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Small island nations take high-emitting countries to court to protect the ocean

Countries threatened by rising sea levels are asking a tribunal to decide on responsibility for pollution of the marine environment

In a landmark hearing, small island nations disproportionately affected by
the climate crisis will take on high-emitting countries in a court in
Hamburg, Germany, on 11 September, in what is being seen as the first
climate justice case aimed at protecting the ocean.

During the two-day hearing, the nations – including the Bahamas, Tuvalu, Vanuatu, Antigua and Barbuda among others – will ask the International Tribunal for the Law of
the Sea (Itlos) to determine whether greenhouse gas emissions absorbed by
the marine environment should be considered pollution.

As one of the planet’s greatest carbon sinks, the ocean absorbs 25% of carbon dioxide
emissions, captures 90% of the heat caused by those emissions and produces
half the world’s oxygen.

Most countries have obligations under the legally
binding UN convention on the law of the sea to take measures to prevent,
reduce and control marine pollution. If the case, brought by the Commission
of Small Island States on Climate Change and International Law (Cosis), is
successful, these obligations would include carbon-emission reduction and
protection of marine environments already damaged by CO2 pollution.

Guardian 10th Sept 2023

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/sep/10/small-island-nations-take-high-emitting-countries-to-court-to-protect-the-ocean

September 12, 2023 Posted by | Legal, OCEANIA | Leave a comment

French nuclear cartel fined €31m

French watchdog issues 31 million euros fine against companies working on
nuclear dismantling. France’s antitrust watchdog on Thursday issued total
fines amounting to 31 million euros ($33.17 million) against six companies
for having engaged in cartel practices linked to the dismantling of a
nuclear site in Marcoule, southern France.

Reuters 7th Sept 2023

https://www.reuters.com/markets/europe/french-watchdog-issues-31-mln-euros-fine-against-companies-working-nuclear-2023-09-07

Construction Index 11th Sept 2023

https://www.theconstructionindex.co.uk/news/view/french-cartel-fined-31m

September 12, 2023 Posted by | France, Legal | Leave a comment

Residents file suit to halt wastewater release from Fukushima plant

About 150 residents from prefectures such as Fukushima and Miyagi went to court on Friday to halt the release of treated radioactive water from the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant, making it the first lawsuit of its kind.

In the suit filed with the Fukushima District Court against the central government and plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings Inc, the plaintiffs said the water discharge, which started on Aug. 24, threatens citizens’ right to live safely and hinders local fishermen’s businesses.

They are also seeking nullification of nuclear regulators’ approval of facilities installed for the water discharge and a ban to be placed on the release.

An additional lawsuit at the end of October is being planned………………………………………………………………….  https://japantoday.com/category/national/residents-file-suit-to-halt-wastewater-release-from-fukushima-plant

September 10, 2023 Posted by | Japan, Legal | Leave a comment

Vinci and Bouygues among six firms fined €31m for bid rigging in nuclear work

KHI By Neil Gerrard08 September 2023

France’s competition watchdog, Autorité de la Concurrence, has fined six companies a total of €31 million for bid rigging relating to tenders for work at a nuclear site in the country.

Nuvia Process (a subsidiary of Vinci Group), ENDEL (formerly and Engie subsidiary), Bouygues Construction Expertises (BCEN), SNEF and SPIE Nucléaire are all subject to the penalties.

The Autorité granted a sixth company, ONET Group, leniency and it has received an exemption from financial penalties.

The fines come after dawn raids at the companies prompted by suspicions of anticompetitive practices when it came to tendering for work at the French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission’s (CEA) Marcoule nuclear site in the Gard region……………………………………………………………………………………………………

In a statement, the Autorité said, “These practices are among the most serious breaches of competition rules, as they aim to remove the advantages that consumers and the public entity are entitled to expect from a competitive economy, and instead benefit the perpetrators.

“Disrupting the normal course of tendering procedures by hindering the free market pricing process and misleading the public authority as to the reality and extent of competition between tenderers, is detrimental to the sector in which such practices take place, and constitutes a serious breach of economic public policy.”

Nuvia’s penalty amounted to €13.9 million, while Endel received a fine of €11 million and BCEN a fine of €6.2 million.

SNEF and SPIE Nucléaire received lesser fines of €20,000 and €10,000 respectively.

The Autorité said it applied a mark-up to Nuvia, Endel and BCEN as they are all part of conglomerates. It also took into account the “repeated nature” of the offences committed by the Vinci and Bouygues groups. https://www.khl.com/news/vinci-and-bouygues-among-six-firms-fined-31m-for-bid-rigging-in-nuclear-work/8031517.article

September 9, 2023 Posted by | France, Legal | Leave a comment

Japan’s nuclear-contaminated water discharge should consider hazard accountability and compensation mechanisms

International legal mechanisms, such as the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, grant countries the right to assert their interests, and Japan’s discharge of nuclear-contaminated water has direct and indirect impacts on the global marine environment. Therefore, countries can seek compensation from Japan through international legal mechanisms for environmental restoration and economic compensation. 

Chunding Li, Zelei Xing,  https://news.cgtn.com/news/2023-09-06/Japan-s-nuclear-wastewater-discharge-should-have-hazard-accountability-1mSm5S2bJsY/index.html

The plan over nuclear-contaminated water discharge from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Japan was launched on August 24, 2023, attracting widespread attention, controversy and condemnation from the international community. 

Currently, the Fukushima nuclear power plant generates, per day, approximately 140 tonnes of nuclear-contaminated water, with over 1 million tonnes of accumulated stored radioactive water. According to the plan, the nuclear-contaminated water will undergo treatment before discharge to reduce the concentration of radioactive substances.

However, even after treatment, this nuclear-contaminated water still contains a certain amount of radioactive materials. It is estimated that around 1 million tonnes of nuclear-contaminated water will be released into the sea, being discharged over a period of 30 years, and seeing a daily discharge of approximately 460 tonnes of nuclear-contaminated water.

This poses huge risks to the environment and human health of neighboring countries, not discounting the threat to the development of industries such as agriculture and fisheries. Given the risks involved, countries have the right to demand that Japan assume corresponding compensation responsibilities.

Japan’s nuclear-contaminated water discharge poses potential hazards to human health. The nuclear-contaminated water contains radioactive isotopes, such as cesium, tritium, and strontium, which can enter the food chain of marine ecosystems, affecting the marine ecosystems of surrounding countries directly. When contaminated seafood is consumed, there is a potential risk to human health. 

Furthermore, these radioactive substances can spread to distant regions through the influences of climate and oceanic currents, causing long-term impacts on marine ecosystems globally. This can result in the death or migration of marine organisms, biodiversity disruption, and the potential negative impact on the sustainable utilization of fishery resources.

Japan’s nuclear-contaminated water discharge has a negative impact on the development and trade of agriculture and fisheries. Firstly, when contaminated seafood is banned from import or faces consumer scrutiny, it will have a significant impact on the fishing industry of exporting countries. Many countries rely on seafood exports to increase trade revenue and promote economic development. The impacts caused by nuclear-contaminated water will directly threaten the economic interests of these nations, leading to reduced income for fishermen and potentially, even job losses. 

Moreover, the discharge of nuclear-contaminated water could also contaminate freshwater resources in neighboring countries, negatively affecting irrigation in farmland and the growth of crops. This poses a threat to the sustainable development of a nation’s agriculture, subsequently impacting the income of farmers and food supplies.

Countries have the right to demand that Japan assumes corresponding compensation responsibilities. Firstly, as the source country of nuclear contamination, Japan should take responsibility for the environmental and human health risks caused by its discharge of nuclear-contaminated water and take measures to mitigate and restore potential damages. 

International legal mechanisms, such as the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, grant countries the right to assert their interests, and Japan’s discharge of nuclear-contaminated water has direct and indirect impacts on the global marine environment. Therefore, countries can seek compensation from Japan through international legal mechanisms for environmental restoration and economic compensation. 

Secondly, existing international laws should promptly regulate Japan’s actions to ensure that the discharge of nuclear-contaminated water meets international standards and requirements, avoiding irreversible harm to global marine ecosystems and human health.

International cooperation is necessary to seek sustainable development solutions. The international community should enhance supervision and collaboration to collectively address the global challenges posed by the discharge of nuclear-contaminated water and safeguard the sustainable development of human health and the environment. 

The discharge of nuclear-contaminated water not only poses significant environmental and health risks within Japan, but also has potential long-term impacts on marine ecosystems of neighboring countries, not excluding the wider global community. Therefore, the international community should strengthen cooperation to jointly formulate and implement relevant policies and standards, to dissuade against nuclear-contaminated water discharge. 

In addressing this issue, advancements in science and technology, as well as the principles of equality and cooperation among different countries, should be fully considered. Resolving the global challenges posed by the discharge of nuclear-contaminated water requires joint efforts from all countries, including cooperation in areas such as technological collaboration, information sharing, and exchange of experiences. 

Additionally, the international community should also strengthen regulatory oversight and safety controls over nuclear energy, in order to prevent the recurrence of nuclear accidents and pollution.

September 7, 2023 Posted by | Legal, World | Leave a comment

What’s Behind Talk of a Possible Plea Deal for Assange?

Were Assange to give up his legal battle and voluntarily go to the U.S. it would achieve two things for Washington:

1). remove the chance of a European Court of Human Rights injunction stopping his extradition should the High Court in London reject his last appeal; and

2). it would give the U.S. an opportunity to “change its mind” once Assange was in its clutches inside the Virginia federal courthouse.

Top U.S. officials are speaking at cross purposes when it comes to Julian Assange. What is really going on? asks Joe Lauria.

By Joe Lauria, Consortium News  https://consortiumnews.com/2023/09/03/whats-behind-talk-of-a-possible-plea-deal-for-assange/

It was a little more than perplexing. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, on Australian soil, left no doubt about how his government feels about one of Australia’s most prominent citizens. 

“I understand the concerns and views of Australians,” Blinken said in Brisbane on July 31 with the Australian foreign minister at his side. “I think it’s very important that our friends here understand our concerns about this matter.” He went on:

“What our Department of Justice has already said repeatedly, publicly, is this: Mr. Assange was charged with very serious criminal conduct in the United States in connection with his alleged role in one of the largest compromises of classified information in the history of our country. So I say that only because just as we understand sensitivities here, it’s important that our friends understand sensitivities in the United States.”  

In other words, when it comes to Julian Assange, the U.S. elite cares little for what Australians have to say. There are more impolite ways to describe Blinken’s response. Upwards of 88 percent of Australians and both parties in the Australian government have told Washington to free the man. And Blinken essentially told them to stuff it.  The U.S. won’t drop the case. 

A few days before Blinken spoke, Caroline Kennedy, the U.S. ambassador to Australia and daughter of slain President John F. Kennedy, was also dismissive of Australians’ concerns, telling Australian Broadcasting Corporation Radio:

“I met with Parliamentary supporters of Julian Assange and I’ve listened to their concerns and I understand that this has been raised at the highest levels of our government, but it is an ongoing legal case, so the Department of Justice is really in charge but I’m sure that for Julian Assange it means a lot that he has this kind of support but we’re just going to have to wait to see what happens.”

Asked why she met with the parliamentarians at all, she said: “Well, it’s an important issue, it has, as I’ve said, been raised at the highest levels and I wanted to hear directly from them about their concerns to make sure that we all understood where each other was coming from and I thought it was a very useful conversation.”

Asked whether her meeting with the MPs had shifted her thinking on the Assange case, Kennedy said bluntly: “Not really.” She added that her “personal thinking isn’t really relevant here.”  

Blowback

Australia has too often behaved as a doormat to the United States, to the point where Australia is threatening its own security by going along with an aggressive U.S. policy towards China, which poses no threat to Australia.  

But this time, Blinken got an earful. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese reiterated that he wanted the Assange case to be dropped. Certain members of Parliament brusquely gave it back to Blinken.

Assange was “not the villain … and if the US wasn’t obsessed with revenge it would drop the extradition charge as soon as possible,” Independent MP Andrew Wilkie told The Guardian‘s Australian edition.

“Antony Blinken’s allegation that Julian Assange risked very serious harm to US national security is patent nonsense,” said Wilkie said.

“Mr Blinken would be well aware of the inquiries in both the US and Australia which found that the relevant WikiLeaks disclosures did not result in harm to anyone,” the MP said. “The only deadly behaviour was by US forces … exposed by WikiLeaks, like the Apache crew who gunned down Iraqi civilians and Reuters journalists” in the infamous Collateral Murder video.  

As was shown conclusively by defense witnesses in his September 2020 extradition hearing in London, Assange worked assiduously to redact names of U.S. informants before WikiLeaks publications on Iraq and Afghanistan in 2010. U.S. Gen. Robert Carr testified at the court martial of WikiLeaks‘ source, Chelsea Manning, that no one was harmed by the material’s publication.  

Instead, Assange faces 175 years in a U.S. dungeon on charges of violating the Espionage Act, not for stealing U.S. classified material, but for the First Amendment-protected publication of it.

Labor MP Julian Hill, also part of the Bring Julian Assange Home Parliamentary Group, told The Guardian he had “a fundamentally different view of the substance of the matter than secretary Blinken expressed. But I appreciate that at least his remarks are candid and direct.” 

“In the same vein, I would say back to the United States: at the very least, take Julian Assange’s health issues seriously and go into court in the United Kingdom and get him the hell out of a maximum security prison where he’s at risk of dying without medical care if he has another stroke,” Hill said.

Damage Control

 The fierce Australian reaction to both Blinken and Kennedy’s remarks appears to have taken Washington by surprise, given how accustomed to Canberra’s supine behavior the U.S. has become.  Just two weeks after Blinken’s remarks, Kennedy tried to soften the blow by muddying Blinken’s clear waters.

She told The Sydney Morning Herald in a front-page interview published on Aug. 14 that the United States was now, despite Blinken’s unequivocal words, suddenly open to a plea agreement that could free Assange, allowing him to serve a shortened sentence for a lesser crime in his home country.

The newspaper said there could be a “David Hicks-style plea bargain,” a so-called Alford Plea, in which Assange would continue to state his innocence while accepting a lesser charge that would allow him to serve additional time in Australia. The four years Assange has already served on remand at London’s maximum security Belmarsh Prison could perhaps be taken into account.

Kennedy said a decision on such a plea deal was up to the U.S. Justice Department. “So it’s not really a diplomatic issue, but I think that there absolutely could be a resolution,” she told the newspaper.   

Kennedy acknowledged Blinken’s harsh comments.  “But there is a way to resolve it,” she said. “You can read the [newspapers] just like I can.”  It is not quite clear what in the newspapers she was reading. 

Blinken is Kennedy’s boss.  There is little chance she had spoken out of turn.  Blinken allowed her to put out the story that the U.S. is interested in a plea bargain with Assange. But why?

First, the harsh reaction in Australia to Blinken’s words probably had something to do with it. If it was up to the U.S. Justice Department alone to handle the prosecution of Assange, as Kennedy says, why was the Secretary of State saying anything about it at all?  Blinken appears to have spoken out of turn himself and sent Kennedy out to reel it back in.  

Given the growing opposition to the AUKUS alliance in Australia, including within the ruling Labor Party, perhaps Blinken and the rest of the U.S. security establishment is not taking Australia’s support for granted anymore. Blinken stepped in it and had Kennedy try to clean up the mess. 

Second, as suspected by many Assange supporters on social media, Kennedy’s words may have been intended as a kind of ploy, perhaps to lure Assange to the United States to give up his fight against extradition in exchange for leniency.  

In its article based on Kennedy’s interview, The Sydney Morning Herald spoke to only one international law expert, a Don Rothwell, of Australian National University in Canberra, who said Assange would have to go to the United States to negotiate a plea.  In a second interview on Australian television, Rothwell said Assange would also have to drop his extradition fight.

Of course, neither is true. “Usually American courts don’t act unless a defendant is inside that district and shows up to the court,” U.S. constitutional lawyer Bruce Afran told Consortium News. “However, there’s nothing strictly prohibiting it either. And in a given instance, a plea could be taken internationally. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that. It’s not barred by any laws. If all parties consent to it, then the court has jurisdiction.”  But would the U.S. consent to it?

Were Assange to give up his legal battle and voluntarily go to the U.S. it would achieve two things for Washington: 1). remove the chance of a European Court of Human Rights injunction stopping his extradition should the High Court in London reject his last appeal; and 2). it would give the U.S. an opportunity to “change its mind” once Assange was in its clutches inside the Virginia federal courthouse.

“The U.S. sometimes finds ways to get around these agreements,” Afran said. “The better approach would be that he pleads while in the U.K., we resolve the sentence by either an additional sentence of seven months, such as David Hicks had or a year to be served in the U.K. or in Australia or time served.”

Assange’s brother, Gabriel Shipton, told the Herald his brother going to the U.S. was a “non-starter.” He said: “Julian cannot go to the US under any circumstances.” Assange’s father, John Shipton, told the same to Glenn Greenwald last week.

So the U.S. won’t be getting Assange on its soil voluntarily, and perhaps not very soon either. And maybe it wants it that way.  Gabriel Shipton added: “Caroline Kennedy wouldn’t be saying these things if they didn’t want a way out. The Americans want this off their plate.”  

Third, the U.S. may be trying to prolong Assange’s ordeal for at least another 14 months past the November 2024 U.S. presidential election. As Greenwald told John Shipton, the last thing President Joe Biden would want in the thick of his reelection campaign next year would be a high-profile criminal trial in which he was seen trying to put a publisher away for life for printing embarrassing U.S. state secrets.  

But rather than a way out, as Gabriel Shipton called it, the U.S. may have in mind something more like a Great Postponement.

The postponement could come with the High Court of England and Wales continuing to take its time to give Assange his last hearing — for all of 30 minutes — before it rendered its final judgement, months after that, on his extradition. This could be stretched over 14 months. As Assange is a U.S. campaign issue, the High Court could justify its inaction by saying it wanted to avoid interference in the election. 

According to Craig Murray, a former British diplomat and close Assange associate, the United States has not, despite Kennedy’s words last month, so far offered any sort of plea deal to Assange’s legal team. Murray told WBAI radio in New York:

“There have been noises made by the U.S. ambassador to Australia saying that a plea deal is possible. And that’s what the Australian Government have been pushing for as a way to solve it. What I can tell you is that there have been no official approaches from the American government indicating any willingness to soften or ameliorate their posihttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fnNjwQNV4Gction. The position of the Biden administration still seems to be that they wish to persecute and destroy Julian and lock him up for life for publishing the truth about war crimes … 

So there’s no evidence of any sincerity on behalf of the U.S. government in these noises we’ve been hearing. It seems to be to placate public opinion in Australia, which is over 80% in favor of dropping the charges and allowing Julian to go home to his native country…

The American ambassador has made comments about, oh well, a plea deal might be possible, but this is just rubbish. This is just talk in the air. There’s been no kind of approach or indication from the Justice Department or anything like that at all. It’s just not true. It’s a false statement, in order to placate public opinion in Australia.”

Afran said a plea deal can be initiated by the Assange side as well. Assange lawyer Jennifer Robinson said in May for the first time on behalf of his legal team that they were open to discussion of a plea deal, though she said she knew of no crime Assange had committed to plead guilty to. 

The U.S. would have many ways to keep prolonging talks on an Assange initiative, if one came, beyond the U.S. election. After the vote, the Justice Department could then receive Assange in Virginia courtesy of the British courts, if this the strategy the U.S. is pursuing.  

September 5, 2023 Posted by | civil liberties, legal, politics international, USA | Leave a comment

RADIOACTIVE TSUNAMIS: NUCLEAR TORPEDO DRONES AND THEIR LEGALITY IN WAR

, By Raul (Pete) Pedrozo, Center for International Maritime Security

Introduction 

Russia and North Korea are both fielding a novel type of naval weapon – nuclear-armed torpedo drones. These new weapons introduce a variety of strategic and operational challenges that further complicate a worsening threat environment. They also pose critical legal questions about whether their intended concepts of operation are lawful. These weapons have a fearsome potential to weaponize the maritime environment, and precise questions of their legality should be resolved in order to dissuade their proliferation. 

North Korea and Russia’s Doomsday Torpedoes

On July 28, North Korea displayed a new nuclear-armed drone torpedo at the 2023 Victory Day Parade in Pyongyang. Although its official classification is unknown, the new weapon is likely a Haeil-class drone torpedo. The nuclear torpedo drone is approximately 52 feet long and 5 feet in diameter, has an estimated range of about 540 nautical miles, and can be fitted with a conventional or nuclear warhead. It could therefore be used against targets in both South Korea and Japan. ……………………………………………..

The nuclear-armed underwater drone can be used to attack coastal naval installations or cities with little or no warning, providing North Korea with a strategic nuclear weapons delivery option that is difficult to detect and defend against. 

The Haeil-class drone torpedo is similar to (but smaller than) the Russian Poseidon, an intercontinental, nuclear-powered, nuclear-armed autonomous torpedo that was first revealed by the Russian Navy in 2015. The Poseidon (also known as Kanyon or Status 6) can reportedly operate at speeds of around 70-100 knots and at depths of around 3,300 feet, which means it can outrun and out dive any conventional torpedo……………………………………………………….

These drone torpedoes can be armed with up to a 100-megaton nuclear warhead, but their primary method of destruction is less about directly impacting targets. Instead, they focus on weaponizing the immediate aftereffects of nuclear detonations in the maritime environment. These nuclear torpedo drones are designed to trigger a radioactive tsunami-like ocean swell that destroys coastal cities and renders them uninhabitable, potentially resulting in large-scale displacement and millions of deaths. The legality of this concept of operations deserves closer scrutiny.

Legal Means and Methods of Warfare

Generally, the legal right of the belligerents to adopt means or methods of warfare during an international armed conflict is not unlimited (AP I, art. 35; HR, art. 22; Newport Manual, § 6.1). Specifically, a belligerent does not have the unlimited right to inflict superfluous injury or unnecessary suffering on the opposing belligerent (HR, art. 23; Newport Manual, § 6.1). Weapons law “regulates which weapons and means can lawfully be used during an armed conflict,” and is comprised on both customary international law and treaties (St. Petersburg Declaration; Newport Manual, § 6.2). The customary international law principle of distinction and the prohibition of unnecessary suffering regulate the legality of the means of warfare (Newport Manual, § 6.2). Weapons law is also codified in treaties, such as the Environmental Modification (ENMOD) Convention and Additional Protocol I (AP I) to the 1949 Geneva Conventions.

Damage to the environment is a concern. AP I places restrictions on weapons that “are intended or may be expected to cause widespread, long-term, and severe damage to the natural environment (AP I, art. 35(3); Newport Manual, § 6.3).” AP I further provides that the belligerent shall take care “in warfare to protect the natural environment against widespread, long-term and severe damage,” which includes a prohibition of the “use of methods or means of warfare which are intended or may be expected to cause such damage to the natural environment…” that prejudices the health or survival of the civilian population (AP I, art. 55(1); Newport Manual, § 6.3). The International Committee of the Red Cross interprets “long-term” to include damage over a period of decades (ICRC Commentary to AP I, ¶ 1453(c))……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

Conclusion

Armed with multi-megaton nuclear warheads, these torpedo drones will be detonated along an adversary’s coast to create a powerful radioactive tsunami to destroy coastal cities and naval bases. Given that the concept of operations for these new weapons might unlawfully modify and weaponize the natural environment, both the North Korean Haeil and Russian Poseidon torpedo drones are likely unlawful weapons per se under the law of armed conflict.

The unleashing of environmental forces in such a manner is contrary to the law of war and likely violates the ENMOD Convention, which prohibits any method of warfare for changing—through the deliberate manipulation of natural processes—the dynamics, composition, or structure of the Earth (DoD Law of War Manual, §§ 6.10.1-6.10.2; FM 6-27, ¶¶ 2-139, 2-140). ………………………………………………………………………………………..

As parties to AP I and the ENMOD Convention, both North Korea and Russia have legal obligations not to use environmental techniques that are prohibited by the Convention, or to employ means or methods of warfare that can cause widespread, long-term, and severe damage to the natural environment.  https://cimsec.org/radioactive-tsunamis-nuclear-torpedo-drones-and-their-legality-in-war/

September 5, 2023 Posted by | legal, oceans, Reference, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Top prosecutors back compensation for those sickened by US nuclear weapons testing.

Niagara Gazette, SUSAN MONTOYA BRYAN | Associated Press 4 Sept 23

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez and 13 other top prosecutors from around the U.S. are throwing their support behind efforts to compensate people sickened by exposure to radiation during nuclear weapons testing.

The Democratic officials sent a letter Wednesday to congressional leaders, saying “it’s time for the federal government to give back to those who sacrificed so much.”

The letter refers to the estimated half a million people who lived within a 150-mile (240-kilometer) radius of the Trinity Test site in southern New Mexico, where the world’s first atomic bomb was detonated in 1945. It also pointed to thousands of people in Idaho, Colorado, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, Montana and Guam who currently are not eligible under the existing compensation program.

The U.S. Senate voted recently to expand the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act as part of a massive defense spending bill. Supporters are hopeful the U.S. House will include the provisions in its version of the bill, and President Joe Biden has indicated his support.

“We finally have an opportunity to right this historic wrong,” Torrez said in a statement………………………………………………………..

The attorneys general who signed onto Torrez’s letter are from Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland, Minnesota, Nevada, New York, Pennsylvania, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and the District of Columbia.

The attorneys mentioned the work of a team of researchers who mapped radioactive fallout from nuclear weapons tests in the U.S., starting with the Trinity Test in 1945. The model shows the explosions carried out in New Mexico and Nevada between 1945 and 1962 led to widespread radioactive contamination, with Trinity making a significant contribution to exposure in New Mexico. Fallout reached 46 states as well as parts of Canada and Mexico.

“Without any warning or notification, this one test rained radioactive material across the homes, water, and food of thousands of New Mexicans,” the letter states. “Those communities experienced the same symptoms of heart disease, leukemia, and other cancers as the downwinders in Nevada.”………………………………………….. more https://www.niagara-gazette.com/news/top-prosecutors-back-compensation-for-those-sickened-by-us-nuclear-weapons-testing/article_1458a962-4903-11ee-94c0-7b044542b2ae.html

September 4, 2023 Posted by | Legal, politics, USA | Leave a comment

How a Louisiana appeals ruling could impact nuclear waste storage in New Mexico

That license allows for a facility to store more than 8,680 metric tons of spent fuel, even as New Mexico passed a law banning the storage of high-level nuclear waste in the state just before the license was issued. The ban will not be lifted, according to the state law, until a national repository is built, and New Mexico officials give approval for a waste facility.

Appeals court vacates Texas spent-fuel storage license that may have ripple effects, nuclear watchdogs say

SOURCE New Mexico BY: DANIELLE PROKOP – SEPTEMBER 1, 2023 

Last week, a federal appellate court in New Orleans ordered a review and reversed a federal license to operate a proposed spent-fuel facility in Andrews County, Texas, just miles across the border from Eunice, New Mexico.

In the Aug. 25 order, Fifth Circuit Judge James Ho wrote that federal law does not grant the Nuclear Regulatory Commission the authority to license private storage facilities for spent nuclear fuel away from reactors.

“The Commission has no statutory authority to issue the license,” Ho wrote. “The Atomic Energy Act doesn’t authorize the Commission to license a private, away-from-reactor storage facility for spent nuclear fuel. And issuing such a license contradicts Congressional policy expressed in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act.”

This is just the latest in a decades-long debate on what to do with the growing amount of radioactive waste from former and current power plants across the country.

Recently, Texas and New Mexico legislatures passed laws banning storage of nuclear waste – despite previous administrations welcoming the industry – and setting up for a showdown with the federal government, who has authority over the nuclear industry.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission issued a license to Florida-based company Holtec International for a proposed storage site in southeast New Mexico between Hobbs and Carlsbad.

That license allows for a facility to store more than 8,680 metric tons of spent fuel, even as New Mexico passed a law banning the storage of high-level nuclear waste in the state just before the license was issued. The ban will not be lifted, according to the state law, until a national repository is built, and New Mexico officials give approval for a waste facility………………………………………………………………………………………………………. more https://sourcenm.com/2023/09/01/waste-storage-in-new-mexico/

September 2, 2023 Posted by | Legal | Leave a comment

Federal appeals court blocks plan to ship nuclear waste to West Texas.

Marfa Public Radio | By Travis Bubenik,  August 30, 2023  https://www.kut.org/energy-environment/2023-08-30/federal-appeals-court-blocks-plan-to-ship-nuclear-waste-to-west-texas

A federal appeals court last Friday blocked a company’s long simmering plan to ship highly radioactive nuclear waste to West Texas, a ruling that further complicates the country’s search for a long-term home for its growing stockpile of waste from nuclear power plants.

The company, Interim Storage Partners, has for years pursued the idea of using an existing site in Andrews County, on the Texas border with New Mexico, as a long-term home for much of the nation’s “high-level” nuclear waste.

In 2021, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission granted the company a license for the plan, despite a move by state lawmakers that same year to ban the proposal. The State of Texas responded with a lawsuit arguing that the NRC didn’t have authority to issue the license.

On Friday, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with the state, ruling that federal law does not give the commission the power to issue such licenses.

“The Atomic Energy Act doesn’t authorize the Commission to license a private, away-from-reactor storage facility for spent nuclear fuel,” U.S. Circuit Judge James Ho wrote for the majority. “And issuing such a license contradicts Congressional policy expressed in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act.”

“This is an important ruling for Texas against a federal agency attempting to overstep its authority,” said Paige Willey, a spokesperson for Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton.

September 1, 2023 Posted by | Legal, USA, wastes | Leave a comment

Texas nuclear waste storage permit invalidated by US appeals court

By Clark Mindock, August 26, 2023,  https://www.reuters.com/legal/texas-nuclear-waste-storage-permit-invalidated-by-us-appeals-court-2023-08-26/

Aug 25 (Reuters) – A U.S. appeals court on Friday canceled a license granted by a federal agency to a company to build a temporary nuclear waste storage facility in western Texas, which the Republican-led state has argued would be dangerous to build in one of the nation’s largest oil basins.

A three-judge panel of the New Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals found that the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission lacked the authority under federal law to issue permits for private, temporary nuclear waste storage sites.

The license, which was issued in 2021 to project developer Interim Storage Partners LLC, was challenged by Texas as well as west Texas oil and gas interests that opposed the facility.

U.S. Circuit Judge James Ho, writing for the court, agreed with Texas that the Atomic Energy Act does not give the agency the broad authority “to license a private, away-from-reactor storage facility for spent nuclear fuel.”

Ho, an appointee of Republican President Donald Trump, said a license for that kind of a facility also conflicts with a U.S. law called the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, which prioritizes permanent storage solutions and otherwise allows temporary storage of nuclear waste only at reactors themselves or at federal sites.

Representatives for the NRC, Texas Governor Greg Abbott’s office and the developer did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Abbott and other state officials had petitioned the court in 2021 to review the order by the agency authorizing Interim Storage Partners to receive and store up to 5,000 metric tons of spent fuel and about 230 metric tons of low-level radioactive waste for 40 years at a planned repository in Andrews County, Texas.

Abbott opposed the plan, saying he would not let Texas become “America’s nuclear waste dumping ground.”

The plan for a temporary facility was devised in order to address a growing nuclear waste problem in the United States. The Andrews County site was chosen after efforts to build a permanent storage facility in Nevada fell apart amid fierce local opposition.

August 28, 2023 Posted by | Legal, USA | Leave a comment

Senate extends nuclear liability-limiting law without public scrutiny. Here’s why we should care.

The chief problem with the Price-Anderson Act is the difference in how the law affects the public and the nuclear firms. In view of federal preemption of nuclear licensing, the public has essentially no say in the siting of a nuclear power plant and so must accept the associated accident risk. Nuclear vendors, however, are freed from all liability for offsite consequences of a nuclear accident, and so have nothing to worry about, either financially or legally.

Bulletin, By Victor Gilinsky | August 22, 2023

By Victor Gilinsky | August 22, 202

On the night of July 27, the US Senate passed the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2024. The Senate-approved bill included a 20-year extension of the Price-Anderson Nuclear Industries Indemnity Act, which provides that if there are any offsite lives and property lost in a severe reactor accident, nuclear industry manufacturers and builders cannot be held liable. The extension of the act also includes another controversial provision—the adequacy of funds provided by the act for compensating victims of a nuclear accident.

The approval last month of this extension came without any public hearings and was introduced in Congress in a rather troubling manner. The extension’s backers, knowing it would face rough sledding in an open hearing, first attached it to the Accelerating Deployment of Versatile, Advanced Nuclear for Clean Energy (ADVANCE) Act of 2023, which was then placed on the Senate legislative calendar on July 10 and added to the “must-pass” National Defense Authorization Act. While it has yet to pass the House, the act bears powerfully on the country’s commitment to nuclear energy, and especially on safety standards for nuclear power plants and therefore should not escape public scrutiny.

The Price-Anderson Act was first approved in 1957, soon after the Atomic Energy Act of 1954 permitted private nuclear energy activity. Firms like General Electric and Westinghouse, among others, told Congress they would not build commercial nuclear power plants—a technology with which there was essentially no experience—if they faced vast liability for possible accidents. To promote rapid investment in nuclear power plants, the government gave the builders and vendors freedom from liability for offsite accidents. It added provisions for public compensation after a catastrophic accident. But both provisions need updating in view of what we have learned in the last 60-odd years.

The act currently provides about $13 billion for post-accident public compensation, with the funds coming over time from a self-insurance scheme funded by the owners of nuclear power plants. But the estimated cost of the 2011 Fukushima accident—several hundred billion dollars—dwarfs the Price-Anderson amount. Yet, there is more. If an accident was to lead to widespread and long-term nuclear plant shutdowns, as occurred in Japan, it isn’t clear the owners would be able to meet their financial obligations. What’s clear is that after a severe nuclear accident, the issue of compensation would land in the lap of Congress.

At a 2014 Nuclear Regulatory Commission hearing on a safety upgrade for the 19 US plants essentially identical to the ones at Fukushima, the staff of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) told the commissioners that a fire in only one of the pools in which nuclear plants store highly radioactive used fuel could release much more radioactivity, conceivably 20 times more, than in the 2011 Fukushima accident. The commissioners at the time dismissed the concern on grounds that such an event was so improbable it failed the NRC’s cost-benefit analysis. But, however remote, the possibility remains.

The chief problem with the Price-Anderson Act is the difference in how the law affects the public and the nuclear firms. In view of federal preemption of nuclear licensing, the public has essentially no say in the siting of a nuclear power plant and so must accept the associated accident risk. Nuclear vendors, however, are freed from all liability for offsite consequences of a nuclear accident, and so have nothing to worry about, either financially or legally.

According to the NRC, calculations using “probabilistic risk assessment” serve as proof that the probability of severe nuclear accidents at US nuclear plants is extremely remote. But large nuclear vendors like General Electric and Westinghouse evidently don’t believe these numbers; otherwise, they would accept liability and would not fear risking their stockholders’ investment. If reactor builders won’t accept paying for the consequences of a possible nuclear accident, why then should members of the public, whose health and communities would be affected?……………………………………………………….

The current exuberance over “advanced” reactors” has some of the same boosterish markings as the earlier AEC episode, with the advocates so sure they are right that they think cutting corners is okay—like dispensing with public hearings on Price-Anderson Act extension.

The Price-Anderson Act extension is part of a larger program that would pull out the stops on granting generous subsidies to private nuclear firms, speeding approvals of nuclear license applications and promoting nuclear reactor exports—all supposedly in the interest of “reestablishing America’s preeminence as the global leader in nuclear energy in the 21st century.”

We need to stop and think as a society before it’s too late. Rather than a hastily and quietly passed 20-year extension, we need first a thorough public examination of the Price-Anderson Act’s fundamental provisions and their effect on nuclear reactor safety and licensing standards.  https://thebulletin.org/2023/08/senate-extends-nuclear-liability-limiting-law-without-public-scrutiny-heres-why-we-should-care/?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=ThursdayNewsletter08242023&utm_content=NuclearRisk_NuclearLiabilityLimiting_08222023

August 26, 2023 Posted by | Legal, politics, USA | Leave a comment

Marshall Islands reacts to US expansion of nuclear compensation

Marianas Variety, By Giff Johnson – For Variety Aug 21, 2023

MAJURO — Within days of United States congressional leaders and executive branch officials telling Marshall Islands leaders there was no more money for nuclear test compensation, the U.S. Senate passed legislation expanding nuclear compensation to more Americans in the U.S. mainland and also living on Guam.

The Senate legislation seeks to expand the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act of 1990. This law currently provides compensation to American Downwinders who lived near the Nevada Test Site, uranium miners, and people who worked at nuclear sites.

The new legislation expands the time period of eligibility for uranium miners from the previous deadline of 1971 to 1990, which means many more workers will be eligible. It also aims to support compensation for people in Guam — who live over a thousand miles away from the Bikini and Enewetak test sites in the Marshall Islands — and other U.S. jurisdictions affected by nuclear testing.

In the Marshall Islands, however, the U.S. definition of those “exposed” is limited to four atolls despite U.S. government studies that show many more islands in the country were exposed to nuclear test fallout. Prior to it running out of compensation funds in the late 2000s, the Nuclear Claims Tribunal compared fallout exposures of American Downwinders and Marshallese. It noted that the highest exposures among American Downwinders were lower than the lowest exposures of Marshallese.

The irony of the U.S. nuclear test compensation disparity is not lost on Marshallese.

“As nuclear test victim ourselves, we support compensation for American victims of nuclear tests, whether they are Downwinders or worked at nuclear test sites or worked in uranium mines,” Marshall Islands Speaker Kenneth Kedi, who represents Rongelap, was quoted Friday in the Marshall Islands Journal. “But the fact that U.S. authorities can tell the Marshall Islands there is ‘no more money’ for nuclear test exposure for people who lived through 67 of the largest US nuclear weapons tests ever conducted while at the same time preparing to expand compensation coverage for Americans is astounding.”

The U.S. government launched its Radiation Exposure Compensation Act in 1990 with a $100 million appropriation from the Congress. Over 30 years later, the U.S. Justice Department has paid out awards amounting to over $2 billion because when additional compensation was needed, the U.S. Congress appropriated more funding.

In contrast, for the Marshall Islands, which was subjected to weapons testing over 90 times the megatonnage of the Nevada nuclear tests, the U.S. provided the Marshall Islands with a $150 million fund as the “full and final” compensation and has refused to respond to Marshall Islands government requests to provide additional compensation in the ensuing 37 years since the first Compact of Free Association went into effect. Despite the fact that the Nuclear Claims Tribunal was an entity created by the first Compact of Association to adjudicate nuclear claims, the Marshall Islands government’s entreaties to the United States for funding to pay the over $3 billion in Tribunal awards have received a cold shoulder.

 “We have no issue with people of Guam qualifying for U.S. nuclear compensation,” Kedi commented. “But if the people of Guam, who are 1,400 miles away from Bikini, are eligible for compensation, what about the many Marshallese who lived much closer to the testing who according to the U.S. are not radiation affected?”

The Tribunal award for Rongelap Atoll, which was not paid for lack of funds, is the largest of the Tribunal awards for four U.S.-acknowledged nuclear affected atolls of Bikini, Enewetak, Rongelap and Utrok — in part due to the need to fund cleanup of dozens of islands that remain radioactive from a snowstorm of radioactive fallout from the 1954 Bravo hydrogen bomb explosion at Bikini…………………………………………………….more https://www.mvariety.com/news/marshall-islands-reacts-to-us-expansion-of-nuclear-compensation/article_72b6eb98-3f55-11ee-ac0f-53b4fd3eeff1.html—

August 22, 2023 Posted by | indigenous issues, legal, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Assange Be Weary: The Dangers of a US Plea Deal

August 18, 2023

By Binoy Kampmark / CounterPunch, https://scheerpost.com/2023/08/18/assange-be-weary-the-dangers-of-a-us-plea-deal/

At every stage of its proceedings against Julian Assange, the US Imperium has shown little by way of tempering its vengeful impulses. The WikiLeaks publisher, in uncovering the sordid, operational details of a global military power, would always have to pay. Given the 18 charges he faces, 17 fashioned from that most repressive of instruments, the US Espionage Act of 1917, any sentence is bound to be hefty. Were he to be extradited from the United Kingdom to the US, Assange will disappear into a carceral, life-ending dystopia.

In this saga of relentless mugging and persecution, the country that has featured regularly in commentary, yet done the least, is Australia. Assange may well be an Australian national, but this has generally counted for naught. Successive governments have tended to cower before the bullying disposition of Washington’s power. With the signing of the AUKUS pact and the inexorable surrender of Canberra’s military and diplomatic functions to Washington, any exertion of independent counsel and fair advice will be treated with sneering qualification.

The Albanese government has claimed, at various stages, to be pursuing the matter with its US counterparts with firm insistence. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has even publicly expressed his frustration at the lack of progress in finding a “diplomatic solution” to Assange’s plight. But such frustrations have been tempered by an acceptance that legal processes must first run their course.

The substance of any such diplomatic solution remains vague. But on August 14, the Sydney Morning Herald, citing US Ambassador to Australia Caroline Kennedy as its chief source, reported that a “resolution” to Assange’s plight might be in the offing. “There is a way to resolve it,” the ambassador told the paper. This could involve a reduction of any charges in favour of a guilty plea, with the details sketched out by the US Department of Justice. In making her remarks, Kennedy clarified that this was more a matter for the DOJ than the State Department or any other department. “So it’s not really a diplomatic issue, but I think there absolutely could be a resolution.”

In May, Kennedy met members of the Parliamentary Friends of Julian Assange Group to hear their concerns. The previous month, 48 Australian MPs and Senators, including 13 from the governing Labor Party, wrote an open letter to the US Attorney General, Merrick Garland, warning that the prosecution “would set a dangerous precedent for all global citizens, journalists, publishers, media organizations and the freedom of the press. It would also be needlessly damaging for the US as a world leader on freedom of expression and the rule of law.”

In a discussion with The Intercept, Gabriel Shipton, Assange’s brother, had his own analysis of the latest developments. “The [Biden] administration appears to be searching for an off-ramp ahead of [Albanese’s] first state visit to DC in October.” In the event one wasn’t found, “we could see a repeat of a very public rebuff delivered by [US Secretary of State] Tony Blinken to the Australian Foreign Minister two weeks ago in Brisbane.”

That rebuff was particularly brutal, taking place on the occasion of the AUSMIN talks between the foreign and defence ministers of both Australia and the United States. On that occasion, Foreign Minister Penny Wong remarked that Australia had made its position clear to their US counterparts “that Mr Assange’s case has dragged for too long, and our desire it be brought to a conclusion, and we’ve said that publicly and you would anticipate that that reflects also the positive we articulate in private.”

In his response, Secretary of State Blinken claimed to “understand” such views and admitted that the matter had been raised with himself and various offices of the US. With such polite formalities acknowledged, Blinken proceeded to tell “our friends” what, exactly, Washington wished to do. 

 Assange had been “charged with very serious criminal conduct in the United States in connection with his alleged role in one of the largest compromises of classified information in the history of our country. The actions that he has alleged to have committed risked very serious harm to our national security, to the benefit of our adversaries, and put named sources at grave risk – grave risk – of physical harm, and grave risk of detention.”

Such an assessment, lazily assumed, repeatedly rebutted, and persistently disproved, went unchallenged by all the parties present, including the Australian ministers. Nor did any members of the press deem it appropriate to challenge the account. The unstated assumption here is that Assange is already guilty for absurd charges, a man condemned.

At this stage, such deals are the stuff of manipulation and fantasy. The espionage charges have been drafted to inflate, rather than diminish any sentence. Suggestions that the DOJ will somehow go soft must be treated with abundant scepticism. The pursuit of Assange is laced by sentiments of revenge, intended to both inflict harm upon the publisher while deterring those wishing to publish US national security information. As the Australian international law academic Don Rothwell observes, the plea deal may well take into account the four years spent in UK captivity, but is unlikely to either feature a complete scrapping of the charges, or exempt Assange from travelling to the US to admit his guilt. “It’s not possible to strike a plea deal outside the relevant jurisdiction except in the most exceptional circumstances.”

Should any plea deal be successfully reached and implemented, thereby making Assange admit guilt, the terms of his return to Australia, assuming he survives any stint on US soil, will be onerous. In effect, the US would merely be changing the prison warden while adjusting the terms of observation. In place of British prison wardens will be Australian overseers unlikely to ever take kindly to the publication of national security information.

August 19, 2023 Posted by | AUSTRALIA, legal, USA | Leave a comment

Judge tosses charges against executive in South Carolina nuclear debacle, but case may not be over

 A judge has ordered criminal charges dropped against the final executive
accused of lying about problems building two nuclear reactors in South
Carolina that were abandoned without generating a watt of power. The judge
tossed the charges Wednesday because ratepayers of the utility that lost
billions of dollars on the project were improperly allowed on the grand
jury that indicted Westinghouse Electric Co. executive Jeffrey Benjamin.

But federal judge Mary Geiger Lewis also ruled that nothing is stopping
prosecutors from properly seeking another indictment.

 Daily Mail 3rd Aug 2023

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/ap/article-12370351/Judge-tosses-charges-against-executive-South-Carolina-nuclear-debacle-case-not-over.html

August 5, 2023 Posted by | Legal, USA | Leave a comment

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