NUCLEAR
Russian Defense Minister Arrives in Iran
Russia Defense Minister Visits Iran
Y2K Hubbub Largely Forgotten
Production under way at uranium mine in SA
Chinese espionage handbook details ease of swiping secrets
Spain Soldiers Checked for Radiation
Hope for world's worst flashpoint
Japan Nuke Plant Shut To Fix Leak
New Batch of Russian Strategic Missiles to Go on Duty Tuesday
Putin Vows Pragmatic Russian Foreign Policy
Putin's Priorities Emerge in New Missile Deployment
Russia Deploys New Nuclear Missiles
Greens See Greed, Neglect Tainting Siberia's Pearl
Lenin Voted Russia's Man of Century
Nuclear Reactor Halted in Ukraine
Nuclear Power Benefit
Tribe urges cleanup for radioactive homes
Energy Crisis in California Threatens the Stability of Utility Shares
K-25 fluorine releases due to pinhole leak
Major changes could be in store for Tennessee Valley Authority
DOE facilities celebrate Christmas
Two recall their first Oak Ridge Christmas
Firm Seeks 'Hotter' N-Waste Permit
Yucca Mountain Nuclear Waste repository
Missile Defense: The Jury's Still Out

MILITARY
Australian military seeks to expand
Submarine sinks in Rio de Janeiro
Brazilian submarine sinks at dock
Colombia weighs land for peace
Colombian Government Upbeat on ELN Enclave Deal
Bush Should Start Over in Colombia
Texas
Bombs in 4 Cities Wound Some 45 Pakistanis
Saddam calls for holy war on Israel
Bush to face fervor over Vieques
Radio contact regained with Mir
TENSE TIMES WITH MIR
Radio Contact Re-established With Mir Space Station
Quemoy to Open Up Port
Weary U.N. Envoys Worry Washington Won't Keep Word
States
Military expects Bush to perform
U.S. troops in Kosovo long for home during Christmas

OTHER
Another Tradition: Refuge in a Shelter
Argonne, Süd-Chemie sign agreement to accelerate fuel cell development
Californians trying alternative energy
Refiner agrees to curb pollution
Human testing strikes controversy
No Happy Holidays for Yellowstone's Bison
New Work Rules Jan. 1 for Most Construction, Drilling, Logging and Mining
A Cleanup for the Big Rigs
Private Sector May Sell Water to Southern California Agency
Whitman Gets 2 Grades for One Record
Land costs threaten preservation
Mysterious virus afflicts turtles
Underwater landslides pose risk
Neighborhoods React Angrily to Power Plan
Decrease demand for gas
It's time to rethink rules that limit gas supplies
Media Statement and Availability Surrounding California's Electricity Crisis
States
Police kill students amid protest against actor
New Mexico
Living it up
Russian researcher spy case opens
A Spy's Advice to French Retailers: Politeness Pays
Russia plans creation of new spy agency

ACTIVISTS
South Korea activist wanted
States


-------- NUCLEAR

Russian Defense Minister Arrives in Iran

Reuters
December 26, 2000 Filed at 1:26 p.m. ET
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/international-iran-ru.html

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Russian Defense Minister Igor Sergeyev arrived in Tehran on Tuesday for a three-day visit that will do little to allay U.S. fears that Russia might reinforce Iran's arsenal.

Russia assured the United States earlier this month that it would not sell offensive weapons to Iran, which Washington says has an active nuclear arms program and supports anti-western ''terrorist'' groups.

``We won't violate any international treaties by our military cooperation,'' Sergeyev said on arriving in Tehran. ``I don't think we will sign any contracts this time.''

U.S. concerns over military ties between Moscow and Tehran rose recently when Russia decided to withdraw from a 1995 pact agreeing not to sell conventional arms to Iran.

U.S. officials traveled to Moscow to press the concerns and make sure that any new transfers to Iran do not include technology that might improve its Sahab-3 missile, now in development with a range of about 1,000 miles.

Iran's defense minister said on Monday that Tehran wanted to expand military cooperation with Russia.

``The geographic position of the two countries in this sensitive region necessitates close cooperation,'' said Rear- Admiral Ali Shamkhani. ``In accordance with Iran's foreign policy, development of military ties with Russia is high on the agenda.''

Sergeyev is due to meet senior Iranian officials including President Mohammad Khatami on Wednesday.

---

Russia Defense Minister Visits Iran

Associated Press
December 26, 2000 Filed at 3:04 p.m. ET
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Iran-Russia.html

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) -- Russia's defense minister traveled to Iran on Tuesday to discuss increasing military cooperation and arms sales between the countries, despite U.S. pressure on Russia not to deal arms to the Islamic republic.

Igor Sergeyev is the first Russian defense minister to visit Iran since the 1979 Islamic revolution. During his three-day visit, he was expected to meet Iranian President Mohammad Khatami.

Other issues to be discussed include the Afghanistan conflict and regional security issues, Russia officials said earlier.

On Monday, Iran's defense minister, Rear Adm. Ali Shamkhani, said that developing military relations with Russia was important to Iran.

Russia alarmed Washington by announcing in November that it was abandoning a 1995 pledge not to sell tanks and other battlefield weapons to Iran.

Washington, which accuses Tehran of sponsoring terrorism, is trying to persuade Moscow to change its mind and has threatened economic sanctions.

The Russian government has said it will not supply hardware capable of creating or delivering weapons of mass destruction, but maintains that resumption of arms sales to Iran is an ``internal affair.''

The United States and other countries also have raised concerns that Russia's construction of a nuclear power plant in Iran could give it access to materials and knowledge that could be used in making nuclear weapons. Moscow and Tehran deny the claim.

---

Y2K Hubbub Largely Forgotten

Associated Press
December 26, 2000 Filed at 8:40 a.m. ET
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/business/AP-Y2K-Plus-One.html?pagewanted=all
http://www.salon.com/tech/wire/2000/12/26/y2k/index.html

NEW YORK (AP) -- The nation's Year 2000 czar is now a deputy mayor in Washington, D.C. The $50 million Y2K crisis center houses George W. Bush's transition team. The international Y2K coordinator plans to relax with friends this New Year's Eve.

A year after the turn-of-the-millennium computer scare, it's just a fading memory for most people. But leading figures in the Y2K consciousness-raising effort say the episode taught important and enduring lessons.

``It showed that we can, if we put the resources to it, solve tough global problems of our making,'' said Bruce McConnell, who directed the international Y2K effort. ``It was a great story of cooperation and hard work. It was expensive, but it was successful.''

For those quick to forget, Y2K was caused by decisions by computer makers decades ago to use two digits to represent the year. The shortcut saved money on memory and storage, but also caused some computers to wrongly interpret 2000 as 1900.

Left uncorrected, the Y2K glitch could have fouled computers that control power grids, air traffic, banking systems and phone networks.

Businesses and governments around the world threw some $200 billion at the problem -- and then they watched nervously, hoping enough of the errant dates had been fixed to avert a worldwide disaster.

For the most part they had. The lights didn't go out. Planes didn't fall out of the sky. Nuclear missiles didn't launch in the middle of the night.

Because few problems materialized, those who had sounded the Y2K alarm had to fend off criticism from people who believed they were victims of a big-money bamboozle.

``It's like saying to a surgeon after he conducts a major intrusive operation that because the patient's fine, it's not a big deal,'' said Harris Miller, president of the Information Technology Association of America. ``Problems did occur, and the fact that it was so minimal means that people did a good job.''

Among the failures: Computers that process images from U.S. spy satellites broke down. Some credit cards charged for the same items multiple times. Japanese nuclear power plants experienced glitches -- among them, a failed clock on a reactor monitoring system -- but no radiation leaks or safety problems.

Many more failures may have gone unreported. Leon Kappelman, a University of North Texas professor who helped businesses with Y2K assessments, says a major telecommunications company -- which he would not identify -- experienced 100 Y2K errors during the first week of 2000.

Those problems were quickly fixed, he says, and customers never noticed.

As a Y2K windfall, businesses and governments got better computers and other equipment. With the help of the World Bank and other Y2K funders, poorer countries got machines and Internet connections they were allowed to keep.

Many U.S. businesses weeded out older machines, combined redundant systems and did something they'd never done before: inventoried their software and computers. Individuals, businesses and countries learned to work together. Within companies, technologists talked with executives, often for the first time.

Mark Haselkorn, a professor of technical communications at the University of Washington, says previously technophobic managers got to see their organizations as dynamic ecosystems and better understand information systems.

For example, supervisors at International Paper Co.'s mill in Franklin, Va., last summer used their Y2K surveys to quickly locate defective circuit boards throughout the plant after a supplier warned of problems.

``There was a heightened awareness of people's perspectives, of people looking beyond just what was happening to them or their particular group, which was a big change,'' said Stephen Schaefgen, who headed International Paper's Y2K efforts.

At the international level, Y2K planners channeled their energies into improving access to technology and defending networks from security threats. Those planners still regularly communicate by e-mail and telephone.

The world discovered that while society has become dependent on machines, people are still in charge.

``There's nothing better than human capital,'' said John Hall, a spokesman with the American Bankers Association. ``I think people gained an appreciation for technology and the people who make that technology possible.''

Sen. Robert Bennett, the Utah Republican who headed the Senate's Y2K advisory committee, says the world also discovered the extent to which computers are interconnected.

Another reminder came in May, when the ``I Love You'' computer virus crippled systems worldwide and caused tens of millions of dollars in damages.

When his Y2K team dismantled in March, Bennett formed a working group in the Senate to address terrorism and other network security threats.

``What happens to us if someone comes at the United States in a very aggressive way?'' he asked.

Many companies and governments simply applied software bandages to address Y2K, noted Dale Way, the Y2K point person with the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers.

A common fix involved tricking computers into thinking the century rollover occurs 30 years or so from now; so more fixes will be needed within 30 years.

``We dodged a bullet,'' Way said. ``But lasting fixes will not be easy to implement. ... When you look at this infrastructure, it is highly uncertain and it breaks all the time.''

A year ago, Y2K planners urged individuals to have extra food, water and flashlight batteries on hand -- though they discouraged overstocking. Meanwhile, Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan sought to calm public fears even while increasing the money supply.

Companies set up command centers, canceled vacations, and then held their collective breath and watched the clocks.

Another Y2K date is coming on Dec. 31 for computers that calculate dates strictly on the basis of a 365-day calendar. Because 2000 is a leap year, Dec. 31 is Day 366. Major problems, however, are not expected.

Y2K contingency teams have disbanded, their personnel moving on to other tasks.

John Koskinen, who spent two years directing Y2K planning in the United States, took a job in September as the District of Columbia's chief administrator.

The U.S. Information Coordination Center -- where Koskinen and his staff prepared for the dawn of 2000 -- closed in March. The 90,000-square-foot space is now being used by the Bush presidential transition team.

Cathy Hotka, who worked on the National Retail Federation's Y2K efforts, has a bottle of New Year's Eve champagne in her refrigerator.

``I'm going to drink like a fish,'' she said. ``I couldn't do anything last year.''

Likewise, McConnell of the now-defunct International Y2K Cooperation Center will be ``reminiscing fondly over our success and grateful I don't have to work this year.''

Anticipating the worst last year, many people bought generators and laid in extra provisions. Some even built special shelters and took refuge in the countryside.

About 20 families who headed for the hills of Floyd County, Va., remain there a year later. Some went into debt to buy several years' worth of water, dehydrated foods and kerosene lanterns.

Howard King, who left his job in Baltimore to join the Rivendell community, plans to stay there for the long haul, his deep distrust of technology unsubsided.

``Now that we've moved here, we are more convinced that the Christian lifestyle in the modern world requires us to live with each other,'' he said.

In Hudson, Wis., Dennis Olson bought 400 boxes of Hamburger Helper, 175 pounds of pasta and nine tubes of toothpaste, along with drinking water and a power generator.

He has donated much of the food to charity, but still has about two months' worth of stocks left. He'll keep the first-aid supplies in case of tornados or other disasters.

Olson says he has no regrets about spending $20,000 to stockpile for Y2K.

``It's only money, and you can always make more, but a boat would have been fun,'' he said. ``You have to look at it satirically. It was a serious issue in its time, but it's behind us now.''

-------- australia

Production under way at uranium mine in SA

The Age
Tuesday 26 December 2000
By DAVID MOODIE ADELAIDE
http://www.theage.com.au/business/2000/12/26/FFXLMPH05HC.html

United States-based Heathgate Resources has confirmed its Beverley uranium mine in South Australia's far north has entered commercial production - making it Australia's first new uranium mine since WMC's Olympic Dam opened 12 years ago.

During a brief visit to Adelaide last week, Heathgate president Jim Graham told The Age the mine was in the "final stages of start-up", with full production rates of 1000 tonnes of uranium oxide a year expected to be reached in the first quarter of next year.

He said shipments had already begun to the mine's US and Japanese customers, with the official mine opening scheduled for February.

The news comes as another SA uranium development, Honeymoon - also in the Lake Frome area - awaits the final go-ahead from the Federal Government on plans to enter production in the first half of 2001.

Honeymoon's Canadian-based owner, Southern Cross Resources, itself 22 per cent-owned by listed Australian resources group Sedimentary Holdings, also intends producing 1000 tonnes of uranium oxide a year.

Heathgate, a subsidiary of privately owned US nuclear power giant General Atomics, has spent the past four years pursuing Beverley's development following its abandonment by previous owners in the early 1980s after the election of the anti-uranium Hawke Labor government.

Mr Graham said the mine's start-up was a welcome Christmas present as it removed future uncertainties hanging over the project, given federal Labor's commitment to allow existing uranium mines to continue operating should it win power in next year's general election.

"It's a very good job and I'm personally very pleased," he said. "It will make everyone associated with this project very proud."

One of the most strident critics of Beverley has been the Australian Conservation Foundation, not only due to historical concerns over the safety of nuclear power but specifically over the mine's use of the controversial in-situ acid leach (ISL) uranium recovery technique.

The ISL process requires sulphuric acid to be pumped down into the aquifer hosting the uranium mineralisation, where the acid dissolves the uranium into the groundwater, which is then pumped back up to the surface for extraction at the mine plant.

Although Beverley has entered production, the ACF is still hopeful of preventing Honeymoon - which will also use the ISL technique - from opening next year.

ACF spokesman David Noonan said the organisation had appealed to the South Australian ombudsman's office to "lift the cloak of secrecy surrounding waste disposal" at Honeymoon, including its long-term impact on the surrounding groundwater system.

Southern Cross Resources has lodged its final environmental impact statement with federal Environment Minister Robert Hill, whose job it is now to recommend to federal Resources Minister Nick Minchin whether the mine should proceed and, if so, under what conditions.

A spokeswoman for Senator Hill said a recommendation was due to have been made on Honeymoon by the end of December but this had now been put back until the end of January. She gave no reason for the delay.

-------- china

Chinese espionage handbook details ease of swiping secrets

Washington Times
December 26, 2000
By Bill Gertz THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/national/default-20001226232548.htm

China's government is engaged in large-scale science and technology spying targeted primarily on gaining U.S. defense secrets for military use, according to a translated Chinese government manual.

The spying handbook was obtained by the Pentagon earlier this year and reveals how Beijing gathers defense intelligence and has been doing so aggressively for more than 30 years.

"A common saying has it that there are no walls which completely block the wind, nor is absolute secrecy achievable," the book by two Chinese intelligence specialists states.

"And invariably there will be numerous open situations in which things are revealed, either in tangible or intangible form. By picking here and there among the vast amount of public materials and accumulating information a drop at a time, often it is possible to basically reveal the outlines of some secret intelligence, and this is particularly true in the case of Western countries. Through probability analysis, in foreign countries it is believed that 80 percent or more of intelligence can be gotten through public materials."

The 250-page book, "Sources and Techniques of Obtaining National Defense Science and Technology Intelligence," is not classified. However, Pentagon officials said its contents provide new insights on how China's government obtains secrets and technology.

The book was written by Huo Zhongwen and Wang Zongxiao, 30-year spy veterans who now teach intelligence at the China National Defense, Science and Technology Information Center (DSTIC) in Beijing.

The center coordinates sharing of technology from some 4,000 Chinese intelligence organizations.

"The Chinese do not spy as God intended it," said Paul Moore, a former FBI intelligence analyst who specialized in Beijing spying activities.

China uses a variety of collectors - students, business people, scientists or visitors abroad - instead of relying on professional intelligence officers working for the Ministry of State Security or the People's Liberation Army Second Department, he said.

Most often, Beijing's intelligence services do not pay cash for secrets and expect people friendly to the Communist government, many of whom are ethnic Chinese, to provide it free of charge, Mr. Moore said during a recent speech.

The book describes Chinese information-gathering as a science.

"Consider information piece by piece; place an excessive, one-sided emphasis on the absolute amount of the information collected; gauge the quality of collection work solely on the basis of the amount of information collected," it states.

The book contradicts official Chinese claims that its high-technology weapons development is indigenous.

Beijing has dismissed U.S. government charges that its nuclear weapons modernization program is based on stolen U.S. nuclear weapons technology, most obtained from U.S. nuclear weapons laboratories.

According to the spying manual, more than 80 percent of all Chinese spying focuses on open-source material obtained from government and private-sector information. The remaining 20 percent is gathered through illicit means, including eliciting information from scientists at meetings, through documents supplied by agents or through electronic eavesdropping.

Through negligence on the part of security review personnel, valuable secrets can be obtained.

The book states that a "Top Secret" scientific report known as "UCRL-4725 Weapons Development, June 1956" was mistakenly declassified by Los Alamos National Laboratory. It became the basis for Progressive magazine's 1979 article on the development of a hydrogen bomb.

"This incident tells us that, on one hand, absolute secrecy is not attainable, while on the other hand, there is a random element involved in the discovery of secret intelligence sources, and to turn this randomness into inevitability, it is necessary that there be those who monitor some sectors and areas with regularity and vigilance," the book states.

Among the best sources for national defense intelligence material, the book lists publications from Congress, the National Defense Technical Information Center and the National Technical Information Service.

As for numerous reports produced by the Energy Department, the Chinese view them as "a source of intelligence of great value."

Regarding clandestine spying, the report states: "It is also necessary to stress that there is still 20 percent or less of our intelligence that must come through the collection of information using special means, such as reconnaissance satellites, electronic eavesdropping and the activities of special agents purchasing or stealing, etc."

Through direct contacts with scientists and other spying targets, the report states that "this is the procedure commonly used for collecting verbal information, but it is not limited to verbal communications. Participation in consultative activities is also a person-to-person exchange procedure for collecting information."

The information is gathered from people and institutions, including government agencies, research offices, corporate enterprises, colleges and universities, libraries, and information offices.

A report produced by the National Counterintelligence Center, an interagency group based at CIA headquarters, called the Chinese military and defense industry's use of unclassified information "one of the most startling revelations" of the book.

The two-part report, issued in the center's June and September newsletters, suggests the release of the spying manual, first reported by Far Eastern Economic Review magazine, may have been a mistake on the part of the secretive Chinese national security bureaucracy.

A second theory is that "China's commitment to expropriating foreign technology is so much a part of its [research and development] culture that the book's authors simply took acceptance of this behavior for granted," the report said.

The report described the book as extraordinary "detailed proof" of China's efforts to obtain foreign defense technology "by the people who helped build China's worldwide intelligence network."

"Incredible as it seems, this frank account of China's long-standing program to siphon off Western military science and technology, written as a textbook for PRC intelligence officers, was sold openly in China for years," the report said. "But you will not find the book in any bookstore or Chinese library today."

The book "represents the first public acknowledgment by PRC officials of China's program to collect secret and proprietary information on foreign military hardware, especially that of the United States," the report said.

Chinese defense technology spying increased during the 1960s when the People's Republic of China (PRC) developed its nuclear arsenal and then fell during the turmoil of the Cultural Revolution when collected research material was put in warehouses and "consumed by mice instead of humans," the book said.

Since 1978, high-technology spying grew sharply under China's national development plan.

I.C. Smith, a retired FBI agent who specialized in Chinese spying, said the FBI severely curtailed its counterspy efforts - Chinese counterspying in particular - during the Clinton administration.

"The shortsighted view of the PRC, a view held by those with little intellectual capacity for counterintelligence, is that China doesn't pose a threat," Mr. Smith said in an interview. "After all, they aren't out there making dead drops, communicating via shortwave radio, paying cash concealed in hollow rocks, et cetera, as is the expected norm for the spy business."

"This view became dominant in the FBI and even to a large extent, the intelligence community, and this resulted in the FBI essentially de-emphasizing counterintelligence, in general, and the China [counterintelligence] program, in particular. This led directly to the debacle of the Wen Ho Lee investigation," Mr. Smith said.

Lee, the Los Alamos nuclear-weapons designer, was suspected of passing nuclear warhead secrets to China. Earlier this year, he pleaded guilty to lesser charges of mishandling classified data on computer tapes that are missing and agreed to tell what he knew to the FBI.

As part of the Lee investigation, FBI agents recently dug up computer tapes from a Los Alamos landfill, but later determined the tapes did not contain the secrets Lee took from the laboratory.

-------- depleted uranium

Spain Soldiers Checked for Radiation

Associated Press
December 26, 2000 Filed at 4:19 p.m. ET
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Spain-Troop-Check.html
http://news.excite.com/news/ap/001226/16/int-spain-troop-check

MADRID, Spain (AP) -- European NATO allies have begun checking whether their soldiers may have been exposed to dangerous levels of radiation from depleted uranium ammunition used by U.S. warplanes in Kosovo last year. Spain said Tuesday that initial tests were proving negative.

The Spanish defense ministry confirmed it would examine all 32,000 soldiers who have served in the Balkan region since 1992. A ministry spokesman said none of the first 5,000 soldiers screened for exposure in recent months had tested positive.

Portugal's Defense Ministry said Tuesday that it would send a team of experts to Kosovo to check radiation levels on spent rounds, but did not foresee screening its 330 troops there.

Spain has just over 2,000 troops stationed in the Balkans, half of them in Kosovo.

Fears arose after NATO acknowledged early this year that U.S. warplanes operating in Kosovo fired armor-piercing rounds containing depleted uranium during the alliance's 78-day bombing campaign in 1999.

Italian Defense Minister Sergio Mattarella said last week that Italy was investigating cancer cases among its soldiers from Kosovo and Bosnia to see if there is a link with the ammunition.

A U.N. team that went to Kosovo in November is doing a similar study and is expected to report its findings in February.

Twelve Italian soldiers who served in the Balkans have developed cancer. In addition, three peacekeepers who served in Bosnia died of leukemia last year. Four soldiers involved in aircraft maintenance have also died of cancer.

Pentagon spokesman Jim Turner said Tuesday there have been no problems with leukemia or other illnesses among U.S. troops who served in the Balkans. He said soldiers receive regular health checkups after returning from overseas.

Spain's Defense Ministry medical chief, Col. Luis Villalonga, said the health tests were designed to calm any fears among the troops. He said last week that Spanish army studies coincided with others by allied forces that showed ``there has been no radioactive pollution.''

He said one case of a Spanish soldier dying of leukemia on returning home was unrelated. He said the soldier had been based in Macedonia, which was not directly involved in the war.

The Dutch Defense Ministry said it would keep abreast of Spanish and Italian inquiries via NATO. A spokesman said the ministry was looking into a National Soldiers' Union report about a peacekeeper with leukemia who served in Bosnia.

Earlier this year, the Yugoslav government reported that the region hit by uranium rounds in Kosovo stretched across a southwestern belt of the province. Most affected were areas surrounding towns such as Prizren, Urosevac, Djakovica, Decani and the Djurakovac village -- areas where Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Greek and U.S. troops have been posted.

In its report, Yugoslavia claimed some 50,000 rounds had been fired, while NATO admitted to 31,000 rounds.

Iraq long has blamed an increase in rates of leukemia and other cancers, as well as neurological and muscular diseases, on the use of depleted uranium bombs during the Persian Gulf War. Official statistics show that the number of Iraqi children with cancer rose to 130,000 in 1997 from 32 in 1990.

Depleted uranium, which has low levels of radioactivity, is used in artillery shells because it is extremely dense and can pierce armor. On impact, the shells create an airborne dust.

Some experts believe uranium rounds are environmentally harmful, especially if people and animals inhale the dust that forms when the shells disintegrate. The U.S. Defense Department has defended the use of the uranium, saying the rounds contained no more health risk than conventional weapons.

-------- india / pakistan

Hope for world's worst flashpoint

The Age
Tuesday 26 December 2000
By GWYNNE DYER
http://www.theage.com.au/news/2000/12/26/FFXZONH05HC.html

Eleven years of killing, more than 50,000 dead, and the highest ratio of soldiers to civilians in the world, with a nuclear war between India and Pakistan as the pay-off if things get out of hand: the conflict in Kashmir dwarfs every other global confrontation in its potential for harm. But the prospects for peace are actually rising in Kashmir.

As the clock ticks down on India's unilateral ceasefire in Kashmir, due to expire at the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan tomorrow, there have been no clear public responses from Pakistan or the main guerilla groups in Kashmir. But there has been no flat rejection of the Indian initiative either, and the local situation has remained sufficiently calm that India may well extend the ceasefire. That could be a new beginning for the whole region, and nowhere needs it more.

Pakistan and India have fought two full-scale wars over Kashmir in the past, and almost ended up at war again in the summer of 1999 over Pakistani troops that infiltrated into the Kargil district the previous spring.

Hundreds of soldiers on both sides were killed in firefights, and artillery and air power were used lavishly. All this happened after both countries had carried out a series of nuclear weapons tests in 1998. It could happen again as soon as the snow melts next spring - and the problem with both sides' nuclear weapons is that they have no safety catches.

Analysts in the subcontinent and elsewhere prattle on about a nuclear "balance of terror" between India and Pakistan, but they are talking through their hats. The old Cold War "balance of terror" between East and West came into existence only after the mid-1960s, when both sides had built thousands of nuclear weapons that were invulnerable to surprise attack because they were buried deep in missile silos or hidden at sea in submarines.

That stabilised the confrontation somewhat, because it was no longer possible to disarm your adversary with a surprise first strike that eliminated all his nuclear weapons. Every nuclear attack would be met with a nuclear counter-attack: "mutual assured destruction". But this period was preceded in the Cold War by a far more dangerous decade when surprise nuclear attacks might succeed - and that is the technological era that Pakistan and India are living through now.

Perhaps in 10 years India and Pakistan will have buried their nuclear missiles in silos or sent them out to sea too. Now, however, their few dozen nuclear warheads are just sitting out in the open, slung under the wings of aircraft at the end of runways, or screwed to the top of relatively short-range missiles at military bases not far from the border. A disarming surprise attack could work, and the warning time available is only 15 to 20 minutes.

So both countries have "launch-on-warning" policies, even though they know radar operators can make mistakes. Some dozens of nuclear warheads exploding over airfields and military bases across northern India and Pakistan (plus, almost certainly, over New Delhi and Islamabad) would not be literally the end of the world, but tens of millions would die.

The need to step back from this hair-trigger confrontation was part of the reason for the three-month ceasefire declared last August by the biggest of the Kashmiri guerilla outfits, Hezb ul-Mujaheddin. It collapsed after only two weeks, but it would never have happened at all without some encouragement from Pakistan (which arms and supplies the guerrillas, though it officially denies it).

The Indian Government's ceasefire this month has held considerably better, and behind the scenes major concessions are being discussed. New Delhi no longer demands that all the Kashmiri groups pledge allegiance to the Indian constitution before starting to talk. Pakistan is signalling that it no longer insists on being included in the talks from the start, though there must be some understanding that it will be brought in before the end.

"If we're genuinely interested in peace, we've got to engage," says Professor Abdul Ghani Bhat, chairman of the All-Parties Hurriyat Conference that unites all the pro-independence parties in Kashmir. "We have to put the past behind us." And as long as everybody keeps the final destination sufficiently vague, it may be possible for all the parties to stop the killing and start talking.

"Talks" doesn't mean a final solution for the Kashmir question, which dates back to the decision of the state's Hindu ruler to opt for India at partition in 1947 despite its majority Muslim population. It certainly doesn't mean the referendum on Kashmir's future that Indian prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru promised and the United Nations endorsed 50 years ago.

It just means talks, and maybe more autonomy for Kashmir - plus an end to the killing, and the withdrawal of a few hundred thousand Indian troops and police from Kashmir's towns and villages, and a long step away from the brink of a regional nuclear war. Enough for the moment.

Gwynne Dyer is a London-based journalist, author and film maker.

-------- japan

Japan Nuke Plant Shut To Fix Leak

Associated Press
December 26, 2000 Filed at 10:03 a.m. ET
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Japan-Nuclear-Leak.html
http://us.f23.mail.yahoo.com/ym/login?.rand=53ni02vhikbn7
http://news.excite.com/news/ap/001226/10/int-japan-nuclear-leak

TOKYO (AP) -- A reactor in the town that suffered Japan's worst nuclear accident was closed Tuesday to repair a four-month-old leak in the cooling system, the plant operator said.

No radiation was released at the Japan Atomic Power Co.'s No. 2 Nuclear Station in Tokaimura, some 70 miles northeast of Tokyo, company spokesman Tomokuni Sugiyama said.

Workers had monitored a small leak in the cooling system since September. Operators decided to shut the plant down after seeing signs that the leak was affecting the system, Sugiyama said.

It was unclear how long the plant would be idle.

Tokaimura was the site of Japan's worst nuclear accident, when two workers were killed and hundreds exposed to radiation at a uranium reprocessing plant in September 1999.

-------- russia

New Batch of Russian Strategic Missiles to Go on Duty Tuesday

Russia Today
Dec 26, 2000
http://www.russiatoday.com/news.php3?id=236448

MOSCOW -- (Agence France Presse) A new regiment of Russia's Topol-M ballistic missile systems will join active duty Tuesday, the strategic missile force's spokesman said Monday.

The first two regiments, each equipped with 10 missile launchers, had joined the Tatischevo military base in 1998 and 1999 respectively, the AVN military news agency reported.

Russian military officials said they expected the 47-ton Topol-M to become the backbone of Russia's strategic nuclear force.

According to the Russian military, the Topol-M missiles, part of a new generation of intercontinental weapons, are capable of evading all anti-missile systems currently in use or in development.

Six test flights of intercontinental missiles were successfully launched this year, among them three Topol-M missiles, military officials said last month.

---

Putin Vows Pragmatic Russian Foreign Policy

Russia Today
Dec 26, 2000
http://www.russiatoday.com/news.php3?id=236444

MOSCOW -- (Reuters) President Vladimir Putin said on Monday that Russia needed a pragmatic foreign policy that leaned neither to Soviet-era imperial expansionism nor to naive faith in the West.

"In the Soviet days we scared the world so that huge military and political blocs emerged," said Putin in an interview with RTR television almost a year after he took Russia's helm. "Did we really benefit from this? Of course not."

"But 10 years ago for some reason we decided that everyone heartily loves us," he added, referring to Russia's post-Soviet honeymoon with the West. "It turned out wrong as well.

Putin, a former KGB spy who won a presidential election in March with a promise to restore order and national dignity, has indicated that he favors a more pragmatic foreign policy than his predecessor Boris Yeltsin.

Next weekend marks one year since Yeltsin resigned, handing power to Putin and with it a foreign policy marred by bitter disagreements with the West on several vital international issues.

FIGHT FOR NATIONAL INTERESTS

"We must get rid of imperial ambitions on the one hand, and on the other hand clearly understand where our national interests are, to spell them out and fight for them," Putin said.

The West is suspicious of Russia's warming ties with some rogue states like Iraq, Iran and North Korea and accuses Moscow of helping Tehran to develop nuclear weapons.

For its part, Russia bitterly opposed NATO's eastward expansion and is alarmed by the prospect that it could embrace parts of the former Soviet Union, such as the Baltic states.

The latest major irritant for Russia is a U.S. plan for a national anti-missile defense system, banned by current treaties, which Moscow believes could ruin the international nuclear security system.

Many political analysts in Russia predict a strong chill in relations once U.S. Republican President-elect George W. Bush takes office in January. A strong proponent of the anti-missile system he has also urged a tougher line in dealings with Russia.

But Putin appeared undisturbed.

"I find it difficult to agree that we should expect any deterioration in U.S.-Russian relations," he said.

"Analysis of recent history shows that when Republicans were in power there has been no deterioration of our relations. We have always managed to find a correct tone in dealing with each other."

But Putin made clear that Russia would not bow to Western pressure, such as recent U.S. threats of possible sanctions for Russian nuclear and military cooperation with Iran.

"There are some specific things about this region, which prompt us to take into account international security concerns," Putin said, referring to both Iran and Iraq.

"Being a U.N. Security Council member and a G8 member we should take into account these concerns," he added. "But I will repeat we should not forget about our national interests.

---

Putin's Priorities Emerge in New Missile Deployment

Washington Post
Tuesday, December 26, 2000; 1:05 PM
By David Hoffman Washington Post Foreign Service
http://washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A51886-2000Dec26?language=printer

MOSCOW, Dec. 26, Russia today officially deployed a new unit of its most modern strategic nuclear weapon, but in smaller numbers than during the last two years, suggesting a shift in priorities under President Vladimir Putin.

The single-warhead, silo-based Topol-M is designed to replace the aging Soviet-era multiple-warhead missiles in Russia's arsenal. In 1998 and 1999, Russia deployed 10 missiles a year.

However, the unit deployed today comprises only six missiles, and the decline appears to be not only a response to budget pressures but a change in priorities.

Alexander Pikayev, a nonproliferation and arms control specialist at the Carnegie Moscow Center, said the reduced complement of missiles was not numerically significant but "symbolically" important, marking a possible shift away from nuclear weapons and toward conventional, or non-nuclear forces.

Putin this year has been refereeing a vigorous and sometimes public debate among top brass over the allocation of resources between nuclear and conventional arms.

The chief of the general staff, Gen. Anatoly Kvashnin, has argued that in the future Russia could do with far fewer nuclear warheads than envisioned by Defense Minister Igor Sergeyev, a former head of the strategic rocket forces. Kvashnin wants to direct money into building new high-tech conventional weapons.

The total number of Russian nuclear warheads is expected to decline to 1,000 or fewer in the next five to seven years because of obsolescence and arms control treaties. This is below the ceiling of 2,000 to 2,500 warheads called for START treaty which has yet to be formally negotiated with the United States.

Putin has not accepted Kvashninıs proposals for extremely sharp reductions - Kvashnin reportedly suggested as few as 550 warheads would be enoughıbut Putin also appears to be leaning away from making heavy new investment in long-range nuclear missiles to keep the levels higher.

The six missiles deployed today join others previously deployed near the Volga River city of Saratov. Pikayev said that producing six missiles a year probably did not major savings because small output is inefficient for a factory capable of making or hundreds a year.

By comparison, the government of former Prime Minister Yevgeny Primakov was suggesting in early 1999 that Russia could and should deploy 30 new Topol-M missiles year.That goal was never formally accepted, and it appears that Russia will not maintain the pace of even 10 new missiles a year.

The cost of the Topol-M program is not known. In general, Russia's fiscal situation is better than at any time in recent years because of windfall revenues from high global oil prices. However, there is still competition over resources inside the military.

---

Russia Deploys New Nuclear Missiles

December 26, 2000 Filed at 6:19 p.m. ET
Associated Press
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Russia-Missile.html
http://news.excite.com/news/ap/001226/18/int-russia-missile

MOSCOW (AP) -- A third set of new intercontinental nuclear missiles was deployed Tuesday at a base in southwest Russia -- part of government efforts to make the rugged, hard-to-detect weapon the backbone of its nuclear forces.

A regiment at the Tatishchevo base in the Saratov region was equipped with the Topol-M single-warhead missiles, said Sergei Derevyashkin, a spokesman for the strategic missile force. He did not say how many missiles were deployed.

The U.S. State Department said it supported the deployment as part of an effort to replace missiles banned by the START II arms control treaty.

``We support very much their efforts to prepare for a post-START II environment,'' spokesman Philip Reeker said in Washington.

The small missile can be fired from a mobile launcher, making it harder to detect and more likely to survive a first strike in a nuclear war.

Some experts have said the Topol-M could be converted to carry several warheads, a change that would violate START II. But Russia has supported the treaty, and any modifications to the missile would likely strain its nuclear arms budget, which was already stretched thin by the original Topol-M project.

Russia already has 20 Topol-M missiles in service, 10 per regiment, deployed in 1998 and 1999.

Topol-M was designed to replace older missiles that have outlived their service or must be dismantled under START II, which was ratified by Russia's parliamentearlier this year but is still awaiting final approval by the U.S. Senate.

Strategic Missile Force commander Vladimir Yakovlev hailed Tuesday's deployment. ``This is a major achievement ... against the background of limited financing,'' he said, according to Russian news reports.

---

Greens See Greed, Neglect Tainting Siberia's Pearl

Associated Press
December 26, 2000 Filed at 0:26 a.m. ET
By REUTERS
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/science/science-environment-b.html?pagewanted=all

LISTVYANKA, Russia (Reuters) - Shimmering between the Siberian taiga and the mountainous Mongolian border, Lake Baikal is the crescent-shaped jewel in Russia's rusting ecological crown.

The world's deepest, oldest major lake is home to hundreds of animal and plant species found nowhere else on earth, but campaigners say a hunt for the more marketable assets of natural gas and fur is threatening to cloud its turquoise waters.

Conservation group Greenpeace also says Russia's failure to cut pollution in the 365 rivers flowing into Baikal is a symptom of state neglect presided over by President Vladimir Putin. Last spring he ordered the Ministry of Natural Resources to absorb the once-independent Environmental Protection Commission.

Without the commission's protection, Greenpeace fears a devastating effect on Baikal's mile-deep waters and 1,500 animal species. In response, the group asked UNESCO last month to transfer the 25-million-year-old lake to its list of endangered World Heritage sites.

Some 80 percent of Baikal's fauna is unique to the lake, making it particularly sensitive to changes in water quality, said Roman Pukalov, Greenpeace's Baikal Campaign coordinator.

But Valentin Brovchak, deputy head of Russia's Department for Environmental Analysis, said decisions were being taken on how to clean up Baikal's tributaries, and disagreed with Greenpeace that the lake's eco-system was in danger.

``I've worked on Baikal since 1992...and while there has not been any sharp improvement in its situation, it has not got worse, either. It's been stable for at least eight years,'' Brovchak said.

GAS, FUR-HUNTING FEARS

Pukalov said uncontrolled hunting was biting deep into one of Baikal's most famous natural attractions.

``The population of nerpa seal in the lake has fallen over the last six years by 30 percent at least. Hunters are allowed 6,000 a year, but illegal hunting claims twice that many.''

He said amateur hunters injured three seals for every one they killed with nets and guns, trying to satisfy a growing demand for skins in northern China and Mongolia.

Pukalov said he also feared the impact on Baikal of test drilling for gas in the delta of the Selenga river and mineral exploration close to the lake, which holds a fifth of the world's flowing fresh water.

``These are some of the biggest problems for Baikal and should not be allowed on World Heritage Sites,'' he said. ``This is why we want UNESCO to put pressure on the government.''

Brovchak said he had not heard of any mineral exploration near Baikal and that a resolution he expected to go before parliament early next year should outlaw oil and gas exploration close to Baikal.

``It says in the resolution that exploitation of new deposits is to be banned in the central ecological zone around Baikal... Already the reserve is probably one of the most strictly protected regions in the world,'' he said.

``You can hardly even pick mushrooms there.''

PUTIN'S ``ENVIRONMENTAL ERROR''

Baikal survived decades of Soviet industrialization relatively unscathed while Russia put its natural resources to work in breakneck economic pursuit of the West, sparing little thought for the environmental damage being wreaked.

The late-1980s 'perestroika' policies of Mikhail Gorbachev lifted ecological issues off the bottom of the Kremlin priority list, but campaigners say Putin is reversing the process.

He enraged campaigners in May when he decreed that the Ministry for Natural Resources absorb the State Environmental Protection Committee and the Forestry Commission.

The government said it was to cut costs but groups like Greenpeace and Baikal Environmental Wave (BEW) said it cleared the way for unchecked exploitation of Russia's overworked environment.

``I think Putin made a very grave error. With one hand (the ministry) is now exploiting natural resources while it is supposed to be protecting them with the other,'' BEW's Jennie Sutton told Reuters.

``If the decree was to cut down on bureaucrats then it would be a good thing, but it also means enterprises like gas exploration are not going to be monitored and held within some degree of state control.''

Greenpeace said it collected more than the two million signatures needed to force a state referendum on the restoration of independent environmental and forestry agencies and a ban on imports of nuclear waste to Russia.

But election authorities threw out half a million of the signatures as illegitimate in November, prompting another furious response from environmentalists and Greenpeace to threaten action in Russia's Supreme Court.

``PROTECTION NOW EASIER''

Brovchak denied any government wrongdoing over the referendum and said the merged ministry was working well.

``It's a lot easier now. If before certain structures involved departments in different ministries it was very complicated to make ecological decisions which related to all of them. There are still problems, but it is still taking shape.''

``I have not seen conflicts of interest or contradictions yet and if there are we will sort them out,'' he said.

Russia's economic problems have often forced the government to push environmental concerns into the shadows, but Brovchak said Baikal was just as precious to politicians as it was to the rest of Russia.

``It is only Baikal that has a specially decreed status, not the Caspian sea or the River Volga. There's so much there; the mythology, history, not to mention the economic significance of tourism and natural beauty,'' he said.

``Baikal is unique. It is a unique phenomenon for the whole world.''

---

Lenin Voted Russia's Man of Century

Associated Press
December 26, 2000 Filed at 12:42 p.m. ET
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Russia-Man-of-the-Century.html
http://www.infobeat.com/cgi-bin/WebObjects/IBFrontEnd.woa/wa/fullStory?article=405535954

MOSCOW (AP) -- Russians listed Communist leader Vladimir Lenin as their No. 1 choice of ``man of the century'' for their country, followed by dictator Josef Stalin, the Interfax news agency reported Tuesday.

The poll asked 1,500 people across Russia to name a choice without offering any suggestions.

After the Soviet leaders, human rights advocate and Nobel Prize winner Andrei Sakharov came in third, Interfax said. The first man in space, Yuri Gagarin, took fourth place, and Soviet reformer Mikhail Gorbachev was fifth, followed by actors and politicians from Russia's past.

Lenin won the most support, with 14 percent of respondents calling him the most important man of the 20th century, showing that many older Russians still revere him. Lenin's lasting popularity among the older generation has also been explained by years of Soviet propaganda, which lionized him.

Stalin received support from 9 percent of respondents despite a consensus among most Russians that he was a cruel dictator responsible for the deaths of millions in arbitrary executions and forced labor camps. Stalin is still respected by a small group in Russia, who see him as a paragon of law and order.

Sakharov, a renowned nuclear physicist who drew attention to the cruelty of the Soviet system and became a symbol of his country's quest to shake off the legacy of Communism, received support from 8 percent of respondents.

The Public Opinion Foundation polling agency conducted the survey Dec. 16. The report did not mention the poll's margin of error. Many Russians consider 2001 to be the beginning of the new century, and pollsters apparently had that in mind when they conducted the survey.

-------- ukraine

Nuclear Reactor Halted in Ukraine

Associated Press
December 26, 2000 Filed at 11:50 a.m. ET
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Ukraine-Nuclear.html

KIEV, Ukraine (AP) -- A nuclear reactor at Ukraine's Yuzhna atomic power plant was halted for several hours following a malfunction in its electrical system, nuclear officials said Tuesday.

The Yuzhna plant's reactor No. 1 in southern Ukraine was stopped late Monday and restarted before dawn Tuesday, the State Energoatom company said in a statement.

Currently, 10 of 13 nuclear reactors at Ukraine's four atomic power plants are working, it said.

On Dec. 15, Ukraine halted for good the only working reactor at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant following pressure from foreign governments and environmental groups.

Chernobyl was the site of the world's worst nuclear disaster when its No. 4 reactor exploded, sending a radioactive cloud over much of Europe in 1986.

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

Nuclear Power Benefit

New York Times
December 26, 2000
http://www.nytimes.com/2000/12/26/opinion/L26NUC.html

To the Editor:

A Dec. 20 Business Day article about the renewed interest in nuclear power discussed the economic incentives. You should have mentioned the environmental benefits, with their long-term cost savings.

Increased use of nuclear power would help save irreplaceable fossil fuel for future generations and reduce production of climate-warming gases and air pollution. More than a dozen countries make greater use of nuclear power than the United States.

The environmental problem of waste burial can be solved by geologists, who have studied rock structures that have not moved in tens of millions of years. The political problems of such waste disposal require stronger, more honest leaders in government and environmental circles than have yet appeared.

DONALD J. KAHN Metuchen, N.J., Dec. 20, 2000

-------- arizona

Tribe urges cleanup for radioactive homes
But Superfund help not likely for now, EPA says

Dallas Morning News
12/26/2000
By Bill Papich/Special Contributor to The Dallas Morning News
http://www.dallasnews.com/texas_southwest/246551_nmradiate_26te.html

OAK SPRINGS, Ariz. - Walking through the rubble of a home she lived in as a child on the Navajo Indian reservation in northeast Arizona, Sarah Benally said the sandstone rocks strewn about were once a popular building material.

"We didn't know they were contaminated," said Ms. Benally, who suffers from a thyroid condition.

Her father built the home using uranium ore waste rock in the early 1950s. He was among thousands of Navajo men who worked in hundreds of uranium mines across the reservation from the late 1940s through the 1970s, mining the fuel for America's nuclear weapons arsenal.

The miners found that with a little chipping, the waste ore rocks from mines could be squared up for excellent building material for walls, floors and foundations.

But nobody told them that uranium waste ore rocks can emit harmful gamma radiation - including the Atomic Energy Commission, which received the uranium.

Officials with the federal Environmental Protection Agency acknowledge the 27,000-square-mile area is "a huge problem." But they say it falls short of Superfund cleanup status because of the area's sparse population and an incomplete knowledge of all problem locations.

Ms. Benally suspects her childhood home as the cause of the condition for which she takes medicine.

Navajo families who have lived or remain near old uranium mines on the reservation "are having so many health problems," she said. And she believes relatives of miners who suffer from cancer, respiratory disease, birth defects, kidney disease and other illnesses also became sick from exposure to the ore.

In the Navajo community of Teec Nos Pos, tribal member Carolyn Clark, 35, said her father built the uranium ore waste rock house she was raised in with her seven brothers and sisters. Her father, a uranium miner, committed suicide when he was 31.

"I guess he had health problems and he just decided to get it over with," Ms. Clark said. "We all have health problems, all sorts."

Her daughter has cerebral palsy.

The federal Indian Health Services agency, which administers health care to tribal members, does not acknowledge any link between disease and long-term living in waste ore rock houses. The government only recognizes that some uranium miners developed lung cancer by inhaling uranium ore dust while working in the mines.

The mines were usually tunnels bored horizontally into hillsides.

The miners worked without protective gear and were never told that radon gas and radioactive particles they inhaled and ingested during lunch breaks could kill them. Only the miners with lung cancer have each received $100,000 compensation as a result of the 1990 Radiation Exposure and Compensation Act.

President Clinton has signed an executive order for an extra $50,000 by July 2001.

"But what do you do with the people who don't qualify for compensation?" asks 50-year-old tribal member Phil Harrison, who needs a kidney transplant. His father was a uranium miner who died of lung cancer at 45.

Mr. Harrison and Ms. Benally belong to the Navajo Uranium Radiation Victims Committee, a grass-roots advocacy organization seeking compensation for miners' relatives.

Mr. Harrison recalls evenings when his father came home from work and his mother shook out the work clothes.

"Everything would be airborne," he said. "We need to find out who else is sick besides the miners. If the mother passed on, then what did she die from? How many kids are sick, mentally retarded, handicapped or have birth defects?"

The Navajo tribe's office of the Navajo Abandoned Mine Lands Reclamation Program has identified 1,300 abandoned uranium mines. Since 1989, about half the mines have been sealed with concrete and other materials. But piles of exposed uranium ore waste rock remain. The rock can contain "hot spots" of uranium ore.

Even where mine reclamation has occurred, there are waste rock houses left standing or only partially dismantled. And because traditional Navajo families are sheepherders who live spread out from one another - their high desert homeland covers parts of Arizona, Utah and New Mexico - the EPA does not know how many uranium homes exist on the reservation.

Since 1994, the EPA has used helicopters for radiation surveys of the reservation where uranium mining occurred, but it has identified only two structures that contain dangerous levels of radiation in their rock walls. Although once inhabited, the structures now are used only for storage, according to the EPA.

EPA officials say the structures will be torn down, the waste ore rocks will be removed, and the structures will be replaced.

Derritch Watchman-Moore, executive director of the Navajo Nation Environmental Protection Agency, expects other buildings, including occupied homes, will be discovered. "We're just at the tip of the iceberg," she said.

For instance, wood dwellings appear not to contain waste rock at first glance. But underneath there can be waste rock foundations. There are even outdoor bread ovens made of uranium ore waste rock.

One structure the EPA plans to dismantle is emitting 44 times the gamma radiation the EPA and U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission considers "acceptable."

The tribal EPA receives funding from the federal EPA. But its operations still lag. Its technology is behind the times, with officials relying on typewriters.

"That's reflective of some of our financial processes that we go through," Ms. Watchman-Moore said, adding that the tribe's strategy for obtaining a reservation-wide uranium waste cleanup is getting mine areas listed as Superfund sites. If a mine makes the national EPA Superfund list, a multimillion-dollar cleanup could go into action immediately.

But for now, that's not likely.

Betsy Curnow, an EPA manager for Superfund site assessment, notes the Superfund was enacted by Congress 20 years ago with the intention of cleaning up pollution in urban, industrial areas of the United States.

Population size near a potential site, she said, is one factor that determines whether it achieves Superfund status.

"Potentially we may list some of these sites on the Superfund, but this is a huge problem, a huge area, and we've got to make sure we're spending our money on the very worst problems out there," Ms. Curnow said.

She emphasized that the EPA has done hundreds of cleanups of hazardous materials on the Navajo reservation, although none have been on the scale of a Superfund cleanup.

Removal of waste rock structures on the reservation would be a long time coming, said Arlene Luther, director of the Navajo EPA waste regulatory compliance department.

She said the Navajo EPA also has identified structures containing concrete made from uranium ore.

"It's something we identified in the early 1980s and, unfortunately, we're still living with it today," Ms.Luther said.

Bill Papich is a Farmington, N.M., free-lance writer.

-------- california

Energy Crisis in California Threatens the Stability of Utility Shares

New York Times
December 26, 2000
By LAURA M. HOLSON
http://www.nytimes.com/2000/12/26/business/26PLAC.html?pagewanted=all

SAN FRANCISCO, Dec. 25 - It used to be that utility companies were the safest stocks for investors to buy, slow growers favored for their stable earnings and predictable dividends. But those assumptions no longer apply in California, where newly deregulated utility companies instead share a familiar characteristic with their Internet brethren these days - enormous cash burn - but lack the huge Internet growth prospects that might otherwise keep stock prices afloat.

After a summer that teetered on the edge of an energy debacle, California has again been gripped in recent weeks by a severe energy shortage that on some days has come close to threatening blackouts among 15 percent of California's 24 million utility customers.

With a cold snap in the Pacific Northwest and limited supplies here, utility companies were forced to pay power generators $1,500 per megawatt hour this month - 40 times what they paid last year - as state officials scrambled for as much as one- third of California's energy needs.

Not surprisingly, investors have shunned California utility stocks, including those of the parent companies of Southern California Edison and Pacific Gas and Electric. The primary worry is that the companies will not be able to recoup the $8 billion they have paid to power producers but - for now, at least - cannot collect from customers, because of a rate freeze in effect until March 2002.

Standard & Poors, the rating agency that monitors companies' financial health, warned last week that the utilities were on the verge of bankruptcy and risked bond downgrades to junk status unless something was done quickly to stem losses.

Share prices of the parent companies, Edison International and the PG&E Corporation, have fallen as much as one-third since the beginning of December, though both stocks rebounded a bit on Friday.

Top executives from the utilities met with state officials last week, and Southern California Edison announced on Friday that it would eliminate its fourth-quarter dividend and trim $100 million in spending, including the elimination of 400 jobs, in an effort to stave off bankruptcy.

Such measures, as well as the fact that the Public Utilities Commission in California agreed to hold emergency hearings beginning Wednesday on possible rate increases, have forestalled a financial brownout for the time being. But the situation remains in flux. "It is still probable the ratings will go down," said David Bodek, a utilities credit analyst at Standard & Poor's. "Conserving cash staved off insolvency only for a few weeks, giving them additional time for the crafting and implementation of a strategy."

The fact that politicians will strongly influence the utilities' fate - Gov. Gray Davis, in particular, is stepping up his involvement - further clouds the picture for financial analysts. "When there is a `protect the consumer' mode, the near-term impact on the companies will be much worse," said Jon Raleigh, a power and utilities analyst at Goldman, Sachs.

But even if the Public Utilities Commission approves a rate increase that somehow satisfies both consumer groups and Wall Street, analysts contend that the companies' prospects have changed.

"Even with a constructive outcome, it will likely be difficult for the utilities to argue they need rate relief to avoid bankruptcy, but keep paying the same dividend," said a report issued Friday by Merrill Lynch. At best, the report added, rate increases could make Edison and PG&E "financially viable, but not financially strong." Bankruptcy, Merrill Lynch concluded, is a real but unlikely possibility.

It should also be noted that the utilities' parent companies - power producers in their own rights - have benefited from the high prices being paid for electricity. PG&E paid power generators $4.5 billion more than it could collect from rate payers from June to November, but it earned $1.57 billion more than in the period a year earlier from its own nuclear and hydroelectric generation plants.

That revenue, a company spokesman said, is supposed to be used to pay off debt and other costs associated with deregulation, not to subsidize rates. Still, if the utility companies' bonds are indeed downgraded, the ripples could wash over the nonprofit agency that manages California's power grid and the exchange where electricity contracts are traded.

In particular, the Independent System Operator, which runs the grid, could be required to demand collateral from the utilities in advance of any power purchases made on their behalf. Otherwise, Kellan Fluckiger, the agency's chief operating officer, said power producers could balk at sending electricity to the state, as they did earlier in the month. Resolving that mess required Mr. Fluckiger's boss at the Independent System Operator to go behind Gov. Davis's back and ask federal regulators to order power producers to send electricity to California.

In the end, any resolution seems bound to be messy. Electricity shortages are expected to continue through the summer of 2002, say power executives, when new power plants will come on line. Utility companies will still have concerns about their viability. Consumers will not be happy paying higher rates.

And federal and state regulators have to come to some agreement on a regionwide solution to resolve the West's energy problems.

-------- tennessee

K-25 fluorine releases due to pinhole leak

The Oak Ridger
Tuesday, December 26, 2000
by Paul Parson Oak Ridger staff
http://www.oakridger.com/stories/122600/new_1226000010.html

A pinhole-sized leak in a section of piping appears to be the reason fluorine was released last week into a vacant building at the Oak Ridge K-25 Site.

Steven Wyatt, a spokesman for the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge Operations office, informed The Oak Ridger that site workers discovered the leak source Wednesday afternoon while conducting environmental monitoring activities in Building K-1302.

Site workers first reported the leak last week, saying an odor was emanating from building K-1302 -- a currently unused building that was formerly a fluorine storage and distribution facility. Fluorine was used at K-25 to refine fuel for nuclear power plants when the gaseous diffusion facility was operational from the 1940s to the mid-1980s.

On Wednesday, the workers discovered the leak was at a point near the ceiling where two half-inch pipes leading to a fluorine storage tank meet, according to Wyatt. The workers noticed a "telltale odor" of fluorine and saw about a 10-inch stream of gas coming from the leak.

Additional monitoring in and around the building showed that the level of the fluorine had diminished after several valves were closed, according to Wyatt.

Officials are still trying to determine what caused the pinhole-sized tear in the pipe. According to Wyatt, one theory is that changing atmospheric conditions were possibly causing changes in pressure within the tanks and piping, thus occasionally forcing the fluorine out through the leaking pipe.

According to Wyatt, plans are also under way to remove the section of pipe that leaked and the small amount of residual fluorine in the system that remained after a previous cleaning effort.

Last week's fluorine leak resulted in five people being treated for either nausea or headaches and more than 200 possibly "at risk" site workers being told to stay home for two days.

---

Major changes could be in store for Tennessee Valley Authority

The Oak Ridger
Tuesday, December 26, 2000
The Associated Press
http://www.oakridger.com/stories/122600/stt_1226000058.html

WASHINGTON -- A new chairman, a Republican U.S. president and a marginal Republican majority in Congress could bring major changes and a few challenges to the Tennessee Valley Authority.

Most observers agree TVA, the nation's largest public power provider, will lose one of its biggest allies in Washington when Tennessee native son Al Gore steps down as vice president.

TVA chairman Craven Crowell, a close friend of Gore's, announced his retirement this month -- one day after Gore conceded the presidential election to Republican George W. Bush. Crowell's retirement with nearly a year remaining on his nine-year term makes way for Bush to appoint a new chairman.

Traditionally, Democrats are viewed as more friendly to TVA than Republicans.

TVA was founded by a Democrat, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and a Democratic Congress. It was a Republican president, Dwight Eisenhower, who branded the agency "creeping socialism" and threatened to sell it off in the 1950s.

Even with Democrat Bill Clinton and Gore in office, a Republican-controlled Congress two years ago killed off TVA's $100 million annual appropriation for river and land management.

Stephen Smith of the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy said Gore was mindful of TVA's interests, and he expects that to change with the new leadership in Washington.

"I think you could say there's very little sympathy for TVA," he said.

Any changes Bush makes to TVA would come with the expected deregulation of the electric utility industry, a development that could lead to the breakup of TVA.

TVA consumers now enjoy some of the cheapest utility prices in the country -- $65 a month for the typical 1,000-kilowatt household compared to $83 nationally.

Bush-Cheney transition spokesman Scott McClellan said the team is focused on the move to Washington and will discuss TVA later. During his campaign Bush said he will push for a "comprehensive energy policy" that addresses a variety of issues.

Rep. Zach Wamp, R-Tenn., said utility deregulation will be difficult to push through Congress, considering the problems that have plagued California since state deregulation there.

The 50-50 split in the Senate (Vice President-elect Dick Cheney will serve as the tiebreaker) will further hinder legislation that does not protect TVA's interests, Wamp said.

"I think after this very narrow election, a simple meat and potatoes agenda is very much in Gov. Bush's interest," he said.

---

DOE facilities celebrate Christmas

The Oak Ridger
Tuesday, December 26, 2000
by Paul Parson Oak Ridger staff
http://www.oakridger.com/stories/122600/new_1226000008.html

The Department of Energy's three Oak Ridge facilities and their managers celebrated Christmas in a variety of ways this month.

BWXT Y-12 recently held a Christmas party for all Y-12 National Security Complex employees and their families at the Oak Ridge Mall. More than 2,000 people attended the event, and gifts were given to both adults and children.

Also, toys were collected at the Christmas party and at Y-12 for the facility's annual toy drive. The toy drive was conducted by the BWXT Y-12 Values Council and the Y-12 Fire Department.

"We had six barrels filled up and running over with toys," said BWXT Y-12 spokesman Bill Wilburn.

Wilburn said the toys were given to the Karns Fire Department, the Holiday Bureau and Tuppertown Baptist Church in Oliver Springs to be distributed.

BWXT Y-12 employees also participated in the Oak Ridge Christmas parade, using a float that was designed and built by volunteers from the Atomic Trades and Labor Council. The float was also used in the Kingston parade.

The company also gave donations to the Holiday Bureau and had several angel trees at the Y-12 Plant.

For the holiday season, Bechtel Jacobs Co., which manages the Oak Ridge K-25 Site, contributed more than $20,000 to charitable organizations in the Oak Ridge-Knoxville area, according to Bechtel Jacobs spokesman John Schlatter. Recipients included the Salvation Army, Second Harvest Food Bank, Knox Area Rescue Ministries, Toys for Tots, the Holiday Bureau and the Empty Stocking Fund.

For the second year, Bechtel Jacobs provided a $2,500 grant to an employee-initiated Community Involvement Team that coordinated donations and gift purchases for underprivileged children through the Angel Tree Program, according to Schlatter. J.C. Penney and Big Lots in Oak Ridge, and Kay-Bee Toys at West Town Mall either made donations or gave additional discounts to the committee.

More than 175 children were "adopted" this year and more than 500 presents were delivered to six surrounding counties -- Anderson, Knox, Loudon, Morgan, Roane and Union. Coats, jeans, shoes, remote-control cars, dolls, bicycles, Big Wheels, and lots of other goodies were brought in for children ranging in age from newborn to 17.

For a second year in a row, the Oak Ridge National Laboratory Values Committee sponsored an Angel Tree. Teresa Ferguson, who co-chairs the ORNL Values Committee, said this year the generosity of ORNL employees will help to make Christmas a little more special for more than 181 children in the area. That area includes Anderson, Blount, Campbell, Knox, Loudon, Morgan, Roane and Union counties.

The Values Committee Angel Tree Subcommittee collected gifts on Dec. 4 and 5 and the results were "tremendous," according to Ferguson. She said there were "bags and bags" of gifts for the children, and even six new bicycles were collected. In addition, monetary donations collected totaled more than $600, and the money was used to supplement 19 other area needy children's Christmas wishes.

Ferguson said it was the generosity of the ORNL employees that made the ORNL Values Committee's Angel Tree such an overwhelming success.

ORNL is managed by UT-Battelle.

In addition, employees of subcontractor services and trades for ORNL's Spallation Neutron Source recently provided Christmas gifts for foster children who would not otherwise have a Christmas, officials said.

Participating in the effort were employees of Knight/Jacobs Joint Venture, which performs engineering and construction management services for the SNS, along with members of the Knoxville Building and Construction Trades Council and the SNS Conventional Facilities Contractors and Suppliers.

In addition to corporate donations and employee and union membership gifts and donations totaling $5,200, Christmas gifts were provided to 23 children under the care of the East Tennessee Community Services Agency, which provides support to foster children and their families.

---

Two recall their first Oak Ridge Christmas

The Oak Ridger
Tuesday, December 26, 2000
by Amy L. Lee Oak Ridger staff
http://www.oakridger.com/stories/122600/com_1226000009.html

Ida Hagaman remembers her 14th Christmas -- her first in Oak Ridge -- as a family event. The year was 1943, and it was a "white Christmas."

"My sister and parents were working, so we were pretty much tied down. We lived in an 'A' house on Georgia Avenue," she said.

Although Hagaman was familiar with snow, "There were a lot of children here who had never seen snow before," she said.

Hagaman said Christmas was not as big a deal then, commercially, as it is now.

"We had a tree, but as far as packages ... we did our shopping in Knoxville when we could get there."

The middle of the year in 1943 saw people from all over the United States making preparations to move to Tennessee. Their mission was mysterious ... something about a "Manhattan Project."

Hagaman said her father, an equipment auditor, was transferred from Eau Claire, Wis., to the Manhattan Project. "Of course we didn't know what the Manhattan Project was then, but he helped find the equipment to build Oak Ridge" she said.

Hagaman remembered many families staying in their new town that year rather than returning to their points of origin.

"Quite a few stayed. There was gas rationing, so it wasn't easy to go back and forth if you (had) lived very far away."

The vast number of community activities we experience today were not part of the holiday hustle and bustle in 1943 either. Hagaman said her family's church was not organized at that time, so they attended services in Knoxville.

"It is much more commercialized now, but we still put an emphasis on the Christian part. It's still a family holiday for us," she said.

Colleen Black wasn't here for Christmas 1943, but arrived with her family from Nashville early in 1944.

Her uncles, who came in 1943 and were already working in Oak Ridge, told the family about the opportunities here. Her father had accepted a job with Midwest Pipe; "He probably moved the pipe in we had leak-tested," she said. That year, Black at age 19 was the oldest girl in her family, and she and her mother took jobs at the Oak Ridge K-25 site in leak testing in the Conditioning Building.

"We didn't ask any questions. We weren't supposed to. Everything was a secret," she said.

Security was so pervasive children were afraid Santa Claus couldn't get into Oak Ridge because he didn't have a badge, and Black said many people didn't receive their Christmas packages from friends and family back home because Oak Ridge wasn't even on the map.

Black remembered having to work Christmas Day 1944 and eating Christmas dinner at the cafeteria at K-25. But the holiday was observed differently then than it is now.

"It was low-key. You didn't buy anything, and if you tried, (the clerks) would say, 'Don't you know there's a war going on?' We were just hoping to get the war over with.

"We didn't hang up designer stockings like the kids do now -- we just used our own socks and hung them around," she said. "And it was unpatriotic to buy (Christmas) lights. There was a war going on, so all the houses weren't decorated inside and out like they are now.

"We had left all our decorations at home anyway because this was just a temporary place. We threw cotton on the tree and strung popcorn to put on it. It was just a different lifestyle, but they were fun times," she said.

Black found her contentment in the community and in the double trailer that eight of 10 siblings shared with their parents -- eating and sleeping in shifts. Black moved into a dormitory, and one brother was in the military.

"Everyone was working together ... We were all far away from family. We just went to church and tried to have a normal lifestyle," she said.

Black said she and some of her friends would get together and make fudge if they could get enough sugar together. "Sugar was rationed. I don't think the fudge ever got hard."

Not only was cooking more difficult, but the city itself was different in those days.

"It looked like an Army camp, which I guess it was. There were no permanent buildings, except some farm buildings. The streets weren't paved, and there were no traffic lights," Black recalled.

"There were a lot of buses, because they had quit making cars in 1942, and gas was rationed. And even if you had a car, it was always full -- it was unpatriotic to go somewhere by yourself.

"There were a lot of walkers, and there was mud everywhere. Soap was scarce and it was hard to keep things clean.

"We wanted to go back home. I never dreamed I'd still be here all these years later."

-------- us nuc waste

Firm Seeks 'Hotter' N-Waste Permit
Envirocare wants a hurry-up approval through Legislature

Salt Lake Tribune
Saturday, December 23, 2000
BY DAN HARRIE and JUDY FAHYS THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE
http://www.sltrib.com/12232000/utah/56369.htm

A high-energy debate about low-level radioactive waste already is under way at the Utah Capitol, even before the public has had a chance to see or comment on the plan.

Envirocare of Utah wants to bring "hotter" waste to its specialized landfill in Tooele County, about 80 miles west of Salt Lake City. To get permission to do it under current law, the company first must pass muster with the state's technical experts and the public. Then it requires final approval by the Legislature and the governor.

Department of Environmental Quality officials have told the company and lawmakers that the agency review won't be completed in time for action by the 2001 Legislature. A mandatory 60-day public comment period is expected to last until March 2, two days after the end of the annual lawmaking session.

That would delay legislative and gubernatorial consideration of Envirocare's application until 2002.

Envirocare President Charles Judd said the company can't -- and won't -- wait that long.

"We're going to proceed," said Judd. "It's not like it's a slam dunk [to win approval] but we think we'll be able to get it through this legislative session without changes to the law."

The timing is critical, Judd claimed, for the company to be competitive.

"We've spent millions of dollars and a lot of time putting this together," said Judd. "We can't wait a year or we feel the market will be greatly reduced."

Judd said his position, and that of Envirocare attorneys, is that the Legislature can take up the bill simultaneously with the public comment period -- an interpretation that clashes with state officials' view.

Regulators point out they are just conducting the review that lawmakers dictated years ago for determining whether projects like Envirocare's are scientifically safe and politically palatable. And, based on when Envirocare completed its paperwork, it appears there is no way for the state Division of Radiation Control to review the application and complete the public comment before the Legislature ends February 28. "We see no reason to change the process as it is," said Bill Sinclair, director of radiation control.

Last year, Envirocare applied with Radiation Control for permits and licenses for Class B and Class C categories of low-level radioactive wastes produced by nuclear power plants, research institutions and hospitals. It is "low-level" in contrast to "high-level" wastes, such as the spent nuclear fuel proposed for another Tooele County site, on the Skull Valley Band Goshute Indian Reservation.

Still, Class B and C wastes are hundreds, and sometimes thousands, of times more radioactive than the Class A wastes Envirocare now disposes.

The company and its supporters recognize that the B and C waste proposal faces a big political challenge because some Utahns not only question the safety of the stuff but also worry Utah is at risk of being labeled the nation's dump for all sorts of nuclear trash.

With this in mind, the company began to make its case long before the 2001 session.

It has contributed heavily to politicians this year -- $53,700. That includes $36,000 to legislators, $11,500 to the state Democratic Party and $4,700 to Gov. Mike Leavitt for the period ending a few days before the election.

And last month, the company prodded the state's advisory Radiation Control Board for swift action on a separate part of the application involving a land-use exemption essential for the B and C waste expansion. The board responded by moving up its meeting date so that public hearings could be held and Envirocare could get a decision before the Jan. 15 start of the 2001 Legislature.

If that approval is wrapped up, the company only has to fight on one major issue: whether Envirocare gets the approval of lawmakers and the governor for B and C wastes before scientists have their say and the public has a chance to weigh in.

Sinclair insisted a change in state law would be required for Envirocare's application to go before the Legislature in the upcoming session. And, he said, while Sen.-elect Bill Wright, R-Elberta, has a bill drafted to amend the law for Envirocare, nothing's definite yet.

"That's under discussion," Sinclair said. "I don't think Sen. Wright has made a decision on whether or not to do that."

Wright did not return a phone message Friday.

The trouble with enacting the proposed change, said Sinclair, is that lawmakers would risk approving a project they don't know for sure will be safe.

"There is a technical part of the process [which is not yet complete,]" said Sinclair. "And there is a public policy part of the process."

The governor said this week that the current review process should be allowed to run its course without interference. "The Legislature may choose to do that [alter the process], but I don't see any particular likelihood that that will happen," said Leavitt.

One legislative critic of the political angling surrounding Envirocare's initiative is Rep. Keele Johnson, R-Blanding.

Johnson, who will not be returning to the Legislature in January, complained the company and its supporters in the Legislature are leveraging the B and C waste on the state's desperate drive to find new funding sources for public schools. Some legislators already have floated a plan that would dedicate to education any new waste fees paid to the state.

"Just don't use education as a reason to push this project through," he said. "It should stand up on its merits."

-------

Yucca Mountain Nuclear Waste repository
Waste storage plan called risky Two proposals would bring spent fuel to Nevada

Dec. 26, 2000
By Mary Manning <manning@lasvegassun.com>
LAS VEGAS SUN

If the Energy Department implements a plan to store high-level nuclear waste above ground outside Yucca Mountain while a permanent repository is being built, the health of Nevada residents would be at risk, state officials say.

The DOE is weighing storing nuclear waste above ground near Yucca Mountain to save money on a permanent repository at Yucca now estimated at $58 billion, the Las Vegas Sun has learned.

Construction of a permanent repository designed to bury 77,000 tons of radioactive commercial and defense waste would be stretched out over two decades -- with completion sometime after 2030 -- to make it more affordable, according to a DOE plan.

Meanwhile tons of waste would be shipped to Midway Valley, a stone's throw from Yucca Mountain, in a section of the Nevada Test Site not contaminated by nuclear testing. There it could be stored in shielded containers on the valley's surface or in pools of water, similar to the pools at the nation's 110 nuclear reactor sites.

Two Nevada officials see safety as the major problem with the DOE plan. There's a question of protecting the environment from radiation releases, and the potential for earthquakes in Midway Valley could stop the Nuclear Regulatory Commission from allowing the DOE to store waste there.

A 5.6 magnitude quake on June 29, 1992, rattled Little Skull Mountain, less than 12 miles from Midway Valley, and damaged a field office in the area, said Joe Strolin, administrator of the planning division for the state's Agency for Nuclear Projects.

"The big issue is whether the site could be licensed for storage under current regulations," Strolin said.

Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, is the only site being studied to become the nation's high-level nuclear waste repository. The DOE is in charge of studying the site's suitability and would oversee the construction of the repository, if it is approved.

The plan, offered by TRW Environmental Safety Systems Inc., the primary Yucca Mountain contractor, is tucked within two technical reports on the rising cost of the project, dated May and December 1999.

TRW's proposals would likely not be approved, said Bob Loux, director of the state's Agency for Nuclear Projects.

"The DOE could not meet the current Nuclear Regulatory Commission requirements for siting nuclear (waste storage) at the Test Site," Loux said.

TRW's proposals are being driven by costs, not science, Loux said.

Under TRW's plans, the DOE would gain time to work out safety and scientific concerns for a permanent dump. Meanwhile, the nation's high level waste would be stored at a convenient location for moving it to Yucca Mountain.

The reports focus on the high cost of titanium drip shields. The drip shields, designed to protect canisters holding nuclear waste from corrosion from ground water, were added in the mid-1990s after government scientists found more water than expected in Yucca Mountain. The shields would cost an extra $7.5 billion, the reports say.

By comparison the entire Yucca Mountain Project, including scores of scientific studies and the construction of an exploratory tunnel, has cost about $6 billion since 1982.

In a TRW report released this month, DOE downplays the use of titanium shields, touting the strength of the metal alloy that will be used for the waste canisters.

In addition, higher costs for drilling tunnels, building surface space to switch nuclear wastes from shipping to disposal containers and other costs add $12.3 billion to the proposed $43 million to $49 million estimate in 1999, the reports say.

The two reports, written as cost analyses, propose several measures to compensate for the high cost of the drip shields, including storing the waste above ground temporarily and building the repository in phases, spreading the cost out over two decades.

In delaying construction of the entire repository -- on a design, which the DOE has not yet finalized -- the reports suggest the waste could be stored in Midway Valley until the repository was completed sometime after 2030.

The report sets out two scenarios. In both, workers dig a tunnel, fill it with waste, and move on to the next tunnel. Through the digging process, waste waiting to be deposited would be held at Midway Valley.

In one scenario, workers would begin closing off the tunnels after 50 years. In the second, workers would close off tunnels after 125 years. The wait between filling and closing the tunnels is to allow the waste to cool.

The repository design does not yet establish how many tunnels would be dug.

The temporary storage of nuclear waste at Midway Valley also was proposed in a December 1998 TRW report that suggested that waste could be trucked to Nevada by 2007 -- three years before the current plan to complete a proposed repository.

In several reports, TRW suggested that bringing shipments of nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain up to three years earlier than the repository's expected opening in 2010 could save more than $500 million.

Jeff Gorman of Dominion Engineering in Maryland said the scientific questions about titanium and the metal alloy have not been answered.

"I have not as yet studied the design of the drip shield so I can't comment on the thickness they have selected," Gorman said. "Possibly in a year or two my colleagues and I will have some insights."

In September state consultants reported that in test results the metal alloy the DOE is planning to use in its containers for burying the wastes disintegrated in water from Yucca Mountain in less than a month, Loux said.

After the waste is on site, metal alloy waste containers themselves could disintegrate inside the mountain before the repository's 10,000-year lifespan is complete, state scientists maintain. Nevada officials have opposed any repository at Yucca.

Loux also points to studies by both state and independent consultants for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the agency that would license a repository at Yucca, that hint at possible weakening of the titanium shields from interactions between ground water, heat from the nuclear wastes and the rock's chemistry.

"The jury is still out," Loux said. "The data say the containers won't work, not just that the supposition that the containers are going to last for 10,000 years. Without reliable containers and without drip shields, there is no repository."

In addition, the project faces an inspector general probe and possibly an investigation by the General Accounting Office.

Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Energy Secretary Bill Richardson have asked the inspector general to investigate the "apparent bias" of TRW. Nevada's congressional delegation has said it will ask for the GAO report.

The investigations were prompted by a Dec. 1 copyrighted Sun story disclosing documents that suggested the DOE was collaborating behind the scenes with the nuclear industry to recommend Yucca Mountain.

Federal law prohibits the DOE from taking sides in the site selection process.

The Sun obtained a 60-page draft of a DOE overview that concluded Yucca Mountain was a safe site to store radioactive wastes even though a massive scientific study had not been completed.

Attached to the overview was a two-page memo from TRW that suggested the overview could be used by Yucca supporters to sell the project to Congress.

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

Missile Defense: The Jury's Still Out

Washington Post
Tuesday, December 26, 2000; Page A28
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A50314-2000Dec25.html

Robert Kagan's Dec. 18 op-ed column on missile defense missed the target ["Why Bush's Missile Plan Might Bomb"].

Mr. Kagan would have us believe that the only difficulty standing in the way of an effective missile defense is a lack of political will. According to this view, America could deploy a functional missile shield in short order if only we had a sufficiently committed president who wasn't afraid to stand up to Congress, Russia, China and our NATO allies. This line of argument papers over two fundamental truths:

(1) Seventeen years and tens of billions of dollars after Ronald Reagan inaugurated the Strategic Defense Initiative, the technology needed to reliably shoot down ballistic missiles still does not exist.

(2) The costs of developing, building and operating a missile defense are not well understood. Last April, the Congressional Budget Office estimated that the Pentagon's current missile defense architecture, which is designed to protect against attack by a relatively small number of incoming missiles, might cost from $30 billion to $49 billion. It further noted that it was unable to make a judgment as to the effectiveness of the proposed missile defense and warned that uncertainty surrounding the ultimate design of the system could result in cost increases.

The jury is still out on whether the new administration will be able to overcome the significant technological and budgetary hurtles that have prevented the deployment of an effective ballistic missile defense. Contrary to Mr. Kagan's assertions, the effort to develop a missile defense capability has enjoyed considerable bipartisan support; at the same time, legitimate, bipartisan concern exists about proposals to deploy a missile defense system that doesn't work and costs too much.

DANIEL JOURDAN Arlington


-------- MILITARY

-------- australia

--------
Australian military seeks to expand

Washington Times
December 26, 2000
By Aravind Adiga SPECIAL TO THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/world/default-20001226224712.htm

SYDNEY, Australia - Australia has embarked on an ambitious program to enhance its overseas deployment capabilities and expand its strategic role in the Asia-Pacific region, including a major increase in defense spending.

The government this month released a defense "white paper," or comprehensive policy statement, outlining an increase in military spending from the current annual level of $6.5 billion to $8.7 billion by the decade's end.

The cumulative increase of $12.6 billion in the military budget over 10 years is a landmark change in Australian strategic planning. The country's military spending has been declining in real terms since the end of the Cold War and now stands at only 1.8 percent of national gross domestic product, the lowest level since the end of World War II.

The white paper argues that a stronger military is necessary for Australia to cope with the increased potential for instability among its neighbors.

It notes that "the countries of our immediate neighborhood - Indonesia, East Timor, Papua New Guinea, and the island states of the southwest Pacific - face large economic and structural challenges."

Australia sent troops last year to East Timor as part of a U.N. peacekeeping force intended to quell rioting by Jakarta-backed militias after the territory voted in a referendum to separate from Indonesia. The mission was Australia's most significant military commitment in recent years.

As the white paper put it: "Our armed forces have been busier over the last decade, and especially over the past two years, than at any time since our involvement in Vietnam."

Since then, there has been further turmoil among Australia's neighbors.

Indonesia, still recovering from the loss of East Timor, has been stunned once again by an independence movement - this time in the province of Irian Jaya. In May, a coup in Fiji deposed the democratically elected government and plunged that island nation into a protracted crisis.

The new defense spending aims to strengthen Australia's ability to respond effectively to overseas flash points such as East Timor.

"Australia . . . cannot be secure in an insecure region, and as a middle-size power there is much we can and should do to help to keep our region secure, and support global stability," the white paper says.

To expand its strike capability, the air force will receive four new Boeing airborne early warning and control aircraft, with an option on another three. In the long term, the government envisages buying up to 100 new aircraft to replace the present combat fleet of F-111 bombers and F/A-18 fighters.

The navy will get at least three new destroyers to replace old frigates, in addition to new amphibious ships, patrol boats, Harpoon anti-ship missiles, and supply ships. The army will receive equipment upgrades and will be expanded to 54,000 troops by the decade's end - an increase of 3,500 over present numbers.

Underpinning the new defense system will be a major investment in intelligence-gathering equipment such as spy planes and radar systems.

The tone of the white paper is more strident than previous pronouncements from the government and signals a desire for greater self-reliance in the determination of Australia's military needs.

"We believe that if Australia were attacked, the United States would provide substantial help, including armed force. We would seek and welcome such help. But we will not depend on it."

Australia's military expansion acquires greater significance when viewed in the context of a general decrease in military spending among many of its neighbors, which are still recovering from the Asian financial crisis of 1997-98. Defense budgets in countries such as South Korea and Japan have decreased in real terms in recent years.

Australia's new spending plans could also provide an opportunity for major international defense suppliers.

Sikorsky, the helicopter manufacturer, is expected to receive a contract for the supply for 12 Black Hawk helicopters to the Navy. Lockheed Martin and Bofors are among the suppliers expected to compete for a new portable "bunker-buster" missile that the army will receive.

-------- brazil

Submarine sinks in Rio de Janeiro

Infobeat
Morning Coffee Edition
12/26/2000
http://us.f23.mail.yahoo.com/ym/login?.rand=53ni02vhikbn7

RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil (AP) - A Brazilian navy submarine sank at its mooring in Rio de Janeiro's harbor, local media reported Monday. Officials said there were no injuries or environmental damage. The S-21 Toneleiros was undergoing repairs at a navy maintenance dock in the harbor when a malfunction in the vessel's hydraulic system caused it to fill with water late Sunday night, Globonews television reported. The diesel-powered submarine remained submerged in 30 feet of water Monday, but authorities reportedly hoped to pull it out using forklifts and cables. Navy officials could not immediately be reached for comment. The vessel was reportedly capable of holding at least four missiles, but authorities said it was not armed at the time of sinking, Globonews reported. The 300-foot-long submarine was used mostly for training purposes, it said.

---

Brazilian submarine sinks at dock

Washington Times
December 26, 2000
World Scene Combined dispatches and staff reports
http://www.washtimes.com/world/worldscene-20001226213640.htm

SAO PAULO, Brazil - The Brazilian navy launched an investigation yesterday into what caused its largest submarine to sink at its moorings.

None of the crew was injured when the submarine Tonelero sank in shallow water yesterday at the naval base in Rio de Janeiro, where it was under repair, naval officials said.

A failure in the hydraulic system that controls the submarine's valves caused the vessel to take on water at an uncontrollable rate, naval Commander Joao Carlos Rezende said.

-------- colombia

Colombia weighs land for peace

Infobeat
Tuesday, December 26, 2000
By MICHAEL EASTERBROOK Associated Press Writer
http://www.infobeat.com/cgi-bin/WebObjects/IBFrontEnd.woa/wa/fullStory?article=405534563

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) - Colombia's second largest rebel group appeared on the verge of gaining a safe haven for holding peace talks with the government after freeing dozens of police and soldiers.

Speaking to reporters Sunday, President Andres Pastrana said ``there is a draft for an agreement'' on pulling out all government troops from a northern region that is a stronghold of the leftist National Liberation Army, or ELN.

A day earlier, the rebel group freed 42 police and soldiers they had captured in fighting during the past few years.

It had been using the men as bargaining chips to gain a demilitarized zone similar to one Pastrana granted two years ago to a larger leftist group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC.

The ELN has demanded the area be cleared to encourage dialogue.

But most Colombians believe the southern FARC-held demilitarized zone has been a disaster, and a new land concession in the north could spark protest, especially from residents of Bolivar State, where the zone would likely be created.

In its Switzerland-sized area, the FARC has allegedly abused local residents and used the zone to recruit fighters and stage attacks. Meanwhile, peace talks with the FARC on ending Colombia's 36-year conflict have gone nowhere.

Pastrana said government officials would meet with Bolivar residents and community leaders before making a final decision to surrender the territory to the ELN.

He said the draft agreement contemplates sending human rights monitors, and has other guarantees to protect civilians.

The announcement follows the hostage release and weeks of meetings between government envoys and rebel commanders in Cuba.

The ELN, formed during the 1960's, has been a major irritant to the Colombian government in recent years, blowing up oil pipelines and kidnapping large groups of Colombians for ransom.

Evidence is growing, however, that the rebels may be pining for a peace settlement, in part due to heavy pressure from the armed forces and surging right-wing paramilitary forces.

In their latest attack on suspected rebel sympathizers, paramilitary gunmen assassinated eight people Sunday in western Antioquia State, state police told the Associated Press.

---

Colombian Government Upbeat on ELN Enclave Deal

Yahoo News
World News
Tuesday December 26 4:21 PM ET
By Jude Webber
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20001226/wl/colombia_rebels_dc_2.html

BOGOTA (Reuters) - The Colombian government said on Tuesday it was moving closer to establishing another demilitarized enclave for leftist rebels as part of President Andres Pastrana's land-for-peace policy.

Pastrana led government representatives in a meeting with community activists in the departments of Bolivar and Antioquia, north of Bogota, to address resident concerns a demilitarized zone for the National Liberation Army (ELN) would heighten violence in their region.

Pastrana said over the weekend the government had drafted a deal to grant the 5,000-strong ELN, Colombia's second-largest rebel group, a demilitarized enclave similar to the tract of southern jungle ceded to the country's main rebel group, the FARC, two years ago to bring it to the negotiating table.

He said he hoped full-scale peace negotiations would take place within nine months after the land deal was in place.

The acceleration of peace moves with the 5,000-strong ELN came after it freed 42 policemen and soldiers in a Christmas goodwill gesture, crowning what both the rebels and government called positive talks in Cuba, the ELN's ideological homeland. Those talks were the latest in a year of informal contacts.

``I think we're at a stage now when white smoke will definitely emerge,'' Development Minister Augusto Ramirez told reporters shortly after Pastrana, his top peace commissioner, Camilo Gomez, and Interior Minister, Humberto de la Calle, began talks with the regional representatives on the ELN zone.

He was referring to the white smoke which emerges from the Vatican when cardinals succeed in electing a pope.

Scene Of Clashes

The planned ELN enclave has already been the scene of fierce clashes between rebels and far-right paramilitary death squads in Colombia's four-decade-old conflict, which has claimed more than 35,000 lives in the past 10 years alone.

Security forces say the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) has used its area, off limits to the military until Jan. 31, for recruitment and to plot bloody attacks. The government has said, however, that an ELN zone would be subject to stricter controls and international monitoring.

Ramirez said that if a deal were reached with the ELN, a national convention of civil representatives, the Roman Catholic Church and the international community would start immediately to pave the way to full-scale talks with the rebels which Pastrana said he hoped could start within nine months.

Two years of peace talks with the FARC which have yielded scant tangible progress ground to a halt last month when the rebels pulled out, demanding a government crackdown on paramilitary squads it says targets rebels and sympathizers.

The FARC has until Jan. 31 to decide to return to the negotiating table or see the Colombian military allowed back into its Switzerland-sized zone.

The government is seeking twin track advances with the ELN and the FARC and was due to meet FARC representatives on Wednesday to cover what would be the first prisoner exchange in Colombia's years of strife, a government source said.

The government has refused the FARC's offer to swap some 450 hostages for about 350 jailed rebels, but has dangled the ''humanitarian exchange'' of 20 prisoners a sweetener to spur the resumption of talks many Colombians believe have gone nowhere.

---

Bush Should Start Over in Colombia

New York Times
December 26, 2000
By PAUL WELLSTONE
http://www.nytimes.com/2000/12/26/opinion/26WELL.html

WASHINGTON - Earlier this month I traveled to Colombia to learn more about this war-torn country, whose military is getting nearly $2 million per day from the United States as part of an aid package that passed last June after narrow approval in the Senate.

I paid a visit to Barrancabermeja, an oil-refining port city on Colombia's Magdalena River. "Barranca," a city of 210,000, is one of the most dangerous places in one of the world's most dangerous countries. This year so far, violence in Barranca has killed at least 410 people. According to local human rights groups, most of those killed were the victims of right-wing paramilitary death squads.

These human rights groups operate in the midst of a 40-year-old civil war now in one of its most violent phases. Every year, the violence in Colombia kills nearly 4,000 people, most of them poor, powerless noncombatants. About 300,000 - more than half of them children - are forced from their homes each year. Another 3,000 people are kidnapped. Ransoms, extortion and the drug trade finance armed groups on the right and left.

In the name of the drug war, the American aid package approved this year allocates approximately 75 percent of its resources to Colombia's security forces. But Colombia's military is a deeply troubled institution, even though it has recently taken important steps to improve its overall human rights record.

The State Department recently reported that "civilian management of the armed forces is limited" in Colombia, and that in 1999 "the authorities rarely brought officers of the security forces and the police charged with human rights offenses to justice, and impunity remains a problem." Many members of the security forces continue to collaborate with the right- wing paramilitaries, who commit about three-quarters of the politically motivated murders in Colombia.

The country's two main guerrilla groups, the FARC and E.L.N., meanwhile, are supported in part by skimming from the drug trade (as are the paramilitaries), and commit about a fifth of killings while terrorizing the population. Yet even in these circumstances, I met many individuals in Colombia who are working for peace as prosecutors, investigators and journalists, and as workers in dozens of nongovernmental organizations. These people have little room for maneuver. A shocking number disappear, are assassinated or are forced to leave the country.

Now Washington has made their jobs harder. As part of an antidrug strategy that has failed so far, the new aid package is escalating the fighting and dealing a severe blow to President Andrés Pastrana's already troubled peace talks with the guerrillas.

Before things get any worse, the coming administration of George W. Bush would do well to take our Colombia policy back to the drawing board. A more effective approach has to include support for Colombia's peace process, strong new protections for human rights defenders and initiatives to make drug production less attractive to economically desperate peasants by providing support for sustainable alternative crops.

In the meantime, we need to make short-term improvements in the policy. The American aid package itself offers a guide.

The Senate's version included strong human rights conditions. It would have cut off military aid until the United States government could certify that Colombia's armed forces were disentangling from paramilitaries and punishing criminal conduct in their ranks. A House-Senate conference committee watered down this safeguard by giving the president the ability to waive it - essentially making the human rights conditions optional. The State Department recognized that Colombia's military did not meet these standards, but the administration took the easy way out and waived the conditions in August.

The waiver sent a terrible signal to Colombia's military and to its beleaguered defenders of human rights. The waiver eliminated what could have been an important source of leverage with the government for those working for human rights.

Next month, the United States government must once again certify that Colombia's military satisfies the conditions, so that delivery of antidrug aid can continue in 2001. This time, the Bush administration's State Department must take a tough stance: no waiver and no aid until all human rights conditions are met. Americans should not be supporting a partnership with a military that does not meet these very basic standards.

Paul Wellstone is a senator from Minnesota.

-------- drug war

USA Today
12/26/00
States
http://usatoday.com/news/states/all50.htm

Texas

Houston - Draden, a drug-sniffing dog, is home after more than two weeks of unintentional freedom. The Customs Service had offered a $5,000 reward, describing Draden as one of the agency's "best assets." The 6-year-old Labrador retriever was found wandering north of Houston and was returned to his handler, 10 pounds lighter and suffering from a slight infection.

-------- india/pakistan

Bombs in 4 Cities Wound Some 45 Pakistanis

New York Times
December 26, 2000
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/2000/12/26/world/26PAKI.html
http://www.infobeat.com/cgi-bin/WebObjects/IBFrontEnd.woa/wa/fullStory?article=405533493

LAHORE, Pakistan, Dec. 25 - Bombs went off in four Pakistani cities today, including a powerful blast that ripped through a crowded market in this eastern border city, the police said. Some 45 people were wounded.

Meanwhile today, in the Indian- controlled portion of Kashmir - the Himalayan territory disputed by India and Pakistan - a car bomb went off outside army headquarters, killing 8 people and wounding 23 others.

A Pakistan-based rebel group called the Jamaat-ul Mujahedeen claimed responsibility for the explosion in Kashmir in telephone calls to local newspapers. Within hours, a spokesman for the Jaish-e-Mohammad, another guerrilla group, also claimed it had carried out the attack.

In Pakistan, the first bomb ripped through a crowded market in Lahore, wounding 36 people, while the second bomb exploded at a railway station in Faisalabad, also in eastern Punjab province, wounding three people, they said.

Six people were wounded in an explosion on a passenger bus in Hyderabad in the southern Sindh province. A blast in Kharian, 70 miles north of Lahore, did not cause any injuries.

No group claimed responsibility for any of the blasts, but Pakistani police accused India of seeking retaliation for last weekend's attack in New Delhi on India's historic Red Fort.

Islamic militants from the Pakistani-based Lashkar-e-Tayyaba took responsibility for the Red Fort attack that killed three people, including two soldiers.

"We were expecting Indian-sponsored terrorist activities after mujahedeen hit New Delhi's Red Fort," said Malik Asif Hayyat, inspector general of the Punjab police.

There was no immediate reaction from India to those accusations.

The explosion in Lahore, the provincial capital of Punjab, caused a fire that destroyed several stalls and shattered glass in nearby buildings in a bazaar.

The bomb was apparently left in a shopping bag near stalls selling used clothing. The explosion touched off a stampede as fire and smoke billowed from the stores.

The bombing occurred as people were busy shopping for the Muslim festival of Id al-Fitr, which follows the end of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan. The festival begins on Wednesday.

-------- iraq

Saddam calls for holy war on Israel

Infobeat
Tuesday, December 26, 2000
http://www.infobeat.com/cgi-bin/WebObjects/IBFrontEnd.woa/wa/fullStory?article=405534147
http://www.washtimes.com/world/worldscene-20001226213640.htm

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - Saddam Hussein used his traditional Christmas message Monday to call on the world's Christians and Muslims to rise up in holy war against Israel and the ``Zionist conspiracy.''

The Iraqi leader praised Christians and other Iraqis for standing up to conspiracies through which ``the United States, Britain and Zionism ... have tried to bend Iraqis' will, bring them to their knees and master their independent decision.''

The letter was carried on the front page of every Baghdad newspaper.

The president called on Christians and Muslims everywhere to take ``the path of jihad (holy war), without which we cannot attain our aspirations of establishing right, justice and peace and delivering humanity from the evils of aggressors, criminal killers.''

Iraq opposes peace agreements signed between Israel and the Palestinians and those signed with neighboring countries.

``The Zionist conspiracy aims at Judaizing (Jerusalem) and other areas of Palestine and annihilating its indigenous population, Muslims and Christians, with the backing of America,'' al-Thawra daily quoted Saddam as saying in his letter.

Since Israeli-Palestinian clashes began in late September, more than 340 people, most of them Palestinians, have died and thousands have been injured. Earlier this month, Iraq pledged $881 million in oil revenues to support the Palestinian uprising.

-------- puerto rico

Bush to face fervor over Vieques

Infobeat
Tuesday, December 26, 2000
By EILEEN McNAMARA Associated Press Writer
http://www.infobeat.com/cgi-bin/WebObjects/IBFrontEnd.woa/wa/fullStory?article=405535556

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) - George W. Bush will face battles in Puerto Rico, where the new governor intends to step up a push for the end of Navy training on Vieques, a dispute that has fueled nationalism in the Caribbean territory.

Governor-elect Sila Calderon has vowed to fight the incoming Bush administration in her efforts to immediately evict the U.S. Navy from its prized bombing range on Vieques, a small inhabited island off Puerto Rico.

Her plans would go against an agreement between the White House and Puerto Rican government that would delay any withdrawal by the Navy to 2003. Navy Secretary Richard Danzig warned her this week that if she does not follow the agreement, the federal government will not be obliged to keep its side of the bargain, including returning some 8,000 acres of Navy land on Vieques.

``When one believes in something and in a principle - in this case the people of Vieques' democratic rights and rights to security of life and health - we cannot act with fear,'' Calderon said Dec. 14.

She spoke after the Navy announced it plans an official referendum on Nov. 6 that would give residents of Vieques, population 9,400, the choice of voting for the Navy to leave by May 2003 or allowing it to stay and resume live bombing.

Calderon plans a local referendum that would allow Vieques islanders to vote to eject the Navy immediately, and she plans to withdraw local police guarding the range against protesters as required in the agreement.

Years of resentment over the Navy bombing exploded in anger after an April 1999 bombing accident killed a civilian Puerto Rican guard on the range. Protesters invaded the range and thwarted exercises for a year until U.S. Marshals ejected them in May.

After that, the Navy resumed exercises but with only non-explosive bombs and reduced the number of training exercises, as had been agreed.

Calderon's opposition could provide the impetus for renewed demonstrations and might allow protesters to regain access to an unguarded range and stop exercises.

Her election is seen as a rejection of an eight-year drive toward U.S. statehood by Gov. Pedro Rossello's party. Calderon supports the current commonwealth status but wants more autonomy, including more control of some $13 billion that the federal government gives Puerto Rico each year.

Bush has promised to improve the military and his vice president, Dick Cheney, is a former secretary of defense. However, he also has said he would honor the Vieques agreement.

A legislator in Calderon's party, Jorge de Castro Font, in a recent radio interview said Puerto Rico's new administration is going to have to proceed with caution with Bush.

``They're not going to be able to make threats nor seek out confrontations,'' de Castro Font said.

The Navy also will lose some leverage, since Rossello had always tried to keep an amicable relationship to further his statehood cause.

The 4 million residents of the Spanish-speaking island are U.S. citizens who served in the armed forces, but they do not pay federal taxes and cannot vote for president.