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Digest 81, originally sent Fri Apr 23 02:53:01 1999 :
There are 10 messages in this issue.
Topics in today's digest:
1. NucNews-0 Brief 4/22/99
2. NucNews-6 4/22/99 - China - Promise; Pakistan; US Dispute (4 )
3. NucNews-4-US 4/22/99 - WIPP (NM) Order; Fernald (OH) Waste; Perry (OH) Leaks; Hanford (WA)
4. NucNews3-US 4/22/99 - DOE; NM Lab Excavation; IL Braidwood; VA Shipyard; Serbs/Clinton/Colorado Shooting
5. NucNews-7 4/22/99 - China
6. NucNews-5-US 4/22/99 - Jonah House (2 articles and appeal)
7. NucNews-2-Int'l 4/22/99 - Russia (4); Ukraine (4)
8. NucNews-8 4/22/99 - War Games (3); Y2K (2); Energy NY
9. NucNews-1-Int'l 4/22/99 - D.U. in Balkans; Canada-Abolition 2000; Dutch El-Al Israel (2); Australia (2)
10. NucNews-9 4/22/99 -NATO World Police; China/Canada; Stealth; Landmines; Kosovans; Apaches
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Message: 1 Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 19:35:04 -0400
Subject: NucNews-0 Brief 4/22/99
[Please address replies to the original publisher (with a copy to us). Your help in refuting false information appreciated!]
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NucNews-1-Int'l 4/22/99 - D.U. in Balkans; Canada-Abolition 2000; Dutch El-Al Israel (2); Australia (2) NucNews-2-Int'l 4/22/99 - Russia (4); Ukraine (4) NucNews3-US 4/22/99 - DOE; NM Lab Excavation; IL Braidwood; VA Shipyard; Serbs/Clinton/Colorado Shooting NucNews-4-US 4/22/99 - WIPP (NM) Order; Fernald (OH) Waste; Perry (OH) Leaks; Hanford (WA) NucNews-5-US 4/22/99 - Jonah House (2 articles and appeal) NucNews-6 4/22/99 - China - Promise; Pakistan; US Dispute (4 ) NucNews-8 4/22/99 - War Games (3); Y2K (2); Energy NY NucNews-9 4/22/99 -NATO World Police; China/Canada; Stealth; Landmines; Kosovans; Apaches
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1. Bombing threatens Serbs' environment By Alex Kirby, April 19, 1999 BBC http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_323000/323113.stm Unsurprisingly, nearly four weeks of bombing are wreaking havoc not only on Serbia's military machine, but on its land, air and water as well.... And there is persistent concern over depleted uranium (DU) munitions. DU is a very dense metal, which helps it to penetrate armour effectively. It is also toxic, carcinogenic, and radioactive. It is blamed by the Iraqis, and by some veterans, for a range of health problems in southern Iraq, where it was used in 1991.
2. Bombing drowns out anti-nuke message Robert Bragg, Calgary Herald (Canada), 21 April 1999 http://www.calgaryherald.com/opinion/stories/990421/2506434.html The movement to abolish nuclear weapons is an overlooked casualty of the NATO offensive in Kosovo.
3. Fingerpointing in El Al Crash Finding of Laxity Is Said to Focus on 2 Dutch Officials International Herald Tribune, April 22, 1999 http://www.iht.com/IHT/TODAY/THU/IN/elal.2.html Paris, Thursday, April 22, 1999 AMSTERDAM - A parliamentary inquiry into the Netherlands' worst air disaster implicates the government of Prime Minister Wim Kok and sharply criticizes Health Minister Els Borst for her role in the fiery 1992 crash, a newspaper reported Wednesday.
4. Dutch ready El Al crash report, may target cabinet By Janet McBride, April 21, 1999, Reuters News Service http://infoseek.go.com/Content?arn=a1020LBY458reulb-19990421&qt=nuclear+plut onium+uranium+radioactiv???&sv=IS&lk=noframes&col=NX&kt=A&ak=news1486 ... In the almost seven years since the disaster, rescue workers and hundreds of local people have reported chronic health complaints ranging from neurological disorders to nausea -- illnesses that have been linked to the plane and its load.... Debate has () raged over the health implications of exposure to depleted uranium, which was used as wing ballast in the aircraft. Only 152 kg (334 lb) of the 282 kg (620 lb) on board were recovered after the crash and fire.
5. Calls for legislation to prevent accepting of nuclear waste Wednesday 21 April, 1999 Australian Broadcasting http://www.abc.net.au/news/newslink/weekly/newsnat-21apr1999-3.htm A Western Australian MP is encouraging politicians in other States to draft legislation which would make it illegal for Australia to accept international nuclear waste.
6. Silex surge has backers glowing Street Talk, By Andrew Main, Australia Financial Review, April 22, 1999 http://www.afr.com.au/content/990422/market/markets7.html Investors in Sydney R&D company Silex were smiling yesterday as the shares surged nearly 84¢ to $4.23 on the back of news about the company's uranium enrichment technology for computer semiconductor equipment. Silex said it clinched a deal with Isonics Corp in the US to jointly fund a testing program for Silex's uranium-enriched Silicon-28 wafers....
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7. Nuclear reactors made safe Russian body says By Seamus Martin, Irish Times, April 20, 1999 http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/world/1999/0420/wor9.htm Two nuclear reactors near Belgrade have been made safe from NATO bombing by the removal of fuel, according to the president of the Russian Nuclear Agency, Mr Valery Mezhuev. "There is no doubt that NATO pilots now know exactly where these reactors are situated," he said.
8. Russia To Boycott NATO Summit Associated Press, April 21, 1999 http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/i/AP-Russia-Yugoslavia.html MOSCOW (AP) -- Russia said today it will boycott NATO's 50th anniversary summit to protest the alliance's airstrikes against Yugoslavia, but addedonline it was preparing new efforts to solve the Kosovo crisis peacefully.
9. Japan To Help Dismantle Russia's Nuclear Subs TOKYO, Apr. 21, 1999 -- (Agence France Presse) http://www.russiatoday.com/rtoday/news/1999042114.html Japan plans to offer Russia about $35 million to help dismantle 50 aging nuclear submarines in its Pacific Fleet, a report said here Wednesday.
10. Russia presses Pakistan on nuclear proliferation April 20, 1999, Reuters News Service http://infoseek.go.com/Content?arn=a1339LBY545reulb-19990420&qt=nuclear+plut onium+uranium+radioactiv???&sv=IS&lk=noframes&col=NX&kt=A&ak=news1486 MOSCOW, April 20 (Reuters) - Russian Prime Minister Yevgeny Primakov, reacting to missile tests by India and Pakistan, said on Tuesday all countries that have conducted such tests should abide by agreements preventing nuclear proliferation.... Tass said trade turnover had fallen from $81.1 million to $55.6 million in 1998 but the two countries saw great potential for cooperation.
11. FRANCE: WARNING ON CHERNOBYL April 21, 1999 New York Times World Briefing http://www.nytimes.com/yr/mo/day/news/world/world-briefing.html France's official nuclear watchdog agency said the one working Chernobyl nuclear energy reactor should be closed down "as soon as possible."
12. Hard-up Ukraine to launch two nuclear reactors alone April 20, 1999, Reuters News Service http://infoseek.go.com/Content?arn=a1418LBY565reulb-19990420&qt=nuclear+plut onium+uranium+radioactiv???&sv=IS&lk=noframes&col=NX&kt=A&ak=news1486 Cash-short Ukraine will strain its scarce funds to complete alone two nuclear reactors at local power stations, because the West is unlikely to provide the necessary financing, senior officials said on Tuesday.
13. EBRD defends Ukraine nuclear power project By Gill Tudor, April 191999, Reuters News Service http://infoseek.go.com/Content?arn=a2757LBY905reulb-19990419&qt=nuclear+plut onium+uranium+radioactiv???&sv=IS&lk=noframes&col=NX&kt=A&ak=news1486 LONDON, April 19 (Reuters) - Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) on Monday defended controversial plans to complete two unfinished nuclear power stations in Ukraine, which it may back with a $190 million loan.
14. EBRD-Anti-nuclear group protests over Ukraine project April 19, 1999, Reuters News Service http://infoseek.go.com/Content?arn=a1049LBY412reulb-19990419&qt=nuclear+plut onium+uranium+radioactiv???&sv=IS&lk=noframes&col=NX&kt=A&ak=news1486 Anti-nuclear activists dressed as giant silver mutants protested on Monday against plans to complete two Ukrainian nuclear power stations, which they say are dangerous and uneconomic.
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15. Energy Dept. suspends director USA Today April 22, 1999 http://usatoday.com/news/digest/nd1.htm The Department of Energy has suspended its security director pending an independent investigation of charges that he leaked classified information. Edward McCallum, who repeatedly has faulted the agency for letting protections erode at nuclear weapons plants and labs, was put on paid administrative leave Monday.
16. N.M. Bomb Lab Digging Up Cold War Graveyard ASSOCIATED PRESS, April 20, 1999 - Salt Lake Tribune http://www.sltrib.com/1999/apr/04201999/nation_w/99421.htm ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- They're digging up the Cold War at a federal weapons lab and shipping off the artifacts. A crew of about 30 has been on the job for about a year to dig up a classified landfill at Sandia National Laboratories. From time to time, the workers abandon monstrous excavators and bulldozers to become amateur archaeologists....
17. Braidwood to begin Unit 2 refueling outage April 20, 1999, PR Newswire http://infoseek.go.com/Content?arn=PR4646-19990420&qt=nuclear+plutonium+uran ium+radioactiv???&sv=IS&lk=noframes&col=NX&kt=A&ak=news1486 DOWNERS GROVE, Ill., April 20 /PRNewswire/ -- ComEd's Braidwood Nuclear Generating Station will remove its Unit 2 reactor from service on Saturday, April 24, for a scheduled refueling and maintenance outage.
18. Shipyard workers rally for congressional help By Timothy Burn THE WASHINGTON TIMES April 22, 1999 http://www.washtimes.com/business/business2.html Several hundred workers from Newport News Shipbuilding rallied at the Capitol yesterday to seek congressional support in their 17-day-old strike against the shipyard. The workers said they want Congress, which appropriates the money for Newport's Navy ship contracts, to lean on company CEO William Fricks to reopen talks.
19. Serbs Blame Clinton for [Colorado] Shooting Associated Press, April 22, 1999 http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/i/AP-Yugoslavia-School-Shooting.html BELGRADE, Yugoslavia -- State-run Serb television said Wednesday that President Clinton was partly to blame for the massacre at a Colorado high school because his policies show ``America solves problems by force.''
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20. State Orders Test Data on WIPP Load Idaho Shipment's Contents Contested By Ian Hoffman, April 21, 1999 Albuquerque Journal http://www.abqjournal.com/news/6news04-21.htm Days after its grand opening, the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant is facing its first enforcement action from New Mexico. State environmental regulators on Tuesday ordered the U.S. Department of Energy to provide testing data on a load of waste from Idaho by the end of today or face potential penalties including fines and an injunction against out-of-state waste shipments to WIPP....
21. Foster Wheeler Awarded Multimillion Dollar Waste Retrieval Project At Doe Fernald Site April 21, 1999 Business Wire http://nt.excite.com/news/bw/990421/nj-foster-wheeler CLINTON, N.J. (BUSINESS WIRE) - Foster Wheeler Environmental Corporation was awarded a $50-million, four-year contract by Fluor Daniel Fernald for the accelerated waste removal project at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Fernald facility in Ohio.
22. Source of Perry leaks found Wednesday, April 21, 1999 By SUSAN JAFFE, CLEVELAND PLAIN DEALER http://www.cleveland.com/news/pdnews/metro/3c21per.ssf NORTH PERRY - Almost four weeks after the Perry nuclear power plant closed for maintenance and refueling, the operators have found the likely reason why several fuel rods developed pinhole leaks.
23. Hanford column gets Dave Barry an invitation Florangela Davila - The Seattle Times April 21, 1999 http://www.spokane.net/news-story-body.asp?Date=042199&ID=s564352&cat= On its way to Dave Barry, arguably the nation's best-known humor columnist, is an invitation from mayors living in the shadow of the Hanford nuclear reservation, irrefutably the nation's most contaminated nuclear site.
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24. Anti-War Horse By Carl Schoettler, Baltimore Sun, April 20, 1999 http://www.sunspot.net/cgi-bin/editorial/story.cgi?storyid=1150070221463 At 75, Baltimore's Philip Berrigan is fresh out of jail and raring to resume his battle against what he knows is wrong. Even if it means more time in a cell.... In the morning, he'll be out in front of a federal office building, protesting on behalf of members of the Jonah House community who have been barred from returning home by the federal probation system.
25. Jonah House supporters protest probation terms 2 with criminal records not allowed to live there By John Rivera, Baltimore Sun, April 14, 1999 http://www.sunspot.net/cgi-bin/editorial/story.cgi?storyid=1150070218099 For the Catholic Worker peace activists who live there, West Baltimore's Jonah House is a place of community, prayer and good works, but to federal probation officials, it is a place of crime....
26. An appeal on behalf of the Jonah House crew Max Obuszewski. Baltimore, MD - mobuszewski@afsc.org Dear Friends, The Jonah House Community needs your assistance. Michele Naar Obed and Susan Crane are defying the ban on living at the Jonah House.... Please write the Chief US Probation Officer in Baltimore with copies to the Chief Judge and Janet Reno and Senator Mikulski.(Addresses below.) Mention any of the following: ... REPORT ON CHALLENGE OF MISTREATMENT BY BALTIMORE PROBATION
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27. 'China will not conduct further n-tests' 20-04-1999 The Hindu http://www.webpage.com/hindu/daily/990420/03/03200004.htm BEIJING, APRIL 19. China will not conduct further nuclear tests and wants India and Pakistan to end their arms race to alleviate tensions in South Asia, the former Chinese Prime Minister, Mr. Li Peng, has said....
28. Pakistan's Nukes and Clinton's Trip to China By Daniel Horner April 9, 1999 http://www.insidechina.com/china/special/horner/horn9801.html It's a safe bet that President Bill Clinton doesn't appreciate the recent uproar over Chinese political contributions in the United States and the transfer of U.S. satellite technology to China. Speculation that China contributed to Pakistan's decision to test nuclear weapons, or worse, will not help.
29. Report Warns of Big Gains to Chinese From Spying By JEFF GERTH, April 22, 1999 New York Times http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/asia/042299china-nuke.html WASHINGTON -- China is likely to use stolen advanced American nuclear weapons secrets to upgrade its weapons within years, not decades, a senior intelligence official said Wednesday.
30. China 'guilty' of nuclear espionage Intelligence could have helped China miniaturise warheads April 22, 1999 BBC World: Americas http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/americas/newsid_325000/325633.stm
31. China Denies New U.S. Charges Of Nuclear Espionage April 22, 1999 Reuters http://www.webcrawler.com/news/r/990422/05/news-china-usa-spying BEIJING (Reuters) - China denied Thursday its spies had poached cutting-edge U.S. nuclear technology which American intelligence officials believe will help Beijing upgrade its antiquated strategic arsenal.
32. CIA: Chinese espionage damaged security 4/21/99- USA Today http://www.usatoday.com/news/washdc/ncswed02.htm WASHINGTON (AP) - A CIA report presented to lawmakers Wednesday concludes that Chinese espionage targeting nuclear weapons laboratories damaged U.S. national security, according to a senior Clinton administration official.
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33. Chinese Stole Data On Reentry Vehicles U.S. Intelligence Assesses Losses By Walter Pincus and Vernon Loeb Washington Post Staff Writers Thursday, April 22, 1999; Page A04 http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-04/22/025l-042299-idx.html An intelligence assessment released yesterday found that Chinese spying has obtained secret information over the past 20 years not only on U.S. nuclear weapons designs but also on U.S. reentry vehicles, the containers that carry explosive devices through space.
34. Chinese missiles will reflect U.S. designs By Bill Gertz and Nancy Roman, WASHINGTON TIMES, April 22, 1999 http://www.washtimes.com/news/news2.html#link Classified U.S. nuclear warhead secrets will be built into new Chinese strategic missiles in "a matter of years" and could include Beijing's first multiple-warhead systems, a senior U.S. intelligence official said yesterday. ALSO OF INTEREST: China Stole Data on Atom Warhead, U.S. Report Finds April 21, 1999, JAMES RISEN and JEFF GERTH, New York Times http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/asia/042199china-nuke.html An Earlier China Spy Case Points Up Post-Cold War Ambiguities [The 2 Lees] March 13, 1999 New York Times http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/asia/031399china-nuke-scientist.html U.S. Report Says China Stole Data On Atom Warhead-NYT Reuters-April 21, 1999 http://www.webcrawler.com/news/r/990421/04/news-nuclear-usa-china
35. Spy, Counterspy and a Splitting Atomic Headache Energy Sleuth's Testimony Seems To Undercut GOP By Walter Pincus and Vernon Loeb Washington Post Staff Writers Wednesday, April 21, 1999; Page A23 http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-04/21/170l-042199-idx.html It was midsummer 1995. Notra Trulock peered at a thick, seven-year-old Chinese nuclear report just handed to the CIA by a walk-in spy. Going from page to page, the Energy Department intelligence chief saw his worst fears confirmed:
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[These articles aren't nuclear, but are worthy of note.]
36. Death Leads Puerto Rico To Seek End Of War Games By John Marino, April 20, 1999 Reuters http://www.webcrawler.com/news/r/990420/18/news-puertorico-accident SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (Reuters) - Puerto Rico's governor asked Washington Tuesday to halt war games immediately on an island off the U.S. territory, a day after a bombing accident killed one civilian and injured several others.
[More on war games earlier this month.]
37. UAE, France begin Gulf war games April 9 1999 Reuters http://infoseek.go.com/Content?arn=a1859LBY093reulb-19990409&qt=%2B%22war+ga mes%22+%2Bmilitary&sv=IS&lk=noframes&col=NX&kt=A&ak=news1486 ABU DHABI, April 9 (Reuters) - The United Arab Emirates and France on Friday began joint military manoeuvres in the Gulf and on land, the official WAM news agency reported.
38. Boredom, punctuated by terror: the real 'War Games' [and a description of Cheyenne Mountain] April 20, 1999 CNN e-mail: space@cnn.com http://cnn.com/TECH/space/9904/20/downlinks/index.html COLORADO SPRINGS, Colorado (CNN) -- I don't want to sound braggadocios, but in the course of doing my job, I do get to do -- and see -- some pretty cool things. Yet every now and then, expectations for a story don't jive with reality.
39. China Y2K Efforts Lack Funds, Coordination http://www.insidechina.com/china/news/07.html BEIJING, Apr. 20, 1999 -- (Reuters) China's efforts to prevent a nationwide computer shutdown on Jan. 1, 2000 face a critical lack of funds and inadequate coordination, a senior information official said on Monday.
40. Report: No one should be Y2K complacent USA Today, April 21, 1999 http://usatoday.com/news/washdc/ncstue07.htm
41. Aging N.Y. Power Plants Dirtier in 1998, Report Says By ANDREW C. REVKIN, New York Times, April 21, 1999 http://www.nytimes.com/yr/mo/day/news/national/regional/ny-power-plants.html Air pollution from 21 aging power plants across New York state rose significantly last year, according to a report released Tuesday by several private environmental, health, and consumer groups.
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42. NATO Confronts a New Role: Regional Policeman April 22, 1999 NY Times http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/europe/042299nato-summit.html ... Perhaps most telling is what will not be stated in the new strategic concept. One of NATO's most cherished descriptions of itself will be dropped. Thus, these lines that were at the heart of NATO's last strategic concept, written in 1991 when the Soviet Union was still alive, will disappear: "The Alliance is purely defensive in purpose: None of its weapons will ever be used except in self-defense." ...
43. China Calls For An End To NATO Strikes On Yugoslavia UNITED NATIONS, Apr. 20, 1999 -- (Agence France Presse) http://www.insidechina.com/china/news/02.html China on Monday repeated its calls for an immediate end to NATO strikes against Yugoslavia, adding it solutions regarding Kosovo being imposed on Belgrade.
44. RPT-Canada deviates from NATO policy on nukes April 19, 1999, Reuters News Service http://infoseek.go.com/Content?arn=a3657LBY020reulb-19990419&qt=nuclear+plut onium+uranium+radioactiv???&sv=IS&lk=noframes&col=NX&kt=A&ak=news1486
45. Downed Stealth Won't Reveal Secrets April 21, 1999 Associated Press http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/i/AP-Kosovo-Stealth.html WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Pentagon is fairly sure what brought down an F-117A stealth fighter early in the air campaign in Yugoslavia, but will not say what investigators have turned up.
46. Mine Conference Faces New Concerns April 21, 1999, Associated Press http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/i/AP-UN-Land-Mine-Conference.html UNITED NATIONS (AP) -- Reports that land mines are being laid in Kosovo and Angola add new urgency to a conference to chart the next steps in implementing the world ban on the deadly devices.
47. Where Did Kosovo Refugees Go? April 21, 1999, Associated Press http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/i/AP-Kosovo-Refugees-Box.html The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees estimates that more than 600,000 people, the vast majority of them ethnic Albanians, have left Kosovo since NATO began its air assault March 24.
48. Apaches expected in Albania Tuesday - U.S. By Charles Aldinger, April 19, 1999, Reuters News Service http://infoseek.go.com/Content?arn=a3258LBY972reulb-19990419&qt=nuclear+plut onium+uranium+radioactiv???&sv=IS&lk=noframes&col=NX&kt=A&ak=news1486 WASHINGTON, April 19 (Reuters) - The United States plans to move 24 Apache attack helicopters from Italy to their new base in Albania on Tuesday and they could be ready for attacks on Serbian forces in a week, the Pentagon said on Monday.
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Message: 2 Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 19:38:17 -0400
Subject: NucNews-6 4/22/99 - China - Promise; Pakistan; US Dispute (4 )
27. 'China will not conduct further n-tests'
20-04-1999 The Hindu http://www.webpage.com/hindu/daily/990420/03/03200004.htm
BEIJING, APRIL 19. China will not conduct further nuclear tests and wants India and Pakistan to end their arms race to alleviate tensions in South Asia, the former Chinese Prime Minister, Mr. Li Peng, has said.
Though China is a country with nuclear weapons, it firmly sticks to the commitment not to conduct further nuclear tests, Mr. Li, China's top legislator, said referring to Beijing's moratorium on nuclear tests announced in 1996, the official media reported today.
Expressing concern over the nuclear tests conducted by India and Pakistan in May last year, he said, ``China remains hopeful that Pakistan and India can resolve their disputes through peaceful negotiations instead of resorting to force.''
China is very much concerned over the nuclear tests conducted by India and Pakistan last year, which aggravated the tension in South Asia, the former Prime Minister, who just returned from a six-nation tour including Pakistan and Bangladesh, told reporters here.
The front-page report in the official China Daily said that China as a close neighbour to both India and Pakistan does not want to see an arms race between the two South Asian rivals as it would lead to tension.
``China does not want to see an arms race between the two countries, since it is not in the interests of the people in the South Asian region nor is it conducive to the peace, stability and development of the region,'' Li said.
He, however blamed India for starting the arms race by testing nuclear bombs and launching medium-range missiles.
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28. Pakistan's Nukes and Clinton's Trip to China
By Daniel Horner April 9, 1999 http://www.insidechina.com/china/special/horner/horn9801.html
It's a safe bet that President Bill Clinton doesn't appreciate the recent uproar over Chinese political contributions in the United States and the transfer of U.S. satellite technology to China. Speculation that China contributed to Pakistan's decision to test nuclear weapons, or worse, will not help.
But if he is shrewd, Clinton has an opportunity to turn these recent troubles to his advantage -- and to the advantage of U.S. and Asian security -- when he meets this summer in Beijing with Chinese President Jiang Zemin.
The details of the twin scandals of Clinton's China policy have been widely reported and will not be repeated here.
As of this writing, it is not clear what role the Chinese played in Pakistan's nuclear tests. Did they try to reassure their ally and dissuade it from testing? Take a hands-off approach? Or provide material, design information, or other technical assistance?
The latest reports say Jiang, at Clinton's behest, sent a last-minute letter asking Pakistan not to conduct the test. But since China did not show a copy to U.S. officials, let alone release it to the public, it is difficult to evaluate this gesture particularly in light of other indications that China has been actively assisting the Pakistani nuclear effort.
A little background is in order here. For the past 15 years, under presidents Reagan, Bush and Clinton, U.S.-China nuclear relations have followed quite a consistent pattern. China's nuclear exports repeatedly have violated international non-proliferation norms and commitments to the United States. But in each case, the U.S. government backed away from the tough penalties spelled out in U.S. law, citing new non-proliferation commitments that China had given.
Clinton has gone even further in overlooking China's transgressions than his two predecessors. He has unilaterally given China a congressionally required non-proliferation certification -- in effect, stamping a seal of approval on China's non-proliferation policies and practices. This approval was necessary to clear the way for large-scale U.S. nuclear exports to China. Clinton's announcement of his intention to take this step was the centerpiece of last October's Washington summit with Jiang.
Defenders of this approach point to China's progress from the renegade nuclear state of 20 years ago to its current status as a party to the current nuclear non-proliferation treaty, and its progress toward developing a new set of export controls. Critics claim that this approach allows China to enjoy the benefits of expanding trade, nuclear and otherwise, with the United States before the verdict is in on whether China really has changed its ways.
Events since the certification seem to confirm these doubts. Earlier this year, U.S. officials had to intercede to stop a government-run Chinese company from making a covert shipment to Iran of a key nuclear-related chemical. The shipment was bound for a facility that is widely believed to be part of Iran's nuclear-weapons program, with which China has had a long history of involvement.
China has had a similar, but even more extensive, relationship with Pakistan, which, over the years, has received critical nuclear-weapons and ballistic-missile assistance. In April, Pakistan made a quantum leap in its nuclear-material production capability by starting up the Khushab nuclear reactor. There is considerable circumstantial evidence that China supplied a key ingredient to that reactor as well.
Slightly more than a week before Pakistan's test, Rand Corp. China expert Michael Swaine told the Washington Post, "The real question, in my view, is whether or not [the Chinese] now decide to quietly increase the level of their assistance to Pakistan. That is a distinct possibility. Stay tuned."
Now, of course, the question is not whether China is providing Pakistan with illicit assistance as the price of restraint by the latter; it is whether China helped Pakistan reject the calls for restraint.
At the summit, President Clinton should make the point clearly and forcefully that the U.S. is not willing to tolerate China's participation in escalating nuclear standoffs. To put some muscle behind his words, Clinton should stop U.S. nuclear exports until the U.S. government has determined that China is not and has not been providing assistance to materials production, testing, or any facet of the Pakistani nuclear-weapons program -- or, for that matter, Iran's, or any other country's.
And that is where the scandals come in. By taking the approach suggested here, Clinton would be making a virtue of political necessity. With the recent uproar in Congress, there is little chance that any significant U.S. nuclear exports would go to China anyway -- at least in the near future. (One of the series of amendments overwhelmingly approved by the U.S. House of Representatives in response to the scandals would expand Congress' role in the nuclear-export process.) But Clinton could extract some political benefits from the situation by being seen as "getting tough" with China.
If Clinton is afraid of offending his hosts, he can blame his stance on congressional criticism and the demands of domestic politics. Moreover, he could propose that if China demonstrates a clean record on its sensitive exports, and plays a constructive role in resolving the South Asian crisis, it would be eligible for expanded trade benefits from the United States. The key point is that China would have to both receive a clean bill of health for its activities in the recent past and sustain a record of sound nuclear-export and other foreign-policy practices well into the future.
Coming on the heels of the China scandals, the summit presents Clinton with a chance to revise his China policy by restoring the appropriate balance between trade and security -- while scoring political points at home. Adept politician that he is, he should seize that opportunity.
Daniel Horner submitted this column to Inside China Today.
http://www.insidechina.com/china/special/horner/horner.html
Daniel Horner is the former managing editor of the Nuclear Materials Monitor and a lecturer at Prague's Charles University and Anglo-American College. He is a former deputy director of the Nuclear Control Institute in Washington, D.C. He can be e-mailed at dhorner@terminal.cz
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29. Report Warns of Big Gains to Chinese From Spying
By JEFF GERTH, April 22, 1999 New York Times http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/asia/042299china-nuke.html
WASHINGTON -- China is likely to use stolen advanced American nuclear weapons secrets to upgrade its weapons within years, not decades, a senior intelligence official said Wednesday.
So far Beijing has not deployed nuclear weapons utilizing stolen American technology, U.S. officials say. But the official, discussing a new intelligence assessment, told reporters that stolen nuclear secrets probably accelerated China's future weapons programs.
The study, done by intelligence officials throughout the government, was coordinated by Robert Walpole, the national intelligence officer for strategic and nuclear programs for the government's National Intelligence Council.
It examined the evidence that China acquired American nuclear weapons information and it estimated what that has meant for the development of China's weapons programs. An outside panel reviewed and concurred with the assessment.
China is developing a lighter, more mobile nuclear force but does not have anywhere near the same number of nuclear weapons as the United States or Russia. Chinese officials have consistently denied that China stole American nuclear secrets.
A one-page unclassified version of the assessment was released at the briefing. It made these points:
"China obtained by espionage classified U.S. nuclear weapons information that probably accelerated its program to develop future nuclear weapons," by enabling Beijing to focus on more productive avenues and "avoid less promising approaches."
"China obtained at least basic design information on several modern U.S. nuclear re-entry vehicles, including the Trident II (W-88)," as well as information on "a variety of U.S. weapon design concepts and weaponization features, including those of the neutron bomb."
The unclassified assessment lacks details and is filled with conditional phrases and generalities. A more detailed, secret version of the report was presented Wednesday to congressional and executive branch officials by George J. Tenet, the director of Central Intelligence, and Walpole.
The public assessment does not address whether China's legal and illegal acquisition of American nuclear weapons information affected American national security.
The study was done at the request of a select congressional committee that found last year that national security had been harmed as a result of China's 20-year pattern of acquiring American technology, including nuclear design secrets stolen from American weapons laboratories.
The lengthy secret report utilized earlier assessments by the CIA and the Energy Department that came to similar conclusions that China had stolen W-88 design secrets, which enable nuclear weapons to be miniaturized, officials said. But in 1997, on the eve of a Washington summit meeting at which Chinese-American relations were elevated to a "strategic partnership," White House officials magnified the differences between the CIA and the Energy Department reports to cast doubt on the Energy Department's troubling conclusions, officials said.
According to the latest assessment, China's quest for smaller nuclear weapons probably reflects its desire for a more mobile force that can survive and retaliate against a nuclear attack by the United States or Russia, or a "second-strike capability."
China's aggressive and successful efforts to acquire U.S. secrets, both through espionage and open methods like scientific exchanges, as well as China's indigenous development, have "made an important contribution to the Chinese objective to maintain a second-strike capability and provided useful information for future designs," the assessment said. The assessment did not calculate the relative importance of each Chinese acquisition method.
China's weapons program is still deficient in significant ways and the Chinese are "almost certainly" now using spying and other methods "to address deficiencies," the assessment added.
The assessment also suggested that China might be more inclined to share older nuclear technology with countries like Iran or Pakistan -- a source of continuing concern for the United States -- as a result of its theft of more modern American technology.
But, the assessment said, "we do not know if U.S. classified nuclear information acquired by the Chinese has been passed to other countries."
President Clinton was briefed on the assessment Wednesday afternoon and then issued a statement saying he had asked the National Counterintelligence Board to assess the potential vulnerabilities at other nuclear weapons facilities besides the national laboratories. He also asked the board for recommendations to strengthen protections against the loss of nuclear secrets.
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30. China 'guilty' of nuclear espionage Intelligence could have helped China miniaturise warheads
April 22, 1999 BBC World: Americas http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/americas/newsid_325000/325633.stm
The United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) has accused China of stealing classified information about American nuclear weapons.
The allegations come in a report released to Congress and the White House. The report says China obtained information about several advanced nuclear warheads, including the miniature version used on the Trident Two missile.
Last month, a Chinese-American scientist was fired from his job at the US Los Alamos nuclear weapons research facility, amid allegations that he had passed information to China.
However, the man, Wen Ho Lee, has not been prosecuted.
The report says that as well as using spies to get the information, China also unearthed it from specialised conferences on nuclear technology and from inadvertent leaks by American scientists.
Damage assessment
The BBC's Washingtron Correspondent, Richard Lister, says is remains unclear how much information has been acquired by China
He says Beijing is also suspected by the Americans of having obtained information about neutron bomb technology.
US intelligence officials say the information gathered by China does not appear to have been incorporated into its weapons stockpile.
But intelligence sources told the BBC the information is expected to be applied within years rather than decades.
Congressional investigation
In February, President Clinton ordered a formal assessment of possible damage to United States security after a congressional investigation into military and commercial links with China concluded that Chinese espionage had harmed US interests.
Republican politicians accuse the Clinton administration of being lax on the issue because it is pursuing a policy of normalising relations with China.
Beijing has always strongly disputed the allegations, saying it has sufficient technical expertise of its own.
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31. China Denies New U.S. Charges Of Nuclear Espionage
April 22, 1999 Reuters http://www.webcrawler.com/news/r/990422/05/news-china-usa-spying
BEIJING (Reuters) - China denied Thursday its spies had poached cutting-edge U.S. nuclear technology which American intelligence officials believe will help Beijing upgrade its antiquated strategic arsenal.
"The Chinese government has never engaged in theft of U.S. military or nuclear technology," Foreign Ministry spokesman Sun Yuxi told reporters.
Reacting to a new U.S. intelligence report on the alleged theft, Sun also said he regretted criticism from what he called "responsible departments."
"Regarding the rumor that China has allegedly stolen U.S. military and nuclear technology, we have already refuted these allegations as groundless and irresponsible," Sun said.
"Irresponsible reports by responsible departments are even more regretful."
Wednesday, CIA Director George Tenet briefed U.S. congressional intelligence committees on the report, which assessed the implications of China's acquisition of U.S. nuclear secrets.
While much of the report is classified, a set of unclassified key findings said that China obtained at least basic design information on several U.S. nuclear weapons including the Trident II W88 miniaturized nuclear warhead.
China also obtained information on a variety of U.S. weapon design concepts and features including of the neutron bomb, the report said.
Allegations that China stole nuclear secrets from U.S. nuclear weapons research laboratories have caused a furor in Congress where anti-China sentiment has raged this year.
The espionage charges have also strained U.S.-Sino relations, despite steadfast denials from China.
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32. CIA: Chinese espionage damaged security
4/21/99- USA Today http://www.usatoday.com/news/washdc/ncswed02.htm
WASHINGTON (AP) - A CIA report presented to lawmakers Wednesday concludes that Chinese espionage targeting nuclear weapons laboratories damaged U.S. national security, according to a senior Clinton administration official.
The report, conducted by an internal CIA review team, has been cleared by an outside team of experts and largely conforms to damage assessments already conducted by the Energy Department, which runs the weapons labs.
China has emphatically denied the espionage charges, saying its own scientists developed the improvements in the country's nuclear weapons capability.
The senior U.S. official said the report concludes that China obtained highly classified information on the design of sophisticated nuclear weaponry, particularly on ways to miniaturize thermonuclear weapons so that multiple warheads could be fitted on intercontinental ballistic missiles.
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, was privy to the report's conclusions.
Both the CIA and Energy Department damage assessments focus on espionage believed to have occurred in the mid-1980s at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, N.M. At a hearing on Chinese espionage last week, Notra Trulock, a senior Energy Department intelligence adviser, testified that the CIA and Energy assessments reached similar conclusions.
Much of the focus of congressional inquiry has been on why Wen Ho Lee, a Taiwanese-born American who worked in classified areas at the lab, was allowed to continue working in sensitive areas at Los Alamos long after he was suspected of providing China information on the W-88, a U.S. warhead used on missiles launched from submarines.
Trulock also complained in his recent testimony that he was initially blocked from bringing his concerns about the case to the attention of Congress.
The United States learned in 1995 that China had made an unusually rapid leap in warhead development. A 1988 Chinese document, obtained by U.S. intelligence, and close analysis of Chinese weapons tests prompted U.S. officials to suspect China had developed a warhead similar to the W-88 miniaturized warhead developed at Los Alamos.
The development has helped China equip a missile with multiple warheads capable of striking more than one target. The special CIA task force was asked to give a detailed analysis of the security implications by this month.
Lee has not been charged with a crime but was removed from his post at the lab after officials said he gave evasive or incomplete answers to questions about his past travel and contacts. But before his removal, Lee had been put in charge of updating computer software for nuclear weapons in the spring of 1997, months after the FBI began an investigation that quickly focused on his alleged role in helping the Chinese.
Since the case became public earlier this year, Energy Secretary Bill Richardson has imposed new security measures on the weapons labs and said he has ordered an internal investigation into Trulock's charges.
The CIA's conclusion was first reported Wednesday in The New York Times.
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Message: 3 Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 19:13:54 -0400
Subject: NucNews-4-US 4/22/99 - WIPP (NM) Order; Fernald (OH) Waste; Perry (OH) Leaks; Hanford (WA)
20. State Orders Test Data on WIPP Load Idaho Shipment's Contents Contested
By Ian Hoffman, April 21, 1999 Albuquerque Journal http://www.abqjournal.com/news/6news04-21.htm
Days after its grand opening, the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant is facing its first enforcement action from New Mexico. State environmental regulators on Tuesday ordered the U.S. Department of Energy to provide testing data on a load of waste from Idaho by the end of today or face potential penalties including fines and an injunction against out-of-state waste shipments to WIPP. It was unclear Tuesday evening what the DOE's response to the order would be.
"We did receive the compliance order this afternoon, and we are reviewing the information," said Energy spokesman Stu Nagurka.
Energy Secretary Bill Richardson personally declined to provide the waste-testing data to New Mexico Environment Secretary Pete Maggiore in a conversation Saturday during the WIPP opening ceremonies.
"As a result, I must issue the enclosed compliance order," said Maggiore in a letter Tuesday to Richardson. WIPP is a system of half-mile deep salt mines 26 miles east of Carlsbad. It is the world's first deep geological repository for defense nuclear waste.
New Mexico's compliance order to the Energy Department is the latest instance of deteriorating relations between the two agencies over WIPP. The conflict raises key issues of state regulatory power over the federal government.
New Mexico's authority to regulate hazardous waste is the only say that any nonfederal entity has in the design and operation of WIPP. "It's a state's rights issue. It's an authority issue. DOE doesn't recognize our authority," said Environment Department spokesman Nathan Wade.
At issue is 42 steel drums of waste sitting at Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory, slated for shipment to WIPP on April 27. The DOE and Idaho reached a settlement in 1995 calling for the first shipment of Idaho waste to WIPP by April 30. In turn, Idaho agreed to store foreign nuclear spent fuel, which the DOE expects to start shipping from Eastern Europe this fall.
The drums in Idaho hold contaminated graphite molds and some surgical gloves. Workers at DOE's Rocky Flats site used the molds to make plutonium pits -- the fission cores of nuclear weapons -- from 1972 to 1988.
In 1995 and again in 1996, the DOE's Baseline Inventory Report -- its most authoritative compendium of WIPP waste -- listed the Idaho shipment as mixed hazardous and radioactive waste. The report said the waste contained six kinds of solvents and other chemicals frequently used in the manufacture of plutonium weapons parts.
The DOE now says its report was wrong. DOE says a series of tests show the waste is strictly radioactive or "clean" of the hazardous chemicals and metals over which New Mexico has regulatory authority.
Faced with the conflicting information, New Mexico regulators want proof and have been requesting the so-called waste characterization data since March 25. The DOE has refused to provide the data, saying New Mexico has no power to demand it.
"We're being reasonable. As recently as this weekend, we were trying to get the information informally by asking for it, pretty please," Wade said.
DOE attorneys argue that New Mexico cannot stop the shipment even if it did contain hazardous waste because WIPP has "interim status" as a hazardous-waste facility while New Mexico is drafting a hazardous-waste permit for WIPP.
State regulators disagree, saying WIPP does not comply with certain interim-status regulations. Federal hazardous-waste law requires an owner-operator of a hazardous-waste facility to perform detailed chemical and physical analyses of the waste prior to disposal. State regulators can request that information under state hazardous waste law.
"Characterization is the cornerstone of hazardous waste law," Wade said. "If you don't know what it is, you don't know where you can put it."
New Mexico's compliance order says DOE must supply the waste-characterization data by 5 p.m. today. Penalties for failing to supply the information include fines of up to $25,000 a day. New Mexico also can seek a court injunction against this and other out-of-state shipments.
Regulators also could allow the shipment, then conduct a hazardous-waste inspection of WIPP to be sure it complies with interim-status regulations.
"We're doing this one step at a time, but we are willing to take additional measures," Wade said.
DOE officials contend New Mexico is treating WIPP differently than other hazardous-waste facilities in the state, a practice they wish to discourage.
WIPP critics wonder whether the Energy Department's reticence to supply the waste characterization data masks a problem with the data itself.
"It is ludicrous we have to go through this charade," said Don Hancock of the Southwest Research and Information Center in Albuquerque. "The law and the regulations are quite clear: When the Environment Department asks for the information, DOE has to provide it. So this tells you one of a couple of things. They either don't have the information, or they have the information and it does not support what they're saying."
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21. Foster Wheeler Awarded Multimillion Dollar Waste Retrieval Project At Doe Fernald Site
April 21, 1999 Business Wire http://nt.excite.com/news/bw/990421/nj-foster-wheeler
CLINTON, N.J. (BUSINESS WIRE) - Foster Wheeler Environmental Corporation was awarded a $50-million, four-year contract by Fluor Daniel Fernald for the accelerated waste removal project at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Fernald facility in Ohio.
Foster Wheeler will extract radioactive material from two storage silos, segregating debris from the waste, and transferring more than 240,000 cubic feet of radioactive waste sludge from the aging concrete silos to new interim storage tanks constructed on site. The company will also design and construct a Radon Control System (RCS) for reducing the buildup of radon gas within the storage silos.
Removal of the waste materials from Silos 1 and 2 will not commence at the site until after both the RCS and the full-scale mock-up system are operational. The full-scale mockup will be constructed on an unused silo that is identical to Silos 1 and 2. This will allow the system to be fully optimized prior to beginning any of the actual waste removal operations.
For approximately forty years beginning in the early 1950s, the Fernald facility operated as a processing plant for uranium used in the nuclear weapons program. During that time, radioactive waste by-products of the processing operation were stored in large concrete silos on site. Now that operations have ceased, the DOE is focusing on decommissioning the facility, including removal of the materials from within the silos for processing before permanent disposal.
"Fluor Daniel Fernald and the DOE have invested considerable resources in ensuring that the cleanup at Fernald is accomplished safely and efficiently." said Sam Box, Foster Wheeler Environmental Corporation's Chairman, President and CEO. "They have shown great confidence in Foster Wheeler's expertise by selecting us to perform one of the critical actions of the Fernald site cleanup.
"Foster Wheeler has become a leader in high-level radioactive tank waste removal and processing. We are building a solid track record for our expertise and quality service in this technically challenging segment," Box noted.
Editor's Notes:
Foster Wheeler Environmental Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of Foster Wheeler Corporation, is an international environmental consulting, engineering, and construction firm employing over 1800 experts in a comprehensive range of environmental sciences and engineering disciplines.
Foster Wheeler Corporation is a global company offering a broad range of design, engineering, construction, manufacturing, project development and management, research, plant operations and environmental services. The Corporation's headquarters are at Clinton, N.J. For more information about Foster Wheeler, visit our World-Wide Web site at www.fwc.com.
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22. Source of Perry leaks found
Wednesday, April 21, 1999 By SUSAN JAFFE, CLEVELAND PLAIN DEALER
http://www.cleveland.com/news/pdnews/metro/3c21per.ssf
NORTH PERRY - Almost four weeks after the Perry nuclear power plant closed for maintenance and refueling, the operators have found the likely reason why several fuel rods developed pinhole leaks.
The plant's owners believe the purified water circulating around the fuel -at a rate of 218,000 gallons a minute - dislodged debris and damaged the rods, said Lew Myers, vice president of FirstEnergy Corp.
At a briefing at the plant yesterday, Myers described the debris as "little pieces of metal shavings probably the size of your fingernail."
During the outage, workers tested all 748 fuel bundles, each containing 64 rods, he said. The 13-foot rods are made of a heat-resistant zirconium alloy, each about the diameter of a pencil. They hold pellets of radioactive uranium that create heat to boil water into steam. The steam turns a turbine to produce electricity.
Before the outage, the company had detected three fuel rods leaking twice the usual amount of radiation. There have been six other fuel leaks since the plant opened in 1987, including a 25-inch-long crack in one rod that forced the plant to close for 59 days in 1993.
In addition to replacing the damaged rods, Myers said the company would install a new kind of filter along with each new fuel bundle. The filters are intended to prevent debris from damaging the rods.
The filters will add about $1,200 to the $250,000 price tag of a fuel bundle. Myers said it was worth the expense.
Last fall, the Union of Concerned Scientists, a nuclear industry watchdog organization, petitioned the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission to shut down Perry until the leaky fuel was replaced. The group claimed damaged fuel could increase the amount of radiation released during an accident or expose workers to higher-than-expected levels of radiation.
The three fuel bundles containing the damaged rods have been replaced, and in the fourth bundle, only the damaged rod itself was replaced, said FirstEnergy spokesman Todd Schneider.
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23. Hanford column gets Dave Barry an invitation
Florangela Davila - The Seattle Times April 21, 1999 http://www.spokane.net/news-story-body.asp?Date=042199&ID=s564352&cat=
On its way to Dave Barry, arguably the nation's best-known humor columnist, is an invitation from mayors living in the shadow of the Hanford nuclear reservation, irrefutably the nation's most contaminated nuclear site.
Call it an act of public relations.
Call it the act of people who are thin-skinned.
Call it the proper thing to do, which is how folks in Southeast Washington explain their invitation for Barry to come have a look around.
Barry has never been to the Tri-Cities, and when contacted last week he hadn't a clue as to where Pasco, Richland and Kennewick are. But now that he knows, he said if there were ever three cities that should be together, he most certainly would've picked these.
What's all the fuss?
Barry's current column mentions Hanford.
Specifically, Hanford's radioactive ants.
``I start to worry when officials tell me not to worry,'' his column begins. In this case, he's worried about assurances that Hanford is safe.
In his very Barry way, the columnist describes his fear that one day soon giant mutant ants will be marching toward California, plotting nasty things. To defend the country, Barry suggests axing billion-dollar missiles for something much more practical: one giant Twinkie (to entice the ants) and one 18,000-pound shoe (to stomp them).
Last week, the Tri-City Herald ran a story on the column. The writer was most offended, and so were officials quoted in his story.
``The piece doesn't paint a flattering picture of the Tri-Cities,'' the story reads. ``Nor is it complimentary of all the hard work and groundbreaking science going on at the federal Hanford site.''
How, laments the paper, could Barry have failed to mention ``the pristine Hanford Reach; the winning Americans hockey team; the booming construction going on behind Columbia Center mall.''
All around the three cities -- and a fourth, because West Richland has joined the image crusade -- the grumbling grew.
```The site glows like a Budweiser sign,''' Michael Turner said recently, quoting a line from the column. ``That's a little bit more than inaccurate.''
Turner is a communications specialist with Fluor Daniel Hanford Inc., the primary contractor cleaning up the Hanford nuclear reservation, which was built during World War II to produce plutonium.
``Everybody should take things in good fun,'' Turner agreed. But the fact is, the region's 200,000 residents have a certain affection for Hanford. They know it's a radioactive, contaminated place. But it's home, he said.
Barry's stereotype ignores the reality, officials protested: Spent-fuel basins have been cleaned. So have some underground tanks. One of the reactors is in safe-storage mode. Nine defense-production reactors have been deactivated.
``The cleanup is moving along,'' Turner said.
At Fluor Daniel last week, the public-relations team debated writing an op-ed piece to counter the upcoming Barry column. But some didn't want to appear ``easily offended.''
The Tri-City Visitors and Convention Bureau, meanwhile, promptly contacted mayors, arranging a jointly written invitation.
``The reality is that the real story, so to speak, is that the community has many positive attributes, like a great quality of life,'' said Kris Watkins, the bureau's president.
Some of the country's top scientists are working at Hanford, she said. There are some 40 wineries, eight golf courses, the Columbia River. And more than 300 days of sunshine a year, Watkins added.
The radioactive ants were first discovered last fall, along with radioactive flies and gnats. The bugs, which authorities call ``contaminated'' not radioactive, were eliminated. But on a regular basis, Turner said, officials find contaminated tumbleweeds.
``I think there are so many cultural attractions in the Tri-Cities,'' Barry said from his Miami office. ``It's a well-known fact. The cultural centers of the world -- Paris, London and the Tri-Cities.
``Personally, I'm leading a group of 1,000 Miamians to the Tri-Cities in case we encounter an ant the size of a VW Bug.''
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Message: 4 Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 19:11:13 -0400
Subject: NucNews3-US 4/22/99 - DOE; NM Lab Excavation; IL Braidwood; VA Shipyard; Serbs/Clinton/Colorado Shooting
15. Energy Dept. suspends director
USA Today April 22, 1999 http://usatoday.com/news/digest/nd1.htm
The Department of Energy has suspended its security director pending an independent investigation of charges that he leaked classified information. Edward McCallum, who repeatedly has faulted the agency for letting protections erode at nuclear weapons plants and labs, was put on paid administrative leave Monday. Lawyers with the Government Accountability Project, which is representing a whistle-blower concerning security at the Rocky Flats nuclear weapons plant outside Denver, suggested the department is retaliating against McCallum based on his discussions with the whistle-blower. A spokesman for the department denied retaliating against McCallum.
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16. N.M. Bomb Lab Digging Up Cold War Graveyard
ASSOCIATED PRESS, April 20, 1999 - Salt Lake Tribune http://www.sltrib.com/1999/apr/04201999/nation_w/99421.htm
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- They're digging up the Cold War at a federal weapons lab and shipping off the artifacts.
A crew of about 30 has been on the job for about a year to dig up a classified landfill at Sandia National Laboratories. From time to time, the workers abandon monstrous excavators and bulldozers to become amateur archaeologists.
Sometimes they have to get down in the dirt with trowels and shovels to carefully retrieve the leftovers that were buried here as the easiest way to keep it out of the wrong hands.
For 50 years, the lab disposed of nuclear warhead casings, components and other waste at its Technical Area 2, a landfill at the end of the main runway that serves Kirtland and the Albuquerque International Sunport.
Sandia assembled bombs in the technical area in the late 1940s and early 1950s. For most of its existence, the area was under 24-hour guard.
The landfill itself, about 1.5 acres, is a series of covered linear trenches in which items were dumped and then covered with dirt. In that respect, the landfill represents a kind of chronology of weapon-engineering work at the lab, said Bob Galloway, who supervises the classified cleanup for Sandia.
"We've gone backwards in time," he said. The project started with the most recent burial trenches and will end with the earliest.
The finds: almost-complete nuclear bombs, hundreds of components that make them work, even rubber human heads whose purpose no one knows.
"The biggest thing we've found, so far, is a complete B-14," Galloway said.
The uncovered warhead was minus its radioactive nuclear core and was apparently a mockup for early engineering tests and training. The 6-ton bomb -- the first thermonuclear warhead made -- was recently transferred to the Air Force's weapons school, where it will be used as an exhibit for students. It must remain in a classified environment because its fully intact innards remain secret, Galloway said.
The oldest burials could hold some surprises, since early records of the landfill were destroyed under the federal paperwork-reduction law in 1972. Without documentation to guide the project, cleanup has been slowed. Because of the nature of Sandia's work, some components are one-of-a-kind prototypes assembled during the development process of various bomb types, he said.
Fran Nimick, Sandia's environmental manager, said little has been found that is radioactive. Crews have turned up some depleted uranium nuggets and traces of radioactive radium, tritium, nickel americium and thorium.
Most of what has been dug up probably didn't need to be in a classified landfill, he said.
"Back then they defaulted conservatively when they weren't sure if something was classified," he said. "When in doubt, bury it."
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17. Braidwood to begin Unit 2 refueling outage
April 20, 1999, PR Newswire http://infoseek.go.com/Content?arn=PR4646-19990420&qt=nuclear+plutonium+uran ium+radioactiv???&sv=IS&lk=noframes&col=NX&kt=A&ak=news1486
DOWNERS GROVE, Ill., April 20 /PRNewswire/ -- ComEd's Braidwood Nuclear Generating Station will remove its Unit 2 reactor from service on Saturday, April 24, for a scheduled refueling and maintenance outage. The maintenance and inspection activities that take place during the outage are intended to ensure that plant equipment and systems are ready to support operations for the summer months and beyond.
During the outage, workers will perform more than 2,600 inspections and maintenance on a variety of plant components and systems. Specific activities include:
-- Overhauling and inspecting the main generator;
-- Upgrading the nuclear reactor's rod control and indication system;
and
-- Replacing 78 of the reactor's 193 fuel assemblies with new assemblies.
Braidwood's Unit 1 will continue to supply electricity to ComEd customers during the Unit 2 outage.
Braidwood's Unit 2 refueling is the fourth of seven outages planned at ComEd's five operating nuclear stations during 1999. The outage will be completed later this spring.
"This outage is part of our 'deliberate planning efforts' to ensure that we have the most generating capacity when the demand is the highest -- the summer months," said Oliver D. Kingsley, Jr., the Nuclear Generation Group's president and chief nuclear officer. "These outages have involved a significant amount of planning, dedication and just plain old hard work on the part of the workforce. The workforce has stepped up to the challenge and performed superbly, completing the requisite maintenance and operational activities in an outstanding manner and then returning the units to service safely and efficiently."
Braidwood Station is located approximately 60 miles southwest of Chicago. The site can produce 2,240 net megawatts of electricity per hour and employs about 850 people.
With more than $7 billion in revenue in 1998, Unicom (NYSE: UCM), based in Chicago and incorporated in 1994, is the parent holding company of Commonwealth Edison (ComEd). ComEd is engaged in the production, purchase, transmission, distribution and sale of electricity to wholesale and retail customers. The utility provides service to over 3.4 million customers across northern Illinois, or 70 percent of the state's population.
Unicom also is the parent holding company of Unicom Enterprises, which is an unregulated subsidiary and is engaged, through its subsidiaries, in energy service activities. SOURCE ComEd Nuclear Generation Group
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18. Shipyard workers rally for congressional help
By Timothy Burn THE WASHINGTON TIMES April 22, 1999 http://www.washtimes.com/business/business2.html
Several hundred workers from Newport News Shipbuilding rallied at the Capitol yesterday to seek congressional support in their 17-day-old strike against the shipyard. The workers said they want Congress, which appropriates the money for Newport's Navy ship contracts, to lean on company CEO William Fricks to reopen talks.
David Waff, a 26-year veteran of Newport News Shipbuilding who attended the rally, said he hoped Congress was listening.
"We want to let Congress know we are being treated unfairly. We deserve better wages, a decent pension and more respect from Newport News Shipyard," he said.
About 9,200 workers, more than half the shipyard's total, walked off the job after their union, the United Steelworkers of America, rejected the company's last offer for a new contract covering wages and pension benefits. The shipyard workers complain they are paid far less than their counterparts at other yards. They vowed to strike for as long as it takes to get the company back to the bargaining table with a better offer.
"We're not here to beg -- we're here to bring the truth," Local 8888 President Arnold Outlaw told an energized crowd of about 800 shipyard workers.
"We build the best ships in the world, but Newport News plans to pay us Third World wages, and that is something we're not going to take any longer."
Newport News is the only private shipyard in the United States that builds nuclear-powered aircraft carriers and one of only two shipyards that builds nuclear powered submarines. The yard is building the aircraft carrier Ronald Reagan, refueling the carrier USS Nimitz and doing maintenance work on the carrier USS Harry S. Truman.
While union officials said the strike has almost completely shut down Newport News, the company said that is not the case. Shipyard spokeswoman Jerri Fuller Dickseski said the company is keeping pace with its projects, including work on the Harry S. Truman.
"We are being very productive. We have talked to our customers and so far we are meeting our priorities."
She said the current work force is made up of salaried personnel and several union workers who have crossed the picket line, though she would not say how many from the local have quit the strike.
"We would like for this strike to end, but frankly we stand by our last offer," said Ms. Dickseski.
The shipyard workers earn on average $13.48 an hour, nearly $3 an hour less than their counterparts at General Dynamics' Electric Boat in Groton, Conn., the only other yard that builds and refuels nuclear submarines.
The union has demanded an across-the-board hourly pay increase of $3.95 over three years. The current top rate for a mechanic is $14.53. In what it termed its "last best and final offer," the shipyard offered wage increases over three years that it said would boost the average worker's pay $2.49 an hour, with automatic promotions based on experience and skills.
A handful of lawmakers joined the rally to show their support for the workers, who chanted "88, Close the Gate!," referring to their union, Local 8888.
Rep. David E. Bonior, Michigan Democrat, said he could hear the rally from inside the granite walls of the Capitol. "The workers at Newport News haven't gotten a raise in six years, and you should know you have many supporters in Congress," he told them.
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19. Serbs Blame Clinton for Shooting
Associated Press, April 22, 1999 http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/i/AP-Yugoslavia-School-Shooting.html
BELGRADE, Yugoslavia -- State-run Serb television said Wednesday that President Clinton was partly to blame for the massacre at a Colorado high school because his policies show ``America solves problems by force.''
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Message: 5 Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 19:21:50 -0400
Subject: NucNews-7 4/22/99 - China
33. Chinese Stole Data On Reentry Vehicles U.S. Intelligence Assesses Losses
By Walter Pincus and Vernon Loeb Washington Post Staff Writers Thursday, April 22, 1999; Page A04 http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-04/22/025l-042299-idx.html
An intelligence assessment released yesterday found that Chinese spying has obtained secret information over the past 20 years not only on U.S. nuclear weapons designs but also on U.S. reentry vehicles, the containers that carry explosive devices through space.
A senior U.S. intelligence official, reporting on the new assessment, said analysts will need "several years" before judging whether the espionage "had a significant impact on [Chinese] programs." But the finding that China has stolen classified information on reentry vehicles for multiple-warhead missiles marked a new dimension in the Chinese espionage debate that has escalated into a major controversy between the Clinton administration and its Republican critics.
Sen. Richard C. Shelby (R-Ala.), chairman of the Select Committee on Intelligence, told reporters the assessment "was a confirmation today of some of our worst fears, and whatever we do we've got to tighten up security at our labs."
He added, "It's bad. It's worse than I thought."
But Sen. Bob Kerrey (D-Neb.), vice chairman of the panel, said, "The administration has not got a bad track record in responding to this problem. They have done things to reduce the risk."
The director of central intelligence, George J. Tenet, briefed the White House and Congress on the new assessment, which was an evaluation carried out since December by U.S. intelligence agencies following reports that China obtained secret information from nuclear weapons laboratories. An unclassified version was made available to reporters.
The study was initiated last December at the urging of a House select committee, chaired by Rep. Christopher Cox (R-Calif.), that studied technology transfers to China. The Cox committee's report, which is undergoing declassification review, is said to be sharply critical of the Clinton administration for allegedly dragging its feet in remedying what the panel saw as major security breaches by the nation's national nuclear laboratories that allowed China to make major leaps in nuclear weaponry.
Much of the Cox committee information came from Notra Trulock, the former Department of Energy intelligence chief who since 1995 has been pursuing indications of Chinese espionage at the labs and demanding tighter security procedures.
The assessment delivered by Tenet yesterday represented the agreed-upon views not only of Trulock, but also the CIA and analysts from other government intelligence agencies. A key finding is that classified nuclear weapons information obtained by China "probably accelerated its program to develop future nuclear weapons" by allowing Beijing's scientists "to focus successfully down critical paths and avoid less promising approaches to nuclear weapons designs."
The new element in yesterday's unclassified version of the damage assessment was that "China obtained at least basic design information on several modern U.S. nuclear reentry vehicles, including the Trident II" sub-launched intercontinental ballistic missile.
While the assessment did not reveal the secret information obtained relative to the Trident II reentry vehicle, one administration source said it involved the material that makes up the heat shield that prevents the vehicle from burning up when it returns to the atmosphere after traveling through space.
Two other pieces of classified nuclear information that China obtained, according to government sources, were the exact dimensions and shape of the W-88, the nuclear portion of the Trident II missile. This information was contained in a lengthy 1988 Chinese document handed to U.S. intelligence in 1995.
Although there has been no indication to date that stolen data has speeded China's modernization program, the 1988 Chinese document, according to sources, indicates Beijing's scientists want to achieve the quality of the U.S. W-88 by the year 2010, when they are expected to produce a next-generation mobile ICBM.
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34. Chinese missiles will reflect U.S. designs
By Bill Gertz and Nancy Roman, WASHINGTON TIMES, April 22, 1999 http://www.washtimes.com/news/news2.html#link
Classified U.S. nuclear warhead secrets will be built into new Chinese strategic missiles in "a matter of years" and could include Beijing's first multiple-warhead systems, a senior U.S. intelligence official said yesterday.
The official said a CIA-led damage assessment found that China stole design data on the most advanced U.S. warhead, the W-88 used on Trident II submarine missiles, as well as "several" other nuclear weapons, including the neutron bomb, which kills by radiation rather than a blast.
The official said details of the compromise were outlined in a Chinese document that a Chinese official gave to the CIA in 1995.
"Some of that information could only have been obtained from espionage," the official said at a background briefing on Chinese spying at U.S. nuclear weapons laboratories. "That's why we feel strongly about making the statement about espionage. . . .
"We think it's influenced China's program, and by 'influence,' what we're really saying . . . is that future Chinese weapons will look more like ours," the official said.
The official said a classified version of the report includes specific dates when China's U.S.-design warhead is expected to be deployed. Pressed for specifics, he said: "Let's just say in a matter of years. We're not talking decades away."
The damage assessment was ordered in March by CIA Director George J. Tenet based on the recommendations of a special House committee headed by Rep. Christopher Cox, California Republican.
Its report, submitted to Congress Jan. 1, is classified, and Mr. Cox has been working since January to get the administration to declassify it. He and the administration have been wrangling over which sections of the 700-page report can be made public.
Sources close to the negotiations over the report said if the White House does not agree to release the report before the committee's authority expires, parts of it approved by the administration will be released anyway.
Sen. Richard C. Shelby, Alabama Republican and chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, called the CIA report sobering, and said the administration "could have and should have" been more aggressive in keeping the laboratory secure.
He also dismissed President Clinton's recent assertion that no nuclear spying took place during the current administration. "That's not true," he said.
Mr. Clinton said in a statement the damage assessment highlights the need to fully implement a new presidential order aimed at improving security at nuclear weapons laboratories. He said he has asked a counterintelligence policy board to examine the threat to nuclear weapons data.
According to a one-page summary of the key findings of the damage assessment, titled "Implications of China's Acquisition of U.S. Nuclear Weapons Information and the Development of Future Chinese Weapons":
"China obtained at least design information on several modern U.S. nuclear re-entry vehicles, including the Trident II (W-88)." Re-entry vehicles are ballistic missile warheads.
"China also obtained information on a variety of U.S. weapon-design concepts and weaponization features, including those of the neutron bomb."
The full extent of weapon details stolen by Chinese spies is not known, and it is not known whether China stole weapon design documents or blueprints.
China probably used the warhead design information to build similar warheads, rather than seeking to replicate U.S. warheads.
The nuclear warhead data "probably accelerated its program to develop future nuclear weapons" and "allowed China to focus successfully down critical paths and avoid less promising approaches to nuclear weapons design."
Wen Ho Lee, a scientist at Los Alamos National Laboratory, was fired earlier this year and is a suspect in the warhead compromise. He has not been charged.
A second intelligence official said the Chinese agent who provided the document outlining his government's spying was a "walk-in," or a volunteer spy. "He provided a large amount of documents, and this information was among them," this official said.
The report released yesterday said China obtained strategic nuclear information from the United States from spying, as well as through contacts with scientists, conferences, publications, unauthorized media disclosures, declassified documents and Beijing's own expertise.
China's nuclear program now has "deficiencies" that are being addressed through continued aggressive espionage and intelligence collection, it said.
The current Chinese long-range missile force of CSS-4s all have single warheads, and "U.S. information acquired by the Chinese could help them develop a [multiple independently targetable re-entry vehicle] for a future mobile missile," the report said.
China is now building two new mobile land-based ICBMs, the DF-31 and DF-41. The missiles are expected to eventually replace all the CSS-4s, which the senior official said have grown "vulnerable" to pre-emptive attack since their deployment many years ago.
On Capitol Hill, legislators warned the administration that the spying scandal has imperiled trade relations with China. "Sino-American relations are increasingly problematic," said one, Rep. Doug Bereuter of Nebraska, a Republican who favors engagement with China.
Sino-American relations have faced troubles before. In 1989, there was the massacre at Tiananmen Square. In 1997, there were indications that China sought to influence U.S. policy through illegal campaign contributions. But the current evidence of espionage has put them in jeopardy like never before.
"We're at one of our low points right now," Mr. Bereuter said.
ALSO OF INTEREST:
China Stole Data on Atom Warhead, U.S. Report Finds April 21, 1999, JAMES RISEN and JEFF GERTH, New York Times http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/asia/042199china-nuke.html
An Earlier China Spy Case Points Up Post-Cold War Ambiguities [The 2 Lees] March 13, 1999 New York Times http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/asia/031399china-nuke-scientist.html
U.S. Report Says China Stole Data On Atom Warhead-NYT Reuters-April 21, 1999 http://www.webcrawler.com/news/r/990421/04/news-nuclear-usa-china
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35. Spy, Counterspy and a Splitting Atomic Headache
Energy Sleuth's Testimony Seems To Undercut GOP By Walter Pincus and Vernon Loeb Washington Post Staff Writers Wednesday, April 21, 1999; Page A23
http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-04/21/170l-042199-idx.html
It was midsummer 1995. Notra Trulock peered at a thick, seven-year-old Chinese nuclear report just handed to the CIA by a walk-in spy. Going from page to page, the Energy Department intelligence chief saw his worst fears confirmed: Somehow back in 1988, China had learned the size and shape of the newest nuclear warhead designed at the Los Alamos National Laboratory.
The evidence was fragmentary at best; some CIA analysts were unsure it spelled espionage. But Trulock was convinced. He set out on a quest to crack the troubling case and plug what he saw as a decades-long series of security leaks from the nation's nuclear weapons laboratories.
Full of mystery and intrigue, the story of Trulock's crusade has exploded into a classic political controversy in Washington, where Congress already was sensitive to the issue because of previous charges China was snatching classified satellite launching technology from U.S. companies while the Clinton administration winked. Leading Republicans seized on Trulock's campaign as even more evidence that President Clinton and his national security aides played down leakage of nuclear information to China to protect their broader engagement policy with Beijing.
Senate intelligence committee Chairman Richard C. Shelby (R-Ala.) led the charge, questioning whether the White House "reacted to possible breaches in security in a timely manner." The accusation from him and others aimed notably at the long gap between April 1996, when national security adviser Samuel R. "Sandy" Berger was briefed on Trulock's suspicions, and February 1998, when Clinton issued an order to tighten security at Los Alamos and other nuclear labs.
"What is . . . incredibly disturbing is apparently the administration didn't take the charges seriously" at first, said Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), an Armed Services Committee member and now a presidential candidate.
Several GOP lawmakers picked up the sound bite that originated with a retired CIA official that if, as reported, Beijing pilfered secrets about eight U.S. warheads, the losses were worse than those suffered when the Rosenbergs aided the Soviet Union. Sen. Robert C. Smith (R-N.H.), a key member of the Armed Services Committee and another presidential contender, said that if news stories proved true that Berger withheld information on Chinese espionage from Congress, "he should be fired."
But Trulock, in his first public testimony last week, offered a version that seems to undercut many of the Republican charges.
Trulock said that, once the White House moved, Clinton aides overruled recalcitrant bureaucrats at the Energy Department and forced the nuclear laboratories to put in place a counterintelligence program that some congressional committees, the General Accounting Office and the FBI had been recommending for 10 years.
On the issue of foot-dragging, Trulock testified he and other Energy Department officials "made a good start" on implementing counterintelligence reforms at the labs from 1995 to early 1997. Trulock noted that Berger, after listening to his early findings in April 1996, encouraged him to brief Congress, which he did in mid-1996.
However they feel about the question of how long the administration took to establish the new rules, Republicans and Democrats on the Senate Armed Services Committee who listened to Trulock and other Energy Department officials seemed somewhat satisfied that reforms have finally been put in place, thanks in large measure to Trulock's persistence.
"I think this is an important issue, and we need to make sure that some of these suggestions are actually carried out," said Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.). "I think that's the challenge."
Now what remains for a host of other congressional panels to sort out in the weeks and months ahead--nine are looking into the matter--seems as much a matter of intense bureaucratic infighting within the Energy Department as White House recalcitrance.
A CIA review of Trulock's concerns, headed by retired Adm. David Jeremiah and expected to be released today, reportedly confirms the initial CIA analysis that, although classified U.S. data were obtained and probably aided Chinese nuclear programs, the overall impact "is a lot more uncertain than some people--including Trulock--admit," according to a source familiar with the study.
The Jeremiah study also notes that any damage assessment must recognize that China traditionally has had a nuclear deterrent strategy, not an offensive strategy. China's efforts to develop over the past decade a small, mobile intercontinental ballistic missile to guarantee a second-strike capability are not surprising.
Trulock said his problems began in 1997, when Charles B. Curtis, a deputy energy secretary who had been highly supportive, left the department and was replaced by Elizabeth A. Moler, Trulock's chief antagonist inside the government. Moler was so intent on mollifying scientists at the nuclear laboratories, Trulock testified, that she and other senior officials talked then-Energy Secretary Frederico Pena out of implementing rigorous counterintelligence reforms in the summer of 1997.
But the setback proved short-lived. Trulock testified that he and his assistant, CIA officer John Bloodsworth, overcame Moler's resistance with an end run to the National Security Council. Rand R. Beers, the NSC's senior director for intelligence policy, grasped the gravity of the Los Alamos case and referred the matter to a national policy board on counterintelligence issues, he said.
Work then began in the fall of 1997 on a presidential decision directive that Clinton issued in February 1998 as PDD-61. This directive doubled counterintelligence spending, created high-level counterintelligence and intelligence offices at the Energy Department reporting directly to the secretary and gave them direct control over security at the labs.
On the issue of the administration's broader China policy, Trulock testified that the matter came up twice as he worked on the Los Alamos case and pushed for a new counterintelligence program.
The first mention, he testified, occurred when Gary Samore, the NSC's top official on nuclear nonproliferation, told him that the administration's policy of using the nuclear labs to engage Chinese scientists in arms control matters should not be allowed to stand in the way of his counterintelligence efforts at the nuclear labs. When Sen. Smith, a leading administration critic, asked Trulock whether Samore ever implied that "you shouldn't take any action that would threaten the administration's policy of engagement," Trulock responded, "I did not interpret it that way. No, sir."
Not satisfied, Smith asked whether Trulock could recall any similar statement made directly to him by Berger, Moler or other officials. Trulock replied, "No, sir."
But Trulock said Moler raised China policy in a conversation last July when she was serving as acting energy secretary, just as the issue of improper satellite technology transfers to China was heating up in Congress. In their discussion, Trulock said, he asked Moler for permission to brief the chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Rep. Porter J. Goss (R-Fla.), who wanted an update on the Los Alamos case.
"She denied my request," Trulock testified. "I can only tell you that Secretary Moler told me that she believed that they--and by 'they' I believe she was referring to the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence--was only interested in harming the president on China policy."
Moler denied making the statement and said Trulock never asked her about briefing Goss.
Trulock told the senators he had written a memo to Moler asking permission to brief Goss, and that the memo later turned up in Moler's safe after she left the department in October.
Sessions leapt at Trulock's account. "I think this document found in her safe corroborates the testimony of this witness and indicates a lack of concern with matters of important national security," he said.
But Trulock's claim was disputed by other witnesses. Paul Richanback, the Energy Department official who emptied Moler's safe, testified he found no memo from Trulock inside, and Trulock later conceded, under questioning by Sen. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.), that he had only a third-hand account of where the document had been found.
Richanback also denied hearing Moler tell Trulock that he could not testify before the Goss panel because it only wanted to hurt Clinton's China policy; Trulock had cited him as a witness in a recent memo to Senate investigators.
Any final assessment of the Energy Department's response to the Los Alamos case is complicated by the fact that its highly fragmentary evidence is still being debated by intelligence analysts.
Trulock testified there are "very few areas of disagreements" between his analysts at the Energy Department and those at the CIA on alleged Chinese espionage at Los Alamos.
But Curtis, who championed Trulock's cause, cautioned senators that trying to interpret scraps of evidence about secrets that may have been passed in conversations more than a decade ago "is not a science--it's an art form. As this committee well knows, it involves reading tea leaves."
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- Seventh of Nine messages - ______________________
_______________________________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________________________
Message: 6 Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 19:14:44 -0400
Subject: NucNews-5-US 4/22/99 - Jonah House (2 articles and appeal)
24. Anti-War Horse
By Carl Schoettler, Baltimore Sun, April 20, 1999 http://www.sunspot.net/cgi-bin/editorial/story.cgi?storyid=1150070221463
At 75, Baltimore's Philip Berrigan is fresh out of jail and raring to resume his battle against what he knows is wrong. Even if it means more time in a cell.
In the warm, comfortable living room of Jonah House, the "community of conscience" he calls home, 75-year-old Philip Berrigan greets a visitor, then settles back into a rocking chair. He looks for all the world like a fellow ready to simply sit and rock and whittle. He's not.
Berrigan has spent half a lifetime fighting for what he calls "peace and justice." He's preached, protested, demonstrated and been arrested in myriad actions against war and nuclear weapons. He has no plans to stop now. Barely five months off a two-year prison stretch he did for an anti-war protest, what Berrigan wants to talk about this day is a demonstration that could land him right back in the federal pen.
In the morning, he'll be out in front of a federal office building, protesting on behalf of members of the Jonah House community who have been barred from returning home by the federal probation system.
"They could arrest me, sure," says Berrigan, who is on probation. He shrugs. "And if they do, OK, all right. We don't choke over going to jail. All of us have done too much of it."
Berrigan himself has gone to prison 60 or 70 times in the three decades since he was arrested for pouring blood on draft records at the Baltimore Customs House, in one of the first anti-war protests of the Vietnam era. He became internationally famous for burning draft records in 1968 as one of the Catonsville Nine. Altogether, his "crimes of conscience" have put him in jail for about nine of his 75 years. He views prison time, he says, as the measure of his commitment.
And he's a man who hates jail.
"No human being belongs in these human zoos," he says. But he gets along very well inside. "I have absolutely no trouble," he says. "That's mostly because you learn nonviolent conduct. You listen to people, first of all.
"Everybody's got a story and nobody wants to listen," he says. "So you listen to people. You try to help out. You teach."
He's become an equal-opportunity teacher. He's taught English to right-wing, anti-Castro Cuban drug dealers from Miami whose politics are diametrically opposed to his. "And you can study the Bible with guys, and some are very eager to do that," he says. "They remake their lives in very astonishing fashion sometimes."
That's not exactly what Berrigan has done in prison. He's written Biblical commentaries while incarcerated, and most of his autobiography, "Fighting the Lamb's War." During his last stretch at the federal prison in Petersburg, Va., he and another peace activist researched the gospels for their political content.
While identified primarily with the peace movement, Berrigan's actions stem from a strong belief in the sanctity of life. So along with war, he opposes Dr. Jack Kevorkian's assisted suicide, abortion and capital punishment.
So does his wife, Elizabeth McAlister. He was a priest and McAlister was a nun when they married nearly 30 years ago. They have three grown children, all born at Jonah House.
They make a handsome couple. McAlister's strong, clear, open face is framed by a striking nimbus of white hair. She's extraordinarily energetic and completely unaffected. Berrigan's a big, handsome, barrel-chested guy who's weathered well over the years. His hair is white, his eyes liquid blue. His face, rugged and lined, creases easily into an engaging, sometimes ironic, smile.
While he talks with his visitor in the Jonah House living room this day, McAlister is at the penitentiary in downtown Baltimore, demonstrating against the death penalty.
"We believe according to the heart of the matter," he says. "We believe that God said, `Thou shalt not kill.' And everything depends on keeping that commandment. And you love your enemies. They're two central commandments coming out of the Bible. After looking at an awful lot of American issues, we've concluded that and we've invested our lives in it."
Communal living
The Jonah House residence is a four-square clapboard house built by the community and its friends on the edge of the old St. Peter the Apostle cemetery in the heart of West Baltimore, a few blocks below North Avenue.
Ten people call Jonah House home these days, and virtually all, except two young women from other communities who now live there, have been convicted of felonies in connection with anti-war or anti-nuclear actions.
So Berrigan, on probation as a "peace felon," is forbidden to consort with fellow Jonah House felons who joined in a 1997 Ash Wednesday action at a Maine shipyard against an Aegis guided missile destroyer.
They acted in the name of the Plowshares Movement, which got its start in 1980 when Berrigan and his brother, Daniel, a Jesuit priest and poet, and six others poured blood on blueprints and hammered on nuclear warheads at a General Electric plant in King of Prussia, Pa. Since then, the movement has spread widely, and there have been more than 60 Plowshares "disarmament actions."
Berrigan needed a special dispensation from his probation officer to "cohabit" with his wife, who is also a peace felon, at Jonah House, the community they helped found 26 years ago.
A "faith-based" community, basically Christian, mostly Catholic, Jonah House is more like an extended family than a 1960s commune. Everything is held in common; all is shared. Berrigan uses what might be called the communal "we" when he talks about the place.
The community moved here about four years ago, after existing for more than two decades in a rented townhouse on Park Avenue on Reservoir Hill. In return for the right to live here, Jonah House members care for the old cemetery. They have cleaned up and maintain about nine of the cemetery's 23 acres so far. To help pay bills, they've also long been a community of house painters.
They gather weekly to schedule who works in the cemetery or who goes out to paint or who does the chores around the house. Berrigan does his share. Ninety percent of communal life is drudgery, he says -- "And you've got to be willing to do that."
"I try to do what I can," he says. "Just like I try to do publicly what I can. I'm equal among other equals. It's all egalitarian. We rebel against this business of leaders. And we say that a leader is one who serves best, if anything."
That said, he concedes that because he is a kind of community elder, perhaps his word has more weight in the weekly discussion.
"Well, because of experience," he says. "And maybe it's useful. It's a service of a sort. That's all."
But he does gets overruled, and on big issues.
"Oh, yeah," he says. "All the time."
Work to do
It seems a pretty routine existence for a place government probation officers characterize as having the potential for "on-going criminal activity." While they allow Berrigan to reside here, they have forbidden the return of Michele Naar-Obed and Susan Crane, two Plowshares activists and Jonah House residents also recently released from prison. The demonstration planned for the next day is on their behalf.
"They know we're committed to nuclear disarmament so they don't blow up the world and they don't want us living together," Berrigan says. "It's as simple as that."
As he talks, he looks south into the dying light of a spring day over tombstones and statues that mark graves dating back to the end of the Civil War. Many Irish railroad workers from the B & O's Mount Clare shops in the southwest Baltimore are buried here.
"I'm getting older," he says. "Every time you go to jail now it's harder. Because you're older you're more vulnerable physically.
"But if I have to go back, I'll go back. And with the help of God, I'll make it all right, and try not to whine. A lot of people whine. Americans are great whiners."
During his two years at the Petersburg penitentiary, his assigned job was recycling cardboard in 500-pound bales and crushing aluminum cans in a big hydraulic press.
His cellmate was a drug smuggler from Essex.
"They whacked him [with] six to eight years," he says. "You'd be surprised the number of people with heavy sentences for marijuana. And, reductively, when you look at the whole thing, they're just keeping the price of drugs up."
He worked almost as hard on his days off answering mail that "inundated" him.
"People don't forget you," he says. "People know we're in serious trouble on this planet and they know we're dabbling with `omnicide,' the death of all things. They don't have the resources to do that much about it. But they'll surely support somebody who's in jail for [fighting] it. And they do."
He says he tries to write back. "I used to spend the whole damn weekend answering mail, answering 30 or 40 letters. That's week in and week out. You just sit there in your cell and you write letters. It's kind of an ordeal.
"But you know you might be able to say something that will be helpful to people. And you're writing from jail so that has a special significance. So you do it."
`A beautiful vision'
A charming little girl in overalls, with wide, dark eyes and a thatch of light brown hair bounces shyly in and out of the Jonah House living room while Berrigan talks. Her name is Rachel. She was born at Jonah House four years ago, and lived there until a couple of months ago, when she was "exiled" with her mom, Michele Naar-Obed, and her dad, Greg Boertje-Obed, a member of the community for 14 years.
"This property has come a long way since we took it over," Naar-Obed says. "It was overgrown. You couldn't get to it.
"I really wish that somehow or other the symbolism of what we do on that piece of land can be conveyed," she adds. "The cemetery represents death in the middle of a dead city and we're trying in our meager way to bring back some sense of life there and it's just such a beautiful vision!"
It's a vision that at first Berrigan had to be convinced to share. He was happy on Park Avenue, didn't want a bigger, nicer house. So why the move?
"I was overruled," he says. "This happens frequently. What do you do? You swallow your ego."
Which, he admits, can be pretty hard at times.
"Yeah, I have a fairly strong ego," he says, laughing. "I have to keep it under wraps all the time."
As it turns out, for a while at least, Berrigan will have plenty more chances for giving in, for getting along, for enjoying the drudgery of life in community. The next morning's demonstration at the federal probation office goes smoothly. No one is arrested, and a probation officer promises to review the files of the people who want to return home to Jonah House.
At the protest, an onlooker learns that Berrigan is 75 years old and suggests, frankly, that he's got maybe another 10 years left.
"At the most," Berrigan agrees.
"Do you want a monument when you die?" he's asked.
He laughs.
"Oh, no, no. Oh, God no," he says. "No. I'd just like my epitaph to be: `He tried. He tried.' "
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25. Jonah House supporters protest probation terms 2 with criminal records not allowed to live there
By John Rivera, Baltimore Sun, April 14, 1999 http://www.sunspot.net/cgi-bin/editorial/story.cgi?storyid=1150070218099
For the Catholic Worker peace activists who live there, West Baltimore's Jonah House is a place of community, prayer and good works, but to federal probation officials, it is a place of crime.
Two former members of the Jonah House community, Susan Crane and Michele Naar Obed, have returned there in defiance of the U.S. Department of Probation, which ordered them not to live in the house after their release from federal prison, where they served terms for civil disobedience.
About 20 people, including Crane and Obed, protested yesterday outside the downtown building that houses the federal probation offices, demanding that the probation terms be changed. No arrests were made.
"We say that we're not criminals," said Crane, "We're not violent people. We try to stop the evil around us."
Obed, who until recently had lived with her husband and 4-year-old daughter in Duluth, Minn., was released from prison in November 1997 after serving 18 months for defacing a nuclear submarine in Newport News, Va.
Philip Berrigan, Crane and four others were convicted of destroying government property after they boarded a nuclear-capable Aegis destroyer in a Maine shipyard in February 1997 and banged on it with hammers. Crane was released in February and returned to Jonah House despite being ordered by probation officials to relocate to Maine, where she says she has no ties.
Berrigan was permitted to return to Jonah House after his release from prison in November, but only if he did not live with anyone with a criminal record, except his wife, Elizabeth McAlister, who also has been arrested for civil disobedience. By living under the same roof with two felons, he is violating the terms of his probation.
An arrest warrant has been issued for Crane.
"They want to close us down, obviously," Berrigan said. "This is one way of handling us or any kind of dissent. It's just repression. They want the American public docile and manipulable and silent."
A probation official who met with members of the group during yesterday's protest said he would revisit the cases. "I'm going to look at each one of the cases and figure out exactly what happened," said Thomas Wise, deputy chief of the U.S. Probation Office in Baltimore.
Jonah House was founded in 1973 by Berrigan, McAlister and other activists protesting the war in Vietnam. Over the years, Jonah House members have engaged in acts of civil disobedience related to protests over war and the production of nuclear weapons.
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26. An appeal on behalf of the Jonah House crew:
Dear Friends,
The Jonah House Community needs your assistance.Michele Naar Obed and Susan Crane are defying the ban on living at the Jonah House. Michele, her husband Greg and daughter Rachel were in exile for almost 18 months. Susan Crane has a warrant out for her arrest.
Please write the Chief US Probation Officer in Baltimore with copies to the Chief Judge and Janet Reno and Senator Mikulski.(Addresses below.)Mention any of the following:
1. Each of these persons has completed her sentence in prison. 2. Refusal to allow them to return home leaves them homeless, jobless, and without support.
3. There is a refusal on the part of the criminal injustice system to acknowledge that people who act for justice and peace are upholding the law.
4. Identify your knowledge of the work of the Jonah House community. 5. The Jonah House members are nonviolent and never act with criminal intent. Theirs is a religious community acting only in accord with Scripture.
6. Give any of your own personal awarenesses of the community members.
Thank you for sharing with us in this struggle.
Philip Berrigan, Gregory Boertje-Obed, Susan Crane, Sr. Carol Gilbert, Jen Kipka, Elizabeth McAlister, Michele Naar-Obed, Sr. Ardeth Platte, Coretta Warren
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David E. Johnson - Chief U.S. Probation Officer -250 West Pratt Street, Suite 400 - Baltimore, MD 21201-2423(Phone - 410-962-4741)
Chief Judge J. Frederick Motz - 101 W. Lombard St.Rm 510 - Baltimore, MD 21201
Attorney General Janet Reno - U.S. Department of Justice - 950 Pennsylvania Ave NW - Washington DC 20530
Senator Barbara Mikulski - 253 The World Trade Center - Baltimore, MD 21201
Will you support the plowshares vision of justice - disarmament and peace? Will you support our right to live in our own home?
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REPORT ON CHALLENGE OF MISTREATMENT BY BALTIMORE PROBATION
On April 13, Pacifica's Amy Goodman, on her Democracy Now radio show, interviewed Philip Berrigan, Susan Crane and Michele Naar Obed, all members of the Baltimore's Jonah House community. They explained that the federal probation office in Baltimore was trying to destroy the community. Afterwards, they joined a 10 AM demonstration outside the building in downtown Baltimore, where the US District of Maryland Probation Office is located.
Prior to the demonstration, other members of the Jonah House went inside the building to demand a meeting with probation officials. However, only Sr. Ardeth Platte remained in the building to await a meeting. The others joined the protest against the probation department.See below for a description of the demonstration written by John Rivera, religion editor, in THE BALTIMORE SUN.
On principle, organizers did not request a permit to hold a protest outside the probation office building. It was unclear how federal officialsmight handle our presence, and there was the concern that marshals might try to apprehend Susan. Surprisingly, though, the demonstration took place without any interference from local police or federal authorities.
Michele, Phil and Susan spoke at the rally, as did Brendan Walsh of the Viva House Catholic Worker, Greg Boertje Obed, Michele's husband, and Rev. John Oliver of the United Church of Christ.When the outside rally concluded, many of the participants entered the lobby of the building to seek the whereabouts of Platte.At first, there was word she had been taken into custody. Actually, though, she was meeting with Thomas Wise, deputy chief of the U.S. Probation Office in Baltimore. He followed her down to the lobby and promised those gathered that he would follow up to understand why his department was refusing to allow Michele and Susan to live at the Jonah House.
Since then, however, there has been no word from probation. Susan, Michele, Greg and Rachel, their daughter, are now living at the Jonah House. Federal marshals came to the Jonah House seeking Susan on at least two occasions before the demonstration. Since the rally, they have not made any new appearances.Phil is also facing possible probation violation for associating with Michele and Susan.
Greg, Michele and Phil addressed a public gathering of about 40 people in Baltimore on April 14. Then Michele, Phil and Susan appeared on WJHU's public radio show "The Marc Steiner Show" on April 16. This was an hour show that included questions from listeners.Please note that the Sunday SUN is expected to do a feature on the probation department's attempt to break up the Jonah House. If you are interested in assisting the Jonah House in its struggle to speak truth to the power of the federal probation department see the above suggestions that follow THE SUN article. Stay in touch for further developments.
Max Obuszewski. Baltimore, MD - mobuszewski@afsc.org
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Message: 7 Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 18:42:46 -0400
Subject: NucNews-2-Int'l 4/22/99 - Russia (4); Ukraine (4)
7. Nuclear reactors made safe Russian body says
By Seamus Martin, Irish Times, April 20, 1999 http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/world/1999/0420/wor9.htm
Two nuclear reactors near Belgrade have been made safe from NATO bombing by the removal of fuel, according to the president of the Russian Nuclear Agency, Mr Valery Mezhuev.
"There is no doubt that NATO pilots now know exactly where these reactors are situated," he said.
The removal and isolation of the fuel have prevented the possibility of an accidental nuclear explosion, Mr Yevgeny Ryazantsev of the Russian agency told The Irish Times.
"The nuclear fuel has been isolated from the reactors. If a bomb did strike the places where the fuel is stored, there would undoubtedly be contamination of the surrounding area but the most important thing is that there would be no chain reaction," he said.
Mr Mezhuev and Mr Ryazantsev refused to specify what type of nuclear reactors they are, but it is known that there are no nuclear power stations in Serbia or Montenegro. Three nuclear plants are situated within a range of 60 to 100 miles of the war zone: one each in Hungary, Romania and Slovenia. Two of the three are Russian-built.
Russia's Lower House of parliament, the State Duma, which is dominated by a Communist-Nationalist coalition, yesterday backed moves to allow Serbia join the proposed political and economic union with Russia and Belarus.
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8. Russia To Boycott NATO Summit
Associated Press, April 21, 1999 http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/i/AP-Russia-Yugoslavia.html
MOSCOW (AP) -- Russia said today it will boycott NATO's 50th anniversary summit to protest the alliance's airstrikes against Yugoslavia, but addedonline it was preparing new efforts to solve the Kosovo crisis peacefully.
After meeting with President Boris Yeltsin, Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov said Russia would not participate in the three-day summit starting Friday in Washington. Moscow has repeatedly denounced the NATO airstrikes, saying that only a nonviolent solution can solve the conflict.
Russia's envoy on the Kosovo crisis was expected to visit Belgrade on Thursday for talks with top Yugoslav official on possible ways to end the conflict, Ivanov said. The envoy, former premier Viktor Chernomyrdin, hopes his old ties with Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic will help produce a solution.
``We are making a maximum effort to find a political solution and hope we will succeed,'' Ivanov told reporters. ``All other ways lead to tragedy and to nowhere.''
U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan is due in Moscow next week to discuss Russian efforts to find a diplomatic solution.
Yeltsin tapped Chernomyrdin to serve as his mediator in the Yugoslav crisis. So far, Chernomyrdin has not offered any new peace proposals and Russia appears to have limited influence with both NATO and Belgrade.
While opposing NATO's use of force, Moscow has yet to offer any concrete suggestions on how peace could be restored to Kosovo in ways that would satisfy both Belgrade and the Western alliance. Western officials had hoped Moscow could act as an intermediary with Belgrade.
Moscow says it opposes the NATO airstrikes, but insists it will not be dragged in to the conflict. Yeltsin has dodged Yugoslav requests for armaments and other aid.
The Russian navy was conducting regular spring exercises today, but Yeltsin has said he will not reinforce the intelligence ship Russia sent to the Adriatic to monitor NATO forces.
The lower chamber of parliament, the Duma, continued to denounce the NATO attacks. The communists and nationalists who dominate the chamber have urged Yeltsin to back Yugoslavia militarily.
Duma vice speaker Sergei Baburin introduced a proposal calling for setting up a special commission to compile data on alleged NATO war crimes so that alliance commanders could be put on trial. The Duma did not set a date to vote on the proposal.
``It is necessary to collect irrefutable evidence so as to ... bring the culprits of NATO war crimes to justice at an international level,'' Baburin said.
While Russia was boycotting the NATO summit, at least 10 other ex-Soviet republics said their leaders or representatives would attend the meeting.
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9. Japan To Help Dismantle Russia's Nuclear Subs
TOKYO, Apr. 21, 1999 -- (Agence France Presse) http://www.russiatoday.com/rtoday/news/1999042114.html
Japan plans to offer Russia about $35 million to help dismantle 50 aging nuclear submarines in its Pacific Fleet, a report said here Wednesday.
The Japanese Foreign Ministry would send officials to Moscow later in the month to discuss details, said the daily Yomiuri newspaper.
Of the deteriorating attack submarines built during the Soviet era, 30 were docked at Vladivostok Military Port and 20 at Kamchatka Military Port, the report said.
The submarines were "weather beaten and in serious condition, which may affect Japan's environment," a Japanese Foreign Ministry official was quoted as saying.
Tokyo would offer about $35 million from a $100 million reserve set aside in 1993 to help the Soviet Union dismantle its nuclear arsenal, the newspaper said.
The Japanese government planned to offer to expand a dockyard near Vladivostok where the Pacific fleet is based, it said, and help pay for removing spent nuclear fuel rods from the submarines and scrapping the hulls. ( (c) 1999 Agence France Presse)
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10. Russia presses Pakistan on nuclear proliferation
April 20, 1999, Reuters News Service http://infoseek.go.com/Content?arn=a1339LBY545reulb-19990420&qt=nuclear+plut onium+uranium+radioactiv???&sv=IS&lk=noframes&col=NX&kt=A&ak=news1486
MOSCOW, April 20 (Reuters) - Russian Prime Minister Yevgeny Primakov, reacting to missile tests by India and Pakistan, said on Tuesday all countries that have conducted such tests should abide by agreements preventing nuclear proliferation.
In comments to reporters after talks with Nawaz Sharif, the first Pakistani prime minister to visit Russia for 25 years, he signalled his concern for stability in Asia.
``Russia has a great interest in the nuclear states, those which have carried out nuclear explosions, becoming parties to the agreements banning the proliferation of nuclear weapons and stopping nuclear tests,'' Itar-Tass quoted Primakov as saying.
Interfax news agency quoted him as saying that unspecified measures were needed to tighten security in South Asia ``so that there is stability in the region.''
Indian nuclear test blasts last May were rapidly followed by rival Pakistan's first underground atomic tests. Last week Pakistan test-fired two missiles in response to a launch by India, causing Russia to express alarm.
India and Pakistan have not signed the international nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) but both have promised to sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT). Sharif said last week Pakistan had no interest in continuing the arms race with India.
Tass said that Sharif had asked Russia to play a bigger role in peace-making in South Asia and that Primakov had replied: ``We shall undoubtedly respond to this.''
The Russian premier reiterated his support for what he calls a multipolar world, in which Moscow should strengthen relations with Asian and other countries and reduce U.S. influence.
Pakistani and Russian officials also signed an agreement on increasing trade between their countries, hindered by political considerations during Soviet times and also by Moscow's 10-year intervention in Afghanistan until 1989.
Tass said trade turnover had fallen from $81.1 million to $55.6 million in 1998 but the two countries saw great potential for cooperation.
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11. World Briefing FRANCE: WARNING ON CHERNOBYL
April 21, 1999 New York Times http://www.nytimes.com/yr/mo/day/news/world/world-briefing.html
France's official nuclear watchdog agency said the one working Chernobyl nuclear energy reactor should be closed down "as soon as possible." The Institute for Nuclear Protection and Security said that despite undoubted improvements, the plant still had serious security failures. It also said the region's "epidemic of thyroid cancer" after the 1986 explosion at the plant continues to grow.
Marlise Simons (NYT) ...
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12. Hard-up Ukraine to launch two nuclear reactors alone
April 20, 1999, Reuters News Service http://infoseek.go.com/Content?arn=a1418LBY565reulb-19990420&qt=nuclear+plut onium+uranium+radioactiv???&sv=IS&lk=noframes&col=NX&kt=A&ak=news1486
Cash-short Ukraine will strain its scarce funds to complete alone two nuclear reactors at local power stations, because the West is unlikely to provide the necessary financing, senior officials said on Tuesday.
``We ourselves will complete two nuclear reactors at the Rivne and Khmelnitska stations,'' Mykola Dudchenko, head of the state nuclear power agency Energoatom, told a news conference.
Dudchenko, who said Energoatom was financing construction works from its profits, gave no details.
``Of course, this financing is not within the desired volumes, but work does not stop,'' he said.
The two new reactors are important for Ukraine, because their launch will allow the closure of the ex-Soviet state's Chernobyl power plant, one of whose four reactors exploded in 1986, sending huge clouds of radioactive dust across Europe.
Ukraine says the G-7 group of the world's leading industrialised nations and the European Bank have come up so far with only $190 million out of a promised $800-900 million in funds for Ukraine to close the troubled plant by 2000.
``I think there will be no financing by the European Bank,'' a pessimistic Dudchenko said. He said Chernobyl's closure could not happen by 2000 as provisionally agreed with the West.
Prime Minister Valery Pustovoitenko, who is visiting the southern Kherson region, also told reporters earlier on Tuesday that ``Chernobyl's closure by 2000 is problematic.''
He said Ukraine would be able to launch the two new reactors to replace lost capacity at Chernobyl by the end of 2000.
In line with Energoatom data, Rivne and Khmelnitska stations are already 80 to 90 percent ready.
Ukraine heavily relies on its 14 working nuclear reactors. Last year the country's five nuclear stations accounted for 75.2 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity, or 43.5 percent of all electricity output.
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13. EBRD defends Ukraine nuclear power project
By Gill Tudor, April 191999, Reuters News Service http://infoseek.go.com/Content?arn=a2757LBY905reulb-19990419&qt=nuclear+plut onium+uranium+radioactiv???&sv=IS&lk=noframes&col=NX&kt=A&ak=news1486
LONDON, April 19 (Reuters) - The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) on Monday defended controversial plans to complete two unfinished nuclear power stations in Ukraine, which it may back with a $190 million loan. EBRD First Vice President Charles Frank said completion of the plants at Khmelnitsky and Rivne was the most cost-effective answer to Ukraine's energy needs, and would meet Western safety standards.
``Ukraine does not need additional capacity but it has a very high cost structure for supplying power through fossil fuels. Those fossil fuels are very expensive and very polluting in many cases,'' he told reporters at the EBRD annual meeting.
``The least-cost option is to build those plants because they are so near completion.''
The EBRD is considering a loan proposal to help fund the $1.5 billion project, which has attracted loud protest from environmental groups.
The two plants would replace output from the Chernobyl power station, where a reactor caught fire and exploded in 1986, scattering radioactive dust across a swathe of Europe.
Anti-nuclear activists dressed as giant silver mutants protested outside the EBRD meeting earlier on Monday, saying the new power stations would be dangerous and uneconomic.
The demonstrators, from an alliance of European environmental groups, held a banner reading ``No EBRD money for nuclear reactors.''
But Frank said the bank did not have a non-nuclear policy and was right to consider the loan for Khmelnitsky and Rivne, which he said were about 80 percent complete.
He said the two plants were built to a different and more advanced design than Chernobyl, and their original Soviet plans were being upgraded to Western safety standards.
``We will not finance the plants if they don't meet acceptable safety standards,'' he said.
Other conditions for the EBRD loan would include the decommissioning of all Chernobyl's reactors, as well as compliance with EBRD financial requirements.
``We want to see that operating unit closed and all the units decommissioned,'' Frank said. ``Chernobyl is an unsafe plant.''
Chernobyl's one functioning reactor is due to be switched off by 2000 under a 1995 memorandum of understanding with the Group of Seven major industrial nations, which agreed to help pay for the shutdown and fund alternative energy plans.
The EBRD said last week it was extending by three years work needed to decommission Chernobyl. It also manages a $750 million project to replace the crumbling sarcophagus which was hastily built around the molten reactor.
Frank said the EBRD, which lends mainly to private-sector projects in the former East bloc, would start deliberating this week on whether the project was a sound banking proposition.
It might submit a loan proposal to its board as early as mid-July, depending on a host of factors outside its control.
Environmental groups say there is widespread opposition to the plan inside Ukraine. But Frank said the EBRD had complied with its own rules on public consultation, and had seen no evidence of major public protest.
``There's no evidence whatsoever of large-scale opposition in Ukraine,'' he said.
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14. EBRD-Anti-nuclear group protests over Ukraine project
April 19, 1999, Reuters News Service http://infoseek.go.com/Content?arn=a1049LBY412reulb-19990419&qt=nuclear+plut onium+uranium+radioactiv???&sv=IS&lk=noframes&col=NX&kt=A&ak=news1486
Anti-nuclear activists dressed as giant silver mutants protested on Monday against plans to complete two Ukrainian nuclear power stations, which they say are dangerous and uneconomic. The demonstrators from an alliance of European environmental groups unfurled a banner reading ``No EBRD money for nuclear reactors'' in front of the central London conference centre where ministers and bankers were arriving for the annual meeting of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD).
The EBRD is considering a proposal for a $190 million loan to complete the two plants - at Khmelnitsky and Rivne - to replace output from the Chernobyl power station, scene of a 1986 disaster when a reactor caught fire and exploded.
``These reactors are very old technology reactors, which are very dangerous. The whole project does not make any economic sense,'' said Johan Frijns, coordinator of the campaign against the reactors.
He said alternative sources of energy, such as gas-fired power stations, should be considered. ``The EBRD should not finance these reactors,'' he added.
Ukraine has pledged to close Chernobyl by 2000 but says it needs Western assistance to do so.
An EBRD spokeswoman said no decision had been taken on the proposed loan. ``It is expected that the final decision will be taken in the first half of 1999. This initiative forms part of the G7 support for Ukraine to close the Chernobyl nuclear power plant by the year 2000,'' she added.
The EBRD said last week it was extending by three years work needed to decommission Chernobyl. It also manages a $750 million project to replace the crumbling sarcophagus which was hastily built around the molten Chernobyl reactor.
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Message: 8 Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 19:29:02 -0400
Subject: NucNews-8 4/22/99 - War Games (3); Y2K (2); Energy NY
[These articles aren't nuclear, but are worthy of note.]
36. Death Leads Puerto Rico To Seek End Of War Games
By John Marino, April 20, 1999 Reuters http://www.webcrawler.com/news/r/990420/18/news-puertorico-accident
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (Reuters) - Puerto Rico's governor asked Washington Tuesday to halt war games immediately on an island off the U.S. territory, a day after a bombing accident killed one civilian and injured several others.
"There must exist a viable alternative to the shelling, bombing and strafing of populated areas," Puerto Rico Gov. Pedro Rossello wrote in a letter to President Clinton.
Two U.S. Marine jets on training maneuvers mistakenly dropped bombs on an observation tower on Vieques, a 21-mile-long (34-km-long) island off the Puerto Rico's eastern coast, Monday night.
The accident killed one man and injured four others, Robert Nelson, a spokesman for Roosevelt Roads Naval Air Base, said.
"Regretfully but emphatically, I must by this means request that you order the immediate and permanent cessation of United States and allied activities that entail the use of weaponry anywhere in the vicinity of the municipality of Vieques, Puerto Rico," Rossello wrote in the letter.
"No community of American citizens should have to endure such conditions," he said.
The dead man was identified as David Sanes, a 35-year-old civilian contractor and Vieques resident. Three of the injured men were also civilian residents of Vieques, and the fourth was a military observer, Nelson said. The injured were treated at a Navy hospital and released Tuesday.
The two F-18 jets involved in the incident were based on the aircraft carrier USS John F. Kennedy.
The U.S. Navy controls the eastern and western ends of the island, which has a civilian population of 9,400 in the middle. The Navy and allied forces have long used the waters surrounding the Caribbean island for target practice.
Nelson said the maneuvers were "routine," but residents said heavy bombing had taken place off Vieques for weeks, with training being conducted by German and Canadian as well as U.S. forces.
"We believe that Kosovo has reached Vieques," said Robert Rabin, a Vieques resident and a member of the Committee for the Rescue and Development of Vieques, which opposes the military use of the island.
"This points up the dangers that Vieques residents live with every day," he said.
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[More on war games earlier this month.]
37. UAE, France begin Gulf war games
April 9 1999 Reuters http://infoseek.go.com/Content?arn=a1859LBY093reulb-19990409&qt=%2B%22war+ga mes%22+%2Bmilitary&sv=IS&lk=noframes&col=NX&kt=A&ak=news1486
ABU DHABI, April 9 (Reuters) - The United Arab Emirates and France on Friday began joint military manoeuvres in the Gulf and on land, the official WAM news agency reported.
The agency said naval, air and ground units were taking part in the war games code-named Gulf 99-1 which would last ``several days.'' It did not specify the exact location of the exercises.
The manoeuvres followed three days of joint naval war games by the UAE and the United States which ended on Wednesday.
The UAE, a major buyer of Western arms, has defence cooperation accords with France, the United States and Britain.
Last month, the UAE protested against Iran for staging naval war games near Iranian-held Gulf islands, which are claimed by both the UAE and Iran.
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38. Boredom, punctuated by terror: the real 'War Games' [and a description of Cheyenne Mountain]
April 20, 1999 CNN e-mail: space@cnn.com http://cnn.com/TECH/space/9904/20/downlinks/index.html
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colorado (CNN) -- I don't want to sound braggadocios, but in the course of doing my job, I do get to do -- and see -- some pretty cool things. Yet every now and then, expectations for a story don't jive with reality.
Take the fabled and fascinating Cheyenne Mountain Air Station. Of course that's a bit of a misnomer, as nothing flies at this Air Force Base. The officers and enlisted personnel are more akin to moles than eagles. As you know, they burrow under the mountain to keep a constant watch for a nuclear attack aimed at North America.
When you think of Cheyenne Mountain, you probably conjure up the same image I did: a cavernous place replete with DEFCON warning lights, wailing Klaxons, red phones, ominous PA announcements issued by an eerily impersonal voice, heavily armed MPs with suspicious glares and a lot of top Air Force brass wearing blue suits and medals.
You know, just like "War Games."
You -- and I -- guessed wrong. The place looks nothing like the Cheyenne Mountain facility Matthew Broderick hacked into. Matter of fact, the producers of that movie, asked for and received permission to scout out the real thing before they built their set. It was a quick visit. The real thing just would not do. "Call in artists!"
The trip down-under 1,700 feet of solid granite begins as you might imagine: After we and our equipment got the once-over (no full body cavity searches), we were driven up toward the tunnel entrance. The tunnel goes all the way through the mountain and has no doors on either end.
The 25-ton blast doors (check out the IPIX image I shot there) are perpendicular to the tunnel. The idea: The force of a nuclear explosion would pass through the tunnel -- and not impact directly on the entrance to the facility.
But when I asked our guide, Air Force Col. Gary Shugart, if Cheyenne could withstand a direct hit by a nuke, his simple, candid response was "no." But their job here -- to confirm the attack and notify the president -- should be done by then.
Anyway, once you pass through the impressive portals, you enter a labyrinth that is reminiscent of being below deck on a big ship. It should come as no surprise since the Navy built the all-steel structures. The idea is to protect the computers and communication systems from electromagnetic interference.
You can peek through a few openings in the walls and see the granite tunnels which enshroud the structure, as well as the springs. That's right, springs. This "ship" in a cave sits on 1,319 springs -- each of which weighs 1,000 pounds.
They were installed because the first generation of computers used here -- Ford Philcos -- contained sensitive vacuum tubes that needed a smooth ride (understandable for a machine made by a carmaker, I suppose). In any case, today's silicon-laden machines don't need the springs.
Cheyenne became 24/7 operational 33 years ago today. It is home of the North American Aerospace Defense Command's Battle Management Center and the U.S. Space Command's Space Control Center. At the nexus of all this information is the Cheyenne Mountain Operations Center (check out the IPIX image I got there).
The room is much smaller than you might guess. The CNN newsroom is probably four times bigger (but size isn't everything, of course). The personnel -- drawn from the U.S. and Canadian armed services -- wear fatigues and flight suits. The man in charge while we were there was Navy Capt. Dave Hawkins. You get the sense his piercing blue eyes would rather be watching the controls of the military version of the 707 that he used to fly instead of the computer screens he now presides over.
They do a lot of drilling here. And that should make us all feel good because there isn't much margin for error in this game. Hawkins ran us through a simulation that depicts a Russian missile launch detected by infra-red satellites. The response and nomenclature is very formalized and precise as they navigate through what is called a "decision tree."
All of it is designed to check and re-check the information from multiple sources before picking up the phone that rings in the White House. In this simulation, the crew determines (in short order) that the launch is a test firing.
You get the sense the job here is one that can be described as long stretches of boredom punctuated by brief moments of stark terror. I came down from the mountain very impressed with the dedication and professionalism of the men and women who work there -- albeit slightly underwhelmed by the facility. Not what I expected but not a disappointment either.
[Box]
Cheyenne Mountain by the Numbers
June 1961 -- Blasting begins
1963 --Excavation completed - construction of 15 interior buildings begins.
April 20, 1966 -- NORAD Combat Operations Center fully operational
Cost of project: $142.4 million
Cost if built today: approximately $18 billion
Length of tunnels: 2.8 miles
Area excavated: 4.5 acres
Amount of granite above facility: 1,700 feet
Number of free-standing structures: 15
Square footage of buildings: 250,000
Number of springs supporting structures: 1,319
Weight of each spring: 1,000 pounds
Number of personnel: 1,200 military and civilian
Number of personnel/days they can survive autonomously: 800 people/30 days
Sleep facilities: None (cots available for use in hallways)
Natural Temperature: 57 degrees F
Climate control: Recovered heat from computer systems
Number of computers: 250
Electrical generators: 6
Minimum needed to run facility: 4
Back up: Gel-cell batteries can provide 30 minutes of emergency power
Length of time for ICBM to fly from Russia to U.S.: 30 minutes
Weight of blast doors: 25 tons
Time to swing them shut: 15 seconds
Chances of facility surviving a direct hit by a nuclear missile: slim to none
Source: Col. Gary Shugart, USAF
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39. China Y2K Efforts Lack Funds, Coordination
http://www.insidechina.com/china/news/07.html
BEIJING, Apr. 20, 1999 -- (Reuters) China's efforts to prevent a nationwide computer shutdown on Jan. 1, 2000 face a critical lack of funds and inadequate coordination, a senior information official said on Monday.
"As the year 2000 draws near, resolving the Y2K problem has become a burning issue which brooks no delay," said Ministry of Information Industry official and senior Y2K planner Zhang Qi.
"Interdepartmental cooperation and coordination is not adequate, there is a huge gap in funds required and there is a lack of understanding of and preparation for the legal disputes that may arise," she told a news conference.
Fearing that the millennium bug will wreak havoc on China's banking and transportation sectors, the government is considering closing banks on Dec. 31.
"This year we plan to change the year-end settlement date from Dec. 31 to Dec. 30 so that we can take a day off," said Chen Jing, technology director at the People's Bank of China.
Aviation officials have also ordered air traffic controllers to ensure planes flying in the hours just before and after midnight Dec. 31 maintain a 15 minute distance gap, up from the regularly-mandated 10 minutes.
Nevertheless, Zhang and other information industry officials are optimistic they can root out major problems before the end of the year.
"I can firmly assure that security of China's flights will be maintained," said Lu Zongping, deputy director of information at the Civil Aviation Administration of China.
China began to address the Y2K problem in 1996, when the financial sector studied how the millennium bug would affect its rapidly-modernizing securities and banking system.
Since then, the sector has spent at least five billion yuan ($600 million) to ensure trading and banking systems will not crash when some systems confuse the millennium with the year 1900, since early software writers used just two digits to specify the year in order to save memory.
Chen said internal banking and securities systems tests would be complete in May. The sector will then begin network testing during weekends in June, July and September, he added.
China's telecom sector and the national power grid are also expected to remain operable after January 1, 2000, Zhang said.
"Almost the entire Chinese power grid is fully automated," she said.
A new Y2K-compliant power grid will soon go on-line in China's northern and northeast provinces and some 60 percent of other grids have been made bug-free.
"The Y2K problem has already been resolved for 99.9 percent of the power carrier system and more than 60 percent of the telecom system," Zhang said.
But outside the large, national computer systems, Y2K compliance is low and problems could plague all sectors, including state-run enterprises.
The military has established its own, internal Y2K compliance program.
$1.0 = 8.28 yuan ( (c) 1999 Reuters)
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40. Report: No one should be Y2K complacent
USA Today, April 21, 1999 http://usatoday.com/news/washdc/ncstue07.htm
WASHINGTON - The Clinton administration Wednesday releases a comprehensive report heralding successes with its Year 2000 computer glitch efforts, yet conceding a 7% rate of failure in making critical deadlines. The report from the President's Council on Year 2000 Conversion - the federal command post for worldwide Y2K efforts - is the first to predict success and offers further evidence that the worst-case scenarios of widespread computer breakdowns are not likely to occur. But "there is still important work to be done," the report says.
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41. Aging N.Y. Power Plants Dirtier in 1998, Report Says
By ANDREW C. REVKIN, New York Times, April 21, 1999 http://www.nytimes.com/yr/mo/day/news/national/regional/ny-power-plants.html
Air pollution from 21 aging power plants across New York state rose significantly last year, according to a report released Tuesday by several private environmental, health, and consumer groups.
Although New York state environmental officials did not dispute the findings on these plants, they said that the state had reduced overall power-plant pollution by half from the level in 1990.
At the plants, which use decades-old technology and burn mainly oil or coal, there was a 21 percent rise last year in emissions of sulfur dioxide, which causes acid rain and respiratory problems, and a 12 percent rise in releases of nitrogen oxides, which cause acid rain and smog, according to the report.
The study said that the persistent problems at these plants, the state's most polluting, could cause health problems for communities downwind in New York and New England, which receives some of New York's pollution along with that of more highly polluting plants in the Midwest.
The plants cited in the report are scattered across the state, from Port Jefferson on Long Island and Astoria, Queens, to the Hudson Valley and Niagara County. They were highlighted because they all produce at least 100 tons more nitrogen oxides annually than the federal standard allowed for new plants burning coal, said Cori Traub, an author of the report and director of air and energy projects for Environmental Advocates, a private lobbying group in Albany. The other organizations publishing the study were the New York Public Interest Research Group and the New York chapter of the American Lung Association. The data were provided by the federal Environmental Protection Agency.
New York state environmental officials said the state was a national leader at cutting power-plant pollution, by focusing efforts on newer plants, where major improvements can be made at a low cost. Samuel Thernstrom, a spokesman for the state Department of Environmental Conservation, said the drop in the state's total emissions of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides since 1990 was due mainly to a shift to cleaner fuels, like natural gas, and improved pollution-capturing gear for smokestacks.
He added that by far the biggest air problem for New York still lay to the west. In fact, he said, some individual coal-fired power plants in the Ohio Valley produce more sulfur and nitrogen pollution than all New York's plants and industries combined. This pollution drifts east, damaging forests and lakes and causing problems like asthma.
The 21 plants are responsible for half the total emission of the nitrogen oxides and sulfur dioxide by all industries in the state, the report says.
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Message: 9 Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 18:34:07 -0400
Subject: NucNews-1-Int'l 4/22/99 - D.U. in Balkans; Canada-Abolition 2000; Dutch El-Al Israel (2); Australia (2)
[Two days' worth here,folks.] ------------------------------------
1. Bombing threatens Serbs' environment The Pancevo complex after the NATO attack
By Environment Correspondent Alex Kirby, April 19, 1999 BBC http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_323000/323113.stm
Unsurprisingly, nearly four weeks of bombing are wreaking havoc not only on Serbia's military machine, but on its land, air and water as well.
Immediate concern centres on the fate of the Pancevo complex in Belgrade's northern suburbs.
Pancevo is a combined petrochemicals and fertiliser factory and oil refinery. It was hit on 18 April, and the Times newspaper reported "a toxic cloud of smoke and gas hundreds of feet" in height.
The report said the cloud contained the toxic gas phosgene, chlorine, and hydrochloric acid. That afternoon the Serbian Environment Minister said the amount of carcinogenic matter in the air over Pancevo was 7,200 times above the permitted level.
The Times said workers at the complex decided to release tons of carcinogenic ethylene dichloride into the Danube to avoid the risk of an explosion.
Pancevo lies on the river, and the pollution is expected to go downstream to Romania, Bulgaria and into the Black Sea.
Aquifers threatened
But it is not only riverborne pollution that is causing concern. Dr Momir Komatina, a hydrogeologist, says the region's underground water sources are at risk.
Groundwater is estimated to supply 90% of Serbia's domestic and industrial needs. Dr Komatina says pollution from the effects of the bombing is a problem "not just for our country but for southern Europe".
The Macedonian Environment Ministry is worried about airborne pollution. It says furans and dioxins - toxic and carcinogenic substances - are being released as the bombs explode, and carried for long distances by the wind.
And there is persistent concern over depleted uranium (DU) munitions. DU is a very dense metal, which helps it to penetrate armour effectively.
It is also toxic, carcinogenic, and radioactive. It is blamed by the Iraqis, and by some veterans, for a range of health problems in southern Iraq, where it was used in 1991.
A recent conversation was instructive.
BBC News Online:"Is NATO using DU?"
Nato spokesman:"Nato is not using nuclear weapons."
BBC News Online:"Thank you. But that is not what I asked."
Nato Spokesman:(laughs).
He later faxed News Online a statement: "Depleted uranium is a part of the US munitions inventory". However, it is inappropriate for us to discuss the specific types of ammunition used, and at what time they are being used."
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2. Bombing drowns out anti-nuke message
Robert Bragg, Calgary Herald, 21 April 1999 http://www.calgaryherald.com/opinion/stories/990421/2506434.html
The movement to abolish nuclear weapons is an overlooked casualty of the NATO offensive in Kosovo.
When leaders of the 19-member military alliance gather in Washington Friday for a three-day 50th anniversary celebration, NATO's nuclear policy will be very low on the agenda.
Before it began bombing Belgrade on March 24, NATO faced the prospect of a serious discussion of its "first use" nuclear weapons policy. The anti-nuclear argument stood a good chance of highlighting the proceedings.
Canada will try to keep the anti-nuclear argument alive by pushing for a broad review of NATO nuclear weapons policy. But chances are NATO leaders will be preoccupied.
That's too bad because, in the decade since the end of the Cold War, support for nuclear disarmament has grown steadily. With the demise of the Soviet Union there was widespread realization that the world did not really need 30,000 nuclear weapons.
NATO's traditional policy of "first use" -- a policy which, arguably, had a place in the bipolar world of capitalist West versus communist East -- seemed increasingly outmoded by the multipolar new world order.
By 1995, a cluster of peace groups had launched Abolition 2000 aimed at obtaining commitments from governments to complete negotiations by the year 2000 on an international convention for the elimination of all nuclear weapons.
In 1996, the International Court of Justice stated that the threat or use of nuclear weapons would be unlawful in most circumstances. In December of that year, a group of 61 retired generals and admirals, many of whom had overseen nuclear weapons systems, stated: "long-term international nuclear policy must be based on the declared principle of continuous, complete and irrevocable elimination of nuclear weapons."
By 1998, citizen groups in so-called "middle power" states including Canada, Germany, Sweden, Ireland and the Netherlands launched the Middle Powers Initiative (MPI) aimed at pressuring nuclear weapons states to eliminate nuclear weapons. Later, a group of states known as the New Agenda Coalition -- South Africa, Brazil, New Zealand, Mexico, Egypt, Slovenia and Ireland -- joined the chorus.
Opinion polls showed huge majority support for an international ban on nuclear weapons. An Angus Reid poll in Canada in March 1998 found 92-per-cent support for Canada taking a "leadership role" in promoting a ban on the bomb. A weapons ban was supported in similar percentages by Americans, Britons and Germans.
The anti-nuclear movement appeared to be on a roll.
But this happened not without setbacks. India and Pakistan joined the nuclear club last year. Notoriously unstable North Korea is rumoured to have the bomb. So is Iran.
The swing toward disarmament seemed headed back toward rising nuclear fear. That swing gained momentum with the war for Kosovo. The voices for banning the big bomb have been drowned out by the explosions of conventional weapons.
This is a double irony because of the manifest failure of an air attack to accomplish much of anything except the widespread destruction of barracks, bridges, refineries and people with the bad luck to be too close to the explosions.
Kosovo is a typical post-Cold War conflict -- an internal civil war animated by traditional tribal, ethnic, religious or cultural differences. Such conflicts cannot be solved by bombing campaigns or, in the larger geo-political scheme of things, deterred or resolved by nuclear weapons, which constitute a huge destabilizing force. There are 5,000 nukes which are now on "hairtrigger" alert (they could be aimed and fired within hours).
But that didn't stop Russian President Boris Yeltsin from mumbling about possibly targeting his nuclear arsenal at NATO cities in response to the continuous bombing of Yugoslavia. He quickly retracted but such talk reinforces NATO's resolve to keep nuclear weapons. It made it difficult to debate reducing the nuclear threat.
When it celebrates 50 years of alliance this Friday, NATO will be too busy bombing to talk about nuclear disarmament.
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3. Fingerpointing in El Al Crash Finding of Laxity Is Said to Focus on 2 Dutch Officials
International Herald Tribune, April 22, 1999 http://www.iht.com/IHT/TODAY/THU/IN/elal.2.html Paris, Thursday, April 22, 1999
AMSTERDAM - A parliamentary inquiry into the Netherlands' worst air disaster implicates the government of Prime Minister Wim Kok and sharply criticizes Health Minister Els Borst for her role in the fiery 1992 crash, a newspaper reported Wednesday.
A 350-page report written by the parliamentary commission, to be released publicly Thursday, says the response from the entire government was slow and insufficient but singles out Ms. Borst and other health service officials, said the daily De Telegraaf, which obtained a copy.
Former Transport Minister Annemarie Jorritsma is less harshly criticized in the report, De Telegraaf said. A spokesman for the parliamentary commission declined to comment on the newspaper's account.
In its report, De Telegraaf quoted a source as saying: ''Jorritsma's work was also messy and she will be firmly dealt with, but Borst was of another caliber. Her work involved human lives.''
The paper did not identify the source but described the person as ''very closely involved'' in the investigation.
The inquiry report follows 10 weeks of hearings into the October 1992 crash of the El Al Boeing 747-200 cargo jet that smashed into an Amsterdam apartment building shortly after takeoff for Tel Aviv, killing at least 43 people and injuring dozens.
The real toll from the crash and the ensuing inferno may never be known because many residents of the southern Amsterdam neighborhood, Bijlmer, were illegal, unregistered immigrants.
In the almost seven years since the disaster, rescue workers and hundreds of residents of Bijlmer have reported chronic health complaints ranging from neurological disorders to nausea. The illnesses have been linked to the plane and its cargo.
Last year, a Dutch newspaper discovered freight papers that listed DMMP, a component of sarin nerve gas, in the cargo. Israel confirmed the shipment of 190 liters (50 gallons) of DMMP, but said the material was nontoxic and was to have been used to test filters that protect against chemical weapons.
Debate has also raged over the health implications of exposure to depleted uranium, which was used as wing ballast in the aircraft. Only 152 kilograms (about 335 pounds) of the 282 kilograms of the uranium on board were recovered after the crash and fire. Depleted uranium burns at high temperatures and can get into the air as dangerous dust.
The report says that an earlier reaction by the government to health complaints from survivors could have prevented a worsening of their symptoms, De Telegraaf said.
The newspaper added that the report contains accusations that reach Mr. Kok, who took office two years after the crash. The prime minister admitted during his testimony that the government had met only five times to discuss the crash.
The newspaper said the lack of coordination by the government also hampered efforts to obtain documentation about the cargo, which was still largely unknown when the inquiry started this year.
Mr. Kok testified in March that El Al had stonewalled the government.
Dutch politicians initially said the plane had been transporting flowers and perfume, but it was later revealed that the cargo included military equipment. It was not until last year that Israel confirmed that DMMP had been part of the cargo.
''There should have been close cooperation,'' De Telegraaf quoted its source as saying. ''Jorritsma did a poor job with the cargo documentation and Borst failed to take action because she was waiting for those papers. That is unacceptable, but who should take the blame is up to Parliament.''
Parliament is set to debate the report's findings in late May.
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4. Dutch ready El Al crash report, may target cabinet
By Janet McBride, April 21, 1999, Reuters News Service http://infoseek.go.com/Content?arn=a1020LBY458reulb-19990421&qt=nuclear+plut onium+uranium+radioactiv???&sv=IS&lk=noframes&col=NX&kt=A&ak=news1486
THE HAGUE, April 21 (Reuters) - Seven years after an Israeli El-Al cargo plane plunged into an Amsterdam suburb, a parliamentary committee will publish on Thursday a potentially explosive report on the crash, El-Al's role and the Dutch response.
At least 43 people were killed when the Boeing 747 ploughed into the impoverished Bijlmer district on October 4, 1992. The real toll from the crash and the ensuing inferno may never be known because many Bijlmer residents were illegal, unregistered immigrants.
In the almost seven years since the disaster, rescue workers and hundreds of local people have reported chronic health complaints ranging from neurological disorders to nausea -- illnesses that have been linked to the plane and its load.
Last year, a Dutch newspaper unearthed freight papers that listed DMMP, a component of sarin nerve gas, in the cargo. Israel confirmed the shipment of 190 litres (42 gallons) of DMMP, but said the material was non-toxic and was to have been used to test filters that protect against chemical weapons.
Debate has also raged over the health implications of exposure to depleted uranium, which was used as wing ballast in the aircraft. Only 152 kg (334 lb) of the 282 kg (620 lb) on board were recovered after the crash and fire.
Thursday's report, the result of a six-month investigation and some 80 witness testimonies, must separate fact from fiction about the aircraft and its cargo, El-Al's role in subsequent inquiries and the handling of the aftermath of the crash by senior Dutch politicians.
If its findings are damning, heads could roll. Deputy Prime Ministers Annemarie Jorritsma and Els Borst have pledged to resign if the committee concludes they failed in their respective duties as transport minister and health minister.
Borst, a member of the centrist D66, and Jorritsma, a VVD Liberal, have been criticised for doing too little too late. Both have rejected charges of inaction.
The conduct of current Labour Prime Minister Wim Kok, his Christian Democrat predecessor Ruud Lubbers and former Transport Minister Hanja Maij-Weggen are also expected to come under the spotlight.
The report, to be presented to parliament, must clarify whether the aircraft's load was mundane, as El-Al has said, or contained weapons and chemicals as Dutch media, local residents and some politicians have alleged.
It is also expected to examine whether El-Al afforded full cooperation to successive Dutch crash inquiries or concealed crucial documents.
In Bijlmer, where a tree called ``The Tree That Saw Everything'' marks the spot where the plane came down, people have little confidence in the report and its conclusions.
``I did not follow the news of the Bijlmer inquiry because I don't speak Dutch,'' said an illegal immigrant from Ghana, who lived in a block of flats demolished in the crash.
Political commentators predict parliament will be at pains to avoid a government crisis at a time when Dutch forces are involved in NATO's bombing campaign against Yugoslavia.
``No one wants a cabinet crisis at a time of conflict,'' wrote the influential Volkskrant newspaper.
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5. Calls for legislation to prevent accepting of nuclear waste
Wednesday 21 April, 1999 Australian Broadcasting http://www.abc.net.au/news/newslink/weekly/newsnat-21apr1999-3.htm
A Western Australian MP is encouraging politicians in other States to draft legislation which would make it illegal for Australia to accept international nuclear waste.
Greens MP Giz Watson has moved a motion in State Parliament to prohibit any research, development or construction of a nuclear waste dump in WA for imported radioactive material.
Ms Watson says there is no reason why her proposal should not attract cross-party support in Western Australia and in other States.
"I think that would be an excellent idea," Ms Watson said.
"Obviously South Australia would be well advised to look at a similar move, because they're probably the second likeliest state to be blessed with a proposal."
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6. Silex surge has backers glowing
Street Talk, By Andrew Main, Australia Financial Review, April 22, 1999 http://www.afr.com.au/content/990422/market/markets7.html
Investors in Sydney R&D company Silex were smiling yesterday as the shares surged nearly 84¢ to $4.23 on the back of news about the company's uranium enrichment technology for computer semiconductor equipment.
Silex said it clinched a deal with Isonics Corp in the US to jointly fund a testing program for Silex's uranium-enriched Silicon-28 wafers.
Silex has been closely watched in recent months, not only by investors but by the ASX, which has issued at least three share-price queries on the stock.
The group was floated on the ASX last May after splitting from the Sonic Healthcare group, issuing 6.7 million new shares at 60¢ to raise $4 million.
But the shares have climbed by more than 90 per cent since March on the prospect of a potential annual royalty stream of $125 million to $215 million if the technology is given commercial application....
with Damon Kitney and Mark Drummond feedback to: amain@mail.fairfax.com.au
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Message: 10 Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 19:39:08 -0400
Subject: NucNews-9 4/22/99 -NATO World Police; China/Canada; Stealth; Landmines; Kosovans; Apaches
42. NATO Confronts a New Role: Regional Policeman
April 22, 1999 NY Times http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/europe/042299nato-summit.html
... Perhaps most telling is what will not be stated in the new strategic concept.
One of NATO's most cherished descriptions of itself will be dropped. Thus, these lines that were at the heart of NATO's last strategic concept, written in 1991 when the Soviet Union was still alive, will disappear: "The Alliance is purely defensive in purpose: None of its weapons will ever be used except in self-defense." ...
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43. China Calls For An End To NATO Strikes On Yugoslavia
UNITED NATIONS, Apr. 20, 1999 -- (Agence France Presse) http://www.insidechina.com/china/news/02.html
China on Monday repeated its calls for an immediate end to NATO strikes against Yugoslavia, adding it solutions regarding Kosovo being imposed on Belgrade.
"As for now it is a matter of priority for NATO to cease immediately its military actions against Yugoslavia," said Chinese ambassador Qin Huasun.
"We are deeply concerned by the deterioration of the situation in the Balkan region caused by the continued NATO military strikes against Yugoslavia," he continued.
Moreover, Qin added, "we are against imposing any solution on Yugoslavia."
The only acceptable solution would be a political one based on respect for Yugoslavia's sovereignty and territorial integrity, as well as for the legitimate rights of all ethnic groups in Kosovo.
China, a permanent member of the UN Security Council, has bitterly criticized the NATO air strikes launched on March 24 as interference in another country's affairs. ( (c) 1999 Agence France Presse)
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44. RPT-Canada deviates from NATO policy on nukes
April 19, 1999, Reuters News Service http://infoseek.go.com/Content?arn=a3657LBY020reulb-19990419&qt=nuclear+plut onium+uranium+radioactiv???&sv=IS&lk=noframes&col=NX&kt=A&ak=news1486
OTTAWA, April 19 (Reuters) - Weighing in against NATO's policy only days before the alliance's 50th anniversary summit, Canada declared on Monday that nuclear weapons should only be used for deterrence.
``The only function of nuclear weapons is to deter the use by others of nuclear weapons,'' the government said in a new policy paper that contrasts with NATO's current policy of allowing ``first use'' of nuclear weapons if necessary.
The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation has never used that option, but has valued it as the ultimate deterrent even against conventional attacks.
Germany has openly questioned the first-use policy. The criticism by Canada, which has no nuclear weapons, has been more subtle and behind the scenes, but the new policy paper makes it clear where it stands.
The Canadian policy paper -- ``Nuclear Disarmament and Non-Proliferation: Advancing Canadian Objectives'' -- also calls for the complete elimination of nuclear weapons.
While this is actually NATO long-range policy on paper, through the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, in practice major powers like the United States and Britain operate on the idea that to get rid of all weapons would allow for blackmail by rogue states which manage to put together a bomb or two.
Clearly the conflict in Kosovo will now dominate the Washington summit, beginning on Friday, but Canadian and U.S. officials say they expect the meeting to agree to commit to a review of NATO's nuclear policy.
``Canada will continue to urge NATO partners to consider the impact on potential nuclear proliferators when considering the characterisation of the purpose of NATO nuclear forces,'' the government said in an accompanying policy document.
In other words, if NATO says it might make first use of nuclear weapons, others outside the nuclear club might decide they should gain their own capacity.
A NATO summit communique is expected to refer to a foreign ministers meeting in December reviewing the options on nuclear policy and other issues.
The Canadian government papers also rejected a recommendation by the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee that Ottawa not import plutonium from Russian and possibly U.S. nuclear warheads that are being dismantled.
The idea is to help nuclear disarmament by using the plutonium in Canadian nuclear reactors in a concoction called Mixed Oxide, or MOX, fuel.
Foreign Minister Lloyd Axworthy told reporters a Canadian reactor was now testing a small amount of MOX fuel to determine if it was feasible to burn it in Canada.
((Reuters Ottawa Bureau, 1-613-235-6745, fax 1-613-235-5890))
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45. Downed Stealth Won't Reveal Secrets
April 21, 1999 Associated Press http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/i/AP-Kosovo-Stealth.html
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Pentagon is fairly sure what brought down an F-117A stealth fighter early in the air campaign in Yugoslavia, but will not say what investigators have turned up.
Studying the wreckage will not help other countries build their own radar-evading planes, the Pentagon said Tuesday.
The American F-117A jet went down March 27, four days into the bombing campaign against Serb-led Yugoslavia. The pilot, who ejected, was rescued by U.S. forces. Serbs claimed they shot down the plane, but the U.S. military will not confirm that.
``We are fairly confident that in this case we do know what happened'' to the $45 million plane, Air Force Maj. Gen. Bruce Carlson said at a briefing Tuesday, but the Pentagon will not discuss it because the punitive air campaign is ongoing.
Carlson said accidents and malfunctions have not been ruled out after an initial investigation. He also said investigators have ruled out ``an act of God or loss of consciousness of the pilot.'' Official word on the cause of the crash, if it is ever released, probably will not come until after the bombing campaign ends, he said.
Six other F-117s have crashed, out of a fleet of more than 60 built between 1982 and 1990. The other crashes were accidental.
Just after the plane went down early in the bombing campaign, television crews filmed happy Serbs posing with the wreckage, some of which may have been shipped to Russia for study. The Russian government disagrees with the NATO campaign but so far has shown no indication it will enter the conflict.
Asked about the possibility that the plane's loss might give other governments access to U.S. stealth technology, Carlson said: ``Sure, that concerns us. We don't like to give anything away.''
But Carlson, an expert on the history and use of stealth technology who has flown the plane extensively, said that while the jet's stealth features are effective, they represent technology of about 20 years ago.
``We've put a lot of distance between (that plane) and the planes we're building now,'' Carlson said. ``That material, should it have gone to Russian hands ..., we think that loss is minimal.''
``Low observable,'' or stealth airplanes, are less visible to enemy radar because of their angular design and the composition of the plane's exterior, or skin.
The F-117 was designed in the late 1970s to be a stealth plane, which made it an improvement over initial efforts to apply stealth technology to existing planes. The B-2 bomber, also being used in the Yugoslav campaign, represents the third generation of the technology. The F-22 fighter, still in development, represents the latest advances.
``The science involved in making an airplane low-observable are not secret,'' Carlson said. ``The technology is available in a number of places.''
But only the United States has the sophisticated manufacturing capability to build stealth planes, he said.
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46. Mine Conference Faces New Concerns
April 21, 1999, Associated Press http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/i/AP-UN-Land-Mine-Conference.html
UNITED NATIONS (AP) -- Reports that land mines are being laid in Kosovo and Angola add new urgency to a conference to chart the next steps in implementing the world ban on the deadly devices.
The issue of new mines is expected to be a major topic at the first conference on the land mine treaty since it went into effect March 1. Mozambique, which has an estimated 2 million land mines from its civil war, is hosting the May 3-7 meeting in its capital, Maputo.
The treaty, which was drafted in December 1997, has already been signed by 135 countries and ratified by 72 -- a near-record number in such a short time. The United States and Russia, however, are not one of those countries.
``In the main the news is good, the figures speak for themselves ... and they are rather dramatic,'' said Robert Fowler, U.N. ambassador for Canada, which hosted the conference that drafted the treaty.
But Fowler cautioned that efforts to de-mine Angola have been ``seriously put into question'' after the government and rebels reopened a civil war in December, sparking the United Nations to withdraw its peacekeepers.
At a press conference Tuesday announcing the meeting, he voiced concern about reports of mines being laid in Kosovo and fears that renewed fighting in Afghanistan could worsen the already serious mine situation there.
``While we celebrate the rapid entry into force of the convention, let us be conscious of the fact that the value of convention rests in its accelerated and sustained implementation,'' said Mozambique's U.N. ambassador, Carlos dos Santos.
The meeting, dos Santos said, would keep momentum going for more signatures and would try to address the main challenges in implementing the agreement, such as mine clearance, destruction, awareness and care for mine victims.
Nations that ratify the treaty pledge to destroy all stockpiles of mines within four years and clear all mines from their territory within 10 years.
Tens of millions of land mines are scattered in more than 60 countries, and they kill or injure an estimated 20,000 people each year, mostly innocent civilians. The mines have also rendered huge swaths of productive land unusable.
As of Tuesday, the United States and Russia had not confirmed their attendance in Maputo.
Washington maintains that land mines are needed on the Korean peninsula to deter North Korea from invading South Korea. Russia and China say they need land mines for defensive purposes.
President Clinton wants the United States to approve the treaty by 2006, but only if the armed forces are able to come up with an alternative.
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47. Where Did Kosovo Refugees Go?
April 21, 1999, Associated Press http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/i/AP-Kosovo-Refugees-Box.html
The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees estimates that more than 600,000 people, the vast majority of them ethnic Albanians, have left Kosovo since NATO began its air assault March 24.
Many of Kosovo's approximately 1.8 million ethnic Albanians were already displaced before the current exodus. This includes about 100,000 Kosovars who sought asylum in European countries before the airstrikes on Yugoslavia.
-- The whereabouts and numbers of the refugees:
Albania -- 357,000 Macedonia -- 130,000 Montenegro -- 70,000 Bosnia Herzegovina -- 32,300
-- Refugees that have been evacuated from Macedonia:
Germany -- 9,974 Turkey -- 3,849 Norway -- 1,104 Poland -- 545 Belgium -- 517 France -- 348 Austria -- 324 Israel -- 106 Croatia -- 88 Switzerland -- 33 Iceland -- 23
-- Countries that have offered to take in refugees on a temporary basis:
Turkey -- 20,000 Germany -- 10,000 Finland -- 10,000 Norway -- 6,000 Sweden -- 5,000 Denmark -- 1,500 Romania -- 1,500 Poland -- 1,000 Iceland -- 100 Malta -- 100
-- Countries that have offered to take in refugees, but where plans have been put on hold because UNHCR wants to keep them in Europe:
United States -- 20,000 Canada -- 5,000 Australia -- 4,000
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48. Apaches expected in Albania Tuesday - U.S.
By Charles Aldinger, April 19, 1999, Reuters News Service http://infoseek.go.com/Content?arn=a3258LBY972reulb-19990419&qt=nuclear+plut onium+uranium+radioactiv???&sv=IS&lk=noframes&col=NX&kt=A&ak=news1486
WASHINGTON, April 19 (Reuters) - The United States plans to move 24 Apache attack helicopters from Italy to their new base in Albania on Tuesday and they could be ready for attacks on Serbian forces in a week, the Pentagon said on Monday.
The heavily-armed AH-64s -- one of the world's most effective weapons against armour -- would arrive after weeks of delay and criticism of their slow deployment from Germany.
The low-flying aircraft would increase NATO's ability to smash Serb tanks and troops sweeping Kosovo, but would also be vulnerable to heavy Serb anti-aircraft fire.
Air Force Brig. Gen. Charles Wald told reporters that heavy rains in recent days had caused very muddy conditions at Tirana airport, where the helicopters will be based, but the Army had put down aluminum mats for them.
``They are planning for the Apaches to start moving tomorrow,'' he told a briefing at the Defence Department.
``We are hoping for that. I would say by Tuesday if everything holds,'' he added when asked if all of the 24 helicopter gunships -- which have already flown to Brindisi and other points in Italy -- would arrive on Tuesday.
But Wald, vice director for strategic plans and policy on the U.S. military Joint Chiefs of Staff, refused to predict exactly when the gunships might go into action against Serb forces.
``I think they are hoping within a week or so to be ready to start flying. But I won't comment on when they are going to be operationally employed. That still is a decision to be made by the operational commander,'' the general said.
The small airport in Tirana, Albania's capital, has recently been equipped by the U.S. Army with lighting and an air traffic control system for 24-hour operations.
Virtually all of a support package of 2,500 U.S. troops, armoured personnel carriers and protective missiles and radars have been installed at the new base in Tirana.
The protective multiple-launch rocket systems (MLRS) are capable of laying down heavy fire on targets in Kosovo to suppress Serb air defences in advance of Apache missions against Serb armour.
Wald said the MLRS systems ``are in place in Tirana as we speak'' but were not yet fully deployed.
U.S. Army Gen. Wesley Clark, commander of NATO forces in Europe, asked for the helicopters nearly three weeks ago to attack Serb troops, tanks and armoured personnel carriers which have been attacking and herding hundreds of thousands of ethnic Albanians out of Kosovo.
Critics have accused the U.S. military of moving too slowly in shifting the Apaches from Germany.
The Pentagon has said the delay has been partly due to strains on Tirana air traffic imposed by a massive humanitarian airlift and the airport's lack of a runway lighting and round-the-clock flight control system until recently.
Deployment of the Apaches would be the first direct involvement of Army forces in the Kosovo operation, and some critics have said it would be a step closer to sending ground forces into Serbia to fight.
The Clinton administration has stressed that it is against committing troops to Kosovo to make peace.
Using the Apaches, each armed with a 30mm cannon, 70mm rockets and 16 Hellfire missiles designed to knock out tanks and other armour, would bring a new dimension to the NATO strike force.
The cannon fires extremely hard bullets made of depleted uranium, capable of cutting through the thick steel skin of tanks. The helicopters attack both in daylight and darkness with a two-man crew equipped with special night-vision devices on their helmets.
But the Apaches would be vulnerable to Serb missiles and anti-aircraft guns because they fly low and much slower than jet fighters.
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NATO Leaders Land Downtown Closings Loom; Traffic Tieups Likely as Security Envelops Anniversary Summit
By Thomas W. Lippman, Washington Post, April 22, 1999 http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-04/22/234l-042299-idx.html
... A Brief History
1948:
Five European nations signed the Brussels Treaty, calling for mutual defense.
1948: The Soviet blockade of Berlin led to a Western airlift and focused U.S. attention on a defense treaty.
1949: 12 nations signed the North Atlantic Treaty in Washington.
1950: Soviet-supported North Korean invasion of South Korea strengthened alliance.
1950: Plans made for defense of Western Europe, including use of nuclear weapons.
1952: Greece and Turkey joined alliance, strenghtening NATO's southern flank.
1955: Germany became a member.
1955: Formation of Warsaw Pact as Eastern reponse to NATO.
1961: East German troops erected Berlin Wall.
1975: 35 nations signed Helsinki Final Act to respect certain human rights and to accept European boundary lines.
1982: Spain joined NATO.
1987: U.S. and Soviets signed Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces treaty.
1990: NATO and Warsaw Pact members signed non-aggression treaty.
1991: Warsaw Pact is dissolved.
1995: NATO launched largest military operation to date in support of Bosnia peace agreement.
1999: Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland joined NATO.