Europe’s nuclear trade body pushes for swift ‘Brexatom’ deal with UK, Telegraph, James Rothwell, brexit correspondent, brussels 11 OCTOBER 2017
Europe’s nuclear trade body has said it sees no reason why the UK cannot quickly sign a nuclear deal with the EU after Brexit which mirrors agreements the bloc already holds with the US and Japan.
Foratom, which is based in Brussels and represents nearly 800 nuclear firms across the EU, said it “absolutely” wanted to maintain close links with the British nuclear industry, even after its departure from the European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom).
The government’s announcement that Britain will leave Euratom – a process dubbed “Brexatom” – is controversial, as it would force the country to establish its own nuclear safeguards regime and sign complex nuclear co-operation agreements with trading partners.But Berta Picamal, a member of Foratom’s executive office, said it was eager to set up a partnership that was “as close as possible” to the current regime as it would be mutually beneficial.
“It is in our interests to put in a regime as soon as possible that is as close as possible to the one we have,” she told the Telegraph.
“We are now analysing nuclear cooperation agreements that we have with third countries to see to which extent we can replicate what we have with the US or Japan with the UK.”
She added: “We do not foresee this not being solved, it’s not an option. Theresa May said she would cooperate on continued research and development projects. It’s key.”
Founded in 1957, the Euratom treaty oversees the international movement of nuclear materials, people and services through a framework which governs safety standards and research.
Though technically not part of the EU, Euratom is under the ultimate jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice (ECJ) and requires the free movement of nuclear scientists between EU member states.
Both of these requirements are red lines for the British government, which has vowed to end free movement and direct jurisdiction of the EU over UK laws after Brexit.
President Donald Trump Could Bring About World War III, Senator Bob Corker Charges |
TODAY‘Reckless’ Trump threatens World War III, says US Senator The New Daily, 10 Oct 17,Donald Trump is treating the US presidency like “a reality show” and making reckless threats that could put the world “on the path to World War III”, according to the chairman of the US foreign relations committee.
In an extraordinary condemnation of Mr Trump, Republican Senator Bob Corker said the President acts “like he’s doing The Apprentice or something.”
“He concerns me … he would have to concern anyone who cares about our nation,” Mr Corker told The New York Times in a 25-minute phone interview following a day-long Twitter spat between the two former friends.
At the height of that spat, Mr Corker said Mr Trump had turned the White House into “an adult day care centre”.
But he went much further in the Times interview, alleging senior White House officials spend most of their days trying to rein in Mr Trump’s worst instincts.
“I know for a fact that every single day at the White House, it’s a situation of trying to contain him,” the Times quoted the Senator as saying.
He accused the president of undercutting Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, and his attempts at finding a diplomatic solution to the North Korea crisis.
“A lot of people think that there is some kind of ‘good cop, bad cop’ act underway, but that’s just not true,” Mr Corker said of the relationship between the president and Mr Tillerson.
The president had undermined diplomatic efforts with his heavy-handed use of Twitter too.
“I know he has hurt, in several instances, he’s hurt us as it relates to negotiations that were underway by tweeting things out,” Mr Corker said.
The Times reported that while Mr Corker wouldn’t directly answer when asked whether he thought Mr. Trump was fit for the presidency, he did say the commander in chief was not fully aware of the power of his office.
“I don’t think he appreciates that when the president of the United States speaks and says the things that he does, the impact that it has around the world, especially in the region that he’s addressing,” he said. “And so, yeah, it’s concerning to me.”
Trump’s plan for the Iran nuclear deal runs straight through a diplomatic minefield
President Donald Trump is expected to tell Congress that the Iran nuclear deal is not in the country’s national security interest.
The Trump administration will try to coerce Iranians and Europeans back to the negotiating table to secure a tougher deal and address other issues.
Some say American financial might will allow Trump to prevail, while others say he has slim odds of getting what he wants and risks inadvertently blowing up the deal.
President Donald Trump has made up his mind about how he will seek to toughen an historic international accord to limit Iran’s nuclear program, according to the White House.
“The president’s reached a decision on an overall Iran strategy. He wants to make sure that we have a broad policy to deal with that, not just one part of it,” White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders told reporters on Tuesday.
Trump will elaborate on details of the plan later this week, Sanders added. The Washington Post previously reported the president will deliver his decision on Thursday.
Diplomacy not bombs, negotiations not sanctions: Those were the findings of a new opinion poll on the North Korean crisis. It was published as the anti-nuclear ICAN group was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
“The message to politicians, including those in America, is: Take more time to pursue diplomacy and find a peaceful solution to the crisis in North Korea,” said Kancho Stoychev, chairman of the Zurich-based Gallup International Association (GIA), a global network of opinion polling institutions.
Stoychev says the fact that results from the Gallup snap poll were published on the same day the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize was simply a coincidence. “It was not our intention. But perhaps that will help foster a more cautious approach to dealing with the crisis,” said Stoychev in a DW interview.
In all, some 17,107 people from 14 countries — the USA and Russia among them — participated in the Gallup poll, which was carried out between September 20 and October 1. Chinese citizens, however, did not take part. Why? Stoychev says that pollsters are prohibited from conducting snap polls in China for political reasons.
Fear of a nuclear catastrophe
The poll consisted of two questions: How likely do you think it is that North Korea will use nuclear weapons? And: Do you favor continued diplomatic efforts to find a solution, or do you think a military solution is necessary? The poll did not ask whether respondents thought that the White House also posed a threat.
The result of the poll was clear: Despite sustained provocations from Pyongyang, the vast majority of those questioned were in favor of continued diplomatic negotiations (see chart). Johnny Heald, GIA’s scientific director, is convinced that the unpredictable personality of North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un greatly influenced the result. “A military approach to dealing with a leader possessing nuclear warheads and who has tested long-range missiles seems far too risky to most people,” said Heald.
Black box North Korea
Fear of Pyongyang is indeed deep-seated. In the USA, 46 percent of respondents said that they thought the use of nuclear weapons was likely. In Germany that number was 48 percent, and it was 51 percent in Pakistan. The greatest fear of nuclear war was registered in Vietnam, at 54 percent.
Tellingly, those who feared such a scenario least were North Korea’s closest neighbors. Only 35 percent of South Korean respondents said they feared an attack, and only 23 percent of Russians voiced such concerns.
Gallup director Stoychev said: “Russia could definitely be hit by a North Korean missile, but so far Pyongyang has shown no aggression toward Russia.” He also offered an answer to the mystery of South Korean calm, explaining that the country has been living under threat of attack for decades and has simply gotten used to the situation.
Japan wants a tougher approach
In Japan, however, 45 percent of those polled thought that a North Korean nuclear attack was possible. “The Japanese people have been in a state of alarm since a medium-range missile flew over the country in September,” says Stoychev.
That is also the reason that a large number of Japanese citizens support a military solution to the conflict (see chart). Some 49 percent of Japanese and Pakistani respondents say they support military action against North Korea.
Kancho Stoychev says he understands the sentiment, but adds that he does not think such a move would have much chance of success. Instead, he points to the tedious yet eventually successful nuclear deal that was completed with Iran in 2015.
“For me, the Iran nuclear deal is a good example. Negotiations with the international community took a long time, but in the end there was a deal. And ultimately, Iran ended it nuclear weapons program.”
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un says his nuclear weapons are a “powerful deterrent” which guarantee North Korea’s sovereignty, hours after US President Donald Trump said “only one thing will work” in dealing with the isolated country…..
Among serious strategists, “madmen” are not afraid to fail, or blow up the world and themselves. That is not their preferred outcome, but they are prepared to take massive risks for specific purposes.President Donald Trump seems not to know this history, nor do most of his advisers. He appears, however, drawn to the same strategy as Nixon. Trump has many incentives to try and convince foreign adversaries that he is “mad,” in hopes that they will back down from long-standing defiant behaviors without heavy costs to the United States. He wants big victories with small sacrifices—a good “deal”—and nuclear threats call out as the obvious instrument.Kim will continue to defy Trump and make the president look like a “dotard”—a wise word choice. A failed bluff is indeed worse than no bluff at all. Trump will not be willing or able to follow through on his nuclear threats, but he will divert attention with new threats in other places, perhaps in Iran. That is his standard mode of behavior. The president will continue to make empty promises, fail to deliver, and then start again. That is his true madnessDONALD TRUMP AND THE ‘MADMAN’ PLAYBOOK , WIRED 9 Oct 17, JEREMI SURI, AS THE THREATS exchanged between the leaders of the United States and North Korea escalate, President Donald Trump’s rhetoric seems to draw from the “madman” playbook employed by President Richard Nixon during the Vietnam War. Trump should not expect the results to be any better, and they might be much worse. American leaders should be extremely wary of the risks of flagrant nuclear brinksmanship.
The paradox of American nuclear power is that the nation’s overwhelming arsenal is almost unusable. The damage created by a single nuclear strike would be so great, it would undermine most American strategic purposes. The public revulsion, even from Washington’s closest allies, would make the United States a global outcast. And American nuclear action would justify others contemplating the same, tearing apart 50 years of global non-proliferation efforts.
These are the circumstances that motivated Chinese leader Mao Zedong to call the United States a “paper tiger” during the Cold War. Mao never took American nuclear threats against his country seriously, as he proved when he attacked US soldiers on the Korean Peninsula, in Indochina, and in other settings. Mao believed that nuclear weapons constrained the United States more than its adversaries. President John F. Kennedy agreed, and began a process of broadening American conventional capabilities (“flexible response”) to create non-nuclear options for combatting aggressors, like Mao.
President Richard Nixon inherited the unwinnable conventional war in Vietnam that Kennedy’s flexible capabilities facilitated. Nixon recognized that military options below the nuclear level enabled self-destructive quagmires, as the country sent thousands of soldiers to fight communists in distant, inhospitable lands. The “Nixon Doctrine” promised to reduce the use of American conventional forces. The president looked for a way to rely more heavily on nuclear weapons, converting their overwhelming firepower into diplomatic and military leverage, without actually irradiating foreign territories.
The destructive power of nuclear weapons remained out of proportion with American political aims, and foreign leaders continued to doubt American will to use them, but Nixon was determined to make his biggest bombs into better bullying tools. As he told Henry Kissinger and other advisers on numerous occasions, he would convince American adversaries that he had strong “guts,” and personal “will in spades” to get tough where predecessors had backed down
Nixon had to show that the limits on how his predecessors thought about nuclear weapons did not apply to him. He was prepared to think about the unthinkable. He would be less predictable and more experimental. He would act a little “mad,” or at least create uncertainty about whether he still followed the accepted rules of behavior for the leader of the free world.
Among serious strategists, “madmen” are not afraid to fail, or blow up the world and themselves. That is not their preferred outcome, but they are prepared to take massive risks for specific purposes. To be mad is not to be irrational. There is a steely rationality in the willingness to combine extreme force with potential suicide. The madman strategist is ready to press the nuclear button if the adversary doesn’t back down. The adversary will give in, according to the logic, because the potential damage is just too devastating, and he thinks the madman might be serious.
During the Cold War, leading American game theorists modeled this behavior. Noble Prize-winning economist Thomas Schelling called it the “threat that leaves something to chance.” Daniel Ellsberg of Pentagon Papers fame spoke of the “political uses of madness.” Henry Kissinger worked closely with Schelling and Ellsberg during his two decades at Harvard University, and he brought this thinking to the White House.
In the first year of the Nixon administration, Kissinger and the president implemented a madman strategy to scare the Soviets into helping the United States extricate itself victoriously from Vietnam. …..
The Nixon-Kissinger madman strategy failed because Soviet and North Vietnamese leaders, like Mao Zedong in China, recognized that the United States had much more to lose than gain from turning the Vietnam War into a nuclear conflict. Nixon could make Indochina unlivable, but he could not save the South Vietnamese government, or America’s reputation as a bulwark of freedom, by feigning madness. All the major actors saw through Nixon’s bluff.
President Donald Trump seems not to know this history, nor do most of his advisers. He appears, however, drawn to the same strategy as Nixon. Trump has many incentives to try and convince foreign adversaries that he is “mad,” in hopes that they will back down from long-standing defiant behaviors without heavy costs to the United States. He wants big victories with small sacrifices—a good “deal”—and nuclear threats call out as the obvious instrument……..
Like Nixon, Trump wants his adversary to fear he might be mad. He hopes that will prompt Kim to back down. As in the past, however, there is no reason to believe that will happen. …….
Kim will continue to defy Trump and make the president look like a “dotard”—a wise word choice. A failed bluff is indeed worse than no bluff at all. Trump will not be willing or able to follow through on his nuclear threats, but he will divert attention with new threats in other places, perhaps in Iran. That is his standard mode of behavior. The president will continue to make empty promises, fail to deliver, and then start again. That is his true madness. https://www.wired.com/story/donald-trump-madman-strategy-north-korea-nuclear-weapons/
False Assumptions About the Iran Nuclear Deal https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/08/opinion/false-assumptions-about-the-iran-nuclear-deal.html, By GHOLAMALI KHOSHRO, OOn Oct. 15, the Trump administration will for the third time have to decide whether or not to certify that my country, Iran, is complying with Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action — the nuclear deal that was reached in 2015 between Iran and the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council plus Germany.
First, some of the agreement’s opponents claim that the J.C.P.O.A. is “the worst agreement the United States has ever entered into with another country.” This ignores an important truth: The nuclear deal is not a bilateral agreement between Tehran and Washington. In fact, it isn’t even a multilateral deal that requires ratification in either Congress or the Iranian Parliament. It is, instead, a United Nations Security Council resolution. (Indeed, this explains why the deal continues to have wide support from the other Security Council members, as well as from Secretary General António Guterres.)
A second false assumption is that the deal is meant to dictate Iran’s policies in matters unrelated to our nuclear program. This has never been the case. It was always clear that the path to reaching a nuclear deal meant setting aside other geopolitical concerns. Anyone involved in the years of talks that led to the J.C.P.O.A. can attest to this. For example, even as Russia and the United States disagreed on many other issues in the Middle East, they were able to work together at the negotiating table.
Reports now indicate the Trump administration wants to tie the nuclear agreement to Iran’s missile program, a move that would go far beyond the J.C.P.O.A.’s intended purpose. Security Council Resolution 2231, which incorporates the nuclear deal, “calls upon” Iran to not work on “ballistic missiles designed to be capable of delivering nuclear weapons.” But my country is not seeking to develop or acquire nuclear weapons and this carefully negotiated language does not restrain us from developing conventional military deterrence technology that so many other countries possess. The fact that Iranian missiles are designed for maximum precision proves that they are not designed for nuclear capability, as such delivery vehicles need not be precise in targeting.
A third false assumption is that there is a “sunset clause” in the deal, suggesting that in a decade Iran will be free of inspections or limits on its nuclear program. While it’s true that some provisions regarding restrictions will expire, crucial aspects of inspections will not. Moreover, the deal establishes that some six years from now — assuming all participants have fulfilled their obligations — Iran should ratify the Additional Protocol on Nuclear Safeguards, part of the Nonproliferation Treaty. This would subject my country to an extensive I.A.E.A. inspection process. Iran will continue its nuclear program for energy and medical purposes as a normal member of the international community and signatory to the Nonproliferation Treaty after the period of years written into the J.C.P.O.A.
We Iranians — like all nations involved in adopting the deal, the international community and nonproliferation experts — recognize that the nuclear agreement was an important diplomatic accomplishment and it remains a credit to the international nonproliferation regime. Among the seven countries that negotiated the nuclear agreement, only America finds the deal’s adoption controversial.
What the president and Congress decide to do about recertification is, ultimately, a domestic matter. But if the United States wants to remain credible in future multilateral negotiations, it cannot go against the international consensus and attempt to scuttle past diplomacy whether as political retaliation against a previous administration, or as part of a constant reassessment of American national interests.
Gholamali Khoshroo is Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations.
First, some of the agreement’s opponents claim that the J.C.P.O.A. is “the worst agreement the United States has ever entered into with another country.” This ignores an important truth: The nuclear deal is not a bilateral agreement between Tehran and Washington. In fact, it isn’t even a multilateral deal that requires ratification in either Congress or the Iranian Parliament. It is, instead, a United Nations Security Council resolution. (Indeed, this explains why the deal continues to have wide support from the other Security Council members, as well as from Secretary General António Guterres.)
A second false assumption is that the deal is meant to dictate Iran’s policies in matters unrelated to our nuclear program. This has never been the case. It was always clear that the path to reaching a nuclear deal meant setting aside other geopolitical concerns. Anyone involved in the years of talks that led to the J.C.P.O.A. can attest to this. For example, even as Russia and the United States disagreed on many other issues in the Middle East, they were able to work together at the negotiating table.
Reports now indicate the Trump administration wants to tie the nuclear agreement to Iran’s missile program, a move that would go far beyond the J.C.P.O.A.’s intended purpose. Security Council Resolution 2231, which incorporates the nuclear deal, “calls upon” Iran to not work on “ballistic missiles designed to be capable of delivering nuclear weapons.” But my country is not seeking to develop or acquire nuclear weapons and this carefully negotiated language does not restrain us from developing conventional military deterrence technology that so many other countries possess. The fact that Iranian missiles are designed for maximum precision proves that they are not designed for nuclear capability, as such delivery vehicles need not be precise in targeting.
A third false assumption is that there is a “sunset clause” in the deal, suggesting that in a decade Iran will be free of inspections or limits on its nuclear program. While it’s true that some provisions regarding restrictions will expire, crucial aspects of inspections will not. Moreover, the deal establishes that some six years from now — assuming all participants have fulfilled their obligations — Iran should ratify the Additional Protocol on Nuclear Safeguards, part of the Nonproliferation Treaty. This would subject my country to an extensive I.A.E.A. inspection process. Iran will continue its nuclear program for energy and medical purposes as a normal member of the international community and signatory to the Nonproliferation Treaty after the period of years written into the J.C.P.O.A.
We Iranians — like all nations involved in adopting the deal, the international community and nonproliferation experts — recognize that the nuclear agreement was an important diplomatic accomplishment and it remains a credit to the international nonproliferation regime. Among the seven countries that negotiated the nuclear agreement, only America finds the deal’s adoption controversial.
What the president and Congress decide to do about recertification is, ultimately, a domestic matter. But if the United States wants to remain credible in future multilateral negotiations, it cannot go against the international consensus and attempt to scuttle past diplomacy whether as political retaliation against a previous administration, or as part of a constant reassessment of American national interests.
Gholamali Khoshroo is Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations.
First, some of the agreement’s opponents claim that the J.C.P.O.A. is “the worst agreement the United States has ever entered into with another country.” This ignores an important truth: The nuclear deal is not a bilateral agreement between Tehran and Washington. In fact, it isn’t even a multilateral deal that requires ratification in either Congress or the Iranian Parliament. It is, instead, a United Nations Security Council resolution. (Indeed, this explains why the deal continues to have wide support from the other Security Council members, as well as from Secretary General António Guterres.)
A second false assumption is that the deal is meant to dictate Iran’s policies in matters unrelated to our nuclear program. This has never been the case. It was always clear that the path to reaching a nuclear deal meant setting aside other geopolitical concerns. Anyone involved in the years of talks that led to the J.C.P.O.A. can attest to this. For example, even as Russia and the United States disagreed on many other issues in the Middle East, they were able to work together at the negotiating table.
Reports now indicate the Trump administration wants to tie the nuclear agreement to Iran’s missile program, a move that would go far beyond the J.C.P.O.A.’s intended purpose. Security Council Resolution 2231, which incorporates the nuclear deal, “calls upon” Iran to not work on “ballistic missiles designed to be capable of delivering nuclear weapons.” But my country is not seeking to develop or acquire nuclear weapons and this carefully negotiated language does not restrain us from developing conventional military deterrence technology that so many other countries possess. The fact that Iranian missiles are designed for maximum precision proves that they are not designed for nuclear capability, as such delivery vehicles need not be precise in targeting.
A third false assumption is that there is a “sunset clause” in the deal, suggesting that in a decade Iran will be free of inspections or limits on its nuclear program. While it’s true that some provisions regarding restrictions will expire, crucial aspects of inspections will not. Moreover, the deal establishes that some six years from now — assuming all participants have fulfilled their obligations — Iran should ratify the Additional Protocol on Nuclear Safeguards, part of the Nonproliferation Treaty. This would subject my country to an extensive I.A.E.A. inspection process. Iran will continue its nuclear program for energy and medical purposes as a normal member of the international community and signatory to the Nonproliferation Treaty after the period of years written into the J.C.P.O.A.
We Iranians — like all nations involved in adopting the deal, the international community and nonproliferation experts — recognize that the nuclear agreement was an important diplomatic accomplishment and it remains a credit to the international nonproliferation regime. Among the seven countries that negotiated the nuclear agreement, only America finds the deal’s adoption controversial.
What the president and Congress decide to do about recertification is, ultimately, a domestic matter. But if the United States wants to remain credible in future multilateral negotiations, it cannot go against the international consensus and attempt to scuttle past diplomacy whether as political retaliation against a previous administration, or as part of a constant reassessment of American national interests.
Gholamali Khoshroo is Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations.
First, some of the agreement’s opponents claim that the J.C.P.O.A. is “the worst agreement the United States has ever entered into with another country.” This ignores an important truth: The nuclear deal is not a bilateral agreement between Tehran and Washington. In fact, it isn’t even a multilateral deal that requires ratification in either Congress or the Iranian Parliament. It is, instead, a United Nations Security Council resolution. (Indeed, this explains why the deal continues to have wide support from the other Security Council members, as well as from Secretary General António Guterres.)
A second false assumption is that the deal is meant to dictate Iran’s policies in matters unrelated to our nuclear program. This has never been the case. It was always clear that the path to reaching a nuclear deal meant setting aside other geopolitical concerns. Anyone involved in the years of talks that led to the J.C.P.O.A. can attest to this. For example, even as Russia and the United States disagreed on many other issues in the Middle East, they were able to work together at the negotiating table.
Reports now indicate the Trump administration wants to tie the nuclear agreement to Iran’s missile program, a move that would go far beyond the J.C.P.O.A.’s intended purpose. Security Council Resolution 2231, which incorporates the nuclear deal, “calls upon” Iran to not work on “ballistic missiles designed to be capable of delivering nuclear weapons.” But my country is not seeking to develop or acquire nuclear weapons and this carefully negotiated language does not restrain us from developing conventional military deterrence technology that so many other countries possess. The fact that Iranian missiles are designed for maximum precision proves that they are not designed for nuclear capability, as such delivery vehicles need not be precise in targeting.
A third false assumption is that there is a “sunset clause” in the deal, suggesting that in a decade Iran will be free of inspections or limits on its nuclear program. While it’s true that some provisions regarding restrictions will expire, crucial aspects of inspections will not. Moreover, the deal establishes that some six years from now — assuming all participants have fulfilled their obligations — Iran should ratify the Additional Protocol on Nuclear Safeguards, part of the Nonproliferation Treaty. This would subject my country to an extensive I.A.E.A. inspection process. Iran will continue its nuclear program for energy and medical purposes as a normal member of the international community and signatory to the Nonproliferation Treaty after the period of years written into the J.C.P.O.A.
We Iranians — like all nations involved in adopting the deal, the international community and nonproliferation experts — recognize that the nuclear agreement was an important diplomatic accomplishment and it remains a credit to the international nonproliferation regime. Among the seven countries that negotiated the nuclear agreement, only America finds the deal’s adoption controversial.
What the president and Congress decide to do about recertification is, ultimately, a domestic matter. But if the United States wants to remain credible in future multilateral negotiations, it cannot go against the international consensus and attempt to scuttle past diplomacy whether as political retaliation against a previous administration, or as part of a constant reassessment of American national interests.
Gholamali Khoshroo is Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations.
As award is announced for anti-nuclear group Ican, its head says US president ‘puts a spotlight’ on the weapons’ dangers, Guardian, Saeed Kamali Dehghan and Jon Henley, 7 Oct 17, The head of the anti-nuclear campaign group awarded the Nobel peace prize has chided Donald Trump for ramping up a nuclear standoff and said the US president has a track record of “not listening to expertise”.
Speaking in the hours after the Norwegian Nobel committee made the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (Ican) its 2017 laureate, Beatrice Fihn, the group’s executive director, said Trump “puts a spotlight” on the dangers of nuclear weapons.
“The election of President Donald Trump has made a lot of people feel very uncomfortable with the fact that he alone can authorise the use of nuclear weapons,” she told reporters in Geneva, adding that “there are no right hands for nuclear weapons”.
Fihn, who called Trump “a moron” in a Twitter post just two days before the peace prize announcement, said the award sent a message to all nuclear-armed states that “we can’t threaten to indiscriminately slaughter hundreds of thousands of civilians in the name of security”.
The chair of the Norwegian Nobel committee, Berit Reiss-Andersen, said the award had been made in recognition of Ican’s work “to draw attention to the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of any use of nuclear weapons and for its groundbreaking efforts to achieve a treaty-based prohibition of such weapons”.
The award underlines the mounting danger of nuclear conflict between the US and North Korea and the increasing vulnerability of the Iran nuclear deal. It also amounts to a reprimand to the world’s nine nuclear-armed powers – the US, Russia, Britain, China, France, India, Pakistan, North Korea and Israel – all of whom boycotted negotiations for a treaty banning nuclear weapons that was approved by 122 non-nuclear nations at the UN in July.
The Nobel committee said “the risk of nuclear weapons being used is greater than it has been for a long time” and there was “a real danger that more countries will try to procure nuclear weapons, as exemplified by North Korea”.
It said the peace prize was also a call to nuclear-armed states “to initiate serious negotiations with a view to the gradual, balanced and carefully monitored elimination of the almost 15,000 nuclear weapons in the world”.
The award is not the first time the peace prize has gone to anti-nuclear campaigners. Philip Noel-Baker received it in 1959 for his work on disarmament, and in 2005 the International Atomic Energy Agency and its former chief Mohamed ElBaradei were joint laureates “for their efforts to prevent nuclear energy from being used for military purposes”.
The Nobel committee’s decision comes just days before as Trump could carry out his threat to unravel the Iran nuclear deal, which could trigger a second nuclear standoff amid the North Korea crisis. The deal, concluded in 2015, settled a decade-long dispute over Tehran’s nuclear programme and averted the risk of another war in the Middle East.
Trump could decertify Iran’s compliance with the nuclear deal next week. He told a meeting of US military leaders on Thursday that Tehran was not living up to the “spirit of the agreement”, and added they were witnessing “the calm before the storm”.
Sir Richard Dalton, a former British ambassador to Iran, said the Nobel award was “a challenge to the international community, led by the UN security council, to protect this historic non-proliferation agreement [the Iran deal], which is vital for regional peace, from its detractors”.
Fihn said in her initial reaction that the group had received a phone call minutes before the official announcement and she had thought it was a prank. She said she did not believe it until she heard the name of the group during the announcement in Oslo.
Ican said in a statement: “This is a time of great global tension, when fiery rhetoric could all too easily lead us, inexorably, to unspeakable horror. The spectre of nuclear conflict looms large once more. If ever there were a moment for nations to declare their unequivocal opposition to nuclear weapons, that moment is now.”
The UN chief, António Guterres, tweeted his congratulations: [on original]
The EU foreign policy chief, Federica Mogherini, who was touted as a possible peace prize winner this year alongside the Iranian foreign minister for their work on the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, tweeted: [on original]
In Japan, survivors of the 1945 US atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki during the second world war welcomed this year’s announcement. Sunao Tsuboi, who met with former US president Barack Obama during the latter’s historic visit to Hiroshima last year, congratulated Ican on its win. He endured serious burns and later developed cancer.
“I’m delighted that Ican, which has taken action to abolish nuclear weapons like us, won the Nobel peace prize,” the 92-year-old said, according to Agence France-Presse. “Together with Ican and many other people, we hikabusha will continue to seek a world without nuclear weapons as long as our lives last,” he said.
Mattis says staying in Iran deal is in U.S. national security interest, https://www.axios.com/mattis-says-staying-in-iran-deal-is-in-u-s-national-security-interest-2492432687.html4 Oct 17Defense Secretary Mattis was asked Tuesday at a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing whether he believes it is in America’s “national security interest at this time to remain” in the Iran nuclear deal. After a lengthy pause, Mattis replied to Sen. Angus King: “Yes Senator, I do.”
Why it matters: Trump has an October 15 deadline to certify Iran’s compliance with the deal, or decline to do so. Trump has slammed the pact as “the worst deal ever”, and has been wrestling with whether to take a step toward ending it. This also puts Mattis directly at odds with Iran hawks like John Bolton who are urging Trump to rip up the deal, and say it’s a disaster for national security.
Europe’s governments look to bypass Trump to save Iranian nuclear deal
Despite pressure from UK and France, US president expected to declare Tehran in violation of agreement but Senate could yet block reimposition of sanctions, Guardian, Julian Borger, 4 Oct 17, European governments fear a concerted effort to persuade Donald Trump to continue to certify the Iran nuclear deal may have failed and are now looking for other ways to try to salvage the two year-old agreement.
European lobbying efforts are now focused on Congress which will have two months to decide – in the absence of Trump’s endorsement of the 2015 deal – whether to reimpose nuclear-related sanctions.
Fresh sanctions could in turn trigger Iranian withdrawal and a ramping up of its now mostly latent nuclear programme, taking the Middle East back to the brink of another major conflict.
When Trump threatened to withhold certification by a congressional deadline of 15 October, the UN general assembly in mid-September was seen by the European signatories of the agreement – the UK, France and Germany – as the last best chance to convince Trump of the dangers of destroying it……..
When their moment came, the European ministers around the table all observed that Iran was keeping its side of the bargain but expressed willingness to confront Iran separately about its missile programme and its role supporting armed groups around the region. The Russians and Chinese, meanwhile, were adamant there could be no renegotiation……..https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/oct/04/iran-nuclear-deal-europe-trump-congress
Trump plans to declare that Iran nuclear deal is not in the national interest, WP, By Anne GearanOctober 5 President Trump plans to announce next week that he will “decertify” the international nuclear deal with Iran, saying it is not in the national interest of the United States and kicking the issue to a reluctant Congress, people briefed on an emerging White House strategy for Iran said Thursday.
The move would mark the first step in a process that could eventually result in the resumption of U.S. sanctions against Iran, which would blow up a deal limiting Iran’s nuclear activities that the country reached in 2015 with the U.S. and five other nations.
Trump is expected to deliver a speech, tentatively scheduled for Oct. 12, laying out a larger strategy for confronting the nation it blames for terrorism and instability throughout the Middle East.
Under what is described as a tougher and more comprehensive approach, Trump would open the door to modifying the landmark 2015 agreement he has repeatedly bashed as a raw deal for the United States. But for now he would hold off on recommending that Congress reimpose sanctions on Iran that would abrogate the agreement, said four people familiar with aspects of the president’s thinking.
A group of seven European Union countries – the Czech Republic, Sweden, Poland, Romania and Bulgaria, as well as Britain and Germany – held at least two formal meetings with North Korean officials in Pyongyang in September, three EU diplomats said.
But they felt frustrated because the higher-level access that they had obtained in Pyongyang last year had fallen away, with only medium-ranking foreign ministry officials now attending the meetings, the diplomats said.
“There was a sense that we weren’t really getting anywhere because they sent these department heads,” said a Brussels-based diplomat who had been briefed on the meetings, which were described as “very serious” in atmosphere and tone.
“They want to talk to the United States.”
The White House has ruled out such talks, with President Donald Trump telling Secretary of State Rex Tillerson he would be “wasting his time” negotiating with the North Koreans.
The United States has no embassy in Pyongyang and relies on Sweden, the so-called U.S. protecting power there, to do consular work, especially when Westerners get into trouble.
In contrast to recent meetings, when North Korean officials met EU envoys in the Czech Republic’s embassy in 2016 to discuss issues including cultural programs and regional security, a deputy foreign minister would attend, one EU diplomat said.
For the small club of European Union governments with embassies in North Korea, that reflects Pyongyang’s anger at the EU’s gradually expanding sanctions that go beyond those agreed by the United Nations Security Council.
It could have repercussions for broader EU efforts to help mediate in the nuclear crisis, according to the EU diplomats briefed by their colleagues in Pyongyang, as the bloc prepares more measures against North Korea.
EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini, who chaired talks on the historic 2015 nuclear deal with Iran, says the bloc is ready to mediate in any talks aimed at freezing North Korea’s missile and nuclear weapons programs.
But at the same time, the European Union wants an oil embargo on Pyongyang that it hopes other countries will follow.
Romandie 5th Oct 2017, [Machine Translation] Luxembourg on Thursday said it feared “unfair
competition” between nuclear and renewable energies, on the occasion of the
examination by European justice of the complaint lodged by Austria and the
Grand Duchy against the payment of public aid for the Hinkley Point plant.
“We want to avoid this nuclear renaissance because all this public money
will be blocked and will not be able to go into energy efficiency and
renewable,” explained to the press at the end of the hearing the Luxembourg
Minister of the Environment, Carole Dieschburg. The arguments of the
representatives of Austria and the European Commission on the United
Kingdom aid measure at Unit C of the Hinkley Point nuclear power plant were
held before the EU Court in Luxembourg on Thursday.
Support for the Republic of Austria, Luxembourg continued for ten minutes. For the Grand
Duchy, the outcome of the dispute will have an influence on the direction
of the EU’s energy policy. “Subsidizing could set an important precedent
and give the green light to a new model of state nuclear financing in
Europe,” Dieschbourg said.
“For us, the important thing is to avoid a
nuclear revival,” she insisted. At the heart of the dispute is the decision
of the European Commission in October 2014 to validate the price support
mechanism provided by London, which is deemed compatible in Brussels with
EU rules. Backed by Luxembourg, Austria filed an appeal on 6 July 2015
against that decision. This mechanism, also known as the “offset gap
contract”, guarantees stable revenues to the operator of the Hinkley Point
nuclear power plant, in this case EDF, for a period of 35 years.
In addition to the procedure initiated by Austria, Greenpeace Energy also
brought an action for annulment against the same decision of the European
Commission.
In collaboration with Areva and the Chinese companies CGN China
General Nuclear and CNNC China National Nuclear Corporation, EDF is building
a new nuclear power plant with two reactors in Hinkley Point, southwest
England, in March, a controversial an estimated cost of about 21 billion
euros. By 2025, the plant will produce 3.300 MWh of electricity, the
largest single-station power plant in the United Kingdom and 7% of total UK
electricity generation. https://www.romandie.com/news/850062.rom
Donald Trump’s demonisation of Iran is dishonest and dangerous, Guardian, Michael Axworthy, 6 Oct 17, The Iran nuclear deal is doing what it was designed to do. It is a force for stability in the unstable Middle East, and to endanger it is irresponsible “…….as we get further into Trumpworld, the more disturbing and dangerous a place it seems to be. And in a strange way, it seems he is not really president at all, but still running for president, still trying to convince people he deserves to be there. He is preoccupied with his predecessor and his policies, and with competing against his record, whether it is the size of the crowd at his inauguration, Obamacare, or now, the Iran nuclear deal that was negotiated while Obama was in office.
With all the difficulties of the world at the moment – a dangerous confrontation with North Korea, the looming threat of trade wars and consequent economic slump, and a Middle East region strewn with failed states, unresolved conflicts and misery, to name just a few – the Iran nuclear deal is a rare example of a recent diplomatic initiative that has actually enhanced stability.
The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (the full title of the agreement) is working. The International Atomic Energy Authority (IAEA), responsible for overseeing its verification and inspection provisions, is satisfied that it is working and that Iran is meeting its JCPOA commitments. The other countries that are party to the agreement, the UK, Germany, France China and Russia, agree with the IAEA and are satisfied too. But Donald Trump is not satisfied.
The JCPOA doesn’t do things it was never framed to do, of course. It doesn’t address missile development – its negotiators judged that to attempt that would be too much, and would make an already difficult negotiation (which many pundits around the world said would never be successful), impossible to bring to a successful outcome………
Trump’s demonisation of Iran is dishonest. The instability of the region is not in any significant measure the consequence of Iranian actions. To blame Iran for terrorism in the region is misleading at best – most terrorism there, and most of the Islamist terrorism worldwide, is inspired by extreme versions of Sunni Islam, not by the Shia Islam of Iran and the Iranian regime.
The Republican right in the US, historically, has disliked arms control agreements, largely because they involve compromise by both sides and therefore fall short of what might appear the ideal from a narrow US perspective. But that is the nature of diplomacy too. Treaties have to be negotiated; only in exceptional circumstances can you dictate terms. Some commentators in the US have called the JCPOA a flawed agreement, but it is only flawed agreement from that skewed and immature perspective.
The JCPOA is doing what it was designed to do: limit Iran’s ability to make a bomb. It is a force for stability in the chronically unstable Middle East, and to endanger it is irresponsible. Not just the IAEA and most of the world, but most of Trump’s own military and civilian advisers, all agree on that. From their near silence on the matter, the deal’s previous enemies in Saudi Arabia now seem to agree too.
If Trump decertifies the deal – which seems to be his intention in the next few days – he weakens it, but gives responsibility for reimposing sanctions, which would wreck the agreement, to the US Congress.
To do that would be an abdication of his responsibility as president. It would be the action of a spoilt child who breaks the toys in the kindergarten because the adults won’t agree to do what he wants them to do. And if Trump abdicates responsibility in this way, the logical next step is that he should have the responsibility taken away from him.
Although Mattis said he supported U.S. President Donald Trump’s review of the agreement curbing Iran’s nuclear program, the defense secretary’s view was nonetheless far more positive than that of Trump, who has called the deal agreed between Iran and six world powers in 2015 an “embarrassment”.
Trump is weighing whether the deal serves U.S. security interests as he faces a mid-October deadline for certifying that Iran is complying with the pact, a decision that could sink an agreement strongly supported by the other powers that negotiated it.
“If we can confirm that Iran is living by the agreement, if we can determine that this is in our best interest, then clearly we should stay with it,” Mattis told a Senate hearing. ”I believe …, absent indications to the contrary, it is something that the president should consider staying with,” Mattis added.
Earlier, when Mattis was asked whether he thought staying in the deal was in the U.S. national security interest, he replied: “Yes, senator, I do.”
The White House had no immediate comment on Mattis’ remarks, which once again highlighted the range of views on key policy issues within the Trump administration.
If Trump does not recertify by Oct. 15 that Iran is in compliance, Congress would have 60 days to decide whether to reimpose sanctions on Tehran suspended under the accord.
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