***************************************************************** 01/28/07 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 15.22 ***************************************************************** 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] How the NY Times Discovered All Those WMDs in Iraq & Cuba 2 Antiwar.com: Window Into Pre-War Planning - 3 [NYTr] IAEA Chief Hopes for Renewed Talks on Iran Nuke Issue 4 Guardian Unlimited: Iran Says It's Installing Centrifuges 5 The Observer: They're broken men, so don't let them take us to a new 6 The Observer: Nuclear plans in chaos as Iran leader flounders 7 The Observer: Shoppers see red and President feels the heat over tom 8 Guardian Unlimited: Iran Says It's Installing Centrifuges 9 New York Times: On Iran, Bush Faces Haunting Echoes of Iraq - 10 Guardian Unlimited: Iran Official Denies Nuke Plant Reports 11 SF Chron: As economy struggles, Iranians losing faith in president 12 Guardian Unlimited: Iran Seeks to Review Nuke Watchdog Plan 13 Guardian Unlimited: Iran Looks to Russia As Global Mediator 14 AFP: Iran starts to install 3,000 centrifuges - MP 15 AFP: Iran sends conflicting signals on nuclear work - 16 UPI: Iran says it will allow nuclear inspection 17 Guardian Unlimited: Experts Debate North Korea's Future 18 Guardian Unlimited: U.S., N. Korea to Resume Financial Talks 19 Guardian Unlimited: North Korea Denies Cooperating With Iran 20 Guardian Unlimited: U.N. to Audit All Operations in N.Korea 21 US: The Rise of U.S. Nuclear Primacy 22 BBC NEWS: Blair sees hope of climate deal 23 AFP: World War III has already begun, says former Israeli spy chief 24 Comment is free: New strategy, old problems NUCLEAR REACTORS 25 Sydney Morning Herald: Shutdown of reactor will take decade - 26 US: Kansas City Star: Nuclear agency studies options for KC plant 27 US: The State: Nuclear power is safest, cleanest and cheapest energy 28 Green Left: 'Don't be a nuclear fool' 29 US: Casper Star Tribune: Idaho energy plan stirs debate 30 iafrica.com: sa news Pebble-bed reactor appeal turned down 31 US: Chattanooga Times Free Press: Nuclear revival - 32 US: Chillicothe Gazette: Future of GNEP site in Piketon still in que 33 US: 49abcnews.com: Wanted: nuclear power - 34 US: LJWorld.com: Wanted: nuclear power | 35 US: LJWorld.com: Bill would make it easier to expand nuclear energy 36 US: Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Global warming joins nukes as fright 37 US: Boston Globe: Risks, benefits of Plymouth's Pilgrim nuclear powe 38 US: JS Online: Another sorry sign: Global warming and climate change 39 AFP: Russia-India summit ends with pomp but few deals 40 Scotsman.com: Opinion - Energy crisis 41 Scotsman.com: Scotland - The generation game 42 Scotsman.com: Scotland - Scotland running on empty 43 UPI: Scotland attempting to avoid energy crisis NUCLEAR SECURITY 44 Moscow Times: Uranium May Be From Novosibirsk 45 Guardian Unlimited: Russian City May Be Source for Uranium 46 IHT: Russian nuclear smuggler told investigators uranium came from NUCLEAR SAFETY 47 US: Pahrump Valley Times: Divine Strake comment period extended to 4 48 Economic Times: Scientists develop cost-effective nuclear medicine 49 US: AP Wire: Audit questions documents used to reject sick workers' 50 US: Spectrum: Life after the blast 51 US: The Spectrum: Compensation still a distant possibility 52 US: Spectrum: FAQ on Divine Strake 53 US: Salt Lake Tribune: Guy: Gov. Huntsman gives the people a voice i 54 US: Inside Bay Area: Tankers of Mass Destruction 55 US: Salt Lake Tribune: Citizens speak out against Divine Strake 56 Independent: The poisoned teaplot: Polonium reading from hotel 'off 57 US: Dayton Daily News: Audit says many Mound workers likely exposed 58 US: Sunday Herald: Nuclear plant faces action after worker contamina 59 US: Spectrum: Coming Sunday: An in-depth look at the nuclear debate 60 US: Spectrum: Baneberry witness tells story 61 US: Daily Herald - Bomb test: Get 2nd opinion 62 US: KTVB.COM: Group calling itself Downwinders try to stop non-nucle 63 US: KTVB.COM: Idaho residents, Department of Defense discuss Divine 64 US: KTRV FOX 12: Downwinders Fight Bomb Test 65 UPI: British Olympic site highly radioactive NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE 66 Guardian Unlimited: Further setback for ailing Thorp plant 67 Pahrump Valley Times: Nuke lobby will use care with Reid 68 Pahrump Valley Times: Reid won't insist on opposition to Yucca proje 69 US: ABQjournal: WIPP Proved Richardson as Compromise Artist 70 This is London: Government's proposed Olympic site is 'radioactive' 71 US: DenverPost.com: Uranium boom in the West 72 US: San Bernardino County Sun: Authority is questioned on perchlorat 73 US: Salt Lake Tribune: Radiation board reviews plan for recycling Ok PEACE US DEPT. OF ENERGY 74 SF New Mexican: LANL: Congress set to probe lab's security failings ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** FULL NEWS STORIES ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** 1 [NYTr] How the NY Times Discovered All Those WMDs in Iraq & Cuba Date: Sun, 28 Jan 2007 20:01:19 -0600 (CST) Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit ZNet - November 12, 2005 http://www.zmag.org/Sustainers/Content/2005-11/12franklin_.cfm How The New York Times Discovered All Those WMDs in Iraq and Cuba By Jane Franklin "U.S. Says Hussein Intensifies Quest for A-Bomb Parts" blared the lead article of the New York Times on Sunday, September 8, 2002. That fateful article is now a notorious example of the disastrous symbiosis between the White House and corporate media. Using White House sources, co-authors Judith Miller and Michael Gordon stated as fact that "Iraq has sought to buy thousands of specially designed aluminum tubes, which American officials believe were intended as components of centrifuges to enrich uranium" for use in making nuclear bombs. The article warned that American officials are "alarmed" by Iraq's "quest for nuclear weapons": "The first sign of a `smoking gun,' they argue, may be a mushroom cloud." Here was the perfect gift to President Bush's quest for war: an article parroting the Administration's own words on the front page of the liberal New York Times, "the newspaper of record." Timed for the Sunday talk shows and their White House guests, the article was deployed within hours of its publication by Vice-President Dick Cheney, Secretary of State Colin Powell, and National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, each seizing the opportunity to spread their scary disinformation to TV audiences throughout the country and the world. On "Meet the Press" with Tim Russert, Cheney cited the article as evidence for the administration's case: "There's a story in the New York Times this morning...I want to attribute the Times. I don't want to talk about, obviously, specific intelligence sources, but it's now public that, in fact, [Saddam Hussein] has been seeking to acquire...the kinds of tubes that are necessary to build a centrifuge" as a step toward building a nuclear bomb. General Colin Powell, the media's image of a moderate (despite such achievements as his cover-up of the My Lai massacre in Vietnam, support for the contras in Nicaragua, and oversight of the invasion of Panama), was part of the show. In his interview on "Fox News Sunday" by Tony Snow and Brit Hume, Powell delivered a bellicose argument for quick "regime change" because "time is not on our side." "As we saw in reporting just this morning," he gravely warned, Hussein has ordered "the specialized aluminum tubing one needs to develop centrifuges that would give you an enrichment capability" for making nuclear bombs. Condi Rice, interviewed by Wolf Blitzer on CNN's "Late Edition," stated that the White House knows of "shipments going into Iraq" of aluminum tubes "that are only really suited for nuclear weapons programs." She failed to mention that her own staff had been informed a year earlier of serious doubts about that claim. Borrowing a key phrase from the Times article, she warned, "We don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud." This phrase became a rallying cry used by President Bush on October 7 in Cincinnati in his speech that took the nation to war. "Iraq," he said, "has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes and other equipment needed for gas centrifuges, which are used to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons." "Facing clear evidence of peril," he continued, "we cannot wait for the final proof--the smoking gun--that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud." Four days later, a cowering Congress surrendered to Bush the authority to make war. So the collusion between the Bush Administration and the New York Times contributed to a catastrophic war. Journalists reported what White House sources reported and then the White House reported what the journalists reported. Even though the so-called facts--later revealed as bald concoctions--were already in dispute, White House fiction subtly morphed into truth because it bore the respected imprimatur of the Times. After the damage had been done, Times editors published on May 26, 2004, a pathetically anemic apology, given the role they had played in facilitating a so-called War on Terror that threatens to be the Forever War. Embarrassed by blatantly false reports, the editors particularly mentioned six articles, including, of course, the September 8, 2002 history-making piece. Judith Miller was responsible for more of the articles than any other reporter (author or co-author of four out of the six) but there were four other reporters who were authors or co-authors: Chris Hedges, John Tagliabue, Patrick E. Tyler, and Michael Gordon. Those five of course are not the only eager mouthpieces. Now publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr. is blaming Times editors as well as Judith Miller for the phony pre-war reports about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. He said editors "didn't own up to it quickly enough." Where was he? And why did the Times publish those jingoist articles about WMDs in Iraq in the midst of a massive White House campaign aimed at building support for Bush's plan to take out Hussein and take Iraq? When it comes to foreign policy, the owners of the New York Times are embedded with the White House team that feeds "information" to the eager mouthpieces of corporate media. They share, for examples, the same clear positions on such crucial matters as Israel and Cuba. Misinformation and disinformation in the New York Times and other corporate media are of course nothing new. Those who want to explore the sordid record, especially of the Times, should start by consulting Lies of Our Times, a monthly magazine published from January 1990 through December 1994; Edward Herman's forthcoming article, "The New York Times Versus The Civil Society," in the December, 2005, Z Magazine; and Howard Friel and Richard Falk's The Record of the Paper: How the New York Times Misreports US Foreign Policy. Judith Miller was able to use her job at a prestigious newspaper to embed herself with key personalities like Cheney's favorite, Ahmad Chalabi, an Iraqi with Iranian ties able to produce lying defectors. At the White House itself Miller embedded herself with various acolytes of Dick Cheney, not just I. Lewis (Scooter) Libby. Her entanglement with John R. Bolton is equally insidious. Just as she collaborated with the White House to stampede us into invading Iraq, she attempted to do the same with Cuba. In the spring of 2002 former President Jimmy Carter was scheduled to visit Havana, becoming the first president in or out of office to visit the island since the revolution of January 1, 1959. Because the visit was contrary to the White House policy of isolating Cuba with sanctions against travel and trade, the White House of course wanted to sabotage Carter's trip. On May 6, six days before Jimmy and Rosalyn Carter were to fly to Havana, Under Secretary of State for Arms Control John Bolton delivered a speech to the Heritage Foundation in Washington called "Beyond the Axis of Evil: Additional Threats from Weapons of Mass Destruction." He announced, "The United States believes that Cuba has at least a limited offensive biological warfare research and development effort. Cuba has provided dual-use biotechnology to other rogue states. We are concerned that such technology could support BW [biological warfare] programs in those states." On cue, Judith Miller immediately published in the New York Times an alarming article headlined "Washington Accuses Cuba of Germ-Warfare Research." Framed in the "he says-she says" format of what passes for "objective" journalism nowadays, Miller adroitly presented the case on behalf of her White House connection. Who is the only person she could find to deny or even question Bolton's claims? Why, a Cuban official, of course. On the other side, cited in support of Bolton were a Soviet defector, a Cuban defector, and unnamed "administration officials." Miller ended her article with a quote from right-wing Cuban-American Representative Lincoln Diaz-Balart (Republican of Florida), who has publicly called for the assassination of President Fidel Castro. Diaz-Balart said that Bolton's remarks "`begin to put into the proper perspective the debate about Cuba, a terrorist state with biological weapons 90 miles from the shores of the United States.'" Thus, the article proceeded from Bolton's claim of a "research and development effort" to Diaz-Balart's affirmation of "biological weapons" 90 miles from Florida. Hurried newspaper readers would probably miss the article's internal evidence indicating opposition to Bolton's claim among Washington's intelligence agencies. Miller reported that Bolton "publicly alluded to conclusions that American intelligence agencies have reached in recent months after protracted internal debate." Internal debate? What's that about? An investigative reporter could have easily found out. Bolton's unsubstantiated charge was so outrageous that it became one of the main issues in his failure to be confirmed by the Senate last summer as ambassador to the United Nations because he had tried to bully analysts into saying that there was a definite attempt by Cuba to develop biological weapons. Reportedly due to Cheney's urging, Bush gave him the job anyway with a recess appointment. The New York Times, which hardly pretends to cover news about Cuba fairly, seemed like a good site for promoting Bolton's onslaught. Miller's report aimed to convince Times readers that Cuba's vaunted health system is actually a cover for terrorist activities. Why would Jimmy Carter want to visit a rogue nation armed with germ weapons? But this time the Administration was going too far. Even much of the rest of the corporate media recognized how perverse it was to portray Cuba's health system, admired and helpful around the world, as a terrorist threat. There was a virtual chorus of "Where's the evidence?" The Florida Sun-Sentinel brought up the question of timing, following up with an editorial that asked, "Where's the beef?" New York's Newsday called the charge of terrorism a "Preposterous suggestion," noting that the upshot is that Cuba has "the most sophisticated biomedical resources in Latin America," and adding, "So what?" Skeptical responses came from all over, including the Chicago Tribune, the Baltimore Sun and the Guardian of London. (Bolton's charge was part of a broader campaign alleging WMDs in Cuba, as explored in my article, "Looking for Terrorists in Cuba's Health System," Z Magazine, June 2003.) Jimmy Carter did not call off his trip. Quite to the contrary. As he and Rosalyn took a tour with Fidel Castro of the Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology, he revealed that during briefings before his visit, he asked the White House, State Department and CIA if there were any "possible terrorist activities that were supported by Cuba," and the answer from all three was "No." Why didn't Judith Miller do that? Why didn't her editors make sure she did? It would have been interesting to be the fly on the wall when Bolton visited Judith Miller last summer while she was in jail. Was it friendship or fear that took him there? The New York Times has never apologized for the May 7, 2002, report that promoted Bolton's false charge about Cuba even though the editors must have heard what Carter had to say just a week later. In October, as her stories continued to unravel, Miller told Times reporters, "`W.M.D.--I got it totally wrong.'" Blaming her sources, she said, "`The analysts, the experts and the journalists who covered them--we were all wrong. If your sources are wrong, you are wrong.'" It shouldn't take much effort to find better sources than Ahmad Chalabi, John Bolton, Karl Rove, Scooter Libby, Dick Cheney, and the rest of the Bush mob. * ================================================================ .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 Antiwar.com: Window Into Pre-War Planning - by Gordon Prather January 27, 2007 It is obvious from their stories that most of the "reporters" covering the trial of Lewis Libby – charged with perjury and obstruction of justice – have either never bothered to read the five count indictment[.pdf] or are too stupid to comprehend what they have read. Jason Leopold is a notable exception. In a columnwritten on the eve of the trial Leopold noted that - "A list of potential witnesses released by Libby's defense attorneys and Patrick Fitzgerald, the special prosecutor trying the case, reads like a who's who of pre-war Iraq planning. It not only may offer the first on-the-record account of the details that led to the leak of the CIA officer, but may also provide a window in which to see how the Bush administration manipulated intelligence to make a case for war - a war that has resulted in the deaths of more than 3,000 US soldiers and tens of thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians." Wow! White House manipulation of intelligence to make a case for war? "Many of the officials identified as potential witnesses were members of the White House Iraq Group (WHIG), which came together in August 2002 to publicize the threat posed by Saddam Hussein. WHIG was founded by Bush's chief of staff Andrew Card and operated out of the vice president's office. The WHIG was not only responsible for selling the Iraq War, but it took great pains to discredit anyone who openly disagreed with the official Iraq War story." Great Zot! WHIG was responsible for discrediting anyone – in and out of government – who openly disagreed with the Bush-Cheney-Rice plan to invade and occupy Iraq? Well, in late 2001, the Italian Military Intelligence and Security Service had informed the CIA that the Iraqi ambassador to the Vatican had reportedly attempted on a visit to Niger to arrange the purchase of "yellowcake" – a mixture of natural uranium oxides. Vice President Cheney immediately asked the CIA to substantiate the report. So, in February 2002, the CIA sent former Ambassador Joseph Wilsonto Niger to look into it. Wilson's oral report to CIA officials upon his return resulted in the CIA characterization of the Italian report as being "of questionable credibility." That was also the conclusion of the State Department's independent assessment of March 1, 2002, entitled "Niger: Sale of Uranium to Iraq is Unlikely [.pdf]." Nevertheless, that intelligence "of questionable credibility" found its way into the 2002 National Intelligence Estimate of Iraq's WMD programs, hurriedly constructed during the summer of 2002 to provide a fig leaf for those Congresspersons inclined to authorizeBush's intended invasion of Iraq. Bush even included that and other intelligence "of questionable credibility" in his 2003 State of the Union message. But, by then, Saddam Hussein had acquiesced to UN Security Council Resolution 1441and had allowed IAEA inspectors unfettered access to Iraq. Director General ElBaradei had reported there was "no indication" Iraq had attempted to import uranium or to import aluminum tubes for uranium enrichment. Aluminum tubes? Well, yes. WHIG had also managed to get into the NIE other intelligence of questionable credibility, namely that Saddam had attempted to import thousands of aluminum tubes, which, according to National Security Advisor Condi Rice were "only really suited for nuclear weapons programs ... centrifuge programs." But an internationally recognized expert on uranium-enrichment, David Albright, had publicly questioned– on technical grounds – the suitability of such aluminum-tubes for centrifuges as early as September 2002. And had continued to question it. Consequently, according to Leopold, National Security Council and CIA officials told him Cheney had visited CIA headquarters and asked several CIA officials "to dig up dirt on Albright," and to put together a dossier that would discredit his work that could be distributed to the media. Someone also seems to have ordered dirt dug up on former UN Inspector Scott Ritter. And on Chairman of the UN Monitoring and Verification Commission Hans Blix. And on IAEA Director-General Mohamed ElBaradei. And, of course, on Joseph C. Wilson, IV. Fast forward to the eve of Bush's war of aggression against Iraq. Wilson, without revealing his mission to Niger a year earlier, had been ‘making waves.' In a March 2, 2003, interview with CNN, Wilson said "The underlying objective, as I see it – the more I look at this – is less and less disarmament, and it really has little to do with terrorism, because everybody knows that a war to invade and conquer and occupy Iraq is going to spawn a new generation of terrorists." David Albright was interviewed on that same CNN segment and made similar comments. Two months later, Nicholas Kristof dropped this bombshell "Consider the now-disproved claims by President Bush and Colin Powell that Iraq tried to buy uranium from Niger so it could build nuclear weapons. As Seymour Hersh noted in The New Yorker, the claims were based on documents that had been forged so amateurishly that they should never have been taken seriously. "I'm told by a person involved in the Niger caper that more than a year ago the vice president's office asked for an investigation of the uranium deal, so a former U.S. ambassador to Africa was dispatched to Niger. In February 2002, according to someone present at the meetings, that envoy reported to the C.I.A. and State Department that the information was unequivocally wrong and that the documents had been forged." Vice president's office? Well, that tore it. Quit digging up dirt on Albright, Ritter, Blix and ElBaradei. Shift target. Find out who that former Ambassador was. Dig up dirt on him! Discredit him! Who was it? Joe Wilson? The guy who's been questioning our motives on TV? Result? A Top Secret memo[.pdf] prepared for Under-Secretary of State Marc Grossman, who was, according to the Libby indictment, responding to a request from Scooter Libby for an explication of Wilson's mission to Niger and the consequences thereof. "In a February 19, 2002 meeting, convened by Valerie Wilson, a CIA WMD manager and the wife of Joe Wilson, he previewed his plans and the rationale for going to Niger… "The Niger allegations were included but did not figure prominently in the 90-page October 2002 NIE on 'Iraq's Continuing Programs for Weapons of Mass Destruction.' "The major point of contention in differing judgments about the likelihood of Iraqi nuclear weapons program reconstitution efforts centered on the CIA's assessment that Iraq was bent on acquiring aluminum tubes to produce parts for a gas centrifuge uranium enrichment plant." Niger allegations? Didn't figure prominently? But aluminum tube allegations did? So what "intelligence of questionable credibility" in the Top Secret NIEwas Libby revealing to reporters to discredit Wilson? And on whose instructions? And why was Libby blowing Valerie Wilson's cover to anyone – in or out of government – who would listen? And on whose instructions? And why did he then lie about what he said and did? Perhaps that's why in January 2004, Fitzgerald issued subpoenas for all notes, email and attendance records of the White House Iraq Group, which, as you will recall, operated out of the vice president's office. 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 ***************************************************************** 3 [NYTr] IAEA Chief Hopes for Renewed Talks on Iran Nuke Issue Date: Sat, 27 Jan 2007 18:21:21 -0600 (CST) Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit Radio Havana Cuba http://www.radiohc.cu IAEA Head Hopes Talks will Resume on Iran Nuclear Issue Havana, January 27 (RHC) -The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Mohammed ElBaradei says he hopes talks on the Iranian nuclear issue will resume. Speaking on Friday in Davos, Switzerland he told CNN international that he was calling for a timeout, meaning that Iran would freeze its nuclear program while the United Nations temporarily suspends sanctions against Iran. He stressed that direct engagement between Tehran and Washington is key to finding a solution. According to a report last fall by Iran's ISNA news agency, the country had been conducting a small-scale research enrichment program using 164 centrifuges at its Natanz facility. ISNA said the country's centrifuges are projected to number 3,000 by March. IAEA inspectors in Iran have reported that the Iranians will begin building a centrifuge facility at Natanz next month, an IAEA official told CNN on Friday. And the official said that the further down the nuclear path Iran goes, the harder it could be to get them to halt production. Former U.N. nuclear inspector David Albright, predicted it would take Iran a year to get the centrifuges in place and another year to make the highly enriched uranium. An Iranian diplomat told IRNA, the nation's official news agency, that inspectors whose countries voted for a U.N. Security Council resolution regarding sanctions on Iraq would be banned. ISNA did not name the diplomat, saying he spoke on condition of anonymity. ElBaradei told CNN that Iran was not banning inspectors, but attempting to reduce their number. "This reduced somewhat the flexibility we have, but I should say we have over 100 inspectors in Tehran, so we have enough people to do the job," he said. "It is in the interest of Iran for us to be able to do our work and to be able to show that they are transparent and they are proactive." The IAEA official said ElBaradei has not heard back from Iran on the timeout proposal. * ================================================================ .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 Guardian Unlimited: Iran Says It's Installing Centrifuges From the Associated Press [UP] Saturday January 27, 2007 9:16 PM AP Photo VAH101 By ALI AKBAR DAREINI Associated Press Writer TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - Iran is currently installing 3,000 centrifuges, a top lawmaker said Saturday in an announcement underlining that the country will continue to develop its nuclear program despite U.N. sanctions. The lawmaker, Alaeddin Boroujerdi, said the installation under way at an Iranian uranium enrichment plant ``stabilizes Iran's capability in the field of nuclear technology,'' IRNA reported. Three inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency who arrived in Iran on Saturday are scheduled to visit the uranium enrichment plant in Natanz, Iranian state-television reported. Iran last week barred 38 inspectors from the United Nations nuclear watchdog because they come from countries that voted for sanctions on Iran. State television did not give the nationalities of the three inspectors, and the IAEA could not immediately confirm their arrival in Iran. Iran's announcement appears to be its latest gesture of defiance toward the international community over its nuclear program. It faces the prospect of additional United Nations sanctions unless it stops uranium enrichment by the end of a 60-day period that ends next month. The U.N. Security Council voted unanimously in favor of economic sanctions Dec. 23 after Iran ignored an earlier deadline to halt enrichment. Large scale use of centrifuges makes it possible to produce more enriched uranium in a shorter period. Enriched uranium is used to fuel nuclear reactors and to make nuclear weapons. Many countries, including the United States, believe that Iran is using its nuclear program as a cover to produce an atomic weapon. Iran says its program is only for generating electricity. Iranian officials had said in recent weeks that the country was moving toward large-scale enrichment involving 3,000 centrifuges, which spin uranium gas into enriched material. The comments from Boroujerdi, the head of the Iranian Parliament's Foreign Policy and National Security Committee, came a day after IAEA head Mohamed ElBaradei said he believed Iran planned to begin work in February on a uranium enrichment facility underground. The subterranean facility is intended to protect the nuclear project from attack. There had been speculation the leadership might launch the project at Natanz next month to celebrate the 28th anniversary of the Islamic Revolution that brought the clerical leadership to power. A senior State Department official warned Iran against accelerating its atomic program. ``If Iran takes this step, it is going to confront universal international opposition,'' Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns said on Friday. ``If they think they can get away with 3,000 centrifuges without another Security Council resolution and additional international pressure, then they are very badly mistaken.'' Iran ultimately plans to expand its program to 54,000 centrifuges. In enrichment plants, centrifuges are linked in what are called cascades. For now, the only known assembled centrifuge cascades in Iran are above ground at Natanz, consisting of two linked chains of 164 machines each and two smaller setups. Meanwhile, Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said Iran's decision last week to bar the entrance of IAEA inspectors from countries whose governments voted in favor the U.N. sanctions resolution was within Iran's legal rights. ``This decision is lawful and will not harm our cooperation with the IAEA,'' Mottaki said Saturday. ---- Associated Press Writer George Jahn contributed to this report from Davos, Switzerland. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 5 The Observer: They're broken men, so don't let them take us to a new war | Comment | [Guardian Unlimited] [UP] Presidents Bush and Ahmadinejad have lost face at home; now others must forge peaceful settlements in the Middle East Henry Porter Sunday January 28, 2007 There is a striking likeness in the expressions of George W Bush and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran as they confront each other over the issues of uranium enrichment and dominance in the Middle East. It falls somewhere between the chastened and defiant playground bully. This is unsurprising: though not political equivalents, the two are really quite similar. Both had little experience of government or international affairs before being carried to power on a tide of populist, religious conservatism. Neither travelled abroad much, but they both had certain views about the world and the destiny of their nations. They had all the answers, yet there was also a dangerous lack of seriousness in them which has now earned them both the scorn of their people and rebuffs from their elders. We think of Bush as being the more unpopular of the two. His approval ratings are at the level of Nixon's just before he left the White House. After an unconvincing performance in the State of the Union Address, his plans for the troop surge in Iraq were rejected by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and may now be voted down by the entire Senate. Senior Republican senators such as Chuck Hagel and John Warner are furious that sensible suggestions contained in the Iraq Study Group Report have been ignored. Although the President looked receptive when the report was delivered to him by James Baker, there has been no progress in policy, no evidence of any kind of deeper thinking in the White House. Nothing except that familiar foggy, narrow-eyed truculence of Bush Junior in a tight spot. This would be a depressing but for similar difficulties experienced by Ahmadinejad over the last few weeks. Just as the senior Republican elders have turned on Bush, so Iran's religious leaders are moving to restrain their President. They criticise his bellicose foreign policy and the exceptionally poor record on promised reforms at home. There is a sense of embarrassment among sophisticated Iranians about their President's pronouncements, which surely rings a bell with Americans. The most important sign-off disenchantment came in Jomhouri Islami, the newspaper owned by Iran's supreme religious leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, which said in an editorial: 'Turning the nuclear issue into a propaganda issue gives the impression that to cover up the flaws in government you are exaggerating its importance.' The paper also suggested that the President should speak about the nuclear issue less, stop provoking aggressive powers like the United States and concentrate on the daily needs of the people - 'those who voted for you on your promises'. Two weeks ago, 150 legislators sent a letter to Ahmadinejad openly attacking him for missing his budget deadline and blaming him for inflation and rising unemployment. A loss of confidence in both men at home is important because it offers us a brief opportunity to assert diplomacy over the habits of rhetoric and escalation. Although UN nuclear experts suggest the Iranians are at least five years from developing a bomb and delivery system, the Iranians are due to open a large uranium enrichment plant within a matter of weeks. If this goes ahead, a peaceful solution will be much harder to find; to decommission this new facility will require a loss of face for Ahmadinejad. So the hawks in the West will begin the slow drumbeat for a first strike. Indeed, it has already started. For some weeks, the Daily Telegraph has been running a series of what, in my opinion, are extremely dubious stories all attributed to mysterious 'European defence officials' and 'senior Western military sources'. A front-page story last week suggested that North Korea has offered to help Iran with a nuclear test within the year. Apart from these shadowy spokesmen, it could offer no evidence, which is why the story was only seriously picked up in Israel. In Israel, it is believed that the Iranians may be able to launch a nuclear warhead into its territory within three, not five, years. Former Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has asked who will defend the Jews from a genocidal government in Iran if they do not themselves. Israeli historian Benny Morris contributed this chilling thought to the Jerusalem Post. 'One bright morning in five to 10 years, perhaps a regional crisis, a day or a year or five years after Iran's acquisition of the bomb, the mullahs in Qom will convene in secret session... and give President Ahmadinejad the go-ahead.' In Iran, 38 nuclear inspectors have been barred from entering the country in retaliation for the UN resolution introducing mild sanctions, and now the Iranians have installed a missile defence system (supplied by the Russians) to defend their nuclear facilities from air attacks. The Americans have responded by moving another aircraft carrier into the region and by offering Patriot missile systems to Iran's uneasy Arab neighbours. Make no mistake: this a much more dangerous situation than Iraq and it is unfolding on the watch of a couple of second-raters. It is true that few nations that have been more estranged over the last quarter of a century, but with the stakes so high, it seems extraordinary that America has no representation in Tehran and almost no contact except through the Swiss embassy. As Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times reminded us last week, in 2003, America rebuffed an advance made by the Iranians through the Swiss, which, in exchange for the lifting of sanctions, suggested the two countries work together on the capture of terrorists in Iraq, stabilising the country after invasion and coming to an agreement on uranium enrichment as well as the financing of Hizbollah and Hamas. The offer, made almost two years before Ahmadinejad was elected, was layered with insincerity and bluff, but professional diplomats are used to this. At least the two sides would have been talking and Tehran could have been held to account for some of the things that have been going on in Iraq. But the situation is not beyond hope. The West must realise that if a first strike takes place we have lost. Whatever is destroyed in Iran, the Iranians will come back and produce a bomb that they may feel more entitled to use. The clash of civilisations predicted by neocon academics for years will have moved a step closer to dominating the 21st century at the very moment when all civilisation needs to concentrate on the multiple threats presented by climate change. What we must hope for is a collective act of will in Europe, and among wiser heads in Washington DC, which says it doesn't have to be this way. This is not impossible. Only last week, representatives from 30 countries led by America and Saudi Arabia met in Paris to contribute to a £5bn fund to prop up Prime Minister Fouad Siniora's government in Lebanon. This was a diplomatic action taken by both Middle Eastern and Western powers to defend Lebanon against Iran's proxies in the Hizbollah terrorist organisation, and it is exactly the right way to deal with Iran. What can the British government do about Ahmadinejad? The first thing to is to recognise his failing support at home is an advantage that will be lost if the drumbeat to war is allowed to continue. There is no reason why Tony Blair should not add to the call from the head of UN inspectors, Mohamed ElBaradei, for a time out in which sanctions would be suspended. Blair still has a voice that is heard in the US. He should consider making a speech which insists that Bush initiates direct diplomatic relations with Tehran as well as a renewed effort to create the two-state solution for Israel and Palestine. He owes something to the cause of peaceful resolution and, besides, these are hardly controversial views: both have already been expressed by James Baker's Iraq Study Group. [UP] Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 6 The Observer: Nuclear plans in chaos as Iran leader flounders [UP] Boasts of a nuclear programme are just propaganda, say insiders, but the PR could be enough to provoke Israel into war Peter Beaumont, foreign affairs editor Sunday January 28, 2007 The Observer Iran's efforts to produce highly enriched uranium, the material used to make nuclear bombs, are in chaos and the country is still years from mastering the required technology. Iran's uranium enrichment programme has been plagued by constant technical problems, lack of access to outside technology and knowhow, and a failure to master the complex production-engineering processes involved. The country denies developing weapons, saying its pursuit of uranium enrichment is for energy purposes. Despite Iran being presented as an urgent threat to nuclear non-proliferation and regional and world peace - in particular by an increasingly bellicose Israel and its closest ally, the US - a number of Western diplomats and technical experts close to the Iranian programme have told The Observer it is archaic, prone to breakdown and lacks the materials for industrial-scale production. The disclosures come as Iran has told the UN nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency [IAEA], that it plans to install a new 'cascade' of 3,000 high-speed centrifuges at its controversial underground facility at Natanz in central Iran next month. The centrifuges were supposed to have been installed almost a year ago and many experts are extremely doubtful that Iran has yet mastered the skills to install and run it. Instead, they argue, the 'installation' will more probably be about propaganda than reality. The detailed descriptions of Iran's problems in enriching more than a few grams of uranium using high-speed centrifuges - 50kg is required for two nuclear devices - comes in stark contrast to the apocalyptic picture being painted of Iran's imminent acquisition of a nuclear weapon with which to attack Israel. Instead, say experts, the break-up of the nuclear smuggling organisation of the Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadheer Khan has massively set back an Iran heavily dependent on his network. A key case in point is that Tehran originally procured the extremely high-quality bearings required for the centrifuges' carbon-fibre 'top rotors' - spinning dishes within the machines - from foreign companies in Malaysia. With that source closed down two years ago, Iran is making the bearings itself with only limited success. It is the repeated failure of these crucial bearings, say some sources, that has been one of the programme's biggest setbacks. Iran is also believed to be critically short of key materials for producing a centrifuge production line to highly enrich uranium - in particular the so-called maraging steel, able to be used at high temperatures and under high stress without deforming - and specialist carbon fibre products. In this light, say some experts, its insistence that it will install 3,000 new centrifuges at the underground Natanz facility in the coming months is as much about domestic PR as reality. The growing recognition, in expert circles at least, of how far Iran is from mastering centrifuge technology was underlined on Friday by comments by the head of the IAEA, whose inspectors have been attempting to monitor the Iranian nuclear programme. Talking to the World Economic Forum at Davos, Switzerland, Mohamed El Baradei appealed for all sides to take a 'time out' under which Iranian enrichment and UN sanctions would be suspended simultaneously, adding that the point at which Iran is able to produce a nuclear weapon is at least half a decade away. In pointed comments aimed at the US and Israel, the Nobel Peace prize winner warned that an attack on Iran would have 'catastrophic consequences'. Yet some involved in the increasingly aggressive standoff over Iran fear tensions will reach snapping point between March and June this year, with a likely scenario being Israeli air strikes on symbolic Iranian nuclear plants. The sense of imminent crisis has been driven by statements from Israel, not least from Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who has insisted that 2007 is make-or-break time over Iran's nuclear programme. Recent months have seen leaks and background briefings reminiscent of the softening up of public opinion for the war against Iraq which have presented a series of allegations regarding Iran's meddling in Iraq and Lebanon, the 'genocidal' intentions of its president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and its 'connections' with North Korea's nuclear weapons programme. It also emerged last week in the Israeli media that the country's private diplomatic efforts to convince the world of the need for tough action on Iran were being co-ordinated by Meir Dagan, the head of Israel's foreign intelligence service, Mossad. The escalating sense of crisis is being driven by two imminent events, the 'installation' of 3,000 centrifuges at Natanz and the scheduled delivery of fuel from Russia for Iran's Busheyr civil nuclear reactor, due to start up this autumn. Both are regarded as potential trigger points for an Israeli attack. 'The reality is that they have got to the stage where they can run a small experimental centrifuge cascade intermittently,' said one Western source familiar with the Iranian programme. 'They simply have not got to the stage where they can run 3,000 centrifuges There is no evidence either that they have been stockpiling low-enriched uranium which could be highly enriched quickly and which would give an idea of a malevolent intent.' Another source with familiarity with the Iranian programme said: 'Iran has put all this money into this huge hole in the ground at Natanz; it has put a huge amount of money in these P-1 centrifuges, the model rejected by Urenco. It is like the Model T Ford compared to a Prius. That is not to say they will not master the technology eventually, but they are trying to master very challenging technology without access to everything that they require.' [UP] Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 7 The Observer: Shoppers see red and President feels the heat over tomatoes [Guardian Unlimited] [UP] Robert Tait finds the Iranian people and parliament in revolt Robert Tait in Tehran Sunday January 28, 2007 The Observer History is not littered with cases of heads of state being brought down by the price of tomatoes but, with his critics growing by the day, Iran's President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, could be in danger of earning such a distinction. Besieged by denunciations of his economic and nuclear policies, the President was put further on the defensive last week by MPs complaining that the cost of tomatoes had soared to 30,000 rial (£1.65) a kilo - an unthinkable price in a country where the average worker scrapes by on £225 a month. Prices subsequently slipped back in response to the outcry. But the startling statistic crystallised popular anger over runaway inflation, which has eaten into the living standards of the army of low-income Iranians whom Ahmadinejad came to office pledging to help. The ever-combative President had a ready riposte. The prices quoted were not representative, he claimed. MPs should visit his local fruit and vegetable store in the middle-class Narmak neighbourhood in east Tehran, where tomatoes cost much less. The tiny store sits around the corner from the modest home Ahmadinejad vacated on assuming the presidency. According to staff, none of his family has shopped there for months. The President might have been advised to have done so before recommending it as a haven for the thrifty. He would have found a shop no longer stocking tomatoes due to their prohibitive price and an owner desperate to sell up. 'I want to change job. It's not a proper investment and it's no longer profitable,' said owner Hassan, 24, who said rising prices had deterred many customers. Wealthy hoarders, he said, were depriving the market of produce so they could sell at inflated prices. But Hassan, who voted for Ahmadinejad, did not blame the profiteers. 'I blame the government - it comes from a lack of regulation,' he said. 'There's no stability. My situation and that of many others was better before Ahmadinejad. When he won I was happy because he didn't dress like a mullah and wore humble clothes, but he is no different. If he had solved youth unemployment, people would have been happy.' A few blocks away, traders at Kerman fruit and vegetable market voiced outrage. Ibrahim Falali, 42, said he was selling imported tomatoes from Pakistan to make up for shortfalls and high prices caused by the export of Iranian produce to Iraq. Onions and potatoes were no longer on sale because customers balked at the prices, while the cost of a kilo of fish had risen from 90p to £1.50. Gripes over surging prices are just part of a broader critique against Ahmadinejad being framed by the media, former allies in parliament and powerful regime insiders close to the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has the final say in all state matters. They accuse him of failing to keep his economic promises to create jobs and reduce poverty while presiding over wasteful policies that have triggered inflation and threaten chaos. But the charge sheet goes beyond economics. Having argued for Iran's nuclear programme with shrill anti-Western rhetoric, Ahmadinejad now stands accused of provoking Western enemies and of leaving Iran vulnerable to sanctions or military attack. Last month, the UN security council passed a resolution imposing limited sanctions over Iran's refusal to suspend uranium enrichment. It gave Tehran 60 days to comply or face the possibility of further embargoes. The Bush administration has begun pressing European banks to cut off transactions with state-owned Iranian banks said to be linked to the nuclear programme. Meanwhile, leading Israeli figures threaten military strikes against Iran's nuclear facilities. Ahmadinejad's opponents say he has inadvertently increased the threat through his uncompromising bluster and further accuse him of refusing to take it seriously. The country's Islamic system, they believe, could collapse under the burden of sanctions or from the repercussions of a military attack. The President has taken a brazen approach to the criticism. Presenting the coming year's budget to parliament last Sunday, he insisted Iran would stick to its nuclear strategy. He dismissed the capacity of sanctions to damage the economy and claimed to have reduced the country's dependence on oil revenues. On state television he brushed aside inflation as 'rumours' and insisted the US was powerless to attack Iran. 'The important thing for us is to become a nuclear power and we have done so without any costs,' he said. But the ability of such defiant talk to rally the nation has worn thin. Last week, Mohsen Rezai - a former revolutionary guard commander linked to Iran's inner circle - said he believed an enemy attack was highly likely. More threatening to Ahmadinejad's authority is the increasing assertiveness of Hashemi Rafsanjani, a former President and head of the powerful expediency council. Rafsanjani - whom Ahmadinejad defeated in the last presidential election - believes Iran faces a crisis and must negotiate on the nuclear case, even if it means backing down. Rafsanjani last week voiced his concerns about the economy and the nuclear strategy to 100 MPs. He said the expediency council would scrutinise Ahmadinejad's budget and criticised 'high-ranking officials' for under-estimating the international threat.In remarks interpreted as designed to show the President's waning influence, Rafsanjani described how a top-level official had been slapped down by Khamenei. 'We had a session with the supreme leader and a group of officials,' he said. 'Somebody said, "the threats are not serious and there is no need for concern", to which Ayatollah Khamenei replied, "the threats are serious".' The unnamed official is broadly assumed to have been Ahmadinejad. Rafsanjani reminded MPs that the 'highest religious duty' of officials was preserving Iran's Islamic system - implying this might mean making painful compromises with the West. Rafsanjani was pushing at an open door. Parliament is in open revolt, believing the President guilty of incompetence, arrogance and self-indulgence. Moves were afoot to rein him in even before Rafsanjani's pep talk. A petition is being circulated to summon Ahmadinejad for questioning over his economic and nuclear policies, while impeachment proceedings are under way against four ministers. Emad Afrough, a fundamentalist MP, said parliament would start dictating to Ahmadinejad unless he learnt the art of consultation. 'The political situation is going to force the government to consult more. If not, some issues be dictated to them,' he said. 'The government cannot count on the fundamentalists like before.' A reformist MP, Akbar Aalami, said disenchantment had reached unprecedented levels. 'This government lacks the maturity to fulfil its legal duties and exercise authority,' he said. Prospects of Ahmadinejad's impeachment and removal from office are widely dismissed. But it is clear that he is running short of friends. One of the few that could be found last week was shopping in the same fruit and veg store the President had cited in his defence. Abdolreza Bazian, 38, had known Ahmadinejad as a neighbour and fellow member of the volunteer Basij militia. 'He is a good man,' he said. 'We have faced price rises but he is not the guilty one. The blame lies with the foreign pressure being put on Iran.' [UP] Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 8 Guardian Unlimited: Iran Says It's Installing Centrifuges From the Associated Press [UP] Sunday January 28, 2007 12:01 AM AP Photo VAH101 By ALI AKBAR DAREINI Associated Press Writer TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - Iran is currently installing 3,000 centrifuges, a top lawmaker said Saturday in an announcement underlining that the country will continue to develop its nuclear program despite U.N. sanctions. The lawmaker, Alaeddin Boroujerdi, said the installation under way at an Iranian uranium enrichment plant ``stabilizes Iran's capability in the field of nuclear technology,'' the official Islamic Republic News Agency reported. Three inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency who arrived in Iran on Saturday are scheduled to visit the uranium enrichment plant in Natanz, Iranian state television reported. Iran last week barred 38 inspectors from the United Nations nuclear watchdog because they come from countries that voted for sanctions on Iran. State television did not give the nationalities of the three inspectors, and the IAEA could not immediately confirm their arrival in Iran. Iran's announcement appears to be its latest gesture of defiance toward the international community over its nuclear program. It faces the prospect of additional United Nations sanctions unless it stops uranium enrichment by the end of a 60-day period that ends next month. The U.N. Security Council voted unanimously in favor of economic sanctions Dec. 23 after Iran ignored an earlier deadline to halt enrichment. Large scale use of centrifuges makes it possible to produce more enriched uranium in a shorter period. Enriched uranium is used to fuel nuclear reactors and to make nuclear weapons. Many countries, including the United States, believe that Iran is using its nuclear program as a cover to produce an atomic weapon. Iran says its program is only for generating electricity. Iranian officials had said in recent weeks that the country was moving toward large-scale enrichment involving 3,000 centrifuges, which spin uranium gas into enriched material. The comments from Boroujerdi, the head of the Iranian Parliament's Foreign Policy and National Security Committee, came a day after IAEA head Mohamed ElBaradei said he believed Iran planned to begin work in February on a uranium enrichment facility underground. The subterranean facility is intended to protect the nuclear project from attack. There had been speculation the leadership might launch the project at Natanz next month to celebrate the 28th anniversary of the Islamic Revolution that brought the clerical leadership to power. A senior State Department official warned Iran against accelerating its atomic program. ``If Iran takes this step, it is going to confront universal international opposition,'' Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns said on Friday. ``If they think they can get away with 3,000 centrifuges without another Security Council resolution and additional international pressure, then they are very badly mistaken.'' Iran ultimately plans to expand its program to 54,000 centrifuges. In enrichment plants, centrifuges are linked in what are called cascades. For now, the only known assembled centrifuge cascades in Iran are above ground at Natanz, consisting of two linked chains of 164 machines each and two smaller setups. Meanwhile, Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said Iran's decision last week to bar the entrance of IAEA inspectors from countries whose governments voted in favor the U.N. sanctions resolution was within Iran's legal rights. ``This decision is lawful and will not harm our cooperation with the IAEA,'' Mottaki said Saturday. ---- Associated Press Writer George Jahn contributed to this report from Davos, Switzerland. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 9 New York Times: On Iran, Bush Faces Haunting Echoes of Iraq - By Published: January 28, 2007 WASHINGTON, Jan. 27 — As President Bush and his aides calibrate how directly to confront Iran, they are discovering that both their words and their strategy are haunted by the echoes of four years ago — when their warnings of terrorist activity and nuclear ambitions were clearly a prelude to war. This time, they insist, it is different. “We’re not looking for a fight with Iran,” R. Nicholas Burns, the under secretary of state for policy and the chief negotiator on Iranian issues, said in an interview on Friday evening, just a few hours after Mr. Bush had repeated his warnings to Iran to halt “killing our soldiers” and to stop its drive for nuclear fuel. Mr. Burns, citing the president’s words, insisted that Washington was committed to “a diplomatic path” — even as it executed a far more aggressive strategy, seizing Iranians in Iraq and attempting to starve Iran of the money it needs to revitalize a precious asset, its oil industry. Mr. Burns argues that those are defensive steps that are not intended to provoke Iran, though there has been a vigorous behind-the-scenes debate in the administration over whether the more aggressive policy could provoke Iran to strike back. The State Department has tended to counsel caution, while some more hawkish aides in the Pentagon and the White House say the increase in American forces in Iraq could be neutered unless the American military forcefully pushes back against the Iranian aid to the militias. To many in Washington, especially Mr. Bush’s Democratic critics, the new approach to Iran has all the hallmarks of an administration once again spoiling for a fight. Some see an attempt to create a diversion, focusing the country’s attention away from a war gone bad in Iraq, and toward a country that has exploited America’s troubles to expand its influence. Others suspect an effort to shift the blame for the spiraling chaos in Iraq, as a steady flow of officials, from the director to the new secretary of defense, cite intelligence that Iranians are smuggling into Iraq sophisticated explosive devices and detailed plans to wipe out Sunni neighborhoods. So far, they have disclosed no evidence. Next week, American military officials are expected to make their most comprehensive case — based on materials seized in recent raids — that Iran’s elite Quds force is behind many of the most lethal attacks. But as they present their evidence, some Bush administration officials concede they are confronting the bitter legacy of their prewar distortions of the intelligence in Iraq. When speaking under the condition of anonymity, they say the administration’s credibility has been deeply damaged, which would cast doubt on any attempt by Mr. Bush, for example, to back up his claim that Iran’s uranium enrichment program is intended for bomb production. “It’s never stated explicitly, but clearly we can’t make the case about Iran’s intentions,” said a senior strategist for the Bush administration who joined it long after evidence surfaced that Iraq had none of the illicit weapons that the administration cited as a reason to go to war. It has not helped that even as the administration is making its case against Iran, the perjury trial of , Vice President ’s former chief of staff, was opening just a few blocks away. The early testimony in that trial has laid bare again how Mr. Cheney, among others, carefully selected intelligence for use in a political campaign to make the case against Iraq. Now, several years later, the administration is paying the price in dealing with a country whose ability to project power and to build a sophisticated nuclear program is far greater than ’s was in 2003. The administration does not have definitive evidence that Iran is moving toward producing a nuclear bomb, but next week it will unveil what officials say is evidence of Iran’s meddling in Iraq. In interviews over the past several weeks, officials from the Pentagon to the State Department to the White House insist that Mr. Bush’s goal in Iran is not to depose a government, Iraq-style, but rather to throw a series of brushback pitches. Officials familiar with the intelligence prepared for Mr. Bush say American assessments conclude that Iran sees itself at the head of an alliance to drive the United States out of Iraq, and ultimately out of the Middle East. Other briefings have included assessments that Russia and China will never join meaningful economic sanctions against a country that they do business with, so if Mr. Bush wants to apply military and economic pressure, he must do so outside the . One result was a strategy that Mr. Bush approved in the fall to push back on all fronts and to force Iran to recalculate what administration officials call its cost-benefit analysis for challenging the United States. The effort to stop European and Japanese banks from lending money to Iran’s oil sector is part of the equation. So is pushing down the price of oil, though administration officials grow silent when asked whether Mr. Cheney or others have discussed with Saudi Arabia the benefits of pumping enough oil to push the price down and deprive Iran of revenues. But it is the military component of the strategy that carries the biggest risks. Two aircraft carriers and their accompanying battle groups were sent into the Persian Gulf, a senior military official said, “to remind the Iranians that we can focus on them, too.” American military forces in Iraq were authorized to move against Iranian operatives, though it is unclear what kind of evidence is needed, if any, that they are conspiring against American forces before military action is authorized. American officials describe those measures as purely defensive. "We are definitely looking to protect our interests in the gulf, in Iraq itself, and to protect the lives of our soldiers," said Mr. Burns, who insisted that there was no effort to stop Iran from ordinary exchanges with Iraq. Yet administration officials clearly worry that the Iranians may not back down, and that a confrontation could build up - especially if a midlevel American commander or a member of Iran's military or paramilitary forces in Iraq miscalculated. Both Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates have warned against that risk, officials say. Administration officials say that while all of Mr. Bush's advisers have signed on to the strategy of more forceful confrontation with Tehran, there is considerable debate about how far to push it. Some Iran experts at the State Department have warned that encounters between Americans and Iranians inside Iraq could strengthen the hand of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad by allowing him to change the subject from his failure to produce jobs and the rising cost of nuclear defiance. Over the longer run, there is a continuing debate about whether military action may some day be necessary to set back Iran's nuclear activities. For now American officials say they do not believe they have a good set of targets or the ability to contain Iran's reaction. "It's not a question of ideology," one senior military official said, refusing to talk on the record about military planning. "We simply don't have the forces to deal with the reaction. They're busy." At the Pentagon, military officials say there are still arguments over the rules for confronting Iranian operatives. Are they legitimate targets simply because they are identified as part of Iran's military? Or do American forces need evidence that they are importing weapons or sowing chaos? Publicly, officials say the answers to those questions are classified. Privately, a senior official said, "It's all still a matter of debate." In coming weeks, administration officials say, more escalation is likely. The Iranians have told the International Atomic Energy Agency that they will announce in February that they are beginning industrial-scale efforts to produce uranium. It will probably be years before they can produce enough fuel for a bomb. But the debate over whether the United States should stick to diplomacy or take more forceful action is bound to begin right away, and will sound familiar. Democrats, even while accusing the administration of failing to engage with Iran, are positioning themselves to sound tough. "To ensure that Iran never gets nuclear weapons, we need to keep all options on the table," former Senator John Edwards recently told an Israeli security conference. "Let me reiterate - all options." For Mr. Bush, this is not only about options but about legacy. Already bloodied in Iraq, he will come under increasing pressure to show that he has not left the United States weakened in the Middle East. He does not want to be remembered for leaving Iran more powerful than he found it when he came to office. ***************************************************************** 10 Guardian Unlimited: Iran Official Denies Nuke Plant Reports From the Associated Press [UP] Sunday January 28, 2007 11:01 AM By NASSER KARIMI Associated Press Writer TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - An Iranian nuclear agency official has denied claims made by a top lawmaker that the Islamic Republic had begun installing 3,000 centrifuges at an uranium enrichment plant, Iran's state-run news agency reported late Saturday. Hossein Simorgh, spokesman of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization public relations department, said ``no new centrifuges have been installed in Natanz,'' referring to the nuclear facility in central Iran, the official Islamic Republic News Agency reported. Earlier Saturday, lawmaker Alaeddin Boroujerdi said Iran was currently installing the 3,000 centrifuges, underlining that the country would continue to develop its disputed nuclear program despite U.N. sanctions. It was not immediately clear why the two officials made contradicting statements. Iranian officials have in recent weeks said the country was moving toward large-scale enrichment involving 3,000 centrifuges, which spin uranium gas into enriched material. Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini refused to elaborate on the discrepancy Sunday, saying only that the contradicting remarks were a ``technical matter.'' ``Let the organization elaborate on it at a convenient time,'' Hosseini said. Hosseini also said that Russia's national security adviser, Igor Ivanov, arrived in Tehran on Sunday for talks with top leaders, including President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Ali Larijani, the country's nuclear negotiator. The U.N. Security Council last month voted unanimously in favor of imposing limited sanctions on Iran after it ignored earlier demands to halt enrichment. Iran faces the prospect of additional sanctions unless it stops enrichment by the end of a 60-day period that ends next month. Enriched uranium is used to fuel nuclear reactors and to make nuclear weapons, and large scale use of centrifuges makes it possible to produce more enriched uranium in a shorter period. The United States and its allies believe that Iran is using its nuclear program as a cover to produce an atomic weapon. Iran has repeatedly denied the allegations, saying its program is only for peaceful purposes including generating electricity. International Atomic Energy Association head Mohamed ElBaradei said recently he believed Iran planned to begin work in February on a uranium enrichment facility underground. The subterranean facility is intended to protect the nuclear project from attack. There has been speculation that Iranian leadership might launch the centrifuges installation at Natanz next month to celebrate the 28th anniversary of the Islamic Revolution that brought the clerical leadership to power. Iran ultimately plans to expand its program to 54,000 centrifuges. A senior U.S. State Department official warned Iran against accelerating its atomic program. ``If Iran takes this step, it is going to confront universal international opposition,'' Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns said on Friday. ``If they think they can get away with 3,000 centrifuges without another Security Council resolution and additional international pressure, then they are very badly mistaken.'' In enrichment plants, centrifuges are linked in what are called cascades. For now, the only known assembled centrifuge cascades in Iran are above ground at Natanz, consisting of two linked chains of 164 machines each and two smaller setups. Meanwhile, three inspectors from the IAEA who arrived in Iran on Saturday were scheduled to visit Natanz, Iranian state-television reported. Iran last week barred 38 inspectors from the U.N. nuclear watchdog because they came from countries that voted for sanctions on Iran. State television did not give the nationalities of the three inspectors, and the IAEA could not immediately confirm their arrival in Iran. Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said Iran's decision last week to bar the entrance of the IAEA inspectors from countries whose governments voted in favor the U.N. sanctions resolution was within Iran's legal rights. ``This decision is lawful and will not harm our cooperation with the IAEA,'' Mottaki said Saturday. ---- Associated Press writer George Jahn in Davos, Switzerland, contributed to this report. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 11 SF Chron: As economy struggles, Iranians losing faith in president Sunday, January 28, 2007 While the United States continues to regard Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as the biggest threat to the West these days, Iranians are losing patience with their flamboyant president, to the point of undercutting his power. After unprecedented anti-government demonstrations by Iranian students -- some of whom openly heckled Ahmadinejad at Tehran University -- the public dealt him a stinging setback in municipal elections, electing more moderate conservatives and reformists. In a separate election to the country's most senior religious body, Ahmadinejad's man was soundly defeated, while his biggest rival was elected. Soon after, 150 parliamentarians signed an open letter critical of Ahmadinejad's policies -- including his closeness with Venezuela's leftist president, Hugo Chavez -- and imposed conditions on the budget he is drawing up for next year. Meanwhile, a newspaper close to Iran's supreme religious leader told Ahmadinejad to tone down his fire-breathing nuclear rhetoric. "They think that it's childish behavior, and it's very detrimental to the Iranian" political interests, said Kamran Bokhari, senior analyst for the Middle East at Strategic Forecasting, a Texas-based private security consulting group. The recent attacks on Ahmadinejad may not mean Iran will soon backpedal on its nuclear aspirations or geopolitical ambitions. But they indicate that the ruling clerics, who hold ultimate power in Iran, may be ready to strike a more conciliatory tone with the West, regional analysts say. Iran's clerics "really want to be around in five years, in 10 years, and the best way for them to do that is to bargain with the United States that there won't be a regime change," said Ilan Berman, vice president for policy at the American Foreign Policy Council. "Under Ahmadinejad, this is not possible." Despite the caustic rhetoric between Washington and Tehran, this presents an opportunity for the United States to negotiate on critical issues ranging from nuclear proliferation to Iran's role in fueling Iraq's sectarian fighting, analysts say. "If the more pragmatic (forces) win out, then the United States has much to gain," said Abbas Milani, director of the Iranian studies program at Stanford University. At least for now, Ahmadinejad does not seem to be backing down in the face of rising domestic criticism. Last week, Iran conducted missile tests, barred some U.N. nuclear inspectors from the country and confirmed that it had received a shipment of Russian Tor-M1 mobile air defense missile launchers, intended, according to one Russian news agency, to defend Tehran's major nuclear facilities. And on Saturday, Alaeddin Boroujerdi, head of parliament's Foreign Policy and National Security Committee, said Iran has begun installing 3,000 centrifuges at its nuclear facility in Natanz. While Iran portrays its uranium enrichment program as a peaceful means of generating electricity, the United States and other nations view it as a step toward developing nuclear weapons. But in a sign that Iran's ruling elite may be willing to yield to international pressure, former President Hashemi Rafsanjani, a pillar of Iran's political establishment, told the British ambassador to Iran on Wednesday that Tehran will agree to "any verifying measures by the responsible authorities" to prove that it is not pursuing nuclear weapons. Much of the dissatisfaction with Ahmadinejad is rooted in his failure to deliver on his main campaign promise: to improve Iran's embattled economy, analysts said. The average Iranian salary is $100 a month, and about 40 percent of Iran's 70 million people live below the poverty line, according to media reports. State-subsidized industries often don't pay their workers for months on end. Inflation continues to rise, reaching an estimated 15.8 percent last year, according to the CIA. Clerics blame Ahmadinejad's confrontational rhetoric for alienating many of Iran's traditional allies abroad, which paved the way for U.N. sanctions against Iran, imposed Dec. 23, said Michael Connell, an analyst at the Center for Naval Analysis, a think tank that conducts research for the Department of the Navy. The sanctions ban the trade of goods related to Iran's nuclear program, and the U.N. Security Council has threatened tougher economic measures if Iran does not stop enriching uranium within two months. At the same time, Washington has persuaded Western banks to cease doing business with Iran. "On the economic front, Iran has been losing ground," Connell said, "and that's what is really bothering the supreme leader," Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Khamenei has been at least indirectly pressuring Ahmadinejad to tone down his inflammatory oratory. Earlier this month, Iran's most widely read newspaper, Hamshahri, whose editorial position is endorsed by Khamenei, blamed Ahmadinejad's "fiery speeches" for encouraging the U.N. sanctions. The United States has demanded that Iran stop its uranium enrichment program and has warned Tehran to back off from what it sees as Iranian interference in Iraq, Lebanon and elsewhere in the Middle East. On Friday, President Bush said he had authorized U.S. forces in Iraq to take any actions necessary to counter suspected Iranian agents there. Also last week, U.S. officials confirmed that the Pentagon had sent the aircraft carrier John C. Stennis toward the Persian Gulf. It will join, in late February, the carrier Dwight D. Eisenhower already in the region and become part of a buildup designed to deter Iran's perceived regional ambitions. The Bush administration continues to rule out direct negotiations with Iran until Iran halts uranium enrichment. But Milani warned that such policies embolden Ahmadinejad. "The confrontational policy that Bush has picked out will ... help the most radical and the most warmongering" elements in Iran, Milani said. "It gives them an excuse for the calamities in domestic politics, the economy." For all their unhappiness, the clerics probably will not seek to unseat Ahmadinejad, because that would make Iran "look very weak internationally," said Bokhari, of Strategic Forecasting. But Iran's legislators are considering a proposal to move up by a year, from 2009, Iran's presidential election, to coincide with scheduled parliamentary elections in 2008, a move clearly intended to curtail Ahmadinejad's presidency, Bokhari said. For now, the clerics most likely will find other ways to rein in the president -- or bypass him when they feel the need to, Bokhari said. Washington should exploit these "internal differences," he said. Connell agreed: "We can press our advantage on the diplomatic front. On Iraq, I think we can negotiate, to a limited degree." The opening for Washington is limited, because while Khamenei or Rafsanjani may be less likely to openly confront the United States, this does not mean they will give up on making Iran a nuclear power or pursuing its interests in the region. "The clerics share the strategy with Ahmadinejad, but they have different tactics," said Assad Homayoun, a Washington-based Iranian dissident and president of the Azadegan Foundation, which advocates a secular democratic government in Iran. "It doesn't mean that if Rafsanjani comes to the United States for discussion of nuclear issues, he will succumb to the will of the United States. (The) policy of terrorism and the nuclear issue will continue." E-mail Anna Badkhen at . Page A - 12 The San Francisco Chronicle ***************************************************************** 12 Guardian Unlimited: Iran Seeks to Review Nuke Watchdog Plan From the Associated Press [UP] Sunday January 28, 2007 10:16 PM AP Photo VAH111 By NASSER KARIMI Associated Press Writer TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - Iran said Sunday it needs time to review a plan proposed by the head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency that calls for holding off on imposing U.N. Security Council sanctions if Tehran suspends uranium enrichment. The International Atomic Energy Agency chief, Mohamed ElBaradei, proposed the simultaneous time-out plan during the World Economic Forum in Switzerland in an effort to end the standoff between the West and Iran over the Islamic republic's suspect nuclear program. ``Time should be allocated to see if the plan has the capacity to solve the (nuclear) case,'' Ali Larijani, Iran's top nuclear negotiator, told reporters during a joint news conference with Russia's national security adviser, Igor Ivanov. He did not elaborate. The Security Council last month voted unanimously to impose limited sanctions on Iran after it ignored demands to halt enrichment. Iran faces the prospect of additional sanctions unless it stops enrichment within a 60-day period that ends next month. While Iran says its nuclear program has the sole purpose of using atomic power to generate electricity, the U.S. and its allies believe Tehran is secretly developing atomic weapons in violation of treaty commitments. Ivanov expressed optimism the dispute can be resolved if both sides agree to ElBaradei's proposal. ``The situation of Iran's nuclear case is critical. Reducing its intensity is our aim,'' Ivanov said. ``We are currently discussing to remove obstacles from the way of negotiations. All sides should show flexibility and avoid statements that worsen the situation.'' Iranian state-run radio said earlier Sunday that Tehran wants Moscow to help mediate the standoff, saying Tehran's leaders are looking to Russia for ``new proposals, such as enrichment of uranium on Russian soil.'' The Kremlin proposed last year that Iran move its uranium enrichment work to Russian territory, where it could be better monitored to alleviate international suspicions. Enrichment can produce material usable both as fuel for electricity-generating nuclear reactors and for atomic bombs. Iranian leaders had said they were interested in the idea, but nothing ever came of it as oil-rich Iran insisted its nuclear project is intended only to produce reactor fuel. State radio also said Russia pledged to complete Iran's Bushehr nuclear power station on schedule this year. Russia last year agreed to ship fuel to Bushehr by this March and start up the facility in September, with electricity generation to start by November. As a U.N. Security Council permanent member, Russia last month forced the body to water down proposed punitive measures that would have imposed curbs on the Bushehr project. But the Kremlin then supported limited sanctions against Iran over its refusal to suspend uranium enrichment. Ivanov's visit came as Iranian officials issued contradictory statements about progress on expanding enrichment facilities at the Natanz nuclear facility by installing 3,000 centrifuges, which spin uranium gas into enriched material. Mohammad Saeedi, deputy head of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization, said Sunday that Iran was continuing its nuclear activity according to schedule. ``If we begin to install centrifuges we will publicly announce it,'' Saeedi said. Earlier, Hossein Simorgh, spokesman for the Iranian nuclear agency's public relations department, also said new centrifuges had not been installed at Natanz, the official Islamic Republic News Agency reported. Those remarks appeared to contradict lawmaker Alaeddin Boroujerdi, who said Saturday that Iran was currently installing the 3,000 centrifuges. The IAEA had no comment on the Iranian statements, spokeswoman Melissa Fleming said Sunday. ElBaradei said recently he believed Iran planned to begin work in February on an underground facility to hold uranium enrichment equipment. A senior U.S. State Department official warned Iran on Friday against accelerating its atomic program. ``If Iran takes this step, it is going to confront universal international opposition,'' Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns said. ``If they think they can get away with 3,000 centrifuges without another Security Council resolution and additional international pressure, then they are very badly mistaken.'' For now, the only known assembled centrifuge operations in Iran consist of two linked chains of 164 machines each and two smaller setups. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 13 Guardian Unlimited: Iran Looks to Russia As Global Mediator From the Associated Press [UP] Sunday January 28, 2007 6:16 PM AP Photo VAH101, VAH102 By NASSER KARIMI Associated Press Writer TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - Iran wants Russia to help mediate in the standoff with the U.N. Security Council over Tehran's nuclear program, Iranian state radio said Sunday as a ranking Russian diplomat met with top Iranian leaders. The radio said Iran was looking to Russia for ``new proposals, such as enrichment of uranium on Russian soil,'' and expects Russia to ``take a close stance with the international community'' to help Iran resolve its nuclear standoff. The Kremlin proposed last year that Iran move its uranium enrichment work to Russian territory, where it could be better monitored to alleviate international concerns that Tehran is trying to build atomic bombs in violation of its treaty commitments. Iranian leaders had said they were interested in the idea, but nothing came of it as oil-rich Iran insisted its nuclear project is intended only to produce radioactive fuel for reactors that would generate electricity. No details were released about the talks held Sunday between Igor Ivanov, Russia's national security adviser, and Iran's hard-line president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the foreign minister and the top nuclear negotiator. In a rare reception for visiting diplomats, Ivanov also met with Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. State radio also said Russia has pledged to complete the Bushehr nuclear power station on schedule this year. Russia last year agreed to ship fuel to Bushehr by this March and start up the facility in September, with electricity generation to start by November. As a U.N. Security Council permanent member, Russia last month forced the body to water down proposed punitive measures that would have imposed curbs on the Bushehr project. But the Kremlin then supported limited sanctions against Iran over its refusal to suspend uranium enrichment. Enrichment of uranium, using centrifuges, can produce material usable both as fuel for electricity-generating reactors and for nuclear weapons. Ivanov's visit came as Iranian officials issued contradictory statements about progress on expanding Iranian enrichment facilities by installing 3,000 centrifuges at the Natanz nuclear facility. Hossein Simorgh, spokesman of Iran's Atomic Energy Organization public relations department, said that ``no new centrifuges have been installed in Natanz,'' the official Islamic Republic News Agency reported late Saturday. The remarks appeared to contradict lawmaker Alaeddin Boroujerdi, who said earlier Saturday that Iran was currently installing the 3,000 centrifuges. Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini refused to elaborate on the discrepancy, saying Sunday only that the contradicting remarks were a ``technical matter'' that should be left to Iran's nuclear agency organization to ``elaborate ... at a convenient time.'' The U.N. nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, had no comment on the Iranian statements, spokeswoman Melissa Fleming said Sunday night. IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei said recently he believed Iran planned to begin work in February on an underground facility to hold uranium enrichment equipment. Iran faces the threat of additional Security Council sanctions unless it stops enrichment by the end of a 60-day period that ends next month. A senior U.S. State Department official warned Iran on Friday against accelerating its atomic program. ``If Iran takes this step, it is going to confront universal international opposition,'' Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns said. ``If they think they can get away with 3,000 centrifuges without another Security Council resolution and additional international pressure, then they are very badly mistaken.'' For now, the only known assembled centrifuge operations in Iran consist of two linked chains of 164 machines each and two smaller setups. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 14 AFP: Iran starts to install 3,000 centrifuges - MP Sat Jan 27, 2:21 PM ET TEHRAN (AFP) - Iran" /> has started to install 3,000 centrifuges to enrich uranium under its disputed nuclear programme, a senior parliamentary official said. "We are now installing the 3,000 centrifuges," said Allaedin Boroudjerdi, head of parliament's foreign affairs and national security commission, quoted by the state news agency IRNA. "God willing it will be finished in due time," the official said, without giving details on the work which is scheduled to be completed by the end of March. The UN Security Council has imposed sanctions to pressure Iran to stop uranium enrichment, which makes fuel for civilian nuclear reactors but also the explosive core of atom bombs. Tehran says its nuclear programme is a peaceful effort to generate electricity but the United States claims the Islamic republic is hiding work on developing atomic weapons. The Security Council has said that if Iran freezes enrichment, then sanctions could be lifted. But Iran is planning to increase its enrichment capacity by installing the 3,000 centrifuges, the machines which enrich uranium, at an underground facility in Natanz. It is already running two pilot cascades of 164-centrifuges each at a pilot site above-ground in Natanz. Copyright © 2007 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 15 AFP: Iran sends conflicting signals on nuclear work - Sat Jan 27, 5:47 PM ET TEHRAN (AFP) - Iran" /> gave conflicting signals on its disputed nuclear work with the Islamic republic's atomic energy agency denying Tehran has started to install 3,000 centrifuges to enrich uranium. "No new centrifuge machines have been installed in the Natanz facility," Hossein Cimorgh, public relations director of the Iranian Atomic Energy Organisation, was quoted as saying by IRNA news agency. He was responding to an earlier statement by the head of parliament's foreign affairs and national security commission, Alaeddin Borujerdi, who said: "We are now installing the 3,000 centrifuges," according to IRNA. "God willing it will be finished in due time," the senior MP said, without giving details on the work which Iran has said was scheduled to be completed by the end of March. The UN Security Council has imposed sanctions to pressure Iran to stop uranium enrichment, which makes fuel for civilian nuclear reactors but also the explosive core of atom bombs. Tehran says its nuclear programme is a peaceful effort to generate electricity but the United States claims that Iran is hiding work on developing atomic weapons. The Security Council has said that if Iran freezes enrichment, then sanctions could be lifted. But Iran says it is planning to increase its enrichment capacity by installing the 3,000 centrifuges, the machines which enrich uranium, at an underground facility in Natanz. It is already running two pilot cascades of 164-centrifuges each at a pilot site above-ground in Natanz, but the larger project would raise the work to an industrial scale. Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki earlier Saturday defended Iran's decision to bar 38 inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency" /> (IAEA), saying the move was within its legal rights. "We decide about our cooperation considering the rights enshrined for members. Legally speaking, the decisions taken will not create any problems in our relations with the IAEA," Mottaki told reporters. Iran announced on Monday it was blocking 38 UN nuclear watchdog inspectors from entering the country in reprisal for the sanctions. In December, parliament adopted a bill requiring the government to revise its cooperation with the IAEA in retaliation for the Security Council imposing limited sanctions on Iran. Mottaki's comments came after a group of three IAEA inspectors arrived in Tehran on Friday for a week-long stay to visit Natanz and Isfahan nuclear sites in central Iran, IRNA said. Iran has also sent a letter to the agency asking for the removal of Christian Charlier, a Belgian official overseeing the IAEA's inspection of its nuclear programme, for alleged leaks to the press. Copyright © 2007 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 16 UPI: Iran says it will allow nuclear inspection United Press International - NewsTrack - 1/28/2007 3:47:00 PM -0500 TEHRAN, Jan. 28 (UPI) -- Iran's foreign ministry spokesman said Sunday the country will cooperate with the International Atomic Energy Agency, despite earlier kicking out inspectors. "Signatories to the Non-Proliferation Treaty have the right not to accept certain IAEA inspectors and replace them with others," Mohammad-Ali Hosseini said at his weekly press conference, IRNA, the Islamic Republic News Agency Reported. The Fars News Agency reported that two IAEA inspectors arrived in Iran on Saturday for a one-week visit. The inspectors are scheduled to visit the Isfahan plant, the Natanz enrichment facility and Arak's heavy water installations, a source told Fars. Iran recently barred 38 IAEA inspectors from its nuclear sites. Fars also reported Iran is preparing for nuclear celebrations in February. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has announced that Iran will celebrate its nuclear rights during the Ten-Day Dawn from Feb. 1 to Feb.11. The Ten-Day Dawn celebrates the end of the Islamic Revolution in Iran in 1979. Iran says its nuclear program is for nuclear power; the United States and other countries say they fear it will produce nuclear weapons. © Copyright 2007 United Press International, Inc. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 17 Guardian Unlimited: Experts Debate North Korea's Future From the Associated Press [UP] Saturday January 27, 2007 10:01 AM AP Photo WEF By EDITH M. LEDERER Associated Press Writer DAVOS, Switzerland (AP) - For all the wishful thinking about regime change in North Korea, experts say the demise of Kim Jong Il could be disastrous for the region. With North Korean nuclear disarmament talks likely to resume next month, the question of how to induce the country to abandon such weapons dominated a dinner discussion at the World Economic Forum this week. Though the experts - seven in all - had different ideas on what should be done, many were opposed to any attempt to topple Kim's reclusive communist regime, saying Thursday that could destabilize the region. Yao Yunzhu, a senior colonel in China's People's Liberation Army, said Beijing recognizes the threat posed by a nuclear-armed North but rejects any response involving harsher sanctions or military action. ``We don't want the regime to collapse and people to suffer,'' said Yao, who directs the Asia-Pacific Office at the Academy of Military Science in Beijing. China is ``very worried'' a collapse could send North Korean refugees pouring into Chinese territory, she said, adding that change must come from the inside. North Korea conducted its first nuclear test in October, leading the U.N. Security Council to impose sanctions on the country. The North argues it has the right to nuclear weapons as a deterrence, saying Washington aims to topple Kim. The U.S. has said it has no intention of attacking the North. The United States and its regional partners are preparing for another round of talks on persuading Pyongyang to abandon nuclear weapons. South Korea officials say the negotiations could resume as early as Feb. 8. The last round in December made no progress. Yuriko Koike, a special adviser to Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, said the soft approach hasn't worked. ``We have offered lots of carrots, and the carrots were used to develop nuclear weapons and missiles,'' she said. Koike said almost 20 million North Koreans are in agony and starving and lifting U.N. sanctions ``will prolong the agony of those citizens.'' Pei Minxin, head of the China program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, said the best policy is to contain the current regime and ``see them out,'' he said. ``North Korea's demise is a given,'' he said, noting that Kim is 65 and his health is not the best. ``He's overweight. He has no heir in his family, and the record of history shows that that kind of regime has an impossible task picking an heir outside the family.'' Geun Lee, an international relations professor at Seoul National University, said he would support gradual regime change providing it doesn't produce ``disastrous consequences.'' ``But that is very unpredictable,'' he acknowledged. He disagreed that Western powers had given the North too much. ``So far you see very clear, meaningful and credible sticks coming from the U.S., but you haven't seen very clear, credible and meaningful carrots coming from the U.S,'' Geun said. He said President Bush should return to the less-muscular approach of his predecessor, Bill Clinton, and offer incentives such as normalizing relations and giving the North security guarantees. The latest North Korean nuclear crisis began in late 2002, when U.S. officials said the North admitted running a secret nuclear program. The program violated a 1994 deal with the U.S., in which North Korea agreed to halt its atomic development. After its admission, North Korea withdrew from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, expelled international inspectors and restarted its main nuclear reactor in order to make plutonium for bombs. Kishore Mahbubani, dean of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy in Singapore, criticized Washington as fickle. ``Unfortunately, the United States' policies on North Korea have vacillated between regime change, policy change, regime change, policy change,'' said Mahbubani, a former U.N. ambassador. ``And unless there's some consistency we'll never get a solution.'' Alyson Bailes, director of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute in Sweden, warned the collapse of North Korea could be a disaster for the entire region. ``It's much better to live with the devil you know than with the chaos that you don't know,'' she said. ``So patience and containment - the hardest things for the U.S. to do - are, I think, the natural thing for everybody else in the region to do, and probably the best of the bad solutions that we can get in the near future,'' Bailes said. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 18 Guardian Unlimited: U.S., N. Korea to Resume Financial Talks From the Associated Press [UP] Monday January 29, 2007 12:31 AM By EDITH M. LEDERER Associated Press Writer DAVOS, Switzerland (AP) - A senior Treasury official said the groundwork has been laid for U.S.-North Korea talks Tuesday on U.S. financial restrictions against the North's alleged smuggling and counterfeiting, which have angered Pyongyang and held up separate talks on scrapping its nuclear weapons program. U.S. Deputy Treasury Secretary Robert M. Kimmitt said the talks will resume in Beijing at North Korea's request. ``I would say these talks are proceeding in a business-like fashion,'' he said in an interview Saturday on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum. ``I think progress is being made on the technical understanding on both sides.'' ``But these are a set of talks, from our perspective, designed to make clear that the action that we took was narrowly targeted, focused on illicit conduct - and the way to cure it is to foreswear such conduct, make restitution for what's been done in the past, and move forward,'' Kimmitt said. In a sign of stepped-up diplomacy with Pyongyang, the U.S.-North Korea talks will be quickly followed in early February by another round of six-nation negotiations on the North's nuclear program. The nuclear talks involve the U.S., Russia, China, Japan and the two Koreas. The U.S. Treasury said it notified all U.S. banks on Sept. 15, 2005 that they were banned from doing business with Banco Delta Asia SARL in Macau, which effectively barred the bank from operating in the world financial system. The United States initially alleged that North Korea was using the bank for cigarette smuggling and counterfeiting $100 bills. Later it alleged Banco Delta Asia was linked with a bank connected to the North's missile program. The Treasury has not yet finalized the ban so banks are not legally banned from doing business with Banco Delta Asia - but all affected banks immediately cut off all business with the bank, U.S. officials said. The U.S. action on Banco Delta Asia came four days before a Sept. 19, 2005 agreement at the six-nation talks in which North Korea agreed to abandon its nuclear program in exchange for security guarantees and aid. That accord has yet to be implemented. Upset and citing the U.S. restrictions, Pyongyang withdrew from further talks and then tested a nuclear bomb on Oct. 9, 2006. Kimmitt said that at a meeting with the North Koreans in New York in March 2006, U.S. officials explained that the Treasury took action against the Macau bank as it has in many other places in the world where it discovered suspicious activity. The U.S. made clear ``this was not directed against North Korea as a country, it was directed against the conduct in which North Korea was engaged using that bank,'' he said. The North Koreans agreed to return to the nuclear talks in December, saying there were no preconditions. But the talks ended with no apparent progress due to the dispute over the U.S. financial restrictions. Another round of nuclear talks is expected to take place in Beijing in early February. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 19 Guardian Unlimited: North Korea Denies Cooperating With Iran From the Associated Press [UP] Saturday January 27, 2007 8:46 AM AP Photo XIN101 By KWANG-TAE KIM Associated Press Writer SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - North Korea dismissed allegations Saturday that the communist regime is cooperating with Iran in nuclear development, accusing Western media of spreading the rumor to mislead public opinion. The ``assertion is nothing but a sheer lie and fabrication intended to tarnish the image of (North Korea) by charging it with nuclear proliferation,'' the North's Foreign Ministry said in a statement carried by the North's official Korean Central News Agency. The Daily Telegraph, a British newspaper, this week quoted an unnamed senior European defense official as saying that North Korea is helping Iran to prepare an underground nuclear test - possibly by the end of this year. In Davos, Switzerland, Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said his organization - the U.N. nuclear watchdog - had seen no direct evidence of such cooperation. Last week, an Iranian Foreign Ministry delegation, led by Vice Minister Mahdi Safari, met senior North Korean officials in Pyongyang and signed a three-year agreement on unspecified scientific exchanges, KCNA said without giving any further details. North Korea, which quit the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty in early 2003, conducted its first-ever nuclear test in October, raising concerns about possible nuclear proliferation. North Korea and Iran - both labeled by President Bush as part of an ``axis of evil'' along with prewar Iraq - are under growing international pressure to give up their pursuit of nuclear programs. North Korea is believed to have sold missiles to Iran. Although North Korea's publicly acknowledged nuclear weapons program uses plutonium, Iran's is based on uranium. Pyongyang's strong denial came as the United States and its regional partners prepare to hold a new round of the international talks aimed at ridding North Korea of its nuclear weapons program. The disarmament talks - which include the United States, China, the two Koreas, Japan and Russia - are expected to resume as early as Feb. 8, according to officials. The latest talks in December ended with no apparent progress. The North claims it has the right to nuclear weapons as a deterrence against alleged U.S. attempts to topple the communist country. The U.S. has said it has no intention to attack the North. Iran insists its nuclear program is intended to produce energy, but the Americans and Europeans suspect its ultimate goal is the production of weapons. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 20 Guardian Unlimited: U.N. to Audit All Operations in N.Korea From the Associated Press [UP] Saturday January 27, 2007 5:31 AM By SARAH DiLORENZO Associated Press Writer UNITED NATIONS (AP) - The United Nations said Friday it would audit all its operations in North Korea, where the U.S. has alleged that money from at least one U.N. program could be ending up illegally in the hands of the communist regime. The U.S. criticism has focused on the U.N. Development Program, with officials questioning whether Pyongyang had used funds for illicit purposes, including nuclear weapons development. But U.S. Deputy Ambassador Mark Wallace also has raised concerns that there may be similar problems with the U.N. Children's Fund. On Thursday, UNDP agreed not to approve any new projects in North Korea until the completion of an external audit, announced this week by Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. U.N. Controller Warren Sach said the audit also would cover the U.N. Population Fund, the World Food Program and UNICEF. ``The board of auditors will be looking at all U.N. funds and programs operating in North Korea,'' Sach told reporters. The U.S. welcomed the wide scope of the audit. ``The more transparency, the better,'' said U.S. mission spokesman Richard Grenell. The United States has said that UNDP's local staff is dominated by North Korean government employees who managed the agency's programs and finances in violation of UNDP rules. The U.S. also complained about Pyongyang's insistence that UNDP pay cash to North Korean government suppliers. UNDP has agreed to stop accepting employees from the North Korean government by March 1. However, the agency has not said how it will overcome the staffing difficulties that could pose. UNDP has noted that because North Korea has no private sector, all the agency's local staff come in one way or another from the government. ``The details of what we'll do are still being worked out,'' said UNDP spokesman David Morrison. ``I believe all of the U.N. funds and programs, and indeed national diplomatic missions, in (North) Korea face similar challenges in terms of hiring local staff.'' Sach said the three-month audit would review the hiring of government employees, foreign currency transactions, payment of North Koreans in foreign currency and the effectiveness of oversight of U.N. projects. The auditors will be from France, South Africa and the Philippines, he said. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 21 The Rise of U.S. Nuclear Primacy Date: Sat, 27 Jan 2007 12:16:11 -0600 (CST) >From Foreign Affairs, March/April 2006 www.foreignaffairs.org The Rise of U.S. Nuclear Primacy By Keir A. Lieber and Daryl G. Press ____________________________ Summary: For four decades, relations among the major nuclear powers have been shaped by their common vulnerability, a condition known as mutual assured destruction. But with the U.S. arsenal growing rapidly while Russia's decays and China's stays small, the era of MAD is ending -- and the era of U.S. nuclear primacy has begun. Keir A. Lieber, the author of War and the Engineers: The Primacy of Politics Over Technology, is Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Notre Dame. Daryl G. Press, the author of Calculating Credibility: How Leaders Assess Military Threats, is Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Pennsylvania. PRESENT AT THE DESTRUCTION For almost half a century, the world's most powerful nuclear states have been locked in a military stalemate known as mutual assured destruction (MAD). By the early 1960s, the nuclear arsenals of the United States and the Soviet Union had grown so large and sophisticated that neither country could entirely destroy the other's retaliatory force by launching first, even with a surprise attack. Starting a nuclear war was therefore tantamount to committing suicide. During the Cold War, many scholars and policy analysts believed that MAD made the world relatively stable and peaceful because it induced great caution in international politics, discouraged the use of nuclear threats to resolve disputes, and generally restrained the superpowers' behavior. (Revealingly, the last intense nuclear standoff, the 1962 Cuban missile crisis, occurred at the dawn of the era of MAD.) Because of the nuclear stalemate, the optimists argued, the era of intentional great-power wars had ended. Critics of MAD, however, argued that it prevented not great-power war but the rolling back of the power and influence of a dangerously expansionist and totalitarian Soviet Union. From that perspective, MAD prolonged the life of an evil empire. This debate may now seem like ancient history, but it is actually more relevant than ever -- because the age of MAD is nearing an end. Today, for the first time in almost 50 years, the United States stands on the verge of attaining nuclear primacy. It will probably soon be possible for the United States to destroy the long-range nuclear arsenals of Russia or China with a first strike. This dramatic shift in the nuclear balance of power stems from a series of improvements in the United States' nuclear systems, the precipitous decline of Russia's arsenal, and the glacial pace of modernization of China's nuclear forces. Unless Washington's policies change or Moscow and Beijing take steps to increase the size and readiness of their forces, Russia and China -- and the rest of the world -- will live in the shadow of U.S. nuclear primacy for many years to come. One's views on the implications of this change will depend on one's theoretical perspective. Hawks, who believe that the United States is a benevolent force in the world, will welcome the new nuclear era because they trust that U.S. dominance in both conventional and nuclear weapons will help deter aggression by other countries. For example, as U.S. nuclear primacy grows, China's leaders may act more cautiously on issues such as Taiwan, realizing that their vulnerable nuclear forces will not deter U.S. intervention -- and that Chinese nuclear threats could invite a U.S. strike on Beijing's arsenal. But doves, who oppose using nuclear threats to coerce other states and fear an emboldened and unconstrained United States, will worry. Nuclear primacy might lure Washington into more aggressive behavior, they argue, especially when combined with U.S. dominance in so many other dimensions of national power. Finally, a third group -- owls, who worry about the possibility of inadvertent conflict -- will fret that U.S. nuclear primacy could prompt other nuclear powers to adopt strategic postures, such as by giving control of nuclear weapons to lower-level commanders, that would make an unauthorized nuclear strike more likely -- thereby creating what strategic theorists call "crisis instability." ARSENAL OF A DEMOCRACY For 50 years, the Pentagon's war planners have structured the U.S. nuclear arsenal according to the goal of deterring a nuclear attack on the United States and, if necessary, winning a nuclear war by launching a preemptive strike that would destroy an enemy's nuclear forces. For these purposes, the United States relies on a nuclear triad comprising strategic bombers, intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), and ballistic-missile-launching submarines (known as SSBNs). The triad reduces the odds that an enemy could destroy all U.S. nuclear forces in a single strike, even in a surprise attack, ensuring that the United States would be able to launch a devastating response. Such retaliation would only have to be able to destroy a large enough portion of the attacker's cities and industry to deter an attack in the first place. The same nuclear triad, however, could be used in an offensive attack against an adversary's nuclear forces. Stealth bombers might slip past enemy radar, submarines could fire their missiles from near the enemy's shore and so give the enemy's leaders almost no time to respond, and highly accurate land-based missiles could destroy even hardened silos that have been reinforced against attack and other targets that require a direct hit. The ability to destroy all of an adversary's nuclear forces, eliminating the possibility of a retaliatory strike, is known as a first-strike capability, or nuclear primacy. The United States derived immense strategic benefits from its nuclear primacy during the early years of the Cold War, in terms of both crisis-bargaining advantages vis-`-vis the Soviet Union (for example, in the case of Berlin in the late 1950s and early 1960s) and planning for war against the Red Army in Europe. If the Soviets had invaded Western Europe in the 1950s, the United States intended to win World War III by immediately launching a massive nuclear strike on the Soviet Union, its Eastern European clients, and its Chinese ally. These plans were not the concoctions of midlevel Pentagon bureaucrats; they were approved by the highest level of the U.S. government. U.S. nuclear primacy waned in the early 1960s, as the Soviets developed the capability to carry out a retaliatory second strike. With this development came the onset of MAD. Washington abandoned its strategy of a preemptive nuclear strike, but for the remainder of the Cold War, it struggled to escape MAD and reestablish its nuclear dominance. It expanded its nuclear arsenal, continuously improved the accuracy and the lethality of its weapons aimed at Soviet nuclear arms, targeted Soviet command-and-control systems, invested in missile-defense shields, sent attack submarines to trail Soviet SSBNs, and built increasingly accurate multiwarhead land- and submarine-launched ballistic missiles as well as stealth bombers and stealthy nuclear-armed cruise missiles. Equally unhappy with MAD, the Soviet Union also built a massive arsenal in the hope of gaining nuclear superiority. Neither side came close to gaining a first-strike capability, but it would be a mistake to dismiss the arms race as entirely irrational: both superpowers were well aware of the benefits of nuclear primacy, and neither was willing to risk falling behind. Since the Cold War's end, the U.S. nuclear arsenal has significantly improved. The United States has replaced the ballistic missiles on its submarines with the substantially more accurate Trident II D-5 missiles, many of which carry new, larger-yield warheads. The U.S. Navy has shifted a greater proportion of its SSBNs to the Pacific so that they can patrol near the Chinese coast or in the blind spot of Russia's early warning radar network. The U.S. Air Force has finished equipping its B-52 bombers with nuclear-armed cruise missiles, which are probably invisible to Russian and Chinese air-defense radar. And the air force has also enhanced the avionics on its B-2 stealth bombers to permit them to fly at extremely low altitudes in order to avoid even the most sophisticated radar. Finally, although the air force finished dismantling its highly lethal MX missiles in 2005 to comply with arms control agreements, it is significantly improving its remaining ICBMs by installing the MX's high-yield warheads and advanced reentry vehicles on Minuteman ICBMs, and it has upgraded the Minuteman's guidance systems to match the MX's accuracy. IMBALANCE OF TERROR Even as the United States' nuclear forces have grown stronger since the end of the Cold War, Russia's strategic nuclear arsenal has sharply deteriorated. Russia has 39 percent fewer long-range bombers, 58 percent fewer ICBMs, and 80 percent fewer SSBNs than the Soviet Union fielded during its last days. The true extent of the Russian arsenal's decay, however, is much greater than these cuts suggest. What nuclear forces Russia retains are hardly ready for use. Russia's strategic bombers, now located at only two bases and thus vulnerable to a surprise attack, rarely conduct training exercises, and their warheads are stored off-base. Over 80 percent of Russia's silo-based ICBMs have exceeded their original service lives, and plans to replace them with new missiles have been stymied by failed tests and low rates of production. Russia's mobile ICBMs rarely patrol, and although they could fire their missiles from inside their bases if given sufficient warning of an attack, it appears unlikely that they would have the time to do so. The third leg of Russia's nuclear triad has weakened the most. Since 2000, Russia's SSBNs have conducted approximately two patrols per year, down from 60 in 1990. (By contrast, the U.S. SSBN patrol rate today is about 40 per year.) Most of the time, all nine of Russia's ballistic missile submarines are sitting in port, where they make easy targets. Moreover, submarines require well-trained crews to be effective. Operating a ballistic missile submarine -- and silently coordinating its operations with surface ships and attack submarines to evade an enemy's forces -- is not simple. Without frequent patrols, the skills of Russian submariners, like the submarines themselves, are decaying. Revealingly, a 2004 test (attended by President Vladimir Putin) of several submarine-launched ballistic missiles was a total fiasco: all either failed to launch or veered off course. The fact that there were similar failures in the summer and fall of 2005 completes this unflattering picture of Russia's nuclear forces. Compounding these problems, Russia's early warning system is a mess. Neither Soviet nor Russian satellites have ever been capable of reliably detecting missiles launched from U.S. submarines. (In a recent public statement, a top Russian general described his country's early warning satellite constellation as "hopelessly outdated.") Russian commanders instead rely on ground-based radar systems to detect incoming warheads from submarine-launched missiles. But the radar network has a gaping hole in its coverage that lies to the east of the country, toward the Pacific Ocean. If U.S. submarines were to fire missiles from areas in the Pacific, Russian leaders probably would not know of the attack until the warheads detonated. Russia's radar coverage of some areas in the North Atlantic is also spotty, providing only a few minutes of warning before the impact of submarine-launched warheads. Moscow could try to reduce its vulnerability by finding the money to keep its submarines and mobile missiles dispersed. But that would be only a short-term fix. Russia has already extended the service life of its aging mobile ICBMs, something that it cannot do indefinitely, and its efforts to deploy new strategic weapons continue to flounder. The Russian navy's plan to launch a new class of ballistic missile submarines has fallen far behind schedule. It is now highly likely that not a single new submarine will be operational before 2008, and it is likely that none will be deployed until later. Even as Russia's nuclear forces deteriorate, the United States is improving its ability to track submarines and mobile missiles, further eroding Russian military leaders' confidence in Russia's nuclear deterrent. (As early as 1998, these leaders publicly expressed doubts about the ability of Russia's ballistic missile submarines to evade U.S. detection.) Moreover, Moscow has announced plans to reduce its land-based ICBM force by another 35 percent by 2010; outside experts predict that the actual cuts will slice 50 to 75 percent off the current force, possibly leaving Russia with as few as 150 ICBMs by the end of the decade, down from its 1990 level of almost 1,300 missiles. The more Russia's nuclear arsenal shrinks, the easier it will become for the United States to carry out a first strike. To determine how much the nuclear balance has changed since the Cold War, we ran a computer model of a hypothetical U.S. attack on Russia's nuclear arsenal using the standard unclassified formulas that defense analysts have used for decades. We assigned U.S. nuclear warheads to Russian targets on the basis of two criteria: the most accurate weapons were aimed at the hardest targets, and the fastest-arriving weapons at the Russian forces that can react most quickly. Because Russia is essentially blind to a submarine attack from the Pacific and would have great difficulty detecting the approach of low-flying stealthy nuclear-armed cruise missiles, we targeted each Russian weapon system with at least one submarine-based warhead or cruise missile. An attack organized in this manner would give Russian leaders virtually no warning. This simple plan is presumably less effective than Washington's actual strategy, which the U.S. government has spent decades perfecting. The real U.S. war plan may call for first targeting Russia's command and control, sabotaging Russia's radar stations, or taking other preemptive measures -- all of which would make the actual U.S. force far more lethal than our model assumes. According to our model, such a simplified surprise attack would have a good chance of destroying every Russian bomber base, submarine, and ICBM. [See Footnote #1] This finding is not based on best-case assumptions or an unrealistic scenario in which U.S. missiles perform perfectly and the warheads hit their targets without fail. Rather, we used standard assumptions to estimate the likely inaccuracy and unreliability of U.S. weapons systems. Moreover, our model indicates that all of Russia's strategic nuclear arsenal would still be destroyed even if U.S. weapons were 20 percent less accurate than we assumed, or if U.S. weapons were only 70 percent reliable, or if Russian ICBM silos were 50 percent "harder" (more reinforced, and hence more resistant to attack) than we expected. (Of course, the unclassified estimates we used may understate the capabilities of U.S. forces, making an attack even more likely to succeed.) To be clear, this does not mean that a first strike by the United States would be guaranteed to work in reality; such an attack would entail many uncertainties. Nor, of course, does it mean that such a first strike is likely. But what our analysis suggests is profound: Russia's leaders can no longer count on a survivable nuclear deterrent. And unless they reverse course rapidly, Russia's vulnerability will only increase over time. China's nuclear arsenal is even more vulnerable to a U.S. attack. A U.S. first strike could succeed whether it was launched as a surprise or in the midst of a crisis during a Chinese alert. China has a limited strategic nuclear arsenal. The People's Liberation Army currently possesses no modern SSBNs or long-range bombers. Its naval arm used to have two ballistic missile submarines, but one sank, and the other, which had such poor capabilities that it never left Chinese waters, is no longer operational. China's medium-range bomber force is similarly unimpressive: the bombers are obsolete and vulnerable to attack. According to unclassified U.S. government assessments, China's entire intercontinental nuclear arsenal consists of 18 stationary single-warhead ICBMs. These are not ready to launch on warning: their warheads are kept in storage and the missiles themselves are unfueled. (China's ICBMs use liquid fuel, which corrodes the missiles after 24 hours. Fueling them is estimated to take two hours.) The lack of an advanced early warning system adds to the vulnerability of the ICBMs. It appears that China would have no warning at all of a U.S. submarine-launched missile attack or a strike using hundreds of stealthy nuclear-armed cruise missiles. Many sources claim that China is attempting to reduce the vulnerability of its ICBMs by building decoy silos. But decoys cannot provide a firm basis for deterrence. It would take close to a thousand fake silos to make a U.S. first strike on China as difficult as an attack on Russia, and no available information on China's nuclear forces suggests the existence of massive fields of decoys. And even if China built them, its commanders would always wonder whether U.S. sensors could distinguish real silos from fake ones. Despite much talk about China's military modernization, the odds that Beijing will acquire a survivable nuclear deterrent in the next decade are slim. China's modernization efforts have focused on conventional forces, and the country's progress on nuclear modernization has accordingly been slow. Since the mid-1980s, China has been trying to develop a new missile for its future ballistic missile submarine as well as mobile ICBMs (the DF-31 and longer-range DF-31A) to replace its current ICBM force. The U.S. Defense Department predicts that China may deploy DF-31s in a few years, although the forecast should be treated skeptically: U.S. intelligence has been announcing the missile's imminent deployment for decades. Even when they are eventually fielded, the DF-31s are unlikely to significantly reduce China's vulnerability. The missiles' limited range, estimated to be only 8,000 kilometers (4,970 miles), greatly restricts the area in which they can be hidden, reducing the difficulty of searching for them. The DF-31s could hit the contiguous United States only if they were deployed in China's far northeastern corner, principally in Heilongjiang Province, near the Russian-North Korean border. But Heilongjiang is mountainous, and so the missiles might be deployable only along a few hundred kilometers of good road or in a small plain in the center of the province. Such restrictions increase the missiles' vulnerability and raise questions about whether they are even intended to target the U.S. homeland or whether they will be aimed at targets in Russia and Asia. Given the history of China's slow-motion nuclear modernization, it is doubtful that a Chinese second-strike force will materialize anytime soon. The United States has a first-strike capability against China today and should be able to maintain it for a decade or more. INTELLIGENT DESIGN? Is the United States intentionally pursuing nuclear primacy? Or is primacy an unintended byproduct of intra-Pentagon competition for budget share or of programs designed to counter new threats from terrorists and so-called rogue states? Motivations are always hard to pin down, but the weight of the evidence suggests that Washington is, in fact, deliberately seeking nuclear primacy. For one thing, U.S. leaders have always aspired to this goal. And the nature of the changes to the current arsenal and official rhetoric and policies support this conclusion. The improvements to the U.S. nuclear arsenal offer evidence that the United States is actively seeking primacy. The navy, for example, is upgrading the fuse on the W-76 nuclear warhead, which sits atop most U.S. submarine-launched missiles. Currently, the warheads can be detonated only as air bursts well above ground, but the new fuse will also permit ground bursts (detonations at or very near ground level), which are ideal for attacking very hard targets such as ICBM silos. Another navy research program seeks to improve dramatically the accuracy of its submarine-launched missiles (already among the most accurate in the world). Even if these efforts fall short of their goals, any refinement in accuracy combined with the ground-burst fuses will multiply the missiles' lethality. Such improvements only make sense if the missiles are meant to destroy a large number of hard targets. And given that B-2s are already very stealthy aircraft, it is difficult to see how the air force could justify the increased risk of crashing them into the ground by having them fly at very low altitudes in order to avoid radar detection -- unless their mission is to penetrate a highly sophisticated air defense network such as Russia's or, perhaps in the future, China's. During the Cold War, one explanation for the development of the nuclear arms race was that the rival military services' competition for budget share drove them to build ever more nuclear weapons. But the United States today is not achieving primacy by buying big-ticket platforms such as new SSBNs, bombers, or ICBMs. Current modernization programs involve incremental improvements to existing systems. The recycling of warheads and reentry vehicles from the air force's retired MX missiles (there are even reports that extra MX warheads may be put on navy submarine-launched missiles) is the sort of efficient use of resources that does not fit a theory based on parochial competition for increased funding. Rather than reflect organizational resource battles, these steps look like a coordinated set of programs to enhance the United States' nuclear first-strike capabilities. Some may wonder whether U.S. nuclear modernization efforts are actually designed with terrorists or rogue states in mind. Given the United States' ongoing war on terror, and the continuing U.S. interest in destroying deeply buried bunkers (reflected in the Bush administration's efforts to develop new nuclear weapons to destroy underground targets), one might assume that the W-76 upgrades are designed to be used against targets such as rogue states' arsenals of weapons of mass destruction or terrorists holed up in caves. But this explanation does not add up. The United States already has more than a thousand nuclear warheads capable of attacking bunkers or caves. If the United States' nuclear modernization were really aimed at rogue states or terrorists, the country's nuclear force would not need the additional thousand ground-burst warheads it will gain from the W-76 modernization program. The current and future U.S. nuclear force, in other words, seems designed to carry out a preemptive disarming strike against Russia or China. The intentional pursuit of nuclear primacy is, moreover, entirely consistent with the United States' declared policy of expanding its global dominance. The Bush administration's 2002 National Security Strategy explicitly states that the United States aims to establish military primacy: "Our forces will be strong enough to dissuade potential adversaries from pursuing a military build-up in hopes of surpassing, or equaling, the power of the United States." To this end, the United States is openly seeking primacy in every dimension of modern military technology, both in its conventional arsenal and in its nuclear forces. Washington's pursuit of nuclear primacy helps explain its missile-defense strategy, for example. Critics of missile defense argue that a national missile shield, such as the prototype the United States has deployed in Alaska and California, would be easily overwhelmed by a cloud of warheads and decoys launched by Russia or China. They are right: even a multilayered system with land-, air-, sea-, and space-based elements, is highly unlikely to protect the United States from a major nuclear attack. But they are wrong to conclude that such a missile-defense system is therefore worthless -- as are the supporters of missile defense who argue that, for similar reasons, such a system could be of concern only to rogue states and terrorists and not to other major nuclear powers. What both of these camps overlook is that the sort of missile defenses that the United States might plausibly deploy would be valuable primarily in an offensive context, not a defensive one -- as an adjunct to a U.S. first-strike capability, not as a standalone shield. If the United States launched a nuclear attack against Russia (or China), the targeted country would be left with a tiny surviving arsenal -- if any at all. At that point, even a relatively modest or inefficient missile-defense system might well be enough to protect against any retaliatory strikes, because the devastated enemy would have so few warheads and decoys left. During the Cold War, Washington relied on its nuclear arsenal not only to deter nuclear strikes by its enemies but also to deter the Warsaw Pact from exploiting its conventional military superiority to attack Western Europe. It was primarily this latter mission that made Washington rule out promises of "no first use" of nuclear weapons. Now that such a mission is obsolete and the United States is beginning to regain nuclear primacy, however, Washington's continued refusal to eschew a first strike and the country's development of a limited missile-defense capability take on a new, and possibly more menacing, look. The most logical conclusions to make are that a nuclear-war-fighting capability remains a key component of the United States' military doctrine and that nuclear primacy remains a goal of the United States. STOP WORRYING AND LOVE THE BOMB? During the Cold War, MAD rendered the debate about the wisdom of nuclear primacy little more than a theoretical exercise. Now that MAD and the awkward equilibrium it maintained are about to be upset, the argument has become deadly serious. Hawks will undoubtedly see the advent of U.S. nuclear primacy as a positive development. For them, MAD was regrettable because it left the United States vulnerable to nuclear attack. With the passing of MAD, they argue, Washington will have what strategists refer to as "escalation dominance" -- the ability to win a war at any level of violence -- and will thus be better positioned to check the ambitions of dangerous states such as China, North Korea, and Iran. Doves, on the other hand, are fearful of a world in which the United States feels free to threaten -- and perhaps even use -- force in pursuit of its foreign policy goals. In their view, nuclear weapons can produce peace and stability only when all nuclear powers are equally vulnerable. Owls worry that nuclear primacy will cause destabilizing reactions on the part of other governments regardless of the United States' intentions. They assume that Russia and China will work furiously to reduce their vulnerability by building more missiles, submarines, and bombers; putting more warheads on each weapon; keeping their nuclear forces on higher peacetime levels of alert; and adopting hair-trigger retaliatory policies. If Russia and China take these steps, owls argue, the risk of accidental, unauthorized, or even intentional nuclear war -- especially during moments of crisis -- may climb to levels not seen for decades. Ultimately, the wisdom of pursuing nuclear primacy must be evaluated in the context of the United States' foreign policy goals. The United States is now seeking to maintain its global preeminence, which the Bush administration defines as the ability to stave off the emergence of a peer competitor and prevent weaker countries from being able to challenge the United States in critical regions such as the Persian Gulf. If Washington continues to believe such preeminence is necessary for its security, then the benefits of nuclear primacy might exceed the risks. But if the United States adopts a more restrained foreign policy -- for example, one premised on greater skepticism of the wisdom of forcibly exporting democracy, launching military strikes to prevent the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and aggressively checking rising challengers -- then the benefits of nuclear primacy will be trumped by the dangers. -- [Footnote #1] We develop our argument further in "The End of MAD? The Nuclear Dimension of U.S. Primacy," International Security 30, no. 4 (Spring 2006). ======= http://www.foreignaffairs.org/20060301faessay85204/keir-a-lieber-daryl-g-pre ss/the-rise-of-u-s-nuclear-primacy.html ======= ***************************************************************** 22 BBC NEWS: Blair sees hope of climate deal Last Updated: Saturday, 27 January 2007, 20:11 GMT [ UK Prime Minister Tony Blair has told the World Economic Forum a major breakthrough on long-term climate change goals could be close. He told the forum in Davos, Switzerland it was possible because of a "quantum shift" in the attitude of the US. He said the German G8 presidency offered an opportunity for a new international agreement for when the Kyoto Protocol expired in 2012. "I believe we are potentially on the verge of a breakthrough," he said. Mr Blair praised Chancellor Angela Merkel's focus on climate change during her EU presidency and India and China's engagement with the G8. He also pledged to work with other world leaders towards a more "radical" and "comprehensive" successor to the Kyoto protocol. "The German G8 Presidency gives us the opportunity to agree at least the principles of a new, binding international agreement to come into effect when the Kyoto Protocol expires in 2012," Mr Blair said. "But one which is more radical than Kyoto and more comprehensive, one which this time includes all the major countries of the world." 'Mood shift' However, he said any agreement would not be able to deliver without binding commitments from the US, China and India. Without the biggest economies being part of the framework to reduce carbon dependence, we have no earthly chance of success [ border=] Tony Blair [ border=] PCs forecast future 'Doomsday Clock' reset He told the World Economic Forum: "If Britain shut down our emissions entirely, i.e. we closed down the country - not the legacy I want - the growth in China's emissions would make up the difference in just two years. "Without the biggest economies being part of the framework to reduce carbon dependence, we have no earthly chance of success," he said. But Mr Blair added: "The mood in the US is in the process of a quantum shift. "The president's State of the Union address built on his 'addicted to oil' speech last year and set the first US targets for a reduction in petrol consumption." In a wide-ranging speech on world issues, Mr Blair also said he believed nuclear power had to be part of the future. "But I look ahead in my country and I see a situation where we're going to move, incidentally, from self-sufficiency in gas to importing 90% of it, and I say for reasons both of energy efficiency and reducing carbon emissions, how are we going to do that without nuclear energy being part of the mix? "And I think we've got to get over this false view that it offers nothing by way of the future. I think there is a whole new generation of technology growing up around it," he said. Standing ovation According to the BBC's Tim Weber, the conference hall was completely full for Mr Blair's speech. Both his speech and following question and answer session received much applause and a standing ovation, our reporter in Davos said. Some observers are seeing Mr Blair's speech as an attempt to be viewed as an elder statesman once he steps down as prime minister. Trade ministers from around 30 countries have previously agreed during the conference that full-scale global trade talks should resume quickly. Politicians have said it would be "catastrophic" if the talks failed. ***************************************************************** 23 AFP: World War III has already begun, says former Israeli spy chief - Sat Jan 27, 3:42 PM ET LISBON (AFP) - A third World War is already underway between Islamic militancy and the West but most people do not realize it, the former head of Israel" /> Israel's intelligence service Mossad said in an interview published in Portugal. "We are in the midst of a third World War," former Mossad chief Efraim Halevy told weekly newspaper Expresso. "The world does not understand. A person walks through the streets of Tel Aviv, Barcelona or Buenos Aires and doesn't get the sense that there is a war going on," said Hakevey who headed Mossad between 1998 and 2003. "During World War I and II the entire world felt there was a war. Today no one is conscious of it. From time to time there is a terrorist attack in Madrid, London and New York and then everything stays the same." Violence by Islamic militants has already disrupted international travel and trade just as in the previous two world conflicts, he said. Halevy, who was raised in war-time London, predicted it would take at least 25 years before the battle against Islamic fundamentalist terrorism is won and during this time a nuclear strike by Islamic militants was likely. "It doesn't have to be something very sophisticated, It doesn't have to be the latest nuclear technology, it can be something simple like a dirty bomb which instead of killing millions only kills tens of thousands," he said. Halevy served as an envoy for former Isreali prime ministers Yitzhak Shamir, Yitzhak Rabin" /> Yitzhak Rabinand Shimon Peres and is a former Israeli ambassador to the European Union" /> European Union. Copyright © 2007 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 24 Comment is free: New strategy, old problems George Bush's new policy on Iraq which will shift political focus from Iraq to Iran and Syria will not right wrongs, it will exacerbate them. Joschka Fischer January 28, 2007 01:00 PM | Can politics learn from history? Or is it subject to a fatal compulsion to repeat the same mistakes, despite the disastrous lessons of the past? President Bush's new strategy for Iraq has posed anew this age-old philosophical and historical question. Ostensibly, President Bush has embarked on a new political and military strategy for the war-torn Iraq. Bush's new course can be summarised under three headings: more American troops, more Iraqi responsibility, and more US training for more Iraqi troops. If you apply this new plan to Iraq alone, two things immediately catch the eye: almost all the proposals of the Baker-Hamilton report have been ignored, and the plan itself - in the face of the chaos in Iraq - is quite simplistic. In light of the failure of all previous "new strategies" for stabilising Iraq, there is little to suggest that the newest "new strategy" will succeed any better, despite the additional 21,000 US soldiers. What is interesting and really new in the US administration's recently announced policy is the way it reaches beyond Iraq, to deal with Iran, Syria, and the Gulf states. Here, unexpected and genuinely new decisions have been announced: an additional US aircraft carrier group will be moved to the Persian Gulf; Patriot anti-aircraft missiles will be stationed in the Gulf states; and the additional 21,000 soldiers far exceed what the American generals had asked for to deal with Iraq. So one wonders about the purpose of this military build-up? One might almost think that Saddam was still alive and in power, so his overthrow had to be prepared all over again. The surprise of Bush's new policy is its shift of political focus from Iraq to its two immediate neighbours. Bush accuses Syria and Iran of interfering in Iraq, threatening its territorial integrity and endangering American troops, and, more generally, of seeking to undermine America's allies in the region. If you add to this the seizure, on President Bush's orders, of Iranian "diplomats" by US forces in the northern Iraqi town of Erbil, a completely new picture of the President's plan comes to the fore: the "new strategy" does not follow the advice of the Baker-Hamilton report, but harks back to the disastrous strategy of the neocons. Iran is now in the superpower's sights, and the US approach brings to mind the preparatory phase of the Iraq war - down to the last detail. Where does all this lead? Basically, there are two possibilities, one positive and one negative. Unfortunately, the positive outcome appears to be the less likely one. If the threat of force - a force that the US is quite obviously building - aims at preparing the ground for serious negotiations with Iran, there can and should be no objection. If, on the other hand, it represents an attempt to prepare the American public for a war against Iran, and a genuine intention to unleash such a war when the opportunity arises, the outcome would be an unmitigated disaster. Unfortunately, this danger is all too real. Since the Bush administration views Iran's nuclear program and hegemonic aspirations as the major threat to the region, its new strategy is based on a newly formed undeclared anti-Iranian alliance with moderate Sunni Arab states and Israel. The nuclear program is the dynamic factor here, because it will set a timeline for action. But air strikes on Iran, which America may see as a military solution, would not make Iraq safer; they would achieve exactly the opposite. Nor would the region as a whole be stabilised; on the contrary, it would be plunged into an abyss. And the dream of "regime change" in Tehran would not come true, either; rather, Iran's democratic opposition would pay a high price, and the theocratic regime would only become stronger. The political options for stabilising Iraq, and the whole region, as well as for securing a long-term freeze of Iran's nuclear program, have not yet been exhausted. The current state of Iran's nuclear program does not call for immediate military action. Instead, the focus should be on diplomatic efforts to detach Syria from Iran and isolate the Tehran regime. But this presupposes American willingness to return to diplomacy and talking to all the parties involved. Tehran is afraid of regional and international isolation. Moreover, the recent municipal elections in Iran have shown that betting on diplomacy and a transformation of Iran from within is a realistic option. So why the current threats against Iran? The debacle in Iraq was foreseeable from the beginning, and America's numerous partners and friends predicted it quite clearly in their warnings to the Bush administration. The mistake that the US may be about to make is equally predictable: a war that is wrong will not be made right by extending it - that is the lesson of Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. The ideologically driven strategy of regime change by means of military force led the US into the Iraq war disaster. Getting into Iraq and defeating Saddam was easy. But today, America is stuck there and knows neither how to win nor how to get out. A mistake is not corrected by repeating it over and over again. Perseverance in error does not correct the error; it merely exacerbates it. Following the launch of the new American policy, the old question of whether politics can learn from history will be answered again in the Middle East. Whatever the answer, the consequences - whether good or bad - will be far-reaching. © Project Syndicate, 2006. Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007. Registered in England and Wales. No. 908396 Registered office: Number 1 Scott Place, Manchester M3 3GG ***************************************************************** 25 Sydney Morning Herald: Shutdown of reactor will take decade - www.smh.com.au Heath Gilmore January 28, 2007 AUSTRALIA'S first nuclear reactor will be officially shut down on Tuesday. Federal Science Minister Julie Bishop will initiate the closure of the HIFAR research reactor at Lucas Heights in Sydney's south, a process that will take nearly 10 years. Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) chief of research George Collins said the 10-megawatt reactor had its first chain reaction on Australia Day in 1958. Dr Collins said the removal of fuel and cooling water from the old reactor would take place soon after this week's ceremony. He said the reactor would be idle for 10 years to allow low-level radioactivity to decay before the concrete and steel structure is taken apart. ANSTO's new OPAL research reactor, to be officially opened in April, will produce radioisotopes used in medicine and neutron-doped silicon for making silicon chips, and be used for research work. Source: The Sun-Herald Copyright © 2007. The Sydney Morning Herald. ***************************************************************** 26 Kansas City Star: Nuclear agency studies options for KC plant 01/27/2007 | By KEVIN COLLISON The Kansas City Star The federal agency in charge of the nuclear weapons parts plant at the Bannister Federal Complex has begun searching for a replacement facility. A decision is expected in April. The National Nuclear Security Administration is in the early stages of a transformation planning process that is expected to lead to a smaller, more efficient manufacturing plant to be completed by 2010 and fully operational by 2012. The NNSA is transforming all of its infrastructure, not just here, but at all eight facilities around the country, said Mark Holocek, deputy site manager. The new plant is expected to be located on either the existing Bannister property in south Kansas City or a greenfield site somewhere in the metropolitan area. The current Honeywell Federal Manufacturing &Technologies plant employs about 2,600 people and manufactures nonradioactive parts for the U.S. nuclear arsenal. The new facility is expected to employ about 2,000 people and save the NNSA $100 million. Local NNSA officials recently received permission to continue planning for a new facility in the area. There had been some concern the operation might be relocated to one of the seven other nuclear weapons facilities the NNSA operates around the country. The plant contributes significantly to the local economy. It had a $193 million payroll last year and purchased $41.9 million in goods from Missouri businesses and $15 million from Kansas businesses, according to the NNSA. The bulk of the employees, 1,792, lived in Missouri. The NNSA is now working to determine which options to pursue for the plants future, Holocek said. The building options are renovating the west side of the existing Bannister Federal Complex, building a new facility on the Bannister property, or a greenfield lease in the Kansas City area. The agency must also determine whether it wants to seek funding to build the plant itself or have the General Services Administration build a plant and lease it to the NNSA. Should the GSA be chosen to manage the project, congressional approval would be expected in October and a development contract would be awarded in spring 2008. To reach Kevin Collison, call (816) 234-4289 or send e-mail to kcollison@kcstar.com. ***************************************************************** 27 The State: Nuclear power is safest, cleanest and cheapest energy source 01/27/2007 I am surprised that a minority of people continue to oppose beneficial nuclear technologies. Susan Corbetts letter Jan. 3 is an example. She thinks nuclear plants are dirty, dangerous and expensive. Dirty? Hardly! Nuclear power is far cleaner than any alternative way of making the large amounts of electricity that are needed. Thats just one of the reasons why more than 70 percent of the electrical power generated in France is produced in nuclear plants and why there is a worldwide surge in construction of new nuclear power plants. Objective environmentalists in this country and elsewhere are supporting nuclear power precisely because it is clean. It does not contribute to acid rain, smog, heavy metal, contamination of soil and water or global warming. Dangerous? No! Thousands die worldwide every year in coal-mining accidents and natural gas fires and explosions, while the record at nuclear plants is zero. Chernobyl is irrelevant because no one in the Western world has built, or will build, that cheap and unsafe reactor type. And the accident at Three Mile Island, which did not hurt anyone, cant happen again in the new reactors with their additional safety features. Expensive? No! It is already cheaper than coal, oil or gas, and that advantage will grow because coal-burners will have to spend money to reduce emissions, and the price of natural gas will continue to rise, while nuclear plants are in a steep price decline. Many utilities in the United States and worldwide are lining up to build new nuclear plants without subsidy. They are not doing this to lose money. Nuclear is safer, cheaper and far more environmentally friendly. The facts speak for themselves. JAMES MALVYN McKIBBEN Executive Director Citizens for Nuclear Technology Awareness Aiken ***************************************************************** 28 Green Left: 'Don't be a nuclear fool' 31 January 2007 Issue #696 Sasha Henriss-Anderssen, Melbourne 26 January 2007 An anti-nuclear Peace Parade and Festival is being planned for Palm Sunday in Melbourne. The action aims to counter the federal government’s plans to expand uranium mining and build 25 nuclear reactors in Australia by 2050. It also aims to pressure the ALP not to abolish its “no more uranium mines” policy in favour of expanded uranium mining at the ALP national conference in April. Palm Sunday falls on April Fools Day this year, which has inspired rally slogans like “Don’t be a nuclear fool” and “Step off the nuclear fuel/fool cycle”. Participants are invited to fly kites, ride bicycles and dress foolishly for the parade from Treasury Gardens to the Sidney Myer Music Bowl. There will be performances by comedians and bands, as well as speakers. Organisations such as Friends of the Earth, the Australian Conservation Foundation, the Socialist Alliance and Nuclear Free Australia, among many others, have joined with the initiators of the rally, the Medical Association for the Prevention of War (MAPW), to send a very serious message to the government and opposition: the people of Australia want a nuclear-free future. The protest will demand: Stop nuclear power in Australia — Renewables not reactors!; Stop uranium mining — leave it in the ground!; Stop nuclear weapons and wars — reject the US nuclear umbrella!; and Stop nuclear waste — no waste dump in Australia! MAPW spokesperson Felicity Hill said: “Nuclear energy is not a healthy option for Australia. It depletes budgets badly needed for health and human security, and it depletes water, which is vital for life, health and medical treatment. “One uranium mine in South Australia is licensed to use up to 45 million litres of water a day. BHP Billiton are certainly not taking short showers or watering their garden on alternate days. The Roxby mine is using water like there is no tomorrow. The driest continent on earth cannot afford the water costs of uranium mining, let alone reactors, and our world cannot afford more nuclear dangers … Prevention is the only cure when it comes to nuclear dangers.” In preparation for the rally, a public meeting at Fitzroy Town Hall on March 1 at 6pm will be addressed by Dr Helen Caldicott, Dave Sweeney, Rebecca Bear-Winfield and Dr Tilman Ruff. The Palm Sunday Peace Parade and Festival will start at 1pm on April 1. For more information, and to get involved, visit , or email , or phone (03) 9419 8700 or (03) 8344 1637. From: Australian News, Green Left Weekly issue #696 31 January 2007. From: Australian News GLW issue #696 - 31 January 2007: Authorised by K. Miller, 23 Abercrombie St, Chippendale, NSW. ***************************************************************** 29 Casper Star Tribune: Idaho energy plan stirs debate By JOHN MILLER Associated Press writer Saturday, January 27, 2007 --> BOISE, Idaho -- Environmental groups, renewable power advocates and some Idaho Democrats say a draft state energy plan is inadequate, because it fails to create a statewide panel to decide where new nuclear or other large power plants can be built. The plan was drawn up this summer, and made public recently. Discussions in the Legislature over the 93-page document -- the first update of Idaho's energy plan since 1982 -- began Thursday. It's the product of an interim legislative committee formed last year amid opposition to a $1.4 billion, 600-megawatt coal-fired power plant proposed by a California utility in Jerome County, near Twin Falls. That project was tabled when last year's Legislature passed a two-year moratorium on such plants, but lawmakers decided to revamp the energy plan anyway, on the assumption that questions over Idaho's energy future would re-emerge. Even before the plan's release, the nuclear watchdog group Snake River Alliance and the NW Energy Coalition, a Seattle-based conservation group, had argued it was shortsighted to allow local governments to hold sway over huge projects with statewide or even regional impacts. They contend the need for state oversight is illustrated by speculative proposals to build coal gasification or nuclear plants in Idaho. Virginia-based Alternate Energy Holdings, for example, has proposed a 1,500 megawatt nuclear reactor. "Until the Legislature deals with this most important of energy issues in Idaho, Idahoans will have little to no say when an out-of-state energy company comes into our state with plans for a power plant that can have grave impacts on the health and safety of Idahoans and the future of our clean environment and water," Snake River Alliance director Jeremy Maxand said Wednesday. Neighboring Washington, Oregon and Montana, as well as California, Arizona and most other states, have statewide panels to oversee the siting of power plants. A majority of the 16-legislator committee that drafted Idaho's plan favored increased involvement of state agencies in discussions over where plants larger than 50 megawatts can be built. "Idaho state agencies should play a role in providing technical information to support local energy facility siting decisions," according to the draft energy policy. Still, the drafters opted to leave the final decision on big power plants to counties, a nod to local control favored by most of the Republican-dominated Legislature. They were suspicious that backers of a statewide commission want to make it nearly impossible to build large power plants, rather than simply control where they are located. "You've got an anti-coal, anti-conventional coalition that feels if they have a statewide authority, you'll never see a nuclear or a coal power plant in Idaho," said Rep. George Eskridge, R-Dover and co-chairman of the interim committee. "We wanted to maintain that local jurisdiction." Building a coal-fired power plant in Idaho -- currently, there are none -- is now next to impossible, since former Gov. Jim Risch opted last year not to participate in a federal program that allows states to buy or trade "credits" for toxic mercury emissions, which are produced by coal-fired plants. So far this year, Democrats have drafted separate legislation that would create a state siting panel to govern the location of any new power plants that rely on fuel such as natural gas, nuclear material or coal to produce electricity. The future of Senate Bill 1041, currently in the State Affairs Committee, is uncertain. Even so, some minority Democrats who sat on the interim committee say the draft plan that resulted is a "thoughtful document," said Sen. Kate Kelly, D-Boise. She also praised the interim committees' decision to include a section in the plan where dissenters could protest the exclusion of a statewide siting authority. "While we do have some concerns with it, it is a consensus document," Kelly said. "I definitely support the product. It says a lot about the committee that we were allowed to include a minority report." Copyright © 19952007 Lee Enterprises ***************************************************************** 30 iafrica.com: sa news Pebble-bed reactor appeal turned down Sat, 27 Jan 2007 Environment Minister Marthinus van Schalkwyk turned down an appeal against the proposed pilot fuel plant (PFP) for an advanced nuclear reactor at Pelindaba, near Pretoria, his ministry said on Friday. The plant is scheduled to supply the Pebble-Bed Modular Rector (PBMR) demonstration power plant at Koeberg, according to reports. The appeal centred on a Record of Decision (ROD), issued in 2003 that had been linked to a second ROD issued on the same day, referring to the PBMR. Among the applicants in the appeal were Earthlife Africa and the Wildlife and Environment Society of SA. Van Schalkwyk said that although the ROD involving the PBMR had been set aside on review by the Cape High Court in 2005, the ROD involving the PFP should be viewed separately. "According to the advice received from senior counsel, the ROD issued to the Nuclear Energy Corporation of SA for the PFP project was not affected by the setting aside of the ROD issued in respect of the PBMR," Van Schalkwyk said. Both RODs had contained clauses that made the implementation of the one subject to the approval of the other. Van Schalkwyk also said he believed that the department misdirected itself in several respects in relation to these two RODs. "I am of the view that the two RODs related to separate and distinct projects and should have been treated as such from the outset." The PFP entails the establishment of a fuel manufacturing plant at Pelindaba and includes the storage, handling and processing facilities for the raw materials and fuels, read an Environmental Affairs and Tourism statement. Also within the ambit of the decision was the transport of raw material from Durban to Pelindaba and the transport of manufactured fuel from Pelindaba to Koeberg in the Western Cape. Sapa © 2002-2005 iafrica.com, ***************************************************************** 31 Chattanooga Times Free Press: Nuclear revival - Video: Training nuclear operators By Dave Flessner and Pam Sohn Staff Writers SPRING CITY, Tenn. -- The Tennessee Valley Authority is using a presidential push for more nuclear power and concern over global warming to add four new reactors. This year, TVA directors say they will submit an application to build two new reactors under the government's new streamlined licensing process. They also plan to restart TVA's oldest nuclear reactor after a 22-year shutdown, and by August they expect to decide whether to spend up to $2 billion to complete the unfinished Unit 2 reactor at Watts Bar Nuclear Power Plant. "We need more power and, at this point, nuclear looks to be the best option," TVA Chairman Bill Sansom said. The total tally could top $7 billion for design and construction. But critics of nuclear power question why the debt-burdened TVA again would pursue an agenda to split atoms for electricity. Nearly 30 years ago, the utility scrapped most of what then was the nation's most costly and ambitious program. "Of all the places on Earth that have given nuclear power a shot and failed, the Tennessee Valley has got to be No. 1," said S. David Freeman, a former TVA chairman who has headed four other electric utilities across the country. The 74-year old utility sank more than $8 billion in the 1970s and 1980s into 10 nuclear reactors that were canceled before they were finished. TVA spent another $6 billion to build the first reactor here at Watts Bar, making it the most expensive nuclear plant of its size ever built. "TVA's electric rates would be a whole lot lower today if they wouldn't have tried to build all those expensive nuclear plants," Mr. Freeman said. "It's just baffling to me that TVA would want to get into that business again." TVA President Tom Kilgore insists the agency now is taking a slower and more cost-effective approach to adding nuclear power than it did before, when it tried to build and operate up to 17 reactors at one time. "If we do decide to proceed with more nuclear units, we're going to make sure they are well designed in advance and are built one at a time," Mr. Kilgore said. After costly repairs in the 1980s, TVA's five operating reactors are now in the top quartile of U.S. nuclear plants for performance and safety, Mr. Kilgore said. Anti-nuclear activists fear other costs and contend additional nuclear power plants will create more terrorism targets, nuclear proliferation and radioactive wastes. "The nuclear industry thinks they are making a comeback and they can run over everybody to get these new plants licensed and built," said Ann Harris, a former TVA whistleblower at Watts Bar who now heads the Southeast office of the anti-nuclear group We the People. "They still haven't dealt with their wastes, their mismanagement or the risks to the public from these plants," she said. TVA spokesman John Moulton said more than 2,500 metric tons of radioactive spent fuel waste "is safely stored" onsite at TVA nuclear plants. All three -- Sequoyah, Watts Bar and Brown's Ferry -- have leaked a radioactive form of liquid hydrogen called tritium. The tritium has been found in groundwater test wells, and TVA documents filed with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission indicate the contamination is traveling in underground streams toward the Tennessee River. NRC officials have said the leaked tritium is not a public health hazard. If the tritium reaches the river, it will be diluted further, they said. NUCLEAR RENAISSANCE No new nuclear reactors have been ordered in the United States since a 1979 accident at the Three Mile Island plant in Pennsylvania raised public concerns about nuclear power and caused the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to revamp its rules. But industry officials believe global warming will bring a thaw for the long nuclear winter. Nationwide, U.S. utilities are pursuing plans for up to 31 new reactors. Proponents say nuclear power is an attractive alternative to coal, which is blamed for contributing to global warming and air pollution. Nuclear energy also provides an alternative to natural gas, which has been buffeted by high and volatile prices, they contend. In the Tennessee Valley, TVA estimates electricity demand will grow 1.9 percent a year. To meet all of that increase with nuclear reactors would require TVA nearly to double its nuclear generation in the next decade. The Bush administration and Republican lawmakers such as Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., and Rep. Zach Wamp, R-Tenn., also are touting the resurgence of nuclear energy, along with a new-to-the-United States reprocessing and recycling technology for highly radioactive spent fuel waste. "Nuclear power is almost the only answer for clean electricity to meet our growing needs," said Sen. Alexander, the co-chairman of the TVA Congressional Caucus and a member of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. "When I look at all of the options, I think nuclear is the leading technology." Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., said he joined the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee to help America become more energy independent. "I think nuclear has to be a large portion of what we do in our country energywise," he said. Adrian Heymer, senior director for new plant deployment at the Nuclear Energy Institute, an industry-backed trade group in Washington, D.C., said 2007 will be a pivotal year for developing new nuclear generation. "The industry has made significant improvements in the reliability, safety and productivity of our nuclear units, and with today's volatile prices for natural gas and global warming concerns from coal, nuclear just makes a lot of sense," he said. Nationwide, nuclear power plants have improved their capacity factor -- a key measure of plant efficiency -- from 71 percent in 1997 to more than 90 percent today. The average cost of producing a kilowatt hour of nuclear power dropped 28 percent from 1997 to 2005, according to the Nuclear Energy Institute. OTHER CONCERNS But nuclear power critics contend the plants only appear to be performing better, in part, because regulators have relaxed their oversight. In 2002, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission refused initially to shut down the Davis-Besse Nuclear Plant in Ohio when workers found a boric acid leak had nearly eaten through the reactor vessel head, threatening a toxic meltdown. The potential return of new nuclear plant construction also is reviving criticism of the industry from nuclear opponents from the past. Steve Comley, the founder of a government whistlebower advocacy group who two decades ago personally handed President Ronald Reagan documents outlining instances of counterfeit parts, is gathering signatures on a petition asking for a congressional investigation into what he says are substandard parts in most nuclear plants. A 1990 Government Accounting Office report found that plant parts ranging from valves to circuit breakers did not have proper certification in 72 of the nation's 113 licensed reactors. Mr. Comley said the NRC didn't verify adequately that the counterfeit parts were replaced or verified in all of the plants, although the industry contends safety-related parts were replaced. "The NRC has always put the profits of the utility industry ahead of public safety, but we're going to make sure that the American public have a say in the future of this industry," he said. Paul Gunter, director of the nuclear watchdog agency Nuclear Information and Resource Service, said the federal government's "subsidies" for nuclear power and NRC's shortened review of new plant designs send the wrong signals to the rest of the world. "How can we tell Iran not to build a nuclear plant when we are subsidizing new plants in our own country?" he said. "This is a very dangerous technology, and we still don't have a permanent place to store its wastes. Trying to build more nuclear plants now is a little like Lucy offering Charlie Brown the football again. Why would we take another kick at nuclear power?" E-mail Dave Flessner at Copyright, permissions and privacy policy Copyright ©2007, Chattanooga Publishing Company, Inc. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 32 Chillicothe Gazette: Future of GNEP site in Piketon still in question www.chillicothegazette.com - Chillicothe, OH Sunday, January 28, 2007 By DAVID KOHL The Associated Press PIKETON -To Greg Simonton and other civic leaders in this town, it's all about the jobs. Jobs to bolster the economy of the Appalachian burg where the double-digit unemployment rate is always near the highest in the state. Jobs to replace more than 1,500 that have been wiped out over the past decade with the downsizing of a uranium enrichment plant. Jobs so attractive they have led Simonton's nonprofit agency to pair up with a private enterprise in a venture that could eventually bring Piketon thousands of tons a year of some of the most toxic nuclear waste on the planet. Piketon is one of 11 communities recently awarded a total of $16 million in study grants by the Department of Energy. The grants are to be used to determine if they would be suitable sites for the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, or GNEP, a hotly debated proposal that proponents promise will change the world. Unveiled by the Bush administration early last year, GNEP envisions a system in which developing nations would receive nuclear power plants and fuel from the West in return for agreeing not to develop their own nuclear technology. The plan hinges on the controversial element of reprocessing spent nuclear rods to produce fuel that can be burned at GNEP plants, an activity that never has been done commercially in the United States. GNEP supporters say not only will it power up the Third World, it will boost the U.S. nuclear industry, greatly reduce nuclear waste and air pollution and avoid the further spread of nuclear weapons. Opponents say the program has the same problem as conventional nuclear power: It's impossibly expensive. But it's GNEP's added element of nuclear fuel reprocessing, shelved for more than 30 years as unsafe and unnecessary in the United States, that really inflames critics of the program. The race for toxic waste The criticism has not deterred the Department of Energy and job-hungry communities that vied for the study grants. "We are very excited about the opportunity to take a look at this," Simonton said after Assistant Secretary of Energy Dennis Spurgeon announced in November the Piketon group was among the grant recipients. The area's congresswoman, U.S. Rep. Jean Schmidt, R-Miami Township, was equally enthusiastic, saying the grant "will go a long way toward future economic development opportunities and may bring thousands of jobs to the area." Simonton directs the Southern Ohio Diversification Initiative, a nonprofit whose purpose is to create jobs in a region hit hard by the layoffs at the Portsmouth uranium enrichment plant in Piketon, owned by the Energy Department and operated by the United States Enrichment Corp., currently the only U.S. firm in the enrichment business. What better way to do that, figured Simonton and his partner, Cleveland entrepreneur and former USEC board member Dan T. Moore II, than to find a new nuclear purpose for a 3,714-acre facility that has been processing radioactive materials for 52 years, first for weapons at the height of the Cold War and later for commercial nuclear power plants? Politicians in other communities that received GNEP grants also expressed eagerness to cash in on what they believe could be an economic bonanza. "These nuclear fuel recycling facilities would firmly establish our state as the leader in this field," said Republican Rep. Steve Pearce of New Mexico, where the DOE awarded two study grants. "This is an exciting opportunity for East Tennessee," echoed Republican Rep. Zach Wamp, whose district includes Oak Ridge National Laboratory, another potential GNEP site. Welcoming locals are just part of what senior Harvard nuclear researcher Matthew Bunn describes as a large and "unwieldy coalition" that has kept the GNEP proposal afloat despite serious questions about its technical feasibility, concerns over its potential to spread nuclear weapons material, doubts that nuclear "have-not" nations will submit to a Western fuel and technology cabal and tepid support and a lack of Congressional funding. That coalition includes the national nuclear labs, which see the potential for billions in research funding, and some players in the industry, who hope for lucrative contracts as part of GNEP and the general growth of the nuclear power industry they expect will accompany it. Cover for waste dump stalemate? And there appears to be a growing faction that sees it as at least temporary cover for long-delayed efforts to open a nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain, Nev., a vital component if the nuclear power industry's predictions of a "renaissance" are to be realized. But Energy Department spokesman Craig Stevens denied that finding an interim storage for waste is a GNEP goal. It's the "stated policies" that matter, he told MSNBC.com. "This is a big thing," Stevens said. "If it's successful and we can make it work, and make it attractive enough at an economic level, this will change the way we power the world." The proposal set off strong protests in anti-nuclear and non-proliferation camps, because it reintroduced the reprocessing of spent reactor fuel to the U.S. nuclear landscape. The critics say the practice would make it far easier for terrorists to get their hands on plutonium that could be used to make crude nuclear weapons. That concern is the major reason reprocessing was banned under the Ford and Carter administrations. The argument for reprocessing GNEP proponents maintain reprocessing - which the nuclear industry and the DOE have taken to calling "recycling" - has the twin benefits of cutting down on nuclear waste and ensuring a rich fuel supply for hundreds of new reactors. In the "once-through" fuel cycle currently used in U.S. nuclear reactors, thousands of tons of uranium ore are mined and processed to produce a relatively small amount of fuel. Once the fuel has been used, it is highly radioactive and must be stored for years in pools of water before it has cooled enough to be placed in concrete casks and eventually transferred to a permanent disposal site. The only such U.S. site under development, at Yucca Mountain in Nevada, has faced political and regulatory hurdles for decades and is not expected to receive waste for at least 10 years, if ever. That's currently the most daunting obstacle for the nuclear power industry, which wants to build more plants and thus create more waste. Reprocessing advocates say 95 percent of current nuclear waste, chiefly uranium and plutonium, is still rich with energy that could be harnessed by new "recycling" technology. The process could be repeated until virtually all of the energy is sucked out of the waste, allowing far more widespread use of nuclear power and drastically reducing the amount of permanent disposal space required. The problem with plutonium The problem with that logic, opponents counter, is reprocessing would make it more likely that plutonium - the material of choice for nuclear bomb makers - could fall into the wrong hands. When it remains mixed with other components of highly radioactive spent fuel, the waste is "self-protecting" because it is quickly fatal to anyone who tries to handle it without specialized equipment and technical know-how. But once plutonium is separated from the other waste via reprocessing, it can be handled without any immediate danger to a would-be bomber's health. "Plutonium itself is not a major radiation hazard," said Dr. Edwin Lyman of the Union of Concerned Scientists. "You can carry weapons-grade plutonium around in your hands for hours and you're not going to sustain a severe radiation injury. And it only takes maybe 10 pounds to make a nuclear weapon." As a result, foes say the amounts of plutonium that would be produced in commercial settings under the GNEP scenario would greatly increase the chances it could fall into terrorists' hands. "Do you really want more bomb-grade plutonium floating around the world?" asked Jim Riccio, nuclear policy analyst for the anti-nuclear environmental group Greenpeace. "Reprocessing is a very dangerous technology," said Lyman. "The Department of Energy is in love with the idea of reprocessing. They at first claimed that the purpose behind GNEP was to develop new types of reprocessing that would not pose the same proliferation risks as conventional reprocessing and would not produce separated plutonium. But, in fact, none of the ideas that the Department of Energy proposed is new." Current commercial reprocessing technology, like that practiced by the French firm Areva, extracts plutonium and uranium from spent fuel and produces "mixed oxide" or MOX fuel that can be used in conventional reactors. The remaining high-level wastes are "vitrified," or sealed up in glass, and stored. But GNEP's goal is to also recycle that waste and turn it into fuel to be burned in a new generation of reactors. New techniques touted by GNEP backers insist new reprocessing techniques can extract all the materials for fresh fuel from nuclear waste in ways that greatly limit proliferation threats. At a September hearing before a Senate panel, Dr. Alan S. Hanson of Areva, which hopes to be a key participant in GNEP, testified that a "phased approach" would avoid separation of pure plutonium, limit its concentration in other mixtures and develop "advanced safeguards" to protect it. But a "GNEP Strategic Plan" released earlier this month by the Energy Department acknowledged "there are limits to the nonproliferation benefits offered by any of the advanced chemical separations technologies, which generally can be modified to produce plutonium." Nonetheless, the plan says GNEP's broader goals and security procedures will be a net plus to global nonproliferation efforts. Because of that confidence, and high interest from Areva and other companies, the Energy Department's Spurgeon said in remarks prepared for the September hearing that the agency is ready to proceed with "commercial demonstrations of these (reprocessing) technologies." That triggered the selection of the 11 communities that had applied for GNEP study grants. The Energy Department is looking for locations that could host a reprocessing facility capable of reprocessing 2,000 to 3,000 tons of nuclear waste a year or a new type of "advanced recycling reactor" that would consume nuclear fuel created in the reprocessing facility - or both. In addition to Piketon, Oak Ridge and the two communities in New Mexico, DOE awarded grants to two communities in Idaho; Barnwell, S.C.; Hanford, Wash.; Morris, Ill.; Paducah, Ken.; and Savannah River, S.C. Like Piketon, most of the sites are at existing nuclear facilities. According to Spurgeon, the site studies and other analysis are aimed at a decision sometime in 2008 by Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman on whether to proceed with full-fledged GNEP development and seek the billions of dollars in funding it would require. At the September hearing, Harvard's Bunn, a leading authority on nuclear arms and a supporter of the expansion of conventional nuclear power, presented a 19-page paper that concluded that GNEP initiatives are headed in "precisely the wrong direction" and will "do more to undermine the future of nuclear energy than to promote it." 'A talking point, not serious analysis' To begin with, Bunn said, reprocessing is far more expensive than "once through" use of nuclear fuel. A study by the National Academy of Sciences estimated that reprocessing the approximately 62,000 tons of spent commercial fuel now in existence would cost as much as $100 billion more than placing it in a repository like Yucca Mountain. Like Lyman, Bunn flatly disagreed that new reprocessing technology removes the risk of proliferation, calling that notion "a talking point, not a serious analysis." Stevens, the Energy Department spokesman, disputed that contention. "The policy will not move forward unless the technology is proliferation-resistant," he said. "If it doesn't work, we're going to find another way to do it. We believe, in a lab setting, it does work. It's a matter of ramping that up." Bunn's paper raised a host of other questions about funding, the Energy Department's lack of experience in overseeing "a commercial-scale facility of this complexity" and the lack of political sustainability for a program that would require years of financial commitment from Congress. He told MSNBC.com he believes it's "very likely" GNEP will collapse before it gets serious funding from Congress. Lyman, of the Union of Concerned Scientists, agreed. "This is the height of fiscal irresponsibility," he said. He also argued that there are "zero" non-nuclear nations who would participate in GNEP out of fear of being seen as lackeys of the West and charged the Bush administration is rushing GNEP along so it can't easily be undone by future administrations and Congresses. Not so, said Stevens. "It's a serious project," he said. "We have staffed up the office" and recruited Spurgeon, a retired USEC executive, the operator of the Piketon plant, to lead the effort, he said. Potential for world changing 'payoff' As for GNEP's high costs, he said, "We recognize the government has a role and a responsibility to invest in basic research. If it works, the payoff will be many times greater than the investment. ... It can literally change economies around the world." At the September hearing on GNEP, Lyman and Bunn's objections were quickly brushed aside by Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., one of the biggest backers of the nuclear industry in Congress and the fuel reprocessing program's chief proponent. Domenici, then chairman of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Energy and Water, charged that Bunn "isn't living in the same age I am with reference to support for nuclear power. He's still talking about things like we need (political) support for certain things, where I already think the nation is far ahead of that." But GNEP has not been as warmly embraced by other members of Congress, and the $250 million sought by the Bush administration to begin work on the program is snarled in an appropriations battle. Nor has the nuclear industry been a strong supporter, though that could be changing because of the program's perceived potential to solve some of the issues surrounding nuclear waste disposal. "I support GNEP as a responsible solution to addressing our spent fuel needs," Domenici said at the outset of the September hearing. He has since introduced legislation that would "integrate" Yucca Mountain and GNEP to allow waste to bypass Yucca and be sent to a holding facility if "the secretary of energy determines if it can be recycled within a reasonable amount of time." New interest in waste implications The waste-handling implications caught the attention of Nevada's Democratic Sen. Harry Reid, now the Senate majority leader and a staunch foe of the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump. At the hearing, Reid said he was "pleased that we're taking another look at the administration's GNEP plan and pleased to see that we're looking particularly at the waste recycling portion of the plan." The Nuclear Energy Industry, nuclear power's chief lobbying group, is showing new interest in GNEP after initially expressing concerns that the plan's potential for overreaching could stymie near-term plans for new reactors. As recently as July, NEI President Skip Bowman called GNEP "a distraction factor" on the waste issue and an NEI policy paper in August noted that viable reprocessing technologies are "decades away." But in December, NEI spokesman Scott Peterson told MSNBC.com that there had been "a bit of a shift" in industry thinking on GNEP's implications for the waste problem. "It's not a shift away from a repository," he said. "But what I think it does recognize is the need we're going to have for new fuel from the 30 reactors we're going to have." And "you will need some definite movement toward the DOE taking (spent) fuel from plant sites," to dispose of it, as it is legally obligated to do, for the U.S. nuclear expansion to proceed." Echoing the Domenici bill, the GNEP strategy released Jan. 10 notes that "once the nuclear fuel recycling center is approved to accept spent fuel, shipments of (spent) fuel could begin from utilities, which would be a significant step in providing confidence in our nation's ability to meet its nuclear waste management responsibilities." Asked by MSNBC.com if such shipments could lead to a GNEP site becoming a nuclear waste dump if plans for a "recycling reactor" don't pan out, Spurgeon said no. Not a 'de facto permanent repository' "We're not talking about interim storage, that would have it morph into a de facto permanent repository," he said during a conference call to unveil the strategy document. And he pledged the Energy Department would seek licensing from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for its projects, even if not legally required to do so. Such discussion has led some anti-nuclear activists in Piketon to charge that GNEP is a "secret plan" by the Energy Department to turn the old Piketon plant into "a giant dump for commercial spent fuel," breaking the Yucca logjam and allowing more nuclear reactors to be built. But the Southern Ohio Neighbors Group will fight the plan regardless, said Geoffrey Sea, a member of the group and a neighbor of the Piketon site. Sea called it "an abomination to even consider this place" for GNEP projects for a number of cultural and environmental reasons and confidently predicted the project will never happen. "It's very clear that the new Congress is going to kill GNEP," he said. But Simonton, a Piketon civic leader, said his group would not advocate anything that is unsafe. "The true community leaders understand that taking a look at something makes sense," he said. "Finding out more information is never a harmful process as far as we're concerned." Originally published January 28, 2007 Copyright ©2007 Chillicothe Gazette ***************************************************************** 33 49abcnews.com: Wanted: nuclear power - 49 News: ABC Topeka Story by Gena Terlizzi (Contact) 6:39 p.m. Friday, January 26, 2007 â€We think that would be good for the state of Kansas and certainly good for Coffey County,†explained Whitney Damron, who spoke on behalf of the Coffey County Board of Commissioners. They're in favor of bringing more nuclear power to their area, and they say a 10 year property tax exemption could help make that happen. The popularity of nuclear power is growing around the world, but that growth has been stunted on U.S. soil. “According to the Nuclear Energy institute, in January of this year there were 29 nuclear power plants under construction around the world, none in the United States,†Damron explained. HB 2038 The full text of House Bill 2038 in printable PDF is available . Proponents of the plan say the new generation of nuclear plants for this country have not been built. That means a lot is unknown. And in business unknown equals risk. Supporters say that's why the industry needs some monetary motivation in the form of a tax break. "The passage of this bill will put Kansas in a better position,†said Phil Wages, with the Kansas Electric Power Cooperative. But not everyone agrees. “I represent the Kansas chapter of the Sierra Club. I have come today to speak in opposition,†explained Tom Thompson. Wolf Creek News Thompson says in all the rush to bring business to Kansas, lawmakers are losing sight of the bigger picture. “Nuclear power is controversial and one of the most expensive ways to meet the energy needs of the rate payers,†Thompson added. He also believes before throwing money at power companies, lawmakers should consider all the options. “Today there are other things than can be done that are far more effective and far cheaper,†he added. And he hopes Kansas can avoid jumping on the glowing bandwagon of the nuclear power craze that's sweeping the world. ***************************************************************** 34 LJWorld.com: Wanted: nuclear power | By Gena Terlizzi (Contact) Friday, January 26, 2007 LJWorld.com video [More nuclear power is what lawmakers want for the Sunflower State. ] More nuclear power is what lawmakers want for the Sunflower State. Watch » --> â€We think that would be good for the state of Kansas and certainly good for Coffey County,†explained Whitney Damron, who spoke on behalf of the Coffey County Board of Commissioners. They're in favor of bringing more nuclear power to their area, and they say a 10 year property tax exemption could help make that happen. The popularity of nuclear power is growing around the world, but that growth has been stunted on U.S. soil. “According to the Nuclear Energy institute, in January of this year there were 29 nuclear power plants under construction around the world, none in the United States,†Damron explained. Proponents of the plan say the new generation of nuclear plants for this country have not been built. That means a lot is unknown. And in business unknown equals risk. Supporters say that's why the industry needs some monetary motivation in the form of a tax break. "The passage of this bill will put Kansas in a better position,†Phil Wages, with the Kansas Electric Power Cooperative. But not everyone agrees. “I represent the Kansas chapter of the Sierra Club. I have come today to speak in opposition,†explained Tom Thompson. Thompson says in all the rush to bring business to Kansas, lawmakers are losing sight of the bigger picture. “Nuclear power is controversial and one of the most expensive ways to meet the energy needs of the rate payers,†Thompson added. He also believes before throwing money at power companies, lawmakers should consider all the options. “Today there are other things than can be done that are far more effective and far cheaper,†he added. And he hopes Kansas can avoid jumping on the glowing bandwagon of the nuclear power craze that's sweeping the world. #comments Journal-World. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 35 LJWorld.com: Bill would make it easier to expand nuclear energy The Lawrence Journal-World By Scott Rothschild (Contact) Saturday, January 27, 2007 Topeka — A House committee Friday approved a bill that its supporters said would make it easier to expand nuclear energy in Kansas. “Whether you like it or not, nuclear energy has to be part of our discussions,†said state Rep. Annie Kuether, of Topeka, the ranking Democrat on the House Energy and Utilities Committee. State Rep. Peggy Mast, R-Emporia, supported the legislation, saying, “nuclear energy is the cleanest and most efficient form of fuel we have.†House Bill 2038 would exempt from property taxes expansion of the Wolf Creek nuclear plant near Burlington, or construction of a new plant adjacent to the existing one. It also would ease siting restrictions if the expansion is at the current facility. Rep. Tom Sloan, R-Lawrence, said the current area of the plant, which was completed in 1985, was made to accommodate future expansion. Utilities have said there are no plans to build a new plant. But legislators said with increasing problems associated with climate-changing fossil fuels, nuclear energy is becoming more attractive. “Bottom line is, if we are going to get clean energy, we need to increase nuclear power,†said Rep. Don Myers, R-Derby. Rep. Josh Svaty, D-Ellsworth, spoke against the proposal, saying that future nuclear capacity will be built with or without tax incentives. “We are going to give away everything, including the kitchen sink in tax breaks,†he said. But the measure was recommended for approval on a voice vote and will next go to the full House for consideration. © Copyright2007 The Lawrence Journal-World. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 36 Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Global warming joins nukes as frightening indicators JS Online: Closer to midnight By ROBERT WEITZEL Posted: Jan. 27, 2007 [80210] Doomsday Nearing? My father's concrete-block barbeque pit was located barely 10 steps from our back door, on the site originally intended for the family fallout shelter. President Kennedy and Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev had just signed the first Nuclear Test Ban Treaty and the Doomsday Clock had been pushed back five minutes to 12 minutes to midnight. The Doomsday Clock first appeared on the cover of The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists in 1947, two years after Hiroshima and Nagasaki, with its hands set at seven minutes to midnight. It was designed to symbolize the urgency of the nuclear dangers facing the world, with midnight serving as the figurative end of civilization. From 1947 to 2007, it has been adjusted 18 times, moving as close to two minutes before midnight in 1953 and as far away as 17 minutes to midnight in 1991. • My father's barbeque pit was a substantially built structure, as I imagined the shelter would have been had it been completed. My dad, like the 200,000 other dads who built backyard fallout shelters in the first two decades of the Cold War, believed it was the only way to keep his family safe, unlike the generals and the CEOs of the U.S. military-industrial complex who knew that the efficacy of such a shelter was its ability to make nuclear war imaginable by the illusion of survivability. Growing up in the shadow of a mushroom cloud, one took cold comfort in knowing that the continuance of the human race hinged on the Strangelovian doctrine of mutual assured destruction. The so-called logic behind MAD was either the nadir of Cold War reasoning or its zenith. Regardless, it was calculatedly simple. If both the United States and the Soviet Union have the ability to annihilate the other, while at the same time, an inability to defend against an all-out nuclear attack, it would be insanity to shoot first. It was 12 minutes to midnight. • By 1984, a tool shed had replaced the barbeque pit in our backyard and President Reagan had begun constructing a continent-sized bomb shelter known as the Strategic Defense Initiative. It was to be a space-based anti-ballistic missile shield that used laser weapons to destroy incoming nuclear warheads. Two decades and $70 billion later, it is still as fictional as its "Star Wars" namesake. But like backyard fallout shelters, Reagan's SDI made surviving nuclear war once again imaginable, which allowed for the possibility of winning with a first strike against the "Evil Empire." This strategy undermined the fail-safe "logic" of mutually assured deterrance. It was 3 minutes to midnight. • On an azure morning in September 2001, America was attacked by terrorists armed with box cutters and an incorruptible belief in eternity. Parents were once again told they could protect their families by turning their homes into fallout shelters using damp towels and plastic wrap and duct tape. In March 2002, the Los Angeles Times published excerpts from the Bush administration's secret Nuclear Posture Review, which is predicated on pre-emptive and preventive nuclear strikes. It also revealed that the Pentagon was ordered to develop a first-strike nuclear strategy for use against the Axis of Evil (Iran, Iraq, North Korea) and our current ally, the former Evil Empire, Russia. More apocalyptic yet, is the NPR's assertion that "we will not hesitate to act alone . . . to exercise our right of self-defense by acting pre-emptively." Exactly one year later, the Bush administration kept that promise. It was 7 minutes to midnight. • On Jan. 17, The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, the keepers of the Doomsday Clock, moved the clock forward two minutes, to five minutes before midnight, primarily because of the continued threat of 27,000 nuclear weapons in eight countries, 2,000 of which are on hair trigger alert and ready for launch. And, for the first time, it also cited "the destruction of human habitats from climate change." According to the the scientists who determine where the clock will be set, "Not since the first atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki has the world faced such perilous choices." The nuclear ambitions of Iran coupled with the United States and Israel's first strike policy and willingness to include tactical nuclear weapons in their battle plan to keep Iran from acquiring nuclear technology is pushing the world to the "brink of a second nuclear age." And again, in what some call the Long War on terror, as in the Cold War, Pentagon planners are attempting to make a nuclear confrontation imaginable with the illusion of survivability. But this time, it is not shelters they are selling. It is scale. They are planning to use only small nuclear bombs from now on . . . a whole lot of them. The Pentagon's 2005 "Doctrine for Joint Nuclear Operations" calls for "integrating conventional and nuclear attacks." This doctrine maintains that the use of tactical nuclear weapons on the battlefield will ensure minimal collateral damage," thereby making their use "safe for the surrounding civilian population." If this doctrine strikes you as more insane than MAD, you are perfectly sane. It is 5 minutes to midnight. • Given the Bush administration's reckless disregard for the global consequences of its ideological juggernaut, American children are no less likely to grow up in the shadow of a mushroom cloud than were their parents and grandparents. They deserve something better. If parents are not willing to demand - and accept - no less than "something better" from their president and his generals, they would be well-advised to pass on to their children the warning they received from Bert the Turtle back in the 1950s: "When the bomb hits, you will notice a bright flash. That's your cue to DUCK and COVER!" All the children of the world deserve something better. Robert Weitzel is a Middleton writer. From the Jan. 28, 2007 editions of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel 2005, Journal Sentinel Inc. All rights reserved. | ***************************************************************** 37 Boston Globe: Risks, benefits of Plymouth's Pilgrim nuclear power plant debated at NRC forum - By Robert Knox, Globe Correspondent | January 28, 2007 At a public forum Wednesday in Plymouth, critics told federal regulators that the Pilgrim nuclear power plant poses health and safety risks that must be considered in deciding whether to let the plant operate an additional 20 years. Supporters emphasized what they called the important role Pilgrim plays in meeting the region's energy needs. "I feel in the long run nuclear fission-based power is not the answer," said Lilias Cingolani of Kingston. After many years of "living across the bay" from Pilgrim, Cingolani said, "common sense tells me it's time to start to phase out nuclear power in favor of sustainable energy sources." Beyond security concerns, critics of relicensing also contended that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission 's environmental impact study minimizes the health risks of radioactive releases from the plant. A draft of the study -- prepared by NRC professional staff and reviewed by a private consultant -- concluded that environmental impacts from Pilgrim were minimal, and that replacing Pilgrim's energy by alternate means such as coal-burning electric generations would be much worse for the environment. The study said the only impacts that rose to the level of "moderate" were on winter flounder and rainbow smelt. It also said warm water released by Pilgrim's cooling system would have a "small to moderate" effect on other maritime species. Pine duBois of the Kingston-based Jones River Watershed Association said local fisheries were in "severe decline" and that Pilgrim needs to modify its water intake structure to reduce the number of flounder, smelt, and other fish it kills. DuBois also said the plant's "continued daily discharge of superheated water" is causing a general rise in the bay's temperature and needs attention. "We can't delay that attention." But Ben Morgan , a Chatham fish hatchery owner, backed a mitigation effort by Pilgrim. He said an ongoing program to release hatchery-spawned flounder into the bay is succeeding in replacing lost winter flounder. Supporters of relicensing praised Pilgrim's "clean, low-cost reliable energy," in the words of Joyce McMahon , spokeswoman for the Massachusetts Affordable Reliable Electricity Alliance , and contended that Pilgrim's continued operation was necessary to meet the region's growing energy needs. Peter Forman , president of the South Shore Chamber of Commerce and a former state legislator, described Pilgrim "as an economic pillar for the South Shore" in a statement released by McMahon. Forman said that without Pilgrim, the high cost of energy would discourage investment in the region. Supporters also praised Pilgrim's safety record. Arthur Gast , a former member of the Plymouth Nuclear Matters Committee , said Pilgrim operates "quietly and safely" and has regularly received NRC's highest safety rating in annual safety reviews. But Rebecca Chin of Duxbury's Nuclear Matters Advisory Committee , a town-appointed panel, said NRC staff "mischaracterized" a study of increased cancer incidences in Southeast Massachusetts published by the state Department of Public Health in 1990 . Chin said more recent studies established the increased risks of an aging population's susceptibility to radiation. In its environmental impact statement, NRC staff cited the conclusions of a peer review board that evaluated the state's cancer study and concluded there was no causal relationship between Pilgrim and area cancer rates. NRC staff said they will accept written comments from the public on the environmental study e-mailed to PilgrimEIS@nrc.govuntil Feb. 28 . The final report is due in July . The NRC will be in Plymouth again Tuesday to present the results of a safety inspection of Pilgrim. The public meeting takes place at 6:30 p.m. at the Hilton Garden Inn at 4 Home Depot Drive , off Long Pond Road . Robert Knox can be contacted at rc.knox@gmail.com. [ /] © Copyright 2007 Globe Newspaper Company. More: ***************************************************************** 38 JS Online: Another sorry sign: Global warming and climate change By Douglas Savage Posted: Jan. 27, 2007 There was considerable buzz in environmental circles about a possible about-face on climate change in President Bush's State of the Union address Tuesday. Where: UWM Union Ballroom, 2200 E. Kenwood. Blvd., Milwaukee When: Registration, 6:30 to 7 p.m.; program, 7 to 8 p.m. How much: $8 per lecture for non-members; area students free with ID; discounted admission for IWA members and UWM faculty and staff To register: Online at or (414) 229-3220 Those hoping Bush had undergone a road to Damascus (or in this case, Kyoto) conversion on global warming were disappointed. His acknowledgements of climate change as a "serious challenge," coupled with his call for a 20% reduction in gasoline usage and better fuel economy standards were certainly greener than usual rhetoric. However, little was said about the tough policy decisions necessary to get us there. Meanwhile, the new Democratic congressional leadership is promising to boost global warming to the top of the legislative agenda. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has called for a special committee to hold hearings and recommend legislation. The move has angered powerful members of her own party, including Energy and Commerce Committee Chair John Dingell (D-Mich.), the House's longest-serving member and a staunch supporter of the auto industry. Dingell recently vowed that the new committee "won't prosper if I have anything to say about it." Three competing Senate climate change plans have also been introduced. The least aggressive, and likely the most politically viable, is sponsored by a trio of past and present presidential hopefuls: John McCain (R-Ariz.), Barack Obama (D-Ill.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.). Critics fault the bill for loopholes larger than the hole in the ozone layer. For example, carbon emissions caps could be eased if, in the language of the bill, "their impact on the economy were deemed too severe." As the policy debate continues on the national level, alarms raised by the scientific community have become more urgent. For example, in its current edition, The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists advanced the hands of its iconic Doomsday Clock two minutes, from seven to five minutes before midnight, reflecting the perils of both nuclear weapons and, for the first time, global climate change. Weary of waiting for leadership from Washington, cities and states across the United States are adopting their own plans. Recently, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett signed the U.S. Mayors Climate Protection Agreement, joining over 350 mayors representing 53 million people in communities across the nation. Side-stepping the Bush administration's rejection of the Kyoto Protocol, cities signing the agreement set a goal of meeting or beating the Kyoto targets for reducing carbon emissions. Local climate change initiatives have become an international movement. Last August, former President Bill Clinton launched the Clinton Climate Initiative, a consortium of some of the world's largest cities, formed to bargain for cheaper energy-efficient products and share ideas on cutting greenhouse gas emissions. In September, the Milwaukee Common Council voted to join Local Governments for Sustainability, a worldwide network of over 500 local governments that have made a formal commitment to climate protection. Among state governments, California has taken the lead in passing enforceable climate change legislation. Its new auto emissions standards require a 30% reduction by 2016. Ten other states have committed to adopting these standards if they survive a legal challenge by automakers. California's landmark Global Warming Solutions Act signed by Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger last fall caps greenhouse gas emissions statewide at 1990 levels by 2020, a 25% reduction. It also enables the creation of a program that allows greenhouse gas producers to buy and sell emissions permits. Such "cap and trade" systems establish a limit on the level of emissions a particular group of polluters, such as electrical utilities, can produce. These caps are then divided into individual permits. Companies can then legally emit only as much as they have permits for. If they need more, they must buy additional permits from companies that emit less and do not use their full allocation. Like many local initiatives, California's efforts also have an international component. Last July, Schwarzenegger signed a climate change agreement with British Prime Minister Tony Blair. The agreement may eventually allow California to participate in a cap and trade system with the European Union. Commenting on this highly unusual pact between a U.S. state and a sovereign nation, Schwarzenegger said, "We see that there is not great leadership from the federal government when it comes to protecting the environment, so this is why we as a state move forward with it." Critics of local action on climate change warn that we may be weaving a growth-inhibiting, industry-unfriendly patchwork of state-by-state regulation. Until we have coherent and enforceable national legislation, however, our local and state officials would do well to compare notes with their colleagues across the country. It is, after all, getting closer to midnight. Douglas Savage is assistant director of the Institute of World Affairs at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. From the Jan. 28, 2007 editions of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel , Journal Sentinel Inc. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 39 AFP: Russia-India summit ends with pomp but few deals by Stephen Boykewich Sat Jan 27, 4:14 AM ET NEW DELHI (AFP) - Russian President Vladimir Putin" /> wrapped up a two-day summit here that was marked by much pomp but little substance, as both sides said commercial ties should be much greater. Putin's visit, together with a raft of Russian ministers and businessmen, was meant to breathe new life into a Cold War-era friendship based on billions of dollars in arms deals. But the traditional strong point of bilateral relations has shifted in recent years as India looks increasingly to the United States and other Western countries for its huge military needs. Putin's trip, which culminated Friday in an elaborate Republic Day parade exhibiting India's largely Russian-made military might, brought a 250-million-dollar contract for joint production of jet engines. But other deals were few and far between. On the key area of energy cooperation, India's state-run Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) and Russian state oil giant Rosneft agreed to jointly bid for exploration and refining projects in India, Russia and other countries. ONGC and Rosneft said in a joint statement they would build on their existing partnership in Russia's vast Sakhalin-1 oil and gas field. But ONGC had been hoping for a more substantial piece of Russia's energy pie, such as a 20 percent stake in the Sakhalin-3 field or a share in the vast Vankor field in eastern Siberia. Currently, energy-starved India's only major stake in Russia's resource wealth is 20 percent of Sakhalin-1, which delivered its first shipments of oil to India in December. In the much-touted field of nuclear cooperation, Russia promised to build four more nuclear reactors for a flagship nuclear plant it is building in Kudankulam in southern Tamil Nadu -- a state that already has two 1,000-megawatt Russian reactors. Putin also pledged to co-operate in building atomic energy stations "at new locations in the Indian republic." Russia is looking for a head start in the international race to supply the Indian nuclear energy market after the passage last year of a landmark US-Indian deal allowing New Delhi access to civilian nuclear technology after decades of isolation. But no contracts with India can be signed before the Indo-US agreement is approved by the 45-nation Nuclear Suppliers Group, which regulates the global nuclear energy trade. And beyond the militarized spectacle of Friday's parade, both sides expressed disappointment that business between the two was lagging. "Both of us agree that our economic relationship is far below what is consistent with the demands of our strong strategic partnership and the growth profiles", Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said Thursday. Meeting with Indian business leaders, Putin also said bilateral trade should be growing faster, setting a target of 30 percent growth per year and expressing his hope that turnover would triple to 10 billion dollars by 2010. Putin said bilateral trade had jumped an estimated 20 percent to 3.8 billion dollars in 2006, though minutes later, Habil Khorakiwala, president of Indian business association FICCI, put the number at just 2.75 billion. "Whether it's 10 percent or 20 percent or 30 percent doesn't matter. The main thing is that three billion dollars is still a tiny number for these two countries," an Indian official told AFP. Khorakiwala posed a question that seemed to linger as the summit closed. "We have to seek an answer to the question why, despite strong political ties between two time-tested friends, bilateral trade and business ties remain low," he said. Copyright © 2007 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 40 Scotsman.com: Opinion - Energy crisis Sun 28 Jan 2007 THE serious accident we report today at Longannet power station, which will have to be converted from coal to gas, is a wake-up call on energy policy. Parliament will have to pass emergency legislation on Tuesday to authorise the transformation; but the real emergency is not legislative. With Hunterston B also out of action, only mild weather has prevented the need for phased power cuts across Scotland. February can be a bitter month, so fingers will stay crossed for six weeks yet. The reality of life in Scotland today is that we can no longer take energy for granted. Elsewhere in this newspaper, Ian Marchant, chief executive of Scottish and Southern Energy, warns against an over-reliance on coal and oil and challenges every Scot to cut energy wastage. Marchant, speaking at a symposium called by Tom Hunter, made a strong case for the development of renewable energy. But the situation at Longannet highlights the need for a diverse energy policy. Renewables can make a useful contribution, but we must also look at the emotive issue of new nuclear plants. We need to plan for the future, and decisions must be made with the head, not the heart. This article: http://news.scotsman.com/opinion.cfm?id=145242007 Last updated: 28-Jan-07 01:20 GMT ***************************************************************** 41 Scotsman.com: Scotland - The generation game Sun 28 Jan 2007 ANALYSIS BRIAN WILSON IF SCOTLAND gets through its power generation crisis this weekend, the privately owned companies who now run the industry will have even more reason than usual to be grateful to the prudent people who built the formerly state-owned industry. For the Scottish power industry's two great strengths are diversity of generation sources and heavy over-capacity. And the lesson of this weekend's events is that only a fool would throw away either. There are very few nations that could lose two power stations with an output equivalent to half their normal consumption and still keep the lights on. With Hunterston B and Longannet down, Scotland is dependent on Peterhead, which is mainly gas-fired, Cockenzie, which is coal-fired, Torness nuclear station, a little bit of wind power and - that greatest of gifts from the past - a full gigawatt of hydro-electric power, which is normally only used to help meet peak demands. If that combination fails - as it just might if there was either a cold snap or another piece of bad luck - we can also turn to the inter-connnector with England. Normally, this is used to sell electricity to the rest of the country, but in an emergency the flow could be put into reverse if circumstances permitted. All the pressure within a market-based system is to squeeze out surplus capacity. But that is an extremely short-sighted and risky policy. Equally, those who say "close down nuclear" or any other form of generation for political reasons fail to take account of the security we enjoy from both over-capacity and diversity. On this occasion, the two stations that have created the problem - Longannet and Hunterston B - run on coal and nuclear power respectively. At other times, the unexpected events could involve the gas supply, power line failure affecting renewables from peripheral areas or any one of a host of other events just as unpredictable as the collapse of a conveyor belt at Longannet. By far the most effective way of hedging our bets is to refuse - in the face of all political and commercial pressures - to put too many of Scotland's gigawatts into too few baskets. Renewables, gas, coal, nuclear - we need them all. • Brian Wilson was energy minister at the Department of Trade & Industry, 2001-2003 This article: http://news.scotsman.com/scotland.cfm?id=145332007 Last updated: 28-Jan-07 01:20 GMT Comments ***************************************************************** 42 Scotsman.com: Scotland - Scotland running on empty Sun 28 Jan 2007 EDDIE BARNES AND MURDO MACLEOD IT IS a mostly wealthy part of the world's fourth-largest economy, enjoying one of the longest unbroken spells of prosperity for several decades. So how, in the early years of the 21st century, did Scotland come so close this weekend to watching as the lights went out? The problems began last September when safety checks at the Hunterston B power station in Ayrshire revealed higher-than-expected levels of cracking in the station's boiler tubes. It has been shut ever since, leaving Scotland's power supply dangerously exposed. The cutbacks prompted warnings prior to the winter that an unusually cold snap could see rationing for industries. However, the mostly warm winter looked to have ensured the grid would get through. But that all changed last weekend when the accident at Longannet caused havoc. Usually a net exporter of energy, Scotland has suddenly been faced with a potential shortage. Only a combination of more warm weather and the back-stop of hydro power appears to have staved off disaster. These were the circumstances of a particular crisis. But behind this, experts warn, lies a wider, more systemic, problem which will only exacerbate our energy worries in future. Currently, Scotland's energy needs still largely rely on fossil fuels. Even by 2010, 45% of our energy will come from oil, coal and gas. Nuclear will provide a quarter, as will wind. The remaining 5% will come from hydro power. However, while Scotland's energy needs will go up (by as much as 50% over the next 40 years), the supply of fossil fuels will fall. A report by the Royal Society of Edinburgh recently concluded that, by 2020, the country will be largely dependent on imported gas, much of it from politically unstable countries. At the same time, the UK government is committed to reducing its carbon emissions by 60% by 2050. So how will all this sit together? The main solution proposed has been a massive increase in renewables. Scottish ministers are gung-ho about the potential they have on their hands. But their UK counterparts are more wary. They insist that renewables alone will fail to properly meet consumer demand. Thus, the question of nuclear power remains open. Tony Blair has declared himself in favour of a new generation of stations, however, in Scotland, the future of nuclear energy remains uncertain. And with Scottish ministers having power over planning, they may be able to hold off Westminster demands for new stations. This weekend's revelations have shown just how fragile the country's electricity system really is - and how close we are on a daily basis to its complete breakdown. This article: http://news.scotsman.com/scotland.cfm?id=145742007 Last updated: 28-Jan-07 01:20 GMT ***************************************************************** 43 UPI: Scotland attempting to avoid energy crisis United Press International - NewsTrack - 1/28/2007 2:58:00 PM -0500 EDINBURGH, Scotland, Jan. 28 (UPI) -- Scottish officials are grappling with a potential energy crisis after an industrial accident forced one of the nation's top electricity plants off-line. The Scotsman reported that after a key conveyor belt broke at the Longannet power station in Fife, Scottish officials are now considering legislation to allow the coal plant to also burn gas to avoid a looming energy crisis. Government officials are proposing that emergency legislation be pushed through the Scottish Parliament to avoid future energy dilemmas. The importance of the closed Longannet station was substantially increased after the earlier shutdown of Scotland's nuclear-powered plant, Hunterston B. "In terms of generating capacity we are very much at the peak at the moment," a government insider told the newspaper. "The thing that is keeping us going is Cockenzie power station (in East Lothian) and hydro power. It's been good that it has rained so much over the last few weeks." The newspaper said another option being considered to avoid an energy crisis is to cut off electrical power to certain regions for a limited period of time. © Copyright 2007 United Press International, Inc. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 44 Moscow Times: Uranium May Be From Novosibirsk Monday, January 29, 2007 / Updated Moscow Time Monday, January 29, 2007. Page 3. Uranium May Be From Novosibirsk By Margarita Antidze Reuters TBILISI, Georgia -- A Russian arrested on suspicion of smuggling weapons-grade uranium into Georgia in his pockets may have obtained it in the Siberian city of Novosibirsk. The Georgian authorities say they have not established the origin of the uranium, but a document seen Friday indicated that the trail could lead to Russia's Siberian heartland, home to a large number of nuclear facilities and vast stockpiles of radioactive material. Georgia said Thursday that it had arrested Russian citizen Oleg Khinsagov in a sting operation last year after he entered the country and tried to sell highly enriched uranium to agents posing as Islamist militants. But the case has revived worries about the safety of material left over from the Soviet Union. Proliferation experts had thought the danger of it falling into the wrong hands had declined with tighter security since the chaotic 1990s. The document, marked confidential, appeared to be a fax sent by Russia's Federal Security Service to the Georgian Interior Ministry in response to a Georgian request for help in investigating the smuggling case. "At the current time we are conducting an investigation to study [Khinsagov's and other suspects'] links with regard to their possible involvement in the illegal trade in radioactive materials," the document said. "We are also conducting checks into Khinsagov's testimony about his possible acquisition of the uranium in the town of Novosibirsk," said the document, dated May 2006. It contained no further evidence of a direct link to Novosibirsk. It said Khinsagov had booked flights to two nearby cities in 2000. According to the document, the uranium-235 had not undergone processing for more than 10 years. That indicated it dated back to a period in the 1990s when international experts say security at Russian nuclear facilities was lax. A Georgian Interior Ministry official who declined to give his name said the document was genuine, including the reference to Novosibirsk. A spokesman for the FSB, when asked about the document Friday, declined immediate comment. Khinsagov was arrested by Georgian agents with 100 grams of highly enriched uranium-235 that he carried in plastic bags in his pockets. Highly enriched uranium, in sufficient quantities, can be used to make a bomb. The United Nations' nuclear watchdog said any smuggling of the material was a matter of "very high concern." In Moscow, analysts and officials said they believed Georgia's decision to go public with the incident a year after Khinsagov's arrest was a public relations ploy to discredit Russia. "On the facts I have I can say that this is a provocative act," Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in Vladivostok. He said Russia was ready to cooperate with Tbilisi on the case. Georgia's pro-Western leadership is locked in a bitter dispute with Moscow that broke out last year when Tbilisi expelled four Russian army officers it accused of spying. "The attempt by Georgia to earn some political mileage from this case ... will provoke serious irritation," said Anton Khlopkov, deputy director of the Center for Policy Studies. Khlopkov, a respected expert on nuclear proliferation, said: "I would not say the security of nuclear materials in Russia is [a matter] of concern. I would say the level of security is rather high." Copyright 2006. The Moscow Times. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 45 Guardian Unlimited: Russian City May Be Source for Uranium From the Associated Press [UP] Sunday January 28, 2007 1:46 AM By JIM HEINTZ Associated Press Writer MOSCOW (AP) - Novosibirsk is located in the depths of Siberia, but despite the remoteness it's one of Russia's main areas for nuclear activity and a cause of concern for those worried about nuclear materials falling into terrorists' hands. The concerns about Russia's third-largest city rose to the forefront this week after officials in the former Soviet republic of Georgia announced the arrest of a Russian man for allegedly trying to sell weapons-grade uranium to an undercover agent. The man, who was arrested last year, initially told his interrogators the uranium came from Novosibirsk, 1,600 miles east of Moscow, Georgian Interior Ministry spokesman Shota Utiashvili told The Associated Press on Saturday. He later recanted his statement, but Georgian authorities sent a letter to Russia's Federal Security Service inquiring about the possible link to Novosibirsk, Utiashvili said. The agency declined to comment Saturday. A top Russian science official has said the sample of the alleged contraband uranium provided by Georgia was too small for analysis that could determine its origin. The episode appeared to cast doubt on Russia's ability to halt the black-market trade in nuclear materials and renewed concern about security at Russia's array of nuclear facilities. The Novosibirsk Chemical Concentrates Plant is one of Russia's main facilities for producing enriched uranium both for use in nuclear reactors and in the higher concentration that could be used to make an atomic bomb. In addition, highly enriched uranium has been shipped into Novosibirsk in recent years from former Soviet bloc countries, including Poland and Romania. Under a program backed by the International Atomic Energy Agency, the uranium is to be blended down into lower concentrations. The U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration funded a program to improve security at the Novosibirsk plant as part of a wider initiative to boost security at facilities throughout Russia. The NNSA says the Novosibirsk plant completed its upgrade in late 2004. However, security apparently was lax in Novosibirsk for years before that. In 2002, the head of the agency that was then responsible for security at nuclear facilities admitted that weapons-grade nuclear material had disappeared from Russian facilities. ``Most often, these instances are connected with factories preparing fuel'' including Novosibirsk's, the official, Yuri Vishnyevsky, said at the time. Novosibirsk was also the site of the 1997 arrest of two men who officials said intended to smuggle some 11 pounds of enriched uranium to Pakistan or China. That uranium reportedly was stolen from a plant in the former Soviet republic of Kazakhstan. Security at Russia's nuclear facilities was seen as deteriorating rapidly in the early years after the collapse of the Soviet Union, when economic hardships made black-market activities increasingly widespread and as political chaos left official lines of command and supervision shaky. The U.S.-based organization Nuclear Threat Initiative said in a report last year that Russia remains the prime country of concern for contraband nuclear material. ``Russia has the world's largest stockpiles of both nuclear weapons and the materials to make them, scattered among hundreds of buildings and bunkers at scores of sites. Over the past 15 years security for those stockpiles has improved from poor to moderate, but there remain immense threats those security systems must confront,'' the NTI said. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 46 IHT: Russian nuclear smuggler told investigators uranium came from Russia: Georgian official - International Herald Tribune Associated Press Published: January 27, 2007 TBILISI, Georgia: A Russian citizen who allegedly tried to sell highly enriched uranium to agents in ex-Soviet Georgia told investigators in initial questioning that the material came from the Russian city of Novosibirsk, a Georgian official said Saturday. Georgia announced this week that it had arrested and jailed a Russian man, Oleg Khinsagov, last year for trying to sell a small amount of weapons-grade uranium to an agent posing as a rich foreign buyer. The episode appeared to cast doubt on Russia's ability to halt the black-market trade in nuclear materials and renewed concern about security at Russia's array of nuclear facilities. But Russian experts and officials accused Georgia of trying to achieve political aims at a time of strained relations between the two countries. "During one his first questionings, Oleg Khinsagov said that he had purchased the uranium in Novosibirsk. But he later took back his evidence and said that he acquired the substance from an unidentified person," Georgian Interior Ministry official Shota Utiashvili told The Associated Press. The official said Georgian authorities sent a letter of inquiry concerning the possible link to Novosibirsk to Russia's Federal Security Service, or FSB. The agency declined to comment Saturday. The Siberian city has a number of nuclear fuel producing and processing plants, including those that handle weapons-grade material. Georgia has accused Russia of a lack of cooperation in the investigation, but Moscow countered that Georgian authorities provided Russian experts with only a tiny sample that was too small to establish its origin. Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov on Friday called the announcement of the foiled nuclear smuggling a "provocation." The incident has aggravated already-high tensions between Russia and U.S.-allied Georgia. Both countries have been at odds for years over the status of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, two renegade regions of Georgia seeking either independence or absorption into Russia. Georgian officials say their agent made contact with the man selling contraband uranium in South Ossetia, which is widely seen as a regional epicenter for smuggling. Georgia's Foreign Ministry said the uranium sting highlighted the need for international observer missions in both regions, a proposal that Tbilisi has been pushing in recent months. Russia has peacekeepers in both regions, which have been under the control of unrecognized separatist governments since fighting ended in the mid-1990s. All rights reserved [IHT] ***************************************************************** 47 Pahrump Valley Times: Divine Strake comment period extended to 4th e-mailed to: dmcmurdo@pvtimes.com. Jan. 26, 2007 LAS VEGAS -- The deadline has been extended to Feb. 4 as the draft December 2006 Revised Environmental Assessment for Divine Strake was reposted due to an inadvertent omission of 10 pages. The comments are being sought for a large-scale, open-air explosive detonation at the Nevada Test Site. According to the National Nuclear Security Administration, chapters five to seven, including 10 pages of agencies and persons consulted, definition of technical terms and references, were inadvertently omitted from the document, which was released Dec. 22. As a result of this inadvertent omission, the NNSA has decided to immediately distribute the missing chapters to stakeholders who received hard copies of the document. In addition, the NNSA has removed the incomplete electronic image of the document from the NNSA Nevada Site Office Web site at www.nv.doe.gov and replaced it with an image of the complete document. The Nevada NNSA apologizes for any inconvenience this inadvertent error may have caused. To allow for the originally intended time for stakeholder review of the entire document (inclusive of the remaining pages), the deadline for submission of comments has been extended to close of business on Feb. 7. Comments can be submitted in a number of ways. Written comments can be mailed to: NNSA/NSO Divine Strake EA Comments, P.O. Box 98518, Las Vegas 89193-8518; Email: divinestrake@nv.doe.gov; fax (702) 295-0625. The updated document is also available for review at the NNSA/NSO Public Reading Room at the Frank Rogers Building, 775 East Flamingo Road, Las Vegas. For comment or questions, please e-mail webmaster@pahrumpvalleytimes.com Copyright © Pahrump Valley Times, 1997 - ***************************************************************** 48 Economic Times: Scientists develop cost-effective nuclear medicine Indiatimes> The Economic Times> News By Healthcare> Article PTI[ SUNDAY, JANUARY 28, 2007 04:49:47 PM] NEW DELHI: A new cost-effective nuclear medicine kit has been developed by Indian scientists to tackle growing number of infectious diseases in the country. The kit, which gives specific detection, location and treatment response, is superior to radiological techniques and is being sought after by foreign countries and organisations, including the International Atomic Energy Agency. "We have developed a single vial cold kit of ciprofloxacin for bacterial infection imaging called 'Diagnobact'," W Selvamurthy, Chief Controller in Research and Development in the Life Sciences and Human Resources under the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), told PTI. He said when the radioistopes is added to the cold kit, it binds to ciprofloxacin, an antibiotic, which can be injected. The kit, which was invented by A K Singh, who has its patent and worked on the project from 1997, was launched in December by Anil Kakodkar, the chairman of Department of Atomic Energy, after the Drug Controller General of India's Radiopharmaceutical Committee gave its permission for marketing in 2005. For the Institute of Nuclear Medicine and Allied Sciences (INMAS) under DRDO, who developed the kit, it was moment to feel proud when for the first time, a technology was received by Board of Radiation Isotope Technoology (BRIT) under Department of Atomic Energy. "This is for the first time they have taken any technology from outside," he said. "The radiation dose is less or equal to CT scan and is quiet safe. It is not at all harmful and each vial costs Rs 800 for Indian market. It could detect and locate any bacterial infections from any part of body, including bones to joints," Selvamurthy said. After the technique was developed, a two-year long multi-centric human trial was conducted in 20 hospitals in India, including in the PGI, Chandigarh, Jaslok and Hinduja hospitals in Mumbai and Sir Ganga Ram Hospital in Delhi. "The multi-centric trial confirmed and validated the techniques and the clinical utility of DIAGNOBACT in diagnosis of infectious lesions," Selvamurthy said. He said the medicine is effective as compared to other radiological techniques becasue it detects the metabolic changes instead of anatomical changes, which are first to occur at the site of the infection. The cold kit, contains a cocktail of various reactants, including ciprofloxacin. At the time of use, radioistope (Technetium or TC 99 m, which is a gamma emitter) is added, which is then suitable for injection into the patient," he said. TC - 99 m is one of the most largest used radioistopes in clinical imaging and has been extensivly used in research for the development of new radiopharmacy for imaging, he said. As radiolabelled ciprofloxacin distributes in different organ in the body through blood and localises in higher concentrate around the infection area, which contains the live bacteria, enabling clinicians to diagnose it, he said. This kit has a shelf life of one year, Selvamurthy said. Singh, who was last year given the Scientist of the Year prize by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh for its invention, has been awarded the process patent for it. The product patent has been filed, he said. Selvamurthy said infectious diseases are one of the largest killers in the third world countries. "The most deadly being tuberculosis. The deadly marriage between TB and HIV leads to many deaths in the country," he said. He said the uniqueness of the technology has led to various demands for its export and which would be dealt by BRIT. "We have got offers from Philippines, Singapore, Middle East, though we have not advertised about the kit. Right now, we are selling it in the domestic market," A K Kohli, Chief Executive Officer of BRIT, said. "We have plans to launch it soon and export it. Pricing is yet to be finalised for the international markets," he said. Copyright © 2007 Times Internet Limited. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 49 AP Wire: Audit questions documents used to reject sick workers' claims 01/28/2007 | Associated Press MIAMISBURG, Ohio - Poor monitoring and record-keeping could make it impossible for the federal government to assess past radiation exposure to workers at a former nuclear weapons plant, according to an independent audit. Advocates say the audit should help the workers qualify for lump-sum payments without having to prove that radiation at the Mound plant made them ill. "There are possibly significant doses here," which were missed by faulty monitoring, said Richard Miller of the Washington-based Government Accountability Project, an advocacy group. The audit, released this month, suggests several changes to the former Mound plant's site profiles, which are documents detailing how workers may have been exposed to radiation that the government has relied on in rejecting hundreds of workers' claims. Those claims would have to be reopened if the federal Advisory Board on Radiation and Worker Health revises the profiles because of the audit, said Amanda Harney, spokeswoman for the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. The board, which meets next week in Mason, will start discussions on the profiles this year, she said. If the government decides it is unable to use science to reconstruct how much radiation exposure the workers received, they would qualify for a status that allows them to collect payments and medical benefits for certain cancers. People who worked at a weapons program in Dayton before the Mound plant was opened in Miamisburg are close to approval for the status because of similar audit findings. Sanford Cohen and Associates of Vienna, Va., conducted the audit based on records reviews and interviews with 17 former workers and other experts on the site, about 35 miles north of Cincinnati. It was written in July. The Labor Department has paid 197 claims out of 1,465 filed by 719 former Mound workers. About 88 percent have been processed based on information in the site profiles, and 70 percent of those claims have been denied. The audit detailed several problems with the site profiles. Among them: _ Workers were not monitored properly for possible exposures to certain toxic metals and a form of plutonium that enters the lungs and stays hidden for a long time when it is heated at very high temperatures. "Thus, significant unknown exposures may have occurred and remained undetected for months." But monitoring was discontinued on radiation workers as soon as they were moved to other projects, and administrative and support staff who worked near the substances weren't monitored at all. _ The document doesn't take into account possible exposure to high levels of radon, which causes lung cancer. _ Officials at Mound often ignored or didn't record high radiation doses recorded on film badges worn by employees because they assumed the workers put the badges directly near radiation sources so they would be moved off of hazardous assignments. _ Other monitoring procedures were inadequate and would have led to underreporting or completely missing doses of radiation. _ Several worker records are inaccessible because they were buried in a radioactive waste landfill at Los Alamos, N.M. Sherrie Neff was among the support staff, such as security and maintenance workers, whom the audit says weren't monitored. She helped clean up Mound buildings in the 1990s to prepare the plant for closure. The Germantown woman has lost a breast, a leg and a lung to cancer, and doctors recently discovered more cancer in her chest. She remained in critical condition Sunday at the Ohio State University Medical Center in Columbus. Federal officials turned down her compensation claim based on the site profile. The letter arrived Jan. 18, two days after the audit was posed on the NIOSH Web site. "She won awards, all kinds of plaques; anywhere they wanted her to work, she'd go," said her husband, Bob. "She's paying for it with her life right now." On the Net: Audit report: http://www.cdc.gov/niosh/ocas/pdfs/abrwh/scarpts/mound.pdf Information from: Dayton Daily News, http://www.daytondailynews.com ***************************************************************** 50 Spectrum: Life after the blast www.thespectrum.com -The Spectrum, St. George, UT Sunday, January 28, 2007 By SCOTT DAVID JOHNSON ST. GEORGE - A gray snow, the fallout was in Donald Moore's hair and on his winter clothes. As the other workers scrambled to evacuate, his nose began to bleed. He had inhaled a hot particle, and in the half-hour he spent in the bathroom, clotting what would become a hole in his nasal passage, he missed the last bus out of Area 12. It was the morning of Dec. 18, 1970, and Moore, then a 40-year-old general electrician at the Nevada Test Site, had just witnessed Baneberry. "I told my wife that I was probably a walking dead man," he wrote in a letter to The Spectrum &Daily News some 36 years later. "I had this mental strain of wondering how long it would take before this atomic bomb would kill me." An underground nuclear test, officially 10 kilotons, Baneberry had vented above-ground about 9,000 feet away, Moore said - an accident that spread radiation throughout the region, across the United States and, according to some reports, into Canada. Safety specialists ran Geiger counters over the men as they left the site, Moore said. Their contamination pegged the meter. They were told to incinerate their clothing - Moore burned his expensive winter boots, jeans and coat - and to take cold showers three times a day for two weeks. Today the 76-year-old is house-bound. His medical and employment records, dating back to the early 1960s, are laid out across his dining room table in neat stacks. A photograph of Baneberry hangs on his living room wall. "I'm one of the lucky ones," he says. "I've kept such good records." Moore, a Navy veteran of World War II, the Korean War and the Vietnam War, is seeking compensation for his exposure to radiation during the Cold War on three test ranges - two in Nevada, one on Johnston Island in the Pacific. "You know when the body is deteriorating," he says. "I can feel it." Moore has had five lesions removed from his scalp, four of them squamous cell carcinoma, and he teeters on the edge of end-stage kidney failure. He suffers from diseases of the heart, blood and lungs. Sleep apnea makes his nights restless. The hole seared by that hot particle 36 years ago has grown. "It has to be from all that fallout," he says. As an on-site participant, Moore stands a better chance of payment than the average downwinder, but the three-year effort to prove his case has taken a toll on him and his wife, Mary. "I've had to jump through so many hoops on this stuff. It's unbelievable what you have to go through," he says. "They leave it up to us to prove it. They don't give us any of the information." Moore says he loves his country but is angry at the loss of his retirement years. Mary is angry, too. "I think about how hard we worked," she says. "We always did our best. We were working people. We always lived just beneath our means so we'd have a good retirement." Now her world has shrunk, she says, and talk of Divine Strake, a non-nuclear blast slated for the Nevada Test Site this spring, compounds the Moores' sense of powerlessness. They have become vocal critics, believing the experiment will sweep latent radiation from previous nuclear tests across the Southwest. But the Moores don't expect to change the government's course. "How do you stop the military industrial complex?" Mary asks. "How do you stop them from doing it?" To read Moore's story in his own words and an opinion piece on Divine Strake, visit Originally published January 28, 2007 Print this article Photo by Jud Burkett/ The Spectrum Donald Moore stands in his living room where a photograph of the mushroom cloud from the Baneberry test hangs among framed newspaper front pages Friday at his St. George home. Copyright ©2007 The Spectrum. ***************************************************************** 51 The Spectrum: Compensation still a distant possibility www.thespectrum.com - The Spectrum, St. George, UT Sunday, January 28, 2007 By SCOTT DAVID JOHNSON ST. GEORGE - A billion dollars in payouts may not be enough to make up for the mistakes of the Cold War. Despite evidence they received high doses of radiation from American nuclear tests in the 1950s and 1960s, many Downwinders are still locked out of a federal compensation program that began in 1990. "I feel badly that some Downwinders are unhappy that we haven't been able to do more," said Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, author of the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act. "We have to live within certain constraints, and it's miraculous that we've been able to get done what we've been able to get done." Along with uranium workers and on-site participants, downwinders seeking to expand RECA tread a political morass of scientific uncertainty, budget constraints and outright apathy. "It's a political battle, it's a funding battle, it's a lack of conclusive scientific information," said Alyson Heyrend, spokeswoman for Rep. Jim Matheson, D-Utah. "And all of those factors combine to make us recognize that trying to provide comprehensive compensation is going to be very difficult." Eleanore Fanire, founder of the Mohave County Downwinders, said the crux of the problem is a lack of political will. "Every downwinder has a face and a name, but not a voice," she said. "Congress has failed. You know the joke about calling to write your congressman? Don't waste your time." Hatch, who helped amend the program in 2000, said RECA is "not a finished product," but the costs are already monumental. The program has paid out more than $1 billion to downwinders, uranium workers and miners, and on-site participants since 1990. But many say RECA standards are set unattainably high. Downwinders must have lived in one of 22 counties in Utah, Nevada and Arizona between 1951 and 1958, and in 1962 - all periods of aboveground testing. Residents of those areas face additional hurdles to tie a restrictive list of qualifying diseases to exposure - all for $50,000. "That's a drop in the bucket," said Fanire. "$50,000 would not pay for chemo treatments - within three or four months you've already spent 50,000." Nuclear fallout reached well beyond test sites in Nevada and New Mexico. A 1997 National Cancer Institute study traced deposits of Iodine-131, just one of several radioisotopes released by nuclear explosions, across the United States. The map of affected counties lines up poorly with RECA coverage. The top five, receiving doses of between 120 and 160 times normal background radiation, are in Idaho and Montana. Neither state is covered. Washington County, Utah, comes in ninth, bracketed by seven other Montana counties. Hot spots also appear east of the Mississippi, in the bread basket states and in the northeast. Idaho and Montana leaders have worked hard to expand RECA to cover downwinders in their states, but they've had trouble building a coalition beyond the Western states. "Part of the challenge is for members of the Congress to understand the issue and how it affects a large number of people," said Lindsay Nothern, spokesman for Sen. Mike Crapo. "We need that understanding to build support for the new spending that would be required in a compensation bill." That understanding grows more distant every year, despite calls for hearings from downwinders and uranium workers' groups. "One thing we're up against is that there hasn't been any nuclear testing since 1992, and so it's kind of fallen off the radar screen," said Heyrend. "There are many people who don't know the extent of the harm that occurred and the fear that these downwinders feel." But downwinders have had trouble convincing Congress of the link between radiation exposure and their illnesses. A 2005 National Academy of Sciences study left leaders scratching their heads. It found that "in most cases it is unlikely that exposure to radiation from fallout was a substantial contributing cause to developing cancer," but the NAS report recommended expanding the boundaries of RECA to include those counties that received equal or larger doses or radiation. The implications throw up another roadblock for excluded downwinders. "The fundamental basis of the problem is that if I walk in the door and I have a cancer, and you're the smartest physician in the world, you won't be able to tell me if that cancer was caused by radiation or not, because it's not going to be any different than a cancer caused by anything else," said Dr. Lynn Anspaugh, a radiobiologist at the University of Utah. "You can't in a firm way tell whether somebody should be compensated or not on the basis of what disease they have." And Hatch fears amending RECA could even lead to further restrictions. "If we adopted the NAS recommendations as many are pressing us to do, it may be doubtful that those who are covered under RECA now would still be eligible for compensation," Hatch said. "I'm not interested in anything that deviates from the intent of the program. And the intent is to apologize to those who've been harmed and give them a reasonable amount of compensation." A Centers for Disease Control study in 2006, released after years of delay, echoed the mixed message of the NAS study, but it gave downwinders hope in declaring it "feasible" to further study the link between nuclear testing and illnesses - with enough funding. Originally published January 28, 2007 Print this article Copyright ©2007 The Spectrum. ***************************************************************** 52 Spectrum: FAQ on Divine Strake www.thespectrum.com - The Spectrum, St. George, UT Sunday, January 28, 2007 Question: What exactly is Divine Strake? Answer: Divine Strake is a large-scale, open-air explosive detonation. It's a non-nuclear 700-ton bomb made up of fuel oil and ammonium nitrate. Q:How was the name "Divine Strake" selected? What does it mean? A:All tests are provided an exercise name by Department of Defense regulations. Names carry no meaning or description of the test. The Joint Chiefs of Staff designates which groups of letters are to be assigned to an agency through a publication, entitled Code Word, Nickname, and Exercise Term Report or referred to as NICKA. DTRA is assigned a set of letters - DG-DL, HS-HZ and MG-ML. The first word selected for the test or test series must be within the range of these assigned letters. As an example, a recent test series was designated DIVINE. The first two letters 'D-I' are in the range of the agency's designated letters, DG through DL. A test beginning with 'DI' means it's an Advanced Concepts Technology Demonstration that has direct systems application. Once the test name is submitted to the Joint Staff, they verify that the name hasn't been used before and then enter it into their database of test names. The NICKA instruction is very specific about what is acceptable and what isn't. There are other rules that must be followed when selecting a name, such as never use a word that could be used as one or two words, e.g., moonlight. (Answer provided by Irene Smith, DTRA Public Affairs) Q:How much does Divine Strake cost? A:Cheri Abdelnour, with public affairs for the Defense Threat Reduction Agency, said Divine Strake will cost $23 million. Q:What are the United States' plans for nuclear weapons in the future? A:According to the National Nuclear Security Administration Web site, NNSA's future path is to establish a smaller, more efficient Nuclear Weapons Complex that is able to respond to changing national and global security challenges. For more information, visit the NNSA Web site at http:// www.nnsa.doe.gov Q:What is the Defense Threat Reduction Agency? A:In the post-Cold War environment, a unified, consistent approach to deterring, reducing and countering weapons of mass destruction is essential to maintaining our national security. Under DTRA, Department of Defense resources, expertise and capabilities are combined to ensure the United States remains ready and able to address the present and future WMD threat. We perform four essential functions to accomplish our mission: combat support, technology development, threat control and threat reduction. These functions form the basis for how we are organized and our daily activities. Together, they enable us to reduce the physical and psychological terror of WMD, thereby enhancing the security of the world's citizens. At the dawn of the 21st century, no other task is as challenging or demanding. (From the DTRA Web site www.dtra.mil) Originally published January 28, 2007 Print this article Copyright ©2007 The Spectrum. ***************************************************************** 53 Salt Lake Tribune: Guy: Gov. Huntsman gives the people a voice in Divine Strake Barb Guy Updated: 01/27/2007 10:52:25 AM MST + »The federal government recently put on "public information sessions" to feign interest in Utahns' opinions on the proposed Divine Strake weapons test. At these sessions, written comments were accepted but there was no forum for people to verbalize their thoughts, except privately to a stenographer. This process denied participants the opportunity to stand and speak their minds. While that's truly insidious, the most evil and clearly calculated result of the sessions' format is that people were robbed of the privilege of hearing the comments of others. Written comments do have their place. In fact, they could trigger the preparation of an environmental impact statement, which would at least significantly delay the test. (Letters will be accepted until Feb. 7 at NNSA/NSO, Divine Strake, PO Box 98518, Las Vegas, NV, 89193-8518 or divinestrake@nv.doe.gov.) But movements for social change can only develop when we hear each other. They do not come from any one person's thoughts, written on a piece of paper and headed for a silent pile on a bureaucrat's desk. That's what Gov. Jon Huntsman knew when he held true public hearings on Divine Strake. He knew earlier federally sponsored sessions lacked that special fraternity, cohesion, alchemy and synergy that can come from a group of concerned people when they are allowed to interact. And when that magic happens, committed people can bring about change. They can move mountains. They can even keep governments from moving mountains. That's why at the Salt Lake hearing last Wednesday, nearly everyone who rose to speak took a moment of their allotted two minutes to thank the governor. Many also thanked Dianne Nielson, executive director of Utah's Department of Environmental Quality, who sat and listened intently and politely to each and every comment. A transcript of all those comments will soon be available on the department's Web site and will be forwarded to the federal folks who ran the previous silent sessions. I want to step aside early this time to make room for some citizen remarks, condensed by me, from the governor's Salt Lake City hearing. --- * BARB GUY is a regular contributor to these pages. © Copyright 2006, The Salt Lake Tribune. ***************************************************************** 54 Inside Bay Area: Tankers of Mass Destruction They sit, often unguarded, in densely populated neighborhoods. But five years after Sept. 11, few barriers protect us from thousands of potential bombs on rails By Erik N. Nelson, Staff writer Article Last Updated: 01/28/2007 Photo Rail tankers carrying hazardous materials sit near Highway 80 and homes in Richmond. (Laura Oda/The Oakland Tribune) O THE THOUSANDS of residents and commuters who see them each day, the big steel tanker cars are ubiquitous features of the Bay Area's transportation landscape, parked on railroad sidings along with low-profile container carriers, steel-mesh auto carriers and bulging grain hoppers. But to terrorism experts, emergency officials and chemical hazard researchers, they are lurking weapons of mass destruction, waiting for mishap or sabotage to set them off. At a U.S. Senate hearing Jan. 18 the problem of highly hazardous chemical rail tankers in urban areas was listed as the Transportation Security Administration's second biggest threat to surface transportation, after direct threats to passenger rail systems that travel beneath the ground or water. More than 100,000 tankers full of toxic inhalation hazard chemicals, such as chlorine and ammonia, are shipped through the nation annually out of a total of about 1.2 million tankers carrying materials considered hazardous in varying degrees. On any day, one can see the tankers lumbering through communities such as Berkeley, Fremont, Redwood City or South San Francisco. Passengers at the Emeryville Amtrak Station often find the tankers sitting idle between the depot's platforms and a shopping mall across the street. The side of the cars are often marked with taggers' spray-painted calling cards, exposing the extent to which the deadly cargo is vulnerable. The juxtaposition of the Bay Area's densely populated Bay-side neighborhoods with pressurized tankers of poison gas like ammonia and chlorine and highly explosive chemicals like liquid petroleum gas used to be something officials could do little more than wring their hands over. Now, however, they are looking to the nation's capital, to a politically shifted Congress and an executive branch under pressure to take action five years after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks transformed the issue from a safety and ecology debate to a national security imperative. But five years later, the Federal Railroad Administration has only one full-time employee working on security for the nation's entire 142,000-mile passenger and freight rail network. Anxious about the unabated threat posed by the potential chemical warheads in its midst, the District of Columbia city government defied the Federal Railroad Administration and passed its own safeguards for such shipments. Other, more industrial cities, such as Chicago, Buffalo and Baltimore, are poised to follow the district's example. The district ordinance has been tied up in federal courts since it passed in 2004, opposed by railroads and the Bush Administration. But in December, two federal agencies proposed new regulations they say would better supervise parked tankers and for the first time consider re-routing hazardous shipments around potential terror target areas. "This has been an issue of concern for us for many, many years," said Nora Davis, mayor of Emeryville, where chemical tankers often sit idle and unprotected next to shopping centers, hotels and apartment blocks. "Finally, people are taking a serious look at this. It's past time for a concerted effort to regulate this." Long-standing issue The issue has been around for decades, starting as a safety and environmental concern. Chemical plants and other facilities using hazardous materials were the main targets of this attention, culminating in the 1999 release of federally mandated "worst-case scenarios" aimed at preparing local authorities for toxic emergencies. After the Sept. 11 attacks, the specter of deliberate attacks on chemical tankers became the focus of regulatory efforts. Environmental activists armed with photos of 90-ton tankers of chlorine — used as a weapon in World War I — passing near the U.S. Capitol spurred passage of the District of Columbia ordinance, which required such shipments to be re-routed away from the city's center. Bay Area officials are also concerned that the recent trend to focus new development in urbanized, formerly industrial areas will put even more homes and shops in harm's way. "We have rezoned quite a bit of land along the waterfront, for housing, for transit-oriented development, which is supposed to be a good thing," said Martinez Mayor Rob Schroder, who envisions the new developments as a place where residents will have easy access to buses, Amtrak passenger trains and ferries to San Francisco. And the freight trains that rumble through the town at all hours along the nation's first transcontinental railroad are so much a part of the town that they have become background noise for many residents. "Every once and a while, we think about and talk about safety, but rarely to do we talk about terrorism because we know how much of a potential for a very bad incident there could be," Schroder said. "It's almost like we don't want to think about it." Just outside of the Shell Oil refinery in Martinez, rows of liquid petroleum gas tankers regularly wait to be hitched to trains. Anyone — journalist, graffiti artist or saboteur — could get close enough to tamper with the parked tankers without railroad security or the thinly stretched Transportation Security Administration officers asking any questions. Problem outside the gates Since Sept. 11, access to hazardous chemicals at fixed facilities has been tightened, such as the installation of a new high-tech surveillance system for the Port of Oakland. The problem, security advocates complain, exists just outside the gates. "What sense does it make to put guns, guards and gates around these factories, and then open the gates and ship their most dangerous poison gas cargoes in huge quantities right through the target cities?" asks Fred Millar, an activist with the environmental group Friends of the Earth. "Why don't we pre-position huge quantities of aviation jet fuel on the tops of all of our tallest buildings? That way, the terrorists wouldn't have to go through the inconvenience of flight training." Millar has mounted a crusade to reroute chemical shipments, phoning fire officials, legislators and journalists in cities across the country, leading video forays into rail yards to document lax security around chemical cars. Such activism has irritated railroads like Union Pacific, who maintain that their safety record, with hazardous freight arriving without incident 99.98 percent of the time, is a model for other industries. The industry's close regulatory relationship with the federal government makes them an ideal partner to help secure the nation against terrorist threats. But they acknowledge that people can get near the tankers, which, unlike tanker trucks, can't be regulated by states or local governments. "People do. We know they do. The key is having eyes and ears, to have people ... watch," said Mark Davis, a spokesman for Omaha-based Union Pacific, which owns much of the rail right-of-way in the Bay Area. "Trespassing on railroad property is dangerous. Reporters and the general public, unfortunately, after 9/11, to make a point, they would come on the railroad property and claim that the industry was not safe. "If you're going to watch, do it from a public street," Davis cautioned. Safety authorities, however, are unimpressed with the railroads' vigilance. "If there were no security on-site, all you would have to do is walk up to one of these cars and disable a valve so that it was stuck in the open position and walk away," said Philip White, chief of the South San Francisco Fire Department. "You just need bolt-cutters." Safety officials from South San Francisco to South Carolina, where a chlorine tanker crash and release in January 2005 killed an engineer and eight factory workers, complain that the railroads often won't tell them what is going through their neighborhoods. After discovering tankers in his city loaded with highly flammable solvent toluene, White supported an unsuccessful effort last spring to pass a state law requiring shippers to pay a hazardous substance fee that would help pay for the equipment and training necessary to deal with the consequences of a release, fire or explosion. And those consequences could be catastrophic, said Ron Koopman, a chemical hazard researcher who retired in 2003 from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. Liquid petroleum gas, also called propane, sits in strings of black tanker cars on sidings between the Bay shore's refineries from Richmond to Martinez and beyond. A ruptured car could lead to something safety experts call a BLEVE (pronounced "blevy") — boiling liquid expanding vapor explosion — said Koopman, who actually ruptured chemical tanker trucks at a nuclear weapons test site in Nevada to record the results. "A really big release outside can explode," Koopman explained. "The fire would heat the other propane cars until they explode, and that creates a huge explosion." Koopman said he believes LPG is even more dangerous than the controversial liquid natural gas, which environmental activists have staged a high-profile campaign against bringing to California. New rail couplers and steel plates have reduced the chances of an accidental rail car puncture, he said, but would not stop an act of sabotage. Safer tankers? On Jan. 16, federal railroad officials, freight, chemical and tanker manufacturing company executives announced a new partnership aimed at developing a safer rail tanker, one less vulnerable to crashes and perhaps even some forms of terror attacks. That very day, a derailment near Louisville, Ky., confounded efforts to bring a cocktail of burning chemicals under control. The freight line that derailed, CSX Transportation, was the same one suing to neutralize the District of Columbia ordinance. While cities in the East have actively sought greater tanker car restrictions, Millar said the effort is just stirring in California. "This is really a statewide problem, particularly in the Bay Area, where they're using the siding track" to store tankers, said White, who urged his counterparts in other Bay Area jurisdictions to inspect their local sidings. Many were surprised to find parked hazardous tankers, he said. White and others who have confronted railroads have found themselves up against powerful railroad, chemical and oil interests with many allies in both Sacramento and Washington. U.S. Rep. Tom Lantos, D-San Mateo, decided against pursuing a legislative or regulatory solution to White's complaint, but instead convinced Union Pacific and its shipping customers to deal with the complaint locally, said Lantos spokeswoman Lynn Weil. "Tom found a solution by just talking with the companies," Weil said, that included providing training and equipment for the fire department and working on alternate shipment routes. But with the Democrat-controlled Congress elected Nov. 7, that dynamic has already begun to change. At the Jan. 18 Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee hearing, senators chided federal security and railroad officials for using only a small fraction of security resources for protecting surface transportation, as opposed to air travel. Among several bills being considered by the new Congress is a bill similar to one sponsored last year by Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., that would require such shipments to be re-routed around major population centers and any areas considered likely terrorist targets. That bill never made it out of the Republican-controlled Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee last year, but is expected to do much better this year. Regardless of what may come with the new Congress, local emergency officials will continue to keep a wary eye on the hazardous shipments. "Would it cause me concern? Yes. Would I make an inquiry? Yes," said David Orth, deputy fire chief in Berkeley, another city along hazardous cargo routes. "If I were getting on the train at the Emeryville station, I'd wonder about it." Contact Erik N. Nelson at or (510) 208-6410. Read his transportation blog at InsideBayArea.com.Print Friendly View : InsideBayArea.com reserves the right © 2000-2006 ANG Newspapers ***************************************************************** 55 Salt Lake Tribune: Citizens speak out against Divine Strake The Salt Lake Tribune Article Last Updated: 01/27/2007 10:19:15 AM MST The following statements were made at the hearing sponsored Wednesday by Gov. Jon Huntsman in Salt Lake City on the planned Divine Strake weapon test: "I was blood tested and tattooed along with my classmates by the government so they could monitor the effects of testing. I'm not interested in going through this again. I'll lie in the road if I have to. The trucks will have to run me over." Michelle Bird "It's empowering to hear everybody's personal stories. To those worried about being emotional: We need to be emotional. Write letters and make phone calls. This is a too-familiar road we're traveling down." Cindy Bur "I'd like to talk about U.S. leadership - or lack thereof. At a time when there are legitimate fears about nuclear-weapons programs in Iran and North Korea, at a time when just last week the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists moved their clock a few minutes closer to midnight, at a time when U.S. credibility around the globe is at its lowest ebb, it's critically important the U.S. not take this action. As several others have said tonight, it's not divine, it's not rational, it's not necessary." George Cheney "The public can demand an Environmental Impact Statement and I hope that's something everyone will do. An EIS finally gives the public a say, but if people don't request it, it won't happen." Michael Cowley "I'm confused. An agency I've never heard of has a $2 billion-plus budget. Why isn't this money being spent better elsewhere? A bunch of guys just want to set off firecrackers." Terry Crowther "I'm a downwinder. My life has been shaped by what happened to me at the hands of my government. I have thyroid cancer and I lost a sister to lupus. In the neighborhood I grew up in I've counted 45 people who died of fallout-related illnesses. We traded our trust for our lives. We won't do it again." Mary Dickson "I believe we should use our resources, our science and our technologies to fund and explore options for peace rather than more options for war." Monica Dixon "I've had two miscarriages [the five other women in my family have had none]. The only difference was my address was Moab and theirs was Michigan. The government can't predict what dose of radiation downwind populations may receive nor how many cancers and miscarriages it will cause. There is no such thing as an acceptable dose." Susan Dolan "It's been my honor to listen to this testimony. I, too, went to the so-called hearing the government offered; it was a sales pitch for this disaster. It's ironic that [tonight's testimony will] be put on the Department of Environmental Quality Web site the same week the Legislature votes to cut their funding, in a year when we have a $1.6 billion surplus. When we pull the rug out from under the guardians, who will protect us?" Ed Firmage Jr. "I find Divine Strake to be totally counterproductive. We cannot blast our way to world cooperation." Naomi Franklin "For 25 years I've been attending hearings about nuclear this and nuclear that. I'd like to say no, no nuclear anything." Meg Hards "My husband and I, along with our children, moved to Cedar City in 1951. Our son Norman died at 42 of cancer. My son Paul died a horrible death at 55 from leukemia; my husband died three weeks later.These deaths were diagnosed as cancer from overexposure to radiation. Divine Strake is wrong and we need to stop it. I don't know how, but I know we must." Lois Iverson "This testing will begin an escalation impossible to stop." Janie Iwamoto "I was raised by a uranium-mining and hauling family. I've watched loved ones take their last breath and die of cancer related to radiation exposure. In the names of those I have buried, please do not allow these losses to be wasted." Collette Johnston "Here we are at the threshold of a decision. Do we walk back into weapons development with its environmental, health and ethical quandaries, or do we step into the future and make a stand for public health, well-being and peaceful diplomatic solutions? These choices define our character." Tara Maher "Developing and testing new weapons won't make our global community any safer; rather it will fuel continued violence and resentment toward the U.S. Let's put our resources toward true tools of peace." Shea Pickelner "I grew up without grandparents - they died of cancer and we received "compensation" which is a horrible, horrible word - so I grew up without anyone older than my parents, as did many my age in St. George. I want to add that story of suffering to the many that have been said." Katie Savage "My father died from multiple myeloma as a downwinder. They offered us compensation but no one can compensate for my father. We need to stand up and be noted and have the courage to say, 'I will not allow it again.' I hope we can get enough strength going between all of us." Barbara Stratton "I want to remind people about a victory: MX missile. We fought it tirelessly and eventually the government conceded. We stopped MX; we can stop Divine Strake." Robert Volker "I have a 1-year-old daughter; I'm here as momma bear. I love this state an awful lot. Every time I go camping I wonder am I camping on top of uranium tailings. I love gardening and I don't want to be afraid to grow food. I don't want to be afraid to drink water, or to breathe. We should just redraw the borders of Utah into the shape of a giant guinea pig." Kerri Warner In tests they exposed sheep to the same radiation downwinders received. The sheep died. I just want the federal government to know that we aren't your sheep. [name unknown] © Copyright 2006, The Salt Lake Tribune. ***************************************************************** 56 Independent: The poisoned teaplot: Polonium reading from hotel 'off the scale' Radioactive teapot 'almost certainly used to kill Alexander Litvinenko was used to serve guests for several weeks after becoming contaminated' By Andrew Johnson Published: 28 January 2007 Detectives investigating one of the murkiest international crimes ever to hit Britain - the murder of the former Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko - believe a quintessentially English teapot is at the centre of the web of intrigue. Test results from the Millennium Hotel in Piccadilly, central London, were said by sources yesterday to show a teapot was "off the scale" in readings for polonium 210, the radioactive isotope used to poison the Russian exile at the hotel on 1 November. Police yesterday refused to comment on the reports, which also said the teapot was not tested until the second week of December, six weeks after the poisoning. The still-radioactive teapot would have been used to serve potentially hundreds of other guests. Mr Litvinenko's widow, Marina, confirmed that when her husband arrived at the hotel his tea was already poured. "He later said the tea wasn't very tasty, 'because it was cold'." It now appears that tea had been poured from a pot thatthe killer had managed to contaminate. Police, understood to be "embarrassed" by the oversight in testing the teapot, now believe they have enough evidence to issue an arrest warrant for Andrei Lugovoi, a businessman and former KGB agent. In Russia, he yesterday dismissed accusations as "lies, provocation and government propaganda by the UK." The Russian constitution does not allow extradition for alleged crimes committed abroad. On his death bed, Mr Litvinenko claimed that President Vladimir Putin and the Kremlin had orchestrated his death because of his outspoken criticism of Russia's leadership. It was initially thought Mr Litvinenko, 43, had been poisoned during a meeting with his Italian contact, Mario Scaramella. The Itsu Sushi bar did show traces of polonium 210, but not where the two men sat. He had met Mr Lugovoi in October at the sushi bar, where it is believed poisoning was first attempted. Hotel rooms Mr Lugovoi occupied in London were contaminated with polonium 210; traces were also found at the Arsenal stadium where he had watched a matchthe day Mr Litvinenko was poisoned and on the plane Mr Lugovoi boarded for a flight to Moscow. If the police have got the right man, the question is whether he acted out of personal antipathy or was obeying orders. Some reports yesterday claimed police have concluded the killing was "state-sponsored". A spokesman for Mr Putin, however, said: "Russia has not done it and it is absurd even to think about it." © 2006 Independent News and Media Limited ***************************************************************** 57 Dayton Daily News: Audit says many Mound workers likely exposed to toxins DaytonDailyNews.com Audit says many Mound workers likely exposed to toxins Employees at the atomic plant weren't properly monitored for exposure to radiation, a report contends. By Tom Beyerlein Staff Writer Sunday, January 28, 2007 A letter arrived at Sherrie Neff's Germantown home on Jan. 18, informing her she had been turned down for compensation and medical coverage under a federal program for cancer-stricken atomic workers. Neff's family had to open the letter for her. The retired Mound Plant worker was in a morphine dream state in an intensive care unit at Ohio State University Medical Center, sedated so she wouldn't pull out the breathing tube that's keeping her alive. A former Germantown councilwoman, Neff has lost a breast, a leg and a lung to cancer. She has been in the hospital most of January. Doctors say a new, fast-growing mass in her chest, probably inoperable, is obstructing her esophagus. Neff and her family believe her illness was caused by exposure to radiation and chemicals over her 37-year career at Miamisburg's Mound Plant. Federal officials say a technical document detailing the plant's hazards, known as a "site profile," doesn't support her claim. But a newly released independent audit says that document is flawed, and may be a poor guide to whether some Mound workers were poisoned on the job. The audit found that support staffers like Neff often weren't monitored for radiation exposures even though many faced the same risks as radiation workers. And employees like Neff, who helped to clean up Mound buildings in the 1990s prior to the plant's closure, were exposed to significant hazards without adequate monitoring. Among the audit findings: " Mound workers weren't properly monitored for possible exposures to toxic heavy metals and superheated plutonium-238 oxide, which linger in the lungs and don't show up in urine tests. That means workers may have gotten significant exposures without knowing about it for months, if ever. " Workers in some buildings were likely exposed to high levels of colorless, odorless radon gas that came from the "Old Cave," a storage pit for radium and thorium wastes. Ironically, negative pressure hoods that were designed as safety devices actually sucked the carcinogenic gases into buildings through foundation cracks. "Radiation safety personnel would put their alpha monitors over the cracks and (the monitors) would peg out." " While employees deemed to be radiation workers were monitored with film badges, many others who worked around the same hazards administrative, security, maintenance and janitorial staff may not have been monitored. Mound officials ignored film badges that turned completely black due to radioactive exposures, assuming that workers intentionally exposed the badges in hopes of being reassigning to safer duties. " Mound, which processed plutonium and polonium and developed a reactor that used highly radioactive thorium, handled a wide array of radioactive materials, including exotic isotopes that weren't always part of worker monitoring. " Inadequate worker monitoring procedures "may have led to significant under-reporting and missed dose at Mound." The plant's poor monitoring and worker-protection practices persisted even into the late 1990s, as employees were removing equipment from the buildings to shut the plant down. " Old Mound records that may have shed light on some of these problems were buried in 2005 in a radioactive waste landfill at Los Alamos, N.M., without the knowledge of compensation program officials. Scientists with Sanford Cohen and Associates of Vienna, Va., a company that provides technical advice to the government on energy and environmental issues, made the findings as part of a 191-page audit of the existing site profile for Mound. The profile, or guidebook, is used by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health to determine whether a worker was likely sickened by on-the-job exposure, and therefor eligible for compensation. The Mound profile was drafted by scientists at the Energy Department's Oak Ridge (Tenn.) Associated Universities. Written in July but released publicly earlier this month, the audit is a first step in a "scientific dialog" on the site profile expected this year before the federal Advisory Board on Radiation and Worker Health, said NIOSH spokeswoman Amanda Harney. The board oversees the federal Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program. Worker advocate Richard Miller of the Washington watchdog group the Government Accountability Project said the audit flags some problems that could help Mound workers qualify for special cohort status a classification that would allow them to automatically receive lump-sum payments and medical benefits if they have certain cancers. "These are not trivial, minor doses" that may have been missed by faulty monitoring, Miller said. "There are possibly significant doses here." Sherrie Neff's husband of 40 years, Bob, said his wife was a dedicated Mound worker for decades. She was featured in a Dayton Daily News series on atomic workers called "Ohio's Nuclear Legacy: troubled past, uncertain future." "She won awards, all kinds of plaques, anywhere they wanted her to work, she'd go," he said. "She's paying for it with her life right now." 17 former workers interviewed in audit of Mound Plant site profile As part of its independent audit of a proposed Mound Plant site profile, Sanford Cohen and Associates interviewed 17 former workers to get a better understanding of radiological control and worker monitoring practices at the Miamisburg atomic plant. Here are some highlights of their comments, paraphrased in the audit report. The workers weren't named in the report. Radon dose was considered by workers to be "the joker in the deck" at Mound. In Building R and SW, radon exposure trumped all other dose contributions. A number of strange types of radionuclides were used at Mound. These radionuclides were ubiquitous and moved all over the site and you would find them in the most unexpected places. Mound was generally safe in most cases. There were a lot of burnouts (workers reaching their radiation exposure limits) in SM building, though (from handling fuel cells and heat sources). The workers put too much faith in the fact that they were wearing their respirators. Some workers didn't submit urine samples when they were supposed to. Also the bioassay group did too little monitoring and for too few isotopes. Mound was a research facility under a code of silence that transcended good common sense. The health physics staff was understaffed, but those present were good technicians. It was just hard for only a few RCTs (radiological control technicians) to cover all the areas adequately. In the early days, very few people were formally trained in health physics. They just learned it on the job as they assisted in the monitoring efforts. Because Mound work was done by many independent researchers, their classified work and the isotopes they were using were often only known to them. Janitors and other maintenance workers, who had to access their spaces, often did not know of the radiological hazards present, and were not monitored. There have been reports that individuals used to put their badges under the lip of the hoods to get out of doing hot work. As a result, dosimetry personnel did not trust the data when badges came back totally black. One individual indicated that he was working in a hood with high dose rates, and was assigned a zero dose. How to get information on the compensation act Atomic workers and survivors who want information about the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Act can meet with federal health officials when the Advisory Board on Radiation and Worker Health meets in Mason next week. The board will meet Feb. 7 through 9 at the Cincinnati Marriott Northeast Hotel, 9664 Mason-Montgomery Road, starting at 9 a.m. each day. To schedule an appointment with staff of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, call (800) 356-4674, or e-mail ocas@cdc.gov. The meeting, which will include discussion of granting special exposure cohort status to workers at the Feed Materials Production Center at Fernald, is open to the public. DaytonDailyNews.com/piketon Copyright ©2007 Cox Ohio Publishing, Dayton, Ohio, USA. All ***************************************************************** 58 Sunday Herald: Nuclear plant faces action after worker contaminated January 29, 2007 By Rob Edwards, Environment Editor THE DOUNREAY nuclear complex is facing legal action for failing to store radioactive waste safely after an incident in which a worker was contaminated with plutonium. The government's Nuclear Installations Inspectorate(NII)hasservedtwo improvement notices on the plant's operator, the UK Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA), obliging it to remedy the problem. Inspectors are also considering sending a report to the procurator fiscal. A worker was found to have accidentally inhaled plutonium while decommissioninganoldfuel-processing laboratoryonJanuary 12 last year. Subsequentinvestigationsuncovered half a dozen contaminated lead bricks left on a shelf nearby.continued... According to one of the notices issued by the NII, the bricks were stored "withoutadequate levels of containment". They also lacked "adequate means of physicalprotection"and"anyidentification by means of marking or labelling". The other legal notice alleges that inadequate safety records were kept. Dounreay has been given until April 6 to comply with both notices and could be fined if it fails to do so. According to Dounreay's spokesman, Colin Punler, the plan had been to reuse the bricks but the project for which they were intended had been shelved. "We have very good procedures for dealing with items with significant amounts of radioactivity," he said. "But this revealed gaps in the way we dealt with items with small amounts of radioactivity. We are now fixing those gaps and confident of complying with the requirements laid down by the regulator." News of the latest legal action comes after it was confirmed that Dounreay is to be prosecuted for allowing hundreds of thousands of radioactive particles to leak into the sea and on to local beaches before 1984. The UKAEA has been cited to appear in court in Wick on February 6. Meanwhile,theSundayHerald revealed last week that decommissioning work at Dounreay was threatened with delaysandjob losses because of a government financial crisis. The plant could suffer major cuts in its budget for 2007-08 because of losses made by the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority, the state agency that funds Dounreay. ©2007 newsquest (sunday herald) limited. all rights reserved ***************************************************************** 59 Spectrum: Coming Sunday: An in-depth look at the nuclear debate www.thespectrum.com - The Spectrum, St. George, UT Sunday, January 28, 2007 The Spectrum &Daily News Divine Strake seems to be the word of the day in Southern Utah as the government plans to perform the non-nuclear test in Nevada. It has revived fallout fears in a community that, by some accounts, feels betrayed by the government over past nuclear testing nearby. In Sunday’s paper, readers will get a historical look at weapons testing in the area. Topics of discussion will include: The Baneberry blast: What was it? What were its ramifications? Donald Moore: An on-site participant to the Baneberry blast reveals his struggle to gain compensation 30 years later. Compensation: Why is it so hard for people to receive compensation for nuclear fallout? Could politics be involved? To read about these topics and more, please see tomorrow’s print editions of The Spectrum &Daily News. Originally published January 27, 2007 Print this article Copyright ©2007 The Spectrum. ***************************************************************** 60 Spectrum: Baneberry witness tells story www.thespectrum.com - The Spectrum, St. George, UT Sunday, January 28, 2007 By SCOTT DAVID JOHNSON sjohnson@thespectrum.com ST. GEORGE - A gray snow, the fallout was in Donald Moore's hair and on his winter clothes. As the other workers scrambled to evacuate, his nose began to bleed. He had inhaled a hot particle, and in the half-hour he spent in the bathroom, clotting what would become a hole in his nasal passage, he missed the last bus out of Area 12. It was the morning of Dec. 18, 1970, and Moore, then a 40-year-old general electrician at the Nevada Test Site, had just witnessed Baneberry. "I told my wife that I was probably a walking dead man," he wrote in a letter to The Spectrum &Daily News some 36 years later. "I had this mental strain of wondering how long it would take before this atomic bomb would kill me." An underground nuclear test, officially 10 kilotons, Baneberry had vented above-ground about 9,000 feet away, Moore said - an accident that spread radiation throughout the region, across the United States and, according to some reports, into Canada. Safety specialists ran Geiger counters over the men as they left the site, Moore said. Their contamination pegged the meter. They were told to incinerate their clothing - Moore burned his expensive winter boots, jeans and coat - and to take cold showers three times a day for two weeks. Today the 76-year-old is house-bound. His medical and employment records, dating back to the early 1960s, are laid out across his dining room table in neat stacks. A photograph of Baneberry hangs on his living room wall. "I'm one of the lucky ones," he says. "I've kept such good records." Moore, a Navy veteran of World War II, the Korean War and the Vietnam War, is seeking compensation for his exposure to radiation during the Cold War on three test ranges - two in Nevada, one on Johnston Island in the Pacific. "You know when the body is deteriorating," he says. "I can feel it." Moore has had five lesions removed from his scalp, four of them squamous cell carcinoma, and he teeters on the edge of end-stage kidney failure. He suffers from diseases of the heart, blood and lungs. Sleep apnea makes his nights restless. The hole seared by that hot particle 36 years ago has grown. "It has to be from all that fallout," he says. As an on-site participant, Moore stands a better chance of payment than the average downwinder, but the three-year effort to prove his case has taken a toll on him and his wife, Mary. "I've had to jump through so many hoops on this stuff. It's unbelievable what you have to go through," he says. "They leave it up to us to prove it. They don't give us any of the information." Moore says he loves his country but is angry at the loss of his retirement years. Mary is angry, too. "I think about how hard we worked," she says. "We always did our best. We were working people. We always lived just beneath our means so we'd have a good retirement." Now her world has shrunk, she says, and talk of Divine Strake, a non-nuclear blast slated for the Nevada Test Site this spring, compounds the Moores' sense of powerlessness. They have become vocal critics, believing the experiment will sweep latent radiation from previous nuclear tests across the Southwest. But the Moores don't expect to change the government's course. "How do you stop the military industrial complex?" Mary asks. "How do you stop them from doing it?" To read Moore's story in his own words and an opinion piece on Divine Strake, visit www.thespectrum.com/news/extras/divinestrake.html Originally published January 28, 2007 Print this article Copyright ©2007 The Spectrum. ***************************************************************** 61 Daily Herald - Bomb test: Get 2nd opinion Sunday, January 28, 2007 Utahns are understandably worried about the prospect that a big bomb test at the Nevada Test Site would spew old radioactive dirt into the atmosphere. But there is also a possibility that the Defense Threat Reduction Agency could be right that the test would pose no threat. The agency wants to set off a 700-ton ammonium nitrate/fuel-oil bomb to evaluate its effectiveness against an underground bunker. That's 280 times bigger than the bomb Timothy McVeigh used against the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. This test, dubbed Divine Strake, would be conducted on ground where the federal government has detonated almost 1,000 nuclear bombs. The agency claims that the test is safe, that it will not cause radioactive material to be thrown into the air and come down on unsuspecting Utahns. And perhaps it is right. It's time to prove up. The claim is subject to objective analysis, and it's time such an analyisis was undertaken by an independent entity. Perhaps the material in the soil has, in fact, decayed to the point where it is no longer a threat, as the government says. Perhaps the spot at which Divine Strake would be exploded is not terribly contaminated from past tests. Such things can be measured. They just shouldn't be measured solely by the government. Utahns are rightfully skeptical of government assurances. Throughout the 1950s, officials assured residents that nuclear tests -- which were actually visible from Southern Utah -- were perfectly safe, that the blasts and the fallout from them posed no threat to people on the ground. With such assurances, watching bomb blasts became a family activity in Utah's Dixie, and some residents even made a game of using Geiger counters to find the hottest fallout spot. Unknown to them, they were in serious danger, a fact that only became apparent when Utahns -- dubbed downwinders -- started coming down with sicknesses and cancers that were clearly linked to radiation exposure. Among the casualties was former Gov. Scott Matheson. It took decades to get the government to grudgingly admit responsibility for the blasts and offer some compensation for those who were sickened or who lost loved ones to the fallout. The government admitted as recently as 2000 that the Nevada Test Site is contaminated with 4 tons of plutonium after decades of bomb blasts, more than it had previously said was there. Airborne material is especially deadly since it can be inhaled. This is not reassuring. But there is a way the government can assure Utah that the Divine Strake test would be safe: Let an independent team examine all the data and tell us their findings. This should be done by people who have no connection with the DOE, either through past employment or current contracts. Utah deserves a truly unbiased result. An independent review that concludes the test is safe would vindicate the government's assertions. And it would have real credibility, something the government lacks. Until an independent review is undertaken, the test should not proceed. Gov. Huntsman and Utah's congressional delegation in Washington should insist on an independent review. This story appeared in The Daily Herald on page A5. Copyright © 2007 Daily Herald and Lee Enterprises ***************************************************************** 62 KTVB.COM: Group calling itself Downwinders try to stop non-nuclear explosives in Nevada Boise, Idaho 12:45 PM MST on Sunday, January 28, 2007 [Robbie Johnson/KTVB] Boise--A group of Idahoans gathered today in Boise to try and put a stop to a plan that would detonate 700 tons of explosives at a former nuclear test site in southern Nevada.  The meeting was a way to prepare for tomorrow's Defense Department's informational session about the so-called Divine Strake.    The U.S. government's intends to put a massive amount of explosives in a hole and set it off.  It would be one of the largest non-nuclear explosions in U.S. history.       Pentagon officials want to use the blast to gather data on destroying underground tunnels or bunkers.    However, the test has been postponed twice because of public and political outcry.  The divine stark test is controversial because of what was done at this southern Nevada test site in the 50s and 60s--there were hundreds of nuclear explosions.  People who call themselves down winders in Idaho are convinced many people eventually died because of radio active fall out. "We just want to go to a meeting and understand what is going on, said Cheryl Freeman, who attended Saturdays conference. Cheryl Freeman and her mother Winnie White attended a conference that the Idaho Historical Society in Boise.  On the agenda, trying to get compensation to people in Idaho who say they are victims of radioactive fall out.  There was also discussion about Divine Strake.  Like others, Cheryl is worried that the explosion, while not nuclear, would kick up soil many believe holds the nuclear remnants of bombs tested there decades ago. "I think we better not have it done it going to come the same way we had it done before its going to come though idaho...just the way the winds come through, said Cheryl Freeman. An organizer of the event, who says dozens of her family members suffered cancer because of the bomb testing, wants people to fight against the Divine Strake plan. "The radio activity in the soil very minute traces of it, if it is air borne and you breathing it in your lungs it is eventually going to kill you, said Tona Henderson, Conference Organizer. But government officials disagree--and say so little radiation is left in the soil that health risks are insignificant--even for someone living at the test site boundary. "They will receive just very small level of radiation, far less than you would receive watching television over the course of a year, said Kevin Rohrer, National Nuclear Security Administrator Still, many Idahoans aren't ready to believe it. "I don't think I trust them because if they have done it once they are going to do it again and it's just not safe, said Freeman. Tomorrow the Department of Defense will hold an informational session at the Grove Hotel beginning at noon.. The department continues to assure that the test is safe.  © 2007 KTVB-TV ***************************************************************** 63 KTVB.COM: Idaho residents, Department of Defense discuss Divine Strake | Boise, Idaho 05:11 PM MST on Sunday, January 28, 2007 [Kaycee Murray/KTVB] Eric Westrom/KTVB Photographer Today's meeting gave Idahoans the chance to talk with the group that conducted environmental assessments of the former nuclear testing site and those proposing the experiment. Boise--Its called Divine Strake. The Pentagon says the experiment is designed to gather data on destroying underground tunnels or bunkers without causing nuclear-type damage to surrounding areas. Today the Department of Defense held an informational meeting in Boise for people to talk about this proposed test it calls safe. Today's meeting gave Idahoans the chance to talk with the group that conducted environmental assessments of the former nuclear testing site and those proposing the experiment. Some people at the meeting didn't find the answers they were looking for. An area 85 miles from Las Vegas in the Nevada desert once used for nuclear testing is again the center of controversy over a proposed experiment called Divine Strake. The Defense Threat Reduction Agency says the experiment would help US Forces better track foreign underground facilities. The test has been postponed twice because of public and political outcry. Some people are concerned the explosion, though not nuclear in make up, would kick up soil many claim still holds nuclear remnants from testing some 50 years ago. We don't want it to happen, said Suzanne Martin, Downwinder. Suzanne Martin and Carrie Jones were happy to fill out these comment forms and hope their thoughts are heard. They call themselves Downwinders - who say the nuclear tests in the 50s gave many people in their families cancer and other diseases and they are worried the proposed experiment will produce another generation of Downwinders. They are going to be such minor size that we are going to breath them in and once that particulate is in your lung, its there and you are going to get cancer and you are going to die, said Martin. Senator Larry Craig is on the fence about the issue. He says he still has many questions he wants answered. We've lost a lot of Idahoans to cancer that I believe is from exposure to those explosions in the 50's, knowing that, then you don't take lightly a new test, said Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho. The National Nuclear Security Administration says soil samples have been tested in the area and a computer model was used to calculate the level of radiation that would be released into the air from Divine Strake. Our models say that if you were standing at the border of the test site when this experiment went off and if you were to stay there for a year, you would receive point 005 milligram of radiation We did some comparisons, a smoke detector in your house, you would receive more of a radioactive dose from your smoke detector than you would standing at the border of the test site, said Kevin Rohrer, National Nuclear Security Administration. NNSA is looking for comments from the public to determine if a new revised environmental assessment is needed. Senator Larry Craig says if Divine Strake does take place- it will be a long way down the road. This is not a slam dunk. Its not something thats going to happen tomorrow or the next day. Will it happen? I don't know but if it does happen we want to make sure that Idaho isn't going to be a victim like they were in the 1950s, said Craig. To submit a comment about divine strake or for more information on it- we've set up a hotlink on our website at ktvb.com. Comments need to be submitted by February 7th. --> © 2007 KTVB-TV ***************************************************************** 64 KTRV FOX 12: Downwinders Fight Bomb Test Boise, Idaho News Boise, Idaho -- A proposed bomb test brought together concerned citizens in Boise Saturday afternoon. The group hopes to put a stop to a 700-ton explosion slated for Southern Nevada. A detonation That could spread radioactive dust across Idaho. Jeremy Maxand is the Executive Director of the Snake River Alliance, an Idaho-based nuclear watchdog group, and says the test is another example of the Department of Defense's arrogance. "The government feels completely okay detonating a bomb like this when there are people, thousands of people, who have not received compensation, or been granted eligibility for compensation like in Idaho, for the damage that's already been done." Tona Henderson is an Idaho downwinder who's seen half a dozen family members pass from cancer. She says radioactive fallout from more than a thousand nuclear weapons tests during the 1950's and 1960's harmed the health of thousands of Idahoans. "I've had 26 people in my family suffer from cancer. My mother had breast cancer, my brother had testicular cancer..." These days the community of downwinders affected by Cold War era testing worry about the government's proposed detonation of a bomb termed "Divine Strake." Maxand says it isn't a good idea to go kicking up the very dust where former nuclear fallout rests. "The concern is that where they're doing the test, at the Nevada Test Site, is an area that is heavily contaminated from past nuclear weapons testing, and that this blast will re-suspend the contamination in the soil from past tests." The Defense Threat Reduction Agency is part of the U.S. Department of Defense says the bomb will help them learn how the blast affects underground tunnels and structures. Downwinders and nuclear specialists like Richard Miller, who's written several books on nuclear fallout, question the purpose of the test since this bomb is so much larger than ones typically used for so called "Bunker Busting." "The idea is that they want to test Bunker Busters, but if you look at the size of a typical Bunker Buster which is just a couple of pounds of a nuclear device, and then compare it with 700 tons of ammonium nitrate and fuel, you have to ask yourself is this the proper test." Maxand and many others speculate that this test, along with the government's Reliable Replacement Warhead program, meant to revamp the country's nuclear arsenal, may lead to renewed nuclear testing. "If our country starts to build new nuclear weapons, or radically changes the existing arsenal like they are with the Reliable Replacement Warhead Program, those weapons will have to be tested. If those weapons are tested at the Nevada Test Site, the contamination will likely end up being blown toward states like Idaho." The Defense Threat Reduction agency has agreed to conduct an informational meeting on the proposed Divine Strake bomb test Sunday January 28th. It will be held at the Grove Hotel on the second floor from noon to 2:30pm. There will be an opportunity for public comment. All content © Copyright 2000 - 2007 WorldNow and KTRV. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 65 UPI: British Olympic site highly radioactive United Press International - NewsTrack - 1/28/2007 4:46:00 PM -0500 LONDON, Jan. 28 (UPI) -- The site chosen by the British government to build athlete housing for the future Olympic Games in London has dangerously high radioactive levels. The Mail on Sunday said while the study that found the radioactive levels at the 2012 London Games site was compiled 14 years ago, those behind the proposed construction only received the information last year. "During a search of archive information from the London boroughs of Hackney and Waltham Forest, records indicated that a quantity of radioactive material was deposited in the late 50s in a disused cesspool," the 1993 report from the engineering firm WS Atkins said. To remove all contaminated sources from the area, Britain has allocated an additional $431 million to the London Development Authority. Yet the substantial increase in the overall cost of the Olympic preparation has added to the embarrassment currently surrounding the event. The newspaper said the development previously was dealt a major blow when its lead engineer quit amid allegations the government was ignoring the dangerous radiation. © Copyright 2007 United Press International, Inc. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 66 Guardian Unlimited: Further setback for ailing Thorp plant Terry Macalister Monday January 29, 2007 The Guardian British Nuclear Group has run into new safety problems at the controversial Thermal Oxide Reprocessing Plant (Thorp) which have delayed its restart. The move threatens to undermine the precarious finances of the government's clean-up organisation, the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA), which relies on Thorp for its income. Faults have been discovered on evaporators necessary for drying radioactive liquid produced by Thorp and the plant cannot operate until these are fixed. Thorp, which was about to begin operations again after a near two-year shutdown following an accident, plays an important role in the NDA because the income it earns is used to finance the agency's wider work decommissioning the UK's old reactors. The NDA said it was not prepared to give a date now for Thorp being brought back on stream. The breakdown comes at a difficult time for the NDA, which is understood to be £160m short for the year ending April and has called for cuts at Sellafield and elsewhere around the industry. The latest embarrassment comes as a group of Thorp customers issued a legal challenge to BNG Sellafield to court over an attempt to charge them for the cost of repairs. E.ON, one of the three, has argued that BNG has even tried to charge them for a £500,000 fine handed out last October for breaching three conditions of its safety licence following the accident at Thorp in April 2005. Useful links British Energy Department of Trade and Industry British Nuclear Fuels Ltd Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament Greenpeace Come Clean WMD awareness programme UK atomic energy authority National Radiological Protection Board Friends of the Earth World Nuclear Association World Nuclear Transport Institute [UP] Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 67 Pahrump Valley Times: Nuke lobby will use care with Reid e-mailed to: dmcmurdo@pvtimes.com. Jan. 26, 2007 By STEVE TETREAULT STEPHENS WASHINGTON BUREAU WASHINGTON -- Mindful of the powers wielded by new Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada, the leading nuclear industry association does not plan to push Congress for bills this year to speed waste disposal at Yucca Mountain, the group's chief lobbyist said Tuesday. "We are frustrated by the schedule. The Department of Energy is way behind," said Alex Flint, senior vice president of government affairs at the Nuclear Energy Institute. "But we also are respectful and realistic of the influence of Sen. Reid," Flint said at an NEI conference for industry executives. "It is going to be extremely hard to use legislation to accelerate the schedule at Yucca Mountain" because Reid has "extraordinary authority." Speaking to reporters later, Flint added, "A fight with Senator Reid right now is not in our best interests" because NEI also wants to nurture policies that encourage new nuclear plant construction. Flint told industry officials NEI will work to get the Energy Department enough money from Congress to meet a June 30, 2008, application deadline for a Yucca Mountain repository, the latest goal for a project that missed a 1998 opening and other deadlines since then. "Our eggs are in that basket," Flint said. Speaking later at the conference, a Department of Energy official hinted that DOE's latest repository effort could be its last if it fails to meet the latest application deadline. "We need to deliver by 2008 or else there will be a substantial restructuring of the program, and perhaps a new direction," said Christopher Kouts, a senior manager in the Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management. "My sense is that we will deliver." Kouts said afterwards he did not know how the repository project might be changed if DOE falls short. "I just think that everybody knows we need to deliver this time, and that is what we are driving very hard to do," Kouts said. "I do think that people are very impatient with the program, and we need to deliver, that is the bottom line." In his presentation, Flint provided a glimpse of NEI's efforts in the Democrat-controlled Congress. Flint said NEI lobbyists are expanding outreach to Democrats and to junior members of Congress. He said he was encouraged that most lawmakers generally have become accepting of nuclear power. "Congress has become de facto neutral on issues affecting our industry," Flint said. For instance, Flint said afterwards there may not be enough votes in Congress to speed Yucca Mountain, but on the other hand, there are not enough votes to repeal the 1982 nuclear waste law that underpins the project. "So the federal policy and the federal program will continue indefinitely until there is an agreement on some other course, and I don't know if there is a consensus on another course," Flint said. As Senate majority leader, Reid has said bills that would help the Energy Department obtain permits and accelerate spending for Yucca Mountain will not be brought up for votes. Nonetheless, Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, has said he and Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., plan to reintroduce a bill that would allow military nuclear waste to be shipped to Yucca Mountain starting in 2010 and commercial spent fuel to be stored there in above-ground casks in 2011. DOE officials have said their plans don't call for nuclear waste to arrive at Yucca Mountain, 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas, until 2017 at the earliest, and probably three or more years later. For comment or questions, please e-mail webmaster@pahrumpvalleytimes.com Copyright © Pahrump Valley Times, 1997 - ***************************************************************** 68 Pahrump Valley Times: Reid won't insist on opposition to Yucca project e-mailed to: dmcmurdo@pvtimes.com. Jan. 26, 2007 NRC CANDIDATES By STEVE TETREAULT STEPHENS WASHINGTON BUREAU WASHINGTON -- Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said Wednesday he is considering candidates to sit on the Nuclear Regulatory Commission but will not insist that the person he picks oppose a nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain. Reid said he is weighing a successor to Edward McGaffigan on the five-person NRC, which regulates the nuclear industry and the handling of nuclear materials and nuclear waste. McGaffigan, 58, announced early this year he is suffering from an aggressive cancer and will resign when a replacement is confirmed by the Senate. Although President Bush makes the formal nomination, McGaffigan occupied a Democrat slot on the commission. That gives Reid, D-Nev., the opportunity to submit candidates to the president. Reid said several senators have suggested candidates to him "but none of them sounded that good to me personally." He did not say who they were or why they were unacceptable. "I would hope we could have somebody who is a scientist and somebody who has some government experience so they are not in the dark as to how government works," Reid said. But Reid said a candidate's views on the Yucca Mountain repository will not determine his choice. "I don't think that is something I will get into with them. I think it would be inappropriate," Reid said. "I am not going to litmus-test. If somebody is a good scientist and understands government, that will speak for itself." The NRC commissioners eventually will play a key role in licensing a nuclear waste site that Reid and most Nevada elected leaders argue will be unsafe and have battled for years. In 2004, when he was in the Senate minority, Reid blocked action on 175 White House appointments until reaching a deal with President Bush to appoint Gregory Jaczko to the NRC. Jaczko was Reid's science adviser and chief aide on Yucca Mountain matters. Despite initial opposition from Senate Republicans and the nuclear industry, Jaczko has served without controversy and was reconfirmed last May. Regarding Reid's current activity, "We can do nothing more than take the senator at his word," said Patricia Conrad, a spokeswoman for the Nuclear Energy Institute. Political science professor Eric Herzik said Reid "is saying exactly the right thing" by stating Yucca Mountain politics will play no role in his selection. "He is being statesmanlike," said Herzik, who teaches at the University of Nevada, Reno. "Reid has taken some forceful positions against Yucca but by the same token he is in a position now where he has to show evenhanded treatment. He isn't just a Nevada senator." But, Herzik said, "If a person has worked for the nuclear industry or has written work praising Yucca Mountain, that person might expect to get a lot of questions." In the end, Herzik said, "the person selected likely will be one that Harry Reid is quite comfortable with." The Senate is expected to debate NRC nominees later this year. It is expected that McGaffigan's replacement will be considered at the same time as a successor to outgoing NRC commissioner Jeffrey Merrifield, who occupies a Republican seat. Nucleonics Week, a publication of the Platts energy information group, reported earlier this month that industry officials and others were circulating the names of possible McGaffigan successors including Michael Ryan, a health physicist who is chairman of the NRC nuclear waste advisory board; NRC general counsel Karen Cyr; and Madelyn Creedon, a Democratic counsel on the Senate Armed Services Committee. According to the publication, possible Republican nominees include Martin Hall, chief of staff on the White House Council on Environmental Quality; Kristine Svinicki, a Senate Armed Services Committee staffer and former aide to Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, and Gail Marcus, deputy director of the nuclear energy branch of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. For comment or questions, please e-mail webmaster@pahrumpvalleytimes.com Copyright © Pahrump Valley Times, 1997 - ***************************************************************** 69 ABQjournal: WIPP Proved Richardson as Compromise Artist by Thomas J. Cole Sunday, January 28, 2007 WIPP Proved Richardson as Compromise Artist Albuquerque Journal--> By Thomas J. Cole Journal Investigative Reporter Even before his election to Congress in 1982, Bill Richardson was in a box over an issue that would dog him for nearly two decades. It was the opening near Carlsbad of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, an underground landfill for plutonium-contaminated waste and other radioactive materials used in building nuclear weapons. How Richardson handled the issue is an illustration of his pragmatic political style. Many voters in his district and elsewhere in New Mexico supported WIPP because of the needed disposal space, jobs the plant would create and other economic benefits. But others— notably in Albuquerque and Richardson's left-leaning adopted hometown of Santa Fe— were opposed because of environmental and safety concerns. "I've got people in Carlsbad mad at me for delaying it (WIPP's opening), and I've got some of you mad at me for not doing enough to kill it," Richardson said in 1988. "I'm in the middle getting squeezed to death." During his first run for the House in 1980 and again during the 1982 campaign that sent him to Congress, Richardson said he opposed WIPP. But his position softened over the ensuing years, demonstrating Richardson's ability to mold a compromise position that gives each side something but not one side everything— and allows Richardson to escape with his political hide. WIPP supporters got what they wanted most— the opening of the plant in 1999. For those people who had environmental concerns, Richardson fought for and got beefed-up safety rules for the operation of WIPP. He also helped secure hundreds of millions of federal dollars in compensation for New Mexico hosting the plant and to improve highways on which the waste would be trucked. Melanie Kenderdine, who worked on Richardson's staff in the House, said the congressman practiced the art of compromise in the WIPP controversy. "That type of ability is very important to good governance," Kenderdine said. WIPP is a Department of Energy facility. Ironically, Richardson, then out of Congress, was energy secretary on the day the plant received its first shipment of waste in March 1999. Copyright Albuquerque Journal ***************************************************************** 70 This is London: Government's proposed Olympic site is 'radioactive' Evening Standard incorporating ThisisLondon.co.uk] Potential disaster: Artist impression of the London 2012 Olympics The Government's proposed site for the Olympic village which will house athletes at the 2012 London Games is contaminated by potentially dangerous levels of radioactive waste. A report commissioned 14 years ago revealed that quantities of radium and uranium uncovered on land where the showpiece complex will be built are three times higher than recommended safety guidelines. But the London Development Authority (LDA), which is preparing the land on which the venues will be built, received the document only last year. The disclosure is a further embarrassment for Labour, which has been hit by a string of controversies since London won the bid in 2005 to host the Games. Last year Jack Lemley, the US engineer hired to run the building scheme, quit after claiming the Government had ignored the high levels of radiation on the sites. A report on the Clays Lane site in Stratford, carried out by engineers WS Atkins in 1993, stated: "During a search of archive information from the London boroughs of Hackney and Waltham Forest, records indicated that a quantity of radioactive material was deposited in the late Fifties in a disused cesspool." Further investigations revealed the maximum gamma activity measured in gross counts per second was 90, while the average background activity in the general area was about 30. A total of £220million has been allocated to clean up the area where the Games will be staged but experts have warned more cash will be needed. Culture Secretary Tessa Jowell has already admitted the total bill for the Games village is likely to top £5billion - double the initial estimate. Resident Julian Cheyne, 59, said: "The Olympics will create a danger of contamination which does not exist now. People are genuinely fearful about the future and angry about how they have been treated by the London Development Agency. We are just seen as a little blot on the landscape of this massive area." Radiation levels are a legacy of the area's industrial past which included an oil-storage depot, a tar factory and a chemical plant. But the International Olympic Committee received no documentation about this past during the bid to secure the games. A spokesman for the LDA said: "We did not commission this report. It only came into our possession last year. Site investigations to test ground conditions are ongoing across the Olympic Park and the latest investigations took place at Clays Lane. "No intrusive investigations into areas highlighted in the WS Atkins Report will take place until all of the residents have moved from Clays Lane." Last year it was revealed that the aquatic centre and the main Olympic stadium sites were also contaminated. The Department for Culture Media and Sport declined to comment. Part of the Daily Mail, The Mail on Sunday, Evening Standard & Metro Media Group © 2007 Associated Newspapers Limited ***************************************************************** 71 DenverPost.com: Uranium boom in the West Opinion New rush gains steam By Dusty Horwitt Article Last Updated: 01/27/2007 10:30:46 PM MST Late last year, the Bush administration delivered two big gifts to the nuclear power industry, signing deals to help India produce more energy from nuclear reactors and for Westinghouse to build four new reactors in China. Those countries are half a world away from Colorado, but the worldwide resurgence of interest in nuclear power runs risks for the state's public lands, health and safety. The nuclear industry's efforts to recast itself as a supposedly clean source of energy - a spin echoed by the administration - has helped spark a uranium boom in the American West. Interior Department records show a sharp increase in mining claims on Western public lands since 2002, driven by a seven-fold increase in the price of uranium. As recently as 2004, no uranium interests were among the largest mineral claimholders in the West. Now, government data show that uranium interests are among the biggest claimholders across the region - in Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico, Oregon, South Dakota, Utah and Wyoming. According to Interior records, mining interests staked just 300 claims for uranium in Colorado in fiscal year 2004. But in the two years since, uranium interests have staked almost 3,500 claims in the state. The new claims are concentrated near the historic uranium towns of Nucla and Naturita in Montrose County, and in Rio Blanco and Moffat counties in the state's northwestern corner. The Colorado Division of Reclamation, Mining and Safety says several older uranium mines in the state could be producing soon. The Cotter Corp. has four mines near Naturita that were active until about a year ago. The mines closed in part due to rising fuel prices for transporting the ore to Colorado's lone uranium mill in Cañon City. International Uranium also has about three or four mines in Disappointment Valley in southwestern Colorado. The mines have permits and are being readied for production. Beyond Colorado, public land snatched up in this new land rush includes 365 claims staked within 5 miles of the Grand Canyon, many for uranium. A company that has staked dozens of these claims, Quaterra Resources of Canada, has already proposed to drill exploratory holes for uranium just north of the canyon. The operation would include a helicopter pad to carry mining supplies and ore in and out. The idea of helicopter flights of radioactive material near America's greatest natural treasure, already crisscrossed by dozens of tourist flyovers a day, is disconcerting. But there are broader impacts from uranium mining. Colorado and other Western states are littered with radioactive waste sites that are legacies of previous uranium booms during the 1950s and the 1970s, when nuclear power plants sprouted across the nation and the price of uranium soared. The Department of Energy has begun a decade-long project to clean up 12 million tons of radioactive uranium mine waste near Moab, Utah, that have contaminated land near the Colorado River. The waste is a threat that could pollute drinking water for millions. Cleanup estimates range between $412 million and $697 million. In a recent series, the Los Angeles Times found that abandoned uranium mines on the Navajo reservation in the Four Corners have led to deaths from lung cancer and a degenerative disease that's come to be called Navajo neuropathy. Among other routes of exposure, the Navajo had unknowingly drunk water from abandoned mine pits and had constructed some of their homes from the radioactive mine waste. The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel recently reported that residents of Monticello, Utah, have unusually high rates of cancer they believe were caused by a now-closed uranium mill. Residents recalled replacing their screen doors because the metal mesh would become yellow and corroded. Schools used ground-up uranium waste in kids' sandboxes. Also complicating the matter is the antiquated federal mining law, written in 1872, that governs much of the new uranium mining. Under the law, filing a claim for as little as $1 an acre allows companies to mine on federal land - a right the government has rarely challenged despite the fact that metals mining is the nation's leading source of toxic pollution. Mining interests routinely leave behind multimillion-dollar cleanups, yet - unlike timber, oil and gas and every other extractive industry operating on public land - they pay no royalties to taxpayers. There is no federal fund to clean up abandoned metal mines. Mining uranium is not the only concern heightened by the nuclear resurgence. We still have no answer to the problems of disposing of the waste from nuclear reactors. Even if the government's designated national nuclear waste dumpsite at Nevada's Yucca Mountain is opened, storing waste there will mean 50 years of cross-country nuclear waste shipments through major cities. We should ask if spending billions of dollars to subsidize the nuclear industry is a better choice than investing our tax dollars in clean renewable energy and energy efficiency. Mining is a necessary part of a modern economy. But before permanently scarring some of our most treasured places to feed the nuclear industry, we should first dig deeper into the empty promise of nuclear power. EWG's recent report on mining in the West is available at http:// www.ewg.org/sites/mining_google/US/. Dusty Horwitt is an energy and public lands analyst with the Environmental Working Group in Washington, D.C. All contents Copyright 2007 The Denver Post ***************************************************************** 72 San Bernardino County Sun: Authority is questioned on perchlorate penalties Jason Pesick, Staff Writer Article Launched: 01/28/2007 12:00:00 AM PST RIALTO - It has been 10 years since the chemical perchlorate was first detected in the city's drinking water. So far, multiple lawsuits and a state agency have failed to solve the problem. "You have a very chaotic and undisciplined process out there," said Michael Whitehead, president of the San Gabriel Valley Water Co., which owns the Fontana Water Co. The issue is now before the Santa Ana Regional Water Quality Control Board, which as a division of the State Water Resources Control Board may be able to clean up the mess. But the process the board has had to follow has generated questions about whether the body is up to the task and what the proper role of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is in the issue. Perchlorate, which can harm humans by interfering with the thyroid gland, is a chemical used in the production of rocket fuels and explosives. It was first detected in the Rialto-Colton Basin in 1997. Traveling south from Rialto's north end, it has now made its way into neighboring Colton. The regional board first became involved in the basin in 2002, when the state lowered its recommended maximum perchlorate level from 18 parts per billion to 4 and a number of drinking water wells were shut down. Earlier this year, as the board was considering whether to issue an order to require alleged polluters Black & Decker, Goodrich and PyroSpectacular to clean up the perchlorate, Emhart Industries Inc., a division of Black & Decker, said the board was biased and should not decide the outcome. To overcome that challenge, the board appointed former state water board director Walt Pettit in October to hear the case and issue final cleanup orders. The following month, Goodrich filed a complaint with the state board, calling the appointment "unlawful," "inappropriate" and "improper." More recently, Goodrich and Black & Decker asked Pettit to halt the hearing, threatening to challenge his validity in court. The challenges are all evidence that the EPA, which has been successful in getting polluters to clean up perchlorate contamination in Baldwin Park, should handle the issue as a Superfund site, Whitehead said. "This is bigger than what they can handle," Whitehead said of the regional board. He said the EPA brings more resources and authority to a problem. Kurt Berchtold, the regional board's assistant executive officer, said he's not surprised by the suspected polluters' challenges of the process. "It appears to us that the parties don't want to have a hearing on this matter," he said. A hearing is tentatively scheduled to take place March 30. "We remain confident that the procedure that the regional board established is appropriate," said. He also said the board's proposed order is more aggressive than what the EPA would have proposed. He said EPA officials have told him they would not require the polluters to provide cities and water companies with replacement water or reimbursement of previous costs spent cleaning up the contamination, as the regional board's proposed order does. EPA officials said they haven't ruled out the idea of taking the lead on the project. The federal agency would declare the area a Superfund site if the regional board is unable to clean up the contamination, said Kevin Mayer, the EPA's regional perchlorate coordinator. Mayer said the EPA is currently working with the regional board. Mayer also said if the EPA had taken the lead, the process might be moving along just as slowly, in part because it would take the agency a year just to name the area a Superfund site. "I wish we were a silver bullet," he said. Wayne Praskins, a Superfund project manager, said the EPA decided to assist the regional board but not to take over the project. "I think we haven't done it because we felt the board is doing a good job," he said. Rialto's city attorney, Bob Owen, who has led an effort to sue 42 suspected polluters, said the city did not want to go the Superfund route because it would take too long. Owen also said he fears a Superfund site could create a negative stigma for the city that would hamper new development and be subject to less local control than the regional board process. "When a community is less than thrilled about EPA getting involved, we have to think about that," Mayer said. Owen said he thinks the board is doing as much as it can to pin down elusive parties. He also said he expects suspected polluters to file suit challenging the board's decision to delegate its authority to Pettit. Sujatha Jahagirdar, a clean-water advocate with the environmental group Environment California, said she is pleased with the regional board's proposed cleanup, which to her is a clear sign of progress. "Obviously, the cleanup in Rialto has dragged on way too long," she said. Updated: January 28, 2007 2:13:20 AM PST Los Angeles Newspaper Group ***************************************************************** 73 Salt Lake Tribune: Radiation board reviews plan for recycling Oklahoma waste Near Blanding Radiation board reviews plan for recycling Oklahoma waste The Sierra Club has appealed the project, but others insist it poses no danger to people By Judy Fahys The Salt Lake Tribune Article Last Updated: 01/27/2007 01:13:37 AM MST BLANDING - A southeastern Utah uranium plant adapted to hard times for more than a decade by eking yellowcake out of the waste produced by other metal mills. But International Uranium Corp.'s (IUC) latest request to use tailings as raw materials came under fire Friday as the Utah Radiation Control Board reviewed a request to recycle 32,000 tons of waste from an Oklahoma metals plant cleanup. The yellowcake uranium would be recycled from the Oklahoma waste at IUC's controversial White Mesa mill, just south of Blanding. State regulators OK'd the plan in June, but the Glen Canyon chapter of the Sierra Club appealed, triggering the radiation board's review. In a daylong hearing, attorneys for the Sierra Club said the Oklahoma waste belongs in a landfill for hazardous or radioactive waste. The high concentration of contaminants like radium and heavy metals that would be dumped in tailings ponds behind the Blanding mill would pose a threat, they said. Their arguments go to a longtime criticism of the White Mesa plant - that recycling yellowcake from waste is “sham disposal,” a cheap way to get rid of waste, as opposed to a method for selling the uranium extracted from the waste. The radiation board decided to delay a decision on the Oklahoma waste. They want to be confident the waste won't contaminate the environment and put people at risk. “Even though there's no evidence of contamination right now, it's something we need to pay attention to,” said Joette Langianese, a Grand County commissioner and member of the board. Past tests have showed chemicals have leaked from the site, but it is not clear if IUC was responsible. There also is no proof that putting the Oklahoma waste in the tailings pond will contaminate the environment. Some board members described a dilemma: There's no proof of groundwater contamination now, but because the tailings ponds are 27 years old and built with outdated technology, problems might occur. “There is no evidence that anybody has ever been harmed by the activity at the White Mesa mill in 27 years,” said Michael Zody, an attorney for IUC. This is the first time the board has been asked to consider a shipment of these “alternative feed materials” since the state assumed oversight of mills from the federal government more than two years ago. fahys@sltrib.com © Copyright 2006, The Salt Lake Tribune. ***************************************************************** 74 SF New Mexican: LANL: Congress set to probe lab's security failings Andy Lenderman | The New Mexican January 27, 2007 The name says it all: "Continuing Security Concerns at Los Alamos National Laboratory." That's what Congress is calling its hearing scheduled for Tuesday to dig into security matters at the lab. The House Energy and Commerce Committee's subcommittee on oversight and investigations is planning to call lab director Michael Anastasio and officials of the National Nuclear Security Administration among its witnesses. "The director is very much looking forward to cooperating fully with the subcommittee and is eager to explain all that we've done in response to this incident," lab spokesman Kevin Roark said Friday, referring to the October discovery of classified information at the home of a former contract employee. No one has been charged with a crime in the case, but the FBI has investigated it. The lab became involved in a major national story in 1999 over the FBI's investigation of Wen Ho Lee, a scientist who pleaded guilty to one count of mishandling classified information. Other security-related problems also arose in subsequent years, which congressional sources said was a factor in the government's decision to open up the lab's operating contract to a competitive bidding process. Now the lab is operated by Los Alamos National Security LLC, which includes Bechtel National and the University of California as partners. U.S. Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman this year fired NNSA's head, and security problems at the Northern New Mexico lab were listed among reasons for the dismissal. None of New Mexico's three House members sits on the subcommittee, which is chaired by Rep. Bart Stupak, D-Mich. "There is no denying that Los Alamos has had some serious problems with its security regimen," U.S. Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., said in a statement. "I hope the House oversight hearings will be focused on solutions and not grandstanding." Contact Andy Lenderman at 995-3827 or alenderman@sfnewmexican.com. Use | ©2007, Santa Fe New Mexican ***************************************************************** 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. 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