***************************************************************** 01/04/01 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 9.3 ***************************************************************** RADBULL IS PRODUCED BY THE ABALONE ALLIANCE CLEARINGHOUSE ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR POWER CONTENTS 1 Maine Yankee rail shipments raise concern for safety 2 NUCLEAR POWER – POTENTIAL SOURCE OF VITAMIN R? 3 NY Nuclear Plant Leaks Again 4 Stull, Stull & Brody Announces Class Action Lawsuit Against USEC, 5 Investigative team to see if documents violated laws 6 Radiation haunts Taipei 7 Row flares over nuclear waste u-turn 8 Why Russia Wants Waste 9 RUSSIA'S CRAVING FOR NUCLEAR WASTES 10 U.S. Agency Seeks Approval to Recycle Radioactive Metals NUCLEAR WEAPONS CONTENTS 1 Worries of DOE bias revived 2 Doubts about FFTF merit legal challenge 3 Lab Bunkers No Longer Called 'Kivas' 4 Nominee criticized for lack of nuke experience 5 Plutonium Pact With Russia Could Backfire, Critic Says 6 Christmas Island Bomb Tests 7 ÿPutting national interests above all 8 REPORT NUKES STORED IN SINGAPORE IN 1960S MAY BE TRUE 9 Fears Grow About Depleted Uranium 10 Dutch Probe if Deaths Related to 'Balkan Syndrome' 11 Four French Balkan Veterans Hospitalized With Leukemia 12 Finland to investigate the use of depleted uranium 13 SFOR Says Depleted Uranium 'A Negligible Hazard' 14 Editorial: Say it ain't so, George W. 15 AMMUNITION SUSPECTED IN PEACEKEEPERS' ILLNESS 16 ITALY LINKS LEUKAEMIA DEATHS TO NATO SHELLS 17 MOD REJECTS CLAIMS OF URANIUM RISK 18 DEPLETED URANIUM: ANALYSIS BY MICHAEL EVANS 19 EU presses Nato over uranium arms 20 Should Nato's uranium weapons be banned? 21 Nato agrees to discuss use of uranium shells 22 EU's Prodi Wants Truth on 'Balkan Syndrome' 23 Italy emphasises troop safety in Kosovo 24 Report: Dissidents Tracked Using Radiation 25 Russia's Neighbors Concerned Over Nuclear Report 26 U.S. yet to query Moscow on nukes-- 27 Russia denies US report of nuclear deployment in Baltic sea port 28 Russia Denies Moving Nuclear Arms 29 Russian nuclear bombs put in storage 30 Reduced radiation for Lepse crew 31 Tenants Rattled By Cleanup Plan For Hunters Point/ Navy's mention 32 Kennewick to participate in protest to save FFTF 33 Richland, Kennewick joing Benton in FFTF challenge ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR POWER ARTICLES ***************************************************************** 1 Maine Yankee rail shipments raise concern for safety JAN 04, 2001 Serving Maine and Lincoln County for Over A Century VOL. 125-NO. 40 Greg Foster Rail containers carrying concrete with little if any nuclear contamination from Maine Yankee in Wiscasset sat on tracks for a week in Brunswick awaiting shipment to a special disposal area in Utah, but residents in the vicinity became concerned when they found out, fearing it may be harmful. Until last week, residents of the area were largely unaware of the contents, according to Friends of the Coast spokesman Ray Shadis, who said he received an anonymous call informing him of the situation. Friends of the Coast is an official intervener in Maine Yankee's decommissioning process. However, Maine Yankee examined the material before it left the plant and detected no radioactivity beyond normal background radiation in the natural environment, according to spokesman Eric Howes. If there had been any radiological concern, it should not have set there more than the 48-hour limit and would have been marked as such in compliance with strict standards to which Maine Yankee adheres, Howes said. "Nothing occurred that shouldn't have occurred," he said. He explained that the material is concrete waste from demolished buildings as a part of the decommissioning process. Guilford Transportation is the company which transports the material from Maine Yankee. Howes said that Maine Yankee personnel examined the concrete before it was placed into the steel sea-land crates and detected no noticeable levels of contamination beyond normal background levels. Even though material may not have any contamination, it is treated as though it does and is shipped out, he said. The company had no markings on the crates indicating there was radioactive materiel in them because the material was of no concern from a contamination standpoint, Howes said. Yet Shadis expressed concern that nobody would ever know the cars contained waste from the decommissioning work totalling in excess of 50,000 pounds of concrete per box car in special sea- land steel crates, Shadis said. "It happens to be concrete, which really has only a small amount of contamination," he said. Because of a recent decision regarding the disposal of low-level waste in the decommissioning process, Maine Yankee has decided not to bury such materials from buildings being demolished but to transport them to specially reserved disposal sites, such as Envirocare in Clive, Utah where the concrete was headed. "The only markings are in-house labels written with a magic marker on tape saying 'class A waste'," he said. There is no specific marking indicating the contents are radioactive, according to Shadis. Other than the in-house labels, the cars have imprinted on them "MHF Logistical Solutions", a Pennsylvania company handling nuclear waste transfer for Maine Yankee. He said he does not know how the caller knew that the rail cars contained the concrete, but he inspected the cars himself. "The public should know that the waste is being handled properly, " Shadis said. "The question is how long does it have to sit there before if becomes a temporary spent fuel disposal site?" Meanwhile, Maine Yankee will be continually shipping low-level materials from the demolition of various buildings at the company site, since its decision to ship them out rather than burying them, Howes said. ***************************************************************** 2 NUCLEAR POWER – POTENTIAL SOURCE OF VITAMIN R? Power Online News for power industry professionals ELECTRON CAFé BY JOHN GLENN: -->1/3/2001  This column is inspired by an essay I read on the Internet subtitled: “‘Vitamin R’ — Radiation Good for Your Health?” The article is titled: “Truth Under Tyranny” and is authored by James P. Hogan. The thesis of the essay is that radiation at moderate doses is good for you and that this fact is being covered up and suppressed. Actually, the theory (hormesis) that substances that are harmful at high doses (like radiation) are beneficial in small doses is well established in toxicology. Radiation in less than lethal doses is used to treat skin diseases, malignant and non-malignant tumors, and even coronary artery disease. Radiation even at relatively high doses is beneficial to health and prolongs life. The controversy is whether radiation at modest doses is protective against early death due to cancer. I am personally an “agnostic” with respect to this part of the theory. I believe it is possible but I am a skeptic waiting to be convinced. One reason I am a skeptic is that the proponents of hormesis tend to be very zealous. My judgment may be too harsh since the proponents do have to be pretty loud to get the attention of a conservative radiation safety establishment that abhors controversy and fears any theory that could undercut their credibility with the public. Any controversial theory is likely to attract amateur supporters. I do not know James P. Hogan, but I do know enough about the topic to spy some rather glaring factual errors in his essay. For example, consider the following excerpt: ÿThe most widely quoted study, on over 7,000 U.S. shipyard nuclear ÿworkers, reports the conventional low-levels-are-hazardous paradigm ÿto have been confirmed. Yet, I talked with one of the researchers ÿinvolved in the study (Prof. Myron Pollycove, U.C. San Francisco, ÿwho serves on the NRC), and it turns out that of the seven dose ÿcategories defined for the study, the results from five showed ÿexactly the opposite. They were eliminated as "flawed," on the ÿbasis that ". . . there is no credible way that radiation can ÿbe beneficial.” Factual errors do not mean the whole idea is wrong. I do know Myron Pollycove and he is certainly one of the more articulate spokesmen for hormesis. However, he was not a researcher involved in this study. His role has been to call attention to this study in ways that the original researchers have been unwilling to do. Also, Dr. Pollycove did not serve on the NRC but was a “Visiting Medical Fellow” at the NRC. As such, he was the rare staff member who was encouraged to express personal opinion based upon his own experience as a Nuclear Medicine physician. Dr. Pollycove was neither a researcher nor a policy maker for the government as implied by the essay. However, Dr. Pollycove has been extremely successful in finding data that provides strong support for the theory that low level radiation may be protective against cancer. With regard to the shipyard study, he was the first individual to see the implications of the data in the following table: STANDARDIZED MORTALITY RATIOS FOR SELECTED CAUSES OF DEATH AMONG SHIPYARD WORKERS IN THE UNITED STATES [I] Matanoski GM. Health effects of low-level radiation in the shipyard workers final report. Report No. DOE DE-AC02-79 EV10095. Washington: U.S. Department of Energy, 1991. Note: The type of work carried out by the three groups was identical, except that the nuclear workers were exposed additionally to 60Co gamma-radiation. Dr. Pollycove was instrumental in getting the establishment to pay some attention to the dramatic difference in deaths due to “all causes” in this study. The UN Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR) 1994 reports, “The statistically significant decrease in standardized mortality ratio for deaths form all causes [0.76±0.015] cannot be due to the healthy worker effect alone, since the non-nuclear workers and the nuclear workers were similarly selected for employment and were afforded the same health care thereafter.” Dr. Pollycove also looked at data from the Canadian Fluoroscopy Study (figure below). He noted that breast cancer mortality is statistically significantly decreased to 0.66 (34 % decrease) in women exposed to cumulative doses of 10-20 rad and is decreased to 0.84 (16% decrease) in women exposed in the 20-30 rad dose range. ÿNote: The empirical curve showing the dip in cancer was provided ÿby Dr. Pollycove, not the researchers. However, the data is from ÿthe original paper. [I] Miller AB, Howe GR, Sherman GJ, Lindsay JP, Yaffe MJ, Dinner PJ, Risch HA, Preston DL. Mortality from breast cancer after irradiation during fluroscopic examination in patients being treated for tuberculosis. N Engl J Med 321:1285-1289 (1989). Can this controversy be resolved? Possibly! Dr. Pollycove by searching the literature and daring to take the data further than the primary investigators makes a good case for a relatively strong protective effect for radiation exposure at 10 to 15 rad of radiation dose. In fact, the protective effect is considerably larger than the predicted harmful effect using the linear, no-threshold theory. A well designed study (both scientifically and ethically) looking for a 20% to 40% suppression in cancer mortality is far more likely to be proven right or wrong than one looking for a less than 1% increase in cancer rate. A new millennium may be a good time to think out of the box and do an experiment to prove the unexpected. It’s a long shot but Vitamin R may be waiting for discovery. Statement [*]WWW.POWERONLINE.COM ***************************************************************** 3 NY Nuclear Plant Leaks Again January 03, 2001 ASSOCIATED PRESS WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. (AP)--A small leak of radioactive coolant was discovered Wednesday a few hours after the Indian Point 2 nuclear power plant went back into service after an 11-month closure to fix a similar problem. Federal and plant officials said the new leak posed no danger, but area officials demanded that the 26-year-old plant be shut down. "I cannot go out and tell the people of Westchester County that the nuclear plant in Buchanan is safe," said County Executive Andrew Spano. "Close down the plant, fix the leak." Consolidated Edison, which owns the plant, said it began generating electricity again at 2:14 a.m. and was operating safely. "Shutting down the plant at this time is totally unwarranted and not in the public interest," the company said. "As with any restart, adjustments and corrections are made as warranted. At no time has any circumstance presented a threat to the health of the public or our workers." Nuclear Regulatory Commission spokesman Neil Sheehan said the leak was "minute," less than 0.08 of a gallon per minute. Industry guidelines allow a leak of 10 gallons per minute, he said. He said the leak was contained in a coolant line and no radioactive material had leaked into the building or the atmosphere, as happened Feb. 15 when a corroded steam tube burst, releasing a tiny amount of radioactive steam. There were no injuries in either case, he said. "They really aren't anywhere close to each other in magnitude," Sheehan said. ALL CONTENTS COPYRIGHT 2001 LAS VEGAS SUN, INC. ***************************************************************** 4 Stull, Stull & Brody Announces Class Action Lawsuit Against USEC, Inc NEW YORK, Jan 3, 2001 (BUSINESS WIRE)--The following is an announcement by the law firm Stull, Stull & Brody Story Filed: Wednesday, January 03, 2001 8:34 PM EST NEW YORK, Jan 3, 2001 (BUSINESS WIRE)--The following is an announcement by the law firm Stull, Stull & Brody: Notice is hereby given that on January 3, 2001, a securities class action complaint was filed on behalf of all persons who purchased the securities of USEC, Inc. ("USEC" or the "Company") (NYSE: USU) in, or traceable to, USEC's July 23, 1998 Initial Public Offering ("IPO"), including all purchasers between July 23, 1998 and December 2, 1999 (the "Class") (inclusive, the "Class Period"). The action is pending in the United States District Court for the Western District of Kentucky against defendants USEC, William H. Timbers Jr., (President and Chief Executive Officer), Henry Z. Shelton (Chief Financial Officer), J. William Bennett (Vice President Advanced Technology), and the following underwriter defendants: Morgan Stanley Dean Witter Co., Inc., Merrill Lynch & Co., Janney Montgomery Scott, Inc., Lehman Brothers, Prudential Securities Inc., Salomon Smith Barney and M.R. Beal & Co. The complaint charges that defendants violated Sections 11, 12(a)(2) and 15 of the Securities Act of 1933, by filing with the SEC and disseminating a Prospectus in connection with USEC's IPO Registration Statement on July 23, 1998, which contained materially false and misleading statements of facts and omissions regarding the Company and its business. For example, as alleged in the complaint, defendants failed to adequately disclose the true risks and uncertainties that the uranium enrichment industry was subject to, and downplayed the likelihood that a long-term contract with the Russian Federation would turn unprofitable. As these undisclosed risks materialized, the Company's stock declined from its $14.25 per share IPO price to $7.375 on December 3, 1999 (a 48% decline)--the day after USEC announced that it would continue its money-losing contract with the Russian Federation. Plaintiff seeks to recover damages on behalf of Class members and is represented by, among others, the law firm of Stull, Stull & Brody. Stull, Stull & Brody has litigated many class actions for violations of securities laws in federal courts over the past 25 years and has obtained court approval of substantial settlements on numerous occasions. If you purchased the securities of USEC in, or traceable to, USEC's July 23, 1998 IPO, including all purchasers between July 23, 1998 and December 2, 1999, inclusive, you may, no later than January 8, 2001, request that the Court appoint you as lead plaintiff, if you so choose. If you wish to discuss this action or have any questions concerning this notice or your rights or interests with respect to this matter, please contact Tzivia Brody, Esq. at Stull, Stull & Brody by calling toll-free 1-800-337-4983, or by e-mail at SSBNY@aol.com, or by fax at 212-490-2022, or by writing to Stull, Stull & Brody, 6 East 45th Street, New York, NY 10017. CONTACT: Stull, Stull & Brody Tzivia Brody, Esq., 1-800-337-4983 fax: 212/490-2022 SSBNY@aol.com TICKERS: NYSE:USU URL: Today's News On The Net - Business Wire's full file on the Internet with Hyperlinks to your home page. Copyright (C) 2001 Business Wire. All rights reserved. KEYWORD: ***************************************************************** 5 Investigative team to see if documents violated laws January 04, 2001 BY JEFF GERMAN LAS VEGAS SUN A team of federal investigators is expected in Las Vegas next month to begin probing whether federal laws were broken in the drafting of Department of Energy documents recommending Yucca Mountain as the nation's high-level nuclear waste dump. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., who requested the investigation, told the Sun this morning that the DOE's inspector general, Gregory Friedman, is "assembling a team" to come to Las Vegas. "They should be there by the first week in February," Reid said from Washington. "They've been asked to look at all of the correspondence, all of the briefing materials--any evidence of bias that would favor Yucca Mountain." Reid said he anticipated the investigation will not be a quick one. "This isn't something they can do in a few days," he said. "It's going to take a matter of months. It's a big project." Reid sent a letter to Friedman last month asking him to investigate the circumstances surrounding the preparation of documents that suggested Yucca Mountain is safe to store radioactive waste, even though lengthy studies of the Nevada site haven't been completed. Reid said the documents appeared to show the DOE collaborating with its chief Yucca Mountain contractor, TRW Environmental Safety Systems Inc., to win approval for the Nevada site, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. "An insidious DOE and DOE contractor bias in favor of rubber-stamping the Yucca Mountain site characterization process has been a problem for years," Reid wrote Friedman. "These documents suggest that any public pretense of impartiality has been abandoned by the (DOE) and DOE contractors." Reid's request for an investigation was prompted by a Dec. 1 Sun story that had disclosed the DOE documents. The Sun reported that it had obtained a 60-page draft of a DOE overview on Yucca Mountain declaring the site suitable for nuclear waste storage. The newspaper also obtained a two-page memo, allegedly written by TRW, that suggested the overview could be used to help the nuclear industry sell Yucca Mountain to Congress. The DOE had been preparing to make a recommendation on Yucca Mountain's suitability in June, but the decision has been delayed because of the inspector general's investigation. Outgoing Energy Secretary Bill Richardson has disavowed the memo and joined Reid in calling for the probe. Amid the furor created by documents, Richardson last month issued a public statement insisting that the site for a repository will be determined by sound science. Yucca Mountain is the only site under study to store the nation's high-level nuclear waste. ALL CONTENTS COPYRIGHT 2001 LAS VEGAS SUN, INC. ***************************************************************** 6 Radiation haunts Taipei The Taipei Times Online: 2001-01-04 THURSDAY, JANUARY 4TH, 2001 RESTITUTION: After years of lies and cover-ups, Taipei residents who were exposed to radiation while at home or school are demanding the government do more BY KO SHU-LING STAFF REPORTER Taipei City's Bureau of Health (½Ã¥Í§½) and Bureau of Environmental Protection (Àô«O§½) are considering subsidizing the medical bills of people who are hospitalized due to excessive radiation exposure resulting from living in radiation contaminated buildings. The announcement was made in response to a petition filed by victims and their families, the Association of Radiation Victims (¿ç®g¨ü®`ªÌ¨ó·| ) and the Radiation Safety and Protection Association (¿ç®g¦w¥þ«P¶i·| ). "THE TRAGEDY HAS DRIVEN THOSE WHO HAVE BEEN EXPOSED INTO A PANIC." Wang Yu-ling, chairman of the Radiation Safety and Protection Association The radiation was found to originate in contaminated rebar made by Hsing Jung Iron and Steel of Taoyuan County between 1982 and 1984. The source of the contaminant remains a mystery. Currently, the city only offers free physical check-ups to people who have lived in radiation contaminated buildings throughout the city's 12 districts, or to children who studied at the radiation- contaminated and now demolished Yung Chun Kindergarten (¥Ã¬K¥®¸X¶é) in the Sungshan District. When the city's first radiation-contaminated building, the Minsheng Villa (¥Á¥Í§O¹Ö) in the Sungshan District, was discovered around 20 years ago, the Cabinet's Atomic Energy Council (­ì©e·|) attempted to cover it up. The issue wasn't revealed by the media until 10 years later. Taiwan has recorded 185 radiation-contaminated buildings, with 98 of them located in Taipei. The number of people suspected of being affected is reported to be more than 15,000. However, little has been done beyond the once-a-year free check-up available to the victims. In 1996, the city started providing the free check-up to victims whose amount of radiation exposure reached between 1mSv and 5mSv. Similar services are made available to people whose exposure exceeded 5mSv. The amount at which radiation exposure becomes a health hazard is 1mSv. The two bureaus plan to deliver a special report on the matter to the city council within 10 days. They are also studying the possibility of appointing Municipal Jen-ai Hospital (¥«¥ß¤¯·RÂå°|) as the medical center offering medical services and counseling to the victims and their families. According to Wang Yu-ling (¤ý¥ÉÅï), chairman of the Radiation Safety and Protection Association and a former resident of the Minsheng Villa, yesterday's petition was prompted by the recent death of a 19-year-old teenager who studied at the Yung Chun Kindergarten 15 years ago. "The tragedy has driven those who have been exposed into a panic," Wang said. The most common symptoms victims suffer are the abnormal development of the thyroid, blood cells, lymphatic glands and genes. "Because the symptoms don't cause sudden death, many people ignore the fact that complications could trigger lethal consequences," Wang said. At least 13 people he knows who used to live in radiation-contaminated housing have died of cancer, he said. A mother, who preferred to be identified as Mrs Cheng, requested that the city offer classes to parents. "I don't know what to say to my daughter when she asks me if she's going to develop some kind of cancer and die," she said. Mrs Cheng's 12-year-old daughter attended the Yung Chun Kindergarten for a year and is currently a sixth-grader at Yung Chun Elementary School. This story has been viewed 624 times. ***************************************************************** 7 Row flares over nuclear waste u-turn Irish Independent Newspaper Online 4-January-2001 TREACY HOGAN, ENVIRONMENT CORRESPONDENT THE Government is furious that the UK is abandoning a plan to curb discharges of radioactive waste from its Sellafield nuclear complex. It has emerged that the British Environment Agency has changed its mind on the amount of toxic technetium-99 which can be discharged into the Irish Sea. And Public Enterprise Minister of State Joe Jacob last night accused the UK of reneging on an agreement to substantially cut the deadly discharges and said this was "not on". Ireland's lobster and other shellfish as well as seaweed have been contaminated by the technetium-99 radioactivity which arises from the reprocessing of spent fuel from Magnox reactors. John Cunningham, deputy director of the Radiological Protection Institute of Ireland (RPII), said the UK Environment Agency now proposes to cut the annual limit for discharges from 90 down to 10 terabecquerals by 2006. Originally it wanted to reduce the limit next year. "We consider technetium discharges as unnecessary and they should be stopped," he added. The UK Environment Agency is reported in the New Scientist to be emphatically denying it has backed down because of BNFL pressure, stating it had come to a considered view after looking at all aspects. However, environmental group Greenpeace has claimed the agency is backtracking under pressure and that nuclear reprocessing must end. ***************************************************************** 8 Why Russia Wants Waste Thursday, Jan. 4, 2001. Page 9 Why Russia Wants Waste By Pavel Felgenhauer Last month the State Duma voted overwhelmingly to approve a government- backed law that will amend current legislation and allow Russia to import highly radioactive waste from foreign countries. While this was not the final reading of the bill, its eventual approval seems virtually inevitable. This result seems strange at first glance since all polls show that the Russian public is unequivocally opposed to such imports. Last fall environmental activists collected more than 2.5 million signatures calling for a national referendum on the issue. But the Central Elections Commission rejected this petition on a technicality, and now Duma deputies have shown no difficulty voting against the clearly expressed will of their constituencies. Nuclear Power Minister Yevgeny Adamov has predicted Russia will earn up to $20 billion over the next 10 to 15 years by importing foreign waste. Adamov and other officials have stressed that spent nuclear fuel is not "waste," but a valuable commodity. After reprocessing, they maintain, plutonium and uranium may be extracted and recycled. They also try to make the idea more palatable by saying that proceeds from these imports will be used to clean up existing contaminated zones. It is certainly true that many areas of the country are radioactively contaminated: The worst zone is in the Urals, in the region around Chelyabinsk. However, there are simply no effective means of "cleaning" large-scale radioactive contamination. When relatively small radioactive spills occur, the contaminated earth is put into steel barrels and buried somewhere. Hard surfaces are washed with water and detergent. These methods are obviously not practical when hundreds of square kilometers are contaminated. After the 1986 nuclear disaster in Chernobyl, there were initial attempts to wash down roads and buildings with detergent, but they were soon abandoned and everything was just left to decompose naturally. The claim that imported waste will be "reprocessed" is also a sham. After all, Russia does not have enough capacity to reprocess the spent nuclear fuel that it produces itself. More importantly, reprocessing spent nuclear fuel does not make economic sense. Since the end of the Cold War, Russia and the United States have been dismantling their nuclear arsenals and many Western countries have been scaling back their civilian nuclear power programs. As a result, the world is awash with cheap uranium and there is simply no realistic market for recycled plutonium. So why, then, do the Duma and the Kremlin support such a dangerous and doubtful plan? It can hardly be for the money. After all, last year Russia had a trade surplus of about $50 billion. A few hundred million in revenues from importing waste simply won’t make much of a difference. The explanation for the extraordinary unanimity of the political elite on the waste imports issue is the typical one: defense considerations. In April 1999, the Security Council (President Vladimir Putin was the secretary of the Security Council at that time) ordered the Nuclear Power Ministry to speed up the development of a new generation of nuclear weapons, including so-called "penetrators." These weapons are designed to burrow down tens of meters underground before exploding. The Security Council also ordered the development of a new generation of very low-yield tactical, battlefield nuclear weapons. Immediately after Putin announced the Security Council decision, Adamov began to clamor for foreign nuclear waste and a bill was introduced in the Duma. In May 1999, Adamov told a conference: "They told us to accelerate military nuclear programs, but said we should do that using our own sources of revenue." In effect that meant the only way Russia can develop a new generation of weapons is if the West is willing to pay for it by dumping its nuclear waste here. The gist of the Adamov plan — to make the West pay for a new generation of nukes that may be eventually used against it — has clearly captured the imagination of the Russian elite. During the Duma debate last month, leading Communist deputy and former Politburo member Anatoly Lukyanov said that anyone opposing the nuclear waste bill must be an "American agent." In fact, the U.S. government has already endorsed Russia’s initiative to import nuclear waste. But true Russian patriots will not be fooled by such tricks. Foreign radioactive waste will soon be on its way in. Pavel Felgenhauer is an independent, Moscow-based defense analyst. -=- [TABLE] ***************************************************************** 9 RUSSIA'S CRAVING FOR NUCLEAR WASTES Chicago Tribune | Print Edition-- January 4, 2001 Letting Russia collect the world's nuclear waste is like giving an alcoholic a well-stocked wine cellar for Christmas. That the receiver may be asking for it in no way makes it right for the giver. Ignoring horrified environmentalists within and beyond its borders, Russia's lower legislative house has given preliminary approval to a plan to import, store and treat nuclear waste from other countries. Russia hopes to sign pacts with China, Germany, Japan, Spain, Switzerland, Taiwan and other nations to take spent fuel rods from nuclear power plants off their hands. Officials of the Atomic Energy Ministry hope to earn as much as $21 billion over 10 years by becoming the world's nuclear dump. Even at that, they are probably lowballing the revenue. With the problems most nations have with growing piles of nuclear waste, almost no price would be too high for a safe, reliable solution. But safe and reliable are not words to be connected to the land of the Kursk submarine disaster. The capitalist vision of dancing rubles is clouding officials' view of their country's woeful nuclear history as well as its current inadequacies. The U.S. is financing, to the tune of hundreds of billions of dollars, the dismantling of Russia's old nuclear submarines because the Russians can't afford it themselves. Russian plants that convert nuclear fuel are running at capacity. Where and how will new wastes be stored or treated? Even scarier is the government's blind refusal to recognize its wide- ranging environmental crises. As Tribune reporter Colin McMahon noted, it is estimated that 60 million out of 145 million Russians live in environmentally dangerous conditions. Air and water pollution are rampant, the economy has no funds for any cleanup, and protesting ecologists are met with investigations and ministry-ordered audits. Each nuclear power faces hard choices of what to do with its radioactive waste. After 18 years and collection of $15 billion from electricity ratepayers, the U.S. is still stymied in its efforts to create a nuclear waste storage area in a Nevada wasteland. But this country cannot abandon those efforts. It is America's problem to solve. Further, just because one nation is asking for this toxic cocktail is no reason for the rest of the world to mix it up. Nuclear-powered nations have a responsibility to recognize the potential global consequences of a Russian nuclear disaster, as well as the risk to Russian citizens who have suffered from their government's previous mistakes. Russia's "easy" answer is a real threat. ***************************************************************** 10 U.S. Agency Seeks Approval to Recycle Radioactive Metals Environment News Service: BY BRIAN HANSEN WASHINGTON, DC, January 3, 2001 (ENS) - The manufacture of consumer products out of radioactively contaminated materials discarded from commercial nuclear power plants and government bomb factories could become a fact of American life. In an extraordinary move, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission today asked the National Academy of Sciences to sanction the controversial practice. Dr. Richard Meserve, chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), made the request during the public portion of a special National Academy of Sciences committee meeting in Washington. Meserve asked the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) panel to examine the practice of releasing radioactively contaminated solid waste materials into everyday commerce. He said this type of recycling is necessary to insure the continued viability of the commercial nuclear power plant industry and the Cold War decommissioning activities of the U.S. Department of Energy. "There has basically been no guidance as to how those problems should be addressed," Meserve said to the panel of NAS scientists. "It is our hope that we will get your findings and recommendations as to how we should proceed in a timely manner." Meserve's request of the NAS panel is the latest development in a long standing government and industry led effort to establish a consistent system governing the release of solid materials from NRC licensed facilities. The nuclear power industry and the Department of Energy (DOE) are currently saddled with tens of thousands of tons of solid materials contaminated with low levels of radioactivity, which they once disposed of in specially designed nuclear waste disposal facilities. That practice changed beginning in the 1970s, when the NRC, its licensees, and the DOE began searching for a more cost effective method of disposing of the enormous volume of steel girders, pallets, machinery and other solid materials tainted with tiny amounts of radioactivity. The NRC and the DOE now allow their licensees and contractors to recycle some solid materials, but there is currently no national health based standard or generally applicable criteria governing the release of solid materials from commercial nuclear power plants or government nuclear weapons facilities. Assessment Division Argonne National Laboratory U.S. Department of Energy) Meserve said that the current "ad-hoc" recycling system is not sufficient for the NRC and its licensees, which he noted must spend large amounts of money to dispose of their low level solid wastes. Meserve said that the DOE has encountered the same costly solid waste disposal problem "in spades" as it proceeds with decommissioning a number of Cold War nuclear weapons facilities. "That's why we're here - to seek your advice on these matters," Meserve told the NAS panel. At the NRC's request, the National Academy of Sciences' panel has agreed to examine the question of whether or not there are sufficient technical bases to establish a consistent system for controlling the release of what it is terming "slightly contaminated" solid materials. The panel is expected to evaluate a number of factors in making its recommendations regarding the release of these materials, including studies of critical groups, exposure pathways and scenarios, and individual and collective doses. Meserve asked the panel to consider a number of other factors in reaching its conclusion, including rulemaking actions taken by federal agencies, states, and the European Union. Meserve outlined four conclusions that he said the NAS panel could reasonably reach. ÿPermitting the release of radioactively contaminated solid materials ÿif the potential dose is less than a specified level. ÿRestricting the release of such materials for only certain authorized ÿuses, which could prohibit recycling. ÿProhibiting the release of materials that were stored in areas ÿwhere radioactive materials were present. ÿSegregating reused materials for public and nonpublic use. Meserve added that his list of alternatives was not intended to "constrain [the NAS panel] from being more inventive" in its recommendations. Meserve acknowledged the controversial nature of the solid waste recycling initiative, which environmental and public health groups have vehemently criticized. Sciences Corporation) "This is a difficult issue where the emotional currents run strong, " he said. Still, Meserve implored the NAS panel to resist putting a "spin" on its findings to address - or to avoid - the controversial nature of the NRC's solid waste recycling initiative. "Call it the way you see it - we'll worry about the political fallout, " Meserve said. "We want your best advice - give it to us straight." Some members of the NAS panel did just that, as they wasted little time in peppering the NCR chairman with a host of probing questions. Dr. Robert Budnitz, president of the California based Future Resources Associates, wanted to know why the NRC had requested the panel's recommendations at all. "Where did this come from? What's going on?" Budnitz asked Meserve. Budnitz, a former NRC official, said he suspects the request came about because the agency could no longer deal with the myriad individual recycling cases that it is currently juggling. Meserve acknowledged the point, saying that "it's a licensee need, " and that it is "extraordinarily expensive" for nuclear power plant operators to dispose of their radioactively contaminated solid materials through other means. Meserve added that, "There's a lot of decommissioning underway [at DOE nuclear weapons facilities] that we need to deal with somehow." Bunditz pressed the point, asking Meserve if the Energy Department has "formally or informally" approached the NRC about pushing for a national standard for the recycling of contaminated solid materials. "Is that part of this or not?" Bunditz asked. Meserve acknowledged that he did "personally meet" with Energy Secretary Bill Richardson about this problem, and that Richardson had encouraged the National Academy of Sciences' involvement in the matter. Andrew Wallo, director of the DOE radiation division's office of environment, safety and health, was on hand Wednesday to report the agency's perspective on the contaminated solid materials disposal problem. Wallo noted that there are hundreds of tons of metals and other slightly contaminated materials at DOE nuclear weapons facilities that must be removed if the sites are to be cleaned up and closed down. "It's a valuable commodity excepting the radioactivity in it," Wallo said of the materials. Wallo told the panel that most of the scrap metal that has been released from DOE facilities is either not contaminated at all, or has surface contamination well below the agency's current standard. However, the pubic and the steel industry has not been accepting of those very low exposure risks, Wallo acknowledged. Wallo recalled the furor that erupted when the DOE allowed contractor British Nuclear Fuels Limited (BNFL) to release 110,000 tons of radioactive metals - including 6,000 tons of volumetrically contaminated nickel - from the DOE's K-25 nuclear weapons plant at Oak Ridge, Tennessee. Public health and environmental groups vehemently objected to the contract, saying that there was no law prevent the metals from being used to make silverware, orthodontic braces, hip joint replacements, and even intrauterine devices. The steel industry also opposed the release of the contaminated scrap metal, saying that it would erode public confidence in the industry and cost steel companies tens of million of dollars should radioactive materials somehow find their way into production furnaces. Energy Secretary Bill Richardson (Photo courtesy DOE) The public outcry forced Energy Secretary Richardson to block the sale of the radioactive nickel. Richardson later issued a moratorium restricting the release of such materials until a national policy could be devised. Gary Visscher, vice president of the American Iron and Steel Institute, watched with interest on Wednesday as the NRC and the DOE asked the National Academy of Sciences to sanction the practice of recycling radioactively contaminated metals. "Anything that diminishes the public's confidence in the safeness of steel is going to hurt our companies," Visscher told ENS. Lisa Gue, a policy analyst with the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen, was also on hand on Wednesday to keep tabs on the two federal agencies and their industry contractors. "We have an ongoing concern with federal agencies that appease industry by setting rules that facilitate the release of radionuclides into the environment," Gue said. "If the nuclear industry cannot afford to protect the public and the environment from its waste products, then it's not a viable industry." Gue and other observers said they are concerned with the large block of time that was devoted to closed sessions during the three day meeting. According to the official agenda, a total of 12 and a half hours of meeting sessions are to be closed to the public, though officials pledged to post a summary of the private sessions on the Internet. /www4.nas.edu/cp.nsf/Projects+_by+_PIN/BEES-J-00-02-A?OpenDocument ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR WEAPONS ARTICLES ***************************************************************** 1 Worries of DOE bias revived January 04, 2001 Yucca contractor prepared design for a waste repository BY MARY MANNING LAS VEGAS SUN More evidence of possible bias on the part of Energy Department's chief Yucca Mountain contractor has surfaced in documents provided by the agency. The contractor, TRW Environmental Safety Systems Inc., was so confident that Yucca Mountain would be chosen as the nation's high-level nuclear waste repository that it wrote a report in August on how to design a 1,000-foot-deep dump at the site, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. The revelation has sparked a new wave of criticism of the DOE from Nevada leaders. Federal law prohibits the DOE from taking sides in the site-selection process. TRW's 51-page report, which was turned over to the DOE last month, concludes that the dump would be safe for 10,000 years, even though epic scientific studies of Yucca Mountain's suitability haven't been completed and safety standards haven't been set by the federal agencies overseeing the licensing of the repository. "Uncertainties regarding repository performance over the next 10, 000 years certainly do exist and may never be completely eliminated, " the report says. "However, the design concepts and operational procedures described in this document do provide reasonable assurance that the safe disposal of spent nuclear fuel and high-level waste can be achieved through a combination of both the natural and engineered barrier systems." TRW, which no longer will be the DOE's lead contractor next month, is being investigated by the agency's inspector general for allegedly pushing Yucca Mountain before receiving the results of the taxpayer- financed scientific studies. The investigation was prompted by a Dec. 1 Sun story that reported the DOE and the nuclear industry were collaborating behind the scenes to prepare a massive public report that will recommend Yucca Mountain. A two-page memo, allegedly put together by TRW, suggested a 60-page overview of the public report being circulated within the DOE's community of experts could be used to help the nuclear industry sell Yucca Mountain to Congress. Yucca Mountain is the only site under study to accept 77,000 tons of high-level waste now being stored at nuclear power plants across the country. On Feb. 12 TRW will be replaced by the Bechtel-SAIC Company LLC, which won a $3.1 billion, 5-year Yucca Mountain contract in November. Allen Benson, the DOE's Yucca Mountain spokesman, said the TRW design report was merely put together to give the public a sense of what a repository could look like. "It's not etched in stone," Benson said. "This document should not be interpreted as an official version of the repository. The design is evolving." TRW officials did not return phone calls. But Bob Loux, executive director of the Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects, said the report appears to be another example of bias against Nevada. "Clearly, the activity of designing a repository in advance of knowing whether the site is suitable seems to be prejudicial in my mind," Loux said. Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., called the TRW report part of a "pattern of deception" to speed up the process of putting nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain. "It's just further documentation of what we've suspected for many years that the contractors and subcontractors have been in cahoots with the DOE to make sure Yucca Mountain is found suitable," Berkley said. "Yucca Mountain will never be suitable, and all of the camouflage they roll out isn't going to make it so." The TRW report is further evidence that the Yucca dump is on DOE's fast track, Rep. Jim Gibbons, R-Nev., said. "I'm shocked at the type of conduct on the part of the Department of Energy. This appears to be part of an on going persistent bias to find Yucca Mountain suitable long before the evidence has been completed. "I believe that this adds great weight to our request to have a General Accounting Office investigation of the Department of Energy with regard to whether (DOE) Secretary (Bill) Richardson violated the law that requires open and full disclosure, as well as an unbiased position by the DOE in this matter." Gibbons said he's still preparing a letter to the GAO, the investigative arm of Congress, asking for the probe. Richardson requested the inspector general's investigation of TRW on the heels of a similar request by Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., last month. Reid said this morning that TRW's design report shows "deception and a lack of judgment on the part of the contractor. "If they're saying the repository is safe, why do they need to take all this money from the federal government (for scientific studies), " Reid said. The report suggests the repository could be designed to accommodate the stacking of thousands of nuclear waste containers underground in tunnels. Also explored in the report is the possibility of expanding Yucca's repository to hold 129,800 tons of nuclear wastes when complete, a goal that is against current law. Current DOE plans call for a second repository in the eastern half of the country after Yucca is approved. The DOE has commissioned contractors to study such potential threats as 84 known earthquake faults at Yucca, possible violent volcanic eruptions and how fast ground water moves through the mountain. ALL CONTENTS COPYRIGHT 2001 LAS VEGAS SUN, INC. ***************************************************************** 2 Doubts about FFTF merit legal challenge Published Jan. 3, 2001 Benton County commissioners' potential legal challenge of the Department of Energy plans to shut Hanford's Fast Flux Test Facility is worth pursuing. Other agencies with similar concerns should join them in trying to buy time to get some concerns about the Energy Department's study answered. Although we had earlier urged Energy Secretary Bill Richardson to decide FFTF's fate before he leaves office later this month, there are enough questions surrounding his department's environmental impact study to warrant more time before such a final decision is made about this most modern of the U.S. reactors. The environmental impact study released last month concluded FFTF was not needed to meet an array of the nation's requirements and that it should be shut down. Supporters of the reactor had hoped it could be restarted for nuclear research and to produce isotopes both for industry and for medicine, to diagnose and treat illnesses, including cancer. Benton County commissioners had enough concerns about the Energy Department's conclusions to hire legal consultants to explore options. An attorney with the Seattle law firm of Foster, Pepper & Shefelman said he found problems with the environmental study that could provide a basis for a legal challenge. FFTF supporters suggest some of the data used in the Energy Department's study is flawed. For instance, the Energy Department report predicted demand for isotopes to treat disease would grow at a rate of 7 percent to 14 percent a year over the next 20 years, while the demand for isotopes used in diagosing diseases - a much larger market - would grow 7 percent to 17 percent per year. But a recent marketing study by Frost and Sullivan Co. found diagnostic use grew by 13 percent in 1999, and therapeutic use grew by 32 percent that year. FFTF backers envisioned an array of private companies, both domestic and international, contracting to use the reactor and financially supporting its missions. However, Energy Department officials said a lack of firm commitments from such companies precluded the reactor's restart. Agency critics counter that little effort was made to secure those commitments. Beyond these questions about the study, a decision to shut FFTF down is controversial because its cost - estimated at $381 million - could pull money from critical Hanford cleanup work. While a new energy secretary in the Bush administration would have a lot of catching up to do before making a decision about FFTF, these questions are concerning enough and the reactor valuable enough to warrant the extra study. And a legal challenge is one way to provide that. Benton County commissioners are looking for partners to join them in seeing if they can buy some time to resolve these concerns before a final decision to shutdown FFTF is made. They plan to meet at 2 p.m. today in the Fowler Building, 1776 Fowler St., just off Columbia Center Boulevard in Richland. We urge other agencies to attend. ***************************************************************** 3 Lab Bunkers No Longer Called 'Kivas' ÿÿÿ Thursday, January 4, 2001 LAB BUNKERS NO LONGER CALLED 'KIVAS' Albuquerque Journal--> Journal Staff Writer Three thick-walled nuclear-experiment bunkers at Los Alamos National Laboratory are kivas no more. Lab director John Browne in late December ordered an immediate name change for the chambers and a storage building elsewhere on the lab that have been known as kivas for years. The change came in response to two letters from local pueblo members who complained earlier in December that kivas - sunken, rounded sites of special worship in Pueblo religious beliefs - are sacred places. The lab's adoption of the word to describe anything else, much less a storage shed and a trio of bunkers, was both disrespectful and offensive, the letters charged. "I assure you that no disrespect was meant in using the word 'kiva,' '' Browne wrote in a Dec. 20 letter to Picuris Pueblo Gov. Red Eagle Rael, one of the people who sent letters to Browne in December. "In fact, the term reflected the scientists' recognition of the importance within the scientific culture of these facilities." Rael could not be reached for comment Wednesday. Marian Naranjo, native communities outreach director for Santa Fe-based Concerned Citizens for Nuclear Safety and a member of the Santa Clara Pueblo, penned the other letter. Naranjo said she wept when she learned what the lab considered a kiva. "We are very happy (with the change) after being saddened for such a long time," she said Wednesday. "A kiva is the place where we have our religious aspect... It's more than a church. It's what really ties us together." Since 1946, a kiva in lab lingo has referred to three criticality bunkers at the bottom of Pajarito Canyon below the lab. The buildings are home to "criticality experiments," said lab spokeswoman Nancy Ambrosiano, where scientists study radioactive materials and their peculiar behavior. The bunkers are the only three places in the United States where scientists can safely play with plutonium and other radioactive materials, placing them close enough together to spark an atom-splitting chain reaction, she said. The bunkers were and remain rare facilities in the nuclear science world, Ambrosiano said, and, like Browne, she said the scientists who adopted the term kiva in mid-1940s did so to acknowledge the bunkers' importance. Later on, said lab spokesman James Rickman, officials also adopted the term kiva for an equipment lab used by air quality scientists, although he didn't know how the word ever came to describe that building. For now, he said, the four former kivas have no name, as Browne ordered the name change only days after receiving the letters. Every building at the lab has a number, Rickman said, so the buildings may end up being known that way. Lab officials may also adopt another innocuous, descriptive title, like "experimental bays." The employees who work in the buildings are also free to come up with their own, more colorful names, Ambrosiano said. Naranjo, though, said she also wants an apology from lab officials, the Department of Energy, which oversees the lab, and the University of California, which runs the lab under contract with the DOE. "I know that the people who presently are in positions (at the lab) personally did not name these places," she said. "That's why I feel that a letter (of apology) from them is essential so that it can be a historical positive change. They can show that this government can show respect for what was here before they came." University of California spokesman Jeff Garberson said Browne's decision speaks for itself - he made the change immediately. "It was a prompt and very courteous response to the community request," he said. The aging bunkers are scheduled to be vacated and new ones built in the next few years. Any new construction is still years away, Ambrosiano said. The DOE is currently funding an environmental study examining the proposed closing, she said, but isn't expected to make a decision on the bunkers until September. Copyright 2001 Albuquerque Journal ***************************************************************** 4 Nominee criticized for lack of nuke experience KnoxNews.com - News - Latest Washington News By STACEY ZOLT Scripps-McClatchy Western Service January 03, 2001 WASHINGTON - With questions abound about Energy Secretary-designate Spencer Abraham's lack of nuclear experience, his nomination may feel the crunch of the evenly-divided Senate. The 50-50 split gives Democrats a brief taste of majority power, with Vice President Al Gore's constitutionally provided tie-breaking vote placing the party in the majority until Inauguration Day on Jan. 20. The teeter-totter power play means Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M, could be chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee during Abraham's confirmation hearings, which a committee spokeswoman said may be held as early as Jan. 18 or 19. Abraham, who lost his reelection bid for Michigan's Senate seat to Democrat Sen. Debbie Stabenow, was nominated by President-elect George W. Bush Tuesday for the post. Though he has strong knowledge of the automotive and oil industry from his Michigan ties, he does not have nuclear energy experience. Bingaman said he expects Abraham will be confirmed but declined to pledge his support and said there are many questions to be asked during the hearing process. Abraham called Bingaman on Wednesday morning to discuss the current status of the Energy Department and test the waters on Bingaman's support for the nomination. Bingaman assured Abraham he would support an expedient confirmation process, but said he is holding off pledging his support at this time. "I want to be sure he understands the importance of our national labs," Bingaman said, referring to Abraham's lack of nuclear policy experience. "Obviously he's going to have to get some very good people in some key positions around him," he said. An aide to Bingaman added that Abraham might have a rough ride because "the Department of Energy does cover so many important issues and it's right that he should be asked about them." Sen. Frank Murkowski, R-AK, who will chair the committee in the long term, traded messages with the Secretary-designate but has not yet spoken to him. He did, however, release a statement supporting Abraham's confirmation. "The Energy Department is a difficult one to manage, but I have every confidence that Sen. Abraham is up to the job," he said. High-ranking committee member Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., said he is not concerned about Abraham's lack of nuclear energy experience because of the nuclear security czar already in place at the agency. Gen. John Gordon was appointed head of the Nation Nuclear Security Agency by Secretary of Energy Bill Richardson last year. Domenici said he spoke to President-elect Bush about Gordon, and Bush pledged his support for the agency and Gordon. And Domenici is confident that with Gordon's expertise in nuclear energy and security, Abraham will have knowledgeable support on the issue. "We have not always put somebody in charge of Energy that (is an) expert in that field," he said. More important, Domenici said, is managing the high energy prices and putting together a strong energy policy. "I think the concern for the Department of Energy is that the United States is in an energy crisis right now and the people in the United States don't know it. (Abraham is) going to jump right into an issue of tremendous effect on Americans," he said, adding that the current situation "is the result of doing nothing for the past eight years." When Domenici spoke to Abraham on Tuesday he advised him to surround himself with "smart people." Though Rep. Heather Wilson, R-N.M, said she is "pleased" with the appointment, she does have reservations. "He doesn't have a strong background with nuclear energy, but is a very smart guy and a quick learner," Wilson said. Wilson has not yet spoken to Abraham but plans to reach out to him and to other national security officials in the Bush administration to discuss the role of the New Mexico labs in their defense and energy strategies. (Stacey Zolt writes for Scripps-McClatchy Western Service.) Copyright c 1999-2000, The Knoxville News-Sentinel Co. All Rights ***************************************************************** 5 Plutonium Pact With Russia Could Backfire, Critic Says January 4, 2001 By MATTHEW L. WALD [I]ASHINGTON, Jan. 3 — A Russian-American disarmament agreement to take 68 tons of plutonium out of nuclear weapons could have the unintended effect of increasing the chance of nuclear proliferation, according to a report by an independent researcher. The researcher, Arjun Makhijani, a nuclear physicist who has specialized in analyzing Energy Department weapons activities, also found that efforts around the world to make plutonium and use it as reactor fuel have cost about $100 billion, and make little economic sense. But the Energy Department is defending the agreement, and its efforts to help the Russians sell the material in Europe as reactor fuel, as a major step toward nonproliferation. Once used in reactors, it is harder to use in weapons. Plutonium is created when uranium is used in reactors, and when it is separated from used fuel it can be reused either for reactors or for making bombs. For decades engineers have sought to build "breeders" that in their atomic reactions actually produce more reactor fuel than they consume. Because of proliferation fears, the United States, in the 1970's, banned the recovery of plutonium from civilian reactor fuel, called reprocessing. But Japan, France and Britain have invested heavily in reprocessing, and Japan and France are also working on breeders. The United States has been negotiating with Russia since the mid- 90's, and signed an agreement last September saying each side would remove 34 tons of surplus plutonium from its weapons inventory. The Energy Department is planning to pay the DUKE POWER Company to burn some of it in civilian reactors, and will mix the rest with high- level radioactive wastes so it cannot be easily retrieved for weapons use. The Russians have said they, too, want to use theirs in reactors, but they also say they want to then reprocess the spent fuel, recovering even more plutonium. Russia would like to build a breeder reactor, and a factory to turn the weapons surplus into plutonium fuel, a mixture of plutonium oxide and uranium oxide called MOx, but needs Western money for the fuel plant, estimated to cost $1.7 billion to $2.5 billion. The United States, while it has abandoned breeder reactors, plans a similar fuel plant in South Carolina. The executive director of the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research, Dr. Makhijani is a frequent critic of the Energy Department but also works closely with them at times. He recently forced the department to reassess its estimate of the quantity of plutonium and other man-made elements spilled into the dirt during weapons- making; the department concluded it was too small by a factor of 10. Another opponent of the agreement is Paul Leventhal, the president of the Nuclear Control Institute, a nonprofit organization based here. "What's at issue is do you turn the plutonium directly into a waste form, or turn to MOx, then end up with waste, in the form of spent fuel," Mr. Leventhal said. The MOx, he and others say, can be turned back into the plutonium metal used in reactors with relative ease. And if it is used in a reactor and reprocessed to make yet more plutonium, the purpose is defeated, he said. Laura S. H. Holgate, the department's negotiator for plutonium, said that under the accord the Russians could not use the weapons plutonium a second time until all had been used once, and that that would be 2025 at the earliest. By then, she said, "our vision of how we treat spent fuel will be nothing like it is today." ***************************************************************** 6 Christmas Island Bomb Tests [I] [I] CHRISTMAS ISLAND BOMB TESTS [I] THE FIRST STEP IN THE SELECTION OF CHRISTMAS ISLAND AS THE BOMB TEST BASE HAD IN FACT BEEN TAKEN IN JANUARY AND FEBRUARY OF 1956, WHEN H.M.N.Z.S. LACHLAN brought a survey party to the Island to "bring information up to date in connection with the International Geo-Physical Year". In March a request was received for the clearing of the runways at the airport and early in April information was received that the British Government was to establish an "Air Base" at Christmas Island and the code name "GRAPPLE' was born. [I] THE OFFICIAL ANNOUNCEMENT THAT THE REAL PURPOSE WAS THE TESTING OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS FOLLOWED AND ON 19TH JUNE, 1956 THE ADVANCE PARTY FOR THE OPERATION ARRIVED. BY JULY A CANVAS TOWN HAD APPEARED AND THERE WERE TWO THOUSAND SAILORS, SOLDIERS AND AIRMEN ON THE ISLAND, APART FROM THE CREWS OF THE VESSELS IN PORT AND THE CIVILIAN SCIENTIFIC PERSONNEL. RECORDING STATIONS WERE ESTABLISHED ON MALDEN AND FANNING ISLANDS. [I] AERIAL PHOTOGRAPH OF CHRISTMAS ISLAND TAKEN BY A NASA SPACE SHUTTLE. NOTE THE WHITE CLOUD COVER AND THE LAGOON STRUCTURE THROUGH THE CENTRE OF THE ISLAND. ÿ[*][I] CLICK ON THE ABOVE MAP OF CHRISTMAS ISLAND FOR A MORE DETAILED MAP. AT FIRST THERE WERE SUGGESTIONS FROM THE GILBERT AND ELLICE ISLANDS GOVERNMENT (NOW KIRIBATI AND TUVALU) THAT THE ISLAND SHOULD BE EVACUATED, BUT THIS WAS SAID TO BE UNNECESSARY AND IN FACT ADDITIONAL WORKERS WERE SENT FOR EMPLOYMENT BY THE FORCES. HOWEVER, IN FEBRUARY 1957 ALL THE WOMEN AND CHILDREN AND MOST OF THE PLANTATION STAFF WERE EVACUATED TO FANNING ISLAND WHERE THEY REMAINED UNTIL 22ND JUNE. [I] LONDON WHARF 1949. THREE BOMBS IN THE MEGATON RANGE WERE SUCCESSFULLY DROPPED BY "VALIANT" BOMBERS AND EXPLODED AT ABOUT 18,000 FEET SOME THIRTY MILES SOUTH OF THE ISLAND BETWEEN 15TH MAY AND 19TH JUNE. THE THIRTY-THREE GOVERNMENT STAFF AND PLANTATION WORKERS, WHO HAD REMAINED ON THE ISLAND, WERE TAKEN ABOARD A NAVAL LANDING CRAFT FOR THE EXPLOSIONS, WHICH TOOK PLACE VERY EARLY IN THE MORNING WHILE THEY WATCHED A FILM SHOW BELOW DECKS. [I] EARLY IMAGE OF CHRISTMAS ISLAND AIRPORT. INSTRUCTIONS PROVIDED FOR ALL DOORS AND WINDOWS TO BE LEFT OPEN AND ALL BREAKABLES TO BE PLACED FLAT ON THE FLOOR. VERY LITTLE DAMAGE WAS REPORTED - EXCEPT BY THOSE WHO NEGLECTED THESE INSTRUCTIONS. EVACUATION OF THE MILITARY PERSONNEL, APART FROM A CARETAKER FORCE, BEGAN IN JULY, BUT MEANWHILE A DECISION HAD BEEN TAKEN IN ENGLAND TO DEVELOP THE ISLAND AS A 5-YEARS TRIALS BASE. [I] MUSHROOM CLOUDS FROM THE GRAPPLE SERIES OF TESTS (UK) GRAPPLE Z FLAGPOLE1, HALLIARD 1 SOME MATERIALS ALREADY LOADED IN THE PORT WERE UNLOADED AND IN AUGUST A BUILD-UP BEGAN WHICH, OVER THE NEXT TWO YEARS, WAS TO PRODUCE A RECONSTRUCTION OF THE WHARF AND PORT, THE RESURFACING AND SEALING OF THE MAIN RUNWAY OF THE AMERICAN-BUILT AIRFIELD WITH THE INSTALLATION OF HANGARS, CONTROL TOWER AND MANY OTHER FACILITIES. ANOTHER 6,000-FOOT SEALED RUNWAY WAS CONSTRUCTED AT THE EXTREME END OF THE SOUTH-EAST ARM - "ACON FIELD" TAKING ITS NAME FROM THE FORMER WRECK. [I] MUSHROOM CLOUD OVER CHRISTMAS ISLAND. AN ASPHALT ROAD TWENTY MILES LONG WAS BUILT FROM LONDON TO THE AIRFIELD, EXTENDING A FURTHER THIRTY- FIVE MILES OF SINGLE-WIDTH TO THE SOUTH-EAST POINT. HUTTED CAMPS WITH POWER-STATION, PIPED WATER AND SANITATION AND RECREATIONAL FACILITIES WERE BUILT THREE MILES WEST OF THE AIRFIELD - "MAIN CAMP" - AND AT LONDON - "PORT CAMP" - TO HOUSE A TOTAL OF ABOUT FOUR THOUSAND MEN AT THE PEAK OF THE CONSTRUCTIONAL AND OPERATIONAL PROGRAMMES. [I] BRITAIN'S FIRST NUCLEAR TEST EXPLOSION AT CHRISTMAS ISLAND TOOK PLACE ON 15TH MAY 1957. IN NOVEMBER OF 1957 THERE WERE TWO FURTHER H-BOMB EXPLOSION AND BETWEEN APRIL AND SEPTEMBER OF 1958 A FURTHER SERIES. THERE WAS NO EVACUATION TO FANNING ISLAND FOR THESE TESTS, BUT ALL WERE TAKEN TO OFF-SHORE BOATS - EXCEPT AT THE TIME OF SOME LOW-POWER BOMB DETONATIONS WHEN EVEN THAT WAS NOT CONSIDERED NECESSARY. WITH THE PREVAILING EASTERLY WINDS THE DANGERS FROM RADIO-ACTIVITY WAS SAID TO BE NIL AND VERY MINIMAL FOR "BLAST". ONLY THE DANGER TO EYES FROM " FLASH" MADE IT ESSENTIAL FOR PEOPLE TO BE UNDER COVER. [I] LOCATION OF THE BRITISH NUCLEAR TESTS ON CHRISTMAS ISLAND. IN APRIL, 1959 H.R.H. THE DUKE OF EDINBURGH VISITED THE BASE DURING A PACIFIC TOUR. WITH TALKS ON THE BANNING OF FURTHER BOMB EXPLOSIONS IN THE ATMOSPHERE BEGINNING IN GENEVA, ACTIVITY WAS MINIMAL. TOWARDS THE END OF THE YEAR IT WAS ANNOUNCED THAT PERSONNEL WOULD BE REDUCED TO 1700 BY 1ST JANUARY, 1960 AND TO 300 IN JULY. CHRISTMAS ISLAND WAS NOW BEING ENVISAGED AS A TRANSIT BASE FOR THE FAR EAST AND R.A.F. TRANSPORT COMMAND TOOK OVER. COPRA CUTTING RESUMED IN NOVEMBER, 1959. [I] CHRISTMAS ISLAND: MUSHROOM CLOUD. BUT IT WAS NOT AFTER ALL TO BE QUITE THE END OF MILITARY ACTIVITY. THE GENEVA TALKS BROKE DOWN AND AMERICAN DEFENCE CHIEFS WERE PRESSING FOR A RESUMPTION OF TESTS. PRESIDENT KENNEDY FINALLY APPROVED AND BRITAIN ACCEPTED THAT THEY SHOULD BE STAGED AT CHRISTMAS ISLAND, 15TH FEBRUARY, 1962 FIFTY MEN FROM THE AMERICAN FIRM OF HOLMES AND NARVER ARRIVED TO REACTIVATE THE MAIN CAMP AND WITHIN TWO WEEKS THERE WERE MORE THAN 800 AMERICAN SERVICEMEN AND CIVILIANS ON THE ISLAND. NUMBERS ROSE RAPIDLY, UNTIL BY THE TIME OF THE FIRST "SHOT" ON 25TH APRIL THERE WERE 3,500 BRITISH AND AMERICAN PERSONNEL ENGAGED. BETWEEN THEN AND 11TH JULY THERE WAS A TOTAL OF TWENTY-FOUR " SHOTS" IN THE SERIES. OTHER TESTS WERE GOING ON AT JOHNSTON ISLAND 1,200 MILES TO THE NORTH-WEST AND ON 8TH JULY IT WAS RECORDED THAT THE MIDNIGHT HIGH-ALTITUDE EXPLOSION THERE WAS CLEARLY VISIBLE ON CHRISTMAS ISLAND. [I] MUSHROOM CLOUDS FROM THE DOMINIC SERIES p; P; YUKON EVACUATION TO OFF-SHORE SHIPS WAS NOT CONSIDERED NECESSARY, BUT AFTER TWO HEAVY EXPLOSIONS PEOPLE BECAME NERVOUS AND VOLUNTARY ARRANGEMENTS WERE MADE. ALMOST TOTAL FOR THE NEXT TEST, EVACUATION SOON FELL BELOW HALF AND ONLY ABOUT A THIRD OF THE PEOPLE, INCLUDING ALL THE CHILDREN, WERE LEAVING THE ISLAND BY THE END OF THE SERIES. THOSE STILL ON SHORE WENT TO THE MANEABAS (public meeting houses) and waited with bowed heads and closed eyes for the countdown, for "flash" was still the danger. They were then free to go outside and see for the first time the boiling flames of the "mushroom" cloud and experience the delayed shock waves and the roar of the explosion. [I] A USAF PLANE FLYING TOWARDS A MUSHROOM CLOUD DURING OPERATION DOMINIC. AT THE BEGINNING OF 1963 THERE WAS TALK OF THE ESTABLISHMENT OF A PERMANENT AMERICAN SATELLITE TRACKING STATION ON CHRISTMAS ISLAND, BUT INTEREST WANED AND BY THE END OF SEPTEMBER THE LAST OF THE AMERICAN SERVICEMEN HAD DEPARTED. IN BRITAIN, TOO, STRATEGIC IMPERATIVES WERE CHANGING AND THE CHRISTMAS ISLAND BASE WAS AN EARLY CASUALTY OF THE WITHDRAWAL OF BRITISH FORCES FROM THE PACIFIC THEATRE. IN JUNE THE LAST INVENTORIES WERE MADE, OBSOLETE AND DANGEROUS MATERIALS WERE DUMPED AT SEA, THE OFFICES WERE LOCKED AND AT SUNSET ON MONDAY 19TH JUNE, 1964 THE WHITE ENSIGN WAS LOWERED AT THE ROYAL NAVY SHORE STATION, H.M.S. RESOLUTION. AMERICAN SERVICE PERSONNEL REAPPEARED VERY BRIEFLY IN APRIL, 1970 TO STAND BY ON CHRISTMAS ISLAND FOR THE "SPLASH- DOWN", TWO HUNDRED MILES TO THE SOUTH, OF THE APOLLO 13 CREW RETURNING FROM THE MOON. AFTER THE DEPARTURE OF THE FORCES, OPERATION "HARD LOOK" HAD CARRIED OUT A FULL INVESTIGATION INTO THE POSSIBILITIES OF RADIO-ACTIVE CONTAMINATION, BUT HAD FOUND NONE. IN 1975 A FURTHER EXAMINATION OF CHRISTMAS ISLAND WAS UNDERTAKEN BY AMERICAN EXPERTS AS PART OF THE PREPARATION FOR THE ESTABLISHMENT OF A JAPANESE TRACKING STATION. THEY REPORTED THAT RADIO-ACTIVITY LEVELS WERE LOWER THAN THOSE FOUND IN MOST AMERICAN CITIES AND THAT THERE WAS NOTHING ON THE ISLAND WHICH COULD LEAD AN INVESTIGATOR TO DEDUCE THAT THERE HAD EVER BEEN AN ATOMIC DETONATION IN THE VICINITY.    [I] STOP PRESS BOMB TESTS: THIS MUST BE DONE FROM LIFE MAGAZINE, 1962. [I] RELUCTANTLY-FORCED BY THE BLEAK HOSTILITY OF RUSSIAN NEGOTIATORS AND THE COMPETITIVE PRESSURE OF RUSSIAN TESTS- THE U.S. FIVE DAYS AGO FIRED NUCLEAR BOMBS IN THE ATMOSPHERE OF THE PACIFIC. AFTER THREE YEARS OF TRYING TO GET THE SOVIETS TO AGREE TO AN EFFECTIVE ARMS INSPECTION AND CONTROL SYSTEM, THE U.S. FOUND ITSELF IN THE POSITION OF HAVING TO TEST AGAIN OR LOSING ITS NUCLEAR LEAD. OUR TESTS CENTRED ON BRITISH-OWNED CHRISTMAS ISLAND, JUST NORTH OF THE EQUATOR, AND OUR OWN JOHNSTON ISLAND, 700 MILES SOUTHWEST OF HONOLULU, 100 PLANES AND 40 SHIPS HAD THREE MAIN JOBS TO DO. ALTHOUGH THEY WOULD WORK IN DEEP SECRECY, THEIR EFFORTS WOULD MOST PROBABLY ENTER ON TASKS LIKE THOSE SHOWN IN THE DRAWING BELOW. FIRST WE WANT TO PROOF-TEST THE WEAPONS WE HAVE DEVELOPED SINCE OUR LAST ATMOSPHERIC SHOTS IN 1958-FOR EXAMPLE, WE HAVE NEVER FIXED A WARHEAD ON ONE OF OUR BALLISTIC MISSILES. THE CURRENT SERIES WILL SHOOT THE WORKS, LOBBING SOME WARHEADS FROM PLANES (FOREGROUND), ROCKETING OTHERS FROM JOHNSTON ISLAND (LEFT REAR) AND SENDING UP A POLARIS MISSILE FROM THE SUBMERGED SUBMARINE ETHAN ALLEN (REAR). WE WILL ALSO TRY OUT SMALLER WARHEADS IN OUR STOCKPILE, SUCH AS THE SHIP-LAUNCHED ANTISUBMARINE ROCKET IN THE RIGHT FOREGROUND. SECOND, WE WANT TO IMPROVE THE EFFICIENCY OF OUR WEAPONS. EFFICIENT BOMBS HAVE MORE VIOLENCE WITH LESS WEIGHT AND ALLOW A GIVEN MISSILE OR BOMBER TO CARRY MORE DESTRUCTIVE FORCE. WE WILL TRY OUT NEW KINDS OF BOMBS AND NEW CONCEPTS OF THEM FROM BALLOONS OVER CHRISTMAS ISLAND, MEASURING THEIR EFFICIENCY WITH HIGH-FLYING "SNIFFER" AIRCRAFT AND WITH SENSITIVE INSTRUMENTS ON THE ISLANDS AND ON BARGES ANCHORED AT SEA. THIRD, WE WANT TO FIND OUT THE EFFECT IN ATMOSPHERIC EXPLOSION HAS ON SUCH DIVERSE THINGS AS MISSILE SITES, RADAR DETECTION, RADIO COMMUNICATION AND THE FUNCTIONING OF DELICATE MACHINERY. THE RUSSIANS FOCUSED MUCH OF THEIR TEST SERIES LAST FALL ON THIS, AND WE IN TURN MUST KNOW HOW SERIOUSLY NUCLEAR BLASTS MAY UPSET OUR DEFENSES-OR OUR ENEMIES'. ALSO WE WILL SHOOT WARHEADS AND PACKAGES OF ELECTRONICS EQUIPMENT OF JOHNSTON ISLAND TO FIND OUT WHAT HAPPENS TO THEM WHEN OTHER WARHEADS GO OFF NEARBY-HELPING US DECIDE WHETHER WE SHOULD SPEND BILLIONS OF DOLLARS TRYING TO BUILD AN ANTI-MISSILE MISSILE. CLICK ON THE ABOVE FOR A FULL SIZE IMAGE OF THE DIFFERENT BOMB TESTS CONDUCTED BY THE UNITED STATES AROUND CHRISTMAS ISLAND. MOST OF THE SERIES' SHOTS WILL GO OFF FAR IN THE SKY TO MINIMISE FALL-OUT; THE RADIATION THEY PRODUCE SHOULD BE MUCH LESS THAN THAT FOR THE LAST RUSSIAN TESTS. OUR SERIES IS EXPECTED TO GO ON FOR TWO OR THREE MONTHS, DURING WHICH 25 TO 30 BOMBS WILL BE SET OFF. BUT THE U.S. HAS MADE IT VERY CLEAR THAT WE WILL TERMINATE TESTS TOMORROW IF THE RUSSIANS WILL DO THE SAME-AND AT LAST AGREE TO A PRACTICABLE WAY TO KEEP ANYONE FROM CHEATING. NEXT ... TO GRAPPLE > NEXT ... TO PICTURE GALLERY 1 > NEXT ... TO PICTURE GALLERY 2 > [I] [*][I] CHRISTMAS ISLAND. JANE'S KIRIBATI HOME PAGE. JANE'S OCEANIA HOME -- REV. 7TH JANUARY 2001) ***************************************************************** 7 ÿPutting national interests above all Yu Min, a key player in China's nuclear weapons research and architect of the country's first hydrogen bomb, prefers not to be called "Father of China's H-bomb" because it is a "foreign expression." "The success of our research on H-bombs was the result of a collective effort," explained Yu, who is also a member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. "It is the team effort, not the role I played as an individual that should be stressed," the 74-year-old scientist said. Yu began his research on atomic nuclear science in the academy after he graduated from Peking University in 1949. "I'm an introvert, and I prefer peace and quietness for reading and deep thinking," he said. He was surprised when he was asked to switch to nuclear weapons research in 1961. He was then only 34 and was gaining success for his research into the atomic nucleus. "I was utterly unprepared and was somewhat reluctant to take the job," said Professor Yu. Compared with his first job, "research into nuclear weapons is a huge project that combines science, technology and engineering. And you have to give up your quiet life and travel a lot." "So I planned to switch back to atomic nuclear research after I finished the job, which I thought might take about five years." But when the five years had passed, he changed his mind. "I decided to continue to work on the country's H-bomb research and development pro-grammes, after many of my colleagues quit the job for various reasons. Experienced people needed to remain on the job." After joining the team, his name disappeared from publications for nearly three decades until 1988. "It is patriotism that is behind my decision to devote myself to the research and development," he said. He still remembers the nuclear threats the United States made against China during the Korean War in the 1950s. "During the Korean War, General Douglas MacArthur once threatened to use nuclear weapons against China. The then American President Harry Truman also claimed that his country would not rule out the use of nuclear weapons against China. "The Chinese nation is not a bully and she should not be subject to bullying. Nuclear weapons are one of the means that can safeguard our national security," said Yu. The only major piece of equipment available to Yu and his colleagues was a radio tube computer, the only one in China at that time. "Even that computer was only available to us for 10 hours a week as it was shared with the Nuclear Weapons Institute." Yu and his 30 colleagues were transferred to the institute in early 1965 for an all-out effort for a breakthrough in H-bomb construction, after China exploded its first atomic bomb in 1964. On December 28, 1966, China exploded its first H-bomb, an experimental device with intentionally reduced power, using the design scheme proposed by Yu and his colleagues. Half a year later, China successfully exploded its H-bomb with a power equivalent to 3 million tons of TNT dynamite, and China immediately announced its breakthrough in H-bomb technology to the world. Yu is very proud of the fact that it took China only two years and eight months to explode its first H-bomb after the successful explosion of its first atomic bomb. "It took the United States seven years and the former Soviet Union four years." China continued to advance in nuclear weapons research and development and took only 45 nuclear tests to reach the nuclear capabilities of the superpowers. "The United States and the former Soviet Union reached the same level after more than 1,000 tests," Yu said. He attributed the "unbelievable achievements" to China's active defence policy and the technological route chosen by the scientists involved. China's defence policy made it possible for the nation to concentrate its resources on a few models that were capable of breaking the nuclear monopoly held by Western powers, he said. The self-reliance policy in nuclear research and development enabled China to lay a solid foundation and build a strong research team, he added. Yu was often too busy to look after his wife and children when he was in the laboratories or nuclear experiment bases in Beijing, Shanghai, the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region as well as Sichuan and Qinghai provinces. But the Chinese people have never forgotten the contributions he and his colleagues have made to the country. On September 18, Yu and 22 other scientists were given achievement prizes for their outstanding contribution to China's first nuclear weapon, missile and satellite programmes. The retired scientist said he remains optimistic about the country's future. "Although we are behind the West in general, backwardness is not the worst thing so long as our people remain united and carry forward the fine tradition of patriotism and selfless devotion." "I believe China will leap forward and in 20 years time we'll catch up with them. Date: 01/03/2001 Author: JIANG GUOCHENG Copyrightc by China Daily ***************************************************************** 8 REPORT NUKES STORED IN SINGAPORE IN 1960S MAY BE TRUE SINGAPORE JAN. 3 KYODO - A Singapore defense analyst said Wednesday it would not be surprising if a report Britain stocked nuclear weapons in Singapore in the early 1960s is true. ''Before independence in 1965, we had no competence or independent jurisdiction on foreign and defense policy. The British still had control over us,'' said the analyst, speaking on condition of anonymity. ''So, it is possible the British could have stocked nuclear weapons here as we did not have the right then to insist on the removal of the weapons or on being consulted.'' A report in the latest edition of a U.S. magazine that specializes in nuclear issues ''Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists'' said Britain stored tactical nuclear weapons at a Royal Air Force base in Singapore in the early 1960s. Citing recently declassified British government documents, the magazine said former British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan personally authorized the deployment of the ''Red Beard'' tactical nuclear weapons in 1962. Today, Singapore's position on nuclear weapons is reflected in the Southeast Asia Nuclear Weapon-Free Zone Treaty, which it inked with other members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in 1995 to keep the region free of nuclear weapons. However, at the same time, Singapore does not insist that U.S. warships passing through Singapore waters or stopping at its ports declare if they carry nuclear weapons, the analyst said. ''We do not insist the U.S. informing us in advance that ships are definitely not carrying nuclear weapons. It's because we do not wish to throw a brick on American deterrent policy, which is based on this kind of ambiguity,'' he said. He added that Singapore's position on nuclear weapons has ''never been quite clearly stated as far as official policy go. But it is implied by the nuclear treaty signed with ASEAN.'' 2000 Kyodo News (c) Established 1945. All Rights Reserved ***************************************************************** 9 Fears Grow About Depleted Uranium BRUSSELS, Belgium (AP)--European governments are disturbed. Some of their soldiers are falling sick and dying, and they don't know why. Every day the question grows louder: Can the armor-piercing munitions made of depleted uranium that NATO used in Kosovo be causing cancer? Story Filed: Thursday, January 04, 2001 3:17 PM EST BRUSSELS, Belgium (AP)--European governments are disturbed. Some of their soldiers are falling sick and dying, and they don't know why. Every day the question grows louder: Can the armor-piercing munitions made of depleted uranium that NATO used in Kosovo be causing cancer? There is no answer. Nobody has made the connection scientifically. Certainly not NATO. The United States, the only NATO ally to use depleted uranium weapons during the 78-day air campaign against Yugoslavia in 1999, insisted again Thursday that the munitions pose no health threat. In Washington, the Pentagon said it is aware of the concerns being raised by some allies. ``We share those concerns,'' said Lt. Col. Paul Phillips. He said the United States has conducted many studies on depleted uranium, particularly since the 1991 Gulf War when the weapons were first used. ``In each study, we've come away convinced that the use of depleted uranium munitions does not present significant or residual environmental or health risks,'' Phillips said. NATO spokeswoman Simone de Manso in Brussels, said: ``According to our knowledge from independent research ... there is no study that can prove a direct link between certain types of diseases of which people are now afraid and contact with depleted uranium.'' His remarks echoed those of the NATO-led peacekeeping force in Bosnia, SFOR. It said in a statement Wednesday that research has shown ``there is a negligible hazard'' from the ammunition. ``SFOR doesn't believe that either the troops serving within SFOR today or the civilian population in Bosnia are at risk,'' the statement said. The reassurances haven't calmed jittery Europeans, and Thursday the 15-nation European Union added its voice. ``There will be an informal inquiry,'' said EU spokesman Jonathan Faull. He said it was too soon to say if soldiers who served in the Balkans under NATO were suffering from illnesses as a result of contact with depleted uranium. ``What we know is that community citizens have been affected.'' Romano Prodi, president of the European Commission, the EU's executive arm, said the EU ``needs to know the truth.'' ``If there exists the slightest risk, then these weapons should be abolished immediately,'' Prodi told Italian radio. A year ago, NATO Secretary-General Lord Robertson confirmed that American jets had fired about 31,000 depleted uranium rounds at Yugoslav armored vehicles in Kosovo. The U.N. Environment Program is expected to release a report on the subject next month. And the subject will be discussed at NATO's regular weekly political committee Tuesday. Italy launched an investigation last week into a possible link between depleted uranium munitions and about 30 cases of serious illness involving soldiers who served in missions Kosovo and earlier in Bosnia, 12 of whom developed cancer. Five of the soldiers have died of leukemia. And France said Thursday that four French soldiers who served in the Balkans during the 1999 bombing campaign are being treated for leukemia. Spain, Portugal, Finland, Belgium, Greece, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic and Turkey announced plans to screen peacekeepers. Some don't believe the screening is worth the effort. Wendla Paile of the Finnish Center for Radiation and Nuclear Safety in Helsinki said such screening was ``pointless.'' ``The radiation from uranium depleted ammunition is so little that it could not explain these extra cases (of leukemia),'' Paile said. Paul Beaver, an analyst at Janes Defense Weekly, said the countries screening their troops have no idea what to look for. ``The problem is there hasn't been any really good work done on it, '' Beaver said. ``There is no concrete information. There has been research carried out by the U.S. Army, the British and the French as well, but it seems inconclusive. I've read all the literature I can find on it, but I have no straight answer.'' Copyright c 2001 Associated Press Information Services, all bsp; ***************************************************************** 10 Dutch Probe if Deaths Related to 'Balkan Syndrome' The Netherlands said on Thursday it was investigating whether the health of its United Nations peacekeeping soldiers in the Balkans was at risk from radiation from depleted uranium following NATO attacks there. Story Filed: Thursday, January 04, 2001 10:40 AM EST THE HAGUE (Reuters) - The Netherlands said on Thursday it was investigating whether the health of its United Nations peacekeeping soldiers in the Balkans was at risk from radiation from depleted uranium following NATO attacks there. ``As far as we know two soldiers have died from leukemia. One was based in Kosovo and one in Bosnia,'' a spokesman for the Dutch Defense Ministry said. ``We're investigating whether more have died or whether there are others suffering from leukemia.'' Several NATO members have voiced concern over mysterious illnesses among alliance peacekeepers in the former Yugoslavia--the so-called ``Balkan Syndrome.'' Italy has urged the alliance to investigate claims that six Italian soldiers who died after serving in the Balkans were killed by exposure to depleted uranium from NATO attacks. Findings would be published next week from the Dutch probe into whether there was a link between ``Balkan Syndrome'' and NATO air attacks in 1999 to oust Serbs from Kosovo, the Dutch ministry spokesman said. U.S. attack jets fired some 31,000 rounds of armor-piercing uranium ammunition against Serbian tanks and armored cars during the Kosovo air campaign. Several European countries have taken part in various Balkan peacekeeping missions since 1992. The Netherlands still has 1,600 soldiers in Bosnia and withdrew its 1,100 peacekeepers from Kosovo last summer, the spokesman said. NATO ambassadors are expected to discuss the ``Balkan syndrome'' at a regular meeting on January 10. Copyright c 2001 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 11 Four French Balkan Veterans Hospitalized With Leukemia Story Filed: Thursday, January 04, 2001 10:33 AM EST PARIS (Jan. 4) XINHUA - Four French soldiers back from former Yugoslavia have been hospitalized for leukemia, presumably caused from contact with depleted uranium ammunitions used by NATO in the Balkans, Jean- Francois Bureau, a French Defense Ministry spokesman, said on Thursday. Defense Minister Alain Richard said on the same day that France supports Italy's demand for a NATO investigation into the possible link between the use of depleted uranium in the Balkans and the recent death of six Italian soldiers who had served in Bosnia. The six Italian soldiers had died of cancer and leukemia, now called "the Balkan Syndrome." France will attend a NATO meeting on January 9 in Brussels, convened at the request of Italy to study potential risks arising from the use of depleted uranium. Belgium and Portugal have also reported "Balkan Syndrome" among their military personnel who had stayed in former Yugoslavia. Depleted uranium, a heavy metal that affects the human renal and hepatic systems, gives off a very toxic dust that can cause cancer and other diseases such as leukemia. The U.S. troops serving in NATO were the only ones using depleted uranium ammunitions, which are good for piercing armored vehicles, according to French military sources. Copyright XINHUA NEWS AGENCY Copyright c 2001, Xinhua News Agency, all rights reserved. p; ***************************************************************** 12 Finland to investigate the use of depleted uranium The Finnish defence ministry has said that it is considering further investigations after reports about depleted uranium in the ammunition used during the Kosovo crisis. Story Filed: Thursday, January 04, 2001 6:18 AM EST JAN 4, 2001, M2 Communications - The Finnish defence ministry has said that it is considering further investigations after reports about depleted uranium in the ammunition used during the Kosovo crisis. It is reportedly possible that the Finnish defence forces also have ammunition that contains depleted uranium of the type that has been found in the Balkans. Reports claim that the ammunition, which is only mildly radioactive in its natural state, has caused leukemia in Belgian, Dutch and Italian soldiers. The danger comes once the ammunition has been used, as the uranium vaporises on contact, and it is thought that the dust resulting from the impact may be dangerous. Missiles purchased from the Soviet Union may contain depleted uranium. Depleted uranium can also contain heavy metals that negatively affect the human body. Finnish investigators are to examine the missiles and Finnish KFOR troops who have spent more than a year in Kosovo will receive additional health check-ups. Meanwhile Italy has asked NATO to clarify the use of weapons containing depleted uranium during missions in the former Yugoslavia after six Italian soldiers that were part of the peace-keeping force in the area died from cancer. According to the BBC, NATO has confirmed the use of weapons that contain depleted uranium in Kosovo and there is also evidence that such weapons were used in Bosnia. The substance is used for armour-piercing ammunition as it is heavier and denser than lead and it has been singled out as an effective weapon against tanks. There have also been claims from Gulf War veterans that depleted uranium is the cause of ailments they suffer from, which have been given the collective name 'Gulf War Syndrome'. Apart from Finland, Spain, Portugal and France are also looking into the issue of depleted uranium in weapons. There are also reports that several European governments have instructed troops not to eat local produce in the former Yugoslavia, and that even drinking water has been provided. ((Comments on this story may be sent to nbr.feedback@nordicbusinessreport.com)) Copyright c 1998-2001 M2 COMMUNICATIONS LTD http://www.m2.com p; Portions of above Copyright c 1997-2001, Northern Light ***************************************************************** 13 SFOR Says Depleted Uranium 'A Negligible Hazard' The NATO-led Stabilization Force (SFOR) in Bosnia said on Thursday the ammunition with depleted uranium it had used during the 1992-95 war there posed only a ``negligible hazard.'' Story Filed: Thursday, January 04, 2001 1:11 PM EST SARAJEVO (Reuters) - The NATO-led Stabilization Force (SFOR) in Bosnia said on Thursday the ammunition with depleted uranium it had used during the 1992-95 war there posed only a ``negligible hazard.'' ``SFOR does not believe that either the troops serving with SFOR today, or civilian population are at risk from DU (depleted uranium) ammunition,'' SFOR said in a statement, issued as a row erupted over alleged ``Balkans syndrome'' among peacekeepers. NATO ambassadors are expected to discuss the mysterious illness next week following claims that six Italian peacekeepers died after being exposed to depleted uranium from spent ammunition, NATO sources said earlier on Thursday. The six Italian soldiers, who all served in the Balkans, died of leukemia. Several other NATO member states have also voiced concern about the problem. Italian Defense Minister Sergio Mattarella told Italian troops in Sarajevo during a visit on Thursday that a commission he has set up to investigate the problem would establish whether the causes of the Italian soldiers' deaths were inter-linked. SFOR said the alliance had conducted research to establish whether the ammunition with depleted uranium--used by NATO troops in 1994- 95--posed any medical risk. ``The result of that research showed that there is a negligible hazard, and that there is no significant risk to deployed troops or to the local population,'' SFOR said. ``Negligible hazard means that no threat or medical hazard exists that is any different from what is experienced in normal day-to-day life,'' the peace force said. It added that a U.N. Environmental Program (UNEP) assessment team had been tasked in November last year with investigating any possible risks by collecting and analyzing soil samples and measuring radiation levels. ``We will be informed of their results early this year,'' SFOR said, noting that the International Commission on Radiation Protection did not list depleted uranium as a health hazard. SFOR said depleted uranium is 40 percent less radioactive than naturally occurring uranium. Armor-piercing rounds tipped with DU have the ability to ``self-sharpen'' as they penetrate, whereas other types tend to mushroom, blunting their impact. According to the Pentagon in Washington, the major health concerns about DU relate to its chemical properties as a heavy metal rather than its low radioactivity. Since 1993, the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs has been monitoring 33 American victims of ``friendly fire'' in the Gulf, half of whom still have DU fragments embedded in their bodies and show higher than normal levels of uranium in urine. Their reproductive health has been normal and babies have shown no birth defects, according to a Pentagon fact-file. NATO officials outlined the Alliance's use of depleted uranium during the Bosnian conflict only last month, when they said some 10,000 rounds were fired in 1994-95. The Pentagon, under pressure from critics who accused it of covering up the issue, said NATO forces fired 31,000 rounds against Yugoslav armored vehicles in the 1999 Kosovo conflict. An Italian spokesman for the NATO-led peacekeeping force in Kosovo said Italians carried out checks two weeks after their troops first deployed in the Yugoslav province in June 1999 and found that levels of radioactivity did not pose a health risk. He said the troops had nevertheless been warned from the start to avoid bomb-damaged vehicles and not to pick up anything from the ground and had also warned civilians via local radio. Luljeta Krasniqi, a 30-year-old Albanian woman living near a former Yugoslav army barracks in the western town of Pec, confirmed there had been warnings. ``We were regularly warned not to touch anything at the bombed barracks because it might be dangerous for our children and for us. We haven't had any problems so far,'' she said. Copyright c 2001 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved. Portions of above Copyright c 1997-2001, Northern Light Technology Inc. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 14 Editorial: Say it ain't so, George W. January 04, 2001 Most of the names that had been floated for secretary of energy in a Bush administration had terrified Nevadans. At the top of the list was former Democratic Sen. Bennett Johnston, author of the "Screw Nevada" legislation that limited the study of a high-level nuclear waste repository to Nevada. Also sending shivers down the spines of Nevadans as a potential secretary of energy was Thomas Kuhn, who runs the Edison Electric Institute, a group of utilities that favors storing nuclear waste in Nevada. Then George W. Bush settled on Spencer Abraham, the Michigan Republican who recently lost his re-election bid to the U.S. Senate. As a U.S. senator, Abraham didn't maintain the same high profile on nuclear waste storage as Johnston once did or even match Sen. Frank Murkowski, R-Alaska, who has taken Johnston's place as the nuclear industry's point man in Congress. Murkowski, who also is a key energy adviser to Bush, wants man's deadliest waste stored in Nevada come hell or high water. But don't be fooled into thinking that the relatively mild-mannered Abraham has an open mind on this issue. Not only has he received a huge amount of campaign contributions from the nuclear power industry, but Abraham also consistently has advocated sending nuclear waste to Nevada. Michigan has four nuclear power reactors, so Abraham has shared that state's damn-the-torpedoes attitude to the disposal of nuclear waste, a philosophy that pays no heed to critical safety issues. So what are Bush's high-ranking Nevada Republican supporters saying about Abraham's appointment? Gov. Kenny Guinn said he was confident that Abraham "will continue the position of President-elect Bush to base any decision on nuclear waste storage on science rather than political expediency." Rep. Jim Gibbons said he believed Abraham would stand by Bush's promise to rely on radiation standards for a repository established by the Environmental Protection Agency, not the incredibly lax standards suggested by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. But these statements show the credulity of these Nevadans, especially since the incoming president has surrounded himself with advisers--both in and out of government--who are joined at the hip with the nuclear power industry. It also didn't help matters that during the campaign Bush was reluctant to publicly detail his stands on nuclear waste storage. It was only months after the Nevada media's persistent questioning--and just a couple of weeks before Election Day--that the Republican ticket finally said that, like the Clinton administration, it also would fight Congress' efforts to weaken radiation standards for a repository. This belated promise was par for the course for the Bush team, which always--after the fact--managed to match Al Gore's Nevada-friendly views on nuclear waste storage. Nevadans understandably are worried about the incoming Republican administration, since it was a GOP-controlled Congress that last year came within a whisker of getting legislation passed that would have guaranteed that nuclear waste would have been sent to this state. It was only President Clinton's willingness to veto this legislation that prevented this specter from becoming a reality. A Republican in the White House with ties to the nuclear power industry certainly will embolden members of Congress with pro-industry sentiments to push Bush to accept legislation that would immediately send nuclear waste to Nevada. Despite assurances to the contrary by top Nevada Republicans, Bush's selection of Abraham is a harbinger of trouble ahead. On nuclear waste storage, at least, Nevada's views could be greeted icily by this administration. ALL CONTENTS COPYRIGHT 2001 LAS VEGAS SUN, INC. ***************************************************************** 15 AMMUNITION SUSPECTED IN PEACEKEEPERS' ILLNESS BY PETER W. MAYER, ASSOCIATED PRESS, 1/4/2001 [I]OME - NATO is being pressured to explain its use of armor-piercing ammunition containing depleted uranium, following the cancer deaths of at least six Italian peacekeepers who served in Bosnia, Kosovo, and Macedonia. Italy's Green and Communist parties, both opponents of NATO's 78- day bombing campaign in Yugoslavia in 1999, have long contended that the ammunition was making peacekeepers in the Balkans ill. Last week, Italy announced it was investigating illnesses among soldiers deployed in Kosovo after the airstrikes there. Spain, Portugal, Turkey, and Finland followed suit by screening their Balkans veterans. NATO scheduled top-level discussions on the ammunition for Saturday, the Italian Foreign Ministry said yesterday. ''The issue has taken a serious turn and the alarm caused is more than legitimate,'' Prime Minister Giuliano Amato said in an interview published yesterday in La Repubblica newspaper. Depleted uranium, a dense metal with low levels of radioactivity, is used in artillery because of its ability to penetrate armor. But some believe the dust created upon impact may be harmful. The NATO-led peacekeeping force in Bosnia, known as SFOR, acknowledged using depleted uranium ammunition in Bosnia in the fall of 1994 and in the fall of 1995. But SFOR rejected the theory that depleted uranium was making soldiers ill. In Kosovo, US warplanes used armor-piercing rounds containing depleted uranium mostly in the central, western, and southwestern parts of the province - areas where Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese peacekeepers later were deployed. A UN team that went to Kosovo in November is doing a study and is expected to report its findings in February. Amato suggested he did not believe NATO's assurances. He said Foreign Minister Lamberto Dini would press NATO to ''assume its responsibility.'' As a NATO member, Italy takes part in every military meeting and is entitled to whatever information it is seeking, a NATO spokesman said in Brussels. Italy's study will concentrate on the illnesses of 30 Balkans veterans, including the six who have died of cancer. About 60,000 Italian soldiers have served in Bosnia, Kosovo, and Macedonia since 1995. Other European countries are checking their troops as well for radiation. Portugal and Turkey were screening soldiers in Kosovo, and Spain said it would examine all 32,000 troops who have served in the Balkans since 1992. Initial tests have come back negative, Spain's Defense Ministry said last week. Portugal's Parliament held an emergency session yesterday after the father of one deceased Kosovo veteran demanded that his son be exhumed for a radiation exposure test. The head of the army, General Antonio Martins Barrento, dismissed the father's concerns as a ''paranoid fantasy.'' Finland, which is not a member of NATO but contributed 2,000 soldiers to the peacekeeping force, said spot checks of urine samples from veterans so far have revealed no radiation exposure. This story ran on page A17 of the Boston Globe on 1/4/2001. ***************************************************************** 16 ITALY LINKS LEUKAEMIA DEATHS TO NATO SHELLS The Times Greg L Davies/Reuters THURSDAY JANUARY 04 2001 FROM RICHARD OWEN IN ROME NATO agreed yesterday to examine the alliance’s use of depleted uranium weapons in the Bosnia and Kosovo conflicts after the number of deaths from cancer among Italian peacekeeping soldiers rose to six. The alliance’s North Atlantic Council, Nato’s highest decision-making body, will discuss the issue next week, after Giuliano Amato, the Italian Prime Minister, and President Ciampi demanded a “full explanation” for claims that peacekeeping troops in the Balkans may have contracted leukaemia through contact with depleted uranium. Portugal, Finland, Spain and Turkey have announced their intention to screen all their troops who have served in the Balkans and to check radiation levels by collecting air, water and soil samples. A spokesman for Nato in Brussels said that the alliance would co- operate fully with the Italian authorities and had already launched its own investigation into the alleged “Balkans Syndrome”. The simmering row over “suspicious deaths” in the Armed Forces shot to the top of the Italian political agenda yesterday, with Communist allies of Signor Amato’s centre-left Government issuing the first calls for Italian troops to be withdrawn altogether. Alarm over the rising death toll dominated television news bulletins and newspaper front pages. Left-wingers also called for the resignation of Javier Solana, Nato Secretary-General at the time of the Kosovo campaign and now the EU’s high representative for foreign and defence policy. But the Nato spokesman said that it would be “virtually impossible to inhale enough DU (depleted uranium) to pose a health risk”, adding that DU had 40 per cent less radiation than natural uranium in soil and rocks. In an interview with La Repubblica, Signor Amato said that the situation was very delicate, but that alarm in Italy was more than legitimate. The Government, he said, had always been led to believe that DU was used in Kosovo but not in Bosnia and that it posed a danger only in exceptional circumstances, such as picking up a fragment of shell with a hand with an open wound. “But we are now beginning to have the justified fear that matters are not so simple,” Signor Amato added. Sergio Mattarella, the Defence Minister, arrives in Sarajevo today to investigate at first hand; Marco Minniti, the deputy minister, is conducting similar inquiries in Pristina. Nato warplanes — notably American A10 “tank-killers” — used armour-piercing shells in Bosnia in 1995 and more extensively in Kosovo last year. During the Kosovo crisis, Italy acted as Nato’s “aircraft carrier”, with wave after wave of warplanes taking off from Aviano in northern Italy and Gioia del Colle in southern Italy to bomb Serb targets. The war stretched Italian loyalty to Nato, however, with the former Communists in the ruling Party of the Democratic Left having to contend with strong pacifist and anti-American opinion. Yesterday Signor Amato denied the issue of leukaemia was causing further strain. Nato and the Italian authorities maintain that there is “no proven link” between DU and deaths from cancer, but Falco Accame, a retired army commander campaigning on behalf of soldiers’ families, said the Italian Army had issued “belated guidelines” on weapons containing DU which showed that the army itself believed there was a risk. Five Italian soldiers who served in Balkans postings and one from an Italian firing range have so far died from leukaemia and groups representing the families of members of the Armed Forces say that 30 more are under observation. No Italian troops serving in Kosovo are yet known to have died of cancer, but campaigners say that several are ill and point out that leukaemia takes 18 months to two years to develop. The sixth to die was named yesterday as Salvatore Carbonaro, 24, an armourer from Syracuse in Sicily, who died of leukaemia at a hospital in Pavia after an 18-month illness. Friends said he had been “fit, healthy and full of life” before going to Bosnia in 1998. Copyright 2000 TIMES NEWSPAPERS LTD. This service is ***************************************************************** 17 MOD REJECTS CLAIMS OF URANIUM RISK The Times THURSDAY JANUARY 04 2001 BY MICHAEL EVANS, DEFENCE EDITOR BRITAIN remained firmly of the view yesterday that the firing of depleted uranium shells by American aircraft during Nato’s bombing campaign in Kosovo posed no health risk for British peacekeepers. Unlike Italy, however, which is investigating the death of several Balkans veterans from leukaemia, there have been no reported cases of cancer-related illnesses suffered by British soldiers who have served in either Kosovo or the earlier Bosnia conflict. The Ministry of Defence’s experience has been confined to the 1991 Gulf War, which did lead to mystery illnesses among about 5,000 veterans, some of whom have blamed the use of depleted uranium weapons. Forty British soldiers who served in the Gulf War were so convinced that their illnesses could be blamed on the firing of depleted uranium shells that they went to Canada for tests. A Canadian expert, Hari Sharma, examined the men and declared that they were suffering from uranium poisoning. However, the MoD said that Professor Sharma’s findings had not been published in any scientific journal and all attempts to persuade him to send his work to be examined in Britain had failed. The Royal Society is carrying out a review of the possible effects of depleted uranium weapons and MoD officials have given evidence to its inquiry. The society’s report is due in the spring. The MoD has taken comfort, however, from a new Pentagon report that has effectively ruled out any link between cancer and weapons tipped with armour-piercing depleted uranium. The Pentagon report said that depleted uranium was 40 per cent less radioactive than natural uranium and that there were normally between two and four tonnes of uranium in the top foot of soil per square mile. However, veterans claim that the danger emanates from radioactive dust spread by the weapons into the atmosphere, which if ingested in substantial amounts could damage organs. The American Department of Veteran Affairs has been monitoring 33 Gulf War veterans who were seriously injured in “friendly-fire” incidents involving depleted uranium. About half of them still have depleted uranium fragments in their bodies. The Pentagon report said that so far results indicated that although many of them continued to have medical problems, they did not relate to their exposure to depleted uranium. The report also said that “no human cancer of any type has ever been seen as a result of exposure to natural or depleted uranium”. Copyright 2000 TIMES NEWSPAPERS LTD. This service is ***************************************************************** 18 DEPLETED URANIUM: ANALYSIS BY MICHAEL EVANS The Times BY MICHAEL EVANS, DEFENCE EDITOR Britain remained firmly of the view today that, despite the alarm expressed by Italy, Spain, Turkey and Finland, the firing of depleted uranium shells by American aircraft during Nato’s bombing campaign against the Serbs in Kosovo in 1999 posed no health risk for British peacekeepers. Unlike Italy which is investigating the death of several Balkans veterans from leukaemia, there have been no reported cases of cancer- related illnesses suffered by British soldiers who have served in either Kosovo or the earlier Bosnia conflict. The Ministry of Defence’s experience has been confined to the 1991 Gulf War which did lead to mystery illnesses among about 5,000 veterans, some of whom have blamed the use of depleted uranium weapons. Depleted uranium is a by-product of the process for converting natural uranium into the enriched form used in nuclear weapons and reactors. The potential exposure of Nato troops to radioactive dust scattered by American weapons tipped with armour-piercing depleted uranium in the Gulf, Bosnia and Kosovo campaigns has become a highly controversial issue, even though there remains no scientific evidence linking it to the deaths of alliance soldiers. Forty British soldiers who served in the Gulf War were so convinced their illnesses could be blamed on the firing of depleted uranium shells that they went to Canada for tests. A Canadian expert, Professor Hari Sharma, examined the men and declared they were suffering from uranium poisoning. However, the MoD said his findings had not been published in any scientific journal and all attempts to persuade the professor to send his work to be examined in Britain had failed. "We also invited the 40 veterans to be examined by independent medical experts in Britain but so far they have not come forward," a spokesman said. The Royal Society is currently carrying out a review of the possible affects of depleted uranium weapons and MoD officials have given evidence to its inquiry. The society’s report is due in the Spring. The MoD has taken comfort, however, from a new Pentagon report which has effectively ruled out any link between cancer and depleted uranium weapons. The Pentagon report said that depleted uranium was 40 per cent less radioactive than natural uranium - and there were normally two to four tons of uranium in the top foot of soil per square mile. However, this argument is dismissed by veterans who claim the danger emanates from the radioactive dust in the atmosphere which, if ingested in substantial amounts, could damage organs. David Case, an expert working for the Pentagon’s environmental exposure team, wrote in the latest report that depleted uranium, which is much denser than conventional material and, thus, has greater penetrative power, could cause kidney problems, if ingested,"because of its heavy metal toxicity". "The health risks from its radioactivity are slight compared to the heavy metal toxicity risk," he wrote. More than 300 tons of depleted uranium were fired in the Gulf War, either by American tanks or by A10 Warthog tank-busting aircraft. The American Department of Veteran Affairs has been monitoring 33 Gulf War veterans who were seriously injured in "friendly-fire" incidents involving depleted uranium. About half of them still have depleted uranium fragments in their bodies. So far, results indicate that although many of them continue to have medical problems, they do not relate to their exposure to depleted uranium. "Tests for kidney function have all been normal and the reproductive health of this group appears to be normal in that no babies born to these veterans between 1991 and 1997 have exhibited birth defects," the Pentagon report said. The Pentagon report also said that "no human cancer of any type has ever been seen as a result of exposure to natural or depleted uranium". Copyright 2000 TIMES NEWSPAPERS LTD. This service is ***************************************************************** 19 EU presses Nato over uranium arms BBC News | EUROPE | Thursday, 4 January, 2001, 16:44 GMT EU [I] European Commission President Romano Prodi has said he wants to know the truth about the effect of Nato weapons on soldiers who served in the Balkans, and on the civilian population. The commission must ascertain the truth, concerning not just our soldiers but also those who were living alongside them[I] Romano Prodi In an interview with Italian state radio, he said that weapons using depleted uranium (DU) should be abolished, if they posed any risk to human health. Italy on Wednesday became the latest European country to ask Nato to investigate the so-called Balkan syndrome, after a sixth Italian soldier died of leukaemia. France, which has revealed that four soldiers are being treated for leukaemia, has also added its voice to requests from Portugal and Belgium for an inquiry. Five soldiers have died in Belgium and one in Portugal. NATO HELP The Czech army health service also said on Thursday that it was investigating the death of a helicopter pilot from a blood disorder. [I] Prodi: DU weapons should be scrapped, if there is any risk Mr Prodi said the commission must establish the truth not only about European soldiers, but also about the civilians living in affected areas. He said: "I will propose immediate contacts be made with the governments of Bosnia and Serbia, to discuss with them the pollution and the problems linked to the depleted uranium." The Italian defence ministry has acknowledged that no link had so far been found between depleted uranium munitions and the deaths of the six Italians, but said it had nevertheless urged Nato to stop using the projectiles. Nato spokesman Mark Laity told the BBC on Thursday that the alliance would not launch an investigation itself, but would provide any information requested. "Nato's position is that we are going to help the Italians in every way we can," he said. "They have asked for information and we are now trying to find it." NO GUIDELINES Italian politicians have claimed that US troops went to the Balkans fully briefed on how to protect themselves in areas where DU weapons had been used, whereas Italian soldiers did not. [I] Nato troops fear DU's effects "Guidelines were issued to some people, but when they were issued, who they were issued to, and what they were is I think one of the things that is going to be sorted out," Mr Laity said. He said Nato was also co-operating with studies by the United Nations Environment Programme into possible environmental contamination, but would be surprised if it they suggested there was a major environmental hazard. The alliance's North Atlantic Council and its political committee are going to discuss the problem in the next few days. Last week, Belgian Defence Minister Andre Flahaut called on all European Union defence ministers to examine the issue. GULF WAR SYNDROME Finland and Spain have already begun looking into the matter. [I] Gulf veterans believe they are at risk The French defence minister, Alain Richard, on Thursday called on the United States to be more open about the matter, but said that there was no reason at the moment for the weapons to be withdrawn. Nato has acknowledged that it did use some DU weapons in the Kosovo conflict, though little more than half the quantity the Belgrade authorities say were fired. Depleted uranium is a heavy substance, 1.7 times as dense as lead, and used in armour-piercing munitions. Many Gulf War veterans believe it is implicated in a range of medical problems they are suffering from, known collectively as Gulf War Syndrome. Because of its ability to punch through armour, DU is prized as a highly effective anti-tank weapon. In its natural state, it is only mildly radioactive, but on impact with a solid object it turns into a burning vapour. The US Defence Department and the UK Ministry of Defence accept that the resulting dust can be dangerous, and say troops entering vehicles hit by DU weapons need to take precautions. ***************************************************************** 20 Should Nato's uranium weapons be banned? BBC News | TALKING POINT | Sunday, 7 January, 2001, 11:43 GMT [I] ITALY HAS DEMANDED MORE INFORMATION FROM NATO ON THE USE OF WEAPONS CONTAINING DEPLETED URANIUM IN THE BALKANS. It follows the death of a sixth Italian soldier from cancer. Nato pointed out that DU was needed for highly effective anti-tank weapons. Many Gulf War veterans believe DU is implicated in a range of medical problems they are suffering from. European Commission President Romano Prodi has called for contacts with authorities in the Balkans to discuss DU pollution and the possible threat posed to civilians in the region. IS THEIR USE JUSTIFIABLE? IS NATO PUTTING ITS SOLDIERS AND PEACEKEEPERS AT RISK UNNECESSARILY? HAS THE POSSIBLE RISK TO CIVILIANS BEEN ADEQUATELY ASSESSED? In war you use weapons to win [I] Casey, USA In war you use weapons to win. The more destructive a weapon is, the greater the chances are for a victory. War is not about throwing sticks and stones. If you're not willing to go all out you will lose. Uranium is a weapon that should be used in war since it inflicts injury before and after it is used. After all who said war was kind? CASEY, USA I disagree with Fraser's comment entirely. War is not war. There should be limits to what is acceptable and what isn't. His opinion might be different if he was in the armed forces rather than having a very cosy office job!! MARK, UK Andrew from the Isle of Wight - how are you planning to enforce your global weapons ban? Uranium and nuclear weapons kept the US and USSR from each other's throats for most of the last fifty years. HA, LONDON, UK The Geneva Convention attempted to tackle this very issue decades ago with little obvious effect [I] Matt, London, UK It's difficult to know where to 'draw the line' as far as weapons are concerned. The Geneva Convention attempted to tackle this very issue decades ago with little obvious effect. Depleted uranium tipped rounds just happen to be perfect for slicing through armour plate and I'm afraid no amount of debating will prevent the military from using it. The bottom line is that weapons are designed to destroy, maim or kill. Whether it's napalm, landmines or D.U., if it's effective on the battlefield then chances are it'll stay in use. MATT, LONDON, UK The real problem is that Nato might yet again have ruined the country they said they were trying to save. But then it wasn't about trying to save them - it was a political stunt. Just look at the relative value of British pilots compared to civilians. As long as our precious pilots were safe at 15,000 feet it didn't matter what happened on the ground. Same argument S. POOLE, ENGLAND The after-effects of depleted uranium use are well known. It is not just a matter of people dying from one cause or another. People in the Balkans Iraq, and the armed forces will be dying for years to come from the toxins released. Let's not put our heads in the sand. DAVID MOW, USA Less effective weapons prolonging conflict or even leading to a defeat on the battlefield would likely cause far more casualties than the limited exposure suffered by soldiers. The solution should not be a ban but a search for ways to minimise the exposure (protective gear, ways to clean up DU from the battlefield and so on). A. MELIN, UK The UK government can and should be able to do more than just keeping "an open mind"[I] Dr Riz Rahim, USA The British Ministry of Defence (MoD) may find some justification, as the Pentagon did, in not considering exposure to depleted uranium (DU) a serious enough problem to warrant a monitoring of the veterans of the Balkan war. But, after the Gulf War syndrome experience, one wonders if the MoD keeping "an open mind" about DU is enough of a concern. It is true that most of the troops still in the Balkans routinely undergo medical tests, and those out of that area can take it upon themselves to get a medical check, but the UK government can and should be able to do more than just keeping "an open mind". DR RIZ RAHIM, USA After the Gulf War we should be used to the American forces killing more Allied soldiers than the enemy manages to. First we had "friendly fire" now we have "friendly weapons". BRUCE WALTON, ENGLAND People who fire weapons regularly have high levels of lead in their blood because of the microscopic dust that's created when a bullet rushes through a gun barrel. Replace the lead with DU and you know what happened here. By the way, does anyone remember the British vehicles that came back from the Gulf after they were fired upon by an American A10? Those vehicles were treated as nuclear waste! BEN, NETHERLANDS It shouldn't be forgotten that depleted uranium can also be released, in similar conditions to military use, in air crashes such as the 747 accidents in Amsterdam and Stansted. This is because it was once used for balance weights in the tail. Maybe there should be a program to remove it from these aircraft. STEVEN MCLACHLAN, ENGLAND Ithink people should be more concerned with that than weaponry[I] Steve Brown, UK There are far more toxic chemicals than DU being leeched into our environment by industry. I think people should be more concerned with that than weaponry, which, by its nature, has always been hazardous to health! STEVE BROWN, UK I have read all the comments that people are making about war, weapons and especially DU weapons. I think its pathetic that everyone is complaining about DU saying that it causes cancer. How many of the people complaining about DU smoke. Smoking causes more deaths in the world than most wars. Wars are not pleasant they are not like the movies. However the only way the UK can remain an effective fighting force is to have the latest weapons and the best training. I was a soldier in the British Army and came into contact with DU as well as other munitions. I don't smoke and am in perfect health. People stop getting on the bandwagon, maybe you should look at banning smoking instead. I suppose you don't go against that because people who die from smoking are not put in the media, their death isn't dramatic enough. DOUG, UK Tony Blair was the most ardent exponent of the Kosovo expedition. His silence on this issue is deafening. MAJOR CHRIS KLEIN, UK Remove NATO, remove the US from our European soil and all misery will be gone along with them. I can't believe what I've read here. One American is arrogant enough to suggest that "bad food" and "cigarettes they smoked" are more likely to have caused leukaemia than DU! Outrageous! Come to Kosmet and spend a few months down there if you think DU is harmless. NIKOLA IVANOVIC, ZRENJANIN, SERBIA The problem here is not that weapons kill those that are targeted. The problem is that they kill those who are using them. If we were talking about cheap bullets that kept pre-firing causing death or injury to the user there would be no argument about changing the ammunition no matter how accurate it was. This is an issue about causing severe illness and/or death to the users, not what the weapons are used against. GRAEME, ENGLAND How about some definitive proof. Is the link between the cancer and the DU ammunition proven, or is it anecdotal? It sounds like unsubstantiated panic because of the word uranium. What levels of radiation do DU shells expose their users too? What precautions are used? No one is demanding we cease using x-ray machines, despite the fact that they expose people to radiation. The reason is clear - they save lives. Does the use of DU shells save lives? I know many will find that a ridiculous question but does their use save the lives of our soldiers? If it does, which I think very likely, then banning them is tantamount to killing our own troops - exactly the complaint we are hearing concerning their use. I guess its okay to doom our troops by providing them with inadequate weapons. AVTW, US Let's wait until there is more proper evidence BOB, UK SO WHAT ARE WE SAYING HERE - THAT WEAPONS CAN BE DANGEROUS, THAT SOLDIERS ARE AT RISK? AND WHAT IS THE PROOF THAT THE CANCER WAS CAUSED BY THIS AND NOT BY, SAY, THE FOOD THEY ATE, THE LEAD IN THE BULLETS OR THE CIGARETTES THEY SMOKED? LET'S WAIT UNTIL THERE IS MORE PROPER EVIDENCE. BOB, UK It seems clear from the lack of bombing accuracy and the large numbers of civilian casualties during the Kosovo crisis that the billions of pounds/ dollars spent on high-tech armaments have been wasted. Yet we continue to throw more money at the MoD. How many more lives are to be squandered before we recognise that the only benefactors are the arms manufacturers? The weapons don't work and the innocent, be they soldiers or civilians continue to pay the price. In this new millennium isn't it time that we found new more peaceful, cheaper even, ways to settle differences? IAIN, UK These weapons have proven to be highly effective. Perhaps our whining allies might prefer to use mines. I am personally in favour of providing our military with the best possible weaponry. ASHTON THOROGOOD, PHILADELPHIA, USA War is messy. People die in it. That's the way of the world. Rather than asking whether we should be clearing up the bits of DU scattered around the Balkans, we should be asking why Nato was involved there in the first place. ROGER MORAN, SCOTLAND/ AUSTRALIA Weapons are only useful if they can be controlled to target an enemy CLIVE MITCHELL, UK WEAPONS ARE ONLY USEFUL IF THEY CAN BE CONTROLLED TO TARGET AN ENEMY. IF A WEAPON GOES ON KILLING AND MAIMING LONG AFTER THE FIGHTING IS OVER, IT SHOULD NOT BE USED AT ALL. MINES HAVE BEEN BANNED BY MANY COUNTRIES - THERE ARE ALWAYS OTHER WAYS OF DESTROYING TANKS AND KILLING PEOPLE. CLIVE MITCHELL, UK Not only should these weapons be banned but also all those politicians and generals of the rogue societies who knowingly, deliberately and intentionally used these weapons of mass destruction against innocent people should be treated as indicted war criminals committing heinous crimes against humanity and brought before an objective, impartial, universally acceptable global court of criminal justice for trial. MOHANSINGH, INDIA The British and American Governments are so two faced. They tried to fool us into thinking they were fighting the Kosovo war to save lives. We all saw through these lies. Then they use these weapons on innocent people. They don't care about anyone but themselves. It makes me ashamed to be British, especially as I read in the press today that the UK is trying to develop a similar bomb to the one the Russians have been using in Grozny. Seems to me that the whole world is going mad. GARY HOLCOMBE, UK There appears to be a lot of hysteria and misinformation surrounding depleted uranium weapons. The danger of radiation contamination is minimal and linked to the cloud of dust caused by the weapon's impact. The dust disperses fairly quickly with little danger to the public. There is, however, an increased risk to troops in the immediate combat area. GREG EVANS, UK I wonder how fast your previous contributor would jump onto the 'left wing/ hysteria bandwagon' if it was his young, previously healthy brother who was dying from leukaemia or it was his family's land that was poisoned? I can understand that these weapons are 'useful' in combat but if we are trying to move towards combat that is based on humanitarian grounds than perhaps it is time to reweigh the usefulness of these weapons with what seems to be their devastating effects on innocent people. JANINA STAJIC, USA/ BRITAIN If weapons harm the people who are using them then this must be seriously looked at[I] Charles Porter, USA If weapons harm the people who are using them then this must be seriously looked at. So should it if long-term effects are present after their use. Sure, we would like to see all weapons banned, but we know also that that is not practical. The "bad guys" will always keep and use theirs. As for saying that a particular type of weapon should be banned: what does it matter how it destroys the enemy? CHARLES PORTER, USA Depleted uranium (DU) is a stable variant of uranium. When the shells penetrate armour, intense heat causes the DU to burn, forming uranium oxide which is potentially harmful. Essentially the problems are caused by the by-products of war which are nothing new. Shells still lie unexploded in Belgium, atolls in the Pacific are still uninhabitable. It's the price we pay for technological advancement; our eventual extinction. ED VISTA, UK Why such an outcry on the use of DU in the Kosovo conflict? Is it because this time DU was used on European soil? Was DU not used on the Iraqi army 10 years ago? BHARAT BHUSHAN, GERMANY/INDIA Would any Nato member country agree to have uranium weapons fired on their own territory? Which one and where? MICHAEL COLESIC, UK How do we Europeans allow the US to ship a cartload of highly toxic munitions and then tell us to detonate it on our own doorstep?[I] Phivos Hadjigeorgiou, Cyprus What I have always failed to understand is how we Europeans allow the US to ship a cartload of highly toxic munitions and then tell us to detonate it on our own doorstep.. Uranium is surely a highly toxic and radioactive element, and at the end of the day, it is not the Americans that are going to suffer from its use in Serbia but surely the whole of Europe and the Mediterranean. PHIVOS HADJIGEORGIOU, CYPRUS It is a worthy debate to consider the use of deadly force against an evil government, where rape, murder, torture, and theft are promoted. It is worthy to debate weapons of mass destruction as per se, evil. But I see no worth in debating the characteristics of the metal in a bullet. The long-term effects of DU on the battlefield are trivial relative to unexploded ordnance which are lethal for generations. R. L. HAILS SR. P. E., USA What must be remembered about the American use of chemical weapons throughout history is that America has never really had to live with the consequences of the use of chemicals weapons. I think that the use of weapons such as Depleted Uranium by America would not come so easily if they affected by their actions. PAT MILLS, UK As I come from a country where DU was used, I am horrified by the cruelty of some comments I have read here. All wars are terrible, all weapons are terrible, but the worse are those like DU, which produce such consequences. Their victims are always the innocent, plus the very soldiers who use them. They should definitely be banned. HELENA, YUGOSLAVIA Comments like 'War is war' seem to be missing the point that NATO is killing its own soldiers with DU. And would Mr. Newdick like to stand up in front of the families of the 6 dead Italian peacekeepers to tell them that the 'dangers... range from the minimal to the non- existent'. It is an ignorant comment from someone who obviously knows nothing about the dangers of radiation. I am not a 'noisy left wing nut', I am a doctor. NM, UK From the perspective of the civilian DU poses much the same continuing threat as that of land mines[I] Edmond Rhys Jones, United Kingdom War is an inherently dangerous activity and should be avoided in the first place but DU poses a qualitatively different threat to 'conventional weapons'. From the combatants perspective suffering from DU related illness is sometimes unatributable and thus more difficult to treat and more difficult to come to terms with; especially in the face of government secrecy. From the perspective of the civilian DU poses much the same continuing threat as that of land mines. EDMOND RHYS JONES, UNITED KINGDOM The fact that these items contain radioactive material of such high levels means that these weapons come under the same banner as nuclear arms. They should be subjected to the same regulations and phased out as soon as possible. NATO thinks it can just dump these things all over the world, bully smaller states into their way of thinking and then leave. ROBERT RUSSELL, UK As Donovan Said "He's the universal soldier and he really is to blame and without him all this killing can't go on." You join the army you make your choice to expose yourself to death and injury. I don't see the difference between being injured by a weapon in your care and being shot or bombed. Personally it makes me sick that people still see the need to fight wars and that for me is the real point, not which weapons hurt who. GORDON MASTERTON, LONDON, UK Surely the issue is to stop the conflict from occurring in the first Mike, London Surely the issue is to stop the conflict from occurring in the first place. I don't see it's particularly relevant whether the injury is cancer due to depleted uranium or various parts blown off due to a hand grenade. Once fighting starts, horrific injuries are certain regardless of the weapons used. MIKE, LONDON These are highly effective weapons whose "radiation" dangers, though not to be dismissed out of hand, range from the minimal to the non- existent. I'm afraid this is one of those subjects where the mere mention of the word "uranium" brings every noisy left wing nut out to join the hysteria band-wagon (adding not a little of their own in the process). MARK M. NEWDICK, USA/ UK It is ironic that Nato's solution to a political problem may have produced a humanitarian disaster for the very population it was trying to protect. Whilst the danger to soldiers is starting to come out into the open, what about the civilian population whose land has maybe been polluted for generations to come? KORTO MALTEZE, UK War is war. You'll die one way or the other. FRASER HOWSE, ENGLAND Gulf War syndrome and Balkan syndrome is same thing. Nato officials knew for 10 years, since the end of the Iraq war about this problem. There are a couple of studies in USA and Canada (since those bombs are made in Canada) about the connection of DU and Golf War syndrome. ANASTASIA TURCOTTE, CANADA All weapons should be banned. The fact that they exist puts every soul on this planet at risk. ANDREW, ISLE OF WIGHT Disclaimer: The BBC will put up as many of your comments as possible but we cannot guarantee that all e-mails will be published. The BBC reserves the right to edit comments that are published. Search BBC News Online[I] ***************************************************************** 21 Nato agrees to discuss use of uranium shells Independent By Stephen Castle in Brussels 4 January 2001 NATO will discuss the use of depleted uranium ammunition in the former Yugoslavia at a meeting next week after mounting international pressure for an investigation into the so-called "Balkan syndrome" which may have affected allied soldiers who served there. Italy requested new information from the alliance on the use of the substance yesterday, and said it will raise the issue at a scheduled meeting of the North Atlantic Council in light of the deaths of six of its servicemen from leukaemia. Although it is not on the meeting's agenda, Italy will be able to raise its concerns on 10 January, either as part of a discussion on the Balkans or under other business, Nato officials confirmed. Disquiet over the use of depleted uranium in ammunition has been growing, with Finland, Spain, Portugal and France looking into the matter and Belgium's Defence Minister, Andr‚ Flahaut, calling on all European Union defence ministers to follow suit. The pressure on Nato to act was stepped up by the Italian Prime Minister, Guiliano Amato, who hinted that he does not believe the alliance's assurances that the ammunition posed no health risk. "This is a very delicate situation," Mr Amato said in La Repubblica, an Italian daily newspaper. "We've always known that [depleted uranium] was used in Kosovo but not in Bosnia. We've always known it was a danger only in absolutely exceptional circumstances, like, for example, picking up a fragment with a hand on which there was an open wound, while in normal circumstances it isn't dangerous at all," he said. "Now we fear things may not be so simple." Italy said last week that it would investigate illnesses among its soldiers who were deployed in Kosovo after Nato's 78-day bombing campaign in 1999, although the concerns date back to deployments in the earlier Balkan conflict in Bosnia. The announcement set off a chain reaction, with Spain, Portugal, Turkey and Finland saying they would screen their Kosovo veterans. In London, the Ministry of Defence said it was "closely monitoring" investigations being carried out by its Nato allies into whether soldiers were exposed to dangerous levels of depleted uranium. The Portuguese Foreign Minister, Jaime Gama, and his Belgian counterpart, Louis Michel, whose countries have also reported deaths among soldiers who served in the Balkans, said yesterday that the truth had to be established. A Nato official said the alliance was doing its best to provide all the information it could to the Italians "as a matter of priority". But, he said, the task was made difficult because the Bosnian conflict took place five years ago. "Nevertheless we are taking the Italian concerns very seriously and are acting as fast as we can." In Kosovo, US warplanes used armour-piercing rounds containing depleted uranium mostly in the central, western and south-western parts of the province - areas where Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese peacekeepers were later deployed. The report of a UN task force sent to Kosovo to look into the ammunition risks is expected next month. Officials at the alliance's headquarters in Brussels are confident it will find no evidence of a link with cancer. ***************************************************************** 22 EU's Prodi Wants Truth on 'Balkan Syndrome' THURSDAY JANUARY 4 5:51 AM ET Romano Prodi said Thursday he wanted light to be shed on claims linking to deaths or illnesses among alliance soldiers who served in the Balkans. In an interview with Italian state radio RAI, Prodi said arms coated with depleted uranium should not be used if there was even the slightest risk for soldiers or for civilians. ``I want the truth to be ascertained, not only concerning the soldiers, but also for the people who lived near them, the population,'' Prodi told RAI. ``It is clear that if there is even a minimal risk, these arms must be abolished. And even if this risk was not there, I don't like the idea of using these particular weapons,'' he said. The so-called ``Balkan syndrome'' has come under the spotlight over the past few days following claims that six Italian soldiers who served in the former Yugoslavia developed leukemia and died after exposure to the ammunition. Italy asked NATO Wednesday to investigate the cases. Similar requests also came from Portugal and Belgium, which have also reported deaths among soldiers who served in the Balkans. Five soldiers have died in Belgium and one in Portugal. Prodi said he was not only concerned about the ``Balkan syndrome'' but also about the environmental damage caused by the wars in Bosnia and Yugoslavia. ``As Commission president, I propose starting immediate contacts with the governments of Bosnia and Serbia to discuss pollution and the problems linked to depleted uranium,'' he told the radio. NATO sources said Wednesday the North Atlantic Council and NATO's political committee would discuss the issue next week. Reuters ***************************************************************** 23 Italy emphasises troop safety in Kosovo - January 4, 2001 CNN.com - NATO has agreed to supply more information about the ammunition ROME, Italy--Italian troops are to be reassured over their exposure to potentially harmful chemicals after concern was raised about the use of uranium bullets used in the Kosovo campaign. Italian Foreign Minister Sergio Matarella is to visit the region on Thursday to meet Italian peacekeepers while the country continues to press NATO for more information about the ammunition. Six Italians who had served in Kosovo and Bosnia have died of leukaemia and there is concern--although no scientific evidence--that there may be a connection with the use of armour piercing uranium weapons. NATO has agreed to help Italy investigate the claims, which is also raising fears in other alliance member states such as Portugal and Belgium. Italian Prime Minister Giuliano Amato said in an interview published in La Repubblica newspaper that alarm over the so-called "Balkan syndrome" was "more than legitimate." "This is a very delicate situation," Amato said, adding that his government had only recently discovered that the depleted uranium ammunition was used in the earlier Bosnia mission as well as in Kosovo. "We've always known that it was a danger only in absolutely exceptional circumstances ... while in normal circumstances it isn't dangerous at all," he said. "But now we're starting to have a justified fear that things aren't that simple." European Commission President Romano Prodi added his voice to the case, calling for light to be shed on the matter. "I want the truth to be ascertained, not only concerning the soldiers, but also for the people who lived near them, the population," Prodi told Italian state radio RAI. He said arms coated with depleted uranium should not be used if there was even the slightest risk for soldiers or for civilians. Doctors have said there is insufficient evidence to link the deaths to exposure to uranium bullets but the Italian media have claimed the number of deaths is too high to be coincidental. A spokeswoman at NATO's headquarters in Brussels confirmed the alliance had received a request from Italy "for more information on the geographic use of the depleted uranium." "NATO will do everything it can to provide this information ... Italy is a member country (of the alliance) and if it requests something, the alliance will do its best to help," the spokeswoman said. Amato's acknowledgement that "Balkan syndrome" was of serious concern prompted swift reaction in Italy. The Communist Refoundation Party, which supported the centre-left government from 1996-98, called for all Italian troops to be pulled out of the former Yugoslavia immediately. Franco Giordano, Refoundation's leader in the lower house of parliament, also called for Javier Solana, NATO's secretary-general during the Kosovo conflict of 1999, to resign from his current post as European Union foreign policy chief. An association representing families of the six Italian dead released a copy of a document in English which it said was a list of NATO guidelines of how to deal with depleted uranium. The association said the document, dated November 22, 1999 and apparently issued from the Yugoslav town of Pec, had never been given to troops before that date, although soldiers had by then spent months peacekeeping in Kosovo after a conflict in which uranium-tipped shells were used. "It is very important to be aware of the problem, to know how to protect soldiers and how to avoid long term health effects," the document reads. "It is important to disseminate this information to all levels." The latest soldier to die was a 24-year-old from Sicily who served twice in Bosnia but never in Kosovo. Some 60,000 Italian soldiers and 15,000 civilians served in the Balkans during the 1990s. According to Italian media reports, NATO used around 31,500 bullets and shells capped with uranium during the campaign. Amato's call for a NATO probe followed similar expressions of concern from elsewhere in Europe. Belgium has called for European Union defence ministers to discuss health problems suffered by peacekeepers in the former Yugoslavia. Portugal has ordered medical tests for its military and civilian personnel serving in Kosovo to check for exposure to radiation and Defence Minister Julio Castro Caldas has proposed a meeting of NATO countries to share information and agree common methods of testing. Concerns have also been raised by service members or civilian aid this report. RELATED STORIES: January 3, 2001 December 30, 2000 c 2001 CABLE NEWS NETWORK. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 24 Report: Dissidents Tracked Using Radiation January 4, 2001 ABCNEWS.com : By Sue Masterman VIENNA, Jan. 4 - The feared East German secret police routinely sprayed suspected dissidents with a radioactive solution as a means of secretly tracking them, according to a new report. Stasi agents would then wear portable Geiger counters that would activate when a marked suspected dissident was nearby, according to New Scientist magazine. So that targets would not hear the distinctive clicking of the counter at close range, Stasi secret police agents wore the detector strapped under one arm, while a vibrating alarm was slung under the other arm. The magazine reports that the 30-year-old invention mirrors the technology behind today's pagers and cellphones. The magazine's article was based on a paper by leading radiation protection expert Klaus Becker. Straight Out of a James Bond Flick? "It really is the stuff of James Bond movies," Barrie Lambert, a radiobiologist at St Bartholomew's Hospital in London, was quoted as saying. "It's an unpleasant thing to do. The risk is not limited to the person being tagged. You'd be exposing other people, such as a spouse." In the 1970s and 1980s, Stasi agents would spray scandium-46, which emits highly dangerous long-term gamma radiation, on the floors of the rooms where suspected dissidents met. The solution would adhere to their shoes, allowing agents to then keep a close eye on anyone who attended a meeting there, the magazine reported. If people could not be sprayed with a radioactive solution the spies would label their cars, documents or paper money, according to Becker. The Stasi also developed an airgun that could fire tags made of small pieces of silver wire into car tires. Effects of Radiation 'Close to Castration' While the radioactive doses used were usually below what would seriously harm or kill, there were mishaps. "The Stasi marked West German deutschmarks with large amounts of scandium to see how they circulated, to whom and for what purpose," Becker was quoted as saying. While they expected to retrieve them, they didn't and the notes disappeared without trace." Dr. Becker says that if a person carried more than one contaminated banknote in a pocket the result would be, according to the Stasi's own research, "close to castration." The threat would continue as money changed hands or shoes brushed off their deadly dust on carpets in the home, particularly where children were playing. The secret police force was careful, however, to ensure that the risk to its own agents was minimal. Cancer Machines? Becker also reported that "unusual non-medical X-ray machines" in former political prisons may have been used for covertly irradiating inmates. Large doses of X-rays are thought to be behind the deaths from cancer of a number of prominent dissidents. Evidence of the radioactive tracking exercise was found in the vast Stasi archives by officials of the Berlin-based Gauck Commission, a German government agency investigating the former secret police. "It is a remarkable story," Becker was quoted as saying. "It's the first well-documented case of such a thing." The German government will likely add his allegations to its massive, ongoing investigation of what may have been the world's most deadly efficient secret service. Becker left East Germany in 1951, aged 18. He later became a senior official of the Juelich Nuclear Research Establishment in West Germany. [I] Reuters contributed to this report. ***************************************************************** 25 Russia's Neighbors Concerned Over Nuclear Report THURSDAY JANUARY 4 8:36 AM ET By Marcin Grajewski WARSAW (Reuters) - Poland and other countries bordering Russia's Kaliningrad region reacted with cautious concern on Thursday to reports that Russia had secretly moved short-range nuclear weapons to its Baltic enclave. A U.S. official said in Washington on Wednesday there had been ``some movement of tactical nuclear weapons into Kaliningrad,'' which lies between Poland and Lithuania. Moscow said reports of such a buildup were ``absolutely untrue.'' Politicians and analysts in the region said such a move would be a step backward in building regional security even though its military importance was limited. Some called it a return to Cold War policies. ``The problem is whether we can treat assurances that there are no nuclear weapons in Kaliningrad as credible,'' Polish Defense Minister Bronislaw Komorowski told public television. ``We treat these signals very seriously... Our appropriate services are carefully analyzing the issue,'' added government spokesman Krzysztof Luft. A Polish diplomat said the deployment probably served a double purpose eastward expansion and preserving Moscow's image as a military superpower despite a decline in its conventional forces. ``It is a worrying sign that Moscow still treats Kaliningrad as a military bastion rather than a zone of economic cooperation with '' the diplomat said. Poland has less to worry about since it gained a Western security guarantee when it joined NATO in 1999 along with the Czech Republic and Hungary, two other former Soviet bloc states. ``But the installation of missiles is a bad sign for the Baltic countries, which want to join NATO, but which Moscow wants to keep in its sphere of influence,'' said Grzegorz Kostrzewa-Zorbas, political analyst at the Polish Academy of Science. ``It is a step back toward the Cold War realities.'' Officials from the Baltics, which are soon to mark the 10th anniversary of a bloody crackdown by Moscow aimed at snuffing out their independence movements, gave a muted reaction, saying they were hoping to consult NATO diplomats on the issue. ``We are monitoring the situation closely... If it (the deployment) is true it is very sad and we would have to make a statement,'' said Madis Mikko, head of the Estonian defense ministry's media and information department. Russia strongly opposes the Baltics' bids for NATO membership, which they launched after regaining independence from the Soviet Union after 50 years of forced rule by Moscow. ``From the military point of view, the deployment of the tactical weapons has limited significance. But the move may persuade public opinion internationally that NATO expansion would destabilize regional security,'' said Kostrzewa-Zorbas. The conservative Polish daily Zycie printed a front-page map on Thursday, which showed the 50-mile range of the Kaliningrad-based tactical nuclear weapons as threatening northern provinces of Poland and southern parts of Lithuania. ***************************************************************** 26 U.S. yet to query Moscow on nukes-- The Washington Times January 4, 2001 By Bill Gertz THE WASHINGTON TIMES The State Department will question Moscow about the recent deployment of tactical nuclear weapons to a military base in a Russian enclave on the Baltic Sea, a spokesman said yesterday. "We will be raising it with the Russians," said Richard Boucher, the State Department spokesman. He was commenting on reports of the transfer that first appeared in yesterday's editions of The Washington Times. The weapons transfer was detected by U.S. spy agencies in June. It is the first time battlefield nuclear arms have been moved into the region since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, according to U.S. intelligence officials. The spokesman's remarks are a sign the administration has not raised the matter with Moscow during arms control talks in the past six months, according to U.S. officials. The failure to respond to intelligence reports of the transfers supports claims by some U.S. intelligence officials that the information was suppressed for political reasons. The disclosure comes weeks after it was revealed that the administration concluded secret agreements with Russia on Moscow's arms and nuclear transfers to Iran. Republicans in Congress have said they were kept in the dark about a 1995 agreement signed by Vice President Al Gore and Viktor Chernomyrdin, the Russian prime minister, that helped Russia avoid U.S. sanctions required under proliferation laws. Pentagon spokesman Kenneth Bacon said Tuesday that if Moscow has placed tactical nuclear arms in Kaliningrad "it would violate their pledge that they were removing nuclear weapons from the Baltics, and that the Baltics should be nuclear-free." Russian government officials, meanwhile, dismissed the nuclear deployment reports as untrue. "This report can only be a political provocation," said Anatoly Lobsky, a spokesman for Russia's Baltic Fleet. He insisted to reporters in Kaliningrad, where the fleet is based, that the Baltic Fleet has no nuclear weapons. Mr. Lobsky, an assistant to the fleet commander, said the naval forces in the Kaliningrad enclave, a noncontiguous slice of Russia between Poland and Lithuania, are abiding by obligations to keep the Baltics a nuclear-free zone. In Moscow, the defense ministry press office issued a statement saying "information on a transfer of tactical nuclear weapons to the Kaliningrad region has no basis in fact." Governments of the former Soviet-occupied Baltic states of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia reacted with concern over the reports. Lithuanian Defense Minister Linas Linkevicius told the Associated Press in Vilnius: "This sounds alarming, but I see no reason Russia should try to escalate the situation in the Baltic region." Lithuanian Foreign Minister Antanas Valionis told reporters in Vilnius that "similar reports have been appearing several times a year, but after raising public concern they after some time are usually forgotten." "To date none of these reports have been confirmed, so I would like not to comment on the recent reports, too," Mr. Valionis said. "We don't know whether it's true or not," said a spokesman for Estonian Foreign Minister Toomas Ilves. "But if it is true, it is regretful, because it decreases the stability of the region." In Latvia, Liiga Bergmane, spokeswoman for the Foreign Ministry, said the government was seeking independent confirmation of the nuclear arms reports. "We don't see any reason why Russia should want to change its policy of keeping these kinds of weapons out of the Baltic region, " she said. "Russia pledged not to increase nuclear arms here and we can't imagine why it would reconsider." On Capitol Hill, Rep. Benjamin A. Gilman, outgoing chairman of the House International Relations Committee, said the transfers, if confirmed, are alarming. If Russia has in fact transferred tactical nuclear weapons to Kaliningrad, we would have to view that as an alarming development that threatens the new democracies of Central and Eastern Europe, " the New York Republican said. "These reports underscore the need to promptly enlarge the NATO alliance to include the previously captive nations of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia." Mr. Boucher declined to comment directly on the report, citing the policy of avoiding comment on intelligence matters. "That would get into confirming the specifics, which I can' t do, but we believe there is something to discuss with the Russians, yes," he stated, noting, "That's about as far as I can go. We don't talk about questions that involve intelligence." "This is a situation that we are following closely," Mr. Boucher told reporters. "It's something that we'll be talking about with the Russians, as we do on all arms-control issues." The spokesman said the Russian government's unilateral pledges to keep nuclear weapons out of the region are not "any sort of legally binding commitment." U.S. national security officials said they are uncertain as to why Russia decided to move tactical nuclear transfers to Kaliningrad. Several U.S. officials told The Times that the weapons transfers could be a sign Moscow is following through on threats to "forward- deploy" nuclear arms in reaction to the 1999 addition of Poland, the Czech Republic and Hungary to NATO over Moscow's opposition. The deployment also is viewed as part of Moscow's recent nuclear policy decree that gives the military greater reliance on battlefield nuclear weapons because of the decline of its conventional forces. Some officials said the weapons may be for use on a new short- range missile Russia calls Toka. The missile was tested in Kaliningrad on April 18 and has a range of about 44 miles. One U.S. official told Reuters that "over the last six months there has been some movement of tactical nuclear weapons into Kaliningrad —we don't know how many, we don't know what type and we don't know why." A second official said the transfer may represent Moscow' s new doctrine that calls for relying more on battlefield nuclear weapons. Tactical nukes can be a cheaper way of maintaining your deterrence capabilities as opposed to the more expensive, larger conventional forces," this official said. If you are worried about deterrence and your forces are deteriorating, nukes do wonders for your self-confidence," the official said. All site contents copyright c 2001 News World Communications, ***************************************************************** 27 Russia denies US report of nuclear deployment in Baltic sea port THURSDAY, JANUARY 4 4:05 AM SGT KALININGRAD, Russia, Jan 3 (AFP) - Russia's Baltic fleet rejected Wednesday a US newspaper report that it had deployed tactical nuclear weapons in the Kaliningrad enclave on the Baltic Sea in a bid to step up pressure on NATO. "There are no nuclear weapons in the arsenals of the navy in the Baltic sea," navy spokesman Anatoly Lobski told an AFP correspondant in Kaliningrad, a Russian Baltic port located between Poland and Lithuania. "The Baltic Fleet respects agreements on nuclear non-proliferation in the Baltic sea." Citing "US intelligence officials," the Washington Times newspaper reported the movement last June of new battlefield nuclear arms to Kaliningrad. Officials in Moscow had issued flat denials of the report earlier Wednesday to national news agencies. "This information absolutely does not correspond with reality," Russian defence ministry sources told Interfax, adding that none of Russia's nuclear weapons had been moved from their permanent sites. "This report can only be a political provocation," said Lobsky. The Pentagon had declined to comment on the reports, the Washington Times said. It cited US intelligence officials, who claimed the weapons movement was "a sign Moscow is following through on threats to respond to NATO expansion with the forward deployment of nuclear weapons." Lithuania's Foreign Minister Antanas Valionis told journalists in Vilnius "similar reports have been appearing several times a year but after raising public concern, after some time they are usually forgotten." "To date none of these reports have been confirmed, so I would like not to comment on the recent reports too," he added. Russia and the United States announced in 1991 and 1992 a non-binding agreement to reduce stocks of tactical nuclear weapons. The Soviet and Russian governments announced in 1991 and 1992, respectively, that all tactical nuclear weapons had been removed from eastern Europe to more secure areas in Russia. It was not clear whether that included nuclear weapons based in Kaliningrad. Cuts in US and Russian tactical nuclear arsenals are due to be discussed in new US-Russian negotiations on a START III arms treaty. Some analysts believe that the admission of Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic to NATO in 1999 has provoked Moscow, which is now responding with this deployment, the Washington Times said. Copyright © 2000 AFP. All rights reserved. All information Copyright c 1994-2001 Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 28 Russia Denies Moving Nuclear Arms January 04, 2001 ASSOCIATED PRESS MOSCOW (AP)--The Russian military on Thursday denied reports that it moved short-range nuclear weapons onto one of its military bases on the Baltic Sea, and Russian analysts said such a deployment would be senseless. The alleged transfer of tactical nuclear weapons, first reported Wednesday in The Washington Times, "doesn't correspond with reality, " said Anatoly Lobsky, a spokesman for the Baltic Fleet. "The Baltic Sea has been declared a nuclear-free zone, and the Baltic Fleet unfailingly fulfills its commitments." Two senior Clinton administration officials with access to intelligence reports on the subject told The Associated Press Wednesday on condition of anonymity that there have been recent indications of movement of Russian nuclear weapons to a naval base in the Kaliningrad enclave. Kaliningrad is sandwiched between Poland and Lithuania and provides Russia with access to the Baltic Sea. They said some weapons may have been there a year or longer. The bombs were designed for a new type of short-range missiles with a firing radius of about 44 miles, according to the Washington Times report--enough to hit targets in Lithuania, one of the three former Soviet republics in the Baltics that aspire to membership in the NATO alliance. They could also strike targets in Poland, which joined NATO in 1999 in the face of fierce Russian opposition. Polish Defense Minister Bronislaw Komorowski on Thursday called for international inspectors to verify that Moscow had not deployed nuclear weapons. "Poland needs to monitor the situation in Kaliningrad on a day-to- day basis and it is doing that," Komorowski said on Poland's Channel One public television. Some U.S. officials believe the deployment of such weapons would be a tactic for increasing pressure on NATO to withdraw all tactical, or short-range, missiles and other nuclear weapons from Europe. Russia has long argued for their removal, but NATO continues to maintain some nuclear bombs for aircraft based in Europe. The Washington Times report cited unnamed U.S. arms control officials as speculating that the deployment was Russia's way of testing the resolve of President-elect George Bush. But Russian military analysts questioned the logic of such a deployment, particularly the choice to station ground-based nuclear weapons at a naval base. "If they did bring tactical nuclear weapons for training or some other purpose to Kaliningrad, they would most likely be naval, like torpedo warheads," said independent defense analyst Pavel Felgenhauer. "There's no need to bring air force or missile weapons to the enclave, " he said, because their potential targets could just as easily be hit with missiles based on Russia's mainland. Kaliningrad is about 250 miles west of the rest of Russia. Yuri Gladkevich, an analyst at the independent Military News Agency, said Russia would have nothing to gain politically from such a deployment. Ditching nonbinding arms agreements from the early 1990's, which were intended to limit tactical nuclear weapons deployment in Europe, would only invite the ire of European countries and the United States. He contended that the news reports were based on misinformation, an intelligence leak intended to influence policy for the incoming Bush administration or to demonstrate to America's European allies that Russia remained a threat. ALL CONTENTS COPYRIGHT 2001 LAS VEGAS SUN, INC. ***************************************************************** 29 Russian nuclear bombs put in storage Lawrence Journal-World: The Washington Post Thursday, January 4, 2001 During the past year, Russia has been putting tactical nuclear warheads into storage facilities at a naval base in Kaliningrad, a Russian enclave on the Baltic Sea between Poland and Lithuania, senior U.S. officials said Wednesday. While Russia's motives are unclear, the placement of battlefield nuclear weapons in Kaliningrad could be a response to NATO's expansion and an attempt to compensate for the decline of Russia's conventional military might, the officials said. Under informal agreements reached in 1991-92 by President George Bush and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, Russia withdrew its tactical nuclear weapons from the former Warsaw Pact states in Eastern Europe and promised to place them in "central storage facilities." The agreements, which never were turned into a treaty, did not specify the storage sites. But American intelligence sources said Wednesday that Kaliningrad, the headquarters of Russia's Baltic Fleet, became a depot for tactical nuclear weapons removed by the Russian Navy from its ships. It was unclear Wednesday whether the warheads that have been moved to Kaliningrad during the past year were sea-based weapons belonging to the Russian navy or land- based weapons belonging to the army. But senior U.S. officials said they were not surprised or alarmed. "We have been following the handling of nonstrategic nuclear weapons at stockpile sites for more than two years, so this is not news to us," one official said. The Russian move was first reported Wednesday by the Washington Times. Experts inside and outside the U.S. government gave widely varying interpretations of the Russian action. Bruce Blair, president of the nonprofit Center for Defense Information, said Russian generals had warned him two years ago that redeploying tactical nuclear weapons to Kaliningrad would be "a likely response to NATO expansion." William Arkin, a consultant on nuclear weapons to the Natural Resources Defense Council, portrayed the move as an attempt to offset Russia's deteriorating conventional military forces. "What is it people expect, given the fact that Poland is now in NATO and the Baltic nations take part in military exercises with the United States?" he said, adding that Russia "doesn't have the capability to respond conventionally." ***************************************************************** 30 Reduced radiation for Lepse crew Russia operates a fleet of nuclear powered icebreakers and one nuclear powered lighter vessel. This section focuses on radwaste and nuclear safety issues related to the operation of the civilian nuclear fleet. [I][*]www.bellona.no & A new building has been raised this winter close to the nuclear storageship Lepse. This building, The Lepse Village, will provide living- and working condition for the crew on Lepse, and reducing their radiation exposure. The Bellona Foundation finances the project. Nils Bøhmer, 2001-01-04 14:36 Lepse, a storage ship for nuclear waste, has since 1986 been moored to the quayside at the nuclear icebreakerbase Atomflot in Murmansk. Stored onboard the ship is damaged spent nuclear fuel and other radioactive waste. Because of the nuclear waste, the exposure for the crew on Lepse are higher than allowed by the Russian regulations. In addition to the crew on 8, some 30 workers on Lepse are also exposed to elevated radiation from the ship's cargo. Due to different unsolved matters the international project to solve the problems with Lepse's dangerous cargo has been postponed. The project was initiated in 1994, but unsolved questions dealing with tax-emtempt status and liability in case of accidents has so far stopped the project. Waiting for the spent fuel to be removed, crew and workers are still onboard Lepse, receiving more than allowed radiation doses. Because of the elevated exposure for the workers Murmansk Shipping Company (MSC) asked Bellona Foundation for assistance. In co-operation with the Norwegian Uniteam ASA, Bellona and MSC developed combined working- and living accommodation based on 20 feet industry containers. The containers are fitted out with kitchens, sleeping cabins, laboratories and radiation control zone with showers. Lepse Village is situated at a safe distant from the ship Lepse, some 100 meters. Each of the three floors consists of four containers. Since the construction is based on containers it is flexible and easy to move. When Lepse will be emptied for nuclear waste, the whole structure can be taken apart and transported to another site. The containers were transported from Norway to Murmansk by MSC in October 2000. During two periods in November and December the Lepse Village was constructed with workers from MSC under the supervision of personnel from Uniteam. Bellona representatives from Oslo and Murmansk have taken part in the construction and controlled the work. During the January electrical installation will be done, and water- and sewage will be connected to Lepse Village. This project is of great importance since it will reduce the occupational exposure for the crew and workers on Lepse, who are doing an important job keeping Lepse in good technical condition and controls the storage of the spent nuclear fuel onboard. Latter on it will also be possible to use this construction at other sites where there is need for a living- and working accommodation for workers dealing with nuclear waste. Lepse, which was built in 1936, has a hull made of 12 mm steel plates. Inside the two storage sections, there are 634 partly damaged spent nuclear fuel elements. MSC and the French company SGN have agreed on the final details of a project on removal of the spent nuclear fuel. The final plan to dismantle Lepse, presented by Minatom, is approved by all Russian agencies involved with the Lepse-project; among them Ministry of Transportation, Atomflot, Gosatomnadzor (GAN) and Mayak. Before all the necessary legal agreement between the contributing parties and Russia have been signed, the project is brought to a standstill. [I][*]www.bellona.no Grunerlokka, 0505 Oslo, Norway Reuse and reprint recommended ***************************************************************** 31 Tenants Rattled By Cleanup Plan For Hunters Point/ Navy's mention of radioactive waste is news to them www.sfgate.com January 4, 2001 The Navy has announced it will clean up radioactive waste at Hunters Point Naval Shipyard--a plan that has alarmed civilian tenants of the decommissioned military base because they didn't know such contamination existed. "The first we heard about it was a fact sheet we received from the Navy" last week, said Georgia Oliva, one of more than 200 artists who rent former shipyard offices for studio space. A few manufacturing plants also operate at the shipyard, a Superfund site. The former base along San Francisco's southern waterfront is undergoing a gradual cleanup. Worries about toxic substances have long plagued the artists and factory employees who work at the shipyard, Oliva said, but radioactive waste adds an entirely new level of intensity to the concern. "We were aware of the other toxic problems out here, such as asbestos and PCBs, but this has really put people over the edge," Oliva said. Navy officials said they have kept the public fully apprised of their clean- up activities at the shipyard. The fact sheet identifies the extent of the radioactive contamination and outlines Navy plans for a cleanup. "We're very up front about telling the community what we're doing out there, " said Lee H. Saunders, a spokesman for the southwest division of the Naval Facilities Engineering Command, which is overseeing decontamination procedures at Hunters Point. Local communities are typically informed of Navy clean-up activities through fact sheets, Saunders said. He said that about 2,000 people, including community activists, received the sheets for Hunters Point. The contamination probably occurred during the servicing of Navy ships and submarines, Saunders said. In 1946, a radiological laboratory was established at the shipyard for military research and to help decontaminate Navy vessels. The base closed in 1974. "The shipyard has a long radiological history ranging from the repairs of radioactive hulls to the on-site disposal of a great many (radioactive) radium dials," said Saul Bloom, director of Arc Ecology, a Bay Area nonprofit group that evaluates the economic and environmental impacts of federal facilities on local communities. According to the fact sheet, surveys conducted by the Navy confirmed radioactive contamination at four abandoned structures near South Basin--Buildings 364, 509, 529 and 707. The surveys found: -- Low-level quantities of cesium 137 and an unnamed isotope of strontium in a sump behind Building 364. A low-level radioactive waste storage tank was once located at the site. -- Small areas contaminated with cesium 137 behind Buildings 509 and 529. -- Low-intensity levels of cesium 137 and radium 226 on the concrete storage pad of Building 707. According to the fact sheet, the Navy plans to remove the waste - - which primarily consists of contaminated asphalt and concrete - - and backfill and resurface the treated areas. Special measures will be implemented to prevent the spread of radioactive dust. The waste will then be transported through San Francisco along Cesar Chavez Street to Highway 101, where it will be trucked to an unnamed special storage site. While most radionuclides, or radioactive elements, are potentially harmful to humans, some are particularly hazardous. Among them are cesium 137 and strontium 90. Saunders said the threat to human health at the shipyards from radioactivity is scant because the degree of contamination is minimal. "I have no specific idea (as to the degree of hazard), but the fact sheet said it is low-level, so that's what it is," he said. Environmentalists familiar with the issue generally concur with that assessment. "The risk level is pretty low, but if a particular radioactive particle hits the wrong (human) cell, then you'd have a problem (with cancer), " said Chris Shirley, a staff scientist with Arc Ecology. "Probability is what it's all about. Basically, though, I'm happy they're finally dealing with it." But some artists and factory workers at the shipyard are unimpressed by such assurances. "Getting information from them has always been difficult," Oliva said. "I certainly don't expect any change now." Bloom agreed that information has not always been forthcoming. "I do believe the site eventually can be remediated," he said. "The biggest problem facing us is the fact that the Navy has been disingenuous about the extent of the contamination and how much it will cost to clean it up." Saunders bristled at such criticism. "Everything we do at Hunters Point is part of the public record," he said. "That's federal law. The Navy holds meetings every month with a (civilian) advisory board to discuss what we're doing and answer questions, and they've always been open to the public." Chain-link fencing posted with signs warning of environmental hazards isolate the contaminated buildings from the rest of the base. About a block from the buildings, workers at Ermico Inc., a skateboard factory, said they aren't surprised by the Navy's announcement. "If they had a Geiger counter here right now, I'd bet it go off the deep end," said Rick Blackhart, who has worked on the base for 20 years. "You see guys running around here in white suits and respirators all the time. I keep getting skin rashes, but what are you gonna do? The skateboards keep rolling out." Oliva said she is at least as concerned about the transport of the waste as she is about its presence in Hunters Point. "They're going to truck it right past the studio of a friend of mine," she said. "They'll go right through the heart of San Francisco. It's crazy." As alarmed as some locals are about the radioactive contamination, others seem less than panicked. The shipyards have always been a toxic morass, they say, a simmering stew pot for almost every toxic element and compound ever isolated or concocted--so learning about one or two additional noxious substances doesn't change things that much. Also, many shipyard habitues share a contrarian love for a place that has stubbornly resisted all attempts at gentrification. Blackhart said he often thinks about the contamination, "but my work is here, and basically, this is a good place." He paused to take in the expansive vistas of the bay, the open sky, the vacant lots, the crumbling buildings. "I mean, if it wasn't for all the garbage," he said, "this would be killer oceanfront property." E-mail Glen Martin at glenmartin@sfchronicle.com. ***************************************************************** 32 Kennewick to participate in protest to save FFTF Jan. 3, 2001: This story was published Wed, Jan 3, 2001 BY JOHN TRUMBO HERALD STAFF WRITER The city of Kennewick is taking a cautious first step toward helping rescue the stalled Fast Flux Test Facility at Hanford. The council, in a workshop session Tuesday, agreed to participate in filing a protest to the Department of Energy's proposal to deactivate the FFTF. Kennewick's protest would consist of filing "an information" into the record before the DOE issues its "record of decision" that recommends a permanent closure of the Hanford reactor. It is expected the first step toward opposing the closure will cost $8,000 to $12,000, which would be shared by Benton County, Kennewick, Pasco, Richland and West Richland, the Port of Pasco and TRIDEC. Representatives of those groups plan to meet at 1 p.m. today at the Fowler Building in Richland to discuss strategy. Meanwhile, the Richland City Council is meeting at noon today to consider challenging DOE's decision. The council plans to meet for 30 minutes at Richland City Hall, 505 Swift Blvd. In November, DOE decided the Hanford reactor, which is used to make isotopes for medical use, should be dismantled. The preferred alternative is to produce isotopes at the Advanced Test Reactor in Idaho and the High Flux Isotope Reactor in Tennessee. The Kennewick council was less interested in the subsequent steps in the fight against DOE, as proposed in a letter from Benton County Commissioner Leo Bowman. After filing information of protest, the entities seeking to save FFTF would file a complaint in response to the record of decision challenging the adequacy of the federal government's environmental impact statement calling for deactivation. A lawsuit would be the third and final step. The total cost for all three steps could be $150,000 or more, said Bowman in his letter to Richland Councilman Larry Haler, chairman of the Hanford Communities. In addition to the legal strategy, Kennewick City Manager Robert Kelly noted Bowman proposes a second prong to preserve the nuclear reactor as a facility to produce medical isotopes. That calls for trying to delay the release of the energy department's record of decision until the administration of President-elect George W. Bush takes over in late January. Energy Secretary Bill Richardson could file the decision anytime after Jan. 15, but the administration changeover comes Jan. 20. "The intent is to allow the next administration to have a chance to look at it," Kelly said. "After then, we'll know more about the political environment." Mayor James Beaver voiced support for FFTF, calling it an asset for the city and the rest of the nation. Councilman Tom Moak agreed but said he was not sure if spending city money to fight the federal government to save FFTF would be worth it. Kelly, commenting as an observer, suggested cities could take a hint from other groups such as American Indians and environmental organizations who have shown the effectiveness of litigation in changing public policy. "Litigation is the language federal agencies understand," Kelly said. In his letter Tuesday, Bowman said commitments would be needed from the public entities by Jan. 10 or the legal assault to save the FFTF would be scraped. COPYRIGHT 2000 TRI-CITY HERALD. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. THIS ***************************************************************** 33 Richland, Kennewick joing Benton in FFTF challenge This story was published 1/4/2000 HERALD STAFF WRITER Richland and Kennewick joined Benton County Wednesday in a plan to challenge the Department of Energy's decision to shut down Hanford's Fast Flux Test Facility. The cities agreed to become plaintiffs in a future suit against the department, disputing the validity of an environmental study on restarting the mothballed experimental reactor. The Richland City Council agreed to pay up to $7,500 for the first phase of the challenge and Kennewick said it would pay up to $8,000. The first phase of the legal challenge could cost $8,000 to $12,000. The county has agreed to pay half of those costs if other cities and agencies also participate. The first phase of legal work would consist of preparing a report to send to Energy Secretary Bill Richardson before his announcement on FFTF's fate scheduled for Jan 15. Pasco, West Richland, the Tri-City Industrial Development Council and the ports of Kennewick, Benton and Pasco plan to meet with their councils and boards before then to decide whether they'll take part in a lawsuit against DOE. On Wednesday, representatives from the cities and agencies expressed support for the county's plans to challenge DOE's decision. "Our support is unwavering," said Ben Bennett, executive director of the Port of Benton. Cancer survivors also told the county they would support a suit against the department, even if they could not contribute financially. In a special council meeting Wednesday, Richland council members unanimously supported a lawsuit challenging DOE's decision. Some council members said they were particularly concerned about how Spencer Abraham, President-elect George W. Bush's nominee for Energy Secretary, would handle FFTF issues. "I'm afraid the secretary appointed under the Bush administration has such a large learning curve that FFTF may be swept under the carpet," said Richland Councilman Larry Haler. Haler and other council members said they hope the decision to shut down FFTF can be reversed before current Energy Secretary Bill Richardson leaves his post. In November, Richardson said the nation could meet its foreseeable needs for isotopes for years to come without the Hanford reactor. The preferred alternative in an environmental study is to shut down FFTF and produce isotopes in existing reactors in Idaho Falls and Tennessee. Although the county had close to 20 supporters at Wednesday's meeting, there was at least one detractor, Gerald Pollet, director of Heart of America Northwest. Pollet chastised those at the meeting for supporting a challenge against DOE. He called the potential lawsuit "foolhardy" and said he was shocked they would try to "restrain the Department of Energy." "I think people need to look at their consciences," Pollet said. "The environmental impact statement is legally inadequate to support a position to restart FFTF." Pollet argued that restarting FFTF would be extremely costly--to the tune of $453 million. FFTF supporters called Pollet's comments misleading. "The current facilities are not adequate to meet the need," said Amy Evans, executive director of Citizens for Medical Isotopes. "In the year 2000, two dozen laboratories worldwide were left high and dry by DOE when a promised supply of arsenic isotopes ran out." ***************************************************************** 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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