showing most Operation TELIC troops have elevated urine uranium values, up to 30 ng/l. Since the signiture of the uranium isotopes in the German study group is Non-depleted Uranium, MOD appears to be hiding the fact that British forces were exposed to bombs and other weapons made from non-depleted urnaium (as opposed to DU). The MOD testing protocol prevents examination of the isotope ratios of uranium unless the total uranium levels are over 50 ng/l a US DVA rule), those UK vets with elevated total uranium values above normal up to 30 ng/l will not be permitted to have their urine measured for DU contents. To further insult the UK TELIC veterans, one third are having their urine sent to Melissa McDiarmid, Baltimore DVA DU Follow up Program, for analysis. McDiarmid is the clincian that lied for 4 years saying no US veterans other than those with retianed sharpnel have DU in excreted in their urine. This lie came to light this year with her admission that the US DVA has been hiding bioassay data showing US GW I vets without retained shrapnel are excreting DU in their urine 8 years after exposure. Reference: Page 12 Minutes DUOB 22 September 2003 7777777777777777777777777777777 Sent: February 7, 2004 7:30 AM Subject: [DU-WATCH] MOD insults Busby, Hooper and vets ... resign, gentlemen "The Chariman explained that the study had to be handled separately from other activities connected with DU because it was part of a larger post-TELIC health investigation for which the DUOB was not competent" David Coggon Chair of DU Oversight Board Gulf Veterans Illness Unit Ministryof Defence Minutes of the Twelfth DU Screening Program September 03, 2003 "The chairman pointed out that unlikfe Gulf War I, Op TELIC was not of immediate concern to tne National Gulf Veteans and Families Association" Chair David Coggon 13th meeting of DUOB The NGV&FA [UK National Gulf Veterans and Families Association] members (Connoly and Glennon), Chris Busby and Malcom Hooper should resign from this politically motivated lie concocted to save Blairs butt. Your membership gives this lying and misrepresenting Board credibility. Resign now. 88888888888888888888888888888888 Sent: February 2, 2004 11:40 AM Subject: [DU-WATCH] Stained shorts and sticky fingers ...Robinson / NGWRC . STATEMENT BY STEPHEN ROBINSON BEFORE THE COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES UNITED STATES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES SUBCOMMITTEE ON TOTAL FORCE REGARDING RESERVE COMPONENT HEALTHCARE: MEDICAL HOLDOVER PERSONNEL IN CURRENT AND FUTURE DEPLOYMENTS, JANUARY 21, 2004, NGWRC NGWRC has capitulated to the OSSGWI and the attractive federal funding opportunities for the obedient children of imperialism. Such good ol' boys as Steve, Charles, Dan and Terra do no go unrewarded after spinnin' out the DoDline in front of the House. The perfect circle jerk. Everyone walks away with a little smile on their faces and can easily overlook a few stains on their shorts and their sticky fingers. Just make sure you don't shake hands with them ... What's it worth to sell out the Hispanic, Native, Black and poor farm boys of America? What a proud bunch you must be. And such a resume, too. Wow!!!!! How come you let cowards and traitors into your ranks. Money heals all wounds, doesn't it. How well you learned your lesson. 999999999999999999999999999999 Sent: January 29, 2004 6:34 PM Subject: [DU-WATCH] ... straightening another record .... DF is not a lawyer Dan Fahey is not and has never been a lawyer. Get this mythical urban legend-BS straight. It offends my species. He is a Humanities graduate with a major in Law Policy. It's called philosophy, ethics, social psychology, and public administration (with a heavy dose of high level argumentation, better known as spinnin' and jivin', US historonics and cultural rhetoric. His DU and the Law paper is a political spin piece. Written inside the Beltway or across the river in Arlington, for him and then signed and released by Fahey. It's classic Public Affairs work. If you think you understand propoganda check out US army public affairs function. Fahey is lookin' for staff job in congress. His conscience might be his down fall. He left military service as an objector refusing to be deployed to Iraq. Obviously it was not for the right reason ... perhaps it was a plan to make him sympathetic with the enemy. He may have good paying job with DIA already. [Brought to you by HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK] ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~--> Buy Ink Cartridges or Refill Kits for your HP, Epson, Canon or Lexmark Printer at MyInks.com. Free s/h on orders $50 or more to the US & Canada. http://www.c1tracking.com/l.asp?cid=5511 http://us.click.yahoo.com/mOAaAA/3exGAA/qnsNAA/Sj.0lB/TM ---------------------------------------------------------------------~-> [Brought to you by HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK] Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/du-watch/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: du-watch-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ***************************************************************** 61 [DU-WATCH] UK: British TV on child cancer cluster Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2004 14:02:50 -0600 (CST) -----Original Message----- From: Richard Bramhall [mailto:bramhall@llrc.org] Sent: February 10, 2004 8:38 AM To: "Undisclosed-Recipient:;"@smtp.enta.net Subject: British TV finds new child cancer cluster worse than notorious Seascale Low Level Radiation Campaign email briefing. Please forward to other campaigners TV researcher finds new cluster of childhood cancers and leukaemia far worse than Seascale Twenty years on from the Yorkshire TV programme "Windscale the Nuclear Laundry" in which James Cutler revealed the existence of the notorious cluster of childhood leukaemia at Seascale near Sellafield, a researcher from HTV has done the same thing for the radioactively contaminated Menai Strait, which lies between the island of Anglesey and north Wales. Like YTV, HTV has identified the children involved and has interviewed them and their parents in a documentary to be broadcast on the Welsh language channel S4C 10th February. These are real children, so it will be hard for the authorities to deny the data. The cluster is more severe than Seascale and its statistical strength is far greater. In the seaside town of Caernarfon leukaemia in the 0 - 14 year old age group is 28 times the UK national average (compared with Seascale's 12-fold excess). The excess risk is not confined to the town of Caernarfon. In the 34 wards surrounding the Menai Strait there were 6 cases of leukaemia 0-4 from 2000-2003, a Relative Risk (RR) of 7.8; between 1996 and 2003 there were 9 cases of brain and spinal cancer; RR = 5.4. The cancers include 3 cases of the rare eye cancer retinoblastoma on Anglesey. All are teenagers. In Conwy (another seaside town) there are two further cases, both under ten years old. Caernarfon has a further case, a child born in 1999 and diagnosed at age 3. Retinoblastoma has been associated with radioactivity since the Seascale cluster of leukaemia is accompanied by a 20-fold excess of retinoblastoma in children of Sellafield workers. The relative risks for retinoblastoma in the HTV research are uncertain because so far we only have one of the diagnosis dates, but a conservative calculation shows that excess risks for the area, compared with average rates, are between 5 and 15-times (this covers separate calculations for Anglesey and the whole of the county of Gwynedd). The statistical significance of all the results is high, so this is not a chance occurrence (for the detail see the report itself on www.llrc.org). This news blows to shreds any credibility COMARE (Committee on Medical Aspects of Radiation in the Environment) may have. COMARE was set up on the recommendation of the Black Committee which investigated the way in which the Seascale cluster was found. COMARE's deliberations have resulted in nothing but two decades of denial, hanging on the single flimsy premise that on "current knowledge" of the relationship between radiation and leukaemia, the level of dose local people were exposed should not have caused so many cases. Parents of young cancer patients in north Wales consistently comment that when they take their children to hospital they are surprised by the sheer numbers of children who come from the same areas. Workers at the Low Level Radiation Campaign were alerted by such anecdotes to look at data leaked to us by Wales Cancer Registry (WCR). We found anomalously high cancer rates along the Irish Sea coast, and inferred that radioactivity migrating onto the shore was the cause and that the dose/effect relationship cited by COMARE was simply wrong. COMARE has failed to conduct a proper investigation of our findings, fearing that to do so would increase our credibility and "open the door for others to lean on COMARE to recommend research." COMARE failed to ask the Welsh Cancer Intelligence Unit (WCISU - WCR's successor) how and why they wiped large numbers of cases off the WCR databases, in effect going back two decades to cure people. The whole sorry story is on www.llrc.org and there you can also download the report in which Dr Chris Busby has analysed the statistical status of what the HTV researcher found. You can even see the minutes of the COMARE meeting which listened to the Director of WCISU but not to us. LLRC is calling (not for the first time) for COMARE to be disbanded, as well as the other watchdog which was set up on Black's recommendation. This is SAHSU, the Small Area Health Statistics Unit; surely it would be best for public health problems such as Seascale to be found by official bodies routinely monitoring official data, rather than in embarrassing TV documentaries? Suffice it to say SAHSU has never found anything. When asked to investigate the concerns of local people they ignore the way radioactive discharges are unevenly distributed by prevailing winds and by local topography, rivers and tides. When challenged (as they were recently at Bradwell in Essex) to look more realistically at data on cancer around an area of contamination they apply the totally inappropriate technique of Bayesian Smoothing to smudge the data out so that nothing can be seen. Take away the Bayesian smudging and the truth speaks clear - radioactive mud blows onshore and kills people. This observation cannot be accounted for using the radiation protection standards advised by the International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP). We have consistently looked at the dose/response relationship on the basis of low dose radiaiton effects (e.g. infant leukaemia post- Chernobyl) and found it to be in error by two orders of magnitude. Consider one example; on the basis of what COMARE and NRPB say, doses at Seascale are 300 times too small to have caused the leukaemia cluster, but nobody denies that the cluster is real. What caused it? Was it the radiation? We think so and we think ICRP's model is wrong in the very low dose end and for radioactivity when it gets into the body - this part of ICRP's modelling is, after all just guess work. Now, thanks to HTV, we have even more evidence that we are right. There are massive implications for all aspects of nuclear policy everywhere. One of those implications is that SAHSU and COMARE must go - they have stood out against scientific advance and the interests of the public for far too long. We will produce further briefings soon. Richard Bramhall Low Level Radiation Campaign bramhall@llrc.org The Knoll Montpellier Park Llandrindod Powys LD1 5LW U.K. +44 (0)1597 824771 [Brought to you by HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK] Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/du-watch/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: du-watch-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ***************************************************************** 62 Kerry, veterans, depleted uranium Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2004 19:12:11 -0800 Dear Friends, Let's focus on depleted uranium as a veterans' issue with John Kerry. Peace, Carol Wolman In the United States Senate, (Kerry) has led the fight to investigate the fate of POW/MIAs in Vietnam, treat and compensate victims of Agent Orange and study the cause of war-related illnesses in Gulf War veterans. " http://www.johnkerry.com/issues/veterans/ The thoughts of the first British Gulf War Veteran to be tested for, and found to be poisoned with depleted uranium. It is an outrageous scandal that depleted uranium was ever used, it was not necessary, it was over-kill, and was not worth the cost to the Soldiers Health. I cannot in any way accept that the Ministry of Defence (MoD) would not have been aware of the consequences following the use of depleted uranium. In my eyes this puts the British and American Governments in the same league as the regime we were sent to fight, one that is willing to use a weapon of Mass Destruction that has serious heath consequences against their own people and for what? To stabilise the price of oil, that's what! Just what kind of society is Britain? I don't know anymore. http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article4406.htm#BRISTOW Depleted Uranium: A Post-War Disaster For Environment And Health With contributions of: Felicity Arbuthnot · Rosalie Bertell · Ray Bristow · Peter Diehl · Dan Fahey · Henk van der Keur · Daniel Robicheau Laka Foundation May 1999"Uranium poisoning is characterized by generalized health impairment. The element and its compounds produce changes in the kidneys, liver, lungs and cardiovascular, nervous and haemopoietic systems, and cause disorders of protein and carbohydrate metabolism....... Chronic poisoning results from prolonged exposure to low concentrations of insoluble compounds and presents a clinical picture different from that of acute poisoning. The outstanding signs and symptoms are pulmonary fibrosis, pneumoconiosis, and blood changes with a fall in red blood count; haemoglobin, erythrocyte and reticulocyte levels in the peripheral blood are reduced. Leucopenia may be observed with leucocyte disorders (cytolysis, pyknosis, and hyperseg-mentosis). There may be damage to the nervous system. Morphological changes in the lungs, liver, spleen, intestines and other organs and tissues may be found, and it is reported that uranium exposure inhibits reproductive activity and affects uterine and extra-uterine development in experimental animals. Insoluble compounds tend to be retained in tissues and organs for long periods." ... It is important to note that there is no scientific evidence which supports the US Veteran Administration claim that the insoluble uranium oxide to which the Gulf War Veterans were exposed will be primarily a renal chemical toxicant. Yet this is the criteria which the VA proposes for attributing any health problems of the Veteran to depleted uranium. Intermediate and chronic exposure duration to insoluble uranium is regulated in the US by its radiological property. The slow excretion rate of the uranium oxide allows for some kidney and tubule repair and regeneration. Moreover, because of the long biological half life, much of the uranium is still being stored in the body and has not yet passed through the kidneys. The direct damage to lungs and kidneys by uranium compounds is thought to be the result of the combined radiation and chemical properties, and it is difficult to attribute a portion of the damage to these separate factors which cannot be separated in life... Damage to body organs occurred with intermediate or chronic exposure at doses as low as 0.05 mg per cu metre air. A generally sensitive indicator of exposure seems to be loss of body weight. However this finding is sometimes attributed to the unpleasant taste of the uranium laced food given to animals. There is also damage to the entrance portals: respiratory and gastro-intestinal systems; and the exit portals: intestinal and renal systems. Uranium oxide was associated with fibrosis and other degenerative changes in the lung. It was also associated with proteinuria, and increased NPN (non-protein nitrogen) and slight degenerative changes in the tubules. The more severe renal damage was associated with the soluble compounds uranium tetrafluoride and uranium hexafluoride (not thought to have been used in the Gulf War ordnance).... None of the uranium research dealt with the synergistic, additive or antagonistic effects potentially present in the Gulf War mixture of iatrogenic, pathological, toxic chemical and electromagnetic exposures. http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article4406.htm#BERTELL ***************************************************************** 63 [du-list] TV researcher finds new cluster of childhood cancers Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2004 19:12:08 -0800 Low Level Radiation Campaign email briefing. Please forward to other campaigners TV researcher finds new cluster of childhood cancers and leukaemia far worse than Seascale Twenty years on from the Yorkshire TV programme "Windscale the Nuclear Laundry" in which James Cutler revealed the existence of the notorious cluster of childhood leukaemia at Seascale near Sellafield, a researcher from HTV has done the same thing for the radioactively contaminated Menai Strait, which lies between the island of Anglesey and north Wales. Like YTV, HTV has identified the children involved and has interviewed them and their parents in a documentary to be broadcast on the Welsh language channel S4C 10th February. These are real children, so it will be hard for the authorities to deny the data. The cluster is more severe than Seascale and its statistical strength is far greater. In the seaside town of Caernarfon leukaemia in the 0 - 14 year old age group is 28 times the UK national average (compared with Seascale's 12-fold excess). The excess risk is not confined to the town of Caernarfon. In the 34 wards surrounding the Menai Strait there were 6 cases of leukaemia 0-4 from 2000-2003, a Relative Risk (RR) of 7.8; between 1996 and 2003 there were 9 cases of brain and spinal cancer; RR = 5.4. The cancers include 3 cases of the rare eye cancer retinoblastoma on Anglesey. All are teenagers. In Conwy (another seaside town) there are two further cases, both under ten years old. Caernarfon has a further case, a child born in 1999 and diagnosed at age 3. Retinoblastoma has been associated with radioactivity since the Seascale cluster of leukaemia is accompanied by a 20-fold excess of retinoblastoma in children of Sellafield workers. The relative risks for retinoblastoma in the HTV research are uncertain because so far we only have one of the diagnosis dates, but a conservative calculation shows that excess risks for the area, compared with average rates, are between 5 and 15-times (this covers separate calculations for Anglesey and the whole of the county of Gwynedd). The statistical significance of all the results is high, so this is not a chance occurrence (for the detail see the report itself on www.llrc.org). This news blows to shreds any credibility COMARE (Committee on Medical Aspects of Radiation in the Environment) may have. COMARE was set up on the recommendation of the Black Committee which investigated the way in which the Seascale cluster was found. COMARE's deliberations have resulted in nothing but two decades of denial, hanging on the single flimsy premise that on "current knowledge" of the relationship between radiation and leukaemia, the level of dose local people were exposed should not have caused so many cases. Parents of young cancer patients in north Wales consistently comment that when they take their children to hospital they are surprised by the sheer numbers of children who come from the same areas. Workers at the Low Level Radiation Campaign were alerted by such anecdotes to look at data leaked to us by Wales Cancer Registry (WCR). We found anomalously high cancer rates along the Irish Sea coast, and inferred that radioactivity migrating onto the shore was the cause and that the dose/effect relationship cited by COMARE was simply wrong. COMARE has failed to conduct a proper investigation of our findings, fearing that to do so would increase our credibility and "open the door for others to lean on COMARE to recommend research." COMARE failed to ask the Welsh Cancer Intelligence Unit (WCISU - WCR's successor) how and why they wiped large numbers of cases off the WCR databases, in effect going back two decades to cure people. The whole sorry story is on www.llrc.org and there you can also download the report in which Dr Chris Busby has analysed the statistical status of what the HTV researcher found. You can even see the minutes of the COMARE meeting which listened to the Director of WCISU but not to us. LLRC is calling (not for the first time) for COMARE to be disbanded, as well as the other watchdog which was set up on Black's recommendation. This is SAHSU, the Small Area Health Statistics Unit; surely it would be best for public health problems such as Seascale to be found by official bodies routinely monitoring official data, rather than in embarrassing TV documentaries? Suffice it to say SAHSU has never found anything. When asked to investigate the concerns of local people they ignore the way radioactive discharges are unevenly distributed by prevailing winds and by local topography, rivers and tides. When challenged (as they were recently at Bradwell in Essex) to look more realistically at data on cancer around an area of contamination they apply the totally inappropriate technique of Bayesian Smoothing to smudge the data out so that nothing can be seen. Take away the Bayesian smudging and the truth speaks clear - radioactive mud blows onshore and kills people. This observation cannot be accounted for using the radiation protection standards advised by the International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP). We have consistently looked at the dose/response relationship on the basis of low dose radiaiton effects (e.g. infant leukaemia post- Chernobyl) and found it to be in error by two orders of magnitude. Consider one example; on the basis of what COMARE and NRPB say, doses at Seascale are 300 times too small to have caused the leukaemia cluster, but nobody denies that the cluster is real. What caused it? Was it the radiation? We think so and we think ICRP's model is wrong in the very low dose end and for radioactivity when it gets into the body - this part of ICRP's modelling is, after all just guess work. Now, thanks to HTV, we have even more evidence that we are right. There are massive implications for all aspects of nuclear policy everywhere. One of those implications is that SAHSU and COMARE must go - they have stood out against scientific advance and the interests of the public for far too long. We will produce further briefings soon. Richard Bramhall Low Level Radiation Campaign bramhall@llrc.org The Knoll Montpellier Park Llandrindod Powys LD1 5LW U.K. +44 (0)1597 824771 ________________________________________________________________________ Yahoo! Messenger - Communicate instantly..."Ping" your friends today! Download Messenger Now http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com/download/index.html ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~--> Send the freshest Valentine's flowers with a FREE vase from only $29.99! Shipped direct from the grower with a 7 day freshness guarantee and prices so low you save 30-55% off retail! http://us.click.yahoo.com/_iAw9B/xdlHAA/3jkFAA/FGYolB/TM ---------------------------------------------------------------------~-> To unsubscribe from this groups send a message to du-list-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com. In the body of the message type unsubscribe and send. Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/du-list/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: du-list-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ***************************************************************** 64 [DU-WATCH] Karen Parker: Fighting to stop the use of illegal Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2004 01:32:09 -0600 (CST) http://www.awakenedwoman.com/karen_parker.htm Karen Parker: Fighting to stop the use of illegal weapons by Stephanie Hiller "I think since we've raised this issue at the UN as vocally as we have, it has had a nonproliferation effect." Karen Parker is a human rights lawyer who specializes in armed conflict law; she has been an advocate for victims of rights abuses including Ugandan refugees, World War II comfort women of Japan, and child slavery in Saudi Arabia. She is responsible, in part, for the evolution of international law in such areas as economic sanctions, weaponry, environment as a human right, and the rights of the disabled. She is currently the chief delegate for International Educational Development - Humanitarian Law Project, a nongovernmental organization (NGO) accredited by the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC). In 2001, Ms. Parker and her colleagues lobbied successfully for the appointment of a special rapporteur on depleted uranium during the annual session of the Subcommission on the Prevention of Discrimination Against Minorities. A graduate of the University of San Francisco Law School, Karen lives in San Francisco. Awakened Woman talked with Karen Parker via telephone a few days before Thanksgiving. I had just learned about the UMRC study (please see our story, "Scientists Discover Radioactive Trail in Afghanistan") regarding the high uranium levels in Afghan citizens, and I asked her for her view of it. "I'm not a scientist, but I know Dr. Durakovich, having communicated with his organization for a number of years. And I have reviewed his material with others highly knowledgeable in the field, who concur that his findings appear to be verifiable and credible and his methodology is also credible." Asked whether their study indicates that some other type of uranium weapons was used in Afghanistan, Karen said, "It's very likely. I think there will also be indications that something more than depleted uranium was used in Gulf War 2." Depleted uranium is a byproduct of the nuclear process, whether military or for energy, and the US has huge piles of it. Though depleted, it is still highly radioactive. DU was introduced in weaponry during the first Gulf War. Initially, DU was used to form tank-penetrating rounds. These were about six inches long and had the feature of penetrating the heavy metal in tanks. Because of its density, depleted uranium was also used in tanks and protective armor for soldiers. Due to its relatively low levels of radioactivity, depleted uranium was considered fairly harmless (it is also used in golf clubs) and the Pentagon has repeatedly denied any danger from its use, even though its original research into the military application of du stated clearly the dangers to personnel. However, when exploded, depleted uranium releases a highly radioactive gas; tiny alpha particles are easily inhaled into the lungs. When Gulf War veterans returned home, many of them became mysteriously ill, with symptoms highly suggestive of radiation sickness. Thanks to the work of Gulf War veterans like Doug Rokke and Dan Fahey, and many dedicated activists, the dangers of depleted uranium are now well known, but the Pentagon continues to defend its use. Karen said that depleted uranium has been used in the nose cones of big bombs used in recent wars. "The daisy cutter is a big fuel air bomb, 15,000 pounds, and when they hit they create a mushroom cloud. They incinerate everything in an area the size of three football fields directly. Maximum bang for the buck! "I have worked with the United Nations on evaluating these weapons. The weapons used in Afghanistan were more bunker busters and fuel air bombs which are called either daisy cutters or nicknamed Big Blu, more than the Abrams tanks and that kind of thing. "The UN investigator has a lot of evidence that the bunker busters have DU nosecones and perhaps other radioactivity. It's kind of from inferences because the radiation tested doesn't match just DU, but there is possible plutonium contamination which according to scientists was more likely to give the kinds of readings that Dr. Durakovich (of UMRC) found." Are they nuclear weapons? "I think so. The UN has condemned the use of them. They are illegal weapons, and they are illegal for more reasons than the depleted uranium. They're just indiscriminate weapons." Whether these weapons are termed nuclear depends on which scientist you talk to, said Karen. For some scientists, nuclear refers only to fission-fusion. But they are certainly radiological weapons, "and as such are illegal by international law. It doesn't have to be shown to be a nuclear weapon to be illegal. It has to have the effects that illegal weapons have, and one of the effects of course is poison. It may be a great weapon but what does it do -- to people? Even people who are not combatants, three years later children are born with no arms. The child was not a target. It's on those grounds that depleted uranium is viewed as illegal. "The other concern the UN has had about those daisy cutters is they're so big and they make such a bang, there are indications that they may have been responsible for subsequent earthquakes in the nearby areas. There have been two rather large earthquakes in Afghanistan, in areas that weren't all that active seismically, and there are some scientists looking into it but it's very difficult because control of the area is almost exclusively in the hands of the United States or United States controlled people." These bombs, and the new generation of small nuclear missiles the Pentagon is currently developing, unlike the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, are not nuclear fission explosives, but they are chemically toxic and do release radiation that can be spread by wind, water, and even birds, affecting masses of people far beyond the target areas. The effects of exposure may not show up for years, and it's not easy to ascertain the exact cause of a birth deformity or a cancer that occurs 20 years later. Karen has argued that these types of weapons are already illegal under the protocols of international laws of warfare such as the Geneva Convention, established just after the second world war, and the Hague Convention. Weapons that keep killing when the war's over are all classed as "weapons of mass destruction" -- and they are illegal according to four rules of warfare: 1. Weapons can only be used in the legal field of battle. 2. Weapons can only be used for the duration of an armed conflict. Weapons can't "keep on giving" twenty years after the military incident. 3. Weapons may not be unduly inhumane. (A look at the pictures of birth deformities in Iraq will confirm that these weapons are not humane.) 4. Weapons may not have an unduly negative effect on the natural environment. In Iraq and Afghanistan, water and soil have been thoroughly -- and permanently -- polluted by these weapons. Radioactive uranium has a half-life of 450 million years! What can we do about this? I asked her. In Karen Parker's view, the strategy that seems to be working is nonproliferation. Typically there are 30 to 40 wars around the world every year. "Governments that have DU weapons and could be using them, have not. The list includes France, Russia, Pakistan, India, Israel. It would be so easy for them to knock off those tanks with depleted uranium, but they're not. "I think since we've raised this issue at the UN as vocally as we have, it has had a nonproliferation effect. I think it has also slowed the sale. So countries that already had DU and were sort of on track to buy some more could be deciding to put their bucks elsewhere. The US can try to fend off the legal consequences. Some of these other countries don't feel that they can." Will the use of these weapons by the US liberate others to use them? "I think the anti nuclear movements in some of these countries is so strong, I can't see that happening. I see a possibility of them ganging up on us and taking a more forceful, unified position against us, similar to the grouping around the steel embargo. Now with the contract-restriction issue raising its head, the EU countries, adding Russia and Canada and perhaps some others, are probably going to take a very strong and very unified action. Through the UN? "A lot of different ways. Through trade sanctions, etc." Will that be effective? "Well Bush backed down on the steel embargo issue -- and he had made a huge promise to a huge number of Americans that financially back him in a really big way. The way the WTO came down on him, he realized it was to his advantage to back down particularly in an election year. "I think what they will do will be very forceful, and I think it will weigh on the depleted uranium issue as well, if they kind these kinds of ways to penalize the United States for what they view as 'wrong' then they'll find other ways. "The US takes an extremely arrogant position on whether it can be hauled into court, defying the International Court. The international community tends to tear its hair, wondering how they're going to control the rogue elephant, particularly in light of this year and these kinds of actions." Legal action by the victims of war demanding compensation is possible, Karen said. She was the attorney in a case brought before the Organization of American States (OAS) by Disabled Peoples International on behalf of the victims of the US bombing of the Hospital for the Mentally Retarded and Mentally Ill in Grenada. They won their case, and the United States responded by building a state of the art hospital in Grenada. ________________________________________________________________________ Yahoo! Messenger - Communicate instantly..."Ping" your friends today! Download Messenger Now http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com/download/index.html [Brought to you by HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK] Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/du-watch/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: du-watch-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ***************************************************************** 65 [DU-WATCH] Returning troops get depleted uranium questions Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2004 14:02:19 -0600 (CST) Returning Vilseck troops get depleted uranium questions By Rick Scavetta, Stars and Stripes European edition, Friday, February 6, 2004 http://www.estripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=20287 Editors note: Stars and Stripes reporter Rick Scavetta is embedded with the 94th Engineer Battalion, a Vilseck, Germany-based unit that has returned from Iraq after a yearlong deployment. This is the third in a series of articles on the soldiers return to Germany. VILSECK, Germany A questionnaire on troops exposure to depleted uranium raised a few eyebrows this week as engineers returning from Iraq began their second day of the U.S. Army Europe reintegration program. The survey was one part of the medical session, during which soldiers from the 94th Engineer Battalion also gave blood samples for HIV screenings and received tuberculosis skin tests. The series of questions on depleted uranium read somewhat like this: Were you near an armored vehicle that was struck by depleted uranium? Were you in or near an Abrams tank when it was hit with depleted uranium munitions? Did you routinely enter vehicles with depleted uranium dust to perform maintenance, recovery or intelligence gathering? Most of the soldiers checked blocks stating they hadnt encountered any of that. But the survey brought questions about why the military was asking. Theyre trying to figure out their liability so they dont get sued down the line, said Spc. John Wissinger, 34, of Denver. He said he was around burning vehicles in Iraq but wasnt sure what type of munitions set them afire. After the checklists were signed, the engineers took off their uniform tops and lined up, each holding a glass vial. Medics from the Vilseck Health Clinic, augmented by soldiers from a stateside Reserve unit, worked the needles. Just a few combat veterans winced at the flash of blood entering the small tube. Most were content to do whatever the Army asked so they could go about their personal business. B.B. Bell says do it, so weve got to do it, said Cpl. Stanley Osinski, 24, of Boston. Meanwhile, the engineers discussed taking advantage of some exclusive offers for returning troops. For example, the bowling center on base offered three free games. A local cantina donated a large cappuccino and 24 minutes of free Web surfing. The coffee was a great idea, but the Internet was no dice, said Spc. Donald Bunn, 25, of North Hampton, Ohio. They said it wasnt working. Most troops shrugged at the 20 percent off purchases at the Arts & Crafts Center, but the free hour at the auto shop would come in handy for tuning up cars left in storage for a year. For those without cars, the base outdoor recreation program gave out mountain bikes for the first week back. The travel company on post gave $10 off the entrance fee to Neuschwanstein, one of Bavarias most famous castles. Unfortunately, the offer was good only until Jan. 25. Troops joked about their blood samples many of them have been partying each night since their return. Im hung over and had about three hours of sleep, said Spc. Ethan Coder, who added that the mandatory training was like a wedge that doesnt fit. Soldiers talked about how one soldier already was charged with driving under the influence. A couple of fights broke out in the barracks, but nothing serious. Pfc. Eric Schrobilgen, 19, of Dubuque, Iowa, sported a small shiner near his right eye, but could not figure out how he got it. His first night back, he drank vodka and some beers. Sometime later he fell in the woods on post, possibly the cause of his injury. He slept most of the next day and was feeling fine, he said. Female soldiers joined the partying, but had to fend off advances from fellow troops, said Pfc. Amanda Jackson, 19, of Roanoke, Va., who stayed up all night at her barracks in nearby Grafenwvhr. At one point she cried, she said, because her boyfriend in Vilseck had not come to see her. But she joined in and drank some wine. Her friend Stephanie Meade, 22, of Chestertown, N.Y., drank heavily and called her mom, she said. Engaged to a Marine at Camp Lejeune, N.C., Meade also found herself turning away drunken guys, she said. Back in Baghdad, guys would use awful pickup lines such as, Hey, wheres that unit patch from? Or, Lets go take a walk. Back in Vilseck it was more direct, Meade said. They would simply ask, You want to see my room? You feel sorry for them, Meade said. They are so pathetic. While the nights may be for revelry, the days are reserved for business. During the week of half-day sessions, each troop carries three photocopied pages titled USAREUR Individual Reintegration Checklist. The lengthy list of sections is divided up in typical military fashion, with line items labeled by category 2.1.10 and 2.1.11, etc. Each corresponds with mandatory tasks. Soldiers need a sign and stamp from officials after each days sessions to prove that the troops received training. Supervising the checklist collection was Sgt. Alberto Blanco, 27, of the Bronx, N.Y., who returned from Iraq early because of a death in the family. Blanco, who underwent a similar reintegration program, knows his returning comrades have other things on their minds. Im just making sure they do the right thing, Blanco said. This is a USAREUR requirement. If they dont fill out everything, they cant go on leave. ________________________________________________________________________ Yahoo! Messenger - Communicate instantly..."Ping" your friends today! Download Messenger Now http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com/download/index.html [Brought to you by HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK] Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/du-watch/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: du-watch-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ***************************************************************** 66 [DU-WATCH] As The Danger of Depleted Uranium is Confirmed Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2004 00:11:49 -0600 (CST) 10th February 2004 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE As The Danger of Depleted Uranium is Confirmed Inaccurate Government Testing Disguises True Amount of Contamination In Troops An ex-soldier has become the first veteran to win a pension appeal for depleted uranium (DU) poisoning. Yet the UK Government has tried to scupper potential future cases by releasing misleading figures claiming fewer than 10 soldiers in the current Iraq war have been contaminated by DU. The figures, released the day after the pensions victory, are based only on 275 samples which may indicate a much higher overall contamination rate among the 70 000 UK soldiers who have been involved in operations in Iraq over the last year. Moreover these positive tests were found using a technique the MoD knows to be inaccurate and capable of indicating negative exposure when a positive exposure has taken place. A more accurate test developed by a University of Leicester laboratory is not being offered to these veterans but only to veterans of the 1991 Gulf War. The importance of accurate testing is underscored by the case of veteran Kenny Duncan who won his pension appeal last week (04/02/04) on the basis that his illness was caused by his service in Iraq in 1991 cleaning tanks hit by DU weapons. Mr Duncan suffers from breathlessness and aching joints. His children also suffer from symptoms similar to those seen in Iraqi children such as deformed toes and low immune systems. Mr Duncans case was formed on the basis on blood tests by German biochemist, Dr Albrecht Schott, that revealed chromosome aberrations caused by ionising radiation. The MoD has always consistently denied that DU exposure can cause harm in the face of increasing strong scientific evidence to the contrary. As Rae Street from CADU argues "This is a landmark case, it justifies CADU and many other groups and individuals struggle for a ban on 'Depleted' Uranium munitions" For more information please contact Camille Warren on 0161 273 8293. ****************************************************************************** *************** The Campaign Against Depleted Uranium, Bridge 5 Mill, 22a Beswick Street, Ancoats, Manchester, M4 7HR Tel./Fax.: +44 (0)161 273 8293 E-Mail info@cadu.org.uk Website: http://www.cadu.org.uk Affiliation costs to CADU are #8 a year unwaged/student and #10 a year waged. For this you will receive campaigning materials and CADU's quarterly newsletter. Our newsletter is also available free of charge by E-Mail (send us a message with 'Subscribe CADU News' as the subject). Please send your cheque draft or postal order in # sterling to the address above. ****************************************************************************** *************** [Brought to you by HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK] Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/du-watch/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: du-watch-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ***************************************************************** 67 [du-list] Fw: Isocyantes Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2004 19:12:06 -0800 Comrades I need you help to answer the question this veteran's wife has, please help. Jagmedic ----- Original Message ----- From: Mary Ann Peace To: Jagmedic Sent: Monday, February 09, 2004 4:08 PM Subject: RE: Isocyantes Hi, Just wondering about "isocyanates", I know they can come in different forms. But, are they capable of causing chemical toxicity?? Isocyanates are found in all chemicals??? My research tells me that they are - what would be the isocyantes found in depleted uranium?? If you recall, my husband had started a BOI stating "possible exposure to isocyantes" . I found so much info that maybe another objective view could help me out. Thanks Mary Ann "We do not stop playing because we grow old, We grow old because we stop playing" "When everything's coming your way, You're in the wrong lane" To unsubscribe from this groups send a message to du-list-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com. In the body of the message type unsubscribe and send. ---------- Yahoo! Groups Links * To visit your group on the web, go to: * http://groups.yahoo.com/group/du-list/ * * To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: * du-list-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com * * Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service. ***************************************************************** 68 [du-list] Scenes of horror at Iraqi hospital (AFP) Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2004 19:12:09 -0800 Scenes of horror at Iraqi hospital http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3.asp?ao=31006&t=1 Jennie Matthew | Samawa, Iraq 11 February 2004 12:22 Two-year-old Nawaf Mishal lies whimpering on a pile of dirty blankets in an Iraqi hospital, so malnourished his face is deformed, his legs are like pencils and his enormous almond eyes empty with pain. He vomits everything he eats, and a 10-day course of antibiotics and fluids at the children's hospital in Samawa, about 260km south of Baghdad, has not helped. Nawaf fell ill when the village drinking water became infused with sewage. No one in his family thought to boil the water first. Doctors at the hospital say the number of cases of severe gastroenteritis caused by contaminated water have doubled since the 2003 United States- led invasion of Iraq. In the children's ward, the stench of dried sweat and raw waste is almost unbearable. Mothers, dressed head to foot in black robes, sit cross-legged on the floor or beds, cradling children as many drift slowly into death. The hospital has only 11 incubator units for more than 20 premature babies. Most date back to the 1980s before international sanctions isolated Iraq from the world in the wake of Saddam Hussein's 1990 invasion of Kuwait. Oxygen supplies run out for days. Doctors have less than half the drugs, fluids and equipment they need. The electricity goes off for hours. The hospital's sewage system frequently overflows. "We have nothing. Most children die, especially in winter," said Samah Zaher, a 25-year-old junior doctor. Doctors suspect three-year-old Abdullah Salah, suddenly seized by convulsions three days ago, has meningitis or encephalitis. But resident paediatrician Ayad Miran thinks the journey to Baghdad for a scan and diagnosis would kill the child. "I'm a sad man for the condition of these children," says Miran, who works more than 10 hours a day, seven days a week for $150 a month. The hospital is also woefully incapable of treating hideously disfigured babies, whose illnesses doctors suspect are being caused by depleted uranium ammunition used by US and British troops in the 1991 Gulf War. "They have different rare diseases and deformities, such as multiple fractures, bone disorders, supernumerary fingers and thumbs. Sometimes they live for a few weeks. When the deformities are very bad they usually die," says paediatrician Abdul Amieer al-Dabbagh. Two months ago, a woman gave birth to what he could describe only as a "mermaid", with a thick "fishbone tail" in place of the legs, three double chins and partially formed ears. He keeps pictures of all such children. It was so disfigured, doctors could not tell whether the baby was a boy or a girl and the infant died shortly after delivery. Unemployment is rife in Samawa and public sanitation almost non-existent. The hospital used to charge for treatment, but with no jobs no one can pay. "I came to Samawa 12 years ago, at the end of the Iran-Iraq war. I chose the safest town and one year later the embargoes started," says Dabbagh. In 1995, he was jailed by Saddam's regime for four months after a British pharmacist visited the hospital with vital supplies of medicine. About 600 Dutch troops have been based in Samawa since Saddam was ousted from power 10 months ago, but no one at the hospital has seen them. Many have high hopes that Japanese peacekeeping troops, who began arriving last month, will rebuild the moribund city. But so far the only signed and sealed construction contract is for their military camp outside the city. -- Sapa-AFP ---------------------------------------------------------------------- stichting Laka Laka foundation documentatie en onderzoeks- documentation and research centrum kernenergie centre on nuclear energy Ketelhuisplein 43 Ketelhuisplein 43 1054 RD Amsterdam NL-1054 RD Amsterdam tel: 020-6168294 Netherlands fax: 020-6892179 tel: +31-20-6168294 fax: +31-20-6892179 www.laka.org laka@antenna.nl ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~--> Send the freshest Valentine's flowers with a FREE vase from only $29.99! Shipped direct from the grower with a 7 day freshness guarantee and prices so low you save 30-55% off retail! http://us.click.yahoo.com/_iAw9B/xdlHAA/3jkFAA/FGYolB/TM ---------------------------------------------------------------------~-> To unsubscribe from this groups send a message to du-list-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com. In the body of the message type unsubscribe and send. Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/du-list/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: du-list-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ***************************************************************** 69 Tri-City Herald:c Few seek nuclear ailment compensation This story was published Wednesday, February 11th, 2004 By Annette Cary Herald staff writer A program to compensate Hanford workers for ailments related to working at the nuclear reservation is finding far fewer takers than expected. U.S. Department of Labor officials are mystified by the low number of applications for a program that pays $150,000 in compensation to those who developed cancer or certain lung diseases from working at the nuclear reservation. Current and former workers and surviving family members are eligible. "It is something they deserve," said Pete Turcic, director of the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program for the Department of Labor, in Pasco. The Department of Energy, after years of denials, announced in 2000 that workers at Hanford and other nuclear sites may have developed cancer from radiation and would be compensated. The complicated program had a slow start, but Turcic said Tuesday that the recent completion of a Hanford-wide profile of radiation doses should speed up the process. However, the Labor Department has received just 3,290 claims from workers or their survivors out of a total of about 51,000 filed nationwide. That might be 3 percent of past and present Hanford workers who were at Hanford from World War II to the present. At some nuclear sites, an estimated 15 percent to 20 percent of workers have applied. At a gaseous diffusion plant in Paducah, Ky., which has looser eligibility requirements because of poor record keeping, more than 20,000 of an estimated 60,000 workers have applied. Estimates of how many people have worked at Hanford vary, but officials started out with estimates of 60,000 production workers and 60,000 construction or building trades workers over the site's history. Some estimates are much higher. Considering that at least a third of U.S. residents get cancer, that means the number of past and present Hanford workers who likely have had cancer may be in the tens of thousands. While not all cancer claims will result in compensation awards, workers or their families have to file an application to figure out if they qualify. There has to be at least a 50 percent chance the cancer was caused by radiation exposure at Hanford. Labor officials are spending the week in the Tri-Cities, talking with people, such as doctors, who are in contact with workers who may be eligible. The officials also are working closely with the Paper, Allied Chemical and Energy International Union, which represents production workers at Hanford, to reach more former Hanford employees. A public meeting is planned Thursday. One theory is that former Hanford workers are not applying because of the patriotic pride Tri-Citians take in playing a role in ending World War II. Hanford workers produced the plutonium used in the bomb dropped on Nagasaki, Japan. "This is an entitlement program," Turcic emphasized. "It is not suing the government. It is compensation for people with illnesses incurred for serving the government." Some have been skeptical that money would actually be paid. The government has paid 22 cancer claims from Hanford workers and expects the newly completed site profile to speed up work to determine how much radiation individual workers likely received. "The dose reconstruction process by design is extremely claimant friendly," Turcic said. When information was missing, for example, the site profile errs on the side of additional radiation exposure. Turcic advises workers to submit claims as soon as possible. Reimbursement for medical costs associated with Hanford illnesses is retroactive to the date the claim was filed. In addition to cancer claims, the program also has paid 34 claims for people with chronic beryllium disease and is monitoring more people at risk for developing the disease. People sensitive to the metal used in nuclear work may develop the lung disease years after exposure. The Labor Department also is trying to reach more people who have moved away. About 76 percent of Hanford workers still living who have filed claims have Washington addresses. Of survivors who have filed, about 90 percent have Washington addresses. Unrelated medical studies of Hanford workers done by other agencies are providing a map of where to look for former workers and their families. Death certificates collected in those studies show many moved to California, Utah, Florida and Texas. PACE and the Department of Labor are urging people who are in touch with former workers who have moved from the area to pass along information about the compensation program. To try to figure out why so few people are applying, the Department of Labor is asking people to contact its Seattle office if they or someone they know might be eligible but has decided not to apply. To discuss reasons for not applying, call 1-888-805-3401 or send an e-mail to deeoic-public@dol.gov. People who want to apply or get more information about the program can contact a Kennewick office opened to help people with the paperwork. Call 1-888-654-0014 or 783-1500. In addition, people can learn more about the program or discuss it at the PACE meeting at 6:30 p.m. Thursday at the Richland Labor Temple, 1305 Knight St. © 2004 Tri-City Herald, Associated Press &Other Wire Services ***************************************************************** 70 Xinhuanet: Stolen radioactive material may be fatal www.xinhuanet.com www.chinaview.cn 2004-02-11 10:14:46 BEIJING, Feb. 11 (Xinhuanet) -- A quantity of a potentially deadly radioactive substance, cesium-137, was stolen from a construction site in Pucheng County, Shaanxi Province, at least five days ago. Police believe whoever took it may have confused the football-sized lead container used to store the cesium-137 with discarded metal scraps. Cesium-137 is a very active radioactive metal that explodes when brought in contact with water. It is mainly used in photoelectronic batteries, vacuum valves and as a test tool in metal surveys. It can cause blood diseases, sterility and birth defects. Local officials have asked anyone who finds the football-shaped container not to open it, put it in a safe place and report it immediately. Police are already actively searching for the stolen material. As soon as receiving the lost report, some 120 police officers and 80 local officials started searching more than two square kilometres site of the theft. Local police officers have been searching in every house in two towns and 14 villages around the construction site. They have also prohibited all salvage stations in Pucheng County from purchasing cesium-137 and asked them to report anyone trying to sell it. "As much as 5,000 yuan (US$602) will be given as a reward to any one who provides valuable clues to find the radioactive matter," local police said. The theft has attracted the attention from the Shaanxi provincial government. A working group of experts with dedicated search equipment was sent to Pucheng. They have been working for five days, said Li Zhonghong, the group leader. (China Daily) Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 71 Newsday.com: Radioactive material reported missing from demolition site February 11, 2004, 8:45 PM EST EAST ORANGE, N.J. -- Authorities are looking for two sealed sources of radioactive material reported missing from a demolition site, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission said Wednesday. A worker left the moisture density gauge at the site of the former Arcadian Gardens housing project at lunchtime Monday and returned to find the crushed remains of the gauge and the radioactive sources missing, said NRC spokesman Neil Sheehan. The amount of radioactive material involved is not considered to be significant, but officials are concerned that someone with prolonged contact could receive harmful amounts of radiation exposure. "This on its own would probably be insufficient to build any sort of terrorist device, but the biggest concern for us is that members of the public might be unwittingly exposed to this," Sheehan said Wednesday evening. Portable moisture density gauges can be used to measure the amount of moisture in soil. The device projects radiation from the two sources into the ground and then displays the reflected radiation on a dial on top of the gauge, the NRC said in a news release. The gauge emits about 3 rems of radiation per hour, Sheehan said. By comparison, the average American receives about 360 millirems every year from manmade and natural sources. One rem is equal to 1,000 millirems. A number of moisture density gauges go missing every year nationwide, but Sheehan said many of them are returned once people realize what they have. "It appears pretty clear that this device was damaged for whatever reason," Sheehan said. "Either the sources were placed with some other demolition material and they have not been able to find it or someone who didn't know what they had walked off with this." The company using the gauge, PMK Group, Inc., has until the close of business Thursday to submit a search plan to the NRC for the missing sources. If the materials are still missing by Friday, the company must put together a list of every person present at the site on Monday. They also must provide a description to those who may have come into contact with the sources. A message left at the firm after-hours Wednesday was not immediately returned. Copyright © 2004, The Associated Press | Article licensing and ***************************************************************** 72 [du-list] Fw: Bill Bright's alert: UNC public notice to mine Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2004 19:12:15 -0800 ----- Original Message ----- From: Anna Rondon To: Tara Thornton ; Phillipa Winkler ; Judy Jack ; Hazel James ; Gilbert Sanchez ; Chris Shuey ; b_norrell Sent: Wednesday, February 11, 2004 1:55 PM Subject: Fw: Bill Bright's alert: UNC public notice to mine uranium HI People If you have not read the Gallup Independent lately our bro Bill Bright seen the Public Notice. Please get the word out ASAP. Anna Rondon ----- Original Message ----- From: Rosemarie Cecchini To: bdunkeldc@hotmail.com ; Pat.Sheely@gimc.ihs.gov ; vanhartesveldt@cnetco.co ; fumceducation@cnetco.com ; Diocese of Gallup ; fumcpastor@cnetco.com ; Janis Martinez ; Mervyn Tilden ; Anna Rondon-Manuelito ; Larry Bernard ; Sr. Gladys Marhefka ; Chris Castillo ; saia_loraine@hotmail.com ; Amber Lopez Lasater ; Jane Broughton ; quelite@cnetco.com ; wjhubb@cnetco.com ; Beverlyzuni@yahoo.com ; Marley Shebala ; Emily Aversa ; Arletta Hartman ; Susan Warren ; pbois55@yahoo.com ; bckoz@cnetco.com ; jmrussell2001@yahoo.com ; Marc Page ; Judy Sweeney ; jeancri@cia-g.com ; Lynn Anner-Bolieu ; Dolores/Mike Sullivan ; Milagros Padilla ; Dale Potter ; MarthaByrd2001@yahoo.com ; Slacke@cia-g.com ; janag@doh.state.nm.us ; nancy@7cities.net ; cathcharities@yahoo.com ; Mary Thurlough ; smf@nm.net ; brdavidlandry@yahoo.com ; dinemission@cnetco.com ; godwire@cia-g.com ; petersbegaye@hotmail.com ; gemarsh@juno.com ; jazua@cnetco.com ; meblue@hotmail.com Sent: Wednesday, February 11, 2004 11:00 AM Subject: Bill Bright's alert: UNC public notice to mine uranium Fwd: from Bill Bright We "the people" have 30 days from Feb. 4 to request two hearings on the proposed United Nuclear Corp. applications to re-open Church Rock and Crown Point mines. I recommend that someone create a common interactive web or group site where all groups/individuals interested in this matter can effectively communicate/stratagize with each other. Who has the capacity to do this and who will be the lead organization? See 2/4/04 Gallup Independent Public Notices for details. Sorry, I was not able to scan it. Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Finance: Get your refund fast by filing online To unsubscribe from this groups send a message to du-list-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com. In the body of the message type unsubscribe and send. ---------- Yahoo! Groups Links * To visit your group on the web, go to: * http://groups.yahoo.com/group/du-list/ * * To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: * du-list-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com * * Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of Service. ***************************************************************** 73 UK The Times: Strike threat at Sellafield after BNFL cuts stewards February 12, 2004 By Angela Jameson SELLAFIELD, Europe’s biggest nuclear site, was last night on the brink of fresh industrial action after British Nuclear Fuels told unions to more than halve the number of full-time shop stewards at the site. The decision by BNFL to cut the number of trade union representatives it funds at Sellafield from eleven to four comes at a time when industrial relations at the Cumbrian nuclear reprocessing plant are at a low after a strike at the plant last autumn, the first for 30 years. The move against the union comes just two months after the unions forced management to cave in and harmonise pay differences between shift workers. The pay deal was achieved only after Amicus and the GMB general union led hundreds of workers in walkouts that crippled the plant for days at a time. BNFL has told Amicus and the GMB that the changes will be imposed from April 1. Unions said the measures will leave only four elected union representatives for more than 4,500 union members on the site. However, the nuclear group, whose future has been uncertain in the face of a long government review, disputed that figure and said that it would fund two representatives each from Prospect, Amicus and the GMB. Last night union officials urged the management to rethink the proposals, saying that they would ballot their members for industrial action if the plans were not withdrawn. Dougie Rooney, Amicus’s national officer for energy, said: “This is a vindictive attack on trade union representatives as a direct result of the successful industrial action undertaken by Amicus and the GMB and is designed to reduce union influence and effectiveness at the site.” After last autumn’s strike, both sides in the dispute called for an end to the acrimony and said that they were looking for ways to improve industrial relations. Unions last night said that the move against their officials showed that BNFL’s management team had no intention of working with them to improve relations between management and the workforce. “By imposing these changes without consultation or agreement, they are giving us no alternative but to ballot our members for industrial action,” Mr Rooney said. BNFL has denied that it was cutting funding for union officials in response to the outcome of the industrial action. In a statment last night it said that the decision to stop funding the posts was the result of a review that began in May 2003, before the recent industrial dispute. “These arrangements will not affect the total number of shop stewards accredited by the company or the rights of representation of any of the unions recognised by the company at Sellafield,” a spokeswoman for BNFL said. thetimes.co.uk/TGD/picture/0,,106784,00.jpg" Copyright 2004 Times Newspapers Ltd. ***************************************************************** 74 Las Vegas SUN: Nevada to inspect tailings at Yucca Mountain for dust hazard ASSOCIATED PRESS LAS VEGAS (AP) - Nevada will inspect volcanic-rock tailings piled up outside the tunnel at Yucca Mountain to see if they pose a blowing dust hazard at the planned national nuclear waste dump, the state's environmental protection chief said. "We will go out and take a look to see if it's a dust problem," Environmental Protection Division Administrator Allen Biaggi told the Las Vegas Review-Journal for a Wednesday report. The state decision to inspect the site came after former Yucca Mountain project workers alleged they were exposed to toxic dust while drilling the 5-mile long test tunnel in the mid-1990s. Yucca Mountain spokesman Allen Benson said the Energy Department has not been contacted by the state about the inspection. He said the pile was not considered waste rock by the Energy Department because it could be used later to fill the tunnel after the repository is loaded with 77,000 tons of spent nuclear fuel and radioactive industrial and defense waste. Classifying the tailings as waste rock could make it subject to federal hazardous waste laws. State Nuclear Projects Agency Executive Director Bob Loux, Gov. Kenny Guinn's top anti-Yucca aide, said the state has the authority to review any possible environmental or public health and safety concern. "If the federal government isn't going to do it, the state will probably have to step in and begin regulating," he said. Biaggi said a state Environmental Protection Division inspector would inspect the site this week for possible sources of inhalable dust particles under the federal Clean Air Act. "We'll look for potential sources of dust from the material and look at what process this came from," he said. The division has no authority to inspect the tunnel or ventilation systems inside buildings at the site. The lavender-colored rock pile is several hundred yards east of the tunnel's north portal, about 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. The Environmental Protection Agency is responsible for monitoring inside the tunnel under the Toxic Substances Control Act, which covers at least two fibrous zeolite minerals found in the mountain, erionite and mordenite. Of key concern is erionite, a carcinogen that scientists from the Los Alamos, N.M. national laboratory found at Yucca Mountain, according to a report written in 1989. An EPA official told the Review-Journal that the tailings might be exempt from hazardous waste regulations under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act. The state oversees the act in Nevada, which covers mining and other activities involving potentially hazardous materials. But Cheryl Nelson, a regulator at the EPA San Francisco regional office, said hazardous waste regulations would apply if the rock was discarded and it exhibited a "hazardous characteristic." Hazardous characteristics usually refer to the possibility that toxic metals like lead or chromium could leach from tailings and contaminate groundwater supplies. One former tunnel construction supervisor, Gene Griego, 52, of North Las Vegas, claims he and others contracted chronic lung diseases from inhaling fibrous silicate-laced minerals, including erionite, inside the Yucca Mountain tunnel. The Energy Department acknowledged last month that some of the more than 1,200 tunnel workers might have been exposed to silica dust, and began offering free silicosis screenings. Information from: Las Vegas Review-Journal -- ***************************************************************** 75 UKAEA: UKAEA cleans up in the west 9th February 2004 Ref: 2004/08 Contact: Rebecca ONeil, 0117 929 2311 The United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) is beginning the clean-up of a former licensed waste disposal area at its Harwell site in Oxfordshire, signing a contract with Mowlem Remediation, the land-clean-up-specialist operating as part of Mowlem plc. From the late 1960s until 1996, some of the chemicals used in Harwells research laboratories were stored, treated and disposed of at the sites Western Storage Area (WSA), which was designed as a licensed landfill for this type of waste. Now, as Harwell is progressively decommissioned and land released for alternative uses, the 24 pits at the WSA are being dug up and the contents disposed of in licensed facilities off-site. Stan Gordelier, Director of UKAEAs Southern Division said: This is another step forward in the transformation of Harwell from a nuclear site into a conventional science and business park. UKAEA is already experienced in land remediation operations from its work on the Southern Storage Area which has been shortlisted for a regeneration award by the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors. It will take 18 months of site work for the contractor, Mowlem Remediation to clean-up the WSA, digging up each of the 4 metres by 4 metres by 4 metres deep waste pits, retrieving the waste and packaging it into drums for disposal. Work on the site will begin in spring 2004 and follows detailed planning and design of the works between Mowlem Remediation and UKAEA. UKAEAs Project Manager Paul Atyeo said: Although the wastes were safely stored in approved conditions, there was some contamination of the ground water in the 1970s. UKAEA has been operating a ground water containment plant to remediate this pollution. As part of UKAEAs mission to restore the Harwell site, the contents of the waste pits will be dug up and appropriately disposed of so that the underlying pollution can be removed. Marcus Foweather Director of Mowlem Remediation said: We are pleased to have produced a Remediation Plan which incorporates remediation strategies, risk assessments, operational envelopes and a waste management plan. The design element of the works is complete and the Mowlem team is looking forward to the physical site works commencing in earnest during spring 2004. The work is programmed to be completed by July 2005 when Mowlem Remediation will hand back a fully restored, clean site to UKAEA having achieved the objective of removing the source of the pollution from the Harwell site. The WSA is roughly the size of a football pitch, none of the chemical wastes disposed of at the WSA were radioactive. Mowlem Remediation is part of the international construction and support services group John Mowlem & Company PLC. Ends For more information please contact Rebecca ONeil on 0117 929 2311. Copyright© UKAEA 2003 ***************************************************************** 76 Salt Lake Tribune: Not a dumping ground February 11, 2004 As a concerned citizen of Utah, I would like to see HB145, "Approval Required for Disposal of Certain Radioactive Wastes In lobbying to have added. One amendment would increase the amount of plutonium that Envirocare can accept, and the other would allow an increase in the radioactivity in the mixed waste that Envirocare accepts. This legislation, as it was written, sends an important message: We are not the nation's dumping ground. Let's not let the special interests have more power than Utah's citizens in determining what we allow dumped in our state. Jennifer Killpack Salt Lake City Copyright Salt Lake City Tribune ***************************************************************** 77 Salt Lake Tribune: Hot waste goes cold February 11, 2004 [PHOTO] Brandon Rufner of HEAL Utah (Healthy Environment Alliance of Rotunda to represent the radioactive waste allowed by loopholes in state law. (Ryan Galbraith/The Salt Lake Tribune) By Judy Fahys The Salt Lake Tribune A bill to put the state's radioactive waste policy firmly in the hands of the governor and the Legislature may have died unceremoniously Tuesday in the House Committee on Public Utilities and Technology. Committee members never voted on St. George Republican Rep. Stephen Urquhart's House Bill 145. Instead, Rep. David Ure, R-Kamas, used a procedural move to adjourn the meeting shortly after the committee began debate -- in effect, taking the question of passing it or amending it off the table, at least for now. Urquhart said the move "might have been the death knell" for the bill, which was intended to close loopholes in the state law that allow higher concentrations of radioactive waste to be disposed of in the state based on the decisions of state and federal regulators. "I don't know if there is support here for bringing the Legislature into radioactive waste issues," he said. "I'm surprised by that." More than 80 people jammed the hearing room Tuesday in hopes of addressing the panel. The state's policy is a charged political issue, with about 86 percent of Utahns opposed to accepting hotter radioactive waste in the state, according to a recent Salt Lake Tribune poll. But Envirocare of Utah, the Tooele County company most affected by the bill, has lobbied hard this session against any new legislative or gubernatorial approval, calling it micromanagement. Urquhart's measure was originally inspired by plans last fall by the U.S. Energy Department to send Envirocare unusually concentrated radioactive radium waste from government cleanup sites in Ohio and New York. Through an act of Congress, the Energy Department cleared the way for waste hundreds of times hotter than what is currently permitted for disposal in the state, before Envirocare dropped its bid for the contract because of public pressure. Without a new law on new radioactive material, the state will still lack control over the radioactive content over several types of waste -- even after the state assumes more authority over the regulatory program this spring -- because of quirks in existing law. "This is critical," said HB145 supporter Lisa Watts Baskin, "for the safety of generations." fahys@sltrib.com Copyright Salt Lake City Tribune ***************************************************************** 78 Las Vegas RJ: YUCCA MOUNTAIN: Official to check for toxic dust Wednesday, February 11, 2004 Tailings left over from tunnel construction could pose hazard By KEITH ROGERS © REVIEW-JOURNAL A Nevada environmental official will inspect volcanic-rock tailings left from construction of the five-mile tunnel at Yucca Mountain to see if the pile poses a blowing dust hazard at the planned nuclear waste burial site, the state's Environmental Protection Division chief said Tuesday. His decision came after the Review-Journal raised questions about the tailings to state and federal authorities in the aftermath of allegations last month about toxic dust inside the tunnel by former Yucca Mountain Project workers. They blame their lung ailments on inhaling cancer-causing mineral fibers while a Department of Energy contractor, Kiewit Construction, bored the 25-foot-diameter tunnel between 1994 and 1997. "We will go out and take a look to see if it's a dust problem," Environmental Protection Division Administrator Allen Biaggi said in a telephone interview from Carson City. "I don't know how these materials have been managed," he said about the pile of lavender-colored rock fragments near the tunnel's north portal area, 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas. A spokesman for DOE's Office of Repository Development, Allen Benson, said his agency has not been contacted by the state about the inspection. Benson declined further comment other than to note that the muck pile is not considered waste rock by the DOE because it could be used later to backfill the tunnel if a repository is built and closed after being loaded with 77,000 tons of spent nuclear fuel and highly radioactive defense waste. Classifying the tailings as waste rock could make it subject to federal hazardous waste laws. State Nuclear Projects Agency Executive Director Bob Loux, a critic of the federal nuclear waste disposal effort, said, "Clearly anything that is an environmental or public health-and-safety concern has to be addressed. "If the federal government isn't going to do it, the state will probably have to step in and begin regulating," he said. Loux predicted the project will face massive environmental and safety problems if the government is allowed to proceed with construction of 155 miles of tunnels for entombing nuclear waste by the end of the decade. "In the long run, the entire future tunneling effort will result in a lot of workers in the tunnel who will be exposed to life-threatening minerals as well as others if this is put in the open air," he said. Loux said he foresees "enormous legal problems" in the near term should worker complaints mount. Meanwhile, Biaggi, the state Environmental Protection Division administrator, said an inspector from the division's Las Vegas office will visit the site "before the end of this week" and focus on fugitive emissions of inhalable dust particles under the Clean Air Act. "We'll look for potential sources of dust from the material and look at what process this came from," he said. The division has no authority to inspect the tunnel or ventilation systems inside buildings at the site that stand between the north tunnel entrance and the muck pile several hundred yards east of the entrance. Although the division has authority delegated by the Environmental Protection Agency to enforce the Clean Air Act outside the mountain, the EPA itself administers the Toxic Substances Control Act which covers at least two fibrous zeolite minerals found in the mountain, erionite and mordenite. Of key concern is erionite, a known carcinogen that scientists from the Los Alamos, N.M. national laboratory found in three boreholes at Yucca Mountain, according to a report they wrote in 1989, five years before the tunneling operation began. Last week, EPA officials in San Francisco had indicated that the tailings might be exempt under what is called the Bevill exclusion within the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act hazardous waste regulations. The state division oversees the act in Nevada, which covers mining and other activities that involve potentially hazardous materials. But in an e-mail Tuesday, Cheryl Nelson, senior regulatory advisor for the EPA's San Francisco regional office, which oversees Nevada, wrote, "If the rock in question was from a tunnelling operation but didn't produce any ore, then `no,' the exclusion wouldn't apply to the excavated rock." The hazardous waste regulations would then "only apply to the rock if the rock were discarded/disposed and if the rock exhibited a hazardous characteristic," according to Nelson's e-mail to the Review-Journal. But in general, the "hazardous characteristic" refers to toxic metals like lead or chromium that could leach from tailings and contaminate groundwater layers. One former tunnel supervisor, Gene Griego, 52, of North Las Vegas, claims he and others contracted chronic diseases from working inside the Yucca Mountain tunnel where he said they inhaled fibrous silicate-laced minerals, including erionite, which scars lung tissues and can cause a fatal cancer, mesothelioma. Until 1996, tunnel workers wore painters masks to curb dust inhalation. After that, until the tunnel was completed a year later, DOE stepped up enforcement of protective gear requirements, making them wear respirators that Griego said were designed to stop asbestos particles but not the smaller-diameter erionite fibers. Last month, DOE officials acknowledged that some of the more than 1,200 project scientists, technicians and tunnel workers might have been exposed to fibrous, silica dust and said they would offer them free silicosis screenings. Copyright Las Vegas Review-Journal ***************************************************************** 79 Las Vegas RJ: Senator cool to Yucca change Wednesday, February 11, 2004 Domenici: DOE plan to alter accounting rules could complicate passage of budget By STEVE TETREAULT STEPHENS WASHINGTON BUREAU WASHINGTON -- An Energy Department plan to change accounting rules for the Yucca Mountain Project is getting a frosty reception from a key senator who is influential on budget and energy issues in Congress. Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., said Tuesday the proposal could complicate passage of the department's budget this year because it seeks to reclassify $749 million and earmark it for the Nevada nuclear waste disposal program. "It doesn't sound like much but it is very important as we try to find money," Domenici told DOE deputy secretary Kyle McSlarrow at a budget hearing before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., said senators will need to inquire further about the department's Yucca proposal in light of cuts to science research and other parts of the DOE budget. "I'm concerned about some of the priorities in the budget," Bingaman said. McSlarrow testified in support of DOE's $24.3 billion request for the 2005 budget year, including $880 million for the Yucca Mountain Project, which seeks to develop a nuclear waste repository 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas. Most of the repository funding would be allocated from fees that utilities pay into a nuclear waste fund. The department is seeking a law that would reclassify a portion of that fund so it can be dedicated to the Yucca project and not diverted to other uses. Domenici said after the hearing the department's accounting request for Yucca Mountain "looks kind of foolish to me. I don't know if I'm going to be for it. They can come and talk to me about it." Domenici, who is generally supportive of the Yucca repository, is regarded as an influential voice on the program. He is a senior member of the Senate Budget Committee, chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee and also chairman of the subcommittee that determines the Energy Department budget each year. But Domenici's comments Tuesday were not the first time he has spoken up on the accounting request. He issued a warning last week to Joshua Bolten, head of the White House Office of Management and Budget. "Very few proposals for a user fee of this size get enacted around here," Domenici said at a Budget Committee hearing. Bolten said the Energy Department's 2010 goal to have a repository opened and accepting nuclear waste would be delayed "unless we were able to find some way to make sure that the funding got over there." Copyright Las Vegas Review-Journal ***************************************************************** 80 deseretnews: No decision on N-waste bill [deseretnews.com] Wednesday, February 11, 2004 Committee members are skeptical of the amendment process By Donna Kemp Spangler Deseret Morning News Utah lawmakers decided no decision was the best decision when it came to a bill that would have required legislative and gubernatorial approval for any radioactive waste hotter than what the state allows at Envirocare in Tooele County. ['Image'] Jason Groenewold and Clarie Geddes speak out at the state Capitol regarding Envirocare and storage of nuclear waste. [''] Jeffrey D. Allred, Deseret Morning News The House Public Utilities and Technology Committee heard almost two hours of testimony on HB145, sponsored by Rep. Steve Urquhart, R-St. George, but in the end decided to adjourn Tuesday without a vote. Members of the committee appeared skeptical of the proposal, wondering if it was appropriate that every license amendment sought by Envirocare would have to come before the Legislature where it would face contentious advocates on both sides. "You don't want full debate because of the amount of misunderstanding," said Rep. David Ure, R-Kamas. Lawmakers are halfway into a two-year task force study of waste issues, and opponents of Urquhart's bill say the task force should be allowed to complete its work before any changes are made to Utah law. But Urquhart is leery of waiting, pointing to two recent Envirocare applications to amend its license that would have allowed radioactive waste somewhat hotter than what it now accepts. Urquhart sought the legislation after Envirocare sought and later backed off from an amendment to their federal license to accept radioactive waste from Fernald, Ohio. The company in Utah's western desert has two additional amendments pending before state regulators to accept wastes different from those they now accept. Those are called "special nuclear materials" and they contain plutonium and other fissionable materials used in the making of nuclear bombs. The materials are still classified as Class A low-level wastes, but they contain radioactivity somewhat higher than the company's current license allows. Activists called a press conference Tuesday to lambaste the amendment, claiming the wastes are 176 times hotter than wastes now allowed and in some cases more than 6,000 times the legal limit. Bill Sinclair, deputy director of the Department of Environmental Quality, said regulators are still looking at the numbers, but he insisted DEQ would not allow wastes any hotter than what the current license allows. Envirocare senior vice president Tim Barney said the numbers being thrown around by the activists simply aren't true. "In fact, the (federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission) order specifically states that Envirocare can only accept special nuclear fuels up to its Class A limits," he said. Another amendment would allow Envirocare to change the way it stores wastes mixed with hazardous and radioactive materials, something the company says it needs to make it more efficient. But those wastes would not exceed the radioactivity of the Class A wastes elsewhere at the facility, Barney said. Waste issues on Capitol Hill were not supposed to be a major sticking point this session, but Urquhart's bill has put Envirocare on the defensive. The bill faces stiff opposition in the Senate should it pass the House. Urquhart is not deterred. "I think it is clear that the people of this state want elected officials involved in radioactive waste policy," Urquhart said, referring to the fact those decisions are now made by state bureaucrats. E-mail: donna@desnews.com © 2004 Deseret News Publishing Company ***************************************************************** 81 RGJ: SS Board OKs letter opposing nuke shipments Reno Gazette-Journal Leader-Courier 2/10/2004 02:36 pm SILVER SPRINGS — When the U.S. Department of Energy begins transporting tons of spent nuclear fuel through Nevada to the nuclear waste storage site at Yucca Mountain in 2010, folks in Silver Springs want to make sure trucks hauling the waste don’t come through that community. At last Monday’s Silver Springs Advisory Board meeting, the board listened to a request by resident Win McCord to send protest letters to state and federal officials opposing the use of Highway 95A as a transportation route. Board members voted 2-1 to send a letter and also go before the Lyon County Commission to garner support from that political body as well as enlist the support of the City of Fernley and City of Yerington. Voting against the motion was Board member Glenn Schaefer. The U.S. Department of Energy is engaging in a transportation study that would bring 77,000 tons of spent fuel to Nevada from 39 states in the U.S. that now hold the waste. However the nuclear material that would be transported along the I-80 corridor to U.S. 95 (Fallon/Schurz) would be coming from the Portland, Washington and Idaho areas. McCord wants to make sure truck drivers working for the DOE do not use Highway 95A from I-80. She remarked the miles and the travel time is shorter if truckers use that route and she wants to make sure that course is not desirable. She remarked the route from Fernley to Silver Springs and Yerington is much shorter than the Fallon to Schurz route as it saves a truck driver 38 miles. McCord wants to make sure drivers don’t chose the shorter route. “We have to toot our own horn now. Otherwise no one will know we’re here,” she told Board members. Discussion focused on a sentence in McCord’s letter that she submitted, which indicated that she wanted to place a moratorium on the use of Highway 95A Board Chairman Pat Geurts asked questioned whether the Board could do such a feat. “It’s a state highway, you have to get the state to do it,” said resident Jim Snellings. He added he believed the cities of Fernley and Yerington could pass a moratorium. Snellings said he used to work as a truck driver and remarked, “You’ll be surprised at what goes through the highways in Silver Springs.” Resident Rick Zierenberg pointed out that Silver Springs should react and at least make those in high positions know how citizens feel about the matter. Board member Schaefer remarked that federal officials probably have already conducted studies and already have a route selected. He added the route would most likely go through areas with low populations. Schaefer pointed out the least populated areas would receive the transportation routes because they are least impacted. “It still doesn’t mean we can’t say something,” said Zierenberg. Geurts remarked that Highway 95A is not well maintained and another route that is better equipped might also be selected such as U.S. 395. Zierenberg also pointed out that other communities should also be concerned if the transportation route changes and the SSAB should also contact Fernley and Yerington as well. “If we don’t step up to the plate they might ram it down our throats,” he said. Schaefer said, “I can’t see the validity. We’re reacting to something that is not going to happen. Someone has done a study and designated the outer perimeter of the designated route.” The SSAB also polled the audience and seven of those in attendance voted in favor of the letter. The letter read, “The Silver Springs Advisory Board requests immediate action to permanently avoid any deviation from the Federal Designated Route to transport nuclear waste to the Yucca Mountain Depository.” It continued, “Our citizens are deeply concerned that such nuclear waste being trucked along I-80 would ultimately find a shorter route by some 39 miles, by driving on Highway 95A and directly through Silver Springs. We are extremely concerned that any nuclear waste has to pass through any part of Lyon County, much less deposited in Nevada. But our chief concern is the safety of Silver Springs and its residents.” The letter concluded, “Please declare an even standing moratorium on the use of Highway 95A from I-80 through Silver Springs for nuclear waste transport. We urge you to give this your immediate action.” The Board also agreed to send copies to U.S. Senators Harry Reid and John Ensign and Representatives Shelly Berkley and Jim Gibbons. The letter was also sent to the Nevada governor, state assemblyman Tom Grady, State Senator Mark Amodei and to the Nuclear Project Agency. © Copyright Reno Gazette-Journal, a Gannett ***************************************************************** 82 Herald: Dounreay aims for a shorter clean-up Web Issue 1939 February 11 2004 DAVID ROSS, Highland Correspondent February 11 2004 THE Dounreay nuclear site could be decommissioned in a shorter time than expected. At first it was thought it was going to take 100 years, and then in 1998 the time was cut to 60. Now Dipesh Shah, the new chief executive of the UK Atomic Energy Authority, has ordered that managers at the Caithness site look at reducing the time further. Mr Shah, who visited Dounreay last month, is determined that the Ł4bn decommissioning programme should be as efficient and as brisk as safety allows, not least because he wants to remain involved. Although UKAEA was Dounreay's operator, it will have to convince the government's new Nuclear Decommissioning Agency, due to be operational by April 2005, that it is fit to remain in charge of restoration. Sandy McWhirther, the plant projects manager with overall responsibility for decommissioning, said: "UKAEA will have a shadowing year from April this year to March 31, 2005. By that time the NDA will be up and running and the first years of our decommissioning programme should form the basis of a contract for us to manage the Dounreay site for two or three years. "If we demonstrate we are the best, which my chief executive is insisting we do, then there would be no benefit to the NDA in introducing competition. The risks of bringing in somebody new, we would hope, would not be considered worthwhile given the certainty that the UKAEA could deliver an accelerated programme. "So we are charged with a mission to reduce the length of time it will take to decommission the site as safely and in as environmentally friendly a way as possible. "There are indications that there could be a very significant reduction in the dates that are currently published. "I can't say whether that will be five years or 20 years. No particular target has been set, but there is the potential for very significant reduction." Copyright © Newsquest (Herald & Times) Limited. All Rights ***************************************************************** 83 Scotsman.com: Call for Scotland to Control Dumping of Radioactive Waste Thursday, 12th February 2004 By Louise Gray, Scottish Press Association Scotland must have control over the dumping and production of nuclear waste in order to protect public safety, democracy and the environment, MSPs said today. Opening a debate on the issue, shadow environment minister Roseanna Cunningham said policies relating to nuclear waste were being discussed at UK and European level without “significant” input from Scotland. The future of the UK energy industry is currently under scrutiny as the Energy Bill passes through Westminster. And Ms Cunningham claimed there are also discussions taking place at a European level affecting nuclear waste management. Yet she claimed Scotland is not consulted, adding: “We may end up having waste schlepped across land and sea to a few as yet undisclosed burial sites.” Ms Cunningham voiced concern over the development of deep geological disposal sites, “secret” dumping grounds, the transportation of radioactive waste and the building of new nuclear power stations. She added: “If nuclear waste is not disposed of properly, it can pose serious dangers to the environment and indeed the public.” Ms Cunningham insisted Scotland must ensure its own safety by monitoring radioactive discharges through the Scottish Environment Protection Agency and giving ministers control over the disposal of nuclear waste in Scotland. She said: “While it is clear that Scotland has to dispose of its own waste, we must have assurances that this will not lead to our country being used as a dumping ground for the rest of the UK which is why the Scottish Executive must produce statutory guidance for SEPA which is long overdue.” But deputy environment minister Allan Wilson said Scotland was already involved in the long-term future of nuclear waste management. Through the independent Committee on Radioactive Waste, which is currently considering the disposal of long-lived radioactive waste in the UK, Mr Wilson insisted Scotland was working with UK ministers and other devolved parties to find “publicly acceptable solutions”. CoRWM was set up by the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Margaret Beckett, along with environment ministers for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. The minister said it was inappropriate for him to pre-empt the conclusions of CoRWM but insisted that Scottish ministers and officials had been involved from day one in influencing the future management of nuclear waste. He said SEPA was likely to implement appropriate policy changes when CoRWM concludes. Tory environment spokesman Alex Johnstone, list MSP for North East Scotland, backed the Executive approach to nuclear waste management but criticised ministers for failing to face up to a looming “energy crisis”. He said Scotland needs to find fresh means of generating electricity without producing Carbon dioxide emissions and suggested backing nuclear power is “vital” in meeting future energy needs. He said: “The truth is we need to think long and hard about how we are going to keep the lights on and generate enough electricity for industry.” Mr Johnstone said the technical advances in the handling and disposal of nuclear waste meant the industry was a viable option for producing future power. ©2004 Scotsman.com ***************************************************************** 84 Pahrump Valley Times: A nuclear leap February 11, 2004 In a Las Vegas Review-Journal article published in its online edition titled "Benefits of Yucca," it states the following regarding the economic benefits to Southern Nevada: "In 2000, the project contributed $195.7 million to Nevada's economy and accounted for 3,650 jobs, the report estimated. "That translates to real disposable income of about $131 million each year in Nevada. "If the Yucca Mountain Project were discontinued, economic losses, relative to the current economy, would be substantial," said Keith Schwer, director of the center, and one of the report's authors." Senator Reid's and Senator Ensign's opposition to the Yucca Mountain Nuclear Repository reveals their true motives: To keep the populace of Southern Nevada in a state of medieval serfdom. In other words, they cannot tolerate a well-paid, technologically educated middle class in their fief. Such an educated middle class would be a threat to their senatorial position as "Lords of the Manor," because they would expose their political motives to preserve ignorance of the masses while redistributing the wealth of the still remaining middle class in the form of welfare. That aside, any effort to impede nuclear energy expansion also supports the Rockefeller interests that make the U.S. energy-dependent on foreign fossil fuel, bringing with it the internationalization of the U.S. under a world government. Once people realize what our senators are up to, they will work to put American senators in their places. FRANK M. PELTESON LAS VEGAS For comment or questions, please e-mail webmaster@pahrumpvalleytimes.com Copyright © Pahrump Valley Times, 1997 - 2003 ***************************************************************** 85 EDFP Opinion: A tale of two Yucca Mountains - Bob Loux Elko Daily Free Press Wednesday, February 11, 2004 A tale of two Yucca Mountains Editor: "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way ... ." The famous opening line in Charles Dickensű classic novel, "A Tale of Two Cities," speaks to the extreme dichotomies that make up our experience of the world - and of a particular place and time - and how oneűs experience depends very much oneűs vantage point. Recent news articles regarding a University of Nevada, Las Vegas Center for Business and Economic Research report on supposed economic benefits of the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump for Southern Nevada present the State of Nevada with an example of economic polarity with some Dickensonian characteristics. On the one hand, there is a UNLV report that paints a rosy picture of jobs and revenue to be derived from an otherwise noxious and unwanted facility - something akin to making a silk purse out of the proverbial sowűs ear. On the other hand is another report, done just two years earlier by the same UNLV group, which depicts the economic impacts of Yucca Mountain in an extraordinarily negative, even disastrous, light. So how is it that the UNLV people can see Yucca Mountain as both the best of times and the worst of times - at the same time? In the words of another famous, albeit anonymous, observer of human folly, "Follow the money." The report painting the bright economic picture was paid for by the U.S. Department of Energyűs Yucca Mountain project. The report showing the serious economic risks and costs of the federal program was commissioned and sponsored by the Clark County Nuclear Waste Division as part of the countyűs assessment of Yucca impacts. In the overly rosy report prepared for DOE, UNLV concluded that not only was Yucca Mountain good for Nevadaűs economy in the long run, but to halt the project now would mean that economic losses to the current economy "would be substantial." By contrast, in the report paid for by Clark County, the same UNLV folks warned, "The transportation of nuclear waste [even] without an accident or spillage of radioactive material through a large urban community will have adverse impacts on a community such as Las Vegas which depends on travel and tourism for its economic livelihood. The maximum economic impact of a transportation accident is devastating to any community, especially one which depends upon travel and tourism as its economic engine." So which is right? You be the judge. In the DOE report, UNLV concluded that Yucca Mountain would bring 3,650 jobs to Nevada, accounting for an average of $131 million per year in additional real disposable income. In the 2001 Clark County report, however, UNLV found that, even in a scenario where no transportation accidents occur, Yucca Mountain would mean a net loss of almost 5,400 jobs and an annual loss of disposable income of $282 million. In the event of a serious shipping accident, more than 50,000 jobs could be lost due to the resultant disruption to the areaűs economy, with an average annual drop in disposable income of $686 million. Property values along transportation routes are projected to decrease an average of 3.5 percent in Clark County, even without an accident occurring. In the event of an accident or serious incident, losses in real market value could be between $5.6 billion and $8.8 billion just in Cark County, with additional declines in Washoe and Elko counties of $2 billion and $129 million respectively. The tale told by the Clark County report is a far more accurate portrayal of how Yucca Mountain will impact Nevada than the unrealistically rosy picture painted by the DOE-funded study. Reams of research by the State of Nevada and independent social scientists and economists from around the country have consistently found that the costs and risks of the Yucca Mountain project far outweigh any transient economic and employment benefits that might accrue from the program. The unanswered question in all of this is why UNLV didnűt attempt to factor the findings of the report it did for the county into the DOE report. The answer seems obvious: You canűt paint a rosy picture when the negative impacts are as great as they are for Yucca Mountain, and DOE was paying for a rosy portrayal. It is no coincidence that no other state in the country wants the nuclear repository project. And it is no mystery why the federal government is going to such great lengths to jam it down Nevadaűs collective throat. To paraphrase Dickens, it is a far, far better thing to recognize that Yucca Mountain represents an unacceptable and potentially catastrophic risk for Nevada, both in terms of the negative impacts for Nevadaűs economy and to the health and safety of its citizens, and to continue the fight to assure this facility never sees the light of day. Bob Loux Executive Director Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects ***************************************************************** 86 Daily Times: EDITORIAL: Bring the de facto nuclear states into the legal loop Thursday, February 12, 2004 Speaking at the 40th annual security conference in Munich, Pakistan’s foreign minister Khurshid Mahmud Kasuri has said that Pakistan will not sign the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. But he has reiterated the pledge that Islamabad will fulfill its international obligation to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons. Mr Kasuri’s statement comes in the wake of the proliferation scandal that has dogged Pakistan in recent weeks and saw an in-depth interrogation carried out by the government into charges of proliferation against some Pakistani scientists. The interrogation, which was completed last week and has resulted in the removal of Dr A Q Khan, former head of Khan Research Laboratories, is evidence of Pakistan’s commitment to nonproliferation. It has set the stage for Mr Kasuri’s confident statement that Islamabad takes its commitments very seriously. Mr Kasuri’s reiteration of Pakistan’s long-held viewpoint is commendable and should allay fears about any rollback of its nuclear capability. A similar assurance was held out by President Pervez Musharraf during his press conference last Thursday. Given these assurances and the sensitivity of the issue, we would request the political opposition to stop being bloody-minded on this score and extend nonpartisan support to the government. Mr Kasuri was also right when he said that Pakistan’s commitment to nonproliferation stems from a basic postulate of realpolitik: if a state is nuclear-capable, it serves to enhance security overall for it to deny the capability to other states. Since there is a normative rejection of this capability, enshrined in the NPT and signed by more than 180 states, the efforts towards preventing horizontal proliferation also have legal-normative underpinnings. However, there is a related issue here which Mr Kasuri did not mention but which needs to be looked at given the reality of three states — India, Israel and Pakistan — that are nuclear capable and are also outside the framework of the NPT. The treaty is constituted in a manner that without a major overhaul of its legal framework, none of these states can be accepted as nuclear-weapons states in the legal sense. Any such change, indeed, would turn the treaty topsy-turvy. However, clearly, there is need to grant legitimacy to these three states through some framework even if such a framework stands outside the NPT and for which there may need to be a separate multilateral treaty. We believe that it is essential for the five legitimate nuclear-weapon states to start thinking of creating a mechanism whereby the de facto capabilities of these states can be legitimised. Since Pakistan and India are embarked on a peace process, part of which also deals with nuclear risk reduction, it would make eminent sense for the two sides to deliberate on a joint draft to this end. India has close relations with Israel and it could get input from that country also before such a draft is finalised and presented to the Club of Five. Movement towards this end would bring the three de facto nuclear states into the legal loop. It would also enhance their commitment to nonproliferation. * Mr Vajpayee’s use of the communal card India’s Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee has started his election campaign on an ominous note. The symbolism of the kickoff rally from Ayodhaya will not be lost on anyone, whether inside or outside India, who cares for the ideal of pluralism and has seen it become a victim of the BJP’s communal agenda. Indeed, Mr Vajpayee’s assertion that the BJP needs to return to power to finish its unfinished business, including constructing the Ram temple, shows clearly that in the run-up to the hustings Mr Vajpayee is once again going to play the Hindutva card. How should one look at this? There can be two views. One argument, given the record of the BJP and its Sangh Parivar cohorts, would be that this could potentially lead to a replay of Gujrat in certain parts of India. From this perspective, one would feel compelled to chide Mr Vajpayee for pandering to the Sangh Parivar vote and besmirching his good image as a decent politician. In this view, Mr Vajpayee’s statement only serves to bring into sharp salience the fact that the BJP is the political offspring of the Hidutva movement and is therefore Janus-faced. There is empirical evidence to support that view. But there is another side to this also. The BJP, at the end of the day, is a political party and may be expected to do whatever it needs to do to mobilise its vote. A large part of its vote indeed belongs to centrist and right-of-centre Hindu community. However, there is no denying the fact that over the past three years it has also emerged as a major political party that needs to respond to the aspirations of multiple constituencies, including the Muslim population. We are therefore likely to see it employ various strategies in the run-up to the elections. In the recent state elections, it did not use the Hindutva card, emphasizing instead issues of governance against Congress incumbents. This strategy was, in large measure, informed by its inability earlier to put to good use the communal card that its chief minister in Gujarat had played successfully. What we are likely to see therefore is the BJP wooing multiple actors using a mix of strategies. Even so, there is no reason for anyone to accept the sort of blatant communalism which was voiced by Mr Vajpayee. There is also the external factor of the peace process between India and Pakistan. That track necessitates putting down elements and ideologies that have poisoned relations over the years. We hope that Mr Vajapyee is not going to push this card any further and that this was just one of those things that politicians, even those of Mr Vajpayee’s caliber, cannot always ignore. * Home | Editorial EDITORIAL: Bring the de facto nuclear states into the legal loop Op-ed: Boeing, Boeing... going? —Brian Cloughley Op-ed: Policymaking in Pakistan —Ejaz Haider Op-ed: Unhappy the land that needs heroes... —Hans B Bremer THE WAY IT WAS: Jack and the Queen of Hearts —Mian Ijaz Ul Hassan THE HISTORY MAN: Cambridge remembers Rahmat Ali —Ihsan Aslam PURPLE PATCH: The Role of Military Power —John Garnett Letters: Zahoor's Cartoon: Daily Times - All Rights Reserved Site developed and hosted by WorldCALL Internet Solutions ***************************************************************** 87 DOE: Environmental Management Site-Specific Advisory Board, Paducah FR Doc 04-2960 [Federal Register: February 11, 2004 (Volume 69, Number 28)] [Notices] [Page 6651-6652] From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr11fe04-64] AGENCY: Department of Energy (DOE). ACTION: Notice of open meeting. SUMMARY: This notice announces a meeting of the Environmental Management Site-Specific Advisory Board (EM SSAB), Paducah, Annual Planning Retreat. The Federal Advisory Committee Act (Pub. L. No. 92- 463, 86 Stat. 770) requires that public notice of these meetings be announced in the Federal Register. DATES: March 5-6, 2004. ADDRESSES: Lake Barkeley State Resort Park, 3500 State Park Road, Cadiz, KY 42211. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: William E. Murphie, Deputy Designated Federal Officer, Department of Energy Portsmouth/Paducah Project Office, 1017 Majestic Drive, Suite 200, Lexington, Kentucky 40513, (859) 219-4001. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Purpose of the Board: The purpose of the Board is to make recommendations to DOE and its regulators in the areas of environmental restoration and waste management activities. Tentative Agenda Friday, March 5 7:30 p.m.--Review of the Proposed Retreat Agenda: Steve Kay 7:40 p.m.--CAB Self-Evaluation Survey Summary Discussion 9 p.m.--Adjourn Saturday, March 6 8:30 a.m.--Welcome: Bill Tanner 8:40 a.m.--Roundtable Discussion--CAB Goals and Operations 9:30 a.m.--Break 10 a.m.--Annual Workplan 12 noon--Lunch 1 p.m.--CAB Budget and Support Staff Contract Issues 2 p.m.--Task Force/Subcommittee Discussion (realignment and reassignments) 2:30 p.m.--Summary/Wrap Up 3 p.m.--Adjourn Copies of the final agenda will be available at the meeting. Public Participation: The meeting is open to the public. Written statements may be filed with the Committee either before or after the meeting. Individuals who wish to make oral statements pertaining to agenda items should contact David Dollins at the address listed below or by telephone at (270) 441-6819. Requests must be received five days prior to the meeting and [[Page 6652]] reasonable provision will be made to include the presentation in the agenda. The Deputy Designated Federal Officer is empowered to conduct the meeting in a fashion that will facilitate the orderly conduct of business. Each individual wishing to make public comments will be provided a maximum of five minutes to present their comments as the first item of the meeting agenda. Minutes: The minutes of this meeting will be available for public review and copying at the Freedom of Information Public Reading Room, 1E-190, Forrestal Building, 1000 Independence Avenue, SW., Washington, DC 20585 between 9 a.m. and 4 p.m., Monday-Friday, except Federal holidays. Minutes will also be available at the Department of Energy's Environmental Information Center and Reading Room at 115 Memorial Drive, Barkley Centre, Paducah, Kentucky between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. on Monday thru Friday or by writing to David Dollins, Department of Energy Paducah Site Office, Post Office Box 1410, MS-103, Paducah, Kentucky 42001 or by calling him at (270) 441-6819. Issued at Washington, DC on February 5, 2004. Rachel M. Samuel, Deputy Advisory Committee Management Officer. [FR Doc. 04-2960 Filed 2-10-04; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 6450-01-P ***************************************************************** 88 KGW: $8 million contract for local company and Hanford kgw.com | News for Oregon and SW Washington | AP Wire 02/11/2004 Associated Press Parsons Hanford Fabricators Inc. has been awarded two contracts worth about $9 million for work at the Hanford nuclear reservation. Fluor Hanford, the prime contractor managing several major cleanup projects at Hanford for the U.S. Department of Energy, awarded Parsons a $4 million contract. Another environmental cleanup company, CH2M Hill, awarded Parsons a separate $5 million contract. The work involves transferring the current Hanford Site Fabrication Services shop to an offsite location near Parsons' existing facility in Pasco. The company plans to hire most of the Hanford employees and move much of the specialized equipment to its own facility. "The cost of maintaining the work force, equipment and buildings cannot be supported indefinitely," Fluor Hanford President and Chief Executive Officer Ron Gallagher said in a news release Tuesday. "Shifting these services to a company in the community is in the best interest of everyone associated with Hanford as well as the local community." Parsons established its Pasco facility in 2001 to fabricate and test its neutralization systems that destroy nerve and blister agents from a U.S. chemical weapons stockpile at Hanford. That program is slated to continue through 2012. This text is invisible on the page, but this text is affected by the invisible item's flow. This text is invisible on the page, but this text is affected by the invisible item's flow. © Belo Interactive Inc. ***************************************************************** 89 Oak Ridger: Health hazards of White Oak Creek examined in report Story last updated at 12:01 p.m. on February 11, 2004 DOCUMENT: The levels of radioactive contaminants that entered the Clinch River, as well as those that reached the downstream Lower Watts Bar Reservoir, are too low to cause observable adverse health effects for most people who have used or continue to use the river for food or recreation. By: Paul Parson | Oak Ridger Staff The release of radionuclides from one Department of Energy facility, which traveled from White Oak Creek to the Clinch River in Roane County, posed "no apparent public health hazard." What that means, according to a public health agency, is that people could be or were exposed to contamination - either by using the waterways as a source of food or recreation - but the levels of exposure are not expected to cause any harmful health effects. That conclusion is reported in a recently released draft document - called a public health assessment - from the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry. Bill Taylor, an environmental health scientist with ATSDR, said the document is the first of two draft versions that will be released. The second draft is expected to be issued in April. Built in the early 1940s, X-10 was originally home to a prototype nuclear reactor used to convert uranium to plutonium - a process later undertaken full-scale in Hanford, Wash. Known today as Oak Ridge National Laboratory, it's a research facility that conducts work in virtually all areas of science and energy. According to the health assessment, the radionuclides were released from X-10 into White Oak Creek in Roane County where some of the contaminants eventually flowed into the Clinch River and the Lower Watts Bar Reservoir. The radionuclides in question include strontium-90, cesium-137 and iodine-131. "White Oak Creek travels south along the X-10 border and ultimately empties into White Oak Lake," the health assessment states. "The government had anticipated using this man-made lake as a 'settling basin' for radionuclides released from the X-10 site. However, some of the contaminants did not settle in White Oak Lake." According to the assessment, approximately 200,000 curies of radioactive waste were discharged from White Oak Creek into the Clinch River between 1944 and 1991. A curie is a measure of radioactivity. One curie is equal to 37 billion disintegrations or radioactive emissions per second from a radioactive material. "ATSDR determined that the levels of radioactive contaminants that entered the Clinch River, as well as those that reached the downstream Lower Watts Bar Reservoir, are too low to cause observable adverse health effects for most people who used or continue to use the river for food or recreation," the health assessment states. ATSDR's public health assessment is largely based on a Tennessee Department of Health-directed study conducted in the 1990s known as the Oak Ridge Dose Reconstruction Project. Headquartered in Atlanta, Ga., ATSDR is part of the Department of Health and Human Services and is directed by congressional mandate to perform specific functions concerning the effect on public health of hazardous substances in the environment. The White Oak Creek document is one of several projects ATSDR is working on in the Oak Ridge area. Earlier, the agency issued a public health assessment stating that past and current off-site exposures to uranium released from the Oak Ridge Y-12 Plant pose "no apparent public health hazard." Norman Mulvenon, chairman of the Citizens' Advisory Panel of the Oak Ridge Reservation Local Oversight Committee, said his organization will wait until the second draft of the White Oak Creek public health assessment is released before providing ATSDR with formal comments on the document. The Citizens' Advisory Panel closely monitors environmental activities in the area, including Anderson and Roane counties. For more information about the public health assessment, call the ATSDR's Oak Ridge field office at (865) 220-0295. ***************************************************************** 90 ENS: Sick Nuclear Weapons Workers Overwhelm Energy Department - By J.R. Pegg [Environment News Service ] WASHINGTON, DC, February 11, 2004 (ENS) - The U.S. Energy Department predicts it will take at least three years to process all the claims of workers exposed to radioactive contamination while building atomic weapons for the government. Congressional critics need to realize even that is "an incredibly aggressive schedule," U.S. Energy Deputy Secretary Kyle McSlarrow told the Senate Energy Committee on Tuesday. McSlarrow, testifying before the committee on the Bush administration's Energy Department budget request for fiscal year 2005, said neither Congress nor the agency did "a good job of anticipating the need for resources." The Bush administration has requested $43 million for the program, well above its earmark of $16 million for the current fiscal year. The program is tasked with implementing the Energy Department's responsibilities under the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Act of 2000. The law promised each worker or their survivors $150,000 for illnesses caused by radiation exposure, calling on the Department of Labor to pay out benefits, with the Energy Department providing support for the process along with assistance to workers and families in pursuing claims. Applications for the two programs have topped 70,000 and fewer than half of the application have been completed. "Everybody vastly underestimated the scope of the program," McSlarrow said. Congress has acknowledged that a legislative fix may be in order, but the Bush administration has pledged to eliminate the backlog by 2006. The commitment to work off the backlog by 2006 does not seem good enough, said Senator Jeff Bingaman, considering the deteriorating health of many of the people the program aims to compensate. "We need to find a way to get these claims processed," said the New Mexico Democrat. Bingaman called on the Bush administration "not to get into a mindset that Congress has to change the law before you guys fix this program." Committee Chairman Pete Domenici, a New Mexico Republican, said the committee is "going to pursue this with vigor." "It does not make sense to build people's enthusiasm up and then have a program of this," Domenici said. The compensation issue dominated much of the hearing, but lawmakers raised a number of other concerns with the Energy Department's budget proposal, including a decrease in funding for science and research programs. The Bush proposal cuts the Energy Department's science budget by two percent compared to fiscal 2004 appropriations. "There is an unfortunate trend in [cuts to] basic research across the executive branch," Bingaman said. North Dakota Democrat Byron Dorgan complained that the budget proposal cuts funding for the clean coal initiative by some $120 million, a move he said undermines the President's pledge to spend $2 billion over 10 years on clean coal research. McSlarrow defended the plan as the "most aggressive pro-coal budget this country has ever seen" and said the administration was on track to meet the overall funding pledge. The science and research budget proposal is reflective of the administration's focus on new technologies and of the tight spending restraints on most federal activities not related to homeland security or defense, McSlarrow told the committee. Domenici honed in on a $25.2 million reduction for infrastructure at the department's 17 science laboratories. "These laboratories have to be the best research institutions in the world and they probably are," he said. "But they are not going to stay that way if we continue to underfund them." Several senators questioned the administration's proposal to move the vast majority of funding for the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository "off budget." The Bush administration has asked for $880 million to fund the controversial Yucca Mountain plan, including $749 million in fees received from utilities from the Nuclear Waste Fund toward construction of the facility 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas. The White House is keen to make this fund, which has accumulated some $13 billion, a source of direct funds for the Yucca Mountain project, which is estimated to cost some $58 billion. But currently the money from the fund is available as general revenue and lawmakers are wary of changing this. Senator Gordon Smith, an Oregon Republican, also queried McSlarrow about the administration's request for Congress to allow it to reclassify millions of gallons of high level nuclear waste as less hazardous. The Energy Department contends the change is needed to expedite cleanups of nuclear waste - at issue is some 100 million gallons of high level nuclear waste created by the U.S. military. The majority of the waste is currently stored in underground tanks at federal facilities in South Carolina, Idaho and at the Hanford site in Washington. The 1982 Nuclear Waste Policy Act requires the Energy Department to bury this highly radioactive waste deep underground - if the waste is reclassified as less hazardous, the department would be permitted to leave it on site where it is now located In July 2003 environmentalists won a lawsuit in federal court to block the department from changing the classification of the waste without Congressional approval. State officials have made it clear they do not support the request to reclassify the waste to a lower hazard categoy, and critics fear the reclassification would allow the agency to leave high level waste on site instead of burying the waste deep underground. "Anything less than full cleanup of the Hanford site is going to be unacceptable," Senator Smith told McSlarrow. The Energy Deputy Secretary said the administration does not want the reclassification to avoid responsibility, but rather for the flexibility needed to handle the problem. "We are not going to do anything that is not in compliance with what state regulators want," McSlarrow said. "The most dangerous thing going on at Hanford is that the environmentalists are keeping us from doing the cleanup we want to do." The cleanup and disposition of nuclear wastes left at Hanford from 60 years of nuclear weapons production is not governed by environmentalists but by the 1989 Tri-Party Agreement between the U.S. Department of Energy, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and the State of Washington, Department of Ecology Copyright Environment News Service (ENS) 2004. All Rights ***************************************************************** 91 Google News Alert - nuclear Date: Wed, 11 Feb 2004 12:53:05 -0800 (PST) BUSH wants nuclear treaty change ABC Online - Australia US President George W Bush has outlined plans to curb the international proliferation of nuclear weapons. President Bush says the ... See all stories on this topic: EDITORIAL: Bring the de facto nuclear states into the legal loop Daily Times - Pakistan ... at the 40th annual security conference in Munich, Pakistan’s foreign minister Khurshid Mahmud Kasuri has said that Pakistan will not sign the Nuclear ... See all stories on this topic: A nuclear leap Pahrump Valley Times - Pahrump,NV,USA ... Senator Reid's and Senator Ensign's opposition to the Yucca Mountain Nuclear Repository reveals their true motives: To keep the populace of Southern Nevada in ... See all stories on this topic: BUSH to press for nuclear curbs BBC News - London,England,UK President George W Bush is to urge tougher action to curb nuclear proliferation in the wake of a scandal involving a top Pakistani scientist. ... See all stories on this topic: BARTLETT Nuclear, Inc. Announces Investment by Berkshire Partners ... Business Wire (press release) - USA 11, 2004--Berkshire Partners LLC and Summit Partners, both Boston-based private equity firms, today announced their investment in Bartlett Nuclear, Inc. ... UKRAINE tries to deflect nuclear allegations EUobserver.com - Belgium EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The Ukrainian government has said that allegations that its scientists supplied Al-Qaida with nuclear weapons are "absolutely groundless ... See all stories on this topic: EU urges India, Israel, Pakistan to sign nuclear treaty ABC Online - Australia The European Union's Irish presidency has urged India, Israel and Pakistan to sign "unconditionally" the nuclear non-proliferation treaty (NPT). ... AP: Pakistan, Nuclear Black Market Linked Kansas City Star (subscription) - Kansas City,MO,USA WASHINGTON - The black-market network that supplied nuclear weapons technology to Iran, Libya and North Korea relied on European businessmen convicted or ... AP Exclusive: Nuclear black market relied on past suppliers to ... San Francisco Chronicle - San Francisco,CA,USA The black-market network that supplied nuclear weapons technology to Iran, Libya and North Korea relied on European businessmen convicted or investigated in ... MUSHARRAF pledges to share with Japan findings on possible ... Xinhua - China ... Musharraf reiterated as a responsible nuclear weapon state, Pakistan is committed to the goal of nuclear non-proliferation, and said it has taken effective ... See all stories on this topic: This daily-once News Alert is brought to you by Google News (BETA)... - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Remove this News Alert: http://www.google.com/newsalerts/remove?s=92d1672a1b037a07&hl=en Create another News Alert: http://www.google.com/newsalerts?hl=en Try Google News: http://news.google.com/ ***************************************************************** 92 Daily Sentinel: Gas wells near old nuclear bomb-testing site approved 02.11.04 GJSentinel.com By MIKE McKIBBIN The Daily Sentinel GLENWOOD SPRINGS  The Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission approved a request Tuesday to allow 40-acre spacing for natural-gas wells outside a half-mile radius of the 1969 Project Rulison underground nuclear explosion project. The action came at the commissions monthly meeting, which was held in Glenwood Springs as part of a two-day visit to Garfield County. The county had the second highest number of drilling permits approved by the commission last year. Project Rulison was an 8,426-foot deep underground explosion of a 43-kiloton nuclear bomb meant to free gas reserves. It took place about three and one-half miles southeast of Battlement Mesa. It did not achieve the intended result, and the Department of Energy is notified and can impose conditions whenever a well is proposed within a three-mile radius of the blast. Because of possible residual radioactivity, a 40-acre parcel surrounding the projects well site was placed off limits to any drilling below 6,000 feet. Presco Inc. of The Woodlands, Texas, sought the reduction from the current 640-acre spacing in order to explore for gas. A 1998 study by Oil and Gas Commission Deputy Director Brian Macke said the explosion caused a chimney cavity formation and fractures in the gas-bearing tight sands of the Williams Fork formation. An estimated 176 million cubic feet of gas may be within the chimney cavity and fracture zone. That zone is believed to be within the 40-acre parcel that is off limits to gas drilling, Macke wrote. Wells within a seven-mile radius of the blast site were tested by the Energy Department in 1997, and no contaminated gas was found, he said. Macke said Tuesday that Presco had drilled a well within a mile and one-half of the blast site last fall. The well was never put into production, so no testing was conducted, he said. Commissioner John Ashby at one point suggested the request be tabled until the March meeting. I see a lack of characterization of what might be in the groundwater down there, although I am confident none of the gas is contaminated, he said. Im not really comfortable making a decision when we really dont know what the stakes are. We dont have the expertise to know for sure where to draw the line. Commission Vice Chairman Brian Cree supported the request with the half-mile restriction. Id like to at least give the company the go-ahead on some of this, Cree said. After much discussion, Ashby and the rest of the commission accepted the half-mile radius restriction and approved the request. Macke said the Energy Department remains responsible for public health and safety issues that involve Project Rulison. I cant give any guarantees future problems might not occur, he said. Mike McKibbin can be reached via e-mail at mmckibbin@gjds.com. ***************************************************************** 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: *****************************************************************