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NUCLEAR
Ship carrying nuclear waste draws ire
France mulls new nuclear reactor to preserve energy options
Iran security chief to meet IAEA head ahead of key nuclear report
Iran 'Vigorously' Pursued WMD First Half 2003 - CIA
Countdown to Armageddon?
Japan's opposition gains
North Korea envoy says nuclear deterrent ready to use
Clinton - Bush should offer non-aggression pact to North Korea
N.Korea Envoy Says Nuclear Deterrent Ready to Use
N. Korea warns of nuke seizure
US warns N Korea on power plant
S. Korea: North Using Plants As Leverage
CIA Says N.Korea Already Has 'Validated' Nuke
Musharraf denies transfer of nuke technology to North Korea
U.S. Helps Russia Repatriate Weapons Usable Reactor Fuel
Russia to Step Up Retrieval of Uranium
The bomb is back
Panel backs 'battlefield' nukes
DOE to phase out exams for ex-workers
Nuclear Weapons Lab Loses 12 Keys New Locks Could Cost $1.7 Million
Louisiana Energy Services touts uranium plant in New Mexico
A-Plant's Foes Challenge U.S. on Safety Plan
Oak Ridge nuclear-waste plant nears startup
Audit Faults Energy Dept. Nuke Program
Two Wis. Utilities to Sell Nuclear Plant
Clark urges creating new agency for Iraq
China consults Powell on North Korea talks
House Approves $401 Billion Defense Bill
Clinton calls for aid to end arms crisis
Albright "Apologizes"
MILITARY
Briefly - Asia
Japan Rethinks Military's Role
Anthrax Scare Leads to Closing of Mail Centers in Washington
Pentagon Agrees to Compromise on Boeing Tankers
CHINA - Joint team eliminates Japan's chemical arms
Collective Punishment for Downing Black Hawk?
Six Killed in U.S. Helicopter Crash in Iraq
Iraq Attacks Kill 2 U.S. Soldiers and Polish Officer
Bremer Plans to Enlarge, Refocus Iraq Occupation Authority
Sharon Urges Trade of 400 Arabs for an Israeli and Remains of 3
Israelis Try to Block Prisoner Swap
Israeli Troops Kill Four Palestinians
Bush Asks Lands in Mideast to Try Democratic Ways
Turkey Won't Send Troops to Iraq
Musharraf Says Pakistan Will Match India Arms Spree
Pentagon Says a Covert Force Hunts Hussein
Defense Department Tests ChemBio Radar in Oklahoma
Pentagon to rotate troops, reduce Iraq force strength
Pentagon To Shrink Iraq Force
Lynch criticises Pentagon film of her rescue as Iraq debate rages
Jessica Lynch Criticizes U.S. Accounts of Her Ordeal
World Court: U.S. Wrong to Hit Platforms
POLICE / PRISONERS / COURTS / JUSTICE
9/11 Panel May Reject Offer of Limited Access to Briefings
Gov't Warns of al - Qaida Cargo Plane Plot
Anthrax scare closes more facilities
ENERGY AND OTHER
Solar Energy Lights Florida Classrooms
Groundbreaking solar cell plant to be set up in Philippines
Written in Private, Energy Bill to Go Public
Senators and Attorneys General Seek Investigation Into E.P.A. Rules Change
U.N. Postpones Debate on Human Cloning
Lilly announces link between new antipsychotics and diabetes
ACTIVISTS
Enola Gay Exhibit Criticized for Omitting Japanese Casualties
Bill for the resignation of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld
Berkeley resolution: Nuke plant should be closed
-------- NUCLEAR
-------- accidents and safety
Ship carrying nuclear waste draws ire
November 07, 2003
(UPI)
http://www.washtimes.com/upi-breaking/20031107-103537-1799r.htm
BUENOS AIRES, Argentina, Nov. 7 -- An Argentine judge had issued an order preventing a ship loaded with spent nuclear fuel from sailing through Argentine national waters.
The Spanish language news service EFE said Federal Judge Federico Calvete's decision implies the Argentine coast guard will prevent the "Fret Moselle," loaded with 344 rods of spent enriched uranium (U-235), from entering Argentine waters.
But coast guard spokesmen told EFE they have not received any orders to bar the passage of the ship, which sailed from Botany Bay in Australia on Oct. 27, bound for The Hague, from where the cargo will be transported to France.
The judge's ruling granted a request from an environmental group that argued the Argentine Constitution expressly forbids the entry of radioactive waste.
Although the "Fret Moselle" has not reported what course it intends to sail, Argentine and Chilean environmental organizations believe the ship will sail around Cape Horn, at the southernmost tip of South America, next week.
Chilean opposition lawmakers also urged President Ricardo Lagos to prevent the ship from sailing around the cape.
-------- europe
France mulls new nuclear reactor to preserve energy options
PARIS (AFP)
Nov 07, 2003
http://www.spacewar.com/2003/031107164621.vqx5zynq.html
France said Friday it was considering building a prototype next-generation nuclear reactor to keep its options open in the face of an aging system that produces 80 percent of the country's electricity.
The announcement drew instant protest from environmental groups, which have successfully pushed Germany into a gradual withdrawal from nuclear power.
Junior Industry Minister Nicole Fontaine said the government had decided it needed to keep "all options open" when it decides between 2012 and 2015 whether to renew its nuclear power sector.
Presenting an energy "white paper", or outline policy plan, to the press, Fontaine emphasized that it does not give a blank check to the new nuclear reactor but "another choice would hardly be responsible".
The white paper said that as nuclear power plants came to the end of their lives around 2020 "France will have to be in a position to be able to decide whether or not to replace all or part of the total with a new nuclear series".
At issue, it said, was "maintenance of France's energy independence, low greenhouse gases and stable and moderate electricity prices".
The white paper calls for the construction of a new-generation European nuclear reactor (EPR) within the next eight years. Its cost, estimated at three billion euros (3.42 billion dollars), would be financed by a European partnership of industrial groups.
The Franco-German EPR project, developed since 1992 by the French state Areva group's subsidiary Framatome-ANP and Siemen, could construct a prototype and connect it to the network by 2010-2012 for testing.
France has 58 pressurized-water nuclear reactors in 19 power stations, most of which were built in the 1980s. They provide about 80 percent of the electricity consumed in France and are believed to have a lifespan of about 40 years.
Fontaine said that a test version was vital because technology was evolving rapidly in terms of safety.
A prototype would also improve the way any new power stations were financed and located, she said.
However, she effectively ruled out the possibility the country could give up nuclear power in 2015. "It's imaginable, but it's necessary to remain serious and responsible."
Fontaine said two requirements had shaped the white paper's proposals: energy independence and respect for the environment.
The government aims to increase thermal energy from renewable resources, mainly wood, by 50 percent by 2015, she said.
In line with a European Union directive, the white paper foresees the development of renewable resources to supply 21 percent of electricity consumption by 2010.
Nuclear energy is a highly controversial subject in many countries, but less so in France, where the French pride themselves on their energy independence.
Lacking major energy resources, apart from a dwindling coal industry, France decided decades ago to go nuclear. By contrast, Italy, for example, adopted a non-nuclear strategy and is now a major customer of French electricity exports, a dependency painfully highlighted by the massive and costly blackout across the Italian peninsula last summer.
A report by the International Energy Agency on Monday sounded the alarm about a looming world energy crisis, saying the electricity sector would swallow up the bulk of the 16 trillion dollars (13.9 trillion euros) needed to meet demand over the next 30 years.
France's announcement Friday sparked outrage among anti-nuclear groups and environmentalists.
The Network to Get Out of Nuclear called for a nationwide protest demonstration on January 17 in Paris.
And Greenpeace, which also is lobbying for France to abandon its nuclear dependence, said the government's plan was "a grave error".
"It mortgages away any alternative option," said Frederic Martignac of Greenpeace-France.
-------- iran
Iran security chief to meet IAEA head ahead of key nuclear report
VIENNA (AFP)
Nov 07, 2003
http://www.spacewar.com/2003/031107172514.yf600ft4.html
Iran's national security chief, Hasan Rowhani, is to hold talks Saturday with the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) ahead of a much-awaited IAEA report on Tehran's nuclear activities.
The United Nations' nuclear watchdog has demanded that Iran stop enriching uranium, which could be used to build a bomb and agree to snap IAEA inspections of its nuclear facilities.
Rowhani is to meeting with IAEA director general Mohamed ElBaradei at the UN agency's headquarters in Vienna.
ElBaradei is in charge of drafting a new IAEA report on whether Iran has honored its commitments under the international nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
The United States accuses Iran, which is building a nuclear power reactor with Russian help, of secretly trying to develop nuclear weapons but Tehran vehemently denies the charge.
ElBaradei's report will be discussed by the IAEA's board of governors on November 20. If the governors find Tehran is not in compliance with the NPT, they could submit the issue to the UN Security Council, which could impose sanctions.
ElBaradei's report is to be released to IAEA member states before the November 20 meeting, perhaps as early as next Monday.
In September the UN nuclear watchdog gave Iran until October 31 to prove it was not secretly developing atomic weapons.
On October 23, a week before the deadline, Tehran submitted a report on its nuclear activities to the IAEA and insisted its nuclear program were strictly peaceful.
It also agreed, when the British, French and German foreign ministers visited Tehran on October 21, to suspend the enrichment of uranium.
But the suspension has yet to come into effect and the Islamic republic has still to satisfy the IAEA's demand that it to sign a protocol to the NPT that would permit UN nuclear inspectors to make unannounced visits to suspect sites.
"It's clear they have a lot to talk about," a diplomat close to the IAEA said of Saturday's meeting between the Iranian security chief and ElBaradei.
Ali Akbar Salehi, Iran's ambassador to the IAEA, told AFP Rowhani would try to clarify the "technicalities" of suspending Iran's uranium enrichment program, namely "how to carry out the process and how to confirm that the whole process has been carried out".
He said Iran wanted to be sure the IAEA would be in charge of verifying Iran's suspension of this program.
"We think the IAEA is the sole verifying body in this," he said.
Diplomats close to the IAEA have said that while the agency has the expertise to monitor compliance with NPT safeguards, it is not equipped to monitor the suspension of an enrichment program.
Diplomats have also said that while Iran may interpret suspension merely to mean shutting down centrifuge machines that make highly enriched uranium, Britain, France and Germany want it to cease all enrichment-related activities, including deliveries and the construction of new sites.
Salehi said Rowhani was ready "to discuss details of how to carry out this responsibility".
"We will do it in a way which will be reached through mutual understanding with others," he pledged.
Diplomats said Rowhani might be carrying a letter outlining Iran's intention to allow surprise inspections of its nuclear installations.
They said the IAEA might be delaying the release of ElBaradei's report, which has already been drafted, in the hope of being able to include such a letter as a sign of Iranian cooperation.
Salehi said a letter had already been written and would be handed over to the IAEA before the agency's November 20 board meeting. But he said it would not be submitted by Rowhani.
"(The letter) says Iran is ready to accede to the additional (NPT) protocol and says:'Please put this intention to the board and we can arrange the signing later'," he explained.
ElBaradei has already said the IAEA will report that Iran has failed to honor some of its international nuclear safeguard commitments.
But it could take months to verify the information Iran had supplied to the UN watchdog and diplomats say this could be taken by the board as a reason not to pass judgement.
"November 20 is an important milestone but we won't be able to finish our work by then," ElBaradei said on Monday.
"We will need a few more months," he said. This was particularly true of "very complex investigations" such as specifying the source of traces of highly enriched uranium found by IAEA inspectors on euqipment in Iran.
Iran says the uranium traces was simply "contamination" imported into the country on equipment it had bought abroad. It says the urnaium was not produced in Iran, as the United States alleges.
----
Iran 'Vigorously' Pursued WMD First Half 2003 - CIA
November 7, 2003
REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/news/news-security-wmd.html
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Iran ``vigorously'' pursued programs to produce nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and sought help from Russia, China, North Korea and Europe, a CIA report said on Friday.
``The United States remains convinced that Tehran has been pursuing a clandestine nuclear weapons program,'' according to a semi-annual unclassified report to Congress on the acquisition of technology relating to weapons of mass destruction.
``Iran sought technology that can support fissile material production for a nuclear weapons program,'' said the report, covering the period Jan. 1 to June 30.
Satellite imagery showed Iran was burying a uranium centrifuge enrichment facility at Natanz, a town about 100 miles south of Tehran, probably to hide it in case of military attack, the CIA report said.
Iran says its uranium enrichment program is only for the peaceful generation of electricity and not for atomic weapons. Earlier this week, it said it had handed over to the U.N. nuclear watchdog drawings of equipment to help prove that.
The CIA said it was concerned about uranium centrifuges discovered at Natanz capable of enriching uranium for use in nuclear weapons.
Iran was believed to be pursuing nuclear fuel from both uranium and plutonium, the report said. A heavy water research reactor pursued by Iran ``could produce plutonium for nuclear weapons,'' it said.
The report had only one paragraph on Iraq, noting that the U.S.-led war that toppled Saddam Hussein occurred during that period. ``A large-scale effort is currently underway to find the answers to the many outstanding questions about Iraq's WMD and delivery systems,'' it said.
Critics have suggested the White House may have exaggerated the threat Iraq posed due to weapons of mass destruction, used to justify the war, because no such weapons had been found.
NORTH KOREA, SYRIA, TERROR GROUPS
The report also briefly discussed North Korea's nuclear ambitions. In late February, Pyongyang restarted its five-megawatt nuclear reactor, which could produce spent fuel rods containing plutonium.
In April, North Korea told U.S. officials that it had nuclear weapons and signaled its intent to reprocess the spent fuel for more. ``We continued to monitor and assess North Korea's nuclear weapons efforts,'' the CIA said.
Syria has a nuclear research center at Dayr Al Hajar and broader access to foreign expertise provides opportunities to expand capabilities, ``and we are looking at Syrian nuclear intentions with growing concern,'' the report said.
The threat of terrorists using chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear materials ``remained high'' during the first half of 2003, the CIA report said. But terror groups would probably continue to favor conventional tactics like bombings and shootings, it said.
Documents and equipment recovered from al Qaeda facilities in Afghanistan showed that Osama bin Laden had ``a more sophisticated unconventional weapons research program than was previously known,'' the report said.
Al Qaeda also had ambitions to acquire or develop nuclear weapons, it said. Also it was possible that al Qaeda or ``other terrorist groups'' might try to launch conventional attacks against the chemical or nuclear industrial infrastructure of the United States to cause panic and economic disruption.
China has over the past several years taken steps to improve on nonproliferation, ``but the proliferation behavior of Chinese companies remains of great concern,'' the report said.
While China in 1997 agreed to end nuclear cooperation with Iran, the CIA said it remained concerned that some interactions continued.
The report also said the possibility of contacts between Chinese entities and entities associated with Pakistan's nuclear weapons program could not be ruled out.
-------- israel
Countdown to Armageddon?
Are the Israelis willing to start World War III?
Exclusive to American Free Press
By M. Raphael Johnson,
November 7, 2003
http://www.americanfreepress.net/11_07_03/Countdown_to_Armageddon/countdown_to_armageddon.html
According to a recent article by veteran British military analyst Joseph Vialls, Russia has sent the most advanced and feared missile in the world, owned only by Russia and China, the P270 Moskit, also known as the "Sunburn," to Damascus and Tehran. This can only be understood as a counter to the Israeli threats to use nuclear weapons against their enemies.
The Sunburn flies at an altitude of 60 feet and is nearly impossible to defend against. A few fired at Israel could make that state "history."
Add to this a new Russian air force installation near the Kyrgystan/Russia border, coupled with a Chinese base just over their western border with Kyrgystan, and Armageddon may be on the horizon. All Russian jets at this new base just outside of Bishkek are equipped with Sunburn missiles.
Vialls writes:
The gloves are off, and with America and Israel still unable to steal any oil from Iraq because someone keeps blowing the pipelines, Russian and Chinese firepower buildup suddenly slammed the door firmly shut on Caspian oil reserves in the old Soviet republics. For more than a decade American oil multinationals have been conducting "joint ventures" in the former Soviet republics bordering the Caspian Sea, with the stated intent of pumping stolen crude oil out through Turkey, then on to western markets. Now this route has been blocked permanently, and America is in no position to do anything about it, because a large part of the U.S. conventional army is currently bogged down in Iraq, being shot at and killed on a daily basis.
For many who have been watching this region as a confrontation between the United States and Israel versus Russia largely over the control of the biggest gas and oil deposits in the world, a new front has been opened.
As a response to this checkmate, Sharon recently visited Putin on Nov. 3 to meet with him concerning the nuclear issue in Iran. Quickly, Sharon permitted Palestinians to return to their jobs and eased their travel restrictions.
Since the end of the Gorbachev era, the Russian oligarchs, nearly all Jewish by ethnicity (with the noticeable exception of Vladimir Potanin), have controlled nearly all key sectors of the Russian economy. This, of course, includes Russia's major ace-in-the-hole, oil and gas. The giant YUKOS conglomerate is presently one of the largest oil companies in the world, valued at about $40 billion.
YUKOS is the result of a "loans for shares" deal brokered through the semi-coherent Boris Yeltsin in 1995. Here, the liberal Russian government swapped loyalty from the oligarchs in exchange for privatization at prices far below that of the market. This $40 billion giant was bought for about $300 million, thus looting the entire Russian economy for the benefit of a handful of Israeli citizens living in Russia.
When YUKOS's chair, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, was arrested at the end of last month, the American capitalist establishment went orbital. Forgetting the 1999 New York Times's expose on massive money laundering and fraud from YUKOS, the conservative establishment began to lionize oligarchy and, specifically, Khodorkovsky.
Recently, The Financial Times weighed in with a giggly piece from Chrystia Freeland, which referred to the oligarch as a "democratic activist." About a paragraph later, the writer said-without irony-that the oligarch's model for economics is the robber baron factories of the early American 20th century. Fox News, on Nov. 3, referred to YUKOS as the most progressive corporation in Russia.
According to a Nov. 3 Agence France-Presse story, Khodorkovsky made a deal with Jacob Rothschild this year that control of the YUKOS giant would pass to Rothschild in the event of Khodorkovsky's arrest. However, the Russian government has frozen all YUKOS assets for the time being.
It is significant that YUKOS's liberal pressure group, the Open Russia Foundation, is completely controlled by Rothschild now that its founder is in jail. As their official mission statement reads, "The motivation for the establishment of the Open Russia Foundation is the wish to foster enhanced openness, understanding and integration between the people of Russia and the rest of the world."
Their board of trustees includes Rothschild and Henry Kissinger. The Washington, D.C. launch of the organization included Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) and Librarian of Congress James Billington, one of the leading voices against Russian traditionalism in the academic establishment. Significantly, the Open Russia Foundation recently provided Yale University with substantial grants to study the Russian economy as well as providing the Carnegie Foundation with 3 percent of its entire operating budget.
It seems that the drive to control the globe's energy is progressing. The American empire's battles in Serbia, Central Asia, Iraq and Chechnya are one and the same war. Other than fighting Israel's enemies, these adventures are also wars to control Central Asian oil and natural gas (one of the main pipelines from the Caspian Sea went straight through Serbia). The control of this wealth by the United States and Israel necessitates bypassing Russian channels. This means that the Jewish oligarchy in Russia would become the central actor in world politics.
The Israeli/CIA complex was using Khodorkovsky to sell off the assets of YUKOS to Exxon/Mobil (as well as a smaller piece to Texaco), hence bringing Russia's pipelines into the hands of the western powers. The Nov. 5 New York Times also indicated that the Bush family's Carlyle Group was involved.
It was not long after Putin began threatening the YUKOS conglomerate that neo-conservative pundits such as William Kristol and Ariel Cohen began calling Putin a "communist," "another Stalin" and "tyrannical."
The basis of these wild accusations, of course, is the fact that Putin stands in the way of Zionist domination.
From this, the roles of several other variables and players develop clearly. The State Department/Harvard University alliance was meant to "deregulate," or "privatize" much of the Russian economy precisely to keep the Russian state out of the equation. Therefore, pro-Israel oligarchs (that is, Israeli citizens living in Russia) then benefited, placing most of the economy in their hands, and, by extension, Israel's.
Russia's response has been to clamp down on further foreign penetration into defense and other sensitive industries, and specifically, to target those believed to be working for both the CIA and Mossad and attempting to control Central Asian oil.
It needs to be reiterated that where the CIA goes, Mossad goes as well. Israeli and American interests have come together in the dominance of the Central Asian region and therefore, so have liberal ideology, the Beltway set, neo-conservatism, Ivy League eggheads, Christian Zionism, the Rothschilds and the American media. Afghanistan through the Caspian Sea through to Georgia, Azerbaijan and into the Balkans (not to mention pipelines leading to oil-hungry China), have become one single theater of war over trillions of dollars in oil and gas wealth, incorporating every single power center in global politics. The battle against the New World Order is being decided in Moscow.
Therefore, all anti-Russian alliances in the region, from Islamic fundamentalism to Slavic separatism to the George Soros "Open Society" Foundation, are in the interests of the CIA/Exxon/Ivy League/NWO complex.
In Azerbaijan, for example, American elites have pushed for a "democratic" state, that is, a state not under the control of pro-Moscow Heydar Aliev, thus leaving the country open to U.S. oil investment. Aliev, of course, is promoting Russian interests in the region, and thus, has become a "tyrant" in the Beltway mind.
The American response to this situation within this region is to create the GUAAM pact, including, Georgia, Ukraine, Armenia, Azerbaijan and Moldova.
Cohen gives us a clue as to why this entity was brokered under NATO auspices: "The Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan Pipeline will export up to 1 million barrels per year of high quality Caspian crude oil by 2005." In other words, billions of dollars of oil are slated to be pumped through this region very soon, and the economic/military alliance of GUAAM is the means to ensure American control over it. This connects the Serbian, Afghan and Iraqi wars.
Russia's response to Israel's terror threats against most of the Islamic world is fully understood as both a political and economic question. Further, increasing cooperation between Russia and India, as well as China, are clear markers that Putin, one of the few actually competent leaders in world politics, is building an anti-imperialist and anti-NATO alliance with the aim of countering American/Zionist moves for the world's oil and gas wealth.
The interests, however, go even further than Zionist control over American foreign policy decision-making. Vialls writes on another topic: that the existence of the American/Zionist empire is based on the victory of American forces over the Russian and Islamic. Of course, both in Bosnia and Chechnya, the Mossad/CIA operatives have not hesitated to assist fundamentalists in fighting Slavic nationalism, largely because Slavicism is a greater threat with Putin firmly in the saddle. Islam, divided and leaderless, with a history of centuries of defeat and colonialism behind it, is only a potential force in world politics.
-------- japan
Japan's opposition gains
November 10, 2003
By Hans Greimel
ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.washtimes.com/world/20031109-103643-4274r.htm
TOKYO - Japan's opposition made gains in elections yesterday, narrowing the ruling coalition's majority in parliament and dampening its hopes for a strong mandate to carry out ambitious economic and political reform.
Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's Liberal Democratic Party said it still had the public's support after its first election test in the lower house of parliament since Mr. Koizumi came to power more than two years ago.
"We'll be able to continue with a stable administration. I'm relieved," Liberal Democratic Party chief Shinzo Abe said after results showed his party and its two junior partners had clinched control.
Together, the LDP-led coalition took 275 seats, enough to keep a majority in the 480-member lower house and name all committee chairs, according to official results collated by public broadcaster NHK after all constituencies had reported.
The total fell short of the coalition's previous 287 seats, and Mr. Koizumi's LDP scored 237, below the simple majority it had by itself before the election.
The results showed a big boost for the opposition Democratic Party, from 137 before the elections to 177. Party chief Naoto Kan was upbeat about his party's performance.
"I can barely speak," Mr. Kan said from party headquarters in Tokyo. "I think the voters appreciated our focus on policies, and I am pleased."
While Mr. Koizumi was confident that his party - which has held power nearly nonstop for 50 years - would keep its coalition majority, even he seemed surprised at the Democrats' showing.
"I thought to myself that the Democrats are putting up a good fight," he said. "Maybe we're really moving toward a two-party system."
Election officials said final results would be announced later today.
The turnout in yesterday's voting was about 52 percent, down from the 62.5 percent who voted in the last lower house election in 2000, when the LDP cruised to victory.
Earlier, Mr. Abe said the LDP might lose its single-party majority, but insisted the coalition still would have a public mandate for reform.
"If the three parties of the ruling coalition achieve a majority, I will take that as a sign of having won the public's trust," he said.
The impact of swing voters as well as the public's reaction to issues such as Mr. Koizumi's push to send peacekeepers to Iraq could have affected his margin of victory. The Democratic Party has fiercely opposed Mr. Koizumi's Iraq policies.
Other hot topics included a proposal to amend Japan's pacifist constitution to give the military more flexibility in the post-September 11 era of terrorism, and the reform of public pensions - a big concern in a country with one of world's fastest-aging societies.
But the economy remained the public's top priority.
Mr. Koizumi credited his reforms for spurring a fledgling recovery from more than a decade of economic stagnation. He has warned voters not to derail the rebound by ousting him.
Mr. Kan accused the LDP of being long on promises and short on results, and said he could do better.
-------- korea
North Korea envoy says nuclear deterrent ready to use
07.11.2003
NZ Herald - REUTERS
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/storydisplay.cfm?storyID=3533004&thesection=news&thesubsection=world
LONDON - North Korea's envoy in Britain said on Thursday that Pyongyang had a nuclear deterrent that was ready to use and powerful enough to deter any US attack.
Ambassador Ri Yong Ho told Reuters in an interview that North Korea would only use its capability in self-defence. Asked if North Korea had a nuclear bomb, he said: "What we are saying is, a nuclear deterrent capability."
North Korea has long hinted that it had a nuclear bomb. It said last month it was prepared to demonstrate the existence of its nuclear deterrent "when an appropriate time comes".
But Thursday's comments appear to be the first time it has explicitly stated that it has a nuclear weapon ready to use.
The ambassador said the deterrent was made with plutonium, most of which was recently reprocessed, and was now ready to use should the United States attack.
The latest crisis in North Korea-US relations erupted in October 2002 when US officials said Pyongyang was pursuing a clandestine nuclear weapons programme that violated its international commitments.
The crisis showed signs of deepening on Thursday when the United States proposed suspending a project to build nuclear power stations in the communist country.
Ri said the suspension, if it went ahead, would have a "very negative impact on the dialogue process" aimed at defusing the standoff.
The reactor project is based on a 1994 agreement under which the North Koreans froze their nuclear arms programme in return for two light-water reactors.
-----
Clinton - Bush should offer non-aggression pact to North Korea
November 7, 2003
Hi Pakistan
http://www.hipakistan.com/en/detail.php?newsId=en44276&F_catID=&f_type=source
HONG KONG: Former US president Bill Clinton said on Thursday his successor George W. Bush should do "one last mega-deal" with North Korea and offer a non-aggression pact in return for unlimited access to nuclear laboratories in the state.
Speaking during a question and answer session after delivering a keynote speech at a CEO forum here, Clinton said despite the determination of North Korea to pursue its nuclear weapons programme. "I don't believe they want to drop a nuclear bomb on Japan or South Korea. They want to eat and stay warm," said Clinton.
"They don't want to disappear from history like East Germany and they don't want to be disrespected and that's why they want the non-aggression treaty," he said.
"I think we (the US) should offer them a mega deal; help with food, help with energy, help with becoming a self-sustaining economy in return for total access to all the labs and all the sites and taking the plutonium rods out of (North) Korea altogether and giving them a non-aggression pact. "I think we should give them that because we're never going to be aggressive against them unless they violate the pact anyway," said Clinton.
The move would be consistent with the wishes of the Chinese, Russians and Japanese who have played a part in defusing the year-long stand-off between the US and North Korea, he added.
Meanwhile, North Korea threatened to seize an international consortium's assets on its soil if the US-led group suspends a nuclear power project in the communist state without compensation.
The North's foreign ministry spokesman told the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) that the consortium, the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organisation, would be banned from taking out equipment, facilities, material and technical documents from the communist country.
The consortium set up by the United States and its allies is in charge of building a nuclear power plant for energy-starved North Korea. But the multi-billion dollar energy project may be halted after the consortium met in New York this week for talks on suspending work amid lingering tensions over North Korea's nuclear weapons ambitions.
After a two-day meeting, the consortium said on Tuesday it would announce a decision on the fate of the project no later than November 21.
Late Thursday, the North Korean spokesman denounced the United States and the consortium for delaying work in building two light-water nuclear reactors (LWR) and demanded compensation for the delays. "North Korea will hold them accountable for this to the last," the spokesman said in an interview with KCNA.
Also yesterday, officials said North and South Korea agreed to build a permanent centre for reunions of families separated by the division of the Korean peninsula more than half a century ago.
The agreement was reached at three-day talks between Red Cross authorities from both sides at Mount Kumgang, north of the inter-Korean border, where the centre will be built, they said.
In the mean time, China's Foreign Ministry said its point man on North Korea travelled to Washington to prepare for a new round of six-nation talks on Pyongyang's nuclear weapons programme.
Vice Foreign Minister Wang Yi was to meet with U.S. officials on Thursday and Friday (today), ministry spokeswoman Zhang Qiyue said.
----
N.Korea Envoy Says Nuclear Deterrent Ready to Use
November 7, 2003
REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-korea-north-nuclear.html
LONDON (Reuters) - North Korea's envoy in Britain said that Pyongyang had a nuclear deterrent that was ready to use and powerful enough to deter any U.S. attack.
Ambassador Ri Yong Ho told Reuters in an interview on Thursday that the reclusive communist state, which is locked in a standoff with Washington over its nuclear intentions, would only use its capability in self-defense.
Asked if North Korea had a nuclear bomb, he said: ``What we are saying is, a nuclear deterrent capability.''
Asked what sort of deterrent, he added: ``When we say deterrent, it can be anything, but the effect is that the U.S. side will have to be very careful if they are to attack us... (it is) powerful enough to deter any U.S. attack.''
North Korea has long hinted it had a nuclear bomb. It said last month it was prepared to demonstrate the existence of its nuclear deterrent ``when an appropriate time comes.''
But Thursday's comments appear to be the first time it has explicitly stated that it has a nuclear weapon ready to deploy.
Ri, giving his first interview since taking up his post in London, said the deterrent was made of plutonium, most of which was recently reprocessed but was extracted before a 1994 freeze on its nuclear weapons program under a pact with Washington.
Asked if the deterrent was ready to use right now, he replied: ``Yes.''
Asked if North Korea would only use it in self-defense, he added: ``Of course. Self-defense is a right of any nation, only in self-defense.''
In response, State Department spokesman Adam Ereli repeated the long-standing U.S. position that, ``we have no intention of attacking North Korea.''
The latest crisis in North Korea-U.S. relations erupted in October 2002 when U.S. officials said the communist state was pursuing a clandestine nuclear weapons program that violated its international commitments.
In an apparent bid to defuse the crisis, Washington last month offered Pyongyang unspecified security assurances for the first time, in exchange for a complete, verifiable and irreversible end to its suspected weapons program.
CONCESSIONS?
Washington has ruled out a formal non-aggression treaty.
Ri said Pyongyang was prepared to make concessions on its original demand for a formal non-aggression treaty. ``We are prepared to consider written assurances on non-aggression,'' he said.
If it deemed the U.S. proposal to be ``genuine,'' North Korea stood ready to restart six-way talks on the nuclear standoff, Ri said. North Korean officials were contacting U.S. officials to get more details of the U.S. proposal, he added. But Ri stressed Washington must commit to a ``peaceful coexistence'' and show a willingness for ``simultaneous action,'' shorthand for both sides taking steps at the same time to answer conflicting concerns and resolve the crisis.
``If the U.S. proposal is truly based on simultaneous actions then we could hold a new round of talks. If the U.S. insists on denying this simultaneous action, it will only increase the suspicions on our side,'' he said.
The United States has played down the idea of simultaneous actions. ``'Simultaneity' is not a word that we would use,'' State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said last week.
Ri said North Korea's foreign minister sent a letter on Monday to the Italian presidency of the European Union and top EU foreign affairs officials explaining Pyongyang was willing to consider the U.S. offer of security guarantees and attend talks if it approved of the U.S. proposal.
China hosted an inconclusive round of six-way talks in August. Ri would not be drawn on a possible date for new talks.
But Ri said Washington's planned suspension of a project to build nuclear power stations in North Korea had raised doubts about whether Washington was sincere about defusing the crisis.
Ri said the suspension, if it went ahead, would have a ``very negative impact on the dialogue process...This is why we can't talk about dates (for talks) yet,'' he added.
The United States wants to suspend the project for one year to see what comes of diplomatic attempts to persuade Pyongyang to abandon nuclear weapons programs. The reactor project is based on a 1994 pact under which the North Koreans froze their nuclear arms program in return for two light-water reactors.
Analysts said North Korea was seeking to up the ante with Washington with its comments on a nuclear deterrent.
``They've got the best of both worlds here -- a virtual deterrent. They may not have (nuclear capability) but everybody thinks they have and have to assume they have...It's the next best thing to having one,'' said William Drennan, Korea expert, United States Institute of Peace, a government-funded thinktank.
----
N. Korea warns of nuke seizure
November 07, 2003
By David R. Sands
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/world/20031106-115235-7083r.htm
North Korea yesterday threatened to seize the assets and equipment at a construction site for two new nuclear power plants being built by the United States and its allies if the Bush administration follows through on a threat to kill the project.
A spokesman for the North Korean Foreign Ministry said that an expected decision by the United States and its allies to shutter the $4.6 billion nuclear project could endanger plans for a second round of multilateral talks on Pyongyang's military nuclear program.
The North "will never allow them to take out all the equipment, facilities, materials and technical documents ... until this issue is settled," the unnamed spokesman said in a statement transmitted by the official KCNA news service.
The nuclear plants, now less than half-built at the remote North Korean coastal village of Kumho, were to be the centerpiece of a 1994 Clinton administration deal to entice North Korea to end its secret drive for nuclear weapons.
A consortium of the United States, South Korea, Japan and the European Union is expected to announce Nov. 21 a freeze in the project, saying the North's new nuclear programs have nullified the 1994 deal.
State Department deputy spokesman Adam Ereli said the North Koreans must allow the consortium to remove its assets and equipment from the site under the terms of the 1994 accord.
"All of this is happening because North Korea violated its commitments under the [agreement]," Mr. Ereli said. "That's what started this whole thing."
South Korea has the most workers at the Kumho site and has invested an estimated $850 million in the project to date.
"We are seriously concerned and strongly urge the North to withdraw its decision immediately," a spokesman for the South's Unification Ministry told reporters in Seoul yesterday.
The dispute throws a new kink into diplomatic efforts to hold a second round of talks on the North's nuclear programs.
The United States, North and South Korea, China, Russia and Japan held an inconclusive first round of discussions in Beijing in August.
Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Wang Yi met with Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly, the Bush administration's point man in the Beijing talks, for nearly three hours yesterday at the State Department on a possible resumption of the talks.
Mr. Wang, who meets with Secretary of State Colin L. Powell today, said through an interpreter after the meeting that he saw a "good opportunity" to revive the negotiations following his trip late last month to Pyongyang.
In London, North Korea's envoy in Britain told Reuters news agency yesterday that Pyongyang had a nuclear deterrent that was ready to use and powerful enough to deter any U.S. attack.
Asked if North Korea had a nuclear bomb, Ambassador Ri Yong-ho said in an interview: "What we are saying is, a nuclear deterrent capability." He said it would only be used in self-defense.
North Korea said last month it was prepared to demonstrate the existence of its nuclear deterrent "when an appropriate time comes."
The Bush administration is demanding an immediate end to the North's nuclear efforts.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-il has demanded a security guarantee from Washington and economic aid as his price for cooperating.
Mr. Kelly said the United States continued to work with its partners on the talks, but told reporters there was "no date" to announce yet for new talks.
The Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization (KEDO) is expected to announce formally on Nov. 21 that the construction of the two light-water nuclear reactors will be suspended for a year.
U.S. officials have made clear they will oppose any effort to revive the project after that.
"Our view is the project should have no future," Mr. Ereli said earlier this week.
The North Korean spokesman yesterday accused the United States of pressing to kill the Kumho project as a way of undermining the Beijing talks.
"What matters is why Washington is so getting on the nerves of [North Korea] at a time when the resumption of the six-party talks is high on the agenda," the spokesman said.
Mr. Ereli said yesterday the United States did not believe the Kumho project and the Beijing talks should be linked.
Pyongyang claimed it had the right to seize the assets at Kumho if the United States and its KEDO partners failed to complete construction.
But a July 1996 protocol signed by KEDO and the North appears to back Mr. Ereli's contention that such a seizure is not permitted.
"The property and assets of KEDO, wherever located and by whomsoever held in [North Korea], shall be immune from search, requisition, confiscation, expropriation, or any other interference," according to the protocol.
----
US warns N Korea on power plant
From correspondents in Washington
November 7, 2003
Agence France-Presse
http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,7794905%255E1702,00.html
THE United States warned North Korea today not to seize the assets of an international consortium if it suspends a plan to build a nuclear power plant on its soil.
A North Korean foreign ministry spokesman earlier said the consortium, led by the United States, European Union, South Korea and Japan, could be prevented from taking equipment, documents and other items out of the Stalinist state.
"North Korea is obligated to allow the safe removal of equipment from the site," said State Department deputy spokesman Adam Ereli.
"KEDO has reminded North Korea of its obligations in this regard, and we expect it to comply."
The Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organisation (KEDO) was set up to build the plant under a now-ruptured 1994 anti-nuclear pact between Washington and Pyongyang.
But the multi-billion dollar project looks set to be halted as a nuclear showdown rages with the Stalinist state.
After a two-day meeting in New York, the consortium said on Tuesday it would announce a decision on the fate of the project by November 21.
The United States had demanded at least a suspension of the project, despite reservations from South Korea that such a move could enrage North Korea and dent prospects for new talks on the North's attempts to build nuclear weapons.
The project was mandated under the 1994 US-North Korea Agreed Framework, which Washington considers was broken by Pyongyang's renewed attempts to develop weapons.
Under the deal North Korea froze a plutonium processing facility in return for regular fuel oil shipments from the United States. South Korea and Japan were to pay for the bulk of the reactor construction.
The US government cut the fuel shipments to North Korea late last year and has withheld funds for the consortium.
The project to build two 1000-megawatt light-water nuclear reactors was originally scheduled for completion this year. But experts say there it could not be finished before 2008/2009.
----
S. Korea: North Using Plants As Leverage
November 7, 2003
ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Koreas-Nuclear.html
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- North Korea's threat to seize equipment and technical data from two nuclear power plants being built there is aimed at gaining leverage in future six-nation talks on its nuclear weapons development, a South Korean official said Friday.
The communist state made the threat Thursday, days after a U.S.-led group tentatively agreed to suspend the $4.6 billion project in retaliation for the North's atomic weapons programs.
``I don't think this will affect the six-nation talks,'' South Korea's Unification Minister Jeong Se-hyun said at a briefing. ``I think it is part of developing a negotiating card for future six-nation talks.''
North Korea said it will block the United States and its allies from removing equipment and technical data from the two nuclear power plants. It also demanded full compensation for the project.
The Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization, a U.S.-led consortium, has been building two light-water reactors in the North as part of a 1994 deal between Washington and Pyongyang. Under the deal, North Korea promised to freeze and eventually dismantle its nuclear weapons programs for energy aid.
All four members of KEDO's executive board -- the United States, South Korea, Japan and the European Union -- said they favored suspending it for at least one year. They will make a final decision by Nov. 21.
Despite its angry reaction to the proposed suspension, North Korea did not revoke last week's agreement ``in principle'' to return to the six-nation talks, which have been stalled since discussions in Beijing in August.
``North Korea is saying that it would raise the compensation issue at six-nation talks,'' Jeong said.
Representatives of the United States, the two Koreas, China, Japan and Russia met in August in Beijing to discuss ending the standoff over its nuclear weapons program nuclear crisis. But the meeting ended without agreement on a next round.
Jeong stressed KEDO is discussing a suspension, not termination, of the project.
``Suspension means that it is on the shelf. It means that we can always use it again anytime,'' he said.
Meanwhile in Pyongyang, inter-Korean economic talks stalled as the South rejected the North's request for electricity.
South Korea's chief negotiator, Kim Gwang-lim, said supplying the North with electricity could put financial strains on other inter-Korean projects, including a planned industrial park in North Korea, according to South Korean pool reports which didn't elaborate.
Earlier this year, North Korea said that trains were running irregularly and power was frequently going out at factories because of an acute energy shortage.
Although Washington says it sees ``no future'' for the nuclear reactor project, South Korea, Japan and the EU favor suspending the project for one year, instead of halting it completely. They want to use the prospect of reviving the project to persuade North Korea to abandon its nuclear weapons ambitions.
The 1994 deal went sour in October 2002 when U.S. officials said North Korea admitted running a secret weapons program. Washington and its allies later cut off 147 million gallons of annual free oil shipments -- also part of the 1994 deal.
Pyongyang claims the United States also reneged on the 1994 deal. It cites Washington's failure to keep its promise to build one of the two light-water reactors by 2003, and its refusal to make compensations for economic losses caused by the delays.
North Korea retaliated by expelling U.N. nuclear monitors. Last month, it said it was building more atomic bombs besides one or two bombs it already is believed to possess.
-------
CIA Says N.Korea Already Has 'Validated' Nuke
November 7, 2003
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-security-korea-cia.html
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - North Korea appears to have built one or two nuclear weapons it could be confident would work even without a test nuclear blast, the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency has told Congress.
``We assess that North Korea has produced one or two simple fission-type nuclear weapons and has validated the designs without conducting yield-producing nuclear tests,'' the CIA said in written replies to questions from the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.
The CIA's Aug. 18 statement was made public recently by the Federation of American Scientists on its Web site (www.fas.org/irp/congress/2003-hr/021103qfr-cia.pdf).
Some experts said on Friday they had expected Pyongyang to carry out a test blast just as India and Pakistan did in 1998 to show the world they were members of the nuclear club, but the CIA's statement suggests this is not necessary.
``Testing would confirm (the existence of a nuclear capability) but it's not changing what they already believe,'' said Daniel Pinkston, a North Korea expert at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies in Monterey, California.
North Korea is widely reported to have been carrying out nuclear weapon-related tests, short of blasts, since the 1980s to develop what it now says is a nuclear deterrent that is ready to use.
``Pyongyang at this point appears to view ambiguity regarding its nuclear capabilities as providing a tactical advantage,'' the spy agency said. A test nuclear explosion could spark an international backlash that would isolate the reclusive Communist state further, the agency added.
Robert Norris, who has tracked North Korea's nuclear program at the Natural Resources Defense Council, said it was not surprising Pyongyang had reached this point.
``They've been working on this for several decades,'' he said.
David Albright, a physicist who is president of the Institute for Science and International Security, said the CIA statement suggested a belief the North had already ``weaponized'' a nuclear device that could be dropped from a plane or delivered by missile.
North Korea's envoy in Britain told Reuters in an interview Thursday the North possessed a ``nuclear deterrent capability ... powerful enough to deter any U.S. attack.''
The latest crisis in U.S.-North Korean relations began in October 2002, when U.S. officials said the North had been pursuing a clandestine nuclear-weapons program that violated its international commitments.
The State Department said on Friday it was optimistic about chances for a fresh round of six-way talks on North Korea's suspected nuclear arms program after Secretary of State Colin Powell met a key Chinese diplomat.
The Chinese official, Vice Foreign Minister Wang Yi, told reporters after his talks with Powell that Beijing was working to set up a new round of discussions among officials from the United States, the two Koreas, Japan, Russia and China.
-------- pakistan
Musharraf denies transfer of nuke technology to North Korea
November 7, 2003
(NNI)
http://www.pakistanlink.com/headlines/Nov03/07/08.html
SEOUL: Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf Thursday denied any cooperation with North Korea of nuclear technology transfer and rejected all such reports.
Musharraf who also held meeting with Republic of Korean leader, Roh Moo-Hyun on the second day of his official visit to Seoul has said this in an interview to Korea Herald, an English daily.
Pakistan has been accused of helping North Korea for its alleged nuclear bomb development programme. The reports appeared in international media had suggested that Islamabad cooperated with Pyongyang' atomic ambitions in return for help in developing ballistic missile in Islamabad. Pakistan however continued denying such reports and even up today, no evidence of such cooperation was surfaced.
"I would like to assure ROK people and government that all reports linking Pakistan to North Korea's nuclear programme are totally incorrect and malicious in nature," Musharraf told Korea Herald.
The one-hour meeting between Musharraf and Roh Moo-Hyun, focused on the nuclear crisis and bilateral relations, especially trade, South Korean officials said and added the international and regional issues as well as subjects like international terrorism also came under discussion.
Cooperation agreements on information-technology and energy and mineral industries were signed, they said.
Musharraf earlier described the one-year standoff between Pyongyang and Washington as a "grave crisis" and urged North Korea to show restraint and avoid escalating tension.
But he made no direct call in support of international demands that Pyongyang scrap its nuclear weapons, according to the published interview transcript.
"Pakistan is opposed to nuclear proliferation and is committed to universal and complete nuclear disarmament," Musharraf was quoted as saying. "We hope that despite its admission of nuclear capability North Korea would avoid escalating tension as it entails grave consequences for all."
North Korea says it wants a denuclearized Korean peninsula, but at the same time claims it has developed nuclear bombs and is making more to cope with what it calls a "hostile" US policy.
At a first round a six-way nuclear crisis talks in Beijing in August the Stalinist state threatened to declare itself a nuclear power and conduct a nuclear test, according to US officials.
Pakistan carried out a nuclear test in 1998 in a tit-for-tat step following India's tests, after years of running clandestine atomic programmes. Islamabad holds non-proliferation as the central pillar of its nuclear policy, Musharraf said. "I want to assure my Korean friends that it is unthinkable for Pakistan to engage in any activity that could be detrimental to the security of South Korea," he said.
The Pakistani leader said he fully supported multilateral negotiations to resolve the Korean nuclear crisis as hopes rose for a new round of six-way talks bringing together the two Koreas, China, Japan, Russia and the United States before year-end.
The nuclear crisis erupted in October last year when Washington said North Korea had admitted to running a nuclear programme based on enriched uranium in violation of a 1994 nuclear freeze accord.
According to US media reports, Pakistan supplied North Korea with designs for gas centrifuges needed for the production of weapons-grade uranium. The North Korea deny running a uranium-based programme but say they have built bombs from a plutonium-based programme.
Musharraf arrived Seoul yesterday (Wednesday) from China on a three days official visit and met this morning (Thursday) with his Korean counterpart, which was the first meeting between the two leaders.
He already held meeting with his Korean counterpart President Hu Jintao and is planned to meet the business community besides visiting various military and civilian installations.
-------- russia
U.S. Helps Russia Repatriate Weapons Usable Reactor Fuel
WASHINGTON, DC, (ENS)
November 7, 2003
http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/nov2003/2003-11-07-01.asp
Highly enriched uranium of Russian origin that has been used in research reactors around the world is being sent back to Russia with financial help from the United States, Russian and U.S. energy officials announced today.
Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham and the Minister of the Russian Federation for Atomic Energy Aleksandr Rumyantsev signed a joint statement today to repatriate high-enriched uranium (HEU) research reactor fuel of Russian origin back to Russia.
The United States will provide financial assistance to the program, but a specific price tag was not mentioned.
"Under this program, we are focusing our efforts on repatriating Russian-supplied fuel from more than 20 research reactors in 17 countries," Secretary Abraham said. "Moreover, we plan to convert these targeted research reactors so that they use low enriched uranium (LEU) fuel instead of HEU."
HEU can be directly used in manufacturing nuclear weapons, but when blended with natural uranium it becomese low enriched uranium (LEU), which cannot be used in weapons.
U.S. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham addresses the International Atomic Energy Agency annual conference in September. (Photo courtesy IAEA) In a joint statement released today, Abraham and Rumyantsev said, "Our common objective consists of reducing, to the greatest extent possible, and, ultimately, eliminating the use of such materials in civilian nuclear activity."
The signing concludes a four day visit by Minister Rumyansev with Secretary Abraham which included trips to the Partnerships for Prosperity and Security Trade Show in Philadelphia and to the United Nations First Committee on Disarmament and International Security in New York City.
In a joint appearance at the UN on Wednesday, Abraham told the delegates that more than 170 tons of Russia's HEU has been converted to non-weapons grade material for use in American commercial reactors. "Altogether, 500 metric tons of Russia's HEU will be converted and used to support civilian nuclear power," he said.
The Bush administration is committed to creating a stockpile in the United States of low-enriched uranium derived from Russian HEU, further reducing HEU inventories, Abraham told the UN delegates. "This stockpile will be used to augment our strategic uranium reserve to enhance our domestic energy security."
The United States has identified 174 tons of excess HEU that will be blended down and used for civil purposes, the secretary said. "To date, over 40 metric tons have been downblended and like Russia, we remain committed to disposing of 34 metric tons of excess plutonium."
"The goal of minimizing international commerce in HEU has long been a pillar of U.S. nonproliferation policy," Abraham said today at the signing ceremony in Washington. "This program exemplifies the strength of the U.S. and Russian Federation partnership to reduce the threat of terrorism and prevent the spread of weapons of mass destruction."
The U.S. and the Russian Federation, in cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), began work on fuel return in December 1999. The program was designed to support the return of Soviet or Russian supplied fresh and irradiated HEU fuel, currently stored at foreign research reactors, to the Russian Federation.
Russian Minister for Atomic Energy Aleksandr Rumyantsev at the IAEA annual meeting in September (Photo courtesy IAEA) Fuel return efforts are already underway. In late September, Russia accepted 14 kilograms of fresh Russian origin HEU from Romania. The HEU was airlifted from Bucharest to Russia where it is waiting to be down-blended to LEU and used for nuclear power plant fuel fabrication.
In Romania, the United States will provide up to $4 million for the purchase of low-enriched uranium for a research reactor that will be converted from HEU to LEU. "This is key to reducing the reactor's attractiveness to terrorists or other threats, even as the reactor will continue to be used for peaceful purposes," said Abraham, who stressed that these conversions must take place "on an urgent basis."
The U.S. and Russia also reached an agreement on the next fresh fuel shipment, which is planned to be implemented by the end of this year.
Preparations are also in progress for the transfer of spent HEU fuel from Uzbekistan to Russia.
"Our governments have completed negotiations on a bilateral agreement under which more then a dozen other countries will become eligible to ship their fresh and spent research reactor fuel to Russia for safe and secure disposition," Secretary Abraham said today. "I am delighted to report that this agreement will soon be finalized and signed."
As part of the global campaign to minimize commercial use of HEU, Abraham told the 2nd annual Carnegie Nonproliferation Conference in Moscow September 19 that the United States has converted half the research reactors using HEU of U.S. origin to LEU.
The United States has "completed a campaign in which 38 research reactors in 22 countries using HEU of U.S. origin have been converted to LEU, keeping over 3,300 kilograms of weapon usable material off the market," Abraham said.
The U.S. Energy Department is developing a new low enriched uranium fuel, which can help replace HEU fuel in additional remaining reactors, Abraham told conference delegates in Moscow.
In their joint statement today, the two energy officials said their cooperation on the research reactor fuel is a "mutual contribution to the reduction of global stockpiles of weapons usable nuclear materials and, therefore, to reducing the threat of international terrorism and preventing the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction."
Their agreement comes just in time for the International Conference on Research Reactor Utilization, Safety, Decommissioning, Fuel and Waste Management taking place next week in Santiago, Chile. Organized by the International Atomic Energy Agency the conference will focus on the 278 research reactors now operating in 59 countries.
----
Russia to Step Up Retrieval of Uranium
November 7, 2003
ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Russian-Nuclear.html
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Under a new agreement with the United States, Russia will retrieve highly enriched uranium it shipped to civilian research reactors in 17 countries, reducing the likelihood of theft.
Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham and Russian Atomic Energy Minister Alexander Rumyantsev signed the bilateral statement on the uranium retrieval Friday and said another agreement securing Russian uranium from a dozen other countries ``is in its final stages.''
The announcement is the latest attempt to address growing concern about the large amount of weapons-suitable highly enriched uranium that is kept at active and idle research reactors in dozens of countries.
Most of this uranium fuel, which is weapons grade and could be used in a crude nuclear device if obtained by terrorists, originated in either Russia or the United States as part of a program to promote peaceful nuclear research. In some cases reactor operators do not have the money to ship the material back.
The U.S.-Russia statement ``confirms our common objective of reducing, and to the extent possible, ultimately eliminating the use of highly enriched uranium in civil nuclear activity,'' said Abraham.
The agreement involves 20 reactors in Eastern Europe and countries formerly part of the Soviet Union. A joint statement said two shipments of Russian-origin highly enriched uranium, or HEU, already had been retrieved and preparations were underway to transfer fuel from a research reactor in Uzbekistan.
The HEU in Uzbekistan has been of particular concern because of the country's close proximity to Afghanistan and to Islamic groups tied to al-Qaida terrorists.
Daryl Kimball, executive director of the private Arms Control Association, said the Russian agreement is ``a step forward ... a good move.'' But he said how good it is will depend on how quickly the Russians act and how comprehensive their retrievals are.
The agreement gave no timetable.
But Abraham said Russian fuel shipments are already underway. In September, Russia retrieved 14 kilograms of fresh HEU from a reactor near Bucharest, Romania, he said.
The United States has been replacing much of the highly enriched uranium it sent overseas with low-enriched uranium fuel similar to what is used in commercial nuclear power plants, thereby reducing the nuclear proliferation threat.
Abraham said Thursday that about 50 percent of the U.S.-origin highly enriched uranium has been retrieved from overseas research reactors. In many of the other cases the task has been complicated because the reactors cannot easily use the low-enriched substitute.
Harvard University researchers said in a report last year that there are 345 operating or idle research reactors in 58 countries that have highly enriched uranium that could be converted for use in a weapon by terrorists if they obtained the material.
Security varies widely at these facilities, the report said.
``In some cases security is provided by a single sleepy watchman and a chain-link fence,'' wrote Matthew Bunn, a researcher at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government.
The Harvard report cited several cases of large amounts of highly enriched uranium at poorly secured research reactors in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. Among them were a reactor in Ukraine that has 75 kilograms of uranium and another in Belarus with 300 kilograms of highly enriched fuel.
In August, 2002, a joint operation between the United States and Russia resulted in 1,797 pounds of highly enriched uranium being whisked away from a poorly secured research reactor near Belgrade, Yugoslavia and returned to Russia. The uranium had been provided by Russia in 1976.
-------- u.s. nuc weapons
The bomb is back
by Security and Defence editor Hans de Vreij,
7 November 2003
Radio Netherlands
http://www.rnw.nl/hotspots/html/nuc031107.html
The threat of nuclear weapons has simmered on the international backburner since the end of the Cold War. Now, it's moving fast to the top of the global agenda. North Korea, Iraq and Iran are just the latest in a series of countries unable to resist the temptation to violate international rules and develop the ultimate weapon of mass destruction.
The UN's nuclear watchdog boss this week urgently called on the world community to halt the looming threat of nuclear proliferation. Mohamed Elbaradei, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, would like to see all plutonium and enriched uranium produced worldwide to be placed under international control. Launching a proposal to that effect on Tuesday, Mr Baradei also stated that all countries should agree to unannounced IAEA inspections. Cat and mouse
In Mr Elbaradei's view, the measures are needed to prevent certain states or terrorist groups from producing nuclear weapons. That threat, he said, is growing. North Korea and Iran are the latest examples. After pulling out of the 1986 Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, Pyongyang is now playing a dangerous cat-and-mouse game with the world's major powers (the US, China, Russia and Japan) - a "game" some would simply call nuclear blackmail. The North Korean government claims that it possesses nuclear weapons and is demanding a large pile of money as well as a non-aggression treaty from the US in exchange for giving up its weapons, whether they exist or not.
The Netherlands supports the IAEA's initiative to put the worldwide production of weapons-grade uranium and plutonium under international control.
A foreign ministry spokesman told Radio Netherlands on Thursday that the Hague government shares the Mr Elbaradei's concerns and will do what it can to assist in finding a solution. "The Netherlands is certainly sympathetic towards Mr Elbaradei's proposals", the spokesman said.
The United States has given a more guarded response. "Mr Elbaradei's plans are worth studying," the US Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham stated on Wednesday. Iran is the other recent example of a country suspected of harbouring nuclear aspirations. Unlike North Korea, Tehran is still a signatory to the NPT and it has pledged a full disclosure of all its nuclear activities. This week, Mr Elbaradei said the reports submitted by the Iranian government were currently under review. He added that it was extremely desirable that Iran allow IAEA inspection teams unrestricted access to its nuclear installations.
Dirty bomb
It's an undisputed fact that Iraq was seriously interested in pursuing a nuclear weapons programme in the 1980s and 1990s. Neither is there any doubt that this ambition is currently shared by many terrorist groups. A "genuine" nuclear weapon may be out of their reach, but a dirty nuclear bomb (a heap of radioactive material packaged in a conventional bomb) certainly isn't.
However, "rogue states" and terrorists do not represent the only threat to the current Non-Proliferation Treaty. It limits the number of legitimate nuclear powers to the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, provided that they move to dismantle their nuclear arsenals and assist the rest of the world in developing atomic energy for peaceful purposes.
Violations
But 35 years after the treaty went into force, nobody can seriously maintain that there's been a substantial drive to dismantle nuclear weaponry. Moreover, the Security Council has been unable to prevent countries such as Israel, India and Pakistan acquiring nuclear capability.
In another threat to the Non-Proliferation Treaty, the United States and Russia have announced plans to modernize their nuclear arsenals. This declared intention by these two nuclear superpowers is a direct contravention of the spirit of the treaty.
Further proliferation looms and it will be only a matter of time before rogue states and terrorists resort to nuclear weapons, unless the UN Security Council move to adopt drastic measures. Not so long ago, very civilized nations (in addition to less savoury ones) such as Sweden, Switzerland, South Africa and Brazil entertained concrete plans in that direction. These plans were put on ice following international pressure, but of course they can easily be taken up again.
----
Panel backs 'battlefield' nukes
Bill would remove prohibition on smaller low-yield warheads
James Sterngold,
San Francisco Chronicle Staff Writer
Friday, November 7, 2003
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2003/11/07/MNGO12SD981.DTL
A House-Senate conference committee finalized an agreement Thursday that will reverse a decade of self-imposed restraint on the development of so- called battlefield nuclear weapons, repealing a law that had prohibited the production of smaller, more usable warheads.
Although the repeal has not been announced officially yet, lawmakers hammering out a final defense authorization bill said that it had completed language that will remove the limits on the development of the low-yield weapons. Republicans tried but failed to repeal the law last year.
The Bush administration argues that it needs the new bombs to destroy caches of weapons of mass destruction in the hands of potential enemies. But Democrats and other opponents say that because the warheads are smaller and thus more usable, they make nuclear exchanges more likely and encourage foes to build their own nuclear deterrents.
Rep. John Spratt, D-S.C., who was one of the co-sponsors of the Spratt- Furse Amendment, the original ban enacted a decade ago, said he was disappointed that the restraint had been removed. But he vowed to continue the efforts to prevent aggressive expansion of the military's still substantial nuclear arsenal.
The law being written by the conference committee lifts the old prohibition, but it also requires the administration to come back to Congress for approval if it wants to begin the actual detailed engineering work on warhead production.
Spratt called the removal of the ban highly symbolic, since Congress must agree to manufacture of the new warheads, but even that creates problems by sending a provocative signal to other countries, he noted.
"The symbolic effect is not to be dismissed," said Spratt, adding, "We're coming back to fight another day."
The Bush administration has pushed hard for elimination of the law, saying that the U.S. military needs new kinds of smaller nuclear warheads that can destroy deeply buried bunkers or other hardened targets without causing the kind of indiscriminate devastation larger warheads would incur.
Congressional Democrats have insisted that the United States -- which already has more than 10,000 nuclear warheads -- does not need new weapons and that development of the smaller warheads will just encourage potential enemies, such as North Korea and Iran, to rush and build their own deterrent forces.
The conferees essentially adapted the version of the bill agreed on in the Senate earlier.
But there is clear ambivalence even among Republicans about how far the administration should be allowed to go in its aggressive nuclear programs.
The Spratt-Furse Amendment prohibited the development of warheads with an explosive force of less than 5 kilotons - one third the power of the atomic bomb that killed 140,000 people when it was dropped over Hiroshima. It was put in place after the end of the Cold War to prevent what Spratt called "backsliding" into an arms race that would end up encouraging the spread of the weapons.
In a separate conference committee working out the final details of the Pentagon's budget for the next fiscal year, lawmakers agreed to far less money than Bush had sought for research into several specific new warhead designs and a new factory for producing the plutonium cores of warheads. In that instance, even many Republicans sought to slow the president's efforts.
E-mail James Sterngold at jsterngold@sfchronicle.com.
-------- u.s. nuc facilities
DOE to phase out exams for ex-workers
Friday, November 7th, 2003
Tri-City Herald,
Associated Press & Other Wire Services
By John Stang Herald staff writer
http://www.tri-cityherald.com/tch/local/story/4350305p-4359363c.html
PORTLAND -- Federally funded medical exams on former Department of Energy workers will be phased out and replaced with a new program by Sept. 30, said a medical researcher involved in the current project.
Hanford Advisory Board member Tim Takaro told other members Thursday in Portland that DOE recently made the change.
Takaro is a doctor, a faculty member in the occupational medicine department at the University of Washington and a key participant in Northwest medical checkups on former DOE plutonium production workers.
DOE has been paying for the exams for nonradiation-related health problems in former workers at its atomic bomb production sites across the nation, including Hanford. Separate programs are set up for construction and production employees.
The exams look for health problems related to exposure to beryllium, asbestos, noise and other industrial sources. And DOE is legally required to make sure the exams take place because some workers exposed to beryllium who contracted lung diseases may be eligible for federal compensation.
Takaro and Hank Hartley, outreach coordinator for the Hanford Building Trades Medical Screening Program, said they recently learned from DOE officials that funding problems are leading the federal agency to revise how the checkups are managed.
Takaro is concerned about plans to phase out the current program before DOE has figured out how to replace it since the backlog of people signed up for medical exams is greater than what can be handled by Sept. 30.
DOE officials with the program in Washington, D.C., could not be reached Thursday afternoon about the plan.
In Hanford's case, former production workers can call toll-free 1-888-277-6886 to schedule checks, which are mostly conducted in the Tri-City area.
Hanford has at least 65 buildings identified as places where workers may have been exposed to beryllium. No current Hanford processes use beryllium, although workers could be exposed to it during cleanup work.
The program has tried to contact more than 70,000 former Hanford production workers, reaching about 30,000.
Almost 2,000 have been checked in the past five years, although momentum is picking up, Takaro said. Doctors have examined about 600 former Hanford production people so far this year.
Another 3,000 have signed up and are waiting for medical checks, but Takaro believes that's too many to be finished in the next 11 months. In addition, the Hanford Building Trades Medical Screening Program has checked about 2,400 current and former Hanford construction workers in the past six years, Hartley said in a phone interview.
He said there are about 80,000 living current and former Hanford construction workers eligible for the checks. The program has contacted about 4,600.
So far, that program has identified two cases of chronic beryllium disease and 49 people who are extra sensitive to beryllium, Takaro said.
And 52 percent of the checked 2,400 people show some significant exposure to asbestos and 78 percent have shown some hearing losses, Hartley said.
The construction worker's program has a small waiting list of people wanting medical checks, he said.
"I feel there are a lot more men and women out there who deserve to go through this program," Hartley said.
-------- california
Nuclear Weapons Lab Loses 12 Keys New Locks Could Cost $1.7 Million
By Brian Faler
The Washington Post
Friday, November 7, 2003; Page A13
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A9866-2003Nov6.html
Officials at a national nuclear weapons laboratory in California have lost a dozen keys to the facility, according to a report released yesterday by the Energy Department's inspector general.
Gregory H. Friedman, the inspector general, said officials at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory have lost nine master keys and three magnetic key cards to the facility -- and, in some cases, do not know why or how long they have been missing.
The lab will need to replace about 100,000 locks in 526 buildings, according to the inspector general's report. That will cost taxpayers about $1.7 million -- although Friedman noted that some government officials dispute those figures.
More broadly, he said the facility did not have adequate measures in place to ensure that such incidents are reported in a timely manner -- or to readily identify and address any potential vulnerabilities in its security that may have resulted.
The lab is managed by the University of California under a contract with the Energy Department. The university has already been under fire for security lapses at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, which it also manages.
"We regret that the events covered in the report were very unfortunate," said Livermore spokesman David Schwoegler. "But once we were made aware of this, our senior management acted aggressively to correct both the key and card issues."
Schwoegler said the lost keys presented only "minimal increased risk to classified information," thanks to redundant security systems, and that there is no evidence security has been breached.
He said Livermore officials estimate they will have to change only 1,300 locks at a cost of $330,000. He also said the lab is in the process of replacing its locks.
-------- new mexico
Louisiana Energy Services touts uranium plant in New Mexico
By The Associated Press
November 8, 2003
http://www.2theadvocate.com/stories/090203/bus_uran001.shtml
An international consortium that wants to build a billion-dollar-plus facility to produce fuel for nuclear reactors told Gov. Bill Richardson it will not dispose of byproduct uranium in New Mexico.
Richardson's office on Monday released a statement from the governor about the $1.2 billion uranium enrichment plant, along with a letter to Richardson from Louisiana Energy Services president James Ferland.
Louisiana Energy, or LES, announced last week the plant would be built off N.M. 176 five miles east of Eunice near the Texas-New Mexico border. Ferland has said construction could begin within three years if the permit process goes smoothly.
The consortium must apply for a Nuclear Regulatory Commission license for the facility, which would use technology owned by Urenco to produce the fuel. Urenco, a joint British-Dutch-German venture, is the consortium's principal partner.
LES switched to New Mexico after community resistance in Hartsville, Tenn., where it had proposed to build the facility after meeting opposition in Louisiana, its first choice.
Ferland's letter to Richardson pledged there would be no disposal or long-term storage _ beyond the life of the plant _ of uranium byproduct cylinders in the state and that LES only would temporarily store cylinders on-site.
"The NRC license will only allow for storage and not disposal on-site," and the company will aggressively pursue disposal outside the state, Ferland wrote.
The company also agreed to a surety bond that provides funds for decontamination of the LES plant and ultimate disposal of any cylinders that may remain if the company defaults.
Ferland said the planned Lea County facility would provide uranium for the U.S. nuclear industry with oversight from the NRC and the state Environment Department.
Richardson, U.S. Sens. Pete Domenici and Jeff Bingaman, Rep. Steve Pearce, state Land Commissioner Pat Lyons, Attorney General Patricia Madrid, LES officials, Lea County officials and other dignitaries are expected to attend an official ceremony Tuesday marking the plant's announcement.
The plant is expected to employ 200 to 400 people during construction and about 250 during operation. The company said the annual payroll will be about $10 million with average salary of about $50,000.
Domenici, R-N.M., in February asked LES to look at establishing the plant in southern New Mexico. In a letter to LES executive director George Dials, Domenici noted LES reviewed a site near Carlsbad before choosing Tennessee and that other New Mexico sites could have been proposed.
Carlsbad Mayor Bob Forrest had cited the nearby Waste Isolation Pilot Plant _ the federal government's underground nuclear waste dump _ as an asset for the project. Dials, then with the U.S. Department of Energy, helped secure WIPP's licensing.
In April, LES announced it would review other sites after environmental groups opposed the Hartsville location. Environmentalists contended LES did not answer questions, including how it would handle leftover depleted uranium.
Louisiana Energy Services did not get a zoning change needed for the Tennessee project, the local economic development agency refused to extend its option to buy land for the plant and a Canadian partner withdrew. In addition, the NRC license application was delayed repeatedly.
In 1998, LES abandoned a seven-year attempt to build the plant in Claiborne Parish after opponents accused it of targeting the area because it was predominantly poor and black.
-------- new york
A-Plant's Foes Challenge U.S. on Safety Plan
November 7, 2003
By LYDIA POLGREEN
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/07/nyregion/07NUKE.html
WHITE PLAINS, Nov. 6 - Opponents of the Indian Point nuclear power plant filed an administrative appeal on Thursday seeking to overturn federal approval of plans to protect residents near the plant's two reactors in case of an emergency.
The appeal, which was filed by Assemblyman Richard L. Brodsky and was signed by nearly 50 local, state and federal officials, is the final step before opponents can file a lawsuit against the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which approved the hotly disputed plan in the summer. Opponents claim the plan will not adequately protect residents from a radiation release or other catastrophe at Indian Point.
The appeal comes as opponents of the plant reassess their efforts to shut down the twin reactors, which sit on the Hudson River about 35 miles north of Midtown Manhattan in Westchester County.
"We are redrawing the battle on a bunch of fronts," Mr. Brodsky said. "We have won the battle for public opinion, won the support of the county and state governments and now we are up against a faceless federal bureaucracy."
Many local officials and environmental groups argued that the emergency plan would not adequately protect residents, but the emergency management agency approved the plan, and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission swiftly concurred.
A spokesman for Indian Point said yesterday that the questions raised by opponents of the plant about the emergency plan had been addressed.
"This is just another tired effort to keep the ball alive," said Jim Steets, a spokesman for Entergy, the company that owns the plant. "Really, what they ought to be doing is ensuring themselves of a reliable electrical supply instead of trying to remove electrical supply."
Alex Matthiessen, executive director of the environmental group Riverkeeper, said the strategy was to press on every front and to identify problems with the plant in an effort to kill it with a thousand cuts.
"Every time Indian Point gets targeted or highlighted as a nuclear power plant with problems, it adds more to a case we have already built," Mr. Matthiessen said, "which is that this plant is a dangerous facility and it is only a matter of time before something terrible happens."
Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton and other Congressional representatives have called for hearings into the process the emergency management agency and the regulatory commission used in approving the plan, and Representative Eliot L. Engel, who represents a district near Indian Point, sponsored legislation passed by the House this week to require the Coast Guard to assess the plant's vulnerability to a water attack.
-------- tennessee
Oak Ridge nuclear-waste plant nears startup
$200M processing site is expected to begin operations in early '04
By FRANK MUNGER, munger@knews.com
November 7, 2003
Knoxville News-Sentinel
http://www.knoxnews.com/kns/local_news/article/0,1406,KNS_347_2409080,00.html
OAK RIDGE - A nuclear-waste processing plant is expected to begin operations here in early 2004, setting the stage for hundreds of shipments to Nevada and New Mexico over the next decade.
The facilities will be used to process highly radioactive wastes and package them in a form considered safe for shipment and disposal. Some of the wastes are remnants of the earliest nuclear operations in Oak Ridge, dating back to the World War II Manhattan Project, and have been stored at Oak Ridge for decades.
The processing plant's startup is about a year behind schedule, but the U.S. Department of Energy official overseeing the $200 million project said he's generally satisfied - all things considered.
"I certainly would have been more pleased had we been able to do this a year ago, but the good thing is the American taxpayer isn't forking the bill for the delay,'' said Gary Riner, the DOE project manager.
Foster Wheeler Environmental Corp. invested about $76 million to build the Oak Ridge facility as part of a 1998 agreement with DOE.
The company was reimbursed $24 million from DOE about a year ago after getting all the necessary permits for the facility. But Foster Wheeler won't recoup the rest of the investment or make a profit until it begins waste shipments to the Nevada Test Site and the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico.
Construction of the sophisticated waste-processing plant is complete, but the nuclear facilities are still undergoing a lengthy set of safety reviews.
In late October, Foster Wheeler pronounced the operations ready to go and awaiting DOE's approval.
A team from the federal agency's Oak Ridge office currently is evaluating the plant. Afterward, Foster Wheeler will have an opportunity to fix any flaws before the plant undergoes a final "operational readiness review'' by DOE staff from Washington.
The startup was delayed this summer after Foster Wheeler identified problems during tests of equipment used to handle liquid wastes called "supernates." One of the issues, according to Riner, was dried materials sticking to equipment in the discharge chute. The recipe was altered to improve the flow, he said.
Other changes were made to reduce the flammability of waste powders, Riner said.
The DOE official said it's possible that processing operations could be cleared to start in December if no additional problems are found, but he said January is more likely.
The Oak Ridge plant will process wastes in liquid, solid and sludge forms. But all of the wastes are radioactive, and some of them are among the hottest ever stored here.
A series of projects were conducted during the past 15 years to remove gunk from underground tanks and other storage sites that were leaking or considered unsafe. The radioactive materials were transferred to storage facilities near the Foster Wheeler plant in Melton Valley, west of Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
The supernates will be the first wastes processed at the Foster Wheeler facility, with liquids drawn into the processing system as needed from the nearby storage tanks.
Once dried and repackaged, those materials will be loaded into casks and sent by truck to the Nevada Test Site for disposal. About 280 shipments to Nevada are expected, Riner said.
The sludges and solids containing long-lived "transuranic" elements - such as plutonium, curium and americium - will be packaged later and trucked to the WIPP underground repository at Carlsbad, N.M. More than 550 shipments of transuranic waste are planned to New Mexico, although Oak Ridge officials are still waiting on approval to send some of the hottest materials.
All shipping casks meet standards set by Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Riner said.
Once the processing of nuclear waste begins, access to the Oak Ridge plant will be severely restricted. But Riner and other officials provided a tour of the facilities during a recent break between inspections.
Each of the waste forms will be processed in a different area of the plant, but all areas are heavily shielded to protect workers from radiation.
Some processing equipment has redundant systems side by side, so that one can be activated if the other fails. That way, workers won't have to go into hot zones in order to fix a problem.
"That's the whole design premise behind this facility,'' Riner said. "Everything is shielded to limit the human interface with radiation."
Senior writer Frank Munger may be reached at 865-342-6329.
--------
Audit Faults Energy Dept. Nuke Program
November 7, 2003
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Nuclear-Cleanup-Audit.html
OAK RIDGE, Tenn. (AP) -- An Energy Department program touted as a model for cleaning up and reusing old nuclear weapons installations has saved far less money than claimed by project managers and has actually delayed the cleanup of the most contaminated spots, an internal audit found.
Since 1996, the department has spent $51 million on incentives and $242 million in site preparation work to transform the shuttered K-25 uranium enrichment site in Oak Ridge into an industrial park.
Oak Ridge program managers and the leasing organization created to bring tenants claim that K-25's reindustrialization, copied to a lesser extent at other Energy Department sites, has saved taxpayers more than $500 million. This week, in fact, the Environmental Protection Agency gave the project an award for excellence.
But the department's inspector general said in the recent audit that no more than $4 million in savings from the reuse program could be verified, only 5 percent of the site's total building space has been leased and less than 3 percent of the site has been demolished.
Most of the 1,500-acre site is slated for demolition, but the department has not yet determined exactly how much of the property is too contaminated to reuse.
K-25 contains more than 500 buildings and other structures on guarded property tainted by hazardous chemicals and low-level radioactivity. For four decades, the site was used to produce uranium for bombs and nuclear reactors.
``I think you have to keep it all in context,'' said Rep. Zach Wamp, R-Tenn., whose district includes Oak Ridge. ``We are committed to reindustrialization, but it can always be done better and more effectively and efficiently.''
The audit by Inspector General Gregory Friedman said work on the most contaminated and unsafe building -- the half-mile-long, U-shaped K-25 Building itself -- ``was deferred while buildings with perceived reuse potential have been cleaned up in an effort to increase commercial tenants.'' The work on that building has yet to begin.
Friedman concluded in an Oct. 14 memo that the money might have been better used to ``decontaminate, decommission and demolish'' the site's higher-risk facilities.
Jessie Hill Roberson, the department's assistant secretary for environmental management, said the audit omitted important cleanup work that had been accomplished, but said the department agreed with the recommendation to steer money toward the cleanup of the more contaminated areas.
In 2002, the Energy Department pledged to finish the multibillion-dollar cleanup by 2008, nearly a decade ahead of previous timetables. Wamp said congressional negotiators will soon endorse a $1 billion cleanup appropriation for K-25 for use next year.
-------- wisconsin
Two Wis. Utilities to Sell Nuclear Plant
November 7, 2003
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/business/AP-Nuclear-Plant-Sale.html
MADISON, Wis. (AP) -- Two Wisconsin utilities are selling a nuclear power plant on the Lake Michigan shore to a Virginia company for about $220 million in cash.
Wisconsin Public Service Corp. of Green Bay owns 59 percent of the 545-megawatt Kewaunee nuclear power plant, and Alliant Energy Corp. of Madison owns the rest.
The deal announced Friday with Richmond, Va.-based Dominion Resources Inc. is expected to close in the fall of 2004, pending regulatory approval.
The Wisconsin utilities said they would pass on the earnings from the sale to customers in future rate proceedings.
Wisconsin Public Resources expects to receive about $130 million, and Alliant subsidiary Wisconsin Power and Light expects to get about $90 million through the sale.
The Wisconsin utilities also have agreed with Dominion to buy power from the plant through 2013, when the plant's operating license expires. The utilities did not disclose terms of that agreement, which also needs regulatory approval.
The utilities said they weren't looking to sell the plant until Dominion approached them.
``We saw this as a unique opportunity to ... have our customers benefit from nuclear power, while providing us a greater certainty about the cost going forward,'' Alliant spokesman Chris Schoenherr said.
Dominion will receive funds worth about $392 million from the Wisconsin utilities. The funds were set up to pay for the eventual decommissioning of the plant. The utilities have no plans to decommission the plant but are required to plan for the eventuality, Schoenherr said.
The plant, located 35 miles south of Green Bay, employs about 460 workers. Dominion plans to retain those workers.
The plant opened in 1974 and is operated by Nuclear Management Co. of Hudson, Wis. Upon completion of the transaction, Kewaunee will be operated by Dominion Energy, an operating unit of Dominion.
In afternoon trading on the New York Stock Exchange, Dominion shares fell 19 cents to $60.96, Wisconsin Public Resources fell 11 cents to $44.75 and Alliant shares rose 4 cents to $24.57.
On the Net:
Alliant Energy: http://www.alliantenergy.com
Wisconsin Public Service: http://www.wisconsinpublicservice.com/
Dominion: http://www.dom.com/
-------- us politics
Clark urges creating new agency for Iraq
November 07, 2003
By Stephen Dinan
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20031106-115236-9543r.htm
Democratic presidential candidate Wesley Clark said yesterday the United States must remain militarily engaged in Iraq but turn over rebuilding to a new international body tasked with creating a new Iraqi government.
Mr. Clark, a retired Army general, said the United States should apply the lessons he learned as commander of U.S. forces in Bosnia-Herzegovina and NATO forces in Kosovo to rebuilding Iraq.
In a speech at South Carolina State University, he proposed turning over command of the military operation to NATO, and creating a new international authority with responsibility for rebuilding.
"The Coalition Provisional Authority, by which America controls Iraq today, should be replaced. But it is simply unrealistic to have the United Nations take over this daunting task - it's not able and it's not willing," he said.
"We must create a new international structure - the Iraqi Reconstruction and Democracy Council - similar to the one we created in Bosnia with representatives from Europe, the United States, Iraq's neighbors, and other countries that will support our effort," he said.
Mr. Clark also said President Bush has failed to attract critical international support; the candidate said he would work on contentious issues at which Mr. Bush has balked.
"Our allies would be more willing to help us on Iraq if we are willing to work together on issues of concern to them, like climate change, the International Criminal Court, and a Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty," Mr. Clark said.
He also said Saddam "did pose a national security challenge" and was in violation of U.N. resolutions. But Mr. Clark said going to war was not justified because Iraq did not pose an imminent threat.
Mr. Clark and eight other Democrats are vying for their party's nomination to challenge Mr. Bush in 2004.
Yesterday, one of those challengers - former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean - got a prized endorsement from the 1.6-million member Service Employees International Union.
A formal announcement will come next week, but SEIU President Andrew L. Stern emerged from a union board meeting declaring Mr. Dean their candidate.
"We are hopeful that there are other unions who share our members' excitement for Dr. Dean's candidacy," Mr. Stern said in a statement afterward.
The SEIU is the largest union in the AFL-CIO. Another large union, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, also is considering endorsing Mr. Dean.
The SEIU endorsement caps a tumultuous few days for Mr. Dean.
He has taken a whipping from fellow candidates about his comments that Democrats should be courting "guys with Confederate flags in their pickup trucks," and issued an apology of sorts yesterday.
But Sen. John Kerry, Massachusetts Democrat and a fellow candidate for president, yesterday began a broad attack on Mr. Dean, using the Confederate flag comments as the root.
"I think Americans deserve straight talk. I think they ought to know who Howard Dean is," Mr. Kerry said.
Mr. Dean, the front-runner in some of the early nomination contests, has found strong support among Democratic activists who opposed going to war in Iraq. But Mr. Kerry argued that Mr. Dean's record of support from the National Rifle Association, as well as his previous support for cuts in Medicare, should make those activists think twice.
----
China consults Powell on North Korea talks
WASHINGTON (AFP)
Nov 07, 2003
http://www.spacewar.com/2003/031107180213.782cg516.html
China forged ahead with its bid to convene new six-nation talks on the simmering North Korea nuclear crisis on Friday, as Vice Foreign Minister Wang Yi briefed Secretary of State Colin Powell.
Wang was at the State Department for the second straight day, following his talks with the Bush administration's North Korea pointman, Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly on Thursday.
"We had very good discussions," Wang said as he left the building.
"Preparations for a new round of six party talks in Beijing have started," Wang said through a translator, but refused to answer further questions.
The United States and other parties are still hoping that another round of talks, to follow inconclusive discussions in Beijing in August, could take place before the end of the year.
The talks, which Washington sees as the only way out of the crisis which erupted a year ago, also include Russia, South Korea, Japan and North Korea.
North Korea agreed in principle last week to attend a new round of talks.
Wang's shuttle has included a recent trip to Pyongyang with parliamentary chief Wu Bangguo.
In the next step of its initiative, China is sending vice foreign minister Dai Bingguo to South Korea to exchange views on the issue November 9-12 and to Tokyo November 12-16.
The United States and Russia are also expected to consult in Washington in coming weeks.
Both China and the United States have downplayed the idea that Beijing's envoys are acting as go-betweens between Washington and Pyongyang.
But on Wednesday, Powell appeared to suggest that part of Beijing's role at least was to act as an informal messenger to the Stalinist state.
Powell recalled how he met former Chinese foreign minister Tang Jiaxuan in March and "reinforced President (George W.) Bush's message that China needed to rise to its responsibilities in dealing with this regional problem."
"The very next day the vice premier (Qian Qichen), who is here with us today, flew to North Korea and delivered that message, that there would be no alternative to multilateral talks in which all countries of the region would be fully involved.
He then noted how Bush outlined his views on the crisis to Chinese President Hu Jintao in Bangkok last month.
"Following that meeting, National People's Congress Chairman Mr. Wu (Bangguo) went to Pyongyang and discussed it with the North Koreans," said Powell during a speech in Texas.
----
House Approves $401 Billion Defense Bill
November 7, 2003
ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Defense-Spending.html
WASHINGTON (AP) -- A $401 billion defense bill approved by the House on Friday would grant Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld the increased control he sought over 700,000 civilian employees -- a change the Pentagon says will free more troops for combat positions.
Democrats opposed provisions of the bill affecting the civilian work force, nuclear weapons research and environmental laws. But most joined Republicans in a 362-40 vote for the bill authorizing 2004 defense programs.
``There is so much in this bill that takes care of the troops, their families, their needs, their capability of waging war -- and we are at war,'' said Rep. Ike Skelton of Missouri, the top Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee.
The bill increases soldiers' pay by an average of 4.15 percent and extends recent raises in combat and family separation pay.
The Senate is likely to approve the bill early next week. It would then go to President Bush for his signature.
The bill offers compromises on two of the most contentious defense issues in Congress. It calls for the Air Force to lease 20 Boeing 767 planes as midair refueling tankers and buy 80 more. Some senators had objected to the Pentagon's earlier proposal to lease all 100 planes as too costly.
It also partially overturns rules preventing disabled veterans from receiving some of their retirement pay. Democrats said the compromise plan wouldn't help about 400,000 disabled veterans, but they failed in a 217-188 vote to have House-Senate negotiators reconsider the issue. The vote was mostly along party lines.
``I commend the House for passing the Defense Authorization conference report and showing strong bipartisan support for America's national security, our troops, and their families,'' Bush said. ``The legislation also makes good progress toward transforming and modernizing our military so that it is best prepared to protect Americans.''
Rep. Joel Hefley, R-Colo., said Democrats took no steps on the issue when they controlled the White House or Congress. ``Now we get this phony posturing after a deal has been worked out to really try to deal with the problem. I think that's a cheap shot,'' he said.
The civil service restructuring was one of Rumsfeld's top priorities. Pentagon officials said restrictions on hiring, firing and promoting employees forced them to use military personnel for jobs better suited for civilians. That argument found a ready audience among lawmakers who say the Pentagon doesn't have enough troops to meet its commitments worldwide.
Democrats said the bill goes too far in stripping overtime guarantees and job protection rules.
``It will undo decades of some of the most important worker protections enacted by Congress and supported by decades of Republican and Democratic presidents,'' said Rep. Steny Hoyer, the No. 2 House Democratic leader.
Republicans countered that many of the rules are outdated.
``When it comes to our civil service, the tradition of preserving traditions has become a tradition,'' said Rep. Tom Davis, R-Va.
Unions opposed the changes. John Gage, president of the American Federation of Government Employees, said the bill ``basically changes the Department of Defense into a fiefdom for Donald Rumsfeld.''
The bill lifts a decade-old ban on research into low-yield nuclear weapons and authorizes $15 million for continued research into the Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator, a powerful nuclear weapon capable of destroying deep underground bunkers. The administration would have to return to Congress before development of the weapons begins.
Republicans said there is no harm in exploring weapons that may be needed one day to destroy hidden stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction. Democrats said the provision could trigger a new arms race and increase the likelihood of nuclear war.
Democrats also objected to exemptions given to the military to provisions of the Endangered Species Act and the Marine Mammal Protection Act. Both were among a series of exemptions sought by the Pentagon, which claims that environmental laws have restricted training exercises. Environmentalists say the laws have had minimal effect on training and that the exemptions go too far.
In other provisions, the bill:
--Makes it easier for foreign-born service members and their families to become citizens.
--Encourages the military to buy from American manufacturers, but eliminates requirements the House wanted.
--Authorizes $9.1 billion for ballistic missile defense, $6.6 billion for the construction of seven new ships, $4.4 billion for developing the Joint Strike Fighter and $3.5 billion for 22 F/A-22 Raptor fighters.
Most of the funding authorized in the bill will come from a $368 billion defense appropriations bill signed by Bush on Sept. 30.
The bill s H.R. 1588
On the Net:
Congress: http://thomas.loc.gov
----
Clinton calls for aid to end arms crisis
Hong Kong - Reuters
November 7, 2003
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/11/07/1068013344855.html
Former US President Bill Clinton yesterday said Washington should offer food and energy supplies to North Korea in return for access to its laboratories to help resolve a crisis over the North's nuclear program.
"I think we ought to offer them a mega deal. Help with food, help with energy, help with becoming a self-sustaining economy... in return for total access to all the labs, all the sites, taking the plutonium rods out of North Korea altogether," Clinton told a business forum in Hong Kong.
"I don't believe that North Korea wants to drop a bomb on South Korea or Japan. I think what they want to do is eat and stay warm."
His comments came after Washington proposed suspending a project to build nuclear power stations in North Korea for a year to see what comes of diplomatic attempts to persuade Pyongyang to abandon its nuclear weapons program.
The Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organisation, the international consortium building the nuclear power stations in North Korea, is expected to officially announce a decision on the future of the light-water reactor project by November 21.
----
Albright "Apologizes"
by Sheldon Richman,
November 7, 2003
http://www.fff.org/comment/com0311c.asp
In 1996 then-UN Ambassador Madeleine Albright was asked by 60 Minutes correspondent Lesley Stahl, in reference to years of U.S.-led economic sanctions against Iraq, "We have heard that half a million children have died. I mean, that is more children than died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the price worth it?"
To which Ambassador Albright responded, "I think that is a very hard choice, but the price, we think, the price is worth it."
That remark caused no public outcry. In fact, in January the following year Albright was confirmed by the U.S. Senate as President Clinton's secretary of state. In her opening statement to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which was considering her appointment, she said, "We will insist on maintaining tough UN sanctions against Iraq unless and until that regime complies with relevant Security Council resolutions."
Apparently no member of the committee asked her about her statement on 60 Minutes. Albright was confirmed.
Why bring this up now? Albright has just published her memoirs, Madam Secretary, in which she clarifies her statement. Here's what she writes:
I must have been crazy; I should have answered the question by reframing it and pointing out the inherent flaws in the premise behind it. Saddam Hussein could have prevented any child from suffering simply by meeting his obligations.... As soon as I had spoken, I wished for the power to freeze time and take back those words. My reply had been a terrible mistake, hasty, clumsy and wrong. Nothing matters more than the lives of innocent people. I had fallen into the trap and said something I simply did not mean. That was no one's fault but my own. (p. 275)
In the paragraph before this one she complains about the 60 Minutes report because "little effort was made to explain Saddam's culpability, his misuse of Iraqi resources, or the fact that we were not embargoing medicine or food."
When one reviews the facts, it is clear that Albright's explanation is woefully inadequate. First, it contains an apparent contradiction. She says food and medicine were not embargoed, but then she says Saddam Hussein could have avoided the suffering "simply by meeting his obligations." Does that mean more food would have been available had Hussein done what the U.S. government wanted? If so, weren't American officials at least partly responsible for the harm done to the Iraqi people? Hussein certainly did not let his people starve. The New York Times and Washington Post have reported that in answer to the sanctions, Saddam Hussein maintained an elaborate food-rationing program for rich and poor, presumably to hold the loyalty of the Iraqi people, which the sanctions were supposedly intended to dissolve. Iraqis are reported to be reluctant to give up the program even though Hussein is gone and the sanctions are over.
Albright is being disingenuous. Although food wasn't formally embargoed when the sanctions began in 1990, Iraq was hampered in importing it because initially Iraqi oil couldn't be exported. No exports, no imports. The UN's "oil for food" program, started six years later, after Hussein dropped his opposition, was supposed to remedy that. But it didn't entirely. Counterpunch.org reported in 1999, "Proceeds from such oil sales are banked in New York.... Thirty-four percent is skimmed off for disbursement to outside parties with claims on Iraq, such as the Kuwaitis, as well as to meet the costs of the UN effort in Iraq. A further thirteen percent goes to meet the needs of the Kurdish autonomous area in the north." With the remaining limited amount of money, the Iraqi government could order "food, medicine, medical equipment, infrastructure equipment to repair water and sanitation" and other things. But - and here's the rub - the U.S. government could veto or delay any items ordered. And it did.
As Joy Gordon reported in the November 2001 Harper's,
The United States has fought aggressively throughout the last decade to purposefully minimize the humanitarian goods that enter the country.... Since August 1991 the United States has blocked most purchases of materials necessary for Iraq to generate electricity, as well as equipment for radio, telephone, and other communications. Often restrictions have hinged on the withholding of a single essential element, rendering many approved items useless. For example, Iraq was allowed to purchase a sewage-treatment plant but was blocked from buying the generator necessary to run it; this in a country that has been pouring 300,000 tons of raw sewage daily into its rivers.
For Albright to say that food and medicine were not embargoed is to evade the fact that critical public-health needs could not be addressed because of the sanctions. Preventing a society from purifying its water and treating its sewage is a particularly brutal way to inflict harm, especially on its children. Disease was rampant, and infant mortality rose because of the sanctions. Let's not forget that destruction of Iraq's infrastructure was a deliberate aim of the U.S. bombing during the 1991 Gulf War.
No wonder two UN humanitarian coordinators quit over the sanctions. As one of them, Denis Halliday, said when he left in 1998, "I've been using the word 'genocide' because this is a deliberate policy to destroy the people of Iraq. I'm afraid I have no other view."
Albright now writes that her answer to Stahl was "crazy" and that she regretted it "as soon as [she] had spoken." Yet she did not take back her words between 1996 and Sept. 11, 2001. According to journalist Matt Welch, after being plagued by student protesters she "quietly" expressed regret for her statement in a speech at the University Southern California shortly after 9/11. But neither her office nor the Clinton administration issued a prominent clarification to the American people or the world. Could that be because her initial answer was sincere and that her belated apology was issued with her legacy in mind? We can be sure of one thing: word of her response spread throughout the Arab world. Maybe even among some of the 9/11 terrorists.
Sheldon Richman is senior fellow at The Future of Freedom Foundation, and editor of Ideas on Liberty magazine and author of "'Ancient History': U.S. Conduct in the Middle East since World War II and the Folly of Intervention.". Send him email.
-------- MILITARY
-------- asia
Briefly - Asia
Combined dispatches and staff reports.
November 07, 2003
Washington Times
http://www.washtimes.com/world/briefly.htm
VIETNAM
Defense chief heads for U.S. tomorrow
HANOI - Twenty-eight years after the end of the Vietnam War, Vietnamese Defense Minister Pham Van Tra heads to the United States tomorrow for the first visit by the communist nation's top military officer.
The four-day Washington foray by the conservative general marks the start of a new era of engagement at a level unthinkable a few years ago.
"Tra's visit to the United States is highly significant," said Carl Thayer, a specialist on U.S.-Vietnam relations at the Australian Defense Force Academy. Gen. Nguyen Dinh Uoc of the Defense Ministry's Military History Institute here added: "It will make bilateral relations more comprehensive by developing military ties between the two countries."
CHINA
Joint team eliminates Japan's chemical arms
BEIJING - Nearly 100 Chinese and Japanese chemical-weapons specialists descended on Qiqihar city in northeastern Heilongjiang province yesterday to dispose of weapons left by retreating Japanese armies nearly 60 years ago.
The team will work with Chinese diplomats, specialists and engineers to dispose of chemical weapons that were collected after World War II and stored in a local warehouse, Xinhua news agency reported. Although the weapons were sealed, one man was killed and 42 were injured in August by leakage from rusted containers.
INDONESIA
Martial law in Aceh extended six months
JAKARTA - The government will extend by six months martial law in troubled Aceh Province, where nearly 1,500 people have been killed in military offensives since it was imposed May 19 to crack down on rebels of the Free Aceh Movement.
After a meeting led by President Megawati Sukarnoputri, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, coordinating minister for political and security affairs, disclosed the extension term, effective Nov. 16.
"The government decided to extend the martial law in Aceh for six months, and every month, it will be evaluated." Mr. Yudhoyono told reporters.
--------
Japan Rethinks Military's Role
November 7, 2003
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Japan-Mulling-the-Military.html
YOKOSUKA, Japan (AP) -- Time seems to have stood still at this base that was once home to the Imperial Japanese Navy: Black submarines flying the rising sun flag huddle in the morning mist, while sailors clamber over their gray-hulled warships.
But outside the gates, Japan is rethinking decades-old attitudes about its military and the commitment to pacifism on which this nation rebuilt itself from the ashes of World War II.
Reflecting the anxieties of a country concerned it can no longer take its security for granted, the issue has become a hot button as Japan prepares for parliamentary elections on Sunday.
Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's ruling Liberal Democratic Party has pledged to draft a proposal by 2005 to revise the 1947 constitution under which occupied Japan renounced armies, navies and the right to make war. Even the largest opposition party agrees on the need to debate the constitutional status of the nation's military, which exists in a legal gray zone as a ``self-defense force.''
The popular prime minister already has won broad support for initiatives loosening the reins on Japan's tightly controlled armed forces. Japanese warships from this base south of Tokyo have steamed into the Indian Ocean to provide logistical support for the war in Afghanistan.
Heading into the election, people list concerns they feel hit close to home -- pension checks, doctors bills, highway tolls. Then there's one that's too close: North Korea.
``North Korea is just scary,'' said Tsunehiro Suzuki, a 48-year-old office worker in Yokosuka, which is Koizumi's home district as well as headquarters to Japan's Maritime Self-Defense Force and the U.S. Seventh Fleet.
``People in this country feel a lot less secure than back when the Soviet Union was supposed to be the enemy,'' Suzuki said.
Japan was shaken when North Korea test-fired a missile over its territory in 1998. It was shocked again when Kim Jong Il admitted last year that North Korean agents had kidnapped a dozen Japanese in the 1970s to steal their identities.
That threat pushed the government to launch the country's first spy satellites and move ahead with plans for a U.S.-developed missile shield, both of which have been criticized as contrary to the spirit of the constitution.
Suzuki scoffed at the suggestion.
``Whether you're talking about defending the country or doing our share in international peacekeeping, military force is involved,'' he said. ``Yet our constitution says we're not supposed to have a military.''
Some analysts accuse Koizumi and his conservative allies of scaremongering to push their agenda.
``They're using North Korea and the Chinese to reinforce this need to be stronger and more autonomous,'' said Ron Morse, professor of Japanese politics at UCLA.
It's a refrain that's been echoed by Japan's socialist and communist parties, which have pleaded with the nation for decades not to forget its bitter experience with militarism.
But both have shrunk to political insignificance in recent years as their ideologies have fallen out of step with the mood of the times.
``The reason they've collapsed is they just don't talk to people's anxieties anymore,'' Morse said.
The main opposition party, the Democratic Party of Japan, includes defectors from both sides of the political spectrum and is pledging to improve Japan's ``defensive capabilities.'' Its platform cautiously approves debate to build ``national consensus'' on constitutional reform.
Koizumi, meanwhile, is keen to get the Self-Defense Force more involved in international peacekeeping. He won Parliament's permission to send ground units for non-combat duty in Iraq, though the dispatch was put on hold amid concern Japanese soldiers could come under fire.
Still, the idea that peacekeeping operations are a legitimate -- and necessary -- mission for Japan's military seems to have been reinforced by mounting perceptions of this nation's vulnerability and dependence on its American ally for security.
``There's only so far Japan can get away with just offering to open its wallet, especially considering how much the United States has done for us,'' said Keiko Horita, 52, a music teacher in Yokosuka. ``It's not fair.''
Some in Koizumi's hometown said they were leery about any tampering with the nation's pacifistic ideals, enshrined in Article 9 of the constitution, and debate on a document that has never been amended in 56 years is bound to be emotional.
Yet the because-the-constitution-says-so taboos that once dominated thinking about the military in this country are becoming a thing of the past.
``I don't know all the pros and cons of Article 9,'' said Nobuo Tamura, a 77-year-old retiree, as he watched a pair of Japanese submarines firing up their diesel engines from a nearby park. ``But I do know that's a navy.''
-------- biological weapons
Anthrax Scare Leads to Closing of Mail Centers in Washington
November 7, 2003
By CHRISTINE HAUSER
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/07/national/07CND-ANTHRA.html?hp
Eleven Washington-area post offices were closed today after a routine air sample taken at a Navy mail facility in the region tested "positive for anthrax," a Postal Service spokesman said.
The spokesman, Azeezaly Jaffer, said in a statement that the facilities were closed "out of an abundance of caution" while biohazard contamination testing was being conducted. There was no indication that the more than 1,000 postal workers at the facilities had been exposed to anthrax.
On Thursday afternoon, the Postal Service learned of the positive test sample at a Navy mail-handling facility at the Anacostia Naval Air Station.
"Those tests came up positive for very low level amounts - less than 1 percent of what it would take to be infectious," a Navy spokesman, Cmdr. Conrad Chun, said. "We are conducting more definitive tests but we have taken all the precautionary measures."
Five workers at Anacostia were given the antibiotic Cipro as a precaution, Commander Chun said.
Mr. Jaffer said that mail moving through the Anacostia facility had been processed through the V Street facility in Washington, one of the 11 shut down. The company hired to transport the mail also collects mail from other area facilities.
Anthrax is an acute infectious disease caused by the spore-forming bacterium Bacillus anthracis. It can infect humans through the skin, as an intestinal disease or through inhalation, and can be fatal.
After the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, 5 people were killed and at least 17 were infected when anthrax was spread through the postal system in letters containing anthrax in a powder.
Since 9/11, many workers at mail facilities, including the one at Anacostia, wear protective clothing.
Commander Chun said that the workers had notified managers after a detection machine registered traces of anthrax at the Anacostia facility, which handles the majority of the Navy mail in the area around the nation's capital. But he said it was not uncommon for the system to have "false positives" and that further testing would be conducted today.
"The system checks the air continuously," Commander Chun said. "They took some further samples and probably some swabbed areas of the facility."
-------- business
Pentagon Agrees to Compromise on Boeing Tankers
By Renae Merle
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, November 7, 2003; Page E01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A9843-2003Nov6.html
The Pentagon agreed yesterday to abandon its plan to lease and then buy 100 Boeing Co. 767 tankers, accepting a cheaper compromise that clears the way for final congressional approval and ends a two-year battle over the program.
The Air Force will lease 20 tankers, which refuel fighter jets in flight, instead of 100 and buy the remaining 80. The deal reduces the original $21 billion cost by $4 billion, according to the Senate Armed Services Committee.
The revised plan will be included in the 2004 defense authorization bill that the House and Senate are expected to approve next week.
Neither the Air Force nor Boeing revealed many details of the compromise. From its earliest days, the program was bedeviled by concerns about its cost -- and it is still unclear how the Air Force and Pentagon will come up with the funds. The Air Force had said it might have to scale back high-profile programs such as the F/A-22 fighter jet if it bought the tankers.
The compromise puts to rest the contentious debate over whether the Air Force should undertake an expensive program to replace its aging fleet of tankers, most of which were built during the Eisenhower administration. The argument for replacing the tankers was undercut by a 2001 Air Force study by a consulting arm of Boeing that concluded no new planes needed to be bought until after 2010, prompting critics to charge that the Air Force had exaggerated the planes' corrosion problems. Congress ultimately conceded that the Air Force needed the new aircraft but balked at the price.
It was important to "bring this acquisition more closely in line with the traditional authorization, budget and procurement processes, while bringing as much savings as possible to the taxpayers," said Sen. John W. Warner (R-Va.), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee and a chief architect of the compromise. "This compromise achieves those goals."
The battle included charges that the deal was conceived to boost Boeing, which laid off thousands of workers during a slump in aviation after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Critics complained that the Air Force skipped many of the traditional procurement steps in pursuing the deal, including not producing an analysis of alternatives. The deal won approval from three committees before the Senate Armed Services Committee protested and began looking for a compromise.
Also, the Pentagon inspector general is investigating whether a former Air Force official gave Boeing a competitor's proprietary information.
"Life in this town is built on compromise," Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld said. "Clearly there were significant individual members of the United States Congress who felt that there were better ways to approach this."
Chicago-based Boeing said it supports the compromise but declined to discuss details, which are still being worked out. In its push for the deal, Boeing initiated an intensive behind-the-scenes lobbying campaign, including encouraging suppliers to call their representatives.
The compromise calls for an outlay of billions of dollars earlier in the program than the original lease required -- payments that the Air Force had hoped to avoid.
As a first step in trying to resolve a future funding crunch, the time frame for payments was lengthened beyond the provisions of the original plan. The Air Force will take delivery of the last plane in 2014 instead of 2011 and will continue to make payments until 2017.
"Our proposal strikes a necessary balance between the critical need for new air refueling tankers and the constraints on our budget," Paul D. Wolfowitz, deputy secretary of defense, said yesterday in a letter to the Senate Armed Services Committee.
The deal is a major boost for Boeing's ailing commercial aircraft business. The backlog for the 767 fell to 31 this year, and production could have been shut down by 2008 without the Air Force's order for 100 planes. Lawmakers from the state of Washington, where Boeing has laid off more than 23,000 workers in the past two years, rallied around the deal.
"Two years ago, the bottom fell out of the aerospace industry, hurting working families throughout Washington state," said Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash). "This deal is a victory for Washington's economy."
The deal includes $6 billion in contracts related to the lease that Boeing had been awarded without competition: $5 billion to maintain the planes and $1 billion for training programs.
The compromise is not perfect, but "the clear message sent today is that the federal treasury isn't Boeing's personal ATM machine," said Keith Ashdown, a spokesman for Taxpayers for Common Sense, a critic of the deal.
-------- chemical weapons
CHINA - Joint team eliminates Japan's chemical arms
November 07, 2003
WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/world/briefly.htm
BEIJING - Nearly 100 Chinese and Japanese chemical-weapons specialists descended on Qiqihar city in northeastern Heilongjiang province yesterday to dispose of weapons left by retreating Japanese armies nearly 60 years ago.
The team will work with Chinese diplomats, specialists and engineers to dispose of chemical weapons that were collected after World War II and stored in a local warehouse, Xinhua news agency reported. Although the weapons were sealed, one man was killed and 42 were injured in August by leakage from rusted containers.
-------- iraq
Collective Punishment for Downing Black Hawk?
By Abu Spinoza
Fox News
Friday, Nov. 7, 2003
http://www.pressaction.com/pablog/archives/001137.html#001137
"The U.S. military swept through Iraqi neighborhoods early Saturday, firing at houses suspected to be harboring hostile forces in the wake of an apparent attack on a Black Hawk helicopter that killed six U.S. soldiers."
The report quotes the commander of the 1st Battalion, 22nd Infantry Regimen, Lt. Col. Steven Russell, as saying, "This is to remind the town that we have teeth and claws and we will use them."
No doubt Iraqi civilians are finding out who has "teeth and claws." Lest one forgets that the Fourth Geneva Convention, relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War (Aug. 12, 1949), adopted after the world learned about the horrors of war crimes of World War II, states very clearly:
In Article 33,
- No protected person may be punished for an offence he or she has not personally committed. Collective penalties and likewise all measures of intimidation or of terrorism are prohibited.
- Pillage is prohibited.
- Reprisals against protected persons and their property are prohibited.
In Article 53,
Any destruction by the Occupying Power of real or personal property belonging individually or collectively to private persons, or to the State, or to other public authorities, or to social or cooperative organizations, is prohibited, except where such destruction is rendered absolutely necessary by military operations.
Is the U.S. military committing war crimes? Who will hold Lt. Col. Steven Russell et al. responsible? Under international laws, it is a war crime to punish Iraqi civilians for the Iraqi resistance downing U.S. military helicopter(s).
The international media, including the U.S. press, has responsibility to expose suspected war crimes and to investigate it thoroughly. The crimes being committed by the occupying powers of Iraq should not remain buried for years.
Only recently the Toledo Blade published an account of war crimes committed by an "elite" military unit during the United States military intervention in Vietnam. The international press has recently revealed the collective burial grounds that existed under Saddam Hussein's regime and various other violations of human rights, but alas it was way too long after these crimes were actually committed. The media must not shut its eyes to the war crimes that are being committed right now and which can be prevented.
Abu Spinoza is a columnist for Press Action. Posted by Mark Hand, November 08, 2003
----
Six Killed in U.S. Helicopter Crash in Iraq
November 7, 2003
New York Times
By CHRISTINE HAUSER
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/07/international/middleeast/07CND-IRAQ.html?hp
Six American soldiers were killed when their helicopter crashed near Saddam Hussein's hometown, and a soldier died in the ambush of a convoy in northern Iraq, the military said today.
The Black Hawk helicopter from the 101st Airborne Air Assault Division went down on the east side of the Tigris river near Tikrit at 9:40 a.m., bursting into flames and killing all six soldiers aboard, the military said. The cause of the crash was being investigated, a military statement said.
In the northern city of Mosul, one soldier was killed and six others were wounded when their convoy was attacked with rocket-propelled grenades, the military said.
In an almost daily occurrence, American soldiers and forces working with them have been attacked by guerrillas opposed to the occupying troops.
American officers based at one of Saddam Hussein's former palaces in Tikrit, the former Iraqi leader's hometown and a hotbed of anti-American sentiment , said it was unclear whether guerrillas had shot down the Black Hawk helicopter.
"At this stage, we don't know if it was due to mechanical failure or another reason," Maj. Josslyn Aberle of the Fourth Infantry Division told reporters, according to a Reuters report.
Last Sunday, guerrillas shot down a Chinook helicopter west of Baghdad in the deadliest single strike on American-led forces since they invaded on March 20 to oust Saddam Hussein.
On Thursday, several hundred American soldiers gathered at a former Iraqi air base to say farewell to their 15 comrades who were killed when the helicopter was struck by a missile. The Pentagon announced that a 16th soldier had died in a hospital in Germany.
A Polish major died in an ambush about 20 miles northwest of the central Iraqi city of Karbala, the authorities said on Thursday. Other deaths reported on Thursday follow a pattern now common in the Iraq.
One American soldier died when his truck struck a land mine near the Syrian border, American military authorities said in Baghdad, and another was killed in Mahmudiya, just south of Baghdad, when guerrillas attacked a patrol of the 82nd Airborne Division with rocket-propelled grenades.
--------
Iraq Attacks Kill 2 U.S. Soldiers and Polish Officer
By Daniel Williams
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, November 7, 2003; Page A24
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A9802-2003Nov6.html
BAGHDAD, Nov. 6 -- Two U.S. soldiers were killed Thursday in Iraq, one just hours before members of his unit commemorated the loss of troops in the downing Sunday of a Chinook helicopter west of Baghdad.
Also, peacekeepers from Poland suffered their first combat fatality.
A member of the U.S. 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment was killed in the morning when his truck hit a mine near the Syrian border, far northwest of Baghdad. Troops have been patrolling the border area, trying to intercept the foreign guerrillas who the Bush administration says have been slipping into Iraq with Syria's help. Iraqi officials say Islamic militants have flooded into Iraq not only from Syria but also from Iran and Saudi Arabia.
In the evening, several hundred soldiers from the 3rd Armored gathered in a field 200 miles northwest of the capital, according to news services, and held a memorial service for comrades killed Sunday when their troop transport helicopter was shot down near the town of Fallujah. The Defense Department said a soldier injured in the crash, Sgt. Paul F. Fisher of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, died Thursday at a hospital in Germany, bringing the number of dead in the incident to 16.
At the memorial service, helmets were placed on upright M-16 rifles to represent the dead. Many in the crowd wore black cavalry hats, reflecting the 19th-century origins of the cavalry in the American West. A female soldier sang "Amazing Grace."
"Death was in the cause of freedom," said Col. David A. Teeples, the regiment's commander. "They were serving our country and answering our nation's call to fight terrorism."
He said that helicopter flights would continue, but with some "adjustment" in timing and flight paths.
The second U.S. victim, from the 82nd Airborne Division, was killed in a rocket-propelled grenade attack 15 miles south of Baghdad.
Attacks on U.S. positions and convoys have almost tripled since June, averaging 29 a day. U.S. combat fatalities total 140 since President Bush declared an end to major combat on May 1, compared with 114 dead in the offensive that brought down the government of Saddam Hussein.
In south-central Iraq, where Poland has contributed 2,400 troops to the U.S.-led occupation and took command of forces in the region in September, a Polish officer was killed in an ambush as he rode in a convoy near Al Mussaib, about 35 miles south of Baghdad.
Maj. Hieronim Kupczyk, 44, was returning to his base after attending a graduation ceremony for members of the new Civil Defense Corps, which will help guard public buildings and carry out patrols.
Several U.S. allies have been reluctant to send military forces to Iraq, either out of opposition to the American invasion or because of the turmoil that has gripped central Iraq, a stronghold of loyalists of the deposed government. A Japanese official visiting Iraq confirmed Thursday that Japan would send 550 noncombat troops next year to provide medical care to civilians and repair water and electrical utilities.
U.S. forces have faced particularly persistent resistance in the so-called Sunni triangle north and west of Baghdad. A senior Iraqi official said that the resistance contains two wings -- remnants of Hussein's Baath Party and Islamic fighters from a variety of Middle Eastern countries -- that have combined in a kind of marriage of convenience to oppose the occupation.
The official said foreigners are being guided into Iraq by Ansar al-Islam, an organization of Iraqi origin allegedly linked to Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network. During the war, Kurdish militia forces under U.S. command drove Ansar al-Islam out of mountain refuges in northeast Iraq. "Ansar is now very diffuse," said the senior Iraqi official. "They provide logistics and help the terrorists navigate through Iraq."
U.S. troops continue to raid suspected hide-outs. Military officials announced the discovery of several weapons caches and the detention of two former Iraqi army generals allegedly involved in attacks on Americans.
The military identified the Iraqis as Lt. Gen. Khamis Saleh Ibrahim Halbossi and Lt. Gen. Ibrahim Adwan Alwani, the Associated Press reported. Both were believed to have played a significant role in organizing the resistance in the Fallujah area, the military said.
--------
Bremer Plans to Enlarge, Refocus Iraq Occupation Authority
By Rajiv Chandrasekaran
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, November 7, 2003; Page A25
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A9898-2003Nov6.html
BAGHDAD, Nov. 6 -- The U.S. civilian administrator of Iraq said Thursday that he intends to increase the size of the American-led occupation authority, giving two new deputies key responsibilities for managing the influx of nearly $20 billion in new reconstruction funds, and to devote more time to the country's political transition.
The administrator, L. Paul Bremer, said in an interview that the reorganization is intended to respond to a transition in the reconstruction effort, from a phase of emergency repairs to the longer-term development of new infrastructure and democratic institutions.
"We are at a new point" in the occupation, he said. "These changes reflect where we are."
With almost $20 billion of the $87.5 billion spending package that President Bush signed on Thursday devoted to reconstruction work for Iraq, Bremer said the occupation authority would set up a large project management office to disburse that money to private American contractors. They, in turn, will be expected to hire Iraqi firms as subcontractors. That office and other staff, which will be hired to oversee the training of security forces, the construction of new electricity-generating capacity and other projects funded by the spending package, will significantly expand the size of the occupation authority. It now has about 2,000 non-Iraqi employees.
"We have to find a way, both legally and transparently and effectively -- and I might add, quickly -- to spend the largest amount of money the United States has ever spent in any country," he said. The contracting process, he said, "is going to be a management challenge of a very substantial scale."
Bremer also said he wants to focus more energy on the creation of a constitution and projects to reform the country's ossified socialist economic system.
The drafting of a constitution has emerged as a particular concern for the Bush administration, which regards it as a milestone in the process of relinquishing sovereignty to the Iraqi people. Although a committee of legal experts has proposed various methods by which the document can be written, the country's U.S.-appointed Governing Council, which faces a Dec. 15 deadline to inform the U.N. Security Council about the drafting process, still has not engaged in serious debate on the issue.
The Bush administration wants the council to agree on a mechanism to select drafters within a few months and to have a final document ready by the spring, paving the way for elections by next fall. Many Iraqi political leaders say the drafters should be elected, which could delay the writing process by more than a year.
"The Governing Council has done very little in the last three months," a senior U.S. official here said. The official said Bremer informed the few council members who attended a meeting with him two weeks ago that "they cannot go on like this."
Bremer told the council that he would be willing to give it more authority if it became more active, the official said.
To cope with the growth of the occupation authority, Bremer said he would appoint two top deputies: Richard H. Jones, the U.S. ambassador to Kuwait, to serve as his top policy officer, and retired Lt. Gen. Joseph K. Kellogg Jr. to become the chief operations officer. Jones, a veteran diplomat who speaks Arabic, will supervise political and economic issues, the operations of government ministries and public affairs. Kellogg, the former commanding general of the Army's 82nd Airborne Division, will be responsible for the day-to-day operations of the occupation authority, including the training of new Iraqi security forces and the reconstruction of the oil and electricity sectors.
Bremer also intends to devote more attention to reducing Iraq's debt, estimated at about $200 billion. Bremer is considering several options to address the issue, including asking Bush to appoint a senior official to engage in negotiations with foreign governments.
Bremer expressed optimism that he would be able to reach an agreement with Iraqi political leaders on the creation of an Iraqi-run paramilitary force to help pursue resistance fighters. Although some Iraqi leaders have wanted to recruit political party militiamen for the force, Bremer has rejected that idea and insisted that members of the unit be hired individually and carefully vetted for ties to former president Saddam Hussein's government.
Bremer said he has seen "a modification of the Iraqi view" over the past few weeks. "I think we'll find a solution to this because it's a logical thing to do," he said.
-------- israel / palestine
Sharon Urges Trade of 400 Arabs for an Israeli and Remains of 3
November 7, 2003
By GREG MYRE
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/07/international/middleeast/07MIDE.html
JERUSALEM, Nov. 6 - Prime Minister Ariel Sharon lobbied Thursday for a potential prisoner trade in which Israel would free about 400 Arabs in exchange for a kidnapped Israeli businessman and the remains of three soldiers, all held by the Lebanese guerrilla group Hezbollah.
Mr. Sharon met the families of the dead and missing Israelis and has scheduled a cabinet vote on the proposal for Sunday. The cabinet appears divided, and the outcome remains unclear.
Germany has served as the intermediary for Israel and Hezbollah in negotiations. While details have not been announced, the proposed deal is front-page news in Israel, where it has unleashed a vigorous debate. Many politicians, commentators and members of the public have expressed reservations about the terms.
Some say Israel would be paying too high a price by releasing so many Arab prisoners. In 1985 Israel freed more than 1,000 Palestinian and Lebanese prisoners in exchange for three Israeli soldiers. Some freed Arabs were later involved in attacks against Israel, officials have said.
"We see the dilemmas," said Yaacov Avitan, father of one of the Israeli soldiers who is missing in Lebanon and presumed to be dead. "Any decision that a minister makes will be a very difficult one."
Some Israelis believe the deal will inspire more kidnappings and place Israel in a similarly awkward position in the future.
Speaking in Parliament, Mr. Sharon acknowledged that the cabinet "will be asked to make difficult decisions that entail a painful price. But to the best of my knowledge the decision is necessary in order to save lives."
Some Israelis object because Israel will not be receiving information on Capt. Ron Arad, an Air Force navigator downed during a mission over southern Lebanon in 1986.
Captain Arad was held for about a year and a half by one of the men Israel is planning to release, Mustafa Dirani, a Lebanese guerrilla leader.
Israeli officials have described Mr. Dirani, who was seized by Israel in 1994, and a Hezbollah leader, Sheik Abdel Karim Obeid, who was taken in 1989, as bargaining chips for Captain Arad. Members of Captain Arad's family said they opposed the release of Mr. Dirani without a breakthrough in determining their relative's fate.
The prisoner exchange is complicated by the murky dealings that appear to have contributed to the kidnapping of a businessman, Elhanan Tannenbaum, three years ago.
Mr. Tannenbaum, an officer in the army reserve, had amassed debts and was apparently pursuing what he thought was a lucrative deal involving Arab businessmen, according to Israeli news reports.
Three years ago he flew to Brussels, where his prospective partners who turned out to be his kidnappers persuaded him to fly to Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates. He was then abducted and taken to Lebanon, according to Israeli reports. Hezbollah has asserted that Mr. Tannenbaum reached Lebanon voluntarily, where he was seized by the group.
Israel has not divulged the names of the Arab prisoners who might be released.
[In Gaza on Friday, meanwhile, Israeli soldiers shot and killed a Palestinian after mortar shells were fired at Jewish settlements, Reuters reported, citing Palestinian medics and witnesses. Agence France-Presse reported that a second Palestinian was killed in fighting at the Maghazi refugee camp in Gaza.]
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Israelis Try to Block Prisoner Swap
By JOSEF FEDERMAN
Associated Press Writer
Nov 7, 2003
http://customwire.ap.org/dynamic/stories/I/ISRAEL_LEBANON_PRISONERS?SITE=DCTMS&SECTION=HOME
JERUSALEM (AP) -- The daughter of missing Israeli air force navigator Ron Arad accused Prime Minister Ariel Sharon of abandoning her father as the family made a last-ditch effort to block a prisoner swap with Lebanese guerrillas that does not address Arad's fate.
Sharon's tense meeting late Thursday with Arad's family put more pressure on the prime minister, who is trying to persuade his divided Cabinet to approve the controversial deal with the Lebanese guerrilla group Hezbollah in a vote Sunday.
A new poll in the Maariv daily showed Sharon's popularity dropping, and one commentator said the lopsided prisoner swap was a factor.
Israel would release about 400 Palestinian and Lebanese prisoners - including two guerrilla leaders - in exchange for kidnapped Israeli businessman Elhanan Tannenbaum and the bodies of three soldiers.
Such exchanges have always been controversial in Israel. The government says it is committed to bringing its POWs home, but also believes that terrorism should not be rewarded. The fate of Arad has added to the drama. Families of Israeli captives are now fighting each other in an increasingly high-profile manner.
The circumstances of Tannenbaum's capture in 2000 further complicated matters. According to news reports, Tannenbaum was mired in gambling debts and possibly involved in dealing drugs when he was abducted in the Persian Gulf emirate of Abu Dhabi and taken to Lebanon. His family has denied the allegations.
Sharon's meeting with Arad's family Thursday night came hours after the prime minister and relatives of the four Israelis included in the swap launched a campaign to persuade hesitant Cabinet ministers to support the deal.
Sharon talked with Arad's wife Tami, his daughter Yuval and his two brothers, Chen and David, in a tense two-hour meeting that stretched until midnight, Israeli media reported. The family claimed the government has abandoned Arad.
At the meeting, Yuval Arad, who was 15 months old when Ron Arad was captured, gave the prime minister a letter saying she had lost hope of ever seeing her father again.
"I still find it hard to believe that the Israeli government would abandon my father," said the letter, which appeared on the front pages of Israeli newspapers and was read on the radio.
"I always held some hope of meeting him, maybe my children will know him, like I should have," she said. "Now I understand that it won't happen."
Sharon reportedly promised to do everything possible to get information on Arad, but said keeping the prisoners would not increase the odds of finding the airman. Lebanese guerrilla leader Mustafa Dirani, who personally held Arad at one point, is expected to be part of the swap.
Tannenbaum's daughter, Keren, also pleaded for her father. "I am begging for my father's life, begging for him to be allowed to stay alive," she said after a meeting with Sharon.
The swap controversy dominated the news Friday.
"The redemption of one very controversial prisoner has become the abandonment of another prisoner. Ron Arad is more than a soldier taken captive: He is a symbol. He is an icon," wrote Nahum Barnea, one of Israel's leading columnists, in a front-page commentary in the Yediot Ahronot daily.
Barnea conceded that if he were a decision-maker, he would support the deal "with an unsteady stomach ... but knowing that there is no choice."
Israeli media said Sharon planned on working the phones over the weekend in hopes of building support.
The release of prisoners is an important issue to Palestinians, who complain that Israel has not freed enough of the thousands of detainees it is holding.
A release of hundreds of Palestinians in a swap with Hezbollah would further boost the prestige of the guerrilla group in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Many Palestinians admire Hezbollah for having driven Israel out of south Lebanon after an 18-year occupation.
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Israeli Troops Kill Four Palestinians
November 7, 2003
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Israel-Palestinians.html
JERUSALEM (AP) -- A symbolic Mideast peace deal has won praise from Secretary of State Colin Powell, the second senior U.S. official in a week to express support for such ``freelance'' initiatives at a time of deadlock over a Washington-led peace plan.
Powell's letter to the authors of the ``Geneva Accord'', made public Friday, was seen by some as a veiled rebuke to Israel's hardline prime minister, Ariel Sharon, who has attacked the agreement as subversive. An Israeli official brushed aside Powell's letter, saying it would have no effect, and that the U.S.-backed ``road map'' plan remains the only serious proposal.
The road map details steps toward ending three years of violent and establishing a Palestinian state by 2005, but does not detail national borders. The Geneva agreement fills that gap, calling for a Palestinian state in the Gaza Strip, virtually all of the West Bank and Arab neighborhoods of Jerusalem. Its authors say it is compatible with the U.S.-backed plan.
In new violence Friday, Israeli troops killed three Palestinians, including a 10-year-old boy and a gunman. Soldiers also caught a top Islamic Jihad fugitive suspected of having plotted several major suicide bombings, including an Oct. 4 attack that killed 21 people in a Haifa restaurant.
In one clash Friday in the West Bank refugee camp of Balata, troops battled Palestinian gunmen and killed a 23-year-old Palestinian man who witnesses said was an unarmed bystander. The army said it shot at a man who threw three explosive devices at the troops.
Separately, Israeli troops in the northern West Bank arrested a senior Islamic Jihad leader, Amjad Obeidi, after tossing a hand grenade into his hideout, the military and witnesses said. The blast lightly injured Obeidi.
The army said troops came under fire as they were leaving with Obeidi, and in one exchange killed a member of the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, a militant faction with links to Yasser Arafat's Fatah movement. With angry shouts for revenge, several hundred people carried the man's body through the streets, firing guns in the air, witnesses said.
Hours earlier, troops shot and killed a 10-year-old Palestinian boy as he was trapping birds near Israel's fence with the Gaza Strip, security officials said. The army said it shot at three people near the fence who carried equipment that looked like it might be used to plant a bomb.
Powell's letter was addressed to the main authors of the Geneva Accord, former Israeli Justice Minister Yossi Beilin and former Palestinian Information Minister Yasser Abed Rabbo.
``Dear Yossi and Yasser,'' the letter read, according to a copy given to The Associated Press by a Beilin aide. ``The U.S. remains committed to the president's two-state vision and to the road map, but we also believe that projects such as yours are important in helping sustain an atmosphere of hope.''
``The United States is always encouraged when there is discussion,'' State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said Friday in Washington of Powell's letter.
Responding to questions, Boucher said the Bush administration was not engaged in ``some kind of end run around leaders in the region.''
Nor, he said, did it undercut the U.S.-backed road map for peacemaking between Israel and the Palestinians.
The new plan was drafted by prominent Palestinians and Israelis, including participants in past negotiations. It proposes a Palestinian state on nearly all of the West Bank and Gaza -- land Israel captured in the 1967 Mideast War. Most Jewish settlers would have to leave their homes.
The proposal would also give Palestinians control of a disputed holy shrine in Jerusalem's walled Old City -- an elevated mosque compound that was once home to the biblical Jewish temples. In return, Palestinians would give up their demand for the ``right of return'' of about 4 million Palestinian war refugees and their descendants to Israel.
The plan is to be officially launched in Geneva, though no date has been set.
Powell's letter came a week after Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz -- the Pentagon's No. 2 official -- praised another unofficial peace plan drawn up by Sari Nusseibeh, a prominent Palestinian moderate, and Ami Ayalon, former head of Israel's Shin Bet security service. A senior Israeli official, speaking on condition of anonymity, played down the unexpected U.S. support for independent peace initiatives.
``They (the Americans) can compliment and praise all they want, but from compliments no real progress has been made,'' the official said. ``With all due respect, there is only one authority that can make these decisions and that is the democratically elected government of Israel.''
Sharon has sharply attacked the Israelis involved in the Geneva accord, saying they had no right to go behind the back of the government to make concessions, even in a symbolic deal.
Israeli analyst Yossi Alpher said Powell's letter was a message to Sharon.
``Any positive response from high figures in the (U.S.) administration ought to be understood by Sharon as a warning signal that the administration's blank check support for his policies should not be seen as a given in the future,'' Alpher said.
``He can't be seen as too hardline with all these other proposals running around,'' he added.
-------- mideast
Bush Asks Lands in Mideast to Try Democratic Ways
November 7, 2003
By DAVID E. SANGER
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/07/international/middleeast/07PREX.html?pagewanted=all&position=
WASHINGTON, Nov. 6 - President Bush on Thursday challenged Iran, Syria and two crucial Middle East allies of the United States - Egypt and Saudi Arabia - to begin embracing democratic traditions, and to view the fall of Saddam Hussein as "a watershed event in the global democratic revolution."
"Sixty years of Western nations excusing and accommodating the lack of freedom in the Middle East did nothing to make us safe," Mr. Bush argued, in a critique that embraced both Democrats and Republicans who preceded him, "because in the long run, stability cannot be purchased at the expense of liberty."
The speech, before the National Endowment for Democracy, appeared to be part of an effort by the White House to change American and world perceptions of the Iraq occupation, describing it in far broader strategic terms than the ouster of a dictator.
But it came at a moment when Mr. Bush is struggling to create democratic institutions in Iraq itself, and when the daily casualties among the American and allied soldiers have led many in the region to question whether the United States is capable of transforming the nation it invaded.
In the speech, the president sought to position the American experiment in remaking Iraq alongside the United States' efforts to spread democracy in Asia and Europe after World War II and to bring about the fall of the Soviet Union. He directly compared what he called his administration's new "forward strategy of freedom in the Middle East" to President Ronald Reagan's 1982 declaration in England that Soviet Communism had failed.
He identified four nations where he said dictatorship was doomed to failure: North Korea, Myanmar - which he referred to by its former name, Burma - Cuba and Zimbabwe, declaring that "these regimes cannot hold back freedom forever." He predicted that just as Nelson Mandela emerged from captivity in South Africa to lead his nation, "one day, from prison camps and prison cells and from exile, the leaders of new democracies will arrive" in the four countries.
Mr. Bush had sounded similar themes before, notably in a speech at the American Enterprise Institute a month and a half before he ordered the invasion of Iraq. But until Thursday's speech, he had not identified nations that he thought urgently needed to reform. For the first time, he also raised, gingerly, the issue of the absence of liberty in Saudi Arabia, one of America's major oil suppliers and a nation that has long been spared presidential rebuke.
"The Saudi government is taking first steps toward reform," he said, choosing his words carefully about a country that one of his senior aides said recently "is probably the most resistant to change of any nation in the region." He referred to its experiment with local elections, avoided any mention of the struggle within the Saudi royal family over whether and how to surrender some authority, and he offered the most gentle of encouragement.
"By giving the Saudi people a greater role in their own society," Mr. Bush said, "the Saudi government can demonstrate true leadership in the region."
He also pressed Egypt - which receives upward of $2 billion annually in aid from the United States - saying it "has shown the way toward peace in the Middle East, and now should show the way toward democracy in the Middle East." But later, his spokesman, Scott McClellan, said the president was not threatening any consequences for his Arab allies if they failed to heed his warning.
The pressure runs the risk of backfiring. In the Arab world, Mr. Bush's remarks about human rights and democracy are often viewed as hypocritical, and Arabs often compare those statements to the treatment of suspected terrorists held by American forces at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, or the president's reluctance to demand that Israel stop constructing its barrier along the West Bank.
Some Arab intellectuals urging greater civil liberties say Mr. Bush's endorsement undermines them, because it paints them as stooges of the United States.
But a scattering of experts feel that it is welcome pressure on governments that have been stuck in place for decades, and Tom Malinowski, the Washington advocacy director for Human Rights Watch, praised Mr. Bush for doing something the Clinton administration had been loath to do: identifying Middle East nations that have refused to liberalize.
"They have ended the Mideast exception to American human rights policy," he said of the Bush administration. "It is welcome moral clarity in the service of a policy that still lacks moral authority."
Not surprisingly, Mr. Bush heaped the most scorn on Iran and Syria, which his administration accuses of seeking to undermine the Iraq occupation. "The regime in Tehran must heed the democratic demands of the Iranian people or lose its last claim to legitimacy," he said.
He lumped Syria's leaders with Mr. Hussein, saying they had promised a restoration of ancient glories but instead left "a legacy of torture, oppression, misery and ruin."
By the time Mr. Bush spoke, it was already evening in the Middle East, and there were no official reactions from governments. But Imad Fawzi Shueibi, a Syrian political analyst and professor at Damascus University, suggested that Mr. Bush's message would be tainted in the Middle East by the widespread negative perception of the messenger.
"I don't think someone who violates the human rights against people all over the world and especially the Arab world can speak about freedom and democracy," he said. "How can we believe that Mr. George Bush wants us to enter the era of democracy and the era of freedom when he remains biased toward Israel despite its violations of human rights, despite its long occupation of Arab land and its apartheid system toward the Arabs in the occupied territories?"
Others found plenty to praise.
"It was exciting," said Omar Baghour, a Saudi economist and columnist at the newspaper Al Madina.
The United States, he said, "is hated in the Arab and Islamic world because it has always been viewed as supporting repressive regimes." Mr. Bush has now turned, he said, to "a more moderate approach, a more rational approach to democratization in the Arab world rather than the threat of force."
Most notable about Mr. Bush's speech was his tone in discussing Iraq. In February at the American Enterprise Institute, he said with certainty that Mr. Hussein's ouster would make Iraq the democratic kernel at the heart of the Middle East. But on Thursday, he raised the specter of what a nondemocratic Iraq might look like in a post-Hussein era, though he assured listeners that success was inevitable.
"The failure of Iraqi democracy would embolden terrorists around the world, increase dangers to the American people, and extinguish the hopes of millions in the region," he said. "Iraqi democracy will succeed, and that success will send forth the news, from Damascus to Tehran, that freedom can be the future of every nation."
Mr. Bush did not mention the issue of weapons of mass destruction. The possible threat from such weapons was the administration's chief argument for war against Iraq, but no evidence of them has been found.
Two hours after the speech, the president gathered leaders of the House and Senate and his security team in the East Room and signed the legislation that provides $87 billion for military action and reconstruction in Iraq and Afghanistan. Flanked by Secretary of State Colin L. Powell and Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld, he called the money "the greatest commitment of its kind since the Marshall Plan."
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Turkey Won't Send Troops to Iraq
November 7, 2003
By DAVID STOUT
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/07/international/middleeast/07CND-TURKEY.html?hp
WASHINGTON, Nov. 7 - The government of Turkey, reversing a recent decision that had sparked anger at home and alarm in Iraq, said today that it would not send troops across the border in support of the American campaign in Iraq.
Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul told Secretary of State Colin L. Powell of the decision in a telephone conversation Thursday night, the Turkish Foreign Ministry said in a statement from Ankara.
"After necessary assessments, Foreign Minister Gul told Mr. Powell that our government would reconsider its request to send troops to Iraq," the statement said. In Washington, the State Department said the decision should not hamper the American pacification efforts in Iraq.
The announcement from Ankara reversed a position taken last month and affirmed just three days ago, when Turkey's ambassador to the United States, O. Faruk Logoglu, said his country's offer to send troops to Iraq was "still alive, very much alive."
The announcement from Ankara is something of a setback for President Bush, who has been trying to convince a number of Muslim nations to send troops to Iraq to ease the burden on the American military and to change the image of the occupation from that of a solely Western effort to one that is multiethnic as well as multinational.
For its part, Turkey has been trying to repair relations with the Bush administration in the wake of its refusal to allow American troops to use Turkey as a base for the invasion of Iraq last spring.
But Ankara's recent offer to send up to 10,000 troops proved widely unpopular inside Turkey and was unanimously opposed, as well, by the 25-member Iraqi Governing Council created under the auspices of the American-led occupation of Iraq.
On Tuesday, Mr. Logoglu acknowledged that Ankara had taken note of the forceful opposition of some members of the Iraqi Governing Council, who had expressed fear that a deployment of Turkish troops inside Iraq could both incite ethnic disputes and encourage Turkish influence over its southern neighbor. Opposition has been especially fierce from Kurdish leaders in northern Iraq, where Kurdish-Turkish tensions have deep historical roots.
Turkey also remains anxious about separatist feelings among the Kurdish population on its side of the border, as well. So it was no surprise that the issue of deploying troops in Iraq had become a volatile political issue within Turkey.
Despite the reversal on troop deployment, the statement from Ankara asserted that Mr. Powell and Mr. Gul nevertheless "had reached a consensus on working together and with the Iraqi people" to establish a free and stable Iraq.
Those goals will not be harder to attain because of Turkey's decision, the State Department said today. "We are still talking to other governments, some other potential contributors," Richard Boucher, a State Department spokesman, said at a news briefing. "And then, as you know, there's a major effort under way to accelerate the deployment, accelerate the training of Iraq security forces."
Mr. Boucher said Secretary Powell had acknowledged in his conversation with Mr. Gul that "given the sensitivities involved, maybe it's not the time" for Turkey to be sending troops to Iraq.
However, Mr. Boucher added, "things may change."
-------- pakistan / india
Musharraf Says Pakistan Will Match India Arms Spree
November 7, 2003
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-korea-pakistan.html
SEOUL (Reuters) - President Pervez Musharraf vowed Friday that Pakistan would match what he called a huge arms build-up by rival and fellow nuclear power India that had upset the balance of forces in South Asia.
Musharraf, wrapping up a three-day state visit to South Korea, also restated his earlier denials that Pakistan had traded its nuclear weapons expertise for North Korean missile technology. The communist North says it has atomic capability.
Musharraf told a news conference that peace with his giant neighbor India was maintained by keeping a balance of forces.
``This balance of forces was tilted -- and imbalance created -- when India went for the nuclear and missile forces, and similar imbalance is being created now through massive acquisition of arms by our adversary, India,'' he said without elaborating.
``We will respond to this imbalance, we will rectify this imbalance in the future through all means possible,'' said the army general, who took power in a bloodless 1999 coup.
Musharraf said it was the threat from India that had driven Pakistan to conduct its first nuclear tests in 1998. He said Islamabad had never proliferated nuclear technology to Seoul's communist neighbor although it had bought North Korean missiles.
He said reported visits to North Korea by nuclear scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan, revered by many in Pakistan as the father of the country's nuclear bomb, were connected to purchases of conventional short-range missiles.
``We have purchased these missiles from North Korea. We have also had a transfer of technology of these missiles. We now manufacture ourselves these missiles in the same organization that Dr. A.Q. Khan headed,'' he said.
``Therefore, I don't know how many times he has visited, but maybe his interaction was in this respect,'' Musharraf said. He said Pakistan now had no arms collaboration with North Korea.
Some media reports say Khan made a dozen trips to North Korea. A Pakistani firm Khan once headed was slapped with U.S. sanctions last March, after Washington accused it of transferring nuclear-capable missiles from North Korea to Pakistan.
Musharraf, who held talks with South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun Thursday, said Islamabad and Seoul had signed agreements for cooperation in the oil and gas sector and in the information technology sector. He gave no figures.
Musharraf flew to Seoul from China, where he agreed a $500 million loan and won commitments to boost trade but did not sign an expected deal on nuclear power plant cooperation.
-------- spies
Pentagon Says a Covert Force Hunts Hussein
November 7, 2003
By THOM SHANKER and ERIC SCHMITT
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/07/international/middleeast/07SADD.html?pagewanted=all&position=
WASHINGTON, Nov. 6 - The top American military commander for the Middle East has created a covert commando force to hunt Saddam Hussein, Osama bin Laden and key terrorists throughout the region, according to Pentagon and military officials.
The new Special Operations organization is designed to act with greater speed on intelligence tips about "high-value targets" and not be contained within the borders where American conventional forces are operating in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Gen. John P. Abizaid, who commands all American forces in the strategic crescent from the Red Sea to the Indian Ocean, decided over the summer to disband two Special Operations missions, Task Force 5 in Afghanistan and Task Force 20 in Iraq, officials said.
Military officers say a broader, regional mission was given to the new force, which has become one of the Pentagon's most highly classified and closely watched operations.
Much about the force, which is commanded by an Air Force brigadier general, remains classified, and Pentagon officials declined to discuss the rules under which the new force operates throughout the region or whether its would require the permission of a foreign government to operate in its territory.
Military officers say that focusing the intelligence, and the Special Operations firepower, within one organization, called Task Force 121, streamlines the effort to use information on these targets and mount an attack.
The new, more flexible force already has shown results, according to Pentagon officials and military officers, who say it has gotten close to Mr. Hussein. Officials declined to give any details.
The decision to create the force was prompted by several factors, Pentagon and military officials said.
Senior Bush Administration officials are frustrated that Mr. Hussein is on the loose and still exerts influence in Iraq. At a minimum, officials say, Mr. Hussein's mere survival is inspiring attacks on American troops and Iraqi security forces; some officials believe he is playing a role in coordinating and directing the violence by his loyalists.
"Capturing Saddam Hussein or killing him would be very important," Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said last week during a speech in Washington. "So we do need to catch him and I think we will."
Mr. Rumsfeld, who routinely cautions that the American military is not designed for manhunts, also said that some of the Iraqi population may be withholding support for the new, American-appointed government in Baghdad because of fears Mr. Hussein may return to power.
"The fact that he's alive is unhelpful," Mr. Rumsfeld said. "Let there be no doubt that the intimidation factor in that regime was near total."
One senior military officer at the American-led coalition headquarters in Baghdad said of the quest for Mr. Hussein, "It's a 24/7 job."
The creation of the task force also reflects a desire by senior administration officials and top military officers to ensure that the American commitment in Iraq does not detract from the hunt for leaders of Al Qaeda and the Taliban who went underground after the war in Afghanistan. Some are believed to be plotting a fresh wave of terror attacks against the United States from the Middle East and the Horn of Africa.
During the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the military worked closely with the Central Intelligence Agency, whose officers routinely traveled and lived with Special Operations units. The new task force receives information from the government-wide intelligence community and, like the two previous missions in Afghanistan and Iraq, has C.I.A. officers attached. However, nothing in the mission of the new task force would compel the C.I.A. to halt any of its own operations against terrorists.
While it is unclear whether President Bush, or the newly-formed Iraq Stabilization Group at the National Security Council, were directly involved in the decision to create the new force, senior administration members have said in the last two months that capturing or killing Mr. Hussein would change the dynamic of the American occupation.
Administration officials say politics is not in their equation, but success in finding Mr. Hussein would no doubt be viewed as a significant victory by a large part of the public.
American military, intelligence and law enforcement personnel have begun or participated in anti-terror operations outside of Afghanistan and Iraq, most notably raids in Pakistan to arrest terror suspects and a Predator strike in Yemen against men said to be Qaeda operatives.
Although the task force has not been publicly disclosed, a number of Pentagon officials and military officers agreed to discuss its work in broad terms as an example of the military's new thinking on how to fight terrorism.
The joint task force of elite Special Operations forces from the Army, Navy and Air Force is supplemented by a sizeable conventional force, which might be called upon to secure the perimeter of an area where a raid is about to take place, create a large diversion or bring firepower in greater numbers than the small Special Operations teams.
Commanders realized they were wasting forces by having two complete sets of fighters on alert 24 hours a day for quick-response missions. In addition, tracking and then capturing or killing Qaeda and Taliban leaders or fleeing members of the former Iraqi government required planning and missions not restricted by lines on the map of a region where borders are porous.
Officials described the force as a antidote to those who were concerned that the war to topple Mr. Hussein had taken the military's eye off the other prizes: capturing Mr. bin Laden and Qaeda leaders, as well as Mullah Muhammad Omar, the fugitive Taliban commander, and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, an anti-American Afghan warlord who survived an attack in 2002 by a Hellfire missile launched from a Predator reconnaissance aircraft.
While American forces have captured or killed many of the top members of Mr. Hussein's government they have had less success with Taliban and Qaeda leaders who survived the war in Afghanistan.
The United States "has made somewhat slower progress tracking down the Taliban - Omar, Hekmatyar, etc.," Mr. Rumsfeld said last month in an internal memo first reported by USA Today. He added: "We have made many sensible, logical moves in the right direction, but are they enough?"
-------- us
Defense Department Tests ChemBio Radar in Oklahoma
NORMAN, Oklahoma,
November 7, 2003
(ENS)
http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/nov2003/2003-11-07-09.asp#anchor5
Tests of radar detection in the event of release of a chemical or biological agent are being conducted in Oklahoma next week.
The U.S. Army, in conjunction with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Lincoln Laboratory, Federal Aviation Administration and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, will begin the third in a series of weather radar tests in the Canadian River Valley and in the vicinity of Camp Gruber, Oklahoma. The tests will be run from November 13 to 17.
The materials selected to simulate a chemical threat release are ethanol and a 1:1 solution of polyethylene glycol (PEG) 200 and water. The materials selected to simulate a biological threat release is clay dust.
During these tests the simulants will be disseminated from a crop duster flying specific routes utilizing predetermined release rates, aircraft speeds of 100 mph and at an altitude of 1200 feet above ground level.
Chemical and biological simulants are routinely used in detection and protection capability studies conducted by the Department of Defense. These simulants have been selected for their ability to represent a spectrum of possible chemical and biological threats, in addition to accepted safety in regards to human health and the environment, the Army said.
The Defense Department says it has evaluated possible environmental impacts as required by the National Environmental Policy Act, and determined that the testing will produce "no immediate or long term impact to the environment." The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Occupational Safety & Health Administration have also cleared the substances for safety.
The testing is designed to evaluate the potential of employing various operational radar systems located in the vicinity of Camp Gruber, Oklahoma, and the Canadian River to provide an early warning capability for ground and aerial release of a chemical or biological warfare agent, or public health threat event.
The initial test period was March 24 - April 14, 2003, and a second test took place May 19 - May 24, 2003.
Information about the test including schedules and maps will be available on the Internet at http://www.jpeocbd.osd.mil/CA_Infopaper.htm.
The public can also call the U.S. Army's toll free Multi-Mission Sensor Test Information Line at 1-866-223-1101 for a daily recorded message about scheduled test sites and times.
----
Pentagon to rotate troops, reduce Iraq force strength
November 07, 2003
By Rowan Scarborough
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20031106-115231-3431r.htm
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld announced yesterday a long-term plan for rotating tens of thousands of fresh troops into Iraq, but he said the overall number of Americans will decline and not increase as Iraqis do more of the fighting.
"The combat units serving in Iraq and most of the supporting units in the theater will be replaced over the coming months," Mr. Rumsfeld told reporters at the Pentagon.
The rotation will began in January and end in the spring, when the number of American troops is expected to decline from today's 130,000 to 100,000.
The plan basically calls for swapping out big divisions now doing the brunt of combat in Iraq: the 1st Armored Division in Baghdad; the 4th Infantry Division in the Sunni Triangle around Tikrit; the 82nd Airborne in the west around Fallujah; and the 101st Airborne Division, which occupies northern Iraq and played a major role in the March and April push to Baghdad.
Those divisions will be replaced by the Army's 1st Infantry Division in Germany and 1st Cavalry Division in Texas, and the 1st Marine Division, based in California. That division will be returning to Iraq, where its Marines staged a rapid advance to Baghdad from the southeast and entered the Iraqi capital on April 9.
The Army's 25th Infantry Division in Hawaii will send a brigade to Iraq. The rest of the division will go to Afghanistan to relieve the 10th Mountain Division now fighting Taliban and al Qaeda insurgents. The Pentagon has alerted 43,000 National Guard and Reserve troops that they may be called up to support the U.S. forces.
The Pentagon did not expect to be fighting a guerrilla war in Iraq at this stage. It has struggled to find a way to send in fresh troops while maintaining security commitments in other parts of the world.
In all, there are 275,000 security forces in Iraq, counting 118,000 Iraqis who have been trained as police, border guards and soldiers.
"Iraq clearly is now the second-largest contributor of personnel to the coalition forces, after the United States, and soon Iraqi forces will outnumber U.S. forces," Mr. Rumsfeld said.
Mr. Rumsfeld again rejected calls from some members of Congress to increase the U.S. troop presence. "I have not been told of a single military commander in [U.S. Central Command] in Iraq who is recommending additional U.S. military forces. Not one," the defense secretary said.
Sen. John McCain, Arizona Republican and a Vietnam War veteran, lashed out at President Bush and Mr. Rumsfeld on Wednesday, saying they were mismanaging the war. Mr. McCain called for 15,000 additional U.S. troops to go to Iraq.
The defense secretary also said it was important not to leave Iraq too soon. "The president is solid as a rock on this," he said. "And the task is not to find a way to leave the country precipitously. ... The task is to see how, at what pace, we're able to see the Iraqi people take over responsibilities for their essential services, take over forces in uncovering weapons."
Soldiers in Iraq are facing some of the most dangerous combat operations in the two-year global war on terrorism. On Sunday, guerrillas used shoulder-fired missiles to shoot down a CH-47 Chinook helicopter, killing 15 soldiers in the most deadly incident so far for U.S. troops in Iraq.
Gen. Richard B. Myers, the Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman, said a young Iraqi had recently turned in 16 SA-7s, the Soviet-designed hand-held missile of the type believed to have shot down the Chinook. An intelligence source said thousands of such weapons might be hidden in Iraq.
----
Pentagon To Shrink Iraq Force
Leaner, Quicker Units To Be in Place by May
By Bradley Graham
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, November 7, 2003; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A9974-2003Nov6.html
The Pentagon announced plans yesterday to reduce U.S. forces in Iraq from 132,000 to 105,000 by next May but, in the process, to replace ground troops currently there with fresh contingents of Army soldiers and Marines early next year.
The reduction is envisioned despite a recent surge in guerrilla activity in Iraq. Outlining the plan at a Pentagon briefing, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld expressed confidence it could be achieved without undermining the stability of the country.
But he also made it clear that the cutback hinges on several key assumptions, including improvement in the security situation in Iraq and the ability of the Iraqi security forces now being assembled to take over responsibility for ensuring law and order.
While the overall number of U.S. troops in Iraq has already declined by about 30,000 since the summer, the new plan represents a major step by the Bush administration toward developing a longer-term exit strategy. If implemented, it could provide a significant political advantage for President Bush in next year's presidential campaign, although Pentagon officials insisted yesterday that politics were not involved in the decision to shrink the force.
A strong military rationale exists for the move, the officials said. They cited concerns by commanders that the prolonged deployment of large numbers of U.S. forces in Iraq could undermine troop morale, damage recruitment and retention rates, and leave the armed forces shorthanded if crises should emerge in North Korea or elsewhere.
They also said the timing of the withdrawal fits with the administration's stated desire to accelerate the transition of authority to Iraqis and ease concerns, particularly in the Muslim world, of an extended American occupation.
Rumsfeld pointed to growth in the number of Iraqi security forces -- which he said now total 118,000 -- as an important factor enabling U.S. troops to relinquish some responsibilities. The Iraqi forces, which include policemen, building guards and several other groups, are projected to reach 221,000 by next autumn.
Also critical to the U.S. reduction plan is the ability of other foreign countries to provide enough troops to maintain the two multinational divisions in Iraq, now led by Britain and Poland and totaling about 24,000 personnel. U.S. officials had been hoping for the creation of a third multinational division, but despite a new United Nations resolution authorizing the American-led occupation, there have been no new significant allied troop contributions.
Rumsfeld said the fresh U.S. forces earmarked for Iraq will be lighter, more mobile infantry units than those currently there, enhancing their ability to deal with guerrilla attacks. Though fewer in number, the replacement troops will provide combat power equivalent to the existing force, he said.
"I think it's important to recognize that numbers do not necessarily equate with capability," Rumsfeld said.
Plans call for the Army to send the equivalent of three combat divisions to replace the four there now. Elements will go from the 1st Infantry Division in Germany and the 1st Cavalry Division in Texas. Both the 2nd Infantry Division in Washington state and the 25th Infantry Division in Hawaii will provide a brigade, as will National Guard units in North Carolina, Arkansas and Washington state, bringing the total number of new Army combat forces to 65,000.
About 20,000 Marines from the 1st Marine Division in California will also go.
Additionally, more than 37,000 Army Reserve and National Guard troops and about 6,000 Marine reservists were alerted this week to prepare for likely duty in Iraq to fill various support functions. And the Pentagon has told about 2,000 Air Force personnel and about 1,000 Navy personnel they could be going to Iraq or Kuwait.
Rumsfeld said an unspecified number of other reserve units also were likely to receive alert orders in coming weeks. In fact, although the overall size of the U.S. force in Iraq is being scaled back, the reserve component is due to increase substantially -- from 28,000 at present to 39,000 next year. This could aggravate already serious strains on reservists, who unlike active-duty soldiers hold civilian jobs and plan to serve part time in the military.
Rumsfeld stressed that the plans were being announced now to give troops maximum warning about their coming duty, and he said efforts were made to avoid extending the tours of units now serving or remobilizing units that recently returned from deployments. But he also acknowledged that there would be exceptions and that "the system is still not perfect."
Asked about concerns that the strains could lead to a surge in soldiers leaving military service, or a drop in new recruits, Rumsfeld said no such trends have shown up yet. But, he added, there is probably "a lag in these things," and he said he remains mindful of the potential for trouble.
-------- propaganda wars
Lynch criticises Pentagon film of her rescue as Iraq debate rages
WASHINGTON (AFP)
Nov 07, 2003
http://www.spacewar.com/2003/031107172925.ivt37acp.html
Jessica Lynch, the Iraq war POW who has become an American icon, has criticised the Pentagon's dramatic film of her rescue by US troops further stoking the debate about how the government represents the conflict.
The former private, who was rescued in April, said she was upset by the way the Defence Department has portrayed the episode and that the film should not have been made.
Lynch's criticism comes as the administration of President George W. Bush battles to win the hearts and minds of the American public over Iraq policy.
US television networks repeatedly aired images of Lynch being carried on a stretcher after the rescue in a dramatic green night footage film.
Asked by ABC News if the official portrayal of her rescue troubled her, Lynch replied: "Yeah, it does. It does that they used me as a way to symbolize all this stuff. I mean, yeah, it's wrong ... I don't know what they had ... or why they filmed it."
Extracts of the interview to be shown next Tuesday have been released in advance.
It was reported at the time that the troops who rescued Lynch had engaged in a fire-fight during the operation, but Lynch said "I don't think it happened quite like that".
Lynch's company was capture after a convoy took a wrong turn and drove into enemy hands. Eleven Americans were killed and Lynch suffered multiple injuries.
But while critical of the Pentagon, Lynch remains praiseworthy of rescuers.
The Defense Department did not immediately comment on the case Friday. But Lynch's remarks will stoke the mounting debate about how the Iraq war is being portrayed.
A poll by Harris Interactive released Thursday showed the public approval rating for Bush's handling of Iraq had fallen to 41 percent, a total 58 percent of respondents said they disapproved of Bush's handling of Iraq.
Newspaper reports have spoken of the anger of some US officials about how the Iraq conflict is being portrayed in the US media.
"When the Bushies say they want the bad news put in perspective, do they really mean they don't want it reported at all?" Washington Post columnist Howard Kurtz asked this week.
The New York Times said it had obtained an e-mail from an aide to the US envoy to Iraq, Paul Bremmer, that reportedly simply stated "I have come to hate the media."
Some media critics say television networks have been hampered in their war coverage back home by a US military ban on filming the coffins of dead soldiers being sent home.
The Pentegon's decision to allow reporters to travel with army units during the race to seize Baghdad was generally viewed as a success, but as the US death toll of the post-war occupation rises, the US media has become more critical.
Footage of returning coffins drapped in the Stars and Stripes flag carries huge resonance in the United States, but film crews and photographers have barred for over a decade from Dover Air Base in Delaware, the main reception base for the remains of GIs killed overseas.
In March, on the eve of the Iraq invasion, the Pentagon sent a directive to US military bases reiterating the policy.
"There will be no arrival ceremonies for, or media coverage of, deceased military personnel returning to or departing from Ramstein (in Germany) or Dover base, to include interim stops," the directive said.
----
Jessica Lynch Criticizes U.S. Accounts of Her Ordeal
November 7, 2003
New York Times
By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/07/national/07LYNC.html
In her first public statements since her rescue in Iraq, Jessica Lynch criticized the military for exaggerating accounts of her rescue and re-casting her ordeal as a patriotic fable.
Asked by the ABC News anchor Diane Sawyer if the military's portrayal of the rescue bothered her, Ms. Lynch said: "Yeah, it does. It does that they used me as a way to symbolize all this stuff. Yeah, it's wrong," according to a partial transcript of the interview to be broadcast on Tuesday.
After months of retreating from the news media, Ms. Lynch will be a ubiquitous presence next week. In addition to her appearance on ABC, she will be on the cover of Time magazine, and NBC will broadcast a movie based on an Iraqi's account of her ordeal. On Tuesday, the book publisher Knopf will release an account of her experience, "I Am a Soldier, Too," written with her cooperation by a former reporter for The New York Times, Rick Bragg.
The book and the movie are unrelated and tell different versions of Ms. Lynch's story, but the publisher has timed the book to capitalize on publicity from the television movie.
The book has already added another, lurid indignity to the public accounts of her capture. It reports that Ms. Lynch's military doctors found injuries consistent with sexual assault and unlikely to have resulted from the Humvee crash that caused her other wounds, suggesting that she was raped after her capture. Ms. Lynch, who was unconscious immediately after the crash, does not remember any such assault, according to people who have talked to her and read the book. Those details of the book's contents were reported yesterday in The New York Daily News.
In the book and in the interviews, Ms. Lynch says others' accounts of her heroism often left her feeling hurt and ashamed because of what she says was overstatement.
At first, a military spokesman in Iraq told journalists that American soldiers had exchanged fire with Iraqis during the rescue, without adding that resistance was minimal. Then the military released a dramatic, green-tinted, night-vision video of the mission. Soon news organizations were repeating reports, attributed to anonymous American officials, that Ms. Lynch had heroically resisted her capture, emptying her weapon at her attackers.
But subsequent investigations determined that Ms. Lynch was injured by the crash of her vehicle, her weapon jammed before she could fire, the Iraqi doctors treated her kindly, and the hospital was already in friendly hands when her rescuers arrived.
Asked how she felt about the reports of her heroism, Ms. Lynch told Ms. Sawyer, "It hurt in a way that people would make up stories that they had no truth about. Only I would have been able to know that, because the other four people on my vehicle aren't here to tell the story. So I would have been the only one able to say, yeah, I went down shooting. But I didn't."
And asked about reports that the military exaggerated the danger of the rescue mission, Ms. Lynch said, "Yeah, I don't think it happened quite like that," although she added that in that context anybody would have approached the hospital well-armed. She continued: "I don't know why they filmed it, or why they say the things they, you know, all I know was that I was in that hospital hurting. I needed help."
Lt. Col. Rivers Johnson, a spokesman for the Department of Defense, declined to comment on Ms. Lynch's views. But he said, "Essentially, the mission to rescue Jessica Lynch demonstrated America's resolve to account for all of its missing service members." He added that the rescue had been conducted under the appropriate procedures for a fluid situation like the war in Iraq. "You always plan for the worst."
Ms. Lynch also disputed statements by Mohammed Odeh al-Rehaief, the Iraqi lawyer, that he saw her captors slap her.
"From the time I woke up in that hospital, no one beat me, no one slapped me, no one, nothing," Ms. Lynch told Diane Sawyer, adding, "I'm so thankful for those people, because that's why I'm alive today."
Jeff Coplon, who helped Mr. Rehaief write his book, "Because Each Life is Precious," said it was possible that both he and Ms. Lynch were telling the truth in their divergent accounts.
"One of the questions that could arise in the wake of this kind of trauma is that someone could believe they remember everything and their memory could still be incomplete," Mr. Coplon said.
-------- war crimes / world court
World Court: U.S. Wrong to Hit Platforms
November 7, 2003
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-World-Court-Iran-US.html
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) -- The United States was wrong to destroy three of Iran's oil platforms during the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s, but doesn't need to pay damages, the World Court ruled in a 14-2 decision Thursday.
``The actions carried out against Iran ... cannot be justified,'' said presiding Judge Shi Jiuyong of China, reading the decision by a panel of 16 judges from around the world.
Washington doesn't need to pay damages because the countries had suspended trade relations at the time and the United States ``cannot have been said to have infringed the rights of Iran,'' Shi said.
The first oil platform was destroyed by the U.S. Navy on Oct. 19, 1987, in retaliation for an Iranian missile strike on a U.S.-flagged oil tanker that injured 18 crewmen. The United States destroyed two more platforms on April 18, 1988, after a mine in the Persian Gulf injured 10 crewmen aboard a U.S. frigate.
The United States argued the actions were in self-defense because Iran was threatening U.S. commerce in the Persian Gulf during the 1980-1988 conflict.
However, the court said it was not satisfied the attacks were necessary. It also dismissed a counterclaim by the United States, citing the suspended trade relations.
William Taft, who represented the United States, said he was pleased with the decision. ``We didn't bring the case, Iran brought the case, and the court sent them home empty-handed,'' he said.
The United States continues to believe the attacks were necessary to ``put an end to Iran's attacks on neutral shipping in the gulf,'' he said.
Iran's legal deputy, Mosskan Mashkour, said the court's decision showed that ``the actions taken by the United States were contrary to international law.''
Iran filed the case in 1992 at the United Nations' highest legal body. The World Court hears only disputes between nations, and has jurisdiction when specified by treaty or by mutual agreement of countries that have a dispute.
Despite U.S. opposition, the court ruled in 1996 that it had jurisdiction in the Iran-U.S. case under a friendship treaty signed between the United States and Iran in 1955.
Iran sued the United States for what it said was a ``fundamental breach'' of that treaty after the United States sided with Iraq and fired on the platforms.
Iran claimed it had been the victim of Iraqi aggression and the United States had assisted Iraq's war effort by supplying it with intelligence and supplies.
-------- POLICE / PRISONERS / COURTS / JUSTICE
9/11 Panel May Reject Offer of Limited Access to Briefings
November 7, 2003
By PHILIP SHENON
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/07/national/07TERR.html
WASHINGTON, Nov. 6 - The White House has offered to provide a federal commission with limited access to Oval Office intelligence reports regarding the Sept. 11 terror attacks, but some members of the panel have described the offer as inadequate and are renewing the threat of a subpoena, commission officials said on Thursday.
They said the issue of a subpoena would be discussed on Friday, and possibly decided, at a meeting of the 10-member panel, which was created by Congress last year to investigate intelligence and law-enforcement failures before the attacks.
It will be the first formal meeting of the panel since its chairman issued a warning last month that he was prepared to subpoena the highly classified documents if the White House did not make them available.
Panel members are trying to obtain copies of the daily Oval Office intelligence report that President Bush received in the weeks before Sept. 11, 2001. The report is known as the President's Daily Brief and is distributed to Mr. Bush and a handful of his top aides every morning.
Officials said the White House, under pressure of the subpoena threat, offered over the last week to make copies of the intelligence briefing available to the commission's Republican chairman, Thomas H. Kean, the former governor of New Jersey, and Democratic vice chairman, Lee H. Hamilton, a former House member from Indiana.
Commission officials said at least three other members of the panel believed that the White House offer was inadequate and planned to press on Friday for the commission to consider subpoenaing the White House for the documents.
The official said the commission would also weigh subpoenas on Friday against the Defense Department and Central Intelligence Agency for information that has so far been withheld from the panel.
A Democratic member of the panel, Jamie S. Gorelick, a deputy attorney general in the Clinton administration, said in an interview on Thursday that she believed the panel was in an "endgame" with the White House over access to the Oval Office documents.
Ms. Gorelick would not describe the negotiations between the commission and the White House but said the panel was determined to have access to all White House intelligence reports that might relate to the attacks.
"It's absolutely critical to our inquiry," she said, "and we are amenable to reasonable conditions."
Ms. Gorelick said White House efforts to withhold the documents were a "mistake."
"It makes people think that there's something really nefarious in those documents," she said.
The possibility of a subpoena was raised last month by Mr. Kean when he said publicly that the commission needed access to all intelligence reports that related to the attacks, including the most highly classified intelligence reports that reached President Bush in the Oval Office.
The White House has repeatedly said it wants to cooperate fully with the commission, the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States. Scott McClellan, the White House spokesman, said on Thursday, "We continue to work closely and cooperatively with the commission to make sure they have the information they need to do their job."
-------- homeland security
Gov't Warns of al - Qaida Cargo Plane Plot
November 7, 2003
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Terror-Warning.html
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Homeland Security Department is warning law-enforcement officers al-Qaida may be plotting to fly cargo planes from another country into such crucial targets in the United States as nuclear plants, bridges or dams, an agency official said Friday night.
Separately, the U.S. Embassy in Saudi Arabia said it would close its diplomatic missions in that country Saturday for an undetermined period because of credible information terrorists are about to carry out attacks.
The United States also warned that Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan may attempt to kidnap American journalists working in that country.
``The U.S. intelligence community remains concerned about al-Qaida's interest in carrying out attacks on us overseas,'' said Homeland Security spokesman Brian Roehrkasse.
A Homeland Security official said the information about the cargo planes, first reported Friday by NBC News, came from a single source overseas.
``It has not yet been corroborated,'' the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. ``We're in the process of trying to corroborate this information.''
``We also remain concerned about threats to the aviation industry and the use of cargo planes to carry out attacks on critical infrastructure,'' the official said.
Both the Homeland Security Department and the FBI were posting an advisory Friday night alerting state and local authorities to the threat, Roehrkasse said. The advisory also was being directed to officials responsible for security at such infrastructure facilities as nuclear plants, bridges and dams, he said.
The information about possible attacks in the Middle East came from a separate source than the information about possible attacks using cargo aircraft, the official said.
Roehrkasse said the color-coded terror alert will remain at yellow, the middle level on the five-color scale indicated an elevated risk of terrorist attack.
He noted that cargo companies already have security measures in place.
Critics have said the Transportation Security Administration, the agency responsible for aviation security, hadn't done enough to make cargo planes safe. Those criticisms intensified when a New York shipping clerk packed himself in a crate and flew undetected to his parents' home in Dallas.
The government is considering regulations to plug holes in air cargo security, which has received less attention than airline passenger security since the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.
Only a small percentage of cargo is checked before being shipped in cargo or passenger planes. Neither air marshals nor armed pilots are aboard cargo planes, and areas where cargo is handled at airports are not as secure as passenger terminals.
Capt. Paul Rancatore, a spokesman for the Coalition of Airline Pilots Associations security committee, said Friday night the government treats cargo aviation differently than it treats passenger aviation.
``That, I believe, is going to lead to an incident in the future with cargo aircraft,'' he said.
On the Net:
Transportation Security Administration: http://www.tsa.gov
Homeland Security Department: http://www.dhs.gov
-------- police
Anthrax scare closes more facilities
November 07, 2003
(UPI)
http://www.washtimes.com/upi-breaking/20031107-060640-4076r.htm
WASHINGTON, Nov. 7 (UPI) -- The U.S. Postal Service Friday was conducting tests for anthrax in 11 postal facilities in the nation's capital after a sensor detected contamination.
In a preventive measure, the Postal Service closed 10 neighborhood post offices that feed mail to the mostly automated sorting facility on the Anacostia Naval Air Station where an alarm first went off Wednesday.
Although fewer than 200 anthrax spores were detected, when infection typically takes thousands of spores, the precautions were felt necessary until more definitive tests can be completed, The Washington Post reported.
Only a handful of postal workers are located in the original suspect facility which sorts mail that goes to many federal offices, including the White House. But remembering 2001, when two postal workers were among five people killed by anthrax in the mail, officials Thursday decided to widen the closings.
Much of the mail destined for federal offices is still irradiated to kill anthrax.
-------- ENERGY AND OTHER
-------- alternative energy
Solar Energy Lights Florida Classrooms
PENSACOLA, Florida, (ENS)
November 7, 2003
http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/nov2003/2003-11-07-09.asp#anchor7
One of Florida's newest schools, the two year old West Florida High School for Advanced Technology in Pensacola, today flipped the switch on the first solar electric system installation in Florida's Solar for Schools Program.
The Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), together with Gulf Power, the Florida Solar Energy Center and Escambia County Schools, participated in the opening ceremony for the newly installed solar electric system.
This first solar electric system installation launches Florida's Solar for Schools Program, which aims to place 29 solar electric systems in schools throughout the state. A first of its kind in Florida, the public-private partnership combines clean energy production with science in schools. The system will provide an on-site classroom for students to learn more about solar power and the benefits of energy conservation.
"The solar facility will be a valuable teaching tool and will give students an opportunity to view energy from another perspective," said West Florida High School Principal Lesa Morgan.
"Planning for future energy needs ensures a brighter tomorrow for Florida," said Allan Bedwell, DEP deputy secretary for regulatory programs and energy. "Installing solar technology in our schools protects our environment and quality of life and also provides an unparalleled educational opportunity for students."
Unlike fossil fuels, the energy created by the solar unit emits no noise or pollution. The electric power generated by the system will be used to power the school's classrooms, with excess energy returned to the local power grid.
"Florida's energy and environmental futures are inextricably linked," said Bedwell. "The most important source of energy is the energy we conserve. Advancing clean energy technology conserves resources, prevents pollution, saves taxpayer dollars and, in this case, teaches valuable lessons to the leaders of tomorrow."
West Florida High School is the only school in Escambia County participating in the Solar for Schools Program. The school integrates traditional academic subjects with technical training to prepare students for employment or post-secondary education.
The program will extend to Bradenton next week when the DEP, together with Florida Power and Light and the Manatee County School Board will install a solar electric system at Sara Scott Harlee Middle School on November 12.
The Florida Energy Office is funding the installation of solar electric systems in Florida Schools as a part of the Florida Solar for Schools Program. Florida's Solar for Schools Program is funded by the Florida Energy Office and managed by the Florida Solar Energy Center. The Center is providing the engineering design for system installations and inspections, and posting select metered data online at: http://www.fsec.unf.edu
----
Groundbreaking solar cell plant to be set up in Philippines
MANILA (AFP)
Nov 07, 2003
http://www.spacedaily.com/2003/031107033739.esxjlhlk.html
American technology firm Cypress will set up Southeast Asia's first wafer fabrication plant for solar cells in the Philippines in a move expected to fuel growth in the country's electronics industry.
It will also be the first wafer fabrication plant in the Philippines, signalling the country's graduation to higher-end electronics manufacturing activities, officials said.
Cypress Semiconductor's majority-owned subsidiary Sunpower Corp. will begin setting up the plant next month for production of solar cells from wafers that are to be fabricated in the Philippines, said Theresa Go, director of the subsidiary's local operations.
"This will be the first time for large-scale production of photo-voltaic cells to be carried out in Southeast Asia," she said.
Photo-voltaic cells are the key components of solar energy systems, converting sunlight into electricity.
They are vital in providing power in remote areas isolated from larger power grids as well as in reducing dependence on non-renewable energy sources like oil, officials said.
Go said that most of the output would be exported with about 20 percent sold locally, adding that their photo-voltaic cells were among the most efficient in the world.
Such cells could play a crucial role in the government's effort to provide electricity to remote rural areas and small islands, she said.
Go said Sunpower decided to begin wafer fabrication in this country after the government and local utilities gave an assurance of a steady, stable supply of electricity and water, key ingredients for production of silicon wafers.
Numerous assemblers of semiconductors and other electronic products have located in the Philippines in recent years, becoming the country's largest source of exports.
The government has long been trying to convince the private sector to set up wafer fabrication facilities in the country so that more of the core materials for semiconducters would be produced locally.
However, electronics firms have complained that Philippines infrastructure is not yet up to standard for wafer fabrication, which requires a very precise, steady supply of electricity and a guaranteed supply of water.
Go conceded that making wafers for photo-voltaic cells was easier than making wafers for semiconductors.
She expressed hope, however, that Sunpower's venture would show other electronic firms that the Philippines is improving its infrastructure to allow companies to engage in more sophisticated operations.
Aside from semiconductor manufacturing in the Philippines, California-based Cypress's has facilities are in Indonesia and Taiwan.
Go said Cypress chose the Philippines for this project because it had built up its Asian manufacturing base in the country over the last seven years.
-------- energy
Written in Private, Energy Bill to Go Public
November 7, 2003
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/politics/politics-energy-congress.html
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - After weeks of mostly secret work, Republicans on Monday will take the wraps off an energy bill loaded with some $16 billion in tax incentives to boost energy production, followed by a House vote later in the week, House Majority Leader Tom DeLay said on Friday.
Democrats have bitterly complained at being largely shut out of the bill-writing process for the past two months. While a few details, such as ethanol tax credits, have surfaced, Republicans kept other policy measures under tight control.
The Bush administration and Republican leaders praise the bill as the first major overhaul of energy policy in a decade.
Negotiators reconciling separate energy bills passed by the House and Senate have said the White House will lose its headline issue -- opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) to oil drilling.
Senate Democrats have threatened to talk the legislation to death if it unfairly favors energy companies over consumers. They declare drilling in ANWR unacceptable as well as any move to shelter the fuel additive MTBE, blamed for fouling water supplies, from defective product lawsuits.
An energy bill is a top priority of the White House, which wants to step up oil drilling, coal production, nuclear power plants and electric transmission grid expansion. The bill also would double use of ethanol, distilled from corn, as fuel.
Environmental groups say they worry the bill will be too industry-friendly and offer few enticements to conserve fuel and expand alternative energy sources.
The bill, which Republican negotiators are putting the finishing touches on, will be presented on Monday to all members of a Senate-House conference committee, DeLay said.
``The language of the conference report will be circulated sometime on Monday, so that the conferees will have the opportunity to review it,'' DeLay announced on the House floor.
The bipartisan conference committee must approve the legislation before it can be sent to the House and Senate floors. That committee vote will occur on Wednesday, he said.
On Thursday, the House will vote on the bill, DeLay said. The timetable has been agreed to by Republican Sen. Pete Domenici, the energy bill manager, a congressional aide said. After having no input except on tax items, Democrats will get their last chance to modify the bill when the conference committee meets. Once it clears the panel, the House-Senate compromise bill can't be amended when it during a floor vote.
Senate Democrats fret the legislation would hurt Americans by weakening federal clean air laws and shielding MTBE fuel additive producers that pollute water supplies from lawsuits.
Sen. Robert Byrd, a West Virginia Democrat, criticized the White House for ``corporate coddling'' of U.S. energy companies, instead of developing an energy policy that will benefit consumers in the long run.
``The administration's national energy policy plan will do about as much to improve the nation's energy security as the administration's invasion of Iraq has done to stem the tide of global terrorism,'' Byrd said on the Senate floor.
Under Senate rules, 60 votes are needed in the 100-member chamber to end debate on the energy bill and proceed with a final vote. There are 51 Republicans in the Senate, along with 48 Democrats and Independent James Jeffords of Vermont, who often votes with the Democrats.
Republican leaders hope to complete work on the energy bill and other priorities before Thanksgiving. Congress is tentatively scheduled to adjourn on Nov. 21
Democratic Sen. Max Baucus, who has a role in the tax section of the energy bill, told reporters that a handful of issues remained to be completed in the bill. They included the question of tradeability of tax credits for power companies and some transportation tax details.
President Bush urged Congress again on Friday to pass an energy bill, saying it was needed to help reduce U.S. dependence on foreign oil and enhance the nation's security.
-------- environment
Senators and Attorneys General Seek Investigation Into E.P.A. Rules Change
November 7, 2003
NY Times
By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr.and CHRISTOPHER DREW
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/07/politics/07EPA.html
WASHINGTON, Nov. 6 - Democratic senators and attorneys general from the Northeast called on Thursday for an investigation into a policy change by the Environmental Protection Agency that lawyers at the agency say will lead it to drop investigations of 50 power plants for Clean Air Act violations.
Attorney General Eliot Spitzer of New York, a Democrat, demanded that the agency turn over all of its files on the investigations so he and officials in other states can proceed with the cases. Mr. Spitzer and other Northeast attorneys general have filed lawsuits against utilities that would force them to spend billions of dollars upgrading their pollution-control systems.
"I'm asking for information the E.P.A. has generated relating to violations of a law they unfortunately have chosen not to pursue," Mr. Spitzer said.
An agency spokeswoman, Lisa Harrison, said on Thursday that Mr. Spitzer "either already has, or has access to, all of the documents that he is referring to."
Another plaintiff in the suits, Attorney General Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, a Democrat, said the agency's decision could "undercut strong state enforcement efforts to protect air quality."
In Washington, Senator Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont, the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, called for hearings. And Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York, asked the agency's inspector general to investigate whether the change in policy exceeded its authority.
"I am concerned that E.P.A. has basically announced to the power industry that it can now pollute with impunity," Mr. Schumer said.
The agency is investigating scores of power plants, oil refineries and manufacturing sites for violations of clean-air laws, including some that have led to notices of violation, or determinations of an infraction.
Enforcement lawyers at the agency say they were told this week that it would pursue investigations only if it could prove that plants were in violation of new, more lenient standard that the agency issued last month under the so-called New Source Review program.
Under the old rules, plants that were modernized in ways that increased harmful emissions generally had to install more pollution controls. Under the new rules, any renovation costing no more than one-fifth of a power-generating unit's value would be exempted from the requirement for new pollution-control devices.
The utility industry and the Bush administration have argued that the old rules were too costly and inefficient and that the new rules and other proposed changes will reduce pollutants.
Agency lawyers and environmental groups say that the new standard would shield almost all of the plants under investigation. The lawyers said the decision would undermine investigations that had already found serious violations at the 50 plants, which are owned by 10 different companies. They said the change could also jeopardize inquiries involving at least 50 more plants.
The agency said in a statement on Wednesday that there had been "no decision by the agency to drop all New Source Review enforcement actions." A handful of pending lawsuits will continue, the agency has said, while additional suits are possible. Representatives of the utility industry and other corporations affected by the policy change sharply criticized the Democratic lawmakers.
Scott Segal, director of the Electric Reliability Coordinating Council, an organization of power generators, said that lawsuits under the old rules were likely to be thrown out of court and that suits brought under the new rules would have a better chance of success.
Jeffrey Marks, an official at the National Association of Manufacturers, said in a statement that "environmental groups, presidential hopefuls and misinformed state attorneys general" have unfairly attacked the new rules, which he said would help "advance energy efficiency and decrease air emissions cost-effectively."
-------- genetics
U.N. Postpones Debate on Human Cloning
Action Derails Bid for a Vote on a U.S.-Backed Measure Calling for a Moratorium
By Colum Lynch
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, November 7, 2003; Page A02
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A8840-2003Nov6.html
UNITED NATIONS, Nov. 6 -- The Bush administration suffered a setback on Thursday in its campaign for a global ban on all forms of human cloning, as key European allies and dozens of Islamic states that support therapeutic cloning blocked consideration of the issue at the United Nations until the end of 2005.
The 191-member U.N. General Assembly voted 80 to 79, with 15 abstentions and 17 no-shows, in support of a procedural motion, introduced by the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), to defer debate on the controversial topic for two years.
The maneuver derailed a U.S.-backed initiative by Costa Rica to hold a vote on a resolution calling for a moratorium on human cloning and establishing a committee to draft an international convention banning the practice.
U.S. and U.N. diplomats said that the resolution, which has 66 co-sponsors, would have been easily adopted with the support of more than 100 nations if it had been put to a vote. However, several countries that were considering supporting the Costa Rican draft -- including Cameroon, Benin and Canada -- either backed the delay, abstained or did not attend.
The action on Thursday drew expressions of relief from the medical and scientific community's advocates, who warned that a total ban would stifle progress in the development of life-saving medicines. It elicited criticism from conservative American Christian groups that view cloning as a violation of the sanctity of life.
The action also exposed the deep political and religious differences between the United States and the Islamic world, which does not recognize that life begins at conception and opposes prohibitions on "therapeutic cloning," which involves the medical and scientific use of human embryos.
"Therapeutic cloning is acceptable universally by all the Shia and the Sunni Muslims," said Abdulaziz Sachedina, an expert on the ethics of cloning in Islam at the University of Virginia's Department of Religious Studies.
"Embryos don't have the same sanctity [that they do in the Christian faith]," he said. "They are not regarded as a person in any sense."
Although there is broad support at the United Nations for a global ban on reproductive human cloning, the debate here has focused on how much leeway should be provided for the pursuit of developments in therapeutic cloning.
France and Germany advocated in 2001 a partial ban that would prohibit the use of cloned embryos to reproduce human beings. At the time, they argued that individual states should decide whether to bar the use of cloned human embryos for scientific research.
The effort quickly stumbled as the United States, the Vatican, Costa Rica and Spain championed a total ban on the use of human embryos for any purpose, including for medical and scientific research. Belgium, which has since emerged as the sponsor of a competing resolution calling for a partial ban on cloning, said it would support the Islamic group's call for a delay to improve the chances for reaching a consensus.
U.S. officials expressed sympathy on Thursday for Islamic governments that are struggling to fashion a policy on cloning that would be consistent with their own religious beliefs.
But they charged that European countries that favor a partial ban on reproductive human cloning exploited the concerns to block the U.S.-backed initiative.
"We are disappointed that the proponents of an incomplete ban on cloning have been able to use a procedural device to prevent the international community from registering the significant majority that exists in favor of a total ban," James Cunningham, the deputy U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said after the vote.
An Iranian representative, acting on behalf of the OIC, introduced the motion to delay the debate to give Islamic governments and religious leaders more time to formulate a joint position on the issue. "Human cloning is a very complex and delicate question," said Mostafa Dolatyar of Iran. "Even in the scientific circles, we can see a manifestation of uncertainty, hesitation and divergence of views."
Despite Thursday's setback, the campaign for a global ban has gained momentum over the past year as conservative Christian groups here and abroad lobbied the supporters of the partial ban to reverse course.
-------- health
PUBLIC HEALTH ALERT:
Lilly announces link between new antipsychotics and diabetes
From: "carol wolman" <cwolman@mcn.org>
Fri Nov 7, 2003
http://www.businesswire.com/webbox/bw.091703/232605394.htm
Dear Friends,
This is offtopic for many of my egroups, but since America is experiencing an explosive epidemic of diabetes, I thought it should be widely circulated.
I just received a letter by snail mail, sent to all physicians, entitled Lilly Announces FDA Notification of Class Labeling for Atypical Antipsychotics Regarding Hyperglycemia and Diabetes. I found the same letter online at the link above, if you care to read the whole thing.
The new antipsychotics (and SSRI antidepressants, which are not mentioned in this letter) have only been in use for 10-15 years. Millions of Americans are on these pills,- Zyprexa, Seroquel, Risperidol. The SSRI's are among the most widely used prescription drugs- with names like Prozac, Paxil, Effexor, Zoloft, Remeron, Luvox, Celexa, Lexapro.
All of these pharmaceuticals have weight gain and loss of libido as frequent side effects. We are starting to see the long term effects. It's not surprising to find that some long-term users are developing diabetes.
Isn't it time that people stopped depending on the pharmaceutical industry to deal with real problems? Prozac will not get rid of the Bush administration.
Carol Wolman, MD Board Certified in Psychiatry
-------- ACTIVISTS
Enola Gay Exhibit Criticized for Omitting Japanese Casualties
2003-11-07
UN Observer
http://www.unobserver.com/layout5.php?id=1162&blz=1
WASHINGTON - The Smithsonian Institution has received a petition from a group of nearly 200 scholars, writers and others criticizing its plans to exhibit the Enola Gay, which dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima in World War II, without mentioning Japanese casualties, an institution official said Thursday.
The Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, which plans to put the completely reassembled Enola Gay on public display on Dec 15 when its new facility opens near Washington Dulles International Airport, will announce its response to the petition Friday, the official said.
The petition urges the museum to change the way of exhibiting the B-29 Superfortress bomber, saying it is inappropriate to display the plane only in celebration of American technology without mentioning the consequences of the bombing, including the number of casualties.
Those who signed the petition included Hiroshima Mayor Tadatoshi Akiba, Nobel Peace Prize laureate Joseph Rotblat, novelist Kurt Vonnegut and historian Howard Zinn.
In 1994, the museum was planning an Enola Gay exhibit that would focus largely on the destruction and suffering caused by the 1945 atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and on the historical aftermath, including the Cold War.
But in the face of a storm of protest from World War II veterans' groups and politicians over the alleged excessive emphasis on the Japanese victims, the planned exhibition was scrapped in January 1995.
Later, the fuselage of the Enola Gay and other items were put on display in an exhibit that made no reference to the damage caused by the bombing. That exhibition ran from June 1995 to 1998.
The Enola Gay dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima on Aug 6, 1945. Approximately 140,000 people had died by the end of that year as a result of the bomb and many others suffered radiation illnesses. (Kyodo News)
Article reprinted, courtesy of Japan Today: http://www.japantoday.com
Please also see:
Enola Gay - Former Exhibition Information The Enola Gay exhibition at the National Air and Space Museum closed on May 18, 1998. This web page provides images and highlights from that exhibition. http://www.nasm.edu/galleries/gal103/gal103_former.html
Enola Gay Exhibit Incites Protest; http://www.avweb.com/newswire/9_45b/briefs/185997-1.html
----
Bill for the resignation of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld
HCON 323 IH
108th CONGRESS
1st Session
http://thomas.loc.gov
Whereas Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld is the chief architect and custodian of the invasion and occupation of Iraq; (Introduced in House)
Urging the President to immediately request the resignation of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld .
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
November 7, 2003 Mr. RANGEL (for himself, Ms. SCHAKOWSKY, Ms. LEE, Ms. WOOLSEY, Mr. OWENS, Ms. CARSON of Indiana, Mr. CLAY, Mr. GRIJALVA, Mr. STARK, Mr. PALLONE, Ms. EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON of Texas, Mr. THOMPSON of Mississippi, Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California, Mr. DAVIS of Illinois, Ms. SOLIS, Mr. DOGGETT, Mr. BROWN of Ohio, Mr. NADLER, Ms. WATERS, Mr. MEEKS of New York, Mr. MCDERMOTT, Ms. WATSON, Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts, Mr. KUCINICH, Mr. GUTIERREZ, and Ms. KAPTUR) submitted the following concurrent resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Armed Services
CONCURRENT RESOLUTION
Urging the President to immediately request the resignation of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld .
Whereas Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld is the chief architect and custodian of the invasion and occupation of Iraq;
Whereas Secretary Rumsfeld must be held accountable for the conduct of the war and the subsequent occupation;
Whereas the tragic deaths of 240 American soldiers in Iraq during the occupation, with 19 perishing in this past week, underscores Secretary Rumsfeld's gross mismanagement of his responsibilities;
Whereas by rejecting the advice of his senior military officers and sending members of the Armed Forces to war in Iraq without adequate planning and sufficient equipment, Secretary Rumsfeld has subjected members of the Armed Forces to an unacceptable level of danger, resulting in higher casualties and injuries and compromising the success of the mission;
Whereas repeated miscalculations by Secretary Rumsfeld regarding the planning and handling of the invasion and occupation, as well as the solicitation of assistance from the international community, have caused the Armed Forces to be caught in a quagmire in Iraq; Whereas Secretary Rumsfeld has misled the American people in his assessments of the progress of the war and occupation; and
Whereas Secretary Rumsfeld has demonstrated a lack of sensitivity in his public statements regarding the war and Armed Forces casualties: Now, therefore, be it
Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring), That Congress urges the President, in light of these aforementioned failures, to immediately request the resignation of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld .
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Berkeley resolution: Nuke plant should be closed
November 7, 2003
Ocean County Observer
11/07/03
by MILLIE GUERRERO, Staff Writer
From: Guin <guinstigator@yahoo.com>
BERKELEY -- A resolution was passed unanimously by the Township Council calling for the Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station in Lacey Township to be decommissioned by April 2004, allowing a transitional period to ensure that all employees are retrained and rehired.
The resolution calls for the plant to be replaced with clean energy solutions, including renewable energy such as solar and wind power for which state funds are available.
But David Simon, a representative of Exelon, the parent company that operates the plant, said accusations made against Oyster Creek are far-fetched and disturbing.
"It's deliberately put out there without looking at the facts," he said. "I have three kids and I would go live near any one of our plants. They are well protected and well fortified."
However, Councilman John Naparano said he felt it was the council's responsibility to speak out, given the public's interest and cause for concern.
"According to the NRC (Nuclear Regulatory Commission), the emissions could spread over 500 miles, covering our people here," he said, "and as a councilman, our council has an obligation to the people we serve and not the special interest groups . . . I'd rather be safe than sorry. I have to think of the people we represent and I would hate to think of what would happen and we did nothing about it."
The council was approached by members of the Jersey Shore Nuclear Watch, who have been advocates for shutting the plant down. The council had previously taken a stance against the power plant in 1994 and adopted a resolution on May 13, 2003 requesting an independent evacuation study and a plan for Oyster Creek.
He said the public interest groups, such as Jersey Shore Nuclear Watch, have been able to provide convincing research regarding the danger the plant poses to the general health and well being of the public.
The resolution states that a minute supply of energy is produced by the power plant, claiming that less than one percent is produced for a country-wide power grid.
But Simon, the Exelon representative, disagreed, questioning how New Jersey would replace 660 megawatts of power that is currently generated by the plan.
"If the people of New Jersey would be willing to put up a thousand windmills or numerous solar panels to replace that kind of energy, then fine," he said.
The township's resolution also cites the community's lack of confidence in the current evacuation plan.
But Simon noted that the evacuation plan was designed to handle all emergency scenarios, adding the fuel storage tank is designed to withstand severe weather conditions, including a major hurricane or tornado. If there is a crash, such as an airliner hitting the plant, the chance of a nuclear accident is "almost nil, but we can't say 100 percent." Simon said.
"These are hardened facilities," he said, "designed with reinforced structure with steel and concrete."
Simon said in if there was ever a release from the plant, the wind direction will only send the emissions in one direction.
"You would have a very directed wave," he said, adding it would be carried by the wind "in a very small area."
Edith Gbur, chairperson of the Jersey Shore Nuclear Watch, defended the group's position against Oyster Creek, saying there are numerous studies to support their concerns, particularly regarding what could happen during a terrorist attack.
Gbur said she is elated with Berkeley's resolution.
"Berkeley is a pioneer and they are really concerned about the people living there," she said. "I'm hoping the other townships will follow them."
Simon, however, said the company is responsive to the public, and willing to work with the municipalities to alleviate any concerns.
"We understand there is concern," he said. "We have a citizens task force, we work with them, we want to be receptive and open to do something to improve how we operate."
--
Berkley resolution against Oyster Creek nuclear plant
A RESOLUTION OF THE TOWNSHIP COUNCIL OF THE TOWNSHIP OF BERKELEY CALLING FOR THE DECOMMISSIONING OF THE NUCLEAR POWER PLANT WITH A CALL FOR CLEAN ENERGY SOLUTIONS AND A JUST TRANSITION FOR DISPLACED OYSTER CREEK NUCLEAR POWER PLANT WORKERS.
October 28, 2003
WHEREAS, the recent power outages in Ocean County including the shut down of the Oyster Creek Nuclear Power Plant constitute a deep and abiding concern that major changes should be made to our energy sources and transmission mechanisms; and
WHEREAS, the Oyster Creek Nuclear Power Plant produces less than 1% of the energy on the PJM Electric Grid and can be replaced by alternative sources of energy; and
WHEREAS, the Berkeley township Council has in the past expressed opposition and concern to the activities of JCP&L and the subsequent owners of the Oyster Creek Nuclear Power Plant, specifically by:
joining William DeCamp, Jr. in a Prerogative Writ Action in 1994 against JCP&L and the Lacey Township Zoning Board of Adjustment which permitted the storage of spent nuclear fuel rods at the Oyster Creek Nuclear Power at a cost that was funded by the taxpayers of Berkeley Township. Adopting a Resolution on April 12, 1994 urging the Lacey Township Zoning board of Adjustment to reconsider the application of GPU/JCP&L's storage of nuclear waste at the Oyster Creek Nuclear Power Plant. Adopting a Resolution on May 13, 2003 requesting an independent evacuation study and a plan for the Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station to protect Berkeley Township in the event of an emergency at the oyster creek generating station; and
WHEREAS, there is a lack of public confidence in the evacuation plan based on the consensus that the plan is insufficient to evacuate residents in the Ocean County area; and
WHEREAS, in case of a major nuclear accident, it would take one to four hours for radioactive plumes to spread within a ten mile ring of the Oyster Creek Nuclear Power Plant depending on the weather and evacuation would take considerable longer than four hours for the approximately 244,000 people located within that radius; and
WHEREAS, radioactive releases could cause cancer in people as far as 500 miles away and make homes uninhabitable according to a 1990 Sandia National Laboratories Report; and
WHEREAS, the elevated fuel pool at the Oyster Creek Nuclear Power Plant containing highly radioactive waste does not offer adequate protection in the event of strong weather situations or terrorist attack; and
WHEREAS, the Oyster Creek Nuclear Power Plant is the oldest operating nuclear power plant in the country;
WHEREAS, in 1985 the Nuclear Regulatory Commission said the Mark I Nuclear Reactor Containment System is a faulty design and has a 90% projected failure rate in case of an accident therefore making it necessary to vent the pressure build up to avoid rupturing the containment system; and
WHEREAS, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has not taken enforcement action against an 11 year old non-compliance identified in a January 24, 2003 Triennial Fire Protection Inspection Report involving the ability of the reactor to safely shut down in the event of a fire, exposing the public to undue risk; and
WHEREAS, nuclear power poses safety and environmental risks and is heavily dependant on taxpayer and ratepayer subsidies, and generates cancer causing Strontium 90,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED BY THE TOWNSHIP COUNCIL OF THE TOWNSHIP OF BERKELEY, IN THE COUNTY OF OCEAN AND STATE OF NEW JERSEY, that the Nuclear Regulatory commission is urged to decommission the Oyster Creek Nuclear Power Plant in April, 2004 with a just transition period to insure that all affected workers are retrained and rehired; and be it further
RESOLVED that the Berkeley Township council urge the implementation and use of clean energy solutions, including renewable energy such as solar and wind power for which state funds are available, and energy conservation; and be it further
RESOLVED that a copy of this Resolution shall be forwarded to the following:
Governor James E. McGreevey
Senator Jon S. Corzine, One Newark Center, 14th Floor, Newark, New Jersey, 07102
Senator Frank Lautenberg, One Riverfront Plaza, 3rd Floor, Newark, New Jersey, 07102
Congressman Robert Menendez, 2238 Rayburn HOB, Washington, DC 20515-3013
Congressman Rush D. Holt, 1019 Longworth HOB, Washington, DC 20515-3012
Congressman Rodney P. Frelinghuysen, 2442 Rayburn HOB, Washington, DC 20515-3011
Congressman Donald M. Payne, 2209 Rayburn HOB, Washington, DC 20515-3010
Congressman Steven R. Rothman, 1607 Longworth HOB, Washington, DC 20515-3009
Congressman Bill Pascrell Jr., 1722 Longworth HOB, Washington, DC 20515-3008
Congressman Mike Ferguson, 214 Cannon HOB, Washington DC 20515-3007
Congressman Frank Pallone Jr., 420 Cannon HOB, Washington, DC 20515-3006
Congressman Scott Garrett, 1641 Longworth HOB, Washington, DC 20515-3005
Congressman Christopher H. Smith, 2373 Rayburn HOB, Washington, DC 20515-3004
Congressman Jim Saxton, 339 Cannon HOB, Washington, DC 20515-3003
Congressman Frank A. LoBiondo, 225 Cannon HOB, Washington, DC 20515-3002
Congressman Robert E. Andrews, 2439 Rayburn HOB, Washington, DC 20515-3001
New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, P.O. Box 402, Trenton, New Jersey, 08625
Nuclear Regulatory Commission, One White Flint North, 11555 Rockville Pike, Rockville, MD, 20852
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 1200 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington DC, 20460
Jersey Shore Nuclear Watch, 59 Berkshire Court, Toms River, New Jersey, 08753
NJPIRG, 11 North Willow Street, Trenton, New Jersey, 08608
Mayor and Council Members Township Attorney
ANNE M. WOLFF, Council President
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