***************************************************************** 12/27/01 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 9.306 ***************************************************************** RADBULL IS PRODUCED BY THE ABALONE ALLIANCE CLEARINGHOUSE ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR POWER CONTENTS 1 NRC Staff Proposes $3,000 Fine Against the University of 2 NRC Approves Power Uprates for Dresden 2, 3 and Quad Cities 1, 2 3 Panel: U.S. Must Tighten Nuke Rules 4 Nevada loses round in Yucca Mountain water fight 5 Nuclear Waste Foes Claim Radiation Regulator Biased 6 Court rejects request in Yucca Mountain case 7 KANUPP has unblemished record of safe operation 8 WIPP breaks weekly record for shipments 9 Letter: Stop nuke waste by shutting down the plants 10 State eyeing appeal in battle over Yucca water 11 China-made Nuclear Power Pressure Vessel Passes Test 12 Japan: Part to be extracted at Hamaoka 13 Vladivostok News :: Nuclear plant plan resurfaces 14 WIPP breaks weekly record for shipments 15 NRC Determines Surry Nuclear Plant Diesel Generator Issue To Be 16 Offer Of Pills Surprises State NUCLEAR WEAPONS CONTENTS 1 [southnews] Concern over US use of Depleted Uranium 2 Troop Buildup Between India and Pakistan--Nuclear Threat 3 Radioactive Liquids Claimed in Afghanistan Tunnels 4 Four Livermore researchers honored Lab physicists made fellows of 5 Rumors of lab closures do not include ORNL 6 Kazakhstan: Experts Report Progress On Safeguarding Nuclear Site 7 Groups Slam Russian Treason Verdict 8 Amnesty International Statement on Verdict in Pasko Case 9 Jail for nuclear whistleblower 10 URANIUM IS CLUE TO NUKE BID 11 HAPPY NUKE GEAR (UGH) 12 Germany to raze 939-bedroom Cold War bunker 13 ENERGY EMPLOYEES WORKER COMPENSATION PROGRAM EXPANDED 14 INEL: Governor must stop lying to us 15 Janet Michel: Sick workers deserve better 16 Energy Department Extends for Five Years Contract for Operation of Fermilab 17 Weapons of mass destruction: going nuclear in Iraq 18 Scientists worry about radiation from Cold War tests 19 Vladivostok News :: Pasko, defense appeal in treason case 20 Uzbekistan to step up nuclear-material monitoring at customs 21 Interest grows in nuclear, biological attack classes ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR POWER ARTICLES ***************************************************************** 1 NRC Staff Proposes $3,000 Fine Against the University of Wisconsin-Madison for Loss of Nuclear Device NRC: Press Release Region III - 2001 - 57 - U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs, Region III 801 Warrenville Road, Lisle IL 60532 Public Affairs No. III 01-057 December 27, 2001 CONTACT: Jan Strasma (630) 829-9663/e-mail: rjs2@nrc.gov [rjs2@nrc.gov] Pam Alloway-Mueller (630) 829-9662/e-mail: pla@nrc.gov [pla@nrc.gov] The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff has proposed a $3,000 fine against the University of Wisconsin-Madison for violating NRC requirements associated with the loss of six plated radioactive sources during a renovation of a campus laboratory. The sources were being used to eliminate static in a research project. The university recovered two of the six sources. All six sources contained about 6.5 microcuries of americium-241, a radioactive isotope. Americium-241 is used in a variety of applications, including residential and commercial smoke detectors. The university lost the sources during the renovation of laboratory No. 342 in the Structural Botany Building during June. On September 27, the university reported the loss of three sources after having recovered two sources on September 13. The NRC subsequently determined that there was one additional source lost, making a total of four sources which remained lost. University officials believe the four sources were disposed of in the normal trash when the floor of the laboratory was cleaned. Following an investigation of the incident, the NRC staff determined that the university's failure to prevent the unauthorized removal or access to licensed material that was stored in controlled or unrestricted areas was a violation of NRC requirements. In notifying the university of the proposed fine, NRC Regional Administrator James E. Dyer said, "The failure to adequately secure and limit access to licensed material is a significant safety issue. Implementation of adequate security measures for licensed materials is intended to prevent members of the public from being unknowingly and unnecessarily exposed to radiation." Dyer noted that the university had taken corrective actions to prevent a recurrence of the situation, including conducting additional surveys of nearby areas and storing the two remaining sources in the radiation safety department. However, he said, a newly adopted enforcement policy provides that a fine be proposed to reflect the significance of the violation and emphasize the importance of maintaining control of licensed material. The specified fines included in the enforcement policy were developed to correspond to roughly three times the cost of proper disposal of radioactive material. The university has 30 days to pay the fine or protest it. If the fine is protested and subsequently imposed by the NRC staff, the company may request a hearing. ***************************************************************** 2 NRC Approves Power Uprates for Dresden 2, 3 and Quad Cities 1, 2 NRC: Press Release - 2001 - 136 - U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs Telephone: 301/415-8200 Washington, DC 20555-001 E-mail: [opa@nrc.gov] Public Affairs Web Site No. 01-136 December 26, 2001 The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has approved a request by Exelon Generating Co. to increase the generating capacity of its Dresden 2 and 3 and Quad Cities 1 and 2 nuclear power plants. The power uprate at Dresden 2 and 3, located near Morris, Illinois, will increase the power of each reactor by 17 percent to about 912 megawatts of electricity per unit. The power uprate at Quad Cities 1 and 2, located near Moline, Il., will increase the power of each reactor by 17.8 percent, to about 912 megawatts of electricity per unit. The application for the increases was submitted to the NRC in December 2000. Exelon intends to implement the power uprate immediately for Dresden Unit 2. Uprates for the three other reactors will be implemented during outages scheduled for 2002 and 2003. The NRC's safety evaluation of the requested power uprate for the units focused on several areas, including nuclear steam supply systems, instrumentation and control systems, electrical systems, accident evaluations, radiological consequences, operations and technical specification changes. The NRC staff determined that the licensee could safely increase the power output of the reactors with modifications to plant equipment and use of new fuel. ***************************************************************** 3 Panel: U.S. Must Tighten Nuke Rules Las Vegas SUN December 24, 2001 WASHINGTON (AP) - The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has failed to adequately ensure that owners of nuclear power plants have enough funds to safely own, operate and later decommission the facilities, according to a new congressional review. The commission needs to tighten its review process for license transfer requests, especially because the future costs to dismantle a plant and dispose of radioactive waste could increase, said the study by the General Accounting Office, the investigative arm of Congress. The review was requested by Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass., because of concerns that deregulation and recent license transfers have affected decommission funds. Costs of decommissioning ranges from $300 million to $400 million per plant. The NRC has licensed 125 nuclear power plants for a limited time. Utilities have sold or are in the process of selling all or part of 15 plants. Another 30 plants have had licenses transferred Before transferring a license to a new plant owner, the commission requires companies to have funds available either by making periodic deposits into a trust fund, prepayment, obtaining a surety bond, insurance or credit or guaranteeing payment if a parent company can meet certain financial requirements. In general, enough money is being set aside to eventually take a plant out of service, the report said. But the NRC hasn't done enough to monitor the financial arrangements, it said. The commission's "reviews were not always rigorous enough to ensure that decommissioning funds would be adequate," the report said. "Moreover, NRC did not always adequately verify the new owners' financial qualifications to safely own and operate the plants." The NRC should request guaranteed additional revenue sources and document its review of any financial information - including revenue projections, the report said. Also, the report said the commission now allows plant owners to wait too long - about two years - before their licenses are terminated to perform radiological assessments to determine what additional cleanup might be needed. The GAO recommended the commission move up that deadline. The commission, in response, said requiring the surveys earlier "would not add significant value to the decommissioning process." It also disagreed that it should modify its review guidelines to include a checklist process "because many of the proposed license transfers are unique." All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 4 Nevada loses round in Yucca Mountain water fight Las Vegas SUN December 26, 2001 CARSON CITY, Nev. (AP) - A federal appeals court has rejected Nevada's request to take another look at its earlier order in a dispute over water needed to develop a nuclear dump at Yucca Mountain. The state attorney general's office said Wednesday that the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco declined to reconsider its order that U.S. District Judge Roger Hunt of Las Vegas hear the water case. Earlier, Hunt had refused to hear the federal Department of Energy's challenge of Nevada's denial last February of water rights for the project. He said it was an issue for state courts. Hunt's action, hailed by Nevada officials fighting the high-level nuclear waste dump, was appealed by the DOE. A three-judge panel of the 9th Circuit Court then put the case back in Hunt's hands. Nevada sought a rehearing, but Adams said that was rejected in an order her office received on Christmas Eve. "We're disappointed because the circuit court misperceived the ripeness issue," Deputy Attorney General Marta Adams said. "There is no immediate need for water to construct and develop the dump. There's no authorization yet to build the dump." "Our argument is that this is not the appropriate forum or time, because other things have to happen first," Adams said. "But because we did get favorable treatment earlier from Judge Hunt, we think we have reason to expect a good outcome again in his court." The DOE has temporary permission to use ground water to study Yucca Mountain through next April, but sought permanent rights to use 430 acre-feet a year to build and operate the repository. An acre-foot is enough water to supply a family of four or five for a year. The state engineer, in denying the DOE's request for the ground water, cited threats to public health, safety and Nevada's tourism-based economy. DOE officials said at the time that a lack of water rights would not stop a repository, only slow it down, because water could be trucked in to the site. Yucca Mountain, about 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas, has been under study for 14 years and is the only site being considered for a possible repository. The DOE, beginning in 2010, wants to entomb 77,000 tons of radioactive waste in tunnels 1,000 feet below the surface. Waste is currently stored in casks at 103 commercial nuclear reactors and various military and industrial sites around the country. All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 5 Nuclear Waste Foes Claim Radiation Regulator Biased The Salt Lake Tribune -- Thursday, December 27, 2001 BY JUDY FAHYS THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE Fellow Tooele County commissioners say Teryl Hunsaker's open support for a big community employer is exactly why he ought to help review a hot waste proposal pending before the Utah Radiation Control Board. In fact, they blessed the commissioner's involvement earlier this month by resolution. But citizen activists insist Hunsaker, also a Utah Radiation Control Board member, has a conflict of interest when it comes to Envirocare of Utah's plans to expand services offered at its Tooele County radioactive waste landfill. Citing bias, they have asked the board to disqualify Hunsaker from judging their appeal of a pending state permit to allow Envirocare to accept waste thousands of times more potent than now allowed at the landfill, located about 80 miles west of Salt Lake City. "He's going to sit in judgment of a company he has a strong bias toward," said Claire Geddes of Utah Legislative Watch, one of the groups behind the appeal. "He should be independent, a person who represents the interests of the entire state, not just Tooele County." The radiation board has set Jan. 4 as the date to consider appeal arguments. In addition, it will decide whether the environmental groups, Families Against Incinerator Risk (FAIR) and the Sierra Club of Utah, should be allowed to have an active role in the board's appeal review. The citizen activists filed their appeal shortly after Envirocare cleared the first step of its three-part approval in July. The activists hope to derail the permit before it reaches Utah's Legislature and the governor, who ultimately must endorse Envirocare's plan to receive containers of "low-level" Class A, C and B waste -- 90 percent of it rubbish from nuclear power plants. In papers filed on the pending appeal, activists base their claim of Hunsaker's conflict of interest on the board attorney's bias guidelines: prejudging the facts that are the subject of the proceeding; showing personal favoritism, prejudice or partiality; and standing to gain or lose personally from the decision. The activists cite four reasons for urging the board to bar Hunsaker from the quasi judicial review. They say he has accepted campaign contributions, criticized the company's critics and donned a pro-Envirocare badge at public meetings. They also question his ability to judge fairly because Tooele County stands to gain financially under any expansion, based on a deal that gives the county 5 percent of annual revenues. "What's remarkable is they don't get it," said Geddes, adding it would be similarly improper for utility regulators at the Public Service Commission to wear a pro-PacifiCorp button while considering customer rates. "They [the Tooele commissioners] validated every concern we had" with the Hunsaker endorsement. Tooele County Commissioner Gene White does not understand the activists' beef. "We are entitled to that seat" on the Radiation Control Board because of the amount of radioactive waste in Tooele County, he said. "We have a responsibility to be there." White said the idea for the resolution, which was not signed by Hunsaker, came from a discussion he had with Envirocare public relations person Joyce Hogan. "She brought me a format [for the resolution]. I filled it in," he said. The one-page notice specifically names Hunsaker as someone who "honorably serves as an effective advocate for the people and interests of Tooele County." It also singles out the activists, asking the commission to "renounce [sic] any allegations of improper conflicts of interest that have been raised by one Jason Groenewold, representing Families Against Incinerator Risk [FAIR], or by any other groups or individuals associated with this individual or group." White had fellow commissioner Dennis Rockwell sign the resolution, then brought it to the Dec. 7 Radiation Control Board meeting. Administrative Secretary and Radiation Control Director Bill Sinclair told White it would be inappropriate to present it to the board that day. White and Rockwell "ratified" the resolution at their meeting a few days later and mailed copies to board members. When asked whether the resolution might have violated the state's open meetings act, which requires public bodies to take official actions only during properly publicized meetings, he admitted his short time on the commission may have led to bungling the procedure but added that the endorsement "is not going to be a big impact on the board either way." fahys@sltrib.com © Copyright 2001, The Salt Lake Tribune All material found on ***************************************************************** 6 Court rejects request in Yucca Mountain case [Las Vegas Review-Journal] Thursday, December 27, 2001 Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal By BRENDAN RILEY THE ASSOCIATED PRESS CARSON CITY -- A federal appeals court has rejected Nevada's request to take another look at its order in a dispute over water needed to develop a nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain. The state attorney general's office said Wednesday the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco declined to reconsider its order that U.S. District Judge Roger Hunt of Las Vegas hear the water case. Earlier, Hunt had refused to hear the federal Department of Energy's challenge of the state's February denial of water rights for the project. He said the issue was one for state courts. Hunt's action, hailed by Nevada officials fighting the nuclear waste dump, was appealed by the Energy Department. A three-judge panel of the 9th Circuit Court then put the case back in Hunt's hands. Nevada sought a rehearing, but Deputy Attorney General Marta Adams said that was rejected in an order her office received Christmas Eve. "We're disappointed because the circuit court misperceived the ripeness issue," Adams said. "There is no immediate need for water to construct and develop the dump. There's no authorization yet to build the dump." "Our argument is that this is not the appropriate forum or time because other things have to happen first," Adams said. The Energy Department has temporary permission to use groundwater to study Yucca Mountain through April but sought permanent rights to use 430 acre-feet a year to build and operate the repository. An acre-foot is enough water to supply a family of five for a year. The state engineer, in denying the Energy Department's request, cited threats to public health, safety and Nevada's tourism-based economy. Yucca Mountain, about 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas, has been under study for 14 years and is the only site being considered for a possible repository. The Energy Department wants to entomb 77,000 tons of radioactive waste. This story is located at: http://www.lvrj.com/lvrj_home/2001/Dec-27-Thu-2001/news/17750362.html [http://www.lvrj.com/lvrj_home/2001/Dec-27-Thu-2001/news/17750362.html] ***************************************************************** 7 KANUPP has unblemished record of safe operation ©The Frontier Publications (Pvt) Ltd. Updated on 12/27/2001 10:38:48 AM ISLAMABAD (NNI): Karachi Nuclear Power Plant (KANUPP) operated by the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC) is going to complete its design life in October 2002. However, The Atomic Energy Commission has applied for granting re-licence for it to operate beyond design life.A release issued here said that that apply for its re-licening has been made due to its an unblemished record of thirty years of safe operation recognized by various safety reviews carried out by the national regulatory authority and a number of international organizations including the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). On the basis of the operating experience, PAEC in late eighties initiated various projects to combat aging problems and for safety upgrades of the plant. The objective of these projects was to ensure the safe operation of the plan during its design life and to judge if it can be operated safely beyond its design life. PAEC has now formally submitted an application to the Pakistan Nuclear Regulatory Authority (PNRA) asking for permission to operate the plant beyond its design life. Towards this end KANUPP is required to fulfil the PNRA requirements of submitting detailed documentation, safety evaluation etc. normally, it takes about three years to complete all the regulatory review, the PNRA hope to be able to carry out the review before October 2002, depending upon the timely submissions by KANUPP/PAEC. © Copyright 2001 The Frontier Post ***************************************************************** 8 WIPP breaks weekly record for shipments Borderland News December 27, 2001 Associated Press CARLSBAD -- The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant has set a record for the number of nuclear waste shipments received at the underground dumping site in a single week. Until now, the highest number of deliveries in one week had been 14, but last week WIPP accepted 16 deliveries, said Ines Triay, manager of U.S. Department of Energy's field office in Carlsbad. If it hadn't been for high winds Friday, the site near Carlsbad would have met its goal of 17 nuclear waste shipments weekly for the first time since opening in March 1998. When the site opened, the DOE set an optimal delivery rate of 17 nuclear-waste shipments weekly from facilities around the country. Two additional shipments were delayed Friday by high-wind warnings near Roswell, Triay said. The warnings kept trucks from leaving WIPP and driving to Rocky Flats near Denver, where two more loads were scheduled for pickup. Of the 16 shipments delivered last week, 10 arrived from Rocky Flats, and six came from the Idaho National Environmental and Engineering Laboratory near Idaho Falls. Each shipment consisted of 28 drums of nuclear waste. Including last week's deliveries, WIPP has 486 shipments since it opened, Triay said. WIPP accepts waste from three facilities -- Los Alamos National Laboratory, the Hanford Site in Washington and the Savannah River Site in South Carolina. Shipments of nuclear waste from Los Alamos lab have been on hold for several months as the laboratory went through an annual audit of its waste-shipment program that is required of all facilities which send waste to WIPP. [http://www.elpasotimes.com/agreement.html] (updated 8/10/2001) ***************************************************************** 9 Letter: Stop nuke waste by shutting down the plants Las Vegas SUN December 26, 2001 For nearly 20 years the Department of Energy has been studying Yucca Mountain as the solution to America's massive nuclear waste problem. But, as many Nevadans know, Nevada would be very foolish to accept America's radioactive waste. And it wouldn't even solve the problem, because more radioactive waste is created every day at the nation's 103 operating nuclear power plants. The first thing to do is to stop creating more waste. Right now, the owners of every nuclear power plant in America are assuring their local citizens that the nuclear waste will be moved to a federally approved repository some day. But no such repository exists, and numerous scientists have denounced Yucca Mountain as unworkable. Yet the entire nuclear industry, the Bush-Cheney administration and the DOE all expect Yucca Mountain to be the solution to the waste problem, even though Nevada is suing the federal government to stop it. It's time to face reality. America must begin switching to renewable energy solutions immediately. No one should be content to simply demand, "Don't give us the waste!" We all need to insist that the nuclear industry stop making it, too, because nobody anywhere wants it. RUSSELL HOFFMAN Carlsbad, Calif. All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 10 State eyeing appeal in battle over Yucca water Las Vegas SUN Today: December 27, 2001 at 9:37:25 PST By Cy Ryan SUN CAPITAL BUREAU CARSON CITY -- The state may appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court in its fight to stop the Energy Department from getting water rights to operate the proposed nuclear dump at Yucca Mountain. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals this week rejected the state's petition to reconsider its earlier decision that handed the Energy Department a procedural victory in its effort to gain permanent water rights at Yucca. Nevada Deputy Attorney General Paul Taggart said today there's been confusion over the case and "it merits going to the U.S. Supreme Court." He said, however, that he would have to confer with the state Department of Conservation and Natural Resources. Mike Turnipseed, while he was state engineer, denied the application of the federal agency, noting Nevada law prohibits a nuclear dump. Turnipseed now heads the conservation department. The Energy Department then filed suit, contesting the Turnipseed ruling, claiming federal law pre-empts state law. U.S. District Judge Roger Hunt in Las Vegas ruled in favor of the state. But the Circuit Court, in its 2-1 ruling, sent the case back to Hunt to decide whether the federal Nuclear Waste Policy Act supersedes the Nevada law that bars a nuclear dump in Nevada. The state asked the Circuit Court to reconsider its split decision. But it refused. Taggart said the court never gave a reason for its denial. "There was no discussion of the merits," he said. Taggart said there has been a "fundamental misunderstanding" by the Circuit Court that the issue was the water that is now being used by the Energy Department in studying the site. The federal agency, Taggart said, has the rights for this temporary use. This legal fight is over the permanent water rights. The state maintains the suit by the energy department is premature because President Bush and Congress have yet to designate Yucca as the permanent burial grounds for nuclear waste. There is also a suit pending in the District Court in Tonopah over the water rights. And the state says the issue should be decided there before the federal court steps in. The Circuit Court, in its original ruling, said, "Although the location of a nuclear waste repository is plainly a sensitive social issue, it is not the issue in this case." The court said, "The issue in this case is whether the Nuclear Waste Policy Act preempts Nevada Revised Statute," which says the construction of a dump would be detrimental to the state's public interest. It said that if the federal act is interpreted to mean that only the federal government is entitled to determine whether Yucca Mountain is suitable, then the Energy Department wins. But Nevada will triumph if the federal nuclear law is interpreted to permit Nevada to take part in the decision making, above and beyond just filing a "notice of disapproval" of the site, as allowed in the federal law. All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 11 China-made Nuclear Power Pressure Vessel Passes Test Beijing Time) Thursday, December 27, 2001 A nuclear power pressure vessel with a 600 megawatt capacity passed a technical examination in Shanghai Wednesday. The pressure vessel for nuclear reactors developed by the Shanghai Boiler Factory (SBF), China's leading manufacturer of nuclear power equipment, is crucial equipment for the second-phase power projects at Qinshan Nuclear Power Plant. Being the country's largest boiler production base for nuclear plants, the SBF has made a number of technical breakthroughs in jointing, assembly and precision finishing while developing this equipment. Experts say, the vessel, advanced in both quality and technology, has set a milestone in the country's manufacturing history of nuclear power equipment. The Qinshan plant designed and constructed by China is located in Haiyan County, east China's Zhejiang Province. Copyright by People's Daily Online, all rights reserved ***************************************************************** 12 Japan: Part to be extracted at Hamaoka asahi.com : ENGLISH The Asahi Shimbun Plant inspectors will for the first time remove the weld where a crack caused a radioactive water leak. A weld in the No. 1 reactor of Chubu Electric Power Co.'s Hamaoka nuclear plant will be extracted to investigate the cause of last month's radioactive water leak, company officials said Tuesday. It will be the first time a sample of a weld connected to the control rod drive mechanism has been removed for examination, officials said. The leak originated in a weld connecting a stub tube to the pressure vessel. The stub tube covers the fuel control rod drive mechanism. Officials from Chubu and the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry said the crack at the nuclear plant in Shizuoka Prefecture was likely the result of stress caused by heat from the welding process-a phenomenon known as stress corrosion. They suspect a combination of heat, pressure and neutrons emitted during the reactor's operation also helped crack the metal. Chubu officials plan to fit the entire cracked section with new parts, including the stub tube encasing the control rod, which regulates the fission chain reaction in the reactor's core. The metal used in the weld is a nickel alloy called Inconel 182, which is more resistant to corrosion than other metals, including stainless steel. It was used in 14 other nuclear reactors, including those in Tokyo Electric Power Co.'s Fukushima plant. The reactor where the crack was discovered began operations about 25 years ago. Government officials said a method of inspecting and repairing old reactors such as the Hamaoka No. 1 reactor is urgently needed. Nuclear reactors have a useful life of between only 30 and 40 years because contact with neutrons weakens metal parts. To combat this problem, reactor operators have recently begun replacing old pipes and valves with new ones, and officials from power companies and the Nuclear Power Engineering Corp. are studying ways to replace these parts in the nation's increasingly dated nuclear reactors. Observer say Chubu's handling of the cracking incident will set a precedent for firms unsure of how to inspect the reactor's core and replace aging parts. (12/26) [Copyright Asahi Shimbun. All rights reserved. No reproduction or ***************************************************************** 13 Vladivostok News :: Nuclear plant plan resurfaces December 27, 2001 By Alexander Kartashov Primorye Governor Sergei Darkin said recently that the Atomic Power Ministry plans to start construction of an $800 million nuclear power plant in Primorye in 2015. He made the announcement December 21 after a trip to Moscow where he met with Atomic Power Minister Alexander Rumyantsev. The feasibility study for the project will start next year using 30 million rubles ($1 million) that the ministry has allocated, he said. Plans to construct a nuclear power plant have been mulled in Primorye since the late 1990s, but they have encountered strong opposition from local environmentalists. In 1998, researchers said such a plant could face a risk of being damaged in an earthquake because of Primorye's proximity to the so-called Ring of Fire fault zone lining the Pacific Ocean. Besides, there were concerns that construction of the potentially dangerous facility would put the local populace at risk not so much as to meet domestic demand, but to earn an extra profit for the ministry by exporting cheap energy to neighboring nations. Darkin made it no secret that demand for the energy, that would cost 4.5 cents to generate, exists in Japan, South Korea, and China, which are ready to pay 10 cents per kilowatt, 6 cents and 5 cents, respectively. At the same time, the governor said that this region too, would in the next 10 years face a lack of energy, and a nuclear plant could be the solution. He himself didn't make up his mind on the planned construction and said he would order a popular poll to decide whether the regional authorities should give a go-ahead to the project. "I don't want to state now whether we need a nuclear power plant or we don't," he said. "We will hold a region-wide referendum on the issue." It was unclear immediately, however, when the referendum will take place while Darkin said the atomic ministry had already earmarked feasibility study funds for next year. Darkin said there were two alternatives to an atomic power plant. The region could build a natural gas power plant using the gas produced in Sakhalin international offshore projects. Darkin said negotiations are underway with Japan's Mitsui Corporation and the Royal Dutch/Shell Group of Companies on the chances of building such a plant, the Zolotoi Rog business weekly reported. The other option could be an arrangement with South Korea on energy exchanges. Energy consumption peaks in S. Korea in summer, apparently due to heavy use of air conditioners, while in Primorye, as in the rest of Russia, it soars in cold winters. Darkin said he had discussed the issue in South Korea earlier this month. Web-administrator John Ryzhov [rev@vladnews.ru] Copyright c 2001 "Vladivostok Novosti" ***************************************************************** 14 WIPP breaks weekly record for shipments Borderland News December 27, 2001 Associated Press CARLSBAD -- The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant has set a record for the number of nuclear waste shipments received at the underground dumping site in a single week. Until now, the highest number of deliveries in one week had been 14, but last week WIPP accepted 16 deliveries, said Ines Triay, manager of U.S. Department of Energy's field office in Carlsbad. If it hadn't been for high winds Friday, the site near Carlsbad would have met its goal of 17 nuclear waste shipments weekly for the first time since opening in March 1998. When the site opened, the DOE set an optimal delivery rate of 17 nuclear-waste shipments weekly from facilities around the country. Two additional shipments were delayed Friday by high-wind warnings near Roswell, Triay said. The warnings kept trucks from leaving WIPP and driving to Rocky Flats near Denver, where two more loads were scheduled for pickup. Of the 16 shipments delivered last week, 10 arrived from Rocky Flats, and six came from the Idaho National Environmental and Engineering Laboratory near Idaho Falls. Each shipment consisted of 28 drums of nuclear waste. Including last week's deliveries, WIPP has 486 shipments since it opened, Triay said. WIPP accepts waste from three facilities -- Los Alamos National Laboratory, the Hanford Site in Washington and the Savannah River Site in South Carolina. Shipments of nuclear waste from Los Alamos lab have been on hold for several months as the laboratory went through an annual audit of its waste-shipment program that is required of all facilities which send waste to WIPP. Copyright © 2001 El Paso Times. ***************************************************************** 15 NRC Determines Surry Nuclear Plant Diesel Generator Issue To Be of Low to Moderate Safety Significance NRC: Press Release Region II - 2001 - 50 - U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs, Region II 61 Forsyth Street SW, Atlanta, GA 30303 Public Affairs No. II 01-050 December 26, 2001 CONTACT: Ken Clark (404) 562-4416/e-mail: [kmc2@nrc.gov] Roger D. Hannah (404) 562-4417/e-mail: [rdh1@nrc.gov] The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff has completed its significance determination of an inspection finding at Virginia Power's Surry nuclear plant near Surry, Virginia, and concluded that the finding was White (low to moderate safety significance). The inspection finding relates to the Surry plant staff's discovery of failed components in one emergency diesel generator and degraded components in another. The NRC staff had characterized the finding as Yellow (substantial importance to safety) on a preliminary basis. At a regulatory conference with the NRC staff in late November, Virginia Power officials presented their position on the issue and their assessment of its significance. The company presented information covering the availability of an alternate diesel, plant staff inspections of the equipment, differences in risk analyses and other factors. After reviewing all the information, the NRC staff determined that its preliminary assessment was overly conservative and the issue should be characterized as White. The safety significance of each NRC inspection finding is characterized by a color -- green, white, yellow, or red. The agency response to the inspection findings is based on the significance of the items. A green finding receives normal NRC oversight, while white, yellow, or red assessments result in increasing NRC involvement, including additional inspections. The NRC staff will inform Virginia Power of the specific additional inspections or other actions to be taken at the Surry plant at a later date. ***************************************************************** 16 Offer Of Pills Surprises State ctnow.com: CONNECTICUT December 26, 2001 By AL LARA, Courant Staff Writer Spurred on by the possibility of terrorist attack, the federal government is proposing to distribute millions of pills that can protect against one kind of cancer for people living near nuclear power plants. Within 30 days, more than 3.4 million doses of potassium iodide will be made available to the states that request it, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission said recently. But the announcement took Connecticut and municipal officials by surprise. Although they knew it was being considered, officials here had not received information about the federal offer, much less decided whether Connecticut would accept it or how the pills would be distributed, said Brian Mattiello, undersecretary of the state Office of Policy and Management. "The federal government's guidance to the states [on emergency management issues] has been slow, disjointed and confusing, and this is just another example," said John Wiltse, director of the state Office of Emergency Management. Recommendations about Connecticut's participation in the distribution will probably come after the meeting of an existing interagency working group on potassium iodide in January, Mattiello said. "It's one of the tools in an arsenal of tools that we can use for our own protection," said Paul Eccard, first selectman in Waterford, where the Millstone Nuclear Power Complex is located. "We hope Gov. Rowland heads the rush to stockpile it, but as for distribution, they can start with the elementary school that's a mile from the plant," said Nancy Burton of the Connecticut Coalition Against Millstone. Potassium iodide is a salt that has been shown in studies to protect the thyroid gland from exposure to radiation, inhibiting cancer growth. The pill distribution is a "reasonable, prudent and inexpensive" precaution and is not based on any new specific threat, NRC spokesman Victor Dricks said. Although the plans have long been in the works, the terrorist threat since Sept. 11 "was certainly a factor in the distribution," Dricks said. The NRC is spending $800,000 for the initial supply of pills that will be supplied to the states. The agency is negotiating with the two or three pharmaceutical companies that manufacture potassium iodide about possibly shipping them directly to residents within 10 miles of a nuclear power plant. For at least the past two years, representatives of the state Department of Environmental Protection, Office of Emergency Management, Department of Public Health and Office of Policy and Management have been meeting to develop policy on potassium iodide. Eccard said the Nuclear Advisory Council that provides local oversight of the Millstone complex recommended stockpiling the pills for local residents, as did failed legislation proposed earlier this year by state Sen. Melodie Peters and state Rep. Andrea Stillman, both Democrats representing Waterford. In November, Burton's group suggested that Millstone owner Dominion Resources supply the pills "as a cost of doing business," she said. ctnow.com is Copyright © 2001 by The Hartford Courant ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR WEAPONS ARTICLES ***************************************************************** 1 [southnews] Concern over US use of Depleted Uranium Date: Thu, 27 Dec 2001 19:51:30 -0600 (CST) Send FREE Holiday eCards from Yahoo! Greetings. http://us.click.yahoo.com/IgTaHA/ZQdDAA/ySSFAA/7gSolB/TM ---------------------------------------------------------------------~-> ---------- CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER: Central Asia Concern Grows that U.S. Has Used Depleted Uranium http://baltimorechronicle.com/duranium_dec01.html by Dr. Ali Ahmed Rind --------------------- Let there be light! said God, and there was light! Let there be blood! says man, and theres a sea! As U.S. and NATO forces continue pounding Italy, France and Afghanistan with cruise Portugal have asked missiles and smart bombs, NATO to institute a people acquainted with the moratorium on the aftermaths of two recent use of depleted previous wars fought by uranium in its the U.S. fear, following armaments until the Gulf and Balkan war more studies are syndromes, the Afghan War done. Canada Syndrome. stopped using its own DU weapons two This condition is marked years ago. Yet the by a state of vague Pentagon wont aliments and carcinomas, admit DU is and is linked with the harmful. usage of Depleted Uranium (DU) as part of missiles, projectiles and bombs in battlefield. As a result of the current conflicts, people of Afghanistan who had been dying of starvation up till now are likely to savor a more modern mode of death: death owing to radioactive materials pulverized over barren mountains and harsh plains in modern worlds war on terrorism. And the fear is that Afghan people will not be alone to go through it. The wind and rivers could take DU across the borders, making it likely that people in Pakistan and other neighboring countries will also be exposed to this health hazard. What Is Depleted Uranium? Depleted uranium is the super weapon of the 90s. It is not a weapon itself, but is a heavy metal used in the production of armaments. DU is a rather benign-sounding name for uranium-238, the trace elements left behind when the fissionable material is extracted from uranium-235 for use in nuclear reactors and weapons. For decades, this refuse was a radioactive nuisance, piling up at plutonium processing plants. By the late 1980s there was nearly a billion tons of this materialcalled tailingsleft over in U.S. dumps. Then Pentagon weapons designers came up with a use for the tailings: they could be molded into bullets and bombs. The material was free, and there was plenty at hand. Depleted Uranium is 1.7 times denser than lead, and this means that it can form the core of a shell that will easily penetrate the steel armor of tanks and other military vehicles. It is triumph of military technology. At high speed, it slices through tanks like a hot knife through butter. Some flying bombs (A-10s and possibly some Tomahawks, etc.), are made of DU metal. DU is a concern, however, because it is a byproduct of the process that is used to make nuclear power fuel or nuclear weapons. Although depleted of its powerfully radioactive component, DU does still contain minute traces of radioactivity. The leukemia rate When a hardened missile in Sarajevo, strikes a target and pummeled by explodes, around 70% of American bombs in the DU burns and oxidizes, 1996, has tripled bursting into minute in the last five particles that can be years. inhaled or ingested as dust. This can be harmful not only because of the residual radioactivity of the DU, which possibly could lead to cancer, but also because uranium itself, as a heavy metal, is toxic and can lead to kidney failure and other health problems. DU is toxic only if the dust is inhaled or ingested, or if DU-contaminated shrapnel enters the body. The inhaled lethal dust sticks to the fibers of the lungs and eventually begins to wreak havoc on the body: tumors, hemorrhages, ravaged immune systems, leukemias. Un-oxidized DU metalin downed aircraft and in unexploded ammunition, rockets, bombs and missilesrusts away into a very fine black dust. This dust, too, spreads around through the air, water and via people, animals and mobile objects that move over it. Staying in a contaminated area is risky because one never knows how one might ingest a particle of DU oxide, and one particle is all one needs to become sick. The radioactive and toxic DU-oxides dont disintegrate. They are practically permanent. DU has a half-life of more than 4 billion years, approximately the age of the Earth. It means thousand of acres of land in the Balkans, Kuwait and southern Iraq have been contaminated forever. If our apprehension about the current war is correct, the Afghan terrain will suffer the same fate. DU Stockpiling Is Spreading The stockpiling of DU weapons is spreading. More than 20 countries now have DU in their arsenals, including Pakistan. A few months back, among the exhibits at IDEX 2001 (see: http://idex.janes.com/), held in Karachi, was a model of the new 125mm armor-piercing fin-stabilized discarding sabot (APFSDS) projectile with depleted uranium (DU) long-rod penetration, which is being developed by the Pakistani National Development Complex (NDC) for use with T-80UD tanks. Gulf War Syndrome The amount of DU used in the Gulf War was approximately 100 times greater than the amount used in Kosovo. In all, about 970,000 30mm rounds with DU expended in Gulf War against Iraq, for a total of over 300 tons Roughly half of the DU fired in the Gulf War was shot in Kuwait, to oust Iraqi occupation troops. Months of bombing of Iraq by U.S. and British planes and cruise missiles during the Gulf War has left behind an even more deadly and insidious legacy: tons of shell casings, bullets and bomb fragments laced with depleted uranium. As allied bombing was intense in part of southern Iraq, an epidemic of carcinomas has erupted in that area. At present, the desert dust carries death all around southern Iraq. The Legacy of DU in Iraq Although downplayed by the U.S. administration and Western media, Iraqi physicians have been reporting sharp increases in cancers such as lymphomas and leukemia in Southern Iraq, as well as an increase in birth defects. Since 1990, the incidence of leukemia in Iraq has grown by more than 600 percent. One Iraqi oncologist who studied cases of rising leukemia among southern Iraqi populations calls conditions in southern Iraq another Hiroshima. Most of the leukemia and cancer victims arent soldiers. They are civilians. And many of them are children. According to mortality figures compiled by UNICEF, as many as 180 children are dying every day in Iraq. Because of the U.N.-sponsored embargo, Iraqi hospitals are short of drugs and equipment to face the endemic. Children are dying in their mothers laps without food and pills. Iraqi physicians call it the white deathleukemia. The Victors Suffer, Too Depleted uranium poses a threat to the victor as well as to the vanquished. Gulf War veterans, plagued by a variety of illnesses, have been found to have traces of uranium in their blood, feces, urine and semen. The number of Gulf War vets who were in contact with radioactive tanks or breathed contaminated dust could be in ten of thousands. The shadows of that war still haunt them. The world came to know about Gulf War Syndromea variety of mysterious ailmentswhen U.S. and allied soldiers returned to their home countries. With the exception of the U.S. defense establishment, everyone believes that this condition is a direct outcome of using DU in conflict. The Balkan Syndrome In 1999 alone, NATO planes fired approximately 10 tons of DU in former Yugoslavia, about 3% of what was used in Iraq. The A-10, used in close combat support, was overwhelmingly the source. Now fears of a Balkan Syndrome are raging across Europe. Medical teams in the region have already detected cancer clusters near the bomb sites. The leukemia rate in Sarajevo, pummeled by American bombs in 1996, has tripled in the last five years. A U.N. report found evidence of radioactivity at eight of 11 sites tested in Kosovo that were struck by NATO ammunition made with depleted uranium. There is concern about civilians who stray too close to the lingering dust at the sites of crushed tanks. Its not just the assailed Serbs who are ill and dying, but NATO and U.N. peacekeepers in the region. Eight Italian soldiers who served in the region under NATOs banner during the past one and a half years have died of leukemia. Five Belgians, two Dutch, two Spaniards, a Portuguese and a Czech are also viewed as victims of DU. Consequently, Italy has asked NATO to institute a moratorium on the use of depleted uranium in its armaments until more studies are done. France and Portugal have added their voice to Italys. France has launched an inquiry into the effects of DU on their soldiers in Kosovo, and Portugal withdrew its soldiers from Kosovo. The Portuguese Defense Minister went public by declaring that Portuguese soldiers were not going to become uranium meat by taking further part in this military expedition. In the meantime, Canada stopped using its own DU weapons two years ago, and has taken steps to deal with sick veterans, offering to pay for soldiers to be tested for DU exposure at independent American centers. However, Ottawa, like Washington, has so far rejected calls for a ban on weapons made from DU. The U.S. Defense Department doesnt want to admit that DU is harmful because they dont want the liability. The Pentagon has shuffled through a variety of rationales and excuses. First, the Defense Department shrugged off concerns about DU as wild conspiracy theories by peace activists, environmentalists and Iraqi propagandists. When the U.S.s NATO allies demanded that the U.S. disclose the chemical and metallic properties of its munitions, the Pentagon refused. It has also refused to order the testing of U.S. soldiers stationed in the Gulf and the Balkans. Gandhi once wrote that morality is contraband in war. But the world should disagree with him by stirring international consciousness in favor of morality and ethos in all forms of war. Chemical weapons are banned by international agreement. Antipersonnel land mines are on their way out. DU rounds should go the same route. They may be military wonders. But theyre ethical horrors that the world should get rid of, and the sooner the better. ------------------------------------------------- Updated by Allegro Web Communications on December 5, 2001. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: southnews-unsubscribe@egroups.com Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ***************************************************************** 2 Troop Buildup Between India and Pakistan--Nuclear Threat Date: Tue, 25 Dec 2001 23:08:33 -0600 (CST) This is the headline story in today's online New York Times. India and Pakistan are both recent nuclear powers. The leadership vacuum in Washington DC brings up the possibility that the situation will quickly spiral out of control. This, in my opinion, is the greatest possibility the world has seen of a nuclear engagement since the Cuban Missile Crisis. Big Troop Buildup Mounted by India and Pakistan By CELIA W. DUGGER The New York Times NEW DELHI, Dec. 24 A warlike momentum is building between India and Pakistan as both countries mount large-scale troop buildups along the full length of their border in response to rising antagonism since a suicide attack this month on India's Parliament. India quickly blamed Pakistan and two Islamic groups operating openly there for the Dec. 13 assault. Western diplomats say the troop mobilizations now are the largest they have seen in more than a decade between the two nuclear adversaries, which have waged hot and cold wars for the last half century. Both nations say they are reacting defensively to each other's buildups and have every hope that strenuous efforts to resolve their differences through diplomacy will succeed. For now, they are preparing just in case. The Pakistani Army has canceled all leaves for its troops and told them to report for duty immediately. India is moving troops by the trainload from what one military official called "peace locations in south and central India" to its northwestern border with Pakistan. Military officials in both countries say the buildup is not just in Kashmir, the territory both claim, but along the international border that divides the Indian states of Gujarat, Rajasthan and Punjab from the Pakistani provinces of Punjab and Sind. Neither side would give estimates of how many troops were in motion. Some Indian officials said reports of the buildup were exaggerated, but a senior official, when asked if it was the biggest in years, said, "No comment." Here in India's capital, a nasty contretemps has erupted over India's decision today to expel a man on Pakistan's diplomatic staff. The Indian authorities say he is a spy who may have fed intelligence to the suicide squad that attacked Parliament, a charge Pakistan dismissed as absurd. Those developments follow India's decision on Friday to recall its envoy to Pakistan for the first time in 30 years. Most policymakers and pundits in both countries still seem to think that the chain of events set off by the attack on Parliament will not lead to war, not least because the addition of nuclear arms to the region makes the risks appallingly high. But for other reasons, too, virtually nobody wants armed conflict. Many of these experts seem to be counting on the United States which is suddenly, since Sept. 11, a crucial player in the region to make the other country see sense. In Pakistan, the thinking goes, the United States cannot afford a war between India and Pakistan that would jeopardize the hunt for Osama bin Laden and his Qaeda leaders who may have fled into Pakistan; so the Americans will press India to settle for a tough diplomatic strategy. In India, the possibility that officials might escalate to war has put extreme pressure on the United States to turn the screws on Pakistan to shut down the militant groups implicated in the Parliament attack. On Thursday, President Bush stood in the Rose Garden on the 100th day since Sept. 11 and condemned attacks on India and the murderous ways of Lashkar- e-Taiba's, one of the two groups India has blamed for the attack on Parliament. The next day, he called on Pakistan's military ruler, President Pervez Musharraf, to shut Lashkar-e-Taiba and the other group, Jaish-e- Muhammad. In Islamabad, Pakistan's capital, the atmosphere in recent days has been normal, with people preparing for festivities on Tuesday, which is not only Christmas, but also a holiday on the birthday of Mohammed Ali Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan. But in India, there is a growing sense of unease about rising tensions after a week in which India's senior elected officials in effect issued an ultimatum to Pakistan: Either shut down the two Islamic militant groups blamed for the attack that killed 14 people, including the five assailants, or all options are open, including military action. Today, there was a flurry of activity from Pakistan in response to India's demands, but none of it satisfied India in the least. General Musharraf told reporters today in China, where he is on a state visit, that he would crack down on Lashkar-e- Taiba and Jaish-e-Muhammad if there was evidence to prove their guilt in the attack on Parliament. "We are taking a very comprehensive look at the entire issue of terrorism emanating from anywhere, especially in our own country," he said. But Indian officials insisted again today that there was already a wide enough trail of evidence about the two groups to justify Pakistan's immediate arrest of their leaders, as well as a shutdown of their activities. Privately, Indian officials are willing to give General Musharraf a little time to act. A senior Indian official today suggested a way out of a diplomatic cul-de-sac. Pakistan is demanding evidence, and India is refusing to share it directly with Pakistan. The official said the United States or another country that has seen India's case could tell Pakistan about it. Pakistan's state bank partly met one of India's demands today. It froze the assets of Lashkar-e-Taiba, or the Army of the Pure, which has sent hundreds of militants to fight Indian rule in Kashmir. But India's concerns that the militant groups will play a shell game, changing names and hats but not real identities, got a boost today. Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, who heads both Lashkar-e-Taiba and a powerful sister organization that runs hospitals and more than 130 schools, announced that he was resigning as head of Lashkar. Lashkar itself will be relocating all its operations to Kashmir, he said. Mr. Saeed said he would stay on as head of the social and religious group based near Lahore, Pakistan. He said the war against India would continue in Kashmir. "Now we have planned decisive attacks in Kashmir," he is quoted as saying on the sister group's Web site. Vijay Nambiar, India's recalled high commissioner to Pakistan, told reporters in Islamabad today that Mr. Saeed's resignation was insufficient. "We want the culprits to be brought to book," he said. The spy case that came to a head today has also sharpened each side's rhetorical knives. The Pakistani Foreign Office fired the first rhetorical shot on Sunday with a statement charging that India kidnapped Muhammad Sharif Khan, a member of Pakistan's mission in New Delhi. "During the interrogation, he was stripped naked, severely beaten up and tortured, resulting in visible and internal injuries, which were also confirmed in the medical report," Pakistan's statement said. India returned fire through a news release from the Delhi police that charged that on a tip, Mr. Khan had been caught red-handed outside Nirula's restaurant accepting sensitive documents relating to atomic energy, nuclear research and railway security from Ajay Kumar, a senior executive assistant in a research office of the Indian Parliament. The news release said that Mr. Kumar had admitted giving Mr. Khan information over the last couple of years in exchange for money and that Mr. Khan had repeatedly asked about security arrangements around Parliament. This morning, an official involved in the investigation showed The New York Times a videotape of two men said to be Mr. Khan and Mr. Kumar having a bite to eat at Nirula's. Their faces appeared to be very similar to those on their official identification cards, though the sight angles were different, making certainty elusive. There was also no date on the video. The last frames on the video show a man said to be Mr. Khan walking and stiffly climbing into a van. The Indian authorities said this showed him being handed over to people from Pakistan's High Commission here after he was questioned. India denies that Mr. Khan was tortured. The authorities here say they strongly suspect that he may have been passing on information about Parliament that was used by the suicide squad on Dec. 13. Home Minister L. K. Advani today called the case against Mr. Khan and Mr. Kumar, the Indian Parliament staff member, a serious matter. Another Indian official involved in the investigation said: "What happened in Parliament needs much deeper investigation. Pakistan's terrorist groups are being provided information and targets by intelligence operatives working under cover in the Pakistan High Commission." Members of Mr. Khan's family, reached by phone today in the central Punjab town of Sargodha, were worried and proud, and they refused to discuss any details of his life. "This event is nothing personal," said his elder brother Raja Abdul Latif. "It is an event of national dimensions. Although we are saddened by the incident, we understand that he is doing a national duty. We would be happy even if our brother's life is sacrificed for the country." Kashmir Clashes Reported NEW DELHI, Tuesday, Dec. 25 (Reuters) India and Pakistan exchanged mortar and small-arms fire across their disputed border in Kashmir today, Indian officials said. The officials said that hundreds of frightened civilians had started leaving their homes in the area. There were no reports of casualties in the exchanges that ran through the night and were the latest sign of tension between the rivals after the Dec. 13 suicide attack on India's Parliament. India has blamed Pakistan and two Islamic groups for the attack. India says three border guards have been killed and half a dozen people injured on its side of the border in a week of cross-border exchanges. Pakistan says two civilians have been killed and four wounded on its side. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Fair use -- I'm a'thinkin' and a'wond'rin' and a'walkin' down the road... I once loved a woman, a child, I am told... I give her my heart, but she wanted my soul... but, don't think twice, it's alright. Bob Dylan ***************************************************************** 3 Radioactive Liquids Claimed in Afghanistan Tunnels Date: Tue, 25 Dec 2001 22:57:22 -0600 (CST) Radioactive Liquids Claimed in Afghanistan Tunnels Via NY Transfer News * All the News That Doesn't Fit [If these reports are accurate, and there are radioactive materials or other biochemical weapons stored in some of these caves and tunnels, the USA will just be creating its own "dirty bomb" by using hyperbaric explosives on the caves. Given their own lack of reliable intelligence and their gullibility toward Afghan warlords' false tales of al Qaeda/Taliban sightings, General Franks and his bosses had better start thinking at least once, if not twice, before deploying all their deadly toys.] URANIUM REPORTEDLY FOUND IN TUNNEL COMPLEX Commander Claims Troops Discovered Substance in Jars, Bottles USA Today - Dec 24, 2001 http://www.usatoday.com by Vivienne Walt KANDAHAR, Afghanistan, Dec 24 -- Bottles and drums of what may be radioactive liquids were found here in a large underground tunnel complex at what was once a military base controlled by Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda terrorist network, a local tribal commander said Sunday. In Washington, one U.S. official said some depleted uranium was found in Afghanistan recently, but that the material did not appear to be dangerous and that it isn't clear whether Sunday's claim involves the same discovery. Other high-ranking U.S. officials said Sunday that they knew of no discoveries of any radioactive materials anywhere in Afghanistan. Even so, the local commander's claim, which a U.S. official on the scene did not deny, renewed concerns that bin Laden may have been trying to make a "dirty" bomb that spreads radiation after being exploded. Haji Gullalai, interim intelligence chief for Kandahar province, says his troops uncovered the tunnels Dec. 5, discovered the suspicious substances -- stored in jars and bottles and placed in sealed boxes -- and then alerted U.S. forces. The tunnels are at the edge of an air base controlled by U.S. forces. The U.S. troops "told me, 'Remove your people from this place because this is very dangerous, it is uranium,' " Gullalai said. He said "engineers" arrived to test the contents wearing protective masks and gowns, and "foreign experts told me directly it was uranium." Marine Corps Capt. David Romley said Sunday in Kandahar that he "cannot deny" that uranium had been found at the airport, where he is stationed as a public information officer. "We are aware that there are CBR (chemical-biological-radioactive)-type environments in the region," he said. In other news: * Afghanistan's new government began the task of bringing peace, stability and progress to this country. Cabinet members met for the first time Sunday. "There are no areas in which Afghanistan will not require assistance," said Hamid Karzai, the new leader. It will take "billions of dollars to overcome the difficulties." Karzai took power Saturday. He and 29 members of an interim ruling council have six months to get the nation's recovery on track before ceding power to a two-year transition government. Sometime in 2004, elections and the drafting of a constitution are scheduled. Karzai pledged Sunday to continue to cooperate with the United States and other nations on finding and holding accountable terrorists and Taliban officials. "They will be taken to court, and they will be given justice wherever it is appropriate," Karzai said. * Pentagon officials said a vehicle convoy that U.S. jets attacked Thursday in eastern Afghanistan was carrying leaders of the Taliban and al-Qaeda. But Afghan officials said the passengers were Afghans heading to Karzai's inauguration. The United States was investigating reports that local warlords may have misled U.S. forces to draw fire on rivals, not al-Qaeda or Taliban fighters. The attack killed at least 50 people, local officials said. * The hunt for bin Laden, concentrated in the mountains of eastern Afghanistan, continued with no word on his whereabouts. Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf said Saturday that there is a "great possibility" bin Laden died in Afghanistan. "Maybe he is dead because of all the operations that have been conducted, the bombardment," he said. The Pentagon is sending 10 "thermobaric" bombs to Afghanistan for use against any remaining Taliban and al-Qaeda fighters still holed up in caves and tunnels. (c) Copyright 2001 USA TODAY ================================================================= NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us 339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org e-mail: nyt@blythe.org ================================================================= nytcov-12.25.01-08:30:13-7002 ***************************************************************** 4 Four Livermore researchers honored Lab physicists made fellows of American Physical Society By FROM STAFF REPORTS Tri-Valley Herald Wednesday, December 26, 2001 - -->Four Lawrence Livermore Laboratory physicists, with expertise ranging from dark matter to hot and dense plasmas, have been named fellows of the American Physical Society. The annual honor was awarded this year to 190 members of the international society, which has about 40,000 members. Honorary fellows for 2001 from Livermore Lab, named this month, include: Peter Beiersdorfer, recognized for his contributions to X-ray imaging techniques that can be applied to plasma and astrophysics research. Plasmas are hot, highly charged gases that are electrically neutral. Siegfried H. Glenzer, who developed a diagnostic technique useful for measuring the properties of high-temperature, confined plasmas in fusion research. Fusion is the energy that powers the sun and thermonuclear bomb explosions. David H. Munro, for work in developing experiments for frozen radioactive fuel capsules that could be used in laser-based fusion research. Karl Albert van Bibber, who played a key role in an ultra-sensitive search for theoretical, smaller-than-atoms particles called axions, which could shed light on matter in the universe that our eyes cannot see. The society also named six fellows this year at Los Alamos Laboratory, a counterpart nuclear weapons research laboratory to Livermore Lab. Both labs, along with Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, are managed by the University of California for the federal Energy Department. Six Berkeley Lab researchers and one UC-Berkeley physicist were also named as fellows. The Berkeley Lab fellows include: Ali Belkacem, Ashok J. Gadgil, Carl Haber, Wim Pieter Leemans, Natalie Ann Roe and Howard Henry Wieman. The UC-Berkeley fellow is Edgar Knobloch. Last year, the society named three fellows at Livermore Lab. ©1999-2001 by MediaNews Group, Inc. and ANG ***************************************************************** 5 Rumors of lab closures do not include ORNL KnoxNews: Sci/tech By Frank Munger News-Sentinel senior writer Al Trivelpiece, during his years as director of Oak Ridge National Laboratory, often preached that people shouldn't take ORNL and other research institutions for granted. As part of that sermon, Trivelpiece would pose this question: If ORNL didn't exist today, how much would the state of Tennessee be willing to ante up to acquire it? The implication, of course, was that a prestigious national laboratory, with its thousands of employees and thousands of visitors and with a budget that annually exceeds half a billion dollars, is surely worth more than one of those car factories which states are constantly chasing after and tossing around millions of dollars in tax breaks and other incentives. In other words, science labs are important and should be savored and protected and maybe even pampered a bit. Trivelpiece told anyone who would listen that the future of the national labs, including ORNL, isn't guaranteed or necessarily secure. He cited periodic budget campaigns in Washington in which some rabble-rousing Congressmen -- usually those without a lab in their state (and certainly not in their district) -- would propose shutting down federal facilities as a cost-cutting measure. Another one of those campaigns appears to be taking place now, with attempts to add Department of Energy facilities to base closure legislation and persistent reports that the Bush administration may actually seek to close 10 or more labs. John Marburger, President Bush's science advisor, was asked about the lab-closure issue during his visit to Oak Ridge last week, and he danced around it pretty well. At a breakfast meeting of the East Tennessee Economic Council, Marburger suggested the latest reports are not so different from rumors that have circulated many times before. Interestingly, Trivelpiece was in the audience that morning, looking fit and happy, but, no, he wasn't the one asking the question. Marburger told the crowd that the Department of Energy probably has more labs than they're aware of and acknowledged there's a possibility that some of the smaller ones could be closed or consolidated. But he also offered the kind of definitive statement the local folks most wanted to hear regarding any closure plan: "It certainly isn't going to apply to Oak Ridge National Laboratory." After the meeting, I talked with Marburger for a few minutes and, among other things, asked him what he thought was the biggest challenge facing ORNL and the other national labs. He is a former director of Brookhaven National Laboratory in New York and certainly knows the research battleground in the United States. "To tell you the truth, the biggest challenge facing the national laboratories is public education," he said. "People don't really understand how science works and the role that national labs play in it. Ultimately, the national labs have to have public understanding in order to get public funding. "The Department of Energy itself needs help to get the message out about what these labs actually do, and what they do is provide the infrastructure for science. When you read about science and see pictures and everything of protein structures and about all sorts of spectacular particle collisions -- that's the end product. But people don't realize you don't get that product without having these big technical capabilities that are in the national laboratories. "You have people literally coming from all over the world to use the facilities in Oak Ridge, and when those people go back and publish their papers, they don't always talk about Oak Ridge. They talk about the work that they were able to do there, and that's what people see. They see the front end. "But the national labs are part of the nation's science infrastructure, and just as with any infrastructure, it's hard to get money to fix your roof or fix the foundation of your house. We need to make sure that the public understands enough about science so that they're willing to support the infrastructure to keep it going." Part of his job, Marburger said, is to explain these issues to Congress and various agencies that rely on the government's national laboratories to support their work. He also said he thought it was the responsibility of journalists reporting on science and technologies to put that information in front of the public. I guess that's what I just did. Merry Christmas. Copyright 2001 The Knoxville News-Sentinel Co. ***************************************************************** 6 Kazakhstan: Experts Report Progress On Safeguarding Nuclear Site By Nikola Krastev The U.S. Department of Energy is reporting progress in its efforts to provide for the safe shutdown of the BN-350 nuclear breeder reactor in Aktau, Kazakhstan. At a time of heightened concern over the proliferation of nuclear materials, experts say the U.S.-led program is on track to eliminate a major source of weapons-grade plutonium production, while at the same time avoiding any possible environmental incident on the eastern shores of the Caspian Sea. New York, 11 December 2001 (RFE/RL) -- The BN-350 fast-breeder reactor in Aktau, in western Kazakhstan, was commissioned in 1972 for the dual purpose of producing plutonium for the Soviet nuclear arsenal and providing electricity, heating, and water desalination. After a 1998 report from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) criticized safety at the reactor, Kazakhstan announced it would shut down the plant and secure it. It requested technical and financial assistance from the United States, which earlier in the 1990s removed a large quantity of weapons-grade uranium from another site in the country. The U.S. State and Energy departments in May 1999 initiated a project to provide assistance to Kazakhstan. This past summer, U.S. and Kazakh officials marked the completion of one phase of the project -- packaging spent fuel from the reactor. An international team of technicians placed the last of 478 canisters of spent fuel in the BN-350 water storage pool under the seal of the IAEA, completing one of the largest such efforts ever undertaken. Other key accomplishments recently announced include the installation of extensive fire-safety equipment, the design and fabrication of "cesium traps" to decontaminate the reactor's radioactive sodium coolant, and the start of procedures for sodium coolant draining and processing. Douglas Newton, the project's manager, recently discussed the program at New York's Columbia University. Speaking later to RFE/RL, he praised the cooperation of the Kazakh government: "I don't think we can ask for very much more in terms of cooperation at a national level. On the individual day-to-day basis, the people at the Nuclear Technology Safety Center have been absolutely invaluable in organizing the various Kazakhstan organizations that have worked with us." The U.S. concerns about these kinds of old-fashioned nuclear reactors are as much about safety as they are about the ability of these reactors to produce weapons-grade plutonium. During its lifetime, Newton said, Aktau's BN-350 has produced several tons of so-called "ivory-grade," premium plutonium. Paul Josephson is an associate professor of Soviet history at Colby College in Maine and has written a book on Russian nuclear programs. He tells RFE/RL that the BN-350 type of reactor was long ago abandoned in the United States: "Breeder reactors were abandoned under President Jimmy Carter in the late 1970s because he recognized that reactors that produce as part of their operation more plutonium than they start with contribute directly to proliferation. They make more plutonium available throughout the world. It's much easier to make a nuclear weapon out of plutonium than it is out of uranium." To make sure that Aktau's nuclear facility will never be able to restart plutonium production, the U.S. engineers have devised a plan that calls for "irreversible shutdown." Under this plan, the radioactive molten sodium coolant of the reactor will be gradually decontaminated (of Cesium-137) and then drained. Once the bulk sodium is drained, pockets will remain throughout the reactor's body. These pockets will be filled with an inert gas to corrode the steel and prevent the reactor from being used again. Newton tells RFE/RL that the U.S. Energy and State departments are discussing with Kazakh officials where to store the plutonium that has already been produced: "The Kazakhs have signaled their intention to store the fuel in northeastern Kazakhstan. But the [U.S.] State Department is still working with them in conjunction with the Department of Energy. And there are several options, and [there has been] a series of options studies. And, of course, our primary concern is the nuclear safety and security of the material that's coming out of the reactor." Professor Josephson, who has visited nuclear power plants in the former Soviet Union, tells RFE/RL that from a geographic and economic point of view, the best place to store the produced nuclear fuel would be in Russia: "Kazakhstan recognizes this, that it's best not to have any plutonium within your borders, but to have it somewhere where it can be safeguarded. And I would think that Russian facilities are the best place, given the geographic location and the long-term experience." The U.S. Department of Energy and other agencies have also been active in helping to secure Russian nuclear facilities but acknowledge there are still many sites that require safeguarding. One difficulty at a number of formerly secret sites is the unwillingness of Russian officials to give U.S. technicians access. But experts on nonproliferation issues say the experience in Kazakhstan has been very positive. Shutting down Aktau's BN-350 reactor has been a collaborative effort involving technical personnel and financing from the United States, Kazakhstan, the European Union, Japan, and Britain. The IAEA has been instrumental in organizing much of the international cooperative effort. Andrew Weiss is a fellow at the Council of Foreign Relations in New York and former director for Russian, Ukrainian, and Eurasian affairs at the U.S. National Security Council. He tells RFE/RL that the Aktau shutdown project could serve as a model for international cooperation on nonproliferation issues: "The work at Aktau, I think, is just an illustration of the kind of cooperation that's developed. We've seen even in more sensitive circumstances -- like Operation Sapphire, where the United States helped secretly airlift a load of very sensitive material out of Kazakhstan -- that they are willing to do the right thing. I think that this kind of cooperation is something that's going to be enduring and hopefully continuing into the future." Operation Sapphire involved the removal of 600 kilograms of weapons-grade uranium from Kazakhstan in 1994. Aside from collaborating on improving its nuclear facilities, Kazakhstan has also turned over all of its nuclear weapons. Since declaring independence in 1991, Kazakhstan has returned to Russia all 1,410 nuclear warheads stored on its territory and closed the Semipalatinsk nuclear test site, where 456 tests had been performed in the previous four decades. © 1995-2001 Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, Inc., All Rights Reserved. http://www.rferl.org ***************************************************************** 7 Groups Slam Russian Treason Verdict Las Vegas SUN December 25, 2001 VLADIVOSTOK, Russia- Human rights groups called the conviction of a military journalist for espionage the latest in a series of blows to free expression by Russia's security services. Grigory Pasko, who reported on alleged environmental abuses by the Russian navy, was sentenced Tuesday by a military court here to four years in a maximum-security prison for treason. "The country still does not fully understand what road the FSB is taking it down," a letter by the Moscow Helsinki Group said, referring to the Federal Security Service, the successor to the Soviet KGB. Signers of the letter included well-known activist Yelena Bonner. Pasko had initially been accused of divulging state secrets on the combat-readiness of Russia's Pacific Fleet to Japanese media. But the court found him guilty of attending a secret meeting of commanders of the Russian Pacific Fleet in 1997 to discuss the results of tactical naval maneuvers, and of possessing notes that he made there. "The essence of the sentence is absolutely incomprehensible to me, Pasko told the court. The case is one of several in past years against whistle-blowers for allegedly revealing secret information. Pasko says he was prosecuted because of his reports of alleged abuses by the navy, including claims it dumped radioactive waste into the Sea of Japan. The Norwegian environmental group Bellona supported Paskso and said the verdict "means that Russia is becoming less open on environmental issues." William F. Schultz, director of Amnesty International USA, said in Washington that Pasko's prosecution "has been a window into a justice system that continues to operate in secrecy and in the service of political masters rather than the law." U.S. Consul General James Shoemaker observed the proceedings in what he called "a case for human rights." He called the verdict "a bit unexpected." Pasko was arrested in 1997 and acquitted two years later of treason charges, but found guilty of abuse of office. Pasko appealed the verdict seeking a full acquittal. Russia's Supreme Court sent the case back to trial with a different judge. All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 8 Amnesty International Statement on Verdict in Pasko Case in Russian Federation U.S. Newswire 25 Dec 10:13 To: National and International desks Contact: Karen Schneider of Amnesty International USA, 301-537-6619 (mobile) WASHINGTON, Dec. 25 /U.S. Newswire / -- Following is a statement by William F. Schulz, executive director, Amnesty International USA on the verdict in the Grigory Pasko case in the Russian Federation: "Today's verdict in the re-trial of Grigory Pasko is a grave blow to human rights in the Russian Federation. Amnesty International considers Pasko to be a prisoner of conscience and will continue to press for his release and full acquittal on all charges. "By reporting on the Russian navy's illegal dumping of nuclear waste off the coast of Vladivostok and informing the public about the dangers of such acts to human life and health, Grigory Pasko was exercising his right to freedom of expression and acting in full compliance with Russian law. His prosecution, recalling cases of repression of free speech in the former Soviet Union, has been a window into a justice system that continues to operate in secrecy and in the service of political masters rather than the law." Copyright 2001, U.S. Newswire ***************************************************************** 9 Jail for nuclear whistleblower Guardian Unlimited | The Guardian | Ian Traynor in Moscow Thursday December 27, 2001 The Guardian [http://www.guardian.co.uk] A Russian journalist who exposed the Russian navy's practice of dumping nuclear waste and toxic armaments in the Pacific has been convicted of treason and sentenced to four years in jail. Grigory Pasko, 39, a naval captain and military journalists, has appealed against the sentence passed by a closed court in the far eastern port of Vladivostok on Christmas Day. He was also stripped of his rank after being found guilty of "intending" to pass state secrets to the Japanese media. But the case, which has been going on for four years, seems to be riddled with inconsistencies. The minimum sentence for the offence is 12 years, the judges dismissed nine of the 10 charges against him, and he had already been cleared of treason and espionage charges two years ago. On that occasion he was found guilty on the lesser charges of abuse of office and he appealed, triggering the retrial at which, rather than being found guilty of passing state secrets to a foreign power, as first alleged, he was judged to have "intended" to pass on the information. It was alleged that an incriminating document was found in his flat. Pasko has always maintained his innocence and he was tried a second time because he refused to accept the lesser offences, for which he received an amnesty. He is threatening to take the case to the European court of human rights. Pasko spent 20 months in prison awaiting the earlier trial, so he is expected to serve just over two years of the sentence. In recent months President Vladimir Putin has made much of seeking to promote the development of a civil society in Russia and Pasko was a prominent participant in a Kremlin-sponsored "civic forum" last month. International watchdogs denounced the trial and the sentence, and the verdict was much criticised in Russia. Moscow environmentalists announced public demonstrations in the the new year. The business newspaper Vedomosti called on Mr Putin to intervene to uphold the freedom of the press. Political allies of the president described the case as flimsy, but the FSB, the internal security service, voiced its satisfaction. "Pasko gathered information under orders from foreigners," a spokesman, Alexander Zdanovich, said. The Pasko case is one of several currently being brought against journalists and academics accused of passing state secrets to foreign powers. They have alarmed civil rights activists, who accuse Mr Putin's government of fostering an atmosphere of national "spymania". [UP] Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2001 ***************************************************************** 10 URANIUM IS CLUE TO NUKE BID NYPOST.COM World News: December 26, 2001 KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - Hundreds of bottles containing depleted uranium were found by anti-Taliban fighters in an area formerly controlled by the al Qaeda - raising the specter that Osama bin Laden was trying to build a "dirty" bomb. The containers of radioactive material were discovered in sealed boxes in a huge tunnel complex in Kandahar, one of the last strongholds of Afghanistan's former hard-line ruling militia. A tribal chieftain, Haji Gullalai, said that after finding the cache earlier this month, he showed the bottles and drums to U.S. officials and was then warned to keep away from the site. "Remove your people from this place because this is very dangerous. It is uranium," he quoted an American military officer as telling him. U.S. officials doubt al Qaeda has the expertise to develop a thermonuclear device. But the discovery of uranium indicates bin Laden may have been trying to build a "dirty" bomb - one capable of spreading radiation over a large area without triggering a nuclear reaction. Post Wire Services NEW YORK POST is a registered trademark of NYP ***************************************************************** 11 HAPPY NUKE GEAR (UGH) NYPOST.COM Regional News: By PHILIP MESSING December 27, 2001 Cops patrolling Times Square on Year's Eve will be armed with high-tech sensors to protect revelers against the possibility of nuclear terrorism, The Post has learned. A "substantial number" of lawmen on duty will be using "personal radiation detectors" on loan from the U.S. Customs Service. The device, which is slightly larger than a pack of cigarettes, is capable of alerting the user to radioactivity nearby, providing greater protection for the expected 1 million New Year's Eve revelers who will watch the ball drop in Times Square. Inspector Christopher Rising, an NYPD spokesman, declined to say how many members of the force would be provided with the gadgets, which are triggered by extremely low levels of gamma rays and X-rays. "Our responsibility is to keep everyone safe. New York City post-Sept. 11, as well as the rest of the country, posts new challenges, and the NYPD is continuing to do everything it can to keep New York City the safest large city in America," said Rising. The black gadget, which weighs 6 ounces, measures 4.1 inches high, 2.4 inches wide and 0.9 inches thick, and is carried in a Velcro belt holster. It is powered by two AA alkaline batteries and costs $1,400. If it detects radiation, the device vibrates, sounds a tone and displays flashing yellow lights. Rising said the plan to use the device in Times Square is strictly "precautionary" and not based on a specific threat. "Customs has been using them for a while to test shipments. They're not designed to give a pinpoint reading - they're designed to tell you where you're safe to be," he explained. A spokesman for Sensor Technology Engineering Inc., of Santa Barbara, Calif., the company that makes the tool, would not provide basic production information, insisting it was designed solely for "governments, countries, municipalities and security concerns." "If you're not one of those, you have no purpose purchasing it," said he spokesman, who declined to give his name. "It's a very, very sensitive device. "If they come into anything that emits radiation, it will sound an alarm and tell someone they need to investigate further." Sources said the NYPD has used the device before, although details were not immediately available. It also has proved effective elsewhere in the war against terrorism. John A. Gordon, undersecretary of the U.S. Department of Energy, told the Senate Appropriations Committee on May 9 that a year earlier, Uzbekistan customs officers using a similar detector seized 10 containers of highly radioactive material that were suspected of being intended for use in a "radiation-dispersal bomb." U.S. Customs spokesman James Michie had no details about that incident, but said his agency had "trained border guards from approximately 20 countries on how to look for radioactive materials that could possibly be used to construct weapons of mass destruction, and these countries include some of the former Soviet Republic." NEW YORK POST is a registered trademark of NYP Holdings, Inc. NYPOST.COM, ***************************************************************** 12 Germany to raze 939-bedroom Cold War bunker December 24, 2001 Tony Paterson The Sunday Telegraph BERLIN - The German government has decided to demolish Europe's largest underground nuclear shelter, consigning 939 bedrooms, 897 offices and 20 kilometres of tunnels. The gigantic Marienthal bunker was constructed after the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis brought the world to the edge of a nuclear catastrophe. The intention to save the lives of up to 3,000 Bonn politicians, military personnel and senior officials was revealed only four years ago. Berlin gave the final approval to destroy the shelter, the largest outside the United States, after a three-month delay caused by parliamentary deputies worried by the "changed security situation'' after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the United States. "However we concluded that there was little point in holding on to a bunker that is meant to shelter top government officials hundreds of kilometres away from a government now located in Berlin,'' a spokesman for the German Interior Ministry said. Demolition workers were last week ordered to resume work on destroying the bunker, more than 100 metres below a vineyard in the Ahr valley near Bonn. The complex was completed in 1972 and contained enough fuel and food to keep those inside alive for 30 days after a nuclear strike. Only designated key personnel would have been allowed to enter -- and would have to leave their families behind. The subterranean complex still contains its "operations room'' complete with pre-1989 wall maps showing the world divided into capitalist and communist camps. Orange magnetic sticker-pads lie beside the charts to denote the positions of first and retaliatory nuclear strikes. While the German president and chancellor were given their own small suites, albeit hardly large enough to fit a bed, the other personnel were expected to sleep on bunks, four to a room. Only the president had the luxury of a bath. Paintings of mountain and seaside views intended to lift the spirits of the incarcerated survivors still hung on the walls of the "cells'' last week. The 100,000 ration packs containing such items as dried pork joints with a 25-year shelf-life that would have kept them all alive have been returned to the army, while medical equipment from the bunker's three operating theatres has been delivered to NATO forces in Kosovo. The 3,000 bunk beds have been bought by Cuba. The cost of decommissioning the complex -- $46 million -- and turning the site back to nature, was cheaper than keeping it open, a government official said. Copyright © 2001 National Post Online | Privacy Policy | ***************************************************************** 13 ENERGY EMPLOYEES WORKER COMPENSATION PROGRAM EXPANDED December 13, 2001 WASHINGTON – The house of Representatives today passed legislation that will strengthen the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act (EEOICPA), which began compensating sick workers earlier this year. "The initial compensation program that we established was a critical first step by the federal government to help workers who sacrificed their health in service to their country," Strickland said. "However, this new language clarifies certain ambiguities in the initial program, and goes a step further in expanding eligibility to employees and family members who were intended to receive this compensation, but due to drafted guidelines, were not." Signed into law in December, 2000, the EEOICPA was developed by Congressman Strickland, Senator Voinovich, and other supporters in the House and Senate after the Department of Energy (DOE) accepted responsibility for exposing thousands of workers to radioactive materials. The Piketon uranium enrichment plant, formerly operated by DOE, is one of the sites that employed exposed workers. The program provides medical benefits to affected workers, as well as a $150,000 lump sum compensation payment. In August, the Labor Department (DOL), who administers the program, began issuing checks to qualified individuals. However, benefits were denied to some applicants because of DOL’s interpretation of the law. "Unfortunately, as the Administration drafted rules to implement the program, we were informed of unintended consequences in the statutory language that would make some survivors ineligible for the program," Strickland added. "Despite the obvious intent of Congress to include these survivors, it was necessary to legislate this clarification." In a letter sent to Conferees in October, Strickland and other House members asked House negotiators to keep language added to the Defense Authorization bill by the Senate. That language will, among other things, specify that leukemia will be covered without regard to age of occupational exposure to radiation, and adjust the definition of a "survivor" for uranium miners and energy workers to eliminate a requirement that survivors must have been under the age of 18 when the covered worker died. Prior to this bill, workers were only eligible for compensation if they had been exposed to leukemia after the age of 20. Also, surviving children were not eligible for benefits if they were not younger than 18 when their parent died. "As the Administration continues to draft rules for programs like this, Congress must remain vigilant in its oversight role of the Departments," said Strickland. "I am extremely pleased that the Conferees agreed that the rules were flawed and maintained these adjustments so that the final program will resemble what Congress originally envisioned." ***************************************************************** 14 INEL: Governor must stop lying to us The Times-News Online -- Twin Falls, Idaho Thursday, December 27, 2001 Twin Falls, Idaho The pit's about to hit the fan, Pit 9 plutonium that is. As reported by The Times-News Dec. 14 the Department of Energy is refusing to dig up the buried plutonium. The DOE calmly states that the buried waste is not covered by the "Get the Waste Out" deal. The DOE would like up to 14 years to think about just covering the waste with more dirt. While the governor does his trusty fist-shaking routine, he is quite aware that he lied to the people of Idaho. Kempthorne knows that any penalty he assesses will simply come from the shortchanged cleanup fund itself. Kempthorne also knows that, in 1997, the DOE decided to leave all the buried plutonium in Idaho, in their Record of Decision for the New Mexico dump. The state had meekly protested that decision but now refuses to challenge it in court. That is because the state knows those are the terms of the deal, despite their lying to Idaho about getting the waste out. It is still possible to stop this insanity, but first the governor must stop lying to Idahoans. This guy gave them a permit to open a new plutonium dump over our water. Do you understand this? Look past the smile. As the song goes, "You've been hit by a smooth criminal." While the governor continues using our taxes to promote himself as the friendly "Buy Idaho" guy, too bad he has already "sold Idaho" as a nuclear sacrifice zone. DR. PETER RICKARDS Twin Falls Copyright © 2001, Magic Valley Newspapers ***************************************************************** 15 Janet Michel: Sick workers deserve better Oak Ridger Online --> Story last updated at 1:18 p.m. on Thursday, December 27, 2001 It is truly wonderful to see the outpouring of sympathy, prayers, support and the congressional rush to compensate the families of the victims and survivors or the terrorist attacks of September 11. Even here in Knoxville, the community has raised over $850,000 to buy a new fire truck for New York City. Meanwhile, tens of thousands of sick, disabled, and damaged workers and survivors of workers who worked at the Department of Energy sites still suffer, do not get adequate medical care or compensation or have any hope of ever getting any. All types of workers have been exposed to potentially thousands of toxic materials, including chemicals, metals, and radiation. What I absolutely cannot understand is why there is so much resistance to compensating these people. Perhaps it is my persistent naiveté and idealism, but I don't understand why the federal government and Congress are so hard on the nuclear workers, who also walked straight into the heart of danger daily, like firefighters although mostly unknowingly. What is even more outrageous is that the recent victims are receiving an average of $1.7 million as opposed to the insulting $150,000 that the DOE workers might receive. Are their lives and their pain and suffering less important? During Word War II, most of the nuclear workers would gladly have worked for their country even if they had been told of the hazards. During the Cold War, many still would have worked in these facilities in the name of patriotism. However, since the end of the Cold War, many more have been made sick and are being exposed today. But the fact remains as former Secretary Richardson said in April 2000 press conference; "We put people in harm's way. We did not protect them. And, we lied to them." This should also be stated in the present tense as many safety problems persist today. If these sites are not contaminated, then why are we spending billions to clean them up? Does it have something to do with our shame associated with the bomb? Or our shame that we allowed these workers to be exposed without informing them and giving them the right to choose? Or is it our shame at deliberately ignoring the medical evidence? Or our shame at denying medical cares because it might show the connections to the workplace? I do know that it is shameful that our country continues to give lip service to compensating the nuclear workers, while everyone rushes to help those September 11 victims. Lest I be criticized, I strongly proclaim that I fully support the efforts to help the 9/11 victims. However, I think our country should move immediately to right the wrongs of the past 58 years. The compensation act passed in 2000 will likely only compensate fewer than 3 percent of the affected population. Even those who were "clear-cut" cases in the eyes of Congress and the media are now having tremendous difficulties. The glorious headlines of fall 2000 about the incredible new compensation were huge exaggerations. But the headlines had the public convinced that everyone would be taken care of. It is a significant piece of legislation with an admission of wrongdoing, direct (or non-discretionary) funding, and more important -- compensation. Attempts to compensate those harmed at the ultra-hazardous DOE sites have a history of over 50 years. And it has taken this long for our government to begin to address this tragedy. There are hundreds, maybe even thousands times more people affected than those victimized by the terrorists. Numbers aside, it is outrageous that our own government knew what they were doing and continued to injure us. The main difference between the 9/11 victims and us is that no buildings collapsed; there were no fireballs; and this is not as "attractive" to the media. We need the nation's support too. Please call your congressional delegation and demand just compensation for all of those harmed. Janet Michel is a resident of Knoxville All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 16 Energy Department Extends for Five Years Contract for Operation of Fermilab House Speaker Hastert Attends Signing Ceremony; Praises DOE's Efforts energy.gov - Headquarters' Press Release RELEASE DATE: December 27, 2001 [Print Friendly Version] BATAVIA, ILL. -- At a signing ceremony today attended by the Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert, the Department of Energy (DOE) extended for five years its contract with Universities Research Association, Inc. (URA), to manage and operate the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory. The new agreement is estimated to have a value of about $1.5 billion over the term of the agreement, depending on future funding levels. Currently funded at approximately $307 million for fiscal year 2002, Fermilab employs more than 2100 staff on a 6800-acre site 35 miles west of Chicago, Ill. "Fermilab's unique facilities and discoveries have helped establish our nation's international leadership in high energy physics," Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham said, announcing the extension. "This scientific leadership enhances our national security by laying the foundation for our understanding of nature and the possible development of future technologies undreamed of today." The Universities Research Association, which operates Fermilab for DOE, is made up of 89 member universities, many of whom also participate in the collaborations carrying out research using the laboratory's particle accelerators and detectors. In all, more than 200 universities and other institutions in this nation and abroad participate in Fermilab experimental programs. About a third of the 2300 scientists using these facilities are from foreign countries. Speaker Hastert, whose congressional district includes Fermilab, said, "This new contract illustrates our nation's continuing commitment to leadership in science. There is no finer example of this than Fermilab. I would like to congratulate the U.S. Department of Energy and the Universities Research Association for continuing an effective partnership that produces world-class science, contributes to our international leadership, and lays the foundation for future technology and economic progress." "This new contract continues our efforts to more fully utilize performance management principles in the management and oversight of our laboratories," DOE Chicago Operations Office Manager Marvin E. Gunn, Jr. said. "DOE and its contractors must work in effective partnership, using best management practices, to assure that these world-class research facilities fulfill their potential for producing great science and discovery." Gunn and URA President Frederick Bernthal signed the new contract in a ceremony at the laboratory. The DOE Chicago Operations Office negotiated the new agreement and provides on-site administration of the contract with URA for management and operation of Fermilab through its Fermi Area Office. Fermilab's Tevatron, recently upgraded with a more powerful new Main Injector, is currently the world's highest energy colliding beam accelerator. With its newly upgraded detectors, the Collider Detector at Fermilab (CDF) and DZero, Fermilab is currently the world's leading high energy physics laboratory in the search for new particles and phenomena. Such discoveries could reveal hidden dimensions of space and time or confirm the existence of the proposed Higgs boson, and point the way to realizing Einstein's dream of a unified "theory of everything." The Neutrinos at the Main Injector (NuMI) project and associated facilities are currently under construction at Fermilab. NuMI will open up a new chapter in high energy physics research when beams of neutrinos are directed through the earth from the laboratory in Illinois to detectors being constructed in a cavern in an iron mine in Sudan, Minnesota. Very recent experiments suggest that neutrinos may have a small amount of mass. The new NuMI facility will examine the question of neutrino mass and help answer many puzzling questions in both high energy physics and astrophysics. Fermilab is also responsible for managing and coordinating U.S. laboratory and university efforts to develop magnets and detectors for the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), a large colliding beam accelerator being built at the CERN Laboratory in Europe. When completed in 2006, the LHC will become the prime focus of international high energy physics. Fermilab and other U.S. laboratories and universities will be active participants in the research programs there. The massive amount of data produced by Fermilab's new accelerators and detectors presents unique challenges to the computer systems used by scientists to record and analyze the events detected. In the on-going Collider Run II, Fermilab's detectors produce 20 megabytes of data per second that must be managed, evaluated and stored for later detailed analysis. Over a year, these experiments generate enough data to fill the hard drives of 80,000 top-line home computers. This is 10 to 20 times the data produced before Fermilab accelerators and detectors were upgraded. Data management needs of future facilities, such as the LHC at CERN, will require at least 10 times greater computer data management capabilities. Fermilab data processing needs for current and future research are driving development of new, cutting edge computer technologies, which are of great potential interest in other fields of study and to private industry. Media Contact: Gary Pitchford, 630/252-2013 Jeff Sherwood, 202/586-5806 Release No. PR-01-217 ***************************************************************** 17 Weapons of mass destruction: going nuclear in Iraq Jordan Times (The Region Section) By Ramzi Kysia BAGHDAD — Dr Alim Abdul-Hamid's office at Al Mustanseriya Medical College in Baghdad is decorated in bright, cheerful colours, but what he has to say is anything but cheerful. Formerly Dean of Basra Medical College, Abdul-Hamid has had plenty of first-hand experience with Iraq's unprecedented plague of cancers and birth defects. “We have seen cases of breast cancer among women in their 20s. In their 20s!,” says Abdul-Hamid. “This is really tragic, because, you know, in America, probably when you come across a case of breast cancer in a woman in her late 30s, you would consider that this is a young age for cancer, while we see cases of breast cancer in the 20s. There are increased incidences of colon cancer, thyroid cancer, in addition to, of course, leukaemias and lymphomas.” What's the source of this epidemic? According to Abdul-Hamid the problem is depleted uranium. Depleted uranium, or “DU”, is an extremely dense, heavy metal, and a waste product of atomic bomb production. It has a half-life of over 4 billion years. It contains trace amounts of plutonium and is 60 per cent as radioactive as naturally occurring uranium. The US military uses it as ballast in their missiles, and they use it to coat shells and pellets. Because of its density, it is armour piercing — so it is used as an anti-tank weapon. DU is also aerosolising. When a shell coated with DU hits, it burns, releasing uranium oxide dust. This dust then rises in the air, is carried by the winds, and contaminates the entire surrounding environment. The Pentagon admits to dropping 320 tonnes of DU in Iraq. The environmental organisation Greenpeace puts the estimate at over 800 tonnes. Hospitals throughout Iraq have reported as much as a 10-fold increase in overall cancer rates and birth defects over the last 11 years. Abdul-Hamid points to an epidemiological study he headed in Basra, demonstrating the connection between DU and cancer in Iraq. The study looked at five factors: biological plausibility, strength of association, incidence rate, increased incidences of cancer among younger children, and the dose-response relationship. According to Abdul-Hamid, all these factors point to a strong, casual link between DU exposure and cancer in Iraq. To test the biological plausibility of their hypothesis, the team of scientists studied the types of cancer being reported, most notably leukaemias, and explored their relationship to DU. The results strongly indicate a radioactive, rather than chemical, contaminant. Explains Abdul-Hamid: “Leukaemia is known to be related to radiation. We don't have evidence that leukaemia is related to chemicals.” Additionally, if the source of the epidemic were chemical, there would have been a sharp spike in cancer rates following the Gulf war, followed by rapid decreases as the source of the contamination disappeared. In contrast, with radiation the strength of association increases as time passes. The fact that cancer rates are still increasing at an exponential rate in Iraq strongly implies a radioactive source. This increase is enormous. According to the study, malignancies and leukaemias among children under the age of 15 have more than tripled since 1990. Whereas in 1990 young children accounted for only 13 per cent of cancer cases, today over 56 per cent of all cancer in Iraq occurs among children under the age of 5. Abdul-Hamid explains that it isn't just direct exposure of the children to the radiation still present in the environment; it's also the cumulative exposure of their parents over time. This cumulative exposure does permanent damage to parental genes, damage which is then passed on to their children. Finally, pointing to a map of Basra, Abdul-Hamid highlights the dose-response relationship between DU and cancers. “If we look at the map of Basra, southern Iraq, and monitor the incidences in different districts over time, we can come out with a very important conclusion. And that is that areas which have got the higher level of background radiation have higher levels of cancers.” These factors overwhelmingly point to DU as the source of Iraq's current cancer plague. Iraqi doctors aren't the only ones complaining about DU. US veterans are upset as well. DU may be a leading cause of the unprecedented levels of illnesses effecting Gulf war veterans. “The Pentagon claims that there are no significant health effects from exposure to depleted uranium, but their own research and documents show that this is not true,” says Charles Sheehan-Miles, a Gulf war veteran and former president of the National Gulf War Resource Centre. Almost 25 per cent of US soldiers who fought in the Gulf war are currently receiving disability benefits from the US Veteran's Administration. This is twice the rate of disabilities as among Vietnam veterans. Unfortunately, DU remains an integral part of the American military arsenal. According to Sheehan-Miles, “Depleted uranium, like landmines and cluster bombs, is a weapon with effects far beyond the battlefield, with innocents and children as the frequent victims. I resent this. As a former American soldier, I was trained to protect the innocent, not to kill them.” As the United States gears up for a new “Desert Storm” against Iraq, using weapons like DU, that is a lesson that more American soldiers, and the politicians who command them, should be reminded of. The writer is a Muslim-American peace activist, and serves on the board of directors for the Education for Peace in Iraq Centre (www.saveageneration.org). He is currently in Iraq as part of a Voices in the Wilderness (www.vitw.org) peace delegation trying to end the war . He contributed this article to The Jordan Times. ***************************************************************** 18 Scientists worry about radiation from Cold War tests 12/27/01 Augusta Georgia: Technology: Web posted Thursday, December 27, 2001 By David Perlman Scripps Howard News Service A 30-year-old legacy from the Cold War has surfaced on a remote Alaskan island, where scientists and Aleutian natives are concerned that radiation from the largest nuclear weapons blast ever conducted in America could now be leaking into the marine environment. At 11 a.m. on Nov. 6, 1971, weapons specialists from the Atomic Energy Commission exploded a 5-megaton bomb - a prototype for a ballistic missile warhead - inside a mile-deep shaft drilled beneath Amchitka Island 870 miles from Petropavlovsk, Russia's Siberian naval base. The thermonuclear blast was almost 400 times more powerful than the weapon that destroyed Hiroshima. Code-named "Cannikin," the weapon shattered the shaft's walls and blasted a huge cavern lined with glass-like molten rock. It triggered a rockfall of jagged boulders from a nearby cliff, created a mile-wide crater atop ground zero that filled with water now known as Cannikin Lake, uplifted a mile of the nearby ground by 20 feet, and vented groundwater through cracks and old seismic faults throughout the site. The blast was felt throughout Alaska, and it registered as a magnitude-7 earthquake recorded by seismographs around the world. At the recent American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco, John C. Eichelberger of the University of Alaska Geophysical Institute and his colleagues reported evidence that tectonic forces moving deep beneath the seabed have been splitting Amchitka apart and creating fresh underground fissures in the island's rocky coast. They voiced their growing concern that for 22 years neither the Energy Department nor any other government agency has monitored Amchitka's coast or its nearby waters to learn whether radioactive elements might be leaking from the island into the marine environment. Thirty years ago, the phenomenon known as plate tectonics was virtually unknown, so scientists didn't realize that a vast slab of the Earth's crust called the Pacific plate has been diving ponderously down beneath North America's continental plate for millions upon millions of years, Eichelberger said. Recent geophysical evidence shows that along the Aleutian island chain where Amchitka lies, the downward motion - called subduction - has shifted more into a westward-sliding motion of the Pacific Plate that has been tearing the chain apart at a rate of about 2 centimeters - more than three-quarters of an inch - a year. As a result, Eichelberger said, the Amchitka site "was - unknowingly at the time - like having a nuclear test site right next to the San Andreas fault." Because the island itself may be splitting in the inexorable grip of the tectonic forces, it's quite possible that new seismic faults and new fissures in Amchitka's rocks have opened up around the Cannikin blast site, allowing hazardous radioactive elements to escape into the sea around the island, Eichelberger said. Five years ago, Greenpeace, the environmental activist organization, tested the waters around the island and said it had found dangerous plutonium there, as well as americium, a nuclear fission byproduct. But they found no trace of tritium, the radioactive form of hydrogen, which is the telltale sign of a hydrogen bomb blast's residue, and Alaskan environmental watchdogs as well as the Department of Energy determined that the radioactive pollution came from fallout from Chinese nuclear weapons tests in the atmosphere. Energy Department experts have created computer models of the Cannikin blast's aftermath and have concluded that radioactive elements from the explosion are effectively contained within the cavity created by the test. But the Departments of Energy and Defense have never monitored the waters offshore from Amchitka, nor have they tested coastal rocks, kelp beds or marine animals for radiation. "Some computer models suggest that the Cannikin cavity could in fact leak," Eichelberger said in an interview. "So the questions remain: First, is there a significant risk, and second, if there is, what should we do about it?" David Smith, a nuclear chemist at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory who has followed up on the weapons test effects at the Nevada test site, agreed that the best science possible is essential to ascertain the status of Amchitka today. "Over the best 30 years," Eichelberger said, "the world of geophysics has been literally turned upside down. Our knowledge of plate tectonics has become solid, and our measurement techniques have vastly improved. This is not a call to arms. It is a call to thinking." Both the state of Alaska and Native organizations remain strongly concerned about the Defense Department's failure to conduct an on-site investigation of radiation in Amchitka's marine environment, according to Douglas H. Dasher, a specialist on radiation contaminants for the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation. "The DOE likes to make computer models, but what's really happening out there inside the fissures and faults on the island, no one knows," Dasher said in an interview. Native members of the Aleutian/Pribiloff Islands Association rely on the marine life of the islands for their living and have long called for on-site studies of the radiation issue at Amchitka. According to Dasher, commercial fishermen - including Americans, Japanese and Russians - work the waters of the Aleutian island chain. And the native peoples regularly use "subsistence foods" - the meat of stellar sea lions, harbor seals and ptarmigan, as well as fish - for a diet much healthier than the fast-food chains that are encroaching on their traditional lifestyle. "The DOE's models and risk assessments of the effects of Cannikin and the other two nuclear tests of 30 years ago say there's essentially no risk of radiation contamination," Dasher said. "But that doesn't provide much confidence for the native populations up there, and like them, we say, 'How do you really know?' We need actual hard facts, not just smoke and mirrors." 1996 - 2001 The Augusta Chronicle. ***************************************************************** 19 Vladivostok News :: Pasko, defense appeal in treason case December 27, 2001 By Anatoly Medetsky Pasko flashes a defiant smile as a police officer handcuffs him in the courtroom on Tuesday Military journalist Grigory Pasko, convicted for treason, and his defense filed two appeals against the verdict to the Military Collegium of the Russian Supreme Court, a defense lawyer said Wednesday. Pasko was sentenced on Tuesday to four years in a maximum-security prison and stripped of his military rank for possessing notes that he made at a secret naval meeting when illegally attending it. The court said he intended to pass the notes to Japanese news media, and divulging them could have harmed the battle readiness of the Pacific Fleet. Pasko said his prosecution was punishment for his reports on alleged environmental abuses by the navy, including dumping radioactive waste into the sea. Human rights groups called the conviction of a military journalist for espionage the latest in a series of blows to free expression by Russia's security services. ``The country still does not fully understand what road the FSB is taking it down,'' a letter by the Moscow Helsinki Group said, referring to the Federal Security Service, the successor to the Soviet KGB. Signers of the letter included well-known activist Yelena Bonner. Lawyer Ivan Pavlov said the defense filed its appeal on Wednesday. "We are asking (the appeals court in Moscow) to overturn the verdict and cease the criminal case," he said. Pasko filed a similar appeal, dictated to him in a prison cell by lawyers, on Tuesday shortly after the sentencing, Pavlov added. Pavlov said the defense team would file a more detailed appeal after it studies the 1,000-page files from the trial. He said the court would make the files available at the end of January. He said the appeals court in Moscow would set a date for reviewing the case based on that detailed appeal. Asked how Pasko feels, Pavlov said, "He hangs on." Pasko is reported to have asked his wife, Galina Morozova, to bring him pens and paper for writing. The case, one of several in past years against whistle-blowers for allegedly revealing secret information, also drew protests from public watchdogs other than Moscow Helsinki Group. The Norwegian environmental group Bellona supported Paskso and said the verdict ``means that Russia is becoming less open on environmental issues.'' William F. Schultz, director of Amnesty International USA, said in Washington that Pasko's prosecution ``has been a window into a justice system that continues to operate in secrecy and in the service of political masters rather than the law.'' Igor Dygalo, an aide to Russia's naval commander-in-chief, denied any ecological aspect to the case and said Pasko, was brought to trial as a military officer, not a journalist. Pasko served in the Pacific Fleet's newspaper Boyevaya Vakhta, or Military Watch, at the time when security agents brought treason charges against him. "Every naval serviceman is required to protect military and state secrets," Dygalo told a Kremlin-connected news web site www.strana.ru. "In this case, it is wrong to evaluate Grigory Pasko's actions as those of just a journalist. He is, first of all, ... a naval officer who took an oath of loyalty to his country." Pasko was arrested in 1997 and acquitted two years later of treason charges, but found guilty of abuse of office. Pasko appealed the verdict seeking a full acquittal, and so did prosecutors insisting he was a spy. Russia's Supreme Court sent the case back to trial with a different judge. Copyright c 2001 "Vladivostok Novosti" This material may not be ***************************************************************** 20 Uzbekistan to step up nuclear-material monitoring at customs posts BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Dec 26, 2001 The Uzbek Institute of Nuclear Physics is working on a US-funded project to prevent the smuggling of nuclear materials via Uzbekistan as part of the global anti-terrorism fight, Uzbek TV reported on 24 December. It said the institute's work to create locally produced nuclear radiation-detection monitors would allow all customs points in the country to be equipped with them "as early as next year". It also said that the institute's nuclear reactor was guarded effectively round-the-clock. The following is the text of the TV report. Subheads have been inserted editorially: [Announcer] At a time when the world community is uniting efforts in the fight against terrorism, a number of international projects are being implemented at the Institute of Nuclear Physics of the Academy of Science of Uzbekistan. European Union grants are being implemented at this major scientific and research centre of the region. Projects to prevent the smuggling of nuclear materials are among them. [Correspondent over video of people working at the reactor hall of the institute, equipment to detect radiation] Mankind has accumulated considerable experience of using the atom for peaceful purposes. It faces dilemmas: radiation safety, nuclear ecology, the storage of nuclear waste and the most dangerous is the possibility of nuclear terrorism by extremist organizations. Uzbekistan, which has its own nuclear reactor and which is an official member of the IAEA, strictly abides by its obligations on the peaceful use of the atom. The Institute of Nuclear Physics is an executor of international programmes which are being implemented both on the basis of its nuclear facility and with the use of the accelerators of the European Organization for Nuclear Research [CERN] in Geneva, Washington University, the TRIUMF [Tri-University Meson Facility, on the campus of the University of British Columbia, Vancouver)], scientific centres in France, Italy, Belgium and other countries. Uzbek nuclear scientists' close contacts with these centres are directed at supporting the treaty on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons, [the prevention of their] transit via territories signatory to the treaty and the consolidation of efforts in the fight against nuclear terrorism. Grants for developing major projects of scientific and technical significance and equipment received by Uzbek scientists bear witness to their high reputation. The project for the prevention of smuggling nuclear materials, which is being implemented jointly with Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory operated by the University of California, is a substantial one among seven prestigious grants operating this year. Locally-produced nuclear detection monitors for all customs posts [V. Petrenko, candidate of technical sciences, captioned] The danger of international terrorism, especially nuclear terrorism, is a global threat. We have received a US grant and are working on the project on preventing smuggling nuclear materials via Uzbekistan. To do this, we have set up radiation monitors which detect the trafficking of nuclear fission materials. [Correspondent] The Institute of Nuclear Physics' work to create locally produced radiation-detection monitors will allow all customs point to be equipped with these monitors as early as next year. This will also allow all possible ways of transit by any sort of transport to be cut off. The system for the physical protection of the nuclear reactor is operating efficiently in the institute. The reactor is monitored continuously around-the-clock. International experts, in particular, from the Sandia National Laboratories [in the USA] say that this work is exemplary on an international scale. The institute's modern technologies, both in fundamental and applied research, in particular its basic output - isotopes and preparations on the basis of this research which are used in many sectors of the national economy - will allow it [the institute] to reach international standards. Source: Uzbek Television first channel, Tashkent, in Russian 1430 gmt 24 Dec 01 /BBC Monitoring/ © BBC. World Reporter ***************************************************************** 21 Interest grows in nuclear, biological attack classes Journalstar.com: Local BY KEVIN ABOUREZK Lincoln Journal Star You've all heard the joke about what to do in case of a nuclear attack. But for Lancaster County emergency workers, the possibility of a nuclear attack has become all too real following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11. The attacks have sparked greater interest in a Lancaster County program that trains emergency responders in how to deal with weapons of mass destruction. "It seems to be a very popular program since Sept. 11," said County Commissioner Bob Workman. Maybe the only county in Nebraska to do so, Lancaster County has been conducting the Weapons of Mass Destruction Responder Awareness Training program since January, said Doug Ahlberg, director of the Lancaster County Emergency Management Agency. The Capitol City was one of 125 cities across the nation chosen in 1999 to receive money for weapons of mass destruction response training. Lancaster County officials used the $280,000 for training, sponsored by the U.S. departments of Defense and Justice, on responding to nuclear, biological and chemical warfare. The money also was used to buy biological monitoring equipment for local emergency and health department personnel. The Lancaster County Board recently allocated $2,500 for training manuals for the program. Ahlberg said county officials have been very receptive toward funding the program. While the program only trains individuals who respond to emergencies in Lancaster County, Ahlberg said, he would like to extend the program. He hopes to begin new training workshops, including a responder operational session to teach individuals how to test for nuclear, biological and chemical agents. He's also looking at developing a workshop for emergency room physicians, nurses and staff. "We want to extend to just about anyone who wants to participate," he said. The county held its first four-hour training session Nov. 28 in Bennet. Emergency personnel from Douglas, Palmyra and Lincoln attended the session, said Dave May, chief of the volunteer Bennet Fire and Rescue team. Even in a small town such as Bennet, emergency workers need to know how to respond to nuclear, biological and chemical weapons attacks, May said. "We don't ever think it can't happen here," he said. "Anything can happen anywhere." The county will conduct nine more sessions within the next three months, Ahlberg said. The Lancaster County Sheriff's Office will receive training in early January. Reach Kevin Abourezk at 473-7237 or kabourezk@journalstar.com. Copyright © 2001, Lincoln Journal Star. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only. For more information go to: *****************************************************************