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-------- depleted uranium
Used Uranium to Aid Cancer Trials, says Energy Department
By Kerri Pepoy
June 13, 2000
http://www.fedbuzz.com/govwire/breaking/uranium.html
The U.S. Department of Energy will assist in cancer research by providing leftover radioactive materials used in its nuclear laboratory facilities to clinical medical trials that are exploring a promising new form of cancer treatment, DOE said on Monday.
DOE plans to supply the isotope Bismuth-213 to a cancer treatment research project at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City, said Energy Secretary Bill Richardson. Bismuth-213 is a decay product of Uranium-233 and is currently in storage at DOE's Oak Ridge National Laboratory. The announcement on Monday builds on the clinical trials using Bismuth-213 that DOE has supported for the past two years at Memorial Sloan Kettering.
"This is an innovative way to utilize legacy materials from nuclear production for positive uses," said Richardson. "The use of this isotope for cancer treatment has shown promise and with an increased availability of the isotope, these research efforts can be expanded."
The procedure being researched at Memorial Sloan Kettering, called radio-immunotherapy, differs from chemotherapy because it directs treatment to the tissue that needs to be destroyed and minimizes impact to healthy surrounding tissue, DOE said.
Bismuth-213 is linked with antibodies, peptides or other biological agents that can travel directly to the site of a tumor within the body. With radio-immunotherapy, patients can be treated with much smaller quantities of radio-isotopes than other forms of treatment that are used today, DOE said.
The clinical trials have explored treatment for forms of cancer including leukemia. As additional supply of Bismuth-213 is made available, researchers hope to use it to develop treatments for other forms of cancer including cancer of the pancreas, kidneys and other organs. The research is in the first stage of clinical trials and has shown promising results, DOE said.
In the near term, as funds are available, DOE plans to increase the supply of the isotope by up to 30 percent over the next year, and hopes to double its supply by 2002.
Initially, DOE will use the existing extraction and process line at Oak Ridge National Laboratory to supply the isotope. In order to double its supply, DOE said additional funding will be needed from Congress to install a new processing line.
-------- france
French policy on du weapons export
Date: Tue, 13 Jun 2000 12:20:27 +0200
From: "Laka Foundation" <laka@antenna.nl>
From a report on French weapon export policy. I can read a little bit French, but I can't translate this in english Henk
Les nouvelles actions internationales : armes de petit calibre, munitions à uranium appauvri
(...)
_ Les munitions à uranium appauvri
En matière d'armes classiques, une nouvelle question semble aussi se dessiner, celle des munitions à uranium appauvri. Les munitions à uranium appauvri ne sont pas des armes nucléaires à effet radioactif. L'uranium est un métal dont l'une des caractéristiques est la très grande densité. Pour ces motifs, il est désormais utilisé pour fabriquer des obus antichars. Sa densité considérable fait que les obus ainsi conçus, tirés par des canons appropriés, réussissent à percer les plus épais blindages. Des obus antichars en uranium appauvri ont été tirés pour la première fois pendant la guerre du Golfe, en 1991. Au Kosovo, les forces de l'OTAN en auraient tiré 31 000, sous forme d'obus de 30 mm tirés par les avions A 10 américains, dits " tueurs de chars ". La France a elle-même mis au point des " obus-flèches " de 120 mm en uranium appauvri pour le canon du char Leclerc.
Interrogé à l'Assemblée nationale, le 15 mars 2000, le ministre de la Défense a rejeté tout effet radioactif secondaire de ces munitions: " Quant au niveau de radioactivité des obus-flèches ainsi réalisés, il est extrêmement faible et comparable à celui de certains milieux naturels. La toxicité chimique est également comparable à celle des autres métaux lourds qui entrent dans la composition des munitions et cinquante années d'expérience industrielle de l'utilisation de ce matériau n'ont mis en évidence aucune pathologie.
" Quant à l'emploi de ces munitions sur un théâtre d'opérations, aucune des études qui ont été menées jusqu'à présent n'a mis en évidence de risques chimiques ou radiologiques pour les populations avoisinantes. En effet, ce matériau est employé parce qu'il est d'une très forte densité. Il est donc d'une très faible volatilité et ne présente pas de risque d'inhalation. Aucune des recherches conduites sur son emploi pendant la guerre du Golfe n'est d'ailleurs venue confirmer l'hypothèse d'une suite pathologique."
Le ministre a cependant conclu que son département restait vigilant sur ce thème et qu'il tenait à la disposition de la représentation nationale " l'ensemble des données médicales et environnementales dont nous disposons ".
Des voix, de scientifiques et de médecins notamment, se sont cependant élevées, soupçonnant ces munitions d'avoir des conséquences liées à la radioactivité sur la population, notamment en Irak. En fait, il est soupçonné qu'une part de ces munitions serait constituée à partir non pas d'uranium naturel appauvri, mais d'uranium ayant été utilisé comme combustible nucléaire, donc enrichi, et ensuite appauvri.
La question serait donc celle de l'utilisation d'" uranium mal appauvri ", qui aurait des effets radioactifs durables. La Mission d'information ne dispose en aucun cas des compétences techniques pour s'aventurer dans ce débat. Cette question va du reste au-delà de l'interdiction de l'exportation de telles munitions, puisqu'il s'agit de leur utilisation par les armées des pays producteurs. Elle souhaite donc que le point soit fait de toute urgence sur la radioactivité de ces munitions et que des normes excluant toute radioactivité soit imposées, ou sinon que leur fabrication et leur utilisation soient interdites.
CONSTITUTION DU 4 OCTOBRE 1958 ONZIÈME LÉGISLATURE
Enregistré à la Présidence de l'Assemblée nationale le 25 avril 2000.
RAPPORT D'INFORMATION DÉPOSÉ en application de l'article 145 du Règlement PAR LA COMMISSION DE LA DÉFENSE NATIONALE ET DES FORCES ARMÉES (1), sur le contrôle des exportations d'armement et présenté par MM. Jean-Claude SANDRIER, Christian MARTIN et Alain VEYRET, Députés.
-------- imf / world bank
Philadelphia Daily News
06/13/00
Pol: It'll be mask hysteria
City Council bill would force protesters to show their faces
by Erin Einhorn
Daily News Staff Writer
http://us.f23.mail.yahoo.com/ym/login?.rand=0nlspg07mv9ia
Police footage from the protests that shut down Seattle during the World Trade Organization gathering in December showed groups of masked demonstrators - perhaps emboldened by their anonymity - torching cars, breaking windows and, police said, inciting riots.
It's a situation that City Councilman Rick Mariano wants to avoid during next month's Republican National Convention.
A bill he introduced to ban the wearing of masks "with the specific intent to intimidate or threaten another person or. . .hide one's identity [while breaking the law]" narrowly won approval yesterday from a Council committee.
A group of local activists blasted the bill as violating basic constitutional rights.
Masks are a form of political expression, they said. And, given the recent use of tear gas to break up demonstrations in Seattle and Washington, D.C., some protesters have taken to wearing gas masks for health reasons.
Three members of Council agreed with them, saying the bill has no purpose but to harass protesters.
"I'm worried that the real intent of this legislation is aimed at suppressing the expression of dissent," Councilman David Cohen said.
Councilman Jim Kenney objected to the bill on grounds it would really only encourage protesters to cover their faces.
"People are going to wear masks because they're told they can't," he said. "The more we try to sanitize and move protests away from the main event, the more resistance we're going to get."
Sure enough, the group of activists who wore their masks to yesterday's Council hearing - decked out in everything from bandanas to pink sequined masks and giant papier-mache heads - said they have every intent to wear masks during protests next month. Most said they'd never worn them before.
But other members of Council were less sympathetic.
Four committee members voted in favor of the bill, which is due for a first reading on Thursday and a final vote next week.
"I'm sorry. I have no problem with demonstrations, protesters. But I have a problem when they wear a mask," said Councilwoman Joan Krajewski. "To me, that's a coward. If you're going to fight for something, then let them know what you're fighting for and who you are. Why the mask? I think they're dangerous."
One young protester wearing a dust mask interrupted Krajewski. "Do you find masquerades dangerous, madam?" she asked.
"When I have a masquerade, I know who's there," Krajewski said.
Philadelphia isn't the first place to consider an anti-masking ordinance. Georgia has one on the books as an anti-Ku Klux Klan measure. Detroit passed an anti-masking bill recently in anticipation of last week's demonstrations against a gathering of the Organization of American States, which met across the river in Windsor, Ontario.
Detroit police arrested 13 people for wearing masks.
-------- india / pakistan
PAKISTAN NOW PRODUCING ENOUGH PLUTONIUM FOR ONE BOMB PER YEAR
From: aiindex@mnet.fr
South Asians Against Nukes Post
Pakistan Press International Information Services Limited
13 June 2000
WASHINGTON June 13 PPI. Pakistan is now generating plutonium at a rate of between 8 and 10 kilograms per year, providing more than enough material to make one bomb a year, according to Monday's issue of McGraw-Hill's Nuclear Fuel newsletter. That capability gives Pakistan the bomb fuel it needs to wed its Nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs to eventually give it lighter weapons capable of being launched in an air attack against arch-rival India.
Senior editor Mark Hibbs, writing in Nuclear Fuel and sister publication Nucleonics Week, published by McGraw-Hill Energy Information Group, the world's largest and most authoritative provider of news, pricing and analysis for oil, electricity, natural gas, coal, nuclear , petrochemical, etc., has previously revealed the existence of Pakistan's Khushab plutonium production reactor and an indigenous heavy water plant, both needed for the plutonium chain. A pilot reprocessing facility at New Labs in Rawalpindi, Pakistan , is now fully operational and separating plutonium for Pakistan 's bomb program at the rate of between 8 and 10 kg per year.
The facility also has the capability to produce without difficulty the same amount of plutonium every year using all the spent fuel burned in the Khushab reactor. International safeguards experts consider 8 kg as roughly the amount needed for a bomb. The significance of this capability-developed both by buying and Smuggling technology from abroad and by indigenous work-is that it gives Pakistan the potential to make nuclear devices small enough to mount on missiles such as the North Korean model Pakistan has already tested. That would give the country the capability to launch a nuclear strike hundreds of miles inside traditional political rival India. More immediately, the capability also increases internal pressure In Pakistan to allow scientists to test a plutonium -based bomb to ensure its operability, he wrote. The pressure is coming at the same time pressure is building in India to allow a new test of its redesigned hydrogen bomb, because the original design partially fizzled in a test in 1998.
----
NUCLEAR SAFETY Radioactivity
Communalism Watch and Governance Monitor
From: aiindex@mnet.fr
Date: Tue, 13 Jun 2000 11:16:58 +0200
http://www.saccer.org
Outlook, June 19, 2000 - In a strange twist to its N-weaponisation programme, the government marginalises the sole safety-monitoring agency
It is one of the biggest strategic moves by the Indian government since Pokhran II. The five-decade-old Indian nuclear programme is no longer just "Atoms for Peace". The Department of Atomic Energy (dae) has come out in the open about its weapons programme. As the first step, the government has decided to take away the authority of the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (aerb) to oversee the safety of a large number of critical nuclear installations meant for the weapons programme in the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (barc). Henceforth, an Internal Safety Committee to be set up by barc's director, Dr Anil Kakodkar, will be responsible for ensuring the safety of the public and the workers from dangers which could emanate from these facilities. This diminishes the responsibility for unbiased independent safety regulations entrusted thus far with the aerb.
The secretary of the aerb, K.S. Parthasarathy, confirmed to Outlook that the regulatory and safety functions at barc and its facilities will be exercised through Kakodkar's committee. He says that the new body has been set up with the full knowledge of the aerb and was established because "there was a fuzzy line about what the board could and could not oversee". But he adds that the new mechanism would follow the principles of good safety management.
But not all are convinced. Says Dr A. Gopalakrishnan, who was aerb chairman from 1993 to 1996, "The news that the aerb's authority has been substantially reduced is not surprising in today's context. In one stroke, the safety assurance and regulation of the mostly dilapidated barc facilities has been made the responsibility of those who are managing these installations, defeating the very principle of independent external scrutiny which is at the core of any safety regulation." He also points out that if the government's intention is to accelerate the weapons programme, it will require a three-shift operation of facilities whose degraded safety status and continued operation without substantial repairs have been causing serious concerns within the aerb from the standpoint of worker and public safety, even in 1995. "The only way to circumvent the problem of external interference in their operation is to immediately remove the aerb's supervisory authority over these facilities," observes Gopalakrishnan.
He and others in the nuclear establishment suspect this could well be the argument the dae used to get the prime minister's consent, throwing basic tenets of independent regulation down the drain and keeping the PM in the dark about the safety issues involved. "If only the pmo will once again go through the aerb Safety Issues Report I'd submitted in 1995, the appalling defects in barc facilities will be clear even to the ias cadre in that office. But the dae is able to push through this change thanks to their new-found power under the present government, as a result of the May 1998 tests," says Gopalakrishnan.
Interestingly, the recent move is also in contravention to the International Atomic Energy Agency's convention on safety. One of the primary safety principles laid out in the 1994 International Atomic Energy Agency Convention on Nuclear Safety, which India signed on September 20, 1994, is that each party to the convention should establish a nuclear regulatory organisation that is effectively separated from the regulated industry and from government organisations that promote nuclear power. Says M.V. Ramana, research associate at the Center for Energy and Environmental Studies, Princeton University: "Turning over regulation of safety at barc to a body that is to be appointed by the Atomic Energy Commission (aec) and barc itself cannot count as effective separation."
As regards aerb's independence, officials of the organisation admit the aerb never enjoyed the required independence from the dae and it has not been properly manned to make its safety evaluations without strong dae influence and interference coming in. It was kept technically dependent on dae totally and answerable administratively and financially to the secretary, dae, the same department facilities it is to regulate in an "unbiased" manner.
Some nuclear scientists feel that now the aerb has been divested of the responsibility for all weapons-related facilities, it may be allowed to carry out its few remaining tasks without dae interference. But this may be wishful thinking. Says Gopalakrishnan, "Since the power reactors are also used as producers of second-grade plutonium for weapons and certain primary fusion materials for thermonuclear devices, the dae may want to continue the stranglehold on even the emasculated aerb which now will be overseeing these power plants."
The reported claim of the dae is that this reorganisation follows India's nuclear-weapon status since Pokhran II. According to a senior barc official, the dae position is that now that India is a nuclear-weapon state, it must organise its safety evaluation systems like other nuclear powers. The US, for example, has a Nuclear Regulatory Commission which regulates all civilian nuclear installations, while the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (dnfsb) is responsible for the independent external supervision of all activities in the nuclear weapon complexes of the Department of Energy (doe).
According to barc officials, the dnfsb is not a secret organisation and is accountable to the US government. It has to present its recommendations on actions needed to ensure worker and public safety to the secretary, doe. And in cases where their reviews show an imminent or severe potential threat to public health or safety, the board is required under law to transmit its recommendations directly to the US president as well as to the secretaries of energy and defense. The dnfsb is also required to explain its actions at public hearings, where it comes under questioning by public interest groups.
In addition, its chairman and members are often asked to testify before Congressional committees and as all members of such committees also hold top security clearances, the board has to reveal full details without taking cover under the Official Secrets Act. The dnfsb chairman and members are selected from non-doe personnel, usually eminent public figures from the industry, academia and management circles. "Will (aec chairman and dae secretary) Dr R. Chidambaram assure us that his Internal Safety Review Committee will also meet all these requirements like in the developed N-weapon states, or does he only wish to fool the government, Parliament and the people through a charade of superficial imitation? And will our parliamentarians wake up and strengthen their overview functions and exercise their powers to bring the dae and the executive branch of government under democratic controls, instead of allowing them to run amok?" asks Gopalakrishnan.
According to Ramana, this step is unfortunate. Even with aerb supervision, he points out, there have been numerous safety problems within the nuclear establishment, including at barc. "For example, in December 1991, reactor workers discovered a big radioactive leak from poorly-maintained pipelines in the vicinity of the Cirus and Dhruva reactors causing severe soil contamination. Without effective monitoring by an independent body, such occurrences are likely to be more frequent. Further, this goes against the global trend for greater openness in nuclear matters and increased autonomy of regulatory bodies," he fears.
Comparing the functioning of the dnfsb with the Internal Safety Committee, Ramana points out a striking difference. Says he: "The essential feature of the dnfsb's functioning is the amount of information in the open. It has a public reading room, a constantly-updated Internet page and answers queries made through the Freedom of Information Act. Such information has never been made available in India and this has allowed for safety lapses and accidents." Chernobyl, anyone?
By A.S. Panneerselvan Former AERB chairman Gopalakrishnan feels DAE used Pokhran II to push its recommendations through and accuses it of running a "charade of imitation". The Internal Safety Committee, to be set up by BARC director Kakodkar, is modelled on a US body but minus the accountability and transparency.
-------- iraq
Hussein Willing To Reduce Arsenal
Associated Press
June 13, 2000 Filed at 8:14 a.m. EDT
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/i/AP-Iraq-Saddam.html
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- President Saddam Hussein said he is willing to reduce his arsenal, but only weapon for weapon with the rest of the world, according to reports published Tuesday.
``If the world said to rid ourselves of our weapons, leaving us only swords ... we would accept, and we would destroy along with them all those (other) weapons we possess. But if they possess a rifle while telling me I only have the right to possess a sword, then I will say this is not acceptable,'' Saddam said.
Saddam's comments came late Monday during a meeting with experts from the Military Industry Commission, which manufactures all Iraqi weapons.
The United Nations has been pressuring Iraq for a decade to eliminate its weapons of mass destruction. Harsh U.N. economic sanctions imposed after Iraq's 1990 invasion of Kuwait are not to be lifted until U.N. inspectors certify the weapons, and Iraq's capacity for producing them, have been destroyed.
U.N. weapons inspectors left Iraq in December 1998 ahead of U.S. and British airstrikes launched to punish Iraq for failing to cooperate with arms searches. Iraq barred inspectors from the old U.N. Special Commission from returning -- and has so far refused to cooperate with the U.N.-appointed successor agency.
Saddam also indirectly responded to a report by the new U.N. weapons inspection regime submitted to the Security Council early this month that said it had made ``a good start'' but needs Iraq's cooperation to do its job.
Saddam said that even before the 1991 Gulf War he had told Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak that Iraq was ready for an agreement to disarm the region of weapons of mass destruction.
``We do not mean here only the ballistic missiles, which is no more than long-range artillery, but all weapons -- and we demanded that the Zionist regime be the first to sign this agreement,'' he said in a reference to Israel.
-------- japan
Radioactive Material Sent to Mori
Washington Post
Tuesday, June 13, 2000; Page A32
WORLD IN BRIEF Compiled by Virginia Hamill
http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/2000-06/13/130l-061300-idx.html
TOKYO--Police have launched an investigation after envelopes containing radioactive material were sent to Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori'scq residence and several government agencies, Japan's government spokesman said.
The envelopes contained a small amount of powder containing the radioactive element thorium, and the level of radioactivity was not deemed harmful, the Jiji Press news agency said.
(Reuters)
-------- korea
The Two Koreas, Talking
New York Times
June 13, 2000
http://www.nytimes.com/00/06/13/editorial/13tue1.html
This week's meetings between South Korea's president, Kim Dae Jung, and North Korea's leader, Kim Jong Il, mark an encouraging change in the relationship between the two Koreas. In the 55 years since the Korean Peninsula was divided after World War II, the North has directed invasion, infiltration and terrorism against the South and both sides have employed vitriolic propaganda against each other. Now, for the first time, the top leaders on each side are getting together to discuss mutual concerns like economic cooperation and family reunification.
Never before have North and South Korea come this close to a normal, peaceful relationship. What has pushed them this far is a combination of severe economic and social strains in the North, including serious famine and energy shortages, and a new recognition by the South that its own security would be endangered by a sudden breakdown of authority in North Korea. That understanding has inspired President Kim Dae Jung's policy of actively engaging the North, an approach the Clinton administration has wisely supported.
Unfortunately, North Korea's government remains one of the world's most opaque and unpredictable. Expectations for specific agreements coming out of the meetings should not be set too high.
South Korea's main goals in these talks, which are scheduled to run through Thursday in the North Korean capital, Pyongyang, include reaching agreement on additional high-level meetings, expanding economic exchanges and arranging for the reunification of millions of families divided since the Korean War. Many of these separated relatives are now elderly, adding some urgency to resolving this issue. South Korea will also bring up military and security issues of concern to the United States. The North must continue living up to its agreements with Washington to freeze its nuclear weapons program and to suspend all testing of long-range missiles.
North Korea has recently been seeking to broaden its diplomatic contacts around the world. It has worked to upgrade its relations with Europe and Japan as well as South Korea and the United States. Last month Kim Jong Il met China's leaders in Beijing. Next month Vladimir Putin is scheduled to become the first top Russian leader ever to visit Pyongyang.
North Korea's development of long-range missiles, coupled with its diplomatic aloofness and unpredictable behavior, was the leading reason behind the Clinton administration's efforts to develop defensive technologies capable of protecting the United States from a limited missile attack. Those concerns remain valid. But as North Korea begins to reach out from its self-imposed isolation, there are grounds for hoping that one day it may no longer need to be treated as a dangerous rogue state.
---
North, South Korean leaders embark on landmark summit 'Highly symbolic' handshake surprises onlookers
CNN
June 13, 2000 Web posted at: 7:40 p.m. HKT (1140 GMT)
http://www.cnn.com/2000/ASIANOW/east/06/13/korea.summit.02/index.html
PYONGYANG, North Korea (CNN) -- In a landmark summit offering the best chance for peace in one of the last remnants of the Cold War, North and South Korean leaders have begun formal talks.
http://www.cnn.com/2000/ASIANOW/east/06/13/korea.summit.02/map.pyongyang.seoul.gif
North Korean leader Kim Jong Il and South Korean President Kim Dae-jung, leaders on the Korean peninsula that was divided in the 1950s, wasted little time Tuesday as they opened discussions almost immediately after the South Korean leader arrived in the North Korean capital.
The historic summit, which had been delayed by one day, began with an unprecedented gesture when Kim Jong Il appeared from the large crowd at Pyongyang's Sunan Airport to greet his counterpart with a highly symbolic handshake -- he used both hands.
The leaders then climbed into a black limousine and drove past the thousands of cheering onlookers lining the route to North Korea's state guesthouse. There, they posed for photos, standing in front of mural of crashing waves.
The two men then sat in armchairs and talked casually. Kim Dae-jung reportedly said he hoped the Koreas could end hostilities and begin an era of cooperation on the Korean peninsula, still technically at war. Reunification and reunion of family members separated during the Korean War were among the issues expected to be discussed.
The Koreas have been divided in a Cold War standoff for decades. The 1950-53 Korean War, in which U.S.-led forces fought Chinese- and Soviet-backed North Korean troops, ended in an armed truce and unwavering political tension. Thousands of troops guard each side of the border.
Leaders get to know each other
Seoul Bureau Chief Sohn Jie-ae said the leaders seemed cordial, they smiled to each other and shared a pleasant conversation. She said the footage, shown on South Korean television, left many South Koreans feeling optimistic about the talks.
However, she said the leaders, meeting for the first time, needed some time to get to know each other. Kim Dae-jung is the first South Korean leader to visit the Communist North Korea.
The two countries had agreed to a summit in 1994. But then North Korean leader Kim Il Sung died at age 82 only weeks before he was to meet with South Korean counterpart, Kim Young-sam.
Sohn said a two-handed handshake is a sign of friendship and respect in Korea. In another symbolic gesture, Kim Dae-jung allowed North Korea to provide his security during the summit, she added.
Korean analyst Stephen Linton told CNN that the double-handed handshake was comparable to a hug in the West. He said nobody could have imagined the North Korean leader doing that in the recent past.
CNN's Mike Chinoy said that the handshake's symbolism could not be overstated, and that the political symbolism was an indication that Kim Jong Il was serious about easing tensions between the Koreas.
"What this means is mutual recognition," Chinoy said. "That is something neither side has been willing to do (in the past)."
Cheering crowd greets South Korean leader
Kim Dae-jung, accompanied by 130 officials and businessmen and 50 South Korean reporters, departed from Seoul at 9:18 a.m (0018 GMT) for the 180-kilometer (110-mile) flight to Pyongyang.
As he exited the aircraft to a red carpet welcome, Kim Dae-jung applauded. He was expected to be taken to a meeting with Kim Jong Il shortly after the historic handshake.
The crowd cheered wildly and waved pink and red flowers as the leaders walked side-by-side past dozens of officials. Two girls presented bouquets to Kim Dae-jung and his wife. Women wore traditional North Korean costumes, and a band played martial music.
Chinoy said there had been a lot of anticipation leading up to the summit -- as many Koreans on both sides of the border had hoped for a dramatic, overnight change in relations.
Before leaving Seoul, Kim Dae-jung downplayed expectations his visit would produce a miracle. However, he said he hoped there could be agreements in the future on some of the problems facing the Koreas.
"I hope that it will be an opportunity to remove threats of war and terminate the Cold War on the Korean peninsula, so that all 70 million Korean people in the South and North can live in peace," Kim said.
Several issues on summit agenda
Talks during the summit were expected to focus on security, reunion of family members separated during the 1950-53 war, and reunification of the Koreas.
The South wants the North to agree to family reunions, a summit sequel in Seoul and other conciliatory gestures in exchange for resources to rebuild the communist nation's dilapidated economy. North Korea, which suffered a deadly famine in the late 1990s, relies on food aid from its traditional foes, South Korea, Japan and the United States.
However, reunification, a stated goal of both nations, is likely to be a lengthy process. The first summit between leaders of East Germany and West Germany was held in 1970, two decades before the dismantling of the Berlin Wall.
There are several other touchy issues between the Koreas -- including North Korea's missile and nuclear programs and the U.S. military presence in South Korea.
Chinoy said Kim Jong Il is facing a dilemma -- he has to build up his nation's collapsed economy, but fears North Korea's power structure could crumble if the nation is opened too fast to the outside.
"He's got a very difficult balancing act," Chinoy said, noting Kim Jong Il wants to prevent what he considers to be the "ideological contamination" of North Korea that could follow the nation's opening to the world.
North Korea recently forged diplomatic relations with Italy and Australia, and has been talking with U.S. and Japanese officials about forming diplomatic links with those nations.
North seeks assistance
The fortunes of the Koreas -- one communist and one pro- Western -- have changed as the years have passed. Previously disdainful of its southern neighbor, an impoverished North Korea now hopes for food and other aid from prosperous South Korea.
James Laney, former U.S. ambassador to South Korea, said North Korea remains in a precarious situation. The nation suffered a drought earlier this year and a series of natural disasters since the 1980s. In addition, the North's economy has virtually collapsed.
"If the North is going to maintain its identity and the government its power, they've got to reach out and get help to shore (up the economy)," Laney said.
"The North needs what the South has ... Kim Jong Il is coming to the table finally because he realizes that that's the only game in town," Laney added.
The summit was being held in the same mysterious style Pyongyang has often employed over the years: No schedule was revealed ahead of the talks.
Seoul officials were quick to downplay North Korea's request over the weekend that the summit be delayed by one day, until Tuesday. They said minor technical problems held up the schedule.
The North's failure to clearly explain the delay prompted a flurry of speculation in South Korean media. The Chosun Ilbo, South Korea's biggest newspaper, said North Koreans might have been checking the safety Kim Dae-jung's flight path.
There is no direct air travel between the Korean capitals, and hundreds of thousands of troops and heavy weapons are massed on both sides of the Demilitarized Zone between the Koreas. Some media have reported that Kim planned to fly off the western coast before heading inland to Pyongyang.
South Korean media also suggested that North Korean officials were upset over southern reports speculating on the schedule of the three-day summit. The two leaders are expected to attend state dinners together, but the North has not released the itinerary.
Pyongyang is said to be extremely nervous about any negative media coverage. The regime's aversion to publicity was seen in last month's trip by Kim Jong Il to Beijing, which wasn't announced by either government until his return home.
---
Korean Leaders Begin Talks on Reconciliation
New York Times
June 13, 2000
By HOWARD W. FRENCH
http://www.nytimes.com/yr/mo/day/late/13cnd-korean-summit.html
SEOUL, South Korea, June 13 -- The first summit meeting between North and South Korea got off to a encouraging start today, after North Korean's Kim Jong Il surprised South Korea's Kim Dae Jung by greeting him personally at the airport near Pyongyang.
The two leaders then embarked on a 40-minute limousine ride that immediately gave them the chance to get to know each other before a more formal meeting and a succession of banquets.
"June 13 will be a day recorded in history," the reclusive Kim Jong Il said to his southern counterpart after they arrived at his state guest house.
"Let's get on and make that history," Kim Dae Jung replied.
Then, in a quip that sounded both hopeful and enigmatic, Kim Jong Il, making only his second known meeting with a foreign head of state after six years in power, said, "I will try not to be too proud, and you will not be disappointed."
Yet disappointment appeared to be far from the spirit of either leader at the start of a summit meeting whose relaxed opening formalities exceeded the expectations of many Koreans.
Whether reviewing goose-stepping North Korean troops or chatting easily with Kim Jong Il, the 75-year-old South Korean leader seemed barely able to suppress his pleasure at realizing a cherished wish of setting foot in the North.
Establishing top-level dialogue across the world's most heavily armed border would likely seal the place of Kim Dae Jong, already a champion of democracy in South Korea, as a force for change in modern Korean history.
Kim Dae Jung pressed the North to ease its harsh restrictions on communications and travel, which prevent an estimated 1.8 million South Koreans from contacting their estranged relatives families north of the border.
After more than a half century of barbed wire, a heavily armed border, and frequent defection attempts from north to south, Kim Dae Jung proposed this evening restoring road and rail links and opening sea and air routes between the two countries.
"When that happens," Kim Dae Jung said at a banquet, "all Koreans will be able to travel freely between the two sides and work toward reconciliation, cooperation and eventual reunification."
Kim Jong Il, who inherited power from his late Communist father, Kim Il Song, only to preside over North Korea's economic and agricultural catastrophes, has emerged from the shadows to become a confident host at a summit meeting that seemed largely conducted according to his vague and secretive style.
When the two governments agreed to the summit meeting after secret negotiations in China in April, Seoul promised large quantities of fertilizer to Pyongyang.
Providing a further inducement, the South Korean president brought along on his visit business leaders of his country's biggest conglomerates, all of whom are eager for a foothold in the North.
In another enigmatic comment by the host, Kim Jong Il said: "The world is closely watching us. Why President Kim came to North Korea and why I accepted is a question mark. We have to give the answer to this question during the two nights and three days."
Kim Jong Il rhetorically asked not only Kim Dae Jung but also other South Korean ministers in the entourage "to make contributions to this."
Enigma has long been a trademark of North Korea, starting with the country's founder, Kim Il Song, who combined Stalinism with almost cult-like leader worship in four decades of power.
Today's event confirmed that Kim Il Song's son also relishes surprise.
"Today was a demonstration of Kim Jong Il's new ruling style," said Dr. Yu Suk Ryul, a North Korean expert at the Institute of Foreign Affairs and National Security in Seoul.
"In the recent past, he paid a surprise visit to the Chinese embassy in Pyongyang," Dr Yu said. "During a previous visit by Chung Ju Yung, the honorary chairman of the Hyundai Group, Kim paid a surprise courtesy call to the Baekhwawon State Guest House. Looking at such actions, it makes sense that Kim Jong Il came out to personally greet President Kim Dae Jung."
Before taking off from Seoul this morning, in a comment that betrayed his wariness about the North, Kim Dae Jung told the South Korean people to pray for his safe return.
He also said that he would work on "the easy things" with Kim Jong Il, seeking to build momentum, instead of attempting great leaps forward on security issues and other sticky questions.
The first day was indeed heavy on ceremony and short on announced details. After their limousine ride, past hundreds of thousands of North Koreans who mostly chanted Kim Jong Il's name and waved colorful fronds, the two presidents met together for 20 minutes.
Their meeting was followed by a lunch sponsored by the head of the ruling North Korean Workers' Party. Then, after a traditional dance performance, and more rubbing of elbows by the two delegations, the visiting president was hosted at an evening banquet.
At the insistence of Pyongyang, the talks lack a formal agenda, and even the schedule of events for Kim Dae Jung's three-day visit has been a closely held secret. The two leaders are expected to hold one more meeting, as well as a larger gathering of the two delegations.
Kim Dae Jung is expected to return to Seoul by motorcade via Panmunjon, the heavily guarded village left on the border by the 1953 truce.
Marcus Noland, a North Korea expert at the Institute for International Economics, in Washington, said the threshold of success for the summit meeting would be a picture of the two leaders together, material goods for Kim Jong Il to show off, and news for Kim Dae Jong to bring home about separated families.
Mr. Noland said that much of this agenda had been achieved in the first hours of the visit, but that the family issue would prove harder to resolve, because reunifying families would threaten the ideological purity of North Koreans, who live under heavy, constant indoctrination.
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Media Struggle To Cover Summit
Associated Press
June 13, 2000 Filed at 1:53 p.m. EDT
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/i/AP-Koreas-Summit-Media.html
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- For reporters from around the world, it should have been a plum assignment: covering the first meeting between North Korea and South Korea, adversaries that have stared at one another across the world's most heavily armed border for decades.
But there was a major obstacle. Most of the reporters would be kept out of the country where the summit was being held, North Korea.
Because of tight restrictions imposed by the reclusive and hard-line communist North, only 50 South Korean reporters were allowed to accompany South Korean President Kim Dae-jung as he flew to Pyongyang, the North Korean capital, on Tuesday to meet with his counterpart, Kim Jong Il.
That meant the hundreds of foreign reporters, and television and newspaper photographers who were assigned to cover the three-day meeting had to do so from Seoul, the South Korean city 120 miles to the south.
From Seoul, foreign reporters were forced to collect the bulk of their information from two second-hand sources: South Korean television footage transmitted from the summit scene, and print pool reports written by South Korean newspaper reporters.
That displeased some of the many foreign journalists who covered the summit from a large media center in the Lotte Hotel in Seoul.
``It's frustrating and disappointing to cover this summit from so far away,'' said David Jimenez, Asian bureau chief for El Mundo, a Madrid-based daily newspaper.
``We know so little about North Korea and its leader that it's hard. I'm not even sure the pool reports are entirely objective, given how close the South Korean reporters and their families have been to the Korean struggle.''
Sitting before his portable computer in the media center, Jimenez said: ``I think it was a mistake by North Korea to keep us away. The fact they are not allowing foreign journalists in shows they must have something to hide.''
A German journalist, Harald Maass of the Frankfurter Rundschau newspaper, agreed.
``Obviously, it's a really bad thing to have to cover the summit from so far away. You really don't know what's happening behind the South Korean reports they show you,'' he said.
Fortunately for the excluded journalists, Day No. 1 of the summit included live TV footage of the elaborate ceremony that Kim Jung Il used to greet Kim Dae-jung at an airport outside Pyongyang.
The pool reports also included quotes from the two men as they spoke to one another or gave speeches, such as the one Kim Dae-jung used to say: ``It is my desire that, through this visit, the 70 million Koreans will be able to be liberated from a possible war.''
The South Korean print journalists in Pyongyang were forbidden to write anything but pool reports and their behavior was closely monitored by North Korean officials.
However, North Korea did not appear to censor the South Korean TV or pool reports, which were transmitted directly from Pyongyang by the reporters' own satellite equipment.
By contrast, the coverage of the summit by North Korea's state-run television and official news agency, KCNA, mainly focused on the hundreds of thousands of people who cheered the start of the meeting on the streets of Pyongyang by praising Kim Jong Il.
Covering the summit from Seoul could be even more difficult for the foreign press on Wednesday and Thursday. The two leaders are expected to meet privately to discuss complex issues such as the reunification of separated Korean families, the economic aid that struggling North desperately needs, and Seoul's concerns about Pyongyang's ballistic missiles.
In Wednesday's early morning editions of South Korea's newspapers, each one relied solely on the pool reports for front-page stories on the summit.
The stories appeared under banner headlines such as ``Leaders of the South and North Make History'' and ``Leaders of South and North Korea Meet With Warm Hearts.'' The papers also showed large photographs of the two Kims shaking hands.
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Pacific Powers Favor Korean Summit
Associated Press
June 13, 2000 Filed at 6:44 a.m. EDT
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/i/AP-Korean-Summit-The-Big-Four.html
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- For decades, the United States, China, Russia and Japan have seen the Korean Peninsula as a vital strategic interest, so few people were surprised when all four supported the inter-Korean summit and the hopes which it brings for a solution to the deadlock there.
But the powers in the Pacific region also appear wary of the unknown, including everything from what kind of influence they would have in a strong, reunited Korea to what kind of realignments would emerge.
Could the United States justify a continued military presence in Korea? Could a unified Korea overtake Japan as a major economic power? Would communist China really want to see a unified Korea under capitalist Seoul?
The reasons for such uncertainty reach back decades.
For 35 years, Japan ruled Korea as a colonial master, exploiting its natural resources, using its people as slave laborers and stationing soldiers there to control the Asian mainland. Korea only escaped its grip in 1945, when Japan was defeated at the end of World War II.
Soon, advancing U.S. and Soviet forces partitioned the peninsula into the communist North and the pro-Western South, and it became a front line of the Cold War.
On June 25, 1950, the North invaded the South in an effort to reunify it, and the fighting that followed -- South Korea, the United States and its allies on one side, Soviet-backed North Korean and Chinese forces on the other -- left up to 5 million people dead, injured or missing.
Ever since the Korean War ended in stalemate in 1953, tens of thousands of U.S. forces have remained stationed in South Korea and Japan as a counter to China, Russia and heavily armed North Korea.
``The Koreas can't help but have the four great Pacific powers in their backyard,'' said Nicholas Eberstadt, a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research in Washington, D.C. ``Any sort of Korean solution will affect or presumably involve those four Pacific powers.''
China and Russia, which used to have closer ties with North Korea, have refrained from publicly criticizing it. They have praised the North for recently seeking diplomatic ties with Western countries and reaching out for international recognition after years of isolation.
``This is the first meeting between the top leaders of the two sides,'' Zhu Bangzao, China's Foreign Ministry spokesman, said Tuesday. ``It is a major event for the Korean peninsula, and it is a good thing.''
Beijing and Moscow also have improved their relations and trade ties with South Korea after transforming their state-run economies with capitalistic reforms, and they would support the North if it followed their lead in an effort to restore its crippled economy.
Last month, North Korean leader Kim Jong Il made a secret visit to Beijing for talks with Chinese leaders -- his first known foreign trip in 17 years. Russian President Vladimir Putin recently announced plans to soon become the first Russian leader to visit the North.
Washington and Tokyo, meanwhile, have long considered the North a ``rogue nation'' that threatens regional security. So they see bilateral meetings and economic and cultural cooperation as a way of coaxing it out of poverty and totalitarianism.
For Japan, the summit is so important that it favors taking few risks during the talks, in the hope that more can be held later. North Korea alarmed Japan in 1998 when it test-fired a long-range ballistic missile that flew over Japan and landed in the Pacific Ocean.
``Japan openly favors the summit, and it has avoided asking South Korean President Kim Dae-jung to raise any delicate issues that could anger the North, such as its ballistic missiles,'' said Hideshi Takesada, a professor at the National Institute for Defense Studies in Tokyo.
If the summit is successful and leads to greater cooperation between North and South Korea, Japan and the United States would probably want to see their eventual reunification discussed.
But China would likely be leery of a unified Korea under capitalist Seoul. The peninsula's current division suits Beijing's strategic interests: It has influence with both Koreas, but they are too absorbed with their own confrontation to pose a risk to China's rise as a regional force. Also, a weak, communist North Korea -- but not so weak as to be unstable -- is a buffer against a potentially resurgent South Korea and Japan.
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North meets South
Washington Times
EDITORIAL • June 13, 2000
http://208.246.212.80/op-ed/ed-house-2000613185851.htm
Today's summit between North and South Korea is historical for the simple fact that it is being held. The leaders of the two countries are meeting for the first time since a truce to the Korean War was called in 1953. But they aren't expected to make much, if any, headway on the issue that most worries the United States and much of the rest of the world: North Korea's missile and nuclear ambitions. The North quite graphically demonstrated its missile capabilities in 1998 after it fired a medium-range missile right over Japan, and in the United States' direction.
North Korea stayed true to its unpredictable reputation when it abruptly postponed the summit, originally scheduled to begin Monday, by one day, 30 hours before South Korean President Kim Dae-jung was due to land in Pyongyang. It cited "minor technical reasons." South Korea has been careful to set the bar of expectations low, insisting that it will consider the meeting a success even if it merely leads to future talks.
Presumably to show support for the summit, the White House announced on Friday that the United States would be ready to ease its sanctions on North Korea by the end of June. But the economic impact of eliminating sanctions on North Korea would be trivial since it is such a "commerce unfriendly society," noted Nicholas Eberstadt, author of the book "The End of North Korea." Mr. Eberstadt said "North Korea is an aid seeking society," adding that what the regime really wants is for the United States to promote aid to North Korea at lending organizations such as the World Bank. It would be a mistake for the United States to support aid to a communist regime that starves its people and routinely tramples their rights.
At the summit, President Kim is expected to discuss reunions for families kept apart by the North Korean regime. Last year, North Korea expanded the definition of a "political outlaw" to include anyone who contacts a South Korean or Christian. This was in order to prevent the severely impoverished North Koreans from meeting their considerably more privileged kin across the border.
Experts are somewhat bewildered as to why the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-il, has agreed to meet with the conciliatory South Korean president. The North Korean regime for decades has sought to keep its people on edge about the potential for imminent, external attack. This image would be severely compromised by having a peace-seeking South Korean president visit native soil. North Korea's decision to go ahead with the summit could therefore be an indication of how badly it needs foreign aid. Earlier this year, South Korea said it was ready to help North Korea rebuild its tattered economy. North Korea is more than likely hoping for a payoff in the form of aid.
And the North can continue to hold up the United States as the main threat to North Koreans. Rapprochement with the regime will surely come quite slowly - if at all.
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Seoul Leader Arrives in North Korea for Long-Awaited Meeting
New York Times
June 13, 2000
By HOWARD W. FRENCH
http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/asia/061300korea-summit.html
SEOUL, South Korea, Tuesday, June 13 -- Nearly 50 years to the week since the Korean War began, the leaders of North and South Korea met this morning for a first-ever series of talks.
With thousands of official greeters cheering his arrival in the North's capital, Pyongyang, President Kim Dae Jung of South Korea descended from a plane and was welcomed by the North Korean president, Kim Jong Il.
They shook hands at length, and then walked together along a red carpet to review a military honor guard.
The two men smiled and chatted as they walked to the visiting president's limousine, while the crowd chanted the name of Kim Jung Il, and ocassionally the name of Kim Dae Jung.
In a surprise, the two men rode together in Kim Dae Jung's limousine, brought especially from South Korea, to the state guest house, where the visiting head of state will be staying.
South Korean officials said they were delighted by the North Korean president's presence at the airport.
"It was something we were not expecting at all," said one government official in Seoul. "It is a very good sign."
He said the two presidents would go immediately into meetings together. Their schedule for the three-day summit meeting has been kept secret. It is known, however, that the two leaders intended to meet alone at least twice.
Before setting off from Seoul, Kim Dae Jung said the entire world was "welcoming and blessing this trip." He promised to listen clearly in order "to broaden understanding between North and South Korea."
Then he asked his nation to "please pray for me and wish for me a safe return."
The departure speech captured the sense of hope that surrounds this trip, as well as the deep uncertainties of dealing with North Korea, one of the world's most secretive and unpredictable nations.
Thirty years ago, a northern commando raid penetrated Seoul in a failed bid to assassinate the president, Park Chung Hee. And just last year, North and South Korea fought a fierce naval skirmish in the Yellow Sea that began over fishing rights and briefly threatened to explode into a full-blown war.
The Korean War, from 1950 to 1953, left millions of people dead, injured or missing, including Americans and Chinese. To this date, 37,000 Americans troops are deployed along the border.
President Kim, who for many years was an outcast and a dissident, was imprisoned in South Korea and even was sentenced to death. But he was elected president and reached out to the North in his inaugural speech in February 1998, when he made a ringing call for an end to the cold war on the peninsula.
Of late, his counterpart in the North has been taking steps to end its isolation, seeking to make or restore diplomatic relations with countries in the region and elsewhere.
In an apt symbol of the divide between the two countries -- one an economically fragile Communist dynasty, the other a capitalist power and vibrant democracy -- Mr. Kim's jet took a long detour over the Yellow Sea rather than fly over the world's most heavily armed border.
For most of the last two years, even as it suffered through diplomatic isolation, economic collapse and a widespread famine, the North's propaganda continued to scorn Mr. Kim, and his so-called Sunshine Policy toward Pyongyang, treating him as a puppet of the United States.
But since Mr. Kim gave a speech in Berlin in March, pledging a huge commitment of resources from the relatively rich South to help rebuild the impoverished North, relations between the two countries began their dramatic shift.
The Berlin speech coincided with surprising changes in North Korea's ties with the rest of the world, as the reclusive Kim Jong Il began some bold diplomatic moves.
"This all began with our president's inauguration," said Kim Myong Shik, a spokesman for the South's government. "Then came Berlin, and the North's opening. Now we have a summit. Don't think it will stop here."
While the two neighbors are largely responsible for this turnabout, both have been supported by their main allies, which are eager for peace but anxious to see their interests protected.
Traveling outside North Korea for the first time since succeeding his father as leader in 1994, Kim Jong Il entered Beijing secretly by special train earlier this month, reaffirming the relationship between the two Communist countries, which fought together against American and southern troops in the Korean War.
At practically the same time, the southern leader met in Tokyo with President Clinton and Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori of Japan.
The United States and Japan are pushing for North Korea to end suspected programs to develop nuclear arms and other weapons of mass destruction. Japan was shocked in 1998 by a surprise test-firing of a North Korean missile that flew over its main island of Honshu, and it and suspended aid and diplomatic contacts with Pyongyang for two years.
The Korean missile program has been the main threat used in Washington to justify the proposed development of a $60 billion antimissile shield.
As a result of a carrot-and-stick effort by Washington conceived by a former defense secretary, William Perry, Pyongyang has suspended any firing of long-range ballistic missiles for the last year.
Meanwhile, for security reasons, Pyongyang has remained all but sealed. Visiting business people and tourist groups were banned weeks ago, and even accredited diplomats caught outside of the country during the preparations had to postpone their return.
The contrast with Seoul could not be more evident. Here, the meeting has been the occasion for mass prayer sessions and parties alike, neither of which the tightly controlled and economically devastated North is particularly known for.
North Korea, which rarely allows foreign journalists into the country anyway, has rejected all requests to cover the meetings except for 50 South Korean journalists who were allowed after protracted negotiations to visit.
Other journalists are following the events from the official press center, at a hotel in Seoul, where wall-to-ceiling television screens are broadcasting live footage from Pyongyang.
Many South Koreans say their most immediate hope is for a reunification of the 1.8 million people whose families were split up by the war.
A close second is a reduction of military tensions on the peninsula, where both sides maintain huge armies, and North Korea has been testing ballistic missiles and is suspected of developing weapons of mass destruction, from nuclear warheads to chemical weapons.
"People don't talk about war like they did when I was a child," said Park Kil Tae, a department store employee. "But every now and then, you stop to think that Seoul could be destroyed in minutes."
"All of the major players at the moment perceive their interests in immediate terms: wanting to have more stability on the peninsula, and kicking problems down the road," said Nicholas Eberstadt, a Korea specialist at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington. "The United States, South Korea and Japan are all very vested in the Perry process, which is actually a kind of American version of President Kim's Sunshine Policy."
So far, Mr. Eberstadt added, China has benefited most from the detente. "China has a divided Korea, with two governments both vying for Beijing's affection," he said. "And all of the Pacific powers are soliciting China's cooperation over North Korea, including Washington."
Some foreign diplomats have suggested that under Kim Dae Jung, South Korea has allowed itself to become slightly intoxicated with the idea of détente and eventual reunification with the North.
That enthusiasm, the diplomats warn, could ultimately bring the relatively rich South to ruinously underwrite the North's badly faltering economy, and perhaps to make unwise political concessions, as well.
But officials in Seoul scoff at that idea. "What is our alternative?" asked Kim Myong Shik, a government spokesman.
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Korean summit begins
Washington Times
June 13, 2000
By Edward Neilan
http://208.246.212.80/world/default-200061323145.htm
SEOUL - President Kim Dae-jung arrived in North Korea's capital, Pyongyang, today to the welcome of North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, kicking off the first inter-Korean meeting since the peninsula was divided into a communist North and Western-oriented South at the end of World War II.
The two leaders shook hands after Kim Dae-jung's plane landed at the airport at 10:25 a.m. and then stood side by side on the reviewing stand as North Korean military men, including a military band in whites, marched smartly past, pooled TV reports showed.
To reach Pyongyang, the South Korean leader's plane had to detour over the sea during a 70-minute trip. There is no direct air travel between the Korean capitals and hundreds of thousands of soldiers are deployed on both sides of the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), which separates the North and South.
The South wants the North to agree to reunions of separated families, a summit sequel in Seoul and other conciliatory gestures in exchange for resources to rebuild the communist nation's dilapidated economy. North Korea, which suffered a deadly famine in the late 1990s, relies on food aid from its traditional foes, South Korea, Japan and the United States.
However, reunification is likely to be a lengthy process. There are a host of touchy issues to resolve, among them North Korea's missile and nuclear programs, and the U.S. military presence in South Korea.
The Kims were not going to hold an official summit meeting today, the U.S. Asian News Agency, specializing in Korean affairs, reported.
The dispatch from Pyongyang, monitored in Tokyo, quoted high-ranking North Korean officials as saying the two leaders had an opportunity to speak with each other for about 20 minutes during a limousine ride from Sunan airport.
The report also said this evening's banquet would be hosted by Kim Yong-nam, chairman of the presidium of the Supreme People's Assembly and North Korea's No. 2 leader.
Kim Dae-jung is accompanied by 130 businessmen and officials, as well as by 50 South Korean journalists. Foreign reporters were excluded from the trip.
Before leaving for the North, Kim Dae-jung said in a departure speech at a military airport outside of Seoul that he hoped the trip to Pyongyang "will be on a path toward peace and reconciliation."
"I hope that it will be a turning point in efforts to remove threats to war and terminate the Cold War on the Korean Peninsula so that all 70 million Korean people in the South and North can live in peace," he said.
In a sign of the lingering animosity between the Koreas, South Korean and U.S. forces south of the world's most heavily fortified border were to remain on a strict military footing throughout Kim Dae-jung's three day stay in the North, said officials.
Leaders of South Korea and North Korea have not met since the two countries were founded in 1948 in the Cold War's infancy. Animosity and suspicion remain fresh a half-century after the communist North, backed by the Soviet Union and joined by Chinese troops, fought the pro-Western South and its U.S.-led allies.
The 1950-53 Korean War left millions dead, injured or missing. Its legacy lingers most vividly at the DMZ, a buffer area that separates hundreds of thousands of troops, tanks and artillery pieces on both sides of the border.
North Korea signed a cease-fire agreement in July 1953, but not a formal peace treaty, leaving the two sides technically at war.
The summit is being closely watched by the United States, China and Russia. The United States has 37,000 troops in South Korea and is its main international backer. China and the former Soviet Union were the main Cold War supporters of North Korea.
Chief presidential Press Secretary Park Joon-young, in a departure briefing yesterday, said, "President Kim's expecting that his trip to Pyongyang will be the first step on a long path toward reconciliation and cooperation, and prosperity and unification by liquidating the inter-Korean relations of tense confrontation."
Kim Dae-jung, looking back on the history of the Korean people "believes that the enormous suffering and trials the Korean people have experienced over 100 years were because of the wrong choices made by our ancestors at the turning of the 20th century," Mr. Park said.
He believes the division of the country and 55 years of confrontation and conflict resulted in loss and sacrifices suffered by the people.
The openness of the South as it approached the momentous encounter contrasted with the North's secrecy about the visit. The summit was scheduled to begin yesterday, but North Korea requested a one-day delay for "unavoidable technical reasons."
The North's failure to clearly explain the delay prompted a flurry of speculation in South Korean media. The Chosun Ilbo, South Korea's biggest newspaper, said North Koreans might have been checking the safety of Kim Dae-jung's flight path to Pyongyang.
South Korean media also suggested that North Korean officials were upset over South Korean reports speculating on the schedule of the three-day summit. The two leaders are expected to attend state dinners together, but the North has not released the itinerary.
• This article is based in part on wire service reports
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End game in Korea?
USA Today
06/13/00- Updated 12:45 PM ET
By Andrew Scobell
http://www.usatoday.com/news/comment/ncextra1.htm
As the 50th anniversary of the outbreak of the Korean War approaches, the world anticipates a historic summit this week between the leaders of North and South Korea. The hope is that the meeting between President Kim Dae Jung of the Republic of Korea (ROK) and North Korean leader Kim Jong Il will be a meaningful first step in a significant rapprochement between Seoul and Pyongyang.
As Defense Secretary William Cohen noted earlier this year during a news conference with his South Korean counterpart, "Dialogue between Seoul and Pyongyang is a necessary precondition to lower tensions on the peninsula." If such a dialogue were under way, then we could move gradually closer to a day when U.S. forces might no longer be needed on the Korean Peninsula.
It is still far too premature, however, to talk about any withdrawal of the 38,000 U.S. troops in Korea. The 38th Parallel remains the most dangerous and heavily fortified border in the world. As Adm. Dennis Blair, commander in chief of U.S. forces in the Pacific, said earlier this year, the Korean Peninsula is the world's "single biggest flashpoint." North Korea possesses the world's fifth-largest army, with more than 1 million troops in the regular armed forces and millions more men and women serving in the reserves or drilling in the militia.
Pyongyang also possesses a large amount of military hardware and has a ballistic missile development program that threatens not only the ROK but also other countries in the region. And North Korea's military capabilities do not seem to have eroded despite the country's serious economic difficulties.
American men and women in uniform will remain steadfast side-by-side with their ROK allies as long as they are needed. That is to say, U.S. forces will stay as long as it is in the national interests of the ROK and the national interests of the United States. American troops have been stationed in Korea since the armistice was signed in July 1953 to deter an attack by the North Korean People's Army. As the commander of U.S. forces in Korea, Gen. Thomas Schwartz, testified before the Senate this spring, the "No. 1 mission [of U.S. forces] is deterrence." They have been remarkably successful in this mission.
It is often said that North Korea is an irrational and erratic rogue state. Pyongyang is certainly a rogue regime with a penchant for lashing out erratically, but it is not irrational. The most powerful evidence that Pyongyang is a rational actor is that since 1953 no all-out attack has been launched across the 38th Parallel. That's because North Korea's communist rulers believe that such an attack would fail with disastrous and perhaps even fatal results for the regime.
North Korea is without question the most militarized state on Earth. About 70 percent of its active-duty forces are deployed within 100 miles of the Demilitarized Zone. Why does it need such a massive forward-deployed military? Their ultimate goal is to unify the Korean Peninsula by force.
When North Korea no longer poses a grave threat to the ROK and regional stability, it might be possible to consider a decline or departure of U.S. forces. Under what circumstances would North Korea no longer pose a threat to the ROK and regional stability? These scenarios would include the total collapse of the party-state, the complete demilitarization of North Korea or the peaceful unification of the Koreas. The likelihood of any of these scenarios is difficult to assess, but progress in a North-South dialogue and Pyongyang's wider opening to the outside world could unleash rapid and tumultuous change in the north.
It is possible, of course, that even when North Korea no longer poses a threat, the ROK will decide that is it still desirable to maintain some type of U.S. military presence. Indeed, Kim Dae Jung has indicated such a preference. And a U.S. military presence on the peninsula probably would have an important stabilizing effect on the region.
The long-run American objective remains a peaceful resolution of the Korean conflict with a non-nuclear, democratic, reconciled, and ultimately reunified peninsula.
The best means to achieve this is for the United States to retain its forces in Korea so that they can continue to serve the same deterrent function they have for the past half-century. The end game may be approaching, but it is not here yet.
Andrew Scobell is research professor of national security affairs at the Strategic Studies Institute of the U.S. Army War College. The views expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Army, Department of Defense or the U.S. government.
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Leaders pledge open discussion
USA Today
06/13/00- Updated 03:57 PM ET
http://usatoday.com/news/world/nwstue01.htm
SEOUL, South Korea - On the first day of a historic summit, South Korea's president pledged Tuesday to work toward eventual reunification of the divided Korean Peninsula, while North Korea's leader said he was ready to open a ''dialogue without reserve.''
Meeting for the first time, South Korean President Kim Dae Jung and North Korean leader Kim Jong Il held hands during a limousine ride into the North's capital, Pyongyang, traveling along avenues lined with hundreds of thousands of people waving bouquets of pink paper flowers.
On a day mostly given to the pomp of an unexpectedly elaborate welcome, the two leaders expressed hopes for an end to more than a generation of hostilities.
Nearly 50 years to the week since the Korean War began, South Korea's president appealed for reunions of separated families and the opening of land, sea and air routes.
''Let us open up the road that has been blocked off for half a century,'' Kim Dae Jung. ''Let us open new sea lanes of communication and air routes, too.''
''When that happens all Koreans will be able to travel freely between the two sides and work toward reconciliation, cooperation and eventual reunification,'' he said.
Kim Jong Il, one of the world's most reclusive leaders, urged a ''dialogue without reserve,'' according to South Korean pool reports. Non-Korean journalists were barred from traveling with the South Korean president to Pyongyang for the three-day summit.
The summit began with a surprise welcome by Kim Jong Il at the airport on the outskirts of Pyongyang where his southern counterpart arrived to an elaborate reception.
''The world is closely watching us. Why President Kim came to North Korea and why I accepted is a question mark,'' the North Korean leader said.
''We have to give the answer to this question during the two nights and three days'' of the summit, the pool quoted him as saying. ''I ask not only President Kim but also (accompanying) ministers to make contributions to this.''
In Washington, White House press secretary Joe Lockhart underscored the importance of the summit, saying the Clinton administration was ''heartened to see the warm welcome that (the South's) Kim Dae Jung received.''
Saying he didn't want to speculate about what, if any, concrete results would come out of the meeting, he added: ''It's obviously ... an important part of the process that they have been brought together in this forum to have discussions directly.''
At the airport, Kim Jong Il stepped forward to shake hands with the southern leader and the two smiled and clapped for each other. The reception included a military band, goose-stepping soldiers and women dressed in traditional, billowing Korean gowns.
The two leaders then rode together in a limousine to the North Korean capital, where an estimated 600,000 people lined block after block. The spectators appeared to direct their emotion at Kim Jong Il, chanting his name as the motorcade passed through the city of 2 million.
Pyongyang's Central TV downplayed the presence of the South Korean president, focusing instead on the man who has ruled the North's totalitarian regime with the benefit of a personality cult since 1994.
''The vast airport and streets of Pyongyang burned with emotions because so many people turned out to see our Great Leader Kim Jong Il,'' a television announcer said.
The North's foreign news outlet, KCNA, remarked that Kim Dae Jung arrived in Pyongyang ''at his own request'' - a phrase apparently meant to suggest he was a supplicant to Kim Jong Il.
Still, it was an unexpectedly warm start to the first meeting between the heads of the two Koreas since they were divided following World War II.
At the North's main state guesthouse, Kim Jong Il explained Pyongyang's secretive approach to the summit, telling Kim Dae Jung: ''We were unable to publicize your visit through newspapers and the radio because of security.''
''In the South, things may work out well if you advertise them, but we will be all right if we pursue only the substance.''
In another exchange, Kim Jong Il said: ''I am convinced that all problems will be resolved.''
Replied Kim Dae Jung: ''I agree. From now, we must talk directly.''
Besides family reunions and the opening of travel routes, the South's president is expected to ask Kim Jong Il for a summit sequel in Seoul and other conciliatory gestures in exchange for economic resources from the South. North Korea was unable to feed its own people in the late 1990s and is now reliant on food aid from its traditional foes: South Korea, Japan and the United States.
Desperation for economic aid is believed to be a major factor in driving the North to agree to the summit.
Korea's leaders have a host of touchy issues to resolve, among them the North's long-range missile and nuclear programs and the 37,000 U.S. troops deployed in the South. Their role has been to deter the North, which is believed to have stockpiles of chemical weapons and one of the world's largest standing armies.
Reunification - the stated goal of both Koreas - also is likely to be a lengthy and difficult process.
-------- russia
Putin Proposes Shared Anti-Missile Defenses
Russia Today
06/06/00
http://www.russiatoday.com/news.php3?id=166272¤ion=default
ROME, Jun 6, 2000 -- (Reuters) Russian President Vladimir Putin, fresh from a summit in Moscow with U.S. President Bill Clinton, proposed on Monday that Russia create a common anti-missile defense system with Europe and NATO.
"We know that many here in Europe and in the world and the United States are worried about whether the 1972 (anti-ballistic missiles) accord will be kept.
"We share the point of departure of this discussion," Putin told a news conference in Russian, speaking through a translator.
"We also thank many European leaders for their position in favor of maintaining this accord. But, while sharing this position...Russia proposes setting up, together with Europe and NATO, a common, joint, European anti-missile defense system," he added.
Putin was speaking hours after wrapping up a summit with Clinton at which the two leaders signed a joint statement agreeing on the need to maintain strategic nuclear stability.
They agreed to seek ways to resolve differences over how best to erect defenses against threats of missile attacks from what the United States calls "rogue states".
The United States wants to deploy a national anti-missile defense shield to intercept incoming rogue rockets. Putin, who opposes such a plan, would rather place defenses close to risky states to shoot down missiles as they are launched.
"On the one hand (joint European-NATO defenses) would enable us to avoid all problems linked to the imbalance of force and on the other, it would allow an absolute 100 percent guarantee for each individual European country with the support, obviously, of our U.S. colleagues and partners," Putin said.
Defense analysts say that behind the careful diplomatic language of the document agreed by Putin and Clinton in Moscow, it appeared Russia had effectively reversed its opposition to changes in the ABM treaty, which has been a cornerstone of the policy of nuclear deterrence.
---
U.S.'s Cohen in Moscow for Missile Defense Talks
Russia Today
06/13/00
http://www.russiatoday.com/news.php3?id=168454§ion=default
MOSCOW, Jun 13, 2000 -- (Reuters) U.S. Defense Secretary William Cohen arrived in Moscow on Monday saying he aimed to learn more about a Russian-proposed alternative to U.S. anti-missile defense plans.
But shortly before his arrival, he said the Russian plan was "vague" and did not seem capable of facing a threat Washington believes could emerge within five years from long-range missile technology falling into the hands of "rogue" states like North Korea or Iraq.
Russia opposes a U.S. plan to build an umbrella-like shield to protect U.S. territory by shooting down incoming missiles in space, saying the system would violate the landmark 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty and could start a new arms race.
Moscow has proposed an alternative plan to shoot down "rogue" missiles shortly after take-off, whatever their target.
But Washington has said Russia's alternative, the so-called theatre missile defense (TMD), appears geared toward shorter-range missiles and not the type that could reach the United States or parts of Western Europe.
"I will try to find out more about their proposed NMD (national missile defense) system," Cohen said on the plane en route to Moscow from Stockholm.
"So far it's a very vague concept or idea which has no defined parameters and so it's hard for me to have a responsible comment on it until I know more about it," he said.
Cohen left the door open for some type of cooperative program with Russia on dealing with shorter-range missiles.
"We can look for ways to cooperate on joint projects," he said. "We already have a number of projects underway working with our allies and we certainly could work with the Russians on TMD programs."
"But based on what I've heard to date, this concept doesn't really effectively deal with the issue that we're confronting."
COHEN TO MAKE RECOMMENDATION IN AUGUST
Cohen is due to make a recommendation in August to U.S. President Bill Clinton on whether to move forward with the missile defense system, with Clinton to decide the next step later this year.
Cohen was scheduled to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin, Defense Minister Igor Sergeyev and Russian lawmakers on Tuesday, ending a weeklong European visit during which he and Sergeyev discussed missile defense with NATO states in Brussels.
European allies have been concerned about the potential for a renewed arms race if the United States deploys its defense. Cohen said their views would be taken into account when Washington makes its decision.
"You cannot have an effective NMD system unless you have the cooperation of key allies," Cohen said. "So their interest should be taken into account, which is one reason why I've spent so much time explaining our system to them," he said.
"We will continue to work with the allies, and if we can work with the Russians we will do so," Cohen said.
Sweden's Defense Minister Bjorn von Sydow said after a meeting with Cohen earlier on Monday that any missile defense programs should be developed in the context of international agreements and treaties to avoid creating potential instability.
"All capabilities related to nuclear, to biological, and chemical warfare...we argue should be regulated in international regimes," von Sydow said. "Otherwise...we can foresee a development of more instability."
U.S. and Russian defense officials were also expected to discuss joint training to prepare peacekeepers for deployment to Kosovo, where Russian forces serve alongside NATO troops.
"We will look for areas of cooperation, understanding there are always going to be areas of dispute," Cohen said.
On Monday evening he was to meet with Russian academics and intellectuals, including world chess champion Gary Kasparov.
---
U.S. Says Missile-Defense Gap With Russia Closes
Russia Today
06/13/00
http://www.russiatoday.com/news.php3?id=168338§ion=default
WASHINGTON, Jun 13, 2000 -- (Reuters) Russia and the United States have come closer to a mutual understanding of post-Cold War realities after last week's Moscow summit between their presidents, a senior U.S. official said on Monday.
Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott, who took notes at the June 3 and 4 meetings between Presidents Bill Clinton and Vladimir Putin, told Reuters in an interview they helped ease a sense of confrontation over U.S. plans for a missile defense system.
"The two presidents were able to agree on a number of what we call principles of strategic stability that may make it possible to resolve this issue in a way that serves both countries' interests in the period ahead," Talbott said.
The U.S. proposals for a National Missile Defense (NMD) system, a shift away from mutual deterrence towards a defensive system which would require changes to the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty, was one of the key issues at the summit.
Russia has warned this could undermine the whole panoply of arms agreements that have helped keep the peace for decades.
Talbott said Putin had shown a willingness to listen on the NMD issue, which was reflected in the 16-point "statement on principles of strategic stability" the two leaders signed at their meeting.
"A lot of experts were predicting that the Russians were simply going to stonewall on this and we were going to get absolutely nowhere," he said.
"That is not the case. The Russians have argued their position forcefully, but they have also listened carefully to ours," he added. COMING TOGETHER
"There's unquestionably some coming together on the level of a broad understanding of what's going on in the world," said Talbott, who has led U.S. efforts to persuade Russia to accept ABM changes to allow NMD to go ahead over the last year.
"The summit, in that sense, defused the argumentative and confrontational nature of this debate which is a good thing for both countries but that still leaves a great deal of work to be done on the practical level," he added.
U.S. officials in Moscow said Putin had made a major concession in accepting there was a real threat, as the United States argues, from North Korea and other states which are developing long-range missiles.
In the Moscow "statement" both leaders reaffirmed their commitment to the ABM as a "cornerstone of strategic stability"
But Putin also appeared to accept that it could be amended in light of the new threat which, the statement said, represented "a potentially significant change in the strategic situation and international security environment."
Point 8 said the leaders "recall the existing provision of the ABM Treaty to consider possible changes in the strategic situation that have a bearing on the provisions of the Treaty, and, as appropriate, to consider possible proposals for further increasing the viability of the Treaty."
Talbott said the statement was "a framework for us to explore in the months to come whether we might make more progress on both strategic offence and strategic defense."
The next chance for top-level consultations on these issues, after lower level negotiations at ministerial level, would be at next month's summit of the Group of Eight in Okinawa, Japan, where Clinton and Putin will again meet.
Clinton has said he will decide later this year whether to go ahead with a system which could cost $60 billion dollars and place 100 interceptors in Alaska to protect all of America from a limited missile attack. TREATY CANNOT BE FROZEN
Talbott said: "The world really has changed since 1972 and the ABM treaty, if it's going to have utility and survive for years and decades into the future, has to be relevant to the future. It can't be frozen in aspic in its 1972 version."
He said he believed "that there was in the principles document a recognition of those realities at a high level."
He added: "That does not mean the Russians have accepted or are going to accept the specific concrete measures that we are proposing with regard to how we address the problem - the North Korean missile threat in particular.
"But I do think it is progress to have a somewhat broader and deeper common ground at the level of concept and theory."
Russia has proposed an alternative response to the threat, jointly developing shorter range defensive missiles that could be based in Russia and would not violate the ABM treaty and stepping up diplomatic moves to head off any attacks.
Putin is due to visit North Korea next month, and Washington hopes he will use that visit to pressure the Stalinist state to further rein in its missile programs and open up more to the world.
U.S. officials said there had been high-level contact on Russia's links with North Korea, which was a close Soviet ally and is now engaged in a broad-ranging diplomatic offensive to emerge from its isolationist shell.
Secretary of State Madeleine Albright had been in touch with Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov before and after Ivanov's visit in February, they said.
---
U.S., Russians Disagree on ABM
Associated Press
June 13, 2000 Filed at 10:42 a.m. EDT
By The Associated Press
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/i/AP-Russia-US-ABM.html
MOSCOW (AP) -- U.S. Defense Secretary William Cohen told Russian officials Tuesday that their proposal of a joint anti-missile shield wouldn't be feasible any time soon and couldn't replace the system Washington aims to deploy.
``We don't see it as a substitute for the limited National Missile Defense system, but something that will be in addition to it,'' Cohen said of the Russian proposal after talks with President Vladimir Putin and Defense Minister Igor Sergeyev.
Putin has proposed that the United States, NATO and Russia develop a joint defense against missiles from so-called rogue nations, such as North Korea, as an alternative to the U.S. plan to deploy the NMD.
Russia adamantly opposes the NMD, saying it would undermine the foundation of the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.
Sergeyev wouldn't offer any technical details of the Kremlin's proposal. Cohen said that Russia proposes a system to be deployed near rogue states that would destroy enemy missiles shortly after liftoff.
The U.S. proposal is for a system that could also destroy missiles while they are in space or descending toward their target.
Cohen said Tuesday that the Russian proposal deserves a close study, but added that it raises numerous technical and political problems. ``A great deal needs to be done in terms of the technology involved in such a boost-stage system, and the practical implications of this,'' Cohen said.
Along with the technical difficulty of tracking and quickly knocking down an enemy missile, it remains unclear where such system would be deployed, how it would be controlled and manned and who would make the launch decisions, Cohen said.
During the talks, Cohen again tried -- and failed -- to soften Moscow's opposition to the U.S. desire to amend the 1972 ABM treaty to make way for the NMD.
Putin underlined the importance of avoiding ``any steps that could undermine the ABM treaty, and, accordingly, the strategic stability in the world,'' the Kremlin said in a statement.
``Russia doesn't see an opportunity to modify this treaty without violating it,'' Sergeyev told reporters. ``And walking out of the ABM Treaty would trigger a new arms race.''
Putin and President Clinton failed to reach agreement on the ABM during their Moscow summit earlier this month, and Putin has warned that Moscow would pull out of all nuclear arms agreements if the United States breaches the ABM treaty.
Russia says the NMD could be quickly expanded to be able to take out Russian missiles, making them useless and thus upsetting the strategic balance.
Cohen tried to convince the Russian officials that the NMD system needs to be quickly deployed in the face of expectations that North Korea will have intercontinental-range missiles by 2005.
But Sergeyev responded that Russia doesn't consider North Korea a threat.
``We disagree on our assessment of the level of the threat,'' he said. ``We see it as a possible, potential, virtual threat, and Americans see it as an already present threat.''
As an alternative to NMD, Sergeyev also proposed joint efforts to set up a ``political umbrella'' to avert missile threats. He offered no specifics.
-------- south africa
BNF helps build 'pocket' reactor in South Africa
By Roger Highfield, Science Editor
Tuesday 13 June 2000
http://www.telegraph.co.uk:80/et?ac=000118613908976&rtmo=0isKJNGq&atmo=99999999&pg=/et/00/6/13/nbnf13.html
BRITISH Nuclear Fuels is financing the construction of a "pocket" nuclear reactor in South Africa, a venture that has been criticised by local environmental groups. The firm has taken a significant share in the South African Pebble Bed Modular Reactor (PBMR), so named because the nuclear fuel consists of uranium oxide particles bound into graphite pebbles the size of cricket balls. BNFL, which is investing "several millions" to build a prototype of the reactor, says it is "the safest, cleanest and most cost-efficient nuclear power source."
The company has signed an agreement to gain a substantial stake in the project, led by Eskom and the Industrial Development Corporation, both of South Africa. The plan to build the prototype near the existing Koeberg nuclear plant in the Western Cape, with a view to exporting the design to other countries, including Britain, has been attacked by Earthlife Africa, among others.
A study by the science and technology policy research unit, Sussex University, concluded that it was a "highly risky" venture, given the poor market prospects for nuclear power, its failure to produce cheap electricity and the problem of what to do with nuclear waste. "Technology similar to the PBMR has been investigated in depth by most of the world's major nuclear power design nations . . . Commercial scale prototype plants proved failures, costing taxpayers many millions of dollars."
But a paper published last year in the journal Nuclear Energy said that the PBMR was safer than existing nuclear reactors and competitive with conventional plants, and that there was a "substantial global market". Dr Sue Ion, BNFL's director of technology and operations, said the reactor had "vast potential" and would be competitive with alternative power sources.
Each PBMR reactor will be designed to produce around 110 megawatts and will have a 40-year life span. The concept is modular; in other words, it will be built in clusters. Four modules will fit inside a football stadium.
The concept originated at Harwell in the Fifties, said Dr Ion, and was based on experience in America and Germany, where prototype reactors were operated for a number of years between the late Sixties and the late Eighties. The first phase of the project, which was given the go-ahead by the South African Government in April, involves undertaking a detailed feasibility study and an assessment of its impact on the environment.
This is expected to be followed, subject to government approval, by the construction of a demonstration plant due to start during mid-2001, with commercial operation forecast for 2005.
The reactor consists of a vertical steel pressure vessel lined with graphite bricks. It uses uranium elements encased in graphite to form a fuel sphere, or pebble. Helium is used to transfer heat to a gas turbine and generator system, cutting out the conventional, and less efficient, process of generating steam to drive a turbine.
The pressure vessel contains a fuel load of 440,000 pebbles during normal operation, 330,000 of which are fuel pebbles containing 15,000 uranium dioxide particles, which are less than half a millimetre in size, and the rest pure graphite pebbles.
To remove the heat generated by the nuclear reaction, helium gas at 540C is passed into the top of the pressure vessel, through the hot fuel pebbles, leaving the bottom of the vessel at a temperature of 950C. The hot gas then passes through a gas turbine system to drive electrical generators before being returned to the reactor.
-------- terrorism
Greece Proposes New Anti-Terrorism Measures
New York Times
June 13, 2000
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/europe/061300greece-terror-ap.html
ATHENS, June 12 -- Greece will propose to Britain a European Union initiative to combat terrorism, a Foreign Ministry spokesman said today, adding that the shooting last week of a British military attaché here made a case for joint action.
A similar agreement for increased police cooperation with the United States has already been drafted, said the spokesman, Panos Beglitis.
Both actions come after increased criticism of Greece's law enforcement record, following the killing last Thursday of Brig. Stephen Saunders. Responsibility for the attack was claimed by the terrorist group November 17.
The group is thought to have killed 22 people -- including four American officials -- since 1975, but none of its members have ever been caught.
Even with assistance from Scotland Yard investigators, Greek police have made no headway in the Saunders case.
Mr. Beglitis said Deputy Foreign Minister Elisavet Papazoi would discuss the initiative to fight terrorism with Britain's foreign secretary, Robin Cook, in Luxembourg, where both officials were attending a meeting of the 15-nation bloc's foreign ministers.
"Today the terrorism question can't be dealt with on a local level," Mr. Beglitis said. "We would like to take it to a European level."
He did not elaborate on the initiative, but said that the Amsterdam charter adopted by the European Union in 1997 had given member states the ability to work more closely on issues like terrorism. "Now we have the tools to work on a European level, something we did not have before Amsterdam," he said.
The memorandum with the United States has been drafted and was ready to be signed by Public Order Minister Michalis Chrisohoidis, Mr. Beglitis said.
Mr. Chrisohoidis said over the weekend that Greece was doubling its reward to $2.8 million for information leading to the arrest of November 17 members.
---
Iranian Defector Reportedly Is an Impostor
New York Times
June 13, 2000
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/mideast/061300iran-terror.html
WASHINGTON, June 12 -- The C.I.A. and the F.B.I. have reportedly concluded that an Iranian defector who claims to be a former intelligence official and the mastermind of the bombing of a Pan American World Airways jet over Lockerbie, Scotland, is an impostor.
The defector, Ahmad Behbahani, said on the CBS News program "60 Minutes" that he masterminded the 1988 bombing the jet over Lockerbie and a 1996 attack against a American military installation in Saudi Arabia. Two Libyans are now on trial for the Pan Am bombing.
An intelligence official quoted anonymously in The Washington Post on Sunday said the C.I.A. and F.B.I. had concluded the defector lied during interviews with intelligence officials and lacked basic knowledge of Iran's intelligence apparatus. Iranian vehemently denied Mr. Behbahani's claims, saying they had no record of him and that his own statements were contradictory.
Al Tellez, an editor for CBS News, said the network "expected the C.I.A. to say" the defector was lying. He did not say how CBS had verified the account.
If verified, Mr. Behbahani's assertions could damage the case against the Libyans as well as State Department efforts to warm relations with Iran.
---
Assad's Legacy: Wielding Terror
New York Times
June 13, 2000
http://www.nytimes.com/yr/mo/day/letters/l13syr.html
To the Editor:
Re "Syria's Leader Assad Dies, Clouding Mideast Prospects" (front page, June 11):
When considering the legacy of President Hafez al-Assad, one has to remember that we are dealing with a man who leveled half a city of his own people, Hama, killing 10,000 civilians, in part to make a point about how dissent would be treated. He played with civilians' lives along the Israeli-Lebanese border for decades by financing Hezbollah. And although he transformed Syria into a Middle East power broker, the pan-Arabism that formed the base of his world view had the annihilation of Israel and Western influence as its prime application.
If Osama bin Laden were to die tomorrow, the American secretary of state would not be rushing to his funeral.
The fact that in this case the terrorist leader happened to have seized and held a country for 30 years should not change anything.
AVRAHAM BRONSTEIN Far Rockaway, Queens, June 11, 2000
---
World Scene Athens to propose anti-terrorism action
Washington Times
June 13, 2000
http://208.246.212.80/world/default-200061321459.htm
ATHENS - Greece will propose to Britain a European Union initiative to combat terrorism, saying last week's shooting of a British military attache in Athens made a case for joint action.
A similar agreement for increased police cooperation with the United States was ready to be signed, a Foreign Ministry spokesman said.
International criticism of Greece's law enforcement record has been increasing after Thursday's assassination of Brig. Stephen Saunders. Responsibility for the attack was claimed by the terrorist group known as November 17. But police still have made no headway on the case, despite assistance from Scotland Yard investigators.
---
Greece to Propose EU Terrorism Effort
Washington Post
Tuesday, June 13, 2000; Page A32
WORLD IN BRIEF
Compiled by Virginia Hamill
http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/2000-06/13/130l-061300-idx.html
ATHENS--Greece will propose to Britain a European Union initiative to combat terrorism, saying the shooting last week of a British military attache in Athens made a case for joint action.
A similar agreement for increased police cooperation with the United States has already been drafted, Foreign Ministry spokesman Panos Beglitis said.
Both actions came after increased criticism of Greece's law enforcement record, following Thursday's assassination of Brig. Stephen Saunders. The terrorist group November 17 claimed responsibility for the attack.
(Associated Press)
-------- ukraine
Chernobyl 'not so deadly'
Chernobyl: Site of the world's worst nuclear disaster
Tuesday, 13 June, 2000, 22:44 GMT 23:44 UK
By BBC's science correspondent, Helen Sewell
From: Ndunlks@aol.com
The nuclear explosion at the Chernobyl power plant has had no major effect on public health, despite fears that it would lead to a massive number of cancers.
Scientists at the United Nations say the radiation caused an increase in a certain type of cancer in children but that it was one highly treatable.
They found no evidence of any other impact on human health.
Thirty one people died from radiation poisoning in the explosion and its immediate aftermath at Chernobyl in 1986.
Soil in the area is still tested regularly
Health experts feared that thousands living nearby would develop cancers as a result of the high levels of radiation emitted.
But 14 years on, scientists at the United Nations say the only discernible impact on human health has been a rise in children with thyroid cancer.
About 1800 children have developed the disease.
It is thought the cancers were caused by radioactive iodine - one of the most serious sources of radiation in the fallout.
Iodine, which is found in certain foods and milk, collects in the thyroid gland.
The children, who drank more milk and had smaller thyroid glands, received a radioactive dose about three times higher than adults.
The International Atomic Energy Agency agrees that the childhood thyroid cancers show the only real impact of the explosion on human health.
The nuclear power plant, after further minor leaks and safety worries, is due to close at the end of the year.
-------- us contractors
After High-Pressure Years, Contractors Tone Down Missile Defense Lobbying
By LESLIE WAYNE
June 13, 2000
http://www.nytimes.com/library/politics/061300missile-defense.html
WASHINGTON -- With $60 billion in potential business from an antimissile defense system, it would seem that the nation's military contractors would be using their well-honed lobbying skills to push hard in the corridors of power here.
Instead, they are strangely invisible. They are not making phone calls to lawmakers. They are not cornering crucial members of the Armed Services Committees. They are barely making a ripple in the debate over the proposed missile system, a legacy of the Reagan-era Strategic Defense Initiative to shoot down missiles as they travel through space. "There is no point in lobbying for something that doesn't need to be lobbied," a lobbyist for a major contractor said. "We don't have to do much to encourage it to happen."
But the contractors have been anything but absent from the debate. If they are not lobbying now, that is because they feel that they have already done their work and do not want to jinx it.
Over the last decade, the arms industry has spent $49 million in campaign contributions to Washington politicians and an additional $2 million in a more subtle and indirect campaign that they say has helped create an atmosphere in which the pressure to build an antimissile system weights heavily on both parties.
Several big weapons builders have financed research centers and used them to shape the debate. The effort has produced a flood of so-called issue advertising that is being broadcast here. Some of the money is disclosed, some is not.
Leading the charge for missile defense is the Center for Security Policy, a group that has relied on military contractors for 20 to 35 percent of its annual budget, which is $1.2 million. Dedicated to having an antimissile system built, the center has at least eight industry representatives on its board -- six from Lockheed Martin alone -- and issues a steady stream of position papers and sponsors numerous seminars for Washington decision makers.
"From our inception, our organization has been a champion of national missile defense," said Frank J. Gaffney Jr., president of the group and a Pentagon official in the Reagan administration. In and out of government, Mr. Gaffney has long been the high priest of the Reagan missile-defense vision.
"We've done that," he said, "because the people associated with this organization like me have spent our lives working for national missile defense."
Since its start in 1988, military contractors have supported the center, giving it more than $2 million. Among them are Boeing, the prime contractor on the project, and the main subcontractors, Lockheed Martin and TRW. Other contractors who have contributed are General Dynamics, Rockwell International and Northrop Grumman. The contributions are tax deductible, meaning that the government, indirectly, bears some of the cost.
In a one-month period this spring, the center issued many statements called "decision briefs" with titles like "Missile Defense: Cheap at Twice the Price," "Protect Americans NOW" and "It's Time to Defend America."
On the 10th anniversary of President Reagan's Strategic Defense Initiative speech of 1983, the center issued a paper saying, "We cannot afford to bet that another anniversary of President Reagan's S.D.I. speech can be safely observed without a deployed antimissile system. Americans need to be protected now, and they can be."
A senior fellow at the World Policy Institute of the New School in New York, William Hartung, said: "The center has been the most vocal in a chorus of think tanks pushing for national missile defense. Among the biggest contributors to the center is the military industry. If they can keep the center afloat, the center can do a better job of pushing the program."
To that end, the center uses its money to brief important members of Congress and it offers a daily running commentary for editorial writers and anyone interested in the issue. In addition, staunch Republican supporters of missile defense like Senator Jon Kyl of Arizona and Representative Curt Weldon of Pennsylvania, both Republicans, are on the center's board.
The center draws attention to those it considers friends. It gave its Keeper of the Flame award in 1998 to former Defense Secretary Donald M. Rumsfeld, head of a government commission that outlined the potential threat of a North Korean missile attack and provided the military justification for national missile defense. Other award winners were Ronald Reagan and Newt Gingrich.
"It's no accident the Republican leadership is seized with the idea of national missile defense," Mr. Gaffney said. "It's a function of a lot of serious spade work and a lot of education from groups like ours." Mr. Gaffney is also spearheading the Coalition to Protect Americans Now, a group that is paying for television commercials here to promote missile defense and attack the Clinton administration for proposing a system that is too limited. The ad show babies in cribs and children playing baseball interspersed with photos of missiles raining down on the United States. As it is shown, an announcer asks, "Where will you be when the missiles are launched?"
Mr. Gaffney will not say who is paying for the ads or how much they cost.
There are many reasons why military contractors prefer to take a back-door approach on missile defense. In part, the problem stems from the sensitivity of the issue. No contractor wants to be seen advocating a defensive program that could be seen as violating the Antiballistic Missile Treaty of 1972.
No contractor wants to become engaged in a battle that many see, at this moment, as more political than an issue of national security. No contractor wants to lobby a program where the slightest political misstep could put them at odds with powerful elements in the White House, Congress, the Pentagon or all three.
"In our view, this is a politically charged program," said David Shea, a spokesman for Raytheon. "And it is appropriate for the government to deal with these questions, not us."
If contractors push too hard, they could alienate a reluctant White House. If they push too softly, they could alienate a Republican leadership that is hungering for the program. And, if the contractors become too associated with missile defense, they could be seen as putting profits ahead of arms reduction.
Besides, with some Republican leaders so solidly behind the program, many contractors feel that they could better spend their time lobbying for programs with less political support. That is especially true now that the administration has given limited support to the plan, as well. "The White House and Congress are doing all the lobbying for them," said Jon B. Kutler, president of Quarterdeck Investment Partners, an investment concern in Los Angeles that specializes in military companies. "The contractors are saving their gunpowder for other challenges."
A missile defense system has long been a article of faith among Republican conservatives. It is the sole weapons system in the Contract With America. To make sure that backers of missile defense were elected, the industry has given generously to Republicans, by a 2-to-1 margin over Democrats.
In 1999, the industry gave the Republican Party and candidates $4.2 million in soft money, the large unrestricted donations to the parties, and in direct donations. That compares with $2.5 million to Democrats, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a research group here. In the 1998 midterm elections, Republicans received $7.3 million, compared to $3.4 million for Democrats.
On the Democratic side, the contractors have Bernard L. Schwartz, chief executive of Loral Space and Communications. An active Democrat who is close to the administration, Mr. Schwartz gave Democrats more than $1 million in the 1996 elections and has given $285,000 in this election.
Besides politics, there are also some business-related reasons for the contractors to steer clear of lobbying. For one, the amount of money that the companies receive from the program is small by their standards. As prime contractor, Boeing receives a $1.6 billion three-year contract to oversee project development. It shares that with other major team members, Raytheon, maker of the "kill vehicle," the interceptor missile; TRW, designer of the communications system; and Lockheed Martin, maker of the launch vehicle.
Although $1.6 billion might sound large, it is small in comparison to the companies' overall revenues. Boeing had $57.9 billion in 1999 and Lockheed Martin totaled $25.5 billion. Moreover, because missile defense continues to be more theoretical than real, it provides little to the contractors in the way of revenues or jobs. More important to their bottom line is prosaic military equipment like fighter jets, submarines and tanks, which have production lines that employ thousands and that are highly profitable.
"National missile defense doesn't create that many jobs," said Lawrence J. Korb, an analyst of the weapons industry for the Council of Foreign Relations. "It just uses your scientists to develop the technology. It's not like putting together an airplane. That's where the big money is."
As a result, contractors prefer to concentrate greater lobbying resources on protecting the bread-and-butter programs. In addition, with limited dollars available for all military procurement -- the Pentagon's budget for military hardware is $60 billion -- contractors fear that dollars spent on missile defense could come at the expense of other programs with more immediate payoffs. Lockheed and Boeing are concerned about keeping the F-22 contract going. Lockheed wants more money for F-16's, and Boeing wants make sure that there is ample money for its new airborne laser program.
There has been a steady stream of money flowing to contractors as the Pentagon has over the years experimented with different missile technologies. Since 1983, according to the Pentagon Ballistic Missile Defense Organization, $56 billion has been spent on that research and development.
"There are people who have spent most of their professional lives pursuing missile defense," said Loren Thompson, a military analyst at the Lexington Institute, a research group in Arlington, Va. The real payoff, of course, would arrive if the defense is constructed in a way that fulfills the Reagan-era vision.
Howard A. Rubel, an industry analyst with the Wall Street firm of Goldman, Sachs & Company, said, "Anything that begins with $10 billion and goes from there is important."
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Thinking outside the corps
Gen. Eric K. Shinseki and Gen. James L. Jones
Washington Times
June 13, 2000
http://208.246.212.80/op-ed/ed-column-2000613184749.htm
In the coming months, we will witness an extraordinary discussion concerning the future of our national security. Our national leadership must determine how we best can protect the interests of our country during a period of great international turbulence and uncertainty in this new century. This debate will play out in national elections this fall, our Defense Posture Hearings before Congress next year and in the Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) for 2001.
These are momentous events, and all Americans have a very real stake in their outcomes. In the months and years ahead, the armed forces will be required to provide the nation with the ability to respond quickly and accomplish objectives in times of peace, crisis and, possibly, war, as a joint team. This is no small order. It requires a profound understanding of the threats we will face and the capabilities we will need to meet those threats head-on.
At the end of the Cold War, our leaders hoped to forge a new world order based on a broadly democratic consensus and a liberal trade and economic system. The challenges we face in this new century are numerous and inherently complex. Rampant nationalism; ethnic, religious and cultural violence; regional despotism fueled by power vacuums; organized criminal elements; and the potential for biological and chemical terrorism are all real threats that undermine the stability of our world.
The future of national security will depend on our ability to work together as a joint force that is rapidly deployable and ready for any contingency. In future wars and crises, single-dimensional responses will be the exception rather than the rule. It is tempting to view our future in terms of conventional conflict. Each of the services has responsibility for deploying specific forces in times of crisis or war - the Army and the Marine Corps provide the nation's supply of ground combat forces. Yet, our recent experiences in Somalia, Bosnia, Haiti and Kosovo are testament to the need for the Marine Corps and the Army to become more versatile and complementary in their capabilities.
Our challenge is to prepare for the challenges of the next decade and beyond: humanitarian crises, non-combatant evacuations and conflicts over natural resources. Traditional military forces and methods rarely resolve these nontraditional, postmodern crises, yet we cannot neglect our fundamental requirement to fight and win a major theater war.
Today, we are strengthening the partnership between the Army and the Marine Corps to form a crisis response force - a Marine-Army team that will operate effectively with other joint and multinational forces in any environment. Our priority will remain deterrence - and then fighting and winning wars should deterrence fail. Our roles and missions will not fundamentally change. However, our methods and operational focus are changing. There are many areas where our common goals can bring about savings to our nation. The Army will be making a substantial investment in the procurement of combat vehicles in the coming years in an effort to uncover cutting-edge technology and capability. This leap in technology and the lessons learned during development and acquisition phases offers substantial benefits for both the Army and the Marine Corps. In fact, the Army will devote substantial resources to research and development where common technologies will have significant joint-service applications; this type of interoperable approach will benefit the nation.
The senior leadership of the Army and Marine Corps met in Carlisle, Pa., to discuss ways of clarifying common goals and missions. Both of our services have respective strengths that must not be compromised under the guise of bureaucratic efficiency. The Marines' ability to deploy rapidly in order to establish a strong footing on foreign shores and the Army's ability to mass forces rapidly and conduct sustained land campaigns are capabilities that must be preserved, especially in the midst of the increased uncertainty of globalization.
Last month's meeting produced significant, tangible results that will help realize the strengthened partnership we feel is essential for national security in the 21st century. We agree on a wide range of policies and actions:
• To study in depth the true costs of the strategy of engagement and to explain the tremendous value of this strategy to the nation as a whole.
• To view the upcoming QDR as representing an opportunity for all services to come together, collectively represent a case for increased defense spending. The Army and Marine Corps staffs will meet in the next three to six months to identify issues and common objectives.
• To review in detail certain aspects of joint doctrine in order to make the nation's ground forces more effective in meeting the challenges of today and tomorrow.
• To ensure that the nation's strategic lift remains high on the priority list for all services. Strategic lift provides our forces the agility so vital to meeting peacetime national security challenges now and in the future.
Jointly addressing these issues will help us hone the complementary capabilities we possess and further the efficiency and effectiveness with which we support America's role as a global leader. Both of our services aim to retain the capability to deploy forces to crisis zones early so that Marines and soldiers can dominate their environment, prevent further escalation and set the conditions for an enduring peace. We are committed to a course that will capitalize on our respective strengths to produce an Army and Marine Corps team that is more responsive and dominant than ever before.
Gen. Eric K. Shinseki is the U.S. Army chief of staff and Gen. James L. Jones is the commandant of the U.S. Marine Corps.
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6 on Leave After Nuke Secrets Gone
June 13, 2000
By H. JOSEF HEBERT,
Associated Press Writer
http://news.excite.com/news/ap/000613/19/missing-secrets
WASHINGTON (AP) - Two elder statesmen, respected across party lines, were named Tuesday to investigate the loss of top-secret nuclear weapons material at the Los Alamos laboratory. At the same time, six lab managers, including the head of its weapons program, were placed on paid leave.
The Clinton administration, trying to contain the political fallout from the disclosure that two computer drives containing nuclear secrets vanished from a vault at the weapons lab, announced that former Senate Majority Leader Howard Baker and former Rep. Lee Hamilton would conduct a separate investigation and make recommendations to President Clinton.
Meanwhile, six managers at the Los Alamos lab in New Mexico, were placed on administrative leave with pay, pending the outcome of various investigations of the incident. Neither lab or Energy Department officials would comment on the action or identify the individuals. It was learned by The Associated Press that among those put on leave was Stephen Younger, head of the nuclear weapons programs.
"I will not tolerate security lapses and I'm outraged at what happened," said Richardson, who did not learn of the missing nuclear weapons files for about a month. He said he doubts that espionage or theft was involved and said the two computer drives probably were "misplaced" during the turmoil surrounding the wildfires that threatened the lab last month.
White House spokesman Joe Lockhart said that Clinton looked forward to getting recommendations from Baker and Hamilton. Baker after a long Senate career was White House chief of staff under President Reagan. Hamilton, an Indiana Democrat, is a respected voice on security issues and former chairman of the House International Relations Committee.
The disappearance of the top-secret computer drives, containing information about how to dismantle both U.S. and Russian nuclear devices, has prompted sharp criticism in Congress. Already a string of hearings are scheduled this week in both the Senate and House to questions lab and Energy Department officials about the embarrassing security lapse, which could blow into a major political problem for the administration and for Richardson.
Richardson, who spent most of last year defusing a security flap involving fired Los Alamos scientist Wen Ho Lee, came under sharp criticism Tuesday for the latest incident, although he apparently didn't know about it until a few days ago.
"This incident occurred on his watch. He'll have to be held accountable," said Sen. John Warner, R-Va., chairman of the Armed Services Committee. Warner said his committee planned a hearing Thursday on the missing nuclear material and both Richardson and Los Alamos lab director John Browne were to testify.
The drives were found missing from a metal container in a highly secure vault in the Los Alamos lab's "X Division" complex where nuclear bomb designers work. The discovery was made late in the evening on May 7 as scientists sought to secure them from a massive wildfire threatening the lab complex. Energy Department officials did not learn of the disappearance for 24 days, until June 1.
During that time both Richardson and his top "security czar," retired Air Force Gen. Eugene Habiger, flew to Los Alamos because of the wildfires. Neither, however, was given a hint that nuclear secrets may have been compromised, officials said.
"I'm most concerned about the failure of the lab to promptly notify ... when these potential (security) breaches took place. ... The lab is going to have to have some good explanations," Richardson told reporters.
The two drives, about the size of a deck of cards and each containing identical information, were used by the Nuclear Emergency Search Team, or NEST, which is trained to respond to nuclear accidents or terrorist acts. The drives, which can be used in a laptop computer, contain highly technical nuclear weapons data needed to disarm and dismantle nuclear devices.
Habiger, tapped last year by Richardson to be the department's "security czar," said only 26 people had authority to enter the vault.
The disappearance of such sensitive top-secret nuclear files opened the way Tuesday for renewed attacks from Republicans on Energy Department security, especially at the nuclear labs. The department came under attack most of last year for lax security at the labs and allegations that it botched the Lee investigation.
Lee was arrested last December and charged with illegally copying secret computer files. The files have never been found and he is awaiting trial. He was never charged with espionage, although suspected for three years of possibly giving secrets to China. He has denied giving secrets to anyone.
In the latest security matter, Richardson said his security and counterintelligence experts "believe that these drives have been misplaced" during the "strain and confusion" caused by last month's wildfires that destroyed thousands of acres and homes as well as damaging the lab complex.
But some lawmakers are not as convinced.
Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said there was "physical evidence to suggest theft," but he declined to elaborate. Kyl, a sharp critic of DOE's security of nuclear materials, called the lost computer drives an "unacceptable security breach."
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