NucNews October 12, 2006 -------- NUCLEAR -------- australia Australia considers nuclear fusion as energy solution The World Today - Thursday, 12 October, 2006 Australia Broadcasting Reporter: Sarah Clarke http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/content/2006/s1763618.htm PETER CAVE: As Australia engages in a nuclear power debate and the world searches for a clean energy source, scientists are now saying that nuclear fusion is the answer to the world's energy crisis. Today, scientists from around the world are meeting in Sydney to discuss this as yet unproven energy source. Europe has already embarked on a $16 billion project to make fusion the power source of the future and now Australia is thinking about coming on board. As Science Reporter Sarah Clarke explains, if it doesn't, scientists warn Australia may be denied access to the world's greatest energy supply. SARAH CLARKE: It's the process that powers the sun and the stars - bringing two atoms together at temperatures of 1,000-million degrees Celsius to generate energy. Harnessed on Earth, scientists say nuclear fusion could provide millions of years of power, with virtually zero greenhouse emissions. Thirty governments across the United Kingdom and Europe are already building a $16 billion commercial fusion reactor in France. Professor Matthew Hole from the Australian National University says if Australia doesn't sign up, it will be locked out of what could be the answer to the world's energy crisis. MATTHEW HOLE: True. There's a real chance that Australia could in fact be locked out of this. And as a result of that, and when it comes to commercialisation, Australia will be in the unfortunate situation of having to buy fully developed technology from another world power at significantly greater cost. And also, us evaluating that nuclear technology from a position of complete ignorance. SARAH CLARKE: Today, fusion experts from around the world are meeting in Sydney to convince the Federal Government to come on board. While the process produces a small amount of radioactive waste, scientists say it's less than the nuclear process fission, and reactors are inherently safe. Supporters include the head of CSIRO, Dr Jim Peacock, but he admits it may be some time before it becomes a reality. JIM PEACOCK: It's a long way from being, you know, a practical source of power, but it, ultimately, if we are able to, you know, do all the right things in research around the world, it would be a marvellous clean energy technology. SARAH CLARKE: For the first time, Australia is showing interest. The Federal Government's nuclear taskforce will consider it and Environment Minister Ian Campbell is showing signs of support. IAN CAMPBELL: We know that for a world to have secure energy, but with much, much lower greenhouse gas emissions, we have to have a very open mind about all of the technologies that can supply that outcome in the future. SARAH CLARKE: While scientists say fusion may be one step closer to reality, environmentalists say it won't come soon enough. Professor Ian Lowe is a nuclear physicist and the Head of the Australian Conservation Foundation. IAN LOWE: I suppose the question is, why we would spend billions of dollars hoping to perfect a new technology rather than spending much smaller sums of money implementing the technologies that work now and would deliver clean energy forever. PETER CAVE: Professor Ian Lowe from the Australian Conservation Foundation ending that report from Sarah Clarke. ---- Australia 'risks missing out' on fusion Anna Salleh ABC Science Online Thursday, 12 October 2006 http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/stories/2006/1762505.htm Australia is running out of time to be part of the global research effort on nuclear fusion, say experts. Dr Matthew Hole of the Australian National University says Australia should be a partner in the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) in southern France, which is a testbed for a commercial fusion power reactor. "The ITER project itself is the world largest science experiment," says Hole, a plasma physicist who is chairing a workshop on fusion and the ITER in Sydney this week. Hole says ITER is driving the international agenda in fusion energy research and Australia should be involved so that it keeps its research capacity in the area, and does not end up having to buy the technology back at great cost. He says the seven ITER partners could ratify the final reactor plan as early as December and once these plans are signed off on Australia will be "locked out" of any opportunity to contribute to the reactor construction. "It's a very urgent issue," says Hole. "The deadline, if not missed, is approaching being missed." "The next opportunity will might be in 10 years time by which time Australia will have no research capability in this area." An Australian discovery Fusion power reactors have been a dream of many since Australian Sir Mark Oliphant discovered nuclear fusion, the process that powers the Sun and other stars, in 1934. Fusion involves the release of energy from the combination of two light atomic nuclei, typically isotopes of hydrogen. And it is this energy that scientists hope to harness as a safe, greenhouse-friendly and economic form of power. Hole says nuclear fusion would produce energy at a cost comparable to nuclear fission but with an environmental impact comparable to wind power. But there are many challenges. Significant energy is required to force two positively charged atomic nuclei together and a plasma gas of the charged particles must be kept hot and dense for long enough to undergo fusion. One challenge is how to confine the plasma that must be kept at temperatures around the heat of the Sun. Doughnut-shaped magnetic fields The ITER will be a fusion reactor called a tokomak, originally designed in Russia but pioneered in the west by Australia. The tokomak fuses ions of hydrogen (deuterium and tritium) that are confined in a doughnut-shaped magnetic field at temperatures of up to 100,000,000ºC. Hole says that unlike previous plasma physics experiments, the ITER will produce more energy than it consumes. Under special conditions it will even produce 30 times more energy than it consumes. He says various technologies being developed in Australia could contribute to the ITER but despite Australia's early leadership in fusion science, it now risks missing out unless it is officially part of the French-based project. Hole says relevant Australian expertise includes the ability to diagnose what is going on in the reactor, including measuring temperatures. "Measuring temperatures at 100 million degrees, for example, is no simple exercise," he says. Australia also has expertise in developing materials that can handle the high temperatures involved, says Hole. Currently, Hole says only A$1.3 million is spent on fusion research in Australia and this should be increased to A$16 million to be competitive with the US and UK commitment. Concerns But energy commentator, Dr Mark Diesendorf of the Sustainability Centre in Sydney, is concerned that the government could invest in fusion at the expense of other low-greenhouse energy sources that are likely to deliver more quickly. Diesendorf says while there could be a big pay-off from fusion, the technology is very risky, with the chance of plasma becoming more unstable the more energy you try to get out of the system. -------- depleted uranium Strykers keep rolling along, despite ruling By William Cole Honolulu Advertiser Military Writer Thursday, October 12, 2006 http://www.honoluluadvertiser.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061012/NEWS08/610120432/1001/NEWS Army training with its 19-ton Stryker vehicles is going forward — at least for now — despite a federal appeals court decision last week that the Army violated environmental law in planning for the arrival of the fast-strike unit. "Training continues as we continue to evaluate our options in regard to the decision by the 9th Circuit Court (of Appeals)," said Stretch Rodney, a spokesman for U.S. Army Pacific at Fort Shafter. The legal friction is part of the continuing clash of cultures that exists in Hawai'i between its sizable military and strategic location in the Pacific, and those who oppose the military. David Henkin, an Earthjustice attorney representing three Hawaiian groups in their suit against the Army, said if negotiations between the groups and the Army fail to produce an agreement soon, he will seek a temporary restraining order or equivalent to halt all Stryker training and work. "I've been talking with the Army," Henkin said. The attorney said he could not reveal what was discussed, but said it could be "not long" before a stoppage is sought. Henkin and the Army disagree over whether the service can continue with the project based on an earlier court agreement. Henkin said the Army shouldn't continue, while the Army believes it can, he said. KICKING UP DUST In a 2-1 decision last Thursday, the San Francisco-based appeals court said the Army must complete a supplementary environmental analysis to consider alternatives to basing a Stryker brigade in the Islands. Wahiawa residents saw the armored vehicles back on East Range Tuesday and yesterday for the first time since last week's court decision. About a month after the first round of driver training sessions for the Stryker vehicles got under way in mid-July, area residents concerned about the dust kicked up by the vehicles turned to the state Department of Health. "Before we did some calls, the dust that they kicked up was so bad the (Health Department) was called in," said Duane Tamura, who lives off Leilehua Road in Wahiawa. The eight-wheeled Stryker vehicles pass by homes in the area on an adjacent dirt road within the Schofield Barracks East Range training area. "The issue was addressed pretty much immediately by taking water trucks out there and doing two-a-day runs along the fence line to (reduce the dust)," said Rodney. The Army also told the Health Department it plans to create a new access road several hundred feet away from the fence line and homes. An approximately 3,000-page Environmental Impact Statement produced by the Army said that 1,736 tons of dust would be generated by the Strykers on O'ahu and the Big Island, an increase of 81 percent. The Army also concluded there would be significant effects on cultural and biological resources, but that mitigation efforts could reduce them..2004 Lawsuit Three groups — Ilio'ulaokalani Coalition, Na 'Imi Pono and Kipuka — filed a lawsuit in 2004 alleging that the project will damage Native Hawaiian cultural sites and harm endangered species and their habitats. At the time the lawsuit was filed, the Army said it was going ahead with the Stryker brigade because it is "critical to achieving current and future national security objectives in U.S. Pacific Command's area of responsibility." The Army is in the process of bringing 328 Stryker armored vehicles to O'ahu, where they will be part of a $1.5 billion unit — one of seven the Army is creating to rapidly transport troops to the battlefield. The Strykers will also provide more protection for soldiers, compared with Humvees. The brigade of 3,900 soldiers is designed to be transported on new C-17 cargo aircraft based at Hickam Air Force Base. More than $700 million in construction projects are under way or planned for the unit, including 71 miles of private trails on O'ahu and the Big Island. An Army official said the new Stryker brigade is expected to deploy to Iraq next summer, but the completion of a new training range on Schofield for Strykers has been delayed. Schofield spokesman Ken-drick Washington recently said official word has not been received that the Stryker brigade is going anywhere. "Of course there are rumors out there about everything," he said, "but nothing definitive has come down." Concerns tied to Hawaiian cultural sites halted work in July for about a month on unexploded ordnance cleanup at the planned "Battle Area Complex" for Stryker training after a work crew bulldozed across a buffer protecting the Hale'au'au heiau, cultural monitors said. ALTERNATIVE LOCATIONS It wasn't the first or only setback for the Stryker vehicle driving and firing range. In January, the Army said depleted uranium was found from 15 training rounds used in the 1960s. A month later, the Army said chemical weapons that included chloropicrin, an asphyxiator used in World War I, were located at the site. The majority opinion of the 9th Circuit reached last week said the Army violated the National Environmental Policy Act when it chose Hawai'i for a Stryker brigade by failing to examine alternative locations in the "programmatic" or "site-specific" environmental impact statement. In April 2005, Hawai'i Chief U.S. District Court Judge David Ezra had ruled against the three Hawaiian groups in the case, saying the organizations raised their objections too late. He also said the Army had properly notified the public and had adequately considered what impacts the project might have on the environment. But Henkin said he warned the Army since 2002 it needed to adequately consider alternative locations for the Stryker brigade, and letting the service continue the development of the unit while the court case ticks on would turn the "whole (environmental impact) process into a sham." The Army can seek a rehearing either from the three-member panel or a 15-judge appeals court panel and has 45 days from last week's decision to do so, Henkin said. The Army also has 90 days to decide if it wants to seek review before the U.S. Supreme Court, he said. Reach William Cole at wcole@honoluluadvertiser.com. -------- europe Nuclear power stance is costly for Spain By Kristian Rix and Juan Pablo Spinetto Bloomberg News Published: October 12, 2006 http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/10/11/bloomberg/bxenergy.php MADRID Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero of Spain is a self- proclaimed antinuclear warrior. When the aging José Cabrera nuclear reactor, about 100 kilometers, or 62 miles, east of Madrid, was shuttered in April, Zapatero refused to consider a new atomic plant. Instead, the reactor will be replaced with a generator that burns natural gas from North Africa. Zapatero pledged last month to announce a plan to phase out all nuclear reactors. Four decades after the dictatorship of General Francisco Franco bet on nuclear power to reduce dependence on foreign energy, Spain is the fastest-growing importer of natural gas in Western Europe. The shift has come with a steep price tag: The cost of energy imports rose 66 percent in two years to €32.1 billion, or $40.3 billion, in 2005, the National Statistics Office said. "We are putting ourselves at the mercy of gas," Pedro Rivero, the chairman of Unesa, a trade group of utilities in Madrid, said last month. Gas-fed generators produce power for about €35 a megawatt-hour compared with €14 for nuclear plants, according to Unión Fenosa, owner of the José Cabrera plant. Spain gets 75 percent of its energy from fossil fuels, more than the average of 50 percent for the European Union. Zapatero is bucking the trend in much of Europe. France and Finland are building nuclear reactors to replace aging ones. In July, Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain supported building a new generation of nuclear power plants. Germany, which has a law designed to shut all nuclear power plants by the early 2020s, has increasingly turned to nonfossil fuel sources like solar power and wind. Spain abandoned new construction of nuclear power stations in the 1980s, because of opposition from the Socialists. In 1984, a Socialist government led by Prime Minister Felipe González scrapped three almost-finished plants. The decision was made five years after the accident at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania. More countries followed suit after the Chernobyl accident in 1986. "We don't need nuclear power," said Lawrence Sudlow, a spokesman for Friends of the Earth in Spain. "People here fight against it to stop the lunacy which creates waste for thousands of years." Only 4 percent of Spaniards say they want more nuclear power, the second- lowest percentage among the 25-country EU, after Greece. Gas-fueled stations passed nuclear plants this year as the second-largest source of power in Spain, supplying 25 percent of the country's electricity, up from 6 percent in 2003. Nuclear supplies 23 percent and coal 27 percent, according to Red Eléctrica de España, the network operator. About 75 gas-fed plants are set to dot the country by 2011. Power demand in Spain is forecast to outstrip the average EU growth in 2006 for the 13th consecutive year, and remain above-average through 2011. The government expects annual demand to increase to 3.8 percent from 3.5 percent until then. "Dependence on gas is not going to fall anytime soon," Rafael Villaseca, chief executive of Gas Natural, the largest Spanish supplier of natural gas, said at a conference in Madrid in May. "Nuclear power, with all its drawbacks, could provide a solution to this problem." Spain imported 70 percent of its natural gas from Nigeria and North Africa last year, at a time when prices rose 70 percent. Atomic energy may be the simplest way to reduce Spain's dependence on natural gas imports, said José Carlos Diez, chief economist at Intermoney, a brokerage firm and fund manager in Madrid. "Nuclear power seems the least bad solution to the problem," he said. Spain began its push into nuclear energy in 1965, 10 years before Franco died. Three nuclear plants were built by 1971, with seven more completed in the next 16 years. The José Cabrera plant was Spain's smallest, with an installed capacity of 166 megawatts. It is the second to be closed; the Vandellós-1 unit was destroyed by fire in 1989. The 466-megwatt Santa María de Garoña operating license expires in 2009. Endesa and Iberdrola, the plant's operators, have asked Spain's nuclear regulator to extend the permit until 2019. The Industry Ministry declined to comment. Economic growth will suffer without nuclear power, said Loyola de Palacio, who was the EU energy commissioner until November 2004. She campaigned for the use of nuclear power to curb European reliance on natural gas from Russia and North Africa. She is now the foreign affairs spokeswoman for the opposition, Partido Popular. Rising energy costs "will undoubtedly knock a few tenths of a percentage point from growth" this year, she said during an interview. Growing dependence on natural gas is also contributing to rising emissions of carbon dioxide. Spain, the fastest- growing air polluter in Europe, produced 5 percent more carbon dioxide last year than allowed under permits granted through an EU emissions program, the government has said. Zapatero said last month that his Socialist government would prepare a plan before the end of the parliamentary term in 2008 to phase out atomic plants. He said that he wants renewable sources like wind parks to make up about 13 percent of electricity demand by 2012, up from 5.7 percent last year. "We are betting on a progressive reduction of the weight of nuclear power in our energy mix," Zapatero said. "We want a more responsible, more sustainable use of energy." Juan Pablo Spinetto reported from London. ---- France Ends Nuclear Energy Reports; Traders See `Step Backward' By Lars Paulsson and Tom Cahill Last Updated: October 12, 2006 (Bloomberg) http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601085&sid=acInNLwOp4ug Oct. 12 -- France, the world's largest producer of nuclear energy, stopped reporting the weekly operations at the nation's 58 reactors, ending disclosure of data used by traders to buy and sell power and by environmental groups to track safety. The French Nuclear Safety Authority, known as ASN, discontinued release of the figures at the end of September and has no plans to reinstate the updates, Evangelie Petit, a spokeswoman for the agency, said yesterday in an interview. Electricite de France SA, which owns the reactors, also said it doesn't plan to release the information. For years, electricity traders in Europe had used the reports to follow plant shutdowns and estimate future halts, which cut power supply and threaten to drive prices higher around the continent. The status of the nation's plants, which provide about 84 percent of French power, had been updated weekly on the agency's Web site. ``Any removal of generation data that has been in the public domain is clearly a step backward,'' said Peter Styles, chairman of the electricity committee at EFET, an industry group for European energy traders. European countries including Spain, the U.K. and Sweden have Web sites that disclose information about individual plants. Figures about power generation capacity can help calculate prices for buyers. `Huge Worry' Greenpeace France, an environmental group, said citizens will have a tougher time determining whether local reactors are operating or not. ``The lack of information is a huge worry here in France,'' said Frederic Marillier, a nuclear campaigner for Greenpeace. ``It's totally ridiculous.'' In countries without public plant information, traders who work for power companies have an edge because they get early alerts when generators shut down and start up. Four electricity industry groups, in France, the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg, in June proposed regulations requiring greater transparency, including aggregated data by fuel source. The groups said then they expected changes to be made in the fourth quarter. Dutch energy companies, including Essent NV and Nuon NV, plan to start reporting daily data about power production this month, Sjoerd Marbus, a spokesman for EnergieNed, a Dutch industry group, said yesterday. Data will be shown by combined fuel source and not on an individual plant basis, he said. `Level Playing Field' The proposal is aimed at creating ``a level playing field'' for all market participants, the June statement said. Germany's four-biggest power companies publish aggregated plant data. ``Any solution for increasing the availability of data will have to include the biggest French and German generators,'' said Styles. Germany and France are Europe's first- and second- biggest power markets, respectively. Styles' organization represents banks such as Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch & Co., Deutsche Bank AG and Barclays Capital, as well as power producers including E.ON AG and Electricite de France. The ASN statistics had been published as a compilation for each reactor for at least the past four years. ``We made the decision to stop publishing the production data,'' said Petit, a Paris-based spokeswoman for ASN. ``Our mission is control and implementation, not production. That's truly the domain of EDF.'' `Ping Pong' Petit said the site would still be updated for individual plants when the agency had information to transmit. Electricite de France, Europe's largest utility by market value, said it didn't ask for the changes by the ASN and has no plans for wider distribution of its plant data. ``EDF continues to send information about its production to the ASN, but ASN has decided to stop publication,'' Agnes Nemes, a spokeswoman for EDF in Paris, said in an interview two days ago. ``EDF has no plan to publish it. For us it's considered confidential information.'' She repeated late yesterday that plans haven't changed. The French Union of Electricity, a trade group, said it has no plans to publish more plant data, be it EDF reactors or other fuel sources, according to spokeswoman Muriel Soubeyrand. France's energy regulator also doesn't have access to the information and has no plans to get the data, said spokesman Christophe Feuillet. ``The problem specific to France is we have no legal recourse to obtain the information if the ASN doesn't give it,'' said Greenpeace's Marillier. ``If they decide it's not in the interest of the public, then it won't be published.'' European Commission energy spokesman Ferran Tarradellas Espuny said he wasn't immediately able to comment when reached by telephone yesterday in Prague. EDF said it will provide the information to individuals who call a dedicated ``green line'' for each plant. ``You can call, but it will be a game of ping pong before you get an answer, which may or may not be right,'' said Marillier. ``A citizen should be able to know if their nearby reactor is working or not.'' To contact the reporters on this story: Lars Paulsson in London at lapulsson@bloomberg.net ; Tom Cahill in Paris at tcahill@bloomberg.net ---- Nuclear power stance is costly for Spain By Kristian Rix and Juan Pablo Spinetto Bloomberg News Published: October 12, 2006 http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/10/11/bloomberg/bxenergy.php MADRID Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero of Spain is a self- proclaimed antinuclear warrior. When the aging José Cabrera nuclear reactor, about 100 kilometers, or 62 miles, east of Madrid, was shuttered in April, Zapatero refused to consider a new atomic plant. Instead, the reactor will be replaced with a generator that burns natural gas from North Africa. Zapatero pledged last month to announce a plan to phase out all nuclear reactors. Four decades after the dictatorship of General Francisco Franco bet on nuclear power to reduce dependence on foreign energy, Spain is the fastest-growing importer of natural gas in Western Europe. The shift has come with a steep price tag: The cost of energy imports rose 66 percent in two years to €32.1 billion, or $40.3 billion, in 2005, the National Statistics Office said. "We are putting ourselves at the mercy of gas," Pedro Rivero, the chairman of Unesa, a trade group of utilities in Madrid, said last month. Gas-fed generators produce power for about €35 a megawatt-hour compared with €14 for nuclear plants, according to Unión Fenosa, owner of the José Cabrera plant. Spain gets 75 percent of its energy from fossil fuels, more than the average of 50 percent for the European Union. Zapatero is bucking the trend in much of Europe. France and Finland are building nuclear reactors to replace aging ones. In July, Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain supported building a new generation of nuclear power plants. Germany, which has a law designed to shut all nuclear power plants by the early 2020s, has increasingly turned to nonfossil fuel sources like solar power and wind. Spain abandoned new construction of nuclear power stations in the 1980s, because of opposition from the Socialists. In 1984, a Socialist government led by Prime Minister Felipe González scrapped three almost-finished plants. The decision was made five years after the accident at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania. More countries followed suit after the Chernobyl accident in 1986. "We don't need nuclear power," said Lawrence Sudlow, a spokesman for Friends of the Earth in Spain. "People here fight against it to stop the lunacy which creates waste for thousands of years." Only 4 percent of Spaniards say they want more nuclear power, the second- lowest percentage among the 25-country EU, after Greece. Gas-fueled stations passed nuclear plants this year as the second-largest source of power in Spain, supplying 25 percent of the country's electricity, up from 6 percent in 2003. Nuclear supplies 23 percent and coal 27 percent, according to Red Eléctrica de España, the network operator. About 75 gas-fed plants are set to dot the country by 2011. Power demand in Spain is forecast to outstrip the average EU growth in 2006 for the 13th consecutive year, and remain above-average through 2011. The government expects annual demand to increase to 3.8 percent from 3.5 percent until then. "Dependence on gas is not going to fall anytime soon," Rafael Villaseca, chief executive of Gas Natural, the largest Spanish supplier of natural gas, said at a conference in Madrid in May. "Nuclear power, with all its drawbacks, could provide a solution to this problem." Spain imported 70 percent of its natural gas from Nigeria and North Africa last year, at a time when prices rose 70 percent. Atomic energy may be the simplest way to reduce Spain's dependence on natural gas imports, said José Carlos Diez, chief economist at Intermoney, a brokerage firm and fund manager in Madrid. "Nuclear power seems the least bad solution to the problem," he said. Spain began its push into nuclear energy in 1965, 10 years before Franco died. Three nuclear plants were built by 1971, with seven more completed in the next 16 years. The José Cabrera plant was Spain's smallest, with an installed capacity of 166 megawatts. It is the second to be closed; the Vandellós-1 unit was destroyed by fire in 1989. The 466-megwatt Santa María de Garoña operating license expires in 2009. Endesa and Iberdrola, the plant's operators, have asked Spain's nuclear regulator to extend the permit until 2019. The Industry Ministry declined to comment. Economic growth will suffer without nuclear power, said Loyola de Palacio, who was the EU energy commissioner until November 2004. She campaigned for the use of nuclear power to curb European reliance on natural gas from Russia and North Africa. She is now the foreign affairs spokeswoman for the opposition, Partido Popular. Rising energy costs "will undoubtedly knock a few tenths of a percentage point from growth" this year, she said during an interview. Growing dependence on natural gas is also contributing to rising emissions of carbon dioxide. Spain, the fastest- growing air polluter in Europe, produced 5 percent more carbon dioxide last year than allowed under permits granted through an EU emissions program, the government has said. Zapatero said last month that his Socialist government would prepare a plan before the end of the parliamentary term in 2008 to phase out atomic plants. He said that he wants renewable sources like wind parks to make up about 13 percent of electricity demand by 2012, up from 5.7 percent last year. "We are betting on a progressive reduction of the weight of nuclear power in our energy mix," Zapatero said. "We want a more responsible, more sustainable use of energy." Juan Pablo Spinetto reported from London. -------- india North Korean nuclear test causes concern, calls for global disarmament: MANW From: Sukla Sen Date: Thu Oct 12, 2006 9:26 am MOVEMENT AGAINST NUCLEAR WEAPONS The Movement Against Nuclear Weapons (MANW), Chennai, deplores unequivocally the nuclear test carried out by North Korea on October 9, 2006, as a serious setback to the struggle for world peace and for elimination of nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction. In its eagerness to join the nuclear club, North Korea has conducted the test without considering, in the least, the consequences it will have for global -and Asian - peace and security. In following the bad examples of India, Pakistan and Israel, North Korea has only helped accelerate the nuclear arms race. The lesson and message from the Indian and Pakistani nuclear-weapon programmes since 1998 and the growth of the undeclared nuclear arsenal of Israel are loud and clear: nuclear weapons are not a guarantor of security and instead increase hostilities and rivalries between nations. The MANW places the prime responsibility for the failure to contain nuclear proliferation on the hypocrisy and double-standards of the P 5 and especially the United States, which have done nothing to honour their commitment to move towards total nuclear disarmament and have,by their actions, strengthened nuclear jingoism masquerading as nationalism in various parts of the world. Pyongyang's extremely undesirable act exposes, yet again, the grave pitfalls in the global Nuclear non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) which have actually abetted proliferation. Purporting to prevent the spread of weapons of mass destruction, but conferring nuclear privileges on the P 5, the provisions of the treaty have, in practice, only served the cause of nuclear militarists in the rest of the world. After over three decades of the NPT, the number of nuclear arsenals remains at pre-1990s levels and the P 5 countries do not have a definite time-table for the total abolition of nuclear weapons. The global consensus against the use of nuclear weapons, which is as oldas the Hiroshima tragedy of 1945, is in the danger of crumbling. The George Bush Administration of the US talks of "usable, battle-field nuclear arms". It has renewed the 1958 Mutual Defence Agreement with the UK for the production of a new generation of nuclear warheads. The assurance by the P 5 countries (under the 1995 United Nations Resolution) not to use weapons of mass destruction against non-nuclear weapon states has, for all practical purposes, been abandoned. Countries such as India, Pakistan and Israel, which have remained outside the NPT, have been allowed to gatecrash into the nuclear club, dealing a deadly blow to any serious attempts at non-proliferation. North Korea and Iran, meanwhile, have effectively been forced out of the treaty by a denial of their due rights even under its discriminatory provisions. The result is nuclear proliferation of the kind illustrated by the North Korean test that can only cause consternation in the pro-peace camp. The MANW hopes that, instead of resorting to the failed mantra of sanctions and threats, the United Nations will take realistic measures to launch a new a global initiative for genuine nuclear disarmament, including by the nuclear haves, both recognised and unrecognized ones. On no account should the UN let itself be an agency playing a proxy role for the US and other powers in their geopolitical games, if the world is to be saved from the menace of nuclear weapons. J. Sri Raman Convener Movement Against Nuclear Weapons (MANW) October 12, 2006 -------- iran US General: Strikes on Iran possible by 2007 US Air Force General reveals details of possible US aerial offensive against Iran should diplomacy fail to solve dispute over Tehran's nuclear ambition; says 'doing it alone' is not an option for Israel Yitzhak Benhorin 10.12.06 YNET http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/1,7340,L-3314171,00.html WASHINGTON - Is it possible to halt Iran's nuclear program by military means? For years, this question has been asked by Israeli and US military officials. Israel prefers Washington to act on its behalf but academics, left-wing politicians and experts say a military option is not on the cards for the Bush administration because of the situation in Iraq. But retired US Lieutenant General Thomas McInerney thinks otherwise. There is a good military solution to Iran's nukes but it requires courage and determination to act Mcinerney told Ynet in an interview. McInerney served as a pilot and a strategic commander in the US Air Force for 35 years. Following his retirement in 1994 he served as a commentator for Fox News. McInerney said Iran should be attacked by fall 2007 if diplomacy fails. He added that an aerial attack should be backed by a secret land operation aimed at deposing the Ayatollahs. McInerney said a military operation against Iran should aim at destroying 1,500 targets within 24 to 36 hours, which would delay Iran's nuclear ambitions by at least five years. He added that paralyzing the Iranian air force and the Shihab 3 missiles aimed at Israel would be among the goals of a US military offensive against Iran. The retired general estimates that such offensive would significantly destabilize the Ayatollah's regime. Asked whether the exiled Iranian opposition is capable of governing Iran once the Ayatollahs are ousted, McInerney said the Iranian nation is divided and many citizens opposed to the Ayatollahs would attempt to take power. Over 4,300 protests took place in Iran last year, he said. He also noted that only 51 percent of Iranians are Persians while 49 percent belong to different ethnic groups. He added that the Ayatollahs can be ousted if the US clandestinely supports opposition groups within Iran. A US aerial attack against Iran would involve the following stages, says Mcinerney: - 60 stealth aircraft, B-2, F-117, and F-22, would take part in the initial attack - The second aerial wave would involve 400 aircraft (B-52, B-1, F-15, F-16 and F-18) - 150 aircraft special aircraft would be dispatched for refueling and intelligence collection missions - 500 cruise missiles would be fired at targets in Iran from US warships The B-2 is capable of firing 80 250-kilogram bombs at 80 different targets simultaneously. Diverting his attention to the importance of possessing key intelligence for a successful assault, McInerney expressed confidence in his country's intelligence-gathering capability. He added however that hitting 20 to 50 percent of Iran's military targets is enough to loosen the Ayatollahs' grab on Iran. He noted that although Israel's military campaign had some flaws, Hizbullah lost 25 percent of its fighters and refused to release injured figures, signs that group is in a difficult position after the war. Asked if 'going it alone' is an option for Israel, McInerney praised Israel's aerial capabilities but warned that the lack of aircraft carriers and the geographical distance make it extremely difficult for Israel to carry out a successful offensive against Iran. McInerney said that the Ayatollahs would seek the opportunity to leave the country to Switzerland where they hold large accounts should military commanders seek to overthrow them. The general said should diplomacy fail, the US would consider military options against Tehran within a year at the latest, charging the west should not allow Iran to acquire nuclear weapons. Iranian threats to launch attacks against western countries, Iraq and Israel through sleeping terror cells proves Tehran's link to terror groups like Hizbullah, Hamas, and Islamic Jihad. He concluded that a diplomatic solution is preferable but without a serious military option in the cards, diplomacy would fail and the US should be ready to act. -------- japan N. Korea threatens 'countermeasures' against Japan Updated 10/12/2006 (AP) http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2006-10-12-koreas-nuclear_x.htm SEOUL — A North Korean official threatened "strong countermeasures" against Japan for new sanctions against the communist regime, Kyodo News agency reported from Pyongyang on Thursday. The Japanese government decided on a package of additional economic sanctions against North Korea on Wednesday in response to the regime's claim of a nuclear test, including a ban on all imports from the country and the docking of North Korean ships in Japanese ports. The sanctions are expected to go into effect after they are approved by Japan's Cabinet Friday. "We will take strong countermeasures," Kyodo quoted Song Il Ho, North Korea's ambassador in charge of diplomatic normalization talks with Japan, as saying in an interview on Wednesday when asked about fresh sanctions by Japan. "The specific contents will become clear if you keep watching. We never speak empty words," he added. Kyodo did not explain why the interview, conducted on Wednesday before the sanctions were decided, was not reported until Thursday. Song said that Pyongyang considered Japan's measures as "more serious in nature" than other nations' because Tokyo has yet to adequately atone for its 1910-1945 colonization of the Korean Peninsula. "We will be taking countermeasures by calculating that in," Song said. Song said Pyongyang was closely watching moves by new Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who took office last month and is known for his hawkish views on North Korea. The Kyodo report quoted Song as suggesting that Pyongyang would not hold normalization talks with Tokyo as long as sanctions are in place. Those talks are currently stalled over issues including the abductions of Japanese citizens by agents from the North in the 1970s and 80s. "I wonder if we can hold talks under these kinds of circumstances," Song said. Japan prohibited North Korea's ships from entering Japanese ports and imposed a total ban on imports from the impoverished nation. North Korean nationals also were prohibited from entering Japan, with limited exceptions, the Japanese Cabinet Office said in a statement released after an emergency security meeting late Wednesday. A total ban on imports and ships could be disastrous for North Korea, whose produce such as clams and mushrooms earns precious foreign currency on the Japanese market. Ferries also serve as a major conduit of communication between the two countries, which have no diplomatic relations. ---- Japan faces its nuclear taboo amid calls to move on from Hiroshima By David McNeill in Japan Published: 12 October 2006 UK Independent http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/article1842545.ece Few people are angrier that North Korea has joined the nuclear club than Sunao Tsuboi. As a 20-year-old student, he was burnt from head to toe when the United States dropped the Fat Man atom bomb on Hiroshima in August 1945. He still bears the scars all over his face and body. "We're furious about this test," he said of Japan's 270,000 atom bomb survivors. "It means that more countries are sure to follow. Our greatest worry is that Japan will now feel it has to have its own nuclear weapon." Japan's history means any talk of developing its own nuclear option has long been taboo. But in the wake of Pyongyang's apparently successful test, the limits of the debate are being tested. Yasuhiro Nakasone, a former prime minister, is the latest politician to suggest that Japan should "study the nuclear issue". While this week, Japan's largest newspaper, The Daily Yomiuri, said the country should reconsider its aversion to the bomb. Politics not technology hinders the development of Japanese nuclear weapons. The world's second-largest economy also boasts one of the largest nuclear industries. It has 55 reactors and the use of a huge new reprocessing plant that will add to the 45 tons of plutonium stored in the country. In 2002 a senior opposition figure Ichiro Ozawa spelled out the implications when he told China that it would be "a simple matter" for Japan to build "3,000 to 4,000 nuclear warheads" if its neighbour got "too inflated". Most experts believe a Japanese bomb could be built in six months. In public at least, the new Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe, resists such calls. In a parliamentary Q&A session this week he stood by Japan's nuclear principles: that it will not "manufacture or possess nuclear weapons or allow their introduction". But the rhetoric has not always matched the reality. Nuclear-armed US vessels have secretly docked in Japanese ports and in the 1970s a nuclear feasibility plan was commissioned. In the short term, most experts believe Pyongyang's bomb is likely to push Tokyo closer to the US. Mr Abe has already pledged to speed up the development of a joint missile defence shield and to boost defence ties, a strategy that brings him into conflict with the "pacifist" constitution. Against a background of growing regional instability, few of the atom bomb survivors are now prepared to bet that the nuclear freeze will last forever. -------- korea North Korea Warns of More Nuclear Tests By NORIMITSU ONISHI Published: October 12, 2006 NY TIMES http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/12/world/asia/12korea.html?_r=2&oref=slogin&pagewanted=all SEOUL, South Korea, Oct. 11 — North Korea said Wednesday that it would consider sanctions a “declaration of a war” and vowed to carry out further nuclear tests if the United States maintained a “hostile attitude.” The North seems to be following a clear strategy that experts say has allowed it, a small, isolated, nearly bankrupt nation, to keep the attention of the United States for more than a decade. Kim Yong-nam, a top North Korean official, criticized the United States for what he called its “hostile attitude” toward North Korea. In the country’s first remarks since its reported nuclear test on Monday, North Korea said it felt compelled to prove its nuclear capacity to “protect its sovereignty and right to existence from the daily increasing danger of war” from the United States. North Korea’s official news agency quoted an unidentified Foreign Ministry spokesman as saying, “If the U.S. increases pressure on North Korea, persistently doing harm to it, it will continue to take physical countermeasures, considering it as a declaration of a war.” This characteristically defiant tone was sounded as the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council prepared to discuss what type of sanctions to mete out. In a rare interview, Kim Yong-nam, the North’s second most powerful leader, said, “The issue of future nuclear tests is linked to U.S. policy toward our country.” “If the United States continues to take a hostile attitude and apply pressure on us in various forms,” Mr. Kim told a Japanese news agency, “we will have no choice but to take physical steps to deal with that.” At the United Nations, ambassadors from Britain, China, France, Russia, the United States and Japan met to settle differences over a resolution to impose sanctions on North Korea. Ambassador John R. Bolton said the United States intended to circulate a revised draft Thursday in the hope of having a vote by Friday. The United States is seeking international inspections of all cargo into and out of North Korea to intercept weapons-related material and a resolution drafted under Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter that poses the possibility of military enforcement. China and Russia are resisting that, though they say they favor strict punishments for North Korea’s defiance of Council warnings not to conduct weapons tests. Secretary General Kofi Annan called the apparent nuclear test “unacceptable” and said he expected the Council to take “a firm action. Asked whether the United States should deal directly with North Korea, Mr. Annan said: “I have always argued that we should talk to parties whose behavior we want to change, whose behavior we want to influence. And from that point of view, I believe that the U.S. and North Korea should talk. They did talk in the past.” That may well be North Korea’s aim. Despite a carefully cultivated reputation as a volatile, capricious leader, Kim Jong-il has pursued a consistent, even canny, strategy in his pursuit of nuclear arms. As Kim Yong-nam’s remarks indicate, North Korea — an increasingly isolated country that has battled famine, a collapsing economy and desertion across its borders — has seen nuclear weapons as a form of defense as well as a potential threat. Its leaders have used that threat as way to wrest concessions from Western powers, and gain protection against what they see as hostile nations determined to topple their government. North Korea embarked on this course in 1993, when it announced that it was pulling out of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and then won an agreement from the Clinton administration for help in building two nuclear power reactors in exchange for freezing its nuclear activities. Over the ensuing years, despite disastrous economic conditions that led to famine in the mid- to late-1990’s, the North succeeded in getting the world’s attention through a series of crises of its own making, from declarations that it had nuclear weapons to missile launchings. “Every time they’ve played this crisis escalation strategy with us before, it’s worked,” said Scott Snyder, a Korea expert with the Asia Foundation in Washington and the author of “Negotiating on the Edge: North Korean Negotiating Behavior.” “The mind-set was that if you’re a small state like North Korea and there are many other problems in the world, the only way to get the United States’ attention is to escalate things in such a way as to force the Bush administration to deal with North Korea directly,” he said. Joining the club of nuclear powers was in keeping with North Korea’s strategy to be treated on equal terms with Washington, Mr. Snyder said. The North made its intentions explicit in March 2005 declaring that, as a nuclear power, it wanted the six-nation talks over its nuclear program to focus instead on “disarmament talks where participants can solve the issue on an equal basis.” The nuclear test was also the product of North Korea’s sense of insecurity — one that grew keener over the past decade because of its troubled economy and the leadership’s inability to control a population that began spilling out, by tens of thousands, across the border into China and some to South Korea. In the past few years, as North Korea began liberalizing its economy and trade boomed with China, new threats of money-making and corruption materialized. Many North Koreans still depend on international food aid because of the collapse of the state’s food rationing system, though life is less precarious than in the 1990’s. Those living near the porous border with China, and even those in remote areas, have increasing access to information from the outside world and contact with it. At the same time, the North is confronted by a Bush administration that described its leader, Kim Jong-il, as a “pygmy” and lumped it into an “axis of evil.” The toppling of Saddam Hussein magnified the threat. “The nuclear test is a response to the threat that North Korea feels,” said Bruce Cumings, a professor of history at the University of Chicago and an expert on North Korea. “It’s entirely real. It’s not a figment of their imagination. They were put in the axis of evil. We have nuclear weapons pointed at them, and we have for decades.” North Korea is “a garrison state of astonishing proportions,” he said. “It’s not going to commit suicide by attacking South Korea or Japan with nuclear bombs. It knows it will lose. Their fundamental orientation is being hunkered down for defense.” The test, experts said, also grew out of the North’s frustrations at the stalled six-nation talks and what it perceived as the Bush administration’s reluctance to engage in genuine negotiations. Last year, the United States offered security and economic incentives in return for the North’s freezing of its nuclear program, but the deal quickly fell apart over its sequence. What is more, Washington imposed economic sanctions around the same time, leading the North to withdraw from the talks. “North Korea has nothing to show for its diplomatic efforts,” said Peter Beck, the Northeast Asia project director at the International Crisis Group, adding that North Korea had also engaged in recent years in fruitless diplomacy with Japan and Europe. “That makes the military perspective much more appealing.” But for North Korea’s closest neighbors, experts said, its leverage comes from its weakness. For South Korea and China, the prospects of the North’s collapse and a flood of refugees, as well as the possibility of an even more intractable successor to Mr. Kim, are perhaps even more worrisome developments than nuclear weapons. In recent days, President Roh Moo-hyun of South Korea has indicated a willingness to be tough on the North by casting doubts about the South’s policy of engaging North Korea. He suspended aid and said the two major projects — industrial and tourist zones operated by South Koreans inside the North — would be put under review. But it is not clear how long the tough stance will last. “We’re under a lot of pressure both domestically and internationally to give up on engagement,” said a senior South Korean official. “But we really don’t have an alternative other than the engagement policy.” Warren Hoge contributed reporting from the United Nations. ---- North Korea Says Tough Sanctions Would Be Declaration Of War by Staff Writers Seoul (AFP) Oct 12, 2006 http://www.spacewar.com/reports/North_Korea_Says_Tough_Sanctions_Would_Be_Declaration_Of_War_999.html A defiant North Korea warned on Wednesday that it would regard harsh sanctions over its nuclear test as a declaration of war, while US President George W. Bush vowed the Stalinist regime would now face "serious repercussions". As the UN Security Council weighed what action to take against the regime, Pyongyang's number two and its foreign ministry warned of "physical" measures if it was hit with the kind of sanctions proposed by Washington and Japan, and threatened further tests. Bush committed his government to seeking a diplomatic rather than military solution to the standoff, while at the same time boosting defense cooperation with Asian allies on the front line against the erratic communist regime. He added it had yet to be confirmed that Monday's blast, announced by Pyongyang, was in fact a nuclear detonation. "But this claim itself constitutes a threat to international peace and stability," he said. "We are working with partners in the region and in the United Nations Security Council to ensure there are serious repercussions for the regime in Pyongyang" as a result of the test, Bush said. The chance of sanctions grew after the North's main ally China said it would support punitive action. "If the US continues to harass and put pressure on us, we will regard this as a declaration of war and will take a series of physical countermeasures," said a foreign ministry statement carried by the North's official Korean Central News Agency. It did not elaborate on the measures, but insisted it was still ready for talks to improve security and stability on the Korean peninsula. "We are ready for both dialogue and confrontation." Bush said he had spoken with the leaders of the four other governments leading efforts to halt North Korea's nuclear effort -- Japan, China, South Korea and Russia -- and had found unanimous agreement on the need for "a strong Security Council resolution that will require North Korea to abide by its international commitments to dismantle its nuclear programs". He said the resolution, being debated Wednesday at UN headquarters in New York, "should specify a series of measures to prevent North Korea from exporting nuclear or missile technologies." Washington also wants sanctions that would prevent "financial transactions or asset transfers that would help North Korea develop its nuclear missile capabilities," he said. The Security Council meeting would follow private talks Wednesday morning among envoys of the Council's five veto-wielding members -- Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States -- and Japan on harsh sanctions against Pyongyang, including inspection of all seaborne cargo to and from North Korea as well as financial restrictions. UN chief Kofi Annan on Wednesday urged North Korea not "to escalate the situation any further" in reference to rumors that Pyongyang was planning a second nuclear test. North Korea's message was reinforced by Kim Yong-Nam, who as head of the North Korean Supreme People's Assembly is effectively the regime's number two. "If the United States continues to take a hostile attitude and apply pressure on us in various forms, we will have no choice but to take physical steps to deal with that," he said in an interview with Japan's Kyodo News. He added: "The issue of future nuclear tests is linked to US policy toward our country." Japan meanwhile ramped up its bilateral sanctions on North Korea, slapping a complete ban on imports and shipping and barring almost all the communist country's nationals. "Considering the improving capability of North Korea's missiles and its nuclear capability, Japan is the country that is most affected by the actions of North Korea in terms of security," said Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. It was not certain if China and Russia -- which both have veto power, tend to oppose international sanctions and have close ties with Pyongyang -- would back harsh sanctions. "I think there have to be some punitive actions but also these actions have to be appropriate," China's UN ambassador, Wang Guangya, told reporters. In North Korea itself little has emerged of the atmosphere since Monday's announcement, which was played down by state media, according to some of the few foreigners allowed to live in the hermit nation. "It really has been a bit quiet," said one foreigner working for a UN aid organization. North Korea has repeatedly insisted its nuclear programme is essential to deterring an attack from the United States. At six-nation talks in September 2005 it appeared to have agreed to abandon its nuclear programme in exchange for energy and security guarantees, in what was seen as a major breakthrough. But the North gave up and began boycotting the talks just two months later after the United States imposed its own sanctions on a Macau bank it said was laundering money for the Pyongyang regime. ---- Lack of knowledge on North Korea's nuclear clout puts US at risk by P. Parameswaran Thu Oct 12, 2006 (AFP) http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20061012/pl_afp/nkoreanuclearweapons_061012150909 WASHINGTON - More than a decade after the CIA warned that North Korea can make nuclear weapons, the United States remains in the dark about the extent of its archrival's atomic program, raising what experts call the risk of surprise. "How far the North Korean nuclear weapons program has progressed is unknown," the intelligence panel of the US House of Representatives warned in a report just 10 days before Pyongyang announced its maiden nuclear explosion on Sunday. Although it did not list the specific intelligence gaps in the unclassified paper, the powerful panel said "there is a great deal about North Korea that we do not know." It then called for "accurate and comprehensive intelligence" against potential strategic threats posed by North Korea, whose Cold War-style nuclear brinkmanship appears to have left the United States helpless. Even as the dust from Pyongyang's nuclear test announcement settles down, the United States is still unable to say how big the underground explosion was. A successful test will in effect make North Korea the world's ninth nuclear power. US President George W. Bush was careful to say in his first reaction Monday that intelligence officials were still working to confirm the North Korean statement. Pentagon and intelligence officials said it was too soon to tell whether the test, which had a smaller yield than expected, was successful or even that it was a nuclear explosion. The United States honed its skills of evaluating the ex-Soviet Union's 800 odd nuclear explosions with a fairly low margin of error by slowly calibrating equipment and understanding extensively the geology around their test sites, experts said. "We know very little about the geology of North Korea. Even extrapolating from South Korea, there are limits," said Jon Wolfsthal, a former senior US Department of Energy official, who once visited North Korea's nuclear complex at Yongbyon, where the reclusive country's atomic program is centered. If the United States could end up with a "10 or 20 percent margin of error" in assessing the North Korean nuclear test, "I think we'll be very lucky," Wolfsthal said. One US intelligence official assessed the North Korea nuclear test as a sub-kiloton explosion, an evaluation that contrasted with that of Russia, which believed the strength of the weapon was from five to 15 kilotons. Experts warn of risks the United States could face for not getting a handle of the nuclear program of North Korea, which allegedly has enough fissile material for up to a dozen nuclear bombs. "It is hard to know the future shape and size of the program and it raises the risk of strategic surprise. If we don't understand the minute nature of the program, it means there are going to be gaps and they can surprise us," Wolfsthal said. But, he added, the United States was fortunate because Pyongyang was willing to "telegraph its punches." It gave five days advance notice before conducting the nuclear test this week and also gave adequate signals before launching in July its first ballistic missile test since 1998. But that year, the US intelligence community was taken by surprise that the Taepo Dong-1 missile had a third stage and was set off as a space launch vehicle, the House of Representatives intelligence panel said in its report. The launch also carried a larger payload than anticipated by US intelligence agencies, it said. "The US intelligence community must collect more and better intelligence ... dedicate the personnel and resources necessary to better assess North Korea's plans, capabilities and intentions," the panel said. William Perry, the US Defense Secretary under the Clinton administration, said the Bush administration's "inattention has allowed North Korea to establish a new and dangerous threat to the Asia-Pacific region. "It is probably too late to reverse that damage, but serious attention to this problem can still limit the extent of the damage," he said. Wolfsthal played down the possibility of Pyongyang making good on its warning of launching a nuclear-tipped missile to the United States. "But we obviously have to be concerned how quickly North Korea can put those pieces together and how prepared we are to respond to it," he said. "And if you think we're bad at figuring out what they just did, we're even less capable of predicting something about their future behavior." "They know that if they want to stand toe to toe with the United States, who has roughly 6,000 nuclear weapons, they're going to need more than a dozen." ---- Bush Admin Rejects North Korea Direct Talks Thursday, October 12th, 2006 Democracy Now! Headlines http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=06/10/12/145208 The Bush administration is facing growing calls to engage in direct talks with North Korea. The issue has received heightened attention following North Korea’s announcement Monday it’s carried out a successful nuclear test. At the United Nations Wednesday, Secretary General Kofi Annan called for more US engagement. * UN Secretary General Kofi Annan: "I believe that we should, U.S. and North Korea should talk, they did talk in the past and obviously we have the six party talks and everyone is urging them to go back to the six party talks and negotiate very seriously and I hope that the six party talks can resume. And so, the talks are necessary, whether it's done in the context of the six party talks or separately, one must talk." In the nation’s capital, President Bush said his administration would continue with six-party talks but rejected direct negotiations. * President Bush: “I can remember the time when it was said that the Bush administration goes it alone too often in the world, which I always thought was a bogus claim to begin with. And now all of a sudden people are saying, the Bush administration ought to be going alone with North Korea. But it didn't work in the past is my point. The strategy did not work. I learned a lesson from that and decided that the best way to convince Kim Jong-Il to change his mind on a nuclear weapons program is to have others send the same message." ---- Defector says NKorea can deploy several nuclear weapons SEOUL (AFP) Oct 12, 2006 http://www.spacewar.com/2006/061012140900.40g1iull.html North Korea has already produced several nuclear weapons and is ready to deploy them in case of war, a high-ranking defector from the communist state said Thursday. Hwang Jang-Yop, a former secretary of the ruling Workers Party of Korea, said the reclusive nation signed a pact with Pakistan in 1996 on the transfer of uranium-based nuclear technology. "North Korea reprocessed half of its 1,800 fuel rods in 1993," he added in a lecture in Seoul, according to the Yonhap news agency. Hwang, who defected to South Korea in 1997 during a visit to China, said the North's declared nuclear test on Monday was ordered by leader Kim Jong-Il to "raise his status." "It is also aimed at stunning the world and encouraging left-wing forces here (in the South)," he added. Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf denied Wednesday that proliferation by his country's disgraced nuclear supremo allowed North Korea to carry out its nuclear test. He also said neither the government nor the army had helped scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan, who has admitted passing nuclear secrets to North Korea, Iran and Libya. "This (North Korean) bomb is a plutonium bomb. We do not have a plutonium bomb. That should indicate to you whether we are responsible or not," Musharraf said. US and South Korean experts have previously said the North is believed to have produced enough weapons-grade plutonium to make several crude nuclear bombs. ---- US fears 'hell' of a response Mark Dunn October 12, 2006 Australia Herald-Sun http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,20565819-661,00.html PLANS previously drafted by the Pentagon predict 52,000 US military casualties and one million civilian dead in the first 90 days of conflict if America attacked Pyongyang. The US leadership is looking at international economic and diplomatic sanctions against North Korea as its primary response to Monday's nuclear test. But military contingencies are considered as a matter of course and analysts paint a horrific picture for even the most targeted of US strikes. A report this week by US-based security and military analyst Stratfor predicts North Korea could return fire on Seoul with "several hundred thousand high-explosive rounds per hour" -- with up to 25 per cent of shells filled with nerve gas. Other estimates say the US would need at least 500,000 ground troops to secure against a North invasion of the South. "When US military planners have nightmares, they have nightmares about war with North Korea," the Stratfor analysis says. Despite the risks, Washington-based Council on Foreign Relations expert Michael Levi, along with several Australian analysts, believe a North Korean nuclear test would increase the likelihood of a US military response. Pentagon strategists continue to work on military contingencies but all scenarios forecast massive casualties and a high likelihood of escalating war. When confronted with Pentagon drafts in 2004, US President George W. Bush was reported to have been horrified at the human cost. Updated Pentagon plans outlining bombing of North Korean nuclear sites, border artillery and troop emplacements call for: ROUND-the-clock strikes using Stealth and Lancer aircraft and naval-launch cruise missiles to destroy nuclear and missile capability and set the research program back years. AIR bombing, possibly including US tactical nuclear weapons, to penetrate metres-thick concrete protecting the North's nuclear research complex at Yonben. But Stratfor's assessment said even if limited strikes were ordered against only nuclear research facilities, North Korean leader Kim Jong-il's unpredictability meant a high potential for huge retaliation. Stratfor argued the US had two advantages -- the time it would take Pyongyang to develop a miniaturised nuclear weapon for carriage on a missile; and America's distance from North Korea. "The most important issue is the transfer of North Korean nuclear technology to other countries and groups," Stratfor said. It concluded by urging US military restraint. "The consequences of even the most restrained attack could be devastating." ---- Neighbours block 'act of war' searches after test By James Bone in New York and Richard Lloyd Parry in Seoul October 12, 2006 UK Times http://www.timesonline.co.uk/newspaper/0,,173-2399836,00.html RUSSIA and China are blocking an American plan to mount international inspections of all cargoes entering and leaving North Korea for fear of provoking a military showdown. North Korea underlined the concerns by saying yesterday that it would regard such sanctions as an act of war. Pyongyang threatened “physical measures”, including a second nuclear test, unless Washington ceased to confront it. President Bush said that he had “no intention of attacking” the isolated Stalinist regime and that he would pursue “all diplomatic efforts” in response to North Korea’s first atomic explosion. “Diplomacy hasn’t run its course, and we’ll continue working to give diplomacy a full opportunity to succeed,” he said. But he made it clear that President Kim Jong Il must face “serious repercussions” for sparking the world’s latest nuclear crisis. The repercussions envisaged by Mr Bush were being contested by Russia and China as they outlined their positions on a new Security Council resolution that could be adopted as early as tomorrow. Their stance meant that while agreement was close to a resolution imposing limited sanctions on North Korea, they would shy away from any enforcement action. While Moscow and Beijing are ready to accept legally binding sanctions aimed at Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programmes, they are balking at a US proposal to enforce them with international inspections. Vitali Churkin, Moscow’s UN Ambassador, has argued that North Korea could use the inspections to provoke a military confrontation. Russia and China oppose extending the sanctions to luxury goods, as Washington has proposed, or to a total embargo on all North Korean exports, as Japan has suggested. They may go along, however, with plans to prohibit travel by highranking North Korean officials. Kofi Annan, the UN Secretary-General, urged the US to hold direct bilateral talks with North Korea. “I believe that the US and North Korea should talk,” he said. North Korea, too, used the threat of further nuclear tests to try to force the US to one-to-one talks. Kim Yong Nam, the president of the Presidium of the North Korean Supreme People’s Assembly, said: “The issue of future nuclear tests is linked to US policy toward our country. If the United States continues to take a hostile attitude and apply pressure on us in various forms, we will have no choice but to take physical steps to deal with that.” In a separate statement, the North Korean Foreign Ministry said that North Korea was prepared to return to six-way talks in Beijing involving the US, China, Russia, Japan and North and South Korea. “Even though we conducted a nuclear test due to the United States, our willingness to realise the denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula through dialogue and negotiation remains unchanged. If the US continues to harass and put pressure on us, we will regard this as a declaration of war.” The remarks suggest that North Korea regards the possession of nuclear weapons as a negotiating tool. News and comment on Korea: www.timesonline.co.uk/asia ---- S Korea deploys radiation detector From correspondents in Seoul October 12, 2006 12:24am Agence France-Presse http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,20566820-5005961,00.html SOUTH Korea deployed a special radioactivity detector near the border with North Korea to verify the communist state's claimed nuclear test, a news report said. The device, hurriedly brought from Sweden, was installed near the heavily-fortified border with the North today, South Korea's Yonhap news agency said quoting an unnamed science ministry official. The equipment is capable of detecting even minute traces of xenon, a radioisotope produced from a nuclear test, the official said. The ministry refused to confirm the news report. North Korea announced Monday that it had successfully detonated its first nuclear device. But there has been no independent confirmation that it was a nuclear test. The United States has been cautious about confirming North Korea's announcement. South Korean officials said Tuesday they believed the North's claim was genuine, while trying to verify it. ---- North Korea arms trade seen as threat KATHERINE SHRADER Associated Press Thu, Oct. 12, 2006 http://www.thestate.com/mld/thestate/news/world/15745649.htm WASHINGTON - North Korea's claimed test of a nuclear weapon is only the tip of what frightens the rest of the world. It's all the more worrisome because the country has shown itself to be a virtual bazaar for spreading missiles, conventional weapons and nuclear technology around the globe. According to U.S. officials and outside experts, Pyongyang has sold its military goods to at least 18 countries, mostly in Africa and the Middle East. That's a good indication, officials warn, that North Korea might sell nuclear weapons if doing so would bring hard currency into the isolated, impoverished communist state. North Korea's catalog has included ballistic missiles and related components, conventional weapons such as mobile rocket launchers, and nuclear technology. It's also possible, the officials say, that the unstable government in Pyongyang has sold components that could be part of biological or chemical munitions. The officials and others interviewed this week about North Korea's weapons trade spoke on the condition that they not be identified given the tense situation between the two countries. On Wednesday, the United States circulated a draft resolution at the United Nations that condemns North Korea's proclaimed nuclear test on Monday as in "flagrant disregard" of U.N resolutions and "a clear threat to international peace and security." The resolution calls for a ban on all North Korean arms sales and travel by people involved in North Korea's weapons program. It also requires countries to freeze all assets related to North Korea's weapons and missile programs. In admonishing North Korea's purported nuclear test, President Bush this week accused Pyongyang of being "one of the world's leading proliferators of missile technology, including transfers to Iran and Syria." The North Korean Foreign Ministry, in announcing the test, said it would "never use nuclear weapons first but strictly prohibit any threat of nuclear weapons and nuclear transfer." North Korea's customer list, going back to the mid-1980s, is said to go well beyond Iran and Syrian. U.S. officials, recent public assessments and outside experts report sales of missiles or related components to Egypt, Iran, Pakistan, Libya, Syria, the United Arab Emirates and Yemen. Pyongyang is also believed to have engaged in conventional arms deals for cruise missiles and other wares with most of those countries and 11 others: Angola, Burma, Ethiopia, Indonesia, Iraq, Rwanda, Sudan, Uganda, Vietnam, Zaire and Zimbabwe. North Korea is also believed to have shared technology used for nuclear development. Government officials have said that A.Q. Khan - the Pakistani scientist who confessed in 2004 to running an illegal nuclear market - had close connections with North Korea, trading in equipment, facilitating international deals for components and swapping nuclear know-how. "There is some indication that I've seen that A.Q. Khan was running his network at least in part on North Korean equipment," said Rep. Heather Wilson, R-N.M., a retired Air Force officer who chairs the House intelligence subcommittee on technical intelligence. She said the U.S. is not aware that North Korea has sold highly enriched uranium or plutonium to another nation, nor are authorities aware of any North Korean weapons sales to terror groups. Her assessment was confirmed by other government officials. Wilson said she recently asked a government expert on North Korea what would stop North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il from selling weapons to terrorists. That expert's response: "The North Koreans would sell their mother for enough money." Also of concern, North Korea sells its weaponry to unstable or undemocratic states that may not have adequate control over their arsenals. That includes Iran and Syria, noted Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., the chairman of the House intelligence policy subcommittee that recently issued a Republican-drafted report on the North Korean threat. In another case, "Yemen is trying to help (the United States) and they have made some public efforts - at least in p.r. efforts - when it comes to helping us on terrorism," Rogers said. "But Yemen has a troubled history." Rogers' report, which was reviewed by the U.S. intelligence community, says that the North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il has a personal fortune estimated at $4 billion, "at least partially amassed through drug and missile sales and counterfeiting." The United States leads the world in arms sales to developing nations. While North Korea is believed to make hundreds of millions of dollars annually from weapons sales, those revenues may be shrinking, in part because of international pressure to avoid the unpredictable government. Some customers also aren't in the market any longer. Libya, for instance, announced in 2004 that it would end its programs in long-range missiles and weapons of mass destruction. Iraq, another former customer, ended its purchases with Saddam Hussein's regime fell. An August 2005 report from the Congressional Research Service said North Korea secured $1 billion from 1997 to 2000 in one area of arms deals: conventional sales with developing nations. That made North Korea the 11th largest supplier to developing nations. But from 2001 to 2004, North Korea didn't make the top list of leading suppliers. Still, it continues to seek out new business. Some government officials suspect North Korea attempted to sell missile technology to Nigeria and may have recently tried to sell missiles to Burma, controlled by an isolated military junta. Concerns about North Korea's weapons market were crystalized in recent public incidents. In late 2002, a ship carrying Scud missiles from North Korea to Yemen was intercepted by Spanish commandos and turned over to the United States. An ally in the war on terror, Yemen protested, saying it rightly purchased the weapons and it wouldn't sell them to anyone else. The freighter was released. By 2003, U.S. intelligence had penetrated Khan's market and learned more about his dealings with North Korea. The following February, then-CIA Director George Tenet testified before Congress that North Korea had shown a willingness "to sell complete systems and components" for missile programs that have allowed other governments to acquire longer-range missiles. ---- White House reverts to cold war containment By Guy Dinmore, October 12 2006 Financial Times http://www.ft.com/cms/s/60c21c52-5a0a-11db-8f16-0000779e2340.html Lacking a viable military option in dealing with a nuclear North Korea or Iran, the Bush administration is adopting a cold war-style strategy of containment and deterrence that does not completely close the door on negotiated settlements. While analysts and diplomats in Washington do not rule out the possibility of US military strikes against Iran – some even wager a better than 50 per cent chance by next summer – there is a sense that the Bush doctrine of pre-emptive or preventive war is buried in the wreckage of Iraq. There will be tough bargaining at the UN as the Bush administration seeks the legitimacy afforded by Security Council resolutions to press sanctions. But the success of US strategy in both regions will depend more on developing ad hoc coalitions of allies and overcoming opposition from China and Russia. Imposition of financial and trade sanctions, freezing of assets, international isolation through travel bans and interceptions of cargo at sea will be accompanied by efforts to strengthen the military capabilities of allies. This means closer military co-operation with the Gulf Arab states and a sympathetic ear to suggestions by Japan’s new government that it might rewrite the postwar pacifist constitution. Interviews with US officials, who asked not to be identified, reveal that the liberation theology that dominated the post-September 11 2001 discourse, notably President George W. Bush’s second inaugural speech last year, has given way to a more pragmatic approach. The shift is so pronounced that both neoconservatives and liberal hawks among Democrats are alarmed that the Bush administration’s apparent embrace of realpolitik will mean abandoning promises made to oppressed peoples while entering into nuclear-reduction deals with the Iranian and North Korean regimes. Beyond the US, more than 100 Arab and Muslim activists have written to Mr Bush calling on him to reaffirm his commitment to sustained democratic reform in the Arab world. They write that autocrats are intensifying their repression, emboldened by the impression that the US is wavering. Reinforcing such impressions, one US official even suggested the administration would be willing to negotiate trade-offs at the UN in parallel discussions over North Korea, Iran and Sudan. “There are competing interests,” he said. Cliff Kupchan, analyst at the Eurasia Group consultancy, sees the Bush administration groping for an alternative to the “binary choice” of living with a nuclear Iran or staging surgical strikes. “This administration has not reconciled itself to a nuclear Iran, but it has with North Korea,” he says. But he sees any containment strategy – should it exist – complicated by a serious deterioration in the US relationship with Russia. According to one senior US official, pressure on Iran cannot change the regime, but it might buttress the more pragmatic forces in Tehran who want to negotiate a settlement with the US. Although the US has moved in the direction of talking to Iran – to the relief of its European allies – it still rejects one-on-one negotiations and insists that the Iranians first suspend their nuclear fuel programme. Similarly with North Korea, the US is resisting direct talks outside the six-party process that has stalled for nearly a year. Responding to its claim of a nuclear test on Monday, the US is speaking the language of isolation and deterrence. “Well, I think the North Koreans know that firing a nuclear missile, shall we say, would not be good for North Korean security,” Condoleezza Rice, secretary of state, stated. “The North Koreans are not confused about what it would mean to launch a nuclear attack against the United States, one of our allies or somebody in the neighbourhood.” John Hillen, assistant secretary of state for political and military affairs, is leading the push for a “new security architecture” in the Persian Gulf to counter the perceived threat from Iran. This involves beefed up military co-operation, including big ticket hardware sales, with Arab states in the Gulf Co-operation Council who are enjoying the windfall from higher oil prices. Not surprisingly, the Arab states that feared both the wrath of the US and the threat of Islamist extremists after September 11 welcome such solicitations. But Emile El-Hokayem, analyst at the Stimson Center in Washington, says the Arab Gulf states have a predicament. He recalls that Qatar, which hosts a US military base, was the only Security Council member not to vote in favour of the July 31 resolution demanding that Iran stop its uranium enrichment. He also argues that a containment strategy relying heavily on a build-up of GCC military capabilities could backfire “by validating Iran’s security concerns and justifying Tehran’s need for a deterrent”. A less adventurist foreign policy would be welcomed by the US public, according to a poll by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. Three out of four Americans feel the US is overdoing the job of global policeman, only 17 per cent rank spreading democracy as an important foreign policy goal, while 61 per cent say the war in Iraq has not reduced the threat of terrorism. -------- pakistan Musharraf Says Pakistan Did Not Enable North Korea Test by Staff Writers Islamabad (AFP) Oct 12, 2006 http://www.spacewar.com/reports/Musharraf_Says_Pakistan_Did_Not_Enable_North_Korea_Test_999.html Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf denied Wednesday that proliferation by the country's disgraced nuclear supremo allowed North Korea to carry out its claimed nuclear test. He also said that Pakistan was not a "rogue state" and that neither the government nor the army had helped scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan, who has admitted passing nuclear secrets to North Korea, Iran and Libya. "This (North Korean) bomb is a plutonium bomb. We do not have a plutonium bomb. That should indicate to you whether we are responsible or not," Musharraf said when asked at a news conference whether Pakistan was partly to blame. North Korea's purported test on Monday has caused shockwaves around the globe, with the US vowing that the isolated Communist regime faces "serious repercussions". Khan confessed on television in early 2004 to running an illegal nuclear black market. Military ruler Musharraf pardoned him almost immediately but he has been living under virtual house arrest ever since. In his recently published memoirs, Musharraf says that Khan, who is still revered here as the father of Pakistan's atomic bomb, gave Pyonygang around two dozen centrifuges used for processing uranium. Musharraf defended Pakistan's decision not to allow international investigators to question Khan, saying that Khan's illegal nuclear network had no state support. "We are not a rogue state," he told reporters. "The government and the army was not involved in proliferation, otherwise we are a rogue country. "Secondly we have been able to convey to them (the international community) that our nuclear assets are under good custodial control, the best in the world maybe." Pakistan's foreign ministry on Monday said it deplored North Korea's announcement that it had carried out the test and warned that it could cause regional instability. -------- russia Moscow protesters slam German nuclear waste imports MOSCOW (AFP) Oct 12, 2006 http://www.spacewar.com/2006/061012144621.ppvty0jx.html Environmentalists staged a brief protest in front of Germany's embassy in Moscow Thursday against long-standing shipments of German nuclear waste to Russia. Brandishing a banner scrawled with "Stop the entry of nuclear waste", a dozen Germans and Russians demonstrated for about 10 minutes before the Russian protesters were seized, handcuffed and hauled away by police. "German authorities must stop burying radioactive waste in Russia which threatens the health of future generations of Russians," Vladimir Sliviak, co-president of the Russian environmental group Ecodefense, said in a statement. "German authorities must not take advantage of the fact that the Russian atomic industry can violate laws and ignore public opinion," he added. According the Ecodefense, some 100,000 tons of nuclear waste have been imported to Russia over the past decade. Up to 90 percent of the waste is stored by Russian companies, awaiting final disposal, the group said. The radioactive material arrives in Saint Petersburg's port in the northern part of the country, Ecodefense said, where it is carried by train toward the Ural mountains, and western and eastern Siberia. -------- security Exporter Arrested on Smuggling Charges By Kim Rahn Staff Reporter rahnita@koreatimes.co.kr 10-12-2006 Korea Times http://times.hankooki.com/lpage/nation/200610/kt2006101219134711980.htm A trading company head has been arrested for allegedly smuggling materials that can be used in producing nuclear weapons or sarin nerve gas to a Middle Eastern country. The prosecution yesterday took into custody a man identified as Lee on charges of smuggling 15 tons of potassium bifluoride to a Middle Eastern country that is suspected of trying to develop nuclear weapons. Potassium bifluoride is used as catalyst in making fluorine for uranium enrichment. The prosecution did not disclose the name of the country. Lee allegedly fabricated export documents to disguise the potassium bifluoride as wood preservatives in May and exported 15 tons of the chemical to the country for the price of $27,500. Intelligence agencies in China, Russia and Western nations list companies trading potassium bifluoride and keep careful watch over them, prosecutors said. According to the law, those exporting the chemical, which is classified as a strategic material for international peace and national security, without permission are subject to up to five years in jail or a fine of three times the price of the goods. The Nuclear Suppliers Group and the International Atomic Energy Agency also strictly regulate trade of the chemical as it could be used in nuclear weapons program or to produce sarin nerve gas. Sarin gas was used as a terrorist weapon in a Japanese subway station in 1995. In December, the National Intelligence Service detected an attempt by Lee to smuggle 25 tons of potassium bifluoride to a Middle Eastern country, but he avoided legal charges, claiming he did not know how dangerous it was. ``If such strategic materials are exported to countries suspected of developing nuclear weapons, South Korea would be branded as a country that is not properly regulated in the international society and face great damage in security and diplomacy,’’ a prosecutor said. ---- Needed: A New Security Plan by WILLIAM D. HARTUNG [from the October 30, 2006 issue of The Nation; online 10/12/06] http://www.thenation.com/docprint.mhtml?i=20061030&s=hartung By this point in George W. Bush's second term, the dangers of his Administration's national security policy are clear. From the debacle of "preventive" war in Iraq to the abuses of human rights at Abu Ghraib and Guantánamo, the Bush Administration's post-September 11 policies have had disastrous consequences. These failures of the Bush foreign policy should have opened the way to the presentation of substantive alternatives by the Democrats. Sadly, that has not been the case. For example, a brief outline of the "Real Security" policy, released on March 29 by the Democratic leadership in Congress, dodges the most important issues. The document has some good proposals, including a call to promote energy efficiency and alternative fuels. A concrete plan that talks about where to invest and what the results are likely to be would offer a sharp contrast to the Bush Administration's "all oil, all the time" energy policy. The positive elements of the Democratic plan are overshadowed, however, by its implication that it may be necessary to increase military spending beyond the levels already reached during the Bush buildup. Counting the costs of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, US military spending is weighing in at more than $550 billion per year, higher than the peak levels reached during the Reagan buildup or the Vietnam War. Yet the Democratic statement speaks of the need to rebuild the military without calling for any cuts in unnecessary programs. This may be a tactical decision aimed at showing that Democrats too can be tough on defense, but all it indicates is that they can compete with Republicans in wasting defense dollars. A second approach that has received considerable attention is found in New Republic editor at large Peter Beinart's The Good Fight: Why Liberals--and Only Liberals--Can Win the War on Terror and Make America Great Again. Beinart's book stresses the importance of working with allies and the need for justice at home as foundations of a sound foreign policy; but these themes are more than offset by his messianic advocacy of nonstop military interventionism. The breadth of Beinart's proposed mission for the military is stunning: "It would be naïve...to think that freedom, even broadly defined...is enough to defeat jihadism.... From the Middle East to Southeast Asia, from the Horn of Africa to the Sahel, the United States may need to enter stateless zones, capture or kill the jihadists taking refuge there, and stay long enough to begin rebuilding the state." After more than three years and $300 billion spent in Iraq--a war Beinart supported--one is hard-pressed to know when the beginning of the rebuilding of the state will have been accomplished in any given intervention. In keeping with his ambitious military agenda, Beinart supports a stable or growing military budget, deriding progressives who "casually urge cutting the defense budget." The Progressive Policy Institute--the research arm of the Democratic Leadership Council--has produced its own set of proposals for reforming US military strategy. The DLC analysis shares Beinart's call for a muscular liberalism grounded in a "stronger and larger military." That being said, the DLC analysis does contain some common-sense proposals for expanding nonmilitary forms of engagement. But despite its nod to diplomacy, when push comes to shove the PPI's proposed strategy speaks of "prevention" of looming threats in purely military terms, as in "destroying weapons of mass destruction...and the means to produce them in rogue states"--essentially a policy of bombing the bombs. The highest priority for any new approach to defense is to broaden the definition of security to include all threats to human life, whether they stem from terrorism, disease, environmental degradation, natural disasters or entrenched poverty. This concept of security as protection makes it clearer that the military is only one of many tools that can be used to address urgent threats. Strength should not be equated with more military dollars but with the application of the right tools to the right problems. An example of this approach is the Unified Security Budget (USB), the product of a task force of nongovernmental policy analysts that includes officials who have served in the Pentagon, Congress and the uniformed military. Its most recent report proposes a "security shift" that would cut $62 billion from military programs and invest $52 billion in nonmilitary security tools. Proposed military cuts include cold war-era systems like the F-22 fighter plane, excessive nuclear forces and the costly, unworkable missile defense program. Alternative security proposals by the USB task force include beefed-up spending on the State Department's diplomatic capabilities and on alternative energy sources, economic development in the global South and a more sensible approach to defending US territory that includes chemical plant protection, port security and increased investment in public health. There are a number of critical security issues that go beyond changing budget priorities. For example, efforts to "get tough" with Iran and North Korea over their pursuit or development of nuclear weapons need to be replaced by genuine negotiations. In Iran this could mean allowing a small civilian nuclear program under a strict regime of international inspections and monitoring. In North Korea the United States should take the lead in offering energy assistance, financial aid and a nonaggression pact in exchange for a rollback of Pyongyang's nuclear weapons program and the elimination of its current weapons. Opening trade with North Korea could help to open up the country economically and politically. Under these circumstances, this could eventually lead to reunification with the South, eliminating the threat altogether. As for Iraq, US military withdrawal within a definite time frame (a year at most) is more likely to reduce internal violence there than the Bush Administration's "stay the course" policy. Withdrawal should be accompanied by a new infusion of economic aid--and a policy toward Iraq's oil resources that restores control to the Iraqi government. This economic program should be paralleled by an effort to negotiate conflicts among Sunni, Shiite and Kurdish factions within Iraq. Negotiations should be backed by a multiparty coalition that includes Iraq's neighbors--from Jordan and Saudi Arabia, to Iran and Syria, to Turkey and Kuwait--plus major powers like the United States, Russia, China and the European Union. To avoid the gridlock that might ensue from working with such a large group, a smaller contact group should be chosen to do the direct negotiating with Iraqi factions. Merely focusing on Iran and North Korea is not enough; drastic reductions in global nuclear arsenals should be pursued as well. Ultimately, the only reliable defense against nuclear weapons is to get rid of them. This means accelerating reductions in the nuclear holdings of the United States and Russia, which still number in the tens of thousands if one counts weapons being held in reserve. This step should be accompanied by a speeded-up process of reducing loose nukes and bomb-making materials in Russia, so that this vital task can be accomplished in four years rather than the thirteen or more it will take at current funding levels. This could be done with an additional annual investment equivalent to the cost of about one month of the occupation in Iraq. The depoliticizing of the gathering and use of intelligence should also be a top priority. Hyped intelligence was used to sell the war in Iraq, and there are already signs that it is forming the core of a case for military action against Iran. In addition to making the details of intelligence assessments public, the CIA and its fellow intelligence agencies should be taken out of the business of covert operations, secret detentions in so-called black sites, torture, secret eavesdropping on domestic targets and other illegal activities. The gathering of intelligence should be the CIA's only job. Greater respect for the information gathered by international agencies like the International Atomic Energy Agency--the only agency that was right in its assessment of Iraq's nuclear, chemical and biological weapons capabilities--would also be a huge step forward. In addition to broadening our definition of what constitutes security, we must begin a national discussion on what the mission of our armed forces should be. When should the United States use military force? Only to attack specific terrorist strongholds, to act against nations that are poised to attack the United States or one of its closest allies, to prevent genocide or to assist in policing peace agreements in unstable regions. The Bush Administration's doctrine of preventive war--which does not mean acting against an imminent threat but rather promoting a first-strike war against a country that poses a distant potential danger to US security--should be abandoned. The United States should seek United Nations and Congressional approval for acts of war and reach out to allies in a genuine fashion, not in the "take it or leave it" manner favored by the Bush Administration. Without a thorough debate over how and when to use force, efforts to change US military spending and strategy will be doomed to failure. -------- treaties Nuclear treaty must be updated or fall obsolete: experts BRUSSELS (AFP) Oct 12, 2006 http://www.spacewar.com/2006/061012163621.3fus4vap.html The nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) has been ridiculed by North Korea and possibly flouted by Iran and risks becoming obsolete if it is not urgently revised, experts warned Thursday. "North Korea's nuclear test has dealt it a heavy blow. The NPT is in agony," said Georges Le Guelte, head of research at the Institute of Strategic and International Relations (IRIS) in Paris. On Wednesday, European Union foreign policy chief Javier Solana told EU lawmakers that he shared concerns about "the failure, in the last analysis, of the non-proliferation treaty." He said the text, concluded in 1968 and which entered into force two years later, "has gone through five revisions already and none of the five revisions has been able to face the difficulties and the holes that it has." "This regime should be adapted to the realities of today and not the realities of yesterday," he said, following North Korea's claim Monday that it had tested a nuclear weapon, sparking worldwide outrage. Signed by 189 countries -- North Korea pulled out in 2003 -- the treaty is the only multilateral agreement designed to stop atomic weapons from spreading, and it also offers a framework for the development of civilian technology. The signatories acknowledged that the United States, Russia, China, France and Britain had the bomb but the five powers also made a commitment in it to disarm at some undetermined time in the future. India, Pakistan and Israel did not sign and are now nuclear powers, although the latter refuses to confirm that it has such weapons. The NPT appears unable to contain the nuclear ambitions of Pyongyang and those suspected in Tehran, although the Islamic republic denies the allegations, yet some blame the nuclear powers themselves for the problem. "You can't say that the treaty cannot be applied, only that the major powers who are its guarantors have not done a lot to ensure that it is respected," said Le Guelte. According to Dominique David, executive director of the French Institute for International Relations (IFRI), the NPT must, above all, be reinforced. "If it turns out that the test by North Korea really was a nuclear one, it would mean that a country that had committed itself in writing not to build a bomb would have definitively violated the NPT," he said. He said that Pyongyang's duplicity is self-evident but hard to sanction. "The problem is that there is no way of sanctioning a country suspected of violating the treaty, when that country pulls out of it at the last minute, just before it acquires a nuclear weapon," he said. Shannon Kile, senior researcher at the Stockholm-based peace research institute SIPRI, proposed that the treaty be beefed up to deal with such cases. "In case a country withdraws, it has to give up all its nuclear infrastructures that it has acquired under the NPT," for example, he said. He pointed out that the document has two main weaknesses. "The nuclear technology is inherently dual use: the infrastructure for making the fuel for the nuclear plants is the same for nuclear weapons -- that's the central dilemma since the NPT's founding," he said. "The other weakness is how can you stop a state that is determined to cheat. North Korea was clearly cheating," he went on. "In the future, the five nuclear powers have to make serious commitments towards disarmament," he warned. "Double standards are not possible anymore." ---- Strain shows on world's antinuke rules Nonproliferation efforts need global support to remain effective By Peter Grier | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor October 12, 2006 http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/world/~3/36178841/p01s02-wogi.html WASHINGTON – The world's patchwork of nuclear nonproliferation treaties and agreements hasn't yet been ripped apart - but it's under strain as never before. North Korea's apparent test of a nuclear device this week is but the latest shock to an international regimen that for the most part has been remarkably successful since its construction at the dawn of the atomic age, more than 40 years ago. The challenge now may be to rally the globe's big powers into a more solid League Against the Spread of Nukes. Potential proliferators such as Iran may be likely to forge ahead unless they see that the US, China, and Russia are willing to forgo business deals, or pay more for oil, to help control nuclear weapons. "You want to show the Iranians that we're actually willing to take some risks on our own to act against nuclear weapons," says George Perkovich, a nuclear strategy and nonproliferation expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington. The main element of what experts call the world's nonproliferation architecture is the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which was opened for signatures on July 1, 1968, in New York. It's augmented by more informal agreements, such as the Nuclear Suppliers Group, and various country-to-country pacts and regional nuclear-free zones. Deviations from the pact In general, it has been successful. North Korea is the only country that has acquired nuclear weapons after signing the NPT. (Pyongyang withdrew from the treaty in 2003.) India and Pakistan have developed an atomic arsenal in recent decades, and Israel is thought to have one, but none of them signed the NPT to begin with. The number of nations with declared weapons, officially seven (not including North Korea), is far smaller than US intelligence reports of the 1960s predicted. Most important, no atomic weapon has been detonated in anger since the United States dropped the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs in 1945. Today this nonuse seems natural, considering the terrible nature of the weapons, but it wasn't foreordained. Back in the early 1960s, when ads for bomb shelters were a common sight, many experts thought it was only a matter of time until someone dropped a bomb. Thomas Schelling, a renowned strategic deterrence theorist, considers nuclear nonuse such a remarkable development that he made it the theme of his acceptance address before the Swedish Academy when he won the Nobel Prize in economics in 2005. In the 1960s, "If I had said, 'Oh, come on, nobody is going to use nuclear weapons for the next 40 years,' everybody would have thought I was out of my mind," said Mr. Schelling at a Council on Foreign Relations event earlier this year. But now, the global status quo on nuclear weapons is being shaken as never before by the twin threats of Iran and North Korea. Iran, an NPT signatory, has in essence been caught in the act of violating the pact, via revelations of covert fissile-material programs. "If Iran can look us in the eyes and say, 'We're going ahead,' what does that say for the system?" says Mr. Perkovich of Carnegie. North Korea, meanwhile, has a long history of exporting its weapons systems to unsavory customers with cash. Preventing Pyongyang from proliferating nuclear devices to terrorists may now be one of the biggest security challenges faced by the US and the rest of the developed world. Proposal for a global alliance The US can't win a war on nuclear terrorism alone, notes Graham Allison, director of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government in Cambridge, Mass. He recommends declaration of a GAANT - Global Alliance Against Nuclear Terrorism. "Establishment of a Global Alliance Against Nuclear Terrorism could help us overcome the psychological barriers to sustained, focused action," writes Dr. Allison in the latest issue of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. Among other things, such an organization could establish a more robust regimen to control trade in nuclear materials and know-how, including some sort of enforcement mechanism, writes Allison. It could also provide a formal infrastructure for such efforts as joint exercises in tracking hypothetical nuclear terrorists. To get the international cooperation needed to stop covert trade in fissile materials, the US might also consider developing something that Robert Gallucci, dean of Georgetown University's Edmund Walsh School of Foreign Service, dubs "expanded deterrence." Fissile material, like a person, has unique identifying characteristics. A US crash program might develop the capability to identify where any fissile material came from. The US could then announce that it would treat a nuclear attack on the US as an attack by both the perpetrator and the country from which the weapon's fissile material was obtained - meaning US weapons might attack both targets in retaliation. "It may be that, by threatening unacceptable consequences, we can deter that which we cannot physically prevent," writes Mr. Gallucci in the Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. -------- u.s. nuc facilities -------- nevada Railroad route to nuclear dump in Nevada getting another look Thursday, October 12, 2006 Associated Press http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,650198240,00.html LAS VEGAS — The Energy Department is reconsidering building a rail line through western Nevada to the site of a proposed national nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain, officials said. The north-south route dubbed the Mina Corridor was examined in the 1990s but shelved after the Walker River Paiute Indians refused access to their reservation. The tribe reconsidered this year. The Energy Department has said it favored plans to build a 319-mile east-west rail line from Caliente, near the Utah border, across rural Nevada to the nuclear dump site, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. The so-called Caliente Corridor route could cost $2 billion. Department officials notified state and local leaders and members of Congress that the plan to take another look at the Mina route would be published Friday in the Federal Register. A draft notice obtained by the Las Vegas Review-Journal said the Mina coordor would be shorter, cross fewer mountain ranges and utilize existing rail bed. "These potential advantages would simplify design and construction," the department said. The Energy Department plans to continue preparing an environmental impact statement on the Caliente corridor, with informational meetings about the rail plans planned in November in several Nevada towns. Draft versions of both studies would be released by the summer, department and Yucca Mountain project spokesman Allen Benson said in Las Vegas. Walker River Indian tribal leaders reversed policy and agreed in May to let the government map a new rail line through their reservation. The tribal chairwoman said the tribe was reserving a final decision on allowing nuclear waste shipments. The state of Nevada opposes the repository plan. However, Bob Halstead, a transportation consultant for the state, said a north-south corridor appeared to make more sense and could cost less than the Caliente route. There currently is no rail line to the Yucca site, which Congress and the Bush administration picked in 2002 as the place to entomb 77,000 tons of radioactive waste now being stored at nuclear reactors in 39 states. The project has been stalled by funding shortfalls and questions about quality control work during site selection. -------- new jersey Emergency response strategy gets review Thursday, October 12, 2006 By BILL GALLO JR. Staff Writer New Jersey Sunbeam http://www.nj.com/news/sunbeam/index.ssf?/base/news-1/116063752569550.xml&coll=9 SALEM -- There were few questions Wednesday night when officials from the state Department of Environmental Protection and New Jersey State Police met with the public to review the plan in place to deal with a radiological emergency at the Artificial Island nuclear generating complex. Postponed from its original July date because of the state government shutdown, the annual hearing on the New Jersey Radiological Response Plan is designed to answer residents' questions and examine the "adequacy and effectiveness" of the plan. The plan designed for Salem County would be activated in the event there is a release of radiation from any of the three nuclear plants in Lower Alloways Creek Township. It deals with all issues that would face emergency response personnel in protecting the public from a radiation release including possible evacuations and protecting the water and food supply. State law requires the plan be in place and mandates several annual drills to coordinate response between the state police, DEP and local authorities. In case of a radioactive release, the state police are the lead agency which would handle the emergency. A similar plan is in place to deal with any release of radiation from the Oyster Creek nuclear plant in Ocean County. Wednesday's only questions came from two Delaware residents. Frieda Berryhill of Wilmington, Del., told the panel of New Jersey state officials that she wished Delaware held similar hearings since residents there who live within the 10-mile Emergency Response Zone from the Island would be affected should there be a radioactive release. She expressed fears that without proper information, many in Delaware would attempt to flee via major highways such as Interstate 95 which is often already a "parking lot." "It could really save lives if people wouldn't respond to spontaneous evacuation," Berryhill said. John Flaherty of Wilmington, Del., representing Common Cause of Delaware questioned how New Jersey and Delaware officials coordinate information so authorities in his state would know what's happening here. John Christiansen of the New Jersey State Police described the step-by-step process of communications between the two states. "I think we have a very positive relationship with our counterparts in the State of Delaware," Christiansen said. Responding to another question from Flaherty about the federal response after Katrina, Christiansen said the response to a hurricane and a problem at a nuclear power plant would differ. Christiansen noted that New Jersey requires a detailed plan be in place to deal with power plants and mandates the plan be constantly practiced, something not done for hurricanes. -------- MILITARY -------- britain Sir Richard Dannatt : A very honest General By SARAH SANDS 12th October 2006 UK Daily Mail http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=410175&in_page_id=1770 People thought that the new head of the Army, General Sir Richard Dannatt, would be a managerial, John Majorish figure, keen to do the Government's bidding. Sir Richard's predecessor, General Sir Mike Jackson, was a soldier from central casting, rugged and hard drinking, whereas Sir Richard looks like a barrister or a banker. But within days of taking over at the end of August, Sir Richard, 55, returned from a trip to Afghanistan and quietly posed the question: "Is £1,150 take-home pay for a month's fighting in Helmand province sufficient?" The Daily Mail took up the casual remark and campaigned for better pay for soldiers on operations. On Tuesday, Gordon Brown announced a tax-free bonus of £2,240 for troops serving in war zones. Sir Richard then turned to the medical care of wounded soldiers, insisting on separate military wards. He is considering changing tours of duty in war zones from six months to four months and planning to make Britain the home base for an expeditionary force, so pulling back from places such as Germany. He is in the middle of replacing controversial patrol vehicles in Iraq and Afghanistan with heavily armoured trucks, and is bringing together charities to improve the care of disabled or mentally ill former servicemen ("If we had a hand in damaging them, then we are responsible for them"). Further, he questions the validity of our continued presence in Iraq and is concerned by the decline in Christian values in Britain that has allowed Islamic extremism to flourish. Sitting in an armchair in his office at the Ministry of Defence, he declares simply: "I am going to stand up for what is right for the Army. "Honesty is what it is about. The truth will out. We have got to speak the truth. Leaking and spinning, at the end of the day, are not helpful." The honest soldier is a figure that frightens the life out of politicians. So far, the General has got his way, partly because of his tactful, unassuming manner. He may be an illustration of the adage that you can achieve anything as long as you do not want to take credit for it. He talks soberly of the "military covenant" between a nation and its Armed Forces. "I said to the Defence Secretary (Des Browne) that the Army won’t let the nation down, but I don’t want the nation to let the Army down." The case of a wounded soldier in Selly Oak Hospital in Birmingham being abused by an anti-war civilian showed a breakdown of the covenant. I ask whether our returning soldiers may suffer the kind of rejection shown to Vietnam veterans. "Iraq may be an unpopular war now and Afghanistan may be a misunderstood war," he says, "but the soldiers, sailors and airmen who are conducting those operations are doing their duty to their best ability. And I hope the British people never forget that our soldiers are doing what the Government requires them to do. "That is why it is important that the story of what is happening in Afghanistan is told. It is important that Paras back on leave can go down to the pub and people will know what they have been doing. It should get out how difficult it has been, how dangerous, how tragic at times, and that they have done well." The treatment of soldiers in civilian wards shows society's lack of understanding of the needs of our troops. "It is not acceptable for our casualties to be in mixed wards with civilians," Sir Richard says. "I was outraged at the story of someone saying: 'Take your uniform off.' "Our people need the privacy of recovering in a military environment — a soldier manning a machine gun in Basra loses consciousness when he is hit by a missile and next recovers consciousness in a hospital in the UK. "He wants to wake up to familiar sights and sounds, he wants to see people in uniform. He doesn't want to be in a civilian environment. We exacerbate the culture shock." Sir Richard's lead in shining a light on the Armed Forces extends to the mission in Iraq. He says with great clarity and honesty that "our presence exacerbates the security problems". "I think history will show that the planning for what happened after the initial successful war-fighting phase was poor, probably based more on optimism than sound planning. "History will show that a vacuum was created and into the vacuum malign elements moved. The hope that we might have been able to get out of Iraq in 12, 18, 24 months after the initial start in 2003 has proved fallacious. Now hostile elements have got a hold it has made our life much more difficult in Baghdad and in Basra. "The original intention was that we put in place a liberal democracy that was an exemplar for the region, was pro-West and might have a beneficial effect on the balance within the Middle East. "That was the hope. Whether that was a sensible or naïve hope, history will judge. I don't think we are going to do that. I think we should aim for a lower ambition." Sir Richard adds, strongly, that we should "get ourselves out sometime soon because our presence exacerbates the security problems". "We are in a Muslim country and Muslims' views of foreigners in their country are quite clear. "As a foreigner, you can be welcomed by being invited into a country, but we weren't invited, certainly by those in Iraq at the time. Let's face it, the military campaign we fought in 2003 effectively kicked the door in. "That is a fact. I don't say that the difficulties we are experiencing around the world are caused by our presence in Iraq, but undoubtedly our presence in Iraq exacerbates them." He contrasts this with the situation in Afghanistan, where we remain at the invitation of President Hamid Karzai's government. "There is a clear distinction between our status and position in Iraq and in Afghanistan, which is why I have much more optimism that we can get it right in Afghanistan." There is a logistical as well as a moral reason for concentrating on the mission in Afghanistan. Sir Richard talked last month of the Army "running hot". Our troops are stretched to capacity. We have only one spare battalion. Almost everyone is going to end up serving in Iraq or Afghanistan. This, of course, will include the regiments of Prince Harry and later Prince William. Sir Richard says a date has not yet been set for Harry's unit in the Household Cavalry to be deployed, but once it is, he will make a recommendation to the Queen about the Prince's circumstances and role. "Currently the question has not been put to me and therefore no decision has been made. When his unit is ready for operation, his commanding officer will look at the situations he might find himself in." Sir Richard will certainly take into serious consideration the wishes of the Princes. "I would imagine both these young men, having opted to join the Army, would want to deploy in operation. I have got a son in the Army. He wants to be deployed with his people, so I would expect Harry and William to do the same." The accusing question put to Tony Blair by parents of servicemen and women is: would a politician send their own child to war? Sir Richard's son, Bertie, was a platoon commander in Iraq. "He was in Iraq until a couple of months ago. It was tough: three of his contemporaries, young officers, have been killed. There is a lot of pressure on young commanders. When my son was deployed he got into some quite hairy situations. "I was a dad as well as being Commander in Chief. I am still a dad as well as being Chief of the General Staff. I wouldn't send an Army where I wouldn't send my own child. "When I was younger, I wouldn't send people where I wouldn’t go myself. Sharing the risk is important. That is why the chain of command is so important." Sir Richard has occasionally discussed with his wife, Philippa, whether to continue his career in the Army, but always found more reasons to stay than to leave. "There are good reasons for joining, apart from Iraq, which is atypical. We have been deployed to bring a better life to people and on the whole we have done that well." With regard to Iran and North Korea, he believes in dialogue. "Particularly with Iran — if we paint them into a corner I think that is being too simplistic. Dialogue and negotiation make eminent sense and military posturing doesn't." The General is a practising Christian and this informs his views on the Army's role and place in society. He believes our weak values have allowed the predatory Islamist vision to take hold. "We can't wish the Islamist challenge to our society away and I believe that the Army, both in Iraq and Afghanistan and probably wherever we go next, is fighting the foreign dimension of the challenge to our accepted way of life. "We need to face up to the Islamist threat, to those who act in the name of Islam and in a perverted way try to impose Islam by force on societies that do not wish it. In the Cold War, the threats to this country were about armies rolling in. Threats now are not territorial but to the values of our country. "In the Army we place a lot of store by the values we espouse. What I would hate is for the Army to be maintaining a set of values that were not reflected in our society at large — courage, loyalty, integrity, respect for others; these are critical things. "I think it is important as an Army entrusted with using lethal force that we do maintain high values and that there is a moral dimension to that and a spiritual dimension. "When I see the Islamist threat I hope it doesn't make undue progress because there is a moral and spiritual vacuum in this country. Our society has always been embedded in Christian values; once you have pulled the anchor up there is a danger that our society moves with the prevailing wind. "There is an element of the moral compass spinning. I am responsible for the Army, to make sure that its moral compass is well aligned and that we live by what we believe in. "It is said we live in a post-Christian society. I think that is a great shame. The Judaic-Christian tradition has underpinned British society. It underpins the British Army." I ask what this means for Muslim soldiers and their allegiance. "These are British Muslims who are also British soldiers. If they are prepared to take the Queen’s shilling they will go wherever the mission requires them to go." As Para 3 Battle Group return from Afghanistan, they are being replaced by 3 Commando Brigade, incorporating the Royal Marines, who are especially trained for cold weather conditions. Although 1,000 extra troops were sent to Helmand following ferocious assaults from the Taliban, only a small number were combat soldiers. For the next few months, there will be 5,200 British troops in Helmand and this will be re-assessed in the spring. What will make a difference is the arrival of more heavily armoured vehicles. Sir Richard is open about the vulnerability of some of the vehicles his soldiers have been using, particularly in Iraq. "The threats we have been facing in Iraq from last summer grew considerably. The sophistication of the mines and rockets used to attack our vehicles went up significantly." Thus, 160 six-wheeled, four-ton armoured patrol vehicles are on their way to Afghanistan. There is also a 20-ton vehicle called the Mastiff ready for use in Iraq or Afghanistan. The controversial "snatch" Land Rovers, which give little protection, should be replaced. "Over time I want to modernise all patrol vehicles," says Sir Richard. "The snatch vehicles were getting old. They were originally developed for Northern Ireland. I want people to have adequate vehicles for the tasks they carry out." There is also a family of armoured vehicles called FRES (Future Rapid Effect System). The cost of this future equipment is £14 billion. Defence spending has traditionally been a low priority for the Treasury. It has never had the populist appeal of schools and hospitals. But the quiet, determined new Chief of the General Staff is hoping that the "military covenant" will prevail. General Sir Richard Dannatt offers one of his deceptively impartial observations: "Twenty-nine per cent of government spending is on social security. Five per cent is on defence. Others can take a view on whether that proportion is right." -------- iraq Co-Author of Medical Study Estimating 650,000 Iraqi Deaths Defends Research in the Face of White House Dismissal Thursday, October 12th, 2006 Democracy Now! http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=06/10/12/145222 The White House is dismissing the findings of a medical study that says 650,000 people have died in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion. The study was conducted by American and Iraqi researchers and published in the prestigious British medical journal, The Lancet. We’re joined by the report’s co-author, epidemiologist Les Roberts. [includes rush transcript] More than 650,000 people have died in Iraq since the U.S. led invasion of the country began in March of 2003. This is according to a new study published in the scientific journal, The Lancet. The study was conducted by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and Al Mustansiriya University in Baghdad. Researchers based their findings on interviews with a random sampling of households taken in clusters across Iraq. The study is an update to a prior one compiled by many of the same researchers. That study estimated that around 100,000 Iraqis died in the first 18 months after the invasion. Les Roberts joins us now from Syracuse, New York -- He is one of the main researchers of the study. He was with Johns Hopkins when he co-authored the study but has just taken a post at Columbia University. * Les Roberts. Co-author of the study on civilian mortality in Iraq since the invasion. He was with Johns Hopkins when he co-authored the study but has just taken a post at Columbia University. RUSH TRANSCRIPT AMY GOODMAN: Les Roberts joins us now from Syracuse, New York. He’s one of the main researchers of the study. He was with Johns Hopkins when he co-authored the study but has just taken a post at Columbia University. Les Roberts, welcome to Democracy Now! LES ROBERTS: Hi, Amy. It’s nice to be with you again. AMY GOODMAN: It’s good to have you with us. Why don't you lay out exactly what you found? LES ROBERTS: Sure, we, as you said, went to about 50 neighborhoods spread around Iraq that were picked at random, and each time we went, we knocked on 40 doors and asked people, “Who lived here on the first of January, 2002?” and “Who lived here today?” And we asked, “Had anyone been born or died in between?” And on those occasions, when people said someone die, we said, “Well, how did they die?” And we sort of wrote down the details: when, how old they were, what was the cause of death. And when it was violence, we asked, “Well, who did the killing? How exactly did it happen? What kind of weapon was used?” And at the end of the interview, when no one knew this was coming, we asked most of the time for a death certificate. And 92% of the time, people walked back into their houses and could produce a death certificate. So we are quite sure people didn’t make this up. And our conclusion was comparing the death rate for that 14 months before the invasion, with the 40 months after, that the death rate is now about four times higher. And, in fact, it’s twice as high as when we last spoke two years ago and when we did our first study. So, things have gotten bad, as you stated. We think about 650,000 extra people have died because of this invasion, and about 600,000, some 90%, are from violence. JUAN GONZALEZ: Well, I’m sure you have heard by now the responses of President Bush and military leaders about this. What is your response to their saying that this is not credible? LES ROBERTS: You know, I don't want to sort of stoop to that level and start saying general slurs, but I just want to say that what we did, this cluster survey approach, is the standard way of measuring mortality in very poor countries where the government isn’t very functional or in times of war. And when UNICEF goes out and measures mortality in any developing country, this is what they do. When the U.S. government went at the end of the war in Kosovo or went at the end of the war in Afghanistan and the U.S. government measured the death rate, this is how they did it. And most ironically, the U.S. government has been spending millions of dollars per year, through something called the Smart Initiative, to train NGOs and UN workers to do cluster surveys to measure mortality in times of wars and disasters. So, I think we used a very standard method. I think our results are couched appropriately in the relative imprecision of [inaudible]. It could conceivably be as few as 400,000 deaths. So we’re upfront about that. We don’t know the exact number. We just know the range, and we’re very, very confident about both the method and the