NucNews - September 23, 2005 -------- NUCLEAR -------- africa Nuclear probe: Earthlife can make submission Pretoria, South Africa Mail & Guardian 23 September 2005 01:43 http://www.mg.co.za/articlepage.aspx?area=/breaking_news/breaking_news__national/&articleid=251842 Although environmental lobby group Earthlife Africa is not part of a team probing health concerns at the Pelindaba nuclear facility, it will be allowed to make submissions, a spokesperson for the investigator said. "We couldn't have included the stakeholders because it would have taken away the independence," said Simpiwe Msibi, spokesperson for the team led by Mogwera Khoathane. "Any stakeholder with relevant information and [who] can help the investigation going forward will be contacted and will give their input." This would include Earthlife Africa, the energy ministry and the National Nuclear Regulator, Msibi said. Already, 173 employees are down to be interviewed in the investigation, due to begin "in a few weeks". "They will be contacted and called in." Earthlife Africa had said it was concerned there would be a "whitewash" and no independence without any of the team members it had proposed. "We now have no hope that the Necsa [Nuclear Energy Corporation of South Africa] study will be independent. It looks like a whitewash," spokesperson Mashile Phalane said in a statement. His statement followed a recent meeting by ill workers of Necsa, Earthlife Africa, the Congress of South African Trade Unions and the justice and peace desk of the Catholic Bishops Conference with Khoathane to discuss civil-society participation in the study. Khoathane was appointed by the Necsa board to probe allegations made against the occupational health and safety practices of Necsa as well as events leading to the death of employee Victor Motha at the company's nuclear reactor near Pretoria. Khoatane's team include Annanda How, an internationally registered International Organisation for Standardisation auditor and trainer for quality and environmental management systems, and Shaun Guy, a radiation-protection and radioactive waste-management expert. Other members are Mokgothu Brian Nkonoane, a practising attorney with experience in personal-injury claims and litigation matters; Monde Ntwasa, a molecular biologist; and Barney de Villiers, an occupational health expert. Earthlife Africa had proposed environmental lawyer Richard Spoor, occupational health specialist Murray Coombs, environmental scientist and toxicologist Willie van Niekerk, organisational psychologist AA Ngwezi, international public-health specialist Gordon Thompson, and international epidemiologist Richard Clapp. The group felt that because some of its nominees were not from South Africa, they could be independent of Necsa since they did not depend on the organisation for contracts or employment. -- Sapa -------- asia CSX derailment under investigation 9/23/2005 3:45 PM (Buffalo-RNS) http://www.wroctv.com/news/story.asp?id=20070&r=l Congressman Tom Reynolds is calling for a federal investigation into the early Thursday morning derailment of a rail car used to haul spent nuclear fuel, in Buffalo. The container was part of a train that was sideswiped by another, in the local CSX yard, on Brinkman Avenue about 1 a.m. Responding emergency crews found the stainless steel rail car was empty, with no radiation leak discovered. The container was on its way from a Department of Energy naval reactor in Idaho, bound for the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery, Maine. -------- australia Australia Union push to end ban on uranium Katharine Murphy September 23, 2005 The Australian http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,16692957%255E601,00.html THE Labor Party faces pressure from one of Australia's biggest unions to dump its 20-year ban on new uranium mines. In comments that split the labour movement, Australian Workers Union national president Bill Ludwig yesterday called on Queensland Labor Premier Peter Beattie to allow the development of uranium deposits in the state. "I think we should have a practical debate about this and not an emotional one," Mr Ludwig declared. "We've got no in-principle opposition to nuclear power, provided it is done in a responsible way." Mr Ludwig's call will ignite hostilities between the nation's biggest unions. Two powerful left-wing unions, the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union and the Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union, which represents thousands of coalminers, are bitterly opposed to nuclear power and the uranium industry. It also aligns Mr Ludwig's right-wing union faction with soft Left federal Labor resources spokesman Martin Ferguson, who has led a campaign to get Labor to reverse its opposition to expanding uranium mining. Three weeks ago, he urged Mr Beattie to rethink Queensland's ban on new uranium mines. The powerful AWU, which represents uranium mining workers, will argue that Labor should scrap its 20-year-old "three mines" policy when the issue is debated at the next federal Labor Party conference, scheduled for 2007. The Labor leaders of Victoria, Western Australia and the Northern Territory have also come under pressure to reverse their opposition to uranium mining amid renewed debate about the use of nuclear energy in Australia and overseas. Mr Beattie has declared that the ban should stay, because more uranium mining would detract from the stellar performance of the coal sector in his resource-rich state. But the Queensland minerals industry has increased pressure on the Premier by calling for valuable uranium deposits in the state's northwest to be exploited. Thirty-two deposits have been identified in Queensland. Yesterday, AMWU national secretary Doug Cameron blasted Mr Ludwig's call and said it would be opposed strongly if there were a debate to change Labor Party policy. "We don't see any merit in capitulating to global corporations putting profits before the safety of their workers," Mr Cameron said. "More uranium mining won't change the Howard Government. "The priority for the ALP is to defeat the Howard Government and we shouldn't be diverted. Unions should not capitulate to big business demands." The CFMEU, which represents 13,000 coalminers, has already declared its opposition to developing nuclear power because of inadequate safeguards. The South Australian branch of the ALP, which oversees BHP Billiton's massive Olympic Dam deposit at Roxby Downs, which has up to a third of the world's known uranium deposits, also wants a debate on the three mines policy. Uranium is also mined at the Northern Territory's Ranger operation and the small Beverley mine in South Australia. There are dozens of undeveloped deposits around the country. Mr Ferguson's stance is opposed by many Australian environmentalists, some health groups and by a large proportion of the federal Labor caucus, including the ALP's environment spokesman, Anthony Albanese. Nuclear power and uranium mining has been put back on the political agenda by a trebling of the world price of uranium. The Howard Government wants to take advantage of this by increasing exports. Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics released figures this week forecasting that the value of uranium exports would jump almost 30 per cent to $616 million this financial year. Canberra is negotiating a new agreement with China that would have uranium sent to Beijing for civilian purposes. Some cabinet ministers have also backed nuclear energy in Australia. Uranium mining has always been divisive for the ALP and the wider labour movement. The party split dramatically on the issue during the 1980s until Bob Hawke pushed through the compromise three mines policy. Mr Ludwig said Australia needed to position itself for a dramatic increase in the number of nuclear power plants in Southeast Asia, the US and Europe as the world embraced cleaner energy sources. ---- Nations Selling Uranium Must Store Waste, Areva Tells Australia Friday September 23, 3:53 PM Asia Pulse http://sg.biz.yahoo.com/050923/16/3v627.html PERTH, Sept 23 Asia Pulse - The world's number two uranium miner, Areva Group, says countries which sell uranium have a moral obligation to store the waste, even if the uranium is exported. Arguing the case for the acceptance of uranium mining in Australia to a federal committee, France-based Areva said if uranium is mined and exported in Australia the waste should be transported back for storage. "I think we probably do have a moral obligation," said Stephen Mann, general manager of Cogema Australia, Areva's mining subsidiary. "Waste material could be stored very safely in depositories." Areva Group is a vertically integrated nuclear company, involved in every stage of nuclear energy from mining to power generation. It produces 20 per cent of the world's uranium via its mining subsidiary COGEMA, which also has exploration projects in the Northern Territory, South Australia and Queensland. The storage of uranium waste, a bi-product of the processing of uranium for power generation, is a contentious issue in the nuclear debate. Federal member of Kalgoorlie Barry Haase, who sits on the federal uranium committee, said the storage of uranium waste was largely misunderstood by the general public. "One of the great problems in discussing anything nuclear is the fallacy in relation to the danger of the stored waste products," Mr Haase said. Mining industry body the Association of Mining and Exploration Companies (AMEC) is pro-uranium mining but research and policy officer Alan Layton does not think Australia should be responsible for disposing of waste from other countries. "I am not certain about this notion that when we sell uranium we have to take back the waste," Mr Layton said. "If you send a live sheep overseas and it is gutted and they don't use the gut we don't take the gut back and bury it in the Gibson Desert." He said it was safer to bury the waste at the point where the product is used, rather than transporting it. The House of Representatives Standing Committee on Industry and Resources is hearing evidence for its inquiry into the development of the non-fossil fuel energy industry in Australia. -------- britain Order served over waste rule breach Fri 23 Sep 2005 Scotsman http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=1986762005 Nuclear plant bosses have been served with an enforcement order after they broke rules which allow it to dispose of radioactive waste. The Scottish Environment Protection Agency (Sepa) has served the notice on UKAEA Dounreay at Caithness. A team of Sepa inspectors carried out a week-long survey of the site in June and reported 28 breaches of rules. The enforcement notice relates to maintenance and repair of the waste dumping system as well as maintenance procedures and record-keeping. There were also problems with monitoring equipment that assesses the environmental impact of the radioactive waste. Enforcement action has also been taken in connection with radioactive liquid leaking onto land around Dounreay. Dr Guy Owen, UKAEA's head of safety and environment at Dounreay, said: "We are working very hard to address the issues identified by Sepa and ensure that all our equipment and arrangements meet the standards expected." Under the the notice, Dounreay needs to carry out nine separate measures to remain authorised to discharge waste. These include inspecting and maintaining all waste handling equipment and monitoring equipment. Dounreay must also inform Sepa of measures being taken to stop radioactive liquid waste being dumped on the shore around the site. -------- iran Facing Opposition, U.S. and E.U. Backpedal on Iran Action By John Ward Anderson Washington Post Foreign Service Friday, September 23, 2005; A17 http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/22/AR2005092202131_pf.html VIENNA, Sept. 22 -- The European Union and United States backpedaled Thursday in their drive to have Iran referred to the U.N. Security Council for nuclear treaty violations, following strong opposition from other countries on the board of the International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N.'s nuclear monitoring group. Russia, China and members of the 115-nation Non-Aligned Movement said during a closed board meeting that they opposed a draft E.U. resolution backed by the United States to escalate pressure on Iran through a Security Council referral. That prompted the E.U. to float a second, somewhat softer resolution, but it, too, quickly came under fire. E.U. diplomats were scrambling Thursday night to gauge which of the two resolutions had greater support and whether to force a potentially divisive vote before the board meeting's scheduled end on Friday. The E.U. and United States contend Iran engaged in a covert, 18-year program to develop nuclear technologies, including nuclear weapons, and should be reported to the Security Council. That body could impose sanctions or otherwise try to force Iran to fully disclose and curtail its illicit activities. Iran responds that it is working only toward developing peaceful nuclear energy, and notes that independent inspections have found no evidence of nuclear weapons development. Iranian officials say the E.U. and U.S. allegations are politically motivated. At a meeting this week of the IAEA's 35-member board, the opposing sides launched intense lobbying campaigns. The E.U. and United States argue that doing nothing against Iran will undermine efforts to stem nuclear proliferation. Backing down now could hurt their credibility, diplomats and analysts here said. At Thursday's meeting, the representative from Russia, which is helping Iran build a $1 billion nuclear reactor, was "adamant" against referring Iran to the Security Council, according to a diplomat who attended the closed-door meeting and spoke on condition of anonymity. A Russian reportedly called such a move "counterproductive." Russia also opposed -- and thus seemed to doom -- the E.U.'s second draft resolution. The Reuters news agency said that resolution proposed finding Iran in "non-compliance" with its nuclear obligations but delaying any referral to the Security Council. China's representative on the board advocated settling the issue by "diplomatic means" and "continued dialogue." Both China and Russia hold Security Council vetoes. A statement by the Malaysian ambassador, Rajmah Hussain, on behalf of the Non-Aligned Movement, a Cold War-era grouping whose members avoided taking sides with the superpowers, completely dismissed the E.U.'s arguments against Iran, which is also a member of the movement. Diplomats here said many countries in the movement were sympathetic to Iran's claim that it was being subjected to "nuclear apartheid" by big powers that want to keep developing countries from acquiring nuclear technology. Individually, however, some members of the movement delivered more measured statements, diplomats said. Many called on Iran to suspend its recent resumption of uranium conversion. India and South Africa said in their statements that the board should seek a consensus, a signal that the E.U. should not force an up or down vote on the matter, but work out a compromise. ---- Iran senses victory in nuclear battle TEHRAN (AFP) Sep 23, 2005 http://www.spacewar.com/2005/050923113909.oc6xs56i.html Iran was Friday sensing victory in a diplomatic battle over its nuclear programme, but regime officials nevertheless stepped up their bid to avoid even limited criticism from the UN atomic agency. The European Union, fearful that Iran's atomic fuel work could be diverted to make nuclear weapons, failed to win a consensus among International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) member states for its bid to refer Tehran to the UN Security Council. Even a softened EU draft resolution, which still finds Iran in non-compliance with nuclear proliferation safeguards, has met with tough opposition from Russia -- leaving Iran feeling justified in its defiant stance. "The retreat of the Europeans over the Security Council is explained by Iran's firm position, the fact that the European demand had no logical basis and the objections of countries like Russia, China and non-aligned states," national security spokesman Ali Agha Mohammadi told AFP. The stand-off deepened in August after Iran rejected demands from Britain, France, Germany that it abandon its enrichment programme in exchange for incentives and ended a freeze on enrichment-related work by resuming uranium conversion. Conversion is the first step in making enriched uranium, which can be fuel for nuclear power reactors or the raw material for atom bombs -- but Iran says its ambitions are strictly peaceful and such work is the right of any signatory of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). In seeking to preserve that "right", Iran's new hardline government has been distancing itself from the West and trying to marginalise Britain, France and Germany -- with whom the previous more moderate regime had been dealing with for two years. According to state television, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad telephoned India and Pakistan on Thursday to thank them for their support for Iran's position and to "denounce the European position". Iran has also been lobbying China and non-aligned states such as South Africa -- playing on a split between those who want to sanction Iran and those who fear pressure on the country, OPEC's second oil producer, could spark yet another crisis in the world's main energy-producing region. "Before, the Europeans said they wanted to counter-balance the unilateralism of the United States. But today they are standing alongside the US," complained Mohammadi. "The new draft resolution at the IAEA is still unacceptable. The nature of the text is unchanged and the Europeans are still using the language of force," he said. Iran had threatened to respond to a referral by limiting UN inspections and resuming ultra-sensitive uranium enrichment work itself. This warning has been extended to cover any resolution that includes an ultimatum or trigger mechanism for a Security Council referral". Playing on fears that oil prices could sky rocket, the head of Iran's powerful Revolutionary Guards, General Yahya Rahim Safavi, also warned Friday that "any sanction against Iran can make the oil price reach 100 dollars a barrel." "Any economic and political pressure on Iran from any power ... will result in a harsh reaction from Iran," he threatened, saying the country "has a solid and unbeatable defence potential (and) can retaliate and attack the interests of the enemies in remote places." Friday prayer leader Ayatollah Mohammad Emami Kashani also offered words of advice to the United States but also the Europeans. "Show some sense: do something so that people say America is a nice place like it was 30 or 40 years ago," he said. "Don't disgrace yourself even more." -------- russia Backing Iran on nuclear case, Russia eyes own interests MOSCOW (AFP) Sep 23, 2005 http://www.spacewar.com/2005/050923123352.0wps9e0l.html Russia is defending Iran's right to a civilian nuclear power program because it has vital interests of its own in doing so, and Moscow will not reverse its position despite US and EU pressure to do so, analysts said Friday. "Will Russia change course and line up with the West? I think this is not possible," said Vladimir Yevseyev, a day after the European Union backed off a drive by the United States to have Iran's nuclear program referred to the UN Security Council. "They will have to find a compromise," said Yevseyev, coordinator of the nuclear non-proliferation program with the Carnegie Moscow Center think tank, refering to the talks in Vienna. In the first place, he said, Russia's support for Iran's nuclear energy program is grounded in financial interest: Russia is helping Iran build its first nuclear power station at Bushehr in a contract worth 800 million dollars, money that Russia's atomic industry says it badly needs. If ties between Russia and Iran remain on track, that contract will be the tip of an iceberg of lucrative deals for Russian companies in the years ahead, ranging from construction of more nuclear power plants to development of other energy resources in the region. Perhaps more important in Moscow's backing for Tehran are Russia's broader geostrategic interests, which represent some of the highest priorities of the administration of President Vladimir Putin. "Russia has important political interests here," Yevseyev said. "Iran is near Turkey and close to the border with Russia. Russia has no interest in having enemies on its borders and wants to have good relations with Iran." Russia and Iran also border the energy-rich Caspian Sea region, where both countries have long-standing and common interests ranging from development of oil and gas deposits to caviar harvesting and which the United States now also views as a zone of strategic interest. "Washington has interests everywhere... and Iran is in a key geographical position here," Yevseyev said. "It is an important transit region," notably for Caspian oil and gas in increasing demand in Europe and the United States. The administration of US President George W. Bush, which has described Iran as one of three states in an international "axis of evil," has charged that Tehran is using its civilian nuclear power program as camouflage for development of nuclear weapons. As the chief supplier of nuclear technology to Iran, Russia has scoffed at this assertion, saying it is not only not backed up by evidence of any kind but is technologically impossible with the type of "light water" nuclear reactor that Russia is building there. Even if Iran were to try to use this reactor to produce an atomic bomb, it is not capable of producing weapons-grade plutonium -- unlike the gas-graphite "heavy water" reactors possessed by North Korea, Yevseyev stated. Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, speaking to reporters on Friday, reiterated Moscow's position, that while Russia, like the United States, flatly opposed any move by Iran to acquire nuclear weapons, it was confident Tehran's civilian program did not have this orientation. "There is no recommendation suggesting that the examination of this issue within the framework of the IAEA has been exhausted and that it must he referred to other structures such as the UN Security Council," Lavrov said. Viktor Kremenyuk, deputy director of the USA-Canada Institute, said that after meeting Putin at the White House last week, Bush showed "understanding" for Russia's need to cooperate with Iran, while Putin made clear that Moscow opposed any effort by Tehran to build atomic weaponry. Russia's nuclear assistance to Iran was critical to the survival and modernization of Russia's own nuclear industry, he said, because it was in danger of "dying" if it did not find markets for its production. "And even if Iran did get the Bomb, so what? India and China have it and we don't fear that. Let the Americans be afraid," Kremenyuk said. -------- security Protecting Vital Assets - The head of nuclear power security for Southern Company speaks to Douglas Rotary Club Author: Nick Danna Douglas, GA Daily News 2005-09-23 http://www.douglasga.com/content/1/3011/Protecting+Vital+Assets+-+The+head+of+nuclear+power+security+for+Southern+Company+speaks+to+Douglas+Rotary+Club.htm DOUGLAS — "My primary goal is to make our nuclear plants unattractive targets," said Brig. Gen. Dave Burford (Alabama National Guard), director of Nuclear Fleet Security and Emergency Preparedness for Southern Company's nuclear operations, Thursday afternoon during a presentation to the Douglas Rotary Club on the security of the nation's nuclear power plants. Burford oversees security operations for all of Southern Company's nuclear facilities, including Plant Hatch in Appling County, and outlined for the club the security precautions required by the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) and the massive, redundant security infrastructure protecting Plant Hatch from a terrorist attack. "We look at what's most important, what's most likely to be attacked," Burford said. According to Burford, the nuclear industry is the model for counter-terrorism security in the post-9/11 world, with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security studying nuclear power security standards with an eye towards applying them to other high-risk targets across the country. "The nuclear industry has its act together," Burford said, "and the Department of Homeland Security is asking us how we do it." What goes into protecting a massive plant like Hatch? Burford says that multiple layers of vehicle and personnel screening, including extensive entry searches and criminal and psychological background checks for each person entering the plant. Each person and vehicle entering is given a comprehensive search, and is subjected to examination by a chemical sniffer, which uses a puff of air to disturb particles on a person or vehicle. Those particles are then analyzed for traces of explosive chemicals. The physical area around a plant is also secured against unauthorized entry using more pedestrian measures: steel barriers and doors, reinforced concrete walls, delay barriers, fences, razor wire, 5,000 pound magnetic locks, alarm monitoring and snipers. "Armed security monitors everyone in the plant at all times," said Burford, who also pointed out that nuclear plant security officers are one of the few civilian security groups authorized to use deadly force to protect their assignments. According to Burford, one of the areas where security could be improved for the nation's nuclear power plants is in the air. While the buildings that encase nuclear reactors are hardened and could be capable of surviving a direct hit by a commercial jet aircraft, the Federal Aviation Administration does not regulate flight over nuclear power facilities. "We're in a battle with the FAA because nuclear power plants are not no-fly zones," Burford said. -------- treaties Key signatories urged to ratify Nuclear test ban treaty UNITED NATIONS (AFP) Sep 23, 2005 http://www.spacewar.com/2005/050923201432.c60q7ecz.html Some 117 countries wrapped up a three-day meeting here Friday on bringing the nuclear test ban treaty into force, pressing for early ratification of the pact by the United States, China, Israel, Iran and seven other signatories. In a final declaration, participants said cessation of all nuclear weapon test explosions and all other nuclear explosions "constitutes an effective measure of nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation in all aspects." "We note that significant progress has been made in signing and ratifying the CTBT which has achieved near universal adherence," the declaration said. But it also noted with concern that the pact has not come into force nine years after it was adopted. The treaty cannot come into force until it is ratified by the required 44 states which had nuclear research or power facilities when it was adopted in Only 33 have done so. The United States, the world's leading nuclear power, Colombia, Egypt, Indonesia, China, Iran, Israel and Vietnam are among the remaining 11 countries that have not ratified the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. Diplomats fear that unless key countries like the United States and China come into the fold, the treaty may well collapse. "There's no change in the position of the United States," said UN Under Secretary General for Disarmament Affairs Nobuyasu Abe, noting that there was no expectation that Washington would ratify it in the near future. "We call upon al states which have not yet done so, to sign and ratify the treaty without delay," the declaration said, echoing an appeal made by UN chief Kofi Annan at the opening of the conference Wednesday. Participants also stressed the importance of building up an effective, global verification regime to ensure compliance with the treaty when it comes into force. "We agree that in addition to its essential function, the CTBT verification system currently being built would be capable of bringing scientific and civil benefits, including for trsunami warning syste ms and possibly other disaster alert systems," the participants added. The treaty, which bans any nuclear blasts for military or civilian purposes, was signed in 1996 by 71 states, including the five main nuclear powers, and now has 176 member states. North Korea, India and Pakistan have not signed it. Both India and Pakistan have carried out nuclear tests since 1996, while North Korea has threatened to do so. -------- u.s. nuc facilities GE to build first nuclear reactor in 30 years September 23. 2005 Wilmington Star http://www.wilmingtonstar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050923/NEWS/50923023 GE has been tapped to build a nuclear reactor in Mississippi. Thirty to 50 people will be on the design team, nearly 40 of whom moved to Wilmington as part of the latest expansion announcement. This would be the first new nuclear power plant started since 1973, although others have come online since then. Star-News Business Editor Bonnie Eksten writes in Saturday's Star-News that this could signal Wilmington's emergence as a technical hub for increasingly important nuclear power. He’s not saying where or exactly when, but Chris Lutterloah Jr. vows that he shall ride again. Mr. Lutterloah, who operates the Desperado Horse Farm in Rocky Point, is undeterred by a recent state Court of Appeals opinion upholding a 2004 conviction for violating a section of the Carolina Beach ordinance that prohibits horse riding in the town. It’s a battle Mr. Lutterloah has been fighting since the 1990s, and, as Ken Little writes Saturday, he isn’t ready to be reined in just yet. One Carolina Beach official said this week the ordinance will be enforced. ---- Bellefonte chosen for nuclear site Sep 23, 2005, 10:57 PM http://www.waff.com/Global/story.asp?S=3891786 The Bellefonte Nuclear Plant near Scottsboro in Jackson County is in line to become home to an advanced nuclear reactor. NuStart announced Thursday it will spend $50,000,000 to apply for licenses for Bellefonte and a site in Mississippi. The Bellefonte Nuclear Plant near Scottsboro has never been activated. In fact, the building isn't even finished. "It was useless. Very useless," says Sheila Clark. "They spent a lot of money up there for years, and years, and years. Now it's not helping anybody any where," says Charlie Seabolt. "Why have it there if you're not going to utilize it?" asks Michele Hodges. But word came Thursday that might soon change. People in Jackson County say it could be very beneficial for the area. "I think it'll be a great thing for our economy," says Gene Holder. NuStart Energy Development estimates the nuclear plant would employ about 2000 construction workers and about 400 permanent employees. People in Scottsboro say that could do wonders for the town's economy. "I think Scottsboro needs the jobs. And the economy needs the jobs that opening back up could bring," says Michele Hodges. "The economy, the way it is around here, we really do need it," says Sheila Clark. It could be four or five years before construction begins at Bellefonte. The cost for the project is expected to be about 2-billion dollars. ---- Sites Chosen for First U.S. Nuclear Plants in 30 Years WASHINGTON, DC, September 23, 2005 (ENS) http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/sep2005/2005-09-23-01.asp The country’s largest consortium of nuclear power companies said Thursday it has selected two sites, in Alabama and in Mississippi, to build two nuclear reactors. If their applications for construction and operating licenses are approved by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, these will be the first new nuclear power plants built in the United States since the 1970s. NuStart Energy Development LLC, a consortium of 11 companies that operate nuclear generating plants around the country, selected the two sites from a candidate list of six. One of the chosen sites is next to the partly finished Bellefonte Nuclear Plant in northeast Alabama, owned by the Tennessee Valley Authority. The federal power agency is a member of the NuStart consortium, which will apply to build and operate a Westinghouse Advanced Passive 1000 reactor adjacent to the mothballed plant. The other site is adjacent to Entergy Nuclear's Grand Gulf reactor at Port Gibson, Mississippi where the consortium wants to build a General Electric Economic Simplified Boiling Water Reactor. Marilyn Kray told reporters at the National Press Club and by teleconference Thursday that all six of the candidate sites were found to be suitable for nuclear reactors. Kray, president of NuStart and a vice president at Exelon Generation, a NuStart member company, said that on its exploratory meetings with the communities near Bellefonte and Grand Gulf, Nustart was welcomed and endorsed by governors, unions, and council groups. Dan Keuter, vice president of business development at Entergy Nuclear, announced that in addition to the company's participation in the consortium, Entergy would develop another construction and operating license application for one of the other candidate sites - its River Bend Nuclear Station in St. Francisville, Louisiana. "We're bullish on nuclear power," said Keiter, "we take a common sense approach to it. The world needs more energy, and environmental regulations are only going to get stricter especially with regard to greenhouse gases. America needs energy independence," he said. Kray said the consortium is prepared to spend $100 million to complete the two construction and operating license applications, $50 million each. The U.S. Department of Energy is funding half the cost of the license applications because it is interested in testing the new license applications process at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. In fact, the NuStart Energy consortium was formed to respond to a Department of Energy (DOE) issued solicitation to demonstrate the NRC’s COL process and complete the engineering for the two selected technologies. It takes an estimated 33 months for a license to be approved, Kray said, then construction would take about 48 months. The consortium projects 2015 as the earliest possible date for the start of operations. By then, Kray hopes, the challenging nuclear waste issue will be resolved. "Instead of dealing with this in a series," she said Thursday, "the waste issue is being actively addressed by the nuclear industry in cooperation with the DOE." She said NuStart hopes that by doing this in parallel with the licensing process, by the time nuclear waste needs to be disposed, the stalled Yucca Mountain permanent geologic repository on the Nevada Nuclear Test Site north of Las Vegas will be operational. Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman expressed the Bush administration's support for nuclear power, saying Thursday, “Today's announcement is a major step in the right direction. As America’s energy needs continue to grow with our economy, further building our nuclear infrastructure will ensure that we can generate large amounts of reliable, affordable, emissions-free power." But the environmental community objects to plugging in nuclear power as a solution to climate change. Responding to an industry campaign in June promoting new nuclear reactors as a solution to global warming, some 300 international, national, regional and local environmental, consumer, and safe energy groups reiterated their concerns and rejected the argument that nuclear power can solve global warming. "Throwing a few billion dollars of taxpayer money at the nuclear industry might make some utility executives happy, but would do virtually nothing to reduce carbon emissions," said Michael Mariotte, executive director of Nuclear Information and Resource Service. "In fact, by diverting limited resources that should be used for sustainable technologies, subsidizing nuclear power would be counterproductive." "This would exacerbate all of the problems of the technology: more terrorist targets, more cost - potentially trillions of dollars - less safety, need for a new Yucca Mountain-sized waste site every four or five years, more proliferation of nuclear materials and technologies, dozens of new uranium enrichment plants, and even then, a severe shortage of uranium even within this century - while displacing the resources needed to ensure a real solution to the climate change issue," the groups said in a joint statement. They urged instead a focus on clean and renewable sources of energy, efficiency and conservation. ---- Labs fuse efforts with federal grant Viola Huang Princetonian Staff Writer Friday, September 23, 2005 http://www.dailyprincetonian.com/archives/2005/09/23/news/13181.shtml The Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL), in collaboration with the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) in Tennessee, was recently awarded a grant of $10 million from the federal government to be given over a five-year period. The grant is part of the Department of Energy's Simulation of Wave Interactions with Magnetohydrodynamics (SWIM) project, which aims to create computer simulations that can correctly model the movements of plasma and subsequently facilitate the development of fusion energy. "The goal of the [simulations] is to understand how radio waves affect plasma motion and how that motion affects the radio waves, so that we can use the process most effectively for driving current while keeping plasma in [a] magnetic field," said astrophysics professor Robert Goldston, director of the PPPL. The effect of radio waves and the motion of the plasma, which were previously studied independently, are brought together by the collaboration of the University and ORNL. "If you fire radio waves into fusion fuel, you can heat and control [the fuel] in various ways," Goldston explained. "ORNL is arguably the world leader in the calculation of how radio waves shine into fusion fuels. We are arguably the world leaders on calculations of how plasmas move around." The goal, he said, is to take the most advanced codes that calculate two different aspects of what goes on in fusion plasmas and determine how the two interact. Ideas ignited The idea for the SWIM project stemmed from a lobbying effort that called for the government to devote resources to computer simulation of advanced fusion technology. Astrophysics professor Steve Jardin, the principal research physicist at the PPPL, was part of a subcommittee put together by a high-level advisory committee of the fusion energy division of the Department of Energy. The group met a few years ago to come up with recommendations of how to increase the use of computer simulation in fusion. "The Department of Energy wanted to launch a large-scale fusion simulation project at $20 million a year to put together all of the isolated computer models of different aspects of a fusion plasma and produce a totally integrated model," Jardin said. He compared the idea to the aircraft industry where, in the past, wind tunnels were used to test small plane models. Careful measurements of drag and lift could be taken to help the engineers make the necessary modifications. "Now we don't have to do that because computer programs are so good that we have numerical wind tunnels where you can input the exact shape of an airplane and the computer program can very accurately model lift and drag," Jardin said. "A fusion plasma is something like the air, just a lot more complicated because of a strong magnetic field and all of the plasma effects. We've developed through the years a lot of computer programs that are very similar in spirit to wind tunnels that use a lot more computational physics." Based on the recommendations of the subcommittee, the Department of Energy put together a competition to award the SWIM grant. The joint PPPL and ORNL proposal, one of four applications, was ultimately successful. Cost of research Jardin said he believes the PPPL and ORNL won the grant because the members of the proposal were the most qualified, some of them being the actual authors of the major component codes they are now going to couple together. "For one thing, we are very enthusiastic about it, and I think that big labs like Princeton and Oak Ridge have the resources to make this thing a success," he added. Money from the grant will add to PPPL's $70 million research endowment. Though $2 million per year is a significant sum, the PPPL was hoping for closer to $5 million per year, Jardin said. "It's really because of budgets," Jardin said. "The government's fusion program budget is way down from what it used to be and probably what it should be. Our friends in the Department of Energy are trying hard to make ends meet." Fusion, one of the focuses of the PPPL, has many advantages as an energy source. It produces no carbon dioxide, a plus for those worried about the effects of global warming, and generates less radiation than current fission power plants do. "In a fission plant, when you operate for 30 years, the core will be radioactive afterwards for 10,000 years. Now they're planning on burying the used core at Yucca Mountain in Nevada, which is angering the residents. Fusion doesn't have anything like that," Jardin said. Fusion also has no potential weapons fallout, since there is no possible way to make an atomic bomb out of a fusion plant. Goldston said the PPPL grant will have a significant effect, both on ongoing experiments at a smaller scale and on the massive International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) project that is to be built in France. PPPL and ORNL are heading the project office for the United States, which has already contributed 10 percent of the $1 billion estimated cost of the ITER project. The ITER project spawned from a deal made 20 years ago between former President Ronald Reagan and former Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev with the ultimate goal of making a prototype fusion reactor that will generate 500 million watts of fusion power. "The five years they've laid out is a reasonable time period for us to get to that point," Goldston said. "This being science, you never really finish anything. Newton thought he figured out gravity, then Einstein came. At the end we will have a computational tool that will allow us to do things we couldn't before, like finishing ITER. But we'll keep going afterwards. It's not just building for five years and using it on ITER. We'll keep identifying new scientific issues and going back to modify." -------- colorado Work on former nuclear plant to end in October BY THE ASSOCIATED PRESS September 23, 2005 http://www.summitdaily.com/article/20050923/NEWS/109230042 DENVER - It has been decades since a visitor to the Rocky Flats industrial area could see why the former nuclear weapons plant got its name. Beneath myriad buildings, parking lots, roads and guard towers, eroded rubble filled in the earth like cereal in milk. The coarse jumble of rocks is seeing the light again. Roughly a month before the plant's cleanup is scheduled for completion, all but a few outbuildings are gone from the 385-acre U.S. Department of Energy factory zone. Soon the tainted factory that employed thousands while producing hydrogen bomb cores from 1952 to 1989 will be reduced, mostly, to Rocky Flats. Officials expect the cleanup to be complete by late October. Dozens of gondola railcars packed with rubble from the leveled Building 371 stood waiting one day recently for an engine to haul them to Envirocare, of Utah, as low-level radioactive waste. In place of the 300,000-square-foot concrete monolith were orderly heaps of backfill. Just one of the paved roads in the former industrial city remains. Heavy equipment tore at it. The western access road, the facility's connection with Colorado 93, will revert to dirt within a week or so. "It's a lot different than it was last week," said John Corsi, spokesman for Kaiser-Hill Co., as he drove past. Kaiser-Hill is the Department of Energy's lead contractor on the $7 billion Superfund cleanup. Buried contamination will remain, as well as a series of water monitors to make sure it doesn't escape into Woman or Walnut creeks. Slightly radioactive hot spots probably also will stay on parts of the industrial area and blow immediately downwind, although spots disclosed Sept. 1 will be cleaned up next week. Such hotspots, including the former industrial area and hundreds of acres surrounding and downwind of it, will not be part of the roughly 5,000-acre Rocky Flats National Wildlife Refuge. What was the Rocky Flats industrial area soon will be an open expanse of surprisingly hilly, rough earth commingled with straw to aid plant growth. Some of it, where the seeds of native grasses have had months or years to grow, already looks "native." The removal of Building 371, the creation of drainages, removal of temporary rail lines, and landscaping and revegetation are the cleanup's final actions, said David Shelton, vice president for environmental stewardship at Kaiser-Hill. The hands-on cleanup force of about 6,500 when Kaiser-Hill took over the effort in 1995 has dwindled to about 250, Corsi said. Sixty-three steelworkers remain. By October, there will be just five steelworkers left, he said. More than 100 salaried workers are immersed in the paperwork generated from the project, Corsi said. Regulators aren't expected to sign off on the cleanup until late 2006. -------- nevada Nevada wins Yucca ruling DOE told it must release draft copy of license application By KEITH ROGERS Friday, September 23, 2005 LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL http://www.reviewjournal.com/lvrj_home/2005/Sep-23-Fri-2005/news/27254254.html Chalk one up for the Nevada lawyers fighting the planned Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository. A three-judge panel for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission ruled Thursday that the Department of Energy must release a draft copy of the license application that it intends to submit for the NRC to review. The panel, chaired by administrative Judge Thomas S. Moore, concluded that DOE's 2004 draft license application "is documentary material and is a circulated draft ... not protected by any deliberative process privilege." The ruling gives more leverage to Nevada officials and other opponents of DOE's plans to build a maze of tunnels inside Yucca Mountain, 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas, to entomb 77,000 tons of the nation's spent nuclear fuel and highly radioactive defense wastes. Having access to a draft before the final license application is submitted means that state attorneys will be able to preview the direction DOE is heading with its design for the below-ground repository and above-ground staging facilities. It also will give them insights on how DOE plans to meet the Environmental Protection Agency's two-tiered, 1 million-year radiation safety standard. The panel ordered DOE to make the draft document available on the Licensing Support Network "no later than the time it makes its initial certification." An attempt by DOE to begin certification of the Web-based Licensing Support Network was shot down this summer by the NRC's Pre-License Application Presiding Officer Board. State Nuclear Projects Agency chief Bob Loux and the state's lead nuclear waste lawyer, Joe Egan, could not be reached for comment late Thursday. Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman's press secretary, Craig Stevens, read a prepared statement that said, "Department lawyers are currently reviewing the document. Once that review is completed, the department will assess its options and go from there." Similarly, NRC spokesman David McIntyre wrote in an e-mail that "we have only just received the ruling and cannot comment until we've had a chance to give it a thorough review." DOE had planned to submit a license application last year but since has decided not to set a target date for the submission. The repository, once targeted to open in 2010, is not expected to be ready until 2012 at the earliest, barring any delays in the NRC's license review or from legal actions. Stephens Washington Bureau Chief Steve Tetreault contributed to this report. -------- new york SPANO ASKS FOR MEETING WITH NRC TO DISCUSS LATEST INDIAN POINT LEAKS FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Sept. 23, 2005 September 23, 2005 Westchester, NY Government http://www.westchestergov.com/WhatsNew/Press/ipletter.htm Saying he remained alarmed about the revelation this week of a leak of radioactive water at Indian Point, County Executive Andy Spano has written to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to ask for an immediate meeting. “The leak, although characterized by both Entergy and the NRC as insignificant, is anything but that,” Spano says in his letter to Nils J. Diaz, the chairman of the NRC. “The fact that this condition was first reported to the NRC in late August or early September and local officials weren’t informed of its existence until September 20th has left us questioning the effectiveness of the NRC as an industry regulator. It also questions how we can continue to assure our citizens that the NRC is closely monitoring the licensee and plant operations.” Saying he was writing in his capacity as chairman of the Four County Nuclear Committee for the Indian Point Nuclear Plants, Spano said he was concerned about the revelation earlier this week of an ongoing leak of radioactive water from an excavation site near the spent fuel pool of Indian Point Reactor #2. He said to Diaz, “I genuinely appreciated your visiting Westchester to meet and provide us with security information. During that visit you encouraged me to never hesitate to contact you in the future with any concerns. I am asking that you come again to Westchester to meet with me and the County Executives of Rockland, Putnam and Orange to discuss the details of this fuel pool leak.” CONTACT: SUSAN TOLCHIN (914) 995-2932 DONNA GREENE 914) 995-2935 -------- south carolina Aiken sues Energy official over plutonium plant By Jacob Jordan The Associated Press Fri, Sep. 23, 2005 http://www.myrtlebeachonline.com/mld/myrtlebeachonline/news/local/12719729.htm COLUMBIA - Aiken County has sued Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman, saying his agency failed to comply with federal law in the construction of a plant that would convert weapons-grade plutonium into fuel for commercial nuclear reactors. A defense spending bill in 2003 put the Energy Department on a strict timetable to have a mixed-oxide (MOX) plant operational by 2009 at the Savannah River Site, which is partly located in Aiken County. But construction of the plant has been held up because of complications that have delayed construction of a facility in Russia. "If that's the case, then they shouldn't have started moving the plutonium in here," said Aiken County Councilman Chuck Smith, who is concerned the material is being stored at the Savannah River Site with no plan to move it out. "We're not trying to take [Energy officials] on; we're asking them to do what they said they were going to do." The conversion to mixed-oxide fuel is a key part of the Bush administration's effort to safeguard excess weapons-grade plutonium held by both the U.S. and Russia. Under an agreement with Russia, the U.S. would blend 34 tons of U.S. plutonium no longer needed for warheads with depleted uranium. "If the project is more than 12 months behind the original 2003 construction schedule, the DOE secretary must submit to Congress a corrective action plan by August 15 that will get the project back on track," according to a statement released by the county. "The secretary's 2005 report did not state whether construction was more than 12 months late, but it is clear from the report and the original plan that the project is more than 12 months behind." National Nuclear Security Administration spokesman Bryan Wilkes said he hadn't seen the lawsuit and couldn't talk about it, but the agency would comply with federal law. Previous litigation against the Energy Department has had little effect. Former Gov. Jim Hodges sued the agency unsuccessfully in 2002 to block plutonium shipments because he was concerned the material would be permanently stored at the site. U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C. and a steadfast mixed-oxide supporter, said this summer a tentative agreement had been reached between the U.S. and Russia and he looked forward to the program getting back on track. Graham "wants to see the program fully funded, construction started and the MOX plant up and running at full capacity as soon as possible," his spokesman, Kevin Bishop, said in a statement. "It's a point that he has made clear to DOE." The lawsuit came as a surprise to some people because of the area's reliance on Savannah River Site as an economic engine. Some environmentalists and nuclear nonproliferation have opposed the mixed-oxide plan, but the county's lawsuit is a rare move. Mal McKibben, the executive director of the Citizens for Nuclear Technology Awareness in Aiken, said the site has had local support since it was built in the 1950s. "I think the lawsuit is a wasted effort. DOE is doing everything they can do to proceed with the MOX plan," McKibben said. "It's kind of like biting the hand that feeds you." The lawsuit asks yhe Energy Department to send Congress a plan to ensure the mixed-oxide plant is operating by 2009 and plutonium shipments to the site be suspended until construction is back on track. The secretary to send Congress a list of options for removing plutonium shipped to Savannah River Site after April 15, 2002. -------- MILITARY -------- business Blackwater Down: Fresh From Iraq, Private Security Forces Roam the Streets of an American City With Impunity Friday, September 23rd, 2005 Democracy Now! http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/09/23/1338246 In this week's cover story in The Nation, Democracy Now! correspondent Jeremy Scahill reports on how mercenaries from private security firms like Blackwater USA and BATS are patrolling the streets in New Orleans. [includes rush transcript] In his article in The Nation, Jeremy Scahill writes: "As business leaders and government officials talk openly of changing the demographics of what was one of the most culturally vibrant of America's cities, mercenaries from companies like DynCorp, Intercon, American Security Group, Blackhawk, Wackenhut and an Israeli company called Instinctive Shooting International (ISI) are fanning out to guard private businesses and homes, as well as government projects and institutions. Within two weeks of the hurricane, the number of private security companies registered in Louisiana jumped from 185 to 235. Some, like Blackwater, are under federal contract. Others have been hired by the wealthy elite" * Jeremy Scahill, Democracy Now! correspondent. - Read Jeremy Scahill's article: "Blackwater Down" RUSH TRANSCRIPT AMY GOODMAN: Jeremy, can you talk about the security scene that is enforcing what Naomi Klein has just described to us? JEREMY SCAHILL: One of the things that I think is really important to point out is that the very forces that Naomi’s talking about that are now trying to implement these sort of austerity measures in some ways and then these policies that target the poor. The forces that are implementing these policies are being backed up now by the very forces that we see operating in Iraq and Afghanistan. You have the U.S. military, of course and the National Guard and there’s an enormous number – It seems like everyone with a badge and gun is now descending on New Orleans. But you also have these private security companies like Blackwater. We have talked extensively about the role of Blackwater in New Orleans here on Democracy Now!. I think we have to view this in the context of what we have seen for decades, in U.S. foreign policy and that is the hidden hand of the free market and the corporate elite, and then the iron fist of military force. So, these measures are being backed up by these private security firms. One of the people who’s brought in private security companies is a powerful businessman by the name of James Reese. He lives in the wealthy, elite, gated community of Audubon Place. They have the only privately owned street in the city of New Orleans. Well, he brought in a company called Instinctive Shooting International, which is an Israeli firm, and it's actually owned and operated by a guy who lives in New Jersey and has had contracts to train New York City police officers, but he is an Israeli martial arts expert. This is part of a bigger trend of outsourcing the training of homeland security to Israeli firms. He brought in these Israeli paramilitaries one of whom bragged to me about having been involved with the Israeli invasion of Lebanon. They're standing there in front of the Audubon Place community. I went up and talked to them, and one of the guys said to me, we fight the Palestinians all day every day of our lives, and then tapping on his M-16, he said, most Americans, when they see this, they get scared. It’s enough to scare them away. But a lot of Americans, I think, would be shocked to know there are Israeli paramilitaries patrolling the streets of a U.S. city. But what's more significant is who James Reese is, the man who brought them in. He serves in Mayor Ray Nagin's administration. He also runs a powerful business lobby, and Naomi has talked about him as well. He also was quoted openly in the Wall Street Journal saying he doesn't want black people or poor people to return to New Orleans. These kinds of sentiments are then being backed up by these military and paramilitary forces. Blackwater is also a very interesting case. They got a lucrative $400,000 contract from the federal government to provide security for FEMA reconstruction projects. The head of Blackwater, the founder, is a man named Eric Prince. He is a mega-billionaire from Michigan. His father was a close friend of Gary Bauer. His father helped to found the Family Research Council. His sister, Betsy, is married to Dick DeVos, who is going to be the gubernatorial candidate of the Republican Party in the state of Michigan. He, Dick DeVos, is the son of Richard DeVos, the founder of Amway, the greatest benefactor in the history of the Republican Party, the man who largely funded the Republican revolution in 1994, this Christian fundamentalist corporation, Amway. So he comes from a powerful Michigan family. He has given hundreds of thousands of dollars to the Republican Party. He started this firm Blackwater Security. He himself is a former navy S.E.A.L. He staffs it with people he describes as patriots, although, it’s interesting, they have been doing recruiting in Chile, hiring men who were trained under Augusto Pinochet's regime. So these forces are now – there are about two hundred of them – in New Orleans right now. One hundred and sixty-four of them are on a no-bid federal contract with FEMA to provide protection for these sites. This is part of a bigger push by these paramilitary firms to gain contracts here in the United States. For instance, Blackwater seized on the fact that four of their employees were killed in Fallujah in March of 2004. Eric Prince viewed this as a profit moment. So, what he did is hired – AMY GOODMAN: This is that horrible moment – JEREMY SCAHILL: Where we saw the charred bodies. They were hanged, and it resulted in the massive U.S. onslaught against Fallujah that resulted in tens of thousands of people having to flee the city, scores of people being killed, innocent civilians. Of course, now Fallujah has become an international symbol of resistance against the U.S. occupation in Iraq. Well after these four Blackwater mercenaries were killed in Fallujah and then their bodies mutilated and hung from a bridge, Eric Prince hired the Alexander Group which is a powerful Republican lobby firm tied to House Majority Leader, Tom DeLay, and then hired a former C.I.A. Department of – C.I.A., State department official, named Coffer Black, to help promote their cause in Washington. I In fact, just as the hurricane was hitting, another high-level person from the Pentagon was hired by the Prince Group, the parent company of Blackwater, Joseph Schmitz. He had just resigned as the Inspector General of the Pentagon. He himself was involved with numerous scandals. So he is then brought on board, and then they get this contract. What's interesting is that when I spoke to the Blackwater mercenaries in New Orleans, they said clearly, we're here on a Department of Homeland Security contract. That was denied by the Department of Homeland Security. One them showed me a badge, said he had been deputized by the Governor of the State of Louisiana. That was then denied. Well, after this report came out, and it went all over the web, and we talked about it on Democracy Now!, the response was tremendous. Blackwater was then under siege from reporters confronting them with this, and they were forced to admit and so was the federal government, that in fact, Blackwater was on the Department of Homeland Security contract and that, in fact, they did operate with a letter from the Governor of the State of Louisiana, authorizing them to carry loaded weapons. So they're patrolling in unmarked cars around the streets, and they said that they were confronting criminals and stopping looters. JUAN GONZALEZ: You actually interviewed some who claimed to have been involved in shootouts and to have actually shot people? JEREMY SCAHILL: Right, and this is something that really underscores the danger of having these kinds of private security forces on the streets. I was – I walked down to a hotel on the corner of Bourbon and Canal in the French Quarter called the Astor Crown Plaza. It's a five star hotel operated by one of the wealthiest businesspeople in the state of Louisiana, a man named F. Patrick Quinn III. He is married to Republican State Senator, Julie Quinn. They are a powerful Louisiana Republican family. He is the owner of the largest hotel chain in the state of Louisiana, and is a powerhouse hotel owner in the South, in general. I was talking to his head of security, a guy named Michael Montgomery. He told me he was with a company based in Alabama called Body Guard and Tactical Security. Actually, Juan, when I was talking to him, he – I said that I was from New York, and he said, “Oh, I was in New York once.” I said, “Oh, yeah?” He said, “I was there for the New York Daily News strike,” and I naively thought somehow that he was an employee, that he had been an employee of the Daily News and I said, “My colleague and friend, Juan Gonzalez, was one of the leaders of that strike. He goes, “Oh, I know Juan Gonzalez. I spiked his car.” I said, what do you mean? He goes, “I was working security there, and we spiked about forty Daily News employees’ cars at La Guardia airport. He said he put sugar in the gas tanks of the car. So that was my introduction to the guy. So we start talking, and then I asked him, well – JUAN GONZALEZ: So you solved the riddle of that big repair bill I had back in 1990. JEREMY SCAHILL: Well, what's interesting, Juan, is you could send it to the BATS Company, Bodyguard And Tactical Security, except they don't exist. I talked to the Secretary of State offices in Alabama and Louisiana. There's no company called BATS registered. They were wearing uniforms that said Bodyguard and Tactical Security. So as I talked to him, this representative from the phantom company hired by a powerful Republican businessman, married to a Republican State Senator, a major donor to the Republican party and the Bush-Cheney campaign, operator of a five star hotel, that’s, he said, under consideration for lucrative FEMA contract to house their workers, it's interesting, because the hotel remains pretty much empty. There are no FEMA workers coming in there. But as I talked to this man who said that he had spiked your car, he told me a very scary story, that I think is the source for potential litigation against these private security firms. Michael Montgomery, the head of BATS, said that on the second night he was in New Orleans he was going to pick up one of Mr. Quinn's associates. They got stopped in the ninth ward. He said they came under fire from a group of people on an overpass that he described as black gang bangers. He said, “At the time I was on the phone with my business partner.” I said, “What did you do then?” He said, “I dropped the phone and opened fire.” I said, “With what kind of weapons?” – “AR-15 assault rifles and Glock 9's.” Fired up at the people he described as black gang bangers on this bridge. I said, “Then what happened? Did you kill them?” He said, “Well, let's just put it this way, I heard a lot of moaning and screaming, and the shooting stopped. Enough said.” Well then he said that the Army came and responded to the incident, surrounded them and thought that “we were the enemy.” That's how he said it. He said, “I then explained to the Army soldiers that we were security. They didn't care. They didn't file a report. They left.” Five minutes later, Louisiana State Troopers come. They ask what happened. He explains the story to them. They then ask him, “How do we get out of the city.” So this is the climate of impunity. This man – and as Michael Ratner of the Center for Constitutional Rights points out, how do we know that he was fired upon? How do we know what that incident was? Why wouldn't law enforcement file any kind of report on a shootout in which this guy is openly bragging to having shot up a bunch of people he described as black gang bangers on an overpass? So if I, as an investigative journalist, cannot track down this company, what if you were one of the people who was shot and wounded by this guy? What if you are the family member of someone who was killed by him and you cannot trace down this company? In fact, the Louisiana agency that governs and licenses private security firms, when I talked to them, they were furious, and they say that they are going to be serving papers on him today to cease and desist operating as a security officer in the State of Louisiana. What's key is that he was hired by Patrick Quinn. Patrick Quinn is liable for the torts of his employees. So if this man, in fact, did shoot up a bunch of people, Patrick Quinn, this wealthy, powerful businessman is also responsible for it. What's interesting is that Patrick Quinn, bringing in an apparently unlicensed company to provide security, is that while you have shelters teeming with people desperate for work, Patrick Quinn is bringing in Mexican workers from Texas to clean out his hotel, and because of Davis-Bacon, they don’t have to pay them – because of the wipe out of the Davis-Bacon Act, they don't have to pay them livable wages. So that’s why they don't want to go in and hire, for instance, African-American men and women to come and clean the hotel, because that gives them jobs and keeps them in the community. Instead, you bring in cheap labor from Texas, Mexicans piled on the back of a truck. AMY GOODMAN: Soon after you did your piece, Jeremy, on Blackwater, when you first got down to New Orleans, and we posted it on the website, we started to get letters and email. There's an email petition of Blackwater employees. Describe it. JEREMY SCAHILL: Yeah, the Blackwater employees and families have initiated a petition against me. What's interesting is that they don't take issue with any of the facts that I have reported. They take issue with the fact that I quote one of the Blackwater employees complaining that he's only getting paid $350 because normally, they get $1,000 or more – AMY GOODMAN: A day. JEREMY SCAHILL: Right, a day. They say they're just trying to provide for their families and put food on the table. These guys are making $1,000-plus a day in Iraq and have all sorts of tax breaks. Well, now they're complaining of only getting $350 a day. The letter, this petition goes on to talk about how they're like any computer programmer or any auto worker. What's interesting is – I don't know about you, but I have never met an auto worker who makes $1,000 a day. AMY GOODMAN: Naomi Klein, you can describe how this security scene that Jeremy is describing on the streets of New Orleans fits in to your assessment of purging the poor? NAOMI KLEIN: Well, Amy, I think what it really underscores is the violence of the economic project itself. I mean, what we are talking about is a wrenching process of uprooting hundreds of thousands of people, who are deeply rooted culturally, historically, economically, in the city of New Orleans. New Orleans is a city with a rich radical history, and people aren’t going to accept this without a fight. That's why the radical gentrifiers of New Orleans are arriving with their own private armies. You know, I was talking about this with Jeremy yesterday. It's almost like a kind of yuppy sci-fi version of old-school colonial warfare. It's like the military industrial complex has been replaced by the mercenary condominium complex. Because, what we are talking about here, the characters that Jeremy is describing like Quinn and Reese, these are the key land developers in New Orleans. They are the ones who are hiring these mercenaries to be the muscle behind the projects. So, I think that that is really the message. But there's something else at play. You hear these names like Blackwater and then on the contracting side, the people getting the job to rebuild New Orleans are Bechtel, Halliburton, Fluor. These are the same companies that are in Iraq and Afghanistan. And they arrived very, very quickly, and the reason they arrived so quickly is because reconstruction now is a standing multi-billion dollar industry, global industry. Whenever there is a war or natural disaster, they move in instantly, often with pre-signed contracts. You know, we were all in New Orleans, and I think, you know, that city needs a lot of things. It needs pumps. It needs affordable housing. It needs water, and it needs electricity, but I didn't see any shortage of law enforcement. As Jeremy said, you know, everybody with a badge and gun is there. So, the presence of these privatized police forces, I think is more ideological than it is anything else. Ideology is really driving the reconstruction project, and if you listen to what's being said by groups like the Republican Study Committee, they're very clear about this. They talk in the language of experimentation. They talk, like Ted said, “Bringing free market ideas to the disaster zone is white hot right now.” Treasury secretary, John Snow, said, you know, “This is a time for all sorts of experiments.” It's almost like they're putting on lab coats and seeing this area of massive humanitarian devastation as a place where they can vindicate their ideology. Their ideology, you know, suffered a pretty serious blow by the disaster itself. I mean, there was talk in the first couple of days after the levees broke, that this was going to be for neoconservativism what the fall of the Berlin wall was for communism. That this was itself this incredibly graphic, damning event for the ideology of privatization, and Harry Belafonte, the other night, you know, he had a great quote at the fund-raiser organized by Wynton Marsalis where he said “This was the result of a political authority that subcontracts its responsibility to the private sector and abdicates responsibility altogether,” but of course what Jeremy is describing is a radical abdication, further abdication in response to the disaster. What I saw when I was in New Orleans was really the emergence of an absolutely unmasked corporate military state. Now, I know these sound like buzz words, but I'll give you an example. One of the images that's really stuck in my mind is the conversion of a huge Wal-Mart into a military base in downtown New Orleans. They call it Camp Wal-Mart. So here you have – and we even hear people suggesting that Wal-Mart should replace FEMA at running disaster response. Another example of this is: There's a building in Baton Rouge, which is the Capital Annex, which is attached to the state legislature. It's where a lot of the government offices are located. Well, after the flood, the state – the Capital Annex building was opened up to many of the business groups that we have been discussing. So, now, you have in that building, a complete merger of government interests. You have got the Mayor's office working out of that building. You have the state legislature working out of that building, but you also have James Reese's business association. You also have Greater New Orleans, Inc., which is a private lobby group representing everyone from Shell and Chevron to Coca-Cola, in that building. Then you have the Association of Conventions and Tourism, which is another private business group in that building. Every morning – I was told this by the Assistant Secretary of Economic Development for Louisiana, he said, every morning there's an 8:30 meeting where seven to ten people from government and business sit down and plan the reconstruction of New Orleans. So, it is literally the merger – completely unmasked – of corporate and state interests. There's no distinction. No, they're not inviting the Teacher's Union to be at these meetings. They're not inviting housing rights activists to be at the meetings. You even see this in the repopulation plans for this city. JUAN GONZALEZ: Well, Naomi, if I can just interrupt, because we have to cut this segment off, I'd like to ask Jeremy, any final remarks? JEREMY SCAHILL: Senator Barak Obama has questioned giving this $400,000 contract to the Blackwater security firm. I think that's a question that people need to be posing to their officials, because Congress could move swiftly to cut the welfare chain off for these private security firms, and it's something concrete that people can do right now as we look at the reconstruction of New Orleans, is to insure that as people do try to come back and rebuild their communities, that they don't have to face down the very paramilitary thugs that are killing people in Iraq. AMY GOODMAN: Jeremy Scahill, Naomi Klein, thanks so much for being with us. This is Democracy Now! ---- Big, Easy Iraqi-Style Contracts Flood New Orleans Friday, September 23rd, 2005 Democracy Now! http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/09/23/1338250 As Katrina's flood waters recede, government contractors are flowing into the Gulf Coast and reaping billions of dollars in pre-bid, limited bid, and sometimes no-bid contracts. We speak with Pratap Chatterjee, managing editor of CorpWatch.org, about his latest article titled "Big, Easy Iraqi-Style Contracts Flood New Orleans." [includes rush transcript] In it, he writes, "In Iraq, limited accountability, corruption, massive cost overruns, and devastating failures fed the chaotic mess that has followed the 2003 fall of Baghdad. Nonetheless, the largest Katrina contracts have been won by many of the same politically connected companies that oversaw that failed reconstruction. And it is perhaps no coincidence, since many of the same people in the Army Corps of Engineers are awarding them-and in much the same manner: as open-ended, no- or hastily bid contracts with guaranteed profit margins." * Pratap Chatterjee, managing director of CorpWatch.org. - Read article: "Big, Easy Iraqi-Style Contracts Flood New Orleans". RUSH TRANSCRIPT AMY GOODMAN: Pratap Chatterjee, take it from there. PRATAP CHATTERJEE: Thank you Amy. I want you to remember one name, and that is Carl Strock. He’s the commander of the chief engineer of the Army Corp of Engineers. He’s the man who basically created the no-bid contract for Halliburton to repair the oil pipelines in Iraq. He presided at a meeting at which Bunny Greenhouse, the woman who actually basically blew the whistle on these no-bid illegal contracts was asked the Halliburton people who were sitting in the meeting to leave. He was the man who then demoted her, and asked her, you know, now not to oversee these kinds of contracts. He was then sent to Iraq, where he oversaw all of the Army Corps contracts in Iraq. So, he oversaw the multibillion dollar contracts that Halliburton had. This is the same man now in charge of the Corps of Engineers, and therefore the man who is now issuing no-bid contracts, so-called no-bid contracts to Halliburton. They're not actually no-bid, they're illegal. And the reason is, the Army Corps has no contract with Halliburton. The navy does. These are contracts in Mississippi to fix the navy facilities like the Stennis Space Center. They borrowed a contract from the sister agency and used it to have Halliburton come in and assess the floodwater damage, something they're not supposed to do. So, now, Carl Strock, the man in charge of the Iraq contract, he is also the man because he was in Iraq, oversaw the fact that this money, that should have been spent in the levees in New Orleans, was diverted to Iraq. Part of the reason was his boss, Robert Flowers, who authorized all of the stuff under the direction of course, of the White House. The White House called the shots. The Army Corps of Engineers if you go back in history is the agency that basically straightened and the Mississippi river and therefore led to the devastating floods, so now, come the 1990's, they said, well, we need to rebuild and correctly so, they need to fix the levee system. When the bush administration said to them, we need the money for Iraq, they gave them a palate of what they could spend and they what they couldn't. They cut the Army Corps of Engineers spending by 44%. All the individuals who would have fixed the wetlands in Louisiana were helping fix the Iraq’s southern marshes. The man who was in charge was Carl Strock's boss at the time, his name is Robert Flowers. He now has a new job with a company called HNTB. HNTB is based in Kansas City, Missouri. He -- what they do is they build levees. AMY GOODMAN: Well, the republicans have tried to portray this as well, well, you know, the situation with the levees and the problems in New Orleans have gone back for decades through democratic and republican administrations, and there was nothing that could have been done in the few short years between when Bush became president in 2001and now to have been able to affect the situation. What's your investigation found out about that? PRATAP CHATTERJEE: To a certain extent, that's true. This is a historical thing. But do remember that the Army Corps of Engineers is the people who straightened the Mississippi River in the first place, built a system of levees and created the navigation system. You have to look over 80 years and go back to the floods in Louisiana in 1926, I think it was. So, the problem wouldn't be there. It wouldn't be such devastating floods if they hadn't caused the problem in the first place. Could they have fixed if in the last three years, probably not. There I have to agree. However, they did and both The New York Times and Wall Street Journal has detailed the engineering problems in how the reconstruction of the levees was done. So, where they could have built t-walls that would have -- the levees would have held, they could have built higher levees. They decided to spend less money because they were sending the money to Iraq. Where it was $4,000 a foot, they basically built I-wall designs that broke at the 17th Street Hammond street, forget the exact name – intersection, the infamous 17th street canal that broke. So, they tried to cut costs. That's one of the problems. AMY GOODMAN: Pratap, we only have a minute left. Summarize, again, the title of your piece at Corpwatch, “Big, Easy Iraqi Style Contracts Flood New Orleans.” What should people take away with this? PRATAP CHATTERJEE: Of course the Big Easy is New Orleans, and the exactly the same companies -- let me leave you with one thing, Fluor, the company that has a lot of the contracts that Halliburton lost -- AMY GOODMAN: Fluor is spelled -- PRATAP CHATTERJEE: Fluor. They were doing a lot of the reconstruction contracts in Iraq. Their work that ground to a halt, because of the strength of the resistance there. Their man who is in charge in Iraq flew from Baghdad to New Orleans to take charge of the contracts they now have in New Orleans. AMY GOODMAN: Pratap Chatterjee, thank you very much for joining us. Managing editor of Corpwatch.org. -------- prisoners of war Army investigating new allegations of prisoner abuse Posted 9/23/2005 6:42 PM (AP) http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2005-09-23-army-abuse-investigation_x.htm WASHINGTON — The Army has opened an investigation into a Fort Bragg soldier's allegations that he witnessed and heard about widespread prisoner abuse — including torture and a beating with a baseball bat — while serving at a base in Iraq. The announcement Friday came as a human rights organization prepared to release a scathing report on three 82nd Airborne Division soldiers' accounts of prisoners being beaten, forced to hold five-gallon jugs of water in their outstretched arms, and denied sleep, food and water. The abuse, one of the sergeants said, was like a game and a way for soldiers to work out their frustrations. The soldiers said there was a great deal of confusion about what types of treatment were allowed under the Geneva convention, and senior officers provided little guidance. The report was compiled by Human Rights Watch from interviews with a captain and two sergeants who were stationed at a military base called Mercury near Fallujah. The captain said his complaints were ignored for 17 months, and he was denied a pass to leave his base after planning to meet with Senate staff members, the report said. Army officials, however, said they began their investigation into the matter as soon as it came to their attention. Army spokesman Paul Boyce said the soldier, whose name was not released, told superiors about the allegations and was then referred to the Army's Criminal Investigation Command. The investigation began at least two weeks ago, he said. Boyce said the soldier is allowed to contact or visit Congress members or staff but was stopped from traveling to Washington from Fort Bragg in North Carolina on one instance because he had not requested either administrative leave or a pass to leave the base. The Human Rights Watch report detailed severe, routine beatings of detainees by the 82nd Airborne Division. One of the sergeants told the group that military intelligence personnel, eager for information, often instructed soldiers to "smoke" detainees — called Persons Under Control or PUCs — during questioning, according to the report. "Smoking" prisoners meant physically abusing them until they lost consciousness. Frustrated soldiers would often beat the Iraqis as a stress release, the sergeant said. "In a way it was sport," the sergeant said. "One day (another sergeant) shows up and tells a PUC to grab a pole. He told him to bend over and broke the guy's leg with a mini-Louisville Slugger, a metal bat." The soldier said anything short of death was acceptable. "As long as no PUCs came up dead, it happened," he said. "We kept it to broken arms and legs." In the report, Human Rights Watch said the soldiers accounts demonstrate that troops were not given clear guidance on how to treat detainee. The group called for Congress to create a special commission to investigate the issue. Tom Malinowski, Washington director of Human Rights Watch, said the report differs from the previous accounts and lurid photographs the public has seen detailing prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib. "A lot of people have heard about this before. But I don't think they have heard a West Point-educated officer who fought on the front lines in Iraq and Afghanistan say what happened was wrong, what happened was systemic, and was the result of leadership failures," he said. Defense Department spokesman Lt. Col. John Skinner criticized the report as a predictable effort to try to "advance an agenda through the use of distortions and errors in fact." Skinner said the military has investigated all credible allegations of detainee abuse and "looked at all aspects of detention operations under a microscope." To date, the military has conducted 400 investigations of prisoner abuse allegations, and 230 soldiers have been court-martialed or faced non-judicial punishment or another administrative action. -------- OTHER -------- environment Pollution Turns China Village into Cancer Cluster September 23, 2005 — By Juliana Liu, Reuters http://www.enn.com/today.html?id=8879 BEIJING — The residents of Huangmenying village are poor, even by Chinese standards, but more and more are opting to splash out for bottled water rather than drink from local wells. Well water, they say, gives you cancer. Their fears are backed by the unusually large number of cancer cases in this village of fewer than 2,500 in central Henan province. The village gets most of its water from a fetid tributary of the Huai River, probably the most polluted stretch of water in China. Kong Heqin, a 30-year-old woman suffering cancer of the throat and intestine, cannot afford the luxury of filters and pumps water that stinks of rotten eggs and contains grainy sediment from a communal well into a red plastic pail. Three operations to control the cancer have left Kong unable to pass solid waste, with a ropy scar snaking up her abdomen. She can feel tumors still growing in her belly, but has no more money for treatment. "I have spent 70,000 yuan ($8,700) on three operations and I can't borrow any more," Kong said. "My husband said we could sell our older son to another couple looking to adopt to raise the money, but I refused. I would rather die than sell my son." Kong's husband, like many men from the village, has gone to Shanghai to earn money as a laborer, but only makes enough to cover the basics for his wife and their two school-age sons. PROTECTED POLLUTERS Local activist Huo Daishan says 118 people have died of cancer in Huangmenying since 1990. Huo is convinced the deaths are directly linked to the rampant pollution of the Huai River and its local branch, the Shaying, which he says have been poisoned by tanneries, paper mills and an MSG factory, all of which enjoy protection from local officials. "Once the factories are able to get the local government involved and combine their interests, it becomes hard to get a grip on the situation. That is why it's been so hard to solve this problem in recent years," Huo told Reuters. Local protectionism and industrial pollution are hardly isolated problems in China. Top officials have said 90 percent of the rivers that flow through Chinese urban centers are severely polluted, and some 300 million people nationwide have no access to clean water. Beijing has acknowledged the crisis and launched a "clear water for the people" campaign, but if decade-old efforts to clean up the Huai alone are any indication, there is a long way to go. This spring, central authorities conceded that tightened regulations and a reported 60 billion yuan ($7.4 billion) invested in improving the Huai, which supplies water to one sixth of China's 1.3 billion people, had done little to stem the tide of pollution. SOY SAUCE Huo, a former county official and photo journalist who has documented the Huai's decline, said the water had improved to some extent under the government push, but at times remained as foul as ever. "When the problem is more severe, the water is black, like soy sauce, with a lot of foam. It has a noxious smell," he said. Tests have shown the Huai contains dangerous amounts of metals, ammonia and oils. China's lax environmental protection rules are also at fault. The tanneries and MSG factories that have ruined the river were allowed to move in from overseas after being banned by foreign governments because of their pollution, Huo said. "A lot of industries are not accepting responsibility," he said. "They refuse to clean up their waste and just discharge back into the river water they take out." In other parts of China, polluting factories and unsympathetic officials have sparked riots by outraged residents. But in Huangmenying, people have not risen up -- they have died or fled. Along a red brick path dubbed "cancer street," weeds grow wild in front of empty, boarded-up houses, their owners either victims of cancer or run off to safer places. Those that have stayed cannot afford to leave or have found some way to cope. And they buy bottled water at such a rate that village store owner Lao Chen can barely keep enough in stock, selling around 100 big bottles a day. -------- ACTIVISTS Still Marching After All These Years By: Rio, Nevada City Published: September 23, 2005 at 09:28 Yubanet.com http://www.yubanet.com/artman/publish/article_25492.shtml Tomorrow, September 24, people here in Grass Valley/Nevada City, in Washington D.C., in San Francisco, and elsewhere will be marching to call for an end to our invasion of Iraq. Again. Many of us have been marching since before the attack in March, 2003, some since Gulf War I, Panama, Grenada, or Viet Nam, and a few since Korea or beyond. It's still the same march. Most of us, if not all of us, know in our hearts that, in the long run, a military solution is no solution at all. In fact, it virtually guarantees eventual failure. It's much more like an act of desperation than a show of strength. But, let's turn back the clock a moment. In August, 1945, the world entered a new era, the era of potential planetary destruction, or self-enacted extinction. Interestingly, at the same time we created something which could, in theory, help us avoid that fate: the United Nations. However, in 1950, President Truman signed a document authored by Wall Street's Paul Nitze called NSC-68. This bill committed the U.S. to an extensive peacetime military buildup to counter a purported (though actually nonexistent) Soviet threat. This commitment to a military economy rather than a people-based economy has been driving our country ever since. And so now we see more than half of every taxpayer dollar going for past, present, and future wars. Now we see a country that has become dependent on war and weapon production to support itself and its way of life. When we are dissatisfied with a government or its policies, or if we covet the natural resources of a country, we feel free to take whatever military action is needed to accomplish our ends, regardless of potential consequences. And the President covers it up with an appropriate fable: "Manuel Noriega is running drugs and needs to be removed." or "Saddam Hussein has weapons of mass destruction." In reality, we are the ones using the weapons of mass destruction, in the form of depleted uranium munitions on the unfortunate citizens of Iraq, on our own soldiers, and ultimately on people all over the world.. We are the ones who feel somehow justified in telling every other nation on earth what to do. And so, numerous wars, invasions, overthrows, and murders later, our country is attacking the people of Iraq. And we're still marching. We're still believing that a world at peace and working in cooperation has the chance of survival that a world perpetually at war doesn't. We're still believing that a world based on peace and justice, rather than on greed and force, is more conducive to quality living and loving. Moreover, we haven't forgotten the very first words of the Bill of Rights: "Congress shall make no law respecting … the right of the people peaceably to assemble and to petition the government for a redress of grievances." True, peace is not an easy path. It takes work, self-restraint, and thoughtfulness. It may not generate the kind of fast profits that selling weapons does. But, in the end, it is the only path that will succeed; the path espoused by every great spiritual leader from Jesus to Gandhi. So, tomorrow afternoon at 2:00 we will meet at the Rood Center to take a stand once again. We are standing to say that our invasion of Iraq is illegal. The weapons we're using against its people are illegal. And, according to the tenets of any established religion I've ever heard of, including Christianity, the whole thing is immoral. Last time I checked, Christians weren't supposed to kill, lie, or steal. Ever! We are standing in unison because it is the one way that ordinary citizens can make their voices heard by a government normally inclined to only consider the corporate line. We are standing to ask this question, "What kind of world do you want to hand to your children and grandchildren?" If you'd prefer not to hand them an irradiated, polluted world at war, then consider joining us. Help us draw that line in the sand. The time has come. Schedule of events: 12:30 Critical mass bike ride from recruitment center at Brunswick and Old Tunnel Rd. 1:30 Shuttle from Pioneer Park to Rood Center 2:00 Rally at Rood Center featuring local talent 3:30 March from Rood Center, via Broad St., to Pioneer Park 4:00 Picnic at Pioneer Park band shell Dusk Candlelight vigil at Broad St. overpass ---- War protesters tried on federal conspiracy charges in New York By Daniel Renfrew 23 September 2005 World Socialist Web Site http://www.wsws.org/articles/2005/sep2005/sp4-s23.shtml Four Catholic activists went on trial this week in the upstate New York town of Binghamton, the first antiwar protestors to be indicted on federal conspiracy charges since the Vietnam War era. On St. Patrick’s Day, March 17, 2003, on the eve of the Iraq war, the four entered a military recruiting center in the small town of Lansing, poured some of their own blood around the vestibule and read out a statement condemning the illegal war. The four Ithaca-based activists, Peter DeMott, Clare Grady, Danny Burns and Teresa Grady, were arrested and in April 2004 faced charges of criminal mischief and trespassing in a state case that ended in a mistrial in Tompkins County court, with nine of 12 jurors voting to acquit. They had rejected a plea bargain that would have left them with no jail time in return for pleading guilty to a minor offense. In response to the state’s failure to convict, the federal prosecutors intervened with the conspiracy charge, which carries a six-year prison sentence and a $250,000 fine for an offense that the state considered a misdemeanor, punishable by no more than six months in jail. While the “St. Patrick’s Four” were among roughly 7,000 protesters arrested across the country in acts of civil disobedience on the eve of the war, they are the only ones thus far to be tried on federal conspiracy charges. The last such case was apparently brought in 1968 against Dr. Benjamin Spock and three others on charges of conspiring to counsel draft resistance. Spock and his codefendants were convicted, but the verdict was overturned on appeal. This latest trial is of utmost political significance for democratic rights throughout the country, and could provide a legal precedent for the Bush administration to intensify intimidation and police crackdowns on nonviolent political dissent. The charges in the indictment include one felony count of conspiracy to impede an officer of the United States by “force, intimidation, and threat,” and three misdemeanor charges. The determination of the government to ram through a conviction—and the complicity of US District Judge Thomas J. McAvoy, who is presiding over the trial—has emerged in the first days of the proceedings. McAvoy handed the prosecution a key legal victory with an extraordinary ruling allowing it to change its indictment after the trial had begun. Thus, the four will be tried for using not “force, intimidation and threat” to impede a federal officer, but rather “force, intimidation or threat.” This one-word change makes the prosecutors’ job far easier, while exposing the frame-up character of the federal case. During the state trial in Ithaca, the St. Patrick’s Four, representing themselves, invoked the Nuremberg Principles of international law as a precedent, arguing that individuals have the right and duty to prevent crimes against humanity, superseding obedience to any government. They also argued their actions were authorized under the “defense of necessity” principle, as the harm they caused was far less than the one they were trying to prevent. Danny Burns in his closing argument put it this way: “No jury would convict four people of breaking and entering if they broke into a burning house to try to save a child. Here, the building was on fire—as Iraq is now, and we broke in to try to save our troops and the innocent Iraqis. We did not save them, but justice says we should not be punished for trying.” For the federal trial, however, Judge McAvoy has preemptively barred the St. Patrick’s Four from using a similar defense. “This court offers no opinion on the war in Iraq as it is entirely irrelevant to this matter... assuming an illegal war, it does not provide a justification for violating the criminal laws of the United States,” he ruled. Judge imposes political gag order This ruling amounts to a judicial gag order, stifling the defendants’ ability to fully draw out the context of their actions as well as their appeal to the international law they argue is meant to function as the “supreme law of the land.” In the first day of testimony by the activists, McAvoy made clear his intention to squelch any effective defense, while allowing the prosecution free rein. “This case is not about the war in Iraq. It is about what happened in Ithaca, New York,” McAvoy lectured the defendants. “To discuss the war and what is happening in Iraq is not permissible.” The judge found both Peter DeMott and Teresa Grady in contempt of court for mentioning that they had been subjected to a previous trial, a fact that he has ordered hidden from the jury. DeMott was hit with a second contempt charge for refusing to answer a barrage of questions from the prosecution—described by some in the court as “McCarthy-like”—demanding that he name names of all those who may have helped to prepare the protest action. A “Citizens’ Tribunal” on Iraq is being held concurrently at a Binghamton church throughout the week, featuring former US diplomats and a British MP who resigned in protest of the war, antiwar activists, various legal experts, and antiwar Iraq veterans Jimmy Massey and Camilo Mejía. The St. Patrick’s Four spoke about their upcoming trial to a packed Binghamton University-SUNY audience of almost 400 people on Thursday, September 15. Danny Burns, who hails originally from Binghamton, denounced the “lies” of the US government and the “fear” and complicity of Democratic politicians such as New York Senators Charles Schumer and Hillary Clinton, who have supported and justified the Iraq war. Vietnam veteran Peter DeMott described the day of the protest, when the four poured about a pint of their own blood along the walls, cardboard cutouts, and US flag at the recruiting office in an “act of conscience” before reading a statement and kneeling in prayer. Answering right-wing critics of the action, the four said they longed for the day when the killing people “upsets as much as the sight of blood poured on the flag.” Expressing confidence in defeating the federal frameup, Teresa Grady called the prosecution’s charge that they used “force, threat, and intimidation” against military recruiters absurd. She said that business continued as usual in the back offices of the center while they were there. She added that the Catholic Worker movement, to which the four are affiliated, is opposed on principle to the use of force or intimidation. Speaking to the WSWS after the meeting, Peter DeMott said he hoped the trial would inspire similar actions and resistance, and that it would raise awareness of what he says are important but often ignored issues, such as that of US military’s use of depleted uranium. “You never see it mentioned, or very, very seldom do you see it mentioned in the mainstream media, that we are in effect conducting a nuclear war in Iraq right now, and that it’s contaminating the earth, the air, the soil, the water of Iraq and it’ll be contaminated for millions of years,” he said. “Our own soldiers are returning contaminated with depleted uranium and now they’re fathering children that are horribly deformed because they’ve been contaminated with radiated material,” DeMott added. “This is mind-boggling what we’ve done and what we’re doing right now.” DeMott says the federal trial is part of an effort to “stifle dissent” and to “show the broader public that if you protest this way we’re going to come down hard on you so don’t even think about it.” Hundreds of people have turned out in Binghamton to demonstrate support for the St. Patrick’s Four in the course of the week. While federal prosecutors expressed confidence in holding this trial in Binghamton, which has historically been one of the state’s more conservative cities, they may be in for a surprise. The long-decaying city, with an unemployment rate reaching almost one quarter of the working population, has shown public signs of opposition to the war. This year the city council passed a resolution by a 5-4 margin calling for the immediate withdrawal of US troops from Iraq.