***************************************************************** 01/07/07 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 15.5 ***************************************************************** 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 [NYTr] Brit Papers Reporting Israeli Plan to Nuke Iran 2 [NYTr] Iran, Russia Again Urge Talks over Nukes 3 [NYTr] Israeli Plan to Nuke Iran: The Official Denial 4 London Times: Revealed: Israel plans nuclear strike on Iran - 5 IRIB PERSIAN NEWS: IRI honor NPT if not threatened more 6 IRIB PERSIAN NEWS: Iran victim of UNSC double standard 7 IRIB PERSIAN NEWS: No attack will go unanswered 8 IRIB PERSIAN NEWS: Quitting IAEA not on Iran agenda 9 IRIB PERSIAN NEWS: China backs Iran N-activities 10 AFP: Iran and trade to top Olmert's agenda in China visit - 11 AFP: Israel plans 'nuclear' strike on Iran 12 Guardian Unlimited: Israel Denies Planning Iran Nuke Attack | 13 AFP: Tehran vows to cooperate with UN atomic agency 14 Guardian Unlimited: Israel Rejects Report It May Attack Iran 15 Guardian Unlimited: Report: U.S., N.Korea to Meet in Jan. 16 Korea Herald: Seoul, Washington, Tokyo rush plans to cope with N.K. 17 Korea Herald: U.S., N. Korea may hold financial talks in week of Jan 18 YONHAP NEWS: N.Korea appears to be ready for 2nd nuke test - S. Kore 19 Korea Times: Allies United Against Nukes 20 AFP: Rice calls for denuclearization moves from North Korea 21 Japan Times: Spain offers to help on N. Korea 22 UPI: Rice warns N. Korea of further isolation 23 Guardian Unlimited: Official: U.S., N.Korea to Meet in Jan. 24 US: Las Vegas SUN: Western Shoshone keep fighting for 1863 treaty pr 25 BBC NEWS: Russia attacks US on defence ban 26 US: New York Times: U.S. Selecting Hybrid Design for Warheads - 27 US: Antiwar.com: Bonkers Bolton's Legacy - 28 US: Patriot Ledger: Company caught in fallout of feds nuclear laws; 29 Japan Times: Japan mulled allowing in nuke-armed U.S. ships 30 AFP: US to announce new nuclear warhead 31 BBC NEWS: Glasgow and West | Academics protest against Trident 32 Independent: Plea to stop Rio Tinto quitting Britain NUCLEAR REACTORS 33 US: reviewjournal.com: NRC commissioner stepping down 34 US: Sun News: Nuclear energy could ease power concerns 35 US: Arizona Republic: APS president: Rate increase will end up savin 36 US: Carlsbad Current-Argus: Schedule set for GNEP public scoping mee 37 AFP: Czech Republic's Temelin nuclear unit shut down for test 38 AFP: Czech Republic's Temelin nuclear reactor back on stream 39 Japan Times: Kepco staff face charges over reactor accident | 40 icScotland: Scotland 'can't afford nuclear' NUCLEAR SECURITY 41 Independent: Israel 'has plan for nuclear strike on Iran' NUCLEAR SAFETY 42 [NYTr] Poisoned Once, Poisoned Twice... Litvinenko Update 43 US: reviewjournal.com: Foe of test site blast - Agencies admit displ 44 US: Bradenton Herald: Issues that deserve attention in 2007 45 US: AP Wire: Ill former nuclear workers question why Mound records w 46 US: Deseret News: Huntsman orders 2 hearings on 'Strake' 47 US: Las Vegas SUN: Utah governor plans public hearings on Divine Str 48 US: The Spectrum: Huntsman promises hearing 49 Independent: Nuclear clean-up cash crisis puts 3,000 jobs in jeopard 50 Rivista Online: Evidence of Depleted Uranium disappears 51 The Spectrum: Time to speak up on test 52 US: The Spectrum: Bomb test fails to capture interest 53 US: Salt Lake Tribune: Guv wants Utah to have a say 54 US: Dayton Daily News: Former Mound employees, advocates question de 55 US: Atlantic Free Press: Bomb Test Fails to Capture Interest - 56 US: Daily Herald: Huntsman plans Divine Strake hearings 57 US: IHT: Whistle-blower awaits word from Supreme Court in 17-year-ol 58 US: Guardian Unlimited: Supreme Court to Rule on Whistle-Blowing NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE 59 US: Aiken Today: Aiken has come a long ways, still a ways to go 60 US: Dayton Daily News: Toxic Mound records buried in New Mexico 61 US: Boston.com: U.S. reviews Ohio toxic waste cleanup - 62 US: AU ABC: Greens fear federal intervention on WA uranium ban. PEACE US DEPT. OF ENERGY 63 SF New Mexican: LANL under watchful eye 64 Tri-City Herald: Vit plant construction a huge undertaking 65 Inside Bay Area: Feds reject 'green team' lab bid 66 KnoxNews: Nuclear sites to be discussed in Oak Ridge ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** FULL NEWS STORIES ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** 1 [NYTr] Brit Papers Reporting Israeli Plan to Nuke Iran Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2007 22:13:19 -0500 (EST) X-Sender-Host-Name: olm.blythe-systems.com X-DSPAM-Result: mail; result="Innocent"; class="Innocent"; probability=0.0000; confidence=1.00; signature=N/A X-Spam-Class: HAM-VERY Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit sent by MichaelP (activ-l) [I've never been sure about the reliability of Brit. Sunday Times stories -- In my memory it did good in publicizing the 1960's scandal involving a government minister (Profumo) and a call-girl, and it also did good in announcing the rendition of Mordecai Vanunu by Israel when he gave info about the Israeli nuclear facilities to that same paper. But there have been other stories that didn't stick.-Michael] Reuters via Yahoo - Jan 7, 2006 http://sg.news.yahoo.com/070106/3/45tb1.html LONDON (Reuters) - Israel has drawn up secret plans to destroy Iran's uranium enrichment facilities with tactical nuclear weapons, the Sunday Times newspaper said. Citing what it said were several Israeli military sources, the paper said two Israeli air force squadrons had been training to blow up an enrichment plant in Natanz using low-yield nuclear "bunker busters". Two other sites, a heavy water plant at Arak and a uranium conversion plant at Isfahan, would be targeted with conventional bombs, the Sunday Times said. The U.N. Security Council voted unanimously last month to slap sanctions on Iran to try to stop uranium enrichment that Western powers fear could lead to making bombs. Tehran insists its plans are peaceful and says it will continue enrichment. Israel has refused to rule out pre-emptive military action against Iran along the lines of its 1981 air strike against an atomic reactor in Iraq, though many analysts believe Iran's nuclear facilities are too much for Israel to take on alone. The newspaper said the Israeli plan envisaged conventional laser-guided bombs opening "tunnels" into the targets. Nuclear warheads would then be fired into the plant at Natanz, exploding deep underground to reduce radioactive fallout. Israeli pilots have flown to Gibraltar in recent weeks to train for the 2,000 mile (3,200 km) round-trip to the Iranian targets, the Sunday Times said, and three possible routes to Iran have been mapped out including one over Turkey. However it also quoted sources as saying a nuclear strike would only be used if a conventional attack was ruled out and if the United States declined to intervene. Disclosure of the plans could be intended to put pressure on Tehran to halt enrichment, the paper added. Washington has said military force remains an option while insisting that its priority is to reach a diplomatic solution. Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has called for Israel to be "wiped off the map". Israel, widely believed to have the Middle East's only nuclear arsenal, has said it will not allow Iran to acquire nuclear weapons. *** sent by mark Graffis (activ-l) The Independent - Jan 6, 2007 http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/article2132596.ece Israel 'has plan for nuclear strike on Iran' By Marie Woolf, Political Editor Israel has drawn up secret plans to use low-yield nuclear weapons to knock out Iran's uranium enrichment facilities, it was claimed last night. According to a report in The Sunday Times, two Israeli air force squadrons are training to use nuclear "bunker busting" bombs to demolish Iran's heavily guarded enrichment programme. Israeli military commanders are said to believe that conventional strikes may not be sufficient to wipe out Iran's enrichment facilities, some of which are built beneath 70ft of concrete and rock. Under the plans conventional laser-guided bombs would open tunnels into the targets and then mini nuclear weapons would be fired, exploding deep underground. The nuclear-tipped, bunker-busting bombs would only be used if a conventional attack was ineffective, or if the US, which also wants to halt Iran's nuclear programme, fails to act. The leaking of the "plans" may well be designed to apply pressure on the US. Israel has already made it clear that it does not want to allow Iran to develop nuclear weapons. It fears for its own safety after the Iranian President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, said: "Israel must be wiped off the map." Israel is said to have identified three prime targets south of Tehran, including Nantanz, where facilities are being installed for uranium enrichment underground. Israeli pilots are believed to have flown to Gibraltar recently to train for the 2,000-mile round trip to Iran. A spokesman for the Israeli embassy in London said last night that Israel preferred to use diplomatic means to end Iran's nuclear enrichment programme. "We have an unchanged policy position on the Iranian nuclear issue. Israel prefers this issue to be resolved through diplomatic channels," he said. "We cannot comment on any other scenario." * ================================================================ .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 ================================================================ ***************************************************************** 2 [NYTr] Iran, Russia Again Urge Talks over Nukes Date: Sat, 6 Jan 2007 12:30:45 -0500 (EST) X-Sender-Host-Name: olm.blythe-systems.com X-DSPAM-Result: mail; result="Innocent"; class="Innocent"; probability=0.0000; confidence=1.00; signature=N/A X-Spam-Class: HAM-VERY Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit [Russia is supporting Iran's call for talks to reach a solution on the issue of nuclear development. The US keeps insisting on surrender before negotiations, and Iran will not give up its right, under the NPT, to develop nuclear power. Nothing changes. But Russia is assuming the temporary rotating Presidency of the UN Security Council and continues to urge restraint (2nd item below). -NY Transfer] Prensa Latina, Havana http://www.plenglish.com Iranian Diplomat Favors Nuclear Talks Havana, Jan 6 (PL/NYTr) The Iranian ambassador to Cuba Ahmad Edrisian has declared that only dialogue will solve the controversies on the nuclear issue between the US and his country. In an interview released by the Granma newspaper on Saturday and in a clear allusion to a declaration recently endorsed by the UN Security Council against Iran, the diplomat stated that the matter would not be solved with resolutions or sanctions by that international organ. After recalling that his nation has not occupied any other State in the last 200 years, Edrisian asserted they would never create atomic weapons but that they would defend their right to the generation of nuclear energy for peaceful aims. "We don't want controversies, we want dialogue and respect," emphasized the ambassador and announced the planned February 11th opening of 3,000 centrifuges to produce enriched uranium contributing to the generation of electric energy. On the other hand, Edrisian highlighted the advances of the Persian state and described as truly democratic the electoral process of the Municipal Councils recently concluded, with more than 60 percent attendance and in which 5,000 women were candidates. ln isn ro mf PL-9 *** Russia Again Urges Nuclear Talks Moscow, Jan 5 (PL/NYTr) Iranian nuclear negotiations will be central to the agenda of Russia's temporary presidency of the UN Security Council in January, a diplomatic source said Friday. The Moscow UN representative, Vitali Churkin, has recently taken the post, and says he will prioritize peace and security on the planet, according to declarations in the press. Churkin said the considerations of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) will make possible talks with Teheran, noted the radio station La Voz de Russia. The diplomat said Moscow has clearly aimed its efforts towards the IAEA regarding the Persian nation's nuclear program. On the other hand, Churkin urged a calm response from Iranian authorities to the UN Security Council's sanctions, encouraged by US and Great Britain. "Perhaps some commitments will arise in diplomatic and political circles after these angry declarations," said the Russian representative, making reference to Iran negotiating with the international community. ln abo oda mf PL-15 * ================================================================ .NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems . Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us . .339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org .List Archives: https://olm.blythe-systems.com/pipermail/nytr/ .Subscribe: https://olm.blythe-systems.com/mailman/listinfo/nytr ================================================================ ***************************************************************** 3 [NYTr] Israeli Plan to Nuke Iran: The Official Denial Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2007 16:11:06 -0500 (EST) X-Sender-Host-Name: olm.blythe-systems.com X-DSPAM-Result: mail; result="Innocent"; class="Innocent"; probability=0.0000; confidence=1.00; signature=N/A X-Spam-Class: HAM-VERY Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit [Well, since we never believe anything until it's officially denied, it looks as though the Brit newspapers may be more right than alarmist. -NY Transfer] sent by Michael Givel (activ-l) Haaretz - Jan 7, 2007 http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/810130.html Israel denies plan to hit Iran enrichment plant with tactical nukes By Haaretz Service and Agencies The Foreign Ministry in Jerusalem denied Sunday a report in the British media that Israel has drawn up secret plans to destroy Iran's uranium enrichment facilities with conventional and tactical nuclear weapons. Citing what it said were several Israel Defense Forces sources, the British newspaper The Sunday Times said two Israel Air Force squadrons had been training to blow up an enrichment plant in Natanz using low-yield nuclear "bunker busters." Two other sites, a heavy water plant at Arak and a uranium conversion plant at Isfahan, would be targeted with conventional bombs, the Sunday Times said. But Foreign Ministry spokesman Mark Regev said that Israel wanted the issue of Iran's nuclear program resolved through diplomacy. "The focus of the Israeli activity today is to give full support to diplomatic actions and the expeditious and full implementation of Security Council resolution 1737. If diplomacy succeeds, the problem can be solved peaceably." Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's office declined earlier to respond to the report. "We don't comment on stories like this in the Sunday Times," said Olmert's spokeswoman, Miri Eisin. Minister of Strategic Threats Avigdor Lieberman also declined to comment. In Tehran, Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini told a news conference that the newspaper report "will make clear to the world public opinion that the Zionist regime is the main menace to global peace and the region." He said "any measure against Iran will not be left without a response and the invader will regret its act immediately." The United Nations Security Council voted unanimously last month to slap sanctions on Iran to try to stop uranium enrichment that Western powers fear could lead to making bombs. Tehran insists its plans are peaceful and says it will continue enrichment. Israel has refused to rule out pre-emptive military action against Iran along the lines of its 1981 air strike against an atomic reactor in Iraq, though many analysts believe Iran's nuclear facilities are too much for Israel to take on alone. The newspaper said the Israeli plan envisaged conventional laser-guided bombs opening "tunnels" into the targets. Nuclear warheads would then be used fired into the plant at Natanz, exploding deep underground to reduce radioactive fallout. IAF pilots have flown to Gibraltar in recent weeks to train for the 2,000 mile round-trip to the Iranian targets, the Sunday Times said, and three possible routes to Iran have been mapped out including one over Turkey. However, it also quoted sources as saying a nuclear strike would only be used if a conventional attack was ruled out and if the United States declined to intervene. Disclosure of the plans could be intended to put pressure on Tehran to halt enrichment, the paper added. Washington has said military force remains an option while insisting that its priority is to reach a diplomatic solution. Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has called for Israel to be "wiped off the map." Israel, widely believed to have the Middle East's only nuclear arsenal, has said it will not allow Iran to acquire nuclear weapons. Israel has long maintained a policy of nuclear ambiguity. Recent perceived slips by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert have reinforced suspicions that Israel does have nuclear arms, but Jerusalem has stuck to its line that it will not be the first to introduce atomic weapons to the region. The Sunday Times newspaper was the first to report on Israel's nuclear capabilities in 1986, based on leaked information by Mordechai Vanunu, a former employee at the Dimona research plant. Following the expose, Vanunu was snatched by Israeli agents in Italy and returned to Israel, where served an 18-year prison sentence. He was released in April 2004. * ================================================================ .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 ================================================================ ***************************************************************** 4 London Times: Revealed: Israel plans nuclear strike on Iran - Sunday Times - Times Online January 07, 2007 Uzi Mahnaimi, New York and Sarah Baxter, Washington ISRAEL has drawn up secret plans to destroy Iran’s uranium enrichment facilities with tactical nuclear weapons. Two Israeli air force squadrons are training to blow up an Iranian facility using low-yield nuclear “bunker-busters”, according to several Israeli military sources. The attack would be the first with nuclear weapons since 1945, when the United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The Israeli weapons would each have a force equivalent to one-fifteenth of the Hiroshima bomb. Under the plans, conventional laser-guided bombs would open “tunnels” into the targets. “Mini-nukes” would then immediately be fired into a plant at Natanz, exploding deep underground to reduce the risk of radioactive fallout. “As soon as the green light is given, it will be one mission, one strike and the Iranian nuclear project will be demolished,” said one of the sources. The plans, disclosed to The Sunday Times last week, have been prompted in part by the Israeli intelligence service Mossad’s assessment that Iran is on the verge of producing enough enriched uranium to make nuclear weapons within two years. Israeli military commanders believe conventional strikes may no longer be enough to annihilate increasingly well-defended enrichment facilities. Several have been built beneath at least 70ft of concrete and rock. However, the nuclear-tipped bunker-busters would be used only if a conventional attack was ruled out and if the United States declined to intervene, senior sources said. Israeli and American officials have met several times to consider military action. Military analysts said the disclosure of the plans could be intended to put pressure on Tehran to halt enrichment, cajole America into action or soften up world opinion in advance of an Israeli attack. Some analysts warned that Iranian retaliation for such a strike could range from disruption of oil supplies to the West to terrorist attacks against Jewish targets around the world. Israel has identified three prime targets south of Tehran which are believed to be involved in Iran’s nuclear programme: + Natanz, where thousands of centrifuges are being installed for uranium enrichment + A uranium conversion facility near Isfahan where, according to a statement by an Iranian vice-president last week, 250 tons of gas for the enrichment process have been stored in tunnels + A heavy water reactor at Arak, which may in future produce enough plutonium for a bomb Israeli officials believe that destroying all three sites would delay Iran’s nuclear programme indefinitely and prevent them from having to live in fear of a “second Holocaust”. The Israeli government has warned repeatedly that it will never allow nuclear weapons to be made in Iran, whose president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has declared that “Israel must be wiped off the map”. Robert Gates, the new US defence secretary, has described military action against Iran as a "last resort", leading Israeli officials to conclude that it will be left to them to strike. Israeli pilots have flown to Gibraltar in recent weeks to train for the 2,000-mile round trip to the Iranian targets. Three possible routes have been mapped out, including one over Turkey. Air force squadrons based at Hatzerim in the Negev desert and Tel Nof, south of Tel Aviv, have trained to use Israel's tactical nuclear weapons on the mission. The preparations have been overseen by Major General Eliezer Shkedi, commander of the Israeli air force. Sources close to the Pentagon said the United States was highly unlikely to give approval for tactical nuclear weapons to be used. One source said Israel would have to seek approval "after the event", as it did when it crippled Iraq's nuclear reactor at Osirak with airstrikes in 1981. Scientists have calculated that although contamination from the bunker-busters could be limited, tons of radioactive uranium compounds would be released. The Israelis believe that Iran's retaliation would be constrained by fear of a second strike if it were to launch its Shehab-3 ballistic missiles at Israel. However, American experts warned of repercussions, including widespread protests that could destabilise parts of the Islamic world friendly to the West. Colonel Sam Gardiner, a Pentagon adviser, said Iran could try to close the Strait of Hormuz, the route for 20% of the world's oil. Some sources in Washington said they doubted if Israel would have the nerve to attack Iran. However, Dr Ephraim Sneh, the deputy Israeli defence minister, said last month: "The time is approaching when Israel and the international community will have to decide whether to take military action against Iran." Copyright 2007 Times Newspapers Ltd. ***************************************************************** 5 IRIB PERSIAN NEWS: IRI honor NPT if not threatened more 2007/01/06 Secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, Ali Larijani said on Friday Tehran is still committed to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). "We are still committed to the NPT, but if we would be further threatened, our conditions, too, would be subject to alterations," said Larijani in a press conference in Beijing, China, on Friday. The Iranian top nuclear negotiator made the remark when asked whether Iran intends to end its NPT membership. He said, "We consider the NPT as a satisfactory international law, although today this treaty is not implemented based on the rules of justice." He said, "All the same, we are determined to pursue our peaceful nuclear program in the framework of the international rules and regulations, including the NPT." In reply to another question on objectives of his China visit, Larijani said, "Following President Ahmadinejad's June state visit of China and his meeting with his Chinese counterpart it was necessary to follow up the objectives of their agreements, including further expansion of bilateral ties." He added that he also exchanged ideas on nuclear and regional issues with Chinese officials." In reply to a question that whether he had also discussed with the President Hu Jintao on the recent UN Security Council anti-Iran resolution, to which China and Russia, too, have for the first time voted positively, Larijani said, "We know which country is the main initiator of that move and we know this process would not lead to any tangible results, since it is faced with numerous problems." He once again stressed the Iranian nation's absolute right to have access to nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, arguing, "The Islamic Republic of Iran would pursue its nuclear program based on regulations of the IAEA. mk Copyright 2004, All Rights Reserved By Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting News Network Sponsored By IRIB News Computer Center. E-Mail: Info@IRIBNEWS.ir ***************************************************************** 6 IRIB PERSIAN NEWS: Iran victim of UNSC double standard 2007/01/06 11:40:48 Þ.Ù Iranian Ambassador in France Ali Ahani has said Iran became a victim of the double standard policy adopted by the United Nations Security Council. In an article which appeared in the Saturday edition of French newspaper, Le Monde, the ambassador criticized the council's discriminatory policy about Iran peaceful nuclear activities. Reiterating that Tehran has not been seeking to develop atomic weapons, the ambassador reassured "Iran will fulfill its commitments as a signatory to the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT)". mk Copyright 2004, All Rights Reserved By Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting News Network Sponsored By IRIB News Computer Center. E-Mail: Info@IRIBNEWS.ir ***************************************************************** 7 IRIB PERSIAN NEWS: No attack will go unanswered 2007/01/07 01:32:44 È.Ù Foreign Ministry Spokesman Sayed Mohammad Ali Husseini warned Sunday that no move against the Islamic Republic of Iran will go unanswered and the aggressor will soon regret its move. His remarks came in his regular talk to the press in reply to a question about Sunday Times reports of an already described as absurd plan by the Zionist regime to attack Iranian peaceful nuclear facilities in Natanz, Isfahan and Arak with low-yield atomic bombs. "When these statements are juxtaposed with the Zionist Premier's admission to the regime's possession of nuclear arms, the world public opinion will reckon that the regime poses a threat to international and regional peace," Husseini noted. "We have reaffirmed several times that IRI's nuclear activities are undertaken within international conventions and in line with peaceful aims," the spokesman said. "Such fanfaronades signal the weak position of the other side and will fail to deal the least of blows to the Islamic Repiublic of Iran's drive for producing peaceful nuclear activities. Copyright 2004, All Rights Reserved By Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting News Network Sponsored By IRIB News Computer Center. E-Mail: Info@IRIBNEWS.ir ***************************************************************** 8 IRIB PERSIAN NEWS: Quitting IAEA not on Iran agenda 2007/01/07 01:42:06 È.Ù Foreign Ministry Spokesman Mohammad-Ali Hosseini said on Sunday that suspension of cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is not on Iran's agenda. He made the remark while talking to domestic and foreign reporters at his weekly press briefing. "Iran's cooperation with the IAEA will be continued as before," he stressed. Hosseini further reiterated that in case of any change in situation, new decisions will be made. Copyright 2004, All Rights Reserved By Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting News Network Sponsored By IRIB News Computer Center. E-Mail: Info@IRIBNEWS.ir ***************************************************************** 9 IRIB PERSIAN NEWS: China backs Iran N-activities 2007/01/07 Chinese Ambassador in Tehran said Iran should not take serious China's positive vote to the UN Security Council's resolution sanction against Iran's nuclear activities. Leo Jen Tung told IRIB on Saturday that China and Russian, taking a 'just' position, had provided proper grounds for Iran's nuclear activities and had acted in benefit of the country. "Without Russia's and China's efforts, the resolution would have been otherwise," he reiterated. The Chinese envoy further emphasized that Beijing's stance towards Iran's nuclear program had been and would be based on justice and logic. On Iran-China economic relations, he said a joint Tehran-Beijing economic commission is due to be held in Tehran later in January. He said that Iran and China are going to increase their trade exchanges volume to over 20 million dollars this year from 15 billion dollars in 2006. mk Copyright 2004, All Rights Reserved By Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting News Network Sponsored By IRIB News Computer Center. E-Mail: Info@IRIBNEWS.ir ***************************************************************** 10 AFP: Iran and trade to top Olmert's agenda in China visit - Sunday January 7, 08:26 PM By Ron Bousso [Ehud Olmert] JERUSALEM (AFP) - Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is due to arrive in China on Tuesday, marking the last and possibly trickiest leg in his recent tour of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council amid efforts to stop Iran's controversial nuclear programme. Along with pushing Israeli concerns over the prospect of its arch foe obtaining an atom bomb, Olmert will also seek to bolster economic ties with the rising world power, officials say. Unlike his talks in Britain, France, (Advertisement) [ src=] Russia and the United States, officials expect to encounter little enthusiasm in Beijing for Israel's call to slap heavy sanctions on Iran, one of China's major suppliers of oil and gas needed to feed its burgeoning economy. Israel, the Middle East's sole if undeclared nuclear power, refuses to believe Tehran's claim its nuclear programme is purely for peaceful ends, fearing it is aimed at obtaining an atom bomb. The Jewish state considers the Islamic republic its arch foe following repeated calls by President Mahmud Ahmadinejad for Israel to be wiped off the map. "As a permanent member of the Security Council, it is very important for the prime minister to present China's leadership with his views on regional issues such as the Palestinian question, Syria, Lebanon and Iran," a high-ranking Israeli official told AFP. Even though China did not oppose a Security Council December 23 resolution slapping light sanctions on Iran, Israel is aware of China's many vested interests in the Islamic republic. "It is still very important to go to Beijing and spell out Israel's concerns over a nuclear Iran. The Chinese, too, do not wish to see an Iranian nuclear bomb and the fact is that they supported the sanctions against Iran," the official said. Although China has generally kept a low profile in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, a recent upsurge in efforts to kickstart the dialogue between Israel and the Palestinians will also appear on Olmert's agenda. Recent visits to Israel by senior Chinese envoys, including Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing, signal its growing involvement in the region. But China, traditionaly seen as pro-Palestinian, raised the ire of Israel when it hosted Palestinian foreign minister Mahmud al-Zahar of Hamas last June in defiance of a Western-led boycott of the Islamic militant group. Many of Olmert's talks will revolve around trade issues, and according to government spokeswoman Miri Eisin, "the visit marks an effort to upgrade bilateral economic ties." China is one of the main clients for Israeli agricultural technology and Olmert is to visit a huge dairy farm outside Beijing. But ties have been hampered in recent years, after US intervention twice scuttled Israeli arms sales to China -- the sale of advanced Phalcon spy planes in 2000, and the sale of spare parts for Israeli-manufactured Harpy drones five years later. Following the abortive business, then prime minister Ariel Sharon bowed to US demands that it be consulted before any sensitive sales to China. "We know who our strategic ally in the world is and what we can and can't do," Eisin said. "But the United States will not pose any difficulties in our ties with China." According to another official: "After the Phalcon affair, Israeli-Chinese relations were damaged but since then they have been restored and are today at a very high point." During his three-day visit, which comes 15 years after the establishment of diplomatic ties, Olmert is to hold talks with President Hu Jintao, his counterpart Wen Jiabao and other senior officials, Eisin told AFP. For Olmert, whose parents found sanctuary from Russian persecution in the northeastern Chinese city of Harbin in the early 1900s, it will be the second visit in less than three years. But it will be the first visit by an Israeli premier since 1998. In an interview with Israel's top-selling Yediot Aharonot daily, Olmert called the trip a return to his roots. "I have a spiritual link with China," he said. "For me, China is not just another country -- it is an important part of my family history." The newspaper published a picture of Olmert wearing a Chinese hat alongside the interview. "My parents grew up and studied in China, and they spoke Chinese," he added. "Chinese culture forms part of my childhood memories." AFP ***************************************************************** 11 AFP: Israel plans 'nuclear' strike on Iran Sun Jan 7, 5:46 AM ET LONDON (AFP) - Israel" /> has drawn up plans to destroy Iranian uranium enrichment facilities with a tactical nuclear strike, a British newspaper said in a report rejected as "absurd" by the Jewish state. The Sunday Times quoted several Israeli military sources as saying that two of the Jewish state's air force squadrons are training to use "bunker-busting" bombs for a single strike. "This is absurd information coming from a newspaper that has already in the past distinguished itself with sensationalist headlines that in the end amounted to nothing," retorted an Israeli official. "To think that we will launch an atomic attack against Iran" /> , and on top of that that we would reveal it in advance to a foreign newspaper is doubly ridiculous," the official, who asked not to be named, told AFP. The Sunday Times -- which in 1986 first revealed Israel's undeclared nuclear arsenal -- said the plans involved sending conventional, laser-guided missiles to open up "tunnels" in the targets before "mini-nukes" with a force the equivalent of one-fifteenth of the Hiroshima bomb are fired in. "As soon as the green light is given, it will be one mission, one strike and the Iranian nuclear project will be demolished," one of the unnamed sources was quoted as saying. Iran warned that it would hit back against any attack in a way that would leave its enemy regretting that it had made such a move. "Any action against the Islamic republic will not go without a response and the aggressor would regret the action very quickly," foreign ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini told reporters. He described the report as "proof of the weakness of the enemy and will have no effect on the determination of the Islamic republic to continue its (nuclear) activities." Israel and the United States, the Islamic republic's two arch-enemies, accuse Iran of seeking a nuclear weapon -- a charge vehemently denied by Tehran, which refuses to bow to UN demands to halt uranium enrichment work. Even after the UN Security Council agreed to impose its first-ever sanctions on Iran in December, Israel has pushed for tougher international action against the Islamic republic. Iran's hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has in the past sparked consternation by calling for the Jewish state to be wiped off the map and also casting doubt on the scale of the Holocaust. Israel has refused to rule out pre-emptive military action against the Islamic republic. In 1981, it took action against Iraq" /> 's nuclear reactor in Osirak. The Jewish state is itself considered to be the sole nuclear weapons power in the Middle East. It does not officially acknowlege its arsenal although Prime Minister Ehud Olmert appeared to do so in an apparent lapse last year. The three prime targets for Israeli action are said to be the uranium enrichment plant at Natanz, a uranium conversion facility near Isfahan and a heavy water reactor at Arak, the Sunday Times reported. The nuclear option is being considered because Israeli military commanders believe conventional strikes may not be effective enough at destroying the well-defended facilities, it said. The atomic weapons would explode deep underground to minimise the risk of radioactive fall-out, it added. US and Israeli officials had met several times to consider military action, it added, saying military analysts assessed that disclosing the plans could put pressure on Iran to halt sensitive uranium enrichment activities. It could also be designed to persuade the United States to act or "soften up" world opinion ahead of an Israeli pre-emptive strike. Israeli pilots are said to have flown to Gibraltar in recent weeks to train for the 2,000-mile (3,220-kilometre) round-trip to the Iranian targets. Three possible routes have been mapped out, including one over Turkey. The plan is similar to one said in a report in the New Yorker magazine last April to have been considered by the United States. The White House dismissed investigative reporter Seymour Hersh's article as "ill-informed". Copyright © 2007 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 12 Guardian Unlimited: Israel Denies Planning Iran Nuke Attack | From the Associated Press [UP] Sunday January 7, 2007 11:16 AM LONDON (AP) - A British newspaper reported Sunday that Israel has drafted plans to strike as many as three targets in Iran with low-yield nuclear weapons, aiming to halt Tehran's uranium enrichment program. The Israeli Foreign Ministry denied the report. Citing multiple unidentified Israeli military sources, The Sunday Times said the proposals involved using so-called ``bunker-buster'' nuclear weapons to attack nuclear facilities at three sites south of the Iranian capital. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's office said it would not respond to the claim. ``We don't respond to publications in the Sunday Times,'' said Miri Eisin, Olmert's spokeswoman. Israeli Minister of Strategic Threats Avigdor Lieberman also declined to comment on the report. Foreign Ministry spokesman Mark Regev denied the report and said that ``the focus of the Israeli activity today is to give full support to diplomatic actions'' and the implementation of a U.N. Security Council resolution imposing sanctions on Iran for refusing to halt enrichment. The United States and its allies accuse Tehran of secretly trying to produce atomic weapons, but Iran claims its nuclear program is solely for peaceful purposes, including generating electricity. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has condemned as invalid and illegal the U.N. resolution. Though Olmert has not explicitly ruled out a military strike against Iran's nuclear program, he has repeatedly said the issue should be dealt with diplomatically. Because an Iranian nuclear bomb would affect the entire world, Olmert has said, the problem must be solved by the international community. The Sunday Times reported that Mossad, the Israeli spy agency, believes Iran could produce enough enriched uranium to build nuclear weapons within two years. It also reported the top three targets for the Israelis were Natanz, where thousands of centrifuges are being installed, a heavy water reactor at Arak and a uranium conversion facility near Isfahan. Israeli pilots, the newspaper reported, have made flights to the British colony of Gibraltar to train for the 2,000-mile round trip to the Iranian targets. The Israeli army declined to comment when asked by The Associated Press on Sunday whether the Israeli air force was training for an attack against Iranian nuclear facilities. ``I refuse to believe that anyone here would consider using nuclear weapons against Iran,'' Reuven Pedatzur, a prominent defense analyst and columnist for the daily Haaretz, told the AP. ``It is possible that this was a leak done on purpose, as deterrence, to say 'someone better hold us back, before we do something crazy.''' Ephraim Kam, a strategic expert at Tel Aviv University's Institute for National Strategic Studies and a former senior army intelligence officer, also dismissed the report. ``No reliable source would ever speak about this, certainly not to the Sunday Times,'' Kam said. --- Associated Press Writer Matti Friedman in Jerusalem contributed to this report. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 13 AFP: Tehran vows to cooperate with UN atomic agency [Mohammad Ali Hosseini] TEHRAN (AFP) - Iran has vowed to continue cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) despite the UN Security Council sanctions imposed over its nuclear programme. "It is not on Iran's agenda to halt cooperation with the IAEA," foreign ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini said Sunday. "Tehran's cooperation with the agency will continue within the previous framework". The Iranian government said on Tuesday it was keeping open the option of quitting the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), if Western countries stepped up pressure on the Islamic republic over its atomic program. Hosseini said "if a special condition is created, a decision will be made for that", without specifying Iran's reaction. The Iranian parliament last month passed a bill that obliges the government to revise its cooperation with the IAEA in response to the UN Security Council's move. The UN Security Council voted unanimously last December to impose sanctions on Iran for its refusal to suspend sensitive uranium enrichment work. AFP ***************************************************************** 14 Guardian Unlimited: Israel Rejects Report It May Attack Iran From the Associated Press [UP] Sunday January 7, 2007 8:31 PM AP Photo JRL121 LONDON (AP) - A British newspaper reported Sunday that Israeli pilots were training to strike targets in Iran with low-yield nuclear weapons, but Israel swiftly denied the report and analysts expressed doubts about its reliability. Citing unidentified Israeli military sources, The Sunday Times said the proposals drawn up in Israel involved using so-called ``bunker-buster'' nuclear weapons to attack nuclear facilities at three sites south of the Iranian capital. Israel has never confirmed it has nuclear weapons, although the Jewish state is widely believed to possess a significant stockpile. Iran says its nuclear program is solely for peaceful purposes like generating electricity. The Sunday Times reported that Israeli military officials believed Iran could produce enough enriched uranium to build nuclear weapons within two years, and the newspaper said Israeli pilots had made flights to the British colony of Gibraltar to train for the 2,000-mile round trip to the Iranian targets. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's office declined to comment on the report. ``We don't respond to publications in The Sunday Times,'' said spokeswoman Miri Eisin. However Foreign Ministry spokesman Mark Regev denied the report, saying: ``if diplomacy succeeds, the problem can be solved peaceably.'' The United States and its allies suspect Tehran of secretly trying to produce atomic weapons there. Some view Israeli officials' occasional implied threats as a means of pressuring the world community to take action, building on the recent United Nations Security Council decision to impose some economic sanctions on Tehran for its refusal to suspend uranium enrichment. Some analysts viewed Sunday's report as another element of delicate diplomacy. ``I refuse to believe that anyone here would consider using nuclear weapons against Iran,'' Reuven Pedatzur, a prominent defense analyst and columnist for the Israeli daily Haaretz, told the AP. ``It is possible that this was a leak done on purpose, as deterrence, to say: 'Someone better hold us back, before we do something crazy.''' Ephraim Kam - a former senior intelligence official now at Tel Aviv University's Institute for National Strategic Studies - also suggested the report should not be taken literally. ``No reliable source would ever speak about this, certainly not to the Sunday Times,'' he said. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 15 Guardian Unlimited: Report: U.S., N.Korea to Meet in Jan. From the Associated Press [UP] Sunday January 7, 2007 11:46 AM SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - The United States and North Korea have provisionally agreed to hold talks on a dispute over U.S. financial restrictions against the communist regime in the week starting Jan. 22, South Korea's foreign minister was quoted as saying Sunday. Song Min-soon made the remark after arriving from Washington, where he held talks with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Friday, according to the Yonhap news agency. ``A date has not been set, but I understand that the North and the U.S. provisionally agreed to hold the talks in the week starting Jan. 22,'' he told reporters. ``I think it will be held around that time.'' The financial dispute was the main stumbling block that deadlocked last month's six-nation talks on North Korea's nuclear programs. The North insisted that Washington lift the financial restrictions first before disarmament discussions could begin in earnest. Financial experts from Washington and Pyongyang held separate talks on the row on the sidelines of the nuclear talks - involving China, Japan, the two Koreas, Russia and the U.S. - but no progress was reported. The two sides agreed to continue the talks, but did not set a date. Song didn't indicate where the talks might be held. The U.S. slapped the restrictions against a Macau-based bank holding North Korean accounts for Pyongyang's alleged involvement in counterfeiting and money laundering. That led to a freezing of the North's assets at the bank worth around $24 million. North Korea says the sanctions are evidence of Washington's ``hostile policy'' and indicate its intention to overthrow the regime, and the North therefore needs nuclear weapons for protection. Washington has denied it intends to invade the country, and says the restrictions are a law enforcement matter unconnected to the nuclear issue. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 16 Korea Herald: Seoul, Washington, Tokyo rush plans to cope with N.K. crisis The United States and its regional allies South Korea and Japan are reportedly speeding up the establishment of a joint plan to cope with a possible armed crisis on the Korean Peninsula. The move comes amid projections that the North Korean regime could face sudden collapse within the next decade, possibly triggered by the death of its leader Kim Jong-il or a military coup. Japanese media reported last week that the United States and Japan are planning to complete a joint contingency plan by around fall this year on what to do if the Korean Peninsula falls into an armed conflict or North Korea attacks Japan with its missiles or nuclear weapons. The plan, which is based on their previous Concept Plan, will contain more concrete operation details to respond to a conflict on the peninsula, media reports said. In 2002 Washington and Tokyo signed the Concept Plan 5055 in accordance with a new 1997 alliance guideline to deal with contingencies near Japan. According to the plan, the two allies will coordinate evacuation efforts of U.S. and Japanese citizens from the peninsula, anti-terror measures, and a joint missile defense against North Korean attacks. Japan will also allow U.S. troops to use its civilian airports and seaports for military supply and logistical missions, as well as sharing responsibility for rescuing missing U.S. troops and providing them medical treatment. The plan coincides with recent predictions by experts here and abroad that the Pyongyang regime could see significant changes in the next 10 years. Larry Niksch, an Asian specialist for the U.S. Congressional Research Service, said that the contingency scenario is planned on the assumption that the six-nation talks to tackle North Korean nuclear weapons program will be doomed to be a failure. A month before the U.S.-Japan plan was disclosed, South Korean media reported that Korea and the United States will begin work this year on the details of the Concept Plan 5029, aimed at coordinating action against any emergency situation in North Korea. Although Seoul's Defense Ministry refused to verify the plan, the South Korean and U.S. governments agreed to improve and develop the COPLAN 5029 during their Security Consultative Meeting on Oct. 22 in Washington. The COPLAN 5029 was designed in 1999 on the initiative of the United States and deemed North Korea was at risk of collapse. The plan was halted in 2005 at the South Korean government's request to discontinue the ongoing discussion at the Combined Forces Command and to change COPLAN 5029 into OPLAN 5029. The Seoul government claimed such a change could "damage the sovereignty South Korea." The plans are mainly designed as preparatory measures for unexpected developments of the North Korean problem. With regard to the U.S.-Japan plan, South Korean analysts say it is also aimed at further reinforcing military coordination between Washington and Tokyo. The United States intends to take advantage of the current tensions on the peninsula for realizing a plan to make Japan its main military partner in the region, analysts said. The two countries appear to be speeding up their effort to construct a ballistic missile defense system, they said. The U.S. military plans to deploy five Aegis warships equipped with SM-3 missiles by this summer while the Japanese force will deploy 16 PAC-3 missiles and four SM-3 armed Aegis warships over the next 10 years. However, Larry Nicksh said the joint plan will trigger a controversy inside Japan surrounding its legality because the current constitution prohibits Japan's possession or use of military forces outside its borders. Meanwhile, other analysts see Japan trying to expedite its move to amend its constitution to allow for the foreign deployment of its troops. Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has repeatedly pledged his desire to amend the constitution. Tokyo intends to ameliorate opposition from South Korea and China through the establishment of joint contingency plans, analysts say. (davidpooh@heraldm.com) By Jin Dae-woong 2007.01.08 ***************************************************************** 17 Korea Herald: U.S., N. Korea may hold financial talks in week of Jan. 22 The United States and North Korea have agreed in principle to hold talks on a dispute over U.S. financial restrictions against the communist regime starting Jan. 22, Foreign Minister Song Min-soon said yesterday. Song made the remark after arriving from Washington, where he held talks with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Friday. "A date has not been set, but I understand that the North and the United States provisionally agreed to hold the talks in the week starting Jan. 22," he told reporters. "I think it will be held around that time." The financial dispute was the main stumbling block that deadlocked last month's six-nation talks on North Korea's nuclear programs. The North insisted that Washington lift the financial restrictions first before disarmament discussions begin in earnest. Financial experts from Washington and Pyongyang held separate talks on the row on the sidelines of the nuclear talks - involving China, Japan, the two Koreas, Russia and the United States - but no progress was reported. The two sides have agreed to continue the talks, but did not set a date. Song did not provide specifics, including where the talks will be held. News reports have said the venue will be either New York or Beijing. Despite the failure of the last round of six-party talks, Rice said the parties had made some progress. "One of the reasons that you are hearing some sense that we might be able to return sooner than later is that when you look at what happened in the last round of the talks, there actually was significant groundwork laid for potential outcomes that could be useful," Rice told a news conference with Song in Washington Friday. "If there are signals that in fact the North is now ready to come back in a more constructive way ... I do think that we could be back in talks fairly soon," she added, but declined to say when that might be. "It is North Korea's turn to come back to us with a positive and realistic response to the proposals tabled in Beijing," Song said. The U.S. and South Korean officials sought to play down reports that North Korea, which carried out its first nuclear test on Oct. 9, might be preparing for another. South Korea said activity had been spotted near a suspected nuclear test site in North Korea but there was no evidence to suggest Pyongyang was about to test again. "We do not have any indication that that kind of test is imminent," Song added. "The North Koreans would have to know that any such test would obviously further deepen their isolation," Rice said. The U.S. State Department on Friday warned North Korea of "severe consequences" to the diplomatic push to end its nuclear programs if Pyongyang conducts a second atomic test. U.S. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack told reporters Friday that there are "signals that they (six-nation North Korea nuclear talks) can start again this month" but said another test would have "severe" consequences. "If you did have another test of a nuclear device, that would have severe consequences for the viability of that political-diplomatic process - why would they take such a step at this time?" McCormack told reporters. North Korea's Oct. 9 nuclear test caused unease across the Pacific and its neighbors, as well as the United States, have been scrutinizing the country for any signs of a new test. The United States monitors North Korea by satellite and spy planes that fly along the fringes of the reclusive communist state's airspace to watch for signs of nuclear activity. "Certain activities have been detected near a suspected North Korean nuclear test site but currently there are no specific indications related to an additional test," said a South Korean source familiar with the North's nuclear program. The source asked not to be named and declined to explain how the latest movements were spotted. Another South Korean official in Seoul said vehicle and personnel movement had been spotted near the site of the North's first test. That official said, however, that there were no signs of cables being laid or electronic monitors being installed which might indicate a test was imminent. 2007.01.08 ***************************************************************** 18 YONHAP NEWS: N.Korea appears to be ready for 2nd nuke test - S. Korean lawmaker 2007/01/07 22:47 KST SEOUL, Jan. 7 (Yonhap) -- North Korea appears to be fully prepared to conduct a second nuclear test but is unlikely to carry it out right now, a South Korean lawmaker said Sunday. In an article posted on his Website, Chung Hyung-keun, a member of the main opposition Grand National Party, said some unusual personnel and construction activities have recently been detected at Punggyeri, Kilju Country, North Hamgyong Province where the North conducted its first nuclear test on Oct. 9. But the North is unlikely to detonate another nuclear device right now prior to an expected new round of six-nation talks on its nuclear program and scheduled negotiations with the U.S. on financial sanctions imposed on it, he said. Chung, who had once served as No. 2 man in South Korea's National Intelligence Service in the 1990s, said he obtained the information on North Korea from government sources, whom he did not identify. Chung quoted his sources as saying that an unidentified object and up to 15 people were found working in December at the west side of the underground tunnel in Punggyeri that was used for the country's first nuclear test, an indication that preparations for a second nuclear test were under way. "Chances are very high that the North Korean worker moved the facilities into the tunnel to prepare for an additional nuclear test," the lawmaker told Yonhap News Agency by telephone. Chung's claim followed a report by U.S. television network ABC last week that quoted U.S. government intelligence sources as saying that the North appeared to be preparing for a new nuclear test. South Korean and U.S. officials denied the report. The latest round of six-nation talks on the North's nuclear program ended in Beijing in December without a breakthrough. Diplomacy is under way to set a date for a new round. Financial officials from North Korea and the U.S. are also scheduled to meet in New York later this month to try to resolve a row over U.S. financial sanctions imposed over the North's alleged currency counterfeiting and other illegal activities. ksnam@yna.co.kr (END) ***************************************************************** 19 Korea Times: Allies United Against Nukes Hankooki.com > The Korea Times By Park Song-wu Staff Reporter Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Song Min-soon returned home from the United States on Sunday after reinforcing the two nations' united front against North Korea's nuclear threat. It was the first foreign ministers' meeting between Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Song, who took over his new job in December amid strong protests from South Korea's main opposition Grand National Party over his alleged anti-U.S. sentiments. Against this backdrop, Song underlined the importance of the two nations' alliance and showed a united approach to defuse the North Korean nuclear standoff. ``Secretary Rice and I agreed that we are prepared to take proactive and forthcoming measures if North Korea comes to us with some realistic response to the proposals made last month,'' he said at a joint press conference in Washington on Friday. Earlier in the day, Sean McCormack, spokesman of the U.S. State Department, said the denuclearization talks could resume ``as early as this month.'' Rice said at the news conference with Song that the U.S. could be back at the six-party talks ``fairly soon'' if the North Koreans are prepared to demonstrate that ``they are, indeed, now prepared to come with a constructive response.'' But she said no ``substantive'' response has come from North Korea on the proposals it received from the other five participating nations when the latest round of talks was held in Beijing last month. McCormack said the North can realize ``a different kind of relationship with the rest of the world'' if North Koreans ``do certain things.'' U.S. President George W. Bush reportedly said in his summit meeting with President Roh Moo-hyun in Hanoi in November that he was willing to sign a document with North Korea's leader Kim Jong-il to officially end the 1950-53 Korean War within his tenure. The two Koreas are still technically at war because the three-year war ended with a truce, not a peace treaty. A peace treaty usually comes with the normalization of relations between adversaries, Song said in a recent meeting with reporters. ``We would very much like to see some sort of early harvest out of these rounds of the six-party talks where you have a clear commitment from North Korea that it has made that strategic decision to denuclearize the Korean Peninsula,'' McCormack said. Rice declined to mention when the talks would resume, but said it was important for the parties to be able to discuss matters ``without airing them in public.'' The meeting between Song and Rice drew attention as it came hours after ABC, a U.S. network broadcaster, reported that North Korea appeared to be preparing for a second nuclear test. Rice warned that any provocative action would only further deepen Pyongyang's isolation. ``The most important assessment is the political assessment and the North Koreans would have to know that any such test would obviously further deepen their isolation,'' she said. But she added that Washington does not see ``any change in the circumstances that we currently face.'' She also said Seoul and Washington are very closely coordinating how to deal with the North's nuclear threat. Last October, Song got into trouble for describing the United States as a nation that has ``probably been involved in the largest number of wars in the history of mankind.'' At that time he was working as President Roh Moo-hyun's top secretary for foreign and security affairs. He drew the ire of the United States by saying, ``If we leave our fate in the hands of the United States just for the sake of falling in step with the international community, it would amount to giving up our own destiny.'' im@koreatimes.co.kr01-07-2007 19:40 ***************************************************************** 20 AFP: Rice calls for denuclearization moves from North Korea by David Millikin Fri Jan 5, 10:31 PM ET WASHINGTON (AFP) - The United States has intensified efforts to resume nuclear disarmament talks with North Korea" /> North Korea, while confirming it was working with Japan on an emergency plan for a possible crisis in the Korean peninsula. US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice" /> Condoleezza Ricetold a joint news conference with visiting South Korean Foreign Minister Song Min-Soon that the six-party talks could resume "fairly soon" if Pyongyang signals it is ready for constructive denuclearization steps. A first round of talks in Beijing last month involving the six -- China, Japan, North Korea, South Korea" /> South Korea, Russia and the United States -- ended without apparent progress. But Rice said Friday that those five days of discussions had laid the groundwork for further negotiations. "We did not make the progress that I think we would have liked, and we believe that the North Koreans need to come in a more constructive spirit," she said. "But it does not mean there were not very productive discussions that took place during that round," she said. Rice said there was "intensive discussion among the parties about a resumption of the six-party talks" and that if the North Koreans demonstrate they are "prepared to come with a constructive response," the negotiations could resume soon. Rice declined to speculate on when the negotiations might resume, though her spokesman said the next round could take place later this month. Song, for his part, said it was "North Korea's turn to come back to us with a positive and realistic response" to proposals made to Pyongyang during the talks December 18-22 in Beijing. "I know of no substantive response from the North Koreans" yet, Rice added, but she said the Chinese were in discussions with the reclusive communist regime. White House spokesman Tony Snow on Friday confirmed that Washington and Tokyo were working on an emergency plan for a possible crisis on the Korean peninsula but said it was a routine contingency effort. "People make plans all the time," Snow said after Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Aso, in Tokyo, revealed that the aim was "to protect some 20,000 Japanese residents and tens of thousands of tourists" in South Korea. "It is a standard part of any government's preparation to try to take a look at all alternatives, domestically and internationally, and try to prepare for them," Snow told reporters. Aso, who did not elaborate on the various scenarios being considered, said officials needed to consider "ways to evacuate Japanese nationals using US military vessels and civilian ships." He added that the plan would also consider how to deal with refugees from the Communist North. Snow said the United States and Japan were hoping "for the six-party talks to resume soon." The negotiations were suspended in late 2005 after North Korea walked out in protest at US financial sanctions imposed on a Macau bank accused of illicit dealings on behalf of Pyongyang. Before the breakdown, North Korea signed a statement agreeing to give up its nuclear weapons program in exchange for economic aid and security guarantees from the other five states. But it then went ahead and conducted its first nuclear test explosion in October, sparking international condemnation and UN sanctions. Under intense pressure from its main ally, China, the North agreed to return to the talks last month. The resulting five-day round of negotiations in Beijing failed to make any progress, as North Korea insisted the financial sanctions be lifted as a condition for tackling the nuclear disarmament issue. Rice played down press reports this week that North Korea was making preparations for a second nuclear test explosion as a way of pressuring its partners for concessions in the next round of talks. "We don't see any change in the circumstances that we currently face," Rice said, adding that a new nuclear test by the North Koreans would "obviously further deepen their isolation." Song said South Korea had no indications another test was imminent. US officials have declined to lay out publicly their specific demands of the North Koreans, but they are believed to include reopening nuclear sites to UN inspectors and initial steps to dismantle key installations, including the nuclear testing center in the mountains north of Pyongyang. Parallel talks on the financial sanctions issue are also due to resume later this month in New York, though no date has been set. Copyright © 2007 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 21 Japan Times: Spain offers to help on N. Korea Web japantimes.co.jp Sunday, Jan. 7, 2007 MADRID (Kyodo) Spain has offered to help Japan in addressing the North Korean nuclear standoff, its foreign minister told Japanese reporters ahead of a visit to Tokyo by Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero. Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos, who will accompany Zapatero on the trip from Jan. 15, said he would like to help Japan on the nuclear issue through diplomatic means. Zapatero expressed his willingness to enhance ties between the two countries. The Japan Times (C) All rights reserved ***************************************************************** 22 UPI: Rice warns N. Korea of further isolation United Press International - NewsTrack - 1/5/2007 10:43:00 PM -0500 WASHINGTON, Jan. 5 (UPI) -- U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice Friday warned North Korea against any resumption of nuclear testing. Asked about the possibility during a press briefing, Rice noted that North Korea's October test got the country a sanctions resolution from the U.N. Security Council. "Really, the most important assessment is the political assessment and the North Koreans would have to know that any such test would obviously further deepen their isolation," Rice said. "The last test, of course, got them a Chapter 7 resolution which was a 15-0 vote and fairly extensive sanctions." South Korean Foreign Minister Song Min-soon, who had been meeting with Rice in Washington, told reporters he was unaware of any preparations by the north for a test. ABC News reported this week that South Korea had detected activity similar to that preceding the October test. © Copyright 2007 United Press International, Inc. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 23 Guardian Unlimited: Official: U.S., N.Korea to Meet in Jan. From the Associated Press [UP] Sunday January 7, 2007 1:16 PM AP Photo DCLJ101 SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - The United States and North Korea have reached a tentative agreement to hold talks on a dispute over U.S. financial restrictions against the communist regime in the week starting Jan. 22, South Korea's foreign minister said Sunday. Song Min-soon made the remark after arriving from Washington, where he met Friday with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. ``A date has not been set, but the North and the U.S. provisionally agreed to hold the talks in the week starting Jan. 22,'' he told reporters. ``I think it will be held around that time.'' The financial dispute was the main stumbling block that deadlocked last month's six-nation talks on North Korea's nuclear programs. The North insisted that Washington lift the financial restrictions first before disarmament discussions begin in earnest. Financial experts from Washington and Pyongyang held separate talks on the sidelines of the nuclear talks - involving China, Japan, the two Koreas, Russia and the U.S. - but no progress was reported. The two sides agreed to continue the talks, but did not set a date. Washington imposed the restrictions against a Macau-based bank holding North Korean accounts for Pyongyang's alleged involvement in counterfeiting and money laundering. That led to a freezing of the North's assets at the bank worth around $24 million. North Korea says the sanctions are evidence of Washington's ``hostile policy'' and indicate its intention to overthrow the regime, and the North therefore needs nuclear weapons for protection. Washington has denied it intends to invade the country, and says the restrictions are a law enforcement matter unconnected to the nuclear issue. Song said he and Rice also agreed that their two countries could consider providing additional incentives for North Korea, providing Pyongyang agreed to take initial steps toward giving up its nuclear program. He did not elaborate on the additional measures, but Yonhap news agency quoted him as saying that they would reflect ``what North Korea wants.'' Song said the incentives would be dependent on Pyongyang taking initial steps toward implementing a 2005 accord in which it agreed to give up its nuclear programs in exchange for security guarantees and aid. The move comes amid speculation that Pyongyang might be preparing for a second nuclear test following its first on Oct. 9, although officials in South Korea, the U.S and Japan have said there was no concrete sign a test is imminent. On Sunday, a South Korean opposition lawmaker claimed that North Korea is believed to be ready for another test. Rep. Chung Hyung-keun made a similar claim last month, saying the North dug two underground tunnels at a mountain in the country's northeast, used one for its October nuclear test and there was brisk activity at the other tunnel. Chung claimed in an article posted on his Web site on Sunday that test preparations at the unused tunnel are believed to have been completed. He did not give a source for his information. The lawmaker said, however, that the North is unlikely to go ahead with a test while its negotiations with the U.S. go on. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 24 Las Vegas SUN: Western Shoshone keep fighting for 1863 treaty property rights January 06, 2007 By KEN RITTER ASSOCIATED PRESS LAS VEGAS (AP) - The way Allen Moss sees it, most of the riches of Nevada - from the Las Vegas Strip to the state's gold mines - belong to an American Indian tribe. Keep Las Vegas, he said. But the Western Shoshone tribal leader wants to reclaim ancestral lands stretching from California through Nevada and Utah to Idaho. Time after time, in lawsuit after losing lawsuit, the Western Shoshone National Council and its members have been turned aside as they try to use a 19th-century treaty to win back what they say has been improperly taken by the U.S. government. "Las Vegas is on Shoshone land. The gold mines, that's all Shoshone," said Moss, Reno-area representative to the eight-member tribal council in Nevada. "People don't understand how much money, how many resources are coming out of Shoshone country." The tribe never used lines on a map until the 1863 Treaty of Ruby Valley, which the Shoshone say gave them to up to 93,750 square miles of ancestral lands. Las Vegas would tuck into a notch on those lines. Tribe members insist the treaty, ratified by Congress in 1866, grants the Shoshone, not the federal Bureau of Land Management or other agencies, royalties and final say over water, mineral and property rights in an area the size of the state of Maine. The hot, harsh desert area bears small bounties of pine nuts and medicinal herbs. The rugged hills have yielded $20 billion worth of gold over the years - third behind Russia and South Africa in world gold production, a lawyer for the tribe said. Moss estimates the number of Shoshone at between 5,000 and 8,000 - descendants of people who lived in lands from the Snake River Valley in Idaho to the Salt Lake Valley in Utah, across most of eastern and central Nevada, and in Death Valley and the Mojave Desert in California. To reclaim the lands and win some legal footing, the tribe has taken its case to fence lines, courts, international tribunals and the public. It sued to block the nation's nuclear waste from being stored in Nevada. It succeeded in postponing government plans to explode a bomb that would send the first mushroom cloud in decades over the desert. And the tribe went all the way to Switzerland to ask the United Nations to intervene in the land rights dispute. The tribe keeps losing on most fronts, but also keeps appealing - and some cases have notched a place in Western lore. Tribal elder Carrie Dann and her late sister Mary became famous for defying the government while losing a quarter-century battle to graze cattle on federal lands next to their Crescent Valley ranch without authorization. The Supreme Court ruled against the tribe in another case in 1979, saying the Treaty of Ruby Valley gave the U.S. trusteeship over the tribal lands. A Sept. 20 Court of Claims ruling in Washington, D.C., took the government position that the treaty was "merely one of friendship and that it conveyed no treaty rights." Lawyer Bob Hager, who has been handling Western Shoshone cases for free since 1983, maintains the tribe is losing on technicalities. He said the tribal claim finally got traction - and attention - with the U.N. Committee for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination last year in Geneva. The panel cited concern about the privatization of Western Shoshone ancestral lands for mining and energy developers and cited federal efforts to open a nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. "The thrust of our argument is that there has been no fair adjudication of claims," said Hager, of Reno. "The Organization of American States in 2002 and the U.N. panel last year reached the same conclusion, that the Western Shoshone were denied due process and equal protection." Cynthia Magnuson, a U.S. Department of Justice spokeswoman in Washington, said the government would not comment on the lawsuits or on the ruling by the U.N. panel. She noted that arguments in the Court of Claims appeal were due this month. "Generally, while things are pending, we do our talking in court," Magnuson said. The government has offered tribal members money, arguing it isn't realistic to expect the U.S. to give back lands acquired through "gradual encroachment" and now dotted with cities, crisscrossed by interstate highways and railroads, and used for mining, ranching and recreation. A law signed by President Bush in 2004 approved distribution to tribal members of more than $145 million, including some $26 million the federal Indian Claims Commission awarded in 1979 based on the 1872 value of 24 million acres. Some Shohones have said they would take the cash, but others balked. Moss, who loads preprinted newspaper advertisements for a living, said the distribution money won't be touched because to take it would concede the government's position. "Our land is not for sale," he said. The money continues to collect interest. Hager said he intends to appeal federal court dismissal of a lawsuit in Nevada challenging the distribution plan. Tribal chief Raymond Yowell claims Congress erred in approving the distribution, because lawmakers were told the federal land claims had been decided and the Western Shoshone had agreed to the amount. Another case pending in federal court in Reno seeks to void the 19th century transfer by the U.S. to the Union Pacific Railroad Co. and seven other large landholders of land, minerals and water in a so-called "checkerboard" pattern. The Western Shoshone also are appealing a federal court ruling last year that the court lacked jurisdiction and that too much time had passed since a landmark 1951 ruling to decide the tribe's treaty rights claim. The 1951 case, filed with the Indian Claims Commission, cut the size of the Western Shoshone aboriginal land claim from 60 million to 24 million acres. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the Dann case in 1985 that the tribe lost title to the land when the $26 million was deposited as payment - even though the money was never collected. Hager said a court decision whether the Western Shoshone could invoke aboriginal rights to block a planned non-nuclear "Divine Strake" weapons explosion at the Nevada Test Site north of Las Vegas could prove pivotal to the tribal claim. Moss isn't sure his sons, now 25 and 21, will take up the decades-long fight. "They can't believe how long the battle has taken," said Moss, 52. "They were taught in school this is a land of laws. I sit here saying, 'This is how the laws have been manipulated and twisted.'" "The Indians look at the ground as being sacred, including the water," he said. "The whole thing boils down to, 'How many times can you break the law or twist the law in your favor?' That's what the government has done." All contents copyright 2005 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 25 BBC NEWS: Russia attacks US on defence ban Last Updated: Sunday, 7 January 2007, 12:27 GMT [ src=] [ Russia attacks US on defence ban [Mig 29] Rosoboronexport sells everything from Mig jets to warships Russia has accused the US of illegally imposing sanctions against four Russian defence firms that Washington says are selling banned items to Iran and Syria. The Russian foreign ministry said the US was wrongly trying to force foreign firms to abide by domestic American rules that only apply to US firms. Moscow's comments come after the US said it was enforcing sanctions against 24 overseas defence companies in total. The US says the firms break its Iran and Syria Nonproliferation Act. This bans companies from providing the two countries with materials that could contribute to the development of weapons of mass destruction, or cruise or ballistic missile systems. 'Politicised actions' The four Russian firms to be hit by the US's latest sanctions include state-owned Rosoboronexport, Russia's largest arms exporter. "This is not the first time the US resorts to illegal attempts to spread its internal legislation on foreign companies and force them to abide by the US rules," said Russia's foreign ministry said in a statement. Other companies hit by the latest US sanctions include some from China, Iraq, Malaysia, Mexico, North Korea and Sudan. The sanctions came into force on 28 December, 2006, and are due to remain in place for two years. They prevent US firms from working with the named companies. The US last hit Russian firms, including Rosoboronexport, with sanctions because of their dealings with Iran in August. Moscow said the latest US move was once more groundless. "And yet once again, the United States is embarking on this vicious circle," said the Russian foreign ministry. "As a result of its politicised actions, the American state also denies itself and US firms the right to co-operate with our advanced companies. "In business language, this is called lost opportunities." ***************************************************************** 26 New York Times: U.S. Selecting Hybrid Design for Warheads - By WILLIAM J. BROAD, DAVID E. SANGER and THOM SHANKER Published: January 7, 2007 WASHINGTON, Jan. 6 — The Bush administration is expected to announce next week a major step forward in the building of the country’s first new nuclear warhead in nearly two decades. It will propose combining elements of competing designs from two weapons laboratories in an approach that some experts argue is untested and risky. The Caucus The new weapon would not add to but replace the nation’s existing arsenal of aging warheads, with a new generation meant to be sturdier, more reliable, safer from accidental detonation and more secure from theft by terrorists. The announcement, to be made by the interagency Nuclear Weapons Council, avoids making a choice between the two designs for a new weapon, called the Reliable Replacement Warhead, which at first would be mounted on submarine-launched missiles. The effort, if approved by President Bush and financed by Congress, would require a huge refurbishment of the nation’s complex for nuclear design and manufacturing, with the overall bill estimated at more than $100 billion. But the council’s decision to seek a hybrid design, combining well-tested elements from an older design with new safety and security elements from a more novel approach, could delay the weapon’s production. It also raises the question of whether the United States will ultimately be forced to end its moratorium on underground nuclear testing to make sure the new design works. On Friday, Bryan Wilkes, a spokesman for the National Nuclear Security Administration of the Energy Department, said the government would not proceed with the Reliable Replacement Warhead “if it is determined that testing is needed.” But other officials in the administration, including Robert Joseph, the under secretary of state for arms control and international security, have said that the White House should make no commitment on testing. Congress authorized exploratory research for the weapon three years ago, and has financed it at relatively low levels since. But now the costs will begin to increase. If Mr. Bush decides to deploy the new design, he could touch off a debate in a Democrat-controlled Congress and among allies and adversaries abroad, who have opposed efforts to modernize the arsenal in the past. While proponents of the new weapon said that it would replace older weapons that could deteriorate over time, and reduce the chances of a detonation if weapons fell into the wrong hands, critics have long argued that this is the wrong moment for Washington to produce a new nuclear warhead of any kind. At a time when the administration is trying to convince the world to put sanctions on North Korea and Iran to halt their nuclear programs, those critics argue, any move to improve the American arsenal will be seen as hypocritical, an effort by the United States to extend its nuclear lead over other countries. Should the United States decide to conduct a test, officials said, China and Russia — which have their own nuclear modernization programs under way — would feel free to do the same. North Korea was sanctioned by the United Nations Security Councilfor conducting its first test on Oct. 9, and it may be preparing for more, experts said. Both administration officials and military officers like Gen. James E. Cartwright, head of the Strategic Command, which controls the nation’s nuclear arsenal, argue that because the United States provides a nuclear umbrella for so many allies, it is critical that its stockpile be as reliable as possible. “We will not ‘un-invent’ nuclear weapons, and we will not walk away from the world,” General Cartwright said in a recent interview. “Right now, it is not the nation’s position that zero is the answer to the size of our inventory.” “So, if you are going to have these weapons, they should be safe, they should be able to be secured, and they should be reliable if used,” General Cartwright said in the interview, conducted before the Department of Energy’s decision was announced. The current schedule, which is subject to change, would call for the president to make a decision in a year or two and, if approved, to begin engineering development by fiscal year 2010 and production by 2012. The two teams competing to design the weapon, one at Los Alamos in New Mexico, the other at the Livermore National Laboratory in California, approached the problem with very different philosophies, nuclear officials and experts said. Livermore drew on a single, robust design that, before the testing moratorium, was detonated in the 1980s under a desolate patch of Nevada desert. The weapon, however, never entered the nation’s nuclear stockpile. The Los Alamos team drew on aspects of many weapons from the stockpile and pulled them together in a novel design that has never undergone testing. A winner of the competition was to have been announced in November. But federal officials said they had a hard time choosing between the two designs, calling both excellent. The question now, arms experts said, is whether a mix-and-match approach combining the two will produce a clever hybrid or an unworkable dud. They said the nuclear laboratories, bitter rivals for decades, have never before shared responsibility for designing a weapon. "There has not been what I would consider a real partnership," said Philip E. Coyle III, a former director of weapons testing at the Pentagon and former director of nuclear testing for Livermore. "In some respects, it's unprecedented." Ray E. Kidder, a senior Livermore scientist who pioneered early arms designs, said the hybrid approach appeared to be based more on the politics of survival for the laboratories than on technical merit. "It's spreading the wealth," he said. Federal officials, Dr. Kidder added, "tend to do that fairly rigorously so as to keep the labs alive. To foreclose the possibility of closure, they try to divide the work load." General Cartwright cast that problem differently, saying that it is critical to keep America's "intellectual capital" in producing weapons alive. "We are starting to get to the point where the people who actually have experience designing a weapon are reaching that point at which they will start to leave the industry," he said. "And are we able to attract the minds that we will need to sustain this activity?" Nonetheless, several nuclear experts expressed doubts about the wisdom of using a design that has never undergone testing, saying future presidents might lose confidence in the arsenal's potency and be tempted to conduct test explosions. "It's one thing to have all the components working and another to have them all working together," said Raymond Jeanloz, a geophysicist at the University of California, Berkeley, who advises the government on nuclear arms. "To me, that's the key technical issue that has yet to be resolved." In the few years since its debut, the reliability program has grown from a fringe effort at the nation's nuclear arms laboratories into a centerpiece of the Bush administration's nuclear policy. Advocates say a generation of more reliable arms would give military commanders the confidence to abandon the current philosophy of holding onto huge inventories of old weapons, and could speed a shrinkage of the American arsenal from some 6,000 warheads to perhaps 2,000 or less. Critics say a main justification for the program vanished in November when a secretive federal panel known as Jason found that the plutonium "pits" at the heart of many nuclear warheads aged far better than expected, with most able to work reliably for a century or more. "This research eliminates a major rationale," Lisbeth Gronlund, a nuclear arms specialist at the Union of Concerned Scientists, a private group based in Cambridge, Mass., said in a November statement. Since that study was revealed, the administration has emphasized other reasons to build a new warhead, especially new, highly classified technologies to make the weapons virtually impossible to use if they fall into unfriendly hands. Other objectives are to simplify manufacturing, reduce toxic byproducts and improve safety of triggering devices. As a signatory to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, the United States and other nuclear weapons states have committed, at least on paper, to the ultimate goal of "the liquidation of all their existing stockpiles" of weapons. But General Cartwright cautioned that much of the criticism of the program was cast in terms of achieving that disarmament, and he said the government's policy, and that of the new warhead program, was to maintain a nuclear stockpile "that would be the smallest practical to maintain its credibility." He described the nation's nuclear weapons stockpile as "an artifact of the cold war - cold war both in its delivery systems and its characteristics and certainly in its technology." "We stopped testing a while back. So, from the testing standpoint, we have not been fielding new weapons," General Cartwright said. "From the standpoint of engineering and design, there has been only marginal activity, mostly reacting to the age of components." Copyright 2007The New York Times Company ***************************************************************** 27 Antiwar.com: Bonkers Bolton's Legacy - by Gordon Prather January 6, 2007 Once George W. Bush became President, the neo-crazies – in and out of government – attempted to implement their long gestating plan to remake the Middle East to their peculiar liking, effecting "regime change" in Iraq, Iran and elsewhere, by force if necessary. Of course, the Best Congress Money Can Buy was perfectly willing to be complicit in the neo-crazies regime change plan, but there was a problem. You. Not many of you were willing to risk thousands of American lives and zillions of Yankee dollars on a peculiar remake of the Middle East. But then, on their second attempt – the firstoccurring back in 1993 – terrorists associated with radical Middle Eastern organizations such as al-Qaeda succeeded in bringing down the Twin Towers, on live TV, killing thousands of Americans in the process. Almost immediately Congress gave Bush a blank check, authorizing the President to "use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorists attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001" in order "to prevent any future acts of international terrorism." Wow! Now, all Bush had to do before launching a pre-emptive attack on Iraq or Iran was to tell the BCMCB that he had determined that the Iraqis/Iranians/Hottentots had nukes and intended to give them to terrorists for use against us. But in the fall of 2002, as Bush was attempting to "fix" the "intelligence" to support the "determination" he had already made, the UN Security Council was being authoritatively told that intrusive go-anywhere, see-anything inspections in Iraq by its International Atomic Energy Agency had failed to find any evidence of an Iraqi nuclear program, peaceful or otherwise. Hence, the Security Council – unlike the BCMCB – refused to give Bush a blank check. Refused to authorize the use of force by Bush and his "coalition of the willing." Bush had announced his National Strategy to Combat Weapons of Mass Destruction – based upon his BCMCB blank check – in late 2002. Now Bonkers Bolton – then Under-Secretary of State for Arms Control – developed from it the Proliferation Security Initiative. According to Bolton, "proliferators and those facilitating the procurement of deadly capabilities are circumventing existing laws, treaties, and controls against WMD proliferation." What to do? Well, form a few extra-legal War-on-Terror-oriented posse. Bolton claimed the PSI was "legalized" by Security Council Resolution 1540which says, inter alia, "Gravely concerned by the threat of terrorism and the risk that non-State actors* may acquire, develop, traffic in or use nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and their means of delivery, "Gravely concerned by the threat of illicit trafficking in nuclear, chemical, or biological weapons and their means of delivery, and related materials,* ... "Acting under Chapter VII of the Charter of the United Nations, "1. Decides that all States shall refrain from providing any form of support to non-State actors that attempt to develop, acquire, manufacture, possess, transport, transfer or use nuclear, chemical or biological weapons and their means of delivery; "2. Decides also that all States, in accordance with their national procedures, shall adopt and enforce appropriate effective laws which prohibit any non-State actor to manufacture, acquire, possess, develop, transport, transfer or use nuclear, chemical or biological weapons and their means of delivery, in particular for terrorist purposes, as well as attempts to engage in any of the foregoing activities, participate in them as an accomplice, assist or finance them;" UNSCR 1540 established a "Committee of the Security Council," to which all States were to report "on steps they have taken or intend to take." One of Bolton’s accomplishments once he became our (unconfirmed) UN Ambassador was UNSCR 1673, which essentially extended the term of the UNSCR 1540 Committee and expanded its authority. Bolton also obtained UNSCR 1718which "Acting under Chapter VII of the Charter of the United Nations, and taking measures under its Article 41, "1. Condemns the nuclear test proclaimed by the DPRK on 9 October 2006 in flagrant disregard of its relevant resolutions, in particular resolution 1695 (2006), as well as of the statement of its President of 6 October 2006 (S/PRST/2006/41), including that such a test would bring universal condemnation of the international community and would represent a clear threat to international peace and security; "2. Demands that the DPRK not conduct any further nuclear test or launch of a ballistic missile; "3. Demands that the DPRK immediately retract its announcement of withdrawal from the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons; "4. Demands further that the DPRK return to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons and International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards, and underlines the need for all States Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons to continue to comply with their Treaty obligations;" Now, of course, the Security Council was not acting under Chapter VII. In particular, the UN Charter doesn’t authorize any entity to require North Korea – a sovereign state – to "return" to the NPT. So UNSCR 1718 is fatally flawed. UNSCR 1718 "calls upon" all UN Member States to take all sorts of actions against North Korea, and establishes a "Committee of the Security Counci" to monitor their performance. The UNSCR 1718 Committee has even more authority than the UNSCR 1673 Committee. It can "examine and take appropriate action on information regarding alleged violations of measures imposed" by UNSCR 1718. Then there’s UNSCR 1737, which calls upon UN Member States to take all sorts of actions against Iran for failing to comply with the requests made of Iran by the Board of Governors of the International Atomic Energy Agency, in blatant disregard of their own Statuteand of the Treaty on Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. So UNSCR 1737 is fatally flawed, too. UNSCR 1737 also establishes a Committee of the Security Council "to examine and take appropriate action on information regarding alleged violations of measures imposed" by UNSCR 1737. So, perhaps it’s worth returning to UNSCR 1540 – the resolution Bonkers Bolton claims "legalizes" the extra-legal PSI posse and its Committee clones – wherein the Security Council "Decides that none of the obligations set forth in this resolution shall be interpreted so as to conflict with or alter the rights and obligations of State Parties to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, the Chemical Weapons Convention and the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention or alter the responsibilities of the International Atomic Energy Agency or the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons;" Whoops! 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. Copyright 2007 Antiwar.com ***************************************************************** 28 Patriot Ledger: Company caught in fallout of feds nuclear laws; SouthofBoston.com 400 Crown Colony Drive P.O. Box 699159 Quincy, MA 02269-9159 (617) 786-7000 New regulations too expensive for Plymouth business Carl Borsari, owner of Nuclear Instrument Co., clears out his business in Plymouth after 35 years. New regulations on radiation forced him to shut his doors. (LISA BUL/The Patriot Ledger) By TAMARA RACE and SUE REINERT The Patriot Ledger PLYMOUTH - New federal rules designed to track low-level nuclear materials proved too burdensome for one small company. After 35 years in business, owner Carl Borsari has decided to close Nuclear Instrument Co. rather than comply with expensive new regulations. Borsari used cesium, a radioactive element, to calibrate specialized electronic instruments. Borsari said the new regulations would have forced him to dispose of his existing supply of cesium and buy a new, smaller supply at a cost of more than $80,000. At 71, he decided to close up shop. He spent this past week cleaning up his quarters in the Camelot Industrial Park. Borsari asked federal officials to take the radioactive material away two years ago, after receiving notice of the new rules. They didnt get around to it until Dec. 18, when it was announced that cesium had been removed from an unidentified Plymouth company to keep it out of the hands of potential terrorists intent on making a dirty bomb. They didnt mention that the U.S. Department of Energy had originally planned to wait another year to pick it up. The cesium was in a pellet 20 millimeters long - a little less than an inch - and contained in an 1,100-pound capsule. Fifty nuclear calibration firms like Borsaris were affected by rules issued by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission adopted in response to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. ‘‘Among the orders was one that called for them to contact local law enforcement to determine the best way to restrict unauthorized access (to radioactive material), said Suzanne Condon, assistant state commissioner of public health. The companies had until last June to comply with security requirements and other rules, or lose their nuclear calibration licenses, Condon said. The other 49 companies all met the new standards, she said. State inspectors found out that Borsari was no longer doing calibration work when they visited his shop last month. When they discovered that the federal government didnt intend to pick up the companys radioactive material until 2008, they asked the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to act faster, she said. ‘‘We said we would like to see this material removed before there was any concern about risk to public health, Condon said. Bryan Wilkes, spokesman for the National Nuclear Security Administration, the energy department unit that carried out the recovery, said he wasnt aware of the 2008 date. ‘‘We were asked by the NRC to remove it, and it was a high priority for them, Wilkes said. Condon and Wilkes praised Borsari, saying he had ‘‘a near-perfect record of compliance. His radioactive material was in sealed, leak-proof capsules, she said. Wilkes said Borsari ‘‘did the responsible thing (by not) just throwing (the material) away in some dump after shutting down his calibration business. Borsari takes offense at the suggestion he was unable to handle the nuclear material. ‘‘Im perfectly capable to manage it. That wasnt the issue, he said. ‘‘It was the cost of continuing. It wasnt worth it. Condon said the company still holds a license to handle a small amount of radioactive material, and she expects it to be transferred soon. Borsari said his firm has already been acquired by another company, but he declined to name it. More than 27,000 companies in the state work with radioactive material, Condon said. Of those, 512 hold radioactive materials licenses, including hospitals, universities, industrial and agricultural users. Cesium is used in cancer treatment and in gauges that measure rock formations in well-drilling, moisture in construction projects, the thickness of paper, metal and other materials, and flow in oil pipes. It takes about 30 years for cesium to lose half its radioactive energy. Fallout from nuclear weapons and accidents has spread cesium around the world. The metal emits radioactivity that can penetrate the body and would endanger health if it were released in an explosion, experts say. The National Nuclear Security Administration initially focused on retrieving abandoned radioactive material in the former Soviet Union and other countries. After Sept. 11, 2001, Wilkes said, ‘‘it became obvious to us that there was a lot of unused and unwanted radiologic material in the U.S. The agency has recovered 13,000 domestic radioactive sources, Wilkes said. He did not know whether any others were in Massachusetts. Sue Reinert can be reached at ; Tamara Race can be reached at Copyright 2007 The Patriot Ledger Transmitted Saturday, January 06, 2007 The Patriot Ledger, 400 Crown Colony Drive P.O. Box 699159, Quincy, MA 02269-9159 Telephone: (617) 786-7000 ***************************************************************** 29 Japan Times: Japan mulled allowing in nuke-armed U.S. ships Web japantimes.co.jp Sunday, Jan. 7, 2007 WASHINGTON (Kyodo) Japan and the United States studied a proposal by Tokyo to publicly acknowledge the transit right of U.S. warships carrying nuclear weapons before a visit by President Gerald Ford in 1974, according to recently declassified U.S. documents. In return, the plan called for the United States to home-port the aircraft carrier Midway away from Japan, according to the documents. The documents include minutes of meetings of Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and senior State Department officials. Copies of the documents were recently obtained by National Security Archive, a Washington think tank. The plan apparently came to nothing and Ford did not make remarks trying to clear allegations that the United States was bringing nuclear weapons into Japan. Japan and the U.S. have to this day continued a "strategy of ambiguity" about whether U.S. military vessels entering Japan's territorial waters carry nuclear weapons. Japan has since 1971 maintained the three nonnuclear principles not producing, possessing or allowing nuclear arms into its territory. The proposal was apparently aimed at quelling concerns about U.S. nuclear weapons before Ford's visit to Japan. In September 1974, retired Rear Adm. Gene LaRocque revealed in congressional testimony that the U.S. Navy would not rule out the possibility that vessels carrying nuclear weapons would make port calls in Japan. The testimony raised alarm bells in Japan, and Washington and Tokyo apparently considered moving the Midway out of Japan as a face-saving measure to resolve the situation before Ford's visit. The Midway continued to be stationed at Yokosuka, Kanagawa Prefecture. According to a document dated Nov. 11, 1974, Philip Habib, assistant secretary of state in charge of Japanese affairs, reported to Kissinger that the Japanese "are willing to make some proposals on the nuclear side which are rather interesting" when the president visits Japan. "It means that the Japanese government would publicly acknowledge the right of transit of ships with nuclear weapons," Habib said. The Japan Times (C) All rights reserved ***************************************************************** 30 AFP: US to announce new nuclear warhead Sun Jan 7, 5:45 PM ET WASHINGTON (AFP) - The United States is expected to announce next week a major step forward in the building of the country's first new nuclear warhead in nearly two decades, a newspaper reported. The New York Times, in a report on its website, said the US government will propose combining elements of competing designs from two weapons laboratories in an approach that some experts argue is untested and risky. The new weapon would not add to but replace the nations existing arsenal of aging warheads, with a new generation meant to be sturdier, more reliable, safer from accidental detonation and more secure from theft by terrorists, the report said. The announcement, to be made by the interagency Nuclear Weapons Council, avoids making a choice between the two designs for a new weapon, called the Reliable Replacement Warhead, which at first would be mounted on submarine-launched missiles, The Times said. The effort, if approved by President George W. Bush" /> President George W. Bushand financed by Congress, would require a huge refurbishment of the nations complex for nuclear design and manufacturing, with the overall bill estimated at more than 100 billion dollars, the report said. But the councils decision also raises the question of whether the United States will ultimately be forced to end its moratorium on underground nuclear testing to make sure the new design works, The Times pointed out. On Friday, Bryan Wilkes, a spokesman for the National Nuclear Security Administration of the Energy Department, said the government would not proceed with the Reliable Replacement Warhead "if it is determined that testing is needed," the paper said. But other officials in the administration, including Robert Joseph, the under secretary of state for arms control and international security, have said that the White House should make no commitment on testing, according to the report. If Bush decides to deploy the new design, he could touch off a debate in a Democrat-controlled Congress and among allies and adversaries abroad, who have opposed efforts to modernize the arsenal in the past, The Times said. At a time when the administration is trying to convince the world to impose sanctions on North Korea" /> North Koreaand Iran" /> Iranto halt their nuclear programs, critics argue, any move to improve the US arsenal will be seen as hypocritical, the paper pointed out. Copyright © 2007 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 31 BBC NEWS: Glasgow and West | Academics protest against Trident Updated: Sunday, 7 January 2007, 15:44 GMT [Faslane demonstration] Academics and students gathered from the UK, Japan and the US An international group of academics is staging a protest against weapons of mass destruction at the gates of the Faslane submarine base on the Clyde. Prime Minister Tony Blair announced plans late last year to upgrade Trident at a cost of up to £20bn. The move forced one Scottish Executive minister to resign and a BBC survey found a majority of Scottish MPs opposed replacing the missile system. But community leaders say the jobs from the base are vital to the area. A delegation of students, from Oxford, Cambridge, Sussex and Edinburgh, have also been camping out at the naval base. Nuclear weapons are not peaceful and go against international law Anne-Marie O'Reilly Oxford graduate They were joined by the academics on Sunday to protest and stage a blockade. Anne-Marie O'Reilly, 22, an Oxford graduate, said she hoped the weekend's activities would make the government sit up and take notice. She said: "It is a really important issue, that we have got nuclear weapons, because by the end of this year the government wants to spend at least another £20bn on them. "Hopefully our voices will be heard and they will see that nuclear weapons are not peaceful and go against international law." Papers were presented on civil disobedience, the militarisation of academia and the status of nuclear weapons in national and international law. Professor Lynn Jamieson, from Edinburgh University, said: "It's a very momentous time at the moment, deciding to try and commit Britain to nuclear weapons until the middle of this century and building a new system, so I feel it's time to be counted in whatever way possible." TRIDENT MISSILE SYSTEM [Trident] Missile length: 44ft (13m) Weight: 130,000lb (58,500kg) Diameter: 74 inches (1.9m) Range: More than 4,600 miles (7,400km) Power plant: Three stage solid propellant rocket Cost: £16.8m ($29.1m) per missile Source: Federation of American Scientists [ The protests come as the Roman Catholic Church re-iterates its opposition to the renewal of Trident. A pastoral letter to be read out at all Masses in Scotland from Bishop Peter Moran, the Bishop of Aberdeen, warns that violence comes in many forms, including in people's attitudes. The letter states: "We are all aware of the suicide bombs, the revenge-driven attacks, the indiscriminate slaughter, the wholesale devastation. We can see violence breeding violence. "Yet people who would never consider such barbarous behaviour, people who long for peace just as we do, are still prepared to threaten death and devastation, out of fear. "The world's most powerful governments, including our own, seem determined to base our security on having nuclear weapons available." The letter urges Catholics to contact their MPs and make their views and the views of the Church known. However, Dumbarton Labour MSP Jackie Baillie insists that Faslane jobs are vital to the area. She claims that 7,000 people work directly at the base, with another 4,000 jobs dependent on it locally. Last month Communities Minister Malcolm Chisholm resigned from his post after voting with the Scottish National Party in a debate on Trident. ***************************************************************** 32 Independent: Plea to stop Rio Tinto quitting Britain By Tim Webb Published: 07 January 2007 Rhodri Morgan, the First Minister for Wales, has written to the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, Alistair Darling, imploring him to intervene to prevent Rio Tinto from pulling out of the UK with the loss of over 500 jobs. The mining giant has a majority stake in Anglesey Aluminium Metal (AAM), which has been in operation since 1971 and is Rio Tinto's only UK facility. But the planned decommissioning of the nearby Wylfa nuclear reactor, and rising energy costs, means the smelting plant is likely to close. After meeting AAM's management last month, Mr Morgan wrote to Mr Darling asking him to broker a meeting between AAM and the owner of the reactor, the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA). AAM has an electricity supply contract with the ageing Wylfa plant which fixes prices until September 2009. The NDA is in talks with AAM about signing an extension to provide electricity up until the closure of Wylfa, in December 2010, but the two sides have yet to reach agreement. Since the existing supply contract was signed, electricity prices have soared. Aluminium smelting is highly energy intensive - the plant takes 250MW, a quarter of the reactor's capacity - and electricity is the highest biggest cost. Plants typically source their electricity directly from a power station because they need a guaranteed supply. © 2006 Independent News and Media Limited ***************************************************************** 33 reviewjournal.com: NRC commissioner stepping down Jan. 06, 2007 THE ASSOCIATED PRESS WASHINGTON -- The longest-serving commissioner on the Nuclear Regulatory Commission is resigning, which means for the second time in two years Sen. Harry Reid will have some input on a replacement for the panel with oversight of Yucca Mountain. Edward McGaffigan Jr. said Friday he will leave the NRC after 10 years for health reasons. McGaffigan, 59, a Democrat, informed President Bush and Reid, the Senate majority leader, of his decision in letters Thursday. Reid, D-Nev., must recommend a person to fill the Democratic spot on the board. The longest-serving commissioner in the NRC's history, McGaffigan was appointed to the commission on Aug. 28, 1996. He is undergoing treatment for metastic melanoma, a particularly dangerous form of skin cancer, according to the agency. Bush appointed Reid's top science adviser at the time, Gregory Jaczko, to the five-member NRC in January 2005. The Senate finally confirmed him in May 2006 as part of a deal in which Reid dropped his opposition to other Bush nominations. Reid has fought for years to keep the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository from being built in Nevada. Some Senate Republicans and the nuclear industry had opposed Jaczko's nomination, fearing he would work to further Reid's desire to kill the project 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas. Jaczko's term expires at the end of 2008. The Energy Department has postponed until 2008 applying to the NRC for a license to operate the national nuclear waste repository, which it hopes to open by 2020 -- two decades late. Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal, 1997 - 2007 ***************************************************************** 34 Sun News: Nuclear energy could ease power concerns 01/06/2007 U.S. FUEL NEEDS By Sen. William Mescher Before I had the privilege of serving the citizens of South Carolina as a state senator, I spent nearly 40 years in the electrical energy sector: first with the investor-owned Commonwealth Edison Co.; then president of Santee Cooper, a public power entity; then chairman of the board of the American Public Power Association; and then an energy and management consultant. I like to think this experience is an asset to my function as a state senator, especially considering how much energy issues have been in the news over the past few years. In fact, even as things calm down a bit and prices reach a more reasonable level, there's no denying that energy is still one of the most important issues facing South Carolina, her people and her industries and businesses. No matter how low prices get this month or next, we are still a long way from a truly stable energy situation. I hope we can be honest enough with ourselves to admit it. We all have firsthand knowledge of just how volatile prices can be. Unprecedented demand continues to put a strain on limited supplies. Seemingly isolated incidents a world away can send the price of gasoline skyrocketing with little or no warning. Whether it's a civil unrest in Nigeria or an explosion somewhere in Russia, the global oil markets are so interconnected that we feel the effects almost immediately. Such an event could happen tomorrow, next week or next month, and the resulting spike in energy prices will once again leave hardworking Americans searching for a way to make ends meet. South Carolina, and all of America, must work to ensure a stable, reliable supply of energy. We need to move quickly to pass legislation on all levels that would aid and abet our efforts to attain energy security, increase our domestic supply, reduce our demand, protect our environment and allow us to provide low-cost and reliable energy to the growing number of people who call this state their home. A series of steps could make all the difference in the world: restarting the nuclear power industry; building needed power plants; expanding our existing oil refining capacity; building new oil refineries; promoting alternative energies like bio-diesel and hybrid technology; expanding research on ethanol to make it more cost-effective; promoting energy conservation; developing green power and other renewable energy; providing incentives to automobile manufacturers and auto purchasers to make and purchase cars getting better gas mileage; switching to compact fluorescent lighting; and finding more stable partners on the global energy market, whether it's for gasoline, natural gas, ethanol or another source, because it is unwise to rely so heavily on geopolitically unstable countries such as Venezuela or Iran. I earlier mentioned nuclear power. Nuclear power is clean, safe, reliable and can rapidly lessen our reliance on foreign fuel sources. If this country is serious about addressing its energy needs, the environment and concerns about climate change, nuclear energy is certainly part of the answer. Concerns about nuclear energy and nuclear waste in the United States are based on political, not technical, issues. The Yucca Mountain nuclear storage facility stalemate is strictly political. It's a "not in my backyard" standoff, pure and simple. For the good of our country the Yucca Mountain problem must be resolved. The timing is right for action on our energy situation. U.S. electricity demand is projected to increase 45 percent by 2030, which is the same year 40 percent of Americans are projected to live here in the South. That's a lot of energy to a lot of people, and our endeavors are well worth the effort. The economic boost for both our personal pocketbooks and our economy as a whole would be tremendous. And the benefits to our national security and foreign policy would be immeasurable. The choice is ours. I hope we resist the urge to act as if things are "back to normal." Instead we must make it a personal and collective goal to find new ways to think about energy. It's going to take all hands on deck - you, me, our communities, our government and our businesses - to ensure that we enjoy long-term success. The writer lives in Columbia. News | Business | Sports | ***************************************************************** 35 Arizona Republic: APS president: Rate increase will end up saving customers [The Arizona Republic] January 7, 2007 Jobs | Mark Shaffer New Arizona Public Service Co. President Donald Brandt discusses some of the utility's main issues: • Proposed 20.4 percent electric rate increase. "If the (Arizona) Corporation Commission doesn't approve our request, there's no doubt in my mind that our bond rating will be downgraded to non-investment grade junk. That will mean a needless increase in cost for our customers between $650 million and $1.2 billion over 10 years. If that happens, I will also be very concerned with our access to capital markets. To have the second-fastest-growing utility in the country teetering on the lowest investment grade is a very dangerous place to be." • Increased federal oversight of Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station because of malfunctions. "We had a great track record, the best in the industry for 10 years. But some element of complacency slipped in and nuclear plants have to be in a constant improvement process. We've already changed the people out there that we needed to. Plus, before his retirement Jim (Levine) took the bull by the horns and put in an improvement program which I think has impressed the Nuclear Regulatory Commission." • Expanding Palo Verde. "It's way too early to speculate about that. There are potential other sites in the state with a better water supply. We are so far off from additional viable nuclear. I think it needs to go in that direction but we have to get Yucca Mountain (nuclear waste repository) going first. Eighteen nuclear plants in India alone are being built but you can't afford in this country to get one even half built because of the risk factors. Global warming and competition are going to force a decision on whether we are going to have more nuclear energy." • TransWest Express 6,000 megawatt project to bring electricity from Wyoming. "Our planning now is looking at having it in place between 2015 and 2020. This is an ideal alternative for our state because there are a lot more wind sites in Wyoming and huge coal reserves. But there is going to be a lot of blocking and tackling." Copyright © 2007, azcentral.com. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 36 Carlsbad Current-Argus: Schedule set for GNEP public scoping meetings Launched: 01/06/2007 10:13:16 PM MST CARLSBAD — Carlsbad and Hobbs residents will soon have a chance to comment on the direction of an upcoming environmental impact statement related to the area's interest in a Global Nuclear Energy Partnership initiative. The Department of Energy has proposed three facilities — a nuclear fuel recycling center, an advanced recycling reactor and an advanced fuel cycle research facility — as a part of its GNEP initiative. The intent is to recycle spent nuclear fuel and destroy its long-lived radioactive components. The Eddy-Lea Energy Alliance — representing the cities of Hobbs and Carlsbad and Lea and Eddy counties — submitted an application in the fall expressing an interest in the recycling center and reactor aspects of program. The prospective site is located almost directly between Hobbs and Carlsbad. The alliance was one of 11 entities selected to receive funding for a site study. Only four of those, along with two additional DOE sites, are under consideration for the advanced fuel cycle research facility. Private entities, including the alliance, are not eligible for the research facility. On Thursday, a notice of intent to prepare a programmatic environmental impact statement was published in the Federal Register. As part of the process of preparing the PEIS, a 90-day comment period began this week and continues through April 4. Public comments will be taken at 11 scoping meetings at the various sites. A Hobbs meeting is scheduled for 6-9:30 p.m. Feb. 26 at the Lea County Event Center. Roswell and Los Alamos are also under consideration, with meetings scheduled for 6-9:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Feb. 27 at the Best Western Sally Port Inn and Suites in Roswell and on March 1 in Los Alamos. Public comments will be considered in determining the scope and issues that will be analyzed in the PEIS. There will be a second public comment period after the preliminary draft of the PEIS is issued. "We continue to mark significant progress with GNEP and we look forward to gaining a broader understanding of the environmental conditions under which we will be operating," DOE Assistant Secretary for Nuclear Energy Dennis Spurgeon said in a prepared statement. "Our need for nuclear power — a safe, emissions-free and affordable source of energy — has never been greater, and GNEP puts us on a path to encourage expansion of domestic and international nuclear energy production while reducing nuclear proliferation risks." Written comments may be sent to Mr. Timothy A. Frazier, GNEP PEIS Document Manager, Office of Nuclear Energy, U.S. Department of Energy, 1000 Independence Ave., SW., Washington, DC 20585-0119; Telephone: (866) 645-7803; Fax: (866) 645-7807; E-mail: GNEP — PEIS@nuclear.energy.gov. Envelopes, faxes and e-mail should be marked, "GNEP PEIS Comments." Additional information on GNEP may be found at www.gnep.energy.gov. Copyright © 2005 Carlsbad Current Argus, a MediaNews Group Newspaper. ***************************************************************** 37 AFP: Czech Republic's Temelin nuclear unit shut down for test Saturday January 6, 03:29 PM PRAGUE (AFP) - The first unit of the controversial Czech nuclear reactor at Temelin was closed down overnight while tests were carried out on the operating equipment. The unit was expected to be reconnected to the network on Sunday, the CTK news agency said Saturday. The equipment has been tested once a month since an order in mid-2006 from the Czech Republic's nuclear authority. The Temelin plant, which started service in 2000, has created fierce controversy in neighbouring Austria, which opted to close down its commercial nuclear power plants in 1978. Austrian protests centre on the safety of the plant, built according to an original Soviet design with Western security systems added on. Temelin is sited 60 kilometres (40 miles) from the Czech-Austrian border. Original plans for the plant counted on four reactors but this was scaled back to two. Copyright © 2007 AFP AFP. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 38 AFP: Czech Republic's Temelin nuclear reactor back on stream Sun Jan 7, 6:06 AM ET PRAGUE (AFP) - A Czech nuclear reactor that has been criticised in neighbouring Austria for saftey reasons was reconnected to the national grid after being temporarily shut down for routine tests. The CTK news agency said the number one reactor of the nuclear power station at Temelin was closed down Saturday as part of once-monthly tests since the middle of last year. The Temelin plant, which went into operation in 2000, has prompted criticism in Austria on safety and environmental grounds. Austria opted to close down its own commercial nuclear power plants in 1978. The plant, 60 kilometres (36 miles) from the Czech-Austrian border, was a Soviet design dating from the communist era when Czechoslovakia was an ally of the Soviet Union. Western security systems were later added. Original plans were for four reactors but were scaled back to two. The power station has experienced a succession of technical difficulties, especially in its secondary non-nuclear circuit, causing the reactors to be hurriedly shut down several times for safety reasons. The station generates 15 percent of electricity in the Czech Republic. Copyright © 2007 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 39 Japan Times: Kepco staff face charges over reactor accident | Web japantimes.co.jp Monday, Jan. 8, 2007 FUKUI (Kyodo) Police plan to ask prosecutors to file criminal charges against some 10 employees of Kansai Electric Power Co. for professional negligence leading to Japan's deadliest nuclear power plant accident in Fukui Prefecture in 2004, investigative sources said Sunday. The police are expected to send their case against the Kepco staff to prosecutors before the end of this month, the sources said. Among the suspects are a former chief at the power company's branch in Fukui Prefecture and maintenance workers at the No. 3 reactor in the Mihama nuclear power plant. In the accident Aug. 9, 2004, superheated steam burst from a ruptured pipe in the reactor's turbine building, killing five inspectors and injuring six others. Police suspect the branch office neglected an immediate safety checkup after confirming that the pipe had not been inspected since the pressurized water reactor first went into operation in 1976. In connection with the accident, the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency produced a report in March 2005 that concluded Kepco's inappropriate maintenance of the pipe resulted in its corrosion and rupture. The report said the accident resulted not only from Kepco's poor maintenance but also from the failure by contractors Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd. and Nihon Arm Co. to take proper precautions. Kepco outsourced safety management of the Mihama plant's piping system to the two firms. The utility said last month it will resume operation of the reactor around this Wednesday as part of ongoing test runs. The reactor was run for two weeks during a test starting in late September. Kepco said it is aiming to resume full-fledged commercial operations in early February. The Japan Times (C) All rights reserved ***************************************************************** 40 icScotland: Scotland 'can't afford nuclear' The SNP has claimed the country cannot afford to build new nuclear power stations after it emerged the estimated decommissioning costs for existing plants has risen by £2.1 billion to £64.8 billion. In a letter to the party's environment spokesman Richard Lochhead MSP, the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) also admitted estimates are subject to "significant uncertainty". Created in April 2005, the authority is the Government body responsible for delivering the decommissioning programme of the UK's civil nuclear legacy. Copyright and Trade Mark Notice © owned by or licensed to Scottish & Universal Newspapers Limited 2007. ***************************************************************** 41 Independent: Israel 'has plan for nuclear strike on Iran' By Marie Woolf, Political Editor Published: 07 January 2007 Israel has drawn up secret plans to use low-yield nuclear weapons to knock out Iran's uranium enrichment facilities, it was claimed last night. According to a report in The Sunday Times, two Israeli air force squadrons are training to use nuclear "bunker busting" bombs to demolish Iran's heavily guarded enrichment programme. Israeli military commanders are said to believe that conventional strikes may not be sufficient to wipe out Iran's enrichment facilities, some of which are built beneath 70ft of concrete and rock. Under the plans conventional laser-guided bombs would open tunnels into the targets and then mini nuclear weapons would be fired, exploding deep underground. The nuclear-tipped, bunker-busting bombs would only be used if a conventional attack was ineffective, or if the US, which also wants to halt Iran's nuclear programme, fails to act. The leaking of the "plans" may well be designed to apply pressure on the US. Israel has already made it clear that it does not want to allow Iran to develop nuclear weapons. It fears for its own safety after the Iranian President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, said: "Israel must be wiped off the map." Israel is said to have identified three prime targets south of Tehran, including Nantanz, where facilities are being installed for uranium enrichment underground. Israeli pilots are believed to have flown to Gibraltar recently to train for the 2,000-mile round trip to Iran. A spokesman for the Israeli embassy in London said last night that Israel preferred to use diplomatic means to end Iran's nuclear enrichment programme. "We have an unchanged policy position on the Iranian nuclear issue. Israel prefers this issue to be resolved through diplomatic channels," he said. "We cannot comment on any other scenario." © 2006 Independent News and Media Limited ***************************************************************** 42 [NYTr] Poisoned Once, Poisoned Twice... Litvinenko Update Date: Sun, 7 Jan 2007 16:13:56 -0500 (EST) X-Sender-Host-Name: olm.blythe-systems.com X-DSPAM-Result: mail; result="Innocent"; class="Innocent"; probability=0.0000; confidence=1.00; signature=N/A X-Spam-Class: HAM Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit sent by Michael Givel (activ-l) The Sunday Telegraph (UK) - Jan 7, 2007 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/01/07/nlitvin07.xml Police believe Litvinenko poisoned twice By David Harrison Alexander Litvinenko, the former Russian spy, was the victim of a "double hit" by the assassins who poisoned him with radioactive polonium-210, police believe. Detectives suspect that Mr Litvinenko, 44, who lived in north London, was first poisoned several days before he was attacked at a central London hotel on November 1. Officers had initially believed he was first poisoned that day at the Itsu sushi bar in Piccadilly, central London, when he met Mario Scaramella, an Italian espionage expert, for lunch. But now Scotland Yard is investigating whether Mr Litvinenko was attacked several days before the lunch meeting and are examining his movements during that period. Police believe the second attack took place at the Pine Bar of the Millennium Hotel in Mayfair. They are focusing their inquiries on two Russians - Andrei Lugovoi and Dmitri Kovtun, both former KGB officers - who met Mr Litvinenko there on the day he fell ill. His post-mortem examination revealed two "spikes" of radiation poisoning, suggesting he received two separate doses. A detective said last night: "It may well be that Mr Litvinenko's killers poisoned him twice, possibly because they wanted to make absolutely sure he would not recover." On Friday it emerged that traces of polonium had been found in the Pescatori restaurant in Mayfair, where Mr Lugovoi is understood to have dined before November 1. The Health Protection Agency said it had monitored the restaurant last week at the request of police. Polonium traces had been found but there was no risk to public health, the agency said. Detectives believe that Mr Lugovoi and Mr Kovtun may have been in the restaurant on the same day they met Mr Litvinenko in the Millennium Hotel. Mr Litvinenko, a former lieutenant colonel in the FSB, successor to the KGB, became a business consultant and private security adviser in exile, and was an outspoken critic of Vladimir Putin, the Russian president. Before Mr Litvinenko died in London on November 23, he blamed Mr Putin and his regime for his murder, a claim the Kremlin denies. Tests have found radiation at all three hotels where Mr Lugovoi stayed after flying to London on October 16. Polonium-210 was also discovered aboard two aircraft on which he had travelled. Mr Lugovoi and Mr Kovtun have admitted meeting Mr Litvinenko on November 1. Both men, and Vyacheslav Sokolenko, a third former KGB officer who was with them in London, have denied any involvement in the murder. Mr Lugovoi claims he is being framed. Nine British detectives went to Moscow last month as part of their investigation. They were not allowed to interview Mr Lugovoi or Mr Kovtun directly but were present when Russian officers questioned them. The Russian authorities have said that British officers cannot re-interview anyone who has already been questioned in Russia, and that any Russian who might be arrested in connection with the case will not be tried in a foreign country. * ================================================================ .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 ================================================================ ***************************************************************** 43 reviewjournal.com: Foe of test site blast - Agencies admit displacement of radioactive particles Jan. 06, 2007 The Reno attorney representing downwinders in a case to thwart the massive, non-nuclear Divine Strake blast planned for the Nevada Test Site claims the government agencies behind the experiment are admitting for the first time that radioactive particles in the test site's soils will be transported by the blast's mushroom cloud. Citing experts on the issue, attorney Robert Hager said the science used to estimate potential exposures "is flawed (and) the modeling of where the radioactivity will be deposited is mere speculation." "The history of prior blasts reflects that it is not possible to predict where or in what concentrations the deadly alpha emitters will be deposited, but that wherever they end up, the population will suffer increased incident of cancer, disproportionately borne by children," he said in a prepared statement this week after reviewing the draft environmental assessment for the bunker-busting Divine Strake experiment. A public meeting on the experiment by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency is scheduled for 6:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. Tuesday at the Cashman Center. Two meetings will follow, on Wednesday in Salt Lake City and Thursday in St. George, Utah. A spokesman for the National Nuclear Security Administration, the host agency for the blast, said he couldn't comment Thursday on Hager's statement. "We've always acknowledged that background radiation exists at the Nevada Test Site, including the Divine Strake location," said the spokesman, Kevin Rohrer. He said the draft environmental assessment presents additional modeling details of how any airborne particles might be transported from the blast. The modeling technique has been approved by the Environmental Protection Agency and is the same one used by the state of Nevada for the test site's air permit. The calculated dose at the test site's boundary is "a very, very, very low amount," Rohrer said, an amount so low it would be difficult to detect using sensitive radiation detection equipment. One of Hager's experts, Richard L. Miller, an industrial hygienist who has authored six books on nuclear testing, said the modeling procedure wouldn't apply to a single event such as Divine Strake because it isn't a continuous emission. "If you have a one-time event, there is no way on earth you will be able to tell where it is going to go," Miller said Friday by telephone from The Woodlands, Texas. "This material is going to be thrust into the atmosphere and travel east. ... It's going to be thrust 10,000 feet and then travel somewhere," he added. Hager, who represents some members of the Winnemucca Indian Colony and some downwinders in Nye County and Utah, said Friday that he doubted government scientists could use wind speed and direction at ground level "and have any confidence that's what's happening in the atmosphere" when particles from the blast come flying off at 13,000 feet per second. "What we're talking about is the ingesting and inhaling of alpha emitters. If you inhale one particle, you'll get cancer," Hager said, referring to plutonium, americium and a "host of radionuclides that they now admit are present in the soil." The Divine Strake experiment is designed to explore futuristic conventional bombs and fine-tune the capabilities of existing nuclear weapons for destroying deep tunnels where an enemy might store weapons of mass destruction, defense planners have said. Originally planned for June last year, the experiment has been stalled by the lawsuit and objections by some members of Nevada's and Utah's delegation and Citizen Alert, a Nevada environmental group. In the meantime, the 36-foot-deep pit that was dug last year near the top of Syncline Ridge, 85 miles northwest of Las Vegas, to hold 700 tons of ammonium nitrate and fuel oil as well as the limestone tunnel that the blast was intended to crush, was mothballed. But in November, officials for the Defense Threat Reduction Agency, said plans for the $23 million blast were back on track for the Nevada Test Site after weighing alternative sites in New Mexico, Utah, California and Indiana. Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal, 1997 - 2007 ***************************************************************** 44 Bradenton Herald: Issues that deserve attention in 2007 01/06/2007 | Donna Wright Health Matters It never hurts to dream big. So here is my list of issues I would like to see addressed in Manatee County this coming year: 1. A solution all sides could live with regarding the Tallevast plume - not just a final clean-up plan everyone could agree would address the full extent of the toxic waste, but also investigations on how long-term exposure to underground toxins leaking from the former beryllium plant has affected residents' health as well as action steps to mitigate whatever problems resulted from that exposure. 2. A solution to Manatee County's affordable housing crisis. Those hardest hit are families earning less than $34,280 - the annual income necessary to afford the fair market rent of $857 for a two-bedroom apartment, according to a study by the National Low Income Housing Coalition. The average hourly wage for a renter in the Manatee market is $10.82. At that pay rate, a worker must log 61 hours a week, 52 weeks of the year to pay $857 rent. Well-sbeing begins with a stable home, the foundation for family security, but sadly that stability is out of reach for nearly 29 percent of Manatee families, based on income data from the latest U.S. Census. 3. A solution to Manatee County's indigent care crisis. Again the problem is the working poor, the people who earn too much to qualify for Medicaid but don't have access to coverage through their employment and cannot afford to pay for insurance on their own. 4. Full compliance with health screening guidelines, including 100 percent participation for mammograms, colonoscopies and total skin checks. 5. Every member of every family would have a complete physical, including eye and hearing tests. 6. Physicians would include an HIV test in routine physical examinations. 7. A major effort by fast food restaurants to decrease portion size and emphasize healthy choices vs. foods laden with trans fats. 8. More insurance plans that would copy the model developed by Manatee County tying premium rates to good health practices. If you take care of yourself and follow doctors' orders, you get maximum coverage at the lowest rates, but if you choose to continue smoking or following bad health habits, you pay more. 9. A return of civility to everyday life, including but not limited to a renewed emphasis on manners, appropriate dress and respect for one another. 10. A major change in the U.S. fashion industry that follows trends in Spain and Italy to ban too-thin models from runways coupled with a major campaign by cultural icons to promote a more healthful definition of beauty. 11. A major campaign to stop red-light runners in Manatee County. 12. A summit of community leaders to address Manatee County's skyrocketing numbers of drive-by shootings, homicides and murders. 13. A major slowdown in the pace of life, especially in the workplace where vacations and quality time off are fast becoming a thing of a past. 14. The announcement of a cancer vaccine. 15. The cure of Alzheimer's disease. 16. A new procedure that reverses vision loss caused by macular degeneration. 17. Changes in Medicare/Medicaid rules that would allow more elderly patients to be cared for in their homes rather than separating them from their families. 18. Adequate funding to offer drug addiction treatment programs for all Manatee residents who need help. 19. Adequate funding to offer mental health treatment programs for all who suffer from diseases of the mind. 20. Full pantries at Our Daily Bread and the Food Bank at Meals on Wheels Plus. 21. An expansion of transitional housing options to help move the homeless from the street to a home of their own. 22. Every child in Manatee County who is old enough for lessons learns how to swim. 23. A sense of balance when it comes to growth; bigger is not always better, especially when it leads to traffic congestion, pressure on social services and schools and negative impact on natural resources. 24. Peace that passes understanding for families who have lost loved ones in a war that becomes harder to justify with each passing day. Donna Wright, health and social services reporter, can be reached at 745-7049 or at dwright@HeraldToday.com. ***************************************************************** 45 AP Wire: Ill former nuclear workers question why Mound records were buried 01/07/2007 Associated Press DAYTON, Ohio - Former nuclear weapons workers have questioned why the federal government buried records that they say could help determine if exposure to radiation and other industrial toxins made them sick, a newspaper reported. About 400 boxes of records from the Mound nuclear weapons plant in Miamisburg were buried in 2005 at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. The records, which tested positive for radioactive contamination, were declared a health threat and had little overall value, officials with the U.S. Department of Energy said. "I find it stunning," Richard Miller, an analyst for the Government Accountability Project, a Washington-based watchdog group, told the Dayton Daily News for a story published Sunday. Miller said the government should exhume the records, if possible. About 700 former workers or their survivors have filed 1,143 cases with a federal atomic worker compensation program, claiming toxins from the plant caused cancer and other illnesses. Compensation totaling $21.4 million has been granted in 149 cases so far. Energy Department spokeswoman Megan Barnett said the records were not pertinent to worker health and no rules were broken. She said documentation shows the records were lab notebooks, scientific records, nonpersonnel X-ray film, accounting files and records of weapons components and production assembly. The Mound plant, built in 1947, sat on a 306-acre site about 10 miles south of Dayton. The workers, who numbered more than 2,000 at the height of production, made plutonium detonators for nuclear weapons. Their work was highly secretive. The plant had a small army of security guards and was ringed by chain-link fencing and razor wire. When the Cold War ended, the plant discontinued the detonator work but continued to make generators for space probes. The Energy Department ended production in 1996, leaving cleanup of radioactive and hazardous waste as the primary activity. Mike Gibson, who worked at the plant for 22 years, said he doesn't think federal health officials can confidently determine whether illnesses are work-related without knowing what's in the buried documents. "The whole process just has a smell to it," Gibson said. Information from: Dayton Daily News, http://www.daytondailynews.com ***************************************************************** 46 Deseret News: Huntsman orders 2 hearings on 'Strake' [deseretnews.com] Saturday, January 6, 2007 By Angie Welling Deseret Morning News Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. has directed the state Department of Environmental Quality to sponsor two public hearings this month on a proposed non-nuclear explosion at the Nevada Test Site near Las Vegas. The blast, called "Divine Strake," has raised concerns among many Utahns about the possible release of radioactive debris from previous nuclear tests at the site. The state hearings, one in Salt Lake City and the second in St. George, are designed to counter "public information sessions" scheduled by the federal government. The public will be allowed to submit only written comments at the sessions conducted by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency. "What the governor has recognized is the public wants a chance to speak about this issue. They don't want to just submit written comments," said DEQ executive director Dianne Nielsen. All public comments made during the state hearings will be transcribed and attached to Huntsman's written comments to the Defense Threat Reduction Agency and the National nuclear Security Administration. Utah officials continue to be concerned about the proposed test, although Huntsman has not yet taken a formal position, Nielsen said. The DEQ is in the process of completing a technical review of the government's most recent environmental assessment, which indicates that although there is radioactive material in two locations about a mile from the proposed blast site, it is "extremely unlikely" that the material would become "resuspended" and cause harm. Still, Divine Strake opponents — and many Utah Downwinders — recall similar promises from previous tests at the Nevada Test Site that ultimately had significant, long-term public health impacts, Nielsen said. "That's a difficult hurdle to get over," Nielsen said. "It is certainly one that we take seriously, and we think federal agencies need to take seriously." Vanessa Pierce, director of HEAL Utah, praised the governor for responding to her organization's request for a public hearing. The federal agencies' information sessions are little more than "propaganda events," she said. "Governor Huntsman has done for Utah what the federal government has failed to do. He's given Utahns a podium and a microphone and a forum to voice our concerns about the test." Dates for the state hearings have not been set, but Nielsen said she would like to see them take place the week of Jan. 15. The deadline for written comments is Feb. 7. Contributing: Lisa Riley Roche E-mail: awelling@desnews.com © 2007 Deseret News Publishing Company ***************************************************************** 47 Las Vegas SUN: Utah governor plans public hearings on Divine Strake blast January 06, 2007 ASSOCIATED PRESS SALT LAKE CITY (AP) - Utah Gov. John Huntsman has directed the state's environmental quality office to hold two public hearings on the proposed non-nuclear explosion planned for the Nevada Test Site near Las Vegas. The 700-ton "Divine Strake" blast has raised concerns about the possible release of radioactive debris from Cold-War era nuclear tests at the site. The blast will send a 10,000-foot mushroom-shaped dust cloud over the Nevada desert. Huntsman ordered the Utah hearings Friday, after complaints from public advocacy groups about the inadequacy of public meetings planned by the Pentagon's Defense Threat Reduction Agency. "What the governor has recognized is the public wants a chance to speak about this issue. They don't want to just submit written comments," said Utah Division of Environmental Quality Executive Director Dianne Nielson. DTRA has meetings planned for Jan. 9 in Las Vegas, Jan. 10 in Salt Lake City and Jan. 11 in St. George, Utah. The meetings are designed to provide information but will only allow for written public comment and will not include a public discussion of issues. Utah hearings are planned for Salt Lake City and St. George, although dates have not been set. All public comment taken during the hearings will be transcribed and attached to written comment the governor plans to submit to DTRA and the National Nuclear Security Administration. Huntsman has not yet taken a public position on Divine Strake, Nielson said. DEQ is conducting a technical review of the most recent environmental assessment from the government, Nielson said. Issued in December, the report acknowledges the existence of radioactive material in soils near the test site, but downplays the likelihood it would become "resuspended" and become a public health concern. Divine Strake opponents, some known as "downwinders," dispute the statement and said similar promises were made during previous nuclear tests. "Downwinder" is a term used to describe residents from parts of Arizona, Nevada, Utah and other locations who lived downwind of weapons tests and later contracted cancers or other serious diseases. "That's a difficult hurdle to get over," Nielson said. "It is certainly one that we take seriously, and we think federal agencies need to take seriously." Vanessa Pierce, director of HEAL Utah, called DTRA's information sessions "propaganda events" and praised the governor for responding to concerns. "Gov. Huntsman has done for Utah what the federal government has failed to do. He's given Utahns a podium and a microphone and a forum to voice our concerns about the test." Idaho's congressional delegation has also sent a letter to the government requesting hearings. Divine Strake had been set for June 2006, but was delayed indefinitely after a lawsuit was filed to block it last spring. All contents copyright 2005 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 48 The Spectrum: Huntsman promises hearing www.thespectrum.com - Spectrum, St. George, UT Sunday, January 7, 2007 By SCOTT DAVID JOHNSON sjohnson@thespectrum.com ST. GEORGE - Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. has promised St. George what the Pentagon refused: a public hearing on Divine Strake. The Utah Department of Environmental Quality will hold public hearings in Salt Lake City and St. George on the 700-ton non-nuclear experiment intended for the Nevada Test Site. Opponents fear the open-air blast could spread contamination from previous nuclear experiments. The hearings will sidestep the Defense Threat Reduction Agency's decision not to accept verbal comments at its own series of meetings next week. After Las Vegas and Salt Lake City, the agency will be in St. George on Thursday. "The governor really felt that citizens needed to have an opportunity to put their comments on the record, and that wasn't an option with the format the agencies have picked," said DEQ Executive Director Dianne Nielson. Transcripts from the hearings will be attached to the governor's comments on a revised environmental assessment, which was released on Dec. 22. Nielson said the state is still "trying to pin down" an exact date, but the meetings will come after the agency's, perhaps the week of Jan. 15. DTRA and the National Nuclear Security Administration will accept comments on the document by mail, e-mail and facsimile until Feb. 7. The environmental assessment acknowledged the ammonium nitrate fuel oil blast would deliver a "radiological dose" to surrounding populated areas, but said the radiation spread by wind would not reach levels requiring a stricter environmental impact statement. The DEQ is currently assessing that document. Echoing statements from Nevada officials, Nielson said DTRA should have conducted a broader study from the start. "This is a pretty significant issue, and it seems like it would be worthy of a full environmental impact statement," she said. Rep. Jim Matheson and activist groups have criticized DTRA for not changing the format of their sessions. Nielson said the hearings would offer the public a better chance to "weigh in" on the document. "The objective here, as the governor recognizes, was to make sure there was an opportunity for full public involvement in the process," she said. J. Preston Truman, director of Downwinders, praised the governor's decision. Downwinders are residents who have suffered serious health problems from living downwind of previous nuclear tests. "What they're going to do is force the issue to be dealt with not just by a few people in a small area of the country," he said of the hearings. Beyond health and environmental concerns, Truman said the proposed experiment is an attempt to circumvent a ban on nuclear tests. "Face it, there is no way we can deliver a 700-ton weapon anywhere unless we send a bunch of railroad cars somewhere and then blow it up," Truman said. "There is no way we can come up with a conventional weapon of this size with this test, so you're talking about a nuclear bunker buster, to which Congress has said, 'Thou shalt not.'" Copyright ©2007 The Spectrum. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 49 Independent: Nuclear clean-up cash crisis puts 3,000 jobs in jeopardy By Tim Webb Published: 07 January 2007 At least 3,000 jobs are at risk because of the budget crisis at the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA), the organisation that funds the clean-up of the UK's state-owned nuclear reactors and facilities. The NDA pays British Nuclear Group (BNG) and UKAEA to decommission their sites. But because of a £160m funding shortfall, the two companies have nine days to provide the NDA with a list of projects to scrap. These were originally due to go ahead in the financial year beginning this April. The crisis has undermined Britain's nuclear clean-up programme. The NDA was set up 18 months ago to oversee a competitive market with companies bidding for clean-up work. Now contractors preparing to bid for the biggest contract yet - the £5bn, five-year clean-up of the Sellafield site - are likely to demand higher profit margins. They want compensation for the risk of their work being cancelled in the future because the NDA is underfunded. The NDA is supposed to receive £2bn each year, half from the Government and half from the income it earns from its ageing Magnox nuclear generators and its reprocessing plants at Sellafield. But problems at the Thorp reprocessing plant, which has been closed since April 2005 because of a major leak, coupled with lower-than-expected profits from the neighbouring Mox fuel plant, have left a £450m hole in next year's budget. The Treasury has provisionally agreed to provide an extra £290m, but this would still leave a shortfall of at least £160m. This means that many contractors that would have been hired for clean-up work, particularly for Magnox reactors that have just been decommissioned, will not be hired. Some existing contractors and BNG and UKAEA staff are likely to be laid off. Unions representing the industry's 30,000-strong workforce - Prospect, Amicus, GMB and the T&G - wrote to Alistair Darling, the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, last week saying they were "appalled" at the "lack of transparency and openness" shown by the NDA. Workers found out about the budget shortfall only from BNG and the media last month. "The trade unions are at a loss as to how this government bombshell over funding has suddenly appeared, and with no consultation with lead stakeholders," the letter ended. Mr Darling will soon meet officials from the Treasury to discuss the NDA's future funding arrangements for the three years beginning in April 2008. © 2006 Independent News and Media Limited ***************************************************************** 50 Rivista Online: Evidence of Depleted Uranium disappears di Sara Rivist@ - Articolo Primo Piano - www.rivistaonline.com [interni] Financial Bill and Military Bases. Dellabella foto internet 08/01/2007 Good news in the end. The 2007 Italian Financial Bill includes two different amendments proposed by Senator Burgarelli from the Greens and Christian-democrats crossed-party coalition, concerning the allocation of State funds for military troops and civil workers affected by severe pathologies as well as the reclamation of military ranges. The first amendment allows for a 10 million euros allocation in 2007 to be used in favour of military bases workers affected by cancer caused by body exposure to radioactive substances such as depleted uranium and nano-particles and produced by the fusion or explosion of volatile substances. Mr Burgarelli wanted to stressed that the agreed compensation is aimed both to workers as to residents of neighbouring areas living around the military bases and must be considered as the "first" refund for moral and material damages granted to the many health victims of the past few years. The second amendment allows for a quota to be taken from funds directed to Military Division's research and warfare supplies program, which shall be allocated instead for reclamation operations aimed to health, safety and environmental purposes and concerning both functioning and released areas affected by military activities. Proven the high percentage of military bases existing in some areas, the amendment mainly refers to Sardegna Region where it has been received with pleasure by the local committees. The 25 millions euros allocated for environmental reclamation proves that funds addressed to the Defence Division do not merely enhance military warfare but can also be used for lands recovery, considering the hash impact that military range activities have under a pure environmentalist perspective. Figures related to this, have eventually been confirmed on medical evidence, showing an increase of cancer-related pathologies occurred in the areas surrounding the military bases. Senator Bulgarelli's statement dates back early in December, precisely on December 13th. Some time later, he maintained that amendments didn't report any reference to the existence of Depleted Uranium, reference it was previously supposed to provide. These information may also imply that victims affected by the so-called Balcans Syndrome, military troops and citizens living in the neighbouring areas around military bases who reported the same cancer-related pathologies caused by body exposition of volatile or radioactive substances, won't be allowed any refund. The creation of a second Investigation Committee dealing with possible use of Depleted Uranium has been already announced: the hope is the one of a major collaborative conduct by top military officials. Translation from Italian: Ilaria Maccaroni ***************************************************************** 51 The Spectrum: Time to speak up on test www.thespectrum.com - The Spectrum, St. George, UT thespectrum.com Sunday, January 7, 2007 Officials within the federal government want residents of Utah and Nevada to believe them when they say that Divine Strake - a 700-ton ammonium nitrate and fuel oil bomb test - will pose no harm to humans. Unfortunately, their actions make it easy to doubt them. The latest example is a meeting scheduled for St. George on Thursday. It is one of three meetings that had been billed as public hearings to hear concerns from residents in an area that is home to many "downwinders" - people who say their health was harmed because of nuclear bomb tests upwind at the Nevada Test Site in the 1950s and '60s. The federal government recently changed the format from a public hearing to an open house, meaning no testimony from concerned residents would be included in the official record. The fear from opponents of Divine Strake is that the non-nuclear test currently being proposed would shoot radioactive dust left over from those earlier tests into the atmosphere to be dropped on innocent people downwind. An even bigger fear is that this non-nuclear test would open the door to the reinstitution of nuclear tests, perhaps in lower grades to be used as bunker-buster bombs in the war on terror. Residents had hoped to have that public hearing format to share their concerns, and Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr.'s office has found a way to work the system to ensure those concerns are heard. The Department of Environmental Quality will review the revised environmental assessment, which will be required prior to the test. So, the governor has decided to conduct public hearings in Salt Lake City and in St. George the week following the open houses. The transcripts from the environmental hearings will be attached to the governor's official comments. It's a shame that the governor had to resort to such tactics, but he deserves credit for doing so. Now, residents must get involved. Besides the governor's hearings, it is still important that people who are concerned about Divine Strake show up to the open house to learn as much as possible about the test. Informational posters and PowerPoint presentations will be available to allow people to gain as much knowledge as possible about the proposed test. Then, residents should use that information to voice any concerns they still have. The problem is that the complaints must be done in writing - either by conventional mail, e-mail or fax - by Jan. 24. Scientific studies show Divine Strake will pose no harm. Other studies show that the test could harm residents. Whatever your beliefs on the subject, take the time to go to the open house. Learn as much as you can about Divine Strake. Then, make sure your concerns are heard by writing to the government and by attending the governor's public hearing. To read the government's environmental assessment, go to: http://www.nv.doe.gov/library/publi cations/environmental.aspxand, to make a comment, e-mail divine strake@nv.doe.govor send a fax to (702) 295-0625. Originally published January 7, 2007 Print this article Copyright ©2007 The Spectrum. ***************************************************************** 52 The Spectrum: Bomb test fails to capture interest www.thespectrum.com - The Spectrum, St. George, UT thespectrum.com Saturday, January 6, 2007 Major media across the country have turned a deaf ear on an upcoming bomb test at the Nevada Test Site. This isn't an ordinary scientific exercise. The test, named Divine Strake, is an explosion of 700 tons of ammonium nitrate and fuel oil set to detonate in the Nevada desert. It has been described in several documents as part of the Defense Department's run-up to the bunker-buster bomb, which is a tool the military would like to have in its arsenal to go after hardened, underground targets such as nuclear sites in North Korea, Iran or anywhere else the United States doesn't like the idea of deployed nukes. And, yes, bunker-busters are expected to be nuclear devices. The test will take place in a part of the United States that was soaked with radioactive particles during the nuclear tests that took place from 1945 until 1992. Some tests were underground, some were at altitude. All spread poison that caused disease through the 48 contiguous United States and into Canada, killing more than 15,000 people and injuring many times more. No matter how many times the subject comes up, however, the national media ignores it. The bomb will go off in the rural West. Why should they care? Because the jet stream picks this stuff up and dumps it randomly across the country. Some of the places hardest hit by nuclear fallout include Kansas City, St. Louis, parts of Iowa, New York and other unlikely spots. This test is rearing its ugly head again. The Defense Department had promised the residents of southern Nevada and Utah a series of public hearings where they could register their comments. Those hearings have now turned into "open house" events where the public can walk through a bunch of displays, take in a PowerPoint presentation and send their comments to the government. A draft environmental assessment says all would be well with this test. It would stir up the nuclear cocktail from the desert floor and redistribute it into the air. But it wouldn't hurt anybody. That's a crock. With the government's track record of lying through its teeth when the Cold War tests took place, who can trust it now? There is no way they can predict how much toxic dust will be shaken up, where it will go, on whom it will land. So the possibility is that it cannot only land on you, but your family in Minnesota, Alabama, Florida, New York, Maine or even Quebec, Canada. To read the government's environmental assessment, go to: library/publications/environmental.aspxand to make a comment e-mail or send a fax to (702) 295-0625. It matters to all of us, whether we live in rural America or one of the bustling metropolitan areas. Contact Local News Editor Ed Kociela at or call 674-6237. Originally published January 6, 2007 Print this article Copyright ©2007 The Spectrum. ***************************************************************** 53 Salt Lake Tribune: Guv wants Utah to have a say State will hold its own public hearings to allow residents to express Divine Strake concerns By Judy Fahys The Salt Lake Tribune Article Last Updated: 01/06/2007 02:44:08 AM MST Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. evidently doesn't think the federal government goes far enough in including the public in the decision-making for a massive bomb test in Nevada. On Friday, the Utah governor said he would host public hearings on the 700-ton, non-nuclear explosion, dubbed Divine Strake, which critics fear would spread radioactive contamination. In doing so, Huntsman signaled that the state government is among a growing chorus of critics complaining that the federal government's "public information sessions" shut out vital input from the public. Utah Department of Environmental Quality Director Dianne Nielson stopped short of saying Friday that Huntsman is displeased with the format the National Nuclear Security Agency and the Defense Threat Reduction Agency have chosen. "It's a publicly significant issue," said Nielson, who is organizing the state hearings, "and anybody who has an issue, or a question or a concern ought to have an opportunity to express those." The federal government's evening gatherings - scheduled next week for Salt Lake City, St. George and Las Vegas - will be more like open houses than a public debate. That has angered many Utahns, who protested last year there was no forum for public comment on the planned Nevada Test Site explosion. Huntsman's plan for hearings the week of Jan. 15 became public just as the federal government announced it would extend the comment period by two weeks, to Feb. 7, because 10 pages of its "environmental assessment" of the blast had accidentally been omitted from the document when it was released two weeks ago. In addition, the Idaho congressional delegation sent a letter to the federal agencies demanding a hearing in that state. And a Nevada nuclear watchdog group said it would videotape public comments outside the Jan. 11 meeting in Las Vegas and submit those comments with its written critique of Divine Strake. Steve Erickson, a plaintiff in the lawsuit aimed at blocking the blast, said the meeting format showed the federal agencies still don't want to hear what the public has to say about Divine Strake. "This is what the federal government does when it doesn't want the public to have a say in the decision-making process," he said. Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, and Rep. Jim Matheson, D-Utah, pushed the government to scrap the test blast in spring and do a more in-depth analysis of how much radioactive dirt it would send airborne and downwind. Initially, the federal agencies said none, but the latest analysis, an environmental assessment released just before Christmas, affirms what critics have been saying: Radioactive contaminants will spread beyond the boundaries of the Nevada Test Site, where the blast is set to take place. After the public sessions, the agencies will have to decide if the effects are insignificant or if a detailed environmental impact statement is needed. The blast has not been scheduled. Divine Strake would use conventional explosives to fine-tune the military's ability to destroy underground bunkers. Agency officials have indicated that the test results are needed to understand the effects of both conventional weapons and nuclear ones. Vanessa Pierce, executive director of the Healthy Environment Alliance of Utah, praised Huntsman for sponsoring a full-fledged hearing and urged Utahns in Congress to do the same. "Governor Huntsman has done what the Federal Government failed to do: He's given Utahns a podium, a microphone and a real forum to voice our concerns about Divine Strake," she said. "His action demonstrates a deep understanding of and respect for Utah's tragic past of being downwind. The public has never had a voice on Divine Strake - until now." Meanwhile, Las Vegas attorney Bob Hager, who represents a Nevada Indian tribe, Erickson and atomic testing downwinders in a lawsuit against Divine Strake, said Thursday he is prepared to go back to court to block the test if the agencies decide the public effect is insignificant. He said the latest analysis, though better, is still poor. "It's not valid science," he said. "It's sham science." fahys@sltrib.com Public information sessions scheduled by the feds Here is the schedule for gatherings on Divine Strake: * Tuesday, 6:30-9 p.m., Cashman Convention Center, 850 N. Las Vegas Blvd., Las Vegas * Wednesday, 6:30-9 p.m., EnergySolutions Arena, 310 W. South Temple St., Salt Lake City * Thursday, 6:30-9 p.m., Dixie Center, 1835 Convention Center Drive, St. George Also, the Defense Threat Reduction Agency and the National Nuclear Security Agency will accept comments on the environmental assessment through Feb. 7. They should be mailed to NNSA/NSO, Divine Strake EA Comments, P.O. Box 98518, Las Vegas, NV 89193-8518, or e-mailed to divinestrake@nv.doe.gov or faxed to 702-295-0625. © Copyright 2006, The Salt Lake Tribune. ***************************************************************** 54 Dayton Daily News: Former Mound employees, advocates question destruction of records DaytonDailyNews.com They say contaminated documents buried in 2005 could contain data essential to health claims of sick workers. By Tom Beyerlein Staff Writer Sunday, January 07, 2007 An Energy Department laboratory in 2005 disposed of enough classified documents from Miamisburg's Mound Plant to fill two tractor trailers by burying them in a New Mexico landfill for radioactive waste. Now some are wondering if the 400 boxes of records ordered destroyed by officials at Los Alamos (N.M.) National Laboratory contained clues about whether some former Mound employees got cancer from on-the-job radiation exposures. The records disposal puts a cloud over the ability of federal health officials to accurately assess claims for compensation by sick atomic workers and their survivors. "I find it stunning," worker advocate Richard Miller said of the records burial, which was made public in December when the Energy Department released a memo to the advisory board for an atomic worker compensation program. Mound shipped 458 boxes of records to Los Alamos in 1993. Before they left Mound, the records tested positive for radioactive contamination. They were stored outdoors at Los Alamos in large "transportainers." About 40 were returned to Mound to be scanned for decontaminated copies in 2003. After determining it would cost millions of dollars to decontaminate the remaining boxes, Los Alamos officials declared them a health threat and buried them, saying they had "low to zero value." But a federal contractor has told the advisory board that the records buried at Los Alamos "were considered particularly important" in compiling a Mound site profile. That's a reference book used by health officials in determining whether workers were sickened by on-the-job toxic exposures and thus qualify for federal compensation and medical benefits. Joseph Fitzgerald of Sanford Cohen and Associates wrote the board in April that existing information "was found to be lacking in the unclassified files in Dayton." Fitzgerald also said "given the implications of the destruction of such a large amount of potentially relevant worker radiological information, it will be important to determine how the disposal of these historic records occurred in light of the relevant moratorium on records destruction." Under an Energy Department moratorium, records that may be useful in health and epidemiological studies are not to be destroyed without a review by DOE's Office of Health, Safety and Security. The Advisory Board on Radiation and Worker Health is expected to consider the records destruction issue as part of its deliberations on whether to approve a draft site profile for Mound later this year, said the board's senior science adviser, Lewis Wade. The board is an arm of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health. Energy Department spokeswoman Megan Barnett said the destroyed records didn't fall under the moratorium and were not pertinent to worker health. She said documentation shows the records were lab notebooks, scientific records, nonpersonnel X-ray film, accounting files and records of weapons components and production assembly. But Miller, of the watchdog Government Accountability Project, said some of these types of documents can contain information vital to creating a site profile defining areas at the plant where workers may have been exposed to radiation and chemical hazards. And even Los Alamos officials acknowledged in a May 2003 document that "it is difficult to evaluate the value of the records in an exact manner." Nonetheless, the lab said, "the general conclusion is the records are of no value to Los Alamos." The contaminated records were to be buried because they were "a continuing menace to human health or life or to property," lab officials wrote. Mike Gibson, a 22-year Mound employee and former union president who now sits on the advisory board, said there are many unanswered questions surrounding the records. "I would like to know who gave (Los Alamos) the authority" to destroy the documents, Gibson said. Also, if the records were contaminated at Mound, "how did they get from a 'hot' building to a 'cold' building for storage? The whole process just has a smell to it." Miller said the fact that the documents were contaminated makes a statement about the dangers of working at Mound. "The fact that these records were hot tells you something about the working conditions around where those records were kept," he said. The Mound plant What: Top-secret defense research and production, including polonium and plutonium processing, development of a thorium reactor, invention of thermoelectric generator used in space program and production of nuclear detonators. Where: Miamisburg When: 1948-93 Sick workers: Seven hundred workers, or their survivors, have filed 1,143 cases against a federal atomic-worker compensation program, claiming their illnesses were caused by workplace exposures to plant toxins. So far, only 149 of the 1,143 cases have received compensation, totaling $21.4 million, plus medical expenses. Sources: U.S. Department of Energy, U.S. Department of Labor DaytonDailyNews.com: Copyright ©2007 Cox Ohio Publishing, Dayton, Ohio, USA. ***************************************************************** 55 Atlantic Free Press: Bomb Test Fails to Capture Interest - Hard Truths for Hard Times - Divine Strake to go Ahead Atlantic Free Press was launched in September 2006 by Dutch-Canadian Richard Kastelein of V.O.F. Expathos, in the Netherlands and American Expatriate Chris Floyd of Oxford, UK. Brick Ogden, an American Expatriate in Amsterdam has been a key supporter of this project. Assistant Editor Canadian Chris Cook hails from Victoria, British Columbian and Senior Writer Paul William Roberts is based in Toronto - but often on the road. The mission of AF Press is simple: to dig out nuggets of truth from the slag-heap of lies, ignorance and witless diversion that has buried public discourse today. AF Press provides a new venue for disseminating hard news and insightful, fact-based analysis of the harsh realities too often ignored or distorted by the mainstream press. Sunday, 07 January 2007 by Ed Kociela Major media across the country have turned a deaf ear on an upcoming bomb test at the Nevada Test Site. This isn't an ordinary scientific exercise. The test, named Divine Strake, is an explosion of 700 tons of ammonium nitrate and fuel oil set to detonate in the Nevada desert. It has been described in several documents as part of the Defense Department's run-up to the bunker-buster bomb, which is a tool the military would like to have in its arsenal to go after hardened, underground targets such as nuclear sites in North Korea, Iran or anywhere else the United States doesn't like the idea of deployed nukes. And, yes, bunker-busters are expected to be nuclear devices. The test will take place in a part of the United States that was soaked with radioactive particles during the nuclear tests that took place from 1945 until 1992. Some tests were underground, some were at altitude. All spread poison that caused disease through the 48 contiguous United States and into Canada, killing more than 15,000 people and injuring many times more. No matter how many times the subject comes up, however, the national media ignores it. The bomb will go off in the rural West. Why should they care? Because the jet stream picks this stuff up and dumps it randomly across the country. Some of the places hardest hit by nuclear fallout include Kansas City, St. Louis, parts of Iowa, New York and other unlikely spots. This test is rearing its ugly head again. The Defense Department had promised the residents of southern Nevada and Utah a series of public hearings where they could register their comments. Those hearings have now turned into "open house" events where the public can walk through a bunch of displays, take in a PowerPoint presentation and send their comments to the government. A draft environmental assessment says all would be well with this test. It would stir up the nuclear cocktail from the desert floor and redistribute it into the air. But it wouldn't hurt anybody. That's a crock. With the government's track record of lying through its teeth when the Cold War tests took place, who can trust it now? There is no way they can predict how much toxic dust will be shaken up, where it will go, on whom it will land. So the possibility is that it cannot only land on you, but your family in Minnesota, Alabama, Florida, New York, Maine or even Quebec, Canada. To read the government's environmental assessment, go to: http://www.nv.doe.gov/ library/publications/environmental.aspxand to make a comment e-mail divinestrake@nv.doe.govor send a fax to (702) 295-0625. It matters to all of us, whether we live in rural America or one of the bustling metropolitan areas. Bomb test fails to capture interest Major media across the country have turned a deaf ear on an upcoming bomb test at the Nevada Test Site. This isn't an ordinary scientific exercise. The test, named Divine Strake, is an explosion of 700 tons of ammonium nitrate and fuel oil set to detonate in the Nevada desert. It has been described in several documents as part of the Defense Department's run-up to the bunker-buster bomb, which is a tool the military would like to have in its arsenal to go after hardened, underground targets such as nuclear sites in North Korea, Iran or anywhere else the United States doesn't like the idea of deployed nukes. And, yes, bunker-busters are expected to be nuclear devices. The test will take place in a part of the United States that was soaked with radioactive particles during the nuclear tests that took place from 1945 until 1992. Some tests were underground, some were at altitude. All spread poison that caused disease through the 48 contiguous United States and into Canada, killing more than 15,000 people and injuring many times more. No matter how many times the subject comes up, however, the national media ignores it. The bomb will go off in the rural West. Why should they care? Because the jet stream picks this stuff up and dumps it randomly across the country. Some of the places hardest hit by nuclear fallout include Kansas City, St. Louis, parts of Iowa, New York and other unlikely spots. This test is rearing its ugly head again. The Defense Department had promised the residents of southern Nevada and Utah a series of public hearings where they could register their comments. Those hearings have now turned into "open house" events where the public can walk through a bunch of displays, take in a PowerPoint presentation and send their comments to the government. A draft environmental assessment says all would be well with this test. It would stir up the nuclear cocktail from the desert floor and redistribute it into the air. But it wouldn't hurt anybody. That's a crock. With the government's track record of lying through its teeth when the Cold War tests took place, who can trust it now? There is no way they can predict how much toxic dust will be shaken up, where it will go, on whom it will land. So the possibility is that it cannot only land on you, but your family in Minnesota, Alabama, Florida, New York, Maine or even Quebec, Canada. To read the government's environmental assessment, go to: http://www.nv.doe.gov/ library/publications/environmental.aspxand to make a comment e-mail divinestrake@nv.doe.govor send a fax to (702) 295-0625. It matters to all of us, whether we live in rural America or one of the bustling metropolitan areas. ATLANTIC FREE PRESS ***************************************************************** 56 Daily Herald: Huntsman plans Divine Strake hearings Sunday, January 07, 2007 The Associated Press SALT LAKE CITY -- Utah Gov. John Huntsman has directed the state's environmental quality office to hold two public hearings on the proposed non-nuclear explosion planned for the Nevada Test Site near Las Vegas. The 700-ton "Divine Strake" blast has raised concerns about the possible release of radioactive debris from Cold-War era nuclear tests at the site. The blast will send a 10,000-foot mushroom-shaped dust cloud over the Nevada desert. Huntsman ordered the Utah hearings Friday, after complaints from public advocacy groups about the inadequacy of public meetings planned by the Pentagon's Defense Threat Reduction Agency. "What the governor has recognized is the public wants a chance to speak about this issue. They don't want to just submit written comments," said Utah Division of Environmental Quality Executive Director Dianne Nielson. DTRA has meetings planned for Jan. 9 in Las Vegas, Jan. 10 in Salt Lake City and Jan. 11 in St. George, Utah. The meetings are designed to provide information but will only allow for written public comment and will not include a public discussion of issues. Utah hearings are planned for Salt Lake City and St. George, although dates have not been set. All public comment taken during the hearings will be transcribed and attached to written comment the governor plans to submit to DTRA and the National Nuclear Security Administration. Huntsman has not yet taken a public position on Divine Strake, Nielson said. DEQ is conducting a technical review of the most recent environmental assessment from the government, Nielson said. Issued in December, the report acknowledges the existence of radioactive material in soils near the test site, but downplays the likelihood it would become "resuspended" and become a public health concern. Divine Strake opponents, some known as "downwinders," dispute the statement and said similar promises were made during previous nuclear tests. "Downwinder" is a term used to describe residents from parts of Arizona, Nevada, Utah and other locations who lived downwind of weapons tests and later contracted cancers or other serious diseases. "That's a difficult hurdle to get over," Nielson said. "It is certainly one that we take seriously, and we think federal agencies need to take seriously." Vanessa Pierce, director of HEAL Utah, called DTRA's information sessions "propaganda events" and praised the governor for responding to concerns. "Governor Huntsman has done for Utah what the federal government has failed to do. He's given Utahns a podium and a microphone and a forum to voice our concerns about the test." Idaho's congressional delegation has also sent a letter to the government requesting hearings. Divine Strake had been set for June 2006, but was delayed indefinitely after a lawsuit was filed to block it last spring. This story appeared in The Daily Herald on page B5. Copyright © 2007 Daily Herald and ***************************************************************** 57 IHT: Whistle-blower awaits word from Supreme Court in 17-year-old lawsuit over nuclear fraud - International Herald Tribune The Associated Press Published: January 5, 2007 WASHINGTON: After 17 years, James Stone has perhaps a few more months to wait before he learns whether he will collect up to $1 million (¬760,000) for exposing fraud by a government contractor at a now-closed nuclear weapons plant. A court ordered Rockwell International, now part of aerospace giant Boeing Co., to pay the government nearly $4.2 million (¬3.2 million) for fraud connected with environmental cleanup at the decommissioned Rocky Flats plant in Colorado. Stone, a former employee at the facility, could be entitled to as much as one-quarter of the payment under the federal False Claims Act. The law is meant to reward employees who know of official wrongdoing to come forward with their stories. The 81-year-old retired engineer filed his whistle-blower lawsuit in 1989, the year Rocky Flats shut its operations after nearly 40 years of production. He has survived legal challenges by Rockwell to dismiss the claim or deprive him of his share. The government joined the suit as Stone's partner 10 years ago. The U.S. Supreme Court now has the case. The ruling could affect an anticipated crush of fraud suits, involving Iraq's reconstruction and aid to Hurricane Katrina victims in the southern United States, if the high court should make it harder for whistle-blowers to share in proceeds of their tips. If Rockwell wins, "it's going to be much more difficult for whistle-blowers, and there are going to be fewer cases," said James Moorman, president of the advocacy group Taxpayers Against Fraud Education Fund. Rockwell must pay the entire penalty no matter how the Supreme Court rules, although it would not have to pay Stone's attorney fees. The only question before the court is whether Stone should get his cut. The company, backed by defense, energy and pharmaceutical interests, wants the justices to restrict when an individual can collect for suing on the government's behalf. The Bush administration is on Stone's side even though the government would collect more money should Rockwell win. "It might be natural for the court to wonder, why would it be in the government's interest to advocate that a share of the money damages in this case should be given to a private party," Justice Department lawyer Malcolm Stewart told the justices during the oral argument in early December. "In our view, Stone is precisely the type of relator that Congress intended to encourage." A relator is an individual who sues under the False Claims Act. The False Claims Act allows individuals, acting on the government's behalf, to file fraud suits against companies that do business with the government. If they prevail, they receive a portion of what the contractor must pay the government. During World War II, Congress amended the Civil War-era law to make whistle-blower suits more difficult. Since Congress changed the law again in 1986, such suits have returned $11 billion (¬8.4 billion) to the government. Recent high-profile cases include settlements with leading pharmaceutical manufacturers. Republican Sen. Charles Grassley, who led the fight to reinvigorate the False Claims Act in 1986, urged the court to rule in Stone's favor. Grassley said provisions in the law that authorize whistle-blower suits are "essential to the government today to confront fraud in government programs from reconstruction in Iraq to aid for victims of Hurricane Katrina." The issues before the justices are: _How much independent knowledge of wrongdoing someone must have to file a False Claims Act suit? _Does that information have to be part of the case that eventually convinces a jury that a government contractor committed fraud? Once alleged improprieties are disclosed publicly, often by the media, an individual faces a higher hurdle to bring a fraud suit on the government's behalf. Otherwise, people could read a newspaper account or an indictment and then rush to the courthouse to file suit. The major exception to this rule is if an individual is an original source of the information. That is what Stone claims; several courts have agreed. Stone did not file suit until after problems at Rocky Flats became public. He did, however, approach federal investigators with information about environmental issues before news accounts were published. At trial, the jury found that Rockwell submitted false claims in 1987 and 1988 that it was meeting goals of treating low-level radioactive wastes at the former atomic weapons plant. Rockwell laid off Stone in 1986. Maureen Mahoney, representing the company, told the justices that it is implausible for Stone to claim he had independent knowledge of any fraud. "His claim by his own admission starts in 1987, after he was gone," Mahoney said. All rights reserved [IHT] ***************************************************************** 58 Guardian Unlimited: Supreme Court to Rule on Whistle-Blowing From the Associated Press [UP] Saturday January 6, 2007 8:31 AM By MARK SHERMAN Associated Press Writer WASHINGTON (AP) - After 17 years, James Stone has perhaps a few more months to wait before he learns whether he will collect up to $1 million for exposing fraud by a government contractor at a now-closed nuclear weapons plant. A court ordered Rockwell International, now part of aerospace giant Boeing Co., to pay the government nearly $4.2 million for fraud connected with environmental cleanup at the Rocky Flats plant northwest of Denver. Stone, a former employee at the facility, could be entitled to as much as one-quarter of the payment under the federal False Claims Act. The 81-year-old retired engineer filed his whistle-blower lawsuit in 1989, the year Rocky Flats shut its operations after nearly 40 years of production. He has survived legal challenges by Rockwell to dismiss the claim or deprive him of his share. The government joined the suit as Stone's partner 10 years ago. The Supreme Court now has the case. The ruling could affect an anticipated crush of fraud suits if the high court makes it harder for whistle-blowers to share in the proceeds. If Rockwell wins, ``it's going to be much more difficult for whistle-blowers and there are going to be fewer cases,'' said James Moorman, president of the Taxpayers Against Fraud Education Fund, an advocacy group. Rockwell must pay the entire penalty no matter how the Supreme Court rules, although it would not have to pay Stone's attorney fees. The only question before the court is whether Stone will get his cut. The company, backed by defense, energy and pharmaceutical interests, wants the justices to restrict when an individual can collect for suing on the government's behalf. The Bush administration is on Stone's side even though the government collects more money if Rockwell wins. ``It might be natural for the court to wonder why would it be in the government's interest to advocate that a share of the money damages in this case should be given to a private party,'' Justice Department lawyer Malcolm Stewart told the justices during the oral argument in early December. ``In our view, Stone is precisely the type of relator that Congress intended to encourage.'' A relator is an individual who sues under the False Claims Act. The False Claims Act allows individuals, acting on the government's behalf, to file fraud suits against companies that do business with the government. If they prevail, they receive a portion of what the contractor must pay the government. During World War II, Congress amended the Civil War-era law to make whistle-blower suits more difficult. Since Congress changed the law again in 1986, such suits have returned $11 billion to the government. Recent high-profile cases include settlements with leading pharmaceutical manufacturers. Sen. Charles Grassley, who led the fight to reinvigorate the False Claims Act in 1986, urged the court to rule in Stone's favor. Grassley, R-Iowa, said provisions in the law that authorize whistle-blower suits are ``essential to the government today to confront fraud in government programs from reconstruction in Iraq to aid for victims of Hurricane Katrina.'' The issues before the justices are: -How much independent knowledge of wrongdoing must someone have to file a False Claims Act suit? -Does that information have to be part of the case that eventually convinces a jury that a government contractor committed fraud? Once alleged improprieties are disclosed publicly, often by the media, individuals face a higher hurdle in bringing fraud suits on the government's behalf. Otherwise, people could read a newspaper account or an indictment and then rush to the courthouse to file suit. The major exception to this rule is if an individual is an original source of the information. That is what Stone claims; several courts have agreed. Stone did not file suit until after problems at Rocky Flats became public. He did, however, approach federal investigators with information about environmental issues before news accounts were published. At trial, the jury found Rockwell submitted false claims in 1987 and 1988 saying it was meeting goals of treating low-level radioactive wastes at the former atomic weapons plant. Rockwell laid off Stone in 1986. Maureen Mahoney, representing the company, told the justices it is implausible for Stone to claim he had independent knowledge of any fraud. ``His claim by his own admission starts in 1987, after he was gone,'' Mahoney said. Yet both the trial and appeals courts, as well as the government, say Stone has shown he provided information on which the allegations of fraud were based. A ruling by the Supreme Court is expected before July. Rocky Flats is designated by the Environmental Protection Agency as a Superfund cleanup site. It is an Energy Department-owned cleanup and closure site. In nearly four decades, some 70,000 plutonium triggers for nuclear bombs were made at Rocky Flats. Production was halted in 1989 because of chronic safety problems, prompting a raid by FBI agents. The Cold War ended before production could resume. In 1993, the Energy Department announced that the facility's mission was over. State and federal regulators signed an agreement in 1996 on the cleanup, including demolition of what was termed ``the most dangerous building in America'' because of leaks, spills and a fire that drove radiation levels off the charts. The case is Rockwell International v. U.S., ex rel Stone, 05-1272. ^--- On the Net: Supreme Court: http://www.supremecourtus.gov Taxpayers Against Fraud Education Fund: http://www.taf.org/ Energy Department: http://www.energy.gov/ Boeing: http://www.boeing.com/ Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 59 Aiken Today: Aiken has come a long ways, still a ways to go Sat, Jan 6, 2007 By PHILIP LORD Senior writer Over the past year Aiken County has seen growth in its industrial base and continued investment in existing industries, but there is still work to be done. Fred Humes, director of the Economic Development Partnership of Aiken and Edgefield counties, told members of the Greater Aiken Chamber of Commerce that 1,400 jobs have been created in the market and $600 million in capital investment have been made in area industries. One of those expansions was an addition at the Kimberly-Clark plant in Beech Island, which added 250 jobs to the area. The expansion makes the Beech Island plant the largest tissue manufacturer in North America, Humes said. Another expansion saw Glaxco SmithKline add 150 jobs by adding to the product line it offered. "A strong industrial base, a strong manufacturing base is really the heart of a community," Humes said. While there have been success stories, Humes said the closure of Avondale Mills last summer and the closure of the SKF plant at the Sage Mill Industrial Park each negatively impacted the community. "There is still a very serious impact on our community through the loss of those jobs," Humes said following an introduction by Keith Wood. Looking at the future, Humes said Aiken County is looking to leverage its experience at the Savannah River Site by cashing in on the emerging hydrogen economy. The Center for Hydrogen Research, which was built at the Savannah River Cooperative Research Campus for $10 million by Aiken County, is currently paying dividends by attracting researchers from Toyota and General Motors to the area. Add to this the South Carolina Hydrogen Fuel Cell Alliance, and Humes said the state's commitment to attracting automakers to the area to help unlock the key to using hydrogen as a fuel for vehicles is key to a future where America is less dependent on foreign fossil fuel. Looking at the SRS complex, Humes said he believed a Mixed Oxide Fuel facility, which will turn weapons-grade plutonium into fuel for commercial reactors, will one day open here. "I still believe that that is going to happen," Humes said. Humes said changes in the leadership in Washington, D.C., will play a role in future missions at SRS. "There are a lot of unknowns here," he said. Currently the U.S. Department of Energy is considering a new management and operations contract for SRS that Humes said is flawed. "The fee (for operating the facility) is very low," Humes said. Input received from the public on the proposed contract will soon be considered and Humes said he felt some of his concerns could be addressed by DOE, if the department listens to those who know about the industry. Other future nuclear projects include the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) Initiative, which will include nuclear reprocessing, and DOE's Complex 2030, which will see the establishment of a plutonium center of excellence to address America's nuclear needs. Included in the 2030 plan is a proposal to be able to create pits, or triggers, for nuclear weapons. Friday was the Chamber's initial First Friday Means Business meeting, which also saw brief presentations by Aiken City Manager Roger LeDuc, Aiken County Administrator Clay Killian, Vice Chairman of the Chamber Board Liz Stewart and Pat Patton of AT, who sponsored the event at Houndslake Country Club. © 2005 The AikenStandard. All Rights Reserved ***************************************************************** 60 Dayton Daily News: Toxic Mound records buried in New Mexico DaytonDailyNews.com Some say the contaminated documents could have helped settle the health claims of 700 workers at the former Miamisburg plant By Staff Writer Sunday, January 07, 2007 In April a team of government contractor staffers traveled to the Energy Department's Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico to view a vast collection of classified records from Miamisburg's Mound Plant, records they believed were important in determining whether Mound workers got cancer from on-the-job radiation exposures. But when they arrived, Los Alamos officials told the staffers that the records were radioactively contaminated and had been buried deep in a New Mexico landfill for low-level radioactive waste in 2005. Now contractors and worker advocates are concerned that the burial of the records could prevent federal health officials from having a full understanding of the risks faced by Cold War atomic workers at Mound. That could have an impact on 700 Mound workers and their survivors who have applied for federal compensation and medical benefits, contending they developed serious illnesses from exposures to plant toxins. "How does this affect the validity of compensation decisions?" said government watchdog Richard Miller, a former lobbyist for an atomic-workers union. Miller thinks the Energy Department should try to locate and exhume the records, if that's possible. The contractors and advocates also wonder whether the Energy Department broke its own rules by burying the documents without a review by health and safety officials. The department denies it broke the rules. The advisory board over a federal compensation program is to take up the question of the documents later this year as it considers approval of Mound's "site profile," a reference book that helps officials decide if a worker's illness is job-related. Federal atomic workers must prove their illnesses were likely caused by workplace exposures to qualify for compensation, unless they are tagged with a special status that assumes an occupational link to their disease. Mike Gibson, an advisory board member who worked at Mound for 22 years and was a union president there, said he doesn't think health officials can confidently determine whether the illnesses are work-related without knowing what's in the buried documents. Consequently, he said, it's possible the Mound could make a case for special status that would make it easier for them to get compensation. READ MORE: Former employee, others say burial must be explained Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2264 or tbeyerlein@DaytonDailyNews.com. DaytonDailyNews.com: Copyright ©2007 Cox Ohio Publishing, Dayton, Ohio, USA. ***************************************************************** 61 Boston.com: U.S. reviews Ohio toxic waste cleanup - Boston Globe ... Lisa Cornwell January 7, 2007 --> [The Associated Press] Jeff Wagner, a spokesman for Fluor Fernald Inc., looks over what was the former Fernald uranium processing plant, Thursday, Oct. 19, 2006, in Cincinnati. Wagner is standing on top of a 110-acre mound now covered by soil and prairie grass that contains 4.7 million tons of low-level waste and building debris. Flour Fernald Inc. was the primary contractor performing the cleanup at Fernald. (AP Photo/Al Behrman) CINCINNATI --A bird's nest nestled in the tall grasses of a wetland symbolizes the end of a 20-year struggle to clean up a site contaminated by radioactive material from a former Cold War-era uranium processing plant. After years of often-contentious public meetings, lawsuits and relentless lobbying, the land is now devoid of 1.5 million tons of its most dangerous waste and has begun its transformation into an undeveloped park and wildlife haven covered with woods, prairie and wetlands. "I thought many times that we would never see it turned into something useable and safe for residents," said Lisa Crawford, president and a founding member of the citizens group that began fighting for cleanup of the former Fernald plant site 22 years ago. "It's been a long road, but we finally got there." Fluor Fernald, the company in charge of the cleanup that cost federal taxpayers $4.4 billion, announced Oct. 29 that its work was completed. The Energy Department, which owns the site, is conducting a final review to ensure the cleanup meets its standards. Findings of numerous health studies on Fernald have not been as definitive as workers and residents had hoped, but studies are continuing. Researchers say it can take decades for radiation-linked cancers to show up, and it is difficult to say whether cancers and other health problems occurring among workers and residents are linked to Fernald. The innocuous-sounding Feed Material Production Center that would later gain national notoriety as a radioactively contaminated site was built in a rural area about 20 miles northwest of Cincinnati in 1951. Its task -- processing uranium metal used to produce plutonium for nuclear weapons -- was shrouded in secrecy. "We were under national security clearance and not allowed to tell our families, friends or even workers in other parts of the site about what we did there," said Gene Branham, former president of the Fernald Atomic Trade and Labor Council union representing Fernald workers. Time magazine wrote a cover story in 1988 about the site and residents' worries -- headlined "The Nuclear Scandal" -- and television talk show host Phil Donahue devoted a program to Fernald that year. "When people knew you worked at Fernald, they would ask you if you glowed in the dark," said Fluor Fernald spokesman Jeff Wagner, who began working at the site for Westinghouse Material Co. of Ohio in 1986 when citizen outrage and fear were at a high point. The questions started in the 1970s. The Department of Energy in 1979 found that radon gas had been leaking from storage silos for years. Residents worried that radioactive uranium contamination found in the air, water and soil could lead to cancer and other diseases. Workers were concerned about risks from uranium and from radon gas and toxic chemicals stored on the site. The public began demanding answers in 1984, when government documents revealed that almost 300 pounds of enriched uranium oxide dust had been released into the air from a faulty dust collection system. Neighboring wells were found to be contaminated from similar emissions from production and waste storage operations through the years. Those emissions dropped into the soil, contaminating groundwater. "I came home in 1984 to find a man climbing out of my well, but he wouldn't tell me what he was doing," said Crawford, who became angry and worried when she found they were testing for radioactive contamination. Her feelings were shared by about 100 families who formed Fernald Residents for Environmental Safety and Health that year. Crawford became president, and she and her husband, Ken, were lead plaintiffs in a class-action lawsuit against the government, charging emotional distress and damaged property values. The plant closed in 1989, the year the government settled for $78 million, including medical testing for nearby residents that is scheduled to end in 2008 unless more funding is found. Fernald workers also sued and reached a $20 million settlement with the government in 1994 that included lifetime medical monitoring. Suspicion and animosity ran high for years. Public meetings in the late 1980s and early 1990s were legendary, said DOE spokesman Gary Stegner. "You'd be trying to answer questions from angry residents, and you'd feel like you had a target on your face," he said. Combativeness gradually gave way to cooperation, and some FRESH members served on an advisory board the Energy Department formed to develop a consensus on cleanup issues. In 1995, the board recommended setting target cleanup levels, restricting future use of the 1,050-acre site and reducing the amount of contaminated soil to be removed. Radioactive waste from concrete silos that Energy Department officials say held the world's largest source of radon gas were removed, treated and shipped to Texas. More than 1 million tons of other radioactive waste were shipped to hazardous waste storage sites in Nevada and Utah, and 323 buildings were demolished. About 4.7 million tons of low-level waste, uranium-contaminated soil and building debris will remain at Fernald in a 110-acre fenced-off pile. The pile is encased in thick liners and caps made of strong synthetic material, clays, rock and clean soil and covered with prairie grass. "Some of us had a problem at first with keeping any of it on site," said Tom Willsey, a trustee for Ross Township, where part of Fernald is located. "We would have preferred to get it all out of here, but at some point reality kicks in and you realize you can't just ship all your problems to someone else's backyard." Activists fighting for cleanups elsewhere praise FRESH's results. "We've come a long way to see the Fernald site cleaned up in a manner that the citizens group feels good about," said Gerald Pollett, executive director of Heart of America Northwest, pushing for the estimated $60 billion cleanup of the Hanford nuclear reservation in Washington state. Fernald area groundwater will be pumped and treated for 10 to 12 more years until the drinking water standard is met, and an education center highlighting Fernald history still has to be developed. But the citizens group, which held its last meeting Nov. 16, feels that its mission is accomplished. While grass has not had time to grow in some areas, wild turkeys and deer roam the rolling hills and wooded areas. Wild geese and ducks can be found in and along the ponds and wetlands at the site where self-guided trails are to be established. "We can laugh about a lot of it now, but we learned that you have to fight for what you believe in," Crawford said. "We didn't get total cleanup, but our community is healthier and safer. We made a difference."[ /] © Copyright 2007 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. 12More: ***************************************************************** 62 AU ABC: Greens fear federal intervention on WA uranium ban. 07/01/2007. ABC News Online [Politics: The Western Australian Government has a policy against nuclear mining (file photo).] A Greens Senator says the Federal Government should make its intentions clear on whether it will try to override Western Australia's policy against nuclear mining. There is further pressure on the State Government to drop its ban on uranium mining after the Commonwealth signed a deal to allow Australian yellowcake to be shipped to China. Acting Premier Eric Ripper is concerned that a recent High Court decision could allow the Federal Government to force nuclear power on the states. Greens Senator Rachel Siewert says the Commonwealth needs to show its hand. "I'm certainly concerned about what the Federal Government's intentions are, and if I was in the State Government I would certainly be trying to find out what the Commonwealth Government's specific intentions are," she said. Senator Siewert says WA should maintain its ban. "[I am] deeply concerned that there will be pressure put on the WA Government to change its very strong position against uranium mining," she said. "I must say that that's a stand that we very strongly support and we're calling on the State Government to maintain the stand opposing uranium mining." A spokeswoman for federal Resources Minister Ian Macfarlane says uranium bans are costing WA money and the Federal Government continues to encourage the WA Government to repeal its legislative restriction on uranium mining. ***************************************************************** 63 SF New Mexican: LANL under watchful eye Sun Jan 7, 2007 1:34 pm Checkpoint stations in Los Alamos will be open on January 8th LANL MAP SHOWING CHECKPOINT Checkpoint stations in Los Alamos will be open on January 8th Andy Lenderman | The New Mexican New security checkpoints to begin screening vehicles near lab $24 million road security project is scheduled to greet many Los Alamos commuters Monday morning, part of the government's effort to better protect Los Alamos National Laboratory. Two security checkpoints covering a section of N.M. 501 will screen vehicles beginning today. The area contained by these checkpoints most relevant to lab workers is Technical Area 3. And, of course, drivers who need to use that route -- also referred to as East Jemez Road and West Jemez Road -- must pass through the guard stations. The level of vehicle screening depends on the lab's current security condition. All vehicles are subject to inspection, and all recreational vehicles and motor homes will be required to stop for a check. A spokesman for the National Nuclear Security Administration said everything is ready to go. "We'll have guards at the stations so we can make sure that the traffic gets through smoothly," spokesman Bernie Pleau said. "It's part of the designed security for the site, to protect those facilities that need to be protected." Current security conditions don't require any identification check, the lab reported in a recent news release. And current security conditions allow people who do not work at the lab to go through the checkpoints also. Cars and motorcycles will be stopped briefly and allowed to proceed after a signal from a security officer, the lab reports. All large delivery vehicles need a pass, and big trucks carrying gravel, logs and pumice are supposed to avoid the area by taking N.M. 4 through the town of Bicycles may go through the checkpoint without stopping, and pedestrians are encouraged to stick to sidewalks, the lab reports. The Los Alamos County Council filed a lawsuit against the National Nuclear Security Administration over the project last year. A settlement requires both parties to work together to build a bypass around the checkpoint area, an effort to alleviate concerns about the checkpoint's impact on tourism and economic development. Contact Andy Lenderman at 995-3827 or . Use | ©2007, Santa Fe New Mexican ***************************************************************** 64 Tri-City Herald: Vit plant construction a huge undertaking Published Saturday, January 6th, 2007 By Annette Cary, Herald staff writer A village of buildings is growing up around the core of Hanford's $12.2 billion vitrification plant as construction progresses on support systems for the huge waste treatment plant. "These aren't the everyday industrial facilities," said John Eschenberg, the Department of Energy manager of the vit plant project. "Everything is big." Hanford's aging infrastructure could not be upgraded at a reasonable cost to support the plant, which is planned to immobilize much of Hanford's worst waste in glass logs. Instead, the 65-acre site will have its own electrical power distribution systems, backup power systems, compressed air, chilled water, process water, drinking water, steam and fire suppression. Those and other support services will require 20 facilities, the largest of them covering the area of one football field. But they'll still be dwarfed by the four main buildings at the plant that will separate, treat and analyze the waste. The largest of those has a footprint of four football fields and will stand 119 feet tall. Work has temporarily stopped on the two buildings that will handle high-level waste to resolve funding and technical issues. But work continues on the Low-Activity Waste Facility, the Analytical Laboratory and the support facilities. While the plant may not be operating until 2019, the support facilities should be completed in 2012 along with the lab and the Low-Activity Waste Facility, Eschenberg said. Among the most complex is the chiller compressor plant, which will supply compressed air to keep waste mixed in tanks and to mix the waste with glass- forming materials. "Moving parts mean maintenance, which we don't want to do," Eschenberg said. Some of the radioactive waste the plant will treat is so radioactively hot that it must be held in tanks in "black cells" that people cannot enter again to fix any malfunctioning equipment after the first waste is pumped in. The waste is left from the past production of plutonium for the nation's nuclear weapons program. Much of the major support systems are needed for heating and cooling. Before construction began on the plant, a new substation was installed. Power will be needed to keep melters for the glass and waste at about 1,800 degrees. It also will be needed to operate the pumps that move millions of gallons of waste from building to building. Steam from boilers heated by fuel oil will be used to heat waste in the tanks and in the off-gas system from the melters. Because of the intense heat required in the plant, chilled water will be needed for cooling. Not only will the melters have cooling water jackets, but also some entire rooms will need to be lined with cooling jackets to protect the integrity of their concrete. In addition, waste that's heated in the Pretreatment Facility to about 160 degrees to speed up removal of aluminum and chrome will have to be cooled back down. The first three buildings to support the plant have been completed and are being used to support construction. They include the construction office, which will become the administration building; a fabrication shop that will become the maintenance shop and a warehouse. Construction is under way on 13 buildings or facilities and the design is being done on the remaining four buildings. In addition, the piping and control systems between the plant's main buildings have been completed. "When complete, this facility will be the largest of its kind in the world, and it will take a lot of support capability to keep it operating day-to-day," Eschenberg said. To see photos of construction progress, go to www.waste2glass.com. © 2007 Tri-City Herald, Associated Press &Other Wire Services ***************************************************************** 65 Inside Bay Area: Feds reject 'green team' lab bid Officials say activists didn't follow proposal guidelines , FROM STAFF REPORTS Article Last Updated: 01/06/2007 02:56:44 AM PST Federal nuclear weapons officials have rejected a bid by disarmament and renewable energy activists to manage Lawrence Livermore weapons design lab, saying the "green team" didn't fit federal plans. The team, calling itself GREEN LLC, was led by two weapons-lab watchdog groups, Livermore-based Tri-Valley CAREs and Nuclear Watch of New Mexico, who never really expected to run the sprawling bomb lab. But they were offended that the National Nuclear Security Administration said the team's proposal ran afoul of federal law and "did not demonstrate an understanding of the requirements of the solicitation where it proposed 'change in the overall direction' at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory." Officials of the nuclear agency so far haven't identified what laws might have been broken by the GREEN LLC bid, which proposed a gradual shift from weapons work into unclassified research on climate change and renewable energy. "It's ironic because our bid proposed to bring Lawrence Livermore Lab more in line with national and international law," said Marylia Kelley, head of Tri-Valley CAREs. For the first time, the activists figured, the lab could be managed in accordance with U.S. promises in the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty to work toward full disarmament, rather than maintaining and designing new weapons. "Our proposal was arbitrarily and improperly eliminated because NNSArejects the principle that the U.S. should lead the world toward nuclear nonproliferation by demonstrating restraint in its own weapons programs," said Jay Coghlan, head of Nuclear Watch of New Mexico. Federal officials say GREEN LLC was proposing a different lab than the government specified in its bid request. "The bottom line is their proposal did not meet the criteria for running the lab," said NNSA spokesman Bryan Wilkes. The activists said federal officials erroneously claimed that mandatory pieces were missing from the team's bid. yet the NNSA hasn't made itself available to discuss the matter in a required post-bid debriefing. "So in a weird way, there's no way for us to even tell them, 'Why don't you look on this page and find what you say is missing,'" Kelley said. "We are expecting our next step will be a (formal contract) protest." Insidebayarea.com | Subscriber Services | Contact Us © 2000-2006 ANG Newspapers | ***************************************************************** 66 KnoxNews: Nuclear sites to be discussed in Oak Ridge By News Sentinel staff January 6, 2007 OAK RIDGE - The U.S. Department of Energy will host a Feb. 13 public meeting in Oak Ridge to gather input on proposed nuclear initiatives. Oak Ridge is a potential site for one or more of the facilities being considered under the Bush administration's Global Nuclear Energy Partnership. The DOE has proposed building three facilities to support broader use of nuclear power: + A nuclear recycling center that would process spent nuclear fuel and manufacture new fuel components. + A recycling reactor that would burn up some of the long-lived radioactive elements in old fuel and generate electricity at the same time. + A research facility that would do development work on the recycling processes for highly radioactive spent fuel. A 7,000-acre site near Oak Ridge National Laboratory is being evaluated as a site for one or more of the facilities. It is among 11 sites around the country being studied for the GNEP program. The Community Reuse Organization of East Tennessee, a nonprofit group that supports economic development at surplus federal facilities, will receive a federal grant for studies associated with the program. Science Applications International Corp. will assess the suitability of the Oak Ridge site for the nuclear projects. Oak Ridge City Council last fall approved a resolution supporting the studies but has not endorsed any of the projects. Following the Feb. 13 meeting in Oak Ridge, the DOE will host similar sessions at the other sites being considered for the program. © 2007 - Knoxville News Sentinel ***************************************************************** 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: *****************************************************************