NUCLEAR
Anti-Nuclear Petition
Taipower faces penalties over Lungmen cancellation
Both of AEP's Cook units now running
China Tested Long - Range Missile Last Saturday
US DU Report
Uranium risk for British troops
Italy did not know depleted uranium arms used
NO LINK BETWEEN DEPLETED URANIUM, GULF WAR SYNDROME
US Mulls Sending Envoy to Pyongyang
Russian Parliament Slashes Benefit Limit for Chernobyl Cleaners
Tentative OK for Russian nuclear waste plan
Russia Risks Another Chernobyl
Russia tentatively OKs waste imports
Russians Back Plan for a Nuclear Waste Industry
2000's Top Stories: Election, Elain
Pentagon Awards Defense Contract
Hail to the Chief Tech-Heads
Nurescell Announces Management Changes
Metals recovery perilous: DOE
Work may have put plant workers at risk
Secret work was done at Paducah Plant employees were at risk
Wen Ho Lee Celebrates Birthday
Cracks in pipes found at S.C. nuclear power plant
Morgan County home to ZeTek, ORNL project
IAAP Burlington Health Study Website
Worker hit in face with chlorine gas
Hanford firm retains contract
For jobs left, Bush looks now to the right
Pressing Challenges Face Bush Team
Powell Will Face World of Challenges
COLUMN: Steve Sebelius Eliminate the middleman

MILITARY
Child warriors fight on front lines
Gunmen kill 10 people in Colombia
Bush faces hard choices in Colombia
Colombia Rebels Offer to Free 45 Hostages
Death toll in E. Timor may be 2,000
INDIA, PAKISTAN: KASHMIR UNCERTAINTY
U.S., British Planes Hit Iraq
Japan sues Mitsubishi Heavy
Albright: Deal with N. Korea possible
Pentagon Will Stop Importing Burmese Clothes for 1,400 PX's
Clinton urges science collaboration
Turner may pay shortfall in UN
Envoy: U.S. near payment deal to UN
Informal Deal Reached on Cutting U.S. Dues to U.N.
UN urges African border aid to end
UNITA rebels circumvent sanctions
Women's Charges to Be Heard Now in U.N.
U.N. Post Filled by American
U.N. Study of Diamonds-for-Arms Deals Focuses on Shadowy Trader
EU proposes deal on U.S. debt to U.N.
2 more suspected in USS Cole bomb
No Answers as Marines Investigate Air Crash
G.O.P. Split Slows Bush's Selection for Defense Post
Northrop - Litton Could Change the Industry
Northrop Grumman To Acquire Litton
Coats for Defense?
Conservatives want Coats for Defense chief
China tests DF-31 again

OTHER
Nuclear standoff in 'Thirteen Days' Chronicling missile crisis with JFK, RFK
CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS STRIKES TV-LIKE TONE
Religion in the News
Train Carrying Acid Derails in Philadelphia
Cinergy agrees to $1.4 bln settlement
Final federal plan to save salmon
Babbitt recommends new monuments
State pays $41 mln to create L.A. park
Surviving whales swim to sea
Clinton departs in regulation rush
Bush to name Whitman to EPA
Scuttle the Everglades Airport
Tentative Deal on Acid Rain Is Reached With Third Utility
State to Shrink Contested Road Project Near Crucial Reservoir
A conservative for EPA
World Bank OKs $122 mln loan to Russia
Hungry Afghans reach UN camps
World Bank, IMF exceed relief goals
U.S. antidumping law attacked
Group of Countries Protests U.S. Change in Dumping Law
NEWARK: OFFICERS ACQUITTED OF MOST CHARGES
Peru's ex-spy chief still hunted
Informer's Part in Terror Case Is Detailed

ACTIVISTS
Protesters plan inauguration turnout
Clinton to act on clemency requests
Report: Chinese activist jailed
HONG KONG: PROTEST CURBS

-------- NUCLEAR

Anti-Nuclear Petition

Fri, 22 Dec 2000 13:55:23 -0500
From: Vic Titious <jejonik@juno.com>

POLONIUM PEGS and Dioxin Dowels

As a side issue of the Nuclear story, to be used as evidence against the conflicts-of-interest within the US "regulatory" system...and to illustrate the level of official disregard for health and scientific integrity...it is useful to note that the typical manufactured, pesticide-drenched, dioxin-delivering, multi-ingredient US cigarette is contaminated with ionizing radiation.

Although some traces of radiation are naturally occurring, from soils, the potentially heavy liability area involves radioactive, mined phosphate fertilizers used on tobacco. Prof. Gofman has not only described the inevitable harms of this radiation in general (nothing that I've read specifically about typical cigarettes yet) but has also pointed out that when this radiation is in combination with dioxins, a by-product of man-made chlorine, we have something called The Promoter Effect whereby the dioxin Speeds Up the cell damage done by the rads.

This is all perfectly "legal" cigarette adulteration in the US. It is even ignored by officials who claim to be "concerned" about smoking and health but who, in actuality, may be more interested in blaming the [unpatented] tobacco plant for the widespread and virtually inevitable diseases caused by a product that may contain more untested, toxic and cancer-causing industrial elements than any other product.

The story of this radiation, said to be probable cause of most "smoking related" (not Radiation Related?) lung cancers, was no secret. One article was prominently published in no less than the Reader's Digest, March, 1986. Where did the concerns go? Well...only speculation but...it might be that the cig radiation story was initially raised to take the heat off of the HIGH levels of dioxin in cigarette smoke. Dioxin's not from the tobacco, of course, but in typical cigs from the chlorine-bleached paper, about a third of the hundreds of pesticides used on tobacco and from any number of the many hundreds of non-tobacco ingredients. But...it is likely that, as the chlorine industries (and investors and insurers) were getting this gift, the radiation industries might have gotten upset that people would apply negative information about rads in cigs to rads in other areas like power plants, x-rays and waste disposal...and nowadays, food irradiation. One guesses that word went out to lay off of BOTH dioxins and radiation. Since then, officials and the corporate media have informed us that the problem with "smoking" is ONLY about tobacco...although, try as you might, you are not likely to find ONE study anywhere of negative effects of unadulterated tobacco. The comparison of natural risks of plain tobacco to the inevitable dangers of a chemical and radiation contaminated cig, one guesses, would be an enormous indictment of not only the chemicals and rads but of the US officials who allowed and facilitated this mass poisoning for decades.

Added point: If anyone, through job or pollution, has health problems relating to industrial radiation (or other industrial toxins and carcinogens)...AND if they happen to smoke....how convenient that their illness can be unscientifically blamed on "tobacco" or "risky behavior".

There's no telling how much of the statistical evidence against industrial pollutants has been stolen from activists to be, instead, used in the liability-dodging "war on tobacco". - JJ

--------

Taipower faces penalties over Lungmen cancellation

Platts - Friday, December 22, 2000
Bonn (Nuclear News Flashes)--22Dec2000

Taiwan Power Co faces penalty payments of over $1-bil if Supreme Court justices do not rule by the end of January on the constitutionality of the government's decision to scrap the Lungmen ABWR project, the utility said.

The court yesterday heard oral arguments for and against shutting down the project, which is about 30% complete. At stake, Taipower officials claim, are contracts with the Taiwan industry, which give companies the right to compensation as a result of suspension of work after 90 days.

These clauses would apply at the end of January, assuming the court case is not yet decided. Taipower's contracts with foreign contractors, including ABWR vendor General Electric Co, have more generous provisions for project delays, allowing work to be suspended for as much as five months before contract terms may expire.

-------------

Both of AEP's Cook units now running

Washington (Nuclear New Flashes)--
22Dec2000

American Electric Power Co's (AEP) Cook-1 was reconnected to the grid yesterday, marking the first time in more than three years that both Cook-1 and Cook-2 have been on line.

Cook-2, which also was shut down in September 1997 to address questions about the operability of safety systems, restarted in June. Unit 1 was at 26% power this morning, according to NRC's plant status report.

-------- china

China Tested Long - Range Missile Last Saturday

Reuters
December 22, 2000 Filed at 6:13 p.m. ET
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/international-china-m.html

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - China conducted another test of its intercontinental ballistic missile last weekend in a continuing effort to upgrade its force, a U.S. intelligence official said on Friday.

The test of the DF-31, first reported by The Washington Times, appeared successful, although the intelligence official said further analysis was needed.

``They have long stated that they were going to upgrade their ballistic missile force and they're doing it,'' the official said on condition of anonymity.

The latest test followed a Nov. 4 test of the missile that China has been developing since the late 1980s and that can reach 5,000 miles.

The November test was conducted while U.S. Army Gen. Henry Shelton, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was visiting China.

Shelton said last week the United States must focus on preventing China from becoming in the 21st century like the ''Soviet bear'' of the past.

-------- depleted uranium

US DU Report

Fri, 22 Dec 2000 11:00:04 -0000
http://www.oversight.ncr.gov/final_toc.htm
fwp_dawson@hotmail.com

Special Oversight Board for Department of Defense Investigations of Gulf War Chemical and Biological Incidents Final report on DU

-------

Uranium risk for British troops

ITN
12/22/00
http://itn.co.uk/news/20001222/world/08uranium.shtml

A dozen Italian soldiers who served in the Balkans have developed cancer and lawmakers have been pressing the government for answers.

Fears are growing that the health of British troops in Kosovo may have been put at risk by ammunition used in the conflict by Nato forces.

Italian Defence Minister Sergio Mattarella has ordered an investigation into cancer cases among national soldiers who served in Kosovo and Bosnia.

Italian and British troops were among the first to enter Kosovo as part of Nato's KFOR force.

There are fears the cancer cases are linked to ammunition containing depleted uranium used by US warplanes during the 78 day bombing campaign.

One Portuguese soldier has already died, and there are believed to be two more soldiers in Italy possibly suffering from uranium poisoning.

A dozen Italian soldiers who served in the Balkans have developed cancer and lawmakers have been pressing the government for answers.

The cases include three veterans of peacekeeping duty in Bosnia who died of leukaemia last year.

Another four soldiers involved in aircraft maintenance also died of cancer, the Milan daily Il Giornale has reported.

The Italian investigation is being headed by Antonio Intelisano, the military prosecutor.

A United Nations team in Kosovo is doing a similar study. Their report is expected early next year.

NATO has said that US warplanes operating in Kosovo fired armour-piercing rounds containing depleted uranium during last year's campaign.

There have already been warnings that the health of Gulf War veterans could be at risk from particles of depleted uranium.

Former US colonel, Doctor Asaf Durakavic told an international doctors' conference that he had found a "significant presence" of the particles in two-thirds of the 17 veterans he had tested.

---

Italy did not know depleted uranium arms used

Friday, December 22 9:43 PM SGT
http://sg.dailynews.yahoo.com/headlines/world/article.html?s=singapore /headlines/001222/world/afp/Italy_did_not_know_depleted_uranium_arms_u sed_in_Bosnia__minister.html

ROME, Dec 22 (AFP) - The Italian government said on Friday it did not know that depleted uranium arms were used in Bosnia by NATO, just days after an inquiry was launched into why seven military personnel recently died of leukemia.

Parliamentary sources said Defence Minister Sergio Mattarella had affirmed that "10,800 depleted uranium projectiles were fired by American aircraft," on Bosnia between 1994 and 1995.

"I must express my bitterness that the competent international organisations have waited until now to answer our request for information that is important for the Bosnian community and members of the military," Mattarella said.

However NATO said on Friday that DU rounds were "fired from A-10 Thunderbolt aircraft, under international auspices," and that the fact had been known for several years.

A NATO official in Brussels added: "There is nothing secret about DU rounds being fired in Bosnia."

NATO denies that other munitions containing depleted uranium, such as bombs and shells, had been fired when US aircraft went into action over Bosnia in the last two years of its 1992-95 war.

Depleted uranium weapons are denser than conventional arms, which means they can penetrate heavy armour more easily. They were used on Iraq in 1990 and 1991 and during the air campaign against Belgrade last year.

According to the independent Italian Observatory for the Protection of the Armed Forces, seven military personnel who served in Bosnia and Kosovo have died and a dozen others are ill from exposure to radiation from depleted uranium weapons.

The defence ministry confirmed that 11 personnel had recently developed leukemia and that three of them had since died, but it said only five had taken part in Balkans "peace missions."

Mattarella, who has launched a scientific inquiry into the deaths, said all possible light would be shed on the matter and that there was no need for alarm.

He said no link had yet been established between the cases and depleted uranium weapons.

The defence ministry said between 30,000 and 40,000 Italian soldiers have served in the Balkans.

In Lisbon, the newspaper Publico -- citing a Lisbon cancer specialist -- reported on Friday that the death of a Portuguese soldier who served in Kosovo could be linked to NATO's use of depleted uranium weapons in the Balkans.

The Portuguese military has remained silent on the issue, and a military source questioned by Publico said medical examinations of the soldier, a 24-year-old corporel, had been inconclusive.

--------

NO LINK BETWEEN DEPLETED URANIUM, GULF WAR SYNDROME

Tara Thornton <duorganizer@miltoxproj.org>
December 22, 2000 (ENS)

WASHINGTON, DC, - The Defense Department has issued an updated report that concludes that any link between the U.S. military's use of depleted uranium and undiagnosed illnesses experienced by some veterans of the Gulf war is "unlikely." The conclusion of the Defense Department report is supported by a recent National Academy of Sciences' Institute of Medicine (http://www.iom.edu/) review of scientific literature related to depleted uranium. The first battlefield use of depleted uranium in tank armor and armor piercing ammunition took place during the Gulf War.

The first interim report about depleted uranium was published in August 1998. This updated report reviews research conducted by both governmental and non-governmental agencies. It also includes the latest data available from a study the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is conducting on service members who had the greatest exposure to depleted uranium during the Gulf War. Since 1993, the VA has monitored 33 veterans who were injured in incidents involving depleted uranium. About half of this group still have depleted uranium metal fragments in their bodies. This update also refines previous Gulf War exposure assessments. The full text of the updated report may be viewed on the Web at http://www.gulflink.osd.mil/news/na_du_ii_19dec00.htm.

-------- korea

US Mulls Sending Envoy to Pyongyang

Associated Press
December 22, 2000 Filed at 3:12 a.m. ET
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Albright-NKorea.html

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Clinton administration is weighing the possibility of dispatching an envoy to North Korea to clarify Pyongyang's readiness to shut down its missile program, according to a senior official.

The disclosure came after Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said in an interview Thursday with The Associated Press that there is ``a genuine possibility'' that Pyongyang will agree to such curbs.

President Clinton continues to weigh a visit to North Korea during his last month in office -- quite possibly to clinch a missile deal. Many senior Republicans on Capitol Hill oppose such a visit.

White House spokesman Jake Siewert said Clinton will make a judgment based on whether he thinks a trip would advance the process of curtailing Pyongyang's missile program.

Asked when a decision will be made, Siewert said, ``As soon as we can.''

According to an official who asked not to be identified, an interim trip to Pyongyang by Wendy Sherman, Albright's top aide on North Korea, is under consideration.

The White House raised the possibility of a Clinton visit to North Korea more than two months ago. His decision has been awaited by Korea-watchers with great anticipation.

At a State Department press Christmas party hosted by Albright on Wednesday night, Sherman showed up with a sign hanging from her neck that said: ``No decision yet.'' Another sign, hanging on her back, said, ``Don't ask, don't tell.''

Albright discussed the missile question at length with Chairman Kim Jong Il when she visited Pyongyang in October.

``What is out there is the genuine possibility of their limiting further their missile testing and further production and export of various technologies in exchange basically for our launching civilian satellites,'' Albright said Thursday.

North Korea has sold missiles and missile technology to Iran and Syria. If Pyongyang agrees to curtail such sales, the United States would be willing to provide assistance to the country's stricken economy.

If the U.S. steps in to launch North Korean civilian satellites, this would satisfy Pyongyang's stated goal, while easing U.S. fears about the country's military capabilities.

But senior Republican lawmakers and other analysts are concerned about the risk of technology transfer to North Korea if the United States agrees to launch satellites.

This concern was spelled out in a letter to Clinton last week from Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill, and the Senate and House chairmen of the committees on foreign affairs and intelligence.

The group also indicated opposition to a Clinton trip to North Korea.

``No one is more alarmed about the North Korean missile program than we,'' the letter said. ``But any hurried or ill-considered deal with North Korea could be worse than no solution at all.''

President-elect Bush has said that since Clinton is in charge until Jan. 20, any decision on travel to North Korea is entirely up to him. Administration officials have briefed members of the Bush team on the North Korean situation and said they received no advice from them on whether Clinton should make the trip.

-------- russia

Russian Parliament Slashes Benefit Limit for Chernobyl Cleaners

Russia Today
Dec 22, 2000
http://www.russiatoday.com/news.php3?id=234150

MOSCOW -- (Agence France Presse) Russia's lower house of parliament, the Duma, voted on Thursday to slash by half the limit on benefits that can be paid to people who took part in clean up operations after the Chernobyl nuclear disaster.

The amendment was passed by 387 votes to five with three abstentions and was a compromise between the government's position and that demanded by the workers, Piotr Rogonov, a member of the Duma's labor and social policy commission said.

Thousands of people were exposed to heavy radiation when they were rushed to the Chernobyl plant in Ukraine in April 1986 to help clean up after one of the nuclear reactors exploded, spreading radioactivity across eastern Europe.

Rogonov said nearly 50,000 people were being paid benefits.

They will now receive between 1,000 and 10,000 rubles (40 and 400 euros, 35 and 350 dollars) a month and money will be paid to their families when they die. Under the old legislation, some of them were receiving 20,000 rubles per month.

The government wanted to set the limit at 5,000 rubles and end payments to families after death.

In October, about 100 people walked about 200 kilometers (120 miles) in a protest march against the plan, abandoning medals they had received for taking part in the dangerous clean-up.

The Chernobyl disaster was the world's worst civilian nuclear accident.

The plant was shut down permanently on December 15, an operation which could cost from three to five billion dollars, according to the deputy speaker of the Ukraine's parliament.

Officially, 31 people died from exposure to radiation, but unofficial estimates put the indirect death toll at between 15,000 and 30,000.

---

Tentative OK for Russian nuclear waste plan

Seattle Times
Nation & World : Friday, December 22, 2000
By Andrew Kramer The Associated Press
http://archives.seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/texis/web/vortex/display?slug=nuke22&date=20001222

MOSCOW -- Lawmakers yesterday tentatively approved a law allowing Russia to import spent nuclear-fuel rods for reprocessing, a plan that could bring the country $20 billion - and 21,000 tons of nuclear waste.

The Russian Atomic Energy Ministry said the money, which Russia would earn over 10 years, could be used to clean up past radioactive spills in Russia.

The proposal has been in the works for years. It is fiercely opposed by environmental groups, who say it amounts to selling downtrodden Russia as the world's nuclear-waste dump.

The Duma overwhelmingly passed the law on the first reading, but it must clear two more readings, pass the parliament's upper chamber and be signed by President Vladimir Putin before it takes effect.

Proponents said Russia could earn much-needed foreign income by taking advantage of the country's Cold War-era nuclear facilities.

"We'll get financing and won't disgracefully beg the International Monetary Fund for money as we do now," Atomic Energy Minister Yevgeny Adamov said.

The environmental group Greenpeace said the promise to use profits to clean up past nuclear disasters was a public-relations ploy.

The ministry just wants "to get Western money for an expansion of the Russian nuclear industry, whose disregard for safety and the environment is starkly demonstrated" by past mistakes, a statement from Greenpeace said yesterday.

The program foresees a market in Europe and Asia by offering a temporary solution to the problem of spent fuel rods piling up at civilian-nuclear reactors.

Nuclear-power stations worldwide currently have about 200,000 tons of waste in temporary storage.

For a fee, small shipments would be sent to Russia's Mayak facility in the central Ural Mountains.

The recycling process extracts useable nuclear material from the spent nuclear rods while reducing their potential to be used in weapons, the Russian Nuclear Ministry has said.

Under current law, waste left over after reprocessing must be returned to the country of origin. The new measure would allow Russia to keep the waste.

France and Britain are currently the only countries operating commercial-reprocessing plants.

Both Russian and foreign environmental groups object to the Russian ministry's plan, saying Russia should treat its own nuclear waste before receiving more.

A 1992 law forbids importing nuclear materials from foreign countries other than former East Bloc nations with existing contracts. Russia now treats spent fuel rods from Ukraine, Bulgaria, Slovakia and Hungary under a system established during Soviet times.

----

Russia Risks Another Chernobyl

International Herald Tribune
Friday, December 22, 2000
Cristina Chuen and Elena Sokova
http://www.iht.com/articles/5088.htm

MONTEREY, California Is the world ready for a self-regulating nuclear industry in Russia, just a short time after the Chernobyl power plant was finally shut down? The Ministry of Atomic Energy thinks so and is promoting a bill before the Parliament that may soon emasculate Russia's independent nuclear regulatory agency.

The bill would transfer authority over licensing and safety inspections from the Federal Inspectorate for Nuclear and Radiation Safety, known in Russia by its acronym GAN, to the ministry, known as Minatom - a throwback to the Chernobyl era.

The creation of a nuclear regulatory agency was a singular achievement of the budding Russian democracy in the early 1990s. It was also a result of a serious re-evaluation of Russia's nuclear programs after the 1986 Chernobyl accident. The 1994 International Nuclear Safety Convention, which Russia has signed, requires parties to separate operation and regulatory activities.

But, Minatom soon chafed under the new regulations, and began to lobby against GAN's "intrusive" inspections and exacting licensing procedures. First, GAN lost its jurisdiction over Russia's nuclear navy. In 1996, the inspectorate was required to make its annual reports secret. This summer Minatom pushed through a government decree eliminating GAN's right to license any military-related nuclear activities.

Now Minatom is trying to eliminate GAN's right to license and perform safety inspections in the civilian sector. If Minatom succeeds, GAN would be left without any effective regulatory tools. Although the minister of atomic energy, Yevgeni Adamov, claims that the licensing change is merely a question of streamlining and that his ministry is not trying to destroy the nuclear regulatory body, the chairman of GAN, Yuri Vishnevsky, says that one should "not believe a word Adamov says."

Mr. Vishnevsky knows what he is talking about: Last year, GAN attempted to shut down two plutonium reactors producing electricity near Tomsk, Siberia, because they were unsafe. Instead of fixing the problems, Minatom, with government collusion, kept the reactors running.

Today, Minatom is on the verge of a massive expansion of its operations, especially in nuclear energy production. Minatom is bringing new power reactors on line, reconstituting divisions that were privatized under reforms, promoting profitable deals like the sale of nuclear power reactors to Iran, and planning to make money by importing spent nuclear fuel.

Furthermore, Minatom has been fighting to consolidate its profit-making enterprises, which currently subsidize activities like nuclear dismantlement, safety and security, into a single corporation. In Soviet times, when the atomic industry monitored itself, it did not have to worry about costs in a state-run economy. Its new focus on profits sharply reduces the incentive for Minatom to maintain safety standards and stop cutting corners.

Another reason why Minatom wants to effectively shut down GAN is that in just two years, 12 of Russia's 29 power reactors will reach the end of their service lives, including several old Chernobyl-type reactors. Upgrades can be costly. Minatom hopes to fix the reactors at one third of the cost that GAN thinks is required to ensure their safe operation.

To proceed with its plan, Minatom needs to remove the safety watchdog from the scene. Mr. Vishnevsky said Minatom officials had told him it would be cheaper to buy legislators than to pay for the upgrades.

In addition, safety improvements continue to be needed at other nuclear installations. According to Mr. Vishnevsky, many of Russia's 109 research reactors are in dire need of safety upgrades. Russia also has to deal with more than 400 radioactive waste storage sites holding 389 million cubic meters of liquid radioactive waste and nearly 50,000 cubic meters of solid radioactive waste. Can Minatom be trusted to seek out safety problems and fix them appropriately?

Except for GAN itself and the rather weak Russian environmental movement, there is no one to challenge Minatom's plans, particularly since the government of President Vladimir Putin eliminated the State Environmental Committee earlier this year. Recently, a public drive to hold a referendum on Minatom's spent nuclear fuel import plans was halted when the Central Electoral Commission invalidated enough signatures to bury the plebiscite.

The plan to hamstring GAN is being pushed through the legislature with the help of the chairman of the Duma environmental committee, who is the brother of a Minatom deputy minister. The government also supports the changes. No wonder GAN has asked Western regulatory agencies for their support. Foreign countries should insist that no assistance money be spent in the civilian sector without independent inspections.

Unless the international community mobilizes, Minatom will soon be able to oversee itself: This closely resembles the situation when Chernobyl exploded. It is not too late yet to reverse the highly dangerous course of events. Can the world afford to let the Russian Ministry of Atomic Energy monitor itself once again? As the Russians say, this is like having a wolf guard the sheep.

The writers are research associates at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies in the Monterey Institute of International Studies. They contributed this comment to the International Herald Tribune.

---

Russia tentatively OKs waste imports

Infobeat
December 22, 2000
By ANDREW KRAMER Associated Press Writer
http://www.infobeat.com/cgi-bin/WebObjects/IBFrontEnd.woa/wa/fullStory?article=405489369

MOSCOW (AP) - Russia's Atomic Energy Ministry on Thursday won preliminary approval of its dream of earning as much as $20 billion by importing other countries' nuclear waste for processing _ up to 21,000 tons of it over the next decade.

Environmentalists say it will turn Russia into the world's nuclear dump.

The State Duma, or lower house of parliament, on Thursday approved by 319-38 the proposal to bring spent nuclear fuel rods to Russia. It must clear two more readings, pass the upper chamber and be signed by President Vladimir Putin to become law.

Proponents stressed that Russia should take advantage of its Cold War-era nuclear and scientific facilities, that it could make up to $20 billion over 10 years, and that the money could help clean up radiation spills in Russia.

``We'll get financing and won't disgracefully beg the International Monetary Fund for money as we do now,'' Atomic Energy Minister Yevgeny Adamov said.

Russian and foreign environmental groups said Russia should treat its own nuclear waste before importing more radioactive material.

The environmental group Greenpeace described the promise to use profits for cleanup as a public relations ploy.

``We see this as a disaster for the Russian people,'' Greenpeace spokesman Jon Walter said. ``It will create another Chernobyl generation, whose lives will be cut short by radioactive contamination.'' Chernobyl was the site of the 1986 nuclear disaster in neighboring Ukraine.

The Atomic Energy ministry wants to get Western funds to expand the Russian nuclear industry, ``whose disregard for safety and the environment is starkly demonstrated'' by past mistakes, Greenpeace said in a statement.

The program to import waste foresees a market in Europe and Asia for the service, which would solve temporarily the problem of spent fuel rods piling up at civilian nuclear reactors.

Nuclear power stations around the world have about 200,000 tons of waste in temporary storage.

For a fee, spent fuel would be sent by armored train to Russia's Mayak facility near Chelyabinsk in the Ural Mountains for reprocessing.

The recycling process extracts useable nuclear material from the spent rods while reducing their potential to be used in weapons, the Nuclear Ministry has said.

Mayak has been the site of several accidents, including a 1957 waste facility explosion that contaminated 9,200 square miles. The region has been called the most radioactive place on the planet because of Soviet-era nuclear waste dumping into lakes and rivers.

France and Britain are the only countries now operating commercial reprocessing plants.

A 1992 law forbids importing nuclear materials from countries other than former East Bloc nations with existing contracts. Russia now imports spent fuel rods from Ukraine, Bulgaria, Slovakia and Hungary for reprocessing, a system established during Soviet times.

---

Russians Back Plan for a Nuclear Waste Industry

New York Times
December 22, 2000
By AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
http://www.nytimes.com/2000/12/22/world/22RUSS.html

MOSCOW, Dec. 21 - Russian lawmakers strongly backed government plans today to earn billions of dollars by treating the world's nuclear waste, provoking sharp criticism from ecologists.

The State Duma, or lower house of Parliament, approved by a vote of 319 to 38 the first reading of an amendment to a 1991 environmental law that prohibits importing nuclear waste for reprocessing or disposal.

Authorities say the amendment would let Russia sign contracts with China, Germany, Japan, Spain, Switzerland and Taiwan, earning as much as $21 billion over 10 years.

"For 10 to 15 years we can make money instead of going with a begging bowl to the I.M.F., which we have done up to now to our shame," the atomic energy minister, Yevgeny Adamov, told Parliament before the vote.

But the environmental group Greenpeace, which campaigned against the plan, warned that the law would turn Russia into a dumping ground.

"We're concerned that this will turn Russia into the world's first nuclear waste dump and that some of the sites that are being proposed are highly contaminated" already, John Walter, a researcher for Greenpeace, said in Amsterdam.

"There are a lot of people in the surrounding regions whose health has been seriously affected by this contamination. There are a lot of birth defects, there are high rates of cancer and all those sorts of associated health problems," he added.

"This is only going to get worse if Russia now decides to try and make a quick buck by hoarding other countries' nuclear waste and spent nuclear fuel. They can't handle their own waste, let alone the rest of the world's," Mr. Walter said.

But Mr. Adamov - who criticized Ukraine last week for closing the Chernobyl nuclear power station, insisting it was perfectly safe - denied that there were any ecological risks.

"The development of a strong energy sector in Russia will not lead to the stockpiling of radioactive nuclear waste," he said.

The Atomic Energy Ministry argues that the funds generated by treating nuclear waste from abroad would allow it to upgrade its own nuclear waste storage facilities, clean up contaminated land and expand a reprocessing plant in the Urals.

---

2000's Top Stories: Election, Elain

Associated Press
December 22, 2000 Filed at 12:11 p.m. ET
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-YE-Top-10-Stories.html
http://usatoday.com/news/ndsfri03.htm

America's protracted election, the tug-of-war over Elian Gonzalez and the terrorist bombing of the USS Cole ranked as the top news stories of 2000, according to The Associated Press annual survey of its members.

No. 1 was no contest: George W. Bush's nail-biting triumph in Florida in an extraordinary presidential race resolved by the nation's highest court five weeks after Election Day. The story received a first-place ranking from 281 of the 312 AP newspaper and broadcast members who took part in the news cooperative's survey.

AP members also turned to Florida for the No. 2 story: The bitter custody battle with political overtones that centered on whether young Elian Gonzalez, rescued from the sea while fleeing Cuba with his mother, should stay with relatives in Miami or be returned to his father.

Following in the rankings were the attack on the USS Cole that killed 17 sailors, soaring oil prices that sent prices at the pump sharply upward, and the recall of more than 6 million Firestone tires.

AP subscribers outside the United States offered a different take on the year's news.

Fifty overseas subscribers, in a separate poll, also chose the U.S. presidential battle as the top story. But they ranked the ouster of Yugoslavia's Slobodan Milosevic second, followed by Israeli-Palestinian violence. Next were the Aug. 12 disaster aboard the Russian nuclear submarine Kursk and the historic summit between leaders of the two Koreas.

U.S. editors ranked Milosevic's toppling No. 9, the Middle East conflict No. 11, and the Russian sub tragedy No. 12. They did not place the Koreas summit among the top 20 stories -- ranking it lower than the 2000 Olympic Games and Tiger Woods' three Grand Slam wins.

This was the 65th year that the AP polled its members. A first-place vote gave a story 10 points, a second-place vote nine points, and so on. The top story last year was President Clinton's impeachment trial.

-------- u.s. nuc weapons

Pentagon Awards Defense Contract

Associated Press
December 22, 2000 Filed at 6:10 p.m. ET
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Missile-Defense.html

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Pentagon announced a multibillion-dollar contract with the Boeing Co. on Friday to keep work going into the next administration on a national missile defense system.

Although no decision has been made whether the United States will deploy such a system, President Clinton said this year that testing and development should continue until the next administration makes a decision.

The contract is valued $6 billion for work from January 2001 through September 2007, and if additional work is required past that it could be worth up to $13 billion.

President-elect Bush has said he supports building an anti-missile shield to protect the United States.

``This will ensure that the Bush administration has the flexibility to structure the program to meet its requirements,'' said a Pentagon spokesman, Lt. Col. Rick Lehner.

The initial contract for Boeing expires in April 2001, and enough money remained only for two more tests, Lehner said.

``We don't want to have an interruption in the test program,'' he said.

Clinton said Sept. 1 that he was putting off deployment in part because of doubts about the technical feasibility of a system to shoot down enemy missiles.

Pentagon brass believe an effective defense against ballistic missile attack on the United States can be built, but they've had limited success with five tests done so far.

In two of three interception tests, prototype interceptor rockets failed to hit their target in space.

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Hail to the Chief Tech-Heads

Yahoo News
Sunday October 22, 12:22 am Eastern Time
TheStandard.com
By Michael Beschloss
http://biz.yahoo.com/st/001022/19246.html

Americans learn almost at their mother's knee about John Kennedy's passion for the moon-landing program and Franklin Roosevelt's deep involvement in the development of the atomic bomb. From such tales, you might imagine most American presidents as technologists-in-chief; sleeves rolled up, crouching over tables and blueprints with the inventors of the telegraph, the electric light or the computer, asking how government could help.

Indeed, presidents have done much to influence some of America's greatest technological breakthroughs: the transcontinental railroad, the atomic bomb, interstate highways, men on the moon, the Internet.

But throughout American history, such achievements have been more the exception than the rule. In the absence of war, economic crisis or an exceptionally visionary and effective executive, presidential influence on technological advancement has been marginal.

Although Thomas Jefferson was famously inventive, intrigued by science and worried about industrialization, he did little more to support technology during his presidency than correspond with Robert Fulton about the steamboat and Eli Whitney about the cotton gin. In the 1870s, when Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone, President Rutherford Hayes provided nothing more than a White House ceremony as workers linked a phone connection from his mansion to the Treasury.

In contrast, Abraham Lincoln was enamored of technology; he was the first president to hold a patent, received in 1849 for a method he devised to buoy sailing vessels over shoals using inflated cylinders. During the Civil War, he established the National Academy of Sciences to "investigate, experiment and report upon any subject of science or art." And he oversaw the transformations in armaments, transportation and battlefield medicine required to defeat the South.

But Lincoln's greatest contribution to America's technological growth may be that he was the "driving force" behind the transcontinental railroad, as Stephen Ambrose writes in Nothing Like It in the World. The one-time railroad lawyer championed "internal improvements" - the great infrastructure challenges of his time - such as canals, roads and trains. As president, Lincoln helped decide the great cross-country project's route, financing, even the gauge of the tracks - 4 feet, 8-1/2 inches. It is probably no coincidence that the man who fought to bind a fractured union politically also sought to do so physically.

Still it was not until the 20th century, after decades of generally weak and peripheral presidents, that Lincoln's successors grew beyond their passive role in technological change.

The great departure was heralded by, of all people, Herbert Hoover. As secretary of commerce under Presidents Harding and Coolidge in the 1920s, Hoover sought increased private-public cooperation to hasten technological innovation in factories and farms.

But it was Franklin Roosevelt who was the first president to fully exercise his executive powers to advance U.S. technology interests. Like Lincoln, Roosevelt exercised those powers in the face of war.

In 1940, with the Nazis and imperial Japanese looming, he warned the Pan-American Scientific Congress that "great achievements of science and even of art can be used in one way or another to destroy as well as to create. ... If death is desired, science can do that. If a full rich and useful life is sought, science can do that also."

Roosevelt - in some cases almost singlehandedly - orchestrated the production of the ships, planes, guns, bombs and more esoteric inventions like radar and atomic weapons that would ultimately bring an Allied victory.

He also established a National Defense Research Committee, which included the presidents of Harvard and MIT. The panel used government money to explore the possibilities of atomic fission. In 1941, during a secret briefing just before Pearl Harbor, Roosevelt ordered members full-speed ahead: If in six months the project was making serious progress, he would throw any industrial and technological resources at his command behind crash production of an atomic bomb.

To preserve secrecy, FDR kept direct control of what became the Manhattan Project. He returned reports from his science adviser, Vannevar Bush, without making copies for White House files. To his private secretary, Grace Tully, the president said, "I can't tell you what this is, Grace, but if it works, and pray God it does, it will save many American lives."

The Cold War enshrined the notion that presidents must be experts in technology, which might sometimes make the difference between victory and defeat.

Dwight Eisenhower, who felt that the innovative Higgins landing craft won D-Day, knew what a crucial edge new developments in intelligence gathering, arms and transportation could bring to armies and navies.

In November 1954, a half-dozen members of Ike's national security establishment asked him to authorize $35 million for a spy plane developed by the "Skunk Works" - Lockheed's secret projects operation. The plane was to fly covertly over the Soviet Union, photographing tanks, airplanes and missile sites.

Knowing that crossing Soviet territory was tantamount to an act of war, the president insisted on approving every flight. He tinkered with routes and interrogated his men on the chances that Soviet technology had progressed enough to detect and down an American plane - as the Russians finally did on May Day 1960, when Francis Gary Powers fell into their hands.

Ike was also the president who demanded construction of the interstate highway system. As supreme commander during World War II, while studying reconnaissance photographs of Hitler's autobahns, Eisenhower mused how far behind the United States was in responding to the needs of the automobile that Americans themselves invented.

The interstate highway system became the largest public works project in history. After steering it through Congress as an essential measure for national defense, Ike was proud of it, but later regretted he had not been enough of a visionary. To get the program passed, his congressional leaders appeased members with large urban constituencies by offering disproportionate funds for construction in the cities.

By 1960, Eisenhower complained that he had "never anticipated" that so many interstate routes would cross highly populated city neighborhoods and that so little money would be spent on rapid transit. It was "very wasteful," he groused, "to have an average of just one man per $3,000 car driving into the central area and taking all the space required to park the car." But by then it was too late.

In his acceptance speech at the Los Angeles Coliseum in 1960, John Kennedy touted his New Frontier as a means of exploring "uncharted areas" of "science and space." But after his election, JFK refused NASA pleas for a $20 billion program (in 1961 dollars) to land on the moon by 1970. He worried it would unbalance the budget and upend the existing space program then neatly divided among scientific, communications, meteorological, military and other purposes. He also feared the possibility that astronauts might die in space - and tarnish his presidency.

Nevertheless, in April 1961, stunned by the first Soviet-manned space flight and his humiliating failed attempt to overthrow Fidel Castro at the Bay of Pigs, Kennedy revived the plan. He wanted to rally national support for himself and give the impression that the United States had seized the initiative back from Moscow. Republicans were horrified by the expense, but JFK managed to convince most of them (not Ike, who thought it "a stunt") that the program was essential to win the Cold War.

Kennedy quickly saw that the moon program presented a public relations bonanza. He flew to Cape Canaveral to quiz scientists on future missions, hectoring them to move faster. He monitored each flight and basked in the reflected glow of each returning hero.

Kennedy's moon-landing program shows how altered a presidential decision can look when viewed from different horizons. Today it seems questionable whether this was the best way to spend a king's ransom in the 1960s. But 500 years from now, earthlings may view the moon landing as the most important American achievement of the 20th century.

Beyond their Cold War role of overseeing (usually in secret) technological developments such as those in satellites, nuclear weapons, planes and missiles, later presidents dabbled only sporadically in technology.

In 1964, nervous about the popularity of the VW Beetle, Lyndon Johnson asked his defense secretary, Robert McNamara, former president of Ford Motor, to feel out the Big Three automakers in Detroit about patriotically combining to build a competitive American small car. They were unenthusiastic.

LBJ also secretly authorized planning for a Cold War communications system that - anticipated by almost no one - would lead, in 1989, to the World Wide Web.

If any president deserves to seize the title of father of the Internet - however accidentally - it may well be Johnson.

Richard Nixon denounced Congress when it refused to fund a supersonic transport plane. Jimmy Carter covertly authorized development of stealth aircraft, then, under attack by Ronald Reagan in the 1980 campaign as soft on defense, allowed aides to leak the secret to the press.

Possibly the most fateful presidential intervention in technological development since FDR and the Manhattan Project was Ronald Reagan's demand for a space-based strategic defense initiative. Had anyone been president in the early 1980s other than Reagan, with his memories of Flash Gordon and his genuine desire to abolish nuclear arsenals, it is almost certain SDI never would have been considered. Some former Soviet officials argue if Reagan hadn't threatened Mikhail Gorbachev with the prospect of bankrupting Soviet society in an effort to build a competitive strategic defense, the Soviet leadership might not have been so eager to make a fire-sale deal to end the Cold War. Such is the power of vaporware.

Both of this year's presidential candidates have watched the link between presidents and technology from a front-row seat. Al Gore's father, as a Tennessee senator, led the fight to finance Eisenhower's highway system. George W. Bush's grandfather, Prescott Bush, was one of the Republican senators who denounced Kennedy's moon-landing program, warning the price tag would "unleash the forces of inflation."

With the campaign racing to a climax, we are about to witness the first inauguration of a new president in 72 years that does not fall under the cloud of economic crises and wars that compelled earlier presidents to be great technologists-in-chief. Out of habit, the next president may be tempted to emulate Lincoln, Franklin Roosevelt, Kennedy or Reagan.

But, in an era of relative peace and unparalleled prosperity, welding himself to great private-sector initiatives may not be the most helpful thing a president can do.

The unique powers of the presidency will always be needed at crucial moments to ensure fairness, national security and technological explorations not driven solely by the profit motive. Presidents can sometimes spot those moments more acutely than anyone else. But in their absence, the best contribution the next president can make to the telephones, televisions and Internets of the future might well be to do what most of our presidents have done throughout American history: Stay on the sidelines and cheer.

Michael Beschloss has written six award-winning books about American presidents, including Taking Charge, the first volume in a trilogy about the Lyndon Johnson tapes.

-------- u.s. nuc facilities

Nurescell Announces Management Changes

Yahoo News
Friday December 22, 9:26 am Eastern Time
Press Release
http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/001222/ca_nuresce.html

NEWPORT BEACH, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dec. 22, 2000--Several changes within the senior management of Nurescell Inc. (OTCBB:NUSL - news) have recently occurred.

In an effort to further strengthen management as the company proceeds into the production and marketing phase of Nurescell's activities, Adrian Joseph has resigned as chief executive officer of the company and will serve in the newly created position of chief scientific advisor.

This new position will permit Joseph to concentrate on scientific activities in Europe and Russia working with Nurescell AG, the German affiliate of the company. His scientific and technical expertise will remain available to Nurescell. Additionally, Sharon Nitka has resigned her position as chief financial officer.

John Longenecker has been named the new CEO and president of Nurescell and will continue to serve as a director of the company. Longenecker significantly strengthens the executive management team through his many years of experience in the nuclear sector. Longenecker brings significant government and commercial nuclear industry experience to the company.

Longenecker is also the president of Longenecker & Associates, a management consulting firm within the high-technology and energy- related industries. Prior to the formation of Longenecker & Associates in 1989, Longenecker was chairman of General Atomic International Services Corp., a company which provided services and products to nuclear power stations.

From 1983 to 1987, Longenecker served in the Reagan administration as the deputy assistant secretary responsible for management of the U.S. uranium enrichment business within the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), and prior thereto worked in the U.S. nuclear reactor development program as the director of Breeder Demonstration Projects for the DOE.

Longenecker was appointed by President Bush in 1992 to serve as the first CEO of the U.S. Enrichment Corp. Longenecker received both his bachelor of science and master of science degrees from Pennsylvania State University and has served as a member of that institution's Industrial Professional Advisory Council.

Longenecker has appeared before the U.S. Congress on numerous occasions, and has presented papers in various national and international forums including the Uranium Institute in London, the Japanese Atomic Industrial Forum, the United States Atomic Industrial Forum, the U.S. Council for Energy Awareness, the American Nuclear Society, the European Nuclear Society, the Canadian Nuclear Society, the World Nuclear Fuel Conference, the Institute of Nuclear Materials Management and the American Society of Mechanical Engineers.

Longenecker is a member of the Nuclear Energy Institute and has served as chairman of the USCEA Uranium Enrichment Task Force. Longenecker is a member of Tau Beta Pi Honorary Engineering Society and the American Nuclear Society.

James Samuelson has resigned his duties as president and will assume the positions of chief financial officer, vice president of operations and remain a director of the company. Samuelson brings significant experience in the international financial markets to the company. Samuelson also serves as vice president and chief financial officer of Advanced Technology Industries Inc. (OTCBB:AVDI - news).

Prior to this position Samuelson served as a vice president in the investment banking groups of two European based financial groups. Samuelson earned both his bachelor of science and master of business administration degrees from Creighton University.

The board of directors would like to recognize the contributions of Joseph to the company since its formation. Joseph's scientific background played an instrumental part in the development of Nurescell's proprietary radiation shielding technology and maneuvering the company to its present position.

The current management appointments will allow Nurescell to transition from research and development to marketing of its product. The company looks forward to its continued cooperation with Joseph as he assumes the role of chief scientific advisor.

William Wilson, chairman of the board remarked: ``The board of directors of Nurescell is extremely fortunate to be able to name these very experienced and capable people to their new positions in the company. We now look forward to a challenging and productive future for the company.

``With the completion of the newly formed affiliate company in Germany, known as Nurescell AG, we have begun the testing and certification process with required governmental agencies and institutes of Nurescell material in Europe and anticipate that this will result in sales of our products in the Russian and European marketplace that would not otherwise be available to the company. We remain enthusiastic about the future of Nurescell Inc. and Nurescell AG.''

In accordance with the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, Nurescell Inc. notes that statements in this news release that look forward in time (which includes everything other than historical information) involve risks and uncertainties that may affect its actual results of operations. The following important factors, among others (including those discussed in Nurescell Inc.'s filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission) could cause actual results to differ materially from those set forth in the forward-looking statements: the availability of funding for current and future operations; the acceptance of our product in the marketplace; and the characteristics and pricing of our product as compared with competing products. You are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date of this news release. Nurescell Inc. undertakes no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

-------- kentucky

Metals recovery perilous: DOE
Paducah workers during the Cold War may have been exposed to five airborne hazards.

From: magnu96196@aol.com
Date: Fri, 22 Dec 2000 07:40:33 EST
By Joe Walker jwalker@paducahsun.com--270.575.8650
http://www.paducahsun.com/cgi-bin/view.cgi?/200012/22+02ZJ_news.html+20001222+news

Two new Department of Energy reports say workers potentially were exposed to airborne hazards while recovering metals, notably gold and silver, at the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion plant during the Cold War years. Five materials - the metals beryllium, cobalt, lead and tantalum, and the radionuclide tritium - may have caused health and environmental hazards, according to the reports, issued Thursday. The materials were used mainly in processing weapons components as part of plant work for outside firms and government agencies.

The work, which took place from 1952 to 1986, included recovering precious metals from damaged and retired nuclear weapons; fabrication of moon landing parts for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration; making research nuclear reactor components; and assembling electronics and parts for missile systems. Other work involved the recovery and recycling of metal from weapons casing and electronics, and the destruction of classified parts for security reasons.

The report says DOE's Office of Environment, Safety and Health, which oversees an ongoing worker health study, should review the information to see if more action is needed. DOE officials said additional steps could include asking that new worker compensation laws - which cover beryllium and radiation sickness - be expanded for lead and other exposures.

Other recommendations:

--The former torching, machining and melting of lead, and the machining and crushing of beryllium and beryllium-copper alloy, should be evaluated further.

--More review of burial practices is needed because of the plant's burial of neutron generators containing tritium, beryllium-contaminated materials, and the volume of beryllium and other materials from the weapons program. That data will provide better information about buried materials and containers before excavation. Don Seaborg, DOE's Paducah site manager, said there are no plans to dig in the classified burial yard where most of the materials are stored. The site is scheduled for cleanup in 2009.

--Work-for-others program records should be centralized, indexed and cross-checked with other facilities to validate and quantify hazards identified.

--Information in the reports should be provided to regulators and interested citizens to make them aware of past work at the plant. Dale Jackson, director of uranium management for DOE's Oak Ridge, Tenn., operations, including Paducah, said sampling shows current workers are not at risk because of the Cold War work.

Highlights of the reports:

--Metals processed were gold, silver, steel, nickel, aluminum, copper, monel (a copper-nickel alloy) and cobalt. A smelter and two sweat furnaces were used, and an induction furnace was added in 1976 to process metals with higher melting points. The smelter was used to destroy the classified aspect of parts used to enrich uranium at the plant, and to recover nickel from production parts removed from enrichment plants at Paducah, Ohio and Tennessee. As late as 1986, some radioactive materials were shipped to the Paducah plant for smelter processing. Radioactively contaminated materials from the plant were processed with the same equipment.

--Many of the materials formerly handled by Paducah plant workers are known today to be hazardous and require protection. In the early days of the plant, those hazards were not as well-known. When smelting started, equipment was not generally used to protect workers from vapors and particulates during furnace operation and slag cleaning. Later, as hazards were better understood, health and safety controls were specified.

--Available records show 2,800 to 5,300 pounds of gold were recovered and shipped from the plant from 1964 to 1985 in contaminated areas of a cleaning building and a smelter.

"The worst-case use of gold would have been through pharmaceutical injection in arthritic patients. If this material were used for this purpose, it would have resulted in an exposure of about 30 millirem, or 10 percent of annual natural background (radiation). But this exposure scenario is extremely unlikely." DOE officials said in interviews that there is no evidence such injections really took place.

--About 7,650 pounds of silver were reclaimed by reprocessing classified X-ray film from 1966 to 1974. The film was incinerated and the ash smelted into silver bars in a foundry. Cross-contamination could have occurred during processing, but there is no evidence of the potential for dangerous levels of contamination.

--Lead was recycled with weapons parts. The only records available said 258,990 pounds of shredded lead were produced and sold. The lead had slight potential for cross-contamination during processing. In the mid '60s through late '70s, Paducah was asked to fabricate X-ray lead shield doors poured in two sections, each with 26,000 pounds of lead. Also, lead was scavenged from abandoned Kentucky Ordnance Works facilities near the plant by using torches to cut and extract lead.

--Much of the outside work was done in the plant machine shop, a state-of-the-art facility during the Cold War. Workers were at greatest risk in the melting and machining of lead, and the machining of beryllium, and beryllium-copper compounds. Beryllium hazards were partly recognized, but records and workers' memory show no clear evidence that recommended protective measures like controlled ventilation and respirators were used.

--About 17 million pounds of "clean" nickel, recovered by smelting into ingots, were sold. Samples showed low levels of contamination of technetium-99 and plutonium - radioactive substances contained in uranium recycled from nuclear fuel - but "these levels would have had no public health consequence." Nearly 20 million pounds of contaminated nickel were cast and remain in a plant scrap yard.

--Roughly 4.5 million pounds of aluminum were smelted into ingots from 1970 to 1986. Records before 1984 could not be found. Samples showed low levels of plutonium and two other radionuclides. Although the aluminum was not a general public health threat, "the potential to exceed annual radiation-protection standards for the public might possibly have existed at foundries (outside the plant) where this aluminum was remelted."

--Scrap steel was segregated into contaminated and clean areas, but no documents were found, and clean areas sometimes were contaminated. Excess clean steel was sold, and contaminated steel may have been sold. Steel known to be contaminated was routinely placed in a scrap yard and not sold. About 26.7 million pounds of contaminated steel scrap were generated. Smelting was cut short because of process problems, and the ingots remain with contaminated scrap.

----------

Work may have put plant workers at risk
Investigators haven't fully evaluated risks, officials say

Louisville Courier-Journal
Friday, December 22, 2000
By JAMES MALONE, The Courier-Journal
http://www.courier-journal.com/localnews/2000/0012/22/ky_uran.html

PADUCAH, Ky. -- Thirty years of secret, "outside" government work at the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant exposed workers to cobalt, toxic beryllium and other harmful materials, the U.S. Energy Department said yesterday.

Officials said there was no evidence the workers were harmed but conceded that investigators have not fully evaluated the risks from the jobs, many of which were done in support of U.S. military installations and the CIA.

The Energy Department released 90 pages of documents and exhibits, marking the culmination of a year-long probe into work that went on at the plant from 1958 to 1988, including building parts for the Apollo space program, recycling atomic bombs and "work activity" for the CIA.

Allegations in a 1999 lawsuit led to the investigation. Yesterday, the Energy Department said the public and current plant workers had not been put at risk, but that exposure of former workers to beryllium and lead needed more study.

"There is no perceived current hazard to the work force," said J. Dale Jackson, the Energy Department's manager of uranium operations at its Oak Ridge, Tenn., office. Officials said former workers concerned about exposure to the materials could contact the medical surveillance program to arrange a screening by calling (888) 241-1199.

Starting in the late 1950s, as the urgency to develop atomic weapons waned, the government sought work from other federal agencies to keep its highly trained technicians and machinists at Paducah on the job. A brochure was even printed offering the plant's services.

Much of the work was classified. Workers melted and crushed tons of atomic weapons, built electronic parts of the Lunar Lander and huge lead doors for NASA, and machined nose cones for missiles and other rocket components.

The work was so secret that wives have said husbands could not tell them what they were doing.

The released documents did not specify how many workers were exposed to such things as toxic metals and radioactivity from old bombs. But the report said it appeared that there were few safeguards to protect them.

Among other things, the report noted that radioactive nickel ingots were "sold into commerce," and some bars of recycled silver and gold could not be accounted for.

The report contained the first government acknowledgement that radioactive nuclear weapon materials, and not just their shells, were brought into the plant, along with beryllium and large amounts of lead.

The documents marked the government's fullest disclosure to date of the nature and scope of its program to salvage precious metals from dismantled equipment.

The papers point out that investigators could not account for all of the metals, including three gold bars shipped to a plant at Oak Ridge in 1981.

Energy Department officials said yesterday that the disposition of the gold "was a matter of national security" and declined to elaborate.

Paducah also produced some 102 silver bars worth about a third of a million dollars, but records for 21 of the bars could not be found. Much of the silver was reclaimed from burned photographs and film.

"No procurement records could be produced to indicate the quantity of silver sold nor the selling procedure," the report said.

Gold was dissolved from bomb components, melted into bars and sold tothe Treasury Department. After the United States abandoned gold-backed currency in the late 1970s, then plant operator Union Carbide began selling gold commercially. The report concludes that up to 5,300 pounds of gold, worth about $2.4 million at today's prices, was recovered at the plant.

Many of the men who worked in smelter operations to melt and dissolve gold initially worked in their street clothes, and "the constant use of a respirator could not be confirmed," the report said.

Investigators still have been unable to determine how much and in what form beryllium metal was used at Paducah. Workers reported crushing bomb casings and parts that were known to contain a beryllium alloy. One retiree reported machining the toxic metal.

"Records do not show clear evidence that recommended protective measures such as controlled ventilation or respirators were used," the report said.

During the course of the year-long probe -- the team assembled its first draft in July -- investigators said they were hampered by incomplete or missing records.

They discovered that voluminous files from a key smelter facility had been put into drums "for disposal as low-level hazardous waste." A search of 23 drums identified as containing "paper and trash" revealed that six contained numerous photographs, files, logbooks, operational records and engineering drawings for the smelter.

The records proved to be "historically useful," Jackson said.

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Secret work was done at Paducah Plant employees were at risk

December 22, 2000, in the Herald-Leader
By Dylan T. Lovan ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.kentuckyconnect.com/heraldleader/news/122200/statedocs/22paducahplant.htm
http://www.state.nv.us/nucwaste/whatsnew.htm</A>

Secret work was done at Paducah Plant employees were at risk LOUISVILLE A Department of Energy report concluded Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant employees were exposed to potentially hazardous conditions from top secret work performed for outside government agencies.

The study released yesterday by DOE examined the plant's secret ``Work for Others,'' program, conducted from the early 1950s to 1986. Under the program, agencies like NASA, the Central Intelligence Agency and the Department of Defense borrowed Paducah manpower to conduct classified tasks. The report's findings came largely from classified nuclear weapons documents and interviews with former workers.

For 50 years the DOE-owned plant enriched uranium for nuclear weapons and power plants. In 1999 three employees filed a whistleblower lawsuit alleging that contamination and conditions were much worse than had been disclosed by former operators.

The plant has contaminated soil, water, and plant and animal life on and around the facility. A cleanup is under way.

The top-secret work detailed in the report included recovery of precious metals from retired and damaged nuclear weapons, assembly of lunar landing parts for NASA and electronic parts for missile systems.

Employees often worked with lead, beryllium and cobalt, and the use of protective clothing and masks wasn't always enforced, said Dale Jackson, director of the Uranium Management Division at Oak Ridge.

-------- new mexico

Wen Ho Lee Celebrates Birthday

Associated Press
December 22, 2000 Filed at 2:10 a.m. ET
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Scientist-Secrets.html

FOSTER CITY, Calif. (AP) -- A year after turning 60 in solitary confinement, Wen Ho Lee celebrated his 61st birthday basking in freedom and surrounded by those who supported him during his months in the vortex of a spy scandal.

``Today, I don't remember all the difficult time of the last year,'' a smiling Lee said Thursday in a brief statement to reporters.

His daughter Alberta sat beside him, her eyes welling with tears. Asked which moments had been hardest for her in the past 12 months, she paused for a while. ``There were a lot of moments,'' she said finally. ``Probably visiting him in jail was the hardest.''

Lee, a former nuclear scientist at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, was indicted Dec. 10, 1999, on 59 criminal counts that he mishandled nuclear weapons secrets. He spent nine months in solitary confinement in a New Mexico jail.

Lee was never charged him with espionage, and he has sworn he never passed secrets to any unauthorized person.

He was freed Sept. 13, when he pleaded guilty to one count of illegally downloading restricted data to an unsecure tape. Fifty-eight counts were dropped.

Lee is writing a book and also has filed a civil lawsuit against the government alleging that his privacy was violated by a smear campaign.

-------- south carolina

Cracks in pipes found at S.C. nuclear power plant

Associated Press
Friday, December 22, 2000
http://www.accessatlanta.com/partners/ajc/epaper/editions/friday/local_news_ a3245faf15e871400020.html

Columbia, S.C. --- More tiny cracks have been found in pipes that carry contaminated water through a Fairfield County nuclear power plant, but officials say the problem should not delay restarting its V.C. Sumner plant next month as scheduled.

It would take three years for any newly discovered cracks to grow big enough to cause concern, according to a report by South Carolina Electric & Gas Co., presented to federal regulators Wednesday.

''We're still anticipating starting up in the first or second week of January,'' said Steve Byrne, vice president of nuclear operations for SCE&G.

The company plans to examine the cracks in 2003 to see if they have grown, Byrne said.

The plant has been closed since October, when inspectors found a major pipe leaking boric acid near the power station's radioactive core. Regulators say the leaking pipe did not pose a threat to the public because the plant has adequate containment areas and controls.

The discovery of the cracks prompted further testing last month that uncovered additional cracks along weld seams on other pipes, the company said Wednesday. Seven possible cracks were found on a section of pipe repaired since October. Eleven others are on other pipes, according to the company's report.

The cause of the cracks is unclear. SCE&G officials say the initial crack could have come from an outdated weld repair technique.

Nuclear safety advocates say the crack discovered in October could have led to a pipe break that would have required the plant to rely on emergency systems to keep the reactor cool.

Some of the possible cracks discovered last month were on pipes that carry water from a reactor core.

Federal regulators, nuclear safety advocates and atomic power executives have been watching the Sumner plant closely. Cracks could indicate similar problems in plants across the country. A 27-inch crack was found in October.

Investigators also are reviewing the type of testing done to examine the safety of pipes.

-------- tennessee

Morgan County home to ZeTek, ORNL project

Fri, 22 Dec 2000 16:36:35 EST
http://www.oakridger.com/

ZeTek Power Corp. will soon be using technology licensed from the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory and setting up shop in East Tennessee.

ZeTek, a subsidiary of the United Kingdom-based ZeTek Power, is a leading manufacturer of fuel cells and expects to employ 150 people within two years at the former Advance Transformer plant in Morgan County, according to an ORNL press release.

Production of fuel cells, which are relatively simple devices that combine oxygen and hydrogen to produce electricity, could begin early next year.

In the press release, Tommy Kilby, Morgan County executive, said, "Morgan County is proud to be the site selected by ZeTek Power. The partnerships created among Morgan County, ZeTek and ORNL will be good for the workforce not only in Morgan County, but the entire region."

This marks the first location of a company in the region as a direct result of technology developed by ORNL since UT-Battelle took over management.

Over the next few years, Oak Ridge could become home to ZeTek research and development, systems integration and corporate offices.

At the heart of ZeTek's alkaline fuel cell system will be two ORNL technologies. One removes carbon dioxide from the fuel (hydrogen from natural gas, propane and other readily available gases) and from air. This technology avoids the release of carbon dioxide into the environment.

The other technology is a method for manufacturing the carbon elements (used in the electrical swing adsorption) through a slurry molding process.

ORNL and ZeTek officials believe the time is perfect for this zero emission technology, which has a variety of uses, ranging from propulsion systems for vehicles and boats to stationary power generators.

"Initially, we expect to target the power generation industry, where fuel cells can help replace power generation from fossil fuels, which is less environmentally friendly," stated Nick Abson, chairman and chief executive officer of ZeTek.

"Within the next 16 months, we expect to show that this technology is competitive with gas-fired generation of electricity."

ORNL's Carbon Fiber Composite Molecular Sieve is one of the technologies that enable the ZeTek alkaline fuel cell system to be robust and inexpensive to operate.

The novel activated carbon was developed as a result of ORNL's long history of carbon research.

The other ORNL technology that ZeTek will use is called electrical swing adsorption and involves passing an electric current through the carbon fiber base material to rid it of the carbon dioxide captured from the fuel or oxidant.

While there are several kinds of fuel cells, ZeTek has opted to produce alkaline fuel cells because they offer several advantages over the others. The alkaline fuel cell operates at the relatively low temperature of 70 degrees Celsius and takes advantage of well-established technology developed for the European space program.

It also uses materials that are lower in cost than what are required for other fuel cell technologies.

ORNL's Carbon Fiber Composite Molecular Sieve and electrical swing adsorption technologies will allow ZeTek to simplify and improve the operation of its fuel cell system.

The Carbon Fiber Molecular Sieve and electrical swing adsorption allow ZeTek to replace a non-regenerative chemical scrubbing system that made its fuel cell less versatile.

ZeTek will have a non-exclusive license to manufacture Carbon Fiber Composite Molecular Sieve systems and an exclusive license to use them in alkaline fuel cell systems.

The technology was developed by Rod Judkins, director of ORNL's Fossil Energy Program, and Tim Burchell, both members of the Metals and Ceramics Division.

Others involved in developing the technology were Charlie Weaver and Bill Chilcoat, both retired from ORNL.

---

IAAP Burlington Health Study Website

To: doewatch@egroups.com
From: magnu96196@aol.com
Date: Fri, 22 Dec 2000 12:31:22 EST

The website for the Burlington study has been launched.
http://www.public-health.uiowa.edu/baecps/index.html
It will be updated frequently. Regards, Bill Field

---

Worker hit in face with chlorine gas

Knoxville News
December 22, 2000
State and local briefs
http://www.knoxnews.com/news/20631.shtml

An Oliver Springs employee changing a cylinder of chlorine gas at a water-treatment plant Thursday was blasted in the face with the potentially lethal gas.

Franklin Maurice Parton, 62, was rushed to Methodist Medical Center of Oak Ridge, where he was listed in stable condition in the intensive-care unit.

Chlorine gas irritates the eyes, nose and mouth and can damage the lungs to the point that pneumonia-like symptoms set in.

Oliver Springs Mayor Gary Stinnett, who also serves with the town's volunteer fire department, said the 11:15 a.m. incident occurred when Parton removed a supposedly expended cylinder of gas used in water treatment.

As Parton disconnected the 150-pound metal cylinder, chlorine gas spewed from the nozzle.

A man accompanying Parton helped him from the water-treatment plant on Highway 61 between Oliver Springs and Clinton. Parton was taken by ambulance to the hospital as the area was closed off, Stinnett said.

The treatment plant was closed for about two hours, Stinnett said, until the Oak Ridge Fire Department's hazardous-materials team sealed the cylinder. The incident did not cause a disruption in water service, Stinnett said.

DOE detects source of fluorine leak

The U.S. Department of Energy said Thursday that workers had discovered a "pinhole-sized leak" in piping that apparently released fluorine gas and caused last week's emergency situation at the Oak Ridge K-25 plant.

DOE spokesman Steven Wyatt said the leak was found near the ceiling in Building K-1302 at a point where two half-inch pipes lead to an old fluorine storage tank. Workers discovered the leak during environmental monitoring at the site Wednesday afternoon, Wyatt said. "They noticed the telltale odor of fluorine and saw about a 10-inch stream of gas coming from the leak," Wyatt said.

The DOE spokesman said plans are under way to solve the problem by removing that section of pipe and "the small amount of residual fluorine in the system that remained after a previous cleanup effort."

Officials are still trying to determine why the gas leaked sporadically.

-------- washington

Hanford firm retains contract
Federal officials extend their pact with Fluor Hanford, which manages the site

Oregon Live
Friday, December 22, 2000
By Linda Ashton of The Associated Press
http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/index.ssf?/news/oregonian/00/12/nw_61fluor22.frame

YAKIMA -- The U.S. Department of Energy is extending for six years its contract with Fluor Hanford, which has managed the Hanford Nuclear Reservation since October 1996.

The $3.8 billion contract carries with it the opportunity for Fluor to earn about $168 million in performance-based fees, said Keith Klein, the Department of Energy's Hanford manager.

"We come to this conclusion following a very tough but productive year," Klein said in a teleconference from Richland, Wash., on Thursday.

"We've seen Fluor demonstrate improved ability to make progress, especially with the timely movement of spent nuclear fuel from the K Basins.

"We're impressed with Fluor's willingness to make changes, aggressively attack problems and, in the final analysis, perform."

Last year, the Department of Energy fined Fluor $330,000 -- the biggest fine issued by the department -- for violating safety rules in the K Basins project, one of Hanford's top priority radiation cleanup efforts, which for years was delayed by technical difficulties and cost overruns.

But by December 1999, the department said Fluor had corrected the problems satisfactorily.

This month, Fluor began moving 2,300 tons of spent nuclear fuel from the aging, leaky basins, which are old reactor cooling pools 400 yards from the Columbia River. The corroded fuel rods are being prepared for interim storage and moved to the central part of the 560-square-mile reservation.

"We're very pleased that the DOE has given us the opportunity to continue what we've started here at Hanford," said Ron Hanson, president and chief executive officer for Fluor Hanford.

"We've had a very good year in clearly achieving significant cleanup results. This agreement gives us the opportunity to keep momentum going well into the future."

This year, Fluor earned nearly $20 million in performance-based fees.

Klein said the new contract was a two-way street, with the Energy Department agreeing to make changes as well, such as trying to eliminate cumbersome requirements and processes.

The contract calls for multiyear planning and goals, rather than an annual approach, which has been more typical of Hanford projects.

The K Basins work will continue to be a top priority with all the fuel supposed to be removed by July 2004 and other radioactive debris, sludge and water cleaned out by 2006.

"There will be progress payments associated with that, depending on how much fuel they move," Klein said. "The final fee will depend on whether they're able to achieve the ultimate end and at what cost to taxpayers."

There are other specific goals in the contract for retrieving transuranic waste, which is typically contaminated clothing, tools and debris; decommissioning buildings; stabilizing plutonium for safer storage; deactivating the Plutonium Finishing Plant; and treating and disposing of other waste.

"The work . . . is hard, it's dangerous, and it requires a great deal of management and craft skill," Klein said.

-------- us nuc politics

For jobs left, Bush looks now to the right
Conservatives are in line for three cabinet posts and the party leadership. His earlier picks had worried some.

Philadelphia Inquirer
Friday, December 22, 2000
By Ron Hutcheson INQUIRER WASHINGTON BUREAU
http://inq.philly.com/content/inquirer/2000/12/22/national/TRANSITION22.htm

AUSTIN, TEXAS - Even as President-elect George W. Bush prepares to name Gov. Whitman, a leading Republican moderate, to the Environmental Protection Agency today , he is looking at conservative elected officials for other high-profile jobs.

Republican strategists and aides said Bush had settled on Wisconsin Gov. Tommy Thompson as secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. Thompson said yesterday that he had not yet accepted the offer. Oklahoma Gov. Frank Keating is considered the leading contender for attorney general.

Bush also is said to have settled on conservative Virginia Gov. James S. Gilmore to head the Republican National Committee.

In tapping the nation's pool of Republican governors for his coming round of appointments, Bush is reaching out to fellow government executives, many of whom were the first to line up behind his presidential candidacy and with whom he shares a political kinship.

Gilmore, Thompson and Keating also have strong conservative backing, and their selection would help offset conservative disappointment over some of Bush's other recent announcements.

So far, Bush has stayed away from ideological purists for top cabinet posts, opting for pragmatic managers who have experience reaching across party lines, such as Colin Powell for secretary of state and Paul O'Neill for treasury.

But some conservative leaders are becoming anxious and want to be able to sign off on some key appointments, particularly attorney general and the secretaries of the Education and Health and Human Services Departments.

Conservatives count on the attorney general to help Bush judge candidates for the federal bench. At the Education Department, they want someone who will promote vouchers so public school students can attend private school if they choose. The HHS secretary sets the tone on critical social and health issues such as abortion, research funding and welfare.

Whitman has been an outspoken supporter of abortion rights and gun control during her two terms as governor. Conservative leaders said Bush averted a potential revolt by selecting her for the EPA, an agency with no jurisdiction over abortion or other social issues.

"Conservatives would have been beside themselves had he appointed her to HHS," said David Keene of the American Conservative Union.

Keene said Bush aides had assured conservatives that Thompson would be selected for HHS, the agency with the clearest line of authority over issues important to social conservatives. Thompson has been a leading advocate of programs designed to prod welfare recipients into the workforce.

"He's conservative. He's strong. His major identification is as sort of the father of welfare reform," Keene said. "And he's pro-life."

Thompson acknowledged his job offer yesterday, telling Wisconsin reporters that he intends to deliver his answer next week after mulling it over during a vacation in Mexico. He said he was "having a difficult time" deciding, and sent mixed signals by saying that while the HHS job was the one Bush wanted him to fill, transportation secretary is "the one I would like to be able to do."

A Republican familiar with Bush's thinking said Bush also appeared ready to name former Indiana Sen. Dan Coats to head the Defense Department. That would please conservatives, too.

"We had been assured last week that it was going to be Dan Coats," Keene said. "Having given people that assurance, if they pull back, there's going to be some real disappointment."

Keating emerged as the top choice for attorney general on Wednesday when Montana Gov. Marc Racicot withdrew from consideration. The Oklahoma governor is in Bosnia at the moment.

Keating is another conservative favorite because of his solid antiabortion record and his efforts to promote strong marriages. As a former FBI agent and a former federal prosecutor, Keating also has obvious credentials for the top Justice Department job.

The latest round of speculation over Bush's picks came as the president-elect resigned as Texas governor to prepare for his move to the White House. Lt. Gov. Rick Perry, a Republican and a Bush ally, was sworn in to succeed him.

"There's only one thing that would cause me to leave early, and that's to become your president," Bush said in his resignation speech at the Texas Capitol. He grew misty-eyed as he offered his farewell.

"It's an emotional moment, to leave a job I love for a state I love," he told reporters as he left the Capitol. "Even though I'm changing addresses, Texas will always be home."

Looking ahead to his new job, Bush outlined his education agenda in separate meetings with a bipartisan congressional delegation and more than 30 Hispanic leaders from across the country.

Rep. George Miller, a liberal Democrat from California, praised Bush's efforts to reach out to lawmakers from both parties. The congressional delegation consisted of 19 members of House and Senate committees with jurisdiction over education issues.

"He spoke very forcefully about his commitment to education," Miller said. "It was a great one to break the ice."

Bush acknowledged that he faces plenty of skepticism about some of his proposals, starting with his plan to let some poor students use federal tax dollars for private school tuition.

On another topic, Bush and his aides took issue with assertions that he is damaging the nation's economy by expressing concerns about signs of a slowdown. White House officials have complained that Bush's comments can become a self-fulfilling prophecy by undermining investor confidence.

"I have said there are some warning signs on the horizon," Bush said. "I think people are going to find out when I am standing as president, I will be a realist."

In Washington, Vice President-elect Dick Cheney said on the same topic that he and Bush were merely reflecting reality. Cheney, who is overseeing the transition, took time out yesterday to meet with his former rival, Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (D., Conn.), Al Gore's running mate. Both Cheney and Lieberman described the encounter as cordial and pledged to work together.

Also yesterday, the Bush transition team announced that Stephen Hadley, a campaign adviser and nuclear arms specialist, would become Bush's deputy national security adviser. An international lawyer, Hadley is considered an expert on nuclear strategy and missile defense policy.

Hadley was an assistant defense secretary under Cheney during the administration of Bush's father. In Ronald Reagan's administration, he served on the Tower Commission to investigate money diverted to fund the Nicaragua contras from arms sales to Iran. Hadley also worked in the National Security Council under President Gerald Ford.

Hadley is a strong advocate to build a missile defense program and revisit arms control issues with the Russians. Robert Manning, senior fellow on the Council of Foreign Relations, said the choice reveals "clearly the direction Gov. Bush wants to go" with missile defense and nuclear strategy.

Ron Hutcheson's e-mail address is rhutcheson@krwashington.com
Sumana Chatterjee of the Inquirer Washington Bureau contributed to this article.

---

Pressing Challenges Face Bush Team

Associated Press
December 22, 2000 Filed at 1:27 a.m. ET
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/politics/AP-Bush-Pressing-Problems.html

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Time waits for no one, not even the president-elect of the United States.

After the jubilant backslapping and what-it-all-means punditry, the next administration has little time for the transition from campaign promises to earnest governance.

When George W. Bush takes office in January, the new leader of the world's most powerful nation inherits a country at peace and still in a record-long economic expansion.

The president-elect also will face immediately a daunting series of pressing problems that will include the Middle East, North Korea and Iraq if President Clinton can't pull off a foreign affairs miracle or two in his last month. This plus signs that an engineered ``soft landing'' economic slowdown might be a good deal harder than Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan expected.

Bush's front-burner agenda is filling up rapidly.

Clinton's sponsorship this week of Middle East negotiations might color how Bush responds to continuing Palestinian-Israeli violence. A Clinton trip to North Korea, still a possibility, could lead to talks to end that country's missile program just as Bush is entering the White House.

Clinton's two-term investment in trying to broker peace in the Middle East, even through the waning days of his administration, will be a tough act to follow. ``It's going to be a new game,'' said Samuel Lewis, U.S. ambassador to Israel from 1977 to 1987, who believes Clinton if anything has been too involved.

Bush not only will grapple with an extraordinary rise in anti-American sentiment in that region but also a renewed threat from Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, the man who plagued the administration of Bush's father and sparked the Persian Gulf War, said Geoffrey Kemp, a former top Middle East aide to President Reagan.

``Saddam is getting stronger every day,'' Kemp said.

World-shaking events cannot always be predicted, of course, and Bush might be tested by adversaries the likes of expatriate suspected Saudi terror kingpin Osama bin Laden. He also faces questions on whether to keep troops in the Balkan countries, how to respond to tensions between nuclear-armed India and Pakistan and what can be done about Iran's nuclear potential.

One of the biggest must-do issues facing Bush at noon Jan. 20 will be preparation of a budget within weeks of taking office. By law, the deadline for presenting Congress a new budget to consider for the fiscal year starting Oct. 1 is the first Monday in February, Feb. 5.

What to do with federal surpluses -- one of the hottest topics on the presidential campaign trail -- is the big question on Capitol Hill. The Congressional Budget Office projects a $4.6 trillion surplus from 2001 through 2010.

Of that, $2.4 trillion is from Social Security, which both parties agree should be set aside for debt reduction and Social Security. The remaining $2.2 trillion is the battleground between Republicans' tax relief and Democrats' programs.

Many GOP leaders say it would be a mistake for Bush to attempt an immediate push for his entire 10-year, $1.3 trillion tax cut plan, given the 50-50 party split in the incoming Senate and the difficulty under any circumstances of maneuvering tax bills through Congress.

While the economy is humming along -- with unemployment at a three-decade low of 3.9 percent and most economists believing the expansion will not dip all the way into recession -- threats on the horizon include a stock market that has been volatile and a huge run-up in energy prices that could get worse if the winter is particularly cold.

On taking office Bush could face an immediate energy crisis and be forced to decide whether to tap the new home heating oil reserve set up in the Northeast if supplies tighten. If oil supplies remain tight, another immediate challenge might be how to persuade OPEC to boost production.

Bush will have an immediate opportunity to remake the Federal Reserve and have a major impact the nation's interest rate policies and bank regulation. While Chairman Greenspan's term runs until June 2004, three other seats on the Fed's seven-member board are open.

During the first half of 2001, the next secretary of defense will create the administration's Pentagon blueprint, stepping at once into a top-to-bottom review of military priorities required by Congress every four years.

``You have a defense strategy that is too ambitious for the kind of resources we have to put into defense,'' said Andrew Krepinevich, director of the nonpartisan Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. ``This is going to put a lot of hard choices on the table very early for the administration.''

--------

Powell Will Face World of Challenges

Yahoo News
December 22 09:39 PM EST
By David Ruppe ABCNEWS.com
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/abc/20001222/wl/powell_will_face_world_of_challenges_1.html

Bush's designated secretary of state, Colin Powell, will face a host of difficult foreign policy-related challenges right after he takes office.

As President-elect George W. Bush's designated secretary of state, Colin Powell will face a world of foreign policy-related challenges as soon as his appointment is confirmed.

Among the thicket of complex issues is the question of whether to build a national missile defense system opposed by some of America's closest allies and how to deal with Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, who doesn't seem to be going anywhere.

Many involve tensions between Bush's campaign promises, pressures from leading Republicans in Congress, opposition from Democrats, and the need to balance the United States' many and sometimes conflicting interests abroad.

With Bush lacking diplomatic experience, Powell, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and adviser to three American presidents, seems certain to play the lead role in formulating U.S. foreign policy.

Here are some of the pressing issues Powell will face:

Missile Defense

The question of whether to begin building a national missile defense system is one that could cause friction not just with Republicans and Democrats in Congress, but also with Russia, China and some of America's closest allies.

Russia and China have been adamantly opposed to the proposed system, saying it would dilute the deterrent effect of their nuclear arsenals. Russian leaders have warned the system currently planned could scuttle much-needed arms control cooperation with the United States. Beijing warns it would build more missiles if the system is implemented.

Many of America's closest allies also oppose building the system, which would require termination of the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty between the Soviet Union (now Russia) and the United States. Powell could find himself expending a good deal of political capital to keep relations good with Russia and China and to win allied support of the program.

Bush has said if the United States couldn't convince Russia to amend the ABM Treaty, then he was prepared to cancel it.

The issue could well confront Powell right after the new administration begins. Bush has vowed to build the system and the Pentagon says it needs to start some construction in Alaska this spring to meet a goal of having the system ready by 2005, at which time North Korea may have the capability to strike the United States with a ballistic missile.

President Clinton delayed the construction decision this year after two of three tests of the system failed to knock a mock warhead out of the sky.

Critics of the program, including many Democrats, have argued construction should only begin after tests have proved the system will actually work. The previous botched tests a doubts about the technology have prompted some scientists to say the estimated $30 billion system will never work.

Iraq

Saddam Hussein could become a major headache for the Bush administration.

Powell also must consider what to do about the 8-year-old economic sanctions against Iraq, which have failed to compel the country's leadership to allow confirmation it has given up its weapons of mass destruction.

Russia, France and some states in the Middle East have been clamoring for the sanctions to be relaxed or lifted, and for the United States and Britain to discontinue their occasional, retaliatory bombing while maintaining "no-fly zones" over northern and southern Iraq.

The Clinton administration has been criticized in the press because the sanctions and the bombings have not removed Saddam from power or compelled him to allow U.N. inspections of suspected weapons.

Saddam also has been able to earn money by smuggling oil while the general economy and quality of life in Iraq deteriorates. The United States says he has been robbing his people of food, medical and other aid provided by other countries.

When Powell accepted the nomination as secretary of state, he expressed new confidence in the potential effectiveness of sanctions.

"I think it is possible to re-energize those sanctions, and to continue to contain him, and then confront him should that become necessary again," he said. "And I will make the case in every opportunity I get that we"re not doing this to hurt the Iraqi people," he said.

As chairman of the Joint Chiefs during the Gulf War, Powell played a key role in orchestrating the U.S. operations to drive the Iraqi forces out of Kuwait and compel them to surrender.

Bush has said he would not ease sanctions or negotiate, would aid opposition groups, and would support military action to combat a threat of weapons of mass destruction.

Keeping Peace in the Balkans

The Bush administration will likely face the question: At what point should American troops come home from Bosnia and Kosovo?

During the campaign, Bush criticized the Clinton administration's use of troops for "peacekeeping" and "nation-building" missions and said he favored pulling U.S. troops out of the Balkans.

In his second debate with Vice President Al Gore in October, Bush said he would "very much like to get our troops out" of the Balkans and would work with the European allies "to convince them to put troops on the ground."

The idea of Americans pulling out of the Balkans has alarmed the European allies who, in fact, shoulder most of the burden in the region and rely on the Americans for symbolic importance, as well as their significant material contribution.

Powell has said he would talk with the allies before any such move was made. "We're not cutting and running," he told a reporter. "We're going to make a careful assessment of it in consultation with our allies, and then make some judgments after that assessment is completed."

Powell is known as an opponent of the use of American military force, except in limited circumstances. When force is used, Powell, a veteran of the protracted Vietnam conflict, thinks it should be overwhelming and quick.

The Middle East

Will the retired general try to play the strong, often-frustrating peacemaking role between the Israelis and Palestinians attempted by the Clinton administration?

Right after Bush takes office, Israel will be holding special elections. The violence between Israeli forces and Palestinian demonstrators shows no sign of abating and the man who has been the main negotiator for the United States, Dennis Ross, is leaving.

From the outset, Powell will be in crisis mode on this issue. If the peace talks cannot be revived under Bush, U.S. relations with a number of Arab governments sympathetic to the Palestinians could sour.

The administration may also consider whether to continue to contain Iran or to reach out to it. President Mohammad Khatami appears open to some kind of rapprochement with the United States. But he struggles for power with hard-line Islamists and the government is believed to be developing both weapons of mass destruction and the means to deliver them.

What to Do With China?

Republicans for years have criticized the Clinton administration policy of "engaging" China, arguing too many carrots and not enough sticks were used.

ut the Bush administration could risk harming economic and arms control cooperation with China by pressing forward with a national missile defense, arming Taiwan with more advanced weapons, and more strongly criticizing or perhaps punishing Beijing for its human rights, arms proliferation and Taiwan policies.

The next White House will face firm pressure this spring from lobbyists and congressional Republicans who want the United States to sell Taiwan more advanced weaponry, such as Aegis destroyers and diesel submarines. Such deals were rejected this year by the Clinton administration. A decision on a package of weapons is usually made each April.

Sales of such weaponry, urged by many congressional Republicans as a counter to China's growing military might, could possibly provoke Chinese aggression toward Taiwan, as Beijing has threatened.

Bush has said the United States should help Taiwan defend itself in the event of a Chinese invasion, but has not been specific about what equipment he would allow.

U.S. companies argue China is an important market for them. But congressional Republicans may pressure the Bush administration to prevent U.S. companies from selling China supercomputers and advanced machine tools and from buying Chinese satellite-launching services, because of national security concerns.

Congress may also urge the new administration to punish Russia more severely for proliferating military equipment and technology to Iran.

Colombia

The Bush administration will also come in at a time when the United States is getting increasingly involved in the conflicts between the Colombian military and rebel guerillas and narco-producers and -traffickers. Concerns have been raised that America could be drawn in to Colombia's conflict, like it was into the Vietnam War.

The United States for months has been providing new military equipment, training and better intelligence tools to help Colombian military forces better combat the drug traffickers. And two U.S.-trained Colombian battalions reportedly are preparing the in coming weeks to launch an offensive.

Bush said during the campaign he generally supports the $1.6 billion initiative, which also found bipartisan support in Congress last summer. But if the offensive fails, the administration may need to reconsider the strategy, perhaps committing more American military aid or reducing it.

Many of the U.S. officials closely involved in the policy have announced their intention of leaving government, including Undersecretary of State Thomas R. Pickering and the White House drug policy chief, Barry R. McCaffrey. And none of Bush's current top advisers has significant Latin American or anti-drug experience.

State Department Security

The State Department has been plagued by security problems in recent years. It was discovered last year that a Russian spy had placed a bug in a supposedly secure conference room in the main building. And a laptop computer containing classified information disappeared and apparently was never recovered.

Since the incidents, the press has been permitted more limited access to department officials.

With Powell in charge, the rules could become stricter.

-------- us nuc waste

COLUMN: Steve Sebelius Eliminate the middleman

Fri, 22 Dec 2000 08:18:32 -0800
Las Vegas Review-Journal
http://www.lvrj.com/lvrj_home/2000/Dec-21-Thu-2000/opinion/15081122.html

Before the weak-kneed former U.S. Sen. J. Bennett Johnston, D-La., decided Wednesday against becoming secretary of energy under President-elect George W. Bush, the incoming administration had a good thing going.

Not that anyone can blame Johnston, the author of the original 1987 "Screw Nevada" bill that designated Yucca Mountain as the site for the nation's nuclear waste. After all, Johnston did receive a call from U.S. Sen. Harry Reid, who told his old friend that he would do everything he could to oppose the nomination. And no one wants to be on the other end of the phone when Ruthless Reid makes a promise like that.

Johnston, who while in the Senate carried enough water for the nuclear power industry to fill Lake Mead, is still toiling for radioactive interests as a private lobbyist in Washington, D.C. Plus, Johnston is a Democrat, the perfect person to appoint to a Cabinet post, allowing Bush to appear bipartisan.

It would have made things so perfect! Put the nuclear industry in charge of the Energy Department, thus eliminating the middleman, and reach across the aisle at the same time. (Bush is, after all, a uniter, not a divider.)

Oh, darn that wuss Johnston. Now who is Bush going to appoint?

Well, there's always Tom Kuhn, of Potomac, Md., one of the Pioneers, the group of eerily Soviet-titled moneymen whose members each agreed to raise at least $100,000 for Bush. Kuhn is head of the Edison Electric Institute, another nuclear power industry lobby. He'd do just as good a job as Johnston, probably, and he doesn't have the nasty "Screw Nevada" moniker that still follows Johnston to this day.

Just think! Bush could eliminate the middleman and repay some of his biggest donors at the same time! (Kuhn is the Pioneer who reminded his nuclear industry donors to include their secret industry tracking number on their checks, so that the Bush campaign would know how much they've done for his campaign.)

And why is that important? Well, Bush has been known to back nuclear projects, so long as some of his donors are involved. That's what happened with the low-level nuclear waste dump that a company called Waste Control Specialists is trying to build in Texas. Company owner Harold Simmons donated more than $90,000 to Bush when he ran for governor of Texas, and ponied up $1,000 to his presidential bid.

Let's not forget, the government promised to take nuclear waste off the industry's hands in 1998. But thanks to the intervention of people like Reid, U.S. Sen. Richard Bryan, U.S. Reps. Jim Gibbons and Shelley Berkley, and former U.S. Rep. (and future U.S. Sen.) John Ensign, the government hasn't been able to keep its word. As a result, the nuclear industry is as hot as a spent plutonium fuel rod before it's submerged in a cooling pool. Bush, though, means to keep that promise, just as soon as science determines Yucca is suitable.

(Speaking of science, a controversial memo from Yucca contractor TRW that surfaced recently suggests that -- shocker! -- the government's primary interest may not be science after all, but rather disposing in a cost-effective and politically feasible manner of the tons of radioactive waste piling up around the nation. Nevada's congressional delegation is using the memo to suggest that all the Department of Energy's work surrounding Yucca Mountain is tainted.)

Ironically, Johnston in his statement backing away from the energy post, thanked U.S. Sens. John Breaux, D-La., and Pete Domenici, R-N.M, for their support. It was Domenici, recall, who said on the floor of the U.S. Senate in July that, should Bush become president, there would be an interim nuclear waste dump within six to eight months.

Well, President-elect Bush, the clock is ticking. And while some Nevada Republicans have their doubts, the rest of us suspect that the Official Bush Administration Nuclear Waste Policy has but two words: Screw Nevada.

Steve Sebelius is a Review-Journal political columnist. His column runs Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday. Reach him at 383-0283 or by e-mail at Steve_Sebelius@lasvegas.com.

-------- MILITARY

-------- colombia

Child warriors fight on front lines

Infobeat
December 22, 2000
By MARGARITA MARTINEZ Associated Press Writer
http://www.infobeat.com/cgi-bin/WebObjects/IBFrontEnd.woa/wa/fullStory?article=405489390

BUCARAMANGA, Colombia (AP) - John Fredy knows how to fire an AK-47 assault rifle, dig trenches and guard kidnap victims. But the short, skinny 13-year-old with big ears and a penetrating stare, a deserter from Colombia's largest leftist guerrilla band, cannot read or write his name.

Freezing, disoriented and on the brink of starvation, he was part of guerrilla column that was surrounded by government troops in late November as it traversed a high Andean plateau near this northern city. In lopsided fighting, at least 51 of the 360 guerrillas have died and 95 others have surrendered during a nearly monthlong assault from the troops.

Generals are calling it the army's greatest victory in nearly four decades of battle with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC. But the episode has also exposed a sad and sinister side of this South American country's 36-year civil war: the growing use of children in combat.

It is a worldwide phenomenon. An estimated 300,000 children under the age of 18 are participating as guerrillas or government soldiers in armed conflicts in Africa, Asia and Latin America, according to the U.S.-based monitoring group Human Rights Watch.

Children from poor villagers are impressionable and easy to recruit, prized as efficient and remorseless killers. They are frequently forced to commit atrocities or sent as cannon fodder ahead of older troops, experts say.

Before the latest fighting in Colombia, some 6,000 minors were believed to belong to guerrilla factions and rival right-wing paramilitary groups here _ constituting about a fifth of the country's nearly 30,000 irregular fighters. The army only recruits soldiers who are 18 or older.

But after witnessing the fresh faces of dozens of boys and girls captured in the clashes _ not to mention the bodies of 34 youths killed in the combat _ experts fear they may have underestimated the problem.

``Either the proportion of children in the troops is far above our previous estimates or, even worse, it could mean that they are increasingly putting the children out on the front lines of the war,'' said Carel Rooy, UNICEF's chief officer in Colombia.

In interviews Tuesday at a government-supported halfway house outside Bucaramanga, captured guerrillas told how their dreams of glamor and glory in the FARC gave way to hardship and disillusionment.

A 14-year-old boy who gave only his last name, Carvajal, said he'd been lured by the swashbuckling image guerrillas had in his poor hometown in southern Meta province, a longtime FARC bastion.

``I saw the rifles they carried, and the four-by-four vehicles they drove around in, and I thought that was great, but I was kidding myself,'' he said. ``They don't pay you and they never let you see your family. You are a slave.'' Carvajal said he was recruited two years ago in Mesetas, one of five southern townships in a demilitarized zone that Colombian President Andres Pastrana ceded to the FARC in November 1998 as an incentive to start peace talks. Of the 16 boys and six girls interviewed here, more than half said they had been recruited in the zone.

Most said they joined voluntarily, but several claimed they were pressed into service. One, a 16-year-old from an Indian tribe in eastern Vichada province, said guerrillas stopped a car he was riding in with his uncle, tied him up and dragged him away, saying, ``he's a big boy now.''

According to the captured rebels, their unit left the DMZ in September on a long and grueling trek to reinforce guerrilla troops in the north. They were told to expect fighting but given little preparation. One boy said his marksmanship training consisted of firing five live rounds. When federal troops attacked after detecting the rebels crossing a cold and barren plateau nearly 10,000 feet above sea level, discipline broke down and desperation took over.

``We had gone five days without anything to eat, and we decided to escape,'' said John Fredy, who fled with two older guerrillas, both 14. ``We didn't want to turn ourselves over (to the army), we wanted to escape and make it to the city.''

But the pressure from troops backed by helicopter gunships was too great, and on Dec. 10 the three stumbled upon an army patrol and surrendered. The army had been dropping leaflets from the air promising that deserters would not be killed.

At the halfway house, John Fredy and other former members of his unit have been given food, clothing and shelter. They are also beginning psychological treatment aimed at breaking their warrior mentality.

``They are trained to kill,'' Juan Manuel Urrutia, director of the federal government's social service agency, said this week. ``Now we must train them to love.''

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Gunmen kill 10 people in Colombia

Infobeat
December 22, 2000
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SANTANDER DE QUILICHAO, Colombia (AP) - Gunmen wearing camouflage uniforms and carrying a hit list entered a village in southwestern Colombia on Thursday and killed 10 people. Witnesses told reporters they believed the killers were members of a right-wing paramilitary squad. Four of the victims were in a billiard hall when they were summoned by the gunmen and then shot execution style. Five others were killed elsewhere in San Pedro, a community of 25 families located 200 miles southwest of the capital, Bogota. Three other people were wounded, including a woman who died while being taken to the nearby town of Santander de Quilachao. Civilians are increasingly being caught in the middle of this South American nation's 36-year war. On Nov. 24, gunmen opened fire in a bar in Santander de Quilachao, killing 12 people. Police are investigating reports the killers belonged to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, Colombia's main leftist rebel group.

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Bush faces hard choices in Colombia

Infobeat
December 22, 2000
By KEN GUGGENHEIM Associated Press Writer
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WASHINGTON (AP) - Some Republicans do not like the way it has been handled. Some Democrats worry about human rights. European support has been lackluster. Latin American nations are wary. The $1.3 billion Colombian anti-drug aid package that the Bush administration will inherit is under fire from all sides. President-elect Bush has supported the plan but the question is what direction his administration will take it.

Will it continue the Clinton administration policy of providing military aid only to fight drugs? Will it blur the distinction between fighting drugs and fighting leftist guerrillas?

Or will all the criticism directed at the package push Colombia _ the third largest recipient of U.S. aid _ further down on a foreign policy agenda dominated by the Middle East, Russia and other concerns.

``I think there's very little evidence that the Bush team is really focused on Colombia so far,'' said Michael Shifter, a Colombia expert at the Inter-American Dialogue. ``I think what's likely to happen is what happened under Clinton, which is that you don't focus on it unless you have to.''

Though the $1.3 billion package is already approved, Clinton administration officials have said Colombia will need years of additional funding.

Colombia's ambassador, Luis Moreno, said in an interview that his country will need about $500 million to $600 million per year for at least three or four years.

The U.S. aid has been promoted as part of a $7.5 billion Colombian plan to stabilize the violence-ridden country. The U.S. contribution is largely military aid to help Colombia fight leftist guerrillas who partly finance their insurgency by protecting coca growers and cocaine laboratories.

Yet just months after the package was approved with strong bipartisan support, it has fallen under strong criticism.

Two powerful Republicans, Reps. Benjamin Gilman of New York and Dan Burton of Indiana, have insisted that more aid should go to Colombian National Police instead of the military. They and other Republicans have criticized U.S. efforts as slow and ineffective.

Some Democrats have been skeptical that the aid will reduce drug production, fear the package will draw the United States into Colombia's guerrilla conflict and help a military linked to human rights atrocities.

European countries are contributing less for social programs than had been expected. Latin American leaders repeatedly have raised concerns that U.S. military aid will only widen Colombia's conflict.

Meanwhile, the U.S. government's two top advocates of the Colombian aid package _ Undersecretary of State Thomas Pickering and White House drug policy director Barry McCaffrey _ are both leaving with President Clinton.

The aid is designed to help Colombia, the world's largest producer of cocaine, cut illegal drug production in half in six years.

Bush expressed support for the Colombian aid in an Aug. 25 speech in Miami, saying, ``This money should help build up the capabilities of Colombia's armed forces.

``Our aid will help the Colombian government protect its people, fight the drug trade, halt the momentum of the guerillas and bring about a sensible and peaceful resolution to this conflict,'' Bush said.

Like Clinton, Bush said he opposed using U.S. troops in battle there.

The Clinton administration has stressed that military aid will be used strictly for fighting guerrillas linked to the drug trade and not to help Colombia in its civil war. Some Republicans say it is naive to separate the drug fight from the overall Colombian conflict.

``We cannot continue to make a false distinction between counterinsurgency and counternarcotics efforts,'' Robert Zoellick, the Bush campaign's top Latin American adviser, told the Council on Foreign Relations in October, according to a summary released by the council.

If Colombian President Andres Pastrana becomes frustrated with the peace process, Bush may agree to a request for help in training overall Colombian forces, said Myles Frechette, a Bush supporter who was ambassador to Colombia during the Clinton administration.

``None of this is going to be easy, but it's easier for a George W. Bush than it is for an Al Gore,'