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                         NUCLEAR POLICY
 
1 U.N. watchdog "deplores" N.Korea nuclear stance
2 *EDITORIAL: *Pakistan and nuclear proliferation
3 UK: Not bailed out but wiped out
4 British Energy's new lifeline
5 British Energy Seeks to Restructure
6 IAEA to Adopt Resolution on NK Nuclear Program   
7 Cameco settles dispute over financial exposure to British Energy 
8 China Favors Denuclearization of Korean Peninsula
9 Government survives no-confidence vote 
10 Look at Israel's nukes too says Goff
11 Japan EDITORIAL: Nuke power regulation
12 KEDO head confident North Korea will bend
13 IAEA Board of Governors Adopts Resolution on Safeguards in the 
14 U.S. Welcomes IAEA Resolution on North Korea Nuclear Program
15 US: Environmentalists target Bush administration 
 
                         NUCLEAR REACTORS
 
16 REGION: *India admits six ?minor? leaks in N plants
17 US: Nuclear plant fiascoes likely with age, secret study suggests 
18 Nuclear power company warns of Tokyo crisis  
19 Canada: Nuclear panel gives Bruce Power reprieve
20 Australia, Argentina nuclear treaty stalls. 
21 US: Regulators uphold safety risk ruling at Peach Bottom nuclear pla
22  
 
                          NUCLEAR SAFETY
 
23 Kiwi war vets set to join nuclear fallout class action 
24 India admits six nuclear leaks 
25 Nuclear Terrorism Focus Shifting to Research Facilities*
26 UK: Radioactive leak at Devonport
27 EU-Russia Committee discusses nuclear safety in Russia
28 Nuclear Heart Amputated From Typhoon
29 State Council Passes Draft Law on Prevention &Control of 
30 Legal aid on horizon for ex-servicemen who witnessed British H-bomb
 
                         NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE
 
31 US: Editorial: Investigate claims by Yucca employees
32 NORWEGIANS PROTEST AT PLANT - 
33 SELLAFIELD Decon 
34 SAFER SELLAFIELD PLANT 
35 Govt disappointed over Argentina's delay to process nuclear waste
36 Taiwan: *Gov't to set timetable to remove nuclear waste*
37 US: Congress Had Ups, Downs for the Utahns 
38 US: Experts: S.D. Quakes No Great Shakes 
 
                         NUCLEAR WEAPONS
 
39 "An eye for an eye ... "
40 US: NTS Editor's Note: The silence is deafening
41 Russian trapped in new spy war
42 Who's playing hide and seek?
 
                        US DEPT. OF ENERGY
 
43 9-11 forced OR radiation team to expand its mission
44 Center urges obtaining radiation drugs
 
                          OTHER NUCLEAR
 
45 The Incredible Mind of Einstein
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                         FULL NEWS STORIES
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 1 U.N. watchdog "deplores" N.Korea nuclear stance

By Louis Charbonneau

VIENNA (Reuters) - The United Nations' nuclear watchdog said on 
Friday it "deplored" North Korea's assertion it had a right to 
possess atomic weapons and called on Pyongyang to open its 
alleged weapons programme to inspections.

International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) head Mohamed ElBaradei 
told reporters the agency's board of governors said it "deplores 
North Korea's repeated public statements that it is entitled to 
possess nuclear weapons".

He said the board had called Pyongyang's stance a "violation of 
North Korea's international commitments" and demanded that it 
respond to ElBaradei's request for immediate senior-level 
discussion in Pyongyang or Vienna.

The board of governors, representing 35 of the agency's member 
states, also called on North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons 
programme, which ElBaradei said was a serious threat to global 
peace and security.

"I think the message is clear -- that North Korea should 
cooperate," ElBaradei said. "I hope that North Korea will see the 
merit of entering into a dialogue with the agency, which could be 
the beginning of a peaceful resolution of the issue."

In its unusually strong statement, the board urged North Korea to 
"open immediately all relevant facilities to IAEA inspections and 
safeguards".

The United States said North Korea had admitted to having a 
secret nuclear weapons programme during a visit to Pyongyang 
early last month by U.S. Assistant Secretary of State James 
Kelly.

Asked if continued non-compliance by North Korea could push the 
international community to get as tough with Pyongyang as it has 
been with Baghdad, which faces a U.S.-led military attack if it 
fails to comply with U.N. inspections, ElBaradei said:

"I don't think I'd like to speculate on that. But I think it has 
been made clear that this is a serious violation of their 
obligations and that at this stage the international community 
would like to see a solution through peaceful means."

The U.S. State Department welcomed the resolution.

"This resolution sends a clear, strong and unmistakable signal 
that the international community will not tolerate a North Korean 
nuclear weapons programme. North Korea must come into compliance 
with its obligations under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, 
including its safeguards agreement with the IAEA," said State 
Department spokesman Philip Reeker.

U.S. President George W. Bush has labelled North Korea part of an 
"axis of evil" with Iraq and Iran and unveiled a doctrine of 
pre-emptive strikes against states allegedly developing weapons 
of mass destruction.

Although the IAEA has been carrying out very limited inspections 
in North Korea since the early 1990s, it has never been able to 
conduct intrusive inspections under the Safeguards Agreement 
needed to flush out any secret weapons programme.

11/29/02

Disclaimer <#> | Copyright <#> | Privacy <#> | Contact Us
<http://about.reuters.com/custhelp> <http://www.reuters.co.za>

*****************************************************************
 2 *EDITORIAL: *Pakistan and nuclear proliferation

The story about the alleged barter deal between Pakistan and the 
Democratic People?s Republic of Korea (North Korea or DPRK), with 
the former allegedly supplying the latter with nuclear technology 
and receiving missile technology in return, is recrudescing in 
the US press with disturbing singularity. Islamabad has denied 
the allegation since information first appeared in the New York 
Times in October. The US administration?s initial public response 
seemed to suggest that any such assistance, if it had taken 
place, might be a thing of the past. Statements were worded to 
deny any current Pakistan-DPRK linkage without categorically 
dismissing the idea that any centrifuges-for-missiles deal might 
have taken place in the past.

Perhaps for this reason speculations have continued and some 
recent stories in fact suggest the ?past? may be as recent as 
three months ago. This was the thrust of a recent story in the 
Washington Post as well as an even more recent one in the New 
York Times. Both stories insist that Pakistan kept assisting 
DPRK?s covert nuclear programme until as recently as three months 
ago. The WP story, as usual, quoted sources ?in the 
administration and on Capitol Hill? to authenticate its findings. 
Similarly, the New York Times? story opened up with the 
description of a Pakistani US-made C-130 cargo plane landing at a 
North Korean airfield ?in full view of American spy satellites?. 
Its thrust seemed to be that Islamabad was deliberately being 
?brazen? about doing business with Pyongyang. The problem with 
this line of argument is that no country, even those far better 
placed than Pakistan to challenge an international norm, would do 
such business ?in full view of American spy satellites?. What?s 
going on? Is there a smoking gun here?

Last month when Pyongyang declared its nuclear programme, it did 
so basically to present Washington with a fait accompli and 
strengthen its bargaining position. But this has given some ideas 
to anti-Pakistan lobbies in the United States. If Pakistan?s 
missile programme has long been ?connected? to DPRK?s programme, 
as known, it required a minor leap of imagination to allege links 
to DPRK?s nuclear programme and create a nexus between the two 
programmes and whip out the smoking gun. Not surprisingly, the 
?revelation? about this linkage has also brought Pakistan?s 
arch-rival India into the picture. New Delhi has since been 
demanding an impartial inquiry into the Islamabad-Pyongyang 
connection. Presumably, such an inquiry would have to be 
conducted by the international community through inspectors or 
the International Atomic Energy Agency. Of course, India is 
citing security reasons and concerns regardless of the fact that 
Pakistan has flaunted its missiles instead of hiding them and the 
DPRK?s nuclear programme is of no threat to India. The idea 
clearly is to bring Pakistan under pressure and force it to 
reveal its nuclear and missile assets. Moreover, if the charge 
could be made to stick, it would force the US administration to 
succumb to inevitable Congressional pressure to slap sanctions on 
Pakistan under the Symington amendment. These sanctions were 
lifted post-9/11 after Pakistan agreed to side with the US in its 
war on terrorism.

Of course, given the framework in which India and Pakistan 
operate, New Delhi will obviously exploit whatever opportunity or 
opening comes its way. What is important, however, is to ensure 
that Pakistan remains clean on this issue. Some past policies 
pursued by Islamabad do not inspire much confidence, which is why 
it is easy to make such allegations and persuade people to 
believe in them. But proliferation is a serious affair and 
Pakistan cannot afford to remain in the eye of successive storms.

Having said that, we think ? as we noted previously also ? that 
official denials from Islamabad and Washington should bury this 
issue for now. States are always concerned about their security, 
which is legitimate, and in the pursuit of those policies often 
accumulate costs. But the important thing is the ability to exit 
at the right time. Islamabad has developed its nuclear and 
missile capabilities and should now concentrate on developing its 
economic potential and integrating itself into the international 
system. Nothing should be done to jeopardise the great ?opening? 
we have received since 9/11 on this score.

But the international community, too, needs to see the issue of 
non-proliferation in light of what the nuclear haves were 
supposed to do when they stitched the Nuclear Non-proliferation 
Treaty (NPT) together. That discriminatory treaty was signed by 
the have-nots because the haves promised, under article VI of the 
treaty, to begin negotiating the process of disarmament in good 
faith. That has not happened. In fact, the NPT?s 1995 
quinquennial Review Conference extended the treaty indefinitely 
without addressing the issue of disarmament satisfactorily or 
putting a time frame on it. Thus the emphasis, since the NPT was 
signed, has shifted from disarmament to arms control and curbing 
horizontal proliferation. That must change. The global security 
system needs to be reconfigured to enhance the sense of security 
of the weaker states and resolve regional conflicts. Without such 
a review, efforts towards non-proliferation can only remain 
discriminatory because they rely on coercion rather than any 
moral norm. *

11/29/02
 
Daily Times - All Rights Reserved Site developed and hosted by 
WorldCALL Internet Solutions <http://www.wcis.com.pk>

*****************************************************************
 3 UK: Not bailed out but wiped out

Times Online
                         
Archive [http://www.newsint-archive.co.uk/]                                   
  
November 29, 2002                      

PATRICIA HEWITT promised that there would be no blank cheque to 
bail out shareholders of British Energy. Well, the shareholders 
are not being bailed out: they will be effectively wiped out in 
the proposed reconstruction. But Ms Hewitt, and her successors at 
the Department of Trade and Industry, will still be reaching for 
their pens and writing an annual cheque of between £150 million 
and £200 million just to keep the company afloat. 

The alternative would to have been to allow British Energy to go 
into administration. Although the Government insisted, and still 
does, that it would countenance such a free market approach, it 
never looked a likely outcome. With British Energy providing a 
fifth of the country’s power, and the extent of public qualms 
over the safety of nuclear power, it would have been a brave 
government that would have been prepared to risk seeing the 
plants being abandoned. 

In retrospect, the most remarkable thing about British Energy is 
not its current financial plight but the fact that in 1996 the 
Government succeeded in selling the business. Admittedly, the 
stock fell below its issue price on the first day of trading but 
at least the bankers had got the then Government’s last 
privatisation away. Considering the huge decommissioning 
liabilities that the company took with it, this was a remarkable 
feat. 

It is those liabilities that the Government is now effectively 
taking back, at least for ten years, although the arrangement is 
that if the company’s fortunes look up, then the Government will 
benefit, with its claim on 65 per cent of British Energy’s net 
cashflow. British Nuclear Fuels will come to BE’s aid, and the 
Government’s, by renegotiating the reprocessing contracts that it 
has with the company. 

Banks and bondholders will have to agree to the restructuring and 
are likely to huff and puff a bit before accepting that there is 
really no profitable alternative for them. They will be left with 
a stake in a much smaller business but one which could become 
profitable should energy prices move in their favour. 

A few months ago, they had no reason to believe that the lower 
energy prices achieved through the new Neta trading arrangements 
were killing the business. Robin Jeffrey, the chairman, clearly 
conveyed the view that BE could weather the situation. Now he is 
paying with his job, not just for the misleading statements that 
the company made but also for the flawed strategy that the 
company adopted. Other power companies are prospering because of 
being vertically integrated, coping with the lower price they are 
paid at the wholesale level for the power they generate by 
selling to consumers at inflated margins. 

British Energy does not have that luxury, since it embarked on a 
strategy of vertical integration only to rapidly change its mind 
and sell the distribution business it had bought. So Jeffrey must 
go. 

Yesterday, as she announced his departure, Patricia Hewitt was 
admirably robust on the issue of whether he should take a fat 
payoff with him. It would, after all, be embarrassing for a 
Government which has made clear its dislike of payment for 
failure to be seen effectively handing a fat cheque to the 
outgoing boss of British Energy. 

However, there are suggestions that Jeffrey may well be offered 
at least his salary, if not any bonus pay. Quite how the 
remuneration policy could be structured to make a bonus possible 
after this performance is unclear. What is patently obvious is 
that Jeffrey has failed, is leaving because of that and should 
not be rewarded for it. 

The Government has now effectively signalled its support for 
nuclear power. With the Energy White Paper, it will have to spell 
out quite how far it is prepared to go to favour nuclear above 
dirtier, but cheaper, sources of power.
 
Just the man for the seat of power
 
VOLUNTEERS to replace Robin Jeffrey were unlikely to be 
plentiful. Who would wish to be chairman of a nuclear power 
business in which the Government was effectively the main 
shareholder, at least for the next decade? 

But Ms Hewitt knew just the man. Adrian Montague is fast becoming 
the Government’s favourite director. An early advocate of the 
Private Finance Initiative, his enthusiasm for what was seen as 
an important part of the Third Way has won him favour with 
ministers. The rewards might not be to everyone’s taste, but 
Montague is already deputy chairman of Network Rail and will now 
be chairman of British Energy. He is also a director of 
Partnerships UK, the hybrid organisation which aims to push the 
PFI cause, while making a bit of money for its directors in the 
process. 

He is one of the few people with the appropriate experience for 
the new job that the Government has just created, chief executive 
of the Shareholder Executive. Gordon Brown made a fleeting 
reference to this latest Treasury creation in his Pre-Budget 
Report speech. The Treasury prose explaining its purpose is not 
entirely enlightening. The idea is that the Government should be 
working to ensure that public enterprises increase their 
productivity, just as Brown is exhorting us all to do. So the 
Shareholder Executive will be a small team (to start with — these 
things have a habit of growing). It will watch the operations 
such as the Post Office, which are owned by the Government but 
run autonomously, and offer help and advice. “It will help them 
to distinguish and set out their long-term commercial and policy 
objectives . . .” This sounds like an excuse for the Treasury to 
meddle where in the past it has not had the opportunity. It is a 
move which is unlikely to be welcomed by those who are doing 
their best to run these strange organisations that are neither 
proper independent businesses nor government departments. 

Would Allan Leighton welcome a little help and advice from the 
Shareholder Executive as he tries to sort out the problems of the 
Post Office? I doubt it! 

But apparently the Treasury already has plans to venture beyond 
the initial list of businesses being mentioned. It has so far 
been prevented from mentioning that, for instance, it intends to 
take a look at British Waterways because it has not yet observed 
the etiquette of mentioning it to the sponsoring department. 
Montague may be able to tread the tightrope that lies before the 
new organisation. It will not be an easy exercise and is unlikely 
to win many friends.
 
MyTravel needs a few departures
 
DAVID CROSSLAND says that, from December, he will work for 
MyTravel for nothing. Since Peter McHugh, the newly installed 
chief executive, says of the business that “our forecasting was 
dreadful, our trading was very bad and our accounting was simply 
unacceptable”, some might think that the man who had presided 
over such incompetence should not merely be donating his future 
services but handing back some of the cash he has received. In 
the year to September 2001, Crossland’s package totted up to more 
than £1 million. 

Now that the full extent of MyTravel’s financial problems has 
emerged, the mood music from the company implies that the 
responsibility lies with the departed chief executive and finance 
director, helped by Arthur Andersen’s approach to auditing. The 
suggestion is that once a chief executive had been appointed, the 
formerly very hands-on Crossland just let go, with dire results. 
However, if that was the case, it is extraordinary how quickly 
things unravelled in the company, since the chief executive was 
appointed only in November 2000. And if Crossland did avert his 
eyes from the business at that stage, he was paid extremely 
generously for one who was quite so non-executive. 

In fact, the indulgence in misleading accounting practices did 
not start on the day Tim Byrne became chief executive but was 
already well established. Which is one reason why it is untenable 
that Eric Sanderson should succeed Crossland as chairman. 
Sanderson has been a director of the company since 1987 and 
chairs its audit committee. As a former chief executive of Bank 
of Scotland Treasury Services, and of the British Linen Bank, he 
might be expected to have known the questions to ask about the 
accounts. Apparently he does not feel embarrassed by the fact 
that moving to a more prudent accounting regime, and putting 
right downright errors, makes MyTravel’s figures look more than 
£80 million worse. Other non-executive directors are said to 
support his view. Which means that the new, and independent, 
chairman, once he is found, should encourage them to follow 
Sanderson out of the door.
 
WATSON’S revenge has been wrought on Iain Watt and his friends in 
the boardroom of Edinburgh Fund Managers. They spurned a takeover 
from Hermes, the fund manager run by Tony Watson, and now Watt 
has been “removed” from the Edinburgh board, with four 
non-executives following. Hermes knows how to gee-up other 
investors and in this case raised sufficient muscle to force 
Edinburgh to capitulate. Watt may have temporarily preserved 
Edinburgh’s independence but he lost the war.
   	 		

THE SUNDAY TIMES 
            
Copyright 2002 
[http://www.timesonline.co.uk/section/0,,549,00.html]           
Times
*****************************************************************
 4 British Energy's new lifeline

Guardian Unlimited | The Guardian | 

Nuclear generator sees government loan extended and its chairman 
resign             
 		
Terry Macalister Friday November 29, 2002 
[http://www.guardian.co.uk]            
 		
Taxpayers are to fork out over £2bn for nuclear clean-up costs 
following the government's fresh bailout of atomic power 
generator British Energy. 

Its chairman and chief executive, Robin Jeffrey, quit the 
stricken company yesterday after the government extended its 
emergency loan package and announced an extensive restructuring. 
Mr Jeffrey will receive a minimum £336,000 "golden goodbye" plus 
a pension of £150,000 a year for presiding over one of this 
year's worst corporate collapses. 

In 2001 he earned nearly half a million pounds. The nuclear 
industry lifer will be replaced by Adrian Montague, a tough 
investment banker who is already deputy-chairman of Network Rail, 
the government's not-for-profit successor to Railtrack, another 
failed privatisation. 

Shares in the nuclear generator plunged 60% after the rescue 
package was announced by the trade and industry secretary, 
Patricia Hewitt, in the Commons yesterday. The fresh bailout 
infuriated environmentalists and rival power companies. 

Friends of the Earth said it was just another example of the 
nuclear industry failing to provide for its own liabilities and 
then "strong-arming" the government for cash. 

"The idea that a deal can be arrived at that will once more 
provide dividends to private investors while the taxpayer picks 
up the clean-up bill is deplorable. Without taxpayers' money this 
company would be bankrupt - handing cash to shareholders in this 
situation is privatisation gone crazy," said Bryony Worthington, 
a nuclear campaigner at Friends of the Earth. 

Rival companies were equally angry, saying state support for 
British Energy distorted the market and they had lobbied the 
European commission not to allow it. But the EC on Wednesday said 
an earlier support package worth £650m did not breach its rules. 

The new bailout will cost £150m to £200m a year for the next 10 
years to keep British Energy in business, and the taxpayer will 
still be paying out for it more than 80 years from now. 

In exchange, BE must pay £20m a year plus 65% of available cash 
towards its liabilities, estimated by BE at £5.2bn. A new 
state-backed body, the nuclear liability fund, will manage the 
clean-up. 

BE ran up £1.2bn of debts after making big payouts to 
shareholders and the new electricity trading arrangements 
introduced by the government sent wholesale power prices diving 
by 40%. 

Ms Hewitt said she was determined to ensure that Mr Jeffrey 
"shared the pain" with banks and shareholders. 

Anticipating anger at a significant pay-off to the outgoing 
British Energy boss, she told MPs: "I would therefore be 
extremely concerned about the level of any remuneration payment 
to the former chairman. I realise there are contractual 
requirements, but the former chairman should surely face up to 
his responsibilities for [past] decisions." 

The government has allowed British Energy to keep a £650m loan 
going, at least until March 9. Ms Hewitt revealed that nearly 
£400m of this had already been used. 

Opposition MPs blamed the government for blocking a new fuel 
contract between British Energy and another nuclear group, BNFL, 
while refusing to exempt British Energy from the climate change 
levy. 

"The truth is that the government's own actions and omissions 
created problems for British Energy which would not have 
otherwise arisen," said Tim Yeo, Tory spokesman for trade and 
industry. 

British Energy owns eight nuclear power plants in Britain 
including Sizewell B in Suffolk, employs 5,200 people and 
provides more than a one fifth of the country's electricity. The 
government has still not ruled out putting it into administration 
and handing it over to accountants, but it insists that its 
plants will always be kept going safely.
 	
Useful links [http://www.british-energy.com/] 
[http://www.dti.gov.uk/] 
[http://www.bnfl.co.uk/website.nsf/default.htm] 
[http://www.cnduk.org/] [http://www.greenpeace.org/homepage/] 
[http://www.hse.gov.uk/nsd/ilrwglos.htm] 
[http://www.ukaea.org.uk/] [http://www.nrpb.org.uk/] 
[http://www.foe.co.uk/campaigns/climate/press_for_change/dump_nuc 
lear/index.html] [http://www.uilondon.org/] 
[http://www.wnti.co.uk] 

Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2002
*****************************************************************
 5 British Energy Seeks to Restructure
 
Las Vegas SUN
 
November 28, 2002 By BRUCE STANLEY ASSOCIATED PRESS 

LONDON- Britain's biggest electricity company said Thursday it 
must restructure and write off much of its 1.26 billion-pound 
($1.95 billion) in debts in a final effort to stave off 
bankruptcy. 

The government has agreed to help British Energy PLC by 
underwriting the cost of decommissioning its nuclear power 
stations and by extending an emergency loan of 650 million pounds 
($1.01 billion) until next March. 

In exchange, the Department for Trade and Industry called on the 
company to speed up the sale of its profitable North American 
operations and to adopt a new business strategy to reduce its 
exposure to wholesale electricity prices. 

British Energy's North American businesses include a 50- percent 
stake in Amergen, which operates the Three-Mile Island nuclear 
plant in Middletown, Pennsylvania; the Clinton nuclear power 
station in Clinton, Illinois; and the Oyster Creek nuclear plant 
at Forked River, New Jersey. The remaining half of Amergen is 
owned by Exelon Inc. 

In Canada, British Energy owns 80 percent of Bruce Energy, which 
operates a nuclear plant at Tiverton, Ontario. 

British Energy generates one-fifth of Britain's electricity but 
has been short of cash due to falling electricity prices and 
technical problems at its power stations. It said in September 
that it might have to file for bankruptcy if the government 
didn't help. 

British Energy called the restructuring plan its best opportunity 
for achieving long-term financial stability. Under the plan, 
creditors would convert some of their debt into newly issued 
shares, a step the company acknowledged would lead to "a very 
significant dilution of existing shareholders." 

The plan's success hinges on the support of major creditors, who 
would have to accept a temporary freeze on payments and "a 
significant writedown" in the 1.26 billion pounds ($1.95 billion) 
that British Energy owes them, the Department for Trade and 
Industry said. 

Under the plan, British Energy would continue to pay into a 2.1 
billion pound ($3.26 billion) fund for decommissioning its 
nuclear plants, while the government would underwrite the fund to 
ensure public safety and environmental protection. The 
government's participation would cost taxpayers as much as 200 
million pounds ($310 million) a year for the next 10 years, it 
said. 

Trade Secretary Patricia Hewitt blamed the company's plight on 
"serious management failings" and said the government has 
prepared contingency plans in case British Energy became 
insolvent and could no longer operate. 

"Whatever happens nuclear power stations will continue to 
generate electricity ... (and) customers' lights will stay on," 
she told Parliament. 

The Department of Trade and Industry originally came to British 
Energy's aid in September with a 410 million pounds ($636 
million) emergency loan. It later increased the loan to 650 
million pounds ($1.01 billion), giving British Energy until Nov. 
29 to repay the funds. Under the restructuring plan, the loan 
would be extended until March 9, 2003. 

Money from the sale of British Energy's North American businesses 
would go toward repaying the government loan. The company also 
named Adrian Montague as its new chairman, immediately replacing 
its current chairman Robin Jeffrey. 

British Energy, which employs 5,200 people in Britain, has seen 
its share price sink from around 250 pence ($3.88) each 12 months 
ago to 6.50 pence (10.1 cents) in late trading in London. Shares 
were down 61.5 percent for the day. 

All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc.
*****************************************************************
 6 IAEA to Adopt Resolution on NK Nuclear Program   
 
Digital Chosunilbo (English Edition) : Daily News in English
 
Updated Nov.29,2002 16:19 KST      

The International Atomic Energy Agency is expected to adopt a new 
resolution urging North Korea to keep its commitments under 
international nuclear agreements. In a telephone interview with 
Korea's Yonhap News Agency, Thursday, Melissa Fleming, a 
spokeswoman for the atomic agency said the IAEA has been 
discussing Pyongyang's nuclear development program during a 
two-day board of governors meeting in Vienna. 

According to Fleming the agency plans to announce its final 
decision on whether to adopt the resolution at a press conference 
scheduled for Friday afternoon local time. She added the agency 
is likely to express the international community's concerns over 
the issue. 

(Arirang TV) 
      


*****************************************************************
 7 Cameco settles dispute over financial exposure to British Energy 

Cameco-Bruce
 
[http://www.cbc.ca/news/]   
  
02:57 AM EST Nov 30 

SASKATOON (CP) - Cameco Corp. has increased a financial guarantee 
to the British government to help back a loan for its Bruce Power 
partner, a move that could help the Saskatchewan uranium miner 
increase its stake in a nuclear power station in Ontario. 

Cameco said Friday it has raised its financial exposure to 
struggling British Energy - the majority owner of a partnership 
that runs the Bruce nuclear plant in Tiverton, Ont. - to $125 
million, up from $102 million. The financial guarantee is a 
condition of the U.K. government's interim funding for British 
Energy, which is close to bankruptcy. 

Cameco also said its obligations for the loan will end if Cameco 
successfully negotiates an increase in its 15 per cent stake in 
Bruce, which is 82.4 per cent controlled by British Energy. The 
rest of the company is owned by trade unions on the Bruce site. 
The Bruce station on the shores of Lake Huron has eight nuclear 
reactors with a capacity to produce more than 6,100 megawatts of 
power a year. 

Cameco said its commitment for the higher financial guarantee 
will last only until Dec. 16 - a potential deadline date for a 
deal to increase the Saskatchewan company's stake in Bruce. 

Cameco is in negotiations to increase its stake along with a 
consortium believed to include Calgary's TransCanada PipeLines 
Ltd. and Toronto's Borealis Capital Corp., a merchant bank funded 
by the Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement Board. Earlier this 
month, Cameco said it was considering a legal

challenge to provisions of the British government's loan that 
made it conditional on financial guarantees by British Energy's 
subsidiaries, including Bruce Power. Cameco had said the Bruce 
Power board never voted to guarantee the loan. 

On Thursday, the British government agreed to help British Energy 
by underwriting the cost of decommissioning its British nuclear 
power stations and by extending an emergency loan of just over $1 
billion US until next March. 

The goverment ruled that British Energy must restructure and 
write off nearly $2 billion US in debts. It is also forced to 
accelerate the sale of its Canadian and American operations, 
including Bruce Power, to avoid bankruptcy. 

Shares in Cameco (TSX:CCO) rose $2.05 to $37.05 in Friday trading 
on the Toronto stock market. 

© The Canadian Press, 2002
*****************************************************************
 8 China Favors Denuclearization of Korean Peninsula
 
  China has always supported the denuclearization of the Korean 
Peninsula and opposed the proliferation of weapons of mass 
destruction there, Chinese Ambassador to UN in Vienna said 
Friday. 

China has always stood for and been actively dedicated to the 
maintenance of peace and stability on the peninsula, Zhang Yan 
told a Board of Governors meeting of the International Atomic 
Energy Agency (IAEA). 

The denuclearization there is in conformity with the common 
interests of the international community, said Zhang. 

He said recent developments around the nuclear issue of the 
Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) have deeply 
concerned China and the international community. 

He expressed the hope that parties concerned will exercise 
restraint and endeavor to solve related problems through peaceful 
and diplomatic means on the basis of sincerity, equality and 
mutual respect. 

The IAEA Board of Governors meeting, which opened here Thursday, 
reached a resolution urging the DPRK to give up any nuclear 
weapons program expeditiously and in a verifiable manner. 

It urged the DPRK to provide the agency with all relevant 
information concerning the reported uranium enrichment program 
and other relevant nuclear fuel cycle facilities. 

US officials said last month that the DPRK admitted it was 
pursuing a nuclear arms program in violation of a landmark 1994 
agreement to freeze work on nuclear weapons in exchange for oil 
shipments and two light-water nuclear reactors that cannot be 
easily used to produce weapons-grade material. 

The Korean Peninsula Nuclear Development Organization, which has 
been building the reactors and providing 500,000 tons of heavy 
fuel oil a year to Pyongyang has decided to suspend fuel oil 
deliveries as from December until the DPRK agrees to stop its 
nuclear program. 

  Copyright by People's Daily Online, all rights reserved   
*****************************************************************
 9 Government survives no-confidence vote 

  Yahoo! News   Fri, Nov 29, 2002     

  Fri Nov 29, 8:21 AM ET       

SOFIA, Bulgaria - Bulgaria's government survived two separate 
no-confidence votes called by opposition parties Friday to 
protest a government decision on the early closure of two nuclear 
reactors. 

Parliament first voted 134-100, with two abstentions, to support 
the government's decision. A second vote was 132-98, with four 
abstentions. 

The two no-confidence motions put forward by the opposition 
accused the government of violating the constitution by 
deliberately not implementing a decision by parliament to tie the 
reactors' closure to Bulgaria's eventual accession to the 
European Union.

Opponents claimed that the government's promise to close two 
nuclear units at the Kozlodui plant in 2006, as demanded by the 
EU, clashed with a recent parliament decision to hold off until 
2007, when the Balkan country is tentatively scheduled to join 
the trade bloc. 

The EU considers the two disputed reactors at the country's only 
nuclear power plant to be a safety risk and wants Bulgaria to 
shut them down permanently in 2006 if it is serious about 
joining. 

Bulgaria has suggested the EU reassess the units, contending they 
have been sufficiently upgraded to warrant operation through 2010 
and 2012, respectively. The EU has agreed to send inspectors to 
review the reactors next year. 

The opposition contends the early closure "threatens Bulgaria's 
nuclear power engineering." 

Its move was widely supported by the public. Many people in the 
impoverished country fear an early closure could drive up prices 
for power and deepen their economic misery. 

About 500,000 Bulgarians have signed a petition calling for a 
referendum on the future of the troubled nuclear plant about 200 
kilometers (125 miles) north of Sofia, which provides some 45 
percent of the country's electricity and employs 5,380 people. 

The government of Prime Minister Simeon Saxcoburggotski argued 
that after Bulgaria succeeded in getting an invitation last week 
to join NATO in 2004, the country press forward on its other main 
goal: EU membership. 

Saxcoburggotski, the country's former king, returned last year to 
his home country after five decades in exile and won a sweeping 
victory in June's parliamentary elections. His party, the 
National Movement Simeon II, and the junior coalition partner, 
the Turkish Movement for Rights and Freedoms, have a comfortable 
majority in parliament with 141 of the 240 seats. 

 Copyright © 2002 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The
*****************************************************************
 10 Look at Israel's nukes too says Goff
 
<http://www.nzherald.co.nz/>
Saturday November 30, 2002

29.11.2002 By SIMON COLLINS

New Zealand Foreign Minister Phil Goff says the credibility of 
the world's hardline position in Iraq is undermined by continued 
development of nuclear weapons in Israel.

He also questioned the intelligence of the United States Defence 
Department, saying there was more intelligence on one floor of 
the State Department in Washington than in the entire office of 
the Secretary of Defence.

He told a dinner organised by the New Zealand Asia Institute at 
Auckland University last night that New Zealand would support 
military action in Iraq only "as a very last resort".

He was asked what role New Zealand could play to reduce the 
threat of nuclear weapons not just in the "Axis of Evil" 
countries of Iraq and North Korea, but also in South Africa and 
Israel.

He replied that South Africa was no longer a problem since it had 
stopped its nuclear weapons programme when apartheid ended in the 
early 1990s.

But he said: "Israel most certainly is a problem for all of us. 
As long as America is saying we want to deal to Iraq because it 
has weapons of mass destruction and it's not observing United 
Nations resolutions, a lot of eyes around the world say doesn't 
that apply also to Israel, why are you only looking to Iraq?

"New Zealand's position on both is not to adopt a me-too position 
to any other country."

He said the United Nations would be ineffective if its 
resolutions were not backed up by the threat of force.

"But in Iraq's case I see huge problems if a military strike is 
launched," he said.

"It will not be another fight in the desert. It will be like the 
Battle of Stalingrad, it will be fought block by block, 
neighbourhood by neighbourhood, with enormous casualties both for 
the invading forces and for civilian populations."

©Copyright 2002, New Zealand Herald       
*****************************************************************
 11 Japan EDITORIAL: Nuke power regulation

asahi.com : ENGLISH
Asahi Shimbun      [http://www.asahi.com/]     JAPANESE   
    
Simple legal revisions cannot solve problems.
 
The Diet is debating revisions in laws regulating the operation 
of nuclear power plants following a string of scandals involving 
cover-ups at nuclear facilities by Tokyo Electric Power Co. 
(TEPCO) and other electric power suppliers.
 
But it is only three months since the first incident came to 
light. The investigations are still in progress, and preventive 
measures have not been thrashed out yet. Hasty amendments to 
related laws are obviously not enough to solve deep-rooted 
problems.
 
Big electric utilities' attempts to conceal damage at their 
nuclear power facilities have drawn attention to problems 
undermining the ethics of the nuclear power industry.
 
One is the oft-criticized closed corporate culture that fosters a 
tendency to hide information damaging to the company. Even 
TEPCO's probe into the incident admitted there was an atmosphere 
at the firm that discouraged employees from objecting to 
misconduct or problematic practices.
 
The nuclear safety authorities' ability and commitment to 
supervise the industry were also questioned. They were criticized 
not only for failing to expose wrongdoing but also for cozy 
relations with the industry, as evidenced by their implicit 
requests for safety reports that said all was well.
 
The centerpiece of the proposed rule changes is introduction of 
criteria for continuing operation of a nuclear reactor when 
damage is discovered. The criteria would be used when minor 
damage is found at a reactor or other parts of the facility. It 
would assess the seriousness of the damage to allow for a 
decision on whether to keep the facility in operation.
 
The envisioned law revisions are also designed to legally codify 
procedures for regular inspections by electric utilities at their 
own nuclear facilities to improve the system that bred the 
problems in the first place. Electric power companies would be 
required to keep records of safety checks and punishment for 
violations would be strengthened.
 
Established criteria for continued operation of nuclear 
facilities when minor damage is found has been used for years in 
Western countries as part of nuclear safety management. But 
without this criteria, nuclear plants in Japan have been required 
to meet the same standards as brand new plants no matter how old 
they are. This is clearly an absurd rule that should be changed.
 
Local residents near nuclear plants have objected, however, 
saying adoption of such standards could undermine safety.
 
If a power plant is allowed to continue operating with minor 
damage, a fair inspection system and disclosure of the 
information used for making the decision are of vital importance. 
Failure to make clear the principles for the implementation of 
the system could create renewed public distrust of the nuclear 
safety administration.
 
Enshrining inspections by nuclear plant operators into law is 
surely a step forward, but this alone doesn't guarantee improved 
safety. Nothing will really change if the operators start 
producing more ``dressed-up'' data.
 
What did the people at the electric power companies actually say 
among themselves about the damage found at their facilities? Why 
were the wrong decisions made? Remedial efforts should start with 
exhaustive investigation and analysis of events leading to the 
cover-ups so lessons provided by the scandals can be learned 
first.
 
What is even more important is to firmly establish the creed that 
damage is not something to hide but something to fix to improve 
safety.
 
One useful step for improving safety would be creation of a 
database to spot patterns and types of damage old facilities tend 
to develop. The data collected should be published and available 
industry-wide.
 
The foundation of nuclear safety is effective inspections 
conducted in good faith by electric power suppliers acting with 
responsibility and closely monitored by the regulatory 
authorities acting on behalf of the public.
 
It must be stressed that the Nuclear and Industrial Safety 
Agency, the regulatory body for the nuclear power industry, will 
gain public confidence only when it becomes independent of the 
Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry.
 
The causes of the scandals can be eliminated only through 
creation of an effective prevention system and a corporate 
culture that doesn't tolerate malfeasance.
 
--The Asahi Shimbun, Nov. 28(IHT/Asahi: November 29,2002)
 
(11/29)
   
*****************************************************************
 12 KEDO head confident North Korea will bend

asahi.com : ENGLISH
 
  Asahi Shimbun      [http://www.asahi.com/]     JAPANESE   
 
  By NOBUYOSHI SAKAJIRI, The Asahi Shimbun   

NEW YORK-The head of KEDO, the international consortium set up to 
build two light-water nuclear reactors in North Korea, is 
confident Pyongyang will eventually abandon its nuclear weapons 
development program.
 
Charles Kartman, executive director of the Korean Peninsula 
Energy Development Organization (KEDO), expressed his optimism in 
an interview Wednesday with The Asahi Shimbun saying it was based 
on recent signals from Pyongyang.
 
``(North Korea) seems to understand that the Agreed Framework is 
now in great jeopardy,'' Kartman said. ``They use the phrase, `If 
the Agreed Framework is to be alive, and the nuclear issue on the 
Korean Peninsula is to find a fundamental solution ...,' then the 
United States should do some things. This is their way of saying 
that the Agreed Framework is not yet dead. It is still alive.''
 
Under the 1994 Agreed Framework, North Korea agreed to give up 
its nuclear weapons development program in exchange for 
assistance from KEDO in building the reactors.
 
Kartman also promised a ``fundamental review'' of the project if 
Pyongyang insisted on continuing its nuclear development program. 
On Nov. 14, the KEDO executive board said in a statement that it 
could review other activities beyond the suspension of heavy fuel 
oil shipments from December if the Democratic People's Republic 
of Korea (North Korea) failed to comply with international 
requests to abandon its nuclear development program.
 
Japan and the Republic of Korea (South Korea) oppose scrapping 
the light-water reactor project, but the United States says that 
option must be included if the North continues to be stubborn.
 
Kartman is known for his expertise in Northeast Asian affairs, 
having been involved with Korean Peninsula issues since the early 
1990s.
 
``I still consider the Agreed Framework to be of vital importance 
to ultimately the complete resolution of the crisis that we faced 
in 1994,'' Kartman said. ``It is the means by which, if both 
sides implement the agreement, North Korea and the United States 
can enter into new and different relations with one another. 
Those improved relations can make a great contribution to the 
peace and security of the entire region.''(IHT/Asahi: November 
29,2002)
 
(11/29)
*****************************************************************
 13 IAEA Board of Governors Adopts Resolution on Safeguards in the 
DPRK - 

Media Advisory 2002/33 - 

29 November [www.iaea.org]   

Also read related story

[http://www.iaea.org/worldatom/Press/News/2002/11-28-734285.html]
 on the Director General's statement to the Board and previous
press releases of 17 October and 18 October. Also see the pages
on IAEA:DPRK

[http://www.iaea.org/worldatom/Press/Focus/IaeaDprk/] .
      
The IAEA Board of Governors adopted a resolution on the
implementation of IAEA safeguards in the Democratic People's
Republic of Korea (DPRK) at its meetings in Vienna 29 November
2002. The Board
[http://www.iaea.org/worldatom/About/Policy/Board/] is the
35-member policymaking body of the Agency.
 			 
Full text of the resolution: (Also available in .pdf format)
 
			 The Board of Governors, 
			 
  1. Recalling its resolutions GOV/2636, GOV/2639, GOV/2645,
GOV/2692, GOV/2711 and GOV/2742, and General Conference
resolutions GC(XXXVII)RES/624, GC(XXXVIII)RES/16, GC(39)/RES/3,
GC(40)/RES/4, GC(41)/RES/22, GC(42)/RES/2, GC(43)/RES/3,
GC(44)/RES/26, GC(45)RES/16, and GC(46) RES/14,
 

  2. Noting that the Democratic People's Republic of Korea
(DPRK) is a party to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of
Nuclear Weapons (NPT) and reaffirming that the IAEA-DPRK
safeguards agreement (INFCIRC/403) under the NPT remains binding
and in force, 


  3. Recalling further resolution 825 (1993) adopted by the
Security Council of the United Nations on 11 May 1993 and 31
March 1994, 30 May 1994 and 4 November 1994 statements by the
President of the United Nations Security Council, particularly
the request to take all steps the Agency deems necessary to
verify full compliance by the DPRK with its safeguards agreement
with the Agency, 


  4. Noting with extreme concern recent reports of an
unsafeguarded DPRK uranium enrichment programme, and the DPRK
statement of 25 October 2002 that it is "entitled to possess not
only nuclear weapons but any type of weapon more powerful than
that," 


  5. Mindful of the indispensable role of the IAEA in continuing
to monitor the freeze on nuclear facilities in the DPRK as
requested by the Security Council, 


  6. Recognizing the importance to the international community
of maintaining peace, stability, and the nuclear weapons-free
status of the Korean Peninsula, and declaring its readiness to
promote a peaceful resolution of the DPRK nuclear issue, 


  7. Noting that the IAEA Secretariat has sent two letters (17
and 18 October 2002) to the authorities of the DPRK, asking them
to cooperate with the Agency and seeking clarification of
reported information about a programme to enrich uranium, 


  8. Having considered the report of the Director General at its
meeting of 28 November 2002, 


    1. Reiterates its previous calls to the DPRK to comply fully
and promptly with its safeguards agreement and to co-operate
fully with the Agency to that end; 


    2. Endorses the statement by the Director General on 17
October 2002 in which he expressed "deep concern" regarding
reported information that the DPRK has a programme to enrich
uranium for nuclear weapons, and the action taken by the
Director General to seek information from the DPRK on any such
activity; 


    3. Insists that the DPRK urgently and constructively respond
to letters from the IAEA Secretariat requesting clarification of
the reported uranium enrichment programme; 


    4. Calls upon the DPRK to accept without delay the proposal
of the Director General to despatch a senior team to the DPRK,
or to receive a DPRK team in Vienna, to clarify the
aforementioned uranium enrichment programme; 


    5. Recognises that such a programme, or any other covert
nuclear activities, would constitute a violation of the DPRK's
international commitments, including the DPRK's safeguards
agreement with the Agency pursuant to the NPT; 


    6. Deplores the DPRK's repeated public statements that it is
entitled to possess nuclear weapons, which runs contrary to its
obligations under the NPT not to develop or possess nuclear
weapons; 


    7. Urges the DPRK to provide to the Agency all relevant
information concerning the reported uranium enrichment
programme, and other relevant nuclear fuel cycle facilities; 


    8. Urges the DPRK to cooperate with the Agency with a view
to opening immediately all relevant facilities to IAEA
inspection and safeguards, as required under its comprehensive
safeguards agreement; 


    9. Urges the DPRK to give up any nuclear weapons programme,
expeditiously and in a verifiable manner; 


    10. Requests the Director General to transmit this
resolution to the DPRK, to continue dialogue with the DPRK with
a view toward urgent resolution of the issues above, and to
report again to the Board of Governors on the matter at its next
meeting or when deemed necessary; and 


    11. Decides to remain seized of the matter. 			   
*****************************************************************
 14 U.S. Welcomes IAEA Resolution on North Korea Nuclear Program
 
                  News from the Washington File
 
  29 November 2002 
 
(Urges North Korea to give up any nuclear weapons program) (250) 
The United States welcomes the International Atomic Energy 
Agency's (IAEA) resolution adopted November 29 that insists that 
North Korea end its nuclear weapons program and open its 
facilities to IAEA inspections. Following is the text of a 
November 29 State Department statement on the IAEA's resolution:

(Revised)
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE
Office of the Spokesman
November 29, 2002

STATEMENT BY PHILIP T. REEKER, DEPUTY SPOKESMAN

International Atomic Energy Agency Adopts Resolution on North 
Korea We welcome the strong resolution that the International 
Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Board of Governors adopted by 
consensus today regarding North Korea's nuclear program. The 
resolution deplores North Korea's repeated public statements that 
it is entitled to possess nuclear weapons, which is contrary to 
its obligations under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. The 
Board insisted that North Korea urgently and constructively 
cooperate with the IAEA in opening immediately all relevant 
facilities to IAEA inspections and safeguards and urged North 
Korea to give up any nuclear weapons program, expeditiously and 
in a verifiable manner. This resolution sends a clear, strong and 
unmistakable signal that the international community will not 
tolerate a North Korean nuclear weapons program. North Korea must 
come into compliance with its obligations under the Nuclear 
Non-Proliferation Treaty, including its safeguards agreement with 
the IAEA. Adoption of this resolution by the 35-member Board 
makes clear that North Korea's nuclear weapons ambitions and 
program are an issue between North Korea and the international 
community, not a bilateral issue with the United States, as the 
North Koreans like to portray it. (The text of the resolution is 
available at www.iaea.org.) (end text) (Distributed by the Office 
of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. 
Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
 
Archives | U.S. Department of State [http://www.state.gov]   
*****************************************************************
 15 Environmentalists target Bush administration 

Las Vegas SUN: 

Today: November 29, 2002 at 9:44:16 PST 

By Launce Rake 
< [lrake@lasvegassun.com] > 

Environmental groups have been foes of the Bush administration 
since the beginning of his term. And the administration's 
policies have done nothing to placate the groups. 

Now some environmentalists in the West are charging that the 
administration is violating federal law by refusing to hand over 
public information. Those voices from the West are echoed by 
activists in Washington, who say that the law is at least being 
bent, if not broken, by the administration's policies. 

Public interest groups from across the political spectrum have 
aired similar complaints, but the environmentalists' criticism 
lately has become more pointed. They allege that the 
administration's friendly relationship with mining, cattle 
ranching and big oil has led to numerous, unnecessary and 
potentially costly, taxpayer-paid legal battles. 

Representatives of the Bush administration insist they are 
toeing the line on federal freedom-of-information law. 

That does not convince activists with the Center for Biological 
Diversity, the multistate group fighting the federal Interior 
Department on several fronts. They say that in some cases 
Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests have been ignored for 
months. 

The Freedom of Information Act, a 36-year-old law, requires 
federal agencies to provide copies of documents unless those 
records would compromise national security, ongoing 
investigations and a handful of other, narrow exceptions. 
Federal agencies generally have 20 days to respond to a request, 
but they have been known to take years. 

"There does appear to be stonewalling on FOIA requests 
occurring, especially when the FOIA requests have to do with 
discussions between agencies and the regulated industries," 
Brian Segee, a center attorney, said. "The overall picture that 
I see is an administration that has close friends in industry 
and will allow industry to set policy, and doesn't want the 
public to know the conversations it is having with industry." 

The group is threatening a lawsuit to try to obtain documents 
related to the controversial Coyote Springs development project 
about 60 miles north of Las Vegas, on the Clark-Lincoln county 
line. 

The center sent its latest, unacknowledged request July 11 
directly to Interior Secretary Gale Norton, Patterson said. 

John Wright, an Interior Department spokesman in Washington, 
said he could not comment on the specific requests from the 
center, but the agency follows the law on information requests. 

Robert Derck, Coyote Springs Investment's general manager, said 
the environmentalists may not have received any documents 
because there are none to recover. 

"Based on what we've been told, they've been sent everything 
that is part of the exchange," Derck said. "I'm not sure if the 
additional information exists." 

But other environmental groups have complaints similar to those 
of the Center for Biological Diversity. Jon Marvel, executive 
director of the Western Watersheds Project, is fighting the 
Interior Department's granting of grazing privileges throughout 
the West, including Nevada. 

He said the BLM and Interior officials have simply cut his 
organization off from receiving information that, by law, should 
be released to any "interested public." 

"Field offices are obliged to send us, without further request, 
documents relating to further actions regarding livestock 
grazing," Marvel said. "A number of field offices have not sent 
us these documents at all. 

"It's a classic delay tactic," he said. "Everything is resolved 
in court. We win these cases repeatedly, but the result is 
constant delay." 

The Boise, Idaho-based Committee for the High Desert is working 
on the same grazing issue. Katie Fite, committee conservation 
director, said federal agencies have stonewalled her group. 

"This all started nine to 12 months ago," she said. "You have 
to muster lawyers and go to federal court, which is a big effort 
for small groups like us." 

Fite, Patterson and other environmentalists say they always win 
the cases when they go to court. Fite said her group now is 
assembling background for more court challenges. 

"This will cost taxpayers God knows how much before all is said 
and done," she said. 

Representatives from other groups, including the Sierra Club 
and Great Basin Mine Watch, said they have had similar or 
identical problems getting information that used to be freely 
provided and that, they argue, should be open to the public. 

But Fite said environmental groups may have erred so far in 
approaching what they characterize as a growing problem 
piecemeal. Groups are individually chasing appeals or court 
action to win information. 

What might be needed, Fite said, is a coordinated effort that 
would bring the groups together to challenge administration 
policy. 

"People have to get together to work on these Western public 
lands issues," she said. 

Lack of coordination may affect the administration's response 
to the issue. Representatives for both Sen. John Ensign, a 
Nevada Republican, and Sen. Harry Reid, Democratic majority whip 
from Nevada, said they have not received complaints about 
information requests. 

Tessa Hafen, Reid's spokeswoman, said her boss is an ally of 
environmental groups in a 2-year-old effort to get the White 
House to release documents related to the crafting of the 
administration's energy policy. 

Jane Feldman, conservation committee co-chairwoman of the local 
arm of the Sierra Club, said she has gotten cooperation when 
seeking documents from the local BLM offices. 

But when information requests go through Washington, responses 
come slowly, if at all, Feldman said. The problem is worsening 
because thorny policy issues ranging from land development, 
grazing and mining rights, water quality and other environmental 
questions are getting handled in the nation's capital, she said. 

Tom Myers, executive director of Great Basin Mine Watch, said 
his problems have been with state BLM offices. Earlier this 
year, his group sued and won a settlement after the agency 
refused to release information concerning Newmont Mining's 
Battle Mountain mine. 

"The Department of Justice settled on the BLM's behalf," Myers 
said. "They did not understand why the BLM was hiding that 
information." 

Myers said that a month ago, the BLM did not reject a request 
but required the organization to pay thousands for the copying 
costs, a request he said he will fight. 

Similar demands have hit other groups throughout the West. 
Myers and other activists say that as nonprofit, public interest 
group, they have a right to information free of charge under the 
law. 

Myers said his group will go back to court. 

"I think people have to file suit more," he said. "As far as 
some sort of class-action, I don't know if there is a legal hook 
for doing that, but I think it's a good idea." 

Sean Moulton, a senior policy analyst with Washington-based OMB 
Watch, a public-interest group, said more lawsuits will come as 
the Bush administration battles left-of-center groups on access 
to government records. 

"We're certainly seeing, under this administration, the 
encouragement has been to restrict information, to not respond 
if at all possible," Moulton said. "It's happening across the 
board." 

He said the push toward secrecy accelerated after the Sept. 11, 
2001 terror attacks, but many cases of ignoring, delaying or 
denying information requests appear to have little to do with 
security concerns. 

The White House, the ultimate boss of the agencies in question, 
says there is no change in policy and the administration remains 
committed to the legal release of documents. 

"The administration takes all FOIA requests seriously and works 
to respond to those requests in a thorough and responsible 
manner," White House spokesman Ken Lisaius said. 

All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. 
*****************************************************************
 16 REGION: *India admits six ?minor? leaks in N plants

Daily Times 

NEW DELHI: The Indian government has admitted that six leaks had 
occurred in the country?s nuclear power plants in the past four 
years but insisted that these were ?minor?, a report said Friday.

?The few incidents of leakage of tritiated heavy water did not 
have any significant impact on the public and environment,? the 
Hindu newspaper quoted Minister of State Vasundhra Raje as 
telling parliament.

She said that only on May 5, 1998, was the radiation dose 
released into the Rana Pratap Sagar lake, in northwestern India, 
in the form of heavy water was above the limit prescribed by the 
Atomic Energy Regulatory Board.

However, the impact of the release was negligible, she said. More 
than a year after this incident, heavy water leaked from the 
Madras Atomic Power Station (MAPS) in eastern India due to the 
failure of a seal plug during a coolant channel inspection. The 
incident led to a release of radioactive material through the 
stack, which was ?well within? the limit prescribed by the AERB, 
she said.

The following year tritium leaked from the moderator system of 
the Narora atomic power station in northern Uttar Pradesh state, 
but the activity was within the prescribed limit.

In June 2000, MAPS faced another problem, but the leak was within 
the norms, Raje said. Three months later, tritium again leaked 
into the Rana Pratap Sagar lake, but again there was no cause for 
undue alarm because it was well within the prescribed limits, she 
said.

The last incident took place at Narora in November last year, but 
the incident did not result in any release in excess of the 
prescribed limit.

Currently 14 nuclear power reactors are operating at six atomic 
power stations in India. Eight more reactors are being 
constructed.

Raje said maintenance practices and operational procedures are 
being ?scrupulously followed? at all plants and an accident like 
that which occurred at Chernobyl was ?highly unlikely?. ?AFP

story_30-11-2002
 
Daily Times - All Rights Reserved Site developed and hosted by 
WorldCALL Internet Solutions <http://www.wcis.com.pk>

*****************************************************************
 17 Nuclear plant fiascoes likely with age, secret study suggests 

The Plain Dealer
                                
11/29/02 Stephen Koff Plain Dealer Bureau Chief 

Washington- Equipment breakdowns at nuclear power plants are not
unusual. 

        Pipes crack, break or clog, springing leaks with some 
regularity. Pumps stall or freeze up. Steam generator tubes 
burst. Steel components can get brittle from being bombarded with 
radioactivity. Nuclear-industry officials acknowledge as much. 

        But the problem is getting worse as the nation's 
inventory of nuclear reactors gets older. In addition, the 
nuclear-power industry is facing increasing competition as the 
result of deregulation, making it more reluctant to seek out 
problems that would require the tremendous expense of repair 
shutdowns. At the same time, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission is 
facing budget squeezes that make it more difficult to monitor the 
industry. 

        The result is growing concern about expensive, 
potentially dangerous nuclear-plant failures. 

        "Given plant aging and materials issues," cracks and 
leaks like those that led to the Davis-Besse fiasco, where 
leaking boric acid ate a hole in the reactor lid, are likely to 
recur, says a confidential analysis by the influential Institute 
of Nuclear Power Operations. 

        Similarly, a research report compiled last year by 
engineers at several laboratories affiliated with the Nuclear 
Regulatory Commission warned that "the number of occurrences of 
age-related degradation has been increasing as nuclear power 
plants age." 

Fewer being tested 

Aging equipment, whether in a nuclear plant or an automobile, 
can, of course, be repaired or replaced. 

        But as many nuclear power plants approach the final 10 
years of their 40-year operating licenses, they are undergoing 
fewer safety tests and inspections, according to engineers with 
close ties to the nuclear industry. That raises the likelihood 
that cracks and corrosion will not be caught in time, they say. 

        The combination of the two trends - fewer inspections and 
aging components - sets the stage for compounding problems. 

        "The utilities are trying to squeeze down their operation 
and maintenance costs," says Harold Ornstein, who until 2000 was 
a senior engineer and technical adviser for the NRC, where his 
investigations included Three Mile Island. He says utilities are 
pushing their staffs to keep the plants running - at the expense 
of finding equipment problems that might require a shutdown. 

        "The idea is to pass the [inspection] test. The idea is 
not to go out and tell you what the problem is," Ornstein said. 

        The Institute of Nuclear Power Operations, the industry's 
own research group, acknowledges the profit pressures. If a plant 
shuts down its reactor to inspect a potential problem, it has to 
purchase replacement power. The costs often run into hundreds of 
thousands of dollars a day. 

        Pressure on staffs to keep a plant operating was a factor 
in all but one significant reactor problem since 1993, according 
to the confidential institute report. 

        "Therefore, given today's competitive environment, 
pressure to continue operating may be a notable contributor to 
future significant events," the report said. The institute's 
analyses are considered among the most credible in the industry, 
and insurers use them to set rates. 

Move on to cut costs 

"There's a big move on to reduce costs, to take tests that were 
once done monthly and now make them quarterly, and things that 
used to be done quarterly are now done yearly, and so on," says 
David Lochbaum, a nuclear safety engineer with the Union of 
Concerned Scientists. 

        "Aging equipment, coupled with fewer safety checks and 
inspections, makes it more likely that something will break or 
fail or be degraded below the prescribed safety margins, and not 
be detected before it is challenged." 

        That means that when it's needed, a safety system could 
fail. 

        Though the Davis-Besse incident was considered extreme, 
nuclear power plants in South Carolina, Virginia, Arkansas, 
Florida and Michigan have seen signs of similar stress cracks or 
leaks in nozzles or welds, according to incident reports filed 
with the NRC. 

	In other recent signs of aging: 

        Last December, a backup pump that's designed to send 
water to steam generators at the Callaway Nuclear Plant in 
Missouri failed to do its job. A piece of foam from a storage 
tank seal had weakened with age and broken loose, lodging in the 
pump's intake valve during a routine test, NRC reports show. Had 
the other backup pumps been turned on, they too could have 
ingested loose foam and become clogged, presenting a potential 
cooling problem if the main systems failed. 

        As had happened at Davis-Besse, the plant had ignored 
industry warnings and deferred inspections, according to an NRC 
review. 

        The previous year, inspectors found cracks, one of them 4 
inches long, in the weld of a giant coolant pipe at the V.C. 
Summer Nuclear Station in South Carolina, where boric acid had 
been leaking for an undetermined time. Workers failed to find the 
cracks during a previous inspection, discovering them only when 
the plant shut down for refueling. Had the cracks burst, a 
massive amount of radioactive coolant could have escaped. 

        And last January, a jet pump inside the reactor vessel 
broke at the Quad Cities Nuclear Power Station in Illinois, 
requiring a shutdown. Jet pumps increase the flow of water 
through the reactor core. Although the manufacturer had 
recommended replacing the jet pumps in the 1980s, Quad Cities 
never did. Nor had the plant inspected the part that broke - 
because a manufacturer's guide did not identify it as among the 
components that could weaken with age. 

        "In other words, the plant's owner was inspecting the jet 
pumps in what it thought were the most vulnerable areas, but they 
were wrong," UCS' Lochbaum said. 

Even defenders agree 

Even the staunchest defenders of nuclear power acknowledge that 
parts and systems are vulnerable to the ravages of time. 

        In fact, more than 30 percent of nuclear power plant 
equipment failures in recent years were at least partly a result 
of the equipment having aged, according to a presentation at a 
conference in 2000 by Steve Nichols, a senior evaluator in the 
Institute of Nuclear Power Operations' engineering department. 
Nichols said he could not comment, citing institute policy. 

        Researchers working in concert with the government have 
quietly voiced concerns for nearly a decade about the 
consequences of plant aging. 

        "Effects of aging degradations, if they are not 
mitigated, will eventually lead to failures that could adversely 
affect plant safety and performance," said a 1993 study by the 
Oak Ridge National Laboratory, one of the research institutions 
that works with the NRC. 

Yet, so far, the safety and backup systems at nuclear power 
plants have prevented life-threatening catastrophes in the United 
States - a fact that the industry and regulators cite to dispel 
fear and criticism. 

        High-level NRC executives like to note that for all the 
expense and negative publicity generated by the 1979 Three Mile 
Island partial meltdown, the public was not harmed. And American 
officials say that plants in the United States have so many 
backup and safety systems that the massive radiation release and 
deaths from the 1986 Chernobyl disaster could never happen here. 

        "It's not the perfect system from the standpoint of 
'nothing will ever fail.' You will have failures. You will have 
things that leak. You will have cracks," acknowledges Alex 
Marion, director of engineering for the Nuclear Energy Institute, 
the industry's lobbying and trade group. 

        "The challenge, of course, is to have inspection and 
maintenance programs in place where you can identify these kinds 
of situations prior to having a serious problem at a plant." 

        "I think what the public ought to feel good about," adds 
Stephen Floyd, the Nuclear Energy Institute's senior director of 
regulatory reform, "is the defense in depth that's built into the 
plants. Not everything breaks at the same time, fortunately." 

Serious incidents decline 

NRC officials agree, rejecting the contention that nuclear plants 
are risking safety under the agency's watch. In fact, the number 
of serious incidents at nuclear power plants has steadily fallen, 
agency officials say, which is one reason the NRC lets power 
plants operate longer without shutting down for inspections or 
repairs. 

        The agency periodically issues warnings for parts known 
to fail or crack - including the nozzles that guide nuclear fuel 
rods, which in the case of Davis-Besse had been leaking boric 
acid for years. Before it will give a plant permission to operate 
beyond its initial 40-year license, the NRC requires a thorough 
inspection that covers passive components such as buried pipes. 
Many of the nation's 103 operating plants are expected to go 
through a relicensing inspection in the next decade. 

        Yet it's still no guarantee. In the case of the Oconee 
Nuclear Station in South Carolina, a relicensing front-runner, 
the cracks were not noticed when it underwent - and passed - an 
extensive inspection to renew its license for an additional 20 
years. After the NRC granted the renewal, the cracks appeared. 

        What is more, critics say that while the number of 
serious incidents is down, that trend is likely to reverse, 
turning higher simply as a function of age. 

        Still, industry defenders say, the problem at Davis-Besse 
was not so much a failure of aging equipment but, rather, simply 
of FirstEnergy Corp. to adequately investigate what it should 
have known was a potential problem. 

        "Safety culture includes a good questioning attitude on 
the part of the plant personnel," says George Apostolakis, a 
nuclear engineering professor at Massachusetts Institute of 
Technology and chairman of an NRC committee that advises 
regulators on reactor safeguards. "There were several indications 
[of problems] there that people didn't seem to interpret 
correctly." 

        But the NRC is far from blameless. A "lessons learned" 
task force assembled by the agency to assess the Davis-Besse 
incident concluded among other things that the agency, beset with 
staffing and "resource allocation" issues, had too few inspectors 
at the plant and "missed several opportunities" to find the 
problem. 

        Davis-Besse has forced the industry and federal 
regulators to focus on how they can make sure the right 
prevention programs are, in fact, in place. 

        "Without a probing, questioning attitude," NRC Chairman 
Richard Meserve said at a nuclear-energy conference in Mexico 
last week, "problems are not going to be detected as quickly as 
they should be." 

        That doesn't mean aging parts won't fail or need 
replacing. But it's an acknowledgment that the industry and 
agency need to inspect more aggressively for susceptible parts 
before they break. 

        Asked what concerns him about aging nuclear plants, 
Marion, the engineering director of the Nuclear Energy Institute, 
said, "The only thing that concerns me is whether or not we can 
position ourselves to be a little more proactive. . . . 

        "It's a very challenging effort, as you can imagine, as 
far as, 'How do you predict there's going to be a crack or a flaw 
in a piece of metal? What do you do to identify it before it 
becomes a significant concern?' " 

To reach this Plain Dealer reporter: 

skoff@plaind.com, 216-999-4212 


© 2002 The Plain Dealer. Used with permission. 
*****************************************************************
 18 Nuclear power company warns of Tokyo crisis  


[http://www.ft.com]           

  By Bayan Rahman in Tokyo  

  Published: November 29 2002 4:00 | Last Updated: November 29 
2002 4:00  
     
Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco), the company that falsified safety 
reports on its nuclear reactors, says it urgently needs ways to 
secure enough energy this winter to avoid plunging its 26m 
customers into darkness.

Tepco may struggle to meet peak electricity demand because 15 of 
its 17 reactors may be closed by February. Nuclear power 
generates almost 45 per cent of Tepco's electricity in the Tokyo 
area.

"Supply-demand is very tight because of the number of unit 
closures so we are having to think about how to secure 
electricity supply to avoid blackouts," a Tepco official said.

Except for occasional typhoon damage to transmission lines or 
pylons, power cuts are rare in Japan and even the suggestion that 
Tokyo residents could face blackouts has jolted the industry and 
the public.

Analysts believe Tepco will be able to meet demand by buying 
electricity from other utilities and resuming operations at 
oil-fuelled power plants. They say Tepco may be using the threat 
of power cuts to push for an early resumption of operations at 
its reactors.

Paul Scalise, an independent utilities analyst in Tokyo, said: 
"Making this kind of statement is political posturing. As well as 
wanting to restart the [faulty nuclear] plants early, Tepco and 
the other utilities want subsidies for having to carry out the 
government's plan to build more nuclear plants over the next 
decade."

But Tepco's move could backfire in its efforts to fend off 
nascent competition after the electric power market was partially 
deregulated in 2000. "Blackouts would destroy Tepco's credibility 
and demolish its biggest argument against new entrants, which is 
that it provides a stable electricity supply," Mr Scalise said.

Tepco launched the study into securing energy supplies after it 
was forced to close nine nuclear reactors because its staff had 
altered safety data on cracks and other faults. Four more 
reactors will be shut for regular checks by February, and a 
further two may be closed for inspection in answer to demands 
from local communities.

Tepco needs to win the confidence of people living near its 
nuclear facilities, in Niigata and Fukushima prefectures, before 
its reactors can operate again. A series of minor accidents in 
Japan's nuclear industry, data falsification incidents and 
accusations of government cover-ups have battered confidence in 
the safety of all nuclear plants.
  
      © Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2002. "FT" and
*****************************************************************
 19 Canada: Nuclear panel gives Bruce Power reprieve

TheStar.com - 

  Fri Nov 29, 2002 | Updated at 07:57 AM  

No strict deadline imposed to secure financial guarantee

PETER CALAMAI SCIENCE REPORTER

OTTAWA — Bruce Power has failed to convince Canada's nuclear 
watchdog that it can deliver immediately on a financial guarantee 
that is a key provision of its licence to operate the Bruce 
nuclear power station.

Yet the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC) cut the 
U.K.-controlled company some slack, telling Bruce Power yesterday 
to come up with a solution without setting a firm deadline.

 "It all comes down to how much time the CNSC is willing to give 
us," Bruce Power chief executive officer Duncan Hawthorne told 
reporters after an hour-long grilling by the federal regulators.

Bruce Power is in trouble with the nuclear commission because of 
the financial woes of its majority owner, British Energy PLC, 
which is threatened by insolvency. Yet the safety and operating 
record for the plant has been a major improvement over Ontario 
Hydro's performance in the past, according to CNSC officials

 The plant operating licence says $222 million must be on tap to 
keep the nuclear station in a safe condition for as long as six 
months if Bruce Power were forced to shut down and had no income 
from electricity sales. British Energy has been providing the 
financial guarantee that this money would be available.

But the credit rating of British Energy has plunged to junk 
status after heavy losses last year, and $1 billion in emergency 
funding from the U.K. government can't be used for the shutdown 
guarantee. That government backing expires Sept. 27.

"I don't have anything that I can take to the bank," senior CNSC 
official Jim Blyth told the hearing.

Blyth said commission staff were not confident that the shutdown 
money would be on hand in the "unlikely" event it was needed. 
Because of that uncertainty, it was not clear that Bruce Power 
was meeting that conditions of the operating licence, he said.

Calgary lawyer Letha Mac-Lachlan, one of seven commissioners who 
oversee the regulatory body, appeared to suggest during the 
hearing that the owner of the Bruce plant, Ontario Power 
Generation Ltd., was legally liable to make good on the shutdown 
financial guarantee if Bruce Power could not do so.

Bruce Power has leased the power station from OPG until 2018, 
with annual fees this year of as much as $102 million. The lease 
says OPG can take back the station if Bruce Power defaults on the 
terms, including failing to comply with the federal licensing 
law.

Yet before it could take over the plant — even including shutting 
it down in a safe fashion — OPG would have to get some sort of 
operating licence from the federal watchdog.

"It's not clear what it would mean if OPG was supposed to take 
control of the site. I cannot tell you how all of these options 
will play out," said Blyth.

Bruce Power head Hawthorne assured the CNSC that the company was 
eager to resolve the "current impasse."

The choices were either to get a specific guarantee from the U.K. 
government or to come up with a made-in-Canada solution, he said.

Meeting with reporters after the commission hearing, Hawthorne 
said his personal preference was a two-step process, with a quick 
short-term solution replaced later with guarantees that took 
longer to put in place.

The short-term solution could be to expand the utility's existing 
insurance to cover the prospect of a prolonged shutdown. A 
longer-term approach would be guarantees from a Canadian 
financial institution once Bruce Power established a credit 
rating, he said.

Bruce Power's attractive profits would make getting a credit 
rating relatively straightforward, Hawthorne said.

 The company racked up $120 million in profits after taking over 
the Bruce station last year and expects to do "significantly 
better" this year, he said.

By 2003, Bruce Power expects to have two more reactors operating 
at the station, which should further boost profits. Four of the 
station's original eight reactors were mothballed by Ontario 
Hydro.

Help could also come from one of the other partners in Bruce 
Power. Uranium producer Cameco Corp. of Saskatchewan has 
suggested it might be willing to boost its 15 per cent stake in 
the company. As a long-established company, Cameco already has a 
credit rating and could put up the required shutdown guarantee.

The unions representing workers at Bruce own the remaining 2.6 
per cent. 
    
Legal Notice:- Copyright 1996-2002. Toronto Star Newspapers
*****************************************************************
 20 Australia, Argentina nuclear treaty stalls. 

30/11/2002. ABC News Online
 	
border="0" alt="Australian Broadcasting Corporation Online">
[http://abc.net.au/]       

A treaty between Australia and Argentina over treatment of spent 
fuel from the Sydney's proposed new nuclear reactor, has stalled 
in the Argentine Parliament.

The nuclear treaty with Argentina has been delayed exactly one 
year and its chances of approval appear to be sliding. 

Overnight the Argentine Congress ended normal sessions and there 
was no vote on whether to accept spent fuel from the new $300 
million Sydney reactor. 

Emergency sessions will take place in December, but so far the 
treaty has not been listed for debate. 

A Greenpeace campaigner said the lack of approval after one year 
was a major triumph. 

It is an important victory in terms of demonstrating the 
opposition and the lack of legality for the agreement. 

In addition, crisis-hit Argentina is due to have presidential 
next April, further complicating any chance of approval.
 

© 2002 Australian Broadcasting Corporation
*****************************************************************
 21 Regulators uphold safety risk ruling at Peach Bottom nuclear plant*

November 29, 2002

*Findings of a safety risk at the Peach Bottom nuclear plant in 
Pennsylvania were upheld this week by federal regulators, who 
noted an "unnecessary delay" in declaring an alert by the 
reactor's operators during a June 2 emergency.*

The findings mean that the Peach Bottom Atomic Power Station in 
York County _ one of five nuclear plants in the state _ will 
undergo additional inspections by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory 
Commission.

Operators at Peach Bottom, which is owned by Exelon Generation 
Co., failed to immediately issue an alert during a June 2 
unexpected discharge of a carbon dioxide fire suppression system 
in an emergency diesel generator room, according to the NRC. The 
alert was declared after 31 minutes.

"There was an unnecessary delay due in part to a lapse, for 
several minutes, in the shift crew's use of their event 
classification procedures," the NRC stated in its findings.

The event required an alert declaration because the diesel room 
was uninhabitable, according to the NRC.

As a result, NRC inspectors on June 19 issued a white-level 
rating for Peach Bottom's emergency preparedness plans. The 
facility received a second white-level rating, for a separate 
event, for failing to highlight problems in a self-critique of an 
emergency preparedness drill.

White-level findings indicate low-to-moderate safety concerns at 
the plant. The highest level of safety concerns is red. Plants 
that turn up no problems during inspections are not designated a 
color, said NRC spokeswoman Diane Screnci.

Exelon appealed both findings Aug. 23, arguing that each should 
have been characterized as green-level ratings. A green level 
indicates a very low safety concern for nuclear plants.

On Wednesday, the NRC upheld its white rating in the June 2 alert 
delay but downgraded the emergency drill finding to green.

"We certainly accept the NRC's findings _ although it's important 
to note that there was no threat to public safety" as a part of 
the June 2 alert delay, Exelon spokesman Craig Nesbit said 
Friday. "We have taken steps to ensure those things are taken 
care of in a timely fashion."

/©NEPA News 2002/

*****************************************************************
 22  
FT.com <http://www.ft.com>  

Wednesday Nov 27 2002. All times are London time.

<http://news.ft.com/world/asiapacific> Print article <#> | Email <#>

Nuclear power company warns of Tokyo crisis
By Bayan Rahman in Tokyo
Published: November 29 2002 4:00 | Last Updated: November 29 2002 
4:00 tepco

Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco), the company that falsified safety 
reports on its nuclear reactors, says it urgently needs ways to 
secure enough energy this winter to avoid plunging its 26m 
customers into darkness.

Tepco may struggle to meet peak electricity demand because 15 of 
its 17 reactors may be closed by February. Nuclear power 
generates almost 45 per cent of Tepco's electricity in the Tokyo 
area.

"Supply-demand is very tight because of the number of unit 
closures so we are having to think about how to secure 
electricity supply to avoid blackouts," a Tepco official said.

Except for occasional typhoon damage to transmission lines or 
pylons, power cuts are rare in Japan and even the suggestion that 
Tokyo residents could face blackouts has jolted the industry and 
the public.

Analysts believe Tepco will be able to meet demand by buying 
electricity from other utilities and resuming operations at 
oil-fuelled power plants. They say Tepco may be using the threat 
of power cuts to push for an early resumption of operations at 
its reactors.

Paul Scalise, an independent utilities analyst in Tokyo, said: 
"Making this kind of statement is political posturing. As well as 
wanting to restart the [faulty nuclear] plants early, Tepco and 
the other utilities want subsidies for having to carry out the 
government's plan to build more nuclear plants over the next 
decade."

But Tepco's move could backfire in its efforts to fend off 
nascent competition after the electric power market was partially 
deregulated in 2000. "Blackouts would destroy Tepco's credibility 
and demolish its biggest argument against new entrants, which is 
that it provides a stable electricity supply," Mr Scalise said.

Tepco launched the study into securing energy supplies after it 
was forced to close nine nuclear reactors because its staff had 
altered safety data on cracks and other faults. Four more 
reactors will be shut for regular checks by February, and a 
further two may be closed for inspection in answer to demands 
from local communities.

Tepco needs to win the confidence of people living near its 
nuclear facilities, in Niigata and Fukushima prefectures, before 
its reactors can operate again. A series of minor accidents in 
Japan's nuclear industry, data falsification incidents and 
accusations of government cover-ups have battered confidence in 
the safety of all nuclear plants.

© Copyright The Financial Times <javascript:void 0> Limited 2002. 
"FT"
*****************************************************************
 23 Kiwi war vets set to join nuclear fallout class action 

                                                
Saturday, 30 November 2002       
    
[http://www.inl.co.nz] 2002. All the material on this page

Two British lawyers in New Zealand to sound out Kiwi war
veterans' about joining a nuclear fallout class action against
Britain say they are impressed with the response. 
		 		 		
More than half the estimated 221 survivors have met the lawyers 
at meetings in Auckland, Wellington and Palmerston North. 
		 		 		
"That's truly significant," lawyer David Harris said yesterday 
after meeting about a dozen veterans at the Palmerston North RSA. 
		 		 		
Mr Harris and Mervyn Fudge are preparing to sue the British 
Government for compensation on behalf of British, New Zealand and 
Fijian servicemen suffering ill health through exposure during 
Britain's 1950s Pacific atomic bomb testing. 
		 		 		
British legal aid may pay a large part of the costs. 
		 		 		
Mr Harris said it was believed that of the 551 Kiwis exposed to 
the nuclear fallout, those who suffered worst were already dead. 
		 		 		
That more than half the 221 survivors were interested in pursuing 
the case was significant, he said. 
		 		 		
He said the veterans had about six months in which to make up 
their minds whether or not they wanted to join the litigation. 
		 		 		
Mr Harris said the legal team, was confident the five legal 
requirements to prove the case, including the "show-stopper 
causative link" from nuclear exposure to illness, were in place. 
		 		 
*****************************************************************
 24 India admits six nuclear leaks 

The Australian: 

[November 29, 2002]
  
AFP 	  

From correspondents in New Delhi

THE Indian Government has admitted that six leaks had occurred in 
the country's nuclear power plants in the past four years but 
insisted that these were "minor".

"The few incidents of leakage of tritiated heavy water did not 
have any significant impact on the public and environment," the 
Hindu newspaper quoted Minister of State Vasundhra Raje as 
telling parliament. 

She said that only on May 5, 1998, was the radiation dose 
released into the Rana Pratap Sagar lake, in northwestern India, 
in the form of heavy water was above the limit prescribed by the 
Atomic Energy Regulatory Board. 

However, the impact of the release was negligible, she said. More 
than a year after this incident, heavy water leaked from the 
Madras Atomic Power Station in eastern India due to the failure 
of a seal plug during a coolant channel inspection. 

The incident led to a release of radioactive material through the 
stack, which was "well within" the limit prescribed by the AERB, 
she said. 

The following year tritium leaked from the moderator system of 
the Narora atomic power station in northern Uttar Pradesh state, 
but the activity was within the prescribed limit. 

In June 2000, MAPS faced another problem, but the leak was within 
the norms, Raje said. 

Three months later, tritium again leaked into the Rana Pratap 
Sagar lake, but again there was no cause for undue alarm because 
it was well within the prescribed limits, she said. 

The last incident took place at Narora in November last year, but 
the incident did not result in any release in excess of the 
prescribed limit. 

Currently 14 nuclear power reactors are operating at six atomic 
power stations in India. Eight more reactors are being 
constructed. 

Raje said maintenance practices and operational procedures are 
being "scrupulously followed" at all plants and an accident like 
that which occurred at Chernobyl was "highly unlikely". 

© The Australian   
*****************************************************************
 25 Nuclear Terrorism Focus Shifting to Research Facilities*

<http://www.deepikaglobal.com>
*Saturday, November 30, 2002*  

KHARKIV, Ukraine: In 1994, a senior Ukrainian nuclear scientist 
offered U.S. officials a chance to buy a cache of weapons-grade 
uranium held by an obscure defense laboratory in this city. It 
was a significant cache--165 pounds, enough for three nuclear 
bombs--and the scientist said Ukraine might be willing to give it 
up.

``It's lightly guarded,'' the scientist said, according to two 
Clinton administration officials present at the meeting, ``and 
I'm worried about it.'' The deal never happened.

Eight years later, with new concerns about nuclear terrorism, the 
U.S. government would like nothing better than to buy Ukraine's 
uranium. But the opportunity appears to be slipping away.

Relations with Ukraine recently have taken a confrontational 
turn, and the laboratory, the Kharkiv Institute of Physics and 
Technology, now insists the material is urgently needed for 
civilian research. Meanwhile, despite elaborate physical 
protections for the uranium, U.S. weapons experts see new reasons 
to worry about its safety: The lab is facing extreme financial 
pressure at a time when Iraqi officials have been openly pursuing 
trade deals with local companies and paying visits to Kharkiv's 
Soviet-era weapons factories and research centers, including the 
institution where the uranium is kept. Iraq two years ago 
appointed an ``honorary consul'' in Kharkiv, a Ukrainian exporter 
who keeps an office not far from the institute--and openly 
displays an Iraqi flag on the front door.

``We would be far better off today if we had just gotten rid of 
the stuff,'' said Matthew Bunn, a former White House 
nonproliferation policy adviser, who argued unsuccessfully for a 
U.S. purchase of the uranium eight years ago. ``Insecure nuclear 
material anywhere is a threat to people everywhere.''

The highly enriched uranium at Kharkiv is emblematic of a global 
proliferation threat that has now become a top priority for the 
United States: the vulnerability to theft or misuse of 
weapons-grade uranium kept in scientific institutions, such as 
research reactors. An estimated 20 tons of highly enriched 
uranium currently is stored at such locations in about 40 
countries, from Russia and other former Soviet republics to Libya 
and Congo.

In the last decade, efforts to protect against the theft of 
nuclear materials largely focused on military installations. But 
weapons experts say that the research facilities are lightly 
guarded in comparison with military stockpiles. Some terrorism 
experts regard them as the most vulnerable repositories of 
nuclear material in the world.

``We are talking about the raw material of nuclear terrorism, 
stored in hundreds of facilities in dozens of nations,'' former 
Sen. Sam Nunn, D-Ga., a longtime arms control advocate, told a 
conference of nuclear terrorism experts this month. ``Some of it 
is secured by nothing more than an underpaid guard sitting inside 
a chain-link fence.''

In August, the Bush administration achieved a dramatic 
breakthrough when it persuaded Yugoslavia to give up 100 pounds 
of highly enriched uranium from the Vinca Institute of Nuclear 
Sciences near Belgrade. But the deal required more than a year of 
complicated negotiations involving Yugoslavia, Russia and the 
State Department. As a clincher, the United States pledged $5 
million to be paid to the institute by the Nuclear Threat 
Initiative, a nonprofit group co-founded by Nunn and billionaire 
entrepreneur Ted Turner.

Afterward, the State Department announced it had targeted two 
dozen other research institutions as ``priority sites,'' most of 
them in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. But while 
progress has been made in the negotiations, several countries 
have balked, refusing to give up what they see as a powerful 
bargaining chip that could be used to extract money, technology 
or other concessions, according to administration officials and 
weapons experts familiar with the talks.

Two of the countries most opposed to giving up uranium--Ukraine 
and Belarus--also happen to own some of the largest stocks of the 
metal. Both countries are under increased scrutiny by U.S. 
intelligence officials because of alleged attempts by local 
businesses to sell weapons or military supplies to Iraq or Iran.

``They were once willing to help us, but they may not be so 
willing anymore,'' said Bunn, now a senior researcher for Harvard 
University's Project on Managing the Atom. ``We can only hope 
that someone eventually can put together a package that will 
change the answer from 'nyet' to 'da.' ''

© Copyright DeepikaGlobal.com 1997-2002.
*****************************************************************
 26 UK: Radioactive leak at Devonport

     BBC NEWS | UK | England | 

Thursday, 28 November, 2002, 

[HMS Vanguard arriving in Plymouth]                                     

HMS Vanguard arrived at Devonport in February

Managers at Plymouth's Devonport Dockyard have been attempting to 
allay fears over a radioactive leak from a nuclear submarine. 

The Environment Agency has confirmed that ten litres of 
radioactive coolant leaked from HMS Vanguard in an incident two 
weeks ago. 

The matter has been reported to the Health and Safety Executive's 
Nuclear Installations Inspectorate. 

Andrew Clark, the Dockyard's technical director, said he was 
certain no one had been put at serious risk. 

'Minor incident' 

"We are absolutely confident that there was no danger at any time 
to either to our workers or to members of the public," said Mr 
Clark. 

"There was no release of this material outside the dock to the 
environment at all, it was all contained and was cleaned up using 
the proper procedures," he said. 

HMS Vanguard was brought to the base for a refit amid protests 
earlier this year. 

The leak occurred while coolant was being transferred from the 
submarine into a tank in Dock Nine. 

The Environment Agency has described it as an "unauthorised 
discharge" but said the leak was contained, and there was no 
release into the environment. 

The agency called it a "minor incident", but has asked Devonport 
Management Ltd, which owns and operates the dockyard, to look 
into the matter and produce a report into how it happened. 
	         	 	 
 [http://www.bbc.co.uk/cornwall] 

© MMII | News Sources | Privacy 
*****************************************************************
 27 EU-Russia Committee discusses nuclear safety in Russia
 
Inter-Parliamentary Working Group

 In 1998 Bellona organised an Inter-Parliamentary Working Group 
(IPWG), which is a forum of Russian and Western parliamentarians. 
The main goal of the IPWG is to address issues of nuclear safety 
co-operation that require political attention. 

BRUSSELS-OSLO - At the fifth meeting of the Delegation to the 
EU-Russia Parliamentary Co-operation Committee meeting in 
Brussels on November 25th-26th, European and Russian 
parliamentarians discussed nuclear safety in north-west Russia. 
The parliamentarians highlighted the importance of signing the 
MNEPR agreement before nuclear safety projects can be realised. 
The Delegation also recognised the need for greater European 
involvement — and funding — in the G8 Global Partnership against 
the Spread of Weapons and Materials of Mass Destruction.
 
  Fifth meeting of the Delegation to EU-Russia Parliamentary 
Co-operation Committee in session.   

  Soizick Martin/Bellona   

Zackary Moss, Soizick Martin, 2002-11-28 18:25

Following the EU-Russia Summit on November 11th — where a Third 
Progress Report on the Energy Dialogue was presented by the 
Russian Vice-Prime Minister Victor Khristenko and European 
Commission Director-General François Lamoureux — the fifth 
meeting of the Delegation to the EU-Russia Parliamentary 
Co-operation Committee took place in Brussels November 25th-26th. 

The Delegation brought together members of the Russian State Duma 
and members of the European Parliament, or MEPs, whom exchanged 
views on nuclear waste and the Multilateral Nuclear Environmental 
Programme in the Russian Federation, or MNEPR. Several of the 
parliamentarians at the meeting placed their emphasis on nuclear 
safety and the conclusion of MNEPR. Concluding the MNEPR 
agreement
 
  Bellona Position Paper on the European initiative   

  The Northern Dimension Environmental Partnership (NDEP). 

[http://www.bellona.org/en/international/russia/waste-mngment/ipw 
g/26350.html]   

The joint Statement and Recommendations from the fifth meeting of 
EU-Russian parliamentarians placed special emphasis on the 
Northern Dimension Environmental Partnership, or NDEP, and 
cross-border co-operation between the European Union and Russia.

NDEP is a European initiative to channel funds to environmental 
projects in north-west Europe, in particular Russia. In July, 
NDEP arranged a pledging conference at which European Union 
Member States, Norway and Russia pledged 110m Euros for regional 
projects, including 62m Euros exclusively for nuclear safety in 
north-west Russia. 

Point 17 of the joint EU-Russia Statement and Recommendations 
underlies the urgency of environmental problems due to nuclear 
waste notably in northwest Russia and for implementing concrete 
measures of international help. 

The MNEPR agreement is an international initiative aimed at 
clearing up spent nuclear fuel, or SNF, and radioactive waste in 
north-west Russia. It is hoped that MNEPR will become a universal 
agreement between Russia and donor states wising to contribute to 
nuclear safety projects in the region. The agreement aims to 
regulate tax exemption and liability.

Negotiations between Russia and potential donor states over the 
MNEPR have been carried out for years without success. 

The importance of signing the MNEPR agreement was raised early on 
in the EU-Russia meeting. In fact, the debate was started by a 
Swedish MEP from the Party of European Socialists, Ewa Hedkvist 
Petersen, whom emphasised the need for Russia to sign the MNEPR 
agreement as soon as possible so that problems caused by 
radioactive waste can be tackled, which she addedd “are 
consequences of the Cold War”. 

The conclusion of MNEPR is required to enable foreign partners to 
implement nuclear projects and would grant them a legal framework 
to carry out the work in Russia. The agreement is still under 
negotiation between Russia and donor countries — including 
Canada, the European Commission and European Union Member States, 
Norway, Japan and the US — mainly because the partner states did 
not manage to find a satisfactory solution to the unresolved 
liability and tax issues. 

But the tax and liability issues must be resolved before the 
MNEPR agreement can be concluded. 

While the US and Norway each have a bilateral agreement which 
allows them to send to Russia equipment and personnel tax free, 
other countries do not. Those countries without an agreement must 
pay Russian taxes, which stops bilateral initiatives taking 
place. So the signing of MNEPR will create a multilateral 
agreement for taxes. 

The liability issue must also be addressed. This is because much 
of the work in Russia is to be carried out by contractors from 
non-donor countries, whom are not covered by the bilateral 
agreements between Russia and donor states.

Environmental challenges

  The Russian Navy and nuclear safety   
  
  Read about international co-operation on naval clean-up

[http://www.bellona.org/en/international/russia/navy/co-operation 
/index.html]    

North-west Russia is awash with laid-up nuclear submarines 
waiting to be decommissioned. Out of the 248 nuclear submarines 
built by the Soviet Union and Russia for the Northern and Pacific 
fleets, 191 are laid-up. 115 of these are located in north-west 
Russia, of which only 32 have been dismantled. Only 10 submarines 
have been defuelled and 71 are laid-up with SNF onboard. 

A representative from the Russian State Duma, Viktor S Opekunev, 
stressed the most important problem facing north-west Russia is 
financing the dismantlement of laid-up submarines and the 
treatment of SNF. But Russia has neither the money nor the 
resources to defuel and dismantle these vessels. In Mr Opekunev’s 
view, Russia should not be solely responsible for Russia’s 
internal disarmament because it is a global problem.

Still, Mr Opekunev stressed that MNEPR should be signed. 

MEP Claude Turmes, Vice-Chairman of the Group of the 
Greens/European Free Alliance, stated that the EU should push the 
conclusion of the MNEPR because it is preventing the 
implementation of projects in north-west Russia. But of more 
importance, perhaps, Mr Turmes brought to the fore the 
non-proliferation threats posed by the laid-up submarines with 
SNF onboard.

Tackling proliferation concerns

According to Mr Turmes, the transport of SNF would add to the 
fears that terrorists might get their hands on material that 
could be used for weapons. Commenting on the transport of SNF 
from north-west Russia to the Mayak reprocessing and storage 
facility in Chelyabinsk county, which, according to the Guinness 
Book of Records, is the most polluted place on earth, Mr Turmes 
said: 

“We should envisage a dry storage on the Kola Peninsula, a far 
better solution that would limit the transport of [SNF] and the 
related problems and risks.” 

The laid-up submarines with SNF onboard are a proliferation 
concern, which has been highlighted by reports that terrorist 
groups like al-Qaeda have been seeking to acquire radioactive 
material. SNF, while of no use as a component in nuclear weapons, 
is suitable for the manufacture of a radiological dispersal 
device, or RDD, such as a “dirty bomb”. 

While a RDD would not lead to a nuclear-yield explosion, it could 
disperse radioactive contamination over a wide area. The 
contaminated area could become uninhabitable and if highly 
populated would have to be evacuated immediately. The most 
destructive aspect of a RDD would be its ability to cause 
psychological distress and public hysteria, rather than kill. It 
could lead to the disruption of a target country’s national 
infrastructure and economy.

Openness from Russia

  Access to enviroinformation in Russia   

  Read about access to environmental information in Russia. 
&nbsp;Jump to section &raquo; 
[http://www.bellona.org/en/international/russia/envirorights/info 
_access/index.html]    

The issue of openness in Russia was also raised at the fifth 
meeting of the EU-Russia Parliamentary Co-operation Committee, 
especially after the Russian security service, or FSB, raided the 
office of the Irkutsk-based environmental organisation Baikal 
Environmental Wave November 22nd. 

Officers from the FSB confiscated 15 computer hard drives they 
allege contain ecological information pertaining to a planned 
$2.5bn oil pipeline to be built through Siberia to China, as well 
as several 1:500,000-scale maps. 

Commenting on the episode at the meeting, Mr Turmes said “I’m 
very worried about what I just heard; on November 22nd, the FSB 
searched the office of a local environmental NGO called Baikal 
Environmental Wave”. 

“This is an organisation which tries to collect nuclear 
information. The Bellona Foundation had the same experience 
before. Now they have good relations with the local authorities, 
as we could see in Murmansk”, he said. 

Indeed, good relations helped Bellona to create an 
Inter-parliamentary Working Group, or IPWG, in 1998. Formed from 
Russian and Western parliamentarians, the main goal of the IPWG 
is to address issues of nuclear safety co-operation that require 
political attention, such as the MNEPR agreement.

Action from Europe
 
  MEPs and members of the Russia State Duma discussing MNEPR and 
nuclear safety issues.   

  Soizick Martin/Bellona   

In October this year Bellona and a member of the Russian State 
Duma, Valentin Luntsevich, organised a trip to Murmansk for a 
group of MEPs. The group visited the Kola Peninsula’s nuclear 
sites to study nuclear safety and the security challenges in 
north-west Russia. 

On the European Delegation’s trip to Murmansk, the group visited 
sites on Andreeva Bay. The MEPs also visited the Nerpa shipyard, 
where the repair and decommissioning of submarines is carried 
out. 

During the visit to Nerpa, the Chairman of the European 
Delegation to the EU-Russian Parliamentary Co-operation Committee 
Bart Staes announced that his group — the Group of the 
Greens/European Free Alliance — filed an amendment to the EC's 
2003 budget for 85m Euros for assistance in the nuclear sector, 
which contains a specific item channeling funds for radioactive 
waste management to the Kola Peninsula. Mr Staes explicitly 
mentioned that the amendment was prompted by Bellona's work on 
nuclear safety in Russsia.

Contributions from Belgium

In light of the G8 $20bn pledge, it is vital that European 
countries become more active in supporting regional projects. The 
fact that MEPs pledged their support for nuclear clean-up in 
north-west Russia during the trip to Murmnask will help to rally 
more support — and hopefully funding — for nuclear safety 
projects. 

During the Delegation’s meeting on November 25th-26th, Mr Staes, 
referring to the October trip organised by Bellona, pointed out: 
“the visit to Murmansk helped me to really understand the 
problem, and understand more about [NDEP].” 

“And I came to the conclusion that my own country, Belgium, 
didn’t do anything. So just after Murmansk, I went to the 
[Belgian] government and they decided to award 2.5m Euros,” Staes 
continued.
 
Action this day
 
  Bellona Position Paper on the G8 initiatve   

  The G8 Global Partnership against the Spread of Weapons and 
Materials of Mass Destruction. &nbsp;Read on &raquo; 
[http://www.bellona.org/en/international/russia/waste-mngment/ipw 
g/26340.html]    

Despite the pledges following the G8 Summit this June, no new 
money is on the table, which is due in part to the failure to 
conclude the MNEPR agreement. 

Nonetheless, a number of countries have pledged their support for 
the G8 initiative. Japan has pledged $120m and Canada has made 
concrete pledges. The United Kingdom, too, has allocated funds 
which are waiting to be spent. But more effort to co-ordinate the 
planned work and distribute the funds will be needed to make a 
real impact on improving nuclear security and nuclear clean-up in 
Russia. 

Still, point 18 of the joint Statement and Recommendations of the 
Russian and European parliamentarians from November 25th-26th 
welcomes the international help to resolve the most urgent 
SNF-related problems being offered in the framework of NDEP, 
which could be realised once the tax and liability issues are 
concluded. 

On the G8 pledge, the EU-Russia Parliamentary Co-operation 
Committee expects the G8 to make concrete the 10 plus10 over 10 
scheme with regard to nuclear clean-up and the non-proliferation 
of material in Russia. 

On the issue of the 10 plus 10 over 10 Mr Staes said: “I had 
recently some contact with the office of Mr Lugar and his people 
say yes, there is the 10+10 over 10 money but on the European 
side, the money does not come.” 

“In the US, there is a certain pressure, but a sign from Europe 
is very important. So we need an international structure to 
co-ordinate the efforts” Mr Staes added. 

The realisation of the G8 pledge must therefore include the 
continued support of the US as well as financial commitments from 
the other G8 partners. Because the US has already spent $7bn on 
nuclear initiatives in Russia since 1992, it is important that 
concrete funding from countries in Europe be made available. 

Without new money, fighting the spread against weapons and 
materials of mass destruction might be extremely difficult. 
Before that can happen, though, tax and liability issues must be 
resolved through the signing of the MNEPR agreement. 

NDEP also relies on the conclusion of MNEPR. But without the 
MNEPR agreement, the money pledged will not translate into 
nuclear projects in Russia.   

  Publisher: Bellona Foundation [bellona@bellona.no] , President: 
Frederic Hauge [frederic@bellona.no] Information: info@bellona.no 
[info@bellona.no] , Technical contact: webmaster@bellona.no 
[webmaster@bellona.no] Telephone: +47 23 23 46 00 Telefax: +47 22 
38 38 62  * P.O.Box 2141 Grunerlokka, 0505 Oslo, Norway
*****************************************************************
 28 Nuclear Heart Amputated From Typhoon

Nov, 29 2002   

  
[http://english.pravda.ru]     

 According to information from the USA, the Nunn-Lugar program is 
currently in its last days
 
The unloading of nuclear fuel from two reactors from the 
strategic missile nuclear submarine Typhoon ( serial number 712) 
is going at full speed at the shipyard Zvezdochka (Russia’s 
Arkhangelsk region). After the unloading of uranium from the 
submarine, the Typhoon will be cut to pieces. As PRAVDA.Ru has 
reported, a recently constructed complex for the unloading of 
spent nuclear fuel from submarines will be used for this purpose. 
The unloading of spent nuclear fuel from submarines is usually 
called the number one operation; this is the first time that the 
operation is being performed by civilian specialists from the 
Zvezdochka enterprise. Earlier works of this kind were performed 
by the staff of the Navy floating transshipping plant #1412. 
According to the estimates of the Russian Ministry of Nuclear 
Energy, the startup of the new coastal reshipping complex will 
help considerably reduce the number of written off submarines 
with nuclear fuel on board. At the same time, this means that the 
nuclear and radiation menace will be reduced in the region. 

The new complex also has some technological advantages. In 
accordance with the traditional plan of work, nuclear fuel was 
first unloaded onto a special transshipping vessel, the PM-63. 
Then, the fuel was packed into special containers, loaded onto a 
special train, and further sent to the enterprise Mayak in 
Russia’s Chelyabinsk region. Now, the spent nuclear fuel will be 
loaded into containers right at the coastal complex, where it 
will stay until a special train arrives. The construction of the 
new complex was financed in the network of the “Cooperative 
Threat Reduction” program (known also as the Nunn-Lugar program). 
The program is in fact the main and only source of financing for 
spent nuclear fuel utilization from Russian nuclear submarines. 
According to information from the USA, the Nunn-Lugar program is 
currently in its last days: the majority of the Senate members 
say that Russia has already received enough for the utilization 
of spent nuclear fuel from its nuclear submarines. Within the 
program’s network, missile compartments were cut out from 16 
strategic nuclear subs (this is very reliable information 
provided by open, mostly ecological sources). And now, if the 
missile compartments are considered dangerous, they are dangerous 
first of all for Russia, as they are in fact unpredictable 
ecological bombs. Americans didn’t provide financing for the 
utilization of uranium from the nuclear reactors, but for 
liquidation of missiles only. 

After the unloading of nuclear fuel and sealing of the reactor 
compartments at the Zvezdochka enterprise, the Typhoon will be 
returned to the Sevmashpredpriyatie enterprise, which is quite 
close to Zvezdochka. The reactor compartments will be delivered 
to the Kola peninsula, for temporary storage. 

The Typhoon, the world largest nuclear submarine with a complete 
submerged displacement of about 33,800 thousand tons was adopted 
by the Navy at the end of December 1983. Its 24 ballistic 
missiles have frightened enemies for many years. On the whole, 
six Typhoons were built in Russia before 1987. The Typhoon was 
included in the Guinness Book of World Records as the world 
largest submarine. The submarine under the serial number 712 was 
the second submarine in the Typhoon family. 

It is highly likely that Typhoon number 712 will be the last 
strategic cruiser utilized with American financing in the network 
of the Nunn-Lugar program. And the Russian Ministry of Nuclear 
Energy has no money for these purposes. The number of Russian 
submarines not in service with unloaded nuclear fuel on board is 
increasing every year. PRAVDA.Ru reported several times already 
that these places where submarines are waiting for utilization 
are turning into a potential ecological disaster. The problem is 
not only that old nuclear reactors may become depressurized or 
burst. The problem is that when the reactors were designed (which 
was dozens of years ago), nobody even thought about the 
consequences. Nobody knows how nuclear fuel will behave in old 
reactors, as no research of this kind was ever performed in 
Russia. Scientists can only guess how it will act. There was no 
time to think about the problem during the Cold War. 

For reference: Typhoon (submarine’s project in number 941) has a 
surface displacement of 24,500 tons; the complete submerged 
displacement is 33,800 tons; its width is 22.8 meters, and its 
length is 175 meters; the draught makes up 11.5 meters. The 
Typhoon’s speed is 27 knots. 


Vitaly Bratkov PRAVDA.Ru 

Translated by Maria Gousseva 

  Copyright ©1999 by " [http://www.pravda.ru/] ". When
*****************************************************************
 29 State Council Passes Draft Law on Prevention &Control of 
Radioactive Pollution
 
   [http://www.people.com.cn]  [http://j.people.com.cn] 

  Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Friday, November 29, 2002   
  
  Chinese Premier Zhu Rongji presided over the 65th executive 
meeting of the State Council Wednesday, which discussed and 
passed in principle the "Law (draft) on Ports of the People's 
Republic of China" and the "Law (draft) of the People's Republic 
of China on Radioactive Pollution Prevention and Control".   

The meeting held that ports are important infrastructure for the 
national economic and social development. So, it is necessary to 
draft a law on ports in order to further promote their 
development, bring their role in economic and social development 
into full play, adapt to the demand of new situations after the 
management system reform, ensure the legal exercise of 
management, maintain the sound order of operation, avoid random 
planning and overlapping construction, enhance their 
international competitiveness, and better serve the national 
economic and social development. 

The meeting also maintained that through years of unremitting 
efforts and with their wide application in the fields of China's 
national defense, medical care, energy, industry, agriculture and 
scientific research, nuclear energy and technology have been 
playing a positive role in defending the national security, 
promoting the national economic and social development, and 
augmenting China's overall national strength. In order to prevent 
and control radioactive pollution, protect the environment, 
guarantee people's health, and facilitate the exploitation and 
peaceful utilization of nuclear energy and technology, it is 
highly necessary to enact a law on prevention and control of 
radioactive pollution on the basis of summing up China's own 
practical experience gained in this field and drawing on the 
successful experience of other countries. 

The meeting decided that the two draft laws, after further 
revised, would be submitted by the State Council to the Standing 
Committee of the National People's Congress for approval. 

By PD Online Staff Zhu Lizhen 

  Copyright by People's Daily Online, all rights reserved   
*****************************************************************
 30 Legal aid on horizon for ex-servicemen who witnessed British H-bomb

New Zealand City Ltd 

tests- counsel says it's time for Brits to say sorry*

30 November 2002

Legal aid is on the horizon for thousands of ex-servicemen suing 
the British, over witnessing nuclear blasts in the Pacific.

UK lawyers have completed a visit to New Zealand to enlist 
veterans to fight a class action against the British Defence 
Ministry.

Many servicemen say their health has suffered after they were 
told to watch H-bomb explosions in the 1950s.

Counsel for the Nuclear Test Veterans' association, Gordon Paine, 
says it's time for the London ministry to say sorry.

He says the British have steadfastly refused to acknowledge or 
admit the radiation caused any health problems.

Mr Paine says he's almost certain the funding for the case will 
be put in place.

Mr Paine says New Zealanders can now get funding through the 
British legal system for their cases.

He says some of thousands of New Zealanders, British and Fijians 
affected may not live to receive a formal apology.

He says some people have already been lost to illnesses even at 
this stage.


© 2002 NZCity, IRN >> *More International News 
Power Search <http://news.nzcity.co.nz/news/>
*© 2002 New Zealand City Ltd </general/about_nzc.asp>*
*****************************************************************
 31 Editorial: Investigate claims by Yucca employees

 Las Vegas SUN: 

Today: November 29, 2002 at 8:57:52 PST 

 The General Accounting Office, the investigative arm of 
Congress, should be swift in agreeing with Nevada's senators that 
the firing of an employee at Yucca Mountain and the transfer of 
another must be investigated. Sens. Harry Reid and John Ensign 
wrote to the GAO this week, alleging "fraud and abuse" in the 
treatment of the two employees. The quality-assurance workers 
allege their treatment came after they reported concerns about 
work at the mountain. Adding to the urgent need for a GAO 
investigation is the U.S. Labor Department's finding that the 
firing was wrong.

 Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, is where the 
government intends to bury the nation's high-level nuclear waste. 
Any questions about safety should be fully answered, and not just 
by the Department of Energy, which is developing Yucca. For the 
sake of public safety and trust, the GAO should get to the bottom 
of the employees' serious allegations. 

 
All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc.
*****************************************************************
 32 NORWEGIANS PROTEST AT PLANT - 

The Whitehaven News
 
 NORWEGIANS PROTEST AT PLANT A Norwegian billionaire was last 
week protesting at the Sellafield nuclear plant with two 
colleagues from environmental group Neptun Networks. Petter 
Stordalen, chief executive officer of Choice Hotels Scandinavia 
ASA, in Norway, was staging a peaceful protest at the 
reprocessing plant . 


There have been protests from the Norwegian Government about 
discharges from Sellafield into the sea, which it claims then 
drift north and affect marine life in Scandinavia. 


The Norwegians positioned themselves near a pipeline bridge that 
carries nuclear waste from Sellafield across the coastal rail 
lines and into the Irish Sea. 


Cumbria Police said they were monitored the protest and that the 
three including Mr Stordalen had "not broken any law".


*****************************************************************
 33 SELLAFIELD Decon 

The Whitehaven News
 
 SELLAFIELD DECOMMISSIONING of facilities at Sellafield is 
progressing safely and cost-effectively, BNFL chiefs have told an 
international audience.

Addressing experts at a top nuclear conference, Steve Challinor, 
Sellafield's head of decommissioning, said: "Our programme has 
been delivered with no major incidents and an excellent safety 
record."

Delegates at the eighth International Conference on 
Decommissioning of Nuclear Facilities were told of the scope of 
the clean-up work at Sellafield, which includes the completed 
decommissioning of seven plants, with "significant progress" 
being made on a further 16, including the Windscale pile 
chimneys, fuel manufacturing facilities and old chemical 
facilities used in the site's early reprocessing work.

"The decommissioning of the Sellafield site presents an ongoing 
challenge, requiring an integrated and co-ordinated programme. 
Site remediation activities are accelerating across the whole of 
the site.

"The successful completion of a number of projects and the large 
number of projects currently undergoing practical decommissioning 
demonstrated that fuel cycle facility decommissioning can be 
safely and cost-effectively accomplished," Mr Challinor added.

*****************************************************************
 34 SAFER SELLAFIELD PLANT 

- The Whitehaven News
 

 SAFER SELLAFIELD PLANT SELLAFIELD'S B41 waste retrieval plant 
passed a significant safety milestone this week.


It has now been four years since the last lost time accident at 
the plant, which represents another important safety landmark for 
the project.


It has already won five Royal Society for the Prevention of 
Accidents (RoSPA) awards, including a gold medal this year.

B41 Project Sponsor Alan Woowat said: "This safety milestone has 
been achieved by sheer hard work and close cooperation between 
the plant and project teams.

"There has been a real determination to move forward, solve 
problems and execute the work safely.

*****************************************************************
 35 Govt disappointed over Argentina's delay to process nuclear waste

30/11/2002. ABC News Online
 	
[http://abc.net.au/]       
 
The Federal Government says it is disappointed but not overly 
concerned that legislation to allow Argentina to process spent 
nuclear fuel from Australia, has stalled in the country's 
Congress.

Overnight, the Argentine Congress finished its work for the year 
without approving the deal on spent nuclear fuel.

Rejection of the deal would make it harder for the nuclear 
regulator to issue an operating license for the new Sydney 
reactor.

However, Federal Science Minister Peter McGauran says the 
legislation is still on the agenda.

"It's disappointing that Congress hasn't considered the issue but 
understandable because of the pressure of parliamentary business 
and there have been very limited sittings, we will now work with 
the Congressional Authority to put the vote off until earlier 
next year," he said.
 
 [http://www.abc.net.au] 

© 2002 Australian Broadcasting Corporation
*****************************************************************
 36 Taiwan: *Gov't to set timetable to remove nuclear waste*

Saturday, November 30, 2002

<http://www.chinapost.com.tw

TAIPEI, CNA/*

The Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) promised yesterday to set 
up a timetable for removing nuclear waste presently stored in 
nuclear power plants operated by the Taiwan Power Company 
(Taipower).

MOEA officials made the promise after talking with protesters 
from the northern coast of Taiwan for about an hour.

An association for the promotion of nuclear safety made up of 
residents of Taiwan's northern coast mobilized 2,500 people for 
the protest. They gathered at the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall 
in Taipei and then paraded to the MOEA building, shouting 
"nuclear waste out" along the way.

Tsai Chang-ming, president of the association, said that 
residents of Chinshan, Shihmen, Wanli, Sanchi ¡X four villages 
along the northern coast ¡X have long tolerated the first and 
second nuclear power plants, built in Shihmen and Wanli, 
respectively.

However, he went on, the residents have asked Taipower not to 
store nuclear waste at the power plants for so long and to stop 
constructing additional waste storage tanks.

Saying that this rational appeal has yet to receive a "goodwill 
and reasonable" response, he added that the association had no 
option but to resort to a demonstration so that the MOEA would be 
forced to respond.

As Minister of Economic Affairs Lin Yi-fu was in Nantou attending 
an industrial seminar, his deputy, Chen Ruey long, received the 
protesters on his behalf. Also in attendance were Taipower 
chairman Lin Neng-pai, Taipower president Lin Chin-chi, 
Commission of National Corporations vice chairman Lu Chi-cheng 
and its executive director, Wu Fong sheng.

Responding to their appeal, the officials agreed that the 
Executive Yuan will complete a draft bill on selecting a final 
disposal site for low-level radioactive waste and will send it to 
the Legislative Yuan for screening within one month.

The ministry will also suggest to the Executive Yuan that a 
national committee on low-level radioactive waste management 
should be set up and that local representatives from the northern 
coast should be invited to become involved in mapping out the 
timetable.

On the issue of requests that Taipower, which is currently 
building a fourth nuclear plant on the northern coast, will 
contribute NT$38 million (US$1.08 million) over a period of four 
years to a fund for the benefit of residents living near the 
first and second nuclear plants as it did for the fourth nuclear 
power plant in Kungliao, the two sides failed to reach agreement, 
although Taipower officials did promise to report on the issue 
within one month.

Vice Economic Affairs Minister Chen said that Taipower Chairman 
Lin has been seeking a permanent storage site for nuclear waste 
since assuming his post and claimed that he had "already made 
initial progress." He did not elaborate.

China Post. All rights reserved. 
*****************************************************************
 37 Congress Had Ups, Downs for the Utahns 

The Salt Lake Tribune -- 

Friday, November 29, 2002 

BY CHRISTOPHER SMITH 

WASHINGTON -- From feting jazz trumpeter Louis Armstrong and 
the Salt Lake Olympics to tweaking tax codes and the status of 
immigrants, Utah's congressional delegation assembled diverse 
but predictable legislative portfolios in the 107th Congress. 

Although Congress was unable to pass a federal budget for 
only the second time in 26 years, its members did manage to 
introduce more than 4,000 measures and pass a fourth of them. 
Utah's five federal lawmakers sponsored 208 bills during the 
107th Congress, which concluded last week. 

Republican Orrin Hatch, the state's senior senator, led the 
pack with 126 measures. Retiring 1st District Republican Rep. 
Jim Hansen sponsored 40 bills in his last session of Congress, 
followed by 19 by Republican Sen. Bob Bennett, 18 from 3rd 
District Republican Rep. Chris Cannon and five from the lone 
Democrat on the state delegation, 2nd District Rep. Jim 
Matheson. 

Many bills were tag-team efforts that began with House 
members from Utah introducing a bill and shepherding it through 
calendars and committees, with Hatch and Bennett then carrying 
it through the Senate to the White House. That system resulted 
in passage of perks for the state like $15 million in federal 
funds toward a new $60 million Utah Museum of Natural History in 
Salt Lake City, $500,000 to St. George to purchase and preserve 
land containing hundreds of dinosaur footprints, and a land 
exchange in American Fork Canyon that clears the way for a new 
Forest Service/Park Service visitor center at Timpanogos Cave. 

Beyond those meat-and-potatoes positions, the state's 
delegation peppered their legislative portfolios with a 
smorgasbord of measures that reflect individual causes, crusades 
and committee assignments. Many of those measures were referred 
to committees and died with the final gavel, while some passed 
either alone or as part of other bills. Successful or not, they 
help shape future campaign platforms and curry favor among 
various special interest groups. 

Hatch's Horde: Hatch is not only the most prolific of the 
Utah delegation, but the most eclectic in the measures he 
sponsored. While his role as a conservative standard-bearer on 
legal and constitutional issues shines through on criminal 
penalties, immigration, taxes and terrorism, Hatch's bills also 
reflect his side job as a musical composer and author. 

He sponsored a measure to modify anti-trust laws to allow a 
standard contract form for playwrights to license their plays, 
and two bills he sponsored modifying copyright laws were folded 
into other legislation and passed. Hatch, who composes primarily 
religious music, also designated Aug. 4 last year as "Louis 
Armstrong Day" and officially dubbed today as "Blues Friday," 
part of the "Blues Heritage Appreciation Fortnight." 

Hatch has a penchant for designating official days and 
months that would fill a Franklin Day Planner. Under resolutions 
he sponsored in the past Congress, National Medical Services 
week was May 20, D"a de los Ni-os: Celebrating Young Americans 
Day was April 30, Patriot Day was Sept. 11, Family History Month 
was in October and Feed America Day was Nov. 21. 

As the past and future chairman of the Senate Judiciary 
Committee, Hatch put forward numerous adjustments and 
enhancements to the federal criminal code. On Nov. 2, President 
Bush signed into law a Hatch bill to fund new research into drug 
abuse treatment, develop drug prevention programs in rural 
communities and drug treatment programs in prisons and jails. 

Many of his bills dealt with immigration policy, from 
extending refugee status of unmarried sons and daughters of 
Vietnam refugees to extending the status of immigrants on 
certain visas if their immigration cases take too long to 
resolve. He also managed to pass a rare "private bill," 
legislation that waives immigration decisions for a specific 
individual and grants a foreign-born individual permanent U.S. 
residency by an act of Congress. 

Hansen's Adieu: Hansen's quiver of bills reflect not only 
his public-lands policy role as chairman of the House Resources 
Committee, but also his unending frustration with what he views 
as overly burdensome environmental protection laws. In the final 
week of his 22-year congressional career, Hansen introduced a 
bill to exempt military lands, private property and all plant 
life from the Endangered Species Act, even though he 
acknowledged the measure had no chance of passage in the waning 
107th. 

Elected on President ReaÂgan's coattails in 1980, Hansen 
sponsored an unsuccessful bill to establish a memorial to 
ReaÂgan in Washington, where the airport and a trade center 
already bear the president's name. He also introduced 
legislation to allow the two Wendovers to merge, but like many 
Resources Committee bills, it drew opposition in the Senate and 
died. life from the Endangered Species Act, even though he 
acknowledged the measure had no chance of passage in the waning 
107th. 

To get around the roadblock, Hansen attached his 
controversial bill to sell public land in Wyoming to The Church 
of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints -- which considers the spot 
called Martin's Cove sacred ground due to the deaths of a 
pioneer handcart company -- to an unrelated bill to compensate 
Midwest Indian tribes for lands lost to dam construction. 
Although the tribal bill had broad bipartisan support, 
Democratic sponsor Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle let it 
die, rather than oppose the wishes of Wyoming's two Republican 
senators, who fought Hansen's Martin's Cove bill. 

Martin's Cove took most of the headlines but Hansen's top 
priority was stealthy insertion of language into the 
defense-spending bill to create 500,000 acres of wilderness 
beneath the Utah Test and Training Range (UTTR) military 
aircraft fly zone to effectively block rail shipments to a 
planned nuclear waste repository in Skull Valley. 

The language was cut this month by congressional budget 
writers after Democrats complained Hansen failed to use the 
committee hearing system and environmental groups such as the 
Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA) opposed giving the 
military control over public land wilderness. 

"Unfortunately for the state of Utah, and the 1.5 million 
people who live on the Wasatch Front, Mormons and non-Mormons 
alike, your friends at SUWA spent considerable energy to defeat 
that bill," Hansen's committee Chief of Staff Tim Stewart wrote 
to the Western Land Exchange Project last week, a group which 
opposed the bill. "They now bear the significant share of 
responsibility and blame for the arrival of 40,000 tons of spent 
[nuclear] fuel to the state simply because they figured if Jim 
Hansen supported a proposal, then it must automatically be bad." 

Bennett's Broadband: Perhaps a holdover from being one of 
Congress' most ardent voices cautioning of Y2K computer woes, 
Bennett pushed a handful of tech-security measures in the 107th 
Congress. He sought to repeal the export controls on high 
performance computers and protect the Internet and other 
critical computer networks from cyberterrorists. Both measures 
were introduced before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. 

Bennett also tried to create a National Mormon Pioneer 
Heritage Area along U.S. 89 in Utah, a measure which stalled in 
committee, and, as part of a delegation initiative, sponsored 
the ill-fated Senate version of a bill to exchange state lands 
in the San Rafael Swell area of Utah for federal lands. That 
land swap imploded when Bureau of Land Management 
whistle-blowers claimed federal taxpayers were being 
shortchanged millions of dollars in a lopsided trade. 

Besides sponsoring the successful Utah Museum of Natural 
History and Timpanogos Cave Visitor Center bills for the 
delegation in the Senate, Bennett also sponsored the resolution 
that authorized the 2002 Winter Olympics Torch Relay to come 
onto the Capitol grounds. 

More than any other member of the delegation, Bennett has 
become directly involved in the leadership layer of Congress. 
His lobbying of fellow senators on behalf of Sen. Mitch 
McConnell for majority whip prior to the Nov. 5 GOP retaking of 
the Senate paid off this month when McConnell named Bennett his 
chief deputy whip. 

Cannon Fodder: Like Hatch in the Senate, Cannon's role on 
the House Judiciary Committee allows him to shape immigration 
policy. As a result, Cannon introduced measures that limit the 
wage employers must pay to migrant agricultural workers and to 
allow states to determine college tuition residency status for 
certain undocumented immigrants. 

But Cannon also dived into public-lands issues, sponsoring 
the San Rafael Swell land swap and a revision of the boundary of 
Glen Canyon National Recreation Area. The bill, which would add 
152 acres to the park and delete 370 acres in Kane County, 
cleared the full House and the Senate Energy Committee, but was 
left stranded on the Senate calendar. 

Cannon pushed through housekeeping adjustments in the 
Central Utah Water Project Completion Act and sought eligibility 
changes for people making claims under the Radiation Exposure 
Compensation Act. He also took aim at local telephone monopolies 
and the U.S. Census Bureau, sponsoring an unsuccessful measure 
to require the bureau to submit a detailed plan for counting 
overseas Americans in future census surveys -- a response to 
Utah's failed court bid to show LDS missionaries were 
undercounted in the 2000 census. 

In one of the highest-profile bills to come out of the 107th 
Congress, Cannon bolted from the GOP pack and was one of only 
six Republicans in the House this month to vote against 
establishing a new Department of Homeland Security. 

Matheson's Milieu: A small-state freshman congressman in the 
minority party is not the most productive status for getting 
legislation onto House committee calendars. So Democrat Matheson 
had to improvise at times. His bill to win federal funds for the 
Natural History Museum was introduced in April 2001, but after 
nearly a year languishing in the GOP-controlled House, Matheson 
agreed to let Hansen re-introduce an identical measure in March 
this year as primary sponsor. It sailed through. 

In the first session of the 107th, Matheson's bill to amend 
the tax code to permit a husband and wife to file a combined 
return with separate tax rates became part of another bill which 
was passed into law. His bills to authorize National Science 
Foundation grants for secondary schools and to direct the 
National Institutes of Standards and Technology to work on 
aviation security standards and performance-enhancing 
drug-testing standards died in committee. 

With Democrats controlling the Senate side during the second 
session of the 107th, Matheson said his party affiliation was an 
asset in helping pass Utah-related bills backed by the state's 
GOP-dominated delegation. 

"Obviously, I'm tooting my own horn, but I lobbied the 
Democratic leadership in the Senate to get these Utah bills 
through," he said. "It does benefit our state to have somebody 
on the other side of the aisle." 

csmith@sltrib.comBOX: Texts and legislative history of all 
bills introduced by Utah's congressional delegation in the 107th 
Congress are available from the Library of Congress' "Thomas" 
Web site, http://thomas.loc.govUtah Delegation's Bills 

Texts and legislative history of all bills introduced by 
Utah's congressional delegation in the 107th Congress are 
available from the Library of Congress' "Thomas" Web site, 
http://thomas.loc.gov 

© Copyright 2002, The Salt Lake Tribune All material found on 
*****************************************************************
 38 Experts: S.D. Quakes No Great Shakes 

Press &Dakotan - News 

11/29/02 

Home [http://www.yankton.net] 

Experts: S.D. Quakes No Great Shakes 

SIOUX FALLS (AP) -- South Dakota has had more than 70 
earthquakes since seismic record-keeping began in the 1800s, 
eight of them in the past decade. 

ŒŒYou don't get a lot of them, but every once in a while 
there's one,'' said Waverly Person, a geophysicist with the U.S. 
Geological Survey's National Earthquake Information Center in 
Golden, Colo. 

But all the quakes that hit the state have been relatively 
minor. 

Quakes in South Dakota are probably caused by the earth 
recovering from a time when glaciers compressed the ground, said 
Sarah Chadima, a geologist with the South Dakota Geological 
Survey. She compares it to a pillow expanding after a head rises 
off it. 

ŒŒThe earth is still rebounding from glacier compression 10,000 
years ago,'' Chadima said. ŒŒThat's our hypothesis.'' 

South Dakota's first quake of the new century occurred four 
months ago south of Huron. It registered a 3.1 on the Richter 
Scale; a magnitude that won't cause damage but can be felt 
indoors. 

But the quake that drew the most recent attention in the region 
took place eight miles south of the South Dakota border in 
Nebraska. The Nov. 3 quake had a magnitude of 4.3 and its 
epicenter was 30 miles northwest of O'Neill, Neb. 

Scientists consider earthquakes with Richter scale readings of 
4 to 4.9 to be minor quakes. About 17 in that range happen 
around the world every day. Fifty of South Dakota's recorded 
earthquakes had magnitudes of less than 3.5 and only one in the 
past 10 years was above 3.7, which does not pose much danger. 

But the Nebraska earthquake, which hit earlier this month, has 
rejuvenated discussion about a proposed low-level radioactive 
waste facility near Spencer. Although the facility is designed 
to withstand a considerable amount of pressure, some are now 
questioning whether it would stand up to an earthquake with a 
magnitude of 5.0 or higher. 

But Person said it is rare for an earthquake in the Midwest to 
have a magnitude of 4.9 or higher. 

Yankton Daily Press & Dakotan 
*****************************************************************
 39 "An eye for an eye ... "

United Press International <index.cfm>

*Blue Planet: Words that last forever*

By Dan Whipple UPI Science News Published 11/29/2002 3:19 PM

"To be or not to be, that is the question ... "

"Four score and seven years ago, our forefathers brought forth on this
continent, a new nation ... "

"Here's looking at you, kid!"

"I am not a crook."

Words, eloquent or profane, sometimes can burn themselves into 
the memory with such tenacity they cannot be removed. They become 
immortal within a culture, within history. Because we are 
primarily visual beings, images can carry even more power to 
attach themselves to our consciousness.

For the nuclear age, the enduring image is the mushroom cloud. 
With the atomic bomb came the hope of cheap, abundant and 
environmentally friendly nuclear power -- "power too cheap to 
meter," according to a once-popular catch phrase that somehow has 
turned out to be unenduring.

There are, at present, 430 nuclear reactors supplying 16 percent 
of the planet's electric power. In the United States, 104 
licensed nuclear power plants produce about 20 percent of the 
nation's power. Far from being cheap, nuclear-powered electricity 
is expensive and unpopular, even with those who benefit from it. 
Fifty-five of those 104 licensed plants are more than 20 years 
old and 47 are between 10 and 19 years old.

Construction of new nukes was dealt a double death blow, first in 
1979 with the Three Mile Island accident in Pennsylvania, and 
again in April 1986 with the Chernobyl nuclear power station 
catastrophe in the former Soviet state of Ukraine. The industry's 
credibility -- not high even its heyday -- never has recovered.

In theory, nuclear power could offer some considerable 
environmental advantages. Early in its history, many 
environmental groups embraced it as the clean fuel of the future. 
It contributes few emissions and no carbon dioxide hasten global 
warming.

A pretty strong case can be made that nuclear power is a 
preferable environmental choice over coal, which now provides 
about half of America's electricity. In his textbook, Energy, 
Gordon J. Aubrecht, a physics professor at Ohio State University, 
estimates that, each year, a single 1,000 megawatt coal-fired 
power plant causes 25 fatalities, 60,000 cases of respiratory 
disease and $12 million in property damage, as well emitting the 
oxides of nitrogen equivalent of 20,000 automobiles.

In contrast, according to Aubrecht, the estimated annual cost per 
person of the entire nuclear power cycle -- from uranium mining 
to power generation -- in terms of health risk and industrial 
accidents is about 10 cents. Instead of 60,000 cases of 
respiratory disease from a 1,000-megawatt coal plant, the 
same-sized nuclear plant can be expected to generate 0.158 cases 
of radiation cancer, and no NOx.

Nonetheless, the nuclear industry's track record of haphazard 
performance, overblown promises and less-than-forthright public 
face has left potential customers extremely wary of further 
investments.

Yet the discipline of the marketplace is in one sense meaningless 
when it comes to nuclear power.

Using nuclear reactors means tapping the enormous energy reserves 
within heavy atoms to generate electricity. The process leaves 
behind some potent jetsam. Reactor waste is among the most 
dangerous substances known. It can remain fatally radioactive for 
more than 10,000 years -- for some materials, millions of years.

In the United States alone, there are nearly 40,000 tons of 
nuclear waste sitting in temporary storage facilities. The 
unprecedented technical challenge is to keep those materials 
perfectly contained through their entire hazardous lifetimes. To 
borrow from Gene Kranz, the Apollo 13 mission flight director, a 
99-percent success rate is not an option.

The Department of Energy's solution is to bury the waste in the 
ground beneath Yucca Mountain in Nevada. The government hopes to 
have Yucca Mountain up and operating by 2010 and out of business 
with a final decommissioning about 100 years later. So, for 100 
years, the government will be keeping watch over the facility. 
But what about the following 10,000 years? How do you keep people 
away for that long? Put up a sign?

In terms of human civilization, 10,000 years more than covers it. 
Writing appeared only about 6,000 years ago, around the same time 
that, according to the famous Biblical chronology drawn up by 
Bishop James Ussher in 1650, the world was created. To be 
specific, according to Ussher, Creation occurred on the 23rd of 
October in 4004 B.C. So a Biblical creationist would expect the 
Yucca Mountain site to last 40 percent longer than the history of 
the Earth so far.

More likely, over the next 10,000 years civilization will 
experience ups and downs similar to the darker and more 
enlightened ages we've seen in the past 10,000. We assume that 
our records will survive somehow, but if they don't, the 
responsible thing to do is figure out how to communicate to 
future generations the dangers buried at Yucca Mountain.

In 1984, linguist Thomas A. Sebeok was commissioned by the Office 
of Nuclear Waste Isolation, and a group of other institutions, to 
tackle this problem. Sebeok found there was no solution, no 
permanent universal language that will say "Danger! Keep Out!" 
forever. Words and pictures depend on context, and over 10,000 
years, context vanishes. Only a few generations after the last 
pharaoh, the knowledge of how to translate Egyptian hieroglyphics 
had disappeared.

In "The Search for the Perfect Language," Umberto Eco wrote about 
Sebeok's findings: "Almost immediately, Sebeok discarded the 
possibility of any type of verbal communication, of electric 
signals as needing a constant power supply, of olfactory messages 
as being of brief duration, and of any sort of ideogram based on 
convention. Even a pictographic language seemed problematic. 
Sebeok analyzed an image from an ancient primitive culture where 
one can certainly recognize human figures, but it is hard to say 
what they are doing -- dancing, fighting, or hunting?"

Sebeok did suggest one possibity, but it mostly did public 
relations damage to the nuclear industry. He said maybe the U.S. 
could establish a committee that becomes an "atomic priesthood," 
passing down the information from one generation to the next, 
evolving with time into both a taboo reaching back into the 
immemorial past and being translated into contemporary terms with 
the passage of time.

The priesthood was never established. Yet the problem remains. 
Even if all 430 of the world's reactors shut down today, the 
waste will sit, still lacking an effective disposal technology. 
It goes on and on, outlasting language, civilization and 
technology. Why do governments continue to permit further 
production of this material while this critical problem remains 
unsolved?

Copyright © 2002 United Press International
*****************************************************************
 40 NTS Editor's Note: The silence is deafening

Thursday, November 28, 2002
 Copyright © Las Vegas Mercury 
 
The Nevada Test Site served a vital purpose during the Cold War. 
It was a key player in demonstrating U.S. military might at a 
time when tensions with the Soviet Union were at their height. 
More than 900 nuclear explosions occurred there above and below 
the ground from 1950-1992--constant reminders of America's 
determination. 

Nevadans generally embraced the test site. It provided thousands 
of good-paying jobs. It drew tourists to the burgeoning resort 
town 65 miles south. More important, it was a point of pride that 
little ol' Nevada was playing a major role in the seemingly 
life-or-death battle against communism. 

At first, Nevadans did not realize they were paying a price for 
this unqualified support. The dangers of nuclear testing were not 
publicly known in the early 1950s, when the Atomic Energy 
Commission was exploding nuclear weapons above ground, creating 
huge radioactive mushroom clouds that drifted hundreds of miles 
through the air. Little did citizens know that the radioactive 
particles emanating from those tests would cause cancer in humans 
and animals in Nevada, Utah and beyond. 

The AEC covered up evidence that aboveground tests posed a 
significant threat to the American people. Once those dangers 
became undeniable, the AEC, which morphed into the Department of 
Energy, conducted nuclear tests underground, a procedure that 
reduced the fallout but contaminated the groundwater beneath the 
test site. Still, knowing all that, most Nevadans continued to 
support the nuclear testing program, in the belief that the 
sacrifices paled in comparison to the task of deterring nuclear 
war and defeating the Soviets. 

After the Berlin Wall crumbled in 1989, the Cold War thawed and 
the Soviet Union (now Russia) no longer posed a threat to our 
very existence, pressure mounted to suspend nuclear testing. 
Years of empty talk of nuclear disarmament--surely the dream of 
anyone spooked by Cold War images of widespread death and 
destruction--finally gained weight. A nuclear testing moratorium 
took effect in 1992, approved by the first President George Bush. 

Nevada, enjoying a massive economic expansion in Las Vegas, 
hardly noticed as employment at the test site dwindled. A few 
lamented the test site's diminished role and started working to 
"repurpose" it for other projects. Some relatively minor projects 
were located at the test site, but the giant facility has 
remained largely dormant over the past 10 years. 

That could change if President George W. Bush's hawkish 
administration gets its way. Rumors, predictions and news reports 
are pouring out of Washington concerning a proposal to resume 
nuclear testing. The changing world political picture--now 
dominated by fear of rogue nations and maniacal terrorists rather 
than the monolithic Red Menace--suggests to some conservative and 
military leaders that testing is needed to update and expand the 
U.S. nuclear arsenal. 

For Nevada, however, the equation has changed since the state's 
warm embrace of test site operations in decades past. Or has it? 
The silence has been deafening in the fields of Nevada politics 
since talk of renewed testing began. 

Nonetheless, here's the new story: 

¥ The Southern Nevada economy has grown and matured to the extent 
that a few thousand new jobs at the test site would not have a 
significant impact. Some outlying towns such as Indian Springs 
and Beatty no doubt would benefit from resumed nuclear testing as 
some workers would settle there. But for the most part, Southern 
Nevada no longer needs to roll out a red carpet for would-be 
employers that nobody else wants. 

¥ The government's plan to dump thousands of tons of high-level 
nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain, adjacent to the test site, has 
helped to change Nevada's comfort level when it comes to 
sacrificing for the good of its country. For almost 20 years, a 
large majority of Nevadans has opposed the nuclear waste dump as 
a health and safety danger and an unfair burden on a state that 
does not host a single nuclear power plant. The feeling has been 
expressed repeatedly that Nevada has more than done its part in 
the quest for world peace. And in light of Yucca Mountain, state 
support for nuclear testing in the Nevada desert would be a 
supreme act of hypocrisy. 

¥ Lacking a single, identifiable enemy such as the Soviet Union, 
the United States will be hardpressed to justify a resumption of 
testing to the world. It has been the United States that has led 
the charge to reduce nuclear arsensals and actively discourage 
previously non-nuclear nations from developing atomic weapons. 
One can reasonably predict that if the United States were to 
resume nuclear testing, it would signal to other nations that 
they could join the nuclear party with impunity. 

And yet, knowing all this, Nevada political leaders are strangely 
silent, either oblivious to the Bush administration's 
well-publicized plans or unwilling to appear weak in the warped 
post-9/11 world. 

The United States does not need to resume nuclear testing. Most 
scientists agree that testing of this kind is not required to 
maintain the U.S. nuclear arsenal, not to mention the fact that 
reviving the testing program could spur nuclear proliferation 
across the globe. 

What's more, Nevada does not need or want nuclear testing to 
resume. It's certainly not needed to boost the economy, and it's 
not wanted because of the environmental and human damage it would 
cause. But who in Nevada's corridors of power will be bold enough 
to say so? 

--GEOFF SCHUMACHER
 
Copyright © Las Vegas Mercury, 2001 - 2002 Stephens Media 
*****************************************************************
 41 Russian trapped in new spy war

Scotsman.com <http://www.scotsman.com/>

/TOM PARFITT IN MOSCOW/

A RUSSIAN scholar is facing 14 years in jail for treason over 
claims he passed state secrets to a shadowy British consultancy 
firm that prosecutors say was a CIA front.

Sitting in the cramped cell of a former KGB prison in Moscow, 
Igor Sutyagin curses the day four years ago when he attended a 
conference on international relations at the University of 
Birmingham.

There the academic, from the respected USA-Canada Institute of 
the Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow, met a British man and 
his woman associate claiming to work for a public relations and 
marketing firm.

The pursuit of Sutyagin - who vehemently denies being a spy, but 
has spent three years in jail - marks the latest in a series of 
high-profile spy trials in Russia.

The arrest of several researchers, academics and writers on 
dubious espionage charges has provoked fears of a growing role 
for the security services following the rise to power of 
President Vladimir Putin, a former KGB colonel.

Human rights groups say the prosecutions are a return to a 
Soviet-style effort to discourage contact with foreigners.

Sutyagin, 38, says he used public sources to provide London-based 
Alternative Futures company with a press digest on military and 
economic matters.

But the London-based firm and its mysterious staff vanished 
without trace, leaving Sutyagin in the lurch and in prison. He 
was alleged to have committed "high treason in the form of 
espionage", but the specific charges against him only emerged 
this month.

Sutyagin?s lawyer confirmed to The Scotsman that the academic is 
charged with using visits to the UK in the late 1990s to pass 
state secrets to Alternative Futures, now described as a hoax PR 
firm controlled by US intelligence.

A first case against him collapsed last year, but prosecutors are 
now seeking a 14-year jail term. Treason prosecutions rarely fail 
in Russia.

The case follows last year?s trial of Grigory Pasko, a journalist 
who revealed the Russian navy?s practice of dumping nuclear waste 
in the Sea of Japan. He was sentenced to four years in a 
hard-labour camp.

Sutyagin, an arms control specialist, has languished in jail 
since agents from Russia?s Federal Security Service (FSB), the 
successor to the KGB, ransacked his flat in the town of Kaluga. 
They confiscated notes, computers and a copy of Tom Clancy?s Cold 
War thriller, The Hunt for Red October.

The FSB alleges that Sutyagin, after lecturing on NATO-Russia 
relations at Birmingham, began a series of meetings with the UK 
firm. They say he handed over material on missile defence, combat 
readiness, strategic nuclear weapons, rocket production and 
modernisation of the MiG-29 jet fighter.

Sutyagin, who earned about £80 a month as an academic, was paid 
£12,000 by Alternative Futures over 18 months, his defence team 
said. The information he handed over came from openly published 
sources, it claims.

Sutyagin?s family is baffled by his imprisonment, claiming the 
researcher was a mild-mannered patriot who loved his work and his 
daughters Nastya, 11, and Oksana, 12.

His wife, Irina Sutyagina, refuses to give up hope. "To survive I 
have to believe. I can only hope they will eventually come to 
their senses and realise their case against Igor is absurd."

Mr Putin?s critics see a reviving role for the security services 
in Russia since he was propelled into the limelight.

"Putin comes from a KGB background and he is comfortable with the 
way those people work," says Alexei Simonov, president of the 
Glasnost Defence Foundation, a human rights watchdog.

Mr Simonov feels the FSB singles out Sutyagin and others as "easy 
targets".

"Such prosecutions help distract from the fact that when a real 
crisis like the hostage-taking in Moscow comes along the security 
services are completely incompetent."

 ©2002 scotsman.com <http://www.scotsman.com> | contact
*****************************************************************
 42 Who's playing hide and seek?

Al-Ahram Weekly | Region | 

  [Al-Ahram Weekly Online]           28 Nov. - 4 Dec. 2002

 Issue No. 614

Site map [http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/issues.htm]   
  Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875       

With United Nations weapons inspectors resuming their mission in 
Iraq, Saddam Hussein's hour of truth seems near, writes Salah 
Hemeid 

This week, UN arms experts entrusted with the daunting task of 
uncovering and dismantling Iraq's weapons of mass destruction 
dusted off their Baghdad offices after four year's absence and 
were ready to resume their hunt for the lethal arsenal. 

Seventeen inspectors, the first contingent of a 300-strong group, 
arrived to restart inspections on Wednesday, when they are 
expected to revisit sites inspected in the 1990s. Half a dozen 
staff members, along with communications gear and computers, were 
flown in from a UN base in Cyprus to set up a logistics system 
for the operation that will determine if Iraq is in possession of 
these weapons or not. 

The inspectors, part of the UN Monitoring, Verification and 
Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC), are back in Iraq under the 
provisions of Security Council resolution 1441 passed on 7 
November, and have demanded the Iraqis give up any weapons of 
mass destruction or face "serious consequences". The resolution 
also requires the Baghdad government to make a declaration by 8 
December regarding any weapons of mass destruction, facilities to 
manufacture them, and "all other chemical, biological, and 
nuclear programmes", even those not related to military use. 

Even before the mission was relaunched, Iraq hit out. Iraqi 
Foreign Minister Naji Sabri complained that the Security Council 
resolution on weapons inspections provides a pretext for the 
United States to wage war against his country. "There is 
premeditation to target Iraq, whatever the pretext," he told 
Secretary-General Kofi Annan in an angry letter broadcast by the 
Iraqi official media. 

Citing a long list of grievances, the Iraqi foreign minister 
explained that key paragraphs in the resolution are "unjust and 
unprecedented". He sharply criticised paragraph 4 of the 
resolution, which says "false statements or omissions" in Iraq's 
declaration of its weapons or weapons programmes -- including 
chemical, biological and nuclear programmes which it claims are 
peaceful -- could contribute to a finding that it had committed a 
"material breach" of the resolution; a finding that might lead to 
military action. 

In his 25-page letter, Sabri also complained that the resolution 
gives the inspectors "unjust powers", such as the right to 
conduct interviews with citizens inside the country without the 
presence of a government official, to ask them to leave their 
country with their families for interviews, to demand lists of 
the names of all scientists and researchers, or to remove 
equipment without notifying the Iraqi government. 

Sabri urged members of the UN Security Council to ensure that the 
weapons inspectors are committed "to their obligations according 
to the UN charter and ... the United Nations' goals".

If they remain committed, he wrote, they will "uncover the false 
US accusations". Sabri said the United States and Britain had 
failed to back up their allegations that Iraq retained some 
chemical or biological weapons and is believed to have reinstated 
its weapons programmes. 

But UN officials suggested that such statements, issued on the 
eve of the resumption of the weapons inspections, might not be a 
hopeful sign. Annan immediately responded, saying that 
inspections are Iraq's only option to avoid war. Mohamed 
Al-Baradei, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency 
(IAEA), assured Iraq that weapons inspectors will carry out their 
job in "a neutral and realistic way". 

But in a press conference in Cairo he dismissed Iraq's claim that 
resolution 1441 was a pretext for war, saying that Iraq's 
compliance with the terms of the resolution, and cooperation with 
the inspectors, will make war avoidable. But British Prime 
Minister Tony Blair, the closest ally of the US, warned Saddam 
not to play again the game of "hide and seek" with the UNMOVIC 
inspectors, as he did with those of the defunct UN Special 
Committee (UNSCOM). 

The Bush Administration, though content to see inspectors back in 
Iraq and holding a wide range of powers, seems to be bracing 
itself for the most likely outcome -- that the inspectors will 
find nothing. The general view is that this will be the trigger 
for US- led military action against Iraq. Indeed, pro- war 
sentiments never abated in Washington, even though the inspectors 
are currently at work in Baghdad. An American magazine disclosed 
on Saturday that a consensus is forming within the Bush 
Administration on how to govern Iraq in the event of a successful 
US military campaign against Baghdad. The administration 
envisions an initial period of military rule. 

US News and World Report said senior Bush Administration 
officials are mulling over a three-stage plan for governing a 
post- war Iraq. The plan was put together by an inter-agency task 
force dubbed the Executive Steering Group. 

The Report stated that administration officials have been 
debating the plan for the past several weeks and have made 
several decisions regarding post-Saddam Iraq, including a 
decision not to create a provisional government or a government 
in exile. 

The magazine said that under the first phase envisioned by the 
plan, Iraq would be ruled by the military and that there would 
almost certainly be an American general. 

The second phase, according to the magazine, would take the form 
of some sort of international civilian administration, entailing 
diminished US military presence and the Iraqis being given an 
increased amount of responsibility in government. 

Under the third phase, power would be transferred to a 
representative, multi-ethnic Iraqi government after some sort of 
constitutional convention. It said President Bush has been kept 
abreast of progress on the plan but had not yet been asked to 
approve any specific aspects. The magazine said the "general 
hope" was that the period of military rule would last somewhere 
between six months and a year. The most optimistic officials see 
an Iraqi government in place within two years, it said. 

To push developments towards war and military occupation, 
Washington may force a crisis in conjunction with the 
inspections, which many observers believe could come right after 
the 8 December deadline. If the Bush Administration considers 
Iraq's declaration as neither complete nor final, its anti-Saddam 
rhetoric will certainly fall on fertile soil. But Washington 
first has to prove it to the world. 
  
© Copyright Al-Ahram Weekly. All rights reserved
 
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 43 9-11 forced OR radiation team to expand its mission

By Frank Munger, News-Sentinel senior writer

November 29, 2002

OAK RIDGE - For a month following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 
11, 2001, Dr. Robert Ricks and his senior staff of radiation 
specialists camped out at Andrews Air Force Base on high alert. 
They were part of the U.S. government's emergency-response team 
deployed near the nation's capital to deal with any new crises 
that might arise, including a nuclear attack. 

Other threats did not materialize, so the assembled specialists 
at Andrews had time to share thoughts on the new reality and 
jump-start preparations for an uncertain future with terrorism. 
"Everybody's lives have changed as a result of those events, and 
certainly REACTS is no exception," said Ricks, director of the 
Radiation Emergency Assistance Center/Training Site in Oak Ridge. 

Since 1976, the Oak Ridge unit has responded to radiation 
accidents around the world - ranging from the reactor explosion 
at Chernobyl to smaller scale incidents in which individuals 
unwittingly exposed themselves to radioactive materials. 

But those were accidents, not terror attacks, and Sept. 11 forced 
Ricks and others to broaden their thoughts about what's possible 
and how to respond. 

For instance, the ramifications of a "dirty bomb" - radioactive 
materials dispersed with explosives - could be much greater than 
the physical harm done to an exposed population, Ricks said. 
"These devices will create a considerable amount of psychological 
concern. That's the primary statement terrorists want to make. 
You didn't have to live in New York City to be affected by 9-11. 
So those psychological consequences will require a lot of 
attention." 

As such, it's imperative that psychologists or psychiatrists be 
included in teams responding to radiation scenes, Ricks said. 
REACTS is funded by the U.S. Department of Energy and 
collaborates with the World Health Organization. 

One of its primary missions is to train medical professionals to 
respond to radiation accidents, and more than 5,000 people - 
including about 1,800 physicians - have attended REACTS courses 
in the United States and abroad. 

Those courses have changed over the past year. 

"We've added training modules on terrorism, where we talk about 
the way in which a terrorist individual or group might use rad 
materials and what the consequences could be with regard to 
radiation injuries," Ricks said. 

The Oak Ridge staff also has undergone training to better link 
REACTS to other parts of the U.S. response to terrorism. 

"We've been working more closely with CDC (the Centers for 
Disease Control) and with certain medical groups that deal with 
radiation-related matters," he said. "Particularly in regard to 
an event that causes mass casualties, the medical community needs 
to pull together." 

Frank Munger can be reached at 865-482-9213 or 
twig1@knoxnews.infi.net.                                
 				
Copyright © 2002 The Knoxville News-Sentinel Co. All Rights 
Reserved. 
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 44 Center urges obtaining radiation drugs

By Frank Munger, News-Sentinel senior writer

November 29, 2002

OAK RIDGE - Radiation specialists here are recommending that the 
government stockpile two drugs - DTPA and Prussian Blue - to 
prepare for possible terrorist attacks with "dirty bombs." The 
drugs can be used to treat people contaminated with radioactive 
materials, but both are listed as "investigational" by the Food 
and Drug Administration and are not commercially available. 

Currently, the Radiation Emergency Assistance Center/Training 
Site in Oak Ridge has the only supply of the drugs in the United 
States, and that supply is limited. 

"We have looked at special drugs with the possibility of adding 
those to the National Pharmaceutical Stockpile, and we've 
developed a proposal on how that could be done," said Dr. Robert 
Ricks, a radiation biologist who directs the emergency center. 
The Oak Ridge proposal was submitted to the Centers for Disease 
Control, he said. 

There are growing concerns that terrorists unable to field the 
technology and materials to build an atomic bomb may use 
explosives to blow up highly radioactive products and expose 
large numbers of people. These radiation-dispersal devices - 
so-called dirty bombs - could create panic in urban centers and 
put a strain on medical resources. 

The National Pharmaceutical Stockpile is an evolving asset that 
could include a variety of more commonly available medicines and 
supplies needed for a mass-casualty event, Ricks said. 

"It's a matter of trying to stockpile enough drugs for whatever 
the needs might be," he said. 

DTPA (diethylene triamine penta-acetic acid) helps the body shed 
internal concentrations of so-called transuranic elements - such 
as plutonium, curium and americium. Prussian Blue (potassium 
ferricyanoferrate) can be used to treat people exposed to 
radioactive cesium and thallium. 

Because the drugs are not approved for commercial sale in the 
United States, REACTS acquires them from a German company with 
FDA approval. The federally funded center uses the drugs to treat 
accident victims or workers exposed to the radioactive materials 
at Department of Energy facilities, including those in Oak Ridge. 

Ricks said his group is working with FDA and the new Department 
of Homeland Security to get the U.S. status of the drugs changed 
from "investigational" to "new drug." 

"That would make them more readily available to the medical 
community in times of need," he said. 

In the current situation, U.S. physicians have to file a request 
with REACTS to get one of the drugs and then agree to become a 
co-investigator, Ricks said. 

Even though DTPA has been used to treat radiation victims for 
nearly 50 years, it remains officially under evaluation by the 
FDA because there's no compelling commercial need, Ricks said. It 
has been administered to about 700 people over the past 
half-century, he said. 

Ricks said REACTS has kept DTPA on the shelf ever since the 
response unit was created in 1976. The Oak Ridge center began 
stocking Prussian Blue in 1997. 

Prussian Blue was used extensively at a 1987 nuclear accident in 
Goiania, Brazil, where hundreds of Brazilians were contaminated 
with radioactive cesium from an abandoned medical-therapy source. 
Its effectiveness in that accident prompted REACTS to seek 
approval for its use. 

Frank Munger can be reached at 865-482-9213 or 
twig1@knoxnews.infi.net.                                
 				
Copyright © 2002 The Knoxville News-Sentinel Co. All Rights 
Reserved. 
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 45 The Incredible Mind of Einstein

The New York Times 

November 29, 2002*  

*By PHILIP M. BOFFEY*

It comes as a shock to realize that Albert Einstein, whose 
theories still seem so futuristic and Star Trekky, did his first 
pathfinding work almost a century ago. In honor of his epochal 
achievements, the American Museum of Natural History has jumped 
the gun on centennial celebrations with an Einstein exhibition. 
It uses child-friendly visual aids to make the science 
comprehensible, humanizes the great physicist by including his 
letters to lovers and children, and traces the social activism 
that generated an F.B.I. dossier of 1,427 pages and an offer to 
be president of Israel.

Einstein's towering intellectual achievement was his two 
relativity theories ? the special theory of relativity, which 
spawned the most famous equation of all time (E=mc2) and led to 
atomic energy and nuclear bombs, and the general theory of 
relativity, which still provides the best explanation of gravity 
? and might still elude us had he never existed.

Fortunately for the museumgoer, Einstein thought mostly in terms 
of pictures. The visitor gets to grasp the core idea of special 
relativity ? that time and space are not absolutes but change 
with the viewpoint of the observer. An exhibit shows that time, 
as measured by a "light clock," appears to slow down when the 
clock is moving. Curators swear that children as young as 10 have 
understood the exhibit in field tests, but trained "Einstein 
explainers" hover to help anyone who looks befuddled. The visitor 
also gets to understand the core idea of general relativity ? 
that gravity is not a force exerted by one body on another but 
rather the result of objects warping the geometry of space-time. 
This is brought home by watching how a heavy ball distorts a 
trampoline-like surface and causes other objects to roll toward 
it.

When British astronomers confirmed one of the most astonishing 
predictions of general relativity in 1919, namely that the sun's 
gravity bends light from distant stars, Einstein was catapulted 
to international fame. Yet when the Nobel Prize jurors honored 
him in 1921, they timidly ignored his daring relativity theories 
and gave him the prize instead for explaining the photoelectric 
effect.

Einstein's commanding reputation gave him an unparalleled 
opportunity to influence public affairs. When refugee scientists 
became concerned that Hitler might get an atom bomb, they 
persuaded Einstein, who had not even realized that such a bomb 
was possible, to write to President Franklin Roosevelt warning 
him of the danger. That led to the Manhattan Project and 
ultimately, despite the wishes of Einstein and many nuclear 
physicists, the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

For the rest of his life, Einstein used his great celebrity to 
support social and humanitarian causes. He campaigned against 
racism, nationalism, anti-Semitism and McCarthyism while calling 
on nations to renounce nuclear weapons and form a world 
government. His rumpled demeanor, shaggy hair and expressive eyes 
put a human face on science. Meanwhile, the great physicist 
worked fruitlessly for the last three decades of his life trying 
to develop a grand unified theory that would combine his own 
general relativity with the other great development in 
20th-century physics, quantum mechanics. That goal continues to 
elude the best minds in physics. It may not be reached until a 
new Einstein comes along.

Copyright The New York Times Company
    
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