NucNews January 17, 2007 -------- NUCLEAR Climate change, nuclear threats push world towards Doomsday LONDON (AFP) Jan 17, 2007 http://www.spacewar.com/2006/070117172752.5saz0cla.html The world is inching closer to nuclear Armageddon, top scientists warned Wednesday as they moved a symbolic Doomsday Clock nearer to midnight and stressed the growing threat from climate change. Stephen Hawking, the renowned Cambridge University physicist, was among 18 Nobel laureates backing the warning, which cited North Korea and Iran as key factors in the increased danger of a nuclear winter. "It is now five minutes to midnight," Hawking said after the clock was moved forward two minutes from 11:53 pm, where it had stood since 2002. "We foresee great peril if governments and scientists don't take action now to render nuclear weapons obsolete and to prevent further climate change," he added. The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists has kept a Doomsday clock since 1947 as a reminder of the dangers of nuclear proliferation. The publication, whose contributors have included Albert Einstein, was set up by scientists who had worked on the Manhattan Project, which developed the atomic bombs detonated over the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. At simultaneous events in London and Washington, the clock's big hand was pushed forward again, its sixth move since the end of the Cold War. "We stand at the brink of a Second Nuclear Age. Not since the first atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki has the world faced such perilous choices," said the bulletin in a statement. "North Korea's recent test of a nuclear weapon, Iran's nuclear ambitions, a renewed US emphasis on the military utility of nuclear weapons, the failure to adequately secure nuclear materials, and the continued presence of some 26,000 nuclear weapons in the United States and Russia are symptomatic of a failure to solve the problems posed by the most destructive technology on Earth." Each of the two nations' warheads was between eight and 40 times more powerful than the one dropped on Hiroshima and 50 of them could kill 200 million people, the statement said. It also criticised the US, Russia and other signatories to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty for having "failed in their obligation to make serious strides toward disarmament". The London event was held at the Royal Society, Britain's top scientific institution, whose president Martin Rees stressed the threat of climate change as well as nuclear proliferation. "Nuclear weapons still pose the most catastrophic and immediate threat to humanity, but climate change and emerging technologies in the life sciences also have the potential to end civilization as we know it," he said. The statement added that the expansion of civilian nuclear power programmes around the world "increases the risk of nuclear proliferation" because enrichment facilities can be modified to produce uranium for weapons use. First set at seven minutes to midnight -- a phrase that has become part of pop culture -- the clock moved 17 times in response to global events. The most recent shift was in 2002 when it moved forward two minutes because the US withdrew from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and terrorists were known to be seeking nuclear and biological weapons. ---- It is 5 minutes to Midnight "Doomsday Clock" Moves Two Minutes Closer To Midnight Physicians launch International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear weapons 17 January 2007 ACDN http://acdn.france.free.fr/spip/article.php3?id_article=263&lang=en WASHINGTON, D.C. and LONDON, ENGLAND /// January 17, 2007 /// The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (BAS) is moving the minute hand of the Doomsday Clock two minutes closer to midnight. It is now 5 minutes to midnight. Reflecting global failures to solve the problems posed by nuclear weapons and the climate crisis, the decision by the BAS Board of Directors was made in consultation with the Bulletin’s Board of Sponsors, which includes 18 Nobel Laureates. BAS announced the Clock change today at an unprecedented joint news conference held at the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Washington, DC, and the Royal Society in London. In a statement supporting the decision to move the hand of the Doomsday Clock, the BAS Board focused on two major sources of catastrophe: the perils of 27,000 nuclear weapons, 2000 of them ready to launch within minutes; and the destruction of human habitats from climate change. In articles by 14 leading scientists and security experts writing in the January-February issue of theBulletin of the Atomic Scientists (http://www.thebulletin.org), the potential for catastrophic damage from human-made technologies is explored further. Created in 1947 by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, the Doomsday Clock has been adjusted only 17 times prior to today, most recently in February 2002 after the events of 9/11. By moving the hand of the Clock closer to midnight - the figurative end of civilization - the BAS Board of Directors is drawing attention to the increasing dangers from the spread of nuclear weapons in a world of violent conflict, and to the catastrophic harm from climate change that is unfolding. The BAS statement explains: "We stand at the brink of a Second Nuclear Age. Not since the first atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki has the world faced such perilous choices. North Korea’s recent test of a nuclear weapon, Iran’s nuclear ambitions, a renewed emphasis on the military utility of nuclear weapons, the failure to adequately secure nuclear materials, and the continued presence of some 26,000 nuclear weapons in the United States and Russia are symptomatic of a failure to solve the problems posed by the most destructive technology on Earth." The BAS statement continues: "The dangers posed by climate change are nearly as dire as those posed by nuclear weapons. The effects may be less dramatic in the short term than the destruction that could be wrought by nuclear explosions, but over the next three to four decades climate change could cause irremediable harm to the habitats upon which human societies depend for survival." Stephen Hawking, a BAS sponsor, professor of mathematics at the University of Cambridge, and a fellow of The Royal Society, said: "As scientists, we understand the dangers of nuclear weapons and their devastating effects, and we are learning how human activities and technologies are affecting climate systems in ways that may forever change life on Earth. As citizens of the world, we have a duty to alert the public to the unnecessary risks that we live with every day, and to the perils we foresee if governments and societies do not take action now to render nuclear weapons obsolete and to prevent further climate change." Kennette Benedict, executive director, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, said: "As we stand at the brink of a Second Nuclear Age and at the onset of unprecedented climate change, our way of thinking about the uses and control of technologies must change to prevent unspeakable destruction and future human suffering." Sir Martin Rees, president of The Royal Society, professor of cosmology and astrophysics , master of Trinity College at the University of Cambridge, and a BAS sponsor, said: "Nuclear weapons still pose the most catastrophic and immediate threat to humanity, but climate change and emerging technologies in the life sciences also have the potential to end civilization as we know it." Lawrence M. Krauss, professor of physics and astronomy at Case Western Reserve University, an a BAS sponsor, said: "In these dangerous times, scientists have a responsibility to speak truth to power especially if it might provoke actions to reduce threats from the preventable technological dangers currently facing humanity. To do anything else would be negligent." Ambassador Thomas Pickering, a BAS director and co-chair of the International Crisis Group, said: "Although our current situation is dire, we have the means today to successfully address these global problems. For example, through vigorous diplomacy and international agencies like the International Atomic Energy Agency, we can negotiate and implement agreements that could protect us all from the most destructive technology on Earth-nuclear weapons." Highlights of the new statement from the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists include the following: "The second nuclear era, unlike the dawn of the first nuclear age in 1945, is characterized by a world of porous national borders, rapid communications that facilitate the spread of technical knowledge, and expanded commerce in potentially dangerous dual-use technologies and materials. The Pakistan-based network that provided nuclear technologies to Libya, North Korea, and Iran, is an example of the new challenges confronting the international community." "Sixteen years after the end of the Cold War, following substantial reductions in nuclear weapons by the United States and Russia, the two major powers have now stalled in their progress toward deeper reductions in their arsenals." "More than 1400 metric tons of highly enriched uranium and approximately 500 tons of plutonium are distributed worldwide at some 140 sites, in unguarded civilian power plants and university research reactors, as well as in military facilities." "Global warming poses a dire threat to human civilization that is second only to nuclear weapons. Through flooding and desertification, climate change threatens the habitats and agricultural resources that societies depend upon for survival. As such, climate change is also likely to contribute to mass migrations and even to wars over arable land, water, and other natural resources." "The prospect of civilian nuclear power development in countries around the world raises further concerns about the availability of nuclear materials. Growth in nuclear power is anticipated to be especially high in Asia, where Japan is planning to bring on line five new plants by 2010, and China intends to build 30 nuclear reactors by 2020." "Several factors are driving the turn to nuclear power- aging nuclear reactors, rising energy demands, a desire to diversify energy portfolios and reduce reliance on fossil fuels, and the need to reduce carbon emissions that cause climate change. Yet expansion of nuclear power increases the risks of nuclear proliferation." The BAS statement also outlines a number of steps that, if taken immediately, could help to prevent disaster, including the following: Reduce the launch readiness of U.S. and Russian nuclear forces and completely remove nuclear weapons from the day-to-day operations of their militaries. Reduce the number of nuclear weapons by dismantling, storing, and destroying more than 20,000 warheads over the next 10 years, as well as greatly increasing efforts to locate, store, and secure nuclear materials in Russia and elsewhere. Stop production of nuclear weapons material, including highly enriched uranium and plutonium-w hether in military or civilian facilities. Engage in serious and candid discussion about the potential expansion of nuclear power worldwide. While nuclear energy production does not produce carbon dioxide, it does raise other significant concerns, such as the health and environmental hazards of nuclear waste, the production of nuclear materials that can be diverted to the production of weapons, and the safety and security of the plants themselves. ABOUT BAS AND THE CLOCK The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists was founded in 1945 by University of Chicago scientists who had worked on the Manhattan Project and were deeply concerned about the use of nuclear weapons and nuclear war. In 1947 the Bulletin introduced its clock to convey the perils posed by nuclear weapons through a simple design. The Doomsday Clock evoked both the imagery of apocalypse (midnight) and the contemporary idiom of nuclear explosion (countdown to zero). In 1949 Bulletin leaders realized that movement of the minute hand would signal the organization’s assessment of world events. The decision to move the minute hand is made by the Bulletin’s Board of Directors in consultation with its Board of Sponsors, which includes 18 Nobel Laureates. The Bulletin’s Doomsday Clock has become a universally recognized indicator of the world’s vulnerability to nuclear weapons and other threats. Additional information is available on the Web at http://www.thebulletin.org. CONTACT: Patrick Mitchell, (703) 276-3266 or pmitchell@hastingsgroup.com. EDITORS NOTE: A streaming audio replay of the news event will be available on the Web at http://www.thebulletin.org as of 6 p.m. ET and 11 p.m. in London/2300 GMT on January 17, 2007. -------- business Northrop Grumman To Provide Ongoing Launcher Support For Trident II Nuclear Missiles The contract includes support of 14 Ohio-class U.S. submarines (SSBN-730 through SSBN-743) and up to four U.K. submarines (Vanguard-class). Also included is support for the conversion of the first four Ohio-class submarines (SSBN-726 through SSBN-729) to a conventional weapon system (SSGN, nuclear-powered guided missile submarine). by Staff Writers Sunnyvale CA (SPX) Jan 17, 2007 http://www.spacewar.com/reports/Northrop_Grumman_To_Provide_Ongoing_Launcher_Support_For_Trident_II_Nuclear_Missiles_999.html Northrop Grumman will provide ongoing technical support for the Trident II (D5) missile weapon system. The Trident weapon system is launched from SSBNs, nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines, and is deployed by both the United States and the United Kingdom. Under the terms $40.4 million contract, Northrop Grumman's Marine Systems business unit, located in Sunnyvale, will provide full life-cycle support including systems engineering support, logistics, underwater launcher technology sustainment and launcher training services for both the U.S. and the U.K. The contract scope also includes life extension activities such as extended refueling shipyard field engineering support, hardware production and production restart planning efforts. Most of the work will be performed in Sunnyvale with additional work to be performed at field site locations in Norfolk, Va.; Bremerton, Wash.; and Kings Bay, Ga. Northrop Grumman Marine Systems originally provided SSP with the Trident II (D5) missile launcher system during the 1980s and 1990s and has been SSP's sole supplier of launchers for the U.S. Navy's fleet ballistic missile program since 1956, including development of the launch system for the original POLARIS weapon system. "Upgrading our Trident-equipped submarines provides capability to the Navy's underwater arsenal," said David Perry, vice president of Northrop Grumman's Marine Systems business unit. "We are proud to continue being the premier source of the technical expertise needed for this key program." The contract includes support of 14 Ohio-class U.S. submarines (SSBN-730 through SSBN-743) and up to four U.K. submarines (Vanguard-class). Also included is support for the conversion of the first four Ohio-class submarines (SSBN-726 through SSBN-729) to a conventional weapon system (SSGN, nuclear-powered guided missile submarine). This conversion replaces each single-missile launcher with Northrop Grumman's Multiple All-Up-Round Canister, which can hold and launch seven Tomahawk missiles. The conversion will allow the Navy to respond to a greater variety of military threats. The sole-source contract contains an as yet-unfunded option of $29 million for the fiscal year of 2007 plus duplicate options of $40 million and $29 million for 2008. If all options are exercised, the total potential contract value would be $139 million through 2010. The U.K. submarines would be serviced through the Navy rather than directly by Northrop Grumman. Northrop Grumman Marine Systems will develop and implement upgrades and technology insertions into the missile launcher subsystems, maintaining both the capability and the critical expertise while staying abreast of environmental and other issues. ---- North Korea Defends Nuclear Weapon Test As Negotiators Talk by Staff Writers Seoul (AFP) Jan 17, 2007 http://www.spacewar.com/reports/North_Korea_Defends_Nuclear_Weapon_Test_As_Negotiators_Talk_999.html North Korea defended its shock nuclear weapons test on Wednesday as the only way to avert a war, as its chief negotiator met with his US counterpart to discuss resuming multi-party disarmament talks. US envoy Christopher Hill held a rare meeting Tuesday with the North's Kim Kye-gwan at the US embassy in Berlin and, although there was no breakthrough, officials said it set the pace for a resumption of full six-party talks. "The Berlin meeting should lay a good groundwork for an agreement on what initial steps to take to implement the September 19 statement," South Korea's foreign minister Song Min-Soon said, referring to a 2005 accord offering the North security and economic aid guarantees in return for disarmament. Rodong Sinmun, North Korea's ruling party paper, said the October 9 test, the regime's first atomic weapons detonation ever, was in self-defence. "There is no doubt that a war would have broken out... if (North Korea) had failed last year to shatter the moves of the US imperialists to provoke a war against it with its strong self-defensive deterrent," it said. It accused the United States of "still whetting the sword of aggression" against North Korea under the disguise of seeking peaceful dialogue. The test triggered global outrage and UN sanctions, and in December senior negotiators from the six nations in the talks -- the two Koreas, China, Japan, Russia and the United States -- met for five days in Beijing. No progress was reported as North Korea refused substantiative discussions about nuclear disarmament in protest at separate US financial sanctions. Bilateral US-North Korean talks on the financial sanctions, notably on a Macau bank accused of illicit dealings on behalf of Pyongyang, are to resume next week. No date has been fixed for the next round of full six-party negotiations, however. Song urged Pyongyang to "initiate the process of dismantling its nuclear programmes" to enable others to "take corresponding steps" in return. In December's talks in Beijing, the United States reportedly demanded that North Korea report all of its nuclear facilities and programme and accept UN atomic agency inspectors. The United States was also said to have demanded the closure of the North's plutonium-producing reactor in Yongbyon and its nuclear test site. With North Korea in mind, China upgrades radioactivity monitoring Beijing (AFP) Jan 17 - North Korea's atom bomb test last year has emphasised the need for China to step up its nuclear and radioactive security regime, state press said Wednesday, citing the nation's environmental watchdog. The Chinese government has allocated 40 million yuan (5.12 million dollars) to better monitor nuclear and radioactive pollution, the China Daily said, citing State Environmental Protection Administration Minister Zhou Shengxian. Zhou said China's increasing use of nuclear power was one reason for upgrading its monitoring system, but North Korea's October 9 test, carried out around 100 kilometers (60 miles) from the Chinese border, also highlighted the need for a better regime. "The significance of nuclear and radioactive security was underscored... following the nuclear test last October in neighbouring Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea)," the paper said, summarising Zhou. Nuclear and radioactive security is defined as regular inspection of nuclear use and operations and an effective response to emergencies, the paper said. North Korea's nuclear test prompted widespread international condemnation and resulted in UN sanctions, backed by Beijing, Pyongyang's longtime ally. There have been no reports of any radiation leaks after the test. China last year set up six nuclear and radioactivity monitoring centres, as China's nuclear power use is expected to soar in the coming decades, the paper said. China currently generates 8,000 megawatts of nuclear power, about two percent of its total energy output, but that is expected to grow to 12,000 megawatts in 2010 and 40,000 megawatts by 2020. -------- canada Nuclear waste disposal plan could come within months Wednesday, January 17, 2007 CBC News http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2007/01/17/nuclear-waste.html A decision on how to store Canada's nuclear waste could come as early as this summer, said a spokesperson for the federal minister of natural resources. Canada is running out of storage room at its nuclear power stations, but the controversial issue hasn't been in the political spotlight since a 2005 report suggested waste be buried deep in the ground. It received some high-profile attention Tuesday, however, when Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion was asked whether he supports increased use of nuclear power during a speech to Toronto's business community. "As long as I'm not able to look Canadians in the eyes and say I'm comfortable with the waste, I will not recommend it," he said. Canada's nuclear industry says there's already a safe plan to deal with radioactive waste. In a report handed to the federal government in November 2005, the Nuclear Waste Management Organization (NWMO) recommended spent fuel rods be buried for a million years. The plan said the material could be retrieved at any time in case new technology provided a better way to dispose of it. Kathleen Olson, the director of communications for Natural Resources Minister Gary Lunn says he has been reviewing the plan and will soon take it to cabinet. Nuclear energy is one of Lunn's priorities for the new year, said Olson, who said she expects a decision on the waste recommendations will be made within six months. "I think there's considerable potential for it to be a hot potato," she said. Mark Winfield, with the Alberta-based environmental research group the Pembina Institute, said the timing could conflict with an expected spring election. "One could imagine that the government would be sensitive to the notion of the Nuclear Waste Management Organization attempting to initiate conversations with host communities all over Northern Ontario, Quebec [or] Manitoba in the middle of an election campaign," said Winfield. Moving the waste to its new home would affect communities around the storage facility, he said. "It's estimated that there would be two to three truckloads a day, every working day for 30 years, to move material to a central storage facility." The president of the Canadian Nuclear Association downplays the concerns, saying other countries bury radioactive waste in geological repositories. "That is, in fact, what has been done in Sweden and Finland [and is] being planned in France," said Murray Elston. The report recommended the eventual storage site come from one of the four provinces involved in nuclear fuel production — New Brunswick, Quebec, Ontario and Saskatchewan. The NWMO is made up of energy executives from those four provinces. Saskatchewan is the world's biggest producer of uranium used in nuclear power plants. The other three provinces have nuclear plants. -------- china With N Korea in mind, China upgrades radioactivity monitoring Wed Jan 17, 2007 (AFP) http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070117/wl_afp/chinankoreanuclearweaponsenergy BEIJING - North Korea's atom bomb test last year has emphasised the need for China to step up its nuclear and radioactive security regime, according to state press reports, citing the nation's environmental watchdog. The Chinese government has allocated 40 million yuan (5.12 million dollars) to better monitor nuclear and radioactive pollution, the China Daily said, citing State Environmental Protection Administration Minister Zhou Shengxian. Zhou said China's increasing use of nuclear power was one reason for upgrading its monitoring system, but North Korea's October 9 test, carried out around 100 kilometers (60 miles) from the Chinese border, also highlighted the need for a better regime. "The significance of nuclear and radioactive security was underscored... following the nuclear test last October in neighbouring Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea)," the paper said, summarising Zhou. Nuclear and radioactive security is defined as regular inspection of nuclear use and operations and an effective response to emergencies, the paper said. North Korea's nuclear test prompted widespread international condemnation and resulted in UN sanctions, backed by Beijing, Pyongyang's longtime ally. There have been no reports of any radiation leaks after the test. China last year set up six nuclear and radioactivity monitoring centres, as China's nuclear power use is expected to soar in the coming decades, the paper said. China currently generates 8,000 megawatts of nuclear power, about two percent of its total energy output, but that is expected to grow to 12,000 megawatts in 2010 and 40,000 megawatts by 2020. -------- depleted uranium Gulf War Profiteering - Victors and Victims, by Christiane N. Martens and Paul V. Rafferty 2007-01-17 UN Observer http://www.unobserver.com/layout5.php?id=3079&blz=1 Today is the Sixteenth Anniversary of the beginning of the first Gulf War. In the interests of remembering what the wars are all about, we thought it worthwhile to repost an article from 2002. Gulf War Profiteering - Victors and Victims, by Christiane N. Martens and Paul V. Rafferty 2002-08-20 - War is by nature confusing and those who “sell war” appear to need a confused public. In a war which seems to have no end, Confusion reigns. The United States continues to press for war against Iraq and refuses any negotiations which would enable Saddam Hussein to allow a return of United Nations inspectors. The Bush Administration openly declares that it is seeking to overthrow the government of a sovereign nation and acts as if this is normal. Meanwhile, a complacent United Nations continues to weaken Iraq, in collaboration with the United States and Great Britain. It is as if the United States were the matador, Saddam Hussein the bull and the United Nations the picadors, tormenting the bull until he lowers his head for the kill. The relations between the United Nations and Iraq are quite often difficult to understand. The U.N. is using Iraqi oil, not only to feed the Iraqi people under the U.N. “oil-for food” program but also to pay reparations for the Gulf War through the U.N. Compensation Commission (UNCC) which was established solely to handle claims against Iraq. In the interest of accuracy, some of the convolutions within this particular aspect of United Nations reasoning have been preserved in this article. As of July 23, official statistics show that the UNCC has allowed over $15 Billion ($15,549,384,227) in war claims to be paid from Iraqi oil revenues - out of a possible $300 Billion plus in claims from 100 nations. As of August 9, the Office of Iraq Programme: Oil for Food, known as OIP, has allowed nearly $56 Billion ($55,846,000) for food and other necessities. This OIP “allowance” also comes from Iraqi oil revenues – all of which are being administered by the United Nations. Iraq is therefore a de facto economic prisoner of the United Nations. The Sanctions imposed upon Iraq, by the U.N. Security Council, do not allow Iraq to sell any of its oil, except that which the U.N. “oil-for-food” office (OIP) specifies. The Office of Iraq Programme reports that: “The first oil under the programme was exported on 10 December 1996. For the first three six month phases the Security Council set a ceiling of two billion dollars on oil exports in each phase. For phases IV and V the ceiling was raised to $5.2 billion but the low price of oil and the state of Iraq's oil industry put that out of reach. In phase VI, the Security Council, resolution 1266 (1999), recognized the earlier shortfalls and permitted Iraq to export an additional $3 billion worth of oil. Security Council resolution 1284 (1999) removed the ceiling on Iraqi oil exports.” The official OIP website adds: “The main focus of the programme has been to ensure substantial deliveries of food and health supplies to Iraq. From phase IV onwards, oil industry spare parts and equipment were also given priority to maintain and increase Iraq's ability to export oil with the Security Council authorising Iraq to import initially up to $300 million and subsequently $600 million worth of equipment with revenue from each phase.” http://www.un.org/Depts/oip/background/basicfigures.html As of the end of July, the U.N. Compensation Commission (UNCC) also states that there were “approximately 2.6 million claims seeking compensation in excess of US $300 Billion”. Any and all claims approved by the UNCC will be paid out of funds from the “oil for food” programme. “Food” must have various connotations. The UNCC explains that: “Nearly one hundred Governments have submitted claims for their nationals, corporations and/or themselves. Thirteen offices of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), have also submitted claims for individuals who were not in a position to have their claims filed by Governments. This staggering volume of claims, and the accompanying documentation require approximately 3,500 square metres of storage space in various locations.” http://www.unog.ch/uncc/claims/governm.htm According to the UNCC, “The overwhelming majority of the 2.6 million claims filed with the Commission have been resolved. However, the claims still to be considered by the panels of commissioners include those claims with the largest asserted values.” Therefore, approximately $285 Billion worth of claims has yet to be adjudicated and if so determined, taken from Iraq’s income from the so-called “oil-for-food” program. Meanwhile, the bombing continues (over 112,000 air sorties in 11 years); Iraq continues to be an experimental laboratory for depleted uranium and the people of Iraq are presented as being “beneficiaries” of the largesse of the United Nations which is managing their oil revenues and doling it out to them as a form of “aid”. Although the United States, Great Britain and the United Nations claim that the sanctions are simply a method of forcing Saddam Hussein into compliance with International Law, the actual victims are the Iraqi civilian population. This month, Benon V. Sevan, Executive Director of the U.N.’s Office of the Iraq Programme, Oil for Food, expressed “grave concern” over declining oil revenues for “relief aid”. He is also concerned about the differences of opinion as to the proper method for pricing Iraqi oil. In a letter to the Security Council’s sanctions committee, he stated that during the first two months of the latest phase of the oil-for-food program, Iraq exported 63.2 million barrels of oil, which is "lower than previous recorded levels of monthly exports under the programme…. Even by the most conservative estimates, some $1.5 billion in revenue had been lost owing to a reduction in the level of Iraqi oil exports." On July 23, however, the United Nations reported that: “ Iraqi crude exports spiked to 9.8 million barrels over the past week – the highest volume over a seven-day period since the start, in late May, of the current phase of the United Nations oil-for-food programme, which allows Baghdad to use a portion of its petroleum revenues to purchase humanitarian relief. “With the price of Iraqi crude oil averaging approximately €24.30 (euros) or $24.50 per barrel, the week’s exports netted an estimated €238 million or $240 million in revenue, according to the Office of the Iraq Programme (OIP), which runs the oil-for-food scheme. “Despite the recent rise in exports, an accumulated shortfall has left nearly 1,000 approved humanitarian supply contracts, worth almost $2.1 billion, without funding.” Basically, the United Nations is controlled by the Security Council which accepts or rejects recommendations made by the General Assembly. This is similar to the British Parliament when only the land owners had any say in governance and the majority of the population had no voice. A bi-cameral legislature had been formed with an upper “House of Lords” making all decisions and a lower “House of Commons” merely expressing their opinions. Then, as in the United Nations, the “Lower House” could only approve or disapprove the “Budget” – the expenses and taxation of the “Realm”. Since the U.N. Budget is usually honed down to the bare minimum necessary for the organisation to function, the General Assembly always approves the Budget. Were the General Assembly to exercise its only power – rejection of the Budget – the entire organisation would collapse and all the projects of the U.N. would cease. Since we now live in a world which is dominated by international agreements, the result would be global chaos. The General Assembly is not suicidal, so the Security Council maintains control of the U.N. - even though all U.N. Member-States are considered "equal" in the General Assembly. The Security Council is comprised of the five Permanent Members (China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States) plus 10 Member-States elected for two-year terms by the General Assembly. Only the Five Permanent Members have the Right of Veto over any decision not to their liking. The Security Council controls the U.N. and while the United States may not officially control the Security Council, U.S. influence is immense. The U.S. has been able to do this for several reasons. First is the fact that the U.N. was founded by the winners of the Second World War: primarily China, France, Great Britain, the Soviet Union and the United States. All but the United States were severely damaged internally by the war and China was further struck by the Civil War between Communist and Nationalist forces – with the United States siding with the Nationalists. Although the Nationalists held China’s Security Council seat, when the United States switched sides, Communist China replaced the Nationalists in 1979. Historically, China has also been an inward looking country, prefering to focus primarily on its own regional empire than to seek foreign adventures. France and Great Britain, though on the winning side, suffered greatly from the Second World War, lost their colonies and were largely dependent upon U.S. loans for recovery. The Soviet Union, in its Cold War conflict with the United States exhausted its own resources in an arms race which it was unable to sustain, collapsed internally and Russia is now largely dependent upon the United States and other Western nations for assistance in its recovery. This has left the United States alone as a “Super-Power” among the Five Permanent Members of the Security Council having Veto Power over all U.N. decisions. By also controlling the U.N. “purse-strings” the U.S. reasserts its authority. On April 3, 1991, five weeks after the official suspension of the Gulf War, the Security Council voted Resolution 687, establishing Iraq’s “legal responsibility” for losses incurred as a result of Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait and the Gulf War. The United Nations Compensation Commission (UNCC) was then established as a subsidiary body of the Security Council and a special fund was created to take a percentage of Iraqi oil to pay successful claimants. Such claims would be heard by the UNCC. In a report to the Security Council, Secretary-General Kofi Annan stated: "the Commission is not a court or an arbitral tribunal before which the parties appear; it is a political organ that performs an essentially fact-finding function of examining claims, verifying their validity, evaluating losses, assessing payments and resolving disputed claims; it is only in this last respect that a quasi-judicial function may be involved." On August 15, 1991, Security Council Resolution 706 authorised Member-States to import Iraqi oil for six months, up to $1.6 Billion, in order to finance the UNCC and other related U.N. operations. Although Iraq “agreed”, this was not possible because of damage to Iraq’s oil industry, during the Gulf War and voluntary contributions from Member-States, plus the U.N.’s Working Capital Fund covered the costs of establishing the UNCC. Then, in 1992, Security Council Resolution 778 allowed these funds to be reimbursed by Iraqi funds that had been frozen by various governments. Finally, in December 1996, the “oil-for-food” program was launched and the U.N. Compensation Commission could operate fully, utilising a percentage of the “oil-for-food” program. Obviously the term “food” has various connotations to some U.N. Member-States. The Governing Council of the U.N.C.C. “establishes the criteria for the compensability of claims, the rules and procedures for processing the claims, the guidelines for the administration and financing of the Compensation Fund and the procedures for the payment of compensation. It reports regularly to the Security Council on the Commission’s work.” “In December 1997, the secretariat presented to the Committee, for the first time, a biennium budget, thus bringing the Commission into line with standard United Nations practice. The Council approved the budget and allocated US$82.3 million for the Commission's operations for 1998-1999.” (The “U.N. OBSERVER” does not yet have the next two Budgets but we felt that due to the mounting calls for war, it is best to consider the available information and allow our readers to check the known facts, themselves.) The Governing Council is actually the Security Council, under a different name but with no one holding Veto Power. Decisions have usually been by consensus, although there are provisions for a nine member approval being necessary, as in the Security Council. Meetings are closed to the public but U.N. Member-States which are not on the Security Council may ask for permission to appear. Iraq and Kuwait have often done this. There are 56 Commissioners, working on 18 panels, including three panels which have now concluded their work. The UNCC states that: “Commissioners are chosen for their integrity, experience and expertise in such areas as law, accounting, loss adjustment, assessment of environmental damage, and engineering.” There is also a secretariat to perform the necessary administrative tasks and the UNCC notes that: “The majority of the members of the secretariat are lawyers, accountants, loss adjusters and information technology specialists. “In addition to the Office of the Executive Secretary, the secretariat comprises: (1) the Claims Processing Division, which includes the Legal Services Branch, made up of various claims sections and units, the Verification and Valuation Support Branch and the Registry; (2) the Support Services Division, which includes the Claims Payment and Compensation Fund Administration, the Executive Office, dealing with general administration, and the Information Systems Section providing computerized systems to support claims processing and payment; and (3) the Governing Council Secretariat.” The United Nations Compensation Commission has subdivided claims into six categories: four for individuals; one for corporations and one for international organisations, “which also includes claims for environmental damage.” By allowing Iraq only enough income to satisfy the desires of the United Nations Security Council and by continuing 11 years of bombing raids, utilising depleted uranium, the United States is preparing its victim for the ultimate “sword thrust” or “Moment of Truth”, as in the bull ring – all under the gaze of a spell-bound crowd - and this is all presented as “relief aid”. The punishment of Iraq by U.S. led U.N. Sanctions has led to the impoverishment of the Iraqi people and caused untold suffering and hunger, as well as birth malformations and increased cancers due to depleted uranium contamination of Iraqi soil and water. Meanwhile, by controlling the flow of Iraqi oil, the overall price of oil is also regulated. Christiane N. Martens and Paul V. Rafferty (Please see some of the following links for additional information on Iraqi civilian casualties.) For additional information, please visit the following websites: United Nations Compensation Commission (UNCC): http://www.unog.ch/uncc/start.htm United Nations Office of the Iraq Programme Oil for Food: http://www.un.org/Depts/oip The Center for an Informed America: http://davesweb.cnchost.com/nwsltr13.html Please also visit: American Gulf War Veterans Association: http://www.gulfwarvets.com and for British Gulf War Vets http://www.gulfwarvets.co.uk/html Iraq News Agency (INA) http://www.uruklink.net/iraqnews/eindex.htm Safer World http://www.safer-world.org/e/disease/gulf.htm Gulf War.com: http://www.gulfwar.com “American Servicemen Used As Guinea Pigs - Tests Revealed: DOD Releases Project SHAD Fact Sheets”: http://www.rense.com/general26/gjh.htm Iraq Shows Baby Milk Store at Reported Weapons Site by Huda Majeed Saleh http://www.commondreams.org/headlines02/0820-03.htm Security Council won't take up Iraq's response on weapons inspectors By GERALD NADLER, Associated Press Writer http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20020820/ap_wo_en_po/un_iraq_2 American public left in dark on US war aims in Iraq By Patrick Martin: http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/aug2002/iraq-a06.shtml Brainwashing America, by Norman D. Livergood: http://www.hermes-press.com/brainwash1.htm Rumsfeld Pushes the Envelope With Forces Proposal http://www.stratfor.com/standard/analysis_view.php?ID=205728 The American Way of War, by Michael Kelly: http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2002/06/kelly.htm Americans Against Bombing/Americans Against World Empire: http://www.iraqwar.org Iraq Affinity Group: http://www.rdrop.com/~pjw/Iraq.html Iraq Action Coalition: http://iraqaction.org For more information on bombings of Iraq: http://www.rdrop.com/~pjw/flyer0100/factsheet0100a.html International Action Center (Founded by Ramsey Clark, former U.S. Attorney General): http://www.iacenter.org Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR): http://www.fair.org UPDATE U.S. Set to Control Iraq's Oil for the Next 30 Years! http://www.unobserver.com/index.php?pagina=layout5.php&id=3038&blz=1 Original posting Gulf War Profiteering – Victors and Victims, by Christiane N. Martens and Paul V. Rafferty http://www.unobserver.com/index.php?pagina=layout5.php&id=313&blz=1 -------- iran Iran says ready to receive Chirac envoy TEHRAN, Jan 17 (AFP) Jan 17, 2007 http://www.spacewar.com/2006/070117145520.wz4pra7p.html Iran on Wednesday said it would be ready to receive any special envoy sent by French President Jacques Chirac for talks on the Middle East. "The rank of the French envoy does not pose any problem and the person would be received by his Iranian counterpart of the same rank," said top Iranian national security official Ali Larijani, according to the ISNA agency. "Iran has no reason to adopt a cold attitude towards the French request to send an envoy," he added. The French foreign ministry on Tuesday confirmed it was discussing plans to send a special envoy to Iran to discuss "regional issues" including Lebanon and Israel's right to exist. ---- Iran ready but says strike on nuclear sites unlikely TEHRAN (AFP) Jan 17, 2007 http://www.spacewar.com/2006/070117174520.ten4w51l.html Iran believes a military strike against its nuclear installations is highly improbable but has nonetheless taken the necessary precautions in case it is attacked, top officials said on Wednesday. "We think that it is highly improbable that our nuclear sites would be bombed but we have taken the necessary precautions even for this," said Mohammad Saeedi, vice president of Iran's atomic energy organisation, according to the ISNA agency. The United States and Israel, Iran's two arch-enemies, have never ruled out military action against the Islamic republic to thwart its nuclear programme, which they allege is aimed at making an atomic weapon. Saeedi did not specify what the precautions have involved. Defence Minister Mostafa Mohammad Najar also said Iran was prepared for any potential move against it. "Iran's armed forces are closely watching all movements in the region and will not allow any aggression from enemies," he said according to the IRNA news agency. A report in the Sunday Times newspaper in Britain earlier this month said that Israel was already planning a small-scale nuclear strike on Iranian nuclear sites, although this was strongly denied by the Jewish state. Iran has already been hit by UN Security Council sanctions over its nuclear programme, which it insists is peaceful and aimed at meeting the energy needs of a growing population. Ali Larijani, secretary of Iran's supreme national security council, echoed Saeedi's comments, saying that "all the options have been taken into account". "But this talk (of an attack) should not be taken too seriously. We think they have the minimum of intelligence not to do a thing like this," he told reporters, according to IRNA. Saeedi also said Iran would press on with its nuclear programme, even if the UN Security Council agreed even tougher resolutions against Tehran in the future. "Even if worse resolutions are adopted, we have started our work and we will continue with it. The secret of our success is unity," he said. "UN Security Council resolutions will not prevent the Iranian people from achieving their objectives," he added. Iran's parliament reacted to the UN Security Council resolution by passing a law that obliges the government to "revise" its cooperation with the UN nuclear watchdog. But almost a month after the adoption of the UN resolution, the government has yet to indicate how it intends to interpret the law and Larijani said that there were no need for over-hasty action. "Why do you want us to react in a hurry? We have to react in a measured way. We want to act in a way that takes into account the country's national interests," he said. Iran has nonetheless made clear it has no intention of surrendering its nuclear ambitions. The government spokesman said Monday Tehran wanted to install "even more" than 3,000 centrifuges to enrich uranium at a key nuclear plant in defiance of the UN Security Council demand to freeze the sensitive activity. Officials have also predicted Iran would make a major announcement on the "completion" of Iran's nuclear programme during the 10-day anniversary celebrations for the Islamic revolution in February. ---- US defence chief seeks Saudi support on Iran RIYADH (AFP) Jan 17, 2007 http://www.spacewar.com/2006/070117185008.ejpuhf32.html US Defence Secretary Robert Gates touched down in Saudi Arabia on Wednesday angling for support from the oil-rich kingdom in confronting Iran's suspected pursuit of nuclear weapons. Gates, who flew into Riyadh from Kabul, was also expected to discuss Washington's new strategy for taming sectarian bloodshed and chaos in Iraq when he sees King Abdullah for face-to-face talks. He is the first Pentagon chief to visit Saudi Arabia -- a key US ally in the Gulf region and wider Middle East -- since his predecessor Donald Rumsfeld came in April 2003, soon after the US-led invasion of Iraq. King Abdullah received Gates at a desert camp at Rawdhat Khuraim, 80 kilometres (50 miles) northeast of Riyadh, together with Crown Prince Sultan bin Abdul Aziz, who is also defense minister. Prince Meqrin bin Abdul Aziz, who heads the Saudi intelligence services, was also present, the state-run Saudi Press Agency reported. No other details of the talks were disclosed. Speaking to reporters travelling with him, Gates indicated that Washington was counting on Riyadh's support in addressing hot-button issues in the region, starting with Iran's nuclear programme. "I think we can always use Saudi cooperation on these issues in the Gulf region," said Gates when asked if Washington was seeking Riyadh's support to check Iran's nuclear ambitions. Iran, which insists its nuclear programme is for civilian purposes only, has defied UN Security Council demands to halt its uranium enrichment work -- prompting the world body to impose limited sanctions. "I think above all, I will be interested in hearing the king's views in these issues, and how the king sees the situation in the region," said Gates, who replaced Rumsfeld as defence secretary a month ago. "His perspective on these things is specially what I'm interested in." Gates, former head of the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), has moved to raise the US military's profile in the Gulf since his appointment by US President George W. Bush. A second US aircraft carrier battlegroup has been ordered to the Gulf region -- the first time the United States has had so much seagoing muscle in the vicinity since the Iraq invasion. Bush has meanwhile ordered the deployment of a Patriot missile defense battalion to the region to protect against any possible Iranian ballistic missile threat. The moves were announced last week as part of the new US strategy for Iraq that will see 21,500 additional troops being deployed, the lion's share of them going to Baghdad to help Iraqi forces quell rampant sectarian bloodshed. Prior to leaving Afghanistan earlier Wednesday, Gates said that US commanders there had asked for more troops for Afghanistan as well. The new US strategy calls for placing Iraq within a regional context, and Gates's brief stop in Saudi Arabia was aimed at re-engaging important US allies in the region. He said Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's government "needs, I think, help from other governments in terms of its influence and authority at home." "I think anything that governments within the region and outside the region can do, particularly on the economic reconstruction and development side in Iraq, would be immensely helpful to the Maliki government and to the Iraqi people," he said. Saudi Arabia is the fourth stop in a trip that has taken Gates -- who visited Iraq in December -- to London, NATO headquarters in Brussels, and Kabul. ---- Iran shoots down U.S. spy drone amid growing military pressure 2007-01-17 (Xinhua) by Liang Youchang http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2007-01/17/content_5615540.htm TEHRAN, Jan. 16 -- Iranian troops have shot down a U.S. pilotless spy plane recently, an Iranian lawmaker announced on Tuesday as the Islamic Republic was facing increasing military pressure from its arch rival -- the United States. The aircraft was brought down when it was trying to cross the borders "during the last few days," Seyed Nezam Mola Hoveizeh, a member of the parliament, was quoted by the local Fars News Agency as saying. The lawmaker gave no exact date of the shooting-down or any other details about the incident, but he said that "the United States sent such spy drones to the region every now and then." SECOND U.S. AIRCRAFT CARRIER The announcement came amid reports that the United States is increasingly flexing its muscles to counter Iran's growing regional assertiveness and put more pressure on Tehran over its controversial nuclear programs. It was reported Tuesday that a second U.S. aircraft carrier, the USS John C. Stennis, will arrive in the Middle East in about one month, the first time since the U.S.-led Iraq war in 2003 that the United States will have two carrier battle groups in the region. The USS John C. Stennis, a Nimitz-class nuclear-powered carrier that has a capacity for 5,000 sailors, is scheduled to sail Tuesday from its home port of Bremerton, Washington, said Commander Kevin Aandahl of the U.S. Navy's Fifth Fleet based in Bahrain. In about one month, the USS John C. Stennis, including an air wing of more than 80 tactical aircraft, will join Fifth Fleet forces that includes aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower. "This demonstrates our resolve to do what we can to bring security and stability to the region ... (and) dissuade others from acting counter to our national interest," Aandahl said. U.S. President George W. Bush announced earlier this month that the United States was taking other steps to beef up security of Iraq and protect U.S. interests in the Middle East, such as sending an additional aircraft carrier to the Gulf and deploying Patriot air defense systems to the region. HARSH REMARKS AGAINST IRAN The latest move comes just one day after new U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates made harsh remarks against Iran, indicating that Iran's perception of U.S. vulnerability in the region was part of the reason the Pentagon sent the aircraft carrier and the Patriot missiles. "The Iranians are acting in a very negative way in many respects," Gates told reporters on Monday after a meeting with NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer in Brussels. "The Iranians clearly believe that we are tied down in Iraq, that they have the initiative, that they are in a position to press us in many ways," Gates said. Gates also said that the deployment of Patriot air defense systems and the second aircraft carrier in the Gulf region indicated the Bush administration's "reaffirmation" of the importance of the region, adding that stability in the region is in "long-term, strategic, vital interests" of the United States. The United States accuses Iran of using its influence to meddle in the region, especially in Lebanon and Shiite-majority Iraq, besides seeking a nuclear weapon, which has been rejected by Iran. In an interview with Fox News earlier the month, Vice President Dick Cheney said that Iran was "fishing in troubled waters" in Iraq, adding "we think it's very important that they keep their folks at home." Meanwhile, U.S. forces are still holding five Iranians arrested in northern Iraq last week, who the United States says have been connected to an Iranian Revolutionary Guard faction that arms insurgents but Tehran says are merely consular staff. In a show of defiance, an Iranian government spokesman said on Monday that the country was pushing ahead with its plan to install at least 3,000 centrifuges for nuclear fuel production. -------- japan Japan's energy initiative welcomed K. Venugopal, January 17, 2007 The Hindu http://www.thehindu.com/2007/01/17/stories/2007011707001200.htm East Asian states focus on renewable sources # 16-member group discusses forming an economic community # Study on economic partnership agreement to be launched Recently in Cebu: Leaders of 16 countries at the East Asian summit have pledged to reduce dependence on conventional energy and invest more money in renewable sources, including nuclear power. Worried by the rising crude oil prices and by the prospect of their needing more affordable energy to fuel rising economic growth rates, the leaders who met at Cebu in the Philippines on Monday, welcomed the clean energy initiative from Japan, which reportedly promised $2 billion in funding for various energy saving projects in member nations. The 16 nations include the 10 of the ASEAN group, and China, Japan, South Korea, India, Australia and New Zealand. India's efforts Prime Minister Manmohan Singh told Indian journalists that he outlined at the meeting India's efforts to develop renewable sources of energy and bio-diesel as a supplement and part-substitute to petroleum. He also apprised the gathering of the country's focus on nuclear energy. He said he suggested that financial institutions, both international and regional, finance energy-efficient technologies and hydroelectric projects. The 16-member group also mulled over the prospects of coming together as an economic community. The group represents nearly half the world's population, an annual economic output almost as large as that of the European Union, and foreign exchange reserves larger than the European Union and the United States combined. Japan, which has been one of the keenest proponents of an East Asian free trade agreement, won enough support from its partners for the launch of a feasibility study on a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement that would go beyond free trade in goods. "Arc of advantage" Dr. Singh told journalists that the objective should be to set in motion a process that would lead to the creation of an East Asia community for an "arc of advantage, which was highlighted in my first visit to the region." Yet, the economic union may not happen quickly. A detained study on the feasibility and advantages of having such an economic community would take at least two years, according to an official in the Commerce Ministry. With negotiations having stalled in the World Trade Organisation to get countries across the world to reduce import tariffs, countries in East Asia have been busily doing free trade deals with one another and with regional groups such as ASEAN. India has joined the bandwagon, but is a good way behind China. Even as it labours over the agreement on trade in goods with ASEAN that will not be signed before July this year, China on Sunday inked the higher order agreement with ASEAN that opens up trade in services from July. The agreement on trade in goods has been operational for a year. "We are a late starter in this process," Dr. Singh conceded at a press conference on board the aircraft bringing him back from Cebu on Monday. "The destination is the same ... but it will take time before we reach there. We are moving at a pace which our system can sustain." -------- korea Russia urges US to lift North Korea sanctions: report MOSCOW (AFP) Jan 17, 2007 http://www.spacewar.com/2006/070117131027.wzr2eayj.html Russia urged the United States on Wednesday to drop financial sanctions against North Korea that have emerged as a key obstacle to talks over Pyongyang's nuclear weapons programme. "The United States should have taken some steps toward the Koreans on lifting financial sanctions and discussing this question with them," Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Losyukov, the head Russian negotiator on North Korea, was quoted as saying by state-run news agency RIA Novosti. Losyukov also called on North Korea to reconsider its refusal to rejoin six-party international negotiations over its nuclear programme on account of the US sanctions. "The link is not 100 percent justified," he was quoted as saying. Six-party negotiations involving the United States, the two Koreas, Japan, Russia and China are aimed at persuading Stalinist North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons programme. The process was suspended in late 2005 after North Korea walked out of talks in protest over US financial sanctions. Washington took punitive measures against a Macau bank accused of illicit dealings on behalf of Pyongyang. The talks resumed in December last year -- following North Korea's October 9 nuclear weapons test -- and ended in deadlock as Pyongyang insisted the financial sanctions be lifted before it would discuss nuclear disarmament. On Wednesday, the top US envoy to the six-way talks said in Berlin that he was having "useful discussions" with his Pyongyang counterpart and that he hoped negotiations would resume this month. ---- Top US envoy holds 'useful' N Korea talks in Berlin BERLIN (AFP) Jan 17, 2007 http://www.spacewar.com/2006/070117151524.dqu0029i.html The top US envoy to six-way talks on North Korea's nuclear arms said Wednesday he was having "useful discussions" with his Pyongyang counterpart here and hoped negotiations would resume this month. Christopher Hill said he planned to continue talks with the North's negotiator Kim Kye-gwan again later Wednesday and possibly Thursday following an initial six-hour meeting Tuesday. "When you have six hours of conversations and you're going to have some more... certainly you can characterize them as useful discussions," Hill told guests at an American Academy event in the German capital. He declined to answer questions on the substance of the meeting but said he hoped the six-party talks, which collapsed in December in Beijing with no discernible progress, would start again "in January". The Berlin meetings came ahead of Hill's visits beginning Friday to South Korea, China and Japan to continue consultations with key partners in the six-party talks on how to make progress in the next round of negotiations. Hill, who was also to brief visiting US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on the meetings, noted that the Berlin talks were the first bilateral discussions he had held with Kim outside Beijing. The two powers held landmark talks in Berlin in 1999 that ultimately led to the lifting of a half-century of restrictions on trade, travel and banking against North Korea after it agreed to a moratorium on missile tests. But the crisis erupted again in 2002. Six-party negotiations involving the United States, the two Koreas, Japan, Russia and China were suspended in late 2005 after North Korea walked out in protest at US financial sanctions imposed on a Macau bank accused of illicit dealings on behalf of Pyongyang. The talks resumed in December last year -- following the North's October 9 nuclear weapons test -- and ended in deadlock as Pyongyang insisted the financial sanctions be lifted before it would discuss nuclear disarmament. Russia on Wednesday called the US sanctions an obstacle to the resumption of talks and urged flexibility on both sides. "The United States should have taken some steps toward the Koreans on lifting financial sanctions and discussing this question with them," Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Losyukov, the head Russian negotiator on North Korea, was quoted as saying by state-run news agency RIA Novosti. Losyukov also called on North Korea to reconsider its refusal to rejoin the negotiations on account of the US sanctions. "The link is not 100 percent justified," he was quoted as saying. Hill declined to discuss the specifics of the latest negotiations but said that the sanctions over the Macau bank were "a separate process from the issue of denuclearization". He said the other powers involved in the negotiations nevertheless had a raft of economic and diplomatic incentives to convince Pyongyang to abandon its nuclear weapons program. "We have a lot of options for dealing with it but we don't have the option of walking away from it," he said. "We'd really like to move this along as quickly as possible." Japan and South Korea welcomed the Berlin talks and voiced hope for an early resumption of multilateral discussions on Pyongyang's nuclear arms program. "Dialogue is a good thing," Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuhisa Shiozaki, the top government spokesman, told reporters. "The Berlin meeting should lay a good groundwork for an agreement on what initial steps to take to implement the September 19 statement," South Korea's foreign minister Song Min-Soon said, referring to a 2005 accord offering the North security and economic aid guarantees in return for disarmament. Hill described that agreement as "a sort of bible for us" and said he hoped it would be the basis for a new agreement. Despite Hill's relatively upbeat assessment, the former US ambassador to the UN, John Bolton, said the six-way talks had failed and a breakthrough would only come after Kim Jong-Il's regime ended. "Six-party talks have not worked. They are not likely to work," he said. ---- Sanctions and War on the Korean Peninsula Martin Hart-Landsberg and John Feffer | January 17, 2007 Foreign Policy In Focus http://fpif.org/fpiftxt/3913 The risk of war on the Korean peninsula remains high, and the U.S. government is raising it higher by opening an economic front. In September 2005, one day after regional negotiations produced an agreement with the potential to defuse North Korean-U.S. tensions, the U.S. government charged North Korea with counterfeiting $100 bills. Calling this alleged North Korean effort a direct attack on U.S. sovereignty and technically an act of war, Washington imposed an ever-tightening and ever-widening web of financial restrictions on the country. This economic campaign, which broadened and intensified after Pyongyang’s missile launches in July and nuclear test in October 2006, is the latest attempt to isolate and weaken the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK). The charges fit a pattern of actions that have so far succeeded in disrupting promising movements toward peace on the Korean peninsula. In the latest round of Six Party Talks, held in December, the restrictions proved to be the biggest obstacle in the path of reaching an agreement. Tensions generated by the restrictions are already fueling a new arms race in East Asia and raising the social costs for Koreans, especially in the North. The economic campaign, if unresolved, is likely to lead to a higher level of tensions in the coming months. Washington’s economic gambit, launched in 2005 and strengthened by UN sanctions in 2006, raises questions concerning timing, threat escalation, morality, and efficacy. With no further rounds of multilateral talks currently planned, the hard-line economic approach toward North Korea has been a counterproductive detour from the more pressing issue of denuclearization and diplomatic normalization. The restrictions and sanctions have acted as too blunt a stick to push North Korea back to the negotiating table and have become instead the main stumbling block in the negotiations. Deployed as an alternative to the less palatable military approaches to regime change, the economic campaign proved counterproductive when the DPRK responded with its missile and nuclear tests. Finally, this economic approach undermines North Korean efforts at reforms and opening, the very process that many argue needs to be supported on moral, as well as strategic, grounds. Thwarted Rapprochement Motivated by the negative economic consequences of the loss of its Soviet bloc trading partners and a series of horrific storms and droughts, North Korea has been actively seeking to normalize relations with the United States for more than a decade. Such rapprochement on the economic level would involve the removal of the sanctions that Washington has maintained against Pyongyang for over fifty years (although some were partially lifted by the Clinton administration) as well as enlisting U.S. support for membership in multilateral institutions (which Washington has hitherto blocked). North Korea has discovered that only one thing will draw the United States into negotiations -- Washington’s concerns over its nuclear program. Thus, the North Korean government has aggressively played its nuclear card. The 1994 Agreed Framework, which resolved the first nuclear crisis on the peninsula, represented a limited but promising start for improved relations. The DPRK promised to freeze and eventually dismantle its graphite-based nuclear program. In exchange, the U.S. government agreed to provide new, less-threatening light water nuclear reactors, end its economic embargo, and normalize relations. Sadly, the U.S. never completely fulfilled its commitments. Confident that economic problems would lead to the collapse of the North Korean government, the Clinton administration made little effort to overcome opposition from a hostile Congress to pursue normalization or even ensure the timely construction of the new reactors. While Pyongyang seemed more committed to the agreement, it, too, threw obstacles in the way of completing the reactors and, possibly, explored an alternative nuclear program. Still, thanks in part to South Korean efforts -- in particular the historic meeting between South Korean president Kim Dae Jung and North Korean leader Kim Jong Il in Pyongyang in June 2000, which was followed four months later by U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright’s visit to Pyongyang -- a real improvement in U.S.-DPRK relations seemed possible. The current U.S. administration, however, actively undermined these promising developments. Even before taking office, George W. Bush announced his opposition to the Agreed Framework. In 2001, upon assuming the presidency, he publicly criticized Kim Dae-Jung for his efforts at reconciliation and declared his determination to topple the DPRK government. In his January 2002 State of the Union address, Bush declared North Korea a member of an “axis of evil.” In October 2002, ratcheting up its regime-change strategy, Washington accused the North of pursuing nuclear weapons using a secret highly enriched uranium (HEU) program in violation of the Agreed Framework. The North has denied this accusation, and the United States has yet to produce evidence that satisfies other governments in the region. Even if such a HEU program does exist, it is likely to have been at a rudimentary level, nowhere near the actual production capabilities of the North’s plutonium facilities. Nevertheless, the HEU charge served as the excuse for the Bush administration to formally end its participation in the Agreed Framework that it deemed was helping sustain the North’s regime. In response to this U.S. decision, the North withdrew from the nuclear non-proliferation treaty and unfroze its nuclear program. Fearing the consequences of this steady escalation of tensions, the Chinese government pushed vigorously to play a mediating role by hosting Six Party Talks that began in August 2003 and involved the PRC, South Korea, North Korea, the United States, Japan, and Russia. Yet, the talks were stymied by U.S. refusal to engage in extensive, direct negotiations with North Korea. Only when the Chinese threatened to publicly blame the United States for the failure of diplomacy was an agreement finally signed in September 2005. This September 19 agreement called for a step-by-step process in which the North would freeze and abandon its nuclear programs in exchange for U.S. provision of a proliferation-resistant reactor and normalization. It is this process that died a quick death with the U.S. designation of a bank in the Chinese port city of Macao as a “primary money-laundering concern.” Restrictions and Negotiations In September 2005, the Treasury Department designated Banco Delta Asia (BDA) in Macao as a suspected conduit for counterfeit $100 bills, so-called “super notes” that North Korea was allegedly producing. In response, the Macao bank froze North Korea’s accounts. The timing was suspect. U.S. concerns over counterfeit bills date back to 1989. For many years, in fact, U.S. government officials thought Iran was behind the counterfeiting and some experts doubt North Korea’s capacity to print such super notes. Again, like the suspected HEU program, the threat paled in comparison to the larger risks of nuclear proliferation. According to the U.S. Treasury, the total value of identified counterfeit notes is $50 million. Nevertheless, the Treasury Department encouraged other countries to follow the U.S. lead and freeze bank accounts that North Korea maintains overseas, a de facto attempt to cut off monetary flows in and out of the country. As Undersecretary of the Treasury Stuart Levey put it, “the U.S. continues to encourage financial institutions to carefully assess the risk of holding any North Korea-related accounts.” Levey further argued that it was impossible to distinguish between North Korea’s licit and illicit transactions, which threw all of North Korea’s economic interactions with the outside world under suspicion. Although it is unclear how many countries have adopted such restrictions on Pyongyang’s financial transactions, Tokyo is leading the pack by limiting economic transactions with Pyongyang and prohibiting North Korean ships from entering its ports. China, too, placed restrictions on its banks doing business with North Korea. There is little evidence so far that the financial restrictions have affected North Korea’s overall economic transactions with outsiders. However, the $24 million frozen in BDA has clearly become the main stumbling block in efforts to reduce tensions on the Korean peninsula and improve relations between the United States and DPRK. Pyongyang is refusing to proceed with the September 19 agreement because it views the measures – termed “designations” by Washington because they apply to a bank and not a country and considered “sanctions” by Pyongyang because of their overall impact -- to run counter to one of the key bargains struck. In that agreement, Pyongyang pledged to “abandon all nuclear weapons and existing nuclear programs,” in return for Washington’s agreement that the United States and North Korea would “respect each other’s sovereignty, exist peacefully together and take steps to normalize relations.” In Pyongyang’s eyes, the financial sanctions infringe upon its sovereign right to engage in legal transactions, raise doubts about Washington’s will to peacefully coexist, and represent steps away from normalizing relations. U.S. financial auditors have reportedly been analyzing the records seized from BDA for over a year without making a formal charge. Bilateral discussions between Treasury Department officials and North Korea negotiators that took place in parallel with the December round of Six Party Talks also did not yield any breakthroughs. Some commentators have suggested that the Treasury Department release those BDA accounts not involved in illegal counterfeit activities. The North Koreans have offered to collaborate with American authorities to allay American concerns. The Bush administration's silence in the face of these proposals adds to the perception that it remains opposed to meaningful negotiations with Pyongyang. Its refusal to respond has indeed given Pyongyang the motivation to forge ahead with its nuclear production. Sanctions and War After North Korea’s missile tests in July and nuclear test in October, the United States and Japan pushed through UN resolutions that condemned Pyongyang’s acts and called for explicit economic sanctions. The July resolution focused on limiting North Korea’s ballistic missile program. The more far-reaching October resolution attempts to shut down all DPRK transactions connected to the production and distribution of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). The most politically challenging of the sanctions applies to the regulation of trade in and out of North Korea involving some aspect of WMD. The main instrument for implementing this trade embargo – primarily the inspection of North Korean cargo -- is the Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI). First announced by President Bush in 2003, the PSI is touted as a key instrument of counter-proliferation. The initiative supports the use of military means, under euphemisms such as “interdiction” and “active defense,” to stop countries from developing or proliferating nuclear weapons and materials. This reliance on military means derives from the 2002 “National Strategy to Combat Weapons of Mass Destruction” that stipulates the United States must have the capabilities, including “preemptive measures,” to “prevent the movement of WMD” and “to detect and destroy an adversary’s WMD assets before these weapons are used.” The PSI has grown in membership and operational scope. Some member countries have already staged military exercises to simulate the use of military ships to stop, board, and seize boats suspected of carrying WMD in the high seas. This proposed use of military force troubles many international legal scholars who view it as a violation of the freedom of movement in the high seas as institutionalized by the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. If applied to North Korean ships, furthermore, the PSI runs the risk of triggering a military confrontation. Pyongyang has asserted that it would consider such an implementation of sanctions an act of war, which is consistent with the consensus view of international law. Acknowledging the dangers, Seoul and Beijing have so far refused to join the PSI. Sanctions and Morality Those who call for sanctions claim the high moral ground, arguing that North Korea has defied international norms concerning nuclear weapons by exiting the NPT in 2003 and moving quickly toward a nuclear test. It also stands accused of counterfeiting U.S. currency, selling large quantities of narcotics, and laundering the profits from various illicit activities through various financial institutions. And Pyongyang’s human rights record, according to Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and the UN Special Rapporteur Vitit Muntabhorn among others, is dismal. Civil society organizations point to Burma and South Africa as comparable cases where sanctions have had moral appeal. Despite some similarities, however, the internal situation in North Korea differs substantially from that in Burma and apartheid South Africa. Most importantly, no domestic group within North Korea supports sanctions, as did the African National Congress in South Africa and the National League for Democracy in Burma, both of which saw the sanctions as strengthening their respective domestic struggles for democratic transformation. As a result, should sanctions indeed lead to regime change in North Korea, no viable domestic movement waits in the wings to provide a new policy direction. The institution most likely to take over in a situation of chaos, the military, is unlikely to have a different approach to the nuclear or human rights issue. South Korea, meanwhile, has rejected the “absorption” scenario, in part because of consideration of cost, in part to facilitate a more humane and stable inter-Korean reconciliation. Washington’s own behavior in recent years also undercuts the arguments that sanctions are the appropriate response after repeated failures to achieve a negotiated settlement to the current crisis. For the last six years at least, Washington has refused to pursue the most obvious and likely productive option—sustained direct negotiations with Pyongyang. Furthermore, Washington's insistence on maintaining the "first-strike" option and developing new nuclear weapons, in particular, has not only undercut its moral standing but also given Pyongyang an additional rationale for its own nuclear program. And, perhaps most critically, because of the increased risk of war in and around the Korean peninsula, the sanctions are not only a blunt instrument but possibly a very dangerous one as well. While North Korea’s human rights record is deplorable, a war on the Korean peninsula, which would result in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Koreans in the first months of conflict, would be a human rights disaster of much greater magnitude. Will They Work? A final consideration is the efficacy of the sanctions. Here, too, sanctions fail the test. North Korea has its own indigenous capacity to produce nuclear weapons and missiles, so cordoning off the country will not necessarily eliminate these programs. Nor do the sanctions have consistent buy-in. China, in particular, is reluctant to police its border to such a degree to prevent the flow of proscribed goods. South Korea is not willing to interdict North Korean ships. The United States, meanwhile, has claimed that the October UN sanctions applied to all alleged activities that finance WMD production, including money-laundering, counterfeiting, and drug trafficking, a position that is neither consistent with the language of the resolution nor universally accepted by the signatories. Equally problematic is the fact that the sanctions are all-or-nothing. They offer North Korea no incentives to commit to the negotiating process or comply with the requirements set out by the resolutions. As sanctions experts David Cortright writes, “Sanctions are most effective when combined with incentives, as part of a carrot-and-stick diplomacy designed to resolve conflict and bring about a negotiated solution.” In short, sanctions are unlikely to succeed in either forcing North Korea to accept an agreement it opposes or collapsing the regime. In fact, in the case of North Korea, economist Ruediger Frank concludes that economic sanctions are not only costly for the participants, they also challenge the very processes of economic reform and democratization that the sanctioning countries presumably want to encourage. How to Proceed Although they enjoy some measure of support from the international community, the sanctions levied against North Korea only add fuel to the fire. Moreover, they fit a disturbing pattern of Washington’s non-diplomacy toward Pyongyang. The economic campaign begun in 2005 pushed North Korea toward accelerating its nuclear program. The more recent sanctions, if implemented with naval interdiction, increase the risk of war. Clearly a change in U.S. policy is needed. More specifically, the United States should first work with China and North Korea to separate out licit from illicit financial activities so that BDA can unfreeze the North Korean assets that support its legitimate practices. Next, the U.S. should directly confer with North Korea on how best to ensure financial transparency in the latter’s financial activity. To tackle the more recent UN sanctions, both sides must be willing to make concessions according to an “action for action” sequence that can remove the immediate threat that naval interdiction poses for sparking a military conflict. Finally, mindful of the priority of averting war in and around Korea and satisfying the legitimate security needs of both North Korea and the United States, Washington must be willing to suspend its economic campaign against, and commit to direct bilateral talks with, North Korea, with the aim of denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula and normalizing relations. Normalization is not a reward. Rather, it is the framework within which the United States and North Korea can best deal with their outstanding concerns. In sum, the Bush administration and the new Democratic Congress can, and must, take clear, preventive steps to ensure that Northeast Asia doesn’t descend into the kind of violence that continues to convulse the Middle East. FPIF contributor Martin Hart-Landsberg is a professor of economics and the director of the political economy program at Lewis and Clark College, Portland, Oregon. John Feffer is the co-director of Foreign Policy In Focus at the International Relations Center. Published by Foreign Policy In Focus (FPIF), a joint project of the International Relations Center (IRC, online at www.irc-online.org) and the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS, online at www.ips-dc.org). ©Creative Commons - some rights reserved. Recommended citation: Martin Hart-Landsberg and John Feffer, "Sanctions and War on the Korean Peninsula," (Silver City, NM and Washington, DC: Foreign Policy In Focus, January 17, 2007). -------- security Computer Simulation Monitors Traffic in Contraband Nuclear Material 2007-01-17 CCN Magazine http://www.ccnmag.com/news.php?id=4737 A Sandia National Laboratories researcher has developed a simulation program designed to track the illicit trade in fissile and nonfissile radiological material well enough to predict who is building the next nuclear weapon and where they are doing it. “By using a cluster analysis algorithm coded into a program,” says Sandia researcher David York. “I evaluated those traffic patterns and routes in which thefts, seizures, and destinations of materials were reported. Data from these examinations were enough to allow me to retrospectively depict the A. Q. Kahn network before it was uncovered.” Kahn is a Pakistani scientist linked to the illicit proliferation of nuclear technical knowledge. Cluster analyses link data of common place, time, or material. Testing a computer simulation on a known past event is one accepted means of establishing the program’s validity. Sandia is a National Nuclear Security Administration laboratory. In the Kahn analysis, York generated an analysis of networked routes indicative of a nuclear trafficking scheme between countries. In several verified incidents, inspectors seized uranium enriched to 80 percent, as well as dual-use items indicative of small-scale development of crude nuclear devices. In the study, York collected and collated data from 800 open-source incidents from 1992 to the present, along with the movement of dual-use items like beryllium and zirconium. He plotted the incidents on a global information system (GIS) software platform. He came up with a network of countries and routes between countries indicative of an illicit nuclear and radiological trafficking scheme. “The number of incidents and the quantity and quality of material seized is disturbing,” York says, “particularly because this may represent a small percentage of the actual amount of material being trafficked.” The situation may be worse than it appears because much information about nuclear material traffic is classified, York says, to prevent embarrassment to countries through which a nuclear weapon or the materials to fabricate a weapon may have passed. York presented his results in October at the International Safeguards Conference sponsored by the United Nation’s International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna, Austria. He has also been invited to present his methods and conclusions to the European Union’s Illicit Trafficking Working Group at the June meeting of the IAEA. How does the method work? “One begins by conducting cluster analyses on the GIS platform for material or activity similar to the incident in question. This gives the analyst an idea of corridors used by potential smugglers. It also indicates where the material might have come from and where it is,” says York. “If the trafficker has only a certain amount of time to reach a destination and you have that information, one can ask what is the shortest route from point A to point B, or find major highways needed to accommodate a large shipment.” For the tool to be effective, “Enough information must be collected under a cooperative international framework,” York says. “Then info must be analyzed to separate patterns from noise, essentially creating intelligence.” Nation-states that reuse nuclear fuel through reprocessing can create and ship dangerous materials that previously were confined to the more industrialized world. “We’re trying to develop a market niche for this kind of tracking program,” says Sandia manager Gary Rochau, “and I think we’re ahead of everyone’s headlights.” The method can be used to track other materials, such as drugs. “We have a lot of interest from a lot of agencies,” says Rochau. -------- space Moscow, Beijing eye space weapons By Bill Gertz THE WASHINGTON TIMES January 17, 2007 http://washtimes.com/national/20070116-101320-7600r.htm China and Russia are developing space weapons and are among several nations working on systems to threaten U.S. satellites with lasers or missiles, says the director of the Defense Intelligence Agency. In Senate testimony last week, Army Lt. Gen. Michael Maples for the first time raised Pentagon concerns about secret Chinese and Russian space weapons programs. "Russia and China continue to be the primary states of concern regarding military space and counterspace programs," Gen. Maples said at the annual threat briefing of the Senate intelligence committee. Gen. Maples said that "several countries continue to develop capabilities that have the potential to threaten U.S. space assets, and some have already deployed systems with inherent anti-satellite capabilities, such as satellite-tracking laser range-finding devices and nuclear-armed ballistic missiles." Other countries are working on improving space-object tracking and "kinetic or directed energy weapons capabilities." Gen. Maples did not discuss the reported testing of a Chinese anti-satellite laser against a U.S. satellite, which triggered high-level Bush administration worries about Beijing's growing space-weapons program. U.S. officials said details about the Chinese anti-satellite laser shot remain classified so as not to alert China about U.S. knowledge of what intelligence officials say may have been a test shot of an anti-satellite weapon. China has developed several types of ground-based lasers with Russian and Israeli technology, U.S. officials have said. Russia developed anti-satellite weapons during the Cold War, and U.S. officials think the Russian military is continuing work on the weapons, which include both anti-satellite missiles and ground-based lasers. Both Russia and China deny that they are building space weapons and have sought to curb U.S. space defenses through a proposed international ban on weapons in space. The Air Force in 2004 deployed the 76th Space Control Squadron, which can disrupt or knock out foreign satellites using electronic jammers from the ground. Nations other than Russia and China that have space capabilities in key areas also "will acquire military and commercial space-based assets," Gen. Maples said. "Increasing levels of international cooperation, along with the growing number of commercial space consortia, is allowing the proliferation of advanced satellite technologies and knowledge of space systems operations to become available to nations lacking a domestic space capability," he said. Gen. Maples said that building space weapons is "financially taxing" and that "most countries assessed to be pursuing these capabilities are not expected to acquire them within the next few years." He warned, however, that less-developed states and "nonstate entities" also "are pursuing more limited and asymmetric approaches that do not require excessive financial resources or a high-tech industrial base." -------- u.s. nuc facilities -------- california The Economics of Building a Nuclear Power Plant in Fresno by Alan Cheah and Mark Stout Wednesday Jan 17th, 2007 http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2007/01/17/18348080.php It was only seven years ago when the promise of cheap electricity through deregulation helped plunge California into a deeper budget crisis and robbed ratepayers of their hard earned money. They are poised to do it again. Nuclear proponents are grateful for our citizenry’s short memories. Now, nuclear power advocates promise cheap, clean, safe energy and jobs. This section focuses on the economic viability of nuclear versus renewable energy and conservation. The Fresno Nuclear Energy Group LLC is proposing a 1600 megawatt nuclear power plant costing $4 billion. History tells us that projected costs differ vastly from actual costs. Just look at the table below: PROJECTED VS. ACTUAL COST OF SELECTED NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS (in billions of dollars) Unit Megawatts Initial cost estimate Actual cost Millstone III (Massachusetts and Connecticut) 1,150 .400 3.82 Limerick 1 (Pennsylvania) 1,055 .344 3.80 Wolf Creek (Kansas) 1,055 1.03 2.93 Susquehanna 1 (Pennsylvania) 1,050 .665 2.05 Susquehanna II (Pennsylvania) 1,050 .720 2.05 Source: Public Utility Commissions in the respective states http://www.21stcenturysciencetech.com/articles/spring01/nuclear_power.html As you can see, actual costs range from 3 to 11 times projected costs. Nuclear proponents argue that much of the added costs are because of unnecessary environmental and safety regulations, politics and finance issues. Whatever the reason, the reality is that the actual cost would likely exceed $12 billion. If nuclear is such a good investment, why have no nuclear power plant ever been 100% privately funded? In Dick Cheney’s Energy Policy of 2003, Title IV, subtitle B: New Nuclear Plants , it authorizes the Department of Energy to provide 50% of the costs to build new reactors and there are no guidelines regarding interest rates and repayment of these loans. In layman’s terms, we heavily subsidize the building of the plant. We do not share in the profits of the privately owned plant and there is no guarantee our financing will be paid back? If it is so safe, why does provision Title IV, subtitle A: The Price Anderson Act limit the liability of nuclear power plants to $10B. A serious nuclear accident according to Sandia National Laboratories could cost upwards of $300B. Taxpayers will pay the difference. John Hutson, Chairman of the PUC and President/CEO of the Fresno Nuclear Energy Group LLC, claims nuclear will bring jobs. Undoubtedly, but let’s look at the job creation comparison for different energy sources: Table 1. Jobs Involved in Producing 1000 Gigawatt-hours of Electricity Per Year Number of jobs: 10 116 248 542 Energy source: Nuclear fission Coal Solar thermal Wind This 1993 finding by the Worldwatch Institute should still apply today on a comparative basis. There is no doubt that job creation for renewable energy exceeds that of fossil fuel and nuclear energy. Many states are ignoring the direction of the Federal government and finding more economic benefits in pursuing green energy. Since 1980 the cost of wind power has declined from $.30 - $.45 per kWh to $.05/kWh . The Federal Production Tax Credit, currently at 1.9 cents/kWh and indexed to inflation , further drives down the cost of wind power to ratepayers, allowing utility power purchase agreements to be signed as low as 3.5 cents. Solar photovoltaic (PV) is about $.20/kWh, and is now reduced with an expanded 30% Federal Investment Tax Credit, and the California Solar Initiative’s incentives for customer self-generation . Nuclear power arguably costs $.03/kWh, only by ignoring large construction capital costs. According to the World Nuclear Association (WNA) report $.03/kWh represents operational costs and waste and decommissioning costs. How they account for waste cost is suspect since the Yucca mountain waste site still has not been approved. If it is approved today it will not be ready till 2017 . Meanwhile thousands of tons of nuclear waste from San Onofre, Diablo Canyon and Humboldt Bay are waiting. What’s not accounted for is construction and financing costs and most importantly, an investor’s required return on capital. According to the Ontario Power Authority’s assessment of the proposed CANDU 6 nuclear power plant, the cost per kWh to the consumer would probably be $.21/kWh when accounting for the required return on capital. Let’s look at this from a more meaningful perspective. Regarding nuclear, there are four things the consumer needs to consider: 1) How much am I going to pay per kWh?; 2) Will the fuel cycle and generation cycle pollute our environment?; 3) Is it safe?; 4) How does it affect our national security? Each of these issues has a major economic impact. What am I going to pay per kWh? Currently, the average PG&E residential electricity rate is over $.16/kWh even though it costs about $.06/kWh for fossil fuel based generation. This should highlight the distinction between what you pay and what it costs to generate one kWh of electricity. Similarly what you will be paying for nuclear will far exceed the reported generation cost of $.03/kWh. As the Ontario Power Authority learned, it could be as high as $.21/kWh. It is expected that uranium 235 will be depleted by 2055 . As that limited resource gets scarce, we will see the cost per kWh rise. Will the fuel cycle and generation cycle pollute our environment? Conventional and in situ leaching methods of mining Uranium 235 result in radioactive contamination, lung cancer, respiratory diseases and contamination of ground water. Enrichment of uranium produces toxic hydrogen fluoride gas and large amounts of depleted uranium. Millions of gallons of water which will be radioactively contaminated are required to cool fuel rods. Our other featured articles will cover this more comprehensively. Is it safe? Since 1952 there have been about 301 nuclear accidents and 22 nuclear disasters . Maybe that’s why the Price-Anderson Act limits a nuclear corporation’s liability to $10 billion . How does it affect our national security? In an age where terrorism is such a major threat, putting in a nuclear power plant only makes Fresno a more attractive terrorist target. How can we better use $12 billion? If the Fresno Nuclear Energy Group is able to suppress local resistance, overturn the 30 year old State moratorium on siting new nuclear reactors, and overcome nuclear power’s equally old losing streak in the US investment capital markets, it will still have an uphill financial battle ahead, in the face of more promising alternatives. The proposed nuclear plant will have a capacity of 1600 MW which, assuming a manufacturer-specified 92% plant availability, translates to 12,895 GWh/yr . 92% plant availability is comparable with recent US nuclear plant fleet capacity factors published by the Department of Energy . 12,895 GWh/yr is roughly 4.5% of California’s annual consumption, which was 208,245 GWh in 2005. For comparison, we will take the Fresno Nuclear Energy Group at their word that this plant could be operational as soon as 2015. Let’s look at what $12 billion can buy us invested in truly clean energy. The investors could put $12 billion into a solar power capital fund, which would be leveraged by Federal tax credits, Federal five-year accelerated depreciation, California Solar Initiative (CSI) incentives, rising utility rates, and rapidly falling solar photovoltaic/solar thermal electric costs. This solar power capital fund would be available for the development of residential, commercial, agricultural, and public sector solar energy systems, using existing, commercialized technology. Rather than selling hardware, the investors could sell power from customer-sited solar power equipment they own, to Valley energy consumers (via “solar power purchase agreements”), at a guaranteed discount compared to PG&E and Edison (10-25% to guarantee rapid adoption). These solar power purchase agreements are a high yield, low risk return on investment. The combination of Federal and State incentives lead to a short payback period of roughly five years, with an ongoing “solar annuity” from the sale of power. For the purposes of illustration, $12 billion could be used to develop 1.5 GW of customer-sited solar photovoltaic at $8/watt (CEC AC) in year 2006 prices . The California Solar Initiative will reduce over time, offset by reductions in PV system costs. Here is how the cash flow would look in this solar capital fund : Initial capital investment: $12 billion Federal 30% tax credit (first tax year): $3.6 billion 5 yr Accelerated Depreciation (net present value): $4.1 billion CSI incentive/system cost reduction (five years): $5.4 billion Capital investment – Federal/CA incentives: ($1.1 billion) From this analysis, it is clear that the investors will have more than made their money back (a $1.1 billion profit, in fact), simply considering the Federal and State incentives returned to them in the first five years. For example, the solar capital fund will have been replenished by 2014 if the systems are installed over 2007-2008. The exciting part: the investors’ solar capital fund would constantly be refilled by incoming Federal and State incentives, ready to roll into the next round of solar expansion. The Solar Energy Industries Association is optimistic that the 110th Congress will deliver an eight year extension of the Federal 30% solar Investment Tax Credit, recently extended through 2008. From 2009-2014, before the proposed nuclear plant could have sold a single kWh, a second 1.5 GW solar photovoltaic network could be financed by income from Federal and State incentives. This second 1.5 GW network will receive substantially less money from the California Solar Initiative than the first, but the planned decline in rebates will be synchronized with a decline in installed system costs. The first 1.5 GW of solar photovoltaic systems will also be generating an estimated 2,800 GWh/yr (at 5.1 hours/day of noon-equivalent sun, based on Department of Energy data for Fresno) . If the average solar power purchase agreement retail cost of power starts at 10 cents/kWh, and the associated Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs) trade at a conservative two cents/kWh, this first 1.5 GW phase of development will be generating $336 million/year, or over two billion dollars in accumulated profit by 2014. By 2014, before the Fresno Nuclear Energy Group hopes to have an operational reactor, the solar capital fund would have fully manifested all 3 GW of the Governor’s California Solar Initiative, generating 5,600 GWh/yr, with roughly $1 billion/year in annual power and RECs sales. Since the Federal and California incentives for commercial solar development are so generous, they would have also returned the initial $12 billion investment back to the investors, twice over before a nuclear plant could be built. The same $12 billion could then be used to capitalize a third round of solar power: 3 GW of solar thermal electric for wholesale power purchase agreements. PG&E and Edison have an obligation to by an increasing percentage of their supply from renewable energy resources under the Renewables Portfolio Standard, now 20% qualifying renewables by 2010. Governor Schwarzenegger is backing a goal of 33% qualifying renewables by 2020. Edison, SDG&E, and PG&E have recently signed one to two GW of solar thermal electric power purchase agreements to meet their 2010 goal. An unprecedented amount of renewables capacity will have to be added by 2020, creating significant market opportunities. This 3 GW, at an estimated $4/watt capital cost, would be based on single-axis tracking for higher output/watt capacity, yielding 7,665 GWh/yr. We are now looking at 6 GW of solar photovoltaic and solar thermal electric systems, all developed on the same timetable as a 1.6 GW nuclear reactor, with substantially better tax effects and return on investment than a nuclear power investment could dream of. In fact, most of their original money is back in the investor’s accounts thanks to the Federal 30% Investment Tax Credit and five year Accelerated Depreciation. The solar investors are producing 5,600 GWh with customer-sited photovoltaic projects, and 7,665 GWh/yr with solar thermal power plants, generating 13,325 Gwh/yr of high value, peak period power. Compare this with 12,895 GWh/yr of baseload nuclear power. Not only do the solar plants generate more power, they generate more valuable power for the investors. The photovoltaic solar power purchase agreements are retail, at over 10 cents/kWh plus REC prices, and the solar thermal electric are peak period Renewables Portfolio Standard contracts, significantly higher than the contract prices a baseload nuclear plant would command. Solar generates power where and when people need it, and California’s markets now reflect that. The solar investment delivers a higher ongoing electricity production and profit, at a much safer and lower after-tax investment. How do we know that this solar power purchase agreement model works? It is already being using by a growing list of investors and project developers: GE Commercial Finance, Chevron Energy Systems, Honeywell, PowerLight/DEPFA Bank, MuniMae/MMA Renewable Ventures, HSN Nordbank, Regenesis Power, Nautilus Energy, and Solar Power Partners. In fact, the solar power purchase agreement was the financial structure selected by the Fresno Airport administration for their recent, successful one megawatt solar Request For Proposals. On January 10th of this year, Ted Turner announced that he was breaking in on the solar development action with an investment in DT Solar. California is expected to see over $20 billion of private investment in solar power by 2020, driven by the $3.2 billion California Solar Initiative and Renewables Portfolio Standard. Will the San Joaquin Valley take advantage of our natural solar resources to move into the clean energy future, or will we get stuck in the nuclear past? In our own back yard, the City of Fresno and the Farm Bureau are adopting solar PV solutions. OK Produce, in downtown Fresno, installed a 231 kW system in January, 2003, and PR Farms, in Clovis, installed a 1.1 MW system in July, 2005. Major corporations like Citigroup, PNC, Bank of America, Toyota, GM, Ford, Honda, Wal-Mart, Target, Home Depot, Lowes and Chipotle, to name a few, are going green . Despite what you have heard, there is a declining use of nuclear throughout the world because of cost, environmental concerns and safety . New nuclear power plant construction around the globe (France, Germany, Sweden, and Japan) have been reduced or eliminated entirely. Seven European plants were shut down in the first two weeks of 2007. Let’s not regress when the rest of the world is moving forward. (See image: E06-04_NucPwrEconomics.jpg) About the authors: Alan Cheah is a retired electrical engineer and software developer. Mark Stout handles Major Accounts for Unlimited Energy Solar Solutions, and is the Sierra Club Tehipite Chapter Air Quaility/Global Warming Co-Chair. Endnotes: http://www.taxpayer.net/greenscissors/LearnMore/2003%20Sen%20Nuclear%20Fact%20sht.pdf http://www.taxpayer.net/greenscissors/LearnMore/2003%20Sen%20Nuclear%20Fact%20sht.pdf http://www.greens.org/s-r/11/11-09.html National Renewable Energy Lab (http://www.nrel.gov/analysis/analysis_tools_benefits.html) http://awea.org/legislative/#PTC http://www.gosolarcalifornia.ca.gov/csi/tax_credit.html http://www.uic.com.au/neweconomics.pdf “Nuclear burial site delayed” Fresno Bee, 14 Aug 2006, page B7 http://www.cleanair.web.net/resource/fs20.pdf http://www.pge.com/rates/tariffs/ResElecCurrent.xls http://www.physics.usyd.edu.au/~ned/warming/mills.pdf , page 8 http://archive.greenpeace.org/comms/nukes/chernob/rep02.html http://www.cbsnews.com/htdocs/nuclear_disasters/framesource.html http://www.greenscissors.org/energy/price-anderson.htm http://www.areva-np.com/common/liblocal/docs/Brochure/EPR_US_%20May%202005.pdf, page 55 http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/aer/txt/ptb0902.html http://www.energy.ca.gov/electricity/gross_system_power.html http://www.sdenergy.org/ContentPage.asp?ContentID=136&SectionID=122&SectionTarget=44 Analysis performed for Fresno area location using the OnGrid Solar Financial Analysis Tool, http://ongrid.net/payback http://www.seia.org/solarnews.php?id=128 IBID http://www.cpuc.ca.gov/static/hottopics/1energy/r0404026.htm http://www.cpuc.ca.gov/_spotlight/051102_renewableenergy.htm http://www.stirlingenergy.com/breaking_news.htm http://www.ceiinc.net/Download/Bethel%20Energy%20Solar%20Hybrid%20Project%20Overview%20-%20R3.pdf http://www.dtsolar.com Green Revolution, by Frank Geve, Fresno Bee, 17Dec2006, page E1 http://www.brook.edu/fp/cuse/analysis/nuclear.htm http://www.greens-efa.org/cms/default/dok/164/ href="mailto:164228.nuclear_power_plants@en.htm">164228.nuclear_power_plants [at] en.htm http://sierraclub.org/energy -------- michigan U.S. Approves License for Nuclear Plant Wednesday January 17, 2007 (AP) http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/070117/cms_energy_license_approval.html?.v=1 WASHINGTON -- The Nuclear Regulatory Commission said Wednesday that it has renewed the operating license of the Palisades Nuclear plant in South Haven, Mich., for an additional 20 years. The environmental and safety reviews of the plant did not uncover any reasons to preclude the renewal of the license, the agency said. Public meetings to discuss the environmental review were held in July 2005 and April 2006. The plant is owned by Nuclear Management Company, a joint venture of three electric utilities, including We Energies, a Wisconsin company, XCel Energy Inc. and Consumers Energy, a subsidiary of CMS Energy Corp. Consumers Energy owns the Palisades plant. Shares of CMS Energy rose 6 cents to close at $16.18 on the New York Stock Exchange. -------- nevada ARCO Ordered to Investigate Radioactivity at Anaconda Mine SAN FRANCISCO, California, January 17, 2007 (ENS) http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/jan2007/2007-01-17-09.asp#anchor3 The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Friday ordered to the Atlantic Richfield Company, ARCO, to begin an investigation to determine the nature and extent of contamination at the Anaconda Copper Mine in Yerington, Nevada. The order requires ARCO to conduct a remedial investigation and feasibility study for most of the 3,468 acre mine site. The EPA established the scope of work for the investigation through discussions and coordination with Atlantic Richfield. “Beginning the comprehensive remedial investigation and feasibility study for this site is the next step toward a thorough cleanup,” said Kathleen Johnson, the EPA’s Superfund Branch Chief managing this site. “After the feasibility study is complete, the EPA, with assistance from Nevada Department of Environmental Protection and Bureau of Land Management, will select a final remedy and work toward the ultimate clean up,” she said. Anaconda Minerals founded the copper mine in 1953. Atlantic Richfield acquired Anaconda Minerals in 1977, and continued operations at the mine through 1982. The site includes a lead shop, four mine waste piles and associated ponds with acidic process water, large tailings piles and expansive evaporation ponds. Approximately half of the site covers private lands held in fee, with the remaining lands subject to the jurisdiction, custody and control of the federal Bureau of Land Management. In 2003, the agencies became aware of significant radiological concerns in soil and groundwater, which led to today’s order. In December 2004, the Nevada Department of Environmental Protection sent the EPA a letter requesting that the agency formally assume the lead role at the site and the EPA accepted the task. The EPA has removed hazardous substances at several sites. These removal actions include the relining and improvement of ponds within the site fluid management system, which will prevent further groundwater contamination and begin to reduce the acidic load within the ore heaps. In 2005 the EPA covered 100 acres of mine tailings to prevent the further spread of hazardous dust from blowing off the site and removed 120 transformers containing hazardous PCBs from the site. The EPA also constructed a new four acre evaporation pond and repaired several other holding ponds to prevent acid mine drainage from seeping into area groundwater. -------- new jersey Monticello nuclear plant out of service The Minneapolis-St. Paul Pioneer Press January 17, 2007 http://www.topix.net/content/kri/3699501354373435237035291494201767365787 'We're trying to get the plant online as soon as possible.' The Monticello nuclear power plant remained shut down Wednesday, a week after a control box broke free from a support beam and caused a drop in steam pressure, federal and plant officials said. The 35,000-pound box fell 8 inches to a foot and landed on top of several steam lines, resulting in a loss of steam pressure and the automatic shutdown of the plant's nuclear reactor, according to Jan Strasma, a spokesman for the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The incidents occurred outside the reactor, resulted in no loss of radiation and represented no threat to public safety, according to Strasma and Arline Datu, a spokeswoman for Nuclear Management Co., which manages the Monticello and Prairie Island nuclear plants for Xcel Energy. 'All of the reactor safety systems functioned as designed,' Strasma said. Datu said it's unclear when the 612-megawatt plant will start up again. 'We are working around the clock to complete the evaluation,' Datu said. 'We're trying to get the plant online as soon as possible.' The shutdown is having no impact on service and will have little, if any, effect on customer bills, according to an Xcel Energy spokeswoman. The last time such a maintenance problem caused an automatic shutdown at the plant northwest of the Twin Cities was four years ago, according to Datu. Strasma said early indications suggest that a combination of vibration and inadequate welding caused the problem. Last fall, Xcel's license for the plant, which began operating in 1970, was renewed until 2030. Dennis Lien can be reached at dlien@pioneerpress.com or 651-228-5588. ---- Nuclear Plant Shut Down After Box Breaks Loose Jan 17, 2007 (AP) http://wcco.com/local/local_story_016225203.html Monticello, Minn. - Xcel Energy Inc.'s nuclear plant at Monticello has been shut down indefinitely while experts investigate why a large component broke loose and triggered the plant's automatic safety systems. Federal officials said on Tuesday that a 35,000-pound control box fell off a steel beam inside the plant, but outside the reactor, last Wednesday. That caused the automatic shutdown, and no radiation was released, federal and company officials said. "We're working as quickly and safely as possible to get the plant back online," said Arline Datu, spokeswoman for the Nuclear Management Co., which operates the plant for Xcel Energy. "I can't speculate one way or another how long or how short that will take." Jan Strasma, spokesman for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, said the control box is about 20 feet long, 6 feet wide and 6 feet high, and had been welded in place. "The initial assessment is that the welds broke due to vibration over the years," he said. One side of the box dropped about a foot onto a large steam pipe, and probably damaged the pipe and perhaps insulation on other steam lines, he said. "There was no release of radioactivity, no threat to public health and safety, and all of the reactor's safety systems functioned normally," Strasma said. Monticello began operating in 1970. Last November, regulators renewed Xcel's license to operate it for 20 years beyond 2010, when its original 40-year license will expire. The plant is about 45 miles northwest of the Twin Cities. Xcel spokeswoman Mary Sandok said the temporary loss of Monticello's power will not significantly affect the regional supply or price of electricity. A side-effect of the shutdown was that it killed over 3,000 fish in the Mississippi River near the plant. Nonradioactive water used to cool the plant is normally discharged into the river, Datu said, creating warm spots. When the discharge stopped, she said, the river water quickly cooled, and the fish died of thermal shock. A planned shutdown typically kills around 100 fish, she said. About 2,400 of the fish were smallmouth bass, while many of the rest were rough fish, said Paul Diedrich, area fisheries supervisor with the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources. Most were 6 inches or smaller, and the loss probably won't be noticeable to anglers, he said. -------- MILITARY -------- prisoners of war Top Pentagon Official Calls for Boycott of Law Firms Representing Guantanamo Prisoners Wednesday, January 17th, 2007 Democracy Now! http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/01/17/1541233 A top Pentagon official last week urged U.S. corporations to boycott law firms whose attorneys represent detainees at the US prison camp in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. In a radio interview last week, Assistant Secretary of Defense for Detainee Affairs Charles “Cully” Stimson said companies might wish to shun firms that represent “the very terrorists who hit their bottom line back in 2001.” Stimson apologized after his remarks were condemned by the American Bar Association and deans from more than 130 law schools. We speak with the co-author of the law school petition and a corporate lawyer representing six Guantanamo prisoners. [includes rush transcript] A top Pentagon official has urged US corporations to boycott law firms whose attorneys represent detainees at the US prison camp in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Charles “Cully” Stimson- who is Assistant Secretary of Defense for Detainee Affairs - spoke last Thursday to Federal News Radio on the fifth anniversary of the first prisoners being sent to Guantanamo. Stimson listed some of the most prestigious corporate law firms in the country that are providing free representation to detainees and said that companies might want to consider taking their business elsewhere - to firms that are not “representing terrorists.” * Assistant Secretary of Defense for Detainee Affairs Charles “Cully” Stimson, speaking last week on Federal News Radio. The American Bar Association immediately condemned his remarks calling them deeply offensive to the legal profession. And one hundred thirty U.S law school deans signed a letter also condemning his remarks. The Pentagon has distanced itself from Stimson saying that he was not speaking for the Bush administration. Stimson has now apologized for his remarks. In a letter to the Washington Post today, he writes “those comments do not reflect my core belief.” He adds: “I believe firmly that a foundational principle of our legal system is that the system works best when both sides are represented by competent legal counsel.” We’re joined by two guests: * Stephen Oleskey. Partner in the Litigation and Real Estate Departments at the law firm WilmerHale. He represents six Guantanamo detainees. * Emily Spieler. Dean of Northeastern University’s School of Law. She is the co-author of the deans’ letter condemning Stimson’s remarks. We invited a representative from the Pentagon to join us but they declined our request. RUSH TRANSCRIPT AMY GOODMAN: A top Pentagon official has urged US corporations to boycott law firms whose attorneys represent detainees at the US prison camp at Guantanamo. Charles “Cully” Stimson, who is Assistant Secretary of Defense for Detainee Affairs, spoke last Thursday to Federal Radio News on the fifth anniversary of the first prisoners being sent to Guantanamo. Stimson listed some of the most prestigious corporate law firms in the country that are providing free representation to prisoners and said companies might want to consider taking their business elsewhere, to firms that are not, quote, "representing terrorists." CHARLES STIMSON: As a result of a FOIA request through a major news organization, somebody asked, “Who are the lawyers around this country representing detainees down there?” And you know what, it's shocking. The major law firms in this country -- Pillsbury Winthrop, Jenner & Block, Wilmer Cutler Pickering, Covington & Burling here in D.C., Sutherland Asbill & Brennan, Paul Weiss Rifkin, Mayer Brown, Weil Gottshal, Pepper Hamilton, Venable, Alston & Bird, Perkins Coie, Hunton & Williams, Fulbright Jaworski, all the rest of them -- are out there representing detainees, and I think, quite honestly, when corporate CEOs see that those firms are representing the very terrorists who hit their bottom line back in 2001, those CEOs are going to make those law firms choose between representing terrorists or representing reputable firms, and I think that is going to have major play in the next few weeks. It’s going to be fun to watch that play out. JANE NORRIS: But clearly, Secretary, the attorneys who are representing the terrorist detainees, they are being paid by someone. I mean, there must be an organization that is funding this representation. Who is that? CHARLES STIMSON: It's not clear, is it? Some will maintain that they're doing it out of the goodness of their heart, that they’re doing it pro bono, and I suspect they are. Others are receiving monies from who knows where, and I’d be curious to have them explain that. AMY GOODMAN: That was Assistant Secretary of Defense for Detainee Affairs, Charles "Cully" Stimson, speaking last week on Federal News Radio. The American Bar Association immediately condemned his remarks, calling them deeply offensive to the legal profession, and 130 US law school deans signed a letter also condemning his remarks. The Pentagon has distanced itself from Stimson, saying he was not speaking for the Bush administration. Now, Stimson has apologized for his remarks. In a letter to the Washington Post today, he writes, quote, “Those comments do not reflect my core beliefs." He adds, quote, "I believe firmly that a foundational principle of our legal system is that the system works best when both sides are represented by competent legal counsel." Well, Stephen Oleskey and Emily Spieler join me now from Boston. Stephen is a partner in the litigation and real estate departments at the law firm Wilmer Hale. He represents six Guantanamo prisoners. Emily Spieler is dean of Northeastern University School of Law. She is the co-author of the deans’ letter condemning Stimson's remarks. We invited a representative from the Pentagon to join us, but they declined our request. I want to go first to Emily Spieler. You co-wrote with Harold Koh, the dean of Yale Law School, this letter. Can you talk about your core objections to what this top Pentagon official had to say? EMILY SPIELER: Well, it is, in fact, true, as he said, apparently, in his letter today, that what he said goes against the very basic tenets of not only American, but also international, law in the role that lawyers should play, particularly in those cases in which there may be unpopular defendants who need competent legal counsel. The drafting of the letter was actually not difficult. Dean Koh and I agreed quite quickly on what the letter should say. And what was astonishing was the rapidity of the response from deans across the country. This clearly struck a cord for all of us, I think, in terms of what is critical that we teach our students and stand for within the legal profession. If we can't encourage people to do these kinds of cases, in fact, the American legal system is in jeopardy. If we can't tell our students that they should do this, it's in jeopardy. If people in law firms feel that they're taking risks by doing it, risks that will affect their bottom line, they won't do it. And again, it goes to the core of our basic legal structure. AMY GOODMAN: What about the issue that this top Pentagon official is raising: who knows where these attorneys are getting their funding? EMILY SPIELER: When we talk about pro bono work, we are in fact talking about firms making decisions internally to take on cases and provide representation for free. That is what pro bono work is. And most parts of the organized bar are extremely interested in seeing larger firms with greater resources step up to do more pro bono work, not less, both on unpopular -- potentially unpopular cases, as well as in representation of people who simply can't afford representation within our own domestic courts. So, I guess, to me, the notion that the administration or anyone who is in power would make decisions about what's acceptable pro bono work and what isn't is deeply troubling. AMY GOODMAN: Stephen Oleskey, you're a partner in the litigation and real estate department at Wilmer Hale. You represent six Guantanamo detainees. You are one of the law firms that this Pentagon official raised, that Stimson raised, in raising the possibility of boycott, though he has apologized now. What do you make of the apology? And talk about the case that you represent. STEPHEN OLESKEY: I think the apology is deserved. Obviously, the remarks shouldn't have been made. We have had, as habeas counsel, and there are about, I think, 500 of us now, to fight since 2002 to get the right to hearings for men in Guantanamo. They are -- almost all of them there have never been charged with anything. They have never had any hearings. They have never had any trials. And the government has fought every step of the way to prevent those trials and hearings from taking place. So, his remarks, his unfortunate remarks, really reflect at an operational level what we've been confronting as habeas counsel, which is the inability to have a basic principle of Anglo-American jurisprudence going back to the English common law vindicated in this case, which is that the king, or in this case the executive, can't hold people indefinitely without charges or a trial. That's what habeas corpus is all about. That's why it's in the United States Constitution in Article 1. That's why it's so important. That's why the Supreme Court has twice said, in various ways, these men deserve to have hearings about their confinement. And yet, these hearings have still not taken place. Our appeals are still in the federal system. And it appears at this moment that it's a fair distance from today to such hearings. That's very disturbing to anyone who believes in the American justice system, as most lawyers do. I hope all lawyers do, in fact. AMY GOODMAN: What do you make of what Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said, blaming the delays in trying these prisoners at Guantanamo on you, on the lawyers -- not you specifically -- but saying the trials may start by this summer. Gonzales told the Associated Press this. He said rules for the military commission are being sent up by -- up to Capitol Hill this week. He said, “It's not for lack of trying,” when asked about the legal fate of the prisoners who have been held at the military facility, in some cases for five years. He said, “We're challenged every step of the way.” STEPHEN OLESKEY: The Attorney General appears to be addressing the approximately twelve people who have been formally charged under what's called a military commission system. Those people, ironically, in a sense, do have the right to a trial. As a result of the Hamdan decision last summer, the Supreme Court has required the government to write new rules, which the Attorney General is referring to, for those trials. They'll have cross-examination. They’ll have witnesses. They'll have an appeal within the military system. What that statement by the Attorney General omits is that almost everyone else at Guantanamo has not been charged under that system, and therefore they’re people who, as Justice O'Connor said in 2004, are being potentially sentenced to indefinite life imprisonment without any hearing. The habeas counsel haven't done anything to delay those hearings, which, as I noted earlier, haven't been held and are still some distance from being held. We are the lawyers in the system advocating that there be trials so that guilt or innocence on some charge can be heard and decided. AMY GOODMAN: Very quickly, Stephen Oleskey, can you talk about the six Guantanamo prisoners that you represent? STEPHEN OLESKEY: Yes. My clients were living and working in Bosnia essentially as social workers after September 11. They were married. They had children. They were very much in the fabric of Bosnian society. They were arrested at the insistence of the United States, who said they were terrorists. The Bosnian legal system, which we established in the Dayton Accords in 1995, investigated them and reviewed them for 90 days. That system determined that there was not any evidence to hold them. They were ordered released by a court in Bosnia. An injunction was entered by a human rights court in Bosnia, preventing their being taken out of Bosnia. The United States demanded nonetheless that they be taken to Guantanamo, and the Bosnian government acceded to that demand. They've been there since January 20, 2005, which will be six years, starting in a couple of days. It's been a very long five years for those six men. AMY GOODMAN: They haven't been charged? STEPHEN OLESKEY: They have not been charged with anything. And, as I say, they should either be returned home, as many others have already been done by multilateral negotiations, by bilateral negotiations with the Bosnian government, in this case, or they ought to have habeas corpus proceedings, as our legal system has provided for hundreds of years. AMY GOODMAN: The response of the government, not specifically in the case of the detainees you represent, but saying sometimes they want to send them home, but they don't want them to be persecuted at home. STEPHEN OLESKEY: That's not an issue in Bosnia. It's a multiracial society. The government was very carefully structured in the Dayton Accords to contain representatives of the Serbian, Croatian and Bosnian communities, and my clients would not be in any jeopardy if they are returned back to Bosnia, from which they were taken. The Bosnian government last year conceded in a letter to the secretary general of the Council of Europe that what happened was an illegal handover. What we would like is a judge to look at that frank admission by the Bosnian government, to look at American law in light of that admission, and to determine whether there's any further basis to hold these men. We believe there is not. AMY GOODMAN: Dean Spieler, while this top Pentagon official did make these comments, he did take them back. Mr. Stimson did take them back. Do you think that there was a message being sent out? EMILY SPIELER: Well, there certainly seemed to be. I think that the retraction was appropriate and needed. But the sense that there might be a chilling effect on the willingness of lawyers to take unpopular or difficult cases, because they might be under attack by the administration and they might find that their firms have some of their business jeopardized, is deeply troubling. And I think that the retraction is important, but the alacrity with which the organized bar, the American Bar Association, and also law deans responded is partly a reflection of the need for this continued response. You know, I think, fear, perhaps hope, that the retraction was a result of the response, but on the other hand, the statement should never have been made. And it's important that those of us who are leaders within the legal community continue to be vigilant on this issue. AMY GOODMAN: And very quickly, the last point that Stimson made, the questioning of possibly where some of the money might come from to support this so-called pro bono work, do you think there are suggestions of investigations of law firms? EMILY SPIELER: That certainly sounded like what was being suggested, or that there should be a cloud over these law firms as a result of this suggestion, and I think that that's abhorrent. AMY GOODMAN: Do you think, Dean Spieler, that the Guantanamo prison should be shut down? EMILY SPIELER: You know, I don't know as much as Mr. Oleskey does about the substance of this debate, and I would prefer to defer to him on that question. I think it's critical that America, the United States, adhere to international norms within the international community. AMY GOODMAN: On that note, we're going to have to leave it there. Dean Spieler, thanks for joining us -- Stephen Oleskey, as well. -------- spies Foreign intelligence court to oversee domestic spying program Updated 1/17/2007 (AP) http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2007-01-17-spying_x.htm WASHINGTON — The Bush administration has agreed to shift course and let a secret but independent panel of federal judges oversee the government's controversial domestic spying program. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court will have final say in approving wiretaps on communications involving people with suspected terror links, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said Wednesday in a letter to the leaders of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Since Jan. 10, when the court began overseeing the program, at least one request has been approved to monitor communications of a person believed to be linked to al-Qaeda or an associated terror group. In his letter to Sens. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., and Arlen Specter, R-Pa., Gonzales wrote that "any electronic surveillance that was occurring as part of the Terrorist Surveillance Program will now be conducted subject to the approval of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court." The Bush administration secretly launched the Terrorist Surveillance Program in 2001 to monitor international phone calls and e-mails to or from the United States involving people suspected by the government of having terrorist links. Gonzales said Bush would not reauthorize the program. The shift in oversight means that all wiretaps or other eavesdropping tools by the federal government must be approved by court order. Previously, the program allowed investigators to spy without a warrant — resulting in widespread criticism from lawmakers and others who questioned the legality. "The issue has never been whether to monitor suspected terrorists but doing it legally and with proper checks and balances to prevent abuses," Leahy, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, said Wednesday in welcoming the change. "Providing efficient but meaningful court review is a major step toward addressing those concerns." The turnaround came after more than a year of stubborn insistence by the White House that oversight by the secret court was not required by law and, in fact, would be a hindrance to stopping terrorists. The FISA court was established in the late 1970s to review requests for warrants to conduct surveillance inside the United States. Bush has maintained that the warrantless surveillance program's existence was "fully consistent with my constitutional responsibilities and authorities," and has said he would continue to reauthorize it "for as long as our nation faces a continuing threat from al-Qaeda and related groups." He has said circumventing the FISA court "enables us to move faster and quicker." On Wednesday, the White House said it is satisfied with the new guidelines to address administration officials' concerns about national security. "The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court has put together its guidelines and its rules and those have met administration concerns about speed and agility when it comes to responding to bits of intelligence where we may to be able to save American lives," White House press secretary Tony Snow said. Snow said he could not explain why those concerns could not have been addressed before the program was started. He said the president will not reauthorize the present program because the new rules will serve as guideposts. A federal judge in Detroit last August declared the program unconstitutional, saying it violates the rights to free speech and privacy and the separation of powers. In October, a three-judge panel of the Cincinnati-based appeals court ruled that the administration could keep the program in place while it appeals the Detroit decision. Additionally, the Justice Department's inspector general is investigating the agency's use of information gathered in the spying program. In testimony last fall in front of the Senate panel, FBI Director Robert Mueller said he was not allowed to discuss classified details that could show whether it has curbed terrorist activity in the United States. Congressional intelligence committees have already been briefed on the court's orders, Gonzales said in his letter. It was sent to the Senate Judiciary Committee the day before he is set to testify before the panel, which oversees the Justice Department. Some Democrats said the change still may not go far enough. "While this may be a step in the right direction, it should not deflect the attention of the American people or the Congress from seeking answers about the current and past operation of this program," said House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers, D-Mich. ---- Bush won't reauthorize eavesdropping program Wed Jan 17, 2007 (Reuters) http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070117/ts_nm/surveillance_bush_dc_2 WASHINGTON - President George W. Bush has decided not to reauthorize the controversial domestic warrantless surveillance program for terrorism suspects and to put it under the authority of a secret special court, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said on Wednesday. "The president has determined not to reauthorize the Terrorist Surveillance Program when the current authorization expires," Gonzales wrote in a letter to Senate leaders. "Any electronic surveillance that was occurring as part of the Terrorist Surveillance Program will now be conducted subject to the approval of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court," Gonzales said. The program, adopted after the September 11 attacks, allowed the government to eavesdrop on the international phone calls and e-mails of U.S. citizens without obtaining a warrant, if those wiretaps are made to track suspected al Qaeda operatives. Critics have said the program violated the U.S. Constitution and a 1978 law, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which made it illegal to spy on U.S. citizens in the United States without the approval of the special court. (Additional reporting by Deborah Charles) -------- POLICE / PRISONERS / COURTS / JUSTICE -------- justice Gonzales: Judges unfit to rule on terror policy Attorney general says federal jurists should defer to president's will Reuters, Jan 17, 2007 http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16668110/ WASHINGTON - Attorney General Alberto Gonzales says federal judges are unqualified to make rulings affecting national security policy, ramping up his criticism of how they handle terrorism cases. In remarks prepared for delivery Wednesday, Gonzales says judges generally should defer to the will of the president and Congress when deciding national security cases. He also raps jurists who “apply an activist philosophy that stretches the law to suit policy preferences.” The text of the speech, scheduled for delivery at the American Enterprise Institute, was obtained Tuesday by The Associated Press. It outlines, in part, what qualities the Bush administration looks for when selecting candidates for the federal bench. “We want to determine whether he understands the inherent limits that make an unelected judiciary inferior to Congress or the president in making policy judgments,” Gonzales says in the prepared speech. “That, for example, a judge will never be in the best position to know what is in the national security interests of our country.” Challenges to Bush policies Gonzales did not cite any specific activist jurists, or give examples of national security cases, in his prepared text. The Justice Department is appealing an August decision by U.S. District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor in Detroit, who ruled the government’s warrantless surveillance program unconstitutional and ordered it stopped immediately. The Justice Department appealed her decision and the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati has ruled that the administration can keep the program in place during the appeal. Attorneys representing terrorism suspects held at Guantanamo Bay are challenging the legality of a law, signed by President Bush in October, that authorizes military trials. Those challenges raise the possibility that trials will be struck down by a federal appeals court or the Supreme Court. Gonzales, a former Texas Supreme Court justice, has in the past warned about judges who inject their personal beliefs in cases. But his prepared remarks Wednesday mark his sharpest words over concerns about the federal judiciary — the third, and equal, branch of government. Judges who “apply an activist philosophy that stretches the law to suit policy preferences, they actually reduce the credibility and authority of the judiciary,” Gonzales says. “In so doing, they undermine the rule of law that strengthens our democracy.” Even so, Gonzales characterized efforts to retaliate against unpopular rulings as misguided, noting a failed South Dakota proposal to sue or jail judges for making unpopular court decisions. He also called for Congress to consider increasing the number of federal judges to handle heavy workloads, and to offer them higher salaries to lure and keep the best jurists on the bench. -------- POLITICS -------- investigations Defense official says Pentagon hid unspent funds in accounts 1/17/2007 By Matt Kelley, USA TODAY http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2007-01-17-pentagon-funds_x.htm WASHINGTON — The Pentagon has hidden at least $1.4 billion in other agencies' accounts instead of returning unspent money to the U.S. Treasury, the Defense Department's internal watchdog told Congress Wednesday. Thomas Gimble, the Pentagon's acting inspector general, said Pentagon offices between 2002 and 2005 used the General Services Administration (GSA) and the Interior Department "to 'park' or 'bank' funds that were expiring." GSA and Interior then spent the money on Pentagon contracts, circumventing the law, Gimble said. Pentagon officials did this because they either wanted to hire a particular company, spend money before it had to be returned or could not respond quickly enough to Defense Department customers, Gimble said. In written responses to Gimble and other federal investigators, Pentagon and Interior officials have acknowledged problems with their contracting processes and said they are working to fix them. GSA officials have returned $600 million in unused funds to the Defense Department. When his office started its work, Gimble said, the Pentagon had "unclear" policies about how to use such accounts. The Pentagon's chief financial officer issued new, clearer policies in October, he said. Gimble told a Senate Armed Services panel that a $100 million office space contract for the Counterintelligence Field Activity (CIFA) was more evidence of a pattern of poor oversight of military contracts. Often, he said, Pentagon contracting officers award billions of dollars in deals without proper planning, documentation or oversight. The 10-year, $100 million CIFA lease was "one of the potentially most serious problems" his investigators found with contracts made through an Interior Department office, Gimble said. That arrangement of using Interior, he said, is supposed to save time and money but often results in expensive and possibly illegal deals. Such contracts also make "end runs" around Congress and higher-level agency officials and hide how the Pentagon spends its money, Gimble said. The Pentagon needs to clean up its act, senators said. "If there's not accountability when something like that happens, we might as well throw in the towel," said freshman Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo. At CIFA's request, Interior hired a company called TKC Communications to provide office space. The agency oversees efforts to track and block terrorism and espionage threats against U.S. military bases and personnel. The deal was written as one for office space management, but the payments went to lease and renovate that space, investigators found. That arrangement was probably illegal and evaded required Pentagon and congressional oversight, Gimble and a separate Interior report found. Federal contracting records show Interior has paid TKC more than $66 million since 2003, including more than $11 million after auditors criticized the deal. Interior officials have defended the contract, saying it was legal and approved by Interior and Justice Department lawyers Brooke Smith, TKC's chief operating officer, said in an interview that no one from the Pentagon questioned the contract and that CIFA liked the arrangement. GIMBLE'S ALLEGATIONS The Pentagon's acting inspector general, Thomas Gimble, took issue with some Defense Department contracting practices at a Senate hearing. He says the Pentagon: • Used the Interior Department to issue $592 million in contracts that "junior" Pentagon contracting officers could have handled. Gimble says that wasted $23 million. • Hid at least $1.4 billion in other agencies' accounts instead of returning money to the U.S. Treasury. • Pays some contracts in advance, meaning Interior receives money before contracts are awarded. -------- us politics Opponents of bulking up U.S. forces in Iraq agree on resolution Updated 1/17/2007 (AP) http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2007-01-17-dems-iraq_x.htm WASHINGTON — A group of senators including a Republican war critic announced agreement Wednesday on a resolution opposing President Bush's 21,500 troop build up in Iraq, setting the markers for a major clash between the White House and Congress over the war. The non-binding resolution, which was also gaining interest from a second Republican senator, would symbolically put the Senate on record as saying the U.S. commitment in Iraq "can only be sustained" with popular support among the American public and in Congress. "I will do everything I can to stop the president's policy as he outlined it Wednesday night," said Sen. Chuck Hagel, a Nebraska Republican and potential 2008 presidential candidate, who joined Democrats at a press conference on the resolution. "I think it is dangerously irresponsible," Hagel said. Even as skeptical Republicans were summoned to private meetings with Bush and national security adviser Stephen Hadley at the White House, Bush's aides made clear that the Capitol Hill challenge would be met aggressively by the administration. Presidential spokesman Tony Snow said resolutions passed by Congress will not affect Bush's decision-making. "The president has obligations as a commander in chief," he said. "And he will go ahead and execute them." Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin, D-Mich., a chief author of the Senate resolution, said it says "we do not support increased troops, deeper military involvement" and calls for shifting the mission of U.S. troops from combat to training, counterterrorism and protecting Iraq's territorial integrity. He said it also calls for "the greater engagement of other countries in the region in the stabilization and reconstruction of Iraq." The resolution does not call for a withdrawal of troops or threaten funding of military operations, as many Democrats have suggested. Instead, the legislation says the U.S. should transfer responsibility to the Iraqis "under an appropriately expedited timeline," though it is not specific. Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, told reporters that she is considering supporting the resolution and said she believed it heads in the right direction. "I want to make sure it's something I can support," said Snowe, who has been adamantly opposed to the increase in troops. The group planned to introduce the resolution Wednesday, with a review by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Jan. 24, one day after Bush delivers his State of the Union address. Hagel's agreement to help Democrats champion the resolution amounts to a setback to the administration and to Bush, who has argued vehemently that some 21,500 additional U.S. troops are needed to help the Iraqi government calm sectarian violence in Baghdad and Anbar province. Bush announced on Jan. 10 that he planned to increase the 130,000 U.S. forces in Iraq with an additional 21,5000 troops. The resolutions in Congress seemed likely to be largely symbolic and they would not affect the Pentagon's war budget or challenge the president's authority over U.S. forces. Such votes, however, could be a shot across the bow to Bush. The resolutions also would help Democrats measure GOP support for more aggressive legislative tactics, such as cutting off funds for the war. Such a vote puts many Republicans in an uncomfortable position. They will have to decide whether to stay loyal to an unpopular GOP president and risk angering voters disillusioned by the war or buck the party line. Republicans are crafting alternative proposals, including a House bill introduced by Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, that would vow to protect funding for U.S. troops in combat. Sen. John Warner, R-Va., is considering a resolution expressing support for the findings by the bipartisan Iraq Study Group. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., said Wednesday she thinks there should be a cap on U.S. troops in Iraq and said she wants "to condition American aid to the Iraqis on their meeting political benchmarks." "I am opposed to this escalation," she said on NBC's Today program. "The Bush administration has frankly failed to put any leverage on this government," said Clinton, considered a likely 2008 Democratic presidential front-runner, although she has not yet entered the race. CLINTON: Start pulling out of Baghdad Bush has been trying to sell his revised war plan to the public in a series of television interviews. He told PBS's Jim Lehrer in an interview broadcast Tuesday that keeping his old policies in place would lead to "a slow failure," but withdrawing from Iraq, as some Democrats and other critics suggest, would result in an "expedited failure." "I am frustrated with the progress," Bush said. "A year ago, I felt pretty good about the situation. I felt like we were achieving our objective, which is a country that can govern, sustain and defend itself. No question, 2006 was a lousy year for Iraq." Several GOP members of Congress have offered only lukewarm endorsements of Bush's plan. Lining up behind Bush in the Senate are Republican stalwarts and a few members who have long backed sending more troops to Iraq, including Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. Acknowledging their party is divided on Iraq, Republican leaders are trying to stave off a showdown in Congress by casting Democratic efforts as a political ploy to embarrass the president. The White House cautioned lawmakers about the consequences of voting against a buildup. "The one thing the president has said is, whatever you do, make sure you support the troops," press secretary Tony Snow said at the White House. "And the question people who support this resolution will have to ask is, how does this support the troops?" ---- GOP Sen. Hagel takes aim at Bush: 'This is not a monarchy' David Edwards and Mike Sheehan Published: Wednesday January 17, 2007 http://www.rawstory.com/news/2007/GOP_Sen._Hagel_takes_aim_at_0117.html On CNN's Situation Room, Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE), who has joined key Democratic senators on a resolution to stop the Iraq troop "surge" being pushed by the Bush administration, told host Wolf Blitzer that "a bipartisan consensus" is needed for Iraq policy to succeed. The bill he co-sponsored was called a "slap at the president" by Blitzer. "The best interests of our country" are not served by American escalation in Iraq, Hagel explained. He said that America cannot just pull out, and "a few more years" would be required before the US withdrew. But he added that more Americans must not be "thrown in" to Iraq, and the Iraqis should deal with the problem themselves. Hagel also sought to remind the president that the Congress is a co-equal branch of government, that "this is not a monarchy," and that on "November 7th, the people changed the management" in Congress. The bill Hagel is now getting behind "is just the beginning," the Vietnam Veteran senator pledged. A clip of the program is available below. -------- ENERGY -------- alternative energy Zapatero pins faith in renewable energy amid nuclear debate MADRID (AFP) Jan 17, 2007 http://www.spacewar.com/2006/070117145117.uncar2g7.html Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero ruled out increasing Spain's reliance on nuclear energy for the time being, in remarks on Wednesday. "It does not figure in the government's plans to develop or expand nuclear energy," Zapatero told an economic forum in Madrid. "We will keep faith with our election manifesto," added Zapatero, referring to his promise before coming to power in April 2004 to abandon progressively the Spanish nuclear programme, which currently accounts for 23 percent of national electricity production. But he added that the Socialist energy manifesto for the 2008 general election had not yet been drawn up. Zapatero also unveiled new targets for Spanish economic growth this year, saying expansion of gross domestic product would measure at least 3.5 percent instead of a previous target of 3.4 percent. "2006 was an excellent year and 2007 will be as well," he said. The Spanish government has forecast growth of 3.8 percent in 2006. Zapatero also stressed the record of job creation under his government, saying more than three million jobs had been created. On energy, he said: "We must rely much more on renewable and alternative energy sources and have a common European policy on energy matters." And he said that there was no "ethical" solution to the disposal of nuclear waste. "In 2007, the government is going to press ahead with strongly defending the environment," he promised. The future of nuclear energy in Spain is the subject of widespread debate among politicians, ecologists and business. The industry ministry has unveiled an initiative to organise monthly working meetings on the issue drawn from across society. Spain currently has eight functioning nuclear plants, relatively few compared with other countries such as France, Britain or even Germany. ---- Bush to Call for More Ethanol use Next Week - Sources Story by Chris Baltimore REUTERS US: January 17, 2007 http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/39866/story.htm WASHINGTON - US President George W. Bush's annual speech to Congress next week is likely to call for a massive increase in how much fuel ethanol that US refiners must mix with gasoline in coming years, sources familiar with White House plans said on Tuesday. Energy legislation signed into law last year would require refiners to use at least 7.5 billion gallons (28.4 billion litres) of renewable fuels annually by 2012. One source briefed by White House officials said Bush's speech on Jan. 23 could call for even more ethanol usage -- over 60 billion gallons by 2030. "I think it's going to be a big number," the source said on condition of anonymity. "It's in the ballpark of even above 60 billion (gallons) by 2030." A White House spokesman declined to comment on the details of the speech. "The President has been a leader on the issue of renewable fuels and has spoken about that numerous times in the past," said White House spokesman Scott Stanzel. "But at this time I'm not going to get into commenting on what might or might not be in the State of the Union address." The White House could be aiming to beat targets set in legislation proposed by a group of Midwest senators, including prospective presidential candidate and Illinois Democrat Barack Obama, that would set the US renewable fuels mandate at 60 billion gallons a year by 2030, the source said. A Bush administration official speaking on condition of anonymity declined to say whether ethanol will be addressed in Bush's speech. But the official said that the 60 billion gallon target is "conceivable and achievable" assuming that making ethanol from cellulosic sources like wood chips and farm cast-offs is cost-competitive with corn-based alternatives by 2012. A rising focus on "energy security" by both the Bush administration and Congress has added momentum to efforts to employ home-grown fuel sources like ethanol to temper US import needs. Boosting ethanol would not be a surprise, given recent comments by White House officials. In a speech earlier this month Al Hubbard, director of the National Economic Council, said Bush's speech will spur "headlines above the fold that will knock your socks off in terms of our commitment to energy independence." A focus on renewable energy sources would continue a trend that Bush started in last year's congressional address, when he called for the United States to cut its oil imports from the Middle East by 75 percent by 2025 by using energy sources like ethanol and biodiesel. The speech is a moving target and White House officials are known to make last-minute tweaks. Last year, White House political advisors added the "addicted to oil" remarks only hours before Bush spoke. Some US officials including some at the Energy Department worry that US farmers won't be able to grow enough corn to meet higher clean fuel targets. Thanks to the ethanol boom, the US corn surplus will shrink to a precarious 752 million bushels -- a three-week supply -- before this year's crop is ready for harvest, the US Agriculture Department said last week. Explosive growth in the fuel ethanol industry has already driven corn prices to the highest level in a decade with no let-up in sight. The US oil and gas industry adamantly opposes more ethanol mandates. "Energy policy based on mandates is no recipe for success,' said Charlie Drevna, executive vice president at the National Petrochemical and Refiners Association, arguing that ethanol is less economic and efficient than petroleum-based fuels. (Additional reporting by Caren Bohan) ---- Solar Power Eliminates Utility Bills in U.S. Home January 17, 2007 — By Jon Hurdle, Reuters http://www.enn.com/today.html?id=12048 EAST AMWELL, New Jersey -- Michael Strizki heats and cools his house year-round and runs a full range of appliances including such power-guzzlers as a hot tub and a wide-screen TV without paying a penny in utility bills. His conventional-looking family home in the pinewoods of western New Jersey is the first in the United States to show that a combination of solar and hydrogen power can generate all the electricity needed for a home. The Hopewell Project, named for a nearby town, comes at a time of increasing concern over U.S. energy security and worries over the effects of burning fossil fuels on the climate. "People understand that climate change is a big concern but they don't know what they can do about it," said Gian-Paolo Caminiti of Renewable Energy Associates, the commercial arm of the project. "There's a psychological dividend in doing the right thing," he said. Strizki runs the 3,000-square-foot house with electricity generated by a 1,000-square-foot roof full of photovoltaic cells on a nearby building, an electrolyzer that uses the solar power to generate hydrogen from water, and a number of hydrogen tanks that store the gas until it is needed by the fuel cell. In the summer, the solar panels generate 60 percent more electricity than the super-insulated house needs. The excess is stored in the form of hydrogen which is used in the winter -- when the solar panels can't meet all the domestic demand -- to make electricity in the fuel cell. Strizki also uses the hydrogen to power his fuel-cell driven car, which, like the domestic power plant, is pollution-free. Solar power currently contributes only 0.1 percent of U.S. energy needs but the number of photovoltaic installations grew by 20 percent in 2006, and the cost of making solar panels is dropping by about 7 percent annually, according to the Solar Energy Industries Association. As costs decline and the search accelerates for clean alternatives to expensive and dirty fossil fuels, some analysts predict solar is poised for a significant expansion in the next five to 10 years. STATE SUPPORT The New Jersey project, which opened in October 2006 after four years of planning and building, cost around $500,000, some $225,000 of which was provided by the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities. The state, a leading supporter of renewable energy, aims to have 20 percent of its energy coming from renewables by 2020, and currently has the largest number of solar-power installations of any U.S. state except California. New Jersey's utility regulator supported the project because it helps achieve the state's renewable-energy goals, said Doyal Siddell a spokesman for the agency. "The solar-hydrogen residence project provides a tremendous opportunity to reduce greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming," he said. The project also got equipment and expertise from a number of commercial sponsors including Exide, which donated some $50,000 worth of batteries, and Swageloc, an Ohio company that provided stainless steel piping costing around $28,000. Strizki kicked in about $100,000 of his own money. While the cost may deter all but wealthy environmentalists from converting their homes, Strizki and his associates stress the project is designed to be replicated and that the price tag on the prototype is a lot higher than imitators would pay. Now that first-time costs of research and design have been met, the price would be about $100,000, Strizki said. But that's still too high for the project to be widely replicated, said Marchant Wentworth of the Union of Concerned Scientists, an environmental group in Washington. To be commonly adopted, such installations would have to be able to sell excess power to the grid, generating a revenue stream that could be used to attract capital, he said. "You need to make the financing within reach of real people," Wentworth said. Caminiti argues that the cost of the hydrogen/solar setup works out at about $4,000 a year when its $100,000 cost is spread over the anticipated 25-year lifespan of the equipment. That's still a lot higher than the $1,500 a year the average U.S. homeowner spends on energy, according to the federal government. Even if gasoline costs averaging about $1,000 per car annually are included in the energy mix, the renewables option is still more expensive than the grid/gasoline combination. But for Strizki and his colleagues, the house is about a lot more than the bottom line. It's about energy security at a time when the federal government is seeking to reduce dependence on fossil fuels from the Middle East, and it's about sustaining a lifestyle without emitting greenhouse gases. For the 51-year-old Strizki, the project is his life's work. "I have dedicated my life to making the planet a better place," he said. ---- Asian and Pacific Nations Sign Clean Energy Pact MANILA, Philippines, January 17, 2007 (ENS) http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/jan2007/2007-01-17-05.asp Government leaders from across Asia and the Pacific have agreed to reduce their dependence on fossil fuels and promote cleaner technologies that address air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. The energy pact signed by the leaders of the 10 member Association of Southeast Asian Nations, ASEAN, and its dialogue partners calls for a concerted regionwide effort to harness alternative sources of energy to ensure continuous energy supply for their growing economies in the face of dwindling world oil reserves. The Cebu Declaration on East Asian Energy Security was signed after a summit last week in the central Philippine city of Cebu during which the leaders pledged to fight terrorism and disease, eradicate poverty, strengthen political solidarity, and create a free trade zone by 2015. ASEAN's members are the Philippines, Thailand, Myanmar, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam. They signed the declaration together with the leaders of Australia, China, India, Japan, South Korea and New Zealand. The government leaders cited the need to strengthen programs to develop renewable energy sources such as biofuels and hydropower sources since "these resources are important aspects of our national energy policies." The leaders agreed to work closely together to improve the efficiency and environmental performance of fossil fuel use. They will encourage the use of biofuels and "work towards freer trade on biofuels and a standard on biofuels used in engines and motor vehicles." They pledged to reduce dependence on conventional fuels through intensified energy efficiency and conservation programmes, hydropower, expansion of renewable energy systems and biofuel production/utilization, and for interested parties, civilian nuclear power. The leaders said they would mitigate greenhouse gas emission through effective policies and measures, thus contributing to global climate change abatement. The entire effort will be market-based. The leaders declared they would pursue and encourage investment on energy resource and infrastructure development through greater private sector involvement, and encourage the "open and competitive regional and international markets geared towards providing affordable energy at all economic levels." Philippine President Gloria Arroyo today directed the Department of Energy to "dovetail all our pertinent programs with the Cebu Declaration on East Asian Energy Security so that we can participate actively in pursuing the common ends defined by the leaders." President Arroyo also today signed into law the Biofuels Act of 2006 which seeks to reduce dependence on imported fuels. The act mandates that within two years, all liquid fuels for motors and engines sold in the Philippines shall contain at least five percent locally sourced bioethanol. Ford Group Philippines Chairman Henry Co expressed full support for the mandatory use of biofuel by oil companies based in the Philippines. "We have a lot of resources to support ethanol production," Co said. Clean coal will be an important part of the energy picture, under the Cebu Declaration, and especially for coal producing nations Australia and China. In Cebu, Australian Prime Minister John Howard and Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao formally established the Australia-China Joint Coordination Group on Clean Coal Technology. The Group will include representatives from government, the scientific community and from industry. The two countries will share knowledge gained through clean coal projects, implement joint clean coal technology projects, and projects on using coal mine methane as a clean energy source. "Premier Wen and I have agreed that this is a significant and important initiative for Australia and for China," said Prime Minister Howard. "We have discussed potential members of the group and I look forward to announcing the agreed members in due course. We expect the first meeting of the Australia-China Joint Coordination Group on Clean Coal Technology to be in early April." The two countries also cooperate closely in the technology focused Carbon Sequestration Leadership Forum, the Methane to Markets Partnership, and the APEC Energy Working Group. ---- North Carolina State Employees Support Renewables RALEIGH, North Carolina, January 17, 2007 (ENS) http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/jan2007/2007-01-17-09.asp#anchor6 The State Employees’ Credit Union, SECU, Foundation has partnered with NC GreenPower to support cleaner, renewable energy alternatives for North Carolina. The SECU Foundation will fund 1 kilowatt hour of renewable energy production in North Carolina for each of the 1.3 million members of SECU annually over the next four years - a commitment to renewable energy in North Carolina of over 5.2 million kilowatt hours. SECU Foundation funding will create generation of electricity from alternative energy sources, such as the sun, wind and methane gas. Each year, SECU members estimate they will be making an environmental impact equivalent to planting 208,000 trees or not driving 3.2 million miles. The SECU Foundation funding also fits well with SECU’s commitment to member financial literacy and wealth creation. Bobby Hall, senior executive vice-president of SECU, said, "If we can help members save $30 per month on their energy bills, that means $360 more per year in each member’s pocket. With over one million members, that can add up fast." A joint education program between SECU and NC GreenPower will be conducted throughout 2007. SECU members will receive practical tips on how to use energy more efficiently, how to conserve through better utilization of insulation, Energy Star rated appliances, light bulbs, and HVAC systems. Most of the conservation measures are relatively simple and inexpensive to adopt. SECU is a non-profit financial cooperative owned by its members. With $14 billion in assets and over 1.3 million members, SECU provides services to members through over 200 branch offices, approximately 900 ATMs, two Call Centers and a website, www.ncsecu.org. NC GreenPower is a non-profit organization based in Raleigh that works with participants of nearly 40 electric utilities across the state to encourage the development of renewable energy through voluntary tax deductible contributions. “This is still a young industry, but one that is growing rapidly,” says Maggy Inman, vice president of NC GreenPower. “Supporting renewable energy development will help to ensure that supplies increase and that costs will continue to grow more competitive with fossil fuels.” -------- OTHER -------- environment Germany Gets Greener, but Habitats Still Endangered 17.01.2007 Deutsche Welle http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,2313119,00.html?maca=en-rss-en-all-1573-rdf Germany has become greener and healthier, according to a report on the country's environment. The good news was the result of a growing consensus on the importance of preserving nature, Environment Minister Gabriel said. Gabriel said the changes came thanks to an increasing awareness in Germany of the need to protect nature. That, he added, had been initiated by the previous Social Democratic-Green party government coalition and continued by the current government of conservatives and Social Democrats. "There has been a high degree of continuity in German environment policy in recent years, which is now also having an impact on discussions on an international level, where Germany has been able to take on a leading role," Gabriel said, after the cabinet endorsed the report's findings. Since 1998, the German government has dramatically increased spending on the environment. The report said substantial progress had been made in saving energy, where state subsidies to homeowners to the tune of 1.4 billion euros ($1.8 billion) have reduced private energy consumption. In addition, state-sponsored research into renewable energies has nearly doubled to 100 million euros a year, resulting, in a boom in the use of solar energy. Offshore wind energy generation is now surging in a country where wind power is already a huge market, the report said. Germany has also managed to lower its carbon dioxide emissions substantially and cut back on the use of hazardous chemicals. Gasoline and diesel are now cleaner due to regulations that require producers to add bio fuels to them. Not all good news But there are also worrying developments, the environment minister said. He pointed to the increasing depletion of natural resources, such as arable land and water. "If we continue with resource depletion at the current pace, we'll need two planets to meet this consumption pattern in the future," Gabriel said. "That is why changing these patterns is the most pressing challenge for the German government." Gabriel lamented the fact that two-thirds of all natural habitats are threatened in Germany, and that 40 percent of species are facing extinction. He said that biodiversity is important in the search for future alternatives to dwindling resources. Re-focusing on nuclear energy, however, is not a viable way to achieve this, he said. Gabriel is opposed to re-focusing on nuclear energyBildunterschrift: Großansicht des Bildes mit der Bildunterschrift: Gabriel is opposed to re-focusing on nuclear energy "It's an absurd discussion, because nuclear power cannot help us reduce our dependency on gas and oil. Nuclear energy doesn't fuel our cars and it is equally inappropriate for heating houses, which is mainly done here with natural gas." Germany decided in 2002 to gradually phase out nuclear energy. The last German nuclear plants are supposed be taken off the grid in 2021. Gabriel also said that along with the rapid depletion of natural resources, the reduction of noise pollution is to become a key policy goal of the current government. Rising cross-border traffic in an expanding European Union is a challenge that needs a strong political answer and a concerted effort by all EU members, he added. -------- ACTIVISTS Doomsday clock moves closer to nuclear Armageddon LONDON (AFP) Jan 17, 2007 http://www.spacewar.com/2006/070117153812.6ieypw3x.html The world inched closer to nuclear Armageddon on Wednesday, according to a group of prominent scientists who moved a Doomsday Clock two minutes nearer to midnight -- the symbolic end of civilisation. North Korea and Iran were cited as particular reasons increasing the danger of a nuclear winter, which had diminished since the end of the Cold War, they said. The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists has kept a Doomsday clock at the University of Chicago since 1947 as a reminder of the dangers of nuclear proliferation. In simultaneous events in London and Washington on Wednesday the clock's big hand was moved forward to five minutes to midnight -- from 11:53 p.m. where it had stood since 2002. "We stand at the brink of a Second Nuclear Age. Not since the first atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki has the world faced such perilous choices," said the scientists in a statement. "North Korea's recent test of a nuclear weapon, Iran's nuclear ambitions, a renewed emphasis on the military utility of nuclear weapons, the failure to adequately secure nuclear materials, and the continued presence of some 26,000 nuclear weapons in the United States and Russia are symptomatic of a failure to solve the problems posed by the most destructive technology on Earth." First set at seven minutes to midnight -- a phrase that has become part of pop culture -- the clock has been moved 17 times in response to global events. The most recent shift was in 2002 when it moved two minutes forward because the United States withdrew from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and terrorists were known to be seeking nuclear and biological weapons. Founded in 1945 by scientists who had helped develop the atomic bomb and were deeply concerned about the use of nuclear weapons, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists counts 17 Nobel laureates among its boards of directors and sponsors. ---- Iraq War Resister Denied Key Defense Strategy in Military Trial Wednesday, January 17th, 2007 Democracy Now! Headlines http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/01/17/1540205 And finally, new developments in the military tribunal of First Lieutenant Ehren Watada. The judge in the case has ruled Watada’s defense won’t be able to present evidence challenging the legality of the war nor explain Watada’s motive to resist deploying to Iraq. Watada faces up to six years in prison. He is the first commissioned officer to refuse deployment orders to Iraq. ---- Protesters Found in Database ACLU Is Questioning Entries in Defense Dept. System By Walter Pincus Washington Post Staff Writer Wednesday, January 17, 2007; A08 http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/16/AR2007011601731_pf.html A Defense Department database devoted to gathering information on potential threats to military facilities and personnel, known as Talon, had 13,000 entries as of a year ago -- including 2,821 reports involving American citizens, according to an internal Pentagon memo to be released today by the American Civil Liberties Union. The Pentagon memo says an examination of the system led to the deletion of 1,131 reports involving Americans, 186 of which dealt with "anti-military protests or demonstrations in the U.S." Titled "Review of the TALON Reporting System," the four-page memo produced in February 2006 summarizes some interim results from an inquiry ordered by then-Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld after disclosure in December 2005 that the system had collected and circulated data on anti-military protests and other peaceful demonstrations. The released memo, one of a series of Talon documents made public over the past year by the ACLU under a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, said that the deleted reports did not meet a 2003 Defense Department requirement that they have some foreign terrorist connection or relate to what was believed to be "a force protection threat." The number of deleted reports far exceeds the estimate provided to The Washington Post just over a year ago by senior officials of Counterintelligence Field Activity (CIFA), the Defense Department agency that manages the Talon program. At that time, then-CIFA Director David A. Burtt II said the review had disclosed that only 1 percent of the then 12,500 Talon reports appeared to be problematic. The ACLU said in its own report that past disclosures about Talon "cried out for congressional oversight yet Congress was silent." It said the new memo indicated there "may be even more disturbing" information to discover and declared "it is time for Congress to act." The ACLU noted the memo showed that Talon reports had a much wider circulation than previously disclosed, with about 28 organizations and 3,589 individuals authorized to submit reports or have access to the database. The organizations with access include various military agencies as well as state, federal and local law enforcement officials. In early 2006, Burtt also said CIFA had not devised a formal way to notify its users when it decided to delete a Talon report on American citizens. The newly released memo says that a software enhancement was being initiated to permit users to edit and delete entries from the database and that it was scheduled for completion in April 2006. A Pentagon spokesman said there are 7,700 reports in the Talon database. Some involve U.S. citizens, but the spokesman declined to say how many. Over the past year the program has instituted multiple layers of review for screening which reports should go into the database, the spokesman said. CIFA has begun a process for analysts to review materials to make sure they fit the program's criteria before being uploaded and made available to Talon users. CIFA was established in 2002 in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, originally to coordinate the counterterrorism and counterintelligence operations of the various branches and agencies of the Defense Department. It has grown rapidly over the past four years, but not without problems. Along with discovery of the Talon data collection, CIFA was linked to the lobbying and earmarking activities that led to the conviction of former congressman Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R-Calif.). Burtt and his top deputy retired in August 2006, and federal investigators are still looking at CIFA contracting activities. Last week, the New York Times disclosed that CIFA had been using national security letters to gather financial data on U.S. citizens, but a Pentagon spokesman said yesterday that such information was for particular investigations and not made part of the Talon database. Talon was started in May 2003 to capture raw, non-validated information about suspicious activity or potential terrorist threats to military personnel or facilities at home and abroad. ---- Troops pressure Congress to back pullout from Iraq January 17, 2007 BY RENEE SCHOOF MCCLATCHY NEWSPAPERS http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070117/NEWS07/701170359/1009 WASHINGTON -- Pressure on Congress intensified Tuesday to stop President George W. Bush's plan to increase troops in Iraq, as about 1,000 active-duty soldiers and Marines urged lawmakers to support a quick withdrawal and antiwar groups planned to rally state legislatures. Although most Democrats and some Republicans oppose Bush's 21,500-troop increase, Congress isn't moving very fast to try to stop or alter the plan. Democratic leaders in both chambers want their first step to be a resolution calling on lawmakers to go on record as being for or against Bush's Iraq plan. Democrats say they have a solid Senate majority against the plan, including perhaps a dozen Republicans, so the resolution is effectively a symbolic vote of no confidence in Bush's war plan. Only after that vote will they look at ways to use Congress' power over funding. The Senate resolution is to be introduced today, but it was unlikely a vote would occur before Bush gives his State of the Union address Tuesday. House leaders plan to let the Senate go first, then vote on a similar resolution. Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa., chairman of the appropriations defense subcommittee, planned to start hearings today about how Congress might use the threat of spending cutoffs to demand changes in policy, but they'll be closed so lawmakers can consider classified information. Also Tuesday, the Senate Judiciary Committee examined the plight of Iraqi refugees. About 1.7 million Iraqis have been driven from their homes, and hundreds of thousands have become refugees in Jordan, Syria and elsewhere. Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., who chairs a subcommittee on immigration and refugees, called for more humanitarian aid for displaced Iraqis and refuge for those who risked their lives to work for Americans in Iraq. Last year, the United States admitted 202 Iraqi refugees, he said. Meanwhile, more than 1,000 active-duty servicemen and women who oppose the war sent an "appeal for redress" to Congress. Although they're duty-bound to carry out the president's orders, they have a legal right to use such means to express their views. The statement, carried on the Web site AppealforappealforRredress.org, was signed by 1,080 troops as of Tuesday afternoon, the site claimed. It urged Congress to support "the prompt withdrawal of all American military forces and bases from Iraq," adding, "staying in Iraq will not work and is not worth the price." "Despite our best efforts, Iraq fell further into chaos," Marine Sgt. Liam Madden, said at a news conference on the steps of a House office building. Madden said he believed the war "benefits neither the United States nor Iraq, and especially not the American military." "Our brothers are dying, and politicians are squabbling," he said. "If you are funding a war that puts them in harm's way, you are not supporting them." ---- Anti-war sign gets a rude welcome By Nancy McCleary, Staff writer Wednesday, January 17, 2007 Fayetteville Observer http://www.fayobserver.com/article?id=252183 Living in a military town isn’t going to stop Catherine McLin from protesting the war in Iraq. Nor will those who destroy the “No War” signs she puts in the front yard of her home on Morganton Road. “I plan to keep putting them up,” McLin said Tuesday. She put up a sign, made of discarded patio blinds and wood, on Thursday. It was only hours before it was destroyed, she said. “Someone had a heyday with it,” McLin said. “They took it apart and scattered debris all over the yard.” Undaunted, she went back to work and created several smaller signs that she has put on her front lawn. She said she lobbied her neighbors and nearby residents to put signs in their yards. Three people agreed to do so, McLin said; 30 turned down her request. McLin, a military wife, said she wasn’t surprised at the reaction. After all, this is a military town. She and her husband moved to Fayetteville in July and bought their home in September. “I expected something to happen,” McLin said. “Something was bound to happen; something was bound to come.” McLin knows she is probably an oddity among military wives, especially here at one of the largest military posts in the country. “One ‘No War’ sign goes up and gets news coverage,” she said. Staff writer Nancy McCleary can be reached at mcclearyn@fayobserver.com or 486-3568.