* Nuclear plant under attack from MP
British Nuclear Fuels admits some data was falsified
* Probe into 'faked' nuclear tests
* Kosovo waterways bombing a 'war crime'
Burning oil, polluted water: The Balkans will take a long time to recover
* Danube pollution warning
The morning after in Novi Sad: WWF says the hidden damage persists
* UK: Scotland
Labour maverick leads Baghdad bus protest
A converted London bus is being used for the trip
* Depleted uranium study 'shows clear damage'
Carnage on the Basra road: What damage did depleted uranium cause?
* The Express claims to have evidence of a "cover up" over radiation poisoning in the Gulf war.
* UN probes Balkan depleted uranium
Serbian armour was targetted with DU weapons
* UN team sifts Serb pollution
Novi Sad: The refinery blazes after a Nato raid
* Greens mock nuclear fuel firm's plans
Inside Sellafield: Will the Mox plant prove a saviour, or a liability?
* Environmental Exposure Report:
Depleted Uranium in the Gulf
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/du/
* Topics of Interest and Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
* Depleted Uranium Fact Sheet
* Activists Push Y2K Nuclear Pause
* Computer amateur discovers Y2K bug solution
* British protester gets seven years in prison
* Peru's Rights Record
* WORLD In Brief - Russia/Japan, Chernobyl
* Chernobyl Nuclear Waste Deal Signed
* West to build Chernobyl radioactive waste plant
* Chernobyl ready for Y2K - official
* Bomb Series Toll Near 300, Heat On Russia PM
* Yeltsin Urged to Get Tough on Crime
* Syrian super Scud ready soon - source
* Black diamonds may be radioactive -Antwerp police
* Yucca Mountain alternative passes
House OKs Berkley amendment on new ways to handle nuclear waste
* Lab Worker Pleads Not Guilty In Attack
* Upgraded Patriot Two for Two in Successful Cruise Missile Target Intercepts
* U.S. PAC-3 missile shoots down target missile
* Panel Faults Lockheed Martin Corp.
* Wise Disobedience
* The Best Investment the Pentagon Could Make
* Montana Is Below Average For Fallout
* Plans To Stop Transfer
* The Lie Detector That Didn't
* Battle to Douse Incinerator Harrison Ford,Wyo. Neighbors Fight Nuclear Waste Site
* Budget Shortfall
* 2 Groups Fight Nuclear Incinerator Project Near Yellowstone
* Helms Demands Sanctions for China
* Albright Defends Russia Policy Secretary Notes Achievements as Well as Corruption's Peril
* Exposure concerns go back 39 years
* New study to determine if uranium mills sickened workers
Hatch adds mill staff to bill on compensation
* Piketon workers may get money
* Piketon workers may get money
* Energy Dept. to Expand Plan on Helping Nuclear Workers
* Payback Sought for Nuclear Workers
* Richardson wants Piketon workers compensated for illnesses
* Only one plant's exposed workers would be eligible under plan
* Paducah site is safe, report says
* No Letup In Probes Of Clinton Presidency
------------
Nuclear plant under attack from MP
British Nuclear Fuels admits some data was falsified
September 16, 1999 - UK: Northern Ireland
http://news2.thls.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk/northern%5Fireland/newsid%5F449000/449032.stm
A Northern Ireland MP has called for the closure of Sellafield Nuclear Plant in Cumbria in England.
The Social Democratic and Labour Party MP Eddie McGrady has said it should shut.
His call came following reports that staff at British Nuclear Fuels falsified quality control records for a batch of radioactive fuel pellets.
Mr McGrady said: "It is an industry which is riddled with a history of mismanagement, lack of safety record, lack of, in fact, openness.
"It has hidden and indeed falsified records in the past, especially to the governmental commission by Dr Black, the commission on the incidence of leukaemia. They falsified records of workmen exposure to that particular investigation.
"This is an ongoing thing and the only answer to it, both in practical terms and for the future of the environment, is a run down and a closure of that particular plant," he said.
The discrepancies were discovered in the production process for MOX fuel, a mixture of uranium and recycled plutonium sold to Japan.
An investigation is now under way.
British Nuclear Fuels admits some data was falsified but said there was no safety implications and that the fuel pellets involved do meet the correct specifications.
'We informed our customers'
Head of operations for MOX fuel, Simon Marshall, said it was their own safety system that found the problem.
He said: "On the positive side it was our system that detected it and we informed our customers.
"We have nothing to hide on this, we informed the customers what was happening.
"Regrettably it did happen and we will be seeking to put in place measures to prevent a recurrence," he said.
---
Probe into 'faked' nuclear tests
September 15, 1999 BBC - World: Asia-Pacific
http://news2.thls.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/asia%2Dpacific/newsid%5F447000/447997.stm
Nuclear experts from Japan are travelling to Britain to investigate reports that shipments of nuclear fuel have not been properly checked.
A British newspaper, The Independent, has alleged that quality checks on batches of fuel, produced by British Nuclear Fuels Limited, were faked.
The company says it's investigating.
The Mixed Oxide fuel - a mixture of uranium and plutonium - was on its way to a Japanese power station.
----------
Kosovo waterways bombing a 'war crime'
Burning oil, polluted water: The Balkans will take a long time to recover
By News Online's Alex Kirby, July 14, 1999 BBC World
http://news2.thls.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/newsid_394000/394326.stm
http://news2.thls.bbc.co.uk/olmedia/390000/images/_394326_river.jpg
A senior South African Government minister, Professor Kader Asmal, says Nato's bomb damage to water resources in the Balkan war was a crime under international law.
Professor Asmal was appointed Minister of Education in June. He had been Minister of Water Affairs and Forestry since 1994.
He was speaking in London, at a symposium on the conflicts provoked by large dams between the needs of development, human rights and environmental protection.
The meeting was organised by the World Commission on Dams (WCD), the Reuters Foundation, and the World Conservation Union.
Professor Asmal, who chaired the symposium and is a lawyer, told a questioner: "The recent bombing of water resources in Europe is very regrettable. It is a war crime".
He did not name Nato specifically, but left no doubt that he had the alliance in mind.
Professor Asmal told BBC News Online: "The Geneva Protocols prohibit attacks on water resources.
"Reservoirs, dams, sewage systems and related resources should never be used like this.
"Part of the reason is because of the risk of escalation in the next conflict."
He added that since the Kosovo campaign, Israel has attacked water resources in Lebanon for the first time in years.
Protecting civilians
Professor Asmal was exiled from South Africa during the apartheid era, and for 27 years was a professor of law at Trinity College, Dublin.
The Geneva Protocols, adopted in 1977, are designed to strengthen the 1949 Conventions on the conduct of warfare.
They say combatants must not "attack, destroy or render useless objects indispensable to the survival of the civilian population, such as foodstuffs, crops, livestock, drinking water installations and supplies".
They also prohibit attacks on dams and dykes if they would result in a threat to civilians.
A report on the environmental impact of the Balkan war was published in June by the Regional Environment Center, a group based in Hungary and part-funded by the European Commission.
It says: "Negative health impacts are expected from damaged infrastructure (water and sewage systems) in Yugoslavia.
"The slow reconstruction of infrastructure (particularly sewers and water treatment) represents a further risk to health."
---
Danube pollution warning
The morning after in Novi Sad: WWF says the hidden damage persists
By Environment Correspondent Alex Kirby,September 14, 1999, BBC, Sci/Tech
http://news2.thls.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid%5F446000/446226.stm
The World Wide Fund for Nature says drinking water supplies in parts of Yugoslavia and neighbouring countries are at risk in the aftermath of the Balkan war.
WWF sent a six-strong team to Yugoslavia for three days at the end of July. It concentrated on the Pancevo chemical complex near Belgrade, and on the Novi Sad oil refinery.
Installations at Pancevo include a fertiliser plant, a vinyl chloride manufacturing plant, and an oil refinery.
WWF said its team found "an enormous deficiency in the monitoring of toxic chemicals in the countries of central and eastern Europe. The pollution monitoring programme for the Danube has been particularly weak".
It said this made it difficult to distinguish contamination caused by the war from previous or continuing pollution.
Pollution spreading
"However, it's clear that the immediate clean-up and stopping of the current pollution coming from Pancevo and Novi Sad are vital."
The WWF team found evidence that toxic pollutants released close to places hit by the NATO bombing were now spreading into surrounding areas.
It concluded that there was considerable atmospheric pollution, probably affecting the environment and public health.
Soil and water samples it took "showed the presence of notable quantities of mercury, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), ethylene dichloride (EDC), and other highly toxic substances, including dioxins".
WWF says the contaminants are now "threatening groundwater drinking supplies and natural resources in several countries of the area".
Mercury accumulates in the food chain, and can be carried long distances in air and water. WWF says the mercury in soil samples taken at Pancevo was 2.5 times above the level that would trigger action if found in a country like the Netherlands.
Exceeding safety levels
The US Environmental Protection Agency says PAHs are highly carcinogenic. WWF found water in a canal at Pancevo containing PAHs 15 times above the EPA limit for drinking water.
Soil samples from Pancevo contained PAHs 10 to 11 times higher than Dutch action levels, while at Novi Sad they were twice as high.
EDC is a highly persistent and toxic pollutant which can affect the human reproductive, nervous and immune systems.
WWF says hydrocarbons, which it found in soil at Pancevo to amount to more than 25% of soil content, are also a problem.
"One drop of oil is sufficient to contaminate one cubic meter of drinking water, making it undrinkable."
Pekka Haavisto, the chairman of the United Nations Balkan Task Force, said UN experts had found environmental "hot-spots" at Pancevo and Kragujevac, an industrial town in central Serbia.
Disaster not likely
He said both needed urgent action, and there was a possibility that rising water levels could push mercury, dioxins and petrochemical waste in the canal there into the Danube. But he played down talk of an ecological catastrophe.
"We didn't find any alarming things in regards to the water-taking issues."
Mr Haavisto said the war's long-term impact on the region's biodiversity was likely to be "minimal", adding that he was more concerned about the presence in national parks of unexploded weapons.
The UN is still investigating the possible consequences of the use of depleted uranium weapons in the war, testing "soil and material samples" it had taken. But there was no word of its possible effects on people.
"We have not been able to do that kind of work at all."
---
UK: Scotland
Labour maverick leads Baghdad bus protest
A converted London bus is being used for the trip
Maverick Labour MP George Galloway is to travel overland to Iraq on a double-decker bus.
September 2, 1999 Published at 19:28 GMT 20:28 UK
http://news2.thls.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk/scotland/newsid%5F436000/436924.stm
The Glasgow MP, a staunch opponent of last year's air strikes against Iraq, is using the trip as part of his ongoing campaign against the sanctions imposed on the country.
The "Big Ben-to-Baghdad bus" - a converted London Routemaster - leaves London on Monday, visiting Glasgow and Birmingham before leaving Britain to travel through Europe and North Africa this autumn.
Rallies are set to be staged at all major cities en-route to highlight the case for ending sanctions against Iraq. The sanctions were put in place by the international community.
The convoy is sponsored by the Mariam Appeal, a charity named after four-year-old Iraqi girl Mariam Hamza, who was brought to Britain by Mr Galloway in 1998 for urgent medical treatment.
The Kelvin MP met the little girl on a tour of a Baghdad hospital and arranged for her to receive life-saving treatment at Glasgow's Royal Hospital for Sick Children, before returning home.
Mr Galloway believes depleted uranium from weapons used by the Allied Forces are having an adverse effect on the health of Iraqi children.
"There is a cancer epidemic laying waste the children of Iraq, which Unicef has now acknowledged is being exacerbated by western sanctions," said the MP.
"It is time we started helping the innocent victims of this tragedy, rather than putting every possible obstacle in the way of these children getting the medicines and treatment which they need."
Mr Galloway said the bus would be a "symbol of British opposition to sanctions and of the need to get medical support to the children of Iraq".
He added: "I am sure it will build opposition to government indifference to the massacre of the innocents in Iraq wherever it goes."
Mr Galloway will travel on the bus for most of the route, which includes France, Spain, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt and Jordan, before reaching Iraq.
Also on board will be a team of six volunteers.
---
Depleted uranium study 'shows clear damage'
Carnage on the Basra road: What damage did depleted uranium cause?
By Environment Correspondent Alex Kirby, August 27, 1999 BBC Sci/Tech
http://news2.thls.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid%5F431000/431817.stm
The controversy over the reported dangers of depleted uranium (DU) has intensified, with a Canadian study said to show "unequivocal" evidence of damage to health.
DU is a by-product of military and civil nuclear programmes, and is mildly radioactive, much less so than natural uranium.
Because it is 1.7 times as dense as lead, it is prized for use in armour-piercing weapons.
A DU round bursts through armour far more easily than a conventional weapon. On impact, the DU dissolves in a burning spray of dust.
Damage to children
The dust can damage health if it is inhaled or ingested. But the Ministry of Defence and the Pentagon have insisted that DU munitions, which both countries used in 1991, pose no special dangers.
Some Gulf war veterans disagree, and believe DU may be a factor in Gulf War Syndrome, the cluster of illnesses which has ruined the health of thousands of them.
They point as well to the much higher rate of childhood cancers and other abnormalities in southern Iraq since 1991.
And children of veterans themselves have been reported with birth defects.
Research by Dr Hari Sharma, of the University of Waterloo in Ontario, appeared to show traces of DU in the urine of 14 out of 30 British veterans he tested.
There is now considerable dispute over his work, with critics claiming he was dismissed by the university for work that lacked rigour and credibility.
His supporters say he has been victimised for publishing evidence suggesting DU harms both veterans and civilians.
But research at the Memorial University of Newfoundland appears to support Dr Sharma.
The researcher, a geochemist, Patricia Horan, used a mass spectrometer to analyse the urine of veterans.
This technique is said to achieve results between 50,000 and 500,000 times more accurate than Dr Sharma's.
'Beyond argument'
The one British veteran to have received the results of his test, Shaun Rusling, of the National Gulf War Veterans' and Families Association, was shown to be still passing DU in his urine eight years after the war.
Malcolm Hooper, emeritus professor of medicinal chemistry at the University of Sunderland, says the new research provides "unequivocal evidence that will stand up to technical examination by anyone".
Professor Hooper, who advises Gulf veterans' groups, told BBC News Online: "This puts the whole thing beyond dispute. It is a breakthrough."
"It shows an initial, significant exposure to DU, exposure which the MoD and the Pentagon have always maintained did not happen.
"It is imperative that the UK government now launches a widespread study of thousands of those who served in the Gulf, in different jobs and locations.
"US forces used DU in Kosovo, and that is disturbing as well.
"The climate and the terrain are different, but we just don't know what happened.
"The government should be checking service people, civilians, journalists, everyone."
Cautious
But the Newfoundland research has not yet been peer-reviewed, which worries Tony Duff, secretary of the Gulf Veterans' Association.
He told BBC News Online: "I think it is interesting. But until it has been reviewed, we cannot draw any firm conclusions.
"I do not want to raise people's hopes by claiming it is definitive until we know that it is."
---
The Express claims to have evidence of a "cover up" over radiation poisoning in the Gulf war.
August 26, 1999 BBC - UK
http://news2.thls.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk/newsid%5F430000/430534.stm
The Express claims to have evidence of a "cover up" over radiation poisoning in the Gulf war.
The paper says new, more accurate tests have shown that servicemen and women were exposed to, what it describes as, terrifying levels of depleted uranium used to fight Saddam Hussein's forces.
However, it also points out that the government insists that soldiers who handled weapons tipped with depleted uranium were at no risk of poisoning.
The headline, Striking gold in Oasis' tomb, refers, not to Noel and Liam, but to what the Telegraph believes is one of the most remarkable archaeological discoveries of the century.
Up to 10,000 Egyptian mummies, untouched for nearly two millennia, have been found in a tomb in the so-called Valley of the Golden Mummies.
Experts say the find is especially important because the cemetery has not been raided by looters.
---
UN probes Balkan depleted uranium
Serbian armour was targetted with DU weapons
By Environment Correspondent Alex Kirby, Sci/Tech
http://news2.thls.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_419000/419561.stm
The United Nations Environment Programme (Unep) says it is investigating possible damage to human health caused by depleted uranium weapons used in the Balkan war.
Depleted uranium (DU) is 1.7 times as dense as lead, and is used in armour-piercing rounds.
USAF A-10 "tankbuster" aircraft fired DU rounds during the war over Kosovo, though Nato insists that that was the only use made of it.
Unep's director general, Klaus Toepfer, told journalists in Nairobi that the organisation was developing a dual approach to the problem.
It was working in Geneva with the World Health Organisation (WHO), the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and other bodies to pool existing knowledge.
Clearing the air
Soon, Dr Toepfer said, Unep would decide whether to send a team to the war zone to assess any damage. If there were no effects, he said, people could be told that clearly.
There are hopes that a team could be sent before the end of August, and that it could produce a report by the end of next month.
But Unep sources have told BBC News Online that no decision has yet been reached on whether to send a team, or how it would work if it went.
Unep and the UN agency on human settlements, Habitat, have already sent two groups of experts to Serbia and Kosovo to investigate the environmental impact of the war.
They are expected to report their preliminary findings in early September. Nato argues, with the support of many scientists, that depleted uranium poses no particular risk to health.
But while DU is only mildly radioactive, there are fears that its use in weapons could cause long-lasting dangers. It burns on impact with a solid object, turning into a spray of very fine dust.
Official warnings
Some scientists believe that these particles can cause cancer if they are inhaled or ingested.
The US Army's Environmental Policy Institute reported in 1995: "If DU enters the body, it has the potential to generate significant medical consequences".
"The risks associated with DU are both chemical and radiological."
Both US and British forces used DU in the 1991 Gulf war, and numbers of veterans blame it for health problems they have developed subsequently. UK Ministry of Defence personnel in Kosovo have been warned to stay clear of areas affected by DU weapons if they are not wearing full radiological protective clothing.
The National Radiological Protection Board advises people visiting or working in Kosovo, "for example press and relief agencies", to avoid disturbing areas contaminated with DU.
But there is no advice given to refugees returning to areas affected by depleted uranium.
---
UN team sifts Serb pollution
Novi Sad: The refinery blazes after a Nato raid
By Environment Correspondent Alex Kirby, July 23, 1999 BBC Sci/Tech
http://news2.thls.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_401000/401981.stm
http://news2.thls.bbc.co.uk/olmedia/400000/images/_401981_un3.jpg
International experts invited by the United Nations to assess the environmental damage caused by the Balkan war have arrived in the northern Serbian city of Novi Sad.
The experts are working for the Balkans Task Force (BTF), a joint initiative of the UN Environment Programme (Unep) and the UN Centre for Human Settlements (Habitat).
The task force is chaired by a former environment minister of Finland, Pekka Haavisto, who has said the aim is to produce "a neutral and scientifically credible report on the situation".
White fog cloud
The team has already visited the Pancevo industrial complex, 15 km from Belgrade, which was heavily bombed.
The town contains an oil refinery, a fertiliser factory and a chemical plant. A raid in April hit storage tanks which released large amounts of vinyl chloride monomers (VCMs) into the air.
The VCMs, used for making plastics, caught fire, producing a white fog which Pancevo's mayor, Srdjan Mikovic, said rolled across the town.
VCMs are carcinogenic. Soon after the raid, the Pancevo Institute for Health Protection recorded concentrations more than 10,000 times above safe industrial levels.
Thousands of tonnes of crude oil and refined products are said to have burned off after the refinery was hit. Officials have told local people not to eat vegetables grown round Pancevo, or to eat fish from the Danube, where chemicals released by the bombing ended up.
They are said to have included sodium hydroxide, nitric acid and 100 tonnes of mercury. The head of the town's environmental protection department, Milan Borna, said: "The full extent of the damage will show in coming years".
Oil leaks
"We fear that the worst effects may be degenerative changes in future generations."
The UN experts have gone to Novi Sad to assess the damage caused by the bombing of the refinery.
They are taking samples, seeing how much of the oil was burnt, and trying to judge how much leaked into the groundwater.
Some of them are to return to Pancevo on 25 July for further investigations there. They are working with a similar team of experts, the Focus group, sent by the governments of Switzerland, Austria, Greece and Russia.
A Unep spokesman, Robert Bisset, said the BTF team was getting all the co-operation it needed from the Serb authorities.
"We ourselves decide where we want to go", he told BBC News Online. "And wherever it is we decide on, the Serbs are giving us full access."
Mr Haavisto is expected to brief journalists in Belgrade on 27 July, shortly before the team ends its field work.
---
Greens mock nuclear fuel firm's plans
Inside Sellafield: Will the Mox plant prove a saviour, or a liability?
July 23, 1999 BBC Sci/Tech
By Environment Correspondent Alex Kirby
http://news2.thls.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid%5F402000/402205.stm
Plans by the state-owned British Nuclear Fuels Ltd (BNFL) to produce a new form of reactor fuel have been derided by Friends of the Earth (FoE).
BNFL is awaiting a UK Government go-ahead to commission a plant producing commercial quantities of the new Mox (mixed plutonium/uranium oxide) fuel.
Some 10% of the fuel is plutonium, and there are fears that it could fairly easily be used for making nuclear weapons.
Forecasts questioned
BNFL denies this, and says the plant - at Sellafield in Cumbria, north-west England - would be both safe and profitable. But FoE have published a report written for the group by three independent experts.
They are Mike Sadnicki and Fred Barker (members of the government's Radioactive Waste Management Advisory Committee) and Gordon MacKerron, head of the energy programme at the Science Policy Research Unit, University of Sussex.
All three wrote the report - "Analysis of the Economic Case for the Sellafield MOX Plant" - in their personal capacities.
The report says the plant's likely scale of losses "would make the sale of BNFL shares, recently announced by the government, unattractive to any intelligent investor".
In June, ministers said they thought the plant could make a profit of at least £100m and pay for all its decommissioning and clean-up costs.
The authors used the methodology and model chosen by the PA Consulting Group, commissioned by the Environment Agency, to assess the economic case for the plant.
Few contracts so far
PA said BNFL would need to secure contracts representing 30% to 40% of its "reference case" (the amount of work it hopes to attract) for the plant to break even and pay all its costs.
So far, FoE say, contracts for 6.7% of the reference case have been signed.
The report says BNFL would have to charge around £2,000 a kilogram for the fuel to break even at 30-40% of the reference case - significantly more than the French reprocessor, COGEMA, charges.
But if BNFL brought the price down to £750 per kg, "it could not break even at 150% of its reference case".
To make the forecast profit of £100m, it would have to charge £1,250 per kg, and achieve 90%.
The report estimates that BNFL has:
A 36% chance of breaking even with the new plant A 15% chance of making a profit of £100m or more A 5% chance of making a profit of £230m or more
FoE says the report shows that ministers "have no rational basis for sanctioning the full operation of the MOX plant". BNFL said it had not seen the report and could not comment in detail.
But it said the PA Consulting Group had confirmed that the economic case for the plant was "strongly positive".
---
Environmental Exposure Report:
Depleted Uranium in the Gulf
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/du/
The Office of the Special Assistant for Gulf War Illnesses is reporting on what we know today about specific events that took place during the Gulf War of 1990 and 1991. This particular report focuses on the use of, and exposures to, depleted uranium (DU). This is an interim report, not a final report. We hope that you will read this and contact us with any information that would help us better understand the events reported here. With your help, we will be able to report more accurately on the events surrounding DU use and exposures. Please contact my office to report any new information by calling:
1-800-472-6719
Bernard Rostker Special Assistant for Gulf War Illnesses Department of Defense
1998190-0000036
Last Update: July 31, 1998
Many veterans of the Gulf War have been experiencing a variety of physical symptoms, collectively called Gulf War illnesses. In response to veterans' concerns, the Department of Defense (DoD) established a task force in June 1995 to investigate all possible causes. The Investigation and Analysis Directorate (IAD) of the Office of the Special Assistant for Gulf War Illnesses (OSAGWI) assumed responsibility for these investigations on November 12, 1996, and has continued to investigate depleted uranium. Its interim report is contained here.
As part of the effort to inform the public about the progress of this effort, DoD is publishing (on the Internet and elsewhere) accounts related to possible causes of illnesses among Gulf War veterans, along with whatever documentary evidence or personal testimony was used in compiling the accounts. The report that follows is such an account.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
I. OVERVIEW
II. DEPLETED URANIUM - A SHORT COURSE A. Health Effects from the Chemical Toxicity of Depleted Uranium 1. Chemical Properties of DU 2. Chemical Effects 3. Chemical Toxicity Standards 4. Implications for the Military B. Health Effects From the Radiological Toxicity of Depleted Uranium 1. Radiological Properties of DU 2. Radiological Effects 3. Radiological Protection Standard and Guidelines 4. Implications for the Military III. ASSESSMENT OF POTENTIAL HEALTH EFFECTS FROM DU USE IN THE GULF THEATER, 1990-1991 A. Overview of Participants in Exposure Scenarios B. Level I Exposures (Friendly Fire) 1. Soldiers in Vehicle On Impact a. Summary of Activities b. Hazard Identification c. Assessment of Health Effects 2. Soldiers Entering Vehicles Immediately After Impact a. Summary of Activities b. Hazard Identification c. Assessment of Health Effects C. Level II Exposures D. Level III Exposures E. Other Activities Under Investigation But Not Yet Categorized 1. Welders 2. Reported Ammo Truck Explosion 3. Airmen Responding to A-10 Crash 4. "Hot Gun" Response for A-10 Aircraft IV. FOLLOW-UP A. Environmental Assessments B. Developmental Testing and Evaluation of DU Munitions - Post Gulf War C. DoD and VA Medical Surveillance Program for Gulf War Veterans 1. Identification and Notification of Gulf War Veterans with Potential DU Exposures 2. DoD and VA Medical Evaluation Program for Gulf War Veterans with Potential DU Exposures D. Postwar Research
V. LESSONS LEARNED AND RECOMMENDATIONS A. Improvments in Training and Awareness B. Developing Medically and Operationally Appropriate Guidance C. Timely, Effective Dissemination of Information D. Responsive Support to Tactical Ground Units E. Clear and Unambiguous Division of Responsibility F. Collection and Reporting of Survey and Monitoring Results G. Equipment H. Medical
VI. CONCLUSION
TAB A - List of Acronyms/Glossary
TAB B - Units Involved
TAB C - Properties and Characteristics of DU
TAB D - Methodology
TAB E - Development of DU Munitions
TAB F - DU Use in the Gulf
TAB G - DU Exposures in the Gulf
TAB H - Friendly Fire Incident Descriptions
TAB I - The Camp Doha Explosion/Fires (July 1991)
TAB J - Accidental Tank Fires
TAB K - DU Notification and Medical Follow-up Program
TAB L - Research Report Summaries
TAB M - Characterizing DU Aerosols
TAB N - Summary of Health Estimates
TAB O - Guidance for Protecting Troops
TAB P - Bibliography
END NOTES
---
Topics of Interest and Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
This is a consolidated listing of Frequently Asked Questions and reports, information papers and studies and analyses available on GulfLINK for major topics that may be of interest to you. The major headings are Frequently Asked Questions and the sub-topics are listings of other related information for a particular topic. In addition, please use our Search engines to review news articles and the Declassified Documents that may pertain to these topics.
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/faq.html
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/search
Anthrax Vaccination Program
http://www.defenselink.mil/specials/Anthrax/
Biological Warfare and Detection Capabilities
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/faq_biologic_5jun.htm
The Fox NBC Reconnaisance Vehicle, July 29, 1997
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/foxnbc
Case Narrative Methodology
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/faq_casenarratives_092697.htm
See Narrative Index for Complete Listing of Case Narratives
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/narr_index.html
CCEP/Hotline: registration and usage
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/faq_ccep10jun.htm
Where to Get Help
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/vets.html
VA's Guide to Gulf War Veterans Health, March, 1998
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/va_health.html#page13
Contagious
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/faq_contagio.htm
Medical Information
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/medical/
Depleted Uranium
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/faq_17apr.htm
Complete Depleted Uranium Information Page
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/du_index.htm
Environmental Exposure Reports
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/faq_environmental_120898.html
Force Protection
http://www.defenselink.mil/other_info/protection.html
Worldwide Chemical Conference, June 25, 1998
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/chemspch_062598.html
Anthrax Vaccination Program
http://www.defenselink.mil/other_info/protection.html#Anthrax
Goldenhar Syndrome Study
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/faq_goldenhar_120397.html
Department of Defense Goldenhar Syndrome Study Published
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Dec1997/b12011997_bt644-97.html
Khamisiyah
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/khamisiyah_index.html
Medical Records
New Program Helps Veterans Find Medical Records
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/news/na_medrecord_080498.html
Mortality Among Gulf War Veterans
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/faq_mortality_082498.html
Pyridostigmine Bromide
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/faq_pb_081998.html
Seabee Documents
http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/seabee
---
DEPLETED URANIUM FACT SHEET (July 31 1998) http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/du/du_factsheet_4aug98.html
What is Uranium?
Uranium is a weakly radioactive element that occurs naturally in the environment. Each of us ingests and inhales natural uranium every day from the natural uranium in our air, water, and soil. The amount varies depending upon the natural levels found in the area you live and the levels found in the areas where the food you eat and the water you drink are produced. Consequently, each of us has some level of uranium in our body, which is eliminated in the urine. In areas where the natural uranium level in the soil or water is high, these levels can be substantially higher.
Enriched uranium (uranium that is more radioactive than natural uranium) is used in nuclear power reactors and very highly enriched uranium is used in some nuclear weapons.
What is Depleted Uranium?
Depleted uranium (sometimes known as DU) is uranium that is 40% less radioactive than natural uranium, while retaining identical chemical properties.
The United States Armed Forces used depleted uranium munitions and armor for the first time during the Gulf War. Depleted uranium's ability to protect our soldiers' lives was clearly demonstrated. Depleted uranium is the most effective material for these uses because of its high density and the metallic properties that allow it to "self-sharpen" as it penetrates armor. In contrast, antitank munitions made from other materials (tungsten compounds) tend to mushroom and become blunt as they penetrate. Armor containing depleted uranium is very effective at blunting antitank weapons.
What are the health effects of Depleted Uranium?
The major health concerns about DU relate to its chemical properties as a heavy metal rather than to its radioactivity, which is very low. As with all chemicals, the hazard depends mainly upon the amount taken into the body. It has been recognized that natural uranium at high doses has caused kidney damage. The greatest potential for medically significant DU exposure occurred with those veterans who were in or on tanks and other armored vehicles when the vehicles were hit by DU munitions and in veterans who worked in or on US vehicles or sites contaminated with DU.
Since 1993, the Department of Veterans Affairs has been monitoring 33 vets who were seriously injured in friendly fire incidents involving depleted uranium. These veterans are being monitored at the Baltimore VA Medical Center. Many of these veterans continue to have medical problems, especially problems relating to the physical injuries they received during friendly fire incidents. About half of this group still have depleted uranium metal fragments in their bodies. Those with retained metal fragments have shown higher than normal levels of uranium in their urine since monitoring began in 1993. These veterans are being followed very carefully and a number of different medical tests are being done to determine if the depleted uranium fragments are causing any health problems. The veterans being followed who were in friendly fire incidents but who do not have retained depleted uranium fragments, generally speaking, have not shown higher than normal levels of uranium in their urine.
For the 33 veterans in the program, tests for kidney function have all been normal. In addition, the reproductive health of this group appears to be normal in that all babies fathered by these veterans between 1991 and 1997 had no birth defects.
What new program on DU is available?
As part of follow-up efforts to ensure that Gulf War veterans who may have had the highest exposure to DU receive appropriate evaluation and follow-up, DoD and VA have instituted a new program to identify, contact, and evaluate the veterans who are believed to have had the greatest risk of coming into contact with DU. This would include veterans who were riding in or on a vehicle that was struck by DU munitions or veterans who entered a struck vehicle immediately after it was hit by DU munitions.
What does this involve if I agree to participate?
If you are on active duty and not enrolled in the Comprehensive Clinical Evaluation Program (CCEP) or if your CCEP examination is over 1 year old, you will receive the standard CCEP evaluation. If your CCEP evaluation is less than 1 year old, your physician will decide what evaluations are clinically required.
All participants will be asked to fill out a brief questionnaire relating to possible exposure to depleted uranium during the Gulf War. In addition, all participants will be asked to provide a 24-hour urine sample - you will be provided a container in which you will collect all of your urine for one day. This urine sample will be analyzed for the presence of uranium.
If you are no longer on active duty, you may enroll in the Gulf War Registry Examination Program at any VA Medical Center. You will be asked to fill out a brief DU questionnaire and provide a 24-hour urine sample for uranium and get a medical examination if you have not already had one or wish to be re-examined.
What does a negative-urine mean?
It is good news. It means that the level of uranium in your body now is no higher than would be expected from normal intake from natural sources (food, water, and air). It does not mean you were never exposed to DU. It simply means that you have a normal level of uranium in your body now.
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Activists Push Y2K Nuclear Pause
By Jim Wolf, September 17 2:42 AM ET
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/19990917/tc/yk_nuclear_9.html
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Environmentalists and arms control activists call it a modest proposal -- a kind of Year 2000 insurance policy for the world.
Power down the 433 nuclear reactors worldwide. De-alert the 5,000 nuclear-tipped missiles that the United States and Russia keep on hair-trigger status.
In a word, observe a year-end, 48-hour atomic ``holiday'' to avoid the remote possibility of nuclear disaster during the technology-challenging year 2000 rollover.
``It could be a matter of life and death,'' said Yumi Kikuchi, coordinator of a growing international grassroots campaign for a ``World Atomic Safety Holiday, or Y2K WASH.
Speaking at a news conference Thursday, Kikuchi and fellow activists ticked off reasons for a ``managed phase-down'' of reactors to standby, to be completed by Dec. 30.
``Rather than risk potentially catastrophic malfunctions with nuclear weapons and at nuclear facilities because of the Y2K problem, just give them the weekend off,'' said Michael Mariotte, executive director of Nuclear Information and Resource Service, a watchdog group in Washington.
``It's a no-brainer,'' added John Steinbach, co-author of Deadly Nuclear Radiation Hazards USA. ``It's like insurance.''
The movement for a year-end pause in atomic business as usual began in Japan, where 52 highly automated nuclear reactors dot a landscape the size of California.
Kikuchi, a 37-year-old concert flutist and mother of two, said petition drives were getting under way in Japan and the 30-odd other countries with nuclear power infrastructure.
Backers of the move argue that the United States should lead the way not because it is particularly vulnerable to Y2K-related disruptions of its 103 reactors, but because it would set a precedent for countries that are.
``Ukraine, Russia, Japan, China, India -- these are all countries that may face severe Y2K difficulties,'' said Mariotte, who faults the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission's Y2K readiness standards for plant operators here.
Kikuchi and a fellow Tokyo-based activist, Gen Morita, were given a chance to deliver their message Thursday afternoon to staff members of the special Senate Committee on the Y2K glitch.
``It's an initial meeting. We'll hear what they have to say,'' said Don Meyer, a spokesman for the bipartisan panel headed by Utah Republican Robert Bennett and Connecticut Democrat Christopher Dodd.
Meyer said the committee was concerned about nuclear safety during the century change, when the Y2K coding glitch could cause ill-prepared computers to crash.
But he said the panel was wary of any group using Y2K fears to push an unrelated agenda such as anti-nuclear power or nuclear disarmament, which fall outside its mandate.
The nuclear holiday campaigners say reactors are at risk because they typically depend on offsite power to run their safety systems. The State Department said Tuesday that Russia and Ukraine were among countries whose power grids could be knocked out by the Y2K glitch.
In one of 196 updated consular information sheets designed to alert U.S. travelers of risks, the State Department said Ukraine, home of the world's worst nuclear reactor accident in 1986 at Chernobyl, seems ``unprepared to deal with the Y2K problem.''
The British Foreign Office, in its Y2K advisories Tuesday, advised against all ``nonessential travel'' to Ukraine over the new year and early January ``until the situation becomes clearer.''
Next week, Kikuchi and fellow activists are taking their campaign to Berlin, where the G-8 industrialized powers will meet to discuss Y2K contingency planning.
She is prepared with an answer to any suggestion that Ukraine, Russia or any other country is too dependent on nuclear power to switch it off during the rollover.
``Which is better?,'' she says, ``to have radioactivity all over the place -- or to be freezing for a day. You have a choice.''
The United States and Russia agreed Monday to jointly staff a temporary military post in Colorado to watch for any Y2K-related false-missile alarms. But no move was announced toward taking missiles off hair-trigger alert.
The shared Center for Strategic Stability and Y2K ``will reduce the chance that a turn-of-the-millennium computer error will create an end-of-the-year security incident,'' Defense Secretary William Cohen said.
Earlier Stories
NRC Says 28 U.S. Nuclear Reactors Still Need Y2k Fix (September 8)
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/19990908/tc/yk_nuclear_3.html
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Computer amateur discovers Y2K bug solution
By JUDY SIEGEL Jerusalem Post, September 15, 1999
http://www.jpost.com/com/Archive/15.Sep.1999/News/Article-0.html
JERUSALEM (September 15) - A computer amateur, who took a six-month programming course 27 years ago and has since learned applications during his IDF reserve duty, has found a solution to the Y2K computer bug that is applicable to all databases.
The revolutionary solution, for which patents have been applied in the US, compresses four digits for the 21st century into two symbols, without interfering with any years from the 20th century. It accomplishes this by using special algorithms for expanding two symbols into four digits and compressing four digits into two symbols.
The achievement belongs to Ben-Etzion Yaron, head of manpower and payroll in the Hebrew University's department of computerized information systems. It has already proven itself in checking for and fixing computer bugs in the department's listing of faculty sabbaticals scheduled for the 21st century.
Yaron received a Kaye Prize for Innovation from the HU last June for a program that identifies the bugs in programs running only on VAX computers. Realizing that this limitation would restrict the use of his invention, he worked day and night over the past two months to expand the application to all computers and computer languages. The only Y2K bugs it cannot fix, he said, are those in computer components embedded in equipment, such as medical devices.
The result of his work is Sapir 2000, which makes possible the analysis of computer programs written in COBOL, used in the 1970s and '80s for databases that its developers thought would be abandoned by the end of the century but remained, with repairs over the years, to cause the Y2K bug.
Yaron's invention can even identify errors in other programs that have already been revamped to cope with Y2K and make corrections, thus providing a kind of "second opinion" to ensure that chaos does not ensue after January 1. Sapir 2000 can also be applied to other situations requiring expansion of existing information to incorporate additional digits.
It is estimated that the time needed by Yaron's program to make databases compatible with the next century is 15 percent-20% of the time required using other solutions.
Yaron said his program would not become obsolete after January 1. Many programming errors will appear for years afterward, he explained, "and Sapir 2000 is extremely flexible so it will deal with problems that we can't even realize today."
HU vice president and director-general Moshe Vigdor said that the university's research and development arm, Yissum, has signed a contract with Magic Software Enterprises, an international firm that supplies computerized solutions for companies.
Magic's local subsidiary is MSE-Israel, whose president and CEO Jack Dunietz and managing director Oren Inbar were present at yesterday's unveiling of Sapir 2000. MSE-Israel will initially market and distribute the new product in Israel and, if all goes well, the product will be sold worldwide, mainly via the Internet.
Inbar said that potential customers may ask MSE-Israel to convert parts of programs on a trial basis free and pay only if they are satisfied and want more work done. MSE-Israel has decided to donate $100,000 worth of development kits, study material, lectures, and consultancies to HU to promote advancement of students at its new School of Engineering and Computer Sciences, which is due to open its academic year next month on the Givat Ram campus.
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British protester gets seven years in prison
USA Today, September 17, 1999 "World"
http://usatoday.com/news/world/nw1.htm Photo: http://usatoday.com/news/photos/17goldwyn.jpg
YANGON, Myanmar - Last week, Rachel Goldwyn, a 28-year-old Londoner, chained herself to a lampost and shouted pro-democracy slogans in this capital city of Mynmar, also known as Burma. On Thursday, at a court proceeding with no defense witnesses, she learned the price of her actions - seven years in prison. Her family is shocked. ''I just couldn't believe it,'' says mother Charmian Goldwyn. ''We all cry, and then cry again all the time.'' Prosecutors for the Asian country say the protest drew 1,000 onlookers. Two weeks ago another Brit, James Mawdsley, got 17 years' imprisonment for entering Myanmar illegally and carrying anti-government literature.
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Peru's Rights Record
Related Articles How to Save Democracy: Throw Away Liberty (Sept. 12, 1999)
New York Times Letters, September 17, 1999
http://www.nytimes.com/library/review/091299peru-democracy-review.html
http://www.nytimes.com/yr/mo/day/letters/lberen.html
To the Editor:
Peru must be held accountable to international law and its multilateral commitments if it wants to be recognized as a responsible country by the world community, even if the Peruvian public does not find this important (Week in Review, Sept. 12). Peru's withdrawal from the Inter-American Human Rights Court is an act that must be deemed unacceptable. This affects us personally.
Our daughter, Lori Berenson, has been incarcerated for nearly four years, convicted for "treason" by a secret military tribunal, which provided no due process. Peru's withdrawal from the court leaves Lori's case in limbo and precludes our daughter from ever receiving justice or public vindication. We had expected that her case would be heard this fall.
RHODA BERENSON MARK BERENSON New York, Sept. 14, 1999
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WORLD In Brief - Russia/Japan, Chernobyl
Friday, September 17, 1999; Page A18
http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-09/17/027l-091799-idx.html
Russian Ship Visits Japanese Military Port
TOKYO--A Russian navy destroyer visited a Japanese military port in what officials said was apparently the first such visit this century.
The 6,700-ton Admiral Panteleyev entered port at Japan's fleet headquarters in Yokosuka, about 30 miles southwest of Tokyo. It is on a five-day visit for friendly exchanges and a joint exercise with a Japanese destroyer....
New Nuclear Waste Plant for Chernobyl
KIEV, Ukraine--Ukraine and a consortium of Belgian, French and Italian firms signed a deal to build a nuclear waste processing facility at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant.
The $122 million contract, to be financed by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, was signed in Kiev by Ukraine's state nuclear energy company Energoatom and Belgium's Belgatom, France's SGN and Italy's Ansaldo.
The deal is a key part of the 1996 agreement between the former Soviet republic and the EBRD on improving safety at Chernobyl. The plant became infamous in 1986 after its No. 4 reactor exploded, spewing radiation over large parts of Europe.
QUOTE OF THE DAY
"We must strangle the vermin at the root."
-- Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin,
on how terrorists must be dealt with in the wake of a string of bombings. -- Page A22
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Chernobyl Nuclear Waste Deal Signed
Thursday, September 16, 1999; 12:19 p.m. EDT
http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WAPO/19990916/V000130-091699-idx.html
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/19990916/wl/ukraine_chernobyl_1.html
KIEV, Ukraine (AP) -- Ukraine and a consortium of Belgian, French and Italian firms signed a deal Thursday to build a nuclear waste processing facility at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant.
The $122 million contract, to be financed by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, was signed in Kiev by Ukraine's state nuclear energy company Energoatom and Belgium's Belgatom, France's SGN and Italy's Ansaldo.
The deal is a key part of the 1996 agreement between the former Soviet republic and the EBRD on improving safety at Chernobyl. The plant became infamous in 1986 after its No. 4 reactor exploded, spewing radiation over large parts of Europe.
Ukraine, at the West's urging, has pledged to close down the troubled facility by 2000, but wants outside financial help to complete the lengthy procedure of removing nuclear fuel and turning the plant into an environmentally safe zone.
Two of Chernobyl's four Soviet-designed RBMK reactors have already been shut down, leaving only one reactor in operation.
The nuclear waste facility, to be completed at the end of 2001, will have the capacity to process 87,500 cubic feet of liquid nuclear waste annually.
Some 472,500 cubic feet of waste has accumulated in Chernobyl over the 21 years of the plant's operation, Chernobyl officials said.
The 1996 deal with the EBRD calls for $758 million in repairs on the concrete-and-steel shelter that covers the destroyed reactor No. 4.
It also calls for other safety projects, including construction of the waste processing plant and of a waste depository that was launched earlier this year.
Ukraine has also demanded more than $1 billion to complete two new nuclear reactors to compensate for the loss of power that would result from Chernobyl's closure.
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West to build Chernobyl radioactive waste plant
09:56 a.m. Sep 16, 1999 Eastern
By Pavel Polityuk
http://www.dogpile.com - search Infoseek
KIEV, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Several European firms will build a plant in Ukraine to process and store radioactive waste from the Chernobyl nuclear power station, site of the world's worst nuclear accident, officials said on Thursday.
The head of Ukraine's state-run company Energoatom Myrkol Dudchenko said the 17.4 million euro ($18 million) contract signed in Kiev on Thursday, would help the country to carry out its promise and shut the Chernobyl station.
Under the contract a consortium formed by Belgium's Belgatom, Italy's Ansaldo Nucleare and France's SGN undertook to build facilities for around 23,000 cubic metres of Chernobyl's liquid radioactive waste by 2001.
``The start of construction works is a step towards a timely closure of the Chernobyl station,'' Dudchenko told a news conference. ``It shows that the West fulfils its promise to help close the station,'' he said.
The construction is financed by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development under an international assistance programme designed to boost safety of nuclear power sites in eastern Europe.
``This contract is a real challenge for us and we can assure you that we will do our best for your satisfaction,'' said Marcel Gaube of Belgatom, adding that the three companies had been involved in similar programmes in Central and Eastern Europe.
Chernobyl's reactor number four exploded in April 1986, spewing a poisonous cloud of radioactive dust over Ukraine, Belarus, Russia and Western European countries in the world's worst civilian nuclear disaster.
The disaster-prone station is now run on one reactor after one reactor was switched off after a fire in 1991 and another one closed down in 1997 after exhausting its safe lifespan.
Ukraine had initially promised to close down Chernobyl in 2000 in exchange for foreign aid to complete two replacement reactors. But it has dragged its feet on closing the station, blaming the West for failing to provide the promised funds.
It is not clear when Chernobyl could be finally shut.
Earlier this year, three French companies signed a contract with Energoatom to construct an interim storage for nuclear waste at Chernobyl, worth 69 million euro ($72 million). The storage should be completed by 2003.
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Chernobyl ready for Y2K - official
11:26 a.m. Sep 16, 1999 Eastern
http://www.dogpile.com - search Infoseek
KIEV, Sept 16 (Reuters) - The millennium bug will not paralyse work at Ukraine's Chernobyl nuclear plant, site of the world's worst nuclear disaster, the station's director Vitaly Tovstonohov said on Thursday.
``We were working together with experts of the International Atomic Energy Agency and the Chernobyl nuclear power plant is ready for the year 2000,'' Tovstonohov told a news conference.
Tovstonohov said engineers would simulate the Y2K problem during a temporary shut-down of Chernobyl's only operating reactor in early October to test its safety.
The United States advised Americans on Tuesday that they could experience difficulties in other countries including Ukraine because of the Year 2000 computer problem.
The State Department said Kiev was ``unprepared'' and likely to experience problems in all sectors reliant on computers.
The Chernobyl nuclear power plant exploded in 1986, sending clouds of radioactive dust over Russia, Ukraine and Belarus and other parts of Europe.
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Bomb Series Toll Near 300, Heat On Russia PM
By Martin Nesirky,September 16 1999
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/19990916/ts/russia_blast_32.html
MOSCOW (Reuters) - A truck bomb exploded outside an apartment block near a dam and an unfinished nuclear plant in Russia Thursday, killing 17 people in the third attack in a week and putting more pressure on Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.
``A man drove up around 6 a.m. (0200 GMT),'' regional Interior Ministry spokesman Dmitry Nevzorov said by telephone. ''He left the vehicle and about 15 minutes later it blew up.''
No one claimed responsibility for the blast in the southern town of Volgodonsk, which left a huge crater filled with murky water and ripped the facade off a nine-story block that was home to more than 400 people. Dozens of people were injured.
Russian officials blamed earlier attacks on Chechen-backed Muslim rebels who have been fighting Russian forces in the North Caucasus region of Dagestan. Chechnya denies involvement.
For their part, the Kremlin and the FSB domestic intelligence agency denied reports security forces themselves might be to blame for explosions in which nearly 300 have died.
``Here we are up against obvious wickedness,'' Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Yakushkin said in a statement on the reports.
The FSB said the media reports, including one in the Moskovsky Komsomolyets daily which said the aim was to provoke a state of emergency and cancel elections, were lies.
BOMBS LEAD TO POLITICAL SPECULATION
Political speculation mounted in Moscow -- where conspiracy theories abound -- that President Boris Yeltsin could be about to ditch his favored successor Putin for failing to halt the violence. Equally unsubstantiated rumors said it was Yeltsin who could be about to go.
The Kremlin has dismissed such talk. Putin simply told his cabinet to work harder and signed an order boosting security.
``I urge you not to dither or panic but to grit your teeth,'' he told the cabinet after meeting Yeltsin. ``I'm calling on you to be more disciplined and vigilant, in deeds not words.''
FSB spokesman Alexander Zdanovich said the latest blast was being treated as a ``terrorist act,'' like the others.
An Emergencies Ministry spokesman said 17 people had been killed in the explosion, two of them children. Sixty-nine people were taken to hospital, 20 of them seriously injured.
NEW SCENES OF DESTRUCTION ON RUSSIAN TV
Television pictures from Volgodonsk, 1,200 km (750 miles) south of Moscow, showed rescuers scrambling over rubble to retrieve mangled bodies on improvised blanket stretchers.
A set of bathroom scales lay among the ruins and a radiator hung precariously from one flat. The facade was missing from a large section of the prefabricated building.
Volgodonsk was founded for workers building a Stalin-era hydro-electric plant and dam. It later grew to a town of 180,000 after a factory opened to build nuclear equipment. An unfinished atomic station stands 13 km (eight miles) from the blast site.
``The plant was, as the specialists say, 90 percent finished but the block is now mothballed,'' an atomic energy spokesman said. ``There has never been nuclear fuel at the station.''
Officials told Reuters the nearby dam was well guarded.
Moscow was hit by two devastating bombs, one Monday which killed 118 people and the other a week ago which killed 94.
A bomb in Buynaksk in Dagestan killed 64 on September 4. A woman died after a smaller Moscow explosion on August 31.
Nevzorov, speaking from the regional center Rostov-on-Don, said the Volgodonsk block had been checked Wednesday as part of a nationwide security operation dubbed ``Operation Whirlwind.''
SOME SAY BOMB CAMPAIGN TO BE LONG
It was not clear why Volgodonsk was chosen as a target but Monday Russian journalist Vyacheslav Izmailov said a Chechen-led band composed mainly of ethnic Slavs had been formed and sent to Moscow, St Petersburg, Dagestan -- and Rostov.
Yeltsin ordered ``Operation Whirlwind'' across Russia following the earlier attacks, which spread near-panic through the population, particularly in Moscow. He said Russia had the will and means to eradicate terrorism.
But Boris Berezovsky, an influential businessman, took a different view at a news conference denying he had had dealings with Chechen officials. He said the bombings would go on.
``The Rubicon has been crossed,'' RIA news agency quoted him as saying. ``The fighters have nothing to lose and we have nothing to oppose them with.''
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Yeltsin Urged to Get Tough on Crime
By Barry Schweid AP Diplomatic Writer Thursday, September 16, 1999; 4:27 p.m. EDT
http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WAPO/19990916/V000333-091699-idx.html
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Secretary of State Madeleine Albright urged Russian President Boris Yeltsin on Thursday to ``get tough on corruption'' and to cooperate with investigators no matter where the evidence leads.
Freedom and free enterprise are competing with corruption and crime, making Russia's future uncertain, Albright said in a major foreign policy speech.
Though pledging the United States would continue to support democracy in Russia, and threatening no reduction in economic support, Albright said bluntly: ``The deadweight of corruption is holding Russia back.''
Foreign investors now hesitate, capital has taken flight, the influential few have distorted Russian markets and the economy has sagged, she said in a speech at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
Foreign funds should be used to help the neediest Russians, not to enrich foreign bank accounts, Albright said. ``President Yeltsin's government needs -- at last -- to make fighting corruption a priority,'' she said. ``The Russian legal system remains no match for well-connected criminals, and the tentacles of Russian organized crime have spread far beyond the nation's borders.''
The lecture, coming as it did from a leading figure in a friendly administration, reflects growing suspicions in the United States about how Western assistance is used in Russia.
The House and Senate are planning hearings on money-laundering and other schemes, and in Moscow suspended prosecutor Yuri Skuratov said the Russian government may have mishandled a $4.8 billion foreign loan by sending most of it to well-connected banks.
Skuratov, who was suspended by Yeltsin in April, said the Russian government made most of the July 1998 loan available to at least 18 Russian banks.
The International Monetary Fund has come under criticism from Congress for not demanding stricter accounting by Russia of the $20 billion it has lent since 1992. IMF officials have said previously that its own review of Russia, conducted by the PricewaterhouseCoopers accounting firm, uncovered no evidence that IMF funds had been improperly diverted.
A senior IMF official said Thursday that his agency so far has uncovered nothing to change the findings of the independent audit.
Meanwhile, Viktor Ivanov, a Russian investigator who was visiting Washington, said Thursday that the United States had not provided his government with any evidence of a money laundering scheme at the Bank of New York.
Allegations of money laundering are at the heart of the corruption allegations. Billions of dollars have flowed through several suspicious accounts at the Bank of New York.
Ivanov, deputy director of the Federal Security Service, heads Russian delegation that is in Washington this week for meetings with U.S. officials.
Albright, meanwhile, has conferred by telephone with Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov and plans to meet with him in New York on Monday while Ivanov attends the special session of the U.N. General Assembly.
The foreign minister criticized the reporting by the Western media and said he would present Russia's defense at the U.N.
Russian authorities have agreed to cooperate with the United States and other Western countries, but have mostly called on Western countries to provide proof of any wrongdoing.
``The problem is real and must be taken seriously,'' Albright said. ``Our message to Russian leaders has been to get tough on corruption and to cooperate, in full, with investigations into it.''
She declined to say whether the administration suspected any U.S. or other Western assistance was misused or whether the Yeltsin government was involved. ``We are in the process of having the fullest possible investigation,'' she said.
Albright dismissed any notion of halting cooperation with Russia along a broad spectrum, including efforts to reduce nuclear arsenals and to curb the proliferation of dangerous technology.
``The suggestion made by some that Russia is ours to lose is arrogant,'' she said. ``The suggestion that Russia is lost is simply wrong.''
The task of political and economic reform in the former Soviet Union is herculean but not hopeless, she said. ``It is grounds for encouragement that the Russian people have, at every opportunity, made clear their rejection both of the Soviet past and a dictatorial future.''
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Syrian super Scud ready soon - source
By ARIEH O'SULLIVAN, Jerusalem Post, September 15, 1999
http://www.jpost.com/com/Archive/15.Sep.1999/News/Article-2.html
TEL AVIV (September 15) - Syria is sparing no expense in developing a new longer-range, surface-to-surface missile that will put all of Israel in range, Israeli sources said. The new missile, a derivative of the Scud C, is expected to be ready in six months to a year.
The missile program tops Syria's military priorities, and Damascus is receiving close aid from Iran to develop the rockets. Once deployed, the missiles could be tipped with non-conventional warheads and would be able to strike at Israel from deep inside Syrian territory.
"It is a constant effort to advance and develop their surface-to-surface missiles, and they are reaching better capabilities all the time," said one source.
Damascus is pumping in money to the project despite its difficult financial situation. The project's funds are "unlimited," Israeli sources said.
The Scud C has a range of 500 kilometers and is manufactured in Syria with know-how from North Korea. Syria has long had the capability of arming its missiles with chemical warheads and is working on biological warheads, one source said.
In addition to this, Syria is reinforcing its missile silos and taking other steps to protect its missile launchers from attack.
Regarding the Syrian military, the source said that its army is the only one in the region which is training to carry out a surprise attack.
While some senior IDF commanders dismiss the Syrian forces as a paper army with outdated weaponry, the intelligence assessment is that it is "not on the skids" and could definitely "make us bleed."
"It is blindness to think that any conflict with Syria would be a morning stroll," one source said.
Still, the assessment is that, despite its intensive offensive training, Syria is not about to launch an attack.
Sources also said that Iran is at a "very advanced" stage in the development of its Shihab 3 surface-to-surface missile. The two-stage missile is based on the North Korean No-Dong, but its design and subsystems were changed by Russian contractors. It has a 1,300-km. range, which puts Israel into its striking distance. It is not clear whether the Shihab 3 would be able to carry a nuclear warhead.
Iran has given top priority to the development of a surface-to-surface missile known as the Kosar, which has a 4,000-km. range. The Russians are also helping Iran develop this missile, which would most likely be able to carry a nuclear warhead.
The sources said that if Russian aid is halted, Iran will still be able to complete its longer-range missile systems, but it will take more time. That would be to Israel's benefit, they said, since it would have more time to improve its anti-missile defenses.
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Black diamonds may be radioactive -Antwerp police
September 16, 1:21 pm Eastern Time
http://biz.yahoo.com/rf/990916/00.html
BRUSSELS, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Russian so-called businessmen may have sold radioactive gemstones on the black market in Europe's diamond capital, Antwerp, the city's judicial authorities warned on Thursday.
They said the Russians had offered a consignment of black diamonds to the official Antwerp diamond exchange recently, asking some $74 million for them.
They were turned down after an inspection of photographs of the gems which they produced and after certificates showing the diamonds came from California, Monaco and Paris proved to be false.
A spokeswoman for the public prosecutor's office said it was feared that the stones had been artificially blackened by subjecting them to radioactive Alpha rays, probably in a Russian nuclear power plant.
The authorities feared the Russians had unloaded the gems on the black market, which operates alongside the official exchange in the northern Belgian port city.
``We stress that we have not actually seen these diamonds,'' the spokeswoman said.
But she said the authorities were worried enough to issue an appeal to anyone who suspected they might be in possession of any of the gems concerned to get in touch with them.
The use of Alpha rays to produce black diamonds is a common practice in the industry, but is normally done under strictly controlled conditions to avoid the danger of radioactivity.
Robots May Fight Future Wars: British Expert
11:34 a.m. Sep 16, 1999 Eastern By Bill Rosato
http://www.dogpile.com - search Infoseek
SHEFFIELD, England (Reuters) - Future wars could be fought by robots commanded by humans, a specialist in robotics told Britain's leading science conference Thursday.
Within five years, ``we could withdraw from war completely and let robots shoot it out,'' said John Pretlove, a lecturer at the University of Surrey.
In addition to waging war, a system of integrating virtual reality and the real world could be the key to creating robots that could carry out other hazardous tasks such as mine clearance, undersea exploration and work in radioactive environments, Pretlove said.
``The key to this work is that we are not trying to replace the man mentally but physically. We are trying to use the human for what humans do best,'' said Pretlove, who is also a specialist in robotics for electrical engineering group ABB.
The system of integrating the real and virtual worlds -- augmented reality -- was similar to that used in films such as ''Jurassic Park,'' Pretlove said. It could give humans a better picture of events and would allow them to control robots more effectively from a safe distance.
Remote-control robots using traditional technology such as video cameras have already been developed. For example, a NASA robot called Dante transmitted messages from inside an Alaskan volcano in 1994.
Augmented reality was a step forward after largely unsuccessful efforts to create robots that were intelligent, Pretlove said at the annual British Association Festival of Science.
``In this approach (augmented reality) one doesn't try to replace the human mind with a computer but rather to have the computer and the operator cooperate to achieve what neither could alone,'' Pretlove said.
Computerized teams of robots from five universities played in a volleyball tournament at the science festival Monday, but Pretlove noted the robots tended to pick each other up rather than the ball -- a problem that would not occur if the robots were operated remotely by humans.
``Relations between man and machines will become much more peer to peer. We will come to rely on machines in a different way to how we do now,'' Pretlove said, but ``we will always be able to pull the plug.''
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Yucca Mountain alternative passes
House OKs Berkley amendment on new ways to handle nuclear waste
By Mary Manning <manning@lasvegassun.com> LAS VEGAS SUN, September 16, 1999
http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/nevada/1999/sep/16/509314151.html
An amendment for studying cutting-edge technology to handle highly radioactive wastes at reactor sites, instead of shipping 70,000 tons of it to Yucca Mountain, has passed the House.
Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., offered the amendment Wednesday to the Department of Energy's authorization bill for researching and developing ways to change nuclear waste into something less deadly. It passed on a voice vote.
The DOE is studying Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, as the only site for a national high-level nuclear waste repository. If the site passes scientific muster, the mountain's repository could begin receiving highly radioactive waste from across the country in 2010.
"Today we have a tremendous nuclear waste challenge," Berkley said. "Our response, so far, has been to dig a hole, pour some concrete and put it underground. It defies common sense to think that in 10, 20 or 20,000 years -- or more -- that we can guarantee there will be no leaks."
The amended authorization bill now goes to a joint House-Senate committee to work out differences between the versions.
Berkley's amendment asks for $6 million in the next two years to explore both transmutation and other high-tech solutions to nuclear waste from 111 reactors piling up around the nation.
Transmutation is a scientific process that turns radioactive waste into less harmful materials by changing the basic building blocks of matter. In the past two years, scientists have improved the technology for transmuting nuclear elements at top Department of Energy and university laboratories nationwide.
Berkley also is asking for basic research into technologies more advanced than the DOE is working on.
Norway, France, Russia and China are looking at a miniature form of transmutation, one that would create a machine available to scientists that fits on the top of a laboratory table.
Berkley's amendment also defuses critics of transmutation who fear terrorists or rogue nations could use uranium or plutonium left over in the process to build more nuclear bombs. Her proposal does not allow isolating either uranium or plutonium from the wastes.
The House measure is the latest development between two competing bills on nuclear waste. The House version has been on hold until the Senate takes action on legislation offered by Sen. Frank Murkowski, R-Alaska.
Murkowski's bill allows the Nuclear Regulatory Commission -- not the Environmental Protection Agency -- to set radiation limits on Yucca Mountain.
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Lab Worker Pleads Not Guilty In Attack
California Headlines, September 17, 1999, Yahoo Newswire
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/headlines/local/state/california/story.html?s=v/rs/19990917/ca/index_1.html#7
(SANTA ANA) -- A lab worker pleads not guilty to charges of smearing a radioactive chemical on the chair of a co-worker. Andrew Blakis entered the plea in a Santa Ana court. The incident allegedly occurred at a U-C Irvine research facility. Blakis said he thought Jingtong Zuo had poisoned his work station, so he retaliated. Zuo sat on the chair for about six hours. Doctors say the effects of the poisoning may not show up for years. Blockis is facing up to five years in prison, if convicted.
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Upgraded Patriot Two for Two in Successful Cruise Missile Target Intercepts
September 16, 3:35 pm Eastern Time
http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/990916/nm_raytheo_1.html
WHITE SANDS MISSILE RANGE, N.M.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sept. 16, 1999--Raytheon Company (NYSE:RTNA - news, RTNB - news) has conducted its second successful flight test in two attempts of the Patriot upgrade for anti-cruise missile capability. The Sept.10 test at the White Sands Missile Range, N.M., resulted in a successful intercept of a BQM-74E sub-scale target flying at low altitude to simulate a cruise missile threat. The fire unit used the most current version of Patriot ground equipment and software to support the test. Raytheon?s first test occurred July 19, 1999, and resulted in a successful intercept of an MQM-107 sub-scale target flying at low altitude.
``We are extremely pleased with the continued success of the anti-cruise missile upgrade program for Patriot,'' said Ed Franklin, vice president, Air and Missile Defense Systems, Raytheon Systems Company. ``This upgrade could provide the Army and international users with a potential cost effective alternative to modernize the existing inventory of Patriot missiles and significantly improve the performance of the fielded Patriot weapon system against stressing cruise missiles.''
Raytheon Company, based in Lexington, Mass., is a global technology leader that provides products and services in the areas of commercial and defense electronics, engineering and construction, and business and special mission aircraft. Raytheon has operations throughout the United States and serves customers in more than 80 countries around the world.
Contact:
Raytheon Company Colleen Niccum, 520/794-8565 http://www.raytheon.com
---
U.S. PAC-3 missile shoots down target missile
By Charles Aldinger, September 16, 1999
http://biz.yahoo.com/rf/990916/bbp.html
WASHINGTON, Sept 16 (Reuters) - An advanced Patriot PAC-3 missile hit and destroyed a target rocket high over New Mexico on Thursday in a successful test for the U.S. anti-missile defense program, the Pentagon said.
The PAC-3, an improved version of Patriots used against Iraqi Scud missiles during the Gulf War, tracked and collided with a Hera rocket at the edge of space over White Sands Missile Test Range at 9:26 a.m. EDT (1326 GMT).
It was the second successful high-speed intercept of a Hera by the PAC-3, being developed by Lockheed Martin Corp. (NYSE:LMT - news).
The test program for the new Patriot, which will include another 15 shots at different types of target missiles, is part of a U.S. program to develop defenses against short- and medium-range missiles fired at troops and bases.
The U.S. military, under heavy pressure from Congress, is also working to develop a limited National Missile Defense against long-range nuclear and other missiles which might be fired by a rogue nation at U.S. cities.
Lockheed Martin is the prime contractor on the PAC-3, but Boeing Co. (NYSE:BA - news) makes the ``seeker'' -- which guides the Patriot to a the target -- and Raytheon Co. (NYSE:RTN - news) provides integration for components of the system.
Thursday's successful test followed two successive postponements, one on Aug. 19 because of problems with a target Hera and another in May because of drought conditions and possible fires from flaming debris in a national forest in New Mexico.
To date, the PAC-3 has successfully completed four missions. The first two were development tests with special instrument packages instead of the seeker.
In the most recent test on March 15, a PAC-3 successfully intercepted and destroyed a Hera although an interception was not the prime mission of the test.
At the same time that the advanced Patriot is being developed as part of a theater missile defense, the Pentagon and aerospace firms are conducting costly research on weapons that could result in a limited National Missile Defense to protect U.S. cities from missile attack.
Russia has strongly protested a tentative U.S. plan to base 100 interceptor missiles in Alaska if a limited national defense can be developed.
That plan would violate the 1972 antiballistic missile (ABM) treaty between Moscow and Washington, and the United States is pressing Russia to agree to make some modifications to the treaty to provide for any such deployment.
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Panel Faults Lockheed Martin Corp.
By ALEX DOMINGUEZ Associated Press Writer,
September 8, 1999
http://biz.yahoo.com/apf/990908/lockheed_l_1.html
BALTIMORE (AP) -- An independent review of launch failures that have cost Lockheed Martin Corp. billions of dollars blamed the mishaps on cost-cutting, lack of quality control and the loss of experienced personnel, the defense giant said Wednesday.
``We found too much emphasis on cost. Mission success needs to be reestablished as the most important performance criteria for all employees,'' said A. Thomas Young, the former Martin Marietta and NASA executive who co-chaired the review panel.
Lockheed Martin suffered four launch failures between August 1998 and this April. More than $2 billion in military and private satellites were either destroyed or placed in useless orbits. Boeing (NYSE:BA - news) has also suffered a number of failures, prompting President Clinton to order a separate government investigation into the failures.
Three of the four failures involved Lockheed's Titan IV rockets, and company officials said they were placing special priority on the successful launch of the remaining 11 Titan launches before the model is retired.
Lockheed president and chief operating officer Peter B. Teets said the company has already implemented an incentive plan to retain experienced employees and make sure the remaining Titans ``fly out with 100 percent mission success.''
The Bethesda-based defense giant reported a second-quarter loss of $41 million in July due in part to the satellite failures.
Young found in interviews with Lockheed customers, in many cases government and military officials, that the failures resulted in a loss of confidence in Lockheed's launch ability. Customers had noted many of the problems the panel found, he said.
``I also believe the customer would concur ... that the problems are not only fixable, but readily fixable,'' Young said.
Teets said implementing the changes will not cost the company anything because of the savings they will create.
In response to the launch failures, the company appointed the independent panel, headed by Young and former Vice Chief of Staff of the U.S. Air Force Thomas Moorman.
The panel was charged with examining three sectors within the company's space and strategic missiles sector: Astronautics in Denver; Missiles and Space in Sunnyvale, Calif.; and Michoud Space Systems in New Orleans.
Lockheed's Denver unit, which builds Titan rockets used to launch satellites, and its Sunnyvale plant have both had large-scale cuts in staff over the past year.
The panel recommended improved training, mentoring, and the use of qualified retirees.
Three of the four failures occurred in April.
The Lockheed-made Ikonos I satellite was launched April 27. The satellite, which was being launched for Space Imaging, Inc., a private company half-owned by Lockheed Martin and Raytheon Corp. (RTN - news), failed to reach its proper orbit. The Athena II rocket used to launch the satellite was also made by Lockheed Martin.
The company did not release the loss amounts.
On April 23, a $433 million Titan IV rocket also failed to lift an $800 million military satellite into the correct orbit. On April 9, a $250 million military satellite being propelled by a Titan IV rocket failed to reach its proper orbit when an upper stage rocket made by Boeing Co. failed.
On Aug. 12, 1998, another Titan rocket and its military satellite blew up shortly after being launched from Cape Canaveral in Florida. The military did not release the cost of the satellite, but the launch cost $344 million, the company said.
---
Raytheon Team Receives Hammer Award; Leads Government Facility to $1.2 Million Savings Per Year
SOURCE: Raytheon Company
August 24, 12:11 pm Eastern Time
http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/990824/ma_raytheo_1.html
LEXINGTON, Mass., Aug. 24 /PRNewswire/ -- A Raytheon Company (NYSE: RTN.A - news and RTN.B - news) team has received a prestigious Hammer Award for helping the government work more efficiently and economically. Created in 1993 by Vice President Al Gore, the Hammer Award is presented to program teams that have made significant contributions in support of reinventing government.
Raytheon Systems Company's Electronics Test and Analysis group, Springfield, Va., led an effort to reengineer a material delivery process that is projected to save more than $1.2 million in the first year and to speed the delivery process by four to seven times. The team developed a new process that utilizes commercial shipping carriers instead of dedicated government shipping to deliver materials to users nationwide.
``The first major hurdle was to convince our government customer that the integrity of the material and delivery timeliness could be maintained using a commercial carrier,'' said Jay Johnson, director of the Electronics Test and Analysis group. ``This effort is a graphic example of the outstanding results achieved by empowering people who understand the systems best.''
Since the October 1998 implementation, the new process has transferred more than 120,000 pieces and 126,000 pounds of material to government facilities. Most of these deliveries have arrived in less than 24 hours and no item has been lost or delayed. More than $800,000 has been saved in nine months, with annual savings projected to exceed $1.2 million.
Raytheon Company, based in Lexington, Mass., is a global technology leader that provides products and services in the area of commercial and defense electronics, engineering and construction, and business and special mission aircraft. Raytheon has operations throughout the United States and serves customer in more than 80 countries around the world.
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Wise Disobedience
September 17, 1999 New York Times Letters
http://www.nytimes.com/yr/mo/day/letters/lschre.html
Related Articles U.S. General Was Overruled in Kosovo (Sept. 10, 1999)
http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/global/091099nato-clark.html
To the Editor:
Senator John W. Warner's concern about possible insubordination by Gen. Sir Michael Jackson, the British general in charge of NATO forces in Kosovo, who refused to obey the command of Gen. Wesley K. Clark, NATO's supreme commander, to evict Russian troops after their takeover of the Pristina airport, is misdirected (news article, Sept. 10). The right of every citizen to disobey illegal or obviously unwise orders from a superior is essential to avoid calamities in a democratic society.
General Jackson was surely in the right. Such an attack could have had frightening consequences, more serious than anything that might have happened as a result of waiting for a few days to resolve the situation.
WILLIAM F. SCHREIBER Cambridge, Mass., Sept. 10, 1999
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The Best Investment the Pentagon Could Make
By JACK SHANAHAN, September 17, 1999
http://www.nytimes.com/yr/mo/day/oped/17shan.html
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- The Pentagon is having trouble recruiting qualified soldiers and thinks the solution is to declare war: a bidding war, against private industry. But if we're concerned about staffing in the military, we should concentrate instead on the nation's crowded classrooms.
Schools and how they suffer at the hands of excessive military spending were the focus of a hearing this week by Senator James Jeffords of Vermont. What deserved more attention at the session was the idea that a main beneficiary of a shift in priorities would be the military itself.
Education levels of those enlisting in the military have been declining, and the Pentagon wants to try to attract and retain more of our best-educated young people by increasing pay and benefits. Some pay increases are in fact warranted for the lowest-paid members of the armed forces. But as a long-term strategy, this approach would mean meeting our defense needs by depriving industry of the minds it needs to stay at the forefront. So even by winning, we'd lose.
No one doubts that the military needs well-educated soldiers, for two reasons. First, today's soldiers use advanced weapons requiring a high level of technical knowledge.
Second, American soldiers are being placed in situations that are far less cut-and-dried than yesterday's battles, and they are being asked to play many roles. The soldier has to know how to fight, how to keep the peace, how to render assistance -- and must understand when each of these skills is appropriate. As our experiences in Somalia, the Balkans and elsewhere have shown, soldiers as peacekeepers are being asked to mediate between ethnic groups whose disputes go back centuries. On a humanitarian mission, creative problem solving by a soldier can mean the difference between life and death for hundreds of civilians.
But recruiters are learning that these same skills -- versatility, critical thinking, judgment -- are highly prized in the private sector. The idea that the Pentagon can outbid, say, Microsoft for a skilled graduate is questionable at best. In any case, a better strategy would be for the Government to invest enough in education to create a larger pool of skilled graduates from which industry and the armed forces could draw.
Too many of our best and brightest are languishing in neglected schools where they are taught by underpaid teachers. By the time these students head to the recruiter's office -- be it the military's or a corporation's -- they don't have what it takes to be a soldier or a skilled worker today.
A 10-year program that included repairing every broken-down public school in the United States ($110 billion, or $11 billion a year for 10 years), fully financing Head Start ($8 billion a year) and reducing class sizes in kindergarten through third grade to 18 students nationwide ($4 billion a year) would cost $23 billion a year. Canceling the unnecessary F-22 fighter jet, scrapping plans for a new generation of attack submarines designed to hunt submarines that were never built, and reducing our stockpile of nuclear weapons to a still devastating level of 1,000 warheads would easily cover these costs.
In fact, reducing the Pentagon's budget by only 15 percent would make more than $40 billion a year available while still allowing us to remain the world's pre-eminent military power. This investment has the greatest chance of solving the personnel problems of today and tomorrow while adding to, rather than taking from, our private sector.
Jack Shanahan, a retired three-star admiral, heads the military advisory committee of Business Leaders for Sensible Priorities.
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Montana Is Below Average For Fallout
Montana Headlines, September 16 1999 Yahoo Newswire
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/headlines/local/state/montana/story.html?s=v/rs/19990916/mt/index_2.html#1
(HELENA) -- Montanans are not getting more thyroid cancer then average, despite fallout from atomic testing that landed in the State in the 1950's and 1960's. Montana ranks 44th in thyroid related deaths, and below the national average in thyroid cancer cases. That's according to the Department of Public Health and Human Services. The study is an outgrowth of a federal study in 1997 that was conducted by the National Cancer Institute. The fallout on Montana was generated by outdoor testing of nuclear weapons in Nevada during the Cold War.
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Plans To Stop Transfer
Pennsylvania Headlines, September 17, 1999 Yahoo Newswires
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/headlines/local/state/pennsylvania/story.html?s=v/rs/19990917/pa/index_1.html#6
(BEAVER) -- Beaver County, state and federal officials are getting together today to outline their efforts to stop the transfer of Duquesne Lights Power plants. The federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission is considering a request to transfer ownership of the Shippingport nuclear power generation facility from Duquesne Light Company to FirstEnergy Corporation. State Representative Mike Veon says FirstEnergy is not living up to its agreement where employees and public safety are concerned.
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Making industrial isotopes cheaper and with less pollution
16 SEPTEMBER 1999, Contact: Karl Leif Bates batesk@umich.edu 734-647-7088 University of Michigan
http://www.eurekalert.org/releases/umic-mii091699.html
ANN ARBOR---Gaseous diffusion, a dirty, expensive process which provides relatively pure forms of elements for microelectronics, medical tracers and nuclear fuel, may have met its match.
Using only a tabletop laser and a 1-inch disk of target material, researchers at the University of Michigan College of Engineering have found they can produce relatively pure amounts of materials, sorted by atomic weight, across the entire spectrum of elements. And unlike gaseous diffusion, an industrial-scale process in use since the Manhattan Project, the separation doesn't require huge electro-magnets or leave behind a lot of cross-contaminated byproducts.
Every chemical element, be it oxygen or uranium, naturally occurs with a few slightly different masses, called isotopes. Carbon, for example, is most abundant as an atom with six protons and six neutrons, giving it an atomic weight of 12. But about 1 percent of Carbon has an extra two neutrons and a molecular weight of 14. These special forms of elements, called isotopes, are often very useful for things like medical tracers, specialty materials and nuclear fuel. But sorting something as small as atoms by weight has always been a tremendous technical problem. The U-M breakthrough holds the promise of eliminating most of that difficulty and expense.
The heart of this new system is the terawatt laser, a beam of pulsed laser energy that delivers incredible energies in femtoseconds, mere quadrillionths of a second. "It's like a karate chop," said Gérard Mourou, director of the U-M's Center for Ultrafast Optical Science (CUOS). When this burst of concentrated energy strikes a target material, a donut-shaped magnetic field is created as a natural byproduct. As highly excited ions of the target material are blown off (the target), the magnetic field, linear and ring-shaped components, exerts a force that sorts them out by molecular weight. The lightest isotopes of the material end up deposited at the center of a silicon disk about two inches away from the target, while the heavier ones separate out toward the edges, allowing for a relatively simple purification process. [See schematic diagram].
The U-M team happened on this separation effect by accident while studying the plasmas produced by a laser ablating, or scouring away, of material. When they noticed a distinct pattern to the weights of the ions in the plasma, "we thought the instrument wasn't working correctly," said Peter Pronko, a research scientist in CUOS. In a paper to be published in the Sept. 27 edition of Physical Review Letters, the team describes this happy accident as "an unusually efficient isotope enrichment process."
Until now, sorting out the various weights of isotopes in a gas or plasma has always required carefully tuned magnetic fields and centrifuges. That's no longer necessarily the case, Pronko points out. "You don't have to build an apparatus to do the separation; the separation is part of the process." And you don't have to re-tune the fields to sort a different material; you merely change the target.
"The thing I like about this process is that everything can be reduced by a factor of a thousand or ten thousand," Mourou said, noting how much less energy and target material is required to yield a significant quantity of isotopes.
Graduate student Paul VanRompay, whose dissertation relies on the isotope separation experiment, offers a tour of the somewhat cramped room where the experiment occurred. The beam of a titanium sapphire laser travels a convoluted path along a 20-foot table arrayed with all sorts of devices to compress it and boost its power, then it is bounced off a mirror to zip through a tube that leads through the wall and into the next room. At the end of the tube there is an 18-inch vacuum chamber which holds four of the 1-inch plates of the target material on rotating arms. Losing only a 500-angstrom pit with each blast, the target is carefully turned to be ablated over and over in a spiral pattern as the laser delivers ten blasts per second.
The new process, which has a patent pending, might be applied to any material, not just the heavy radioactive elements used for weapons and power plants which constitute most of the material processed by gaseous diffusion plants. The research team has produced enriched boron, gallium, titanium, zinc and copper. Economically important isotopes such as Cesium 137 and Iodine 131, which are essential to medical diagnosis and treatment, may also be cheaply produced by the process. So too can important isotopically enriched thin-films like diamond and silicon which are essential to microelectronics.
Purity is essential to thin-film technology, which is emerging as an exciting new approach to creating better microelectronics, wear-resistant coatings, optical coatings and smart materials. Thin films, which are only a few atoms thick, work best when all the spherical atoms in the film are the same size, and are laid down in a perfectly uniform, regular pattern, like a cookie sheet full of ping-pong balls. But the odd heavy isotope disrupts the pattern because it's larger. A baseball on that cookie sheet full of ping-pong balls, for example, would disrupt the straight, regular lines of the balls.
In the case of diamond thin-films, a promising material for absorbing the excess heat from a semiconductor chip, the 1 percent of carbon in the diamond that weighs more than 12 mass units robs the film of most of its thermal efficiency. But so far, purifying isotopes for thin films has been so expensive that it has only been done for the most costly and mission-critical components of military satellites.
The inexpensive ultrafast laser is capable of spraying pure thin-films of isotopes directly onto microelectronic devices, Pronko said.
Traditional gaseous diffusion isotope separation, in addition to being costly, time consuming, and dirty, has also become politically controversial. Workers at two giant Department of Energy gaseous diffusion facilities in Ohio and Kentucky recently learned of their long-term exposures to plutonium, uranium and other radioactive and hazardous wastes while producing materials for nuclear weapons and fuel.
Earlier this year, the Piketown, Ohio, gaseous diffusion plant operated by U.S. Enrichment Corp., abandoned plans to use a proposed laser-based separation process. So-called "Atomic Vapor Laser Isotope Separation" used precisely tuned lasers to excite select isotopes in a hot vapor, but then still required large and expensive magnetic fields to sort the isotopes out by size. This approach was too costly to justify its use, the company concluded after a brief trial. The U-M process requires no such magnets for its operation and uses solid materials instead of vapors.
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The Lie Detector That Didn't
By Al Kamen, Friday, September 17, 1999; Page A23
http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-09/17/026l-091799-idx.html
"It's very painless," Energy Secretary Bill Richardson said of the lie detector test he took the other day. No official results were released, but Richardson says he passed.
The Energy Department plans to require as many as 5,000 scientists working in nuclear programs to be polygraphed on espionage matters. Richardson said he took the test Tuesday "because one of my employees dared me."
Seems when Richardson was out talking to Los Alamos lab folks, someone wanted to know why, if polygraphing was such a superfine idea for them, how come Richardson wasn't taking one? The scientists argue the tests are intrusive and unreliable.
Not at all, Richardson said in a telephone interview yesterday. "There are no lifestyle questions," he said. "You sit in a comfortable chair" with the examiner in the room and he "ties two of your fingers together to a cord into a computer, not like that old meter that you see in old movies. It's very simple, four simple questions."
The questions likely were similar to the four being proposed by the department: whether an employee spied, committed sabotage or terrorism, illegally disclosed classified information or had unauthorized contact with foreign intelligence types.
"I took it to send a message," Richardson said. "They tell me I passed."
Sure. But they didn't ask him about that "temporary" beard that he's had for months; "it's coming off soon," he said. Or about his claim to have lost 30 pounds, or about whether he's running for governor of New Mexico.
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Battle to Douse Incinerator Harrison Ford,Wyo. Neighbors Fight Nuclear Waste Site
By Elizabeth Grossman Special to The Washington Post Friday, September 17, 1999; Page A23
http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-09/17/024l-091799-idx.html
PORTLAND, Ore.-Flamboyant lawyer Gerry Spence, actor Harrison Ford, local environmentalists, ski bums saving for season passes and other denizens of Wyoming have joined together to fight the construction of a nuclear waste incinerator upwind in Idaho.
Close to $500,000 was raised at a recent meeting of famous and not-so-famous residents of Jackson Hole, Wyo.--a reported $50,000 alone from Ford and his wife, screenwriter Melissa Mathison--to begin a campaign against the incinerator proposed for the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory, which they fear will spew deadly pollution their way. The meeting was organized by the nascent Keep Yellowstone Nuclear Free group.
Spence, widely known for his fringed leather jackets and defense of survivalist Randy Weaver, said he and others will file suit on behalf of Keep Yellowstone Nuclear Free against the Department of Energy to stop construction of the incinerator "pending a full analysis of the safest methods to dispose of the waste."
Pledging to take on the cause pro bono, Spence said in an interview, "How can a man ask for fees when the issues at stake are the health of our kids, our neighbors' kids and their grandchildren?"
Construction of the facility, designed to compact and incinerate nuclear-contaminated waste and hazardous chemicals, was to begin this summer, but the federal permitting process has not been finished and the date has since been moved to early 2000.
The plant will be built and operated for the department by British Nuclear Fuels Inc. (BNFL), the U.S. subsidiary of a British company. BNFL operates nuclear waste facilities at Rocky Flats, Colo. and elsewhere.
The facility will deal with contained waste, primarily from the former Rocky Flats nuclear weapons site, which has been stored at the Idaho lab since the 1970s. Eighty percent of this waste will be "supercompacted and encapsulated, basically squished down," so that it can be shipped for storage in New Mexico, said Mike Simon of the Idaho Department of Environmental Quality. The remaining 20 percent will be incinerated, which officials say is the safest way of dealing with it.
"It's kind of the Mercedes of such systems," said Ann Riedesel, BNFL communications director.
The national lab is located in southeastern Idaho, near the Craters of the Moon National Monument. There, according to federal meteorologists, the prevailing winds blow from the southwest to the northeast, generally up the Snake River plain toward Wyoming. The Tetons and the greater Yellowstone area would be about 75 miles downwind of the incinerator.
This summer, citizens in Teton County, Wyo., began to express concern about the incinerator. Republican Sen. Craig Thomas worked out an agreement with Idaho Gov. Dirk Kempthorne (R) and Energy Secretary Bill Richardson to hold an official hearing on the incinerator in Wyoming sometime this fall.
Thomas wrote earlier this month to Vice President Gore: "My constituents want to know why the Clinton administration is pursuing something that could endanger Yellowstone National Park and has the potential to hurt the health of families in Wyoming."
Also being questioned is the plan to treat containerized waste. Compacting nuclear waste creates the risk of "criticality," a nuclear chain reaction that might occur as radioactive material is crushed, says Hisham Zerriffi of the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research, a nonprofit group based in Takoma Park.
The Idaho environmental agency held hearings in May on the proposed permit for the incinerator, which will emit some 43 pollutants, among them plutonium and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs).
State, federal and company officials insist the incinerator's filters will stop all but the smallest particles, leaving emissions that won't endanger the public. The plant will meet state and federal environmental standards, they said.
The new facility would increase emissions only "incrementally" and the proposed facility is "very controlled" due to the "redundancy" of filtration systems, said Doug Hardesty, an Environmental Protection Agency air program official in Seattle.
If the Wyoming and Idaho critics go to court to stop the incinerator, they will be up against a formidable group. BNFL's directors include William J. Crowe Jr., former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; James R. Schlesinger, former secretary of defense and energy; and former Republican House leader Robert H. Michel, among others.
BNFL and its partners' proposed 10-year federal contract with the Energy Department is worth an estimated $6 billion.
---
[A little blackmail here?]
Budget Shortfall
Wyoming Headlines, September 17, 1999, Yahoo Newswire
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/headlines/local/state/wyoming/story.html?s=v/rs/19990917/wy/index_1.html#6
(CASPER) -- A nuclear waste dump is just one idea a committee is proposing to alleviate Wyoming's budget shortfall. The Revenues and Expenditures committee is also looking at a 60-Million-dollar across-the-board spending cut. Spending on everything from education to disability programs could be cut.
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2 Groups Fight Nuclear Incinerator Project Near Yellowstone
By MICHAEL JANOFSKY, September 17, 1999 New York TImes
http://www.nytimes.com/yr/mo/day/news/national/wyo-nuke-waste.html
JACKSON, Wyo. -- It started with a short letter to a local newspaper here four months ago, in which a woman from Ketchum, Idaho, warned Jackson residents that the Federal Government intended to build a nuclear incinerator 90 miles upwind from Jackson and Yellowstone National Park.
At the time, almost no one here knew what she was talking about.
Now, almost no one here does not, and the shift has led to the latest battle between the Department of Energy and a Western community determined to stop construction of an incinerator that some scientists believe will spew radioactive and toxic materials into the air.
The conflict has a familiar echo in the West as the United States works to dispose of nuclear and hazardous waste that built up during 50 years of cold war weapons research. Federal laws require that the material be treated and disposed of. Yet, few communities have been willing to play host to such operations.
Two environmental groups, one of them some Jackson residents who organized to fight the project, plan to file suit on Friday in Federal District Court in Cheyenne, contending that Federal laws have been ignored in allowing plans for the incinerator to proceed.
The groups are seeking an injunction that would block construction until a more thorough environmental impact study is completed and circulated for public comment.
The groups -- Keep Yellowstone Nuclear Free and the Environmental Defense Institute, a watchdog organization in Idaho -- contend that state officials in Idaho and the Federal authorities forged ahead without properly informing Wyoming residents, without reviewing the full range of health consequences and without considering a less threatening means of eliminating the waste.
They also accuse the Energy Department, in planning the incinerator, of ignoring "past accidents, mishaps and regulatory lapses, which have plagued its nuclear waste program and which call into question its unsupported assurances about the safety of the incinerator project."
The groups, which are represented by Gerry L. Spence, a nationally known lawyer and Wyoming resident, in effect say that the fix is in and that Wyoming, the nation's least populous state, with fewer than 500,000 people, can do little to stop the project.
"I'm concerned about the air I breathe, but ideally, this is not just a matter of what's happening here," said Mary Mitchell, vice president of the ad hoc Jackson group, which has been leading the opposition to the incinerator. ''I won't really be happy until they have replaced what I see as antiquated technology with alternative ways of dealing with nuclear waste."
In recent years, community opposition helped thwart proposals to operate similar incinerators at the Rocky Flats plant outside Denver, Los Alamos, N.M., and the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, Calif. At Livermore, opponents of an incinerator were aided by the laboratory's own scientists, who analyzed the proposal and concluded in 1990 that burning nuclear waste violated ''the cardinal principle of radioactive waste treatment; namely, containing radioactivity rather than spreading it."
But even successful opposition elsewhere has not stalled plans by the Federal Government to build an incinerator at the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory, a facility the size of Rhode Island in southern Idaho that would burn much of the most hazardous nuclear and toxic waste material remaining in the United States. The material is now stored and buried at the site.
The Department of Energy has hired a contractor, British Nuclear Fuels Ltd., to build the incinerator. Construction on the $1.2 billion project is scheduled to begin once the Idaho Division of Environmental Quality issues permits that reflect its satisfaction that state air quality regulations will be met and that disposal operations will not affect the environment.
Steve Allred, the division administrator, said he would rule on the permit applications by the end of the year.
The threat of a lawsuit has at least made the Federal Government listen. The chief defendant in the suit, Energy Secretary Bill Richardson, said in an interview that construction of the incinerator would proceed only if the department is assured that operations would not jeopardize health and the environment.
Richardson said he had offered to meet in Washington with Spence and his clients to hear their concerns, and Spence said he welcomed the invitation, but he added that the plaintiffs would drop their suit only if the Energy Department abandoned plans for the incinerator.
Until then, the plaintiffs have vowed to press on, based on their fears that wind patterns would carry hazardous and radioactive emissions over parts of Wyoming that include Jackson and the two national parks just north of Jackson, Grand Teton and Yellowstone.
They have collected testimony from scientists who contend that despite all assurances from officials in Idaho and Washington that a new incinerator would operate safely, some toxic and radioactive particles would elude even sophisticated filter systems and contaminate downwind areas.
To bolster their efforts and cover legal costs, they have raised more than $300,000, with pledges of $200,000 more, reflecting a rare collaboration in this resort town of 6,000 people, where many rich and famous people have built second homes. In addition to small contributions from hundreds of year-round residents, members of the Yellowstone group said they had received $50,000 each from Harrison Ford, the actor, and James D. Wolfensohn, president of the World Bank, who have homes in the Jackson area.
For now, the two plaintiff groups are on the mission almost alone. Leading Wyoming officials, including Gov. Jim Gehringer and Senator Craig Thomas, both Republicans, have asked the Clinton Administration to explain the need for an incinerator, rather than a containment strategy. But neither the National Park Service nor politically influential groups in Idaho like the Potato Growers of Idaho that could be affected by an accident or inefficient operation, have objected.
Michael V. Finley, superintendent of Yellowstone National Park, said members of his staff were reviewing impact studies on the park and discussing pertinent issues with officials from the Idaho laboratory.
Mike Duff, executive director of the potato growers group, which represent hundreds of farmers living near the proposed incinerator site, said its members were "comfortable with the activities" at the laboratory.
Still, Jackson residents are worried.
"Nine years after Livermore, and we're still involved in a redundant effort," said Sophia Wakefield, a grocery store owner here who is a member of the Yellowstone group. "It seems like such a waste of time. But we don't want to just stop an incinerator from being built here. We want to stop it for all time."
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Helms Demands Sanctions for China
By David Briscoe Associated Press Writer Friday, September 17, 1999; 2:38 a.m. EDT
http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WAPO/19990917/V000770-091799-idx.html
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/w/AP-Missile-Threats.html
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Sen. Jesse Helms has another ultimatum for the Clinton administration: Sanction China for selling missiles or lose another nominee for a top State Department post.
Helms, R-N.C., vowed Thursday to block confirmation of Robert Einhorn to be assistant secretary of state for nonproliferation affairs. Einhorn currently is a special adviser to the undersecretary for nonproliferation.
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman issued the ultimatum at a hearing at which CIA official Robert Walpole repeated intelligence conclusions that China and North Korea had aided Pakistan's missile capabilities.
``Enough is enough,'' said Helms. After the hearing, he also opposed President Clinton's decision to consider easing trade sanctions against North Korea as long as the communist regime refrains from testing long-range missiles.
Helms said sanctions against China are required by a law aimed at stopping the spread of nuclear technology. He accused Einhorn of ``gobbledygook'' in responding to questions about transfer of missile technology by China and other countries.
China's sale of M-11 missiles to Pakistan, which have a 250-mile range, was disclosed in the CIA's annual National Intelligence Estimate on Missile Threats last week and confirmed by Walpole at the hearing.
Administration officials believe China has come a long way since it first disclosed in 1993 that China transferred some missile technology to Pakistan. The CIA has not provided details on its latest intelligence conclusions or specified whether it was referring to previously disclosed transfers from 1992 or more recent incidents.
Nonetheless, the administration is looking into the legal need for sanctions.
``China continues to contribute to missile programs in some countries,'' Walpole told Helms.
Walpole, who oversees strategic and nuclear programs, said Pakistan has M-11 short-range ballistic missiles from China and Ghauri medium-range missiles from North Korea, but did not say how many.
``We assess both may have a nuclear role,'' he said
In his printed testimony, Walpole said the CIA continues to judge it unlikely that either China or Russia would sell a complete intercontinental ballistic missile or technologies that could lead to completion of one by another country.
The CIA's report, for the first time, assessed the likelihood of several countries' missiles to reach the United States by 2015.
It characterized the prospect of North Korea acquiring a long-range missile as ``most likely.'' Iran's prospect was judged to be ``probable,'' and Iraq was labeled a ``possible'' threat. Russia and China have long had missile capable of reaching the United States.
Helms asked Walpole if he believes the United States needs a national missile defense system -- something Helms strongly supports.
``As an intelligence officer,'' Walpole said, ``I might answer that in the walls of my own home to my wife,'' but not at the hearing.
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Albright Defends Russia Policy Secretary Notes Achievements as Well as Corruption's Peril
By Steven Mufson Washington Post Staff Writer Friday, September 17, 1999; Page A02
http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-09/17/016l-091799-idx.html
Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright, beset by congressional criticism of the Clinton administration's policy toward Russia, said yesterday that "the suggestion made by some that Russia is ours to lose is arrogant; the suggestion that Russia is lost is simply wrong."
However, in the wake of recent reports about Russian corruption and capital flight, Albright said Moscow's response to corruption "has not been adequate," and she maintained that Russian President Boris Yeltsin "needs--at last--to make fighting corruption a priority."
"The Russian legal system remains no match for well-connected criminals," she added. "The deadweight of corruption is holding Russia back."
In a speech at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Albright said that Russian leaders should cooperate with the investigations into money laundering and the misuse of International Monetary Fund funds "no matter where or to whom the evidence leads."
Albright's unusually pointed comments about the need for Yeltsin to take a personal role in fighting corruption followed a report that Yeltsin and his family directly benefited from improper payments from foreign companies seeking to do business in Russia.
Rumors have also circulated in Moscow about the possibility that the unpopular Yeltsin might use the recent terrorist attacks as a pretext for postponing or changing Russia's scheduled parliamentary elections in December and the presidential election next year.
Many Russia experts have said the Clinton administration has invested too much political and diplomatic capital in bolstering Yeltsin personally. Yesterday, Albright said that Russians should be given the chance to choose a successor to Yeltsin "because nothing could do more damage to Russia, at home or abroad, than a failure to observe the constitutional process."
Albright's remarks were the latest in a series of Clinton administration efforts to rebut critics who say that the new allegations about Russian corruption point to a failure in recent U.S. policy toward Russia.
Attention has focused on the possible laundering of Russian funds through accounts at the Bank of New York and on alleged misuse of IMF loans.
On Tuesday, House Majority Leader Richard K. Armey (R-Tex.) said that "the unparalleled financial graft in Russia . . . marks the ineffective end of the Clinton-Gore administration's approach to Russian reform. . . . The stated purpose of the Gore-Clinton policy was to help the Russian people become a peaceful and productive free-market democracy. Instead, Russia has become a looted and bankrupt zone of nuclearized anarchy."
Armey added, "It's time for Congress to ask the question: Who lost Russia?"
Albright responded yesterday that the corruption scandals were a blot on a record that had many other successes.
"It is right to focus on the cloud of corruption in Russia," she said. "But it is not the whole picture."
Among the bright points, she cited a reduction in nuclear warheads, the elimination of nuclear weapons from three former Soviet republics and the U.S. purchase of more than 60 tons of enriched uranium that could have been used for nuclear weapons. She also praised U.S. efforts to obtain Russian cooperation on arms proliferation, the expansion of NATO and the peacekeeping forces in the Balkans. And she hailed the rise of a vigorous press and electoral process in Russia.
She said financial assistance to Russia during the Clinton administration has helped to employ Russian nuclear scientists, thereby safeguarding their technical know-how, and has benefited programs for aiding entrepreneurs, independent media and independent trade unions. She attacked congressional plans to cut 25 percent or more of President Clinton's budget request for programs in Russia and other former Soviet republics, saying the cuts "would require unacceptable and self-defeating trade-offs."
-----------
Exposure concerns go back 39 years
ASSOCIATED PRESS, September 16, 1999, in the Herald-Leader
http://www.kentuckyconnect.com/heraldleader/news/091699/statedocs/16plutonium.htm
PADUCAH -- A government document shows Atomic Energy Commission officials as many as 39 years ago were concerned about the way workers at the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant were handling recycled uranium contaminated with neptunium.
The document indicates that officials with Union Carbide Corp., which managed the plant at the time, were reluctant to conduct tests on 300 workers who may have been exposed, The Paducah Sun reported yesterday.
According to the document, plant managers ``hesitate to proceed to intensive studies because of the (employee) union's use of this as an excuse for hazard pay.''
The document is expected to be released at a congressional committee hearing today in Washington.
The Department of Energy announced yesterday that U.S. Secretary of Energy Bill Richardson will be in Paducah today and Friday for meetings with residents and civic leaders as well as plant employees and former workers.
The agency also announced yesterday that Jimmie Hodges, the Paducah site manager for the U.S. Department of Energy since 1994, is retiring Oct. 1.
His decision comes during a federal investigation into health, safety and environmental issues at the plant, which enriches uranium for use in nuclear power plants.
The Energy Department got out of the uranium-enrichment business in 1993 and now focuses its efforts on the environmental restoration of the plant site and the management of waste generated there.
Last month, the department started looking into allegations contained in a workers' lawsuit that former plant operators falsified documents regarding the disposal of contaminated waste and records involving environmental contamination at the plant.
The workers say they were unknowingly exposed to highly toxic plutonium at the plant from the early 1950s until the mid-1970s.
Also yesterday, documents released by an environmental watchdog group showed that a southern Ohio defense plant handled a more dangerous, undiluted type of plutonium-laced uranium than the government previously acknowledged.
Documents gathered by the organization Uranium Enrichment Project include a 1993 Energy Department report describing plutonium contamination at an unused building in the Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant complex.
A 1985 report described spent nuclear fuel going directly from a federal facility in Idaho to the Portsmouth Plant at Piketon, Ohio. That fuel would have a higher plutonium level than material from Paducah, where some purification would have taken place.
---
New study to determine if uranium mills sickened workers
Hatch adds mill staff to bill on compensation
September 16, 1999, By Lee Davidson Deseret News Washington correspondent
http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/1,1249,115009291,00.html?
WASHINGTON - Unlike other victims of Cold War atomic testing and development, uranium mill workers were never compensated by the government for cancer and sickness they suspect resulted from their jobs in the nation's nuclear program. But now, scientists are heading to Moab this month to examine former mill workers to try to scientifically determine whether the old suspicions are likely correct.
Ironically, aides to Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, say debate in Congress on whether to give mill workers compensation will likely come before that study is complete, if it comes at all. So Hatch already included the mill workers in a bill he introduced last month to expand who qualifies for such government compensation.
While compensation has been available since 1990 for qualifying uranium miners, Nevada Test Site workers and cancer victims living downwind from atomic tests, Hatch is seeking to expand the list of qualifying illnesses, to lessen demands for proof by victims and add the mill workers. That comes after a Deseret News series last year revealed that most Utahns who believe they are atomic cancer victims can't qualify under current guidelines or prove that they do.
Lawrence Kerr, an aide on Hatch's Judiciary Committee, said Hatch has already heard so many exhaustive horror stories from mill workers that "it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out it's a situation where a disease was caused." Kerr said Hatch expects that "if that bill is going to go through (to expand compensation), it will go through this (1999) session." But if Hatch's bill doesn't pass this year, the study could still help the mill workers qualify. William Lambert, a research assistant professor of medicine at the University of New Mexico, is heading the new study. It is being funded by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health.
Lambert said he cannot discuss too many details of the ongoing study to not bias its results but said, "We're in the middle of data collection on a large study that will look at 500 people who formerly worked in uranium mills."
As part of that, researchers already examined hundreds of former millers in Colorado and New Mexico. He said scientists will be working in Moab this month examining former millers there. To ensure scientific reliability, Lambert said he and other researchers designed a random sampling of workers from employment lists of old uranium mills. "It was difficult to track down workers so many years later," he said.
Researchers will use a special van to conduct clinical tests on those it has invited to participate in Moab. Lambert said, "This study is the first large-scale study to be done" on uranium mill workers and will "look to see if long-term conditions" are present among many mill workers. Lambert said data collection will be conducted this fall, and he expects results to be available next spring.
Uranium miners - but not mill workers - were included in the original 1990 compensation bill because the miners were considered to have worked in much more dangerous conditions. Government documents revealed that federal officials figured that poor ventilation in the mines would create high exposure to radon gas for miners as uranium ore was dug out and broken - and would likely cause lung cancer. But the miners were never warned.
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Piketon workers may get money
Friday, September 17, 1999
By Jonathan Riskind Columbus (Ohio) Dispatch Washington Bureau
http://www.dispatch.com/pan/news/helpusnws.html
An investigation first must link their cancers to the plutonium sent to the plant through the 1970s.
WASHINGTON -- Southern Ohio uranium-enrichment workers exposed to plutonium during the Cold War may be compensated if a federal investigation links cancers to their work, a top U.S. Department of Energy official said yesterday.
By November, officials hope to determine just how much deadly material was delivered to the Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Piketon from the 1950s through the '70s and whether workers are suffering health problems today as a result.
The comments by a senior Energy Department official, who spoke on condition that his name not be used, came on the same day that Energy Secretary Bill Richardson announced a proposed "pilot project'' to compensate workers at a sister plant in Paducah, Ky., for lost wages and health benefits. The initiative could cost as much as $20 million if approved by Congress, the official said.
Richardson also announced a separate $21.8 million initiative to speed cleanup efforts and medical monitoring at Paducah, Piketon and a former uranium-enrichment plant in Oak Ridge, Tenn.
But Rep. Ted Strickland, D-Lucasville, expressed outrage that Piketon wasn't included in the pilot project for Paducah workers, saying Piketon employees have been exposed to similar contaminants. He said a top Energy Department official told him that the department wanted to include the other two sites, but the idea was quashed by Department of Defense and Department of Justice officials worried that anything other than a very limited program for Paducah would open a can of worms at nuclear facilities nationwide.
"I was told by a high-ranking Department of Energy official that these other workers are being left out in the cold because the Department of Defense fears setting a precedent that will force it to pay for the countless Americans who may have been exposed to radiation during weapons testing and research,'' Strickland said. "The fact is, the only way the Department of Defense and the White House will accept the secretary's initiative is if it is dubbed a 'pilot' program and it is restricted to workers in Paducah.''
Defense and Justice officials could not be reached for comment.
However, the senior Energy official said his department might extend the benefits program to Piketon workers after it completes an investigation. The probe will include a visit to southern Ohio in October or November to meet with workers, consult medical officials and gather other information.
He acknowledged that there was "an option around at one time'' to include Piketon and Oak Ridge in the initial program, but the department opted for a limited program because more is known about Paducah's situation now.
"Piketon will be one of the first places we focus on,'' the official said. "The Paducah pilot project will help us toward that process. The investigation of what went into Piketon is ongoing now. We hope to have answers within the next month or two.''
A congressional hearing scheduled for yesterday on the Paducah and Piketon radiation problems was postponed because of Hurricane Floyd.
Strickland said he would try to expand the administration's pilot program beyond Paducah before it leaves Congress. It shouldn't be necessary to complete the Piketon investigation to set aside the same benefits for Piketon workers found to be suffering from plutonium-related illnesses, he said.
Last month, the Washington Post revealed that workers at Paducah over a period of decades handled some 100,000 tons of plutonium- laced uranium, mostly spent reactor fuel from the government's nuclear reactor in Hanford, Wash. The recycling process, a flawed attempt by the government to reuse nuclear fuel, resulted in workers apparently being exposed to plutonium and other radioactive materials far more deadly than uranium.
Energy Department officials first said that all the initial conversion and most of the initial enrichment of that material was done at Paducah. As a result, they maintained, the material sent to the 3,700-acre facility at Piketon had a much lower -- though still unknown -- plutonium level.
However, The Dispatch disclosed Tuesday -- and Energy Department officials later confirmed -- that the more dangerous spent reactor fuel also was sent directly to Piketon. What isn't clear is how much material went to Piketon and whether it can be tied to cancers that a number of former workers suffer.
The plutonium that Piketon workers were exposed to is thousands of times more radioactive than the uranium they were supposed to be handling; even a millionth of an ounce can cause cancer.
"This is a particular type of radioactive exposure that is quite pernicious,'' said the Energy official.
He said he doesn't expect to find a need for a benefits program in all the nation's energy and defense nuclear facilities. The use of plutonium- laced uranium -- and the exposure workers suffered at Paducah and possibly Piketon -- is "unique,'' the official said.
A number of former Piketon workers have wondered for years whether their cancers were caused by helping fuel the nation's atomic defense.
Dan Minter, president of the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers union, which represents Piketon workers, also was upset that Piketon was not included in the pilot project. However, he predicted that would change when more facts emerge.
"This cannot be something they will stick with,'' Minter said. "I will assume the same remedy will be afforded here.''
Enrichment essentially is a purification process. Piketon and Paducah now enrich only commercial-grade uranium and are operated by a former government corporation called USEC. Plant officials have said modern safety standards protect workers.
In Paducah, a preliminary Energy Department investigation found no imminent danger to workers or the public from radioactive waste. But the report issued earlier this week also called for strengthening of safety practices at the cleanup site.
---
Energy Dept. to Expand Plan on Helping Nuclear Workers
By MATTHEW L. WALD, September 17, 1999 Nw York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/yr/mo/day/news/national/energy-uranium.html
WASHINGTON -- The Energy Department said on Thursday that it would expand its proposal to compensate contractor employees made sick by nuclear weapons work to include those at the uranium-processing plant in Paducah, Ky., and would ask Congress for money to increase medical monitoring and cleanup at similar processing plants in Tennessee and Ohio.
Energy Secretary Bill Richardson said last month that the department would seek to extend the benefits that are routinely provided to Federal employees to the contractor workers in Pennsylvania who processed beryllium, a metal used almost exclusively in nuclear weapons. Richardson went to Paducah today to participate in a community meeting and describe the extension of the proposal.
The three processing plants separated isotopes of uranium to isolate the kind most useful for bombs and power plants.
The department has acknowledged for years that the plants, especially the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant, also processed uranium with some plutonium in it. The Washington Post reported last month that plutonium may have made workers sick at the Paducah plant.
Dr. David Michaels, Assistant Secretary of Energy for Environment, Safety and Health, said in a telephone interview that the Clinton Administration was trying to determine whether other workers had been made ill and whether they were being fairly treated under state workmen's compensation programs.
The Administration will propose spending $21.8 million, including $7 million for medical monitoring and $14.8 million for accelerated cleanup efforts at Paducah and at Portsmouth, Ohio. The third gaseous diffusion plant is at Oak Ridge, Tenn.
The proposal has set off new arguments about the allocation of resources at the Energy Department.
Representative Ted Strickland, an Ohio Democrat whose district includes the Portsmouth plant, said, "If people have been harmed, we ought to know that and accept responsibility, regardless of where."
Strickland said he was told by several department officials that they wanted to include all three uranium processing plants but that the Defense Department, which has numerous contractor employees who may also have been exposed to radiation, and the Justice Department, which represents the Federal Government in court cases, thought this would set a bad precedent. The program at Paducah, whose costs the Energy Department has not stated, is described as a pilot program.
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Payback Sought for Nuclear Workers
By H. Josef Hebert Associated Press Writer Friday, September 17, 1999; 12:34 a.m. EDT
http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WAPO/19990917/V000716-091799-idx.html
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Clinton administration will ask Congress to compensate thousands of workers who became ill from radiation during the Cold War years at a federal uranium plant in Kentucky, Energy Secretary Bill Richardson said Thursday.
Richardson announced the proposal before flying to Paducah, Ky., to talk with plant workers and community leaders. The plan eventually might cover employees at two uranium-processing plants in Ohio and Tennessee.
The payout to current and past workers at the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant could cost as much as $20 million, depending on the number of workers covered, said a government official familiar with the plan. The amount to be sought from Congress has not been determined.
Richardson also will ask Congress for $21.8 million for expanded medical monitoring, exposure assessments and accelerated cleanup at the plants in Paducah, Piketon, Ohio, and Oak Ridge, Tenn. Each processes, or enriches, uranium for use in reactors or when highly enriched, for nuclear weapons.
Richardson apologized to current and former workers at the Paducah plant Thursday, saying the government was not forthcoming about the possibility of exposure to toxic plutonium there.
``On behalf of the United States government, I am here to say I'm sorry,'' he said during a town hall meeting with about 300 people. ``I'm apologizing to the workers at Paducah.''
For years, Paducah employees have complained about an increased number of cancers linked, they believe, to radiation exposure suffered while working with uranium they did not know was laced with plutonium.
The exposure occurred over more than two decades beginning in the 1950s. Some excessive radiation exposures may have occurred into the 1990s, according to one lawsuit.
Plutonium is found in used reactor fuel and is a key ingredient in nuclear bombs. It is highly radioactive and can cause cancer if ingested, even in minute amounts.
The Energy Department now acknowledges that some plutonium was in the uranium dust to which the Paducah workers routinely were exposed from the mid-1950s to the late 1970s.
The compensation plan and additional funds for monitoring and faster cleanup reflects ``my commitment to address concerns about environmental, safety and health issues at the gaseous diffusion plants,'' Richardson said.
If approved by Congress, the plan would provide money to current and former Paducah plant employees for lost wages and health benefits if the workers can show they developed certain cancers related to exposure to plutonium-laced uranium.
Officials described it as a ``pilot program'' that may be expanded to the Ohio and Tennessee plants if further investigations show workers became ill from such exposure.
By March, the government is expected to complete an investigation into whether exposure to plutonium at those plants was as extensive as at Paducah, and whether workers in Ohio and Tennessee should be compensated.
Earlier this week, the department said an investigation at the Paducah plant found ``no imminent hazard'' to current workers. But the review said there were still ``weaknesses'' and shortcomings in programs that are supposed to monitor and shield workers from harm.
The review recommended that Paducah plant managers pay more attention to potential radiation exposure and that radiation controls be tightened.
The Paducah compensation plan is similar to one announced in July for nuclear weapons plant workers exposed to beryllium, a chemical used as a strengthening alloy in atomic weapons. That plan was estimated to cost $13 million over 10 years; it awaits congressional approval.
The Energy Department until recently refused to acknowledge that workers' health problems, including increased incidents of cancer, were linked to work at the weapons plants. Richardson said he was committed to addressing the health and environmental concerns involving both the gaseous diffusion plants and worker exposure to beryllium.
Still, Rep. Ted Strickland, D-Ohio, said refusing to expand the compensation plan to cover the plant in his district was ``unjustified.''
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Richardson wants Piketon workers compensated for illnesses
By KATHERINE RIZZO The Associated Press 09/17/99
http://flash.cleveland.com/cgi-bin/clv_nview.pl?/home1/wire/AP/Stream-Parsed/OHIO_NEWS/o0451_PM_OH--RadiationCompensa
WASHINGTON (AP) -- If Energy Secretary Bill Richardson has anything to say about it, workers who became ill from being exposed to radiation at a Department of Energy plant in southern Ohio will be compensated for their illnesses.
But for now, a plan the department is working on will cover only workers at its plant in Paducah, Ky., because of recent revelations of exposure to plutonium, which is highly radioactive and can cause cancer if ingested even in minute amounts.
The department now acknowledges that plutonium was contained in the uranium dust Paducah workers routinely were exposed from the mid-1950s to the late 1970s. The department believes a substantially smaller amount of plutonium exposure occurred in Piketon, Ohio, and another plant in Oak Ridge, Tenn., but it does not yet know exactly how much plutonium-laced uranium was handled there.
The congressman who represents Piketon, home of the Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant, said Thursday that he was irate about the exclusion of his constituents from what DOE was calling a pilot project.
Rep. Ted Strickland, D-Ohio, said DOE officials he would not identify told him a broader compensation program was rejected out of concern for setting a precedent that would put taxpayers on the hook for payouts in the billions of dollars.
"Well, that is a concern in the U.S. government," Richardson said at a town hall meeting Thursday night in Paducah to discuss health, environmental and safety concerns at the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant. "But I want to assure the workers at Portsmouth and Oak Ridge that if there is a link between their work and illness, that we're going to make every effort to treat them like we're treating the workers at Paducah."
More than 500,000 people who worked in the nuclear production complex from the early 1940s through the 1980s. If only a portion of them have contracted diseases that qualify them for compensation, the totals could be enormous.
"Regardless of what the reason was, it's unjustified," Strickland said.
The department was characterizing its compensation request as a test, or pilot program which "will help evaluate the need for similar programs at these other sites."
Bob Schaeffer of the watchdog group Alliance for Nuclear Accountability called that a frustrating pattern.
"They're showing a fear of liability and they're showing typical administration dealings with whatever wheel is squeaking today rather than dealing with things systematically," he said. "The distinctions are artificial, political and budget-oriented rather than human.
"They're going to end up spending more money fighting multiple worker and community suits."
The department did not say how much a compensation program would cost, because that would depend on how many workers qualified.
Shaeffer said he was eager to see which radiation-linked cancers would qualify workers for payments, presuming Congress approves any payments. "The devil is in the details here," he said. "People could be waiting years or be dead while they decide what diseases, and how they should be diagnosed" in order to qualify for compensation.
Shaeffer's group wants the government to presume that people suffering from radiation-induced illnesses got them from exposure to the weapons plants if they worked there or lived near enough to be affected by airborne emissions or groundwater contamination.
"You're giving people that sacrificed for the benefit of the country the benefit of the doubt," he said.
At the same time it announced its desire for a Paducah-only compensation program, the department announced details of its plan to ask for extra cleanup money for Paducah, Piketon and Oak Ridge.
The department said it would seek $7 billion for expanding a medical monitoring program, examining contamination control programs and investigating to determine exactly how recycled uranium moved throughout the weapons complex.
It also will ask for an extra $10.7 million to speed up cleanups under way at Paducah and Piketon, and $4.1 million to speed up cleanups of inactive operations at those sites.
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Only one plant's exposed workers would be eligible under plan
September 16, 1999, BY KATHERINE RIZZO Associated Press Writer
http://www.ohio.com/bj/news/ohio/docs/030664.htm
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Energy Department said Thursday it will ask Congress for money to compensate Kentucky workers with radiation-related cancers. But workers at sister plants in Ohio and Tennessee would be out of luck, at least at first.
The congressman whose district includes the Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Piketon, Ohio, said he was furious.
``It is not right. It is not fair,'' said Rep. Ted Strickland, D-Ohio. ``It is a morally wrong decision.''
Years ago, an unknown number of Piketon employees were exposed to an unknown amount of plutonium on the job.
Strickland said his conversations with DOE officials he would not identify led him to conclude that the Clinton administration rejected a broader compensation program out of concern for costs. He said officials fear setting a precedent that would put taxpayers on the hook for billions of dollars in payouts to many of the 500,000-plus people who worked in the nuclear production complex from the early 1940s through the 1980s.
``Regardless of what the reason was, it's unjustified,'' the lawmaker said. ``What this administration ought to be saying is We're going to investigate thoroughly and we're going to let the chips fall where they may.'''
The plants at Piketon, Paducah, Ky., and Oak Ridge, Tenn., processed uranium for nuclear warheads. Some of the uranium handled at Paducah and Piketon was tainted with plutonium. Workers who later got cancer suspect exposure to plutonium may be the cause.
The Energy Department also announced details of its plan to ask for extra cleanup money for all three plants.
The department said it would seek $7 billion for expanding a medical monitoring program, examining contamination control programs and doing some historical sleuthing to determine exactly how recycled uranium moved throughout the weapons complex.
It also will ask for an extra $10.7 million to speed up cleanups underway at Paducah and Piketon, and $4.1 million to speed up cleanups of inactive facilities at those two sites.
DOE did not rule out the possibility of seeking compensation at some point for workers at Piketon and Oak Ridge. The department characterized its compensation request as a test, or pilot program which ``will help evaluate the need for similar programs at these other sites.''
Bob Schaeffer of the watchdog group Alliance for Nuclear Accountability called that a frustrating pattern.
``They're showing a fear of liability, and they're showing typical administration dealings with whatever wheel is squeaking today rather than dealing with things systematically,'' he said. ``The distinctions are artificial, political and budget-oriented rather than human.
``They're going to end up spending more money fighting multiple worker and community suits.''
The department did not say how much a compensation program would cost, because that would depend on how many workers qualified.
Schaeffer said he was eager to see which radiation-linked cancers would qualify workers for payments, presuming Congress approves any payments. ``The devil is in the details here,'' he said. ``People could be waiting years or be dead while they decide what diseases, and how they should be diagnosed'' in order to qualify for compensation.
Schaeffer's group wants the government to presume that people suffering from radiation-induced illnesses got them from exposure to the weapons plants if they worked there or lived near enough to be affected by airborne emissions or groundwater contamination.
``You're giving people that sacrificed for the benefit of the country the benefit of the doubt,'' he said.
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Paducah site is safe, report says
By JAMES PRICHARD, Associated Press, September 15, 1999
http://www.courierpress.com/cgi-bin/view.cgi?199909/15+paducahsite091599_news.html+19990915+news
Federal investigators at a cleanup site in Kentucky found shortcomings at a uranium plant but no impending hazards to workers or the public, Energy Secretary Bill Richardson said Tuesday.
The Energy Department investigation follows the recent revelation of a federal whistle-blower lawsuit filed by three workers at the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Paducah, Ky. The suit alleges that plant workers were unknowingly exposed to plutonium for 23 years.
The lawsuit also claims that former plant operators falsified documents regarding the disposal of contaminated waste and records involving environmental contamination at the plant.
In announcing the team's initial observations, Richardson said investigators also reported that general radiation risks are low at the plant and radiation-protection programs there have improved during the past decade.
"At the same time, we don't have to wait for their final report to start work on corrective actions in the areas where the team has identified room for improvement," he said in a news release in Washington.
The team found that managers of cleanup operations at the site need to keep a closer eye on radiation-exposure levels and tighten contamination-control practices.
"We're pleased that the team confirmed basically what we felt, that there are no imminent health risks and that the risk to health from the uranium activities is extremely low," said Mark Musolf, a spokesman for Bechtel-Jacobs Co. LLC, the plant's environmental contractor.
The Energy Department owned and operated the plant until 1993, when production was turned over to the United States Enrichment Corp., an entity created by Congress under the National Energy Policy Act of 1992.
The department now focuses its efforts on the environmental restoration of the plant site and the management of waste generated there.
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No Letup In Probes Of Clinton Presidency
Executive Privilege Claim in Clemency Case Angers GOP
By Charles Babington and Juliet Eilperin Washington Post Staff Writers Friday, September 17, 1999; Page A01
http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-09/17/058l-091799-idx.html
President Clinton refused yesterday to provide witnesses or key documents to members of Congress investigating his decision to grant clemency to Puerto Rican nationalists, raising tensions between the White House and a Republican-led Congress that is showing a renewed appetite for probing the executive branch.
The White House's invoking of "executive privilege" infuriated GOP leaders, who have accused the administration of withholding information on a variety of issues since Clinton took office. Yesterday's sharp exchanges, and the new round of investigations by several congressional committees, show that the climate of accusations surrounding Clinton did not evaporate with his impeachment acquittal, but instead will dog him through the final days of his presidency.
Targets of the new congressional probes are the administration's role in Russian banking improprieties, the 1993 siege at Waco and last month's decision to free a dozen members or sympathizers of the Puerto Rican terrorist group FALN.
White House aides and other Democrats warn that the probes could come back to haunt the Republicans, accentuating an image of a vengeful party bent on harassing the president. But while Clinton has no more campaigns to run, the investigations could also cause problems for the two politicians most closely associated with him.
Vice President Gore, who's running for president, could be tarnished by the probe into Russian finances. He has been the administration's point man on relations with President Boris Yeltsin's regime, which critics have accused of mishandling foreign aid from the International Monetary Fund and other institutions.
Hillary Rodham Clinton, meanwhile, has seen her New York Senate bid buffeted by the Puerto Rican clemency issue, in which Republicans have accused the president of trying to win support for his wife among New York's Puerto Rican voters. As the controversy swelled, the first lady said the clemency offer should be rescinded, but most of the inmates in question were released last week.
Republicans say they are investigating legitimate, important matters, not trying to score political points. Beginning with the investigations of the White House travel office firings and White House deputy counsel Vincent Foster's suicide, they say, the administration all too often has withheld information when Congress tried to perform its oversight duties.
Yesterday, Rep. Dan Burton (R-Ind.), chairman of the House Government Reform Committee, rebuked the White House for rejecting his panel's request for documents and witnesses pertaining to Clinton's decision to grant clemency to the Puerto Ricans. "The president has a moral obligation to the American people to explain why he let terrorists out of prison," Burton said.
The White House returned fire, accusing Burton of seeking political revenge against a president the Republicans could not drive from office. "We're now hearing and getting subpoenas from a committee chairman who -- I don't really know what legislative accomplishments he's had in his tenure as chairman," White House press secretary Joe Lockhart said. "But I can tell you that we've gotten something like 700 subpoenas from him. He has publicly stated that his mission is to get the president. . . . This is about trying to pursue a political agenda."
In a six-page letter to Clinton yesterday, Attorney General Janet Reno argued that the White House has strong legal arguments for refusing to provide key memos or witnesses to explain the clemency decision, a power the Constitution assigns solely to the president.
"The White House staff and the Department of Justice act as confidential advisers to the president as part of the clemency review process, and executive privilege has long been understood to protect confidential advice generated during that process," Reno wrote.
Burton's committee remains the most active House panel, investigating not only Waco and the FALN decision but also the 1996 campaign finance scandal; Chinese espionage; and allegations the Clinton administration has retaliated against whistle-blowers.
House leaders have been sharply critical of Clinton's and Gore's approach toward Russia, and three panels are looking at the issue, including the House Banking and Financial Services Committee, the House International Relations Committee and the Joint Economic Committee.
On the Senate side, the Judiciary Committee has been feuding with the administration on several fronts: The panel plans to vote next week on whether to issue subpoenas in connection with Clinton's clemency offer and has threatened to unilaterally release a redacted version of Reno's closed-session testimony on the department's investigation of possible espionage by nuclear scientist Wen Ho Lee.
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah) is also discussing the creation of a bipartisan Waco task force with Sens. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) and Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.).
Judiciary is not the only active panel on the Senate side, however. A Foreign Relations terrorism subcommittee is also investigating the FALN flap, while the full committee will hold hearings next week on the administration's Russia policy.
Republican investigations of Clinton are nothing new, of course: In June 1998, House Democrats estimated that the GOP had spent $17 million on 50 probes of the administration, 38 of which were going on at the time.
But in many ways, the sudden burst in investigative activity underscores how the already-strained relations between Congress and the White House have only worsened since the impeachment proceedings ended this winter.
Specter, a moderate who has been critical of Reno during her tenure, said the Senate's relationship with the Justice Department "has been eroding day by day until it's reached the point of absolute frustration."
"The attorney general makes a standard answer: 'I'll take that into consideration and get back to you,' and she never does," he added. "We need to issue subpoenas and we need to go for contempt citations because they have stonewalled us."
But White House chief of Staff John D. Podesta said: "At this point they are kind of like Ahab: They do it for hate's sake. . . . It's a lack of an agenda on their part. Members like Chairman Burton just live for these partisan investigations. . . . But I think the American public is sick of it."
American Enterprise Institute resident scholar Norm Ornstein observed that investigations provide Republicans with an opportunity to make some political inroads while their top legislative priorities, such as their $792 billion tax cut package, are stymied. "They need to follow a course here and figure out some way to be on the offensive," he said.