Greenpeace demands answers over freighter accident

Australian Broadcasting Corporation, September 2, 1999
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newslink/weekly/newsnat-2sep1999-73.htm

Greenpeace is demanding answers over an accident on a freighter carrying plutonium-based nuclear fuels off the Western Australian coast.

It has been revealed a 41-year-old crew member was flown off the Pacific Pintail suffering a broken collarbone and head injuries, after the ship hit bad weather at the weekend.

Greenpeace nuclear campaigner Ben Pearson says the incident highlights their deep concerns over the safety of such ships travelling anywhere near Australia.

"Did the ships come within the Australian Exclusive Economic Zone?" Mr Pearson asked.

"What was the position of the crew member - was he a person who was critical to the operations of the crew or the security detail, did the ships have to wait?

"Did we have two ships loaded with plutonium just sitting idle off the Western Australian coast for an hour or a day? This is the kind of thing we want cleared up."

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Official Admits Chernobyl Problems

By Sergei Shargorodsky Associated Press Writer Friday, September 3, 1999; 4:38 p.m. EDT
http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WAPO/19990903/V000737-090399-idx.html
KIEV, Ukraine (AP) -- ``Serious and unexpected'' problems were discovered during repairs on the Chernobyl nuclear plant's only working reactor, an official acknowledged Friday -- but added that the plant will still resume operations this fall.

Reactor No. 3 at Chernobyl -- the site of the world's worst nuclear accident in 1986 -- was shut down for planned repairs July 1. The repairs are expected to last until Nov. 9.

A new repair schedule had to be devised following the discovery of additional defects at the Soviet-constructed RBMK reactor. The defects were ``quite serious and unexpected but did not deviate from the existing norms,'' said Borys Baranov, shift manager at Chernobyl.

Baranov did not give any more details, nor did a Friday statement from Chernobyl about the repairs' progress.

Baranov, whose comments were carried by the Interfax news agency, said the reactor still would come back on line Nov. 9, provided that necessary funds and equipment arrive on time.

``In any case, the reactor will be restarted, since we lack the equipment needed to provide for the stoppage of Chernobyl,'' he said.

The plant's safety has long been a major concern in the West, and Ukraine has pledged to close it by 2000. But the energy-strapped former Soviet republic has asked for outside financial help to complete two new nuclear reactors to compensate for the power loss.

The G-8 group of leading industrialized nations has made no decision on that request, and some even argue that Ukraine could acquire alternative energy sources. Without outside help, Ukrainian officials have said, Chernobyl is likely to continue operating well beyond 2000.

The No. 3 reactor, presently under repair, is the only one that remains in operation at Chernobyl.

In 1986, a devastating explosion and fire at Chernobyl reactor No. 4 spewed radiation over much of Europe. Another Chernobyl reactor was shut after a 1991 fire, and the fourth was closed down permanently in 1997.

-----------

ALERT - Y2K, Etc

UPI, 2:29 PM ET September 3, 1999, By MARTIN SIEFF
http://news.excite.com/news/u/990903/14/other-news

... Y2K U.S. Defense Secretary William Cohen will head for Moscow in 10 days time for talks with the Russians about a possible START III nuclear arms reduction treaty. He will also discuss with the Russians ways of preventing their antiquated computer systems from accidentally launching nuclear missiles if they are disrupted by the Y2K crisis in the coming months....

TYPHOON The U.S. Department of Defense said it could not and would not confirm a Hong Kong press report that Russia had agreed to sell China two Typhoon class strategic nuclear submarines, each of which could obliterate at least a score of U.S. cities.

But a top U.S. defense expert told UPI there already was a well- documented pattern of Russia supplying its own weapons scientists and advanced technology to China to help it build its own strategic nuclear submarine force that could threaten the continental United States. MIDEAST Once again, the Israelis and Palestinians finally appeared to reach agreement on the last details of their latest accords at the very last minute. If no last-minute hitches occur, the agreement will be signed this weekend, hopefully putting final status talks between the two sides on the negotiating table at last. DIANA Mohamad al Fayed, the father of Princess Diana's boy friend Dodi al Fayed, refused to accept the conclusion of an official French inquiry that drunken driver Henri Paul was responsible for the car crash in a Paris tunnel two years ago that killed all three of them. An al Fayed spokesman in London said the Egyptian-born owner of Harrods' store still believes Diana and Dodi were murdered in a conspiracy and is determined to expose it.

KOREA South Korea said it would not recognize North Korea's rejection of the sea border between the two neighboring countries and would not tolerate any North Korean naval incursions over the so-called Northern Limit Line.

The dispute reflects a new aggressiveness in recent days by the North Korean leadership that some analysts believe may reflect their belief that they are finally the owners of working nuclear weapons and ballistic missile delivery systems. The United States and North Korea are scheduled to have talks in Berlin next week on reducing tensions.

CHINA Chinese President Jiang Zemin, speaking in Bangkok, the capital of Thailand, said that his country continued to oppose "hegemony" and "power politics" two code words in Chinese diplomatic usage for U.S. global domination.

The speech served notice that even while China is starting negotiations with the United States to win U.S. approval for it to join the World Trade Organization, its leader remain committed to opposing the global extension of U.S. power.

---

US, Russia agree on early warning Y2K info

Australian Financial Review, September 3, 1999
http://www.afr.com.au/content/990903/update/update41.html http://www.abc.net.au/news/newslink/weekly/newsnat-3sep1999-48.htm

Moscow and Washington have agreed in principle to share missile early warning information at a centre in Colorado over the New Year to prevent nuclear missteps if Russian satellites are blinded by a millennium bug, US officials said today.

Details still have to be worked out, but Defence Secretary William Cohen will discuss the US proposal with Russian Defence Minister Igor Sergeyev in Moscow this month, a defence official said.

Pentagon officials hoped an agreement will be reached.

"There is an agreement in principle," the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The September 13 meeting between Cohen and Sergeyev, which was announced in Moscow on Monday but has not been officially confirmed by the Pentagon, would be the highest level talks on the US proposal since March, when Russia broke off discussions in anger over the NATO air campaign against Yugoslavia.

But lower level talks resumed recently and Pentagon officials have urged the Russians to send officers to the centre in Colorado Springs, officials said.

Washington is worried that if computers in Russia's nuclear command and control system fail when their internal calendars turn over to the year 2000, confusion could lead to potentially dangerous misunderstandings.

"The concern isn't that a rocket could be launched automatically," said Major Michael Birmingham, a spokesman for the US Space Command who noted that US and Russian launch procedures preclude that.

"The concern is that satellite systems that detect missile launches or observe missile launches will have a Y2K problem that will cause the country's satellites to go blind," he said.

It is believed that computers programmed to read the calendar year as two digits will be stumped on January 1 when the year 2000 registers as "00," throwing entire systems into turmoil.

US military officials report that all but two US nuclear-related "mission critical" systems are now Y2K compliant, but they worry that Russian systems may not be.

As a hedge against that, the US military has set up a small centre at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs where US and Russian military personnel can exchange unclassified information about launches in the days before and after the New Year.

"The intent is to have an American and a Russian side-by-side to ensure strategic stability," Birmingham said.

It would consist of two Russian officers sitting alongside a US officer and a senior non commissioned officer, who would be in voice communication with the US early warning command centre inside nearby Cheyenne Mountain.

The US-Russian centre will have a hotline linking it to Moscow, Birmingham said.

If any anomalies do occur in the Russian early warning system, the Russian officers could consult the Americans and report back to Moscow.

Plans call for the centre to operate from December 27 to January 6.

---

Russian Atomic Base Boss Denies Metal Stolen

VLADIVOSTOK, Russia, Sep 3, 1999 -- (Reuters)
http://www.russiatoday.com/news.php3?id=89928

A director at a base that services Russian nuclear submarines said on Friday a woman arrested for trying to sell radioactive metal was employed at the state-run plant but he denied the alloy was from there.

Police in the Russian Far East city of Vladivostok told Reuters their investigation showed the stolen alloy of uranium-238 and other rare metals came from one of the many atomic plants in the region, home to the Pacific Fleet.

"The woman arrested did indeed work at our factory," said Grigory Pavlenko, one of the directors of the Zvezda maintenance plant that services nuclear submarines in the town of Bolshoi Kamen near Vladivostok.

"But that does not mean the theft was from us," he told reporters.

On Thursday, police said they had arrested a woman who tried to sell the radioactive metal to undercover agents.

She had the metal wrapped in newspaper in a simple shopping bag. On Friday, police confirmed earlier television reports that an undisclosed number of other people had also been arrested.

Pavlenko said police and factory investigators had carefully checked stocks and could not find any missing atomic material.

A police spokesman said the stolen material did not necessarily come from Zvezda but was from a base in the area.

He said the smuggling ring had wanted to sell the alloy for $65,000 and had kept it in a lock-up suburban car garage without any safety precautions. Police said the piece of metal they confiscated weighed more than three kg (6.6 lbs.) and exceeded radiation safety levels by 2,500 times.

Russia has a huge nuclear submarine fleet but many of the vessels are languishing in dock. Strapped for cash to pay wages, workers and armed forces personnel have in the past sold equipment to raise money.

Organized criminal gangs have also sought to capitalize on this and take advantage of poor security at bases.

---

From Spy to Statesman

By MARKUS WOLF, September 4, 1999 New York Times Editorial
http://www.nytimes.com/yr/mo/day/oped/04wolf.html

BERLIN -- Can a former spy make a good prime minister? As the longtime head of East Germany's foreign intelligence service, my answer is yes. In any case, all of us should hope I'm right, since Vladimir Putin, Russia's latest Prime Minister, is, like the two who immediately preceded him, a former intelligence operative.

The common view of spies is that they're shadowy operators, dwellers on the dark side. Like Hollywood's version of international espionage -- Western spies good, Eastern spies evil -- such characterizations are grossly oversimplified. After all, every state that employs a military service also has an intelligence operation.

In the West, men like George Bush and Yitzhak Shamir of Israel have served as respectable leaders after having led their countries' spy agencies. So it's not surprising that former Eastern spies are accepted in the role of prime minister or even president.

I don't know Mr. Putin personally (he is a generation younger than I am), but I knew one of his predecessors, Yuri W. Andropov, a highly cultivated man of open political views and great esprit. Still, perhaps Mr. Andropov, who headed the K.G.B. before briefly leading the Soviet Union back in the early 1980's, isn't the most appropriate model from which to judge the worthiness of the new Prime Minister. Yevgeny M. Primakov, another former head of intelligence, probably offers a better comparison. Note that despite the brevity of his term as Prime Minister, from 1998 to 1999, Mr. Primakov earned the esteem of politicians both in Russia and abroad.

On the whole, the spies I have known have been extremely well read, highly intelligent, politically informed people. They have often been blessed with remarkable leadership and managerial skills. Being the leader of an efficient intelligence operation has made them particularly well versed in the political, military and economic potential of foreign governments. And they have been intimately familiar with the tactics of deception -- a skill that can have great advantages for political maneuvering.

Because of President Boris Yeltsin's poor health, he must delegate many duties to his ministers and other Government officials. His tendency to find scapegoats when plans go awry has meant that his prime ministers' terms have grown shorter and shorter.

Now, when the Kremlin seems less inclined to take on Russia's most pressing problems and criminal activity spreads like mildew across the land, the current Prime Minister will need to use compromise as his foremost political tool. To succeed, he'll have to be as skillful in the open melee of Russian politics as in the shadowy world of espionage.

Markus Wolf, the author of "Man Without a Face," was the head of East Germany's foreign intelligence office from 1952 to 1986.

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Getting the New Russia on Its Feet
Our assistance is making the American people more secure.

By Samuel R. Berger, Sunday, September 5, 1999; Page B07
http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-09/05/138l-090599-idx.html

Not for the first time, people are pointing to trouble in Moscow -- to evidence of corruption, malfeasance and capital flight -- to question whether we have been right to engage with Russia and whether we engaged in the right way.

There are indeed plenty of troubles in Russia today. But they should not obscure what U.S. engagement has produced for the American people. Since 1992 our efforts have helped deactivate almost 5,000 nuclear warheads in the former Soviet Union; eliminate nuclear weapons from Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan; safeguard sensitive technologies; engage more than 30,000 weapons scientists in civilian research; and obtain hundreds of tons of uranium from dismantled Russian weapons.

Today three-quarters of our aid to Russia is devoted to programs that diminish the danger of nuclear war and proliferation. Russia also has withdrawn its troops from Central Europe and the Baltics -- not a forgone conclusion when the Soviet Union collapsed -- respected Ukrainian sovereignty, begun to forge a cooperative relationship with NATO, joined us in peacekeeping missions in Bosnia and Kosovo and made some -- though not yet sufficient -- progress in controlling the export of lethal technology to rogue states. We have agreed to begin discussions this year on a START III treaty, even as we work to get START II ratified and preserve the ABM Treaty.

None of this would have happened without our diplomatic engagement. And none would have been possible had we not simultaneously supported Russia's transformation into a more stable, open and prosperous society, despite the frustrations of that undertaking.

Our approach to Russia's transition is based on a still valid premise: Reform will take a generation or more. Neither success nor failure is preordained. But encouraging success is in our interest. At this early stage, the only way to lose Russia is to give it up for lost.

To understand corruption in Russia, we must understand that it is rooted in the legacy of Soviet communism. The communist elite expropriated state assets to enhance its wealth and power. Soviet citizens grew accustomed to stealing from the state to squeeze out a better existence.

So among the first and most important tasks facing Russian reformers at the beginning of this decade was to place state assets under private control. This was a political as well as an economic imperative, for breaking the state's stranglehold on Russia's economy was a prerequisite to breaking its stranglehold on the country's society.

Today some argue that it would have been better to delay privatization until Russia's political culture and legal institutions were more mature. But after decades of communism, it would have taken years for Russia's fractured institutions to agree on the necessary steps and still longer for the culture to change.

When Russia's democratically elected leaders decided to begin privatization, rather than wait and hope for a better day, we tried to help make that process work. So we helped Russia create a securities and exchange commission and a national electronic trading system that would allow shares to be traded openly. We helped the development of small businesses and channeled aid through nongovernmental organizations and local governments.

Unfortunately, a system with too many bad rules gave way to a system with too few good rules. Many Russians associate privatization with insider deals on a handful of large enterprises in 1995 -- a program we refused to support.

But if Russia has made less progress than the optimists hoped, it has made more than the pessimists feared. Tens of thousands of private businesses have been created. Russia's first modern middle class has emerged. With IMF help, Russia has beaten hyperinflation.

Most important, the Russian people speak freely, choose their leaders, hold them to account. They repeatedly have rejected a return to communism. My bet is they will again.

As for corruption, we have spoken out bluntly, early and often. While in Moscow in 1995, President Clinton called for an "all-out battle to create a market based on law, not lawlessness." In 1998, he made clear that investment in Russia depended on "strong checks on corruption and abuse of authority."

Long before allegations surfaced, U.S. law enforcement officials were investigating Russian financial and organized crime and preparing indictments. In early 1997 Vice President Gore pressed Prime Minister Chernomyrdin to back money-laundering and anti-crime bills, which the Russian Duma and Federation Council subsequently approved. We feel President Yeltsin should not have vetoed the money-laundering law, and we urge the Russians to get new legislation passed.

Last year Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said that foreign funds "should be used to support policies that help the neediest Russians, not enrich foreign bank accounts." While we have no evidence that IMF funds have been stolen, we will continue to insist on safeguards and accountability of IMF programs as a prerequisite for disbursements. Today IMF funds can be used by Russia only to refinance its debt to the IMF.

Ultimately, accountability must come from the Russian people. That they now have the freedom and power to provide it, that the truth is no longer hidden from them but exposed by an energetic press, that they have broken the back of communism and chosen to pursue their aspirations with, not against, the world, remains among the most hopeful developments of our time. By standing with them when possible, while standing up for our interests when necessary, we have made the American people immeasurably more secure. This remains the right course for America.

The writer is the president's national security adviser.

---

Russia denies plan to sell n-subs to China

By Vladimir Radyuhin September 04, 1999 The Hindu
http://www.indiaserver.com/thehindu/1999/09/04/stories/03040006.htm

MOSCOW, SEPT. 3. A senior Russian military official has denied newspaper reports that Russia is planning to sell two nuclear- powered submarines to China. A general in the Defence Ministry's international department described as ``rubbish'' reports in the Taiwanese press this week that Russia had agreed to sell China two Typhoon-class submarines, capable of launching ballistic missiles. The $1-billion deal was allegedly reached during the Russian Deputy Prime Minister, Mr. Ilya Klebanov's recent visit to Beijing.

The Russian media confirmed that Mr. Klebanov had finalised a deal to sell up to 60 SU-30 MKK fighter jets to China.

The official, who asked not to disclose his name, told the Kommersant business daily on Friday that Russia could not possibly sell nuclear-armed submarines to any country because this would violate two international treaties signed by Russia: the nuclear non- proliferation treaty (NPT), which bans the export of nuclear arms, and the missile technology control regime (MTCR), which prohibits sales of missiles with a range of above 300 km. Russia has six Typhoon-class submarines, which are the world's largest nuclear-powered submarines, equipped with 20 launchers capable of hauling SSN-20 ballistic missiles armed with 10 nuclear warheads each to a distance of 8,300 km.

The Russian general said the Typhoon-class submarines were not even on the list of weapons allowed for export. He suggested the report was a ``trial balloon'' launched by Beijing.

The Kommersant daily said the report could also be Beijing's warning to its neighbours, including Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and India, to show restraint in upgrading their defence potentials. The newspaper referred to U.S. plans to set up a theatre missiles defence system in Asia together with Japan, and possibly South Korea and Taiwan, as well as India's plans to acquire Bars-class nuclear-powered submarines and TU-22 strategic bombers from Russia.

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China to begin new nuclear power plant in October

September 3, 1999 Reuters
http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=3475

BEIJING - China will start the construction of a nuclear power plant in the eastern province of Jiangsu next month, an official said yesterday.

"We will begin pour concrete in October," said the official of the Jiangsu Nuclear Power Co based in Lianyungang.

The plant, a Sino-Russian joint venture, will include four 1,000 megawatt nuclear power generators, he said.

The first phase of construction will include two Russian-designed reactors, due to be finished by the end of 2005, he told Reuters from Lianyungang.

Investment in the first phase of the project would be several billion dollars, the official said.

Lianyungang will be China's fouth nuclear power plant after Qingshan in the eastern province of Zhejiang, Daya Bay and Ling'ao in the southern province of Guangdong.

State media have said China plans to bring dozens of nuclear power plants on line....

---

China Said Planning Military Drills

Filed at 8:31 a.m. EDT By The Associated Press, September 5, 1999
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/i/AP-Hong-Kong-China-Taiwan.html

HONG KONG (AP) -- Continuing its show of military might, China's army is planning large-scale exercises on the coast across from Taiwan, a Beijing-backed newspaper reported Sunday.

The drills will be a closer simulation of war than those performed in 1996, when heightened tensions with Taiwan last prompted China to conduct large-scale exercises and missile tests, Chinese-language daily Wen Wei Po reported, quoting an unidentified military expert.

The report detailed China's latest military maneuvers aimed at forcing Taiwan President Lee Teng-hui to retract his assertion that China and Taiwan should have ``state-to-state'' relations.

Lee's comments on July 9 infuriated Beijing, which considers Taiwan a breakaway province that must eventually be reunited with the mainland, by force if necessary.

Navy, air force and ground troops will take part in the exercises that will focus on beach landings in the southeastern coastal provinces of Zhejiang and Guangdong, the newspaper reported.

---

Taiwan Spurns China's No-Nukes Vow

Friday, September 3, 1999; 4:14 p.m. EDT
http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WAPO/19990903/V000720-090399-idx.html

TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) -- Taiwan on Friday called on China to drop its threat to use force in a dispute over the island's status, saying a pledge by Beijing not to use nuclear weapons against its rival did not go far enough.

``Dialogue, communication and negotiations (are needed) to resolve problems, not violence in any form to solve issues,'' said Sheu Ke-sheng, vice chairman of the Cabinet's Mainland Affairs Council.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Henry Chen echoed that call, saying China should ``get to the root of the issue and express clearly that they give up the threat of force against us.''

Also Friday, Washington's new de facto ambassador to Taiwan paid a courtesy call on President Lee Teng-hui but gave no indication whether they had discussed Lee's affirmation of statehood, which has shaken relations across the Taiwan Strait.

The U.S. diplomat, Raymond Burghardt, has said nothing publicly since he arrived earlier this week about Lee's claim that Beijing must deal with Taiwan on a ``state-to-state.''

China and Taiwan split after the Nationalists lost the mainland to Mao Tse-tung's communists in 1949. Beijing still views the island as a renegade province.

Beijing's saber rattling has prompted expressions of concern from the United States, which has diplomatic relations only with Beijing but is bound by U.S. law to sell Taiwan defensive weapons and ensure that the sides resolve issues between them peacefully.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Sun Yuxi said Thursday that China had ruled out using nuclear weapons against Taiwan -- the most explicit, public renunciation of the nuclear option China has ever given Taiwan.

But Sun said China stood by a threat to use other types of force to block formal independence.

Newspapers in Hong Kong reported Friday that Chinese military exercises near the Taiwan Strait are continuing, and Hong Kong officials said many passenger flights between Hong Kong and China have been disrupted as the mainland closed up air spaces because of the tensions with Taiwan.

Meanwhile, a survey commissioned by Sheu's council shows that 88 percent of Taiwanese believe China is hostile toward Taiwan's government and two out of three believe China is hostile toward the people of Taiwan.

Eighty-seven percent oppose the ``one-country, two-systems'' formula that China has proposed to reunify Taiwan.

Those figures were all time highs, a direct result of China's recent campaign of intimidation, Sheu said. The survey had a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percent.

--

Military Continues War Exercises, Threats On Taiwan

BEIJING, Sep 3, 1999 -- (Agence France Presse)
http://www.insidechina.com/news.php3?id=89919

China's army continued military exercises aimed at intimidating Taiwan Friday, while missile experts warned President Lee Teng-hui not to underestimate China's missile capability, state press reported.

"Chinese missile specialists have pledged to speed up the development of missiles to enhance China's national defense capabilities in a bid to maintain the country's sovereignty and territorial integrity," the Xinhua news agency said.

The unnamed experts from the China Aerospace Machinery and Electronics Corporation (CAMEC), a missile manufacturer, said President Lee had "underestimated the military strength" of the mainland military.

"China now boasts missiles of various altitudes, ranges and speeds," the report said, adding "they may strike at any targets with precision."

Tensions across the Taiwan Strait have grown since Taiwan President Lee Teng-hui characterized relations with the mainland as "special state-to-state relations."

China, which considers Taiwan an inseparable part of the mainland, saw the remark as an unacceptable shift towards independence.

Lee's remarks brought forth a torrent of war-like rhetoric from Beijing, but western diplomats in the capital say there is little chance of the mainland engaging in hostilities, especially before Taiwan presidential elections next March.

China's foreign ministry Thursday reiterated Beijing's refusal to renounce the use of force to reunify Taiwan, while also insisting that it would never use nuclear weapons to strike at the rebel territory.

"The use of force is not aimed at the Taiwan people, but at foreign forces meddling in reunification and abetting Taiwan independence," said spokesman Sun Yuxi.

Also Friday the People's Liberation Army daily announced that Chinese high-tech military exercises were taking in the high plateaus of the western Chinese Lanzhou military region and in mountainous areas of the southern Guangzhou military region.

Soldiers of the Lanzhou region were learning how to fight in high-altitude, low oxygen-conditions using heavy equipment including advanced artillery and tanks.

"They have organized infantry and tank maneuvers at an altitude of 5,000 meters in a series of strategic exercises," the paper said.

Meanwhile, in the Guangzhou region, soldiers were holding exercises in the Shiwan mountains near the border of Vietnam, with drills being carried out in mountainous and forest-covered regions, it said.

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China urges halt to nuclear arms race in S. Asia

06:56 a.m. Sep 02, 1999 Eastern
http://www.insidechina.com/news.php3?id=89727

GENEVA, Sep 3, 1999 -- (Reuters) China on Thursday called on India and Pakistan to halt their nuclear arms race in South Asia to restore stability in the volatile region.

Speaking at the United Nations Conference on Disarmament, Chinese ambassador Li Changhe regretted the U.N.'s failure to launch negotiations on nuclear issues during its 1999 session, which ends next Tuesday.

"As a close neighbor of South Asia, China genuinely hopes that the tension there can be eased and the nuclear arms race brought to an end so that peace, security and stability can prevail in the region," Li said.

Tensions between nuclear-armed India and Pakistan, traditional arch-foes, have been high since a two-month conflict earlier this year when Indian troops dislodged armed infiltrators in the disputed Kashmir region.

Pakistan and India clashed at the conference two weeks ago after Pakistani ambassador Munir Akram said India's new draft nuclear deterrence doctrine was a "dangerous escalation" of the nuclear and conventional arms race in South Asia.

That doctrine proposed creating a land, sea and air-based Indian nuclear deterrent. Akram accused India of planning to create a huge arsenal of nuclear weapons.

Neither India nor Pakistan, which conducted underground nuclear explosions last year, have signed the 1996 Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) prohibiting such blasts.

The U.N. arms body, whose members include the five official nuclear powers -- Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States -- has been unable to hold substantive negotiations since agreeing CTBT three years ago, due to deep divisions.

The five powers have refused demands by non-aligned India and Pakistan for negotiations aimed at eliminating nuclear arms, diplomats say.

The five have said the next step should be negotiations to halt production of nuclear bomb-making fissile material.

The United States, which is studying plans to deploy a missile defense scheme, is the only member state opposed to negotiations on outer space defense systems. Washington's firm position has also prevented a compromise negotiating package, diplomats said.

Li said the disagreements on nuclear disarmament and outer space defense had prevented agreement on a program for 1999 and he called for flexibility next year.

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Strike halts business in Pakistan

Updated 2:54 PM ET September 4, 1999 By RAJA ZULFIKAR
http://webcrawler-news.excite.com/news/u/990904/14/international-strike

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Sept. 4 (UPI) Traders across Pakistan brought business activity to a halt in response to a strike call by opposition parties to protest the IMF-advised levy of a 15 percent general sales tax.

The strike today was complete in Sindh province and was largely successful in Balochistan and the North West Frontier Province. Traders in Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's home province, Punjab, observed a partial strike, although traders' groups claimed the strike was total.

The government recently agreed to levy the tax as a condition for disbursement of a $280 million IMF loan. Sharif said the measure was difficult, but necessary, and urged traders to accept it.

Today's strike saw no violence. It enjoyed full backing from major opposition parties, which have stepped up their anti-government campaign since mid-July, when Sharif was forced to order Kashmiri militants out of Kargil in Kashmir or risk a war with India.

Facing his first serious challenge from his traditional constituency, Sharif blamed the opposition, not the traders, for the strike at a public meeting in the North West Frontier Province.

In a statement, the leader of the opposition, former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, said the strike was "evidence that the government has lost its political and moral legitimacy, and it must immediately resign. "

Leaders of the trading community were in hiding today in the wake of a weeklong crackdown against them after the government held fruitless negotiations to persuade them not to strike.

---

Pakistan police detain anti-US cleric

Updated 1:22 PM ET September 4, 1999 By RAJA ZULFIKAR
http://webcrawler-news.excite.com/news/u/990904/13/international-us

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Sep. 4 (UPI) Police in Pakistan have detained the chief of a pro-Taliban Islamic party in his house to prevent anti-U. S. rallies in the federally administered tribal areas bordering Afghanistan.

Heavily armed police today guarded Fazlur Rehman's residence in Dera Ismael Khan, some 200 miles (320 km) south of Peshawar as the right-wing Jamiaat-e-Ulema-e-Islam (JUI) Party chief refused to accompany the authorities.

Explaining the JUI leader's arrest, a senior government official said that he was due to address rallies in the tribal areas against the United States in violation of a ban on such congregations.

There was sharp reaction from Rehman's supporters immediately after his arrest as they gathered around his residence, braved the ban on rallies and chanted anti-U.S. slogans. They also shouted slogans in support of Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden, saying he was a hero of the Islamic world.

The United States considers bin Laden a terrorist, responsible for last year's U.S. Embassy bombings in east Africa.

The JUI has mustered support from clerics on account of its extremely hostile anti-American stance. Rehman has addressed protest rallies and demonstrations, mostly in the Northwest Frontier province, warning that no American citizen in Pakistan will be safe if the U.S. launches any attack against bin Laden.

Last month, a senior U.S. diplomat called on Fazlur Rehman in Islamabad to not make life threats on U.S. citizens. But the JUI chief said he will stick to his words.

The United States has already warned its citizens to remain careful and has beefed up security at the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad and consulates in Lahore and Karachi.

The JUI has meanwhile, called an emergency meeting to discuss the latest situation. It has warned that if their leader was not freed immediately, they will react in severe protests. The JUI has a strong support base in the Northwestern Frontier and the southwestern Balochistan provinces.

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India test fires anti-tank missile

Updated 4:35 AM ET September 5, 1999
http://webcrawler-news.excite.com/news/u/990905/04/international-missile

NEW DELHI, India, Sept. 5 (UPI) India has test-fired its indigenously built anti-tank guided missile Nag, or Cobra, off the eastern coast.

Newspaper reports today say that the missile, with a range of 2.5 miles each, was launched on the range at Chandipur-on-sea in Orissa state.

Nag, an all-weather third-generation heat-seeking missile capable of penetrating any type of armor, was first test-fired in July last year.

India's integrated missile program also includes the intermediate- range Agni, or Fire, ballistic missile, the short-range surface-to-air Trishul, or Trident, the surface-to-surface Prithvi, or Earth, and the surface-to-air Akash, or Sky.

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N.Korea Accuses South Of Fanning Arms Race

Updated 4:05 AM ET September 5, 1999
http://webcrawler-news.excite.com/news/r/990905/04/international-korea-north

SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea has accused its rival South Korea of irresponsible spending and causing an arms race with a planned purchase of submarines.

"The South Korean authorities are channeling a huge amount of money to purchase the up-to-date submarines," the North's official Korean Central News Agency reported late Saturday.

"Never-to-be-condoned is the criminal move of the South Korean authorities, who are squandering the funds squeezed from the people, in spite of the severe economic crisis, for an arms buildup for a war against the north," it said.

The North said South Korean was seeking to buy three submarines by 2005, and accepting bids from companies in Russia, Australia, France and other European countries.

The South Korean defense ministry confirmed that it had held an open presentation for interested companies from many countries in July concerning a plan to purchase several submarines in the future.

"We are not seeking to buy up-to-date submarines, but those which have been used for several years by respective countries," said a defense ministry spokesman. "We haven't decided exactly how may or when we will buy them."

The ministry had said last April it was considering taking submarines from Russia as a way for economically-strapped Moscow to pay off debts owed to Seoul. The ministry spokesman said the plans were still under consideration.

KCNA's report comes amid rising tensions between the two Koreas, after North Korea last week declared invalid the sea border in the Yellow Sea separating the rival Koreas, which was demarcated by the United Nations Command four decades ago.

South Korea said it would not tolerate any North Korean intrusion into its waters south of the disputed boundary.

North and South Korean naval ships exchanged cannon fire at the Yellow Sea border on June 15, the first such skirmish since the 1950-53 Korean War.

The war ended in a truce rather than a peace agreement, leaving the two Koreas still technically at war.

The North advised European countries to cancel their tenders on the submarines if they "truly want peace and stability on the Korean peninsula."

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By Steven Mufson Washington Post Staff Writer Sunday, September 5, 1999; Page A06
http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-09/05/184l-090599-idx.html

At a launch pad in North Korea sits a long-range missile that is a 117-foot-tall, eight-foot-wide exclamation mark for proponents of a U.S. missile defense program.

In the hands of Pyongyang's mysterious and belligerent-sounding leadership, the missile, which is capable of hitting parts of the United States, adds urgency to America's efforts to develop a system that could shoot it out of the sky.

Together with other missiles tested last year by Iran and North Korea, the new missile, named the Taepodong II, has "put over the top the logic for beginning to develop national missile defense," said a senior Clinton administration official.

But some foreign policy experts warn that American missile defense systems could make Asia and the United States less rather than more secure by stimulating an arms race among countries eager to overwhelm the capabilities of those systems.

Although U.S. missile defense systems are still in the experimental stage, they have already had a major impact on policymakers in Beijing. The proposals for a national missile defense system have contributed to China's reexamination of its own relatively small nuclear arsenal, which might no longer provide adequate deterrence against the United States.

And U.S. plans to develop a theater missile defense system--which would protect troops in the field, rather than the whole country--have heightened Chinese concerns that the United States might provide an antimissile umbrella for Taiwan, reestablish military cooperation that was limited after Washington and Beijing opened diplomatic relations and make a Taiwanese declaration of independence more likely.

If China responds by increasing its own missile arsenal, other regional powers--Japan, India and Taiwan--could respond with additions to their own stockpiles. India's efforts would prod Pakistan to build up its arsenal too, and China's response would also increase pressure in the United States for further military precautions.

"This is the classic way arms races get going," said Charles Freeman, formerly a senior Pentagon official who is now a consultant for businesses in China and other countries. "For very good reasons we go ahead with plans that cause other people for very good reasons to do things, and there you have it."

The U.S. drive toward antimissile defenses also has irritated Russia. Moscow has spurned Washington's request to negotiate changes to the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty, which limits the defensive systems each country can deploy.

Clinton administration officials have tried to dampen talk of an arms race. Though missile defense was first promoted during the Cold War by President Ronald Reagan as a way to protect against the Soviet nuclear threat, senior Clinton administration officials have told Chinese leaders that current missile defense programs are directed at smaller "rogue" states that might use a lone weapon or handful of weapons to try to blackmail bigger powers.

U.S. officials have also sought to calm Chinese leaders by saying that missile defense is still an unproven technology and is, at best, years away from deployment. A decision on deployment is possible next year, with actual deployment coming no earlier than 2003 and probably later.

But some policy experts say that explanation is difficult to sell in Beijing, where many leaders believe the United States is pursuing a "containment" policy toward China. Moreover, there have been two successful tests of missile defense technology recently, albeit with targets simulating medium-range missiles, rather than the ocean-spanning kind.

Despite the concerns laid out in the recent Cox Committee report on alleged Chinese espionage, Beijing is widely believed to have maintained a small arsenal of about two dozen nuclear-equipped missiles. They were developed in the late 1950s and 1960s, fueled by then-Chinese leader Mao Zedong's own ambitions and by threats made by the United States to use nuclear weapons during the Korean War.

Although the Chinese arsenal would be enough to deter American nuclear attack right now, an effective U.S. missile defense might defuse the Chinese deterrent.

"We're in the process of bringing about the kind of China force that [Rep. Christopher] Cox [R-Calif.] and others say the Chinese have been developing all along," Freeman said.

Not everyone agrees. "That missile defense leads to Chinese missile development is a specious argument. The Chinese were going to do it anyway," said James Lilley, a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and former U.S. ambassador to China.

China's recent announcements that it had tested a new long-range missile and that it possessed a neutron bomb have added to the drumbeat in Congress for missile defense, say congressional supporters. China has been updating its missiles so that they carry multiple warheads.

Some U.S. allies remain unconvinced that missile defense will actually reduce risks of attack. South Korea has declined to participate in building nuclear missile defense systems. A security strategist for the South Korean foreign ministry recently said that Seoul viewed missile defense as too expensive, ineffective against the North Korean threat because of the short flight time between the north and south of the peninsula, and detrimental to relations with "other powers," meaning China.

Instead, South Korea wants to build longer-range missiles to add to its deterrent against North Korea's missiles.

By contrast, Japan last month signed a deal with the United States to conduct joint research on a ship-based antimissile system that could destroy incoming missiles like the one North Korea is threatening to launch.

In the United States, despite concerns, an unusual degree of bipartisan support in Congress and the Clinton administration has gathered behind missile defense plans that were deeply divisive during the Reagan era.

Traditionally, conservatives have been the biggest supporters of missile defense for isolationist reasons, said Robert Kagan, a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. But the threat that rogue states could pose to U.S. forces around the world with nonnuclear missiles, and the specter of a rogue state lobbing a long-range nuclear missile toward the continental United States, have rallied liberals who support an activist U.S. foreign policy to the cause of missile defense.

"Missile defense makes interventionist policy possible," Kagan said.

During the Reagan era, there was a less compelling need for missile defense, according to a senior Clinton administration official, because U.S. nuclear deterrence was enough. "Deterrence worked with the Soviet Union because at the end of the day it had a rational, calculating leadership," the official said. "In the case of Iran and North Korea, we're dealing with much less rational and predictable regimes that might do something crazy like attack the U.S."

Yet people active in international nonproliferation efforts believe that U.S. missile defense efforts show that the United States is giving up on nonproliferation and is resigned to countries such as Iran and North Korea obtaining nuclear weapons.

"As missile defense gathers speed, what is the political impact?" asks Roelf Ekeus, Sweden's ambassador to the United States and former head of the United Nations Special Commission for arms inspections in Iraq. "It gives the impression that the U.S. is settling down to live with nuclear weapons. The risk is that more and more [countries] just give up the hope [of nonproliferation], which I think is a great threat."

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Arms Control Is Dying. Unless It's Reviving.

By ERIC SCHMITT, September 5, 1999
http://www.nytimes.com/library/review/090599arms-control-review.html
Photo:
http://graphics.nytimes.com/library/review/090599arms-control-review.1.jpg

WASHINGTON -- By many measures, international arms control seems to be on the verge of unraveling.

A global treaty banning all nuclear testing is bottled up in the United States Senate.

Another pact to reduce the atomic arsenals of Russia and the United States is stalled in the Russian Parliament.

Iraq, Iran and North Korea are racing to build new biological, chemical, nuclear weapons or long-range missiles, American intelligence analysts say. Finally worn down by Iraqi non-cooperation, the United Nations has dismantled its efforts even to monitor Iraq's terror-weapons programs. And India and Pakistan are menacing each other with nuclear-tipped missiles.

"We're heading downhill," said Michael Krepon, president of the Henry L. Stimson Center in Washington, a group that researches arms control and international security.

"All of the major fault lines of nuclear danger are growing."

Why then are many arms control advocates echoing the bullish declaration of Adm. Stansfield Turner, a past director of Central Intelligence: "This is the most opportune moment in the past 40 years for nuclear arms control"?

The answer is simple: Russia, which is still the only country that can claim parity with America's own nuclear arsenal, has serious reasons for wanting to cut back its stock of warheads.

Russia's strategic forces are declining fast and Moscow lacks the money to pay for new systems.

It badly wants a new strategic arms reduction agreement, Start 3, that could take both countries down to 1,500 long-range nuclear warheads from more than 6,000 currently; from the Russian point of view, that would at least allow Russia to keep even with the United States despite all its troubles.

roponents of such a deal argue that it would have advantages for the United States as well: It would shrink the nuclear stockpile of the country that still harbors the single biggest threat to American security, and from which American security officials fear that terrorists may even now be shopping for nuclear material.

And with instability engulfing Russia, including growing public cynicism toward the government, rising corruption with allegations of Russian laundering of billions of dollars through the Bank of New York and the economy shakier than ever, time may be running short to strike a bold new arms deal before both countries hold presidential elections next year, experts say.

"We have a way to secure extremely deep cuts, and make them verifiable and irreversible," said Mr. Krepon.

"In return for doing Russia that favor, which is a favor to ourselves, we can get a number of things we want."

But the Administration is proceeding gingerly, still insisting that Russia's Communist-dominated Parliament first ratify the Start 2 treaty, which brings both nations' strategic forces to 3,000 to 3,500 warheads, before seriously negotiating any follow-on pact to further reduce the weaponry.

And even though the cold war is over, the logic of nuclear arms control has detractors. The Pentagon and many conservatives fear that dipping much lower than 3,000 warheads would jeopardize the American nuclear advantage over the rest of the world, and encourage other countries to seek the status of first-tier atomic powers.

Moreover, Washington's insistence that the Russian Parliament act on Start 2 may have backfired, angering many Russian lawmakers who complain of American coercion.

"They are trying to portray us as a country unwilling to divest itself of nuclear arms, a kind of nuclear monster that does not want to disarm," Roman Popkovich, chairman of the defense committee of Russia's lower house of Parliament, said last month.

Yet another hurdle is the strained relationship between Moscow and Washington, frayed most recently by the air war in Kosovo. "Things are at such a low level of credibility with Russia right now," said Senator Pete Domenici, a senior Republican from New Mexico.

"A lot of work has to be done."

That is why Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott, the Administration's top Russia expert, plans to fly to Moscow this week to try to smooth out differences in advance of a more important meeting in Washington on Sept. 17 with a Russian Deputy Foreign Minister, Georgi Mamedev.

Against long odds, Mr. Talbott is trying to broker a deal to modify the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty to allow the United States to build a limited national defense against long-range missile attacks -- in exchange, perhaps, for a Start 3 agreement.

Russia has long opposed such a shield, fearing it could lead to a broader "Star Wars" space-based defensive system.

But missile defenses are a top foreign-policy priority of Senate Republicans like Jesse Helms of North Carolina, whose Foreign Relations Committee is likely to hold the nuclear-test ban treaty hostage until President Clinton submits two other treaties that Mr. Helms wants to kill, including amendments to the A.B.M. Treaty.

The Administration's deliberate approach illustrates a shift in the politics of arms control, which became the lifeblood of America's foreign policy during the last half of the cold war, arms control advocates say.

It was just a few years ago that President Clinton presided over the extension of a treaty to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons and signed the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. Those accomplishments capped an astonishing 10-year period for American arms control policy that included landmark strategic arms reductions treaties negotiated by President George Bush.

Mr. Clinton, arms control advocates say, has lost the momentum created in his first Administration. Gone is the initiative of President's first four years, they say, replaced by drift and a reluctance to challenge Senate conservatives.

"It's a very timid approach and time is running out," said Spurgeon M. Keeny Jr., president of the Arms Control Association, a research and advocacy group. "They've had a failed policy in dealing effectively with the Senate, because of a feeling that a confrontation on this would hurt the rest of their domestic agenda."

If the Administration is to pull off one more arms control victory in its waning months, it can expect little or no help from Senate Republicans, who are moving away from the arms control legacy of the Bush and Reagan Administrations, to push for national missile defenses.

"We don't want to unnecessarily antagonize the Russians, but they are not the Soviet Union," said Senator Gordon H. Smith, an Oregon Republican on the Foreign Relations Committee.

"They're not the threat they once were.

The threat is more dispersed now."