***************************************************************** 07/10/05 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 13.157 ***************************************************************** 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 Irna: Peaceful nuclear activities, Iran's absolute principle - MP 2 WorldNetDaily: How Condi scuttled EU-Iran agreement 3 Daily Times: Netanyahu warns West it must halt Iran nuclear plans 4 [NYTr] Korea: Six-Party Nuke Talks to Resume 5 Korea Herald: [EDITORIALS] Talks rekindle hopes 6 Guardian Unlimited: Rice: Nuke Talks With N.Korea Only a Start 7 Washington Post: N. Korea Agrees To Rejoin Talks 8 Guardian Unlimited North Korea to Resume 6-Nation Nuke Talks 9 Xinhua: DPRK says will "do its utmost" for progress in nuclear talks 10 Xinhua: China welcomes DPRK agreement 11 Xinhua: Hu Jintao hails resumption of six-party talks 12 Guardian Unlimited: North Korea to Resume 6-Nation Nuke Talks 13 Guardian Unlimited: Korea Breakthrough Reached Over Dinner 14 Digital Chosunilbo: North Korea Has Bought One Last Chance 15 US: San Francisco Chronicle: The little-known links in the chain to 16 US: Albuquerque Tribune: Energy bill gets down to business 17 US: Buffalo News: Last week in Congress 18 NO means yes--missile defense in Canada 19 Pakistan News: G8 urge Israel to sign NPT "immediately" 20 Minjok-Tongshin: China and Russia Issue Joint Statement on New World 21 AFP: Mitterrand approved French attack on Greenpeace ship NUCLEAR REACTORS 22 IPS-English ENVIRONMENT-FRANCE:Dangerous Summer for Nuclear 23 US: On Ongoing Cover Up Of 3 Mile Island- Signed, Notorized Statemen 24 US: [NukeNet] On Ongoing Cover Up Of 3 Mile Island- Signed, 25 AU ABC: MP to study nuclear power use in Europe 26 Bellona: Floating nuclear power plants easy prey for terrorists 27 US: AFP: Mitsubishi Heavy offers to buy US nuclear builder Westingho 28 US: DenverPost.com: Should we invest in nuclear power? 29 Japan Times: Tepco restarts last suspended reactor 30 Japan Times: Saga reactor has to be shut down 31 US: The Advocate: NRC criticizes response to Millstone shutdown 32 Al Jazeera: Israel to build new nuclear reactors - 33 London Times: Blair’s man set to head nuclear power inquiry - NUCLEAR SECURITY 34 Xinhua: IAEA tightens rules on nuclear use 35 IPS: THE REAL THREAT IS NUCLEAR TERRORISM 36 Xinhua: 89 countries agree to reinforce protection of nuclear facili 37 US: Scotsman.com News: Nuclear power stations on alert over terroris NUCLEAR SAFETY 38 [du-list] Uruknet item including DU effects 39 [du-list] A MUST READ and FORWARD : The Tiny Victims of Desert 40 Daily Yomiuri: Victim's suffering scrutinized / Kyoto man denied NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE 41 US: Bradenton Herald: Tallevast distrustful of tests 42 US: SignOnSanDiego.com: The discovery of ammonium perchlorate 43 Las Vegas SUN: Letter: Yucca, energy bill should infuriate all Nevad 44 US: KESQ: Discovery of ammonium perchlorate halts construction in Sa 45 US: San Bernardino County Sun: Rialto opposes fees by county PEACE US DEPT. OF ENERGY 46 Military's Energy - Beam Weapons Delayed 47 AP Wire: Congress considers buying property near Paducah plant 48 Santa Fe New Mexican: UC and LANL: A hasty union that's endured 49 HoustonChronicle.com: American Prometheus 50 Courier Journal: U.S. may study buyout around Paducah plant 51 Carlsbad Current-Argus: Head of Carlsbad’s Sandia labs goes to work ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** FULL NEWS STORIES ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** 1 Irna: Peaceful nuclear activities, Iran's absolute principle - MP July 9, IRNA Continuation of peaceful nuclear activities within the framework of international regulations and under supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is among absolute principles of Iran, MP Kazem Jalali said. Addressing a press conference here Friday, Rapporteur of the National Security and Foreign Policy Commission of Majlis added that Iran accepted suspension of uranium enrichment voluntarily to prove its goodwill intention to the world. He expressed hope that Europe and the West would take the opportunity and present their proposal to normalize the process of Iran's peaceful nuclear program. Answering a question on possible changes in Iran's foreign policy following the election of the new Iranian president-elect, he said Iran's foreign policy is firm and will not be changed by any election held in the country. Head of Iran-Russia parliamentary friendship group added that both Iranian and Russian officials are seriously determined to boost bilateral, regional and international relations. Iran attaches special importance to presence of a powerful Russia in international developments, Jalali said urging the two sides to prepare ground for determining new security cooperation. Referring to multilateral developments including Iran's membership in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), campaign against terrorism and illicit drugs and legal regime of the Caspian Sea, the MP said Tehran and Moscow will enjoy bright future. He condemned Thursday's terrorist bombings in London which reportedly killed more than 50 people. Iran condemns massacre of innocent people and terrorist moves in all shapes, Jalali said. He criticized US dual policy towards terrorism, saying Iran, itself, is a victim of terrorism and believes establishment of justice in the world is the most effective way to defeat the phenomenon. ***************************************************************** 2 WorldNetDaily: How Condi scuttled EU-Iran agreement SATURDAY JULY 9 2005 [Supercritical Thoughts] [Gordon Prather] © 2005 WorldNetDaily.com Even after years of go-anywhere see-anything inspections, Mohamed ElBaradei, director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, continues to report to the IAEA Board of Governors that he can find no indication that Iran now has, ever had, or intends to have a nuclear weapons program. Nevertheless, last week Secretary of State Condi Rice "determined" – pursuant to Presidential Directive 12938, as amended – that the Atomic Energy Agency of Iran had engaged in activities or transactions that materially contributed to the proliferation of nuclear weapons. Whereupon Treasury Secretary Snow immediately "blocked" all the Iranian agency's U.S. assets. Of course, it's doubtful that the Atomic Energy Agency had any assets in the U.S. to seize. So, why did Bush-Rice-Snow bother to seize them? Apparently, so Bush could threaten this week to seize – pursuant to Presidential Directive 12938, as amended – all the U.S. assets of any foreign company that provides (or attempts to provide) financial, material, technological or other support to the Atomic Energy Agency of Iran. France's new foreign minister, Philippe Douste-Blazy, was in Washington to "review" with Condi the state of the "Paris negotiations" between the European Union and Iran. Last November, France, Germany and the United Kingdom – as agents for the European Union – began negotiations with Iran on "a mutually acceptable long-term arrangement" that would a) provide "objective guarantees" to the EU that Iran's nuclear program was exclusively for peaceful purposes, b) guarantee future EU-Iranian nuclear, technological and economic "cooperation" as well as c) provide "firm commitments" by the EU to Iran "on security issues." Now, the key to preventing nuke proliferation is the international control of the acquisition and chemical/physical transformation of certain "nuclear" materials. In return for a promise not to acquire or seek to acquire nuclear weapons, the Treaty on Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons recognizes the "inalienable right" of all signatories to acquire and transform those materials, subject to oversight by the IAEA Safeguards regime. The EU-Iran negotiating agreement reaffirmed Iran's "inalienable right" under the NPT to acquire and operate – subject to the IAEA Safeguards regime – any and all nuclear fuel-cycle facilities. However, as a "confidence building measure," Iran volunteered to temporarily suspend its IAEA Safeguarded fuel-cycle activities and invited the IAEA to "verify" to the EU that suspension. However, the Iranians made it very clear that under no circumstances would they permanently suspend all nuclear fuel-cycle facilities. So, at best the EU can hope the Iranians would agree to EU-Iranian co-production co-ownership arrangements for reactors and other fuel-cycle facilities. Hence, if the EU-Iranian talks are successful, numerous European entities – many having substantial U.S. assets – will be providing financial, material, technological and other support to the Atomic Energy Agency of Iran. Nevertheless, at a joint press conference Douste-Blazy pledged to continue "consulting" with Condi as the Europeans prepare a new proposal, which "might" include security guarantees for Iran. Douste-Blazy noted that for the EU to give Iran such "security guarantees" – which is Iran's "ultimate objective" in the negotiations – it would be necessary for the U.S. to endorse those guarantees. So, obviously, Condi had summoned Douste-Blazy to Washington to tell him that the success of the EU-Iranian negotiations was her "ultimate objective." And, that she had been mistaken when she "determined" just a few days before that the Iranians were using the Safeguarded nuclear programs at their Atomic Energy Agency to hide a secret nuke program. And, that President Bush had absolutely no intention of seizing the U.S. assets of any European entity – public or private – that was a party to any "mutually acceptable long-term arrangement" with the Atomic Energy Agency of Iran. Obviously! But then Douste-Blazy declared, "Our ultimate objective is to insure that there is a suspension of the enrichment and reprocessing of hazardous nuclear material." Whoa! Up until now, that hasn't been the EU "ultimate objective." Re-establishment of normal banking and trade relations with Iran – disrupted for more than 20 years by U.S. sanctions on European entities that have attempted to do business in Iran and with Iranians – has been. So, what did Condi actually tell Douste-Blazy? "Well, the Paris agreement is initially about suspension. But ultimately, the world has to be assured that Iran cannot have this [nuclear fuel-cycle] capability. And that there will ultimately have to be objective guarantees, and we believe that means cessation." That tears it. No EU offer that makes that voluntary suspension an enforced cessation will be acceptable to the Iranians. So, thanks to Condi's "determination," there won't be a EU-Iranian agreement. Physicist James Gordon Prather has served as a policy implementing official for national security-related technical matters in the Federal Energy Agency, the Energy Research and Development Administration, the Department of Energy, the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the Department of the Army. Dr. Prather also served as legislative assistant for national security affairs to U.S. Sen. Henry Bellmon, R-Okla. -- ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee and member of the Senate Energy Committee and Appropriations Committee. Dr. Prather had earlier worked as a nuclear weapons physicist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California and Sandia National Laboratory in New Mexico. © 2005 WorldNetDaily.com, Inc. ***************************************************************** 3 Daily Times: Netanyahu warns West it must halt Iran nuclear plans Monday, July 11, 2005 LONDON: The Israeli finance minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has warned that the West must do more to counter Iran’s potential nuclear threat following the election last month of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad reported a British newspaper on Sunday. Netanyahu, in London to address a conference, said concerted action was required to rein in Iran, not least because of its links with Islamic terrorist groups such as Hezbollah and Hamas, the Sunday Times reported. “The Iranian regime supports terror, both ideologically and operationally,” the newspaper reported. “I think the regime will go as fast as it can to develop nuclear weapons, regardless of who leads it. ” Sunday Times asked whether there would ultimately have to be a military solution to the problem — perhaps involving a repetition of Israel’s pre-emptive strike on Iraq’s Osirak nuclear reactor in June 1981 — Netanyahu replied: “I don’t know. ” He added: “I am not aware of any plans, but that doesn’t mean they don’t exist, for example in America,” it reported. daily times monitor Daily Times - All Rights Reserved ***************************************************************** 4 [NYTr] Korea: Six-Party Nuke Talks to Resume Date: Sat, 9 Jul 2005 12:24:10 -0500 (CDT) Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit [With Bolton off the scene and Condi Rice semi-muzzled, Korea is offering the US a carrot.-NY Tramsfer] Prensa Latina, Havana http://www.plenglish.com Korea: Six-Party Nuke Talks to Resume Beijing, Jul 9 (PL)--The Democratic People Republic of Korea (DPRK) agreed Saturday to open the 4th round of the six-party talks in late July to keep discuss pending nuclear issue in the Korean Peninsula. According to the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), Pyongyang agreed to resume the talks after the US clarified its official stand to recognize the DPRK as a sovereign state and Washington promised not to attack the DPRK and to hold bilateral discussion within the framework of the six-party talks. The DPRK side interpreted the US side4s expression of its stand as a retraction of its remark designating the former as an "outpost of tyranny" and decided to return to the six-party talks, the KCNA said. The agreement was announced after a meeting between DPRK4s Deputy Foreign Minister Kim Kye-gwan and US Assistant Secretary of State for Asian Affairs Christopher Hill. "Both parties agreed to open the fourth round of the six-party talks in the week that begins on July 25th," KCNA underlined. Kim and Hill met in Beijing on July 9th and the announcement came as US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice arrived in Beijing for talks. The six-nation talks, which broke down last year, involve the US, the two Koreas, Russia, China and Japan. nytr/mh * ================================================================ .NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems . Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us . .339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org .List Archives: https://olm.blythe-systems.com/pipermail/nytr/ .Subscribe: https://olm.blythe-systems.com/mailman/listinfo/nytr ================================================================ ***************************************************************** 5 Korea Herald: [EDITORIALS] Talks rekindle hopes North Korea has agreed to return to the six-party talks, ending more than a yearlong boycott of the international negotiations on resolving its nuclear standoff. We welcome the decision and wish smooth sailing in the new round of talks, slated to begin during the week of July 25, possibly July 27. Hopes of progress are running high as Pyongyang's decision to attend the negotiations follows a recent normalization of inter-Korean relations. The Seoul-Pyongyang ties improved in the wake of the meeting in June between Unification Minister Chung Dong-young and North Korean leader Kim Jong-il. At the meeting, Chung explained Seoul's "important proposal," an offer to provide massive aid to the North if it abandons its nuclear programs. Kim's response to the offer is not known, but the North's willingness to resume the six-nation talks indicates he thinks the idea is at least worth giving a try. Seoul has made its proposal more convincing by obtaining endorsement from Washington. Discussion at the fourth round of talks is likely to focus on it, along with the proposal presented by the United States during the previous round which fell short of arousing interest from North Korea. Washington and Pyongyang have also improved the chance of progress by showing flexibility in their stance. U.S. officials, including Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, provided a justification for the North's return to the negotiation table by reaffirming the official U.S. stand to recognize North Korea as a sovereign state, not to invade it and hold bilateral talks within the framework of the six-nation talks. Pyongyang, which demanded that the United States apologize for Rice's description of North Korea as an "outpost of tyranny," took the officials' clarification of the Washington stand as a retraction of the remark. While the atmosphere surrounding the multilateral negotiations has definitely improved, there is no guarantee that the talks would proceed smoothly and live up to high expectations. Participants in the discussion are expected to face many obstacles. One important factor that could influence the talks is whether Washington is willing to guarantee the security of the current North Korean regime and refrain from raising issues that threaten it. Although Washington has declared it would recognize North Korea as a sovereign state and not invade it, it cannot be seen as a promise to protect the current Pyongyang regime. It could threaten the regime by raising such issues as its human rights abuses and missile programs. Washington's stance on these issues will depend on how far Pyongyang is willing to go toward the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula. We urge it to make sincere efforts this time to resolve its nuclear question once and for all. In the new round of the six-party talks, Seoul's role will be more important than ever as it has put forward a proposal in which North Korea is apparently interested. We urge Seoul officials to make careful preparations for the coming talks not to miss out on this golden opportunity. 2005.07.11 ***************************************************************** 6 Guardian Unlimited: Rice: Nuke Talks With N.Korea Only a Start From the Associated Press [UP] Sunday July 10, 2005 10:16 AM AP Photo TOK213 By GEORGE GEDDA Associated Press Writer BEIJING (AP) - Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice cautioned Sunday that North Korea's decision to resume nuclear disarmament talks does not mean the United States is any closer to its long-standing goal of a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula. ``It's only a start,'' Rice said at a news conference. ``It is the goal of the talks to have progress.'' North Korea announced Sunday that it is committed to banning nuclear weapons from the peninsula. The statement came on the same day Rice and Chinese leaders were meeting in an effort to resolve the long-running impasse that has spawned concern that the hardline North is developing nuclear weapons. As Rice was arriving here Saturday night, North Korean Vice Foreign Minister Kim Gye Gwan was telling U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill that his government was prepared to return to the bargaining table during the week of July 25 after a yearlong boycott. ``The issue now for North Korea is to make the strategic choice to give up it's nuclear weapons program,'' Rice said. ``This not just a concern of the United States. This is a concern of all of North Korea's neighbors.'' Rice spoke near the end of a 20-hour visit here in which she met with President Hu Jintao, Vice Premier Wen Jiabao and Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing. She reaffirmed her concern over ``the significant pace of the Chinese military buildup.'' She also listed several other points of friction but added ``the relationship still has more positive than negative'' aspects. During her discussions, she said she also raised concerns about China's record on human rights and religious freedom. After her visit to China, Rice was flying to the Thai resort city of Phuket, which suffered widespread devastation in December's tsunami. The six-party discussions, in addition to the United States and North Korea, involve China, South Korea, Japan and Russia. Three rounds of discussions were held during 2003 and 2004, producing scant progress toward the U.S. goal of verifiable dismantling of North Korea's nuclear weapons programs. As an inducement, North Korea would seek significant economic benefits if it makes a credible commitment to disarmament. Rice said North Korea's decision to return to the talks followed an intense flurry of diplomatic activity. She said South Korea and China in particular showed North Korea ``what the path might look like'' for their impoverished country if they become a non-nuclear country. She also said Beijing should hold direct talks with the government of Taiwan in addition to the Taiwanese opposition leaders who have visited the mainland in recent months. ``We hope that China extends its contact to the elected government of Taiwan,'' Rice told reporters. ``We encourage as much contact as possible.'' Taiwan and China split in 1949. Beijing claims the self-ruled island as part of its territory and has threatened repeatedly to invade. The two sides have no formal relations and haven't had high-level official contact since the 1990s. On another issue, Rice also said Afghanistan still needs the help of American security forces and rejected a call from a regional group led by China and Russia that the U.S. withdraw its troops. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005 ***************************************************************** 7 Washington Post: N. Korea Agrees To Rejoin Talks Nuclear Arsenal On Table After Year-long Boycott By Glenn KesslerWashington Post Staff Writer Sunday, July 10, 2005; Page A01 BEIJING, July 10 -- North Korea has agreed to return this month to six-nation talks aimed at eliminating its nuclear arsenal, ending a year-long boycott, U.S. officials and the North Korean government said Saturday. The agreement to restart the talks was reached at a rare dinner meeting here between a senior U.S. envoy and his North Korean counterpart, held shortly before Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice arrived Saturday night for talks with Chinese officials on the North Korean issue. [Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice arrives in Beijing for talks on North Korea. She later plans to tour a tsunami-hit area of Thailand.] Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice arrives in Beijing for talks on North Korea. She later plans to tour a tsunami-hit area of Thailand. (By Ng Han Guan -- Associated During the meal, Kim Gye Gwan, the North Korean deputy foreign minister, told Assistant Secretary of State Christopher R. Hill that North Korea was willing to attend talks in Beijing the week of July 25, according to a senior U.S. official traveling with Rice. In what U.S. officials took as an encouraging sign, they reported that Kim said the purpose of the talks was the "denuclearization of the Korean peninsula" and that North Korea intended to make progress at the negotiations. Rice met with Chinese President Hu Jintao, Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing and other Chinese officials Sunday morning. She then was to fly to Phuket, Thailand, for a scheduled tour Monday of damage from last winter's Indian Ocean tsunami. She then planned to return to East Asia for talks with Japanese and South Korean officials, also focusing largely on the North Korean issue. Rice, after meeting with Li, said China and the United States agreed that resumption of the talks "is only a first step. The real issue now is to make progress at these talks." Li added the two countries had a "shared goal -- a Korean peninsula that is free of nuclear weapons." China has already announced that State Councilor Tang Jiaxuan -- a former foreign minister who also plans to meet one-on-one with Rice -- will visit Pyongyang this week as Hu's personal envoy, apparently to report on the discussions with Rice. The diplomatic breakthrough comes five months after North Korea declared it had nuclear weapons and would never return to talks because of what it called the Bush administration's "hostile policy." The statement was made shortly after Rice, in her confirmation hearings, said that North Korea was one of six "outposts of tyranny" -- and President Bush, a few days later in his State of the Union address, pledged to combat tyranny around the world. The United States' partners in the talks, particularly China, have complained that the Bush administration's rhetoric concerning North Korea and its leader, Kim Jong Il, was making it difficult to draw the reclusive nation back to the sessions. In recent months, U.S. officials have sent signals that they respected North Korea's sovereignty, though Rice has declined to retract her "outpost of tyranny" comment. Bush, who received the ire of North Korea after referring to Kim as a "dictator," began saying "Mr. Kim" when referring to him. North Korea's official KCNA news agency, in a statement Saturday night confirming the talks, appeared to claim a victory in the change of tone when it described the dinner between Hill and Kim. "The U.S. side clarified its official stand to recognize the DPRK as a sovereign state, not to invade it and hold bilateral talks within the framework of the six-party talks," the statement said, using the initials for the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. "The DPRK side interpreted the U.S. side's expression of its stand as a retraction of its remark designating the former as an outpost of tyranny and decided to return to the six-party talks." Hill said that his dinner conversation with his counterpart lasted more than two hours, and was conducted in a correct and careful atmosphere. The men focused on "a process that is going to lead us to a solution," Hill said. "We agreed that we can't have dueling speeches. We need to have results" that meet specific objectives, he said. The envoys agreed that "we have to look at ways to make each round count," Hill said, "and we need to make sure that each round builds more momentum for the next, so when we push that rock up the hill it doesn't come back to the bottom each time." U.S. officials stressed that the meeting between Hill and Kim did not amount to negotiations, but an exchange of diplomatic messages. They said Hill's statement was similar to comments made at two recent meetings between mid-level officials at North Korea's U.N. mission, which helped set the groundwork for North Korea's agreement. Still, it was the highest level contact between the two countries in more than a year. The Bush administration has insisted it will not hold bilateral negotiations with North Korea, except as part of the six-nation negotiating rounds that also include China, Russia, Japan and South Korea. Only three sessions have been held in the past two years, the last in June 2004, with little progress. In the meantime, U.S. intelligence analysts have said they believe North Korea's stockpile of weapons-grade plutonium has increased fourfold during the same period, enough to make about nine nuclear weapons. The United States also pressed China and South Korea to send tough signals to North Korea about the implications of its continued refusal to return to the negotiating table. Those countries instead appear to have swayed North Korea by suggesting that a successful negotiation would result in significant assistance. China rebuffed a U.S. suggestion in April that it temporarily cut off North Korea's supply of oil and lured North Korean officials to the three previous sessions with huge payments and concessions. Rice, speaking to reporters traveling with her to Beijing, said the United States had no plans to update its proposal, advanced at the talks a year ago, but was prepared to negotiate if North Korea came forward with a serious counteroffer. Under the U.S. proposal, if North Korea agreed to end its plutonium and uranium programs, South Korea and other U.S. allies could provide immediate energy assistance to the North. Pyongyang would have three months to disclose its programs and have its claims verified by U.S. intelligence. Only then would the United States and its allies give provisional security assurances and enter a process that might result in direct U.S. aid and a permanent security guarantee. "There is something there for the North Koreans to react to if they choose to," Rice said. "It is not as if we are starting from a blank slate and everybody has to make it up." At past sessions, North Korea has made a series of proposals, none of which have been acceptable to the United States. North Korea denies it has a uranium-enrichment program and has proposed only a long-term freeze of its plutonium program. It has also called for a long list of concessions, including billions of dollars in aid. Staff Writer Elizabeth Williamson in Washington contributed to this report. © 2005 The Washington Post Company ***************************************************************** 8 Guardian Unlimited North Korea to Resume 6-Nation Nuke Talks From the Associated Press [UP] Sunday July 10, 2005 12:46 AM AP Photo SELX101 By GEORGE GEDDA Associated Press Writer BEIJING (AP) - North Korea said Saturday it will abandon its yearlong boycott of nuclear disarmament talks and resume negotiations this month with the U.S. and four other nations, a breakthrough reached just as U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice began a mission to end the impasse. North Korea's vice foreign minister, Kim Gye Gwan, informed U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill that the North is prepared to return to the talks during the week of July 25. Word of the decision came as Rice arrived in Beijing, the first stop on a four-country Asian tour devoted primarily to the North Korea situation. For weeks, the U.S. has urged North Korea to get back to the bargaining table and take the discussions seriously. A Bush administration official who spoke with reporters accompanying Rice said Kim told Hill that North Korea's purpose in the talks will be denuclearization and that its negotiators will be intent on making progress. North Korea's official Central News Agency confirmed the July 25 time frame. ``The U.S. side clarified its official stand to recognize (North Korea) as a sovereign state, not to invade it and hold bilateral talks within the framework of the six-party talks,'' KCNA reported. In Washington, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said, ``We are pleased that North Korea is coming back to the talks with a commitment to a denuclearized peninsula. We look forward to making progress in the six-party talks toward that goal.'' The other countries involved are China, Japan, Russia and South Korea. A spokesman for Russia's foreign ministry said the development was welcome news. Three rounds of largely fruitless talks took place in 2003 and 2004; there have been no six-party discussions over the past year. North Korea blamed ``hostile policies'' of the United States, including statements by U.S. officials that they considered inflammatory and disrespectful. Rice, for example, branded North Korea an ``outpost of tyranny'' during her confirmation hearings in January to be the chief U.S. diplomat. President Bush and Rice have dropped such rhetoric lately, in an apparent bid to encourage North Korea to be flexible. North Korea was a priority for Rice heading into meetings Sunday with Chinese President Hu Jintao, Premier Wen Jiabao and Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing. On the trip from Washington, Rice did not use any pejorative language about North Korea when talking with reporters. She stressed that the U.S. respected North Korea's sovereignty and had no plans to attack the country. In recent weeks, there have been signs that North Korea was interested in ending the boycott. Five weeks ago, North Korean diplomats at the United Nations expressed such a desire during a meeting with two U.S. State Department officials. North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il also held out the possibility of a resumption during talks last month with South Korean Unification Minister Chung Dong-young. The U.S. recently announced a 50,000-ton food donation for North Korea. The timing of the announcement was seen as a gesture toward North Korea. The Bush administration said it was a humanitarian donation and denied that it was related to nuclear diplomacy. A range of possible dates for resuming the talks have been discussed. During the dinner Saturday night at a Chinese Foreign Ministry facility, Kim said his government had chosen the week of July 25, the administration official said. For years, the U.S. government has believed that North Korea possesses at least two nuclear weapons. Intelligence analysts believe that the country may have acquired several more in the recent past. North Korea readily acknowledges that it has a plutonium-based nuclear weapons capability. It confirmed to U.S. officials three years ago that it also has a uranium-based program but it has since retracted those statements. The U.S. has sought the verifiable disarmament of North Korea's nuclear weapons programs. In exchange, North Korea would receive energy aid and economic benefits from the U.S., Japan, South Korea and other donor countries. Reaching a disarmament agreement with North Korea would be extraordinarily difficult. The isolated communist nation would have to dismantle the plutonium program it acknowledges and allow the creation of an intrusive verification system. The same would apply to the uranium-based program, which it denies possessing. Despite the nuclear standoff, cooperation between North and South Korea has continued. A North Korean delegation arrived Saturday in Seoul for economic cooperation talks. The two Koreas resumed contact in May following a 10-month freeze when the North was angered by mass defections of its citizens to the South. From Beijing, Rice planned to go to the Thai resort city of Phuket, which was devastated by last December's tsunami. Her final stops will be Japan and South Korea. --- Associated Press Writer Burt Herman in Seoul, South Korea, contributed to this report. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005 ***************************************************************** 9 Xinhua: DPRK says will "do its utmost" for progress in nuclear talks www.xinhuanet.com www.chinaview.cn 2005-07-10 17:36:12 PYONGYANG, July 10 (Xinhuanet) -- The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) on Sunday called for an in-depth discussion at the upcoming fourth round of the six-party talks on ways of denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula and pledged full efforts to achieve progress. "The resumption of the talks itself is important, but the most essential thing is for the talks to have an in-depth discussion on ways of denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula to make substantial progress in the talks," said a spokesman of the DPRK's Foreign Ministry. "The DPRK will do its utmost for it," he added. The remarks came one day after DPRK's Vice-Minister of Foreign Ministry Kim Kye-gwan and US Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill, both heads of their countries' delegations to the six-party talks, announced in Beijing on Saturday to open a new round of the six-party talks in the week beginning July 25, 2005. "The resumption of the six-party talks that have remained deadlocked for over one year is entirely thanks to the sincere efforts made by the DPRK for the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula," the spokesman said. "Our consistent stand to attain the goal of denuclearization through dialogue and negotiations has never changed." He said the talks have been deadlocked till now because the United States refused to recognize Pyongyang as a dialogue partner. The outcome of the latest contact between the DPRK and the United States proves that it is possible to settle any problem when the parties concerned try to directly solve it, said the spokesman. "The neighboring countries supporting the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula and those related to it have also made efforts for the resumption of the talks," he said. The six-party talks, which involves China, DPRK, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the United States, last met in June 2004. Since then, Pyongyang has refused to attend, citing "hostile" US policies. The nuclear row erupted in 2002 when US officials said the DPRKhad admitted to having a secret uranium enrichment program, in addition to its acknowledged plutonium-based one, a claim denied by the DPRK. Enditem Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 10 Xinhua: China welcomes DPRK agreement www.xinhuanet.com www.chinaview.cn 2005-07-11 07:54:40 BEIJING, July 11 -- Beijing has welcomed Pyongyang's announcement that it will return to the Six-Party Talks on its nuclear weapons programme, hoping the involved parties will continue to seek common ground. "China is willing to work with other parties concerned, including the United States, to play a constructive role in pushing forward the next round of talks," said President Hu Jintao during a meeting with US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice yesterday. The top US diplomat thanked the Chinese Government for its efforts in helping Pyongyang back to the negotiating table. "China has played a very active role showing North Korea (DPRK) what the path ahead might look like," she said at a press conference in Beijing. China helped to organize talks in Beijing late on Saturday between senior officials from the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) and the United States. These led to an agreement to resume multilateral talks aimed at ending the DPRK's nuclear weapon drive. Kim Gye-gwan, the DPRK's vice-foreign minister, informed US Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill that Pyongyang is prepared to return to the talks during the week beginning July 25. The decision came just after Rice touched down in Beijing for a 20-hour visit, the first leg of a four-nation Asian tour, widely believed to be devoted primarily to the nuclear issue. Rice reaffirmed that the US recognizes DPRK as a sovereign state and has no intention of invading or attacking it. She said she is looking forward to making progress in the Six-Party Talks, an important step in dealing with the DPRK nuclear programme and in establishing a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula. However, Rice also cautioned that the resumption of the talks is only a first step and practical progress is the main target. Rice held talks with Chinese President Hu Jintao, Premier Wen Jiabao and Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing. She concluded her visit by meeting State Councillor Tang Jiaxuan, who is expected to pay a three-day visit to the DPRK starting from tomorrow. Local observers said Tang's visit is in preparation for the opening of the next round the fourth of the Six-Party Talks. The DPRK called yesterday for an in-depth discussion at the Six-Party Talks on the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, and pledged its full efforts to achieve progress. "The resumption of the talks itself is important, but the most essential thing is for the talks to have an in-depth discussion on ways to see the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, to make substantial progress during the talks," said a DPRK Foreign Ministry spokesman. The Russian Foreign Ministry welcomed the agreement to re-start the Six-Party Talks. Russia is one of the parties involved. "Moscow favours the early resumption of the talks," Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Yakovenko was quoted as saying by Itar-Tass news agency. The ROK Deputy Foreign Minister Song Min-soon said: "When the talks are held the countries participating in the Six-Party Talks should make substantive progress for the resolution of the North Korean nuclear problem through serious and concerted negotiations." During the meeting with Rice, Premier Wen Jiabao said the two countries should strictly abide by World Trade Organization regulations and resolve problems relating to trade and the economy through dialogue and friendly consultation. Rice said the US welcomes a strong Chinese economy and believes China's economic development will benefit global economic growth. She said the United States hopes to set up more open economic lines of communication with China, through which the two can properly handle relevant issues and strengthen co-operation. Rice left Beijing later yesterday for Thailand and will go on to Japan and the Republic of Korea. Meanwhile, the annual meeting of the US-China Joint Commission on Commerce and Trade (JCCT) will be held in Beijing today. US Trade Representative Rob Portman, Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez and Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns will attend. The opening up of the Chinese market and the protection of intellectual property rights will be high on the agenda. (Source: China Daily) Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 11 Xinhua: Hu Jintao hails resumption of six-party talks www.xinhuanet.com www.chinaview.cn 2005-07-11 08:08:48 BEIJING, July 10 (Xinhuanet) -- Chinese President Hu Jintao said here Sunday that China welcomes the resumption of the six-party talks and appreciates the efforts made by relevant parties for this end. [Chinese President Hu Jintao said here Sunday that China welcomes the resumption of the six-party talks and appreciates the efforts made by relevant parties for this end. ] Chinese President Hu Jintao said here Sunday that China welcomes the resumption of the six-party talks and appreciates the efforts made by relevant parties for this end. Hu told visiting US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice that China also hopes that the good momentum, in which all the parties concerned are seeking common grounds, would be enhanced and further boosted. He said peacefully settlement of the Korean Peninsula nuclear issue through dialogue concerns the peace and stability of the Korean Peninsula as well as northeast Asia. China is ready to keep close contact and cooperation with all the parties concerned, including the United States, and will continue to play a constructive role in seeking progress in the new round of six-party talks, Hu said. Vice Foreign Minister of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) Kim Kye-gwan and US Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill, who are heads of their countries' delegations to the six-party talks, agreed Saturday to open the fourth round of the six-party talks in late July, 2005. Rice, who arrived in Beijing Saturday afternoon for a 20-hour visit, referred the news as a positive progress in the process of peacefully solving the Korean Peninsula nuclear issue. She told Hu that the United States hopes that all the six parties would join efforts and push forward the new round of talks for substantial results. On the issue of Taiwan, Hu said the Chinese government has the sincerity and determination to improve and expand relations acrossthe Taiwan Straits and to push for peaceful reunification of the motherland. Hu expressed appreciation to President Bush and the US government for their repeatedly reiteration of adherence to the one-China policy, abidance to the three Sino-US joint communiques and the opposition to "Taiwan independence." Hu expressed the wish that the US side meet its commitment with concrete actions by keeping vigilant against any moves that the secessionist force of "Taiwan independence" make to push for "Taiwan independence" through "constitutional" changes, by more explicitly supporting the improvement and development of cross-Straits relations and by promoting peace and stability in the area around Taiwan Straits. Rice said the US side firmly adheres to the one-China policy and abides by the three joint communiques between the two countries. On Sino-US relations, Hu said that the overall bilateral ties at present maintain a momentum of steady growth, and the two countries are implementing step by step the important consensus reached by the leaders of the two countries on further advancing the constructive and cooperative relationship. The two sides have made new progress in exchanges and cooperation in the fields of economy, trade, anti-terrorism, law-enforcement and health.The two sides have also kept consultation and coordination on important international and regional issues, Hu said. The president said that China highly values its relationship with the United States. China is ready to work along with the United States to strengthen dialogues, mutual trust and cooperation, respect and care for each other's concerns, in an efforts to make the bilateral relations achieve greater progress. Rice said that the relationship between the United States and China is in good momentum. She said it had been the second time for her to visit China as US Secretary of State within six months, which demonstrates the importance and the level of the relationship between the two countries. She also said President Bush expects Hu's visit to the United States and hopes to exchange views with him on US-China relations and other major issues of common concern. Beijing is the first leg of Rice's four-nation Asian tour, which will also bring her to Thailand, Japan and the Republic of Korea. Before her meeting with Hu, Rice had met with Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao and held talks with Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing. Enditem Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 12 Guardian Unlimited: North Korea to Resume 6-Nation Nuke Talks From the Associated Press [UP] Sunday July 10, 2005 6:31 AM AP Photo SEL101 By GEORGE GEDDA Associated Press Writer BEIJING (AP) - North Korea said Saturday it will abandon its yearlong boycott of nuclear disarmament talks and resume negotiations this month with the U.S. and four other nations, a breakthrough reached just as U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice began a mission to end the impasse. North Korea's vice foreign minister, Kim Gye Gwan, informed U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill that the North is prepared to return to the talks during the week of July 25. Word of the decision came as Rice arrived in Beijing, the first stop on a four-country Asian tour devoted primarily to the North Korea situation. For weeks, the U.S. has urged North Korea to get back to the bargaining table and take the discussions seriously. A Bush administration official who spoke with reporters accompanying Rice said Kim told Hill that North Korea's purpose in the talks will be denuclearization and that its negotiators will be intent on making progress. The North's official Korean Central News Agency confirmed the July 25 time frame. ``The U.S. side clarified its official stand to recognize (North Korea) as a sovereign state, not to invade it and hold bilateral talks within the framework of the six-party talks,'' KCNA reported. In Washington, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said, ``We are pleased that North Korea is coming back to the talks with a commitment to a denuclearized peninsula. We look forward to making progress in the six-party talks toward that goal.'' The other countries involved are China, Japan, Russia and South Korea. A spokesman for Russia's foreign ministry said the development was welcome news. Three rounds of largely fruitless talks took place in 2003 and 2004; there have been no six-party discussions over the past year. North Korea blamed ``hostile policies'' of the United States, including statements by U.S. officials that they considered inflammatory and disrespectful. Rice, for example, branded North Korea an ``outpost of tyranny'' during her confirmation hearings in January to be the chief U.S. diplomat. President Bush and Rice have dropped such rhetoric lately, in an apparent bid to encourage North Korea to be flexible. North Korea was a priority for Rice heading into meetings Sunday with Chinese President Hu Jintao, Premier Wen Jiabao and Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing. Rice met with Li on Sunday morning and thanked China for its help in arranging for new round of six-party talks. She called this ``a first step'' but said the ``real issue'' is whether progress can be made. Li said the parties should ``continue to work together toward our shared goal'' of a Korean Pensula free of nuclear weapons. Later, Rice went to the Great Hall of the People, where she met with Hu. During a photo session, the Chinese president said, ``I trust your visit will help mutual understanding and cooperation.'' Rice, in turn, said she hoped her visit ``will contribute to our continued improvement in relations. We have a wide range of issues before us.'' In Seoul, meanwhile, South Korean Vice Finance Minister Bahk Byong-won said at the start of a meeting Sunday with North Korean officials that the North's returning to the nuclear negotiations ``removes the biggest hurdle to making full-scale progress in economic cooperation talks.'' The North's top delegate to the Seoul talks, Choe Yong Gon, vice minister of Construction and Building Materials Industries, said, ``We should work toward creating good things for the North and South Korean people.'' On the trip from Washington, Rice did not use any pejorative language about North Korea when talking with reporters. She stressed that the U.S. respected North Korea's sovereignty and had no plans to attack the country. In recent weeks, there have been signs that North Korea was interested in ending the boycott. Five weeks ago, North Korean diplomats at the United Nations expressed such a desire during a meeting with two U.S. State Department officials. North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il also held out the possibility of a resumption during talks last month with South Korean Unification Minister Chung Dong-young. The U.S. recently announced a 50,000-ton food donation for North Korea. The timing of the announcement was seen as a gesture toward North Korea. The Bush administration said it was a humanitarian donation and denied that it was related to nuclear diplomacy. A range of possible dates for resuming the talks have been discussed. During the dinner Saturday night at a Chinese Foreign Ministry facility, Kim said his government had chosen the week of July 25, the administration official said. For years, the U.S. government has believed that North Korea possesses at least two nuclear weapons. Intelligence analysts believe that the country may have acquired several more in the recent past. North Korea readily acknowledges that it has a plutonium-based nuclear weapons capability. It confirmed to U.S. officials three years ago that it also has a uranium-based program but it has since retracted those statements. The U.S. has sought the verifiable disarmament of North Korea's nuclear weapons programs. In exchange, North Korea would receive energy aid and economic benefits from the U.S., Japan, South Korea and other donor countries. Reaching a disarmament agreement with North Korea would be extraordinarily difficult. The isolated communist nation would have to dismantle the plutonium program it acknowledges and allow the creation of an intrusive verification system. The same would apply to the uranium-based program, which it denies possessing. Despite the nuclear standoff, cooperation between North and South Korea has continued. A North Korean delegation arrived Saturday in Seoul for economic cooperation talks. The two Koreas resumed contact in May following a 10-month freeze when the North was angered by mass defections of its citizens to the South. From Beijing, Rice planned to go to the Thai resort city of Phuket, which was devastated by last December's tsunami. Her final stops will be Japan and South Korea. --- Associated Press Writer Burt Herman in Seoul, South Korea, contributed to this report. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005 ***************************************************************** 13 Guardian Unlimited: Korea Breakthrough Reached Over Dinner [UP] Sunday July 10, 2005 6:31 PM AP Photo TOK202 By GEORGE GEDDA Associated Press Writer BEIJING (AP) - From the start, North Korean officials made clear to their U.S. dinner companion what was on their mind: assurances the U.S. had no plans to attack and that it recognized North Korea's sovereignty. U.S. diplomat Christopher Hill obliged during the ``steak and cheesecake'' dinner at a government restaurant and soon heard the ranking North Korean at the table say his government was willing to resume nuclear disarmament talks this month. For more than a year, North Korea had shown contempt for the six-nation negotiating process by boycotting it. That has caused jitters in Washington and throughout Asia. Participants at the Saturday night dinner raised a toast to the success of the revived diplomatic endeavor. Yet there are no guarantees the next round of talks would be any more productive than the first three, held in 2003 and 2004. The new round will open in the Chinese capital during the week of July 25. At the time of the dinner detente, Rice was nearing Beijing, where she planned talks with Chinese leaders about North Korea. Hill called the chief U.S. diplomat on her government plane just before the end of her 20-hour trip from Washington. Hill, who heads the State Department's East Asia bureau, told Rice that the North Koreans had said their negotiators were intent on making progress toward the establishment of a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula. If North Korea is sincere, it would represent a major policy shift for a country that is believed to have at least two nuclear weapons - and maybe several more. North Korea withdrew from the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in early 2003 and said it needs nuclear arms as a way to deter a possible U.S. attack. The pending resumption of the talks was a rare bit of good news for the Bush administration on a highly troublesome issue. But Rice, while welcoming the North's decision, said it was just a first step. ``It is not the goal of the talks to have talks. The goal of the talks is to have progress,'' Rice told reporters Sunday. ``The issue now is for North Korea to make the strategic choice to give up its nuclear weapons program,'' she said before leaving for Thailand, her second stop on a four-country Asia swing that also includes visits to Japan and South Korea. She added that the nuclear impasse was a concern not only of the U.S. but also its partners in the negotiations: China, Japan, Russia and South Korea. South Korea's main nuclear negotiator, Deputy Foreign Minister Song Min-soon, said Sunday that the North's imminent return to the arms talks was the ``fruit of the efforts'' of all countries involved. Japan reacted cautiously. ``We hope that North Korea has a sincere and constructive attitude'' at the talks and that they lead to ``substantive'' progress, a Foreign Ministry spokesman said in a statement. North Korea's official Korean Central News Agency quoted a Foreign Ministry spokesman as saying the resumption of talks ``is important, but the most essential thing is for ... an in-depth discussion on ways of denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula to make substantial progress in the talks.'' North Korea ``will do its utmost for it,'' according to the report. Rice said a ``tremendous flurry of diplomatic activity'' - led by China and South Korea - contributed to North Korea's change of heart. U.S. officials also believe that the North's continuing economic woes may have contributed. The officials point out that infrastructure investments by China in North Korea are way down. So, too, is aid from South Korea. By getting rid of its nuclear weapons program and having that verified, North Korea should be able to count on substantial economic help from the China and South Korea as well as the U.S. and Japan. Rice arrived in Thailand on Sunday night, landing in the resort city of Phuket. On Monday, she planned to review efforts to rebuild coastal areas devastated by last December's tsunami. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005 ***************************************************************** 14 Digital Chosunilbo: North Korea Has Bought One Last Chance Editorials/Columns Updated July.10,2005 21:38 KST North Korea Announces Return to Six-Party Talks N.Korea, U.S. Could Spend More Time Alone Together North Korea has decided to return to six-country talks on its nuclear program. If the talks start again in the last week of July, as Pyongyang has promised, it will have been 13 long months since the inconclusive third round of negotiations ended in June last year. The announcement comes not a moment too soon, given the chances of mounting international pressure on the North had July passed without a new start to negotiations. North Korea has behaved recklessly in the last year. It has announced it has nuclear devices and reprocessed spent fuel rods into weapons-grade plutonium. The international community, with the U.S. at the helm, has been unable to take effective steps to contain it. Instead, the South Korean government has softened its stance toward the North and offered it aid on a large scale. Pyongyang may feel it is time to quit while it is ahead, having milked the standoff for what it was worth, and that more is to be gained now from coming back to the negotiating table, both materially and in terms of prestige. But North Korea has also lost much. Above all, it has invited maximum international exposure of its oppressive system and dismal human rights record. Its economic plight, too, has got worse. So while it may have gained time and a chance to be heard on the nuclear issue, the environment for securing the system, which is after all its main concern, has deteriorated. By the same token, the regime will find that the sooner it renounces its nuclear program the more likely it is to survive. Still, if the talks resume, their prospects are by no means bright. Nothing has changed in the basic positions of the U.S. and North Korea. If the North persists with antics like trying to divert the talks into mutual disarmament negotiations and boasting about how it is a nuclear state, matters can only get worse. Washington too needs to show some flexibility in negotiations while remaining focused on the central goal of getting the North to abandon its nuclear program. A resumption of the talks in itself does not mean much. Unless they achieve substantial progress, they will merely fuel the suspicion that they are a waste of time. The UN Security Council would be waiting, and with it the prospect of sanctions. The next round of the six-party talks is the last chance to solve the nuclear dispute through dialogue. ***************************************************************** 15 San Francisco Chronicle: The little-known links in the chain to the bomb Reviewed by Elizabeth Svoboda Sunday, July 10, 2005 Before the Fallout From Marie Curie to Hiroshima By Diana Preston WALKER; 400 PAGES; $27 On a balmy June night in 1903, physics professor Pierre Curie extracted a small vial from his pocket and held it aloft. Friends and colleagues looked on, transfixed, as the radium inside shone "brilliant in the darkness," glowing like a neon tube against the backdrop of the Parisian night sky. Curie's gesture was a tribute to his physicist wife, Marie, whose six years of painstaking lab work had yielded the singular substance in the vial. Caught up in celebrating Marie's achievements -- she had just become the first woman in France to receive a doctorate -- the garden-party group could scarcely have guessed the outcome of the scientific chain reaction their guest of honor had set in motion. The faintly shimmering vial contained secrets that, in less than 50 years, would give rise to a flash of light "brighter than a thousand suns," a radioactive juggernaut that would annihilate more than 100,000 people in Hiroshima, Japan. In "Before the Fallout," British historian Diana Preston traces this improbable trajectory, examining the succession of Pandora's boxes researchers and politicians opened to make possible a weapon of unthinkable destructive power. The deliberations of the Manhattan Project's kingpins at Los Alamos, N.M., have been hashed out ad infinitum in classic works such as Richard Rhodes' "The Making of the Atomic Bomb." Preston's book escapes comparison with such literary behemoths by focusing on the key roles of lesser-known personalities. She proposes that for every Oppenheimer, Einstein and Teller -- larger-than- life caricatures in the cultural lexicon -- there is a bit player, equally integral to the drama, whose story remains largely unknown. Among Preston's cast of atomic Rosencrantzes and Guildensterns, German physicist Werner Heisenberg is most deftly portrayed. Though eager for Germany to win World War II so the Allies would not treat it "the way the Romans had treated Carthage," Heisenberg never belonged to the Nazi party. Preston raises the intriguing possibility that he and others assigned to the German nuclear weapons project "had misgivings about producing a bomb, which may have unconsciously inhibited their work." But whatever internal conflicts Heisenberg might have had, they didn't prevent him from playing them close to the chest. Danish physicist Niels Bohr emerged terrified from a meeting with Heisenberg in 1941, convinced his onetime colleague had "intended to convey to him that Germany had made great progress" toward an atomic bomb. When word of this presumed progress reached Manhattan Project scientists later in the war, they resolved to redouble their efforts -- possibly leading them to finish the bomb sooner. Lise Meitner, the small, mousy-haired physicist so gifted that Einstein called her "the German Marie Curie," is another of the forgotten luminaries Preston resurrects. In a 1939 Nature paper, Meitner and her colleagues Otto Frisch and Fritz Strassmann explained nuclear fission for the first time -- the essential reaction on which all future bomb development was based. Germany unwittingly sabotaged its efforts to build an atomic weapon when escalating anti-Semitic legislation forced Meitner to escape to Sweden before the outbreak of war. There, her salary dropped to that of a starting lab assistant, she remained in obscurity for decades. In addition to dissecting atomic physics' most obscure and complex personalities ("history," she writes, "is inherently about people" ), Preston mines the social implications of the ambiguous new role scientists played in the postwar world. Before the bomb, she notes, the world "did not require [researchers] to be good communicators, or good with people, to be politically aware, or to display good judgment of any kind in any area other than science. " In the wake of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, were researchers to be the modern equivalent of Platonic philosopher-kings, drawing on their specialized knowledge to formulate judgments about when their creations should be used? As McCarthy-era injunctions against those opposed to atomic weapons proved, many politicians wanted scientists to remain in a moral vacuum, impervious to the consequences of their work -- and powerless to do anything about them. Preston's pet causes occasionally taint her otherwise evenhanded telling. Her discussion of German chemist Ida Noddack, who was pooh-poohed by male colleagues after publishing a 1934 article that hinted at how to split nuclei, is a "What if?" gambit that lasts several pages. She advances the dubious proposition that if Noddack's ideas had been taken more seriously, "fission might have been discovered four years earlier than it actually was." For all Preston's cries of sexism, she is convinced that the Allied high command's swift decision to drop bombs on two Japanese cities could not have stemmed from racism. Her conclusion is at odds with her acknowledgment that a wartime Marine Corps publication spoke of the Japanese as "lice" and declared that the Corps had been "assigned the gigantic task of [their] extermination." Despite these lapses in historical judgment, "Before the Fallout" offers a novel and remarkably human perspective on greater and lesser stars in the atomic firmament and the ways they influenced each other. In this 60th- anniversary year, when new books about the bomb are as ubiquitous as self-help tomes, Preston's achievement is a rare one. San Francisco science writer Elizabeth Svoboda's work has appeared in Discover, Wired and other publications. Page E - 3 The San Francisco Chronicle] ***************************************************************** 16 Albuquerque Tribune: Energy bill gets down to business By Scripps Howard News Service July 9, 2005 WASHINGTON - The congressional prescription for the nation's energy future might include escalators in federal buildings that run only when a rider steps near. Or Grand Canyon tour buses fueled by hydrogen. Or diesel fuel made from mustard seeds. Or diesel fuel made from chicken fat. Or not. New Mexico Sens. Pete Domenici and Jeff Bingaman and their staffs will be sorting through these and hundreds of other provisions of the Senate and House versions of the energy bill when they begin negotiations with the House next week. Domenici, an Albuquerque Republican, and Bingaman, a Silver City Democrat, as chairman and ranking member, respectively, of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, will lead a dozen other senators into the negotiations that could break a three-year stalemate on comprehensive energy legislation. Domenici said he has been assured by his House counterpart, Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Joe Barton, a Texas Republican, that there's nothing in either bill "that's a show-stopper." The major issues are well known. Controversial House provisions include: Drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Domenici is adamant that this provision be dropped. Instead, he says, it will be part of the must-pass reconciliation bill Congress will take up at the end of the year to balance revenues with spending. No legal liability for makers of MTBE. This lead substitute in gasoline has polluted drinking water supplies in hundreds of communities, including some in New Mexico, but especially in New England. Senators won't let the Texas MTBE producers off the hook from lawsuits but are willing to see if Rep. Charles Bass, a New Hampshire Republican, can negotiate a compromise with Barton. Incentives for oil and gas exploration. President Bush and Domenici agree that with oil at $60 a barrel, U.S. producers don't need $8 billion worth of tax incentives to drill holes. Most of the $10 billion in tax incentives in the Senate bill are aimed at forms of renewable energy and purchases of energy efficient products. Controversial Senate provisions include: Renewable portfolio standard. Bingaman persuaded senators to require utilities to obtain 10 percent of their electricity from renewable sources like wind and solar power by 2020. But the White House is opposed, and the narrowness of Bingaman's win, 52-48, could make it difficult for him to prevail. Ethanol mandate. Oil producers strongly object to a provision requiring them to use 8 billion gallons of ethanol from corn and other feedstocks by 2012, but Domenici knows it is ethanol that keeps Midwest senators behind the bill. Loan guarantees. Much of the $8 billion in direct spending authorized in the Senate bill is to back the cost of coal gasification projects and a new generation of nuclear plants. Some environmental and spending watchdog groups say this is a waste of tax dollars. Both bills would strengthen federal control over where to site liquefied natural gas terminals and transmission lines, at the expense of local and state officials. Domenici was indignant when the U.S. Supreme Court said cities had the right to buy up homes for shopping malls, but he says the secretary of Energy should have the same power when it comes to important electric transmission corridors. Hundreds of other provisions in the bills represent some member's pet project or idea. Like extending daylight-saving time by two months by starting in March and ending in November. Barton has predicted the Senate will go along with this House provision. Rep. Louise Slaughter, a New York Democrat, says the nation could save more than $100 million a year with "intermittent escalators" that would be triggered by an electric eye when a rider approached. She would start with new federal buildings. House Science Committee Chairman Sherwood Boehlert, a New York Republican, added the provision for a "demonstration project" in using hydrogen to power Grand Canyon tour buses. Ohio Democratic Rep. Dennis Kucinich says mustard seeds would produce more oil for bio-diesel than other vegetable seeds. Sen. Thad Cochran, a Mississippi Republican, is the champion of chicken-fat bio-diesel. Bingaman and Domenici back provisions that could spur sales of Pony Pack, a device made by an Albuquerque company that saves fuel when trucks are idling. They also agreed on provisions to speed oil and gas development on Indian reservations if the tribes choose. And no big bill would be complete without a few pork-barrel science projects. The Senate bill directs grants to the universities of Kentucky, Purdue and Southern Illinois for research on making gasoline from coal. The House bill orders the Department of Energy to create the Arctic Engineering Research Center in Fairbanks, Alaska, and tells the Commerce Department to start up a geophysical research facility in Barrow, Alaska. ***************************************************************** 17 Buffalo News: Last week in Congress Monday, July 11, 2005 www.buffalo.com How our representatives voted 7/10/2005 [ border=] Western New York's four members of the House of Representatives and the state's two U.S. senators on major legislation in Congress. A "Y" means the member voted for the measure; an "N" means the member voted against the measure; an "A" means the member did not vote. HOUSE There were no key votes in the House last week; it is adjourned until Monday. SENATE While the Senate was adjourned last week due to the Fourth of July holiday, there were two key votes before it adjourned July 1. Energy and Water Development Appropriations Act for Fiscal 2006 - The Senate on July 1 rejected an amendment by Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., that would have eliminated funding for nuclear "bunker-buster" bomb research and earmarked that $4 million to reduce the deficit. Proponents argued that the nuclear bunker buster would spew tons of radioactive debris above ground. In addition, proponents argued that the Senate should follow the lead of the House, where funding of the research was removed from the appropriations bills. Opponents argued that the funding was for feasibility research only. The vote was 43 yeas to 53 nays. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D, Y; Sen. Charles E. Schumer, Y. Energy and Water Development Appropriations Act for Fiscal 2006 - The Senate on July 1 passed a bill allocating $31.2 billion for the Department of Energy and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Included in the $25 billion for energy issues are funds for research and development in nuclear energy and renewable energy. The bill also allocates funds for the nuclear storage facility at Yucca Mountain in Nevada, environmental cleanup and the nuclear stockpile stewardship. The vote was 92 yeas to 3 nays. Clinton, Y; Schumer, Y. Information for this column is supplied by Targeted News Service. Copyright 1999 - 2005 - The Buffalo News ***************************************************************** 18 NO means yes--missile defense in Canada Date: Sat, 9 Jul 2005 11:58:48 -0500 (CDT) ------------------------------------------------ "Missile Defense" still alive and well in Canada ------------------------------------------------ by Richard Sanders, Ottawa ON, 2005 06 29 WHEN an American newspaper prematurely printed Mark Twain's obituary, he replied: "The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated."1 The same may be said of Canadian complicity in what has been euphemistically labelled a "missile defense shield."2 (See below: "What is "Missile Defense"?) Contrary to popular opinion, Canada is still actively participating in the creation, design, research, development, testing, deployment, maintenance, and operation of numerous "missile defense" systems. The Canadian government has spent billions on military programs that aid and abet the U.S.-led "missile defense" weapons program. New Report Exposes Canada's Role The first part of a new study, called "Canada's Role in so- called 'Missile Defense'," has just been published online. It is also available in hardcopy as the June 2005 issue of the Coalition to Oppose the Arms Trade's magazine, Press for Conversion! Part One of this study, entitled: "NORAD, Government Largesse, and the ABC's of Corporate Complicity," is now available at COAT's website: http://coat.ncf.ca/missiledefense (Part Two of this report is expected in September.) The newly-released, 50-page study is the result of a five- month investigation by COAT founder and coordinator, Richard Sanders, who has been working full-time in the peace/antiwar movement since 1984. [...] The report documents various ways in which Canada's military, corporate, and scientific communities, as well as government departments, agencies, and crown corporations, are active in the "missile defense" weapons scheme. Although most of the information in COAT's report was culled from publicly-available government and corporate sources, very little has been reported by the mainstream media, or by peace/antiwar organisations. "No" Means "Yes" The Canadian government's ostensible "no" was not linked to any actual efforts to slow or to stop even one of the many existing forms of Canadian complicity in "missile defense" outlined in COAT's report. Neither has the Canadian government taken any concrete steps to prevent this country's further entrenchment in America's extensive weapons development program. When examining Canada's continued involvement in the "missile defense" weapons scheme, it becomes clear that Prime Minister Paul Martin's supposed "no" was a public relations gesture with no real meaning. It was designed to deceive the public, cover up Canada's important ongoing participation in "missile defense," quell growing dissent within Liberal Party ranks, and garner public support for a faltering minority government. COAT's report counters the notion that Canada's "no" was a blow to the Bush administration because it deprived them of all they really wanted, namely, the use of Canada as a cover behind which they could hide their massive weapons program. This "Canada-as-cover" hypothesis ignores the reality that for decades the U.S. has greatly benefited from Canada's highly-advanced, military-industrial-scientific sectors, and their many contributions to the creation, development, testing, and deployment of numerous weapons technologies. Canada's contribution to U.S. weapons advancement programs, including "missile defense," is especially coveted by the Americans because it is heavily subsidised by the Canadian government, i.e., by taxpayers. The "Canada-as-cover" hypothesis is also discounted by the fact that the U.S. has repeatedly proven its willingness to take drastic unilateral actions to protect domestic commercial interests even if they are extremely unpopular on the global stage. The Trap Some Called a Victory As a result of the Liberal government's ballyhooed "no," there is now a widespread misperception about Canada's involvement in America's destabilising weapons-development program. As a result, Canadian opposition to "missile defense" has now all but died. Anyone trying to expose and oppose Canada's continuing involvement in the "missile defense" program now faces considerable challenges. Because most Canadians never realised that their country has been deeply embedded in "missile defense" work for many years, much time must now be spent deconstructing the myth of Canada's supposed noninvolvement. In their eagerness to claim a victory, many in the peace movement helped to spread a false message of hope to the effect that "We won on missile defense!" By congratulating the government for its empty pretense of not joining the U.S.-led weapons program, many activists unwittingly undermined the struggle to stop Canada's concrete role.... Until the myth about Canada's nonparticipation has been dispelled, Canadians will not be able to slow down, let alone halt, Canadian complicity in the so-called "missile defense" program. Needed: Myth Busters To oppose this country's continuing participation, COAT is urging Canadians to help debunk the widely-accepted myth that looms behind our government's nominal "no" to "missile defense." The best remedy in this struggle is to demonstrate that Canada is still actively involved. The latest issue of Press for Conversion! contains a wealth of data elucidating this subject and is a unique new asset in the Myth Busters' toolkit. How You Can Help Here are some initial ideas on how Canadians can help to expose and oppose their country's major role in "missile defense" weapons program: 7 Order extra copies of COAT's report for distribution at events and/or to pass along to friends, colleagues, activists, teachers, journalists, politicians, etc. 7 Circulate this email message to your contacts and to appropriate list serves. 7 Post a link to COAT's report on relevant websites. 7 Raise the issue of Canada's real involvement in "missile defense" at meetings and other educational events. 7 Urge individuals and groups to renew their opposition to so-called "missile defense." 7 Use COAT's report as a resource when contacting the media and politicians and/or when writing essays, articles, speeches, or lectures. 7 Reprint material from COAT's report in newsletters, magazines, or newspapers. (Please cite the source and refer readers to COAT's website.) 7 Urge the media to investigate. Refer the media to COAT for interviews and/or background information. (See contact information below.) 7 Organise an event to raise public awareness and to oppose Canada's ongoing role in the "missile defense" weapons- development scheme. 7 Invite the report's author to make a presentation at a public event. 7 Please subscribe or renew your subscription to COAT's magazine. 7 When you subscribe, renew, and/or order extra copies, please make a generous donation to COAT to support this important work. Footnotes: 1. "The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated." So said Mark Twain in a telegram from London to the New York Journal in 1897 when it prematurely published his obituary. (Apologies to Twain for comparing him to the most comprehensive weapons-development scheme in world history. As the vice president of the Anti-Imperialist League between 1901 and 1910, Twain was all too familiar with the American government's warmongering.) 2. What is "Missile Defense"? It is the largest and most comprehensive weapons-development program in world history. Its goal is to improve the tracking, targeting, and firing functions of existing sea- and land-based missiles, as well as to create air-based and space-based "directed energy" /laser weapons. The program is deceptively marketed to taxpayers as a "defensive shield" to protect homeland populations from terrorists and rogue states. In truth, although "missile defense" weapons will soon be defending U.S. and NATO troops and weapons so that they can "safely" wage wars far from home, there is no reason that weapons advancements made under the guise of "missile defense" will only function in such "defensive" scenarios. Once the targeting, tracking, and firing systems of U.S./NATO weapons have been improved, these new technologies can and will be used in whatever roles are chosen for them, whether offensive or defensive. For more information, contact Richard Sanders, coordinator, COAT, and editor, Press for Conversion! Email: overcoat@rogers.com Telephone: 613-231-3076 Website: http://coat.ncf.ca ***************************************************************** 19 Pakistan News: G8 urge Israel to sign NPT "immediately" PakTribune.Com Jumaada al-sani 2, 1426 Hijri July 11, 2005 Saturday July 09, 2005 (0302 PST) GLENEAGLES, Scotland: G8 Summit-Nuclear Arms Leaders of the G8 group of industrialized countries indirectly urged Israel Friday to immediately ratify the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and abide by other conventions on the weapons of mass destruction, reports IRNA. "We call on all states not party to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, an IAEA Comprehensive Safeguards Agreement and Additional Protocol, the Chemical Weapons Convention, the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention, the 1925 Geneva Protocol and the Hague Code of Conduct Against the Proliferation of Ballistic Missiles, to accede without delay," they said in a statement. "Multilaterally agreed norms provide an essential basis for our non-proliferation efforts. We strongly support universal adherence to and compliance with these norms," the leaders said on the final day of their annual summit in Gleneagles, Scotland. Their 6-page statement on non-proliferation also emphasizes that the NPT remains the "corner-stone of nuclear non-proliferation" and that the G8 members, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, Canada and the US, are fully committed to all its three pillars. "We remain determined that threats and challenges to the nuclear non-proliferation regime be addressed on the basis of the NPT," they said. Pakistan News Service © PakTribune.com Pvt Ltd 2003-2004 ***************************************************************** 20 Minjok-Tongshin: China and Russia Issue Joint Statement on New World Order 2005.07.10 23:22:51 Xinhua 2005-07-08 - China and Russia here Friday issued a joint statement on a new world order in the 21st century, setting forth their common stand on major international issues, such as UN reforms, globalization, North-South cooperation, and world economy and trade. The statement was signed by Russian President Vladimir Putin and visiting Chinese President Hu Jintao after their talks. During their talks, the two leaders discussed ways to further enhance the strategic and cooperative partnership between China and Russia, and exchanged views on major regional and international issues. The joint statement said the two countries are determined to strengthen their strategic coordination in international affairs and promote peace, stability and prosperity of the world. UN REFORMS The joint statement says that UN reforms should be aimed at strengthening the world body's leading role in international affairs, improving its efficiency and increasing its potential for dealing with new challenges and threats. UN reforms should be based on consensus through consultations, and should fully embody the common interests of the vast number of member countries. The United Nations is the world's most comprehensive, representative and authoritative organization, and both its role and function are irreplaceable, said the joint statement on a new world order in the 21st century. The United Nations should play a leading role in global affairs and be the core for establishing and executing basic norms of international law, the statement added. The statement calls for UN peacekeeping operations to be carried out in accordance with the tenets and principles of the UN charter. Resolutions of the UN Security Council must be strictly abided by. Cooperation between the UN on the one hand and regional and subregional organizations on the other should be developed, according to the joint statement. The joint statement also calls on the world body to play a bigger role in the study of global economic and development problems. MULTILATERALISM The joint statement says that countries must be allowed to decide autonomously on their internal affairs while international issues should be solved through dialogue and consultations on the basis of multilateralism. The international community should completely renounce the mentality of confrontation and alliance; there should be no pursuit of monopoly or domination of world affairs; and countries of the world should not be divided into a leading camp and a subordinate camp, said the joint statement. Every country must be assured of the right to choose its own path of development that fits its national realities, the right to participate in international affairs as an equal, and the right to development on an equal footing, it says. Differences and disputes must be solved through peaceful means rather than through unilateralism or coercion. There should be no use or threatened use of force, says the joint statement. Only on the basis of universally recognized tenents and norms of international law, and under an impartial and rational world order, can problems facing mankind be solved, says the document. All countries should strictly observe the principles of mutual respect for each other's sovereignty and territorial integrity, mutual non-aggression, non-interference in each other's internal affairs, equality and mutual benefit, and peaceful coexistence, it says. The joint statement believes that the world is undergoing a historic change. The establishment of a new world order will be a long and complicated process, it says. The central task of mankind in the 21st century is to safeguard peace, stability and security for the whole mankind, and to realize full-scale coordinated development on the basis of equality, maintenance of sovereignty, mutual respect, mutual benefit and ensurance of good development prospects for future generations. Hu arrived here on Thursday for a state visit. He will also visit Kazakhstan and Britain, where he will attend the G8 plus five summit. NEW SECURITY FRAMEWORK The joint statement calls on the international community to establish a new security framework on the basis of mutual trust, mutual benefit, equality and cooperation. The framework should have the universally recognized norms of international relations as its political foundation, and mutually beneficial cooperation and common prosperity as its economic foundation, says the joint statement. The establishment of this framework should be based on the equal security rights of all nations while dialogue, consultation and negotiation on an equal footing should be the means for settling conflicts and maintaining peace, the joint statement says. China and Russia support efforts to maintain global strategic stability, and the multilateral process of establishing legal systems on arms control, disarmament and non-proliferation, it says. The two sides will work together to put the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty into effect as soon as possible and to push for the universality and effectiveness of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (INT), the Biological Weapons Convention and the Convention on the Banning of Chemical Weapons ( CWC). They also call for the peaceful use of outer space, and voice opposition to weapons deployment and arm races in outer space. They push for relevant international legislation to this end. The two leaders believe that in face of new threats and challenges, further effective measures should be taken to prevent the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) as well as their carriers and relevant materials, according to the joint statement. The joint statement says the two sides have decided to cooperate more closely in related international organizations and forums and expand cooperation with other like-minded countries. The issue of proliferation of WMDs should be resolved through political, diplomatic and international cooperation within the framework of international law, says the joint statement. The two sides think that a UN-led global system should be set up to deal with new threats and challenges on the basis of the UN Charter and international law, it says. The joint statement says regional integration is an important character in the development of the current international situation. Open, non-exclusive regional organizations are playing a positive role in shaping a new world order. The two countries appeal for the promotion of further economic cooperation in regional integration and for the establishment of security cooperation mechanisms. They also voice support for regional organizations to set up ties with each other and produce an atmosphere of mutual trust and cooperation, the joint statement says. ATTENTION TO GAP OF DISPARITY All countries should have an equal opportunity to enjoy the profits of globalization in such fields as economy, society, science, technology, information and culture, said the joint statement, calling for mutually beneficial cooperation and common development. Developed countries and developing ones should make efforts to eliminate discrimination in economic relations, and narrow the gap of disparity between the rich and the poor, says the joint statement. The international community should formulate a comprehensive economic and trade regime acceptable to all, through negotiation on an equal footing. Pressure and sanctions should not be used to force a country into unilaterally making economic concessions, it says. It also calls for respect for the history and traditions of those countries with diverse ethnic groups and their efforts to maintain national unity. Attempts to encourage secession or incite ethnic hatred within a country should not be accepted. Diversity in cultures and civilizations should not be the source of conflict, but rather resources from which all countries can learn. Different historic backgrounds, cultures, social and political systems, values and modes of development should not be used as pretext for interference in other countries' internal affairs, says the document. The Chinese president arrived in Moscow Thursday for a state visit, the first leg of his three-nation tour, which will also take him to Kazakhstan and the United Kingdom. In Kazakhstan, he will attend a Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit. Then he will fly to Scotland for an informal meeting between leaders of the Group of Eight industrialized countries and five developing nations -- China, India, Brazil, South Africa and Mexico. Copyright © 1999-2005 Minjok Tongshin mailto:minjok@minjok.com ***************************************************************** 21 AFP: Mitterrand approved French attack on Greenpeace ship Sunday July 10, 12:54 AM PARIS (AFP) - The man who was in charge of France's DGSE intelligence service when agents blew up a Greenpeace ship in New Zealand, killing a crew member, says that former president Francois Mitterrand gave the go-ahead for the attack. Twenty years after the bombing of the Rainbow Warrior, which sank in Auckland harbour as it was due to investigate French nuclear weapons tests in the South Pacific, Le Monde published extracts of a 23-page document written by DGSE chief Admiral Pierre Lacoste the following year. The document by Lacoste, who was sacked over the affair, represents the first official confirmation of Mitterrand's involvement in what the then New Zealand prime minister David Lange described "a sordid act of international state-backed terrorism". The Rainbow Warrior was in Auckland to head a flotilla of protest boats to Mururoa Atoll in French Polynesia in an attempt to disrupt French nuclear testing, a source of discord between France on one hand and New Zealand, Australia and other Pacific nations on the other. In the document published by Le Monde, Lacoste describes a meeting with Mitterrand at 6.00 pm on May 15, 1985, just under two months before the attack. "I asked the president if he would authorise me to conduct the project of neutralisation that I had studied at the request of (defence minister Charles) Hernu. He gave me his consent while emphasising the importance he placed on the nuclear tests," wrote Lacoste, then head of the General Directorate for External Security (DGSE). "I then went into great detail on the project, the authorisation was sufficiently explicit". Earlier on May 6, 1985, Lacoste had met with defence minister Hernu to outline the plan to sabotage the Greenpeace ship. "Far from being shocked by the idea of sabotage in the dock at Auckland", wrote the admiral "he made light of my reservations and encouraged me in that direction, repeating that it was an issue essential to defence policy". "They (Greenpeace) want to make war with us, we are at war, we mustn't have scruples on such vital subjects, I take full responsibility", the admiral quoted Hernu as saying. Greenpeace photographer Fernando Pereira drowned after going to his cabin between the two explosions which ripped open the hull of the Rainbow Warrior at the quayside in central Auckland. Two members of the 13-strong French secret service team which carried out the bombing, Dominique Prieur and Alain Mafart, were arrested by New Zealand police two days later as they returned their campervan to the rental company. By September that year France had been forced to admit its responsibility, defence minister Charles Hernu had resigned and Lacoste had been sacked. In November 1985, Mafart and Prieur pleaded guilty to manslaughter charges and were sentenced to 10 years in jail. French pressure to have the pair returned saw trade pressure applied to New Zealand, which relies heavily on agricultural exports to the European Union. Export shipments to France and its South Pacific territory of New Caledonia were held up or rejected. After UN mediation, a July 1986 agreement saw the agents released from jail in New Zealand for what was supposed to be three years exile on Hao atoll in French Polynesia. By the middle of 1988 both had been returned to France, a move which intensified New Zealand's bitterness towards the French government. Copyright © 2005 AFP. All rights reserved. All information ***************************************************************** 22 IPS-English ENVIRONMENT-FRANCE:Dangerous Summer for Nuclear Date: Sun, 10 Jul 2005 16:00:28 -0700 ROMAIPS EU EN ENVIRONMENT-FRANCE:Dangerous Summer for Nuclear Power Plants Julio Godoy* - Tierramérica PARIS, Jul 9 (IPS) - The northern hemisphere's summer began officially just a few weeks ago, but the high temperatures already recorded in France could prompt the shutdown of some of the 58 nuclear reactors that supply 80 percent of the country's energy. On Jun. 23, Electricite de France (EDF), the government electrical power monopoly that controls the nuclear facilities, was on the verge of disconnecting the Tricastin plant, located in southeast France on the Rhone River, because the temperature of the water discharged by the reactor cooling system surpassed 25 degrees centigrade, the maximum allowed under the country's environmental laws. According to those rules and nuclear safety standards, the reactors must be shut down if the temperature inside rises above 50 degrees, or if the volume of the water flow falls below certain limits. The temperatures of the water outflow also must be kept below 25 degrees in order to protect aquatic life around the power stations, and the water should not heat up more than two degrees from the time it enters until it leaves the reactor. According to Stephane Lhomme, spokesman for the French anti-nuclear association Sortir du Nucléare, it is possible to predict already that at least one of the conditions for shutdown will be met this summer, with the high temps that are part of an unprecedented drought affecting Europe since late last year. ”France finds itself in a situation of pre-nuclear accident,” he said in a conversation with Tierramérica. The activist noted that in summer of 2003, when France suffered a record-setting heatwave, several nuclear plants reached the point of having to shut down. One was the Fessenheim, the country's oldest, located in the northeastern region of Alsace, bordering Germany. In August 2003, temperatures inside the Fessenheim plant reached 50 degrees, and the facility's authorities ordered high pressure hoses to wet down the exterior walls -- a rather primitive method to cool off the reactor in an era of advanced technology. Other nuclear power plants in France dumped water heated to more than 25 degrees into the rivers. Because so many power plants faced similar conditions, the government decided at the time to lift the limits on maximum water temperatures and on minimum water flows. According to Lhomme, the southwestern nuclear plant at Blayais, on the Gironda River estuary, committed 50 infractions in 2003. In these early days of summer, many regions of France are already reporting temperatures above 35 degrees centigrade. The government's weather agency, Météo-France, has declared a third-degree alert, out of a maximum of four, in 12 of the 96 mainland departments due to the heat. In the Rhone valley, which runs from Switzerland to the Mediterranean and with five nuclear power plants along the river, the ambient temperature is already reaching an average of 35 degrees, and the temperature of the river itself more than 20 degrees. In the region of Vienne, some 500 km southwest of Paris, the river of the same name has dried to a trickle -- so much so that local authorities have ordered strict rationing of water use. The Civaux nuclear plant, on the banks of the Vienne, takes in around 350,000 cubic meters of water per day when in full operation. Due to the drought, the facility should have been shut down already. About 30 French departments have established similar limits for water use. However, the EDF director for environment and sustainable development, Claude Jeandron, says he feels no worries about the prospects for an extremely hot summer. According to Yves Boulaigue, drought expert for the state-run Nuclear Security Agency, ”the low flow volume of the rivers does not pose a safety problem... (because) all power plants have water reserves for the cooling process, to ensure their autonomy.” Disconnecting one or several nuclear plants would create a huge energy problem, given that in the summer, especially one that is very warm and dry, there is a decline in output from hydroelectric power plants, the country's second leading energy source. Shutdowns would mean importing electricity, as France was forced to do in 2003. Unofficial estimates about those imports are that it cost EDF around 300 million euros (more than 360 million dollars). The state energy company refuses to comment on the figure, but decided to insure itself against possible losses in 2005 for the sum of 550 million euros. In any case, ”we can't insure ourselves against the environmental risks, and those are something we all face,” says Lhomme. That is why the French anti-nuclear activists continue to warn against dependence on the reactors, and Sortir de Nucléaire has filed several denunciations in French courts against the nuclear authorities, charging that they have violated their own environmental and safety standards. ”Summer 2003 already proved that the promises made by the defenders of nuclear energy are false. Atomic energy is not going to reduce global warming, but -- irony of our climate problems -- that warming does reduce the capacity for utilizing atomic energy,” said Lhomme. (* Julio Godoy is an IPS correspondent. Originally published Jul. 2 by Latin American newspapers that are part of the Tierramérica network. Tierramérica is a specialised news service produced by IPS with the backing of the United Nations Development Programme and the United Nations Environment Programme.) ***** +Tierramérica (http://www.tierramerica.org/english/) +Nuclear Security Agency (http://www.asn.gouv.fr/) +Electricite de France (http://www.edf.fr/) +Sortir de Nucléaire (http://www.sortirdunucleaire.org) +Météo-France (http://www.meteo.fr/) (END/IPS/EU/EN/TRASP-LD/JG/MP/05) = 07091629 ORP007 NNNN ***************************************************************** 23 On Ongoing Cover Up Of 3 Mile Island- Signed, Notorized Statement Date: Sat, 9 Jul 2005 19:08:00 -0400 Sunday, July 10, 2005 is the seventh anniversary of the signed, notorized statement below by Dr. Bertell: http://www.mothersalert.org/bertell.html 3 MILE ISLAND COVER-UP: DR. ROSALIE BERTELL'S SIGNED, NOTARIZED STATEMENT -------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ Dr. Rosalie Bertell is the President of the International Institute of Concern for Public Health, and a renowned epidemiologist by profession. She is also an expert on the health effects of low level radiation. Dr. Bertell received the Right Livelihood Award (Alternative Nobel Peace Prize) in 1986. She can be reached at: drrbertell@home.com Phone: 416-260-0575 Below is Dr. Bertell's signed, notarized statement of July 10, 1998 concerning the ongoing cover-up of the Three Mile Island Accident. -------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ "I feel that former President Jimmy Carter should come forth with all of the facts surrounding the Three Mile Island Accident, especially those which involved the radiation release and the dose to the public. This disclosure should, moreover, be in language which can be easily and correctly understood by the public, and not massaged to hide the truth. After the accident, for example, I found that the dose officially assigned to the public, was called: "measured dose to the public from the accident" - where "measured" meant it only included the dose after the rate matres were in place the third day after the accident began; "accident" meant that the radiation dose received during the same time period in 1978 when the TMI reactors were all operating and there was Chinese nuclear test fallout, could be subtracted. President Carter was, and continues to be by his silence, complicit in keeping the true facts of the Three Mile Island Accident from the American and world public. While it may have been legally although not morally, permissible to withhold this information in 1979 under the guise of national security needs, now that the Cold War is over it is no longer credible that the US government protect the nuclear industry at the cost of the lives and health of its citizens. As I, Dr. Rosalie Bertell, President of the International Institute of Concern for Public Health, stated in my e-mail to President Carter of February 10,1998, President carter was and is involved in the cover up of the Three Mile island Accident, and in particular the serious health damage to the people who lived nearby. I was on the Citizen's Advisory Council to the Blue Ribbon Panel set up by President Carter to investigate the TMI accident. The members of this public panel did not have FBI clearance, with the possible exception of Dr. Kemmeny who had worked on the Manhattan Project. The staff, selected from those who worked for the NRC or DOE, did have such security clearance, and therefore they were able to withhold any information they or their superiors wanted to declare "classified:, from the Panel. The nuclear weapons program demanded that workers and the military personnel handle this radioactive material and the nuclear ordinance, therefore health effects of radiation could be classified for national security to prevent rebellion. At the first meeting of the Citizen's Advisory Council to the Kemmeny Commission, I brought up this potential problem and asked what provisions had been made for the Commission members to have security clearance so that they might have full access to the truth about the accident. Another Advisory Council Member asked who was in charge of reactor operations during the accident. These two questions were never answered, and they were enough to cause the dissolution of the entire advisory panel. In fact, Dr. Kemmeny even stated publicly to the press that we had never been invited to Washington [although the Commission paid our air fare and hotel bills]. The Industry Advisory Council to the Kemmeny Commission continued to function during the investigation. The nuclear industry has frustrated the litigation of all of the serious health claims of the TMI exposed people, in spite of the Supreme Court's ruling in 1997 that these claims must be heard. Lawyers for the nuclear industry are gloating that they are "invincible" before the Courts. Using dirty tactics, they have managed to eliminate all of the expert witnesses which the victims had engaged to bring their cause before the Court, subsequently causing the cases to be dismissed for lack of witnesses. There may be as many as 2,000 people who have not had their grievances heard by the courts. This dismissal, after the Supreme Court Ruling, as accomplished through a judge's ruling, not through the court hearing which the people had been promised. The people have still, almost 20 years after the accident, not had their day in court! It is my opinion that former President Carter should come forth and make the truth known so that the court cases for the victims can be reopened. I believe that it should also be made a court ruling that defendants, such as the nuclear industry, should not be allowed to declare their own witnesses the official spokespersons for a branch of knowledge, able to define for the court the methodologies which they accept and practice as the only legitimate ones! It was such a ploy that was used to dismiss the TMI plaintiff's witnesses. This is blatant violation of justice and of the human rights of the victims. It is especially abhorrent in the questions of health effects of radiation, a field of public health which was usurped by the nuclear physicists under the exigencies of potential nuclear war after World War II. Professional Health Physicists are not required to have any training in biology, public health or any medical discipline. Their methodologies are very limited and unacceptable to many professionals in the fields of epidemiology, occupational and public health. [Signed] Dr. Rosalie Bertell Notarized by Michele D. Guy, July 10, 1998 -------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ Back to More Information | Mothers Alert Home | Actions | News ***************************************************************** 24 [NukeNet] On Ongoing Cover Up Of 3 Mile Island- Signed, Date: Sun, 10 Jul 2005 16:11:22 -0700 NukeNet Anti-Nuclear Network (nukenet@energyjustice.net) Sunday, July 10, 2005 is the seventh anniversary of the signed, notorized statement below by Dr. Bertell: http://www.mothersalert.org/bertell.html 3 MILE ISLAND COVER-UP: DR. ROSALIE BERTELL'S SIGNED, NOTARIZED STATEMENT -------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ Dr. Rosalie Bertell is the President of the International Institute of Concern for Public Health, and a renowned epidemiologist by profession. She is also an expert on the health effects of low level radiation. Dr. Bertell received the Right Livelihood Award (Alternative Nobel Peace Prize) in 1986. She can be reached at: drrbertell@home.com Phone: 416-260-0575 Below is Dr. Bertell's signed, notarized statement of July 10, 1998 concerning the ongoing cover-up of the Three Mile Island Accident. -------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ "I feel that former President Jimmy Carter should come forth with all of the facts surrounding the Three Mile Island Accident, especially those which involved the radiation release and the dose to the public. This disclosure should, moreover, be in language which can be easily and correctly understood by the public, and not massaged to hide the truth. After the accident, for example, I found that the dose officially assigned to the public, was called: "measured dose to the public from the accident" - where "measured" meant it only included the dose after the rate matres were in place the third day after the accident began; "accident" meant that the radiation dose received during the same time period in 1978 when the TMI reactors were all operating and there was Chinese nuclear test fallout, could be subtracted. President Carter was, and continues to be by his silence, complicit in keeping the true facts of the Three Mile Island Accident from the American and world public. While it may have been legally although not morally, permissible to withhold this information in 1979 under the guise of national security needs, now that the Cold War is over it is no longer credible that the US government protect the nuclear industry at the cost of the lives and health of its citizens. As I, Dr. Rosalie Bertell, President of the International Institute of Concern for Public Health, stated in my e-mail to President Carter of February 10,1998, President carter was and is involved in the cover up of the Three Mile island Accident, and in particular the serious health damage to the people who lived nearby. I was on the Citizen's Advisory Council to the Blue Ribbon Panel set up by President Carter to investigate the TMI accident. The members of this public panel did not have FBI clearance, with the possible exception of Dr. Kemmeny who had worked on the Manhattan Project. The staff, selected from those who worked for the NRC or DOE, did have such security clearance, and therefore they were able to withhold any information they or their superiors wanted to declare "classified:, from the Panel. The nuclear weapons program demanded that workers and the military personnel handle this radioactive material and the nuclear ordinance, therefore health effects of radiation could be classified for national security to prevent rebellion. At the first meeting of the Citizen's Advisory Council to the Kemmeny Commission, I brought up this potential problem and asked what provisions had been made for the Commission members to have security clearance so that they might have full access to the truth about the accident. Another Advisory Council Member asked who was in charge of reactor operations during the accident. These two questions were never answered, and they were enough to cause the dissolution of the entire advisory panel. In fact, Dr. Kemmeny even stated publicly to the press that we had never been invited to Washington [although the Commission paid our air fare and hotel bills]. The Industry Advisory Council to the Kemmeny Commission continued to function during the investigation. The nuclear industry has frustrated the litigation of all of the serious health claims of the TMI exposed people, in spite of the Supreme Court's ruling in 1997 that these claims must be heard. Lawyers for the nuclear industry are gloating that they are "invincible" before the Courts. Using dirty tactics, they have managed to eliminate all of the expert witnesses which the victims had engaged to bring their cause before the Court, subsequently causing the cases to be dismissed for lack of witnesses. There may be as many as 2,000 people who have not had their grievances heard by the courts. This dismissal, after the Supreme Court Ruling, as accomplished through a judge's ruling, not through the court hearing which the people had been promised. The people have still, almost 20 years after the accident, not had their day in court! It is my opinion that former President Carter should come forth and make the truth known so that the court cases for the victims can be reopened. I believe that it should also be made a court ruling that defendants, such as the nuclear industry, should not be allowed to declare their own witnesses the official spokespersons for a branch of knowledge, able to define for the court the methodologies which they accept and practice as the only legitimate ones! It was such a ploy that was used to dismiss the TMI plaintiff's witnesses. This is blatant violation of justice and of the human rights of the victims. It is especially abhorrent in the questions of health effects of radiation, a field of public health which was usurped by the nuclear physicists under the exigencies of potential nuclear war after World War II. Professional Health Physicists are not required to have any training in biology, public health or any medical discipline. Their methodologies are very limited and unacceptable to many professionals in the fields of epidemiology, occupational and public health. [Signed] Dr. Rosalie Bertell Notarized by Michele D. Guy, July 10, 1998 -------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ Back to More Information | Mothers Alert Home | Actions | News _______________________________________________________________________ Subscribe/Unsubscribe Here: http://www.energyjustice.net/nukenet/ Change your settings or access the archives at: http://energyjustice.net/mailman/listinfo/nukenet_energyjustice.net ***************************************************************** 25 AU ABC: MP to study nuclear power use in Europe Australian Broadcasting Corporation Online"> Saturday, 9 July 2005. 11:23 (AEST)Saturday, 9 July 2005. 11:23 The Northern Territory's Country Liberal Party (CLP) Member for Solomon, Dave Tollner, says he will use a European study tour to examine why nuclear power is an accepted part of life in France. Mr Tollner will visit the UK, Germany, France and Singapore on a three-week trip focusing on tourism and energy alternatives to coal. In Germany, he will visit the world's most advanced windfarm and a factory making buses fuelled by hydrogen cells. Mr Tollner will also visit nuclear power facilities in France. "I'm keen to get a bit of an understanding about how the nuclear cycle works, and France I think is the world leader when it comes to nuclear generation," he said. "But I'm particularly keen to look at some of their storage facilities as well." ***************************************************************** 26 Bellona: Floating nuclear power plants easy prey for terrorists Russia’s branch of the environmental organisation Greenpeace has formally warned authorities that increased terrorist threats will make the floating nuclear power plants (FNPPs), which the Russian Agency for Atomic Energy (Rosatom) is currently planning for Southeast Asian customers, sitting ducks for possible terror attacks. Design of a floating nuclear power plant: 1 - Living area, 2 - NPP operating room, 3 – Reactors, 4 - Steam turbine installation, 5 - Power generation area, 6 - Storage area for spent fuel. Rashid Alimov, 2005-07-08 15:23 The notion of building floating nuclear power plants and selling them to countries like Indonesia, Thailand and China have been a pet project of Rosatom for many years. The Ministry for Atomic Energy, Rosatom’s successor, has long viewed floating nuclear power plants as a solution to bringing energy to far flung regions along Russia’s arctic coast and to other regions around the world. Environmentalists and many security experts have denounced the idea as sure ecological hazard and a target for terrorist organisations. The Russian branch of Greenpeace addressed the Federal Security Service (FSBthe sucessor organisation to the KGB) with a request to ban the building FNPPs as their poor security makes them a “prime choice” for potential terrorist attacks. The Greenpeace reportreleased just hours before the tragic terrorist blasts in London on July 7thwas prepared for world leaders currently meeting at the Gleneagles, Scotland summit of the G8. The summit is making strides toward combating greenhouse gases, but is also viewing the expansion nuclear power as one possible solution to reduce their emissions. Greenpeace report, sent to the Federal Security Service Environmental groups like Bellona and Greenpeace are firmly opposed to the notion of substituting current energy sources with expanded nuclear power, especially when so many non-polluting renewable sources have not been sufficiently explored and because nuclear power represents incalculable risk to the environment and international security. “Climate change cannot be solved by developing the nuclear industry. Moreover, every nuclear object is a target for terrorism”, Vladimir Chuprov of Greenpeace Russia told Bellona Web. At present Rosatom is implementing the FNPP construction of project on a lease-to-own basisprovided the plants are never transferred to a new ownerto countries in Southeast Asia. The FNPPs are designed to have a 70-megawatt capacity and are based on the reactor type used in Soviet icebreakers. Licenses for the reactors were issued by the Russian nuclear safety service—FSETAN, the successor of Gozatomnadzorin December 2004. Thailand and Indonesia have demonstrated a keen interest in FNPPs. Negotiations about financing the project — a $150m loan from China — are currently underway in Beijing. In October 2003 Rosatom signed a Protocol of Cooperation with South Korea for the potential purchase of an FNPP as well. Enriched weapon-grade uranium (containing 40 percent uranium-235) is the fuel used for FNPPs According to engineering standards, some 960 kilograms of uranium will be stored at each floating plant. “Exploitation of FNPPs in Southeast Asian countries without intensified security measuresthe project does not provide for the armed escort of Russian navy for the whole term of their exploitationcreates a serious threat of terrorism and piracy on the high seas”, reads the address sent by Greeenpeace Russia to the FSB. “Even if there were any armed escort, there is no 100 percent guarantee of plants’ protection.” In its report to the FSB, Greenpeace refers to a long list of terrorist groups, active in Southeast Asian countries, which they based on a report by the US Department of State entitles “Global Terrorism in 2003,” as well as a report on the same by the Russia’s General Prosecutor's Office 2003. “This project is clearly a risky venture,” says Bellona’s Alexander Nikitin, a former Russia’s Navy nuclear submarines inspector turned environmentalist. “Safety shouldn’t be neglected for the profits Rosatom wants to get from selling the FNPPs to the troubled regions. Such Rosatom activities simply violate the idea of non-proliferation.” Under a 1992 agreement, Russia as a member of the Nuclear Suppliers Group, is banned from selling nuclear technology to states that do not submit to international controls of the International Atomic Energy Agency. In Nikitin’s opinion, leasing the FNPPs to the Southeast Asian countries doesn’t solve the problem, as it would be difficult to ensure their security in such conditions. According to the Greenpeace, there are three likely terrorist scenarios that could be perpetrated again FNPPs: 1. Destruction of the containment of an FNPP and using nuclear materials from the plant as a “dirty bomb” for contaminating a locality possessing an FNPP. 2. Robbery of an FNPP in order to withdraw weapons uranium. The further route of the radioactive materials is hardly possible to trace. The uranium could then be transformed into a nuclear warhead, both in Russia or any other country of the world that has sufficient technology to do so. 3. Robbery of an FNPP to obtain radioactive materials for producing a “dirty bomb”. In Russia, Rosatom plans to build experimental demonstrational FNPPs before selling them abroad and moor them at the Sevmash docks near Severodvinsk in the Arkhangelsk Region in Russia’s Northwest and at a nuclear submarine base at Vilyuchinsk in the Kamchatka region in Russia’s far east. The FNPP at Sevmash, which would float on a barge in the White Sea off Severodvinsk, should be ready by 2010, according to Rosatom spokesman, Nikolay Shingaryov. Rosatom decided to start constructing a floating nuclear power plant at Severodvinsk’s Sevmash shipyard in 2006. The construction schedule should be developed by October 21st 2005. A November 2000 order by former Russian Nuclear Energy Minister Yevgeny Adamov required ordered the creation of all the documents needed for producing FNPPS and obtaining all necessary licences licenses. Now, the design works are completed, the licenses received, and the estimated cost of the project is about $175m. But according to Russian environmentalists, the actual sum will be higher. The local Severodvinsk parliament plans to consider the problem of funding before the end of 2005, Regnum news agency reported this week. If the first FNPP project were successful, it is planned, that Sevmash will produce FNPPs to be transported in other regions, for example, at Vilyuchinsk. Geothermal power plant launches in Kamchatka 2001-12-19 The first Russian geothermal power plant is to be launched in Kamchatka tomorrow. A main opponent to this development is the Ministry for Nuclear Energy (Minatom), which is about to launch the world's first floating nuclear power plant at a nearby bay. Near Vilyuchinsk there are two geothermal plants, recently launched into operation, and this region — which earlier suffered from the lack of electricity — now has enough energy thanks to these plants. But nonetheles, in 2004 the Vilyuchinsk head Alexander Markman and Yevgeny Kuzin, the head of Malaya Energetika, Ltd, signed a requirement specification for the project of mooring an FNPP at the Krasheninnikova bight of Avachinskaya bay near Vilyuchinsk. Plans to moor an FNPP at Pevek in Chukotka have also been discussed, but a public environmental assesment, initiated in 2000 by local NGO Kaira-club, contained many errors and legal violations. That —and the lack of effective demand in the region — forced Rosatom abandon the Pevesk site. Floating nuclear power plants in Russia: a threat to the Arctic, World oceans and non-proliferation Bellona presents electronic version of the report, which analyses the environmental, economic and political consequences of the implementation of the floating nuclear power plants project by the Russian Agency of Atomic Energy. “FNPPs in Russia’s White Sea would be a threat for the Arctic and the world’s ocean,” reads a separate report “Floating nuclear power plants in Russia” posted by Bellona Foundation on its web-site. On June 30, at a round table in the State Duma, Russia’s lower house of parliament, Yevgeny Velikhov, head of the Kurchatov Institute, said that “installing a floating nuclear power plant may resolve regional energy problems. The European North, Eastern Siberia, and the Far East demand special attention." The Greenpeace report to the FSB retorted that: “For Southeast Asian countries, the project with FNPPs will indicate a step toward militarization which will cause a negative impact on the economy of these countries and will worsen the foreign policy situation in the region.” Greenpeace’s Chuprov added that: “Rosatom’s policy conflicts the position of the country’s leaders on combating terrorism. These actions of the nuclear lobby threaten the future of the country. Greenpeace calls to reject the project on construction of floating NPPs and to focus on development of renewable energy sources and energy saving,” “It is better invest in solar and wind energy rather than produce time bombs”. The Rosatom’s FNPPs project is the first project of this kind to be used in the civil sphere. Only the US Army once possessed a 10 megawatt FNPP called Sturgis that operated a MH-1A reactor mounted on the modified hull of a Liberty ship that was moored in the Panama Canal zone. Installed in 1968, its operation was ceased in 1976. The project proved to be ineffective due to high maintenance costs. Publisher: , President: Information: , Technical contact: Telephone: +47 23 23 46 00 Telefax: +47 22 38 38 62 * P.O.Box 2141 Grunerlokka, 0505 Oslo, Norway ***************************************************************** 27 AFP: Mitsubishi Heavy offers to buy US nuclear builder Westinghouse Saturday July 9, 2005, 2:21 pm TOKYO (AFP) - Mitsubishi Heavy Industries has offered to buy US nuclear power plant builder Westinghouse for 200 billion yen (1.8 billion dollars) in a bid to expand its overseas business, a report says. Japan's biggest heavy machinery maker hopes to strike the deal by the end of this year, the business daily Nihon Keizai Shimbun said. A Mitsubishi spokesman could not be reached for comment. Westinghouse's parent firm, British nuclear reprocessing group British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL), said last week it was putting the US company up for sale. Apart from Mitsubishi, France's AREVA, the world's largest nuclear engineering group, and US giant General Electric are also interested in acquiring Westinghouse, the Japanese daily said. Demand for nuclear power construction has levelled out in Japan and domestic heavy machinery makers such as Mitsubishi Heavy, Hitachi and Toshiba are aiming to expand their nuclear power operations abroad. Mitsubishi Heavy hopes the acquisition of Westinghouse will boost the number of overseas orders for new nuclear power plants amid rising global demand for energy, the report said. Copyright © 2005 AFP. All rights reserved. All information ***************************************************************** 28 DenverPost.com: Should we invest in nuclear power? - OPINION Launched: 07/10/2005 01:00:00 AM President Bush and some environmentalists look to nuclear as an alternative to other fuels. The idea should be pursued - without hype or hysteria. Climate change and rising demand for energy are sparking debate about energy alternatives for the future. Whatever actions America takes must be affordable as well as effective. The Bush administration wants to expand commercial nuclear power. While the idea predictably has met resistance, no reasonable solution should be off-limits. Even some environmentalists say climate change is such a grave threat that they're willing to discuss nuclear energy as an option. However, the issue needs to be analyzed without either industry hype or anti-nuke hysteria. The industry's desire to expand nuclear capacity is driven partly by looming deadlines. In 31 states, 103 commercial reactors supply about 20 percent of the nation's electricity, primarily in the East and Midwest. Federal licenses for about 10 percent of those nuclear plants will expire in 2010, and more than 40 percent will expire by 2015. Any attempt to ramp up U.S. nuclear output will take time, so the nation has to decide in the near future whether to expand or even keep its nuclear capacity. Nuclear reactors generate "baseload" electricity, the power that's always on to keep refrigerators running and traffic lights working. Today, America's baseload comes mostly from burning coal or natural gas, both of which emit carbon dioxide, the chief suspect in global warming. "Solar and wind power cannot even begin to fill the need" for additional electrical power, Fortune magazine opined in May. Bluntly, environmentalists who don't like nuclear power need to offer realistic alternatives. By contrast, nuclear reactors do provide baseload power and don't emit carbon dioxide or other greenhouse gases. The Nuclear Energy Institute, an industry trade group, is citing concern about global warming in its push to increase U.S. nuclear capacity by 10,000 megawatts by 2012. That sounds like a lot, but it pales compared to what's already on the drawing board, not only for coal-fired generation but also for wind turbines. Some critics also argue that nuclear power actually does generate greenhouse gases, particularly when processing uranium ore into usable fuel. And at every step, nuclear power creates radioactive wastes. So the idea of nuclear power as a clean energy has its critics. Yet, what may stand in the way of the nuclear industry's resurgence may not be environmentalism or even the public's disquiet about nuclear energy since the 1979 Three Mile Island accident in Pennsylvania. The nuclear industry can't entirely blame public fears about atomic energy for its woes: The siting of new power plants, regardless of fuel type, almost always triggers public protests and regulatory challenges. What worries the nuclear industry is money, dating back to the 1982 financial collapse of reactor projects by the Washington Public Power Supply System, a $2.25 billion bond default known in the Pacific Northwest as "Whoops." In the following years, the Whoops fiasco had plenty of company, as other proposed nuclear projects smacked into financial realities. The truth is, the overall electric generation business can't take many new risks. Stock prices for electric utilities already are languishing because of worries about existing debts and the likely need for large future capital outlays. And nuclear plants are more costly than plants powered by other fuels. The last commercial U.S. nuclear power plant was built in 1979. Other countries, however, have continued to construct reactors. Many of those countries have streamlined the processes of designing the plants and obtaining environmental permits, steps the U.S. nuclear industry wants our government to take. Even so, in other countries nuclear plants still have experienced delays and cost overruns. That experience abroad makes investors jittery. So, it's not Main Street that may stall nuclear's comeback. It's Wall Street. In an article that otherwise was generally pro-nuclear, energy expert Judith M. Greenwald wrote in the May issue of the Oxford Energy Forum: "Nuclear energy can be part of the solution to climate change, but only if it can solve its own problems." Given the economics, jump-starting the U.S. nuclear business would require a huge taxpayer subsidy such as direct government guarantees protecting investors if the projects get delayed. And given the cost of building power plants and the years it takes to repay bondholders, federal guarantees likely would require hundreds of billions of dollars and government backing for decades. Whether voters would support such subsidies is unknown. The question should be analyzed based on what energy policy gives the country the most return for its dollars. (Notably, while U.S. utilities aren't announcing any new reactors, several are investing heavily in renewable sources, especially wind.) Would America be smarter to put its money into nuclear - or into energy efficiency and finding ways to make wind, solar and other renewable sources more reliable? Is there an affordable way to do both? Can we clean up coal, or sequester the greenhouse gases caused by burning fossil fuels? Yet the core problem with U.S. energy policy is more basic: The country isn't sufficiently investing in any of its options - nuclear, renewables or clean coal. America needs to shake off that underlying lethargy, and soon. All contents Copyright 2005 The Denver Post or other copyright ***************************************************************** 29 Japan Times: Tepco restarts last suspended reactor Saturday, July 9, 2005 FUKUSHIMA (Kyodo) Tokyo Electric Power Co. on Friday restarted the last of its 17 nuclear reactors shut down after the utility was discovered to have falsified safety reports on reactor faults. [News photo] Operators at the Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear power plant of Tokyo Electric Power Co. start up the No. 1 reactor. The 460,000 kw No. 1 reactor at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant in Okuma, Fukushima Prefecture, is scheduled to begin generating electricity in five to 10 days after having been shut down for two years and eight months. The 34-year-old reactor is the oldest owned by Tokyo Electric Power Co. Tepco had shut down 10 reactors in Fukushima Prefecture and seven in Niigata Prefecture by the end of April 2003 in order to make further inspections and repairs. The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, under the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, ordered Tepco in November 2002 to suspend the Fukushima plant's No. 1 reactor for a year after it was found to have falsified safety inspection results. The data falsification at the No. 1 reactor was considered to have been the most serious in a number of false reports discovered at Tepco reactors. The Japan Times: July 9, 2005 (C) All rights reserved ***************************************************************** 30 Japan Times: Saga reactor has to be shut down Sunday, July 10, 2005 FUKUOKA (Kyodo) Kyushu Electric Power Co. said Saturday it will manually shut down a nuclear reactor at a power plant in Saga Prefecture by early Sunday due to a rise in the level of radioactive material there. According to the company, it found an upward trend in the concentration of radioactive iodine in the primary cooling system of the No. 2 reactor of its Genkai power plant. It is highly likely that a minute hole, technically called a pinhole, opened up in a metallic container of uranium fuel, leading to leakage of radioactive iodine after the uranium material underwent fission. Such fission creates radioactive iodine. There are no reports of effects of radiation in the vicinity of the 559,000 kilowatt reactor, Kyushu Electric said. During an inspection Friday of the cooling system, the utility saw the radioactive iodine concentration level at 2.3 becquerels per cubic centimeter, and it further went up to 3.4 becquerels Saturday morning, nearly six times that of the normal level. Although the figure is still far below the 52,000 becquerels per cubic centimeter limit set by safety regulations, the company decided to shut the reactor down ahead of its regular inspection scheduled for July 16. The Japan Times: July 10, 2005 (C) All rights reserved ***************************************************************** 31 The Advocate: NRC criticizes response to Millstone shutdown Associated Press Published July 9 2005 HARTFORD, Conn. -- The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission criticized how operators at the Millstone nuclear power reactor in Waterford handled an emergency shutdown in April, according to a recent report. Investigators cited plant technician performance, insufficient diagnosis of the reactor's problem and poor communication. They said that together, the three factors created unnecessary risks. The report also said supervisors for Dominion Nuclear of Connecticut Inc. didn't provide clear guidance on the scope of review needed in the days after the shutdown. "Our operators responded very conservatively to these events, and we strongly support that," said Peter Hyde, a spokesman for Dominion. "But, we recognize this was not our finest hour." Overall, the problems were non-threatening, according to the report, and overall response by operators was deemed adequate. The emergency shutdown was apparently prompted by the malfunctioning of a computerized reactor protection system's circuit card, investigators said. During the shutdown, a safety valve that opened automatically to release heat produced as a result of the shutdown was open for too long. Dominion determined that an insignificant amount of radioactive liquid and steam was released from Unit 3 because of the shutdown, the NRC report said. --- Information from: The Hartford Courant, http://www.courant.com Copyright © 2005, The Associated Press © 2005, Southern Connecticut Newspapers, Inc. ***************************************************************** 32 Al Jazeera: Israel to build new nuclear reactors - Aljazeera.com 7/10/2005 10:00:00 PM GMT Israel's dimona reactor Palestinian sources revealed on Sunday that Israel is planning to install water cooled nuclear reactors in the 1948 occupied Negev desert parallel to the borders with Egypt. "The Israeli scheme came as part of other plans, including activating the implementation of the two seas canal that will connect the Dead Sea with the Red Sea on stages, after its success to recruit the PA and Jordan into supporting it, with the aim of providing the water needed for the hydraulic cooling system", the sources said. And while Israel, which claims it doesn't have a nuclear arsenal, is widely believed to have around 200 nuclear warheads, the Israeli finance minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, tried on Sunday to fuel the world’s concerns about Iran’s nuclear program. During his visit to London to address a conference, Netanyahu repeated Israel’s and U.S. claims that Iran’s nuclear ambitions pose real threat to the world. He also stated that he wants the shipment of Russian nuclear equipment and nuclear fuel to a plant under construction at Bushehr to be immediately stopped. The U.S., backed by Israel, has been accusing Iran of covertly trying to produce nuclear weapons, claims that have been repeatedly rejected by the Islamic republic as false and politically motivated. Iran needs its nuclear program for peaceful purposes, like power generation. Copyright 2005 Al Jazeera Publishing Limited ***************************************************************** 33 London Times: Blair’s man set to head nuclear power inquiry - Sunday Times - Times Online thetimes.co.uk July 10, 2005 David Cracknell and Andrew Porter SIR ANDREW TURNBULL, the outgoing cabinet secretary, is being lined up to head a review of nuclear energy ordered by Tony Blair. The move has prompted concern that Downing Street is planning to use what had been billed as an “independent” inquiry to justify a decision that has already been made in principle to build more nuclear generators. Lord Birt, the prime minister’s personal adviser in No 10, is understood to be pushing for Turnbull to chair the review, which could lead to the construction of six new generators. Birt is an advocate of nuclear power as a way of Britain meeting its targets for cutting greenhouse gas emissions. Ministers see Turnbull, who steps down next month, as a close ally of Birt and some have questioned whether the review could be truly independent under his chairmanship. His appointment would also lead to environmental campaigners complaining that the government is unwilling to listen to arguments against nuclear power. The future of nuclear power has become an important issue in Labour’s third term. Some ministers support the setting up of a committee as a strategy to defuse the political row over the question. They have been impressed by the way the pensions commission — set up to investigate long-term solutions to paying for old age — has taken some of the political heat out of the issue. The findings of the nuclear review would — like any pensions conclusions — be difficult for the prime minister and Gordon Brown, the chancellor, to ignore. Supporters of nuclear energy point to Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) figures which show it as a cost-effective way of reducing carbon dioxide emissions. Some officials, like the nuclear industry itself, believe a quick decision should be made as existing nuclear plants reach the end of their operating life and require replacement. A recent internal document to ministers said: “The case for looking at the nuclear question again quickly is that if we want to avoid a sharp fall in nuclear’s contribution to energy supplies . . . we should need to act soon, given the long lead times.” The DTI will need to wait to make its decision at least until the autumn, when Margaret Beckett, the environment secretary, is due to produce a report on the implications of global warming. Beckett is known to be more sceptical about nuclear power than some other ministers. She believes the government’s main task should be to look at measures to deliver the 20% cut in carbon dioxide that has been pledged by 2010, and achieving further cuts by 2020, building up to a 60% reduction from 1990 levels by 2050. She supports the establishment of a European scheme for trading emissions quotas between countries. The Treasury is believed to be highly sceptical of plans to build new nuclear stations. British Energy, a public company, had to be temporarily bailed out by the Treasury three years ago when it almost went into liquidation. A damning report into a leak from the Thorp reprocessing plant at Sellafield in Cumbria which emerged in May, dented the confidence of industry advocates and gave ammunition to environmental campaigners. Copyright 2005 Times Newspapers Ltd. ***************************************************************** 34 Xinhua: IAEA tightens rules on nuclear use www.xinhuanet.com www.chinaview.cn 2005-07-09 10:38:03 Beijing July 9 -- At a conference in Vienna, Friday, 89 nations agreed to restrictions on atomic devices, aiming to reduce the threat from nuclear terrorism. The delegates adopted a draft ammendment from China tightening aspects of the 1980 Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material. The amended convention will make it "legally binding" for states to protect all nuclear facilities and materials in use, storage or transport. The previous convention only dealt with fissile materials while in transport. The treaty also provides for expanded international cooperation to prevent nuclear theft. (Source: CRIENGLISH.com) Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 35 IPS: THE REAL THREAT IS NUCLEAR TERRORISM Inter Press Service News Agency Monday, July 11, 2005 04:12 GMT Dietrich Fischer JULY 2005 (IPS) - If the world continues on its current course, the terrorist bombs in London should be considered a mere foretaste of far worse future catastrophes, writes Dietrich Fischer, academic director of the European University Centre for Peace Studies in Stadtschlaining, Austria, and a member of TRANSCEND, a peace and development network. As long as the major powers insist on maintaining nuclear weapons, they cannot expect to prevent other countries and terrorist organisations from acquiring and using them. Those who still believe in the fairy tale of "deterrence theory" better wake up to the age of suicide bombers. We need a vastly more open world, where all nuclear weapons are verifiably destroyed and the manufacturing of new ones cannot be hidden. The International Atomic Energy Agency, IAEA, can now inspect only sites that member countries voluntarily place under its supervision; such an "inspection" is meaningless. If we cling to obsolete ways of thinking -- that threatening others will make us safe -- we face extinction as a human species. Is getting rid of all nuclear weapons a realistic prospect? Certainly more realistic than waiting until they are used. Some have argued that we cannot disinvent nuclear weapons and therefore will have to live with them as long as civilisation exists. But nobody disinvented cannibalism either; we simply learned to abhor it. (END/2005) This is an abstract from the column. Editors interested in acquiring the full text of this column, please contact romacol@ips.orgspecifying the name and address of the publication as well as a proposed rate. Unfortunately, we cannot comply with requests from individuals or organisations that do not represent print media outlets. Copyright © 2005 IPS-Inter Press Service. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 36 Xinhua: 89 countries agree to reinforce protection of nuclear facilities www.xinhuanet.com www.chinaview.cn 2005-07-09 12:49:44 VIENNA, July 8 (Xinhuanet) -- Signatory countries to the Convention of the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material on Friday agreed on a beefed-up treaty on protecting enriched uraniumand other dangerous nuclear substances. A conference sponsored by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and attended by 89 signatory countries went through over 20 amendments before passing the revamped treaty. IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei described the treaty as an "important step toward greater nuclear security by combating, preventing and ultimately punishing those who would engage in nuclear theft, sabotage and even terrorism." The treaty for the first time stipulates that signatory countries should strengthen international cooperation in protection of nuclear materials and the fight against terrorism. The treaty was approved just one day after the London bombings,a terrorist attack that left at least 50 killed and hundreds injured. The Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material, was drawn up in 1980, is aimed at promoting the peaceful use and protection of nuclear material. The purpose of the conference is to improve the system of international nuclear safety and ward off possible terrorist nuclear attacks. Enditem Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 37 Scotsman.com News: Nuclear power stations on alert over terrorist attacks Sun 10 Jul 2005 On guard: Sellafield is among the facilities which have increased vigilance since the attacks. Picture: Getty Images MURDO MACLEOD THE government has ordered Britain's nuclear power stations on to a heightened state of alert amid fears of more terror attacks. Security status at all the UK's nuclear installations, including the four in Scotland, has been stepped up to "amber alert". A series of measures across the UK has also seen an increased number of police officers and more searching at the country's railway stations, airports and seaports. Travellers have been urged to get to airports earlier than they usually would in order to allow time for more baggage searches and other security checks. And bus and rail passengers are being subjected to random searches, especially in and around London, amid fear of more bomb attacks on buses and trains. Eurostar train services in southern England were delayed yesterday by a security alert which closed the Ashford international station in Kent for about an hour as police carried out controlled explosions on two pieces of unattended luggage. Power stations and reprocessing plants are regarded as "high value" targets for terrorists aiming to disrupt electricity supplies, steal radioactive material for use in bombs or even to cause a nuclear explosion. The last time the plants went to amber alert status, the highest level before red alert status itself, was after the 9/11 attacks in New York. Non-essential staff were asked to stay away from work on Friday, and car searches were stepped up. The car-free exclusion zones around key buildings were also widened. A spokesman for British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL), which operates the decommissioned Chapelcross near Dumfries and Hunterston A near Ayr, along with the reprocessing site at Sellafield in Cumbria, said: "In common with other Government establishments sites operated by British Nuclear Group, we have moved to a higher state of alert, following the events in London. "This is a precautionary measure and we have no reason to believe that any of our facilities are under specific threat." A source at British Energy, which operates the power plants at Torness in East Lothian and also Ayrshire's Hunterston B, confirmed that their sites had also been put on amber alert in accordance with advice from the government. A spokesman for the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority added: "It must be stressed that this is a precautionary measure and doesn't reflect any specific threat." Some British nuclear installations, including the Sellafield reprocessing centre in Cumbria, already deploy armed guards as a precaution against terrorist attack. And BNFL is to build a reinforced concrete curtain wall around plutonium storage facilities. A spokesman for the British Airports Authority said that security had been stepped up at the UK's major airports. He said: "Security is at a high level in the wake of the incidents last week." In London, 100 extra "transport operational command unit officers" - Metropolitan Police officers who patrol London's bus and road network - have been put on duty, as well as 80 additional Transport for London staff and 120 traffic wardens to help keep traffic flowing. Extra search teams, which respond to bomb scares by swiftly clearing tube stations, were also on standby. In addition, bus drivers have been ordered to search their buses every time they turn around at each end of a run. It emerged last year that an emergency planning exercise, run in 2003, exposed a number of flaws in the UK's ability to deal with a major terror attack against seaports and airports. And a simulated terror attack on a nuclear power station in 2002 found confusion and slowness in the emergency response. Experts said the emergency services needed more equipment and training and that the public needed better information on what they should do in the case of a disaster. THE SCOTSMAN ***************************************************************** 38 [du-list] Uruknet item including DU effects Date: Sun, 10 Jul 2005 16:11:24 -0700 "In June 2005, Dr. Thomas Fasy of the Mr. Sinai School of Medicine concluded that data from Iraqi hospitals indicated that depleted uranium's effect had shown up dramatically in a more than 400% rise in children's cancer in just over a decade. Uranium ions bond with DNA and this, he said, has also caused a notable leap in children's leukemia rates along with sharply elevated incidences of congenital birth defects. The United States literally released cancer-causing material into Iraqi air, soil and water." Mission Accomplished Iraq is Broken SAUL LANDAU, CounterPunch July 9, 2005 It's hard to believe that supposedly intelligent people like Senators Joseph Biden (DE), Hillary Clinton (NY) and John Kerry (MA) call for "staying the course" in Iraq and acting responsibly by sending more US troops with more fire power over there. Don't they understand that American soldiers break, not fix? The more US soldiers in Iraq, the more damage they will do and the more enemies they will make. To limit damage, to act morally and responsibly, remove the cause of violence and chaos in Iraq: the US military presence. Since the early 1950s, US Presidents have used troops and the CIA to break other countries, not fix them. In 1953, the CIA shattered Iran's integrity by overthrowing the elected Mossadegh government. 26 years later, Iranians overthrew the US-backed Shah. In 1979, Iranians showed the depth of their rage by also seizing scores of US officials as hostages. The Ayatollah's regime labeled the United States "The Great Satan" ­ for screwing their country. In 1954, the CIA smashed Guatemala by overthrowing a democratically elected government and replacing it with a military gang that killed and looted for forty years. Embraced by the Pentagon, these gangsters in uniform slaughtered as many as 100,000 Guatemalans (mostly indigenous peasants) and stole their land. The country has not yet recovered. On September 11, 1973, Richard Nixon helped rupture Chile by "destabilizing" its elected government. For seventeen subsequent years, Washington supported a bloody military dictatorship led by General August Pinochet, a specialist in assassinating, disappearing and torturing his opponents at home and abroad. In 1991, the civilian government's National Truth and Reconciliation Commission listed Pinochet's crimes: 3,197 people assassinated or disappeared, tens of thousands tortured, hundreds of thousands forced into exile. In March 2003, George W. Bush ordered the US military to break Iraq. The US arsenal destroyed the electricity and water supply, damaged sewage treatment and other vital sanitary facilities and pulverized bridges, other public places and thousands of homes. On May 1, 2003, dressed in a jump suit, Bush landed on the USS Abraham Lincoln and announced: "Mission Accomplished." His critics, myself included, laughed at such braggadocio. We misunderstood him. He had accomplished the standard post-WWII US military mission: He broke another country. The US-led Coalition has not restored what it demolished in Iraq, nor reestablished services to the level of Saddam Hussein's regime. They imprisoned tens of thousands of Iraqis, subjecting many of those to systematic torture. Former prisoner Ali Abbas told journalist Dahr Jamail that to break the will of Iraqi prisoners, US guards at Abu Ghraib "used electricity on us" while millions of homes lacked electricity for hours each day. "They also shit on us, used dogs against usand starved us." As Abbas told Jamail, "the Americans delivered electricity to my ass before they brought it to my house" (Jamail testimony at the World Tribunal on Iraq, June 25, 2005, Istanbul). Estimates of Iraqis in prison range as high as eighty thousand, most of whom have not been charged. In 1991, during the first Gulf War, the breaking began. US planes and artillery delivered more than 300 tons of uranium tipped bombs and shells to targets in southern Iraq alone. Residue from these weapons turned into particles that people -- including US troops ­inhaled. In 2003, more US toxic material rained down on the Iraqi environment. In September 2002, I saw dying kids in the Baghdad Children's Hospital. Iraqi doctors had already surmised that only the presence of depleted uranium could have caused such a profound spike in the cancer rates among children. In June 2005, Dr. Thomas Fasy of the Mr. Sinai School of Medicine concluded that data from Iraqi hospitals indicated that depleted uranium's effect had shown up dramatically in a more than 400% rise in children's cancer in just over a decade. Uranium ions bond with DNA and this, he said, has also caused a notable leap in children's leukemia rates along with sharply elevated incidences of congenital birth defects. The United States literally released cancer-causing material into Iraqi air, soil and water. This toxic metal had performed the coup de grace to the Iraqi health system, already devastated by US bombing and embargo, Fasy said. The cost of such breakage: human life (World Tribunal on Iraq, June 26, 2005). In November 2004, US soldiers carried out punitive action in Falluja, a city of some 300,000 residents, an operation that surpassed the 1936 Nazi bombing of Guernica in Spain. Falluja was reduced to rubble. Thousands died. On the economic front, Washington broke Iraq as well ­ of its socialist habit. US colonial administrator J. Paul Bremer forced a constitution down Iraqi throats ­ to break their statist economic system. He planned to privatize some 200 state-owned enterprises. Management of port facilities at Umm Qasr went to Stevedoring Services of America, a US company. "Bremer studiously ignored the rapidly rising unemployment and social disorder that arose from the destruction of a social order." "If privatization isn't halted," wrote Naomi Klein, 'free Iraq' will be the most sold country on earth" (The Nation, April 28, 2003). But Iraqis resist. They continually sabotage the oil pipeline. Indeed, such tactics have caused major oil companies to lose enthusiasm for owning Iraqi oil. Besides, they do well under the current OPEC arrangement -- $60 a barrel -- and have no wish to change it. Iraqi workers also have not welcomed the selling of state-owned factories to foreigners. Some work forces have even threatened to assassinate prospective buyers. This does not make investors feel as if modern Iraq provides a welcome climate (Naomi Klein, speech at Cal Poly Pomona, November 2004). The chaos that engulfs Iraq does not improve from the presence of US troops. Iraqis who testified in the Istanbul World Tribunal on Iraq told about intense hatred of their people for the occupiers. The Iraqis feel abused by far more than the publicized incidents at Abu Ghraib. On routine US patrols and raids, trigger-happy young soldiers gun down innocent Iraqis. Pilots drop bombs on coordinates where people live. The 2004 documentary Gunner Palace resembles scenes from the TV show Cops. GIs bash down doors, charge into homes with fingers on rifle triggers shouting "on the floor motherfucker," while women scream and children cry. The humiliated and handcuffed men go to prison. The soldiers then return to their posh living quarters and count the days remaining before they can go home. Like the GIs in Vietnam three plus decades ago, those in Iraq sacrifice lives, limbs and psyches. But as the film makes clear, most don't know the purpose of their military mission. Indeed, Iraqis recall well how US troops watched passively while massive looting took place of their national, historic treasure [How does one fix a broken Babylon? A crime wave swept the country and Armed Americans shrugged. Women can no longer walk the streets in safety as they once did. US occupations has also pitted Sunnis against Shiites, Kurds against Turkmen. Some Iraqi Christians have fled in fear to Syria. Bush omitted these facts and ignored the violence and chaos that define daily life. US personnel avidly train young Iraqis into constabulary form ­ those that survive the regular suicide bombings and other attacks aimed at the police. This scenario ­ reality -- does not penetrate the heads of key Democrats who continue to talk about "our obligation" to fix Iraq. Words don't fix broken lives or property. Commitment to democracy calls for more than the United States appointing an Iraqi government and calling it democratic or forcing an Iraqi election in which millions bravely voted, but for what never got reported. The media and the White House ignored the startling fact that the majority of Iraqis voted against the US-chosen Iyad Allawi and for the United Iraqi Alliance, which demanded "a timetable for the withdrawal of the multinational forces from Iraq" (The Nation, February 11, 2005). Instead of picking up on the withdrawal demand, before more breakage occurs, foolish Democratic Senators demand that Bush send in more troops. Bush ironically appears as more moderate as he appeals for patriotic unity in the form of flying the flag on July 4. What must Iraqis feel at the sight of that flag on July 4? In its name, the US military has destroyed their cities, tortured their people, shot many of them for no reason at checkpoints or wherever the troops happened to be patrolling. Iraqis have scarce electricity, food and water and no secure jobs. Yet, Bush keeps repeating that he "liberated Iraq." On June 28, addressing the Special Forces at Fort Bragg, Bush asked implying that "our" people had given up a lot to wage his war : "Is the sacrifice worth it?" He quickly answered his own question. "It is worth it" The Iraq war has cost him nothing ­ perhaps a few hours of missed video golf. "We have more work to do," he stated. Yes, Bush stands as a national model of sacrifice and hard work! And Iraqis must think that those Democrats who ask for more troops are either crazy or stark opportunists. It will take them that much longer to restore some integrity to their broken society. Saul Landau teaches at Cal Poly Pomona University and is a fellow of the Institute for Policy Studies. Landau testified before the World Tribunal on Iraq June 24-27, Istanbul. :: Article nr. 13532 sent on 10-jul-2005 00:29 ECT :: The address of this page is : www.uruknet.info?p=13532 :: The incoming address of this article is : www.counterpunch.org/landau07092005.html 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/ ***************************************************************** 39 [du-list] A MUST READ and FORWARD : The Tiny Victims of Desert Date: Sun, 10 Jul 2005 16:12:13 -0700 A MUST READ and FORWARD : The Tiny Victims of Desert Storm By Photography by Derek Hudson Text by Kenneth Miller Reporting by Jimmie Briggs Jul 6, 2005, 08:56 Life Magazine http://www.life.com/Life/essay/gulfwar/gulf01.html (first page) http://www.axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/article_19046.shtml (full text) When our soldiers risked their lives in the Gulf, they never imagined that their children might suffer the consequences--or that their country would turn its back on them. Jayce Hanson's birth defects may stem from his father's Gulf War service. But like hundreds of other families, the Hansons face official stonewalling--and a frightening future. He gets ear infections constantly, but he never really cries. You know how most children scream when they get earaches? Maybe he's immune to pain." -CONNIE HANSON From outside, the evil that has invaded Darrell and Shana Clark's home is invisible. Set on a modest plot in a San Antonio subdivision, equipped with a doghouse and a swimming pool, the house is a shrine to the pursuit of happiness--a ranch-style emblem of the good life Darrell and 700,000 other U.S. soldiers fought for in the Persian Gulf four years ago. Inside, the evil shows itself at once. It has taken up residence in the body of the Clarks' three-year-old daughter, Kennedi. On a Saturday afternoon, Darrell and Shana huddle in their paneled living room. They are in their mid-twenties, robust and suntanned, but their eyes are older. Kennedi toddles about, pretending to snap pictures. You see the evil's imprint when she lowers the toy camera: Her face is grotesquely swollen, sprinkled with red, knotted lumps. Kennedi was born without a thyroid. If not for daily hormone treatments, she would die. What disfigures her features, however, is another congenital condition: hemangiomas, benign tumors made of tangled blood vessels. Since she was a few weeks old, they have been popping up all over--on her eyelids and lips; in her throat and spinal canal. Laser surgery shrinks them, but they return again and again. They distort her speech, threaten her life. And, inevitably, they draw the stares of strangers. "When people see her," says Shana, "they say, 'Ooh, what happened to your baby?'" Neither Shana nor her husband can answer that question conclusively, but they suspect that Kennedi's troubles have their origins in the Gulf, where Darrell served as an Army paratrooper. During operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm, he faced a mind- boggling array of environmental hazards. Like an estimated 45,000 of his comrades, he has developed symptoms--in his case, asthma and recurring pneumonia--linked to an elusive affliction known as Gulf War syndrome. And like a growing number of Gulf War veterans, some of whom remain apparently healthy, he has fathered a child with devastating birth defects. Jayce is remarkably agile. He can feed himself marshmallows (above) or shimmy quickly across a floor. But learning to walk on prosthetic legs (right) is terribly difficult without arms to use for balance. Jayce's mother, Connie (left), holds up a mirror to help him with coordination. A devout Christian, she faces her family's troubles stoically. "I accept what God has given us," she says, "and try to make the best of it." Researchers have been probing Gulf War syndrome since late 1991, when returning soldiers reported a spate of mysterious maladies. Conclusions have been slow to arrive. Last June the federal Centers for Disease Control (CDC) confirmed that Gulf vets were unusually susceptible to a dozen ailments--from rashes to incontinence, hair loss to memory loss, chronic indigestion to chronic pain. But in August a Pentagon study concluded that neither the vets nor their loved ones showed signs of any "new or unique illness." Veterans' advocates disputed that finding, as did the National Academy of Sciences' Institute of Medicine, which declared that the report's "reasoning . . . is not well explained." And while there is, as yet, no absolute proof that Gulf vets' babies are especially prone to congenital problems, patterns of defects have begun to emerge--patterns unlikely to result from chance alone. During the past year, LIFE has conducted its own inquiry into the plight of these children. We sought to learn whether U.S. policies put them at risk and whether the nation ought to be doing more for them and their families. We also aimed to determine whether, as some scientists and veterans allege, the military's own investigation is deeply flawed. The future of this country's volunteer armed forces--institutions dependent on citizens' willingness to serve, and therefore on their trust--may rest on the answers to such questions. Certainly, soldiers expect to forfeit their health, if necessary, in the line of duty. But no one expects that of a soldier's kids. ea' Arnold was not born to a soldier, but she might as well have been: Her father went to the Gulf as a civilian helicopter mechanic with the Army's 1st Cavalry Division. On a Wednesday morning, Lea' lies naked in her parents' bed, in a small house off a gravel road in Belton, Tex. A nurse looms over her, brandishing a plastic hose. "Don't hurt me," wails Lea. "I'm not going to hurt you, sweetie," says the nurse. "You need to peepee." As the nurse administers the catheter, Lisa Arnold--a sturdy woman who carries her sadness on broad shoulders--tells the story of her daughter's birth. "The doctor said, 'Well, she's got a little problem with her back.' They let me hold her for a minute, and then they took her to intensive care." Lea' had spina bifida, a split in the backbone that causes paralysis and hydrocephalus, or water on the brain. She needed surgery to remove three vertebrae. "They told us that if she lived the next 36 hours, she'd have a pretty good chance of surviving. Those 36 hours . . . it's kind of indescribable what that's like." Three years later, Lea' has grown into a redhead like her mother, with the haunted face of a medieval martyr. She cannot move her legs or roll over. A shunt drains fluid from her skull. "She tells me every night that she wants to walk," says Richard Arnold, a soft-spoken ex-Marine. Richard, who had fathered two healthy children before he went to war, was working for Lockheed in the Gulf. But he bunked in the desert with the troops--and that meant swallowing, inhaling and otherwise absorbing some very dicey stuff. According to a 1994 report by the General Accounting Office, American soldiers were exposed to 21 potential "reproductive toxicants," any of which might have harmed them as well as their future children. They used diesel fuel to keep down sand. They marched through smoke from burning oil wells. They doused themselves with bug sprays. They handled a toxic nerve-gas decontaminant, ethylene glycol monomethyl ether. They fired shells tipped with depleted uranium. Other teratogens--materials that cause birth defects--may have been present too. One possibility is that desert winds bore traces of Iraqi poison gas.(POISON IN THE DESERT and POISON IN THE AIR) Some physicians who have treated Gulf vets believe they may be suffering from a general overload of chemical pollutants--and that their body fluids are actually toxic. (Indeed, many veterans' wives are sick; a few complain that their husbands' semen blisters their skin.) "It was a toxic environment," says Dr. Charles Jackson, staff physician for the Veterans Administration Medical Center in Tuskegee, Ala. Other doctors, while agreeing that chemicals or radiation may have caused birth defects, think the vets' ills came from a germ--an unknown Iraqi biological warfare agent, perhaps, or some form of leishmaniasis, a disease carried by sand flies. Government scientists generally discount these theories. "The hard cold facts" are simply not there, says Dr. Robert Roswell, executive director of the Persian Gulf Veterans Coordinating Board. But one hypothesis elicits even his respect. "The one argument that does deserve further study [concerns] the combination of pyridostigmine bromide with pesticides." Pyridostigmine bromide--or PB--is a drug usually prescribed to sufferers of myasthenia gravis, a degenerative nerve disease. But animal experiments have shown that pretreatment with PB may also provide some protection from the nerve gas soman. The U.S. military therefore gave the drug to most Americans in the Gulf. Darrell Clark, for instance, took it, and Richard Arnold--now racked with chronic joint pain--probably did: "I took everything the First Cavalry took." The Defense Department may have been taking a big chance with PB. In earlier, small-scale safety trials, Air Force pilots had reported serious side effects, including impaired breathing, vision, stamina and short-term memory. (Many soldiers would experience such symptoms during the Gulf War.) Even more alarming, PB was known to worsen the effects of some kinds of nerve gas (see POISON IN THE MIX). Nonetheless, as war threatened, the Pentagon persuaded the Food and Drug Administration to waive its prohibition on testing a drug for new purposes without the subjects' "informed consent." FDA deputy commissioner Mary Pendergast defends that ruling: "You can't have your troops being the ones to decide whether they'll take some step to keep themselves healthy." If PB did cause lasting problems, the reason could be the way it interacts with bug spray. In 1993, James Moss, a scientist with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, found that when cockroaches are exposed to PB along with the common insect repellent DEET--used in the Gulf--the toxicity of both chemicals is multiplied. Moss says he pursued his experiments in spite of orders to stop. His contract wasn't renewed when it expired last year, and the researcher claims he was blackballed. (USDA Secretary Dan Glickman says Moss's "temporary appointment" was up and Moss knew it.) Since Moss's study, two others--one by the Pentagon itself, the second by Duke University--have found neural damage in rats and chickens exposed to another chemical cocktail, this one a mixture of PB, DEET and permethrin, an insecticide. Permethrin, however, was probably used by no more than 5 percent of U.S. soldiers in the Gulf. Pentagon officials deny that any PB-DEET mixture could have caused birth defects in male Gulf vets' children. "I'm not aware that a male can be exposed to a chemical agent, and then two years later his sperm creates a defect," says Dr. Stephen Joseph, assistant secretary of defense for health affairs. But some chemicals, such as mustard gas, have been shown to affect sperm production for even longer periods. Clearly, further research is needed to determine whether a PB-and-bug-spray combo can behave the same way. rmy Sgt. Brad Minns is pretty sure he didn't take PB, but he did take a vaccine meant to save his life if Iraq resorted to germ warfare. He fears that this medication caused his chronic fatigue--and that his Gulf War service ultimately blighted his baby's life at the root. In their bungalow at Fort Meade, Md., Brad and his wife, Marilyn, list their son's tribulations. Casey was born with Goldenhar's syndrome, characterized by a lopsided head and spine. His left ear was missing, his digestive tract disconnected. Trying to repair his scrambled innards, surgeons at Walter Reed Army Medical Center damaged his vocal cords and colon, say Brad and Marilyn. (Ben Smith, a spokesman for Walter Reed, says, "A claim has been filed by the family, and until it's resolved [the case] is in the hands of the lawyers.") Now 26 months old, Casey speaks in sign language. His parents feed him and remove his wastes through holes in his belly. Otherwise, he's a regular kid, tearing about the sparsely decorated room, shoving pens, books, scraps of paper into his mouth. Marilyn follows, tugging them out again. "A lot of parents have anxieties about coming forth" - DR. SHARON COOPER, Womack Army Medical Center Born with organs out of place, he suffered further damage in surgery, says his father, Brad. Now Casey's chest has stopped growing, leading to fears that he may need an operation at some point to preserve function in his lungs. "He's a little terror," says Brad, with the weariest of smiles. A military policeman posted mainly at an airfield in Saudi Arabia, Brad, along with 150,000 other American soldiers, took a vaccine--on his commander's orders--against weapon-borne anthrax. A second vaccine, against botulism, was administered to 8,000 soldiers. A staff report issued last December by the Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs concluded that "Persian Gulf veterans were . . . ordered under threat of Article 15 or court-martial, to discuss their vaccinations with no one, not even with medical professionals needing the information to treat adverse reactions from the vaccine." The Senate report noted that the particular botulinum toxoid issued "was not approved by FDA." Other details from the survey: Of responding veterans who had taken the anthrax vaccine, 85 percent were told they could not refuse it, and 43 percent experienced immediate side effects. Only one fourth of the women to whom it was administered were warned of any risks to pregnancy. Of all responding personnel who had taken the antibotulism medicine, 88 percent were told not to turn it down and 35 percent suffered side effects. None of the women given botulinum toxoid were told of pregnancy risks. "Anthrax vaccine should continue to be considered as a potential cause for undiagnosed illnesses in Persian Gulf military personnel," said the report in one of its summations. And in another: "[The botulism vaccine's] safety remains unknown." n a conference room at the Womack Army Medical Center in Fort Bragg, N.C., Melanie Ayers is addressing a support group for parents of Gulf War babies. "Sometimes," she says, "I wish I'd gone into a corner and stayed naive." Pixie-faced and preternaturally energetic, Ayers, 30, dates her loss of innocence to November 1993, when her five-month-old son died of congestive heart failure. Michael, who was conceived after his father, Glenn, returned from action as a battery commander in the Gulf, sweated constantly--until the night he woke up screaming, his arms and legs ice-cold. His previously undetected mitral-valve defect cost him his life. After Michael's death, Melanie sealed off his bedroom; she tried to close herself off as well. But soon she began to encounter "a shocking number" of other parents whose post-Gulf War children had been born with abnormalities. All of them were desperate to know what had gone wrong and whether they would ever again be able to bear healthy babies. With Kim Sullivan, an artillery captain's wife whose infant son, Matthew, had died of a rare liver cancer, Melanie founded an informal network of fellow sufferers. Surrounded by framed photos of decorated medics and nurses, a dozen of those moms and dads have come to share their worries, anger and grief. Kim is here. So is Connie Hanson, wife of an Army sergeant; her son, Jayce, was born with multiple deformities. Army Sgt. John Mabus has brought along his babies, Zachary and Andrew, who suffer from an incomplete fusion of the skull. The people in this room have turned to one another because they can no longer rely upon the military. "They told us that if she lived the next 36 hours, she'd have a pretty good chance of surviving. Those 36 hours. . . . It's kind of indescribable what that's like." -LISA ARNOLD Spina bifida cripples her legs. Her upper body is so weak that she can't push herself in a wheelchair on carpeting. To strengthen her bones, she spends hours in a contraption that holds her upright. Brothers Nathan (in tree) and Joey, both born before the war, are healthy. "The boys care a lot about Lea'," says her mom, Lisa. "Every time she goes to the hospital, their schoolwork suffers." "A lot of the parents have had anxieties about coming forth with their concerns," says Dr. Sharon Cooper, the Womack Center's director of pediatrics. Cooper is one military official who, rather than taking an adversarial stance, is dedicated to helping Gulf veterans and their families cope. Many vets speak of Army physicians who dismiss physical ailments as symptoms of stress, even as fabrication. They cite an internal report by the National Guard, leaked to the press last year, which revealed that hundreds of Gulf vets had been wrongly discharged as a money-saving measure--let go with a supposedly clean bill of health, although ongoing medical problems entitled them to remain in the service for treatment. A second report, issued by the GAO earlier this year, scores the Veterans Administration for being routinely tardy with its payments to ailing vets. "When you send a veteran off to do dangerous work, I think his complaints deserve respect," says West Virginia Sen. Jay Rockefeller. "The phrase I've used is 'reckless disregard.' There's a stark pattern of Defense Department recklessness." For vets with afflicted babies, the runaround can be just as bad. Military doctors often ignore signs of inborn disorders, say Gulf War parents, or refuse to discuss them frankly. And when they do talk about birth defects, the doctors--and Pentagon bureaucrats--are quick to cite a statistic that drives these parents wild: At least 3 percent of American babies are born with abnormalities. To which Melanie Ayers responds: "I'd like to put my child's picture in front of them and say, 'Glance at that once in a while to make sure you're telling me the truth.'" "There's a stark pattern of Defense Department recklessness." -SEN.JAY ROCKEFELLER "Just about our whole world is centered around Lea'," says Lisa Arnold. Huge medical bills--and the unwillingness of insurance companies to cover preexisting conditions-- force the family to live in poverty to qualify for Medicaid. ndeed, the truth may not be as simple as "at least three percent" implies. On a blazing Saturday afternoon, flanked by his parents, three-year-old Cedrick Miller is dangling his feet in an apartment-complex pool in San Antonio. Flossy-haired and shy, he looks younger than his age. Cedrick was born with his trachea and esophagus fused; despite surgery, his inability to hold down solid food has kept his weight to 20 pounds. His internal problems include hydrocephalus and a heart in the wrong place. But it's clear from one look that something else is awry. Cedrick suffers, like Casey Minns, from Goldenhar's syndrome. The left half of his face is shrunken, with a missing ear and a blind eye. His mother, Bianca, says that when a prenatal exam showed the defects, "everything we'd hoped for just crashed. What had Cedrick done to deserve this?" Steve Miller, a former Army medic, thinks chemicals damaged his sperm. He believes statistical evidence is at hand. "With Goldenhar's," he says, "we have clustering." Clustering is the term epidemiologists use when an ailment strikes one group of people more than others--and the phenomenon can be a key indicator that something more than chance is causing birth defects. The Association of Birth Defect Children says it has found the first cluster of defects in the offspring of U.S. Gulf veterans: 10 babies with severe Goldenhar's syndrome, a condition that usually strikes one in 26,000, according to ABDC executive director Betty Mekdeci. (Another case has surfaced in Britain, where 600 vets complain of Gulf-related illness.) The ABDC, which has gathered data on 163 ailing Gulf War babies so far, is tracking four more possible clusters--of victims of hypoplastic left heart syndrome, of atrial-septal heart defect, of microcephaly and of immune-system deficiencies. Significantly, not one of the parents in the ABDC survey has a family history of these types of birth defects. Or as Mekdeci puts it, "There have been no relatives with funny ears." The difficulty in proving conclusively whether clusters are occurring is that no one--not Mekdeci, not the Pentagon--knows how many babies have been born to Gulf vets. The Defense Department's own survey of 40,000 birth outcomes, initial results of which are due in late October, is the largest study yet, but far from complete since it relies on data only from military hospitals. The Pentagon's Dr. Joseph says the forthcoming report will include "by far the best and most comprehensive information available." Maybe it will, but many still question whether Defense Department scientists are really seeking the hard answers. Earlier this year Dr. Joseph told LIFE that, although trained as a pediatrician, he was entirely unfamiliar with "Goldhavers or Gold Heart--whatever." It's precisely that kind of response that enrages veterans with afflicted babies. Along with the ABDC and Defense Department surveys, more than 30 other studies of Gulf vets and their children are under way. One that is no longer ongoing, by the Senate Banking Committee, folded last year when committee chair Don Riegle retired. Of the 400 sick vets who had already answered committee inquiries, a startling 65 percent reported birth defects or immune-system problems in children conceived after the war. "A millionaire couldn't care for these kids." -LISA ARNOLD An airplane swing sets Jayce free. Although Riegle is gone, there are a few others in Washington fighting for afflicted Gulf War families. One is Rockefeller, but in recent months he has lost clout. After last year's GOP landslide, he was ousted as chairman of the Veterans' Affairs Committee, which produced the 1994 report on PB and vaccine use in the Gulf. The new chair, Alan Simpson (R--Wyo.), plans no action "until the hard science is in," says an aide. Then there is Hillary Rodham Clinton, the point person for an administration that, by pushing through a 1994 law mandating benefits for vets with symptoms, has cast itself as a friend of Gulf War syndrome sufferers. On August 14, at the opening session of the presidential advisory committee on the syndrome, she declared, "Just as we relied on our troops when they were sent to war, we must assure them that they can rely on us now." Whatever White House fact finders discover, there's no guarantee that Gulf War babies will get government help. As it stands, a soldier's children receive free medical care only as long as a parent remains in the service. For parents who return to civilian life, the going can be grim. Moreover, the government's record on earlier military health grievances is hardly reassuring. Soldiers unwittingly used in radiation experiments in the 1950s, for instance, had to fight the VA for compensation until the 1980s. And Vietnam veterans claim that scientists manipulated evidence to hide the ravages of Agent Orange. "The CDC actually skewed the data," says retired Navy Adm. Elmo Zumwalt Jr., who blames his son's fatal cancer on the defoliant. Vietnam vets won a $180 million settlement from Agent Orange manufacturers, but not until 1984. Gulf vets, says Zumwalt, "need to keep the pressure on, because in the case of Agent Orange--and I'm sure it'll occur with Desert Storm syndrome--the companies who stand to be found liable for any harmful effects will be in there lobbying." A few Desert Storm families have been relatively lucky--the Clarks, for instance, whose daughter has been granted free treatment through November of 1996, thanks to an Air Force doctor who recommended her as a subject for study. But others have been denied insurance coverage for "preexisting conditions." They are being driven into poverty; some join the welfare line so Medicaid will help with the impossible burden. "You could be a millionaire, and there's no way you could take care of one of these children," says Lisa Arnold. Betty Mekdeci thinks Congress should set up a special insurance fund for families like the Arnolds. "The very least we owe these folks is to provide them with a guarantee of care," she says. "I'd be glad to pay the extra taxes to do it."" "I'm angry, frustrated and sad," says Darrell Clark. "It's unfortunate that no one will speak up and say, 'Maybe we made a mistake. How can we help you get on with your lives?'" acked into an airplane-shaped swing at his grandmother's house in Charlottesville, Va., Jayce Hanson is getting on with his life as best he can. A cherubic, rambunctious blond, he's the unofficial poster boy of the Gulf War babies--seen by millions in People. Jayce is the center of attention here, too, as his father pushes the swing and a photographer snaps his picture. But since his last major public appearance, he has undergone a change: His lower legs are missing. Now three years old, Jayce was born with hands and feet attached to twisted stumps. He also had a hole in his heart, a hemophilia-like blood condition and underdeveloped ear canals. Doctors recently amputated his legs at the knees to make it easier to fit him with prosthetics. "He'll say once in a while, 'My feet are gone,'" says his mother, Connie, "but he's been a real trouper." During the war, Paul Hanson breathed heavy oil smoke; he stopped taking PB pills early, because they made him dizzy. Now he suffers regularly from headaches, nausea, tightness in the chest. Still, he is optimistic for his son. "Jayce is very bright," says Paul. "He doesn't realize his limitations. But when he grows up and says, 'Why am I not like everybody else?' we'd like to be able to explain it to him." -- Posted for educational and research purposes only, ~ in accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 ~ NucNews Links and Expanded Archives - http://nucnews.net Looking for solutions? 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Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ***************************************************************** 40 Daily Yomiuri: Victim's suffering scrutinized / Kyoto man denied A-bomb survivor status dueto account credibility : National : DAILY YOMIURI ONLINE ( The Yomiuri Shimbun The Kyoto prefectural government rejected an application from an 82-year-old Kyoto man to be officially recognized as an atomic bomb survivor in March due to a lack of evidence, ignoring a central government guideline, The Yomiuri Shimbun learned Saturday. A guideline issued by the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry allows applications to be accepted even when applicants' own detailed statements about where and how they survived the bombings are the only available evidence. Two months after the prefectural government first refused his application, the man visited the office with his lawyer and resubmitted the application which was eventually approved. According to the man's 74-year-old wife and others, the man was at his workplace in Nishi Ward, Hiroshima, about 3.5 kilometers away from ground zero, when the atomic bomb was dropped on Aug. 6, 1945. He moved to Kyoto after World War II. Because he suffered no visible external injuries, he only told his family about his suffering. Since being diagnosed with throat and colon cancer last spring, he decided to seek official recognition as an A-bomb survivor because he had hidden his suffering for so long. In March, he visited the prefectural government office and submitted a document about his experiences, recalling he saw a flash and a mushroom-shaped cloud from his workplace, and that he helped burn bodies. An official handling the request rejected his application saying there was no evidence he had suffered after the bomb was dropped. The man attempted to find those who could attest to his suffering, but failed. So he visited the office on May 13 with his lawyer and a statement from his wife who had heard about his suffering. The same official insisted there was still not enough evidence, but when the lawyer demanded the official to follow the ministry's guideline, the request was accepted. According to the ministry, the guideline was issued in 1957 encouraging prefectural governments to accept requests for the official recognition of A-bomb survivors whose statements about their experiences are difficult to verify. Employing the guideline, the Hiroshima municipal government has officially recognized more than 30 people as A-bomb survivors and the Kyoto prefectural government recognized one man as an A-bomb survivor in 2002. Officially recognized survivors receive exemptions of medical fees. The man in question became seriously ill earlier this month. His wife quoted him as saying: "I didn't seek recognition to get money because I'm not sure how long I'll live. I have no reason to lie about my experiences. They've trodden on my dignity." (Jul. 10, 2005) Copyright © The Yomiuri Shimbun. ***************************************************************** 41 Bradenton Herald: Tallevast distrustful of tests 07/09/2005 | DONNA WRIGHT Herald Staff Writer TALLEVAST - Fearing for their health, Tallevast residents want independent tests on all monitoring wells Lockheed Martin Corp. has drilled to map a plume of contamination stemming from a former beryllium plant. The residents distrust Lockheed's claim that data collected so far shows no current health risks to Tallevast residents. Shawn Collins, an environmental attorney who won more than $25 million in jury awards and settlements for families in a similar pollution case in Lisle, Ill., said Tallevast residents have good reason to collect their own data. Collins' case involved TCE, a solvent that was used at the Tallevast site. "There is no immediate test that will tell if you have been exposed or harmed by TCE," said Collins, "but the level of exposure is knowable within narrow limits if you know the length of time the citizens were exposed. It is knowable within very narrow limits, if you know the amounts of TCE to which they were exposed. And if you have young children exposed for a decade or more, those people are threatened by dangerous health effects." Tallevast leaders want those answers. Independent samplings from the Lockheed-Tetra Tech wells is a start, said Wanda Washington, vice president of Family Oriented Community United and Strong, or FOCUS, an advocacy group for residents. "If they are saying the numbers are low and there is no risk to me, I need to know that is true," Washington said. "We are asking to test their wells because we want to know what the real numbers are." "If they put their request in writing, we will consider it," said Lockheed spokeswoman Meredith Rouse Davis. But Davis stopped short of saying Tallevast's request would be granted. "The Florida Department of Environmental Protection, as the regulator of the remediation process, has every right to sample those wells," said Davis. "But we do not open up those wells to everyone because that might change the integrity of those wells." Said Washington: "We just don't trust their levels. We are questioning the risk, our risk. I need to know if my home and community are safe." DEP spokeswoman Cragin Mossteller said state regulators are committed to working with Tallevast residents to help them get the answers they seek. "We meet with them on a regular basis and look forward to listening to their suggestions of how to further test the delineation of the plume," said Mossteller. The contamination stems from the former Loral American Beryllium Co. plant that operated in Tallevast under different names for more than four decades. Lockheed acquired the property in 1996 in a corporate buyout of Loral holdings. While trying to sell the plant in 2000, Lockheed discovered the liner of an evaporation pond had leaked, spilling dangerous industrial solvents and chemicals, TCE and others, into the groundwater. While the county and state were notified of the pollution, residents did not learn of the contamination until 2003 because state law said no one was legally bound to notify the community. Tests on monitoring wells installed over the past year now show that the plume originally thought to cover five acres actually extends over 131 acres. As the owner of the property when the contamination was discovered, Lockheed has assumed responsibility for assessing the extent of the contamination and cleaning it up. Tim Varney, the technical consultant chosen by Tallevast residents to monitor Lockheed's progress in remediating the plume, warned company officials and DEP representatives in June that Tetra Tech had taken its samples too soon after the wells had been drilled. Varney said the wells have to settle to get accurate readings. He predicted that the latest testing will come up with new numbers that could change the perimeter of the plume. While Davis admitted different samplings at different times could yield different data, especially if done by different labs, she said those fluctuations would not be dramatic. "Lockheed Martin installed and sampled the monitoring wells in accordance with Florida regulations - that is to wait 24 hours after grouting the well before sampling," said Davis. "In some instances we did wait more than 24 hours so the wells could equilibrate; but, to meet the 90-day requirement imposed by the FDEP, exceeding the 24-hour period was not always possible. We did wait a full week before sampling the Floridan aquifer wells." Tetra Tech completed resampling all 130 wells in the past two weeks, said Davis. Results of those tests will be released at the end of July. "We do not expect to see a wide fluctuation," said Davis. "If there are, it could possibly mean that the dynamic of the well might have changed to allow us to get a more accurate reading to guide the remediation process." Davis said a contaminated well would likely stay contaminated, although the level of contamination might change over time. It's that change in levels that worries Tallevast residents, said Washington. Nothing less than a picket fence of monitoring wells spaced 25 to 50 feet apart will accurately define the plume, said Collins. Collins reached a $16.9 million settlement in 2004 for 1,400 clients whose drinking water was contaminated by TCE traced to the nearby Lockformer Co. In another suit against the company, Collins won a $10 million class-action jury award in 2002 for 186 other families in LeClerq, Ill. whose drinking water was contaminated by a second plume near the Lockformer plume. He also secured a $7.2 million settlement in 2003 for Anne Schreiber, who spent 11 years of her childhood in the LeClerq, Ill., area. Collins proved Schreiber was exposed to TCE as a child, which caused her to develop Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma later in life. In the Lisle case, almost all of the families relied on drinking-water wells for their needs, Collins said. Testing all of those wells for TCE exposure gave a good representation of what toxins were underground, he said. The Tallevast situation warrants similar blanket testing, Collins said in a recent phone interview. Collins warned that TCE can form slugs or pools of high concentration. If a well is drilled outside of that pool or slug, it may not pick up the true level of the toxin in the ground. "Unless you have established that picket fence of monitoring wells, you cannot say where the boundaries lie," Collins said. Finding those boundaries is of paramount importance, said Collins. The answers, he added, are obtainable. "Whether it is Lisle or Bradenton or Dayton, Ohio, the direction of the groundwater is known," said Collins. "The speed is known. You can determine fairly accurately how long it has been in the ground and you can determine the concentrations and movement through the community's groundwater. The company and the government owe it to the people to find these things out." But Davis defended Lockheed's approach to defining the plume. "To identify and not miss the plume, we started with discrete interval sampling and mobile laboratory analysis to aid in determining the optimum number and location of permanent monitoring wells," Davis said. "This means, we sampled the water before installing monitoring wells. We installed over 140 borings for discrete interval sampling and collected over 800 discrete samples for mobile laboratory analysis in order to determine the best locations for the monitoring wells. Then we installed the 130 monitoring wells." The 130 monitoring wells aren't enough for Laura Ward, president of FOCUS, who agrees with Collins' picket-fence approach. "That's what we think, too," said Ward. "We have been asking for that over and over. When you dig one place and not find anything, and drill a few feet away, and find high levels, a picket fence is the only way to find the real boundary of the contamination." Donna Wright, health and social services reporter, can be reached at 745-7049 or at . Herald watchdog This report is part of The Herald's in-depth coverage of toxic contamination stemming from the former Loral American Beryllium Co. plant in Tallevast. HeraldToday.com y ***************************************************************** 42 SignOnSanDiego.com: The discovery of ammonium perchlorate By The Associated Press ASSOCIATED PRESS 4:04 p.m. July 9, 2005 SANTA CLARITA  The discovery of ammonium perchlorate under a massive home development project in northern Los Angeles County has halted construction and raised concerns about the fast-growing region's water supply. The underground pollutant, a component of rocket fuel left over from a former weapons plant, was found in April in a well near the 2,500-home West Creek and 1,089-unit Riverpark developments. Environmentalists have long fought to slow the pace of home construction in the area and have argued the Santa Clarita Valley's water supply is not big enough to keep up with the growing population. They have cited perchlorate as among their concerns, but the discovery in the well marks the first time it have stalled home-building in the area. "They say they want to get these wells back online, but they should be cleaning up the source of the pollution first," said Lynne Plambeck, president of the Santa Clarita Organization for Planning the Environment. "Growth is happening too fast." Valencia Water Co. immediately shut down the well and plans to clean it up. Company president Robert DiPrimio said there was no reason to believe the chemical had reached other wells or was rapidly spreading. Officials are scheduled to review a new environmental study on the water supply next month. "Baywatch." © Copyright 2005 Union-Tribune Publishing Co. ***************************************************************** 43 Las Vegas SUN: Letter: Yucca, energy bill should infuriate all Nevadans July 08, 2005 Nevadans have a healthy mistrust of the federal government, largely because of the political campaign that's been ongoing since 1987 to force upon us a scientifically unsound nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain. More than 30 other states were eliminated as potential sites almost immediately because of political expediency. Nevada was picked because it was politically weak. One would think that after unkept presidential campaign promises in 2000 and 2004 that Gov. Kenny Guinn and other Nevada Republicans would be outraged at President Bush and the Energy Department over the recent allegations of scientific deceit at Yucca Mountain. Instead, Nevada's court victory regarding the mountain's radiation standar, and the Energy Department's incriminating e-mails are pretty much being ignored. The Energy Department is proceeding on Yucca Mountain as if nothing has happened. Where is the outrage from Nevadans on this issue? The state's residents should be expressing their concern to President Bush and to Congress. It is disgusting that the energy bill nearing completion in Congress would subsidize new nuclear power plants. Of course, taxpayers will bear the potentially huge risk imposed by the Price-Anderson Act, which limits the liability of nuclear power producers in the event of a catastrophe. Why not use all subsidy money to promote green energy sources, such as wind, solar, geothermal, biomass and hydrogen, which are safer, do not produce toxic waste and are technologically possible today? FRANK PERNA All contents copyright 2005 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 44 KESQ: Discovery of ammonium perchlorate halts construction in Santa Clarita NewsChannel 3 Palm Springs, CA: July 10, 2005 SANTA CLARITA, Calif. The discovery of ammonium perchlorate under a massive home development project in northern Los Angeles County has halted construction and raised concerns about the fast-growing region's water supply.The underground pollutant is a component of rocket fuel left over from a former weapons plant. It was found in April in a well near the West Creek and Riverpark developments in Santa Clarita.Environmentalists have long fought to slow the pace of home construction in the area. They argue the Santa Clarita Valley's water supply is not big enough to keep up with the growing population.Valencia Water Company immediately shut down the well and plans to clean it up. Officials are scheduled to review a new environmental study on the water supply next month. Copyright 2005 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, Copyright 2002 - 2005 WorldNow and KESQ. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 45 San Bernardino County Sun: Rialto opposes fees by county Published: Friday, July 08, 2005 - 6:58:34 By Nikki Cobb, Staff Writer RIALTO - Officials are fighting a county proposal to add an eight-cent surcharge to residents' monthly trash bills. The county says the surcharge, which works out to 69 cents per ton of garbage, will pay to remove the rocket fuel additive perchlorate from city water wells. But Rialto leaders say San Bernardino County is partly to blame for the chemical, which after decades still leaks into their groundwater, and residents shouldn't have to pay for the cleanup. Richard Scanlan, Rialto's director of airport and solid waste management, said the regional water board ordered the county to either provide water to replace the perchlorate-contaminated groundwater or install filters in affected wells. "The long and the short of it is, they have these costs that have to pay for our water,' he said. "So they're trying to generate a new stream of revenue.' County spokesman David Wert said the surcharge, if approved, will be levied on anyone using the county dump in Rialto. The city, he said, is one of a few with perchlorate problems, so it is one of the few who will benefit from the estimated $1million the county would get annually for the surcharge-funded cleanup. "You could argue that the city has the least to complain about,' Wert said. Not so, Rialto officials say. The city is suing the county and a slew of others, including the Defense Department and numerous government subcontractors, over the perchlorate contamination. City Attorney Robert Owen said the city also will formally challenge the proposed surcharge. "Our citizens are already paying a perchlorate surcharge on their water bill to fund our suit against (those responsible for perchlorate contamination),' Owen said. "They shouldn't have to pay a surcharge on their trash, too.' Owen said the county claims the perchlorate cleanup is an "uncontrollable circumstance,' a label he disputes. "They knew the perchlorate was there eight years ago. It was their negligence that created this problem,' he said. In the back-and-forth, Wert disputed Rialto's claim that the county bears responsibility for the contamination. The county bought the perchlorate-tainted land without knowing the hazard, he said. Now, though, the cleanup must be done. And it's costly. "We could add the surcharge, or put fewer deputies on the street, have fewer libraries, cut museum funds or cut fire service,' Wert said. "Somebody has to pay." Copyright © 2005 Los Angeles Newspaper Group ***************************************************************** 46 Military's Energy - Beam Weapons Delayed Date: Sun, 10 Jul 2005 14:33:53 -0400 One potential customer is the Department of Energy. Researchers at its Sandia National Laboratories are testing Active Denial as a way to repel intruders from nuclear facilities. But Sandia researchers say the beams won't be in place until 2008 at the earliest because so much testing remains. http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/science/AP-Directed-Energy-Weapons.html? Military's Energy - Beam Weapons Delayed a.. E-Mail This b.. Printer-Friendly c.. Single-Page By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Published: July 10, 2005 Filed at 11:22 a.m. ET ARLINGTON, Va. (AP) -- For years, the U.S. military has explored a new kind of firepower that is instantaneous, precise and virtually inexhaustible: beams of electromagnetic energy. ''Directed-energy'' pulses can be throttled up or down depending on the situation, much like the phasers on ''Star Trek'' could be set to kill or merely stun. Such weapons are now nearing fruition. But logistical issues have delayed their battlefield debut -- even as soldiers in Iraq encounter tense urban situations in which the nonlethal capabilities of directed energy could be put to the test. ''It's a great technology with enormous potential, but I think the environment's not strong for it,'' said James Jay Carafano, a senior fellow at the conservative Heritage Foundation who blames the military and Congress for not spending enough on getting directed energy to the front. ''The tragedy is that I think it's exactly the right time for this.'' The hallmark of all directed-energy weapons is that the target -- whether a human or a mechanical object -- has no chance to avoid the shot because it moves at the speed of light. At some frequencies, it can penetrate walls. Since the ammunition is merely light or radio waves, directed-energy weapons are limited only by the supply of electricity. And they don't involve chemicals or projectiles that can be inaccurate, accidentally cause injury or violate international treaties. ''When you're dealing with people whose full intent is to die, you can't give people a choice of whether to comply,'' said George Gibbs, a systems engineer for the Marine Expeditionary Rifle Squad Program who oversees directed-energy projects. ''What I'm looking for is a way to shoot everybody, and they're all OK.'' Almost as diverse as the electromagnetic spectrum itself, directed-energy weapons span a wide range of incarnations. Among the simplest forms are inexpensive, handheld lasers that fill people's field of vision, inducing a temporary blindness to ensure they stop at a checkpoint, for example. Some of these already are used in Iraq. Other radio-frequency weapons in development can sabotage the electronics of land mines, shoulder-fired missiles or automobiles -- a prospect that interests police departments in addition to the military. A separate branch of directed-energy research involves bigger, badder beams: lasers that could obliterate targets tens of miles away from ships or planes. Such a strike would be so surgical that, as some designers put it at a recent conference here, the military could plausibly deny responsibility. The flexibility of directed-energy weapons could be vital as wide-scale, force-on-force conflict becomes increasingly rare, many experts say. But the technology has been slowed by such practical concerns as how to shrink beam-firing antennas and power supplies. Military officials also say more needs to be done to assure the international community that directed-energy weapons set to stun rather than kill will not harm noncombatants. Such issues recently led the Pentagon to delay its Project Sheriff, a plan to outfit vehicles in Iraq with a combination of lethal and nonlethal weaponry -- including a highly touted microwave-energy blaster that makes targets feel as if their skin is on fire. Sheriff has been pushed at least to 2006. ''It was best to step back and make sure we understand where we can go with it,'' said David Law, science and technology chief for the Joint Non-Lethal Weapons Directorate. The directed-energy component in the project is the Active Denial System, developed by Air Force researchers and built by Raytheon Co. It produces a millimeter-wavelength burst of energy that penetrates 1/64 of an inch into a person's skin, agitating water molecules to produce heat. The sensation is certain to get people to halt whatever they are doing. Military investigators say decades of research have shown that the effect ends the moment a person is out of the beam, and no lasting damage is done as long as the stream does not exceed a certain duration. How long? That answer is classified, but it apparently is in the realm of seconds, not minutes. The range of the beam also is secret, though it is said to be further than small arms fire, so an attacker could be repelled before he could pull a trigger. Although Active Denial works -- after a $51 million, 11-year investment -- it has proven to be a ''model for how hard it is to field a directed-energy nonlethal weapon,'' Law said. For example, the prototype system can be mounted on a Humvee but the vehicle has to stop in order to fire the beam. Using the vehicle's electrical power ''is pushing its limits,'' he added. Still, Raytheon is pressing ahead with smaller, portable, shorter-range spinoffs of Active Denial for embassies, ships or other sensitive spots. One potential customer is the Department of Energy. Researchers at its Sandia National Laboratories are testing Active Denial as a way to repel intruders from nuclear facilities. But Sandia researchers say the beams won't be in place until 2008 at the earliest because so much testing remains. In the meantime, Raytheon is trying to drum up business for an automated airport-defense project known as Vigilant Eagle that detects shoulder-fired missiles and fries their electronics with an electromagnetic wave. The system, which would cost $25 million per airport, has proven effective against a ''real threat,'' said Michael Booen, a former Air Force colonel who heads Raytheon's directed-energy work. He refused to elaborate. For Peter Bitar, the future of directed energy boils down to money. Bitar heads Indiana-based Xtreme Alternative Defense Systems Ltd., which makes small blinding lasers used in Iraq. But his real project is a nonlethal energy device called the StunStrike. Basically, it fires a bolt of lightning. It can be tuned to blow up explosives, possibly to stop vehicles and certainly to buzz people. The strike can be made to feel as gentle as ''broom bristles'' or cranked up to deliver a paralyzing jolt that ''takes a few minutes to wear off.'' Bitar, who is of Arab descent, believes StunStrike would be particularly intimidating in the Middle East because, he contends, people there are especially afraid of lightning. At present, StunStrike is a 20-foot tower that can zap things up to 28 feet away. The next step is to shrink it so it could be wielded by troops and used in civilian locales like airplane cabins or building entrances. Xtreme ADS also needs more tests to establish that StunStrike is safe to use on people. But all that takes money -- more than the $700,000 Bitar got from the Pentagon from 2003 until the contract recently ended. Bitar is optimistic StunStrike will be perfected, either with revenue from the laser pointers or a partnership with a bigger defense contractor. In the meantime, though, he wishes soldiers in Iraq already had his lightning device on difficult missions like door-to-door searches. ''It's very frustrating when you know you've got a solution that's being ignored,'' he said. ''The technology is the easy part.'' ------ On the Net: Joint Non-Lethal Weapons Directorate: https://www.jnlwd.usmc.mil ***************************************************************** 47 AP Wire: Congress considers buying property near Paducah plant | 07/10/2005 | Associated Press KEVIL, Ky. - Congress is considering a measure calling for the government to buy about 120 properties owned by families who live above 10 billion gallons of contaminated groundwater near the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant. It's not clear how much the property owners would get or how ongoing cleanup efforts would be affected. But in 2002, local economic development officials estimated such a buyout would cost about $15 million. "At one time I would not have sold, but if the price was right I would listen," said Ronald Lamb, a mechanic who unsuccessfully sued the government over the pollution. "I hope they don't think they will get it for nothing." The proposal has its critics. "It sounds to me like cut and run," Steve Ellis, vice president of the citizens group Taxpayers for Common Sense. "I don't think buying people out is the solution." Tony Hatton, assistant director of the Kentucky Division of Waste Management, which oversees the environmental cleanup at the Paducah plant, said he couldn't see how the federal government would view buying the land as "fitting into any type of remedy" for getting rid of the contamination. State officials would expect to be brought into the decision and discussions about its effect on the cleanup, Hatton said. Some critics say a buyout would limit the government's future liability for cleaning up the contamination. Others wonder what taxpayers have to show for the $178 million spent on various studies and experimental anti-pollution technologies, some of which were tried and then abandoned. "As far as any major results, there aren't any," said Mark Donham, an environmentalist who was the former chairman of the citizens' advisory board that oversaw the plant's cleanup. Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., wants a study done that would answer important questions about what would happen to cleanup efforts if the government buys the land. The measure passed the Senate 92-3 on July 1 and now goes to a conference with the House, which did not include a similar provision. The contaminated groundwater plume, discovered in 1988, is under about 9,500 acres. It contains the solvent trichloroethylene and radioactive technetium-99, both of which originated in the plant, which produces fuel for nuclear power stations. Ken Wheeler, chairman of the Greater Paducah Economic Development Council, said the buyout issue originated with the Paducah Area Community Reuse Organization, a federally funded panel looking to offset job losses at the plant. The reuse group in the past has suggested using sites at and around the plant for an industrial park or manufacturing. Wheeler told the Courier-Journal in Louisville that he thought the cleanup would continue, regardless of the finding's of the study sponsored by McConnell. "The study is to decide on a course of action and assess the interests of the owners," he said. Bill Tanner, superintendent of the West McCracken Water District and a former member of the citizens' advisory board, said he doubts the site would appeal to any industry unrelated to nuclear activities or the plant cleanup. "You're not going to get a General Motors to come in there," he said. Information from: The Courier-Journal, ***************************************************************** 48 Santa Fe New Mexican: UC and LANL: A hasty union that's endured Sun Jul 10, 2005 8:20 pm The long-standing association between nuclear weapons and the University of California -- an institution of Nobel Prize-winning scientists and liberal thought -- might seem odd. But 60 years ago, the nation's top scientists wanted UC to be their boss, rather than the military, as they scrambled to build an atomic bomb after Japan attacked Pearl Harbor. UC was at first reluctant to become the business manager of a new secret laboratory in New Mexico during World War II. Indeed, a university official suggested giving the contract to The University of New Mexico -- but one of its famous physicists, Ernest O. Lawrence, persuaded university officials otherwise. At the end of the war, UC was ready to sever ties with Los Alamos National Laboratory, but it found it hard to do so because of postwar politics -- and the once-again persuasive lobbying by that same physicist. Who first suggested UC as the prime contractor? In some histories, that answer is not clear. Recently, Alan B. Carr, a historian for LANL, compiled key government documents in a booklet called The University of California Contract to Operate the Los Alamos Laboratory, 1942-1947: A Documentary History. "Unfortunately, however," Carr writes, "there is no definite record of how the University of California was proposed as a potential candidate to run the laboratory." But Gregg Herken, a UC historian at the University of California-Merced, has no doubts: "It was Ernest O. Lawrence," he said in a short interview. "The inventor of the cyclotron, for which he received the Nobel Prize in 1939, Lawrence was no less famous among colleagues for his unparalleled skills as an entrepreneur and promoter of 'big science,' " is how Herken describes Lawrence in his book, The Atomic West, published by the University of Washington Press. Lawrence was a good friend of John Neylan, president of the UC board of regents. Lawrence, an experimental physicist, and J. Robert Oppenheimer, whose work was on the theoretical side, had become friends when Oppenheimer came to UC-Berkeley in 1929. As World War II approached, Lawrence began to get involved in government-sponsored war research, including the uranium-separation program for what was to become the Manhattan Project. In 1942, Oppenheimer was asked to lead a series of meetings on the feasibility of developing an atomic bomb. Those meetings were held in a building on the Berkeley campus. So almost from the beginning of the bomb-research effort in 1941, UC had some kind of connection. With Lawrence pushing from behind, UC was to get involved in a big way. The military question When Gen. Leslie R. Groves was given command of the effort to produce an atomic bomb in 1942, he assumed any laboratory would be under military control. His chosen scientific director, Oppenheimer, also assumed so to such an extent he ordered Army uniforms with the rank of lieutenant colonel. But Oppenheimer ran into opposition from some of the men he wanted to bring to Los Alamos. Isidor I. Rabi, a physicist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Robert F. Bacher, an experimental physicist and administrator at M.I.T., both of whom Oppenheimer wanted badly, flat told him no to any idea of working in a military lab. A compromise was then worked out with Groves: As long as the lab was doing the research portion of the work, it would be civilian; as soon as it went to the engineering phase -- that is, assembling bombs -- the Army would take control. Bacher, though, made it clear, in the last sentence of his acceptance letter, how he stood: "And this letter is my letter of resignation on the day this become a military project." As part of the agreement for civilian control, Groves agreed to find a contractor to run the lab up until the point the Army took over. This was spelled out in a letter signed by Groves and James B. Conant, the president of Harvard University and head of the atomic program of the Office of Scientific Research and Development. (The OSRD was created by the Roosevelt administration to coordinate scientific research for military purposes.) "In the end, the military never took charge of Los Alamos," Carr writes. The actual negotiations between the university and the government fell to Robert M. Underhill, secretary for the board of regents. Carr says Underhill, with the approval of UC President Robert C. Sproul, accepted a letter of intent from the OSRD on Feb. 10, 1943. "Unfortunately, preliminary negotiations with Groves and Oppenheimer broke down almost immediately," Carr writes. "Underhill's primary responsibility was to protect UC, and when Groves and Oppenheimer failed to offer satisfactory terms, he walked out of a meeting on 20 February." Settling on UC One of the documents in Carr's compilation is a letter from Underhill dated March 15, 1945, to Lt. Col. Stanley L. Stewart, the contracting officer for the Manhattan Engineering District, the overall agency for bomb development. The letter is a report on the contract negotiations that took place three years before, including the Feb. 20 meeting. In it, Underhill said there were problems between the university and the scientists on the project about the plan of operation. Underhill didn't seem to care whether the university got the contract or not. "I suggested that some other university might be found to carry on the activity," Underhill says in his 1945 letter. "There was some discussion of Cal. Tech. (California Institute of Technology), in view of the fact that Dr. Oppenheimer had served at California and C.I.T. as well. I also suggested that the University of New Mexico might take on the work as it would be located nearby. There was some discussion at that meeting of the University of Chicago carrying on the work because of some interlocking arrangements. However, there seemed to be no general desire on the part of the Army that any institution but the University of California be requested to do the work. ... "I expressed the attitude of the University of California as being perfectly willing to have the work given to some other University and withdrew from the meeting. The next day, I was informed by the Director (Oppenheimer), whom I met by accident on a sidewalk in New York just opposite the Grand Central Terminal, that the group still wanted the University to go forward with the contract." Underhill met with Groves the next day, and after a few more weeks of negotiations, the contract was hammered out. Underhill and a Col. J.C. Marshall, contracting officer for the U.S. Corps of Engineers, signed it on April 20, 1943. As a contract, it reads fairly straightforward, with clauses protecting the university from damages, lawsuits as related to activities, audits, overtime, patents and the like. What it doesn't mention is Los Alamos or atomic bombs. A fresh look The contract signed in 1943 is the same contract that UC operates under now, only with many modifications, said Kevin Roark, a spokesman for Los Alamos National Laboratory. The new contract, when it is approved after a first-ever competition this year, with be a completely new one, he said. Underhill was asked, in an oral-history interview in 1976, if he didn't feel "a bit queasy about accepting a contract that you really knew nothing about." "There was a war on, and the university was expected to meet the obligations suggested by the United States government, and my duty was to see to it that we didn't get hurt," he replied. "So, I guess, I wasn't very troubled then. I was troubled whether there was enough money to run them, but I could take care of that with advances." Underhill likely didn't really know what was going on in Los Alamos despite visiting the lab frequently during the war, Roark said. "Sproul and Underhill were in the dark about the nature of the work," he said. "Underhill signed documents that he had no idea what they were for." The contract was and always has been nonprofit, Roark said. UC receives a management fee, but any extra money generated by lab operation goes right back into research. UC, as a public institution, is a nonprofit organization, he said. The contract was extended twice during the war, but even before the second extension expired, Sproul was suggesting the university was not going to extend it any longer. Underhill was told the Army and the university would sever ties in March 1946. Sproul, according to Herken's book, told the regents he was eager to end the contract and be "rid of bomb making, plutonium, and New Mexico." Herken also writes Oppenheimer wanted ties to be severed because he "had continually chafed at the bureaucratic restrictions imposed by the university." Oppenheimer also, to avoid what Herken calls "endless questions from prying UC administrators," kept Underhill in the dark. It was Lawrence, Herken writes, who finally told Underhill what was going on. Finding stability Events, including delays in the creation of the Atomic Energy Commission, which was supposed to take over from the Army, kept the cancellation from happening. As time passed, Lawrence pushed for a pre-eminent role for UC in postwar big science, including establishment of his own lab at Berkeley. The university also began to see the advantages of having cutting-edge science under its control and began to look at Los Alamos -- and a possible new, competing lab in Livermore -- under its control. By the late 1940s, Herken writes, neither Sproul nor AEC officials saw the relationship as anything but permanent. "The seemingly unlikely marriage of the University of California and the Atomic Energy Commission was consummated shortly thereafter," Herken writes of the UC-LANL talks. On Jan. 1, 1947, the lab was transferred out of the Army's Manhattan Engineering District and into the jurisdiction of the Atomic Energy Commission. At that time, Project Y, as the lab was called during the war, became Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory. It was renamed Los Alamos National Laboratory on Jan. 1, 1981, when the Department of Energy, the successor to the AEC, wanted to apply some consistency to names of the various labs under its jurisdiction, Roark said. By Chris Mechels (Submitted: 07/10/2005 9:48 am In the main this piece is a useful addition to the UC/LANL history. However, near the end the reporter has some serious lapses. If you read the Herken work closely, you will find that UC President Sproul and Underhill wanted no part of LANL after WWII. It was Lawrence and (Regents Chair)Neylan who were promoting it, as a way to get AEC funding for Lawrence's accelerators, which the AEC was not keen to fund. UC finally agreed to manage LANL as a "quid pro quo" for AEC funding for Lawrence. Lawrence received, and wasted, huge amounts of AEC funding on his schemes, and UC showed, and shows, little interest in managing LANL. Other errors; there was no thought of a separate Livermore lab at that time. That came later, in 1952. And UC was not keen for the science opportunities at LANL, as related by the reporter. A Norberg interview of Underhill, concerning the post WWII contract negotiation, makes very clear that UC was not keen, at all. Underhill, and UC, were so arrogant that they insisted that the head of the AEC, Carrol Wilson, would not be allowed to sit in on the negotiations. He had to wait outside during the sessions. At least one thing, the vaunted UC arrogance, has not changed with time. To me, the reporter does not fairly reflect what Herken has written. Go read the book; "The Brotherhood of the Bomb" and make your own judgement. Also, download a copy of the "Zinner Report" from http://www.utwatch.org for a 1970 UC Academic Senate evaluation of the UC/LANL relationship. In essence they reported that UC was NOT managing LANL and never had. The reporter needs to do his homework a bit more carefully. He might also find Bob Seidel of "Lawrence and his laboratory" a useful source on this period. the Santa Fe New Mexican. ***************************************************************** 49 HoustonChronicle.com: American Prometheus by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin July 8, 2005, 12:33PM Inside Los Alamos Examining the man and the culture behind the atomic bomb By CHRIS PATSILELIS When J. Robert Oppenheimer, father of the atomic bomb, formally resigned his directorship of the secret Los Alamos laboratory in 1945, he prophesied that "if atomic bombs are to be added as new weapons to the arsenals of a warring world, or to the arsenals of the nations preparing for war, then the time will come when mankind will curse the names of Los Alamos and Hiroshima." Although the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki have been the sole casualties of atomic war, Oppenheimer's words have reverberated throughout the past 60 years — and, unnervingly, into our future. Kai Bird, historian and contributing editor of the Nation, and Tufts University professor Martin J. Sherwin, author of A World Destroyed: Hiroshima and Its Legacies, have written an absorbing, densely detailed biography, American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer. Twenty-five years in the making and drawing upon archives in the United States and Europe, FBI files and interviews with Oppenheimer's friends, relatives and colleagues, American Prometheus is both an incisive portrait of a scientist and a vivid chronicle of an age. J. ("Julius" on his birth certificate) Robert Oppenheimer was born in New York City on April 22, 1904, to wealthy (three maids, one chauffeur), cultured, first- and second-generation German-Jewish immigrants. Precocious, sensitive, introverted and aloof, Robert studied science at Harvard and Cambridge universities and in the 1920s went to Germany to study the emerging theories of quantum physics. Returning to the United States in 1929, Oppenheimer became a professor at the University of California at Berkeley, and in the 1930s founded America's first center for the study of quantum physics. Moved to work toward economic and racial justice by the harsh realities of the Depression, Oppenheimer also became acquainted with people who were communist sympathizers if not outright communists. In April 1943, with World War II raging, the 38-year-old Oppenheimer took charge of the government's secret bomb-making laboratory in the desert at Los Alamos, N.M. Working with the efficient, no-nonsense Gen. Leslie R. Groves, by summer 1945 "Oppie" oversaw a frontierlike community of 4,000 civilians and 2,000 servicemen. He directed several hundred of the world's most accomplished scientists, including many Nobel Prize winners. He also showed newly developed managerial skills as he successfully tended to the myriad medical, morale and recreational needs of his large flock. He succeeded in his main task at 5:30 in the chilly dark morning of July 16, 1945, when the first atomic bomb was detonated blindingly at the Trinity site in southern New Mexico. One witness later described the moment: "All of a sudden, the night turned into day, and it was tremendously bright, the chill turned into warmth." Practically overnight Oppenheimer became America's hero-scientist. But he felt terribly guilty after the horrifying devastation of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings. He agonized over the question of scientists' moral responsibility for the consequences of their inventions and whether they should have a say in determining how their inventions should be used. The last half of American Prometheus — some 300 pages — is taken up with Oppenheimer's relentless struggle to warn the world about nuclear power ("We have made a ... most terrible weapon ... an evil thing."), his fight against physicist Edward Teller's H-Bomb, and his endless battles against those who claimed he was a communist or communist sympathizer. At the height of the anti-communist hysteria in 1954, the Atomic Energy Commission branded Oppenheimer a security risk and revoked his clearance to work on government projects. Spiritually tormented, Oppenheimer died 13 years later of throat cancer. Except for the long, tedious stretches about the investigations and court battles relating to Oppenheimer's politics, American Prometheus is a comprehensive, informative study of a fascinating scientist and his age. Jennet Conant's 109 East Palace: Robert Oppenheimer and the Secret City of Los Alamos focuses exclusively on the period from April 1943 to August 1945 when Oppenheimer and Gen. Groves directed the clandestine Los Alamos Project. Conant, author of Tuxedo Park and granddaughter of James B. Conant, former co-director of the Manhattan Project, tells her story from the viewpoint of Dorothy McKibbin, a friendly middle-aged widow who was one of the first local civilians hired by the Los Alamos team. Ostensibly, McKibbin's job was secretarial, but her real function was "gatekeeper" of Los Alamos. Working out of an office in Santa Fe, McKibbin issued security passes to all those who wished to enter Los Alamos, 35 miles to the northwest. She was told never to ask probing questions of supervisors, to refer to Oppenheimer (whom she idolized) as "Mr. Bradley," and never, under any circumstances, to use the word "physicist." Whereas American Prometheus takes a wider perspective of Los Alamos and the crucial scientific project, 109 East Palace focuses up-close on the day-to-day living experience in the secret community in the desert. We learn what it was like for wives not to know the projects their scientist-husbands were working on. We see independent-minded, indeed egotistical, scientists chafe under the dictatorial authority of Groves. And we watch as alcohol consumption increases as the months crawl by in the isolated environment. Conant describes the baby boom that occurred in this Spartan setting with few recreational activities. Eighty babies were born in the first year, and by June 1944 approximately one-fifth of the married women were pregnant. Hospital costs skyrocketed because of the increasing birth rate. Since the government had to pick up the medical tab, Groves felt compelled to ask Oppenheimer to do something about it. The latter declined, however, stating that population control was not one of his duties. Besides, "Oppie's" wife was pregnant, too. 109 East Palace reveals the human side of the Los Alamos story. Much less about the frenetic race to build the atomic bomb, this book is a compassionate look at the hopes, loves and anguish of people obliged to live closely together in the desolate New Mexican desert. Chris Patsilelis is a reviewer in Cheshire, Conn. The Houston Chronicle ***************************************************************** 50 Courier Journal: U.S. may study buyout around Paducah plant Sunday, July 10, 2005 Chemicals tainted land's groundwater Ron Lamb looked over a well on his land that the government capped in 1994 after the water was found to be contaminated. (By Jim Roshan, Special to The Courier-Journal) By James R. Carroll KEVIL, Ky. -- Ronald Lamb was outraged and demanded government compensation after discovering in 1994 that his water well had been tainted by pollution from the nearby Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant. Now, Lamb said he's intrigued by a measure before Congress calling for the government to study buying the properties of families whose homes and farms sit on top of a plume of groundwater contaminated by degreasing solvents and radioactive chemicals. "At one time I would not have sold, but if the price was right I would listen," said Lamb, a mechanic who unsuccessfully sued over the pollution. "I hope they don't think they will get it for nothing." It's not clear how much Lamb and other owners of about 120 homes sitting above 10 billion gallons of contaminated groundwater might get, or how ongoing cleanup efforts would be affected. But in 2002, local economic development officials estimated such a buyout would cost about $15 million. The department is being asked to look into the purchases as a way of saving the government money, according to language inserted by Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., into the $31.2 billion spending bill for energy and water projects. "It sounds to me like cut and run," Steve Ellis, vice president of the citizens group Taxpayers for Common Sense, said of how a buyout might affect the cleanup. "I don't think buying people out is the solution." Tony Hatton, assistant director of the Kentucky Division of Waste Management, which oversees the environmental cleanup at the Paducah plant, said he couldn't see how the federal government would view buying the land as "fitting into any type of remedy" for getting rid of the contamination. State officials would expect to be brought into the decision and discussions about its effect on the cleanup, Hatton said. McConnell, who has said he supports the ongoing cleanup, said a study could answer important questions about what would happen to those efforts if the government buys the land. The measure passed the Senate 92-3 on July 1 and now goes to a conference with the House, which did not include a similar provision.Limiting liability? The contaminated groundwater plume, discovered in 1988, is under about 9,500 acres. It contains the solvent trichloroethylene and radioactive technetium-99, both of which originated in the plant, which produces fuel for nuclear power stations. Some critics say a buyout would limit the government's future liability for cleaning up the contamination. Other critics wonder what taxpayers have to show for the $178 million spent on various studies and experimental anti-pollution technologies, some of which were tried and then abandoned. "As far as any major results, there aren't any," said Mark Donham, an environmentalist who was the former chairman of the citizens' advisory board that oversaw the plant's cleanup. But Jim Smart, an associate engineering professor at the University of Kentucky's campus in Paducah who also serves on the advisory board, said it has taken time to evaluate different technologies and to properly study and map the contamination. "Maybe looking back, the money could have been spent wiser, but that's hindsight," he said. The Energy Department for about a decade has been paying the West McCracken Water District about $65,000 a year to provide free municipal water to homes whose well water was tainted by the pollution. How long a buyout study would take and what would happen to the land after the government bought it is unclear. Energy Department spokeswoman Laura Schachter said everything the study would cover hasn't been worked out yet, but part of its scope would be "does this effectively help with reducing risks to people and to the environment?"Using the land Some local officials think a buyout would clear the way for local industrial development on the land. But others doubt any company would be attracted to an area dotted with chemical and radioactive contamination. Schachter insisted her agency is not giving up on the cleanup. She acknowledged the department has talked about studying a buyout, but "later down the line." "We'll follow the will of Congress," Schachter said of McConnell's request for the study. Ken Wheeler, chairman of the Greater Paducah Economic Development Council, said the buyout issue originated with the Paducah Area Community Reuse Organization, a federally funded panel looking to offset job losses at the plant and its eventual closing. In a telephone interview, Wheeler suggested the private property might be consolidated for a more appropriate use. The reuse group in the past has suggested using sites at and around the plant for an industrial park or manufacturing. Wheeler said he thought the cleanup would continue, regardless of the study's findings. "The study is to decide on a course of action and assess the interests of the owners," he said. McConnell learned of preliminary conversations on a buyout late last year and sent a letter to the Energy Department in December asking about the implications of purchasing property near the plant. Among other things, McConnell wanted to know why the buyout was being looked at as an option for dealing with the contamination, whether such a purchase would save money that could be used for other cleanup projects, and whether buying land over the plume might affect cleanup commitments. "While I understand this proposal may allow (the Energy Department) to reduce its cleanup efforts off-site, I am concerned that this approach may be used as a rationale to discontinue efforts to clean the source of the contamination at the plant site," McConnell wrote to Paul Golan, then the Energy Department's acting assistant secretary for environmental management.Neighbors Although a buyout is only conceptual, it would involve about 120 families from the Heath-Grahamville area whose homes or land sit over the plume. "If the money's right, I'll sell anything," said Christopher Johnson, who is raising a family on 10 acres and says he likes rural living. "But they will have to dish out some dollars for me to leave." But others question whether a buyout could lead to the government using eminent domain to force families off their land. Bill Tanner, superintendent of the West McCracken Water District and a former member of the citizens' advisory board, doubted the site would appeal to any industry unrelated to nuclear activities or the plant cleanup. "You're not going to get a General Motors to come in there," Tanner said. Donham said the key will be establishing a fair market value for the property. "How do you value two decades or more of living in a toxic environment, having family members getting ill, and seeing the value and heritage of your property go downhill?" he asked. "Yet the government won't compensate for this, and I foresee a lot of bitterness if the government tries to take this property on the cheap." Copyright 2004 The Courier-Journal. ***************************************************************** 51 Carlsbad Current-Argus: Head of Carlsbad’s Sandia labs goes to work on Los Alamos bid Updated: July 10, 2005 - 02:24:12 By Victoria Parker-Stevens/Current-Argus Staff Writer CARLSBAD — The head of Sandia National Laboratories in Carlsbad recently left his position to help the lab’s contractor in its bid to run New Mexico’s other national lab. Paul Shoemaker served as Sandia’s Carlsbad Programs Group manager for five years. He is now focused on the Los Alamos National Laboratory bid of Lockheed Martin Corp., which runs Sandia for the federal Energy Department. Lockheed Martin, with partners that include the University of Texas system, is seeking the contract that has been held by the University of California since LANL’s beginnings in the 1940s. A series of problems with security and finances prompted the DOE to put the contract out to bid. The head of the Lockheed Martin bid team is former Sandia president Paul Robinson. Originally from Albuquerque, Shoemaker has been with Sandia for more than 20 years. He has a degree in physics from New Mexico Tech and a master’s in public administration from the University of Texas. Before moving to Carlsbad, he worked with Sandia senior management in Albuquerque as part of the non-proliferation and materials control strategic business unit. He took the position in Carlsbad formerly held by Ned Elkins, who had left to head up what was then a new LANL presence in Carlsbad. “Paul did a good job for Sandia while he was here,” Elkins said recently, noting the lab’s work on the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant’s recertification application. “I think he kept the focus of the organization.” One of the Carlsbad Programs Group’s largest projects under Shoemaker’s direction was its technical contributions to the 9,000-plus page recertification application. The application documents compliance with Environmental Protection Agency standards. The EPA must recertify WIPP every five years. While in Carlsbad, Shoemaker spoke highly of the value of collaboration among all WIPP-related organizations, as well as Sandia’s connections in the community. As vice president, Shoemaker was next in line to be Carlsbad Department of Development board president. “He was definitely an asset to the CDOD board, and we’re going to miss him,” said Paul Detweiler, CDOD executive director. “I’m sure wherever he goes, he’s going to make a big impact,” he said, noting the value of Shoemaker’s management experience, as well as his science and technology background. “He had good input and a lot of knowledge that was valuable to all of the (CDOD) projects.” Board president Mike Garringer, formerly secretary-treasurer, now holds what would have been Shoemaker’s seat. “He’s a really bright guy, very personable,” Garringer said. “We were really sorry to lose Paul. He was very interested in what was happening in Carlsbad and having Sandia be a big part of that. We need more companies like that.” In addition to Paul, his wife Marissa and kids will also be missed in Carlsbad, said Leslie Rostro, a friend who worked with them when she headed up the local United Way organization. “I think it’s a very big loss,” she said. “They cared a lot about the community.” Currently, S. Andrew Orrell is serving as acting manager of Sandia’s Carlsbad operation. Shoemaker could not be reached for comment. Copyright © 2004 Carlsbad Current-Argus, a Gannett Co., Inc. ***************************************************************** 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: *****************************************************************